《Age of Adepts》


 Prologue

    2032, Earth.


    After many years of development, the first generation of the Biological Assistance Chip was released.


    This Biological Assistance Chip was said to work by being embedded into one¡¯s DNA and would perfectly merge with the host, fully utilizing the current abilities of the host and assisting them in all facets of their lives, whether they be work, school, or entertainment rted.


    Of course, in order to avoid the chip bing too intelligent and taking control of the user, the first generation of the chip didn¡¯t possess aplete, working artificial intelligence, but only had simple data storage and analysis functions. However, It was still capable of aplishing work that required a huge amount of data processing, and, thus, was able to assist the user withplex tasks, which would normally strain the mind.


    As one of 50,000 lucky people across the world, Li Xun had been selected as a first batch user and was given the Biological Assistance Chip, which he had always dreamed of, right after productunch.


    Inside his home, Li Xuan unwrapped the package, which had made all his friends green with envy, and took out the Biological Assistance Chip.


    In this day and age, technology had be quite advanced. The so-called Biological Assistance Chip was not one of those antique silicone chips, which needed to imnted, but a milky white orb that one would swallow. It was pill sized.


    Following the instructions in the user manual, Li Xuan swallowed the orb andy t on his bed, patiently waiting for the chip to be absorbed into his body.


    The white orb disintegrated in Li Xuan¡¯s stomach, slowly seeping into his cells, and then prating deeper into his physiology before embedding itself into Li Xuan¡¯s DNA and bing part of his body.


    The Biological Assistance Chip had now be an essential part of his life, able to enhance all of his senses to assist him.


    But, as other users of the chip were busy getting used to a whole new set of senses, Li Xuan, who was obsessed with data andputing, was busy connecting the chip to the Inte.


    However, as he was getting ready to experience the pleasure diving into the world of data, at the very moment that the Biological Assistance Chip connected to the link that led him to the vast amount of data in the new World Information Network, the immense ocean of data contained within immediately swallowed Li Xuan¡¯s small, weak soul consciousness.


    Liked it? Take a second to support UntouchableFly on Patreon! You¡¯ll immediately get ess to as many as 5 patron-only chapters.

 Chapter 1

    In a dark, oppressive swamp filled with a thick, wet fog.


    Even the harshest sunlight was unable to prate the low clouds and gloomy fog, so anyone walking through this area would feel a constant chill on their skin.


    There were small, foul-smelling ponds everywhere one looked. These ponds were inhabited by a myriad of strange creatures. Whenever wanderers visited, this deste and silentnd would be a paradise for those creatures, many of whom fed on flesh and blood. Demon Rattans, Scavenger Crows, Ghost Nannies, and Giant Swamp Alligators. Each of these terrifying demonic beings made travelers avoid this ce like the gue.


    But, right in the center of this swampynd, where no reasonable living human being could bear to live, a dark looking tower loomed over the surroundingnd.


    It was a tall stone tower, with a height of over a hundred meters.


    Its foundation was made entirely of augite, so when the darkness of night came, the entire tower would radiate a chilly and silent glow, making it especially attractive to evil spirits and wraiths.


    Maybe it was because of ack of basic maintenance and care, but the lower part of the tower waspletely entwined with the crazily growing vines of a demon rattan, making its surface look like it was filled with wooden spikes that shined like metal. If any ordinary man became entangled in these vines, all the blood in his body would be sucked out. Eventually, his corpse would join the others in the huge pile of bones lining the base of the tower.


    The sky darkened with theing night, a candle was lit inside the tower.


    Dim candlelight leaked through the narrow window in the side of the tower. Not only did it¡¯s light not bring any warmth, but, instead, would send a shivering sensation crawling down one¡¯s spine and through their heart.


    Greem, who had just turned fifteen, was sitting in front of a worn-out wooden table. There was a thick magic book unfolded in front of him, which he was silently making a copy of. Although he had arrived in this world two years ago, the difort of his soul still gave him frequent headaches.


    His mind was distracted, the scenes of what happened back on Earth continually shing through his eyes. In his distraction, the tip of his writing brush paused for a moment, causing a big lump of ink to well up on the crude goat skin.


    ¡°Damn it! I failed again!¡±


    Greem¡¯s brows knitted into a tight frown. He couldn¡¯t control himself and clenched his fists. He wanted to scream out in anger, but he took a deep breath and held still for a while. After a long time, he finally managed to suppress the urge.


    This world was no longer the Earth that he was familiar with, and the body he was now inhabiting was not his original body either. It once belonged to an Apprentice Adept, whose name was Greem. In brief, he was just a wandering soul, who managed to take over this body right at the moment when the original Greem died.


    Retaining nothing from his original life, he traveled from Earth, where magic didn¡¯t exist, and came to this world of advanced magic, where foul demons and nonsensical creatures freely roamed. This world was a ce where Adepts stood at the top. The process of adapting overwhelmed Li Xuan, such that he almost ended it all right there, but luckily, after merging the memory fragments that left in this body, Li Xuan had gained a basic linguistic ability. Otherwise, just with the weird pronunciations and grammar in this world, along with thepletely different alphabet, which looked like swimming tadpoles, would be enough to torture him to death.


    Even so, the headache that frequently struck him troubled him deeply.


    In this ce, he never dared to expose his real identity. He could only use Greem¡¯s name, trying his best to struggle to survival in this tall tower.


    Although he was simply an Apprentice Adept living under Great Master Anderson, his glorious status would draw envy from most people living in this world. However, only those people who actually lived in this tall tower would know that not only was this not an enviable position to be in, but could actually be considered a terrifying form of torture and punishment.


    An Apprentice Adept¡¯s basic job was to work diligently and conscientiously, taking care of the daily life of their Great Master, in this case, Great Master Anderson. They were also in charge of cleaning up the magic experiment equipment, keeping the inside of the tower clean, taking care of those demon creatures outside of the tower, and... being a part of Great Master Anderson¡¯s experiments.


    Although thest job was rare, when the wagons that brought ves or condemned prisoners were a few dayste, Great Master Anderson, who easily became frustrated when there was ack of beings to experiment on, would order a random apprentice to be his temporaryb rat.


    It was said that Mary, who came from Ante Province and lived next to Greem, was ¡®fortunate¡¯ to be the experimental ¡®partner¡¯ for Great Master Andersonst month. She didn¡¯t die from the magic experiment, although her body was seriously ¡®contaminated¡¯, and she had some horrifying mutation now. Since she came out from theboratory, wearing a thick cloak which covered her entire body, she had just hidden in her room and never left.


    Many Apprentice Adepts thought that Mary might have died in her room.


    But Greem knew the truth: Mary was still alive.


    At night, in the unnatural stillness of that tower, he could hear the sounds of agonized groan scratching against the wall. Because of that, while everyone else was asleep, he would throw some food, which he had snuck back to his room, into her room through those tiny windows on the tower.


    Although Greem had his own problems to deal with, he still had somepassion inside him, from his time back on Earth, so he felt he should try to help Mary, as best he knew how.


    Today, the headache came at the wrong time. It chose to strike him right when he was making a copy of the book. He was low on money, yet he had wasted another piece of goatskin paper.


    Although it was just a crumpled and crude goatskin paper, it was worth about two silver coins. In this world, the mostmonly used currency was the gold coin. A gold coin could be exchanged for ten silver coins, and a silver coin could be exchanged for ten copper coins. Five copper coins was about how much money most people in this world made a day.


    Hence, for most, an ordinary looking piece of goatskin paper was considered a huge fortune. But in this ce, it was just rubbish that an Apprentice Adept could simply throw away.


    However, within the tall Adept¡¯s tower, nothing was ever, truly free.


    Greem was required to pay for Room, food, and board, along with the cost of learning with his own efforts. The only ways to earn money required one to walk out from the tall Adept tower, and either feed those brutal and ferocious demon creatures, take care of those eerie and strange demon nts, or searching out and harvesting the magic materials specified by Great Master Anderson. One could also earn money by cleaning out some of the dangerous areas within the tower.


    When carrying out these tasks, they would put on a magic talismans made by the Great Adept himself, which would allow them safe passage through the magic formation around the tower. But in this mysterious and strange world, no mere talisman could allow one to consider themselves absolutely safe. Every couple of months there was always an incident where a few unfortunate guys would be devoured by demon creatures or nts when taking care of them. Sometimes people were struck down by magical energy while cleaning up some experiment of the Great Adept.


    Therefore, most of the time the safer tasks would be taken by senior Apprentice Adepts, and, as a result, the weaker Apprentice Adepts could only pick more dangerous tasks to earn their money and knowledge points so they could continue their magic training.


    Money was, of course, used to buy one¡¯s daily needs, while knowledge points were used in buying knowledge. It was a currency system created by the Great Adept himself. In the library within the tower, each magic book wasbeled with different knowledge point values. Borrowing books would require knowledge points, not money.


    The apprentices had to work hard to earn knowledge points, but those hard earned points would only allow them to borrow the book for a very short amount of time. The time was so short that it was totally not enough for an apprentice to master all the knowledge within the book. Therefore, most of the apprentices had made a habit of copying the books themselves.


    Whenever they borrowed a magic book, the apprentice would put all their efforts into copying the knowledge they needed, so they could continue to study in future. Copying books required ink and goatskin paper. Obviously, these were not free either, and thus the Apprentice Adepts needed even more money.


    Of course, if an Apprentice Adept came from a rich family, then they could spend a huge amount of money in exchange for knowledge point. The exchange rate between them was one knowledge point cost one hundred gold coins.


    For example, the ¡®Glossary of Demon Creatures¡¯, which Greem had borrowed today, had cost him three knowledge points. He could only borrow it for half a day. With Greem¡¯s copying speed, based on his best estimation, he would have to borrow it three times in order to make aplete copy of this book.


    This would cost him a total of nine knowledge points. Greem would have to leave the tower two weeks in a row in order to earn these nine knowledge points.


    So he didn¡¯t feel even the slightest bit upset for wasting a piece of goatskin paper, but he was furious that he had wasted two hours of his precious time of copying the book.


    Greem took another deep breath, and did his best to stamp out his anger, as doing so would help his book copyingter, however, in the next moment, a familiar beeping sound suddenly resounded in his brain.


    *Beep* ¡°Biological energy has reached the required amount. Biological Assistance Chip, serial number ZXJ9521 initiating...¡±


    Greem let out a cry of surprise.


    ¡°Biological Assistance Chip!¡±


    Once upon a time, during the tough time when he had just arrived in this new world, Greem had indulged himself in fantasies where he became a mighty immortal who traveled to a new world with a divine weapon. But too bad for him, besides giving him a frequent migraines, the damn chip had never shown any signs of activating. Surprise, surprise... it had finally decided to work today!


    After the chip finished making adjusting to its new state, a graceful yet emotionless female voice resounded in Greem¡¯s brain.


    ¡°Host detected, establishing database... please wait...¡±


    Eh? It could still identify his new body? That was unexpected.


    After all, this was a world of advanced magic. The entire dimension was filled with a mystical material called Elementium. Based on the differences in these basic ¡®elements¡¯, these Elementium were ssified into types, like Earth, Fire, Wind, Light, Darkness, etc.


    Adepts would have differing levels of affinity toward these elemental types, and thus there were different fractions among Adepts. Because this system waspletely different from how Earth operated, Greem was troubled and how to standardize the data in this world, so having the chip here to attempt to quantify these things brought him hope.

 Chapter 2

    After a long wait, the Biological Assistance Chip finallypleted its first self-test.


    Soon, all of Greem¡¯s basic attributes were projected into his mind.


    In this world, every normal human being possessed some basic body attributes at birth. After years of research and ssification, which had been done by generations upon generations of Adepts, they had finally categorized these into four different attributes: Strength, Physique, Agility, and Spirit. As one could guess, Adepts were differentiated based on these four basic attributes.


    Strength was primarily used to quantify a person¡¯s muscture and body strength. This attribute was very important for closebat Adepts. The strength attribute would affect one¡¯s base damage when using closebat weapons, and it also affected one¡¯s melee uracy.


    For an ordinary man, having 3 to 4 Strength was quite normal. An adult with 5 strength would be considered to be quite strong.


    Agility was used to quantify body synchronization, flexibility, reflexes, and bnce. It was extremely vital for those warriors who wore light or medium armor, or for those bandits who wore leather armor, and for any people who wished to be good archers.


    Physique represented a person¡¯s health and endurance. Any increase in physique would improve a person¡¯s Fortitude and Concentration. Therefore, it is very important for all professions.


    Fortitude, also known as the ability to resist poison or disease.


    Concentration. This iss a very important skill for spellcasters.


    The minimum physique for any human is 1. If a human¡¯s physique dropped below 1, they would die.


    Spirit determined a person¡¯s learning and inferring ability. This attribute was especially important for Adepts because it decided the number of spells an Adept could cast. It also made it easier for them to cast spells, as well as increased the power of their spells.


    Most animals had a Spirit of 1 or 2, while creatures simr to humans would have at least a 3. If an ordinary human wanted to be an Adept, they would need to have a Spirit of 21, at minimum.


    After analyzing the effects of these attributes to Adepts, Greem decided the most important attribute for himself currently was Spirit. Once his Spirit reached 21, he would be have leaped up to the heavens, officially bing an Adept.


    The only path for him to increase his Spirit was constant meditation, reading spell books and notebooks, and hearing of the experiences from other veteran Adepts.


    However, all of this was simply within his sight but beyond his reach!


    Because, in this gloomy and cruel world of Adepts, knowledge equaled power, and thus was hard toe by.


    Why did so many Apprentice Adepts ignore the risks and stay in this ce, even though they knew there was great danger waiting for them everywhere? Simple, it was because this was the only ce where they could seek knowledge and resources for growth. When they stepped out from this tall tower of magic, even if they owned a fortune equivalent to the wealth of a country, they would have no way to obtain magical knowledge and experience. Not like that here, which they could obtain in a systematic manner.


    In this frightening world of Adepts, all extraordinary spellcasting skill and precious spell knowledge were monopolized by Adepts. It waspletely impossible for ordinary mortals to get ess them!


    Therefore, knowledge and resources were the wings for any Adept to fly after their dream. Only by having both could an Adept have a bright future.


    After reading up on the basic attributes, Greem switched his focus to the ¡®skills¡¯ and ¡®personal ability¡¯ fields.


    Greem only had two skills: Scroll Copying and Spell Reading. These two were basic skills for all Apprentice Adepts.


    One of them allowed apprentices to copy the magic knowledge they needed for learning, the other one allowed the user to read spell books.


    If an ordinary man touched a magic book without having the skill ¡®Spell Reading¡¯, then his mind would be confused by the words, due to the supernatural force of the letters, and they would lose control of their body for a period of time. Only those, like Apprentice Adepts, who went through strict mind training could ovee this psychic effect, essing the real magic knowledge hidden within the book.


    The only skill that he had listed in Personal Abilities was ¡®The Burning Hand¡¯. This noted the only magic attack skill that Greem had learned in his 6 years of being an Apprentice Adept. The Burning Hand created a small ball of fire in his palm, allowing him to roast anyone who came too close.


    Unfortunately, Greem was still an Apprentice Adept. There was no way he could master any spellpletely. All he could do was follow the elemental typing that fit him best and attempt to do his best with it.


    And, of course, the element that he had the highest affinity for using Fire!


    Unfortunately, this affinity was not considered good in the walls of this tall tower within the swamp. As everyone knew, Great Master Anderson¡¯s elemental affinity was Darkness and Wind. Greem¡¯s path was not matched with his teacher, so it would be much more difficult for him to obtain guidance from his teacher. Therefore, most of the time he had to depend on himself and study even harder.


    In fact, this problem had been troubling Greem since he arrived in this world, but now that the Biological Assistance Chip had started up again, Greem firmly believed that he could find a suitable magic path for himself in theing days.


    As for the ¡®Experience¡¯, after Greem read through the rted information from the chip, he began to have a basic understanding of what it was all about. Through the process of organizing Greem¡¯s past memories and knowledge, the Biological Assistance Chip had extracted two conditions required for Greem to advance and be an Adept.


    First, without a doubt, his Spirit had to reach the minimum level for an Adept.


    For example, Greem¡¯s Spirit Attribute was at 8. That meant he was a ¡®wise man¡¯, being much more intelligent than ordinary people, but, in order to advance and be a real Adept, he needed his Spirit attribute to reach 21. There was a 13 point gap. This simply couldn¡¯t be rushed. He would have to read a mountain of spell books to reach that level.


    Secondly, his own ¡®experience¡¯ had to reach a certain point as well.


    This meant that, after Greem had increased his Spirit attribute to 21, he still needed to somehow raise his Experience to the maximum level. Only then he could officially advance. He needed to do both to be an Adept.


    There were many methods of obtaining experience points. For example, scroll copying, spell reading, spending time practicing spellcasting, crafting magic wands, identify magic items... In short, any knowledge umtion that involved magic would give Greem a certain amount of Experience points.


    This all sounded easy, but it was actually quite difficult to umte Experience points.


    Because only sessfully experiments orpleted understanding of magic could bring him experience points. Only after Greempletely read through and mastered a magic book could he understand its usage in the world. If he read a book, yet failed to understand the knowledge contained within, how could he grow?


    It was always easier said than done. Even with help from Biological Assistance Chip, Greem still needed to work extremely hard in order to get what he wanted.


    Right when Greem was lost in his fanciful thoughts, the sound of footsteps came from the corridor outside of his room.


    ¡°Greem, hurry, it¡¯s our turn to do tasks!¡± A rough voice spoke from outside his door.


    It was Tony, an Apprentice Adept who around the same level Greem was.


    Lower rank apprentices, like them, had to inspect the grounds surrounding of the tower every seven days for magic materials and properly harvest them. This was also one of the daily tasks the master of the tower had given to apprentices.


    Greem hurriedly tidied up his room, grabbed a ck cloak, which had been hung on the wall, opened the door and left his room.


    Tony had broad shoulders, a huge body, a ferocious face, and a head with long disheveled hair. All of this made him look more or less like a barbarian. It was said that he came from a kingdom in the Grimm Hignds. ording to rumors, people born in thatnd possessed barbarian ancestry.


    Neither of them said anything when they met outside. They simply exchanged nods, then turned around and walked along the dark corridor, toward a staircase.


    Although it was daytime now, they didn¡¯t meet any other apprentice along their way. There were over fifty official apprentices living in the tower but, most of the time, these apprentices were either busy with their own magic spell practicing, or preparing all sorts of weird magic experiments. They rarely loitered about in public ces.


    This was one of the main reasons why this swampy tower always looked so quiet.


    After crossing the long, dark corridor and descending the spiral stone staircase they reached the main hall on the first level of the tower. Here they finally ran into more people, because this was the living quarters for the Probationary Apprentices.


    Most of these people, children really, were 8 to 14 years old, and there were about twenty of them.


    These little fellows came from all over, and they were all here with the dream of bing the greatest Adept. But, little did they know, the path to bing an adept was incredibly tough and terrifying, and that path was all that was in their futures.


    Actually, there was a strict separation of the poption in this tower. In general, most of these children only had around 3 to 5 Spirit Points. Therefore, they were currently not considered real Apprentice Adepts, and, thus, they could only be addressed as Probationary Apprentices.


    All Probationary Apprentices had toplete their basic training innguage and writing. Also, they could only advance when they were able to sense their elemental affinity and gather Elementium while meditating. Only then would they have the chance to climb up to the second floor and be an official Apprentice Adept. As for those fellows who could never reach this basic requirement, they would be weeded out.


    Assisting these little fellows inpleting their meditation, teaching themnguage and writing skills, instill them with the basic rules of the magic world... of course, it was impossible to let the Great Master Adept carry out these low-grade jobs. Therefore, it became the daily routine for official Apprentice Adepts in the tower.


    But, such an easy daily task would never fall into Greem¡¯s hands.


    After saying hello to Wace, who was teaching those Probationary Apprentices theirnguage ss, both men ignored the burning nces from these little fellows and went straight through the main hall, quicklying to a tightly sealed stone door.


    Tony ced his right palm against the stone door and spoke in a low voice, ¡°Curium ? Ada.¡±


    Followed thepletion of the secret spell, the ancient looking stone door slowly slid to both sides, revealing the dark, eerie looking swamp, outside the tower, to the two of them.

 Chapter 3

    This was an eerie and fearsome magical swamp.


    Though it was daytime, the thick clouds and fog meant that very little light was able to get through, and thus the world looked quite dreary. The whole world seemed to have a gloomy, earthy yellow tone.


    After living in such an environment for a long time, even the character of a person would change and be darker.


    Both men waited until the stone door behind thempletely closed up, then Tony pulled up his hood and said,


    ¡°I¡¯m going that way.¡±


    He didn¡¯t wait for Greem¡¯s reply, but simply turned around and took a path that led off to the left, which led him onto a narrow and winding trail which was paved with tiny white stones.


    Greem waited until Tony¡¯s bulky body disappeared into the misty fog, then he pulled up his hood, turned the other way, and took the trail on the right.


    While walking, he whispered, ¡°Show me the detected data for Tony.¡±


    In next second, a report about the Apprentice Adept Tony, done by the Biological Assistance Chip, was projected into his mind.


    ......


    Greem¡¯s mouth twitched in surprise. With such a Physique, why didn¡¯t this guy change paths and be a Warrior? His strength and physique were twice that of Greem¡¯s. That meant that if he got in a fight with Tony, perhaps it would only take a single punch to knock Greem out.


    But as an apprentice Adept, Tony had 6 Physique, 2 more than Greem. No matter how hard Greem worked, this innate advantage would be hard to ovee.


    Knowing this, Tony was probably nning to follow the path of a Body Refining Adept. By using specific methods to strengthen his body, then using magic spells to assist his closebat ability... perhaps this was the only path he could choose!


    Only by staying quite close to the target for a period of time could the Chip analyze and acquire such urate information. It did this by monitoring the target¡¯s movement and behavior. No doubt this would allow Greem to take up a more proactive position when working with other people. It also allowed him to avoid taking unnecessary risks.


    And this was, undoubtedly, the most important thing to Greem!


    But perhaps such a method was useless against a real Adept, as their bodies were would sometimes radiate a strong elemental energy. This was something Adepts did passively after their body gathered a huge amount of energy. This was also how they avoided others sensing their strength.


    It was unknown how much valuable information the Biological Assistance Chip would be able to ascertain when the target was under the powerful interference of energy radiation. Not only that, but Greem was worried that Adepts might be able to detect his Biological Assistance Chip, hence he had to be extra cautious when using it inside the tower.


    The stony trail in front of him kept winding as it led into the depths of the misty fog. There were weird nts of all sizes, which could be barely seen on both sides of the path. There were short and thick, cone-shaped trees, small leafy nts that curled around in a spiral, vine-like rattans that brushed against the top of his head as he walked under them, and amazingly colored, mystical flowers that had petals the size ofrge washbowls... there was also a muddy, stinky pond...


    Though all of this made it seem like this was just a normal swamp, Greem knew very well that he could never take even half a step out from the stony trail.


    For all those animals and nts, which were able to survive in this magical swamp, were frightening demons who would eat every little bit of the humans they encountered, not even leaving their bones behind.


    Those in looking short trees were actually quite frightening. If a person got close enough to them, their curled up branch would instantly expand, grabbing and holding the person within its tight clutches. At that moment, the bloodsucking rattans, which were hanging on these trees, would coil up around that person, poking countless sharp thorns into their body, slowly sucking the blood out of their body, drop by drop.


    After the person¡¯s blood waspletely dried up, the remaining skin, flesh, and bones would be the best fertilizer for these killer trees.


    If someone could ever safely dig out the blood red soil underneath those killer trees, they would certainly discover a huge pile of skeletons, some of which belonged to humans, some of which were animals. Without doing this, there was no evidence of any of the prey these nts had devoured!


    There were two reasons why this tower in the swamp groomed these demonic nts. First, it was to prevent the intrusion from other humans. Second, it was so they could harvest some unique magic materials from the nts.


    The root of the Killer Tree and the blood sack that grew within the body of the Bloodsucking Rattans were both good tonics. They were a beneficial supplement for Adepts who didn¡¯t have a good physique. On a regr basis, apprentice Adepts had to take the risk of being attacked by demon nts to harvest materials. Therefore, this was a dangerous task, which had a very high death toll.


    It was probably because they had sensed the smell of blood and flesh from Greem¡¯s body, but the deathly still swamp suddenly seemed toe to life. Consciously, or unconsciously, all those demonic nts started wriggling their bodies, branches, and roots slowly moving toward the stony trail.


    Greem pretended he didn¡¯t see the movements of these demon nts. He wasn¡¯t actually worried about them right now.


    No matter how crazy or brutal they were, they didn¡¯t dare to move onto the simple and in stony trail under his feet, as if there were something on this road that they feared.


    ¡°Query the database, record, and archive all the magic nts in the surrounding area!¡±


    ¡°Initial data insufficient... root database was iplete and unable to match the species... activating elemental vision, reconstructing database...¡±


    Following with a bunch of warning tones from the chip, the image projecting on his retina started swaying, then it straightened out as a vast amount of data began pouring down like a waterfall in front of his eyes. At the same time, every single object in his sight was highlighted with different colored lights.


    Elemental vision? Was this a special ability that he got after the chip merged with his current body?


    The nts were highlighted with a green colored light, indicated these nt demons contained a lot of Elementium that was, unsurprisingly, often found in natural nts. Other colors, like red, yellow, blue, and purple, indicated the areas where their respective energy was gathered. Besides these, the ever changing humidity, temperature, wind speed, thickness of poison particles, distribution of element particles and their cirction... all the data which the chip could detect was projected onto his eyes in a colorful dynamic graph.


    Greem frowned.


    This colorful and overplicated retinal projection had seriously affected his normal vision. This was too much information.


    ¡°Remove useless colors... remove diffused highlights... only focus retina vision on the mostmon energy ranges...¡±


    After Greem gave out hismands, one after another, finally the ring, colorful orb dimmed down bit by bit, and all the items in his vision had once again resumed their normal colors.


    The thick and pale misty fog had now turned into countless lumps, threads, and sheets of slow moving water elemental particles. They were constrained by a mysterious force, and couldn¡¯t spread out, but were forced to cover this magic swamp month after month, year after year.


    Greem stopped moving and stood straight. Hiding under the shadow of his hood was a pair of brightly shing eyes, staring out at the demon nts beside the trail without blinking. With the help of his brand new vision, the true color of these nts hiding under the disguise of the swamp had finally been revealed.


    Underneath the wrinkling and withered tree skin, was an army of eerie looking ghost faces that were tightly squeezed together. All of them were the souls trapped by the Killer Trees. Also, Greem could ¡®see¡¯ a green colored energy illumination on the needle like prickles on the edges of the Killer Tree¡¯s branches. This energy should indicate the presence of the paralytic poison that the Killer Tree used to sedate its prey.


    As for the Bloodsucking Rattans, which hung from the Killer Tree, they lookedpletely demonic, as they were entirely blood red under his elemental vision. It was pure blood that flowing underneath its twisted, creeping green skin, and, right at the spot where it connected with Killer Tree, within a hollow tree cavity, numerous blood sacks, the size of a human fist, were pumping at a regr tempo, making them looked like human hearts.


    Caw~ caw~


    Together with few piercing caws, a group of Scavenger Crows flew in and stopped on a tree branch, moving their blood red eyes and staring at Greem.


    Honestly speaking, being stared at by a group of ominous demons like this made Greem feel incredibly ufortable.


    Faced with this group of dangerous swamp demons, Greem didn¡¯t dare be the slightest bit careless. Although Scavenger Crows were not considered to be strong demon beasts, their blood red eyes had the ability ¡®Doom¡¯, and there had been some frightful incidents in which Apprentice Adepts had their eyes blinded by these crows.


    Seeing that these Scavenger Crows were itching to attack, Greem raised his right arm and softly intoned a spell that he had memorized. After five seconds of spellcasting, arge red magic fireball appeared in Greem¡¯s hand, twisting violently.


    Greem¡¯s entire right hand waspletely covered by this magic fireball, but he was still safe and sound.


    This was his Burning Hand spell!


    After spending six years in the Magic Tower, this was the only spell Greem was able to use.


    With Greem¡¯s current ability, he could barely stretch the me out 5 steps. That was his limit. Therefore, it could, currently, be considered a close range spell.


    The violently burning magic me brightened the surrounding fog. The powerful ripples generated by the fire element had finally made these demons realize that this human in front of them was not something they could easily capture.


    As for those demons who were slowly gathering around Greem, it seemed like they were struck with a great terror, and all of them quickly fled away from the sides of the trail in a great panic. Also, that group of Scavenger Crows were letting out loud caws as they flew into the sky, briefly wheeling about in the air above and disappearing into the depths of the fog.


    Greem breathed out a long sigh of relief. With this, the pressure on him had been reduced.


    None of these demons had the guts to step onto the stony trail, but that didn¡¯t stop them from using their own methods in order to try to lure or intimidate Apprentice Adepts into leaving the stony trail. If Greem was scared by the terrifying scene of being surrounded by demons, and, in his panic, idently left the boundaries of this stony trail... even with the help of Magic Talisman, he would probably die a terrible death.


    The soul, blood, and flesh of an Apprentice Adept. No doubt they were much more delicious than ordinary humans or wild beasts. Besides, this didn¡¯t vite the agreement between the demons and the Magic Tower. Therefore, every inspection trip outside of the tower was a thorough check of willpower. Once these demons found a weakness in one¡¯s mind, the future of that person would not be good.


    ¡°Record everything you can about these demons!¡± Greem said calmly.


    ¡°Beep... recordpleted! Host, please name the creatures in the order they are presented.¡±


    Images of creatures appeared in front of his eyes.


    ¡°Killer Trees... Bloodsucking Rattans... Scavenger Crows...¡±


    ¡°Namingpleted! New information has been recorded in the database.¡±

 Chapter 4

    While most of the demons were backing away, in fear of the magical me which had just appeared in the air, Greem jumped off the path, dug out the soil underneath a nearby Killer Tree, used his magic me to burn the thick tree root, and finally saw the material that he hade to harvest today.


    Between the tangled roots and pale white human bones were some small pulpy root nodes. Some were white, some were red, and there were even a few purple colored ones. Greem suppressed the disgust he felt and, using a small knife that he carried with him, he carefully harvested three of the purple nodes and ced them into his waist pocket. Afterward, he quickly rushed back to the path.


    If this task wasn¡¯t so important, he wouldn¡¯t ever step outside of boundaries of the path! Even though he had moved with great speed, those demons, who had previously been running away, had, once again, gathered around. Also of note, the Bloodsucking Rattans, which hung from the Killer Trees, now upied the space he had been in when digging up the roots.


    If he had been a second slower, he wouldn¡¯t have been able to escape without a tough fight!


    Actually, thanks to his new ¡®elemental vision¡¯, he was able to directly find the Killer Tree¡¯s core roots. If it was before, he would have had to make repeated trips from the path to find his harvest. The more trips off the path he had to take, the higher the risk.


    He continued following the eerie trail for another two hundred meters, soon leaving the main clump of Killer Trees. In front of him, he saw a horrible ghost tree, which looked alive as it stretched over the stony trail, the vines and tree branches hanging down from it looked alive as they wriggled in the air.


    Pulling out the magic talisman from under his shirt, Greem whispered the secret spell that every apprentice Adept had to master.


    ¡°Muhantoria ? Sinra.¡±


    Upon thepletion of the secret magic spell, a mysterious, invisible force erupted from the talisman, quickly covering every inch of his surroundings.


    A warning red within Greem¡¯s mind.


    ¡°Abnormal force field detected! The functionality of this chip is being interfered with...¡±


    The voice of the chip got weaker and weaker. It slowly faded into a soft whine before eventually goingpletely silent.


    Greem ignored the chip, then he started striding forward while holding the magic talisman up above his head. With each step he took, the vines and tree branches in front of him receded. Eventually they separated, allowing him to pass through and continue on his way.


    Now that he was done with the Killer Trees and Bloodsucking Rattans, it was time for him to enter what was known as a paradise for a type of being known as a Demon Baby. Greem¡¯s heart held a strong fear for this ce.


    The area just past the Ghost Tree was filled with demons. They called it the Garden of Whispers.


    If one looked out from the path, all they would see were fields of flowers, yet all these fields were filled with ashes, corpses, and countless demons.


    The unique environment of the magical swamp had made this ce a paradise for Demon Babies, Banshees, and Flower Fairies, all of whom were simply twisted creatures whose only desire was to fill their stomachs with the corpses and souls of the unprepared beings who entered this ce. Whenever such a fool entered this ce, his fate was to copse under the endless evil influences and illusions and be a fertilizer for these unique nts, who lived off of death and despair.


    Human Faced Mushrooms gathered on both sides of the path. They were all holding hands and singing a joyful melody, warmly beckoning Greem to join them. These little things looked like tiny mushrooms with hands and feet. They had a pattern on their caps which resembled a human face.


    Although these Human Face Mushroom had cute little hands and feet and were not much more than a foot tall, when they gathered together, jumping andughing, it sent chills down Greem¡¯s spine.


    ¡°Warning... Warning... Strange energy is affecting the host... Advising the host to leave this ce immediately...¡±


    Greem quickly backed away from the dancing mushrooms. When he had distanced himself from them, the spine-tingling sensation finally subsided.


    No matter how cute these Human Face Mushrooms looked, they were still a genuine carnivorous demon, and they were known for not even sparing the soul of their prey. The original form of these demons was actually a type of white mushroom, which had been injected with a lot of potent Dark Elementium. Individually, they only had a weak illusion ability, which was definitely not enough for them to capture prey like a human, which was so muchrger than them.


    But these creatures lived together in a group.


    When hundreds of Human Face Mushrooms gathered together, they could form arge mirage-like illusionary region, causing their prey to lose themselves without even realizing it. Thus, if one came across arge group of Human Faced Mushroom feasting on prey, their victim might still have a smile on his face, beingpletely immersed in some type of fantasy!


    For an official Adept, these Human Face Mushrooms, who only possessed basic illusion abilities, were simply a good material for enhancing their own magic. But for an apprentice Adept like Greem, he would face the risk of being killed by them every time he encountered them.


    If Greem couldn¡¯t withstand the illusionary region created by these Human Face Mushrooms and walk off the path of his own volition, then these creatures could enjoy a big feast without viting the agreement made with the tower!


    Therefore, facing toward these smiling but insidious demons, who kept moving closer to him, Greem grinned and took out an egg-sized, stone, quickly throwing it right into the center of the dancing mushrooms.


    In the next moment, a blue sh erupted from the stone as faded lightning struck out at anything close by. Five Human Faced Mushrooms fell lifeless to the ground. All the other Human Faced Mushrooms were scared and ran off in all directions, hiding in the nearby foliage.


    Greem trotted over to the five Human Faced Mushroom corpses, carefully picking them up and cing them all into his waist pocket. Then he picked up the small round stone and returned to the path.


    The small egg-shaped stone was a Thunder Stone, which he had purchased from apprentice Rick for a high price. When activated, it would shake violently for a moment before releasing a small burst of lightning which dealt 5 points of lightning damage. It was the perfect weapon for dealing with these Human Faced Mushrooms, which were quite weak. After all, his ¡®Burning Hand¡¯ spell was quite destructive, and thus he needed another method.


    None of those Human Faced Mushrooms dared to show their faces after being attacked. However, the countless spine-tingling nces and the noisy ttering whispers were still following after Greem, making his hair stand on end.


    The Human Faced Mushrooms were one the materials he had to harvest for his task. Therefore, once Greem hadpleted this part of the task, he quickly hurried down the winding trail, not daring to stay in that ce any longer.


    To be honest, among all thends around the tower, this ce was known for having the highest apprentice fatality rate!


    Leaving the flowery fields where the Human Faced Mushrooms grew, Greem soon arrived at the region where the Demon Babies lived.


    The Demon Baby was a little monster which had a small shriveled body, which looked like a human baby. They also had something like an umbilical cord dragging behind them as they moved. They moved around by crawling on the ground, but the speed at which they crawled was extremely fast.


    These Demon Babies were not real babies, but actually very horrifying monsters. They had an innate ability, which was very simr to a ¡®curse¡¯. With this ¡®curse¡¯ their words and wills would join together to be reality. One could imagine their power as something simr to a ¡®Wish¡¯ spell.


    Unfortunately, they were all evil creatures with absolutely twisted minds, and their hearts were full of vicious hatred. Therefore, one shouldn¡¯t expect terrible malice to be unleashed upon them when they encountered these Demon Babies.


    When dozens of Demon Babies gathered together andunched their most powerful curses toward a target, even a powerful Earth Bear would be greatly weakened by the stacking of their evil intentions. After that, the Demon Babies would easily be able to kill their victim.


    When walking among this group of dreadful monsters, one would need heart, and a will of iron, or else they would end up having their skin stripped and bone dismantled by the Demon Babies, soon bing one of the many wandering souls in this Garden of Whispers.


    Greem quickened his pace as he hurried through the deste bushes of the garden. He didn¡¯t have the courage to stop and simply held the talisman tightly to his chest, going faster and faster as he hurried through this section of the swamp.


    By the time the sharp and ear-splitting cries of the Demon Babies started filling his ears, Greem was sprinting. Though it was terrifying, Greem soon left the Garden of Whispers, breathing heavily as he turned onto another narrow trail.


    Although he had gone out to harvest materials, the more important part of this routine task was to inspect the activity of the demons near the tower and to check for things that were out of ce, like if there were signs that an outsider had tried toe to this area. Every seven days he had to take note of the activity of all demons around the tower, appropriately harvesting some magical materials as he did so. This was the purpose for Greem¡¯s trip.


    In fact, the region he was inspecting was actually a part of the inner boundary of the magical swamp. It was very rare for an outsider to actually make it this far into the swamp. After all, demons raised by Adepts were all extremely dangerous, even putting on a magical talisman wouldn¡¯t enough to guarantee the safety of an apprentice Adept. As for those ordinary humans who tried to sneak into this ce to steal the resources of an Adept, the chances of them getting past all those monstrous demons was next to impossible.


    To be honest, mortals most likely wouldn¡¯t even get past the outer perimeter of the magical swamp.


    But, ording to Greem¡¯s knowledge, sometimes the Adept Tower would purposely deactivate some of the outer perimeter defense mechanisms, actively attracting some ordinary humans into the depths of the swamp. At that moment, the swamp would turn into a demon carnival as they all feasted on the ignorant mortals!


    The Adept Tower was a humongous ring-shaped structure and thendscape surrounding its foundation was extremelyplicated. The demons were distributed throughout the swamp in a very methodical manner. Therefore, every inspection trip would require at least two apprentice Adepts, one went clockwise and the other went counter clockwise. They would follow a fixed route and cross most of the demon infested areas. Starting from the front door of the tower and meeting at the back door, once theypleted this circr route their inspection would be consideredplete.


    Every inspection task would award them four Knowledge points and some gold coins. Compared to other tasks within the tower, the reward of Knowledge points was considerable handsome. But, even with such a high reward, most of the apprentice Adepts, who hungered for Knowledge points, would still step back from this inspection task, avoiding it like the gue.


    The reason for this was obvious: the fatality rate for the inspection task was definitely the highest among all the tasks in the tower! None of the other tasks could surpass it.


    For this inspection trip, Greem took the counterclockwise route, where he was required to go past the grove of Killer Trees, the Human Faced Mushroom¡¯s field, the Garden of Whispers, and a few other areas. As for the other apprentice Adept, Tony, he took the clockwise route, but it wasn¡¯t a safe route either. After all, those Giant alligators and Parasite Bug Queens were just as dangerous as some of the creatures on his side!


    Especially when you had to harvest some of the Alligator eggs or a bug cocoon. Doing these things required one to go deep into their nest, and this was what was so dangerous about the clockwise inspection task. Therefore, when Greem saw Tony at the back door of the tower, he felt d that Tony had survived as well.


    Both guys didn¡¯t talk much after they met. They just nodded their heads indifferently and continued into the tower.


    It was the apprentice leader, Anksorus, who was waiting for them there. After submitting the required items for the task, the two of them were basically free for the next six days. As for the Knowledge points, Anksorus had input them into their magical talisman using a secret method.


    For all the apprentices in the tower, their magical talisman was actually a token of their identity.

 Chapter 5

    After submitting his task, Tony immediately rushed back to his room, obviously intending to go to take a nap. After all, every inspection trip would push one¡¯s nerves to the limit, and it really consumed your stamina. In contrast to Tony¡¯s actions, Greem hesitated for a moment, then he turned around and walked toward the library.


    It was around midday, so there weren¡¯t very many apprentices inside the library.


    It was a simple stone room with dozens of yellowed wooden bookshelves ced against the walls. On top of these shelves were all kinds of magic and spell books made from all kinds of materials and in all shapes and forms. The man who managed these books was a middle-aged, intermediate level old apprentice Adept.


    For these intermediate apprentice Adepts, who had only barely reached this level with help from the experience of age, the Adept Tower would never put in any more effort to cultivate them. Also, this group of apprentice had given up their ambitions. They were not willing to take those overly risky missions, but, at the same time, they refused to return to the life of ordinary humans. Therefore, they became a unique group within the apprentice Adepts.


    Although a librarian only received one Knowledge point every seven days, it was an easy job, and there wasn¡¯t any danger at all. That¡¯s also the reason why this task had been upied by these senior intermediate apprentice Adepts. For someone like Greem, who had no one to depend on and was forever alone, all he could do was take on those dangerous missions.


    Greem didn¡¯t rush to the bookshelves in the deepest area, like he used to do. Instead, he was browsing through each bookshelf leisurely, asionally picking up a book and flipping through a few pages. All the books in this library were books of magic. When they were not borrowed, only the introduction was visible to a reader, while all the other content in the book was perpetually covered with ayer of floating dark fog, making sure no one could read through it.


    Greem never dared to underestimate this normal looking dark fog, because it was personally designed by the master of this tower, the frightful Adept Anderson. Without going through a treatment from a special magical formation, no apprentice could read the content of the book, not even a single character. If anyone started wishfully thinking of breaking this mechanism, they would trigger a hidden magical formation, attracting the ire of, and punishment from, the Great Adept himself.


    Although the consequences could be quite dire, Greem still wanted to test to see if his Biological Assistance Chip could bring him an advantage in this situation. After all, Knowledge points were very difficult to earn, and currently Greem only had 7 points. Knowledge points alone were not enough to support his needed Spirit growth requirement.


    He picked up the book, ¡®The History of Adept¡¯, and pretended he was seriously reading the intro. But in actuality, deep in his mind he was quietly issuingmands to the Biological Assistance Chip.


    ¡°Scan this book. Try and see if you can obtain the content without triggering the magical formation!¡±


    *beep* ¡°Command received, processing mission... starting deep scan...¡±


    Greem lowered his head.


    When the Biological Assistance Chip was scanning things outside his body, his eyes would take on a red tint. This required him to mask his eyes to prevent anyone from finding something abnormal through his eyes.


    ¡°Unknown protective force field detected... analyzing...¡± *beep* ¡°Warning... force field is experiencing an unknown transformation... scanning terminated...¡±


    Greem quickly closed his eyes and then the book.


    It really didn¡¯t work. Any tiny bit of interference from the outside world would be enough to trigger the protective magical formation on the book. It looked like his overly optimistic stealing mission had failed. Henceforth, if he wanted to obtain new knowledge, he had to be honest and exchange for it with Knowledge points.


    But he had no regrets on this matter. Because, with the help from Biological Assistance Chip, he no longer had to use the traditional method of copying ¨C by hand. Any book, as long as he could borrow once, he would be able to duplicate it exactly, without missing anything, into the storage area of the chip, and he would be able to read it anytime he wanted.


    Even if he couldn¡¯t master the book in a short period of time, he could still save them up and let the chip sort through and categorize them. Afterwards, he would be able to take his time and slowly study the content of the book. With this alone, the chip was provided him a tremendous boon!


    He had no other choice but to put down the ¡®History of the Adepts¡¯. After that, Greem came to stand in front of another bookshelf. All the books on this shelf were rted to the usage of the fire element, a very suitable section for him, ording to his elemental affinity, and that¡¯s the reason why this bookshelf was the one he visited the most.


    ¡®The Behavior of Fire Elementium¡¯


    ¡®Controling Techniques of the Fire Element¡¯


    ¡®The Burning Hand¡¯


    ¡®How To Cast A Huge Fireball¡¯


    ......


    ......


    Some of these books were pure theory discussion on magic spells, some were simple insights into casting spells, some were orthodox models of elemental spells and casting techniques... among these books, the books about casting spells were able to help him master some necessary spells and improve hisbat ability, but they were not enough to increase his knowledge storage. Only those books about the theory of magic had a possibility of improving his Spirit.


    How to utilize his Knowledge points in the most reasonable manner. He needed to expand the number of spells he could use, thus boosting hisbat ability and survivability, and, at the same time, he needed more books on magical theory, which could push him further into bing an official Adept. This was a tough conundrum that really pushed his mind to the limit!


    Greem became confused as he pondered this question while standing in front of the bookshelf.


    Every magical energy system would definitely have their own respective theoretical foundation, and the power of Adept was based on the strength of their foundation.


    So, what exactly did Magic represent to Greem?


    Giving no reason, Greem gave the chip a nearly impossible long term mission.


    ¡°Chip, gather all the foundational information rted to magic and find out the source of it. Also, give me the leveling path which best suits my future development!¡±


    *beep* ¡°Command received, processing mission... constructing long-term observation project: The Source of Magic...cking information, failed to construct aplete model... constructing short-term evaluation project: The Host¡¯s Path to bing an Adept...cking information, failed to construct aplete model...¡±


    The continuous re of warning noises made Greem feel another headacheing on. What could he do? The Biological Assistance Chip had just awakened, so its database was nearly empty. If he didn¡¯t find a way to gather some basic books on magic, it would impossible for it toe to any reliable results.


    Fortunately, he had copied several books over the past six years. He would find a way to feed them to the chip when he returned to his room. Then the chip would, at least, have something in its database. Not like now, where it wasn¡¯t able to do anything.


    Turning around and leaving the library, Greem first went to the canteen and cured his hunger. Only after he was sated did he return to his own room.


    Upon opening the door and entering his room, the first thing Greem did was throw a nce at the floor beneath his feet.


    Right on the floor near the door was a weak rippling of fire elemental energy.


    The energy came from fire elemental particles purposely ced near the door. They didn¡¯t have any major functions, but when someone passed by that spot, the elemental energy around that person would inadvertently alter the arrangement of these fire elemental particles. With that, Greem would easily be able to tell if anyone had entered his room while he was gone.


    People in thismunity of Adepts rarely showed their true faces. Those who were not proactive in their preparations and self-defense wouldn¡¯tst long in this tower.


    Gently closing the door, Greem impatiently dug out all the Magic notes he had copied over the past few years. After a serious calction, Greem figured that he currently owned fiveplete Magic books.


    The first book was definitely the ¡®Glossary of All Things¡±. It was the elementary book for all apprentice Adepts.


    Greem sat down in front of his wooden table, meticulously reading through this ¡®Glossary of All Things¡¯. Although the majority of the content within had transformed into his memory, but unavoidable he still forgot some, especially the tiny little details.


    At first, he did his best to recite the book as he went through. He was having the Biological Assistance Chip copy all the knowledge content via his eyes into its storage, sorting and storing them ording to his specifications.


    As time went on, Greem stopped wasting his energy on thinking or even reading. He simply turned himself into a human copying machine, his eyes continually flickering as they scanned over every single word, magical inscription, and image... they were all being copied at high speed.


    In less than fifteen minutes, the ¡®Glossary of All Things¡¯ had beenpletely saved in the Chip¡¯s memory!


    Even Greem himself couldn¡¯t control his shock at this extreme speed.


    As the core elementary book for all apprentice Adepts, this ¡®Glossary of All Things¡¯ recorded over ten thousand different races and unique creatures that had been discovered in the Adept Mainds. It also held records of most of themonly found nts, animals, minerals, special magical materials... As a whole, this book had over thirty thousand entries.


    During his first two years here, Greem had spent a whopping 17 months copying and memorizing the entire book, But now it took him less than fifteen minutes to save itpletely.


    While getting over his shock at the Chip¡¯s amazing speed, Greem closed the book, and slowly started recalling the copied memory into his mind. Information on any species, fauna or flora, would appear in his mind as soon as he thought of it. The Chip would also project any rted information and data into his mind. This would, indeed, save Greem a lot of time.


    Good. This was really useful! He would never have to worry about struggling to memorize that hard to understand magical knowledge.


    Beingpletely overwhelmed with excitement, Greem didn¡¯t pay any attention to the growing pain in his brain. He couldn¡¯t wait and quickly took out the second book, starting to duplicate it using the same method.


    ¡®The Beginning of Spirit Force¡¯, an orthodox book on Magic Theory. It mainly exined the raw source and application of the Spirit energy used by Adepts. It also contained some simple methods for exercising one¡¯s Spirit Force.


    After he finished copying the second book, Greem gently touched his head. He felt incredibly nauseous and tired at the same time.


    These... these were the symptoms of Spirit energy depletion!


    As an apprentice Adept, he was extremely familiar with this situation. During the period when he had just learned the Burning Hand spell, as he still couldn¡¯t master the output of his magic energy, he had always depleted his pitiful store of Spirit energy.


    In theter stages, when he got more familiar with the casting of Burning Hand, he finally gained a level of proficiency over Spirit energy usage without being taught by anybody. When one controlled magical energies, their Spirit energy was proportionate to the strength of their soul. The stronger one¡¯s soul, the more Spirit energy they had to use. Thus, that person would be able to cast more magic spells.


    Take Greem as an example! He had a Spirit of 8, and his Magical energy was ten times his Spirit. In this case, 80 points. There were some Adepts who liked to call this Magical Energy ¡®Adept Energy¡¯.


    Anyway, these 80 points of Adept Energy were all Greem¡¯s current abilities afforded him.

 Chapter 6

    A simple Burning Hand magic spell would require Greem to expend approximately 20 Adept energy points, which meant that Greem could cast four Burning Hand spells in a row. But, of course, that was just in theory, as it was extremely difficult to achieve that in reality.


    When an Adept had a full ¡®Energy Pool¡¯, his mind was performing at its best. No matter whether he was pondering over hard questions or casting spells, he would perform the best when his Energy Pool was full, but when an Adept¡¯s Energy Pool was at ? its max, his mind would be fatigued. The most significant expression of this would be dizziness and the swelling of certain tissues in the brain, causing the Adept to feel sick and start throwing up.


    If he tried to cast a spell at that moment, even a spell that would normally only take him five seconds, he might not even be able to cast it in ten seconds, and there was a good chance he might not even be able to cast it at all.


    Therefore, when any Adepts were required to frequently cast spells, they did their best to conserve a portion of their Spirit energy so that they could avoid all the negative side effects of Spirit Fatigue.


    From the symptoms Greem was having, it was clear that his Energy Pool was at less than 5%, and thus he was suffering from Spirit Fatigue. The only solution for this was to get a good night of sleep. After all, sleep is how a brain relieves itself.


    The Chip was great, but it consumed arge amount of Greem¡¯s Spirit energy when it was operating. Hence, once he realized that he was suffering from Spirit Fatigue, Greem struggled to his bed, threw himself onto it, and immediately fell asleep.


    The rest of the day passed as he slept, and the darkness of night settled over the swamp. Now the moon had raised itself high up into the dark sky, though its face was rarely seen through the dense clouds and fog. A deep silence reigned over the quiet Swamp Tower as many of its residents went to sleep.


    During this time, a tall and bizarre dark shadow suddenly appeared beside Greem¡¯s bed, bending over him and quietly staring down at him.


    As the result of nausea from his severe Spirit Fatigue, Greem didn¡¯t sleep well. Even though he was in a sleeping, his brows were tightly knitted in a frown and his face was filled with distress.


    The bizarre looking human figure had its back toward the moonlight, so its entire body was immersing in an indescribable darkness. No one would be able to clearly see its face, but no one could ignore the pair of blood red eyes flickering on this unseen face. These eyes would make anyone who saw them shiver in fear.


    ¡°Blood... blood... I need blood...¡±


    The dark shadow tremblingly stretched out both arms, as if to grab Greem¡¯s neck, but, for some unknown reason, it always retracted back, as if it was reluctant to do whatever it was trying to do. Its behaviors seemed to suggest that it was experiencing a fierce mental battle within itself. Also, it kept mumbling the same words over and over again, showing the intense struggle happening within.


    After a few minutes, it seemed to gain control of itself. It paused for a moment, then stared at Greem, who waspletely unaware as to what was going on around him. A few momentster, it turned around and jumped out of the window.


    This window was on the outside of the tower. This meant that there was a formidable Magical Formation attached to it, which would make it impossible for any outsider to roam freely in this ce. But, strangely enough, when this dark shadow grabbed onto the tower wall outside Greem¡¯s room, it never actually triggered the magical formation surrounding the tower.


    If Greem had seen this, he would have realized that this being was an Apprentice Adept, as only Apprentice Adepts had the Magical Talismans which would let them freely travel through the magical formation.


    The dark shadow was climbing around the outside wall of the Adept Tower at an extremely fast speed. Its movement was swift and agile, yet seemed effortless as the shadow flowed around the vertical face of the tower. This was an impossibly impressive feat of strength and dexterity, and would have stunned anyone who witnessed it. Surprisingly enough, it seemed like it purposely moved through the dark corners of windows and ledges, where moonlight couldn¡¯t reach. This made its movements even more impressive, yet also hard to see.


    Its movement was swift and graceful, and it didn¡¯t make any noise over the course of its journey. Also, it seemed like it was searching for something specifically, as it purposely avoided the rooms which were still lit by candlelight. After searching for a while, it seemed to finally find whatever it was looking for.


    It hung on the side of a narrow window, tilting its head slightly to one side and listening for a moment. Only after making sure that the sound of breathinging from inside the room was stable and lengthy did it carefully climb through the narrow window.


    For a while, nothing could be seen or heard inside the room. After a few minutes, it finally left the room, the faded smell of blood hovering around its body.


    It was obvious that the dark shadow was satisfied with itself. Before it sneaked away, it squatted on the narrow window and casually turned its head upward and looked at the sky. Right at this moment the clouds cleared just enough for the moon to shine through, pouring its silver light down from the sky above, and lighting up the face of the shadowy figure.


    What was seen was the youthful face of a teenage girl. Her face was fair and beautiful, but if one looked closely, they would see two sharp incisors sticking out slightly from her upper lip, and if they looked even closer, they would see blood staining these teeth.


    The beautiful young girl used her tiny tongue and gently licked both teeth clean. When she withdrew her tongue, she pursed her lips, as if she were tasting a delicious fine wine. Only after sitting there for a moment did she leaped out from the window and disappeared into the dark shadows below, where the moonlight could never reach.


    ............


    The next day, Greem was woken by a rapid knocking at his door.


    Greem shook his head, which still felt dizzy, then he got up and opened his door. To his surprise, he found three people standing outside.


    Apprentice Leader Anksorus, Apprentice Ellen, and Apprentice Fenrir.


    The position of Apprentice Leader was personally assigned by Great Master Anderson, and Anksorus was the current Apprentice Leader. Therefore his status was supreme amongst all the Apprentice Adepts. Most of the time, he would perform Apprentice management duties on behalf of the Great Master, managing all the Apprentice Adepts inside the Tower. Also, as he possessed the strength of an intermediate Apprentice, thus all lesser Apprentices had to obey his orders. If someone antagonized him, he could easily y put that person on a path to death, and they would never know that they had been set up.


    As for the other two men, Ellen and Fenrir, they were just beginner Apprentice Adepts, just like Greem, but both of them were good at butt kissing, and they had followed Anksorus day in and day out, licking his boots. Hence they were considered the trusted followers of the Apprentice Leader.


    So wherever Anksorus appeared, these two tterers would always be there. The rtionship between them was simr to the symbiotic behavior between the Killer Trees and the Bloodsucking Rattans. Two tterers needed help from Anksorus. Only then would they have the privilege to choose safer daily tasks. Meanwhile, Anksorus would need these two Apprentices¡¯ help in order to hold back those idealists who desired his position.


    Greem had an unsociable and entric character, and thus he rarely made contact with others. Therefore, the rtionship between him and this group was not good, but not bad either. That¡¯s why he felt really surprised when he found out these guys standing outside his room.


    Apprentice Leader Anksorus was a young man in his mid-twenties. He had a hawk nose, a pair of thick brows, and sharp eyes. Although his facial features didn¡¯t make him look fierce, it still gave an imposing air to anyone who stared at him. The moment when the wooden door opened up, Anksorus shing nce immediately fell on Greem¡¯s face, indistinctly making Greem feel as if his skin had been burned.


    Greem felt a small shock in his heart.


    He knew that this was an anomaly that only happened when one¡¯s Spirit energy overflowed, and was a signal that this guy¡¯s overall power had reached to a very high level.


    Among all the Apprentices of the Tower, there was actually very strict divisions which were based on the power of the Apprentice.


    Those who had only mastered one or two Magic spells, and possessed a Spirit level of 10 or less were all beginner Apprentice Adapts, considered to be the lowest ranked among the Apprentice Adepts in this tower. As for those who had mastered three to four Magic spells, and had a Spirit level of 11 to 15 were ssified as intermediate Apprentices, and they were considered to be fairly strong power. Finally, those who mastered five or more Magic spells, and had a Spirit level of over 16 were the elite of the Tower: the Advanced Apprentice Adepts.


    Once an Apprentice¡¯s Spirit level reached 20, then he had gained the qualification to be a Pseudo Adept, and the Great Master Adept would give him a special treatment, preparing himself for the ceremony which would mark them bing an official Adept.


    One must note that, currently, there were no real Pseudo Adepts in this Swamp Tower!


    As for this Anksorus, although it was unknown how many Magic spells he had mastered, but, with the help from some unique Magic items, sometimes he was able to unleash a power which not weaker than that of an Advanced Apprentice. Within the Tower, there were only three people who had reached the level of Advanced Apprentice: Hawkeye, Evil Bugs, and Madwoman.


    Of course, these were not their real names, but nicknames.


    Hawkeye was Clutha, a frightening guy from the West Coast. In order to strengthen his own power, he actually reced one of his eyes with a hawk¡¯s eye. This gave him some bizarre abilities.


    Evil Bugs was Actaeon. He was even more bizarre than Hawkeye. He went as far as raise a swarm of horrifying bugs with his own blood and flesh. When fighting with him, a single careless mistake in battle would end with being eaten by thousands of bugs!


    As for thest one, Madwoman, she had an immense thirst for violence. Using a huge steel sword, which was taller than your average human, she was undefeated among all the Apprentices. She was so violent and terrifying in battle that no one dared to challenge her.


    The three of them had either mastered some Magic spells with tremendous power or possessed some bizarre and unique abilities. No matter what, they had long ditched the status of ordinary Apprentices and all be candidate who had the potential to break through and attained the status of Pseudo Adept.


    Thus, when facing with the ming nce from such a powerful Apprentice Adept, Greem¡¯s spirit was clearly not enough to support him, and his mind was suppressed by the person in front of him.


    ¡°Greem, something happened in the Towerst night! Do you know anything about it?¡± Apprentice Leader Anksorus was still staring coldly at Greem without saying anything. It was Ellen who was doing all the talking.


    ¡°What? Something happened? Was someone killed in a Magical experiment?¡± Obviously, Greem had no idea what was going on.


    ¡°There were no issues with any magical experiments. Someone was murdered right inside his room!¡± Finding that Greem¡¯s puzzled eyes and shocked expression didn¡¯t seem fake, Anksorus spoke slowly, but his eyes were still focused on Greem¡¯s face, making sure he missed nothing of Greem¡¯s expression.


    ¡°Murdered?¡± Greem was startled, but he immediately became freaked out and said, ¡°Who died?!?¡±


    Although from time to time Apprentice Adepts died in idents in this Swamp Tower, most deaths happened while on dangerous missions or from idents in bizarre Magical experiments. Not once had an Apprentice Adept been murdered by someone before. After all, every single Apprentice Adept was a precious treasure for Great Master Adept Anderson, so he would never allow his Apprentices to murder each other.


    Once something like this discovered by him, those who vited his will would definitely be severely punished.


    ¡°Muret.¡±


    Greem frowned.


    He knew this Muret. That guy was just an ordinary Apprentice who had only mastered one magic spell... that was all he knew. The only other thing he could remember was that this guy had a face full of freckles, and was younger than him.


    ¡°So why are you guys here...?¡±


    ¡°We need to check your room. This is not out of spite against you, as we are checking every apprentice¡¯s room.¡± Anksorus said with a cold manner.


    ¡°That¡¯s right, we have to check everyone¡¯s rooms. Move aside quickly, or we will tell the Great Master that you are to me for this murder... Do you think you will live long if that happens?¡± No doubt Fenrir was the biggest nuisance here, spitting out threats against Greem.


    Greem felt anger well up in his heart, but he gritted his teeth and slowly pressed it down.


    They were checking everyone¡¯s rooms?


    Would you have the guts to check Hawkeye¡¯s room? How about Evil Bug¡¯s room? Or maybe Madwoman¡¯s room. You guys would turn around and walk away if Madwoman was standing in front of you!


    Though his heart was full of rage, Greem simply frowned. He hesitated for a short moment before finally moving aside and letting them enter his room.

 Chapter 7

    His room was small and cramped, being, at most, around twenty square meters. Just by standing at the door, one could see everything inside.


    There was a bed and a simple old wooden writing table. A few books were messily ced on top of it, one of which was lying open, a few strange and mysterious symbols could be seen on the exposed pages. An old chair was also in sight. The paint on it had been worn away, revealing the original dark color of the wood beneath.


    A wooden rack was sitting on one side of the room and there was a row of ss jars resting on top of it. Inside these jars were some weird half-cultivated nts and bizarre demon organs.


    An iron edged wooden box was sitting in the corner of the room. There was a trash can sitting right next to it.


    Other than these, there was practically no other furniture in the room.


    A derisive look could be seen in Ellen and Fenrir¡¯s eyes.


    Although they were also Apprentice Adept, both of them were living lives that were hundreds of times better than Greem. Not only did they have big, soft, andfy beds in their rooms, but the luxurious decorations in their rooms was simr to that of human nobility in this world.


    Maybe it was because they wanted to show off their authority, but both Apprentice Adepts rushed into the room and began to rummage through his meager belongings.


    The mattress on the wooden bed was thrown to the ground, the books on the table were flipped about in a messy way, and an ink bottle was overturned, staining all the opened books with arge amount of ink. The iron edged wooden box was opened up and all the clothes in it were dug out and thrown on the ground.


    Apprentice Leader Anksorus merely stood at the door and watched as his men wrecked Greem¡¯s room. He impassively looked on and did nothing to stop them.


    Greem stood beside Anksorus. In his sleeves, his fists were repeatedly clenching and releasing. At the same time, his eyes were filled with a cold fury.


    After wrecking his room, Anksorus¡¯s twop dogs finally finished ¡®searching¡¯.


    Under the triumphant and snide nces of the two men, Greem coldly shut the door.


    He hurried over to the overturned wooden box. After briefly searching through the pile of messy clothes, Greem finally couldn¡¯t hold himself and cursed in a low voice.


    Python Rattans, Rat Grass, ck Lotus Flower, Wild Steel Flower, Grave Moss...


    After risking his life and going on so many inspection trips, the Magic materials he had arduously harvested from the Magic Swamp were all missing. It was obvious that Apprentice Leader Anksorus¡¯s two henchmen had picked them up while ¡®searching for proof¡¯ just now.


    Although he intended to rush out and confront them, when he thought of Anksorus¡¯s insidious and gloomy expression, a tremor immediately went up Greem¡¯s spine.


    Clearly, these guys were using the excuse of investigating Muret¡¯s death to loot all the normal Apprentices resources. And because of Anksorus¡¯s Apprentice Leader status, no one dared to confront them to their faces. Of course, these three bastards wouldn¡¯t be so stupid as to provoke one of the powerful people in this tower, they were only brave enough to pick on someone weaker, like Greem.


    Soon, they were knocking on the wooden door next to Greem¡¯s.


    Mary¡¯s ¡®encounter¡¯ was no secret to these few guys. Since she hadn¡¯t shown herself for a long time, they were taking this as an opportunity to see her current status. Apprentice Leader Anksorus also wanted to know if she was still alive or not.


    But right when Ellen was getting so annoyed that no one was answering the door that he was about to break down the door, the door actually opened up from the inside.


    A young girl wearing in red cotton dress stood in front of them.


    ¡°So it¡¯s Apprentice Leader Anksorus! I haven¡¯t had the time to thank you for arranging myst task!¡± The delicate voice of the young girl could easily melt anyone¡¯s heart, but that was nothingpared to the effect of her mesmerizing beauty.


    She had slender limbs and well-defined curves, and her skin was as fair as wless jade. Her facial feature was delicate and perfect, and her tiny red lips were covered with a smile. But the most attracting part of her was her pair of bright blood red eyes. They were like two pure crystal clear rubies mounted on her extraordinary face, making her as enchanting as a fairy.


    Also, she was wearing a bright red dress thatpletely exhibited her lovely body and exposed arge portion of her fair skin, dazzling anyone who saw her.


    In this gloomy Swamp Tower, the majority of the Apprentice Adepts wore unified gray Apprentice robes and ck cloaks, causing dark tones to be the main theme of this ce. By bumping into a young girl with such a splendid and ring bright appearance, these guys immediately stunned, immediately bing tongue-tied at her charming beauty.


    Not only that, but after witnessing the magnificent beauty of the girl in front of them, an inexplicable lust began to surge the lower half of the three men, burning violently and bringing their more carnal hunger to life.


    Anksorus proved why he had been specifically chosen by the Great Master Adept himself, as his self-control was far stronger than the other two men. While Ellen and Fenrir were seized by a sudden lust and showing horny faces, being ready to surrender their souls to this girl, Anksorus was able to pull himself out from this ¡®charm¡¯ instantly.


    ¡°Who are you? Quickly tell me your name, or else...¡± Anksorus¡¯s expression was changing rapidly, he took two steps back and hastily ced both hands in his waist pockets.


    Although the Tower was a big ce, all the Apprentice Adepts were pretty familiar with each other. After all, there was only about forty to fifty people here, and they had all been living together for years, so it would be quite strange for them not to know each other.


    Even someone like Greem, who was known for being unsociable and entric, had a couple of ¡®friends¡¯ who he wouldmunicate with, not to mention Anksorus, who was the Apprentice Leader that had to liaise with every Apprentice each week.


    It would be modest to say that, with both eyes closed, Anksorus could list out all the basic living situation and status of every single Apprentice Adept, from level one to level three, of the Adept Tower.


    But wait... she dide out from Mary¡¯s room....


    Mary, a girl who came from a remote province. Thergest impression she had made on Anksorus was very stubborn. But if judging by her looks, Mary, who came from a family of nobles, was, in fact, a rare beauty amongst all the female Apprentice Adepts.


    Too bad she was ignorant of her status in the tower, as she simply ignored the countless invitations Anksorus sent, requesting her to join him in his bed on nights when he was lonely. Therefore, during an asion when Adept Anderson urgently needed a subject to experiment on, and thus had turned to Anksorus for an Apprentice Adept... he had passionately rmended Mary for the ¡®position¡¯.


    Could it be...


    Thoughts were shing through Anksorus¡¯s mind, and he quickly thought of that stubborn little beauty, who was cowardly and weak in any situation that mattered, yet had stood him up countless times. Whenparing that girl to the vibrantly dressed girl who had an imposing manner in front of him, his jaw dropped and he let out a shocked cry.


    ¡°You... you¡¯re Mary!¡±


    As if hearing the name ¡®Mary¡¯ caused the girl in the red dress to feel pain, her sweet and charming face suddenly twisted ferociously, causing her small cherry mouth to seem to tear open from the corners of her lips to her ears, turning her once small mouth into a gaping maw which stretched from ear to ear. With a sudden movement, the girl leaped forward, quickly biting down on Anksorus¡¯s bare neck.


    With a single bite, nearly half of Anksorus¡¯s neck was removed, exposing his bloody flesh and broken trachea. His blood instantly shot out, like a water fountain, and soon the floor, the wall, and the body of the girl were all stained with blood.


    Anksorus fell back and mmed up against the cold hard wall behind him. He slowly sliding down the wall and ended up sitting on the floor, trembling nonstop. Meanwhile, he pulled a magical item, which was shaped like a scorpion, out from his waist pocket, and triggered it, causing it to shoot out a ming red beam toward the girl in red dress. The beam went straight through her chest.


    This ming beam was a very powerful Fire Magic, so the intense heat of the beam instantly burned an egg-sized hole through the girl¡¯s body. The scorching beam didn¡¯t stop after passing through her body, and it even left a hole on the corridor wall behind her.


    After using it, Anksorus threw away the magical item. Next, with both hands trembling, he pulled a small, fist-sized bottle containing green liquid from his waist pocket, he then pulled off the bottle¡¯s cap and poured the liquid onto the huge wound on his neck.


    Anksorus had a pretty strong vitality, so even though he had suffered such a deadly injury, he didn¡¯t die immediately. Instead, his half-broken neck suddenly showed signs of rotting, and the exposing flesh rapidly dehydrated. At the same time, the blood spurting from his wound slowed down and eventually came to aplete stop.


    Partially zombified body.


    After learning about organic structures, anatomy, and necromancy, an Apprentice Adept would be able to use Magic and imnt a thing called a ¡®Zombie Sack¡¯ within his body. With that, once the Apprentice suffered a severe injury, the Zombie Sack would be triggered and make part of his body zombified, preventing him from dying due to the injury.


    But it was just a temporary measure. Once the instant threat of death had passed, a new threat approached, as he would now have to find a way to get rid of the violent negative energy in his body.


    But when faced with the choice of life and death, most Apprentice Adepts choose to save their lives, not matter the cost. As for the dangerous negative energy, that was something they could worry about at ater date.


    However, in next second a shadow was cast over his body.


    With one hand caressing his nearly broken neck and the other holding a small bottle up above his gaping wound, Anksorus was unable to do anything in response except turn his head to see what was happened, and what he saw was the girl in the red dress¡¯s huge bloody mouth full of sharp teeth. Her red dress was being stained purple by some liquid leaking from the hole in her chest...


    Purple colored blood?!


    Was she still human?


    This was thest thought that ever went through Anksorus¡¯s mind.


    The girl, once again, leapt forward, cing her body on top of his andtching her gaping maw onto his wounded neck. The sound of her sucking out his blood was loud and clear.


    As the girl was busy with her work she was ignoring the other two Apprentice Adepts at her side. Both men had taken out the crude magical items they owned and readied them in their hands, but when facing with such a bloody and horrifying scene, neither of them could gather enough courage to trigger the magical items in their hands.


    Thinking back, even the powerful magical item of Apprentice Leader Anksorus couldn¡¯t cause real harm to this red dressed monster, perhaps the magical items in their hands would not be enough to damage her in the slightest. What if they provoked this monster? Perhaps it would leap onto their bodies next, feasting on their flesh, drinking their blood, and crushing their bones between its teeth...


    By the time both men had proceeded to cower up against the wall, trembling nonstop, the girl in the red dress had stopped consuming the flesh and blood of the former apprentice leader. She sat up from the body, her back facing toward these two cowardly Apprentices, and took out a snow-white handkerchief and a round shaped small mirror. She proceeded to gently wipe her lips, a look of satisfaction covering her face.


    Under the effect of some mysterious healing force, the bloody purple hole on her chest started stitching itself together at an incredible rate. In the blink of the eyes, it had transformed back to the same silky smooth fair skin, and not even the tiniest scar could be seen.


    What a frightful regenerative ability! Could it... could it be that she was the legendary, fearsome noble of the dark ¨C the Vampire?


    Through a tiny crack in his door, Greem witnessed everything that had just happened. As for how his neighbor, who had been contaminated by a Magical Spell, turned into a Vampire, he didn¡¯t have a single clue.


    But in regards to the death of the Apprentice Leader Anksorus, he was filled with a heartfelt joy.


    However, the fight hadsted for some time, and even an Apprentice had been killed. No matter how insensitive the Adept of the Tower was, he should have sensed something by now!


    Greem¡¯s mind was suddenly filled with a single thought: With all that had just happened, how was this day going to end?

 Chapter 8

    After licking the blood off her face, the girl in the red dress turned around, once again revealing her delicate and seductive face to the two quivering Apprentices. Fenrir, who couldn¡¯t withstand such a powerful visual impact, fainted, his arms and legs sying out on the floor in random directions.


    The terrifying and ferocious look of ¡®Mary¡¯ had beenpletely covered up, as she had turned back into the lovely girl with the beautiful face. However, her blood red eyes and the two small, yet sharp looking, teeth sticking out from her lips gave hints of the terrifying being hiding behind the charming beauty.


    Though nearly half her body was sttered with blood, she somehow managed to look as delicate and charming as a flower. It was such an intense visual impact that even Greem, who was only glimpsing this through the crack in his door, couldn¡¯t control himself and felt himself being charmed by her intense beauty.


    A Vampire in its nascent form had no fear of having its body damaged, because, as long as they had blood, they would be able to obtain unlimited vitality. This was an immortal species which only existed in ancient books in this Land of Adepts. As they were over hunted by Adepts, their species was nearly extinct. Even if there were some survivors, they dared not to expose their real identity.


    This was why Greem was so shocked by seeing Mary turn into a Vampire. After his initial shock over Mary¡¯s current racial status, Greem also felt a shiver, as he thought about how powerful Adepts must be, that they should be able to hunt these vampires into extinction.


    What kind of Magic experiment did Mary go through? How did it turn an ordinary human girl into this bloodthirsty ancient species who loved to kill? Could the strange noises he heard during the night have been caused by Mary¡¯s ¡®mutation¡¯?


    Right when the red dressed girl Mary moved threateningly towards Ellen, who was still trembling, the torches on both sides of the dark corridor suddenly lit up, and a mystic figure stepped out from the shadows of the wall and spoke.


    ¡°Halt your steps, my child. Today¡¯s ughter has been more than enough for you toplete thest step in your evolution! From now on, you have to try your best to restrain your desire for fresh blood by steeling your mind. Return to the path of searching for knowledge!¡±


    The man who was speaking had a bent back, and his face was full of wrinkles and loose skin. A long, flowing, pure ck robe covered his body, and a long pointed hat, which curled slightly at the top, sat on his head. He was holding a staff made from twisted roots and gnarled branches, and it had a big green crystal embedded on top of it. Specks of light diffused from the crystal, creatingyers of amber in the middle of the air.


    This old man was the only Adept in this Adept Tower, the great Adept, Anderson.


    As for his Adept rank, with Greem¡¯s current knowledge and experience, he had no idea.


    Although he had known that today¡¯s events would alert the master of the Adept Tower, which is why Greem had disabled his elemental vision beforehand, but when Adept Anderson suddenly appeared in the hallway, the strong magical energy radiating from his body still caused Greem¡¯s eyes to sting and tear up.


    Greem quickly, yet gently, shut his door as tightly as possible, hiding quietly in his room. He didn¡¯t have the courage to peek at what was happening outside. If he saw some secret that Adept Anderson didn¡¯t want anybody to know about, his pathetic life would quickly end.


    All the real Adepts, that Greem knew about, were cruel and vicious men, who weren¡¯t phased in the slightest when it came to killing someone, and who carried out all sorts of dangerous and evil magical experiments on living human and creatures as if it was nothing. No matter how careful he was, there was no way he could hide from Adept Anderson¡¯s spiritual senses. However, by behaving in this way, he was showing that he wasn¡¯t trying to watch, and wasn¡¯t involving himself in any of the Adept¡¯s business. At least if he left before anything really happened, he would be safe.


    Meanwhile, on the other side of the wall, a nasty confrontation was ongoing.


    Mary had, once again, turned into a ferocious and frightening Vampire. Her blood red eyes were shing like a wild beast¡¯s and her nails had started to grow crazily, eventually bing sharp ws with glinting tips.


    Clearly, the Vampire Mary had a bestial nature. Her body was up against the wall. Like a gecko, she was climbing around on the vertical wall at an incredibly high speed. She started rushing toward the master of the Tower, Adept Anderson.


    Running along the wall at high speeds, when she got close enough to the Adept, Mary kicked off the wall with her powerful legs, catapulting her lithe body toward the Adept at a zing fast speed. While her body was flying through the air, Mary stretched her ws forward, reaching out to grab at the Adept¡¯s heart.


    When faced with this aggressive Vampire in her nascent form, all Adept Anderson did was grin his evil smile. There wasn¡¯t the slightest sign of panic or worry on his face. He shook the staff in his hand, and a small tornado appeared in Mary¡¯s path.


    ¡°Even though it is just a homunculus, the bloodthirsty nature actually surpassed the consciousness of the host... what a pity...¡±


    Mary¡¯s body weight was rather light after being modified, so her attacks were focused on speed and agility. Too bad that, in the eyes of an Adept, her innate abilities, though beyond that of normal humans, were not enough to cause him even the slightest bit of worry. Therefore, when Mary mmed into the tornado, she was immediately caught tightly in it, and was unable to escape.


    A secondter, as the suction force of the tornado became stronger, Mary let out a cry of shock, as her body was being spun about, making her ridiculously dizzy.


    Under the control of Adept Anderson, the tornado twisted, and Mary was thrown out from it, forcefully mming into a nearby stone wall. Although it did not seem like Anderson had put much effort into it, but the impact was enough to take Mary out of the fight. Greem could even hear the sound of bones cracking through the wooden door.


    ¡°A newborn Vampire who has lost her mind... Why would I keep you? Go to hell!¡±


    Adept Anderson smiled hideously, then he raised his skinny and wizened right arm, unleashing a pale white me, filled with the aura of death, which floated above his palm. Then he flipped his palm and pressed down onto the struggling and groaning girl¡¯s forehead.


    Perhaps it was because she sensed that her death was near, but this vampire, who were known for having extraordinary senses when it came to detecting danger, finally stopped struggling about like a beast. Mary suddenly let out a grating scream, moving her body backward desperately, a deep fear could be seen in her eyes as she looked at the me. Those same eyes had shifted from a crimson red to a deep green color.


    ¡°Eh?¡± Master Anderson stopped pressing his arm down. The deathly fireball was still burning quietly, but the cracking sound of a normal fire burning couldn¡¯t be heard. The reflection of the pale dancing white me made Mary¡¯s pale face look even whiter, as if there was a thickyer of powder applied to it.


    ¡°Oh... So the fear of death can make you regain consciousness? This is a phenomenon that I have never seen before... I think there is value in researching this.¡± Adept Anderson spoke to himself under his breath. He waved his palm and killed off the me. After that, he snapped his fingers, creating dozens of small air vortexes around Mary¡¯s neck, limbs, and all her joints, firmly chaining her up.


    Then he turned around and nced at Anksorus¡¯s corpse.


    Because of Mary¡¯s blood crazy feeding, all the blood in the body had been sucked out. Therefore, Anksorus¡¯s corpse had taken on a very grim visage. What had been healthy looking skin minutes ago had be wizened and saggy, making his corpse look simr to that of a mummy who had been buried underground for dozens of years.


    ¡°The original Apprentice Leader is dead... I¡¯ll have you rece him! Remember to properly manage all my apprentices.¡± With a frown on his face, Adept Anderson simply pointed his finger at Ellen, who was barely able to stand by supporting his weight against the stone walls, and gave out his order in an indifferent tone.


    After he finished saying that, the torches on the corridor¡¯s wall suddenly dimmed. When they resumed their original brightness, the master Adept and Mary had disappeared from the corridor.


    After witnessing a bloody feast and barely escaping with his life, Ellen was unexpectedly promoted to Apprentice Leader. His body was still trembling violently, and his pants were wet, but his face was filled with a mixture of shock and excitement.


    Suddenly he thought of something. With staggered steps, he leaped onto Anksorus¡¯s corpse and began to crazily search through the contents of the dead man¡¯s pockets.


    Since he had be the new Apprentice Leader, the Magical Talisman which represented the status of Apprentice Leader now belonged to him. He had to find it as soon as possible.


    Waist pocket, inner pocket, neck guard, leather boot...


    He performed a thorough search through all the ces that could hide things on Anksorus¡¯s body. The corpse, which he had formerly looked on with fear and distaste, had now be his treasure chest, filling him with great delight.


    Finally, he found the Magical Talisman on the dreadful looking broken neck of the corpse. Holding it high up, heughed loudly and merrily, obviously having no idea how insane was his behavior looked in the eyes of others.


    Fenrir, who had fainted on the floor, moved his body, struggling long and hard to stand up.


    As he gazed at Ellen, he was filled with a murderous intention due to the jealousy he felt.


    As a matter of fact, he had awakened long before, but, as he couldn¡¯t predict what would happen, he had remained lying on the ground, pretending he was still unconscious.


    Who would¡¯ve thought that his fear would actually make him miss an opportunity to be the next Apprentice Leader, which was quite a prestigious status to him. At this moment, he wished he could strip Ellen¡¯s flesh from his bones!


    ¡°Why didn¡¯t that vampire kill him?!?¡± Fenrir roared furiously in his mind.


    But on the surface, he had covered up the feeling of loss and fury, which was so prevalent in his mind. When he stood up from the floor, he had a ttering smile on his face.


    ¡°Apprentice Leader Ellen, quickly get up. The floor is dirty. Let me clean up the mess for you!¡±


    Fenrir¡¯s interruption immediately restored Ellen to reason.


    Ellen stood up swiftly and tidied up his appearance. While looking at the Magical Talisman in his hands, an arrogant smile covered his face.


    ¡°I¡¯ll leave everything here to you! Something bad has happened to the original Apprentice Leader. I need to inform everybody about this urgent news... Hmm. I seem to remember that it is time to feed those Giant Alligators outside...¡± Thest part of the sentence was said in a cruel and uncaring voice.


    ¡°Understood! I¡¯ll clean this mess up right away!¡± Fenrir couldn¡¯t help but bend his head even lower.


    After enjoying the first tastes of his newfound power, Ellen couldn¡¯t hold himself back, and let out a loudugh again. Then he quickly walked down the corridor and out of sight.


    He had looted everything left on Anksorus¡¯s body, but there might still be some good stuff left in Anksorus¡¯s room. Therefore, after leaving the mess to Fenrir, he impatiently sprinted toward the end of the corridor.


    It took a few minutes for the sound of his maliciousughter to die away.

 Chapter 9

    At dinner, all the Apprentice Adepts learned that they had gotten a new Apprentice Leader.


    In regards to this change, most of the Apprentices showed no reactions, and not a single person even asked what had happened to Anksorus.


    Greem, being quite the opposite of their new Apprentice Leader, Ellen, who was proudly proiming his new status in the cafeteria, could barely hold down his ire at his new Apprentice Leader.


    Although the former Apprentice Leader hadn¡¯t been very nice, at least he was a fairly strong guy who had mastered three to four magic spells. He wasn¡¯t as strong as Hawkeye, Evil Bugs, or Madwoman, but he was much stronger than most of the elementary level Apprentices. Why else would they swallow their pride silently while being ruthlessly exploited by him?


    On the other hand, everybody knew Ellen¡¯s background. He was just a rookie, and had only mastered ¡®Wind de¡¯ and ¡®Twister Shield¡¯. He had spent most of the past year hiding in the Adept Tower, which made hisbat skills awfully weak. If he had to fight them, perhaps more than half of the Apprentices Adepts could defeat him 1-on-1.


    But looking at the four ¡®friends¡¯ who were surrounding him, clearly this guy had a good understanding of his weaknesses and hadpensated for them by drawing in a few helpers.


    Right when Ellen was proudly giving his ¡®inauguration speech¡¯, the wooden door of the cafeteria was roughly kicked opened by someone, forcefully mming up against the stone wall.


    After that, a young man, who had his left eye covered with an eye patch, walked into the cafeteria with a somber expression on his face.


    Apprentice Leader Ellen¡¯s ¡®inauguration speech¡¯ came to a sudden halt. At the same time, whispers of ¡°Hawkeye¡± could be heard from all corners of the cafeteria.


    The young man who wore eye patch was one of the three strongest Apprentice Adepts, Hawkeye.


    As they were the strongest, each of them had a group of subordinates who always gathered around them. Therefore, the three of them never came to dine in this cafeteria, as all their meal were brought directly to their rooms by their subordinates.


    That¡¯s the reason why all Apprentices felt surprised when Hawkeye suddenly visited the cafeteria.


    Of course, Hawkeye didn¡¯te here for a meal, but to look for someone.


    Hawkeye swept the entire canteen with his single eye, and every single Apprentice lowered their heads, rather than meeting his gaze. It was impossible to do anything else, as a powerful energy seemed to travel out from his eye, suppressing anyone who dared to meet his eyes.


    See Hawkeye begin to walk towards him, Greem felt his heart stop. He immediately lowered his head even more.


    Unfortunately for him, Hawkeye¡¯s legs came to a stop right in front of him.


    ¡°Are you Greem? Come with me!¡± Hawkeye didn¡¯t say very much, but what little he did say was impossible to ignore. After saying that, he turned around and left, not caring the slightest about anyone else¡¯s reactions.


    A wry smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face. He pushed his meal tray away, stood up, and followed behind Hawkeye.


    Without turning his head, Greem could feel the annoyed gaze of the new Apprentice Leader, Ellen, burning a hole in the back of his head.


    Greem had a rough idea why this guy came for him. Therefore, when, after following Hawkeye through a few long dark corridors, he arrived at a certain wooden door, he was fairly sure he was right about what was going on.


    This was Madwoman¡¯s room. Waiting inside were the other two strongest Apprentice Adepts: Evil Bugs and Madwoman.


    It was a stone room, nearly as simple as Greem¡¯s room, and it was furnished to the same level as Greem¡¯s room was. There was a solid wooden bed, a writing table, and a chair... nothing else.


    Well, there was one more thing. In one corner of the room, there was a human-shaped practicing target made entirely of metal. From the crisscrossing scars and markings on it, perhaps it was the most frequently used piece of ¡®furniture¡¯ in this room.


    Also, Madwoman¡¯s iconic steel greatsword was hanging from the wall on the other side of the room.


    Hawkeye, Evil Bugs, and Madwoman didn¡¯t have a harmonious rtionship most of the time, but when something rted to their personal interests happened, this small group could still work together to further all their interests.


    As this was Madwoman¡¯s room, clearly she was the only one who would take charge here.


    When Greem, who felt he was in an awkward situation, stopped right in the middle of the room. The person who attracted most of his attention was Madwoman, who had a muscr body, which looked like that of a barbarian¡¯s. She was standing with her arm folded at her chest. Madwoman didn¡¯t wear a soft and baggy cloth robe, like most Apprentices, but wore a simple leather jacket and pants.


    The leather jacket was straining and looked like it was going to burst as her bulging muscles pushed against it. Her muscles looked like chunks of steel and made Greem feel a bit envious. To be honest, no matter how much Greem searched in his memory, he swore that he had never seen a woman with such a muscr body before.


    ¡°I heard that you saw what happened this afternoon? Tell me everything you know! If anything you say is of value, we will reward you considerably!¡± Madwoman¡¯s voice was like her body, strong and powerful.


    In regards to what Madwoman said, Evil Bugs, whose entire body was covered with a thick cloak made a movement as if he was nodding his head, while Hawkeye, who had brought Greem here, didn¡¯t do or say anything.


    ............


    Half an hourter, Greem returned to his own room.


    After he shut the door, he impatiently pressed his back against the cold, iron framed, wooden door, saying nothing aloud, but speaking in his mind.


    ¡°Was there any result from your probe just now? Quickly, show me all the data!¡±


    *Beep* ¡°Probing of living organismspleted. The results are listed below...¡±


    Following that, streams of information started flowing into his brain, It took a moment, but information on the strongest three Apprentice Adepts started taking shape.


    Since the Biological Assistance Chip had activated, it had beencking much in reference to information on Adepts, as it had no data forparison. Therefore, the organizing and categorization of Adepts had not progressed at all. In Greem¡¯s brain, there was a huge amount of information on Magical Spells, Magical Items, and conceptual descriptions of each, but he just hadn¡¯t had the chance to witness and observe any actual Magical phenomenon. As a result, the chip was unable to derive information on the more magical things in his surroundings based on its current memory.


    It was such an unfortunate situation.


    But, today, through close observation of the three strongest Apprentice Adepts, no doubt Greem had obtained a lot of precious data. This would, no doubt, be of great benefit in defining his future development path.


    Of course, if he could personally experience the abilities of an official Adept, it would result in him getting much better data. Unfortunately, he feared that his chip¡¯s scanning feature would be noticed if he targeted an official Adept. Therefore, Greem could only use his passive sensing ability, which was the mode he had put the chip in when Adept Anderson had suddenly appeared yesterday.


    As for today, when the three strongest Apprentice Adepts were standing in front of him, he felt it was safe to scan them, and they did not have very strongest spirit energy maniption abilities, so they were leaking a lot of energy, which the chip could scan and analyze. That¡¯s why Greem could fearlessly put out his full sensing and sense all the leaking information. As the result, it had progressed in its calction of the source of Magic.


    These were absolutely amazing numbers. If they had not been within the realm of Greem¡¯s expectations, perhaps he would have cried out loud. Hawkeye was, indeed, worthy of being called one of the three strongest Apprentice Adepts. With just these basic body stats, he could easily crush Greem.


    In a matchup against Hawkeye, his strength was weaker, his speed was slower, and his body was not as tough. Even if both of them only mastered one spell, Hawkeye would still have thousands of method to kill Greem. Not to mention, this guy was far more powerful when using magic spells!


    But Hawkeye¡¯s Spirit attribute was the one gave that Greem the most surprise. Having a Spirit of 18 meant that he had incredibly strong spiritual senses. He would be able to sense the slightest heartbeat within a 50-meter radius! With such a strong sensing ability, the difficulty ofunching a sneak attack on him would be immense.


    However, the chip put a question mark in the race field... It looked like there were some inhuman elements to be found in the energy he put off. Maybe this had something to do with the imnted eye?


    Compared to Hawkeye, it seemed Evil Bugs was better at concealing his energy, as even the chip couldn¡¯t obtain his attributes at such a close range. But from his powerful Spirit of 19, which clearly couldn¡¯t be hidden, it could be seen that, between the two, he was the one who was the closest to bing an official Adept.


    But looked like he had modified his body to a very high degree of modification, as it had reached a level where even the chip couldn¡¯t determine his race.


    In brief, although he probably didn¡¯t have the highest of physical attributes, he was still one of the three strongest, and this was shown in the frightening spells he had mastered and the modifications he had made to his body.


    Looking at Madwoman¡¯s attributes, a sense of powerlessness came from the bottom of Greem¡¯s heart. 15 Strength, 16 Physique... was she still a fucking human? Perhaps, with attributes like these, she was no different that some of the demon beasts in the swamp?


    Whenparing the strength of two fighters, if there was a difference in strength of 5, the weaker party would be easily knocked flying. If the difference was 10, the weaker party would experience broken bones and smashed flesh every time they got hit. The difference in Strength between Greem and Madwoman was a shocking 11 points.


    This... This was ridiculous! Even if both of them fought bare-handed, Greem would be as fragile as ss in front of her? Not to mention that if she struck him in the face, he would likely have his skull crushed in.


    Naturally, all kinds of fighting scenes appeared in Greem¡¯s mind, but in every scene, he would end up severely beaten or dead.


    As for that 16 in Physique, it simply ced a huge gap between them. Even if Madwoman just stood there without moving and let Greem attack her with Burning Hand for a couple of minutes, it still might not be enough to kill her.


    Through theparison of this basic data, once again Greem acknowledged his weakness. With just his own personal effort, and under the magnifying effect of his innate attributes, the gap between himself and these guys, who were extraordinarily talented, would just be bigger and bigger. He didn¡¯t think that there was any way he could catch up to them on his own.


    Therefore, if he really wanted to proceed in this bizarre world, the only thing he could depend on was the Biological Assistance Chip inside him.


    Only after pondering these things did Greem look at the reward he had gotten from the ¡®strongest three¡¯.


    With a flip of his hand, a thick book appeared in front of Greem.


    With his great eloquence and urate depiction of his experience from the day before, Greem truthfully described all the detail movements of the red dressed Mary. No doubt this gave the ¡®strongest three¡¯ a better impression of him. Only then was he given this odd looking book of magical knowledge.


    ording to the rules of the Adept Tower, any exchange of internal knowledge was strictly prohibited. Exchanging any magical knowledge copied by Apprentice Adepts was also strictly prohibited. Anyone who vited these prohibitions would be punished by the master of the Tower. Therefore, Madwoman must have obtained this book from another ce, or else she wouldn¡¯t have simply given it to Greem.


    Greem held his breath impatiently, then he flipped to the first page of the book.


    ¡®Golem Creation Manual¡¯!

 Chapter 10

    ¡°Titan, a physical construction with a powerful magic at its foundation. It is a magical automaton. It is made using mystical materials, such as the Magic Repelling Steel from the Master Material Universe. The primary characteristic of it is the resistance toward the elements.¡± ¨CLilo ? Ann


    ......


    Golems are artificial, self-loting objects created by Adepts. The Titan was the most powerful of these golems. The most defining characteristic of these Titans was their resistance toward elemental attacks. In other words, only those golems which possessed elemental damage resistance could be called Titans. It was all because of the mightiness of Adepts. It was only thanks to the characteristic of elemental damage resistance that they were considered to be so powerful.


    However, being able to resist elemental damage didn¡¯t mean the golem was the ultimate weapon for an Adept. This ability only allowed a Titan to be immune to spells targeted at its body. For example, using a fireball on the ceiling above a Titan, causing it to be crushed by the weight of the ceiling, or casting an Acid Pool spell and causing the Titan to fall into the generated pool of acid. Both of these spells were very effective against Titans. Not to mention that all Titans had very low Spirit. They could only follow simplemands, which was their biggest weakness when facing intelligent lifeforms.


    Also, Titans were not totally immune from elemental damage, as using a specific elemental spell would cause a specific effect to a certain type of Titan. By properly understanding their weaknesses, it was rather simple to fight against a Titan.


    ......


    So golems were mechanical living organisms who possessed powerful strength and were created with magic. The most significant difference between them and other golem was their strength, making them seem full of vitality. Golems gained their magical life from an elemental soul, which was usually of the Earth element. The process of creating a golem was taking a soul and tying it onto a manmade body. It would then merge with this specially prepared vessel, and obey the will of its creator.


    ......


    Golems didn¡¯t have their own minds, and they wouldn¡¯t do any other things unless their creator specifically gave them themand. They would follow simple and precisemands, and couldn¡¯t eptplicated strategies or tactics. The creator could onlymand a golem within a 60-meter radius, and he had to be able to see or hear the golem. If no newmand was given, the golem would usually give their all in carrying out thestmand given to them. Of course, they would fight back if somebody attacked them.


    If the creator was not going to be near the golem, he could preemptively give the golem a simplemand to guide its movement, or could make the golem follow another person¡¯smands. But as the creator of the golem, he could always make the golem only follow hismand, revoking another person¡¯s control rights at any time.


    ......


    Somehow, once he started reading the book, Greem was instantly caught up in the content of it, hardly able to tear himself away from it, and, thus, he finished it in one go.


    Golems were a really good thing!


    Putting aside those advanced steel golems, even the lowest level y golem could challenge an advanced Apprentice Adept. In other words, only a group that worked well together, and all were at the advanced level of abat profession, would have the possibility of defeating a y golem.


    As guards for Adepts, Titans, and other golems, were so much more dependable than human guards, as they were absolutely loyal. On the downside, the cost of a Titan, or any other golem, left Greem speechless.


    Take the lowest level y golem as an example: a y golem, without any additional magical equipment, weighed 600 pounds, was 8 feet tall when standing straight, and was entirely made from soft y. This type of y golem wouldn¡¯t take any damage from sharp weapons, but some heavy weapons could cause physical damage to them.


    The base cost for this type of y golem was 21,000 gold coins. As for the stone golem, which was one level higher than the y golem, their basic cost was 55,000 gold coins. And the even higher leveled iron golem was a shocking 80,000 gold coins.


    This was the base cost before taking in the effects of supply and demand of the market into consideration. If it was during a period of war, these golems, which were extremely suitable for use on the battlefield, would have their prices doubled and people would still easily pay for them. As long as a small lord purchased three to five y golems and ced them into his own army, he would be able to gain a huge advantage when fighting with other nearby lords.


    Therefore, if he was able to be a golem creator, money would no longer be an issue for Greem!


    Unfortunately, not only did it take a huge amount of unique materials to create a golem, but it also required an extraordinary wondrous item crafting skill and the ability to create soul vessels. If Greem¡¯s innate elemental affinity was the Dark element, maybe he could extract souls from some human-like creatures. Then he would be able to easily create soul vessels, which could give a golem basic intelligence. However, his elementary affinity was the Fire element, and that killed off any possibility of making a golem anytime soon.


    What Greem could do now was ask the Chip to store all the content on this ¡®Golem Creation Manual¡¯ temporarily, so he could do more research in the future. After considering all these things, he began to research the new functions of the Chip.


    Following the slow chanting of a magical incantation, Greem, who had stretched out his right arm, suddenly had a glowing magical me ignite in his hand, covering his entire palm and part of his arm.


    As he was staring at the me burning calmly on his hand, the mechanical voice of the Chip resounded in his brain.


    *Beep* ¡°Aplete Spirit energy model has been detected. Please confirm if the host wants to solidify it? Warning: The solidification will reduce Spirit by 2 and Profession Experience by 50!¡±


    The same message had appeared once when he was inspecting the outside of the Tower. But, as he was at a dangerous ce at that time, Greem hadn¡¯t dared to test it, and, hence, he had chosen to ignore it. But today, he decided to check out what this Solidification was all about!


    ¡°Confirm!¡±


    *Beep* ¡°Solidification taskmencing now... expectedpletion time: 12 hours, 27 minutes and 13 seconds...¡±


    Greem¡¯s mind trembled as with the Chip began the ¡®Solidification task¡¯. He clearly felt part of his Spirit had disappeared. After a self-inspection, he found his Profession Experience had dropped from 614/1000 to 564/1000.


    Ugh... his 614 Profession Experience was the result of Greem¡¯s past six years of effort, including constant meditation, countless failures while practicing spellcasting, countless hours under the dimmed candlelight copying those hard to understand books of magic, and those dangerous, but unavoidable, magical experiments...


    Frankly speaking, in the past, Greem had, indeed, been pretty useless. He had be an Apprentice Adept six years ago but had only umted half of the Profession Experience required to be an intermediate Apprentice, and he had only mastered one spell ¨C Burning Hand. As for the second magic spell he was currently learning ¨C Fire Arrow ¨C he had only just begun gathering the preliminary knowledge for it, and thus was still far away from a sessfully casting of that spell.


    After analyzing this data, he realized that, among all the Apprentices in the Tower, the innate attribute of his body was considered low-grade... No wonder he hadn¡¯t be an intermediate Apprentice in these six years.


    But that was the Greem of the past!


    Now, with the support of the Chip, he had gained a fresh start and would soon be able to solve all the difficulties in front of him.


    The task of solidifying the Spirit model for the Burning Hand was upying most of Greem¡¯s mental capacity, which made him feel mentally exhausted. In this situation, it was no longer suitable for him to carry on with any spell practice or reading that would consume his Spirit. Therefore, Greem simplyy down on his bed and began to meditate.


    Following the start of his meditation, Greem gradually calmed down. His breath became longer and more regr, and his entire Spiritual conscious waspletely indulged in extending from his body.


    The once noiseless room became emptier and quieter, as if everything around him had suddenly be muted. The feeling of his body became indistinct, and he felt like he was sinking into a gigantic piece of cotton candy. It felt like everything his body was being pulled apart.


    Finally, his spiritual conscious broke through the boundary of his body and went into a bizarre world.


    This was a world full of lights.


    Mystical specks, of a variety of colors, were dancing in the air,pletely filling every inch of space he could sense.


    Perhaps the intrusion of his spiritual conscious alerted these illuminating specks, who seemed to dance around irregrly and unconsciously. Suddenly this bizarre world shifted and became a little bit of different.


    Greem¡¯s spiritual conscious started to swim aimlessly in this world full of bright specks of light. Wherever he went, it seemed like each different speck had its own independent conscious, as they each acted in different ways.


    Those illuminating specks who dimly glowed red showed an obvious weing behavior toward Greem, as they would jump into his soul when got close enough, giving him wisps of warm sensations. On the other hand, those cold toned illuminating specks, for example, Blue, Gray, ck, White... clearly, they were keeping a distance from him.


    As for those neutral colors, like Purple, Green, Yellow, these illuminating specks didn¡¯t move away from him nor show any passionate behavior, but when Greem¡¯s spiritual conscious touched them, they would still merge with him slowly. The entire process was calm and harmonious, and nothing unnatural could be found.


    The bright orb representing Greem¡¯s spiritual conscious slowly roamed in this boundless ocean of light, passively epting the merging of those specks of light. Out of curiosity, he tried to control his orb and moved toward some White specks. Apparently, his arrival had rmed the White illuminating specks, as the leisurely and mindless swimming specks immediately fled the area.


    Finally, Greem couldn¡¯t bear it anymore. Under a strong conscious guidance, a spiritual tentacle suddenly stretched out from his transparent orb of soul and poked through a slightly bigger White speck.


    The White speck exploded, turning into a stream of Spirit and flowing into Greem¡¯s soul. Compared to the warm sensation he got when merging with the Red specks, what this pale looking speck brought to Greem was gloomy, dead silence.


    The feeling was like when someone woke up at midnight and suddenly drank a ss of cold water. It just made his body shiver. Aside from the shivering sensation, Greem¡¯s spiritual conscious felt a shock and a corrosive pain. It seemed that, while it would bring his Spirit some advantages, merging with the White specks would also damage him.

 Chapter 11

    Greem suddenly shuddered, shaking him out of his deep meditative state.


    Greem sat up on his bed, panting. He could still vividly remember what he just experienced in his dream. He could even feel a bit of the burning pain he had received from the white speck.


    Was it an illusion? A dream? Perhaps it was something else?


    Greem began to feel a certain sense of bewilderment and confusion.


    He had meditated countless times before, and every time it had been a vague experience. Only rarely did he feel anything even slightly spiritual. As for thatst dream.... it was... it was like he was in control of himself while dreaming!


    ¡°Chip, run a self-scan!¡± Greem, having suddenly thought of something, gave the chip an order.


    *Beep* ¡°Beginning scan of the host¡¯s body... Scanpleted. Saving self-test report...¡±


    Following the messages from the Chip, a new self-scan report was projected into his mind.


    As expected, some abnormal changes had urred in his body.


    If not because the Chip could perform an urate detection down to the cellr level, Greem would never know that the deep meditation just now had actually increased his Spirit by 0.03 and his Experience by 2.


    That meant that the dream-like state he had experienced just now was not an illusion, but had really happened.


    So what were those colored specks of light?


    Right when the question arose in his mind, the answer came to him.


    Elementium!


    Every person who had the talent to be Adept would have a different elemental affinity. Those colored specks of light he saw during meditation were actually bits of Elementium flowing through the world around him. As his elemental affinity was fire, those red specks, which were drawn toward him, like bugs toward a bright light, were actually Fire Elementium.


    ording to the Elementium ssifications done by Adepts, his affinity toward red Fire Elementium was the highest. After that was the green nt Elementium and the yellow Earth Elementium. As for the others, he did not have an affinity to them as they were repelled by the Elementium which he had an affinity to.


    As for the white speck that Greem had caught during his meditation, it must have been Dark Elementium. Because it did not match with Greem¡¯s affinity, it would be at least ten times, or even a hundred times, more difficult for him to catchpared to Elementium he had an affinity for. Besides that, although these Dark Elementium could still increase his spirit by a tiny amount, they would also hurt his body at the same time.


    In his memory, the few Apprentice Adepts he knew who had Dark Elementium as their primary elemental affinity, didn¡¯t have very healthy bodies and they always looked like a gust of wind could knock them down. Perhaps the corrosiveness of the Dark Elementium was the cause of their frailty?


    It seems that the innate elemental affinity of an Apprentice could affect the efficiency of their meditation, and that efficiency could, in turn, increase the growth rate of the Apprentice¡¯s Spirit.


    Greem tried to recall what he experienced back when he was meditating, and what he remembered made him frown. ording to his memory, the numbers of white Dark Elementium specks was clearly far more than the number of red Fire Elementium specks. That meant that, in this environment, the efficiency of meditation for those Apprentices who had an affinity for Dark Elementium was way higher than his own!


    How was this possible? Shouldn¡¯t the distribution of the basic Elementium in this world be rtively bnced?


    Could it... could it be that the Adept of the Tower did this purposefully?


    Suddenly, Greem¡¯s face took on a ghastly pallor.


    He had just remembered that master of the Tower, Adept Anderson, had affinities for Dark and Wind Elementium.


    No wonder that many of the other Apprentice Adepts who had joined the Tower around the same time as Greem had mastered two or three spells and managed to rank up to intermediate Apprentice, while he was still struggling down the path of a beginner Apprentice. It was not only his own innate talent that tied him down. It was this damn ¡®harsh¡¯ environment.


    Greem thought for a second, then he gave up the idea of meditating again. For a beginner Apprentice Adept like him, although meditation could increase his Spirit, it still couldn¡¯t rece sleeping. Therefore, in order to restore Spirit in a fast and efficient manner, calming his mind and sleeping was the best way to go.


    Looking at his own Spirit, which had been reduced to half, Greem shook his head and smiled bitterly. Then he threw himself back on his bed and fell into a deep slumber.


    ......


    The next day, Greem, who was sleeping soundly, was awoken suddenly by an rm from the Chip.


    To his surprise, the spiritual model of the Burning Hand had been solidified by the Chip.


    Over the next few seconds, all the data regarding this spiritual model flowed into Greem¡¯s mind.


    The Burning Hand was a low-grade fire spell capable of engaging foes in both offense and defense, but it was not considered a powerful spell. However, the spiritual model of it showed that it was formed from many magic words; 28, in fact. Each of these 28 magic words was nearly impossible to pronounce and had its own unique independent usage. While it may appear that each of them was unrted, when they were put together in a specific formation, they would be aplete magic model, capable of unleashing magical forces on the physical world.


    If this task was handed to an ordinary man, asking him to memorize 28 independent but closely connected magic sybles, then to recite them without missing a single one... Most mortals wouldn¡¯t be able to achieve this, as just speaking a single spell word required great control and energy.


    When he first arrived in this world, he didn¡¯t believe he would be able to do that. But in this bizarre world, where Elemental Energy was everywhere, he actually aplished this fairly easily.


    Of course, this had something to do with his 8 points of Spirit Energy.


    In the past, reciting the Burning Hand spell, which consisted of 28 magic sybles, took Greem 5 ¨C 7 seconds. But, now that it had been solidified, Greem didn¡¯t need to waste time reciting the spell. All he needed to do was to inject his Elemental Energy into the model of Burning Hand in his mind.


    This meant that it only took him 2 ¨C 3 seconds to release aplete version of Burning Hand. Moreover, in the future, when he improved his fire elemental mastery, the duration of casting would be further shortened.


    But that was not the only good news.


    As this was a spiritual model that had been pre-solidified in his mind, it no longer required as much of his Spirit energy to construct it. The result of this was that the Burning Hand spell, which used to deplete his Spirit by 2 when casting, now only depleted his Spirit by 1.


    Didn¡¯t that mean the number of times he could cast spells in the future had doubled?


    This discovery was brought a big smile to his face as his mind was wildly dreaming up many possible uses for this particr ability.


    But then the Chip, once again, resounded in his mind.


    *Beep* ¡°Discovered room for improvement of this spell model. Please confirm if the host wants to optimize? Attention, this optimization will cost 1 Spirit per day, and 100 Experience. Estimated time for the task is 34 hours and 25 minutes¡±


    Huh? Optimize the Burning Hand?


    It sounded like something really good. But why did it consume so much Experience? If any operation rted to Spiritual models cost him this many Experience points, perhaps all the Experience points he umted in the past six years would be used up in the next few days.


    Greem calmed himself down and took a moment to ponder this optimization. After a few moments he decided to decline.


    First off, Burning Hand was just a close ranged spell. It didn¡¯t have much potentialbat value in Greem¡¯s mind. Sooner orter, it would be reced by other long ranged offensive or defensive spells which were more valuable, therefore it wasn¡¯t worth investing in it now.


    Second, taking his current Spirit energy into consideration, he couldn¡¯t have more than 3 solidified models in his Spiritual Domain. Under this situation, where only limited slots were avable, giving Burning Hand a space in his Spiritual Domain clearly didn¡¯t match up with his optimized path.


    In fact, Greem himself would¡¯ve preferred to prioritize the solidification of a long-range attack spell, and he had a specific spell in mind for this very purpose.


    This was a fire spell that he had studied and researched for nearly half a year ¨C Fire Arrow.


    Fire Arrow, a low-grade fire elemental spell. The spell allowed him to form a magical arrow of Fire Elementium and throw it at his target, causing 7 points of physical damage and 18 points of fire and explosive damage.


    With Greem¡¯s pitiful 3 Physique and 11 Health Points, a Fire Arrow was more than enough to instantly kill him. Therefore, all this time Greem had been dreaming of learning this long-ranged attack spell.


    But too bad, although Fire Arrow was a low-grade spell, it consisted of 34 Spell Words. This was the reason why, even though he had been restlessly studying for half a year, he still hadn¡¯t mastered the method of constructing its Spiritual model.


    Greem had invested more than 20 Knowledge points and a huge amount of time in learning this Fire Arrow spell. It even dyed his research into Magic knowledge. However, he was still lingering outside the door of sess, and far from bing an elite among the Beginner Apprentice Adepts, mastering more than two spells.


    But now, with the help of the Chip, presumably this ¡®doorway¡¯ hade much closer!


    Ignoring the fact that it was time for breakfast, Greem hurriedly washed his face, then sat in front of his writing table, excitedly opening up his magic notebook. Everything rted to the magical model of the Fire Arrow, the magic words of it, the frequency of the Spirit Energy, and the material of the spell construct; Greem had copied all of them into this notebook.


    Real spellcasting was not as simple as ordinary people thought it was.


    34 sybles of magic couldn¡¯t be recited in one go like how they were written. A spell couldn¡¯t be cast just like that. The entire process was an extremelyplicated process and required the perfectbination of hand, mouth, heart, and mind. It was the result of them working together.


    When reciting each syble, Greem needed to adjust his Spirit to a matching vibrational frequency, and both of his hands had to perform a specific gesture.


    Any mistake or dy in the casting process and the only result would be a... casting blowback.


    Although this kind of casting blowback wouldn¡¯t kill an Apprentice, it would cause damage to his Spirit, and it would take him a long time to recover. Also, if one¡¯s spirit was frequently damaged, there was a possibility that they could suffer a permanent reduction in their Spirit!

 Chapter 12

    Three dayster.


    With disheveled hair, a dirty face, and two red eyes, Greem breathed out a long sigh and closed the book sitting on the table in front of him.


    A moment ago, the Chip¡¯s alert tone, which he had been waiting on for a long time, had finally resounded in his brain.


    *Beep* ¡°Data Model of Fire Arrow has been constructed sessfully!¡±


    Finally!


    Thinking back, the Burning Hand was a spell Greem had masteredpletely. So long as he could cast it once, the Chip would be able to visualize its model in Greem¡¯s Spiritual Dimension via precisely monitoring how he controlled his Spirit Energy and the Spiritual Frequency he had used.


    It had been so simple and easy.


    But Greem hadn¡¯t mastered the Fire Arrow spell... he couldn¡¯t even sessfully cast it even once. Thus, the Chip¡¯s ability to record, store, and mimic his spells were unable to be used.


    So Greem had to find another method, and thus he memorized all rted magic theories and casting techniques of Fire Arrow. Then he let the Chip proceed with the arrangement and sorting of them, analyzing them to find out the best casting technique that matched him most precisely.


    The Data Model the Chip had constructed with this method wouldn¡¯t rece a real Spiritual Model, which made this a unique spell experiment, rather than the actualization of a spell.


    Greem massaged his forehead and took a few deep breaths. After that, he said, ¡°Let¡¯s begin the simtion!¡±


    *Beep*


    With a crystal clear alert tone, a nearly perfect virtual image of Greem was projected into his mind. Following the specifications of the data model, it started to recite the spell words of Fire Arrow in a sonorous, yet forceful, voice.


    Via his connection with the Chip, Greem¡¯s mind merged with the virtual image, following along with the reciting of the spell and adjusting the frequency of his Spirit to match that of the Data Model. At the same time, both hands of the virtual image were making small gestures in the air, guiding the attracted elemental energy and molding it into the shape of an arrow.


    Too bad, due to his unfamiliarity with the casting, when he was reciting the 14th magic word, its hand gesture was clearly a half second slower. Within Greem¡¯s Spiritual World, the half molded Fire Arrow exploded, and a raging fireball instantly swallowed the virtual image.


    If it was in the real world, perhaps nearly half of Greem¡¯s room would have been destroyed, but in this virtual world, simted with his Spirit Energy, after the violent wobbling of lights and shadows, the perfectly simted explosion disappeared, and the entire scene was restored to its initial state.


    Although he knew beforehand that everything was just a simtion, Greem still couldn¡¯t help breaking into a non-existent cold sweat in his spiritual World.


    Witnessing a huge fireball explode in front of his eyes, and seeing his virtual body being ripped apart, even Greem, who was not faint of heart, felt his heart stop for a second.


    In order to let himself truly experience theplete process of casting the spell, Greem had ced his entire conscious into the virtual image. Therefore, you could say what happened just now, while not being real, could be described as an unreal reality.


    Greem didn¡¯t jump right back into practicing, but closed his eyes, meticulously studying his first attempt in his mind. After he confirmed the reason for his mistake, he opened his eyes and began his second simted casting attempt.


    Unfortunately, it was a failure again! This time, he failed at matching his Spirit frequency with the 17th syble. The half-constructed Spiritual Model exploded once again. As a result, the raging element mes once more swallowed Greem¡¯s virtual body.


    The digitized wobbling of lights and shadows slowly faded.


    Soon, his Spiritual World was restored to its initial state.


    Greem let out a helpless and bitterugh, then he took a moment to calm down. Soon, the sonorous and forceful voice of the simted Greem¡¯s voice once again resounded throughout the empty Spiritual World.


    Many explosions urred...


    Every time, his mistake was nearly the same. Either his hand gestures couldn¡¯t keep up with the spell¡¯s sybles, or his Spirit frequency wasn¡¯t right. To put it simply, no matter which part caused the problem, there was be only one result: a massive explosion.


    If this had happened in the real world, Greem¡¯s weak body would have be powder after the first explosion. But since it was not, he was sitting safely beside his writing table, staring nkly into space.


    After practicing it so many times, his Spirit had finally been depleted.


    Whenever his Spirit waspletely depleted, he would struggle back to his bed and fall asleep. Once he had slept and restored his Spirit, he would then rush to the cafeteria, order himself a huge meal, then return to his room andmence the next round of Spell Simtion practice.


    With this incredible persistence and fortitude, finally, during an instance when everything worked wlessly, Greem sessfullypleted a simted casting of Fire Arrow.


    When the burning elemental me formed into a magic arrow and was stably floating between Greem¡¯s hands, he nearly couldn¡¯t hold back his tears. When he let himself get excited, a massive explosion, once again, devoured his body again.


    But he didn¡¯t get discouraged this time. Instead, he let out a loud and satisfiedugh while his Spiritual World was destroyed around him.


    ......


    Greem sat up straight in front of the writing table, opening his eyes for the first time in a few hours. A look of joy could be seen at the corners of said eyes.


    ¡°Chip, do you have a recording of myst Simted Spell attempt?¡±


    ¡°Video has been recorded and saved. You can rey it at any time...¡±


    Greem tried his best to calm down and nodded his head, but the way he tightly clenched his fists revealed how excited he was.


    This new found function of the Chip was really a huge help to him.


    Without the virtual Spiritual world constructed by the Chip, Greem could only practice this Fire Arrow Spell in the Spell Practice Room over and over. He would have to personally endure the backfire to his Spirit and body caused by his casting failures. Every serious casting backfire would require a period of time to heal and rest before being fully recovered. No doubt this would seriously dy the progress of learning any spell or progressing one¡¯s Spirit.


    This was the reason most of the Apprentices in the Tower only mastered one to two spells.


    Of course, there was a possibility that some Apprentices had hidden what they knew, never really exposing their true abilities. After all, the field of research and progress for all Apprentices was secretive, and trying to learn about one¡¯s private matters was a huge taboo within the Tower.


    There probably were not that many Apprentices hiding what they knew, as the number of unlucky guys who were struggling, even among Beginner Apprentice Adepts, was really quite high, and thus there was very little need to hide one¡¯s abilities. In the past, Greem was one of them.


    But with the activation of the Chip, Greem felt it was time for him to soar up into the sky.


    ¡°Chip, y the recording of the sessful casting!¡±


    *Beep*... with the appearance of data streams, a ¡®Greem¡¯ who was concentrating on spell casting was projected into his mind. Greem ced his entire focus on this virtual image, repeatedly watching the entire process of spellcasting. He watched every detail of it, not missing the slightest change in his Spiritual energy.


    Although it was only a Spiritual simtion, Greem¡¯s mind followed the normal spellcasting process andpleted it. Therefore, excluding theck of real elemental energy, nothing was different whenpared to casting the spell in the real world.


    It went without saying that this recording of a sessful spellcasting would go a long way in helping Greem mastered the magic spell. At least, it helped Greem save at least half a year of restless effort, and avoided the painful cycle of being injured, resting and healing, and being injured again.


    Since he had a single sess out of a hundred attempts, that meant that Greem¡¯s knowledge and ability were enough to support the minimum requirement for casting the Fire Arrow spell. Thus, the only obstacle that preventing him from mastering the Fire Arrow was his familiarity with casting the spell.


    And this was the strength of the Chip!


    After repeatedly reviewing the sessful simted casting, and making sure he had mastered all the key elements of the spell, Greem hurried out of his room and went straight to the Magic Spell Practice Room.


    This was also one of the inconveniences that an Apprentice Adept had to face.


    Their mastery in magic spells was too low, which made the consequence of practicing an unfamiliar magic spell in their own room too severe. Thus, the only option for them was to rent the Magic Spell Practice Room in the Tower, allowing them to experiment with a new spell. That¡¯s why there was a saying, the mastery of a new magic spell was always supported by the huge amount of knowledge... and an incredible amount of money.


    ......


    The Magic Spell Practice Room was located on the third floor of the Tower and was set up to handle any mishaps that a backfiring spell might cause.


    Although he was part of the Tower, Apprentice Adepts were only allowed to set foot on the first to third floors. The first floor was mainly for Probationary Apprentices, who had only recently joined the Tower. The second floor was the living quarters and recreational areas for official Apprentice Adepts. The third floor was a public area where they could experiment with magic spells and practice.


    The area where official Apprentices were allowed included: The Library, the Potion Brewing Room, the Summoning Room, the Alchemy Laboratory, the Magic Spell Practice Room, the Room of Seals, the Curse Altar, the Magical nt Cultivation Room... But as a lone wolf who always by himself, the only ces that Greem normally visited were the Library and the Magic Spell Practice Room. As for all the other ces, he did not have deep enough pockets to waste money visiting them.


    It was dinner time when he arrived, hence, there weren¡¯t many Apprentices at this ce.


    After Greem impatiently paid 10 gold coins to Amn, who was the administrator of the Magic Spell Practice Room, he was given a special card. With this card, he had an hour of practicing time in a practice room.


    For an Apprentice Adept, an hour of practicing time was considering pretty long. With their pitiful amount of Spiritual Energy, they couldn¡¯tst more than half an hour of continuous spellcasting. If Greem didn¡¯t control the output of his Spiritual Energy, he could deplete it all within fifteen minutes.


    Greem walked up to a stone door that had a number above it that matched the number on his card. He raised up the card and waved it gently in the air. The heavy stone door immediately opened up, not making any noise as it did so.


    The so-called ¡®Magic Spell Practice Room¡¯ was, in fact, a simple stone room that had about 40 square meters of space, but there was a gigantic human-shaped target, made of stone, ced on the other end of the room. The dull and dark material showed that it was made from a dark augite stone, which was capable of repelling magic.


    With the ability of an Apprentice Adept, the low-grade magic spells they were able to experiment with were definitely not enough to destroy such a solid and strong magic repelling stone target. That¡¯s why it was the most suitable target for magic practice.


    Of course, for those Apprentices who needed to practice their Curse Spells, or some other unique types of spells, they had no choice but spend money to purchase some suitable demons as their practicing target, or else they would have to sneak outside the Tower, where they could practice those bizarre spells in secret.

 Chapter 13

    After the stone door closed, the practice room became a soundproof space, and Greem wouldn¡¯t have to worry that someone might spy upon what he was doing from the outside.


    Greem took two steps forward, positioning himself right in the center of a strange looking spell formation that was about 2 meters in diameter. He couldn¡¯t recognize a single spell drawn on it. Clearly, they were far beyond the knowledge of any Beginner Apprentice Adept.


    But today he had no time or energy to bother with all these minor details. He turned around and stood with his back straight, quietly recalling the entire casting process of the Fire Arrow spell. After he was certain of the casting process, he started speaking in a solemn voice, ¡°Chip. Pay close attention to the entire process. Correct me immediately if you think I am making the slightest mistake!¡±


    *Beep* ¡°New task established,mencing real-time monitoring...¡±


    As a blue light began blinking in Greem¡¯s eyes, a digitized scene was projected onto his retinas.


    The digitized practice room looked exactly like the practice room, but countless tiny dots of blue nodes had appeared on Greem¡¯s retinas, slicing up the entire room into countless tiny regions. Also, the body movements Greem required to perform were divided into countless still virtual images, each staged in such a way as to indicate an order he must follow. Which was exactly what he needed to do: follow the movements of these virtual images.


    Finally, Greem, who had been standing still, looking nkly off into space, began to practice.


    He started to recite the magic words, and, at the same time, making drawing movements in front of his chest at an incredibly fast speed, These movements made him look weird, but at the same time, seemed to possess a certain flowing grace. As Greem progressed through the spell, his body started to blink red as a huge amount of Fire Elementium was summoned by his spell, slowlypressing and forming into the shape of an arrow in between his moving hands.


    Perhaps the process had been too smooth, but right when he was reciting the 32nd magic syble, Greem heart surged with excitement, and that made one of the nodes of the spiritual model copse, and the rest of the spiritual model immediately followed. The raging Fire Elementium, which had been summoned andpressed repeatedly, became unaligned, and a ground-shaking explosion of Fire Elementium started erupting in front of Greem.


    But, right at the moment when everything started to fall out of order, Greem, who had been prepared for the unexpected, forcefully mmed on the card ced in front of his chest. The card vibrated, and a Magic Barrier surged up from the spell formation under his feet, encasing his body and the exploding Fire Arrow.


    Strangely, once the raging Fire elements were covered by the Magic Barrier, their power was reduced by half. Therefore, a potentially ground shaking explosion of elementium was suppressed and came out as a small fireworks show.


    After a dull noise, which sounded like a firecracker, Greem was submerged by thick and dark smoke, and a small me could be briefly seen through the smoke.


    A momentter, Greem dashed out from the smoke while continuously coughing.


    ¡°Damn it... I thought I was going to seed...¡±


    His face was smudged by thick smoke, and his clothes were full of burn marks, making him look like a homeless man who had been dragged through a fire.


    Although he was caught right in the center of the explosion, the power of the raging Fire Elementium was suppressed by the Magic Formation. Therefore, only his hands and forehead were licked by the mes. He didn¡¯t really suffer from any injuries except minor burns.


    His first real casting attempt had failed!


    And the cause of it was actually Greem¡¯s weak control over his own emotions. As he felt he was going to seed, he let his excitement get the best of him, and that emotional outburst had disturbed the spellcasting process.


    After letting the dark smoke clear from the room, he tidied up his appearance and applied some medicinal paste on his wounds. Only then did he step back into the spell formation.


    Gritted his teeth tightly, Greem began his second spellcasting attempt.


    Perhaps he was being rewarded for all his perseverance in the past few weeks, or perhaps fate had decided it was time for him to master the spell, but the second spellcasting went smoothly and swiftly. After a seemingly unendingly long 13 seconds of casting, Greem finallypleted a sessful casting of the Fire Arrow spell.


    When the raging Fire Elementium had concentrated and formed into aplete Fire Arrow in his palm, the sweet mechanical voice of the Chip once again resounded in his brain.


    *Beep* ¡°Aplete Spiritual Model has been detected. Please confirm if the host wants to solidify it? The solidification process will consume 3 Spirit and 50 Experience!¡±


    ¡°Confirm!¡± Greem was unable to hold himself back and shouted out loud.


    ¡°Please name this Spiritual Model?¡±


    ¡°Fire Arrow!¡±


    ¡°Model sessfully named! Solidification task now starting... expectedpletion time is 14 hours, 37 minutes, and 21 seconds...¡±


    After settling everything with the chip, Greem still needed to handle the ¡®hot potato¡¯ in his hands.


    For many exploding spells, the caster only had a buffer of 2-3 seconds after casting the spell to use it. If this time was exceeded, or the caster moved their body, the casted spell would begin to copse.


    If he cast a spell and let it explode within his palm, he could barely imagine what would happen to his body.


    Therefore, once Greem was finished with the Chip, he immediately pushed both hands forward, inciting the Fire Arrow to fly forward and m right into the stone target situated on the other side of the room.


    The Fire Arrow erupted as it struck the chest of the stone target. This time, without the suppression field of the Magical Formation beneath his feet, the raging Fire Elementium could finally reveal its brutal and violent nature.


    A loud explosive noise was heard.


    A fireball the size of a melon suddenly appeared, quickly spreading into a violent fiery shockwave. The raging explosion instantly heated up everything within a 5 meter radius of the stone target to rather intense temperatures.


    After the smoke cleared, Greem could see that the chest of the stone target had been burned ck, and there was even a nail-sized hole where the center of the explosion had been.


    Unexpectedly, a wall on one side of the room began to wobble like the surface of water did when small ripples went through it. After a moment, a few words began to show up.


    Obviously, this specially designed Spell Casting Practice Room was very effective at its job. Although, with the help of the Chip, Greem didn¡¯t need the limited data detected by the Spell Formation, but all the other Apprentice Adepts couldn¡¯t live without it. Only through the evaluation and calction of the Spell Formation could they have a more direct feeling of control when dealing with the spells they were learning. That, or they would have to experience it directly on a battlefield, where they had to put their lives at stake.


    In just 15 minutes of time, Greem had achieved his goal for this trip. He happily turned and opened the door to the Spell Casting Practice Room. When the stone door opened up, a beautiful figure was waiting outside the door for him.


    Slender limbs; perfect curves; fair and silky smooth skin; a delicate face... But what excited Greem the most was the ming red chiffon dress and her equally red luscious lips.


    The only differencepared to thest time he had seen her was that her ruby red eyes were gone, having been reced by a pair of turquoise blue eyes, which made Greem felt like he was staring into a sparkling ocean of blue.


    It was Mary, wearing her vivacious red dress!


    ¡°Oh, so it seems you really are here!~¡± Her juicy red lips moved gently, letting out words in a voice that made Greem¡¯s heart race. ¡°Alright, since I¡¯ve found him, you¡¯re no longer of any use to me.¡±


    The second sentence, which was said in a tone that sounded much colder than the first, was not spoken to Greem.


    Only now had Greem noticed that this ¡®neighbour¡¯ of his, who was slim and neither tall nor short, was dragging an adult man with her right hand. It was Anm, the administrator of the Magic Spell Practice Room.


    Red-dressed Mary waved her little hand, and Anm was easily thrown over ten meters. He hit the ground with a ¡®thud¡¯, and started groaning, unable to stand back up.


    Greem felt his expression change.


    Although Anm was not considering a chunky man, his body weight was at least that of the average adult man. However, this Mary had just thrown him a fairly long distance with a single bare hand, and she had done it without even trying that hard. Inferring from what he had seen in front of him, Greem guessed that she had, at least, 10 Strength.


    Judging from the swiftness of her movements, her Agility was not low either. Together with her frightening Vampire ability of regeneration, perhaps even the three strongest Apprentice Adepts wouldn¡¯t be able to gain an advantage over her in a fight.


    Hadn¡¯t she been taken away by the master of the tower? How was she here, safe and sound? She...


    ¡°Follow me!¡±


    While Greem was still pondering all of this in his mind, Mary stretched out her fair, silky smooth, right hand and grabbed his cor. Then she turned around and strode away, her hand on his neck. Greem did his best to try and avoid her hand, but he was unable to do so.


    Although he was only 15 years old, he was actually a little bit taller than Mary. In order to avoid being dragged on the floor, he was forced to stagger along behind her, having no idea what was going on.


    ......


    In the Public cafeteria.


    It was dinner time, so most of the Apprentice Adepts were gathered in the cafeteria, sitting in small groups, having their meals, and talking to each other.


    From the ces they sat and the way that they each talked, it was enough to determine the strength of these small groups and the position of each Apprentice Adept in the group.


    After all, those who were lone wolves, like Greem, were actually quite few in number. Most of the Apprentice Adepts preferred to group up and form small gangs, allowing them to work together and fight off those who approached with bad intentions.


    But, right when the atmosphere of the ce was warming up, a sudden loud noise was heard, as the freshly repaired wooden door was smashed open by someone.


    Every single Apprentice Adept stared nkly at two people who hade in, one after the other, their widely opened eyes were filled with looks of disbelief.


    Mary?!


    Although most of the people here had never seen how Mary looked after her ¡®mutation¡¯, through their own channels, they all knew what had happened that day. Thus, in their mind, even if Mary didn¡¯t get sliced by master Adept for his research, she would have been locked up on one the upper floors of this Tower, forced to live life as a captive forever. In stark contrast to everyone¡¯s expectations, she actually shown up in this ce, as bold as brass!


    Ellen, who sat right in the center of the cafeteria, immediately felt his expression turn sober as his eyes were filled with fright.


    He had personally witnessed how brutal and frightening Mary was. Even though she had been restored to her harmless look, the horrifying memory left in his mind could never be erased.


    Mary stormed in like a whirlwind, sooning to stand right in the center of the cafeteria with her arms crossed. She coldly nced around the room, slowly circling it, before her vision finally stopped on Ellen, the newly appointed Apprentice Leader.


    ¡°I, Mary, am back again!¡±

 Chapter 14

    After proudly announcing her return from the middle of the cafeteria, Mary shifted her little hand forward, pulling Greem forward and cing him in front of her.


    ¡°From today onwards, know that he is my subordinate. Anyone who makes trouble for him will have me as your enemy!¡±


    After she finished saying that, she let go of Greem and swept her right hand through the air. Her ws moved so fast that they seemed to leave afterimages in the air. As the faint trails of light faded away, five sharp whistling noises could be heard by the crowd.


    What... What insane agility, and what a terrifying shing force. With such speed and attack strength, who would have time to recite a spell if she attacked them?


    After estimating the attack strength of Mary¡¯s casual strike, everyone who saw this scene had fear cover their faces.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but smile wryly at his current situation. For the first time in his entire life, he felt a headache caused by ¡®good fortune¡¯.


    As much as he could, he was a man who strived to live a low-profile life, but, in the end, he was helplessly dragged into what could only result in a fight between those strongest Apprentice Adepts. Though Mary did this out of good intentions, would a simple threat of violence really be able to hold back those Apprentice Adepts who feared nothing?


    In this Adept Tower, where the hearts of men were iprehensible, and where everyone was scheming against each other, there were nearly infinite methods of killing someone without being noticed. In the library, a wide variety of knowledge of Curse Spells and Poisonous Potions were avable. So long as someone willing to put in the effort, it wasn¡¯t exactly difficult to make an Apprentice Adept die an ¡®unfortunate death¡¯, with no one the wiser.


    Within this eerie and frightening Adept Tower, Greem would never dare let the slightest drop of blood or the tiniest hair on his head fall into someone else¡¯s hands. After all, there were countless bizarre spells which could be used against a person. The slightest mistake could end with him be a puppet controlled by someone else.


    That was also the reason why most of the Apprentice Adepts lived in the seclusion of their own rooms, rarely having any intimate physical contact with anyone.


    Sensing the hostile nces shooting at him from all directions, once again Greem felt speechless, and a bitter smile covered his face.


    It seems he had found a great method for making a lot of enemies at once.


    In the past, he was just a harmless low-rank Apprentice in other people¡¯s minds. Even if he got in some minor arguments, no one would really try to find a method to kill him. But today, he had nearly offended every single Apprentice Adept in the tower without saying a single word.


    Without having to think twice, he knew that, from today onwards, he had be a bird of a different feather among all the Beginner Apprentice Adepts. If there was anyone who tried to get in touch with him, either they were probing for Mary¡¯s information, or they were plotting his demise.


    Although Greem wasining in his mind, right at this moment he had no other option but to put on a poker face and face these new hardships head on.


    After delivered what she intended to say, Mary, who had established her authority, grabbed Greem and left the cafeteria in a rush. A momentter, the prideful and elegant Mary had, once again, appeared in front of Anm, who was still suffering from the shock of being thrown across a room.


    ¡°Give me the card of the Arena!¡±


    Mary was showing herself to be a surprisingly domineering and tyrannical person. As she mmed her tiny palm onto the table, everything on it was knocked over. A slimy and ugly frog squeezed out from the pile of books while croaking continuously, quickly jumping onto Anm¡¯s shoulder and angrily staring at Mary, who was the culprit of his difort.


    It was a small frog, but it had a huge head, which was quite strange looking. It¡¯s slimy back was full of lumps and blisters, which were all filled with green ooze. It had a huge mouth and its eyes were situated on two protruding tentacles, giving it a really bizarre look.


    Frightened, Anm gently patted on the weird head of the frog, turning his head and speaking softly to it. The frog, unwillingly, opened up its mouth and spat out a special card, which was glowing with a golden ze.


    Mary snorted coolly, snatched the golden card off the table, turned around, and then dragged Greem away.


    Before they left, Greem couldn¡¯t help examining the strange looking frog.


    A Companion Beast!


    Perhaps this frog was Anm¡¯s Company Beast?


    Apprentice Adepts, like them, who were still struggling in the lower floors of the Tower, were all restlessly trying to strengthen themselves. No doubt, increasing one¡¯s Spirit was the toughest path. Without a Magic Medicine that grew one¡¯s Spirit, a top-grade meditation method, and without a formal Adept to answer all their questions, they could only depend on themselves to progress.


    Therefore, any method that could possibly help one in improving their own power was worth it, and Companion Beasts were, undeniably, a good supplemental method for increasing one¡¯s strength.


    Companion Beasts were also known as Parasite Beasts. They were a unique type of demon that had been modified and breed with magic. Through a special magic ceremony, an Apprentice Adept could establish a binding between his soul and one of these beasts.


    Of course, a method like this came with its own pros and cons. On the bright side, an Apprentice Adept could borrow the innate abilities of the demon, granting himself some special abilities that others didn¡¯t have. On the downside, during the process of establishing the Companionship, the Apprentice had to cut part of his soul and transfer it to the Companion Beast. With that, if the Companion Beast was seriously hurt or died, the Apprentice himself would suffer the same fate.


    If the beast was seriously injured, it might cause the Apprentice to suffer a permanent Spirit depletion, as his soul would be injured; There were known cases where an Adepts soul had broken, causing them to be aplete idiot.


    It was a rule of thumb that an ordinary Apprentice Adept could only establish a rtionship with one Beast. But, as in anything, there was always an exception. Evil Bugs, who was one of the three strongest Apprentices, had taken the path of binding with a Companion Beast. However, he actually broke through the supposed limit, and somehow had a lot of strange insects within his body.


    As for how he did that, no one knew. Any Apprentice Adept who was taking the path of binding with a Companion Beast would kill for this knowledge, but none of them had the courage to spy on his secret. Because, in the end, anyone who tried to spy on him would end up dead in an ¡®ident¡¯.


    Anm, who only had the capability of an Intermediate Apprentice, had chosen a Poison Dart Frog, who could, unsurprisingly, shoot poisonous darts, as his Companion Beast. Besides shooting poison, it also had a pretty good regeneration ability. Perhaps, this was the biggest reason Anm had chosen it.


    ......


    When the main door of the stone room had closed up, Mary and Greem were left standing there by themselves in arge room.


    This Arena was way bigger than the stone room Greem had rented previously, taking up a whole 200 square meters. Thus, this was not a ce for Apprentice Adepts to practice their magic spells, but a miniature fighting arena.


    If Apprentice Adepts needed to resolve disputes, usually they would use this Arena as ast resort. Although this ce came with a rule forbidding them from killing each other, if an ¡®ident¡¯ really happened, the killer wouldn¡¯t have to pay with their own life. All they would have to do was pay arge fee aspensation.


    Hence, many Apprentice Adepts had a great fear of this Arena, and, thus, it had earned the nickname of ¡®Arena of Death¡¯!


    Mary¡¯s slim figure stood opposite of Greem¡¯s. She had an eerie smile on her delicate face, which Greem felt was both seductive and cruel.


    ¡°I don¡¯t need a good-for-nothing subordinate. Show me what you are capable of!¡±


    After announcing this, and without giving him any time to prepare himself, her delicate looking body swayed, leaving behind a row of afterimages. Her real body was mixed in with these afterimages, sprinting toward Greem at an incredible speed.


    She really meant it? This Mary was really a girl of action!


    Although Mary had been a rather cial beauty in the past, she still had held the careful and low-profile character of your standard Apprentice Adept. How did she be so overbearing, arrogant, and aggressive after being let off by Adept Anderson?


    Unfortunately, Greem had no time to ponder on this anymore, because Mary¡¯s attack was fast approaching.


    A series of rapid warning tones resounded in his brain, nearly making him lose focus.


    ¡°Warning! Warning! High-speed target approaching... Initial evaluation shows the target has the Agility which is greater than 13. Host, please move two steps to the left. After dodging, counter attack with a Burning Hand spell...¡±


    As the solidification of the Fire Arrow was still in progress, Greem could only use one spell, Burning Hand.


    The speed of the attack was extremely fast, and Greem couldn¡¯t even see where was the real Mary was. What he could do was toy all his hope on the guidance given by the Chip, move his feet, and step aside, quickly preparing a Burning Hand spell.


    However, as they say, no n survives contact with the enemy.


    Greem clumsily fell to the ground while only half way through dodging. His shirt waspletely torn at the chest, revealing three gashes. He struck out with Burning Hand, but his strike hit nothing.


    Greem pressed his hand against his wounds, distraught at what had just happened. He raised his head and gave Mary an angry look. Meanwhile, Mary was standing leisurely to the side, sticking out her long flexible tongue, and licking the blood from her nails.


    ¡°So it seems you have decent reflexes... But your body is too weak. If this speed is all you have, perhaps you¡¯re going to suffer today!¡± Maybe it was because she had tasted blood, but her eyes, which had beenpletely blue, started to take on a shade of red, making her seem so much more dangerous. ¡°If you don¡¯t want to die, you better move faster~...¡±


    Mary briefly squatted down after she finished speaking, making her looked like a leopard preparing to pounce. In the next second, she was rocketing toward him.


    Damn it, if this went on he really would die.


    As her eyes began to turn red and her fangs began poked through her lips, warning tones went off like crazy in his brain. Unable to take care of the wounds on his chest, Greem let out a roar. He forcefully pped both of his palms together. Three secondster, two massive fireballs erupted from both of his hands, causing Mary to jump back.


    ¡°This is what I¡¯m talking about! Hehe... you better watch out!~¡±


    Mary¡¯s voice was filled with excitement. She even giggled a bit. In the next second, she leaped forward, turning into a streak of blue.


    Even with Greem¡¯s dynamic vision, he was still only able to see Mary¡¯s afterimages. He waspletely unable to find her actual position. Therefore, in order to avoid her getting too close, Greem kept moving his body and adjusting his posture to keep the majority of her after images in front of him. Meanwhile, he was crazily waving his hands, attempting to use the burning me to block off all the possible paths of attack.


    Both fireballs were making sizzling noises while Greem was waving them about, pouring sparks of fire all around his body. Unfortunately, it seemed his attempt at defense was pointless. No matter how hard he tried, he just couldn¡¯t figure out where she was. Instead, from time to time, he would feel a sudden sharp paining from a new ce on his body, and all these were making him more and more furious.

 Chapter 15

    As the fight progressed, Greem was realizing, more and more, what his weaknesses were.


    His below average Physique was one of the biggest weaknesses. Even with the help of the mighty Chip, he found that he was not as strong as he had originally thought.


    His Agility of 4 defined the speed of his reflexes, movement, and the flexibility of his body. Although the dynamic vision provided by the Chip allowed him to roughly guess where Mary was moving, his overly ¡®clumsy¡¯ and ¡®slow¡¯ body was having a hard time keeping up with the guidance of the chip.


    Therefore, most of the time, even though Greem knew in advance where the attack wasing from, he was unable to defend fast enough. Often when the sharp ws passed his body, his me was mere inches away, but he still couldn¡¯t even touch the tips of the fringes of Mary¡¯s dress.


    Hence, within the huge Arena, Greem was restlessly waving two huge fireballs and doing everything he could tond even the slightest blow on his enemy. However, it seemed he was unable to do anything except receive wounds and groan as the pain from all the wounds added up. As for Mary, she was like a red ghost who drifted from ce to ce, seeming to blink in and out of reality as she dashed around Greem. Quite frequently, the dreadful mes almost touched her body, but they were unable to cause her any harm, as she was moving with great speed and agility.


    Fortunately, Mary was just yfully evaluating Greem¡¯s fighting ability, so all her attacks were only causing minor flesh wounds. If she had been serious, Greem would have long since been sliced into chunks of meat. But even so, having his body scratched by Mary¡¯s de-liked sharp ws, left Greem with countless scratch marks, and blood all over his body.


    Although the wounds on his body wouldn¡¯t get him killed, they brought Greem a great deal of anger and humiliation.


    A month ago, this Mary was only a beginner Apprentice, and she was not stronger than him. Because of that damn mutation, caused by magical contamination, she was now able to twist Greem around her little finger, like he was nothing. This exploding anger was continually suppressed by Greem, as he knew he was unable to defeat Mary, but he was still doing all he could to chase her shing red shadow with his raging me.


    Inwardly, Greem¡¯s mind was still as calm as a cier, and he wasmunicating with the Chip without showing any signs externally. Since he couldn¡¯t catch Mary with his dynamic vision, he had to find a workaround.


    Greem¡¯s spirit was draining fast as he kept waving both of his hands restlessly through the air. The dreadful looking fireballs in his hands were bing bigger and even more violent. While underneath his eyes, a weird looking blue dot was blinking dimly, marking an interception point which the Chip had vaguely calcted.


    When Greem sensed Mary was attacking from his front, he slightly separated his hands, blocked off possible attacks from his left and his right, leaving a half meter weak point in front of his body.


    Seeing this, Mary, who nned to attack from the left, simply let out a cold snort, stopped and stood straight, swaying slightly to the side to dodge the ming red fireball. Not only that, she actually slipped into the slight gap in front of Greem¡¯s chest.


    ¡°Hmm! What a careless boy, should I leave a mark on your face, or on your chest?~¡±


    Mary, who still had time to spare as shezily fought Greem, pondered why her instincts had hesitated at this very moment.


    All of a sudden, her expression changed drastically, and she immediately retreated with an even greater speed than she had attacked with. Even so, her retreating body still couldn¡¯tpletely escape from the two fireballs that had suddenly changed their courses.


    Two frightening fireballs came from the left and the right, mming into each other and exploding, sending sparks of fire in all directions and creating a sea of mes in front of Greem¡¯s body.


    What happened made Mary cry out in shock. In the time it took to blink, she had moved herself 10 meters away from Greem, yet she still felt some pain from that attack. She lowered her head and took a look at herself. To her surprise, she found that her red chiffon dress actually been filled with burn marks, as those randomly flying sparks had fallen on her and burned holes in her dress, revealed what was hiding inside.


    ¡°You bastard... how dare you to damage my dress...¡±


    Mary¡¯s cold and pretty face became angry. With a cruel nce, she stared straight at Greem, who was dancing in joy.


    At this very moment, Greem was struck with unspeakable excitement, as he was finally able to force Mary back. Atst, he found out a weakness in this girl¡¯s fighting style. When facing with this kind of high-speed enemy, who fought like an assassin, a weaker spell that covered a wide area was effective in limiting where they could move, while powerful, concentrated spells were unable to even touch them...


    While immersing himself in the joy of his minor sess, Greem suddenly felt an ominous killing intent. Shocked, he raised his head and saw a girl with a ferocious look on her face.


    ¡°I...¡±


    Knowing something bad was going to happen, Greem quickly tried to exin his actions, but before he could say anything, a red shadow shed in front of his eyes, grabbed him, and mmed his head against a nearby stone wall. The brutal and violent force of Mary¡¯s hand pierced through Greem¡¯s entire body, but, before he could feel the pain, his eyes went ck and he fainted.


    And thest thought that went through his mind was:


    What incredible speed!


    ............


    When Greem finally regained consciousness, he felt a throbbing pain all over his body, but he also felt a new pain. It seemed he was being dragged by someone.


    A little, icy cold hand was holding onto his ankle, pulling him across the floor in a face down manner, which was how he was being brought back to his room. When he finally reached his room, his bare face had been fully covered in blood, which was the result of having his face scraped against the rough floor.


    Greem dared not to struggle, as it seems like hisst attack had infuriated the moody and petnt Mary. Therefore, all he could do was close his eyes and try his best to endure the pain he felt from all over his body.


    Fortunately, he could still feel pain... It was better than having been killed while in aa!


    Greem had the chip perform a self-test, and a huge, frightening, red warning sign showed up on top of the report.


    Ugh. He only had a total of 11 Health Points, and he had lost 8 of those. This literally put him death¡¯s doorstep. If he lost anymore, he would be in trouble.


    Although that damnable Mary hadn¡¯t hurt any of his vitals, and just left a few scratch marks on his body in a yful manner, it was more than enough to reduce his Health Points to such a pathetic state. This really showed how huge was the gap between them was.


    A momentter, Mary opened up the wooden door of Greem¡¯s room and threw him inside. After that, her lovely voice said a very cruel thing, ¡°Rest tonight, we¡¯ll continue our training in 17 hours.¡±


    So, it seemed Mary had noticed that Greem was awake.


    Greem raised his head up, shocked that she had known. What he saw was his half opened wooden door, and the silhouette of the slim, curvy body of a young woman backlit by the candles in the hallway.


    17 hours? She expected him to recover in 17 hours?


    Greem opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but the wooden door was mmed closed, leaving him in the gloomy darkness of his room.


    ............


    Half an hourter, with a strong will, Greem finally climbed up from the floor and lit a few candles, so he could take a look at himself.


    He took off his short worn-out Apprentice robe and found that his skinny body was full of crisscrossing scratch marks and wounds. Although not deep, they were unexpectedly dense.


    Under the dull candlelight, he began to carefully doctor his wounded body.


    He had some basic healing medicine in his room. After all, in order to survive in the Tower, medicinal paste and poison antidotes were must have items.


    Bearing the pain, Greem applied the medicinal paste to his wounds while grimacing. Immediately, a sensation of tickling that made him crazy came from the wounds, but soon after, it was reced by a cold sensation that soothed his mind, and the pleasant feeling of having his flesh regenerating followed. Hence Greem started the slow process of healing.


    After he finished applying the medicinal paste, Greem decided to look over the other parts of his self-test report.


    Surprisingly, the torture he had gone through, just now, had increased all of his attributes, and it even increased his Experience by 12. Greem couldn¡¯t help breathing out a long sigh. Did this mean his path to bing strong was going to be filled with misery?


    After wallowing in misery and slightly suicidal thoughts, Greem took a deep breath, theny down on his bed and started his daily meditation.


    Once again, he had arrived in the Spiritual Dimension, which was filled with countless bright specks of light. This time, the light orb representing Greem¡¯s consciousness transformed into a ferocious monster which had hundreds of tentacles from its body. Under Greem¡¯s control, these Spiritual tentacles kept poking and swimming around, reaching out and grabbing at all the Fire Elementium swimming nearby.


    In the past, Greem had only passively absorbed the Fire Elementium that came close enough to him. How could that bepared with his current efficiency, as he was actively absorbing them? With his current speed, one round of meditation would yield ten times what previous meditation had.


    It had been a long day for him. So many things had happened and he was too busy to attend to them all. This was the first time he had been able to catch his breath all day and he found himself to be exhausted. Therefore, before he could check the results of his meditation, he fell asleep.


    ............


    At dawn the next day, Greem woke up to the sound of heavy knocking at his door.


    ¡°Who¡¯s that?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s me, Tony. It¡¯s time...¡±


    Greem¡¯s lips twitched. He realized that six days had passed since hisst inspection trip, and that it was time for them to do it again!


    As he was getting up, he quickly nced at the results ofst night¡¯s meditation. He was filled with joy as he saw that his Spirit had increased from 8.07 to 8.15. A single night of meditation had increased his Spirit by 0.08.... Didn¡¯t that mean that, even if he didn¡¯t spend any time studying Magic books and just did basic meditation, his Spirit would reach the level of Advanced Apprentice Adept in three months?


    This wasn¡¯t the only good news.


    His Fire Arrow spell would be solidified in 1 hour. In 1 hour, he would be a beginner Apprentice who had mastered more than one Magic Spell. He would no longer be a rookie who could be bullied by anyone.

 Chapter 16

    Following the same route as the week before, Greem set out on his inspection trip.


    Greem quickly noticed that things were quite different today.


    When he set his foot on the stone paved path, Greem immediately felt things were wrong. Today, the demons were strangely excited and were behaving in unusual ways.


    The first stop of his inspection was the grove of Ghost Trees.


    Before he even reached the grove, Greem was freaked out by what he saw in front of him.


    Hundreds of Scavenger Crows were standing on top of those skinny and wrinkled Ghost Trees, and every single one of them had their beady red eyes focused on Greem. Oddly enough, none of them were making any noise, which was totally different from how they normally behaved.


    Honestly, being stared at by a few hundred Scavenger Crows at the same time would make even the bravest Apprentice Adept¡¯s spine crawl. But what made Greem feel even more baffled was how quiet they were. If they were behaving normally, the noisy caws of the Scavenger Crows could be heard from a mile away.


    But today...


    Judging from their quiet manner, it looked like they were all anticipating having a big feast.


    From the knowledge Greem had in his mind, these Scavenger Crows would only be so quiet and patient when they were waiting for their food. It was said that these birds could follow a dying traveler for days without sleep or rest, just waiting for the moment when the traveler finally fell.


    Under the ¡®weing parade¡¯ of a few hundred Scavenger Crows, Greem slowly began walking down the stony trail. As he proceeded, he knew that he waspletely surrounded by creatures who came with bad intentions.


    ¡°Chip. Perform a scan the surrounding area. I want to know what is happening here!¡± Greem could no longer stand the oppressing atmosphere and whispered an order to the Chip.


    *Beep* ¡°Commencing real-time scanning task... establishing dynamic monitoring for surrounding area...¡± *Beep* ... *Beep* ... *Beep* ... ¡°Source of disturbance is -unknown smell- ... Direction: South East... Distance: 500 meters...¡±


    Unknown smell?


    After noting the Chip¡¯s report, Greem took a deep breath and tried to smell this ¡®Unknown Smell¡¯. After a moment, he was able to sense the mild smell of blood mixed with the rotten smell of the fog. No wonder all these demons looked so excited today! If he was able to smell the scent of blood, of course these creatures, who had tens or even hundreds of times more sensitive senses, could smell it!


    However, today was not the monthly ¡®open day¡¯, when the tower would purposely lower the swamps defences to entice outsiders toe and ¡®feed¡¯ the ¡®wildlife¡¯! Could it be someone had really sneaked into this ce?


    With questions filling his mind, Greem poured an entire bottle of ¡®n Grass¡¯ potion into his mouth, pulled up his hood, and started running towards the South East.


    An n Grass Potion was a special magic potion decocted from n Grass. It was able to close every single pore on a human¡¯s body, suppressing the drinker¡¯s body odors. But it onlysted for 30 minutes.


    ............


    In the Garden of Whispers.


    The garden, which was usually dead silent andpletely empty of life, had turned into a terrifying battleground.


    As he approached the site, he could hear the horrible screams of Demon Babies and the cries of wandering souls. He also heard loud human voices, cursing with rage and fright. Apparently, this was the source of the pungent smell of blood that had attracted his attention. Using the trees and grass as cover, Greem slowly moved closer to the battlefield. Soon, he found a ce with a good view, which allowed him to watch what was happening.


    There were two groups fighting at the scene.


    The attackers were, of course, the horrible Demon Babies and the other wandering souls who lived here. Then there were 17 mercenaries struggling to hold off the horrifying creatures in front of them.


    It seemed to be a group of skillful and experienced mercenaries. They looked strong and vigorous, and were notcking in physical strength or courage. Also, their equipment was pretty good. They hadrge thick shields made from solid wood, arm and shoulder guards, and each of them had a bow with them. This made them capable of hunting many of the ordinary demons in this swamp.


    But, unfortunately for them, the demons who surrounded them were some of the most frightening creatures within the swamp: Demon Babies.


    Demon Baby had no legs, and crawled across the ground with a pair of sharp ws, dragging a long organ, which looked like an umbilical cord, behind them. They were ugly and had twisted bodies, yet looked remarkably simr to human infants. However, their faces were not made of smooth youthful flesh, but of wrinkled dead skin, and their facial features were squeezed together, giving them extremely ugly faces.


    Within the knee-deep bushes, these small demons were crawling back and forth, letting out curses and screams that echoed throughout the area. Whenever a baby¡¯s cry was heard, it would immediately cause those human mercenaries to yell in fright.


    Although these Demon Babies had small bodies, each of them had a Strength of at least 5, which equaled that of your average adult human. Not only that, but they also had a pair of deadly ws. Whenever they leaped forward and struck therge wooden shields, they would leave deep scratch marks behind.


    However, their deadliest weapon was their Curse.


    When Greem arrived, these Demon Babies were trying to break through the defensive shields with their bodies.


    One after the other, the Demon Babies rushed through the bushes,unching themselves into the air and trying tond behind the defensive shields of those mercenaries, but every time, those mercenaries, who were prepared, would knock them back with their arm guards. There was even a Demon Baby who couldn¡¯t escape in time, and found themselves nailed to the ground with an arrow.


    Although it had its body nailed to the ground, the Demon Baby was still very fierce, crazily digging the dirt with its ws. Then it raised its body and let out an irritating baby cry toward a closest human mercenary.


    The cry was sharp and ear-splitting, but while it was just an unpleasant noise for other people, but when the cry hit the mercenary who was standing closest to it, it instantly struck him with the frightening ¡®Curse¡¯.


    The muscr mercenary suddenly threw away his shield and ced both of his hands tightly against his ear, screaming out, ¡°Help me! ... I can¡¯t see anything! ...¡±


    Right after he screamed, tears of blood spilled from his tightly closed eyes, terrifying the rest of the mercenaries.


    Before anyone could do anything, another two Demon Babies dashed out from the bushes, ferocious smiles on their ugly faces. They opened up their mouths and screamed at the mercenary who had been previously struck by ¡®Blind¡¯.


    Blind + Insanity + Confuse!


    Even an official Apprentice Adept would have a hard time in defending against a Demon Baby¡¯s curse, let alone these mercenaries, who were only ordinary humans. Before his fellow mercenaries could knock him out, this mercenary crazily pushed away everything around him and rushed out of the defensive formation.


    ¡°No! ... Bazar,e back!...¡±


    A middle-aged man, who looked like the leader of the group, immediately shouted from within the formation. But it was toote.


    If someone could have looked down from above, he would have seen some crazy movements within the bushes around this team of mercenaries, as many fast moving grass lines shot toward the mercenary who was fleeing in confusion.


    ¡°Bazar!¡± A bold looking man threw away his own shield, grabbed an ax, and started charging out to rescue his friend. However, he was forcefully pulled back by his leader.


    ¡°Don¡¯t go, Tark! It is toote now...¡± The leader grabbed the bold looking man¡¯s arm while gazing helplessly after the departing man.


    As if proving his words, Bazar, who was running amok, got pushed down by a swarm of Demon Babies. His pain filled and shrill screaming onlysted for a few more seconds beforeing to aplete stop. Then all that could be heard was the noise of those Demon Babies tearing into his flesh and munching on his bones.


    Although it was half covered by the knee-deep bushes, no mercenary could stand to witness the scene of those Demon Babies feasting on their friend. Just by looking at the constant moving dried grass and listening to the terrifying and eerie noises, it was still enough for them to envision the extremely dreadful scene that must be happening in those bushes. Therefore, their long-standing determination and morale began to fall.


    Suddenly, a human head sized fireball shot out from the center of the mercenaries, creating a long trail of dark smoke. It fell right into the center of the area where those Demon Babies were happily feasting.


    In next second, together with a deafening explosion, the terrifying Fire Elementium expanded and turning everything in an area of ten meters into a raging sea of mes.


    With just this one single strike, more than twenty Demon Babies were killed. Fourteen of them, who were at the center of the explosion, had been turned into ashes in an instant. Those who at the edges of the explosion were all injured by the raging mes. For a moment, the shrill cries of Demon Babies reverberated through the skies!


    A Fire Spell?!


    Greem, who was watching from the dark, was startled for a moment. He quickly looked around, soon finding three suspicious targets, who were standing in the center of the mercenaries. There were all dressed rtively simrly to himself.


    Their ck cloaks and hoodspletely covered their bodies so that not even an inch of their skin was exposed, but, judging from the size of their bodies, he supposed that they were two men and a girl.


    Three Apprentice Adepts who had left their nest for experience?


    As he couldn¡¯t directly see them, there was no way for Greem to obtain the specific attributes of these people. Hence, he didn¡¯t dare act recklessly. He quietly took out his Magical Talisman and reported what was happening here to the Adept Tower.


    During this period of time, the Demon Babies, who had suffered great losses, actually called upon all the wandering souls to aid them.


    As these wandering souls were capable of living among other demons, of course they were not low-ranked creatures, like those zombies or skeletons, but, rather, were actually a conscious body that was formed from strong resentment and evil intentions. Although they had human forms, they didn¡¯t have physical bodies, and their innate ability to freely shift between the ethereal and the physical allowed them to ignore most physical attacks and defenses.


    Their bodies looked like blurry shadows. Comparatively, their heads were much clearer, and they had facial features simr to that of a human. They had a pair of arms with sharp ws, yet where their legs should be was just a vague shadow. If looking from afar, it was like their legs had merged into the air.


    When this group of wandering souls dashed out from the woods, the entire ce was immediately filled with the eerie cries of ghosts, which could make one¡¯s soul shiver. The temperature also significantly dropped.


    When attacked by this, seemingly endless, group of frightening wandering souls, the mercenaries defensive formation immediately copsed.


    The wandering souls, who had shifted their bodies into their ethereal forms jumped into the group of men without fear, as they could totally ignore the weapons and shield held by those mercenaries. With their icy cold ghost ws, these wandering souls were busy leaving deadly scratch marks on their target¡¯s bodies. There were even some wandering souls squeezed themselves into the bodies of the mercenaries, taking control over their bodies andunching attacks against the other mercenaries.


    Now that a breach had been created by the wander souls, the evil Demon Babies, again, joined the battle, using their horrifying curses to destroy the wills of these mercenaries. After that, they dragged the cursed bodies into bushes and started feasting on them.


    The scene had be even more chaotic and bloody.

 Chapter 17

    As they looked out and saw the massive crowd of demons and wandering souls overwhelming the mercenaries around them, the three Apprentice Adepts were, finally, forced to remove their cloaks and join the battle, revealing their faces to the world.


    The leader of the three was a muscr young man. He had a head of disheveled gold hair that hung down to his shoulders. Just under his hair, a mysterious circlet adorned his forehead. It was clearly not an ordinary item. He was wearing a delicately made leather jacket and carrying a broadsword on his back. Judging from the size of the sword, it would weigh too much for the average man to even swing it.


    The other man was dressed like nobility. The delicate and luxurious clothes on his body were quite impressive, but what was even more impressive was his head. He had dark green skin, a long narrow mouth, and a thin tongue that kept flicking in and out... He, unexpectedly, had the head of a snake.


    Meanwhile, a little girl stood in between these two men. She had a face like an angel and was wearing a long light yellow dress. She was of average height and was holding a gold colored birdcage in her hands. Strangely enough, not only she did not show any sign of fear towards the bloody scene in front, but she was actually ncing around with a cute smile on her face, which made her simply look like a curious young girl.


    Greem¡¯s eyes suddenly went wide.


    Via his Elementium Vision, he saw very bright glowing Elementium, and Spiritual ripples that looked like tidal waves,ing from all three Apprentice Adepts.


    By the Chip¡¯s evaluation, these three were either Pseudo-Adepts or elites among the Advanced Apprentice Adepts. No matter who they were, they were not something Greem, a beginner Apprentice Adept, could ever think of handling.


    Why had such strong peoplee here like this? This ce was the private property of Master Anderson, and a resources site of the Sarubo Family. With the exception of the annual resource shipment, this ce was not open to outsiders.


    All of this made Greem really curious about the motives of these foreign Apprentice Adepts.


    But, after witnessing their immense abilities, Greem¡¯s curiosity instantly died, leaving himpletely alert, and feeling a little fear.


    The human mercenaries were capable of dealing with demon beasts, but once they were faced with Demon Babies, Wandering Souls, and other simr demons, they were like sheep being led to the ughter. When the simple defensive shield was broken, the swarm of demons began to massacre the mercenaries.


    Demon Babies were jumping and leaping all over the ce, crying out terrifying curses to reduce their prey¡¯s fighting abilities. Using the bushes as cover, these monstersunched sneak attacks and knocked the mercenaries to the ground. Thus, it was a scene filled with mercenaries in the throes of death. Also, those dreadful Wandering Souls were circling around in mid-air, seeking chances to pull a mercenary into the skies. When that happened, the other demons would storm in and rip the helpless prey to pieces.


    Right in the middle of this chaotic scene, a Wandering Soul, who had an ugly and twisted face, dove down from the air, targeting those three casual and strange looking Apprentice Adepts.


    Before the lead man and the little girl could do anything, the snake-headed struck.


    Striking with great force, a pale green looking poison, shaped into an arrow, instantly prated the Wandering Soul¡¯s body, immediately exploding. The intense corrosive poison melted the ¡®Resentment Core¡¯ hidden inside of its body, turning it into a pile of ashes with a horrifying and painful sounding scream.


    Greem noticed that the poison ¡®arrow¡¯ wasn¡¯t created with normal spellcasting, but wasunched from the mouth of that Snakehead Apprentice.


    And that attack was just the beginning. The Apprentice didn¡¯t stop what he had started, and opened his mouth widely, continuously spitting out poison ¡®arrows¡¯. With each strike, he urately eliminated one of the horrifying Wandering Souls, which were rated as possessing the power of an intermediate Apprentice.


    Bloodline Adept!


    He was definitely one of those Bloodline Adepts that the basic Adept book had mentioned!


    Within the vast andplicated development hierarchy of the Adept World, there were four branches that stood out: Bloodline Adepts, Body Refining Adepts, Principle Adepts and Profound Adepts. It could be said that most of the other Adept branches were matched up to these four major branches.


    Bloodline Adepts were a bunch of lunatics who craved having the purest bloodlines. They used the power of said bloodlines to improve their own strength. Usually, they would choose some incredibly strong creatures from another world as the source for their bloodline, then they would improve the purity of their own blood, generally using a method which could be traced back to some ancestor. After doing all of this, they would gain incredible abilities that aligned with that of ancient powerful creatures. In general, their ultimate goal was to relive the glorious life of these ancient creatures.


    As for Body Refining Adepts, they were another group of lunatics who went all out in the pursuit of strengthening their own bodies. In their eyes, all resources were just a medium, a consumable supply that could be used to make their muscles stronger. In order to stimte their muscles, they might soak themselves in a container full of poisonous chemicals, or imnt a deadly, highly radioactive meteorite into their body. They might go out and endure the most extreme and deadly environments... and they would do all of these to make their bodies strong so that nothing could hurt them.


    In all honestly, Principle Adepts were the mostmon type of Adept in the Adept World. No matter it was the Elementium Adept, who chased after the peak powers of their Elements, the Curse Adept, who used strange abilities to kill people unseen, or even the ck Adept, who just enjoyed using violent killing abilities, usually utilizing the force of souls and emotion; all of them belonged to the branch of Principle Adepts. Although it seemed that there was a tremendous difference in what they did, when they arrived at the advanced stage, they would try their best to master specific Principles or Rules of the Universe.


    They were the people who grew by mastering Elemental Laws Principles.


    As for Profound Adept, they were the purest type of Adepts. They were not willing to ¡®contaminate¡¯ their own bloodline just to obtain powerful ability, and they refused to coupled with Principles of nes and became the ¡®ves of Principles¡¯. They gathered knowledge, immersed themselves in the world of knowledge, and used the knowledge they learned as their weapon. Thus, they became a weird group among Adepts, who only cared about gathering and expanding their knowledge, but totally ignored their own development.


    With these four major branches as the backbone, an infinite variety of strange Adepts were born into this world. They conquered different worlds, looting resources and knowledge, and enving thousands of nes. They were the dominating force of the entire Adept World when fighting, or conquering, other worlds.


    This was the information regarding the Adept Hierarchy which Greem had obtained after the Chip spent time gathering and organizing the mass of raw data he had input into it. As he only knew a handful of people, the data he gathered was notplete, and there was, probably, a huge discrepancy in it. Although he only had this small amount simple information, it drew the outline of the massive and ferocious Adept World he was now a part of.


    If he hadn¡¯t known of these branches, he wouldn¡¯t have been able to correctly guess the details of that Snakehead Apprentice a second ago.


    But, right as Greem was guessing which species of snake the Snakehead Apprentice had inherited a bloodline from, something even more surprising happened.


    The cute little girl joined the fight!


    A Demon Baby, who was quickly moving across the ground, had ced its eyes on these three people, setting them as its target and dashing in their direction. At the same time, it kept letting out irritating cries from its mouth, which was twisted and full of sharp yellowed teeth,unching its Curse attacks at the three of them.


    No doubt, its behavior had provoked the little girl.


    However, not only did her immature face not show any signs of anger. Instead, it bloomed with a sweet smile. She raised up the birdcage in her hands, which looked like a toy, pointed it toward the Demon Baby, and shook it a few times. Though not a single sound was heard, lights and shadows flickered, and the Demon Baby, who had previously been dashing toward them, disappeared from where it was.


    At the same time, Greem, who had sharp vision, noticed that a miniature Demon Baby had appeared inside of the birdcage the little girl carried. It was only the size of a human hand, and looked exactly the same as the Demon Baby who had just disappeared.


    Obviously, this Demon Baby had no idea what had caused its sudden transformation. After being stunned for a second, it became extremely fierce and let out a jarring cry toward the little girl outside of the cage, repeatedly mming the cage with it¡¯s body. But, no matter how hard it tried, there was no way it could escape from that simple looking birdcage.


    Space Magic?!


    Greem ced a hand tightly over his mouth to prevent himself from screaming out loud.


    Out of the many Principle Magics, although every Principle would bring an astonishing power at the ultimate level, if someone really wanted to define their ranking, the Principles of Time and Space Magic were among the very top. But, ording to Greem¡¯s knowledge, these two top-level magic branches were among the weakest of all the branches in the Adept World. This was simply because these two magic branches could only depend on one¡¯s innate talent.


    Even the most powerful Adept, who could destroy a world with the wave of his hand, could never make time stop for one second. However, some people were born with this ability, and, although they might not learn any knowledge rted to Magic, they could still achieve something that even the best Adepts couldn¡¯t.


    And yet, just because these magics were so bizarre and unpredictable and could only be used by someone who had the talent, those Adepts who didn¡¯t possess such talent, no matter how much of a genius they were, it would be impossible for them toe out with great results through experimentation. Therefore, without a huge and solid foundation, it was really tough for those who focused on the Time and Space Magic Branches to produce top-tier Adepts.


    Greem was having issues deciding whether this was the little girl¡¯s innate ability, or some bizarre Magical item that allowed her to catch any enemy, regardless of distance.


    Although Greem thought he had a deep understanding of this bizarre world of advanced magic, right at this very moment, he had to admit one thing: the real world of Adepts was much more crazy and bizarre than his wildest dreams and nightmares. These three outsiders were either Pseudo-Adepts or elites among advanced Apprentice Adepts. If Greem was forced to fight them while only having ess to his two low-ranked spells, he would probably die.


    For this reason, he didn¡¯t dare continue watching anymore. He turned around, followed the trail, and quietly returned to the Adept Tower.


    When he arrived at the main door of the Tower, the newly appointed Apprentice Leader, Ellen, was here along with the three strongest: Hawkeye, Evil Bugs, and Madwoman.


    Greem threw a puzzled nce at Ellen, but soon realized why they were here.


    The warning he sent via the magic talisman could only be received by a special magical item, which was currently held in Ellen¡¯s hand. When Ellen heard there were three powerful Apprentice Adepts in the Magical Swamp, he knew that, with his abilities, there was no way he could chase off or capture these outsiders. Therefore, before Greem had returned, Ellen had asked the three strongest for help.


    It, obviously, cost him something in order to obtain help from the three strongest... but only he knew what that cost was.


    Recalling to what he witnessed just now, Greem didn¡¯t have too much confidence in the ¡®Strongest Three¡¯. No matter how hepared them, those three outsiders were stronger than them. Perhaps Ellen was wishfully thinking he could capture all of them?

 Chapter 18

    In less than ten minutes, the mercenary group, which had been employed by the three Apprentice Adepts, had almost been entirely wiped out.


    Thest four of them were covered from head to toe with blood. They were standing back to back, barely able to defend themselves against the attacks of the surrounding demons. On the other side, their employers, the three Apprentice Adepts, were casually standing there and watching the mercenaries get killed with a cold indifference. Unless they were attacked by the demons, they didn¡¯t interfere the battle between the demons and the mercenaries. It was as if the deaths of these mercenaries meant nothing to them.


    As thest four mercenaries were fighting for their lives, the three Apprentice Adepts were leisurely chatting with each other.


    ¡°The Elementium aura we sensed just now should have belonged to one of the local Apprentices. Why didn¡¯t you let me capture them?¡± The cute and chubby faced girl grumbled at herrge muscrpanion.


    ¡°What¡¯s the point of capturing him?¡± The man shook his head and continued, ¡°Clearly this ce has a well-built Magical Formation. We have been roaming around here for three days and are still unable to find the way to enter it. Without one of them leading us there, I¡¯m afraid we wouldn¡¯t be able to find that Adept Tower even if we spent another three days searching.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s exactly why we should¡¯ve captured him!¡± The little girl spoke furiously. Perhaps due to the fact that her opinion was not epted, she began to release her anger onto the creature she had captured in the birdcage.


    As she muttered something under her breath, the internal space within the birdcage began to squeeze in on itself, shrinking. Thepression of the space soon reached the body of the Demon Baby, and some cracking noises started to issue from its body. Hearing the sharp and pain-filled criesing from the demon baby, the smile on this little girl¡¯s face became filled with joy.


    When the poor little Demon Baby finally imploded and crumpled into a pile of meat paste, little girl immediately waved her arms in the air and stamped her feet in joy, a look of extreme excitement covering her little face.


    Seeing that the little girl had relieved her anger on her ¡®toy¡¯, the other two Apprentice Adepts breathed out sighs of relief.


    The Snake Headed Apprentice shook his head and moved closer to the muscr leader, asking, ¡°Are you sssure it wasss alright to let that ssscout get away? I¡¯m sssure he¡¯ll bring more guardsss here!¡±


    ¡°Guards?¡± The muscr leaderughed grimly, ¡°This swamp is just an ordinary resource site. Do you think the Sarubo Family would really be willing to waste an official Adept to guard it? In my opinion, with the exception of Adept Anderson, all that¡¯s left in this ce are Apprentice Adepts. You really think we should be afraid of the Apprentice Adepts we are likely to find in this ce?¡±


    Snakehead Apprenticeughed hideously, his forked tongue flicking in and out through his lips, creating a gruesome sounding hiss.


    ¡°Thisss ce doesss have quite a lot of rare materialsss that I need. In any cassse, it¡¯ll take a while before those guardsss get here. I think I¡¯ll just do a little sssightssseeing while I wait.¡±


    After saying that, the Snake Headed Apprentice simply walked toward another swampy area in the distance.


    Something really strange was urring. Although the stony trail was not that far away from him, he didn¡¯t notice it and walked right past. This was, in fact, one of the many defensive mechanisms of the Adept Tower. Only those internal Apprentice Adepts, who wore a Magical Talisman, could see the stony trail, while, in the eyes of any outsider, the trail was just another part of the swamp, no different in any way.


    Watching as one of his partners disappeared into the fog, the muscr leader hesitated for a moment, then he just turned around and walked off in another direction. It was a rare opportunity to be in the private resource site of an Adept family. If he didn¡¯t get himself something good before he finished his official business here, that would be quite a waste.


    As for that bizarre little girl, either intentionally or unintentionally, they left her in the middle of those violent and bloody demons. Would she be hurt? This question never crossed the minds of these two male Apprentices. Honestly, perhaps the biggest and most brutal demon in this swampynd was the little girl.


    Therefore, when Greem brought Ellen and the ¡®strongest three¡¯ here, what they saw in front of them was a cute little girl with a golden birdcage, standing right in the middle of a crowd of blood-covered demons.


    At this moment, there was not a single member of the entire mercenarypany that had not been torn into chunks of meats and scattered all over the ce. While their broken corpses were being pulled apart by an army of Demon Babies, the little girl was standing right in the center of these demons. Oddly enough, no demons dared to get within ten steps of this little girl.


    Not only that, but when the little girl bounced and skipped from ce to ce, those Demon Babies, who were busy eating, would roar at her in anger, then they would move aside and make way for her, not daring to really get in her way.


    A mercenary, who had bloody stumps for legs and a single broken arm, was being gnawed on by dozens of Demon Babies. Barely alive, he raised his bloody and broken arm, waving toward the little girl, who was approaching him, and said, ¡°Save me... save... me...¡±


    With a sweet smile on her face, the little girl squatted in front of him and asked, in a soft voice, ¡°I can save your soul from these demons. Are you willing to let me save your soul?¡±


    The dying mercenary was surprised to hear that and immediately nodded his head. However, he didn¡¯t notice that the girl had said the word ¡®save¡¯ in a vague and weird tone. If he had known the othernguages the girl knew, he would have found out that when these weird tones fit together, she had actually said a word meaning ¡®Consume¡¯, which was from the Ancient Andesnguage in the Adept Continent.


    After obtaining the approval of this mercenary, the smile on little girl¡¯s face became even sweeter. She swiftly took out a milky white crystal ball from her pocket and ced it against the mercenary¡¯s forehead. With a short and simple spell, the mercenary¡¯s body trembled, and then the tiny me of hope, which had just appeared in his eyes, died off.


    A white shadow came out from his forehead and disappeared into the crystal ball.


    The life force of the mercenary evaporated, and his bloody arm copsed to the ground, never to rise again.


    The Apprentices of the Tower had watched this all happen and were standing there, appalled at what they had just seen.


    Their arrival had attracted the little girl¡¯s attention. She walked straight up to Greem¡¯s group, raised her head, and gently asked, ¡°Hi! I¡¯m the adorable Alice! Are you guys from around here?¡±


    Greem and the others red at this little Lolita, who seemed to be trying to make herself familiar with them, and didn¡¯t get deceived by her disguise. Within the poption of Apprentice Adepts, friendship, love, and humanity were all just beautiful words that had long since be thrown away. All that was left inside them was the desire for knowledge, resources, and power.


    Those Apprentices who were na?ve would die before ever reaching intermediate Apprentice. The thought of such a person reaching the level of Advanced Apprentices was simply too impossible to even be conceived.


    Noticing that they were eyeing her crystal ball and birdcage, Alice quickly hid both of them behind her, quirking her lips and saying, ¡°All of these things belong to Alice. You wouldn¡¯t think of taking them away from me, would you?¡±


    Ellen looked all over the ce, then sternly whispered to Greem, ¡°I thought you said that there were three Apprentice Adepts? Where are the other two?¡±


    ¡°Kerry went that way... he¡¯s a big guy, and good at fighting... if he meets with this big sister, I¡¯m sure something lively will happen...¡± the little girl pointed her finger to the East and spoke in an innocent manner. Clearly, she was referring to Madwoman, who was also carrying a huge sword on her back. ¡°Jeffrey went that way... I think he said he wanted to look for some materials...¡±


    What she said shocked the five of them, and their eyes took on ghastly looks.


    No matter how many demons were killed, none of them would feel even the slightest bit of pity about it, but if those secret medicine ntations and gardens were found by these outsiders, perhaps all the Apprentices of the Tower would be punished by Adept Anderson.


    Madwoman¡¯s loud, braying voice instantly exploded.


    ¡°I¡¯ll go that way and stop that guy!¡±


    After saying that, Madwoman¡¯s bulky body started sprinting toward the East. As she ran, she crushed the few Demon Babies who got in her way under her feet, making others screaming angrily, though none dared to move closer to her.


    ¡°I¡¯ll go this way!¡± Hawkeyes said coolly, pulling up his cap and dashing towards the West.


    For some unknown reasons, the caws of Scavenger Crows were heard from the sky, though they were hidden by the thick fog. The noise immediately followed behind Hawkeyes. Apprentice Leader Ellen rolled his eyes and murmured, ¡°I¡¯ll go and help him!¡± After saying that, he simply followed behind Hawkeyes and left.


    In the end, only Evil Bugs, Greem, and the strange, unpredictable little girl were left at the scene.


    ¡°Are you going to fight me?¡± The little girl tilted her head and stared at the remaining two men. ¡°Before we fight, don¡¯t you guys want to know where we came from?¡±


    ¡°There is no reason to ask you anything. You have caused mayhem here, and you shall be punished for it. If I capture you, you¡¯ll have to tell me everything. If I can¡¯t defeat you, I¡¯ll bear all the losses here. Now, show me what you can do!¡±


    It was rather rare to hear Evil Bugs say so much.


    But, right as he finished speaking, the ck soil underneath the little girl¡¯s feet exploded, and a huge amount of ck scorpions burst from the ground. Each of these scorpions was the size of a human palm, had a pure ck body and a pair of ws, and on their backs was a tail with a poison needle. The stinking smell of poison filled the air near these scorpions.


    Although there was a distance of twenty meters between them, it was impossible to tell when Evil Bugs had sent these scorpions out, sneaking their way underground to hide near the little girl.


    This little girl shouldn¡¯t have a strong Physique. Thus, as long as she was poisoned, she should quickly lose the ability to cast any of her bizarre spells.


    Before they hade here, Greem had emphasized the strange abilities of this little girl, therefore, Evil Bugs had no ns of experiencing it himself. He just wanted to knock her out as quick as possible.


    But what happened probably made Evil Bug¡¯s mouth drop.


    An invisible barrier was created between the little girl¡¯s feet and those scorpions. No matter how they mmed into it or pricked it with their tails, there was no way they could get past it. Slowly, when more and more scorpions gathered together, a wall of bugs was built up against the invisible wall.


    One after another, scorpions stacked on top of each other, crazily attacked the invisible barrier in front of them, but, no matter how they tried, they just couldn¡¯t break through it.

 Chapter 19

    ¡°Protection Barrier!¡±


    Evil Bugs kept repeating this phrase in a hoarse voice, as he was struck dumb with amazement by what he saw in front of his eyes.


    Protection Barrier was a spell which could divide space and was considered one of the sturdiest shields in the world. Even an official Adept would have a hard time breaking through this paper-thin barrier.


    ¡°Impossible! Absolutely impossible!¡± Evil Bugs lost control and let out an angry roar, ¡°Your barrier must be fake! Else that would mean you are as strong as an Adept! March, my children! Use your numbers and overwhelm our enemy¡¯s defenses!¡±


    Under the control of Evil Bugs, thousands of scorpions immediately burst out from underneath his cloak, forming into scorpion armies that marched toward the little girl who was standing in front of them. At the same time, Evil Bugs opened up his mouth, spitting out countless flies, which looked like clumps of dark clouds, quickly blotting out the sky and thend as they flew towards the little girl.


    No beginner Apprentice could interfere in a battle between two Advanced Apprentices. So, from the time the battle began, Greem had been slowly backing away, doing his best to get out of the way, so as not to get hit with a wayward spell.


    Judging from the current situation, Evil Bugs had established a dominant position, as the little girl was trapped under a mound of his scorpions. As soon as he could find a way past the Protection Barrier, this battle would be over.


    Unfortunately for Evil Bugs, the situation was overturned in the next second by a seemingly unintentional counter-attack from the little girl.


    The Little girl, who was seemingly trapped by countless scorpion, still wore the same sweet smile on her face, as if she had nothing to fear from those crawling scorpions around her. Looking Evil Bugs through the rising wall of scorpions, she raised the birdcage in her hand and shook it in Evil Bug¡¯s direction.


    At this moment, Evil Bugs felt his heart go cold.


    Greem had told him about how bizarre was this little girl was, so Evil Bugs had been paying extra attention to any movements the girl made. When he saw little girl shake the cage, although he didn¡¯t notice any attacks falling on his body, Evil Bugs still dodged to one side as fast as he could.


    A pained cry came from Evil Bug¡¯s mouth.


    His body had, indeed, moved away from where he had previously stood, but, for some reason, he nearly fell down after dodging movement. Then he noticed that his right leg had mysteriously disappeared. In next second, his missing right leg appeared in the birdcage, looked extremely tiny.


    The little girl stared at him in astonishment. She never expected that her enemy would be able to dodge so fast.


    Before the enemy could do anything to his limb, Evil Bugs let out a furious cry, causing the tiny leg trapped in the birdcage to explode into countless scorpions. The scorpions transformed into a thread of dark smoke and disappeared. At the same time, his ck robe started to ripple and flow. This was caused by the movement of scorpions, which had started to cling to each other to form a brand new leg.


    ¡°Biological modification?¡± For the first time, the little girl¡¯s smile disappeared. Her grim-looking little face had a somber expression that didn¡¯t match her appearance. ¡°What a surprise, so you have given up your human body and modified yourself to be entirely made of bugs. Hmm! Don¡¯t assume you can be immortal like this. I, Alice, will let you taste real terror today!¡±


    After that, the little girl stretched her cute little hands and performed a grabbing gesture toward Evil Bugs. In next second, Evil Bug let out an angry roar, pressed his hand against his chest, and staggered back, almost falling to the ground. At the same time, out of nowhere, a beating heart appeared in the little girl¡¯s hand.


    If it was any other person, perhaps this would have killed them. But, obviously, Evil Bugs had gone through thorough body modifications and had gotten rid of several organs which were vital for normal human beings. When he saw his heart had been stolen by the little girl, he simply let out a shrill cry.


    Following this cry, just like his right leg, the heart in little girl¡¯s hand exploded into countless scorpions, quickly turning to ash.


    ¡°It seems you were quite thorough with your modifications!¡± The little girl spoke savagely. With a reedy, grating voice, she continued, ¡°I don¡¯t believe you have reced all of your organs. I¡¯ll definitely find the core that maintains your bug infested body!¡±


    Finished speaking, the little girl began to recklessly attack with both hands, continually grabbing at Evil Bugs¡¯ body. Although some of her attacks were dodged, under her continuous attacks, she would still sessfully hit her target every few attacks. And whenever she seeded, some weird object would appear in her palms. Bloodily, sloppy, and sticky, no one would be able to identify where these organs came from in his body.


    But no matter what kind of organs appeared in little girl¡¯s palm, in the end, they always exploded into scorpions and then faded to ashes.


    While she was happily pulling his organs out, Evil Bugs was filled with a raging inferno of anger.


    While moving at high speed and continuously dodging the bizarre, mysterious, long ranged attacks from the enemy, Evil Bugs kept attacking little girl with his scorpions. However, no matter how carefully he tried, he still couldn¡¯tpletely dodge the bizarre spell attacks, which gave no warning and put off no Elementium ripples.


    At the same time, when faced with the indestructible Protection Barrier, he actually felt a sense of helplessness, as he couldn¡¯t find the opportunity to attack the little girl. If this kept going on, even if he had a high confident on his own modified bugs body, perhaps he would have to admit defeat to this little girl.


    Right when the thought of retreating was growing in Evil Bugs¡¯ mind, Greem suddenly shouted out to him.


    ¡°Sir Evil Bugs, attack the back of her head...¡±


    Eh? Attack the back of her head?


    Evil Bugs groaned in his mind. He had already tried the back of her head. In fact, he had tried attacking from all possible angles and positions, even from underground. But no matter what he did, the paper-think Protection Barrier had dissolved all of his attacks. No matter how he tried, he just couldn¡¯t find any weak spots in her invisible Protection Barrier.


    But something surprised him, as when Greem¡¯s shout was heard by Alice, she unconsciously turned rigid for a second. At the same time, her pair of big, purple eyes red at Greem, who was hiding in a far distance, and she started secretly gnashing her teeth in anger. Although no much emotions could be seen on Alice¡¯s rigid face, Evil Bugs still noticed a small bit of panic in her eyes.


    Could that really be her weak spot?


    Though he was still skeptical about what Greem had said, Evil Bugs¡¯ heart was filled with anger, as he had most of his internal organs plucked out by this little girl. Hence, without giving it a second thought, he initiated a close ranged attack.


    Without making any noise, Evil Bug¡¯s body copsed. His ck cloak fell to the ground after losing its support, revealed nothing but emptiness underneath it.


    At the same time, a dark figure suddenly appeared at Alice¡¯s back.


    It was a dark figurepletely formed from countless scorpions, an amorphous bug body which had been assembled into a human form. A face could be barely seen on the head of this figure.


    Right after it stood up, the humanoid figure immediately leaped forward, pressing its body into the invisible barrier that he had been having a hard time in breaking through. In the next instant, the scorpions around them turned into a ck tidal wave, crazily mming themselves against the regions behind Alice¡¯s head.


    Somehow, a fist size ripple finally appeared on the Protection Barrier, right at the position where all those scorpions were mming into.


    In fact, that region was not a Protection Barrier, but a mini size Air Barrier, which had perfectly connected with the Protection Barrier.


    Evil Bugs instantly widened his eyes, and his heart was filled with an unspeakably wild joy. Indeed, there was a w in the enemy¡¯s defense, and the w was this Air Barrier.


    Although they were both Barriers, there was a vast difference between their magical characteristics!


    Protection Barrier was a Space Type Spell, the top Principle among all Adept Principles. It was also referred to as the strongest defense within the nes. On the other side, Air Barrier was formed from a variant usage of Wind Elementium.


    If no one spotted this weakness, perhaps it would be extremely difficult for anyone to discover this small ¡®backdoor¡¯ that was hidden in the Protection Barrier. But when Evil Bugs used all his effort and hit on this particr spot, the only unstable part of the Protection Barrier instantly exploded.


    After a heart-stirringly loud crash, the scorpion army broke the ¡®mirror¡¯ and swarm into the Protection Barrier like a ck tidal wave. In an instant, the small cute body of Alice had been covered by the rolling and creeping tide of scorpions.


    Unexpectedly, a sharp grating cry resounded throughout the scene, and a ground shaking explosion suddenly rippled from within the scorpion army, which had piled up like a small ck hill of scorpions.


    Broken pieces of ck scorpions flew in all directions, as terrifying looking cracks of space stretched out in a spider web pattern. Whenever a scorpion touched by these space cracks, its body part would immediately disintegrate without making any sound. No matter how thick their shell was, none could escape from the devastating attack. This perfectly showed the matchless ability of space spells.


    A raging shockwave repelled all the scorpions that had piled up on her body. Then the ¡®space cracks¡¯ swept the area, violently crushing and disintegrating any scorpions which got in their path, revealing Alice¡¯s small form within the mound of bugs.


    Right in the center of suddenly the web of space cracks, Alice was floating in mid-air, her long waving hair flowing out from her head. She let out a terrifying and extremely angry roar into the sky.


    Using space as her weapon, disintegrated all the scorpions around her. Once this little girl, who possessed a great innate talent of space, became angry, she was capable ofunching such terrifying and deadly attacks. This made Greem, who was hiding a few hundred meters away, feel his heart tremble with fright.


    Was the gap between Beginner Apprentice and Advanced Apprentice this huge? Although he kept reminding himself that this Alice belonged to the top tier of Advanced Apprentices, he couldn¡¯t hold down the fear and shock growing in his heart. This group of people was simply too powerful!


    Even though they were still not official Adepts, or even Pseudo-Adepts, they possessed terrifying abilities which were beyond belief!

 Chapter 20

    With just one single terrifying attack, Alice had covered a huge 50-meter area with a 360o destructive spell that no one could escape. Within this area, space shattered as the deadly space cracks swept across nearly every inch of the region.


    When faced with the devastating space cracks, which could shear through anything, Elementium Resistant was simply a joke. No Apprentice level Personal Protection spell would provide any protection against the destruction caused by the space cracks. Without any unique life-saving abilities, even if ten Pseudo-Adepts tried to resist Alice¡¯s attack together, they would all probably die.


    At this moment, Greem really felt a bit of pity for Evil Bugs, as he had been right in the center of that area, hence he had probably been killed. Also, Greem would have to immediately run for his life if Evil Bugs was dead.


    Right when Greem was about to give up on Evil Bugs, his eyes suddenly saw something near the battlefield.


    Dirt was being pushed up at that ce, revealed a big hole underneath. A swarm of ck scorpions burst out from it, quickly forming together and bing Evil Bugs.


    Fortunately, Evil Bugs was still alive!


    But, just as a wild joy had begun to surge up in Greem¡¯s mind, he forced himself to push it back down.


    Something was not right. It seemed that this Evil Bugs had really suffered from that destructive space spell.


    At this moment, Evil Bugs had lost all his arrogance and high-spirits, which he shown at the beginning of the fight. The army of thousands of horrifying scorpions had shrunk to a mere hundred, which was barely enough to form up his body. The newly formed body was shorter than before, and his Elementium Aura could hardly be sensed. Clearly showing that he had lost much in thatst sh.


    On the other side, Alice, who had justshed out with that deadly attack, had lost her calm and indifferent attitude as well. Although those scorpions had only been able to attack her body for a few seconds, but during that short period of time, she had been fully covered by more than a thousand scorpions, crawling and biting on every inch of her skin. This..., it simply made her rage with extreme anger.


    As her floating body returned to the ground, Greem finally saw how miserable her appearance had be.


    The cute little Lolita had disappeared. The right side of Alice¡¯s eye had turned into a huge and bloody hole, with blood dripping down on her silky smooth skin. The dreadful poison of scorpion had made numerous ck and purple patches all over her body. All of that together with her nearly insane and eerie grin... She looked like she was about to go berserk.


    Run!


    Greem was no idiot. When he saw Alice was staring straight at him with her remaining evil looking eye, without giving it a second thought, he turned and ran away.


    With his ability, there was no way he could fight this Alice. Also, Evil Bugs was half-crippled and had no way to stop this Lolita who was about to rampage. Therefore, without saying anything, Greem fled the scene.


    Initially, Acteon was waiting, hoping the scorpion poison would be able to kill this formidable Lolita. But when he saw the enemy slowly turn her remaining eye toward him, he immediately dispersed his scorpion body, transforming back into a swarm of scorpions and squeezing underground, disappearing without a trace.


    Soon, a furious little girl was the only one left at the scene.


    The rampage started.


    She floated up into the air, and began to soar like a bird, flying in the direction that Greem had run, and quickly disappeared into the thick fog.


    When everything had been quiet for a moment, the dirt under a skinny Killer Tree was pushed up, revealing Evil Bugs, who had been hiding while waiting for the little girl to leave.


    He looked off towards where Alice had disappeared and hesitated for a moment, but, in the end, he just couldn¡¯t gather his courage to chase after the terrifying girl. Although that little Lolita was badly injured as well, she still looked like she had energy spare. He just didn¡¯t have the confidence to face such a frightening enemy again.


    After a long moment, he clenched his teeth, turned around, and ran off in the direction that Hawkeye had gone. As for that Alice... it would be better to let someone else deal with her.


    ............


    Meanwhile, Greem was having a hard time.


    Unexpectedly, that Lolita who went rampage hadn¡¯t chased after Evil Bugs, but had her eyes on him, who had only said a few words in the earlier battle.


    He covered his head and scurried away from her, like a rat to its hole. Behind him, the little Lolita was floating up thirty meters in the air, holding the bizarre birdcage and continually waving it in Greem¡¯s direction.


    However, something was really puzzling Alice. It seems like this rascal had a pair of eyes the back of his head. Whenever her spatial attacks approached him, he would speed up and turn in another direction, making her attempts at targeting hime to nothing.


    If it was only one to two times, perhaps he was just having a lot of luck today. But with her continuously failing, Alice was certain that this Beginner Apprentice could sense the existence her spatial energy, hence, she wished, even more, to kill him.


    It appeared that him finding the weakness of her Protection Barrier was not a freak ident, but he could really see the entire structure of her Barrier by seeing through her spatial energy.


    In fact, this was a weakness of Alice¡¯s innate Spatial abilities.


    Although her Protection Barrier was nigh invulnerable, it had a huge disadvantage. Once she used spatial energy to warp the fabric of space around her into a barrier, she became trapped in a rtively small space. Although that would spare her from suffering any damage from an enemy, she couldn¡¯tunch any attacks while the barrier was intact.


    Therefore, in order to allow her to attack, she had to leave a ¡®hole¡¯ in her Protection Barrier, so she could manipte her Spirit Energy to target an enemy. To avoid this hole being noticed, she purposely used invisible Wind Elementium and created a weaker barrier at that spot.


    The full covered, invisible Air Barrier with about fist-sized, and, as long as an enemy knew nothing about it, no one would ever think that there was actually a hole on this Protection Barrier.


    No ordinary enemy could defend themselves from Alice¡¯s bizarre and frightening long-ranged attacks while probing the Protection Barrier inch by inch. That¡¯s why she was able to keep this big of a secret, and had earned herself the aplomb of being nearly invincible.


    But today, unfortunately, she had met with two special Apprentice Adepts at the same time.


    One was an Advanced Apprentice who hadpletely modified his body and was able to transform into countless scorpions. He also possessed a nasty and weird attack method. In the end, he was simply a cockroach who was nearly impossible to kill. The other one was just a weirdo. Although he was just a Beginner Apprentice, he was still able to expose her biggest secret... Also, it seemed like he could really see her spatial energy.


    In order to capture this weirdo, Alice had drawn on the highest energy she could use and, in the shortest amount of time possible, she had ced an invisible Space Trap in his path. But, seconds before this rascal ran into this invisible trap, he suddenly changed directions and dodged her ambush.


    Now, Alice had no doubts about his ability.


    Thus, her drive to catch him increased even more!


    ............


    After running for so long, Greem had be extremely tired.


    Due to hisck of training and cultivation, his Agility and Physique were very low. If he had not covered his body with Wind Elementium to increase his speed, perhaps he would have long since been captured by that terrifying Lolita. He had a feeling that, if he really was captured by her, something extremely horrifying would happen to him.


    Thus, even though he was gasping for breath, he still clenched his teeth tightly and kept running for his life.


    The graceful Wind Elementium carried his body, reducing his weight by half, and allowing him to move through the muddy swamp at a rtively high speed. Sensing his Physique was dropping fast, Greem¡¯s face kept twitching as he began to panic. In his panic, he came up with a dangerous n. Making up his mind, he turned to the right and sprinted into the depths of the swamp.


    He would never be able to escape by running, so Greem decided to lure Alice to the habitat of Ghost Nanny.


    This area of the swamp was a bit different from the others.


    The rotten, stinking sludge and the slow moving muddy water mixed together, and clumps of messily growing grass and other dirty waste were floating all over the ce. The water in this muddy and filthy pond was notpletely still but was flowing at an extremely slow pace. From time to time, bubbles and half rotten tree branches woulde to the surface.


    Indistinct wailing and moans of doom were sung above this misty pond, resembling the cries of the damned, and causing ice to go down the spine of any who heard this hallowing tune.


    There was trail went across this swampy area, but the dark trail and the muddy water had mixed together, so, for those outsiders, it was really tough to find the ruined trail in the midst of the filthy swamp.


    Within this swampy area, which covered nearly thirty square miles, there lived many different groups of Ghost Nannies. The smaller groups only consisted of seven to eight members and normally lived in the more remote regions this area. Meanwhile, bigger groups could have up to a hundred members, and they upied thergest region right in the center of this part of the swamp.


    As demons, Ghost Nanny only had basic intelligence. Usually, they were transformed from those humans who had identally drowned in the swamp. Although they had previously been humans, their minds were filled with an intense hatred and resentment towards all of humanity.


    For months, or even years, they would lie in ambush at the banks of the swamp. Once a living human came nearby, they would jump out, biting the flesh of their target, and dragging them to the bottom of the swamp, in order to drown them. With this method, they ensured their poption kept growing.


    Their appearance closely resembled a skinny humandy. However, most of their muscle was missing and their skin became pale as the result of constantly soaking in muddy water. Add this together with their wrinkled and moldy bones, and they looked like a living corpse. While most were naked, those who had lived better lives as humans might be wearing a broken dress, though it was always so faded that it was impossible to tell what the dress had fully looked like, or even what color it had been.

 Chapter 21

    Disheveled, dirty hair; pitch-ck, crooked ws; extremely sharp fangs. All of these were typical features of a Ghost Nanny.


    Onnd, their fighting ability was weaker than that of Ghouls, but when they were in muddy swamp water, theirbat strength doubled, and they were able to fight on par with those Giant Alligators. Also, within certain,rger Ghost Nanny poptions, which had survived for a long time, there might even be a leader, who had mastered the certain Elementium abilities. These unique Ghost Nannies actually had an advanced intelligent that was on par with that of Apprentice Adepts.


    Put it this way: If human Adepts were willing to give these Ghost Nanny Leaders leeway, it was possible for them to give birth to a couple of Ghost Nanny Adepts.


    Too bad for them, this was an Adept world where human Adepts had seized the dominating position. Thus, the evolution and development of all other species had been stamped down into nothingness. So, no matter how clever or how wise a Ghost Nanny Leader became, when faced with an Adept who held the superior position, they were just a precious experimental target or a source of materials that could be recklessly ughtered.


    Today, the peace of this Ghost Nanny¡¯s habitat had broken by two outsiders.


    A young man and a girl had intruded on the swampy area, one after the other one.


    The young man who came first was obviously an Apprentice Adept of the Adept Tower. Ignoring his striking Apprentice cloak, he also carried with him the distinct magical ripple of the talisman, which could only be owned by Apprentices of the Tower. However, this foul minion of the Adepts was really an unlucky guy, as he was being chased by someone today. With his weight being reduced by Wind Elementium, he stumbled his way through the muddy water, yelling out something recklessly while running for his life.


    ¡°Sinbad! ... You pitiful creature who only dares to hide in the mud...e out here quickly... Sinbad... you¡¯re a pathetic slug... a squishy monster...¡±


    Thus, the entire Swampy area became all muddled by this crazy young man who was being hunted by someone.


    Ordinary Ghost Nannies were not intelligent enough to notice what was going on. When they sensed the aura of a human approaching, they quickly struggled to get out from the mud, trying to catch Greem, who skimmed over their territory, and pull him down into the mud.


    Therefore, behind Greem, numerous arms exploded to the surface of the water, waving crazily. One after the other, Ghost Nannies were being lured from the bottom of the pond, staggered about, then chasing after him.


    But Greem¡¯s target was not them. No matter how many these stupid and low-ranked Ghost Nannies he pulled, there was no way they could bring any threat to the frightening Lolita who was chasing behind. Throughout the entire Swamp area, perhaps the only existence that could pose a threat to Alice, and that was... Sinbad!


    With the help of her innate ability, Alice was floating in the air twenty meters above the ground. Staring at the turbid mud and stinking water that was sshing all over the ce, the anger on her face was building up more and more.


    ¡°Hey you! Guy! Listen... stop running around... as long as you bring me to the Tower, I promise I won¡¯t hurt you!¡±


    With a loud voice, Greem replied without turning around.


    ¡°Right! You won¡¯t hurt me... Don¡¯t use these kind of childish lies on me... You just want to chop me into small pieces of meat... Catch me if you can!¡±


    After that, he continued forward, repeatedly yelling ¡®Sinbad¡¯ as he did so.


    ¡°You¡¯re courting death... Rascal, don¡¯t you dare let me get you... If I catch you...¡±


    ¡°What are you going to do? Steam me? Roast me? Or maybe you¡¯ll just clean me up and eat me alive? Anyway, all of you female demons are just freaks... yesterday, that Mary just tortured me, and today I¡¯m being chased by you, a Lolita who never grew up... I¡¯m just so unlucky...¡±


    Before Greem could continued speaking, he felt something tightly grip his feet, as a rattan suddenly shot out from the pond and coiled around both of his legs. With that, he lost the support of Wind Elementium and fell into the stinking swamp water.


    As Greem was struggling desperately, a huge Ghost Nanny slowly rose up from the center of the pond, riding on an even bigger creature, which resembled an alligator.


    Messy, dirty hair; ws with pitch-ck pointy nails; a ragged and torn dress; pale but tough skin; a skinny and withered body... This Ghost Nanny Leader who had suddenly appeared had a simple whip made from rattan carried in her hand, and she was riding on a fierce-looking demon. All of this gave her an appearance that was slightly valiant.


    ¡°Sinbad! Oh Sinbad... you¡¯re finally here... hurry up and take me away! From now on, I belong to you!¡± When Greem, who barely floating on the stinking water, saw this ferocious looking leader of the Ghost Nannies, he immediately leapt toward her in excitement, as if he had just seen his best friend.


    Apparently, this young human, who always came and kidnapped her own kind, had gone crazy. Sputtering with rage, Sinbad hade to the surface to chase this Apprentice Adept off, but she ended up being startled by his actions. Maybe those ordinary Ghost Nannies had no idea who this Apprentice Adept was, but as their Leader, Sinbad knew everything.


    After that Tower was built in the middle of this Swamp, the natives here had lost control over their territories, and the ce had be one of the resource sites of the human Adepts. Under the domination of the master of this swampy area, the natives here had be the watchdogs for the human Adepts, working for them to chase away those intruders who tried to visit this ce.


    Despite feeling aggrieved for their new status, they knew, quite well, how frightening those human Adepts were. Therefore, they were forced to grimly endure the fact of having their territory frequently visited by human Apprentice Adepts. That wasn¡¯t all. asionally, the Apprentice Adepts would kidnap a few Ghost Nannies for their experiments, and Sinbad was forced to turn a blind eye to it.


    But, today, this Apprentice Adept in front of him had gone too far, because he actually came straight to the heart of the swampy area, where most of the Ghost Nannies lived. This filled Sinbad with a raging maelstrom of anger.


    Staring at this young, delicate, and tender human who came to her, Sinbad could no longer hold back her hatred toward living creatures and her desire for fresh meat. Stretching out her pitch-ck ws, she reached for his heart, intending on having a hearty bit of finger food.


    Right as her fingers began to reach out, Sinbad suddenly felt a strong and deadly killing intent. She raised her filthy head and stared straight at Alice with her faintly glowing red eyes.


    For some unknown reasons, when Sinbad saw this little girl, she couldn¡¯t control herself and drooled. A strong desire made her wanted to hug this little girl tightly, and to then use her sharp fangs to gently poke through the little girl¡¯s fair, delicate skin, and let that warm, fragrant, sweet fresh blood flowed into her cold body.


    Especially when she sensed the sweet aura of soul that was hidden within the tiny little body. It brought her an ecstasy beyond description.


    She had no courage to challenge a human Adept, but when an Apprentice Adept, who had such a strong aura of soul, was standing right in front of her, it filled her with desire.


    A little Apprentice Adept... If she ate one secretly, presumably that human Adept in the tower wouldn¡¯t turn hostile to her? But, if he really got mad because of this, Sinbad could still use those useless fools at the outer perimeter as an excuse. As long as she could get a taste on such a delicious Apprentice Adept, five... no, ten... no, twenty. Sinbad was willing to sacrifice that many of her subordinates for this juicy Apprentice in front of her.


    Compared to the floating Alice, Greem was like old hard cheese next to a tter filled with the richest and freshest of foods and was no longer of any interest to Sinbad.


    Sinbad raised her right hand and forcefully pped on the back of the giant lizard under her. This tame demon opened its mouth and let out a loud roar, shooting a grayish beam from its yellow eyes onto Greem¡¯s body.


    Eyes of Petrification!


    This was the innate ability of the Giant Lizard. Getting hit by it at a close distance could turn a mortal into a pathetic stone figure forever. As an Apprentice Adept, Greem did have some resistance toward magical attacks, but when faced with the mount of the Ghost Nanny Leader, he, inevitably, turned to stone.


    Feeling the gradually numbing and stiffening of his body, Greem quickly took out a tiny potion bottle and chucked it into his mouth, gathering thest of his energy and waving his hand at Alice, who flew just above him. After that, his entire body turned to a grayish color, bing hard as a stone as it sunk towards the bottom of the muddy swamp.


    Four Ghost Nannies turned around and dived into the muddy water, dragging this war trophy toward their nest, located at the bottom of the pond.


    Floating in mid-air, Alice¡¯s beautiful and finely made dress was waving in the air. She couldn¡¯t do anything as she witnessed that detestable rascal wave his hand at her and disappear into the muddy waters. Indeed, her spatial ability was extremely powerful, but it could only show its strength after she targeted a specific space with her Spirit. As the rascal had disappeared into the muddy water, there was no way she could target him anymore.


    When she realized that in order to catch that rascal she would have to get her dress smeared by the dirty water beneath her, another me of fury exploded in Alice¡¯s mind.


    That rascal would rather let those demons capture him than to surrender himself to Alice... he must have some way of escaping the demons. There was no way she would let him off so easily... she had to catch him, and question him on his ability to see her spatial energy!


    Filled with a boiling anger, Alice stretched her right arm forward and grabbed in the air, aiming at the chest of that mighty looking leader of the Ghost Nannies. Under the disbelieving eyes of her target, a stinking, withered, lifeless heart suddenly appeared in Alice¡¯s palm.


    Her fair, delicate palm gently clenched, crushing the lifeless and rotten heart. As old ck blood dripped from her hand, she stared at the Ghost Nanny Leader with indifferent, cruel looking eyes, and then spoke softly with a threatening tone of voice.


    ¡°Give me that Apprentice Adept, or else...¡± Alice paused, then continued, saying, ¡°Next time, it will be your brain that gets crushed!¡±

 Chapter 22

    As they were an undying demon, Ghost Nannies hearts, throats, chests, and stomach were no longer held any vital points. But, their brains held their broken souls. If a Ghost Nanny¡¯s brain was destroyed by an enemy, they would face the risk of having their soul disintegrated.


    Therefore, upon sensing the sensation of emptiness and weaknessing from her chest, a vicious expression of hatred shed across Sinbad¡¯s ugly face, and her ferocious-looking facial features became even more twisted and brutal.


    With her tough, tensile skin and poisonous sharp ws, and her army of subordinates, Sinbad was capable of fighting on par with a Giant Alligator. Her deadly teeth and ws could easily tear apart half-inch thick armor, and just by touching an enemy¡¯s flesh, the poison hidden in her pitch-ck nails could instantly paralyze most living beings.


    But, just like most of the other demons who lived in this swamp, she didn¡¯t have any good long-ranged attacks. The Ray of Enfeeblement and Sleep Spell were very short ranged attacks, and could hardly prate basic defensive spells. Therefore, when she was faced with Alice, who could fly and attack from long range, although Sinbad¡¯s overall attributes were suppressing this little girl¡¯s, herck of a long-range offensive skill made her unable to fight back.


    Having fear toward the enemy¡¯s traceless magical spell, Sinbad tapped her feet against the beast beneath her, and the Giant Lizard immediately dived back into the muddy water, leaving only Sinbad¡¯s head on the surface. She viciously red at Alice, yet showed no signs of backing off.


    Alice furiously unleashed all her attacks, but Sinbad, who had hidden most of her body underwater, managed to dodge all of them. After all, Alice¡¯s body movements were too obvious. As long as one paid attention, and moved away from the target area on time, it was actually pretty easy to dodge her spatial attack.


    Even after striking at the Ghost Nanny Leader many times, Alice¡¯s hands still only contained muddy water, which only made her even more upset. In her fury, she ripped eight noxious rotting brains out of some of the weaker Ghost Nannies, who were just standing around, causing the rest of them to panic and immediately dive down towards the bottom of the muddy water. Soon, only Alice and Sinbad were left in thisrge swampy area.


    After furiously venting her anger, Alice took a moment to ponder her weakness.


    Indeed, her Spatial Spells were mysterious and powerful, but they were all single target offensive skills, with the exception of herst ditch space crack ability, she had norge area of effect spells to speak of. Although she was nigh invincible when in 1-on-1 battles with Apprentice Adepts of a simr level, but when she was met with her current situation, her ability fell short of her wishes.


    If she had mastered a Magma Fireball spell, she would be able to turn this stinking pool into a huge pot of boiling water in a few seconds, cooking all the foul demons that were hiding inside. But, because of her passion toward, and confidence in, her Spatial Spells, she refused to study or research any of those ¡®simple¡¯ Elementium Spells.


    As the result, there was nothing she could do in her current situation. She actually felt helpless about how she would handle that evil Ghost Nanny Leader, who refused to get out of her way.


    If her muscr partner was here, perhaps with the advantage of his bulky and strong body, he would be able to brutally break into the nest of this Ghost Nanny Leader. But Alice was a long-range Apprentice Adept with a weak Physique. Once she was trapped in a close fight with a multitude of Ghost Nannies, she had no confidence that she would be able to escape from this ce in one piece.


    However, she had decided that she was going to capture or kill the weird beginner apprentice who could see through her spells today. After a short moment of hesitation, she unleashed her spatial Protection Barrier. Then, like a shooting star, she simply threw herself into the muddy water.


    Apparently, Sinbad never expected this little human Lolita who had lost one of her eyes would be so courageous. She quickly controlled the Giant Lizard and dived deeper into the water, letting out a weird and ultra high-frequency sound from her mouth, and calling all her subordinates to help.


    The muddy water started to roll, as the stinking water began flowing violently. The calm swamp pond immediately started boiling like hot water.


    Numerous moving object could be seen swimming crazily toward Alice. Those objects were actually Giant Lizards kept by Ghost Nanny. They were over 5 meters long and covered in ayer of tough scales. Aside from their sharp ws, they could shoot out a Petrification Beam at a target within 5 to 10 meters. Also, one after another, Ghost Nannies could be seen swimming down into in the stinking water, restlessly attacking this valiant intruder who attacked their home.


    Under the surface of this stinking pond, where human vision was reduced to nothing, Alice was fully covered in an indestructible Protection Barrier. Her remaining eye was shing with hatred as she used her unique spell to ughter every single approaching enemy she could sense.


    There were plenty of spells that would allow her to regenerate her eye that the scorpions had torn out, but she just couldn¡¯t swallow her anger from receiving such a wound in the first ce. Although it was that hateful bug man who did this to her, the real culprit was this weird low-grade Apprentice who had led her to this ursed stinking pond.


    No matter whether it was some innate ability of his, or some kind of magical spell that allowed him to sense the spatial energy, there was no way that Alice could let this leak out to the public. If her enemies learned of this, the reputation Alice had made for herself would be at risk.


    Following the eruption of a bloody and chaotic war under the muddy pond, the entire swampy area had turned into a fierce battlefield. Yet, the culprit of all this, Beginner Apprentice Greem, was currently having his petrified body being dragged into the nest of the Ghost Nannies.


    After the fight began, the four Ghost Nannies had dragged thepletely petrified Greem to the bottom of the pond. Then they dug a hole in the stinking and filthy mud, revealing an underwater tunnel. With Greem dragging behind them, they squeezed into the hole. The tunnel was filled with a sticky, pungent mud, but that didn¡¯t slow down their speed at all.


    They swam straight for a couple of meters, then upward. Soon, they burst to the surface of the water, revealing themselves to be in a damp tunnel under the swamp. Right when these demons started crawling forward, dragging Greem through this dark, damp tunnel, they heard the dulled and hoarse roar of Sinbad from the swamp above them.


    The intense battle had caused Sinbad to start roaring furiously, calling all the Ghost Nannies in the entire area to aid her. Her voice was so loud it even made the tunnel walls vibrate violently.


    Because of their hot tempers and low intelligence, the two Ghost Nannies following behind Greem became restlessness and let out a few short cries, quickly turning around and diving back into the mud. Obviously, both of them were answering the call of their leader and going out to fight the enemy. As for the other two Ghost Nannies, they too let out angry cries, but could only hold back their desire for the fight and continue their task of dragging Greem along the tunnel.


    This muddy swamp pond was a home for the Ghost Nannies. They could soak themselves in the stinking mud and water, year in and year out, waiting for their prey toe. But, undeniably, they too needed a ce to store the things they considered as treasures. Rotten and stinking dried meat, worn-out leather armor, weapons that showed ack of maintenance and were full of rust, and the stinking roots of nts that they had harvested...


    If these items were ced left in the fetid swamp water they lived in, they would quickly rot away into nothingness, so Sinbad dug out a horizontal tunnel beneath the bottom of her swamp, drilling out to ce far from the wet swamp and making a rtively drier cave to store things in.


    And now, the petrified Greem was being escorted to this cave.


    Although his eyes, ears, mouth, and nose were covered by sticky mud, and his body was as hard as a stone statue, Greem¡¯s mind was still functioning as it did before. He was still able to sense everything that was happening around him.


    It seemed that those two monsters had finally started to fight!


    Through the indistinct vibrations and roarsing from above, Greem could imagine how intense and bloody the fight was. Although the army led by Sinbad far outnumbered her enemy, and they were fighting in their own territory, Greem still didn¡¯t think they could defeat that frightening little Lolita.


    Having mastered no Elementium Spells and only fighting with their tough bodies, when facing with Alice¡¯s nigh invincible Protection Barrier, their fighting ability was a joke. As long as they couldn¡¯t find the hidden ¡®back door¡¯ of the Protection Barrier, even if they kept attacking until their heart and lungs gave out, they could never break through that Protection Barrier.


    Unless they could force Alice to use up all her Spirit Points, they would surely lose the battle. Hence, while they were busy fighting amongst each other, Greem should do his best to escape from the ce.


    Although Greem¡¯s body had be petrified and couldn¡¯t move the slightest bit, he was still capable of manipting his Spirit Energy. Reaching out with his spirit energy, he undid the stopper on the little bottle hiding in his mouth, disgorging a spicy and strong potion, which quickly flowed down his throat and arrived at his stomach.


    After many years of inspection trips around the Tower¡¯s perimeter, Greem knew the in¡¯s and out¡¯s of the abilities of the swamp demons. Would he really go on inspection trips without preparing himself for the possibility of being inflicted with a strange status? This ¡®Freedom of Movement¡¯ potion was an item he paid a high price for and bought from another Apprentice Adept of the Tower. It was effective in removing Petrification and Paralysis of any type.


    After the potion starting to take effect, a tickling sensation gradually spread across Greem¡¯s rigid body, and his body slowly returned to his control.


    After being dragged for nearly a hundred meters, they finally arrived at a rather dry cave with a good bit of t ground. A moldy smell filled the narrow cave and nearly made Greem suffocate.


    After throwing Greem into a pile of messily ced objects, the two Ghost Nannies started to yell and roar at each other. It seems like they were arguing about whether they should go and help in the battle or stayed here to guard their ¡®food¡¯. But, right when both of them were busy arguing, two crackling noises sparked up behind them. It was the sound of two fist-size Elementium Fireballsing to life.


    The two Ghost Nannies were startled for a moment. Then they noticed the petrified human had stood up, and there were two small fireballs dancing in his palms.


    Possessing only basic intelligence, these Ghost Nannies had no idea what was going on, but when they sensed the fresh smell of flesh and blood, they immediately let out aggressive roars and leaped toward Greem.


    In the next instant, the two small fireballs exploded and turned into two zing mes, burning their way toward two Ghost Nannies. Both parties brushed past each other, with Greem soon falling on the floor, panting for breath. His shirt was torn, a four frighteningly deep wounds could be found on his chest.


    On the other side, the two Ghost Nannies continued on their way and mmed into the dirt wall behind Greem. Smoothly controlled by Greem, the two burning mes traveled through their huge mouth, and burned off anything that contained in their heads. As a result, both of Ghost Nannies died.


    The air was thin in this cave, and it was only made thinner after being burned off by the Fire that had just happened. Greem was gasping for breath for quite some time.


    Stars were dancing in front of Greem¡¯s eyes, and he felt really unwell. He didn¡¯t felt any paining from the wounds caused by the Ghost Nannies, but instead felt a strange tickling sensation. This made Greem¡¯s heart sink. Damn it, he had been poisoned by the Ghost Nannies attack!


    He searched around on his person, found a bottle of antidote, and poured it into his mouth. Only now did Greem let himself calm down.


    He held his breath in deep concentration and listened to the violent vibrationsing from the tunnel. This was a sign that the battle wasn¡¯t over yet, and he still had a chance to escape, so Greem set his mind to rest and gathered his courage. Then he began examining the nest of the Ghost Nannies.

 Chapter 23

    There was a saying, no thief left empty handed!


    He only arrived in this ce after much risk to his own life. If he just turned around and left, wouldn¡¯t that be a waste of Sinbad¡¯s ¡®wonderful hospitality¡¯?


    Greem initiated his Elementium Vision and started to scan the cave.


    Within the odds and ends that were piled up like a mountain, Greem only found a few items he thought were useful. For these Ghost Nannies, who were trapped in the swampy area, there weren¡¯t that many opportunities for them to find any good loot, hence, although it seems like there were quite a lot of ¡®treasure¡¯ gathered here, only a handful of it was valuable.


    Seven to eight high-grade blood sacks, which looked like red beads; a broken piece of magical equipment, which had degraded so much that no one could tell what it originally was; a fist-sized metallic ore that glowed an odd blue; a strange egg-sized white stone... without thinking twice, he took all of it and tucked it into his waist pocket.


    All of them were urately picked up by Greem, as he could sense indistinct Elementium ripples they gave up. As for the other dirty and messy items, he simply ignored them. After all, he was in the middle of running for his life. If he carried too many things, the chances of him escaping would be much slimmer.


    As the hidden nest of the Ghost Nannies, there was more than one tunnel that led to this cave. Clearly their leader, Sinbad, knew the saying ¡®a cunning rabbit has three holes into its burrow¡¯. However, this clever arrangement benefited Greem, the part-time thief, greatly today. He took a brief second to orient himself, then squeezed into a wet tunnel that led away from the muddy pond.


    Quite a whileter, a weird looking human-head emerged from a small muddy pond in the swamp. As the slimy mud slowly slid off his head, Greem only exposed the upper part of his head, silently watching for movement in the distance.


    Originally, there should have been some Ghost Nannies living in this muddy pond, but, obviously, they had been drawn to the massive battle happening in the distance, answering the furious and angry calls of Sinbad and joining the fight. Hence, Greem could freely move around and no one was around to put up a resistance. He took a breath and started making his way to get out of the pond.


    As the battle in the distance was happening underneath the thick and slimy mud pond, the only signs were the roars and cries of Ghost Nannies and the bubbles exploding to the surface. Greem never wanted to see that frightening Little Lolita ever again. He turned away from the battle and swam toward the banks of the muddy pond.


    He bet the Ghost Nannies were suffering under Alice¡¯s bizarre and unpredictable Spatial Attacks!


    But, just as he had almost reached the edge of the pond, and was getting ready to climb out, an explosion urred in the muddy water behind him, revealing a Giant Alligator with its mouth wide open, biting down at Greem. Everything happened so suddenly, and the harsh environment was the best cover for the Giant Alligator, thus, until the very moment before it struck, the only warning Greem received was a sudden beeping from the Chip.


    After performing a series of iling rolls and twists, Greem barely managed to avoid the deadly bite of Giant Alligator by a matter of millimeters. The massive mouth, filled with sharp teeth, mmed forcefully together beside his waist, creating a small breeze that sent forth a rotten smell which made Greem¡¯s hair stand on end.


    If he had not been warned by the Chip, with just one bite, this ferocious Giant Alligator would have easily broken his body in half. If that really happened, all of his great ambitions would have been for nothing.


    Taking the opportunity when his enemy missed its attack, Greem crawled on his hands and knees and rushed to the edge of the pond. He turned around and quickly summoned a Fire Arrow, striking right at the massive mouth that had just opened up for the second time.


    The ¡®Fire Arrow¡¯ spell, which had previously been going through a solidification process, was finally ready, thus he was able to smoothlyplete his attack.


    The Fire Elementium Spell exploded, swallowing the entire head of this Giant Alligator. The fiery explosion was followed by a heavy downpour of broken teeth and chunks of flesh around the edge of the pond. Suffering from intense pain, the Giant Alligator¡¯s body thrashed around crazily, creating a mud wave that was a few meters tall and turning the surrounding area into even more of a muddy mess.


    The main reason why Greem chose Fire Arrow, and not Fireball, as his first long-range offensive spell was because it also caused physical damage when it hit something. This characteristic was especially significant when he was dealing with wild creatures who had a high-resistant toward Elementium based attacks.


    Of course, Greem would never admit it, but the real reason he gave up learning the Fire Ball spell was the extremely difficult 54 Magical Sybles he would be required to memorize and intone correctly to cast the spell.


    Going back to his current situation, Greem¡¯s attack had, obviously, exposed his current location.


    ¡°Oh. So you were hiding there! Don¡¯t you even think about running away from me again...¡±


    A jarringly high-pitched female voice suddenly came from the distance. Inside her Protection Barrier, the frightening Alice struggled her way out from the muddy pond and let out a furious roar in Greem¡¯s direction.


    Unfortunately for her, in next second a long whip, made from some native vine shot up from the water and coiled tightly around Alice¡¯s invisible barrier. Thus, the little Lolita only able to show half of her body, and was trapped in the pond, unable to leave the surface of the water.


    Countless Ghost Nannies kept mming into the Protection Barrier, like wild beasts. However, their sharp ws and aggressive attacks could do nothing to the Protection Carrier, hence, more and more Ghost Nanny simply hung themselves on the barrier, trying to use their body weight and drag this foul human, who had ughtered many of their sisters, back into the muddy pond.


    Like pouring dumplings into a pot of boiling water, one after the other, Ghost Nannies kept swimming around the invisible barrier, stepping on their allies bodies and leaping out from the water, crazily and recklessly knocking at Alice, who was struggling to free herself from the horde. All of this only made Alice be even more furious.


    Not caring anymore, numerous Spatial cracks, which could be seen with the naked eye, appeared, slicing up everything that came closer to the barrier. Whenever a Ghost Nanny touched these Spacial cracks, no matter whether it was their arm or their tough and strong body, whatever encountered these cracks would be cleanly sliced in half, causing sticky, ck blood to be thrown all over the ce.


    Even so, these Ghost Nannies still rushed in, wave after wave, never showing any signs of stopping.


    Not only that, but even Sinbad¡¯s Giant Lizard rushed forward to attack Alice. Using its massive tail, it pped down onto the indestructible barrier, forcing most of her body to sink back into the muddy water again. The massive impact transferred to Alice, causing blood toe out from her nose and mouth.


    Thus, a fierce battle once again erupted between Alice and Ghost Nannies, who rushed in like a swarm of hos. Meanwhile, Greem was trapped in a dangerous fight with the Giant Alligator.


    Although his Fire Arrow just now had severely injured the Giant Alligator¡¯s mouth and caused a bloody mess inside, it was a ferocious demon who possessed a very strong vitality. This kind of damage was far from taking its life. As a result, the furious Giant Alligator channeled all of its pain into fury, and focused all that fury on Greem, pulling its massive body, which was covered with hard scales, from the mud and continuallyunching attacks at Greem.


    Fearing the Giant Alligator¡¯s ¡®Slow Ray¡¯, Greem restlessly ran for his life. Most of these damn swamp demons had Earth Elementium abilities, and, with their thick skin, powerful bodies, sharp ws, and pointy teeth, fighting with them in this muddy swamp was just asking for death.


    Meanwhile, thanks to a warning from the Chip, Greem learned that there were some underwater creatures sneaking their way toward him.


    Damn it. Why had he decided toe to a nest of these cursed demons?


    While nagging and cursing in a voice only he could hear, Greem followed the cues of the Chip, narrowly dodging the continuous attacks of the horrifying Giant Alligator behind him.


    Rather than referring to the ce he stood as the edge of the pond, it was more like a narrow, sloppy dirt ridge in between two muddy ponds. The ground was soft, and each step he took was arduous, as his feet kept sinking down deep into the mud. Thus, it was extremely tough to escape from these Giant Alligators in this environment. Too bad he couldn¡¯t fly like Alice.


    At this very moment, it was toote to regret never trying to learn the Wind Elementium Levitate Spell. Greem struggled forward, doing his best to stumble his way to safety. Watching the quickly approaching movements of the sneaking underwater beasts, his heart was now filled with misery. He had activated the Magical Talisman in his hand multiple times, but it just didn¡¯t seems to have any effect.


    In a more normal situation, the deterrent effect of an Adept enormous on these swamp demons. But the aggressiveness of these demons had been stimted by the smell of blood, which made it really difficult to scare them away.


    A foul wind caressed his face.


    The surface of the water exploded as two massive Giant Alligators jumped out at the same time, widely opened their huge mouths, which each could swallow Greem whole in one bite.


    Looking at the huge mouths that were well within reach, gazing at the glimmering, disordered teeth, and staring into the throats which lead to a digestive hell... the warning tones of the Chip had gone haywire in Greem¡¯s mind, but it seemed like there was no way he could rescue himself from this dire situation.


    Right as Greem closed his eyes, preparing himself for death, something suddenly mmed into him, then he began to fly through the air.


    A heart-stopping sound came from the snapping of the massive mouths of the Giant Alligators, but Greem had, once again, narrowly escaped their bloody mouths. He opened his eyes as he heard their furious roarsing from far behind him. He was flying an inch above the water surface at an incredible speed.


    Ugh... what was going on?


    His heart was pounding fast, being filled with fear and uncertainty as to his current situation. Greem was able to clearly see something through the reflection on the surface of the muddy water under him, and the sound of pping wings could he heard from above him.


    He strained his head, struggling to see what was above him. To his surprise, a huge humanoid bat was carrying him while flying strenuously.


    Yes, it was having trouble flying!


    This humanoid bat had a massive pair of fiery red leathery wings, which were about 4 to 5 meters long, but it had a rather skinny and small body. Of course, its wings could carry it perfectly, if it was flying all by itself. But, when flying together with Greem, clearly its strength was insufficient.


    A new species of swamp demon? Of course not. Greem could sense an indistinct magical aura and a familiar smell from its body. With the help of the Chip, and by seeing its strange, yet familiar face, a certain girl appeared in Greem¡¯s mind.

 Chapter 24

    ¡°Mary? You¡¯re Mary!¡± Greem cried out in shock.


    The huge humanoid bat grinned like a human, then dived and threw Greem to the ground. After rolling a few times, Greem finally came to a stop, then stood up, a pain filled expression on his face. Meanwhile, after circling through the air onest time, the huge bat descended andnded beside Greem.


    Miraculously, when the humanoid bat approaching the ground, its form starting to twist and change in a bizarre manner. The fiery red body hair gradually disappeared, changing into a soft and bright red dress. The thick, protruding cheeks began to squeeze inward, revealing a beautiful and charming face.


    After it finished transforming, it gracefully turned around and walked toward Greem. Mary was back.


    Bat Morphing!


    This... appeared to be a unique ability of Vampires.


    The innate abilities of a newborn Vampire were gaining strength through drinking blood and regeneration. By these two things alone, they were already an extremely frightening species. However, If a newborn Vampire could go one step further, they would gain the ability to morph into a bat. No matter if it was transforming into a single huge bat and flying through the sky, or exploded into thousands of small bats, as a mean of escape, it performed admirably in saving one¡¯s life.


    And, if a Vampire made it to the mature stage, they would be able to start mass-producing Blood ves.


    So, in order to fight with a mature Vampire, one would first need to face a massive army of Blood ves.


    When his mind ran through all the knowledge it contained rted to Vampires, Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel respect, and even a bit of awe, toward Mary¡¯s speedy progress. Only a few days had passed since she had be a Vampire, and she had already awakened her second innate ability.


    ¡°Who is that little girl? Why is she hunting for you?¡± Mary wasn¡¯t looking at Greem, but at the chaotic battlefield in the distance.


    Their current location was about five to six miles away from the heart of the Ghost Nannies Pond, so the thick fog of the swamp was blocking their vision. However, it wouldn¡¯t matter if they were ten miles away, as there were massive waves of Elementium being released from where Alice and Sinbad were.


    The battle was getting intense!


    ¡°They are intruders! Three Advanced Apprentice Adepts attacked. That little girl, Alice, is focusing on the Principle of Space, which she is very suited to using. She is terrifyingly strong...¡±


    While Greem was exining this in a soft voice, a shock wave of Elementium erupted from the direction where the battle was taking ce, and then the jarring howls of Ghost Nannies could be heard.


    ¡°Oh no, let¡¯s run!¡± Greem¡¯s face changed dramatically, ¡°That terrifying little girl got away from Sinbad!¡±


    He had personally sensed this frightening shock wave before, so he knew Alice was using her powerful spatial attack that could cause mass destruction with space cracks. It was worth noting that using this skill required her to pay a high price, but as long as Alice used it, Greem was sure that Sinbad could never stop her from running away.


    ¡°If we work together, do you think we have a good chance of killing her?¡± Mary suddenly turned around, her green eyes shing red as she stared straight at Greem.


    ¡°This... well... if we work together then... perhaps... maybe...¡± Greem was surprised by Mary¡¯s unexpected question. When faced with this strong Advanced Apprentice, all he cared about was running for his life. The idea of turning around and charging right back at the enemy was simply preposterous.


    After all, with his current ability, even if Alice was severely wounded and dying, she could still easily crush him.


    If he could keep a distance of 50 meters from Alice, Greem was 80% confident that he could dodge her spatial attack, with the help of the Chip. If the distance was shortened to 30 meters, his confidence dropped to 40%, and if he was within 20 meters of Alice, he knew that he would be killed instantly.


    He needed time to respond to the warnings from the Chip. If he didn¡¯t have the Chip, Greem was nothing but a tiny, fragile ss figurine in front of Alice.


    He didn¡¯t have the strange bug-like body of Evil Bugs, who could still stay alive even if his heart was ripped. Thus, once Alice locked onto him with her Spirit energy, he would be dead! Therefore, Greem instinctively wanted to say no to Mary¡¯s question.


    But, when faced with the unstoppable Mary, it seemed he had no say in the matter.


    Her body started twisting bizarrely again as Mary transformed into a tiny bat, which was only the size of a human fist. She flew toward Greem¡¯s chest, then squeezed herself into his shirt. She looked up at him and spoke threateningly, ¡°You better not reveal I am here! I am determined to get the blood of that fool!¡±


    Faced with Mary¡¯s hairy, little face covered with a ¡®threatening¡¯ expression, all Greem could do was nod his head nkly.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, if she really tries to kill you, I¡¯ll find a way to protect you!¡± Though Mary said that, Greem¡¯s mind barely calmed down. He started to ponder how he was going to sneak up on Alice without alerting her.


    However, when he turned around his pupils contracted, and he was filled with terror at what he saw in front of him.


    A shadowy figure was slowly condensing in the fog about ten meters away from him. Judging from the outline, it was that frightening little Lolita, Alice.


    ¡°Alice!¡± Right at this moment, Greem felt his mouth be dry and his breath be short.


    This Alice was like a vengeful ghost. No matter where he ran, she just kept finding him. After being forced by the Ghost Nannies and unleashed a second space crack spell, which covered a huge area, not only she did not take the time to find a ce to recover, but she came right after him. Did she not know that resting was a necessary part of life?


    Recovering from his shock, Greem realized he should be running right now.


    But, before he could lift his feet, a shivering, pre-pubescent voice rang through the air.


    ¡°If you dare to take even one step, I promise I¡¯ll teleport your heart into your stomach... I dare you to try me...¡±


    Greem raised his head and watched as the shadowy figure gradually became visible. In the end, he didn¡¯t have the courage to take that one step.


    Damn it, she was too close!


    After thinking that, he was stunned by Alice¡¯s visage.


    In her previous battle with Evil Bugs, Alice had lost one of her eyes and suffered many cuts and bruises, but this time, the little Lolita was in an absolutely terrible state.


    The hole that was her right eye was still empty, but now, stretching from the bottom of her right eye to the left corner of her lips were three frightening looking scars. The skin near these scars was turning ck, and the exposed fleshed had was showing obvious signs of rotting. Whenever Alice spoke, or did anything that moved her face, ck blood would drip from these nasty wounds.


    Also, the number of injuries on her body had multiplied, and there were many parts bite marks on her exposed skin. The tiny, cute looking little Lolita had been reced with a twisted looking voodoo doll-esque being.


    An indistinct vibration of spatial energy filled the area. After struggling for a moment, Alice managed to finish her spatial energy construction, teleporting herself from one area to another. Normally, she could easilyplete this simple spatial jump, but now she had to strain everyst drop of her strength to barely make it.


    Right after she got out of the spell matrix, Alice¡¯s remaining eye was shown to be filled with a ming ze of rage, gazing ferociously at Greem, who was wearing a nk expression. Although she barely came up to Greem¡¯s chest, her brutal and overbearing presence was crushing Greem.


    Greem¡¯s heart started racing even faster when he saw arge head hanging from Alice¡¯s waist.


    Judging from the vicious and ugly looking face, it had to be Sinbad¡¯s head. It looked like even the leader of Ghost Nanny was unable to escape from the brutal Alice.


    ¡°You¡¯re good... you¡¯re really good...¡± Alice murmured. Clenching her jaw tightly ring at Greem. It was easy to see that she was unable to express all the rage and frustration she felt with Greem right now.


    When she had first stepped into this Magical Swamp, she was in high spirits and filled pride. In her mind, with the exception of those exalted, venerable Adepts, all other people were just a drab assortment of trash, not even worthy of carrying her shoes. Relying on her indestructible Protection Barrier, and her mysterious Spatial Cut, she was even qualified to stand up to a Pseudo-Adepts.


    But who would have thought that, inside this seemingly insignificant Magical Swamp, which was amon resource site of a Third Grade Adept family, she would actually suffer such a heavy loss? Right at this moment, nobody could understand how depressed and angry she was! She was like an ancient brutal beast who devoured all men before her. All she wanted to do was to peel the skin off this slippery rat and pluck out all the sinew between his muscles, smashing all his bones one after the other and crushing his flesh into a pile of meat paste.


    Perhaps, only by doing all this, she could ease the anger in her heart.


    ¡°Boy, tell me honestly, how did you find the loophole of my Protection Barrier?¡± Alice ferocious-looking face grinned as both her hands began grabbing at the air in front of her. A constantly stretching spatial crack appeared in between her hands, like a tamed snake. ¡°As long as you tell me the truth, I promise, I¡¯ll not do anything to you today. I, Alice, will always honor my words!¡±


    ¡°Only dead man would trust you! Even if you don¡¯t attack me personally, you might simply throw me into a swarm of demons, and that would kill me. Hmm, it¡¯s obvious that I know more of dirty tricks and sinister plots than you...¡±


    Greem startedining in his mind, then he realized that he was staring at a spatial crack was behaving like a tamed snake in Alice¡¯s tiny hands. He was not brave enough to say even a single word in front of such a feat of power. Although he looked calm on the outside, on the inside his mind was overheating.


    ¡°Damn, she is indeed a genius, she is ying with a spatial crack with her bare hands! That¡¯s a spatial crack! A SPATIAL CRACK! Even the sharpest weapons in the world can¡¯tpare with it! No matter if it is faced with a shield made from pure steel, or an iron that went through thousands of tempering steps, as long as they don¡¯t have any magical protection, then it will be cut through like was a sheet of paper!¡±


    Although it was an extremely dangerous spatial construct, this little Lolita was handling it with her hands as if it was a cute little puppy. This was the proof of how important innate ability was to an Apprentice Adept.


    ¡°I can¡¯t see the Spatial Energy around you at all!¡± Greem hesitated for a brief moment, then decided to tell her the truth.


    ¡°Nonsense!¡± Alice cried out in rage, saying, ¡°If you can¡¯t see them, then how did you find the exact location of my Wind Barrier?¡±


    ¡°You should know that Spatial Energy doesn¡¯t have any specific Elementium characteristics. It is part of a nar Principle. Those who don¡¯t possess an innate talent for a principle can never see it with their naked eyes. But don¡¯t forget this, there is a huge repulsive force between opposing Elementium, and the Spatial Energy you are using is incredibly harsh and solitary..... So...¡±


    ¡°So you determined the shape and position of my Protection Barrier by sensing the area where no Elementium is present and, as a result, were able to see that they were repelled by Spatial Energy? Then...¡± Mary drew inferences from what Greem said and soon she found the source of the loophole, saying, ¡°Damn it, I shouldn¡¯t use a Wind Elementium spell to cover that hole. Next time I will use the Force Field spell that has no Elementium in it.¡±

 Chapter 25

    Note from the Trantors: We of UntouchableFly hope you have enjoyed the first 25 chapters of Age of Adepts. Starting at Midnight CST tomorrow, March 30th, we will begin releasing a chapter a day. However, if you enjoy this novel, please consider supporting us on Patreon. Both of us, FruitFly and VeggieFly, would love to trante this for a living. So, if you enjoyed reading this so far, please consider supporting us, and if you have any issues, concerns, questions, you can email me at


    Thank you for reading this far, and I hope you will stick around, I know we n to. ??


    Alice deserved her status as an Advanced Apprentice Adept. Although Greem had only said a few words, she was able to immediately figure out what her weakness was.


    Her innate Spatial talent was still worthy of being called ¡®invincible¡¯.


    At least, she was invincible when faced with foes that were at the same level.


    So long as one was unable to break through her paper-thin Protection Barrier, her body waspletely safe. No matter what was thrown at her, there was no way you could prate that invisible shield and hurt her. At the same time, she could always casually torture her enemy with her Spatial Cut and Telekinesis.


    But, no matter how sturdy a shield was, there would always be a weak spot, and Alice¡¯s Protection Barrier was no exception.


    In order to not bepletely isted from the world when Protection Barrier was up, she had to leave a hole that allowed her to municate¡¯ with the outside world. This hole was how she was able tounch attacks at her enemy while her Barrier was up.


    So, in order to cover up this ¡®loophole¡¯, she purposely studied Wind Elementium spells. After that, using invisible Wind Elementium, she patched the hole. The invisible Protection Barrier was mixed with the invisible Wind Elementium barrier creating abination that had previously deceived all her enemies, giving them an impression that her Protection Barrier was perfect and wless, and that no weak spot existed.


    But she never would have thought that today, in this obscure ce, she would meet with a group of such strange beings who defied her invincible status. One was a disgusting man who had modified his body and turned himself into a bug man, another was a Beginner Apprentice who could actually see Elementium in the world around him with his naked eyes. Having encountered of this two strange men had brought her to the unluckiest day of her life.


    If that bug man had, instead, been some other Advanced Apprentice, perhaps the enemy would be killed by her unpredictable Telekinesis ability. How could she have known she was going to encounter someone with such a strange body modification, which gave them the time to find the loophole on her defense. Also, without this Beginner Apprentice who was able to see Elementium with his naked eyes, how could her Protection Barrier have been broke through, forcing her to taste the pain of a thousand scorpions bites?


    The more she thought of this, the angrier Alice became. She wished she could immediately rip his skin off and crush his bones, but she hadn¡¯t got the information she was most concerned with yet, so she could only press down her anger and continue, ¡°Is it a magical eye or some kind of special magic spell?¡±


    ¡°It¡®s a spell!¡±


    ¡°Give it to me, and I¡¯ll spare your life today!¡±


    ¡°Can I trust your words?¡±


    ¡°Hmm! It seems to me like you don¡¯t have a choice! Don¡¯t force me to pull your soul out. If that happens, I¡¯ll tortuously dig through your entire brain!¡±


    Though Alice¡¯s personal image had beenpletely eroded by the day¡¯s events, her pride was still present, and the threatening, dominating manner of her words told Greem that she was not taking no for an answer.


    Greem quickly examined Alice¡¯s current state.


    Either because she had taken so much damage, or that her Protection Barrier was in atent status, but the Protection Barrier wasn¡¯t anywhere to be found around Alice.


    Wasn¡¯t she afraid of a sneak attack?


    I¡¯ll just do it!


    Being over-cautious and indecisive in front of this extremely strong Advanced Apprentice was simply asking for death.


    A momentter, Greem flicked his sleeve, throwing out a small dark green bottle toward Alice¡¯s face. Not needing to be activated any spell, once the bottle smashed to the ground, and the green substance was unconstrained by the bottle, a strange looking smoke exploded from the point of impact. A secondter, an ugly slime man, who was around one meter tall, slowly stood up from the ground.


    This low-grade humanoid puppet was just a temporary product, as it could onlyst for seven minutes at most, and it¡¯s only method of attacking was to surround the enemy, causing them to suffocate within its soft y body. Of course, using such a temporary ve to attack an Advanced Apprentice was a joke, but it could keep even a powerful enemy upied for a second.


    Meanwhile, Greem swiftly took a few steps back, both hands moving extremely through the air while reciting magical spells out loud. A Fire Arrow began to form in front of him. After the solidification of the Fire Arrow spell waspleted,pared to it¡¯s former casting time of more than 10 seconds, Greem could now cast it within 5 seconds. It was obvious that this was a huge advancement inbat power for him.


    But, too bad, what he did made no difference in front of this terrifying little girl. An invisible Protection Barrier instantly appeared between the slimy puppet and Greem, cutting off the Spiritual connection between them. In the next second, the slime man sshed to the ground and then simply disappeared.


    This was the biggest weakness of Summoning Magics.


    Once the Spiritual connection between the caster and the summon was lost, under the effect of this world¡¯s Principles, no matter how strong the summon was, it was forced to return to where it came. Therefore, before this cheap slime puppet could do anything, it had turned into a pool of acidic liquid.


    As for the Fire Arrow Greem cast with great effort, Alice simply responded with an expression of disdain, she didn¡¯t even try to stop him from casting.


    Right after the Fire Arrow left Greem¡¯s hand, it instantly mmed into a tiny ¡®Mirror Space¡¯ hanging in the air in front of him. Blocked by this tiny Protection Barrier, which reflected energy, the Fire Arrow simply exploded.


    Clearly, this explosion was going off too close to Greem. In the next instant, the raging me was reflected by the ¡®Mirror Space¡¯ and sent spewing towards Greem, swallowing the body of the young Apprentice.


    Although Greem could sense any changes in the area with his Elementium Vision, he was unable to react to this kind of sudden change in the space around him. He could cast a familiar magic spell in 3 to 5 seconds, but Alice could unleash her innate spatial magic in less than a second.


    The massive gap between them allowed Alice to sit down and watch as Greempleted his spell casting process. She had plenty of time to decide if she wanted to block it orunch a counter attack. Not only that, if she wanted, Greem would never be able to finish casting any spell that took longer than 3 seconds.


    As she watched the me envelope the Beginner Apprentice in front of her, a scornful look appeared in Alice¡¯s single remaining eye.


    How dare a Beginner Apprentice take the initiative to attack an Advanced Apprentice. This guy was simply asking for death!


    She suddenly felt something was amiss.


    An egg-sized pebble suddenly shot out from the rolling me, rushing in Alice¡¯s direction. At the same time, Greem also dashed out from the me, both hands covering his head.


    The raging me, obviously, didn¡¯t distinguish between friend and foe, and thus Greem had suffered a great deal of pain when forcing his way out of the inferno. His body had been severely burned by the me, and both of his exposed arms were covered with burn marks and blisters.


    With a cruel and hideous grin on her face, Alice gently waved her fingers, sending a few barely visible streaks shing through the air. The flying pebble was sliced into four pieces when it came into contact with streaks. Violent blue-colored lightning spread across the air for a second and then disappeared.


    His attempt at using the Lightning Stone to attack had been aplete failure.


    Without hesitation, Greem pulled out another ckish object and threw it towards Alice. After that, he simply turned around and ran, as if trying to escape another explosion.


    ¡°Didn¡¯t you hear what I said before? You¡¯re forcing me to chop off your legs! Well, if that is what you really want...¡± Alice spoke while sneering, but before she could finish, her expression suddenly changed and she immediately turned to face the approaching object, as it had just avoided one of her casually cast Spatial Cuts.


    A tiny bat had performed a swift turn in the air and avoided the Spatial Cut that came at her, flipping its wing at an incredible speed. She quickly arrived above Alice¡¯s head.


    A summon? Was it a contracted creature or some kind of demon?


    Alice couldn¡¯t immediately identify the source of this weird bat that came to her. Shrugging, she waved her hands, unleashing a couple of Spatial Cuts andpletely sealing off any paths that the palm-sized bat could take. After doing this, she felt at ease, thinking that the bat would not be an issue anymore.


    But, in next second, something happened that made her cry out in surprise.


    Transforming rapidly, the tiny palm-size bat bloated up like a balloon, turning into a tall, slim human girl wearing a striking red dress. Not only that, she didn¡¯t perform any dodging movements, and simply fell straight toward the Spatial Cuts, aggressively leaping onto Alice¡¯s body.


    Relishing in Alice¡¯s greatly terrified expression, ws appeared on the fingers of this red-dressed girl, bing extremely sharp and pointy and indistinctly glowing like molten metal. Also, as she fell, the look of this young girl changed dramatically, as her green eyes turned bloody red, looking as if blood was going to drip out of them.


    As the red-eyed girl fell through the Spatial Cuts, the sound of flesh being torn apart by the spatial attack sizzled through the air.


    A huge amount of blood sshed out from the back of the red-dressed girl, and numerous crisscrossed holes could be seen on her body. The series of cuts had turned her body into a human mesh.


    But this red-dressed girl didn¡¯t pause or back off as her bright red lips were opening wider and wider, and two frightening looking fangs poked through her lips. When she finally reached Alice, she simply bit into her exposed neck.


    Damn it, she was a Vampire!


    She, like everyone, had heard of these bloody beasts before, but, as an Advanced Apprentice Adept, Alice immediately realized what was faced with.


    Like a mosquito biting on her neck, a tingling sensation was felt, which quickly turned into a pleasurable feeling that made her feel like she was walking on clouds. Following the drawing of her blood, she clearly felt her life force was quickly fading away. Her body felt drowsy and was sofortable that she just wished she could let go of everything and fall into a deep slumber.


    But no matter what, Alice was an Advanced Apprentice who had a strong will, and she had high resistance toward the paralytic poison being injected into her body via the Vampire fangs. After being dazed for only a brief moment, she managed to regain control of her will.


    For the first time in her life, Alice felt like death was knocking at her front door.


    In her previous two battles, though he had managed to damage her, Evil Bugs was not her match. As for Sinbad, if they hadn¡¯t fought in her swamp, the leader of Ghost Nanny would have been instantly ughtered.


    But at this moment, Alice really felt the threat of death.


    If she didn¡¯t properly manage her current situation, she, who would very likely be a great Adept, would die in this filthynd.


    Having no alternative, Alice gathered the veryst drops of her strength and, once again, let out a frightening scream that shook the world around her.


    In next second, space shattered, and everything around her was crushed into powder!

 Chapter 26

    This was the third time Alice had used her Spatial Shatter skill.


    As she had an innate talent for using space magic, although she was still an Apprentice, she was able to unleash frightening and devastating spells. However, obviously her body was not strong enough to withstand repeated usage of these high-level spatial magics.


    Therefore, after ripping apart and shattering everything within a fifty-meter radius, part of her body disintegrated as well, showing just how much damage she had taken over the day¡¯s events.


    Taking the opportunity to escape while the red-dressed girl was being sliced apart by her devastating skill, Alice struggled and squeezed into a spatial tunnel that suddenly appeared behind her, disappearing without a trace.


    While blood was spewing from every inch of her body, Mary remained standing at where she was, her body broken. There wasn¡¯t a single patch of undamaged skin on her body. In his enitre life, he had never seen anyone in such a miserable state.


    It was like she had just been thrown through a turbine, as all her skin was split and her flesh badly mutted. Blood was flowing continuously from more than hundred wounds, of all sizes, dying her pale white skin a deep red. Underneath her feet, a small pool of blood was forming.


    Greem slowly moved closer to the battlefield.


    ¡°Hey... are you still alive?¡± Greem asked in a shaky voice.


    The bloody figure trembled, moving her blood red eyes and stared at Greem. An extreme thirsty look fully filled her eyes, which were had be as crimson red as her blood.


    ¡°Blood... I need blood... quickly give me blood...¡± The figure spoke with a deep and hoarse voice. If Greem hadn¡¯t been paying extra attention, he wouldn¡¯t have heard what she said.


    Just by speaking these few words, the movement of her lips made the muscles on her face tear again, causing more blood to gush out.


    ¡°Don¡¯t tell me you want my blood!¡± An unsightly expression immediately emerged on Greem¡¯s face.


    Judging from the severity of Mary¡¯s injuries, even if she drank every drop of the blood in his body, it would probably still not be enough for her to make a full recovery!


    Right when Mary nearly couldn¡¯t control herself, and was preparing to leap on Greem, he recalled something. Without hesitating, he took out eight blood sacks, which looked like red beads, from a pocket at his waist. These were something he had ¡®acquired¡¯ from the Ghost Nanny¡¯s nest.


    Mary instantly grabbed the blood sacks and started crazily swallowed them, one by one, proving how frightening Vampires, a species that inherited from the ancient era, could be. The terrible wounds all over her body starting to heal at an incredible speed, and the whole process was so miraculous Greem simply couldn¡¯t believe his eyes.


    A second ago she was dying, looking like she could copse at any time, but now, it was as if someone had just cast a magic spell that could turn back time. She was recovering at an unbelievable speed.


    After devouring three blood sacks, all the tiny and small wounds on her body had disappeared, and those bigger wounds had started stitching themselves together. After swallowing the fifth blood sack, not a single one of the dreadful looking wounds on her body remained, and, once again, her skin, albeit blood covered, became smooth and fair. After the seventh blood sack, her entire body started to glow blood red and, finally, Mary came back to life.


    When she was about to swallow thest blood sack, she hesitated, then turned around and threw it back to Greem. She had now fully recovered, so it seemed unnecessary to waste another blood sack. Looking at Greem¡¯s heartbroken face, it was easy to tell that these blood sacks were, likely, very valuable.


    After throwing the blood sack, a multitude of tiny cracking noises came from her body. This was the sound of the crystallized blood on her body starting to crack, falling off from her slim and fit body and revealing her perfect, curvy, seductive, and incredibly naked body to Greem.


    Even though he had lived two lives, at this moment Greem blushed.


    Although he had tried his best, turning his face to the side and pretending he was coughing, the image of her breathtaking, magnificent form had been burned into his mind.


    ident, this was totally an ident! This was in no way intentional!


    ... Though it seemed that she really didn¡¯t care....


    For some unknown reasons, the Chip actuallypleted a deep scanning process by itself. Although Greem only took a short glimpse at the report, every single piece of data rted to Mary had been saved in his mind. Also, the ¡®thoughtful¡¯ Chip had saved a 100% urate and realistic model of Mary¡¯s current appearance...


    Ugh... just by reading these ridiculous numbers, Greem felt his heart was going to stop beating.


    Her Agility was 17, meaning she had extraordinary reflexes and was why she was able to move so fast. It was no wonder that, even if she wasn¡¯t moving that fast, she could still produce numerous afterimages to confuse her enemies.


    In contrast to that, her Strength was her weakest stat, but it was still quite strong.


    With a Strength of 9, she could easily wield a two-handed bastard sword in a single hand, and could send arge man flying with a single punch.


    While Greem was immersing himself in the world of data, Mary had put on her striking red dress. In fact, her method of dressing herself seemed impossible. With just a snap of her finger, the blood underneath her feet started to coil up her body, moving around, like a wave flexible snakes. When they finally stopped, a gorgeous red dress had appeared on her body.


    A round object thumped against Greem¡¯s chest.


    Startled, Greem lowered his head and looked at the object. He was instantly taken aback by the twisted, ugly, frightening looking face in his hands, and nearly threw it away, out of fear. But, in the next second, he realized that it was Sinbad¡¯s head.


    ¡°That girl had to make a hasty retreat, but she left this behind. Let it be thepensation for all those blood sacks you gave me!¡± Said Mary, showing a carefree expression while curled up her lips like she didn¡¯t care.


    ¡°You... after suffering such a huge loss, did you even get what you were looking for?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t hold himself from asking. When he thought of how body and disfigured she had been a few seconds ago, his heart almost stopped out of shock.


    ¡°Hehehe...¡± Mary burst out an extreme pleasureugh when Greem mentioned this, blinding him with an incredible smile and saying, ¡°I devoured some of the blood essence of that little girl, so it will take her at least two to three months to recover! Besides, I have a feeling that the blood of that little girl will help me make significant progress... haha...¡±


    Greem was shocked, he was finally gaining a clear understanding of why Vampires were considered so incredible.


    From what the Chip had detected of Mary¡¯s attributes, her Physique was 10/11, and here Spirit was 17/18. The first number was her current attribute, the second value was its potential. Originally, Mary had a maximum of 10 Physique and 17 Spirit. Now that she had fed on the blood of that frightening Alice, she was able to quickly raise these stats.


    Although they were currently still the same, as long as she continued her training over the next few days, she should be able to make both her Physique and Spirit reach her potential maximum, and only then would today¡¯s harvest be consideredplete.


    A female Vampire who could increase her personal attributes just by sucking other people¡¯s blood... Just thinking about this made Greem feel dizzy. Once again, it proved how powerful innate abilities were!


    Judging from her appearance, that terrifying loli, Alice, was, at most, thirteen or fourteen years old. At this age, if she didn¡¯t have an innate talent for Spatial Magics, perhaps she would just be a rookie who had just stepped into the level of Beginner Apprentice. But reality was quite different, as she was a frightening little loli with a high intelligence, but low emotional control. Because of her innate talent for Spatial Magics, she became an elite among all other Advanced Apprentices.


    If not because she was at the bottom of fortune¡¯s wheel, and thus met with freaks like Evil Bugs, Greem, and Mary, with her abilities, perhaps she could easily sweep through all the apprentices in the tower.


    It was same for Mary.


    Before this, she was only a Beginner Apprentice who had merely mastered two magic spells. But, after she was mutated into Vampire, her overall ability immediately skyrocketed, and she had be one of the strongest Advanced Apprentices.


    Analyzing the data, Mary had 60% chance of beating Hawkeye and a 30% chance of beating Madwoman. As for Evil Bugs, Mary had a less than 10% chance of defeating him.


    After all, no matter how incredible her vampirism ability was, it would only be effective when she had a supply of blood. Also, her desperate fighting style could be used against Hawkeye. If she broke through his defenses, no matter what kind of injuries she suffered, she would be able to recover.


    But if she used the same method when facing Madwoman or Evil Bugs, Greem didn¡¯t see any hope of her winning.


    Madwoman¡¯s frightening looking metal sword was not just a decoration, and, with her Strength of 15 and her Physique of 16, she had more than enough to unleash brutal physical attacks. Maybe her 8 Agility was her weakness, but, with the help of magic spells, it would be really tough for ordinary enemies to use this weakness against her.


    And, although that Evil Bugs didn¡¯t fare so well when faced with Alice, that didn¡¯t mean his real fighting ability was weak. Also, since his body was formed of scorpions, didn¡¯t that mean there wasn¡¯t any blood for Mary to use her vampirism on?


    Thus, in conclusion, while Mary had gained strong abilities, but she hadn¡¯t reached the incredible stage that Alice had.


    Since Mary was willing to protect him, Greem didn¡¯t hide anything and, like a loyal military adviser, told all of his analyses to Mary, so she could give up any unrealistic fantasies she might have.


    After bing a Vampire, Mary¡¯s temperament had changed tremendously. It wasn¡¯t hard to tell that the force of that alien bloodline had deeply affected her mind and conscious. She was being nice to Greem, but that was mostly because, during the mutation of her bloodline, he had shownpassion to her.


    But feelings didn¡¯tst forever, and they would quickly fade from the cruel, rational, hard daily life of an Apprentice. Therefore, he had to show his skills to avoid giving the impression that he was simply hiding under Mary¡¯s wings.

 Chapter 27

    Greem needed time to grow.


    Though he firmly believed that, with the experience of having lived a life before this one, and help from the Chip, his growth speed should not be less than those geniuses who were born with extraordinary innate talents, he needed time in order to grow. Just like a juvenile beast, even if Greem was given a pair of wings, his growth would still require a huge amount of time and the investment of a vast amount of resources.


    Currently, he was weak. If he had someone to protect him, he could grow much faster in the safety provided by that person. Therefore, when Mary took her own initiative and spread her wings to offered him shelter, although troubling in the way she did so, he now happily epted this protection.


    But Greem wished he could show his value, trying his best to make this ¡®rtionship¡¯ appear more like a form of alliance that benefited both partners, rather than just himself.


    Greem took a long look at Sinbad¡¯s head, which was sitting in his hand. If he was right, Sinbad¡¯s soul was still trapped in this head, and, if he didn¡¯t properly manage it, perhaps the quality of his prize would be reduced.


    Anyway, this was the head of a Ghost Nanny¡¯s Leader who could bepared to some Advanced Apprentices. Thus, no matter how he might use it, this was an excellent material for experimenting on.


    There was a total of three outsiders who had intruded on the Magical Swamp. Although they didn¡¯t kill Alice, at least they had made her suffer. At this moment, that arrogant and cocky girl was either dead or in really bad shape. As for the other two intruders, Madwoman and Hawkeye should be dealing with them, so it was not something Greem needed to worry about.


    As for Mary, clearly she was more interested in the blood of the other two intruders, because, without saying goodbye to Greem, she transformed into her bat form and shot away, into the misty fog. In the end, Greem was left standing by himself in the swamp. After recovering from the shock of finally having a calm moment in this hectic day, he snuck his way back to the Adept Tower, wanting to safely get his loot back to his room.


    ............


    A dazzling light show was shing in front of her eyes. At the same time, an intense dizziness made it hard for her to identify directions, or even which way was up!


    But, with the help of her spatial senses, Alice arduously freed herself from the chaotic spatial storm, ripping open a spatial crack and returned back to the physical world.


    A wriggling spatial crack appeared in mid-air, and, right after that, Alice came out from it facing upside down.


    ¡°Ouch!¡±


    Alice, who utterly exhausted, had hit her head on the hard and cool surface of a rock, so she cried out in pain and surprise.


    Damn rascal. Damn Vampire. You better not let me fully recovered. Once I have fully healed, I¡¯ll definitely...


    While crazily cursing in her mind, Alice suddenly wentpletely still, With her reminding eye wide open and filled with a great fear, she stared straight at the frightening figure that had suddenly appeared in front of her. The fear made her pause, forcing her not to do anything recklessly.


    Alice examined her surroundings in confusion. Only now did she notice that she was in a dark, closed off stone room. This ce was not the safe zone that she had set up in advance, and the person who stood in front of her was not any Apprentice Adept she was familiar with.


    Looking at the man¡¯s skinny and almost dried-up body, his gray Adept long robe, his old wizard¡¯s hat, and that vicious, eerie smile...


    Alice finally realized who was in front of her, and couldn¡¯t keep herself from letting out a cry of shock, ¡°Adept Anderson!¡±


    The skinny old man who stood in front of her was none other than the master of the Tower, First Grade Adept, Anderson.


    He was the highest authority of the Tower. Hence, right when Alice used the Teleportation spell and retreated, her destination was modified, bringing this little loli, who had already suffered so much, straight to his front door.


    The frightening ability of a real Adept was not something any ordinary mortal could understand.


    Honestly, right from the beginning of their apprenticeship, many Apprentice Adepts started modifying their bodies. In their minds, the appearance of their body and their face was far less important than their overall power.


    If someone thoroughly examined everyone in this town, out of over fifty Apprentice Adepts, perhaps less than half of them was still had pure human bodies.


    Bloodline modification, biological modification, spell contamination... all these were the direct results of their restless efforts to be stronger. The boundary between human and inhuman was not all that significant in this world of Adepts.


    Knowing that even Apprentice Adepts were heavily modifying their bodies, one can only imagine what full Adepts must do to their bodies.


    Able to endure the cruel and painful modification process, able to persevere in the lonely lifestyle of knowledge seeking, able to use all means and make themselves be stronger... After going through all this suffering and finally bing an official Adept, do you think they would still have a kind andpassionate personality?


    When mentioning these Adepts in the world of Adept, what most ordinary people thought of was powerful, insidious, evil beings, who are level-headed in all scenarios. Although they imed themselves to be ves of knowledge, forever walking in the path of knowledge-seeking, their methods of gathering said knowledge would never be described as merciful or moderate.


    In the entire multiverse, being on of the rare,rge scale nes, it was inevitable that the World of Adepts had enved more than a thousand middle and small scale nes. They brutally ¡®appropriated¡¯ all the resources and knowledge from those nes which they conquered, using them to arm and strengthened themselves. If an Adept family didn¡¯t have their own private ne, they weren¡¯t even considered to be in the lowest rank of Adept Families.


    The core strength of the army which represented the World of Adepts was made up of members of these Adept Families. If a First Grade Adept, like Anderson, was ced in the boundless battlefield of the endless conquering expedition, he would simply be cannon fodder.


    Yes, the entry requirement to be in the army of World of Adept was to be a First Grade Adept. As for Apprentice Adepts, they were merely rookies who were not experienced in the Principles of nes. They were not even qualified to be cannon fodder.


    Thus, after meeting with so many Adepts, Alice held a deep fear and respect toward these powerful people.


    Although her innate Spatial ability made her be considered an extraordinary talent, when faced with these official Adepts, even with her amazing protection barrier, she was merely a canary who could be killed by them anytime. In the World of Adepts, innate talent represented your potential, not your strength. Throughout the past millions of years, countless geniuses lost their lives to stronger Adepts with lesser potential.


    Therefore, when Alice realized she was facing an official Adept, her arrogant and violent attitude immediately vanished. Even though the severe injuries on her body made her feel an intense amount of pain, such that she was soaked with a cold sweat, she still acted like nothing was wrong, slightly bending her body forward, and patiently waiting for the man to question her.


    ¡°I¡¯m in a really bad mood today. It seems that a few bugs slipped into my garden when I was busy with experiment. So, little girl from the House of Fragrance... Who gave you permission to enter my territory?¡± Adept Anderson¡¯s insidious looking face waspletely emotionless, and his cold voice made shivers run down Alice¡¯s spine.


    ¡°Honorable Adept Anderson, my mentor, the great Deborah, sent me here to deliver a message.¡± Alice didn¡¯t hesitate and immediately stated her purpose ofing here.


    ¡°Deborah, the crazy woman?¡± Anderson frowned, ¡°So, you¡¯re that genius Apprentice that Deborah got three years ago? Now what? Are you trying to show off in my ce after learning a few tricks from her? Hahahaha... little girl, didn¡¯t your mentor tell you that I don¡¯t like to be disturbed? Oh right, so are the other two little bugs from the House of Fragrance too?¡±


    Cautiously standing up while keeping her back straight, Alice quickly replied, saying, ¡°No. We met at the outside of Swampy Area. All of us are here for our own respective missions. One of them is from Mandasor Academy, the other is from the ck Glove Association.¡±


    ¡°Mission? All of you came to my Magical Swamp for a mission?¡±


    ¡°Yes! We each received training missions from our own organizations. That¡¯s why we came here uninvited!¡±


    ¡°Damn it, damn it... I knew those damn Zhentarim guys would never stop trying to get this ce. This is The Magical Swamp! My private territory! How dare those guys set this ce as one of their mission sites. In the next Adepts gathering, I¡¯ll definitely report their damn behavior to the council...¡±


    Perhaps what Alice said had been a sensitive subject for Adept Anderson, but, though he has already behaved crazily, when he heard about the situation he became even more frenzied. Almost screaming, he began to venomously curse at someone in some distantnd. At a certain point, Anderson started speaking in a couple of differentnguages, and Alice could only identify not more than three of them.


    At some point, Adept Anderson calmed down and suddenly became quiet. Once again, his insidious looking eyes stopped on Alice¡¯s face.


    ¡°Because you have shown respect, I¡¯ll not keep you here. But, as you have intruded on my garden and wreaked havoc, I can¡¯t let you go without punishing you. This will serve as your lesson!¡± Adept Anderson gently pointed his staff into the air and unleashed a tiny glowing green dot, which shot right into Alice¡¯s empty eye socket.


    At the same time, a bizarre looking ring suddenly appeared under Alice¡¯s feet. After blinking a few times, a bright light shed, and Alice disappeared from the stone room.


    At almost the same time Alice was expelled, the same teleportation ring also appeared under the feet of the other two Apprentice Adepts, who were still searching through the depths of the swamp. With a sh, they were expelled from the Magical Swamp as well.


    ............


    At the entrance of Magical Swamp.


    It was a small, dested, miserable looking hillside.


    Facing the hillside was the Magical Swamp, covered with a thick fog. When looking out from the hilltop, besides the numerous muddy ponds, one could only see some light mangled foliage. Otherwise, nothing seemed abnormal.


    After a dazzling sh, Alice was thrown to the ground from empty space.


    Before she could struggle up, another two light shes urred, and two familiar figures appeared in the space around her.


    While whining, Alice stood up from the ground, hastily taking out all sorts of bottles from her waist pockets and beginning to restlessly heal herself. Although she had left the boundaries of the Magical Swamp, she dared not utter any curses toward that Adept.


    Who knew if that damn Adept had some way to spy on them. If he heard her say anything bad, perhaps he would strike them down where they stood...

 Chapter 28

    Moaning and groaning, the two neers staggered to their feet.


    Comparing to the spatially talented Alice, both of them rarely teleported, therefore, aside from the normal dizziness that apanied teleporting, both of them felt sick, almost to the point of throwing up. However, both of them had extraordinary Physiques, which made them very adaptable. Thus, after a brief moment of rest, they had recovered.


    Apparently, before being teleported to this ce, these two had been in fierce fights, as both of their bodies were covered with scars. Even now, they were tightly gripping their weapons, as if thinking they might be attacked at any moment.


    When they saw Alice, who was looking incredibly miserable, both men exchanged nces, incredulous looks in their eyes. Before they had entered the Magical Swamp, the three of them had spared, trying to determine who would be the leader of this temporary team.


    Although both of them were very confident in themselves, they were both defeated by Alice¡¯s mysteriously Telekic ability. If they were being honest with themselves, this Alice definitely had the ability to kill them instantly.


    But, unexpectedly, after splitting up for only a short time, Alice had suffered very severe injuries. Compared to her, their wounds were nothing worth mentioning.


    ¡°Alice, who were you fighting with? Was it a Pseudo-Adept?¡± Hesitantly, the muscr man with a huge sword on his back asked the terrifying loli what was wrong. The Snake headed man, who was standing beside him, also showed an expression filled with concern, quietly awaiting Alice¡¯s answer.


    ¡°Kerry, my business is my own...¡± Alice didn¡¯t deem to answer the question, and simply kept focusing on healing her own injuries.


    Alice secretly felt a great fear in her heart. She was not worried about her injuries, she had suffered severe injuries before this. What she feared was whatever Adept Anderson had done to her when he threw that bizarre looking green light into her eye. No matter how she examined herself, she couldn¡¯t find anything unusual in her body, so she had no choice but to focus on healing her wounds.


    After drinking all sorts of potions, the wounds on her nearly disintegrated body finally stopped leaking blood. Then Alice started to apply a dark purple, pungent smelling, medicinal paste onto her wounds.


    Strangely, the result of this seemingly insignificant mud-like paste worked really well. No matter how awful a wound was, as long as it was covered by the paste for a short period of time, her skin would be restored to its former fairness and smoothness.


    After she finished healing all her wounds, Alice starting to heal her right eye.


    If a normal human lost a body part, it would be a lifelong scar that could never be healed. But for these Apprentice Adepts, who had set foot in the field of mysticism and supernatural forces, restoring lost body parts was quite possible.


    From a ck y pot, Alice carefully picked out a strange looking creature, which looked like a tiny snake. Pinching its tail, she carefully ced it into her empty eye socket. This weird creature was being pinched by Alice so it couldn¡¯t move, causing it to keep twisting in the air while making a jarring, sharp hissing sound. It had a head that looked like a meatball, and a mouth that opened up like a flower. Within this odd shaped mouth were many tiny, sharp teeth.


    ¡°Snake-Sakura Grass!¡±


    Obviously, the muscr man knew about this creature, and he couldn¡¯t help but sigh at its value.


    ¡°What is this thing?¡± The Snake headed man had never seen anything like this before.


    ¡°It is a holy healing medicine, able to rece any missing important organ in the body. Don¡¯t judge by its ugly looking appearance. It is a mutated nt that was specifically cultivated for this purpose. It¡¯s basic price of it is around 70 Magic Crystals.¡± The muscr man briefly exined. At the same time, his face was filled with envy.


    ¡°70 Magic Crystals?¡± Snake headed man was shocked, and he was instantly able to understand the value of this item.


    Numerous major-scale Adept associations existed in the World of Adepts. There were simply too many to count. Internally, each of these organizations and associations would implement the system of knowledge points or exchange points, of which none were exchangeable. Therefore, in an effort to solve cross-organizations trading, the Magic Crystals was born.


    This was an advanced-magic universe with countless nes.The entire space of each of these nes was filled with a magical energy. Usually, these magical energies were equally distributed throughout the space, but, on rare asions or in some unique environments, very dense clusters of magical energy could be found.


    Therefore, in these unique environments, the overly dense magical energy would infest the surrounding minerals, turning it into a crystal. This crystal was a unique item that allowed Adepts to quickly replenish their Elementium consumption. Hence, it was an item that had gained the eptance of all casters in every single major ne.


    As a result, the Magical Crystal had be an important strategic resource for the Adept World, as they were constantly conquering other worlds. Thus, it was used as the basic currency for the entire World of Adepts.


    The Snake headed man couldn¡¯t help it and gulped.


    For example, in the ck Glove Association he came from, after he sessfullypleted this training mission, he would get 15 knowledge points and 30 Magic Crystals. To get 70 Magic Crystals, he would have toplete two ¡®Dangerous¡¯ missions, seven ¡®Difficult¡¯ missions, or thirty-five ¡®Normal¡¯ missions.


    Hence, when he saw Alice unhesitatingly use the Snake-Sakura Grass, which cost 70 Magic Crystals, the muscles on his face starting to twitch uncontrobly.


    Although it had a ferocious and strange look, the Snake-Sakura Grass was just a special mutated nt. After Alice ced it into her emptied eye socket, it immediately coiled up its body and centered itself. Its slimy body started to break down, turning into tiny threads that looked like micro-sized snakes. Countless threads began twisting and weaving into each other, soon forming into the shape of a human eye.


    But, a moment before the eyeball formed by the Snake-Sakura Grass was about to be finished, a bizarre green light suddenly shed around it. In the next second, the Snake-Sakura Grass suddenly went berserk.


    Countless tiny tentacles started poking through Alice¡¯s eye socket, and kept growing bigger, swinging violently. Soon, a few of these tentacles expanded to the size of Alice¡¯s arm, and then continued to stretch further and further.


    After going through a long period of healing herself, most of Alice¡¯s wounds had fully recovered. Hence, her cute loli look had returned.


    But, in this moment, a gigantic and terrifying ¡®living octopus¡¯ was sticking out from the eye socket of the tiny, cute Lolita, No matter who it was who witnessed this, that person would definitely shiver in disgust at the scene in front of them.


    Alice¡¯s flesh stimted the disorderly growth of this Snake-Sakura Grass.


    Under the influence of a mystical curse, the freshly recovered body of Alice starting to started to quickly wither, and nearly half of her flesh was devoured by the rapidly expanding Snake-Sakura Grass.\


    Without hesitation, and using all her strength, Alice was able to forcefully pull out the Snake-Sakura Grass, which currently upied her right eye socket. Lifting the crazily twisting octopus-like monster up into the air, Alice let out a deep and hoarse roar into the sky as blood spewed from her eye socket.


    ¡°Curse you... you bunch of damn rascals... I¡¯m going to kill you all!¡±


    The unusual situation that urred had frightened the other two male Apprentice Adepts. Although they had no idea what this little Lolita had experienced in the Magical Swamp, they could still clearly feel a deep hatred in her furious roar.


    Judging from what happened, it must be the Adept who did this personally.


    That Adept Anderson who lived a sedentary life in this Magical Swamp and didn¡¯t even show respect to Adept Deborah, who was Alice¡¯s mentor, how could he let them off so easily? Because, both of them were expelled by Adept Anderson personally! Who knew what he had cast on their bodies?


    Right when they were struck with these doubts, a young woman¡¯s lustful moan suddenly came into their ears. Soon, two vague, elusive Enchanted Souls squeezed out from the ground underneath their feet, turning into two magnificent girls, that perfectly fit their tastes, that clung tightly to their bodies.


    Well, things would be better if these were just two illusive souls, but, as soon as they were grabbed by the soul beings, their Spirit started to gradually deplete.


    ¡°Spirit-Sucking Devils!¡±


    The Snake headed man was the first to identify these enchanting spirits, and his loud cry was full of unconcealed fear.


    Spirit-Sucking Devils were very frightening souls. They consumed a person¡¯s Spirit, which was gained from meditation. As long as one¡¯s Spirit wasn¡¯t depleted, they could survive being attacked by these frightening devils. But, once their Spirit Points were depleted, the foul devils would start to consume the life force of their target.


    The Snake headed man went berserk.


    He started to roar and yell, and his skinny body began to stretch longer and taller, quickly being covered with dark green scales. In the blink of an eye, he had transformed into a huge, raging serpent, which was nearly ten meters tall.


    But, too bad, no matter what he transformed into, the bizarre Spirit-Sucking devil still clinging tightly to his body, continually draining his Spirit Points.


    Roaring, mming, swaying, rolling... he tried all sorts of highly difficult movements, wreaking havoc to this small hillside with his massive body. He even turned his head backward and spat venomous liquids onto its own body, but all its attempts failed to get rid of the Spirit-Sucking Devil.


    No magic spell could do anything, no physical attack could touch them, it was as if this devil was just an illusion that didn¡¯t exist. It was like it was all his own fantasy. However, his Spirit was really being depleted. And with the restless and brutal movements of the giant serpent, his Spirit was being reduced at a fast rate.


    The muscr man didn¡¯t recklessly try to remove the devil from his body, as his high Physique Points gave him a better magic resistance than the Snake headed man, therefore, by avoiding unnecessary movements, he lost Spirit at a lesser rate.


    When dealing with a curse cast by an official Adept, these Apprentice Adepts had no way to remove it. Hence, he dared not to stay here any longer and started running off into the distance.


    Only by returning to his own organization as soon as possible could he get help from his mentor, or else he would die to this terrifying devil.


    After countless failed attempts, the Snake headed man had no choice but to return to his human form. Only then did his Spirit depletion slow down. He angrily cursed in his head, then took out a Magic Crystal from his pocket, absorbing the energy from it. Then he did as the muscr man did, using only his muscle strength, and ran of into the distance.


    He also realized that, as long as he didn¡¯t use any magic spells, the speed of the devil sucking his Spirit Points would be slower, and, with the replenishment of the Magic Crystal, he could sustain himself for a longer period of time.


    After the two male Apprentices plunged into the wilds and fled, Alice used her Spatial Energy and crushed the monstrous creature in her hand. But, she immediately felt a subtly prickling in the back of her eye as, once again, a brand new tentacle poked out of her empty eye socket.


    In the moments before this, perhaps Alice had only felt hatred and anger, but now an unspeakable fear emerged at the bottom of her heart.


    With an explosive noise, Alice disappeared from where she was, re-appearing in a distant ce. And right when her body solidified, she disappeared again...


    She was running out of time.


    If she allowed this terrifying curse to stick around, she would soon run out of flesh. She had to return to her mentor as soon as possible, only then could this frightening curse be removed.


    Therefore, even if this would totally deplete her Spirit Point, Alice still had to try her best and rush back to the House of Fragrance.


    Soon, peace had once again returned the hillside next to one of the entrances of the Magical Swamp.

 Chapter 29

    Greem waspletely ignorant to the events that urred after he went back to the tower.


    As to be expected, anytime something good happened to him, it was almost always apanied by misery.


    Before today, he thought he would have time to slowly and quietly developed himself, but, after the day¡¯s event, he realized that things would not be so easy for him.


    His previous peaceful life had made him think that his life as an Apprentice could carry on forever at a gradual pace. But, after today¡¯s heart-pounding encounter, he had realized the huge gap between a Beginner Apprentice and an Advanced Apprentice.


    As he had witnessed the extraordinary potential of Advanced Apprentices, and how they utilized magic spells that worked perfectly with their talents, Greem realized how slow and backward his progress was.


    Following his original development path, perhaps it would take him three to four years of daily meditation, and ceaselessly pursuing the umtion of magical knowledge, before he could be an Intermediate Apprentice. To be an Advanced Apprentice would take Greem at least another ten years of work. As for bing a Pseudo-Adept? With Greem¡¯s current potential and innate talent, he didn¡¯t have much hope for reaching that level.


    As an Apprentice Adept, every tiny increase of his Spirit was unimaginably valuable to him, and it only resulted from hard work. His innate talent was no better than the others, thus, if he wanted to grow faster than the rest of the Apprentices, the only way was to seize more resources and to get sufficient magical knowledge.


    Aside from these, there was no other workaround.


    And, in order to improve the power of his magic spells, his first priority was to increase the quality of his body. All magic spells, no matter whether they were support spells or long-ranged attacks, were supported by the body of the caster. Magical spells could only unleash their full strength when used by a caster who had increased the quality of his body.


    After safely returning to the Tower from the jaws of death, Greem immediately locked himself up in his room and starting to ponder on his future path.


    Thinking on the four major branches of Adepts, Greem carefully weighed the advantages and disadvantages of each, associating them with his own ability and quietly evaluating his future.


    Body Refining Adept.


    To be a Body Refining Adept, the first requirement was a dauntless will, which was as firm as steel. In order to stimte and strengthen the body, these Body Refining Adepts had to be willing to do anything.


    As an example of a training method for a Body Refining Adepts, they would soak themselves in a container full of toxin all days. Venoms from scorpions, snakes, spiders, Septmortem Flower, Nightmare Grass, Zombie Powder... In short, no matter where the toxin came from, they would use anything they could get their hands on. From mild to strong, from weak to powerful, using all sorts of deadly toxin they kept stimting every single cell in their body over and over again, forcing the body to release its potential, and strengthening it bit by bit.


    Of course, when they were doing this, surviving was definitely the most important thing. They would have to figure out the maximum amount of toxin they could endure, so they wouldn¡¯t die from the toxin.


    As they progressed through their body refining process, as they stepped over the beginner threshold, they would gain resistance to some toxins, and perhaps no ordinary toxin in the mortal world could harm them. If they wanted to go further, the only way was to restlessly search for rarer, more powerful magic toxins.


    Therefore, as a Body Refining Adept, perhaps the first half of their life would be used up figuring out the maximum amount of toxins their body could take and hunting for those rare magic toxins that worked best for their bodies.


    Of course, there were also some Body Refining Adepts that used objects with frightening radioactive characteristics to stimte and refined their body, and there were some who would specifically search for harsh natural environments, using the terrifying forces of nature to push themselves forward.


    All in all, there were a variety of methods to train in this branch. But no matter which method one used, a Body Refining Adept would have to endure constant pain and hardship. Only then they would have a frightening body that no ordinary man could everpare with.


    If Greem wanted to be a Body Refining Adept, first he would need to find aplete method of body refining. After that, he would have to search for all the poisonous items he would need to use in the long period of hardening himself. Also, during the process of body refining, he would be extremely weak, thus he would need better, more nutritious meals to nourish his weakened body.


    Also, he would also need to find some suitable fighting techniques, so he could unleash the power of his improved Physique and Strength.


    After analyzed these basic situations, Greem felt extremely dubious about bing a Body Refining Adept. Putting aside the extreme difficulty of body refining techniques, acquiring the precious nutritious foods required to match up with the body refining process would be tough.


    Bloodline Adept.


    Obviously, this was the easiest choice to gain a strong short-term fighting ability.


    When talking about Bloodline Adepts, biological modification was quite amon topic, as it was the most popr method among Apprentice Adepts. With just a ¡®small¡¯ magical ceremony, they could transnt a highly efficient organ from a powerful demon, possibly giving them special abilities in the process.


    Most of the Apprentice Adepts would never say no to such a simple method of strengthening themselves, wherever conditions permitted, and they would always carry out certain degrees of modification to themselves. However, this was easier said than done! This came with the risk of having your bloodline contaminated, losing vitality, or transnted a crappy organ that didn¡¯t provide good abilities.


    For Apprentice Adepts like Greem, who lived in the Magical Swamp, isted from the outside world, what kind of powerful demons could they find? With their ability and status, it was just impossible for them to acquire organs those real frightening demons. Therefore, if these Apprentices could find a usable piece of a demon that matched up to the rank of an Advanced Apprentice, that would be incredibly valuable.


    It was said that Hawkeye Clutha, one of the three strongest Apprentice in the Tower, had transnted the eyeball of a ¡®Red-eyed Rex Mari¡¯, which gave him the ability to control Scavenger Crows.


    Greem felt this decision was short-sighted.


    Maybe this demon organ allowed him to attain a higher level in one swift step, bing one of the Advanced Apprentices, the elite among all the Apprentice Adepts in the Tower. But, at the stage where he was now, the potential brought by biological modification hade to an end. If he was lucky, he might be able to be a Pseudo-Adept in five years and start his preparation for breaking through the rank of official Adept. But if he was out of luck, perhaps he would never be able to be an official Adept.


    After all, for anyone who had their bloodline contaminated, the difficulty of bing an official Adept would be exponentially harder!


    So,pared to a Bloodline Adept, biological modification was a wasteful path that led to nowhere, a deceiving power, which would ruin one¡¯s future.


    However, inparison with biological modification, the path of a Bloodline Adept was much, much tougher.


    In order to be a Bloodline Adept, one would have to find a creature with ancestral bloodline, using arge amount of their blood, and a process called blood purification, to obtain the inherited power that hidden in their blood.


    If he chose this path, there were many challenges he would have to solve.


    First, many of the known powerful bloodlines were controlled by different Adept families.


    These Adept families were descendants of some original Bloodline Adept, who had be mighty in the past. As the descendant of someone who possessed a strong bloodline, naturally, they had inherited the superior bloodline of their ancestor. In order to ensure the continuity of their family bloodline, they refused to marry to anyone outside of their own family, maintaining an enclosed circle to protect the purity of their family bloodline.


    Asides from these known powerful bloodlines, if any other Apprentice Adept wished to tackle the branch of Bloodline Adepts, they could only try their luck on the bloodlines of other, untried, demons.


    If they happened to get a Third Grade bloodline, perhaps their descendants wouldn¡¯t even be Second Grade Bloodline Adepts, and those Second Grade Bloodline Adepts would be lucky if their descendants became First Grade Bloodline Adepts.


    So, for those juniors from strong bloodline families, if they didn¡¯t possess powerful abilities, once they left their home, they would be preyed upon by others. Some rogue Apprentice Adepts would happily capture them, attempting to squeeze out the essence of their bloodline, in turned giving them some powerful abilities.


    But, to aplish this, a huge amount of blood from the bloodline apprentice was required, and the sess rate was pretty low. Another thing to consider was that it was a huge taboo for those bloodline families.


    With the incredible and strong resources of these bloodline families, would they just sit back and let their bloodline be obtained by others? Thus, even if they had to pay a huge price, they would hunt down the culprit and kill them. So, in the history of the World of Adepts, there had been many incidents of massive turmoil brought about by the stealing of a bloodline of a powerful bloodline family.


    In fact, perhaps the Snake Headed Apprentice from earlier today was also a descendant of a bloodline family, or else he wouldn¡¯t have shown such distinct characteristics of a demon. Perhaps Greem could have obtained his blood... but he didn¡¯t.


    Of course, he didn¡¯t regret this.


    This descendant of a Bloodline Adept was only an Advanced Apprentice, so he wouldn¡¯t have too strong of the bloodline inherited in his blood. In order to guarantee Greem bing a Pseudo-Adept, perhaps he would need at least a dozen of these descendants. Only then could he extract enough blood to purify his bloodline.


    This would be as difficult for Greem as fighting a Mega Dragon!


    Besides that, ording to what Greem had learned from books, currently, among all Bloodline families that were still active in the center of the Adept Continent, the highest level among them was only at the Seventh Grade. The Ninth Grade was the current pinnacle of the Bloodline Adept structure.


    As a Bloodline Adept, one was not required to do too much cultivation or umtion of knowledge. All they needed to do was to keep purifying their own bloodlines, and, eventually, they would be able to obtain the abilities of their ancestor¡¯s bloodline.


    For example, let¡¯s say that an Adept was the inheritor of a Fifth Grade bloodline, just by being a Bloodline Adept, he would be able to rank up with the speed that was tens to hundreds of times faster than that of the other branches. This allowed him to press forward with an indomitable spirit for the first half of his life, and live a life of glory. Besides that, Adept who possessed unique bloodline might have some special abilities too, letting them have the advantage when fighting with a same grade Adept.


    However, the pinnacle of the source bloodline was also the end of their Adept path.


    When Adept with a Fifth Grade Bloodline finally became a Fifth Grade Adept, he would be forced to face the fact that the road ahead of him waspletely cut off. He would never be able to proceed further after reaching Fifth Grade.


    This was the saddest thing about these Bloodline Adepts!


    Once they chose to walk this path, and picked a wrong bloodline, the chances of them reaching the top of this World of Adepts was forever lost.

 Chapter 30

    Since the path of Bloodline Adept was so tough to get into, and the fact that, though they could grow quickly, their growth was limited from the start, Greem decided to eliminate this possibility.


    So, all he had left in front of him was to be a Principle Adept or a Profound Adept.


    Between these two choices, Greem strongly preferred Principle Adept. Whenever he envisioned those powerful Elementium spells that were capable of such vast destruction, and the bizarre and frightening curse spells, Greem wished for that power, and really wanted to master some incredible spells.


    But, the path of Principle Adept was also the hardest, as it was without any short-cuts. In order to climb up to the top rungs of the Adept hierarchy, a Principle Adept had to take one step at a time, diligently improved their elemental affinity, and then mastering any rted Elementium spells. Then they had to have a strong understanding of the core ne Principles. Only when he became the master of a principle could he proudly announce that he was a Principle Adept.


    This was, usually, something that could be achieved after reaching the Seventh Grade.


    If he didn¡¯t have the Chip, Greem wouldn¡¯t ever choose this path. Because, if he did, that also meant he had to spend a huge amount of time meditating and improving his elemental affinity. In fact, in order to make oneself have a better elemental affinity, many Adepts would try their best to rece their body with the Elementium that they had the highest affinity for, even if that would eventually transform them into an Elementium life form.


    Analyzing from all aspects, no doubt the path of Principle Adept was an obvious choice for any Adept, as it was the path that had the highest possibility of reaching the pinnacle of the Adept world. So, with the nid out by the Chip, Greem felt this was the best path for him.


    However, before he became truly strong, Greem would have to find ways topensate, as he was currently weak, or else, how could he make his way out of the intense and brutalpetition among Apprentices?


    So, after decided he would make Principle Adept his primary path, Greem also nned to learn some of the skills of Profound Adepts to support the slow growth of his primary path. And, no doubt the ¡®Golem Creation Manual¡¯ he obtained before was one such Profound Adept method that could help improve his current fighting ability.


    ¡°Chip, what¡¯s the progress of organizing the data of the ¡®Golem Creation Manual¡¯?¡±


    *Beep* ¡°The copying of magic spell book ¡®Golem Creation Manual¡¯ had beenpleted... the data has been optimized, and useless content has been removed. The list of suitable golems has been constructed...¡±


    Greem¡¯s eyes instantly brightened when he heard the message.


    ¡°Send me all the data!¡±


    *Beep*... A stream of data was immediately transferred over. Closing his eyes, he silently looked over the additional magic knowledge that suddenly popped up in his mind.


    Strictly speaking, it was a list of items.


    ......


    ......


    It had, previously, been a long list, but after the Chip removed those golems that were beyond Greem¡¯s current abilities, and other useless content, all that was left were these two elementary golems, which had been repeatedly optimized.


    Yes, the Chip rmended a Golem, rather than a Titan.


    Comparing their fighting ability, no doubt a Titan, who had a fixed body, was stronger than a Golem, which was more like a summon. But, with theckluster resources that Greem currently possessed, perhaps it was not realistic to hope he could gather enough resource to create a Titan.


    Take the most basic y Titan as an example.


    An eight foot tall, six hundred pound y Titan was made entirely of soft y. This took no ount of the crafting cost in building it. Just the soft y alone would cost him nine thousand gold coins. For everything he would need to make one y Titan, the basic price was twenty-one thousand gold coins.


    Compared to that, the Golem suggested by the Chip was way cheaper, as the only required raw material was an Advanced Apprentice level demon core. Although it required a lot of magic knowledge in order to sessfully create one, the total cost was around seven thousand gold coins.


    By his calctions, Greem would be able to save up that much money, which was a huge relief to him.


    Greem couldn¡¯t create an Acid Golem now, because hecked a suitable Water Elementium Demon Core. But the y Golem was a perfect choice, as he just obtained the head of an Earth Elementium demon, which would be a perfect core for the y Golem.


    When he thought of that, Greem quickly walked to the wooden rack in the corner of his room.


    Arge ss jar was ced on top of a wooden tray. It was covered with a ck cloth so that no one could see what was inside.


    Greem gently lifted the ck cloth, leaned forward, and quietly stared at Sinbad¡¯s head, which was soaking in a yellowish liquid. Perhaps noticing Greem¡¯s nce, some indistinct twitching movements could be seen on Sinbad¡¯s face, and he felt the weak soul was begging for mercy.


    A strong smell, simr to formaldehyde, was lingering near the jar.


    Scientifically speaking, the Ghost Nanny was not considered an immortal creature, so their organs had to be carefully stored away after being taken from their body, or else the usable value would quickly diminish. Although Sinbad¡¯s head had not been originally acquired by Greem, it was clear that Alice had taken a good care of this head. She also trapped Sinbad¡¯s soul within it.


    Of course, Greem had no idea whether this was because Alice wanted to vent her anger by torturing Sinbad, or if she had other ns, but, no matter what, this had given him a huge advantage. At least he had noints about not getting Sinbad¡¯s heart.


    In order to maximize the benefits brought by this head, Greem even went to some Apprentices who were experts in anatomy and borrowed aplete set of tools.


    In order to safeguard his secret, Greem was forced to use his room as aboratory.


    A couple of minutester, Greem had prepared everything for the operation. He put on a sterile, non-magical white cloth and stood in front of the operation table. Sinbad¡¯s head had also been taken out from the liquid, and was lying t on the table with her eyes wide open, angrily cursing at the human in front of her.


    Since Greem had been working toward bing an Adept for thest few years, he had long been mentally prepared for this kind of surgical operation. Even though it was the first time he carrying a biological experiment, he was calm, in control, and well prepared.


    Ignoring Sinbad¡¯s evil re, Greem calmly gave amand to the chip.


    ¡°Chip, perform a deep scan of Sinbad¡¯s head!¡±


    *Beep* ¡°Mission has been received.. Beginning scan...¡±


    With the shing of blue light in his eyes, a unique spiritual wave started scanning up and down on Sinbad¡¯s head, revealing the secrets hidden inside, inch by inch.


    Most demons, as they had a strong life force had mixed together with their bizarre innate abilities, had formed an energy field that simr to a shield. Thus, Greem nornally couldn¡¯t scan beneath their skin with Elementium Vision and Spiritual Vision, which made it nearly impossible to analyze what was inside.


    But, because Sinbad had lost all her strength, and her life force was nearly depleted, the energy field, which would have formerly blocked Greem¡¯s vision, no longer had any effect. After probing and scanning multiple times, a three-dimensional image of Sinbad¡¯s head had been constructed in his mind.


    A tough skull was wrapped around a deted brain. The cerebrum, cerebellum, and brainstem were hidden deep within the cranial chamber. Thisplete model of Sinbad¡¯s brain was presented right in front of Greem¡¯s eyes. And, right in the center of the deted brain, a thumb-sized, yellowish crystal could be seen.


    As Sinbad was a Ghost Nanny Leader, and had mastered some Elementium abilities, a unique core had grown in her brain. Thus, her heart, brain, throat, and stomach were no longer vital organs. As long as this core and her soul still existed, her damaged organs could always be restored.


    Without hesitation, Greem stabbed his razor sharp scalpel into Sinbad¡¯s head. As the skull opened up, a stinking, dark purple blood instantly sprayed out, staining Greem¡¯s clothes. But, he didn¡¯t even took a look at them, and just kept adjusting the depth and angle of his cut. With the help of the hammer, chisel, and other tools, Greem carefully dismantled the skull.


    With dozens ofrge candles lit, the room was aze with light. Covered in sweat, Greem stood firmly in front of the operation table. With the sound of a chisel cutting flesh and bone spreading thoughout the room, he slowly broke apart Sinbad¡¯s skull.


    Finally, under the swaying light of candle, Greem took out a light yellow, half transparent crystal, which smelled like dirt, and held it up to the light to gave it a closer look.


    At the same time, a message from the Chip resounded in his mind.


    *Beep* ¡°High energy demon core detected. Type: Earth Elementium creature...¡±


    A smile of relief finally emerged on Greem¡¯s bloody face.


    He now had a core from which he could create a y Golem!

 Chapter 31

    It was impossible to create the equipment to summon a y Golem in Greem¡¯s room. So, he left and hurried up to the Alchemy Laboratory, located on the third floor of the tower.


    After paying three Knowledge Points and thirty gold coins, Greem was allowed to use the most sophisticated alchemy station avable for three hours. This was nearly half of Greem¡¯s saving, so, if it wasn¡¯t that he wanted to have the highest sess rate for this first Golem, he would never willing to pay this much money.


    The floor was clean and tidy and the walls were smooth and shiny. There were wooden racks against the walls, on whichid all sorts of items. There werebeled containers for all themonly used magical materials, and there were Elementium sticks, which were used to detect the Elementium characteristics of an item. There was a full set of metal armor, which was used to test the strength of a magical item... besides all these, there were many items of which Greem had no idea what their usage was.


    But Greem¡¯s didn¡¯t care about any of these. What he was most interested in was the shining Magical Alchemy Station in the center of the room.


    There were metal chains hanging from the ceiling. A brightly glowing stone was hanging on the end of each metal chain. Eight metal chains; eight bright stones. They made a perfect circle around the Alchemy Station. With this, the operator could put all their focus into crafting a magical item without being disturbed by shadows.


    These were basically magical versions of an astralmp!


    And the Alchemy Station was, in fact, a magical version of an industrial crafting table.


    The Alchemy Station was an 8 x 4 meter object with some raising tforms and indentation on its surface. It was covered with mystical equipment that was beyond ordinary people¡¯s imaginations. To be precise, the surface of the station was divided into sixteen working areas, and each area was capable of aplishing some specific crafting task.


    For a master Alchemist, who was familiar with the process of crafting, they would be fullypetent with all this equipment and be able to smoothly aplished a well-nned experiment. But for someone who was new to this Alchemy Station, perhaps just getting used to this magical equipment would take several days.


    However, this was not an obstacle for Greem, who had the help of the Chip.


    ¡°Chip, begin scanning this Alchemy Station. Analyze the procedures of a crafting experiment!¡±


    *Beep* ¡°Mission has been created... Beginning scan...¡±


    As a shing blue light appeared in his eyes as all the equipment ced on the Alchemy Station, and magical mechanisms and formations hidden within the Alchemy Station, were scanned by the Chip and stored in Greem¡¯s mind.


    Combining previously analyzed data and the on-site scanning task, the equipment ced on top of the Alchemy Station was quickly stored in the Chip¡¯s database. Afterward, they were projected into Greem¡¯s retina.


    Now, whenever Greem nced around the Alchemy Station, whenever a strange or mysterious item came into his vision, a clear annotation would appear near them.


    To put it simply, the Alchemy Station was an amalgamation of many of earth¡¯s crafting and forging machines, all fused into one convenient tform.


    A magnifying ss was mounted on a movable mechanical arm. It was not using the same concave-convex lens, which he had back on Earth, but a ss that had been etched with a special magical formation. Greem had chosen the highest standard Alchemy Laboratory, so this ss could give him a magnifier power of 300-500x. If it was a normal Alchemy Laboratory he chose, perhaps the maximum magnifier power would just be 150x.


    This was so important because, when crafting most magical items, a microscopic carving was required. Usually, on a specific region of the magical item, one would need to carve a few independent, yet tightly interconnected, magical formations. For some expert Alchemists, they could even carve more than hundred magical formations on a fist sized ruby crystal.


    As a beginner, Greem wasn¡¯t capable of aplishing this, but he only needed to carve seven magical formations on a thumb-sized demon core.


    The Summoning Rune was a must have, as it was the most integral rune, which was required to summon the y Golem. It was found in every single magical summoning item.


    The formation of Elementium Body Construction was also a must have, as it would weave the magical forces of this world to construct an Elementium body for the Golem. His current project would construct a body of soft y.


    The Mind Control Imprint System was the most important among all the formations, as, during the crafting process, Greem had to leave an imprint of his own soul in the formation. This was what would make the y Golem obey hismands.


    In order to let the Golem freely control the Elementium constructed body, the necessary energy nodes and circuits would have to be carved as well, because this directly affected the mobility andbat ability of the Golem. Obviously, he couldn¡¯t afford to make any mistakes on them.


    Of course, Greem didn¡¯t understand these highly difficult runes at all, but, fortunately, he had the Chip, which helped himplete the design and optimization. Hence, all he needed to do was just followed the nid down by the Chip.


    But even with this, the difficulty of Greem¡¯s work was still beyond imagination.


    In the past six years, Greem had only performed a handful of alchemy experiments, and he had just done somemon experiments, such as Elementium purification and extraction. Honestly speaking, he was still a rookie in the field of alchemy.


    But today he didn¡¯t have the resources for a test run, because he only had one demon core!


    If he failed, his dreams of a Golem army woulde crashing to a halt.


    ............


    Greem stood still in front of the Alchemy Station for nearly fifteen minutes, not moving a bit. In his mind, using a simtion, the Chip was repeatedly showing him the procedure of crafting the Golem core. He only stopped doing that after he could recant every single detail by heart.


    Greem after standing still for over fifteen minutes, he finally moved.


    From his waist pouch, he took out a bar of ck Magic Iron and threw it into a crucible. In next second, he sent his Spirit energy into the controlling magical formation of the Alchemy Station. A popping sound was heard as an Elementium fire was ignited below the crucible.


    If he worked without this magical Alchemy Station, he would need to create his own Elementium fire to heat and melt this ck Magic Iron. Throughout the entire process he had to maintain a stable output of Elementium fire for more than fifteen minutes, or else it wouldn¡¯t melt it correctly.


    And now, with the help from this Alchemy Station, he only needed to activate the magical formation hidden underneath it and the equipment would automatically heat up and melt the crafting material ording to the temperature and time he set. And while waiting for the ck Magic Iron topletely melt, he could have time for some other preparations.


    This alone fully demonstrated the benefits of using a Magical Alchemy Station.


    After carefully cing the core took out of Sinbad¡¯s head on top of the Alchemy Station, Greem adjusted the magnifying lens to an appropriate position and correct power level. Only then did he start preparing the equipment for a microscopic carving.


    The tool used to perform a microscopic carving was a special magical item. Depending on the strength of magic energy injected into it, this tool could produce aser-like beam of heat as tiny as a mosquito¡¯s leg. This heat beam was specifically modified and adjusted by master Alchemist. Although it was small, it was excellent at cutting.


    Let alone thosemonly used magical metals, even the Eighth Degree Gold, Underground Wrought Iron, and Kryptonium Steel, which were all unique metals which possessed a hardness beyond any ordinary man¡¯s imagination, were easily carved by this heat beam.


    What Greem needed to do now was to use this equipment to carve the required seven magical formations on the thumb-sized core, one Summoning Formation, one Mind Control Imprint System formation, one Elementium Life Granting formation, four energy nodes, and a few extra energy circuits...


    This was all easier said than done. Greem calmed his mind, then he leaned forward and ced his eyes above the magnifier lens, finally starting to work on the project he had been preparing for.


    Under the 300x magnifying power, the crystal clear, thumb-sized core had be a massive object with its surface fully covered by coarse pellets. Following the Chip¡¯s instructions, Greem controlled the magical formation, adjusting the core to the perfect position and angle. Only then did he activate the heat beam.


    A heat beam, the size of one-tenth an ox hair, hit right onto the core, making the spot red and soft, gradually etching an indentation the size of a quarter of a human hair. After that, Greem moved the heat beam with his Spiritual energy, slowly traversing the surface of the core. As this happened, a straight and narrow line appeared.


    Everything, from the position of the beam, to how deep each cut should be, all of these were marked with different colors in Greem¡¯s mind. All he needed to do was control the heat beam with his Spirit energy and draw ording to theyout and speed given by the Chip, carefullypleting this highly focused task.


    One after another, magical runes, which looked like scribbles, were engraved in a crisscrossed pattern and surrounded with magical formations. Leaving all four corners empty so he could carve the necessary energy nodes, and carve an energy circuit in the center to connect all of them...


    After an hour and a half hour of concentrated effort, all seven magical formations had been interweaved on the surface of the core, bing a wless magical formation as a whole.


    The first step had beenpleted.


    The next step was to connect these magical formations, which also required patience and precision.


    The microscopic carving only produced the lines of these magical formations. The magical energy would never flow in this indentations by itself, hence a medium that could respond to the magical energy and allowed the energy to flow freely was needed.


    And this medium was the ck Magic Iron that had been melted into a liquid form.


    Of course, if it was an official Adept who was filthy rich, the medium would be reced with Mithril. But Greem didn¡¯t have such resources or money, thus, he could only use the Magic ck Iron, which was the lowest grade medium he could use.


    Although using it would cause a significant energy loss as it conducted magical energy, for a simple y Golem that didn¡¯t require advanced skills to craft, it was more than enough.


    Therefore, Greem had to go through another hour of restless consumption of his Spirit energy. Although he was using only a tiny bit of it every second, after an hour of constant consumption, blue veins had started popping out on his forehead.


    With help from the magical formation, Greem slowly poured the Magic ck Iron molten into the indentations carved out by the heat beam. He had to be careful not to leave any cracks or allow any to spill out of the carvings. For a Beginner Apprentice, this extremely difficult task was simply a mighty miracle that seemed impossible to achieve.


    But, with the help of the powerful Chip, Greem actually turned this impossibility into a reality.


    When thest thread of Magic ck Iron liquid merged into the indentation, Greem cut off the magical formation, pushed away the magnifying lens, and quietly stared at the Golem core, which was floating on top of the Alchemy Station. Right at this very moment, his mind was rocking with roaring waves, and he felt himself tearing up.


    His first Golem wasplete!

 Chapter 32

    Greem left the Alchemy Laboratory. Originally, he had nned on sneaking out and testing onbat strength of the y Golem in the Swamp, but he was distracted by arge crowd of people rushing through the hallways of the tower.


    Not once in Greem¡¯s memory had the Tower been so lively before.


    Normally, everyone was busy with their own matters. Those who had been given tasks would carry on with their own business; those who didn¡¯t would be meditating, copying books, or working on some magical experiment... Every day in this Tower, except during meal time, very few sounds could be heard. Even when two Apprentices met in a corridor, they would just nod to each other and move on.


    But today was an exception, as nearly every single Apprentice Adept was out and about, rushing down the hallway in the same direction.


    Greem felt surprised and bewildered. He called out to his ¡®friend¡¯ Benson, who he barely knew, who was also a Beginner Apprentice.


    ¡°What¡¯s happening? Where are you going?¡±


    Right after Greem asked this, Benson responded in a surprised voice, saying, ¡°You don¡¯t know? Haven¡¯t you checked your magical talisman? Master Anderson is summoning all the official Apprentices to a meeting in the lecture hall. Don¡¯t bete!¡±


    Benson hurried down the hallway after saying that.


    Adept Anderson called a meeting?


    Greem was struck dumb by this rare event.


    ording to the unified proposal of the Zhentarim Association of the Adept Continent, as the stationed Adept in this Swamp Tower, Adept Anderson was required to provide a free magic ss every three months to the Apprentices in the tower. And, normally, if an Apprentice had any questions regarding magic, they would have to pay knowledge points or magic crystals in exchange for the right to ask Adept Anderson questions privately.


    But too bad, in this Swamp Tower, which was nearly cut off from the outside world, Adept Anderson was the ultimate master. Thus, he simply ignored all the rules and regtions set by the Zhentarim Association.


    Throughout the past six years that Greem had lived in this Tower, Adept Anderson only held a handful of open lectures... In fact, it couldn¡¯t have happened more than four times. The rest of the time, he would hide away on the upper floors of the Tower, rarely interacting with any Apprentices.


    Therefore, after receiving this news, Greem was simply amazed.


    Hastily pulling out a magic talisman on his neck, Greem noticed it was blinking with a red glow, and felt slightly hot to the touch.


    Ugh... it seems that when he was performing the alchemy experiment just now, in order to avoid any interruption, it seemed he had temporarily shut off themunication ability of the talisman. When he turned it on now, a deep, hoarse voice immediately came out of it.


    ¡°Every Apprentice Adepts who hears this message must go to the lecture hall at once! If you fail to reach it within fifteen minutes, I¡¯ll revoke your Apprentice status!¡±


    Greem violently shuddered. He quickly put away the magic talisman and joined the crowd rushing to the lecture hall.


    The seating of this lecture hall was simr to Earth¡¯s thrust style theaters from his previous life, but the round-shaped raised stage, located in front of the seats, had been reced with a tall tform. With this arrangement, no matter where an Apprentice was sitting, he would have to tilt his head up slightly to look at the Adept who was lecturing.


    Apparently, the guy who designed this lecture hall refused to allow any Apprentice to sit higher than the Adept, even though it was just a physical position in a space.


    The spacious lecture hall could hold more than two hundred people, but the Tower only had around fifty Apprentices, thus, everyone was sitting spread about. Three clear-cut groups were seen, with the three strongest apprentices in the center of each group. Besides that, a fourth group had gathered around the new Apprentice Leader, Ellen. The rest of the Apprentices were sitting alone, showing their status as ¡®lone wolves¡¯.


    If it was in the past, Greem had been one of these ¡®lone wolves¡¯.


    While he was observing the situation in the lecture hall, Greem saw a figure that stuck out from the rest of the crowd.


    A striking red dress. A cool and arrogant, yet beautiful and seductive face... The owner of this face was beckoning to him to join them.


    Naturally, Mary, sitting alone by herself, was the focus of almost everyone in the hall, and, no doubt, her action had made Greem the enemy of most of the male Apprentices in the hall.


    Countless nces were resting on Greem, causing his expression to shift.


    This Mary really knew how to stir things up!


    But at this moment, he had no room to hesitate. He strode up to Mary and sat beside her quietly.


    ¡°Remember, you¡¯re my subordinate. Next timee earlier!¡±


    Mary had leaned toward Greem, ced her charming face beside his ear, and whispered her threatening speech. Greem felt a terrifying killing intent as she did so. It seemed Mary was really satisfied with this result. Having an expression simr to that of a cat who just ate a canary, she sat straight back in her seat.


    Her green eyes ran down the entire hall, charming all the male Apprentices who met her nce, then causing them to shudder, lowering their heads hastily and avoiding her eyes.


    Right at this moment, Greem sensed another ¡®strong¡¯ ncee to rest on his personage, causing his hair to stand on end.


    Shocked, he raised his head, and realized who it was!


    The man who was staring at him was one of the three strongest, Evil Bugs, whose real name was Acteon.


    Two bizarre looking green lights could be seen underneath his hood, coolly gazing at Greem. Although no words came from him, an invisible pressure started to fill the air around Greem.


    Facing a guy with 19 Spirit, Greem was, obviously, at aplete disadvantage. If they were to fight, Greem couldn¡¯t guarantee that he would be able toplete a magic casting under such powerful spiritual pressure.


    But, when he recalled the tough battle that happened yesterday, and the look of panic in Evil Bug¡¯s eyes, as he fled for his life from the frightening Alice, the fear in Greem¡¯s mind immediately subsided.


    ¡°You covered your head and scurried away like a rat to its hole, but I saw her flee before me. Perhaps you haven¡¯t even fully healed your injuries! Covering yourself so tightly in that hood, I think you¡¯re just trying to hide all the scars on your body, right?¡±


    Inwardly, Greem was giving himself some motivational speech. Whenever he thought of Evil Bug¡¯s broken face hiding behind the hood, a proud feeling immediately surged up in his mind, and that boosted his confidence and allowed him to return Evil Bug¡¯s re.


    Evil Bug¡¯s nce became even cooler.


    Although no words were exchanged between them, both of them could clearly sense the slightest changes in the opponent¡¯s emotions. Acteon could even see the mocking smile hiding behind Greem¡¯s mock stern expression.


    In an instant, two shivering green mes erupted under the shadow of Acteon¡¯s hood, and condensed Spiritual energy began to violently surge around him, nearly spewing out into the surrounding area.


    But in next second, Greem, who was exchanging res with him, disappeared, reced by an enchanting face.


    Mary stepped in front of Greem and relentlessly red at Acteon. Her lips moved, but no words could be heard. Although there were a dozen meters between them, but Acteon could still read her lips.


    ¡°He is my man! If you dare touch him, I¡¯ll kill you!¡±


    It was a short speech, but it clearly portrayed her fierce and overbearing character.


    Evil Bug¡¯s eyes became even colder.


    Judging from all aspects, this Mary, who had just arrived at the level of Advanced Apprentice, was not his match. Most of her abilities were constrained by him. But... apparently Acteon was not at his peak form currently. To be bluntly honest, hisbat strength was pathetic right now.


    He would need a few more days to restock his dead scorpions. If he was forced to fight Mary now, even if he could win, his vitality would be greatly reduced.


    However, Evil Bugs was a patient man who knew when to stay low. He turned his eyes away and avoided Mary¡¯s challenging nce, pressed down all thoughts of anger and staying quiet.


    ¡°You¡¯re a real troublemaker! How dare you to offend Evil Bugs!¡± Satisfied that she had forced the opponent back, Mary turned to Greem and teased him in a faux-threatening tone.


    Greem smiled wryly to himself.


    I was forced into that situation, ok?


    But, when faced with the domineering Mary, he had no resentment orints. Because, between the two of them, he could sense an unspeakable trust and... dependence.


    Dependence?


    Greem shook his head, once again feeling his thoughts were absurd. Mary depend on him? It must because he had depleted his Spirit in his alchemy experiment. That must be why he had such a ridiculous thought.


    Obviously, the delicate interaction between Evil Bugs and Mary had attracted the attention of the other two Advanced Apprentices, as they kept running their eyes between Mary and Greem.


    Like a mother cat who was trying to protect her territory, Mary kept showing her fierce and dominating expression to these guys, giving them a look that said she would never give in to any threat.


    As the atmosphere of the hall had tensed, due to the interaction between Evil Bugs and Mary, a shadow was suddenly seen swaying on top of the tall tform. Soon, the skinny form of Adept Anderson emerged from the shadows.


    Holding the Magical Staff in his hand, Adept Anderson gazed around the hall with his uncaring eyes. After a brief moment of silence, he finally spoke.


    ¡°Today, I have good news and bad news for you!¡±


    Everyone in the hall immediately held their breath and focused on Anderson.


    ¡°The good news is all of you are going to receive a batch of resources, which will be the most generous gift you had ever received in your entire life.¡± Throwing a wicked re around the hall, he noticed that these Apprentices stayed focused on him, even though he had said something shocking. Anderson nodded his head, satisfied, then continued saying, ¡°And the bad news is... every single one of you is going to have to take on apulsory mission!¡±


    Adept Anderson hit the ground with his staff, and a half-transparent image was immediately projected on top of the tform. Numerous green characters were seen flickering on the surface of this projection.


    ......


    Investigate an abnormal creature in Redwood Vige.


    Acquire a Tower Bell Flower.


    Defend Fort Fir.


    Guard the Twilight Valley.


    Eliminate an enemy of the Humming Hunting Ground.


    ......


    ......


    Line by line, most of them were the Apprentice level missions within the territory controlled by Zhentarim.


    Originally, as the Apprentices of the Swamp Tower, they were only required toplete the inspection mission of this resource site, thus they were considered living in a rtively isted clique. But now, Adept Anderson had actually opened all the Apprentice level missions of the entire Zhentarim territory to them... Could this mean there were some big changes in store for them?


    Some of the more veteran Apprentices couldn¡¯t help it, and their eyes clouded over as they became lost in thought.

 Chapter 33

    After spending so many years facing life or death situations around the tower and when dealing with others, most of these Apprentice Adepts had long understood one thing: pie didn¡¯t fall from the sky, and nothing was truly free. If something imed to be free, it was definitely a trap!


    As they looked at the green colored missions in front of them, they smelled something fishy.


    As expected, with a wave of Adept Anderson¡¯s hand, most of the flicking green colored words instantly disappeared, being reced with orange text, which represented dangerous missions, and red text, which represented extremely dangerous missions.


    ¡°Those green missions, which you saw previously, are Apprentice missions you can take in future. But, before that, every single one of you will have toplete apulsory mission! You have three months toplete thispulsory mission, and if you fail... hehehe... you¡¯ll be punished by losing your status as an Apprentice!¡±


    At this moment, the expressions of all the Apprentices changed.


    For those Apprentices who had confidence in their own abilities, no doubt this was a great chance for them to obtain Knowledge Points and resources. But, for those weaker Apprentices, perhaps all that awaited them was death.


    Everyone quickly ran their eyes over the list ofpulsory missions. At the bottom of the list was the only green colored mission.


    Swamp Tower Garrison:


    This mission required ten Apprentices, one Librarian, one Laboratory Administrator, one tutor for Probation Apprentices, two Tower Inspectors...


    The light of hope had reignited on the faces of the few brand new Beginner Apprentices, who were the weakest of the whole group, and they quickly turned to their Apprentice Leader, Ellen, who happened to have a joyful expression on his face as well. Meanwhile, the four ¡®good buddies¡¯ that surrounded Ellen had triumphant looks on their faces, holding their heads high.


    Greem¡¯s nce only briefly stopped on that green color mission, then he moved on, starting to seriously and thoroughly examine the list ofpulsory missions.


    With his abilities and qualifications, he knew that it was impossible for him to be one of those ten lucky guys. Perhaps, after today¡¯s meeting dismissed, many Apprentices would immediately start shady negotiations amongst themselves, and some would even meet with Apprentice Leader Ellen privately, submitting themselves to him in exchange for ess to the safe mission.


    After all, out of 57 official Apprentices on the spot, there were 4 Advanced Apprentices, 21 Intermediate Apprentices, and 32 Beginner Apprentices, including Greem.


    Looking back at the list ofpulsory missions, an orange mission could be dangerous to even an Advanced Apprentice. As for the blood red mission? Perhaps only a Pseudo-Adept couldplete it safely!


    No wonder that, after all the Apprentices had seen the list, the room was immediately filled with gloomy expressions.


    ¡°Hmm! I¡¯ll go to that Ellen and force him to give you a ce on that safe mission. If he refuses, I...¡± For some unknown reasons, Mary had be quite angry. Although she was showing her tiny canine teeth, and had a ferocious look on her face, her actions were cute to Greem, and made him feel warm inside.


    Greem grabbed her arm.


    ¡°Don¡¯t! You¡¯ve got to have confidence in me. I can handle those orange missions!¡± Right at this moment, a firm and calm look could be seen in Greem¡¯s eyes.


    ¡°Well, since you are so confident, then you should just focus and pick yourself a good mission!¡± Mary was quite good at changing pace, and she continued, saying, ¡°Oh right, what do you think about my skin? Is it delicate and smooth? I can feel the condition of my skin is getting better and better!¡±


    Staring at how Mary gently licked her lips and wore an arrogant expression, Greem shuddered. He hastily let go of Mary¡¯s arm and tried his best to focus on the list of in front of him.


    ......


    Cleanup the Great Graveyard (3/10) Orange Mission


    Mission details: Elite Grade Immortal Creatures were found at the Great Graveyard, located south of the Tiga region. Ten Apprentice Adepts are needed. During the mission, Viscount Gary will send a squad of two hundred elite guards to assist with the cleanup.


    After missionpletion, Viscount Gary will issue a mission aplishment certificate.


    Mission rewards: 30 Knowledge Points, 3 Magic Crystals, 10 Zhentarim Association Merit Points.


    ......


    Abnormal Creature in the Lands of the Giant Willow (2/3) Orange Mission


    Mission details: Traces of an abnormal creature have been found in the Land of the Giant Willow, located near the south border of the Talion Forest. Eleven local vigers have gone missing. Three Apprentice Adepts are urgently needed for an expedition into the depths of the mountain to find the source of this abnormal creature.


    After missionpletion, the Zhentarim Association¡¯s local base will issue a mission aplishment certificate.


    Mission rewards: 20 Knowledge Points, 1 Magic Crystals, 5 Zhentarim Association Merit Points.


    (If the Apprentices who carry this mission can resolve the source of the disaster, based on the evidence provided, the reward will be increased considerably.)


    ......


    Griffin Cliff Domestication Mission (0/3) Red Mission


    Mission details: The Griffin Cliff, located in Rahia, urgently needs the expertise of three Apprentice Adepts to help them capture Griffins, assisting Beast Master Hank. The mission will be concluded after sessfully domesticating ten Griffins.


    Mission aplishment certificate will be issued by Beast Master Hank of Rahia.


    Mission rewards: 50 Knowledge Points, 10 Magic Crystals, 30 Zhentarim Association Merit Points.


    (Uponpletion of the mission, the Hamilton Company will provide a private reward.)


    ......


    Underground Cave Investigation Mission (4/10) Red Mission


    Mission details: Traces of subterranean creatures have been found in the Underground Cave of Nigond. An investigation team, consisting of ten Apprentice Adepts, is urgently needed. The team will be required to venture at least ten miles into the underground, investigating the activity of living creatures in that area.


    Status of the mission will be determined by the Zhentarim Association¡¯s base in Nigond.


    Mission rewards: 70 Knowledge Points, 12 Magic Crystals, 50 Zhentarim Association Merit Points.


    (The Underground is well-known for being rich in Dark Grass, Phantom Mushrooms, and Night-Eyes Stones. If any of these materials are harvested during the mission, you may keep them.)


    ......


    ......


    Line by line, a list of missions, taking ce in nearly all the dangerous regions controlled by Zhentarim association, wasid out before them.


    In the center of Adept Continent, in order to protect the ecosystem that nurtured the demonic resources of their mother ne, all the Adept associations and alliances had strictly prohibited high-ranked Adepts from carried out any devastating development to the maind. Therefore, humans only upied around 35% of thend, the rest was a boundless savagend with no human activities. Countless demons and strange creatures were living freely in these ces.


    When faced with some of the moremonly seen wild beasts or demons, locals would be able to defend themselves or chase these creatures away by force. But when they encountered those frightening demons, who possessed terrifying abilities.... Small viges being ughtered overnight was not umon in this world...


    Thus, whenever something like this happened, in order to clean up these frightening demons, who intruded into the human world, those local authorities would need the help from the powerful and supernatural Adepts.


    Obviously, those lofty Adepts would never travel so far for these kinds of petty issues. Hence, most of these supernatural forces were countered by Apprentice Adepts. Through all sorts of missions, they obtained the resources they needed, training themselves and helping to maintain the safety of human society along the way.


    And this was how Adepts maintained this world.


    Greem thoroughly examined every single message he found in the list ofpulsory missions. At the same time, the Chip, which Greem had ordered to deactivate its scanning features, was sorting and summarized every single mission, quickly copying all the data into it¡¯s memory.


    Among all thesepulsory missions, Greem was only capable of epting Orange missions. He would never dare touch those Red missions.


    A legend, at the top of the list, stated that Orange missions were only suitable for Advanced Apprentices. Apprentices below this rank would have to be prepared to face a certain degree of danger. As for Red missions, they were prepared for Pseudo-Adepts. Perhaps even most Advanced Apprentice would have slim chances of surviving these missions.


    But, obviously, this was a bizarre and fantasy world of Adept. There was a huge uncertainty for any of these missions... even for those simple missions with the annotation of ¡®safe¡¯.


    Let¡¯s take, for example, the investigation type missions, which were the mostmon mission type on this list. It was extremely risky to venture deep into a dangerous area, however, those investigation missions in ¡®safe¡¯ regions weren¡¯t somewhere you could rx either. The demons that normally appeared around mortal viges were some low-risk creatures, like Swamp Ooze, Gnome, or Stirges. A Beginner Apprentice could fairly easily handle them.


    But, if luck was against them, perhaps they would have to face Wyverns, Rock Monsters, or Forest Spirits. All of these were extremely frightening creatures. Even an Advanced Apprentice would be in a life-threatening situation if they really met with these demons.


    Thus, picking a mission was like gambling, as no one knew when bad luck was going to strike. Every year, 13% of Apprentice Adepts died while trying toplete missions.


    After a quick selection process, the Chip had picked an Orange mission that suited Greem perfectly. It had examined each mission and removed the ones with the most uncertain elements.


    ......


    Apprentice Alchemist of ge Training Mission (1/3) Orange Mission


    Mission details: An Apprentice Alchemist of ge is in the middle ofpleting his training mission. He urgently needs three Apprentice Adepts to apany him into the Well of Treasures.


    The mission will be consideredplete after the Apprentice Alchemist¡¯s training mission has beenpleted. The mission aplishment certificate will be issued by the Apprentice Alchemist.


    Mission rewards: 20 Knowledge Points, 3 Magic Crystals, 1 Tranquility Potion, 1 Potion of Invisibility.


    ......


    The difficulty of this mission was not high. The Well of Treasures was a training field that all Apprentice Alchemists had to visit. It was a ce with countless ¡®little toy¡¯ that had been casually ced by master Alchemists throughout the thousands of years it had existed, awaiting neers to dig them out.


    Although they were only little toys, no matter what, they were crafted by master Alchemists. Each and every one had great research value. Some might even find the legacy of a master Alchemist in a random object.


    Therefore, this Well of Treasures was the traditional treasure hunting ground for all Apprentice Alchemists.


    But every Apprentice Alchemist was only allowed to enter that ce once. He could bring one item from the ce, but also had to leave one item behind. This was the true purpose of the Well of Treasure.


    There were all kinds of crafted items in there, and most of them were pretty dangerous. For example, if an Apprentice Alchemist wanted to bring away a crafted golem, the only way he could was by defeating it. As most of the Apprentice Alchemists were really weak at the elementary stage, the Alchemist Association allowed these Apprentices to hire three helpers. But, these three helpers weren¡¯t allowed to bring anything out from that ce.


    It seemed that this was a pretty easy Orange mission, so long as that Apprentice Alchemist wasn¡¯t an overly greedy guy, trying to challenge one of those really dangerous items, this mission could bepleted easily.


    Also, the mission reward of 1 Tranquility Potion had attracted Greem as well. It could increase the Spirit of Apprentice who had less than 10 Spirit by 1. It was considering an ultimate treasure among all Beginner Apprentices! (This item could only be used once. Afterward, it would have no more effect!)


    After making up his mind, Greem whispered his decision to Mary, and she, too, felt it was the right choice after evaluating the risks. As for Mary herself, she simply chose the Red mission to investigate the Underground Cave.


    Relying on her Vampire characteristics of flying, fighting, and regenerating, she was confident that she could stay alive, even when faced with some rather dangerous demons. Thus, she purposely picked the mission where she had the highest chance to encounter many different species of demons.


    It wasn¡¯t tough to tell that Mary was in a stage of exponential growth, and what she needed most was the blood of powerful creatures!

 Chapter 34

    Now that he had decided on the mission he was taking, he needed to sign up quickly.


    After all, every mission noted how many apprentices were currently applied to the mission, and how many could take the mission total. These were listed in the parenthesis. Once a mission had all its slots taken, it would disappear from the list. If he was toote, his preferred mission could slip away right in front of his eyes.


    After making the announcement, Adept Anderson disappeared without saying anything else. Of course, all the secretarial work would be left to Apprentice Leader Ellen.


    As expected, Ellen instantly took the garrison mission of the Swamp Tower, which was also the only Green mission on the list. His ¡®minions¡¯ had gotten in on that mission as well. Although the mission could still fit in few more Apprentices, Ellen had taken the dominant position, showing a look that said whoever paid the highest price would get a ce on the mission.


    Feeling indignant, but not daring to speak out, some weak Beginner Apprentices crowded around Ellen, lowered their voice and tried to bargain with him. Some rather good looking female Apprentices even gave him appreciative looks, squeezing themselves closer to Ellen. But most of the Beginner Apprentices actually gathered around the three strongest, chatting amongst themselves as if they were discussing on something. Obviously, they couldn¡¯t make up their minds on what to do.


    Mary grabbed Greem and approached the crowd gathered around Ellen. Raising her brows, those soft-speaking fellows immediately moved to the side, revealing Apprentice Leader Ellen, who was sittingfortably in the middle.


    Though Ellen portrayed an aloof look in front of these Apprentices, when faced with the three strongest and Mary, he didn¡¯t dare act tough.


    The three strongest were Advanced Apprentices, acknowledged by all Apprentices. If a confrontation erupted, Ellen, who was barely an Intermediate Apprentice, even with the help of magical items, would never be the match of them.


    As for Mary, Ellen was truly freaked out by her.


    Even though he had be the Apprentice Leader, whenever he thought of his previous encounter with Mary, with her ferocious, frightening face and her blood sttered body, Ellen just couldn¡¯t stop the shivering sensation that went down his spine. Besides, after being taken away by Adept Anderson, Mary was safely released. Obviously, she was being raised by Adept Anderson in the Tower. Without sufficient excuses and reasons, Ellen would never want to confront Mary.


    Staring at Mary, who was now approaching him, Ellen tried his best to keep a calm exterior, but his pale face and wandering eyes betrayed what he truly felt. When faced with this terrifying Vampire, he felt intense fear in his heart!


    ¡°I am signing up for the Underground Cave investigation mission. Sign me up now!¡± Mary never took him seriously, and behaved with a domineering attitude.


    Without saying any word, Ellen took out the Apprentice Leader¡¯s magical talisman, infused it with his Spirit energy, and a small screen immediately light up on top of it. The content showing on the screen was the Underground Cave investigation mission Mary chose.


    Mary took out her magical talisman and pointed it at the screen. Immediately, the number showing how many Apprentices had signed up for the mission had changed from (4/10) to (5/10). It looked like four Apprentices had signed up for this mission before her.


    It was now Greem¡¯s turn to sign up.


    ¡°I would like to ept the Apprentice Alchemist of ge Training Mission!¡± Greem spoke in a calm voice.


    Ellen briefly gazed at him, then, remaining silent, he adjusting the content on the screen. Following with the swaying of the screen, the mission Greem chose was shown.


    Greem didn¡¯t say anything either. Without hesitation, he took out his magical talisman and pointed it toward the screen. But, something out of his expectations happened. Right when the magical talisman as about to touch the screen, the mission on the screen suddenly flicked in a bizarre manner, and reverted back to the previous mission, which Mary had chosen.


    Not expecting this change, Greem¡¯s magical talisman touched the screen.


    In next second, the number of participants for the Underground Cave investigation mission had changed from (5/10) to (6/10).


    This never seen before urrence startled everyone at the scene, and even Ellen seemed puzzled by it. With a wry smile, he said,


    ¡°Aiyaya... what¡¯s going on? It seems the magical equipment broke! What should we do now... Uh.... Do you want to go and see the Master Adept? Maybe he can cancel this mission for you?¡±


    While everybody was still in shock, Mary exploded.


    Without warning, Mary¡¯s sharp nails started to glow as they piercing through the air toward Ellen¡¯s heart with a jarring noise. It was a short distance, and, together with the huge gap between their Agilities, perhaps Ellen wouldn¡¯t even realize he was being attacked until Mary was crushing his heart in her hand.


    But, when Mary¡¯s death-dealing ws were about halfway to Ellen¡¯s body, a huge, dark hand, shining like te mail, suddenly stretched out from the side, both hands instantly colliding.


    It looked like the two hands had only collided once, but, for some unknown reasons, in an instant, the huge hand, which looked like the w of a monster, shattered. In fact, it was sliced into pieces by Mary¡¯s razor sharp nails. Although it seemed Mary was in the advantageous position in this exchange, there were no pieces of flesh or blood to be found in the shredded hand, the tiny fragments having transformed into countless ck scorpions, quickly clinging onto Mary¡¯s arm.


    Mary took a step back and swiftly moved her arms, quickly killing all the scorpions that had been trying to attack her. At this moment, Evil Bugs, whose body was fully covered by a cloak, was seen standing beside Ellen.


    The huge hand belonged to him.


    Flying around while making buzzing noises, the swarm of scorpions soon returned to Acteon¡¯s sleeve, like bees to their hive. Over the next few seconds, peace returned to this ce. A bizarre scene had yed out before them, and it had shown the frightening abilities of Evil Bugs.


    The paled-face Greem took onest look at the screen, turned around, pulled Mary, who behaved like an overprotective mother cat, and left quietly. Strangely, the aggressive Mary didn¡¯t behave recklessly this time. This was because, with her sensitive senses, she had noticed the other two Advanced Adepts had quietly stood up, and were approaching the scene as stealthily as possible.


    No idiot could be an Apprentice Adept, and those Advanced Apprentices were all as crafty as foxes. Except for a few weird guys, most of the Advanced Apprentices knew how to restrain themselves in order to protect their own skin. Mary, a girl who had suddenly skyrocketed to Advanced Apprentice, clearly posed a serious threat to the position of the three strongest. Thus, intentionally or unintentionally, the three of them had grouped up in an attempt to elbow Mary out.


    ............


    Before they separated in front of Greem¡¯s room, Mary looked like she intended to say a few words tofort him, but stopped when she saw his sad smile.


    Stepping back into his room and gently closing the wooden door, Greem silently stood in the dark for a long time.


    He was clear about what happened today, and it wasn¡¯t entirely Mary¡¯s fault. If he really thought about it, Greem was sure that it must have been Evil Bugs who had ordered his mission be switched to Mary¡¯s. Although he wasn¡¯t sure whether this was because of the intruder incident yesterday, or if the three strongest were just trying to cause Mary fear, but, in short, Ellen¡¯s little trick must have been authorized by Evil Bugs.


    Conflict between the powerful brought disaster to the powerless!


    A situation like this was, in fact, the sad reality for the powerless.


    Greem totally had no intention of seeking the truth in today¡¯s misfortune, because he had decided to work hard for his future.


    The red Underground Cave Investigation mission was a dangerous mission. If he was a Pseudo-Adept, it would be a challenging mission. If he had the ability of an Advanced Apprentice, it could be life threatening. But he was only a Beginner Apprentice!


    Mixing himself in with a group of Advanced Apprentices while being so weak... although Mary would definitely take care of him, he would still need to have some usable abilities. Yes, maybe Mary did appreciate his kindness during her difficult days, but that wasn¡¯t enough for her to risk her life to save him.


    Considering all that he was about to face, what Greem really needed was an ability that he could protect himself with.


    In the dark, Greem took out the freshly crafted y Golem from his waist pouch. The thumb-sized core was shining indistinctly with the glow of Earth Elementium. The four energy nodes carved on top of it could continually absorb the Earth Elementium in the world around them, turning it into usable energy and storing it for future use.


    Out of the four energy nodes, two were illuminated, showing that it was 2/4 charged with Earth Elementium, which should be enough to run some tests.


    Greem tilted his head to the side and listened for any movements outside his room. Then he gently opened up the door and stealthily left his room.


    At this moment, most of the Apprentices were still gathered in the lecture hall, dealing with the frustration of thepulsory mission. Therefore, Greem didn¡¯t meet with any Apprentices as he left.


    Fifteen minutester, Greem was, once again, walking along the familiar stony trail outside the tower.


    The fierce battle between Advanced Apprentices yesterday had clearly killed many of the demons in this swampynd. Along the way, as he saw the demons scattered about, a rare feeling of pity actually emerged in Greem¡¯s mind.


    Although these demons look really frightening and evil most days, once they were faced with Apprentice Adepts who were stronger than them, they immediately became trembling cattle, unable to fight against the oppressive forces of the Adepts.


    Perhaps, in the eyes of these demons, those Apprentice Adepts were the real monsters, and were even crueler than themselves!


    Traveling quickly on the stony trails, Greem soon arrived at the testing field he had chosen ¨C the Muddy Swamp.


    Sinbad was dead, having been transformed into the y Golem in his hand. Now the Ghost Nannies had no leader, which meant it was the perfect time for him to train here.


    Standing firmly at the edge of the Muddy Swamp, five steps away from the filthy and stinking pond, he could indistinctly sense the weak soul ripples of three Ghost Nannies hiding underneath the muddy water.


    Greem casually tossed the y Golem summoning core at the edge of the pond. When the light yellow core touched the mud, a vague vibration reverberated from it.


    Being guided by Greem¡¯s Spirit Energy, no activation spell was required, so a huge amount of earthy yellow smoke started to form around the core. Driven by strange forces, the y on the ground starting to twist itself together, quickly molding itself into a shape that was roughly human.


    Greem closed his eyes and sensed the y Golem, quickly finding the core he had crafted on the chest of the y being.


    He opened his eyes and gave it an examining look.


    He was trusting that this y Golem would change his fate!

 Chapter 35

    The Golem standing in front of him weighed about 90 kilograms and stood 1.7 meters tall.


    The earthy yellow surface of the body was constructed from a loose, damp y. It had four distinct limbs and a head, but all were very coarse. Also, it didn¡¯t have as many joints as a real human.


    Its legs were two thick y pirs, which seemed to merge with the soil on the ground beneath its feet. Its arms seemed to be able to move in any direction, and on these arms were a pair of gigantic palms, which would likely be able to tightly clench things. It didn¡¯t have a face, but there were some protrusions where a face would normally be.


    If looking at it from afar, this y Golem would appear to be a bald guy wearing a yellow leather armor. If a robe was put over its body, it could be used to deceive an enemy.


    Greem ordered the y Golem to walk up and stand in front of him.


    This y Golem was truly a creature of the Earth, as it could move its heavy body over the soft and damp soil without making a single noise. Its movement was quicker and lighter than a leopard, and no traces of its passage could be found on the ground. However, it did leave strong traces of Earth Elementium in its wake!


    When Sinbad¡¯s core was obtained, her soul was captured inside it. As a direct result of being made from a high-quality demon core, this y Golem possessed an intermediate intelligence, which was not as rigid as other Titans and Golems. Through the Mind Control runes he had carved on the core, Greem only needed to give it amand and it would do its best to smoothly carry out the order.


    Staring at the y Golem standing in front of him, Greem stretched his arm out in front of him and touched it. Its skin was rough and solid. Although it was constructed from soft y, it still had a decent defense. He took out a dagger and stabbed the y Golem¡¯s waist a few times. The dagger simply poked through the skin and left behind some marks, which soon disappeared as a faint earthy yellow glow appeared around the mark as the golem regenerated.


    Good, it had a basic defense, was mostly immune to piercing damage, and could heal itself. In brief, the basic defense of a y Golem was equal to a human fighter who wore a full set of leather armor. Of course, it couldn¡¯t bepared with that of a Stone or Iron Golem, and the only feature worth mentioning was the self-healing ability.


    Greem walked in a circle around the y Golem. He thought the 1.7 meter height of the golem didn¡¯t make it look powerful enough. Thus he tried to make the y Golem bigger.


    Following Greem¡¯smand, the quiet y Golem started to grow taller and bigger. However, the once solid y body actually became soft and light. When it finally reached a height of four meters, its entire body looked like a clump of gray mist. The once solid y body had be a gas-like Earth Elementium body.


    What was wrong?


    Aftermunicated with the Chip, Greem finally understood. The demon core used to create this y Golem only had the ability of an Advanced Apprentice. Hence, it could only control a total of ny kilograms of Earth Elementium. Once this weight was exceeded, it would lose any substantial form it formerly had.


    The height of 1.7 meters was the most optimized height after extensive calctions performed by the Chip. Being at such a size, the density of the Earth Elementium was at an optimum level, giving it its maximum defense ability. If he attempted to make it taller, the total volume of the Earth Elementium remained unchanged, making the defense strength of y Golem drop significantly. So, although it looked taller, its density decreased. As a result, it was going to be difficult to protect the core hidden within its body.


    Sighing helplessly, Greem had no choice but let the y Golem resumed its former form.


    Next, he needed to test the few basic skills that came with this y Golem.


    Although weakened, the Quake skill that came with this golem was still an offensive ability. When it was activated, the surrounding ground would shake as the y Golem moved around. Greem had tested it, and the vibrations had a greater impact on smaller creatures, as they could hardly stand still around the y Golem, let aloneunch attacks against it. It could also be used decently against middle-sized creatures. As forrger creature, this skill was useless.


    The second offensive skill to test was Clod of Mud.


    In order to test it, Greem had the y Golem lure three lurking Ghost Nannies from a nearby pond. As a result, the y Golem and the three Ghost Nannies put on a ¡®big fight¡¯ for Greem.


    Strictly speaking,pared to a Ghost Nanny, who barely had any good offensive or defensive skills, the y Golem, who was the equivalent of a pseudo-summon demon, could easily suppress them in all aspects. No matter how these three Ghost Nannies kept scratching or biting on its solid skin, all the scratch marks would disappear in the blink of an eye. But when y Golem attacked with its heavy fists, the Ghost Nannies would be knocked away, suffering heavily.


    Following Greem¡¯s orders, y Golem grabbed a Ghost Nanny with one of its hands and squeezed it until a cracking noise could be heard. Then it threw it off into the distance. While the Ghost Nanny was still flying through the air, the y Golem grabbed at the air above its head and, immediately, a meter long spear of hardened mud appeared in its grip.


    It threw the spear through the air, prating the Ghost Nanny¡¯s weak body and nailing it to a Killer Tree growing at the edge of the pond. As a demon itself, the Ghost Nanny had a strong vitality. Although its body had been punctured by the spear, it still restlessly struggled and tried to free itself.


    A second spear was released, mming straight through the Ghost Nanny¡¯s head. It was left hanging motionlessly from the Killer Tree.


    At this moment, the two remaining Ghost Nannies hung themselves on y Golem¡¯s body like two mad dogs mping onto a meaty bone. With both arms, y Golem forcefully pulled them away from its body and threw them onto the ground. While they were struggling to get up, the y Golem raised both of its arms high up into the air. In the next second, countless dirt spikes poked up through the ground and turned them into two shish kabobs.


    In a brief moment, all three Ghost Nannies had been annihted, and the y Golem remained undamaged.


    Throughout the entire process, Greem had remained an indifferent spectator, letting the Chip collect real-time data from the battle so that it could work out a better-optimized strategy for using the y Golem inbat.


    Soon, detailed battle data of the y Golem was projected into Greem¡¯s mind.


    Through this detailed data, Greem was able to have a better understanding of this y Golem he had created.


    Judging from this data, the y Golem was merelyparable to an Intermediate Apprentice. But, upon considering its self-healing andck of fear towards death, it could unleash a basicbat strength that was simr to that of an Advanced Apprentice.


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, the damage that could be inflicted by a spell cast by an Advanced Apprentice Adept was around 20-30 points, varying based on the caster¡¯s Spirit. As for the defensive spells of an Advanced Apprentice, they had a defensive value of around 30-40 points, so two attacks from a simr level opponent would be enough to rip a defensive spell apart.


    In this aspect, a y Golem¡¯s offensive strength was rather weak. If faced with an Advanced Apprentice, the y Golem would need offensive support from Greem. Only then would it have a possibility of defeating the enemy. After all, Greem¡¯s Fire Arrow spell could inflict 13-18 points of Fire damage and 6-7 points of Physical damage. If he and y Golem worked in tandem, they might be able to break the defenses of an Advanced Apprentice in a single round of attacks.


    And once the enemy lost his magical defenses, unless he was a Body Refining Adept, he would just be like a tame sheep that Greem could kill easily, not even worth mentioning. So, as long as he didn¡¯t have to face someone like Evil Bugs or that frightening little Loli, thebination of Greem and the y Golem was enough to threaten even an Advanced Apprentice.


    But, too bad, the Underground Cave Investigation mission exceeded the abilities of an Advanced Apprentice. Most likely, he would be working with a group of Pseudo-Adepts, thus, although he had a y Golem now, Greem was still too weak.


    ording to the requirements of the mission, they had to set off in half a month in order to arrive at the mission location. So, Greem was left with fifteen days to prepare. Such a short amount of time was, clearly, not enough for Greem to improve his magical abilities. Therefore, he had to keep digging into the potential provided by Golems, so he could increase his strength while he still had the chance.


    Greem remained where he was, pondering upon what this meant for him. Finally, he looked off into the distance, to another area of the swamp, which was obscured by thick fog.


    He was looking toward the habitat of the Giant Alligators, which he reckoned were also Earth demons.


    If he could kill the Giant Alligator King in there, he would likely acquire another handy Earth Elementium core. As for the Water Elementium core, Greem just couldn¡¯t think of a demon in this swampynd which fit the requirements.


    ¡°Fine, I¡¯ll spend the next few days fighting those Giant Alligators!¡±


    With a ferocious look shining in his eyes, he viciously spoke that while facing in the direction where those Giant Alligators lived.


    After that, he motioned at the y Golem, making the human-sized Golem copse. Freed from the bounds of the Earth Elementium, arge amount of y had formed a pile where the golem used to be standing.


    Greem grabbed the summoning core, rolled it around in his palms, and examined it closely. Initially, there were two illuminated energy nodes, but now, one of them had slightly dimmed. ording to this consumption rate, with all four energy nodes illuminated, perhaps this y Golem could only fight in an intense battle for fifteen minutes. If it was not a fierce fight, perhaps it couldst longer.


    As the energy stored in y Golem was not suitable to hunt that Giant Alligator King today, Greem put away the summoning core. Then, using the Burning Hand, he ignited all three broken bodies of the Ghost Nannies. He pulled up his hood and disappeared into the misty fog.

 Chapter 36

    Once Greem was gone, all that was left was a pile of dirt and three charred bodies. On top of a tilted Killer Tree, not far from the scene, a Scavenger Crow with blood red eyes let out a soft caw, and pped its wings, flying up into the foggy air.


    But, right at this moment, a silky smooth, snow-like arm suddenly stretched out, tightly grabbing the Scavenger Crow before it could get too far. Without allowing this stupid creature to struggle, the tiny palm casually clenched, and so one of the demons who had the title of ¡®Scavenger of Swamp¡¯ was crushed into meat paste, and small bloody chunks flew in all directions.


    The curvy, seductive body of Mary appeared on the top branch of the Killer Tree.


    She gracefully stood there, staring off into the direction Greem had left. A small smile appeared on her face. Then, as suddenly as she had appeared, she disappeared.


    Although Greem thought himself clever, he had underestimated just how bizarre and unpredictable magic spells could be. There was nowhere in this Magic Swamp where one could hide their activities. The Scavenger Crows, which could be found everywhere, were, in fact, Hawkeye¡¯s spies, secretly spying on the activities of every single Apprentice for him.


    In the dead of night, when Apprentice Adepts were hiding in their rooms, performing all kinds of strange magical experiments, they would never think that, in the night sky outside the Tower, there was a pair of blood red eyes spying on them.


    With regards to this flying spy, only those who possessed sharp and sensitive Spiritual Senses could notice the difference.


    If this spy had not been killed, Greem¡¯s trick would have been rted back to Hawkeye within half an hour. Therefore, although Hawkeye had the lowestbat strength among the Advanced Adepts, his ability to obtaining information was, no doubt, the highest.


    Hence, the only way any Apprentice could keep secrets safe was to make sure that these ¡®spies¡¯, who could be found everywhere, were removed from the equation.


    ............


    Greem had no idea of what had just happened behind him. Although his Elementium vision had discovered the Scavenger Crow, he didn¡¯t think to rte it to Hawkeye.


    After sneaking his way back to his room, Greem was unable to restrain himself and started tidying up his belongings.


    Other than Sinbad¡¯s core, he had earned quite a few items from the events involving the fight with the Loli the other day. As he was rushing to turn the best resource he had into his personal strength, Greem had put all his focus on Sinbad¡¯s core, and hadn¡¯t taken the time to properly examine the other items!


    Sinbad¡¯s core had been the most valuable of them, and it had been turned into the summoning core of the y Golem. Of all eight premium quality Blood Sacks he found, Mary had swallowed seven of them, leaving him with just one. A delicacy like this was something only Adept Anderson could eat for sustenance without considering it wasteful.


    As everyone knew, with the exception of Body Refining Adepts and Bloodline Adepts, most Adepts had very weak bodies. Constantly dealing with Elementium Corrosion and long hours spent reading spell books and magical scrolls... A lifestyle like this would only bring about a lousy body. Thus, though most Adepts were not so frail as to be unable to stand up to a gust of wind, almost all had weak constitutions.


    If one focused too much on the utilization and strengthening of their Spirit, but neglected their body, they would often have very weak bodies, and have no choice but to take extreme measures, using tonics to strengthen their body.


    The Blood Sack, harvested from the root of the Bloodsucking Rattan, was an excellent supplement for nourishing blood and qi. However, if one could find an Alchemist and get them to help them concoct it into a ¡®Bloody Banshee Potion¡¯, it could increase the Physique of a weak Adept by up to 2. Of course, this Bloody Banshee Potion only worked for those with 10 or less Physique, and it only worked once.


    Obviously, Greem didn¡¯t have the resources or abilities to get an Alchemist to concoct a Bloody Banshee Potion for him! Therefore, though he knew that consuming it directly would waste most of the essence contained within, Greem ate the Blood Sack.


    When the soft, jelly-like Blood Sack broke in his mouth, a strong, bloody, and sweet taste exploded on his tongue. As the sticky essence of blood started to flow down his throat and into his stomach, a warm sensation started to surge within Greem¡¯s body.


    *Beep* ¡°Unknown energy detected in Host¡¯s body, unable to predict what changes said energy will cause to Host¡¯s vitality. Does Host wish to cleanse it? If no answer is received from Host, cleansing procedure will automaticallymence in 5 seconds...¡±


    ...


    ¡°5... 4... 3...¡±


    ¡°Cancel the cleansing procedure!¡±


    ¡°Host¡¯smand received, cleansing procedure terminated... Would the Host like to monitor internal body data in real-time?¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    ¡°Host¡¯smand received. Commencing real-time monitoring of body¡¯s internal data...¡±


    A series of indistinct beeps followed, then data on his body was projected into his mind.


    While examining the information on his body, Greem discovered something unexpected. Aside from both Physique and Health Points, which were slowly rising, it seemed his experience had increased as well. If his memory served him, he only had around 530 Experience Points during thest self-inspection, but now it had increased to 650. This... this was a huge leap of over 100 points!


    Where did these pointse from?


    Ignoring the changes the Blood Sack was causing, Greem poured all his focus into reading the logs of the Chip. He soon found a message that he had previously missed.


    ¡°Host has sessfully crafted the first y Golem, obtained 120 Experience points.¡±


    So they came from crafting the y Golem!


    It looked like he had found himself a suitable secondary profession, as it could provide him with an extra way to gain experience. In the past, he had always been afraid that learning a magic spell would consume a huge amount of his experience points. But with these supplemental experience points, the pressure of learning magic spells would be slightly lessened.


    Strictly speaking, Greem was only 15 years old now, which meant he had plenty of time before he reached his prime, meaning he had plenty of room for self-improvement. This could be easily seen from the slowly, but surely, growing attributes that he had gained recently.


    But, too bad, living in such a gloomy, oppressive environment had altered his character so that it was slightly skewed to darkness. Utilitarianism and materialism were all that upied his mind. As for those seemingly beautiful emotions, likepassion and love, he had long since ditched them for their uselessness.


    Before one could be truly powerful, they must be cautious and meticulous, in order to safeguard oneself against threats. But even with that, he still couldn¡¯t escape from the power struggles of those Advanced Apprentices...


    He had a favorable impression of Mary, and, from what he observed, Mary seemed to think positively about him. Although she seemed a little overbearing, she always tried to protect Greem.


    But with Greem¡¯s cautious and modest character, he was, obviously, not willing to ce safety in another¡¯s hands. So, fully utilizing this period of safety, he would pour all of his efforts into growing as fast as he could. This was his highest priority. As for his future? Greem had no idea what the future held.


    He had no idea how he had arrived in this ce, or why he was here, if there even was a reason. So far, all he had done was drift with the tide, not involving himself in any intrigues. His current status and identity had limited his vision, causing him to have difficulties realizing what this world was really like. Perhaps leaving this ce was not a bad thing... at least he could truly experience this strange world!


    And perhaps he would be able to discover what path he should take in this life.


    As his mind was busy fantasizing about his future, the blood essence of the Blood Sack had finally merged with his body, tinting his pale skin with a red aura and filling his body with a strength that couldn¡¯t be depleted.


    As he watched, the number representing his Physique on the self-test report started to climb up, eventually stopping at 4.37. As when the river raised, the boat floated higher, his digitized Health Points had risen to 14.


    His Physique had changed from 3.05 to 4.37, an increase of 1.32 points, although it wasn¡¯t the result a Bloody Banshee Potion could bring, it still far exceeded his expectations. Perhaps this had something to do with his overly low Physique. Also, though his Physique had increased to 4.37, it was still on the same level as those Apprentice Adepts who were the same age as him, and he still couldn¡¯t withstand a single blow from those Body Refining Apprentices.


    As for the 14 Health Points, that was just a digitized model constructed by the Chip ording to the characteristic of life forms in this world of advanced magic. It didn¡¯t truly rte to reality. It was more like a representation of Greem¡¯s current vitality.


    Also, with Greem¡¯s weak Physique, if he didn¡¯t have any protection from a defensive magic spell, any magic spell that hit his directly would kill him on the spot. Therefore, in the next few days, besides restlessly digging into the potential of his Golem, he had to find himself a defensive spell.


    If he didn¡¯t, when he was to face wars in the future, let alone participating in them, just the shock waves caused by the fights between those mighty warriors would kill him.


    After he finished with the Blood Sack, Greem resumed his inspection of the rest of his loot from the day before.


    A broken piece of magical equipment, which had degraded so much that no one could tell what it originally was; a fist-sized metallic ore that glowed an odd blue; a strange egg-sized white stone.


    That magical equipment was obviously a low-grade item, which had been crafted with the mostmon material, Thorium. It should belong to an Apprentice Adept who had gotten eaten by those Ghost Nannies, and was nearly worthless. Greem threw it away.


    The egg-sized white stone was actually pretty good loot. After several tests, he finally identified what it was.


    The egg of a Giant Lizard!


    Giant Lizards were demons who resembled an alligator, like the one that had been ridden by Sinbad. Its natural habitat was ces like small ponds or swampy areas, and had the innate ability petrify things with it¡¯s Petrify Beam ability. If it were not for the short range of Petrify Beam, it would actually be a pretty good contractualpanion.


    He felt vitality from the egg, meaning it was still alive. If he could trade it with other Apprentices, he should be able to get something useful back.

 Chapter 37

    As for thest item, which was the fist-sized metallic ore, after taking a moment to identify it, Greem realized that it was Magic Iron.


    With proper smelting, refining, and forging, weapons made from this ore would stand out from standard iron weapons by disying improvements in sharpness or pration ability. Among mortals, this was an amazing treasure, but among Apprentice Adepts, who possessed supernatural powers, it was just an average item.


    After briefly examining all the items, Greem took out a magic book and started reading. Actually, he wasn¡¯t in the mood to indulge himself in the atmosphere of researching magic knowledge. But he needed to arduously utilize every second he had.


    When his Spirit Energy was full, he would practice magic spells. Although he could solidify useful spells with the help of the Chip, he still needed to practice them. Also, he had the ability to learn a skill. Whether it was ¡®Spell Casting Mastery¡¯, ¡®Spellwalk¡¯, or even ¡®Wondrous Item Crafting¡¯, they were all excellent options for him.


    Only by purposely strengthening a specific ability could he obtain skills that would supplement his current abilities, allowing him to survive the uing mission.


    ¡®Spell Casting Mastery¡¯ was a skill that decreased an Apprentice Adept¡¯s casting time. He only needed to recite up to 80% of a spell, then it would be cast automatically. Although it only shaved off 20% of a spell¡¯s casting time, it was a prerequisite skill for the ¡®Quicken Spell¡¯ skill.


    The value of the ¡®Quicken Spell¡¯ skill was enormous for Elemental Adepts. But it was beyond Greem¡¯s current abilities.


    ¡®Spellwalk¡¯, was the Apprentice level skill that Greem wanted the most. It allowed an Apprentice Adept to cast a spell while moving. Without it, no matter if it was an offensive or defensive skill, he could only cast them while standing still.


    Therefore, this skill was a must have for allbat Adepts.


    ¡®Craft Wondrous Item¡¯ was a required skill for those Apprentice Adepts who wanted to concoct magical medicines, artifacts, or equipment. Only by mastering this skill could one further develop their skills in crafting magical items.


    As for the process of obtaining these skills, most magic books didn¡¯t mention it in detail. However, all of them mentioned the term ¡®Will of the World of Adepts¡¯. Greem had always been skeptical toward this.


    No matter what kind of knowledge or techniques one knew, as long as one could practice them diligently, the body would remember it and it would eventually be second nature. But, depending on the feedback of the ¡®Adept World¡¯s Will¡¯ someone could obtain some mysterious ability without doing anything. This was just like a pie falling out of the sky suddenly andnding perfectly in someone¡¯s hands. Greem didn¡¯t understand how this could be.


    Could this boundless world really have its own will? Was there some supreme deity indwelling in this World, paying attention to every individual who lived within its body, and, when the individual did something it approved of, it would reward him at the right time?


    If this Will really did exist, what did it looked like? And, where did it hide? Also, what kind of ability did it have that allowed it to ovee everything and control this universe?


    However, in regards to this extremely mysterious and abstruse will, Greem couldn¡¯t guarantee that it didn¡¯t exist. After all, the Adept World, where he currently lived, was a major scale ne that was surrounded by a vast magical ocean. With such arge amount of abundant magical energy, it wasn¡¯t surprising to see all kind of mystical events ur.


    So, before he uncovered the forces behind this mysticism world, he had to keep a reverent and respectful manner for everything. And that was the right attitude for an Apprentice Adept who sought knowledge and universal truths.


    Greem kept copying the knowledge from the book into his database until he was left with 1 Spirit point. Then he stopped ¡®reading¡¯. He couldn¡¯t use up all his Spirit, as the Fire Arrow spell was in the process of optimization and would use up 1 Spirit point every day.


    He looked through the window and saw the dark sky. He quickly realized that it was after midnight.


    Greem tiredly closed up the book, stood up, and stretched his body, making cracking sounds as he stretched. Then he got in his bed.


    But he was not going to sleep yet because he hadn¡¯tpleted his daily meditation!


    Thus, within his still and quiet room, his breathing slowly became stable as his soul conscious immersed itself in the Spiritual world, which was filled with brightly glowing ¡®specks¡¯.


    This was one of the sad realities that an Apprentice Adept had to deal with.


    Every day, from the moment they opened their eyes, they would have to face a full schedule. Even when they finally climbed back into their beds after beingpletely exhausted, what awaited them wasn¡¯t sweet dreams, but boring meditation. And only by meditating every day, could they increase their Spirit bit by bit.


    ............


    However, as the candles within the Tower went out, one by one, eventually bequeathing the tower in aplete darkness, save for the slight moonlight which could prate the fog and clouds above the tower, a strange figure suddenly appeared on one of the outside walls of the Tower.


    A nearly perfectly perpendicr wall; numerous hidden, mysterious magical formations, yet all of these were no obstacle for it, as it was still crawling around the tower at a speed faster than any ordinary man. From its movement, you could tell it had a target in mind. It continuously passed many wide opened windows, never stopping even once, all the while moving from shadow to shadow at an incredible speed.


    She was not a kind of shadow creature who could freely leap between shadows, but her extremely high Agility gave her fantastic mobility. For her, walking on the perpendicr tower wall was like walking on a level road, and she could do it all without making any noise. She was like an assassin who thrived in the shadows.


    Finally, she found her target.


    With a leap, the figure swiftly hung herself outside of the narrow window, hiding her body in the shadow where no light could reach. It seemed she was listening for something.


    No sound could be heard from the room, except for stable, lengthy breathing. Obviously, the Apprentice in there was deep in meditation. An Apprentice Adept who was in a meditative state was defenseless. As long as a thief, or someone of a simr profession, could sneak into his room, he would be able to easily kill an ambitious future Adept.


    But, clearly, the figure hanging outside of the window was an experienced person, as she didn¡¯t jump into the window impatiently. She closely examined the window.


    Quiet! Silent! As still as death!


    Everything around her seemed perfectly normal, but, for some unknown reason, a feeling of apprehension was growing inside her.


    She didn¡¯t sense anything, but she had a gut feeling, from the depths of her strange bloodline, as if there was something really dangerous waiting for inside the window.


    Although she really hated this damn bloodline, which had made her partially human and partially inhuman, but, as a Vampire who had gone through the awakening of her bloodline, she had an absolute trust in anything that came from her bloodline.


    That bastard had dared to go against her earlier that day, and now he was in a deep meditation, seemingly defenseless. This Apprentice Adept was really careless!


    Within the dark shadows below the window, bits of a bizarre smile could be seen in a pair of bright eyes. Mary gracefully waved her arm, throwing a fist-sized round object into the narrow window, then she immediately transformed into a ck bat and merged into the dark night, pping her wings and flying off into the distance.


    Right when the round object went through the window, a magic formation, hidden on the inner side of the window, was triggered.


    A blue colored ¡®Stun Thunder¡¯ instantly swept across the area that the round object had passed through. As this was electrical energy, even if she doubled her speed, Mary wouldn¡¯t be able to dodge this trap. Not only that, within the darkness of the room, a couple of bizarre, colorful magic spells suddenly shot out from an empty ce, instantly striking the round object, which had safely passed through the Stun Thunder trap.


    After all, the round object was just a hard shell made from ordinary y. There was no way it could withstand so many magic spells, and thus it shattered immediately!


    The outer shell was broken, revealing a jelly-like ooze that was trapped within. In fact, it was a living creature, and a human-like face could be seen on its pale green body, which seemed to be formed from mud, human waste, and stinking water.


    ¡°Oh shit, it¡¯s the Sludge!¡±


    ¡°Damn it, it¡¯s the Sludge...¡±


    ¡°Everybody run...¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    As they were knowledgeable Apprentice Adepts, all of them recognized this ¡®frightening¡¯ demon, who was really famous within this Magical Swamp. Those who had experienced its terrifying ability would be overwhelmed with sorrow. During normal days, if anyone encountered it in the Magical Swamp, they would definitely keep far away from it. This included the strongest three.


    Because it was the most disgusting demon that lived in the swamp: the Sludge.


    The Sludge was a super disgusting demon with a soft flexible body. It looked like a weird organic object with soft, slimy tissue, messy teeth, and a pair of eyes. Its pale green body looked like a pile of mud, but it actually more like jelly.


    Its offensive strength was so weak, one could simply ignore. But, it had a ¡®frightening¡¯ skill that brought grief to those who faced it: ¡®Acid Retch¡¯.


    This strange creature contained a certain amount of Elementium within its body, but it had been contaminated by a chaotic force. If any object or creature got stained by its ¡®bile¡¯, they would suffer slightly from it corrosive acid... but then there was its incredible, frightening stench.


    This filthy smell couldn¡¯t be removed by any magic spell. Those who came in physical contact with this ¡®acid retch¡¯, would have to bear it for ten to fourteen days! Within this period, any object touched by the man would also gain the stench as well.


    Imagine this, if an Apprentice Adept, who had touched this ¡®acid bile¡¯, tried to have a meal, even if it was the most delicious delicacy in the world, it would smell like shit that had been soak disgusting water for a thousand years. The torture, the ridiculeing from people who avoided him like gue... it would simply make an Apprentice Adept go crazy.


    And now the Sludge, who had previously been trapped in a harden y shell, was broken out by the spells of these Apprentices. So what happened next was a really enjoyable scene!


    When the pale green acid liquid sshed all over the room, sounds of vomiting immediately echoed it.


    ¡°Ma-... gh... Mary... urf..., I haven¡¯t... urgh... finish with you... braffffff...¡±


    An extremely tragic, furious roar came out from Apprentice Leader Ellen¡¯s mouth. But before he could finish, his voice was flooded by the loud noise of vomiting.

 Chapter 38

    The next day, Greem met two reeking midgets.


    Clearly, they were two unlucky guys who had been attacked by the Sludge, which seemed to have hit them with both it¡¯s ¡®Acid Retch¡¯ and a ¡®Shrinking¡¯ curse, thus turning them into their current forms. But, before Greem could learn how this had happened, the two, discovering his presence, clenched their jaws shot and red at him.


    Faced with their angry nces, thoughpletely confused as to why they were doing so, he just quickly handed over the list of the items he wanted to trade to Danny, turned around, and left.


    Danny was considered to be one of the friendliest guys among all the Apprentice Adept in the tower, and he had established an underground market by selling info on supply and demand. Greem hade by to tell him that he was selling a Giant Lizard egg and Magic Iron Ore. If any Apprentice Adept was interested, they woulde to him for a trade. At the same time, he bought a few useful items from Danny at a high price.


    Comparing to previous days, the Tower was rather lively today. Most of Apprentice Adepts had left their room,ing out and talking with their familiar ¡®friends¡¯ about all that had happened yesterday. Thepulsory mission that Adept Anderson had set for them was like a bomb, bringing a massive storm to the peaceful lives of these Apprentices.


    All Apprentices were forced to discontinue their research projects and pay close attention to thetest developments, as their very status as ¡®Apprentice¡¯ was at stake.


    After all, only a handful Apprentices had immediately decided on their missions yesterday, and most of them were still hesitating. In fact, everyone could tell that these missions had been put out by then Zhentarim Association. This also meant that they would have to form a temporary team with Apprentice Adepts from all over the Zhentarim region to fight together.


    This was a situation that never happened before, so, while the uniqueness of this event in their formerly dull lives was refreshing, it also absolutely terrified and disturbed most of them as well.


    Walking slowly in the public hall on the second floor, Greem passed through all these perturbed Apprentice Adepts. When these Apprentice Adepts saw him passing by, they would immediately shut their mouths, giving him a ¡®your not wee here¡¯ look. Even a few of the ¡®lone wolves¡¯, who normally talked with him, were avoiding him, their faces filled with mixed emotions.


    Greem was like a lone wolf who had just been rejected by the pack of wolves, walking slowly in the grasnds. Pulling his hood and covered his head, Greem turned around and left the hall.


    Only the strongest three could make everyone stay away from him. Ellen was not capable of doing this.


    Greem had no intentions on finding out why the strongest three were being so hostile towards him. In any case, it was probably because of Mary. The thing he was concerned with most was how to improve himself in the shortest amount of time, so he could survive the uing mission.


    Taking the opportunity, while nobody was watching him, Greem, once again, snuck out of the Adept Tower.


    Returning to the muddy swamp, Greem suddenly sensed how deste this ce had be.


    Originally, no matter how deste this ce had seemed, Greem could always sense a pack of Ghost Nannies hiding at the banks of the muddy ponds, waiting for their prey. But, now, after performed countless scans, he just couldn¡¯t find the red dots that represented Ghost Nannies on his Elementium vision.


    Within his line of sight, there were around four to fiverge stinking ponds. ording to Ghost Nannies habits, each pond should be inhabited by a group of them, at most thirty, at minimum seven.


    But now, after going through all those intense battles, thergest Ghost Nanny group, who had inhabited thergest of the ponds, had suffered greatly, causing the groups who lived near the borders to weaken, making their lives seem really miserable.


    However, this was better for Greem, as it saved him some effort.


    Today, Greem purposely came here to ughter demons, so he really needed arge battlefield. If there were any Ghost Nannies left over from the past few days, they would be ughtered by him today.


    After inspecting the area again and checking all the surrounding areas (he had the Chip record the terrain data), only then did Greem take out the y Golem core.


    After spending more than ten hours of recovering, all four energy nodes on the summoning core were brightly lit, showing that they had been fully charged with Earth Elementium. The Golem was ready to show its might!


    Greem threw the summoning core to the edge of the muddy pond. As before, when it touched the muddy shore, a huge amount of earthy yellow smoke instantly erupted. This was not real smoke, but dense Earth Elementium ring up around the core.


    Earth Elementium rapidly gathered together. Driven by unseeable forces, the wet soil started to rise and twist, quickly forming into a humanoid y Golem that was around Greem¡¯s height.


    Too bad it was not a Stone or Iron Golem, or else it¡¯s defense would be strong enough that he could, perhaps, fight face to face with the Giant Alligator King, which was Greem¡¯s target today. You got what you paid for! Indeed, the y Golem was cheap, but its defense was only on par with that of a human fighter in full leather armor. It could hardly withstand a Giant Alligator¡¯s sharp fangs and powerful tail.


    But the Giant Alligator did have a weakness, or else, with its formidable strength,parable to that of an Advanced Apprentice, it would merely be a dream for Greem to fight it.


    ............


    Early in the morning, the muddy swamp was still peaceful.


    Less than half a mile from the stinking ponds where the Ghost Nannies lived was a vast area inhabited by Giant Alligators. There were a few frightening Giant Alligators just lying around within grass bushes, sleeping carelessly.


    But, while they were enjoying their rxed, leisurely lifestyle, a loud noise was heard, and a crooked figure was seen jumping into the pond where they lived.


    Looking at the disheveled hair, full of moss, the pitch-ck, dirty ws, and the skinny yet vigorous body... it was actually one of their neighbors, a Ghost Nanny.


    As a native creature of the Magic Swamp, all strong demons had their own fixed territories, and the borders of these territories were distinct. No one was allowed to step over into another¡¯s territory. But today, this stinking and dirty Ghost Nanny had dared to intrude into the territory of the Giant Alligators, and this made the Giant Alligators, who had just been rudely roused from their sleep, be extremely angry.


    Without making any noise, seven to eight Giant Alligators left the grass bushes, sunk into the water, and disappeared. The only traces of them were some fast moving water lines that led toward the Ghost Nanny.


    Somehow the Ghost Nanny had all her arms and legs broken by someone. Thus, even though she had a strong body, she just couldn¡¯t do anything to save herself. Soon, a ferociousrge mouth broke the water and forcefully bit onto her upper body, dragging her down as it dived back into the water. More Giant Alligators arrived, causing water to ssh everywhere and mud to fiercely roll around. Once these Alligators had tasted blood, they went into a blood frenzy and started restlessly tearing the struggling Ghost Nanny apart.


    An enormous Giant Alligator appeared on the banks of the pond.


    Unlike the other Giant Alligators, it didn¡¯t charge in to devoured the outsider who intruded on its territory, but pushed its upper body up, like a true king, and slowly looked around.


    Those Ghost Nannies had their own leader, so it was impossible for them to intrude on another¡¯s territory without reason. Could that Sinbad be trying to stir up a war between them?


    As a demon leader who had gone through a unique evolution, obviously this Giant Alligator King possessed some basic intelligence. Thus it was able to ponder over some simple questions rationally.


    But, while it was still wondering, another Ghost Nanny came flying over, drawing a strange line in the air as it fell into the depths of the swamp. After ripped one intruder to pieces, the Alligators had beenpletely incensed, and the noise immediately attracted those Giant Alligators, making them swarm towards the new ¡®arrival¡¯.


    Only the Giant Alligator King, who stood firmly on the banks, could see that this new Ghost Nanny had been thrown here by someone, and this ¡®someone¡¯ was hiding behind a Killer Tree not far from the pond.


    Without hesitating, Giant Alligator King moved its short but powerful legs, beginning to waddle toward the Killer Tree. In order not to alert the ¡®enemy¡¯, it purposely moved around the pond, hiding within dense, waist-high weed fields as it sneaked its way toward the target.


    Obviously, it had a massive body, but it still tried to sneak around like an assassin. Hiding behind another Killer Tree in the distance, Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head.


    Although it had evolved and possessed some basic intelligence, it was still a mere demon. Compared to the profound intelligence human had, it¡¯s low-grade intelligence was just a joke.


    Even with its stomach kissing the ground, the gigantic body of Giant Alligator King was still two meters tall. No matter how dense those weeds were, they could barely cover its legs and stomach. Its gigantic body was fully covered with hard scales, and pointy spines stood high up on its back, able to be clearly seen from far away. Under such a situation, it still thought it couldn¡¯t be seen. This situation was simplyughable.


    What¡¯s more annoying, its enormous body weighed over thirty tons, so the ground would shake briefly with every step it took. But, it still was attempting to sneak around, like it was actually going tounch a sneak attack. It seemed that it had no idea how much it shook the ground with every step it took.


    ¡ª


    Having smoothly moved around a bunch of obstacles, the Giant Alligator King finally discovered a suspicious figure behind the Killer Tree.


    It was a hateful human wearing in an Apprentice robe. It also had a few immobilized Ghost Nannies beside ¡®him¡¯. Every minute ¡®he¡¯ would throw one into the pond in the distance. Thanks to ¡®him¡¯, the once peaceful and quiet swamnd had be a lively and noisy bloodbath, where the frightening scene of Giant Alligators ripping apart their food was seen everywhere.


    The Giant Alligator King angrily red at this evil Apprentice, and, in order to prevent this enemy from fleeing, it patiently moved forward, slowly yet surely proceeding toward this Apprentice.


    100 meters...


    70 meters...


    50 meters...


    20 meters...


    Today was its lucky day.


    It almost reached the back of that evil Apprentice, and ¡®he¡¯ still hadn¡¯t sensed anything strange behind ¡®him¡¯.


    While praising itself for how well it had sneaked up on its target, the Giant Alligator King lowered its body, making thest preparations for a devastating strike.


    Time to die, human! I¡¯m having Apprentice Adept for dinner!


    Moving explosively, the Giant Alligator King leaped toward its target.

 Chapter 39

    When the Giant Alligator King fully opened its mouth, it was even taller than an adult human. Frightening looking teeth were messily distributed on both upper and lower jaw, all of which looked like razor-sharp daggers.


    With its incredible jaw strength, perhaps this unprepared Apprentice would have his body immediately ripped in half.


    But something dramatic happened. The human Apprentice turned around, throwing the Ghost Nanny in his hand into the Giant Alligator King¡¯s mouth. After that, twisting and turning in a strange manner, he escaped the frightening bite of the Giant Alligator King at lightning speed.


    The skinny and tough body of Ghost Nanny was instantly bitten in half, pungent, sticky, ck blood flowing down from the sharp teeth.


    The Giant Alligator King let out a disgusted roar.


    As a demon itself, it was never picky about food. However, it would say no to these neighbors without any hesitation. Even from the point of view of a demon, these Ghost Nannies really stunk. Only when food had really run out would it consider eating one or two of these Ghost Nannies.


    Giant Alligator King spat the broken body out of its mouth. In the next second, it caught sight of the figure of a fleeing human. It could tell this human Apprentice couldn¡¯t run very fast, as he was staggering his way while stumbled over puddles.


    It let out a joyful roar, moved its gigantic body, and crashing forward toward its target, like a small mountain.


    Due to the terrain of this area, the Giant Alligator King actually moved faster than that human Apprentice, so it quickly reached ¡®his¡¯ back.


    Though it kept catching up, the bizarre human would always dodge out of the way of its giant mouth miraculously. This made it even more furious, and it became more and more reckless as this continued to happen.


    Finally, in one sessful attempt, the Giant Alligator King crushed the human¡¯s arm with one ferocious bite. But, strangely, it didn¡¯t taste any blood or flesh in its mouth. In fact, it felt like it had just devoured a mouthful of y. Also, after the Apprentice¡¯s robe was ripped apart, revealed that the being in front of it was not a human Apprentice, but a strange humanoid y Creature.


    The Giant Alligator King immediately realized it had been fooled. Raging, it leaped onto the unfortunate being who had lured it here, preparing to rip it into a thousand pieces.


    Since it¡¯s true identity was exposed, it was no longer necessary for the y Golem to continued its charade.


    Tearing off the troublesome robe, the y Golem finally could show all of its power. It started to fight this clumsy Giant Alligator King in an orderly manner.


    After all, the Giant Alligator King was an aquatic demon, which meant it could move like a fish in muddy swamp water. But when it camend movement, its gigantic body was far too clumsy. With its body fully covered with hard scales, it kept pushing around like a frantic war machine, sending grass flying all over the ce, breaking trees, and leaving a deep trail on the ground.


    But its attacks were overly focused on its head and tail.


    Most of its offensive abilities could strike out in a fan-shaped region around the front of its head. Within this area, its ferocious bite could easily tear apart an enemy. Also, whenever it used its long tail to attack, it would break the enemy¡¯s bones.


    But, the region between its front and rear limbs was its offensive weak spot, which neither its head nor tail could reach. If an enemy hid within that area, it would have to slowly move its gigantic body to position an enemy where it could strike out at them.


    And this damn y Golem had obviously found its weakness, as it sprinted straight into that region and kept crazily attacking its body.


    Using its heavy and powerful fists, the y Golem kept punching on the hard scales that lined the Giant Alligator King¡¯s ribs. Besides from attacking it physically, the y Golem also used Mud Spear to support its offensive. But all these were useless. Having its body fully covered with thick and tough scales, the Giant Alligator King didn¡¯t even care about these ineffective strikes. It just kept turning its body, restlessly trying to chase away this nasty enemy who dared to fight so close to it.


    But the y Golem always kept pace with Giant Alligator King, making sure it couldn¡¯t be attacked.


    The thick and tough scale were a defensive mechanism for the Giant Alligator King, but it also limited its range of activity to its mouth. The enemy was so close, but he just couldn¡¯t do anything to it.


    Although the y Golem had dominated from an advantage position, Greem, who was remotely controlling from this distance, didn¡¯t felt happy at all.


    This wouldn¡¯t work!


    Without breaking past the enemy¡¯s scales, there was no way y Golem could cause sufficient damage to it. If this situation went on, the battle would end in a draw, as neither party could do anything to the other. The Giant Alligator King was blinded by its anger now, which is why it kept fighting with the y Golem. Once it regained its rational and returned back to the familiar swamp water, there was no way y Golem could fight it.


    Fortunately, before Greem came here, he had performed a thorough analysis on the strengths and weaknesses of the Giant Alligator, so he had an idea on how to beat it. After received hismand, y Golem stopped wasting its energy on attacked the opponent¡¯s body with its fist, and started releasing ¡®Spikes¡¯ underneath the Giant Alligator King¡¯s body.


    Most parts of Giant Alligator¡¯s body were covered with a thickyer of scales, which were excellent against physical attacks. But, there was a part where these scales didn¡¯t cover: its abdomen.


    Not only did these spikes do physical damage, but they also did Earth Elementium damage. As Giant Alligator was an Earth Elementium demon, it had a significant resistance toward Earth Elementium damage, so it took no damage from that part of the spike attack.


    But even so, the pure physical damage still brought pain to Giant Alligator King, causing it to continually let out pained snorts.


    Throughout the entire Magic Swamp, no demon could prate its thick scales and attack its weak spot, and this had made it the overlord of this vast swampynd. But today, the nasty golem had really upset this king.


    Only after feeling pain did the Giant Alligator King recalled that he had a simr innate ability. Thus, with a furious roar, a thick Earth Elementium immediately started gathering around its body.


    ¡°Quagmire Spell!¡±


    Greem clenched his fists tightly as he watched the innate ability of this Giant Alligator King. When he confirmed it was the ¡®Quagmire Spell¡¯, he couldn¡¯t hold back his excitement and immediately let out a loud cry.


    Excellent! The Giant Alligator King was dead meat now!


    To be honest, if this Giant Alligator King had the innate ability of Earth Elemental offensive spells, or those supplementary spells that could bring additional defense, Greem would call back the y Golem and leave immediately. But since it was the Quagmire spell, the sess rate for today¡¯s battle had shot up to 70%.


    As expected, as Greem was jumping for joy, a really funny scene urred on the battlefield.


    Within 50 meters of the Giant Alligator King, the ground had transformed into a thick deep muddy pit, which acted like quicksand. If other creatures fought with it, perhaps they would be caught unprepared and trapped by the quicksand. It was a type of restraining spell that covered arge area. This, together with its frightening physical capabilities, had brought the Giant Alligator King the dominate position in thisnd.


    Unfortunately for it, the y Golem was an Earth Elemental!


    Though other creatures would be trapped by it, the y Golem was standing on this constantly moving quagmire like it was t ground, nothing really happened. It seemed the heavy and solid body of the y Golem had suddenly lost all its weight, as it stood easily on the quicksand, showing no signs of sinking.


    Therefore, on top of this slow moving quicksand, an intense, yet strange battle of a mouse ying with a cat erupted between two creatures of the Earth.


    The y Golem had given up on attacking with Mud Spear, which caused no real damage, and kept releasing Spikes underneath its opponent¡¯s body. On average, it could cast this once every 11 seconds. After all, Spike was an AOE spell. Although the y Golem couldn¡¯t see the exact soft spot of the Giant Alligator King¡¯s abdomen, nor how effective this attack was, as long as the attack was focused under the Giant Alligator King, it would be enough to hurt it.


    After fifteen minutes of this intense battle, it was obvious that the Giant Alligator King couldn¡¯t hold much longer, as its movement was slower than before.


    Not only was it unable to hit the enemy, it also kept feeling a sharp pain on its abdomen. This depressing battle had made it really angry. As a demon with basic intelligence, it realized that if the situation went on like this, it would really be killed by this fellow.


    Thus, the Giant Alligator King decided not to bother with this y Golem anymore. It turned its body and started moving toward a pond in the distance.


    However, this had been within Greem¡¯s expectations. When it started turning its body, it realized that another human was blocking its way back. Also, the human was holding a strange looking object, which resembled a spider.


    Relying on its sensitive sense of smell, Giant Alligator King sensed real blood and flesh from this obstacle. It couldn¡¯t hold its anger and let out a furious roar. Facing with the real culprit of today¡¯s evil plot, it ferociously leaped forward, nning to knock this enemy away and returned to its home territory.


    In next second, a white spider web covered its head, sticking onto its short and thick front legs. At the same time, a ming hot Fire Arrow was shot out, quickly nailing into the upper part of its long, narrow mouth. That¡¯s where its head was located, and also the part nearest to its eyes.


    Giant Alligator King closed its eyes, and ayer of tiny scales was seen to be on its eyelids as well. It felt a severe pain on its forehead as a raging fire exploded on its face.


    As its front legs were tangled by spider webs, and both of its eyes were forced closed by the fire so it couldn¡¯t see a thing, it had to slow down. Therefore, the y Golem, who had been following along beside it, started to increase the frequency of its attacks.


    In order to win this battle, Greem nearly went bankrupt.


    These one-time usage spider web items were not cheap. Whenever he used one, his heart would bleed. But in order to prevent the Giant Alligator King from running away, he had no alternative but to kept using them to trap its legs.


    The Giant Alligator King had an overpowering Strength. ording to Greem¡¯s preliminary estimation, it had at least 14 Strength. With this incredible power, each spider web could only trap it for six to seven seconds. If not because Greem also kept attacking its eyeballs with Fire Arrow, causing it to be unable to find its way back, perhaps it would forcefully push through these obstacles and run back to its nest.


    Hence, with a careful and urate nning, after nearly seven to eight minutes of the restless attacks, the Giant Alligator King¡¯s abdomen was finally punctured by the y Golem¡¯s Spike spell.

 Chapter 40

    The Giant Alligator King had died, and it had done so at the hands of two seemingly insignificant beings!


    Greemmanded the y Golem to hack into the Giant Alligator King¡¯s corpse so that he could harvest some important materials, including an egg-sized Earth Elemental core. After that, before all the other Giant Alligators could bother them, they hastily left the area.


    After Greem¡¯s form had disappeared at the end of the trail, behind a Killer Tree less than half a mile away from the battlefield, Mary was staring distractedly at the Giant Alligators who were roaring angrily in the distance. On the ground around her, fourteen broken Scavenger Crow bodies were scattered around.


    She had witnessed the entire course of Greem¡¯s battle just now, and was now filled with mixed emotions.


    The Giant Alligator King was a terrifying demon that even she had not dared provoke!


    Although the Giant Alligator King was considered to be on the same level as an Advanced Apprentice, this wasn¡¯t a good representation of it¡¯s true fighting ability. With her high Agility, even if Giant Alligator King was given a pair of wings, it would still not be able to think about catching her. However, the thick and strong scales of Giant Alligator King were not something she could break through either, as she was ¡®weak¡¯.


    If they fought, the Giant Alligator King couldn¡¯t do anything about her speed, and she couldn¡¯t do anything about its defense.


    Mary knew the limitations of her abilities. While they were weak, she might be able to bully most of these Apprentice Adepts. But following their inevitable improvement, her advantage was, in fact, shrinking.


    And now this seemingly insignificant Beginner Apprentice ¡®subordinate¡¯ of hers had actually been able to use that strange y Golem to kill the Giant Alligator King.


    This... this brought her great confusion!


    Turning her eyes down to those broken crow bodies, her eyes clouded up, and her mind was drifted away.


    He was a ¡®subordinate¡¯ that she had personally subdued! Since when he had be the main fighting force, and she became the ve who was responsible for clearing up the spies on the perimeter? A me of anger erupted in Mary¡¯s mind, and a blood red thread appeared in the middle of her green eyes.


    She was the boss, and he was just a little subordinate. This rtionship could never be changed! It looked like it was time to teach this smug brat a lesson. Although he treated her nicely in the past, she wouldn¡¯t allow him to ride her to the top... Yes, she would teach him a lesson when she got back!


    Pressing down the depression and frustration building in her mind, Mary leaped into the air, transformed into a tiny bat, pping her wings, and flew off towards the tower.


    When Mary knocked on Greem¡¯s door, raging anger in her heart, she was taken aback when the door opened to reveal Greem¡¯s dazzling smile.


    Pulling Mary into his room, Greem presented his present to her like he was offering her a precious treasure.


    ¡°Mary, look at this! I know you like the blood of strong beings, right? Would this be useful for you?¡±


    Pungent and sticky blood was inside a small pot. With both hands, Greem held it out to Mary. His face was shined with anticipation, his face covered with a look simr to that of a small child begging to be praised.


    ¡°This... what is this?¡± Mary stammered.


    Somehow, though she came here to teach Greem a lesson, her anger had instantly vanished, she even stammered when talking to the guy.


    ¡°Don¡¯t ask. Give it a taste first and see if you like it! I have harvested quite a lot of them this time. If you like it, I¡¯ll go to theboratory and have them purified and get rid of the pungent smell, with that, I¡¯m sure it will taste better!¡±


    Putting on a poker face, Mary criticized him to cover up her surprise at this situation.


    ¡°Who would present a gift like this? You didn¡¯t even wrap it up nicely. You just ced it in a crude pottery pot. At least, you should pour it in a crystal clear goblet! And, how did you abstract this blood? Don¡¯t you know the sweetest blood of a creature is their heart blood? For the sake of your sincerity, I¡¯ll forgive your rude manner this time. Remember! Next time prepare your gift properly before you present it to me!¡±


    ¡°Understand... I totally understand... but... Mary! You see, it will take me a lot of time to prepare all of these, and I don¡¯t think I have enough Knowledge Points right now...¡±


    Her beautiful green pupils contracted, and a dangerous look shed through her eyes.


    ¡°So... you¡¯re trying to borrow from me?¡±


    ¡°No... Well, yes, but only temporarily. Once I have sold all the items I have listed, I¡¯ll pay you back.¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help it and smiled awkwardly. The quality of the Earth Elemental core he harvested this time was better than the first one, and so he had more space to embed Magical Formations on it. Thus he was troubled with how to fully utilize it.


    He didn¡¯t have much time left until they had to set off for the mission, yet he still had a few urgent matters that needed to be taken care of.


    The freshly harvested Earth Elemental core was definitely one of them.


    Greem had thought of a unique n for this new core. Since it was also an Earth Elemental core, why couldn¡¯t he connect the energy of both summoned y Golems? When separated, each y Golem would work on their own, and when they were connected, they would share their energy. Wouldn¡¯t it be better this way?


    Upon thinking of this, Greem had the Chip perform some preliminary calctions. What he needed now was to learn about energy connections and soul synergism. Once he had this knowledge, he should be able to craft this new golem.


    Greem also still needed to find a suitable defensive magic spell.


    Currently, he had mastered two Fire Elemental magic spells, one used for closebat, and with slight defensive usages, and the other was a pure long-range offensive spell. Thus, he still had a huge weakness when dealing with defense. If he didn¡¯t solve this problem, he would very likely die on the uing mission.


    Using his bug fusion ability, Evil Bugs was like an unbeatable cockroach, and he never feared an enemy¡¯s attacks. Madwoman had an incredible Physique, and her offensive strength was nearly invincible, thus she never had to worry about her own safety. Hawkeye¡¯s abilities were unknown. Mary possessed an inhuman Agility, and the frightening ability of bloodsucking, which provided her with powerful regeneration. Hence, she too was as unkible as a cockroach.


    All these Advanced Apprentices had their ownplete and systematic path of magic. No matter it was in offensive or defensive, they possessed their own unique abilities, and thus they differed greatly. But, no matter who he had to face, Greem had no confidence in surviving against their attacks.


    This was Greem¡¯s current weakness.


    Due to ack of knowledge and resources, Greem was considered an underdog, even among Beginner Apprentices, and hadn¡¯t really decided on his development path. Thus, he hadn¡¯t developed a systematic way of cultivating his magical ability.


    Although he had wished to be a Principle Adept before this, and even learned some Profound Adept skills, the damnpulsory mission had halted his original development n.


    ording to his initial n, he was supposed to pour most of his resources into learning elementary knowledge and theories of Fire Elemental magic spells, trying his best to increase his Spirit so he could reach the same level as most other Apprentices his age, stepping into the rank of Intermediate Apprentice. By his estimations, this process would take him at least three months.


    But now this Redpulsory mission was pressing down on top of his head like a nightmare. If he didn¡¯t possess any appropriate countermeasures before it started, perhaps he would die in that frightening Underground Cave. Because of this, Greem had no choice but to readjust the allocation of his resources, putting all of them into the golems.


    As the direct result of this, Greem was nearly bankrupt!


    He didn¡¯t have sufficient Knowledge Points to rent the Alchemy Laboratory; didn¡¯t have enough Knowledge Points to learn defensive magic spells; and didn¡¯t have enough gold coins to purchase suitable items for anything...


    Putting aside the gold, without sufficient Knowledge Points to support the crafting of a new summoning core, Greem had no hopes of surviving that cave. If it wasn¡¯t for this, he would never ditch his pride to try and get something from Mary.


    Mary stared straight at Greem¡¯s face with her dazzling eyes. Finally, she nodded her head without saying anything.


    After obtained an ¡®investment¡¯ from Mary, and unaware of the beating that he had narrowly escaped, Greem eagerly rushed off to the Alchemy Laboratory and, like an extravagant man, rented out the high-quality Alchemy Station for seven hours.


    The Earth Elemental Core obtained from Giant Alligator King was as big as a pigeon egg. ording to the Chip¡¯s designs, besides a few basic controlling magical formations, he could ce a few more energy nodes on the extra space. Thus, while the previous summoning core could only have four energy nodes, this one could have nine.


    More energy nodes meant a moreplex magical formation and numerous modifications to the entire structure. So, since the moment Greem had obtained the core, the Chip had been busy calcting and testing the design.


    When Greem had finally prepared all the magical materials, the Chip hadpleted the task.


    *Beep* ¡°Thetest structural design for golem summoning core has beenpleted. Commence data transfer?¡±


    ¡°Transfer!¡±


    After the data finished transferring, Greem closed his eyes and saw the custom three-dimensional design of the magical formation.


    After on these calctions, he needed to carve fifteen magical formations of all sizes on the surface of the pigeon egg sized summoning core. He also needed to connect them all together, forming them into arger, moreplex magical formation. A design task like this could only bepleted by the Chip in such a short amount of time. For Greem, he could barely recognize any of the rune structures on it.


    After spending a few minutes trying to understand it, Greem stopped trying and turned his attention to the issues he had to faceter during the carving process.


    With the help of the Chip, Greem could totally avoid the problem of insufficient knowledge and skill, and was able to divide the entireplex crafting task into countless simple and straightforward operations. Through these trivial, small operations, Greem, who was only a rookie in Alchemy, couldplete theplex rune structures in one go, while this would usually only be possible in the hands of those Master Alchemists.


    Therefore, at this moment, what Greem worried about was not whether he waspetent enough toplete this project, but if his Spirit was sufficient to support the massive strain he was about to put on it.


    But he didn¡¯t have any alternatives.


    He had to construct his Golem army as quickly as possible in order to optimize his offensive ability. Then had to find the time to learn one defensive magic spell in order to give himself both the offensive and defensive advantage. And this was the key to his survival in thepulsory mission!


    Greem took a deep breath, and once again stood in front of the Alchemy Station. He rid himself of any distracting thoughts and fully focused on crafting the brand new summoning core.

 Chapter 41

    Editor Note: So life is getting busy for me on May 1st, and I will be unable to continue editing AoA. (Don¡¯t worry, FruitFly is still tranting). However, all of this just goes to say that UntouchableFly will soon be in need of an Editor. If you have any interest in this, please either leave ament below, or email me at


    Several hourster, when Greem exuberantly rushed back to his room, he found an Apprentice Adept was waiting for him.


    To his surprise, after putting out the ¡®item for sell¡¯ notice, the first person who came to see him was actually Anm, the administrator of the Magic Practice Room. Though Greem barely had contact with anyone, he had heard that this Anm hadn¡¯t managed to squeeze himself into the ten man list for the mission of guarding the Swamp Tower.


    This also meant Anm, who was an Intermediate Apprentice, had to face the risks brought to him by the approachingpulsory missions.


    ¡°I heard you have an egg of a Giant Lizard in your possession?¡± Upon meeting Greem, Anm didn¡¯t hide his objective of being here. As the clock was ticking, all beginner and intermediate Apprentices were filled with a sense of crisis, thus they were seizing every second they had to strengthen themselves. As a result, the items which were very useful for small scale battles between Apprentices, such as potions and scrolls, had their prices skyrocket. They were so expensive that even the richest Apprentices felt a heartache when purchasing them.


    If not for this, Greem wouldn¡¯t have nearly gone bankrupt just because he purchased a few one-time use spider webs.


    But this was not a bad thing either.


    From the ¡®ckmarket¡¯ list provided by Danny, Greem saw many rare materials that he could hardly find during normal times. These items were definitely the treasures of other Apprentices, many of which had been set aside to be used when they broke through to the next level in the future.


    But too bad... due to thispulsory mission, which was a matter of life and death, they were forced to give up their futures, selling these treasures in exchange for items that would instantly increase theirbat abilities.


    Greem politely invited Anm into his room.


    As Anm came into the room, the strong smell of blood and the pungent smell of formalin filled his nose. ss jars of all sizes could be seen ced on a shelf in the corner of the room. They were filled with light green liquid, and all kinds of demon organs could be seen floating in these jars. Hearts, gastric pouches, brains, eyeballs... many of them still had blood in and on them. Clearly, they were freshly harvested.


    An excited frog croak rang through the air, which came from Anm¡¯spanion beast, the Poison Dart Frog as it suddenly appeared on his shoulder, restlessly croaking at these materials. When Anm finally calmed it down, it crawled beside his ear and starting to whisper something.


    ¡°Looks like you havee across some fresh materials. Why don¡¯t you sell them to me?¡± Anm quickly threw out a demand.


    ¡°All of these materials were harvested from the Giant Alligator King. I think that there are guys who can¡¯t wait to improve their ability that wouldn¡¯t mind imnting the heart of the Giant Alligator King in their body. If you really want to buy it, you better give me a good price!¡± Greem remained calm and reminded Anm.


    In this unique period, anything that could improve an individual¡¯s battle ability could no longer be traded at a reasonably normal price. As for how much the price was increased, it was actually proportionate with the quality of the item, and also dependent on how much of a hurry the individual who trying to purchase it was in. Therefore, when faced with an urgently needed item, anyone would have to prepare to go bankrupt.¡¯


    ¡°The Giant Alligator King? That¡¯s even better!¡± What Greem said made Anm feel his heart burn with desire, but then he stopped, baffled. He stared at Greem, asking, ¡°You were able to kill the Giant Alligator King?¡±


    Greem briefly shook his head and pointed his finger at the wall between his and Mary¡¯s room.


    Anm quickly realized what this meant and nodded his head.


    When a Beginner Apprentice tried to challenge the Giant Alligator King, it was no different than courting for death. But if it was an Advanced Apprentice, who was also a Vampire, trying to do so, that was a whole different story. Although he still felt uncertain, it wasn¡¯t something that was difficult to ept.


    Over the next few minutes, the two Apprentices bargained hard with each other. Although one of them was eager to purchase, and the other was impatiently trying to sell off his items, neither was willing to give up their bottom line so easily. Finally, after two hours of intense negotiations, Greem sold all his organic materials in exchanged for seventeen Knowledge Points, three Magic Crystals, one ¡®Screaming Tree Branch¡¯, and one Invisibility Potion (weak).


    As for the back scales, fangs, and ws of the Giant Alligator King, Anm showed no interested in them. Nheless, Greem considered selling them to some of the Apprentices who were preparing to take the path of Body Refining Adept.


    If not because times were so rough, Greem had actually nned to extract the backbone and tendons of the Giant Alligator King, as both of them were in great demand among Body Refining Apprentices. But if he really rushed back to the scene, perhaps the corpse of the Giant Alligator King would have long since been cannibalized by the other Giant Alligators.


    It took Anm a few trips to move all the materials, and once he was done, Greem immediately rushed to the library with his freshly obtained Knowledge Points.


    He was looking for a good Fire Elemental defensive spell.


    ......


    Inferno Force Field, a basic Fire Elemental defensive magic spell capable of forming a high-temperature field around the body, toasting any enemy that entered the region, and causing them to suffer a rapid loss of body water content. Effective circumference: 10 meters. (Note: This is a prerequisite magic spell for Ring of Fire, an advanced Fire Elemental defensive magic spell.)


    ......


    Fire st, a basic Fire Elemental defensive magic spell capable ofying Elementium orbs that spin around one¡¯s body. Any enemy who touches the Elementium orbs will suffer a Fire st that inflicts 3-5 Fire damage. Effective circumference: 8 meters. Numbers of Elementium orbs: 17.


    ......


    Inferno Body, a basic Fire Elemental defensive magic spell capable of temporarily transforming part of one¡¯s body into Elementium to avoid a deadly offensive attack. Significantly improved Fire Elemental resistance for the caster. Effective circumference: 0 meters. (Note: This is a prerequisite magic spell for Fire Elementium Modification.)


    ......


    Fire Shield, a basic Fire Elemental defensive magic spell capable of forming a small fire shield in front of the caster¡¯s body. It is able to block most long-range magic spells and melee attacks. Any enemy who attacks the shield will receive 1-2 Fire damage. Effective circumference: 3 meters. Defensive strength: 35 points. (Note: This is a prerequisite magic spell for Inferno Shield.)


    ......


    Inferno Shield, an intermediate Fire Elemental defensive magic spell capable of forming three spinning fire shields around the caster¡¯s body. Before the shields are broken, it is able to block all long-ranged and melee attacks. Inflicts 3-5 Fire damage to melee attackers. Effective circumference: 5 meters. Defensive strength: 80 points. (Note: Requires Fire Shield as a prerequisite magic spell.)


    ......


    Ring of Fire, an intermediate Fire Elemental defensive magic spell capable of using arge amount of Fire Elementium to form a ring of fire around the caster¡¯s body. Inflicts 5-7 points of fire damage every second to any enemy who enters the ring. Effective circumference: 15 meters. (Note: Requires Inferno Force Field as a prerequisite magic spell.)


    ......


    ......


    This dazzling array of Fire Elemental defensive spells posed a difficult choice for Greem. All these magic spells had their own pros and cons, hence, in order to pick a suitable spell, he needed to carefully identify their differences and measure them against each other.


    Also, as most of the defensive magic spells came in a set, some intermediate and advanced defensive magic spells required a caster to master certain prerequisite basic defensive magic spells. So, if he chose the wrong spell, and wished to learn other advanced spells, it would take him more time and energy.


    Inferno Force Field and Ring of Fire were each a part of sets, and they were both field control spells. They didn¡¯t provide any substantial defense to an individual, hence they couldn¡¯t block against any long-ranged attack. But when faced with melee attacks, field control was pretty effective.


    Especially the intermediate spell, Ring of Fire, which could inflict 5 to 7 Fire damage every second, for those enemies who only possessed melee ability, it was nearly impossible to face. Take Greem as an example: currently, he only had 14 Health Points. If he entered the Ring of Fire, perhaps he would be burned into a charcoal within three seconds.


    And, what could he do within three seconds? If he hadn¡¯t solidified any magic spells, perhaps, before he could cast any spell, he would be killed by the fire damage.


    Imagine this: within a group of Beginner and Intermediate Apprentices, a Pseudo-Adept who had mastered Ring of Fire suddenly appeared, cast the Ring of Fire magic spell on these rookies, putting them in intense pain. Not only that, he might not even need to attack personally, as just the Fire damage would be enough to kill all rookies who had no Fire elemental resistance.


    Whenever he thought of this breathtaking scene, Greem just couldn¡¯t control himself and trembled in excitement. But, when he recalled that Ring of Fire couldn¡¯t stop an enemy from attacking, his excitement quickly turned to dislike.


    By contrast, Fire Shield and Inferno Shield were rather low profile.


    Forming a shield of dense Fire Elementium and making it hover around the caster¡¯s body in order to block any possible direct magic spells and melee attack, and if there was an enemy that dared to get closer before the shieldpletely broken, it could also inflict some nasty Fire damage.


    Generally speaking, it didn¡¯t have any obvious offensive abilities, but possessed excellent defensive abilities.


    Therefore, as expected, Greem borrowed two magic spell books: Fire Shield and Inferno Shield.


    In this ce, it required fifteen Knowledge Points to purchase the Fire Shield magic spell book, but it only cost three Knowledge Points to borrow it once. So, most Apprentices preferred to borrow it a few times and take their time copying it rather than spending so many of their precious Knowledge Points purchasing a book.


    It was time for the Chip to shine.


    Greem just needed to borrow the book once, and the Chip would be able to scan all the content it and store it in his mind. Then, he could spend his own sweet time studying them, thus saving a huge amount of Knowledge Points, which he could use to borrow more books.


    Also, he couldn¡¯t master a defensive magic spell by reading just this. He still needed to do a lot of preliminary studies. Gritting his jaw tightly and steeling his mind, Greem borrowed all the required books in one go.


    ......


    ¡®The Influences of Fire Elementium Density Toward the Effectiveness of a Magic Spell¡¯


    ¡®Elementary Fire Control Techniques¡¯


    ¡®Analysis on the Usage of Fire Shield¡¯


    ¡®Characteristics of Fire Elementium Distribution¡¯


    ......


    ......


    Carrying a tall stack of borrowed books, Greem once again rushed back to his room. As he reached his room, he heard the door of his neighbor open up and saw Mary¡¯s cool and elegant face poke out from behind the door.


    ¡°Where is my present?¡±


    ¡°Ugh...¡±


    Suddenly, Greem was struck dumb and felt glued to the floor.


    As he was busy with his summoning core, he actuallypletely forgot about Mary!


    Staring at Mary¡¯s gloomy face, and realizing she was going to rampage soon, Greem quickly let out a loud cry.


    ¡°One hour... just give me one more hour. The present is going to be ready soon!¡±


    After that, he ran into his room.

 Chapter 42

    After making sure Mary was appeased, Greem was finally able to finish preparing for the uing mission.


    In order to better protect his life, Greem had nearly used up all his resources adding all kinds of items to his inventory, each capable of helping him handle different situations.


    The ¡®Screaming Tree Branch¡¯ that he had received when trading with Anm was one of them.


    The Screaming Tree Branch was a unique item produced by nature. If one cut a branch from it and tied it to their skin, it would let out a shrill scream when the holder was struck by a curse. The one Anm traded with Greem could still be used three times, and was vital for the mission.


    Before leaving the Tower, he had to prepare quite a lot of simr items.


    Blood coagting medicinal paste, which made wounds heal more quickly; Purple Wistaria, which could reattach an amputated limb; basic antidotes formon poisons; Absinthe Powder, which could repel insects and snakes in the wild; a talisman that could detect spiritual creatures...


    Being away from the tower, besides forgetting all those strange and unpredictable demons, beasts, and monsters, the most troubling of all were other Apprentice Adepts. who possessed all sorts of fanciful abilities. The more thoroughly he prepared, the more likely he could save his own life at a critical juncture. Therefore, during the preparation of these items, Greem tried his best to take into ount all possible situations so as to be ready for anything.


    Most importantly, as the mission was taking ce underground, Greem purposely studied the information rted to the Underground Cave. So he had gained a basic understanding of the location.


    To Greem¡¯s surprise, the underground of the Adept Maind was not entirely hard rock and soil, but included vastworks of underground caverns and karst caves, and twisting tunnels that connecting them together. In this underground world, one could find glowing rocks, crystals, and phosphorescent mosses, lichens and fungi. Compared to the world above, strange nts were verymon in this ce. Without using any magical methods, it would be impossible to identify which of them were poisonous and which were edible.


    However, these mutated nts and creatures weren¡¯t the most frightening things in this underground world, but the countless monstrous, evil, dark creatures and Fallen Adepts who had separated themselves from the path of official Adepts.


    Most of these Fallen Adepts hadmitted serious crimes against the Adept Maind. In order to escape being hunted down by Adept Associations, they were forced to hide in the underground, choosing to live among all those ugly and twisted creatures. Some said that these Fallen Adepts had actually built a small city for themselves. It was awless ce where evil ran rampant, a true city of crime.


    As the underground world had aplicated terrain and countless tunnels, although the major Adept Associations had organized numerous clean-up operations, never once had they been able topletely wipe out these dark Adepts. Thus allowing these criminals to grow stronger. By now, this underground city of sin had several hundred official Adepts, and were considered an abnormal branch of official Adepts: the Fallen Adepts.


    The Underground Cave, where Greem going to investigate, was just one of the entrances to the underground world, of which there were dozens. Although an Adept Tower had been built there, and was guarded by an official Adept, they still couldn¡¯t stop those Fallen Adepts from trying to sneak through this cave with all kind of methods.


    With the abilities of Apprentice Adepts, such as Greem, there was no way they could fight with those Fallen Adepts. Thus, they were only required to investigate the distribution of demon creatures within ten miles of the surface. Also, they needed to report if they found any traces of Fallen Adepts.


    The first mission was easy, but the second one would bring them great danger. If they actually ran into Fallen Adepts during their investigation trip, even those Pseudo-Adepts would find it hard to escape.


    Therefore, knowing he might face such a situation, Greem had to specifically prepare some unique items.


    Since the ce was filled with rough, twisting tunnels and caverns, any creature from the surface world would find it hard to see things in the dark. So, the first thing Greem had to solve was how to maintain his vision when traveling underground.


    In order to solve this problem, there were two solutions.


    The first solution was to purchase some crafted items which came with the effect of Low-light Vision. Of course, it would be better if it carried the function of Dark Vision. But taking his finances into consideration, Greem had no choice but to lower his expectations.


    Low-light Vision allowed the bearer to maintain normal vision in a dusky environment, and Dark Vision was an enhanced version of it, allowing the bearer to have a perfect vision, even in total darkness.


    The second solution was to imnt an ¡®Eye of Void¡¯ or ¡®Thousand Eyes Bug¡¯ in his body.


    Using some techniques from biological modification, recing one of his eye with an ¡®Eye of Void¡¯, which was an eyeball modified with a magical spell. With that, he would possess the ability to see invisible objects and vision in total darkness. But as this method involved biological modification, the purity of his bloodline risk being contaminated.


    As for thetter, he had to swallow a ¡®Thousand Eyes Bug¡¯. After that, the bug would live in his body, and apound eye would grow on his forehead. After the Thousand Eyes Bug integrated with a body, it would form a symbiotic rtion with the host and thus the host would gain its special vision: Infrared Senses.


    This parasitic method did bring an amazing effect, but, at the same time, it came with some irritating side effects. Every day, the host had to consume mothrvae, which was the favorite food of the Thousand Eyes Bug. Without it, from time to time, the parasite bug would feed on the host¡¯s blood essence and flesh. ording to the description in the book, thoservae looked nearly identical to silkworm in his past life, which made Greem nearly thrown up when reading about it.


    After taking all situations into consideration, Greem felt his priority would be on those supplementary crafted items. If he really couldn¡¯t find anything, then he would have to force himself to use the Thousand Eyes Bug.


    After taking care of his vision problem, Greem started to ponder about the issue of mobility.


    That ce was underground, fully surrounded by wet soil and hard rock. Any intense fights could cause a devastating copse. How was he going to rescue himself if he was trapped in a pocket cavern?


    Greem¡¯s mind was deeply troubled by this question. However, the Chip gave him the answer. The y Golem!


    Greem¡¯s elemental affinity was Fire Elementium, but the y Golems he owned now both had an affinity for Earth Elementium, and all Earth creatures were experts in traveling underground. With help from the y Golems, there shouldn¡¯t be any earthen ce that could trap Greem.


    But after all, this supposed to work theoretically. In order to get first-hand information, he had to test it out himself. Therefore, after meeting with Danny and telling him he was looking for a Low-light Vision talisman, Greem once again snuck out from the Tower.


    To be honest, after thepulsory mission was announced, most of the Apprentice Adepts were busy preparing. Hence, the inspection mission of the tower had temporarily been halted. With that, Greem didn¡¯t have to worry that someone would disturb his practice.


    Following the familiar path that led to the outer perimeter of the swampy area, Greem found himself a t field, nning to practice the offensive model he envisioned. The reason he chose this pace was because Sinbad, the leader of Ghost Nannies, had been killed. Without their leader, and with all the recent deaths, no Ghost Nannies woulde and disturb him.


    He casually threw out the two y Golem summoning cores. When they touched the ground, two totally different looking y Golems immediately appeared in front of Greem. The core obtained from Sinbad summoned a human-shaped golem that was nearly two meters tall, and the newly crafted Giant Alligator King core actually brought forth an alligator shaped golem. Aside from being smaller than the real Giant Alligator King, they looked nearly identical.


    Greem narrowed his eyes and pondered on this for a brief moment.


    Both cores were extracted from demons heads, so it wasn¡¯t surprising that they contained part of the demon¡¯s soul. So, when the summoning core gathered Earth Elementium and formed a body, the conscious of the former demon, before they were killed, decided the final shape of their body after being crafted into a golem.


    Of course, as this body was formed with Earth Elementium, as long as Greem gave a precise order through the Mind Control Imprint System, the golems could still change into any shape Greem wanted, by adjusting their distribution of Earth Elementium. But this process would consume a certain amount of their energy reserve.


    Staring at his two subordinate golems, standing side by side in front of him, Greem couldn¡¯t control the excitement growing in his mind. Three days ago, he was still a lone wolf that no one seemed to care about, but now he hadpleted the first steps of building a loyal army of golems. Although the number of his subordinate was still small, he still took heart in his progress.


    The Chip had gathered statistics on this new golem, so Greem focused his attention on the data.


    As expected, as the Giant Alligator King was way stronger than Sinbad, as the attributes of the y Alligator Golem totally surpassed his first y Golem, excluding Agility. Also, all its fighting skills were perfectly matched with Greem¡¯s abilities. At a nce, it looked like it was perfect for melee battles.


    But Greem didn¡¯t bring them out to show off their muscles, as he wanted to practice the firstbat tactics he had envisioned in his mind.


    Taking a brief moment to calm his mind, Greem howled, giving a battlemand to both golems.


    ¡°My golems! Use your braveness and fearless to open up the path to victory! Now, follow mymand! Combine!¡±

 Chapter 43

    Following Greem¡¯s order, the humanoid y Golem trembled, like a statue that had its internal supports taken away, and copsed. At the same time, an earthy yellow dust exploded from the back of the y Alligator Golem, which quickly molded itself into the shape of the humanoid y Golem.


    Therefore, the previously separated humanoid y Golem and the alligator y Golem merged, transforming into a strange looking ¡®Demon Alligator Hunter¡¯ form.


    From a far distance, they looked like a masculine hunter riding on a nearly three meter long demon alligator, holding a dirt spear in his hand. As the summoner of both golems, Greem was able to clearly see this newly formed golem. Actually, the hunter was not riding on top of the alligator, but its entire lower body had merged with the back of the alligator.


    A y Golem could never detach themselves from the ground, or else they would lose their endless supply of Earth Elementium. Now that they had merged, most of their abilities had beenbined. The dense Earth Elementium had formed ayer of sparkling and crystal-clear Earth armor on their body, showing some signs of being simr to stone armor.


    Demon Alligator Hunter!


    Through extensive calctions performed by the Chip, and the merging of magical formations, two y Golems, with nearly identical sources, had been merged together, giving birth to a brand new golem.


    Greem strode forward. Following his arrival, the Demon Alligator lowered its body, gently coiling its long tail around Greem¡¯s body and lifting him onto its back. The spikes on its back wriggled, transformed into the shape of a chair.


    cing his body firmly into the y chair, Greem lightly tapped his feet.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡±


    Following hismand, the Demon Alligator opened its mouth and let out a deep howl as it began to waddle its huge body toward the Ghost Nanny¡¯s nest in the distance.


    Actually, those Ghost Nannies resting in the muddy swamp not far away had noticed their presense. But after going through two devastating mass killings, they had be like birds which jumped at the mere twang of a bow-string ¨C badly frightened. Thus none of them dared toe out and look for trouble. However, having such arge Demon Alligator intrude into their territory and begin to wreak havoc to the muddy swamp they lived in, no matter how weak they were inparison, these Ghost Nannies had no choice but to force themselves to face this foul intruder.


    Sharp, shrill howls, like night owls call, started ringing through the air of the muddy swamp. Skinny, yet surprisingly strong, figures kept squeezing out from the muddy pond, one after another one, letting out sharp cries and crowding in from all directions.


    Their hair was dirty and disheveled; their bodies pale and wrinkled; their nails pitch-ck and razor-sharp... Like frightening ghosts, these demons charged toward the intruders while letting out terrifying howls. If an ordinary Apprentice Adept was here, perhaps he would have scurried away at this frightening scene, but Greem was just the opposite.


    Today, he was testing the strength of his newlybined Golems. How could he be scared at such a small scene?


    After ran his eyes over the swarm of Ghost Nannies storming in from all directions, Greem had a cruel smilee over his face as he stomped his feet.


    ¡°Kill! Kill them all for me!¡±


    Upon receiving Greem¡¯smand, the seemingly stiff and dumb Demon Alligator Hunter suddenly ¡®woke up¡¯. Although it didn¡¯t have clear facial features, a strange ¡®roar¡¯ actually rang through the air, causing ripples to spread across the water.


    Biting with its mouth; ripping with it¡¯s sharp ws; swinging around its long and powerful tail, the Demon Alligator dashed into the swarm of Ghost Nannies whileunching frightening attacks. Though walking on the muddy, stinking water, its gigantic body moved like it was walking on t ground. Shock waves could be seen spreading out from underneath its body, causing any Ghost Nanny that came within 5 meters of Demon Alligator to tremble, barely able to stay on their feet.


    Any Ghost Nanny who fell into the sharp ws and gigantic mouth would be ripped into a bloody mess in an instant, staining the water with their stinking, ck blood. But even so, wave after wave of Ghost Nannies still broke through Demon Alligator¡¯s head and tail attack, sessfully squeezed themselves into both sides of its body, restlessly climbing up onto its back, trying to pull Greem and the ¡®Hunter¡¯ into the muddy pond.


    Faced with few hundred ck, dirty hands clustered below its body, the Hunter showed no fear at all. Holding the spear in its hand, the Hunter kept piercing through the heads of Ghost Nannies. Since the Ghost Nanny was a demon and not an immortal creature, once their head was pierced through by the spear, they would die. Thus, ugly, twisted bodies of Ghost Nanny continuously fell off from Demon Alligator¡¯s back, sinking to the bottom of the muddy pond.


    When the fight became furious, the Hunter would wave its arms, unleashing countless Spikes in a 10 x 8 meter area, puncturing the bodies of Ghost Nanny on the ground.


    On his side, Greem pped his palms before separated them, shooting out two frightening mes. In an instant, the Ghost Nannies, who had nearly reached his pant legs, were drawn into the scorching me.


    Burned by the intense heat, the Ghost Nannies started screeching. For a moment, countless ming bodies rolled off the back of the Demon Alligator, struggling in the muddy pond while letting out miserably cries, turning the entire muddy swamp into a living hell.


    Moving forward while growling aggressively, the Demon Alligator ripped apart everything that got in its way. Located at the highest point of its back, the Hunter attacked anything that got too close, while asionally throwing its spear at a long range target. If there were too many enemies, it would unleash a Spike spell, causing Ghost Nannies to shed blood like fountains.


    Even though both Golems hadbined their strength, they were nowhere near as shy as Greem, who had transformed fire wielding maniac. He sat firmly on the rear end of Demon Alligator¡¯s back, both arms slightly stretched out, shooting two frightening mes out a few meters, causing any Ghost Nanny who got too close to be caught up in a terrifyingly hot inferno.


    Following the reckless charging of Demon Alligator in the Ghost Nanny army, Greem¡¯s frightening me had nearly set the entire muddy pond on fire. Moments ago, these Ghost Nannies were still leaping to them crazily, but they were now filled with great terror, each and every single one was screaming and swimming away from the battlefield.


    Within the zing, scorching hot muddy pond, the putrid smell of burnt flesh filled every inch of the air, making anyone who smelt it feel like throwing out. Greem had transformed into a frantic demon lord, controlling his frightening mes arbitrarily, killing every single enemy he could found on his way, totally had no idea that all the enemies around him had been turned into charcoal.


    When the zing mes formed by Burning Hand finally died down, Greem finally woke up from the satisfying ughter. After waking up, the first thing came to his attention was the pungent smell that filled his nose, which nearly made him suffocate.


    Stamping his right foot a few times and giving the golem a mentalmand, the Demon Alligator moved. Though it looked slow, it actually left the muddy pond at an incredible speed. When they finally left the pond, Greem looked over his shoulder, a miserable scene immediately revealed in front of his eyes, and he was filled with a great shock.


    Just a brief moment ago, when he was recklessly killing all those ¡®weaklings¡¯, countless terrifying, horrible consciouses had swarmed into his mind, making him frantic and crazy. Although it had been satisfying, it went against the elementary Adept teachings, which said all Adept had to keep calm and rational at all times.


    ¡°Chip, activate Elementium Vision!¡± As if Greem had sensed something, he gave out hismand with a soft voice.


    *Beep* ¡°Elementium Vision activated.¡±


    The multi-colored Elementium Vision projected into Greem¡¯s eyes. Looking around, he found the entire sky above the muddy swamp was full of broken souls, who were howling and groaning endlessly. No wonder his conscious had been upied by something else just now. It was all because of these broken souls!


    If he was an Apprentice Adept who had an affinity Darkness, he would definitely have been struck with a wild joy, skipping around as he gathered all these broken souls. For them, these high quality broken souls were the best materials for their experiments. But Greem was unable to do these things.


    Without protection from Dark Elementium, if he got too close to these broken souls, who mainlyprised of negative energy, his Spirit and body would suffer a certain degree of corrosion. If this situation persisted, his body would be skinny, as his blood and soul were slowly corrupted by the negative energy. Therefore, Greem always kept a safe distance from any souls.


    Just now, he was immersed in a satisfying emotion of ughter, forgetting his original purpose ining here. Now, thinking back, he started to ponder on thebat performance of his Demon Alligator Hunter.


    Overall, the Demon Alligator Hunter possessed the ability of an Advanced Apprentice, thus it had no problem suppressing an Intermediate Apprentice. Greem even had the confidence to fight the strongest three, but, of course, it was tough to tell if he could actually beat them in a fight.


    Among all the Advanced Apprentices Greem met before, perhaps only the frightening Loli, Alice, would be able to suppress his Demon Alligator Hunter. As for the other Advanced Apprentices, he could only evaluate their abilities after fighting with them.


    Actually, the real weakness of this Demon Alligator Hunter was Greem.


    As the Demon Alligator Hunter was summoned by Greem, as long as the enemy took care of Greem, it would no longer be a threat. So, when a real fight erupted, perhaps most of the enemy¡¯s offensive attack would be aimed at Greem. If he couldn¡¯t withstand another adept¡¯s massive firepower, no matter how tough was his Demon Alligator Hunter was, he would have no chance of winning a fight.


    Therefore, Greem had to find a way to solve this weakness, and this was also the second test would run today.


    ¡°Demon Alligator Hunter! Dive down!¡±


    Following Greem¡¯smand, the small ¡®throne¡¯ he was sitting on started to move forward. At the same time, the Hunter golem in front of him started to expand as Greem slowly merged with it.


    When Greem¡¯s body finally disappeared into golem¡¯s body, the Demon Alligator underneath let out a short growl, and an earthy yellow smoke started emitting from its body. In next moment, the entire Demon Alligator Hunter disappeared without a trace.


    As if suddenly he had sunk into a pitch ck abyss. Greem¡¯s breath suddenly stopped, being reced by the strong smell of dirt. All of his senses had vanished, but there was a massive external force pressing onto his body. The force was so strong, it nearly made all his bones start to crack.


    But following the dispersion of Earth Elementium around Demon Alligator Hunter¡¯s body, this external force started to subside, eventually disappearing.


    Although he couldn¡¯t see with his eyes, nor hear with his ears, Greem slowly sent forth his Spirit energy, using it as a recement for his eyes and ears, allowing him to sense everything around himself.


    He was traveling underground! Although he was not moving at an incredible speed, Greem still felt like he was riding on the clouds. It was like Demon Alligator Hunter was floating within a pool of sticky, heavy liquid, continually consuming the Earth Elementium energy stored within its body and breaking through the dirt around him, traveling by slipping through the earth.

 Chapter 44

    Greem was ¡®swimming¡¯ three meters underground, like a fish in the water.


    His Spirit energy went through the dense fog of Earth Elementium surrounding him, showing him the surrounding earth. Twisting roots of old trees; coarse sand and rocks; wriggling insects; gophers hiding in their nests; rotten tree branches, and some other unidentifiable things...


    It was only a short journey, but it allowed Greem to glimpse apletely different world that had always been right under his feet. In this secret world, Greem was like an untouchable king overlooking his kingdom, not caring about anything. If he really wanted to do something, with just amand, Demon Alligator Hunter would be able to wreak havoc in this ce.


    Although he wished he could spend a little longer traveling underground, but after merely seven to eight minutes, he could no longer stand it anymore.


    It was not because he had depleted his Spirit, but because he was out of breath.


    As an Apprentice Adept who worked with supernatural forces every day, no matter if it was resistance or endurance, Greem¡¯s body was way stronger than an ordinary mortal. Any ordinary human would go into aa after holding his breath for a few minutes, but he was able to hold his breath for nearly eight minutes before needing to catch his breath.


    Following hismand, the Earth Elementium around the outside of the Demon Alligator Hunter¡¯s body started to vibrate, pushing away the thick and heavy soil above its head and slowly squeezing its way to the surface.


    The sudden arrival of the Demon Alligator Hunter had shocked the surrounding demons. Numerous sharp cries rung through the air, as curses poured onto them like rain.


    ¡°Damn it! We surfaced in the nest of the Demon Babies!¡± Greem cursed, driving the Demon Alligator Hunter forward and breaking his way out of the swarm of Demon Babies.


    Although the Demon Babies¡¯ Curse spell was unpredictable and hard to defend against, they were just low-ranked demons. Faced with the Elementium formed Demon Alligator Hunter, the sess rate of their curses was not very high. Instead, two Demon Babies were killed by spears thrown by the Hunter, causing the rest of them to scurry away, hiding in nearby bushes and daring not to move the tiniest bit.


    At this moment, Greem had dimly tasted the mentality of Alice and the other two Advanced Apprentices when they intruded into the Magical Swamp. Once a person possessed the abilities and resources of an Advanced Apprentice, ordinary low-ranked demons were no longer a threat to them. As they were only faced with a bunch of ¡®ants¡¯ they could kill easily, no wonder that, even they knew this was a forbidden ce, they could still behave so recklessly.


    To be honest, if Adept Anderson hadn¡¯t done anything, with just the Apprentice Adepts and demons of the Magical Swamp alone, there was no way they could¡¯ve stopped the trio.


    As for Alice¡¯s sad encounter, it waspletely by ident.


    Just because Alice possessed an overpowered skill and a frightening ability, it had forced Evil Bugs to fight her with his life. Then she had chased Greem all over the swamp and suffered a great loss at the hands of Mary.


    In the past, these hateful Demon Babies were a group of frightening and hard to deal monsters. If he had been surrounded by them, even with the protection of his magical talisman, he would have faced miserable consequences. But now, with the help of the Demon Alligator Hunter, Greem could actually kill them easily, and no longer feared them.


    Unknowingly, Greem¡¯s mentality had started to change.


    Use one¡¯s strength to bully the weak; the weak are easy prey to the strong; be pushy and overbearing... all these phrases sounded nasty to the ear, but, now that he was in the position of the strong, it was rather an enjoyable experience.


    Driving his Demon Alligator Hunter forward and rushing out from the Garden of Whispers, Greem came to the stony trail and jumped off his Golem. He dispersed the Earth Elementium and picked up the two summoning cores. He was quite close to the entrance of the Tower, thus, Greem decided to try to appear like his former weak self.


    Pulled his hood up and covering his face, Greem stealthily returned to the Tower.


    The experiment had been sessful, and Greem¡¯s confidence had grown. But, at the same time, it had exposed some problems, the most serious of which was how to handle long periods of time underground.


    Perhaps the Demon Alligator Hunter didn¡¯t need to breathe, but Greem did! Deep underground, protected by the Earth Elementium emitting from the Demon Alligator Hunter, Greem had been given the ability to travel through the Earth. However, there was no air underground. If he didn¡¯t solve this breathing problem, he would never be able to stay underground for more than 8 minutes.


    Hence, after returned to the Tower, for the next few days Greem spent most of his time running between different Apprentices, searching for a solution that would allow him to have dark vision and breath underground. When he had some spare time, he would sneak out from the Tower to hunt for suitable demons that he could use to craft new Golems.


    But too bad, up until thest day before he had to set off, he still couldn¡¯t find any suitable demons.


    After all, this Magical Swamp was just an extremelymon resource site of an Adept family. It was all ordinary demons and nts being raised and nted here, where they were all easy to maintain and harvest. Therefore, it was just a fancy dream to harvest arge quantity of demon cores from this ce. In fact, both Sinbad and the Giant Alligator King were rare advanced demons of the Magical Swamp, which only leveled up in the past hundred years. If not because of this, Greem would never have found any demon cores he could use.


    But though he didn¡¯t find any new demon cores, Greem still harvested a bunch of magical materials and ingredients for magical medicine. Using these materials, Greem was able to exchange for some rather useful items from other Apprentices.


    Out of these items, Greem was most satisfied with an exquisitely made Circlet of Nobility.


    Wearing the Circlet of Nobility on his head, the crystal clear diamond socked right in front of the circlet was pressed against Greem¡¯s forehead. Besides making him look a little regal, it also increased his Spirit by one.


    For an Advanced Apprentice, this circlet was unable to supplement their Spirit. But for Greem, who only possessed 8 Spirit, it brought him a rather significant improvement.


    Also, his dark vision problem had been solved.


    The solution? A pair of Gnome Goggles!


    ording to the exnation he had received from the Intermediate Apprentice who had sold this item to Greem, the goggles were a product from another ne. It was made frombining a ck leather belt with two transparent crystals. Wearing it, Greem had clear vision in low-light environments.


    Greem had the Chip run an analysis when he returned. This strange object was supposed to be a product of a mechanical civilization. The Chip couldn¡¯t sense any Elementium ripplesing from it, as if it was just an ordinary item used by mortals. It was made from a type of underground crystal and was polished using a special method. This allowed the wearer to pierce the veil of low-light environments.


    The Chip had also performed an analysis on theposition of the crystals. They were not a product that could be found in the World of Adepts, and should be a unique material that only existed in the ne of that mechanical civilization.


    As a major scale ne, the World of Adepts had conquered countless small and middle sized nes. These Gnome Goggles most likely came from a secondary ne that had been conquered.


    It wasmon knowledge in the Adept World that only those who were official Adepts were qualified to travel between nes. Anyone below this level, even those Pseudo-Adepts who possessed extraordinary talent, were not allowed to participate in the conquering war for other nes. Therefore, Greem could only let his mind run wild as he tried to imagine what this mechanical civilization was like. Meanwhile, he carefully ced this Gnome Goggle in his waist pouch.


    As for the problem of breathing underground, Greem had also solved it by employing a biological method.


    Within the Tower, some Apprentices were experts in biological modification. Using ¡®Snake Vine¡¯ and ¡®Purple Left Flower¡¯, together with ¡®worm ointment¡¯, toad poop, and some other bizarre items, an Apprentice had produced a bulbous looking breathing organ. When Greem needed to travel underground, he just had to ce this biological apparatus into his mouth and he would gain the ability to breathe through his skin.


    As it was only a supplementary organ, and not a recement for his own organs, the risk of having his bloodline contaminated was non-existent.


    After solving all these problems, Greem could finally put his heart to rest. He spent all his day on either meditating or restlessly researching those magical books he had just copied.


    On the fifth day after signing up thepulsory mission, Greem finally received the message he had been waiting for from the Chip. The optimization of Fire Arrow spell had finally beenpleted!


    *Beep* ¡±Optimization for the spiritual model of Fire Arrow has beenpleted. Does the host wish to see the optimized content?¡±


    ¡°Show me!¡± Greem yelled out in impatience.


    Following a long stream of data, the look of his long-ranged offensive spell, Fire Arrow, after extensive optimizations done by the Chip, was projected into Greem¡¯s mind.


    If the look of Fire Arrow before this was a magical arrow, it had now transformed into a ming spear. The seemingly tame me had formed into a zing spear. With a thought from Greem, it would shoot out with an incredible speed, dealing twice the damage the Fire Arrow had.


    While wearing the Circlet of Nobility, Greem had a total of 9.37 Spirit, giving him a little less than 94 Adept energy. As the ming Spear used 24 Adept Energy every time it was used, his Spirit would be depleted after using it four times. Thus, a skill like this would have to be reserved, only being used at the most critical moments.


    After all, with the offensive strength of the ming Spear, he could easily break apart an Intermediate Apprentice¡¯s magical defenses. Even if he had to face an Advanced Apprentice who had mastered defensive magic spells, the ming Spear would still be able to put a dent in it.


    To be honest, only now did Greem feel that he had finally mastered a good skill. With it, he felt a slight bit of confidence in surviving the mission he was going to undertake.


    Finally, after a nerve-wracking few days, it was time for the mission.

 Chapter 45

    To Greem¡¯s surprise, it was not a long parade of coaches that came to pick them up, but a flying ship that descended from the sky.


    Of course, it was not the same as a ship that sailed on the ocean.


    It had a wide, t bottom and an exquisitely built and spacious three floor tower, but there wasn¡¯t any mast or sail to be seen. This meant it was not an air powered ship. When the hundred meter long, thirty meters wide ship came thundering down, all the Apprentice Adepts waiting in front of the Tower were filled with fear, their breath catching at the sight of, seemingly, impending doom.


    Greem had no idea what any of the other Apprentices were feeling. Through his Elementium Vision, he saw the bottom of the ship had been carved with runes and strange magical formations, and a massive magical energy was flowing rapidly between these lines. From what he saw, the Elementium was no longer a singr and isted particle, but had been kneaded together by a mystical and majestic force, transforming into a mighty magical melody of energy that could no longer be differentiated into different elements.


    The reason why Greem paid so much attention to it was that this magical energy had mysterious and strange characteristics. As they came out of the runes, they showed no specific attributes, but when they passed through certain magical formations, they started showing signs of specific Elementium.


    For example, the billowing wall of air that was surrounding the flying ship had been shot out after the energy passed through a magical formation. Carried by this powerful wind, the flying ship could gracefully and firmlynd on therge empty area in front of the Adept Tower.


    Adept Anderson, who rarely showed his face in public, was standing in front of the Tower. Wearing a resentful expression on his face, he was staring at the flying shipnding in front of him. When he saw a figure flying off from the flying ship, his expression became even more incensed.


    ¡°It really is you. I was still wondering why we suddenly have to visit one more mission site, but now I understand. Now you can¡¯t hide from us anymore.¡± It was a burly man who came flying from the ship. His defining features were a pair of thick eyebrows and the shining, luxurious, golden armor he was wearing. His bulky muscles were sorge they looked to be trying to burst from his armor.


    Waving the magical staff in his hand angrily, Adept Anderson let out a raging roar.


    ¡°You bunch of damn thieves! You bandits! I have emphasized it many times... this is my private territory and ce of residence, you have no right to turn it into a mission site... Regarding this, I¡¯ll keepining to the Zhentarim Association...¡±


    Disdainfully, the masculine guy saying,


    ¡°What are you scared of? Afraid your petty tricks would be discovered by the association? Hahaha... don¡¯t forget, you¡¯ve just been stationed here and this piece ofnd is still owned by the Sarubo Family. Now that the head of the Sarubo family has agreed to open this ce up, can you stop him? Let me give you a friendly reminder, you better hurry up and clean up your mess. Don¡¯t let those inspection Adepts find your dirty secrets!¡±


    After saying that, the masculine man turned around and swept his eyes over the Apprentices waiting in front of the Tower. An ¡®as expected¡¯ expression appeared on his face.


    ¡°So, this is the result of you garrisoning this ce for twenty years? Three half-Advanced Apprentices and not a single Pseudo-Adept! En, that little Vampire does seem to have potential, but why is her foundation so weak? I can smell that she is still limating to her bloodline!¡± With his sharp vision, the masculine man ran his eyes over the few Advanced Apprentices. Those who met his eyes would feel a prickling pain and quickly lower their gaze.


    The guy had briefly looked at Mary, said a little, and moved on. He didn¡¯t even look at Hawkeye and went straight to Evil Bugs. The moment he saw Evil Bugs, a disgusted and disdaining expression covered his face. Only after he saw Madwoman, a girl with a simr body structure to him, did his expression rx.


    As for all the other Intermediate and Beginner Apprentices, the guy simply turned a blind eye to them, not showing the slightest interest in checking on them.


    ¡°Looks like the association should¡¯ve made this ce a mission site long ago. Look at you. After being stationed here for so long, and you were only able to cultivate three advanced Apprentices?¡±


    ¡°Let me emphasize this one more time. This ce is my private territory. ording to the agreement signed between me and the head of Sarubo family, I...¡± The gloomy faced Adept Anderson was still raging.


    ¡°Haha... you better tell that to the association! My mission is to bring all the Apprentices of various mission sites to their respective destinations. I am not troubling with any other matters. Oh right, I heard you had taught a lesson to Deborah¡¯s apprentice a few days ago? That woman said she is not finished with you...¡± Delighting in Adept Anderson¡¯s future misfortunes, the guy grinned evilly.


    ¡°That crazy woman, Deborah? She dared to say that? Her apprentice intruded on my resource site and wreaked havoc. If not for Deborah¡¯s sake, I would have used that little wretch as an experimental specimen... I only gave her a petty punishment, and that crazy woman still wants to look for trouble...¡± As he mentioned this, Adept Anderson¡¯s face filled with rage.


    ¡°A petty punishment? I heard that you nted a Blood Worm in her body, and nearly sucked all that little girl¡¯s blood essence out? She is a valuable individual that possesses an innate talent for spatial magic, and also the only one who has been found in the past hundred years of the House of Fragrance. Why would Deborah not be angry with you? Also, they said you had given a good torture to the other two apprentices, which made their mentors very angry. In my opinion, you¡¯d better be very careful the next time you leave this swamp!¡±


    ¡°You think I¡¯m afraid of them? If they are capable, let theme to this Magical Swamp! I, Anderson, have never feared anybody!¡±


    The masculine guyughed, then ignored ¡®tough guy¡¯ Anderson and turned to face the awaiting apprentices.


    ¡°This ship is going to Erathia, Bracada, and Dagon. Apprentices who are going to attend missions in these ces, board the ship now. If you miss this ship, you¡¯re going to travel by foot. For those apprentices who don¡¯t arrive at their respective mission site on time, the association will revoke their Apprentice status!¡±


    Greem was shocked, but he quickly calmed himself.


    The mission he ¡®chose¡¯ was located in the Dagon region. It looked like he was among the first batch of apprentices to leave this Magical Swamp.


    After the masculine man waved his hand, a couple dozen apprentices started hurrying towards the flying ship, carrying simple luggage on their backs. Walking along a wood nk lowered from the ship, the group boarded this mystical vehicle in an orderly manner.


    The spacious deck of the ship was crowded with people. Judging from their dress, all of them were Apprentice Adepts as well.


    Asteers, when the apprentices of Swampy Tower boarded the deck, they were weed with countless demeaning gazes and criticisms. Although none of them could hear what was said, but, just from their disdainful expressions and exaggerated tones, clearly they were not saying anything positive.


    Since all three destinations of this ship were advanced mission sites, the majority of the passengers were Intermediate and Advanced Apprentices. There were even a few Pseudo-Adepts with extraordinary bearing hidden among them. On the flip side, most of the Swamp Tower apprentices who boarded the ship were Intermediate Apprentices, and only three of them were at the Advanced Apprentice level: Madwoman, Evil Bugs, and Mary.


    When Greem followed the group and boarded the ship, the crowd suddenly heated up.


    ¡°What? A Beginner Apprentice is going to an advanced mission site? Is he looking to die?¡±


    ¡°Yeah... I bet he must be an idiot that performed too many experiments on himself!¡±


    ¡°Perhaps he will piss his pants when we arrive!¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    Countless discussions were resounding across the deck. Anyone who saw Greem would have a disbelievable expressione over their face, as if they had suddenly discovered an underground dwarf in a kingdom of giants.


    Greem¡¯s expression went rigid for a second, but he had no choice but to lower his head and followed the group to a corner of the deck.


    Intentionally or unintentionally, even the apprentices of the Swamp Tower, including Madwoman and few others, kept a distance from Greem. Mary didn¡¯t move away, and she still stood firmly beside Greem, responding to those ill-intentioned gazes with her normal, overbearing manner.


    For some unknown reasons, Hawkeye actually chose an orange mission. Thus, he hadn¡¯t boarded this flying ship.


    As the crowd was measuring up the neers, the masculine man boarded the ship once again. Throwing a fierce gaze at all the Apprentice Adepts, he saw Mary and Greem being isted by the crowd, and his gaze paused.


    ¡°Why is there a Beginner Apprentice here? Didn¡¯t those old men who released thepulsory missionbel them correctly?¡± Muttered to himself, then, with a serious expression, he continued speaking, ¡°I don¡¯t care which institute or region you are from, as long as you are on this ship, you better behave for me. Arriving at your destination safely is the only request I have for you. If anyone dares to cause trouble on the ship, don¡¯t me me for being cruel!¡±


    As a powerful Body Refining Adept, when the masculine guy made no effort to hide his strength, a powerful aura came from his body, making all the Apprentice Adepts tremble.


    ¡°You live on the deck, and no one is allowed to step into the cabin. Anyone who disobeys the order will be thrown off the ship. You hear me?¡± Sweeping his fierce gaze around, when the masculine man saw the crowd remaining silent, like cicadas in cold weather, he felt satisfied. He retracted his aura and entered the cabin.


    Following this, loud yells from dozens of boatmen, who dressed like sailors, the flying ship trembled, and a loud buzzing noise came from the bottom of the ship. At the same time, a pressure started building on all the apprentices.


    The ship gradually ascended into the sky.


    Looking at the people on the ground getting smaller and smaller, Greem was struck with a brief thrill. He was finally going to the outside world.


    There was no hypocritical affection between Apprentice Adepts, hence, Greem had no intention to wave goodbye from the side of the ship. But he saw a female apprentice of the Swamp Tower rushing alongside the ship, continually waving her hand at someone down below while crying.


    This made all the Apprentices on board look at her with disdain.

 Chapter 46

    The flying ship streaked through the air, leaving a cloud-like trail of Wind Elementium behind it.


    Anything on the ground, no matter if it was a human, a beast, or a tree, had be a tiny little ck dot. Even the magical swamp, which Greem had spent the past six years in, just looked like a filthy pond covered by a dense fog.


    After staying in the magical swamp for so long, Greem felt that the outside world was quite strange.


    After the ship ascended to cruising altitude, Greem walked over to the ship¡¯s side to have a good look at thend below. Asides from the magical swamp, Greem saw a few human viges and a small city.


    There were pale yellow wheat fields everywhere, each decorated here and there with thumb-size windmills. On the road, which stretched on and on like a silver belt, he could also see some ant-sized coaches.


    The flying ship was heading South.


    The further South they got, the greener the earth became, but human activities were still rare. Whenever they approached a human colony, Greem could always see vast, thick forests around it, and the lively activities of the wild beasts within them.


    This was the current situation on the Adept Maind.


    Every human colony was surrounded by a boundless virgin forest and savage woods. Countless wild beasts, demonic beasts, and demons were living within them. The human forces of the colony could deal with those ordinary wild and demonic beasts, but when they were forced to face those strange and unpredictable demons, they would have to rely on the help of more powerful forces.


    And these forces were, obviously, Adepts.


    As powerful individuals possessing supernatural powers, Adepts were the true masters of thisnd. Although they had ceased to be normal humans, most official Adepts were willing to contribute part of their strength to allow ordinary humans to continue live and multiply in thisnd.


    Ordinary human society was like the sheep living in captivity, and the Adepts were the shepherds who looking after these ranches, looking forward to new blood joining their ranks. In the eyes of ordinary humans, Apprentice Adepts like Greem had powerful, mystical, and bizarre abilities, but in the eyes of official Adepts, they were still just ants.


    As long as they hadn¡¯t crossed the threshold and be an official Adept, these apprentices were still creatures that couldn¡¯t be mentioned in the same breath with official Adept.


    As he saw the world unfolding in front of his eyes, his desire to be stronger rose in Greem¡¯s mind alongside a sense of urgency.


    Although he had poured forth a lot of effort recently, that was more because of habit and had been required for survival. But today the desire of bing stronger actually came from the bottom of his heart.


    This was a mysterious, profound, and strange world, totally different from the Earth, where he hade from. Back on Earth, the strength of an individual was insignificant, and one could only grow stronger by relying on the strength of the masses. But in this world, which had an ocean of magical energy, the strength of an individual had great meaning. Things that couldn¡¯t be achieved on Earth were possible here.


    For the first time, Greem couldn¡¯t restrain his desires. He wanted to stand at the pinnacle of this world with his own strength, so he could the real shape of the world. Perhaps this was the why the mighty Will of the Adept World had drawn him from Earth, a world where no magic existed, into this world of advanced magic.


    A bitter wind scraped it way up the side of the ship.


    Although the deck was protected by a Barrier, sparing these apprentices from the brunt of the gale-force winds, the temperature was still very low on deck.


    Greem only had a Physique of 5. Obviously, he couldn¡¯t withstand the changing temperature with his body alone, thus, he pulled his robe tight to keep warm. Mary was still wearing her same iconic thin red chiffon dress, exposing arge amount of her fair skin, yet she didn¡¯t seem to feel the chilling breeze.


    With more than 10 Physique, an Apprentice Adept would never be affected by the temperature changes caused by the seasons. For Greem, it was a freezing wind, but for Mary, it was just a rather cool breeze. When an Apprentice Adept had more than 15 Physique, those ordinary harsh environments would no longer be impossible ces to live.


    Beyond 20 Physique was a frightening level that only Body Refining Adepts could attain. If someone really reached that level, he would be tough to kill even by being thrown into a pit ofva or an extremely cold abyss.


    Although much weaker than Body Refining Adepts, Principle Adepts would also gain some resistance to the elements when became official Adepts.


    As it was his first time seeing it, the scenery outside of the ship was indeed breathtaking, and was too beautiful to be absorbed all at once. But after looking at it for quite some time, it became boring. Thus, Greemid out a cloth and invited Mary to sit together with him, stealthily measuring the crowd with his eyes as he did so.


    He had a feeling when he boarded the ship that he was the only Beginner Apprentice on board. Now, through the passive probing with his Elementium Vision, he was able to get a clearer understanding of the situation.


    Striking red glows, which represented danger, were spread out amongst the crowd. There were even a few people who glowed purple, which meant extreme danger.


    The Chip quickly presented the actual statistics of the crowd to Greem.


    There were a total of 317 Apprentice Adepts on board. 11 Pseudo-Adepts, 92 Advanced Apprentices, and the rest were Intermediate Apprentices. Greem was excluded from the statistics.


    Those Pseudo-Adepts were the big shots among the poption of Apprentices. Each of them was surrounded by arge group of opportunists. But, the rtionship between these Pseudo-Adepts was cold and detached, as if there was a clear distinction between them, and no one wanted tomunicate with the other.


    Actually, this was understandable.


    At their current level, as long as they could break through the frightening barrier, they would be able to have a meteoric rise, bing supreme existences that stood out from the crowd. At that point in time, these opportunists surrounding them would be disgusting flies, which they would never take seriously.


    They were not willing to spend time in making friendly contacts with other Pseudo-Adepts at the same level. After all, there was a huge risk they had to face during the ceremony of bing an official Adept. If the Pseudo-Adept they had established a friendly rtionship failed in breaking through the barrier, then the previous investment of affection would be wasted. At that point in time, one person was an official Adept, while the other was still an apprentice, and so they wouldn¡¯t be able tomunicate as peers.


    As for a true rtionship, they could totally have it after both became official Adepts. Presumably, no newly promoted Adept would reject a friendly rtionship with same level Adepts!


    Therefore, influenced by such proud and aloof, yet narcissistic mentalities, all eleven Pseudo-Adepts had divided into their own factions, each showing no intention ofmunicating with others. The livelymunication between Advanced Apprentices was in sharp contrast with the Pseudo-Adepts.


    Across various groups of all sizes, Advanced Apprentices were the group had the liveliest and most frequentmunication. While the Intermediate Apprentices, who was also thergest group, kept silent or simply agreed with what other people said. They were like green nts that ented the beauty of red roses, insignificant and unworthy of being mentioned.


    By contrast, Mary, who quietly sitting beside Greem had be the perfect target for a friendly rtionship. Even a few male Pseudo-Adepts were peeking at her.


    A female Advanced Apprentice who excelled in both appearance and body shape, even though she always wore a cold and aloof expression, she still attracted frequent nces from many male Apprentices.


    ¡°Don¡¯t you want to make a few friends?¡± Trying hard to hold his smile, Greem continued whispering, ¡°I can tell many of them really wish to get to know you!¡±


    Mary opened her green eyes and swept across the crowd. She chuckled disdainfully, then said, ¡°Too bad, I have no interest in their filthy blood. If they bother me, I¡¯ll let them know how the Bloody Queen handles annoyances!¡±


    ¡°Bloody Queen? Is this a nickname you came up with yourself?¡± Greem chuckled, ¡°That¡¯s rather appropriate. I wonder when I will have the honor of experiencing it?¡±


    ¡°You?¡± Mary coolly gazed at Greem¡¯s face with her beautiful eyes, saying, ¡°You¡¯ll have to work really hard for that!¡±


    After that, she stretched her curvy body,id on her side, and ced her head on Greem¡¯sp, started her daily meditation.


    Greem sighed softly.


    After hearing her words, he realized that had definitelye from Mary¡¯s heart.


    From the day they stepped onto the path of bing Adepts, strength became the only measurement of status. When looking for a lover, even if Mary had a favorable impression of Greem, the huge difference between their strengths had be a gap, and Mary didn¡¯t want a ¡®partner¡¯ who was too weak.


    Greem had a feeling that, if he had pushed for it, Mary wouldn¡¯t mind ying with him in bed. But if she was truly looking for a partner to spend the rest of her life with, Greem was only a weakling in her eyes, and would never be a candidate in his current state.


    This cold reality watered down the joy of having a beauty sleeping on hisp. Greem shook his head and smiled wryly. Then he took a book out from his luggage and started to read.


    In the current situation, where everyone was talking, meditating was rather rude. Therefore, Mary had used meditation to iste herself from the crowd, avoiding the trouble that came from rejecting their invitations. It was actually a rather brilliant method, but now Greem had be her temporary guardian, and had to endure hostile nces from the crowd.


    Evil Bugs had sat down cross-legged near Greem and Mary. His face was covered with a hood, making sure that nobody could see his current expression.


    No matter what, there was no serious resentment between him and Greem. He set the trap for Greem out of a dispute caused by personal feelings. If not because he had promised Ellen, the new Apprentice leader, that he would protect his safety, Ellen would never have had the guts to provoke Mary.


    Regarding how he felt about setting this trap, perhaps Evil Bugs had no feelings at all.


    In his mind, Greem was just a roadside ant that he could kill at anytime. Not worth his time remembering. Perhaps, when he returned to the Swamp Tower after finishing hispulsory mission, the person with the name ¡®Greem¡¯ would have long since vanished, never to be seen again.


    Therefore, For Evil Bugs, Greem had never been his enemy. Only Mary was qualified to be his enemy.

 Chapter 47

    Life on the flying ship was monotonous and boring.


    Though there was magnificent scenery underneath, it eventually got boring, causing some to even turn a blind eye to it.


    As the deck was packed with over three hundred apprentices, it was not afortable ce to stay. But fortunately, around noon the next day, the flying ship had arrived at the first mission site, in the Erathia region.


    It was a stronghold built in the middle of the mountains, fully surrounded by dangerous high peaks that stretched far into the sky. Clouds were floating within deep valleys, making sure no one could peak through them and get a glimpse at the ground below. The flying ship docked at a massive thirty-meter-tall tower in the center of a stronghold.


    The entire tower was built with huge logs, all of each were at least half a meter thick. Although it looked rough and simple, it had a touch of solidarity that would give one the feeling that nothing could destroy it.


    The flying ship didn¡¯tnd on the ground, but hovered on the side of the tower. A wood nk was ced between the ship and the tower, allowing apprentices to leave the ship. Wind Elementium was swirling around the flying ship violently, creating a small windstorm. Therefore, all apprentices who needed to disembark here would have to withstand the strong wind as they walked along the trembling wood nk before arrived at the top of the tower. As the result, when each and every single apprentice walked on the wood nk, their heart was trembling just like the wooden nk.


    Lying on the side of the ship, Greem nced down beneath the flying ship. He saw numerous hardworking figures within the stronghold.


    No matter whether it was the masculine guy carrying huge wooden logs and walked through the empty field, or the guards who had bows and arrows on their back and spear in hand as they patrolled the top of the outer wall, the majority of them were not human. Some had the heads of lions, some had the heads of tigers, and others the heads of wolves. They were not human.


    Humans only ounted for a small portion of the poption of this ce, and most of them were supervisors.


    Looking at these weak human supervisors, a few of whom were waving their whips and yelling at a ferocious looking ¡®beast man¡¯, who was farrger than them, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed with their courage. Judging from the muscles of these beast-men, perhaps even without using any weapon they could easily squeeze and crush these supervisors¡¯ head with a single hand! However, these supervisors showed no signs of fear, instead, they held their heads high, yelling and scolding these beast men as if they were lowly ants.


    Also, from time to time, people wearing the gray robe of Apprentice Adepts would appear around the stronghold. Their status was clearly higher than the human supervisors. Wherever they went, those human supervisors would bow to them act in a ttering manner, while the masculine, tall beast men would have frightened expressions appear on their faces as they clumsily bowed to the Apprentice Adepts.


    Most likely these beast men were ves brought from some secondary nes which had been conquered by Adepts! No wonder they were acting so tame!


    Greem suddenly realized something.


    Although these beast-men had great physical strength and constitution, and tall, muscr bodies, they didn¡¯t possess any supernatural powers. So, they didn¡¯t have any way of countering apprentice Adepts who had mastered mystical forces. Perhaps, even a beginner apprentice could kill dozens of beast men without too much trouble. That¡¯s was probably the reason why they were so respectful to apprentice Adepts.\


    Actually, this ce was considering a small mission site, and only around twenty to thirty apprentices left the ship. Most of them were intermediate apprentices, and two were advanced apprentices. No Pseudo-Adepts left the ship.


    Soon, under the submissive yet numbed nces of countless beast men, the flying ship once again ascended into the sky, flying along the steep and rough mountains as it continued heading South.


    ...


    After passing countless mountains and rivers and a vast virgin forest that stretched tens of thousand miles, the flying ship finally arrived at another human colony. The slope of the terrain gracefully ttened out, andrge scale of human activities could be found around the ce. But too bad, as most of the mission sites picked by Zhentarim Association were at the borders of the colony, the ship never went too deep into the heart of the Erathia region. Instead, it turned its nose, started to fly along the edge of the colony.


    Over the next two days, the ship visited five mission sites. Nearly half of the apprentices had left the ship by this point. The third day after Greem boarded the ship, it adjusted its course to South West and left the Erathia region, quickly approaching the Bracada region.


    Compared to the warm sunny days in Erathia, Bracada was simply a world covered by freezing snow.


    As the flying ship entered the region, the greenery started to diminish, being quickly reced by a boundlessnd of white snow.


    Pure white snowkes were swirling in the air as the temperature started to drop significantly.


    Some apprentices with high Physique still had their shirt loosened, happily exposed their ripped muscles. On the flipside, those with low Physiques had pulled their robes tight, using all kind of methods to keep warm.


    As Greem only had a Physique of 5, he hadn¡¯t reached the level where he could ignore this extreme cold. Hence, he summoned Fire Elementium and had it hover around his body, warming him up.


    But fortunately, the flying ship never visited the deepest area of this realm of ice and snow, but kept flying along it¡¯s edge. It visited three snowy remote towns along its way, and, by the end, had dropped off most of the apprentices.


    As the flying ship turned its nose and adjusted its course to fly East, there were less than fifty apprentices left on the deck. Five Pseudo-Adepts, twenty-seven advanced apprentices, thirteen intermediate apprentices, and the one and only beginner apprentice, Greem.


    After spending a couple of days on the ship, with regards to the world outside the Magical Swamp, Greem was no longer as ignorant as before.


    The world Greem was currently living in was an Adept World named ¡®Lethon¡¯.


    Throughout the entire multiverse, the ne of Lethon was a rather rare major scale ne. It was a ne with a single political system, led by Adepts, which made it a pure Adept world. Their enemies were other major scales nes. For example, the ne of the Gods, which was guarded by deities; the ne of the Dragon, which was protected by Divine Dragons; The ne of the Gnomes, which was a highly advanced mechanical civilization; The Dark ne, which was filled with foul demons and evil spirits...


    All major scale ne had mature civilizations. The Adept World of Lethon had established aplete framework for Adept development, with it, batch after batch of qualified and powerful Adepts were cultivated. Afterwards, they used these new Adepts to expand their territory, invading intermediate and small-scale nes.


    In order to seize the resources and intellectual property of different nes, there would be violent conflicts and wars between all major nes. Therefore, if one wanted to describe it, the Adept World was a powerful and aggressive civilization that loved engaging in wars.


    This was the current state of the Adept World¡¯s foreign ¡®policies¡¯. Internally, there wasn¡¯t a single n powerful enough to unify all the Adepts. Thus, ording to territories and regions, many ns of Adept had formed. Among them, four of them held the most dominate positions.


    The Northern Witches upied the northern region of the Adept Maind, controlling and that covered more than six million square kilometers, which was then divided into dozens of human kingdoms of all sizes. The rulers and nobles of these kingdoms were ordinary humans, but they all recognized the Northern Witches as the guardians of their kingdoms.


    In fact, whenever a mighty female Fourth Grade Adept came into power amongst the Northern Witches, she would call upon a group of followers and venture out into the vast wilderness, zing her way through all manners of obstacles and established a great kingdom that would only belong to her.


    Relying on the constantly emerging, powerful female Adepts, the Northern Witches were constantly fighting for living space in this savage world. Whenever a new kingdom was born, and a magnificent Adept Tower was built, it also meant that another Female Adept has risen to power.


    The Northern Witches were experts in Curses and Prophesy, thus they were all Principle Adepts.


    The South West side of the Adept Maind was mainly the territory of the Silver Alliance.


    Strictly speaking, it was the haven for Profound Adepts.


    The Silver Alliance was made from a group of Profound Adepts who were notable for always wearing silver robes. Using alchemical knowledge and resources gathered from countless nes, they constructed a magnificent and majestic floating city in the sky and countless fortresses which they used to invade new nes.


    In brief, most of the crafted weapons used by the Adept World when invading new nes were supplied by the Silver Alliance. They were like a group of crazy, yet amazing, engineers, machinists, and alchemists. Using massive amounts of resources and tremendous knowledge, they invented all sorts of creatively crafted machines, providing the Adept World with powerful devices.


    The eastern region of the Adept Maind was the territory of the United Adept Association. Nearly all kinds of Adepts could be found in this association. By utilizing a systematic cultivation road map, and a shareable knowledge system, it had attracted many Adepts who possessed powerful abilities. These Adepts had formed an association governed by strict rules, yet emphasizing impartiality.


    Aside from these three major Adept associations and ns, within the center of the Adept Maind, which was also the region with the densest poption, there was a rather loosely organized Adept association: The Zhentarim Association. Honestly speaking, unlike the other three major Adept forces, the Zhantarim Association didn¡¯t have a clear direction of development or core bond between its members. It was more like a consortium of Adept families.


    Actually, it had something to do with how Adept forces were distributed in the center of the Adept Maind.


    The center region of Adept Maind was a vastnd with abundant resources, but the human colonies here were scattered. Each human colony was a small kingdom, usually guarded by at least one Adept family. Therefore, the center region was made up by many Adept Families.


    In order to counter the invasion from all three major Adept forces toward the center region, Adept families of all sizes had grouped together and formed the Zhantarim Association,bining their might to ensure they maintained their ce in the world.


    Therefore, the Adept forces that Zhentarim Association could call upon were definitely stronger than the other three surrounding forces, making them the strongest of the three. But, unfortunately, as the internal workings of the Zhantarim Association were quite loose, and there were too many different families, which prompted many internal rivalries, whenever they were in a battle, the Zhentarim Association could never be as effective as the other three major forces.


    In light of this, the newly elected top management of the Zhantarim Association had decided to strengthen the intensity of their Apprentice Adept training, and thus Greem was forced to face this dangerous training mission.

 Chapter 48

    ording to the annals of the Adept Maind, the Zhentarim Association controlled thirty-one regions. The smallest region covered seven to eight hundred thousand square kilometers, while thergest upied more than a million square kilometers. It was a boundless area rich in resources. These areas contained 60% of the entire Adept Maind¡¯s poption.


    Greem¡¯s mission site was located in the Ker mountain range, northeast of the Dagon region.


    After discovering an entrance to the Underground, the Zhentarim Association had constructed an Adept Tower nearby, and sent a powerful Second Grade Adept to guard it. Ninth Grade was the highest rank in the Adept hierarchy, so a Second Grade Adept sounded like a weak entity, hardly capable of shouldering such an important task, but, as a matter of fact, within the Adept Maind, which was the source of most of the Adept poption, the highest grade Adept one could get in touch with, or even hear about, was a Fourth Grade Adept.


    Even for Zhentarim Association, the highest grade Adepts on duty were Fourth Grade Adepts. As for all the higher graded Adepts, rumors said they had left the Adept World, to explore and conquer worlds in the vast ocean of stars.


    This had led to the current power structure of the Adept Maind: First Grade Adepts were crazily gathering knowledge and enriching themselves so they could grow, and were the most numerous grade of Adept across all the major ns; Second Grade Adepts were the backbone of all different institutes, and most of them were able to undertake tasks alone; Third Grade Adepts could gather a group of followers and build themselves a small Adept n or family.


    As for Fourth Grade Adepts, they were powerful entities that all major ns wanted. Of course, if a Fourth Grade Adept had the will, he could always explore a new region and establish an Adept kingdom that belonged to himself.


    Therefore, the ranking of all Adept associations and ns were based on the number of Fourth Grade Adepts they had.


    As for the Fallen Adepts in the Underground, Second Grade was as high as they went. Thus, by sending a Second Grade Adept to stand guard at the Adept Tower, it was more than possible to resist surprise attacks from those Fallen Adepts.


    No matter what, the war between these official Adepts was not something an apprentice adept like Greem could involve themselves in. So, this mission was more about investigating the distribution and activities of the underground creatures, and noting signs of Fallen Adept activity.


    Whether intentionally not, within the shallow area of the Underground Cave, the most active Adepts presence were the apprentice adepts cultivated by the Fallen Adepts. Also, the Zhentarim Association rarely sent official Adepts into that area. The missions were mostly carried out by apprentice adepts.


    Therefore, not surprisingly, this ce had be a ughterhouse for apprentice adepts, as brutal battles happened nearly every day. A lot of Apprentice Adepts had gone through life and death battles here, hardening themselves for their futures.


    ............


    When the flying ship started descending to the mission site, Greem was shocked by what he saw.


    Their mission site was actually a small city.


    Considering their proximity to the Underground Cave, from time to time, rare resources from underground would be found and traded here. So, upon introspection, it wasn¡¯t actually that strange for so many merchants and ck market ¡®tradesmen¡¯ to be found in this ce.


    As the flying shipnded on arge square outside of the city, a man could be seen waiting for them. He had an uncaring expression on his face, and reeked of the smell of blood. Judging from his Spirit Energy, he was an Advanced Apprentice.


    While staring at the five peopleing down from the ship, this man wore a strange smile on his face, portraying a disdainful and proud look, like an experienced veteran looking down on some weak rookies. But when he saw the masculine Adept jump off the ship, he retracted all unnecessary expressions and bowed respectfully.


    ¡°Alright, alright! Save yourself the trouble. This batch of apprentice adepts is for you. You guys better use them carefully. The next batch wille in two months time. If you kill them all, it will cause trouble, and you will have issues with the Association!¡± The masculine man waved his hand unconcernedly, pushing thest five Apprentices off the ship, like shooing chickens.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, master Sammir. The underground activities have been rather calmtely, and it has been more than two weeks since our patrol team has encountered any of those ck bastards. Oh, the ¡®ck Wood Lotus¡¯ and ¡®Night Eyes Stone¡¯ you ordered have been prepared, and are waiting for you.¡± The ferocious looking male apprentice smiled politely as he said this.


    Finally, Greem and the other apprentices knew the name of this Body Refining Adept, Sammir.


    ¡°En. You go ahead and settle these new apprentices, I¡¯ll make a trip to the city. After you are done with them, find me at Old Kerry!¡± Without waiting for the male apprentice to reply, Adept Sammir strode off into the distance.


    As the rest bowed as master Sammir left, only the ferocious looking male apprentice stood tall.


    ¡°All of you, follow me!¡± The male apprentice quickly ran his eyes over these five apprentices. His expression didn¡¯t change when saw the two Pseudo-Adepts, but frowned when he saw Greem, ¡°My name is Kevin. You can call me ck-hand Kev.¡±


    It was a rather simple introductory, but judging from his proud undertone, it seemed he preferred his nickname over his real name.


    ¡°ck-hand Kev? Don¡¯t tell me you have a brother called White-hand?¡± A young manughed. He was wearing a short yellow robe, and numerous magical items could be seen on his exposing skin. He was one of the Pseudo-Adepts, and, obviously, he was dissatisfied that this ¡®ck-hand¡¯ Kevin didn¡¯t respect him.


    Surprisingly, the Pseudo-Adept started preparing a spell to strike out at the ¡®rude¡¯ ck-Hand Kev.


    Nearly at the same moment he began to chant, ck-hand Kevin disappeared. In next second, a vague figure appeared behind that young Pseudo-Adept. Each of his hands held a dagger. ck-Hand Kev aggressively leaped toward the Pseudo-Adept.


    As a Pseudo-Adept with 20 Spirit, even the slightest changes in his surroundings could be detected. Although he was shocked by Kev¡¯s sudden strike, that didn¡¯t stop this young Pseudo-Adept from reacting.


    A series of zapping noises rang through the air, as a blue colored electrical defensive web appeared behind his back. The Pseudo-Adept remained calm and turned around, shooting out two thick lightning beams from both of his palms, aiming right at the advanced apprentice who was surrounded by an electrical web.


    Right at the very moment when he wasunching the attack, this Pseudo-Adept hesitated.


    This was the first time here, and he was about to kill a ¡®teammate¡¯? That might get him into trouble!


    When he was wondering whether he should reduce the strength of his ¡®Electro Charge¡¯, a sharp pain suddenly came from his back, and a pitch-ck dagger came out from his chest. Only now the vague figure who was struggling in the electrical web transformed, shattering, like ss in front of them. At the same time, a cruel and hoarse voice spoke into his ears.


    ¡°In this ce, Pseudo-Adept means nothing! Remember, next time, don¡¯t make fun of that which you don¡¯t know!¡±


    Finished speaking, ck-hand Kevin pulled the dagger out from the young Pseudo-Adept, took two steps back, and coolly gazed at him.


    The Pseudo-Adept¡¯s face was bathed in sweat, due to pain. He was shocked by ck-Hand Kev¡¯s great dexterity and preternatural swiftness. Suppressing the intense pain, he took a purple potion from his waist pouch, drank half of it and poured the other half into the wound on his chest. Strangely, in few seconds the punch-through wound healed, leaving nothing but bloody crust.


    The young Pseudo-Adept wiped off the blood crust, revealing smooth and fair skin underneath.


    ¡°Hell!¡± Kevin whistled, ¡°A Bloody Mary? You Pseudo-Adepts do have a lot of good stuff, don¡¯t ya! I should¡¯ve given you a bigger wound just now! Now you know why they call me ck-hand Kevin, because I always like to attack the enemy¡¯s back. Next time you are looking for trouble, remember to watch your back!¡±


    The suffering young Pseudo-Adept clenched his jaw tightly, but had no intentions of provoking him again. On the other side, the other Pseudo-Adept furrowed his brows, obviously, he too was startled by the aggressiveness of this ce.


    But what really frightened these two men was not Kevin¡¯s aggressiveness, but his bizarre ability.


    Firstly, he was not using any sort of spatial attack, or else, they would have sensed the ripple of the spatial. Secondly, it was also not a shadow clone technique, because there was no sign when Kevin revealed his true self at the end, and they could still sense the spirit ripple of him from the vague figure which served as a lure. How could that young Pseudo-Adept be deceived so easily?


    For the moment, the group was pondering what just happened in front of them, but no one had any clue on how Kevin did that. Though he was just an advanced apprentice, he was able to easily defeat a Pseudo-Adept. Of course, it was partially because it was a surprise attack, but more was because of Kevin¡¯s unpredictable and strange magical ability.


    Before getting to the root of Kevin¡¯s abilities, the young Pseudo-Adept decided not to agitate him anymore.


    Although Mary was an assassin who fought in closebat with her high speed, she was unable to see how Kevin had done that. This made her knit her brows in a tight frown.


    While she was frustrated by this, Greem gently nudged her arm and mouthed the word: ¡®Illusion¡¯.


    Perhaps only Greem could clearly saw the entire process of that extremely short battle.


    The Kevin¡¯s ability was the rare ¡®illusion¡¯.


    While all the other apprentice adepts were going after for more powerful magic spells, Kevin was emphasized onbining his innate magical ability and his ownbat ability. Just now, using his illusion to deceive the enemy¡¯s five senses, he never moved, but simply covered himself with an illusion.


    While the young Pseudo-Adept was deceived by the illusive figure, which looked like a real human, and turned his body around, he had exposed his defenseless back to Kevin, who was also an assassin who fought with his high Dexterity. Judging from the swiftness of his movement, Kevin¡¯s Dexterity was just slightly lower than Mary, perhaps around 13 to 15.


    If a guy like this was moving with his full speed, without Elementium Vision, perhaps Greem couldn¡¯t even find out where he actually was, let alone counter the full force of his attacks.


    Thus, among all Body Refining Adept, a high agility assassins like Mary and Kevin, were the biggest threat to apprentices who fought with offensive magic spells.

 Chapter 49

    Led by ck-hand Kevin, the group of Apprentices soon arrived at a rather shabby stone room located on the first floor of the Adept Tower. There, they finally met the other mission members.


    Out of ten apprentices who signed up for the Underground Cave investigation mission, three of them were Pseudo-Adepts. They were Leo, from the Mushroom Forest of the Rofen region, Sabrina, from the Tracy family of the Woodrow region, and Marcus from the ck Forest Institute of the Sidney region. Leo was the young Pseudo-Adept who was wounded by Kevin previously.


    As for the six advanced apprentices, Sh, Matthew, Leander, Mary, Isaac, and Bruce, four were male and two female, and they all came from different regions and families. The magical spells they studied were different in a thousand ways, but now, because of the mission, they were grouped together in this room.


    As for Greem, the only beginner apprentice within the group, he was elbowed out from their interactions, as if he never existed. As one of the members of a ten man team, no doubt Greem¡¯s existence would lower their overall strength. Thus, when facing Greem, no one would give him face.


    And there was no way Greem could exin why he was here. So, he just kept his mouth shut and listened to their conversation, all the while secretly having the Chip gather basic information on these people.


    All ten apprentices were brought here via three different flying ships. The earliest had arrived two days ago and, after spending a few days in this Adept Tower, they were rather familiar with this ce. Hence, they were now briefly talking about the details of the mission site.


    But as they were talking, a middle-aged male Adept wearing a white robe and a pointy hat, rushed into the stone room.


    ¡°Looks like all of you are here. This is perfect, I don¡¯t have to exin this for the second time. Wait, why there is a beginner apprentice here? Alright, alright, this must be the mistake by the old fools of the association. Heh... since all of you are here, you will have to resign yourself to your fate! Those Hooked Horrors in the Underground are going to have a lovely feast...¡±


    A vicious grin followed his words, sending chills up everyone¡¯s spines. But obviously, no one would dare refute his terrifyingment.


    ¡°Fine, fine... apparently you¡¯re a group of boring fellows, none of you even dare to get dere otherwise... but this may not be a bad thing, as you, likely, won¡¯t get yourself killed in the dark underground because of your arrogance. The duration of this mission is six months, and the ten of you will be a team. Every ten days, you need to patrol the underground, and you¡¯ll have to visit five inspection sites every time. They are all located in different locations.¡±


    ¡°Therefore, if you don¡¯t want anything bad to happen to you, you¡¯d better move in a full group of ten, following the provided route and inspecting these five mission sites in order. If you¡¯re quick, you canplete it within five days, and then you¡¯ll have five days to rest. Of course, you can split your team up, and that way you might even finish the inspection trip within two days. But if you bump into those ck bastards in the underground area, you¡¯re on your own. Hehehe...¡±


    The exnation of the mission brought unsightly expressions to all ten apprentices, but at this point, the middle-aged Adept introduced himself.


    ¡°My name is Angus. You cane to my residence toplete the missionter. Remember, no matter what kinds of dangerous situations you encounter in the Underground, you¡¯re on your own. No one will be there to save you. If you¡¯re lucky and kill some stupid ck bastards, remember to bring their heads back. You can exchange them for rewards from me!¡±


    ¡°............¡±


    Faced with a group of silence apprentice Adepts, this Adept Angus had no interest in providing further exnations. He turned around and quickly left.


    Now, there weren¡¯t any outsider remaining in the room. The ten apprentices, who were thrown together by thepulsory mission, had no choice but to sit down together, beginning to discuss how were they going toplete the mission.


    The young female Pseudo-Adept, Sabrina, who had arrived two days earlier, became the primary source of information for the group. She began to exin the mission in greater detail.


    She had long dark hair, which flowed down to her waist. The left side of her face was covered with a silver mask, but the other side of her faced showed that she was a fairly pretty girl. But strangely, under the silver mask, her left eye was reced with a mechanical mechanism. Her left arm was also mechanical. When she moved, metal noises could be hearding from her body.


    All five mission sites were located fairly close to the surface, and the furthest one was around ten miles away from the entrance. If this distance was on the surface, it wouldn¡¯t take more than seven to eight minutes for these few Pseudo-Adepts toplete the patrol. But when it was in the underground world, this distance amounted to quite the challenge.


    From the entrance of the cave to thest mission site, the linear distance was ten miles. But, between them were rough mines, tunnels, rift valleys andrge cracks. Asides from some rather safe routes, which had been found, the underground was filled with twisting and turning tunnels. If they followed the safe route, they should only bump into lesser underground creatures. But if they struck out in a random direction, perhaps all that would await them would be something nasty.


    ¡°The first patrol will start in three days, so we need toe up with a detailed n today. With that, we can prepare ourselves.¡± Sabrina concluded her exnation of the mission with this, which brought deep frowns to everyone¡¯s faces.


    Three days? This was such a short amount of time to prepare!


    ¡°Did you guys forget that we have a burden on our team?¡± One of the male apprentices, Isaac, gazed at Greem discontentedly. Clearly, he wasn¡¯t happy that Greem was dragging down the strength of the entire team.


    ¡°I brought him here, I¡¯ll be responsible for his safety!¡± Mary¡¯s green eyes brightened suddenly, ring at Isaac as she spoke with a cold and stern voice.


    ¡°If that is the case, I suggest we¡¯ll split up for the mission. Let this beautifuldy bring her knight along. With this, we¡¯ll be more efficient inpleting the mission, and we¡¯ll have more spare time to study and rest!¡± Isaac spoke with a cold grin.


    ¡°Are you sure about this?¡± Sabrina shook her head, then said, ¡°Don¡¯t think that we can just ditch this burden. Since we¡¯re a team, we need to take the whole situation into ount and n ordingly. Every time we patrol, if we miss two sites, our earnings will be cut in half, and if we miss three, we won¡¯t receive any earnings at all. If two people are assigned to a mission site, of course we canplete the patrol quicker. But if a small team is too weak, they might note back...¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Are you feeling sorry for the rookie?¡± Obviously, Isaac had decided that someone on the team had to be the realist.


    ¡°It¡¯s not that I feel sorry for him, but, if we follow your suggestion, that also means we might need toplete the ten men mission with just eight of us the next time. And the time after that, we might need toplete it with just six of us. With this, even if you are strong individually, in the end, you might still end up getting killed while between all mission sites!¡± Sabrina spoke with a cold tone.


    Obviously, for the past two days, she had thoroughly studied their mission, and had clearly analyzed all the possible traps hidden within it.


    She felt she this was a dilemma!


    If they carried out the mission as a team, as all five mission sites were scattered in different locations, it would take them extra time to travel between them. But there was strength in numbers, and they could face all possible dangers with ease. If they split up, unavoidably, their overall strength would be diluted. If they were unlucky and had one or two small teams annihted, they would suffer over the next few months!


    For the moment, everyone was lost in deep thought, and even Isaac, who was upset of Greem¡¯s presence, kept his mouth shut.


    For any simple task flow, not only did they had to consider the time efficiency, they also had to give consideration to the bnce of strength. Even if some Pseudo-Adept thought he had a superb ability and left hispanions to die, he alone wouldn¡¯t be able toplete the patrols by himself, and would tire out before the end of the mission.


    They had to carry out their mission underground, so no matter how strong an individual was, there was no way he could spend seven to eight days without resting. Wandering through the underground alone would never be as rxing as having a group of people together. That¡¯s the reason why the Adept association created this mission, not only was it was an assessment of their teamwork, but it also served as an examination of their individualbat abilities.


    ¡°I think we should split up! All of us are here to train and improve ourselves. We¡¯re not here to rx and enjoy ourselves. I¡¯ll team up with Mary, we should be able to handle one mission site, I have confidence in this.¡± Greem spoke.


    Hearing what he said, many people silently breathed out sighs of relief.


    After all, if they had to bring a burden into the dark and bizarre Underground, even those three Pseudo-Adepts would be troubled.


    ¡°Alright, so be it. Everybody use the next two days to rest and prepare yourself with the items needed for our mission. Three days from now, we¡¯ll meet up here.¡± All three Pseudo-Adepts couldn¡¯t help but look at Greem, once again reconfirming that he was only a beginner apprentice. Obviously, that Sabrina intended to be the leader of this team, which is why she promptly concluded the meeting.


    Silently, everybody nodded their heads, then left the stone room one after the other.


    When they were the only ones left in the room, Mary teasingly asked, ¡°Why are you so sure I¡¯ll team up with you?¡±


    ¡°Heh. You want blood; I want demon core. We¡¯ll split up any other materials we findter. There is no conflict in this, so it¡¯s a win-win situation for the both of us.¡± Greem stretched his right hand out towards the blood-loving girl with the green eyes.


    ¡°Hmm! I want first pick of the loot!¡± Mary ced her soft, fragile-seeming palm into Greem¡¯s and shook his head. Then she turned around and left the room.


    They only had three days, and she needed to prepare a few more items. After bing an apprentice Adept, this was the first time they had left the Magical Swamp, so Mary decided to go for a walk...


    After the room becamepletely quiet, Greem closed his eyes, pretending he was thinking about something, while, in fact, he wasmunicating with the Chip in his mind.


    ¡°Chip, have you gathered all the data on those people just now?¡±


    *Beep* ¡°Data sampling has beenpleted. Transmitting...¡±


    Following a series of beeps, data starting flowing into his mind.


    ......


    ......


    This data really showed him nothing...


    Left speechless, Greem breathed out a long sigh. It looked like, without witnessing them actually fight, it would be really difficult for him to get data on the actual abilities of his teammates.

 Chapter 50

    Within the dark underground tunnel, a perfect silence prevailed.


    Originally, there weren¡¯t any routes in the Underground world. Only irregr rock fractures and water channels formed after thousands of years of water erosion. However, through the endless excavating efforts by many generations of underground creatures, the winding cave system with many chambers,rge and small were interconnected by tunnels of all length, forming an awe-inspiring three-dimensional tunnel system that extended in all directions.


    There weren¡¯t any straight paths down here, like the ones back on the on the surface. All the passages were meticulously excavated along rock fractures. Stretching through those ancient water channels, twisting and turning. Sometimes, when the walls between caves were rtively thin, you could hear sound from other passages, but they were still forced to travel a long, winding passage of tens of miles inplete darkness, before reaching their destination.


    Countless stctites were hanging from the ceiling of caverns; stgmites protruded unevenly from the damp floor. Water continually dripping down through the uneven rock formations, allowing for the ground to be damp and covered with moss.


    To be honest, when traveling in such an isted and quiet environment, it was very easy to feel a creeping sensation. Thinking that just the few hundred tons of rocks and soil on top of your head could copse at any time, and in turn, crushing you.


    Everyone was holding a torch in. The group of ten, including Greem, were formed in a long line, walking slowly and difficulty in the underground tunnel.


    The glow of their torches could only light up a region of five meters. From time to time a bone chilling breeze would squeeze out from some unseen cracks in the rock wall, causing the torches to flicker in the wind. The flickering projected their shadows on the other side of the rock wall.


    Although they had tried their best to keepplete silence while walking. But the indistinct noise of their footsteps and the sounds that came from their bodies scratching against the rock wall, all of them were still echoed far away in this dark and quiet tunnel. And, this would bring them so much more unexpected dangers in their journeyter.


    After walking continuously for three hours, the team finally arrived at their first stop on the inspection route.


    Strictly speaking, the first three hours journey was just a small assessment before they truly entered the Underground Cave. The real starting point of their investigation and inspection mission started here.


    ¡°Alright, this is where we split. Try your best toplete the mission as soon as possible, then we¡¯ll meet back here again. I wish you all the best!¡± The clear and melodious voice of Sabrina became hollow in this oppressive cavern.


    Ten Apprentice Adepts split into five small teams. All traveling to different sites toplete their own mission. The deepest mission site was taken care by Sabrina and Sh. Of course, no one would have any objection when she volunteered for the most dangerous mission, thus, they too had tacitly approved her leadership.


    As for the team of Greem and Mary, although everyone was jealous, but they had no choice and gave them the easiest mission. Because if the rest of the group sought momentary satisfaction and gave Greem¡¯s group a tougher mission, which eventually brought them to death. Next time, they would have toplete the ten person mission with only eight members.


    Every single person was wearing a thick ck robe, which fully covered every single inch of their skin. This was to prevent their aura and body temperature from exposing their positions in the eyes of those underground creature who possessed infrared vision. After whispering wishes to each other, five small teams disappeared themselves into the darkness, heading to their respective destination.


    After split up, Greem and Mary continued walking in the dark tunnel for nearly seven to eight minutes, then they stopped.


    Greem listened for any sound that might be audible. When he finally confirmed there wasn¡¯t anything nearby, he casually killed off the torch in his hand. When thest glow of light faded into the darkness, a mystery and bizarre world was made revealed in front of Greem¡¯s eyes.


    The illuminating mosses on the cave walls were glowing coldly in the dark. Drawing out apletely different yet bizarre scene in Greem¡¯s eyes, which had temporarily been granted with the ability of low-light vision. Lit up by this faded glow, darkness gradually retracted, recing by a mysterious world of glittering.


    The color of the cold, gruesome-looking cave wall was ck, and the region where water gathered was gray. Within Greem¡¯s Elementium Vision, besides from arge patch of green illuminating glow, the world in front of him was full of ck and gray colors. However, hidden in a dark corner not far from where he stood, he could barely see a few creepy moving red dots.


    Red dots represents the leaking life force.


    Judging from the size of the red dots, they should be some tiny creatures. Perhaps Rock Scorpions or wall lizards.


    Greem turned around and saw Mary. She was still wearing the same bright red chiffon dress, exposing arge area of her fair skin. But strangely, even though Greem was only three steps away from her, but he couldn¡¯t sense any temperature that all living beings had. If just looking at her with infrared vision, perhaps Mary was no different from a human shaped stgmite.


    Alright, a Vampire¡¯s ability was indeed unpredictable.


    With infrared vision, able to hide her vitality aura, and together with her supreme agility, the dark Underground was a perfect ce for an assassin like her.


    Greem pulled down his hood, took up the lead and resumed their journey, walking along the winding rough slope in front of him.


    Their mission site was near an underground pond located seven miles away. They might pass by a couple of Underground creature habitats along their way, but there wasn¡¯t too much of a risk to worry. As long as they paid more attention to their surroundings, they should be able to walk passed them without any issue.


    ............


    Although both of them possessed powerful magical abilities, yet when traveling in The Underground world where dangers were everywhere even Mary, who was an advanced apprentice, was still like a toddler who just started learning how to walk.


    Greem thought he had been well prepared, but before he reached one hundred meters from starting point, he was met with the first ambush in this Underground world.


    Yes, an ambush!


    When Greem was passing by a rock crack, a Rock Python who was hiding within it suddenly darted out, opening its stinking and ferocious mouth, biting toward his neck.


    He was caught off guard.


    The cold, hard rock wall had provided a well cover for this Rock Python¡¯s indistinct vitality aura. So, when Greem saw a red dot suddenly jumped into his vision, the venomous fangs of Rock Python had nearly reached his face.


    If Greem had 10 or above Agility, perhaps he could respond on time. But, his 4 Agility had severely limited his instinctive reflex, forcing him to shut his eyes in great fear while waiting for the brutal bite to hit him.


    A Rock Python wouldn¡¯t kill him, but a painful wound was inevitable.


    A shrill whistling sound of object piercing through the air beside his ear. Mary, who was apparently walking behind of him second ago, suddenly jumped in front of him. With her fingers pointing like a de, she sliced through the air with incredible speed. In just a split second, the Rock Python had been sliced into seven pieces.


    A pungent smell of blood filled the air within the tunnel.


    Greem took a few deep breathes, finally making his racing heart beats returned to normal. His body was wet with cold sweat. Damn Underground creatures, they sure knew how to pick a perfect spot to ambush!


    Although the tunnel was dark, Greem felt his face was burning.


    He was overconfident. A theory was always just a theory. He thought he had stored a huge amount of skills and experiences required for the adventure, but in real life there was always traps that he could never predict.


    After the first setback, two people exchanged their position.


    Nimble and noiseless, Mary took the lead. No Underground creature that tried to ambush them could escape from her sharp magical weapon-like nails. Even if it was an extremely close range ambush, she could always slice the enemy into pieces with her supreme Agility.


    Thus, within just an hour, eleven Underground creatures were killed by her.


    Indistinctly, Greem heard the noise of creatures fighting from the tunnel far behind him. It seemed like a small scale of war was inevitable. In this Underground world, no matter how loud noise was or how small of a wound is, they were both a huge taboo. As both could easily lure bigger and more aggressive Underground creatures.


    Although with Mary and Greem¡¯s overall strength, they had no fear in these weak creatures, but they could still bring Greem and Mary unnecessary troubles for their journey.


    The first real trouble urred at the seventh hour after they entered the Underground world. A group of eleven Hooked Horrors struck them.


    Hook Horrors were widely distributed in all parts of Underworld world. They looked rather simr to a small dinosaur with its body fully covered in hard scales. When they stood straight, they reached the height of two meters. Although they weren¡¯t considered arge creature, but they had a strong bone, and a mouthful of big, shining, sharp fangs. Their sticky saliva was dripping down from this brutal mouth, looking like they were going to have a big feast.


    Unlike other smaller creatures, they didn¡¯t use ambush as their strategy, but patiently waited until Greem and Mary entered their encirclement, only then did they steadily walked out from the darkness. Before seeing their body, Greem was greeted with pairs of pale yellow eyes.


    A hard-skin creature like this was tough to deal with, at least, Mary¡¯s sharp ws couldn¡¯t prate their strong scales. Without hitting their armpit, eyes, or neck, the weak spots of their defense, Mary¡¯s attack was harmless to them. On the opposite, their slim but sharp upper limbs, located on their chests, could cause her devastating damage.


    Together with the tremendous mming force that came from its heavy body, plus the Paralyze and Slowing effect that was innate to all Earth Elemental creatures, this all made it really tough for an ordinary Apprentice Adept to escape safely with such limited space.


    A wry smile emerged on Greem¡¯s face, he shook his head, quickly took out two summoning cores and threw them onto a nearby dirt patch.


    Although majority of the underground tunnel was excavated on the solid rock wall, utilizing the hardness of the rock to prevent the tunnel from copsing, but there was always dirt and sand to be found everywhere. Thus, Greem nevercked the material to shape his y Golems.


    A soundless roar rang through the air. The Demon Alligator Hunter gradually took its shape beside Greem.


    ¡°Oh, good kid! You have a hidden trick!¡± Mary¡¯s voice came from the darkness.


    With Mary¡¯s 17 Agility, freeing herself from these Hooked Horrors was a piece of cake. If not because of Greem, it would just take her five seconds to pass through the enemy¡¯s rather shabby encirclement.


    After a few failed random attacks at those Hooked Horrors, Mary gave up trying. She returned to Greem, started to give an examining look at this new, strange golem.


    This... it seemed different from the one she sawst time! Could this y alligator a new golem he obtained, after killed the Giant Alligator King? Apparently, this kid wasn¡¯t as weak as she imagined!


    Filling her mind with countless questions, Mary saw Greem walk up to the y alligator¡¯s back and sit down. Following a mild vibration, the y alligator moved its huge body, crushing its way to those Hooked Horrors who starting to tighten up the circle.

 Chapter 51

    Note: As VeggieFly is leaving us, we have got ourself two new editors: shFly and KiwiFly. This chapter is edited by both of them.


    The y alligator charged forward, and, with the breeze it caused sweeping up dead leaves, it looked as if it were invincible.


    It was worth mentioning that the build of the Demon Alligator Hunter had entered the scope ofrge creatures. Inparison, the ferocious Hooked Horror was only considered a medium size creature.


    Fights between demon beasts always came down to strength, and no doubt, the size of their bodies was the most direct method of showing off their strength.


    Facing the charging Demon Alligator Hunter, the Hooked Horrors, who even Mary couldn¡¯t harm, had transformed into a group of terrified little bunnies putting up a deathbed struggle. One after another they were thrown to the ground by the Demon Alligator, who used his powerful jaw to shred them into little pieces. At the same time, the hunter, who sat up high, kept throwing spears down. Each spear pinned the Hooked Horrors, who tried to leap onto the Demon Alligator¡¯s back, to the ground.


    Although Hooked Horrors were also Earth Elemental creatures, which granted them immunity from the Earth Elemental damage brought by the Dirt Spear, they couldn¡¯t escape from the brutal physical damage. Hence, while charging towards their enemy, many Hooked Horrors were nailed into the ground by the spear, putting up a useless struggle.


    A few of the lucky Hooked Horrors managed tond beside the Demon Alligator. They vented their anger by using the most powerful attacks they could muster. They tirelessly hit the thick, tough y armour covering the top of the Demon Alligator¡¯s body. They attacked aggressively. Their scratching and biting caused dirt chunks to fall off continuously. But from time to time, an earthy yellow ring of light would burst out from the Demon Alligator¡¯s body, bringing the Demon Alligator anotheryer of new y armour.


    The hunter who sat high up would never let the enemies who tried to destroy the body of the Demon Alligator go. The dirt spears, that were fired from close range,


    prated the Hooked Horrors¡¯ skulls instantly, making them fall to the ground while letting out miserably cries.


    In just ten minutes, this group of Hooked Horrors had been wiped outpletely by the Demon Alligator Hunter.


    Once the battle was over, Greem started to clean up the battlefield. But the result, once again, made him scorn these Hook Horrors who died miserably. Even amongst this ratherrge group of wandering creatures, there wasn¡¯t even a single demon core to be found. Greem hastily harvested some of the still intact razor sharp ws. After harvesting, Mary and Greem climbed back up onto the Demon Alligator and ventured deeper into the Underground World.


    In around half day, the broken bodies of the Hooked Horrors they had left behind would be digested by other Underground creatures. The other creatures would be lured in by the smell of the dead bodies. Within the Underground world, there were plenty of ¡®natural scavengers¡¯, as food was extremely scarce, and anything that could be eaten would not go to waste. These ¡®natural scavengers¡¯ would wander around the dark and quiet Underground world all day looking for food that would cure their hunger.


    However, something happened that Greem hadn¡¯t considered. Not long after they left the battlefield, a short stgmite in a corner of the cave suddenly trembled and transformed into a weird-looking human figure who had, what seemed to be rock-like skin. It was staring nkly in the direction in which Greem and Mary disappeared, seeming like a lifeless object. The creature then sent a strange wave forth and, by using a secret message, transmitted it far into the distance.


    Only after transmitting all the information, did the stone figure difficulty and slowly merge back together with the short stgmite, leaving no trace that it was ever there. It was such a strange life form, that, even if Greem had the intention to find it, he would find it really hard to differentiate it from other ordinary stgmites.


    ............


    Deep down in the Underground world, within a secret cave.


    A bonfire was brightly burning in the centre of the cave, spreading its toasty warmth throughout it. Four bizarre-looking figures, covered in ck cloaks, were standing in a circle around the fire. They remained quiet, as if they were waiting for something.


    In order to prevent their aura from leaking out, the ced a thick, transparent barrier at the entrance of the cave.


    All of a sudden, a strange croaking sound was heard from one of the members.


    Apparently, this figure was female, as her arm, that stretched out from underneath the ck cloak, was very slim. An extremely ugly toad was squatting in the middle of her palm. It kept letting out jarring, croaking sounds by squeezing and expanding its huge yet half-transparent stomach.


    ¡°There is also activity detected in sector seven! Including sector four and five, which were triggered moments ago, this makes three sectors in total. We can be sure that they¡¯re from the outside,¡± Thedy finally spoke.


    ¡°Jajaja... We had just received the news that a group of delicious prey areing from the outside, and now we¡¯ve finally detected their whereabouts. What a bunch of fearless rookies! Since the triggering time of these few sites are so close to each other, they must have split up. Jajaja... this is the best news we¡¯ve heard all day!¡± A sinisterugh came from another man in a ck cloak.


    ¡°Can you find anything out about the overall strength of each small team? I heard that there are a few Pseudo-Adepts in this group? I just need one more Pseudo-Adept soul toplete my corpse puppet!¡± Another man in a ck cloak spoke. From his lofty and domineering voice, it wasn¡¯t hard to tell that this guy was the leader of this four-people group. This man also had the strongest treacherous undertone.


    ¡°It is really tough to tell! After all, any overly aggressive spying methods would be easily detected by them. Therefore, the message I received only tells me that some


    creatures, who have fulfilled the preset requirements, passed by. However, we can¡¯t confirm their actual strength and numbers,¡± The samedy replied.


    ¡°Hmm! Once they split up, they are not far from meeting their death. ording to their tradition, most of them will probably form a two-person team, and, at most, a three people one. We have four people here and three of us are Pseudo-Adepts. Can¡¯t we capture one of their small teams?¡± Grinning hideously, the ck cloak leader continued saying, ¡°Let¡¯s go to site number four first, as that¡¯s the closest site from here. If everything goes smoothly, we can visit a few more sites afterwards, and try our best to capture few more teams!¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡±


    The group put their words into action immediately. They were a group of people who handle things with resolute and cruel means. After a short discussion, they had given up this temporary camp and started squeezing their way out of the cave, relinquishing themselves to the eternal darkness outside.


    ............


    At the same time, Greem was enjoying a rxed journey. He absolutely had no idea that great danger was approaching from a far distance.


    He and Mary had be indifferent spectators who did nothing. The Demon Alligator Hunter alone was able to make a clean sweep of all Underground creatures who kept leaping out from the darkness. Marching and crushing all in their way, they had virtually turned this extremely dangerous mission into a rxed and peaceful sightseeing trip.


    But, a discovery had brought all sorts of feeling to his mind. The Underground world was a ce where all dirty things hid, and a ce where different species crossbred with each other. All sorts of messy bloodlines could be found here.


    The aggressiveness and cruelty of these Underground creatures were stronger than those on the surface. Sometimes, even though they knew they were not the match of Greem and his minions, they stillunched an attack on him. They


    attacked in such a way that they seemed to not take their own safety into consideration. In fact, some hunters only needed to throw their spear at the weaker charging creatures in order to kill them. As for those stronger creatures, before they could break up Demon Alligator¡¯s tough y armour, it¡¯s sharp and powerful front legs would have crushed them into meat paste.


    Facing such an enormous creature, who could absorb Earth Elementium from the surrounding environment and continuously self-heal, these creatures¡¯ attacks could never bring any threat. If they really wanted to defeat the Demon Alligator, they would have to use a devastating magic spell and crush the summoning core that was buried deep inside its body in one go. The only other option was to use a continuous amount of super energy to smash its tough shell. But, obviously, none of these small Underground creatures was capable of achieving either one of the options.


    Actually, this was rted to the environment they were living in.


    The Underground world was full of long, narrow tunnels, caverns with protruding stgmites on the ground, and countless stctites that hung from the ceiling of caverns. Living in such environment, an overly grown body brought two major harms. Firstly, it was very hard to find sufficient food to sustain their life, and, secondly, it was very difficult to pass through all the narrow tunnels without getting stuck.


    Therefore, in order to adapt to such an environment, the majority of the Underground creature had evolved. Although they became cruel and aggressive, their bodies were short and t. This meant that they when faced with the Demon Alligator, who was clearly a massive monster in this Underground world, were suppressed in both Strength and Physique.


    As the golem was moulded from Earth Elementium, the size of the Demon Alligator was controlled directly by the summoning core. When it was required to face battle, it would charge in with its biggest form. However, when it was required to travel underground, it would adjust its body shape ording to the shape of the tunnel.


    For example, when travelling in some really narrow and rough tunnels, it could even adjust itself into the shape of huge Rock Python, which allowed it to squeeze through the tight space more easily. The two ¡®masters¡¯ who owned this self-moving golem, who was capable of changing its shape, needed only to sit on its back and allow the golem to do all the work. Was there anything else that could be more rxing than this?


    In order to see throughout their long and boring journey in the dark, Greem and Mary even lit up their torches on the back of Demon Alligator. They tried to ovee their own boredom by studying their own magical topic. As for those Underground creatures, who had eyes but failed to see Mount Tai, they just let their dedicated Demon Alligator Hunter handle them!


    Therefore, the mission which initially required them to embark on a tiring seventeen-hour long journey, only took seven hours before they arrived at their destination.


    It was an enormous limestone cavern and was filled with all kinds of strangely shaped stctites. In a lower region in a corner of the cave, water fell off the cavern wall and formed a small pond. The pond made this ce be one where surrounding Underground creatures always visited.


    The team stopped in this dark limestone cavern. Lit up by the dancing me of the torch, the huge body of the Demon Alligator appeared even more frightening and ruthless. Frightened by it, most of the Underground creatures who came here for water immediately scurried away, and only a handful of creatures who didn¡¯t possess sufficient intelligence initiated their attack. Of course, these poor fellows were all killed on the spot.


    Greem¡¯s soft, thick and waterproof ck deerskin boots stepped onto the muddy and slippery stone path. As Greem climbed down from the Demon Alligator Hunter, he pushed back his hood. He quickly started scanning the mission site through his strange goggles.


    It was unexpectedly calm, a mission like this was considered an Orange mission?


    But, before he could continue pondering this strange urrence, an extremely gentle and lovely female voice suddenly rang out from behind him.


    ¡°As an elegant gentleman, don¡¯t you think you should help the beautifuldy get down from the vehicle?¡±


    A cold shudder suddenly went down Greem¡¯s back. He was taken aback by Mary¡¯s ¡®frightening¡¯ voice. To be honest, Mary always showed him the brutal and aggressive side of hers during a fight. By suddenly portraying the look of a gentledy, clearly, because of boredom, she was once again trying to fool him.


    After knowing her for a long time, he now had a clearly understood Mary¡¯s temper.


    She was an extremely dangerous girl; she was a wounded girl whocked trust in the outside world.


    Greem had absolutely no idea how Mary endured all those frightening magical experiments done by Adept Anderson. However, Greem was sure of one thing: the current Mary was showing signs of having split personalities. One was the original Mary, who was a shy and introverted girl, while another was the cruel vampire Mary, whose mind was twisted. The two totally opposite personalities were ced in the same body, producing a Mary who always felt insecure.


    She was like a mind twisted dowager. On one hand, she wanted to use her beautiful and sexy appearance to make everyone crazy about her. Whilst, on the other hand, she couldn¡¯t restrain her desire for fresh blood and wished she could rip every single human into pieces, pouring their blood onto her beautiful body.


    Therefore, her behaviour swung between seduction and cruelty. Even a slight mistake would trigger the pain hiding deep within her heart, causing her to transform into the ¡®Bloody Queen¡¯ that she always dreamed of!


    In brief, it was extremely rare to see a perfect human being to walk on the path of Adept!

 Chapter 52

    Edited by: KiwiFly


    Trantor¡¯s note: Guys, we urgently need new editors for this project. If you know someone who can help, send me an email at


    The biggest benefit of owning the Chip was the near encyclopedic knowledge it granted him.


    After searching through its database, the Chip transmitted the most appropriate action into Greem¡¯s mind.


    After receiving this data, Greem bowed like a noble. He bent down on one knee and offered Mary his hand, allowing Mary to use his knee as a way to dismount the Demon Alligator.


    Mary was obviously satisfied with Greem¡¯s sweet and considerate behavior. She gracefully turned, her soft, striking red dress contrasting vividly against her delicate and fair skin. Under the reflection of the dim torchlight, she seemed to be the most dazzling object in the eternal darkness.


    ¡°I like this ce and wish to take a bath here. So, I¡¯ll need to trouble my honorable knight to stand guard for me!¡± Mary gave her wish, once again portraying the lofty manner of a nobledy.


    ¡°As you wish!¡±


    Clearly, whenpared to Mary, Greem seemed much more familiar with these types of role-ying games. Greem ced his arm on his chest and bowed. He then grabbed the Demon Alligator Hunter and left to patrol the surrounding area.


    They were sent here toplete their mission and, coincidentally, the mission site was located in the middle of that water pond. So, after leaving Mary behind, Greem couldn¡¯t refrain himself from starting to search for the biggest benefit of this trip.


    There was a reason why this Underground Cave was so famous. This Underground Cave produced some rare and special resources that couldn¡¯t be found anywhere on the surface. An example of one such resource was the Soul Mushroom.


    The Soul Mushroom was a kind of white mushroom, which existed in two different forms: its incorporeal form and its corporeal one. It was one of the main ingredients used to produce Invisible Potion and Shadow Perish Enchantment. They grew in shady and cool ces and were able to feed off of negative energy. Therefore, Soul Mushrooms were frequently found growing near evil spirits. This was the reason why normal people couldn¡¯t see them. Only apprentice Adepts who possessed supernatural power, like Greem, were qualified to harvest them.


    Before they left, Adept Angus had told them about these Soul Mushrooms, promising that if anyone was to find some on their mission, he would purchase them off them for a good price. From his desire for the mushrooms, Greem believed that Adept Angus had decided to be a pharmacist.


    It was because of this that Greem showed great enthusiasm for this additional job, as he could easily aplish it. After all, in order to prepare himself for this mission, he had depleted nearly all of his umted resources and savings. Right now, apart from some necessary spell casting materials and travel kits, the only things left in Greem¡¯s waist pouch were three Magical Crystals.


    With just this meager wealth, it was impossible for him to buy anything good in this ce.


    As Greem was traveling further and further away, Mary had just reached the edge of the pond.


    Here in the Underground world, everything was covered in an oppressive, eternal darkness. From time to time, indistinct noises were even heard echoing throughout the caves.


    If any ordinary human had found themselves in this ce, perhaps they would have long screamed their lungs out by now, frightened by the terrifying and gruesome environment. But, Mary was theplete opposite to them. She inserted her torch into a crack in the wall, and, while humming a joyful tune, she slowly peeled the thin red dress off her body. She tested the temperature by


    cing her perfectly shaped leg into the water, and, finding it to her liking, she cheered and dived in.


    The water sshed in all directions, presenting a barely visible beautiful body. If this sight was not seen in the Underground, it would definitely be called a seductive and magnificent wondend.


    But, whilst Mary was happily swimming in the water, at the ceiling, where the light of the torch couldn¡¯t reach, a pair of bizarre eyes lit up.


    Clearly, those pair of eyes belonged to an intelligent creature. They were fluttering from side to side, looking puzzled and undecided.


    To be honest, this Underground world was and where darkness was eternal and ughter and blood were asmon as flies. Nothing in thisnd could be rted to the words ¡®beautiful¡¯ and ¡®warm¡¯. Although he had learned about the free and peaceful life on the surface from books and knowledge shared by wandering travelers, he had never believed in any of those fairytales.


    He knew that the surface was cruelly and brutally ruled by frightening and evil human Adepts. Since this was the case, how could the humans on the surface live a free and peaceful life? Those fairytales must be the lies that the evil Adepts used to deceive the weak-minded humans. From what he could tell, they had seemed to work, as the foolish humans had fallen hook, line, and sinker, into believing them.


    This was something that he firmly believed in, so, when suddenly seeing a beautiful naked girl bathing in his hunting zone, he was struck with uncertainty.


    The numerous ferocious actions, performed by apprentice Adepts, had caused a wariness to develop in him. Thus, without making any noise, he started to crawl along the ceiling, inching closer and closer towards the beautiful girl.


    His delicate and flexible body enabled him to perform extraordinary movements, so, even if he was moving along a surface covered with slippery moss, he was still able to move as if it was t ground. He moved silently, and, like a spider


    creating its web in darkness, he slipped down a crack in the wall. He hid behind the various stgmites and stctites, and, unseen, he approached the edge of the pond.


    Mary had just finished swimming and was now sitting on a rock at the edge of the pond, slowly and gently squeezing out the water from her hair. Her long, dark hair flowed down her body and reached just below her perfect asset. Her hair covered her body perfectly, preventing anyone from witnessing the ultimate beauty. What a sad moment!


    The perfectly hidden humanoid figure stealthily arrived at Mary¡¯s red dress. After searching for a while, he found nothing that seemed to be a storage pouch or a magical weapon.


    Could this beautiful girl not an apprentice Adept?


    After stealing a nce at the barely visible beautiful body, he couldn¡¯t help but gulp. As he watched her an evil thought arose in his mind.


    Regardless of whether she was an apprentice Adept or not, shipping such a high quality ¡®product¡¯ to Elysium city would definitely result in a high profit. If he could get that profit he would be able to live a nice life; he wouldn¡¯t have to run around in the oppressive tunnels all day trying to make his living


    The person who had left earlier was definitely an apprentice Adept. A man who was able to control such a frightening Golem monster was obviously something that he, as an Underground Rogue Hunter, could possibly deal with. However, since the beginning, thisdy never showed any special ability. It was likely that she was just a mistress the male apprentice had brought along. If she was really a normal human, then it was possible that he could sessfully abduct her.


    After making up his mind, the shadowy figure hid behind the rock that the nakeddy was sitting on. He quietly pulled out the leather pouch that was tied onto his waist. A palm-sized green object climbed out of the leather pouch and quickly moved onto the rock, climbing towards the nakeddy.


    After a brief moment, Mary cried out. As soon as this happened, the shadowy figure instantly bolted out, like a lightning strike, and ced his two bent des against her neck.


    The tiny green lizard opened its mouth, draping itself over Mary¡¯s naked body and sticking its tongue out. It had actually bitten Mary¡¯s sexy butt! Greenish liquid oozed from the small wound, and Mary seemed to be paralyzed, looking as if she could hardly stand by herself.


    The shadowy figure had no use but to use one of his hands to hold up Mary¡¯s body. He had to do this in order to prevent Mary from slipping into the pond.


    ¡°You better make sure to hold her tight. If you tear any of her skin then you¡¯ll suffer some nasty consequences.¡± A deep and steady male voice suddenly rang out throughout the cave, scaring the shit out of the shadowy figure.


    Somehow Greem had returned from patrolling and was leaning against a stgmite. He was watching the scene with a smile on his face. Behind him, the frightening Demon Alligator Hunter walked out of the darkness. The noise it made as it walked wasparable to a giant.


    The shadowy figure seemed not to have expected this situation. He stepped back and positioned his body behind Mary¡¯s. He then raised one of his bent des to Mary¡¯s throat and gripped her arm with his other hand. He looked like he was holding Mary hostage.


    However, the figure was puzzled, as the male apprentice didn¡¯t seem to want to rescue hispanion. On the contrary, he seemed to be preparing himself to watch a good show.


    ¡®Her... life... is in my hands, don¡¯t...try... anything rash!¡± The shadowy creature was speaking in the Salusnguage, which was different from the universally used humannguage. However, this didn¡¯t stop Greem from understanding what it was saying. Language, with the help of the Chip, was perhaps the easiest thing for Greem.


    Greem, still leaning against the stgmite, watched the scene before him.


    The perfectly curved, seductive body of Mary was a magnificent view and Green would never miss such a good opportunity to enjoy it. Also, as Greem was extremely interested in this creature, he ordered the chip to scan it.


    ¡°Beep! Scanning of creaturepleted. Found a matching species in the living beings database. Does the host wish to view it?¡±


    ¡°Yes! Show it to me!¡±


    After Greem¡¯s agreement, the detailed information on the creature in front of him was sent into his mind.


    The Lizardmen race are intelligent creatures found in the Underground. They possess the bloodline of both a lizard and a human. They are mutated creatures and are able to move stealthily, and control their body temperature. In the Underground world, they are found in every major region working as assassins.


    Lizardman?


    While studying the information, Greem quietly matched the shadowy figure in front of his eyes with the one in his mind.


    The creature had a skinny, human-like body and wasn¡¯t wearing any clothes. Dark green lumps could be found everywhere on its rough, thick skin. It only had four fingers, and its hands were like webbed like a frog. It also had long and curvy nails, which looked like razor-sharp des.


    The creature seemed to have human-like facial features, but, as its skin was too dark, no one could clearly see its expression. Its transparent eyelids kept blinking, allowing its protruding eyeballs to focus freely and turn in any direction it wanted.


    Judging from its voice, it should be a man, no, a male.


    However, this was beside the point. In any case, it was an ugly fellow who made Green feel disgusted after just one look.


    Especially, after it recklessly abducted Mary!


    Inwardly, Greem gave out his final verdict.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the advantage it had in this environment, it would only be able to, at most, match up to an intermediate apprentice. Greem scoffed. With this little ability, it still dreamed of abducting the frightening Mary?


    A faint smile emerged on Greem¡¯s face. He really didn¡¯t know whether he should give a three-second tribute for its unfortunate encounter.


    Greem only hoped that it wouldn¡¯te to regret its decision.

 Chapter 53

    Greem¡¯s overly calm attitude had caused the Lizardman to start to doubt the value of the hostage he held in his hands.


    But, before he could do anything, the frail Mary moved first.


    With just a few twists, her fair and slippery naked body was freed from Lizardman¡¯s control. Mary then dodged nimbly, suddenly appearing behind the Lizardman. Greem could see that the Lizardman¡¯s arms were hanging limply by his sides, and he seemed to have lost the ability to defend itself.


    Blood was oozing out from the joints of the Lizardman, dying his dark green scales red. It seemed that Mary had cut his muscle tendons using her sharp nails.


    Any ordinary human, when getting wounds like these, wouldn¡¯t be able to fight, however, Lizardmen were different. They had a strong vitality and excellent resistance, so, to them, it was simply a minor injury. After all, although the Lizardman couldn¡¯t move his limbs, he still had a mouth full of sharp fangs.


    But, because Mary was hiding behind him, all of his attacks had failed.


    As he was trying to detach himself from the frighteningdy, his body turned numb and, like a robot losing power, he stiffened. A smile graced Mary¡¯s features as she slowly pulled her long, sharp nail out of the Lizardman¡¯s back.


    In closebat, by using the gap between the Lizardman¡¯s scales, Mary could sever his neck instantly. At this moment, the Lizardman waspletely powerless and had no way to fight back.


    ¡°What? Are you going to stay here and watch?¡±


    After ridiculing Greem, who was in a rather embarrassing situation, Mary draped herself over the Lizardman¡¯s body, gradually moving her tender lips towards his fragile neck.


    ¡°Beauty and the Beast!¡±


    ¡°Little Green Man Fighting the Vampire!¡±


    It was such an erotic drama, that Greem hoped he could enjoy it close-up. He wanted to p excitedly.


    However, whenever he imagined the potential scene that was going to unfold, he felt that it was better to just avoid it. Unlike those vampires who, in his memory, would gently poke their sharp fangs into their lover¡¯s necks, Mary obviously preferred to ravage her meal and enjoy itpletely.


    Greem felt that if he saw the scene of fresh blood mixing with organs, he would lose his appetite. Therefore, he just spun around and sulkily left.


    As he passed by a stgmite, he heard the frightening sound of muscle ripping, followed by Mary¡¯s excited moans. As Greem heard the weak cries of a creature in the throes of death, he couldn¡¯t help but shudder and increase his speed.


    After nearly half an hour, Greem saw Mary fixing her dress as she walked out of the cave. It seemed that she had enjoyed her ¡®restaurant¡¯.


    Anyone looking at her beautiful face brimming with energy, wouldn¡¯t be able to tell what had just happened.


    ¡°Have you taken the sample from the mission site?¡± Greem closed up his magical book and asked.


    ¡°This is just a small matter, so obviously it¡¯spleted!¡± Mary said contentedly. After agreeing, she casually tossed a Rune Crystal to Greem.


    Greem cast a verification spell, and, after finding it suitable, he ced it into his waist pouch.


    Every pond located in the mission sites had a small magical formation ced at the bottom of it. These formations helped the Adepts on garrison duty grasp the situation in the Underground Cave. It enabled them to observe the terrain without leaving their Adept Towers.


    The duty Greem and the other apprentices were given was to collect the information stored in the formations by using a custom-made Rune Crystal. Afterpleting this duty, they were free to use their spare time to harvest some rare Underground resources.


    The team, after splitting up, had agreed to reunite in three days. Thus, they had plenty of time to harvest all the resources located around the mission site. Since both of them hadpleted their mission in half a day, they had some spare time they could use to leisurely travel around.


    However, while both of them were traveling around, a heart-pounding battle was urring in another cave just five miles away!


    Leo, the apprentice Adept from the Mushroom Forest in the Rofen region, was fleeing. Two ck-robed Pseudo-Adepts were chasing after him. Matthew, the other advanced adept in Leo¡¯s team, was nowhere to be found. It seemed that he had been struck with great misfortune.


    Leo truly deserved to be the young Pseudo-Adept his family had high hopes for. It could be seen that he had extraordinary talent in Thunder Elemental magic spells. Although he didn¡¯t have great Agility, he could move freely thanks to theyer of white Wind Elementium surrounding his body. In fact, one could even liken his speed to that of a feather or a fast stallion. If it wasn¡¯t for the winding tunnels and stgmites, Leo probably would¡¯ve already escaped his pursuers by now.


    Whenever he ran by some narrow areas, he would stretch both his hands outward and form an arc of blue electricity, allowing it to dance violently between his palms. Then he would toss it over his shoulder and, without even bothering to check the result, continue onwards. After throwing it, within ten seconds, a loud boom would ring out from behind him, followed by a bunch of cursing.


    Following that, two sorry-looking, burnt figures would emerge from the dust. This happened so often that, every time they exited, the small Lightning Storm would¡¯ve ripped off a bit more of their ck robes. Their robes were falling off like butterflies.


    After one of the ck robes waspletely torn to pieces, it revealed a man wearing pitch-ck, soft leather armor. He carried a snake-headed staff and had bloodshot vertical pupils. He was absolutely terrifying.


    ¡°Are we still going to chase? This guy is a tough nut to crack!¡± A middle-aged man asked through clenched teeth.


    The figure on the left pulled off his hood, revealing a malicious and cruel looking face.


    ¡°Chase! This guy isn¡¯t familiar with the surrounding terrain, and, once he runs into a dead end, we¡¯ll teach him a slow lesson.¡±


    ¡°Where are Anna and Gary? Why aren¡¯t they here yet? Do they really need to take so long just to settle an advanced apprentice?¡± The man with bloodshot eyes asked, looking over his shoulder.


    ¡°They changed their route! They¡¯ve already sent me the details about the enemy team¡¯s situation. They sent me all the information they got from that advanced apprentice. I think that they¡¯re on their way to sector seven right now in order to search for the weakest team.¡± It seemed that judging by the way he gave orders, the middle-aged man was the leader of the group.


    ¡°Damn it! I knew this was going to happen! It looks like we have to try harder. If we let this guy go, then we¡¯ll have to return empty-handed.¡± The man with bloodshot eyes cursed with clenched teeth. After hitting the ground with his staff, he transformed into smoke and merged with the cave wall, disappearing without a trace.


    The ck-robed leader grinned somberly, and a ring of ck light flickered out from his body, doubling his running speed.


    A momentter, a ground shaking boom echoed out from a tunnel far away.


    The brutal and violent shock wave swept across the winding tunnel, crushing everything in its way. Anything that stood in the way of it, be it stgmites, stctites, sand, stone or dirt, was all swept up and thrown in a random direction. The residue magic energy caused the debris to act like sharp arrows, shattering the cave in a violent explosion.


    The battle of life and death that had urred between the Pseudo-Adepts had brought about devastating damage to the Underground tunnel. It had even caused widespread damage within a two-three mile radius. Arge amount of the area had copsed, causing rocks to shift positions and block tunnels. This caused many tunnels to be unavable for usage, however, at the same time, new passages were being formed. The old saying ¡°When one door shuts, another one opens¡± had never been so true before.


    Of course, such a massivemotion could never escape from the eyes of the apprentice adepts in this region. After witnessing the destruction, they all quickly found themselves a stable spot and hid. They were all quietly wondering what had caused this huge turmoil.


    Within a dark, quiet and broken cave, a soft popping sound was heard, and a huge, dark figure suddenly emerged from underground. The figure nearly upied the entire space in the cave.


    ¡°Damn it! Why is there suddenly an earthquake? Could those other Adepts have stumbled upon an active region during their inspection? Damn it...¡± Mary¡¯s sweet and seductive voice echoed throughout the darkness of the cave.


    ¡°I¡¯m afraid this earthquake isn¡¯t a natural one!¡± Greem¡¯s stable and calm voice quickly followed. His eyes flickered with an intelligent expression as he continued saying, ¡°The source of the quake is located five miles to the south-east of us, and is around twenty metres deeper than us. If this was a natural earthquake, the focal point wouldn¡¯t be so close to the surface, so...¡±


    ¡°So... someone caused it!¡± Mary looked over her shoulder at Greem. Obviously, she was surprised by the fact that Greem could still remain calm in such an situation. She was also surprised that he could have such an urate sense of direction, even though they were in an underground area with no light. After thinking these thoughts, she continued with her speech, ¡°Are you saying one of our teammates has met with enemies?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s highly possible!¡± Greem analysed. ¡°Firstly, because the source of the quake is so close to us, it is unlikely that it has no rtion to our team. Besides, you know the strength of the Underground creatures in this ce, and, except for a few rare creatures, it is impossible for any of them to harm us. Therefore, the earthquake cannot be because of a Pseudo-Adept going all out against a creature. Since that isn¡¯t a possibility, there can only be one logical exnation!¡±


    ¡°En!¡± Mary nodded her head in agreement. ¡°It should be those ck-clothed bastards from before. The only thing is, is that we have no idea who bumped into them. Truthfully, I really want to test out their ability. I mean, with your golem we can travel underground, so maybe we canunch a sneak attack!¡±


    ¡°We were overconfident on this mission. After all, this is our first mission and the first time we¡¯vee to the Underground. Hence, before we understood the unique environment and the new style of fighting here, we shouldn¡¯t have split up. We should¡¯vepleted our mission together and waited until the next mission to split up. Also...¡±


    ¡°Also what?¡±


    ¡°Also, don¡¯t forget that we¡¯re the weakest team amongst all of them. If the enemy really wants to ambush our group, we¡¯re the most likely to be targeted!¡±


    ¡°So what? I really want to test out their ability. Since you im your Earth Elemental golem is so amazing, can you sense the surrounding enemy¡¯s activities? I¡¯ll tell you what, if you help your sister catch one of those bastards, I¡¯ll spend the night with you. What do you think?¡± Mary trailed her finger across Greem¡¯s lips and giggled carefreely.


    For some unknown reason, Greem suddenly shuddered. He couldn¡¯t help but feel heartache due to Mary¡¯s naughty behaviour.


    Mary¡¯s interest in teasing men had grown stronger, and she never forgot to keep flirting with Greem. However, after noticing that her bloodshot eyes would grow darker when she got excited, Greem had no choice but to use his powerful will to suppress his lust. He did this because he didn¡¯t want to be Mary¡¯sb rat and someone she could just toy with whenever she wanted.

 Chapter 54

    After trying his best to get rid of the thoughts brought about by Mary, Greem used the chip to connect his mind with the controlling core of the Demon Alligator Hunter.


    Greem¡¯s surroundings seemed to suddenly dissolve intoplete silence, and, by using the golem¡¯s crystal core, Greem found himself looking at a whole new world. In this strange new world, Greem could see the all of the Earth Elementium in his surroundings. By using this feature, Greem could observe any movement made on the ground, as even a slight movement would cause ripples in the surrounding Earth Elementium.


    However, these ripples were extremely weak, and only urred in the Earth Elementium. So, anything that wasn¡¯t an Earth Elemental creature would find it extremely difficult to sense movements happening far away.


    But, Greem had actually done it!


    While he was immersed in that strange world, he could sense movement from as far away as a hundred metres! Not even the sounds of snakes crawling or scorpions nesting could escape his notice. He could sense all of these movements through the delicate spiritual connection between each Earth Elementium. He could then project these movements into his mind, forming an image that looked almost identical to the real world.


    As he was limited by his Spirit, the maximum distance he could sense was only one hundred meters. If he tried to sense anything beyond one hundred meters, he could only roughly sense the direction where the vibration originated. In addition to this, he couldn¡¯t picture the exact scene in his mind like he could when it was within his range.


    When on the surface, observing a distance of one hundred meters was an easy thing to do. In fact, any apprentice Adept could see dozens of miles by simply standing on high enough ground. If the apprentice was capable of flight, then they could see over an area of nearly one hundred miles. However, when this one hundred meters was ced within the Underground world, where everything was coated in thick rocks, sand and dirt, it became really impressive.


    After all, whilst in this Underground world, even if two men were separated by a ten meter thick rock wall, it would still be very hard for them to discover each other. The Underground Cave was a strange ce, because there was more metal the deeper you went. This metal greatly interfered with spiritual sense and detection magical spells. Therefore, unless a special method was used, it was near-impossible that these two men would discover each other.


    Either way, the ability to move stealthily and to see in the dark were basic abilities for all intelligent Underground creatures. Without these abilities, it would be very hard for them to earn their living in this eternally dark ce.


    Like a man talking in their sleep, Greem kept muttering things under his breath, describing everything he was sensing. Suddenly, his body trembled violently and he whispered urgently into Mary¡¯s ears.


    ¡°There are two human-like creatures located one hundred meters down, at an angle of seventeen-degrees south-east. I¡¯m sensing a strong Elementium aura. It is highly likely that they are both apprentice Adepts.¡±


    Mary¡¯s body went stiff, and her bloodshot eyes narrowed.


    The source of the quake had originated from that same direction, and, now there were two apprentice Adepts emerging from there. It wasn¡¯t hard to put two and two together. They both knew that there was a higher possibility of it being a bad situation than a good one!


    ¡°Can you identify who they are? It would be best if you could get a clear sense of their strength!¡± Mary whispered, cing her lips beside Greem¡¯s ears.


    It seemed that Greem hadn¡¯t heard what she said, as he continued immersing himself in his detection. ¡°They are heading in our direction right now, but there is a four-degree deviation... between us, there are three tunnels and two caves. They are ny-three meters away... they have arrived at the first cave, however, the cave has copsed. There is no tunnel leading to where we are. Wait... it seems that they are casting some kind of spell, as I can sense a strong Elementium ripple. It seems that they¡¯re holding something in their hand that can pinpoint our location... that is...¡±


    Greem suddenly opened his eyes, a shocked expression emerging on his face. He whispered, ¡°It¡¯s amunication crystal! They have themunication crystal we were all given before we split up! They¡¯re using it to track us!¡±


    After arriving in the Underground Cave, each person, in order to makemunication easier, had exchanged their respective personal auras. The fact that the enemy had gotten hold of amunication crystal meant that one of their group members had already been caught by them.


    Greem took out a fist-size blue crystal from his waist pouch and prepared to toss it far away, but before he could, Mary stopped him.


    ¡°If they are really locating us through the personal aura in themunication crystal, then why don¡¯t we just prepare a trap for them...?¡± Mary asked. It seemed that whenever ughtering was involved, a strong killing intent would always leaked from her eyes.


    Both of them were scheming and merciless people, so, after a short discussion, Mary took Greem¡¯smunication crystal and hid in the darkness. Greem grinned evilly before kicking the Demon Alligator and sinking into the soil.


    ............


    Anna lead the way as they wormed their way through the broken and winding tunnel.


    Before entering the next cave, she quickly scanned the surrounding area.


    Her eyes swept across the silent tunnel before stopping. She looked far into the distance. Broken rocks and stgmites were scattered around at the edge of the winding tunnel. Dimmed light,ing from unknown sources, was shining through the gaps between them, resembling the sharp fangs of grinning devils.


    She tilted her head slightly and listened to any audible sound. She heard a muffled rumblinging from the beneath her. Sprays of mist were constantly bursting out from the cracks in-between the rocks; while the glow of illuminating fungus shone onto these mists, created a strange and unusual illusion-like scene.


    In such an environment the difficulty of hunting enemies was huge.


    The battle that had happened previously had caused a lot of damage to the surrounding terrain, resulting in many passages bing hard to recognize. This caused the natives¡¯ advantage to weaken, as they no longer had a solid grasp over the area.


    As the enemies they were hunting were very cunning, Anna made sure not to leave too many traces in the air. It was because of this that, after travelling a certain distance, she had to reconfirm the enemy¡¯s location.


    Anna ced the blood-stainedmunication crystal on the ground and began to softly recite some strange, unintelligible spells. After she had finished casting, a pale, long-haired women, who didn¡¯t have any facial features, manifested itself in front of her.


    ¡°The great ancient banshee, please show me the location of our enemy!¡±


    After hearing her request, the faceless banshee, who was hovering above themunication crystal, slowly turned her head before stopping when she faced a certain direction.


    ¡°Looks like they¡¯re moving towards sector eleven!¡± Gary, the ck-robed Pseudo-Adept, who was following behind Anna, said excitedly.


    Gary¡¯s interruption had clearly caused the summoning ceremony to rebound. The faceless banshee¡¯s head turned around until her gruesome face faced Gary. A mouth appeared and opened up on her face. It seemed like she was preparing to let loose a howl and devour Gary¡¯s soul.


    Anna, who was an advanced apprentice, abruptly bit the tip of her tongue. She immediately spat out a mouthful of warm blood. An extremely miserable cry rang through the air as the banshee instantly disappeared.


    At the same time the banshee disappeared, Anna gave out a muffled grunt. It was clear that she too had suffered some bacsh.


    Gary, showing no remorse for his reckless actions, pped his robe and transformed into a strong wind, disappearing from where he was. His voice rushed into Anna¡¯s ears and lingered there for a while.


    ¡°I¡¯ll go ahead and hunt for those enemies. Take your time and catch up quickly!¡±


    As soon as Gary had left, a hateful and venomous expression leaked out from Anna¡¯s cold eyes. However, she knew, that with her status of only an advanced apprentice, there was no way she could offend those Pseudo-Adepts. If not for their need for her ¡®summoning¡¯ abilities, perhaps these Pseudo-Adepts would never even have allowed her to join in their hunting group in the first ce.


    Their target was only a beginner apprentice and an advanced apprentice. Why did they dare traverse this Underground world with such weak strength? Sometimes Anna really wondered whether there was something wrong with the brains of the Adepts on the surface. How could they send such weaklings to the Underground world? This was no different than sending them to their death!


    Anna hastily grabbed the things she had left on the ground, before pulling her ck robe tightly against her and rushing through the dark tunnel. If she waste, then that Gary would never leave anything good for her. Now, Anna¡¯s only wish was that the enemy¡¯s advanced apprentices could hold on for a little bit longer. If they did that, then she might have a chance to capture the beginner apprentice.


    In Elysium City, the city of Fallen Adepts, resources were extremely scarce. The resources she could get in exchange for a beginner apprentice from the surface could let her rx for nearly a year.


    The abyss-like tunnel didn¡¯t seem to have an end. The winding passages full of obstacles made it difficult for her to run at full speed. Fortunately, there was still some residue Wind Elementium, left behind by Gary, in the tunnel. This not only prevented Anna from getting lost but also saved time.


    Anna had almost arrived at the huge cavern in sector eleven, however, she stopped in the middle of thest tunnel.


    For some unknown reason, her intuition was warning her that there was danger.


    Rumble...


    The ground suddenly shook, causing Anna to be terrified, as she felt that the source of the quake came from right under her feet.


    The violent quake caused the tunnel ceiling to copse and huge amounts of sand and rocks to pour down from the ceiling. Soon, Anna was forced to retreat to the cave she had previously entered.


    In the dark and cold cave, a bizarre human figure silently waited for her.


    For any outsider, the darkness was the source of terror. However, Anna had lived in this Underground world for her entire life, so, for her, it was the best source of protection. But, right at this moment, she couldn¡¯t help but be shocked. She stared at the apprentice Adept, who was standing far away.


    Anna used the enemy¡¯s spiritual ripples to quickly identify them.


    It was actually that advanced apprentice! She couldn¡¯t believe that he actually dared to confront her face to face!


    ¡°Just let yourpanion show themselves!¡± Anna¡¯s clever mind had quickly analyzed the whole situation. She continued by saying, ¡°I can¡¯t believe this! A beginner apprentice actually has the ability to travel through the earth! It looks like he really is suitable for living in this kind of ce!¡±


    The mild earthquake just now had happened at the perfect time. It executed just the right amount of force to it had utilize the surrounding terrain and separate Garry and her. It looked like her enemies had chosen to ambush them and had picked her as she was the weakest. She scoffed. They actually dared to try and seek advantages over her, an advanced apprentice.


    A cruel grin lit up Anna¡¯s face. She bent down and charged towards the girl in the red dress.


    Small announcement: As both new editors are busy with their life, I have decided to pause the release until next chapter is edited. New editor will start editing oning Saturday. So, most probably I¡¯ll release chapter 55 on Sunday. However, if you be one of my Patreon, you can still have early ess to unedited chapters. Latest unedited chapter on Patreon is chapter 58, and chapter 59 will be released on Patreon within 2 hours from now.

 Chapter 55

    As Anna was charging towards the enemy, she quickly tossed a few bizarre magical rings onto Mary¡¯s body.


    Confusion spell!


    Slow spell!


    One spell could confuse the target¡¯s mind and cause there to be a dy in their reactions, while the other one could reduce the target¡¯s movement speed by nearly half. If the target didn¡¯t have immunity or couldn¡¯t quickly dispel them, then these two simple curses could lower their strength by more than thirty percent.


    But, Anna wasn¡¯t done yet! She cried out and stretched her arms out, facing her palms towards the sky. A strange-looking, glowing green rune soon appeared on each palm. Almost as soon as those runes appeared, the lower section of Anna¡¯s arm began to transform into green vines. These vines brought about a fierce gale and began to whip Mary, who was standing there, motionless.


    It was Spirit Summoning.


    However, Anna¡¯s Spirit Summoning spell was quite unique and could massively enhance herbat ability. This was because she could actually let a part of her body merge with the summoned spirit.


    The powerful whip smashed into the ground, causing tworge cracks to branch out like a spider web. As the debris shot in all directions, Mary¡¯s body suddenly turned into a series of after-images, and, within a split second, she appeared beside Anna.


    Anna couldn¡¯t help but be shocked by Mary¡¯s ghostly speed.


    In actual fact, Mary¡¯s after-images were formed under the effect of the Slow spell. Anna shuddered as she realized that if the Slow spell wasn¡¯t activated Mary probably wouldn¡¯t even have left after-images at all. As soon as she realized that she was facing an opponent who possessed super speed, Anna couldn¡¯t help but curse at her reckless and impulsive actions.


    Damn it! She shouldn¡¯t have tried to start a melee fight with an opponent like this!


    However, it was toote to pull back the whip now. Anna cried out loudly as she unleashed a dazzling ring of green light that started to spread around her body. Soon, the light transformed into a thorny set of armor that perfectly covered her well-rounded body. After ensuring that she had a proper defense, Anna restlessly swung the whip above to protect her head, shattering all the after-images that had appeared in front of her.


    Although Anna had a nearly imprable defence, ripples still continuously appeared on the surface of her armor. A few crisscrossed scratches were seen on the armor near her chest and ribcage. Also, after suffering a few hits from the enemy¡¯s sharp nail, a long strand of the vine had been cut off from her left arm. Despite the fact that only green liquid was oozing from the wound, Anna couldn¡¯t stop herself from taking a step back and letting out a painful groan.


    Anna crazily forced a new strand of the vine whip to regrow. After regrowing, it once again began swinging violently in all directions, brutally attacking every possible enemy that appeared.


    As a matter of fact, she had absolutely no idea where the true form of the enemyy. The only thing she could catch was the bizarre after-images that were left behind by the enemy attacking at their top speed.


    It was clear that Anna wasn¡¯t familiar with melee fighting, and she could only decently attack by using the summoned spirit. Thus, whenparing Anna, a beginner-level melee fighter, with Mary, who was a master of meleebat, it was obvious that she would suffer a tragedy today!


    Her whip vine, that she crazily swung from side to side, couldn¡¯t touch Mary at all, and her body armor could only barely spare her from Mary¡¯s attack. However, despite this, she was still hanging on. At least, under Anna¡¯s crazy offensive strikes, Mary found it rather tough to get close and attack the body armor. Although from time to time, Mary could sessfully attack it, it still wasn¡¯t enough to deal a deadly blow.


    At the same time, far behind them, sudden, rapid booms were heard from the other side of the tunnel. This tunnel had been clogged up by countless rocks and sand. It was obvious that the ck-robed Pseudo-Adept, who was led down the wrong tunnel, had discovered that something was amiss. The rapid booms were probably caused by him crazily attacking the clogged tunnel.


    The raging magic spells that the Pseudo-Adept was unleashing caused arge amount of rock debris, and countless stgmites and stctites to fall down and break into pieces. They were falling apart in haphazardly, filling the entire battlefield with smoky, rock dust.


    If that Pseudo-Adept was given sufficient time, it was likely that he could really break through the cave wall and open a new temporary passage.


    Anna knew that her reinforcement would soon arrive, so she gave up on attacking and just focused on defense. Anna ignored the fact that Mary kept leaving bloody scratch marks on her body and just kept crazily swinging her whip.


    Indeed, it seemed that none of these advanced apprentices could be taken lightly.


    Although the magic spells they had mastered hadn¡¯t yet reached an extravagant stage, they still covered all the aspects ofbat: offensive, defensive, distraction and self-enhancement. This meant that the outsiders barely any weaknesses to exploit. This eventually led to the outsiders gaining a quick win.


    Anna and Mary were both advanced apprentices, but, judging from the situation, Anna was clearly weaker than the quick and aggressive Mary. Although Mary wished to end the fight as soon as possible, it was something that was easily said but not done. At the very least, Mary couldn¡¯t do it without paying a price!


    Mary¡¯s attacks had caused the cave wall to be on the brink of copse, with many cracks decorating it. After seeing this, Mary gave up on killing Anna alone.


    ¡°Rascal! Don¡¯t just hide there and do nothing! Quicklye over and help me!¡±


    After dodging the vine whips attacking her sides, Mary once again waved her hands. She then left two deep, bloody scratches on Anna¡¯s body. However, as Anna had quickly regained the initiative and had begun to attack again, Mary was unable to attack any more. She quickly dodged the vine whip that curled backwards. When she once again broke Anna¡¯s defence and managed to move closer, she found that both the wounds had beenpletely covered by the thorny armor.


    It had happened again and again. Eventually, Mary couldn¡¯t tolerate anymore and called for help.


    Anna¡¯s face turned pale in an instant.


    Anna was already struggling with fighting Mary alone. She was absolutely convinced that, if she had to face thebined attacks of two people, she would face disaster.


    Anna didn¡¯t dare to neglect this thought, so she immediately bit off half of her tongue. As she spat out a mouthful of blood, her body suddenly became taller.


    Before this, only a small part of her arms had been transformed into green vines. But now, her body started to expand and her skin started to break apart, exposing countless green vines worming in between.


    By forcefully increasing her summoned spirit¡¯s level, Anna hadpletely transformed her body into a frightening Man Eating Flower. Her feet had transformed into green roots that dug their way into the ground, her arms were fully transformed into whip-like green vines, and her body yed the part of the thorny flower stalk. However, her head, the only thing left that resembled a human, was surrounded by a countless number of huge flower petals.


    After transforming into the carnivorous, violent ¡°Flogger¡±, all of her vital organs had disappeared from her body. She knew that as long as she could hold on until Gary arrived, all the energy spent on performing the secondary transformation of her summoned spirit would be worth it.


    Greem, who had been hiding in the dark, dared not to neglect the fight anymore. He finally made up his mind and got himself involved in the battle between the two advanced apprentices.


    A vibration suddenly resonated through the ground. The ground underneath the Flogger¡¯s feet had turned into a slippery, muddy swamp-like area. Before Anna could flee from this area, a huge and frightening figure emerged beside her. It opened up its huge mouth and bit on the flower stalk that made up her waist.


    Anna let out a jarring shriek as the pain hit her. She violently waved her two thick, long vine whips, hitting the Demon Alligator¡¯s y armor over and over again. Debris and y flew across the room, turning the cave into a violent battlefield. At the same time, behind the heavy protection of the huge petals, she opened her mouth and spat out a clump of sticky, stinking, green, acidic vomit.


    The acidic vomit sprayed at the Hunter who was riding on the back of the Demon Alligator. The vomit instantly corroded and melted its upper limbs and skull. If the crystal control core of the Hunter wasn¡¯t located at its chest, it would have likely beenpletely destroyed in this attack.


    Greem, who was lurking in the shadows, was struck by terror.


    It was as expected. The battle between advanced apprentices was not something he, a beginner apprentice, could easily get involved with. If it wasn¡¯t because he was being cautious, and only let the Demon Alligator Hunter ride on the Demon Alligator instead of him, he probably would have been killed.


    He hadn¡¯t mastered a defense magic spell, so, when facing a furious counterattack by an advanced apprentice, he had no trump cards that he could use to bring him out alive.


    But, the Demon Alligator Hunter, controlled by Greem, only needed to briefly restrain Anna¡¯s attacks. That was more than enough to turn the tides of battle.


    Before Anna could save herself from the Demon Alligator¡¯s gaping jaw, Mary¡¯s attack had arrived.


    The sound of flesh being cut rang through the air. Mary bent over and stared at Anna¡¯s head. She reached out and, using her sharp nails, she sliced through Anna¡¯s firm skin. Then, she sunk her fangs into the area where the head and the stalk met.


    The quick, sucking motion made Anna go berserk. She struggled desperately, waving her arms and using them to violently whip Mary¡¯s mutted back. However, no matter how hard she tried, there was no way to stop the vampire from wildly sucking her blood.


    As more of her blood essence was drained, the power behind Anna¡¯s whip began to shrink. Finally, her arm dropped and her body began to quickly dry up. Her eyes, hiding behind her petals, began to hopelessly close.


    As her life force was quickly departing from her body, Anna could no longer maintain her summoned spirit body transformation. Her body kept shrinking


    and transforming and finally returned to her original human form. Just as she died, Greem ordered the Demon Alligator to open its huge mouth and swallow Mary and the dead body into its body. It then turned to Greem and did the same before quickly descending into the earth again.


    The moment after they had disappeared, a loud boom was sounded out from a cave wall on the far side. Parts of the cave wall crumbled, resulting in a huge hold. A Pseudo-Adept, whose ck robe was covered in a mist of green, illuminating light, sprinted into the cave.


    As he stared at the remains of, what seemed to be, an incredibly tumultuous battle, and smelled the stinking vomit that had spilled all over the cave, Gary unintentionally let out an extremely angry roar.


    He didn¡¯t roar because he was heartbroken about Anna¡¯s death. He simply hated the fact that the enemy had used the simple method of luring the strong and striking at the weak to eliminate his partner. This... this action simply disyed contempt towards him!


    ¡°You bastards! Come out and fight me now, damn it! I¡¯ve remembered your auras. You better not let me bump into you again. I...¡±


    After spending a long time furiously roaring into the cave, Gary had never sensed any abnormal auras. Left with no choice, Pseudo-Adept Gary turned around and dissolved into the darkness of the tunnel.

 Chapter 56

    [Editor DragonFly here! We¡¯ve decided to change the term ¡°Elemental¡± to ¡°Element¡± when talking about a specific element to avoid any confusion. For example, Saying Fire Elemental could give an entirely different meaning which could mean a being made of fire. So in this case, Fire Element or the Element of Fire is going to be used. Also, we¡¯ve changed ¡°Blood Clotting Medicinal Paste¡± to ¡°Blood Coagting Medicinal Paste¡±. Sorry for the inconvenience and enjoy the chapter below. :D]


    After travelling for nearly two hundred meters underneath the earth, Greem was forced to resurface.


    After all, traveling underground underneath the earth¡¯s surface wasn¡¯t as easy as it is on the surface. Areas full of rock formations and random patches of sand had brought no small amount of trouble for the golem. For this very reason, Greem had immediately ordered the Demon Alligator to resurface by making their way out of a random tunnel just after they had left the danger zone.


    Greem closed his eyes and used his senses to probe things out. Inside the Demon Alligator¡¯s stomach, Greem found Mary breathing rapidly, her body as hot as boiling water. As for Greem¡¯s reaction to this, he just shook his head and sighed.


    The ancient bloodline of the vampires was, as expected, quite incredible. Just by sucking blood alone, their strength would continue to soar into greater heights.


    During the previous battle, Mary had forcefully sucked the blood essence of the enemy advanced apprentice, filling her body with great amounts of blood energy enabling her to, once again, undergo another round of evolution.


    Due to theck of necessary information pertaining to Mary¡¯s situation, Greem did not dare to disturb her natural evolution. What he could do, however, was to find a rtively safe ce, he then made the Demon Alligator spit her out and ced her on a warm and cozy nket. After that, he excitedly started to search the dead body for treasures it won¡¯t need anymore.


    Before he started, he sped both of his hands together forming a posture of a prayer, closing both of his eyes as he prayed to all of the gods he could think of. After he finished praying, Greem rubbed his palms excitedly, kneeling besides Anna¡¯s miserable-looking body and started to conduct a search for possible loot.


    Being an advanced apprentice, she must have some magical items she carried with her. No matter how poor she was, she should at least have some magical books or notes containing valuable magic insights. Even if she didn¡¯t brought those with her, Greem still hoped he could at least find some magic crystals or magical materials.


    When Anna was still alive, she was beautiful while also having a well-developed body which added another level of attractiveness towards her. Unfortunately, thest battle was incredibly violent, resulting in most of her skin being torn into bloody scars, making her current looks a far cry to her previous one. Despite her body being in such a state, most of her clothes and equipment were still intact.


    The very first item that Greem looted from her body was a bracelet Anna had worn on her right wrist.


    Through his Elementium Vision, he could see that the bracelet emitted a bright green glow making it obvious it was indeed a unique magical item. Greem spent quite some time in identifying it and found out that the bracelet could swiftly unleash a nt element armor made of countless thorns.


    Although the nt element was not in line with Greem¡¯s elemental affinity, as long as there is energy stored in the bracelet, Greem could still forcibly use it. Having mastered not even one defensive magic spell, being able to use it as a substitute for such spells brought him a great sense of happiness. He even gave the bracelet a few kisses out of joy and wore it on his wrist with not an ounce of hesitation.


    The next item Greem looted was Anna¡¯s leather boots.


    After going through identification, Greem found out it was a pair of magical boots made from Lantern Grass and the leather from a Demon Flower. The boots had the magical effect of being unhindered when walking through a forest. When wearing them, one wouldn¡¯t be stopped by the bushes,vines and brambles when walking through a virgin forest. Even if it was in an impassable forest that no one could walk through, these boots would allow the wearer to pass through it as if he was walking on t ground.


    Unfortunately, it was ady¡¯s boots!


    Greem had tried putting it on a few times, but it clearly wasn¡¯t suitable for him. Left with no other choice, he set it aside for now and decided to go and ask Mary in the future to see if she has any interest in them.


    The third item he discovered was a pair of magical earrings.


    It had the effect of self-recovery magic of the nt element. By wearing these earrings while standing still in a ce filled with lush vegetation, the wearer would recover approximately ten health points every fifteen minutes. Although ites with a strict condition, it could still help during certain types of situations.


    After all, just using Blood Coagting Medicinal Paste would only heal external wounds but not provide any restoration to health points. For this very reason, wearing these earrings might be able to save his life in precarious situations.


    With Anna¡¯s status of an advanced apprentice, owning three magical items was considerably good. Soon, Greem stripped off her waistband and quietly identified it while holding it within his hand.


    It was a well-made and luxurious-looking waistband. A bunch of bizarre runes were engraved at its inner side. Greem spent a decent amount of time reading them but he could only recognize four of them from the eleven runes present.


    Feeling hopeless, Greem borrowed the strength of the Chip.


    ¡°Chip! Scan these runes!¡±


    ¡°Beep. Scanning of storage waistbandpleted... discovered eleven Ancient Adept Runes, initial result shows they are the activation spell of the waistband... the content of the spell is...¡±


    Following the data transmitted by the Chip, Greem furrowed his brows and imitated the pronunciation of the eleven Ancient Adept Runes.


    Right after the spell was recited, Greem sent out his senses and discovered the existence of a small spatial space from the waistband. Within this tiny space, dozens of unknown items floated around.


    A storage waistband! It really is a storage waistband!


    Greem had long coveted a convenient treasure like this one.


    Although the storage waist pouch was quitemon among apprentice Adepts, it wasn¡¯t a spatial item, that¡¯s why it wasn¡¯t capable of eliminating the weight of the items stored within and it was also unable to iste the magical ripples emitted by magical items. While the waistband was considered to be of the lowest grade of spatial items, anything stored inside would no longer weight anything and no outsider would be able to sense the magical ripples inside.


    Therefore, he was pleasantly surprised for being able to harvest a luxurious treasure such as a storage waistband. For his very first battle in the underground world, it was considered to be really good.


    Greem carefully looked over his shoulders and realized Mary was still in a state of deep meditation. He immediately put on the storage waistband carefully hiding it beneath his waist pouch.


    This precious treasure cannot be exposed!


    This was an incredibly amazing item. Greem already had one even though not all pseudo-Adepts have the fortune to own one!


    After ncing at Anna¡¯s corpse several times, making sure there weren¡¯t any leftover magical items on this Fallen Apprentice Adept¡¯s body, Greem went on to inspect the contents of the storage waistband, taking them out one by one.


    Inside, he found seven magic crystals, a notebook about magic spells, a Croaking Frog used for special magic spells, amunication crystal, a crystal green wooden stick which was as long as his arm, a magic mythril the size of a thumb, and a wooden statue normally used by priests.


    ......


    Including today¡¯s loot, Greem currently owns a total of ten magic crystals indicating how rich he had be with this small fortune of his.


    The notebook about magic spells recorded Anna¡¯s insight and her experiences on her learnings of nt element magic spells. It also contains iplete knowledge concerning the use of summoned spirits to possess and strengthen the summoner¡¯s body. Unfortunately, all of these weren¡¯t of much use to Greem because of his magical affinity towards fire which contradicts the element of nt. It looks like he has to find a way to trade it for something else of use after his return.


    The Croaking Frog was amon magical material. It¡¯s primarily used for setting up alert-type magic arrays which belongs to the auxiliary magic array type.


    Themunication crystal Greem found was obviously from one of his groupmates who was captured by Anna. By sensing the personal imprint stored inside it, he knew the unlucky owner of it was in fact, Matthew, an advanced apprentice.


    Both the crystal green wooden stick and the magic mythril were rare magical materials. The former was a semi-finished product, a nt element magical item Anna was crafting but only managed to finish halfway. Thetter was a high-grade material used for crafting magical staves, which could greatly improve the conductivity of magical energy. Effectively reducing the loss of energy when casting spells.


    The amount of magic mythril Greem has on hand was enough for him to craft a small-sized single-handed magical staff.


    Greem was uncertain about the purpose of thest item, the wooden statue. A magical aura exuded from it but there wasn¡¯t any magical runes or characters engraved on this item. It looks like he has to return to the Adept Tower and have an expert appraise it for him to know what exactly it is used for.


    While Greem was observing the wooden statue and silently pondered, a soft and warm body suddenly assaulted him from his back.


    ¡°Hehe, my dear, handsome Greem! Since you treated me so nicely, how do you want me to repay your kindness?¡± A sweet and seductive rang beside Greem¡¯s ears. After that, Mary squeezed her arms beneath his armpits, gently stroking the area around his chest.


    Ugh...


    This sudden and unexpected lustful development instantly made all of Greem¡¯s hair on his body stand on ceremony, also causing his body to be as stiff as a stone statue.


    ¡°Do you want me to give you a kiss?¡± Mary¡¯s sweet voice lingered in his ears.


    ¡°I...¡±


    Just when Greem was about to say something, a fragrant but sloppy tongue forced its way inside his mouth.


    It was as if a Magma Fireball spell suddenly exploded in Greem¡¯s mind, blowing all other thoughts away! His mind lost on cloud nine, losing himself over the blissful moment of the present.


    A fairly long time had passed by, and only then did Greem finally struggled to get his mind out of this dream-like state. At this moment, Mary could be seen sitting beside him, holding a pair of magical leather boots in her hand.


    ¡°Chip, tell me what happened just now? Why does Mary affect me so deeply?¡± Greem secretly asked the Chip this question.


    ¡°Beep. Detected traces of a magic spell... Host might have been charmed by a spiritual magic spell. Judging from the experience the host went through just now, it should be the ¡®Natural Charm¡¯ spiritual spell...¡±


    Natural Charm?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help having his lips twitch.


    Damn! This particr one is extremely effective!


    Ultimately, most magic spells of the spiritual type would show obvious spirit ripples when being casted. So long as one paid close attention, it¡¯s rather easy to guard against them. But, what makes Natural Charm a cut above the rest lies in the word ¡®Natural¡¯.


    This spell cannot be learned at all, as it only awakens in a limited number of species. Once it was awakened, it would bring the host a tremendous but hidden benefit.


    Whenever a creature possessing the ability of Natural Charm entered a dangerous region, it would not gain the hostility of those neutral creatures as long as the creature didn¡¯t have any destructive behavior.


    If Mary does indeed possess this ability, then every word and action from her would be more seductive and charmingpared to before, making it harder for enemies to be on guard against her.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but start to doubt, did Anna possessed some kind of special bloodline in her body, for example, that of a Demon Flower or a Demon Tree? If not, how could she bring out such a weird ability by having her blood absorbed by Mary?


    ¡°You¡¯re awake now, Greem?¡± Marry seemed to be fully satisfied by how the situation turned out.


    ¡°I never thought just a single kiss from me could bring your head up in the heavens! Looks like you really have to temper your willpower more often!¡±


    Greem stared at Mary with a distressed expression. He noticed that Mary is still unable to properly control her newly obtained ability, that¡¯s why each and every word and action of hers carried a strong power of suggestion and seduction.


    ¡°We already killed an advanced apprentice Fallen Adept, should we continue looking for more resources or return back as soon as possible? Greem can only try his best and divert Mary¡¯s attention.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go back!¡± Even though Mary was an overenthusiastic, her mind was still clear and logical saying, ¡°We have created more than enough of a racket here. Maybe the other teams are already rushing back to our base as we speak. And so, I¡¯ve decided we should be heading back too! I don¡¯t want any more of this underground world ce crawling with those ck-robed Pseudo-Adepts!¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    Greem nodded his head, fully agreeing to Mary¡¯s suggestion.

 Chapter 57

    When Greem and Mary finally arrived to where the groups had split apart, there were four people waiting for them already.


    Noticing the weakest team had sessfully returned safely, a rxed smile simultaneously appeared on the faces of Marcus, Leander, Isaac, and Bruce as their hearts finally felt at ease. If something happened to the Greem and Mary duo, someone would have to do investigation missions all alone.


    But before they could ease their blooming smiles, they were ck-jawed after seeing the dead body Mary had brought back with her. Seeing the ck-colored Adept robe with distinct characteristics from the ones they¡¯re wearing, they all came up with an idea... this apprentice Adept¡¯s corpse belonged to a Fallen apprentice Adept.


    While the three advanced apprentices could still remain impassive, the Pseudo-Adept Marcus sported an unnatural expression on his face.


    ¡°Did that body belonged to an advanced apprentice or a Pseudo-Adept?¡± Marcus asked in a deep voice.


    ¡°Of course she¡¯s an advanced apprentice. If she was a Pseudo-Adept, we won¡¯t be standing here before you, safe and sound.¡± Mary said naturally.


    Hearing her answer slightly rxed Marcus¡¯ stiff expression, but he was still unable to get rid of his unnatural expression. If he didn¡¯t experienced going to the underground world himself, he might not even be the slightest bit interested regarding this kind of result. But if there was one thing the cruel experiences of the underground world had taught him, it would be that using any kind of elemental magic spell in a ce like this would be catastrophic. He knew their victory didn¡¯te easy as most apprentices only know a few elemental magic spells.


    Elemental magic spells could inflict a massive amount of damage within arge area of effect, thus making them stand at the very forefront among all other kinds of magic. This made apprentice Adepts who mastered elemental spells to be likened to a magic cannon with frightening firepower, able to bombard the battlefields with magic spells and cause mass ughter. What limited their potential was not the number of enemies but the very little amount of magic energy they had.


    However, in this underground environment, all of these skills would no longer be of much use.


    In the event of an unexpected fight urring underground, the fiery elemental spells would destroy not only the enemy, but also the area around them. With that said, immeasurable amounts of dirt and sand would pour down from above. Even if it was a Pseudo-Adept, once he¡¯s trapped in this dreadful situation, escape would have an extremely slim chance.


    What apprentice Adepts want in this location was not some kind of magic spell that has a highly destructive power, but one with just enough power to defeat their foes. An apprentice Adept can only be called a qualified spellcaster when he/she is able to both control the power and effect of the spell, and efficiently cast it towards the enemy urately.


    Put it this way, a swarm of Rat Men ambushed you amidst the darkness, it¡¯s not them that is more likely to kill you, but the explosive fireball you nonchntly sent to the enemy. After being viciously swarmed by the underground creatures and being ambushed by strange demon beasts of the darkness, apprentice Adepts who had gone through this stressful and miserable situation would slowly adapt, shrugging off their previous arrogant and pretentious attitudes. Bing someone ruthless but calm, yet smart and shrewd.


    These few apprentice Adepts experienced firsthand how painfully hard it was to fight an enemy of the same level in this underground world making them feel shock over the corpse of an advanced apprentice brought by Mary.


    Not one Body Refining Adept was present among the apprentices who signed up for the Underground Cave exploration mission. But why is that? It is because the deep and narrow underground tunnels aren¡¯t suitable for Body Refining Adepts who fought with pure strength. When fighting in this kind of environment, mini magic spells with moderate power and quick casting speed would be preferable.


    In a fight between apprentice Adepts, the two parties need to constantly change their battleground and slowly umte advantages to devour the enemy one bite at a time. Once either side realized the situation wasn¡¯t looking good for them and decided to flee, it would be incredibly difficult for the chasing side to entrap the enemy without having any special ability.


    But this red-dressed Mary could actually aplish this feat, showing that she must have some kind of strange magic spells that are extremely suitable for use in this types of ces. What would that be?


    The group couldn¡¯t help but ponder upon this.


    At this time, thirty-four hours had already passed since they decided to split up. From what they could infer from the distances from here to the paths each of them took, even Sabrina¡¯s group who took the toughest mission site should have returned by now. When they connected the dots between their absence and the violent ¡®earthquakes¡¯, the group was struck with worries.


    Fortunately, the worst case scenario never happened. After three hours of waiting, Sabrina and Sh returned in a rtively bad shape.The mission site they chose was located nearly ten miles deep beneath the ground, thus being greatly affected by the violent earthquake earlier. If it wasn¡¯t for Sabrina mainly studying mechanical spells, having reced a few of her vital organs with powerful magical machinery, perhaps it would be very difficult for them to break through the copsed underground passages that led them back to the surface.


    Out of the five teams that had gone here, only four had returned safely. Hence, it was painfully obvious who among them were attacked.


    Right when the group was about to bitterly ept the loss of two fellow members in their very first trip to the underground world, the young Pseudo-Adept named Leo fled back to their camp, bathed in blood.


    His gray apprentice robe had torn apart here and there, his skinny body full of crisscrossing wounds. Dark smoke emanated from these wounds, staining the flesh around them in pitch-ck color. Leo¡¯s face had also been hit by an Acid Arrow, with half of his face making a sizzling sound resulting from the corrosive effects of the strong acid. If not for his distinct spiritual ripple revealing his identity, the group would¡¯ve treated him as an enemy.


    Although he was severely wounded, Leo still refused his teammates¡¯ treatment. Especially because they were yet to truly establish trust between each other. He does not want his body¡¯s secrets to fall into the control of any outsider.


    Hiding in a corner alone, Leo hastily treated his wounds. He then came back to the group with a gloomy expression, prepared to be questioned by his teammates.


    When they heard there were three ck-robed Pseudo-Adepts and one advanced apprentice attacked Leo and Matthew¡¯s group, even Sabrina couldn¡¯t help but ponder in silence. If she was the one who bumped into the enemy group, maybe she herself wouldn¡¯t escape uscathed. Seeing Leo was able to preserve his own life, it meant he possessed good enough ability to do so.


    ¡°How was the overall strength of the enemies you guys encountered?¡± Sabrina asked Mary after she was done with Leo.


    ¡°We met two enemies, one Pseudo-Adept, and one advanced apprentice. We set up a n and lured away the Pseudo-Adept then ambushed this advanced apprentice. Greem and I cooperated to kill her!¡± Mary described lightly.


    Although she told them it was her and Greem together that killed the enemy, whether it was intentional or not, the group naturally ignored Greem¡¯s existence.


    No way, a beginner apprentice who had less than ten Spirit points and only mastered a spell or two, could a guy like this really participate in a battle between advanced apprentices? The group had a hard time imagining this.


    It was only at this time that Leo noticed the female corpse lying besides Mary¡¯s feet. Immediately after, he shrieked out loudly.


    ¡°S-she... she was among the four who attacked us. After Matthew and I split up and fled on our own, two Pseudo-Adepts went after me while this girl and the other Pseudo-Adept chased after Matthew. I only managed to escape from their pursuit after a bitter fight.¡±


    Although Leo spoke evasively, the group didn¡¯t really care much.


    Split up and flee separately? Hmph. Under such perilous circumstances, would a mere advanced apprentice like Matthew even have the courage to flee on his own? Leo must have realized the situation wasn¡¯t looking too good, thus he ditched Matthew and ran for his life. By doing that, he divided the enemy¡¯s strength and attention.


    Although everyone had already guessed what probably happened, no one med Leo for his actions. If they were in his shoes, they might have done the same thing as him.


    Matthew¡¯s inability to escape can only be me to his ownck of ability. Who gave him the audacity to take on this Red Mission without any life-preserving methods?


    After gathering information from both teams, Sabrina finally concluded the intelligence gathering about the enemies.


    There were three Pseudo-Adepts. The first among them took the path of Bloodline Adepts possessing the frightening bloodline of the Demonic Serpent; the second one took the path of Profound Adepts able to summon some corpse puppets with powerful battle power; thest Pseudo-Adept walk the path of Principle Adepts having an elemental affinity with Wind Elementium.


    With this intelligence in their hands and the dead body of an enemy advanced apprentice, the group received rewards from Adept Angus when they returned to the Adept Tower. Although Leo was ambushed on his way back, he was still able to return andplete his mission, thus he also received his share of the reward.


    As for Mary, the girl who got lucky and was able to kill an enemy of the same rank all alone, she obtained a special reward from Adept Angus. But no one knows what kind of reward she actually received since the process of giving out rewards was done with utmost secrecy.


    At the time the group was about to leave, Adept Angus warned them in a ghastly voice saying, ¡°Little apprentices, you better not regard yourselves as veterans already after only one sessful trip from the underground world. In the uing mission you will have, you¡¯ll be met with more difficulty with the frequency of attacks from the enemy will rise. Only those who are cautious and prepared will live longer lives. So take advantage of the few days of rest you have, otherwise, you won¡¯t be as lucky as you are now in your next trip.¡±


    ¡°Moreover, the intelligence you brought back is useful. I¡¯ll pass them onto the hunting team here. I assure you, the ones who attacked you wouldn¡¯t have a peaceful trip back towards their base. Jajaja...¡±


    From the hidden meaning faintly revealed by Adept Angus¡¯ words, the group finally understood the importance of the few apprentice teams that only consisted of pure veterans.


    If we were to talk about it figuratively then, them, the new team would be the bait to lure out the prey. While the team of ckhand Kevin would be the harpooner that strikes down the enemy. One acting as a prey to lure out the strong enemy apprentices, while the other acted as the hunter, specialized in hunting down these ck-robed Pseudo-Adepts who took the bait and exposed themselves.


    In fact, when those ck-robed Pseudo-Adepts failed to kill Leo and Mary, they had also exposed their whereabouts. With just a send of a message, the hunting group who had roamed the underground world for many years would immediately pursue them.


    Upon imagining the possible cruel fates the ones who ambushed him and made him flee in desperation, a savage smile emerged on the Leo¡¯s half-festered face.

 Chapter 58

    The reward they received was directly tied to the difficulty of the mission they turned over.


    The mission that Mary and Greempleted together had the lowest degree of risk, so the reward they received was much lesserpared to the others. But the special reward they got from bringing back an enemy¡¯s body made them smile widely.


    After they returned to their residences, Greem was nning on having a good rest in his room. But Mary stopped him and threw an object at him.


    It was an Earth Element Crystal Core the size of an egg. An earthly yellow halo can be seen floating around the brownish yellow core with bits of tiny bright specks of light emitted from it. When he was holding it in his hand, It shined beautifully like a bright and shimmering star!


    Greem could not help but hold his breath.


    Through the rhythm of the undting elemental ripples, he could clearly see that it was a Pseudo-Adept level Earth Element Crystal Core.


    ¡°You deserve this. I had already savored my reward by sucking dry all the blood essence of the enemy. Let this be the reward for your hard work!¡± Mary was still as generous as always and with that said, she turned towards her own room and went in.


    Greem was pleasantly surprise and hesitated for a while but finally decided to keep the gift and went back to his room.


    Greem waited for a bit to ascertain the surroundings were safe and calmed his mind. He remained silent as he startedmunicating with the Chip.


    ¡°Chip, can you digitize Mary¡¯s attributes?¡±


    ¡°Beep. Data collection has beenpleted... Detailed information is as follows...¡±


    Ugh... She does indeed have a powerful ability that allows her to evolve just by sucking blood. Greem wondered what kind of magical experiment Adept Anderson, one who had resided in the Swamp Tower all these years, did to Mary. How is he able to create such a frightening magical puppet?


    If Greem guessed correctly, Adept Anderson must have ced some kind of controlling mechanism in Mary¡¯s body, deeply rooted in her Vampire bloodline. Although Adept Anderson might be lenient towards Mary now, once she matured sufficiently to his taste, perhaps that will be the time he wille and harvest what he had fostered.


    What was the limit of Mary¡¯s growth? Pseudo-Adept or official Adept? Could it be, Adept Aderson is nning to use some kind of method to create an Adept-level magical puppet?


    Most importantly, once Mary bes a Pseudo-Adept, she would have the terrifying ability to produce blood ves. At that time, if Adept Anderson really wants her to, Mary could give him a loyal army of blood ves. For a first grade Adept like him, this would be an excellent trump card against his enemies!


    Mary might already be aware of her own situation which is why she was rather self-indulgent in both her actions and words. She did everything arbitrarily, unrestrained by her own natural instincts. She probably isn¡¯t able to distinguish whether her thoughts wasing from her true self or from the will Adept Anderson nted deep within her soul using magic.


    That¡¯s why even though the rtionship between Greem and Mary had been rather good as ofte, he still harbored vignce deep within his heart because he did not know when the trigger hidden in Mary¡¯s body would be activated.


    But this was a ¡®small problem¡¯ that can be solved with time. So long as Greem sessfully be an official Adept, that Adept Anderson would no longer be a superior existence he couldn¡¯t reach. Perhaps he could even solve Mary¡¯s problem through exchanging benefits or other means.


    Greem satfortably in front of the wooden table in his temporary shelter. He took out the spoils of the previous underground trip examining them one by one.


    Naturally so, the thorny armor bracelet and the storage waistband he looted from Anna had to be kept for his own use. As for the earrings that has a self-healing effect, he would put it up for sale in exchange for magical equipment that¡¯s more suitable for him. Since he already scanned and copied the contents of the notes about magic spells, it was no longer valuable to Greem. He would sell it too and see if anyone was interested.


    The crystal green wooden stick and magical Mythril looked like the materials Anna had prepared to craft her future magical staff. Too bad though, as she hadn¡¯t collected all the required materials, so she had to carry them with her which ended up as loot for Greem.


    After having Adept Angus identify the crystal green wooden stick, he found out it was a tree branch from an Adept-level Treant that boosts the power of all nt Element magic spells. Regarding the magical Mythril, it was a native product of the underground world, unable to be found above the surface. The thumb-size Mythril Greem found can easily fetch a price of more than a thousand magic crystals. It¡¯s also quite rare and highly demanded that once it was sold, it can¡¯t be bought back with the same price.


    This is only natural as magic Mythril is a high-ss consumable product and those who already got it after spending a hefty amount of money will also soon use them up. So a situation of high demand but low supply persisted.


    Therefore, if Greem really wanted to craft his first-ever magic staff, he doesn¡¯t have to find magic Mythril anymore. Though he needed to rece the material used as the main body of the staff. In the end, Greem¡¯s elemental affinity was Fire and not the nt Element.


    Concerning thest item, the wooden statue, Adept Angus identified it as a spiritual beacon used tomunicate with creatures from other nes. ording to Adept Angus¡¯ exnation, that female apprentice Fallen Adept that they killed could establish a stable and strong connection with an unknown powerful being from another ne through the ritual of Spirit Summoning. And it seems that from time to time, they would exchange items from the other¡¯s ne that they needed.


    However, for this matter, Adept Angus expressed serious contempt.


    The World of Adepts itself is a major ne that attracted the universe¡¯s attention, dominating more than thousands of small and medium-sized nes. And thus, no matter what kind of resources one needed, anyone could obtain it through the local trading system. There wasn¡¯t any need to use the backward method ofmunicating with other nes. Because each and every one of these nes have their own respective principles, added to that the severe interference caused by the tidal waves of energy from the oceans of stars, the resources consumed by a sessful long-range item exchange would be three to five times higher or more, in contrast to the cost to get it via the normal method.


    If it wasn¡¯t for some extremely rare types of resources, no one would use such a primitive method anymore. As for the reason why that female apprentice still kept thismunication beacon, it is most probable that she wanted to exchange knowledge with that existence.


    And this was strictly forbidden by the entire Adept society!


    Most importantly, if a native Adept carried out such scornful behavior that betrays the Will of the Adept World, then it would essentially reduce the beneficial response that person gets from the Will itself. As a result, it would be progressively harder for the Adept to advance to a higher gradepared to others.


    That¡¯s why there are not that many official Adepts who would do something like this, an act that would give them more losses than what they would gain. Probably only those Fallen Adepts that were banned by official Adepts would be willing to use this inefficient and harmful method simr to quenching thirst with poison.


    Being just a mere beginner apprentice, Greem still haven¡¯t qualified to get in contact with the Will of the world in a direct and clear manner. So, regarding the Will that Adept Angus had revered in utmost respect, Greem¡¯s mind was filled with curiosity. Even though he has no specific n to use it for magic experiments, he still kept the wooden statue with him.


    Maybe, just maybe, when his ability has improved a bit allowing him full control of his own life, he might consider exchanging something that he¡¯s interested in with the powerful beings that existed in other magical and mysterious nes.


    As for the Pseudo-Adept level Earth Element Crystal Core he got unexpectedly, Greem did not dare to deal with it carelessly. He ordered the Chip to give it a full scan then have it draft a n for a custom golem modification.


    After Greem was done with all these, he took out a magic book and began his daily routine of studying while working with the Chip to run simted experiments within his spiritual domain. When his Spirit was at the brink of depletion, he lied down on his bed and started to go in a state of deep meditation.


    Now, with the help of the Chip, he could enter into a deep meditative state whenever he wanted. Every meditation would give him an increase of 0.08 Spirit and four experience points. This was very important for any Adept since it could increase their maximum level of Spirit. While there are many Adepts who would consume magic medicines or special potions to increase their Spirit, this isn¡¯t an option for those ordinary apprentices without the support of a wealthy family who would offset the astronomical cost of the said special consumables.


    For example, the ¡®Mind Concentrating Potion¡¯ which was very effective in increasing the Spirit of any apprentices below the level of advanced apprentice. The list price for it in the Potion Hall of the Adept Tower was five merit points plus five magic crystals for every bottle. A bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion could bring an increase of 0.5 to 0.7 Spirit to a beginner and intermediate apprentice. Despite the fact that the number wasn¡¯t that remarkable, it was still a precious item for those ordinary apprentice Adepts.


    After all, before Greem had the help from the Chip, he could hardly enter into a deep state of meditation. Besides, normal meditation could only bring an additional increase of 0.01 to 0.02 to Greem which was vastly inferior to his current rate of growth from his deep meditations.


    Strictly speaking, merely a bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion could save two full months of strenuous meditation for an apprentice Adept. By looking at its wondrous effects, even if the price of Mind Concentrating Potion was rather expensive, it was still sought after by countless apprentices.


    Merit points is used to purchase most of the resources in this ce. It waspletely different from the knowledge points Greem gained back in the Swamp Tower. The knowledge points he knew of were merely a currency implemented by Adept Anderson solely for use inside the Swamp Tower. On the other hand, merit points implemented by the Zhentarim Association could be used in any area that was under them.


    As for the other three major Adept associations, they also have their very own independent currency system. There is clear dissimrity between them and they also couldn¡¯t be exchanged with one another.


    After risking his life through thepletion of his very first underground inspection mission, aside from the rewards he got, Greem also received five merit points which was just enough for him to buy one bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion.


    It was already midnight when he was done meditating. After verifying the results from his meditation, his body was wracked with exhaustion. Greem shook away all other thoughts and went to a deep slumber.

 Chapter 59

    Built by the Zhentarim Association, the Adept Tower garrisoned in the Underground Cave was considered a small one. It had seven floors aboveground and two floors below, making it a building that consisted of nine floors.


    It¡¯s worth noting that the structure of the building was also simr to the Swamp Tower which Greem had stayed before.


    The first to third floors above the ground was a public area. They were open to all apprentice Adepts, functioning as the main area of activity for them. The public facilities avable for them covered nearly every field of study an apprentice could ever be involved in. On the other hand, the fourth to seventh floors were only avable to official Adepts, serving as their living quarters and a site for experimentations. If any apprentice intruded in these ces without special permission, they would be mercilessly attacked by the defensive mechanisms of the Adept Tower.


    Currently, Greem was out on a stroll around the public hall located on the first floor of the tower.


    Unlike Swamp Tower, the Underground Cave was an open territory, allowing apprentice Adepts to form their own items to visit different areas in search of materials and harvest resources. That¡¯s why the materials and resources avable in this ce was many times more abundantpared to the Swamp Tower.


    In addition to the gloomy and dark underground world, there¡¯s also the resource-rich Ker Mountain Range in the surface. Within the confines of these steep mountains, countless exotic flowers and rare herbs can be found growing healthily. While numerous powerful magic creatures were hiding in their respective nests deep within mountains.


    Actually, the surrounding area of the Underground Cave was perfectly suitable in nurturing apprentice Adepts.


    For beginner apprentices, they could team up together and venture into the wild forest around the Adept Tower to harvest the resources they need. They could even practice their magic spells while they were at it at the animals that can bemonly found in the woods. Intermediate apprentices could venture deeper, able to set foot into the depths of the mountain range and go for solitary training. As for advanced apprentices, they could journey to the upper regions of the underground world, fighting Ratmen, Hooked Horrors and many more undead creatures.


    An apprentice Adept who honed his skills through these methods would be far more brutal and strong-willed than an apprentice from the Swamp Tower who only know how to grow with time through long-term meditation. In other words, Greem gave off the impression of a typical apprentice that came from a low-tier Adept academy, while the others seemed to be battle hardened apprentices who learned from realbat. There was too much of a difference between them that they cannot bepared at all.


    Early in the morning, the public hall had already been packed to the brim with apprentice Adepts who are seeking for new additions to their teams. Most of them were beginner and intermediate apprentices with a small number of advanced apprentices can be found among them. Even more apprentices were on the corners of the hall with ck cloth spread out on the floor, with a couple of strange looking items on top of it, all the while holding a book in their hands. When an apprentice came up to them, only then would theyzily answer a few words. They would just read their books quietly most of the time.


    This lifestyle waspletely different from the Swamp Tower making Greem feel envy but helpless before it.


    After all, before they entered Swamp Tower to learn, all apprentice Adepts were required to sign a magic contract with Adept Anderson, making them lifetime apprentices of the tower. In order to break free of this contract, there were only two methods: Either obtain Adept Anderson¡¯s permission or be an official Adept.


    If any apprentice bound by the contract secretly escapes from the Adept Tower he belonged to, he would lose his status as an apprentice, bing a traitor that will be sought after by hunters. Truth was, among those Fallen Adepts living in the depths of the Underground Cave, majority of them were traitors before they became Adepts. However, with their status as an Adept not being approved by the Zhentarim Association, they could only conceal their identities and be stray Adepts.


    Although Greem envied the lifestyles of apprentices in this ce, he could only shake his head and sigh as he felt sad for his fate.


    Taking cover within the crowd of apprentices, Greem browsed through the stalls located on the sides of the road while secretly examining these apprentice Adepts of the Underground Cave.


    From the apprentices who were recruiting members in the center of the main hall, Greem found out something about them. He noticed that even a beginner apprentice here would be fully equipped with decent magic equipments and magical items. The magic wand that can hasten casting speed, a waist pouch full of magic scrolls and potions, a dazzling disy of tiny decorations... each and every one of them here was considered a mini arsenal. Although their individual battle power wasn¡¯t strong, but with the help of so many items to supplement them, they would be able to bombard the enemy with a plethora of magic spells.


    In Greem¡¯s eyes, these apprentices were walking human gold coins. From top to bottom, inside and out, every single inch of their body was giving off the strong smell of money. Comparing himself to them, Greem can¡¯t help but feel ashamed of his own unbing, quickly erasing the proud feeling he had after the small victory he aplished.


    Possibly only the beginner apprentices who ran stalls while reading books would be the only people as poor as Greem. Anyone can easily tell they just became beginner apprentices, the rookies who are still unqualified to venture into the wild.


    Greem circled around the public hall and when he had stored enough information, he stopped and came to a rather lively stall and interacted with the owner.


    The owner of the stall was a young man. He looked quite heavy, donning a poorly fitted short apprentice robe provided by the Adept Tower. This gave him a funny appearance. Together with his facial features that kept changing while he was talking, all of these had made his stall the liveliest ce in this area.


    ¡°Hello, my name is Greem!¡± Greem walked up to the owner and introduced himself.


    ¡°That... hello to you too, my name is Sam.¡± The fatty responded with humorous atmosphere. He continued, ¡°Is there anything I can help you with?¡±


    ¡°Hello, Sam. I would like to inquire, is there any special procedure that I have to go through to be a vendor here?¡±


    ¡°Ugh...


    Sam stared at Greem from top to bottom and asked curiously, ¡°You¡¯re a new beginner apprentice here, aren¡¯t you?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s right! I just came here two days ago.¡± Greem replied vaguely. He didn¡¯t want to waste any energy in exining why he, a mere beginner apprentice, woulde to this ce and carried out a deadly mission here in the Underground Cave.


    ¡°You poor thing! You must be a neer who was ditched by your mentor. I knew it at first sight! But don¡¯t worry, just follow your big brother Sam and sooner orter, you¡¯ll be like them, armored to the teeth with all kinds of magical equipment..¡± Unexpectedly, Sam was actually a warm-hearted person, as he quickly activated his enthusiastic brother mode.


    But when Greem had nced on this guy¡¯s face, he was left speechless after seeing the data detected from Sam in his mind.


    This person who proimed himself as big brother was actually a super rookie, a beginner apprentice who only has six Spirit points. This had nearly driven Greem insane.


    ¡°Ugh...Sam, I just wanted to ask you... Can I also put up a stall here to sell a few items?¡±


    ¡°No problem, it¡¯s not a problem at all! I, Sam, is known for taking good care for all neers. Come here... I still have some extra spare space here, you can just ce your things here!¡±


    After he obtained Sam¡¯s permission, Greem quickly paced a tray-sized ck cloth on the ground then took out five items from his waist pouch, cing them on top. There was the nt element self-healing earrings, the crystal green wooden stick used as the body of a magic staff, leather boots that has the ability of ¡°Jungle Walk¡± that enables the user to walk unhindered in jungles or woods, the Croaking Frog andstly, the notebook of magic spells he got from the enemy.


    The leather boots were here too, and the reason why made Greem angry. The reason was simple, Mary didn¡¯t like it as the magical pattern on top of the boots wasn¡¯t exquisite enough for her taste. So, early in the morning, she simply threw them back to Greem asking him to get rid of it himself.


    Greem totally could not understand this reason at all. And thus, hebeled Mary as one of the most iprehensible creatures of this world.


    Watching how Greem had made a fuss while setting up his stall, Sam, who sat beside him wasn¡¯t able to hold hisughter. He gave Greem¡¯s shoulder a pat and warmly said, ¡°Yo brother. Don¡¯t me your big brother for not reminding you. You¡¯re going to have a hard time selling your item by doing that.¡±


    ¡°Take a look at me! My stall is so big while yours is very small. With what are you going to attract people¡¯s attention? Look, my stall even has a superb collection of beautiful things, but you only have... wait, what¡¯s that?¡±


    No matter how weak Sam¡¯s Spirit was, he was still able to quickly sense the distinct magical ripples from the items that Greem took out. Good heavens! He had a total of five items, and four of them were obviously magical items! From the design of those items and the magic runes carved on them, they clearly looked like items from the underground world.


    Puzzled, Sam stretched out his arm and picked up the pair of magic earrings and carefully gave it a look. In an instant, he let out a cry full of shock, ¡°Recovery Earrings! This is a pair of Recovery Earrings!¡±


    Although his voice wasn¡¯t that loud, it still alerted a few apprentice Adepts who happened to pass by. One after another, they stopped by the stall and turned their eyes to the earrings held in fatty¡¯s palm.


    ¡°Fatty, what are you shouting at? Can you really get yourself a pair of Recovery Earrings? Don¡¯t try to bluff with us!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s right! Sam, you must have gone mad from wanting a pair of Recovery Earrings! Can a poor vendor like you really find yourself a pair of Recovery Earrings? Hahaha...¡±


    Ridiculed by the surrounding crowd, Sam¡¯s face flushed with embarrassment but he never loosened his tight grip on the pair of earrings.


    Among the crowd, a girl with delicate features and a sweet smile suddenly walked towards the stall.


    ¡°Sam, can you let me have a look at those earrings?¡±


    ¡°This... the muscles on the fatty¡¯ face twitched as he showed a look of wanting to give himself two ps on his face.


    In the end, he had no choice but to helplessly open his palm revealing the beautifully crafted earrings in front of this female apprentice.


    Curious, this female intermediate apprentice picked up the pair of magical earrings and examined it. After that, a pleasantly surprised expression was portrayed on her face. Under her skillful control, a bright green glow quickly and shily emitted from this seemingly unimportant looking magical item. A faint fragrance of vegetation spread out and filled the surrounding air.


    A series of gasping sounds could be heard.


    ¡°There really was a pair of Recovery Earrings!¡±


    ¡°Heavens! Someone is selling a tier-3 magical item in the main hall...¡±


    ¡°No way! I have to inform Lina quickly! She had always wanted a pair of Recovery Earrings!¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re right! I have to inform my boss too...¡±


    ¡°...¡±


    Within the crowd, many people hastily took out strange lookingmunication devices. In an instant, sounds of frogs croaking, birds chirping, insects calling, wolf howling... all kinds of weird animal noises reverberated in the entirety of the main hall.

 Chapter 60

    Greem rubbed his nose, clearly taken aback by the massive uproar. On the other hand, the fatty Sam couldn¡¯t help but keep whispering to himself.


    ¡°This is bad... this is really bad... if I knew beforehand that it was truly a pair of Recovery Earrings, I wouldn¡¯t have shouted out loud with my big fat mouth! If boss Kern knows about this, he¡¯ll surely give me a good scolding...¡± after he finished saying that, he also took out a round crystal ball and used it to call someone.


    The messy situation made Greem¡¯s brows furrow. He had no idea what had caused thismotion. It was just some ordinary self-healing earrings, how was it able to cause such amotion? However, through the help of his sensitive senses, he soon heard a keyword from the conversations between the surrounding apprentices.


    Tier-3 magical item!


    Greem had only read a few books of Alchemy before and had neverprehensively learned or researched much about the ssification of magical items. That¡¯s why he was totally unfamiliar with the term of Tier-3 magical item.


    Right when he was hesitating while thinking, the delicate looking female apprentice finally asked her question.


    ¡°Pardon me, between the two of you, who is the owner of these Recovery Earrings?¡±


    Meanwhile, fatty Sam had gloomily set aside hismunication crystal and with a discouraged look, he pointed his finger at Greem.


    Left without any choice, Greem nodded his head and rubbed his nose saying, ¡°I own this item!¡±


    ¡°How much are you selling it for? How many magic crystals?¡± The female apprentice asked, full of anticipation.


    ¡°I¡¯m not selling it!¡±


    ¡°Not selling? Then why did you disy it?¡±


    ¡°Instead of selling, this item can only be traded. Items of the nt element doesn¡¯t suit me, so that¡¯s why I nned to exchange it with...:¡±


    Before Greem was able to finish his words, an uproar suddenly broke out from the crowd. Soon, a few men covered in sweat pushed through the crowd and arrived in front of him.


    These men were shocked to see each other in front of the stall and red at each other furiously.


    ¡°Boy from the Patton family, it¡¯s you again? One of my man saw this item first today, don¡¯t you go on thinking you can seize it from us!¡± A burly man said in an imposing manner. He was also carrying a broadsword strapped on his back, wearing a finely made leather armor.


    On the other hand, while showing a sinister expression and unwilling to be outdone, an apprentice in a gray robe who had rushed here responded disdainfully, ¡°Your man saw it first? Hmph. Just with that childish thinking alone makes you unworthy of my time. Whoever bids the highest price will get the item, this is the rule of this ce. If you¡¯re so great as you say, why don¡¯t you buy everything you see here?¡±


    Apparently, both men were team leaders of two established teams with both possessing the ability of advance apprentices. Therefore, when they started to challenge each other, the raging killing intent they exuded gave made everyone suffocate to the pressure. Since this ce was the inner area of the Adept Tower, none of them dared to start a real fight. What they could do, however, was to keep pressuring the other side using their powerful spirit.


    ¡°Alright, alright! Why are you two doing this every time you meet? Since all of us came across the Recovery Earrings together, let¡¯s name our prices. We¡¯ll see who get¡¯s it at the end!¡±


    The voice came from a young man dressed in a red robe who pushed his way out through the crowd.


    Although he looked young, he had a calm and cold expression, like someone who had been through many things. He didn¡¯t have a handsome face but he wasn¡¯t ugly either, his looks were quitemon, a faint smile formed from his slips.


    ¡°What a surprise, Boss Kern is here too!¡±


    ¡°This is going to be lively!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t push me aside! I still want to see what will happen!¡±


    ...


    ...


    The crowd¡¯smotion was getting louder and louder.


    The man in the red robe turned around, sweeping his eyes over the crowd that had gathered. They quickly settled down when his nced passed by them. Afterwards, he gave the crowd a warm smile.


    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s stop making a racket. It¡¯s quite rare to encounter a pair of Recovery Earrings here, and we all know everybody would want to get their hands on it, but we¡¯ll see who has the fortune of bing its owner in the end!¡±


    Being suppressed by the man in the red robe, the two team leaders had no other choice but to retract their spiritual pressure. Together, they all went in front of Greem¡¯s stall, casting greedy looks towards the earrings resting on the female apprentice¡¯s palm.


    This female apprentice was clearly a team member of the guy with the broadsword as his brows quivered with extreme pleasure when he saw her.


    ¡°Heidi, you truly have a good pair of sharp eyes. How is it? Are you able to buy this pair of earrings? If you don¡¯t have enough magic crystals, the few of us together can go gather more. You have to buy it, no matter what!¡±


    The man in the gray robe and Kern furrowed their brows at the same time.


    ¡°But he doesn¡¯t want to sell, he only wants to trade it with something else!¡± Heidi couldn¡¯t help but stomp her foot.


    ¡°Trade?¡± All the three leaders were struck dumb and immediately asked, ¡°Trade with what?¡±


    ¡°Trade it with fire element magical items!¡±


    The three men simultaneously became silent.


    Where was this ce? It was the Underground Cave!


    Fire element materials were extremely rare in this ce. As a result, all Fire element magical items were considered a raremodity.


    However, all three of them were obviously not someone who would give up easily. One after the other, they all secretlymunicated with Greem through Spiritual Whisper, seeking for an alternative deal but Greem was firmly turned them all down.


    Right when the three leaders were calling their men to help out and look for fire element magical items, Greem found a chance to ask fatty Sam and learned the main reason why Recovery Earrings was a sought after item by many people.


    For most of the beginner and intermediate apprentices here, although the resources and materials found in Underground Cave had a high value, the risk from obtaining them was consequentially enormous. So most of their training and the areas of activity were carried out in the Ker Mountain Range. Catching demon beasts, harvesting magical medicines, exploring secret ces, all of these were always apanied with unpredictable dangers. Therefore, if a team could have a member with them who was well-versed in healing during their trip, it would definitely bring massive benefits to any apprentice team.


    That¡¯s because if they only use Blood Coagting Medicinal Paste and Health Potions in healing their injured team members, the expenses they would incur would be too much, cutting down their earnings. Under such circumstances, a nt element Recovery spell would definitely help them save arge amount of additional expenses. Also, one advantage of the Recovery earrings was that, once the nt element energy stored within it ran out, they only have to stay within a ce filled with lush vegetation for a period of time and the energy would be refilled automatically.


    This, without a doubt, gave it a higher value!


    As for the so-called tier-3 magical items, it was actually a ssification of magical items given by apprentices. Magical items that could provide an effect 10 to 20 energy points were ssified as tier-1. Most small decorative items crafted by apprentice Adept belong to this category.


    Meanwhile, items that could provide 20 to 30 energy points of effect were tier-2 magical items. Sometimes, a few top quality items that were crafted by apprentices would be able to reach this tier as well.


    As for the tier-3 magical items, their effects had reached an outstanding 30 to 40 energy points. Most of these items were crafted by official Adepts, usually as the products of their alchemy training. But when it falls to the hands of an apprentice Adept, it would be their trump card that can increase their strength.


    After listening to fatty¡¯s exnation, Greem was confused and said, ¡°This is impossible! I have tested it myself and these earrings can only provide me at most 10 green life energy. It can¡¯t be a tier-3 magical item!¡±


    Hearing what Greem had said, fatty couldn¡¯t help but pat his shoulder.


    ¡°Don¡¯t tell me you were using your own energy to test it? In order to activate the Recovery Earrings¡¯ maximum healing effect, there are two conditions. Firstly, you have to use it at ce filled with vegetation like for example, a forest. Secondly, the user must also be a nt element apprentice. Since you¡¯re a fire element apprentice, the effect would surely be reduced!¡±


    Atst, Greem was lit with a me ofprehension.


    No wonder these earrings gave him such a weak response when he tested it. Although the female apprentice only gave it a brief test, it instantly showed a distinct green glow. Apparently, he had used the wrong energy for it!


    ncing at the noisy scene, fatty shook his head while saying, ¡°This have be such a mess... if this continues, those bastards of the enforcement force might be drawn to themotion here soon...¡±


    Maybe fatty was truly a real jinx or bad things were really just supposed to happen. Amotion broke out from the crowd once again as two intermediate apprentices wearing blue uniforms rushed in through the audience.


    ¡°Who was the one? Who dared selling tier-3 magical item in this ce? Who gave you the audacity to do this? Don¡¯t you all know tier-2 and above magical items and equipment can only be traded by us, the Murphy Association?¡± Showing a fierce expression, the young apprentice who was in the lead viciously red at fatty Sam upon his arrival, convinced that the guy was the culprit.


    ¡°Sure enough, it¡¯s you again! Sam! How dare you!¡±


    His face covered with fury, Sam refused, ¡°Ryan, you better not speak without knowing the truth. This thing doesn¡¯t belong to me. No matter how unreasonable you are, you can¡¯t incriminate an innocent man!¡±


    The enforcement guy named Ryan moved his somber nce away from Sam¡¯s face and came to a stop on Greem who was wearing a calm and rxed expression. He was suddenly hit with uncertainty.


    Although there were many apprentices in this Adept Tower, he knew who possessed strong abilities among them. However, he never once saw this beginner apprentice before, and from where did this guy found a tier-3 magical item?


    ¡°Kid, I think you don¡¯t probably know the rules in this ce!¡± Ryan stood loftily in front of Greem and continued, ¡°As I said earlier, in this Adept Tower, any tier-2 and above magical item can only be sold to us, the Murphy Association. This is the magic contract that was signed between our association and Adept Howard. If you don¡¯t obey the rule, you¡¯ll risk having your apprentice status being revoked! Hmph...¡±


    After he finished saying that, he timely snatched the earrings away from the female apprentice¡¯s palm and held it in front of his face. After inspecting it, he nodded with satisfaction.


    ¡°The quality of this earrings is pretty good. ording to the rules of Murphy Association, I¡¯ll buy it from you using the market price. The price is...¡± Ryan rolled his eyes and added, ¡°Fifteen magic crystals!¡±


    Ryan actually only wanted to say twelve magic crystals but he realized there were too many apprentices gathered around. He had no choice but increase it by a tiny bit.


    But even so, when the price of fifteen magic crystals was heard by the crowd, an uproar quickly ensued.


    ¡°Why don¡¯t you go and rob someone else?¡±


    ¡°Heavens! Only fifteen magic crystals! This price can¡¯t even buy a mere tier-1 magical item!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s right, this is robbery in broad daylight!¡±


    ...


    ...


    The agitated replies of the apprentices obviously made Ryan angry from embarrassment.


    ¡°Shut up! This is the agreement between our association and the master Adept himself! Who dares to question me? If any of you still make irresponsible remarks, I¡¯ll immediately report you to the Adept on duty!¡±


    His blunt threats eventually quieted down the crowd. Even the three leaders who were standing in front of the stall were wearing annoyed expressions, suppressing their fury.

 Chapter 61

    After finding out that the crowd had be quiet, Ryan nodded in satisfaction.


    Right at this moment, a servant who had followed him here suddenly pulled on his sleeve from behind, pouting his lips at Greem¡¯s stall.


    ¡°Master Ryan, why do I have a feeling that those other items aren¡¯t ordinary things too?¡±


    Ryan leaned his face forward and gave those items a careful look. Indeed, it was as the servant had said. He discovered some rather umon characteristics among them.


    ¡°Croaking Frog, Elven Boot, Treant Branch...¡±


    For every name he called out, the crowd would gasp in amazement. And when the name of Treant Branch was called out, a few apprentices who were experts in nt element magic spells couldn¡¯t help but ce their palms against their chests, as if they couldn¡¯t withstand the intense shock with their heart breaking into pieces.


    At the same time, fatty Sam was wearing an unsightly expression. He was portraying a look as if his heart had died, much like the look one would have if their father had just passed away.


    As for the other few team leaders, they had totally given up their intention of owning these treasures. They called their men back and walked away from the stall, bing one of the bystanders instead. They had a clear judgement. If a beginner apprentice was struck by luck, it was possible that he could find himself a tier-3 magical item. But if this beginner apprentice was able to take out a couple of tier-3 magical items together, then it wasn¡¯t luck anymore.


    Only a beginner apprentice who was backed by a powerful n or one who was exceptionally powerful could do so. Either person was not someone they could afford to offend. Perhaps it was only Ryan, who was blinded by his own greed, who could not see such a simple fact!


    Indeed, upon seeing so many tier-3 magical items, Ryan could no longer maintain his calm. He immediately stretched his arms forward and tried to snatch all of them away.


    Pap!


    Arge hand reached out from the side and grabbed his wrist.


    ¡°Mister, I don¡¯t think you have the right to forcibly buy my items!¡± Greem could no longer stand the lousy show this clown was putting on, so he decided to stop this man from continuing to behave recklessly.


    ¡°Why? You dare to disagree with me? Every single apprentice who lives in this Adept Tower knows that all tier-3 magical items are traded solely by us, the Murphy Association. You¡¯ve already vited the rules for trading in this ce, so you better be careful or else I¡¯ll put you into custody!¡±


    ¡°Haha, mister. I think the agreement signed between your Murphy Association and master Adept himself is only limited to the members of this Adept Tower, right? However, I¡¯m not an apprentice of this ce. Furthermore, these items weren¡¯t produced by your Adept Tower. Therefore, what gives you the right to forcibly buy them off me?¡±


    ¡°Kid, don¡¯t try to fool me. If you¡¯re not a part of this Adept Tower, how did you enter this ce? Hmph. You better let go of your grip, or else...¡±


    ¡°Or else what?¡±


    ¡°Or else, I¡¯ll take you to Enforcement Quarter and teach you a good lesson!¡±


    ¡°Hehe, if you really n to do so, you should prepare to be humiliated!¡± Greemughed through clenched teeth. He was finally unable to take it anymore and waspletely pissed off by this idiot.


    ¡°What? Are you going to assault me?¡±


    While saying that, Ryan pped on his waist. In that instant, ck and thick hairs suddenly burst out from his once fair and clean face, and his body vaguely started to expand.


    Beastialize!


    A frown appeared on Greem¡¯s face. He took two steps back, and swiped his fingers across his waist pouch, taking out two summoning crystal cores.


    Right when he was hesitating about whether or not he should really fight, a cold voice could be heard from the middle of the crowd.


    ¡°Stop right there!¡±


    The voice sounded familiar to Greem.


    Greem immediately recognized him after being hinted by the Chip.


    A thought came over him, so he clenched his right palm tightly and didn¡¯t throw the summoning crystal cores out.


    To be honest, this ce wasn¡¯t suitable for the Demon Alligator Hunter to fight. Firstly, there wasn¡¯t any y in the public hall. The only way to get the Earth Elementium was to try and absorb it from the surrounding air, however, this wasn¡¯t an easy task. Also, as the Demon Alligator Hunter was his trump card, the better he kept it a secret, the better the result would be in a real fight. Thus, unless it was a critical moment, he didn¡¯t want to expose this secret.


    Right when both men were confronting each other aggressively, a man strode out from the crowd. Judging from the way the crowd parted to make way for this man, it was obvious he was quite well-known.


    ¡°Master Kevin!¡±


    ......


    One after another, the apprentice Adepts bowed and greeted the man. Soon, ckhand Kevin, the advanced apprentice who Greem had run into once, arrived next to both the men.


    ¡°Master Kevin, why are you here?¡± Ryan, the blue-robedw enforcement, nodded while bowing towards Kevin.


    The young, yet prestigious, Kevin wouldn¡¯t even bother responding to Ryan. Instead, he nodded his head at Greem. He then squatted in front of Greem¡¯s stall and examined the items.


    ¡°Elven Boot, Croaking Frog, Treant Branch... good stuff, they¡¯re all tier-3 magical items. No wonder these guys are so crazy about it. But, I thought I heard someone say that there was a pair of Recovery Earrings here?¡±


    ¡°That... that... master, the Recovery Earrings are here!¡± Ryan hesitantly handed over the Recovery Earrings.


    ¡°Alright!¡± Kevin took over the earring and tossed it back to the stall. Then he assumed a serious attitude and grabbed the magical notes. He gave it a few flips and briefly read through.


    Finally, Kevin raised his head and lightly sighed.


    ¡°Just as I came back, I received news that the Demon Vine Lady was killed in the underground world, but I didn¡¯t believe it. I¡¯d never have thought that you¡¯d even brought back her notes about magic spells. I suppose these items are taken from her, too? You¡¯re really one of the younger generation who is worthy of respect!¡±


    ¡°Demon Vine Lady? Are you referring to the girl who can transform her body? She was killed by Master Mary, and it was her who ordered me to sell these equipments!¡±


    ¡°Mary? The girl who can transform into a vampire?¡± After pondering for a few moments, Kevin chose to believe Greem¡¯s exnation. After all, no matter how he looked at it, it was impossible to believe that a beginner apprentice would have the ability to kill a notorious advanced apprentice Fallen Adept. ¡°Pack up all your things and follow me! You won¡¯t find anything you want here. I¡¯ll bring you to the ce you¡¯re supposed to go!¡±


    After finishing speaking, he helped Greem roll up the cloth before striding away. Throughout the entire process, he simply ignored the existence of Ryan.


    After both men finally disappeared from the sight of the crowd, an uproar once again broke out from the public hall. The few team leaders even dragged fatty Sam to a corner to thoroughly question him about the background of that mysterious young man.


    But those questions had lost all meaning to Greem. He was totally struck dumb by what he saw now.


    Kevin had brought him to a small training camp outside of the Adept Tower. In order to reach the camp, they had to fly. Therefore Kevin led him to a flying demon beast. For the first time in his life, Greem had the chance to ride on a flying demon beast. The demon beast Kevin had led him to was referred to as a ¡®Socrates Condor¡¯.


    Socrates Condor was an advanced apprentice level Wind Element demon beast. It stood three meters tall and had a full wing span of five meters. It had a big, strong body and possessed the ability to cast Wind de, Wind Vortex and a few other basic Wind Element magic spells. It was a rare flying creature that dominated the forest region.


    Because of its great physical strength and incredible flying speed, they were often captured by Adepts and tamed into excellent flying vehicles.


    It was the first time he had the opportunity to fly on a demon beast, so he was rather nervous about the experience.


    When the majestic looking condor soared up into the sky, its golden feathers sparkling in the sun, Greem couldn¡¯t help but grip the soft feathers behind the condor¡¯s neck. He felt like his heart was beating so fast it would jump out of his chest.


    Whilst riding on the other condor, and leading the way, Kevin looked over his shoulder. He saw Greem¡¯s nervousness and simply let out a loudugh. Clearly, this wasn¡¯t the first time he saw someone behaving like this.


    Greem had his eyes closed tightly. It was only when the condor stopped its eleration, and started to cruise steadily in the bright blue sky, did he finally let loose of his sweaty palms and tried his best to open his eyes.


    For the first time, Greem felt like he was so close to the sky. Those pure white, fluffy clouds were hovering over his head like cotton candy. Below him were steep and tall mountains, valleys and woods that rolled through thend, and a dense forest littered with wild animals. From time to time, he could even see some birds chirping on treetops...


    All of these had brought light to Greem¡¯s mind, who had been spending too long in a dark and treacherous world. To be honest, after staying for a while in that gloomy and bizarre Swamp Tower, Greem had felt his body and mental state be rotten. He could no longer retain the rxed and easy-going attitude he had when he just arrived in this world.


    Following the rxation of his mind, the feeling of nervous he felt from his first time flying gradually subsided. Greem folded his legs and sat on the back of the condor. He started to enjoy the magnificent scenery he saw underneath the condor.


    It was lucky he wasn¡¯t afraid of heights! Or else, if a future great Adept was afraid of heights, it would besting stain on his mighty reputation.


    The training camp wasn¡¯t far and was located approximately thirty miles from the Adept Tower. It was situated right in the middle of a serene valley.


    The two Socrates Condors pped their wings and slowly descended from the sky. Although Greem still had a pale face, his performance descending was much betterpared to when he was ascending.


    After getting off the condor, Kevin casually tossed out a magic crystal. His condor immediately grabbed it with its mouth and swallowed it. At the same time, the condor ridden by Greem was staring at him with a cold gaze.


    This was probably the fee for riding this flying creature!


    Greem copied Kevin and tossed out a magic crystal, which made the condor previous anger turn to joy. After swallowing the magic crystal, it slowly walked to an empty field beside them.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go. I¡¯ll bring you to a real circle of friends. We and those people in the public hall are from two different worlds! You¡¯ll get nothing good by hanging around with them. Besides, what you really want can never be found in that ce!¡± Kevin spread out his arms and said, ¡°Only here can you find the true value of yourself. And this ce is the future that belongs to allbat Adepts!¡±


    Ugh... what a dramatic opening speech! But too bad there wasn¡¯t a round of apuse. Instead, there was a rather awkward silence.


    But before Greem could think of a way of handling such a situation, a haughtyugh was hearding from a far distance.


    ¡°Cheesy Kevin, you¡¯re giving the same speech again. Who are you trying to fool into your team? Quickly bring him to me, the bald Hulk, and let me have a good look!¡±


    The fervent and excited Kevin¡¯s enthusiastic expression waspletely crushed. While cursing under his breath, he and Greem walked towards the man who just undermined him.

 Chapter 62

    The entire training camp upied a vast tract ofnd, however, there weren¡¯t many buildings that could be found in this ce.


    On the east side was a row of solidly built wooden cabins. They were all built with huge logs. Although they looked simple and primitive, they were extremely sturdy. While on the west side, a number of tents were found scattered around. Judging by the size of them, each could only house one to two people and were used for resting.


    In the entire camp, the thing that drew one¡¯s eyes the most was arge area upied by a training ground. Countless apprentice Adepts were using this training ground and were seriously fighting each other. Yes, they were all apprentice Adepts. They weren¡¯t some ordinary human fighters. Looking at those bowl-size fireballs that dashed through the air like shooting stars and the frightening figure of a man, covered in raging lightning, raising his axe high up, made Greem¡¯s heart, once again, start to pound fast.


    All this while, the impression Greem had toward apprentice Adepts was rather dark and crafty, with many of them having a twisted mind. Thus, this was the first time he saw something like this. Out in the broad daylight, these apprentice Adepts were fighting each other, face to face, with their raging magical spells.


    At the edge of arge training ground, a group of men could be seen gathered together, watching the fight between two advanced apprentices.


    One was like Greem, a long ranged spell caster who had mastered Fire Element magic spells.


    The other took the path of a Body Refining Adept, a frightening god of war who possessed the powerful ability of thunder.


    Both men were exchanging attacks in the field, locking themselves in a fierce battle.


    Three Inferno Shields were spinning around the body of the Fire Element apprentice and helped him block most of the dirt and sand that sshed into his direction. The thunderbolts flew towards the Fire Element apprentice like huge silver serpents. At the same time, a strange magical array could be seen flickering under his feet.


    Apparently, this magical array had some sort of quickening effect, which allowed him to run at a speed not slower than those apprentices who had high Agility. In addition to this, a fireball, which was enshrouded between his palms, kept spitting out continuous fireballs. He was bombarding his opponent like the pouring down of a heavy rain of mes.


    On the other hand, the wrathful Body Refining Adept, with the help of his intrepid physique and the lightning web that covering around his body, had withstood the continuous bombardment of fireballs. He kept letting out raging roars before charging forward, trying his best to follow after the Fire Elemental apprentice.


    Frightening thunderbolts kept bolting out from his giant axe. If he was allowed to get closer to his opponent, even if it was just by a little bit, then he would be able to throw out the thunderous axe and instantly inflict severe damage on his opponent, as they had a weak physique.


    Following behind Kevin, Greem came to the edge of the battlefield. Before he arrived, he could already smell the pungent smell of lightning burning through the air. His ears were also filled with loud booming soundsing from the explosion of those fireballs.


    Although the field wasrge, it appeared to be too small to amodate the overly brutal and violent magic spells. Previously, a few fireballs even flew out from the battlefield and shot towards the crowd of bystanders. Whenever this happened, everyone would cheer like it was a great party.


    Some would take out their magical staffs, shooting out freezing beams to freeze the fireball into an ice cube. Meanwhile, some would jump up in the air and sh through the fireball that passed besides them, breaking it into small fireworks. No matter who stood out and showed off their incredible magical ability, the crowd would always respond with loud cheers and apuse.


    The man who had jeered at Kevin was seen standing in the middle of the crowd. He was a bald man with a burly body, with chunks of muscles that looked like pieces of metal filling every inch of his body. Although he was standing there bare-handed, he was releasing a mighty air of indomitable spirit.


    He was a Body Refining Pseudo-Adept. The enormous pressure he gave off had almost turned into a physical pressure. Standing right beside him, Greem felt that he was having a hard time breathing normally.


    His mind had been bombarded by a series of warning tones given by the Chip.


    ¡°Warning! Warning! A high-frequency spiritual radiation is detected... The host needs to leave the source of said radiation immediately, or else, signs of Spirit decay will appear in three seconds. Countdown started: 3... 2... 1...¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but wear a bitter smile on his face.


    In this Adept World of advanced magic, all apprentice Adepts had umted magical Elementium in their body by constantly meditating and consuming magical medicine. The more Elementium that was in one¡¯s body, the stronger their spirit radiation would be. For them, perhaps this was something normal, however, for ordinary humans, this spirit radiation was the equivalent of the nuclear radiation that could be found on Earth in his previous life.


    Apprentice Adepts could only be considered as nuclear material or nuclear waste, as, although they were dangerous, there was a limit to the damage they could inflict. However, those official Adepts had crossed the line of qualitative change and had transformed from nuclear material to a nuclear reactor. Thus, their hazardousness was brought to another higher level.


    This burly bald man who always wearing a smile on his face was definitely a Pseudo-Adept who could break through the line of official Adept at any time. Even though Greem had just gotten a little bit closer to him, as a beginner apprentice, he nearly couldn¡¯t withstand the frightening spirit radiation he unintentionally emitted.


    After greeting Kevin, the bald Hulk¡¯s eyes rested on Greem¡¯s face. However, after a brief gaze over at Greem, his metal-like square face showed a curious expression.


    ¡°Howe he is only a beginner apprentice? Don¡¯t tell me that those ck bastards of the Underground world were fed with Corpse Worms, which caused them to be defeated by a mere beginner apprentice? You, Dark Wood, go and test him out!¡± Clearly, Hulk was the true leader of this training camp, as he simply picked an opponent for Greem without asking for anyone¡¯s permission.


    ¡°Hey, both of you, don¡¯t you feel tired after jumping around in the battlefield for so long? Hurrye over here, we have a new game now!¡±


    Soon, following Hulk¡¯s shout, both advanced apprentices left the battlefield. They were bathed in sweat and their bodies were full of wounds. You could tell this wasn¡¯t the first time they had fought each other. It seemed that both of them had fully understood each other¡¯s ability. Although, before their opponent revealed any significant weakness, both of them did have the chance to defeat each other. However, it wasn¡¯t easy to grab hold of this winning chance.


    The burly man who possessed thunder elemental ability had his body fully covered in burned marks of all sizes. While receiving treatment from someone, he asked with a loud, hollow voice, ¡°Where does this beginner apprenticee from? Chief, are you trying to get him killed by asking him to fight? Look at his tiny body that is as weak as a bean sprout. I¡¯m scared he won¡¯t be able to withstand this torture!¡±


    Hulk threw his head back and let out a ground shakingugh.


    ¡°Mark, you better not brag without feeling shame! Do you have any idea what this little guy did? This tiny beginner apprentice is the guy who killed the Demon Vine Lady. So, among all of you advanced apprentices, who of you dares to m their chest and guarantee that they can defeat that Demon Vine Lady?¡±


    Hearing what Hulk said, the confused crowd instantly threw their nces over to Greem, who was currently smiling wryly. They tried to figure out what made this tiny man so strong.


    Greem opened his mouth, wanting to say a few words to cover his secret. However, Kevin immediately patted his shoulder lightly. He moved closer to his ear and whispered, ¡°Little man, let me teach you a lesson today. If you don¡¯t want others to spy on your secret, then, next time, remember to destroy your enemy¡¯s soul!¡±


    Greem¡¯s mouth hung open for a minute before he finally realized what gave himself away.


    Damn it, the dead body of that Demon Vine Lady.


    Indeed, he and Mary had killed her, but they never extracted and destroyed her soul. After submitting her body to the Adept Tower, those Adepts must have learned his secret by studying the memory that remained in her broken soul.


    Fuck! Damn!


    Right at this very moment, Greem wished he could give himself a really good p. He wanted to cry and shed bitter tears for his thoughtless mistake. At the same time, he felt a sense of powerlessness when he thought about the bizarre magic spells that existed in this strange world of Adepts.


    There were all kinds of magic spells, and, while no one could really tell how many spells were out there, their bizarre results were simply impossible to guard against. It looked like his n of hiding behind Mary and earning his fortune secretly had just burst. Today, in this ce, he had to show out his true ability.


    Fortunately, his strongest ability was something that none of these guys could ever spy upon. In actual fact, the ability that they thought he possessed was actually the tiniest part of it and was not worth of mentioning.


    After making up his mind, Greem decided to give up the idea of concealing himself anymore. A wicked smile emerged on his face.


    ¡°Alright, since you guys want to see my true ability, then send your fighter now! Let him show himself. I wonder who my opponent will be?¡±


    ¡°Err... excuse me. I¡¯ll be your opponent! My name is Dark Wood!¡± A rather deep, hoarse voice came from the crowd. After that, an old, skinny hunchback, walked out from the crowd. He was carrying a staff made from ck wood.


    He had loose and wrinkled skin, a skinny and shriveled body, a somber and ferocious expression and a head full of dried and yellow disheveled hair. His hands and legs looked dark and dirty, and his pitch-ck curved nails looked like the sharp ws of an eagle. He gave Greem a gruesome smile, revealing a mouthful of brown, broken teeth.


    On top of the ck wood staff, he carried in his left hand, were chains of teeth and miniature skulls. Whenever a shivering breeze blow by, they would produce a rattling sound that sent chill down one¡¯s back.


    Judging from his appearance, he seemed to be approaching the end of his life, as he looked like a skeleton with one leg already in the grave. But, upon seeing this man, Greem¡¯s pupils contracted, and his expression gradually turned dignified.


    Although this guy only had the spiritual ripple of an advanced apprentice, the threat of death he brought to Greem was distinct and straightforward. If Greem¡¯s guess was correct, this frightening guy must be someone with the elemental affinity of negative energy. The only thing he didn¡¯t know now was whether this guy was one who yed with dead bodies or a frightening one who yed with curses.


    Perhaps, in order to understand his real ability, Greem would have to experience it personally on the battlefield!


    ¡°Hehe! Don¡¯t you think it¡¯s unfair to let an advanced apprentice, fight with a mere beginner apprentice like me? Since you guys wish to see my real ability, you¡¯ll have to pay a price. Before we start the match, I need to know what I¡¯ll be earning when I win the match?¡± Greem folded his arms in front of his chest, portraying a look of confidence.


    ¡°Kid, you¡¯re pretty cocky!¡± Dark Wood once again showed his insidious smile, saying, ¡°Initially, Master Hulk only wanted to see how long you could hold out when facing my attack. So, do you still think you have the chance to win this match? Jajaja...¡±


    ¡°What if I really win this match? Do you dare to bet with me?¡± Greem took the opportunity and counter-checked the guy.


    ¡°Why not? For the sake of your courage, I can give you odds of ten to one. No matter how many magic crystals you bet, as long as you can defeat me, I¡¯ll pay ten times back!¡± The insidious smile of Dark Wood, along with his skeleton-like head, made him looked really frightening.


    ¡°Who else wants to bet with me? Come on, show me your courage!¡±


    Greem yelled out loudly and tossed out all his belongings.


    He offered all the contents wrapped in that ck cloth and thest nine magic crystals he had.


    He had instantly kindled the atmosphere of the scene!

 Chapter 63

    They had seen many arrogant people before, however none were as arrogant as this guy!


    How dare a mere beginner apprentice provoke and challenge a group of elite enforcers who were, at the minimum, advanced apprentices? No doubt this was an act that truly provoked the ire of the crowd.


    While grinning viciously, one after another elite apprentice epted this bet. At the same time, they kept cheering, encouraging, threatening and teasing Dark Wood, wanting him to teach this unbridled rascal a good lesson. Following the piling up of the bet, the crowd became more excited. Eventually they even pushed Hulk aside, and started clustering around both men to escort them into the battlefield.


    Watching his enthusiastic peers, Hulk¡¯s expression couldn¡¯t help but turn strange. He secretly pulled Kevin into a corner.


    ¡°Kid, you¡¯re the one who referred this guy here. You better not give me trouble. Do you think he has a chance of winning?¡±


    ¡°Ugh... ording to the memory that Adept Angus extracted from her soul, this Greem owns a pretty powerful Earth Element Golem. Perhaps... maybe... if he brings all his ability into y, I think there is a possibility he can save himself from losing. However, it is absolutely impossible he can defeat Dark Wood!¡±


    After obtained a satisfying answer, Hulk couldn¡¯t help but feel excited too.


    ¡°Guys, get your ass out from the field and leave them alone! I don¡¯t want that kid to have any excuse for his defeatter. Mensa,e here and help me calcte the total bet. Don¡¯t forget to include my bet. I¡¯ll bet two hundred Magic Crystals on Dark Wood!¡±


    Hulk¡¯s loud roar resounded throughout the entire ce and further ignited the atmosphere of the scene.


    Weird yells and roars of the name ¡®Dark Wood¡¯ echoed around the field and lingered in the air.


    Right at this moment, Greem and Dark Wood had entered the battlefield. They facing each other with a distance of a hundred meters between them.


    While he was staring at how Greem calmly and unhurried began preparing for the battle, Dark Wood grinned broadly, exposing his broken and brownish teeth. He grinned and said, ¡°Kid, you do have guts! But I hopeter you won¡¯t be howling sorrowfully of your own blood, with a rotted body. Don¡¯t worry, as long as you are willing to lie t on your face and admit your defeat and ignorance, I¡¯ll consider sparing you! Jajaja...¡±


    In regard to his opponent¡¯s offensive remark, Greem simply responded with a cold gaze, before continuing his preparation and tossing out the summoning crystal core.


    It was a perfect battlefield for him. Although the ground he was stepping on a was made by magically hardened dirt, it they was still dirt!


    In next moment, a huge amount of Earth Elementium gathered around the summoning core. It gradually revealed a vague, mammoth figure in front of the crowd.


    Ugh... wasn¡¯t this a little too oversized?!


    Staring at the huge Demon Alligator Hunter who slowly making its debut, the exciting mor from the edge of the battlefield starting to subside, while a feeling of doubtful starting to rise in the heart of these bystanders.


    Was this kid a summoner? Why did he summon such a huge creature?


    Following the condensation of Earth Elementium, the body of Demon Alligator Hunter became firmer and sturdier. It continued like this until its massive body and ferocious appearance had finally revealed itself in front of everyone. Greem strode forward and climbed on top of the Demon Alligator¡¯s back, sitting therefortably.


    Damn it, this kid surely had remarkable skill!


    Dark Wood cursed inwardly and quickly preparing his own magic spells.


    As this was a battle under the watchful eyes of the crowd, both parties were allowed to prepare themselves with some supplementary magic spells. However, they were forbidden fromunching an attack in advance. Thus, the magic spells Dark Wood prepared were mostly assisting and summoning type spells.


    When Dark Wood waved his ck wood staff in the air, the little decorative items tied on top of the staff hit with each other and produced a nking noise. Numerous white illuminating balls burst out from the sharp teeth and miniature human skulls. They soon formed into two frightening bone shields that floated beside his body.


    The bone shield was assembled by countless pale white bones, and there was even a ferocious-looking skull protruding on the surface of the shield. Two pale green mes were floating in the eyes of the skull and the skull kept moving its jaw, portraying a frightening look of being constantly ready to devour someone.


    At the same time, Dark Wood was reciting some magic spells quickly. A bizarre- looking dark halo, whose purpose was unknown, began emanating from his right palm.


    ¡°Have both of you prepared?¡± Hulk¡¯s loud roar echoed throughout the entire battlefield.


    Upon seeing both men quietly nodding their heads, Hulk then yelled out loudly, ¡°Then, I hereby announce that the battle has begun!¡±


    Right at the very moment when the announcement was given, the dark halo floating in Dark Wood¡¯s palm trembled in a strange manner. On the other side, Greem, who had been on full alert, immediately noticed the iing attack through his Elementium Vision.


    It was a curse attack!


    Only a curse attack could be so incorporeal, making it hard to defend against.


    Greem sat high up on the back of Demon Alligator. His apprentice short robe began to wave lightly in the breeze. Below his exquisite Circlet of Nobility was a pair of eyes, flicking with a blue glow. These eyes stared at Dark Wood, who was standing a hundred meters away.


    If it was another apprentice, perhaps he would¡¯ve been hit by Dark Wood¡¯s dirty trick without knowing anything prior. But Greem¡¯s Elementium Vision allowed him to see all magical Elementium, so he could see this dirty trick vividly. An incorporeal, bizarre-looking darksso coiled out from the dark halo in Dark Wood¡¯s palm and flew towards him.


    At this moment, the Screaming Tree Branch, which Greem had brought along, was sounding a constant rm.


    But Greem¡¯s mindset wasn¡¯t disturbed at all by the Screaming Tree Branch. Instead, he had all his attention focused on the hints that the Chip was transmitting into his mind.


    ¡°Warning... warning... A hostile Spiritual lockdown is detected... Host, please move away from this spot immediately... Failure to do so will result in host being attacked by any subsequent curse spells... Upon matching the spells with current magic spells database, possibility of Spirit Confusion is 71%, possibility of Spirit Slow is 26%, possibility of Soul Borers is 3%...¡±


    Apparently, all curse spells needed to first lock down on the victim with spiritual energy, before they could establish the hidden spiritual tunnel that allowed the curse spells to reach the body. This method saved the time, as the curse spells no longer needed to fly through the air. Perhaps this was the main reason why all curse spells were so difficult to intercept or counter!


    Greem soon understood this fact. As soon as the Demon Alligator¡¯s mind was interlinked with Greem¡¯s, it instantly took a step back, dodging the curse by a split second. Greem used the Hunter as a recement for himself and let the cksso trap it.


    In next second, the dark halo in Dark Wood¡¯s palm vanished after a sh. As soon as it disappeared, a clump of smoke bursted out from Hunter¡¯s body, transforming into a ck skull that flew a half circle around its body, before finally prating into the Hunter¡¯s body.


    Damn it, it had failed!


    That guy had summoned an Elementium Golem.


    Through his Spiritual Sense, Dark Wood instantly realized his curse spell had never actually hit an actual Spiritual entity. This led him to curse under his breath. Without hesitation, he raised his right arm, which looked like a ghost w, and began to draw in the air, preparing himself to cast his next spell.


    But, right at this moment, Greem¡¯s attack had approached him.


    The Hunter mounted on top of Demon Alligator kept waving its arms, and threw out strong spears made from Earth Elementium onto Dark Wood. This caused his bone shields to violently tremble. Right after that, a Fire Arrow, which contained pure, high-concentrated Fire Elementium, broke through the air and pierced the bone shield.


    In the next second, the raging explosion of Fire Elementium had flooded the tiny region where Dark Wood was standing.


    ¡°Eh...¡±


    At the same moment, the elite apprentices outside of the battlefield couldn¡¯t help but exchange an astonished expression with each other. The strength of the attack and the attack pattern of magic spell didn¡¯t look like something a beginner apprentice could do! The spell was casted quickly and had an offensive strength that was as high as 32 points. Were all these something a beginner apprentice could achieve?


    No sound could be hearding from the crowd, as they started to treat this half yful battle with a more serious attitude.


    Even those apprentices outside of the battlefield could sense something. Dark Wood, who was being attacked by Dirt Spears and Fire Arrows. had an even stronger feeling. Damn it! It was abined attack of Earth, Fire and Physical damage! The trembling bone shield, that was being burned by a raging me, started to show signs of copse.


    A gloomy expression emerged on Dark Wood¡¯s face. Using his conscious, he quickly drove away the other bone shield and reced the one that was defending all the attacks. Meanwhile, clenching his jaw tightly, he took out a few chunks of ck, stinky, rotten meats. He conveniently tossed them beside his feet.


    In next moment, Greem drove the Demon Alligator and strode forward. He nned to use the massive body of the Demon Alligator to crush his opponent. Suddenly, a bizarre figure dashed out from the raging me and threw itself on the ground. It used a totally weird style of running and sprinting around Demon Alligator.


    It was a frightening corpse that stood two meters tall. It had a pale body, two heads, five arms and seven legs. The entire body looked like a monster that had been messily pieced up together using a few broken human bodies. It crouched on the ground and moved forward using all five arms and seven legs. This made it move in an unpredictable pattern. It swiftly dodged a few dirt spears that were aimed at its body and soon approached the Demon Alligator who wasing in its way.


    The heavy front legs of Demon Alligator pounded on the ground forcefully, causing the ground to keep violently shake. The misshapen corpse, who had just arrived in front of him, was affected by this immediately. It staggered and seemed like it could no longer stand firm.


    The Demon Alligator moved aggressively and opened up its huge mouth. It leaped forward and pulled the corpse into its mouth. With a powerful clench, the razor sharp fangs instantly crushed its target into meat paste.


    But, a muffled boom suddenly rung through the air. The corpse surprisingly exploded into a huge amount of ck blood, which stained the Demon Alligator¡¯s head. After that, under the shocked gaze of Greem, the Earth Elementium that had molded with the Demon Alligator¡¯s head copsed within a split second. Tons of dirt lost their bond with the Demon Alligator and sttered all over the ce.


    Damn it! What powerful corrosive ck blood. It could even corrode and neutralize Elementium!


    But obviously, the controlling crystal of Demon Alligator wasn¡¯t located in its head. If it was, then, perhaps Greem¡¯s trump card would¡¯ve been destroyed in an instant.


    Although it lost its head, the Demon Alligator still moved forward vigorously. Strong Earth Elementium once again gathered in front of its body, revealing the outline of a new head.


    The self-healing ability of Demon Alligator was pretty convenient, as, as long as its body was still in touch with earth, it would be able to heal 10% of damage every minute. This was one of the biggest reasons why the Demon Alligator Hunter was so hard to defeat!

 Chapter 64

    Just as Greem was feeling proud of Alligator¡¯s strong recovery ability, he suddenly heard strange noises. One after another, frightening misshapen corpses suddenly leapt out from the mes, sprinting their way towards the Demon Alligator while letting out terrifying groans.


    Damn it! There were too many of them!


    Moving as nimbly as squirrels, eleven of the misshapen corpses swarmed up in a fan shaped formation.


    Without hesitation, Greem quickly activated his bracelet, which unleashed body armor made up entirely of thorny vines. It blinked with a bright green glow as it covered his entire body.


    What happened next was a bloody and savage close-range battle between the Demon Alligator Hunter and the group of misshapen corpses.


    Although the misshapen corpses appeared to be attacking Demon Alligator, anyone could tell that their actual target was Greem, who was sitting high up on its back. This tactic was the go-to for most apprentices who primarily used summons as weapons when attacking their opponents.


    Compared to the powerfulbat strength of a summon who was unafraid of death, the summoner himself had much less defence. Therefore, rather than waste a huge amount of energy trying to defeat the summon, it was easier and far more effective to just defeat the summoner. Thus, after he used his blood essence to create the eleven misshapen corpses and entangled Demon Alligator in the fight, Dark Wood stealthily moved far away to once again start casting the long-range curse spells that he was an expert in.


    While controlling Demon Alligator Hunter and trying to deal with the crazy attacks of the misshapen corpses, Greem also needed to focus his mind to defend against the mysterious darkssoes that Dark Wood kept attacking him with. He was suffering greatly!


    Many of the misshapen corpses in close range of the Demon Alligator were being killed, but the death of each corpse would result in arge explosion, which would destroy arge part of Demon Alligator¡¯s body. After the third corpse exploded, the front of the Demon Alligator, which had looked so strong and mighty before, was in a disastrous state.


    He couldn¡¯t let this continue!


    A trace of a smile appeared on Greem¡¯s lips, then he quickly put something into his mouth and lightly stomped his feet. The Hunter, who was mounting in front of him and kept throwing dirt spears at the enemy, expanded its body and moved backwards, swallowing Greem¡¯s body into its own.


    In the next second, like a giant whale, the massive Demon Alligator Hunter sank into the ground and disappeared without a trace. The eight remaining misshapen corpses immediately stormed forward, restlessly digging into the hardened ground, but failed to find anything.


    Damn...


    Instant uproar from the side of the battlefield.


    The damn kid could actually travel under the ground? This was going to be fun for Dark Wood!


    To be honest, when Dark Wood saw his opponent and the summoned golem disappear from his line of sight, he was also filled with questions and frustrations.


    Damn it, how was he going to fight this battle? If he couldn¡¯t see his opponent, how was he going to lock down the target with his curse attacks?


    While he was looking for a solution, his spiritual senses suddenly discovered something under his feet, bringing a dramatic change to his expression. Without hesitation, he forcefully hit the ground with his staff.


    A huge dirt w suddenly stretched out from the ground beside Dark Wood. With tremendous force it pped onto Dark Wood and crushed him into a pile of meat paste. After that, the upper body of Demon Alligator Hunter unearthed itself.


    Although it was a sessful strike, Greem¡¯s face on the Hunter didn¡¯t show any sign of joy. Instead, he threw his gaze like two lighting beams into the far distance.


    He saw a misshapen corpse suddenly thrown itself onto the ground, violently twisting and struggling.


    In just a couple of seconds, Dark Wood had reced the misshapen corpse and was standing where it had once been.


    The Hunter¡¯s expression changed slightly and it started to squeeze back into the ground, but it was toote.


    The pile of meat paste under the Demon Alligator¡¯s giant w suddenly exploded, staining the exposed body of Demon Alligator Hunter with arge amount of a gray-colored substance. Hearing the sizzling sound of corrosion made Greem¡¯s heart pound.


    Through the Hunter¡¯s eyes, Greem viciously gazed at Dark Wood, who was standing up again. Without saying anything, he once again sank into the ground. The misshapen corpses who had fast been approaching once again missed their target.


    Fuck... staring at the emptied battlefield once again, except for the remaining seven misshapen corpses and the broken ground, there wasn¡¯t any trace of that hateful kid. Dark Wood was furious.


    Under themand of Dark Wood, the seven misshapen corpses were stationed around his perimeter. With this, not only could he could instantly block that bastard from retreating the next time he tried to attack, the formation also allowed him the flexibility to shift himself to any of the corpses as needed.


    However, just as Dark Wood retracted his spiritual senses to the vicinity of his body, quietly observing every slight change under the ground, the ground under the feet of a corpse standing at a far distance suddenly started to boil. Countless dirt spikes poked up through the ground and turned the corpse into shish kabobs.


    Once again, the misshapen corpse exploded. But this time, the gray substance sshed onto the ground harmlessly. As the attack had beenunched from beneath the ground, the Demon Alligator was never exposed.


    Dark Wood, standing on the battlefield, together with the audience at the side, gasped in astonishment.


    Damn it, it was hard to tell the oue of today¡¯s battle!


    In the next seven or eight minutes, Greem cunningly stoppedunching any attacks at Dark Wood. Instead, he kept moving around Dark Wood¡¯s perimeter, finding opportunities to kill the remaining misshapen corpses. Clearly, he wanted to destroy all Dark Wood¡¯s minions.


    If they were all ughtered by this kid, how was he going to shift himself to another corpse when he was again faced with danger?


    Left with no alternative, Dark Wood called all four remaining misshapen corpses to his side, having them surround him in a circle. With this, if Dark Wood was under attack, he could shift himself to another corpse, but he would still be inside the attack radius of his opponent, which significantly increased his risk!


    But under such circumstances, he had no choice but to take this risk. He was trying his best to lure that bastard from the ground, then he¡¯d seek his winning chance, despite the great danger.


    At the thought of himself being forced into such a messy state by a Beginner Apprentice, a shivering ghost me instantly ignited within Dark Wood¡¯s gloomy eyes. He wished he could instantly capture the bastard and torture him good.


    But too bad, you couldn¡¯t always get what you wished for, as it was Dark Wood himself who was being tortured by this mere Beginner Apprentice.


    In the second half of the battle, the hateful bastard never showed his face, but instead kept attacking from under the ground using long-range magic spells. Although most of the magic spells were noticed by Dark Wood before they hit him, two misshapen corpses had been miserably killed by thebination of a Quagmire Spell and dirt spikes.


    The sorrow of getting attacked but failing to catch the enemy was perfectly expressed by Dark Wood.


    As he witnessed one corpse puppet after another, each meticulously made by him to possess the fighting strength of an Advanced Apprentice, be destroyed by the ¡®enemy,¡¯ Dark Wood¡¯s emotions moved from anger to frustration to sadness until he nearly burst into loud sobbing from Greem¡¯s torture.


    When Hulk finally shook his head, sighed, and announced the winner, Dark Wood, who had remained standing through will alone, immediately fainted from anger.


    The crowd gazed at each other helplessly. Although they wished to say a few words tofort Dark Wood, no one seemed to know how to start.


    Without the ability to attack underground, no matter who encountered such an enemy, he wouldnd himself in serious trouble. This situation could only be med on Dark Wood¡¯s bad luck, as he was picked by Hulk to fight with this freak who had brought him such a miserable ending.


    Wearing a gloomy expression, Hulk pulled Kevin in front of himself, asking with a ferociously, ¡°I thought you said he doesn¡¯t have any special abilities? How did we end up with this kind of result? Tell me honestly, if you are fighting with an opponent like this, can you defeat him?¡±


    ¡°Ugh...¡± Kevin gulped, then continued, saying, ¡°If it is not a fair match, and the venue is a dested wood, give me half day and I¡¯ll be able to kill him in the dark. But if we were to fight in an emptied field like this, I... I wouldn¡¯t have a chance of winning, because I can¡¯t cause him any damage.¡±


    Right at this moment, Greem carefully poked his upper body out from the ground. Once he determined that he had won, he squeezed out from the ground.


    After spending so long underground, all the outer wounds of the Demon Alligator had fully recovered and it looked exactly like it did before the fight began. The crowd felt wonder at the sight, but when they recalled the bets they had ced before the fight, no one could maintain a happy face.


    Looking at the young guy striding towards him, Hulk had no choice but to bite the bullet. With a loud voice, he asked, ¡°Mensa, give me the number! I want to know how much we need to pay this guy?¡±


    Mensa wore ck clothes and had a noble appearance. Without hesitation, he loudly read out.


    ¡°Mister Greem pledged nine magic crystals, two tier-3 magical items, one tier-4 magical item, one tier-1 magical item, and the magic notebooks of the Demon Vine Lady. Estimated total is 417 Magic Crystals. ording to ten to one odds, we need to pay him 4170 Magic Crystals. However,bined, we all only bet 3270 Magic Crystals, so...¡±


    ¡°So we still owe this guy 900 Magic Crystals!¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    The crowd stared speechlessly at each other, before they couldn¡¯t help it and moved their gazes to Kevin, who had brought this bastard here.


    In that instant, the generally calm Kevin had a forehead bathed in sweat.


    Greem, who stood beside him, was grinning from ear to ear as he quickly stepped out to ease the situation.


    ¡°It¡¯s good to have the love of all my Senior Apprentices. As you have given me the chance to prove myself, how dare I collect this debt from you! This amount is more than enough. I, Greem am not a greedy man!¡±


    Upon hearing Greem¡¯s rather ttering speech, all the Advanced Apprentices and Pseudo-Adepts shook their head and sighed. In fact, Dark Wood wasn¡¯t weak. He could be considered as having middle tier strength within all the Advanced Apprentices in this training camp. But due tock of preparation, he was defeated by this foxy kid, and fainted on the spot. Everybody really was frustrated.


    ¡°Hey, you crafty kid, don¡¯t get carried away. The reason you had such an easy win is because your ability naturally oppressed Dark Wood. We¡¯ll pay those Magic Crystals we owe you, but do you have the guts to fight again with us? A fight between you and me, what do you say?¡± The man who said this was the violent burly man who Greem had seen carrying a thunderous axe when he had arrived. Obviously, this man had taken the path of a Body-Refining Adept, and used Thunder Element magic spells as his supplement ability.


    Greem grinned, saying, ¡°Why not?! But my golem is damaged from today¡¯s battle. I need time to readjust and fix it. Why don¡¯t we fight tomorrow?¡±


    Hearing this, the violent burly man became extremely happy. The eyes of the surrounding men also brightened. Clearly, they were tempted as well.


    With the time of one night, they believed they could help Mark find a way to defeat this guy. This hateful kid only had a special ability in summoning his golem, which allowed him to hide underground and attack his enemy. As long as they could find a way to stop this ability, how could a rubbish made from dirt be the match of Mark, the man known for a mighty strength? It was simply a silly dream!


    Perhaps imagining some scenes that could vent their anger, all of the apprentices couldn¡¯t hold themselves back and grinned coldly.


    In that moment, a shivering breeze blew through the scene, making one¡¯s hair stand on end.

 Chapter 65

    Finally, as the sky darkened, Greem safely returned to his residence in the Adept Tower.


    Upon entering the room, he immediately locked the door. Then, he carefully took out all of the good items in the pouch at his waist and lined them up on the wooden table in his room. Looking at his trophies, he excitedly rubbed his hands together and licked his lips. He felt excited and restless. He was beyond words.


    The ten small bottles on the left were Mind Concentrating Potions, which he had always dreamed of having. They were even the high quality products that were only internally avable to the elites of the training camp. They provided 20% better results than the potions found on the outside. Each bottle was sold for 200 magic crystals, so just these ten bottles would have cost Greem two thousand magic crystals. Thanks to today¡¯s unexpected windfall, Greem didn¡¯t have to spend a single crystal of his own to buy them.


    These Mind Concentrating Potions were more than enough to allow Greem to break through the barrier of Beginner Apprentice, and would immediately bring his Spirit to the level of peak Intermediate Apprentice. Whether he could easily enter the realm of Advanced Apprentice depended on Greem¡¯s personal potential.


    His eyes lingered on the Mind Concentrating Potions for a long time before Greem reluctantly moved on to the next item.


    It was an azure magic crystal core. After Greem took it out from his waist pouch, he was finally able to see the tiny electric arcs lingering on its surface. It looked like the magical crystal possessed its own unique life force, as it was able to absorb the lightning energy hovering in the air. It produced a mystical realm that perfectly suited for Lightning Elementium.


    Judging from this, this was definitely a magical core taken from a Pseudo-Adept level Storm Giant.


    Based on their characteristics, Storm Giants should be categorized as Elemental beings. However, the only Storm Giant poption that existed in the Adept World had a rather strange bloodline. It was said that in the ancient era, a Great Adept once conducted some extremely risky bloodline experiments. He used some kind of magical method to merge his bloodline with a group of Wind Elementium. He intended to increase the size of his heir, who had the same bloodline.


    In the Adept Continent, those called Great Adepts were all Adepts of the third grade and above.


    It was worth mentioning that his experiment was a huge sess. He managed to create a species new to the World of Adepts: the Storm Giants. They were powerful magical creatures who had the bloodline of an Adept and the body of an Elementium.


    Sadly, these Storm Giants experienced an identity crisis. Apparently, they preferred to be friends with their own kind, the Wind Elementium, who were rather simple and biddable. Therefore, a huge number of Storm Giants escaped the control of the Great Adept and gathered together with Wind Elementium found in the natural environment. In the end, they established a small Storm Giant Kingdom in the Emerald Hills at the center of the Adept Continent.


    Due to their special identity, and the fact that they possessed the double characteristics of both Adepts and Wind Elementium, they were eventually able to summon countless Wind element creatures from the Element ne after constructing a huge Storm Altar. As a result, they became a powerful middle-sized n located at the center of the Adept Continent.


    It was likely that the Lightning crystal in Greem¡¯s hand was a product from the Storm Kingdom.


    The Storm Kingdom and the Zhentarim Association had signed a magical contract.ording to the magical contract no ns within the central region of the Adept Continent were free to hunt Storm Giants with intention of obtaining their Elementium core. However, such magical contracts could never prevent the existence of the ck market and hunters. Privately, simr rare resources were still secretly traded by many parties.


    The Pseudo-Adept level Earth element core Greem obtainedst time might only cost 500 Magic Crystals to buy, however, this Lightning element core would cost Greem 1200 Magic Crystals. The reason was simple: it was rare.


    Perhaps in terms of purebat strength, an Earth element core would bring Greem more direct and powerful improvement. But since Greem wanted more diversifiedbat tactics, he felt it was better for him to have a Lightning element core. Since the y Golem brought Greem the ability to travel underground, how about a Lightning Golem? Maybe it would allow Greem to fly in the sky!


    To be honest, after he had taken a ride on Socrates Condor and soared freely through the sky, Greem had fallen in love with the feeling.


    But, in order to maximize the yield of this Lightning element core, Greem would need the Chip to perform tedious calctions and adjustments and, through the use of magical formations, uncover the true potential of this crystal. So he had no choice but to temporarily hoard it on the shelf and wait until the Chip had finished its calction. Only then could he consider how he was going to craft a new Lightning Golem for himself.


    As for the third item lying on the table, it had been traded for the Demon Vine Lady¡¯s magic notebook. It was a powerful Fire element treasure produced from an underground magma volcano: a Fire Diamond. Sadly, a Fire Diamond was a magical item and not the magical core of a Fire Element creature. It was very difficult to use it to craft a Fire Element Golem.


    Although it couldn¡¯t be used to craft a golem, a Fire Diamond was also a magical item Greem had been eagerly looking for. With this item now in his possession, he was one step closer to the staff of his dreams.


    By using a Fire Diamond as the focus gem for his magic staff, not only would it hasten the gathering speed of Fire Elementium, it could also bolster the strength of any Fire element spells Greem cast. Therefore, the benefits it brought were not any less than those a golem would have.


    Currently, Greem had found the focus gem and the mithril used to create the runes on the body of his future staff. The only thing left was to find a magic staff that suited Greem the most. In order to craft the magic staff of his dreams, Fire Dragon Wood was the most inferior option, Fire Coral was the second best, while the backbone of a Fire element demon beast was the perfect choice.


    But the problem was, such rare resources could only be found identally and not by searching for them. How was Greem going to find a backbone of Fire Element demon beast? Greem had been worrying and hesitating recently. He didn¡¯t know if he should wait until he found the perfect material, or try to find some Fire Corals to meet his urgent need.


    Pondering on such a question would never lead to any real answer.


    Left with no choice and with a wry smile on his face, Greem ced all the items back into his storage waistband.


    Although he was eager to try out the effect of those Mind Concentrating Potions, he couldn¡¯t do it now. He had an important mission to aplish tonight. The mission was directly rted to the other bet he faced tomorrow.


    So, after briefly admiring his war trophies, Greem rushed to the third floor of the Adept Tower. He plunged into the Alchemy Experiment Room, only returning to his residence the next morning with apletely burned out body and mind.


    Sadly, before he could get even two hours of sleep, someone came knocking on the wooden door of his residence.


    It was Kevin.


    It seemed like he wanted to keep a close eye on Greem, as if he thought that Greem was afraid and was in danger of running away from the fight.


    But when he saw Greem¡¯s rxed face, he couldn¡¯t stop himself and asked, ¡°What were you doing yesterday night? Don¡¯t tell me you totally forgot you have a very important battle today?¡±


    ¡°Ugh... I was overexcited because of the sudden windfall yesterday, and was having a hard time sleeping.¡± Greem simply made up a reason to exin the dark bags under his eyes.


    Kevin¡¯s face showed that he obviously didn¡¯t believe Greem. But out of curiosity, he asked the following question: ¡°Are you confident about today¡¯s battle? Let me tell you, in order to stop you, a kid who suddenly appeared and suppressed the head of those veterans, they spent the entire night working busily. Possibly, they¡¯vee up with all kinds of solutions to deal with your Earth elemental golem. You... are you really confident about fighting Mark today?¡±


    ¡°Do you want me to win or lose?¡±


    ¡°That... Kid, to be honest, I see a good future ahead of you. I¡¯ve never seen any apprentices with abilities simr to yours. If you put them to good use, you¡¯ll be do really well in the Underground Cave. And that¡¯s why I¡¯m so eager to get you into the elite group! But... your debut yesterday was offensive and conspicuous. Boss Hulk only intended to let you put on a show of your ability and introduce you to the members of the elite group, but... you went straight in and defeated Dark Wood, a veteran member.¡±


    ¡°Was it a big deal?¡±


    ¡°More than big! I¡¯ve never seen the members of the elite group bound by amon hatred for the enemy. Because of you, they¡¯ve all contributed their strategies and their weapons, and have brought out all of their methods of dealing with an enemy who can travel underground. So, you better be extra careful today. I¡¯ve reminded Mark; as long as you admit defeat, he¡¯ll stop attacking at once. He won¡¯t leave you with any permanent damage!¡±


    ¡°Master Kevin, do you trust me?¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°No matter how much they¡¯ve prepared for this battle, I¡¯m still confident about today¡¯s battle. So... if you do trust me, why don¡¯t you ce your bet on me? What do you say?¡±


    Kevin was instantly silent. He stared at Greem, who was looking back at him seriously, and felt puzzled.


    Greem¡¯s opponent was a unique, strong guy in the training camp: the Thunderous Axe Mark. Unlike Dark Wood, the guy didn¡¯t have any significant weakness. After all, Dark Wood was a dark spell caster who spent his days with corpses. Once his curse spells and the army of monster corpses failed, he would have no more arrows left in his quiver. After all, Dark Wood himself was like a skeleton ¨C so weak that couldn¡¯t even stand a gust of wind.


    But Thunderous Axe Mark was a totally different opponent. His mighty strength was more than enough to fight equally with Greem¡¯s Demon Alligator, while his excellent Physique had brought him magic and a physical resistance that caused his opponents to despair. As long as he had ways to force Greem out from the ground, or had the ability to attack him underground, Greem¡¯s y Golem wouldn¡¯t even be able tost for three to five minutes.


    Under such circumstances, why was Greem still so confident?


    This huge mystery bugged Kevin for the entire journey. He was still pondering the answer even as both men stepped down from the condor and once again entered the training camp.


    Staring at the ocean of people, who were waiting at the side of the battlefield, Greem smiled and leaned over to speak into Kevin¡¯s ears. He whispered, ¡°Master, why are you so confused? You¡¯re the one who brought me to this training camp yesterday, and that means you¡¯ve also offended every single man in this ce. Why don¡¯t you ce your bet on me today? Once you win, what can they do to you? Who will have all their money? Why are you still hesitating?¡±


    The distressed expression on Kevin¡¯s face grew stronger.


    He really had boarded a sinking ship! Now, it would be difficult for him to disembark from this situation!

 Chapter 66

    When Greem stood once more in the middle of the battlefield, he was immediately overwhelmed by Mark¡¯s imposing aura.


    Back when he was still on Earth in his previous life, being overwhelmed by a person¡¯s imposing aura might just only be a metaphor. But in this world of highly advanced magic where even spirit and faith could be some kind of force, one can actually feel the intense spiritual pressure and the aura emanating from another person.


    Through the Chip¡¯s feedback, Greem realized that his opponent had at least seventeen points in both Strength and Physique with a tiny bit lower amount of Spirit which was at least sixteen points.


    It was a powerful aura forged from an intrepid physique and powerful spirit. It made Greem have difficulties in movement making him feel as if he was standing right in the heart of a powerful storm from Mother Nature. He even felt a slight burning sensation of pain on his skin.


    Greem knitted his brows in a tight frown.


    Looks like he has to improve his Spirit as soon as possible, or else he would have to endure the intense suffocating pressure given off by advanced apprentice whenever he had to face one.


    This was all due to Greem¡¯s rank being too low. If he had at least the overall strength of an intermediate apprentice, he would be capable of integrating his elemental energy and spirit to form a protective shield simr to that of an energy field. In that case, if he was to face an enemy stronger than him, he would not be like the way he is now who was simr to a man standing naked without any cloth.


    Thunder Axe Mark was a burly man who stood at 2.5 meters tall. He had broad shoulders and a muscr body. Although his axe was still strapped on his back and not in his hand, it still didn¡¯t reduce the violent aura he was giving off.


    At the moment he saw Greem who seemed to have a poor physique, he wasn¡¯t able to hold himself back and bursted out in a fit ofughter.


    ¡°Kid, you¡¯ve got guts! You already know you¡¯re going to be tortured today but you stille out here and face me, hahaha... I like this!¡±


    Greem narrowed his eyes. While he was enduring the ufortable feeling brought by the gap between their ranks, he refuted vaguely.


    ¡°It¡¯s still too early to tell who will be the winner. I hope master Mark will be nice to meter!¡±


    ¡°Haha... I wish I could. Despite the fact that these guys asked me to break both of your arms and legs and crush half of your bones, I, Mark, am rather fond of you. Good kid, I really didn¡¯t expect you to be able to make Dark Wood, that living corpse, faint because of anger. Honestly, it was pretty enjoyable to watch that. Hehe, since I¡¯m really happy today, I¡¯ll just break both of your legs then. Take this suffering as the weing gift from our training camp!¡±


    ¡°Ugh...¡± Although having both arms and legs being broken wasn¡¯t an injury that couldn¡¯t be healed in the first ce, one would still have to go through a painful healing process. So, upon listening to how Mark talk about this ¡°painful¡± topic with a rather ¡®charitable¡¯ tone, Greem simply rolled his eyes taking all of this as a fart.


    ¡°Hey, are you guys ready? Once you¡¯re done with calcting the bets, I¡¯ll start the fight! How long do you want me to wait?¡± Mark shouted at the side of the battlefield as he rubbed his palms together. Obviously, Mark was a hot-tempered man.


    Meanwhile, it was a lively scene at the side of the battlefield.


    There were oceans of apprentices and pseudo-Adepts surrounding Messa who was eagerly shouting out their bets.


    ¡°One hundred and seventy magic crystals! I bet on Mark!¡±


    ¡°Two hundred and thirty magic crystals! Me too, will bet on Mark!¡±


    ¡°Ny magic crystals on Mark¡¯s victory!¡±


    ...


    ...


    Arge illuminated stone b was erected at the side of the field, showing the bets on the fight. The number of magic crystals that had wagered on Mark was stacking up really fast, soon stopping at a total of 3680 magic crystals. On the other hand, below Greem¡¯s name, it only showed merely 700 magic crystals.


    This actually included Greem¡¯s own bet, otherwise, the bet would copse with everybody only betting on one side.


    Today¡¯s odds weren¡¯t as exaggerated as yesterday. After being carefully considered and agreed on by everyone, Hulk had taken charge and hosted the bet, the ratio he gave out was four to one. With the odds like this, if Greem was defeated by Mark, aside from the pain and wounds he will be receiving, he would also have to owe a hefty debt. In that case, he would have to sell himself out to the camp, working restlessly in order to pay back his debt!


    For those fighting maniacs of the training camp, being able to profit or not was just a small matter. But pushing the neer off the edge was the entertainment they were all looking for.


    However, while themotion was gradually subsiding and Hulk was about to announce the start of the battle, a deep and hoarse voice suddenly sounded through the scene.


    ¡°Three hundred magic crystals, I bet on Greem!¡±


    Although the voice wasn¡¯t that loud, it was like a cold breeze suddenly freezing the lively atmosphere. Everyone was stunned for a brief moment and only then did they remember to turn their heads and find out where the voice came from.


    Dark Wood?!


    It was Dark Wood!!!


    In that instant, everyone felt as if their world as they knew it, was suddenly turned upside down. This... how could this be possible? No one would find it strange even if everyone in the training camp had ced their bets on Greem, but it shouldn¡¯t be Dark Wood! Didn¡¯t he know they were actually helping him to vent out his resentment?


    Right when everybody still had their mouths wide open while gazing at each other, speechless, another voice came from the middle of the crowd.


    ¡°I also bet on Greem, two hundred and seventy magic crystals!¡±


    Kevin! It was ckhand Kevin!


    Everyone inhaled sharply while showing all kinds of expressions. As the host for today, for the first time, Hulk felt today¡¯s sunlight was rather offending to his eyes. The magic crystals piled up beside him didn¡¯t look so loveable anymore. Although he never had the time to study the art of prophecy, he still had the feeling that today¡¯s wager had gone beyond his control.


    He red at Dark Wood and Kevin then eagerly shouted with a loud voice.


    ¡°The bet is decided and so I announce, the fight begins now!¡±


    Following the announcement of Hulk, both men standing inside the battlefield promptly moved.


    The burly man named Mark stretched out his arm, pulling out the giant axe from his back and then held it tightly with his giant palm. At the same time, cracking and popping sounds were hearding from his body as countless blue electric arcs lingered around him.


    The electric arcs created a powerful chain reaction, causing Greem who stood a hundred meters away, smell the putrid odor of air being burned by electricity.


    Even though he had great confidence in the Demon Alligator Hunter, Greem still did not dare to wait for Mark to gather enough energy for a power strike. He quickly stomped his right foot, rushing the Demon Alligator Hunter to sink into the ground with the fastest speed possible.


    Having his strength umted to the maximum, Mark threw his head back and let out a raging war cry, striding with steps that shook the earth while charging towards the Demon Alligator Hunter which was descending into the ground. He didn¡¯t use too much of his strength on his feet but every step he took would leave behind a shallow crater full of cracks. Also, despite not charging at them with big steps, Mark still managed to arrive in front of Greem before the Demon Alligator Hunterpletely disappeared to the ground below.


    A strong gust of wind brushed past his face as the Demon Alligator¡¯s bulky tail full of spikes and lumps swept by,nding right onto Mark¡¯s axe that was covered with raging electric arcs.


    A loud boom rang out, immediately followed by dirt scattering in all directions. A mini lightning storm then suddenly exploded.


    Greem, who had his body hidden within the Demon Alligator Hunter, sank underground just in time, sessfully evading the shower of debris and the lightning storm. However, the crowd clearly saw that before the Demon Alligator was able topletely sink into the ground, arge portion of its long had already disappeared making it look really miserable.


    Concurrently, Mark crouched down and forcefully jumped up with both of his legs, borrowing the force from it and leaped high up in the sky. While his body was still in the air, he let out another raging cry. He used all of his strength and threw his axe down, aiming at the very spot Greem had disappeared to.


    Another earth-shaking explosion could be heard. Carrying with it a dazzling lightning storm, the axe forcefully struck the surface of the ground, shattering the ground and producing arge crater half a meter deep. The exploding lightning storm kept ring violently at the the bottom of the crater, burning all the dirt into pieces and shaping the sand into molten ss.


    It was such a vicious strike. Let alone resisting it directly, even the shockwave alone would be enough to kill a beginner apprentice.


    In the sensitive spiritual senses of the crowd, Greem¡¯s life force had significantly dropped. In just an instant, he had already lost two-thirds of it.


    Fortunately, the earth had helped Greem block most of the damage, making him suffer only a fraction of the damage from the shockwave. And so, Mark¡¯s thunder strike wasn¡¯t able to defeat him within a few seconds. This made the crowd feel pity and shock then they all sighed.


    If Mark was able to move just a bit faster, or if only he could strike with an even stronger force, perhaps he had already killed Greem who was still in the shallow level under the ground.


    A beginner apprentice challenging an advanced apprentice? What a joke! If the strikended right on the target, Greem wouldn¡¯t even be able to withstand a single strike from Mark. Maybe only a useless fool like Dark Wood would be defeated by a mere beginner apprentice!


    Enduring the gazes of either wonder, mocking, or disdain, Dark Wood hid his face under the shadow of his hood, showing only a pair of pale green ghastly mes dancing unclearly. No one knew what he was thinking about.


    Only Kevin¡¯s expression changed following the situation of the fight.


    The vicious first strike of Mark nearly scared away Kevin¡¯s soul. His bet of two hundred and seventy crystals was his hard-earned savings for two or three years which he had hoped to use to buy a nice, enchanted dagger. If his rash decision caused all of his savings to disappear, he would be crying out loud.


    What kind of trump card did that Greem have? If it was that Demon Alligator, once it shows up again, it would only be crushed into a pile of y by Mark¡¯s formidable strength. Kid, oh kid, you better not cheat me, or else I¡¯ll go and bother you every single day!


    At this time, Greem was hiding underneath the ground and spitting blood.


    The enemy¡¯s powerful strike had given him serious injuries. If not because he was able to act just in time, hastily diving deep underground, maybe with just the first strike alone would force him out. Even so, the tremendous shockwave that he felt from the squeezing of the ground had him coughing up a few mouthfuls of blood, nearly making him unable to recover.


    While he was moving quickly in the darkness of the underground, Greem hid inside a small space created within the Demon Alligator Hunter¡¯s body and hastily treated his injuries. After he was done with that, he had a ferocious expression on his face as he tossed out a new golem he had created from the strenuous effort of a whole night. He then drove the Demon Alligator Hunter to slowly ascend to the surface.


    Sure enough, Mark had been on guard against Greem¡¯s sneak attack from underground. On his foot were a pair of strange leather boots that were able to unleash bizarre magical ripples, enabling him to turn the ground underneath his feet into a hard rock, effectively blocking all the earth element spells casted by the Demon Alligator Hunter.


    In the end, Mark simply sat down and crossed his legs while wearing a disdainful look and he shouted, ¡°Kid, from now on, any attack of yoursing from under the ground is useless to me. If you wish to fight me, show yourself now! If you want to prolong this battle, I have no problem doing this with you. I don¡¯t believe your golem will be able to let you hide underground for so long!


    Before he finished speaking, Mark abruptly stood up and pulled out his axe again.


    At a spot nearly a hundred meters away from him, the Demon Alligator Hunter slowly emerged to the surface. Greem stared at him coldly.


    ¡°Good kid, so you do know what you should do. Today, let your master Mark teach you what a true battle is!¡±


    After saying that, Mark covered his body again with countless arcs of blue lightning. He wielded his axe and charged towards Greem while howling out loud.


    ¡°Didn¡¯t you want to see what my trump card is? Fine, I¡¯ll show it to you now¡±. Greem grinned. With both hands raised up, he shouted, ¡°Show yourself, my raging fighter!¡±


    Following his summons, the ground on the battlefield crumbled.

 Chapter 67

    At this moment, the entire battlefield copsed.


    In between the locations of Mark and Greem, arge portion of the ground suddenly crumbled and caved-in, revealing arge and terrifying pit. At the heart of this hole, one could see dirt tumbling violently while clouds of dust rose to the surface. A massive figure could be seen gradually emerging from the depths of the pit.


    Mark was forced to give up on his assault. A dignified expression was present on his face as he stared hard at the frightening figure that was slowlying into view as dust settled down and it revealed its features.


    The first thing he saw was a bizarre looking pair of fiery scarlet eyes, and after that he saw that its body was made up entirely of hard rocks. The triangle-shaped snake head which was molded from Adamantine Rock seemed to be indestructible, while a narrow seam can be found on its pointed snout. In fact, anyone blessed with a sharp vision would easily be able to tell that this gigantic snake, which was constructed entirely from rocks, even had a thin tongue and a pair of very sharp fangs.


    Beyond the snake head was a strange body made from countless rocks of all shapes and sizes stacking onto each other,yers andyers of this formed the intimidating body of this giant rock snake. Since only a part of this snake¡¯s body showed up from the cover of the dust cloud, no one could get a full glimpse of it with most of its body still hiding underground.


    But from what Mark could tell from the body parts that were exposed, looking at it from the ground up to its head that was held high up in the air, he estimated it to be at least twelve meters tall. If its entire body was truly made up of those rocks with high metallic content that weremonly found underground, then with just its frightening weight along with its indestructible body would be enough for it to be the greatest nightmare of most of its enemies.


    This... was this terrifying Rock Snake one of that guy¡¯s golems?


    Before he could dismiss his thoughts from his mind, the super Rock Snake had opened up its mouth wide, initiating a long-range attack named Gravel Spray at Mark. A vast amount of gravel and dirt was extracted from the end of its tail, channeling through a long winding tunnel inside its body and afterwards it shot out from its mouth, sshing Mark with a massive wall of dirt. From what they could tell, this Rock Snake didn¡¯t bother filtering the things it absorbed from the ground. There were many dried branches, grass and nt rubbish mixed in the dirt that was used in this nasty attack, along with countless underground insects, rats, earthworms and other unknown creatures.


    Such a filthy attack made Mark feel stressed out.


    While letting out an angry roar, he gathered up all of the thunder energy he has and directed it in front of his chest, forming them into arge web of lightning big enough to protect his body. The spray of dirt full of filth that impacted on the finely and closely woven lightning web produced a hissing noise that resounded throughout the entire ce. A pungent odor of something burning lingered in the air afterwards.


    In the moment Mark was using all of his strength to hold back the Gravel Spray attack, the audience located at the sides of the battlefield suddenly let out shocked cries.


    ¡°Careful...¡±


    ¡°Quickly, put up your defenses...¡±


    ...


    Since Mark¡¯s line of sight was blocked by a huge amount of dirt, he wasn¡¯t able to see beyond the Gravel Spray. However, in a small time frame within a split second, his formidablebat instincts and abundant fighting experience allowed him to react quickly, raising his axe and cing it in front of his chest.


    Puff!


    A muffled explosion sounded out as the web of lightning scattered.


    The terrifying and sturdy triangle-shaped snake head pierced through the dirt wall breaking the lightning web into tiny sparks. It then opened itsrge ferocious mouth and forcefully bit into Mark¡¯s battle axe.


    An earth-shattering explosion echoed out to the surroundings. The Rock Snake clenched its huge mouth, using the sharp fangs made from tiny pointy rocks to tightly clutch onto the thunder axe, all the while taking advantage of the powerful thrusting force to crazily knock Mark far into the distance.


    If it was another advanced apprentice and not Mark, this tremendous body m alone would be enough to break their bones and crush them into a meat paste. Fortunately, Mark was a rare apprentice Body-Refining Adept of this training camp, his overall strength second only to Hulk, who was a Pseudo-Adept. Therefore, instead of being turned into a human paste, he could be seen letting out continuous wild roars. His body being stimted by berserk strength resulted into cracking and popping sounds that could be hearding from his own bones, and his muscles started to expand and be more robust at an incredible rate. Countless thick snake-like blood vessels crazily twisted and crawled under his metallic muscles...


    The frantic Mark had one of his legs slightly bent down at the front while the other leg stretched out straight to support him from behind. His burly arm which had suddenly doubled in size held tightly on the axe. He had sessfully blocked the full force of the Rock Snake¡¯s thrust.


    Although he had seeded in holding his ground, thend underneath his feet failed him.


    Following the violent thrust of the Rock Snake, Mark¡¯s body kept being pushed backwards. His legs that were like pirs went through the hard ground, producing an increasing pile of dirt being umted behind him.


    When the violent strike of the Rock Snake finally had its strength depleted, Mark¡¯s body had already been pushed back for more than twenty meters. The dirt that had piled up behind him became so tall it nearly drowned out his big burly body. The lower part of his body becamepletely submerged in dirt though.


    ¡°You must have used up all your strength already, huh? Now it¡¯s time for you to taste mine!¡±


    Mark suddenly raised his head up staring right in front of him at the frightening head of the snake which was still biting on his axe while making eerie sounds. He roared out loud as fury welled up within him.


    He forcefully knocked away the giant Rock Snake, and took advantage of the opportunity when its head drew back slightly. Mark suddenly jumped up with both feet while holding the axe with both hands, brutally chopping into the forehead of the Rock Snake.


    Just like before, another loud explosion exploded out which sounded like metal striking metal ringing through the air. The giant Rock Snake had a ring-shaped body with a circumference of two meters which was entirelyposed of Adamantine Rock that can be found underground. The snake was forced back by Mark¡¯s rapid chopping attacks causing huge amounts of rock fragments, dirt and sand to fall from its body like a waterfall.


    Together with the audience, Greem¡¯s face twitched after witnessing how a muscr giant of a mere three meters high kept striking down on the gigantic rock monster which was many more times bigger than Mark. If this Rock Snake was a living creature, all of its bones would have been broken by now. It was a rock monster though and obviously not a living organism. Thus, that amount of damage wasn¡¯t enough to kill it.


    ordingly, under the long-distance control of Greem, the Rock Snake crazily twisted its body, coiling up into a dirt pir that towered up in the sky. While that was in action, it retracted its body back into the dust cloud then prepared for another vicious thrust.


    Mark, who had been able to attack it unceasingly before, wouldn¡¯t just let this go. He roared wildly and formed a lightning storm over his body as a protective shield, bending down and then sprinting right into the dust cloud to continue the intense fight he had with the Rock Snake in a chaotic fashion.


    The massive dust cloud was stirred up and wasn¡¯t restrained anymore.


    The air was full of dust that covered everything, blocking the vision of everyone. The chaotic and violent sh of Earth Elementium and Mark¡¯s lightning storm produced disruptions in their surroundings and isted everything inside from the audience¡¯s spiritual senses. No one was able to bypass those by-product barriers which made them unable to find out the actual situation in the heart of the battlefield.


    From time to time,rge chunks of rocks would shoot out from within the dust cloud and sudden explosions of thunderps could be heard as well. Judging from these, the audience could infer indirectly how chaotic and intense the fight must be inside.


    Meanwhile, Greem, who was riding on the Demon Alligator Hunter which was standing far from the center of the fight, had a more vivid and direct perception towards the situation inside the dust cloud,pared to the those other people. Under his skillful control, the rapid firing of Dirt Spears from the Demon Alligator Hunter and the Fire Arrows he casted towards the dust cloud would always inflict great damage to the enemy.


    The furious roars that continued to sound out from within were the biggest evidence of how effective his attacks were.


    It was such a remarkable battle which was like that of monsters fighting. It brought an indescribable sense of shock to the onlookers at the sides. Countless eyes of different colors filled with variety of expressions rested on Greem¡¯s face. They had changed their view towards him a lot of times already, previously from disdain to looking down and disregard but now, they had been startled after they examined him to be a rather dignified figure.


    This was a fucking beginner apprentice!


    Even so, he could still engage Thunder Axe Mark in such a fierce battle!


    Although he wasn¡¯t fighting directly in person, but a summon was still part of an apprentice Adept¡¯s strength!


    They couldn¡¯t help but try to imagine. If it wasn¡¯t Mark, who had a strong physique and muscles and clearly a man with powerfulbat power that was fighting right now but them... Many elites among the people in the training camp showed painful and struggling expressions. Even though they didn¡¯t want to admit this, but if they were the ones there instead of Mark, maybe they would be struck down on the ground by a mere beginner apprentice, unable to get up anymore.


    This mighty Rock Snake was just too strong!


    It¡¯s overall strength was perhaps not weaker than that of an advanced apprentice of the path of Body-Refining Adept. If taken into consideration, the snake¡¯s frightening rock armor and its fearless onught would probably make even those Pseudo-Adepts in the camp hesitant to face this monstrosity!


    At the time when everybody still had their minds filled with troubled and distorted thoughts, a ground-shaking eruption red up through the air. Mark, who had been transformed into a muscr giant, was thrown out of the dust cloud and flew away like a cannon ball, mming into the ground with tremendous force.


    The crowd was shocked by this and hurriedly turned their eyes over to Mark. They instantly discovered countless frightening wounds covering the entirety of Mark¡¯s body.


    Mark¡¯s left arm was broken and twisted into an unnatural angle while his right arm still looked to be in a good shape, barely able to hold on his axe. The battle axe forged from multiple special alloys had be out of shape while its body was full of deep scratches and bite marks.


    Mark¡¯s body also had the same type of scratches on his axe.


    When he tried to stand up on his feet while ferociouslyughing, blood gushed out from the countless wounds he had, making his entire body bathe in blood. A terrifying cut from the bottom of his left eye to his right chin nearly ripped his face into two, of which the exposed flesh turned into a shade of earthly yellow color. A clear sign of being contaminated by Earth Elementium.


    If Mark doesn¡¯t try to remove this Earth Elementium, a wound like this wouldn¡¯tpletely heal even with his astounding self-recovery brought by his high Physique.


    ¡°Cough... good kid...¡± Mark stood still at the ce where hended and coughed up blood then said, ¡°This fellow is really strong! If not because I made a mistake of having few of my helpful magical equipment exchanged for all of these rubbish, you wouldn¡¯t have been the one that had the advantage today... cough...¡±


    The dust cloud dispersed, revealing the gigantic snake.


    The crowd¡¯s eyes shrank.


    The Rock Snake¡¯s condition wasn¡¯t any better than Mark¡¯s.


    The gigantic snake with the size of a normal human house was now left with only one-third of its original size. Debris kept falling apart from its skull which had been crushed by Mark. The surface of the entire snake¡¯s body was covered fully with ck burn marks resulting from the violent lightning strikes. Many rocks on its body had melted and dripped down like hot wax.


    Right in the middle of the broken skull, behind the manyyers of Adamantine Rocks, an egg-shaped summoning core could be vaguely seen.


    Although the Rock Snake was pretty much in a very bad shape, that didn¡¯t hinder or cause any problem to its movement, offensive power, and defensive ability.


    Some people blessed with keen perception even saw through the cracks of its body how huge amounts of Earth Elementium carried a lot of rocks and sand all around its interior restlessly fixing up all of the damages it sustained. Even the massive damage that was on the head of the snake could be seen closing up at an incredible pace.


    It only took fifteen minutes for this Golem of the earth element topletely fix all of its injuries.

 Chapter 68

    Looking at the ferocious Mark who was able to remain standing, Greem secretly felt respect for the man but that doesn¡¯t mean he eased up his vignce on Mark.


    Clusters of earthly yellow smoke gathered at the severely broken parts of the Rock Snake. Using the Adamantine rocks it got from underground as materials, and the sticky Earth Elementium as the bonding agent, it only took a few seconds for the exposed summoning core to once again be concealed within.


    After itpleted its self-recovery, the frightening Rock Snake stood erect and coiled up its long tail made from rocks then thrusted itself to the enemy. The broken mouth opened up widely, revealing a pair of sharp fangs formed from pointy rocks, aiming right at Thunder Axe Mark who could barely stand straight.


    The distance of under thirty meters took only a split-second of time.


    But right before the Rock Snake¡¯s ferocious mouth and its sharp fangs reach its target, a taller, burlier and more terrifying human than Mark appeared in front of him.


    He had the same human body, the same muscles and bones, but this tall man only briefly clenched his fist and lightly punched the snout of the Rock Snake who approached him with a tremendous force. The Rock Snake which had put up quite a fierce battle with Mark shattered instantly into tiny bits, sending fragments everywhere.


    It seemed as if there was an invisible air barrier around this tall man as nothing of the flying debris was able to get close to his body. He was standing right there at the heart of the explosion of dirt and debris but he was still firm just like Mount Tai. He still even had the strength to slowly retract his outstretched right fist that he then pointed at the depths of the dirt storm, performing a grabbing gesture.


    A light puffing sound was heard, as the summoning core that dropped down between the slits on the ground was transported by a powerful force and it fell right into the tall man¡¯s palm.


    The tall man raised his right hand up, and carefully examined the eye-catching core through the light from the bright sunlight.


    What was once a brownish crystal clear surface of the core was carved fully with countless micro runes and arrays with each magical rune emanating strong Earth Elementium and glimmered, forming a three-dimensional micro magical array in front of his eyes.


    To be honest, he was able to clearly see every single rune there is that was carved with lines a few hundred times finer than threads of hair, and he could also roughly identify each individual magical runes. But when he pieced them all together, Hulk could only scratch his bald head as he couldn¡¯t understand how these runes were able to project and shape the incorporeal Earth Elementium into the powerful and ferocious Elementium Golem.


    After he spent an ample amount of time but still failed toprehend the essence of the magical knowledge behind it, Hulk had no other choice but to secretly sigh for his ownck of talent concerning magical arrays. Meanwhile, Greem had led his Demon Alligator in front of Hulk, staring right at him anxiously.


    Appropriately tossing the summoning core back to Greem, Hulk wore an expression full of disdain as he said, ¡°Look how panicked you are. Do you think I can break it just by staring at it? Alright, alright already! I¡¯ll consider you the victor of today¡¯s bout. I¡¯ll even help Mark admit his defeat! Now you go and redeem your war trophy.¡±


    Greem retrieved the summoning core in a flurry, and then immediately ced it in front of his eyes for a careful inspection. After it suffered violent impacts multiple times, Greem was worried the overpowering shockwave would damage the fragile magical arrays carved on the core.


    Fortunately, after having it carefully examined by the Chip, this summoning core which was able to summon a ferocious Rock Snake from underneath the ground, was still intact. This had eased Greem¡¯s mind.


    As for Hulk¡¯s unexpected interference, Greem did not dare sound any dissent.


    Although the chief of the training camp could easily stop the battle effortlessly, he deliberately used such a violent and savage method to destroy the rocky body of the Rock Snake. This was obviously Hulk¡¯s way of giving a warning towards Greem.


    It looks like he had performed too well today, forcing the chief to use that kind of method to warn Greem not to overdo things. It was the ¡®gentlest¡¯ method of cowing Greem into submission.


    Nheless, the strength of a Pseudo-Adept that Hulk showed truly shocked Greem. The pure power of his muscles and the mastery of such strength, Greem could totally sense something different between Hulk and the other apprentices.


    People had always said Pseudo-Adepts were the ones closest to Adepts, could this peculiarity be the origin of an Adept¡¯s qualitative change from an apprentice Adept?


    Greem silently lowered his head and diligently remembered what he hadprehended into his heart so that he could take his time in analyzing it in the future.


    ¡°It seems all of us here had really underestimated you!¡± Hulk said as he supported the wobbling Mark from the side. He continued, ¡°Looks like you are quite reliant on Golems for most of your battle power. Indeed, this will allow you to gain a huge boost of your overall power. Alright, follow me. A talented man like you is needed in this camp. Let me see if I can find a suitable position for you!¡±


    After he finished saying that, Hulk carried Mark and turned, running towards arge wooden cabin that was quite far. Smiling wryly, Greem touched his nose and followed closely behind Hulk.


    Absolute silence was widespread among the onlookers that were on the side of the field, each and every one of them woreplicated expressions. It was clear that none of them was able to ept that kind of a surprising result. There were even a few advanced apprentices donning long faces, showing miserable looks that was as if their parents just passed away.


    When Hulk passed through the crowed, he suddenly stopped and turned to Dark Wood who also had aplicated expression.


    ¡°Hey dead man, why did you bet on Greem?¡± he asked loudly.


    Dark Wood pulled down his hood and covered his skeleton-like face. A trembling voice came out from within his shadowed face.


    ¡°If Mark won, wouldn¡¯t that mean I¡¯m useless? Isn¡¯t this oue better? Now, who would dare to say I was defeated because I¡¯m useless?¡±


    Hulk¡¯s mouth hung open for a while which seemed as if he had something to say but failed to think of any.


    Damn it, although this guy¡¯s answer was rather disparaging, it was still an honest answer. It made the chief of this training camp unable to find a suitable reason to vent his anger on this person.


    ¡°How about you? Why did you bet on him?¡± Hulk turned to Kevin and asked.


    ¡°This kid told me he was confident in this fight and since I¡¯m really poor, I thought why not try my luck!¡± Kevin¡¯s nswer was also straightforward and honest.


    ¡°Ahhh...¡± Hulk was at a loss for words and finally gave up on his intention of venting his anger on someone. ¡°You two lucky guys, why didn¡¯t anyone tell me about this earlier? Hmph. Go and get your rewards now. Hey kid, you follow me, I¡¯ll be treating you to a meal...¡±


    Hulk really meant what he said.


    Different from what wasmon formalities where the host would wee his guests and talk for a bit, a few burly men immediately came in while carrying heavy food boxes in their hands right after Hulk brought his guests in and made them sitfortably in front of a long wooden table.


    An exquisitely made silver tray was ced in front of Greem. It had some simple but elegant decorations and the words carved on it looked quite mysterious as well. But Greem wasn¡¯t interested in them at all. Instead, he kept staring nkly at the thick roasted meat that was on top of the tray.


    It was a very huge piece of roasted meat weighing at least two kilograms. There were still traces of blood and smoke that could be seen from them. Arge ss was ced right beside the tray, the contents of it was some crimson, sticky liquid. Greem tried to sniff it and a pungent smell of blood invaded his nostrils.


    ¡°Eat up!¡± Hulk said with a sinister and hideous smile, ¡°I rarely treat someone to a meal, don¡¯t tell me you¡¯re not going to be giving me face!¡±


    The severely wounded Mark was supposed to find a quiet ce to treat his serious injuries, but strangely enough, he, too, had struggled for the long table. The bloody meat ribs that was ced in front of him weighed nearly ten kilograms, and the wine ss that came together with the meal was reced by arge copper basin.


    Greem then turned his head towards the host of this meal, Hulk. Right in front of Hulk was arge piece of medium rare animal rib and judging from its condition where it still had some blood, it seemed to be quite fresh as if it was just newly sliced from the body of somerge wild beasts.


    Meanwhile, inside his mind, the Chip gave enlightened him from his silent inquiry.


    Underground Fire Dragon!


    This was the ribing from an Underground Fire Dragon!


    The Underground Fire Dragon was a type of dragon who lived in theva region deep within the ground. It possessed a little bit of the bloodline of dragons but didn¡¯t possess frightening abilities like those mega dragons. They also loved to eat sulfur and the Dragon Fruit, therefore they were also a kind of Fire Element demon beast.


    While Greem was still hesitating, Mark had already started to indulge in his huge meal. He had tossed away the huge silver cutlery and used his bare hands to tear apart the rib, gobbled it while ignoring its raw taste.


    Hulk shouldn¡¯t use this to harm him!


    After he ordered the Chip to give the rib a thorough scan and found that there was no problem, Greem finally took the cutlery and tried to cut through his meal. He wasn¡¯t really paying any attention to these utensils but when he grabbed the knife, he realized that this seemingly insignificant silver knife was unexpectedly a magical item. It held two magic effects of Pration and Sharpen. The silver fork he was holding on his other hand also had the magic effect of Pierce and Strengthen.


    Fuck, these were only cutlery used for cutting through the rib but the magic effects they had were so much better than those defensive magical items owned by most of the intermediate apprentices. Greem couldn¡¯t help but marvel at the gap between different ranks of apprentices.


    Greem sighed and cut out a small piece of meat after considerable effort. He picked it up with the silver fork and ced it in his mouth.


    To be honest, for the very first time he tasted the meat, Greem nearly spat it all out. It tasted raw and bitter but Greem still tried his best and gave it a good chew until he felt his jaw be sore and reluctantly swallowed it into his stomach. When the meat had reached the inside of his stomach, a warm sensation then swiftly surged from his lower abdomen, causing his body to have a reaction towards this burning sensation.


    It was as if Greem¡¯s body suddenly entered into a state of extreme hunger, a strong desire to consume food resonated from his entire body and mind, challenging his will.


    ¡°What¡¯s happening to me? Chip, activate dynamic body scan!¡±


    ¡°Beep. Dynamic body scanning initiated... traces of Fire Element energy detected... host¡¯s body is absorbing them in a high speed...¡±


    ordingly, a dynamic body attribute sheet was projected in Greem¡¯s eyes. Both his Physique and Spirit started to increase slowly. Although the gain was only three to four digits after the decimal point, at least it was still gradually increasing.


    Greem¡¯s eyes flickered.


    Tonic food?


    Could this be the tonic food of this world?!

 Chapter 69

    The meat of Underground Fire Dragon tasted bitter and tough.


    Although the thing ced in front of Greem was technically considered cooked meat, he was still having a hard time ripping, chewing and swallowing it. He nced towards the other two men who were happily gobbling up their own meal. Greem couldn¡¯t help but wonder whether these two had enhanced their teeth with a Piercing and Tearing spell. Without it, how could they actually manage to chew this meat, which was tougher than cow leather?


    Greem was eating very slowly, but resolutely.


    After switching part of his attention to his increasing Physique and Spirit, he became even more determined to finish this piece of meat. However, it seemed that he was the only one who could have done this. After all, not everybody was able to detect such tiny changes to their attributes.


    The second piece of meat was served right after he finished the first one. The total size of both pieces was at least three times bigger than his stomach. But he still swallowed them down through clenched teeth. At the end, he had even given up trying to taste the meat. He had to rely on his strong will to force them into his mouth and desperately swallow them into his stomach.


    As every single piece of shredded meat and every single chunk of meat cube fell into Greem¡¯s stomach, he found that they were all gradually, yet constantly, emanating an Elementium aura that brought Greem joy. It was the taste of Fire Elementium!


    Normally, if Greem wanted to increase his Spirit, he would have had to rely on his daily four hours of meditation to slowly absorb the Fire elementium freely swimming in his Spiritual domain. Usually, this process would increase the maximum level of his Spirit. It was as if his Spirit was a small pond, and his daily rest would refill the pond to its maximum level while meditating would help him expand the pond¡¯s boundary.


    Greem had previously thought that the only way one could expand the upper limit of their Spirit was through some specially concocted Spirit Potions. However, today¡¯s ¡®delicacy¡¯ had made him think differently. He now knew that, apart from meditation and Spirit Potions, there was another method which could slowly improve the quality of an Apprentice Adept¡¯s constitution.


    Although consuming arge amount of these potions could quickly increase the upper limit of one¡¯s Spirit, the increase would usually result in some side effects. This method would bring harm to the normal functions of other body attributes. However, the ¡®delicacy¡¯ that he had just eaten came with no side effects. It would increase his Spirit slowly and would show the same results as meditation.


    Greem had been told before that the Mind Concentrating Potion, like the one he had just bought, would increase one¡¯s Spirit at the expense of one¡¯s Physique. Therefore, this potion had to be taken in moderation or else Greem would be like Dark Wood and turn into a living skeleton.


    While pondering about how he couldbine the delicacy and the Mind Concentrating Potion to yield the best result, a cube of meat suddenly got stuck in Greem¡¯s throat. He couldn¡¯t swallow it or cough it out, so he just picked up a ss of crimson liquid and gulped it down.


    As if a me had entered his mouth and was flowing into his stomach, Greem¡¯s face suddenly turned purple. It seemed as if blood was about to burst from his face.


    This... this was the blood of Underground Fire Dragon!


    Fire Elementium kept emanating from the meat of Underground Fire Dragon and was absorbed and merged into his hungry body. With great effort, Greem managed to swallow thest piece of meat. He finally couldn¡¯t hold up anymore andy his face on the dining table. His Spiritual conscious had be totally muddled and paralyzed because of the huge amount of Fire Elementium. He found himself being unable to think clearly.


    ¡°Hehe, kid, this is the first truth I wanted to teach you.¡± Before falling unconsciouspletely, Greem vaguely heard the loud voice of Hulk. ¡°Only by knowing how to eat properly, can an Apprentice Adept, be a better fighter! Remember this!¡±


    Green didn¡¯t remember a single thing that happened after that. The Fire Elementium exploded in his body like scorchingva melting its way to its destination. It was recklessly rushing through every single blood vessel and vein within his body. The overly-strong Fire Elementium had painted his skin fiery red and made his skin hot enough to burn one¡¯s finger when touched. He was like a human shaped furnace that was on full power.


    Clearly, these Fire Elementium, that were full of strong bioactivity, were extremely suitable for human absorption. They were present in a huge amount and pounded through every single inch of his muscles, bones, tendons and blood. They continuously merging themselves into Greem¡¯s body, bathing his entire body in a grand feast of Fire Elementium.


    Greem was drunk! He was drunk off Fire Elementium!


    ............


    When Greem finally woke up, seventeen hours had passed.


    The time was urate to the millisecond, as he had been informed by the Chip.


    When Greem awoke, he found that he was lying on a warm, cozy nket inside of a small single tent.


    As soon as he opened his eyes, he felt like he was going to explode.


    An unprecedented feeling of satisfaction from his bloodline flooded most of his conscious. Greem felt as if his entire body was trembling and moaning in enjoyment. He felt as if every single bone and muscle were cheering, eager to try out their new strength. His bloodline was fully satisfied for the first time ever. It kept urging him to fight and expel the steady flow of raging strength in his body.


    ¡°Chip, what has happened to me? Why am I feeling this way?¡± Greem had always been a calm man who valued reason before everything else, so he was not ustomed to this unusual impulse.


    ¡°Beep. Detected that the Host¡¯s body attributes have all reached the upper limit... also detected arge amount of unabsorbed bioactive Elementium within the Host¡¯s body... The abnormal feeling the Host ising from the stimtion of these bioactive Elementium... It is suggested that the Host performs fire spell practice at once so that the umted bioactive Elementium can be absorbed...¡±


    Damn, it was all because of the overly low endurance limit of his body. It seemed that he just couldn¡¯t bear the excessive nourishment he gained from the delicacy!


    Greem instantly bolted up from the nket. He lightly clenched his fist and immediately felt explosive strength start to gather around his shoulder. For a moment, it made think that he had switched his path to one of a Body Refining Adept.


    He lifted the tent p and exited from it. He realized that he was still in the training camp and had just been thrown in a tent on the west side. It was opposite from the wooden cabin in the east. With his sensitive senses, he could tell that some of these tents were empty, while others were upied by men who were either meditating or sleeping soundly.


    It was the morning of the next day. Many elites in the training camp were conscientiously practicing their magic spells at the edge of therge training field. As Greem watched at the skilful and free way they practiced their instantaneous casting, he couldn¡¯t help himself from starting to want to try out his spell too.


    As a matter of fact, instantaneous casting was an ability for matured spell casters.


    When an apprentice reached to a certain degree of mastery with a magic spell, they would try topress or even skip a part of the incantation, while still keeping the continuity of spell casting. The final goal of thisborious training was to be able to cast the spell instantaneously.


    Some powerful Adepts didn¡¯t even need to chant the dozens, or even hundreds, of words in a chant. Instead, a few short incantations were all they needed to say to instantaneously cast the spell.


    However,pressing a long chant into a short one required the spell caster to spend hours upon hours of restless practice. In addition, a secret magical spell legacy was required.


    That was why an Adept family was so important to an Apprentice Adept. Each Adept family would have their own magic spell legacy. Only an apprentice belonging to that Adept family would be able to enjoy the legacies and techniques that were handed down by generations of senior Adepts. This would result in making their path smoother and easier.


    Or else, without the aid of such ancient knowledge, an apprentice would have to grope in the dark for everything he tried to achieve. With that, even an apprentice with extraordinary magical talent would still have to waste the precious time he had.


    Take Greem as an example. Currently, if he recited one-third of a magic spell, the spell would enter into an irreversible molding process. If this process was interrupted or he stopped casting midway, he would have to withstand a certain degree of bacsh. But, for those apprentices who had the legacy from their family, it was like they were cheating. They knew which part they had to stop, and they knew how to stop casting halfway while avoiding the bacsh.


    Just this alone wasn¡¯t something that Greem could learn by himself. He wouldn¡¯t be able to learn it even if he spent countless years practicing spell casting.


    Therefore, this was the advantage of having legacies as their knowledge.


    Those apprentices who had learned ¡®Free Cast¡¯ could practice their magic spells randomly, and when the spell had almost activated, they would dispel it. They would be able to improve their mastery of the magic spell by repeatedly practicing in this way.


    After all, there was a limit to an Apprentice Adept¡¯s Spirit. Without using instantaneous casting or free casting, they would find their Spirit depleted after casting a dozen magical spells. After that, they could only sleep in order to restore their Spirit. But, by using instantaneous casting, they could practice a hundred or even a thousand times every single day.


    Hence, the progress of an apprentice who had ess to a legacy and Greem, who seemed like a feral child, was vastly different.


    Right now Greem didn¡¯t have the time to feel envious or jealous of these apprentices. He brought himself to a corner of the training field and found arge rock as his target. He started to repeatedly cast thetest solidified spell he had: ming Spear.


    Inparison to the quiet and calm free casting that was going on beside him, Greem¡¯s spell casting practice was like a wild bombardment. Following his loud and clear reciting, he kept firing one ming Spear after the other. Things that looked like burning spears kept appearing in his hand and, while making a hissing noise, flew into therge rock that stood a hundred meters away. It exploded and filled the air with loud booms.


    The ming Spear¡¯s swift and violent physical damage, along with its powerful explosion, instantly flooded therge rock target in a fierce and raging sea of me. The ear-piercing noise of explosion never stopped even for one second.


    If the situation was normal, Greem¡¯s pathetic nine Spirit points would have been depleted after four ming Spears. But for some unknown reason, the violent and raging Fire element energy kept emerging from his body. It was so strong that he even felt like his Spirit was going to explode.


    Therefore, Greem had no choice but to keep firing ming Spears in order to release the tremendous pressure he felt on his Spirit. This resulted in the entire training camp being shocked by him!

 Chapter 70

    Countless napping apprentices roared furiously as they jumped out of their tents, dark shadows under their eyes indicating their need for sleep, cursing their inconsiderate peer in loud voices. But when they saw the young man in front of arge rock target, they had no choice but to halt their actions and angrily return back to their tents.


    Soon, countless magical glows sprung up on the top of the tents. The sleepless apprentices had no choice but to use magic spells to shield themselves from the disturbance outside in order to return to their sweet dreams.


    After a full half hour, Greem was breathing heavily and his Spirit level was very low.


    Through his delicate senses, he could feel a steady stream of Fire element energy from the depths of his bone and flesh resupplying him with Spirit. This process was much slower than before, and finally at a rate that he could endure.


    ¡°How is it? Do you feel better now?¡± A deep voice suddenly came from behind him.


    Greem looked over his shoulder and found Kevin standing there.


    ¡°Do you know how many people in this training camp are jealous about the big feast you had yesterday?¡± His arms crossed, Kevin spoke with a smile on his face. ¡°What you had yesterday was a grand feast of Underground Fire Dragon, which is something many people in this camp dream of having but never even have a chance of tasting. Being treated to a meal by Hulk is something that you should feel proud of, rather than return like a champion from the Underground World!¡±


    ¡°I suppose that the meat is really expensive?¡± Greem asked, while scratching his head.


    ¡°Expensive? Not really! In the market, you can buy 500 grams of fresh Underground Fire Dragon ribs with 100 magic crystals, and a ss of dragon blood only costs 200 magic crystals.¡±


    Though Kevin said in a rather rxed manner, Greem felt like the man was actually talking through his tightly clenched jaw.


    Greem was no longer the same young and inexperienced rookie. He could now clearly understand the true value of magic crystals.


    For an apprentice like him, who hade here while carrying out the simple Underground World inspection mission, each trip to the Underground World would bring him a reward of five merit points and ten magic crystals. For an elite apprentice like Kevin, the reward for each mission was roughly ten merit points and 30 to 40 magic crystals.


    Taking away the basic expenses of purchasing materials and necessities, an elite apprentice with savings of 200-300 magic crystals was considered a rich man. Otherwise, after yesterday¡¯s bet, why had there been so many elite apprentices clenching their teeth tightly and wishing they could devour him alive?


    To be in honest, after two bets, Greem had taken nearly all of the savings of every single elite apprentice in this training camp. If Hulk had not given out his order, perhaps right as Greem stepped out from this training camp, he would be greeted by countless apprentices waiting to knock him out and rob him!


    Even though he had won himself a huge sum of ¡®ill-gotten gains¡¯, when Greem heard the actual price of Underground Fire Dragon, he still couldn¡¯t control himself and his face twitching violently.


    After holding back for quite some time, Greem finally couldn¡¯t contain himself and let out a raging roar into the sky.


    ¡°If I had known that thing was so expensive, I would¡¯ve... I would¡¯ve.. definitely...¡±


    ¡°Definitely not touched it at all?¡±


    ¡°I would¡¯ve definitely eaten more of them!¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    After making fun for a bit, when both men looked at each other again, they actually felt closer.


    In fact, since the first day they had met, Greem had been in secret awe of these elite apprentices who had gone through life and death training. Though he had defeated two rather famous Advanced Apprentices, they were actually fighting publicly in an open field. If there hadn¡¯t been a limitation because of the fighting ground or a restriction to the magic approach they could use, Greem, who was just a beginner apprentice, was still too weak.


    He was strong because of his Golems; he himself was just too weak.


    If he and Dark Wood had been in a thickly forested mountain, Dark Wood, who was an expert on curse spells, would have thousands of ways to drive Greem crazy. And if his opponent had been Kevin, Greem would have definitely died instantly.


    There was no way he could have hidden under the ground all day, trying to avoid the enemy¡¯s attack. No matter what, he needed toe back to the surface to eat, drink, and sleep. When he rxed his vignce, the enemy would stealthily kill him.


    Therefore, though his fighting ability had gained eptance from most people, Greem knew himself. Maybe he really could pose a threat to most of the people in this training camp, but it would not be fatal, and that¡¯s why the members of this training camp could ept him rather leniently.


    If Greem had really been deceived by the glory of his own victories and tried to interact with these people arrogantly, all he would end up with is endless hostility and hatred.


    For this very reason, when Kevin expressed his kindness, Greem immediately repaid that with ten times the enthusiasm.


    Though Kevin was much older than Greem, he was only about twenty-seven, and was still a young man. Hence, they weren¡¯t too different from each other.


    After talking for some time, Kevin pulled out an old sack and gave it to Greem.


    ¡°This is your portion after yesterday¡¯s victory. It¡¯s inconvenient to carry so many magic crystals, so I exchanged most of them into a magic crystal card. It can be used in exchange of magic crystals in all Adept stations belonging to the Zhentarim Association. This is much better than carrying a few thousand magic crystals and swaggering through the streets!¡±


    Greem was pleasantly delighted and expressed his gratitude fervently.


    ¡°It is just a small matter, there is nothing to thank me for. In fact, I should be the one to say thanks to you! If not for you, yesterday I wouldn¡¯t have been able to earn a small fortune. Haha, you didn¡¯t see how jealous those guys were; it was such an enjoyable moment!¡±


    Greem rubbed his palms, but didn¡¯t know how to continue this conversion. Although it was nice to be friends with Kevin, it seemed that Greem had offended many more guys in this camp!


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Hulk¡¯s given his order. From now on, you¡¯ll be part of my team. But maybe you didn¡¯t know that, since when Hulk mentioned this, you had passed out and were being carried away from the wooden cabin.¡± Kevin couldn¡¯t help but let out a loudugh. Though he was teasing Greem, Greem could still hear an undertone of envy from Kevin¡¯s words.


    ¡°Brother Kevin, can you exin the responsibility and power of a camp apprentice?¡±


    ¡°Haha, no problem! Come, let me bring you back to Adept Tower. I¡¯ll tell you the actual situation of this training camp on our way back!¡±


    When Greem took his huge fortune and safely returned to his residence at Adept Tower, he finally had a better understanding of what a training camp was.


    The training camp, just as its name implied, was a training camp used to train elite apprentices. But, it was also a coboration used to maintain the interest of the small size Adept families.


    After all, though it was called the Underground Cave, along with the dark and deep Underground World, it also covered the Ker mountain range and a vast forest full of resources that spanned thirty thousand miles ofnd. It was also one of the richest regions throughout the entire Dagon region.


    Also, the Second Grade Adept who had been sent here by the Zhentarim Association had lived in seclusion inside of the Adept Tower and rarely showed himself in public. As long as it wasn¡¯t a major incident, like the Fallen Adepts that had attacked them on the surface, he never really interfered in anything regarding the Underground Cave and only focused his attention on his own magical experiments.


    asionally, he would secretly venture into the Underground World, but it was mostly to harvest the knowledge and resources required by his experiment. He rarely got involved in the battle between Adepts from the surface and the Fallen Adepts.


    Truly, all seventeen of the First Grade Adepts who ran the Adept Tower of the Underground Cave were the decision makers in every single affair. And behind each of them was an Adept family who was significant in the Dagon region.


    Of course, the overall strength of these Adept families was insignificant in the eyes of the Zhentarim Association, as they were only considered small Adept families. But in the Dagon region, they were the local viins who controlled everything. Ordinary human nobles and merchants could only seek the protection from the Adept families; only then could they make their living, bringing in endless profit from the Ker mountain range.


    Herbs, woods, special nts, leather, the cores of demon beasts, mysterious demons... no matter what kind of material or resource, you could always find it here. Countless hunter groups, exploration teams that ventured between the steep mountains within the Ker mountain range, brought a steady supply of precious resources out and gave the lion¡¯s share to the investor who had supported them.


    But these were low-grade resources. The real items that made the Adept families so filthily rich were the magical materials that came from the Underground World. Dark Grass, Phantom Mushroom, Nine-Eyes Stone ¨C these items that could tempt even official Adepts were the main reason why the Adept families couldst for hundred or even thousands of years without decaying.


    No ordinary human had the ability to venture into the depths of the Underground World and harvest these resources. Only the mysterious existences who possessed all kind of special approaches, Apprentice Adepts, had the ability to venture into the territory of underground creatures and bring back the rare and precious resources from specific regions.


    All seventeen stationed Adepts represented the seventeen top Adept families in the Dagon region. As long as they still existed, no outsider could interfere in the interests of these Adept families. As official Adepts, of course, they didn¡¯t get themselves involved in suchborious yet time-consuming task. The junior apprentices from each family acted for them in order toplete this harvesting mission.


    In doing so, not only could they ensure the continuity of their family¡¯s interest, they could also train the best juniors of their family. Eventually, the training camp was born.


    If all of the seventeen stationed Adepts were the representatives of their respective Adept family, then all of the elite apprentices in this training camp were the hatchet men for their respective Adept family. Once something that would hurt the interests of their family happened, they would be the executioners who stood out to protect the interests and the face of their own family.


    Of course, if the exploration team who was sent out or invested in by a family discovered a rare demon beast or devil that they failed to capture, the apprentices stationed in the training camp would contribute their strength and provide the exploration team with the powerful support of magic spells.


    However, the most important activity for the elite apprentices stilly in the Underground Cave.


    Because that ce was the lifeline for the Adept families, a resource they would never give up.

 Chapter 71

    Since the existence of the Underground Cave was very important for all of the Adept families in the Dagon region, foreign elite apprentices such as Greem became their favorite target for recruitment.


    First, having some foreign recruits wouldn¡¯t cause too much of an impact on their current interests. Without the support of an Adept family, the Apprentice Adepts wouldn¡¯t have the guts to offend the official Adepts openly. So, the recruited elite apprentices could be their most capable hatchet men, but were unable to be one of theirpetitors.


    Second, the Underground World wasn¡¯t a peaceful ce. The rare resources sought after by Adepts from the surface were also the target for the ck bastards of the underground. Therefore, the start of every single underground expedition trip and harvesting trip was also the beginning of a chaotic battle between the two parties.


    Due to extensive exploration and development, all of the rare resources produced in the Underground World had been excavated and their locations marked down as resource sites. What time these resources were matured and what time they needed to be harvested, these things both parties knew very well. Therefore, whenever it was time to harvest, a deadly ughter would ur in the surroundings of these resource sites.


    Neither party would send out their official Adepts in this chaotic battle, but restricted the battle to the level of Apprentice Adepts. Only the winner of the battle had the right to enter the resource site and harvest the resources. As for the loser, either they escaped with wounds or they would have been killed in the battle.


    Like this, a bloody ughter had been ongoing for more than three hundred years in the Underground Cave, and it had be an unwritten edict in this ce. Using their strongest apprentices as their token, both parties would fight for the fixed resources every month. The winner took it all, while the loser got killed miserably. It was an arena where all Pseudo-Adepts could put on a good show.


    Now, because of the uniqueness of Greem¡¯s ability, he was chosen by the training camp under the lead of Hulk, and was fortunate enough to be a member together with the other elite apprentices. With this, he became busier, as apart from carrying out the apprentice mission organized by the Zhentarim Association every fifteen days, he also needed to join the underground patrol of the training camp intermittently.


    With this, Greem¡¯s speed of obtaining merit point was definitely faster than all other ordinary apprentices.


    After gaining a basic understanding of the situation at the training camp, Greem left Kevin and returned to his residence.


    Having entered his room and properly locked the door, Greem made sure his surrounding was safe. Then he started to take out all of the magical and wondrous items from his body.


    Circlet of Nobility, Thorn Armor Bracelet, Hasten Boot, Screaming Branch, Gnome Goggle...


    When he was sure there weren¡¯t any magic spells still affecting his body, he inwardly gave out an order.


    ¡°Chip, run a scan on the current situation of my body...¡±


    ¡°Beep. Mission epted. Commencing scanning of Host¡¯s body...¡±


    After the slow yet meticulous spirit frequency spread across his body, Greem¡¯stest stats were projected into his eyes.


    As he stared at the statistics, a smile emerged from Greem¡¯s face.


    Compared to his previously frail body, all of Greem¡¯s attributes were now on a new level. Physique was the attribute with the most outstanding improvement, as it had jumped up by two points. After all, just one month ago, Greem had only had three points in his Physique. Compared to the other Apprentice Adepts, he was too frail to stand even a gust of wind.


    Though the other three attributes hadn¡¯t increased by a big margin, they all had a significant improvement, and were no longer in the stagnant state like the past.


    After he browsed through his own attributes, Greem satfortably in the chair. He casually pulled out a bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion from his storage waistband, held it in front of his eyes, and examined it silently.


    The light blue potion was wobbling within the tiny bottle and some tiny blue pellets could be vaguely seen swimming within the liquid. But as their aura was isted within the bottle, it was very difficult for the Chip to get an urate analysis of the ingredients contained in this potion.


    Greem gently pulled out the cork and a unique smell of the sea instantly came to his nose. Without hesitation, Greem threw his head back and gulped down the potion in one go.


    Just as the potion entered his mouth, a light blue mist suddenly sprayed out from his nostril and formed into a thumb-size piteous mermaid in front of his eyes. The tiny mermaid quickly withered and aged in the air, and when its incorporeal body had nearly vanished, a sharp and miserable shriek suddenly resounded throughout the entire room.


    The shriek didn¡¯tst long, and the image of mermaid quickly vanished, followed by the dissolving of the blue mist. But the mermaid¡¯s sharp cry had prated Greem¡¯s mind with a grieving and pathos curse.


    ¡°Chip, what just happened?¡±


    ¡°Beep. Detecting the existence of ¡®Flesh Curse¡¯... Preliminary estimation shows it is the potion¡¯s negative side effect. By dispelling it, the effectiveness of the potion will be lower... Does Host want to use Spirit and dispel this Flesh Curse?¡±


    Greem sighed inwardly.


    Before, he had heard that the Mind Concentrating Potion had a strong negative side effect; looked like the rumor was real. In order to increase his Spirit, he had no choice but to endure the ravages of this Flesh Curse.


    ¡°Negative. Just keep the dynamic scanning going!¡±


    ¡°Command epted. The effect of the potion is starting...¡±


    On the attribute sheet projected in front of Greem¡¯s eyes, the number representing his Spirit slowly started to rise. At the same time, his Physique also started to drop.


    8.43...... 8.44...... 8.47...... 8.53...... 8.62......


    4.98...... 4.97...... 4.95...... 4.92......


    Fortunately, yesterday¡¯s grand feast of Underground Fire Dragon meat had brought Greem plenty of vitality, which minimized much of the pain on his internal organs, though it still felt like being bitten by thousands of ants at the same time. Otherwise, even he himself couldn¡¯t be sure if he would able to endure this painful process till the end.


    While enduring the heartbreaking paining from all over his body, he was only happy because of the ever increasing Spirit.


    8.98...... 9.03...... 9.08......


    Even in pain, Greem smiled as he witnessed his Spirit finally stepping over eight and sessfully bing nine.


    Finally, when his Spirit stopped at 9.27 and didn¡¯t move again, Greem let out a muffled groan and gave out amand, ¡°Chip, dispel the Flesh Curse!¡±


    ¡°Command epted! Releasing Fire Elementium...¡±


    A warm burst of energy started to flow through his entire body and the aching and tingling sensation gradually subsided before disappearingpletely. Greem was more focused on the attributes that had changed:


    Ugh... this bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion had brought an increase of 0.85 to Greem¡¯s Spirit. At the same time, his Physique had dropped by 0.77 and even his Strength had dropped by 0.05.


    Greem stood up and exercised his body. Though the feeling of emptiness brought by the reduction of his Physique was still there, it wasn¡¯t as strong as he had expected. It seemed like the grand feast he had yesterday brought him some hidden benefits! Meanwhile, the increase of his Spirit brought Greem an improvement of his overall ability. Both the speed of his thought or the profoundness of his spirit senses had significant improvement.


    Tempted by the result, Greem hesitated for half a second before he took out another bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion, pulled out the cork, and gulped it down.


    Greem strenuously endured the huge negative effects of the potion: the same pain, the same Flesh Curse, the same anticipation. The only focus of his attention was the Spirit, which was constantly increasing.


    9.29...... 9.33...... 9.46...... 9.52......


    ......


    Suddenly, the trifling tones of the Chip chimed out, ¡°Warning, Host¡¯s muscle damage has exceeded 17%.¡±


    ¡°Muscle damage has exceeded 19%.¡±


    ¡°Muscle damage has exceeded 21%.¡±


    ¡°Beep... warning! Muscle damage has exceeded 21%. Non-interference will result in Host entering a temporary state of decay. Does Host want to interfere?¡±


    Greem lightly clenched his jaw and replied with a deep voice. ¡°Negative!¡±


    The original aching and tingling sensation had turned into a severe pain, like his heart were being sliced through, and beads of sweat started to roll down his forehead. On the chair, Greem twisted and struggled through the pain, relying on his strong will so that he wouldn¡¯t pass out. If he passed out, he would lose control and the Flesh Curse would wreak havoc on his body before it dissolved itself. No doubt, that would bring even more damage to his Physique!


    So, even if it only spared him losing 0.01 Physique, Greem still tenaciously kept himself awake.


    9.87......


    ¡°Muscle damage has exceeded 22%.¡±


    9.93......


    ¡°Muscle damage has exceeded 23%.¡±


    9.99......


    ¡°Muscle damage has exceeded 24%.¡±


    10.03......


    ¡°Muscle damage has exceeded 25%.¡±


    Sensing that his Spirit had stopped moving, Greem finally shouted, ¡°Dispel!¡±


    As the warm burst of energy once again flowed through his body, the severe pain subsided entirely.


    Greem ced both hands on the armrest of the chair and tried to push himself up, but he failed twice in a row. The severe pain numbed his body and stopped it from responding to his control.


    Just at that moment, thetest attributes refreshed in front of his eyes.


    It finally broke through ten!


    As of now, Greem was honored to be an Intermediate Apprentice.


    From a Beginner Apprentice, who only had eight Spirit, to an Intermediate Apprentice of ten Spirit, it had only taken Greem one and a half months, but he had spent six whole years in the past just to increase from six to eight Spirit. This was clear evidence of the huge difference between someone with sufficient resources and someone without.


    But in order to achieve what he had now, Greem had paid a huge price with his body.


    His Spirit had increased from 9.27 to 10.03, a small change from single digit to two digits, but his Physique had shrunk back to 3.17 from 4.21, a jaw-dropping reduction. Along with that was a 0.01 reduction in his Strength and a reduction of 0.08 in his Agility.


    The damage caused by the Mind Concentrating Potion increased progressively!

 Chapter 72

    To be honest, Greem was acting rather impulsive by consuming the Mind Concentrating Potion!


    ording to the process he had understood earlier, a time interval of at least three to four days was required between each intake of the potion. This was so that he could avoid the cumtion of damage. But, because he thought that he was a young, strong and growing man, he decided to take the second potion right after the first. After all, he didn¡¯t have the patience to wait.


    The consequence brought about by his reckless decision was obvious.


    After the first potion, his Physique was only reduced by 0.85, but the second potion had brought it down by another 1.05. If Greem had taken the third potion, perhaps his Physique would¡¯ve taken a nose dive of nearly two points.


    After all, the parameters calcted by the Chip were just the digitized representation of his body¡¯s attributes. All four major body attributes weren¡¯t isted but supported and influenced each other. For example, Spirit and Agility influenced the hitting uracy of long range attack and the frequency of attacks. Spirit and Strength together influenced reflex and explosive force. Meanwhile, Physique was the foundation for all attributes. It worked with other attributes and influenced a person¡¯s amount of health, their physical and elemental resistance, evasion, and many other aspects.


    When Greem¡¯s Physique dropped from 4.98 to 3.17, the reduction of two points not only lowered his health points, but also caused a decay to his entire life system.


    At this moment, Greem felt as if his entire body was empty.


    The feeling of emptiness and hunger brought by the quick decay of his Physique kept bugging him. It was a really ufortable feeling and made all his internal organs feel like they were being burnt by fire.


    As he was left with no other option, and temporary had no strength to stand up, Greem reached his hand to a small copper bell on his table and rung it.


    Following that, a unique soundless wave rippled through the air, and a wooden, human-like face suddenly protruded from the empty surface of the table.


    ¡°Mister Greem, may I know what special service you need?¡± Surprisingly, the wooden face spoke.


    ¡°Food! I need food right now! Now, immediately, right away!¡±


    ¡°May I know what grade of food you need? We offer an ordinary set meal of nobility. The degree of luxury is guaranteed to be the ultimate enjoyment among human noble. Each set only costs one magic crystal. We also provide a magical energy set meal. All the ingredients are taken from intermediate to advanced level demon beasts found in the depth of Ker mountain range. Each set only cost five magic crystals.¡±


    ¡°Magical energy set meal. I want it right now!¡±


    ¡°Understood! Your order has been epted, please ce the meal fee inside of my mouth!¡± Following what it said, the protruding face opened up its mouth.


    Greem took out five magic crystals from his waist pouch and ced them into the mouth of the human face. It was originally a solid wood carving, but now it had turned into a crack that led to a secret ce. It quickly swallowed the magic crystals.


    After the wooden human face swallowed the magic crystals, it suddenly expanded and transformed into a square wooden box. When the wooden box finally exploded into countless wooden fibers and retracted back into the table, a steaming hot rib ced on top of a silver tray was revealed in front of Greem.


    A set of exquisite cutleryy next to the meal. The meal consisted of an appetizing fried rib, garnished with red, blue and white vegetables along with some tasty sauce. It was paired with a ss of fragrant grape wine.


    As Greem wasn¡¯t a picky man, he didn¡¯t pay too much attention to his meals. However, he had to admit that for the Apprentice Adepts who had been immersed in a boring routine, a meticulously prepared meal like this was considered a huge mentalpensation.


    Wasting no time on table manners, Greem savagely exterminated the fried rib like a hungry ghost rushing for his food. When the entire rib finally rested in his stomach, the burning hunger had finally subsided.


    ¡°Chip, can you identify what this meat is?¡±


    ¡°Beep. The possibility of Iron Rhinoceros is 87%, Berserk Beast is 10%, Gray Pocket Beast is 2%...¡±


    The Chip showed Greem a long list, but the possibility of thest seven to eight were so low that they could simply be ignored. Only the first few had the highest possibility.


    Greem moistened his hungry lips, threw his head back and gulped down the grape wine.


    He could clearly felt that the magical energy meal he had just now was far inferior to the Underground Fire Dragon meat he had yesterday. Also, the Iron Rhinoceros, who the meat had the highest possibility ofing from, should¡¯ve just been an intermediate Earth element demon beast. The Elementium contained within the meat was totally unmatched with his elemental affinity. Although it could still bring him a huge amount of health points, it didn¡¯t provide any benefit to his Fire element innate ability.


    It looked like if he wished to replenish both his health points and Fire element innate ability at the same time, he should choose meat from those Fire element demon beasts. The higher grade, the better.


    Therefore, urged by his hunger, Greem once again rung the copper bell.


    As expected, when Greem mentioned straight away that he wanted the Fire element demon beast as his meal, the wooden face immediately offered him a long list of delicacies.


    ming Tiger ¨C 15 Magic Crystals per 500 grams


    Fire Lizard ¨C 20 Magic Crystals per 500 grams


    Inferno Hound ¨C 25 Magic Crystals per 500 grams


    Fire Swallowing Sparrow ¨C 30 Magic Crystals per 500 grams


    ......


    Greem quietly listening with his eyes closed. From time to time, he would ask for more information. Soon, he made up his mind and picked a delicacy that suited him the most: Fried Heart of Inferno Hound.


    After paying 25 magic crystals, the wooden face quickly swallowed the dishes on the table and revealed another luxurious meal.


    This time it was not a rib but a fresh heart that was still pumping lightly. It seemed there was a fire source concealed within the fist-size heart. It was still raw and fresh when it appeared, but following an explosion of the fire source, a scorching hot me soared up to the roof before disappearing in an instant.


    When the enshrouding heat finally vanished into the air, a fresh and fragrant fried heart of Inferno Hound was revealed in front of Greem.


    Greem first used the table knife and poked a small hole on the surface of the heart, then suck all the warm blood inside of it in one go. When the warm and appetizing liquid flowed through down his throat and reached his stomach, a raging and explosive sensation made Greem so happy that he couldn¡¯t help but close his eyes in enjoyment.


    Soon after wolfing down everything in his mouth, Greem sliced the heart of ming Hound into small equal sizes and tucked in one after another. Whenever a piece of heart exploded in his stomach and began to emanate a raging Fire element energy, Greem had the impulse to moan because of the pleasure feeling.


    The raging Fire element energy kept flushing throughout his entire body. Although it made him drenched in sweat, it was an extremely refreshing.


    After he finished two sets of ming Hound meals continuously, he finally managed to replenish part of his Physique, which had been reduced a lot. In addition, there was a slight increase to his Spirit.


    Strength ¨C 4.04, Agility ¨C 4.30, Physique ¨C 3.34, Spirit ¨C 10.07


    After the wooden face cleared up the leftover dishes on the table, Greem ced both palms on his big belly. He struggled his way to his bed, before starting his daily meditation routine.


    After experienced a targeted food tonic, today¡¯s deep meditation had brought Greem¡¯s Spirit the unprecedented increase of 0.11, which was an additional 0.03paring to the normal 0.08 increase. Judging from this alone, if he was able to increase the density of Fire element energy in his body or his surroundings, it would also increase the efficiency of his meditation.


    Greem ordered the Chip to record this finding, so he could use his free time to research for the best meditation form. After finishing with all these, Greem breathed out a long sigh of satisfaction and sunk into a deep slumber.


    ............


    It was a good sleep!


    After a long hour of sleep, when Greem finally woke up from his sweet dream, he found that his entire body was filled with a powerful yet inexhaustible strength.


    Of course, this was only a sensation of fullness after his Strength had reached the maximum level. After all, he only had 3.34 of Physique and 4.04 of Strength. For a Beginner Apprentice, numbers like this weren¡¯t considered a shame, but if it was an Intermediate Apprentice, it was considered rather ¡®frail¡¯.


    Even though an Intermediate Apprentice didn¡¯t take the path of Body Refining, he should also make his Strength, Agility and Physique reach the minimum level of five. It was only a body quality like this that wouldn¡¯t hinder their Spirit, cing themselves in an unbnced course of development. Of course, those like Evil Bugs and Dark Wood were extreme examples and couldn¡¯t be judged by this standard.


    For people like them, their bodies could no longer be judged by normal standards, as they had transformed intopletely different body constitutions. The bug¡¯s body of Evil Bugs clearly showed the miraculous signs of vitality and damage sharing, and he could be considered an undefeated cockroach.


    Meanwhile, although Dark Wood¡¯s Physique was extremely low, he obviously possessed some unspeakable special abilities. At least, Greem¡¯s Demon Alligator had attacked him multiple times with Paralyze Gaze during their battle, but it seemed like he wasn¡¯t affected at all. Clearly, his strange body constitution had an immunity toward such spell.


    Greem briefly exercised his body. Right when he decided to pay a visit to the library in this ce, someone came knocking on his door.


    It was Mary.


    When Mary strode into his room with rather charming steps, her eyes were instantly filled with unconcealed puzzlement.


    ¡°You... your Spirit has reached ten?¡±


    The strange feelinging from Greem¡¯s body made Mary think that there was something wrong with her senses, as it was obvious that the spiritual ripple could only be owned by an Intermediate Apprentice.


    ¡°Yes, I just made a breakthrough yesterday. Oh, right. I suppose you¡¯re here for the war trophies? Let me tell you some good news, I sessfully sold all those war trophies, and I got us these treasures!¡± While saying that, Greem took out a bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion from his waist pouch.


    Mary took over the potion and gave it a closer look. An expression of suddenprehension emerged on her face. She then gave it back to Greem.


    ¡°You can keep this yourself! A low-grade potion like this has no effect for me, but it can still provide some benefits to you. Remember, don¡¯t consume them continuously, and don¡¯t forget to recuperate after having it. Or else, the condition of your body will be really bad!¡±


    Greem was startled.


    Although he did expect that Mary wouldn¡¯t care too much about this potion, but her indifferent attitude of giving it back still surprised him. After all, a bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion was five merit points and five magic crystals in this Adept Tower. Anyone who went to the Underground World at least once would understand how valuable a merit point was.


    Therefore, Greem was left speechless.

 Chapter 73

    Unlike the eternal darkness, the Underground Cave was never a calm ce.


    Because most of the regions had only been vaguely surveyed, even the native underground species who had upied this domain for a long history, didn¡¯t own apletely reliable map.


    The underground tunnels could stretch for miles; sometimes they expanded into massive caverns more than a thousand meters wide and sometimes they narrowed so even the Cave Dweller couldn¡¯t squeeze through. The biggest cavern was like a miniature surface world: there were hills, valleys, an underground river, andkes. In this three-dimensional environment, most of the species could utilize the cavern ceiling and walls, using their innate ability or a magic spell to fly, hover, or even ride on some of the creatures who could walk on walls (like the giant spiders or some kinds of lizards) and travel freely in this domain.


    As the only city built in the Underground World by the exiled Adepts, the location of Elysium City was top secret. The rock stratum, rich in metal, could easily iste any ill-intentioned probes from the outside world, and, together with the dark and deep caves scattered across the entire Underground World, the creatures of darkness hiding in the tunnels, Golems, and underground natives, made it so no outsider could distinguish the single passage that led to Elysium City from countless winding tunnels in the darkness without being led by an Elysium City resident.


    Some said the mighty Second Grade Fallen Adept of Elysium City had set up a massive formation of illusion outside of the city, and it was able to wipe out every single trace of Elysium City¡¯s existence. With that, even if an enemy really did find his way to the area, he still wouldn¡¯t be able to identify the exact location of the city, even if he left no stone unturned.


    Elysium City, Catsear Tavern.


    When the huge firestone hanging high up on the cavern ceiling started to go off, the tide of darkness flowed on.


    For the Fallen Adepts who lived in the dark Underground World, there wasn¡¯t a clear difference between day and night. Without using something to reference the time, their life would be muddled and it would be tough to arrange everything in a regr manner. Thus, having inherited some habits from the surface, the Fallen Adepts with powerful abilities and a bagful of amazing tricks mined a huge number of firestones from the underground and used a magical array to make them light up ording to the time on the surface world.


    Thus, Elysium City finally attracted arge group of Apprentice Adepts who had been driven into a corner and made them the city¡¯s first batch of loyal residents.


    When the night screen was down, the streets and alleyways of Elysium City lit up with torches and bonfires and a dimmed oilmp hung on the door of Catsear Tavern.


    Pushing the dpidated and dirty door open, a long-faced Langdon came through the door. Having entered, the noisy and lively atmosphere immediately brought a frown to his face.


    It was only seven in the evening, but the tavern was fully packed with drunkards of all species. Basically, all of the famous underground species had representatives here. Of course, this didn¡¯t include the lower ss species.


    Inferior species like Hooked Horrors and Petrified Lizards would definitely not have the status of an Elysium City resident. Instead, there were mostly demi-human or intelligent species, who looked human. For example, Lizardmen, Gnolls, Dwarves, and Ratmen.


    As he stared at a group ofrge-size rats walking upright in front of him, looking at their ugly hairy faces, Langdon¡¯s mind filled with disgust. He was a genuine human being, after all.


    Of course, an ordinary human wouldn¡¯t be able to survive in Elysium City, which was dominated by demons and monsters, but Langdon had no fear at all. He even ferociously kicked away a Ratman who got in his way. He could do this because he was an Apprentice Adept, a Pseudo-Adept.


    In Elysium City, aside from the Master Adepts who rarely showed themselves in public, a Pseudo Fallen Adept like him was considered a supreme existence. Wherever he went, countless underground natives would give way to him in a rather ttering manner.


    His light blue apprentice robe was decorated with countless mysterious and undecipherable golden runes that blinked sometimes as he moved, giving him a magical and mysterious air. Combined with a handsome appearance and his cultural and elegant bearing, Langdon looked like a noble. But too bad, the once elegant face looked extremely gloomy right now.


    After he kicked away the Ratman who got in his way, and totally ignoring the squeaking protest, Langdon strode to the counter, forcefully pped the counter-top, and let out a raging roar.


    ¡°Give me a bottle of ming Wine!¡±


    The noisy and lively tavern suddenly became dead silent.


    Old John, who was leisurely cleaning wine sses on the other side of the counter, rolled his eyes, murmured, and pulled out a bottle of wine from under the counter and slid it over the smooth counter top.


    Once the bottle was uncorked, the strong, spicy smell of wine immediately filled the air inside the packed tavern. Countless hairy faces poked their nose into the air and their shining saliva started to drip from their lips.


    Breathing heavily and with a pair of bloodshot eyes, Langdon, who rarely drank, threw his head back and ferociously gulped down a few mouthfuls of the hard liquor. The spicy liquor rushed into his stomach like raging mes and made it so he couldn¡¯t hold it and burst out with a few dry, hoarse coughs.


    A ssh of liquor danced in the air.


    Most of the liquor he had drunk was coughed out.


    The Ratmen, who dressed in old cloth, mimicked humans, and walked upright, immediately flocked up,y down on the floor, and stick out their big wet tongues, savagely licking the liquor spilled on the stone floor. Though normally they behaved like humans, once they saw something that was good and cost nothing, they would immediately throw away their deceiving behavior and once again expose the true instinct as low-intelligence creatures.


    Elysium City was under strict governance: only intelligent creatures were allowed to be its residents, and they had to appear human. In order to get themselves status in the city, many Ratmen, Gnolls, Lizardmen had no choice but to dress in dirty cloth which they simply picked up from piles of rubbish, stand upright, and walk with strange and staggered steps, as if pretending they were some demi-human.


    In this mini city ruled by Fallen Adepts, these creatures had no means or methods to earn their living. They ate the rubbish of the Adepts. Of course, sometimes they would resort to dirty businesses like stealing from someone; only by that could they gain a better life.


    Looking at Ratmen punching and biting each other for his vomit, Langdon clenched his jaw tightly and wished he could kill them all with an Acid Pool spell.


    He was a distinguished Pseudo-Adept; how he had he ended up spending his days with a group of demons and monsters?! An unspeakable feeling of grief and hatred filled his mind with anger that couldn¡¯t be vented. Langdon threw his head back and gulped the remaining ming wine in a swallow, casually tossed out a magic crystal, and staggered out from the tavern.


    ¡°What happened to master Langdon? I think this is the first time we¡¯ve seen him behave abnormally like this?¡± In a dark corner, two shadows whispered to each other.


    ¡°What? You don¡¯t know?¡± Another shadow said under its breath. ¡°I heard that his partner is dead.¡±


    ¡°Demon Vine Lady?¡± The first shadow let out a shocked cry. ¡°You said the Demon Vine Lady is dead?¡±


    ¡°Quiet...¡± The first shadow looked around uneasily, realized no one was watching them, and then warned with a low voice, ¡°You just came back from the west, that¡¯s why you don¡¯t know. The east region was rather lively in the past few days. I heard quite a few Pseudo-Adepts were having a fierce fight there. They even copsed a few tunnel levels.¡±


    ¡°Just now you said the Demon Vine Lady was dead? Who killed her?¡±


    ¡°Who else? Of course she was killed by those bastards from the surface. I hear those Adepts on the surface had nothing else to do, so they sent a group of apprentices to our world to seize our resources. The Demon Vine Lady was killed by this group of rookies. Rumor says...¡± The shadow paused and looked around, lowered its voice, and continued, ¡°Rumor says that she was killed by a Beginner Apprentice whose name is Greem! She...¡±


    Before the shadow could finish its words, a ground shaking boom drowned out its voice. The rock wall beside them had been punctured by a frightening fist and arge hole was left.


    A huge figure, over three meters tall, dashed through therge hole. With both hands, he forcefully pulled up the two shadows, who had been conversing secretly in the darkness.


    Light from the zing stove in the room shone onto these two shadows. They were Gnolls.


    ¡°You damn inferior creatures, who gave you the audacity to secretly talk about the matters of me, Langdon? I hate hearing the name of Greem. Whoever dares mention it again, this will be an example!¡±


    After the angry roar of the huge figure, an azure ice energy started to gather within his palms. Within the time of a breath, the two Gnolls froze into two ice statues. Right after that, the huge figure used all his strength and threw both ice statues onto the ground, shattering them into tiny pieces and sshing throughout the entire floor of the tavern.


    ¡°All of you damn dregs, hear my words and remember. Nobody mention that damn name again! Anyone fails to obey this, I, Langdon, will remind them with their own death!¡± Langdon, who had transformed into a frightening giant, roared out furiously.


    ¡°Greem! You damn bastard, I¡¯ll be waiting for you in the darkness of the underground...¡±


    ............


    Having no knowledge of what happened in the remote Underground World, Greem was extremely busy for a few days.


    He had finished reading all the books from the Swampy Tower. Only the long-drawn-out process of magical knowledge umtion and magic spell model analysis were left.


    For the first defensive magic spell he was going to possess, Greem poured in a hundred times the enthusiasm.


    Fire Shield, that was the first defensive magic spell he chose for himself. But, in order to truly master it, Greem first had to master four to five elementary subjects and a huge amount of magic spells. From the to the , and to ...


    Greem was required to master dozens of magic spells knowledge and techniques before he could learn Fire Shield. Though he was assisted by the Chip, it was still an extremely tough mission in order to thoroughly master them one by one.


    But ording to the calctions and estimations of the Chip, Greem was delighted to learn that he would be able to bag this Fire Shield magic spell before his next trip to the Underground World.


    This was a great news!

 Chapter 74

    After discovering that the food tonic could bring great benefits to an apprentice Adept¡¯s body, the magical energy meal which he only eats once a day became an essential part of his daily life.


    After being inspired and guided by him, it didn¡¯t take too long for Mary to be a ve of this ¡°delicacy¡± as well, apanying him in indulging in a frenzy eating spree. If not for having to carry out appropriate ¡®exercises¡¯ after each meal to help in the digestion of bioactive element substance, Greem would surely change all of his regr meals into magical energy meals.


    For the following days, every morning was spent on studying for magic knowledge, be it rain or shine. Greem utilized fully the help of the Chip, instilling the huge amount of knowledge he learned into his brain, then saved them in a systematic manner.


    Noon time was the most important time of the day, being the time to enjoy the various delicacy avable to them. Both of them had already tried every single one of the magical energy meals that was provided by the Adept Tower, but chose to eat the one that suited them the most. Greem still preferred the Fried Heart of a ming Hound while Mary enjoyed drinking the blood of a Wyvern.


    The insanely high daily meal expenditure of fifty magic crystals had caused their Physique to skyrocket. Currently, Greem would have daily increase of 0.3 to his Physique. As for Mary, although she didn¡¯t experience such an incredible development, she was still euphoric, showing a look of satisfaction and contentment.


    After they finished eating, it was finally time for appropriate ¡°exercises¡± where Mary would give Greem a good beating. Greem practically turned into a high quality human punching bag, brutally tortured by Mary.


    Facing Mary who had used her full speed from the get-go, Greem was forced to wear his Circlet of Nobility and only then can he barely make out her flickering figure. Whenever his palms holding scorching mes moved slower, he would be rewarded with five bloody shallow scratches on his body.


    For the first three days, Greem¡¯s body would be full of wounds after every fight. His body which had just grown a bit sturdy looked like it had been used as a scratching post by more than a hundred catwomen at the same time, was full of crisscrossing scratch marks.


    Greem had a sorrowful discovery that, without the help from his Golems, fighting Mary all alone was as if he was inviting torture. Mary could even use the gentlest ¡®touch¡¯ to reduce his health points to one, while his ming palms couldn¡¯t even touch the corner of her dress.


    Initially, he thought of suddenly changing the direction of his mes to give Mary a surprise attack, but the same technique had be useless the second time around when dealing with Mary, who was an agility type assassin Adept. Without a suitable defensive magic spell, Greem would never be able to withstand Mary¡¯s attack just with the Burning Hand alone.


    As for the reason why he didn¡¯t want to use Fire Arrow and ming Spear, the answer was too obvious. Even the Burning Hand, the type of magic spell that could be casted with just a thought, couldn¡¯t intercept Mary in such a close distance, how much more for the Fire Arrow and ming Spear which required three seconds of casting time.


    In order to save a little bit of his face, Greem was forced to break his personal vow, secretly ordering the Chip to perform a scan and save Mary¡¯s attack pattern and habits. After that, he asked the Chip to construct a mini battlefield spellcasting assist system. With the help of this system, the Chip could capture Mary¡¯s movements, using its incredible calction speed to derive possible positions she would appear, and also the possible spots she would attack.


    Later, Greem followed the calctions of the Chip and finally caught Mary.


    Unfortunately, Greem¡¯s temporary sess angered Mary, and he received a continuous and brutal beating from a red figure who suddenly rampaged. Greem didn¡¯t evenst for five seconds with his body fully bathed with blood.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but admire Mary as she could actually control her attacks at a very precise level without the help of something like the high-precision Chip. This... this shows fully how perfect her control over her enemy¡¯s life is, and her aggressiveness that can overwhelm the enemy with grief.


    The Adept Tower¡¯s arena alsoes with various functions beyond an outsider¡¯s imagination. Any apprentice Adept who fought inside it could choose between two modes: Training Match or Death Match.


    Under the training match mode, once an apprentice Adept had their health reduced to a dangerous level, any attack from their opponent would immediately trigger a defense mechanism of the arena, putting up a strong protective barrier that would protect the wounded apprentice inside. Meanwhile, the death match mode didn¡¯te with any life-preserving defense mechanism.


    This was where Mary¡¯s remarkable control stand out. Every time they fought, she could make Greem be covered in blood all over with her ferocious attacks, while never triggering the automatic defense mechanism of the arena. This really frightened Greem!


    Therefore, every afternoon had be the hardships of Greem¡¯s painful journey. The match would always end with him being covered in blood and being dragged out from the arena by Mary. The only difference was how long he couldst.


    The first day, hested for seven minutes.


    The second day, hested for fifteen minutes.


    The third day, he initially had a chance tost for much longer but since he provoked Mary, he was defeated close to five minutes.


    The fourth day, hested for half an hour. It was also the first time he and the Chip worked together wlessly.


    The fifth day, he managed tost for one full hour without being hurt at all because his Fire Shield had finally appeared.


    That¡¯s right, it was really a surprise!


    Under the tremendous pressure from Mary, the frightening Blood Queen, Greem actually managed to master all of the preliminary knowledge required for Fire Shield one day ahead of schedule, and he was also sessful in casting it before the match began.


    The Fire Shield was a shield-shaped defensive magic spell that wasposed entirely of Fire Elementium. When sessfully casted, it would automatically revolve around Greem¡¯s body in a radius of one meter. The area the spell can defend covered 1.5 meters tall and 1 meter wide. Not only does it provide an excellent physical and magical defense, it also has the Reflect Damage effect during a melee battle.


    Mary had once tried it. Using her super high agility, she came closer to Greem from the side but no matter how hard she tried, her razor sharp ws couldn¡¯t break through the defense of Greem¡¯s Fire Shield. The small Fire Shield actually had its own intelligent sensor capable of automatically moving by itself to the appropriate positions to block all attacks.


    So far, Mary hadn¡¯t master any closebat skills that had a name. Her offensive methods were primitive, mostly relying on her high agility, attacking the enemy with her strong body. If we were to talk about any special ability that was worth mentioning, it would be the the ability to infuse her blood element magic energy into her ws, making her every attack draw blood from her enemy that can also replenish herself.


    But the damage inflicted by that kind of offensive method would never be great. In fact, each strike would always inflict just nine to thirteen points of damage. Meanwhile, the defensive strength of the Fire Shield was thirty five points, making it obvious that it would take more than a single strike from Mary¡¯s attacks.


    That¡¯s why when Greem mastered the Fire Shield, he was able to turn the tables of the battle to his favor.


    Originally, it was Greem who tried hard to defend, having his health reduced bit by bit from the raging attacks of Mary. The situation would¡¯ve been better if he didn¡¯t try to counterattack since he couldst longer. But once he gave up on his defenses in order to have a chance to hit Mary who moved swiftly like a ghost, he would be defeated by Mary instantly, resulting to a miserable ending for himself.


    But now with the help of the Fire Shield, not only did Mary fail to break through his defenses even after multiple tries, she also had her ws burned by the sudden explosions of mes from the Fire Shield. Her dress which didn¡¯te with any defensive magic wasn¡¯t spared from being burned causing it to have a fewrge scorched holes.


    Finally! He finally got the upper hand for once and this brought great joy to Greem.


    Whilefortable appreciating Mary¡¯s hot and seductive body, he was reciting the chant of Fire Arrow with a loud voice, manipting the explosive mes to chase after her. For the first time ever, he never had to worry about suddenly getting scratch marks appearing on his body.


    Greem¡¯s rxed method of attack greatly angered Mary. That¡¯s why, after thirty seven seconds ofcency, he was once again bloodied all over after receiving the furious attacks of Mary. Surprisingly, the defense mechanism triggered this time. A transparent protective barrier tightly covered around Greem¡¯s body. Mary was knocked away by it, showing her skin that had turned ck because of the me.


    Looking at the bloodshot eyes of Mary who kept gazing at him savagely through the transparent barrier, Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh deeply.


    As always, Mary would never let herself be outdone by someone else!


    With the current strength of Mary¡¯s melee attacks, there wasn¡¯t any possibility she could pierce through the Fire Shield. It was at least correct ording to theory!


    But when Greem met Mary, a girl with a tremendous desire to excel over others, even the theory calcted by the Chip had be unreliable.


    Driven by anger, Mary actually withstood the fire element damage from the Fire Shield and didn¡¯t even back off. She also withstood the double fireball attacks from Greem¡¯s Burning Hands and used an attack that was beyond anyone¡¯s imagination. Forcefully hitting thrice on the same spot of the Fire Shield and took advantage of the cumtive damage to sessfully break through Greem¡¯s tough protective shell.


    What happened afterwards was a terrifying experience for Greem!


    The pain of having one¡¯s flesh burned by elemental fire wasn¡¯t something anybody could endure. Although Mary could use her incredible regenerative ability and blood sucking to restore her health, there was no way she could avoid the pain from using those methods, and thus, she could only endure using her strong will.


    It was all due to her stubbornness, not wanting to let Greem suppress her in their daily practice. Even if it was just once, she refused to ept that. This mentality made her willing to endure such a tremendously painful torture, her firm and outrageous attitude had deeply moved Greem.


    Looking into his own heart, if he was in her position, he would definitely be unable to achieve this!


    Having to face this firm girl who was fierce to her enemies but even fiercer to herself, Greem could only secretly admire her inside his mind!


    But at the same time, Greem secretly gave the Chip another research topic to work on.


    How to manipte the Fire Shield using his Spirit, so that he would be able to avoid the cumtive damage caused by the enemy¡¯s multiple attacks on the same spot?


    Unfortunately, ever since the fifth day of their training, Mary had stopped dragging Greem over to the arena. Contrary to her normal behavior, she immersed herself in the public library of the Adept Tower, spending every day and night reading through books, searching for the possible methods of breaking through Elementium magic shields.


    This made Greem¡¯s heart fill with anxiety once more!

 Chapter 75

    Once again Greem returned to the Underground World. He was no longer nervous like the first time, instead, he was filled with anticipation.


    For all the elite apprentices of training camp, every single progress they made on the path of maturity was made by stepping on the bones of those Fallen apprentices. Therefore, if Greem really wanted to rise up in rank as soon as possible, he needed to feed on the flesh and blood of his brethren who lived in the Underground World. This was the only way he could make himself stronger.


    After grouping up in the mission hall, the team of nine members once again set out on their dangerous Underground World journey.


    The idental death of Matthew and the severely wounded Leo had let the team to realize how dangerous the Underground World really was. Thus, while having a temporary rest at the front line camp, the team had an intense quarrel over how to aplish their mission.


    Currently, Leo was still burdened with injuries.


    Of course, those flesh wounds had long been recovered. But, some of the treacherous curses were deeply rooted inside his body. These had caused him to suffer badly. Nevertheless, after spending thest couple of days healing himself, he had finally dispelled all the curses. But still, it was tough for him to restore his severely damaged body to its peak in such a short period of time.


    This also meant that the team had one less Advanced Apprentice. In addition, currently, Pseudo-Adept Leo could only be considered as an Advanced Apprentice.


    The weakening of the team¡¯s overall strength had shaken their courage. A few of the conservative members kept voicing their desire of finishing the mission as one whole team. Even though it would mean tripling or quadrupling the time to finish, it would no doubt be the safest approach.


    Presumably, those underground ck bastards wouldn¡¯t have the courage to ambush a mission team consisting of three Pseudo-Adepts, and five Advanced Apprentices.


    This suggestion was voiced by Isaac, and the majority of the Advanced Apprentices immediately agreed.


    The dancing light of the temporary bonfire shone onto the faces of each team member, leaving behind patches of shadows on their finely chiseled features. Everyone was hiding their facial expression behind the shadows, leaving Isaac alone expressing his opinion in an impassioned tone.


    ¡°... We cannot take any more reduction in our overall strength again. If we lose another team member this time, our situation would be worst next time. So, wasting some extra time is necessary. It is only with that that we have a guarantee of finishing this mission properly! ...¡±


    ¡°Agreed!¡±


    ¡°I think Isaac is right!¡±


    ¡°Agreed!¡±


    Three Advanced Apprentices, Sh, Leander and Bruce quickly approved the suggestion. Meanwhile, the only Advanced Apprentice who hadn¡¯t voiced her mind was Mary. She was standing soundlessly and motionlessly in the shadow of arge rock, where the light of bonfire could never reach.


    Hence, everybody couldn¡¯t help but turn their nce to Sabrina, who had been acting as the team leader.


    Sabrina raised her head and looked around. As she rolled her eyeballs, mechanical noises could be heard.


    Compared tost time, it was rather obvious that some minor and strange transformations had urred to her. They could be traced to her head, which had gone through some mechanical magic spell modifications. However, no one seemed to be able to identify where the transformation was, and which part brought them the strange feeling. It was more of a subtle feeling they had!


    Sabrina retracted her nce. Just when she was about to announce something, a rather strange voice suddenly rang throughout the temporary camp.


    ¡°If you wish to carry out the missions in a big group, go ahead. But Mary and I will only carry out a single mission.¡±


    The voice was clear and firm, but, when everyone turned their eyes to the source of it, they were all struck dumb. This was because the speaker was a burden they had never regarded as one of the team. It was Beginner Apprentice Greem!


    No, they could no longer address him as Beginner Apprentice Greem. It should now be Intermediate Apprentice Greem.


    In regard to Greem¡¯s improvement, no one seemed to be bothered at all.


    In this gloomy and bizarre Underground World, even an Advanced Apprentice couldn¡¯t keep himself safe when facing a dangerous situation. Let alone an Intermediate Apprentice who just broken through. Perhaps he couldn¡¯t even escape the shock waveing from the battle between those stronger apprentices. That¡¯s why the group had always excluded him from the discussion.


    Mary, who hid in the darkness, still didn¡¯t say anything. It was clear that she had tacitly approved Greem¡¯s answer. No doubt, this had puzzled the rest of the team members.


    ¡°Are you sure you know what you¡¯re saying?¡± The deep, strange voice of Sabrina rung through the scene. Although what she had said didn¡¯t sound menacing, but it was clearly apanied by a tyrannical aura.


    ¡°Kid, keep your mouth shut and stand aside. This is no ce for you to talk. If you really wish to carry out the mission alone, why don¡¯t you go to the deepest cave?¡± Isaac wasn¡¯t as reserved as Sabrina and roared at Greem in a threatening manner.


    ¡°Fine, we¡¯ll go to the deepest cave!¡± Greem¡¯s answer was simple and direct.


    ¡°You... what did you just say?¡± A bewildered expression emerged on Isaac¡¯s face.


    ¡°I said, Mary and I willplete the mission in the furthest cave. We¡¯ll return to Adept Tower straightaway afterpleting the mission. You guys can take your time and slowly visit all the other four mission sites!¡±


    ¡°You...¡±


    Now not only Isaac, but even the other two Pseudo-Adepts had raised their heads. They once again carefully examined this Intermediate Apprentice who was shamelessly bragging. But, no matter how they probed with their senses, the spiritual ripple feedback from this young kid seemed pretty weak. It was totally not like the disguise of a random strong man.


    Was there something he could rely on, or was there something strange with that Mary?


    Finding no answer from Greem, everyone couldn¡¯t help but turn their nces towards Mary, who was hiding in the shadows.


    ¡®Hmph. This bastard only know how to put up a show, using me as his cover every single time!¡¯


    Deep inside her mind, Mary was roaring furiously, but on the outside, she still looked calm and peaceful. Nevertheless, it was hard for the three Pseudo-Adepts to see under her foggy, blood red aura, and was near-impossible for them to use her blood element magical energy to see her overall strength.


    ¡°You agreed to his suggestion?¡± Although Sabrina was sitting on the floor, an aggressive aura began to emanate from her and began crushing towards Mary.


    ¡°Yes! Give us the mission object!¡±


    Mary left the shadows and moved towards the Pseudo-Adept, Sabrina. She spread her dazzling, pale right palm outward.


    After remaining silent for a brief moment, a magical item, that looked like a magic wand, was tossed into Mary¡¯s palm.


    Mary focused her mind and verified the genuineness of the item, before nodding her head satisfyingly. She put the item away, turned around, and walked towards the dark, winding tunnel in front of her.


    ¡°Hold on! Take this as well.¡±


    What Sabrina gave her this time was a crystal ball.


    Mary once again focused her mind and verified it. But, upon realizing what it was, her beautiful face startled. She nodded her head at Sabrina with a meaning only both of them could understand.


    ¡°Thanks! I owe you a favor.¡± Saying nothing else after that, Mary brought Greem and dissolved into the darkness in the far distance.


    As the left side of her face was covered by a silver mask, no significant expression could be found on the other side of her face. Despite this, a scorching hot glow was seen shooting out of the left eye that had been modified with a mechanical eyeball.


    ¡°We should be moving now! There¡¯s a long way ahead of us.¡±


    After a long moment of silence, the deep voice of Sabrina once again rung throughout the scene.


    At the same moment, Greem and Mary were traveling the Underground World in a total darkness.


    For the first time, the Demon Alligator Hunter actually swallowed both of them at the same time, before submerging itself into the total darkness found underground. Following the indication given by the magical item, it started traveling through the numerous dark caverns and tunnels.


    Fortunately, Mary wasn¡¯t someone with an oversized body. Instead, after holding her in his arms, Greem actually felt that Mary was overly slim and soft. Nevertheless, the silky smooth feeling came from his touch, and the fragrance that filled the darkness brought him an amazing experience.


    What to do? The Hunter could only create a limited space inside of its body, thus both Greem and Mary had no choice but to tightly hug each other.


    Perhaps their current posture might seem romantic and erotic to an outsider, but in fact, Greem was unable to take advantage of it. All ten of Mary¡¯s razor sharp nails were moving around his back. In addition to this, her tiny yet frightening fangs were ced against his neck. If Greem had any evil intentions, Mary would probably move without thinking and definitely leave Greem with a profound memory permanently engraved in his mind!


    Perhaps, this was the personal code of conduct which Mary had been implementing on herself: I can flirt with you, but, if you tried to move recklessly, I¡¯ll leave you with a bone-deep memory!


    So, although their bodies were tightly pressed against each other, Greem had to clench his jaw tightly. He was scared that slightly losing control would bring about an undeserved catastrophe. But, thankfully, there were plenty of things that could distract his focus. Therefore, when he focused solely on the unique vision of the Demon Alligator Hunter, he was able to temporarily forget the awkward position he was in. In addition, he was able to devote himself to controlling the traveling direction of his Golem.


    The crystal ball, Sabrina had given Mary before they left, stored the route she had verified in their previous trip. It also stored the underground creatures they might bump into and the distribution of demons.


    With the help of this clear three-dimensional map, along with the precise direction control from the Chip, the trip was uneventful. Most of the time the Demon Alligator Hunter would travel through underground holes, and, if there was a rock in-between, it would choose to travel through the dirt. It was only when they bumped into arge area of solid rock would they would consider taking a longer route.


    Therefore, the mission site that took Sabrina twenty-seven hours to arrivest time, only took Greem four hours this time.


    The Demon Alligator emerged from the ground within a small, dark and quiet cave. Greem scooped Mary up in his arms and jumped down.


    They used the magic item once to verify the exact location of the mission site. They only set their minds at ease when they realized it was indeed only two hundred away from them. But, soon after that, both of them quickly returned to a vignt state.


    Those underground ck bastards knew countless strange and bizarre magic spells. Who knew if they had set up some traps around the mission site? If Greem¡¯s trace was noticed by them, then his return trip would be ten to a hundred times more dangerous.


    But Greem was rather unperturbed by this.


    For today¡¯s trip, besides from thepletion of thepulsory mission given by the Adept Tower, there was another more important mission he needed to aplish.


    The elite mission of training camp!


    Besides from fighting each other for rare underground resources, the elite Apprentice Adepts would normally try to ambush and kill the opponent¡¯s other teams.


    Within the deeper region of the underground, apart from rare resources, there were many other unique metals that were rarely found in the surface world. However, most of these mines and resource sites were controlled by Fallen Adepts, with each site being heavily guarded by five to ten apprentice teams.


    Today, the elite apprentice mission Greem received was: ¡®Raid the mine pit number seven!¡¯

 Chapter 76

    The mine number seven was a Blood Stone mine that was located deeper than the deepest mission site.


    The most abundant resource in that ce was a unique mineral called a ¡®Blood Stone¡¯. By itself, a Blood Stone didn¡¯t have much use, but it was frequently used as a catalyst in all kinds of magical experiments. The powdered form of Blood Stone was highly sought after in the ck market, since it purified and extracted magical medicine.


    However, apparently, the training camp wasn¡¯t looking for Blood Stones. The ambush nned by Kevin¡¯s team was actually for the gem that apanied Blood Stones: the Blood Ga. As a kind of gem, once Blood Gas were given to Master Jewelers, they were modified into all sorts of magical essories. The jewelers did everything possible to draw out the mysterious energy contained inside of the gem, which provided the magical essories with marvelous power.


    For example, the Resuscitate Earring which Greem had found previously was crafted from Deep Peridot, which was another kind of magical gem.


    Blood Stone, even if it was only the elementary Blood Stone that went through the initial extraction, would sell for 10 magic crystals per kilogram in the ck market. In order to be rich by trading it, the elite apprentices of the training camp would have to hire arge group of underground merchants. Only then could they carry them away.


    The apanying gem, Blood Ga, was only the size of an egg, but was sought after by swarms of merchants and Adept families, who were willing to purchase it at the price of 200 magic crystals per kilogram. So, after evaluating the profit, Hulk decided tounch an ambush to the mine number seven and set their goal as looting the Blood Ga supply, which had been stockpiled for nearly half a month, but not the overly heavy and cheap Blood Stone.


    In the past, the battle of the Underground World was more like a chess game.


    The resource sites and mines upied by both parties were almost fixed, and both parties had a clear understanding of each other¡¯s overall strength. Therefore, it was like ¡®you brought your team and ambushed one of my resource sites today, tomorrow I¡¯ll bring my men and ambush your team on their way back.¡¯ The roles switched sides every time and both parties fought savagely in the dark underground tunnels, shedding blood like water.


    But, there was one rule both parties followed strictly; never once had they broken this rule. No matter how they fought, no one was allowed to maliciously destroy any resource site or mine!


    Strictly speaking, for both Adepts from the surface and Fallen Adepts, arge portion of their interest depended on the constant supply of these resources and minerals. Once somebody set an example by maliciously destroying the opponent¡¯s resource site, it would also be hard to keep their own resource sites from being destroyed at the same time. Therefore, in order to avoid a total disaster, through the constant battles over more than few hundred years, both parties had developed a kind of unspoken rule.


    ¡®You can seize my resources. As long as your elite apprentices can defeat my defenders, then the resources are yours. But, you can never destroy the environment of the resource site!¡¯ Once any malicious destruction of a resource site was found, the apprentice who did that would be hunt down by Adepts from both sides.


    Hence, taking the opportunity of thest 200 meters, while proceeding with high vignce, Greem told Mary everything he had learned so far regarding the situation of the Underground World. By pulling Mary into Kevin¡¯s team, he wanted to use this trip to the Underground World to make her one of the elite apprentices as soon as possible.


    But in order to aplish this, he had to let Mary distinguish herself in this mission. From what he heard from Kevin, the training camp had started to get in touch with the other Pseudo-Adept of their team, Sabrina. As for the other team members, before they showed any outstanding performances, they were only on the observation list, as they still hadn¡¯t attracted Hulk¡¯s interest.


    After all, there were three Pseudo-Adepts in their team!


    For now, Greem was considered one of the members of the training camp, while Sabrina was in the process of getting in. As for the other two Pseudo-Adepts, Leo and Marcus, none of them had hit Hulk¡¯s liking. Therefore, in order to get Mary into the training camp, she had to show an outstanding personal performance on this ambush mission.


    To be honest, Greem didn¡¯t need to encourage or instigate Mary. After knowing that damn training camp had made Greem one of their members without her, Mary was already in a state of tantrum. But for someone like her who had an uncertain temper, the angrier she was, the brighter her smile.


    Perhaps, only at the very moment she was hunting for prey would she show her true color!


    ............


    In a serene, deep underground cavern:


    The peace had just returned not long ago, but five strange figures of all shapes had once again intruded into the ce.


    The leading man was a tall, intrepid man. A pale blue ring of light made up of ice crystals hovered around his body. Wherever he walked, the wet air would freeze through the sudden drop of temperature and turn into ice crystals that fell to the ground.


    Clearly, he was the leader of the five man team. As he looked at the emptied underground cavern, the once silent atmosphere instantly filled with echoes of his angry roars.


    ¡°Where are they? Someone told me they discovered some intruders here? So, tell me where are those damn intruders?¡±


    Judging from his deep, hoarse voice, he was the Pseudo-Adept Langdon.


    ¡°Langdon, calm down. Since we promised to help you in your revenge, we won¡¯t give up halfway. Something¡¯s not right today, so we need to think,¡± a ck robed man said.


    ¡°That¡¯s right! This is rather abnormal. Since we got the news, we¡¯ve been waiting for them. No matter which route they take to this mission site, there is no way they could hide from our probe. But...¡± The other man in ck robe voiced out his doubt.


    ¡°But they bizarrely bypassed our intercept. Gary, could he be the beginner apprentice you mentionedst time, the one who can freely travel in the ground?¡± The third ck robe man questioned calmly.


    Upon hearing what he said, Langdon¡¯s body shook briefly and the temperature of the air dropped by a few more degrees. Right after that, Langdon¡¯s cold roar rang through the cavern. ¡°I can still sense the aura of Elementium in this ce, which means they just left. So long as we move faster, we might be able to intercept them. Philip, we¡¯ll count on you now!¡±


    Philip was also a Pseudo-Adept. In fact, all the members of Langdon¡¯s team were Pseudo-Adepts.


    Being able to gather four Fallen Pseudo-Adepts to help him in seeking revenge, Langdon was a man with extraordinary ability. But, to be more precise, these men were helping him because of the face of his master. That was why they willingly epted such a dangerous mission of revenge.


    Respected and feared by a group of Pseudo-Adepts, obviously, his master was one of the few well-renowned Fallen Adepts in Elysium City!


    Dark Light! This was the name known by every single being in Elysium City. As a mighty Fallen Adept, even in the Underground Cave region, Dark Light was an illustrious name. As his disciple, Langdon too was a man who had a strong calling power among the apprentices in Elysium City.


    Called out by him, though Philip was rather reluctant, he still stood up from the group.


    ¡°Stand around me!¡± Philip instructed coolly. Then he lightly poked the staff in his hand into the hard rock under their feet.


    After the injection of a steady stream Earth element energy, the fist-size, earthy yellow crystal on top of the staff started to emanate a dazzling Elementium halo. Meanwhile, covered by this Elementium halo, a vague, mysterious looking magical array emerged on the floor underneath their feet.


    ¡°Come closer to me, we¡¯re going to be teleported soon!¡±


    After Philip¡¯s reminder, the group quickly moved closer to him, cing themselves within the boundary of the mysterious magical array.


    ¡°Prepare yourself! Don¡¯t resist the Earth element teleportation energy. Let¡¯s go!¡±


    Following a loud shout from Philip, a copious amount of Earth Elementium suddenly burst out from the mysterious array underneath their feet. The Earth Elementium was so dense it looked like a thick cloud of dust hovering around them. Soon, a bizarre earthy yellow ring of light flickered, the dust suddenly solidified, and the men turned into y statues in an instant.


    When the mysterious magical array disappeared, the five y statues shattered immediately, breaking into dirt debris that scattered across the floor. Not flesh nor bone could be found among the debris, and the five Pseudo-Adepts hadpletely vanished from where they had been standing.


    ............


    Langdon had guessed wrongly by thinking Greem would rush back to the surface after hepleted his mission, which eventually led them in the wrong direction. They were now on their way to bumping into Sabrina and the other team members.


    Using Philip¡¯s Stratum Teleportation magic, the five Fallen Pseudo-Adepts went straight to the upper-level tunnels close to the surface. Greem and Mary were hiding in a ce near the mine number seven, which was much deeper.


    The rest of Kevin¡¯s team members hadn¡¯t arrived, so working together, Greem and Mary started to put their capabilities to use and investigate the situation surrounding the mine.


    Greem worked as transportation by using Demon Alligator Hunter¡¯s ability to travel under the ground and send Mary into the mine. Mary transformed into a bloodsucking bat that flew without noise and surveyed the entire mine without alerting anybody. Surprisingly, Mary, who flew around openly, even noted down every single tunnel, miner, and the position of every defending team of Fallen Apprentice Adepts, and she stored the information into a crystal ball.


    When Kevin and the other five team members arrived at their secret rendezvous point, they were greeted by this extremely urate three-dimensional image of the mine.


    The miners were allprised of Ratmen, and there were more than two hundred of them within the entire mine number seven. Meanwhile, the defending force was made up of seventeen underground mercenaries and six Fallen Apprentice Adepts. During the battle, the Ratmen would never get involved, so they only needed to consider the defending force in their n.


    After all, for the Ratmen, no matter who controlled the mine, would always obeymands. So long they were provided with sufficient food every day, they didn¡¯t care who they served!


    Staring at the panoramic image of the mine pit provided by the two new recruits, Kevin couldn¡¯t help but feel a chill run down his back.


    Greem¡¯s ability was a total cheat. In the Underground World, so long as a ce wasn¡¯t protected by any magical arrays, he would be able to infiltrate it in a way that was nearly impossible to guard against. Mary¡¯s ability of Bat Morphing made her able toe and go like a shadow, as no one could be on guard against a cold-blooded creature who could roam freely on the cavern ceiling. Through the infrared vision and life force sensing ability of the vampire, any arrangement of the enemy was transparent.


    With these two new recruits in a team, if the opponent didn¡¯t have a way to guard against them, they could even find out what color underwear their opponent was wearing!


    [Edited by: LemonFly]


    Take a second to support UntouchableFly on Patreon! You¡¯ll immediately get ess to as many as 5 patron-only chapters.

 Chapter 77

    Aside from the meager garrisoned force, Kevin was also concerned about the overall might of the Fallen Apprentice Adepts.


    ording to their standard practice, out of six Fallen apprentices there would be at least two to three Pseudo-Adepts, with the rest being Advanced Apprentices. However, today¡¯s situation was a bit abnormal. Out of the six Fallen apprentices, there was only one Fallen Pseudo-Adept. This seriously puzzled Kevin.


    After all, the circumstances surrounding the Fallen apprentices waspletely different from the orthodox Adept Tower. The number of apprentices from the tower was basically a pyramid shape. In order to cultivate a Pseudo-Adept, it required at least five to ten advanced apprentices as backup. Advanced apprentices, on the other hand, also needed five to ten intermediate apprentices, and so on...


    The Adept Tower relied on a method of allocating more resources to those who showed more potential. When theybined this method with the vast amount of apprentices, it allowed them to cultivate elite apprentices out of the hundreds and thousands of apprentices. These elite apprentices possessed extraordinary potential and innate talent, and could be further trained and cultivated.


    However, for Fallen Adepts who hid in the Underground World, the structure of their apprentices waspletely different.


    In the Fallen Adept camps, there were next to no Beginner or Intermediate Apprentices. In their eyes, they didn¡¯t need trash like this, as they weren¡¯t worth wasting resources on. All of their resources could instead be focused on those apprentices who had potential, resulting in a strong overall strength. Many were eliminated by thisw of the jungle, which was inherently cruel and savage. Therefore, the ratio of the Pseudo-Adepts among the Fallen Apprentices was really high. Sometimes, they could even reach the ratio of one Pseudo-Adept per every Advanced Apprentice!


    This was also one of the things that brought the most headaches to those elite apprentices of training camp!


    When both parties came across each other, they could still put up a fight if the number of Pseudo-Adept was simr. But, once their Pseudo-Adepts were outnumbered, then the battle would be a lopsided loss. After all, for any Advanced Apprentice from the surface, a Fallen Pseudo-Adept, who wasn¡¯t tied up by an opponent at the same level, was like a fierce wolf. When facing this fierce wolf, the surface Advanced Apprentices found thay were like tame sheep. No matter how well the sheep equipped themselves, and even though they had twice the number of the fierce wolf, they still found themselves unable to resist when facing the fearless wolf.


    But surprisingly, out of six Fallen Apprentices in this mine today, only one of them was a Pseudo-Adept. This allocation was obviously lower than their normal standards. On the contrary, there were two Pseudo-Adepts in Kevin¡¯s team of six people, while the rest were all strong Advanced Apprentices.


    With their overall strength, it was more than enough to easily suppress the opponent!


    As for those seventeen underground mercenaries, besides a few who appeared to be strong and needed special attention, the rest could be simply ignored by these apprentices. If a battle between Apprentice Adepts really erupted, no matter how many mercenaries there were, they would just end up as a bunch of suicidal corpses.


    ording to Greem¡¯s assumption, when a battle like this happened, where one side had a clear upper hand, it would probably be a battle filled with ambushes, assassinations, and all sort of treacherous approaches. But when the battle truly erupted, he was dumbstruck.


    So, this was how a battle was carried out in the Underground World!


    Without concealing their suppressive force, Kevin brought five of his team, including Greem and Mary, and quickly blocked off the mine. After that, they threw two deterring Elementium fireballs into the mine, causing all the defending forces of the enemy to be ejected from the mine pit.


    It was a natural cavern that was nearly the size of three football fields. It was the perfect battlefield for ughtering.


    It wasn¡¯t tough to tell this ce was well used. The ce was cluttered with broken stgmites and stctites, and the cavern wall was marred with ck burn marks. In addition, the ground was stained with old patches of blood that had never been washed off.


    At either ends of the cavern, both groups hastily arranged themselves in their own respective formations. They faced each other with a distance of two hundred meters in between.


    Naturally, it was the group of underground mercenaries who stood before the Fallen Apprentices.


    Most of these mercenaries didn¡¯t even wear aplete set of leather armor. They simply walked into the battlefield with their shabby cloth. Out of these seventeen mercenaries, three of them were Gnoll assassins, two were Lizardman Beastmasters, one was a Soul Hunter, and eleven were Werewolves.


    The only ones that required some extra attention were the three Gnoll assassins and the Soul Hunter. The rest of them were just used to attract the attention of the enemy. They were just flesh targets used to absorb the firepower.


    The Fallen Pseudo-Adept, who hid behind the formation, was a dark, skinny middle-aged man. When he saw two Pseudo-Adepts from the surface standing on the enemy¡¯s side, his expression turned gloomy and dark.


    ¡®Damn it... Damn it... Damn it! That bastard Philip! He¡¯s the one who said there wouldn¡¯t be any problems even if he was away for one or two days! If that was truly the case, then how did this strong team break through the upper tunnel interception and reach this depth? Philip, you bastard! If this garrison mission fails, you¡¯ll be the one who shoulders all the responsibility!¡¯


    Although inwardly he was furiously roaring, this Fallen Pseudo-Adept still remained calm on the outside. He began to give out battlemands.


    ......


    Different colors of Elementium shields sprung up on the bodies of these Apprentice Adepts. There was a bright red Fire Shield, a Lightning Shield, that kept sputtering violently, a powdery dust that hovered around someone¡¯s body, a set of freezing Ice Crystal armor, and a vibrant green armor of thorns...


    In just split second, all Apprentice Adepts had covered their body with Elementium protection that came in all different colors, shapes, and effects.


    Of course, this was a luxury that belonged only to apprentices. Those mercenaries, who served as flesh shields, wouldn¡¯t able to enjoy it at all.


    Unnoticed, three enemy Gnoll assassins had managed to vanish from where they were. Two Lizardman summoners were loudly reciting some hard to understand chants in theirnguage. They quickly summoned four Petrified Lizards, who had muscr bodies and tough skin. The eleven Werewolves fighters had their bodies covered with broken leather armor, a il or wooden club in one hand and a crude wooden shield in the other. They savagely yelled as they charged their way towards the enemy.


    Behind them, after the Fallen apprentices hadpleted their personal defensive spells, they quickly followed with another round of loud chants of magic spells. But this time, all of them were reciting magic that would unleash offensive magic spells.


    ¡°Greem, you can handle those trash!¡± Although Kevin was an Advanced Apprentice specializing in meleebat, he, after giving Greem an order, immediately joined his peers and began countering the enemy by using long-range offensive magic spells.


    After Mary had mutated into a vampire, it seemed that she had forgotten all the magic spells she had learned in the past. She now only owned some innate passive abilities from her own species. Therefore, when faced with such a situation, she simply dissolved into the surrounding darkness and disappeared without a trace.


    Numerous colorful offensive magic spells flew past each other in the midair of this spacious cavern. They intercepted and shed with each other, turning the scene into a glorious sea of Elementium. The raging and unregted Elementium exploded and swept across the center of the battlefield, flooding the group of Werewolves who were charging the enemy.


    Less than half of the eleven Werewolf fighters managed to survive this devastating explosion. Even the remaining five of them could be seen to have suffered different degrees of injuries. A shocked expression covered their faces. However, they were just too unlucky. Before they could regroup and initiate the next charge, a massive figure suddenly revealed itself in front of them.


    With the rapid firing of Dirt Spears and arge area of Spikes, all of them were sent to meet their maker in an instant. This was how fragile thesemon underground creatures were when facing a spell caster.


    Greem sat on his Demon Alligator and remained on the spot. He didn¡¯t dive right into the enemy.


    The formation of the Fallen Apprentices on the opposite looked rigid and disciplined. If he recklessly charged into them, all it would take was a simultaneously-casted magic spell for him and his Demon Alligator to instantly shatter into pieces.


    Greem had learned something new today. It was no wonder Apprentice Adepts used the formations, that even ordinary humans used, in their battles. The offensive strength of the Elementium spells was just too terrifying! Even though those Pseudo-Adepts could act lofty and ughter a couple of Advanced Apprentices in a small scale battle, they couldn¡¯t when they fought this kind of battle. No matter how conceited or unbridled they were, they didn¡¯t have the courage to run into the enemy¡¯s formation.


    The basic defensive strength of those Pseudo-Adepts¡¯ personal defensive magic spells mostly hovered between eighty to one hundred points. A strength like this could be easily broken with just a simultaneous firing of magic spells from three Advanced Apprentices. Therefore, before advancing into the realm of an official Adept, where their bodies could resist this simultaneous attack, none of them dared to take the risk.


    So, even though they had outnumbered the enemy in terms of their Pseudo-Adepts, Kevin still opted for suppressivebat tactics. This was the safest approach and involved using the overwhelming advantage of their magical power to crush the enemy¡¯s team.


    After two round of exchanges in magic spells, the gap between both side¡¯s magical strength was evident. Although many of their magic spells were still being intercepted halfway, the number of magic spells thatnded in the enemy¡¯s camp was clearly more than theirs.


    As they were flooded by waves of glorious magic spells, the team of Fallen Apprentices started to panic.


    Most of the defensive barriers surrounding the Fallen Apprentices¡¯ body had faded. Some of them were even wounded. Contrary to them, Kevin¡¯s team still maintained a neat formation. All their defenses were still intact and they looked rigid and imprable.


    Sitting high up on Demon Alligator, Greem ordered the Hunter to keep firing Dirt Spikes at those Petrified Lizards who were slowly crawling in his direction. As he ordered, he also followed Kevin¡¯smand and contributed a ming Spear. It hit an enemy Advanced Apprentice and made him miserably scream.


    As he was sitting high up, he had a clear sight of the entire battlefield. Soon he noticed Mary¡¯s whereabout.


    At the edge of the battlefield, within a patch of dark shadow, a muffled snort suddenly exploded.


    Right after that, a vague image of a Gnoll assassin suddenly emerged from the darkness. It held clutched its throat and staggered a few steps forward, before finally copsing onto the ground. Blood kept bursting through its fingers, despite how hard he tried to stop it from leaving its body.


    Right when it was struggling to catch itsst breath, a few nging noises rang out from the darkness next to it. Soon, another Gnoll was forced out from the shadows. Both of its eyes were blinded and its body was fully covered with frightening scratch marks. Unwilling to admit defeat, it furiously swung its dagger into the air, while letting out wild roars. But, unfortunately, it could no longer see the enemy.


    When nearly all of the blood in its body was drained, it finally copsed while groaning under its breath.


    The continuous death of its two peers had frightened the third Gnoll. Thisst Gnoll suddenly revealed itself and turned around to flee into a far direction, with the fastest speed it could. But, before it could reach the distance of ten meters, a dazzling red light shed out. As it shed out, the Gnoll¡¯s head flew up into the sky, and the headless body was left running. It managed to run a few steps more, before falling to the ground.


    The skinny and ugly body twitched unconsciously a few times, before lying motionlessly in the dark.

 Chapter 78

    Beautiful, beautifully done! Vampires truly deserved to be known as the nobles of the dark night! They could even kill in such a graceful and elegant manner, making it full of artistic ir. Magnificent!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but mutter some praise under his breath. He then refocused his mind and threw out the ming Spear in his hand. This time, his target was an apprentice who had five skulls hovering around his body!


    The ming Spear that suddenly exploded destroyed two skulls of the target. It also managed to trigger the apprentice¡¯s anger. He kept waving his pitch-ck staff at Greem, throwing curse spells one after the other at Greem. These spells were all invisible to the naked eye.


    After receiving the order from Greem, the Hunter took his position and blocked off all the curse spells. With the Hunter taking care of this, Greem focused his mind and keptunching attacks at the apprentice who appeared to be a necromancer.


    All kind of curse spells wereunched. There was Scavenger Bugs, Voodoo Skulls, Bone Spears, and even Unnerving Gazes. The magic spells this necromancer apprentice demonstrated had really widened Greem¡¯s horizons. If not because of the fact that he had activated his Elementium Vision, he knew he wouldn¡¯t be able to match this apprentice. He wouldn¡¯t be able to even if he was given nine lives.


    Meanwhile, the only threat he brought to his enemy was his ming Spear and the Hunter¡¯s Dirt Spear. Theck of long-range magic spells had made Greem realize something. Maybe he should find some time to develop a Golem which specialized in long-range attacks.


    Even though Greem¡¯s overall strength was insufficient to break through the necromancer apprentice¡¯s defense, the team members behind Greem could do that. After establishing an advantageous position in this battle, the reckless bombardment of magic spells had brought about tremendous pressure to those Fallen Apprentices.


    A few of these Fallen Apprentices started to slowly fall back, as they found it hard to withstand the massive suppressive force.


    This was also the basic pattern of the battle between both parties in the past.


    They started the battle by lining up in their formation. Both sides wouldunch long-range magic spell attacks, just like normal human soldiers did. They kept doing this until one side couldn¡¯t withstand the attack and showed signs of defeat. Next would be a small scale of pursuit and annihtion. Small battles would normally ur between two to three Apprentice Adepts anywhere in the surroundings.


    Finally, following the powerful sweep by two Pseudo-Adepts from Kevin¡¯s team, the team of Fallen Apprentices fell apart!


    Losing all their confidence in victory, the wounded Fallen Apprentices turned around and scurried into the surrounding underground tunnels. It wasn¡¯t tough to tell they were all fleeing in a disorderly manner. Each of them just went their own way, with no one trying to cover their peers or trying to support each other.


    Also, all six Fallen Apprentices had actually fled in separate directions. They showed no signs of fleeing as a group.


    The distance between this ce and Elysium City was long. Perhaps they found their peers with ulterior motives much more frightening than the enemy chasing behind them!


    Kevin whistled, splitting eight members of his team into smaller teams. They started to fiercely pursue those fleeing Fallen Apprentices.


    Kevin and a Pseudo-Adept had set the enemy¡¯s Pseudo-Adept as their target. The other Pseudo-Adept in their team remained solo, while the rest of the team members had split into a few smaller groups. They all started to chase the enemies¡¯ butt into the darkness.


    Greem didn¡¯t team up with anybody. He wore a ferocious smile as he drove the Demon Alligator into the tunnel. He began to chase down the same opponent he was fighting with just now.


    ............


    In the darkness of the tunnel, there was a perfect silence.


    Aaron once again activated the Hasten Ring on his right pinkie, desperately trying to make his fleeing speed faster.


    The rough terrain in the darkness was never an obstacle for him. It seemed his skinny body never ran out of stamina, supporting him in rushing through cave after cave.


    The underground passage was forever winding and twisting. It came in a veryplicated formation. In every single smaller cave or cavern, there were always countless narrow tunnels that could barely allow a person to squeeze through.


    Utilizing his knowledge of the surrounding terrain, Aaron had fled three miles in just ten minutes. He had travelled through dozens of tunnels and caverns.


    When the glow of the Hasten Spell was dismissed from his body, Aaron finally stopped. He leaned against arge solid cavern wall, panting for breath. His skinny chest was seen pumping rapidly, as he breathed like broken bellows.


    Although he was surrounded by silence, Aaron still had his hand tightly clenched around his pitch-ck staff.


    So long as any noise or movement happened around him, he would be able tounch the bone spear that was stored in the white crystal on top of the staff within half a second.


    After catching his breath for a few minutes, Aaron finally managed to regte his breathing. He listened for any sound that might be audible from the passage he had juste from, but he heard nothing abnormal.


    Could he be really so lucky as to not have an enemy following him?


    Aaron smiled coldly in self-mockery.


    After bing a necromancer apprentice, his luck had never been good. It was as if the Will of the Adept World hated him, turning him into a sad child abandoned by destiny.


    Although he didn¡¯t sense any unusual activity, Aaron was still overwhelmed by anxiety. He felt like a ferocious monster was hiding somewhere in the dark, eyeing him greedily. It was only waiting for the perfect moment to devour him in one brutal bite.


    No way! He had to get out of here as quick as possible!


    Right when Aaron had made up his mind to leave, he realized the wet soil underneath his feet had turned into a slow moving acid pool. Both his legs had sunk into it without his knowledge.


    Damn it, it was an Acid Pool spell!


    Aaron forcefully patted his neck, making the bone ne on his neck flicker. He unleashed two skulls who hovered around his body. These skulls provided him with both offensive and defensive effects. When he was fleeing just now, in order to avoid attracting any attention, he had shut this personal defense mechanism down. This was why he was now caught in the trap by that enemy who hid in the dark.


    After he went through the tough battle previously, his defensive skulls were now at the lowest level of performance!


    As it was corroded by the strong negative energy, hissing noises was hearding from the acid pool underneath his feet. This helped Aaron to quickly free himself from it.


    Two muffled booms were hearding from the darkness not far away. A shadow that looked like a small hill started to march forward. The strong aura of Earth Elementium could be vividly identified from afar.


    Damn it! It was that bastard who rode on a y alligator!


    What a brave kid. He was only an Intermediate Apprentice, yet he dared to chase after an Advanced Fallen Apprentice!


    A hideous smile emerged on Aaron¡¯s face. He opened his brownish, dirty mouth and sprayed out a huge clump of ck bugs. They turned into arge ck cloud in an instant and swarmed towards the location of thatrge shadow. After that, he quickly recited some magic spell chants with his hoarse and jarring voice. He revealed fist size skulls in his hand from time to time and promptly them at the enemy.


    These were the Voodoo Skulls that he had made himself. They would explode violently whening into contact with something. They would not only inflict massive physical damage to the enemy, they also carried a magical poison. This frightening magical poison was a type of mixed poison that could even melt down hard rocks.


    Yet, while he was waiting for the enemy¡¯s miserable shriek, something happened. A ming spear, that suddenly lit up the dull cavern, appeared on the opposite side of the cavern. A handsome young man, surrounded by raging me, smiled at him. He carried the deadly ming spear in his hand.


    ¡°No... please don¡¯t kill me, we can talk...¡±


    Aaron¡¯s face was covered with panic. He watched how the ming Spear shot towards him and nailed one of his defensive skulls into the wall. It exploded violently and flooded him with dazzling me and scorching heat.


    Three secondster, Aaron staggered out from the sea of mes. He looked extremely miserable right now! The thin skin and flesh of his were burned by the me and charred. Half of his remaining magical items were destroyed, and the white crystal socketed on top of his staff had shattered, releasing all the souls trapped by the Soul Spell.


    ¡°Hmph. Kid, do you really think you can kill me like this? We¡¯re not finished today. Wait until the next time we meet again, I¡¯ll...¡± While cursing furiously, Aaron used his charred hand to slowly start digging into the ground. His pinkie started to emanate with a white glow.


    It was the glow of an Escaping Spell!


    This magic spell, which he had hidden inside of his pinkie, might have been hisst life-saving trick.


    In two more seconds, he would be able to escape from this ce. A ray of hope suddenly burst out from Aaron¡¯s bleary eyes. But right at this moment, he suddenly felt the rock wall beside him move.


    When he turned around in astonishment, he was horrified to discover a pair of huge eyes gazing coldly at him. It had a huge triangle shape snake-like head, a wide, ferocious mouth, crisscrossing fangs, and a tongue that kept darting out. All of these were entirely made up of rock! Cold hard rock!


    When he finally realized this, the giant snake had opened its mouth and devoured him in one gulp.


    After a long time, peace finally returned to this cavern.


    Greem quietly stood at a corner of the cavern. He didn¡¯t ride on the Demon Alligator. Just now, he had used the Demon Alligator Hunter to lure most of the enemy¡¯s attack. While this was happening, he took the opportunity to break through the enemy¡¯s defense with a sneak attack. However, the one who finished the enemy was his Giant Rock Snake, who made its first debut.


    A light vibration came from the dark. The Demon Alligator Hunter came to him with its body charred ck. Half of the Hunter¡¯s body was melted down by the enemy¡¯s attack. On the other side, the giant Rock Snake crawled on the rock wall and crawled towards him. It opened its mouth and spat out a broken body.


    Haha! He had pocketed the head of an Advanced Fallen Apprentice!


    But the corpse of a necromancer was also very frightening. Therefore, Greem didn¡¯t do it himself. He waited until the Hunter fixed itself, before letting it search the enemy¡¯s body for any possible loot. After that, he let Demon Alligator swallow the dead body into its stomach, before swaggering back to the previous battlefield.


    Some of his teammates had returned. Only a few of them had actuallye back with fruitful results. Most of them just returned empty-handed.


    What to do? The environment of the Underground World was perfect for fleeing. All they needed to do was cause a copse in a random ce. This was enough to cause the pursuer to fail. Also, all Fallen Apprentices were experts in staying alive. Thus, although it was easy to defeat them, it was far tougher to kill them.


    The Pseudo-Adept and Kevin had failed to capture the enemy¡¯s Pseudo-Adept. However, the other Pseudo-Adept had managed to bring back an enemy¡¯s head. All the remaining Advanced Apprentices harvested nothing. Therefore, when Greem¡¯s Demon Alligator spat out an enemy¡¯s corpse, everybody couldn¡¯t help but look at him with different eyes.


    This was different from the battle in their training camp. Although Greem utilized an opportunity where everybody was unfamiliar with his abilities to ¡®luckily¡¯ win two battles, this didn¡¯t mean that he was really strong. But the appearance of this Fallen Advanced Apprentice¡¯s corpse had caused the way these guys looked at him topletely change.


    This... this meant that he possessed enough strength to kill an Advanced Apprentice! This was a trait that everybody valued the most!

 Chapter 79

    Right when everyone was praising Greem, a red figure shed by. Mary had returned.


    Upon her arrival, she forcefully flung an ugly and haggard head in front of everyone.


    Although Kevin was just an Advanced Apprentice, he was able tomand two Pseudo-Adepts. This showed that he was a man who possessed special abilities. However, today¡¯s situation had put him in a rather awkward situation.


    The elite apprentices, who were specifically trained by the training camp, had only managed to get one head. This was out of all six of them. However, both new recruits had brought back one each. This made Kevin, the elite leader, secretly remark about the new recruits¡¯ aggressiveness!


    Half of the six Fallen Apprentices who were guarding on this mine pit had been eliminated. This was a rare result and deserved praise. However, as they had spent more than an hour in battle, they didn¡¯t have much time left to plunder the resources in this mine.


    After all, this mine number seven was located deep in the Underground World. It was tough for them to protect it. Once reinforcement from Elysium City arrived, perhaps a new round of catch and kill would ur.


    In regards to the arrival of Kevin¡¯s team, those Ratman miners showed no sign of fear. Their queen even flung herself at the team for negotiation, suggesting that if any apprentice was willing to spend the night with her, she would exempt all of the mining fees, and even give them a small ¡®treasure¡¯ that the Ratman tribe had saved for one whole year.


    But when they stared at the small and furry face of the Ratman queen and eyed her plump body and pair of big, saggy breasts, all these elite apprentices couldn¡¯t help but feel disgusted. When her bean-sized, flirting eyes rested on any apprentice¡¯s body, the apprentice would instantly feel a chill run down his back. They couldn¡¯t help but feel like vomiting.


    As the result, after Kevin paid a double price of five hundred magic crystals, they finally received twenty-six Blood Gas from the Ratman queen. Each of these Blood Gas was the size of a chicken egg. They had an estimated worth of about four thousand and eight hundred magic crystals. If they could bring them back smoothly, each member would be able to receive two to five hundred magic crystals.


    The amount they earned was directly proportionate to the contribution of the person. People like Greem, Mary, and the other Pseudo-Adept, who had each brought back an enemy¡¯s head, would have their ie definitely be more than others.


    After Kevin and the other two Pseudo-Adepts had a discussion, they quickly decided on a solution. Pseudo-Adept Grimm received three Blood Gas, Kevin two, Greem two, Mary two, and the remaining three Advanced Apprentices received one each. As for the remaining twelve Blood Gas, they had to be submitted back to the training camp. Hulk would have the Turlock Merchant who supported him purchased all of them. The profit would then be equally split amongst the team members.


    As for the Blood Ga they received, they could settle it by themselves. Presumably, those filthy rich Adept families would definitely find them to discuss purchasing these precious treasure.


    Since they hadpleted the mission, it was now time to worry about how they would safely return to the surface.


    ording to their past experience, the return journey would be the most dangerous journey. Most of the casualties the mission team had suffered were from this period. Thus, whether they could stay alive to enjoy their hard-earned fortune was still a very cruel question!


    Should they traveled together in a big group and returned to their camp? It was a rather objectionable thought, as there was no doubt that they would be ambushed by the enemy. No matter if it was those treacherous underground devils or the Fallen Apprentices who had gotten wind of their arrival, all who would make their return journey would have to face risks and obstacles.


    Therefore, the best solution was to split up and return to the surface using their own means. If they failed to return, they could only me their ownck of strength. By doing it this way, it was no one¡¯s fault but your own!


    Hence, once they were done with sharing their loot, they wished each other luck and went their own ways. After all, there were plenty of passages that led to the surface. So long as they were not struck by bad luck, their chances of bumping into the enemy would be low.


    ............


    Once everybody dissolved into darkness, Mary leaped onto the Demon Alligator. She gazed around with her bloodshot eyes and shouted impetuously, ¡°We better get moving quickly! I keep feeling that there are some risks to this mission. It¡¯s as if someone is keeping an eye on us. We better be careful during our way back!¡±


    Greem¡¯s heart suddenly sank. He couldn¡¯t help and knitted his brows in a tight frown.


    In this era where sense topped everything else, Greem never dared to neglect any symptom of danger. Especially one from Mary, who inherited her ability from a mutated bloodline of an ancient species. Her grasp of the Principle of ne was much more profound than his. If even she had a bad feeling about the mission, then it was almost determined that something bad going to happen.


    Greem once again carried Mary in his arms and merged into the body of the Hunter. He controlled the massive body of the Demon Alligator and slowly sunk into the ground, disappearing without a trace.


    By utilizing the Earth element magic energy of the Demon Alligator Hunter, Greem gave the surrounding terrain a brief scan. But he didn¡¯t find anything suspicious. After eliminating the possibility that this mine number seven was a trap, Greem had no choice but to half skeptically drive his Demon Alligator Hunter towards home.


    If he followed how they came here, Greem would travel through the underground tunnel at a high speed. He would only travel in the ground once they bumped into terrain which required a long detour. With that, he could minimize the consumption of the Demon Alligator Hunter¡¯s Earth elemental magic energy.


    But since he was warned, he didn¡¯t mind wasting more magic energy. He chose to travel underground for the entire journey, stealthily ascending to the upperyer.


    As their journey back was full ofrge stretches of metal ore or solid rock, they were required to keep making detours. This made it so they couldn¡¯t travel at a high speed under the ground.


    Three hourster, they had traveled more than half of their journey. Greem finally rxed his mind a little bit.


    But, right when he drove the Demon Alligator Hunter through the soil between two huge rockyers, he felt as if the body of the Demon Alligator Hunter had just passed through a quiet water surface. The Earth element magic energy that ran through its entire body suddenly became berserk.


    It¡¯s a trap!


    He felt something amiss almost instantly. But, right after the Earth element magic energy started to rampage, the pressureing from the huge amount of soil around them suddenly became stronger.


    Greem¡¯s expression suddenly changed dramatically. He quickly drove the Demon Alligator and squeezed into the nearest underground tunnel.


    It was a dark, quiet and oppressive tunnel.


    The tunnel meandered gently into the darkness. It was as if it was the intestinal canal of an enormous monster and full of unknown danger.


    Most of the tunnel was excavated between the rockyers. Only a tiny portion was made up of wet and ck soil. But right at this moment, this patch of soil wall suddenly began to boil. With a loud boom, a massive object invaded this quiet tunnel. It came with arge amount of dirt that sttered around.


    Soon, two human shaped shadows dashed out from this massive object.


    ¡°What¡¯s wrong? What happened to your Golem?¡± Mary¡¯s urgent voice came through the darkness.


    ¡°We¡¯re being ambushed! There is a special magic array in the region we passed through just now. It messed up the Demon Alligator¡¯s Earth element magical energy! We have to get out of here as soon as possible!¡±


    Mary was stunned, her bloodshot eyes looked dazzling in this total darkness.


    ¡°Which way should we go?¡±


    ¡°...¡± Greem¡¯s eyes flickered under the cover of his goggles. He nced over to the ends of the dark and unpredictable tunnel. He couldn¡¯t make up his mind.


    ¡°Hmph!¡± Mary snorted coldly, saying, ¡°Let me do this!¡±


    She suddenly stood up with her back straight. She faced one end of the tunnel, took a deep breath and let out a loud roar. Her voice was piercing and sonorous. Greem felt a buzz strike his brain before he lost his hearing totally.


    Following the strange sound wave that quickly rippled through the tunnel, Mary stood quietly with her eyes closed. It was as if she was focusing her mind on listening to something.


    ¡°The tunnel¡¯s length is three hundred and twenty-seven meters, heading upwards. There is a small cavern at the end of it, and inside of the cavern...¡± Mary paused for a brief moment, before her voice suddenly turned shrill, ¡°Two men! There are two mening our way at high speed!¡±


    Greem¡¯s eyes instantly turned fierce and aggressive.


    Two men? They were rushing their way here brazenly? Needless to say, they must be thinking that they got two easy targets. Even without meeting them face to face, Greem was sure that they must be the two Pseudo-Adepts.


    Since the enemy was so well-prepared, it was highly possible that the few surrounding tunnels weren¡¯t safe either. Greem waved his hand and disintegrated the Demon Alligator Hunter. He picked up both summoning crystals from the dirt pile and turned around. He then sprinted towards the other end of the tunnel while dragging Mary.


    The ground of the tunnel was always rough and wet. The uneven surface and small rocks that were scattered around made Greem, a guy who had less than five Agility, stumble along his way. One would be able to slip even when walking at a steady pace in a passage like this, let alone running at full speed.


    In fact, not only the ground was uneven, there were also obstacles that came from above.


    Numerous stgmites of all sizes hung down quietly from the roof. If someone was only looking at the ground, it was very easy for him to knock his head into one of these obstacles.


    Therefore, for the first half of their fleeing journey, it was Greem who dragged Mary and ran at full speed. But before they reached a ten-meter distance, it became Mary who carried Greem in her arms while running full speed.


    The wet and cold air brushed against his face. It entered his mouth, nose and reached his rapidly pumping lungs through his windpipe. It brought down Greem¡¯s body temperature, yet made his mind calm down. Under his low-light vision, the dark passage shed by in an incredible speed. One after the other, stgmites appeared right in front of Greem¡¯s eyes, however, before he could cry out, Mary dodged them.


    Mary had transformed into a ghost who traveled through the darkness. All it took was a brief step with her soft and agile feet to make both of them glide through the air at an amazing speed. Every single overhanging stgmite and every narrow passage was like a broad, smooth highway. She could always pass through noiselessly and agilely with just a gentle step of her feet.


    Perhaps Mary had gotten used to such a high speed. However, for a rookie who only had less than five Agility, Greem¡¯s mind was filled with panic. This panic was stronger than the type one gets by riding on the craziest and riskiest roller coaster. If not for the wind pressure that filled his throat, he probably would¡¯ve vomited by now!


    Right when both of them were running through the dark underground at high speed, the tunnel in front suddenly contracted. It became so narrow that only one person could pass through. And, at the narrowest part of the tunnel, a lightning web suddenly appeared and stopped them from moving further.


    This lightning web covered the tunnel from the top to the bottom. Itpletely sealed up the entire passage. At the part where the lightning web connected with the cave wall, dazzling arcs of lightning could be seen dancing around violently.


    The popping noise of the electricity was clear and audible.


    It was a dead end!

 Chapter 80

    With just a brief moment of hesitation, the tunnel behind them started to fill up with a cloud of dust, a strange-looking magic array could be seen vaguely surfacing on the ground.


    Soon, two tall figures emerged from the magic array.


    It was a Teleportation magic spell, not underground travel!


    A blue light flickered in Greem¡¯s eyes, and with just one look, he already identified the method that was used by the enemy.


    Even though they used a Teleportation magic spell, there were no traces of spatial ripples. But he could sense a strong Earth element magic energy instead. It was as if this Teleportation magic spell was driven by Earth element magic energy!


    But this was not the right time to give it a thorough analysis. Currently, they were being chased by someone at their backs, while there was an ambush in front, this was a nasty situation!


    ¡°You¡¯re Mary, am I right?¡± One of the men that were behind them slowly walked forward, saying with a cold voice, ¡°Excellent. So the two who murdered Grier are here. I¡¯m going to pull your souls out from your bodies, imprison them in the Soul Trapping Corpse and let the both of you howl painfully for more than ten thousand years!¡±


    The one who talked was a noble youth, tall and handsome. His light blue robe shimmered with multi-colored runes in the dark, while the frightening energy of frost started to spread throughout the entire tunnel.


    ¡°Grier? Who¡¯s that?¡± Mary was perplexed.


    ¡°If the name Grier is unfamiliar to you, then how about Demon Vine Lady?¡± The handsome face of the noble youth started to contort, showing a ferocious expression.


    ¡°Demon Vine Lady!¡±


    ¡°Demon Vine Lady!¡±


    Both Greem and Mary let out cries of shock at the same time. They couldn¡¯t help but feel that their unexpected cmity wasn¡¯t just an ident after all!


    So they actually bumped into an old enemy! Judging from his age, he was most probably thepanion of Demon Vine Lady. Things have now be interesting!


    ¡°What¡¯s that Soul Trapping Corpse he just mentioned?¡± Mary wasn¡¯t able to dispel her curiosity and whispered.


    ¡°That¡¯s an undead creature created using a living person. Before the enemy is dead, they will draw special magic arrays on the enemy¡¯s body, so when the enemy is finally dead during the sacrifice ceremony, the soul would be trapped within the undead body, bing the eternal ve of the spellcaster.¡± Greem quickly answered her question.


    With the help of the Chip, Greem was gifted with an extraordinary retentive memory, thus he was able to remember a lot of elementary knowledge and seldomly used topics of this magical world.


    The noble youth strolled forward, and supplemented Greem¡¯s answer by saying, ¡°What you said is just the lightest punishment. Once both of you be Soul Trapping Corpses, I¡¯ll find a remote ce rarely visit by everybody. I will then bury the both of you deeply in the soil, and let you maintain your consciousness while painfully spending the next hundred years inplete darkness! Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯ll pay the both of you a visit from time to time, making sure your souls will stay forever intact, your memories stay clear, and your mind can¡¯t be insane! Hahaha...¡±


    Ugh... Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel a chill run down his back. He had underestimated the level of enemy¡¯s evilness and madness!


    ¡°Which way?¡± Taking advantage of the opportunity while the guy was stillughing wantonly, Mary whispered to Greem.


    ¡°In front!¡± Greem replied with a low voice, ¡°There are two Pseudo-Adepts behind us. But I only sensed one soul aura in front of us, that¡¯s where we¡¯re going!¡±


    ¡°Alright!¡±


    Right after they ended their conversation, a raging me bursted out from Greem¡¯s body, revealing a Fire Shield shrouded in scorching mes. Mary spread her arms and clung onto Greem, pressing her body closely with his. Without any hesitation, they turned around and propelled themselves into the lightning web that kept producing buzzing noises of electricity.


    ¡°Still trying to run away from me?¡±


    The blue-clothed noble youth roared furiously. His body suddenly expanded a few times bigger than it was, and he stretched out his thick hand full of wiry hair and forcefully grabbed towards his enemies.


    The giant hand of the blue-clothed noble youth missed his targets. However, his fingertip touched the lightning web, and was instantly turned ck by the noisy Paralyzing Lightning.


    Struck by the pain, the blue-clothed noble youth roared furiously again and retracted his giant hand. Within a split second, the giant hand which looked simr to a stone pir returned to its original shape. Only a trace of burn mark could be seen on his fingers which emitted ck smoke.


    ¡°Damn it, Hegel, retract your lightning trap at once!¡± The blue-clothed noble youth roared out loudly, and obviously, the target of his roar wasn¡¯t standing in front of him.


    Meanwhile, Mary and Greem were about to throw themselves into the lightning web, and once they did, the violent and raging electricity immediately came surging through their bodies.


    Of course, the first target who bore the brunt of all these was the Fire Shield summoned by Greem.


    The violent electric arcs hit the Fire Shield producing countless dazzling sparks, the frightening electricity which had enough power to burn an ordinary human into charcoal caused the Fire Shield to keep making buzzing and crackling noise. The overly dense energy of electricity even gathered into some frightening blue smas, hovering at a distance less than a meter from Greem¡¯s head, slowly moving toward its target.


    An ordinary Fire Shield only had thirty-five defensive strength, but as Greem¡¯s element affinity was Fire, he was able to increase the defensive strength of his Fire Shield to fifty points. But this was still insufficient to protect them through their short journey of ten meters.


    10 meters!


    With Mary¡¯s extraordinary Agility, she could actually sh through this ten meters of distance within a blink of an eye. But right at this very moment, this short distance seemed so long and dangerous!


    The Fire Shield vanished into thin air before it couldst for half of the distance. The scorching smas which had been waiting around them immediately swarmed their target. It would only take half a second before Greem would be turned into a thread of smoke by them. Since Mary¡¯s Physique was higher than Greem¡¯s, she actually had a higher chance to survive the second half of a lightning-filled passage.


    Everything happened within just a split second of time! Right when Greem¡¯s body trembled violently, closing his eyes and waiting for his death toe, Mary suddenly shouted out, unleashing a vast amount of blood from her body that instantly covered both of them.


    No matter how pure was these Blood element energy, they just couldn¡¯t withstand such a violent and raging smas. Both of them were like the raw meat cing on top of a roasting pit, countless Blood element energy that hovering around them were instantly devoured by the ferocious smas. At the end, the thin Blood element energy could no longer provide them with a full protection. Unexpectedly, Mary clenched her jaw, shifted most of the Blood element energy to Greem, allowing most of her body exposed to the electricity and smas.


    The frightening noise of flesh being burnt by electricity could be continuously heard at the scene. The exposed parts of Mary¡¯s body quickly turned into charcoal, before crumbling into ashes that flew in the air.


    On the other side of this narrow tunnel, a short midget was staring in bewilderment, a look of disbelief present on his face to what just happened in front of him.


    What happened inside of the lightning web was clearly seen by him. Although he had witnessed it personally, but he was still unable to believe what he saw.


    Someone really had the courage to run through his lightning death trap!


    This... how could this be possible?


    Whether he believed it or not, this just actually happened. And right in front of him, arge charred object dashed out of the lightning web, forcefully mming onto the ground.


    ¡°Little kid, you¡¯re pretty tough, huh! But this is better, as Langdon would owe me two big favorster!¡± Although the short midget looked skinny and ugly, he was surprisingly an actual human. When he saw the preys that brought themselves in front of him, he quickly leaned forward and tried to catch them using his hand.


    His palm could be seen being covered with a glove made up entirely from a denseyer of tame electricity.


    If any living being was touched by this Paralyzing Lightning, they would lose all their strength for fifteen minutes.


    An indistinct noise rang out in the air, as a crystal clear Elementium core fell on the ground.


    The midget became startled for a brief moment but decided to pick it up. But before he could get close to it, a dense cloud of Earth Elementium suddenly bubbled up and covered the core.


    ¡°Eh, what is this thing?¡±


    The midget was struck with curiosity. At this time, Langdon¡¯s loud roar could be heard through the lightning web and was heard by this midget.


    The midget hesitated, wondering if he should capture these two preys first or turned off the lightning web. A loud rumble suddenly came from the ce where the thick cloud of Earth Elementium appeared. And a massive monster suddenly squeezed its way out from under the ground, moving its huge and long body, thrusting it ferociously into the midget.


    Its body was made entirely of rocks, a rocky snake head, tongue, and fangs... this... this was clearly a Rock Snake!


    With just a flick, the midget suddenly vanished from where he previously stood, only to reveal himself again behind a huge rock some twenty meters away. Meanwhile, with the use of its rock-solid mouth full of sharp fangs, the frightening Rock Snake forcefully mmed on the ground where the midget once stood at just mere moments ago. In just an instant, a powerful quake spread throughout the entire tunnel, causing the rock bed to shift, causing huge amounts of rocks to fall from the ceiling.


    The Rock Snake pulled out its head from the piles of stones, and once again held its head up high. With not even a second had passed by, it¡¯s earthy yellow eyes had already locked down on midget located not far away from it, and readied itself to violently thrust again to its target.


    Damn it! What exactly was this?


    Taken aback by the surprise attack, the midget stamp with rage and cursed. He quickly rubbed his palms and unleashed a raging lightning, striking onto the snake head who wasing fast in his way, trying his best in holding it back. The wantonly sshing electricity burned the snake head of Rock Snake, producing a thick cloud of smoke, while the skin made from tough rock had also starting to melt like hot wax.


    However, the Rock Snake¡¯s strength was on it¡¯s tough skin. It wasn¡¯t bothered by these damages and still charging toward the enemy savagely.


    Left with no alternative, the midget once again used his Lightning Jump ability and brought himself to another spot.


    ¡°Hegel, what the hell are you doing there? Quickly turn off the lightning trap!¡± On the other side of the tunnel, Langdon became even more impetuous when he heard the violent rumbles.


    After not receiving a response from his peer after a long time, his eyes turned bloodshot. Langdon turned around and asked furiously, ¡°Philip, can you bring me over there?¡±


    Holding his staff firmly, Philip, who stood behind Langdon, focused his mind and sent out his senses. Soon, he shook his head, saying, ¡°The changes of terrain are really intense on the other side. The aura of the rockyers aren¡¯t stable. I can¡¯t establish a stable stratum node!¡±


    Damn it...


    The angry Langdon couldn¡¯t wait any longer. He let out a furious shout and once again transformed into a giant three meters tall. A crystal clear blue armor was seen forming outside of his body. After that, he crazily shot himself into the lightning web.


    The raging electricity kept wreaking havoc on his body, while the blue smas restlessly destroying his ice armor. However, he used his hands and protected his eyes and face. In addition, with the help of the copious Ice energy that kept bursting out from his body, he managed to withstand the attack of the lightning. He then strode out from the lightning web.


    Revealed in front of his eyes was a broken tunnel with many parts copsed. The original cavern was no longer there. Only broken ruins were left after the intense battle. An enormous rock snake was seen lying on the ground, motionless. Thick and pungent dark smoke was seen lingering around the over thirty meters long body. The position of the snake head was now reced by a pool of flowing magma, while a crystal clear, earthy yellow core shed a few times, before finally dimming downpletely.


    The midget was squatting beside the snake head. It seemed as if he was examining something.


    ¡°Where are the enemies I asked you to intercept? Where are the two bastards!?¡± Langdon, who had transformed into a blue giant, roared crazily.


    ¡°Aren¡¯t they there?¡± The midget turned around and pointed to a spot. ¡°Eh? Where did they go?¡±


    The midget had finally realized that both charred humans had vanished without a trace!

 Chapter 81

    Within the soil, the Demon Alligator Hunter was traveling at high speed.


    After they went past the lightning trap, the unusual interference affecting the Earth Elementium had disappeared.


    In order to save their life, Greem had no choice but to give up his Rock Snake. He had ordered it to trap the super frightening Thunder element Pseudo-Adept, while he secretly summoned the Demon Alligator Hunter. He then brought Mary and fled for their life.


    Currently, Mary couldn¡¯t be referred to as a human. She seemed to be more like dark charcoal just pulled out from the fire.


    All of her skin was charred. Countless ashes would peel off with just a slight touch. Once the charred ashes had peeled off, her steaming hot, half-baked flesh was exposed. Apparently, the high heat brought by the raging electricity had killed most of Mary¡¯s bones and flesh.


    If it was any other ordinary human, a severe injury like would have long since killed the person!


    However, Mary had proved herself as a Bloodline apprentice who had gone through a mutation. Her vampire bloodline had gifted her with an amazing ability. As long as her heart core wasn¡¯t destroyed, her soul would be maintained intact. Within her charred and cooked body, a weak soul aura could still be sensed.


    ¡°Chip, scan Mary¡¯s current condition. Provide me with the most reliable treatment!¡± Although Greem¡¯s heart was trembling, his voice was still calm and cold.


    ¡°Beep, scanningmence... Warning! Warning! The survival rate of the target is less than 7%. The core consciousness has shown signs of damage... Warning! Warning! Target¡¯s life aura is deteriorating. If this is not treated then the heart core will start to break down...¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t tell me all this crap! Just give me the best solution!¡± Greem interrupted impatiently.


    ¡°Blood, a huge amount of blood... The target has the body constitution of a mutated vampire. As long as the target is provided with sufficient blood, it will survive. Even if the entire body is disintegrated, as long the target¡¯s core consciousness touches fresh blood, they would be able to rise once again!¡±


    ¡°Blood?¡±


    Greem shook his head, cursing inwardly at his own stupidity. Mary was a vampire, what else could save her apart from blood?


    ¡°Change our course immediately. Find me a region where there are abundant underground creatures. Quick!¡±


    A couple of minutester, at a colony of green-skinned Goblins, the giant body of Demon Alligator Hunter suddenly emerged from the ground.


    Green-skinned Goblins were a subspecies of demi-humans and had the average height of one meter. Their green skin was as tough as cow leather, and they had a pair of donkey-like big ears. Their diet consisted of everything and anything. To be specific, in this Underground World, apart from rock and dirt, they could eat almost everything.


    But, as their individual strength was extremely weak, they had the habit of living in groups.


    In this Underground World, these Goblins were at the bottom of the food chain. However, they were widely distributed and had thergest poption out of everything. Their biggest characteristic was their ability to eat anything. They also had an incredible rate of reproduction.


    Normally, such weak creatures wouldn¡¯t be able to survive in this harsh environment. Despite this, they could be found in every region of the Underground World. The reason was actually rather simple.


    Food was a rare resource in Underground World, and it was extremely tough to find a stable source of food. Therefore, these Goblins were bred like livestock by the other underground creatures. When theycked food to survive, they woulde to a colony of Goblins and eat one or two in order to cure their hunger.


    To be honest, the meat of these Goblins was tough and bitter. It also came with a stinking smell that was hard to get rid of. Therefore, unless the hunger really drove them nuts, no underground creature would be willing to torture their stomach like that.


    Perhaps, this was the main reason why Goblins never went extinct.


    But today, this colony of Goblins had been struck with a great misfortune!


    Within a narrow cave, over one hundred Goblins were gathered in their camp cooking some ¡®delicacies¡¯. The shabby condition of this camp looked absolutely hopeless. Besides from the crushed rocks scattered around the ce, the only other things present were countless piles of dirt. Even though there was a tent found in this ce, it was just a dirty cloth. It was supported by a wooden stick, and no one could tell its original color.


    This was a tent that even the homeless guys in the human society wouldn¡¯t step into. But it was, in fact, the home of the Goblin who had the most prestigious status: the n chief!


    It was dinner time for these Goblins. Goblins, who had gone out hunting, had returned to their base. They chattered on their way and threw their spoils (which were things like wall lizards and other small insects) into therge stone pot in the middle of the camp. The fire was burning brightly under the stock pot. The color of the liquid inside of the pot looked green and muddy. In addition, countless strange objects were seen floating inside of this nasty liquid.


    There were bones of unknown origin, strange-colored chunks of meat from unknown creatures, sharp teeth of demon beasts, small bugs that were struggling and crying violently and pale white eyeballs that looked really frightening...


    A few Goblins were standing on a tform, holding a wooden stick in their hands. These goblins kept stirring the bottom of the stone pot, bringing up many unknown objects from it. This was a pot of meat filled with poison and harmful ingredients, however, to these goblins, it was the most sought after ¡®delicacy¡¯ of the day.


    Countless Goblins held a stone bowl in their hands and gathered around the bonfire. There were pushing each other and trying to fight for the forefront position while waiting for the arrival of their n chief. As the chief of Goblins, it was natural that he held the right of enjoying this ¡®delicacy¡¯ first.


    Therefore, right in the middle of this noisy scene, the Demon Alligator Hunter made its debut.


    Greem carried Mary in his arms and squeezed out from Demon Alligator. He coldly gazed at this ugly scene, saying with a low voice, ¡°Kill them all!¡±


    After saying that, he ignored everything and walked away.


    After finding a rather clean ce, Greem gently ced Mary on the ground.


    Just this gentle movement alone had made countless pieces of ashes fall off from Mary¡¯s charred body.


    Greem pulled out a dagger from his waist, poking it into Mary¡¯s chest without hesitation. He cut away her half-baked flesh while paying no attention to the steaming heat. Greem pushed aside her flesh, exposing the dying ¡®heart¡¯ within her chest.


    This was Mary¡¯s heart and was also where her core conscious stayed.


    As long as her core conscious was still intact, even if her body was badly mutted, she could still regenerate through the method of rising from the blood.


    After exposing Mary¡¯s heart, Greem cut his wrist without the slightest hesitation. As soon as his blood dripped onto the withered heart, a small amount of vitality was instantly brought to it. The once pale and earthy yellow flesh instantly turned red. Tiny blood vessels started to regrow like tree branches from the flesh, stretching out crazily.


    Soon, these blood vessels formed into a thinyer of blood film and covered the entire heart. They kept stretching outward, following the dripping of Greem¡¯s blood, and moved to all the other parts of her body like some strange-looking tentacles.


    With incredible speed, Mary¡¯s heart soon restored its original look.


    The blood was still dripping. Whenever each drop of blood hit her heart, it would be absorbed instantly. Finally, following a light pumping sound, Mary¡¯s heart had once again resumed its pumping motion.


    ¡°Blood, I need more blood...¡±


    Mary¡¯s charred lips moved, exposing the dark and red flesh inside her mouth.The hungry moaning of Mary could be hearding from her throat.


    His blood was far from enough!


    ¡°Why is it taking so long!?¡± Greem roared with a deep voice.


    Meanwhile, the Goblin camp was in a state of chaos. Blood was being spilt everywhere.


    Using its Quake spell, the Demon Alligator had copsed the entrance to this cave and was moving its massive body around. It was using the Spike spell to ughter these green-skinned creatures. The Hunter had separated itself from Demon Alligator and strode to Greem. It was carrying a long dirt spear in its hand, which had two Goblins hanging off the tip of it.


    The Hunter waved its hand. It revealed a half a meter deep hole in the ground. It then it ripped apart the Goblin¡¯s body and threw it into the edge of the hole. Following that, a huge amount of blue blood sprayed out from the broken body of Goblins. The bottom of the hole started to turn wet and muddy.


    The Demon Alligator handled the task of ughtering, while the Hunter worked on draining blood from the Goblins. Within just a few minutes, the hole was fully filled with blue colored blood. Meanwhile, arge pile of dead bodies was seen at the edge of the hole. It was made up of all sorts of strange-looking Goblin corpses.


    Greem carefully ced Mary¡¯s body into the blood pool. Soon, her body waspletely covered, and the pool of blood started to boil violently.


    The level of blood pool was lowering fast.


    ¡°Hurry! I need more blood!¡±


    Urged by Greem, more Goblins were thrown to the edge of the pool. The blue colored blood flew over the ground like water. The blood that was being injected into the pool was just enough to support the consumption of Mary¡¯s resurrection.


    Fifteen minutester, the sound of water sshing rung throughout the hole. A naked and perfectly-curved female body flew out from the blood pool and started hovering in the sky.


    An obvious look of confusion appeared on Mary¡¯s face, who was just raised from the dead. She suddenly opened up her greenish eyes, looking around in a confused manner. Her fair and silky smooth skin radiated with a brilliant glow. Her sexy body looked tender charming, seductive and delicious, all at the same time!


    She blinked her eyes and spent a few moments trying to recall her memories. Soon, Mary had remembered everything.


    ¡°You... You¡¯re Greem? I... I¡¯m Mary!¡±


    Within just three seconds, the same Mary had returned.


    ¡°Damn it, how can you use such dirty blood to resurrect me!? Bastard! Don¡¯t you know I hate the blood of low-grade creatures the most?¡± Before Greem coulde forth and greet her, Mary sniffed and immediately began screaming andining.


    Ugh... fine, Greem had no choice but to admit that he had too little understanding regarding the Vampire. He found that thebination of both vampire and woman made for the most frighteningbination under the heavens. It made it a mysterious creature that was extremely hard to predict!


    ¡°Wee back! Thank you!¡± With utmost sincerity, Greem stepped up and bowed. His words carried two meanings, and the actual meanings could only be understood by the both of them.


    If it were not for Mary protecting the fragile Greem in the previous battle, Mary would have been able to go through the lightning trap by herself easily. However, she chose to use everything she had to protect Greem. This caused her to gain the most severe injury she had ever had. It was so serious that even her core consciousness was nearly broken.


    Greem wasn¡¯t a cold man whose heart made from stone. He was truly touched by Mary¡¯s action. But, as an Apprentice Adept who had to maintain their calm and merciless behaviour at all times, he preferred to hide his true emotions deep in his heart. He would only bring them out when they were alone and lonely.


    Therefore, with regards to Mary¡¯s decision of saving his life with her own life, Greem could only express his true feelings with two simple words: Thank you!

 Chapter 82

    Note: We¡¯ll release two chapters today, making up for that day when we didn¡¯t release a chapter. Hope you enjoy it! Also, if you can, do support us on Patreon here. That really helps! Thanks!


    Regarding Greem¡¯s gratefulness, Mary expressed her disdain.


    Mary lightly snorted, then the remaining pool of blood entwined her body fully, transforming into an exquisite red dress.


    Greem called back his Demon Alligator and decided to rush back to Adept Tower but Mary, who had just recovered suddenly turned her head and stared at a random direction with her emerald green eyes.


    ¡°Wait, what is that thing?¡±


    Greem was startled for a moment. He followed Mary¡¯s line of sight and his nce moved over. He saw a yellowish green rock with a circumference of 1 meter, ced right in the center of camp.


    Ugh... a rock?


    Greem¡¯s eyes scanned the surrounding area. Aside from the small and shattered ones that scattered across the entire camp, there wasn¡¯t anyrge rocks that could be found. But now, arge rock suddenly appeared beside the only broken tent in this camp. It was rather strange and and abrupt.


    Previously, Greem had all of his focus on saving Mary therefore he didn¡¯t really bother paying attention to anything that was present in this ce. But since what they noticed is clearly abnormal, he quickly activated his Elementium Vision.


    Under the observation of the Elementium Vision which allowed him to see through every Elementium, the handsome face of Greem twitched a few times for reasons known only to him.


    Damn, this isn¡¯t a rock, but it¡¯s a...


    After his careless mistake of being deceived by the enemy, Greem angrily snapped his finger andmanded the Demon Alligator Hunter to stride towards the ¡®rock¡¯.


    The ¡®rock¡¯ clearly knew it¡¯s trick was already exposed, that¡¯s why before the dirt spear of the Hunter impaled it, this ¡®rock¡¯ instantly disintegrated. Actually, it wasn¡¯t disintegrated, but just a Goblin, slightly over one meter tall, putting away its cape, revealing its true form.


    ¡°Spare my life, oh great one! Mighty master Adept, please spare my life! Please forgive this Snox! This Snox is willing to be your ve! Just please, don¡¯t kill Snox!¡±


    Upon revealing its true self, the Goblin quickly threw itself onto the ground and kowtowed again and again, begging for his life while miserably howling to no end.


    ¡°Ugh... wait!¡± Greem stopped the Hunter, and said, ¡°You know how to speak in humannguage? A low-grade creature such as goblin possesses intelligence?¡±


    ¡°Master, Snox is no ordinary goblin! Snox is the smartest goblin in the world, Snox can serve you tea and meals, prepare your sleep bed, and Snox can even guard the door for you. Snox is the most capable creature!¡± Realizing this young ¡®malefic¡¯ person showing interests on it, the goblin quickly promoted itself.


    ¡°What was the trick you used just now? If not because of my sharp vision, I would have been deceived by you.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s one of the tricks I secretly learned, abination of a camouge spell and a partial transformation spell, they are nothing much, really.¡±


    ¡°You know how to cast magic spells?¡± Greem¡¯s face was stered with astonishment, ¡°Moreover, you know two magic spells!¡±


    ¡°A-Actually, I-I know three magic spells!¡± The goblin who called itself Snox stammered.


    ¡°Three? What¡¯s the third spell you know?¡± Greem felt the world as he knew it, had turned upside down.


    Even a mere goblin could master three magic spells, but he... up until now, he seemed to have only mastered four, no, the ming Spear was just a variance of Fire Arrow. Therefore, strictly speaking, he only mastered three magic spells!


    Not knowing theplicated thoughts this young apprentice had on his head, Snox said under its breath with an embarrassed tone, ¡°I... I also know I-Invisibility.¡±


    Greem waspletely speechless!


    A goblin, which was regarded by the entire Adept world as the weakest demon beast, could actually possess its very own intelligence, and even master three magic spells. What were all these spells? Invisibility, Camouge, Partial Transformation... these skills made it an expert in stealth. If not because Greem had the Elementium Vision, and Mary had the ability to sense life aura, perhaps this little guy with the name of Snox would really be able to avoid today¡¯s unexpected cmity!


    Greem cupped his hand under his chin, and contemted.


    At the time when he was still pondering what should he do to this strange goblin, Snox became frightened by Greem¡¯s serious expression and quickly waved its hands around and exposed a bigger secret.


    ¡°Your mightyness, you don¡¯t want to kill Snox! Snox knows a secret treasure of a master Adept. Snox can bring you there!¡±


    If there was still anything that could move Greem today, what Snox said just now was definitely the one.


    Greem¡¯s pupils contracted, and he clenched his jaw tightly and said the following words with a cold voice, ¡°Looks like you are an escaped magical ve from an Adept Tower. Tell me, which Adept Tower did youe from?¡±


    Greem finally understood. How could a wild goblin suddenly be blessed with basic intelligence? Even if it did have it, from where could it get in touch with the mysterious and profound magical knowledge it possessed? Therefore, putting all those clues together, Greem came to the conclusion that this must be a magical ve who identally escaped from its Adept Tower that belonged to an unknown official Adept.


    Snox hesitated for a few moments. Its tiny eyeballs could be seen moving around, but seeing the razor sharp dirt spear of the Hunter pressing against its shoulder, it realized there wasn¡¯t any possibility of escape from this situation.


    Probably thinking that it didn¡¯t have any chance of surviving if it didn¡¯t tell the truth, Snox bowed his head down in sorrow and said out a name.


    ¡°Elysium City! Master Adept Pridka!¡±


    ¡°Adept Pridka from Elysium City? This name sounds unfamiliar! Greem, have you heard it before?¡± Mary asked, perplexed.


    Greem had a cold face, squeezing out shivering words from his tightly clenched teeth.


    ¡°Mary, you really should pay more visits to the library. Understanding our enemy is essential to protect oneself.¡±


    ¡°Is this Pridka really famous?¡±


    ¡°Of course. Because Adept Pridka is a Second Grade Adept!¡± Greem spewed out thest few words with great force.


    Hearing this, Mary immediately drew in a sharp cold breath.


    Although Mary behaved willfully and unscrupulously in normal times, but there was still a limit to her unbridled personality. When faced with an official Adept, she wouldn¡¯t be as reckless as how she used to be, but instead, she would offer her respect wholeheartedly. Because she knew how frightening the existences known as an Adept are. They could easily kill her with just a wave of a single hand.


    As for a Second Grade Adept, perhaps that would be a frightening existence even an official Adept would tremble with fear upon meeting!


    Mary and Greem exchanged nces, and understood each other¡¯s thought with just a look.


    They have to make this Snox fall under their control!


    This was a goblin who once served a Second Grade Adept! Any magical knowledge or special information dug out from its mouth would be enough to bring great benefits to both of them. As for the secret treasure of the Adept mentioned by Snox, they simply forgot about it and never bothered again to ask any further.


    They weren¡¯t idiots! Could a frightening Second Grade Adept really tell a mere goblin about the whereabouts of their treasure? This was a joke to an intelligent and experienced mighty Adept! Maybe this Snox had taken those magical experiment wastes the Adept casually threw away as treasure!


    With his mind filled with endless spections, Greem held Mary in a princess carry and climbed up to the Demon Alligator, also bringing along the goblin whose name was Snox. They, once again, submerged into the ground.


    ...


    Within the broken-down tunnel.


    Three figures of varying heights could be seen squatting in front of the remains of the Rock Snake, silently examining what¡¯s left of it in front of their eyes. The broken core that had lost all its light and Elementium was now held in Pseudo-Adept Philip¡¯s hand, as he gave it a thorough observation.


    ¡°How is it? Did you find anything?¡± The short Pseudo-Adept, Hegel, yawned and asked impatiently, ¡°You have spent thest half an hour just looking at it, just tell me what¡¯s so unusual about it?¡±


    ¡°This is an Elementium core taken from a Pseudo-Adept level Earth Giant!¡± After pondering for a long time, Philip finally voiced out his findings with a deep voice.


    ¡°Garbage! Anyone can tell that easily. If that¡¯s the only thing you can tell, why do we still need you, an expert in Earth element, to give us your insights about this thing.¡± Hegel rudely said.


    Meanwhile, Langdon was standing quietly on the side. His eyes were filled with a frosty glow. It¡¯s obvious he still hadn¡¯t gotten rid of the anger caused by letting his enemies escape.


    ¡°There¡¯s a total of fourteen special rune arrays engraved on it, most of them are magical arrays used to absorb and store Earth element energy, while the rest have the purpose of Elementium Grant Life, Elementium Summoning, Mind Control Imprint System, and Elementium Tempering. Through a unique method, all these independent arrays are interconnected, transforming into a brand new three-dimensional magical array! This is the reason why this Rock Snake possessed such an incredible strength, able to trap a Pseudo-Adept which enabled their escape.¡±


    Hearing the mocking words of the guy, Hegel was lit with the mes of anger.


    ¡°Damn it, can you really me me? You told me to stop an Advanced Apprentice and a Beginner Apprentice from leaving this ce, but you never told me that guy owned arge beast like this! Hey Philip, with your amazing magical knowledge, do you know any Beginner Apprentice who can control a Pseudo-Adept level Golem? Do you think this is logical?¡±


    ¡°Hmph. He¡¯s an Intermediate Apprentice now!¡±


    ¡°Alright, alright! Even if he¡¯s an Intermediate Apprentice, don¡¯t you think this situation is rather abnormal?¡±


    ¡°This is nothing abnormal. If he can find a master Alchemist, drew out enough power from the core and utilized it, the amount of Spirit he will need in order to control it would be greatly reduced. It isn¡¯t something unbelievable for a Beginner Apprentice to control a Pseudo-Adept level Golem. It¡¯s just that with his Spirit, it¡¯s very difficult to fully unleash thebat strength of the Golem!¡±


    After listening to the conversation of the two, Langdon finally spoke.


    ¡°If these Golems were crafted by that Greem himself?¡±


    Philip was stunned for a brief moment, but shook his head before saying, ¡°Then he must be a genius alchemist of this generation! If not, then I can¡¯t think of any other method that can utilize an Elementium core up to such an incredible level.¡±


    ¡°As for the answer, we will know the next time we meet him again. No matter what, he still has toe back to the Underground World. And at that time, we¡¯ll know all the answers we want after capturing him.¡± Hegel said with a carefree manner, ¡°Oh right, Langdon. Since I followed you for this mission, Mine No. Seven that I was supposed to guard had been robbed by those bastards from the surface. I¡¯m afraid you will have to rpense for the losses! Also, if we are questioned by master Adept Puner, I hope you can calm down his anger!¡±


    Upon hearing what Hegel said, the handsome face of Langdon had twisted once again.


    The temperature of the cave dropped down by a few degrees!

 Chapter 83

    Half a dayter, Greem and Mary finally returned to the Adept Tower.


    Upon their arrival, they were notified that theirpulsory task force had lost another member, Sh, while the rest of the team were all wounded. The team suffered a great losses.


    What caused all of this was four Fallen Pseudo-Adept who suddenly appeared out of nowhere.


    After they were ambushed, Sabrina and the other two Pseudo-Adepts fought against three of the enemies, but the remaining Fallen Pseudo-Adept put up a fierce fight with Sh, causing them to be at a disadvantage. Because of that, Sh and the other three had to flee in desperation. Sh was killed during their escape by her enemy.


    Before those Fallen Pseudo-Adepts attacked them, they were told that they were here to seek revenge from Greem and Mary. Therefore, after they managed to escape to the surface, the team members who were still suffering from the shock had pushed all the me to the both of them. A few Advanced Apprentices even kept asking them to be responsible for Sh¡¯s death, wanting the duo to bear all of the responsibility for their failure inpleting their mission.


    Thus, when Adept Angus, who came to receive the mission item, arrived at the main hall, Isaac started to jump up and down furiously.


    ¡°Master Adept, it¡¯s all because of them... they insisted on leaving the team, which eventually attracted the revenge of four Fallen Pseudo-Adepts, that is the reason why we failed in this mission. You have to punish them!¡±


    Leander and Bruce were also yelling out loudly, filled with righteous rage.


    As for the other two male Pseudo-Adepts in the team, both of them were having long faces while not saying a single word. Even though they didn¡¯t try to pin the responsibility to others, in their minds, they were still filled with dissatisfaction towards Greem and Mary. Due to the difference between their levels, they were defeated in a fair fight with those underground Fallen Pseudo-Adepts, and returned with bodies full of wounds.


    The only team member who was able to return unscathed was Sabrina.


    ¡°Hahaha...¡± Adept Angus responded with a cold sneer then said, ¡°Stop ying your childish tricks in front of me. I¡¯ve seen too many internal discords between team members all these years, I have no time for your petty thoughts and plots. What I really care is, what have you brought back to the Adept Tower?¡±


    Everyone¡¯s heads turned to Sabrina at the same time.


    Wearing an indifferent expression, Sabrina stretched her hand out and handed over four mission items. Out of all four of them, only one mission item was lit.


    ¡°You onlypleted one mission? Where¡¯s the other mission item?¡± Adept Angus¡¯s expression turned cold in an instant.


    ¡°It¡¯s with me!¡± Mary took a step forward and extended her palm.


    A brightly lit mission item was revealed in front of everyone.


    ¡°Out of five missions, you onlypleted two. ording to our agreement, you¡¯re spared from the punishment of failing the mission. But you can also forget about the rewards.¡±


    When they realized that they were spared from the punishment, some of the Advanced Apprentices of the team rxed their expressions. But what Adept Angus said afterwards came as a shock to them.


    ¡°Also, I want to announce an internal decision of the Adept Tower Council. Considering that Greem and Mary showed outstanding performances in the elite mission of the training camp, the council had decided to transfer them into the training camp. From now onwards, they don¡¯t have to participate in any morepulsory missions.¡±


    Although Adept Angus said it with a deep and hoarse voice, it sounded like a sudden thunder p in the ears of all team members, greatly stupefying every one of them.


    ¡°This... how can this be?¡± Seized by terror, Isaac yelled out loudly, ¡°Master, this is unreasonable! Our team is left with only eight members, if you transfer two of them away, how are we going toplete the remaining missions? We want to protest...¡±


    Before he could finish his words, a ck chain suddenly shot out from the void, tightly tying Isaac up in a bundle.


    ¡°What? Is there anyone else who dares to challenge the authority of the Adept Tower Council? Kid, let me tell you, no matter what, don¡¯t challenge the authority and dignity of an Adept. This is a lesson for you, next time, I will not be as nice today and won¡¯t spare you as easily!¡±


    Following Adept Angus¡¯s stern warning, the ck chain suddenly turned red, transforming into a long chain of scorching hot metal, burning Isaac¡¯s skin and flesh making them produce hissing noises. When Angus¡¯s voice turned louder, the chain started to tighten, digging deep into Isaac¡¯s flesh, causing his bones to produce cracking noises as well.


    It was as if Isaac¡¯s magic resistance had suddenly disappeared, making him unable to withstand the fire chain punishment from Adept Angus. After letting out a few miserable shrieks, Isaac fainted as a result of severe pain.


    With a snap of a finger, the fire chain vanished out of thin air, just like how it appeared.


    Adept Angus then moved his dazzling eyes across everybody¡¯s faces. When he did that, every team member felt a sharp pain in their eyes, and couldn¡¯t help and lower their heads.


    ¡°This is just a small punishment to all of you. Your purpose here is to train yourself andplete missions assigned to you, not ming each other and putting up a stupid show of internal discord! If you¡¯recking in strength in order to crush those ck bastards, then be smarter, use your strategies and unite to defeat the enemy toplete your task. You don¡¯t have enough manpower? Then go to the main hall in the first floor and get some new recruits! See for yourself if any fools are willing to be hired by you!¡±


    After a rare long-winded speech, Angus turned his eyes to Greem.


    ¡°Kid, I heard you¡¯re really good in hiding your ability! Haha, looks like you know how being lowkey is important in keeping your life safe. But sometimes, burying your strength too deep isn¡¯t good as well. A strong man should show his bearing and dignity. If you showed your ability earlier, perhaps all the members of this team are now your minions, and the girls would¡¯ve been your exclusive sleeping buddies, isn¡¯t that more meaningful thanying low all by yourself? Come, show me your loot this time!¡±


    Ugh... Looks like Adept Angus was also a restless guy when he was still an apprentice.


    While helplesslyining inwardly, Greem and Mary took out their war trophies from their underground trip. Two people brought back two heads of Fallen apprentices, and both were at the level of Advanced Apprentices.


    An unsightly expression surfaced upon the faces of the others who were watching quietly beside them. Only Adept Angusughed out loud in satisfaction.


    ¡°Not bad, not bad at all! You only visited Underground World twice, yet you brought back two heads already. Indeed, you possess the magical ability that is suited perfectly to the Underground Cave. Kid, you have a bright future, I have confidence in you! Now tell me, what kind of reward do you want to exchange for these heads?¡±


    The near death experiences of this trip had filled Greem¡¯s mind with great anger. A Pseudo-Adept level Rock Snake he just crafted had been destroyed by the enemy. This, without a doubt, deeply angered him!


    ¡°Elementium core with life aura, it¡¯s better if it¡¯s of the Earth element, and it should also be at Pseudo-Adept level.¡± Greem gritted his teeth and decided not to hide his talent in crafting golems. After all, he had already exposed the Rock Snake previously. So long as someone paid enough attention to him, that alone was more than enough for them to make some assumption.


    If he stillid low like how he did previously, perhaps he wouldn¡¯t be as lucky on his next trip to the Underground World.


    ¡°Hahaha... two heads, you can exchange them with two Pseudo-Adept level Earth element cores, here you go...¡± Angus grabbed the two heads, and casually tucked them into a bowl-sized spatial crack that suddenly opened up in front of him. He then pulled out two Earth element cores shing brightly and tossed them over to Greem. After doing all that, he turned around and left.


    The host was now gone, leaving behind the group who were gazing at each other awkwardly.


    Greem nodded his head to Sabrina, pulled Mary away, and returned to his very own residence.


    Theirst journey had made Greem and Mary realize their weakness. Therefore, for the following days, both of them started to get busy on their own, trying all they could in order to supplement their weaknesses.


    What Greem could do now was feed himself with the best food, strengthen the foundation of his constitution, and consume a bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion every three to five days so that he can restlessly increase his Spirit. As for the two Pseudo-Adept level Earth element cores, they had long ago turned into two brand new Rock Snake Golems.


    Mary on the other hand, felt theck of power behind her attacks and the vulnerability of her resistance. Thus, she spent a huge amount of magic crystals to purchased a pair of ¡®Cruel ws¡¯, using it to improve her offensive power.


    This pair of Cruel ws was a set of melee finger-cot magical items. The effect attached on the left hand was tearing, while the right hand gave her attacks the effect of bleeding. They were considerably a perfect match to Mary¡¯s current abilities. In the middle of a fight, Mary could inject her Blood element energy into these finger-cots, giving them a +2 effect of sharpness.


    Besides that, Mary was also wringing her brain out concerning her magic resistance.


    It would take a long time for her to train to increase her magic resistance, that¡¯s why Mary purchased some small decorative items that could bring her additional magic resistances. If she had an Electric Resistant Ne which could bring her +2 in electricity resistance, she wouldn¡¯t be burned into a big piece of charcoal when she forcefully prated through the lightning web in the Underground World.


    Greem had given all his magic crystal cards to Mary, therefore Mary, who had her desire of spending unleashedpletely, used this fortune and brought back a lot of magic resistance jewelries and magic potions. While Mary was crazily spending Greem¡¯s magic crystals, Greem was having a ¡®passionate and friendly¡¯ conversation with the Snox in his room.


    Snox still looked like a green-skinned goblin. The only change it had was a magical cor on its neck, which a few runes could vaguely be seen on top of the cor. It was a special magical item used specifically for imprisoning those demi-humans who refuse to obey its master¡¯smand.


    A ring of runes was engraved on the inner side of the cor. Three tiny needles that poked into the wearer¡¯s neck were present, slowly drawing the magic energy of the wearer in keeping the cor¡¯s normal functionality. Any action that causes any damage to the cor would immediately trigger a powerful lightning attack. The same effect applies to the wearer if it moved too far away from its master.


    The only way to remove this cor was for the caster to recite a magic spell ording to a specific order.


    Therefore, after putting the cor on Snox upon their return, Greem finally had his mind rx.


    It was clear that this extremely intelligent goblin named Snox had long gotten used to the life of being a ve, and for that reason, it didn¡¯t show any resistance to what Greem had done to it.

 Chapter 84

    This was an extremely clever little guy who knew how to understand people¡¯s thoughts.


    Upon entering Greem¡¯s room, it quickly carried out its duty. Taking care of the room¡¯s cleanliness, organizing books on the table, wiping off ink stains, washing the quill pen and cleaning the remains of magical experiments, and even helping Greem take off his thick and heavy traveler robe...


    In short, all the tasks that a magical ve could do, it hadpleted them within a very short period of time after it came into the room. After that, it stood politely beside the table, awaiting Greem¡¯smand.


    Carrying a smile in his eyes and watching how Snoxpleted all these tasks, Greem finally gave out his order in a rather cold manner.


    ¡°Tell me about that Adept Pridka!¡±


    The goblin¡¯s body trembled slightly, raising its head and taking a peek at the young apprentice who stood opposite to it, but its gaze was caught by Greem¡¯s cold and calm nce. This made it shudder, quickly lowering its eyes and began to speak in a stuttered manner.


    The story was more or less as what Greem had been expecting. This green-skinned goblin who had the name of Snox was indeed a very lucky escaped ve.


    In order to tell the whole story, it had to start from fifteen years ago.


    To put it simply, that Second Grade Adept Pridka wanted to carry out some kind of soul experiment, so he captured arge group of underground creatures to serve as his magic spell experiment subjects. Like most of the magic spell experiments, this soul experiment was extremely dangerous and difficult to control, thus most of his test subjects eventually died painfully, while only this green-skinned goblin survived.


    With regards to the soul experiment, Snox didn¡¯t have many memories, and most were notplete. But through its brief description, Greem suspected that Second Grade Adept Pridka was trying to perform a soul transfer experiment.


    As soul transfer was the only lead to immortality, it was a magic topic that must be researched privately by most of the Adepts who wished for immortality.


    As for the Adept¡¯s treasure mentioned by Snox, it was just one of the manyboratories Adept Pridka built in the Underground World. Since Snox identally awakened its intelligence during the soul experiment and managed to survive, in order to better observe any changes to its soul, Adept Pridka promoted it to be his personal ve. And out of curiosity, he taught it some magical knowledge.


    So, that was when Snox learned all three magic spells it knew.


    Despite only having the most basic intelligence, Snox was actually smart in its own unique way. The reason why it chose these three spells was so that it could escape from the Adept! Even though it didn¡¯t have a brilliant brain and vast knowledge like an Adept, but it also knew as a test subject, sooner orter it would have to be cut open on an operating table.


    Since the day its intelligence awakened, it had been preparing for its grand escape.


    After listening to Snox¡¯s story, Greem couldn¡¯t help and specte how this goblin must be a very lucky creature that was blessed by the Will of Adept World. After it served the Adept for eleven years, it finally found an opportunity for its great escape.


    It happened five years ago during an Underground World clean up mission. The Zhentarim Association sent arge group of Adepts and ambushed Elysium City. Adept Pridka was forced to bring most of the Fallen Adepts and moved to a deeper ce underground, while Snox was abandoned in theboratory.


    ording to normal circumstances, Snox would disappear together with the self-destruction of Elysium City. But surprisingly, this lucky fellow was able to escape before the city was destroyed. And so, not knowing anybody, Snox had once again be a wild creature that roamed the Underground World.


    As for its situation after that, it was rather easy to guess.


    Despite the fact that Snox mastered a few peculiar magic spells that didn¡¯t have much fighting ability, it was not something that could be easily captured by ordinary underground creatures. After wandering in the wild for some time, through its peculiar abilities, Snox actually gathered arge group of goblins and established a camp in the shallow region of Underground World, bing the leader of a goblin colony.


    After he listened to Snox story, Greem sighed emotionally inside of his heart. This was simply a motivational story of this strange world. But too bad, no marvelous or extraordinary story could move him now. Greem snapped his finger angrily, causing the tiny needles that poked into Snox¡¯s neck to inject a powerful electricity into its body.


    In next moment, dark smoke started to billow out from Snox¡¯s body, as it fell to the ground, its body twitching.


    ¡°Hmph, your story is indeed motivational, and is pleasant to hear. But tell me, what benefits can I get after putting all that effort to save you? Do you think I just want to listen to your fucking fantasy story?¡± The enraged Greem kept roaring at Snox, showing a look that seemed as if he was about to rip this goblin into pieces.


    ¡°Mas... master... I.. I can... I can give you a magic spellboratory of a Second Grade Adept!¡± Snox proved itself to be a tough creature who had both thick skin and strong guts, even though it was facing a threat to its life, its eyes and mouth twitching due to the electricity, it was still able to smoothly say its life-saving statement.


    ¡°Where¡¯s thatboratory?¡±


    ¡°In Elysium City!¡±


    ¡°Fuck! Damn you, goblin! Do you think a surface apprentice like me can freely enter Elysium City, the ce where all Fallen Adeptse together in crowds? Do you want to taste electricity again?¡±


    ¡°Master, I was referring to the ruins of the old Elysium City, not the current one!¡± Greatly terrified by Greem, Snox nearly used up all of its strength in yelling out this sentence.


    ¡°Oh? Give me more details!¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t really understand what the exact scenario was, but all I know is one thing, Elysium City had been destroyed three times before. Whenever the surface Adepts came to the Underground Cave, the Elysium City would be destroyed. After that, those Fallen Adepts will find another location and rebuild a brand new city. The Elysium City I mentioned to you just now is the ruins of the previous Elysium City after it was destroyed in thest war. The current Elysium City is built after that.¡±


    ¡°After it went through a massive self-destruction, would there still be anything left?¡± Greem pretentiously said in a disdainful manner.


    ¡°Master, master! Theboratory built by Adept Pridka was protected by the strongest magical arrays. Although it¡¯s impossible for it to remainpletely intact, but I¡¯m sure there will be some leftover resources. The resources that can be found there are left by a Second Grade Adept, though it might just be in a small quantity, but it¡¯s still worth the risk!¡±


    Greem quieted down.


    ¡°Chip, analyze the truthfulness of what Snox said.¡±


    ¡°Beep. Data analysispleted... Preliminary results show what it said is true... The reference data included: ¡®The Chronicles of Underground Cave¡¯, ¡®The Secrets of Underground Creatures¡¯, ¡®Bibliography of Fallen Adepts¡¯... Note: When the creature mentioned theboratory in the ruins, an abnormal spiritual ripple was detected. The analysis shows there is something it needs in that ce...¡±


    ¡°Hmph, it can also be the chance for it to once again escape from the hands of someone else!¡± Greem had this thought in his mind.


    Of course, all these were secrets that was hidden within Greem¡¯s mind. Externally, he had his face covered with a bright smile and raised Snox from the ground, vowing solemnly that, so long as it could bring Greem to theboratory, he would set it free and reward it with a huge sum of magic crystals.


    In order to win over the heart of this new minion, Greem spent a big sum of his fortune and ordered the daily noble meal set for it. Therefore, while Greem was happily enjoying his magical energy meal set, Snox was also squatting at a corner of the room, devouring the delicacies like a wolf.


    After both of them came to an agreement, Snox had also mitted¡¯ itself to be Greem¡¯s servant. After it was promoted, the first thing Greem did was threw it into the bathroom and gave it a thorough wash.


    In the Underground World, all resources were rare and precious, and these goblins had no habit of washing themselves regrly. That¡¯s why Greem wasn¡¯t able to stand the stinking smell that continuously emitted from its body. In order to get rid of this pungent smell, Greem had purposely purchased a bottle of deodorant, using it to thoroughly wash Snox from top to bottom.


    Afterwards, when Snox stood in front of Greem, it actually looked cute and adorable like those green-skinned cartoons in Greem¡¯s previous life.


    ¡°Alright, now show me all of your abilities!¡±


    ¡°Master, which one do you want to look at first?¡±


    ¡°Show me your Camouge Spell!¡±


    Snox pulled out a small old wooden stick from its waist, then quietly recited some magic spells, and afterwards used the stick to point at its own body. Following the radiant glow of magical rays, the skin color of Snox turned exactly like the color of the floor. When it lied down on its stomach at a corner of the room, one could easily overlook its existence.


    ¡°How about the Partial Transformation spell?¡±


    Hearing what Greem said, Snox made its ears stand erect as they slowly twisted and transformed into a withered flower. Although it wasn¡¯t wless, but it still looked like the real thing. It wasn¡¯t easy to tell the difference with just one look.


    ¡°Good!¡± Greem nodded his head, and then said, ¡°Invisibility?¡±


    Snox shook its body, dismissing all abnormal transformations present. Following a murmur of an invocation, its wooden stick flickered as its body suddenly turned incorporeal. Five secondster, it simply vanished into thin air.


    Greem turned his head over and gave it a careful observation. If he didn¡¯t have his Elementium Vision and if Snox could move more nimbly, the result of this Invisibility spell would be pretty good.


    ¡°Take a few steps!¡±


    A row of marks of water suddenly appeared on the floor. Snox took a bath previously, and that¡¯s the water that remained on its body.


    Tracing its movement, Greem could vaguely see an abnormal reflection of light. But when it stopped, the abnormality instantly disappeared.


    ¡°Here, hold this book!¡± Greem directly grabbed a book and gave it to Snox.


    Initially, the book floated all alone in midair, making it look really bizarre. But after five seconds passed by, it started to turn intangible and finally vanished without a trace.


    ¡°Oh? You can also hold foreign objects and make them invisible as well! Are there any limitations to such foreign objects?¡± Greem asked curiously.


    ¡°Firstly, it can¡¯t be a living object. Secondly, its size cannot be bigger than one fifth of my body size.¡± Snox¡¯s answers didn¡¯t go beyond Greem¡¯s expectation. A magic spell with such excellent results alwayse with very strict restrictions.


    Greem hesitated for a moment, and then finally decided to give up the idea of learning this Invisibility spell.

 Chapter 85

    The most orthodox path that was directly in front of Greem was doubtlessly furthering his research on the magic spell knowledge rted to his elemental affinity ¨C Fire. Understanding this knowledge could help him when he breaks through the threshold of an Adept in the future. Meanwhile, the ability to craft golems, which currently was the greatest help to him, was considered unorthodox, as it deviated from the right path he chose.


    The rtionship between them was like the rtion between ¡®Dao¡¯ and ¡®Technique¡¯ in his previous life.


    The ¡®Dao¡¯ was the path of development he chose for himself and was also the ultimate goal he would spend the rest of his life with in restless exploration. While ¡®Technique¡¯ was merely the tricks used in order to achieve some smaller goals, it was just an auxiliary method.


    Although Greem only mastered a handful of fire element magic spells at this point of time, and their power wasn¡¯t sufficient to deal with the current enemies he had to face, but that was still Greem¡¯s ¡®Dao¡¯. In order to avoid any deviation happening in his future Adept path, Greem had to spend a huge amount of time immersing himself in studying them, trying his best in mastering the characteristics and rules of the Fire element. Only by doing so, could he get hold of his very own ¡®Dao¡¯.


    As for the Golem, for a short period of time, maybe it could allow Greem to rise above his peers, bringing him limitless glory with its formidable power. But after all, something like this was just a trick, it did not conform to his ¡®Dao¡¯. Therefore, he could use it to his heart¡¯s content or use it to seize the resources he needed, but if he really wanted to be an Adept in future, he couldn¡¯t ck in his research of Fire element magic spells.


    For most people, it was tough to have both the Dao and Technique in their path, thus they could only choose one. But for Greem, there wasn¡¯t any problem at all. After all, he had the help of the Chip. The most time-consuming task in magic spells research was the umtion and analysis of data, which he could leave for the Chip to handle. What he just needed to do was wait for the final essence of knowledge derived by the Chip, and merge them into his own path of magic.


    Therefore, the difference between the Dao and Technique wasn¡¯t that obvious when ites to Greem.


    Greem¡¯s Spirit had reached the level of an Intermediate Apprentice, which allowed him to have six solidified magic spell models in his Spiritual Domain. Currently, he already had four solidified magic spells: The Burning Hand, Fire Arrow, ming Spear, and Fire Shield.


    Therefore, it became difficult to decide which way he should go in researching Fire element magic spell. Currently, Greem took fancy to two magic spells, me Body and Molten Ball.


    me Body allowed Greem¡¯s body to house more Fire Elementium, while it would greatly improve his Fire element resistance, it was also the only path which leads him to the advance magic ¨C Fire Elementium Modification. But in order to master this spell, besides from the continuous research of Fire element magic, he also needs to learn the knowledge of anatomy and its variation.


    Molten Ball, as the name implied, was a magic spell that merged a huge amount of Fire Elementium and Earth Elementium together, forming into a huge fireball of one meter in diameter. It could inflict Earth element damage to the enemy during its flight, and had the effect of knockback. And once it was detonated by the spell caster, it could also inflict a massive Fire element damage. Thus, it was an AoE, dual element damage magic spell.


    But in order to master it, Greem also needs to have some understanding of the Earth element.


    If only taking the offensive aspect of a magic spell into consideration, no doubt Molten Ball was the most appropriate choice. Greem had already mastered the Burning Hand, which was a close-ranged magic spell, while he had Fire Arrow and ming Spear that covered his long-ranged offensive ability. Unfortunately, both of them were magic spells that only attack a single target, that¡¯s why he really need an AoE spell to supplement hiscking offensive strength.


    But considering his future, if Greem really wanted to have some achievements in the path of a Fire element Adept, he would need to have both Focused Wizardry and Elementium Body sooner orter. Thus,ying a proper foundation now could bring him greater help in the future.


    With just a slight hesitation, Greem made up his mind and chose the me Body.


    If it was any other Apprentice Adept, when faced with a simr situation, aside from considering their future, they also had to take their current situation into consideration. me Body could bring an improvement to his Fire element affinity and also a rapid increase of his Fire resistance, but it didn¡¯t bring any notable help to magic battles between apprentices.


    Once an apprentice is killed in battle by an enemy of the same rank, there would be no future left to consider. That¡¯s why even though the right path of magic was clearly in front of them, in order to survive in the endless battles many apprentices were forced to give up on their future, choosing to maximize their battle power.


    But this wasn¡¯t a problem for Greem at all.


    Because of the Chip, crafting Golems which seemed profound and difficult to master to others was a piece of cake for Greem. So, with the protection of his Golem army, he could totally ignore the threat brought by his enemies, while optimizing his path of magic as much as he like.


    Since he had made up his mind in learning me Body, Greem had to pay a visit to the library of Adept Tower, and purchase some books for elementary knowledge of anatomy and variation. Fortunately, this type of knowledge were only the elementary subjects for Necromancer, so long he had enough magic crystal, he would be able to purchase them. If it involved the more profound and advance knowledge of Spiritual Mutation and Spiritual Elementium, perhaps Greem would have to pay a visit to those official Adepts, and only then could he gather the relevant knowledge he needs.


    Throughout this hectic process, Snox had been reverently holding all magic spell books its master purchased, following behind Greem like a loyal servant. Though some Apprentice Adepts who passed by were greatly puzzled by the presence of this green-skinned goblin in the Adept Tower, but when they saw the glittering cor worn on Snox¡¯s neck, they immediately understood its status.


    For the sake of offsetting their magic spell weakness, some apprentices would gather and enve some demon beasts or demons. But most of them were creatures with powerfulbat ability such as the Nightsaber Leopard, Rock Tortoise, ming Tiger, Socrates Condor, etc. It was rare for someone to have a green-skinned goblin as his servant.


    As Snox had been the servant of a Second Grade Adept, clearly it had the experience in facing such situations. Thus, not only did it not look nervous, instead, it immediately put itself into the position of a loyal servant. It even went as far as helping Greem negotiate the price with the vendor, and find pleasure in it.


    After having experienced a simr situation a few times, Greem was surprised to find out that not only does Snox have a good grasp of the market prices, it also had a very good eloquence, both abilities could absolutely make it into an outstanding profiteering merchant.


    Since the discovery, Greem simply delegated his authority to Snox. Whenever he had anything he needs, he would just give Snox a list of items and his magic crystal card, asking it to be fully in charge of the purchase. After that, Greem would shut himself in his room, spending all of his time in studying the magic knowledge transferred to him by the Chip.


    Also, in order to improve its enthusiasm, Greem even had an agreement with Snox, he would pay all the items he needed ording to the market price, and any discount Snox obtained after the negotiation with the merchant would be its personal reward.


    With this reward scheme, Snox who never owned anything personal had instantly turned crazy, transforming itself into the greatest profiteering merchant in this Adept Tower. Everyday, it would spend all of its time befriending with a group of Beginner Apprentices.


    Surprisingly, Snox did have its own unique ideas and innate talents with regards to the price fluctuations in the market. Buying at a low price and selling at a high price, hoarding and profiteering, jacking up prices... all theseplicatedmercial approaches only a human could master, it had learned them within just a few days, using them to thrive in its own business.


    Soon, all of the Beginner and Intermediate Apprentices in the first level of Adept Tower were aware of this goblin merchant whose name was Snox, and it even carried an array of unique items that can hardly be found by ordinary people. Consequently, it had further set off its mysterious and strange background.


    What to do? Both underground guys killed by Greem and Mary were Advanced Fallen Adepts, thus their equipment and magic items weren¡¯t something ordinary Beginner and Intermediate Apprentices would normally see. So when Greem gave all these items to Snox and asked it to settle them itself, it became even more confident in running its business.


    Yes, after Snox became well-known in the apprentice market located on the first floor, it had bought itself a full set of costume using the magic crystals it earned. An exquisite, luxurious magical robe, a full set of glittering magical equipment, though they were mostly equipment of low quality primarily used by Beginner Apprentices, but having a full set of this costume could still dazzle the eyes of the general public.


    Together with a finely made magic wand and a magic cape that trailed behind its body. Whenever it appeared in the apprentice market, it would always attract waves of greetings.


    The reason why so many Beginner and Intermediate Apprentices became its fans was because of the Third and Fourth Grade magical items it took out asionally. As these were all premium wares that no ordinary apprentice could easily find.


    During the course of running its business, it was naturally greeted by a few market enforcers that came aggressively and asked Snox to pay taxes. But when Snox hinted at them the name of its master, the guy named Ryan had no other choice but to go away in dejection. Obviously, through the family that supported him, that Ryan learned the glorious story of Greem in the training camp. That¡¯s why so long as Snox don¡¯t push things too far, Ryan wouldn¡¯t find fault with it as he didn¡¯t want to let the family behind him offend an elite apprentice who was rising fast like a rocket.


    But there was no way ordinary apprentices could have known this. Instead, Ryan¡¯s unusual behavior further attracted the curiosity of the public, making them continue finding out who master behind Snox was. But no one seemed to know the answer.


    Consequently, a rumor suddenly spread secretly between apprentices, that this Snox might be the servant of an official Adept. Hence, encouraged by these strange rumors, Snox¡¯s business became extremely prosperous!


    Greem, who knew nothing about all of these, was currently shutting himself in his room, seriously working out on his future path.


    Since he had decided to study me Body first, thus in the short run, there wouldn¡¯t be any notable improvements to hisbat strength. If he wanted to maintain his advantage in the Underground Cave, he has to fully dig out thebat potential of his golems.


    Serving as his ride, Demon Alligator Hunter¡¯s excellent ability to travel beneath the soil had let Greem established hispetitive advantage. But theck of offensive ability was still its weakness. It was more than enough to deal with an Intermediate Apprentice, but when ites to an Advanced Apprentice, its ability falls short. And if were to face a Pseudo-Adept, the overly loose body structure made it unable withstand even just a single blow.


    Now, the arrival of the Rock Snake had made up for the weakness of having insufficient offensive power. A Pseudo-Adept level Rock Snake alone might not be enough to fight with an agile Pseudo-Adept, but how about two Rock Snakes? Or maybe three?


    With a great determination and effort, it only took Greem three days to turn two new Pseudo-Adept level Earth element cores into two brand new Rock Snakes. With the protection from both of them, if he were to face with the very same Fallen Pseudo-Adepts from the previous encounter, he wouldn¡¯t be beaten into such a sorry state likest time, which nearly cost him his life in the Underground World.

 Chapter 86

    After a period of research, Greem had roughly discovered some new techniques in using his Golems.


    The Demon Alligator Hunter was an Advanced Apprentice level Golem; using it would upy two points of his Spirit. Such upancy wouldst as long as the Golem is still in use. Meanwhile, the Pseudo-Adept level Rock Snake would upy three points of his Spirit. This also meant that if Greem go all out in battle, with his eleven points of Spirit (Circlet of Nobility gave him +1 in Spirit), he could only maintain one Demon Alligator Hunter and two Rock Snakes in the battlefield.


    After all, he still needed to conserve some Spirit in order to cast necessary magic spells.


    This was the best result after extensive calctions of the Chip and the advantage brought by the unique magical arrays, which had greatly reduced the Spirit requirement of the golems. If it was some other magical golem that was ordinarily made, with Greem¡¯s current Spirit, he would only be able to maintain a single Rock Snake for his battles.


    One of the main reason for such situations is often caused by the unique characteristics of a Golem.


    Golems and thosemonly seen Titans were different.


    Titans were human-liked creations with a fixed body created using huge amounts of rare resources. Because they have massive builds, there¡¯s plenty of space on their bodies allowing the creator to draw all kinds of magical runes and special magic arrays. Naturally, a creation produced with this method had the Spirit requirement for its user reduced to the minimum level.


    In most cases, during a battle, the user only needed to give the Titan the simplestmands which it will follow unless otherwise ordered, and then the user could relinquish his control afterwards.


    But Golems were different. Before they were summoned, they didn¡¯t have a fixed body, its manifestation was simr to magical summoning, with the only difference of having a Golem recing the random outworld creature that would have been summoned. This was the reason why a Golem would consume Greem¡¯s Spirit when it was in use.


    Also, a Golem doesn¡¯t have a massive body that could let its creator freely put his talent in magical arrays to use. In order to carve a sufficient amount of control-type magical arrays and energy system in the chicken egg-sized Elementium core, it was simply an extremely strict challenge to the skill of the Golem creator.


    To be honest, with the help of the Chip, Greem being capable of creating powerful Rock Snake Golems was already a jaw-dropping achievement.


    Comparing thebat strength of both creations, the Titan, which possessed a unique body was no doubt stronger than a Golem who was summoned temporarily. But since the beginning, Greem could only create Golems but not a Titan, the main reason was... Titans upied a huge amount of space, and it was not convenient to carry around.


    Take the cheapest y Titan as an example. A y Titan which wasn¡¯t equipped with any magical equipment already weigh three hundred kilograms, standing at 2.4 meters tall. A giant like this was indeed powerful, but how was Greem going to bring it into a battlefield?


    Even in nonbat mode, a big guy like this was near impossible to pack and carry around. Also, its massive weight would mean a consumption of a lot of magic energy, thus, depending on the Titan¡¯s ability to absorb the magical Elementium in the air wasn¡¯t dependable as it wasn¡¯t enough to supply its need inbat.


    Therefore, a Titan which possessed a fixed body was more likely to be used as a guardian for an Adept Tower or some important magical equipment. During normal times, they would be hidden in a secret spatial void, motionless. Making their magical energy consumption be at the lowest level. Whenever they were needed for a battle, the preset alert mechanism would then activate them, and then churn them out from the void in order to repulse the enemy or annihte the intruder.


    To achieve all these, it required the support of a massive energy storage inside of an Adept Tower.


    With all these characteristics, it has been decided that Greem could only fight with the help of Golems. After all, bringing an egg size core everywhere he went was so much easier and conceble than bringing along a Titan which could shake the earth with every step it takes.


    As a result, in order to maximize the help of the Golems, while Greem continued to improve the fighting potential of his Golems, he¡¯s also trying his best in increasing his Spirit. After all, his Spirit was directly rted to the number of Golems he could use in his future battles.


    That¡¯s why, on the fourth day after his safe return to the Adept Tower, and after his Physique increased to 3.82, he consumed another bottle of Mind Concentrating Potion. This time, it added 0.7 to Greem¡¯s Spirit, slightly lower than the previous increase of 0.75.


    By continuously consuming the same type of magic potion, the result it yielded the next time would be lesser, until it had no more effect to its consumer. This was a normal phenomenon that had been thoroughly researched by Adepts, and no one could do anything about it.


    The reason behind this phenomenon was because of the body¡¯s natural resistance to drugs. After consuming the same type of magical potion for a long period of time, the residue of the drug that was hard to remove would umte in the body, reducing the magical effect of the same drug. Though this was a progressive process, but it did exist.


    So, after consuming the Mind Concentrating Potion, Greem¡¯s body attributes were as below.


    Compared tost time, Greem¡¯s Spirit had gained an increase of 1.07. 0.70 was gained through the Mind Concentrating Potion, while 0.37 was earned through the magical energy meal set and his daily meditation. Based on a rough calction, if this 1.07 of increment was exchanged into magic crystals, it would cost around 350-400 magic crystals.


    This numerical figure had made Greem believe that a sessful Apprentice Adept was indeed fostered by a huge amount of magic crystals.


    ...


    It was noon time. After finishing a tiring business deal in the morning, the most sessful goblin merchant in the Adept Tower could be seen walking at a brisk pace toward its own room.


    Ever since it earned its first barrels of gold from Greem, Snox had rented a room beside its master¡¯s residence as its own cozy home. Every day, it was only to report the daily result to its master at the evening, then it could spend the rest of the day at its leisure.


    Having a good night¡¯s sleep, counting the money until its hands cramp.


    To be honest, a pleasant life like this was the perfect lifestyle it had always dreamed of. However, this dream was never realized when it was following the Second Grade Adept, it also never came true when it was still roaming in the Underground World, but instead, its dream was actually realized after it became the follower of an Apprentice Adept.


    For that reason, for the past few days, it had be totally insane, spending all its day bustling around.


    During daytime, it would spend all of its time in the apprentice market, using its eloquence and innate talent to earn a steady stream of magic crystals. At the evening, after enjoying its meal, it would dwell inside of its simple room, counting all the magic crystals it earned during daytime over and over again. In fact, every night it was sleeping in the middle of all the magic crystals it earned.


    But the smart Snox also knew one thing, it was that mysterious master behind it that gave it all these. Without the financial support and total delegation of this mysterious master, it was just a green-skinned goblin that was looked down by all Apprentice Adepts. It wouldn¡¯t even have the right to yell in the middle of these apprentices.


    Despite spending all day and surrounding Snox with honeyed words, it could still see that deep inside of the Beginner Apprentices¡¯ eyes, there was still a hint of disdain that cannot be hidden by them. What they respected was not Snox, but the mysterious master was behind it.


    Despite having extraordinary talent, without a powerful master as the clever goblin¡¯s backup, the only ending for it would be being pushed onto the ground, having its face branded with the mark of a ve, then thrown into the dark and wet dungeon, feeding on the leftover food of humans, yet carrying out tedious andborious jobs.


    Snox was aware of all these, because before it was chosen as the test subject by the master Adept, that was the life it went through!


    Compared to that, although its current master wasn¡¯t as powerful as the previous one, but after indulging in such a lifestyle, it had never even thought of escape anymore. Most of the time, it even kept hoping that a lifestyle like this couldst forever!


    Filling its mind with endless fantasies, it used the rune talisman tied around its waist and a magical password to open up the door of its room. But upon entering, it was immediately stopped by a strong smell of blood.


    In just one morning, its room had transformed into a bloody and frightening ughter house. Meanwhile, its lovely yet mysterious master was seen standing in front of a bloody autopsy table, seriously examining a strange body that had been dissectedpletely.


    He was seen holding a dissecting knife, wearing a pair of deerskin gloves fully stained with blood, and a long white robe that was covered in blood as well. It wasn¡¯t hard to tell that he was busy working on an autopsy experiment.


    It looked like its master was a rookie in the biological autopsy.


    Even though Snox never personally dissected any creature, but it had spent a long time in theboratory of a Second Grade Adept. Influenced by what it saw during that period of time, Snox actually possessed a richer knowledge in autopsy than Greem. If it was a necromancer apprentice, he would never make an autopsy experience into such a bloody scene.


    Which part to cut, how to avoid the blood vessels of the creature, all these were the basic skills of a necromancer apprentice, thus it was impossible to drag himself into such a messy state. Therefore, Snox was sure that it must be the first time its master carried out such an autopsy experiment.


    As the loyal servant of its master, how could it just sit back and ignore the awkward situation its master was facing right now?


    Moving over a small stool, Snox climbed up on it and started to passionately give advice and suggestions to its master, it wasn¡¯t even afraid of being dirty and personally helped out to move the body of Lizardman so that its master could dissect the creature on a better position.


    Surprisingly, Snox actually turned into a tutor who possessed an excellent magical knowledge, wittingly or unwittingly starting to guide Greem on his first ever autopsy experience. Of course, because of the patience of the teacher, and the devoutness of the learner, none of them actually felt anything wrong with their current roles.


    Therefore, with the ¡®assistance¡¯ of Snox, Greem smoothlypleted his first autopsy exercise.


    It was right until Greem satisfyingly removed his deerskin glove, throwing them together with his long white robe into a dustbin beside the autopsy table, did Snox suddenly realize its ¡®rude¡¯ behavior. It quickly rush off the small wooden stool, squatting down beside the stool and waited for the punishment of its master.


    ¡°You¡¯ve done great today. It looks like you learned quite a lot of things from that Second Grade Adept. I¡¯ll have you as my assistant in my future autopsy exercises.¡± Greem gave Snox a warm smile, and then continued saying, ¡°Get up! Do you really think I¡¯ll punish you for something that you never did wrong, just because of my pride? Alright, clean up the ce, it¡¯s time for lunch!¡±


    Conveniently tossing away the rubbish in his hand, Greem turned around and returned to his own room, leaving behind Snox who had a nk expression.


    Looking over its shoulder at the bloody ¡®ughter house¡¯, it sniffed the pungent smell of blood and after thinking for some time, Snox finally understood why its master didn¡¯t want to put this autopsy station in his own room.


    He must be afraid the smell would affect his appetite!


    This was a really special master. Snox murmured inwardly.

 Chapter 87

    The Underground World had been in turmoil recently.


    This was the message that Kevin had specifically brought when he had paid Greem a visit.


    Of course, Kevin hadn¡¯t visited him just to inform him of this message, but to also bring along the chief officer of Lothar Merchant who had been stationed in this ce. The purpose for their visit was to purchase those Blood Gas that had been awarded to Greem and Mary in mine number seven.


    Having spent some time identifying them, Greem determined that these Blood Gas were rather special magical materials. Those that were mainly used in crafting some types of unique magical items, however, they were of no help to the Golem that he needed now. Perhaps because of this, Greem briskly gave all six Blood Gas that he and Mary had owned to the Lothar Merchant and let them handle the sale.


    As for the fee, Greem had not asked for magic crystals, but instead had requested them to exchange all the profits into Pseudo-Adept level Elementium cores. In response to his request, the chief officer had agreed with a smile all over his face.


    Since Greem had been willing to give away his Blood Ga, the chief officer was able toplete his half-yearly target. Additionally, since Greem didn¡¯t ept the magic crystals and was willing to exchange them for Elementium cores with Lothar Merchant, the chief officer was able toplete two transactions in one go! How could he not be happy?


    The reason why Greem had acted so briskly earlier was because he had found out that this Lothar Merchant was supported by the Adept Angus whom he had been dealing with this entire time and that both Kevin and Adept Angus had belonged to the same family ¨C the Byron family.


    Due to these two reasons, Greem had agreed to the request of this chief officer without any hesitation, as it would also serve as a friendly gesture towards the Adept Angus.


    To reciprocate Greem¡¯s friendly gesture, before leaving with satisfaction, Kevin showed a warmer attitude to their friendship. Secretly, he told Greem that if there was anything in the future that Greem wasn¡¯t able to solve by himself, Greem could definitely pay a visit to Adept Angus. Regardless of whether it was the purchase of knowledge or exchange of resources, Adept Angus would be sure to give him the best discount!


    In less than half a day, the Pseudo-Adept level Elementium cores that Greem had requested were delivered to him. There was a total of four Elementium cores, one of the Earth element, two of the Water element and one of the Wind element. In addition to the cores, he also received map of the entire Underground World which clearly marked every detail that had been discovered so far. However, this map could only be used as a reference, because it was very tough to perfectly line it up with the actual terrain and one needed to consider the changes in terrain.


    Greem had finally understood that the only thing that could help him establish thepetitive advantage in future battles was arge quantity of Golems. There were many benefits that the Golems brought: they were convenient and fast, easy to hide, and could be owned inrge quantities. If the conditions permitted, Greem even wished that he could build an army of Golems that would obey his every singlemand.


    If anyone so much as looked at him the wrong, he wouldn¡¯t need to take care of them himself. With just with a signal from his eyes, a swarm of Golems would flood the enemy in an instant.


    Of course, such fantasy could only be realized in the distant future. As for now, however, he could only continue carefully crafting his team of Golems.


    Yes, Greem had already had a tentative idea ¨C using a variety of Golems andbining different tactics to effectively use the fullbat force for each type of Golem. Since he had spent most of his time in the Underground World recently, he preferred to craft more Earth element Golems. However, considering the potential changes to the future battlefields he would encounter, he would have to prepare in advance.


    The Water and Wind element Golems were in preparation for his future.


    Especially a Wind element Golem, owning one of them meant that Greem would had a free flying demon pet, thus he would no longer have to worry about traveling long distances anymore.


    After the Chip had scanned those Elementium cores, Greem ordered it to start drafting the most suitable design for the Golems. Once this hadmenced in an orderly fashion, Greem took the crystal ball and quietly gave the data and records stored inside a thorough study.


    Within the dark screen, he could only see bright dots on the uppermostyer. Even though it was just the uppermostyer, it had still beenpletely formed by numerous winding and twisting tunnels, cracks, secret passages, valleys, and water channels. Countless caves and caverns were marked in between making them look like the dazzling stars in the night sky. While there were innumerable passages that connected all locations, most of them were impassable by normal human beings.


    On this map, the spaces where one was only allowed to stay temporarily were marked in green, while the passable passages were marked with tiny blue lines. In between those dense andplicated arrays of blue and green were countless glowing red dots. These were the rough distribution of the currently known underground creatures, colonies and demons.


    Of course, in this three-dimensional map of the uppermostyer of Underground Cave, Greem wasn¡¯t find any information rted to the ruin of Elysium City.


    For this reason, Greem called upon Snox and asked it to point to the exact location of that Adept treasure. After spending half a day seriously studying the map, Snox finally pointed to a region. Greem didn¡¯t see any indication of a city in that region. Instead, he saw arge patch of red that represented danger.


    In the Underground World, there were many regions filled with dangers that made no outsider want to step into them. Usually, either those regions had a harsh natural environment that no apprentice would be able to endure or they housed some extremely dangerous demons. No matter the reason, they were all dangerous regions that all Apprentice Adepts had to handle with extreme care.


    Looking at the dazzling red glow on the map, Greem couldn¡¯t help but start to hesitate.


    Judging from the brightness of the color, the region was a dead zone where even Pseudo-Adepts would be faced with danger. Hence, when Snox pointed at it without the slightest hesitation, it seemed rather logical that it was the right ce.


    Since the ancient era, Adepts liked to build all sorts ofboratories in their own residence. From Snox¡¯s description, Greem could tell that this Second Grade Adept had been an expert in biological modification. However, once hisboratory was abandoned, there was a very high chance that those mutants, golems and the magical energy that had been stored in theboratory could irreversibly contaminate that particr region.


    It would have been fine if those mutants or modified creatures had died, but if a powerful fellow was lucky enough to have survived, those Apprentice Adepts who went to explore the region would be facing a frightening monster simr to an Adept. Though Snox imed it knew the magical password for some of theboratories, the potential risk still held Greem back.


    While Greem was hesitating, a message from Snox boosted his confidence to take the risk.


    A Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter!


    There was actually a Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in a secret chamber of that Second Grade Adept!


    For others, this Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter was merely a powerful magical item that could summon three Pseudo-Adept level Fire Spirits every day. But for Greem, it had an inexplicably special use.


    With Greem¡¯s elemental affinity of Fire, he could totally use this scepter to construct a Teleportation Gate to get to Fire Elementium ne. By doing so, he would have an endless supply of Fire element cores. And once his overall strength reached a powerful stage, he could even try to upy a territory in the Fire Elementium ne and be a true Fire Lord himself.


    Putting aside everything else, just take those Elementium cores that Greem had been gathering. Perhaps most of them weren¡¯t even produced in his own ne, but were harvested from those other Elementium nes.


    The entire multiverse was boundless and deep. It waspletely filled with elemental energies that came in all forms, which would eventuallypose into a vast ocean of energy. Meanwhile, different nes were like inds ¨C isted from each other and floating in this vast ocean of energy.


    Each ne was apletely different world of its own ¨C from earth, mountains, rivers to oceans, sky and living beings, nothing wascking. But, when each ne was born, they were mixed with an imbnced Elementium energies, thus making each ne show a totally different and unique characteristic.


    The ne where the world of Adept resided was a major one that was extremely suitable for the survival of living things. However, when the control of the ne fell into the hands of Adept who rose abruptly, the characteristics of the ne had changed as well and deviated towards the chaotic yet powerful energy of magic.


    And as for the Elementium nes mentioned just now, when they were born, they resided in a region where a single Elementium gathered. Hence, when these nes had matured, they became a ne with a single Elementium.


    In an ordinary material ne, the distribution of Elementium matters would be nearly bnced. Earth Elementium gathered together forming mountains, hills, ins and different terrains. Water Elementium gathered together to form into streams,kes, and ocean. Wind Elementium brought clouds, rains, thunder and lightning to material nes, while Fire Elementium broughtva, volcanoes, and life.


    Due to the collection of these Elementiums, it gave birth to numerous perfect material worlds that flourish and became the breeding ground for all living things.


    Elementium nes, on the other hand, weren¡¯t like these worlds.


    Take the Fire Elementium ne that attracted Greem the most. Although there were mountains, hills, oceans andkes, the basic Elementium that constructed them all were Fire Elementium. Inside of that ne, the mountain, the ocean, even the sky was on fire.


    Of course, a world like this was not suitable for the survival of normal living things, but it actually gave birth to Fire element creatures that used Fire element energy as their source of life: Fire Spirits, Fire Giants, Lava Hounds, Fire Deities, Fire Hawks, Magma Core Giants, Fire Demons, Fire Element Elders, Fire Lords, Fire Kings... It was a world ruled by Fire element creatures and simr to the human world, they also had a well-structured ruling hierarchy, based on the overall strength of each individual.


    If Greem really wished to have a great achievement in the Fire element, then sooner orter, he would have to visit the Fire Elementium ne.


    The World of Adept was, after all, a major ne in itself. As invading and upying was an Adept¡¯s second nature, an Adept loved to search for new material nes in the vast ocean of stars. Once they found one, they would invade them straightaway, pulling them onto the bandwagon of nes that kept expanding at a rapid rate.


    Even with the cruel and ruthless characteristic of Adepts, though they had long found the coordinates of these Elementium nes, not even one Adept ever dreamt of conquering an Elementium ne and making it into an auxiliary ne of the Adept World. The reason was that all these Elementium nes were frightening major nes. Just judging from their overall strength alone, if the Adept World really connected these Elementium nes, perhaps the happiest party would be those unambitious Elementium creatures.


    At that point in time, perhaps it would not be not the Adepts who would happily carve up the massive resources of Elementium nes, but the countless Elementium creatures who would swarm into the Adept World and turn this ce into a brand new Elementium ne.


    Therefore, in the rules of the Adept World, all Adepts held a very careful attitude when managing the Teleportation Gate that connected to any major ne. Because even the slightest mismanage could have devastating consequences!

 Chapter 88

    Although it was impossible to verify in the meantime if the treasure of the Adept that was mentioned by Snox was real, it was still totally worth it to take some risks just for it.


    After all, for Greem who was giving his all in bing an official Adept, an item which a Second Grade Adept turned his nose up might be a priceless treasure that he couldn¡¯t even buy with a hefty price. Therefore, after roughly determining the location of that ruined Elysium City, Greem started nning on how he could go there and find out the actual situation on site.


    Judging from the location disyed on the map, it was located in the innermost area of the shallowyers in the Underground Cave. The distance between it and the surface was just seventeen miles as the crow flies, but it was deep within core area with abundant underground creatures. ording to the data on the map, there existed a fewrge colonies of underground creatures that could be found at the surrounding area of the suspected site, including many powerful underground creatures which wandered around in the Underground World.


    (DragonFly: As the crow flies means the shortest path between two points in a map, disregarding the vagaries of intervening terrain)


    If he really wanted to explore the area,cking a proper preparation wouldn¡¯t be anything different from putting himself on a silver te and cing in front of those evil and cruel creatures!


    For the past few days, Mary was quite busy in strengthening and improving her overall strength, and had been running her feet off all day. When Greem finally found an opportunity to tell her about his n, unlike her usual impulsive temper, she didn¡¯t jump on board and agree to Greem¡¯s idea. Instead, with a very calm manner, she told Greem that she had found herself a way to improve herbat strength, and was currently busy working on it, thus she couldn¡¯t join him in this mission.


    Therefore, Greem naturally handed over the control of Snox to Mary, asking her to keep an eye on this cunning little guy, while he focused all of his attention on preparing the resources he needed for the Underground World expedition.


    When he finally had everything ready, Greem paid a visit to Kevin, informing him that he was going to find some Dark Grasses in the Underground World, using it as an excuse to sneak into the Underground Cave.


    ...


    Honestly saying, the Underground Cave wasn¡¯t a ce suitable for travel and sightseeing.


    For any surface creature who were still mentally sound that stepped into the Underground Cave for the first time, the biggest change in behavior they showed was an extremely oppressive emotion. Whenever they thought of the possibility that there were thousands of tons of dirt and rocks above their head which might copse and flood them at any moment, no creature could remain calm as they usually do in the surface. Meanwhile, in the Underground Cave, any irrational behavior would have the possibility to expose one¡¯s whereabout, which in turn would attract a swarm of predators.


    For the sake of this trip, Greem had gone all out. Besides from the Demon Alligator Hunter he was riding with, he also had three Pseudo-Adept level Rock Snakes ced in his waist pouch. If he really bumped into some enemies that he need to fight, he would risk his life and unleashed all three Rock Snakes at once. With that, he didn¡¯t believe there would still be any enemy that could stop him from fleeing with his life intact.


    As for the two Water element cores and two Wind element cores, Greem was still in the process of refining the design for their magical arrays. He estimated that he would have some results after the end of this trip to the Underground World.


    Upon entering the boundary of Underground Cave, Greem immediately summoned the Demon Alligator Hunter and sunk into the soil, following the direction shown on the map and kept venturing deeper into the ground. Every time after he traveled for some distances, Greem would always drive Demon Alligator Hunter to squeeze out into a random dark tunnel, making sure he was still on the right course.


    Using such method, in just slightly over three hours, Greem had already reached the depth of about ten miles under the ground. But the deeper he went, the slower the speed he could travel underground.


    Huge chunks of metal ores,rge stretches of rock formations, all these had be the obstacles that Greem couldn¡¯t prate through while he was traveling in the soil. Inside the soil where no light was present, Greem¡¯s spiritual sense could, at most, cover a distance of nearly twenty meters. Trying to find a path that led straight to his destination under such circumstances was no doubt extremely difficult.


    Therefore, after running into rock walls several times, Greem had no choice but leave the soil and enter into a random tunnel. What to do? When traveling in a totally unfamiliar region like this, using the ready-made tunnels that were excavated by the underground creatures was so much more easier than poking his nose randomly in the pitch-ck sea of soil.


    Inside the dark and wet tunnel, Greem took out his crystal ball, and used it to once again confirm his current position. After that, he continued his journey following the path of a tunnel descending into a path of darkness.


    Sitting high up on the t back of the Demon Alligator, Greem could be seen wearing a thick and sturdy traveler robe, with the Circlet of Nobility mounted on his forehead, while his eyes were hidden behind a pair of strange looking Gnome Goggles. Through the night vision of the goggles and his Elementium Vision that could see through all Elementium, the tunnel had turned into a totally different and bizarre world inside of Greem¡¯s eyes.


    The background color of his entire field of view was green, and even though everything seemed dark, he could still have a very clear vision on every single object. Within his field of view, everything that had the Elementium aura would glow with their own unique Elementium color, even though they were hiding behind a big stgmite, or stuck inside some rock cracks. Physically, they might have an excellent disguise, but there was no way they could hide their colorful glows from Greem¡¯s eyes.


    ording to the brightness of their glow that was represented in the Elementium Vision, Greem could easily estimate their strengths even from a very far distance.


    Those weaker creatures would be handled by Demon Alligator Hunter. With just a few dirt spears, their concealed bodies would be instantly impaled. When their warm blood burst out of their broken bodies, thest trace of their life aura would soon vanish from Greem¡¯s vision. If they bump into stronger creatures, Greem would summon his Rock Snakes, using their extremely strong body to crushed their enemies into meat paste.


    That¡¯s why along their journey, those underground predators that were scattered around had finally met their yers. Before they could wait for their prey to get closer, every single one of them would be killed at the ce where they were hiding for an ambush.


    Although these solo predators were rtively easy to handle, but the underground colonies which gathered in arge group around the passage Greem must pass through were much tougher to deal with. For example, the Tunnel of Gnolls, the Nest of Lizardmen, even Greem wouldn¡¯t dare to provoke them easily. Or else, if theye out in full force, even though he could still defeat them, he would have alerted all the monsters who lived in this region.


    Yet, without Greem¡¯s knowledge, when he stealthily passed through the Tunnel of Gnolls, right at a dark and wet shadowy corner where he just went passed, a skinny body suddenly stood up from the ground.


    This was an old Gnoll who had one foot in the grave already. There wasn¡¯t much muscle that could be found on its skinny body, and an antique looking ck dagger was hanging down on its waist, while its old body could barely stand straight. But when it narrowed its murky yet cold eyes and looked into the direction where Greem disappeared, an awe-inspiring aura of a strength gradually emanated from its body, nearly freezing air in the surroundings.


    ¡°Leader, that human has headed towards the direction of the ruins!¡± A dark figure suddenly emerged from the shadows.


    ¡°Let him be! He is just merely an Intermediate Apprentice, there is nothing much he can do there.¡± Two tiny mes could be seen igniting within the bloodshot eyes of the old leader of Gnolls. ¡°Further down is the territory of the Lizardmen. Using their advantage in numbers, these damnable fellows kept us from getting close to the ruins. We¡¯ll let this small bug in, perhaps he could cause some troubles for them!¡±


    ¡°I understand! Your subordinate will make the necessary arrangements now, I¡¯ll let our brothers at the sentry post to let him pass.¡± The dark figure bowed, and soon dissolved into the darkness again.


    Greem was still slowly moving further down in the darkness. For some unknown reasons, he kept feeling a chill on his back, as if a shivering breeze was able to prate through his thick coat and entered his body, which caused him to tremble slightly.


    Damn it, where did this bad omene from?


    Never once in his life did Greem wished something very much. He wished he knew some magical knowledge about predictions and whatnot. Even if he just knew the tiniest bit of it, he would be able to briefly predict which direction the danger wasing from. That would allow him to make some preparations beforehand.


    Greem even secretly took out the Screaming Branch and examined it a few times but he didn¡¯t find anything unusual on it. This meant the danger was on its way, but the target wasn¡¯t necessarily him. Could the dangere from inside the ruins?


    While he was pondering quietly, Greem put up an even more rapid scan at his surroundings that was hidden in darkness.


    By right, with the see through ability of his Elementium Vision, no Elementium user could get near him without alerting him. But in this Underground World, besides from those frightening demons, what kind of creature could pose a threat to his life?


    Greem¡¯s brain was spun at high speed as he kept pondering about his situation. Various data of powerful underground creatures that was stored in the Chip shed through his mind one after another. Suddenly, a few creatures aroused Greem¡¯s vignce.


    Gnoll Hunter... Lizardman Assassin...


    It seems that this region is part of their territories. As these two bizarre underground creatures weren¡¯t ssified as demons, that also meant there wasn¡¯t any Elementium energy present in their bodies. However, in the list of dangerous underground creatures of Underground Cave, their names were still listed at the top. This meant even without relying on the power of Elementium, they still possessed enough fighting ability that could make just about anyone tremble in fear.


    Greem¡¯s heart became heavy.


    With regards to these creatures who became excellent fighters just by using their intrepid bodies, it was very difficult for the Elementium Vision to detect them, while night vision fared even worse. Perhaps even Mary¡¯s infrared vision would not be of too much use here. So, how could he detect these bizarre and nasty fellows?


    When Greem was panicking, the Chip finally came out with useful information.


    The ability of Full Matching Field of View!


    This was a method of using spiritual sense that only Greem could achieve.


    For every short distance he traveled, Greem could always make a backup of the terrain feedbacking from his night vision and Elementium Vision. After that, using the incredible Field of View Matching ability of the Chip, he could find out the slightest difference in two terrain images that were captured in different times.


    If there was really a cold-blooded assassin hiding around Greem, so long as it moved along with him, there would be a slight difference in the shadow where it was hiding. Nobody could detect such difference with just their naked eyes, but nothing could escape from the Full Matching Field of View provided by the Chip.


    So long as he discover them, the threat they posed to him would be reduced by at least 80%.


    At that time, it would not be them who can create trouble from the dark, but instead, Greem would be able to give their arrogance a fierce punishment!

 Chapter 89

    The darkness was filled with twisted shadows, stgmites, stctites and rocks of all shapes and forms that upied nearly every part of one¡¯s vision. Inside the spacious and quiet cavern, even the slightest of noise would ripple through the winding tunnel and reach a very far distance.


    From high up on the back of the Demon Alligator, a grim blue light could be seen flicking through Greem¡¯s eyes.


    Though he had been surrounded byplete silence, Greem¡¯s mind was filled with a streak of warning tones. It seemed that arge group of enemies were approaching!


    An indistinct crackling sound rang through the air, as the fiery red Fire Shield made its dazzling appearance and started to hover around Greem¡¯s body. The Chip was busy calcting in Greem¡¯s mind and matching countless real-time images with each other. Numerous tiny differences that no naked eye could ever detect were found by the Chip¡¯s incredible ability and projected onto Greem¡¯s retina one after another.


    Greem turned his head towards a hanging stctite on his left. He saw a shadow there that seemed thicker than before. Following a gentle stomp of his feet, the Hunter who was mounted in front of him raised its hand into the air and formed a razor sharp, earthy yellow dirt spear in its grip.


    With a twist of its body, the Hunter threw out the dirt spear in its hand using all its force. The spear instantly turned into a yellow bolt of lightning and nailed into the shadow in an instant.


    From Greem¡¯s field of view, he hadn¡¯t noticed anything at that spot, neither any reaction of Elementium nor any life aura. However, following the piercing of the dirt spear, he heard a muffled sound of flesh being pierced through, immediately followed by a shrill cry that rang out through the once dead silence.


    Amotion broke out through the darkness, as a human-like figure with tiny dark green scalespletely covering its body suddenly showed up. The dirt spear had pierced through its chest and nailed it onto the stctite.


    Warm blood was dripping down from the tip of the dirt spear. The human-like figure started to struggle restlessly. However, the more it struggled, the bigger the wound formed by the piercing of the dirt spear became and the fiercer the blood burst out.


    Pop!


    A second dirt spear sliced through the air, piercing through its head straightaway.


    The movement of the figure came to aplete halt instantly. It was now hanging on the stctite motionless, leaving behind only the crystal clear sound of blood dripping down in this quiet cavern.


    In the next moment, Greem raised his head and looked up at the ceiling of the darkened cave.


    The height from the ground to the ceiling was over tens of meters long. Due to theck of light, even with him vision, Greem could only see a vague image. However, following the Hunter¡¯s throwing of two dirt spears, another skinny, yet robust figure was seen falling down from the ceiling.


    The two dirt spears had pierced through its right chest and left leg, but hadn¡¯t been able to im its life. However, as it was lying on the hard cold ground painfully giving its dying kicks, the gigantic foot of Demon Alligator suddenly appeared in its line of sight.


    A muffled boom broke out through the silence, followed by the sound of a watermelon being crushed was heard in the cavern.


    Leisurely and slowly, the Demon Alligator continued its movement and strode away. Once its leg left the ground, the ce where the human-like creature had been lying was instead reced by a pile of crushed meat, making it impossible to identify its original shape, species or even gender.


    A sharp whistle suddenly echoed in the darkness.


    When the whistle resounded throughout the entire cavern, from the far-reaching darkness, countless shadows approached him at high speeds. Judging from the size of the group, perhaps there were more than hundreds of them.


    Twangs of bowstring burst out through the darkness, as noises of sharp object piercing through the air rang out from all directions. The arrows sliced through the air and were targeted at Greem who was covered by a raging me all over his body.


    Aww! So they were going for a gang fight!


    Greem dared not underestimate his enemy. Without any hesitation, he dispelled the Fire Shield that was hovering around his body and then merged himself with the gigantic body of Demon Alligator ¨C it looked as if he was sinking into a muddy swamp.


    Right when Greem had disappeared, countless sharp arrows instantly struck at the back of Demon Alligator where he had been previously standing. All the arrowheads were flickering with a greenish glow; clearly, the arrowheads had some unknown poisons applied onto them.


    Like the Demon Alligator, the Hunter¡¯s body had also been stuck by multiple arrows, however it showed no concern at all. With both hands continuously grabbing into the air over its head, it kept forming one dirt spear after another. Each spear had a length of one and a half meter. Without stopping its movements, it fired these dirt spears into those Lizardmen who had shown themselves in the far distance.


    Some of the spears were dodged by the Lizardman hunter and assassin, some shattered after hitting the stgmites that blocked their path, and some hit right on target, eliminating the enemy in the total darkness.


    It was worth mentioning that the bodies of the Lizardman were overly delicate and slender. In order not detract from the agility and speed of their movement, their body hadn¡¯t evolved with thick and dense hard scales like some of those huge size demons. Instead, they were givenyers of tiny, light, dark-green scales, whose function was only to prevent the leaking of their body temperature.


    This evolution had given them with the incredible ability to move stealthily in the darkness of the Underground Cave, but it also made their defense so weak that they couldn¡¯t even withstand a single blow. Regardless of which part of their body had been pierced through by the cup-sized dirt spear, it would instantly be a frightening injury. Their delicate bodies just weren¡¯t able to withstand an attack like this.


    As they were facing of against an Elementium Golem, made entirely of y, the poison arrows they usually used couldn¡¯t bring them their desired effect. Left with no other option, these Lizardman hunters were forced to pull out their short daggers and run through the rock walls and stgmites to leap onto the giant Demon Alligator that kept pushing its way forward.


    At this moment, their weakness ¨C theck of a magically enhanced weapon ¨C had be clear.


    Though the weapon produced from the unique underground metal was extremely sharp, most of them were overly thin and short. A weapon like this could never break through the y armor of Demon Alligator. Numerous Lizardmen surrounded the Demon Alligator and kept attacking it, using their dagger to shed off countless dirt chunks from its y armor. However, within seconds, following the sh of an earthy yellow light ring, the y armor had once again been restored to its original condition.


    They weren¡¯t to defeat Demon Alligator, but Demon Alligator could easily kill them off.


    Though the attack frequency of Demon Alligator was rather slow, every time it cast an AoE Spikes spell, it would always im the lives of three to five Lizardmen. The Demon Alligator was like a massive tank that kept moving forwards, while the Lizardmen were like a group of ignorant natives who carried bamboo sticks in their hand and bamboo arrows on their back. The gap between their strengths was simply huge. Thus, the massive casualties caused by this gap was reasonable.


    Finally, after more than half of the Lizardmen were either wounded or killed, a shrill whistle once again echoed out in the far distance from the darkness.


    Following a few deep and hoarse roars, the Lizardmen began to retreat.


    After peace had once again returned to the surroundings of the Demon Alligator, from under the covering of its thick coat, Greem finally emerged. He hesitated for a brief moment and decided not to drive Demon Alligator to pursue after the Lizardmen.


    Apparently, all of the underground poptions had a very strong sense of territory. Perhaps it was because he hade too close to their habitat, that caused the Lizardmen to orchestrate their violent attack. Having suffered such a huge loss, it looked like these Lizardmen had returned to their nest to focus on defense.


    However, right when Greem drove Demon Alligator to continued his journey, he, due to his sensitive hearing, heard the miserable shrieks of Lizardmening from the far distance. It seemed as if a new round of battle had erupted in the darkness.


    Nevertheless, Greem showed no interest in this. He just stood up on Demon Alligator¡¯s back, threw a few nces over into the far distance, before continuing his journey.


    Amidst a pitch-ck shadow, the old Gnoll leader was hiding behind a rock pir, looking at Greem as he strode away into the far distance. His skinny, gray, furry face showed an unconcealed expression of shock.


    Behind him, one after another, the vigorous Gnolls ran through the dark and rugged cavern as if they were on a t surface, before leaping fiercely onto the group of defeated Lizardmen. Both parties were chasing and ughtering each other within the darkness filled with countless rock pirs and stctites. The muffled sounds of daggers slicing through throats kept ringing in the air.


    If this ambush mission had been carried out smoothly, maybe they would have at most been able to chase away that damn Lizardmen tribe from this region. At that point in time, all the profits found in the ruins would have belonged to the Gnolls.


    However, Gray Ear¡¯s mind was still felt with scruples in regards to that surface apprentice who had suddenly intruded onto the inner area of the ruin.


    It waved its hand and a minion of the same species emerged from the shadows behind him.


    ¡°Go and inform Cracked Tooth in Elysium City to pass a message to his master Fallen Adept that someone is trying to enter the ruins. Tell him that the tribe of Gray Ear had failed to stop the enemy and that we¡¯ve suffered a huge loss, while the Lizardmen tribe of Dark Scale had been totally wiped out by the enemy!¡± From within the darkness, a shivering gleam flickered in the bloodshot eyes of that old Gnoll, with its pale white fangs looking extremely frightening.


    ¡°Understand. Your subordinate will carry out your order now!¡±


    After slightly bending its body and bowing, the dark figure turned around and dissolved into the vast darkness.


    ............


    The further inside he went, the stronger the worry in Greem¡¯s mind became.


    Front and back, left and right, even above his head and under his feet, the metal contained within the soil was getting denser and denser, while the exposed soil was bing lesser and lesser. This also meant that if he encountered a frightening enemy in this area, it would be tougher for him to escape like how he usually did.


    For him, this was bad news that he really didn¡¯t want to hear.


    But Greem had to admit, this was the perfect region to build a city.


    In order to build a city once and for all in the Underground World, in addition to taking into ount living resources, mineral resources and water source in the surrounding area, the most important factor to consider was the stability and toughness of the geological structure. It was really rare to find a region like this in the Underground World, which was surrounded by countless metal ores andrge stretches of stable rock stratum.


    Being able to find metal ores meant that the ce would had a constant supply of resources which could attract the wandering merchants. The existence of a water source meant the ce could support more lives. However, none of these areparable to a stable ¡®sky¡¯. No one wished to be crushed into meat paste by millions of tons of rock and sand during his sleep!


    Thus, when Snox had pointed out that this area was where the ruins of the previous Elysium City were, judging by just the terrain alone, it made perfect sense.


    Greem had passed through several habitats of different underground creatures. Perhaps as a result of the Lizardman¡¯s defeat, all these underground creatures gathered in the far away darkness, but no one recklesslyunched an attack.


    Under this intense threatening situation, the Demon Alligator had finally reached the end of its long and tiresome journey.


    When Greem passed through a huge arched door riding the Demon Alligator, the space in front of him suddenly expanded, revealing a gigantic cavern filled with bizarre and fantastical colors in front of his eyes.

 Chapter 90

    A Forest!


    There was a forest in this Underground World!


    When Greem first saw this flourishing green forest, he felt dumbfounded.


    His first reaction was to use a spell to check whether it was actually real. The result assured Greem and confirmed that what he saw wasn¡¯t caused by any illusion, but was instead an actual, genuine space within this Underground World.


    Greem stood at the cavern entrance and scanned the boundless and dense forest. He instinctively sensed a strange and twisted smell lingering in the air. He was standing on the dividing line. Taking a step back would bring him to a hard rockyer that was painted with darkness and a weak glow of metal; while taking a step forward would let him be greeted by greenish grass that touched his ankle, and tall trees and dense vines that tightly barricaded the passage. In addition to this, there were also rose and fruit bushes.


    Vaguely, through the greenery, Greem could even see the shadows of small, tiny animals that were sprinting through the forest. In the far distance, within the depths of the forest, tree branches and leaves were swaying up and down, and the howls of monkey and roars of tigers echoed across the ce. This resulted in an extremely vigorous atmosphere in the forest.


    However, behind this flourishing scene, a strange energy aura could be sensed. This aura made Greem¡¯s heart tremble.


    After three seconds, Greem hade to a conclusion. This ce must be the ruins of the previous Elysium City that was mentioned by Snox. After the Adept Tower was destroyed, a huge amount of magical energy leaked. This frightening leakage was the direct cause of what was presented in front of Greem¡¯s eyes.


    Every Adept Tower had an Elementium Pool built within it. It served as the source of energy for all their magical equipment. But once the Adept Tower was destroyed, the leakage of these energies would cause a tremendous and irreversible contamination to the surrounding environment. The abnormal energy level in this region was so strong that it had even caused the birth of this mutated forest.


    Yes, this was a mutated forest. However, but not those virgin forests which could be found everywhere on the surface world.


    When infected by such a strong energy, any nt or creature would vite the naturalw, and grow at an incredible speed, before mutating into a totally different species. Therefore, although the forest looked normal on the outside, it was just a disguise.


    This ce had be the paradise for demons!


    Greem took off the thick and sweltering traveler¡¯s cloak from his body and wiped the sweat off his face. He took out his water bag and replenished his body with some water. After that, while sitting high up on the back of Demon Alligator, he slowly and carefully continued his journey by entering the forest.


    From the first step into this forest, anything around him could no longer be trusted.


    In fact, this seemingly blooming, evergreen demonized forest was far more fearful than the dark underground tunnel. There were far more menaces that lurked everywhere. Yet, Greem had no idea what kind of demons were waiting for him inside of this forest. However, since he hade this far, no matter what was hiding in this ce, he still needed to give it a try!


    It was worth to mention, that, with the support of three Pseudo-Adept level Rock Snake Golems, Greem¡¯s heart had be bolder.


    No doubt, walking in a forest that never been explored before was really tough.


    The ground was choked with weeds and wildflowers. Shrubs could be seen everywhere, roses and vines climbed wantonly and some of therge tree branches stretched many meters long! All of these nts grew disorderly, tightly knitted into each other. These nts filled up every single gap between the tall and old trees. Without the Demon Alligator, it would be difficult for Greem to move even a single step in this forest.


    But now, relying on the gigantic body and powerful muscle strength of the Demon Alligator, Greem was like someone who just had joined a demolishing team: crushing and ripping everything in his way. This resulted in a smooth and t path being made in this densely grown forest.


    With every step the Demon Alligator took, wildflowers, weeds, shrubs, and bushes would turn into powder. As long as a tall and old tree got in the way of the Demon Alligator, it would be knocked down and crushed. Old trees were falling down, vines began to break off and colorful leaves flew in the air.


    However, countless bizarre scenes were hiding behind this seemingly normal situation.


    Whenever the huge feet of the Demon Alligator crushed a patch green grass, countless indistinct and strange noises could be hearding from underneath its feet. They sounded like the cries of a baby, yet also resembled the shrill howls of bizarre demons. It was rather unsettling and forced people to cover their ears.


    When the Demon Alligator raised its feet again, Greem could see dozens of emerald green sprouts in the disc-shaped hole that was made. All the other weeds and wildflowers were crushed into a pile of greenish liquid, yet they were the only thing that survived. Not only did they survive, they even coiled up their green sprouts, like a living creature, and began to change into mouths full of sharp teeth. They began to tightly cling to the Demon Alligator¡¯s feet and started biting like crazy.


    Under their insane attack, pieces of dirt kept falling off the Demon Alligator¡¯s feet. In addition, its feet had started to suffer some damage.


    Meanwhile, right in front of Demon Alligator, some towering old trees were seen arduously pulling out their roots. They slowly ran away from the path the Demon Alligator would taketer. However, there were still some fearless mutated nts who valiantlyunched attacks at the Demon Alligator.


    These mutated nts strongly resembled a sunflower. The only difference was the middle of the petals. At the end of the thin stalk, where the bright yellow petals were blossoming, a woman¡¯s face could be seen mounted right at the center. Their method of attack was rather primitive, as they kept spraying out venom from their tiny mouths. This venom was not only acidic, but was smelly and sticky as well.


    Many overhanging vines started to twist crazily. A frighteningrge mouth suddenly broke out from the end of these vines. It was full of countless tiny teeth that look frightening and sharp. If any creature passed by them, it might only take a single leap to bite off the creature¡¯s head.


    A disgusted expression emerged on Greem¡¯s young face.


    This forest was just like a gigantic beast in disguise. Once the Demon Alligator intruded, it instantly triggered all the snakes hiding in the bushes. If someone without sufficient strength came here by ident, they would probably find it difficult to keep even their corpse intact!


    Imagine this: without the Demon Alligator, those mutated sprouts, that hid between the ordinary grass, would cut through the soles of one¡¯s feet. They would then squeeze into the body of the creature and begin to feast on the delicious flesh. Those old trees, who could walk freely, were most probably the Dryads who existed in the legend. Once an ordinary creature was entangled by their roots, their only ending would be suffering through the pain of having their flesh devoured by these frightening trees.


    As for those terrifying nts and snakes in disguise, they were just thepanions of the Dryads. Although their individual strength wasn¡¯t worth mentioning, there were a lot of them. It would be rather troublesome if Greem was caught by them.


    Greem slightly tilted his head upward and pointed with his finger. Beside him, a long vine, that hung from a tall and old tree, was nearly touching him. However, with this point of a finger, a me suddenly broke out and coiled up the vine. Within the towering and scorching me, the vine kept twisting and struggling violently, while its ferocious mouth started letting out a strange hissing sound that made one frown.


    But it was too bad. No matter how crazily it struggled, it just couldn¡¯t escape the fate of being annihted. The scorching me soon devoured its body, transforming it into ashes that fell from the sky.


    Perhaps realizing this intruder was tough to handle, indistinct whispering noises could be hearding from the depths of the forest. With great effort, countless mutated nts started to flee from the area around the Demon Alligator.


    After efficiently frightening these demonized nts, who had no idea of their limits, the Demon Alligator slowly and leisurely continued its journey into the depths of the forest.


    After they continued for a short distance, Greem looked over his shoulder. The path they came from had once again been blocked off by those strange nts. It looked like these demonized nts were not willing to let their food slip away. They still wished to feast on Greem¡¯s corpse.


    The next wave wasing from the demons who lived in the demonized forest.


    The species who were affected by the environment the most were creatures of the forest. When they absorbed the Elementium energies that lingered in the air, they would evolve into frightening demon beasts who possessed the ability to use Elementium. However, demons and demon beasts were different. Demons weren¡¯t the result of natural evolution. They were more like monsters created by the abnormal contamination in the environment.


    Their species wereplicating and confusing and their abilities were wild and mystifying. So far, no Adept could m their chest and brag that they understood every single demonic species. So to speak, in every unexplored virgin forest, there was a possibility of finding some new demon species.


    And usually,pared to demon beasts, they were much more frightening and bizarre!


    The first wave of attackers that dashed out from the depths of the forest was a pack of mutated wolves.


    The bodies were asrge as an adult cow and was dark red and bizarre looking. Most of their hair had fallen off, exposing countless lumps and dark spots. Even more strange was the fact that all of them had two heads. These heads were gruesome and frightening. They had pale white fangs and gigantic mouths. Green slime kept dripping down from the edges of their mouths, and a strange glow could be found at the end of its throat.


    Their movements were vigorous and agile, while their burly body could bepared to tigers and lions. When they leaped out from the forest in arge pack, howls that sent chills down one¡¯s back immediately rung throughout the entire sky.


    A chain of half-transparent Wind des and a rain of snake-shape lightning instantly flooded the huge body of the Demon Alligator.


    Some of these double-headed wolves were prowling the outer perimeter. They kept casting spell after spell at the Demon Alligator. Some would howl and dash to the side of the Demon Alligator and use their half-inch long, sharp nails and their glowing fangs to crazily attack the y armor of the Demon Alligator.


    Greem¡¯s face turned slightly pale.


    With just one round of attacks, arge portion of the Demon Alligator¡¯s y armor had broken. If it were not for the protection of the Hunter, Greem would probably have had to face enemy¡¯s attack directly.


    The individual overall strength of these double-headed wolves wasn¡¯t too strong. They were, at the most, at the level of Intermediate Apprentices. But when more than a hundred giant wolves came together in a massive army, even the Demon Alligator Hunter, who had the overall strength of an Advanced Apprentice, would find it hard to defend against this frightening enemy!


    Greem gritted his teeth, pulled out an Elementium core and gently tossed to the ground.


    When it touched the ground, a Rock Snake, that was more frightening than the Demon Alligator, squeezed out from underneath the soil.


    The robust body of the Rock Snake was formed entirely from rocks. The internal diameter alone was slightly over two meters. When a massive object like this jumped into the pack of wolves, it signified the start of a reign of terror.


    Although the elemental and physical attacks of the double-headed wolf could shatter the Demon Alligator¡¯s defense, they just couldn¡¯t move or bite off anything from the rock solid body of Rock Snake. Thus, the battle between them was more like a one-sided ughter, with the wolf pack having the miserable fate of beingpletely wiped out!

 Chapter 91

    Right at the heart of the forest, the ruins of an Adept Tower could be seen, the previous majestic building has now turned into a huge pile of rock fragments and debris.


    The once seven floors tall Adept Tower was now left with only the bottom three floors intact, and the copsed brick fragments had buried all of its entrances. Meanwhile,rge wild vines and flower bushes had littered all over the ruins, nketing the entire ce under a dense green foliage.


    Even so, wisps of light green smoke still rose continuously from under the debris, and the demonized nts present here in this area had be so much thicker and stronger than those outside.


    The muffled sound of footsteps came from the end of the street. Afterwards, a giant alligator appeared and strode forward, the green vines that nketed the streets and the roof of houses could be seen retracting, revealing the traces of human activity in the past in front of the intruder.


    Following the noise of copsing houses, an even morerger and stronger Rock Snake broke through these dpidated houses and slithered away all over the ce. Various things left a mark on its body, there were corrosive traces due to the green acid, burn marks caused by lightning strike, scars that was cut by Wind des, charred marks left by a fire burn... all these traces could still be evidently seen by one¡¯s eyes, and they were the proof of how tedious and frightening the five miles journey was in the forest!


    If not because the Chip learned the elementary knowledge of Golem creation prior to this excursion, and enhanced the core of the Earth element Golem with a tempering magic array, thereby making the Earth Elementium dense enough to form hard solid rocks, just with Demon Alligator Hunter alone would be impossible for Greem to fight his way out, eventually arriving safely in the heart of this area where the ruins of the Adept Tower was situated.


    Behind their backs, the continuous roars of demons could still be heard from the forest. But strangely enough, as if they were frightened by the ferocious ughter of Rock Snake, none of them dared to step into the innermost area of the ruins where Greem and his Golems are.


    Greem furrowed his brows, a gloomy expression surfacing upon his handsome face.


    Those were the type of demons which aren¡¯t afraid of death. They would never allow any outsidere to this ce and disrupt the source of magic energy which could give them a tremendous benefit. So the reason they dared not to pursue further was not that they were fearing at Greem¡¯s group, but...


    Greem turned his head over and sent his nces towards the ruins nketed inyers of demonized nts and his heart suddenly started to feel heavy.


    Could there be several stronger demons hiding in the ruins, which is why those fellows at the outer perimeter dared not to intrude in this territory? Even though it was just a spection, but deep within Greem¡¯s mind, he had a hunch that this was the most logical reason!


    Looking at the wisps of light green smoke, Greem suddenly had an idea.


    Although the Adept Tower looked like it was thoroughly destroyed, but part of its Elementium Pool still hadn¡¯tpletely lost its functionality. Many years had already passed but it was still working properly tenaciously. It¡¯s a pity though that the Elementium energy gathered by it couldn¡¯t be stored properly, that¡¯s why they dispersed in the surrounding area, causing a tremendous transformation.


    ¡°Go, dig out that ce for me!¡±


    With Greem¡¯s order, the Rock Snake moved its massive body and darted into the copsed tower.


    Suddenly, an explosive sound burst out of nowhere, followed by a green beam piercing through the air and forcefully nailing the Rock Snake¡¯s in the forehead. The sudden explosion of green energy quickly corroded away a fist-sized hole at the point of contact. Furiously, the Rock Snake let out a loud hiss, retreating to where it was with an incredible speed and coiled up its body.


    Greem was briefly ovee with panic. Tracing back the faded trail left in the air by the green arrow, he quickly found the attacker.


    It was a beautiful girl with a pair of translucent wings of light on her back. She had a perfectly curved body, a short dark green hair, and a small face with two emerald eyes. She was naked, with only her important body parts covered with brilliant rose branches and green vines, barely hiding her seductive figure.


    Right at this moment, she was hovering above the copsed Adept Tower, a magical bow engraved with strange patterns held in her hands, she was staring angrily directly at Greem.


    Greem slowly gulped his saliva.


    An extremely strong green Elementium glow had flooded his Elementium Vision. If not because he had reduced the brightness of it, perhaps he wouldn¡¯t be able to stare right at this extremely beautiful yet frightening demon.


    ¡°Chip, can you detect the source species and overall strength level of this creature?¡±


    ¡°Beep. Gathering energy aura...¡±


    ¡°Analysis of the data is as follows:¡±


    ¡°Source species of the demon: Fairy ¨C 70%, Flower Spirit ¨C 17%, Forest Genie ¨C 9%...¡±


    ¡°Overall strength level: Adept level.¡±


    ¡°Elementium spectrum: nt Element.¡±


    ¡°Scan results of magical item: Green Magical Bow. Able to unleash Elementium arrows that inflicts 30-40 points of damage. Attack Method: Single target. Also able to unleash Elementium Arrow Rain which inflicts 8-10 points of damage. Attack method: Area of Effect (30-50 meters).¡±


    ¡°Scan of magical item: Armor of Rose. Seven mysterious flower branches were found growing on it. Each is capable of defending 60 points of physical damage and 40 points of elemental damage. When the damage is beyond the defending limit of the mysterious flower branch, it will be destroyed and vanish. Only when all of the flower branches disappear will the creature suffer the external attacks itself. Note: When mysterious flower branches are destroyed, a new flower branch will regrow every five minutes. Note again: Fire Elementium and Negative energy can inflict double the damage to the creature.¡±


    When the data flowed into Greem¡¯s mind like a waterfall, he finally couldn¡¯t hold it in and drew in a few sharp cold breaths.


    This was extremely frightening; this was a formidable demon who had reached the level of an Adept! Also, judging from her powerful aura, perhaps even among all other demons in the area, she could be considered the most supreme existence.


    Especially when Greem found out the powerful AoE offensive ability that the magical item in her hand had, his mind was immediately filled with a raging storm, making him feel like abandoning this mission.


    Different from the magical items crafted by Apprentice Adepts, the magical items that grew together with demons were the most frightening weapons. When an Apprentice Adept crafts a magical item, he would be constrained by theck of materials and resources, thus it was impossible to use all ingredients that suited their innate elemental affinity. As a result, the final product would have limited power and doesn¡¯t possess the characteristics of continued growth.


    As for the magical items used by demons, most of them were produced using part of the demon¡¯s body and some rare resources. Not only were they powerful, they could also keep growing stronger following the improvement of the demon¡¯s overall strength.


    Thus, it was pretty obvious which was a better weapon whenparing them together!


    Right when Greem was still hesitating, the powerful ¡®Fairy¡¯ hovering in the sky suddenly spoke.


    ¡°Hehehe... What a surprise, after so long, there¡¯s still an Apprentice Adept who dares to seek his doom here! Little guy, could your master have forgotten to tell you there are some ces you just can¡¯t simply visit? But it¡¯s toote to regret now. Be nice and surrender your flesh and soul, it has been a long time since I tasted the delicious flesh of humans... hehehe...¡± Upon speaking, it immediately revealed a mouth full of sharp fangs, exposing the true nature of a frightening demon.


    Damn, although it had an appearance of a beautiful woman, but it actually had a masculine and hoarse male voice. Within a split-second of time, thest bit of liking Greem had for it had vanished into thin air.


    However, before Greem could give out a response, the Fairy with indistinguishable gender had already pulled back the bowstring with its right hand, gathering the surrounding green nt element energies onto the string in an incredibly fast speed. In the next moment, more than thousands of glowing green Elementium arrows had rushed towards Greem like a raging storm.


    Not even three seconds had passed by, the Fire Shield that came out from Greem¡¯s body and the y armor outside of the Demon Alligator¡¯s body already shattered from the spine-chilling attack. If not because the Rock Snake darted back to where Greem was standing and used itsrge and strong body to block in front of Greem, perhaps just this attack alone would bore through thousands of holes on Greem¡¯s body.


    But even so, a glowing arrow still pierced through Greem¡¯s shoulder. There were even some faint green energies attached to the finger sized wound, corroding his flesh and producing hissing sounds, making his forehead covered in sweat because of the severe pain.


    Greem endured severe pain and produced scorching hot mes from his fingertip, poking it in his wound. The strong Fire Elementium quickly neutralized the green energies that was left behind on the wound. After that, with his jaw tightly clenched, Greem pulled out bottles upon bottles of magical potions and medicinal paste, pouring them directly on his wound.


    The dizziness caused by the loss of blood, the feeling of weakness brought by the corrosion of green energy, the severe paining from the burn he himself inflicted, and the tingling sensation brought by the regeneration of his flesh as the result of magical medicines... all kinds of strange sensations mixed together, restlessly attacking Greem¡¯s mind.


    Not daring to hide his true power anymore, Greem crazily tossed out the other two Elementium cores. Following a frightening loud boom that shook the earth, two brand new Rock Snakes squeezed out from the ground.


    Currently, Greem had 11.19 Spirit. Together with the +1 enhancement brought by the Circlet of Nobility, he had a total of slightly more than 12 Spirit points. Meanwhile, summoning a Rock Snake would consume 3 Spirit points, while the Demon Alligator Hunter would take 2 Spirit points. With the total Spirit he had now, he was barely able to support his troops.


    The Demon Alligator Hunter was carrying Greem and slowly retreated, while three gigantic Rock Snakes crazily rushed into the enemy, using their strong bodies and incredible physical damage to fight with the frightening Fairy.


    As if the sky was falling and the earth was opening up, the entire ce was shaking violently!


    As usual, the Rock Snakes fought savagely and brutally!


    Their wicked attacks had made the ruins of the city deteriorate in a speed faster than normal.


    But even so, three powerful Rock Snake Golems were still not enough to ovee the terrifying ability of the Fairy. No matter if it was the glowing arrows that attack a single target or the AoE Arrow Rain, they always inflicted heavy damage to the bodies of the Rock Snakes.


    And it was clear that the Fairy was a demon possessing great agility. While pping its wings, it was flying in between the three Rock Snakes with an incredible speed. No matter how they tried to bite or m their foe using their bodies, they always failed to touch even slightest trace left behind by the Fairy. The only attack that could inflict a huge amount of damage to it was the AoE Sand Spray.


    Nevertheless, with the blossoming of beautiful roses on the Fairy body, a mass of green light continued to emerge around its body, helping it to block all of the physical and element damage it was supposed to receive.


    Also, this Fairy had a pretty strong melee ability. Whether it be punching or a palm strike, its tiny hands covered in ayer of greenish halo could always shatter the solid rock armor covering the Rock Snakes¡¯ bodies easily, as if those rocks were made from tofu.


    Therefore, under the suppression of such an imbncebat power, soon all three Rock Snakes had their bodies fully covered in scars, while you could see through the countless holes in their bodies!

 Chapter 92

    This was the first situation Greem was forced to throw away everything and flee by something other than Fallen Apprentices; a frightening Adept level Fairy had forced him scurry out of the demonized forest.


    Obviously, that frightening Fairy was a demon who was very territorial, so it just gave up the pursuit after Greem left the demonized forest. With that, Greem was fortunate enough to keep all three Rock Snakes of his, and hadn¡¯t suffered any unrecoverable losses.


    Looking over his shoulder into the dense forest, Greem¡¯s eyes couldn¡¯t help but twitch. With a deep voice, hemanded the Chip, ¡°Chip, create a mission file for Transvestite Fairy, find out the feasibility of defeating or killing it!¡±


    ¡°Beep. Mission epted... Mission File Name: Transvestite Fairy... Drafting feasible solution...¡±


    ¡°Predicted offensive strategies to inflict substantial damage to Transvestite Fairy include:


    Curse Magic Spell;


    Group Attacks;


    3: Activate Project Lightning Giant;


    Destroy the True Form of the Fairy.¡±


    Greem wrinkled his brows, then whispered, ¡°Exin the practicality of these strategies.¡±


    ¡°Beep. First strategy, Curse magic spell. The target, Transvestite Fairy, is still a life form, curse magic spells can partially reduce its fighting ability. With that, Rock Snakes would have more time to break through its personal defense protecting its body.


    Second strategy, attack in a group. With the current fighting strength of the team, it is insufficient to defeat the Adept level Transvestite Fairy. In order to defeat it, it is necessary to have team members, who have strong overall strength, fighting it with each individual¡¯s strength. The predictedbat mode is as follows...


    Third strategy, activate Project Lightning Giant. In order to stop the Transvestite Fairy from dodging Rock Snake¡¯s attack with its incredible speed, it is necessary to have team members pin it down from close range. The members with whom this is possible include: Bloody Queen Mary and Lightning Giant. If we choose Bloody Queen Mary, based on the pre-battle evaluation, her mortality rate is more than 89%. Suggest Lightning Giant as the first choice.


    Fourth strategy, destroy the frue form of the Fairy. The Transvestite Fairy that appeared this time was just a parasite form. Its true form hadn¡¯t shown up. Based on the biological characteristics of such demons, so long as the true form of the Fairy is found, with the support energy cut off, the fighting ability of the Fairy will decrease significantly.¡±


    Greem closed his eyes and listened carefully, and kept throwing out questions after he thought about it.


    ¡°With regards to the project Lighting Giant you mentioned, what stage are we at now? How long does it take toplete?¡±


    ¡°Beep. The design of Lightning Giant has beenpleted. We currentlyck the necessary magical materials to craft it.¡±


    ¡°What else do we need?¡±


    ¡°Five Advanced Apprentice level Wind element cores!¡±


    ¡°After being sessfully crafted, what will be the overall strength of Lightning Giant?¡±


    ¡°Based on all the Apprentice Adept levels we know so far, uponpletion, the Lightning Giant will possess the basic overall strength of a Pseudo-Adept.¡±


    ¡°How about inparison to Hulk?¡±


    ¡°ording to results derived from basic statistics, out of one hundred matches between thepleted form of Lightning Giant and Hulk, Lightning Giant would be defeated and killed in seventy-three matches, defeated and severely damaged in eleven matches, and end in a draw in sixteen matches. Based on preliminary estimates, theplete form of Lighting Giant can only use guerri tactics. Only by keeping an appropriate offensive distance with Hulk and attacking with lightning in between will the possibility to inflict sufficient damage to the enemy exist.¡±


    ¡°That means it totally can¡¯t defeat a top level Pseudo-Adept!¡± Greem muttered to himself, then quietly recalled the short moment when Hulk struck.


    Though the battle was very short, but with the Chip¡¯s function of image saving and reying, Greem could still clearly and directly felt the frightening fighting strength Hulk showed. Extremely tough muscles and their brutal aggressive strength had given Hulk unapproachable power.


    With just one strike, he had broken Rock Snake¡¯s base defense like it was nothing, and transferred extremely violent and powerful force into the inner body of Rock Snake. Otherwise, it was impossible for him to shatter Rock Snake¡¯s body with just one punch and capture the summoning core straightaway.


    To be honest, after the Chip had scanned the Transvestite Fairy today, though its overall strength was Adept level, if it was to fight against Hulk, Greem wasn¡¯t sure if the Fairy could still keep its dominating fighting style.


    If he had someone who was as strong as Hulk and could stand in front as the shield, and pulled together another four to five Pseudo-Adepts who specialized in long-range magic spells, then the percentage of winning this battle would be around 20-30%. Of course, if Greem included all of his three Rock Snake Golems, the percentage would straightaway climb up to 50-60%.


    Therefore, the key to the battle was how to inflict sufficient damage to the Transvestite Fairy effectively and in a timely manner. Otherwise, if he just fought with his three Rock Snakes, the enemy would be able to rip them into pieces easily.


    It wasn¡¯t that he couldn¡¯t get the help from Hulk, but if he did that, maybe he would have to give away most of the profits he found to someone else. ording to Snox, there were several magical treasures that Greem was determined to get. Therefore, after giving the idea some thought, Greem decided to rely on his own strength for this mission.


    Since he couldn¡¯t get the help from Hulk, he would have to find something else to substitute for Hulk¡¯s position.


    The Lightning Giant project was a summoning core enhancement project that had been tailored to the Storm Giant core he obtained previously.


    For a simple Elementium core, due to its size, there was a limitation to the magical arrays that could be amodated. It was impossible to add more powerful magical arrays on it without restriction. Therefore, currently, all the Golems that Greem crafted using Pseudo-Adept level cores were rather weak. Though they were enough to bully lower ranked opponents, once they were to face a simrly ranked opponent, the fighting strength they put out was just not satisfactory.


    In light of this, after being prompted by Greem, the Chip started enhancing the procedure of Golem crafting by trying to split the magical arrays that were all crafted on one single core to multiple cores. At a point in time, one core would serve as the bearer of the Golem¡¯s conscious, while, using the method of energy sharing and magical arrays distribution, the rest of the cores would serve as the key nodes that constructed a brand new type of Golem.


    With this method, Greem would be able to maximize the limited space on each core by fitting more enhancement magical arrays onto each one of them, and eventually produce an even more powerful Elementium Golem.


    Of course, in this way, it was impossible to summon aplete Golem with an individual core. A Pseudo-Adept level core of a Storm Giant plus six Advanced Apprentice level Wind element cores; each of them would bear part of the functions, and would use the method of consolidated cores and three-dimensional magical arrays to construct the Lightning Giant.


    However, though this project had been worked on for half a month, the Chip was busy calcting the distribution and connection between the primary core and node cores, so it hadn¡¯te out with a specific design solution. But since the Chip had included this project in the strategy today, it meant the calctions hadpleted, and the design solution of the Lighting Giant was done.


    This ce was, after all, not rest stop. Thus, after having a short break, Greem quickly resumed his return journey. While he was leaving, some ignorant Gnolls actually tried to intercept him, which made Greem, who was filled with pent-up anger, explode. Hemanded all three Rock Snakes to crush their nest straightaway.


    Faced with three near invincible super monsters, the arrows, daggers, and short spears of the Gnolls were useless. If not for the fact that Greem had no desire to continue fighting, with a single charge, this renowned Gnoll tribe of Gray Ear would have lost thirty percent of their members.


    Hence, when the two Pseudo-Adepts sent by Elysium City, Langdon and Philip, arrived hurriedlyter, all they saw was dead Gnolls and the Lizardman tribe who had beenpletely wiped out. Greem was long gone.


    With a gloomy expression, Langdon listened to the bloody story told by the leader of the Gnolls. He didn¡¯t pay any attention to the story¡¯s fishy details, but instead, focused all of his attention on the other side of the demonized forest.


    There many strange rumors were told in the Elysium City in regards to that ce. Even his master, Adept Dark Light, once warned him not to simply try to seek the treasures inside of the ruin, as if there were some secrets hiding in it. As a result, he only had a superficial knowledge about the demonized forest, as he hadn¡¯t spent any time trying to understand or explore it.


    Impatiently, Langdon interrupted the weepyint of the Gnoll leader, and asked with a cold voice, ¡°Have you entered this demonized forest before? Is there anything inside of it?¡±


    He was not an idiot.


    In regards to thepletely wiped out Lizardman tribe, many of their adult fighters had been killed by element damage caused by a throwing type of attack, which made Langdon think of the y Golem of that bastard. But the rest of them had been killed by sharp weapons at close range. Also, he didn¡¯t believe that kid from the surface would have the patience to venture deep into the nest of Lizardmen, ughtering every single woman and juvenile of the tribe.


    This ce was the best habitable area closest to the demonized forest. For the underground creatures, having control of the magical materials harvested from that ce would bring them tremendous benefit. Thus, it was understandable what kind of role the Gnoll had in wiping out the entire tribe of Lizardmen.


    But Langdon wasn¡¯t interested in being the judge on this. He only wanted to find out why that bastard had been in the demonized forest.


    Could that guy intruded on this ce by ident? Or, did hee here with a purpose and was searching for something?


    Having these questions in mind, Langdon invited Philip to explore the demonized forest. Therefore, the two Fallen Pseudo-Adepts who thought they were strong enough simply walked into the demonized forest. But, not even half an hourter, both men were forced to run out from the forest in a sorry state.


    Their bodies were full of bloody holes, pierced through by the element arrows. Infected by bizarre and nasty energy, the blood dripping out from the wound had turned green. While they were fleeing, many lower grade demons had taken the opportunity to attack them as well, leaving more scars and wounds on their body.


    After Philip left a Teleportation mark at the edge of the forest, both men rushed back to Elysium City.


    Obviously, they had found some clues in the demonized forest. Judging from what they had found, they believed that the bastard must have gone straight to the ruins of the Adept Tower located in the depth of the forest. And since that guy had such a clear and precise target, clearly he wouldn¡¯t abandon what he was looking for just because the ce was guarded by a frightening Adept level demon.


    So, both men arrived at the conclusion that the kid must have temporarily withdrawn after learning of the difficulties, and would return once he got more help.


    That was why Philip had left a Teleportation mark behind. With that, they would be able tounch a surprise attack once Greem returned to the forest. If they were able to intercept them on their way back, with an advantage in the number of Fallen Apprentices and that frightening demon who lived in the demonized forest, it was highly possible they could destroy every single person in the surface team in one clean sweep.


    Even in the bloody battle history of Elysium City, that stretched more than hundred years, a result like this was extremely rare!

 Chapter 93

    After smoothly returning from the Underground World, Greem busied himself once again.


    However, different from his usual, currently he was busily working towards a goal and was well-directed.


    After he returned, the first thing he did was pay a visit to the Lothar Merchant. By the time he left them, he had five Advanced Apprentice level Wind element cores in his waist pouch. Nevertheless, a big purchase like this would mean a sharp decrease in Greem¡¯s stash of crystal cores.


    In the blink of an eye, he had spent more than half of the over 3000 magic crystals he had won from the bet previously. Currently, Greem¡¯s magic crystal savings had dropped below 800. Considering that he and Mary had be ravenous beasts who had to have the daily magical energy meal set, he had to save the remaining magic crystals to support their daily consumption. Therefore, earning a lot of magic crystals in a short period of time had presently be a pressing matter.


    After he returned from the Underground World, the trio who had temporarily formed a treasure hunting alliance gathered together and had a meeting. When Greem briefed the team about the situation he had seen in the ruined Adept Tower, both Mary and Snox were stupefied.


    An Adept level demon!


    This... was this something their small team could ever handle?


    Although Mary had a high opinion of herself, in the end, she was just an Advanced Apprentice Vampire. If she were to fight that frightening Fairy, she would be instantly killed by it. As for Greem, so far he was still just an Intermediate Apprentice, even though, under the double tonics of the magical energy meal set and the Ming Concentrating potion, his Spirit was rising quickly every day. If they really were to fight an Adept level demon, not only could he not provide any help, it was possible that even the shock wave of the battle would cause him deadly injury!


    As for the mighty Goblin merchant Snox, though its unconventional ability of invisibility and ability to stay concealed was pretty amazing, they could not fight. Therefore, besides what little bit of help the memories that reside in its brain could provide, there was nothing it could do to help.


    Noticing the frightened expression on both his teammates¡¯ faces, Greem let out an understanding smile. He then soberly analyzed the advantages and disadvantages between themselves and the enemy. Following his lead, both his teammates gradually overcame their fear towards the Adept level monster, and started to seriously and carefully n out how to defeat the frightening Fairy.


    First of all, the three of them were sure of one thing. If they allowed that Fairy to keep its overall strength at Adept level, nning this treasure hunting mission was no different than nning their own death. Therefore, they had to find ways to weaken the overall strength of that frightening Fairy.


    There were two possible ways to do so. First was using curse magic spells, and secondly, targeting the true form of the Fairy.


    Greem could find a way to purchase some curse magic wands or one-time use magic spell scrolls. But they didn¡¯t know if the inferior products produced by Apprentice Adepts could prate the magic resistance of the Fairy. So, they couldn¡¯t ce too much hope on this.


    While they were discussing the issue, Greem secretly hinted that he could get in touch with Adept Angus, and maybe he could obtain some Adept level magic spell scrolls from him. But in order to trade with an official Adept, Greem had to produce something that could attract his interest.


    Therefore, Greem had to figure out this new problem!


    As for the true form of the Fairy, Greem¡¯s predicted (actually it was the Chip¡¯s prediction) that there was a high chance it was hiding close to the broken Elementium Pool. At this point, Snox finally came into y. Its familiarity with the Adept Tower let it quickly draw out the inner structure of the ce, and it was able to precisely point out the location of the Elementium Pool.


    ording to its description, the Elementium Pool was located in the second underground floor beneath the ruins of Adept Tower. In order to get there, they had to go through numerous magical secret doors and arrays. Though it was highly possible that most of these mechanisms had stopped working, if there were still a couple of them still functioning, it would cause immense problems for Mary¡¯s infiltration. So, upon Greem¡¯s request, Snox had to follow Mary when she snuck into the ruins of Adept Tower.


    In regards to this, Greem showed an unprecedented firm attitude. Left with no room to argue, Snox fearfully agreed.


    In order to achieve the above two things, Greem needed to have the overall strength to fight or pin down the Fairy. Being able to do so would heavily rely on the nearpleted Lightning Giant. Only when the Lightning Giant had the expected strength would Mary and Snox have more confidence in this treasure hunting mission!


    With that in mind, in the following days, Greem, Mary, and Snox became really busy. Greem lived night and day in the Alchemy Laboratory, crafting his new Golem, while Mary would go out early and came back at dusk, covered in scars and wounds. Even with the extraordinary regeneration of Vampires, she still had so many scars. This showed how incredibly dangerous her training was, that it had gone beyond what even her body could endure.


    Snox, who dreamed of bing the greatest Goblin merchant, was rarely seen in the public hall on the first floor of Adept Tower. Instead, it was wearing old and torn thief equipment, and spent all of its time in the Magic Spell Practice Room, practicing its stealth. As for its original glittering magical equipment, it had no choice but to lock it away in a wooden chest while crying.


    During this period, Greem and Mary managed to find some time to participate in an Underground World ambush mission organized by the training camp. However, after the miserable defeatst time, the Fallen Apprentices had strengthened the defending forces in all of their resource sites. This caused the team, led by Kevin, to get entangled in a bitter battle.


    In this tough war, when two of the Pseudo-Adepts from Kevin¡¯s team became locked inbat with the Fallen Pseudo-Adepts, Greem was forced to send out Rock Snakes in order to defend against the bombardmenting from an extra Fallen Pseudo-Adept.


    In the situation where the number of their Pseudo-Adepts was outnumbered by the opponent, and the overall strength of their Advanced Apprentices wasn¡¯t too strongpared to the enemy, for the sake of avoiding an ambush by the enemy¡¯s reinforcements, Kevin had no choice but to abandon the mission.


    Even with such an ending, all of the team members had a calm attitude. In their usual battles with the Underground World enemy, a result like this was perfectly normal. With regards to Greem¡¯s performance in the battle, no one seemed to have any opinion. With the overall strength of an Intermediate Apprentice, he was able to withstand bombardment from a Fallen Pseudo-Adept for more than fifteen minutes. A result like this could simply shut anyone¡¯s mouth.


    It was because his firm standing that Kevin¡¯s team hadn¡¯t been defeated from a shortage of Pseudo-Adepts. Otherwise, once their team had been scattered by the attack, among all of the Advanced Apprentices, who dared say he could escape from the enemy¡¯s pursuit? As a matter of fact, it wasn¡¯t rare for many ambitious and genius apprentices to get themselves killed in the dark and quiet underground tunnel.


    Every year, there were always more than a couple of Advanced Apprentices who died quietly in some random dark corner of the Underground Cave. Even an incident as big as the death of Pseudo-Adept wasn¡¯t rare news. In fact, the root cause of the destruction of the previous Elysium City by the surface Adepts was because a surface team consisting of six people bumped into a Fallen Adept while they were patrolling in the Underground World.


    No one knew what exactly happened, because all of the two Pseudo-Adepts and four Advanced Apprentices were killed silently in the Underground World. With reinforcements sent by the Zhentarim Association, the raging surface Adepts stormed into the Underground World and forcefully destroyed the stronghold of the enemy ¨C Elysium City.


    But too bad, the Second Grade Adept of the enemy, Adept Pridka, had self-detonated the Adept Tower, taken some of Fallen Adepts, and escaped from Elysium City, which allowed them to escape from the catastrophe. Consequently, within just a few years, a new Elysium City had been built up once again.


    The more understanding they had about this history, the more alert the elite apprentices were for a major scale conflict. Once either side pushed too far, it was highly possible that it would attract a strong reaction from the other side.


    In the unique environment of the Underground Cave, no matter how talented or how strong an Apprentice Adept, once they provoked their opponent¡¯s Adept, the inevitable result would be death. Therefore, after bringing back three Fallen Pseudo-Adepts¡¯ heads in their previous mission, Kevin¡¯s team had anticipated danger in every sound. Thus, theirtest mission¡¯s defeat had instead let both Pseudo-Adepts in the team breathe out a long sigh of relief.


    As a passing traveler in the Underground Cave, Greem wouldn¡¯t spend too much of his time in this ce, so he didn¡¯t really understand the petty thoughts behind their action. The only reason he didn¡¯t fight with everything he had was simply that his Spirit and Physique were in a weak state.


    A few days ago, Greem had consumed another bottle of the Mind Concentrating potion, which only brought an increment of 0.51 to his Spirit. In rtion to that, his Physique had dropped below 3. As a result, the Chip had revised his body¡¯s status from healthy to weak.


    Under the circumstances, Greem had to temporarily stop consuming the Mind Concentrating potion and focus on tuning his body. With the vigorous vitality of a fifteen year old youth and the strengthening effect from the Spirit to his muscles, the normal level of his Physique should be between 4 ¨C 5.


    But this was amon failing for all apprentices who took the path of Elementium, as they usually only focused on cultivation and training their Spirit, either they were meditating or studying magical knowledge, spending long hours copying magical books, and exposing themselves to dangerous magical materials which could harm their body in the long-term. These unhealthy habits led all the Elementium apprentices to have the same unhealthy appearance. They always looked skinny and sick.


    If they were able to advance and be official Adepts, they would have plenty of time and countless methods of finding some miraculous items that could remedy the weakness of their body. But for now, they could only clench their jaw tightly and endure with a strong mind. They kept damaging their body in exchange for every little bit of increase in their Spirit.


    The failure of the mission didn¡¯t affect Greem. Upon his return from the Underground World, he immediately rushed back into the Alchemy Laboratory. He spent most of his time in there, meticulously and carefully crafting his number one Golem ¨C the Lightning Giant.


    Finally, after torturously working for dozens of days, Greem waved his hand and killed the magical me on on the Alchemy Station, brought the primary core that he used as the bearer of the Golem¡¯s conscious in front of his face, narrowed his eyes, and gave it a thorough look over.


    Right at this very moment, he finally breathed out a long sigh of relief, because...


    The Lightning Giant was born!

 Chapter 94

    This was a magnificent piece of art that would subvert the knowledge of all the Magical Automaton Crafters!


    The dazzling primary core looked nearly transparent under the bright light. On its irregr surface, countless magical micro runes that looked like tiny spider webs were engraved following the shape of the core, making them look like natural blood veins of the core. Following the rippling of the surrounding Elementium energy, tiny golden electric arcs started to appear, moving around on its clean and sparkling surface.


    For every rotation these electric arcs made, more roaming electric Elementium were absorbed in from the surrounding environment and the bigger these golden electric arcs grew, interlocking with each other. Finally, the crackling and dazzling lightning storm started to roll up around the primary core. Though the aura didn¡¯t carry a strong force, anyone would be frightened by the concentrated aura emanating from it.


    Greem held the primary core with two fingers. The more he looked at it, the more he liked this core. Meanwhile, a vast amount of pride flooded his mind.


    This primary core was the key to constructing the Lightning Giant. For the sake of leaving more space for both tempering and strengthening arrays, the energy storing and energy forming magical arrays had been shifted to the other five Wind element cores. Even so, when the primary core was exposed in the air, those roaming Lightning energies still couldn¡¯t be controlled and were absorbed, leading to the strange scene that was happening now.


    Greem clenched his right palm and conveniently dispersed the disorderly lightning energy. Then, he ced his right hand which was holding the primary core in front of his forehead, quietly connecting his mind with the Mind Control Imprint System on the core. From the entire primary core, it could be said that this Mind Control Imprint System was the most important part, as this was the magical array that Greem would use to take control of the future Lightning Giant.


    Greem¡¯s Spirit energy smoothly prated into the Mind Control Imprint System, resonating with the tiny thread of Spirit energy that he ced there while crafting the core. Once he had finally finished with this action which was simr to ¡®consecration¡¯, the Mind Control Imprint System on the primary core had officially been activated. From this point onwards, no one would be able to seize the control of it from Greem.


    Of course, this was apulsory process for all privately owned Golem. On the other hand, for those Titans or other automatons crafted by a Magical Automaton Crafter, as the person who controlled them frequently changed, most of them had their Mind Control Imprint Systems reced with Rune Controls. The Automaton Crafter would then craft the Controlling Rune into something that was easier to transfer and carry around ¨C for example, a que or talisman. Then, they would sell them to the public, so that, anyone who held the Controlling Rune in their hand would be able to givemands to the Titan or Automaton.


    As a result, a Titan¡¯s ¡®loyalty¡¯ was far less than that of a Golem¡¯s!


    Right when the fully satisfied Greem had arrived at the entrance of his room, he bumped into Mary who had also returned looking worn out. Though covered by her red dress, the frightening scars and wounds on her body could still be clearly seen; even her pretty face was covered with crisscrossing wounds.


    ¡°You... what happened to you?¡± Greem had been busy working on his Golems in the past few days. Thus, he just hadn¡¯t had time to pay close attention to Mary¡¯s every move, which was why he was so shocked seeing her condition.


    ¡°Hmph. These are just some small wounds, that bastard is suffering from injuries worse than mine! If not for the fact that it could help me master magicalbat skill, I would have long turned him into dried meat!¡± Mary waved her hand fiercely, cursing through her tightly clenched teeth. Though she sounded like she had had the advantage, as Greem was very familiar with her character, he was sure that Mary must have been defeated by someone in a match.


    ¡°Mary, since you always seem to visit the Ker mountain range recently, perhaps you could find me an appropriate training opponent? Preferably a Pseudo-Adept level opponent and more importantly, someone who can keep a secret!¡± Greem said hesitatingly.


    ¡°You¡¯ve sessfully crafted the Lightning Golem?¡± Mary¡¯s eyes flickered.


    ¡°Yes! But I haven¡¯t run a field test yet, to test its overall strength...¡±


    ¡°Excellent. Let¡¯s go, you can also help me get revenge!¡±


    Mary had been suffering a lot recently, as her mind was consumed by the mes of revenge. Nevertheless, she had never had the idea of bringing a group of men and fight the enemy as a gang. So, after suddenly hearing Greem¡¯s request, she simply gave up all intentions of healing herself in her room and instead, turned around and dragged Greem out of the Adept Tower.


    Completely ignoring the strange ncesing from the surrounding Apprentice Adepts, Mary immediately transformed into a giant blood-sucking bat upon rushing out of the Adept Tower. She, then, grabbed on Greem¡¯s shoulder and soared into the sky.


    It waste in the afternoon, the dusky sky could seen filled with thest orange rays for the day. The Ker mountain range in the far distance looked like a sleeping giant, as it stood in the darkness and in the far end of the sky.


    Mary was flying deep into the mountain range.


    After Mary had sucked Alice¡¯s blood, her Strength and Physique had experienced a significant improvement. Back in the days, it was ratherborious for her to carry Greem while flying and she could only fly nearly at the altitude of treetops. But now, while restlessly pping her leather wings, she was actually able to carry Greem up to the altitude of nearly hundred meters in the air, and was able to fly forward like a sharp arrow piercing through the air.


    The wet and cold night breeze fiercely pped Greem¡¯s face, the strong wind pressure forcing him to narrow his eyes and making it difficult to maintain his normal vision. Left with no other alternative, he once again put on the Gnome Goggles and only had he felt much better.


    With the help of low-light vision from the goggles, he looked downwards at the earth and saw that at the edge of the dusky forest, there were long lines formed by countless torches rushing towards the Adept Tower.


    These were probably the expedition teams that ventured deep into the mountain range every day, hunting demon beasts and harvesting magical herbs.


    While Greem was pondering, Mary had carried him and streaked through the night sky at an incredible speed, passing over those expedition teams.


    The sky had yet to turnpletely dark and obviously, some expedition teams had discovered the abnormality in the sky. Following their shouts, a few of their leaders had also tilted their head up and looked into the sky. But, before they could spot the tiny ck dot, it dissolved into the dusky night sky as Mary and Greem squeezed into the depths of the forests of the mountain.


    The distance between Mary¡¯s destination and the Adept Tower as the crow flies was about seventy miles. If they had traveled by foot through the forests, it would have taken them more than half day to reach their destination. However, when it came to Mary, it had just been a forty-five minute journey.


    Their destination was a small hill that connected to a huge mountain range. When Mary and Greem approached the hill, she slowed down and started to descend. On top of this small hill, there was a t and emptied field the size of two football fields. Though there were some wild bushes and weeds growing on top of the field, they were scattered around and one could tell with just one look that this ce must have gone through a great amount of torture.


    Casually throwing Greem onto a patch of grass, the blood sucking bat exploded into a clump of blood mist and transformed into the red dressed Mary within a blink of an eye.


    ¡°Toril, you bastard! Show yourself quickly! I, the red-dressed Mary, am back for revenge again!¡± Upon being restored to her human form, Mary stood there with her hands on her hips and let out a furious roar. Her shrill voice kept echoing through the dusky mountain forest. Indistinctly, the reverberation of her voice could be hearding from a far distance.


    What was she doing?


    At this moment, Greem¡¯s mind was fully bewildered and he found it funny to see Mary acting like that.


    He had long heard that Mary had been searching everywhere for an appropriate opponent to train her meleebat skills with. However, no matter how pressing the matter was, she wouldn¡¯t havee to a remote and dested mountain forest like this to try and search for the right candidate! In this ce, besides those wild animals and demon beasts in the forest, what else could she find? Could she had been training with a demon beast?


    Having his mind filled with endless fantasies, Greem shook his head and let out a wry smile. Right as he was about to ask Mary to stop making fun of him, a deep sigh rang out, followed by a robust and burly body squeezing itself out from the forest and revealing itself on this small hill.


    Dark clouds hovered in the sky, while the silver moon jumped out from behind these clouds, pouring its bright light onto the body of this figure.


    This was a strong man with a perfectly fitted and well-bnced body. He had a pair of dark green eyes, a somber face, and was wearing a full set of green armor on his body. With just one look, one could tell he must be a strong man who focused on melee fighting.


    The guy came out with a warmth smile on his face, clearly, intending to have a good talk with Mary. However, when he realized that Mary wasn¡¯t the only person on this hill, his expression immediately turned cold. He threw his nce over at Greem from a far distance and remained silent, looking like he was pondering over something.


    ¡°Toril, I have told you before, if you want me to be your woman, you have to truly defeat me! I¡¯ve found you an opponent today. As long as you can defeat him, I¡¯ll agree to your request! What do you say? This isn¡¯t too strict of a condition, right? Don¡¯t tell me that you¡¯re scared of an Intermediate Apprentice?¡± With her hands on her hips, Mary mored in high spirits, totally ignoring Greem who had an expression showing that he didn¡¯t know whether to cry or tough.


    Since when had Mary had an admirer? Judging from the look of that guy, he should also be an Apprentice Adept, but Greem had no idea why this guy wanted to live in this wilderness. As for his overall strength level...


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but furrow his brows.


    The wave of this guy¡¯s spirit was rather strange, but from the information feedback from the Chip, he was verified as a genuine Pseudo-Adept.


    As Greem stared straight at this guy and kept examining him, the green armor guy was also silently giving Greem an examining look.


    ¡°You kept telling me that you already have a boyfriend, could he be that little guy who can¡¯t even stand a gust of wind? The wave of his Spirit is so messy and heterogeneous, I supposed they were forcefully increased using some kind of medicinal potions, huh? I don¡¯t see anything how this weakling could be worth your love. Can he endure your enchanting kiss? With his weak and frail body, how many kisses can he even withstand...¡± The more the guy spoke, the angrier he became. By the end of his rant, he could barely control his anger.


    A, so this guy was his rival in love! Bah! This was absurd, what was this nonsense about a rival in love? At most, he and Mary had a little bit of dubious rtionship; they couldn¡¯t even be considered a pair of lovers. So, where had him being a rival in love came from?


    Wearing a strange smile on his face, Greem stared at this green armor guy. But, before he could tease the guy, an unbelievable, miraculous transformation started to happen on this guy.


    His body started to expand slowly, pushing the loose armor on his body causing it to produce cracking noise. Countless dark hairs squeezed out from underneath his skin, while his face started to twist and protrude. Two razor sharp fangs had poked out from his lips. The most attracting part was his eyes, as the two dark green glows became brighter and brighter. By the end, they had even be brighter than the silver moon in the sky, making Greem feel a tremendous pressure.


    Within just five seconds, the green armor guy had transformed into a giant raging ape with an extremely masculine body that stood more than four meters tall.

 Chapter 95

    Bloodline Transformation?


    He was a Pseudo-Adept who had taken the path of a Bloodline Adept!


    It would have been a lie if he said that he wasn¡¯t nervous at this moment. After all, in the eyes of all apprentices, the overall strength of a Bloodline Apprentice was considered the strongest among all other simrly ranked apprentices.


    Take the guy in front of him as an example! ording to the records of history, the Giant Raging Ape was a powerful Grade Five demon beast. This also meant that as long as this guy kept purifying the bloodline of Giant Raging Ape in his body, then he would have the potential to be a Fifth Grade Adept.


    If he really was fortunate enough to reach Grade Five Adept, perhaps he would have to worry about his future development. But as for now, he could enjoy the tremendous benefits that were brought to him by the bloodline body transformation. The intrepid physique, strong strength, tall and masculine body, and a fighting style that would that let him fight continuously, only stopping once he was killed, without any fear of death...


    Stimted by the bloodline of the Giant Raging Ape, the consciousness of the green armor guy had be rather disordered and confused. He kept mming into his chest with both of his huge hands, while letting out a series of furious roars at Greem.


    Alright, perhaps this was the only weakness that was brought upon by the path of the Bloodlines. The person could rather easily be immersed into a restless state by his bloodline, causing him to lose the proper sense and calm sober mind. Of course, there was some bloodline fanatics that didn¡¯t regard this as a weakness. In their minds, the raging inner state could further stimte their desire for a fight and would allow them to unleash an even more powerfulbative strength. Whenpared to that, losing a little bit of sense didn¡¯t mean anything!


    ¡°Don¡¯t you need to prepare yourself? Be careful, once this guy transforms, he will attack anyone he sees!¡± Mary chuckled and left the hill, while saying, ¡°I am looking forward to your great performance!¡±


    Greem raised his head upwards to look at the Giant Raging Ape who stood tall in front of him and shook his head, letting out a wry smile on his face. Finally, he took out a small leather pouch from his waist and tossed it onto the ground. Once it hit the ground, the neck of the pouch opened up, as a dazzling magical glow shot out from inside the pouch.


    Five crystal clear Advanced Apprentice level Wind element cores flew out from inside the pouch and gradually hovered in midair. When they revealed themselves in the air, shrill sounds of wind suddenly rung through the air on this small hill. Drawn in by a mysterious force, a huge amount of Wind Elementiums started to swarm into the hovering Elementium cores crazily, surrounding them as they started to revolve around the cores while continuing to produce shrill noises.


    Wind was invisible.


    And Wind Elementiums couldn¡¯t be seen with naked eyes as well.


    But when such a massive amount of Wind Elementiums gathered together, a green vortex had be visible to the naked eye.


    These Wind Elementiums came at an incredible speed, causing the night sky to be sliced into thousands of tiny threads. Soon, with the five Wind element cores as the center, the gathered Wind Elementium formed into a human-like body with four limbs.


    A green body, green hands, and green legs.


    When the body of this green giant was sessfully formed, a new element core flew out from inside the pouch and threw itself into the broad chest of the giant. In next second, a green head struggled out from the top of this burly giant. Nevertheless, it didn¡¯t have a vivid facial appearance ¨C no eyes, no ears, no mouth, and no nose.


    If the previous five Advanced Apprentice level Wind element cores had been used to construct the body, then this Pseudo-Adept level Wind element core was used to support the entire body, as the bone of this green giant.


    But, this was not yet the end.


    A mini sun gradually rose up from the pouch.


    The Elementium let out a dazzling glow, while the lightning barrier let out crackling noises. When thisst primary core merged into the body of this green giant, it brought about an incredible and mystical transformation to the Golem.


    The giant which had looked rather lifeless previously, in this moment, had be alive!


    It had a massive body that stood five meters tall and brilliant green skin, covered by ayer of golden armor. Though its limbs didn¡¯t look as slim and agile as a human¡¯s, it had arms, palms and fingers. Even so, when the two mini golden suns on its face lit up, a magical shield entirely constructed by static electricity emerged on its giant left hand, while a dazzling lightning spear had appeared on its right palm.


    Counting the Wind Vortex Shield and Lightning Armor outside of this giant¡¯s body, the personal defense mechanism of this Golem could make anyone¡¯s jaw drop.


    The Lightning element was in fact, a branch of the Wind element. Thus, there weren¡¯t any obstacles stopping the both of them from merging with each other. The five Wind element cores that scattered across the body and limbs of the giant kept drawing Wind Elementium to the body. Besides using some to form the physical Wind body, all the other Wind Elementiums had been used by the primary core to strengthen and temper. The core turned them into lightning energy to supply the bottomless energy demanded by the Lightning Giant.


    On one side was the Giant Raging Ape who stood four-meter-tall and on the other side was the Lighting Giant who stood five meters tall. Two massive objects stood facing each other with a distance of nearly forty meters in between.


    Though the green armor guy who had transformed into the Giant Raging Ape had appeared to be savage, when it came to facing a formidable opponent whom he had no idea of the true overall strength of, he showed a rather dignified and good control of himself. Nevertheless, the tremendous pressure that the Lightning Giant brought to him had also further stimted him and made him even more maniacally. White gas could be seen spraying out from his nostrils, as he kept mming the ground with both giant arms and making loud noises.


    Finally, unable to contain the near boiling fighting spirit in his body, the Giant Raging Ape let out a furious roar that echoed throughout the forest and moved its gigantic body, charging towards the opponent while roaring violently.


    Greem kept backing away from the battlefield. While he was doing so, he continued staring at the Giant Raging Ape, with his eyes flickering with bright blue light. Rows of numbers were pouring down in front of his eyes, flooding his vision with a vast amount of data.


    Soon, most of the irrelevant data had been removed, leaving behind only the data that was provided by the Chip after having scanned the Giant Raging Ape.


    ¡°Target: Toril. Gender: Male. Adept path: Bloodline. Body attributes: Strength ¨C 20 (+2), Physique ¨C 20 (+2), Agility ¨C 11, Spirit ¨C 17(-3)¡±


    Upon reading Toril¡¯s body statistics, Greem was struck with awe inspiring envy.


    20 points of Strength! A Strength like that could probably defeat every single demon beast who was well-known for its Strength in this Ker mountain range!


    20 points of Physique! With such Physique, even if this Toril didn¡¯t wear any armor, just the strength of his muscle alone, he could defend himself from all themon weapons used by normal humans in this world. Thosemon weapons that don¡¯t possess any supernatural force could no longer inflict any damage on him.


    Greem even spected that with 20 points of Physique, even if there was really someone who could chop off one of Toril¡¯s arms, he would probably be able to regrow it in just a few days, because it seemed as though all creatures who had their Physique reach the level 20 would possess the passive ability to regrow their limbs.


    Analyzing the data provided by the Chip, the normal body attributes for Toril should be: Strength ¨C 18, Physique ¨C 18, Agility ¨C 11, Spirit ¨C 20. Once he hadpleted his bloodline body transform, then his Strength and Physique would be boosted to 20, however, it was surprising that his Spirit had dropped to 17.


    Perhaps, this was one of the weaknesses of the bloodline of Giant Raging Ape!


    Though it seemed as if Greem had spent a long time in thinking all this, in reality, it had all happened within a split second.


    While Greem was backing off, the Lighting Giant chose to charge at the Giant Raging Ape.


    With a wave of its hand, the Lightning Spear held in the right hand of this Lightning Golem had disappeared, flying out with a speed that no naked eye could detect and nailed into the broad chest of the Giant Raging Ape. The spear suddenly exploded and the mini Lighting Storm instantly flooded the body of the Giant Raging Ape.


    From the projection of Greem¡¯s vision, the basic strength of this mini Lightning Storm was 21 points.


    However, a lightning damage of this level was insufficient to stop a powerful magical creature who had both its Strength and Physique reach level 20. Through the body transformation, Toril was temporarily given the intrepid body and magic resistance of the Giant Raging Ape. Besides bringing him intense pain, these crackling electric arcs would never be able to halt his movements.


    A loud boom rung in the air, as the massive body of the giant ape pierced through the Lightning Storm, spread out itsrge palm and forcefully waved toward the Lightning Giant. Compared to the savage and brutal manner of a giant ape, though Lightning Giant had a bigger body, its movements were rather nimble.


    With just a slight dodging movement, the Lightning Giant avoided therge palm of the Giant Raging Ape and reappeared behind its opponent within the blink of an eye. It then shook its right arm and unleashed a lightning whip that coiled around the Giant Raging Ape¡¯s waist. Through the lightning whip, streaks of brutal and violent high voltage electricity instantly transmitted over to every single corner of the giant ape¡¯s body, causing it to continuously let out a furious roar into the sky. Soon, the smell of burning flesh emitted from the point of contact.


    The failure in executing its first strike and the severe paining from its body both greatly agitated the Giant Ape, causing it to be even more maniacal. It stretched out its hand, grabbed the long whip on its waist and with just some light force from its hand, it simply shattered the whip into pieces. Having freed itself from the trap, the Giant Ape turned around and punched out both fists at the same time that came crushing towards the Lighting Giant, while producing two loud booms that pierced through the air.


    Though it had a double the defense from the Wind Vortex Shield and the Lightning Shield that carried in its left hand, under the heavy blow of the extreme raging force of the Giant Ape, the outer defense of the Lightning Giant was shattered in an instant.


    A loud boom rang through the air.


    The Lightning Giant sailed through the air and drew out a pale green trail in the sky, flying away nearly hundred meters before it could stabilize its body once again. At this very moment, the end of its left arm had disappeared, while a huge dent could be seen on the chest part of its golden armor.


    Greem, who had back off to the edge of the forest in the far distance, knitted his brows with a tight frown.


    Compared to the bloodline transformation which possessed a physical body, the body of Lightning Giant formed by pure Wind Elementium was rather fragile. Therefore, during the a melee battle with a big guy like this whose body emphasized Strength and muscles, obviously it was at a disadvantage.


    But because of the twoyer defenses, the iron fists of Giant Raging Ape couldn¡¯t prate the basic defense of the Lightning Giant, or else, it would have been too troublesome for it to recover.


    Within a few blinks of an eye, followed by the golden shes on the huge dent on the Lightning Giant¡¯s chest, it was once again restored to its original shape.


    And right at this moment, the raging and furious Giant Ape had once again charged towards it with tremendous momentum.


    ¡°Don¡¯t fight it in such a close range, keep a distance of thirty to fifty meters and attack it with lightning!¡±


    From the far distance, Greem transmitted his thoughts to the primary core of the Lightning Giant.

 Chapter 96

    Within the spacious field shrouded in darkness and silence, two giants were fighting each other restlessly; it was a fantasy that had never appeared in Greem¡¯s memory before.


    But today, in this mysterious and bizarre outworld, such a fantasy had be reality.


    Like a bulldozer that never got tired, the Giant Raging Ape forcefully leveled the forest surrounding this small hill; even the ground waspletely filled with deep footprints and cracks, making the ground look like spider webs.


    Meanwhile, the Lightning Giant with a green body and golden armor was like a nimble spirit. It kept dashing around the perimeter of this giant ape, luring its opponent intounching attack after attack, while continuously throwing Lightning Spears and Wind des at the giant ape.


    As the battle progressed, the data gathered by Green¡¯s eyes had be more vivid and direct. Though the Lightning Giant was personally crafted by him, throughout the entire process, he was working like a human spirit energy projector, as he knew nearly nothing about all the theories and knowledge in crafting it. Therefore, with regards to the fighting abilities and body attributes of the Lightning Giant, the Chip had only given him a vague estimation. Inparison, the data he had gathered in the battlefield, which was much more direct and detail.


    The Lightning Giant with the overall strength of peak Pseudo-Adept, had thebined element characteristic of both Lightning and Wind. Body attributes: Strength ¨C 12, Physique ¨C 18, Agility ¨C 18, Spirit ¨C 20. Skills: Wind Vortex (Passive), Thunder Armor (Passive), Lightning Shield (Active), Lightning Spear (Active), Lightning Whip (Active), Wind de (Active), Thunder Storm (Active), Chain Lightning (Active), Lightning Jump (Active).


    It was a long-range Golem focused on agility. Though it was rather weak in Strength and Physique, its dazzling array of offensive skills made up for these weaknesses, making it the strongest Elementium Golem that Greem owned currently.


    Also, its overall strength had not disappointed Greem¡¯s expectations. In the second half of the battle, relying on its nimble movement, the Lightning Giant kept moving around the giant ape and attacked it by throwing Lightning Spears and Winds des. No matter how the Giant Raging Ape leapt at it furiously, there was no way it could catch up to the Lightning Giant.


    Nevertheless, after failing to catch up with the enemy several times, the Giant Raging Ape quickly showed its frightening innatebat ability, as it started to attack using ¡®Soul Crunching Roar¡¯ and ¡®Rock Throwing¡¯. The former attack consisted of a raging roar that instantly stunned the surrounding enemies, causing the enemies to be struck into a soulless state for three to five seconds. Of course, this skill could also instantly kill those ordinary humans who had no magical protection. This skill covered an area of fifty meters.


    The second skill allowed the Giant Raging Ape to form an irregr shaped rock with a diameter of two meters between its palms and then throw it at the enemy. The rock was enchanted with a raging force, which could easily smash into the gigantic body of the Lightning Giant.


    Though the Giant Raging Ape only possessed a few bloodline abilities, they were all perfectly matched with its incredible Physique and Strength. Once any enemy was struck by its Soul Crunching Roar, as a result of the brief moment of soullessness, the enemy wouldn¡¯t be able to escape from the brutal melee attack from this Giant Ape.


    But too bad, such kind of offensive Spirit skill was useless against an Elementium Golem.


    Therefore, the Giant Raging Ape could only futilely chase behind the Lightning Giant. Although the Giant Ape continued leaping and charging forward, knocking down countless trees in its stead like a crazy monkey, it still failed to even touch the shadow of the enemy.


    Right when Greem thought that he could win today¡¯s battle with such a method, the Giant Raging Ape transformed from the green armored man, Toril, who suddenly ditched the tough to catch Lightning Giant, roaring furiously and leaping into Greem¡¯s direction.


    Greem silently sighed.


    Not any idiot could be an Apprentice Adept. This guy had just been unable to control his anger because of the enticement from the Lightning Giant and his mind was further disturbed by the force of bloodline. Now, having yielded no results for such a long time, Toril¡¯s consciousness had once again obtained control of the Giant Raging Ape¡¯s body. Thus, he had given up chasing behind the Lightning Giant like an idiot and switched his target to Greem, the mastermind behind all this.


    As long as he could defeat Greem, the bastard who kept escaping him would vanish into thin air. Even if his attack couldn¡¯t reach Greem, at least he could lure that bastard to Greem¡¯s side and with that, he could finally put his raging force into use.


    With such a simple thought in his mind, the Giant Raging Ape¡¯s eyes turned bloodshot, as he mmed into the ground with both hands and jumped towards Greem.


    Greem was easily able to tell the petty thoughts his opponent had in his mind.


    Indeed, the Lightning Giant had an excellent fighting ability, but it also had a deadly weakness ¨C the person who controlled it was too weak! Thus, Greem was the weak link that anyone could use to defeat the Lightning Giant!


    Relying on the Lightning Giant to block off the assault was no doubt the worst decision. With the melee offensive ability of the Giant Raging Ape, perhaps it would only take it a few dozen of seconds to smash the Lightning Giantpletely, which would eventually damage to the Elementium cores hiding inside of its body.


    Greem checked his own body attributes, the summon of Lightning Giant had consumed seven Spirit points, which left him with less than six. Staring at the Giant Raging Ape who had lept at him with tremendous momentum and feeling the violent shakes on the ground, Greem once again tossed out a crystal clear Elementium core.


    ¡°Show yourself, my Rock Snake!¡±


    Following Greem¡¯s loud roar, a wide, bottomless trench suddenly broke out in the ground in front of him and a frightening giant snake made up entirely of rock slithered out from the cracks.


    The ce where the Rock Snake hade out from was right in the charging path of the Giant Raging Ape. With a coiling movement from its massive body, the Rock Snake climbed up and entangled itself with the Giant Raging Ape¡¯s body.


    In next second, the frightening scene of ¡®King Kong¡¯ fighting a giant snake unveiled in front of Greem¡¯s eyes. Too bad, the violence and savageness brought him no interest in watching this cool battle unfold at a close distance. Instead, he crazily fled from the center of the frightening battle.


    Sand flew into clouds, pebbles swept along the ground, debris of grass flew in the air and huge clouds of dust dispersed quickly in all directions, while countless rock fragments shot out from the battlefield like bullets and smashed into the surrounding forest.


    When the dust cloud had settled down a little bit, Greem finally stopped running further away. The green glow on the his Quicken Boots gradually faded away, as he had ran to a ce half a mile away from the battlefield.


    Throwing a nce over his shoulder and staring into the shaking battlefield, Greem saw that the Lightning Giant was hovering in midair and had lifted both arms in the air. Over its tall body, a funnel shape, slow revolving Thunder Storm was forming at an incredible speed, while the tail of the Thunder Storm was pointing directly at the Giant Raging Ape who had been violently fighting on the battlefield.


    Though it was in the middle of a violent battle, the Giant Raging Ape had quickly noticed the abnormality over its head. With great efforts, it tried to move away from the location the Thunder Storm had locked down on. However, the Rock Snake, who had had its body nearly broken into pieces by the Giant Ape¡¯s earlier attack, had tightly tangled with the giant ape¡¯s feet. No matter how the giant ape tried to attack it, it showed no signs of letting go.


    Soon, after over twenty seconds of brewing, the Thunder Storm had been finallypleted.


    A sudden streak of huge lightning strike sliced the dark night sky into two and filled the entire ce with undying shes of radiance.


    The raging, violent, and scorching hot electricity wantonly slithered around the body of Giant Raging Ape and Rock Snake. The tremendous lightning energy instantly broke through the crimson colored life barrier outside of the Giant Raging Ape¡¯s body and had prated straight away into its huge body.


    In next second, the raging energy exploded inside of the Giant Raging Ape¡¯s body and burst a huge bloody hole in its broad back. Blood sprayed out like a waterfall, but before it could touch the ground, it had been simply evaporated by the violent lightning energy that was wreaking havoc in the air.


    It was a brutal attack, one the Giant Raging Ape couldn¡¯t withstand even with its tough Physique.


    Under the uninterrupted attack from the Thunder Storm, it threw its head back and let out a furious roar into the sky. The Giant Raging Ape finally fell down to the ground and the masculine body starting to shrink slowly until the original look of the green armor guy was revealed.


    ¡°Quick, quick... ask your Golem to gather some of his blood for me!¡± Not knowing when, Mary suddenly appeared beside Greem. She looked at the scene where the dust had finally settled, actually showing a more joyful expression than Greem.


    Ugh...


    Greem turned around and looked at Mary whose face had turned red from excitement and finally realized that he had been used by her. Nevertheless, an ending like this was not bad either ¨C she got the blood she had wanted and Greem had obtained the most satisfying data from the battle. It was a win-win situation! Perhaps, the only one who suffered from all this was that Pseudo-Adept Toril who had possessed a powerful bloodline!


    Greem totally had no intention of killing Toril.


    This ce was within the coverage of Adept Tower¡¯s power. Since Toril was able to have his secluded cultivation here, he must have had some kind of connection with those Adepts in the Adept Tower. It was a little bit over to severely wound this guy for no reason. However, if Greem had taken the opportunity to kill him, perhaps before Greem could even return to the Adept Tower, he would be greeted by someone on his way back.


    Secretly giving out his order to the Lightning Giant, Greem turned around and dragged Mary before running from the scene.


    He had very sensitive senses. While two monsters were fighting, he had detected seven to eight indistinct, yet powerful Spirit waves hiding around the battlefield. Out of all these Spirit waves, one had actually belonged to someone whom Greem was rather familiar with ¨C Adept Angus.


    Hence, the Lighting Giant hovering in the air waved its arm and dispersed the Thunder Storm, before transforming into a dazzling lighting streak and following Greem. As for the Rock Snake who had been left behind on the battlefield, after struggling and freeing itself from the fainted green armor guy, it dragged its broken body and slithered through the grass and also chasing Greem and left this ce.


    Without anyone¡¯s knowledge, before the Rock Snake left, it had secretly swallowed a mouthful of dirt underneath the body of the guy, dirt which was mixed with a huge amount of his blood.


    When peace had once again returned to the ce, two dark figures suddenly emerged beside the green armor guy.


    Leaning forward and giving the guy a look, one of the dark shadows shook his head, sighing.


    ¡°Toril is a junior from your n. So, are you going to let that kid leave just like that?¡±


    Another dark shadow was seen hiding behind a dense ck cloud, only showing two bizarre looking mes in his eyes. With a cold voice, he said, ¡°Hmph, if not for the fact that Angus had stopped me, do you think anyone can leave this ce alive even after bullying a member of the Wharton family?¡±


    ¡°Angus? Oh right! It is his turn on duty at the Adept Tower now. Could this kid be a new junior from his family?¡± The first dark figure asked wonderingly. ¡°Why would he just let his junior to cause trouble freely like this? Don¡¯t tell me he is not afraid of stirring up a war between Adept families?¡±


    ¡°Hmph, that kid is not from his family. I think he was sent by the Zhentarim Association. He is just a little guy who is training here.¡±


    ¡°Eh, there is such a good seed among the neers? Once I finish with my magical experiment, I¡¯ll thoroughly examine him.¡±


    After a short conversation, both men nodded their heads and departed.


    The first dark figure quickly dissolved into the forest, while the other leaned down to pick up Toril into his arms. Following the spread of the dark cloud, they too vanished into thin air.


    Atst, the forest had truly be quiet, leaving behind only the messy battlefield, which quietly showed the miserable experience it had just went through!

 Chapter 97

    Though their minds were filled with worries, the return journey back to the Adept Tower had gone rather smoothly.


    After Greem used a secret magic word to disperse the huge Wind Elementium body of Lightning Giant, within the blink of an eye, the massive monster simply turned back into seven crystal clear, dazzling magical cores.


    Before Greem could put them all away, Mary had leapt forward and ced them in her palms, giving them a good fondle and careful examination, while showing a look of great affection. After some time, as if just looking at them wasn¡¯t enough to express her love, Mary actually brought the primary core to her face and kept stroking it gently, quietly feeling the slight tingling sensations caused by the tiny electricity sparks on her face.


    Ugh... looking at this scene, Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel helpless, as some ck lines appeared on his forehead.


    Come on, though these cores looked beautiful and glittery like some pure and magnificent objects, they were actually a fighting Golem that killed without blinking its eyes! After Mary had witnessed the savage and brutal performance of the Golem, she actually showed great attachment to it. This... Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh with mixed emotions, telling himself that most of the people who took the path of an Adept were those who had some sort of weird mentalities.


    Suppressing theints he had in his mind, Greem finally took back his number one Golem from Mary¡¯s hand. At the same time, he tossed a blood-colored crystal over to her. With Rock Snake¡¯s ability to control Earth Elementium, it wasn¡¯t too big an issue to filter out blood mixed with the dirt. His only hope was that after losing such a huge amount of blood, Toril wouldn¡¯t have his overall strength drop too much, or else, for no reason, Greem would have to face another deadlier enemy in future.


    Even after such a violent battle, all the summoning cores of Lightning Giant were still intact, but the summoning core of Rock Snake had suffered a lot of damage, which was the result of getting an Advanced Apprentice level Rock Snake to risk its life to pin down a formidable Bloodline Pseudo-Adept. After Greem dispersed the Golem¡¯s body, only then had he realized that the Elementium on this summoning core was in a state of disorder and the magical energy was leaking uncontrobly. It simply looked as if it couldn¡¯t be used anymore.


    Greem took some time and examined it thoroughly. When the Chip finally confirmed this summoning core could no longer be repaired, he had no choice but to put it away regretfully.


    And after tidying up themselves at the edge of the mountain range, both of them finally returned to the Adept Tower stealthily. However, as they were about to step into the main entrance of the Adept Tower, the two rock ghost statues ced on either side of the entrance suddenly moved.


    Following a creaking noise produced by their movements, the rock ghost statue on the left, while maintaining their standing position on top of the tall rock tform, leaned forward andboriously moved its rock eyes to stare into Greem¡¯s face.


    ¡°Hey, little guy, the enforcer, Master Angus asked you to pay him a visit at his residence.¡±


    After saying that, it retracted its body and once again resumed its original leaping posture ¨C motionless and noiseless.


    Greem was suddenly startled.


    During his stay in this ce, he had passed by this entrance many times and every time he would see this pair of rock ghost statues guarding the entrance. But, he never thought they were actually automatons. Not only that, they were... Adept level automatons.


    It looked like this seemingly defenseless public Adept Tower wasn¡¯t as fragile as he had initially thought!


    Therefore, the journey that followed was a terrifying one that made his hair stand on end. Wherever Greem and Mary seemed to go, no matter if it was those lifeless statues or the shepherdess in the oil painting that hung on the corridor wall, they all had be alive and continuously repeated the same words.


    ¡°Quickly pay a visit to Adept Angus!¡±


    With regards to these repeating messages, if both of them still had no clue that they were being watched by Adept Angus, then they really were idiots. But this also struck fear into their minds, because they weren¡¯t able to tell what kind of method Adept Angus was using to watch them.


    Hence, immersed in the oppressive atmosphere, both of them soon arrived at Adept Angus¡¯s residence which was located on the fifth floor of the Adept Tower.


    Adept Angus met with them in hisboratory.


    Compared to their imagination, this ce didn¡¯t look as frightening, ghastly and filled with blood a they as they had fantasized. It was a clean and tidy privateboratory of an official Adept; the entire ce was brightly lit and looked rather like an advancedboratory. However, from the many jars that were ced around theboratory, Greem could sense a dazzling red glow. From the living and kicking tiny creatures to the magical organs, all of them emanated a strong aura of energy.


    And clearly, Adept Angus was in the middle of concocting some kind of special potion, as the table in front of him was fully covered with small bottles and test tubes of different shapes. When the both of them have arrived at theboratory, Angus was seen gently shaking a test tube in his hand, and from time to time, he would bring it in front of his eyes to give it a careful examination.


    A mysterious, azure potion was contained in the test tube. Every time Angus shook the test tube, there would be countless tiny bubbles bursting out from the azure potion, and transforming into all sorts of marine creatures. Sometimes it was a mermaid riding on a seahorse, sometimes it was a magical Narwhal flipping its tail and swimming around or sometimes it was a swarm of Silver Swordfish leaping and chasing each other around... In short, whenever he shook the test tube, they would transform into another creature, giving it a touch of bizarreness and mystery.


    Mary always had little resistance to something as peculiar as this, but since they were in theboratory of an official Adept, she just couldn¡¯t act as recklessly as she usually did. Thus, she could only throw her question to Greem using the movement of her lips. Perhaps Mary¡¯s rank was way beyond that of Greem¡¯s, but in terms of magical knowledge and their application in real life, Greem could defeat her easily.


    The blood of a deep sea mermaid!


    Likewise, Greem replied her question moving just his lips. Only the blood of those deep sea mermaids who lived in the deepest area of the ocean could have such a unique illusive effect. That¡¯s right, what they saw just now was not real, but just the illusionary force ignited by the shaking of the azure colored blood.


    After a long time, Adept Angus finally put down the test tube in his hand and turned around to stare at both his visitors.


    ¡°Moments ago, the leader of Wharton family lodged aint. He thinks your reckless behavior has seriously damaged the honor of their family and asked me to hand you over to them. So, tell me, should I listen to his request?¡±


    Mary frowned, as she had no idea how to answer this question. She tilted her head and threw her gaze over to Greem and hinted at him to answer the question.


    Greem smiled and bowed deeply, saying, ¡°Your respectful Master Angus, to my knowledge, the leader of Wharton family is just an ordinary human! How can a mere mortal with no special status give you an order? If they really wanted me and Mary to atone for our mistakes with our life, then the Master Adept behind the family will definitely give out his order personally.¡±


    Adept Angus narrowed his eyes, staring at the duo with a tilted nce.


    Vampire + Golem Controller!


    And that too, they were an Advanced Apprentice level Vampire and Intermediate Apprentice level Golem Controller!


    But there was one thing surprised him ¨C this team was actually headed by the Intermediate Apprentice who was much weaker!


    Could it be because of the excellent potential of Golem Controller put out by this kid or was there another reason? Or else, why else would that little girl, who was an Advanced Apprentice level Vampire, be willing to give up her authority between them?


    After all, not one of the apprentices who took upon the path of Adept had a kind heart. Instead, their mind waspletely filled with arrogance and pride. They were just a group of self-centering people with wild ambitions. It would be absurd if they had willingly treated weaker peers with modesty and an amiable attitude.


    As the result, when any Adept had the need to team up with someone else, the team would usually be headed by the strongest amongst them, while the rest of the team members obeyed all hismands. This situation was even more obvious amongst the Apprentice Adepts. Therefore, Angus showed great interest in the duo in front of him.


    ¡°Kid, being a good talker is useless. The man you provoked this time was Toril, the member of Wharton family who has the highest chance of bing an official Adept. I heard that because of your willful action, the time for that guy to be an official Adept was pushed back by three years! Hahaha... now all the members of Wharton family are showering in mes of anger and they are searching for you two everywhere. Perhaps, once you two leave this ce, there will be arge group of people waiting for you outside, wanting to capture you and exchange you for a reward!¡± A treacherous smile emerged on Adept Angus¡¯s face.


    Greem¡¯s heart began to race, as he felt helpless about their current situation.


    If that Wharton family was really as aggressive as Adept Angus described, perhaps before both of them could even enter the Adept Tower, they would have already been captured. Since Adept Angus said it like that, based on the strong implication of a warning in his words, perhaps he was just intimidating them and forcing them into a trap. Facing the intimidation of an official Adept, what options did these two little Apprentice Adepts have?


    ¡°Your respectful Master Angus, Mary and I are just two mere Apprentice Adepts, naturally, we¡¯re willing to follow anything you say. I wonder is there anything we can offer you our services for?¡±


    Seeing as Greem had behaved as he had expected, Adept Angus let out a satisfied smile.


    ¡°Show me your Golem!¡±


    Without saying another word, Greem presented the summoning cores respectfully with both hands.


    Using his fingers, he pinched each core a few times and gave them all an examining nce; the smile on Angus¡¯s face grew stronger.


    ¡°It looks like they were all personally crafted by you!¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    ¡°If you¡¯re given with three years, can you be an official Adept?¡± Adept Angus suddenly changed the topic.


    ¡°Ah...¡± Greem was dumbstruck and didn¡¯t know what to say. Even Mary couldn¡¯t control herself, as her eyes went wide.


    ¡°There is nothing to feel surprised about! Because I can only protect you for three years. If that Toril bes an official Adept before you, then I have no reason to stop him from seeking his revenge. As for theintsing from his family, they won¡¯t affect me at all. After all, you defeated him in a fair match. If a defeat like that causes the family to jump onto their feet, then the Wharton family will have lost all facepletely. But...¡±


    ¡°Mary and I are willing to pay any price in exchange for your protection, is there anything we can do for you?¡±


    ¡°Hahaha... talking to a smart kid like you really saves me a lot of trouble. Here, this is a magical contract, I want both of you to sign your name on it! Don¡¯t worry, with your current overall strength, I don¡¯t need anything from you. Once you¡¯ve signed the contract, it also means you have signed a contract with my family, the Byron family. With that, I can use the name of the Byron family and provide you with three years of protection and spare you from the retaliation and harassment of the Wharton family.¡±


    ¡°What do I need to do in exchange for the protection?¡±


    ¡°You need to be an official Adept in three years. After that, you have to represent the Byron family and participate in apetition. Apetition that only Titan Controllers, Golem Controllers and Automaton Controllers can participate in.¡±


    Take a second to support UntouchableFly on Patreon! You¡¯ll immediately get ess to as many as 5 patron-only chapters.

 Chapter 98

    ¡°You mean, the minimum requirement to join thispetition is being an official Adept? Could it be... could it be...¡± Greem spoke hesitatingly, as he recalled some relevant content from the vast information about the Adept World he had stored in his mind.


    ¡°That¡¯s right. Thepetition I want you to participate in is the Advancement Competition of Profound Adepts, which will be held in the Sky City in five years. As long as you can help us, the Byron family maintain our selling rights in the Sky City, when everything is over, our family will also reward you with a great gift.¡±


    ¡°I see what you mean now, what you need is a promise. As long as I can promise you that I¡¯ll be an official Adept within three years and represent the Byron family to participate in thatpetition, you¡¯ll provide us with three years of protection. This is a deal where both of us benefit and fulfills the usual practices of fair deals between Adepts. Hence, I ept the deal!¡±


    ¡°Hehe, excellent! Remember, you will only have three years. Once that Toril bes an official Adept, the agreement between us will be voided. After all, no one is willing to had a fall out with a Bloodline Adept who is a good fighter.¡±


    ¡°I understand. I¡¯ll definitely be an official Adept before he does!¡± Greem pledged with sincerity and seriousness.


    Looking at Greem¡¯s seemingly sincere expression, Adept Angus waved his hand, and a clump of gray smoke instantly exploded in front of Greem, before condensing into a magical contract within a split second.


    Greem took a step forward and seriously and detailedly read the magical contract multiple times. After making sure there weren¡¯t any wording or style traps, he carefully inked his magical mark.


    Under normal situations, when a spell caster signed a contract, they disliked leaving behind their soul mark. Though that provided a higher binding effect, it made it rather easy for an outsider to obtain his soul aura. Therefore, in order to deal with such situations, Adepts had created the magical mark. It was a special mark formed with the individual¡¯s unique Spirit wave and the energy of their element.


    With that, not only did they not have to worry about someone obtaining their aura and using it against him, it was also impossible to fake by someone else. That was why it had be epted by all spell casters.


    The magical seal Greem that designed for himself was a tightly clenched fist, covered in mes and soared up into the sky.


    The mes surrounding the iron fist represented his element affinity of Fire, while the iron fist represented strength. His magical seal also represented the wild ambitious that starting to burgeoning deep inside Greem¡¯s heart.


    After putting away the contract, Adept Angus tossed over a chest badge that represented the Byron family over to Greem.


    ¡°By wearing this, as long as you¡¯re in Dagon Region, no one will take the initiative to provoke you. Alright, you can leave now!¡±


    Uponpleting the deal, Adept Angus simply turned Greem and Mary away from hisboratory. For him, this was just one of the backup ns he had prepared for his family. While there were countless other measures he had prepared, it hadn¡¯t reached the level where he needed to handle it solemnly.


    Hence, before that little guy became an official Adept, everything was just casual preparation!


    After Greem and Mary left Angus¡¯s residence with great respect, they were shocked to find that more than twenty elite apprentices had gathered outside of Angus¡¯ residence. They had split into two groups and were confronting each other. When Greem made his appearance, the leaders of both groups immediately rested their eyes on his face.


    When their eyes gazed over the badge pinned on Greem¡¯s chest, the leaders of both fractions had their expressions change at the same time. One gnashed his teeth angrily, while the other¡¯s face was covered with a bright smile; he even took the initiative to hug Greem¡¯s shoulder.


    ¡°So? Now you have seen it for yourself.¡± A gloating expression could be clearly seen on Kevin¡¯s face. ¡°Greem is part of the Byron family now. Stop wasting your time here and leave. Why are you still standing around here?¡±


    Greem roughly remembered that he had seen the leader of the other group in the training camp before. It seemed like his name was Hamill and he was also a Pseudo-Adept. But judging from his unconcealed Spirit wave, obviously, his overall strength was so much weakerpared to Toril.


    ¡°Greem... very good...¡± With a ferocious manner, Hamill threatened, ¡°You¡¯re smart, kid, knowing to hide under the protection of Master Angus. Or else, I, Hamill would have definitely let you known the serious consequences of provoking the Wharton family.¡±


    Greem let out a somber smile.


    ¡°The reason I joined Byron family is because of the care from Adept Angus, as he didn¡¯t want me to be defeated by the crafty plot of a shameless person. However, for someone like you, a coward who only knows how to show his aggressiveness with his mouth, I¡¯ll never be afraid!¡±


    ¡°You...¡±


    ¡°Since you have the desire to seek revenge for that Toril, why don¡¯t we find a chance tomorrow and have a fair fight? As long as you can defeat me in a fair match, I¡¯m willing to give up the protection from Master Angus. So, do you have the guts to ept my challenge?¡±


    ¡°You...¡±


    ¡°Arrogant...!¡±


    ¡°This is absurd...!¡±


    For the moment, all those elite apprentices who followed behind Hamill couldn¡¯t control their anger anymore. Each of them kept scolding and yelling out with a loud voice. Though Hamill was also letting out furious shouts, his eyes flickered and his face looked gloomy. Obviously, he didn¡¯t have the courage to ept Greem¡¯s challenge.


    Greemughed scornfully.


    ¡°Same goes to all of you. For those who want to seek revenge for Toril, I¡¯m open for a fair bet with anyone. As long as you cane out with a satisfying stake, I¡¯ll fight with you right away. So, is anyone willing to have a fair match with me?!¡±


    Greem asked with a severe countenance and a harsh voice. As he red at this group of guys who appeared to be tough outwardly, but actually were timid inside, an indistinct bright light could be seen flickering in his eyes. Even Kevin, who was standing closest to him, was secretly shocked by the aggressiveness emanating from Greem¡¯s eyes.


    Though the group had been here to capture the wild kid who had offended the dignity of Wharton family, when they stared into the aggressive nces of their target, those who kept yelling angrily just now actually had shut their mouth. Some even turned their head sideways to avoid being directly gazed at by Greem.


    At that moment, tens of Advanced Apprentices and Pseudo-Adepts were stuck in an awkward situation, brought on by Greem who was just an Intermediate Apprentice.


    Though they knew by losing their face like this, they would definitely be punished by their family when they returned, no one was willing to stand up and fight this mad guy who was in high spirits.


    Now, they were losing their face as a group, which allowed them to still have room to turn the situation around when they returned. But, if anyone epted the challenge in a moment of madness, the problem they faced would not only be losing their face anymore. It was very likely that they might also have their reputation crushed, which was something they had been building restlessly for the past seven to eight years, and eventually be theughing stock of everyone.


    If their opponent was someone else, they wouldn¡¯t have behaved so cowardly, but this kid in front of them was too strange. He... he actually defeated Toril, who was about to hold his advancement ceremony, also... also they heard he had done that in a fair one-to-one fight.


    When Toril was severely wounded and thrown to the ground, the official Adept sent by Wharton family and stationed in the Underground Cave was right at the spot, but it hadn¡¯t been convenient for him to capture this rascal personally. If this Greem had the courage to directly offended the dignity of an official Adept, no one would stop a Master Adept from killing him personally.


    But... but the problem was, this kid actually beaten Toril toa in a fair match. If the Master Adept struck at that point in time, other families would have definitely beenughing at him, teasing him for not having any other sessors in his family, as they even needed an official Adept to handle something as petty as dealing with an Intermediate Apprentice.


    Therefore, after weighing and considering the situation, this group hade here together to question Greem and capture him in the name of their family. However, since this guy was now part of the Byron family, it was impossible for them to give him a serious beating without any forethought. But... in order to capture him with a one versus one fight, none of this guys had the confidence.


    Depressed, extremely depressed! Indignation, an indescribable indignation!


    Tens of elite apprentices from Wharton family had their face turned livid with rage. It was as if their bodies were attacked by hundreds of thousands of ants; it was an extremely awkward situation for them.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go, we¡¯ll settle this score with him in future!¡± Realizing that the situation was going out of his control, Hamill furiously waved his hand and took all his men and quickly left the scene.


    Watching how the group of elite apprentices hade in a threatening and ready to fight manner, but eventually left sheepishly, the members of the Byron family remained at the scene and kept exchanging nces with each other speechlessly. They were all veterans of the training camp. Although because of thepetition, both families didn¡¯t have a concord rtionship, actually, both groups were pretty familiar with each other. If their positions were reversed in this situation, perhaps their performance wouldn¡¯t have been better than those from Wharton family.


    It was not because they were ipetent, but because this rascal had strange abilities!


    Since Kevin was experienced in such scenes, he pushed Greem and brought him out from the ce.


    ¡°Brother, since you have be a part of us, then as your brother, I¡¯ll not regard you as an outsider anymore. Don¡¯t worry, in Dagon region, as long as you show the badge of the Byron family, no one will give you any trouble. If someone does, tell me and I¡¯ll bring our men to annihte him!¡±


    A big smile was immediately brought to Greem¡¯s face and he expressed his gratitude to Kevin.


    Kevin was not bragging, what he had said was actually real.


    ording to the Chronicle of Adept Families, there were more than twenty Adept Families with the proper name who could be found in this Dagon region. Among these families, the Byron family, which Kevin was working for, could easily be ranked among the top three of all Adept families in this region. Also, the Byron and Mises family had supported a small human kingdom which had upied a huge area of fertilend in the central area of the Dagon region.


    Therefore, the promise of providing him protection within the entire Dagon region wasn¡¯t a lie at all.


    In fact, not only the entire Dagon region, this kind of situation wasmon throughout the entire Zhentarim territory. In this world ruled by Adepts, the noble or even imperial families of human were just tools and servants who helped Adept families manage ordinary mortals. If any of them offended the Adept family who supported them, even if he was a king of a human kingdom, he would have to step down from his throne or even die of ¡®sickness¡¯.


    For Kevin, as the nephew of Adept Angus, if he paid a visit to a human kingdom, he would be weed with the most luxurious, grandest reception and treatment. As long as he nodded his head slightly, even if he wanted some princesses to serve him on his bed, those kings would personally send them to his bed with a bright smile on their faces.


    This was in fact, the most realistic yet cruel reality of the current Adept World!

 Chapter 99

    Right from the start, the Underground Cave was a ce where one was apt to get into trouble.


    Though no one had purposefully spread the news, early next morning, nearly the entire Adept Tower was startled by a frightening news that had spread like the gue.


    In a fair one-on-one match, an individual who had recently broken through to Intermediate Apprentice Adept had defeated Toril, the member of the Wharton family who had the highest chance of bing an official Adept in the shortest amount of time. When the news was freshly heard, countless Apprentice Adepts simply sniffed at it to show their contempt.


    In the World of Adept, even within the same grade, but just different by one or two minor tiers, let alone the gap between two major grades, there would be a jaw-dropping difference between their overall strength. Some busybodies actually performed a statistical study before. In a normal battle, a Pseudo-Adept could easily defend himself from the joint attack of two to three Advanced Apprentices and could just as easily defend himself against the joint attack from a double digit number of Intermediate Apprentices.


    Therefore, when they heard the news for the first time, most of the people just treated it as a lousy lie used by an enemy of the Wharton family to bring shame to them. But as time went by, the ¡®lie¡¯ had grown hotter and hotter, so much so that many guys who were well-known among the elite apprentices vowed solemnly that it was real.


    As the result, a massive storm broke out in the circle of Apprentice Adepts within the Adept Tower of Underground Cave!


    Countless Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced Apprentices ran around, spreading the news, while inquiring about the genuine version of that ¡®rumor¡¯. Soon, all the rumors gathered through the grapevine had pointed to a name that everybody was unfamiliar with ¨C Greem. Hence, more news about Greem was dug out.


    For example, when Greem had arrived at the Underground Cave, he had just been a Beginner Apprentice. Also, during his first trip to the Underground World, he had killed the frightening Demon Vine Lady and gotten himself the first head of a Fallen Apprentice. Not only that, when he was invited to join the training camp, he actually had defeated two elite Advanced Apprentices...


    When the series of outstanding results were pieced together, every single apprentice who heard about it was struck with astonishment.


    This... how could this be possible?


    Everyone was very familiar with the overall strength of an apprentice who had just be an Intermediate Apprentice. During this stage, their overall strength was in a rather awkward situation, as usually they had only mastered two to three offensive magic spells. Some with a stronger overall strength would master a defensive magic spell in advance, while those ordinary Intermediate Apprentices would have to fight nakedly for a long period of time before they mastered the first defensive magic spell in their life.


    Comparing an overall strength like this to an Advanced Apprentice who been thoroughly tempered or even those Pseudo-Adepts who had nearly reached the pinnacle of apprenticeship, it was like the difference between a five to six year old toddler and a youth who had nearly be an adult. Most of the time, a gap in overall strength like this could never be covered up by skillful techniques or experience.


    But they soon learned that, it was highly possible that this man of marvel, Greem, was a Golem Controller who had extraordinary talent. He was able to overstep the constraints of his level and control many powerful magical Golems. After this news was spread, it immediately made the few rare Golem controllers within the apprentice circle feel proud of themselves; they even walked and talked with a higher spirit aspared to before.


    However, none of them knew at this moment when they were discussing about this miraculous Golem Controller with much warmth, Greem, whose face would have blushed because of the discussion, had brought Mary and Snox and ventured deep into the Underground Cave. They followed the path he found on his previous trip and stealthily traveled towards the ruins of the Adept Tower.


    To be honest, with regards to this treasure hunting trip, though Greem had prepared numerous ns and strategies in his mind, when his opponent was an Adept level demon, it was unknown whether these ns and strategies would work as they were designed to.


    Riding on the back of the Demon Alligator Hunter, the trio had a meeting and repeatedly cross-checked each other¡¯s tasks. In order to defeat the Transvestite Fairy, not only Greem had to face a tremendous amount of pressure, he even arranged an extremely important task for both Mary and Snox toplete.


    As the main force for the war, Greem¡¯s existence was used to attract attention. Only by luring the frightening Fairy away from the entrance of the ruin could Mary and Snox have the chance to sneak into the ce and search for the true form of the Fairy.


    And only by finding a way to cut off the spiritual connection between the Fairy and its true form would Greem have the possibility of defeating it face-to-face. Or else, if he had to fight aplete Fairy, even if Greem sacrificed all of his Golems, he might not be able to obtain any advantage.


    Perhaps the previous lesson was overly painful as all the Gnolls that had been prowling at the outer perimeter of the ruin had actually disappeared. This really surprised Greem who had nned to make a clean wipe of the outer perimeter first.


    When Demon Alligator Hunter once again arrived in front of the demonized forest, both Mary and Snox had their jaws dropped in amazement. They wouldn¡¯t be so surprised if what they saw was on the surface world. However, when they were at nearly twenty miles underneath the surface, yet were still able to see such a wild profusion of vegetation. This really astounded both of them who had got used to the deste and lonely environment of the Underground World!


    ¡°Let¡¯s move, and don¡¯t forget about your task. Once that Fairy leaves the ce, both of you need to act fast, because I can¡¯t stand against it for a long time!¡± Before they separated, Greem couldn¡¯t help but urge once again.


    A sweet smile emerged on Mary¡¯s pretty face. Her slim body leapt into the air and within a split second, she had transformed into a fist-sized red bat and flew into the forest.


    Greem didn¡¯t have too many worries for Mary. Both her overall strength of an Advance Apprentice Vampire and her new ability, Natural Charm were the biggest guarantees for her survival. Especially thetter, in a chaotic demonized forest such as this, as long as she didn¡¯t actively attack the enemy, ordinary demonized creatures and nts wouldn¡¯t attack her actively either.


    In fact, the ability of Natural Charm could actually ignore the species, genders, factions, and some other factors, and directly influence the subconscious mind of any intelligent creature. Thus, it could simply be regarded as the best innate ability for treasure hunting in the wilderness. Allegedly, the advancement requirement for this very unique ss actually needed the ability of Natural Charm as a foundation.


    The current Snox was seen wearing a torn and tattered leather armor, while having a perfectly matching old cloak flinging behind its back. Also, the short wooden stick that it always carried around was found in its hand.


    ¡°Master, rest assure, I¡¯ll try my best toplete the task!¡± Snox bowed respectfully before jumping off from the Demon Alligator. It moved its short legs and strode into the depths of the forest.


    Though the demonized forest was a ce filled with dangers, for a goblin who had mastered Invisibility and Camouge, those low ranked demons could never threaten its life. Also, with Mary protecting it in the dark, even if some demons had discovered Snox, they would be ¡®lucky¡¯ enough to have gotten themselves killed.


    When both peers disappeared, only then had Greem dispersed the Demon Alligator Hunter and freed up two Spirit points used to summon it. For the uing battle, he needed his most powerfulbative force, thus every single Spirit point was extremely precious and couldn¡¯t afford to waste any of them.


    After adjusting and calmed down his Spirit, without any hesitation, Greem summoned the Lightning Giant and a Rock Snake. It took seven Spirit points to maintain the existence of the Lightning Giant, while Rock Snake upies three Spirit points. Currently, Greem¡¯s Spirit had reached 13.25 (including the +1 effect from the Circlet of Nobility), if he was pushed to his limit, he could summon another Rock Snake or a Water Elemental.


    This was the strongest battle group Greem could achieve after pushing himself to the limit.


    Nevertheless, considering the surrounding environment in this ce wasn¡¯t suitable to let out histest golem, the Water Elemental, to unleash its strongestbative strength, Greem preferred the former option.


    Upon the appearance of the Lightning Giant, deep and muffled thunderps immediately echoed throughout this spacious underground space. With its entire body covered by a crackling lightning storm, the Lightning Giant opened up its dazzling eyes and hovered in the air over ten meters from the group. It took the lead and charged into the demonized forest.


    Greem gritted his teeth and briefly organized the equipment on his body, before following behind the Lightning Giant without another nce backwards. Meanwhile, the massive Rock Snake was slowly slithering behind Greem, keeping its high vignce towards any possible attacks that mighte from his back.


    A man and two monsters were slowly walking in the demonized forest.


    Greem didn¡¯t need to waste his time or effort cleaning any of those troublesome vines or bushes on their way, as the Lightning Giant¡¯s tall body shed through any nts that got too close to it, turning them into a pile of ashes by the sudden strike of the thunderstorm. Even those little animals hiding in the dense woods couldn¡¯t escape from it! As long as their life aura was detected by the Lightning Giant, they would be greeted by a lightning strike.


    With the peak Pseudo-Adept level overall strength of the Lightning Giant, even those Iron Rhinoceros who were known for their strong vitality couldn¡¯t withstand the lightning strike it casually unleashed, let alone those small demons who only had with their strange abilities and the ability to hide!


    Completely advancing while crushing everything in their path!


    Wherever they passed, everything would be turned into ashes, even the ground was filled with burned cracks caused by the lightning strikes!


    Though the demons wished to protect the magical source which brought them endless power, when thergest pack of violent wolves were totally wiped out by the Lightning Giant, these demons had finally be scared and started to crazily flee from the messenger from hell who could bring death upon all of them.


    At the same time, right in front of the copsed Adept Tower where Greem had visitedst time, the seductive body of Fairy was seen gradually emerging from thin air.


    It was overlooking the rocking dark cloud that had formed above the forest. From time to time, a dazzling lightning strike would struck out from it, following by a series of muffled thunderps. Though it couldn¡¯t see the numbers of the enemy from here, but judging from the power of this summoned thunder cloud, the Fairy had furrowed its brows slightly, as if trying to make a tough decision.


    Looking at the direction where the thunder cloud was headed, it seemed its destination was right where the Fairy was.


    If these intruders were allowed to bring those mes of war to this ce, perhaps they would cause an inestimable damage to the life source hidden underground. Finally, a firm expression emerged on the beautiful and delicate face of the Fairy. With its hand making a grabbing movement in the air, the magical bow that it had owned since the day it had been born appeared in its grip.


    Following a whisper from the Fairy, the demonized nts around the ruins started to grow crazily and soon a dense green foliage had totally covered up the secret entrance to the ruin.


    After finishing all these, the Fairly shouted angrily, flipping its near transparent wings, before leaping towards the enemy with tremendous speed.

 Chapter 100

    The Fairy had an incredible flying speed. It actually intercepted Greem and his golems in the middle of the demonized jungle.


    ¡°It¡¯s you again? You don¡¯t know the difference between life and death! This time, don¡¯t even think about leaving this ce alive!¡±


    Looking at the rather familiar face of Greem, two Spirit mes of anger immediately shot out from the Fairy¡¯s eyes. Even though there were nearly a hundred meters of distance between them, the intense Spiritual pressure still cause Greem¡¯s heart to tremble violently. He struggled to maintain a calm mentality.


    Damn it! As expected, he couldn¡¯t handle an Adept level demon at his current level of strength!


    Greem kept backing off. It was only when the Rock Snake coiled its body around Greem and protected him inside its coils that he could calm his panicked mind down and regain his thoughts.


    ¡®Lightning Giant, engage it. Don¡¯t let it have any opportunity to attack me!¡¯ Greem transmitted his order through a hidden Spiritual channel.


    Almost straight away, the Lightning Giant ced its palms together and unleashed a huge lightning strike that had the diameter of a washbowl. It flew straight at the Fairy, who was hovering in the air.


    Obviously, the Fairy was very confident in its Rose Armor, since it actually didn¡¯t speed up and dodge the attack. Instead, it pushed through the raging Elementium Lightning and ferociously leapt onto the Lightning Giant, who was in the middle of attracting lightning.


    While it did so, numerous rose stalks burst out from its body and started twisting and interlocking with each other. The stalks formed an exquisite looking rose armor that protected its body within. After that, it braved the sshing electric arcs, stretched out one of its hand, and forcefully pierced toward the target¡¯s chest.


    The Fairy had extraordinarybat instinct, which allowed it to clearly identify the strengths and weaknesses of the Lightning Giant.


    When fighting an Elementium Golem like this, reducing its strength slowly was definitely not the best method. Though doing so would allow the Fairy to suffer less attacks, it would also drag the battle into an unpredictable and tough to control fight of attrition. Therefore, it had to kill the Lightning Giant using the least amount of time possible, even if that would consume some of its defensive strength. This was, in fact, the best method of preventing the enemy from controlling the pace of the battle.


    In the face of the enemy¡¯s solo onrush, the Lightning Giant showed no emotion at all. A sudden thunderp emanated from its body, and immediately, the Lightning Chain unleashed from its palms became thicker. Also, half a second before the sparkling arm of the Fairy drilled a hole through its chest, the electricity surrounded the Lightning Giant¡¯s body shed, and it suddenly vanished from the scene.


    Lightning Jump!


    Though it had ¡®jump¡¯ in the name, the actual result was no different than a short distance teleportation.


    A loud thunderp was heard from hundred meters away. With its body shrouded in violent electricity, the Lightning Giant reappeared where the noise had originated. There wasn¡¯t any dy or hesitation. Right as it reappeared, a brand new Lightning Chain streaked across the hundred-meter distance and struck the Fairy¡¯s delicate body.


    It was worth mentioning, among all of the Elementium magic spells, Lightning element magic spells held the top position in speed. It had nearly reached the stage of reaching the enemy with just a thought. Only those who had Agility at level 20 could dodge an attack with such incredible speed.


    A joyful expression emerged on Greem¡¯s face.


    But, before the smile could fully bloom on his face, Greem couldn¡¯t help but show a bitter expression.


    Indeed, with the overall strength of the Lightning Giant, it was more than enough to deal with the frightening Fairy. But, it was also because of the extraordinary overall strength of the Lightning Giant, that it had clearly portrayed the weakness of its master, Greem. Thus, when the frightening Fairy couldn¡¯t find any loophole on the Lightning Giant, perhaps it would switch its attention to...


    While Greem was pondering silently, as expected, after quickly exchanging a few rounds of attack with the Lightning Giant, the Fairy suddenly halted, slowly turned its head, and looked over at Greem.


    Damn it, damn it, damn it...


    Without saying another word, Greem simply turned around, taking the Rock Snake, and fled into the distance.


    ............


    While the thunder cloud hovered over the demonized forest and the loud boom of lightning strikes echoed throughout the entire cavern, at the edge of the forest closest to the cavern entrance, a dense clump of Earth Elementium suddenly sprayed out from underground. It quickly formed into a ring-shaped magical array with a three meter diameter.


    A massive gray dust cloud burst out from the magical array. Soon, five incorporeal, strange looking human figures formed.


    Following a muffled boom, a light yellow ring made of Earth Elementium shed and the dust pir hovering in the air suddenly exploded, revealing five Fallen Pseudo-Adepts, who had arrived via teleportation.


    Langdon, Philip, Hegel, and the other two Fallen Pseudo-Adepts whose names were unknown.


    All five men were swaying, but, relying on their powerful Spirit, they quickly dispelled the Earth Elementium which had invaded into their body and once again calmed their minds.


    Though Stratum Teleportation provided greater speedpared to running on their feet, they experienced a short period of dizziness after each teleportation. Thus, it was totally unsuitable to use in a sudden ambush, but instead, a supplementary method when traveling long distances.


    When the group of men finally got rid of the dizziness caused by the teleportation, they started ncing over to the forest not far away. They were immediately attracted by the deafening noise of the violent thunderps.


    Clearly, that ce had turned into a frightening killing field!


    Standing straight and tall, Langdon looked over at the thunder cloud in the far distance. His gaze followed two vague figures who were flying at top speed and attacking each other under the thunder cloud. A strangely satisfied emotion surged up in his mind.


    Damn kid, let me see where can you run this time! No matter how many people you brought here, I want all of you to die in this demonized forest!


    ¡°Let¡¯s go! It is about time for us to make our debut!¡± With a hideous smile, Langdon took the lead and walked into the forest. Behind him, the remaining four Fallen Pseudo-Adepts exchanged nces with each other, said nothing, and followed his footsteps.


    ............


    While thunderous rumbling was heard in the distance, a red bat was pping its wings and approaching the entrance of the ruin.


    Upon sensing the life aura that came from the body of the red bat, a long thin vine suddenly shot out from the dense bushes that tightly nketed the entire ruin. It coiled towards the red bat, who was flying at low altitude but with incredible speed.


    Mary let out a loud shout. Her body instantly transformed back to human form, and she used her pair of razor sharp ws to swing fiercely in the air. Within the time of a few blinks, the demon vine¡¯s tentacle was sliced into countless pieces.


    It was like she had stirred up a nest of hos! In the next second, countless vines shot out from the foliage, forming into a dense green forest, crazily piercing and coiling towards Mary.


    A hideous expression came on to Mary¡¯s face. She then turned into crimson lightning, savagely streaking into the heart of the green forest. She kept swinging her razor sharp ws. Each strike cut through a thick vine, causing sticky green liquid to spray out from the broken vine.


    As Mary was restlessly fighting with the vine forest, a bizarre demon vine poked out from a huge green leaf, pointing its end right at Mary from a distance. The end of the demon vine spread out like a flower and revealed a strange eyeball that looked steadily at Mary. No matter how she twisted and turned, she just couldn¡¯t escape from the eyeball¡¯s vision.


    While fighting in another battlefield in the far distance, the Fairy recieved the projected image of Mary restlessly ughtering the demon vine, causing it to slow down its movements slightly.


    For other people, such a slow down was nearly impossible to detect, but in the eyes of the Lightning Giant, it was distinct and clear. A crackling lightning spear instantly hit the flower armor of the Fairy.


    The sudden mini lightning storm flooded the Fairy and fully tested the magic resistance of the Rose Armor.


    So far, though the Lightning Giant had fought with the Fairy for such a long time, it still hadn¡¯t broken through the defense of the Rose Armor. It was like those flower stalks could regrow forever. Whenever one was burned off, soon another would regrow.


    Though the Lightning Giant had tried its best, it still hadn¡¯t inflicted any actual damage. At most, it only managed to destroy some of the Fairy¡¯s defensive magical equipment.


    The new enemy in the distance distracted the Fairy¡¯s mind, making it let out a furious roar and want to leave the battlefield. Therefore, the Lighting Giant, who had been fighting with guerri tactics, immediately charged forward, pushing through the violent arrow showers of the Fairy, and entangled them together.


    Meanwhile, at the ruins of Adept Tower, because of Mary¡¯s daring and savage attack, the ground was fully filled with countless twisting and struggling broken demon vines. When the number of demon vines was reduced to a certain level, a concealed dark hole was revealed.


    While the demon vine forest and Mary were fighting with all they had, a gray rock that no one noticed was seen moving toward the hole, one step at a time.


    Carefully dodging the demon vines that rolled all over the ground, trying its best to avoid being stained by the green liquid, Snox kept scanning for danger around its body through the opening of its cloak. Then, moving one step at a time, it slowly approached the entrance to the ruin.


    Mary knew what it was doing, and was working hard to attract all the attacks of the demon vines to one side, allowing the goblin, Snox, to infiltrate the heart of the enemy using its camouge skill.


    Finally, after journeying over numerous obstacles, Snox arrived at the hole.


    Hesitating for a few seconds, Snox touched the magical cor strapped around its neck. Sensing the magical contract that was taking effect in its body, it finally made up its mind toplete the task given by its master.


    What to do? Before they hade, in order to ensure the sess of the mission, Greem had purposely paid a visit to Adept Angus and purchased a magical servant contract from him.


    The magical servant contract was currently taking effect on Snox. Once it thought or behaved in a way that betrayed its master, that young man could sense it. And at that point in time, all he needed to do was recite some secret magic words, then the magical cor strapped on Snox¡¯s neck would instantly crush its head.


    Therefore, if Snox wished to live on, it would have toplete its task, ording to the order of its master!


    Throwing away all of the unnecessary fantasies in its mind, Snox gently shook off the magical camouge from its body. Then it waved the short wooden stick and cast an Invisibility spell on itself. Finally, it dashed into the hole without looking back.


    Just as Snox dashed into the hole, at the far distance, a few of the main characters of the event were instantly struck with a vague feeling. All of them sent a nce over to the location of the ruin¡¯s entrance at the same time.

 Chapter 101

    Within just five minutes, the Lightning Giant had been hurt by an unprecedented torture.


    Though it had the overall strength to crush the strongest Pseudo-Adept, its weakness was as vivid as its strength ¨C its defense was overly weak!


    The Wind Vortex surrounding its body could deflect an enemy¡¯s attack using its powerful airflow, while the Lightning Shield and golden armor also effectively reduced the strength of an enemy¡¯s attack. With these threeyers of magical defense, the Lightning Giant could audaciouslyunch attacks at the enemy and dodge the enemy attacks with its lightning speed without too much worry.


    Due to the Lightning Giant¡¯s Lightning Jump ability, not many enemies were able to catch up to its movements.


    But when using to intercept the enemy, especially the Fairy who had a stronger overall strength than the Lightning Giant, its¡¯ fatal weakness of rather a fragile individual defense and theck of a solid body had been revealed. Within the period of five minutes, the magical defense outside of its body had been broken through seven times, while multiple parts of its tall, mighty and cloud-like body had been ripped apart by the Fairy.


    If Greem had not sent the Rock Snake as reinforcement in time, the Lighting Giant probably would have been forced to abandon a part of its body in order to protect the two most critical cores inside of its body.


    Nevertheless, the Transvestite Fairy was, after all, an Adept level demon. Thus, any offensive magic spell or physical attack casually unleashed by it would always cause frightening damage to the Rock Snake or Lightning Giant. Since the Rock Snake had a body made of a thick and dense underground sedimentary rock, even if faced a Pseudo-Adept opponent, as long as it didn¡¯t let the opponent hit the same spot multiple times, it did not have to worry about its rocky body being broken by the enemy.


    But when facing against the Adept level Fairy, the rocky body had not been tempered and the magical defense was overly fragile. Struck by the rain of greenish arrows, the entire body of the Rock Snake looked like it was soaking in a highly concentrated acid, as its surface corroded with countless holes of all sizes. And due theck of Earth Elementium, the bonding agent on many parts of its body, the rocks on those parts had started to fall off its body.


    The entire body of the snake had be three sizes ¡®skinnier¡¯.


    As the offensive strength of the Light Arrow Shower had exceeded the self-regenerating speed of the Rock Snake, thus, it was only a matter of time before the Rock Snake disintegratedpletely.


    But in this tough battle, Rock Snake was not the main force. It was only responsible for assisting and supporting the attacks and defenses of the Lightning Giant. Thus, just the shock wave from the battle of those two mighty monsters had nearly made it break down. From this, one could easily imagine how tremendous the pressure the Lightning Giant was enduring right now.


    The once dense and solid green body was filled with holes now, the cloud-like Wind Elementium that had been torn and ripped into shreds were lingering around its body. These Wind Elementiums were originally part of the Lightning Giant¡¯s body, but they had turned green as the result of being corroded by the mutated energy of the Fairy and thus could no longer be recalled to use again.


    The golden armor had also fallen apart, as threads of lightning energy continued to dissipate into the air ¨C a clear sign that the Lightning Giant¡¯s ability to restrict its own energy had been reduced to the lowest level.


    However, the beautiful Fairy, who had the upper hand and was in an advantageous position in the battlefield, actually looked restless and feverish. In fact, many times it had been able to push the Rock Snake to a corner. With just another round of fierce attack, it would have been able to pierce through the triangle-shaped head of the Rock Snake and crush the crystal core hiding inside its skull. Instead, it behaved like it was rushing for a very important date. As whenever there was a chance, it would turn around and try to leave the ce, wasting the best opportunity to kill one of its enemies.


    Therefore, relying on just the alternating cover fire, while being desperately held down by the Rock Snake and Lightning Giant, the Fairy continued to retreat while counter attacking. However, it just wasn¡¯t able to get rid of these two super glues even after spending fifteen minutes.


    Yet, right at this moment, the five Fallen Pseudo-Adepts from Elysium City had suddenly appeared at the edge of the battlefield.


    No doubt, for both parties in battle, their arrival was a massive storm.


    The Fairy was struck by a sudden sense of danger. It had felt with its own strength, it was probable that it wouldn¡¯t be able to chase these group of enemies out of here today. Meanwhile, Greem¡¯s heart started to race as he was hiding outside of the battlefield. He realized there was a huge loophole in his n and thus, it looked like there was going to be a long day ahead.


    Upon stepping into the battlefield, the faces of all five Fallen Pseudo-Adepts showed a horrified expression.


    Previously, when they had sensed the uproarious battle happening in the demonized forest from a far distance, they thought that Greem had invited a whole group of surface Apprentice Adepts to jointly attack the Adept level Fairy. Who knew that when they came to the scene and took a look, it was actually... just Greem¡¯s Golem team that was fighting against the frightening Fairy. The discovery had no doubt made them more fearful of this strange kid, who appeared to only possess the overall strength of an Intermediate Apprentice.


    There was absolutely no way they could allow someone like this to continue to grow!


    Facing the five Fallen Pseudo-Adepts who hade in a very threatening manner, Greem waved his hand and called the Rock Snake and Lightning Giant back, before turning around and starting to flee.


    The miserable looking Rock Snake caught up to Greem, opened its giant mouth and swallowed him, before simply diving into the ground and disappearing without a trace. At the same time, enshrouded by crackling and dazzling electricity, the Lightning Giant vanished from the scene, and in next second, suddenly reappeared at the far end of one¡¯s line of sight. But before they could catch up with it, the muffled sound of thunderp rang out once again and the Lightning Giant had disappeared again without a trace.


    Freed from the tangles of the Lightning Giant, the frightening Fairypletely ignored these few neers, pped its wings and rushed back to the entrance to the ruins.


    When it finally returned to the ruins, the Fairy found that the entire demon vine forest was in shambles.


    Scattered, broken branches of demon vines and stinky, sticky green acid decorated this ce and making it look like a miserable battlefield. Yet, the culprit behind this, the red-dressed Mary had long disappeared from the scene.


    The Fairy let out a furious roar, retracted its wings and dived into the dark entrance.


    Originally, there hadn¡¯t been any passage under the ground.


    When the self-destructing magical array of the Adept Tower had been activated, by a series of explosions, most of the magical equipment in this ce had been turned into broken gravel and debris that scattered everywhere, burying everything under the copsed rocks and sand. However, a Human-face Flower that originally nted in the magical garden had been fortunate enough to survive the explosion.


    After sensing the huge amount of green nt element energy leaking out from deep underground, the Human-face Flower hadmenced the tireless journey of digging. Supported by its wild hunger for the nt element energy, it had actually bored through the dense and solid heap of rubbles as far as dozens of meters underground, before setting its root into a surviving broken Elementium Pool inside of the Adept Tower.


    Dominated by and by absorbing the mutated energy, the Human-face flower was able to step over numerous thresholds that ordinary demons could hardly ovee and eventually became the first frightening demon in this demonized forest to possess the overall strength of an Adept.


    Although its overall strength had skyrocketed, it had been stillcking in intelligence and magical knowledge. As a matter of fact, this was the weakness of all wild demons. Even though by using the method of seizing resources, they were also able to be formidable existences that couldpete with human Adepts, because theycked the legacy of a magic spell, it was tough for them to fight against a human Adept of the same grade.


    And, once they exposed themselves, often times they became prey hunted by human Adepts. Where had all the rare materials in the Adept Worlde from? They actually came from these wild demons who had never gotten eptance from human Adepts.


    Of course, there existed some foreign species Adept that were epted by humans.


    ording to Greem¡¯s knowledge, in the World of Adept, the number of marine species Adepts was nearly equal to the number of human Adepts. Apart from that, there was also some foreign species who possessed strange innate abilities who were also epted by the World of Adept and be part of the poption of official Adepts.


    Take this frightening Fairy as an example. If there was a human Adept family who was willing to ept it and taught it some of the customs and knowledge of the Adept World, then it would have had the possibility of being epted by human Adepts. Unfortunately, in this uncivilized and dark Underground Cave, it could only mix with a bunch of low-grade demons who had low intelligence and had onlye to evolve by ughtering, which caused it to fear contact with any humans.


    Driven by its fear, this demonized forest dweller had developed the xenophobia and aggressiveness toward any outsider. Those underground races who had lived in the surrounding areas of the demonized forest kepting here to harvest some of the materials that Adepts wanted, had further intensified its feelings of confrontation and conflict.


    In the eyes of humans, this demonized forest was like a magical treasure vault containing numerous magical materials. Yet, in the eyes of the Fairy and all other demons in this forest, the humans and underground creatures were the fresh food that could satiate their hunger.


    As a result as this hostile rtionship, any foreign species who intruded into the demonized forest would immediately attract a violent response from the demons.


    Flying down the dark and narrow tunnel in top speed, the Fairy¡¯s mind waspletely filled with anger. It wished to charge into the ce and ughter everything in sight and cruelly kill every single enemy who dared to intrude on its territory.


    But before that, it had to guarantee the safety of the source of its power.


    It had personally excavated the dark and deep tunnel; it was a winding tunnel that twisted and turned in all directions and its diameter was just enough to allow the Fairy¡¯s slim body to travel through. The entire stretch of tunnel was filled with countless openings, most of them led to some crafty trap or a dead end. There was only one path that would lead to its nest directly.


    Though most of the upper floors of the Adept Tower had copsed, in the first and second underground floors, there were still some magical equipment that were preserved in good shape. Aftering out of the dark tunnel, one woulde upon a broken corridor which had originally belonged to the first underground floor. Most of the stone rooms and magical secret rooms on both sides of the tunnel had been broken through by force. Looking through the broken stone doors, it was evident that there was nothing left inside.


    Originally, this ce had been used as a storage warehouse for the Adept Tower, thus there were many spare resources. However, throughout the years, they were all breached by the Fairy and it had looted everything stored inside.


    The Fairy hadn¡¯t stopped here and had continued to rush through the corridor, following the spiral stone stair located at the end of the passage and leaping towards the second underground floor, where its true form was located.


    However, without its detections, right inside of an emptied stone room, in a dark corner where no light could reach, a pair of crimson eyes had suddenly opened.

 Chapter 102

    The second underground floor, which served as the energy room for Adept Tower, was a huge and spacious space.


    The copse of the above-ground buildings had caused an immeasurable amount of damage to this floor. Out of the five Elementium Pools, four of them had beenpletely destroyed by the devastating explosion. Thest Elementium Pool had suffered some damage as well, as the supposedly bnced magical elementium contained within had skewed. It now contained primarily nt Elementium.


    Every Elementium Pool was a huge pool. The pool wall waspletely engraved with countless magic spell runes and magical lines. The energy gathering array at the bottom of the pool constantly absorbed magical Elementium from the surrounding space and filled the huge pool.


    Four of the Elementium Pools had copsed and broken down. The debris and rock fragments that had fallen from above had fully filled the pool, and the remaining magical arrays had stopped giving out the glow which meant the magical energy was functioning. The surviving Elementium Pool was functioning, but one could see a huge crack in the pool wall.


    Elementium water was leaking out from the crack and was diffusing into the surrounding air.


    Clearly, the dissipating magical energy was mainly nt element energy, for an indescribably pleasant scent of vegetation had filled the entire underground floor.


    Right in the middle of the remaining Elementium Pool, there was a huge, ancient looking tree that filled every inch of the pool with its sprawling roots. Its trunk took five men to encircle. On top of the ancient tree was a huge room made up of pink flower petals, and inside was a warm and sweet little bed made of fragrant and soft flower pistils. All of it emanated a luscious scent that could make anyone drunk.


    Although it looked like a tall and ancient tree, in fact, it was not a real tree, but the true form of the Fairy, who was originally a tiny and delicate Human-faced Flower. Because it had absorbed a huge amount of nt element magical Elementium, it had grown explosively into its current form.


    Honestly speaking, from its current looks, perhaps even the most knowledgeable Adept would have a tough time identifying its original species. After all, it was extremely rare to see a demon who had solely upied an Elementium Pool!


    After it had rushed to the underground floor, upon realizing nothing had happened to its true form, which upied almost 1/5 of the underground space, the Fairy finally breathed out a sigh of relief. But when itmunicated with its true form¡¯s sleeping consciousness, it suddenly let out a shrill roar.


    It had a jarring and sharp voice, abination of male and female, that was noisy and unpleasant to the ears.


    ¡°You damn bastard, get out here! What have you done to my true form?¡±


    After the Fairy waved its slim arm, countless green acid arrows shot out instantly, targeting a seemingly insignificant rock at the corner of a far away wall.


    ¡°Don¡¯t hit me, don¡¯t hit me! I¡¯ming out now!¡± A panic-stricken cry was heard, and then the short and green body of Snox rolled out from where the incorporeal rock had been.


    The powerful acid arrows pierced through the rock, which was actually camouge from the gray cloak, and right into the wall behind it. A hissing sound betrayed the presence of the corrosive acid as arge patch of the wall simply melted like hot wax, exposing the magical runes and lines that were engraved on the wall¡¯s insides.


    Taken aback by the power of the acid arrows, Snox kept jumping up and down while swinging the short wooden stick in its hand. With a loud voice, it threatened, ¡°Stop attacking me, or else I¡¯ll detonate the alchemy bomb I ced inside the Elementium Pool!¡±


    ¡°Alchemy bomb?!¡± Worried, the Fairy immediately stopped its movement.


    The events of the past half day were quickly transmitted to it from its true form. After the damn goblin had intruded, it had spent a long time searching for all of the hidden ces. Then it climbed into the Elementium Pool and tossed in quite a few strange cylindrical scroll-like objects into the pool. Not only that, the fellow had also stuck many of the cylinders into different parts of the true form¡¯s body.


    The Fairy opened its soft and fair hand, and the root of its true form pushed up a cylinder and ced it onto the Fairy¡¯s palm.


    What was this object?


    Curiously, the Fairy flipped it around in its palm and spent some time looking at it, but it just couldn¡¯t figure out the exact function of the cylinder. There weren¡¯t any identifiable magical patterns engraved on top of it, and there weren¡¯t any Elementium crystals that could be used as a source of energy. How could something like this cause any damage to it?


    Just as the Fairy¡¯s face showed perplexity and it decided to capture the goblin, Snox raised the short wooden stick high and let out a stern shout, ¡°Explode!¡±


    In next moment, under the Fairy¡¯s disbelieving gaze, the cylinder in its hand exploded.


    A huge fireball instantly swallowed the upper body of the Fairy. The raging airwave blew away all of the debris and rock fragments around it, shooting them out in all directions, and a mini mushroom dust cloud bloomed. When the dust gradually settled down and the fireball slowly disappeared, the smoky ck body of the Fairy finally was revealed.


    However, after a bright green ring of light shed, the fair and beautiful face of the Fairy had returned and it didn¡¯t seem to be hurt by the explosion.


    Clenching its jaw tightly in anger, the Fairy crushed the remaining half of the iron tube in its palm. It decided to straightaway kill the damn goblin who dared to provoke the almighty.


    But, before it could charge towards its target, Snox suddenly pointed its short stick in the direction of the Elementium Pool. ¡°Don¡¯t move! If you move a little bit, I¡¯ll detonate the alchemy bomb ced in that ce!¡±


    Coming from Snox, it was a rather weak threat, but it caused the Fairy to change its expression instantly.


    The power of the previous explosion wasn¡¯t really strong ¨C trying to use it to kill a formidable Adept level demon was no different than an ant, ludicrously ignorant of its own weakness, trying to topple a huge tree. But it was strong enough to destroy the Elementium Pool.


    The Elementium Pool had been damaged into a very fragile state. With one wrong touch, it could be destroyed. Even the Fairy¡¯s true form had to be careful when growing in it. It was afraid that it might burst the pool wall and destroy the energy source which had brought it the power it now had.


    It wouldn¡¯t take many of those alchemy bombs. Just one or two would be sufficient to inflict massive and irreversible damage to the Elementium Pool. If that really happened, the Fairy¡¯s ability to continue growing strong would disappear. The Fairy cried out in terror but didn¡¯t dare move anymore.


    ¡°Can you please not destroy my home?¡± Its eyes damp with tears, the Fairy begged in a soft voice. ¡°I¡¯m willing to pay any price.¡±


    The Fairy spoke with an affectedly sweet voice. Together with its ethereal beauty, it could easily make any male creature in the world desire to indulge in its delicate appearance.


    Perhaps living together with a Fairy like this was not a bad choice. It would no longer be the green-skinned goblin who was looked down by everybody, but a...


    Before the perfect lifestyle in Snox¡¯s imaginationpletely unfolded, Greem¡¯s cold snort suddenly rang out in its mind. Snox shuddered, recalling the magical cor strapped around its neck and the magical ve contract binding it.


    ¡°Ugly, don¡¯t think that you can seduce the great Snox. If you don¡¯t obey me, I¡¯ll detonate all of the alchemy bombs at the same time!¡± After being warned by its master, Snox, angry from embarrassment, jumped up from the ground and waved its fist angrily at the Fairy.


    Oh dear, in front of Snox was an Adept level demon Fairy! Normally, a frightening demon like this could vanish Snox with a single finger. But now, this demon could only swallow the insults and humiliation silently and tter Snox in a hundred and one ways. The indescribably pleasant feelinging from the situation was more enjoyable than having ten goblin girls giving it a massage.


    Any other time, if an insignificant green-skinned goblin-like this one was served as food to the Fairy, it wouldin about the stinking and sour meat which was tough to chew. But now, with the goblin¡¯s dominating position in the situation, it actually kept yelling and shouting at the Fairy.


    The Fairy¡¯s face turned red from anger, then it gradually turned pale green, and eventually became as dark as the bottom of a used pot.


    However, as it was a demon by nature, it didn¡¯t care about the virtue and dignity that normal human held so dear. In an instant, it had brought up a smiling face and said, ¡°Since your honorable self has risked your life and intruded into this ce, I supposed you¡¯re looking for the treasures buried deep under the ruin, huh? I¡¯ve saved the trouble for your honorable self, because I have cleaned up that ce, and found some pretty good treasures. Here!¡±


    Following the sweet chuckle of the Fairy, the tall and thick trunk of the Human-faced Flower, which looked like an ancient tree, suddenly trembled slightly, and the exotic little bed ced in the flower petal room split open, revealing a pile of magical gems and magic spell materials.


    Damn it, no wonder all of the treasure vaults and secret rooms along the way were empty. The Fairy had transferred them here!


    When Snox¡¯s eyes came to rest on the splendid gems, gold coins, mithril, diamonds, and crystal essence, it could no longer move its nce away. Deep in its mind, countless greedy voices were hysterically howling.


    Mine... mine... they are all mine!


    The deafening howl of its soul deeply shook Snox¡¯s mind, causing it to sink into a state of ecstasy. It never noticed the bright flicker that shed in the Fairy¡¯s eyes.


    ¡°Die now, you damn goblin!¡± As it roared out the words furiously, the voice of the Fairy suddenly changed from a delicate female voice to a hoarse and masculine male voice.


    As the Fairy suddenly turned hostile, countless thick and strong roots shot out from the rubble around Snox, crazily piercing toward it from all directions.


    With such a sudden change, Snox was caught unprepared and didn¡¯t even have time to respond. It could only helplessly stare at countless roots, with their end shining brightly like metal, piercing toward its body.


    The sound of objects slicing through the air was heard from around its body. The strong wind caused by the razor sharp roots swept across its body and face, causing pain like someone was slicing it with a knife. Snox closed its eyes and waited for death, but it suddenly felt itself flying through the air, dashing and darting in between the crisscrossing web woven by the roots, dodging every single attack by a matter of inches.


    Snox turned around, only to see the beautiful face of its female master. Mary was right by its side, holding on to its body and dashing through the root forest. But she was having a tough time dodging all of the attacks!


    ¡°You fool, hurry up and tell it to stop the attack!¡± Noticing that the stupid goblin still hadn¡¯t realized the situation, Mary wished she could just throw it right into the root forest.


    ¡°Oh.¡± Finally, Snox awakened, turned its face, and pointed its finger at the huge tree sitting far away from where they were.


    A loud boom echoed through the air. A fireball erupted from the center of the huge Human-faced Flower¡¯s trunk. A bowl-sized amount of skin was broken by the explosion, causing sticky green liquid to spray out like a water fountain.


    ¡°Are you going to stop? If not, I¡¯ll detonate them all in a row!¡± Snox shouted out in a loud voice.


    Furious, the Fairy finally stopped all of its attacks.

 Chapter 103

    An absolutely stagnant atmosphere reigned in the ce.


    After its true form had gotten hurt, the Fairy continued roaring out raging curses. Its jarring and delicate feminine voice ovepped with a hoarse and deep masculine one, causing nearly no one to understand what had been it roaring about.


    Finally, after venting the pent-up anger in its chest, the Fairy who had a slender and delicate female outlook pped its transparent wings and hovered midair in the second underground floor, firing its question furiously.


    ¡°You damn intruders, why did you invade my home? Tell me your purpose!¡±


    ¡°Your honorable, we¡¯re just a group of people who came here for treasure hunting. As long as we can find the treasures we are looking for here, we have no intention of bing your enemy!¡± After Mary dropped it on safe ground, Snox eagerlymenced a negotiation.


    Although it was not an expert in fighting, when it came tomercial negotiation, Snox actually possessed some excellent talents which in no way matched its status and position.


    In regards to Snox¡¯s hateful ttering appearance and guileful words, Mary showed a disgusted manner and she felt disdain for the negotiation. Thus, she simply handed the whole negotiation to Snox, while maintaining a high vignce for any possible sudden attacking from the Fairy.


    All negotiations needed a trump card!


    There was absolutely no need for a negotiation with an imbnce strength to be carried out.


    If not for the protection from Mary, the Fairy would have just need a quick sudden attack and it would be able topletely wipe out the body and soul of this disgusting goblin merchant, sparing itself from stiflingly and depressingly negotiating with the goblin.


    To be honest, not many of those materials, resources, and treasures looted from the ruins of Adept Tower were suitable for its use. The reason the Fairy had gathered them together was purely for the purpose of appreciating them, with the intention of using them to decorate its flower room. Even if it gave out all of them to these intruders, it wouldn¡¯t have felt too much pity either. However, the depressing emotion of being robbed by some lower ss creatures just kept bugging it.


    During normal times, it had always regarded itself as the master of this demonized forest. Countless demonized nts and creatures in the entire demonized forest had to obey all itsmand. Those who could tter it in a good way would be able to upy a piece ofnd closer to the ruins, while those wild and stubborn demons could only live at the outer perimeter and absorb the rarefied demon energy that had been filtered multiple times by others.


    When it was in a good mood, it would leak out slightly more Elementium aura. And just with this tiny bit of bestowment, it could always make the demons in the forest struck with extreme joy and shed tears of gratitude. When it had a bad mood, it would upy all the demon energy, causing all the demons outside of the ruins to scratch their ears and cheeks in anxiety, immersing themselves in a restless state and start killing each other.


    Just with an approach like this, throughout the entire demonized forest, it had been worthy of the title of the strongest existence, the king whom all the demons had to tter!


    But today, the ¡®king¡¯ was forced to control its temper and negotiate with a low and degrading green-skinned goblin and the topic of their discussion was actually how much of its collections it had to give up to fill the seemingly bottomless greed of the opponent.


    Right when both parties were restlessly tussling with each other, the lower level of these ruins suddenly shook violently, as huge amounts of stone bs immediately fell off from the shaky ceiling, bringing dust clouds into the air, impairing their vision.


    ¡°Damn it... damn it...¡± The anger of the Fairy was approaching the boiling point. ¡°There is another group of bastards wreaking havoc above, I...¡±


    It wanted to rush out and drive away that group of invaders, but it also felt worried about leaving behind these two time bombs in its home. Therefore, it became even more fidgety and restless.


    As a feral demon, it didn¡¯t have sufficient magical knowledge to repair the broken Elementium Pool. Once thest Elementium Pool had totally broken down because of the fighting by those invaders, then the hope for it to continue growing stronger would bepletely cut off.


    Right as it was hesitating, another ground-shaking quake came from above, causing the rock wall of this second underground floor to burst with a massive crack.


    ¡°You group of damn bastards... Once I go up, I¡¯ll catch you and kill you with the cruelest of torture...¡± After letting out a furious roar, the Fairy waved its hand, and the huge flower room wriggled, sending out dozens of vines which moved flexibly like human fingers, cupping arge pile of secret treasures and throwing them in front of both the outsiders.


    ¡°Take these with you and get the hell out of here now! Next time, if you dare to intrude this ce again, I¡¯ll kill you even if that means I¡¯ll have to lose this nest! Leave behind that magical wand and scram!¡± Losing its patience, the Fairy started to chase away its guests.


    ¡°You asked us to hand over the controlling magic wand now? Aren¡¯t you asking us to get ourselves killed here? Who knows if you will even keep your promise!¡± It looked like Snox was pushing all the way through to be a bad guy. Since it was a one-time deal, it did not care about the impression the Fairy had of it.


    ¡°Take these things and give me the controlling magic wand once you leave this territory, hurry up!¡± The Fairy was so angry that even its beautiful face had started to twist.


    Snox was indeed a talented goblin, as it ced its hand on its body and actually pulled out a huge bag full of patches and ced all the dazzling magical gems, precious diamonds, magical materials, and some peculiarly shaped magical items into it.


    Snox in burdensome manner carried the big bag on its back, while urging Mary to leave this ce quickly.


    Under the hostile gaze of the Fairy, Mary transformed into a huge bloodsucking bat and grabbed onto Snox, before flying out from the second underground floor. Once they left the ce, the Fairy immediately waved its hands, and the crisscrossing demon vines and rose stalks instantly upied all the empty space of the ce.


    Meanwhile, it was seen pping its wings and followed closely behind the two outsiders, flying towards the upper level of the ruins.


    For every short distance it had traveled, the Fairy would cast a spell, using the dense flower stalks and vines to seal off the path leading to the lower ground. From now on, it would never underestimate these lower ss creatures who had a weak overall strength, but possessed quick wits and a crafty mind.


    One after another, when the three of them flew out from the entrance of the ruins, they were shocked to find out that the demonized forest had turned into a tattered battlefield of ughter. It looked like before driving away all the intruders, the Fairy had no intention of returning to its nest.


    The Fairy gently pulled the string of the magic bow in its hand and unleashed more than hundred green light arrows, instantly destroying the temporary tunnel that led to the lower ground.


    ¡°Once you give me the magic wand, you can leave this ce immediately. I still need to settle the score with those few bastards for destroying my territory!¡± Frost starting to condense on the Fairy¡¯s beautiful face, as it spoke with an extremely cold voice.


    Snox and Mary exchanged a nce,municating soundlessly.


    Eventually, Snox carefully pulled out the magic wand, lightly tossing it over to the Fairy.


    ¡°One more thing, that Intermediate Apprentice who can control the Lightning Giant is my master. As long as you can help us defeat those few Fallen Apprentices, we promise to never step into your territory in future!¡±


    The Fairy snorted and took the magic wand and sensed it briefly. Once it had sensed there was some magical connection between the wand and a ce at the lower ground, it set its mind at rest and tucked the magic wand into its rose armor.


    ¡°Leave here now. If I ever see you again, you¡¯ll be sorry!¡± After leaving behind a threatening word, the Fairy suddenly transformed into a trail of green light and rushed towards the battlefield not too far away.


    Meanwhile, Greem was currently experiencing a rapid feeling of despair.


    What kind of a feeling was brought by suffering from the bombardment and being chased by five Fallen Apprentices? Greem was feeling that very deeply right now.


    Both the legs of the Lightning Giant had disappeared. The two crystal cores hiding inside that were used to gather Wind element energy had been destroyed. The disorderly and messy Wind Elementium that was gathering underneath the lower body of the giant could barely keep the shape of a wind vortex. The tattered and torn golden armor was falling off from its broken body, exposing the Wind element core that had been hiding inside of the mist form green body.


    After having itsbative strength greatly reduced, the Lightning Giant dared not meet the attacksing from five Fallen Apprentices head on. Instead, it kept flying and shing in the sky, dodging the magic spell attacks that came in session.


    However, its condition was considered good. The Rock Snake where Greem was hiding inside, was dragging its half broken body and kept digging into the soil, but it wouldn¡¯t take long before it was forced out from underground by that hateful Philip. And when it showed itself, it was the moment when all five Fallen Apprentices wouldunch a massive attack.


    The violent quake the Fairy sensed in the lower ground was the result of thebined raging attacks of five Fallen Apprentices.


    Meanwhile, there was another thing that looked as tattered and torn as the Rock Snake ¨C the most innocent demonized forest!


    Clearly, the Fallen Pseudo-Adept, Langdon, had taken the path of a Bloodline Apprentice and the magical bloodline he had chosen was the Frost Giant.


    When he went all out and revealed its magical transformation, Greem could clearly feel the surging energy of frost emanating from his tall and burly body.


    After the transformation, the Frost Giant stood over four meters tall. It had light blue skin and countless icicles hanging on the Frost Armor on his muscr body. Every movement of his brought forth a freezing breeze that sent chills down one¡¯s spines. The Snow Storm spell covered arge area and the Ice Spear that he threw also had brought tremendous damage to thisnd. Whenever a magic spell was cast, the ground was always filled with broken and fallen ancient trees and demons, frozen in transparent ice crystals.


    Obviously, the other Fallen Pseudo-Adepts weren¡¯t fighting with all they could like how Langdon fought, but even so, the powerful Elementium magic spells still brought about frightening damage to the Rock Snake where Greem was hiding.


    Nevertheless, the person who had threatened Greem the most was that Philip.


    By now, Greem could be sure that he must have been the mysterious guy who had forced him out from the soilst time.


    He was a Pseudo-Adept level Earth element expert. Though he seldom directly attacked at Greem, he could always use the Earth element ability he had mastered to iste the deep connection between the Rock Snake and Earth Elementium. As the result, after traveling for a short distance in the soil, the Rock Snake would be forced out to the surface by the Earth Elementium that squeezed it from all directions.


    If previously, the Earth Elementium was like an ocean that the Rock Snake could travel through freely, now, this ocean had actually be solidified, preventing it from traveling through it freely.


    The lower half body of the Rock Snake had been broken off by that Thunder element Pseudo-Adept, Hegel. He had used a lightning chain and trapped the Rock Snake, then all five of themunched abined attack and broke it. If not for the fact that Greem had summoned another Rock Snake on time that attracted their firepower, perhaps he would have long died in the besiegement of the five Fallen Pseudo-Adepts.


    Nevertheless, as he was persisting through the extremely painful experience, a message came from Mary through the magical seal, which had finally let him breathe out a sigh of relief.


    The Fairy had returned!

 Chapter 104

    When the frightening Fairy had arrived with its chest filled with anger, all five Fallen Apprentices wereunching a violent bombardment at the Rock Snake who had just been squeezed out from the ground.


    Ice des and snow swords that covered arge area, an unbroken lightning chain, a volcano that shook the earth and sky, and shadow arrows that blotted out the sky and thend...


    It was true that these raging magic spells had caused tremendous damage to the Rock Snake inside which Greem had been hiding, but they had also took this demonized forest into an abyss of misery. Looking around, one-third of the demonized forest had been leveled by the raging magic spells. Hovering high up in the sky, when the Fairy saw this scene of devastation, it could no longer control the mes of anger that were boiling in its heart.


    Since he had received the message from Mary, Greem would rather scurry around dodging the enemies¡¯ attacks, rather than simplyunching a counter-attack recklessly. Even the Lighting Giant who was seen flickering frequently in the sky had put away all the magic spells that covered arge area. Instead, it was just using the lightning strike which only attacked a single target and barely dealt with the attacksing from the enemy.


    Therefore, when the Fairy had arrived at the scene, the first thing it saw were five Fallen Pseudo-Adepts in the middle of brazenlyunching full-blown attacks, which was turning the entire forest upside down with their bombardment.


    The Fairy shouted out loud as it moved with the speed of lightning. It chose Philip, who was standing at the tail of the group, as its first target and initiated a deadly attack.


    In the previous battle, all the other guys were responsible for attacking, while this Philip was responsible for forcing Greem out from underground. Thus, in contrast, he was standing at a rather far behind the others, causing him to encounter the frightening Fairy who had justunched an attack out of anger.


    How frightful was an Adept level demon who attacked with all its power? One would have a rough idea just by looking at this strike.


    The bowstring of the magical bow held in its hand was instantly pulled to its maximum length. The powerful nt element magical energy that made one¡¯s heart tremble had quickly gathered around the fingertip of the Fairy, condensing into a small bright green arrow. Aghast with horror, when Philip turned his head around, the bowstring was released and the arrow left the string like a lightning, nailing into his chest in an instant.


    A stone armor had been quickly formed, but was instantly shattered by the arrow beam upon contact. If Philip had not tried his best to stop and instead had moved a little bit to a side, perhaps this arrow would have pierced through his heart.


    But even so, the frightening arrow beam which pierced through his right shoulder had also blown half of his body away. Under the corrosion from the green energy that suddenly exploded, the flesh on the right side of his body started to melt. His bones were destroyed, exposing most of his vital internal organs in the air, which were also making a hissing noise as the result of being corroded by the mutated energy.


    With just one move, Philip who had been taken by surprise was seriously injured and dying!


    Only now had the remaining four men turned their heads around furious and shocked. But right at this moment, the Fairy¡¯s devastating arrow showers had approached them. It came towards them with incredible momentum and tremendous force causing the four men to instantly sink into a situation of restless defending and counter-attacking.


    Philip was first beaten until he was half dead by the full power attack of the Fairy, then he was plunged into an abyss of misery as a result of the shower of frightening arrows. Suffering from double the injuries, Philip dared not to hesitate anymore. He immediately detonated the long magical staff in his hand, causing a huge clump of earthy yellow dust in the shape of a cloud to rise up from the ground. When the dust cloud was quickly dispersed by the shower of arrows, his trace was nowhere to be found at the scene.


    Struck with the feeling of anger and astonishment, the remaining four Fallen Pseudo-Adepts dared not hesitate as well. Almost instantly, they disyed all their incredible skills and vigorously threw out the fiercest magic spells they knew onto the delicate body of the Fairy.


    Ice st!


    Electric Jail!


    Shadow Invasion!


    Fire st!


    Four distinctly different Pseudo-Adept level magic spells, the most powerful single target magic spells they could cast, were thrown at the Fairy. Actually, they knew other major scale magic spells, but when fighting with a demon leader who had incredible speed, it was still these magic spells that focuses the attack on a single target that would yield the maximum results.


    It was worth to mention that although a wild demon like the Fairy had an Adept level body constitution, it didn¡¯t actually possess the true ability of an Adept. Although the body constitution of human Adepts was weaker than demons, relying on the magic spell legacies that had been passed down for hundreds of thousands of years and their umtion of knowledge, they could unleash those terrifying magic spells that were many times stronger than their ¡®frail¡¯ body.


    Hence, despite these Fallen Pseudo-Adepts being one grade lower than the Fairy, their offensive magic spells weren¡¯t as weak as one might expect.


    Four raging magic spells that represented their strongestbative ability were crazily wreaking havoc on the Fairy¡¯s body. Green rings of light continuously flickered and exploded on top of the rose armor which was protecting the body of the Fairy. One after the other, rose stalks that stretched out from the armor vanished as a result of the attack from the magic spells, but they still dedicatedly protected the Fairy¡¯s body.


    In some area, the raging magic spells broke through the defense of the rose armor, causing the violent Elementium to explode on the Fairy¡¯s body. For the first time since the battle hadmenced, the Fairy had blood spilling out from its mouth, as it had been truly hurt this time.


    The Fairy became berserk, flipping its wings in the quickest speed it could and hastily brought it out from the region where the firepower was concentrated at. At the same time, the arrows shower unleashed from its hand was getting more intense, as it intended to break through the defensive magic spell of the four men with a full blown attack.


    Langdon, who hadpleted his bloodline transformation, let out a loud roar. An angry expression could be seen covering his azure blue face. One after another ice spears quickly condensed in his palm. Using the fastest speed he could, he continuously threw them at the Fairy who was in turn, dashing around and dodging the attacks.


    The bloodline of Frost Giant had given him the ability to cast Ice element magic spells limitlessly and also strengthened each of the Ice element magic spells unleashed by him to the maximum power. Although all the ice spears that exploded around the Fairy¡¯s body hadn¡¯t hit right onto the target, the dissipating frost energy still invaded its body, covering its rose armor with a thick ice crystal that slowed down its dodging and flying speed.


    The other three Pseudo-Adepts saw this opportunity and immediately increased their attack frequency. The magic spells blotted out the sky and pierced through the air, continually shooting at the Fairy.


    The reward was limited if they just killed an Intermediate Apprentice from the surface. But if they could kill an Adept level wild demon leader, then just by splitting the Adept level magical materials they had obtained ¨C it would be enough for all four of them tough for an entire day!


    However, right as both parties were locked up in a fierce fight, Greem who had previously fled to a far distance, hade back after taking a short break. Of course, the target he chose for himself were the Fallen Pseudo-Adepts who had brought him into a sorry state.


    Hovering high up in midair and quietly brewing for seventeen seconds, the major scale thunderstorm of the Lightning Giant had once again circled all four Fallen Pseudo-Adepts in the attack range.


    The suddenly denseness of Lightning Elementium in the air had squeezed out all the other Elementiums. Thus, except for Hegel who was also an expert in Lightning element magic spells, all the other were facing difficulty when casting their respective element magic spells. Also, the lighting strike that hade down in a row had brought the effect of paralysis, interrupting the casting of their magic spells.


    Though they knew that by standing close to each other, they would have to facerge area offensive magic spell attacks from the enemy, however, when facing a frightening Fairy who could move like the wind, though all four Fallen Pseudo-Adepts had confidence in themselves, they dared not stay too far away from their peers. Or else, if the Fairy ignored the damage inflicted on it and forcefullyunched an onrush assault, neither of them had the confidence that they could withstand it unless their peers came to the rescue.


    Except for the Frost Giant that Langdon had transformed into that possessed some melee abilities, the rest of them were purely element apprentices. Once they let the enemy get closer to them, though they would not be at a loss of what to do, theirbative strength would be greatly reduced.


    Realizing they had been attacked from both the front and rear, Langdon who was leading the team let out a furious roar, ¡°Hegel, you go and fight with that kid¡¯s golem, the three of us will hold up against this crazy woman!¡±


    Hegel answered the call, turned around and unleashed a chain lighting, forcing the Lightning Giant who had continued to approach to back off. After that, he and the golem started a fierce exchange of attacks.


    Meanwhile, relying on the toughness of the rose armor and the powerful magic bow in its hand, the Fairy was dashing around through the massive showers of offensive magic spells and continued to reduce the individual defense of those few Fallen Pseudo-Adepts using guerri methods. Under its continuous attack, the Pseudo-Adept level defense could notst more than thirty seconds. Whenever a defensive magic spell was broken, it was the dangerous time for that Pseudo-Adept to hide behind his peer and recast a defensive magic spell for himself.


    Nevertheless, by the mutual support and cover fire of the three Pseudo-Adepts, they actually were able to put up a fierce fight against the Fairy. They were even able to add a few more new wounds onto its body.


    As a wild demon, besides a few limited magical spells, the Fairy had nearly no other offensive approaches. In order to quickly prate the enemy¡¯s defense, it would have to take the risk and fight in close range. However, this meant that the attack it would receive would also increase significantly, while the guerri-style right now was much safer.


    Of course, it could also hold up against the enemy¡¯s attack and unleash another full blown arrow showers. But in a battle like this where every second counted, the casting time of seven seconds just seemed unrealistic. Hence, it could only rely on its fast and rapid attacks by moving around at top speed while slowly reducing the enemy¡¯s strength.


    Nevertheless, opportunities always came at the least expected moment!


    When the Inferno Shield hovering outside of the Fire element Pseudo-Adept had once again been shattered by the Fairy, he quickly hid behind Langdon who had a tall body, while reciting the magic spell incantation that summoned the Inferno Shield with a loud voice. Meanwhile, though the Fairy had already discovered his weakness, it had to face both the rapid fire of Langdon¡¯s Ice st and a crafty and strange Dark Curse from the other Pseudo-Adept. Thus, it had no choice but to let him recast his defensive magic spell.


    Right when the casting of the Pseudo-Adept¡¯s Inferno Shield had been nearlypleted, the ground underneath their feet suddenly trembled violently. The once solid hard rockyer actually burst out and cracked, and a giant snake poked its head out from the crack.


    The expressions of these Fallen Apprentices instantly changed!


    The violent changes in the terrain forced them to keep dodging and jumping around, it also meant their mutual dependence on their defensive formations had been broken. In this chaotic situation, each of them could only take care of themselves and had no time to look after their fragile peers!


    The other Pseudo-Adepts were in a better condition, as they were protected by their own defensive magic spell. So, while continuously attacking the enemy, they also quickly dodged the scene and safely escaped the attack range of the Rock Snake. But this was not the case for that Fire element Pseudo-Adept, his nearplete Inferno Shield had been forcefully interrupted and as he was busy fleeing away from the scene, he just didn¡¯t have the chance to recast the spell.


    While he was running away restlessly, he suddenly felt a strong winde from behind him. The Fire element Pseudo-Adept¡¯s heart immediately sank. With no time to consider any other options, his eyes went wide as he let out a loud shout, quickly forming a temporary Fire Shield behind his back.


    But it had been toote, before the Fire Shield could fully reveal itself, a super sharp slim hand pierced through the enshrouding me and grabbed his shoulder, pulling him into midair.


    Damn it, it was that Fairy!


    Realizing this instantly, a couple of magical items hanging on the Fire element Pseudo-Adept lit up at the same time, a Fire Field covered his body immediately turning his surroundings into a realm of me.


    In the raging and soaring mes, Fire Crows flew around happily, some partly hidden and some partly visible Fire Spirits...


    At that moment, countless Fire element creatures revealed themselves within the Fire Field, instantly igniting everything around the Fire element Pseudo-Adept!


    However, following the sound of an exhale, another slim hand pierced through his shield and poked into his body. When both slim hands let out a powerful force, a loud tearing noise was heard ¨C the Fire element Pseudo-Adept had been torn into two by the Fairy!

 Chapter 105

    When the steaming hot small andrge intestines, heart, liver, lungs and all sorts of internal organs fell from the sky along with a shower of blood, all of the human apprentices standing on the battlefield couldn¡¯t help but have their minds go nk from shock.


    That was a Pseudo-Adept! A Pseudo-Adept was killed this time!


    All of the Fallen Apprentices were yelling crazily in their minds. On their twisted faces, besides their anger, there was also a slight expression of fear that couldn¡¯t be concealed.


    If... if in the previous moment, it was them whose defensive magic spell had broken, then perhaps the broken corpse falling from the sky right now would be theirs! Upon thinking about this, all of the Fallen Apprentices had their mind fully filled with a shivering sensation. For the first time, all of the Fallen Apprentices were in awe of an Adept level demon.


    Without saying anything, Hegel fully wrapped his body in a dazzling electric web and instantly disappeared from where he stood. When he reappeared, he was at the far edge of the demonized forest. On the other side, the Dark element Pseudo-Adept¡¯s body exploded into arge clump of dark smoke which sank into the ground underneath his feet. Right after that, a small mound was seen moving quickly towards the outer perimeter of the forest.


    Langdon, who had transformed into the Frost Giant, instantly changed his expression. He took a small step back, squatted down, and ced both arms on his chest. In an instant, arge chunk of crystal clear ice surrounded him until he resembled an ice cube. Judging from the thickness of the ice and the magical runes shing within it, perhaps even the Fairy¡¯s strongest attack would not be able to break it in a short amount of time.


    What to do? The transformation into a Frost Giant had given Langdon an powerful body and incredible muscle strength. It also brought him an extraordinary talent in Ice element magic energy. But too bad, none of this had anything to do with speed! Once he was defeated in a battle and tried to escape, such a huge body would instead bring him even more enemies.


    Therefore, Langdon could only use the Wall of Ice to protect his safety temporarily. Meanwhile, within the transparent ice cube, the tall and burly body of Langdon had started to shrink quickly and once again was restored to his normal shape. Standing inside of the transparent ice cube, he took out a magic spell scroll, fully inscribed with ancient looking patterns, threw a furious nce over at the Fairy and Greem a few times, and finally had no choice but to activate the scroll.


    Following a sh of bright light, a violent spatial ripple reverberated within the battlefield. When the bright light faded out, Langdon had disappeared from the ice cube.


    The escaping scroll! It was not something an ordinary apprentice could buy by paying a hefty price. Usually, it could only be produced by official Adepts, and the destination was most likely some safe and hidden ce!


    Greem didn¡¯t try to break the Ice Wall. Instead, he carefullymanded the Lighting Giant and the other two Rock Snakes to surround him and slowly left the battlefield.


    The few Fallen Pseudo-Adepts who had been used as buffers had run away, leaving only him and the Fairy on the battlefield. With the demon¡¯s bad habit of seeking revenge for the smallest grievances, perhaps it would not regard him as its rade¡¯ who just fought together with it. Therefore, it was best to...


    Too bad, just as Greem reached a hundred meters away, a green light suddenly shed in front of his eyes, and the Fairy, whose body was covered in scars, blocked his path.


    Greem silently sighed.


    Though the Fairy had gained a huge advantage in the previous battle by severely wounding, killing, and scaring off three Pseudo-Adepts, it had paid a serious price for it.


    Weakened by countless powerful magic spells, the Rose Armor on its body looked dull. Its slim and delicate body was covered in traces left behind by the magic spells, especially from when it hadunched an ambush at the Fire element Pseudo-Adept. Although the battle had onlysted a very short period of time, the counter attack he had unleashed before his death had still caused tremendous damage to its body.


    From what Greem could see, its short green hair was a hideous mess from being burned by fire and countless burn marks and blisters could be found all over its seductive and tender body. Burn marks could also be seen on the corners of the transparent wings on its back, causing it to fly unstably, and its speed had greatly reduced as well.


    ¡°So, after wreaking havoc in my territory, you still think to leave just like that?¡± The Fairy¡¯s beautiful face was covered in a ferocious and twisted smile. It continued, saying, ¡°You better stay back obediently. Use your flesh and soul as thepensation for my loss!¡±


    After it finished saying that, the Fairy immediately prepared to attack.


    Without hesitation, Greem quickly shouted out, ¡°Hold on! Honorable Fairy, we were fighting side by side just now, weren¡¯t we?¡±


    ¡°Hmph, all of you are damn intruders, and you all deserve to be killed. They paid their price. As for you... you have to pay the price as well!¡±


    ¡°Honorable Fairy, you really need to consider carefully. Now you¡¯re seriously wounded too, and if you want to defeat me, the price might not be something you can withstand currently! Why not...¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re dreaming! No matter how high the price I have to pay today, I still want to tear you to pieces!¡±


    Looking at the resolute expression of the Fairy, Greem simply showed a look of ¡®you¡¯re the one who forced me.¡¯ He suddenly stood up with his back straight, gazed straight at the approaching Fairy, and shouted out with a stern and loud voice, ¡°Since you insist on fighting, I¡¯ve no choice but to keep youpany. Detonate! Detonate everything for me!¡±


    Obviously, thest words were not intended for the Fairy.


    Hearing the sharp and stern shout of this wildly arrogant kid, a bad feeling suddenly surged up in the Fairy¡¯s mind.


    Indeed, as Greem¡¯s shrill voice dissolved into the air, a loud rumbling suddenly came from the ground underneath their feet. Following a violent shake of the ground, the earth where the ruins were located suddenly rose and immediately copsed into the ground. The same process repeated three times. Only then did the frightening shock wave from the explosionpletely vanish.


    This time, it was the Fairy¡¯s turn to let out a shrill cry.


    Because, just now, the inseparable spiritual connection between it and its true form waspletely cut off. It was not concealed or interrupted by something, but it was... it waspletely cut off.


    Without the endless energy transmitted through the soulyer of its true form, the soul aura of the Fairy started to weaken significantly. ¡°You damn human. What have you done? I¡¯m going to kill you!¡±


    The Fairy pulled out the short wooden stick, only to realize it had broken into pieces and turned into ash in an instant. As the ashes flew away, an enshrouding curse shot right into the Fairy¡¯s body, causing its aura to be even weaker.


    Despite suffering from a series of attack, the Fairy¡¯s soul still hadn¡¯t dropped below Adept level. From this, one could tell it had stored a vast amount of soul energy after upying an Elementium Pool. But when its true form and the Elementium Pool exploded into thousands of broken pieces from the alchemy bomb, the Fairy¡¯s soul pressure suddenly disappeared.


    Looking into the distance at Mary, who was pping her wings and quickly flying to him, Greem waved his hand and ordered the Lightning Giant and two Rock Snakes to leap toward the Fairy. In an instant, the me of war, which had just settled down, reignited.


    The brutal and intense battlested for two hours before it ended. In truth, the result of the battle had been decided when the Fairy¡¯s true form was destroyed. If the Fairy had been a demon with sufficient intelligence and a crafty mind, it would have immediately escaped from the ce when it had lost the connection with its true form.


    But obviously, the Fairy hadn¡¯t learned the cunning and treachery of a human. Hence, when it made its desperate assault, intending to perish together with Greem, it actually allowed Mary totch herself to its body and savagely bite into its neck.


    The vampire¡¯s hunger for blood was unimaginable. This was especially true for an Advanced Apprentice level vampire!


    Without the lighting whip of the Lightning Giant, perhaps Mary would have been destroyed by the final counter attacks of the Fairy. But with the help from the Lightning Giant and Rock Snakes, Mary simply clung onto the Fairy¡¯s body regardless of her own safety, crazily sucking out all its nt element energy-filled blood.


    While resisting the attacksing from golems, the Fairy crazily tore Mary¡¯s body apart. However, no matter how she was attacked, Mary didn¡¯t stop, but kept sucking the blood of the Fairy.


    Meanwhile, the blood swallowed by Mary brought her tremendous benefit. Besides fixing her broken body at an incredible speed, the spirit wave emanating from her became stronger and her soul aura also became more powerful. On the opposite side, the spirit wave and soul aura of the Fairy were decreasing at a constant pace. Eventually, its breathing was as thin as a thread.


    Initially, it was Mary¡¯s tiny body coiled up on the Fairy¡¯s body, butter, as the Fairy¡¯s body became weaker and lost all of its strength, Mary had to hug it tightly to prevent it from copsing.


    When thest thread of soul aura vanished from the Fairy¡¯s body, only then did Mary loosen her arms, satisfied. The slim and tender body of the Fairy was like a drooping leather pouch that had lost all its air. It was now lying motionlessly on the floor.


    Mary let out a loud belch. Her beautiful face turned red from abundant vitality. She only had the time to give Greem a sweet smile before she fell down beside the Fairy¡¯s body. She actually fell asleep!


    Damn it! It was really troublesome when a woman went crazy! Couldn¡¯t you just wait until we returned to the Adept Tower, and only start your enjoyment once we confirm everything is safe?


    After silentlyining in his head, Greem had no choice but to carry Mary with one arm and pull the Fairy¡¯s corpse with the other. Then he started tomand the Lightning Giant and loot the battlefield.


    The dead Fire element Pseudo-Adept¡¯s body was scattered across the ce; perhaps he could find some useful treasures among the broken bodies. Of course, Greem really wanted to find the magic spell notebooks that may have been in the guy¡¯s waist pouch.


    As Greem was busy working, a grass bush not far from him split apart and Snox squeezed out from under it with a huge bag on its back. ¡°Master, master! There are still some treasures underground!¡±


    Greem gritted his teeth and stomped his feet, then ferociously said, ¡°I¡¯ll have Rock Snake help you. Get everything you can ¨C you only have fifteen minutes!¡±


    A Rock Snake hastily slithered over, opened its huge mouth, and swallowed Snox. After that, it raised its head high before mming it into the ground, digging out a huge hole, and diving into the soil. Breaking through all kinds of soil and rock strata, the Rock Snake rushed towards the second underground floor with incredible speed.


    With the raging energy that had leaked out as its beacon, there was no way they could go in the wrong direction!

 Chapter 106

    Most of the time, Greem was too busy to individually identify what kind of objects were hidden inside the grass, like which of them were useful and which weren¡¯t. As long as he sensed an element aura lingering in a certain spot, he would let the Rock Snake swallow the object together with arge patch of dirt. He would then store them inside of the Rock Snake¡¯s stomach and slowly identify them when they returned to safety.


    Fifteen minutester, the ground shook violently before bursting apart. The Rock Snake that had squeezed underground had smoothly returned.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go, quick!¡± The more rewards Greem harvested, the faster his heart raced. Without saying another word, he jumped into the stomach of another Rock Snake and left the ce straightaway.


    Half an hourter, a bizarre looking dark figure suddenly appeared at the destroyed battlefield.


    Through his strong spiritual sense, he walked with light steps on the battlefield like a wandering soul. Soon, he stopped at the spot where the Fairy had died. Quietly, he sensed and identified the traces of elemental aura in the air.


    For others, the remains of aura didn¡¯t have any meaning, but they provided him with a vast amount of information and critical data about the battlefield. Soon, scene after scene of the battle started to y in his mind, and eventually assembled into aplete scene.


    He showed no emotion in regards to the violent battle that had just happened. He even maintained the same indifferent expression when he realized a Fallen Pseudo-Adept was killed in the battle. However, his body slightly trembled when he saw Greem order the Rock Snake and take away the dead body of the Fairy. A frightful, bright beam suddenly shot out from his eyes, which were hidden behind his drooped hat.


    Since the most valuable Fairy was gone, there wasn¡¯t any need for this ce to continue existing!


    Following a deep voice¡¯s reciting of an incantation, countless ghost-like dark shadows shot out from his body, charging in all directions within the demonized forest. Soon, the entire forest became dead silent and no life aura could be sensed anymore.


    The demonized forest had be something that only existed in the past. Once again, this ce would be a dead zone where no life could exist!


    After finishing with all of this, like how he had appeared, the dark figure simply vanished into thin air! Throughout the entire process, no living creature or thing could sense his existence, as if he was just a soul that wandered in this world.


    ............


    Greem didn¡¯t rush back to the Adept Tower. But instead, after he brought his team of golems to the surface, immediately snuck into the Ker mountain range. They found a secret ce and dug out a cave. Only then did they started slowly organizing their war trophies for this trip.


    The first object Rock Snake spat out was Mary, who was sleeping soundly, and the Fairy who had be mummified.


    Once again, Greem gave Mary a thorough examination. She was just overstuffed with a huge amount of blood from a mighty existence, and had no choice but to sleep to slowly digest the energy contained within the blood. ording to the Chip¡¯s estimation after it gave Mary a scan, she had earned a good fortune this time. Most probably, she was going to advance into the Pseudo-Adept realm.


    Greem ced a thick and warm nket in a corner of the cave and carefully ced Mary on top of it. She was wearing a sweet and calm smile on her face, her rosy cheeks looked like a ripe apple, her lips were juicy and delicate, and her beautiful eyshes were moving like butterflies... The sleeping Mary was showing the rare, gentle, and serene look of a young girl, so Greem couldn¡¯t help but gently kiss her forehead.


    After he settled Mary, Greem moved his nce over to the Fairy¡¯s corpse.


    After losing the support of endless energy and having all of its blood sucked out, the shriveled corpse of the Fairy looked like a deted leather skin. Nevertheless, both the Rose Armor, that fully covered its body, and the magic bow were still the items attracted Greem the most. In the previous battle, those two items had given Greem a really hard time.


    Holding the magic bow in his hand and spending some time in examining it, Greem finally heard the exciting ¡®beep¡¯ sound in his mind.


    ¡°Beep! Scanning of the objectpleted!


    A magic bow is found. Detail information as below: ...[omitted]...


    Modifiable!¡±


    Greem was very excited. He licked his lips and narrowed his eyes.


    In his first battle with the Fairy, the Chip had roughly scanned the basic information of this magic bow. Now it was adding more detailed information about it. There wasn¡¯t anything to be excited about this information, however. The only thing that made Greem really excited was the conclusion just given out by the Chip: the magic bow was modifiable!


    As the Fairy was the only user of this magic bow, the energy spectrum used to unleash light arrows was also nt element. This meant that the magic bow couldn¡¯t be used by anyone else! But now, since the Chip had determined that it could be modified, it also meant the energy spectrum used to drive it could be modified as well, so it could be changed to Fire element or Blood element...


    When Greem thought that in future battles, he could just sit high up on the Rock Snake¡¯s head and pour down countless light arrows to the enemy just by moving his fingers, Greem just couldn¡¯t help but feel really excited.


    Gently cing the magic bow aside, Greem murmured under his breath, ¡°Calm down, calm down... let me see if there is a magic staff that I can use. If there is one, I¡¯ll give this bow to Mary. If not, hehehe...¡±


    The second item pulled from the Fairy¡¯s body was the Rose Armor.


    Greem really wanted to keep the protective gear for himself. But, at the thought that once the Rose Armor was attacked by the enemy, his body would be covered by countless rose stalks, Greem instantly felt no love for it. Fuck, a grown man wearing Rose Armor and fighting with the enemy... Upon thinking about that peculiar scene, Greem just couldn¡¯t ept it.


    Never mind, just give it to Mary after modifying!


    As a wild demon, the Fairy only had these two magical items with it. Looked like it was really poor.


    After the Rose Armor was stripped away, the petite body of the Fairy was totally naked. However, after losing the nourishment from its blood, the once silky smooth and glittering skin had dried and shriveled like an eighty year old granny. It was no longer as beautiful as before and felt like a dried bark upon touching.


    Although the Fairy was dead, Greem could still sense an extraordinary, powerful auraing from all of its organs. Should he slice it into pieces and harvest the magical materials? Or keep the corpse intact and find a way to maximize his profit?


    Greem hesitated for a moment before he decided to put it aside for now. He would make the decision after he consulted with some professionals.


    If he was a necromancer apprentice, for sure he would use the Fairy¡¯s corpse and produce a powerful corpse automaton. However, as he was a fake and inferior golem controller, it would be tough for him to squeeze the value of this Adept level demon to thest drop!


    He ordered the Chip to give the body structure of the Fairy a detailed andplete scan. After that, he extracted the flesh and blood information from some critical parts of its body, handed them to the Chip, and let it analysis slowly. Finally, Greem started to organize all of the other war trophies.


    Snox, who had been attentively serving its master, carefully ced a huge bag in front of Greem. Following the opening of the bag, countless colorful lights immediately shone upon Greem¡¯s face, forcing him to close his eyes.


    Shadow Stone, Tiger¡¯s Eye Stone, Mchite, Green Agate, Lesser Moonstone, Emerald, Topaz, Aquamarine, Blood of the Old God, Ruby, Opal, Sapphire, Azure Moonstone, Deep Peridot, me Spessarite, Golden Dranite, Blood Gem, Dawn Stone, Tsite, Night¡¯s Eye, Noble Topaz, Pyre Stone, Living Ruby, Lion¡¯s Eye Stone, Crimson Spinal Stone...


    [TL note: As a guy who never yed WoW, this gave me a hard time...]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be ovee with emotion. He firmly believed that the Fairy must be a gemstone collecting maniac. Nearly every magical stone and gem he had ever heard of could be found in this bag. Any gemstone taken out from this bag could be exchanged for dozens of miles ofnds and peasants in a mortal kingdom. Especially the few with higher values, they could even be used in exchange for the title of Count.


    But in the eyes of an Apprentice Adept, they were only consumable magical materials. Nevertheless, only official Adepts could use these expensive magical materials without changing their expression.


    Greem lightly fiddled with the gem stones. asionally, he would pick one up and give it a careful look. After all, he only knew most of these magical stones from books, it was far less direct and clear than holding them with his own hand.


    Standing beside Greem, Snox too was breathing heavily.


    Looking at the colorful reflection of these gemstones, it felt it was getting harder to breathe smoothly, and its heart was pounding extremely fast.


    Greem casually picked a few gemstones that he could put them to a good use, then pointed the remaining gemstones and said lightly, ¡°I¡¯ll let you settle with these gemstones. You can take 1/3 of them. That¡¯s your reward for this adventure. You¡¯ve done great today, especially the loophole you left on the controlling magic wand, it was brilliant. You deserve all of this!¡±


    After it heard what Greem said, Snox¡¯s green face started to twitch. Before a smile could bloom on its face, its eyes rolled up and it fainted.


    Greem shook his head, never paid any attention to his minion who just begun to show its value, and continued to nce through the gem stones. Very soon, he pulled out a fiery red magic scepter, which looked like it was made from the Fire Coral found in the bottom of the ocean.


    A Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter!


    When the scepter revealed itself, Greem immediately sensed the surging Fire element energy hiding within it. Before he could put his hand on it, Greem could also felt the scorching hot element fire from it. However, when he finally gripped on the scepter, the heat disappeared without a trace. The scepter had be warm and nice to hold, and a warm stream of energy kept flowing into his body.


    At the same time, the Fire element energy gathering in Greem¡¯s body started to be restless, and became at least three times more active than before.


    ¡°Chip, scan this Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter!¡±


    ¡°Beep. Task epted! Commencing scanning operation... beep! Operationpleted. The result of the scan is as follow:


    Object: Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter


    Attribute: Fire Element


    Secondary Skills: Added Fire Resistant (Intermediate) to Bearer. Immune to any lower grade Fire element damage. Fast Cast (Fire Element)


    Ability: Inferno Shield (3 times / day), Summon Fire Deity (Pseudo-Adept level) (1 / day)


    Additional functions: When ced on top of a special magical altar, it can be used to establish a small teleportation gate to the Fire Element ne. Able to summon a Fire Deity (Pseudo-Adept level) every day without any consumption, or two Fire Giants (Advanced Apprentice level), or five Lava Hounds (Intermediate Apprentice level), or ten Fire Spirits (Beginner Apprentice level).


    These Fire element creatures cannot go beyond 1000 meters from the magical altar. Once the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter is taken away from the altar, all Fire element creatures will be repatriated to their original ne.¡±


    Ugh... Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a sharp cold breath.


    This Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter was much stronger than his original estimation!

 Chapter 107

    It was a powerful magical item, and it was almost like it was specifically made for Greem.


    Greem held the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his hand and kept inspecting it over and over. He could hardly tear himself away from it.


    The scepter consisted of three parts: The tail, body, and head. It had a one-meter long body, which was entirely made from a bright fiery red material. Although it was glowing red, it felt warm upon touch, and feltfortable when held in the hand.


    A magical gemstone with no attribute was socketed on the tail of the scepter. Obviously, it was a design used to allow the scepter to be ced on a Fire Altar. Three inter-coiling Fire Dragons were engraved on the head of the scepter. A Heart of the Fire Lord was ced in the middle, where the three dragon heads met.


    It was a unique magical gemstone that came from the Fire Element ne and possessed a thread of Source Energy of Fire Element. With this magical gemstone, the bearer of the scepter would be given with the ability of fire resistance. Of course, the fire mentioned here should be the ordinary fire found in the natural environment, not the Elemental Fire created by magic spells.


    By just holding the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his hand, Greem was given the ability to take a bath in the magma pool of a volcano.


    After fiddling with it over and over for a long time, Greem finally ced it into his storage waist belt with reluctance. From now on, he finally owned a suitable magical item for himself. It was not surprising that the Fairy only kept this extraordinary item but did not use it, as the element spectrum was totally different from its own!


    Greem nced through the pile of gemstones again, and this time, he pulled out two strange objects: a test tube containing a mysterious purple potion, and a magical book that had a gruesome ghost head drawn on its cover.


    Greem picked up the mysterious test tube with his fingers, uncorked it ,and gave it a brief smell. A pungent smell, like a mixture of fish and pepper, immediately brought a frown on his face. The test tube was fully filled with a purple colored magical potion. With a gentle shake, the potion immediately began emanating a purple glow.


    Bloodline Strengthening Potion?


    Greem¡¯s eyes brightened. He couldn¡¯t bear it and brought a tiny dot of the purple potion up to his mouth with a fingertip. After a brief moment, the Chip gave out a confirmed answer.


    Bloodline Strengthening Potion!


    Maybe for Greem, who aimed to take the path of an Elementium Adept, this item didn¡¯t serve too much of a purpose. But for Mary, or other apprentices who took the path of the Bloodline, it was a priceless treasure. Its biggest value was that it could provide a preliminary purification of the bloodline of an apprentice, allowing the apprentice to take a step closer to the source of their bloodline.


    Therefore, after confirming the ingredients of the potion, without saying another word, Greem immediately poured it into Mary¡¯s mouth. After all, Mary was using sleep to digest the surging energy of blood that came from the Fairy. In another word, it was also an evolution of the innate talent of her vampire bloodline. Therefore, if she could receive some external help at this moment, it would no doubt help make the breakthrough easier!


    Devouring the blood of stronger existences was an effective method to improve the grade of a vampire, while the Bloodline Strengthening Potion could further stimte the evolution of a vampire. With these two factorsplementing each other, it was a huge boost to Mary. Hence, after pouring all of the potion into Mary¡¯s mouth, Greem rubbed his palms excitedly, his mind filled with anticipation.


    He just couldn¡¯t wait to see what Mary would looked like, after having both her overall strength and bloodline improved!


    After dealing with the Bloodline Strengthening Potion, Greem calmed himself down and started to give the gruesome magical book a thorough examination.


    When Greem rested his gaze on the horrendous ghost head drawn on the cover of the book, a pale white mist suddenly diffused from the book itself, and the ghost head became alive within the mist.


    It was a ghastly and bloodcurdling ghost face that hid within the shadows, so no one could see the expression on it, as sight was impaired by the mist. Just as Greem knit his brows in a tight frown, a strange, indistinct, and near inaudible voice suddenly rung up in his mind.


    ¡°In ordance with the ancient will, following strictly with the principle of equivalent exchange! Little guy who is walking on the path of an Adept, do you want to obtain the mighty and mysterious knowledge from the ancient era? Then open me up quickly!¡±


    Greem was slightly shocked.


    He had heard of this kind of magical book, that had its own consciousness. Most of them were produced by Adepts of the ancient era. Inside of these books, it was highly possible one would find some unique magic spell or mysterious knowledge that no one knew. Of course, it could also be a prank left behind by an ancient Adept. There were even funny, true stories of official Adepts being fooled by such pranks!


    In order to open up such magical books protected by a demon spirit, not only would one have to follow the will left behind by the previous owner of the book, he also needed to fulfill some random in-bad-taste requests given out by the demon spirit itself. Therefore, it was a ¡®fair trade¡¯ that really depend on the luck of the person.


    ¡°Your honorable demon spirit, if I really want to read the contents of this book, what kind of price do I have to pay?¡± Greem wasn¡¯t fooled by the flowery words and cunning statements of the guardian demon spirit, but instead, he soberly asked the most critical question.


    From the relevant knowledge Greem had studied before, it was mentioned that when some Apprentice Adepts with insufficient overall strength found a demon spirit book, they couldn¡¯t wait and opened it up straightaway, only to realize the price they had to pay after reading the book was not something they could afford, but it was all toote! Not only did the unlucky fellows not learn any ancient magic spells, they even paid the price with their own precious lives!


    Therefore, in the fundamental code of practice for Apprentice Adepts, when they bumped into some living creatures from the outerworld or demon spirits, they had to be really careful in any choices they made. Once they fell into these creatures¡¯ word traps or were bound with a mandatory contract, getting themselves killed was, in fact, the lightest consequence. The most frightful was having their soul became these creatures¡¯ war trophy.


    In the aspect of toying with someone else¡¯s soul, these demon spirits could even bepared with a powerful existence, such as an official Necromancer.


    Perhaps realizing its small trick was discovered by Greem, the gruesome ghost face turned listless. ¡°As expected, you¡¯re a hateful boring guy. Aren¡¯t you excited by knowing that you can learn ancient magic spells and mysterious knowledge? Why are you fussing with these boring questions!¡±


    ¡°Your honorable ancient demon spirit, please answer my question!¡±


    ¡°Alright, alright! If you wish to read this book, you need to give me 15 points of your Physique...¡± The demon spirit¡¯s voice was getting lower and lower. Thest few words sounded so vague it was as if it was the snoring of a kitten. Greem nearly didn¡¯t hear what it said.


    Greem broke out in a cold sweat, nearly couldn¡¯t hold himself back from throwing the demon spirit book from his hand.


    Damn it, 15 points of Physique!


    No wonder this book wasn¡¯t opened up by the Fairy. Presumably even it grudged the loss of a precious 15 points of Physique. For Greem, he only had three points in Physique. If he had identally opened this book, the mandatory contract between him and the demon spirit book would be taken effect immediately. And since he couldn¡¯t fulfill the requirement of the contract, let alone anything else, the only consequence would be an inevitable death, by having his soul extracted from his body!


    Just as Greem raised the book high up and want to forcefully throw it to a corner of the cave, a stream of data transmitted from the Chip stopped his movement.


    Within the on-site data, which had been restored and magnified a few times by the chip, thest few vague words spoke by the demon spirit book were clearly presented in front of him.


    ¡°... or reced with something of equivalent value!¡±


    It was spoken in an ancientnguage of ¡®Amarr,¡¯ and had been spoken with a weird tone by the demon spirit. Perhaps, most of the targets it ever spoke with had been deceived by this petty trick.


    Though the ancient Adepts had forced demon spirits to guard the inheritance of their knowledge, and hadid down the strictest rules for them, as long as anyteers could achieve the requirement of reading the book, the demon spirit had to follow the will of the Adept and hand over the knowledge without hiding anything. But no matter how strict the rules, the crafty and cunning demon spirit could always find a workaround. This demon spirit had found a loophole in the contract, not only it increased the requirement of reading to a jaw-dropping condition, it had also hidden the most critical rule of the contract.


    Yes, even if that ancient Adept coulde back alive, he couldn¡¯t use the demon spirit for viting the contract. It had acted ording to the contract between it and the ancient Adept! As for whether can you understand the ancientnguage of Amarr, it had nothing to do with the demon spirit! It is you who arecking knowledge, and never serious in handling the situation.


    Greem wiped off the cold sweat on his forehead, and with a serious tone, he told the ghost face, ¡°Your honorable demon spirit, please tell me what are the substitute requirements. I want to give it serious consideration!¡±


    The ghost face on the cover of the magical book suddenly became extremely angry, ferociously letting out a raging roar at Greem. However, as Greem had gained insight into this seemingly ferocious appearance, he just narrowed his eyes and enjoyed the demon spirit¡¯s performance.


    Realizing that the threatening was ineffective, and its previous petty trick had been exposed, it knew by dragging anything further, it might trigger the frightful ancient contract. Left with no alternative, the ghost face of the demon spirit dully told Greem the real requirements of reading the book.


    ¡°With 15 points of Physique, you can have a total control of this magical book. With 8 points of Physique, you can read all of the contents of this book. With 5 points of Physique, you can read any content that is below the grade of Adept, 3 points of Physique allow you to learn a specific magic spell, 1 point of Physique gives you a random magic spell.¡±


    ¡°Substitute objects, I was asking about substitute objects! What kind of objects can be used as the substitution?¡± It was Greem¡¯s turn to interrogate the demon spirit.


    ¡°Magical gemstones, magical materials, any mysterious knowledge which is not inside of this book... anything and everything. As long as they are rted to magic spell, they could all be the substitute objects, but the required amount would be a lot!¡±


    ¡°How about this?¡± Greem tried his luck by cing an Emerald on top of the magical book.


    It was arge Emerald with a size simr to a human heart. It would cost at least 230 magic crystals in the Adept market.


    ¡°0.3 Physique.¡±


    The answer given by the demon spirit shocked Greem.


    If calcted based on this, then if he wanted to gain total control of this book, 15 points of Physique would be equivalent to twelve thousand magic crystals! Maybe for an official Adept, this price was nothing, but for Apprentice Adepts who were constantly in need of resources, it was simply an astronomical figure.


    The corner of Greem¡¯s eyes twitched. He tilted his head and looked at the pile of gemstones, which he had thought were plenty moments ago. But now, he felt that even if he had more of them, it was still not enough for him to spend.


    cing the demon spirit book on the ground, Greem started to ce magical gemstones on top of it. Every time after he ced one gemstone, the demon spirit would tell him a small figure.


    Shadow Stone, Tiger¡¯s Eye stone, Mchite, Green Agate, Lesser Moonstone, Emerald, Topaz, Aquamarine, Ruby, Opal, Sapphire, Azure Moonstone, me Spessarite, Golden Dranite, Dawn Stone, Living Ruby, Noble Topaz...


    Following the piling up of the magical gemstones, the figures eventually reached 11. The remaining gemstones were all top grade. For example, Blood of the Old God, Blood Gem, Deep Peridot, Dawn Stone, Tsite, Night¡¯s Eye, Lion¡¯s Eye Stone, Crimson Spinal Stone. All of them were gems which Greem felt reluctant to give away.

 Chapter 108

    Please support the trantion through my patreon if you are able to.


    There will be early ess to future chapters.


    Many thanks!!!


    Greem hesitated for a brief moment, then waved his hand, ordering the Rock Snake to a corner of the cave to spit out a huge amount of dirt, gravel, weeds, broken vines and other debris. Afterwards, he started to thoroughly search through the messy pile to find some magical items that had been left over by the Fire element Fallen Pseudo-Adept.


    Snox had awakened long ago and was cleverly squatting beside Greem, helping him aplish the dirty job.


    After searching through the entire pile, Greem had found three magical items.


    One was a ne that allowed the bearer to unleash me Balls instantly, another was a bracelet that could improve the efficiency of Fire element meditation, and thest one was a magical staff made of Fire Coral.


    As effects of all three magical items were for Fire element apprentices, they were suitable for Greem as well. However, since he had found the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, they would no longer bring him those huge benefits.


    Gnashing his teeth, Greem ced all three magical items on top of the demon spirit book.


    ¡°14 points.¡± The number announced by the demon spirit made Greem clench his jaw forcefully.


    It only needed one more point!


    Greem searched through his storage waist belt and waist pouch, he couldn¡¯t find anything else that was suitable. As for the remaining items, he felt reluctant to give up any of them!


    Right as he was hesitating, a goose egg shaped Opal suddenly fell into the pile of gemstones.


    ¡°15 points, you have reached the upper limit for unsealing the demon spirit book. The book will now start unsealing!¡± At this moment, the ghost face had finally shown the frightful manner of an ancient demon spirit. Soon, numerous magical arrays started to emerge on the cover of the book. Following a barely audible muttering voice, one after another, the arrays disintegrated and vanished along with those gemstones and magical items which had been used as substitute objects!


    After the ghost face had gradually faded away from the book cover, the real appearance of this magical book was finally revealed.


    Struck by surprise, Greem gazed at Snox who had an aching heart expression on its face. A smile emerged on Greem¡¯s face. He nodded his head praisingly at Snox, before switching his focus back to the magical book.


    This book was called a demon spirit book initially, because the entire book was concealed by the demon spirit and one had to achieve the basic requirement to read it. But now, as the requirement of reading it had been achieved, ording to the ancient contract, the demon spirit had taken the war trophies it deserved and disappeared from this world. That was why the magical book was now present in front of Greem.


    The book had a ck cover and was made of leather. The corners of the book were installed with golden frames, giving it a touch of a dignified and ancient look. Greem tried to weigh it in his hand, though the book was at most thirty pages, it weighed a whopping three to four kilograms.


    When Greem used his finger and gently stroked the rather coarse hardcover, the name of the book condensed from greenish ghost mes and was revealed. It was written in the ancientnguage of Amarr ¨C The Secret Scroll of Voodoo.


    As Greem had unsealed the book with the highest requirement, when he held the book, a feeling of kinship immediately filled his mind. He didn¡¯t even need to flip the pages with his own hands, as when he prated the Scroll of Voodoo with his Spirit, the book started to flip the pages by itself and stopped at any page that Greem showed an interest in.


    After giving it a brief read, Greem was instantly shocked by the contents of the book.


    The entire Scroll of Voodoo was simply an encyclopedia of voodoo,piled by an ancient Adept. From the origin of voodoo to the prevalence of voodoo, records of different voodoo ceremonies, and detailed process of creating a voodoo doll... this book had them all in extreme detail.


    Besides the vast knowledge of voodoo, it also included many bizarre and unpredictable voodoo curses from the ancient era. For example, Scourge Cauldron, Curse of Bloodline, the Spell of Great Pestilence, Kiss of Death, Spirit of Pestilence... Just hearing their names alone would be enough to make one¡¯s hair stand on its end, but casting them was surprisingly simple. The materials used were not rare resources or expensive materials, but... humans.


    To be more precise, the casting required arge amount of humans, including their souls and flesh!


    The entire Scroll of Voodoo seemed to be teaching someone how to use the simplest method to create the Scourge Cauldron. Then how to use the Spell of Great Pestilence to produce a deadly pestilence that could wipe out all living being in an entire continent. After that, gathering all the variants of pestilence and merging them together to eventually produce the mighty Spirit of Pestilence.


    And this Spirit of Pestilence would be the strongest warrior working for the owner of this secret scroll.


    By sending it out, Pestilence would wreak havoc to wherever it went, causing death to spread across thend. Any living beings without a proper defensive magic spell would unable to stand against the invasion of this Pestilence, which had been mixed with a small percentage of source rules of Voodoo.


    Since the ancient era, the Spirit of Pestilence had been the best agent in warfare and was used by Adepts to deal with those lower grade nes who put up a desperate struggle. For smaller scale nes, they just need to throw a Spirit of Pestilence onto it, and they would be able to have their harvest one monthter. The entire ne would have been filled with howling souls that wandered everywhere, and they could seize any materials and resources they had wanted from that ce. Compared to sending arge army of Adepts to eliminate enemies everywhere and repress the revolts from the natives of the ce day and night, this method saved a lot of time.


    However, this method was overly evil, and frequently it would evoke a strong reaction from the Will of the ne that was being invaded. After all, the Will of the ne was the collection of every single material and living beings¡¯ wills. When all the living beings on a ne were wiped out, the Will of the ne would perish altogether. Therefore, those who possessed the Spirit of Pestilence would often receive a curse from the Will of ne which had perished and would be an enemy of that particr ne.


    Once an Adept wasbeled as the enemy of the ne, he would be disgusted by all the nes, including the origin ne where he was born and raised. And when someone like that entered into a random ne, he would immediately be weed by the wrath of everything in that ne, as all the living beings within the particr ne would advance wave upon wave,unching attacks at him without any fear of death and would only stop once one side was dead!


    Hence, as he was holding a weapon of mass destruction like this in his hand, even Greem couldn¡¯t remain calm anymore!


    Greem restlessly connected his mind with the Scroll of Voodoo, asking the Chip to make an identical copy of the content in his mind, then ordered it to slowly organize and analyze the data. He wanted to know if the Chip could find something suitable for him to use from these ancient voodoo magic spells.


    Once Greem had established a deeper spiritual connection with the Scroll of Voodoo, to his surprise, he found out that this Scroll of Voodoo could be used as a magic spell book. He could store six spiritual models of magic spell in a secret space within the book. This also meant, as long as he held the book in his hand, he would have six free magic spells which he could instantly cast.


    Of course, he had to store the spiritual models of these six magic spells in the book first.


    Damn, wasn¡¯t this just like the cache in his Chip, but an outworldly version?


    At this point in time, Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel respect towards those ancient Adepts. Though they were fighting alone, and they didn¡¯t have aplete education system which allowed one to slowly umte knowledge like how it was done back in the Earth, with just a tiny little spark in the mind of a random and unknown genius, they could actually create a mysterious space like this, which looked like an advanced technology from the modern world.


    With regards to this, Greem couldn¡¯t help but admire them speechlessly!


    Initially, he thought he was the only one who had the technique to solidify magic spells and stored their spiritual models in his mind. But judging from what he had just discovered, this mysterious world did indeed have a simr technique. The only difference was, once the spiritual model stored in the mysterious space of the book was used, it would vanish, and would once again need to be re-injected before it could be used again. Based on this point alone, it was not as effective as the cache in his Chip.


    It looked like he was going to have an additional magical equipment ¨C an extremely powerful magic spell sequencer!


    In future when fighting with enemies, without using any of his Spirit, Greem could use the advantage of instant casting brought by magic spell sequencer and shower the enemy with a raging bombardment.


    Upon thinking about this, Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel really excited.


    In order to express his love towards this Scroll of Voodoo, he purposely found a half meter long silver chain from his storage waist belt and used it to tie the magical book around his waist. After tinkering with it a few times, he was very satisfied with the results. Now, with just a thought in his mind, the magical book would automatically fly into his left hand, flip through the pages by itself and stop at the page where the magic spell Greem wanted to use was located.


    As for keeping it a secret, Greem had no worries at all.


    He had gained total control of this book, and it had a constant hidden connection with his spirit. Thus, even if it fell into the hands of an outsider, what the outsider would see would be the pages of totally emptied goat skin. Without Greem¡¯s permission, no one could overtake him and read the contents of the book.


    Perhaps, this was the biggest benefit of unsealing it with the highest requirement!


    Right as Greem was showing his fondness towards the magical book and could hardly tear himself away from it, Snox was keeping itself busy as well. It kept searching through the dirt pile that the Rock Snake spat out. Eventually, its hard work did pay off, because it really found something surprising.


    The partial fragment of the Fairy¡¯s true form!


    Among some of broken pieces of dried up tree skin, a sticky green liquid and some strange broken pieces of what looked like internal organs of a human could be found. It looked like during the evolution of the Fairy¡¯s true form, some unexpected mutation had happened.


    However, when Greem picked up those fragments in his hand and gave them a careful look, his mind was immediately filled with a series of messages from the Chip.


    ¡°Beep, unique active molecules of bloodline gene is detected, data saved...¡±


    ¡°Beep, unique active molecules of bloodline gene is detected, data saved...¡±


    ¡°Beep, unique active molecules of bloodline gene is detected, data saved...¡±


    ......


    ......


    A series of prompting sounds rang through Greem¡¯s mind and also caused his eyes to be filled with unconcealed awe.


    It was not because the Chip had crashed that the messages kept repeating themselves, but because every new prompt meant that the Chip had found another new bloodline gene in the fragment of the Fairy¡¯s true form. Eventually, a total of twenty-seven brand new bloodline genes were found. The discovery had suddenly made Greem feel that something was not right.


    A demon leader who was trapped in a small ce like that. Where had it gotten in touch with and devoured so many bloodline genes? After all, among the poption of Apprentice Adepts, these bloodline genes were priceless treasure that one couldn¡¯t even purchase with money! With just a small bottle of purified ancestor¡¯s bloodline, any apprentice would be able to step onto the broad road of the Bloodline Adept.


    With twenty-seven brand new bloodline genes, it also meant that frightening Fairy had once devoured twenty-six creatures who possessed mutated bloodline genes! Could there be twenty-six Bloodline apprentices from different species that had visited the demonized forest and gotten themselves killed there?


    Of course, it was impossible!


    Even by searching all the Bloodline Apprentice in the Dagon region, it would not possible to find twenty-six different species.


    So, how had this frightening Fairy achieve something that even an official Adept would find tough to do?

 Chapter 109

    Please support the trantion through my Patreon if you are able to.


    There will be early ess to future chapters.


    Many thanks!!!


    rmed and panicked, Greem was in deep thought.


    He sort of had the feeling that he had unintentionally intruded into a dangerous domain that he shouldn¡¯t have stepped into at all!


    It was impossible for the Fairy to have absorbed so many bloodline genes just by relying on its own ability. So there was only one possibility: the fragments of bloodline genes were being stored by the Adept Tower. When that ce had been abandoned by the Fallen Adepts, the Human-faced Flower that was lucky enough to survive had absorbed the other bloodline genes, and so had grown into an Adept level Fairy.


    After all, due to the mightiness of Adept¡¯s bloodline and the powerful strength of the family behind them, in the entire Adept Continent, any behavior that led to the stealing of Adept¡¯s bloodline was forbidden and any research rted to that was totally prohibited as well. Therefore, that within an Adept Tower built by Fallen Adepts, Greem had actually found the trace of so many bloodline genes, perhaps... there was a severe secret hiding behind this!


    On instinct, the first assumption Greem had was that Second Grade Fallen Adept Pridka had carried out a secret experiment rted to synthetic bloodlines. And it was highly possible this assumption was real! After all, for a First Grade Adept, carrying out any research rted to bloodlines was nearly impossible.


    But the deeper Greem dug into this matter, the more he just couldn¡¯t help but gulped a mouthful of his own saliva as his mind was overcast by a huge patch of shadow.


    Could a Second Grade Fallen Adeptplete bloodline research on such a huge scale alone?


    After all, Bloodline Apprentices were high-quality resources that were sought after by ns of all different sizes. The treatment they received was much better than that given to Elemental Apprentices, Body Refining Apprentices, and Profound Apprentices. If more than double digit numbers of Bloodline Apprentices had been murdered or went missing in the Dagon region, a massive storm would have long broken out.


    However, Greem had been in this ce for quite some time but he had never heard any rumors or news regarding this.


    Could this mean that the Second Grade Fallen Adept had handled this matter brilliantly and kept it well hidden, or there was an unknown, yet powerful, n that was hiding this for him? In the Dagon Region, a couple of small Adept families wouldn¡¯t be able to achieve that; even the big families would not be able to keep this matter very secret.


    If that was the case, then the only possibility would be...


    Greem turned his head slightly, looking into the direction of the Adept Tower of Underground Cave. Suddenprehension bloomed in his mind.


    Only the Zhentarim Association had the ability to cover the matter up to the level of no leakage!


    Based on this assumption and extrapted further, the purpose of designing the Underground Cave was rather thought-provoking.


    On the face of it, it seemed like a few Fallen Adepts had fled to the Underground World, engaged in guerri warfare, and fought with the surface Adepts for rare and precious resources. But if one looked from a higher perspective, that ce did look like a conflict zone purposely created by someone, with the hidden purpose of training their minions through constant battles.


    If the higher grade Adepts who managed this region truly had a selfish motive, were taking the opportunity to secretly carry out forbidden research, it could actually be covered up with a good reason. After all, the ce was in constant warfare. From time to time, many apprentices would get themselves killed. At most, people would felt pity for their death but it was tough for them to rte their deaths to something else.


    If Greem were the true mastermind behind this, he would just need to assign more Bloodline Apprentices when announcing a mandatory mission, then purposely create some conflicts during their mission. With that, the death of the Bloodline Apprentices would be well-reasoned and no one would notice anything fishy.


    Greem recalled, among the ten people on thepulsory mission team of his, four of them were Bloodline Apprentices, including Mary. So far, out of two Advanced Apprentices who were dead, Sh had been a Bloodline Apprentice. Also, it seemed like the Demon Vine Lady killed by Greem had also been a Bloodline Apprentice.


    He had never felt anything wrong before this. But thinking back now, as the superior existence among same level apprentices, the death rate of Bloodline Apprentices was extremely high! This... this told him something was not right.


    So how were they going to handle Greem, an outsider who identally intruded onto their secret experiment field? Were they going to assign him a highly dangerouspulsory mission without his knowledge and have him killed in the Underground World? Or maybe the mastermind would settle this matter personally, killing Greem straightaway and shutting his mouth? After all, he was just an Intermediate Apprentice who had no background, and no one would confront a Second Grade Adept for the death of a mere apprentice!


    Quietly, from his waist pouch, Greem took out the chest badge that represented the Byron family, which he had been given by Adept Angus, and carefully pinned it onto his chest. For the first time, he realized the tremendous benefit of having support from an Adept family!


    ............


    One hourter, when Greem, carrying the sleeping Mary, and Snox, who was carrying a huge bag on its back, approached the entrance of the Adept Tower, they were blocked by a magical golem.


    With no exnation, they were brought to a huge secret room on the ninth floor of the Adept Tower.


    They were greeted by a young Adept who looked only a few years older than Greem. He had a delicate and handsome face and a tall and strong body. He was wearing a luxurious Adept robe with a pointy Adept hat on his head. Standing in front of them, he sent forth a youthful aura that felt rather strange.


    If not for the powerful spiritual pressure indistinctly leaking out from his body, perhaps Greem would thought this Adept was disguised by an Apprentice Adept. But when he sensed the pure and reserved spiritual wave, Greem immediately felt like he was staring at a dazzling sun which made his eyes sore. Under the brilliant radiation of such strong glow, he nearly turned into a blind man.


    Greem immediately lowered his head, bent his back slightly, and expressed his respect. At the same time, he quietly unleashed some Fire Elementium and covered his eyes. Only then did he feel the pain in his eyes relieve a little bit. In his arms, as if the sleeping Mary had also sensed some threat, she restlessly moved her body and buried her beautiful face under Greem¡¯s arms.


    At the same time, Snox, who was standing behind Greem, shrank its body away from fear, lying on the ground with its face down, and did not dare stand up again.


    As a demon, Snox¡¯s sense of danger was more direct and sensitivepared to human beings, so the spiritual pressure it felt was much stronger than anybody else.


    This was a simple and rather crude meeting room; the wooden table and chairs ced inside had never gone through any polish, as they still had the original color of the wood.


    The young, evil looking Adept was sitting in one of the chairs, holding a cup of a steaming hot beverage in his hand. He was none other than the Second Grade Adept who controlled this Adept Tower, Master Andre.


    After all, he was in a bizarre world, which was totally different from the Earth in his previous life. Though the appearance, behavior, and habit of the people here were pretty simr to Middle Ages Europe back on Earth, there was still a huge difference. The most obvious difference was their name.


    In Greem¡¯s memory, Europeans always hadplicated names that were used to indicate the origin of their family. But in this world, where the strong would gain authority, the family influence had been weakened. A new type of family was found here, which was established around a powerful Adept.


    Usually, the leader of the family would not be the strongest of that family, but an elder of the family who was an expert in managing their territory. The direction of development of the family was actually held in the hand of the higher grade Adepts, who hid behind curtains and possessed powerful abilities.


    The Adept and the family were like twin trees that supported each other; when the family was strong, the Adept of the family would be the vine that parasitized the tree. And once the Adept became stronger, the family would, in turn, became the essory of the Adept, allowing him to demand anything he wanted.


    Therefore, many mighty Adepts didn¡¯t have a family name. On the contrary, his family would felt honored to have his name as their family name. It was a reversed rtionship of dependence.


    Since the first day Greem had arrived at the Adept Tower of the Underground Cave, he had memorized the name of Master Andre. But with his status and position, there was no chance he could have met with such mighty existence.


    Apparently, today was obviously an exception!


    Therefore, Greem lowered his head and bent down his body, waiting quietly and never showed any disrespect.


    After a long time, after Adept Andre had slowly finished with the hot beverage in his hand, he ced the cup down gently and moved his nce over to Greem, who was standing respectfully.


    Without raising his head, Greem could feel the scorching hot nce. It didn¡¯t mean Adept Andre¡¯s element affinity was Fire, but that the element energy soaking his eyes was too dense. When he moved his nce over to Greem, the sudden increase in element density had caused element damage to him.


    This was why Greem felt like he was burning!


    ¡°Have you gone to the Underground World recently?¡± Adept Andre finally spoke.


    Greem¡¯s body trembled slightly. He lowered his head further and said, ¡°Yes, master. I just came back from the Underground World!¡±


    ¡°Did you find anything?¡±


    Greem moved his head a little, as if he had tried to raise his head to have a look but quickly held down the impulse.


    ¡°Yes, master. I did find something on this trip!¡±


    A wondering expression emerged on Greem¡¯s face, which was still pointed at the floor. Clearly, he was puzzled about why a Second Grade Adept would show concern to a mere Intermediate Apprentice. Of course, Greem had purposely put on this expression!


    With the powerful Spirit of a Second Grade Adept, perhaps the entire Adept Tower was under his control and senses. Therefore, though Greem had lowered his head, any changes on his face would still be sensed by Adept Andre.


    Greem had to put on a real show!


    Since the moment he had stepped into Adept Tower, Greem had been hypnotizing himself restlessly, disguising himself as a reckless boy who knew nothing.


    After all, the information he had obtained previously was based on the data gathering, information summarization, and analysis of the powerful Chip. If any ordinary Apprentice Adept had wished to dig out the hidden secret from the Fairy¡¯s body, perhaps he would have needed to use the precise equipment found in the Alchemy Laboratory.


    Therefore, if Greem wanted to lower the risk he would face, he needed to pretend that he knew nothing about the secret!


    Also, Greem had tried to sound out Snox secretly, but the goblin had shown no knowledge of the bloodline experiments. It didn¡¯t even have an idea about how it possessed such bizarre abilities.


    This had strengthened Greem¡¯s decision to y stupid!

 Chapter 110

    ¡°What did you find? Show me!¡± Adept Andre ordered.


    Without any hesitation, Greem respectfully bowed and gently ced Mary on the floor beside him. He then turned around and asked Snox to bring the bag over. But too bad, his order had already lost its effectiveness, as Snox had copsed on the floor and couldn¡¯t get up.


    Left with no other choice, Greem walked over to the huge bag and arduously dragged it to the center of the meeting room. He opened up the bag and poured everything out on the floor.


    Immediately, precious stones, dazzlingly magical gemstones and an exceptionally designed rose armor and magical bow rolled out onto the ground. Meanwhile, the Fairy¡¯s body which looked like a saggy leather pouch and the broken stalks of its true form were mixed among them. They looked like they hadn¡¯t gone through any sorting.


    Looking at the scene, Adept Andre who looked like an evil youth narrowed his eyes, showing a ruminating expression. But when he gazed at the bright chest badge on Greem¡¯s chest, the smile on his face became stronger, while the oppressive atmosphere that had suffocated Greem instantly disappeared.


    ¡°An Adept level demon leader! I never expected an Intermediate Apprentice like you could harvest a prey of this level, no wonder Angus was so impatient to recruit you into his family!¡±


    ¡°It is all because of the care Master Angus has shown for me. Actually, we were able to defeat this frightening Fairy because of Mary; she had risked her life for this. Also, we were helped by a few Fallen Pseudo-Adepts!¡± An excited expression immediately appeared on Greem¡¯s face. Without waiting for Master Andre to ask the questions, he started to narrate the battle of the demonized forest in a detailed manner.


    He had no idea whether this Adept Andre had any methods of learning the truth of what had happened in the Underground World. Out of careful consideration, Greem chose not to tell any lies, and he told the entire process without covering anything up, expressing how proud he was for participating in such an incredible battle.


    It was a rare urrence, as Adept Andre patiently and carefully listened to everything Greem had to say. From time to time, he even nodded his head praisingly.


    Greem was able to fight an Adept level demon for such a long hour, employing some tricks, he even dragged a few Fallen Pseudo-Adepts who hade to ambush him into the battle, and eventually became the final winner who looted everything. To be honest, when such crafty nning and strategy was seen from an Intermediate Apprentice, it clearly showed his amazing ability to control a battlefield.


    ¡°You only found these after killing an Adept level demon?¡± Adept Andre¡¯s eyes kept lingering on the magical book tied to the side of Greem¡¯s waist. It was not until after Greem finally took out a strange looking, fiery red scepter from his storage waist belt, that his expression had rxed a little bit, ¡°So it is a Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter! Not bad, with your Fire element affinity, currently this scepter is the perfect magical item for you!¡±


    Andre lowered his head and pondered for a brief moment, he then raised his head and said, ¡°I need some magical materials for the experiment I¡¯m working on right now, so, I¡¯ll purchase all your war trophies. And since you¡¯ve risked your life to find all these items, I¡¯ll not seek profit at the expense of a little guy like you. Here are a few items, the value of each is higher than your magical materials. You can pick which one you want for yourself.¡±


    Following a wave of Adept Andre¡¯s hand, though it was mixed with all the other war trophies, the Fairy¡¯s corpse and the fragments of its true form started to fly up into the air by a mysterious force. In an instant, they were thrown into a dark rift that suddenly tore up in midair. After they disappeared, three small bubbles flew out from the dark rift, each of them was holding a bizarre magical item of peculiar design.


    One was a narrow-necked sk the size of a human palm, containing a mysterious, light-blue potion.


    Another one was a pair of red colored wings. It shone with a cold metal ze, and a special glow kept circting on top of it.


    Thest one was a token engraved with mysterious andplicated patterns, the purpose of which was unknown.


    ¡°The value of these three items are not lower than that of your demon corpse. The first one is an ¡®Elementary Intelligence Potion¡¯, with the current level of your Spirit, it will increase your Spirit by three points without causing any harm to you. The second item is an Adept level Wing of mingo, with a simple transnt operation, you¡¯ll be given the ability to fly freely in the air. And thest one is a Token of Permit, with it, you can visit the World of Deep Red once, a ce where you can improve your Fire element affinity.¡±


    Greem¡¯s body shook, his eyes instantly went wide, as he greedily stared at the three peculiar items floating inside of the bubbles. A wild beast was making an uproar in his mind, asking him to pull over all these items and make them his.


    Clenching his fist tightly, after put in a huge effort, Greem finally pressed down the restless emotions in his mind. He raised his head and asked with a stammering voice, ¡°Your respectful Master Andre, I... can I chose more than one?¡±


    ¡°You can only pick one! The value of your demon is only worth one.¡±


    Greem fixed his bloodshot eyes on all three items in front of him. Meanwhile, his mind was spinning fast to decide the right choice.


    Though the Elementary Intelligence Potion was a good item, it was only effective for apprentices below the Pseudo-Adept grade. Also, using it just to increase Spirit was rather wasteful, as the biggest purpose of it was used to bring enlightenment to one¡¯s intelligence. As the matter of fact, not everyone who lived in the Adept Continent was given the ability to study magic when they born. Even when two official Adepts got married, it was also possible that they would give birth to an ordinary child who had no talent in magic at all. In that situation, the purpose of Elementary Intelligence Potion hade into y.


    It could promote an ordinary child into a Beginner Apprentice Adept straightaway. This was the biggest value of it!


    The Wings of mingo, it was a pretty good assisting magical organ. And best of all, it was an option that brought the least amount of bloodline contamination. After owning it, Greem would have the ability to fly freely in the air.


    Also, for this kind of transnted magical organ, usually it would just be a small bloodline mark that solidified on the body. From the face of it, no one could tell any difference. Only when he recited a simple magic incantation would the magical organ activate and a pair of magical wings would stretch out from his back.


    For him, whether for pursuing enemies or for fleeing at high speeds, it was an excellent option!


    But, after clenching his jaw tightly and hesitating for some time, Greem eventually stretched his hand towards the third bubble.


    Though the first two items were extremely rare and precious, but if he was willing to spend some magic crystals, he could still find them in the market. But for the third item, which would allow him to improve his Fire element affinity, it was something that could hardly be found anywhere else!


    The bubble burst, and a cold metal token fell into Greem¡¯s hand.


    ¡°Good, very good! The deal isplete, and you can leave now. As for how to use this token, you can go and ask Angus!¡± Andre waved his hand after finished saying that. In an instant, Greem felt the sky and the earth spinning around. When his mind had finally settled down, he realized he had returned to his own room located on the second floor.


    Right beside him, he saw Mary who was sleeping soundly, Snox who was struggling in getting on its feet again and the opened bag with glows of gemstones all over the ce, the Rose Armor shining brightly, magical bow and the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter... after a careful counting, none of them was missing. Everything was lying on the floor, emanating its own glow quietly.


    Haha, it looked like these items couldn¡¯t enter the eyes of a Second Grade Adept. He was being overly worried previously!


    Before Greem returned to the Adept Tower, he had sessfully hypnotized himself to forget every single assumption he had made before this, and only made a backup of them in the storage area of the Chip. Now, after leaving the control of that Second Grade Adept, the backup data stored inside the Chip had once again transmitted into his mind, allowing him to remember those memories he had forgotten.


    He had no choice, as when faced with a Second Grade Adept, he had to be extremely careful.


    Greem carefully ced Mary on the bed, before putting all the gemstones into the bag and tossing it over to Snox, asking it to find a way to settle them. As for himself, after putting away those magical items, he turned around and left his room, rushing toward Adept Angus¡¯s residence.


    It was hard to describe what kind of strange expression Adept Angus had when he saw the mysterious token. However, after he listened to Greem¡¯s much-varnished exnation, though he still had his brows knitted in a tight frown and felt puzzled, he just couldn¡¯t find anything wrong with it.


    Angus dared not show any hesitation with regards to the order from a Second Grade Adept. He stomped his feet lightly, and immediately, a mysterious magical array that covered the entire main hall emerged on the hard rock floor.


    ¡°Insert that token into the center of this magical array!¡± Angus ordered with a low voice.


    Only now Greem had noticed that right in the center of this magical array which was entirely made up of element energy, there was a round shaped notch, and the size which perfectly matched the bottom of the mysterious token.


    After Greem inserted the token, Angus, while slowly activating the magical array, exhorted Greem with a deep voice, ¡°The ce you¡¯re going to visit is the World of Deep Red. It is a small space created inside of an underground volcano by the Adept Tower. A ce suitable for those apprentices with Fire element affinity to train. After you arrive there, do not do anything extra, as the ce is heavily guarded by numerous magical automatons, also... in a few simple words, just follow everything ¡®she¡¯ says!¡±


    Angus¡¯s voice became slightly hesitant at thest few words. Especially when he mentioned ¡®she¡¯, his face was filled with a strange mixed expression of envy and hatred.


    This had caused a nervous feeling to slowly enter into Greem¡¯s mind.


    Could that ce have something special or strange?


    However, before he could ask any other questions, the magical array had activated. Once again, Greem was forced to go through a violent dizziness that overwhelmed all his senses. Everything in front of his eyes had been stretched out and became a vague image. The space around him would sometimes elongate and sometimespress ¨C it just looked like a dough that anyone could knead freely.


    Greem had no idea how much time had passed.


    ording to the Chip, the entire process onlysted five seconds. However, Greem himself felt as if it hadsted for one whole day.


    When the dizziness brought by the disorientation of space finally faded away, Greem rolled his eyes and leapt out from the magical array, throwing himself onto his knees to retch. Never in his life had he hated this simple space teleportation so much! He didn¡¯t possess the integrated and near materialized Spirit like an official Adept, thus without the protection from the magical array, there was no way he could defend himself from the invasion of the spatial force.


    Yet, while he was cursing inwardly, a pair of slim and soft long legs suddenly appeared in front of his eyes. After that, a female¡¯s charming, seductive voice rang into his ears.


    ¡°Eh, howe this time it is a handsome boy? I thought that old man Angus has finallye to see me! Handsome boy, what¡¯s your name?¡±


    To his horror, Greem raised his head!

 Chapter 111

    She was a very graceful and charmingdy, and a bantering smile could be found on her juicy lips.


    Her skin was silky smooth and as white as snow, some tiny purple colored freckles could be seen indistinctly spread across them. Her sexy hot body made her the most beautiful creature Greem had ever seen in his entire life.


    A pair of curving horns stretched out from her forehead, and her purple colored long hair was hanging loosely down her back. A dangerous look of lust was lingering in her narrow yet charming eyes, making any man in the world want to indulge in her magnificent beauty upon staring at her face.


    On her back were a pair ofrge bat wings with distinct joints, one could even see sharp ws poking out from these joints. A t and slender bone tail stretched out from her lower back, glowing like a metal. All of these gave her a touch dangerous, yet inviting look ¨C it was like a forbidden excitement.


    She was wearing a curvaceous silk gown with a leather belt with silver ornaments strapped around her waist. She leisurely fiddled with a long whip made from wrought gold chain which produced electric sparks when it swung around.


    The devil¡¯s horns, those ming lips, and the signature bat wings, long tail and hoof legs, this... She was an abyss creature that shouldn¡¯t appear in the Material ne ¨C a Subus.


    Right when Greem saw this Subus, his thoughts had nearly stagnated. In a trance, he thought the previous teleportation had transported him into the horrible World of Abyss. When he recovered from his shock and nced around, only that had he realized that he was in a unique space that was trapped by some sort of magical spells.


    In front of Greem was a spacious and deep hall ofva. Nearly half the space of this hall was upied by a hugeva pool. The pool was filled with slow-moving moltenva and scorching hot whiteva stones. A three acres¡¯ stone tform was found on a corner of the hall, on top of it was a simple stone cottage, a simple stone table, and chairs ¨C everything looked so simple and crude.


    Greem was now kneeling on this tform. Behind him was the teleportation magical array with its glow slowly fading away, and in front of him was... an Abyss Subus with a charming face and sexy body.


    With Greem¡¯s vast knowledge, he roughly understood theyout of this ce with just a brief nce.


    Fuck, what bullshit World of Deep Red. It was merely a small living space established within the inner part of an underground volcano! And, the reason why those old goats had established this space wasn¡¯t for any magic spell research at all, but purely... to house this seductive Subus of the Abyss.


    After all, the Abyss Subus was the native creature from the World of Abyss, which was a lower grade ne. Though they didn¡¯t possess a powerfulbative strength, relying on their sexy and charming bodies and their extraordinary smart brains, they had been the favorite concubines and advisers of many powerful Devil Lords of the Abyss.


    Though they could also enter into a material ne, the perfect living environment for them was still a hot and harsh world like the World of Abyss. Meanwhile, a primary material ne, like the World of Adept, would seriously reject the chaotic and brutal aura emanating from the body of these creatures from the Abyss.


    Therefore, since those old goats wanted to let this Abyss Subus survive in this world, they had no other option but to establish a ¡®World of Deep Red¡¯ near the underground volcano, which had a simr environment to the Abyss ne.


    To put it inly, this was a ¡®recreation and entertainment¡¯ ce those Adepts had set up for themselves. And judging from what this Subus had just said, perhaps she was not even the exclusive concubine for someone, but...


    Greem shuddered suddenly, quickly stopped himself from pondering further.


    When Greem was curiously measuring the surrounding with his eyes, the Subus was also staring at him in wonderment!


    To be honest, only those human Adepts could enter this ce at their pleasure. And as for any existence below the grade of Adept, Greem was the first toe to this ce!


    Right when Greem was contemting how to introduce himself, a tall humanoid stone figure suddenly walked out from a wall beside the stone tform. A low, muffled voice came out from its bee hive-like face full of holes.


    ¡°Outsider, ording to the message transmitted from the master, you can only stay in this ce for two hours. Please do not disy any behavior that will harm the stability of this space, or else, you¡¯ll be killed!¡±


    Having finished saying that, the huge humanoid stone figure took a step back, before once again merging back into the stone wall. No one could see any difference from the spot where it came out.


    An Adept level magical automaton!


    With just one gaze, Greem had determined the overall strength of this huge humanoid stone figure. And with such a mighty overall strength and within this tiny space, a magical automaton would be able to kill him easily. Even if he had summoned all his Golems, he would not be able to save his life, because there wasn¡¯t any space he could run to, to get away from the attack!


    Greem finally sensed the unique environment of this ce.


    The dried and hot fire air made it extremely difficult to breathe. It was as if there was a fireball residing in his lungs, every inhale and exhale was a scorching hot airflow. As Greem¡¯s element affinity was Fire, within his Spiritual Domain, his entire body and soul were rejoicing for the dense and active Fire Elementium found in the surrounding environment. However, his overly frail body just couldn¡¯t withstand the harsh environment. Indistinctly, signs of self-destruction had appeared on his body.


    With no time to interact with the Subus standing beside him, Greem immediately sat down folding his legs and started cultivating his Inferno Body.


    For any Element Adepts, if they wish to maximize the power of their element magic spell, they had to carry out a magical modification to their body. And, having the body totally transformed into Elementium was an inevitable path! It was an extremely slow process and also consumed a huge amount of resources.


    They had to consume Fire element demon beasts¡¯ meat on a regr basis and use it to slowly and gently stimte their body to allow their body to get used to the gradually denser Fire Elementium. And the cultivating of Inferno Body was just the first step to transforming the body into Elementium, and it was also the initial threshold.


    Only once he hadpleted the cultivation of Inferno Body, Greem would have the ability to travel to some unique environments which were rich with Fire Elementium and continue his meditation and cultivation. While his innate talent might have weed these rich Fire Elementiums, his body wouldn¡¯t be able to withstand the entire cultivation process.


    Greem closed his eyes, calmed his mind and entered into deep meditation. Before, he had to use his Spiritual tentacles to capture those Fire Elementiums, but now, they were flooding into his Spiritual Domain like they had just burst out from a huge dam. Also, because of the overly dense Fire Elementiums, the incorporeal process that normally only happened in his Spiritual Domain had be visible to the naked eye.


    Countless flickering tiny red dots were lingering around Greem¡¯s body, constantly merging into his body, prating into his bones and tendons, flesh and blood, some even prated into the source of his Spirit.


    However, this process didn¡¯t bring him only benefits.


    Following the pration of countless Fire Elementiums, within his flesh, blood, bones, tendons, internal organs and some other parts of his body, Fire Elementiums started to pile up and couldn¡¯t be absorbed in a timely manner. They started to show their active, unstable and destructive characteristics, as they had begun to erode Greem¡¯s body.


    Looking from a far distance, it was like an invisible furnace was burning violently inside of Greem¡¯s body. His skin turned red and just as his sweat had emerged, they immediately evaporated before they could roll off his skin. Greem¡¯s breathing became heavier, and even the air he let out had turned into a scorching hot me.


    Due to ack of magic spell protection, Greem¡¯s cloth had started to burn off, enshrouding him within a huge fireball. However, as the me didn¡¯t possess any supernatural power, obviously, it couldn¡¯t hurt Greem at all. Instead, it was giving him a touch of mystery.


    Though Greem¡¯s mind was indulging in the deep meditation, his brows started to furrow, and his mind slowly retracted from the Spiritual Domain.


    His body constitution was too weak, so there was no way he could withstand a Fire element cultivation of this level. Usually, he could maintain three hours of deep meditation, but in this ce, he was forced to stop before reaching fifteen minutes.


    When he regained consciousness, two totally opposed logical judgments came out from his burning hot body. Guided by his Fire element innate talent, the Spiritual Domain had be unprecedentedly strong and nourished. The raging Fire element energy kept storming into it at a constant pace, bringing tremendous benefits. On the other side, the body which had suffered a constant erosion from the Fire element energy was moaning and howling miserably. While the body had undergone the tempering process, it was also being weakened at the same time.


    The corner of Greem¡¯s eyes twitched.


    Could this be the end of his rare opportunity of being able to cultivate in the undergroundva? After he was transported to this ce, the mysterious token had disappeared. Apparently, it could only be used one time. If he was forced to leave this ce now, he wouldn¡¯t have any more opportunities to visit this ce!


    This was an extremely unique environment, and it would be extremely difficult for him to find a simr ce to continue his cultivation.


    ¡°Chip, is there any solution to the current situation?¡±


    ¡°Beep, Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter...¡±


    The Chip¡¯s answer was simple and straightforward. Greem forcefully pped his forehead, cursing his own stupidity.


    With a flip of his palm, the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, ced inside his storage waist belt, appeared immediately. Upon holding it, the painful and numbing sensation he had felt throughout the entire body disappeared instantly. Even the mes that had tortured him previously had be a suitable temperature.


    Greem lifted his fair right hand; he saw numerous zing red fireballs ragingly burning the surface of his skin. The dancing mes and the scorching hot ze now looked like a crimson outfit,pletely covering his entire body, making anyone who saw this admire the miraculousness and bizarreness of the magic spell.


    With the help of the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, Greem was now spared from the harm that mighte about from those low-intensity mes. With that, he was tempted and moved his nce over to the boilingva pool not far away.


    Since it was a rare opportunity for him toe here, he had to maximize the gains no matter what!


    Greem gritted his teeth and stood up suddenly. The few remaining magical equipment detached from his body automatically. Fully naked and holding only the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, Greem strode to the edge of theva pool.


    He had no choice; perhaps with the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, his body would be able to withstand theva pool, but his magical equipment wouldn¡¯t. If they were destroyed in theva pool, it would be a huge loss for him! Therefore, Greem could only carry out the experiment with a naked body.


    As for the Subus who had been standing beside him smiling, Greem simply ignored her existence!


    At this moment, Greem¡¯s thoughts of bing stronger were extremely firm and tough ¨C the petty charm spell of the Subus couldn¡¯t affect him.


    Standing at the edge of the pool, normally the burning hot air wave would have been enough to half-cook him, but now, it felt like a warm breeze.


    Greem poked his toe lightly into the boiling moltenva. Judging from the feeling, it felt like a hot water with a temperature of fifty degree Celsius. Though it felt hot to the touch, he could still bear it.


    Greem clenched his jaws, gently cing his first leg into the pool, then the second leg. Marching forward step by step, soon his entire body had submerged into the boiling moltenva.


    Sensing the increasing temperature right in front of him, Greem stopped moving forward and stopped at a position where his head was just barely under the surface. Once again, he started the cultivation of his Inferno Body.

 Chapter 112

    As the matter of fact, the cultivation of Inferno Body was more of a process of attracting the Fire Elementiums in the air and making them merged into the cultivator¡¯s body. Using them, the cultivator was able to temper and strengthen his Fire element innate talent.


    Thus, during the cultivating process, the density of the Fire Elementiums in the surrounding environment yed an important role in the speed of the cultivation!


    If Greem was ced in a wet and cold environment like the Swampy Tower, the speed of his cultivation would be at least ten times slower. On the contrary, when he was cultivating in this undergroundva pool where Fire Elementium was in an extreme majority, his progress in cultivation had simply skyrocketed.


    Theparison between two different environments couldn¡¯t even be calcted with mere numbers!


    Countless Fire Elementiums kept pouring into Greem¡¯s body together with some mysteriousva materials. They were condensing his flesh and blood, tempering his bones and strengthened his tendons, helping his body which had be corroded by the Mind Concentrating Potion, be strong once again.


    Washed by the slow-moving moltenva, Greem¡¯s bones and tendons had started to produce cracking noise, a sign of their growing and bing stronger. At the same time, his blood and flesh had be sturdier and filled with more vitality. His dark long hair which had once hung loosely on his shoulders had beenpletely burned off by theva. However, they were now slowly regrowing while making a strange hissing sound. Surprisingly, the color of his hair had changed to dark red and was glowing now with magical luster!


    Within Greem¡¯s mind, the dynamic data about his body attribute was refreshing at a crazy speed.


    Before he could get a glimpse at the rows of tiny green characters that were pouring in with insane speeds, they were immediately flooded with new prompts given out by the Chip.


    ¡°Beep. An iing unusual foreign material detected. It will increase host¡¯s Physique by 0.01 points...¡±


    ¡°Beep. Merging of a foreign Fire element energy into the Spirit source detected. It will increase host¡¯s Spirit by 0.01 points...¡±


    ¡°Beep. An iing unusual foreign material detected. It will increase host¡¯s Physique by 0.01 points...¡±


    ......


    ......


    Two different messages kept alternating off his vision. From time to time, a message that prompted the sessful cultivation of Inferno Body would mix between them.


    ¡°Beep. The host¡¯s body and Spirit have reached the lowest requirement of the cultivation of Inferno Body. Current progress: 1%.¡±


    When Greem finally stepped over the threshold for cultivating the Inferno Body, the temperature of theva, which had caused him to reach the limit of his endurance, suddenly dropped. He felt that he was able to handle the extreme temperatures better now.


    A thought suddenly struck Greem, and he couldn¡¯t hold himself and took a step forward. He wanted to keep himself at the border of his limits, and force himself to endure the painful torture throughout the entire cultivation.


    ¡°Beep. The Inferno Body has been strengthened. Current progress: 2%.¡±


    Trying his best to ignore the tremendous pain resulting in his body going through the tempering process, Greem diverted his attention by staring at the rolling text in his vision. Only by doing that could he feel an excitement filling his mind, making the pain he was suffering endurable.


    Following the strengthening of the Inferno Body, the enduring limit Greem had towards the high temperatures of theva had be higher, and he himself also moved deeper into theva pool.


    The Subus was standing on the edge of theva pool, overlooking at the rocking and burning hotva. Her green glowing eyes were filled with strong surprise and a look of disbelief! How could this be possible? That kid who had just came in was only a mere Apprentice Adept, how could he directly touch the frightening undergroundva?!


    Could it have been because of that mysterious looking magical scepter? Or, he was a kid with extraordinary innate talent, having amazing potential in his bloodline?


    The more she thought about it, the more excited she became. The Subus couldn¡¯t help but lick her juicy ming lips in a seductive manner. A hot stream suddenly surged in her heart, as the once charming eyes turned watery.


    Although she was a Subus from the World of Abyss and was regarded as a Fire element demon by themon people, when facing a undergroundva at this degree, she only dared to y with the fire at the edge of the pool. She could only cup a handful of white and boilingva, pour them on her curvy and perfect body, and let them roll off her silky smooth skin freely. But if asked to dive deeper into theva pool, even she couldn¡¯t withstand the devastating and deadly high temperatures.


    After all, she was just a Subus, not a ming Demon who could dance with fire. She could only endure the fire, not like it from the depths of her soul.


    After more than an hour, following the sshing of fire sparks, Greem poked his head out from theva near the edge of the pool. He started to walk slowly back to the tform.


    A moment ago when he was at the bottom of theva pool, he had received a prompt from the Chip.


    The Inferno Body had reached to the maximum level that he could withstand currently. His tempered body had started to show signs of decay as a result of over cultivating. Therefore, he had no choice but to leave theva pool slowly and prepare to cool down his body that had been constantly been in extreme limits.


    Previously, Greem had looked like a slightly skinny, immature youth of sixteen years. But now, he actually possessed a muscr body that would make a lot of people envious.


    With just an hour of tempering, his body had grown to the height of two meters. His burly body was now filled with toned muscles that popped right out, and together with the long dark red hair hanging loosely on his back, he was sending forth a devil-like charisma.


    When remaining standing in the boiling hotva pool that had reached his waist level, the Chip had finally refreshed thetest body attributes in Greem¡¯s mind.


    ¡°Greem (Advanced Apprentice): Strength ¨C 7.12, Agility ¨C 7.35, Physique ¨C 9.17, Spirit ¨C 16.25.¡±


    Without any notice, Greem had grown to the Advanced Apprentice level that he once had looked up to. Also, his Physique and Strength had finally crossed the threshold of five points, matching the grade of his Spirit.


    Clenching his fists slightly, for the first time, Greem felt that his body was filled with mighty forces that he could never deplete. At the same time, the raging Fire element energy was pushing around violently within his body, making it hard to sit still and urging him to smash something to release the active energy.


    Greem lowered his head and looked at the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his left hand. He couldn¡¯t help and sigh with mixed emotions at his heaven-defying luck. Without this scepter, at most he could only have a short moment of meditation right beside theva pool. And if he had wanted to cross into the threshold for the Inferno Body, it would have been simply impossible without tens of days of restless cultivation. Because of this scepter, Greem was given with the ability of intermediate level Fire resistance, allowing him to be spared from the Fire element damage caused by the scorching hotva.


    Just because of this, the progress of his cultivation had skyrocketed. Without it, he would have had to express his thanks to heaven and earth just for having a one-point increment in his Spirit!


    Right when he had all his attention focused on his brand new body attribute, a soft and warm body suddenly attached onto his back and was stroking up and down slowly. At the same time, a sweet, seductive voice suddenly squeezed into his ears.


    ¡°My handsome boy, I just losing sight of you for a short time, I never thought that your body would be so strong, so attractive! Do you want this sister to apany you for ava bath?¡±


    After that, two tender and lovely arms stretched out from his back, gently and slowly stroking on his toned chest. In an instant, the marvelous sensation of being touched by silky smooth skin had filled Greem¡¯s mind.


    Right at this very moment, the Subus who had her charming fame spread across the universe had fully revealed the tenderness and agileness of her body. While sticking out her flexible tongue and lightly licking on Greem¡¯s neck, she pressed her curvy body tightly onto Greem¡¯s back, at the same time her hand were skillfully flirting and stroking his chest.


    Inside of theva pool where no one could see what happened, her long bone tail gently coiled up around Greem¡¯s ripped thigh like a nimble snake, using the huge contrast between the touch of coarse bone and sensitive skin to further provoke this young man¡¯s ¡®anger¡¯.


    For an evil creature like this Abyss Subus, the concept of chastity and dignity was something that would never cross their minds. In the World of Abyss ruled by the jungle rules, the mighty strength that brutally destroyed everything was the only thing they were after and also the ultimate guide of the Will of Abyss World. Since Subus don¡¯t possess a strong body constitution or powerful magic spells, attaching themselves to mighty existences became their only method for making a living.


    The material world wasn¡¯t a ce suitable for their survival, yet they still stubbornly tried toe to a material world. What they wanted was in fact, the bloodline and soul of a mighty existence.


    The reason those human Adepts summoned and imprisoned this Subus in their own ne was for nothing more than to enjoy her wonderful body and her wild techniques when making love. Although this Subus knew this clearly, she still came to this ce without any hesitation, because she was proud and had confidence in her body.


    Once she was allowed to spend a long time with an Adept, she would use her own ways to make the Adept fall in love with her uncontrobly. At that point in time, not only she would gain control of huge sum of fortune, she could also devour the Adept¡¯s body, and return to the World of Abyss with the soul of a mighty human.


    For the Will of Abyss, any behavior regarding bringing back the soul of a mighty existence from a primary ne was well worth the praise. If these Abyss Subus couldn¡¯t improve themselves by ughtering, then carrying out the business of smuggling the souls of mighty existences was still beneficial!


    Only through this method, would she have the chance to grow into an advanced devil ¨C a Pleasure Devil, which was the advanced shape of Subus.


    It was worth mentioning, the flirting techniques that the Subus knew were most effective!


    In nearly a few seconds, Greem¡¯s face became flush.


    But at the moment this Subus had attained her sess, she had failed at the same time. Because the huge humanoid stone figure hidden inside of the stone wall had once again revealed itself.


    ¡°Time¡¯s up! Outsider, you have to leave here at once. Or else, you¡¯ll be attacked by all the Lava Guards. Countdown starts now! 10... 9... 8...¡±


    Fuck! The time was up!


    The intense sense of danger brutally pulled Greem out of his lustful fantasy. He forcefully shook off the Subus clinging on his body and rushed towards his magical equipment that were scattered on the ground and picked them up. When he had finally rushed into the center of the teleportation array, he saw the Subus standing in theva pool, breaking into a furious rage.


    She had already bitten the well-cooked duck, however, it had just slipped away because of a stupid reason. How could she not get angry?


    Surrounded by her furious roar, the attractive and inviting body of Subus gradually rose from theva pool. The widespread bat wings on her back kept pping in the air, while the raging aura of Abyss emanated from her body like a blood mist, covering arge area.


    But too bad, before she could increase her power to the maximum level, two tiny, delicate and mysterious looking magical arrays suddenly emerged on her round and smooth shoulders. Under the suppression of the two mysterious magical arrays on her shoulders, the power gathered by the Subus suddenly dispersed without making any noise. From a brutal and violent Abyss Devil, she was once again transformed back to the little Subus that could be freely toyed with by anybody.


    She let out a shrill curse, before throwing herself back into theva pool.

 Chapter 113

    One monthter, Mary finally woke up.


    Because the energy level of the blood she had drunk was way beyond her vampire grade, she had been forced to continue her sleep in order to digest such powerful blood energy. Of course, this was also an innate ability unique to the vampire!


    If it were any other creature devouring so many different mutated energies in one go, it would be very easy to contaminate the direction of its own bloodline. But it was apletely different case for the vampire. No matter how many different mutated energies they were fed, after digestion, they would all be nourishment for the vampire¡¯s bloodline. Their bloodline being contaminated would never happen.


    But this time, her evolution was clearly different. After she woke up from her deep sleep, Mary felt like she was dying of starvation.


    The feeling greatly frightened her.


    In the past, when she devoured some blood energy and went to sleep, she would always have the feeling of repletion and satisfactioning from her bloodline upon waking up. But for some unknown reason, after devouring all of the blood from an Adept level demon, she actually felt hungry when she woke up. She was so hungry that her stomach was beginning to gurgle.


    Also, the feeling of hunger wasing from the deepest part of her body, from the source of her bloodline. As if... as if, after this evolution, the progress of her bloodline was greater than the progress of her body constitution, and in a more radical manner.


    Could there be a factor that stimted the growth of bloodlines hiding within the blood of that Fairy? Bearing the heavy question in her mind, Mary moistened her lips and opened her eyes.


    This was not her room! There was somebody else in this room!


    Without making any noise, Mary sat up on the bed. Her bloodshot eyes stared straight at the back of a stalwart figure.


    She was in Greem¡¯s room. However, the figure sitting in front of the writing table and reading a book quietly was obviously not him. The broad and ripped body was rather strange to her. But the familiar soul ripple and the familiar aura emanating from the body... eh, something was not right! Why was there a pungent smell of sulfur mixed with that familiar smell?


    Mary drifted into the air noiselessly. In a sh, she arrived at the back of that familiar yet strange figure. The nails on her fingertips stretched out with incredible speed, and with a crimson glow, they turned extremely sharp. Meanwhile, her bloodshot eyes were on the figure¡¯s neck. She could give it a ferocious bite any time she wanted.


    Following Mary¡¯s movement, two objects that had been ced on top of her body fell to the ground, producing a crystal clear noise.


    Alerted by the noise, the burly figure turned his head. When he saw Mary, a delighted smile immediately emerged on his face.


    ¡°You¡¯ve awakened?!¡±


    It was a sincere smile; a smile full of delight!


    Mary stopped her leaping movement. She narrowed her bloodshot eyes, asking with a cold voice, ¡°Who are you? Why do you smell like Greem?¡±


    Looking at how nervous and panicked Mary was, an expression wavering betweenughing and crying appeared on Greem¡¯s handsome face. It looked like after her long period of sleep, both of them had changed a lot, resulting in Mary suspecting her own eyes.


    Greem stood up from the chair. In the past, he used to be as tall as Mary, but now, he was a head taller than her. With his burly body, when both of them stood face to face, the pressure unintentionally caused by his body actually forced Mary to take a step back.


    ¡°To determine the real identity of a person, the best proof is his soul ripple. Mary, can you sense my soul ripple now?¡± Greem asked in a calm manner.


    At the moment, he didn¡¯t want to overly provoke Mary, because she was like a strictly vignt leopardess, looking as if Greem did something wrong, she would leap onto him and give him a fierce bite. Although his increased overall strength had given Greem more confidence, when they were in a tiny room with limited space, even five of him tied together would not be enough to hold against the ripping of a Pseudo-Adept level vampire.


    Yes, as Greem was very sensitive, he could tell that Mary was a Pseudo-Adept level vampire now! ording to the ssification of Vampires from the books he had read, Mary should possess her own noble title now.


    The titles of Vampire nobility were not the rankings used by ordinary mortal kingdoms. They were a form of hierarchy used by the Vampire n based on the overall strength of their members. Due to the fact that vampires loved to stay hidden within human society, they disguised themselves as human nobles to conceal their true identity. Therefore they had adapted the same rankings used by human nobles.


    With Mary¡¯s current level, perhaps she could be given the title of Baron!


    Vampire, Knight, Baron, Viscount, Count, Marquis, Duke, Grand Duke, Prince! These were the noble titles used by the vampire n. Yet sometimes, the grade of their bloodline was not urately reflected by the grade of their overall strength.


    For example, Mary¡¯s current grade of bloodline made her a Baron, but her overall strength was Pseudo-Adept. If she were met with a vampire who owned the best blood of the orthodox vampire family, it was highly possible that his overall strength would only be Intermediate Apprentice level, but he had already been given the title of Viscount.


    For any race other than the vampire, the title didn¡¯t carry any meaning. But within the vampire n, it would bring tremendous benefit. At least, for that Intermediate Apprentice level vampire Viscount, when he was faced with Mary, it was highly possible that he would use the suppressive effecting from the bloodline and force Mary to be his ve. As to whether he would seed or not, that would depend on the level of suppression from the bloodline and the fight between their wills.


    Mary once again stared at Greem¡¯s face wonderingly. She couldn¡¯t stop sniffing the smelling from Greem¡¯s body. It was indeed Greem¡¯s soul ripple! After making sure of this, the nervous expression on her face finally eased up a little bit. But, where did that pungent smell of sulfur and the feeling of sweetnesse from?


    Once again, Mary brought herself closer to Greem¡¯s body, opened up her juicy lips, ready to give him a small bite so that she could taste his blood. But just as her tiny fangs approached Greem¡¯s neck, a small fireball suddenly exploded and blew her away.


    With just a small swaying movement in the air, Mary returned to Greem¡¯s side. She stared right at a small me that had suddenly burst out from Greem¡¯s neck.


    It was a golden me the size of a human thumb, quietly hovering on top of Greem¡¯s skin and burning soundlessly. It did not produce the crackling noise of ordinary mes. After five seconds, perhaps not sensing any foreign hostility or intention of attack, the golden me simply submerged into Greem¡¯s skin without leaving a trace.


    Now Mary finally understood. The fireball hadn¡¯t been summoned by Greem using a magic spell, but was a self-defense mechanism put out by the instincts of his body.


    Curiously, Mary stretched out a finger and pressed the spot where the me had emerged from. But this time, though she pressed and stroked Greem¡¯s skin with her silky smooth finger for quite some time, no me appeared. Mary startled for a brief moment. After that, she seemed to have learnt something.


    A shivering killing intention suddenly filled the air, and crackling noises were heard as Mary¡¯s nails started to grow longer. Filled up with Blood element energy, the tip of her nails became extremely sharp. Nearly at the same moment, right at the spot Mary had her finger pressed, a golden me burst out and ignited her finger.


    Her mind filled with curiosity, Mary brought her hand to her face and looked at it. The me actually detached from Greem¡¯s body, stubbornly burning her fingertip and continuously causing damage to her.


    A blood red beam shot out from Mary¡¯s fingertip. Very soon, the Blood element energy neutralized and annihted the me. After that, she turned her head and looked into Greem¡¯s face.


    ¡°What exactly is this? It looks pretty amazing!¡±


    ¡°Thebination of Inferno Body and Fire Shield.¡±


    ¡°Where did you get that smell of sulfur on your body?¡±


    ¡°It is the aftereffect of soaking in undergroundva. I¡¯m looking for a way to get rid of it.¡±


    ¡°Soaking in undergroundva?¡±


    ¡°You know, you¡¯ve been sleeping for 32 days without waking up!¡± Greem spread his arms helplessly and continued, saying, ¡°During this time, many things have happened and you need time to understand them all!¡±


    ¡°Then tell me from the beginning!¡± Mary¡¯s furrowed her brows and curled her tiny lips. ¡°I want you to tell me while I¡¯m eating!¡±


    Within two hours, Mary had swallowed five magical energy set meals continuously. Only then was she able to barely stop feeling the hunger from the depths of her soul. Meanwhile, Greem sat by her side, watching her wolf down her food, and he started to tell her what all had happened.


    Of course, Greem only told her what had actually happened. As for those spections and doubts he had derived at the cave, he said not a word. After all, they were at the Adept Tower, which was controlled by others. Who knew if that Second Grade Adept Andre was watching them secretly. Therefore, to be on the safe side, he decided to keep the secret to himself!


    When Mary finally stopped eating, Greem brought out the two presents and gave them to Mary once again.


    Touching the exquisite Rose Armor and magical bow that she only had a vague impression of, Mary tilted her head up and waited for Greem¡¯s exnation, puzzled.


    ¡°Both of them were the Fairy¡¯s magical items, but I¡¯ve modified them. Now you can use them with your Blood element energy. In the past, you werecking a long-range offensive approach. Now with these two magical items, we¡¯ve fixed your weakness!¡±


    Greem had alwaysined about Mary¡¯s simple approach to using her bloodline power. Although she had such an amazing innate talent, she still fought like a mad dog, trying to hurt the enemy by risking herself at the same time! If she was faced with an enemy who had the ability to stop her bloodsucking and regenerating ability, her fighting style was simply an act of courting death!


    Now, with the Rose Armor, her vulnerable defense had been patched up. And with the crimson magic bow, herck of long-range offense had also been repaired. With both magical items, she could make use of her high agility, fighting with guerri style and slowly biting away the enemy¡¯s offensive and defensive approach. If she was required to fight close-range, she could also put away the magic bow, change her weapon into her cruel ws, and lock the enemy in a close fight.


    Essentially, not only was she well-equipped for long-range and close-range battle, she also now possessed the necessary defense. With all of these, Mary¡¯s fullbative ability was able to be unleashed!


    During this period of time, Greem had also been working busily on something else.


    After hepleted the modification of Mary¡¯s magical items, he spent all of his time mastering Fire element magic spells and restoring his golems.


    The Inferno Body was just an elementary threshold on his path to the Focused Fire Element. Although it didn¡¯t give any directbative ability to Greem, it was the best foundation for all Fire element magic spells. For example, thebination of Inferno Body and Fire Shield had given Greem the self-defense mechanism that triggered automatically upon touch. Any behavior that would harm him at close-range would immediately be countered by the self-activating me, and it brought three to five points of damage.


    Although the damage inflicted by the me was not strong, it didn¡¯t require him to cast any spell, and it also didn¡¯t consume any of his Spirit. It was considered a pretty nifty self-defense ability!

 Chapter 114

    Recently, Greem had been carried out an in-depth research on the Inferno Force Field.


    He hadpleted studying all prerequisite knowledge rted to Inferno Force Field. Currently, he was able to cast it and maintain it for ten minutes. However, regardingbining his Inferno Body and the Inferno Force Field, there were still many tough questions to solve.


    ording to the best scenario Greem had thought of, he wanted to make the damage caused by the auto triggering self-defense me to be reflected onto the force field. With that, once any enemy entered his Inferno Force Field, the enemy would have to constantly suffer from the damage caused by the mes. This was almost equivalent to a small Ring of Fire magic spell!


    Greem had estimated this before, if he wanted to fully master the Ring of Fire, he would most probably have to wait until after he became an official Adept. As for now, he was trying to achieve it with an irregr way ¨C using abination of Inferno Body and Inferno Force Field to eventually yield a result simr to that of the Ring of Fire.


    Yet, in order to achieve this, he still needed a huge amount of magic spell knowledge and analysis, and he also needed to further optimize the control of the Inferno Force Field¡¯s nodes. In short, most of his energy had been reserved for the Chip, so it could perform the heavy load calctions. Meanwhile, Greem only needed to work on some simple tasks like reading, meditating and the restoring his golems.


    After the battle in the demonized forest, Greem¡¯s team of golems had suffered heavy damage.


    The Lightning Giant had lost two auxiliary cores; it would be able to restore to its full power once they were replenished. However, out of the three Rock Snakes, two of them had beenpletely destroyed beyond repair. Therefore, during this period, besides hiding in his room and studying some rted magic spells, Greem had spent most of his time in the Alchemy Laboratory.


    Through the enthusiastic promotion of Snox, those magical gemstones they had brought back from the Underground World had all sold out, bringing Greem a huge amount of magic crystals and handy magical equipment.


    Also, Greem had acquired apletely new body attribute, as hisbative strength had skyrocketed.


    Name: Greem


    Species: Human


    Attributes: Strength ¨C 7.32 (+1), Agility ¨C 7.51 (+1), Physique ¨C 9.47 (+1), Spirit ¨C 16.67 (+3)


    Profession: Apprentice Adept (Advanced)


    Health Points: 34/34


    Experience: 871 / 1000


    Status: Healthy


    Skills: Scroll Copying, Spell Reading, Golem Crafting (Intermediate), Casting Mastery


    Personal Abilities: Inferno Body (Passive), The Burning Hand (Solidified), Fire Arrow (Solidified), ming Spear (Solidified), Fire Shield, Fire Damage Reflect (Proximity Passive)


    Magical Equipment: Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, Storage Waist Belt, Secret Scroll of Voodoo, Circlet of Nobility (Spirit +1), Ioun Stone (Spirit +2), Boots of Speed (Agility +1), Talisman of Force (Physique, Strength +1), Wand of Dispel, Wand of Healing, Wand of Prophecy, Green Spirit (Curse Resistance +5), Screaming Tree Branch.


    After spending a huge amount of magic crystals, Greem finally experienced the huge gap in overall strength by having most of his magical equipment reced. There was a Star of Felune gemstone among the loot he had brought back from the Underground World, after having it cut and crafted by a Jewel Master, he had acquired an Ioun Stone which had the effect of Spirit +2. Together with the Circlet of Nobility that gave him +1 in Spirit, although Greem only had 16 points of Spirit, he was able to unleash a frighteningbative strength of 19 points.


    This also meant, if Greem had pushed all the way to his limits in a battle, he would be able to simultaneously control six Rock Snakes, or two Lighting Giants and one Rock Snake.


    Nevertheless, crafting a Lightning Giant would require a Pseudo-Adept level core from the Storm Giant, which was a prohibited item that he could only obtain by luck, not by searching for it. Therefore, even after Snox nearly visited all the merchants within the surrounding regions of the Adept Tower, they never found another one.


    During this period of time, the name of Snox had be famous in the middle and lower tiers of the Adept Tower. Nearly all the merchants supported by Adept families had learned of its existence.


    In fact, within the Underground Cave region, all high-end materials and resources were almost monopolized by these merchants supported by Adept families. They purchased every single local product that was produced in the Underground Cave and sold them to other regions, earning a huge amount of profit through the price differences.


    Although other ordinary merchants or traveling tradesmen tried to achieve this as well, they just didn¡¯t possess the abundant economic capabilities and amunicationwork that spread across the entire Adept Continent like those Adept Families¡¯ merchants. There was no way they couldpete with these giants. As the result, just by selling off a Night-Eyes Stone and a Tsite gemstone, Snox had quickly won over the hearts of these small merchants and traveling tradesmen.


    And perhaps, these powerful merchants had received a warning from the Adept families that supported them, though Snox had undercut them and sold off these high-end materials and resources, it didn¡¯t face any attacks from anyone. With that, it simply created the mysterious and mighty image of Snox. Most of the mysterious magical equipment Greem acquired actually came from these traveling lower grade tradesmen.


    Greem was the one who had the most understanding about his own overall strength. Currently, arge percentage of his overall strength was focused on golems. At least, until he couldplete the framework of his Fire element magic spells, he could only rely on his golems to maintain a powerful offensive strength.


    Since he didn¡¯t have to worry about his offensive strength, Greem had shifted the focus of his research in Fire element magic spell to defensive magic spells. Whether it was the Fire Shield, the Inferno Body or the Inferno Force Field, all of them were Fire element defensive magic spells. As long as he wasn¡¯t facing an Adept level opponent, even if he had to fight a Pseudo-Adept, it would be very difficult for his opponent to bypass his multiyers Fire element defense when surrounded by a group of golems.


    But, as there were numerous magic spells of all kind, and most of the lower tier magic spells were invisible, incorporeal and tough to predict. Therefore, in order to avoid any idents, Greem had crazily purchased some higher grade magic wands.


    The Wand of Dispel could eliminate some abnormal statuses that could be applied to his body. For example, poison, slow, frost, paralysis and some others.


    The Wand of Healing could help cure some obvious injuries in his body.


    The Wand of Prophecy could predict the direction where the dangers mighte from in advance.


    Aa the Dagon region was a ce with an abundant choice of items, Greem even nned to prepare a preventive measure or healing approach for each possible magic spell attack that he might have to deal with in the Underground Cave. Preparedness prevents cmities, this was the core belief that Greem had in his life!


    After equipping himself, Greem was confident that he could even fight against those Pseudo-Adept level experts. Of course, not an ultimate expert like Hulk! When faced with an ultimate expert like Hulk, the golem crafted using an advanced apprentice level core was still too fragile. It was really difficult to use the characteristic of element golems to reduce Hulk¡¯s overall strength.


    If Greem really wanted to fight with Hulk, perhaps he would have to promote the level of all his Golems to the Pseudo-Adept level and use two Lightning Giants as his primarybat force. Therefore, though with his currentbative strength, Greem already had the ability to imperil Hulk, he stillcked the confidence to defeat him!


    As for those apprentices under Hulk, Greem wasn¡¯t being arrogant, but if they were to fight fairly, no Apprentice Adept would be his match!


    Nevertheless, though his overall strength was improving at a steady pace, Greem dared not stepped into the Underground Cave again. The reason was simple. After the battle of demonized forest, one Fallen Pseudo-Adept was killed and the others were severely wounded, and the Elysium City had announced a kill order toward Greem. As long as he stepped into the Underground Cave, Elysium City would try to kill him at all costs!


    This also meant, at that point in time, it was highly possible that he would see a Fallen Adept from the group who ambushed him halfway.


    For this reason, after Greem learned the news from Adept Angus, he was leftpletely speechless. He had no choice but obediently throw himself in secluded cultivation, never stepping out of the Adept Tower.


    Though the surface Adepts had upied the dominant position in this region, when those Fallen Adepts were determined to kill an Apprentice Adept, they would have hundreds if not even thousands of methods to achieve their goal. Therefore, after Greem offered a few of his most precious gemstones to Angus, his name was finally removed from thepulsory mission and the training camp missions. Now, he could just spend his sweet time in the Adept Tower until thepulsory missions had ended.


    What to do? This Adept Angus was the appraiser for theirpulsory mission!


    While Greem and Mary were spending their days leisurely, other team members who hade here together with them were in a bad situation. After two Advanced Apprentices had died and Greem and Mary dropping out, the team of six remaining apprentices tried to recruit some temporary teammates in the Adept Tower, hoping to get some help inpleting their mission. But too bad, no one answered their call.


    Left with no alternative, they could only stick together, spending days and nights rushing between five mission sites. For the mission duration of fifteen days, they would have to spend eleven to twelve days to visit all five mission sites. And after they returned, they were only left with two to three days of resting time, before they needed to attend the next mission.


    Also, after the death of a Fallen Pseudo-Adept, the attacksing from the Elysium City directed at the surface apprentices had be more frequent. Nearly every day, the six-person team would have to face all kinds of ambushes and traps. If not for the strong overall strength of three Pseudo-Adept working hand-in-hand, perhaps it would have been extremely difficult for them to stand up to these frightening attack that kept repeating day after day.


    But as the result of going through this intensive battlefield and warfare training of magic spells, all six of their overall strengths had grown at an incredible speed. Compared to when they had just arrived this ce a few months ago, though they still maintained the same grade, their truebative strength had doubled.


    It was especially true for Sabrina, who was the leader of the team. Vaguely, she was now portraying a slight fiercer killing intent and a ferocious manner, just like the ck-hand Kevin they had met when they just arrived.


    There was one time that Greem and Mary had bumped into the team who had juste back from their mission in the Adept Tower. The hostility between them had reached to a level where no hiding was needed.


    Although they had heard that Greem had put out an astonishingbative strength in this ce and even defeated a Bloodline Pseudo-Adept who was about to advanced into an official Adept. But, after experiencing the tough life in the Underground World, they thought theirbative strength had improved a lot. Hence, when they bumped into each other, a fight had nearly broken out.


    The location they had bumped into each other at was right outside Adept Angus¡¯s residence. Greem and Mary were here to ask some questions rted to magic spells, while the team was here to submit their mission items afterpleting another round of Underground World training.


    The team members who had had a hard time kept staring at both Greem and Mary angrily, but not their leader, Sabrina. She was seen wearing a smile on her face as she greeted both of them.


    When Greem and Mary had left the ce, Sabrina was still looking at the direction where they had gone. She didn¡¯t say anything and was pondering about something in her mind.


    ¡°What¡¯s wrong, chief? Why are you caring about two bastards? If not for their dropping out from our team halfway, our training mission wouldn¡¯t have be so tough!¡± The Thunder element Pseudo-Adept, Leo came closer to her and whispered. From the way he talked, it wasn¡¯t tough to tell he had truly submitted to Sabrina.


    Hiding under her silver mask, Sabrina¡¯s mechanical eyes were glowing greenly. With a cold voice, she said, ¡°You never noticed that, didn¡¯t you? One of them is a Pseudo-Adept now, and the other is an Advanced Apprentice!¡±


    The team members who had just crowded around were immediately dumbstruck!

 Chapter 115

    Two monthster.


    The gradual descent of the flying ship in the center of the square signaled that thepulsory mission of the Underground Cave hade to an end.


    Just like the time when they came here, it was the same masculine guy wearing a golden armor who was in charge of escorting them back.


    When he saw Greem and the other apprentices, a smile with unknown meanings emerged on the masculine man¡¯s face.


    ¡°Hahaha, little bastards, how was the life in the Underground World? Let me see... not bad, not bad at all! Out of ten apprentices, there are still seven of you left. It looks like those underground fellows are being courteous to you. Eh? Howe there is one additional Pseudo-Adept? It seems someone is doing pretty well! Haha, is that little beginner apprentice the first one to get killed? How brave is the mere beginner apprentice toe to this ce, he was just courting death! Hahaha...¡±


    Hearing how the masculine man lectured them with a self-entertaining manner, an unsightly expression appeared on the faces of these few apprentices.


    During thest underground patrol for the mission team, they were struck by a nned ambush from the Fallen Apprentices. The Advanced Apprentice, Bruce, was killed on that trip, while the rest managed to flee with different degrees of injuries. Hence, when they heard the mocking words from the masculine man, they immediately lowered their heads, as their eyes were filled with mes of anger.


    With a bitter expression, Greem bowed slightly and greeted, ¡°Master Sammir, I¡¯m the Beginner Apprentice you mentioned!¡±


    The haughtyughter of Sammir suddenly came to a stop.


    His eyes went wide as he stared right at Greem¡¯s face. Since Greem had changed tremendously, only now could he slightly see Greem¡¯s previous look.


    ¡°You¡¯re an Advanced Apprentice now! Kid, so you¡¯re the one who had the best luck from this ce! Alright, alright! I don¡¯t care a shit about how you live your life here, I want everybody aboard the ship now! I still need to rush back and report thepletion of the task!¡±


    Without saying anything else, the group started to board the flying ship one after another one. As Greem¡¯s contracted servant, after paying one magic crystal, Snox was allowed to board the ship as well.


    After an indistinct swaying movement, the flying ship rose high into the sky. The group of apprentices leaned on the side of the ship and stared at the crowd and buildings that became smaller and smaller. Their mind was filled withplicated feelings. Like birds that had managed to escape from the cage, everyone¡¯s minds rxed. Those who were familiar with each other even gathered in a group, happily sharing their experiences whileughing.


    However, huge gaps between each team still existed. The team of seven apprentices was split into two distinct groups.


    During thest few days before leaving the Underground Cave¡¯s Adept Tower, Greem ordered Snox to sell off all magical gemstones and materials that he wouldn¡¯t be using in theing days, while purchasing a huge amount of demon beasts¡¯ meat, magical knowledge and element crystal cores that they could find in the market.


    He knew very well thatparing to this ce, the Swampy Tower was simply a destend. Once they returned to that ce, they wouldn¡¯t be able to enjoy the daily magical energy meal anymore. Not only that, there wasn¡¯t any apprentice markets, so no more merchants that provided them with numerous resources. At that point in time, even if they wanted to be well-fed and well-clothed, they would have to depend on themselves!


    The huge amount of resources and goods hadpletely filled his storage waist belt. In order to bring everything they had purchased back, Greem even purchased another five to six storage waist belts. But even so, there was still many materials that couldn¡¯t fit. To solve this problem, Snox simply ced them into a huge bag and carried it on its back. No matter where it went, it just couldn¡¯t tear itself away from the huge bag.


    The flying ship continued to fly high in the sky. As they were at the inner area of the well-developed human colony, the ship was flying with its top speed. When they hade here previously, the Underground Cave was thest stop, but now it had be the first stop. Therefore, as the ship stopped at the mission sites in different regions, more and more apprentices were boarding the ship.


    Compared to the arrogant manner these apprentices had when they first came, it seemed the hardship had rubbed off their sharp edges. They had be more reserved andposed. But once there were more than a hundred apprentices aboard the ship, it was inevitable that the ship had be a noisy scene.


    The group that kept walking around the deck and made the most mor were those Advanced Apprentices. Although Intermediate Apprentice had the most numbers here, most of the time, they would just serve as the backdrop. But still, the real stars among the apprentice circle were those Pseudo-Adepts.


    After their training, these Pseudo-Adepts would certainly be the future hope of their families who received focused cultivation. Therefore, taking this opportunity, they would also like to get in touch with theirpetitors of the same rank.


    In the eyes of a Pseudo-Adept, he or she could only see another Pseudo-Adept!


    When the flying ship had passed the Dagon and Bracada region, there were more than ten Pseudo-Adepts gathering on the ship, including Mary, who was a Blood element Pseudo-Adept who had just made a breakthrough and... Evil Bugs Acteon.


    Yes, unfortunately, that Evil Bugs Acteon had also sessfully leveled up as Pseudo-Adept during his training!


    Perhaps he was satisfied with his own progress, when he boarded the flying ship at the Bracada mission site, he didn¡¯t cover his face with the cap like how he usually had. Compared to before, his face had be uglier. Theplexion of his face was dark and dull. Also, an array of tiny, bizarre looking eyes surrounded his purple pupils. All the eyes were blinking at the same time, sending chills down one¡¯s spine.


    His mouth had reced by a lotus shaped organ that looked like the mouthparts of a beetle. Whenever the ck mouthparts moved or opened, one could even see the blood red mouth cavity and green saliva inside.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to tell that Evil Bugs had gone deeper in the modification of his own body. Currently, he could even be addressed as a ¡®half-bug man¡¯! Though Greem had felt disdain in regards to such behavior of abandoning a human body totally, he had to admit, among all the apprentices he had met, Evil Bugs was the only one who treated himself in the cruelest manner!


    The overall powerful strength had given Acteon strong confidence, allowing him to ignore the eyes and judgment from any outsiders. It was easy to tell from the way how he stepped onto the ship with his head held high in the air. His purplepound eyes gazed across the lively crowd, before finally resting on Mary and Greem¡¯s face. The Advanced Apprentices who followed and regarded him as their chief actually sensed a feelings of angering from Acteon.


    When they followed the gaze of their chief and saw Mary, who was wearing a red dress and red armor with a red bow on her back, a captivated and intoxicated expression immediately appeared on their faces. However, when they sensed the reserved yet powerful spiritual ripples emanating from Mary, they were struck by awe. Without hesitation, they quickly put away their lustful looks and bent their bodies slightly to show respect to Mary.


    A cold and strikingly pretty woman like her was actually a Pseudo-Adept? This group of men couldn¡¯t help by sigh emotionally inwardly,ining about the unfair treatment that the Will of the World had shown.


    After gazing at Mary coldly for some time, finally, Acteon pulled down his cap and covered his face. Silently, he walked over to a corner. Throughout the entire process, his gaze had never stopped on Greem¡¯s face for more than one second.


    ¡°Looks like we¡¯ll have more fights when we return! This Acteon seemed to also have gained a lot during this trip.¡± Greem wasn¡¯t bothered by the disdain Evil Bugs had for him, instead, he banteringly spoke with a smile on his face.


    ¡°Hmph. No matter how deeply hidden his abilities are, he is no way a match for you. Among all many people I¡¯ve met so far, you¡¯re the master in the art of disguise! It is undisputable that you possess such a powerful ability, yet you just pretend that you¡¯re a harmless apprentice, waiting for some idiots to poke their heads in front of you and only to get themselves killed by you. Are you addicted to self-torture?¡± Mary refuted in a rather discontented manner.


    She was feeling doubtful now! By pushing her up to the position of Pseudo-Adept, was this damn bastard doing it for her own good, or just out of his usual habit of pushing her to the front so he could hide behind and n evil plots against the enemy?


    At thest mission site of Bracada region, Madwoman had boarded the ship too.


    When they suddenly met, not only did they not have any joyful feeling of reunion, the atmosphere seemed to have turned heavier and more bizarre.


    Madwoman was still at the same rank ¨C an Advanced Apprentice. But during the training mission, she had also had significant growth in her overall strength. Butpared to Evil Bugs and Mary, obviously, she was out of luck.


    Previously, in order to stand up against Mary, an ¡®outsider¡¯ who had suddenly emerged, the rtionship between Madwoman and Evil Bugs had been rather harmonious. But now, since Evil Bugs had be a Pseudo-Adept, an estrangement suddenly urred between her and Evil Bugs. Madwoman walked alone to a corner and found herself a resting spot, showing no intention of congratting Evil Bugs on his breakthrough.


    Her behavior had puzzled Greem. He started to ponder about the true rtionship between both of them.


    Soon, when the flying ship entered the Erathia region, more than two hundred sixty Apprentice Adepts had boarded the ship. As for those who didn¡¯t board the ship, most probably they were killed during the mission.


    There was a total of eleven Pseudo-Adepts when they first came, but on their return trip, the number had reached to fourteen. This also meant, during the training mission, three lucky Advanced Apprentices had taken the leap and became the fortunate ones. Everyone was looking at these three lucky apprentices, casting countless nces of unexinable envy and hatred, buried deep in their minds.


    After tens of days of flying, when the ship entered the center region of Zhentarim, one after another, the apprentices started to leave the flying ship. Eventually, Greem and few others had smoothly arrived at the Swampy Tower.


    As their group was heading to the Dagon region, which was the most remote area of the Zhentarim territory, they were thest group of apprentices that had returned to the Swampy Tower. As the result, those apprentices that gathered at the entrance of the Swampy Tower represented nearly all the official apprentices of this ce.


    While he was still on the ship, Greem gave the crowd a rough gaze. Within seconds, the Chip had given him the numbers of apprentices he saw: thirty-seven apprentices. Including the nine apprentices on the ship, the total was only forty-six. Comparing to sixty-two apprentices that had attended the mission, one-third of the apprentices were gone.


    Presumably, among all Adept Towers, a depletion ratio like this was considered the highest. And obviously, the reason for this was closely rted to the cking off of Adept Anderson, the master of Swampy Tower. In the previous years, Greem and all the other apprentices were locked up in this magical swampynd, a ce with sparse resources. During normal days, in order to carry out a magical experiment, they even had to restlessly harvest the materials themselves or exchange with other apprentices.


    As the result,pared to those apprentices from other Adept Towers, the overall strength of the apprentices from Swampy Tower was shockingly weak, and they were poor to a jaw-dropping extent. And by participating in the dangerous apprentice training with such overall strength, any minor ident would be a life-threatening event for them!


    Even for those apprentices who had lived through the training mission, most of thempleted their mission with the poorest results, hence their improvement wasn¡¯t much. On the contrary, led by Ellen, the ten apprentices who stayed back were covering their face with a ttering smile. Facing with these apprentices who risked their life but harvested a little, they felt that they really had great foresight and had made a wise decision.


    But, when thest batch of nine apprentices stepped down from the flying ship, everyone at the scene couldn¡¯t help but change their expressions drastically!

 Chapter 116

    Mary had be a Pseudo-Adept?!


    Though everybody was surprised that Evil Bugs Acteon had a breakthrough, it wasn¡¯t something unexpected. After all, he had been one of the strongest three in the Swampy Tower!


    However, Mary¡¯s breakthrough had confounded these people, and they simply felt it hard to believe.


    Therefore, overshadowed by Mary¡¯s huge glory of bing a Pseudo-Adept, the fact that Greem had also made the leap and be an Advanced Apprentice was merely discussed among the Beginner and Intermediate Apprentices. For those Advanced Apprentices who held the discourse power of apprentices, they just locked their gazes onto the two brand new Pseudo-Adepts.


    Virtually overnight, the power structure of Swampy Tower was going to change!


    As the newly appointed Apprentice Leader, Ellen had prepared a long weing speech full of beautiful words and affection. But when he stood right in front of the evil looking Acteon and the ghostly Mary, he was instantly pressured by the shivering aura emanating from both of them. His body started to tremble, and he couldn¡¯t utter out a single word that would be fitting for the atmosphere.


    ¡°We¡¯re tired, and we need rest. Everybody just go back to where you belong!¡± Mary, in the same self-centered manner, said with a cold voice.


    Only when she was facing her prey would she let out a pretty and coquettish smile that came from the bottom of her heart. As for these people of no importance, to be honest, even if they stretched their neck and ced themselves in front of her, she would be toozy to take a bite.


    Faced with such an overbearing ¡®subordinate¡¯, Ellen¡¯s overall strength was simply not enough for him to do anything. As a result, he wittily moved aside, clearing the path that led to the entrance.


    Following behind Greem, Snox was seen having six to seven fully packed waist pouches tied around its waist, and carrying a huge bag on its back, as it also staggered into the Swampy Tower.


    ording to Adept Anderson¡¯s temperament, it was obvious that he wouldn¡¯t waste any time in weing the apprentices¡¯ return. Of course, if he was informed earlier that two of his apprentices had sessfully be Pseudo-Adepts, perhaps he might have changed his mind and showed his face, trying to win over their hearts.


    After all, Pseudo-Adepts were a unique group of apprentices! If someone was lucky enough to make the breakthrough, that Pseudo-Adept would instantly be an existence of the same grade as him. If Sarubo family knew he had conveniently ¡®wasted¡¯ drawing in Pseudo-Adepts, those advanced Adepts of the family would have definitely invited him for a ¡®polite¡¯ discussion.


    Therefore, in this isted and private resource site, even Advanced Apprentices were mere targets he could torture and bully as he like. But when it came to Pseudo-Adepts, it would be a totally different case. Any damage done to Pseudo-Adepts was behavior that strangled the future of the Adept Families.


    Instead, as long as Anderson reported the news about the two Pseudo-Adepts to Sarubo family, the management of the family would definitely reward him handsomely for the ¡®cultivating¡¯ credit he had put out. Also, the yearly resources, materials he received from the family would also be increased significantly.


    Of course, if Acteon and Mary wished to gain a further support in resources from the Sarubo Family, they would have to sign a magical contract with them, using the years of service they could provide to the family after they became an official Adept in exchange for a portion of resources. The longer they served, the more resources they would receive. If they were willing to join the family, they could even receive the best cultivation conditions from the family.


    Hence, the same night after Greem and the others returned to the Swampy Tower, Acteon and Mary were called up to the fifth floor of the tower by Adept Anderson. There, they met another official Adept from Sarubo Family, Adept Keoghan.


    From the introduction given by this Adept Keoghan, both of them had roughly learned the basic situation of Sarubo Family.


    One thousand three hundred years ago, Sarubo Family was established by a great Fourth Grade Element Adept, Sarubo. During that period, Sarubo was the deputy chairman of the Zhentarim Association and had a great reputation in the center region of the continent. And just five hundred years ago, this founder of the family had even made a breakthrough and became a Fifth Grade Principle Adept. After that, he had traveled to the Ocean of Stars and was never seen again.


    As the matter of fact, in the Adept Continent, this was the mostmon situation for the nearly all Adept Families!


    Every single Adept Family was founded by a mighty Adept. If this Adept stepped into Fifth Grade sessfully, he would inevitably have to travel to the Ocean of Stars, searching and conquering those weaker nes in the vast ocean of stars. Any Adept who failed to attain Fifth Grade would have to face his death one day.


    When an Adept Family lost the deterrent forceing from a powerful Adept, their inevitable fate would be devoured by other Adept Families. Those families who had a Fifth Grade Adept conquering the weaker nes elsewhere were considered stable, after all, though the Fifth Grade Adept wasn¡¯t allowed to return to the World of Adept personally, he could still supply the family with the resources he found at the outside world.


    With these premium resourcesing from other nes, the family would be able to maintain their power, while constantly cultivating new blood to supply the vacuum left over by the departure of the family¡¯s experts. On the other hand, the reason those Fifth Grade Adepts were willing to supply the hard earned resources to their families, was so that the family could cultivate more Adepts that he could use to conquer new nes.


    When they were on a major scale conquering mission at another ce, the Adeptsing from their family would be the main force used to expand their kingdom.


    Therefore, when Acteon and Mary signed the family contract with the Sarubo Family, after they became an official Adept, unavoidably, they would have to participate in the ne warfare initiated by the Sarubo Family.


    ording to the introduction by Adept Keoghan, currently Sarubo Family didn¡¯t have any Fourth Grade Adepts. They only have one Third Grade Adept, one Second Grade Adept and seven First Grade Adepts. Among the regions ruled by Zhentarim Association, an overall strength like this was only considered an intermediate force.


    Sarubo Family was stationed at Feidnan City, two thousand six hundred miles from the Swampy Tower. Meanwhile, this ce was just one of the four major resource sites of the family and was stationed by Adept Anderson.


    After briefly exining the situation of the family, Adept Keoghan started to ask about their decisions. They had to choose between exchanging their portion of resources with the years of service, or joining the family in order to receive full fledged support. Unexpectedly, Acteon chose to join the family, while Mary went for ten years of service.


    Actually, if there were shorter years of service, Mary would have rather chosen that, as that was also the decision that she made after discussing with Greem. But too bad, the minimum years of service Keoghan gave her was ten years!


    Soon, both of them left their own magical seal on the magical contract drafted by Adept Keoghan. From now onwards, their status and position would bepletely different than that of other apprentices.


    As they had made different choices, the treatment they received was alsopletely different!


    After Evil Bugs Acteon made the decision, he was immediately given a family chest badge by Keoghan, and was urged to move his residence up to the fourth level of the tower as soon as possible. That was a region that no ordinary apprentice could set their feet on! Though Mary was also allowed to temporarily stay at the fourth floor, she had to pay a fee of two magic crystals every day.


    As for the reason, the density of a particr Elementium at the fourth floor¡¯s residence could be controlled, which had a tremendous benefits for their meditation and the modification of their body. As Mary was only employed by the family, obviously she couldn¡¯t enjoy this benefit exclusive only to the members of the family.


    After Adept Keoghan left, Mary and Adept Anderson carried out an in-depth discussion. And through a tedious bargain, both of them eventually came out with a fair deal where both parties were satisfied.


    After agreeing to give a huge bucket of her own blood, Mary got herself and Greem the right to move their residence to the fourth floor. Along with that, Mary also promised after she became an official Adept, she would not seek revenge against Anderson. She also promised to provide her Adept level blood sample, allowing Anderson toplete his research.


    Strictly speaking, the experiment Anderson carried out on Mary was in fact, a bloodline experiment that couldn¡¯t be known by the public. Thanks to Mary¡¯s good fortune, she was able to survive the painful bloodline modification that could get her killed, and was lucky enough to be a mutated vampire.


    She was a mutated vampire because the vampire bloodline Adept Anderson possessed wasn¡¯t of pure blood, and the source was somewhat dubious. Therefore, after repeatedly being preached at by Greem, Mary expressed her willingness to forget the grudge from the past, but with the condition that she needed some samples and data of the source bloodline.


    As a result, everybody was happy with the oue, and both parties had obtained the things they wanted the most.


    Mary vaciting and staggered her way back to Greem¡¯s residence, threw the things in her hand over to Greem before she threw herself onto the bed and fainted. What to do? She had lost a huge amount of blood, even with her body constitution, she would need a good sleep before she could recover.


    After settling Mary in a good position, Greem calmly sat back on his wooden table and started to give the small test tube in front of him a careful and serious examination.


    It was a ss test tube the size of a human finger, and wasn¡¯t too long either. Bringing it in front of his face and staring at it seriously, Greem could only see some nearly dried up blood at the bottom of this test tube.


    Actually, that Adept Anderson was a half-baked bloodline researcher. During an asion, he was sent to investigate a haunting event in a territory ruled by Sarubo Family. He was met with a vampire who had hid deeply in the human society.


    Though three Adepts of the family were working hand-in-hand, they still couldn¡¯t defeat this powerful vampire. At the end, the Second Grade Adept of the family struck personally, only then they were able to expel that fellow from their family¡¯s territory. When they searched through the mysterious castle where this vampire lived a secluded life, Adept Anderson identally found a test tube containing highly concentrated vampire blood.


    Obviously, that escaped vampire was also carrying out some kind of secret research rted to bloodlines.


    Hence, Adept Anderson secretly concealed this war trophy, and hid in this remote and deste Swampy Tower. Without anybody else¡¯s knowledge, he conducted research regarding the mutated vampire.


    But too bad, most of his initial experiments had failed miserably. All the creatures injected with the vampire blood were dead because of the disintegration of their genes. Among all bloodline creatures, the bloodline gene of the vampire was considering tyrannical. When any other bloodlines tried to merge with it, they would always be nourishment to it, and it was impossible to have the situation where both would co-exist.


    Initially, Anderson thought it was because those test creatures he used had an overly weak body constitution, making them unable to withstand the violent bloodline modification. Therefore, he used the authority he had and started to run the experiment on apprentices of the Swampy Tower.


    Three Intermediate Apprentices were injected with the source vampire blood sample; Mary was the only survivor. Undoubtedly, she had be the key to his future experiments.


    When it came to vampires, locking them up and conducting the research would yield no results. Because vampires needed to keep sucking the blood of experts to purify and cleanse their own bloodline. That was the reason why Anderson had set Mary free, with the intention that she could evolve by herself andplete the purification of her vampire bloodline.


    It was worth mentioning that his view on this matter was urate. At least, Mary¡¯s current progress had gone way beyond his expectation. Presumably, through analyzing and experimenting with both the old and new vampire blood, he would be able to make a step forward in his research of mutated vampires.


    Therefore, since he was given with new experimental material, Adept Anderson generously gave Mary a drop of the source blood. Nevertheless, this drop of source blood was almost reaching the end of its life expectancy and would soon lose all its gene activity!

 Chapter 117

    The next day.


    It was a rare asion, as Adept Anderson had called all the Apprentice Adepts of the Swampy Tower together. In front of everyone, he announced the new statuses of Acteon, Mary and Greem. From now onwards, the three of them would no longer be bound by the system of apprentices, and could arrange their lives ording to their own will. Also, they had be the people who had the highest authority in the entire tower, under Adept Anderson.


    Within the crowd, the newly appointed Apprentice Leader, Ellen¡¯s expression turned extremely awful, but at the same time, was mixed with a helpless look.


    Pseudo-Adept!


    They were a group of monsters standing between Apprentice Adepts and official Adepts!


    It was tough to predict which of them would have a greater chance to be an official Adept smoothly. Therefore, for all the lower ranked apprentices, offending any one of them could turn into a future catastrophe!


    But... but Ellen had deeply offended one of them.


    Hence, right when the meeting was dismissed, Ellen immediately paid a visit to Acteon, while bringing along all the resources he could find.


    Since Acteon, Mary and Greem had moved their residences to the fourth level of Adept Tower, even Ellen, the Apprentice Leader, had to send a visiting request prior to meeting Acteon. Then, he had to stand mortifyingly at the entrance to the fourth floor, waiting for approval from Acteon.


    And this was still considering nothing! What angered him the most was that that damn Greem had actually brought his contracted creature, a goblin, to the fourth floor without feeling ashamed, and made it one of the residents there. This had further stirred up Ellen¡¯s hatred!


    A goblin, a cheap, insignificant, dirty, cowardly... goblin, how could it rise above his head? Whenever this thought came into Ellen¡¯s mind, he felt like his heart was filled with weeds and felt extremely depressed!


    No one knew what had happened during the secret meeting between Ellen and Evil Bugs. But when Ellen left Acteon¡¯s room, he was seen holding his head high and once again resumed the arrogant and lofty manner he had previously.


    While Ellen¡¯s mood had transformed, a small meeting was carried out inside of Madwoman¡¯s room. There were only two participants, Madwoman and Hawkeye Clutha.


    It was not long before this, in order to keep the same pace and protect the interest of their minions, the strongest three of the Swampy Tower had a regr meeting like this. But today, after Evil Bugs Acteon had be a Pseudo-Adept, the once harmonious circle of strongest three had be a past tense. Everything had changed from the root!


    ¡°How is it? Is your circle still stable?¡± A shivering glow could be seen filling Madwoman¡¯s eyes. She had shed off her previous violent and reckless attitude and was now portraying the calm and intelligent nature of a proper Advanced Apprentice.


    ¡°Benson and Carl made the call for a meeting, those few fence-sitters used the excuse of conducting an important magic spell experiment and didn¡¯t turn up. Looks like they are going to switch sides.¡± Hawkeye Clutha let out a helpless and bitter smile, before continuing, ¡°One of the hardcore fans of Evil Bugs, Chris, is recruiting new followers, those fence-sitters might have been getting in touch with him secretly. Hmph...¡±


    Having finished saying that, Clutha raised his head and gazed at Madwoman, asking, ¡°How about you? What is the situation from your side?¡±


    ¡°Hmph... not any better than yours! Donna can¡¯t make those few subordinates listen to her anymore and wasining to me just now!¡±


    Both apprentices sat facing each other in silence, with their minds filled with disconste emotions.


    At the beginning of thepulsory mission, they had been underestimating this training mission, and didn¡¯t push themselves too hard. Madwoman only chose a Red mission, which was not really dangerous. On the other side, Clutha even chose a lower risk Orange mission. Now, faced with two new Pseudo-Adepts who had raised up abruptly, as the veteran Advanced Apprentices, they felt discontented and helpless about changing the situation.


    After remained silent for a brief moment, Clutha finally spoke again.


    ¡°Judging from the current situation, the rtionship between Acteon and that Mary is rather hostile. In your opinion, do we need to decide which side we should join?¡±


    ¡°Between the two of them, who do you want to join?¡± Madwoman¡¯s face darkened. As the most experienced and oldest Advanced Apprentice, asking her to put down her face and became a minion for someone else, she... she just couldn¡¯t imagine the horrifying and humiliating life she was going to face.


    ¡°Perhaps, if we wait for a few more days, we¡¯ll not be able to make the decision ourselves.¡± Clutha was rather calm and realistic. ¡°Mary is too arrogant. Besides her peacock, she never cares about other people¡¯s feelings and face, and she won¡¯t be taking care of our current interests. So...¡±


    ¡°So you want to get in touch with Acteon?¡±


    ¡°Yes! Although Evil Bugs has a slightly extreme mind, after all, we had been getting along for a long time. As long as we give up some of our interest, I think he¡¯ll ept us. No matter what, if he wants to deal with that Mary, he will need the help from both of us. No matter how many insignificant apprentices he recruits, they arepletely useless in fighting when with a Pseudo-Adept. We are the only ones he could use!¡±


    Madwoman snorted depressingly, holding back her anger, as she nodded in agreement to Hawkeye¡¯s opinion.


    However, before she could say anything, the deep, hoarse voice of Evil Bugs suddenly rang out through the secret room that only the both of them were in.


    ¡°I certainly didn¡¯t expect that Hawkeye could still judge the hour and size up the situation so urately. You¡¯re right, I really do need the help from both of you!¡±


    Both apprentices were aghast.


    Madwoman widened her big eyes and quickly gazed at surroundings of her own room.


    Under the restless nces of both apprentices, some noises suddenly came out from the shadow behind Clutha¡¯s back. Soon, a strange looking scorpion with peculiar appearance squeezed out from the shadow, waving its huge pincers towards both of them. On the ck crust behind of this scorpion, a pale human face emerged, it was the ugly face of Acteon after his mutation.


    ¡°Hello, long time no see! Howe you never informed me about your meeting?¡±


    Madwoman and Hawkeye remained silent and didn¡¯t respond to Acteon¡¯s question. However, their flickering eyes had betrayed the nervous emotions hiding in their mind. They hadn¡¯t expected this at all, with just a small tier difference between them, they could no longer detect Evil Bugs¡¯ magic spell approach.


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to be panic. Just as Hawkeye said, I¡¯m in urgent need of your help. If you can condescend to me and join the Evil Bugs¡¯s alliance, I, Acteon, will wee you with open arms!¡±


    The corner of Madwoman¡¯s lips twitched violently a few times.


    She was not an idiot, since this so-called alliance was named after Acteon¡¯s title, then he would be the true master. To say the least, they were his allies, but as the matter of fact, they were just his advanced level hatchet men! Though they were discontent by this, Madwoman still wanted to hear the true motives of Evil Bugs.


    ¡°What do you need us to do for you?¡±


    ¡°Help me watch every single move of those two. When timese, help me in fighting against them. Don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯t make you fight face-to-face against that Mary. If we really engage in a fight, I¡¯ll just need the two of you to pin down that Greem. I¡¯ll handle Mary myself!¡±


    After hearing what Acteon said, a hardly concealed shocking expression emerged on their faces. Clutha couldn¡¯t bear himself and asked, ¡°You only need both of us to pin down that Greem? He... he only just became an Advanced Apprentice! For a newbie like this, even I alone should be able to defeat him, right?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe...¡± The human face on the back of the scorpion let out Acteon¡¯s signature gruesomeugh, ¡°Hawkeye, don¡¯t think so highly of yourself! Perhaps, both of you haven¡¯t found out this. In that team of Mary and Greem, it is obvious that Greem is the mastermind behind everything. Or, put this way, he is the key person on their team!¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Impossible!¡±


    The response Madwoman and Hawkeye gave out was exactly the same as the one they had when they first heard Evil Bugs had be a Pseudo-Adept, extreme shock. Evil Bugs Acteon, who was now a Pseudo-Adept, actually gave such serious consideration to the once little Beginner Apprentice. This... this was really out of their expectations.


    Could that Greem really have some strange abilities?


    ¡°Don¡¯t you forget this, after all, Mary is just an inferior vampire who had her bloodline mutated! With such a lousy bloodline and innate talent, wanting to have quick progress in her rank is just like a fat hope. So, the only possible reason that brought her such a mystical transformation would be that strange boy whose overall strength had skyrocketed. This Greem is the only person on their team whose true strength I can¡¯t tell!¡±


    Clutha remained silent for a while, before asking, ¡°Mary is now a Pseudo-Adept, will Master Adept agree to your behavior of publicly attacking her?¡±


    Right after he finished his words, Hawkeye immediately heard the arrogant and gruesomeugh of Acteon.


    ¡°Hehehe... I¡¯ve signed the family contract, yet she only signed on an employment contract. So, if something really happens, who do you think the family would help? Also... if there aren¡¯t any ordersing from the top, why do you think I would be so passionate about fighting against a Pseudo-Adept, who is the same rank with me?¡±


    ¡°What you are saying is... the person who wants to deal with Mary is Ander...¡± Clutha cried out involuntarily.


    ¡°Shut up! Hawkeye, if you don¡¯t want to get killed in the dark, then stop these damn words in your mouth. There are things you just have to do and don¡¯t have to get to the bottom of and will bring no good to you!¡± Evil Bugs Acteon hurriedly interrupted Clutha, a threatening expression finally showing up on his ugly bug-like face.


    Clutha arduously swallowed a lump in his throat. He exchanged a nce with Madwoman and eventually, nodded his head silently.


    ¡°Hehehe... I knew you¡¯d make the smartest decision. Alright, when the timees, I¡¯ll contact you again. Hawkeye will keep an eye on them, as for Madwoman, you¡¯ll train those Intermediate Apprentices, so we can put them to good useter. Hmph, once I find the right opportunity, we¡¯ll teach both of them a good lesson!¡±


    After saying that, the evil and arrogant cries of bugs echoed out in the room. In an instant, the ck scorpion exploded into a puddle of poisonous liquid, before slowly submerging into the floor and disappearing without a trace.


    Inside the room, Madwoman and Hawkeye sat facing each other in silence!


    Meanwhile, inside a secret room within the fourth floor of the Swampy Tower, the scorpion who had suddenly disappeared from Madwoman¡¯s room squeezed out from the floor, climbing onto a somber looking figure who had his bodypletely covered in a ck cloak.


    The somber figure suddenly stretched out a bizarre looking huge hand, half flesh and half shell, picked up the scorpion and shoved it into his mouth. After the scorpion was crushed into a puddle of blood and fragments by his razor sharp teeth, only then did Evil Bugs tilt his head up and reveal his face.


    Within just a few days, one could tell that the degree of bug transformation on his body had gone deeper.


    Now, rather than referring to him as a human apprentice, he was more like a bug man who had the identity of a human.


    He had transformed into ¡®it¡¯!

 Chapter 118

    From within the darkness outside the tower, a red-eyed crow flew into the night sky without a sound.


    Suddenly, from a brightly lit room located on the fourth floor of the tower, a crimson glow ignited, shooting through the window and hitting the crow, making it explode into a huge clump of blood mist that covered the night sky.


    ¡°Hmph, this is the fourth one! What exactly does that Hawkeye want to do?¡± Mary gently put away the crimson bow in her hand, cursing angrily, ¡°Does he wants me to have a heart-to-heart talk with him now?¡±


    ¡°It looks like few of them have coborated again!¡± While busy with his own stuff, Greem casually responded.


    Mary tilted her head and gave it a thought, before nodding her head, agreeing to Greem¡¯s opinion.


    Though part of previous strongest three, Hawkeye, was at most an Advanced Apprentice now. If he really provoked Mary, she could rip his crow¡¯s nest up at any time! Since he was brave enough to keep sending his minions to watch them, there must be someone else backing him. And currently, the only apprentice who could be doing this within the Swampy Tower would be Evil Bugs, Acteon.


    Most of the residences located on the fourth floor were for official Adepts. That was why not only had they had a super luxurious andfortable bedroom, they were also equipped with their own study and smallboratory. At this moment, Greem was meticulously leaning onto a micro alchemy station, watching the transformation of the drop of source blood through a special magical array.


    During thest few days, in order to activate the gene activity of this drop of source blood, Greem had tried nearly all magical approaches he knew. Eventually, he learned that only the blood full of energy aura could save this drop of source blood. Therefore, Greem cut his own arm, pouring his blood which was full of Fire element energy into the cultivating test tube.


    Soon, he obtained a test tube full of boiling blood which was slightly mutated.


    No, strictly speaking, it didn¡¯t look like a test tube of blood, but more like a blood monster that had been held captive within the test tube.


    After the blood injected by Greem was devoured by the source blood, it had quickly contaminated and mutated into the same vampire blood as the source blood itself. Though the Fire element energy contained within Greem¡¯s blood had killed a lot of vampire blood gene, under the constant attack from the newly contaminated blood genes, the Fire element energy had been neutralized, causing all of Greem¡¯s blood to be contaminated and mutated.


    After that, the test tube of blood transformed into a blood monster that seemed to have its own consciousness. Needle-like tentacles kept stretching out from the sticky blood, crazily poking at the strong surface of the test tube. If not for the fact that the toughness of the test tube was not weaker than magical alloy, perhaps this blood monster would really escape.


    While observing its behavior, Greem kept praising it unstoppably.


    Miraculous, this was absolutely miraculous! In this world of advanced magic, even a drop of advanced grade vampire source blood could portray such a terrifying destructive force. Imagine if a vampire injected this kind of blood gene into its prey, perhaps the life of its enemy would be in its handpletely.


    Could this be the secret behind why those advanced grade vampires were able to producerge armies of blood ves?


    After the drop of source blood had assimted so much of blood, it had hidden deep inside the lump of blood. If wasn¡¯t for the help from the Chip which had attached a spiritualbel to it, perhaps Greem wouldn¡¯t have been able to find its exact position within the lump of blood which kept changing its shape and surface structure.


    The energy used to support the violent activity of the blood came from the nutrients after the blood gene had self-dposed. Hence, the more violent its activity was, the smaller its size became. It was like a raging burning me, and the fuel wasing from its own mass.


    Eventually, when it finally realized it couldn¡¯t escape from the test tube, the lump of blood finally quiet down, entering into a hibernation state. Also, from the size of a chicken egg, it had turned into the size of a thumb. ording to the Chip¡¯s calction, this thumb-sized blood lump was sufficient to support its life for half a year. Only when it was stimted by some external forces, would it be reactivated.


    Did all the vampires in this world possess the same frightening ability? Or was there something special about the vampire that Anderson and the other Adepts attacked?


    No wonder after Mary was mutated into a vampire, her intelligence seemed to suffer some damage, and she became rather ill-tempered and irritable. As a matter of fact, no matter who had this kind of blood in his or her body, which was one that could self-burn and boil at any time, he or she wouldn¡¯t be able to maintain a calm and delicate manner.


    ording to the characteristics portrayed by this drop of source blood, Greem even suspected that when the original owner of the blood got close enough with it, it was highly possible he could regain the control of this blood, and eventually gain control of the consciousness and life of the one who had this blood in the body.


    In connection to this, Greem performed a thorough search through all the records and experiments rted to vampires, bit by bit he puzzled together the direction of evolution and strengthening path for vampires, arduously finding ways and approaches that could allow Mary to break through the current bottleneck in her bloodline.


    After all, Mary was a mutated vampire. In a way, she was just an advanced blood ve. Once that higher-order vampire appeared in front of Mary, perhaps she wouldn¡¯t have the chance to control her own fate anymore. Therefore, the reason why Greem became so obsessed in carrying out research on the source blood was to cut off the spiritual connection between her mutated blood and the source blood, making her the true master of her own body!


    ............


    At the entrance of Magical Swamp.


    It was still the same small, deste and miserable looking hillside.


    Following an ear-splitting cry, a witch, wearing a gray Adept robe and a pointy Adept hat, rode on her flying broom and descended from the sky, setting her feet on this destend.


    When she got down from the broom, a lovely, active and pretty little girl who looked like a doll jumping out from her back. She was wearing a light yellow dress, had a baby face, wasn¡¯t tall, and was carrying a golden bird cage in her hand. She was none other than Alice, the little girl who had suffered a great dealst time she visited the Magical Swamp.


    ¡°Great Granny, here it is!¡± Though Alice had a sweet and beautiful look, when she was looking at the familiar scene in front, her azure blue eyes immediately shot out two bright glows of hatred.


    ¡°Those rascals who bullied me are living inside this ce!¡± She said.


    The witch, who Alice addressed as her Great Granny, had a really old face.


    Under the crooked and dirty hat was the ugly and aged face of a female. Her face was fully filled with wrinkles making her skin look like that of a dried and withered tree. She had a hook nose that looked like the hawk¡¯s beak, a pair of murky gray eyes, and a mouthful of brownish and broken teeth. She was bending her body while holding onto the flying broom, and after every movement, she would stop and pant for a long time.


    However, this old witch, who looked so weak as to be unable to stand any breeze, as if she would copse and die at any moment, was actually emanating a powerful spiritual ripple that could send a chill down anyone¡¯s spine.


    After she held the broom and panted for some time, she took out a dirty and ck biscuit-like object from her pocket. With a cold voice, she said, ¡°Go, Alice. Crush this into powder and sprinkle it into the swamp!¡±


    Although the old witch had an aged voice, her words carried an authoritative air that no one could disobey. Even Alice, who was a cunning and wicked girl, dared to not refute her will. Obediently, she took over the biscuit-like object and walked in front of the Magical Swamp, crushed it into powder and sprinkled it into the pond which was nketed by a thick fog.


    While she was doing that, Alice even covered her hands with a thinyer of spatial barrier, to avoid touching the insignificant looking biscuit. As it was an object taken from the pocket of Endor, the infamous ¡®Poisonous Witch¡¯, it was definitely something that came with a deadly poison!


    As expected, not long after the powder was sprinkled into the water, a new clump of mist was seen rising up from the wet pond. Bit by bit, it merged into the misty fog of the Magical Swamp. Following the spreading of this mist, all the demons living in this region were struck with a deadly cmity.


    A Red-eyed Crow, which had justnded on top of a Killer Tree at the border of Magical Swamp, tilted its head and watching wonderingly at these two outsiders who appeared out of nowhere. But suddenly, its fluffy dark feathers exploded without making any noise. The broken flesh and bones soon transformed into new bloody mist that merged into the air.


    Following the flow of the mist, all living beings who possessed magical element in their body, be it nts or animals, exploded when they were touched by the mist. However, those ordinary nts right beside them were not affected by it at all.


    As the incorporeal mist spreading across thend, Red-eyed Crows, Killer Trees, Bloodsucking Rattans, Green Spot Snakes, Ghost Nannies, Demon Babies, and even those parasitic demon worms, all exploded while they were moving freely within their own habitat. After a huge amount of demons were killed, the remaining creatures were those who had a very sensitive sense of dangers. They ignored the territory of other demons within the Magical Swamp and rushed towards the direction opposite to the mist using the fastest speed they could.


    At the beginning, the mor was only limited to within the outer perimeter of the Magical Swamp. But when the mist slowly pushed through and prated into the inner area of it, arge group of escaping demons finally broke out.


    And right at this moment, the inspecting Apprentice Adept had finally realized that something was wrong. The news was spreading quickly, and the entire Swampy Tower had been lit up, floor after floor.


    Compared to those standard Adept Towers like the one at the Underground Cave, the tower at Magical Swamp was clearly weaker and cruder. Although the internal facilities were ratherplete, it was weak in terms of the surveince throughout the entire swampy area.


    Although Sarubo Family was once prosperous, following the absence of that Fourth Grade Adept for a long time, and with no new Fourth Grade Adepts, the prestige and influence of the family could no longer bepared to what they had before.


    For a small resource site like this, the Sarubo Family didn¡¯t even have the financial capacity to build a proper Adept Tower, and could only substitute with a weaker version of the tower. Therefore, when faced with the invasion of a powerful enemy, their response was slow and clumsy.


    When the Magical Swamp plunged into a big mess, Adept Anderson, the man who controlled the Swampy Tower, finally walked out from his magic spellboratory. Very soon, he had locked down on the enemy¡¯s position.


    Following a muffled ¡®ng¡¯ noise, dust and grass blew upwards at the small hill near the entrance of Magical Swamp. Adept Anderson had traveled through the space of nearly ten miles and suddenly appeared in front of the old witch.

 Chapter 119

    ¡°So it¡¯s you, Endor! I don¡¯t think there are any old grudges between us, is there? Why are you causing problems at my ce?¡± Stepping out from the vortex, Anderson immediately saw the old witch with a peculiar look. Unable to press down his anger, he roared, ¡°Don¡¯t you forget, this is the territory of the Zhentarim Association! You, the Northern Witches, have no right to show your arrogance here!¡±


    Still holding onto her broom, the old witch let out a shiveringugh that sounded like the cries of a night owl. She looked at Anderson, who appeared to be ferocious in appearance but feeble in essence, with a disdainful expression, and said, ¡°Zhentarim Association? Would they publicly drive off us, the Northern Witches, just because of your tiny little resource site?¡±


    ¡°Then why are you here today? Don¡¯t tell me you¡¯re here to be a guest?!¡± Anderson still roaring furiously, nevertheless, he had lowered his voice. He was facing at a Combat Witch from the Far Land of North, although he had the topographical advantages, if a fight really broke out between them, perhaps the chances of him winning would be slim.


    Though these Northern Witches looked weak and ill, they were able to open up new worlds in the Land of Far North, a ce with extreme cold temperature and harsh environment. They had a strong will and frightening approaches that no male Adept could everpare with. Putting others aside and just talking about this Endor, she was sent to station at the Zhentarim region for merely seven years, before she had brought herself the famous title of ¡®Poisonous Witch¡¯.


    ording to rumors, once there was a wandering Adept who had recruited a group of bandits and robbed apany of traveling merchants sent by the Northern Witches, they also killed an Apprentice Witch who had followed the merchant. When this Endor heard the news, she struck immediately, and found that group of bandits just after half a day.


    She didn¡¯t charge into the group and ughter everyone in her sight. She just sprinkled some poisonous stuff around their camp site. Virtually overnight, all the bandits, including the wandering Adept, were killed by the horrifying, deadly poison. Just with this warfare alone, this ferocious, tough and old witch from the Land of Far North had killed nearly three hundred men with her poison, causing her reputation of ¡®Poisonous Witch¡¯ reach to ultimate heights.


    She was a Northern Witch, yet she had killed so many people in a region ruled by the Zhentarim Association. Her actions had immediately evoked a strong reaction from some Adept Families at the center region of Adept Continent. But with regards to this matter, after all, the old witch had the valid reason for seeking revenge for her disciple, hence, no matter how discontent those Adept Families were, they had no choice but acquiesce her action.


    Therefore, whenever the name of this poisonous witch was mentioned, all the Adepts from center region of the continent would feel a headache. After all, in the center region of the continent controlled by the Zhentarim Association, there weren¡¯t any major scale of invasionsing from demons, and the conditions of the natural environment were so much betterparing to the Land of Far North. As the result, most of the Adepts here had spent too much time carrying out magical experiments, which caused theirbative abilities and approaches to recede. That was why they were not as ferocious and brutal as those Northern Witches.


    If not because Zhentarim Association had controlled a huge area with abundant resources, which allowed them to produce countless Adepts, with the quality of the Adepts in this ce, there was no way they couldpete with the other three major Adept powers that surrounded them.


    The Magical Swamp was, after all, a private resource site for Sarubo Family. If it were any other Adept of the same grade who hade and gave him trouble, Anderson would have attacked him or her without another word. But when facing this infamous ¡®Poisonous Witch¡¯, even with his unsociable and entric temperament, he wouldn¡¯t initiate any attacks easily.


    Faced with Anderson¡¯s question, the poisonous witch let out a few ghastly sneers, turned behind her and said, ¡°Alice,e out and show yourself to this master Anderson, so he can save his breath in uttering that nonsense!¡±


    When Anderson saw the little girl who had jumped out from behind the poisonous witch, his gloomy face turned as dark as the bottom of a used pot. ¡°Endor, who is this little girl to you? I remember she is Deborah¡¯s disciple.¡±


    ¡°You do have a good memory. She is doing her apprenticeship under Deborah currently. But she is also my blood descendant! She is an Apprentice Witch with the most potential from my family, Moya Family! However, she had suffered a shameful ambush and humiliation from you! Today, I¡¯m here to settle the scores with you!¡±


    Fuck! Right at this very moment, who knew how many times had Anderson cursed in his mind! Who would know by simply teaching a lesson to an Advanced Apprentice who had intruded Magical Swamp, he would provoke a junior from the n of the ¡®Poisonous Witch¡¯? Could what he had done disgusted the Will of the Adept World, causing it to bring him such punishment?


    While cursing his bad luck inwardly, Anderson roared out furiously with a cold expression, ¡°I did teach a lesson to this little girl! So what? Are you going to fight me just because of her? Endor, don¡¯t you forget you¡¯re just a representative sent by Northern Witch, attacking me would stir up a n war between our families!¡±


    ¡°n war? Hmph. Would the family behind you, Sarubo Family, dere a war against my Moya Family just because of such a petty matter? But, you don¡¯t have to worry, my purpose today is not to teach you a lesson, but to let Alice vent her spleen.¡± Hearing what the poisonous witch had said, the doll-like Alice¡¯s eyes immediately turned red, as she threw herself into the old witch¡¯s arms and acted like a spoiled child. She even turned her head and gave Anderson a fierce gaze.


    ¡°So what exactly do you want? I was just punishing a little fellow who was rude to me, do you really want me to pay a price for that?¡± Anderson¡¯s voice lowered by a few degrees.


    ¡°Hmph, I can ept your action of teaching Alice a lesson! But your apprentices had jointly attacked Alice, and we need to settle this score in a proper manner! I¡¯ll not bully the weak by being strong, so get those few fellows who had hurt Alice before and let them have another fight again. If your apprentices win, I¡¯ll leave immediately. If your apprentices lose, hehehe... they will have to face their death!¡±


    The gloomy face of Anderson twisted violently a few times. He then waved his hand and recited some incantations that no one could understand. Following an enshrouding magical ring that shed through the top of this small hill, three figures of different appearances appeared in midair.


    As Adept Anderson owned the highest control power of the Swampy Tower, therefore, withoutmunicating with Greem and the others, he had used his right and forcefully teleported Acteon, Mary and Greem over to this small hill. Obviously, the three of them still had no idea what was going on, they were busy with their own matters in their own residences, but with a magical ring that suddenly shed underneath their feet, they hade to this wilderness for no apparent reason.


    The three of them were first struck with bewilderment, then they were startled. And when they saw Adept Anderson, they quickly bowed deeply and paid him respect, waiting for his orders quietly.


    ¡°They are the ones! All of them are bad people, they had hurt me repeatedly! Especially that disgusting vampire, she even sucked away a lot of my blood...¡±


    Right when Alice jumped out and scolded angrily, the poisonous witch who had brought her here knitted her brows in a tight frown.


    Two Pseudo-Adepts and an Advanced Apprentice!


    How came their rank was slightly different from what Alice had described?


    ¡°Alice, are you sure they are the ones? Why they are different from what you told me?¡± The poisonous witch¡¯s expression turned cold.


    ¡°Yes, I¡¯m sure! Butst time two of them were only Advanced Apprentices, and this...¡± Alice pointed her finger at Greem, a vicious glow could be seen flickering on her cute little face, ¡°This guy, he was only a Beginner Apprenticest time!¡±


    They had been promoted?


    Facing two Pseudo-Adepts, even the Poisonous Witch Endor started to worry.


    With her overall strength and the aggressiveness of Moya Family that supported her, it wouldn¡¯t be a big deal if Alice killed two Advanced Apprentices. But when it involved Pseudo-Adepts, things became a bit trickier to handle!


    For any Adept Family, Pseudo-Adepts were the backup force they prepared for their future, and they wouldn¡¯t give any of them up. ording to Endor¡¯s understanding, this Sarubo Family didn¡¯t even own more than a two digit number of Pseudo-Adepts, if she killed two of them at the same time, even though Sarubo Family was a weak family, perhaps they would still dere a war to the Moya Family!


    ¡°Alice, you can¡¯t touch those two Pseudo-Adepts! I thought you said you hated that kid the most? Go challenge that Advanced Apprentice! Kill him and vent your spleen, I¡¯ll find a way to settle the other two.¡± Showing no changes on the outside, Endor had transmitted her thought over to Alice¡¯s mind via telepathy.


    Alice, who was in the middle of yelling and scolding, stopped for a brief moment. Then, she pointed her finger at Greem and announced her challenge.


    By right, a meaningless challenge like this would not be approved. As the apprentice of Swampy Tower, Adept Anderson was obliged to provide protection to Greem. But obviously, today was an exception. When Alice announced her challenge in front of everyone, Adept Anderson never said another word, clearly, he had tacitly assented such behavior.


    Greem sneered a few times inwardly.


    Though he only arrived here for a very short amount of time, but right when he saw Alice, he had grasped the reasons behind this farce. Therefore, when confronted with Alice¡¯s challenge, Greem took a step forward.


    ¡°After beating youst time, I never expected to see you back for revenge so soon! So, if I beat you again this time, when are you going toe back for your revenge?¡±


    Though Alice was a ck-hearted and merciless girl, she still took her honor seriously. When she heard the ridiculeing from Greem, she immediately jumped up and down from anger, screaming furiously, ¡°Do you really think you can defeat me? Last time, if it weren¡¯t for the fact that you all had taken turns attacking me and had gotten help from the sneak attack of that vampire, do you really think you could live until today?¡±


    ¡°So, if I really defeat you this time, what are you going to do?¡± Greem was waiting for these words from her. Without hesitation, he immediately countered her statement.


    ¡°If I¡¯m really defeated by you, my life will be yours, and I¡¯ll be your ve forever! But if you¡¯re defeated by me, your life will be mine!¡± In a towering rage, Alice roared out this statement without thinking twice.


    Endor, standing behind Alice, furrowed her brows. For some unknown reasons, an inauspicious feeling suddenly surged up in her mind. This young kid, who was going to fight Alice, portrayed an overly calm and peaceful manner. Could he really possess some powerful trump cards?


    Secretly, a tentacle stretched out from Endor¡¯s powerful spirit, slowly but surely it reached Greem¡¯s body, and gave its target a serious examination. Overall strength of an Advanced Apprentice and ordinary Fire element innate talent. The magical equipment on his body could be considered as finely made. But, with such overall strength, it was far from enough to defeat Alice.


    Since she stepped into the path of an Adept, Endor never saw anyone possessing a more powerful innate ability than Alice¡¯s spatial innate ability. No matter what kind of powerful magic spells those elemental apprentices mastered, when facing against Alice, an opponent who had total control of the spatial aspects of the battlefield, nothing would matter when they couldn¡¯t hit her with their spells.


    As for Body Refining and Profound Apprentices, in front of Alice, they were as fragile as scarecrows. Only those Bloodline Apprentice with extraordinary innate talents would be a threat to Alice.


    But, after thest defeat, Alice had gone through a painful torture, which eventually made her skyrocket in her mastery in short distance teleportation. When facing against Alice, who could now travel freely within a battlefield, Endor couldn¡¯t think of how those Apprentice Adepts could defend against her Spatial Cut that was capable of destroying anything, and how were they going to capture Alice who kept teleporting across the battlefield!


    After making sure the overall strength of Alice¡¯s opponent, Endor let out a shivering sneer, saying, ¡°Kid, save your breath, go inside and have a fight with Alice!¡±


    Having finished saying that, she stretched her arm and took the golden bird cage from Alice, then waved it towards both Greem and Alice.


    In next second, both Greem and Alice had disappeared from the scene!

 Chapter 120

    When Greem finally got a hold of himself, he discovered that he was standing right inside of the golden bird cage.


    Through the fence of the bird cage that now looked like rows of stone pirs poking into the sky, Greem could vaguely see the view outside of the cage. Especially when the frightening poisonous witch was leaning close to the cage, her enormous eyeballs that nearly upied half of the sky simply sent chills down Greem¡¯s back.


    When he looked into the distance, right at the other end of the cage, nearly three miles away from him, the petite figure of Alice was seen continuously teleporting her way and rushing in his direction.


    Greem knitted his brows into a tight frown.


    At this moment, he wasn¡¯t sure on whether this ce was just a small space in a different dimension or if old witch really did transform him into a smaller size. Nevertheless, now was not the right time to research further on this. In less than ten seconds, that Alice who had gone berserk would arrive in front of him.


    Previously, he had been concealing his capabilities and avoided the limelight, so he could further polish his own overall strength, and design a set ofbat tactic that suited him the most. It seemed that now was the perfect timing for him to test if thosebat tactics were suitable!


    Greem started to equip himself swiftly.


    While remained standing at where he was, he touched his waist belt with his right hand. A strange scepter with peculiar designs immediately appeared in his grip. At the same time, he stretched out his left hand, the magical book, tied by a silver chain that was hanging on his waist automatically flew into his hand, and started to flip through the pages by itself.


    Following one after another the fiery red ring shed out from Greem¡¯s body, Inferno Body, Inferno Shield, Inferno Force Field, Fire Damage Reflect, multiple Fire element defensive magic spells had revealed themselves. After finishing preparing his defense, Greem pointed in front of him with the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, and started to recite with a loud voice, ¡°Redmond Carina, Anya Roset, in the name of mes...¡±


    From all directions, countless fiery red mes started to gather in midair. Within the blink of an eye, a tall Fire Deity over seven meters stood right in front of Greem. It was surrounded by raging and boiling mes, and the color of the mes had turned from ordinary fiery red into me with a purple colored core. This also meant that this Fire Deity possessed the overall strength of a Pseudo-Adept.


    But, this was not the end!


    Countless brilliantly lit objects flew out from Greem¡¯s storage waist belt and scattered around. After a burst of furious cracklinging from the explosions of Elementiums, these objects formed into different elemental golems with a variety of heights, shapes and looks.


    The most attractive among them would be the Lightning Giant. Every time it made its debut, it would always bring forth a frightening scene, where the sky would be filled with raging thunder strikes. Also, the tall, green body which waspletely covered in the golden armor, the lightning serpents that kept bolting out and lingering around its body, all had given it a touch of mightiness.


    While the Lightning Giant slowly ascended into the sky, the Fire Deity strode toward Alice and the Water Elementiums started to gather on both sides of Greem at an incredible speed. Soon, two Pseudo-Adept level Water Elementals had emerged out from thin air.


    Greem stomped his feet on the ground with great force, though they looked like they were made from stone, they were actually transformed from the Protection Barrier. Since he couldn¡¯t squeeze into the underground, there was no need to summon the Demon Alligator Hunter or Rock Snake. Greem gave up on the thought of summoning Earth element golems and switched his attention to the battle that was happening in the far distance.


    The summon of Lightning Giant had consumed 7 points of his Spirit, while two Water Elementals took away 6 points of his Spirit. As for the Inferno Shield and the Fire Deity, both of them were abilities brought to him by the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, thus they didn¡¯t consume any of his Spirit. With Greem¡¯s total Spirit of 19 points, he still had 6 points that he could use in case of emergencies, and, judging from the development of the battleter, only then would he decide which golem to summon next.


    The Lightning Giant was focused on offense with the Fire Deity as its assistant, and two Water Elementals handled both offense and defense at the same time.


    These Water Elementals were the brand new golems crafted by Greem using Water element cores. They had an appearance that resembled arge clump of water that could stand straight and walk around. They didn¡¯t have feet, so their lower bodies were just thick water pirs, and water could be seen kept sshing around from the bottom of these water pirs. Their upper bodies had the vague look of a human, there was a body, a head, and even two arms. But all these body parts looked rather crude, there didn¡¯t have any facial features on their heads, and both arms were just two thick water pirs.


    Though these Water Elementals had a humble outlook, their strange abilities could cause eyebrows to raise.


    Right after both Water Elementals appeared, they immediately waved their arms several times in the air. After each wave, there would be a smaller size Water Elementals pulled out of their bodies, and within a blink of an eye, the smaller Water Elementals changed their appearances into that of Greem¡¯s. They even had the same magical equipment as Greem had.


    Nearly in an instant, two Water Elementals working together and produced twelve ¡®Greem¡¯. And, after all thirteen Greem switched their positions in a messy order, the real Greem, who was now mixed among the other ¡®Greem¡¯, had a bright smile blooming on his face.


    There were so many ¡®Greem¡¯ that looked exactly like him, to be honest, when he saw he was surrounded by copies of ¡®himself¡¯, even he nearly burst out intoughter.


    And, this was not the end. Following the waving movement of both Water Elementals, arge sheet of billowing water vapor emerged, nketing this group of ¡®Greem¡¯. From the outside, one could only see some wobbling figures behind this sheet of water vapor, and couldn¡¯t get a glimpse at the true scene at all.


    Right at this moment, not only Alice, who was standing right opposite to Greem, nearly copsed by what she was facing, even both Adepts who were standing outside of the cage and were observing the situation had their expression changed slightly, each portraying a different look on their faces.


    Of course, Adept Anderson showed a surprised look at first, then it was reced by a delightful expression. Initially, he thought it would be a one-sided ughter, but because of the sudden explosive performance put out by this mysterious kid, everything became unpredictable. Though he could sense that because of Greem¡¯s existence his control over Mary had weakened, the thought of killing Greem in the dark had long hatched in his mind.


    But, on an asion like this, Anderson preferred to see that cute little Alice having her head severely beaten. After all, he still had plenty of time to deal with that kid. Therefore, Adept Anderson simply eased his mind, and for the first time, he was praising at Greem in his mind.


    You just can¡¯t keep all the people happy at the same time!


    When Anderson brought upon a bizarre smile on his face and quietly watched the battlefield, aplex look could be seen in Endor¡¯s eyes, as she seemed to dither over her decision.


    Damn it, what kind of abilities did this kid possess! Lightning Elementals, Water Elementals, Fire Elementals... each and every single one of this element golems possessed the overall strength of a Pseudo-Adept, were these something he could own and control? Could it be that old rascal, Anderson, knew that she woulde and passed these advanced magical items to this young kid? But this didn¡¯t make sense either. How could an Advanced Apprentice control so many Pseudo-Adept level element golems at the same time?


    You couldn¡¯t me this Poisonous Witch¡¯s bewilderment, after all, summoning ordinary element golems would consume a huge amount of Spirit. If not because the golems owned by Greem had been optimized and used the special magical arrays designed by the Chip, perhaps just one Lighting Giant alone would upy more than half his Spirit, and he would have no way to fight against Alice using a small team of golems.


    Meanwhile, right at a corner outside of the cage, Evil Bugs was watching Greem¡¯s approaches without making any noises. However, a huge wave that could devour his entire body and soul had been rocking violently in his mind.


    Damn it, damn it! How did this bastard own such frightening approaches?


    If he ced himself in Alice¡¯s position, even Acteon would feel a headache if he had to face more than one Pseudo-Adept level element golems, let alone Alice who would always fight alone.


    Right when everyone outside of the battlefield was watching the intense battle that nearly broke out inside of the golden bird cage, Alice, who was supposed to fight against Greem, nearly broke out into a rampage.


    Last time, this was just a poor guy who had to cover his head and scurry away from her, but this time, he was actually able to summon so many different element golems. Apparently, he was going to gang fight her! Alice felt as if her heart had been thrown into boiling oil, it was going through all sorts of torture right now. She just couldn¡¯t believe this was real.


    But, the situation simply didn¡¯t permit her to ponder further. The Lightning Giant, whose body was surrounded by raging lightning serpents, was charging towards her.


    Within a tiny fraction of a second, the powerful high-voltage current had filled her entire field of view. Alice didn¡¯t want to fight face-to-face with a mighty element golem, so, with a sh of her body, she had disappeared from where she was.


    This time, her destination of teleportation was right above the head of that damn bastard.


    She had made up her mind, once she got rid of those troublesome element golems, the first thing she wanted to do was cut that bastard into tens of pieces with her Spatial Cut.


    But, something horrifying had struck Alice. When she stepped on the vibrating spatial and squeezed out into mid air, the Lightning Giant, together with a suddenly exploding thunderp, had appeared beside her at the same time. A crackling noise echoed out from the scene, as a Lightning Chain covered with violent electricity was whipping toward Alice¡¯s body in a ferocious manner.


    Bastard, how had this Lightning Giant caught up with her speed?


    The thought shed through Alice¡¯s mind, but before she coulde out with any answers, with a sway of her body, she once again disappeared from where she was.


    It must because she had been obvious about her motives and target, that was why the Lightning Giant could find out her teleportation destination. There was no way it could guess where she was going this time!


    Having the thought of making fool of this Lightning Giant, this time, the destination Alice chose was thirty meters behind Greem¡¯s group. Right as she came out to the normal spatial, Alice spread her arms and prepared to pull out a Spatial Cut, hoping to give this group of ¡®Greem¡¯ a brutal attack.


    But, before the spatial crack appeared between her hands and stabilized into an ideal Spatial Cut, the terrifying Lightning Chain had once again coiled up and forcefully pped onto her back.


    @#&%£¤......


    Right at this very moment, Alice¡¯s mind was filled with infinite anger. But at the same time, she felt a shivering sensation that was creeping up from the bottom of her heart.


    How was this possible? How did this lightning man, who apparently had no brain, urately grasp her destination, twice in a row? This was simply something impossible to be aplished!


    Filling her mind with endless resentment, Alice disappeared from the scene once again.


    This time, Alice emerged at a short sixty meters to the left of Greem, and she didn¡¯t rush inunching an attack likest time. She patiently and carefully monitored the activity surrounding her. As expected, within seconds after she teleported, the powerful lightning man had also emerged after a sh of electricity.


    And, the spot it emerged was still the same five meters behind of her!


    Even for someone with a scheming mind like Alice¡¯s, she also couldn¡¯t control herself and nearly cursed out some bad words. Because when she gazed at the group of ¡®Greem¡¯ who were hiding behind theyers of the water barrier, she discovered that each of them was secretly holding onto a Wand of Prophecy, and was murmuring something while facing in her direction.


    Damn it, so it was you that kept ying tricks on me!

 Chapter 121

    At this moment, Alice¡¯s anger had reached an uncontroble degree.


    When she let loose of herself and attacked in rage, Alice, who possessed the spatial innate talent, had perfectly exhibited the frightening ability of the spatial magic spells.


    With her delicate, fair and tiny little hands, she performed a gentle ripping gesture in the air. In an instant, one after another spatial crack, which looked like ck pearls nes, were produced between her palms. After that, this pair of little hands started to knead them in the air, transforming them into all kinds of weapons that beyond anyone¡¯s imagination.


    An arc-shaped ¡®Moon Bent de¡¯, a ¡®Dark Spear¡¯ that looked like a throwing spear, a perfectly round ¡®Explosive Ball¡¯...


    And, following Alice¡¯s shrill screams, one after another bizarre weapon was thrown at the group of Greems at the same time.


    The cutting and piercing abilities of these spatial cracks were simply incredible.


    A ¡®Moon Bent de¡¯ streaked passed Greem silently, on its way, two mirrored Greems were cut into halves. Also, the Inferno Shield and Inferno Force Field were both missing a chunk, after being grazed by it. Judging from the size and shape of the missing parts, it was identical to that Moon Bent de.


    It looked like when facing the spatial magic that Alice was an expert with, these ordinary defensive magic spells would hardly function as they were supposed to! As the matter of fact, in front of spatial magic, which had a higher order in the source of their principles, any element magic spell was like a bubble that could be burst easily. Both of them were simply not on the same level.


    If Greem allowed Alice to keep bombing savagely like this, even if he summoned all his golems, he wouldn¡¯t be able to keep his life safe. Realizing he couldn¡¯t hold up against Alice¡¯s attacks, Greem clenched his jaws tightly and ordered his team of golems to counterattack, so that he could suppress Alice¡¯s attack frequency.


    Therefore, a magnificent show of firework had broken out within the ¡®tiny¡¯ space of the bird cage.


    Nearly every single time when Alice teleported to a new location, the Lightning Giant who followed right after her would flood the region with its raging lightning attack, immediately followed by a me Throwingunched by the Fire Deity and the Frost Nova unleashed by the Water Elemental.


    Though in the past, the Protection Barrier covering outside Alice¡¯s body was ¡®indestructible¡¯, when facing Greem, who had the ability to pinpoint her ¡®weaknesses¡¯, and together with a group of mighty fighters with no fear of death, whenever a new Protection Barrier was created, it would be shattered into pieces after one round of violent attacks.


    And, within such a short period of time, she only had enough time toplete a long-range attack.


    Although every time she was able to teleport away before the Protection Barrier shattered, such a frequent teleportation and attack routine was a heavy burden for Alice.


    Whenever the Protection Barrier was broken, she had to teleport herself to a far distance and fix it, only then could sheunch the next round of attacks. And when she teleported herself to Greem¡¯s side, even with her high casting speed and the powerful Spatial Magic of hers, she would have to run away afterunching a single attack. If she made any mistakes in her move, she would have to face the miserable fate of being burned by the explosive fireball and frozen by the azure ice ring.


    But that was not the worst, as the most frightening attack was the strike of high voltage electricity!


    As the result, just after seven rounds of attack, Alice¡¯s cute, light yellow dress had turned into broken rags, while her precious golden hair was standing up on its end and became a dark and fluffy bird nest after being burned by the raging electricity. Also, her skin waspletely covered in burns and frost marks, dark and green patches could be seen everywhere.


    Meanwhile, out of twelve mirrored Greems, nine of them had been destroyed, leaving only three that mixed together with the real Greem, and no one could tell which one was his true form. As for the team of golems, they were now standing around Greem and protecting him with high vignce and waiting for Alice toe forth and meet her death.


    The Lightning Giant was hovering in midair with its body covered with raging lightning that producing loud thunderps, from time to time, dazzling electric arcs would bolt out from its green body. A huge thunderstorm was brewing right above its head; the funnel shape dark cloud had covered nearly half of the space of the cage.


    Staring at this Lightning Giant who portrayed a mighty bearing, Alice angrily clenched her tiny fists, wishing she could use the most violent spatial magic and wipe it off the face of this worldpletely.


    It was all because of this hateful Lightning Giant that she was now suffering from a very serious injury.


    It was worth it to mention that the speed and frequency of the Lightning element magic spells were the fastest among all other magic spells. Every time, right when her Protection Barrier broke, that damn lightning strike unleashed by the Lightning Giant would always lock onto Alice¡¯s whereabouts andnd right on her body. Not only that, the arc-shaped lightning of the Lightning Giant actually... actually brought a slight paralysis effect.


    This had caused Alice¡¯s dodging movements to be slower and resulted in her facing the shower of elemental magic spells.


    As the blood descendant of Endor, Alice had countless magic spell and element talismans with her. But even so, she also couldn¡¯t withstand the damage brought by such violent element magic spells.


    The magic spell talisman used to iste herself from element attacks exploded before it could evenst three rounds of attack.


    The element talisman, which was used to increase her element resistance, had also shattered into pieces after being tortured by a massive amount of elemental magic spells.


    In the end, after her element resistance was reduced to a very low level, Alice had to fight the battle using purely her strong will.


    Whenever her Spirit had depleted, she would run to the outer perimeter and gulp down arge bottle of magic potion. With that, she would be brimming with Spirit seconds after, with her Spirit restored to the maximum level!


    And, whenever her magical energy had depleted, she would once again run to outer perimeter and drink up a bottle of magical energy potion. Right after that, she would once again have vigorous magical energy!


    With the help of these bottles of magical potions, Alice was like an undefeatable cockroach, crazily charging into Greem¡¯s team of golems, again and again.


    The Fire Deity was shattered into pieces twice by the raging spatial cuts and had been summoned by Greem for the third time.


    The bodies of both Water Elementals were full of holes now. If not for the fact that they were element golems with the ability to absorb the wandering elementiums in the air and fix their own body, perhaps they would have long disintegrated into a puddle of water.


    The only member of the golems team who was still in a good shape would be the Lightning Giant.


    But even so, after going through many rounds of spatial magic attacks, its body had also been badly mutted, as many parts of it had been hanging and falling off. When Alice realized it was extremely difficult for her to attack the real Greem, she eventually switched her target, cing the focus of her attacks onto the Lightning Giant, who had posted the biggest threat to her safety.


    The adjustment in her tactic had soon brought her the best results!


    One of the Lightning Giant¡¯s arms had disappeared.


    The Wind element core hiding inside the arm was shattered by a spatial cut, resulted in the total disintegration of that part of the body and was no longer able to restore its original shape.


    But too bad, the changes made to her guerri tactic hade toote.


    Right when Alice smoothly destroyed the left arm of Lightning Giant, her Protection Barrier was broken by the incredible fast lightning chain, and her petite body was coiled up by the same lightning chain.


    In next second, the furious ming pir and the frost nova had flooded the region where she was trapped.


    Before Greem could see the result of this massive attack, an egg-shaped shock wave as violent as a sudden thunderp burst out from where Alice was. The shock wave swept across the area, shattering the spatial of the area like a thin sheet of ss. The spatial was broken, and the air was shaking violently. All the materials within the area had been annihted and reassembled, yet any living creatures within the area would be wiped offpletely and turned into a puff of smoke.


    The Lightning Giant was standing closest to the attack. Though it had noticed the attack and fled with top speed, half of its body was swept across by the broken spatial. A sudden lightning shed by with a loud boom, the Lightning Giant reappeared at a random ce some three hundred meters away. The once burly and tall body was left with a half and a head. As for the rest of its body, it was all cut off by the spatial cracks.


    The body of the Fire Deity, who had suffered badly from the attack, had copsed onto the ground once again.


    Hiding at a far distance, Greem¡¯s facial muscles kept twitching uncontrobly. He had reached the summoning limit of the Fire Deity using the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter. He couldn¡¯t summon it again today.


    The violent spatial shockwave expanded outward at an incredible speed. As Greem¡¯s speed had been enhanced with the Hasten spell, he barely managed to escape from the attack boundary.


    Both Water Elementals had transformed into two water lines and fled from the battlefield. But too bad, one of them had been caught by the spatial shockwave, and exploded into a stter of water that sshed into all directions. Thest one managed to escape from the attack, and had reformed its body while standing beside Greem, putting up a high vignce.


    When the spatial crack at the heart of the shockwave started to heal slowly, only then Greem stopped from running. He turned around, and through the dense spatial fragments, he saw Alice.


    Right at this moment, Alice looked so ferocious and violent, as if she was a mighty deity that had just descended from the heavens!


    Her dress had been shattered into pieces, exposing her petite and cute body in front of everyone. Her eyes were closed, her fists clenched tightly, and she threw her head back and let out shrill cry into the sky. The Spatial Shockwave that swept across half of the space within the cage just now, was thest attack she unleashed after being agitated by the intense sense of danger.


    After unleashed thisst attack, the Spatial Energy contained within her body had been depletedpletely.


    Two streams of blood suddenly flowed down from the corner of Alice¡¯s tightly closed eyes. Meanwhile, her delicate and fragile body was shivering like a dried body left in the cold breeze, eventually, she drifted down from midair without making any noise.


    She was defeated!


    She was defeated, in the middle of a fair match and by an enemy she had looked down the most!


    The cruel reality had deeply pierced through Alice¡¯s heart and soul, causing her who had lost all strength, to wish that she was killed by having her head mmed onto the ground in this cage, so that she could be spared from facing the reality that she never wanted to ept!


    But, in next moment, her cold and weak body was cupped by a pair of warm arms. And after that, a long robe, which had an unfamiliar smell, was ced on top of her naked body.


    She opened her blurred eyes, staring at the silhouette that had been inscribed deeply in her mind, before murmuring, ¡°You... bastard...¡± Finally, she passed outpletely. At the same time, Greem was looking at the weak little girl in his arms, inwardly, he kept roaring out furiously, ¡°You can¡¯t die like this! You can¡¯t die here! Or else, your Granny Witch would definitely go berserk...¡±


    A sudden shake struck the spatial.


    The scene in front of his eyes changed, and Greem felt the burden in his arms was lifted as Alice was taken away by that Poisonous Witch Endor.


    Endor ced Alice on the ground, and after thoroughly examining her a few times and making sure that she had only passed out as the result of depleting all her energy, Endor finally set her mind at rest.


    She turned around and stared at Greem¡¯s face for a long time, until he felt a chill running down his spine, only then had Endor let out a frightening smile, which was uglier than someone who was crying out loud. ¡°Kid, you¡¯re very good! You¡¯re very good... I¡¯ll remember you!¡±


    Having finished with her words that were buried with some unknown meaning, Endor carried Alice and mounted her flying broom, and with a blink of an eye, they disappeared into the sky.


    Leaving behind a group of people who were exchanging nces with each other, not knowing what to say.


    What happened today was too damn strange!

 Chapter 122

    In just a short amount of time, the disturbance brought forth by Alice had died off.


    As a matter of fact, before most of the apprentices within the tower had gotten to the root of this matter, it had passed away into silence. Not to mention that Adept Anderson, who rarely showed himself in front of his apprentices, and even Evil Bugs Acteon, who had witnessed the entire process himself, had be very quiet.


    With regards to Greem¡¯s performance, except Mary who didn¡¯t express any surprise, the other two had been struck with awe. It was especially true for Acteon, the degree of his shocking emotion had even elevated to a state where he felt uneasy to even eat or sleep.


    Although Greem never publicly exhibited any hostility towards Acteon, as a Bloodline Apprentice who had taken a mutated path and took the initiative to strike at any potential enemy, the guideline Acteon had been practicing all his life was put all his efforts to construct an aggressive position in his living circle, which could bring him all the benefits.


    In the past, as he was constrained by his overall strength, he had no choice but to keep a rtively bnced rtionship with the other two strongest. But after his breakthrough in the recent training mission, he could no longer hold down his true nature and had stood out, ¡®subduing¡¯ both Madwoman and Hawkeye.


    If he hadn¡¯t witnessed the battle of that bizarre kid, perhaps, he would have thought the scale of victory had skewed to his side. Mary, who was only an expert in running fast, had nothing worth mentioning in her defensive and offensive ability and was not his opponent. As for Greem, a mere Advanced Apprentice, how big a storm could he bring up?


    However, the battle in the bird cage between Alice and Greem had deeply touched Acteon.


    From that day onwards, he kept asking himself inwardly. If he and Greem had fought in the bird cage, could he break through the line of defense formed by the group of golems andnd his attack onto Greem? Obviously, the answer was something that he didn¡¯t like to hear.


    Therefore, since that day, he had be extremely reticent!


    ............


    Within a dark secret room.


    Acteon, wearing a ck robe, was sitting within the shadow of a corner, pondering himself while remaining silent.


    Throughout the entire secret room, there was only a magical torch lit up, and was ced on a wall in the far distance. Not only was the dimmed, jumping me not able to bring any significant light to this space, instead, it gave a touch of gruesomeness and fear to the ce.


    There wasn¡¯t any furniture or decorations in this secret room, not even themonly seen table or chairs. Even Acteon was sitting on the cold, hard surface of the floor with his legs folded. Behind him, in a corner of the room where light couldn¡¯t reach, a mysterious cocoon was seen hanging down from the roof, and was expanding and creeping in a creepy manner.


    Rather than referring to this ce as a secret room, it was more like a bug¡¯s nest.


    Right beside Acteon, countless ck bugs were swarming across the floor like a dark wave. Sometimes they would move to the east, and sometimes they would move to the west, the buzzing noise of their legs scratching the floor was incessantly lingering in the air.


    As if affected by these bugs, Acteon¡¯s body which hid underneath the ck robe started to move restlessly, as if there were hundreds of thousands of bugs trying to rush out from within, wanting to mix together with their peers which were crawling outside. Right when these ck bugs nearly went out of control, finally, Acteon raised his head up, and within the shadow of his hood, two bright green glows ignited.


    A sharp, ear-piercing cry of bugs echoed out from within the secret room.


    Acteon opened his mouth widely. Right at the center of his mouth, which was formed withyers of lips, a peculiar head of bug suddenly poked out. The bug cry just now was let out from the mouth of this bug.


    Upon hearing the cry, the restless bugs had returned to a calm state once again. All the ck bugs now surrounded Acteon, like people worshiping their king, they all held their heads low and remained silent, waiting for the order of their master.


    Acteon casually picked up a ck bug and threw into his mouth, starting to munch on it and producing the crystal clear sound of biting and crushing. The stinking green liquid leaked out from his lips, and the pungent smell of it had made the air in this secret room even more filthy.


    ¡°So, this is the path you picked for yourself? It is really unique!¡± An old voice suddenly rang out from within the secret room.


    ¡°Master Anderson, you¡¯re finally here!¡± Anderson lightly raised his head, as if he wasn¡¯t surprised by the voice that suddenly broke the silence of the room.


    ¡°You knew I¡¯ll be here?¡± The old voice sounded surprised. It was the voice of the master of this Swampy Tower, Adept Anderson.


    ¡°Of course! As long as you¡¯re still the true master of this tower, I know you will contact me sooner orter!¡±


    ¡°So, I assume you have also guessed my purpose in contacting you?¡±


    ¡°You wish for my help in dealing with that Greem!¡±


    ¡°Hmph, you¡¯re a clever kid. Indeed! I need you to stand out and get rid of that hateful kid. And, I believe you¡¯re willing to do this!¡±


    ¡°Your respectful master Anderson, can I ask you a question? Do you really need help killing an Advanced Apprentice? Can¡¯t you just kill him straightaway? Could that bring you any consequences, unbearable even to you?¡± Clearly, Acteon wasn¡¯t an idiot. Without knowing the answer to this critical question, he wouldn¡¯t want to be the gun held in someone else¡¯s hand!


    ¡°Because I still want to control that little vampire. She is the key sample to the next step in my blood research. Based on the rtionship between her and that kid, if I do this myself, perhaps it would be extremely difficult for me to control her again.¡± Adept Anderson remained silent for a brief moment, before finally saying the reason.


    ¡°With thebative ability that kid showed us yesterday, do you think I can defeat him?¡± Anderson was never bothered by Adept Anderson¡¯s answer, instead, he quickly threw out the next question.


    ¡°With my judgment, it is extremely difficult. If you¡¯re fighting him alone, you¡¯ll face an inevitable death. But, it seems you have formed an Evil Bugs Alliance. If you can bring in the strength of this alliance, perhaps it will be enough.¡±


    ¡°But, by doing all these, what kind of benefits would I be getting? Instead, I¡¯ll be offending Mary, a Pseudo-Adept for no apparent reason!¡±


    ¡°What if I say I can make you stronger?¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    ¡°I suppose your contracted partner is that Queen Bug? The queen of Carrion Beetle, hehe, you¡¯re really lucky to bump into such a great fortune. It looks like you did have pretty good luck in the past!¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    ¡°Right now, probably you¡¯re worrying about how to improve your overall strength. You have tied your life with that Queen Bug, as the result, not only do you have to fulfill the level up requirement by yourself, you also need to fulfill the level up requirement of the Queen of Carrion Beetle. With that, though the half-bug body has given you an advantage when facing an opponent of the same rank, the speed of progress has also dragged you down.¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    ¡°How many Pseudo-Adepts had you devoured in your training mission? One or two? Without such lucky encounters, there is no way you can be a Pseudo-Adept smoothly. So, what are you going to do after that? In order to level up as an Adept, how many Adepts are you nning to devour?¡±


    ¡°Master Anderson, I¡¯ve understood what you mean. So, with regards to my current situation, do you have any better suggestions?¡±


    ¡°It is no doubt you have to strengthen yourself first!¡± With a disdainful voice, Anderson gave his lecture, ¡°Although currently, that Queen Bug is your contracted creature, and you two are sharing a life together, however, there is an issue of dominance that resides within your rtionship. When you be stronger, naturally, it will be your best servant. But if it evolves faster than you, though there is no risk in terms of your life, but when ites to the true master of this body, perhaps most of the time it will be controlled by the Queen Bug!¡±


    ¡°Then, how can I strengthen myself even faster?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe... kid, most probably you have forgotten that I turned Mary into her current appearance! As long as you¡¯re willing to participate in my magic spell experiment, I can promise you, I¡¯ll give you an intrepid body that is not weaker than Mary¡¯s!¡±


    ¡°I agree to this condition. What do you need me to do?¡±


    ¡°First, I need a drop of blood from your Queen Bug! Only by obtaining its blood can I urately concoct the mutated blood most suitable for your body constitution.¡±


    After remaining silent and pondering for a long time, Acteon finally nodded his head in agreement.


    And after obtaining Acteon¡¯s agreement, Adept Anderson immediately urged him to hand over a drop of Queen Bug¡¯s blood.


    Acteon gritted his teeth and opened his lotus-shaped mouth, the bug resided inside once again poked out part of its body. Upon revealing itself, the bug immediately let out a miserable cry, causing the dark Carrion Beetles surrounded Acteon to be restless and furious. But after forced by Acteon, the Queen bug had no choice but opened its mouth and spat out a drop of strange liquid, which was extremely stinky and sticky.


    The air within the secret room briefly vibrated. When the drop of liquid left the mouth of Queen Bug, before it could reach the ground, a spatial ripple appeared at the right time cupping it from below. A bright light of teleportation shed through the room, the liquid had disappeared in a strange manner.


    Acteon¡¯spound eyes flickered. Obviously, he was frightened by how tight a control Adept Anderson had on the tower.


    ¡°Kid, you have made a wise decision! Alright, with this thing, I¡¯ll be able to concoct a mutated blood soon. Once you have also owned the bloodline of a vampire, that will be the moment for you to shine!¡±


    Sensing that Adept Anderson¡¯s powerful Spirit had gradually withdrawn from the secret room, only then Acteon blended himself back into the vast darkness. Within the dark shadow where no one could peek through, the chirping of beetle could be heard without end, no one knew what was the contents of the violentmunication between Acteon and the Queen Bug.


    The entire space was filled with a ghastly and wicked atmosphere!


    ............


    After returning to his residence, Greem once again dwelled into the secluded lifestyle he used to have.


    Deep meditation, reading books, magic spell experiments... All these boring yet fixed routine had filled up his daily life. For some unknown reasons, a deep sense of danger had been enveloping Greem¡¯s body and soul, urging him to keep umte knowledge and strengthening himself.


    He had a feeling, if he didn¡¯t put in all his effort to run faster, some frightening events would happen on him. Although it was tough to exin where or who these dangers woulde from, Greem believed in his instincts without a shadow of the doubt. And he had put out real action as preventive measures.


    Also, the magic spell study he carried out in session had brought him tremendous benefits. Having been organized and ssified by the Chip, all those magic spell books he had read in the past had transformed into the mystical knowledge that he could use at anytime he wanted. The vacancy of his elementary knowledge about Fire element magic spell had now been filled up.


    Therefore, unknowingly, both Inferno Shield and Inferno Force Field had be skills in his bag, while the mastery of Inferno Body had increased to 41% from 37%.


    Strictly speaking, currently, the fundamental knowledge in Fire element that Greem had was not weaker than that of any official Adept¡¯s!

 Chapter 123

    Since thestpulsory mission had beenpleted, the Swampy Tower was like a clogged up water channel that had suddenly opened up. In a natural way, the fresh water from the outside world started to influence the life within the isted world.


    And obviously, Adept Anderson wasn¡¯t happy to see such changes. However, when he was faced with the will of the entire Zhentarim Association, which was a n that even the Third Grade Adept from Sarubo Family dared not disobey, there was just nothing he could do to change the situation!


    Therefore, when the apprentices that had attended the training mission made their return, the Mission Hall of the Swampy Tower, which had not been used for a very long time, once again opened up. Every day, the mission board ced in the hall refreshed with countless new missions, from advanced missions like hunting feral demons of Adept level, which only Pseudo-Adept could participate in, to petty missions like gathering resources, expelling demons, and investigating abnormal events. It all refreshed in real-time.


    Put it this way, even at the center of the continent, the well-developed region and the primary colony of human society, every day there would be hundreds of thousands of bizarre incidents happening. Either it was the discovery of demon traces near a small town located at the border, or a vige near the wilderness was attacked by some unknown beings, or some expedition team had discovered an uncultivated resource site.


    Without exception, whenever something like this happened, the Zhentarim Association would bring the matter in, and announce a time-limited mission to all the Apprentice Adepts within the entire central region of the continent. With this method, they could bring all the apprentices within the center region into y. Not only could they train these apprentices, they could also solve the problem urring at the border of their territory. In another way, they used these apprentices to shoulder the heavy burden of defence missions instead of official Adepts.


    Greem could hole himself up in his residence and improve the foundation of his magic spells bit by bit. But, Mary and Snox couldn¡¯t behave like that. Hence, during this time, they were like prisoners who had bloodshot eyes, hanging around all day inside of the Mission Hall, quietly filtering through the missions and finding ones they like the most.


    After all, Mary had taken the path of a Bloodline Adept, and it would slow her progress to just rely on the umtion of magic spell knowledge. Only by constantly devouring the blood of experts would ensure her quick progress. Therefore, she had shown enthusiasm when picking her missions, and she had been working hard inpleting them. Within just a month, shepleted two missions and earned herself twenty merit points.


    But it was too bad that all the missions she chose were located within the perimeter of the Swampy Tower. It was a region where human society was well-developed. Though sometimes demons intruded into the ce, it was just impossible to have any Pseudo-Adept level monsters. Therefore, she had no alternative but to look for a distant location.


    Very soon, a suitable mission jumped into her eyes.


    At the Timbermaw Hold, located seven thousand miles away, a camp of Lycanthropes who moved from the depths of the jungle was suddenly discovered. Therefore, the local authority had announced a mission to recruit Pseudo-Adept or Advanced Apprentice and was preparing to eliminate this camp.


    When Mary enthusiastically invited Greem to join her in this mission, she was turned down straightaway.


    As an Element Apprentice who prepared to take the path of Focused Fire Element, Greem felt he needed to be more focused on the mission of his choice. Last time, he had gained tremendous benefit by soaking himself inside the undergroundva pool in the Underground Cave region, so he wished to find another ce which had a simr environment like the volcano, so he could make further progress with his Inferno Body.


    He had a feeling that in order for him to advance into the realm of official Adept steadily and surely, the Inferno Body yed a very important role.


    Fortunately enough, on the third day after Mary left excitedly, Snox, who had been spending all day in the Mission Hall, rushed back to Greem. The mission that suited him the most had appeared!


    It was a mission to gather resources, which had a rather low risk, and the location of the mission was right within a volcano which would erupt on a fixed interval. Cotopaxi Volcano was located near the border, east of the Sidney region. It was a ce rich in Fire Diamonds of premium quality, and was one of the main ies for the local Adept Family.


    Cotopaxi Volcano was a very powerful active volcano. Out of the twelve months in a year, it would be in a dangerous active period for nine months. During this period, even Adepts wouldn¡¯t risk their life by stepping into it. Only during the three-month resting period would the Cotopaxi Volcano calm down slightly and give the nearby Adept Family a chance to harvest the Fire Diamond that could be found underneath it.


    Even during the resting period of the volcano, the temperature inside was still incredibly high. Also, as most of the Fire Diamonds were found at the edge ofva pool or floating inside of the pool, no ordinary humans could harvest them, and only Advanced Apprentices who had element resistance could achieve this seemingly impossible mission.


    Therefore, in order to increase the productivity of Fire Diamonds during this resting period, aside from sending their own family members to harvest the Fire Diamonds, the local Adept Family would also announce a mission publicly. Any apprentice that entered the Cotopaxi Volcano just needed to submit a fixed portion of Fire Diamonds at the end of their mission, and they could keep the rest as a reward for their mission.


    As a result, every year before the volcano entered its resting period, it also was the time to announce this mission!


    Greem rushed to the Mission Hall. Without hesitation, he immediately undertook the mission of harvesting Fire Diamonds. Looking at the message of the mission, it was only open to twenty apprentices and Greem was the neenth apprentice who undertook the mission. Nearly at the same time that he epted the mission, it disappeared from the mission board.


    The quota of twenty apprentices had beenpletely filled up!


    The mission required Greem to report to the mission site located in the Sidney region within fifteen days. Time was pressing, so Greem immediately started to arrange all the necessary matters.


    The first issue was how to settle Snox.


    Snox had a timid and cowardly character, which made it not fit for a fighter¡¯s position. Instead, it showed great interest in bing a goblin merchant. For this reason, Greem decided to leave Snox in the Swampy Tower and gave it all of the resources he wouldn¡¯t be using temporarily.


    The magical gemstones he had brought back from the Underground Cave, the magical equipment he stripped from the dead bodies of Fallen Apprentices, and the remaining four Mind Concentrating Potions he had ¨C none of them fit in the path Greem was currently taking. So he simply handed them to Snox, making them the highest quality treasures for the newly opened Goblin Shop.


    In the eyes of the Pseudo-Adepts that came from some big family, perhaps the items were worth nothing. But when they were ced in Swampy Tower, a ce where all resources were scarce, nearly on the first day that the Goblin Shop opened for business, it became a mystical ce passionately sought after by all Beginner and Intermediate apprentices.


    Mind Concentrating Potions?!


    What kind of miraculous item were they? Why they never heard of it before? A bottle of it could bring an increment of 0.5 ¨C 0.7 in their Spirit? This... how could such miraculous magical potions exist in the world?


    As for the side effects of the Mind Concentrating Potion, in the eyes of the apprentices who could go to every extent just to improve their overall strength, it was simply nothing! After all, inside of the Swampy Tower, through their daily meditation, most Apprentice Adepts could only obtain a tiny fraction of increase in their Spirit.


    In the end, only a handful of apprentices could enter a deep meditation state every single time like how Greem was able to. Thus, an increment of 0.5 in Spirit would also mean three months of restless meditation for most of them.


    In the past, they had toboriously meditate for three months in order to achieve the same result, but now, it could be obtained with just one single bottle of potion. How could a miraculous result like this not attract their craziness?


    Unfortunately, the high price of it had made them shrink back at the sight of it, and they could only jealously watch as Hawkeye purchased all four Mind Concentrating Potions in one go.


    Clearly, the results brought by the Mind Concentrating Potion to an Advanced Apprentice weren¡¯t as significant as when it was used by an Intermediate Apprentice, however, for Clutha, any tiny bit of increment in his Spirit was extremely valuable. It was because he had eighteen points in his Spirit now. So long as he could increase it just by a little bit, perhaps he could be a Pseudo-Adept.


    Most of the Beginner and Intermediate Apprentices couldn¡¯t get their hands on a top grade product like Mind Concentrating Potions, but their eyes were dazed by the dazzling arrays of magical resources and materials. Perhaps Greem only put his concern towards the Fire element magical equipment he could use but Snox was never picky.


    Using the first pot of gold it had saved, Snox purchased a lot of local products from the Underground Cave. Now, by putting them on disy in its own Goblin Shop, they immediately attracted a crazy spending spree from the apprentices within the tower.


    Ironwood Branch that brought the effect of +1 in the speed of vitality restoration, the Mantle of Intelligence that brought the effect of +1 in the speed of Spirit restoration, Ogre Gauntlets that brought the effect of +1 in Strength, Boot of Haste that brought +1 in Agility, Minor Antidote, Gem of True Sight that could detect any invisible creature...


    Although the magical equipment wasn¡¯t of a high grade, they were perfectly suitable to be used by Beginner and Intermediate Apprentices, and their price was within a range they could afford. As the result, once they were put on sale, a great rush for them broke out within the Swampy Tower.


    With that, Snox was catapulted into the limelight!


    A Goblin that was able to possess such a ¡®massive¡¯ fortune, of course, it attracted jealousy from outsiders. However, anyone with a sensible mind would know that behind this goblin was a Pseudo-Adept and an Advanced Apprentice. So long as their brain wasn¡¯t damaged by fever, they would know that by offending this goblin, they would also provoke the Bloody Queen and the frightening malefic Greem.


    Therefore, after settling with Snox, Greem packed his luggage and left Swampy Tower without alerting anyone.


    If Greem traveled 7000 miles by foot or coach, he would be lucky to arrive at the mission site before the mission ended. So, after Greem left the Magical Swamp, he found himself a public flying site at the nearest city.


    There, he could get a ride on a flying boat!


    The so-called flying boat was a vehicle that was at least few times inferior to the flying ship used by the Adept Association. However, it was the mostmon and convenient method of travel within the center region of the continent. When Greem saw the flying boat for the first time, his facial muscle twitched uncontrobly.


    This... wasn¡¯t this the hot air balloon back on Earth in his previous life?


    A huge, long, cigar-shaped balloon was floating above. Apparently, it was made from the leather of a unique demon beast. Arge cabin was hanging under the balloon: the bottom level was used to house cargo while the upper level was the ce where the travelers would stay. Nevertheless, it did send forth a mystical aura.


    Of course, the fee of riding the flying boat wasn¡¯t cheap either, and ordinary cargo wouldn¡¯t be shipped using the flying boat. Same goes with the travelers. The only ones who could afford to rent a whole room on the flying boat and experience a luxurious and romantic flying trip would be either the nobles from human society, rich merchants who traveled between ces, or Apprentice Adepts who were rushing to different mission sites.

 Chapter 124

    Palmyra Town was the resource supply point nearest to Cotopaxi Volcano.


    It was also the ce where all visiting apprentices reported for duty.


    When Greem arrived at the town, riding on a leisurely moving coach from the outpost, it was dinner time.


    Palmyra Town was a remote but not quite deste town. It was not a big town, and there was only a main street that cut through the center of it. It was a small ce where one could nce over the entire town just by standing at the street corner.


    Dozens of wooden houses were built along both sides of the main street. Just with one look, one could tell they were all ordinary folk houses. In addition to that, there was also a tavern, a grocery shop, and a shabby, wet, little hostel. Together with a poption of around a hundred, that was everything one could find in this tiny town!


    Right after Greem came down from the coach, he vaguely heard a loud yet muffled noise that kepting from the volcano located in the far distance. The noise didn¡¯te at random intervals but had always lingered in Greem¡¯s ears ever since he had approached the region. When at the outer perimeter, it wasn¡¯t that clear, and was just like the muffled thunder one could hear in the wilderness during winter. But, when he came into this tiny town, he was immediately amazed by the mightiness of Mother Nature.


    This, perhaps, was the noise caused by the restless underground activity of the volcano!


    At the thought that the residents of the town had to live in such an environment year in and year out, Greem just couldn¡¯t hold down his curiosity. What was the reason behind them willingly enduring such a harsh environment and staying in this ce?


    Although currently, the resting period of Cotopaxi Volcano was approaching, the dense dust cloud was still bursting out from the crater that was located in a far of distance at high altitude. The town was built fewer than seven miles from the foot of the volcano and because of volcanic activity the sky was forever hazy. No matter if it was outside or inside the town, whether it was in the buildings or on the stony pavement, everything was nketed with a thickyer of volcanic ash.


    Inside the hostel, there was an Advanced Apprentice waiting for Greem. His name was Ivan. Judging from the badge pinned on the chest of his gray long robe, he came from the local Adept Family, the Zuber Family. The Cotopaxi Volcano was a family resource site they owned and no visiting Adept could step into the volcano without getting their permission prior.


    When Ivan saw Greem was just an Advanced Apprentice, he could hardly believe it and was unable to hold down his emotion. Then, with a cold voice, he said, ¡°Even during the resting period, the inner area of the volcano isn¡¯t a safe ce. It is filled with terrifyingly hot airflow and Magmakin. Are you sure you can survive in a ce like that?¡±


    In an indifferent manner, Greem ran his eyes around the main hall of the hostel. He then casually waved his hand a few times in the air, revealing a magical talisman burning with fire element hovering in midair. Of course, his behavior attracted the eyes of everyone at the scene. The people who were sitting around the six to seven tables in the hall immediately turned their gazes over to him.


    Honestly speaking, after Greem had stepped over the threshold of the Inferno Body and after he was injected with the energy from the undergroundva pool, his more than two-meter tall body was rather offending to the eyes. Yet, his long, dark red hair, and the reserved aura of cruelty and brutality had also given him an extraordinary bearing that could easily attract people¡¯s gazes.


    ¡°Eh, so you¡¯re a Fire Element Apprentice! Then the hard underground environment will bring little effect to you. So long you can avoid those hateful Magmakin, perhaps, you can pay a visit to a deeper area!¡± Ivan nodded his head, took out a white stone, and handed it over to Greem.


    It was the visiting permit for him that allowed him to enter the inner area of volcano a few dayster!


    ¡°Go and talk with them! All the people you find in this hall are visiting apprentices who havee here for the mission. If you can form a team with them, it will be easier for you toplete the mission!¡± Since he had discovered that Greem was a Fire Element Apprentice, Ivan disyed a warmer reception.


    Greem nodded his head to express his understanding and then slowly walked toward the hall, gradually gazing at all of the unfamiliar faces who were chitchatting across the tables in low voices. At the end, he decided to sit at a table alone.


    For this underground trip, his primary goal was toplete his Inferno Body, and he wasn¡¯t too eager to get the rewards of the mission. Therefore, he had no intention to form a team with other apprentices. That was also why he had been putting up a cold look upon his arrival. It prevented any strangers from talking with him, as he wanted to avoid any unnecessary trouble.


    All Apprentice Adepts were acute observers. Since Greem had put up an invisible barrier around him, naturally, no one woulde and bother him. Meanwhile, Greem took the opportunity to slowly observe the entire situation around this group of apprentices, so that he could make any necessary preparations for future.


    The main hall of the small hostel wasn¡¯t big and it was dim. There were approximately seventeen Apprentice Adepts; only two of them were Pseudo-Adepts and the rest were the same as Greem, Advanced Apprentices. In fact, this demographic matched the characteristics of this mission.


    In order to harvest the resources at the underground volcano, on one hand, they had to endure the influence from the extreme environment, on the other hand, they had to deal with Magmakin, Fire Spirits, and other elemental creatures who inhabited the ce. Therefore, Advanced Apprentice was the lowest requirement for this mission!


    Greem came to a conclusion, that among all these Advanced Apprentices, more than half of them must have Fire as their affinity element. While the rest of them may not be Fire element apprentices, they would be fellows with extreme confidence in themselves. And, the reason why there were so few Pseudo-Adepts? It was because resource harvesting missions like this dependedrgely on one¡¯s luck.


    If they were lucky, they might bump into a Fire Diamond mine that was exposed after theva subsided. But, if they were out of luck, the story of someone returning with empty hands after three months of the mission was not a rare asion either.


    At that point in time, not only would they not receive any mission rewards, they even had topensate the portion of resources required by the mission from their own stores.


    Therefore, if not for a special need, no Pseudo-Adept would visit the underground volcano and test their luck.


    After getting hold of the rough situation of the mission¡¯s apprentices, Greem hurried through a meal before he went in his own room and never came out again. He had arrived rather early, and there were still five days before the resting period of the volcano. So, for the next few days, he never stepped out from the room and even asked the servant to send his meals straight to his room.


    Using the few days of spare time he had, Greem put in all his effort and arduously researched about the Ring of Fire. He had a feeling that the advanced Fire element defensive magic spell was the perfect match to his Inferno Body. If he could master it sooner, it was highly possible that he could form a Protective me simr to that of a Balrog of Abyss. If he really seeded, anyone who tried to attack him would have to first suffer from constant fire damage. It fit better with his treacherous mentality of killing the enemy in the dark.


    During this period, there were a couple of Apprentice Adepts who paid him a visit, trying to pull him into their exploration teams. Greem turned all of them down. Therefore, after a few rounds of rejections, all of the Advanced Apprentices who would visit the underground volcano had learned about the guy who had the intention of visiting the volcano alone.


    As they were all able to be Advanced Apprentices, none of them were people with simple minds. They realized that a guy who had the courage to do that was someone who had extreme confidence in his trump cards. As a result, no one made any thoughtlessments about him. However, many of them were secretly waiting to see some shit happen to Greem!


    Soon, the day everybody was waiting for arrived!


    On this very day, the loud rumble that kept lingering in everybody¡¯s ears finally came to aplete stop.


    The towering dust pir in the far distant sky started to scatter and the shower of volcanic dust that had never stopped also reduced gradually and eventually came to aplete stop.


    Greem, who was quietly studying a book in his room, felt the changes in the outside world. He pushed open the wooden window pane and looked into the street. Without hesitation, he packed everything around him and walked out from the room. Simr to him, many apprentices prepared themselves, and they nodded their head at each other in the corridor as they gathered in the main hall of the hostel.


    Ivan, who was responsible for leading the group, was waiting in the main hall.


    After another fifteen minutes, when all twenty apprentices had arrived, the group left the hostel, following behind Ivan as they rushed to the foot of the volcano.


    For this group of Apprentice Adepts, a distance of seven to eight miles was nothing. In less than fifteen minutes, the group came to a natural cave located halfway up the volcano. Two Pseudo-Adepts from Zuber Family were waiting for them here. After verifying everybody¡¯s visiting permit, only then did they let them into the cave.


    It was not a big cave and it only upied around seventy square meters of area. Inside the cave, countless rocks with sharp edges and limestone were arranged in a crisscross pattern. Most probably, it was the tunnel that led to the depth of the volcano, as no moss, lichen or any simr things could be found here. Large cracks and deep trenches filled the wall on the both sides, and frequently, hot airflow that could cook a person instantly would burst out from them.


    Perhaps because the undergroundva had just subsided not long ago, even the ground in the cave was boiling hot. The air inside of the tunnel was filled with the pungent smell of sulfur. Without a unique approach, when an ordinary human stayed in this dirty air for more than ten minutes, his body would be invaded by the poisonous fire, turning his trachea and lungs into a sack full of blood.


    But, no hardship in this environment could bring any harm to the apprentices who had the courage to visit the ce. One after another, protective barriers of different colors emerged and covered them inside, isted from any distractioning from the outside. Greem didn¡¯t show off his Inferno Body, but instead cast an Inferno Force Field around him.


    Quietly, he looked to the left and right, noticing eight apprentices had cast a simr Fire element defensive magic spell. They upied nearly half of the entire twenty apprentices. Yet, the rest of them were either Earth or Wind element apprentices, and he couldn¡¯t find any Water element apprentices. Presumably, those apprentice with Water as their affinity element wouldn¡¯t want to suffer in an environment like this.


    Compared to other spectrums of the element, when residing in a harsh environment like this, not only those Water element apprentices would have a hard time in gathering Water Elementiums, the strength and effect of their magic spell would also be reduced by at least seventy percent. So long their brain was functioning properly, none of them woulde to this ce and torture themselves!


    When the group arrived at this ce, they split up into their own smaller teams.


    Few apprentices who had formed a team gathered together, and the Fire element apprentice among them cast a Fire element resistance spell on everyone in the team. After that, they simply squeezed into the tunnel without saying anything else. The residual temperature within the tunnel was still very high. In a narrow space like this, if they encountered an unexpected hot airflow burst of a major scale, even Advanced Apprentices would have to face a life-endangering situation.


    Therefore, after wishing everyone good luck, the group split up and entered different tunnels, disappearing into the depths of the volcano.


    Greem noticed that the Apprentice Adepts from the Zuber Family didn¡¯t follow any visiting apprentices into the tunnel. It looked like they were more familiar with the terrain of this area, and they had a more convenient destination to visit. There was no need to try their luck by poking around like the visiting apprentices.


    Greem shook his head and sighed. Then, he scrunched his body and squeezed into one of theva tunnels.

 Chapter 125

    Compared to the Underground World at the Underground Cave region, the volcanic cave in this ce was more dangerous and frightening.


    All the tunnels were created by the violent geologic activity of the volcano, they were actually cracks and channels made forva to flow freely. Thus, it was a ce filled with uncertainty.


    Perhaps, when you were walking in the middle of a red-hot tunnel, a sudden burst of hot air from a crack in the wall could bake you into a pile of charred bones. You might also take a wrong step and fall into a bottomless valley, eventually diving into ava pool that could melt you entirely in seconds.


    Though the volcano had gradually entered its resting period, at some random areas, violent geologic activity still existed. And if the sudden sinking of strata happened right next you, it was most probable that you would be crushed into meat paste by the cave that suddenly closed up or by the shifting of the stratum.


    Therefore, when walking around in a ce like this, one would really have to pay extra attention to the stability of the surrounding rock strata.


    Absolute safety never existed here, each and every single apprentice had to be extreme cautious, so that they could avoid getting themselves dragged into sudden changes of the terrain.


    However, danger not only came from the shifting of terrain in this volcano, most of it were actuallying from the unique creatures that inhabited this region ¨C Fire Spirits, Lava Hounds, Fire Lizards, me Imps, Guardian of mes... one could easily find more than dozens of Fire element creatures that were named here, yet, there were still countless unnamed creatures hiding in every corner of the ce.


    These Fire element creatures who lived by fire and feasted on fire had called this volcano their home, constructing a unique food chain in this world ofva. Of course, the ones who stood on top of the food chain would certainly be the dreadful Molten Giants. They were like a group of ming giants who possessed a high intelligence, and owned some frightful element abilities that were not weaker than human Adepts.


    It was a pity that they were overly dependent on the environment to live their lives, as once they left the world of volcanoes, their overall strength would be slowly, but constantly reduced. Therefore, all Molten Giants lived in the deepest areas of this underground volcano, and could hardly be seen in the outside world. With the abilities of ordinary Apprentice Adepts, it was insufficient for them to visit such a deep area within the world of volcano, thus, it was nearly impossible for them to bump into each other.


    And yet, the ones who took the ce at the bottom of this food chain would most probably be those disgusting me Imps. They look simr to Goblins, but their skins were red. Also, they didn¡¯t have any flesh or blood, but were a product mixed from balls of source mes and some broken consciousnesses.


    They would shuttle back and forth betweenva tunnels while chattering like magpies, searching everywhere for the area dense with Fire Elementiums. They would also attack any outsiders who intruded into the areas where they were residing, and their attack methods were rather primitive ¨C by shooting fire arrows. Once they realized they couldn¡¯t defeat their opponent, they would simply dive into a randomva pool or hot me and flee to another ce within split seconds.


    If a treasure hunter let a me Imp escape in front of him, then within a very short period of time, his surroundings would be flooded by a swarm of me Imps.


    But, these me Imps were extremely poor. When you exhausted all mental efforts and eliminated them, what you would most probably get was a pile of volcanic ash, and there wouldn¡¯t be any other war trophies you could find. On this point alone, the value of me Imps was far lower than that of Fire Spirits. Though Fire Spirit were also stood at the bottom of the food chain in this volcano world, once they were eliminated, you could at least obtain some broken element cores, far better than me Imp who gave nothing.


    me Imps possessed the abilities of Fire Arrow and Fire Teleportation, if they were ced in the outside world, they would be a nasty type of element creature. However, in this volcanic world where everything had a very strong fire resistance, their bizarre abilities were useless when using against other fire element creatures.


    And this, was the root cause as to why they were reduced to the bottom of the food chain!


    Greem chose not to travel with others. Alone, he squeezed into one of theva tunnels and ran with quick steps through the passage that led downwards. There weren¡¯t any straight paths in this ce, and no tunnels with regr shapes could be seen either. Every path would wind and twist following the changes in the terrain, and there were many forks along the way.


    This world of volcano was like an enormous beehive, the paths within were rough and rugged, and between each tunnel were caves of different sizes. When walking in this ce, if one didn¡¯t have any method to identify his way, it was really easy to get trapped in this gigantic maze, and eventually be killed by the heat after depleting all food and water.


    Nevertheless, this was not a problem for Greem at all. Not only that, the deeper he traveled into the world of volcano, the more active and restless the blood and flesh of his entire body became. They were rejoicing and cheering for how dense the Fire Elementium in this ce were. Even without putting up an element protection, the misty red glow lingering about his body would never bring any harm to him, instead, they actually brought him some benefits.


    But, for the sake of appearances, he had to put up his Inferno Force Field, so that his clothes wouldn¡¯t be burned off by the high temperature. After all, he was a human, and he didn¡¯t have the habit of running naked like those Fire element creatures!


    He had no map, yet he didn¡¯t need one. Greem never showed any hesitation when he arrived at all forks on his way, he just kept striding forward and heading deep underground. In fact, the beacon that guided his way was the density of the Fire Elementiums in the air! He hadn¡¯te here for treasure hunting, but to go to a ¡®spa¡¯. Thus, wherever Fire Elementium were denser, he would head that way.


    The twists and turns in passages might fool him, but the Fire Elementium hovering in the air would never lie to him. Hence, without missing any turns, he arrived in front of a smallva pool.


    This ce was not considered the depths of the volcano world; it was just a sunken region that existed naturally. Thus, after most of the moltenva subsided back into the underground, a small portion of it was trapped in this hole, forming a smallva pool.


    Right now, a group of me Imps and a Lava Hound were seen gathering in this ce, swimming and floating in theva pool, and pouring the boiling hotva onto their body happily.


    Within this group of monsters, it was obvious that the Lava Hound had a higher status, as alone it had upied nearly half the space. While the rest of the me Imps could only squeeze together on the other side of the pool, none of them daring to step closer to the Lava Hound.


    When they saw that a human had suddenlye through the tunnel and stood in front of them, the Lava Hound, who had a very strong sense of territory, became the first to jump out from theva pool, blocking Greem. It slightly crouched down its body, opened up its huge mouth where scorching hot me could be seen dancing inside, and let out a deep growl in a threatening manner.


    So, this was the Lava Hound?


    Greem stopped, blue light could be seen flickering in his dark eyes, as he kept scanning on the internal structure of this peculiar creature in front.


    It was a Fire element creature whose size simr to that of a tiger¡¯s back on Earth in his previous life. Most parts of its body were molded from boiling hot half-moltenva, and scorching hot mes enshrouded the surface of its body. When this Lava Hound opened its ferocious mouth and howled at Greem, the searingva that dripped from its sharp fangs could even pierce small holes on the ground.


    This was a sign that theva found on its body was stronger than that found in the natural world, and the Fire Elementium soaking in them was more violent and more corrosive.


    A momentter, the biological information about this creature as scanned by the Chip was projected into Greem¡¯s mind.


    Lava Hound. A unique half-element creature of the Underground Volcano World.


    Overall strength level: Intermediate Apprentice.


    Body Attribute: Strength ¨C 9, Agility ¨C 13, Physique ¨C 10, Spirit ¨C 8.


    Abilities: High-speed Charge, ming Jump, me Throw, Ferocious Bite.


    Part of this information was constructed after analyzing the body structure of the Lava Hound, while the other was supplemented by the information found in books. When both informations merged, all its secrets werepletely revealed in front of Greem.


    Though the Chipbeled this Lava Hound as having the overall strength of an Intermediate Apprentice, in this unique environment, an ordinary Intermediate Apprentice would find it tough to defeat it.


    Right when Greem had found out all the secrets of this Lava Hound, his silence hadpletely provoked the creature.


    The powerful hind leg of Lava Hound forcefully kicked on the ground, catapulting itsrge body into the air and leaping towards Greem and forcefully mmed into the Fire Shield that Greem had just summoned.


    A deep, muffled boom echoed out.


    The Lava Hound¡¯s body brushed the Fire Shield and dodged to Greem¡¯s sides, with just a twist of its heavy and agile body, it had once again repositioned itself, and leapt towards the opponent once again. Yet right at this very moment, four vividly deep w marks hadn¡¯tpletely faded away from the Fire Shield.


    The Lava Hound forcefully mmed onto the Fire Shield once again!


    This time, the Fire Shield could no longer withstand the attack from the ming ws and the powerful impacting from the heavy body of Lava Hound. With a loud rumble, it exploded into fragments of fire that shot in all directions.


    Following the waving movement of the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in Greem¡¯s hand, a new Inferno Shield popped up from his body, knocking back the Lava Hound who had taken the opportunity tounch another attack.


    Greem frowned. It looked like the Fire Shield of Beginner Apprentice level could hardly help in the current battle of such magnitude. Even an ordinary Lava Hound could break it with just two rounds of attack. Presumably, if he was facing with stronger Fire element creature, this Fire Shield wouldn¡¯t be stronger than a soap bubble.


    Yet, the Inferno Shield had proved itself to be the upgraded version of Fire Shield, as its defensive strength was at least five to six times stronger. Greem remained standing where he was, letting the Lava Hound continuouslyunch attack after attack. The Inferno Shield took nearly ten rounds of attacks before its energy was depleted to a stage of near copse.


    Through his experiences from the battle, Greem modified some necessary parameters of his strategy. After that, he had no mood to keep ¡®ying¡¯ with this Lava Hound anymore. An element core was tossed out, and a gigantic Rock Snake, nearly upied half of the space in this cave, immediately poked its head out from the ground.


    Looking at this new intruder who appeared out of nowhere, the Lava Hound still leaped forward without caring about its own safety, wanting to defend its own territory to thest drop of its blood. But too bad, when facing against the Rock Snake, who had the advantage of a bigger body, the offensive ability which the Lava Hound was proud of was just a joke. Before it could bite off a few chunks of rock from the Rock Snake¡¯s body, its body had fallen by the brutal bite of the Rock Snake, resulting in total disintegration of its body.


    After the Lava Hound¡¯s body fell apart, from theva rocks that scattered around, Greem picked up a Fire Stone that was still burning violently. This, was the only valuable thing he could find from the body of this Lava Hound!


    Greem stayed at where he was and examining the Fire Stone, while the Rock Snake continued its way and slithered towards the remaining me Imps.


    A shower of Fire Arrows fell onto the grayish green head of the Rock Snake, only managing to leave behind holes the size of a chicken egg. For the Rock Snake whose entire body made from hard rock, a damage like this could even bepared to a gentle tickle. It slithered in front of them, using its huge mouth to chomp, its long tail to m, and its body to crush. Very soon, most of the me Imps were eliminated.


    Seeing that the situation was unfavorable, the rest of the me Imps quickly dove into the scorching me dancing above the boilingva pool, disappeared without a trace. Soon, the entire cave had finally be quiet!

 Chapter 126

    Once peace and quiet returned to this ce once again, those disturbing Fire element creatures had long left the scene.


    Dragging its heavy and long body, the Rock Snake was slithering around the outer perimeter and on high vignce. Meanwhile, Greem took off all his clothes and while fully naked, walked into theva pool step by step.


    The boiling moltenva quickly flooded to his ankles, then to his calves and then his thighs. Whenever a bubble stirred up by his movement broke, steaming hot airflow with the temperature of at least few hundred degrees would burst out from it. And yet, it seemed like Greem couldn¡¯t feel anything, as he continued to march deeper into the pool, allowing the sticky and scorching hotva to devour his body, and eventually, his head.


    Following the injecting of the frightful high temperatures into his body at a steady pace, Greem felt as if every single cell in his body was cheering and rejoicing. However, though the Fire element energy inside of his body was soaring at an incredible speed, he couldn¡¯t felt the same pleasure he hadst time, where both his body and Spirit were improving at the same time.


    As if... as if thisva pool wascking a fundamental element that allowed his Inferno Body to progress.


    Greem stood up from theva pool, wonderingly, he ran his eyes around the area. Finally, he couldn¡¯t hold on anymore and asked out his question, ¡°Chip, give this situation a thorough analysis. Tell me what is the reason that is preventing Inferno Body from continuing its progress?¡±


    In next second, countless messages of analysis rolled off his vision, and disappeared at the end, leaving behind only the final conclusion. The most possible reason why thisva pool couldn¡¯t elerate the progress of the Inferno Body was that it wasn¡¯t connected to the volcano core located at the deepest level. Thisva pool was just a small region of leftoverva after all theva had subsided to the underground, and it had lost direct connection to the core of theva.


    Seemed like it was meaningless for him to keep visiting the outer perimeter. Only by traveled deeper underground and finding thevake that directly connected to the core, would this trip be well worthwhile.


    Nevertheless, it didn¡¯t mean by having a bath in thisva pool brought no benefit to him. Greem sent out his spirit and prated through the sticky and scorchingva, and very soon, he discovered some strange objects underneath the pool.


    Greem walked into the direction of South East within the pool, using Inferno Force Field he pushed away the surroundingva, exposing the red-hot pool wall. He passed the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter to his left hand, while gathering some violent Fire element energies on his right hand. Then, he forcefully pierced his right hand into the spongy pool wall.


    When he pulled his right hand out from the wall, a chicken-egg-sized rock was seen tightly gripped in his palm. Following the injecting of raging Fire element energy, the outeryer of the rock started to melt like hot wax, eventually, revealing a dazzling red glow together with a sizzling heat wave.


    An underground Fire Diamond!


    It had only been the size of a human thumb. Judging from its color, it was merely an intermediate quality Fire Diamond. However, just an ordinary Fire Diamond like this could be sold at a hefty price of 120 magic crystals in any arcane shop. Also, for all Apprentice Adepts who visited deep into the volcano, they just needed to submit five simr Fire Diamonds, and they would be considered as fulfilling the portion of resources required by the mission. As for any other things they harvested, they could be treated as personal rewards for the apprentice.


    Since this ce brought him no significant help, Greem had no intention of staying any longer. He hurriedly put on his clothes, took the Rock Snake and rushed to the next destination with a high density of Fire Elementiums.


    One hourter, there was still not a single soul in this underground cave, but, bizarrely, a light sound of footsteps suddenly echoed out.


    A momentter, a vague figure with the shape of a human was revealed within the boiling heat wave right beside the edge of theva pool.


    This was a young male with a long brown hair hanging loosely on his shoulders. He had a somber and stern face. Mystical and profound magical runes were seen fully drawn on his exposed neck, giving him a touch of wickedness.


    He was one of the visiting Pseudo-Adepts who Greem paid special attention to previously.


    He seemed startled right when he arrived at the cave. As a Pseudo-Adept, he always acted alone, as he felt disdain to be in the same group as those rookies. Relying on his strange ability of invisibility, most of the Fire element creatures in this ce couldn¡¯t find any trace of him, allowing him to avoid most of the unnecessary battles, eventually arriving at this cave smoothly.


    However, from the burning fragments ofva rocks left over by the Lava Hound, and the volcanic ashes of the me Imps, together with the traces found on the ground left behind by somerge crawling creature from the surface, he came to a conclusion that this ce was visited by someone else before.


    Quietly, Tamora stood at the edge of theva pool with his back straight, using his spirit to give the surroundings a quick scan. He found nothing. It looked like even if there were creatures here, they had be the war trophies of the person who hade before him.


    How could it be possible that someone was faster than him? Could it have been the other Pseudo-Adept?


    Having his mind filled with questions, Tamora had no choice but made ast-minute change to his route. He didn¡¯t want to follow behind another expert and feast on the crumbs from the table. He had three months of time, and it was more than enough for him to dig out sufficient magical crystals to support his two years of consumption.


    ............


    During the second half of his journey, Greem had stopped behaved timidly like he had previously, and became bold and enthusiastic.


    Sitting high up on the body of Rock Snake, he let it crush through one after anotherva tunnel like a bulldozer. When a tunnel wasrge enough, they would charge through it. When a tunnel was too small, once the Rock Snake squeezed through, it would be big enough.


    Anyhow, with the self-repairing speed of Rock Snake, the mild scratching and damage on its body could cause no real damage to it.


    Throughout their journey, when they encountered some smaller sized Fire element creatures, the Rock Snake would simply crush them. If it were some middle-sized creatures, it would first forcefully mmed and break the creature¡¯s body, then continued by crushing over it. As for the desperate counterattacks put out by these Fire element creatures, they could barely bring additional tiny wounds onto the Rock Snake¡¯s body, let alone stop it from pushing through.


    Greem didn¡¯t even bother toe down and pick the Fire Stones or broken cores that fell out from the bodies of these Fire element creatures. He just let the Rock Snake swallow them straightaway, and only when he needed to organize them in future, would he sort through and filter them slowly.


    Also, for every ce with a high density of Fire Elementiums, basically there would be a big or small sizedva pool. The only thing Greem needed to do was using his spirit and prate through the sticky and scorchingva, and find out those Fire Diamonds buried deep inside of rock stratum or covered inside some of the hard rocks.


    Of course, asionally, he would discover some other magical gemstones or unique metal ores.


    Then, in the course of marching forward at great speeds, Greem saw anothermon Fire element creature.


    Fire Spirit was considered the natural spirit that numbered the greatest in this world of volcano. Usually, they took the form of a humanoid me that stood over one meter tall and could walk around freely. They didn¡¯t have any eyes, ears, mouth, nose, or internal organs. Their bodies were totally made up of steaming hot fire, and they couldn¡¯t be too far away from ava pool.


    For these fellows who had no corporeal body and were just a collection of Elementium, the Rock Snake could easily crush them just with its heavy and rock solid body, saving the time of putting out an intense fight. And, from penniless vagrant like these, Greem would never find anything useful.


    Fire Lizards were a type of Fire element demon beasts. They did have flesh and blood, and simr to those ordinaryrge-scale lizards, they liked to hide in the dark and sneak up on their enemies. However, these underground Fire Lizard had rough skins and thick muscles, and they also possessed the ability to spit out mes from their mouth. Not only that, they also had excellent fire resistance. They had a habit of lurking at the edge of ava pool, waiting for Fire element creatures to fall into their snare.


    The Fire Stones with a high density of Fire Elementium and the conscious cores found inside the bodies of Fire element creatures were their favorite food.


    Before came to this underground world, Greem already had an initial understanding about this world of volcano. In order to save the maximum amount of time, he had decided not to leave this ce until the end time of the mission. With that, the issue Greem needed to solve urgently was regarding food and water.


    As for water, besides having a water sack in his storage waist belt, Greem could always collect it by gathering Water Elementiums. Although his element affinity was Fire and he was in a volcanic environment, which could be extremely tough to summon his Water Elementals, he could still solve his water issue easily.


    So, the next issue he needed to solve was food!


    The food Greem brought with him could onlyst him for one week. No matter how much more food he brought, it would be really difficult to keep it for a long time in such an extreme environment. Also, as Greem couldn¡¯t consume fire as his food like how those Fire element creatures could, searching for a new food source in this underground world had be an inevitable task.


    Yet, in this world of volcano, only Fire Lizards who were made up of flesh and blood could be used as a food source. Nevertheless, the meat of Fire Lizards was tough and tensile, and its blood had a stinky odor and was hot. If not for the fact that the Fire element energy contained within would bring a tremendous benefit to his body, Greem would never torture his stomach with this nasty food.


    Basically, these middle and small sized Fire element creatures couldn¡¯t pose any threat to Greem. But, those Magmakins and Guardian of mes who had a stronger overall strength were difficult to handle.


    Both Magmakins and Lava Hounds were actually two different creatures with the same foundation, it just that one of them took the shape of a human, while the other looked like a hound. When facing a Lava Hound, a Rock Snake could tear it apart with just a powerful m and a ferocious bite. But when facing a Magmakin, the same tactic waspletely useless!


    Magmakin was a humanoid monster who possessed an intermediate intelligence. The outeryer of its body was undergroundva stone of all sizes, ordinary offensive magic spells could hardly prate thisyer of extremely tough rock armor. Also, they were extremely cunning creatures, and would never act like the Lava Hounds who couldn¡¯t even judge the overall strength between itself and its enemy.


    The Magmakin liked to tenaciously defend theva pool it took it as its home, and would never allow any outsider took a step into its territory. Also, its offensive methods were rather simr to that of a Fire element Adept. For example, it would use an endless shower of spells ¨C Firestone Throwing, Ignite, mestrike or some other simr spells ¨C when it fought. Frequently, it would use these Fire element spells that blotted out the sky and turned theva cave into a sea of fire.


    When Greem bumped into a fellow like this who hid in a far distance and keptunching long-range offensive magic spells, he had no choice but tomand the Rock Snake to charge into theva pool and engage the enemy in a melee fight. Though both Rock Snakes and Magmakins were Advanced Apprentice level creatures, as the Rock Snake had the advantage of a bigger body, it had a stronger strengthpared to the opponent.


    A fierce melee battle would always break out within theva pool. Eventually, the final victor would always be the Rock Snake, who had a bigger body, a greater strength, and a better Physique.


    Nevertheless, whenever an intense battle was over, the burly body of Rock Snake would always be slimmed down. After all, it was just an Earth element golem, thus, when fighting against the same grade opponent, in the opponent¡¯s territory, just soaking its body in theva pool would bring a huge damage to itself.


    Therefore, every time after it killed a Magmakin, the rounded and thick body of Rock Snake would always slim down by at least three times.


    The Rock Snake could defeat these Magmakins after a fierce fight, but when facing the Guardian of mes, the oue would be near impossible to predict.

 Chapter 127

    If the appearance of Magmakin could still be considered human-like, then the Guardian of mes would be purely a Fire element creature who had reincarnated from an evil creature.


    It had a tall and ferocious stature. Countless sharp rock peaks or spikes had covered the entire surface of its body. It had a strength simr to that of the Rock Snake, hence, when it wielded its huge rock fists and fought against the Rock Snake, the entireva cave would shake and sway violently.


    Two huge monsters shed against each other, rolling on the floor and punching each other fiercely. The massive activity and noise produced by them was not weaker than a remarkable battle between two world-ss monsters. Even Greem was forced to step back, so that he could avoid the flying debris and rocks that kept falling off from above.


    After nearly ten minutes of violently battling, the Rock Snake finally showed slight signs of defeat.


    After all, the rocky body of Rock Snake was temporarily molded using ordinary underground rocks. Inparison, the Guardian of the mes¡¯ steel body was made up of hard ore and special steel rocks it gathered from different ces, when it was wandering in this underground world. Hence, when the Rock Snake lost its advantage in body size and strength, there was no way it could withstand attacks from a relentless opponent like this.


    For Greem, however, he always scored his victory through numerical superiority of his golems. Since he couldn¡¯t defeat the enemy with one golem, then he could just send two of them together!


    As the result, a momentter, the second Rock Snake made its debut with a loud rumble.


    Following the debut of the second Rock Snake, the previously brutal and oppressive Guardian of mes was defeated swiftly.


    What to do? No matter how brutal and violent it was, there was no way it could withstand its body coiled up and trapped by one Rock Snake, while the other focused on biting at its head ferociously. Each Rock Snake had a clear task of their own, with their ingenious teamwork, they cut off the control this Guardian of mes¡¯ conscious core had on its body with one blow.


    A man would die when he lost his head; a snake would lose its direction when lost its head!


    Though this Guardian of mes had the overall strength of a Pseudo-Adept, once its conscious core was pulled out from its body, its gigantic body made from steel rock instantly became a mere skeleton and tumbled down within split seconds.


    Recently, Greem had been collecting Pseudo-Adept level Fire element core. However, it seemed pretty difficult to find something that could satisfy his requirement. One of the main reason was the toughness of these Fire element creatures!


    Taking this Guardian of mes who he had just killed as an example. It owned an absolutely intrepid body made from steel rock, which ordinary magic spells could not harm at all. Along with that, it also possessed an array of powerful Fire element abilities and melee skills that brought despair to its opponent. When both of thembined together, even if a human Pseudo-Adept bumped into it, he would have to find a way to bypass this Guardian of mes and wouldn¡¯t waste his time and energy to risk his life and fight a fruitless battle.


    Therefore, when facing a frightening fire monster like this, excluding an official Adept who had the ability to kill them surely and steadily, among all Apprentice Adepts, only those Pseudo-Adepts who stood at the pinnacle could defeat it after suffering a mild degree of losses. Also, within the body of this Guardian of mes, the only valuable item would be the Pseudo-Adept level conscious core. If these human Pseudo-Adepts didn¡¯t kill it swiftly and quickly with a thunderous approach, then it would be end up being a miserable event, as they usually would obtain a broken conscious core.


    All in all, because of these factors, the Pseudo-Adept level Fire element core had be scarce.


    However, with the help of two Rock Snakes, Greem had just obtained one smoothly. The joyful emotion in his mind had made his face melt into smiles.


    Currently, besides making a great effort in expanding his knowledge regarding magic spells, he had used the rest of his time to craft a team of golems that were loyal only to him, trying his best to standardize, quantify and systematize them.


    The most vital advantage of a team of golems was their numbers, then only came theprehensiveness of their types and the cultivation of elite fighters. When having battles in different kinds of terrain, thebative ability put out by different types of golems could differ greatly.


    Like when he fought the Fairy in the Underground Cave regionst time. If Greem only had Rock Snake, then even if he summoned a couple dozens of them, he wouldn¡¯t be able to bring any harm to that Fairy who could fly in the sky. Thus, in a situation like that, the Lighting Giant had used its high-speed movement to its advantage and had put its fierce long-range firepower into y.


    But in today¡¯s situation, no matter how powerful the Lightning Storm and high-voltage electricity of the Lightning Giant was, most probably, it also couldn¡¯t prate the thick skin of the Guardian of mes which was made from steel rock. Once element magic spells were useless against the enemy, the effect a peak Pseudo-Adept level Lighting Giant could bring wouldn¡¯t be able topare to that of a Rock Snake¡¯s, who only had the overall strength of Advanced Apprentice.


    Thus, predictably, when he had to fight with an enemy on the surface of the ocean, the golems who could bring the maximumbative abilities would be those Water Elementals.


    For this reason, increasing the number of golems and diversifying their types had be the direction that Greem was arduously working on going towards recently.


    Greem already had a certain number of backups for Earth, Wind and Water element golems, and only the team of Fire element golems took forever to build. The main reason was theck of Pseudo-Adept level Fire element cores. But after obtaining this Fire element core today, Greem had seen the light of hope in constructing his future army of Fire element golems.


    Therefore, under the deliberate control of Greem, two Rock Snakes slithered everywhere in the undergroundva tunnel, one behind the other. When they came to an ordinaryva pool, they would just skip it without taking a second look, never wasting their time on those ordinary Fire element creatures, instead, they were focused and determined to hunt for Guardian of mes.


    As the result, along their way of traveling deeper, besides obtaining two Fire Diamonds, seven Fire Stones and arge pile of different gemstones and ores, Greem also found himself four Pseudo-Adept level Fire element cores. And this, was the thing that made Greem go wild with joy!


    After running around madly for two days in this world of volcano, Greem merely passed through the shallow region of this ce and set foot into the core region of this underground volcano for the first time. From this moment on, Greem couldn¡¯t be as bold and as wild as before, because he hade to the habitat of those Molten Giants. Once he provoked them, even with the help of a team of powerful golems, the torture would be more than Greem could ever stand.


    Basically, a Molten Giant who had just been born would possess the overall strength of an Advanced Apprentice, while those adult Molten Giants were mighty existencesparable to human Adepts. If not because their survival solely depended on the endless supply of Fire element energy from the underground volcano, perhaps there would be another species of Adepts that would appear on the Adept Continent.


    Undoubtedly, there was an Adept level Fire element core found in the body of an adult Molten Giant, which was a rare treasure coveted even by Greem! But, dealing with Molten Giants wasn¡¯t as simple as dealing with the Guardian of mes. Though Guardian of mes had a strongbative strength and a smart mind, they, after all, were living in the wild and were always alone. Thus, it was pretty easy for a group of apprentices to beat them in a group.


    Yet, the intelligence of these Molten Giants was not weaker than human Adepts, and they had inhabited the core regions of the volcano in the form of a big n. So, if any one of them was attacked, it would immediately attract a group of Molten Giants who came to help.


    At that point in time, it would not be the golem team who was beating the Molten Giant in a circle, but instead, them being circled by a swarm of Molten Giants!


    Whenever the vision of such terrifying scenes came into his mind, Greem just couldn¡¯t help but tremble with fear.


    Upon entering the core region of the volcano world, the first thing Greem saw was a boundless ocean ofva. As if an enormous empty space suddenly opened up in the underground world, and the matters that filled this empty space was the slow-moving, sticky and glowing red hot moltenva.


    Throughout his journey in this ce, Greem had witnessed countlessva pool of all sizes, however, this was the first time he saw ava region where a vast amount ofva formed a boundless ocean.


    To be honest, when Greem took his first step out of the tunnel and saw the quiet, red hot ocean ofva, he nearly forgot how to breathe.


    Inside an enormous space stretched as far as eyes could see, an ocean made from steaming hotva of ck and red color was moving slowly. There was over one hundred meters of distance between the surface of theva ocean and the cave ceiling, those thick me jets frequently burst out, brightening the entire space, casting an unchanging tone of red in this ce.


    Inside of thisva ocean, besides the moltenva which was at an astonishing temperature, there were also some rock blocks with peculiar shapes floating around. Some only was the size of a washbowl, some were the size of a house. They bobbed up and down in the moltenva like inds.


    Yet, on top of these big and small inds were numerous rock pirs with strange gemstones of different colors mounted in them, shimmering like stars in the night sky. Many of them were actually Fire Diamonds the size of a human fist. One could even find Fire Diamonds the size of a human head.


    As far as the eye could see, thisva ocean was virtually a massive magical treasury vault, lying quietly here, awaiting for one to visit.


    Nevertheless, the environment here was exceptionally dreadful.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s reading, the temperature at the border region of thisva ocean had approached one thousand degrees Celsius, yet the temperature at the inner region had reached a jaw-dropping two thousand degrees Celsius. In an environment such as this, once an apprentice lost the protection of his magic spell, even a Pseudo-Adept would face the fate of turning into a pile of charred bones in an instant.


    For Greem, he was relying on the double protection of his Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter and Fire element affinity, only then was he able to survive in this harsh environment. Or else, not only would he be unable to dive into thisva ocean and cultivate, it would also be extremely tough for him to even get close to the region.


    Greem waved his hand and dispersed both Rock Snakes, then he picked up the two golem cores and put them away. After giving the surroundings a thorough examination and making sure it was safe, he hid all his equipment and clothes behind a pile of rocks. Then, with his jaw clenched tightly, he dove into theva ocean.


    Painful... a pain that went straight into his heart!


    Right when he stepped into theva ocean, the terrifying high temperature had brought a pain that nearly killed Greem instantly. It felt like his body was stabbed by hundreds of thousands of steel needles at the same time, the severe pain had clouded Greem¡¯s conscious immediately.


    Like a fresh steak was ced on top of a frying pan, his skin and flesh was made sizzling noises inside of the boiling hot moltenva. Greem¡¯s entire body was fuming with dark smoke and a burned smell started to linger in the air.


    Contrary to the torture his body was facing, Greem¡¯s Spiritual Domain had shown an unprecedented activity. Like the flood that had just breached the dam, Fire element energies kept injecting into his body violently, washing and cleaning his body at a constant pace and at the same time, improving his Spiritual Domain bit by bit.


    Apparently, there were some mysterious, unidentified, and tough to capture elements that had entered Greem¡¯s body together with the Fire element energies. They were strengthening Greem¡¯s innate talent in the Fire element and forging a brand new me Body for him. This method of injecting energy was usually used by those Element Adepts after they sessfully advanced into the Adept realm, as once they had a powerful Spirit to control their body, only they could withstand the violent process of body modification.


    And this, was the inevitable course for an Element Adept to transform his body into Elementiumpletely. Only when his body and spirit were at the same frequency and essence, could hey a solid foundation for the future, which was transforming his spirit into Elementium.


    So, when Greem, with the weak overall strength of an Apprentice Adept, tried to set foot in a territory that only official Adepts could handle, it was inevitable that he had to suffer some torture!

 Chapter 128

    Only by facing cmities could a person truly grow!


    At the edge of thisva ocean filled with infinite and copious fire energies, what Greem obtained was not only being able to gather the Fire element energy. His innate talent affinity to Fire element was like a stranded fish put back into the water, allowing him to sense the progress of his Inferno Body at every single second.


    If not because deep in his mind, the real-time data transmitted by the Chip was refreshing the progress of his Inferno Body continuously, perhaps Greem would have long given up and back off from theva ocean, as he couldn¡¯t endure the severe pain that made him feel like he was being cooked by the raging mes.


    Under the impact of an even more violent Fire element energies, the Inferno Body, which had stopped its progress since Greem had left the World of Deep Red in Underground Cave Region and had been stuck in the progress of 17%, started to skyrocket, cing him in both a state of pain and of joy!


    18%......


    19%......


    20%......


    ......


    ......


    The strengthening of his Fire element innate talent had also spurred the self-evolution of his corporeal body. Under the scrubbing from the raging Fire element energy, some internal organs, flesh and tissues that didn¡¯t match with his Fire element innate talent were baked into coke and incinerated into ashes. Meanwhile, with the support of the powerful energy, new body parts had quickly regenerated, recing the position of those old ones.


    Originally, this was a chaotic and disorderly process, and was basically carried out automatically by body instincts. However, with the refine control the Chip had over the body, Greem was able to ovee the severe pain he felt on his body, and focus his spirit on the bnce between the speed of the Fire element energy entering his body and the speed of regeneration on his body parts.


    No doubt having both Spirit and body evolving at the same time was a good thing, but it had to be controlled to an appropriate rate. Without a strong Physique, no ordinary apprentice could withstand this overly violent modification of body. Hence, only after soaking his body in theva ocean for two minutes, after the progress of Inferno Body increased from 17% to 23%, Greem had no choice but to grit his teeth and get out.


    When he climbed out to the shore filled with rubble, the boiling hot half-moltenva was rolling off his body, making the volcanic rocks underneath his feet burn and produce sizzling noises. When all theva left his body, an ugly body of ck and red was revealed.


    The darkened part was his skin that had turned into coke and started to peel off within the mes of frightening temperatures. The red part was his newly regenerated flesh, the crimson tissue was exposed directly under the high temperature and heat, but clearly, they possessed a higher resistance and endurance toward the deadly fire.


    Though, the body in the past was part of Greem, but obviously, it wasn¡¯t fitted perfectly for his Fire element energy. Now, after going through the modification as the result of having copious Fire element energy injected into his body, together with the help from his powerful flesh-regeneration ability, it had formed into a brand new body that perfectly matched with his innate ability.


    However, a body modification like this couldn¡¯t bepleted in one go!


    After all, Greem¡¯s Physique was still very weak. Doing it in one go would be an overly brutal process, and it was very easy for the bnce of the body to copse. That was why he only scratched the surface of it. When the Chip detected his body had reached the limit of his endurance, it immediately gave him the warning, which led him to halt the cultivation of Inferno Body at once.


    Right at this very moment, his body looked slimmer than before, however, it had be dapper. Nevertheless,pared to the glorious look on the outside, all his internal organs, bones and tendons were now fully filled with cracks and wounds of different sizes. Before he could fix all these injuries, he had to temporarily stop this overly violent body modification.


    He had given himself a brief moment to rest at the shore, once he finally got used to this body, Greem put on his clothes, squeezed into one of theva tunnels in the wall without looking back.


    At a ce half an hour distance from theva ocean, Greem found himself a half-istedva cave. After modifying it slightly, he had turned it into his temporary base camp. Perhaps, within this period of time, he would have to dwell here days and nights, waiting patiently for his body to recover.


    He summoned a Rock Snake, using its thick body to block off the only entrance to the cave. With that, he wouldn¡¯t have to worry about enemies sneaking up on him when he was sleeping. After all, the Rock Snake¡¯s body was made up of rock, as long as it coiled up its body, and reduced the frequency of its consciousness, it could disguise itself well as a rock wall.


    Greem took out a small pile of Fire Stones and ced them inside a small hole located at the center of the cave, using them as his fuel, he started to cook a magical energy meal set himself. As his ingredients were the flesh of a Fire element creature, it only required a simple roasting. After he was done, Greem immediately wolfed down to heal his hunger.


    It was worth to mention, following the improvement of his Physique and Strength, those meats of demon beast which were overly tough and sour to him in the past, had be one of the recipes of his diet. Though every time after he finished eating them, his cheek would hurt for quite a long time. However, whenever he sensed thefortable energy slowly released inside of his body, he thought that the torture wasn¡¯t that hard to endure at all!


    When he finished eating the magical energy meal set, Greem poured another gallon of clean water into his mouth, only then he satisfyinglyid down on a soft nket ced beside and went into deep slumber. This time, he didn¡¯t perform his meditation. His broken body could no longer withstand any more changes, and only the soundest sleep would bring him into the state of worried-free, which was the thing he needed the most now!


    While indulging in a sound sleep, little to his knowledge, right at this moment, within theva ocean, something rted to him was happening.


    Not knowing which time of the day, an extremely bizarre battleship had drifted into thisva ocean.


    Why was it described as bizarre? Because this battleship was modified from a floating rocky ind. The rugged and rough rocks made the ship look tattered. There weren¡¯t any sails on the ship, and vaguely, there were some tall and burly figures onboard.


    It was a group of tall rock men that looked rather like rock golems. Their bodies were entirely pieced up together with granite of high hardness. Numerousrge cracks could be found on the surface of their bodies which stood four-meters-tall, high-temperature mes could be seen leaking from these cracks, forming into balls of frightening mes which took different colors.


    For those adults, the mes protecting their bodies were the color of gold, while the juveniles had a crimson color me.


    They had the body and limbs that looked exactly like those of a human, and had rugged heads. However, their facial features weren¡¯t arranged in a regr and neat pattern like those on a human¡¯s, but more like messily ced rock formations.


    At the position of their eyes were two deep holes, vaguely, one could see the gleams of magical gemstone shining from them. Their nose and ears looked exactly like ck beehives, while their mouth was simplyrge rifts that stretched across their faces. If they were fully opened, they could easily swallow a wild boar in one bite.


    This mysterious battleship was swiftly sailing through the sticky moltenva, avoiding those big chunks of floating inds on its way. As for those smaller rocks, they simply crushed through them, smashing them into pieces and turning them into debris that floated on the surface of theva ocean.


    From time to time, the tall giants on the ship would bow down on the side of the ship, poking theirrge palm into the high-temperatureva, and scoop up one after another magical gemstone or metal ore that emitted a unique element rhythms.


    For these guardians who were patrolling theva ocean, not all things could meet the fancy of their eyes. Whenever they scooped up one object, they would bring it in front of their face and give it a careful examination and would only toss those with excellent colors into ship¡¯s deck. The entire deck of the massive battleship had been fully filled with a thickyer of war trophies.


    As for those magical gemstones or metal ores of ordinary colors, the tall giants would toss them back into theva ocean, let them eventually melt down and became part of the vastva ocean.


    Theva ocean was like a super gigantic furnace, sinking all the waste and sediment to the bottom, yet pushing the most beautiful treasures to the surface, waiting for the arrival of these Sons of the ming Ocean.


    As the Sons of the ming Ocean who had lived their entire lives in this world of volcano, the Molten Giants were the natural rulers of this realm. Not only did each of them possess a formidable overall strength individually, each also had a high intelligence and rtivelyplicated social structure.


    There were seven Molten Giants onboard this battleship ofva rock. Two of them were at Adept level, while five were at Pseudo-Adept level. This also meant that the basic deployment for ava rock battleship was two adults and five juveniles.


    The nest of these Molten Giants was located on a ring-shaped reef at the heart of thisva ocean. In order to avoid the intrusion of human Adepts, they had organized four to five patrol teams who spent all day patrolling this vastva ocean.


    During ordinary times, when the volcano was at its erupting phase, their life would be rather calm and peaceful. But once the volcano entered its resting phase and the waterline in theva ocean reduced, numerous tunnels that led to their nest would be exposed. And whenever this period of the year arrived, it was also the time those human Adepts sent their minions into this world of volcano.


    Those countless Fire element creatures found at the outer perimeter were actually intentionally driven out by the Molten Giants, to use as the cannon fodder to block off the path of Apprentice Adepts. But there were many times, some fearful humans would still intrude into their home, stealing the supreme quality delicacies they had gatheredboriously (Supreme Fire Diamonds), and killing their juveniles that hadn¡¯t reach their mature phase.


    Hence, whenever the resting phase of the volcano arrived, it was also the time when these Molten Giants underwent a lot of stress, as it was the dangerous period when they would increase the frequency of patrol.


    But for this time, when thisva rock battleship was slowly sailing forward along the shore of theva ocean, a tall Molten Giant, who was standing at the bow of the ship and kept sniffing with its nose, before suddenly letting out a loud roar.


    ¡°Halt... halt... I can smell a human! Quickly stop the ship and check it out!¡±


    With the work put in together by all Molten Giants, theva rock battleship stopped near a pile of rocks on the bank.


    A few tall, heavy figures jumped straight onto the shore, starting to seek the trace of the scent left over by a human and any other clues.


    Soon, the ce where Greem dove into the ocean and the spot where he hid his clothes were identified by them.


    ¡°Arghol, it looks like some human had intruded into our world again! What should we do now?¡± In a low, muffled voice, a juvenile Molten Giant asked.


    One of the adult Molten Giants was seen touching its chin with itsrge palm. A pondering expression emerged on its face. Finally, in a resolute manner, it said, ¡°Send someone and report this to the Elder, ask the elder to send more help here. Three of us will stay here and search for traces of that human. Since he could bypass the blockade of Fire Beasts in such a short amount of time, he is surely a guy with bad intentions. We can¡¯t allow him to keep wandering in our world!¡±


    Another adult Molten Giant agreed, so he said, ¡°Then let me bring two little ones and bear the task! It had been many years since those human Adepts invaded theva ocean, and this time, it is highly possible he is just an Apprentice Adept. I can handle an intruder like this!¡±


    After obtained the approval from Arghol, the leader of this group of Molten Giants, the second adult Molten Giant raised its ming arm in the air, with a soft voice, it read, ¡°In the name of the Mighty Lord of Lava Rock, my servants, awake now!¡±


    Following with its loud roar, not far away from them, theva ocean started to roll and rock violently, over thirty strong and vigorous Lava Hounds made their debut by squeezing out from the surface of theva ocean, and gathering in front of the Molten Giant.


    ¡°Go now, my servants, and help me find that damn human!¡±


    Upon hearing themand from this Son of the ming Ocean, these Lava Hounds threw their heads back and let out loud and sharp howls, pressing forward and sprinting into theplexva tunnels.


    Without Greem¡¯s knowledge and sense, a great hunt targeted at him had begun!

 Chapter 129

    Greem was awoken with a start by a noisy mor.


    Outside of the cave, amotion had broken out. Even the Rock Snake, who was supposed to guard the cave entrance, had poked half of its body out and was ferociously attacking something, only blocking off the entrance with its thick tail.


    When Greem packed everything and walked out from the cave, the battle outside had ended.


    Within the not so spacious cave, seven broken Lava Hound bodies were scattered on the ground and red-hot half-moltenva was running freely everywhere. For the Lava Hounds, if rocks were their body, then the moltenva would be their blood.


    Since there was so much of their ¡®blood¡¯ flowing everywhere, the chances of their survival were rather slim!


    Why were there so many Lava Hounds? Could the small cave Greem upied be their nest?


    A bunch of questions appeared in Greem¡¯s mind, but very soon, he rejected them.


    Yesterday, when he was looking for a ce as his temporary shelter, Greem had put in quite a lot of effort. He had avoided most of the areas of activity for Fire element creatures. Under such circumstances, why was he still attacked by this pack of Lava Hounds? Also, the order he gave the Rock Snake was to defend and fight back only when it was under attack. This meant that it was the pack of Lava Hounds who had initiated the attack!


    The more he thought about it, the tighter Greem¡¯s brows became. He had a feeling, this was not an ident, but...


    Indeed, after the Chip performed a quick search, from the description of Molten Giants, Greem saw their ability to summon andmand Fire element creatures.


    And just as he made up his mind, the noisy howls of Lava Hounds could be hearding from a fewva tunnels. Judging from the volume of noise, there was arge pack of Lava Hounds sprinting towards him.


    Damn it, the enemy hade to him! He just wondered if there was a Molten Giant in this group of approaching enemies.


    With no time to ponder further, Greem turned around and jumped into therge mouth of the Rock Snake, quickly squeezing into the tunnel that led to the upper level of the volcano. No matter where the enemy came from, the further he distanced himself from theva ocean, which was the imed home of the Molten Giants, the better!


    Moving its thick and long body, the Rock Snake forcefully squeezed into a rather narrowva tunnel. The protruding rocky scales on its body brushed across the rock wall and produced a lot of sparks, sending broken stones flying in all directions. After its entire body squeezed into the tunnel, the Rock Snake swung its tail with a tremendous force. In an instant, the entrance of theva tunnel copsed and the falling rocks quickly sealed off the entire entrance.


    At the same time, tens of Lava Hounds leaped out from nearby tunnels, yet they were blocked from going any further by the falling rocks. Like a bear with a sore head, the Lava Hounds immediately let out furious roars. While arduously digging at the piles of broken rocks, they sent out a warning to their master, who was at a far distance.


    A momentter, an adult and two juvenile Molten Giants came to the scene with heavy steps. What could they do? As their bodies were overly huge, they just couldn¡¯t squeeze through the ordinary and narrow tunnels. Most of the time they could only travel through therge tunnels produced by the erosion of undergroundva. As for enemies who hid in narrow spaces, the Molten Giants could only rely on their Fire element creatures to chase them out.


    Upon seeing the copsed tunnels, a suddenprehension struck them.


    Under the orders of the adult Molten Giant, Alexios, the remaining Lava Hounds gave up the decision of digging a path, turned around, and leapt into a few nearbyva tunnels which were still in a good condition with the intention of intercepting the enemy by taking a circuitous route.


    Alexios turned around and gave its order to the two juveniles of its n. ¡°There is only one enemy, and he is a mere human Apprentice Adept, so there is no danger ahead. Bring my message to Arghol: he needn¡¯t bbor our people. I¡¯ll hunt him down myself.¡±


    Having finished saying that, it turned around and walked towards the tunnel that had beenpletely sealed off. Following its striding, a scorching hot me of extreme temperature burst out from its body. And, right in front of it, the once rock solid piles of broken rocks started to soften and melt, and eventually, turned into boilingva that flowed all over the ce.


    Unobstructed, using the fearful me, Alexios had melted a human-shaped tunnel in front of it, allowing it to keep striding forward at high-speed. Yet, it left a path full ofva behind, so no outsider could follow.


    However, at that time, Greem had fled to some five miles away.


    Nevertheless, in this underground world filled with twisting and winding tunnels, although he had fled for five miles, if it was measured in a straight line, it might just be a distance of four to five hundred meters. Also, the Fire Elementium contained in the rock strata here was extremely high. If the Rock Snake wished to travel through the ground like it did in the Underground Cave, it would have to consume a jaw-dropping amount of Earth Elementium.


    Therefore, before reaching the most critical moment, Greem didn¡¯t want to waste the Rock Snake¡¯s energy.


    The pursuitsted only an hour before it ended, and it was the Molten Giant who gave up the hunt. It was as if there was a clear-cut line in their mind; once the fleeing enemy crossed that line, they wouldn¡¯t take the risk and continue the pursuit beyond that boundary.


    Sensing the intense source of Fire chasing behind him was departing, Greem finally breathed out a long sigh of relief. He was pretty sure that it must have been an adult Molten Giant of Adept level. If he was forced to fight with a big fellow like this, even if he summoned all his golems, he would end up with a miserable defeat.


    Hecked a big guy of Earth element that could stand up against this Molten Giant, and he didn¡¯t own any element golems that could provide maximum power in this volcanic environment. It looked like there was still a huge gap before he could construct a fully fledged golem army.


    Moreover, he could tell the Molten Giants showed great care for the younger generations of their n. With his senses, he discovered that two little Pseudo-Adept fellows hadn¡¯t participated in the hunt and they didn¡¯t travel alone. Undoubtedly, this increased the difficulty of capturing one of them.


    After all, with Greem¡¯s current overall strength, he didn¡¯t have the courage to n anything against adult Molten Giant of Adept level. Yet, there was some hope for the little guys of the Pseudo-Adept level!


    Since he had been driven off from the core region of theva ocean, Greem had nothing else could do but wander around the upper region. While waiting for the full recovery of his body, he was searching for a new route that led to theva ocean. After all, for years, this enormous volcano had been corroded by the undergroundva and hundreds of thousands ofva tunnels had been formed and interconnected like aplicated spiderweb. Thus, nearly all of the tunnels would point to the miraculous and profound world ofva. It was impossible for the Molten Giants to block off every single route.


    Without wasting any more time, when his body had fully restored to its best condition, Greem once again snuck into theva ocean. This round, he doubled the time he spent soaking in it and the progress he achieved surprised him.


    The modification progress of his Inferno Body had skyrocketed to 37%, from the previous 23%. Yet, Greem¡¯s body had once again gone through great torture, as 1/7 of his flesh was burned off. But his booming Physique had stimted the quick regeneration of new flesh and blood.


    His body was like a factory that kept being pushed down and rebuilt. Every time, the delicate bnce constructed by the regeneration of his flesh would be broken by the strengthening of his Fire element innate talent. And when everything was pushed down, new internal organs and flesh would regrow slowly, so that they could match thetest state of his Inferno Body.


    And, within the progress of this seemingly endless loop, those modifications, that perfectly matched with his Inferno Body constitution, remained. And yet, the temporary unfitted modifications would be ced in line, waiting to be modified again.


    Initially, Greem wanted to let the Chip to participate in this process of body modification and reconstruction. But after a few small scale experiments, he had no choice but to give up the idea. Due to the constraint of his experience and vision, it was impossible for the Chip to predictively leave appropriate room for the future strengthening of his Fire element innate element. Yet, it was marvelously achieved by the instincts of his own body, amidst obscurity and out of chaos.


    Also, under the instruction from the instinct of his body, many tiny changes made to his organs were determined as useless or redundant by the Chip. However, after going through another couple rounds of body modification, to Greem¡¯s surprise, the portions which had been deemed useless and redundant actually turned into the wless foundations for thetest modification.


    If such discovery only happened once in awhile, Greem wouldn¡¯t be so surprised. But, following the Chip¡¯s overall monitoring of his entire body, a simr discovery could be found in almost every modified part of his body.


    At this point, Greem was forced to stop the Chip from meddling in the process and let the instinct of the body lead the entire process. The Chip would be a general observer, recording the entire process with detailed and urate data.


    The more he observed the process, the deeper he pondered it. And that brought Greem more understanding about the ¡®Will of the World¡¯ he always heard from Adepts.


    The world Greem was staying in right now was just arge-scale ne inside of the enormous multi-verse. Yet, a boundless world with abundant resources like this was merely a tiny grain of sand within the depths of the vast ocean of stars.


    If Earth, and the universe where Earth was located in Greem¡¯s previous life, was referred as a world of low-magic, then in this life of his, the ne of Adepts and the multi-verse would be referred to as a world of advanced-magic. Countless energy tidal waves fully filled every inch of space in this world.


    Influenced by the copious energy tidal waves, ultism itself had transformed into a frightening force. Any world, any ne, any human, could unleash fearful power far beyond the limit of their own ability. And all this could be put together under the scope of mighty ultism!


    Back on Earth in his previous life, if someone imed that the Earth had its own conscious and possessed its own will, it would simply be a joke that made peopleugh their heads off! Because the mass of the Earth was too huge; for a massive object like this to produce its own will, it was far from enough just to rely on the materials and energy contained within itself.


    Therefore, in the world of low-magic, it was impossible for a to produce its own will!


    But... but Greem was living in a world of advanced-magic. The mighty energy tidal wave was everywhere. And this had given a solid foundation for the to give birth to its self-conscious. Of course, in this multi-verse, there weren¡¯t anys, only nes!


    At all times, one after another, floating continents covering the insides of ne barriers were soaking in immense energy. Using their own body of boundlessnd, they carried massive amounts of dirt, sand, rocks, trees, woods, forests, mountains,kes, oceans, metal, mines, minerals, andst but not least, hundreds of thousands of living creatures of different species. No matter if it was just an ordinary rock or a mighty Adept who stood at the pinnacle of the world, they were all part of the ne.


    Innumerable materials, millions upon millions of living beings of different species, together with the immense energy tidal wave; all of these had provided a solid foundation for the birth of the collective consciousness. Perhaps the prime form of the Will of the World was this collective consciousness, as it was the grand fusion of the countless living beings and elementary materials found within its body. But, as time went on, the ne became stronger, and a vague, incorporeal conscious of the ne was born, virtually.

 Chapter 130

    With the massive scale of a ne, the Will of the ne born within could never be as nimble and as witty as a human brain, which answered to every single plea it received.


    Nevertheless, the basic likes and dislikes were no different from a normal human!


    Every single individual who lived in its bosom, regardless of if they were living beings with consciousness, or rocks and woods without any consciousness, they were all humble existences that formed the entire Will of the ne. If a ne waspletely sealed off and the resources and living beings contained within maintained at the same volume, then the Will of the ne would lose its opportunity to evolve and be stronger.


    Only by diligently keeping what it owned and seizing the resources required for its growth from outside of its own body could the Will of the ne continue to grow stronger. Eventually, this would allow it to awaken and be an even mightier existence.


    As a major scale ne, obviously, the Adept Continent had long given birth to its own mighty conscious that solely belong to itself, which had then transformed into the Will of the World that perfectly matched the Adept Continent.


    And, after the birth of this Will, the only method to control this ne was using the Hand of Principle that took no shape and was nothingness. Thus, every single material and living being that existed in this ne was bound by the power of countless principles.


    Wood could produce fire, fire could melt metal, metal could chop down trees and break rocks, while earth bore the weight of everything, dirt gave birth to life, and water nourished and cherish all things... yet all of this was just the surface of the world. The ultimate hand that controlled and guided everything behind was the ubiquitous invincible Principle of the ne.


    Even the supreme Adepts, who imed they could conquer every ne and were formidable enough topete with deities, couldn¡¯t ignore the existence of the Principle of the ne and act wantonly.


    Therefore, the stronger an Adept became, the deeperprehension he had for the Will of the World, while weaker living beings would only have a vague feeling towards everything. Just like the evolution of Greem¡¯s Inferno Body, at a given time, the Will of the ne had shown its existence.


    There was no God nor Deity here, but a selfless Will of the ne hiding in the depths of the ne, quietly but surely pushing the course of the world in an orderly fashion. Any behavior that was of benefit to the evolution of the ne would receive positive feedback from the vague Will, which eventually improved the individual¡¯s degree of mastery and control toward the Principle of the ne.


    As for the behavior which defied the Will of the ne, it would attract ¡®its¡¯ dislike, and thus make the individual a target that was hated by every single living being of that particr ne.


    And yet for Greem, it was through the monitoring of and analyzing the overall data of his body that he noticed that there was a huge, invisible hand who controlled everything inside of the ne. Otherwise, if he had really thought this was just an unconscious behavior that was put out by the instinct of the body, it would be an insult to his intelligence.


    And if an Apprentice Adept wished to be an official Adept, it seemed that one of the thresholds he had to step over was the understanding of the Principle of the ne. Otherwise, why was there such a huge gap between a Pseudo-Adept with 20 Spirit and an Adept with 21 Spirit?


    His mind filled with questions, when Greem finished soaking his Inferno Body, he hurriedly left theva ocean to avoid being caught by the patrolling Molten Giants.


    After rushing to the safe zone in one go, Greem found himself another ce as his temporary shelter.


    After some time, the food and water he had brought were nearly depleted. Having no other alternative, Greem had to live a primitive life of eating raw meat and blood. His food source were the Fire Lizards he hunted, while the water came from condensing it using magic spells and Fire Lizard blood.


    In order to make the best of his soaking time, every two days, Greem would change the location of his temporary shelter. With that, the time and location he appeared at theva ocean would bepletely different. Using this method, he managed to avoid several ambushes and traps set by the Molten Giants, making them really angry. But there was nothing they could do about it.


    Through the countless times he municated¡¯ with the Molten Giants, even though they had never met face to face, Greem had quickly figured out his enemies¡¯ way of thinking and acting. Also, through the countless probes and results, he finally broke through the blockade of the Molten Giant patrol team at the outer perimeter, and sessfully drew close to their nest ¨C the Ring-shaped Reef.


    Although it was referred to as Ring-shaped Reef, it was in fact, a chain of interlocking huge rocks floating on the surface of theva ocean. Using a thick alloy chain, the Molten Giants had tied them together, forming into arge floating ind anchored right at the center of theva ocean.


    The nest of the Molten Giants was ced on top of these floating inds.


    So to speak, from the womb to the tomb, a Molten Giant spent nearly its entire life in this boundlessva ocean. This resulted in the fact that though they had the overall strength of an Adept and high intelligence, they didn¡¯t own the advanced wisdom that matched it.


    In brief, they were smart, but hadn¡¯t reached the state of ¡®cunning!¡¯


    That was the reason why, though they had such formidable overall strength, they were thrown into unrest by a mere ¡®Advanced Apprentice,¡¯ Greem.


    Of course, an Advanced Apprentice who was like Greem was rather rare toe by.


    Through secret observation of the Molten Giants, a thief-like thought arose in his mind. He actually intended to rob the Molten Giant¡¯s n treasure vault. The Molten Giants were born and brought up here, and they had been patrolling theva ocean every single day. Nearly all the advanced magical gemstones and top grade magic spell materials that one could find in the underground volcano had to be piled up like a mountain in their treasure vault.


    If he could rob a n treasure vault of this magnitude, Greem felt that he wouldn¡¯t have to worry about harvesting resources himself for the next few hundred years. Just doing it once was more than enough to fill his need to the maximum!


    However, after a few more times of careful survey, Greem was discouraged once again.


    As expected, the Molten Giants attached a very great importance to their treasure vault. Not only had they built the treasure vault on thergest floating ind, it was ced right next to the residence of their elders. Also, round the clock, two elite level Molten Giants guarded its entrance with high vignce to make sure there would be no leakage of any kind.


    Greem had the Chip design him countless ns, but still he couldn¡¯t find a safe and sound method that allowed him to sneak into the treasure vault under the watchful eyes of two elite level Molten Giants.


    Nevertheless, during the fruitless course of finding his path to the loot, unintentionally, Greem made another discovery.


    He discovered the graves of the Molten Giants!


    Although Molten Giants could live more than 2000 years, as time went by, unavoidably, they still had to face their deaths. In order to give their deceased people a ce to rest forever, the Molten Giants had built a graveyard on one of the floating inds amidst the Ring-shaped Inds. Whenever a Molten Giant was facing its own death, it would enter this graveyard and wait there quietly for its death toe.


    Once they were dead, their huge and ming hot bodies would cool down gradually, and eventually solidify into a stone statue that stood quietly. Hence, in this graveyard stood great numbers of stone statues, and many of them were the dead bodies of formidable existence that stood seven to eight meters tall.


    No doubt the Molten Giants had put a heavy guard on their treasure vault, to stop any human Adepts or some Fire element creatures from sneaking into it and stealing their treasures. But for the n graveyard, Greem didn¡¯t find any real safety precautions.


    Actually, this was understandable. After all, no one or creature would have improper thoughts toward a lifeless stone statue! But when the Molten Giants were met with Greem, an expert who could even squeeze oil out of stone, their n graveyard was facing great peril.


    Greem was after the element core that remained in the dead bodies of the Molten Giants. Of course, the element cores which had been dead for a long time had no soul aura and couldn¡¯t be used anymore. However, among the element cores from Molten Giants that had been dead for less than one hundred years, Greem might be able to find some which could be used as the conscious core for his golem.


    After all, the Molten Giants who had the right to enter their n graveyard were all old fellows, so the lowest level element core he could find would be of that of Adept level. If he was lucky enough, perhaps... perhaps he might even find a Second Grade Adept level core.


    Whenever Greem thought of owning a golem of such level, his heart raced and he couldn¡¯t hold down his emotions. He wished he could just bolt into the Ring-shaped Inds, crush all of the giant dead bodies, and seize all of the element cores into his arms.


    It was a pity that such thought would always remain a mere fantasy. If he really put it to action, he would face his death, as the Molten Giants would definitely skin him and swallow him alive!


    Approximately, there were over two hundred Molten Giants living on the ind. Around seventy of them were juveniles of the Pseudo-Adept level, yet more than one hundred forty of them were adult Molten Giants. In this environment where they had no natural enemy and no worries about food, their defensive mechanism wasn¡¯t considered too strong.


    If it weren¡¯t for Greem¡¯s level being too low, the stupid giants who only possessed arge body and strong overall strength would definitely be his best prey. But as for now, even if it was just a juvenile Molten Giant, Greem would have to put in huge effort in order to defeat it.


    Hence, if he wanted to pull chestnuts out of the fire, the only way would be to fish in troubled waters.


    After he tentatively drafted out his n, he wasn¡¯t in a hurry to provoke the Molten Giants. Instead, he became quieter than before. Every day, he only traveled and hunted at the outer perimeter of the volcano world, took a bath at the border of theva ocean every three to five days, and stealthily scurried away.


    Relying on this regr mode of action, Greem sessfully deceived the Molten Giant patrol teams, causing them to loosen their vignce and not consider him as an enemy that could pose any threat to them. Although the hunt for Greem was still going on, it was more like a routine activity; every couple of days, the game of cat and mouse would be carried out.


    Of course, Greem wasn¡¯t in a hurry.


    The duration of his mission was three months, and if he wanted any progress in his Inferno Body, he needed time to umte the energy. What he needed to do now was wait for the breakthrough of his Inferno Body. When the day came, that would be the moment he put his n into action.


    Finally, two months after he entered the volcano world, the Inferno Body he had anticipated for long made the breakthrough.


    When the progress projected into his mind by the Chip jumped from 99% to 100%, Greem felt a tremendous transformation suddenly happen to his body.


    Everything had be different from the past!


    me Body!


    He had finally stepped over the stage of Inferno Body and owned a me Body of his own!

 Chapter 131

    There was a huge difference between Inferno Body and me Body.


    If with Inferno Body, Greem¡¯s body was still considered flesh and blood, then now, after having evolved into me Body, he could be considered truly immune to fire. Even without relying on his Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, he could now swim freely in theva ocean anytime he wanted and he wouldn¡¯t be hurt by the high temperature.


    After all, the so-called fire immunity cast externally could only spare him from lower grade Fire element damage. Once an element me went beyond a certain degree, he would still bear some damage caused by the me. Previously, during the strengthening process of his Inferno Body, his body was easily damaged by the brutal modification performed by the Fire element energy. The strength of the Fire element energies had gone beyond the maximum endurance limit of his fire immunity.


    Now, after havingpleted the modification of his me Body, he could transform parts of his body into Elementium any time he deemed it was necessary, which gave him immunity from all Fire element damage. In the future, even if he was facing a Second Grade Adept, he wouldn¡¯t be hurt by an element fireball cast towards him. However, such damage immunity was limited to only the Fire element. If he was attacked with a mutated Fire element magic spell, he would still be hurt by it.


    For example, a Magma Fireball, which was a magic spell thatbined the damage of both the Fire element and physical damage. Although Greem would be immune from the Fire element damage, he could not escape from being hurt by the physical damage. Yet, a mutated Fire element magic spell like thatposed more than half of all magic spells, as it was amon counter measurement employed by Adepts so that their element attack would not be totally ignored by their enemy.


    Previously, if Greem had gone too deep into theva ocean, he would have had to face the possibility of being hurt by the me. But now, with his me Body, any region with dense Fire Elementium would be his home. No matter how high the temperature of an element fire, he would not be hurt by it anymore. In fact, they became the biggest tonic for him.


    With theva ocean, the topographical advantage of Molten Giants had evened out!


    For the Greem of the past, if the controlling of element fire was a superb magical skill, then the same ability had now be an instinct. From now onwards, he didn¡¯t have to dive nakedly into a sea of fire, because he was fire, and fire was he. Thus, under his control, no element fire could burn off his clothes anymore!


    In addition to that, the biggest advantage brought by me Body was Focused Fire Element. All of the offensive strength of Fire element magic spell doubled, casting time reduced by half, and the cost of Spirit halved as well. In any region rich in Fire Elementium, the recovery speed of his Spirit would double, and the me Body would self-heal the damage on his body.


    But, there was a trade-off for this!


    It was not all benefits brought by the me Body. At least, if Greem was hurt by Water or Ice element magic spell, the damage would double. Also, when he was in a region rich in Water Elementium, the recovery of his Spirit and self-healing would also be repressed.


    Nevertheless, Greem knew this in advance, so he didn¡¯t feel surprised at all. Currently, he was more concerned about his overall strength. After the Chip performed a thorough scan of his body, thetest data of his overall strength was projected into his vision.


    Name: Greem


    Race: Human (Half-Elementium)


    Attribute: Strength ¨C 9.24 (+1), Agility ¨C 7.87 (+1), Physique ¨C 13.22 (+1), Spirit ¨C 20.


    Profession: Apprentice Adept (Pseudo-Adept)


    Health Points: 62/62 (Healthy)


    Experience: 927/1000


    Skills: Scroll Copying, Spell Reading, Golem Crafting (Intermediate), Focused Fire Element.


    Personal Abilities: me Body (Passive), The Burning Hand, Fire Arrow, ming Spear, Fire Shield, Fire Damage Reflect (Proximity Passive), Inferno Force Field.


    Magical Equipment: Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter, Storage Waist Belt, Secret Scroll of Voodoo, Boots of Speed (Agility +1), Talisman of Force (Physique, Strength +1), Wand of Dispel, Wand of Healing, Wand of Prophecy, Green Spirit (Curse Resistance +5), Screaming Tree Branch.


    Upon reading thetest body statistics produced by the Chip, even if Greem had a steady and resolute mind, he couldn¡¯t hold down his surging emotions. He had finally be a Pseudo-Adept! From now onwards, he was no longer a rookie apprentice whose fate could be freely decided by anybody!


    However, it was a pity that since his Spirit had skyrocketed from 16 to 20, the Circlet of Nobility that brought +1 to his Spirit and the Purple Ioun Stone of +2 Spirit had lost their effect. His Spirit had now reached 20, which was the maximum Spirit for an Apprentice Adept. If he wished to increase it more, then he would have to gain understanding in the force of principle and aided with the ceremony of advancement.


    No doubt this had toeter. But as for now, the most important thing about bing a Pseudo-Adept was that he could finally put the n he had plotted for a long time into action!


    After obtaining the me Body, the human aura on his body had faded. So long as he carefully disguised himself, with the harsh and cruel environment of theva ocean, it would be extremely difficult for those Molten Giants to find any trace of him.


    Greem returned to the shore and equipped himself with all of his magical equipment. Then he dove into theva ocean once again, disappearing without a trace.


    ............


    Over thest few days, Elder Nimr had felt ill at ease.


    As the leader of the surviving Molten Giant n, Nimr was obliged to use its intelligence and life to safeguard and continue the existence of the Molten Giants.


    This world didn¡¯t belong to them!


    Although Molten Giants had arge body and formidable individual overall strength, as a special race that couldn¡¯t survive outside of the volcano world, they could only firmly stay entrenched in their own environment, avoiding any intrusion from outsiders.


    This was a world that belonged only to human Adepts.


    With regards to this, even the first Molten Giant born from the depths of the earth core had realized it. The human Adepts tolerated the existence of their unique race so that they could enve them and loot their treasures.


    The volcano world belonged to them, yet they belonged to the Zuber Family.


    Bonded by a 1000 year old magical contract, the mighty n of Molten Giants had be special miners who worked for the local human Adept family. Every five years, they had to hand in a long list of resources. Yet, even they, who were Sons of the ming Ocean, had a headache over the required numbers of resources on the list.


    As a powerful and proud race, they did try to revolt. However, the power of human Adepts was not something they could stand up against. Without experiencing it personally, no one could imagine how frightening the ability of a Third Grade Adept was. As a direct result of their rebellion, 1/3s of their n members had been wiped outpletely. It was a severe loss that took them nearly four hundred years to recover.


    Before the rebellion, though the human Adepts had treated them cruelly and harshly, they wouldn¡¯t enter their territory. However, for the past few hundred years, the Zuber Family had been pushing them more and more. Frequently, when the volcano entered its resting period, they would send some Apprentice Adepts to train down here.


    It might just be training for the human apprentices, but for the Molten Giants, the apprentices were actually ughtering their enved beasts. Not only that, sometimes they even besieged a juvenile Molten Giant who had been leaving them alone. This further attracted the anger of Molten Giants.


    However, though Elder Nimr had negotiated a few times with the Third Grade Adept of Zuber Family, it was always warned not to randomly hurt the Zuber Family apprentices who had their training here. But visiting apprentices were excluded.


    But too bad, in the eyes of the Molten Giants, human apprentices were nearly impossible to differentiate. Hence, they had no choice but to swallow insult and humiliation silently, organizing their own patrol teams to prevent any human apprentices from getting close to their habitat. Fortunately, the human apprentices who came for training weren¡¯t too strong. Also, by intentionally driving Fire element creatures towards the outer perimeter, thereby forming a blockade, someone disturbing their life in theva ocean was rare.


    Nevertheless, this year¡¯s situation was obviously different from the past.


    This time, there was a mysterious guy among the human Apprentice Adepts who had breached the borders ofva ocean several times. It seemed like he was researching some kind of unknown magic spell. Due to his treacherousness, they had failed to intercept him even after sending a couple of patrolling teams. Therefore, Nimr could only order his n members to heighten their vignce and ban their juveniles from leaving their habitat alone.


    In order to avoid any outsiders from casting their covetous eyes on their harvested gemstones and materials, Nimr even deployed two more formidable fighters to safeguard their treasure vault. But from time to time, even when it wasfortably soaking in ava pool, a feeling of fear still surged up in its mind, as if it had missed something really important.


    Nimr was an enormous Molten Giant who stood at seven meters tall and was the oldest member of their n. It had turned 1815 years old this year, and its overall strength had reached the pinnacle of Molten Giant. If it was converted into the hierarchy of human Adepts, it had the mighty overall strength of at least a Second Grade Adept.


    But, as a special race who relied on their strong bodies and innate talent when fighting, it had mastered less than ten powerful Fire element abilities. Yet, the same grade human Adept could have nearly one hundred incredible magic spells, which they could use freely.


    Theycked the profound umtion of knowledge with the history of over hundreds and thousands of years like human Adepts,cked the endless bizarre magical equipment which human Adepts owned, and did not have the massive numbers of minions who could be called for freely. By just relying on the powerful innate abilities gifted by the Will of the ne, the Molten Giants would never escape their fate of being enved by human Adepts!


    With the overall strength of Nimr, so long as that frightening Third Grade Adept of Zuber Family didn¡¯te personally, in its home of theva ocean, it never feared, even when faced with an opponent of the same grade. But, for the past few days, a frequent chill had been flowing through its mind, as if something bad was going to happen to its n.


    For this reason, it felt uneasy even when eating and sleeping. Every single day, it urged its n members to patrol every region and inspected all the inds regrly, causing everybody to be busy and tired. But it felt rather relieved, as after this restless period, the three month resting phase of the volcano was approaching its end. Upon sensing the rumbleing from the earth core that became louder gradually day by day, its mind calmed down slightly.


    But as the ending of resting phase approached, the more its fear grew.


    Yet today, the uneasy feeling in Nimr¡¯s mind had reached maximum level, so that it could hardly sleep in theva pool within its cave. It couldn¡¯t stop itself from walking out from its residence, cing itself at the edge of the ind that it had taken as its home, and quietly watching any surrounding activities.

 Chapter 132

    The inner ocean, which was enclosed by the Ring-shaped Ind, covered an area of five miles in a straight line. While Nimr stood at the edge of its own ind, it could barely see the outline of the ind to its opposite. It threw its nce over to the inds one after another and could see the busy figures of its n members everywhere, yet it saw more juveniles who were swimming in the innerva ocean, ying and chasing with each other. Though it was a little bit noisy, it actually made the n look more lively and full of energy.


    Right as it was about to shut its eyes, trying to sense the possible direction where the danger mighte from, far at the Southeast border of the Ring-shaped Ind, an unprecedented explosion suddenly broke out. A rock wall of nearly one hundred meters in circumference shattered into pieces, shooting countless rocks fragments and debris like a shower into theva ocean and causing a massive me and dust pir to rise up.


    Nimr sprinted with big steps. One after another floating ind flitted across under its feet. In less than fifteen minutes, it had arrived at the floating ind located nearest to the explosion. Standing at the edge of the floating ind, half of its body was submerged in the boiling hotva. Using its right palm that was asrge as a coach, it scooped up a huge pool of moltenva and poured it onto its body, while reciting a series of profound, obscure and strange incantations. After finished with that, an enormous Eye of the me appeared right in front of it.


    ¡°The mighty Spirit of Fire, please show me what happened at that ce?¡± Using its deep and hoarse voice, Nimr spoke out its request.


    Supported by the powerful Fire element energy, the Eye of the me trembled, soon, the scene located dozens of miles away was projected in front of it.


    ¡°These damn intruders! It must be them who are destroying our home and profaning our holy ocean! Elders, follow me to banish them from ournd!¡±


    Nearly one hundred strong giant fighters saw the scene as well, and the air filled with their furious roars. After greeting each other, they quickly boarded one after another primitive lookingva rock battleship and sailed towards the ce of the explosion at top speed.


    Elder Nimr was controlling the Eye of the me and kept watchful eyes on any activities happening in the region afar. Though there was a hugemotion, but it just couldn¡¯t find any traces of the intruder. This... no doubt had made Elder Nimr more worried!


    What exactly did these intruders want? Could it be merely an act of vandalism?


    With the understanding Nimr had toward those Human Adepts, regardless of what they did, they were all well-targeted with hidden motives. It was rare that they would meaninglessly destroy something, just to vent their anger!


    If their true motive wasn¡¯t to destroy theva ocean, then...


    A shudder struck Elder Nimr¡¯s mind. It turned around and roared at the remaining n members, ¡°I want a total locked down on the entire ind! All adult giants must act right now...¡±


    Before it could finish its word, a huge dust pir suddenly arose from an ind located at the Northwest corner of the Ring-shaped Ind, as if something with a gigantic body was rolling on the ground and wreaking havoc.


    That ind... that ind was their n graveyard!


    ¡°Damn it, those foul humans should be devoured by the Spirit of the mes, how dare they make trouble at the ce where our ancestors are sleeping! Quick... hurry up... I want everyone to go there right now!¡±


    Hearing the roar of their Elder, all the remaining Molten Giants immediately strode in the direction of the graveyard in top speed. At the same time, some giants who possessed the ability of Fire Teleportation were even seen slightly squatting down and immediately disappeared within a towering fiery explosion. And a momentter, at a distance of two to three hundred meters, a simr fire pir appeared, revealing the body of the same giant.


    After pausing for four, five seconds, once the surrounding Fire Elementiums was back in its control, the giant would initiate Fire Teleportation once again, bringing it three hundred meters closer to the destination.


    Although Molten Giants owned an intrepid body and physique, agility was never their strong point. Those giants who possessed the ability of Fire Teleportation could still put out a considerable speed, as each time when their body flickered and reappeared, they always drew themselves closer to the ind destination. Yet, those ordinary giants could only run past ind after ind using their feet, causing a greatmotion along their way.


    And, right at this very same moment, Greem¡¯s eyes shined brightly, while busily looting the mighty war trophies that he dared not imagine in the past.


    This was an ind with an irregr shape that upied nearly one hundred acres ofnd. The shore of the ind was fully filled with rocky peaks and stone pirs arranged in a crisscrossing pattern. On the empty field within the ind, nearly forty dead bodies of Molten Giants who hadpletely solidified into stone statue were seen standing quietly.


    If it was ording to Greem¡¯s initial n, he woulde to this ind stealthily without alerting anybody. But too bad, though the n was well-designed, when he finally swam his way to this graveyard of giants, he realized that it was extremely difficult to harvest everything here without making any noise.


    When alive, these Molten Giants had been known for the hardness and high-density of their bodies. After they died, the Fire Elementiums inside of their body would fade away, and their conscious core would be tightly trapped inside of the stone statue who served like a super thick armor. These rocks were the toughest steel rocks or granites found in the underground, and they even mixed with ck Iron, Wrought Gold, and Mithril which had the hardness beyond one¡¯s imagination.


    Not only a stone armor like this possessed a fearful strength in physical defense, it also carried an excellent resistance against magic spells. Hence, since Greem came to the ind stealthily, he had broken three enchanted longswords but failed to even crack a stone statue.


    Looking at the precious treasures that spread out everywhere over the hills and dales, yet unable to make them his, had nearly driven Greem insane!


    Also, the practical environment didn¡¯t allow him to spend a long time to slowly chisel away the hard shell of the giant. Once those giants who went out patrolling returned after hearing the news, perhaps he, a mere Fire element Pseudo-Adept, would be skinned alive and swallowed by over three hundred giants.


    Left with no alternatives, Greem summoned six Rock Snakes in one go, using their savageness to put out a show of ¡®hit, m, rob¡¯ that shook the heaven and startled the earth in this graveyard of the giant. Six Rock Snakes pulled out all tricks in their bag, either using their rock solid body to crazily m, or coiled up a stone statue and kept smashing it onto the ground. In short, they resorted to the most violent methods they had and used the craziest manner to achieve their goal!


    So, the huge dust pir Elder Nimr saw just now, was actually the result of the violent actions put out by the team of Rock Snakes!


    While directing the Rock Snakes to restlessly destroy the dead bodies of the giants, Greem kept running his eyes nervously at the surroundings.


    Due to the fact that this ind was the n graveyard, rarely anyone chose to live on the surrounding inds. Also, the massive explosion that happened previously had attracted most of the giants to the other side of the Ring-shaped Ind. Hence for time being, this ce was still considered safe.


    However, following the huge dust clouds and noise caused by the activities of Rock Snakes, the figures of giants who were running wildly at top speed could now be seen at the far side of the Ring-shaped Ind. Yet that was not the most frightening part. A dozen of Molten Giants who stood over five meters tall were driving on mes that kept leaping up and approaching to the graveyard at incredible speeds.


    It was an enormous Molten Giant with the height of seven meters that led the pursuit. The powerful Fire and Earth element energy contained within its body had reached to a dazzling stage that could blind anyone¡¯s eyes just by staring into it.


    Damn it, damn it... this was a Second Grade Molten Giant!


    While calcting the enemy¡¯s¡¯ speed, Greem kept urging his minions of Rock Snakes to make the best use of their time and work harder. After all, for those who were eligible to enter the graveyard of giants, the weakest would also be the mighty existence of that Adept level and many of them were even Second Grade Molten Giants.


    In a treasure vault like this, even if he spent one more second in it, and grabbed one more handful of treasures, it would be the mightiest opportunity for his future debut!


    While throwing an examining look at the enemy¡¯s besiege, Greem kept crazily mming and smashing the rock statues. His heart was racing so fast it almost jumped out of his mouth. Even with his Physique, cold sweat started to exude from his palm and back.


    ¡°Beep...¡±


    Upon hearing the dangerous warning tone sent out by the Chip in his mind, without the slightest hesitation, Greem turned around and jumped into the mouth of one of the Rock Snake, brought his dismantling team and dove into theva ocean in lightning speed. Then, each of them simply fled into different directions on their own.


    Naturally, the Rock Snake who carried Greem was the only one with all the war trophies. Once it entered theva ocean, it immediately sunk deeper into the half-moltenva that hardly flowed, swaying its body and bolting toward the nearest escape route. Meanwhile, the other five Rock Snakes were swimming on the surface of theva ocean, creating a huge uproar and fleeing in different directions.


    A moment ago, it was a calm and peaceful world of me; a momentter, it had transformed into an explosive ocean that rocked violently.


    When they were hiding inside the graveyard of giants, these Molten Giants dared not attack them using violent long-range abilities, fearing that they might destroy this holy ind of theirs. But once they left the ind, these Molten Giants wouldn¡¯t be easy with them anymore. While getting closer to them in high-speed, they kept crazilyunching long-range Fire element abilities to attack at the Rock Snakes.


    ming Storm!


    Lava re!


    Fire Stone Shower!


    Hellfire Pulse!


    ......


    ......


    One after another Fire element abilities of massive power had stirred theva ocean into a rocking sea of fire, and a violent explosion of energies immediately swept across the entire space. Elementium storm visible to naked eyes quickly spread out on the surface of theva ocean and soon covered all Rock Snakes who were fleeing.


    Though a Rock Snake had a thick andrge body and its Strength and Physique was considered superb among all element golems, when it was facing a tyrannical and brutal attack that saturated every inch of the space like this, the body made up of hard rocks still melted like hot wax.


    The bodies of two Rock Snakes were broken into half from the middle and were swept up into the sky by the Elementium storm like a whirlwind that swept away scattered clouds. The broken bodies flew high up above the sea of fire. And in next moment, more raging energies had rolled them up like a mat.


    At the same time, though the bodies of the other three remaining Rock Snakes were badly damaged as well, they still desperately fled towards the outside of the storm. However, before they could run to a far enough distance, a series of fire explosion came into the scene, which brought a Molten Giant who had a tall and mighty body beside them. Upon making its debut, it raised its huge stone fist and simply punched the Rock Snakes¡¯ bodies.


    Sensing the conscious nodes that died off one after another on his back, Greem¡¯s heart was pounding violently. He hadpleted half of his n, and what was left would be how he could make his escape!


    In the beginning, Greem¡¯s existence wasn¡¯t noticed by any of the Molten Giants. But following the annihtion of the Rock Snakes and the help from its Fire Sense, Elder Nimr who possessed a formidable overall strength had finally discovered the Rock Snake that had hid deep inside theva ocean and was fleeing at top speed.


    But right at this moment, Greem had fled some seven miles away.


    The miserable situation of their n graveyard hadpletely infuriated this group of Molten Giants. Whether they were sailing onva rock battleship or swimming in theva ocean, they used all their efforts to chase Greem. In addition to that, each giant had summoned arge group of Fire element creatures and organized them into an army of fire that consisted of an insane number of soldiers, vowing that they would capture the foul human.


    But too bad, due to the disadvantage in their speed, they were extremely furious and helpless at the same time.


    The little human thief who had robbed their n graveyard, had smoothly escaped theva ocean and rampaged his way towards the outer perimeter of the volcano world.


    The greatly angered giants no longer stayed within the restraints of the contract they had signed with the Human Adepts. Riding on the rockingva they stormed into theva tunnels, following that little human thief and pushing their way to the upper level of the volcano. Yet, on this route, there were many human apprentices who came here for training, and wasboriously searching for magical gemstones and underground materials that had been washed up to the upper level by theva.


    As the result of being caught unprepared, these apprentices had suffered a great deal.


    A dozen of Advanced Apprentices failed to escape in time and were killed by the besiegement of Fire element creatures who flooded them like a tsunami. The other apprentices put out every single skill and approach they knew and only managed to miserably escape this world of volcano which had gone on a rampage.

 Chapter 133

    As for what had happened exactly at the depths of the volcano, no one really knew.


    Nevertheless, the volcano world which had gone fully rampage was no longer a ce suitable for treasure hunting, and it was a fact that everybody knew. Hence, Greem too, mixed among all other visiting apprentices and expressed his anger, before submitting his required portion of mission item and leaving Palmyra Town without alerting anybody.


    When Greem returned smoothly to the Magical Swamp with his brand new status as a Pseudo-Adept, a massive storm immediately broke out in the entire Swampy Tower.


    Once upon a time, Greem was just a nobody among the apprentices of the Swampy Tower and many people hadn¡¯t even realized his existence. But now, following his mighty rise, those experts who Greem used to look up to had been ditched at his back and became the group who had the most dejected emotions.


    And right when a portion of apprentices was still doubting on the authenticity of the news, Adept Keoghan, who represented Sarubo Family had visited Swampy Tower once again and had a meeting with Greem at the fifth floor of the tower. As expected, Greem¡¯s decision was exactly same as Mary¡¯s ¨C he chose to serve Sarubo Family ten years in exchange for the resources required for his level up.


    Of course, if Greem had the confidence to find all resources required for the official Adept Advancement Ceremony by himself, then he could always choose to leave Sarubo Family and be a wanderer. However, with the current development situation of Zhentarim Association, they had employed a rather hostile and oppressive policy towards any wandering Adepts and apprentices who didn¡¯t belong to a family. Thus, if Greem wished to spend his apprenticeship smoothly, unavoidably, he had to join an Adept Family.


    As for the Byron Family¡¯s chest badge that Greem had obtained at the Underground Cave, it only meant the Byron Family was willing to protect him at the Dagon region, as he hadn¡¯t sign any magical contract and officially joined the Byron Family.


    After meeting with Adept Keoghan, Greem was immediately dragged into Mary¡¯s room, by the vampire girl who had heard the news of his return.


    ¡°Tell me now, what had you done during the mission? How is it possible that you made the breakthrough and became a Pseudo-Adept?¡± With Mary understanding of Greem, this guy could neverplete a mission smoothly, as every time he would create big troubles halfway.


    Greem responded with a big smile on his face, but said nothing. However, after he stroked his hand across the tabletop, he left behind one big and four small, a total of five mysterious, dark red gemstones.


    ¡°What are these?¡± Curiously, Mary stretched her hand toward the biggest gemstone, but right when her little hand touched the mysterious gemstone, she retracted it instantly.


    A light crackling noise was heard, as a small me ignited on top of the gemstone and ferociously burned her fingers.


    Even with Mary¡¯s body constitution of vampire, her fingers which had touched the gemstone had turned dark. But she wasn¡¯t bothered by it, with a gentle wave of her palm, the burn marks immediately disappeared and her fair and delicate fingers had returned.


    Mary didn¡¯t act recklessly this time, but stood still and pondered for a moment.


    Obviously, the me wasn¡¯t controlled by someone, and it wasn¡¯t the result of some magical arrays. It was a defensive mechanism initiated by the instincts of the gemstone. It was like as if... as if it possessed its own consciousness!


    ¡°What exactly is this?¡± Mary asked the question once again, but this time, she wore a fierce expression on her face and revealed a pair of her sharp fangs. She had a look as if to say that if Greem didn¡¯t give her the answer, she would leap onto him and gave him a brutal bite.


    ¡°Second Grade Core!¡± A weird smile emerged on Greem¡¯s face, as he spoke the answer one word at a time.


    The juicy red lips of Mary murmured the same answer a few times, before she came to a rude awakening. ¡°Second Grade Core? Did you kill a Second Grade demon? Where is the corpse? Did you extract its blood? Hurry up... tell me quickly!¡±


    ¡°Ugh...¡± Greem spread his arms and expressed his speechless at Mary¡¯s response. ¡°If I really meet with a Second Grade demon, do you think I can stille back alive?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re right!¡± Mary smiled slightly and felt surprised for losing her cool just now.


    She just couldn¡¯t help it. She was at the most important transition period throughout the entire life of a vampire, and the fastest method for increasing her overall strength was being fed the blood of experts. With these two reasonsbined, it was more than enough for Mary to be nervousness enough to lose her cool and be restless and passionate upon hearing news about a powerful creature!


    Of course, in the eyes of Mary, the current Greem could barely be considered an expert. Nevertheless, no matter how much Mary tried to convince Greem until the roof fell down, Greem would never agree to let her suck his blood. Because ording to the Chip¡¯s analysis, any individual who had his blood sucked by a vampire, would always suffer from a different degree of decay in his overall strength.


    And, this decay was most likely the key to why the vampire could evolve by sucking blood!


    To put it simply, if Greem allowed Mary to suck his blood, most probably his attribute would drop, and it would effect his Physique and Spirit, which were the attributes he cared about the most. With regard to this, Toril, the Bloodline Apprentice they met at the Underground Cave, was the perfect example.


    Originally, that guy had reached the pinnacle of his apprenticeship, and was about to hold his official Adept Advancement Ceremony. However, he was miserably defeated by Greem¡¯s golem team. Such injuries would only take him one to two weeks of resting to fully recover. However, from the news from his family, the Pseudo-Adept Toril had experienced a decay in his Spirit. Though it hadn¡¯t dropped below 20 points, it was more than enough to affect him from advancing normally.


    Hence, after summarizing from so many bloody examples, Greem had reason to believe that through sucking the blood of others, the race of vampire could extract the bloodline factor of the host and use it to strengthen themselves and weaken the enemy. Try to think about it, under such circumstances, how could Greem let Mary suck his blood?


    After exchanging thetest developments of each other, Mary rushed back to the Mission Hall, continued searching for apprentice missions that suit her the most. As for Greem, he returned to his own room and started listening to the briefing of the goblin merchant, Snox.


    During the three months that Greem was not here, following the injecting of information and resources from the outside world, the Swampy Tower had be livelier, no longer a ce of stagnancy and dead quietness like how it was in the past. With Mary¡¯s backing, Snox had opened the first Goblin Store in the tower.


    There weren¡¯t many items avable to buy in this little store, yet they were all rare resources that could hardly be found in the outside world. Also, recently Snox had put its eyes on those Beginner and Intermediate Apprentices and had started to purchase magical materials and ordinary resources that they wouldn¡¯t be using for now.


    Nevertheless, in order for such a little store to operate in full scale, it needed an endless supply of high-grade items, or else, it would be pretty tough to attract these apprentices.


    After finished listening to Snox¡¯s briefing, Greem nodded his head satisfyingly. Then, he casually poured out arge pile of magical gemstones and materials from his storage waist belt, and most of them were Fire Diamonds. After all,pared to those apprentices who spent all days wandering at the outer perimeter of the volcano world, Greem had ventured into the depths of theva ocean countless of times and the chances of him finding high-grade magical gemstones were much higher.


    Also, those Fire Diamonds and magical gemstones were mostly washed out from theva ocean during the active periods of the volcano. And, after going through the filtration of Fire element creatures, the leftover would be all of that lesser quality materials. Yet, the Fire Diamonds Greem brought back from theva ocean were at least supreme grade Fire Diamonds, the size of a human fist. Greem even tossed a huge human skull-sized Fire Diamond over to Snox, asking it to find someone to craft it into the shape of a jade pillow.


    With that, when Greemid his head on top of it and meditated in the future, the result would definitely be better!


    After Snox left happily with a packed waist pouch, the smile on Greem¡¯s face gradually subsided. He started to ponder seriously on some very important information.


    During his absence of the past three months, Adept Anderson had actually publicly announced that he would take Evil Bugs Acteon as his disciple. And ording to what Snox told him, nearly every day of these past three months, Acteon had dwelt in the fifth floor of the Adept Tower, and no one knew what he and Adept Anderson were doing up there!


    Facing two enemies who might have joined forces, Greem¡¯s feeling of joy after bing a Pseudo-Adept immediately vanished in a sh. Once again, he felt the pressure of time that waited for no man. Though, after he made the advancement and became Pseudo-Adept and managed to obtain the protection from the family preventing Adept Anderson from harming him openly, it was still possible the Adept would have nned something treacherous in the dark.


    And by getting so close with Evil Bugs, could Anderson use Acteon to deal with Greem?


    Greem let out a bitterugh.


    Since the day he had a thorough understanding of the conflict of interest between Adept Anderson and Mary, he knew sooner orter, he would be hated by Anderson. He just didn¡¯t think that the enemy would move so quickly, so pressing against the time!


    In the eyes of these treachery and cunning Adepts, all apprentices were merely a bunch of materials who knew how to walk by themselves. If not for the fact that the top management of the Adepts had put a constraint on their behavior, perhaps these selfish fellows would never allow the rising of new Adepts, who would stand up and fight for rare resources against them.


    Nevertheless, no matter what the enemy was nning, as long as the speed of his progress went beyond their expectations, any dangers and traps would pass away like a cloud, and none of them could shake the direction of his progress.


    After giving the current situation a thorough analysis, Greem immediately drafted out a long working n for the time toe. Under his arrangement, perhaps for the next half year, every single day would be filled with numerous tasks and no time for leisure.


    In this mysterious world, in order to keep his life safe, Greem had poured all his energy and time in the learning and researching magic spells.


    ............


    Inside Snox¡¯s room.


    Aftering back from its master¡¯s room, Snox had been indulging in an enthusiastic stage.


    Every time when it took out a magical gemstone from its waist pouch, it would always dance with joy, repeatedly kissing and stroking it, before using its magical probing stick to verify the element and quality of the gemstone.


    Staring at the pile of gemstones which was getting taller and taller, Snox¡¯s heart was filled with wild excitement. At this time, it just wished it could run back to its master and passionately kiss his shoes. Perhaps, only by doing this it could let its master experience the passion and loyalty of Snox!


    But, during this delightful process, a small setback had struck Snox.


    Within the pile of gemstones its master had given it, Snox discovered a mysterious, white stone the size of a human fist. No matter what method it used to verify the stone, it just couldn¡¯t find out its element, and couldn¡¯t confirm whether it was a magical gemstone, material or egg of demon beast!


    Even after using its magical probing stick to test it, the message it got in its mind was a simple ¡®unknown item from Outworld¡¯. Since the magical probing stick confirmed it was an item rather than a living being, it also meant it wasn¡¯t an egg of some demon beast. Yet, its master had included the white stone in the pile of gemstones, it told Snox that this was an item of great value.


    The info Snox concerned the most was the word ¡®Outworld¡¯.


    Could this white stone be a mysterious gemstone from another ne?


    Snox scratched its head and had no choice but to put the mysterious white stone back onto the table and turn around and continue to organize the rest of the gemstones.

 Chapter 134

    Right when Snox was busy settling therge quantity of Fire Diamonds and gemstones brought back by its master, Greem had also started to seriously go through the loot he had brought back during the trip to the volcano.


    A Second Grade Crystal Core of Molten Giant, four First Grade Crystal Cores of Molten Giant.


    Perhaps, even an official Adept would felt jealous of a loot like this!


    However, with Greem¡¯s current ability of golem crafting, he still couldn¡¯t work on this Second Grade core. After all, any external modification would mean damaging the core itself and the self-defense mechanism initiated by this Second Grade core alone was enough to give Greem a huge headache. It was impossible for him to focus all his attention on controlling the alchemy station, while keeping a lookout on the rampaging behavior put out of the core itself.


    If anything unexpected happened during the critical moments, it was highly possible this hard toe by supreme treasure would be destroyed!


    As a result, before he could improve his overall strength to another level, he had no choice but to put this precious core aside and only work on it once he had the confidence to do so in future.


    As for the other four First Grade cores of Molten Giant, they were the focus of Greem¡¯s work.


    Using the most primitive method, Greem meticulously and carefully scanned every single aspect of each core into his mind. The data gathered by the Chip included the hardness of each core, the tness of each side of the core, the direction of every single thread of crystal grown into and the distribution of their thickness... and it put the utmost focus in scanning the surface area of each core that it could useter.


    Using thisplicated and vast statistical data, the Chip would design the most appropriate three-dimensional magical array for each of the core, then through multiple optimizations, make the arrays able to fit perfectly onto the core.


    As Molten Giant was a double-elements magical creature of Fire and Earth, no doubt, by only utilizing one of the element would be a huge waste. Therefore, in order to dig out their potential to thest drop, the Chip would need a long time to calcte and analyze beforeing out with the best solution.


    After handing this tedious task to the Chip, Greem spent all his time busily working on learning Fire element magic spells. Since his body transformed into me Body, the time took Greem to learn these Fire element magic spells was cut into half. In the past, it took him one to two months to learn a new magic spell, but now, his list of personal skills was refreshed with a new skill on a daily basis.


    Nevertheless, for magic spells which could give him multiple effects and required different magical knowledge, Greem still needed to put in a huge amount of effort in order to master them.


    During his previous trip to the volcano world, Greem¡¯s newly constructed team of Earth element golems was nearly wiped outpletely, and it would take him some time before he could restock the loss of five Rock Snake¡¯s cores. As the Swampy Tower didn¡¯t carry the huge resources of core Greem needed, hence he could only ask Mary to buy some when she was out for her mission.


    But, this could at most bring him Pseudo-Adept level cores, and each of them cost a hefty price. After all, Greem had a higher requirements about the quality of the cores. And, though he hoped to find some Adept level cores at the apprentice market, it was merely wishful thinking!


    ording to the normal system of administrative, if Greem needed any high-level Adept resources, the most convenient way would be through the help of Adept Anderson. But too bad, it was obvious that Adept Anderson was just a selfish guy, as he only concerned on his own magic spell experiments and would never show concern to any of his Apprentice Adepts.


    As the result, bypared to apprentices from other Adept Towers, the apprentices of Swampy Tower were so much weaker.


    ............


    On the fifth floor of the Swampy Tower.


    In the depth of night, Acteon came to this ce once again.


    Inside therge stone hall, a huge magical array was seen drawn on the rock solid surface of the floor. It was an array constructed from numerous strange and profound magical runes and lines. No matter how hard Acteon tried to recall his knowledge, out of so many runes, he could barely recognize a couple of runes that he felt familiar with.


    They were all mysterious runes rted to bloodline, souls, and fusion. As for their specific usage, it was sad that with the knowledge of an Apprentice Adept, there was no way he could decipher any further.


    In addition to that, what really startled Acteon was the strong scent of blood inside of the magical array, and the dark blood stain on the floor that couldn¡¯t be washed away. All this was the direct evidence to the torture he had suffered in the past few months. If not because he was supported by a crazy will of bing stronger, even with his body being half-bug, he wouldn¡¯t be able to withstand the process of bloodline quenching and fusing that went on repeatedly.


    d in a dark Adept robe, Anderson was seen adjusting the magical array. His lips moved as he murmured, his ghost-ws like fingers streaking through the air in a mysterious manner, and with that, one after another profound magical rune emerged out of nowhere and kept merging with the magical array lying quietly on the floor.


    As the result, all energy nodes of the magical array lit up in an orderly fashion.


    ¡°Take off all your clothes and stand in the magical array!¡±


    The order from Adept Anderson was straight and clear, but his words carried an undertone of authority that allowed no one to disobey.


    With a pale face, Acteon followed his orders.


    After the robe d on his body was taken off, exposing in the air was a twisted, fearful looking body that was half-bug!


    On his body, the part that belonged to human was rare to see, as most of his body part portrayed the obvious characteristics of bugs. A pair of colorful, hue-shifting eyes, countless tinypound eyes surrounded his pupil, ayered, lotus-shaped mouthpiece, a ck hard shell that formed ayer of protection on his entire body, and the pair of sickle shaped arms that folded on the side of his body...


    Since he transformed himself into a bizarre look of half-human, half-bug, Acteon had never revealed his body in front of anyone. Put it bluntly, anyone who had the privilege of witnessing his true form had been devoured by him, became the nourishment of this body of half-bug.


    But for today, he was forced to expose his body, in the most humiliating manner!


    The gruesome and shivering air, the icy cold stone floor that sent a chill down his spine, all made him felt extremely ufortable. Yet, he still stood with his back straight in the center of the magical array, inside a magical ring that could only be upied by a single person.


    ¡°Good... excellent...¡± Within the spacious hall, the cold voice of Adept Anderson sounded out like the curseing from the misty void. ¡°Although the function of your body has decayed slightly, the result of bloodline infusion ising along well! Kid, if you can survive this round of magical experiment, you¡¯ll definitely be the one and only one giant bloodsucking bug in this world!¡±


    Hee hee hee...


    Following the near insane howl let out by Adept Anderson, the surging energy within the magical array started to gather toward the magical ring at the center of it. The bright glow of the intense magical energy even illuminated Acteon¡¯s body, making it half transparent and allowing anyone to see his internal organs and bones. Within the intense light, a vague, incorporeal yet broken figure of soul emerged out of nowhere, standing right at the position where Acteon was at, throwing a nk look at the surroundings.


    At the same time, right above the magical array, a crack was broken out on the ceiling, and a human fist-sized, crystal clear Soul Diamond was seen gradually making its descent. With the help from the strong glow emitted by the circting of the magical array, one could even see through the Soul Diamond and see a glittering and translucent crystal of crimson rolling within the core of it.


    Step by step, Adept Anderson controlled the Soul Diamond, making it attach to Acteon¡¯s forehead slowly. In an instant, a burning smell filled the air, as the Soul Diamond radiated a high temperature and scorched Acteon¡¯s forehead, burning it and producing dark smoke. Finally, the Soul Diamond sessfully socked itself onto his forehead.


    The crimson crystal was revolving swiftly. For each turned it revolved, it would shot out a tiny crimson thread. Guided by the Soul Diamond, this tiny crimson thread merged into Acteon¡¯s body slowly. At the beginning, the transformation wasn¡¯t that clear. But following the merging of more of these threads with him, Acteon¡¯s body started to turn dark red and crimson demonic runes could vaguely be seen on the surface of his body.


    No doubt, for Acteon, such degree of body modification was frightfully torturous. His half-bug body which had taken a deep root in the control would never allow his bloodline to be contaminated by any external bloodline. At the depths of his bloodline, a ce where no outsider could ever take a peek of, a battle of life and death had broken out, and the situation could be described as intense and severe!


    Suppressed by the magical array, the home advantage of half-bug bloodline was reducing at a constant speed. On the other side, supported by the endless energy from the Adept Tower, the weak vampire bloodline was doing its job with ease, as it kept expanding its territory inside of Acteon¡¯s body, seizing one part at a time.


    His body had be the battlefield of life and death between two bloodlines. Right at this very moment, Acteon was like an ordinary mortal who had all his mysterious and powerful abilities stripped away, the cold air of the hall even made him tremble, as he could hardly endure the cold temperature.


    Both bloodlines had shown the same overbearing manner, and both had regarded the other as a contaminant, making it impossible for either one of them topromise and co-exist with the other. Whenever a bloodline became weaker, it would find a way to invade those body factors, and produce more peers by contaminated them, bringing in more soldiers into the battle.


    Yes, it was a battle! A battle fought for dominance between half-bug bloodline and vampire bloodline! Unless one sidepletely defeated the other side or the body of the host was too weak for the battle to continue, the battle would continue like this forever.


    Following the progress of the battle, ck, pungent and sticky liquid started to ooze from Acteon¡¯s eyes, ears, mouths, nose, and all parts of his body, flowing across his skin and dripping onto the floor.


    The liquid was actually his life factors that were killed in the battle of the bloodline.


    Meanwhile, Acteon¡¯s life aura had started to turn lifeless.


    Upon sensing the body of the host had be extremely weak and could die at any time due to the battle that happened at the depths of bloodline and soul, both mutated bloodlines had finallypromised. They retreated to their own source territory, slowed down the speed of pressuring the host¡¯s body and put out a high vignce at any movement of the enemy bloodline.


    Using the Queen Bug as its base, the half-bug bloodline retreated and hid in Acteon¡¯s brain, while the mutated vampire bloodline had modified Acteon¡¯s heart, and ced its home there. Although the initial nning of having both bloodlines merged as one didn¡¯t happen, but having them co-exist had worked out smoothly.


    Adept Anderson, who had been focusing all his attention on watching every activity happened inside of Acteon¡¯s body, finally let out a long sigh of relief. With a thought of his mind, he shot out a hidden spiritual ripple.


    Taking the opportunity when Acteon¡¯s soul, body, and bloodline were all at their weakest moment, a soul contract hidden inside the Soul Diamond had snuck its way into Acteon¡¯s body.


    ¡°You...¡± After all, Acteon did own the Spirit of that Pseudo-Adept level. Though he was weak now, he would still notice any danger that came to him. However, before he could n his counterattack, the soul contract had seared deeply into his soul.


    As the result, in next second, the naked Acteon had be as obedient a puppet.


    ¡°Waiting for your order, my great master Anderson!¡±


    Upon hearing the expected response, Adept Anderson couldn¡¯t control himself anymore and let out a loudugh. The entire hall was filled with cruel and high-pitchedughter that sounded like cries of the night owl.

 Chapter 135

    Snox was very upset!


    And, the thing upset the optimistic Snox was actually that mysterious white stone.


    Since it couldn¡¯t figure out the actual usage of the white stone, Snox had put it aside and continued busying itself with its Goblin Store. It just had no time to find an expert to identify what it was.


    But unexpectedly, after spent two busy days, it suddenly discovered the white stone was glowing.


    The white stone was lying quietly on the wooden table near the window. Under the shine of the fading moonlight, it was emitting with a faint white glow.


    Yes, it was a glow emitted by the white stone itself and not the reflection of moonlight. Snox was certain about this!


    Step by step, Snox drew closer to the white stone, and carefully, it touched the stone with its hand. It was neither warm nor cold. The white glow wasn¡¯t caused by a heat source, but from some kind of mysterious magical energy inside the white stone. Based on the fact that the stone could absorb moonlight and transform into energy of its own, Snox determined it was possibly a special magical equipment that came from another ne.


    Once it had reached this conclusion, merely for experimentation, Snox took out a magic crystal. To its surprise, when it ced the magic crystal near the white stone, the white stone actually dismantled and transformed. After a series of dismantling and assembling movements that dazzled Snox¡¯s eyes, a mysterious magical machine that looked simr to amunicative mirror was unveiled in front of its eyes.


    A mechanical arm stretched out from this magical machine, mped onto the magic crystal and ced it onto a hole located at the lower part of its body. Right after that, a strange mechanical voice echoed out in the room.


    ¡°A mutated entry level energy crystal is detected. It can be used as energy source. Magical Kernel serial number 03768, estimated recovery of function reached 17%. Initiating now...¡±


    After that, following a series of peculiar noises, this Magical Kernel transformed from the white stone actually stood up, tilted a screen that was located at the top part of its body and pointed it right at Snox.


    A violent distortion of images shed through the screen, and suddenly, an enormous ss eye appeared on it, followed by a noisy and hoarse voice.


    ¡°Peculiar... this is peculiar... why did a Magical Kernel that had not show any activity for more than two hundred years suddenly activate? Hey, little guy, are you the one who activated this Magical Kernel?¡± Snox was certain that thenguage spoken by the voice came from the Magical Kernel was something that it had never heard or learnt before.


    ¡°Who are you? How did you squeeze into this tiny object? This... what is this... what exactly is this object?¡± The naturally timid character of Snox had struck again. Judging from the size of the eyeball, Snox bet it must be a terrifying and enormous giant. If it jumped out from this tiny object, how could Snox escape from its death?


    Right at this very moment, Snox was seized with remorse. Why hadn¡¯t it mentioned this discovery to its master earlier! Perhaps, only that miraculous master of its could save it from the giant mouth of this giant.


    Right as a fierce mental struggle was going on inside of Snox¡¯s mind, the ssy eyeball on the screen backed off some distance, and eventually, allowed Snox to get a clear look at the appearance of the giant.


    Fancy that! The ¡®giant¡¯ was actually someone with a near identical appearance and build like Snox! It had a simr height of around one meter tall and had green skin, a pair ofrge ears, a long and pointy nose, and disheveled, fluffy, short yellow hair. The enormous ssy eyeball that Snox saw just now was actually a special goggles.


    Yes, this fellow was actually a goblin too!


    The goblin on the other side was d in a dirty white coat, a drawing pen was ced in one ear, and it was wearing a high-power magnifier on its eyes. That was why it looked so strange. However, no matter how strange it looked, Snox was certain that this fellow was a... goblin!


    After bent over the screen and spending some time looking left and right, obviously, the goblin on the other side never expected it was also a goblin who had just sent a request formunication from a far distance ne. Therefore, after murmuring someints for some time, it finally became friendlier, andmenced a warm interaction with Snox.


    ¡°You... are you a goblin too?¡± Snox asked timidly.


    ¡°Little guy, you are now meeting with the greatest chief inventor of the Goblin Empire, Duke Gazlowe. So, before you ask any question, you better add in the proper honorifics!¡± On the other side of the screen, the yellow-hair goblin was seen waving its arms dissatisfied and speaking in a threatening manner.


    ¡°Oh, the Great Duke Gazlowe, could you tell me what exactly is this object? Also, why is that I can understand your words?¡±


    ¡°Damn you #%@£¤%... it looks like you this little guy had not understand anything yet.¡± The yellow-hair goblin crazily cursed, before it exined to Snox with a helpless expression. ¡°What you¡¯re looking at right now is the Magical Kernel I invented: the Super Long Distance Magical-Mechanical Communication and Transmitting Machine. To put it simply, it is a little equipment that allows two goblins tomunicate and transmit items across a super long distance.


    As for why you can understand my words, it is because you¡¯re a goblin too! As long as you¡¯re a goblin, no matter which ne you are living in, it is natural that you can understand the Goblinnguage, as it is one unique to Goblins!¡±


    Snox¡¯s eyes went wider and wider, as it hardly believed what it had just heard.


    ¡°If this machine was invented by you, why was it stranded in this ce?¡± Snox asked wonderingly.


    ¡°Since this machine is called Super Long Distance Magical-Mechanical Communication and Transmitting Machine, it is of course used to carry out trading of items between nes! When I was young, I produced a few hundred of them at one go, and randomly tossed them into different ces in the multi-verse. So, when the local experts picked up this machine, they could be my customers. If my memory served me well,st time, it was a powerful Molten Giant who used this machine with the serial number of 03768 tomunicate with me. But too bad, that giant was really poor, and didn¡¯t own any good stuff that met the fancy of my eyes!¡±


    ¡°You... you are actually a Mighty Transnar Merchant?¡± The greedy-in-nature, keen on receiving petty advantages Snox had its eyes pop out instantly. For Snox, obviously,pared to the status of Chief Inventor of the Goblin Empire, the yellow-hair goblin¡¯s status of a transnar merchant was so much more respectable.


    ¡°Certainly! As the greatest engineer, inventor and transnar merchant of the Goblin Empire, I, Duke Gazlowe, am well-known throughout the entire multi-verse!¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve mentioned many times about Goblin Empire? This... what is it then?¡± Snox asked curiously.


    Gazlowe said out loud with a proud voice, ¡°Goblin Empire is, of course, the empire of Goblins! It is a kingdom built by us, Goblins, after upying an entire ne. In this kingdom, we, the Goblins are the true master of the ne. Since you¡¯ve asked this question, presumably, in the ne you¡¯re living right now, goblins have an inferior status?¡±


    Hearing what it said, Snox clenched its fists tightly in excitement, while both of its eyes were filled with tiny sparks of envy. However, it soon recalled its current situation and couldn¡¯t help but lower its big ears dejectedly.


    Gazlowe sighed silently.


    It had seen many situations like this. In most of the material nes, Goblins were discriminated against and lived miserable lives being bullied by everybody. They didn¡¯t possess any ability in fighting, and they didn¡¯t have any extraordinary innate abilities. Even among all demons, their ce belonged in the bottom of the food chain.


    Nevertheless, with regards to this goblin who had identally activated the Magical Kernel in another ne, Gazlowe expressed its extreme curiosity. After patiently questioning Snox, it was told that this dejected little goblin was actually a ve who served a mysterious Adept.


    And when Gazlowe couldn¡¯t bear itself and suspected that Snox was just a penniless vagrant who owned nothing, the angry Snox opened up its waist pouch and revealed all its treasures to Gazlowe.


    Human fist-sized Fire Diamonds; Sapphire, Ruby, Green Agate, Topaz, and Beryl which sent forth a powerful aura of magical element, and rare Night-Eye Stones, Pyre Stones, Crimson Spinel Stones and other treasures which could only found in certain nes...


    A little, seemingly insignificant goblin actually took out so many rare gemstones in one go, this had made Gazlowe nearly dropped its eyes out. It paid no attention to those elemental gemstones, because at the ne where it was living, it could find plenty of them easily. However, the Night-Eye Stones, Pyre Stones, Crimson Spinel Stones and few other special gemstones and materials that Snox took out thest were something it had never seen before, and it took a great interest in a few of them.


    In the Goblin Empire where it came from, the one single most powerful creation was all kind of magical machines. And, the energy that drove these magical machines would be a huge amount of energy crystals and distinguished magical gemstones. If it could bring all these special magical gemstones back to the Goblin Empire, figured out the mode of existence and the method of sharing the special energies, no doubt it would bring a tremendous help to the development of the magical machine.


    Thus, the more this two goblins talked, the friendlier they became with each other. By the end, they actually reached a trade agreement, nning to carry out a transnar barter trade in secret.


    The trade list drafted by each of them was extremely long.


    For Snox, it had listed every single magical gemstone, magical materials and some unique Adept resources it heard or seen before in the World of Adept. As for Gazlowe, its listprised all sorts of powerful yet dangerous magical machines and some local resources produced in the Goblin ne.


    While browsing through the trade list provided by the other party, when one of them was interested in some random item on the other¡¯s list, it would offer a price and started the negotiation process. Sure enough, Goblins deserved to be generally regarded as a race that cared about nothing but profit, and they were also the greediest race in the world.


    When it came to the price of the item, this pair of Goblin brothers who were happily chatting with each other moment ago immediately turned into someone as mean as a miser, fighting over the smallest trifles. Because of a difference in one or two magic crystals, they would rage at each other, cursing loudly all the familial rtives of the other goblins, and portray a fierce look of ¡®take it or leave it¡¯.


    Therefore, Snox didn¡¯t sleep for the entire night, spent all its effort and more than twenty hours fighting with Duke Gazlowe, who was a greedy, stingy, shameless, selfish, narrow-minded... goblin. In addition to that, it also paid no attention to hygiene and carried a pungent body odor. As for the result? Two transnar deals that were worth less than five magic crystals.


    And yet, in order to maintain the smoothmunication, Snox had literally spent three magic crystals in just one night.


    But with regards to this, none of them actually felt strange. Snox was dancing in joy as it was able to negotiate a discount of one single magic crystal for the deal. On the other side, Gazlowe was seen roaring furiously, cursing Snox as the most shameless and despicable green-skinned goblin it ever met.


    Finally, both ended their firstmunication in such ¡®friendly¡¯ atmosphere!

 Chapter 136

    Three monthster


    When Greem woke up from a long period of meditation, he couldn¡¯t help and have a worried expression on his face.


    ¡°Chip, how efficient is this meditation?¡±


    ¡°Calcting... Spirit has increased by another 0.007. ording to the current progress, in order to reach the maximum of 20 points, an estimated 139 days will be needed.¡±


    The muscle near the corner of Greem¡¯s lips twitched.


    His body had turned into me Body and he had also used his authority in the Adept Tower to make himself a room with abundant Fire Elementiums. In addition to that, his daily meals were all magical energy foods that would bring great benefits to his body and Spirit. Evenbined with the Fire Diamond pillow and Deep Sea Flower, he had actually just gained an increment of 0.007 in a day. Compared to the past, where he could easily gain 0.05 increment in every meditation, Greem felt it difficult to adapt to the situation.


    Since he had be a Pseudo-Adept, Greem had discovered that the increase in Spirit brought by basic meditation and studying magic spells was not as significant as in the past. Because he had the help of the Chip, he was able to detect the increment of his Spirit on a daily basis. Yet, for those Pseudo-Adepts who didn¡¯t own such ability, their productiveness was ten times lower than his. What was the thing that they relied upon in order to go through this painful period?


    Greem closed his eyes and pondered for a brief moment. Only then did he realize something.


    It seemed like those Pseudo-Adepts rarely stayed in their own rooms and meditated days and night. Instead, they spent most of their time bustling about, training themselvesboriously through different missions. In the past, Greem had thought they did this for the sake of getting more resources. Now, looking back and pondering deeper, it was more likely that due to the slow progress in their Spirit, they were pushing themselves to the brink of death as a method of stimting their Spirit.


    This might not be a bad idea!


    ¡°Chip, you spent quite a long time doing analysis. Have you found out why there¡¯s such a slow progress for Spirit?¡±


    ¡°Beep. The modeling of the mission has beenpleted. The result shows that during the period of apprenticeship for humans, the primary task is to arduously increase the density of Elementium in the body and strive for a qualitative change thates from quantitative umtion. The ultimate goal is to rise and be a magical creature: Adept.


    After entering the grade of Pseudo-Adept, the increase of Spirit bes slower because the umtion of element energy is approaching its bottleneck. Due of theck of traction from a vital core, and because of the characteristics of elements, the energy umted in the early state will cause an unpredicted distraction to the energy thates inter. This causes the efficiency of energy umtion in theter state to weaken significantly.¡±


    The Same-Element Attraction and Universal Repulsion of element energy?


    Both of them were elementary theories of elemental magic spells that had long been known by all senior Adepts. To put it simply, among the different types of Elementiums, it was easier for the Elementiums with the same element to gather together and produce a homogeneous region. The Adepts referred to this phenomenon as Same-Element Attraction!


    However, there was a limit to such aggregation. Once it reached or exceeded this limit, Adepts had discovered that it would be extremely difficult to bring in more Elementium of the same element. It was as if there was a powerful repulsive force between those Elementiums of the same element which caused them to reject each other. As a result, Adepts had referred to this phenomenon as Universal Repulsion.


    The characteristics of Same-Element Attraction and Universal Repulsion existed within all Elementiums at the same time. The key was the regional density of the Elementium. If the density was lower than the limit, they would portray the characteristics of Same-Element Attraction, but when it was higher than the limit, they would show the characteristics of Universal Repulsion. The Adepts didn¡¯t know the details and exact theory for this phenomenon, or perhaps they did have a conclusion but magical knowledge of such an advanced degree was not something Greem had the right to know right now.


    ¡°Chip, do you have any workable methods that can solve the current problem?¡±


    ¡°Beep. Data analysisplete. There are two workable solutions:


    Solution number 1: Core Transnt.


    The Spirit of Apprentice Adepts is scattered, as it is not bound by a vital core. Transnting a Fire element core into the brain can reduce the repulsiveness between Fire Elementiums.


    Pros: Able to solve the issue of having Spirit increase at a slow rate, and eventually increase the sess rate of official Adept Advancement Ceremony.


    Cons: The transnted Fire element core cannotpare to the Element Core formed by oneself and it will restrict the possibility of future development.


    Solution number 2: Stimte the Spirit.


    Bypass the weak stimtion toward the Spiritual Domain which is caused by the umtion of Elementium. Instead, use a more direct approach which can stimte the source of the Spirit, using the method of reducing the tenacity of the Spirit to obtain increments of the Spirit¡¯s maximum limit.¡±


    Greem knitted his brows in a tight frown.


    Ugh, restricted to the knowledge mastered by the Chip, Greem didn¡¯t like either of the solutions it provided. The first solution was a method that attended to the superficials and neglected the essentials; it was the lousiest approach that could destroy his future totally, and was only useful to those Pseudo-Adepts who had no more hope of bing an official Adept. As for the second solution, it wasn¡¯t too dependable either. It was still unknown whether this method could really cultivate an official Adept, but it for sure could give birth to a freak.


    Since the crooked ways weren¡¯t feasible at all, Greem had no choice but to focus all of his attention on the source of Adepts.


    Spirit!


    The reason for human Adepts to set 21 points of Spirit as the basic threshold of breaking through the limits of humans and bing official Adepts was most probably because 20 points was the maximum limit of Spirit a human¡¯s body could ever achieve!


    Once they stepped over this threshold, there would be some essential differences between a human Adept and an ordinary human, as the human Adept would be more like a magical creature. Therefore, the reason why there was such a huge gap in the overall strength between an Adept of 21 points Spirit and a Pseudo-Adept of 20 points Spirit was most probably because the basic data of their bodies had be totally different!


    With the aid of so many outside advantages, without the need to participate in any life and death training, Greem could still achieve an increment of 0.007 in his Spirit on a daily basis. If this was known by any other Pseudo-Adepts, for sure they would be extremely jealous. For Greem, however, it was still very slow!


    Because... because the recent transformation of Evil Bugs Acteon had made his heart tremble!


    Initially, he had thought his progress had gone beyond all other people. Thus, catching up or even suppressing Acteon was just a matter of time. But, after he had identally bumped into Acteon in the Tower a few days ago, such thoughts had be rather inconclusive!


    That Evil Bugs nearly had a new transformation every single day and his massive Spiritual pressure had be more visible. After having the Chip perform a scan on him, Greem knew that it was highly possible Evil Bugs¡¯s Spirit had gone beyond the half-mark of a Pseudo-Adept. That meant his Spirit must have reached beyond 20.50. Yet, he had only be a Pseudo-Adept less than half a year ago!


    This proved that the increase rate of Evil Bugs Acteon¡¯s Spirit was not weaker than Greem¡¯s.


    Of course, it might be the result of Acteon visiting the fifth floor of the Swampy Tower every couple of days. From the scan results of the Chip, it was highly possible that Adept Anderson was performing a bloodline infusion experiment on Acteon, because the Chip had detected the familiar scent of blood from Acteon¡¯s body.


    Although the smell of blood was rather faint, with the Chip¡¯s gene detection approach that scanned up to the cellr level, it was still detectable and was presented in front of Greem. He was really angry with such a discovery, as the source of the bloodline factor was actually pointing directly at Mary.


    This meant that the blood sample Mary had given Adept Anderson was being used on Evil Bugs. Having two different bloodlines that kept fighting each other inside of Acteon¡¯s body was no different than cing him at the brink of life and death every single day. No wonder his Spirit was increasing at such an incredible rate.


    There was no room for reconciliation between Evil Bugs Acteon and Greem. And yet, there was one thing that worried Greem the most. If Acteon was able to stand at the pinnacle of Pseudo-Adept before him, then it was highly possible that something he didn¡¯t want to see would happen.


    From the information publicly avable in magical books, he knew that the sess rate of bing an official Adept in the Zhentarim region wasn¡¯t that high. Basically, out of ten Pseudo-Adepts, if two or three of them could be official Adepts, that would be something worth a grand celebration. During an official Adept Advancement Ceremony, though the innate talent of an apprentice yed a big role, arge part of the sess rate was actually pure luck.


    Indeed, a Pseudo-Adept with a powerful innate ability would have a higher sess rate than those Pseudo-Adepts of that weaker innate talent, however, it was not absolutely certain. Even a Pseudo-Adept with extraordinary innate talent would still have to face the possibility of failing when advancing into the realm of official Adept! Yet, for some fellows with lousy innate talent, if they were lucky enough, they might take the leap and rise to be the master of this world ¨C an official Adept!


    Therefore, in the Adept Continent, every single Pseudo-Adept felt nervous during the official Adept Advancement Ceremony, fearing they might miss their steps and became a total failure for their life. After all, once the advancement ceremony was failed, there would be a significant decay in the Pseudo-Adept¡¯s Spirit and the sess rate of next advancement would drop by 50%.


    Hence, except for those favored children who received special attention from big families, no Adept Family wanted to pour another round of new investment into a Pseudo-Adept who had failed once.


    And this was what worried Greem the most!


    If... if Acteon reached the top of Pseudo-Adept first, he would only have to tell those Adepts who were in charge of the advancement ceremony that his sess rate of advancement was 100% if he could devour Mary. Then... what kind of oue would happen?


    On one side was a Pseudo-Adept who had signed an Adept contract with the family, and on the other side were two Pseudo-Adepts who had only signed the servicing contract. One had a 100% sess rate of advancement, the other side had two Pseudo-Adepts who had an uncertain sess rate of advancement...


    If it was that situation, together with the involvement of Adept Anderson, Mary would face a life-threatening situation!


    Greem hadn¡¯t told Mary about this. Before he had a method to solve this situation, telling the situation to the irritable Mary would be no help at all. Unless Greem could capture tens of Adept level demons at one go and give them all to Mary as a supplements, he would have to depend only on himself in order to change the situation.


    Greem lowered his head and looked at his right palm. On top of it, there were two ck fragments of bugs. Through his powerful Elementium Vision, Greem could barely see some constantly changing Musta scripts on top of the fragments. On one of the fragments, he read ¡®save me,¡¯ while the other was ¡®devour Mary.¡¯


    The two fragments of bugs didn¡¯te to him at the same time. The first one had arrived during the night, one month ago. When he had been meditating, a fingernail sized ck bug had crawled through the window into Greem¡¯s room. It had exploded upon touching on Greem¡¯s wooden table, leaving behind only a bizarre shell covered with words. As for the second one, it had appeared one week ago.


    It was only because of the clues brought by these fragments that Greem had drawn the conclusion that Acteon had the intention of devouring Mary. Otherwise, no matter how profound his intelligence, there was no way he could have thought of such an absurd conclusion.

 Chapter 137

    No doubt, the bugs had been sent by the Evil Bugs Acteon himself!


    Save me?


    Could he really be pleading for help?


    Devour Mary?


    Why would he leak his best workable n to Greem?


    After posting a bunch of questions to the Chip and having it analyze the possible answers, a terrible plot was soon discovered, and it simply left Greem chilled to the bone!


    Most probably, Evil Bugs had been totally controlled by Adept Anderson until now, and that had forced him to seek help from his enemy, Greem. As for how a Pseudo-Adept who was under the total control of an Adept was able to deceive his master and retain his soul consciousness, perhaps that had something to do with his unique bug body!


    Though he was fortunate enough to retain his self-conscious under the evil plot of Adept Anderson, obviously, there was no way he could escape from the control. Therefore, he used the method of leaking their treacherous plot in exchange for Greem¡¯s interference.


    However, even though Greem knew all this, was there anything he could do about it?


    Should he lodge aint with Adept Keoghan, who was also an Adept from the Sarubo Family, and tell him about the impudent behavior of Adept Anderson? That might make Adept Anderson suffer some punishment, but it wouldn¡¯t change the situation at the root, as Acteon would be still under his control. And if Anderson made it clear that he was willing to give up the right of control, perhaps the Sarubo Family would take over the control of a family Adept who obeyed all their orders, wholeheartedly.


    If that happened, Mary still wouldn¡¯t escape her tragic destiny!


    Defeat and kill Anderson? This was simply something impossible to achieve!


    If all of the four formidable golems anticipated by Greem were ready and he could lure Adept Anderson to some pre-set ce, together with the help from Mary and Acteon, they might have a slight chance of killing him. However, the sess rate for a n like this would never exceed 12%, ording to the Chip. Greem would never take such a huge risk!


    In the past, whenever someone had mentioned how powerful an Adept was, he had only had a rather vague and general idea. But through the training he had gone through in the past half a year, Greem finally had a basic outline in his mind.


    Take Beginner Apprentices as an example. Their bodies were nearly identical to a normal human; the only difference was that they had mastered one or two magic spells of average power, and that was a really low number. With this grade, if an apprentice went to carry out a mission, they usually hired some human mercenaries to protect them from being hurt by ordinary humans, such as damageing from arrows, flying daggers, traps, and other simr weapons.


    Once they had managed to be an Intermediate Apprentice, the power of an Apprentice Adept would start to show up. At this grade, either they had chosen their direction of future development or they possessed some approach that would bring them strong power; no ordinary human couldpare anymore. Even the militia organized by themon cities would not provoke anyone from this group of fearful existences. However, so long as they employed an appropriate approach, the possibility of ordinary humans killing Intermediate Apprentices still existed.


    But, once an apprentice entered the Advanced Apprentice realm, then even a mortal army would not be able to defeat him anymore. Imagine this, a person who possessed the vigorous vitality of a wild buffalo, was able to run as fast as a cheetah, and could put out the formidable strength that was no weaker than a burly adult. For an existence like this, even without using any magic spells, they would be able to wreak havoc within the mortal army. If he was aided with magic spells, annihting an army of two hundred men would be like cutting through butter with a hot knife.


    Of course, if a human noble was willing to pay a huge price to equip an army of fearless soldiers with the finest weapons and armor, it was still possible to defeat an Advanced Apprentice by sacrificing the lives of over three hundred soldiers.


    But once an Apprentice Adept became a Pseudo-Adept, then the army of an ordinary human noble would lose any effectiveness. If this Pseudo-Adept was shameless enough to conduct guerri warfare, he might even be able to copse some small kingdoms. In order to deal with a Pseudo-Adept, it would need the life of at least 1000 elite soldiers. As for whether could they kill the Pseudo-Adept, it would purely depend on their luck during the battle!


    Of course, theparison of overall strength mentioned was derived from a situation where the mortal powers weren¡¯t aid by any mysterious forces. Yet currently, throughout the entire Adept Continent, if a kingdom didn¡¯t seek protection from an Adept Family, there was no way it could survive. Many Kings or Grand Dukes of human kingdoms were actually agents sent by Adept Families, random mortals who were experts in managing and running a territory, or Apprentice Adepts who had lost all hope of advancing further.


    In brief, mortal power was always a tool for Adepts, and the rtionship was never reciprocal.


    So, in order to deal with an Adept, mortal forces would never be dependable.


    Only an Adept had the possibility of killing another Adept!


    This true saying had been deeply engraved into the bones of all mortals. No human nobles, big and small, who were protected by Adept Families would want to offend any Adepts, even if the one in question was the lousiest Adept. After all, the power of an Adept was extremely dreadful!


    Therefore, after estimating the overall strength of both sides, Greem quickly gave up the stupid idea of fighting Adept Anderson face to face.


    Although Adepts were dangerous and fearful, so long as one could find the right way, an Adept was rather fragile!


    Every year, there were a bunch of Adepts who identally died in magical experiments and there was also many of them who ventured deep into a savage forest and never came back. But most of them actually died in the conquering warfare of the Adept Families.


    Sometimes, it was the war for territory between different Adept Families of the original ne, sometimes it was the conquering and colonization warfare the Adept Family conducted in the other nes. In brief, if Greem and others became official Adepts, they too would probably have to participate in many bloody wars.


    However, sitting back and waiting quietly for Adept Anderson to kill them was an absurd thought. With the nasty character of Adept Anderson, where he would spend years dwelling in the Swampy Tower and never go out, one could easily tell that he was a research type Adept and not an expert in battling.


    But even so, Greem still didn¡¯t want to fight him face to face!


    Since he had no intention to fight head on, then the only option left would be scheming.


    Therefore, during this period of time, aside from spending all day arduously improving his overall strength, Greem also quietly nned and prepared for something. However, because the target of his scheme this time was an official Adept, Greem had to consider carefully before making any decisions. After all, if Acteon wished to reach the pinnacle of the Pseudo-Adept stage, it would take another three months, so Greem still had some time to plot his scheme.


    ............


    Inside Evil Bugs Acteon¡¯s room.


    It was dark and wet like the true nest of a bug. White cocoons could be seen all over the floor. Some of them were broken, with numerousrvae crawling out from these broken cocoons and their body covered in sticky, yellow slime. Whenever a rune was lit from within a magical array engraved on the floor, bright light would shine upon the intact cocoons, turning them transparent, and one could even see countlessrvae inside of the cocoons.


    There was the mutted dead body of a wild buffalo on one corner of the room, and traces of bug bites could be found on top of it. The ck blood of the buffalo oozed from the dead body and spilled all over the ce, sending forth a pungent and foul smell.


    The air within the room was extremely filthy. It smelled like strong acid mixed with blood and a rotting scent. Yet, it was as if Acteon never noticed it. He was sitting on the floor, both legs folded, his body bent forward and stock still. Though he didn¡¯t move his body, subtle movement could be seen within the gray robe on his body. From time to time, it would bulge for a brief moment before returning to its original shape.


    This was a sign that within his seemingly calm body, it was not as peaceful as the outside indicated.


    Since he hade back from the bloodline infusion ceremony carried out by Anderson, most of the time, Acteon would sit quietly like a dead man, not moving at all. Yet, inside of his body, a bloody war without any physical expression had juste to a temporary stop.


    Every day, the Half-Bug Bloodline, lead by the queen of Carrion Beetles, and the Vampire Bloodline, lead by the Heart of Bloodthirsty, would use his body as a battlefield and fight an intense war. Both parties wished to devour the other and use the other as nourishment to strengthen themselves. Hence, in this war of bloodlines where the winner would survive and the loser would die, neither of them was willing topromise and co-exist with the other.


    If two mutated bloodlines could be fused together easily, there would be plenty of Bloodline Adepts in this world. Why would there be still so many Adepts who dwelt deeply in dark and wet towers, carrying out frightening experiments that mostly yielded no results?


    If the potential of two separate bloodlines was imbnced, then the inevitable oue would be having one devoured by the other. Yet, if the potential was bnced, it would end up with both being losers and cause the body of the host to disintegrate. All in all, in order to make two ipatible bloodlines coexist harmoniously, it seemed like a key neutralizing agent was missing, which meant that the Adepts couldn¡¯t create the results they wanted through any bloodline experiments.


    If the development followed such trend, Acteon would eventually face the miserable oue of being killed.


    Initially, the Half-Bug Bloodline had upied the home advantage in his body and had had the absolute advantage in the war with the Vampire Bloodline. However, whenever the Vampire Bloodline was going to be defeated, Adept Anderson would always call him to the secret room located on the fifth floor of the tower and inject a new dose of the source blood into his body.


    It was all because of this endless supply of new blood that the Vampire Bloodline was able to contaminate a vital organ of Acteon; it had modified Acteon¡¯s heart into the Heart of Bloodthirsty. With the aid of the Heart of Bloodthirsty, the Vampire Bloodline had gained the upper hand in the war of bloodlines for the first time. The obvious symptom of this was that Acteon¡¯s bug body had deteriorated and his skin had started to turn dark red.


    Acteon¡¯s head had sunk to his breast. Even when the battle of the two bloodlines caused a significant decay in his vitality, making him stand at the gates of death, he still didn¡¯t move. However, right at this moment, in the depths of his Spiritual Domain, on top of the source of his soul, an even crueler and brutal battle was happening.


    The conscious seal formed by the soul contract was deeply seared on the source of Acteon¡¯s soul. But strangely, some cracks surrounded the part of his soul which bore the soul contract, and it seemed that part of his soul had almost departed from the entire source of the soul.


    By hiding most of his consciousness in the queen of Carrion Beetles¡¯ body and escaping from the control of Adept Anderson, Acteon was able to barely maintain the independence of his own consciousness. At this point in time, he dared not let his primary consciousness to return to the source of the soul. Once it made the return, the fact that he still had an independent consciousness would be sensed by Adept Anderson through the soul contract.


    Therefore, currently in his body, Adept Anderson was only controlling his secondary consciousness, which he had broken up earlier. But his primary consciousness was hiding inside, waiting for the perfect opportunity to seize back the control of his body.


    It was extremely tough to escape from Adept Anderson¡¯s control just by relying on his strength alone. That was why he had secretly sent a few of his bugs to seek help from the enemy he hated the most. But too bad, both distress calls he had sent were like stones dropped into the sea, producing no response at all. With that, Acteon couldn¡¯t bear it and became restless with anxiety.

 Chapter 138

    The third floor of the Swampy Tower, inside of the Alchemy Laboratory.


    After upying the highest standard Alchemy Laboratory alone, Greem had made it his home and hadn¡¯t stepped out from it for three days and three nights.


    The first day, he hadn¡¯t done anything. He had just held the core of the First Grade Molten Giant, which would be the target of his experiment, and turned it round and round for careful examination, allowing the Chip to finish its final molding and design.


    Through the powerful see through ability provided by Elementium Vision, he could see every single crystal that formed the entire crystal core, every single thread of crystal, from the direction of where they stretched to the distribution of Earth and Fire Elementium, together with each part¡¯s hardness; every single detail, every single node, was stored in his mind without leaving out anything. The gathered information was then turned into groups of data and eventually transformed into a three-dimensional and detailed virtual model.


    After finishing with all that, without saying another word, Greem simplyid down on the floor inside the Alchemy Laboratory and went into deep slumber. He only woke up early morning of the next day. He stretched his back and yawned, standing up from the floor.


    He washed his face with some fresh water summoned using a magic spell and tidied himself up. When he felt his Spirit had freshened up again, Greem once again stood in front of the Alchemy Station with a solemn expression.


    After going through so long a period of preparation and brewing, the design of a brand new golem was deeply engraved in his mind. Today, he would turn them into reality.


    He curved the corner of his lips upward a little bit, giving himself encouragement with a brief smile. Gradually, the hesitation and worries in Greem¡¯s eyes faded away and were reced with resolution and confidence.


    Without hesitation, Greem waved his hand and activated the Alchemy Station.


    A brand new golem with a brand new design concept. In order to exert the power of this double-element core of Earth and Fire to the fullest, the Chip had specially designed a brand new three-dimensional magical array for them. Five Energy Gathering Arrays, three Elementium Strengthening Arrays, two Elementium Switching Arrays, two Energy Force Field Arrays, one Lava Armor Activator, one Summoning Runes Array, one Elementium Life Granting Array, several energy nodes and circuits...


    The Beginner Apprentice level y golem only had seven magical arrays. While the Lightning Giant employed the decentralized approach of a three-dimensional magical array, it only had nine magical arrays on top of the primary core. Yet, for this core of a First Grade Molten Giant, which was only the size of a chicken egg, Greem nned to carve sixteen magical arrays in one go. Not only that, he also needed to connect them together and eventually make them into one massive andpact entity.


    Back on Earth in his previous life, he could let the smartputer control and finish such microscopic carving work on the molecr level. However, in this miraculous and mystical world, the only thing Greem could rely on was the guidance and assistance of the Chip, and he had to personallyplete all of the tasks himself.


    Throughout the entire three hours of the rune carving process, not a single careless mistake or ck behavior was permitted. If the carving of any rune deviated from the original design, even if it was just the distance of a single crystal thread, it would cause significant influence on the finished golem. Yet, if the deviation went beyond the distance of two crystal threads, it meant that the Adept level core he had obtained by risking his life would be destroyed.


    In addition to that, during the carving process, he needed to maintain a stable and constant output of his Spirit. If the output was too low, it would affect the circting efficiency of the Elementium energy and if it was too high, it might poke through the surface of the crystal core and damage the inner core. As for stopping half way during the crafting process, it was a huge taboo. He had toplete the entire process in one go, and had no room for any hesitation.


    In order to make the crystal core unleash its full power, it must be matched with sufficient magical arrays. Yet, more magical arrays meant there was little room for mistakes during the crafting process, as any slight mistake would cause the crystal core to be destroyed. Therefore on the Adept Continent, anyone who could carve more than ten magical arrays on top of an Adept level crystal core was regarded as a Master Alchemist. Meanwhile, only a Grandmaster of Alchemy could carve sixteen magical arrays on top of a single core in one go.


    Therefore... naturally, the first Adept level golem crafted by Greem was a total failure!


    During the carving process, the heat beam controlled by Greem¡¯s Spirit had stopped at a spot for an additional 0.7 seconds. It poked through the surface of the crystal core and when the internal core was touched by the heat beam, it instantly exploded and disintegrated.


    A crystal core worth more than 4000 magic crystals was destroyed just like that!


    With no time to feel upset or regret and no time to sigh with emotion or indulge in sorrow. Greem simply threw away the residues of the broken crystal core in his hand and waved his arm to shut off the Alchemy Station,id himself on the floor, and sunk into deep slumber once again.


    If time were with him, he could have performed this task after bing an official Adept. At that point, with the help of his Spirit which would have multiplied many times, it would be easier and more rxed than now.


    But time was pressing on him!


    The feeling of urgency had forced him to reinforce his overall strength as soon as possible. Yet, trying to challenge a task at the Adept level with the ability of Pseudo-Adept, he faced unimaginable risks. However, he had no alternative but to choose now.


    Seven hourster, after freshening his Spirit, Greem stood back up, once again in front of the Alchemy Station bravely.


    But too bad, just two hourster, the second crystal core was still a failure.


    This time, Greem didn¡¯t rush toy down. He sat on the cold stone floor with his leg folded, took out some food, and ate it quickly. When he finished his meal, heid t on the nket and sank into a deep sleep. Two teardrops rolled off his face silently, but he wasn¡¯t aware of that.


    Ten hourster, right after his Spirit had been restored to its maximum level, prompted by the Chip, Greem opened his eyes. Inside of his ck and crystal clear eyes, there was no hesitation or helplessness, or even any remorse or regret. There was only tenacity and perseverance with no chance of turning back.


    After thirteen seconds, Greem once again stood in front of the Alchemy Station.


    Perhaps it was because no difficulty was insurmountable if one set his mind to it, or maybe everything woulde easy at the right time, the third crystal core waspleted just like that!


    Greem didn¡¯t roar out loudly and he didn¡¯t cheer with tears bursting out from his eyes. As calm as ever, Greem carefully ced the crystal core in a safe ce. Then he once againid down on the nket and went into a deep and sound sleep.


    Fifteen hourster, the fourth crystal core was a sess too!


    Not until thest magical rune was carved, the entire set of three-dimensional linesposed into a perfectly intact and closed magical array, and the Elementium energy absorbed from the air started to flow freely in the magical rings, did Greem¡¯s rigid face start to have a slight expression.


    He couldn¡¯t tell whether he felt joy or heartache and couldn¡¯t tell if his mind was filled with pleasure or sorrow. The repeated process of having his Spirit depleted and refilled multiple times had long wearied him.


    After cleaning up everything in the Alchemy Laboratory, he shut down the Alchemy Station, walked out from theboratory, and returned to his room. Upon reaching his room, Greem simply let go of everything and fell into a deep sleep.


    He was asleep for a full day and night before he could get rid of the fatigued feeling and escape from a dark nightmare where he kept falling off a cliff into a bottomless abyss. But before he opened his eyes, he was greeted by the delicious aroma of food.


    He opened his eyes and saw that a familiar face was bowed over the bed, looking at him. The pretty face disyed confusion and bewilderment, but most of it looked thoughtful. She carried a wooden tray in her hands. A te of beef fillet dressed with juicy gravy and a few sweet, fluffy white buns could be seen on the tray, along with a te of assorted fresh fruit.


    ¡°Are you hiding something from me?¡± Mary asked slowly.


    Though the man in front of her looked only 16 or 17 years old, he actually possessed a staid and tactful temperament, which even many adults didn¡¯t have, and he always had a look of perfect calm, as if he could aplish any task with ease. Although a man like this could bring confidence and a feeling of dependability to his peers, she just felt that the man had buried his true feelings very deep.


    The current exhausted look was rare for the man. Every time he looked like this, it meant that they were facing a tough issue that was beyond the imagination of ordinary people.


    What kind of tough issue had forced him to this degree of exhaustion?


    Mary was greatly puzzled.


    By rights, now was the period they had the most freedom and leisure! Since both of them had be Pseudo-Adepts, many restrictions that had shackled them in the past had vanished like mist and smoke. Even Adept Anderson had been solicitous and be friendlier.


    As long as they followed the current path and walked steadily, relying on their innate talent and potential, stepping to the pinnacle of the Pseudo-Adept stage was just a matter of one or two years. At that point, if they tried their luck, they might even have the possibility of bing noble Adepts who could control their own fates!


    When that moment came... it would be when they could always keep each otherpany, like birds flying and nesting together, and the moment they officially became spouses!


    Since everything seemed so beautiful, Mary was greatly puzzled about why Greem was still working so hard. With her knowledge about Greem after spending so much time with him, she was sure that there must be a new crisis of a great magnitude ahead, and it was a crisis that she couldn¡¯t sense at all. Otherwise, there was no way this man would work like there was no tomorrow!


    Of course, with Mary¡¯s temperament, she would straightaway ask anything that came to her mind.


    Greem let out a wry smile. He took the meal tray from Mary, staying on his bed, and polished off the foods.


    After he finished his meal, his face filled with a bright smile, Greem grabbed Mary¡¯s tiny palm and started asking about her training. However, secretly, he quickly told Mary everything through Spiritual Whisper.


    Since Mary had noticed something, Greem had no intention of keeping her in dark anymore. He would need her to participate in many things toe, so it was vital to tell her early so that she could mentally prepare.


    Initially, after telling her everything he knew at one go, Greem had prepared to use force to prevent Mary from going on a rampage. But unexpectedly, after learning everything through his Spiritual Whisper, Mary, who supposed to blow a fuse, was actually rather calm. She even... even stared at his face with an interesting expression.


    Could the Mary in front of him be fake?


    Just as Greem started to suspect that he was talking to a dummy, Mary finally chuckled and asked, ¡°You did all this just because of me? They just want to im my life. Why are you making such a desperate effort?¡±


    Although she was talking about a topic concerning her life, looking at her face, which was melting in smiles, it was as if she wasn¡¯t concerned at all.


    Did she know exactly what they were facing? Why wasn¡¯t she showing any concern over her own life but wandering from the subject and talking about something else?


    Greem startled for a brief moment, speechless, and said, ¡°You... because you are my partner!¡±


    Before he could finish his words, a pair of sweet, juicy, and soft lips had locked onto his lips.

 Chapter 139

    The man was masculine and hearty and the girl was seductive and charming; a grand show of eroticism was about to ur.


    But the two performers didn¡¯t throw themselves into the show enthusiastically, and the words quickly exchanged between them would make anyone who heard them speechless.


    ¡°Hey, that thing on your body is so hard! You¡¯ve hurt me...¡±


    ¡°Hmph! If you dare to bite me, I¡¯ll blow you away from here!¡±


    ¡°Alright, alright! Don¡¯t be mad... anyhow, the smell of your blood is getting sweeter, I just can¡¯t help but wish to taste it!¡±


    Mary was now kneeling and sitting intimately on top of Greem¡¯s body, while he was sitting half way up from the bed. Her juicy lips had just left his shoulder and she was touching her pair of tiny fangs andining about the pain. Meanwhile, a small Fire Shield that had suddenly burst out was hovering on top of Greem¡¯s shoulder; the fierce mes had just subsided.


    One of Greem¡¯s hand was gently stroking Mary¡¯s back while the other hand was pressing against her lower abdomen. Both hands were now glowing faintly with red light. With a single thought, the explosion of Fire Elementium could blow Mary away from his body.


    ¡°Greem, the smelling from your body is getting tastier! Couldn¡¯t you please let me taste just a little bit? Just one tiny little bite will do...¡± Mary brought her tongue to her lips. She couldn¡¯t bear it and kept trying to enchant the man.


    But too bad, Greem had long be immune towards her tactics.


    ¡°Hmph. I¡¯m sorry, I don¡¯t have the luck to enjoy it. You female vampires are simply too terrifying! I¡¯m scared that if I really received an ecstatic kiss from you, by the time I stepped down from this bed, I would have dropped back to Advanced Apprentice from Pseudo-Adept! Do you know the situation right now? Don¡¯t be ridiculous!¡±


    ¡°I just can¡¯t stop myself!¡±


    ¡°Ugh... this vampire race¡¯s illness of biting someone when they get excited has really gained a deep root in you...¡±


    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s call a stop for now. Since we still have some time, I¡¯ll need to improve my strength as well!¡± After she finished saying that, a pair ofrge leather bat wings spread out from her back. Following a gentle swinging motion from the wings, she gracefully leapt into the air, flying backward and out from the narrow room.


    She gave Greem a beautiful smile before turning around and leaving.


    As Mary disappeared from his sight, Greem finally breathed out a brief sigh of relief.


    He couldn¡¯t help it. The power of Mary¡¯s charm was getting stronger and she had better learned how to use her innate Natural Charm. Although Greem had confidence that she wouldn¡¯t hurt him, the habit of female vampires where they would simply bite someone when they were aroused really made Greem¡¯s hair stand on end.


    Although both he and Mary were Pseudo-Adepts, once he allowed Mary to bite through the protectiveyer of Fire Shield, the sharp fangs would release a frightening hallucinogenic agent upon contact with his blood. It was a hallucinogenic agent that even he as a Pseudo-Adept did not have immunity for. That was the reason why the fellows with weak resistance factors in their body couldn¡¯t struggle, even as they were killed by Mary¡¯s bloodsucking ability.


    Greem also didn¡¯t have confidence that he could survive the ecstatic kiss of a Pseudo-Adept level female vampire!


    Even though they were having fun just now, the information Greem wished to tell her had been transmitted into her mind using Spiritual Whisper. Yes, Mary was a hot-tempered person, but when she was faced with a life-threatening situation, she still showed prudent behavior. If during normal times, she behaved like a hot-tempered and irritable person, it was because she believed she could solve everything with her sharp fangs and ws, and therefore, she was toozy to employ any treacherous plot or scheme.


    However, when her enemy was an official Adept, the profound knowledge and life experience she had umted during her apprenticeship would instinctively tell her what to do. This was also a must-have survival skill for every single Apprentice Adept!


    When fist and fireball could solve everything, using force to break through the tough situation was the easiest approach! And when fist and fireball couldn¡¯t crack the nut, the smart brain of an Apprentice was something that no one could underestimate!


    Greem stepped down from his bed and walked slowly to the living hall. He recited a short incantation and summoned a smooth mirror of water. He took a few slow turns in front of the mirror, giving his own body a serious look.


    After he had gone through the washing in the undergroundva ocean, his current body waspletely different from the past. The tall and burly body was now d in a simple long robe; by putting out slight force, bits of lean muscles would poke right out. He had dark red skin, long dark red hair, and there was even a ring of tiny dark red spots surrounding his ck pupils.


    Flowing under the tough muscle was a copious amount of bodily strength. With his current muscle strength, he could fight face to face with an Iron Rhinoceros. With his Physique and the toughness of his muscle, he could resist the piercing of some small sharp weapons. Taking the super high resistance and personal protection of his me Body into consideration, he could even take a walk naked in the Magical Swamp and only a handful of demons could hurt him.


    And that was not because the level of demons in the Magical Swamp was not high!


    Although he was only 17 years old, his two meter tall burly body and the glossy skin hardly anyone would believe that he was just a teenager who hadn¡¯t reached adulthood. Both the firm muscle and the dark red skin tone had given him an impressive touch of evilness and charm.


    Just as Greem was admiring his near perfect body, a chuckle that spoiled the pleasure suddenly broke out from the side.


    ¡°Eh, I never know you had such a hobby? You¡¯re growing into a narcissist now!¡±


    It was Mary!


    Greem rolled his eyes. Only Mary could enter his residence freely and never knocked the door before she came! Also, she could move at high speeds and lightly; on many asions, even the Chip could hardly detect her until she drew very close.


    Embarrassed, Greem waved his hand and dispelled the water mirror. Then, with a shake of both arms, all of the magical equipment scattered over the floor flew back onto his body, armoring him rapidly.


    ¡°I thought you had gone for training? Why did youe back?¡± Greem asked grumpily.


    As he had just gone through a few days of painful torture, he was nning to give himself a half day¡¯s break so that he could just rx and enjoy the happiness and joy brought by his skyrocketed overall strength.


    ¡°Hmph! Do you really think I like to watch how you pose yourself in front of a mirror? Your old friend is here; that¡¯s what I¡¯m here to tell you about!¡±


    ¡°Old friend?¡±


    ¡°That Alice who was defeated twice by you. She is now standing right in front of the Swampy Tower main entrance and is demanding to see you in person!¡±


    Greem drew in a cold breath instantly. He had just begun to feel the beauty of the life, but now he was struck with a headache.


    ............


    At the main entrance of the Swampy Tower.


    d in a long princess dress, the petite doll-like Alice was standing right in front of the main entrance, expressionless. Even though she didn¡¯t express any emotions, there was an oppressive and low-pressure force field that kept emanating from her tiny body, pressing against the two Advanced Apprentices in front of her and making them furrow their brows.


    A Beginner Apprentice, Tony, who used to be rather ¡®familiar¡¯ to Greem,y in pain at her feet. Both his arms were twisted like dough. If he didn¡¯t go through a full healing, it would likely be extremely tough to recover.


    Though it was Madwoman and Hawkeye Clutha who blocked Alice, they showed no intention to attack the little girl. It was because they actually sensed a Pseudo-Adept level spiritual ripplee from the ¡®petite and cute¡¯ Alice.


    This was the only kind of spiritual ripple that made them hate with gnashing teeth!


    Because... because in just the short period of half a year, they had repeatedly sensed it at least three or four times!


    Damn it, since when did the Pseudo-Adept stage became so easy to achieve? How were there so many new Pseudo-Adepts appearing in front of them!


    To be honest, Madwoman and Hawkeye had no opinion with regards to any outsiders who became Pseudo-Adepts. However, when, one after another, ¡®familiar¡¯ people around them suddenly became Pseudo-Adepts, yet it had been so long for them and they had hardly obtained any critical breakthroughs; this was the main reason why they hated and were jealous to their bones!


    Just as they joined forces and barely held up the brutal and violent spiritual pressureing from Alice, they heard footstepsing from inside the tower behind them. It was Greem and Mary who walked out side by side.


    Alice suddenly retracted her spiritual pressure. Then she threw her cold nce onto Greem¡¯s face like a razor-sharp de. Madwoman and Hawkeye, who were struggling miserably from the pressure, instantly felt the burden lift. Without hesitation, they quickly moved backwards and gave way to Greem. Though their hearts were filled with hate, when the two Pseudo-Adepts, Greem and Mary, made their appearance, they couldn¡¯t help but breathe out a sigh of relief.


    The spiritual ripples of Alice and Greem collided in midair. Then they retracted it at the same time.


    She had be a Pseudo-Adept!


    He had also advanced into the realm of Pseudo-Adepts!


    An astonishment of unknown sentiment surged up in both hearts at the same time.


    Compared to the past, both of them had significant changed, from their outward appearance to their temperament. However, there was no way they could fake their spiritual ripple. Therefore, just through brief contact, they immediately realized the transformation of their opponent. Of course, what had changed and what remained the same was still obvious, as always, which made both of them gnash their teeth in hatred!


    ¡°Are you here to have another fight with me or are you here to fulfill your pledge?¡± Greem crossed his arms on his chest, touching his clean chin with one hand. Following the improvement of his overall strength, his self-confidence had taken a leap; together with that, his personal charisma had increased significantly as well.


    ¡°I¡¯m here to, of course, I¡¯m here to... to...¡± Initially, Alice, who hade with an imposing manner, had intended to unt her prowess. However, when faced with Greem, who was not any weaker than her, for some unknown reason, she actually lost some of her confidence. ¡°Last time was just an ident, this... if you can defeat me this time, I¡¯ll be sincerely convinced!¡±


    ¡°Are you sure this is thest time? And there won¡¯t be a fourth time, or fifth time...¡± Greem tilted his body forward slightly, so he sent forth a stronger sense of pressure.


    ¡°Bullsh... Nonsense! You only defeated me once... the first time I was defeated because of the sneak attack that came from that rascal female vampire. That didn¡¯t count...¡± Though she realized her oppressive air was weakening, Alice still clenched her fists tightly, wanting to fight for her honor. ¡°Also... also if I defeat you this time, I¡¯ll not kill you... I¡¯ll spare you once too, and give you a chance to seek your revenge...¡±


    After she finished saying that, she once again held her head high and snorted coldly at Greem.


    ¡°It seems like you lost to me in the previous fight. Why should I use my own possessions to bet with again?¡± Greem let out an evilugh, with a weird expression of flirting a little loli.


    ¡°Hmph! I knew you would say this!¡± Alice said, like she was disdainful and refuting Greem. She reached her hand into the air and pulled out a magical scroll that emanated with a startling magical ripple. ¡°Not long ago, you visited the territory of the Zuber Family and wreaked havoc, nearly destroying their resource site. If not for Granny Endor helping you stop this crisis, do you think you could have escaped from the revenge of the Zuber Family? Their Second Grade Adept almoste here to strangle you! Do you really think they are just a bunch of idiots and cannot figure out the trouble you caused underground?¡±


    The expression on Greem¡¯s face became rigid.


    True enough, he had been rather thoughtless in what he did, as he had only concentrated on how to strengthen his overall strength. He had neglected the possible reaction of the Molten Giants. He had gone too far by destroying their ancestor¡¯s graveyard!


    ¡°So, what do you want?¡± Greem now spoke in a milder tone.


    ¡°So long as you ept my challenge and fight another round with me, we, the Northern Witches, will assume part of your responsibility in causing that trouble. Now, sign this magical scroll. With that, it will make sure we fulfill our pledge!¡±


    ¡°Is this all you want? Since you¡¯re so eager to defeat me and get rid of the pledge you made before, don¡¯t tell me you are from the n of Destiny Witches?¡± With the aid from the Chip, Greem knew nearly all of the experts from the different powerful ns throughout the entire Adept Continent. That was why he could sense something from Alice¡¯s eager attitude.


    ¡°That is none of your business! My only question for you is whether you want to sign it or not. Sign the contract and we¡¯ll have a new bet. If you win, I¡¯ll still be your ve, and we¡¯ll bear the responsibility. If you lose, we¡¯ll still help you, but all previous pledges between us will be voided. I¡¯ll not kill you, but grant you the opportunity to seek your revenge. So, are you going to sign it or not?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll sign it! Of course I will! You¡¯re going to suffer from this!¡± Greem burst intoughter.


    As his words left his mouth and rippled through the space, the magical scroll suddenly broke out into fierce mes.

 Chapter 140

    When the Chain of Principle merged into their body, indicating that the contract had taken effect, the dust for the new bet finally settled down and there was no way they could alter anything.


    However, before either party could say anything in response, thick ck smoke suddenly burst out from a sea snail pendant hanging at Alice¡¯s waist. After that, it condensed into the wrinkled and aged face of the Poisonous Witch, Endor.


    ¡°Alice, what mischief are you getting up to again? I thought I just asked you have him revoke thest pledge? Why is there suddenly a new bet on the contract?¡± As the lips made from smoke moved, a dreadful, hoarse, and deep voice, like the hissing of a poisonous snake, echoed out into the scene.


    ¡°Granny, please don¡¯t interfere. I¡¯ll definitely defeat him this time! Could you have forgotten that I¡¯m a Pseudo-Adept now? Besides... I¡¯ve learned that skill...¡± Putting away her previous fierce and stern manner, Alice spoke with that Poisonous Witch using a sweet and fawning voice.


    Obviously, Endor too was very confident in Alice¡¯s overall strength. When she saw Alice¡¯s resolute attitude, she couldn¡¯t help but waver a little from her stance. But when the smoky face of the Poisonous Witch turned towards Greem, her eyes immediately went wide, and she cried out with an unbelieving voice, ¡°What is going on? This is absurd! Why is he a Pseudo-Adept too now? No way, I¡¯d definitely not...¡±


    But too bad, before she could finish her words, Alice gently patted on the sea snail, using spatial force to iste it from the outside world. Without the support of the magical equipment, the smoky and incorporeal head of Endor immediately vanished into thin air.


    ¡°Alright, now there is no one that can interfere with us. Come, let¡¯s find a ce and begin our fight!¡± Apparently, Alice had made up her mind, regardless of if she would be punished by the Poisonous Witchter.


    After saying that, Alice turned around, and with a brief swaying movement of her body, she disappeared from where she stood. When she appeared again, she hovered in midair some 300 meters away.


    A slight frown appeared on Greem¡¯s brow.


    This Alice indeed had extraordinary talent with Spatial Magic. She had shown her ability to use Spatial Teleportation smoothly, without causing the slightest ripple and not even showing any sign prior. Greem was going to fight a tough battle today, as he was faced with an opponent who had total control of every inch of the space within the battlefield!


    Greem dared not underestimate her. He waved his hand and tossed out a few element cores. Within a split second, they transformed into his once strongest fighter: the Lightning Giant. Upon its debut, all the apprentices of the Swampy Tower who had clustered around were extremely shocked. Their eyes were instantly filled with an awestruck expression that could not be hidden. Madwoman and Hawkeye had a more direct feeling, and the look in their eyes was much moreplicated.


    They could sense it vividly. Not only Greem, even this elemental golem he had summoned possessed a terrifying overall strength that could torture them easily.


    Greem again took out a bottle of the advanced healing potion he had brought back from the Underground Cave, gently tossed it over to Tony¡¯s side. He was now lying on the ground and not moving even a tiny bit. Greem nodded his head slightly towards the wounded apprentice. After that, the Lightning Giant leaned forward and grabbed Greem with its huge palm and a fierce wind suddenly blew by as it transformed into a whirlwind, streaking through the air, following closely behind Alice.


    Mary snorted coldly. She didn¡¯t morph into a bloodsucking bat like in the past. With a shing movement of her body, she leapt into the sky. Her tall and graceful body stopped in midair for a brief second before a pair of huge bat wings spread out on her back and then started to p in a violent manner, giving her incredible speed as she chased behind the duo.


    Since she had be a Pseudo-Adept, she had been able to perform partial morphing. Never again would she have to face a situation where she couldn¡¯t fly when she was in a human form, yet couldn¡¯t use any Blood element magic spells when she morphed. The present Mary was considered as having truly mastered the bat morphing ability of the vampires.


    Using their own distinctive methods, the three Pseudo-Adepts rushed through the sky like three shooting stars and left the Magical Swamp, heading toward a wilderness not far away.


    When they were inside the boundary of the Magical Swamp, every act and every move was under the surveince of Adept Anderson, so it was tough for them to put all of their skills and tricks into y. As a result, without prior arrangement, they had chosen a wilderness where no one was around as their battlefield.


    After the three Pseudo-Adepts finally disappeared from their line of sight, all of the remaining apprentices had their face filled with all sorts of expressions. Some looked like they had lost all hope, some were beaming with joy, some sank into deep ponderings, some had mixed feelings of jealousy and hatred... Madwoman furiously mmed her huge sword onto the ground; the iron sword, even without sharp edges, immediately sunk a few inches deep into the stone ground.


    As the veteran apprentice experts of the Swampy Tower, they had actually fallen to the status of bystanders who these few fellows had never paid attention to. The significant psychological gap had given them a depressive emotion. They exchanged nces, trying their best to hold back the bitter taste in their mouths. They didn¡¯t even have the mood to talk with each other, simply turning around and returning to the tower with their hearts filled with disappointment.


    Meanwhile, at a ce some twenty miles away from the Magical Swamp, with just a slight sh of her body, Alice appeared in a wilderness that covered arge piece ofnd. The ce was fully grown over with withered and yellow weeds that reached waist-height; under the constant blowing of the shivering and dry wind, they leaned from side to side, giving the ce a touch of destion.


    No one knew what kind of ability Alice had obtained after she became a Pseudo-Adept, that it actually gave her such strong confidence. Nevertheless,pared to her, Greem too had explosive self-confidence, and showed a look of eagerly wanting to fight.


    When he saw Alice hadnded and was waiting for his arrival, Greem controlled the Lightning Giant and soared up high into the sky. Using his special Elementium Vision, he gave the surroundings of the battlefield a quick scan. Once he confirmed that there weren¡¯t any traps, he returned to the ground with a flicker.


    At the same time, Mary, who was d in a red dress, also rushed her way to the battle site with the help of her ck wings. Shended not too far away from the center of the battlefield.


    ¡°Hmph, since both of you are here, then I¡¯ll fight both of you at the same time!¡± Alice was standing under a crooked tree, wearing a face of disdain and arrogance.


    The feverish and hot-tempered Mary¡¯s blue eyes turned bloodshot instantly. She spread her wings and bared her fangs, ready to leap at the arrogant little girl at once. But in the next second, a sudden thunderbolt struck from the sky above, casting out a violent electrical web and blocking her from going further.


    ¡°Don¡¯t fall into her trap! If you really fight her now, I¡¯ll be considered as viting the contract. At that point, even if we defeat her, most probably she will use this as an excuse to tear up the contract.¡± Greem walked down from the Lightning Giant¡¯s palm, looked at Mary, and shook his head.


    ¡°Hmph! Such impudent thoughts can onlye from someone as despicable as you! With your lousy skills and pathetic innate talent, what makes you think you canpare to me, the great Alice? You¡¯re merely a little vampire, and you won¡¯t make any difference at all. If you don¡¯t want to see this guy die in an awful manner, you better fight together with him!¡± Alice scolded angrily, with her hands on her hips, portraying a look of disdain towards Mary.


    If it were in the past, the impulsive Mary would have already dashed forward without thinking twice. However, it was obvious that she had gained a greater control over her bloodline innate talent. Hence, when faced with Alice¡¯s provocation, though her fangs were bared and she had a threatening look, her bat wings flipped and slowly brought her body backward, leaving the battlefield for the duo.


    Unknowingly, Mary¡¯s trust towards Greem was approaching blindness. In her opinion, Greem never fought a battle unprepared, and since he had dared to ept a challenge from the arrogant and cocky Alice, he must have a method to deal with her.


    As the result, with regards to Greem¡¯s battle, she wasn¡¯t worried at all!


    Upon noticing that the female vampire wasn¡¯t provoked and had simply left the battlefield, the doll-like Alice furiously vented her anger by tearing the weeds around her, murmuring in her mouth like she was cursing viciously.


    ¡°That¡¯s enough. There aren¡¯t any other people here, so you don¡¯t have to keep wearing that cute mask of yours. An apprentice who can be a Pseudo-Adept at such a young age, I¡¯m sure you must be a wicked girl with a ck-hearted and vicious approach. Since you wish to defeat me to prove your overall strength, show me what you have!¡± Greem taunted with a disdainful expression; he had no intention of taking pity on the weak.


    ¡°I¡¯ll show you what I have, and you¡¯ll definitely regret your decision today!¡± Alice gnashed her teeth furiously.


    When the conversation is disagreeable, saying even one word more is a waste of breath!


    Though they were both Pseudo-Adepts, true respect always came after a real fight.


    Nearly at the same time, both parties¡¯ eyes flickered with a stern look. Without saying another word, they initiated their attack.


    Swift of foot like a wind, quick like a greased lightning; these descriptions were nothing in front of Alice¡¯s Spatial Teleportation. Relying on this ability allowed her to move anywhere she wanted, and any opponent¡¯s movement was like a still image in her eyes.


    Nearly right after both of them decided to attack, Alice appeared less than five meters from Greem. Yet, her body suddenly came to a halt as a half-sphere shaped, frightening electrical web descended from the sky andpletely covered Greem. If she took a half-step further, the high-voltage current slithering over the electrical web would instantly burn her body.


    Meanwhile, inside of the electrical web, it had turned into a world of leaping me.


    The Ring of Fire bursting out from that damn rascal¡¯s body nearly covered every single inch of the space inside; not only the grass and dirt on the ground, even the seemingly empty air started to burn. Yet, the cocky guy just gave Alice a smile before his entire body merged into the fierce mes.


    Seeing that its master hadpleted his Fire element defense, the Lightning Giant, who was hovering in midair, dispelled the Electrical Barrier. After that, the gigantic body, made up of countless greenish gray vortexes, instantly transformed into a sharp arrow, dashing ferociously towards Alice.


    At the same time, from within the Ring of Fire, which had exploded into a massive sea of me, three Fire Balls shot out, rushing through the air and hurtling towards Alice¡¯s petite and fragile body.


    Though she was faced with a joint attack from top and bottom, no fear could be seen on Alice¡¯s face. With just a sh, she disappeared from where she stood and reappeared on the other side of the Ring of Fire. Right after she reappeared, she performed a pulling and tearing gesture with her hands and a deadly Spatial Crack appeared between her hands.


    It was a mystery about how she could control it; the spatial crack actually produced an enormous pulling force. All of the Fire Elementiums swimming within the Ring of Fire were immediately pulled into the spatial crack like flying moths darting into me, disappearing without a trace. In less than three seconds, the part of the sea of me closest to her was sucked dry, exposing the charred surface of the ground and the grass ashes flying around in the heatwave.


    During this brief moment, the Lightning Giant once again leapt towards the enemy. Before it arrived, a dazzling Lightning Chain streaked through the air and approached the enemy.


    She teleported a few times, but every time, she could only attack for a few seconds before the hateful Lightning Giant tracked her down and came towards her. In the aspect of high-speed moving alone, the Lightning Giant¡¯s Lightning Jump was not much weaker than Alice¡¯s Spatial Teleportation.


    After several attempts, Alice finally grew angry again.


    With a Spatial Teleportation, she jumped to a high altitude some 200 meters away. Alice had stopped trying to attack Greem; instead, she loosened her hair and started to recite a mysterious magical spell in a loud voice. When the Lightning Giant once again tracked her down and approached her, using her tiny hand, Alice pointed at it angrily.


    ¡°Ammitten... Rosa, Spatial Seal!¡±


    A silver beam shot out from Alice¡¯s tiny finger, piercing through the air at top speed to hit the space right in front of the Lightning Giant. Right after that, countless silver chains made from runes stretched out from the space, coiling and tightly tying the Lightning Giant¡¯s body instantly.


    At the same time, at the spot where the silver beam hit, a spatial hole suddenly opened up and the silver rune chains dragged the Lightning Giant into it before disappearing.


    In the next second, Greem lost track of the position of the Lightning Giant!

 Chapter 141

    Within the depths of the ming ocean.


    A cluster of leaping me suddenly twisted and transformed, revealing Greem¡¯s face, which had a rather shocked and startled expression.


    For golems, who were a kind of elemental summon, seals or expelling magic was their biggest enemy. Of course, it was impossible for either type of magic spell to cause any damage to the golem itself, but they were capable of temporarily banishing the golem from the battlefield.


    With Alice¡¯s achievements in Spatial Magic, even if the Lightning Giant struggled with all its strength, it would still have to stay in that isted spatial for more than fifteen minutes. During this period of time, Greem would lose any aid from this formidable fighter, and would be forced to step out and face the aggressive Alice personally.


    A gentle ripple spread out in the space.


    Alice appeared in front of the massive ming ocean that covered nearly one hundred meters in circumference. Her face was beamed with a sweet and cute smile.


    ¡°Big brother, where are you? Are you ying hide and seek with Alice? Then you better hide properly! Alice ising for you...¡± The voice was sweet and enchanting, but the shivering gleam shooting out from the depths of her eyes would make anyone who saw it tremble.


    Greem¡¯s face quickly reappeared from the other cluster of me. Looking at Alice, he let out a cold smile and said, ¡°It seems you have learned something new. I certainly didn¡¯t expect you to have learned a Seal Magic Spell. I¡¯m hiding inside the me. Catch me if you can!¡±


    Right after he finished saying that, the face faded away and transformed back into a soaring me that sent forth deadly heat. Meanwhile, using his home advantage, he teleported himself to hide on the other side of the me field. Within seconds, tworge spatial des in an x-pattern streaked through the ce where he had showed his face previously.


    The me shattered, bursting into a devastating heat wave.


    If he hadn¡¯t run quick enough, he would have been wounded by the frightening Spatial Cut Alice unleashed.


    This was the defensive tactic Greem had designed for himself.


    After he had seeded in turning his body into a me Body, both his elemental resistance and his physical resistance had improved hugely. However, he still couldn¡¯t change the weakness of his ¡®short-legs¡¯. Within all his body attributes, currently his Agility was his biggest weakness and his slow speed had be his deadliest impediment.


    In order to close up this breach, Greem had utilized the Inferno Force Field and me Body to create a massive me field. After that, relying on the copious amount of Fire Elementiums gathered by the me field, Greem had finally been able to move at high speeds without any issue. From time to time, he could also use the Elemental Nodes found in the Inferno Force Field to fulfill his dream of short-distance Fire Teleportation.


    This also meant that if enemies couldn¡¯t destroy his me field, they would have to hold back their anger and chase behind him as he disappeared and reappeared randomly, suffering all the while from the endless fire attacks he unleashed.


    Faced with Greem¡¯s provocation, Alice¡¯s smile became even sweeter. Casually, she created a zigzagging spatial crack and tossed it into the me field. She twisted her body and dodged a huge dreadful hand made up from fire, and then, with a sh, she appeared at another ce of the battlefield.


    Alice wasn¡¯t rushed, so she just teleported herself to a new spot after each attack. Every time, she created a half-meter long spatial crack and tossed it towards a random ce within the me field. As time went on, gradually, aside from being filled with steaming heat waves, the me field was now packed with countless seemingly insignificant, yet slow moving, spatial cracks.


    These spatial cracks kept devouring mes that drew too close to them. At the same time, any object that shed into them split apart without making any noise. Their sharpness wasparable to top grade magical equipment. The few times that Greem shed with them while moving inside the ocean of fire, if not for the fact that he was protected by Inferno Shield, just his me Body wouldn¡¯t have been enough to withstand the cuts from the deadly spatial cracks.


    Whenever Greem touched a random spatial crack, in the next second, the spot where he had stood would be covered with a swarm of spatial cracks. That damn Alice actually could shrink so many spatial cracks and toss them out like marbles.


    When faced with this kind of broad attacks, Greem had no choice but to rely on short-distance Fire Teleportation to dodge them.


    However, with the increasing number of spatial cracks that were wandering around in the me field, the number of nodes that he could use for a safe teleportation had be very small. Greem was like a lone wolf being cornered by several hunters; his heart had started to fill up with frustration and anger.


    Earlier, he had tossed out the Demon Alligator Hunter to distract Alice¡¯s attention. But too bad, upon revealing itself, the Earth element golem, who had gone through some good times with him, was immediately riddled with countless spatial cracks unleashed by Alice and nearly became scrap.


    Following the improvement of Greem¡¯s overall strength, the enemies he faced had also be stronger. The Demon Alligator Hunter, who merely had the overall strength of an Advanced Apprentice, could now only y the role of cannon fodder and could no longer be the main character of the battlefield.


    After being invaded by countless of Alice¡¯s spatial cracks, the me field unleashed by Greem was shrinking; many regions within it had their Fire Elementium sucked dry. As a result, Greem was forced to reveal himself!


    At this critical moment, Greem swung the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his hand, summoning a tall Fire Deity from within the sea of me, and used it to block off the shower of spatial magic spells cast by Alice.


    For the first time since the battle had begun, Alice set foot into the boundaries of the me field.


    Though Alice was unbridled and arrogant, she was not silly! Before the me field was destroyed, she would never step into a field that wasn¡¯t controlled by her.


    But as the me was shrinking, the area upied by the sea of me had shrunk to less than half of its original size and it was filled with many empty regions where mes had vanished. Hence, faced with an enemy who had lost his ability to fight back and with the idea of humiliating the guy face to face, Alice finally stepped into the outer area of the me field.


    Under her feet the soil was charred and ck, all of the grass had turned into ashes floating in the air as a result of being covered by the deadly high-temperature me. The air was filled with high-temperature traps and spatial mes, and no breathable air existed inside of the me field. If Alice had been a mere mortal, she would have long been toasted into a dried corpse by the high temperature and then burned into a charcoal by the deadly me.


    Yet she was like a cute little girl taking a happy stroll in the royal garden, holding the end of her skirt gently, walking on tiptoe half a meter above the ground. It was as if there was apletely transparent path underneath her feet, sparing her from touching the thickyer of ashes on the ground.


    Just like that, Alice moved step by step like a fairy in a merry mood and drew closer to Greem, who had retreated to the center of the me field.


    Greem was finally hurt!


    While he had been moving in the me field, he had identally mmed into a wandering spatial crack. When the Inferno Shield, which had suffered from terrible damage, shed with the spatial crack, it instantly exploded into sparks and res and shot in all directions. It was toote to dodge and the spatial crack brushed over his left arm.


    Without a sound, the flesh on his arm vanished. Even his arm bone had a cut of shining gold. It was a jagged cut, as if it had been bitten by a ferocious beast.


    Bright red blood burst out from the wound, quickly flowing down from Greem¡¯s arm.


    However, there were swaying res attached to the top of the blood, which made it look like a tiny fire serpent slithering on his body. After his body had transformed into a me Body, even his blood had changed and be different from others.


    Hiding some three miles away and watching the battle, Mary couldn¡¯t bear it and lightly licked her juicy lips. She felt a pain in her heart as she watched thatrge concentration of ming blood go to waste. As for the dangerous situation Greem was facing now, she paid no attention at all.


    After being together for so long, she had a very good understanding of the ¡®crafty¡¯ little man. He would fight desperately to profit at other people¡¯s expense and would rather die than suffer any losses. This was the true motto of his life. Since he currently looked like a masochist, then he must have a powerful approach that could defeat the enemy.


    Simr to Alice, who liked to stand facing the enemy and enjoy the despairing look in their eyes, Greem also loved to create misconceptions for his enemies and make them feel like they were standing at the pinnacle of their life. And yet what happened next would be the fearsome process of him using his strongest approach and bringing his enemies down from the pinnacle, sending them into a bottomless abyss!


    First step, second step...


    Third step... fourth step...


    As Alice approached slowly, both of them finally stood face to face at a very close distance.


    Fifty meters! For the two formidable Pseudo-Adepts, it was a super close distance where they could touch each other just by stretching out their hand and they could hear each other¡¯s breathing!


    ¡°So, are you giving up your struggle? Without those elemental golems, with just your pathetic strength, how could youpare to me, the great Alice? Keep on struggling! Let out your miserable cries! I want to rip your disgusting face into pieces... hahaha...¡±


    As sheughed frantically, Alice pulled the silver chain in her hand. Behind her, the Fire Deity, who was tightly tied by hundreds of thousands of rune chains, immediately copsed with a loud boom. Its entire body exploded into falling res that nketed the sky.


    This gave a touch of ruthlessness and savageness to her aggressive manner.


    Yet Greem, who had all of his retreats blocked by silver rune chains poking out from the spatial cuts, was still wearing a bright smile on his face as he looked at the little loli, who was enjoying the pleasure of finally getting her full revenge. He suddenly pointed behind Alice with his finger.


    ¡°Look behind you... look behind you... hurry up and look over your shoulder!¡±


    Alice tilted her head up and let out a pleased, piercingugh into the sky. ¡°What? Don¡¯t you have any other approach? How could you use such a boring approach and try to sneak...¡±


    Before she could finish her words, a fierce wind suddenly approached from behind her, blotting out the sky and covering up the earth. With tremendous momentum, it nketed the area she was standing in within a split second.


    The temperature of the air climbed up with terrifying speed; within the time it took to blink an eye, it approached nearly 4000oC. Out of nowhere, countless pure white mes emerged in the space and burned through every single inch of the area. It even caused the spatial structure that Alice could freely control to be unstable.


    Alice turned back, shocked.


    A great menacing ming Giant was stooping like a cloud, stretching out a gigantic ming hand, trying to grab her!


    ¡°Ahhhhhh!¡± An ear-splitting screech echoed from the battlefield as Alice mmed through the spatial cut in front of her, hiding in the boundless void she was familiar with.


    The gigantic ming hand roared over the ce where she had stood. Five deep trenches were immediately carved out on the ground, and they slowly filled with charred ck soil.

 Chapter 142

    Alice couldn¡¯t escape very far!


    In order to stop her from shing around and fighting with guerri warfare, Greem was willing to take some damage so that he could scheme her into his trap. Strictly speaking, if Alice could put away her proud attitude and didn¡¯t care if the scene turned ugly, she could be near invincible among all of the Apprentice Adepts!


    Even though he owned the Lightning Giant, who was a Pseudo-Adept level fighter, and even aided by an elite warrior like the Fire Deity, Greem still didn¡¯t have the confidence to defeat and capture Alice. It was all because Alice¡¯s innate talent in spatial magic was simply heaven-defying!


    When you just poured in all your effort and unleashed a great attack, she simply teleported to a far distance and watched you act like a fool. When you rxed a little bit, she would teleport back in front of you. Faced with an opponent like this, even if one¡¯s overall strength was stronger than hers, perhaps he would be tortured into bing half-insanity by her.


    Since today was the debut of his brand new golem, the Fire Lord, Greem had no intention of turning the scene into a lowedy of lions hunting for flies. Hence, he had put in a huge amount of effort, and even went into the battle personally, with the goal of luring Alice into the me field that he had prepared for her.


    With the help of the chaotic me field, and together with the Elementium turbulence that distracted one¡¯s spiritual sense, Greem was able to sneakily bury the core of his brand new golem into the soil and wait patiently for Alice to arrive on the battlefield he had prepared.


    He had guessed that, with Alice¡¯s character, if there was a chance that she could humiliate him face to face, the treacherous little loli would never let it slip away from her.


    In order to improve the mightiness of his brand new golem, together with the core, Greem had also buried a few supreme quality Fire Diamonds and Fire Stones he obtained from the underground volcano. When Alice set her mind at ease and came daring to the predetermined position, Greem had finally summoned his trump card: The Fire Lord.


    Fire Lord. Adept level element golem, arge-scale and double-elements creatures of Earth and Fire. Basic body attribute: Strength ¨C 14, Agility ¨C 8, Physique ¨C 16, Spirit ¨C 21. Element magic spells mastered by it: Lava Armor, Shroud of me, Fire Core Explosion, Firestorm, Meteor Shower, Earth Quake, Elemental Summoning, Fire Teleportation, Fire Cage.


    Aside from the Earth Quake being a pure Earth element magic spell and the Fire Teleportation and Firestorm being pure Fire element magic spells, the rest of them were all mixed magic spells of Earth and Fire element. More importantly, the Fire Lord had also mastered the skill of Elemental Summoning, which was the best ability for a gang fight.


    At fifteen minute intervals, the Fire Lord was able to randomly summon twenty Fire element creatures from the Fire Element ne. From a Fire Deity of a Pseudo-Adept level down to Fire Bats of Beginner Apprentice level, who answered the summon and came through the space was based on pure luck!


    Yet, what Greem used to deal with Alice was the only imprison type magic spell the Fire Lord knew, the Fire Cage. Using the double-element characteristics of Earth and Fire, the magic spell could produce a near isted space in a particr region. Using this magic spell, the Fire Lord could force some opponents to fight a melee battle.


    Right after Alice broke through the space, and before she could get far enough, she was forced out from theyer of space by a hugeva pir thaty in front of her. When she was once again returned to the material ne, she was shocked to find that she had been trapped inside of a gigantic ming cage, 30 meters in width and length.


    Each of theva rock pirs constructed in the ming cage had a diameter of half a meter and there were huge gaps between these pirs. With her body size, she could easily squeeze through them. However, before she could put this thought into action, bright red res started to burst out from between theva rock pirs and clusters of scorching hot me had filled the gap. Soon, the ming cage waspletely sealed.


    Any creature that tried to get close to the pirs would have to withstand 8 points of fire damage every second!


    Meanwhile, the six meter tall Fire Lord was running toward her from behind her with heavy steps that shook the ground.


    The look of the Fire Lord was rather simr to a Fire Deity, yet it was stronger and more ferocious. The human-shaped body waspletely made up of materialized fire and was covered with ayer of Lava Armor filled with dark red patterns.


    The entire body was enshrouded in leaping me and flowingva. Wherever it stood, the ground would be toasted dry by the extreme heat. The dark soil and sand would start to soften and became glowing red, eventually melting into a substance that looked likeva.


    The color of the me outside of its body was bright red, yet the me inside of its body was pure white. One could even see a shade of gold at the core of it. It had a pair of gigantic palms made from condensedva. Ferociously high temperature res and me were emanating from their cracks, making them into a pair of deadly palms covered in violent me.


    The space within the ming cage wasn¡¯t big. It was surrounded by ming fire pirs that no one could get close to and there was a Fire Lord who crazily punched and attacked the enemy. From time to time, it would raise both hands high up in the air and unleash an AoE Fire Core Explosion or Firestorm.


    Abination like this instantly drove Alice to desperation.


    Alice kept teleporting herself crazily and running for her life within the confined space of the cage while trying her best to search for the weak point of this isted space. But it was a pity that the ominous environment didn¡¯t allow her to halt even a brief second, hence she wasn¡¯t able to focus her attack at the constantly moving weak point. Instead, the dreadfully high temperature and the me that filled every inch of the space had worn away at her Protection Barrier, making it as thin as a piece of paper.


    The Spatial Cut she unleashed did slice through some of theva rock pirs and shattered them, causing me and sparks to leap everywhere. But too bad, following the cirction of a red glow on theva pirs, all damage done to them was instantly repaired. As for attacking the Fire Lord directly, Alice had also tried that, yet all of her hard efforts had yielded no result.


    After all, Fire Lord was a real Adept level golem and it had cost Greem 18 points of Spirit to summon. If the me Body hadn¡¯t been able to reduce the cost of all Fire element magic spell to half, it would have been impossible for him to deploy it and Lightning Giant at the same time.


    Nevertheless, the debut of such formidable golem always meant catastrophe. With Alice¡¯s current overall strength, she could only flee at the mere sight of the oing attack and there was no possibility that she could fight it head to head. If the ming cage hadn¡¯t existed, with just a teleportation, Alice could have always escaped from the attack range of the Fire Lord. Then she could have just fled without turning back.


    But now...


    What would be the consequences when a person was ced in a cage together with a fierce lion?


    No matter how crazily Alice dodged, the me in the air still burned through her Protection Barrier. Her dress was kindle, her long hair started to curl up, and one after another blisters started to appear on her delicate skin... Wherever she went she would be greeted with me; the air was filled with scorching hot res and everywhere had a deadly high temperature. Where could she run?


    Even under such a miserable and tragic situation, even if Alice¡¯s voice turned hoarse as a result of constantly letting out pained shrieks, and even if her face was washed with tears, she still clenched her jaw tightly and didn¡¯t want to bow her head and admit defeat to her damn enemy!


    If she was defeated once again today, she would rather be killed instantly in this ce, a ce that brought her despair!


    Finally, the fire poison that existed in every inch of the air invaded her body, turning her feet heavy so that she could barely move and her vision started to sway and blurr. Eventually, through her tear-filled vision, thest image she saw was the frighteningly gigantic hand of the Fire Lord grabbing toward her and filling up her entire line of sight.


    Losing all her strength, Alice rxed her tensed mind and her consciousness immediately sank into a vast darkness.


    ............


    She had no idea how long she had lost consciousness for.


    When a stream of pure and sweet water flowed into her dried and cracked mouth, Alice finally regained her conscious.


    She choked on the water and kept coughing, yet she still swallowed, in her mind, the most refreshing and sweet dew, with big gulps. When her belly was bloated and could no longer swallow anymore, only then did she stop this nearly insane behavior.


    She was in a simple and neat apprentice¡¯s residence. She couldn¡¯t find a magnificent andfortable bed, no luxurious furniture, and no glittering magical crystalmps. The only thing she saw was a simple wooden bed, a wooden table, a chair, and some experimental equipment, like jars and bottles that weremonly seen among apprentices.


    In front of the bed stood a man holding a water-skin and staring at her silently. Of course, the man was none other than the man she hated with gnashing teeth, Greem.


    Right at this moment, Alice finally realized that she waspletely naked!


    Her princess dress had been badly burned, it had be rubbish not better than a pile of ashes, and all her magical equipment was ced on top of the wooden table. As for herself, she was now stripped naked and all of her various burn wounds of all sizes had been covered with a thickyer of pungent ck medicinal paste.


    Originally, her body had been covered with a thin sheet, but following her sudden movements of sitting up and drinking water, the nket had slipped off, exposing her delicate, budding body.


    Alice was twenty-six years old this year, but her body had been locked forever at the stage she had been at when she was seven years old, the moment she had awakened her innate spatial talent!


    There was no screaming, no bursting into tears; Alice just kept staring at Greem¡¯s face, emotionless. She didn¡¯t even pull up the nket to cover her naked body.


    ¡°Why can you control an Adept level element golem?¡± She asked with a hollow and faint voice, as if she was a puppet who had no soul.


    There was no need for her to verify the fact she had been defeated by the rascal in front of her, she could feel it vividly. Because... because the magical contract she had personally drafted was currently tightly tying her to this rascal. She was now a possession of this guy!


    Hmph. You didn¡¯t kill me because you don¡¯t want to lose a precious fighter, eh? Also, I suppose you don¡¯t want to offend those frightening Northern Witches! Alice thought pensively. At this moment, her thoughts and mind had be unprecedentedly clear and incisive. Looking back at what she had done during this period, she looked at an arrogant girl who was courting for her own death, a fool who ran further into the path of her own peril.


    Since when had she be so stupid? Damn it, I pushed myself to a dead end!


    From the moment she had been defeated, it was like Alice had changed into someone else. She had be totally different from the crazy, extreme, and treacherous little loli in the past.


    Starting from the moment she had woken up, Alice had begun to walk on the dark path of self-salvation.


    Alice¡¯s eyes stared straight into Greem¡¯s pupils, which were ck with shades of dark red. She didn¡¯t find any lust in them. When she looked out of the corner of her eyes, she didn¡¯t find any trace of that female vampire.


    What is this? Stripped me naked and personally applied medicine on me? Is he trying to soften my grudge and pull me into his camp? If he really wanted me to serve him, why didn¡¯t he ask that Mary to apply medicine? Isn¡¯t that a better way to win my heart?


    Could it be... could it be he had an improper desire for the body of a loli?

 Chapter 143

    Right as Alice was staring expressionlessly at Greem, her mind filled with various fancies and conjectures, a green-skinned goblin suddenly poked its head from behind the man, throwing a puzzled and alert nce over at her.


    ¡°Alright, Snox, this is the Alice I told you about. From today onwards, she will be an exclusive servant-girl for me. Your task is to teach her the proper manner of a servant-girl, I hope I can see her carrying her duty as soon as possible. Now, bring her with you!¡±


    What he said was like a sudden thunderbolt out of a clear sky that struck right into Alice¡¯s mind and caused her to feel giddy, as sparks flew before her eyes. Was this guy serious? He really nned to make a Pseudo-Adept who possessed a rare innate talent of spatial his servant-girl?


    A moment ago, Alice had tried her best to keep a calm exterior, yet her face was blushing right now, as she fiercely gazed at this bumptious... master.


    ¡°What¡¯s wrong? Do you have any opinions of your own, Alice?¡± The smile on Greem¡¯s face bing weirder and weirder. ¡°Before we agreed to our bet, you had said it clearly that you¡¯ll make me your master. So, don¡¯t tell me you can¡¯t even carry out the duties of a servant-girl?¡±


    ¡°You... fine...¡± Alice spewed out a few words from her tightly clenched teeth, furiously pulling the nket and covering her body, before stepping down from the bed.


    When her feet touched the floor, Alice felt a severe paining from every part of her body. This had made her lose her bnce and stagger her steps, nearly falling to the ground. However, though she was a little loli with the pretty face of an angel, Greem wasn¡¯t moved a tiny bit at all and didn¡¯t show any signs that he was going to stretch his arms out and help her stabilize herself.


    After all, Alice was a Pseudo-Adept who took the element path, thus her Physique was far weaker than that of Greem, who had his body transformed into Elementium. So far, Alice¡¯s Physique hadn¡¯t reached more than 10, and this had even caused her ability of body recovery to be inferior than those of Advanced Apprentices who had a high Physique.


    Gnashing her teeth and holding the severe pain, Alice left Greem¡¯s residence, and came to Snox¡¯s room located next to Greem¡¯s.


    Upon entering Snox¡¯s room, all her expressions of pain, resentment, and mortification immediately disappeared from her face. They were reced by the same old arrogant and overbearing look. Even her frail and weak appearance was gone, as if the injuries and pain all over her body couldn¡¯t even affect her a tiny bit.


    ¡°I need some better healing medicines and Asun Water which can remove scars. Also, I¡¯m hungry, get someone prepare me a set of mushroom trout fish rolls, golden roasted goose and Schiffman tea. Remember, the trout fish must be those devil trouts caught from the Abyss of Darkness, and can only have three whiskers below its jaw... also, the honey applied on the skin of golden roasted goose must be from the Snow Bee¡¯s honey from the East Coast, in addition to that...¡±


    As the true owner of the room, Snox had its mouth opened wider and wider. In the end, it was so angry that it simply jumped to its feet, waved its fists and let out a furious roar. ¡°You¡¯re dreaming! You wildly arrogant little human! This ce is the territory of the great Snox, and you¡¯re just a servant-girl newly recruited by the master! I came here before you, and you must...¡±


    Snox hadn¡¯t finished its lecturing, because Alice had ripped open a tiny spatial crack and kicked it inside.


    Nearly ten minutester, when Alice reopened the spatial crack and let Snox out, the robe d on its body had turned ripped like those wore by street beggars, and its skin was covered with scratch marks as a result of being attacked by some sharp fangs and ws. From the other side of the spatial crack, one could even hear the savage howls of wolves.


    Just looking at the wounds that were only found on the Snox¡¯s back, Alice had instantly drawn a conclusion to its character. She casually dismissed the spatial crack and with a cold voice, she said, ¡°Now you should know who the boss in this room is, eh? If the pack of Carnassial Tooth Wolves just now can¡¯t satisfy you, I can always send you into the nest of Two-legged Flying Dragons!¡±


    Though Carnassial Tooth Wolves could only be considered as Beginner Apprentice level demon beasts and didn¡¯t possess formidable offensive strength, but for Snox, a goblin who didn¡¯t own any offensive ability and could only escape by relying on a handful of disguising abilities, they were no doubt dreadful monsters. If thrown into the nest of Two-legged Flying Dragons, a type of demon beasts who had an incredible sense of smell, it would be impossible for it to make its return!


    In next second, Snox simply went down on its knee, hugging Alice¡¯s silky smooth legs and crying out loudly, ¡°Boss! Boss! Boss! You¡¯re the boss here... I¡¯ll obey everything you tell me to in future...¡±


    Alice gave it a kick in disgust, furrowed her brows and said, ¡°Go now! Prepare me some clothes, foods, and healing medicines. When I¡¯m having my mealter, I want you to tell me everything between you and that ras... that guy!¡±


    The bacshing from the magical contract imprinted in her soul made Alice halt for a brief second, she had no choice but to change the way she addressed that ¡®rascal¡¯ into ¡®guy¡¯, a rather neutral way of addressing him. If she didn¡¯t do that, even if she was a Pseudo-Witch, she too couldn¡¯t be immune from the severe pricking she felt at the depths of her soul.


    Only the heaven or ghost might know why it happened. In order to have a better control over that ¡®guy¡¯, she specifically picked a magical contract with the best binding force from the private treasures of her granny. But now... she had actually trapped herself into this awful situation, and it simply made Alice feel frustrated and furious!


    Only by gaining a better understanding of the enemy, could one defeat the enemy with the minimum cost!


    Alice had made up her mind, from now onwards, she would never underestimate that hateful rasca... ouch... guy. She would take her time in patiently and meticulously understanding everything about that guy, after that... hmph, he better not has the wishful thinking of using a rubbish contract to confine a great... ouch, ouch! Pain, it was really painful!


    As the loser of the bet, every word and action of Alice was restricted and bounded by the powerful magical contract. Once a disrespectful thought or intentions of hurting her ¡®master¡¯ arose in her mind, her soul would have to suffer from different degrees of bacsh by the magical contract. If such bacsh urred too rapidly, it could cause a frightening and irreversible damage to her soul.


    At that point in time, her future path as a Witch would have toe to a premature end!


    ............


    Unavoidably, the spiritual ripple happened on the other side of the contract had also affected Greem.


    It had been less than fifteen minutes since that little girl left his residence, yet he had sensed seventeen strange ripplesing from the magical contract. Most of them were mere ripples of curses or disrespect, so Greem had simply handed over the executive right of the contract to the Chip, then he had just cut off the spiritual connection between him and the contract.


    With the arrogance and wild pride of that little girl, if she wasn¡¯t taught a hard lesson, she would never stop from continuing to do what she did. Therefore, the order Greem gave the Chip was to have a full feedback to all the spiritual ripples, any disrespectful thoughts would be punished through the contract, no dy was allowed, and no indulgence would be given as well.


    Right when he finished settling that nasty little girl, a fragrant scent wafted from behind, before a warm, soft body cuddled onto his back.


    ¡°Greem, why don¡¯t you hand me that Alice and let me teach her? I promise I¡¯ll make her into an obedient servant-girl and guarantee it¡¯ll be more effective than that magical contract.¡± The seductive and charming voice of Mary resounded beside his ears, it was even mixed in with a subtle nasal voice of moaning.


    Aww, here came another one!


    Greem nearly couldn¡¯t hold onto himself and rubbed his forehead.


    ¡°Mary, let me give you a grave warning, you better give up the idea of turning Alice into your blood ve!¡± Greem said solemnly. ¡°The true identity of Alice is still a mystery, but I¡¯m certainly sure that she is connected with those witches from the North. Although you can have a strong binding force to those blood ves created after you ¡¯embrace¡¯ them, but it doesn¡¯t mean there is no weakness at all. As long as the source of the bloodlines is killed, which is you, your control over Alice¡¯s soul would vanish. So, if this Alice does have a serious background, then you¡¯re just asking to get killed!¡±


    ¡°I Understand, I understand! I¡¯ll not be that silly and fight a girl with you. But...¡± Mary licked her red lips excitedly, continuing to say, ¡°I don¡¯t think it will be a big problem if I suck a little bit of her blood?¡±


    Greem sighed softly.


    ¡°Don¡¯t tell me you can¡¯t see it? This Alice must have just be a Pseudo-Adept, and she couldn¡¯t wait any longer so she came straight to fight with me. She didn¡¯t even nurse her body and Spirit to the best condition. If you suck her blood now, perhaps she would drop back to the level of Advanced Apprentice immediately. Don¡¯t be silly, we need to cultivate her properly! Her abilities y a very vital role in my ns!¡±


    ¡°You just don¡¯t let me suck anyone¡¯s blood! Then how am I going to improve my overall strength? No way, I need to find a suitable apprentice mission, I have more freedom outside than I do in this ce!¡± With Mary¡¯s hot-temper, she meant what she said. She turned around and left Greem¡¯s residence, rushing to the Mission Hall.


    Greem sighed again, turned around and took out a magical spell book, ced it on the table and started to read it quietly.


    ............


    On the fifth floor of the Swampy Tower.


    Inside of a dark and gruesome secret room, Anderson waved his hand and dispelled the magical mirror in front of him. A pondering and hesitant expression was on his face.


    ¡°Adept level element golem? How did that kid do it? In my memory, there is never an Apprentice Adept that could bypass the threshold and control an Adept level golem or magical beast. If anyone tried to do it by force, perhaps just the requirement of summoning would instantly draw all his Spirit to thest drop, turning him into an idiot who had all his brain power depleted. Yet, that kid had done it with ease! Maybe, I should find an Automata Master and get him to verify if there is anything special on his summoning cores?¡±


    After pondering for some moments, Anderson waved his hands again in front of his face, revealing a mirror that showed him the image of another secret room.


    It was a magical secret room that was nearly isted from the outside world. Countlessplicated runes and secret magical arrays were carved on the floor at the center of the room. They consisted of numerous strange symbols and characters which looked like tadpoles, and many of them were in the mysterious knowledge that never appeared in the outside world.


    Although the magical array lookedplicated and mysterious, but all the runes, arrays and magical rings were pointing to the three core nodes. At these three core nodes, one could see three objects that looked rather simr to a torture chair.


    Judging from the overall design and structure, this should be a vicious magical array with the mixed functions of official Adept Advancement Ceremony and vitality extraction. The two torture chairs ced at the outer perimeter were the source of energy that drove the entire magical array, and it seemed they were prepared for Acteon and Mary. As long as they forcefully advanced into official Adepts with the help of a special magical ceremony, then the magical array would extract all their vitality and injected the energy into the center magical ring.


    At that moment, with the nourishment from the flesh, blood, and innate talent of two new Adepts, it was highly possible that Anderson could breakthrough the threshold that was holding him back for a long time, and eventually, make him into a formidable Second Grade Adept.

 Chapter 144

    It had been more than 300 years since Anderson had be an official Adept!


    Due to his timid and prudent disposition, he hardly participated in any conflicts or battles among the Adepts. As a result, the improvement of his overall strength was very slow. In thest 100 years, he had even fallen into the terrifying situation of having his overall strength nearly stopped from progressing.


    But a new round of the family¡¯s internar warfare was going to begin soon. ording to statistics obtained from analyzing all of the previous data, the minimum fatality rate of First Grade Adepts in internar warfare was 50%. For an Adept like him, who was not good at fighting, the rate would be even higher. Therefore, in order to bring his overall strength up another grade before the warfare began, Anderson had no choice but to take the risk and cast his evil eyes on to the few Pseudo-Adepts under him.


    Initially, the magical array had only been prepared for Acteon and Mary. But following the debut of Greem and Alice, Anderson felt like he might need to give the magical array some modifications so that he could include thetter two in his evil scheme.


    By devouring three Pseudo-Adepts cultivated by the family in one go, even if Anderson seeded in making an advancement, he would still receive punishment from the Sarubo Family. However, as he would be a Second Grade Adept at that point in time, so long as he was willing to give up more of his rights, presumably, the punishmenting from the family would not be that severe.


    After all, anyone could easily tell the difference between the value of a Second Grade Adept and three Pseudo-Adepts.


    Currently, the only high-end Adepts owned by Sarubo Family were one Third Grade and one Second Grade Adept. If they could have a new Second Grade Adept, the overall strength of the family would definitely take a huge leap. With that, their position and interests in the Zhentarim Association would also rise ordingly.


    Under such circumstances, who would really take action against the wrongdoings of a Second Grade Adept?


    After he finished checking the magical secret room, Anderson wasn¡¯t tired, so he continued by checking on the situation of Acteon, Mary, and Greem. As he was the highest authority in the Swampy Tower, he could examine and observe every single nook and cranny within the tower and within a three mile radius of the tower. In addition to that, the subject of his surveince would not notice his presence at all.


    By relying on this method, Anderson was able to get a detailed grasp of the recent developments among those few apprentices.


    Despite that, Greem entered his line of sight only once in awhile, so Anderson understood him the least among all three Pseudo-Adepts of the tower. For the sake of safety, Anderson felt that he should just devour Acteon and Mary.


    As for Greem, once Anderson gained control over his body, Anderson would force him to make an advancement. If Greem managed to breakthrough, he would be one of Anderson¡¯s food items. If he failed, then he would be given to Mary and she would suck his blood, increasing the sess rate of Mary¡¯s advancement. Acteon was aided by a huge amount of Mary¡¯s source blood, which had greatly increased the sess rate of his advancement. Though Mary¡¯s overall strength would suffer major decay because of that, with the nourishment from the blood of Greem and Alice, she too would have the possibility of making a breakthrough.


    If necessary, he could even throw Intermediate and Advanced Apprentices over to Mary, making them her tonic!


    In addition to that, what he needed from them wasn¡¯t a normal breakthrough. At that point in time, he could just use some prohibited magical medicine to stimte them, causing their Spirit to boom, and the sess rate of forced advancement would be at least 80%. He just had to devour their blood and flesh before they were killed by the bacsh of the magic spell. The path of advancing into Second Grade Adept was still bright and dazzling!


    Trying his best to hold down his restless excitement, Adept Anderson repeatedly pondered every single step and flow of his plot for advancement, thinking carefully about any possible event that might happen during its execution and arduously patching up the loopholes.


    ording to the news leaked by Master Herbert, the Second Grade Adept of the family, in just one year the founding ancestor of the family would open the door of the ne, sending all the family¡¯s Adepts, including Anderson, into the war zone. Therefore, he was only left with a short half year!


    Through the mirror, Anderson covetously ran his eyes over the images of all three Pseudo-Adepts, who resided in different locations within the tower. He moved his dried, thin lips and murmured under his breath, ¡°Work hard and grow stronger, my fruits! Once you reach your mature stage, you¡¯ll have the right to merge together with me... hehehe...¡±


    ............


    The day after Alice had her bet with Greem, the Poisonous Witch, Endor, once again appeared in front of Greem.


    Greem was pretty sure that if killing him would release Alice from the bounds of the magical contract, he would be a dead man already!


    After Endor gave Alice¡¯s soul a thorough and detailed examination, her face became so dark that one could even squeeze out some ck water from it. Under the restriction of that powerful magical contract, Alice had virtually be Greem¡¯s contracted ve and she was the one who was being controlled.


    More importantly, Alice was a descendant of the Northern Witches and the blood flowing through her body was from the n of Destiny Witches. The attention this n attached to a contract was heavier than all the other few ns of witches. Hence, the matter had be rather tricky to solve.


    In the center region of the Adept Continent, when one was referred as a witch, she was usually a female Adept. But in the northern region of the continent, where the heart of the Northern Witches was situated, the title of witch usually referred to those mysterious existences who owned the bloodline inherited from the ancient era. Every single one of them possessed extraordinary power from their bloodline, and the source of their bloodline would always trace back to Salem, a Ninth Grade Witch, and the first existence who had stood at the pinnacle of the Adept World.


    With regards to this Ninth Grade female Adept of the Adept World, she wasmonly referred to as the Witch Queen. Since she had left the Adept World, she had left behind thirteen different witch ns among her descendants. And through the historical changes of more than ten thousand years, many of them had withered away. Currently, only seven of them remained in the territory of the Northern Witches.


    As for the six ns that had withered away, under the influence of the mighty Will of the World, they wouldn¡¯t vanish totally. Every once in awhile, some random descendant of the witch would suddenly awake with some special powers, and was able to revive the witch ns that had nearly vanished from the world.


    ording to some rumors, the reason behind this was because the Witch Queen Salem had an agreement with the Will of the Adept World. The overall strength of someone like a Ninth Grade Adept was too formidable and she was able to cause tremendous distraction in the normal function of the ne. Therefore, in order to kick these ¡®burdens¡¯ from the Adept World, the Will of the World had no alternative but topromise to their requests.


    Since then, anyone who became Fifth Grade Adept or above would be ¡®squeezed¡¯ out of the Adept World. In return, the Will of the World allowed these Adepts to include part of their own principles in the functioning system of the Adept World.


    Although the Witch Queen had left, she had also left behind thirteen World Principles in the Adept World, all of which carried her unique mark. With that, as long as the system of the world kept functioning properly, it was impossible for her followers to vanishpletely! Even if some formidable Adepts killed off all of her descendants, as long as the World Principles still existed, as time went by, when a suitable vessel was found, the principle that carried her mark would still light.


    Therefore, in the Adept Continent, the Adept Family that possessed a principle inherited from the ancient era was a monument that would never copse!


    Alice belonged to the n of Destiny Witches. A few thousand years ago, due to some unique reasons, the n had withered away. However, in thest few hundred years, arge group of witches from different ces around the Adept Continent had awakened with special innate talents. As a result, the leader of the Northern Witches had dispatched many of her subordinates to bring these witches back to their sacrednd.


    With regards to these newly awakened, some witches took them as a new hope and some looked at them as troublemakers, and neither side coulde to a mutual agreement. Because of this, the task of bringing them back had be a rather awkward situation.


    The Poisonous Witch Endor came from the n of Dark Witches, and this n had a very good rtionship with the n of Destiny Witches. That was why, when Endor discovered that Alice had awakened the bloodline of Destiny Witches, she took initiative and assumed the responsibility of Alice¡¯s return ceremony.


    But too bad, before the ceremony was prepared, Alice had be a contracted ve of someone else. If it was any other witch, perhaps she would have long strangled Greem to death. Even if it might kill Alice at the same time, the witches would never allow the bloodline of a witch to be contaminated by any outsiders!


    Nevertheless, considering the bloodline abilities of the Destiny Witches possessed by Alice, Endor felt that it was an omen given by the Force of Destiny, which led her to give up the idea of killing Greem. Instead, she dragged him into a secret room and carried out an in-depth discussion.


    Endor gave Greem a warning. If he wanted to bind Alice to his side, the only way was to make her bloodline abilities grow as quickly as possible and bring her to the territory of Northern Witches within ten years, so that she couldplete her baptism of destiny. During this round ofrge scale awakenings, Alice had not been the only one who had possessed the bloodline of the Destiny Witches, but only one of them could survive after going through the baptism.


    If Alice couldn¡¯t make it to the ceremony, once another witchpleted her baptism and became the Destiny Witch, then, under the influence of the World Principle, Alice¡¯s power would be a sacrificial offering for that particr witch. In the end, Alice¡¯s existence would bepletely wiped away by the Will of the World!


    For no apparent reason, Greem had been dragged into an unnecessary conflict, from which he felt tremendous pressure. But, considering that he would need help from Alice in the uing mission of self-rescuing, he had no choice but to ept this ¡®hot potato¡¯ while sighing.


    Yet, when he vaguely hinted at the situation with Endor and asked if he could borrow her power in solving a ¡®small problem¡¯ of his, Endor simply turned around and left!


    Though Endor didn¡¯t embrace Destiny, she still held reverence toward Destiny.


    It was because of Greem that Alice was able to be a Pseudo-Adept smoothly. This also meant that the Force of Destiny had tightly tangled both of them together. Before she could tell whether her help with Alice was positive or negative, Endor would never get involved in the natural selection of a Destiny Witch.


    With regards to the exnation from this ¡®Poisonous Witch¡¯, inwardly, Greem just gave her two huge middle fingers to express his despisement. If you don¡¯t want to help, just say so! Why are you giving me such a ¡®refreshing¡¯ reason in order to shirk the burden? Greem couldn¡¯t help but admire her excuse!


    Therefore, drawn by the mighty Force of Destiny, this future ¡®Destiny Witch¡¯ hade to Greem, like she was supposed to, and be the fourth member of Greem¡¯s camp!

 Chapter 145

    It was like thest calm before a major storm, the atmosphere within the Swampy Tower was rather strange.


    The Swampy Tower was just a small resource site owned by Adept Family, and it only had a total of 49 Apprentice Adepts. There were even three Beginner Apprentices who had just learned how to meditate.


    Yet, in this group of apprentices whose overall strength was on the low side, four famous Pseudo-Adepts had made their appearance without a proper ground. In addition to that, among the poption of all Pseudo-Adepts, any one of these four alone could be considered an outstanding existence. This was an abnormal situation, no matter where it happened, people would shout at its bizarreness.


    After all, it took a huge amount of resources to cultivate a Pseudo-Adept. And in order to be an Adept, besides hefty resources, they also needed some luck. With the current situation of the Swampy Tower, it would take extreme fortune to cultivate a single Pseudo-Adept, let alone produce all four of them at the same time.


    Perhaps, it was because of the existence of these four Pseudo-Adepts, Sarubo Family had paid more attention to the Magical Swamp. In addition to the Mission Hall, the Arcane Hut of Clute, the Popoli Merchant, the Dephene Association of Delicacy, the Fenrir Pet Shop... all these shops and merchants who focused on apprentices had opened their businesses in the Swampy Tower.


    Mixing amongst them, the Little Shop of Goblin opened by Snox had flourished in business.


    Different from other businesses, from time to time, there would be one or two items that could be rated as that of premium quality that appeared in Snox¡¯s little shop. They were either magical gemstones or magical materials or magical equipment. In short, no matter what sort of items, they would always attract arge crowd of Intermediate and Advanced Apprentices rushing to purchase them.


    As for that honorable Snox who didn¡¯t have an impressive appearance, it actually had an exalted rank amongst the apprentices of the tower, which was something hardly matched by any outsiders. The reason was simple, just with the three Pseudo-Adepts standing behind it, nobody in this Swampy Tower had the courage to provoke it.


    Since Alice had be a part of the Swampy Tower, initially, she had thought that Greem would ask her to do all kinds of tasks every day. But to her surprise, since that day, she had never met her nominal ¡®master¡¯ again. She didn¡¯t expect that Greem was actually a nerd who rarely stepped out from his residence. Every day, he was either dwelling in his room and reading books or locking himself in the Alchemy Laboratory, doing some secret experiments.


    All his meals were sent into his residence by Snox, and he never showed himself during normal days. Although this had spared Alice from feeling embarrassed when meeting him, but it actually made her feel a little bit angry as she was being treated coldly.


    Utilizing the few days of free time she had, Alice questioned Snox repeatedly. From its mouth, she managed to dig out every single thing Greem had achieved since he had made his debut until now. In addition to that, using her status as an Pseudo-Adept, she too had an understanding about Greem¡¯s behavior in the early days from the mouth of a few apprentices in the tower.


    Put it this way, the more Alice understood, the more confused she became!


    If a person was shaped by all the events he or she encountered throughout the entire life, then the trail of Mary¡¯s life was clear at a nce.


    The apprentice career of Mary which was worth mentioning had all started because of that magical experiment. Before she became a vampire, there wasn¡¯t anything significant in her life. But once she became a vampire, she started to soar high up into the sky, taking a leap, jumping from a Beginner to an Advanced Apprentice, and eventually giving her all the glory of bing a Pseudo-Adeptter.


    Therefore, the event that changed Mary¡¯s life was that bizarre magical experiment carried out by Adept Anderson!


    From this information she obtained, Alice could clearly see the pattern of development for Mary, and ording to Mary¡¯s behavior, she could also have an estimation of the potential height Mary would attain in her life. Everything was so vivid and straightforward!


    Yet, when applying this theory on Greem, it just didn¡¯t make any sense!


    The turning point in Greem¡¯s life happened almost at the same time as Mary¡¯s. It was as if he suddenly possessed some kind of mystical power overnight. This had led Alice to suspect, could it be at the same time that Adept Anderson was carrying out an experiment on Mary, he too had done something to Greem? Or else, his transformation in theter stage was simply incredible!


    Within the period of mission thatsted for three months, he had grown into an Advanced Apprentice from a mere Beginner Apprentice, and even skipped the stage of Intermediate Apprentice. The secret to all his victoriesid on the powerful element golems. As for himself, it was obvious that he took the path of an Element Adept.


    With regard to those element golems owned by Greem, they were still fresh in Alice¡¯s memory. As both her miserable defeats were all caused by those hateful element golems!


    Of sufficient numbers, great variety, and each was extremely powerful and well-directed!


    This was the personal review Alice had for these element golems.


    By right, for golems such as these, if they were controlled using the method of Elemental Summoning, not only it would require a special magical ceremony, the summoners himself also had to bear a tremendous burden on his Spirit. It would never be like Greem¡¯s case, where he had handled them with suchposure and ease.


    Alice also noticed, every time when Greem summoned his element golems, he would need an element core as the magical material, and the surface of the crystal core was always fully engraved with runes, portraying the look of going through a thorough modification. With this finding, she drew a conclusion that the deepest secret of Greem¡¯s mightiness must be hiding inside of these crystal cores.


    Because of this, she had the intention of getting closer to Greem, so she could find out more answers from him to uncover his secret. But too bad that Greem was a nerd who rarely left his room, this had made her, the nominal servant-girl of his, became totally unused.


    As a result, after holding herself patiently for seven days, Alice snatched over the meal te from Snox, took its ce and stood in front of the door to Greem¡¯s residence. That hateful Mary was the only person who could freely enter Greem¡¯s residence, even Snox had to obtain Greem¡¯s permission every time before delivering the meal to him.


    Not long after that, Greem sensed Alice¡¯s spiritual ripple, and he finally disarmed the defense mechanism on the door.


    Alice stretched her arm and pushed open the door and strode into the residence, carrying the meal te.


    The room was still as simple and crude as before.


    Yet,pared to thest time, it had be even messier!


    Though it was daytime, the illuminating crystal ced on top of the wooden table still shone with a bright and soft light. This made Alice puzzled, could this guy have been working sincest night, without resting during the course?


    The floor was fully filled with scrapped goat-skin scrolls, some were curled up, some were spread out, and some were crumbled into small balls... each of them had extremelyplicated runes and mysterious magical arrays drawn on them. As Alice didn¡¯t have any knowledge of magical arrays, hence, she felt a headache upon looking at this mysterious knowledge which required a professional to understand it.


    Walking on her tiptoes, Alice carefully skipped over the mess on the floor and came in front of the wooden table.


    The wooden table was also messy like the floor, books were opened and ced all over the tabletop, stacking on top of each other and nearly flooding the entire table. Greem was now leaning against the table silently, using a pen brush to draw something on a goat-skin paper.


    But obviously, his progress wasn¡¯t smooth.


    Half-way through the drawing, he brought the goat-skin paper in front of his face and gave it a careful examination. Soon, he shook his head, cursing under his breath and crumbled the paper into a small ball, and tossed it over his shoulder.


    Alice tilted her head so she could dodge the paper ball that had came to her face. Angrily, she ced the meal tray on top of the table with a rather strong force. Due to her ¡®carelessness¡¯, the tall stack of books had finally copsed with a loud noise.


    Ugh... What was going on?


    Greem raised his head, confusingly, and ran his eyes around. His sulky eyes were immediately met with the vision of Alice, who was looking at him in a provoking manner.


    ¡°Eh? When did youe here?¡± Greem rubbed his forehead, as he felt a prickle in his brain.


    Since his overall strength skyrocketed, Greem had discovered many benefits brought by a high Physique.


    He had been awake for three days and three nights. If it was in the past, perhaps he would have been extremely exhausted by now. However, besides feeling a slight tiredness from consuming too much of his Spirit, his body was as healthy and vigorous as it was three days ago.


    ¡°The purpose I came here today is to ask you a question: what are you going to do with me? Are you going to let me live like I am now, spending all my days boringly strolling around in this filthy and broken ce? The magical facilities here are just too obsolete and behind on times,pared to other ces, this ce is simply a deste desert of the Adept World!¡± Alice stood with arms akimbo,ining angrily at Greem.


    One could tell that she had had enough of staying in this Swampy Tower.


    She couldn¡¯t find any higher grade magical potions, she couldn¡¯t enjoy a slightly normal delicacy, she couldn¡¯t obtain any of the advanced magical materials required for her magical experiments, and her residence was simply like a sheep pen... In this backward and dpidated ce, Alice just couldn¡¯t imagine how Greem and the others managed to survive!


    If not because of those merchants or associations who recently came into this ce, bringing some changes to the Swampy Tower, Alice felt like she was going to rot in this dark and wet Magical Swamp.


    Faced with a hard working ¡®subordinate¡¯ who took the initiative and toe to him for work, a gratifying smile emerged on Greem¡¯s face. He casually took a white bread from the meal tray and ced it into Alice¡¯s hand, and said with a smile on his face, ¡°If you want to find something to do, why don¡¯t you show me your abilities first? Can you toss this thing over at Snox¡¯s head?¡±


    Right after he finished his words, the white bread in Alice¡¯s hands had disappeared.


    She pped her palms and rubbed off the bread crumbs, throwing a disdainful gaze over at Greem and portrayed a look of ¡®just try me¡¯.


    Greem opened his mouth slightly out of surprise.


    He quickly readjusted his mentality, picked up another piece of bread and ced into Alice¡¯s hand. This time, he snapped his fingers and activated all the defense mechanisms of this magical residence.


    Alice curled up her lips in disdain, grabbing the bread with both hands and gave it a rub. A strange spatial ripple was sensed in the air, before the bread disappeared once again.


    Greem¡¯s expression became even more dignified.


    After he gave thest piece of bread over to Alice, not only had Greem activated every single defense mechanisms of his magical residence, he also focused his mind and unleashed a light red force field that covered the entire room.


    Right now, Alice was residing within fouryers of element defense or magical force fields, if she could still...


    But too bad, before the thought could fully form in Greem¡¯s mind, he saw Alice waved one of her hands, as a small spatial ck hole emerged in front of her. After that, she quickly stretched the other hand with the bread into the ck hole. When she finally pulled her hand out, there was nothing left in her palm.


    Meanwhile, the spatial ck hole had disappeared instantly!

 Chapter 146

    A few momentster, three pieces of intact white bread were delivered back by Snox.


    But Snox had a pretty unsightly expression!


    To be honest, no matter who was hiding in a secret room and happily admiring and counting his treasures, to be suddenly hit on his head by two pieces of white bread, he would have the same unsightly expression. And besides, thest time a tiny female hand had suddenly appeared in midair and tossed a piece of white bread over to its face.


    No body, no arms, it was just the fair, tender, little hand of a female... Snox was frightened out of its wits because of such terrifying scene. If it had not received the Spiritual Whisper from its master on time, it would definitely think that it was haunted by some evil female ghost!


    Greem picked up all three pieces of white bread one after another. Using the exact scanning and see-through vision of the Chip, he once again confirmed their integrity. The teleportation just now hadn¡¯t altered their material property, nor did it destroy any of their material structure.


    Greem again ced the bread into Alice¡¯s hand. With a smile, he said, ¡°This time, send them into my hand!¡±


    After he finished saying that, a leaping me burst out from Greem¡¯s body. The high-temperature force field instantly covered his entire body. After going through a period of hard training and closely working with it, Greem could now easily manipte his own fire element.


    Even when he had the me spread all over his body, he never caused any harm to the wooden chair underneath him or the booksying around. But if the clothes on his body hadn¡¯t been protected by magical power, they would have been burned off by the fierce me.


    A slightly disdainful expression emerged on Alice¡¯s cute face, which still had a little bit of baby-fat. Displeased, she asked, ¡°Do you really think my Spatial Teleportation can do anything you ask? If it could prate your Elementium Protection, do you think you could have still defeated me?¡±


    ¡°Give it your best shot. I want to see what kind of results it can achieve!¡± Greem encouraged the little girl while stretching out his right arm, enshrouded in steaming hot me.


    Looking from afar, it was as if the me was burning directly on Greem¡¯s skin. Yet, when looked at a close distance, there was actually a thinyer of crimson Elementium film attached tightly on the surface of his skin, which separated his skin from the element fire.


    This was actually a product produced from merging me Body and Inferno Force Field!


    Some day in the future, when Greem eventually became an official Adept, and when he totally transformed his Spirit into Elementium, this thinyer of film would disappear, and eventually make him into a type of elemental life form. When the time came, even though his vitality would not be endless like genuine elemental life forms, it would still sufficient for him to slowly explore the boundless multi-verse!


    Under Greem¡¯s attentive gaze, a ripple starting to appear in the space near his ming right hand. Obviously, the bread sent through the space by Alice couldn¡¯t prate the dense and tough Inferno Force Field and was forced out from the interyer of space by its force.


    When it lost the protection from the force of space, the white bread was instantly turned into ashes upon contact with the defensive me.


    Later, Greem retracted the defensive me and Inferno Force Field, but it was too bad that Alice still couldn¡¯t teleport anything into his hand. Though he felt that it was a pity, it was in fact, a reasonable situation. If Alice¡¯s Spatial Teleportation could freely travel through the target¡¯s element defense, then under the heaven, what kind of opponent that had the same rank as her could stand up against her?


    She could totally transfer a bottle of explosive potion into her opponent¡¯s heart or plunge an explosive fireball into the enemy¡¯s stomach... Just thinking of such scene made one tremble with fear!


    After several failed attempts, finally Alice ran out of patience. ¡°What exactly do you want me to do? Are you just going to ask me to teleport this thing over and over again?¡±


    ¡°What I need from you is very simple: during a special asion, I want you to teleport something I need into my hand!¡± Greem once again unleashed his Inferno Force Field, covering both him and Alice; only then did he seriously tell her his motive.


    Alice nced around, looking at thisyer of force field which was obviously used to prevent any outsiders from peeking or overhearing their conversation. Not saying any words, she nodded her head as if she understood something. But right after that, she rested her arms on her hips, and said in a disdainful manner, ¡°Why should I listen to you and do something that is totally impossible to achieve? This brings me no benefits at all. Don¡¯t think that I¡¯ll help you!¡±


    Greem smiled. With a flick of his wrist, an element core emanating a powerful element wave appeared in the palm of his hand. When Alice saw its dazzling appearance, looked at the crystal clear material, and sensed the rhythmic element wave that felt like a tidal wave... she couldn¡¯t contain herself and swallowed a lump in her throat.


    It was an Adept level crystal core! This was the true form of that frighteningva monster who defeated her! However, when she looked at it, not only did it not bring her the slightest feeling of fear, it actually carried a vague magnificence and perfection!


    ¡°Are you going to give it to me?¡± Right at this very moment, Alice nearly stopped breathingpletely; her eyes went wide as she held her breath, waiting for Greem¡¯s answer.


    ¡°I can¡¯t give it to you right now, of course!¡± Greem answered grumpily. ¡°But, within a month, if you can teleport anything into my hand, I¡¯ll let you own it temporarily!¡±


    Alice was dejected for a brief moment when she heard Greem¡¯s answer, but soon, her face was beaming with high spirits again.


    ¡°Will you keep your promise? Rest assured, as long as I double my effort and keep practicing, I can definitely do it. But, I¡¯ll need to examine this treasure of yours first, give it to me now and let me y for one night!¡±


    Greem hesitated, but eventually he nodded his head and agreed. But before he ced the summoning core of Fire Lord golem into Alice¡¯s spread palm, he earnestly warned her and said, ¡°You can have some fun with it, but you can¡¯t damage the summoning core. Also, when you summon it, remember to protect yourself properly!¡±


    As he said that, Greem purposely pointed at the ceiling with his finger. Alice nodded her head, expressing her understanding.


    This ce was the Swampy Tower, and they were inside of Greem¡¯s personal residence. Yet, even when he was talking, he had to cover himself with his own element defense and didn¡¯t take the magical defense mechanism of the residence into consideration. Just this point alone was enough to tell her something!


    Judging from this, it seemed like the rtionship between Greem and the stationed Adept of the Swampy Tower wasn¡¯t that harmonious. It might even be at the stage of diametrical opposition. Considering that her life was now tied to Greem¡¯s, Alice had no alternative but to start thinking for this small team.


    Although Greem didn¡¯t mention it explicitly, Alice could still guess. The request he had expressed was very important for him and it might even reach to the level that could affect his life and future!


    Hmph, I¡¯ll just help him for once! Or else, if he died, I¡¯ll die as well. Also, his request sounds pretty fun. If I can include it in my offensive approach, perhaps it will be quite a breakthrough.


    Filling her mind with fanciful thoughts, Alice casually shoved the summoning core into an opened spatial hole before she turned around and left Greem¡¯s residence.


    Compared to Greem, Alice had never needed any magical equipment like a waist pouch or storage waist belt. She only needed to find herself a safeyer of space and open up an isted space which bore her conscious¡¯s seal; she could store all of her personal belongings in it. However, with her Pseudo-Adept Spirit, this isted space only had a maximum size of five meters square.


    After Alice left, Greem appeared to be the sole person in the room. But, he still didn¡¯t retract his Inferno Force Field.


    Right at this moment, a hoarse, deep voice suddenly came out from his body. ¡°So, this is your n? I don¡¯t think it is a good idea! Are you sure you can keep that Anderson from finding out?¡±


    A creeping movement was seen on the cloth near Greem¡¯s chest; a thumb-sized ck bug crawled out from underneath it and stopped on his shoulder. The voice came from this ck bug.


    ¡°Hmph, Acteon, what¡¯s the point of you saying such sarcastic remarks now? If you had note to a dead end, you¡¯d nevere begging for my help!¡± Greem refuted with a cold voice.


    ¡°Hehe, we¡¯re just using each other for our own benefits!¡± The beetle that Greem referred to as Acteon vibrated its wings, producing some noise that sounded like the chirping of insects. ¡°Can¡¯t you tell that from the information I gave you? Not only does Anderson have his eyes on me and Mary, recently, he has started to cast his evil gaze on you and this little girl. If we don¡¯t do something, perhaps all of us will be thrown into a pot by that Anderson and our blood and flesh will be the foundation of his advancement!¡±


    Greem became as silent as a stone!


    With regards to this point, Acteon had urate judgment. From all of the intelligence they had gathered so far, this Anderson was indeed an insane Adept who would devour someone to the point of not even spitting the bones out. In order to improve his overall strength, he was preparing a horrible sacrifice of blood and flesh.


    Once the preparation came to its conclusion, most probably, this Swampy Tower would immediately turn into a massive graveyard as every single one Apprentice Adepts who lived here would be unable to escape from bing part of the offering for his ritual. The lower grade apprentices might just be the fuel used to heat the cauldron, and they, the Pseudo-Adepts and Advanced Apprentices, would be the main ingredients for this sacrificial ritual of blood and flesh.


    Thus, during this critical moment, any selfish behavior of paying attention to oneself without thinking of others would be stupid!


    Perhaps it was because he had realized this reality that Acteon finally gathered up his courage and transferred his remaining consciousness into this beetle,ing to Greem to discuss working together towards amon goal.


    As for escaping from the Swampy Tower and never returning, Greem never even considered it at all.


    He lived in the Adept Continent; nearly all of the territory upied by the human race was under the tight control and surveince of Adepts. If Greem wished to escape without putting up a fight, Adept Anderson would just need to use a sly approach andbeled them as apprentices who turned renegade and escaped; with that, no matter how high the sky and how vast thend, there would be no way of survival for them!


    As a matter of fact, he could easily tell this from the Fallen Adepts and Fallen Apprentices he had met at the Underground Cave.


    Therefore, when faced with this Evil Bugs Acteon who had solelye for help, Greem could only suppress the disgusted feeling he had in his mind and tentatively reach a strategic cooperation with him!


    They would unite to fight against that frightful Anderson!

 Chapter 147

    Trying to confront a veteran Adept who had be an official Adept for more than 300 years with the status of a Pseudo-Adept, such thought was no doubt as mad as a hatter. If not because he really didn¡¯t have any other alternative, Greem would have nevere up with this idea!


    Greem counted on his fingers, at the very most, his team only consisted of three good fighters.


    The actual body of Evil Bugs was now under the total control of Anderson. Although the beetle which hosted the primary consciousness of Acteon guaranteed that he could seize back the control for a very short period of time, such statement didn¡¯t contain any elements worth trusting! Hence, inwardly, Greem had been treating Acteon as half a Pseudo-Adept. At the critical moment, it would be considered fortunate if Acteon didn¡¯t turn his back on Greem and helped Anderson. Greem would never ce the hopes for victory on this guy.


    On the contrary, Mary was a helper whom he could count on. But unfortunately, her vampire bloodline was the work of Anderson himself, If Anderson didn¡¯t leave any contingency measurement in it, Greem would really have to despise Anderson for being an ipetent Adept.


    Knowledge is power!


    A true wise Adept would always defeat his enemies using his brain and knowledge.


    Therefore, with regards to how to use Mary in his n, Greem had his nerves on tenterhooks. Simr to Evil Bugs Acteon, when counting on the overallbative strength of his team, Greem could only take Mary as half a Pseudo-Adept.


    In this iron triangle of resisting Anderson, two of them actually couldn¡¯t be totally trusted. It was imaginable how depressed Greem was feeling right now in his mind and how tremendous the pressure he was enduring at the moment was!


    It seemed that at the most critical moment, perhaps only he himself could stand out to resist the enemy!


    As for the enemy they had to face, the First Grade Adept Anderson, if ording to the calctions derived from the Chip, he possessed thebative strength of at least eight to ten Pseudo-Adepts. This also meant, even taking away the aid he received from the Swampy Tower, and the amplification he had from additional magical equipment he owned, just Anderson alone would be able to easily withstand the besiegement from eight to ten Pseudo-Adepts at the same time.


    Of course, if they really did have ten Pseudo-Adepts, most probably they would be able to force Adept Anderson to give in. It was a pity that they didn¡¯t!


    There were simply too many uncertainties from Evil Bugs and Mary. Once the war started, the possibility of them turning into burdens was higher than bing his strengths. If not because he really had run out of methods, Greem would never willing to form an alliance with such teammates who might betray him at any time!


    With that, once the war started, it was possible that most of the pressure would be shouldered by Greem alone.


    Meanwhile, since the birth of the Fire Lord, Greem¡¯s personal overall strength had gone through a significant transformation. Currently, he could be considered a qualified Pseudo-Adept. No matter whether it was his defensive or offensive abilities, he was nowhere weaker than any ordinary Pseudo-Adept. And if he poured in all he got, he could even support two Fire Lords in the battlefield at the same time.


    It could be said that from thest battle between the Fire Lord and Alice. Thebative strength that an Adept level Fire Lord could bring into y was equal to at least two to three Element Pseudo-Adepts. Thus, even taking the maximumbative strength from two Fire Lords was only equivalent to six Element Pseudo-Adepts.


    With abative strength like this, together with Greem, Acteon, and Mary, they merely had thebined strength to fight that Anderson. As for who would obtain the final victory and who would be defeated? The chances of victory for Greem¡¯s team was, in fact, less than 10%!


    And even for this 10% of chance, it was based on the situation that all Greem¡¯s plots were sessfully executed and that Adept Anderson didn¡¯t have any too much of an incredible preparation.


    Just because of the overly low sess rate, Greem had no choice but to arduously increase every single advantage he could on his side, while trying his best to eliminate the advantage on Anderson¡¯s side!


    Strictly speaking, Greem¡¯s team actually did had some hidden approaches. The biggest piece of good news was that Evil Bugs could constantly supply them with the intelligence of the enemy. As the saying goes, know the enemy and know yourself and you can fight a hundred battles with no danger of defeat! In Greem¡¯s scheme, he had to get to the bottom of Adept Anderson¡¯s plot and n, then came out with well-directed countermeasures and counter-attacks, as this would be the safest strategy.


    On the other side, there was a super expert hiding in Greem¡¯s camp: Alice. Although the rtionship between her and Greem was rather stiff, when her life was in an endangering situation, presumably, she would also be one of the main fighting forces in Greem¡¯s team. In Greem¡¯s mind, at least this Alice was much more dependable than Acteon and Mary!


    In order to increase the odds of winning the battle, even if it was just a small advantage that was not worth mentioning, Greem would still give it a meticulous and detailed consideration, altering and perfecting his n and strategy. Even Snox was included in his n and had undertaken some very important tasks.


    While plotting his counter attack, Greem was also working hard to improve his survival abilities.


    Imaginable, once things turned ugly between both sides, Greem, as the leader of their camp, would definitely be the primary target who Adept Anderson focused his attacks on. Therefore, currently, it was more important for him to improve his survival abilities than train hisbative abilities, as it would be more beneficial for him in the uing warfare!


    After going through arge number of filtrations andparisons, there weren¡¯t many methods that he could master in a short period of time to improve his ability quickly. However, the drawing of Magic Runes was definitely an exception.


    ording to the records found in some magic books, the origin of magic spells actually came from observing and copying natural magic runes found on demon beasts by the ancestors of the human race. Most of the time, these demon beasts and demons didn¡¯t have any knowledge of magic spells, and they didn¡¯t understand any theories of magic spells at all. Yet, relying on thebination of their own innate abilities and the world around them, they could always master some mysterious abilities without being taught by anyone.


    Although these magic runes were rather simple and primitive, they actually pointed to the very core of the World Principle, and they were the specific representation of ne Principles for some lower tier nes. Therefore, it allowed them to possess some bizarre abilities that left one speechless.


    Initially, the ancestors of the human race hadn¡¯t known anything about it. However, the human race had proved themselves to be the species good at learning and creating. Some wise people among them had observed these natural magic runes and copied them, and had drawn them on their own body, which eventually became man-made magic runes.


    And this was the origin of the magical array!


    Later, as the ancestors of human race mastered more and more magic runes, they extracted the best, and through a continuous effort of reorganizing and restructuring, they eventually gave themselves a new power that never existed before. And, these unique runes extracted from natural magic runes were in fact, the magic spell runes that every single Adept had to learn and master today!


    Put this way, ancient Adepts were actually a group of ordinary humans. They used a unique paint and drew all kinds of peculiar and bizarre magic rune patterns on their body, allowing them to possess some strange abilities that was simr to demon beasts or demons.


    Through the historical changes of more than hundreds of thousands of years, this group of humans who kept studying on the arcane knowledge had eventually freed themselves from the status of ordinary humans and became the leaders and protectors of the entire human race. They no longer drew any magic runes on their body, instead, they had them engraved on top of their weapons or some special equipment, turning them into frightening magical weapons and magical equipment.


    They even learned how to meditate, using progressive methods to modify themselves into magical creatures simr to demon beasts. They also studied and analyzed the ne Principle, ultimately, leaving the conscious seal that belonged to them in the functioning system of the ne.


    As for now, Greem really wished he could borrow the help from these magic runes, so he could quickly improve his basicbative strength. Those scraped goatskin papers Alice saw in his room were actually the magic runes array Greem specifically made for himself.


    Initially, Greem thought it would not be a difficult task. After all, he was a Grand Master of Automata who could carve seven magical arrays on top of a thumb-sized crystal core. The only difference now was the working area had shifted over to his own body, and the area had expanded to at least few hundred times, supposedly, it should be an easier task!


    But too bad, when he really gave the task over to the Chip, and after the Chip ran through a thorough scan and analysis of his body, he was shocked to find out that on a human body, the area that could draw with magic runes was actually less than 1/7 of the total surface area. Yet, these areas were scattered everywhere on the body, and they were overly broken and in a disordered manner.


    ording to the distribution of these magic runes area, Greem came to the conclusion that the magical energy area on the surface of the human body was mostly interconnected with the vital organs. For example, the heart, brain, and lower abdomen, these were the ces with dense magical energy, while the limbs and the edges of the body were the regions with thin magical energy.


    Each region were interconnected with different vital organs, therefore, the magical energy they could support had slight differences as well. In order to better utilize them, he really needed to gave them a thorough and detailed examination and a huge amount of calctions and statistical analyses of data.


    This was also the reason why Master of Magic Runes was a rare upation and why it was also very expensive to draw a magic rune!


    ording to the information Greem had learned, if an ordinary apprentice wished to draw a magic rune on his body, even if it was just an Array of Agility (Agility +1) on his leg, the lowest fee he needed to pay a Master of Magic Runes was 1000 magic crystals. As for having an Energy Gathering Array (Doubles the speed of Elementium gathering) drawn on his chest, the lowest price was 3000 magic crystals.


    Yet, for a magic array which could bring the ability to see through to the apprentice¡¯s eyes, the cost of having it drawn was a hefty 5000 magic crystals.


    Looking at the list of expensive prices, Greem felt his heart jerking spasmodically. Maybe, when he had nothing else to do in the future, he could consider bing a Master of Magic Runes!


    As Greem hadpleted the transformation of his me Body, the regions of magical energy on his body wererger than those on other ordinary apprentices¡¯. Therefore, how he could make a good use of these magical energy regions had be a hard nut to crack. As the result, during this period of time, Greem had locked himself in his room, repeatedly examining the characteristics of the different regions on his body, using the Chip to construct the perfect magic runes drawings for him.


    By carrying out thisborious task himself, Greem now knew why despite meeting with so many Adepts, rarely had he seen anyone of them have magic runes drawn on their body. In order to draw a magic rune on the body, the Master of Magic Runes had to fully understand the body attribute of the target. Try to think about this, would any Adept willing let an outsider learn every single detail of the secrets found in his body?


    Therefore, this probably was one of the most important reasons why magic runes were not popr!


    After going throughprehensive and detailed calctions, the n to draw magic runes that Greem had drafted for himself was unprecedentedly humongous andplicated.


    ording to his n, he would need to draw an Energy Gathering rune array at the bottom of both feet, both palms and wrists would need to have a Precise Strike rune array (Instantly enhances the output of Elementium, causing element damage to be doubles), a Major Elementium Strengthening rune array on his chest, a Major Elementium Defense rune array on his back, and a Light of Spirit rune array on both his forehead and temples (able to directly transform Spirit into offensive Fire Element magic spell).


    Each and every single one of them was tailor made for and by Greem himself!

 Chapter 148

    Etching magic runes on one¡¯s own body was not something that could be easily aplished!


    It required special magic rune ingredients, a Master of Magic Runes who possessed peculiar innate talent, exclusive drawing experience and skill... and not a single requirement could be omitted. However, Greem didn¡¯t have even one of them.


    Inside of the Alchemy Laboratory of the Swampy Tower.


    The radiance from dozens of illuminating crystals had made theboratory as bright as day; not a single shadow could be seen. Unlike in the past, Greem didn¡¯t stand in front of the Alchemy Station. Instead, he was lying down on top of the Alchemy Station. Today, he was both the operator and the target of the operation!


    He didn¡¯t have any of the special ingredients required for the drawing of magic runes, so Greem could only use the method of crafting golems to carve the magic runes; he couldn¡¯t hire any professional Master Magic Runes, so Greem could only do it himself, drawing on his own body; he didn¡¯t possess any of the experience and skill in drawing magic runes that were passed down for generations, and he was solely depending on the optimizedbination and simted experiments carried out by the Chip in his Spiritual Domain...


    Today, it was destined that Greem would be a bull in a china shop, as he would throw every single pot and bottle that represented all of the previous expectations and rules onto the ground and then break a new path that belonged solely to himself.


    In a normal process of magic runes drawing, the Master of Magic Runes would usually need the aid of some medicines, so that he could reduce the recovery ability of flesh and blood in a particr region. Every single rune array that functioned properly wasposed of hundred and thousand of runes and magical lines. If the target of the drawing was someone with high Physique, before thest line of rune could be drawn, the first line of rune would havepletely self-healed.


    This wouldpletely destroy the entire process of magic rune drawing!


    Using a special medicine to anesthetize and repress the recovery ability of blood and flesh on a particr region of the target¡¯s body, and using the magic rune ingredients meticulously concocted to etch the corresponding magic runes on the skin of the target, and finally, interconnecting them with the magical energy organ inside of the target¡¯s body. This was the elementary theory that let magic runes stimte the human¡¯s body, which could make the target unleash a special ability.


    It was because of this tedious andplicated process that the importance of a Master of Magic Runes was so significant. There had been some fellows who wished to save the hefty amount of magic crystals that one cost, and fancied that they could use the simplest method of drawing magic runes on themselves. They thought such magic runes could bring them some effects for a short period of time, and following the self-recovery of the body, every external change made to their bodies would eventually fade away.


    And very soon, they had realized that they were just drawing water with a bamboo basket ¨C it achieved nothing. Not only would the magic runes not be solidified forever, it also cost them a dearly expensive amount of ingredients.


    Unfortunately, the magic rune suit of the me Fiend that Greem was custom making for himself was an example of that mentioned above. Nevertheless, relying on his extremely high control over his me Body, the process of losing effectiveness would definitely be slowed down. Also, he had never had the hope that the magic rune suit could be used forever; so long as it could support him in making his way through this ¡®cmity,¡¯ it would be enough.


    Greemy t on top of the Alchemy Station. Using his Spirit, he activated the alchemy equipment.


    As the needle-sized heat beam hit his body, Greem started to smell a pungent burning scenting from the burning of his muscle and fat and he heard the hissing sound of boiling fat. The heat beam moved slowly across the surface of his body, scorching his skin and turning it ck, leaving behind lines like shallow trenches.


    Expressionless, Greem silently endured the burning from the heat beam. At the same time, he had to pour in all his effort to repress this me Body¡¯s instinctive defense and counterattack against the heat beam. In addition to that, he had to hold down the regeneration speed of his flesh. Before those shallow trenches could recover, Greem controlled the other alchemy arm, using it to inject the filler that he had prepared beforehand into them.


    The strange hissing sound of the heat beam burning his flesh, the pungent stinking smell that came from the filler slowly corroding the muscle of a human body... the weird sound, the strange smell, both filled the entire Alchemy Laboratory almost immediately. It would make someone feel like he hade to a dark, ugly room of torture!


    Greem was trying to draw a rune arrayposed ofplicated, hard to understand runes, and full of numerous winding lines onto a random part of the body. At the same time, the core nodes of the rune array had to perfectly ovep with the magical nodes found on the body itself. During this process, any slight deviation would cause the total destruction of the entire rune array.


    Therefore, even though the severe paining from the surface of his body kept stimting his nerves, Greem still retained the same expression and focused his vision on the tiny light beam that kept jumping over his skin. With an attentive gaze, he watched the entire process as his skin turned red, softened, copsed, turned dark, and eventually, became coke.


    There would be a total of fourteen rune arrays drawn on his body, each of them an independent entity, and all possessed the effect of stimting the body function of that particr region. But when they were interconnected and activated, they would create an extremelyplicated, profound and mysterious magic rune suit ¨C the transformation of a me Fiend.


    And this was the direction of advancement Greem had set for his Fire Element magic spell!


    The me Fiend was a dreadful creature of the Abyss that came from the lower tier ne. They usually possessed a huge and menacing body, however, theirbative strength actually came from their terrifying me ability that was beyond anyparison. Once they flew into a rage, their entire body would ignite, turning them into a horrible ming humanoid. Any living beings that got too close to their body would have to withstand a constant fire damage.


    Without high fire resistance, ordinary enemies didn¡¯t even have the qualifications to fight a battle with it, and would be turned into coke by the constantly burning me. As for the enemies that had the qualification to stand face to face with the me Fiend, they would have to deal with raging Fire element magic spells that blotted out the sky and covered the earth, and the hand-to-handbat skills of the me Fiend, which were not weaker than those of ordinary demons.


    me Fiends may not be the strongest creatures among all of the experts of the Fire element, but they were definitely the creatures that stood out from the rest who practiced Fire element magic spells. That was why Greem had drawn fourteen rune arrays on his body; he wanted to use them to fully arouse his potential and mimic part of the me Fiend¡¯s abilities.


    This was also the main reason this magic rune suit was called ¡®the transformation of a me Fiend!¡¯


    Of course, all of this was based on Greem¡¯s first and earliest assumptions and spections. If he really wanted to transform into a true me Fiend, the best and most straightforward method would be to pay a visit to the lower tier ne, ughter, and dissect a real me Fiend himself. As for now, he could only mimic and improve his design.


    The process of drawing the magic runessted for one whole day and night, until noon of the second day. Only then did Greem drag his exhausted body back to his residence. Meanwhile, Mary, who had juste back from outside, had been waiting for him in his room.


    When she saw that Greem waspletely exhausted, yet still trying his best to keep up his spirit, a saddened expression emerged on Mary¡¯s pretty, travel-worn face.


    After she helped Greem lie t on his bed, Mary gently touched his face and softly said, ¡°Sleep well! I¡¯ll guard you right here!¡±


    Greem was barely able to give her a smile before he sank into deep slumber.


    ............


    Inside another room.


    Within the faint, transparent force field of a barrier, Alice could hardly tear herself away from the Adept level element crystal core; she kept turning the summoning core over and over in her palm. The fist-sized, transparent crystal core was emitting an enchanting glow that could grasp the soul of one who looked at it.


    With each turn and new angle, the transparent crystal core reflected another gorgeously bright and colorful, yet extraordinarily beautiful halo. Alice¡¯s gaze rested on it, and her face had an expression of obsession; for a very long time, she couldn¡¯t pull herself away from such emotion. With her vision, of course she could peer onto the surface of the crystal core and see the mysterious magical arrays that were as tiny as cow hair, but extremelyplicated and profound.


    No matter how you looked at it, it was no doubt a great work of art produced by a skillful Grand Master.


    Relying on the exceptionally designed magical array, the unique power stored within the element core was guided and unleashed; bybining this power with the vast element energy gathered from the outside world, it gave birth to a frightful Adept level element golem that was capable of causing a major catastrophe!


    Whenever she recalled the fact that she was miserably defeated by this crystal clear, extremely beautiful, little object, an indefinable me of anger immediately surged up from the bottom of Alice¡¯s heart. But immediately after that, the me of anger would melt away bit by bit under the strange, fantastic elemental halo of the element core.


    Oh right, I had promised that rasca... ouch... master one thing. It looks like I need to make the best use of my time and practice!


    While rolling about on her bed without care over her own image, Alice slowly stretched out her Spirit. Through the slight spiritual sense brought to her from the magical contract buried deep in her soul, she quietly confirmed the current location of her master.


    That... he was in his own room now, and he hadn¡¯t fully activated all of the defense mechanisms. Also, it was obvious that his Spirit was on the low side, and he had sunk into a deep state. He should be sleeping now. Wow, isn¡¯t this a great opportunity? As long as I can teleport one object into his hand, then I¡¯ll have this precious thing apany me for a few more days!


    Her mind filled with a restless excitement, Alice stretched out her hand and drew a magic rune in midair. After that, she took out an earring and tossed it over. The magic rune was covered by an extremelyplicated magic ring; when the earring traveled through it, it was like prating ayer of transparent water mirror. Within a split second, it disappeared without a trace.


    Meanwhile, inside the other room, some enshrouding runes suddenly appeared on Greem¡¯s right palm. Following the vibration of these runes, an elegant earring slowly prated through the spatial distortion; in the next moment, it would fall into Greem¡¯s palm.


    Pap! Mary stretched out her hand and swung gently; the earring was instantly pped into the corner of the room.


    ¡°What a nuisance, it must be that little girl again! Hmph, trying to secretly give her earring to Greem, I knew she was up to something bad!¡±


    As the earring was pped away, Alice immediately sensed it. ¡°Eh, what happened? It is obvious I¡¯m going to seed this time, why was it pped away suddenly? Could it be some kind of new defense mechanism? No way, I have to give it another try!¡±


    It wasn¡¯t an ident; the second time, the third time... all of Alice¡¯s attempts were interrupted by some kind of unknown defense mechanism. Instead of giving up, it actually aroused her anger. ¡°What¡¯s all this about? It is obvious that guy is sleeping now. Why there is still such a strange defense mechanism? You¡¯re the one who forced me now!¡±


    Gnashing her teeth in anger, Alice started to move both her arms quickly in midair. She actually unleashed a total of four spatial magic runes at the same time. However, before she had the time to teleport anything through them, all four spatial magic runes that had appeared on different part of Greem¡¯s body vanished at the same time.


    Damn it, you¡¯re challenging me right now!


    Alice, who had herpetitiveness evoked, immediately started continuous and endless attempts, but to no effect. Unsurprisingly, every attempt was interrupted by something or someone. This made her even angrier, and she poured in more effort to try harder.


    At the same time, inside of Greem¡¯s room, Mary was seen yawning and stretching her back while moving her fingers to quickly poke the air. Whenever a new spatial magic rune was formed, before it could establish a stable minor spatial tunnel with the other room, it would be instantly broken by Mary¡¯s finger, which had been injected with Blood element energy.


    Therefore, unknowingly, Alice had started to y a game of ¡®cat and mouse¡¯ with Mary!

 Chapter 149

    Within a dark, wet room, a bloody magical array loomed in front of one¡¯s eyes.


    It was a mysterious magical array drawn using the mixed blood of seven different species of demons. All the runes and magical lines thatposed the magical array were drawn using fresh blood. The fresh blood was warm and the lines carried a slightly crimson hue; they looked bizarre and evil.


    In a corner of the room, there were countless dried bodies of demons from the Magical Swamp, all thrown messily in a pile. Each of them looked extremely miserable; anyone who saw them would be struck with shudders instantly.


    A previous member of the three strongest apprentices in the tower, Hawkeye Clutha, now sat with his legs folded inside of a magical ring, which was drawn right in the center of the magical array. His body was fully covered with the pungent and stinking blood of the demons. Meanwhile, outside of this magical array, Madwoman stood, holding her huge de. It seemed like she was thinking about something.


    In the next few moments, following a weird murmuringing from the magical array, countless crows with ck feathers and red eyes flew in from the opened window and leapt straight into the crimson magical array.


    Every single red-eyed crow who had leapt into the magical array exploded into tiny pieces of flesh and blood that shot in all direction. Countless ck feathers floated through the air, but before they could touch the ground, they turned into wisps of smoke and vanished into thin air. Their flesh turned into countless skinless bloody snakes, whose bodies clustered outside of the magical ring that Hawkeye sat in.


    When there were enough bloody snakes gathered around the magical ring, Clutha¡¯s body flickered as he removed himself from the center of the magical ring and reappeared beside Madwoman.


    ¡°Alright, the magical array has started to function. It is your turn now!¡± Clutha nced around at everything inside of the room. Then he nodded his head, satisfied. A hideous and dreadful smile emerged on his face.


    Though it was thest moment, Madwoman still hesitated. She couldn¡¯t help but ask, ¡°Clutha, are you sure this Blood Sacrifice magical array can really stimte my Physique and make it grow stronger? But why I can sense a slight smell of danger from it?¡±


    Clutha replied, with a hideous smile on his face, ¡°At our current stage, keep dreaming if you want to obtain significant growth in your overall strength without paying any price! Dangerous? Tell me, what magical array is not dangerous? This is the only Blood Sacrifice magical array that is within our ability and is also the only one that can help you! If this magical array wasn¡¯t only focused on improving Physique, do you really think I would be so generous and give away the opportunity to improve my overall strength to you? Remember, once you be a Pseudo-Adept, you must help meplete that mission!¡±


    A determined expression shed upon Madwoman¡¯s savage face; she no longer hesitated. Some loud *doom* noises were heard, as she finally removed the thick and heavy magical armor on her body, removed her inner dress, and revealing her lean and perfect body. Naked, she stepped into the magical array.


    When she sat with both legs folded in the center of the magical ring, a shivering gleam flickered in Clutha¡¯s bloodshot eyes, before he let out a deep, hoarse cry.


    As a result, more and more red-eyed crows started to leap through the window, and more and more bloody snakes clustered outside of the magical ring. Countless snake heads were poking around and their crimson bodies stacked,yer uponyer. Anyone who saw this would tremble in fear.


    In the center of the magical ring, Madwoman immediately felt a raging crimson tidal wave swarm into her body. Stimted by this crimson tidal wave, the body factors which had been stagnating for a long time once again filled with vigor and vitality; they started to grow slowly yet steadily.


    Madwoman purposely held back the repelling force of her body from these external energies and allowed the crimson tidal wave to sweep across every single part of her body.


    However, while her overall strength was increasing, Madwoman had a vague feeling that something was not right.


    While the crimson tidal wave was stimting her Physique¡¯s potential, it seemed like it was also slowly corroding her nerve system, which resulted in significantly decreasing her control over her body.


    This... why was this process a little bit different from how Hawkeye Clutha had described?


    Madwoman struggled, sat up straight, and opened her mouth, wanting to ask Clutha about this. But when she opened her mouth, only then did she realize that all of the nerves on her face had be paralyzed, as she couldn¡¯t let out any voice at all. Yet, when she tried to stand up from the floor, she felt as if every single part of her body had been dislocated and would never respond to her will.


    Madwoman¡¯s heart started to race. Taking the opportunity before she lost all her strength, she poured in all her effort and turned her head. Only then was she able to see Clutha.


    Clutha stood at the edge of the magical array, wearing a weird smile on his face and staring at her. His once bloodshot eyes had transformed into a bright green. As he opened his mouth, a bizarre looking bug head poked out from it. It had a ferocious mouthpiece and a pair of dreadful lookingpound eyes. Anyone who looked at it felt their flesh creep.


    Perhaps sensing that the time was right, the scorpion pushed with its razor sharp legs and leapt out from Clutha¡¯s mouth. It then crawled quickly across the floor, climbing over the creeping bloody snakes, until it got to Madwoman¡¯s feet.


    The magical ring which had blocked all of bloody snakes on the outside had no effect on this scorpion. It moved and swayed its body at top speed, climbing up Madwoman¡¯s burly body to her mouth. Madwoman tried her best to clench her jaw, but the paralyzed nerves prevented her from doing so. Using its front legs, the scorpion opened up a tiny slit in her lips. Then, without hesitation, it simply squeezed through the slit.


    The raging and furious Madwoman understood everything in an instant.


    Evil Bugs Acteon! It was him behind all this!


    The raging me of anger burnt her body and mind. Using her strong will, bit by bit she expelled the crimson energies in her body. But too bad, when she had nearly seeded in seizing back control of her body, her body started to tremble violently. Itsted for quite a long time, before everything calmed.


    Quietly and calmly, Madwoman rose to her feet. When she suddenly opened her eyes, deep within her pupils, one could see a slightly bright green hue.


    When she stood to face at Hawkeye Clutha, both of their mouths opened at the same time, revealing the hideous, dreadful, and ugly looking head of a bug.


    At the same time, in many dark corners throughout the entire Swampy Tower, some fearful looking and ugly scorpions were hidden quietly. They were either hidden underneath the bed inside of an apprentice¡¯s residence or hidden in the darkest corner of the room. Silently and motionlessly, they kept watch over each and every move of all of the Apprentice Adepts.


    If any apprentice sank into the deepest slumber, they would move noiselessly. Crawling along the bed-leg and over the soft nket, inch by inch they moved closer to the target. Once there was an opportunity, they would leap forward immediately, with their quickest speed, and jump into the mouth of the apprentice.


    Frightened and hoarse cries, together with the sound of struggling and retching, were heard from many of the apprentices¡¯ residences. None of that made any difference to the matter. Their throats swelled up and a small lump dug quickly through them. In just a short amount of time, the apprentices who had put up such a furious struggle would calm and lie back on their bed, continuing their sleep.


    Meanwhile, inside their body, the head of bug was vaguely seen swaying its feelers happily!


    ............


    Inside of the bloody, stinking bug nest of Evil Bugs, Acteon.


    Acteon, still d in the same thick, heavy ck robe, bowed his head and sat quietly in the center of the secret room. Though the clothes on his body were seen moving, he didn¡¯t look like a living being.


    So long his master, Anderson, didn¡¯t give him any orders, he would always remain in the same posture and behavior: eating, resting, multiplying, and growing mechanically. All of the scorpions were the result of his own multiplication and fission, and it happened right in his huge abdomen, which looked like a pregnant woman¡¯s. Countless tinyrvae kept splitting and multiplying. Then they would cluster together, ughtering and devouring each other.


    Only the scorpions that were strong enough could devour enough of their peers to leave Acteon¡¯s body and join the swarm of bugs that were in the secret room.


    In a corner of the secret room, a swarm of scorpions had clustered together and formed a new wave of bugs. There were now two groups of distinctly different bugs and they never mixed together. In the heart of this new wave of bugs, the bizarre bug that hosted Acteon¡¯s primary consciousness constantly let out a faint chirping, keeping a secret spiritual connection with all of the bugs that had divided from it and now hid in different parts of the Swampy Tower.


    Within its senses, one after another, Apprentice Adepts in different parts of the tower had fallen into its control. This had allowed it to spread its spiritual tentacles wantonly to every single remote corner of the ce.


    However, this army of its didn¡¯t go the expedient route and invade every single individual. Instead, it only targeted the Apprentice Adepts who possessed basicbative abilities. As for the human ves who lived in the lowest tier of this poption, it disdained to waste its energy on them. In addition to that, it also purposely avoided a few specific targets in this invasion that had spread throughout the entire tower and so didn¡¯t capture all the apprentices in one.


    Greem, Mary, Alice, and Snox the goblin: this four unique individuals had be the exceptions who mixed among the group of bug-infested humans and hadn¡¯t detected any changes to their surrounding environment.


    Meanwhile, Acteon¡¯s primary consciousness, which was hiding behind the scenes and remotely controlling everything, now quietly umted and conserved his energy. Once the dreadful moment arrived, the individuals whose soul consciousness he controlled would be his fearless fighters. Although he had reached a strategic agreement with Greem, even though they were working together with amon effort, he still wished to keep some final trump cards that could allow him to turn the situation over at thest moment.


    ............


    Snoxy on its stomach in the Little Shop of Goblin, bored.


    Recently, things had seemed to be rather strange. All of the apprentices in the tower had been behaving weirdly.


    A few of the Beginner Apprentices who used to gather in its shop had gone missing; the Swampy Tower, which had just turned lively and restless, had once again be deserted and quiet.


    It was as if all of those apprentices had suddenly gone into a hibernation, dwelling in their own residence and rarelying out. asionally, it would bump into a few of them in the corridor, but they just brushed past it expressionlessly, without even giving it a greeting.


    After suffering a few days in such a bizarre atmosphere, Snox had started cking. It simply closed the shop, returned to its residence, and started to arduously practice its Camouge spell and Partial Transformation spell. For some unknown reason, its master had secretly given it a mission a few days ago. In order to it to achieve the goal set by its master, it would need to pour in more hard work!


    After it returned to its residence and activated all the magical defensive mechanisms, Snox carefully took out its magic wand, pointed at its own body, and cast a Camouge spell. Influenced by the magical energy, its body started to transform slowly.


    The ugly and short body stretched a little bit taller, bing simr to the target of its practice. The green skin also gradually turned fair and delicate. More importantly, it¡¯s ugly and withered face started to twist and turn; vaguely, the look of a cute little girl appeared.


    Standing in front of a mirror and examining its looks, Snox shook its head, dissatisfied. It then stretched out the slim and fair hand that gripped the magic wand and kept waving and pointing at its body. Every time the magic wand touched its body, a small Partial Transformation spell transformed that part of the body closer to the image found in its mind.


    After an hour of tedious and hard work, the ugly, stupid Snox disappeared. Standing inside of the room now was the proud, arrogant figure of Alice.

 Chapter 150

    The Magical Swamp was still the same as always, wet and dark, like a pond of stagnant water that exuded a stinking smell.


    However, under the surface of this filthy and troubled water, a terrible undercurrent was brewing.


    For the Probationary Apprentices, who spent days and nights on the first floor of the tower, their minds were always filled with envy whenever official Apprentices walked past them proudly. Yet, little did they know, a deadly storm, more than enough to destroy everything, was blotting out the sky and covering the earth while sweeping towards their direction.


    In this massive storm, those whocked preparation would not be able to escape death by sheer good luck.


    Another ten days passed in this harsh environment. Finally, the frightful day arrived!


    It was early in the morning of a gloomy and overcast day. Most of the apprentices were still indulging in their sweet dreams. However, the devilish Adept Anderson had justpleted the construction and modification of his mysterious magical array.


    After he came out from the specifically isted inter-space, Adept Anderson quickly connected his Spirit with the controlling core of the tower and brought all the tower¡¯s information into his mind.


    He had been busy working in the inter-space recently, so he didn¡¯t have aplete understanding regarding any changes in the outside world. But as he was the highest authority in the Adept Tower, nothing that happened within the tower could hide from his senses and examination.


    Perhaps it was a response towards his spiritual prying, but one after another, the spirit of a few Pseudo-Adepts turned lively, as if they had been startled from their dreams.


    Hmph. Since all of the intended targets were here, there was no need to choose another day. Today would be the day for his n to be executed!


    The skinny, wizened Adept Anderson wore a pointy Adept hat on his head and was d in a gray Adept robe. He stood quietly in the controlling hall of the tower. Both of his arms moved in the air, drawing and forming one dazzling rune after another. The runes disappeared immediately after they emerged, and their disappearances caused the tower to tremble slightly.


    Under the control of Adept Anderson, the entire Magical Swamp was now tightly nketed by a denseyer of fog. Even the few eye-catching entrances had dissolved into it. With the slight vibrations of the tower, the outer wall of the tower was brightly lit.


    When the raging element energies flowed past the augite stone used to construct the tower, it immediately lit with a cold and dreary magical glow. The Spirits of Death and Wandering Souls that normally hid in the depths of the swamp came swarming in, hovering and swirling around the tower, and kept letting out ghostly howls that could take one¡¯s soul away.


    All of the frightening demons, who had signed a magical contract with the Swampy Tower and inhabited in different parts of the Magical Swamp, started to be restless. One after another, they left their nests, gathering around the tall tower with high vignce for any possible visitors.


    Layers uponyers of magical halos hovered on top of the tower. Countless magical traps and magical defense mechanisms activated. All magical secret doors and passages leading into the towerpletely sealed; even all of the windows in the tower were covered up by countless invisible air barriers.


    Nearly at the same time, every single apprentice of the tower was trapped where they were; none of them could move even a little bit.


    ¡°Acteon, bring all of them here!¡± Anderson gave his order coldly.


    Following his order, Evil Bugs Acteon, who had been sitting in the secret room like a dead man, suddenly raised his head. Two bright and zing mes of soul ignited in his eyes. He shouted,manding the army of countless scorpions that swarmed out from the secret room and instantly flooded the entire corridor.


    Every single residence of the apprentices, which used to be protected by countless magical defense mechanisms, were now wide open. The army of scorpions came sweeping by like a fierce tsunami and carried all of the apprentices from their room and into the corridor, one after another.


    With the aid of this army of countless scorpions, Acteon sent all of the apprentices of the tower to the fifth floor, a high-level floor that none of these apprentices had ever stepped in before.


    In the spacious and well-lighted magical main hall on the fifth floor, the scorpions moved in and out, bringing all the apprentices of the tower. Greem and the other three Pseudo-Adepts were the first ones who had been brought here. They were now trapped and tightly tied up with half-transparent air chain like mummies. Their eyes were shut and they had lost consciousness.


    In order to avoid any unnecessary trouble, Adept Anderson had used the power of a Sleep talisman and made all the apprentices sink into a deep slumber.


    Once all of the personnel had taken their ce, only then did Adept Anderson drift through the air ande into the main hall. He lowered his head and looked at all of the apprentices of the tower who were now sleeping. A hideous smile emerged on his lips.


    ¡°Stop pretending that you¡¯re sleeping. Do you really think I can¡¯t sense your restless spiritual wave? When you¡¯re facing an Adept, any petty tricks are useless!¡±


    Upon hearing what Anderson said, all three Pseudo-Adepts opened their eyes at the same time.


    ¡°Respectable master Anderson, can you tell us what are you trying to do? Please don¡¯t tell me you want to kill all the apprentices of the tower in this ce? If that really happens, how are you going to answer to the Sarubo family?¡± Greem struggled a few times. When he realized that there was no way he could escape from the shackles, he angrily threw his questions towards Anderson, who was hovering in midair.


    ¡°Hmph! Family? Once I use your blood, flesh, soul and break through my shackles, I¡¯ll be a mighty Second Grade Adept. At that moment, the Sarubo family will do their best to maintain a good rtionship with me. Do you really think they will question my wrongdoings for you, a group of mere Apprentice Adepts?¡±


    ¡°What? You really want to kill us all? I...¡±


    Toozy to hear the pathetic cries of a dying sheep anymore, Anderson pointed with his finger. A Silence rune immediately fell onto Greem¡¯s body, causing him to lose his voice instantly.


    Mary and Alice were also struggling with all their might, but they just couldn¡¯t escape from the shackles on their body.


    Adept Anderson gently pointed his finger again. In an instant, the storage waist belt left Greem and fell into his hand. He closed his eyes and gave the item a careful examination. A few momentster, a joyful expression came to his brows. He flicked his palm, revealing a crystal clear golem summoning core emanating powerful elemental ripples in his palm.


    Even among all of the official Adepts, such a finely made element golem was a rare item. If he could remove the consciousness seal left by Greem, perhaps he could bring himself an additional free ve. He casually waved his hand a few times, sealing up this Adept level crystal core with a simple method. Only then did Anderson ce it into his pocket with a big smile.


    He gave the surroundings another quick nce, and when he felt there was nothing amiss, Adept Anderson raised both hands high in the air. An intense spatial ripple swept across, so that the entire main hall was covered in a soft white light. When the white light faded away gradually, they were no longer on the fifth floor of the Swampy Tower, but in a secret magical room located at an unknown location.


    The secret magical room was a pretty big space; it covered an area of nearly three football fields. Right in the center of this secret room, a strange, triangle shape altar had been built. It was not a big altar, but was divided into three levels. Each level had a height of around two meters and they were connected with a ten step stair.


    On the stone wall of each level of the altar, countless carvings of human faces could be seen; they had different shapes and expressions, some were painful, some were howling, some were crying, some had a sorrowful look... none of them had the same look. Nevertheless, they all looked real, as if they were made by real living humans. Anyone who saw them felt a shiver run down their back!


    Anderson flew above the highest level of the altar, hovering steadily in midair. As a hard to understand, profound incantation echoed throughout the heavens and earth, this secret magical roompletely sealed off with a loud booming noise. The connection between it and the outside world was nowpletely cut off.


    This was actually a precautionary measure of Anderson¡¯s.


    In order to avoid any distractions from the outside world, he had temporarily shut away this piece of space. Before his blood sacrifice ritual waspleted, no one could escape from this space. Perhaps, at the same time of tomorrow, the person who reopened this space and walked out with head held high would be a brand new Anderson, a Second Grade Adept!


    At that point in time, all those who used to look down on him would have to lower their heads when faced with his dazzling glory, their minds filled with fear, and submit their respects to Anderson. Meanwhile, the news of the birth of a new Second Grade Adept would be sung throughout the entire region under the Zhentarim Association!


    While envisioning a beautiful future, Anderson leaned forward and ran his eyes over the Apprentice Adepts who were now lying messily on the floor. He waved his hand and dispelled the Wind Chain on Mary¡¯s body.


    The first moment she was freed, Mary moved with lightning speed to leap in front of Anderson. Her hand¡¯s crimson sharp ws struck at his throat with a speed no naked eye could see.


    If it had not been for that invisible barrier which appeared in a peculiar manner, perhaps Mary would have had the opportunity to hurt Anderson. But it was a pity, as she was facing a veteran Adept who had been an official Adept for more than 300 years, no matter how fast Mary¡¯s surprise attack, it would never be faster than the speed of Anderson¡¯s thoughts.


    Countless w marks continuously appeared on the invisible barrier. Mary clenched her jaw tightly and keptunching attack after attack, but she just couldn¡¯t break through the thinyer of the protective barrier.


    Using the entire Swampy Tower as his background support, the endless supply of pure magical energy that came through space and reached this isted space kept being injected into the invisible barrier outside of Anderson¡¯s body. To injure him, Mary¡¯s attack had be powerful enough to break this barrier with one single strike, or else, with the supplement of this endless energy, it was absolutely impossible for her to deplete the Wind element energy on this barrier.


    ¡°My beautiful, elegant personal guard and servant, stop pressing down your true savage and wild nature. Give up your meaningless resistance, and from now on, continue to bow under the feet of your great master, Anderson...¡±


    As Adept Anderson, hovering on top of the altar, murmured under his breath, in the middle of a frenzied attack, Mary¡¯s body suddenly trembled and her bloodshot eyes instantly turned pale white. Unconsciously, she stopped her attack.


    ¡°Yes, that¡¯s right! Go now, go... Under the altar are the countless sheep I prepared specifically for you. Go now and taste their blood; let their boiling hot, fresh blood warm your cold body once again...¡±


    A slightly pained, struggling expression appeared on Mary¡¯s beautiful face. But unfortunately, under the restriction of Adept Anderson¡¯s talisman, her will was unworthy of mention. In less than three seconds, her primary consciousness was toppled by the raging instinct of the vampire.


    Some cracking noises came from Mary¡¯s throat. Her body flickered as she jumped off the altar,nding on top of the Apprentice Adept closest to her. A pair of razor sharp vampire fangs poked through her lips and impaled the arteries on the apprentice¡¯s neck. Startled from slumber, the apprentice cried out loudly in pain, but too bad, his cries and struggle made no difference. In just a brief moment, his voice petered out.


    When Mary left his body and leapt toward the next target, a sweet smile could be vaguely seen on the face of this apprentice, whose blood had all been sucked out. It was as if he was still indulging in some sweet dream of happiness.

 Chapter 151

    Inside of Snox¡¯s room.


    Arge lump of ck beetles was seen creeping at a corner of the room. Using their great numbers, they drew out the vague outline of a human.


    When the tower becamepletely silent, the pile of ck beetles suddenly exploded with a boom. In a messy state, Alice squeezed out from inside of this pile of insects.


    Using her hands, she swiped away some beetles remained on her shoulder, dress, and hair. And while pinching her nose and wearing a disgusted expression, she crushed a few of them who were running around her feet. Only after done with that, did she close her eyes and start to sense the current situation of the tower.


    At this moment, the tower had bepletely empty and no aura of life could be sensed anymore. All the Apprentice Adepts located on the second floor and above had vanished, and the only humans remained were those juvenile Probationary Apprentices. They were all lying t quietly on their wooden bed, and had stopped breathing.


    It wasn¡¯t tough to tell that Adept Anderson had burned all his boats and didn¡¯t leave any leeway for himself.


    If during this time tomorrow, he failed to turn himself into a Second Grade Adept using the blood sacrifice ritual, then he wouldn¡¯t be able to escape from the punishment from Sarubo family. ording to the rules of Zhentarim Association, any fellow who used the method of blood sacrifice ritual to improve their overall strength would have to be punished.


    If he was able to advance into a Second Grade Adept smoothly, and was willing to continue his service with the family, then presumably, Sarubo family would be happy to cover up what happened in the Magical Swamp for him. By just simply making up a story of demons outbreak or magical experiment leakage, they would be able to wipe clean everything that happened in this ce.


    Therefore, though Adept Anderson portrayed a confident look and behaved like everything was under his control, once he failed in the advancement, the only consequence waiting for him would be to be forced to sign a life-long contract with the Sarubo family, in which he had to give up all the rights of being an Adept, and serve the family obediently for the rest of his life!


    As for putting him to death? Hmph, no Adept family would waste such a precious resource!


    Even if he was a human being!


    Alice flying in midair along the emptied corridor, the wave of ck beetles was following closely behind her. Their destination was the controlling main hall located on the fifth floor of the Swampy Tower.


    Although Adept Anderson had brought all the apprentices and teleported into that mysterious magical secret room, but this unmanned tower still followed his order, not only it had totally shut off any ess to itself, it also kept transmitting the powerful element energies into that mysterious ce.


    If they didn¡¯t find a way to cut off the connection between Adept Anderson and this tower, then Greem¡¯s team would be facing with a formidable Adept who supported by an endless amount of elemental energies. When faced with an enemy like this, even all of them poured in whatever they got, perhaps it would be near impossible to withstand even a casual strike unleashed by Anderson.


    Alice went through the quiet long corridor, continuing her way up the narrow and steep stone staircase. Soon, she came to the intersection between the fourth and fifth floor. She was stopped by a half-transparent energy barrier. Any action of touching it would immediately trigger the defense mechanism of the tower and she would have to face a ferocious counter attack.


    Although it had lost the real-time control from the stationed Adept, once the overall strength of an Adept Tower hiding under the surface of the water revealed itself, it was still not something an ordinary Apprentice Adept couldpete with.


    Alice clenched her teeth, without even a second thought she forcefully leaped into the energy barrier.


    Behind her, the swarm of ck beetles had also rushed towards the barrier, instantly flooding the entire spiral staircase.


    Right when Alice stepped into the corridor of the fifth floor, the emptied corridor immediately turned gruesome and dreadful. The wall on both side suddenly transformed into a thinyer of sticky and tough diaphragm and rose up and down, as if countless of monsters were trying hard to break through it ande into the corridor.


    One after another, the ferocious, frightful heads of monster were showing on the stone wall, which had now turned as thin as the wings on a cicada. While struggling desperately, they kept roaring savagely at Alice.


    Two crystal clear popping sounds were hearding from the other end of the long corridor. From either side of the stone wall, two monsters had managed to escape from the trap and fell onto the cold, gray floor with strange fluid sshing around from their body. Their appearance was like a signal, within the next few seconds, a session of popping sounds started to ring through the ce, as one after another monster made their escape from the wall. In an instant, the long corridor had been fully filled with these nasty monsters.


    Magical Beasts!


    They were all magical beasts!


    These were all frightening beasts modified using magic spell by the stationed Adept. Each of them possessed the overall strength of an Advanced Apprentice, and they came in great numbers. If all of them came forth in a rush, even though Alice was a Pseudo-Adept now, she would still fall in the waves of besiegement.


    Alice¡¯s face turned dark, yet she dared not hesitate. She let out a shriek and dashed into this group of savage beasts.


    She was faced with a tough situation, indeed. However, it was most probable that Greem and the other were facing with the situation ten times, or even hundred times tougher than hers! Instead of standing in front of that frightful Adept Anderson, who had revealed all his sharp ws and fangs, Alice would rather stay here and fight a fierce battle with these magical beasts which had the number hundred times more than hers!


    Two huge Spatial Cuts broke through the passage, thrusting into the swarm of magical beasts in an instant. They swept away all obstacles in the way, slicing through flesh and bones, sending sticky fluid all over the ces... After all, these were just magical beasts who had received magical modification, though their body had turned near invincible against the attack of ordinary swords and des, when faced with the Spatial Cut that was extremely sharp and capable of destroying anything, they could only let out miserable howls, while their limbs were ripped apart, and theirs head were removed from their bodies.


    Yet, as there were too many of these magical beasts, a dozen of them had managed to dodge the attacks and came rushing in front of Alice, crazily they started to m, bite, and rip the paper-thin Protection Barrier.


    Alice tried her best to hold back the ufortable feeling of staring so close to these magical beasts, who were ugly, wizened, and had their bodies covered in sticky fluids. Clenching her jaw tightly, she kept unleashing Spatial Cuts in top speed. In front of her Spatial Cut magic spells, any flesh and blood was like a ball of rotten meat, like a hot de slicing through the butter, they cut through everything on their way, noiselessly.


    Alice was hovering in midair, any magical beasts came in front of her looked like they were jumping into a meat grinding machine. They had instantly been ripped apart, their flesh and blood sshing in all directions. All sorts of broken limbs kept flying past in front of her eyes, there was even a half broken head of magical beast that suddenly flew into her direction, fell onto the Protection Barrier, before slowly rolling off onto the ground.


    Meanwhile, the ground underneath her feet had turnedpletely into a ughter house. Countless broken bodies were scattered around, each had an extremely miserable look. The purple and green color blood had stained the entire wall of the corridor, and unknown fluid was dripping down from the ceiling.


    The cute little face of Alice had turned stiff, her eyes filled with a severe murderous look. At this dreadful moment of life and death, she had given up pretending to be a cute and harmless little girl, and had totally revealed her true nature of being treacherous and brutal.


    It was a corridor of less than 30 meters, yet it took Alice a full fifteen minutes to reach the other end. Behind her, was a hell on earth that no one had to guts to take a second look.


    When she used the Spatial Wave and shook away all the colorful blood and intestines that stuck to her Protection Barrier, and countless debris of flesh that no one could tell where they had originally belonged, in front of her was another long corridor.


    There were many colorful oil paintings hanging on both sides of the wall. Some were beautiful sceneries, some were finely painted portraits. But it was a pity that all these paintings had their main object missing, no exception. Yet, inside of this corridor, she saw arge crowd of incorporeal, vague figure of souls and spirit, and many demonic nts, which had twisted and deformed bodies. They were either lingering around aimlessly, or climbing the ceilings.


    Undoubtedly, Alice¡¯s appearance had attracted their attention. All souls, spirit, and demons stopped their movement, turned their heads and looked towards Alice. Under the dimmed light of the corridor, countless crimson ghost mes and greenish glows were ignited, one after another.


    Alice¡¯s face turned dark in an instant.


    Every single one of these bastards had the overall strength of a Pseudo-Adept!


    ¡°Greem, I hate you...!¡±


    The furious and shrill shriek of Alice echoed throughout the quiet long corridor, lingering in the air for a long time, just like how much she hated that guy!


    ............


    Within the secret space.


    Standing on top of the terrifying altar, Adept Anderson closed his eyes as he tried to sense something. A surprise expression was brought upon his face.


    ¡°I never expect that you had left a helper on the outside. Since Alice is outside, then this one here must be a fake!¡±


    Anderson pointed out his finger, unleashed a dark beam and shot it into the ¡®Alice¡¯s¡¯ body, which was now lying quietly on the floor. After a brief moment of twisting and transforming, the ugly, short and green body of Snox had showed up in front of him.


    ¡°Not bad, not bad at all! You do have aplete and thorough n.¡± Anderson¡¯s expression turned dark, but he didn¡¯t look panicked at all. Instead, he showed a regretful expression on his face. ¡°Since you had hidden someone outside in advance, I¡¯m sure you must have taken precautions against this. And the only way for you to obtain this information would be...¡±


    Anderson paused, and suddenly, countless Wind Chains stretched out from around Acteon, who was standing quietly beside the altar and tightly tied him up.


    However, although Anderson¡¯s action had shown a serious hostility, Acteon didn¡¯t put out any resisting behavior. He still looked absolutely submissive toward Anderson.


    ¡°Not him?¡± Anderson cast a few spells in a row and threw them into Acteon¡¯s body, he didn¡¯t find anything worth suspecting. The blood contract in Acteon¡¯s soul was still intact, showing no sign of being touched by someone else before.


    Pondering hard and with no results, Anderson decided to give up.


    ¡°If I have to give up one Pseudo-Adept, so be it! As the matter of fact, just the three of you is enough for me to break through the threshold of Second Grade Adept. But I¡¯m curious, since you cane out with the idea of arranging someone on the outside, then what is your n in fighting against me? Don¡¯t tell me that you are going to fight me with just you few Pseudo-Adepts? If that truly is your n, I¡¯ll really feel sorry for yourughable, naive ideas!¡±


    Adept Anderson rested his shivering gaze over at Greem.


    Despite being tied up by Wind Chains and lying on the floor, Greem still maintained the same sneer on his face.


    ¡°Even though we had be Pseudo-Adepts, we still cannot get rid of the status of Apprentice Adept. Indeed, wee short in fighting against you! But, what if we are reced by a few Adepts?¡±


    The look in Anderson¡¯s eyes became even more stern and cold.

 Chapter 152

    ¡°Aren¡¯t you afraid that I¡¯ll kill you right now?¡± Anderson roared with rage.


    Hearing what he said, Greem smiled. ¡°You¡¯re wee to do anything you want! I¡¯ve given up resisting now, and you can just kill me straightaway. But... if you do that, how are you going to execute your n of bing a Second Grade Adept? You have brought so many apprentices here, I¡¯m afraid that only by turning a few of us into official Adepts then it will be the help for you to make your breakthrough. If you are afraid of our resistance, why don¡¯t you just kill all of us now? Then, tomorrow you can wag your tail at the messenger from Sarubo family. Perhaps you¡¯ll still be the same Adept Anderson, but your dream is destined to be shattered!¡±


    ¡°Since you¡¯ve told me about your n, do you think that I¡¯ll allow you to destroy my n?¡±


    ¡°Does it make any difference if you know about our n? One way or another, you have to make us into Adept today; then you¡¯ll devour us. This is the path you¡¯ve chosen for yourself, and it is also the destiny that none of us could escape! We¡¯ve arrived at this moment and it is impossible for you to simply change your n. As for us, we can only put up a desperate fight for our own survival!¡±


    ¡°If that is the case, you¡¯re not supposed to be so straightforward, so honest with me! Don¡¯t tell me that you still have some backup ns?¡±


    ¡°Haha... what kind of backup ns could I have? Today, right at this ce, I only have threepanions. You weren¡¯t being serious when making that puppet ve of yours, so you actually allowed him to save his primary consciousness. But it seems like he is not here with us; it looks like he has made me into his cannon fodder. If that is the case, why should I cover for him?¡±


    ¡°I knew it was him! Hmph, I¡¯m surprised; that half-bug body does have some incredible abilities, as it actually escaped from the binding of a soul blood contract. Besides this, is there anything else?¡±


    ¡°Of course! My only helper, Mary, has now be the chip held in your hand. Taking everything into consideration, it seems that I¡¯m the only one who can risk my life with you! I hope you can be more carefulter!¡± After he finished saying that, Greem closed his eyes,pletely ignoring Anderson.


    Anderson became silent. He stared at Greem¡¯s face, which was now showing a determined expression. His mind was filled with surprise.


    He had never expected this; a little guy who had borne patiently under him for seven years, an apprentice who he had never paid attention to before, actually possessed such a wild and unyielding attitude and was courageous enough to challenge him face to face.


    If this had happened one month ago, if Greem had dared to be so arrogant and unbridled, Anderson would have definitely countered him with even crueler and fearsome approaches. He would have used the dreadful reality to teach this little kid a lesson; in this world, an Adept was the true master who controlled everything!


    But it was a pity, during the recent months, he hadn¡¯t done anything but pour most of his time into the modification of this bloody altar. Three Pseudo-Adepts, three key nodes of blood sacrifice; not a single one could be omitted. Only when everything was functioning perfectly ording to his will, could he obtain the perfect result he had longed for.


    As for the foreign Pseudo-Adept, Alice, because Anderson wasn¡¯t sure of her background, he could only treat her as a backup sacrificial offering. But things had gone a little out of his control; the surviving consciousness of his puppet ve had leaked his n and had caused all these sacrificial offerings to prepare in advance.


    Alice hadn¡¯t entered the secret space, which meant that he couldn¡¯t afford to lose any one of the three Pseudo-Adepts who served as his sacrificial offerings. Or else, the ritual of blood sacrifice wouldn¡¯t be able to function properly.


    Once the ritual of blood sacrifice began, the first stage would be extracting the life, soul, blood, and flesh of all the Apprentice Adepts and use them as sacrificial offerings to boost the three selected Pseudo-Adepts. Pushed by this evil and twisted life force, they would have at least 70% to 80% odds in bing an official Adept.


    And once they became Adepts, the second stage of blood sacrifice ritual could begin. At that moment, the powerful and surging blood, flesh, forces of soul from three newly advanced Adepts would be his tonic, helping him in breaking through the shackles and bing a Second Grade Adept in one go.


    Greem had expressed his n explicitly; his counterattack woulde during the moment after the first stage of the blood sacrifice ritual ended and before the second stage began. No doubt, it was the perfect time tounch his counterattack, if he still had the ability to do it!


    When faced with a fearless young Pseudo-Adept, Anderson only responded with a savage smile. Using one hand, he drew something in midair. A ck rune appeared, before it vanished instantly. A dark shadow underneath Greem¡¯s body suddenly came alive.


    The dark shadow didn¡¯t have tall stature and it was as thin as a sheet of goat-skin paper. However, it exhibited extremely dexterous movement. Like a paper-man, it crawled and climbed onto Greem¡¯s chest, pulling out a dagger from its tiny paper-like body. Ferociously, it thrust the dagger into Greem¡¯s chest.


    Greem let out a muffled grunt because of the pain. His blood burst and sshed all over the paper-man¡¯s body.


    Like a real living being, the paper-man stuck out its thin, tiny hand and touched Greem¡¯s flowing golden blood, brought it over to its body, and evenly smeared it onto its body. Once it hadpleted the task, a soul ripple identical to Greem suddenly emanated from the body of this paper-man. Immediately after that, it smiled hideously, climbed over to Greem¡¯s mouth, pried open his tightly clenched jaw, and disappeared into the depths of his throat.


    Even though he had estimated all of the possible approaches of Adept Anderson, when faced with such bizarre scene, Greem was still struck with chills and had his flesh creep. He was the meat on someone¡¯s chopping block now. Although he had known that the opponent would use some kind of mind-control method, when it really happened, Greem was still shaken by the bizarre approaches of Adepts!


    Before the thought could fade away from Greem¡¯s mind, his body started to struggle and tremble violently. The Wind Chains were so tight that they cut into his flesh, every single one of Greem¡¯s muscles stiffened, and his blood vessels, thick as earthworms, poked up under his skin. These were signs of how violent and intense the battle of consciousness happening inside his body was.


    Too bad, with his Spirit of an Apprentice Adept, there was no way he could fight against a veteran Adept. In less than five seconds, his held up body was once again mmed back onto the ground; cracking noises kepting out from his throat, but he couldn¡¯t say a single word.


    After a few momentter, Greem finally becamepletely calm. He nowy t where he was, motionlessly. If his chest had not still been moving up and down slightly, he would have looked exactly like a dead man.


    ¡°Hahaha... all your consciousness and soul are in my control now. So, with what are you going to resist meter? Hmph, just another pathetic fellow who tried to imagine the frightening abilities of Adepts through some crude books and mere legends! If you had just a little bit more understanding of the mightiness and approaches of an official Adept, you would not have behaved so arrogantly in front of an Adept! The world of Adepts is not something you, a mere chicken, could ever imagine! Hahaha...¡±


    It was not the end after Anderson gained control over Greem¡¯s consciousness and soul. He stretched his arm and beckoned, every single magical equipment and strange object found on Greem¡¯s body and emanating with elemental aura left his body, flying in a row, like a long snake, towards the altar. Among the magical equipment, Anderson was attracted by a unique object.


    It was a magic spell book Greem had tied around his waist with a silver chain. Under Anderson¡¯s control, it left Greem¡¯s body, but before reaching ten meters away, it flickered and escaped from his control and then reappeared back on Greem¡¯s waist.


    Eh, a Soul Gear? Anderson couldn¡¯t help but feel extremely curious about Greem now. Judging from the behavior of this book, it should be a Soul Gear recorded in ancient books and was a piece of magical equipment tied up with the soul of the owner.


    Frequently, Soul Gear like this possessed tremendous power that went beyond any ordinary magical equipment. However, each and every single Soul Gear had a very strict external requirement for their growth. Without nurturing them with a huge amount of resources and effort, the Soul Gear would not be able to unleash its full potential and would just behave like an ordinary magical equipment.


    To a certain extent, they could provide some unique approaches! Yet, when faced with an official Adept, the approaches employed by these apprentices could not be more frightening than the bite of a mosquito!


    Though he had found a rare Soul Gear, Anderson simply had no time to further study the secret hiding in it. Now, he could only cast a simple energy seal and let it continue hanging on Greem¡¯s waist. He had no other choice, as every single Soul Gear had the same behavior! Before its owner waspletely killed, no one could separate it from its true owner.


    After he settled Greem, Anderson finally moved his nce over to Mary.


    Currently, Mary had crazily sucked all of the blood from four apprentices. Her lower abdomen had bloated, her eyes had turned bloodshot, her fangs had poked out, and her face was fully stained with blood.


    Anderson shouted out with a low voice, ¡°Come over here!¡±


    Mary¡¯s body trembled suddenly upon hearing his voice. A pained and struggling expression emerged on her face. On one side, a messageing from a consciousness seal hiding deep in her soul was asking her to obey the order, on the other side, within her subconscious mind, the wild and restless vampire instinct was resisting the order.


    Noticing the effect of consciousness seal had be weaker, Anderson¡¯s face started to turn dark.


    In order not to obstruct the possibility of evolution for the vampire innate talent, Anderson hadn¡¯t wiped off Mary¡¯s instinctive consciousness. It was true that Mary had grown quickly into a satisfying sacrificial offering, but after she had advanced into a Pseudo-Adept, it had also caused her to no longer be under his total control.


    But, as Anderson increased the strength of his conscious wave, eventually Mary reluctantly walked in front of him.


    Anderson swiped his hand in the air and a cut was immediately made on Mary¡¯s neck. An arrow of blood shot out from the cut. Before the blood could touch the floor, it was collected by Anderson using a magic spell.


    As Mary was attacked, she immediately started rampaging. She took a few steps back, bared her teeth, and showed Anderson a threatening look. Still, she didn¡¯t have the courage to leap at him.


    Anderson was in an agitated mood now, so he became really angry with Mary¡¯s behavior. He cast a Wind Vortex and sent Mary high up into the sky. When she finally struggled out from the vortex full of sharp wind des while letting out miserable shrieks, her body was like it had just been pulled out from a grinder. Her skin was filled with countless cuts of all sizes; there were even some deep cuts that exposed her bones!


    The severely wounded Mary immediately let out a sharp and miserable cry. Like an injured puppy, she rushed far away at top speed, crouched on the floor, and gently licked her wounds.


    ¡°Suck his blood and heal your wounds!¡± Anderson used his long staff and jerked up an apprentice, throwing him over to Mary. Then, coldly he warned, ¡°This is a warning for you. Remember this next time. I¡¯m your master! If you dare to show me disrespect again, I¡¯ll drain all of the blood in your body!¡±


    The apprentice jerked up by Anderson was none other than the new Apprentice Leader, Ellen. However, right at this very moment, he could only watch helplessly as his body flew toward the frightfully savage demon. With a leap, Mary caught Ellen in her arms. Without hesitation, she bowed her head over his neck and gave it a ferocious bite.


    Although Ellen had a sound mind, his body was totally not under his own control. He could feel two cold, sharp fangs poking into his blood vessel noiselessly, then his head started spinning. In a trance, he saw a dazzling glow right before his eyes, and he suddenly came to in a magical hall packed with people.


    Familiar and unfamiliar apprentices and Adepts were lined up on both side of a red carpet, their face filled with smiles, and staring at him. Thunderous apuse and cheers deafened his ears. And he was d in a luxurious and noble Adept long robe and held an exquisite and splendid Adept long staff in his hand. He was smiling and nodding his head at the crowd while walking step by step toward the magnificent stage, where everybody was looking at...


    On the lofty stage, a gorgeousdy in red was looking at him with a sweet smile on her face.


    Who is she? Oh right, she is my intimate lover who swore to walk the rest of our lives together! Upon thinking about this, Ellen couldn¡¯t help but hasten his pace, wishing he could reach the stage quicker and hold the fair, delicate hand of his lover.


    But, somehow, it was as if the red carpet underneath his feet kept stretching longer and longer. No matter how hard he tried to run and shout, the distance between him and the slender hand of his beautiful lover grew and grew...


    Finally, the scene around him distorted, and his conscious grew dim and faded.


    As Mary¡¯s creepy sucking continued, Ellen¡¯s arm finally drooped!

 Chapter 153

    On top of the bloody altar.


    Three torture chairs besmeared with blood were ced in a triangle shape on top of it. Greem, Acteon, and Mary were now sitting in these chairs. They had a nk look on their face, as if they were waiting for something to happen.


    Below them, on the first and second level of the altar, all Apprentice Adepts were messily ced and piled up. A huge bloody hole could be seen on each and every single one of these dead bodies, blood was gurgling out from them. The magical runes on the altar had absorbed these fresh blood and became full and started to light up one after another.


    A bloody mist gradually diffused from the altar, giving it a touch of mysteriousness and evil.


    When all the evil runes on the altar were lit, a faint murmur of souls begun to linger in the air. Immediately after that, countless wraiths and spirits made their appearance in this ce, flying and hovering in a circle around the altar. From time to time, their vague, incorporeal visage would transform into beautiful girls with splendid outlooks or transformed into a dreadful ghosts with withered faces...


    A creepy, ghostlyughter incessantly lingered on.


    Within this evil and bizarre scene where angels and demons kept shifting like the clouds, the dead bodies of apprentices lying t on the altar quickly withered. It was as if all their blood, flesh, and soul were extracted by some external beings. Very soon, they shrunk and turned into messengers of death which looked simr to Ghouls.


    The red glow on the altar became more striking!


    If someone tried to perform a blood sacrifice ritual in a material ne with a tight andplete principles, he would immediately attract the strong bacsh from the Will of the ne. It was especially true for the Adept World, which was a major scale ne, as it was highly possible that the master of the ritual would evoke a deadly bacsh.


    Adept Anderson had spent a huge effort in constructing this bloody altar. And obviously, he was able to divert the bacshing from the Will of the ne into three nodes of the ritual. As the result, when the blood sacrifice ritual wasmencing, Greem, Acteon, Mary, all three of them were tightly strapped onto the torture chairs, and their bodies were shivering violently.


    It was not fear that caused them to shiver, but because they were locked down by an unspeakable Will of Vastness from a remote space. Through theyer of principle, it kept sending forth its anger over into these three apprentices. Pressured by this Will of Vastness, blood starting to burst out from their mouth and nose, while a flow of blood also seening down from the corner of their eyes and ears.


    Yet, these damages to their corporeal bodies could not bepared with the severe injuries inflicted on their souls. If not because the bloody altar kept extracting the life force of those apprentices and replenishing their consumption, perhaps right at the very moment when Greem and the other two got in touch with the Will of Vastness, they had already vanished into thin air.


    But even so, during the continuous collision between their own will and the consciousness of the ne, their soul had been riddled with a thousand gaping wounds and became extremely weak and fragile. Although such wounds on their soul could be fixed using the fragments of soul sent over by the altar, it was rather easy that these foreign souls would contaminate their own soul.


    In addition to that, these fragments of soul extracted by the altar were stained with a huge amount of negative emotions, such as anger, hatred, fear, sadness, which was thest thing that filled those apprentices before they were killed.


    By letting so many negative emotions surge into their minds, for an ordinary soul, no doubt it was something extremely frightening. Judging from this point alone, that Adept Anderson simply never cared whether the three of them could truly be an Adept or not. He was using the method of blood sacrifice to repeatedly stimte their soul and potential of their body, using the approach of ¡®help the shoots grow by pulling them upward¡¯ to overdraw their vitality and Spirit.


    When their entire body and soul were brewed to the maximum, strongest moment, perhaps it would be the moment their Spirit crossed the line of qualitative change that came from quantitative umtion, thereby using the huge amounts of negative emotions as the core and formed into their own conscious core. As the matter of fact, many books of magic called this process of Pseudo-Adept advanced into Adept as ¡®Crystallizing the Spirit Consciousness¡¯.


    Only when a Pseudo-Adept could smoothly,pletely, and steadily formed his own conscious core, his advancement ceremony was considered a true sess. What Adept Anderson prepared for Greem and the other two was actually an immature, unstable ceremony of Adept Advancement.


    Affected by the power of blood sacrifice, the trio might be able to improve their bodies, souls, and Spirits to the lowest requirement of advancing into the realm of Adept in a very short amount of time, and eventually, form their very own conscious core. But once the power of the blood sacrifice faded away, under the condition where they didn¡¯t have a stable understanding of the Principles, sooner orter, their conscious core would disintegrate and cause irreversible damage to their souls.


    Nevertheless, Adept Anderson didn¡¯t care anything about this. What he wanted was the brief moment when the trio entered the period of qualitative change!


    He just had to take the opportunity of that brief moment when the trio became official Adepts, using them as the sacrificial offerings and performed a second blood sacrifice ritual. With that done, he would only have to withstand a little amount of bacsh from the Will of the ne and would be able to instantly devour three conscious cores which had just formed into shape. At that moment, he would have 30-40% of chances of breaking through the bottleneck that had been holding him back for many years and bing a Second Grade Adept who would be highly sought after in the Zhentarim Association.


    At the thought of a magnificent future waiting in front of him, Anderson¡¯s mind started to boil with excitement. But the further he progressed into his n, the lesser room was left for him to rx and cken. Therefore, he forcefully calmed down his surging emotions and payed a close and tight attention to the slightest changes to the trio who were now strapping on the torture chairs.


    By this time, the blood sacrifice ritual had slowly entered to its climax. Three sacrificial offerings were now in the critical moment of forming their conscious cores. If that little kid really did have some special preparation, then this would be the best moment for him tounch his counterattack.


    That was the reason why Adept Anderson used his powerful Spirit and through different approaches, he put up a high vignce, closely monitoring even the tiniest bit of changes of the trio. Enduring the painful mental suffering, he waited patiently for any abnormal changes that might happen at any time.


    Just as he expected, right at the moment when the force of blood sacrifice on the bloody altar reached to its densest level, the damn change of situation had finally arrived.


    It happened right from that Greem!


    He was now sitting straight on the torture chair. Stimted by the intense life force and soul aura, his entire body had expanded a few timesrger than before. Tiny cracks were seen filled up every single inch on his burly and tough muscle. An extremely high temperature was emanating from within his body.


    It was obvious that he took the path of Element Adept, and was focusing on Fire element. However, within this Adept Advancement Ceremony, there wasn¡¯t any resource avable to support and strengthened his Fire element innate talent. As the result, once the bacsh of advancement urred, among three of them, most probably he would be the one who suffered the most severe consequence.


    It was perhaps he had sensed his own miserable destiny, Greem, who had his body and soul totally controlled by the paper-man, suddenly trembled in a violent manner. An intense Fire element source energy was ignited and starting to burn fiercely within his body, kindled his entire body in an instant, including even his soul.


    Adept Anderson¡¯s face turned livid immediately.


    Within his spiritual sense, the paper-man hiding inside of Greem¡¯s soul kept letting out shrill cries of dread. However, it was not the paper-man who gave out the order of igniting his body and soul!


    Could it be... could this Greem like that Acteon, be hiding a secondary consciousness within the depths of his soul?


    No matter how hard Adept Anderson tried to ponder, he would never understand the Chip¡¯s unique form of existence.


    The Chip had merged into Greem¡¯s genes, and in fact, it was more like an auxiliary brain of his. All the functioning and thinking of this brain was carried out with the method of bioelectric currents, thus it was near impossible for it to be detected from the outside. Even though Adept Anderson was a treacherous and careful person, throughout the dozens of monitoring he performed, he actually just focused on traces of magic spell and ripples of Elementium and Spirit.


    Through such extraordinary form of existence, the Chip was able to conceal itself from his detection and hid quietly within Greem¡¯s body.


    As the matter of fact, with regard to the possible changes and development of the blood sacrifice ritual, Greem had carried out countless inferences and deductions with the Chip. As long as that Adept Anderson didn¡¯t go crazy, then before the ritual begun, using a magic spell or method to gain the control over Greem and the other two was a certain choice for him!


    Therefore, at the beginning of the event, Greem didn¡¯t hide anything and straightaway showed Anderson his trump card. After all, no matter what he said or did, Anderson would still do what he supposed to do, so, Greem might as well not hide anything from him. And by doing that, he actually stirred Anderson¡¯s mind and caused Anderson to be filled with suspicions.


    Actually, Greem really couldn¡¯t stop the bizarre paper-men from invading his body, and was controlled by it using a special method. Fortunately, by predicting all kinds of possible situations that he might face, Greem had drafted out hundreds and thousands of counter measurements with the Chip.


    What the Chip needed to do was, when Greem lost his self-consciousness, and right at the most critical moment of the blood sacrifice ritual, it would just have to select a most suitable solution and execute it. After all, in the aspect of controlling the body, the paper-man could never bepared to the Chip, which was part of Greem¡¯s body.


    And the solution picked by the Chip was: Self-burning!


    The Chip had no idea about what kind of form the paper-man existed in. Nevertheless, it had just known one thing: the paper-man was not a Fire element creature!


    Burning himselfpletely, ignited himself thoroughly, from his body to his blood and flesh to his soul, anything that could be burned was now covered in fierce mes.


    Sitting on the torture chair, Greem¡¯s body kept trembling violently. He threw his head back and let out a long, painful groan into the sky. A me jet of extremely high temperature burst out from his nose and mouth. Amidst this deadly me jet, the paper-man was struggling and roaring furiously in pain. But very soon, it was kindled by the fierce me, starting to burn, and eventually, turned into a pile of ashes and vanished into thin air.


    Greem had finally freed himself from the restrictions put on his soul and regained his consciousness from the emptiness!


    Right after he was awakened, Greem immediately frowned his brows painfully.


    In a trance, two extremely opposite consciousnesses came from his body and soul made him felt like as if his mind had been broken into two. Or else, why was he sensing two totally opposite yet sharp feelings from his consciousness?


    One of the feelings kept telling him that he was in a perfectly fine condition. The endless supply of life force, fragments of soul that filled with deep understanding of different knowledge, all these things were rushing into his body and soul continuously, kept strengthening and expanding him.


    He had a false impression, that he could keep growing stronger like this without any limit!


    On the other end, the second feeling was totally opposite to the first. An intense crisis of death had wrapped his entire body and soul, causing his soul to turn gloomy and dark. He never felt so weak and small before, it was like a balloon filling with air had reached its limit, and maybe in the next seconds, it would burst with a loud boom and vanished into nothingness.


    Both feelings were so vivid and direct and they both had deeply engraved the strongest feeling into the depths of Greem¡¯s soul, making him believe them without a shadow of the doubt.


    Was he strong or weak? Was he walking toward the pinnacle of his life or still lingering at the brink of death?


    In an instant, Greem was perplexed by the feelings he felt!

 Chapter 154

    Though Greem might be perplexed, the Chip would never be!


    The Chip was dynamically monitoring every single piece of data within Greem¡¯s body; it could detect or even predict the uing transformation through the movement of its graphs for all of the functions in his body. If he continued to receive the endless supply of mutated energy that had no filtration and sorting, perhaps he could form a random and unknown conscious core.


    But once the mutated energy supporting this transformation faded away, he would suffer a devastating fall. It wouldn¡¯t even matter if the conscious core shattered, because at that point in time, even his soul would not be able to escape from the dreadful bacsh that came from failing in advancement.


    It was time for the counter attack! He couldn¡¯t afford to wait until the moment his conscious core formed or he would lose the chance of using his Fire element innate talent as the core to form his own conscious core!


    All of a sudden, Greem put up a violent struggle. But all four of his limbs were strapped by a special rope, and there was even a half-ball shape iron cap covering the top of his head. Any slight movement would immediately trigger a strong reaction from the torture chair. Some bizarre runes emerged on top of the ck rope, scorching his skin and making them produce a hissing noise.


    The rope tightened, making it looked like it was sinking into his flesh.


    There were even seven or eight sharp, ming red spines poking through from the inner side of the iron cap and forcefully impaled into his skull, releasing a peculiar wave that would distract the normal thinking of a human. Severe pain and distraction to his thinking, either one of those was more than enough to interrupt Greem¡¯s uing actions!


    Greem had 13 points of Physique; a high Physique like this was enough to help him endure most of the paining from his body. But even so, he found it tough to withstand the unique instruments of torture Adept Anderson had specifically prepared for him and the other two.


    It was worth mentioning that in order to hold them captive, Anderson had really put in a lot of effort.


    The rope was made from the skin of a ck Serpent from the East Coast. It was capable of withstanding any Pseudo-Adept level offensive magic spells. In addition to that, among three of them, none was an apprentice with great strength, so it was impossible for them to escape the fetters of the torture chair with only their body strength.


    Together with the distractioning from the Brain Wash Cap of Gnoll, even if all three of them really became Adepts, they were in a situation where they didn¡¯t have the chance to absorb elemental energy from the outside world and recover their body. They would be just three delicious dishes who had the identity of official Adepts, but not the overall strength of an Adept.


    This ce was a small inter-space controlled by Anderson, and he was the highest authority. Without his permission, the trio could never absorb even the tiniest bit of elemental energy. Three Adept level sacrificial offerings who had stepped into the realm of Adepts, yet only had the overall strength of Pseudo-Adept. This was the grand feast Adept Anderson had prepared for himself!


    Through the torture chair, the mutated energiesing from the altar still continued prating Greem¡¯s body, pushing him closer and closer to the most frightful abyss. However, even when he was confronted with a crisis of life and death, Greem was still as calm and sober as usual. In fact, his thoughts were far clearer than normal and he could see things far more thoroughly.


    ¡°Alice, why are you taking so long? If you dy further, it is true that I can¡¯t escape from death, perhaps you¡¯ll have to die together with me too!¡±


    ¡°It is almost... done.... give me another... ten... minutes... these... damn defenses... of the tower... are really tough... to kill...¡± Alice¡¯s conscious wave that came from the depth of his soul was breaking up. Obviously, she was in the middle of an intense ughter.


    ¡°Remember, you only have ten minutes. Now, teleport the thing I need over here first!¡±


    ¡°Damn it... this is insane... why are you... asking things... at this... moment? Rascal... I... aw...¡±


    Alice cursed hurriedly, and judging from herst shrill cry, it was obvious that she had unleashed her most deadly strike: Spatial Shatter. Having temporarily wiped clean the enemy around her, she was finally able to seize the opportunity and teleport over the thing Greem needed.


    Greem felt a slight vibration on his palms. While still strapped on the torture chair, he flipped both palms and saw two micro magical arrays, emitting wave after wave of spatial ripples. When these spatial ripples reached a very dense degree, a tiny spatial tunnel was torn open.


    Two faint noises were heard as two objects traveled through the magical arrays, simr to a short-distance teleportation array, and fell into his palms.


    Over the past month, Alice had repeatedly tried all sorts of methods to teleport an object over to Greem¡¯s palm, but they were all blocked off by his elementium shield, protection barrier, or some other simr defensive mechanisms. As she was being pushed to a corner, Alice eventually thought outside of the box and came out with the idea of designing a strange thing: a micro space positioning array.


    The Chip started to work on her idea. With that, a mysterious array, now found on both of Greem¡¯s palms, was produced!


    Relying on the positioning function of the array, it had be simpler for Alice to teleport objects over to Greem. Most of the time, it was as easy as performing a short-distance teleportation herself.


    The item that fell into Greem¡¯s left palm was the summoning core of his Fire Lord golem, while the item fell into his right palm was his favorite weapon: the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter.


    He had foreseen that all of the equipment and items found on his body would be taken away by Anderson, therefore, long before anything else, he had left both of his ultimate weapons, which could help him turn the situation around, with Alice. When the time was right, he would ask her to teleport them over.


    Now, with his magical weapon and his strongest golem in his hands, it was time to fight Adept Anderson!


    With a gentle swing of the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his right hand, arge gate of me immediately emerged behind Greem. It was enshrouded with leaping and steaming me, creating an extremely high temperature. Through the smoky and hazy opening of the gate, one could vaguely see the realm of Fire Elementium, a world of terror purely made up of mes.


    Endless Fire Elementium burst out from the ming gate; in an instant, they transformed the surrounding space into a sea of me. Meanwhile, amidst this raging and soaring sea of me, Greem tossed the summoning core of his strongest golem onto the ground.


    In next seconds, a formidable, tall and burly Fire Lord was born amidst the raging sea of me!


    After making its debut, the first thing Fire Lord did was wield its huge, mingva rock hand and crush the torture chair which Greem was trapped in.


    While stretching his slightly numbed arms, amidst the me that spread all over his body, all of the frightening wounds on Greem¡¯s body started to close, healed, and eventually, disappeared without a trace. After owning the me Body, any ce with fire would be his home and he could even conveniently self-heal.


    Adept Anderson was hovering on top of the bloody altar, staring at that little Pseudo-Adept who stood with his back straight. The emotion of fury and resentment in his mind had reached their maximum degree. Because of that powerful gate of me, the function of the bloody altar had suffered a great distraction. The other two sacrificial offerings on the altar had also started to move and struggle, showing signs of awakening soon.


    Damn it... damn it... damn it...!


    Curses rolled from Anderson¡¯s tongue. Without hesitation, heunched an attack at Greem.


    Hundreds and thousands of wild and ferocious Wind des immediately rushed towards Greem.


    Without Greem¡¯s needing to confront the attack personally, the Fire Lord, who upied nearly half of the space on top of the altar, took two steps forward and unleashed a Firestorm to throw it over to the iing attack.


    The Wind de and Firestorm collided in midair, instantly smearing the surrounding space with a red hue. Countless raging me and razor sharp wind des were crashing and slicing each other in the air. Very soon, the difference in their power was revealed in front of everyone.


    The energies contained within the Firestorm were overly divided, and their power was far weaker than of those Wind des on the opposite side.


    As a result, sliced by countless Wind des that came whistling in before the Firestorm could bring all of its power into y, all the Fire Elementium was churned and shattered into pieces. And after annihting the Firestorm, the remaining Wind des finally caught up to the body of the ming giant.


    The ming giant was standing aloft; its leaping me armor ofva hadbined the violence of Fire element and the sturdiness of Earth element. Thus, although the surface of the armor was all scratched up, the source of Fire element in its body remained intact.


    Relying on the protection of this ming giant, Greem roared out with a loud voice, and he finally summoned the Fire Deity smoothly. Unlike what he usually did, where he always sent the Fire Deity into the battlefield as cannon fodder, Greem actually departed from his normal behavior. He forcefully poked his hand into the chest of the Fire Deity and pulled out a unique fire stone with some indistinct runes.


    He threw his head back and roared again. Then Greem opened his mouth, ced the ming fire stone inside, and swallowed it.


    It was as if he had just swallowed a mini sun; from his mouth to his throat, and also from his stomach, a dazzling bright light and an intense heat emanated from within his body. It almost transformed him into a transparent and ming humanoid. After such a strong congregation of Fire Elementium entered his body, driven by Fire element energy of the same origin, numerous magic runes engraved on the surface of his body started to light up, one after another.


    Greem kept roaring furiously and loudly. Intense heat and dazzling light were emanating from all over his body. An Elementium meing from the source of his soul had finally kindled his body and soul.


    In the past, Greem had been bathed countless of times in the element of fire, yet those were fires produced from the collision between Fire element energy and his me Body. But right at this very moment, Greem was kindled by the me that diffused from the depths of his soul.


    After a long history of learning fire, ying with fire, and researching fire, for the very first time, Greem had touched the inner principles of Fire Elementium and established a slight connection with the Fire element principle residing within the Will of the ne. And this was the true source that could allow Greem to keep walking further in the path of an Adept.


    ¡°Not enough... this is far from enough! I need more...¡±


    While letting out a thunderous roar, Greem finally activated the mystical ability the magic rune suit brought to him: the transformation of the me Fiend.


    A ming humanoid far stronger and purer than the ming giant made his debut in the scene. The two-meter tall body kept expanding and bing bigger and bigger after being injected with a vast amount of Fire element energy; soon it reached the height of three meters. Meanwhile, a thick fire pir shot out from the gate of me behind him, injecting an endless amount of Fire element energy into his body.


    Due to this ming humanoid drawing and absorbing the Fire element energy in an overly violent, quick manner, the gate of me nearly couldn¡¯t supply his demand. The me on the tall gate pirs and the gate itself gradually faded away, exposed an ancient-looking stone frame fully engraved with runes.


    Supported by such vast Fire element energy, Greem once again let out a terrifying roar that shook the entire space. Driven by his powerful will, all of the Fire element energies he absorbed rushed crazily into his Spiritual Domain. In that ce, they were repeatedlypressed and tempered, again and again.


    Such degree of fire congregation was no longer something that could be controlled by his mere me Body. For every time his Spiritual Domain shook and contracted, the powerful fire energypressed and tempered by the true form of his spiritual consciousness would bring him devastating fire damage.


    When the strength of the fire damage reached a certain degree, the me Body of that lower grade could no longer provide him any resistance toward the damage!


    Every time his true form of spiritual consciousnesspressed the fire energy, it was no different than an ordinary human hugging a fire pan that could bring him severe injury. However, there wasn¡¯t any sizzling sound of skin and flesh being burned, the only thing was a severe pain that prated the depths of his soul.


    Amidst the severe pain that kept striking him, Greem¡¯s senses had be blunted. Yet, most of the impurities and useless waste found in the true form of his spiritual consciousness were burned off by the dreadful me. Backed up by the attitude of not fearing pain, and being repeatedlypressed by his spiritual consciousness, the powerful fire energy had finally starting to take its shape. Using that tiny thread of Fire element principal as the core, they crystallized and formed into the conscious core that was required to advance into the realm of an Adept.


    In the middle of a battlefield, Greem had finally advanced and be a Fire element Adept!

 Chapter 155

    Never once before in his entire life had Greem felt so close to the Will of the World!


    In the past, he was always having trouble differentiating between the consciousness of the ne and the will of the world. He kept having the feeling that they was just two different names for the same matter from two different angles. Yet, at this moment when he finally made the advancement and became a Fire element Adept, only then was he profoundly enlightened by the huge difference between the two.


    A ne was an enormous vessel that carried all living beings, a ce where all things lived, bred, and expanded. At the beginning when a ne was born, basically the consciousness of the ne had also been born with it. After all, it was just a congregation of consciousnesses produced by all living beings and materials within the ne itself ¨C chaotic and unclear. During this period, due to the consciousness of the ne only possessing a simple instinctive response, without developing a clear and direct self-consciousness, it was generally referred as the consciousness of the ne.


    So to speak, most of the nes within the multi-verse only possessed the consciousness of the ne!


    And it was obvious that the will of the ne was more advanced and possessed higher intelligence than the consciousness of the ne. On the foundation where a ne possessed its own consciousness, when this particr ne developed and expanded to a certain magnitude, the consciousness of the ne would give birth to the will of the ne, which was something simr to the soul of a human.


    Thus, most of the consciousnesses of nes were primitive, naive like a babies who just begun to babble. They would respond to any event that might hurt them, but the process was clumsy and slow. On the other side, the will of the world was in fact, a consciousness of the ne that matured and grown up a little bit, and it had given birth to an independent self-consciousness from the chaotic congregation of consciousness. It was capable of using principles of the ne as its weapon to interfere or adjust any event that happening right within its body.


    The rare few major nes in the multi-verse belonged to this category.


    There was even some more matured will of the worlds, which were able to rely on their preferences to influence and guide those individuals who lived under their protection. Those who do something right would be rewarded and wrongdoings would be punished. Using the power of the world principle, they guided themselves to moving towards the direction they anticipated.


    Throughout the entire multi-verse, there was only one world had given birth to a matured will of the world. It was a lower tier realm infested with foul demons and devils ¨C the World of Abyss.


    Meanwhile, the World of Adept where Greem lived in right now was obviously a major ne who had given birth to its own will of the world. Together, millions upon millions of living beings and billions upon billions of materials within the ne had formed and produced a consciousness of the ne that owned a partial self-consciousness. No matter whether it was a stalk of flower, a shrub of weed, a human being, a stone, regardless the level of their status, whether they were a noble or a mere peasant, irrespective of whether they were strong or weak, they were just a tiny part of this powerful will of the world.


    Apparently, this will of the world was simr to those consciousnesses of the ne born in most of the material nes. It was against the blood sacrificial ritual which would cause a great number of souls in its world to vanish and be used as the sacrificial offering for a foreign world. As the result, with regards to Greem¡¯s behavior of directly fighting against the bloody altar, the will of the world had used the power of principle and given him preferential treatment.


    Or else, with the current capability of Greem¡¯s soul, he would have to face a great challenge if he wished to be an official Adept. ording to the Chip¡¯s estimation, if the will of the world didn¡¯t make a concession for Greem, the odds of Greem advancing into the realm of Adept just now was less than 7%.


    ording to the information Greem had, usually Adepts would call the process of adapting the principles, using the principles andplying with the guidance from the will of the world in order to obtain personal experience and improved one¡¯s skill, as the ¡®feedback of the world.¡¯ And as the matter of fact, such feedback was part of the world principle itself!


    Therefore, it could be said that literally because of the power from the feedback of the world, that Greem was able toplete his Adept Advancement Ceremony!


    Since he had advanced smoothly and became an official Adept, he was now freed from the shackles of the bloody altar. However, when he stood up with his back straight and ran his eyes around thispletely isted inter-space, he realized that the situation of the battle was still in the worst condition.


    In less than ten minutes, the Fire Lord was showing signs of defeat, as now it could barely defend against the violent bombardmenting from Adept Anderson. As for the other twopanions of his, Mary was strapped on a torture chair ced on the other end of the altar, letting out a painful shriek into the sky. It was obvious that her situation wasn¡¯t good at all. Alice had just ughtered her way into the controlling main hall of the Swampy Tower and was fighting a fierce battle against two Adept level magical beasts. She was now running around busily, chased by the enemies, hence there was no way she could help create trouble.


    As for that Acteon, after receiving an order from Adept Anderson, he had escaped from the torture chair, and was roaring with a deep voice while dashing towards Greem who had just opened his eyes.


    Greem let out a deep and lordlyugh. He stretched his tall and burly stature, moved both arms over his head and unleashed a red force field from his body, covering an area of fifty meters in diameter.


    Right after Evil Bugs leaped into the red force field, an elemental me appeared out of nowhere immediately coiled up his body. The frightful high-temperature evaporated all the water in his body, which was few in volume, and the scorching hot me jet roasted his body and made it produce crackling noises. In less than three seconds, his formidable half-bug body was nearly toasted by Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire.


    In a speed faster than he came, Acteon scurried away from this red force field.


    Although he had escaped from it, he had left behind a great number of charred and cracked bug fragments. If not because he ran away in time, even without Greem attacking him personally, just with the Ring of Fire outside of Greem¡¯s body alone would have been enough to roast him into a bug barbecue.


    Acteon spent a long time strolling around the Ring of Fire. He had no courage to take another step into it.


    After bing an official Adept, a Pseudo-Adept like Acteon was hardly his opponent.


    Through the Chip¡¯s Elementium Vision which provided him aprehensive and thorough sight, Adept Anderson, who was now hovering in midair carried by wind vortex, was no longer enveloped in mystery like in the past. From the battle between him and Fire Lord, Greem could vaguely detect some information rting to him.


    ¡°Chip, can you digitize Anderson¡¯sbative ability?¡±


    ¡°Beep. The thread of task has been established... Initializing... Beep! Beep! Beep! ... Warning! Warning! Unable toplete the task... An error urred in the digitalization of the target...¡±


    ¡°Chip, find the reason why we can¡¯t construct the model of the target.¡±


    ¡°Beep. Analyzing of error data has beenpleted... the highest possibility is that the sample temte of the target model is no longer appropriate... the host needs to recollect the data of Adept level targets in order to reconstruct the temte...¡±


    Greem saw the light suddenly.


    After the Chip was activated, the first digitalization model he built was based on an ordinary human. Using the body attribute data of an ordinary adult as the foundation, the Chip had constructed the scale of overall strength for Apprentice Adept. And since he had be an Adept himself, this basic temte could no longer be used on Adept Anderson. As the result, the Chip couldn¡¯t construct the digitized model of him.


    ¡°Chip, expand the scope of collecting data, including all data in the database of the Adepts I¡¯ve met into the calction. Use Adept level creatures to reconstruct the basic digitized temte.¡±


    ¡°Beep. Task has been established... beginning extraction of data about Adepts. The samples included: Anderson, Sammir, Angus, Flower Fairy, Andre, Endor, Molten Giant... Constructing new digitized temte...¡±


    Taking the time when the Chip was busy constructing the new temte, Greem moved his feet and appeared beside the ming giant, helping it to block off Adept Anderson¡¯s attacks.


    In just less than ten minutes, the ming giant¡¯s body had been heavily damaged.


    One after another powerful Fire element magic spells cast by itnded on the elemental barrier outside of Anderson¡¯s body, causing it to ripple and make the surrounding air to vibrate violently. However, with the endless and constant supply of element energy from the Swampy Tower, there was no way these attacks could break through his defense, and his defense was also enhanced by the tower. The attacks unleashed by Anderson were also something it could not stand up against.


    An attack was countered by another attack, after the Fire element magic spell cast by Fire Lord was shattered by Anderson¡¯s Wind element magic spell, the remaining magical energy still riddled a thousand holes on itsva armor. If this Fire Lord wasn¡¯t an elemental creature, perhaps it would have already been defeated by Anderson¡¯s brutal and savage attack.


    Greem didn¡¯t want his mostpetent minion to be destroyed by Anderson, so he took the initiative to rece Fire Lord and stood in front of Anderson, while the Fire Lord turned around and dashed towards Mary, trying to rescue her from the torture chair.


    ¡°What a lucky kid. You better not think that just because you became an Adept, you have the ability to resist me. Today, I¡¯ll make you realize the huge difference between you and me!¡± Upon seeing Greem, a frenzied and vicious expression immediately emerged on Adept Anderson¡¯s gloomy old face.


    As the events developed into the current stage, Anderson realized that his n had beenpletely ruined. Although there wasn¡¯t any risks to his life, the ns of advancement he had been thinking for more than one hundred years were destroyed by this seemingly insignificant Pseudo-Adept. The resentment and unwillingness of epting such fact in his mind could no longer be described with any words or any spokennguage.


    With his mind filled with a slight thread of craziness brought on by the shattering of his hope, Anderson rode on a strong wind and unleashed a fierce assault at Greem.


    After just exchanging three rounds of attack, Greem had deeply felt the pain Fire Lord was suffering just now.


    There was absolutely no way he could destroy Anderson¡¯s elemental defense outside!


    From the strength of element the Chip detected, the elemental defense outside of Anderson¡¯s body actually possessed a whopping 120 degree of defensive strength. The ¡®degree¡¯ here was a quantifier fixed by all Adepts, it was used to standardize the basic data of offensive and defensive ability. It used the full energy a magic crystal could unleash as the basic unit, which was 1 degree, and using it to quantify all kind of standards.


    Basically, the power of a magic spell cast by a Beginner Apprentice using his own energy was around 1 to 5 degrees. As for Intermediate Apprentice, it was around 5 to 10 degrees, and Advanced Apprentice could have 15 to 20 degrees. As for Pseudo-Adept, their power was between 30 to 50 degrees.


    The power of Anderson¡¯s elemental defense was as high as 120 degrees. This also meant, if the magic spell Greem cast couldn¡¯t break his defense with one hit, by the time the next magic spell was ready, Anderson¡¯s defense would have already recovered back to its peak.


    With the energy of Swampy Tower as his support, Anderson didn¡¯t have to worry about his defense.


    Contrary to that, Greem could hardly withstand the swift and violent attacksing from Anderson.


    After all, Greem had justpleted his advancement. His Ring of Fire hadn¡¯t merged perfectly with his Fire element innate talent, and his basic defensive strength was only 70 degrees, which was far behind that of his opponent¡¯s.


    In just the time of fewer than ten seconds, Greem had received waves of bombardment from threerge scale magic spells. Part of the power of these magic spells prated through the gap of his Ring of Fire and had inflicted some damage onto his body.

 Chapter 156

    Greem was having a hard time in the battle of Adepts against Anderson.


    It was worth mentioning that as an Adept who just made the advancement,pared to a veteran Adept like Anderson, whether it was hisbat experience or his ability to cast magic spell, there was a huge gap between them. If you took the support and enhancement the Swampy Tower provided to Anderson into consideration, this battle had slowly be a one-sided one.


    With just five minutes into the battle, Anderson had determined hisbative superiority. A raging tornado carried countless wind des and daggers kept breaking through the interception from Greem¡¯s magic spells, spreading the mes of war closer to his side.


    The transformation of me Fiend had given Greem a lofty and burly body, allowing him to own an intrepidly built and near limitless Fire element energy in the magic spell battle. But once he suffered a setback in the battle, the loophole in his defense was actually bigger than normal.


    Greem himself was not a velocity-type Adept who specialized in agility. As a matter of fact, among all the data of his body attributes, Agility was his biggest weakness.


    Therefore, the lofty ming humanoid transformed from Greem was seen simply standing still where he was, the ground underneath his feet had melted into half-moltenva, and the space covered fifty meters radius around him was filled with rolling and steaming mes. Anyone who tried to get closer to him would have to first withstand an endless fire elemental damage.


    It was perhaps this that might have helped him in establishing some superiority when fighting with an Adept who specialized in agility. However, when he was facing an Adept who never needed to worry about defense, an Element Adept who just had to attack with all he had, Greem¡¯s weakness had be apparent.


    The elemental affinity of Adept Anderson was Dark and Wind Elementium. As the result, though all the magic spells cast by him were mainly using Wind Elementium, they also carried Dark Elementium which brought a strong corrosive effect. A faint dark smoke always enshrouded the wounds on Greem¡¯s body which were cut by those wind des. If he didn¡¯t use a huge amount of Fire element energy to wash and wipe off these Dark Elementiums, even with his high Physique, he wouldn¡¯t be able to heal them quickly.


    This had made this battle tougher for Greem!


    If the situation continued to develop in this direction, even if Greem devoted all his effort, it was still very difficult for him to defend against Anderson¡¯s assault. And once he was defeated, as they were in apletely sealed off inter-space, there wasn¡¯t any paths that could allow him to escape.


    Greem bowed down and poked his left hand into the floor which had turned into flowingva. When he pulled his left hand out, a big chunk of floor nearly five meters wide was pulled out together, turning into a mingva shield and was ced in front to block him.


    The noise of wind des cutting kept ringing through the scene. Theva shield had blocked off a tornado that swept right in his direction. The wind des that came together with this frightful tornado were like countless spinning steel des, cutting and slicing out a few hundred crisscrossing deep trenches on the surface of the shield in an instant.


    Greem roared and raised theva shield high, both his feet had sunk deeply into the moltenva underneath. Driven by him, the scorching hotva flowed up along his body and resupplied into theva shield in his hands. But unfortunately, before he could patch up the damage, an extremely sharp Wind Spear hit and crushed onto the surface of theva shield, instantly exploded it into countless tiny wind des and vortexes that dispersed into all directions.


    With this hit, the thickness of theva shield was reduced by half, and with the thickness that was remaining, it was impossible for him to defend against the next attack.


    Greem kept waving the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his hand. Assisted by the Secret Scroll of Voodoo, three major Fire magic spells exploded beside Anderson in a row. It was a pity that such attacks could only destroy the magic spell Anderson was about to cast, but were unable to prate through his elemental barrier and inflict any damage on him.


    In this situation, actually, a melee battle was more likely to harm to the enemy. However, with Greem¡¯s heavy and slow pace, it was simply a foolish dream if he wished to chase Anderson who was riding in the wind!


    Greem turned around and let out a furious roar, ¡°Acteon, I know you are here. Don¡¯t tell me you¡¯re going to wait until I am defeated, then only wag your tail at that ugly fellow? If you still wish to seize back your freedom, show yourself. I need your help now!¡±


    The target of Greem¡¯s roar was, of course, not that Acteon who kept wandering around his Ring of Fire and seeking opportunities to strike, but the primary consciousness of Evil Bugs who had formed a strategic alliance with him.


    Right at this moment, within thispletely sealed off interspace, the situation of the entire battlefield was clear at a nce.


    There was only a handful of people still alive in this ce. Besides Anderson who was hovering and flying in the air, the rest were Greem, who had made his advancement and became a Fire element Adept, Mary, who had been freed from the torture chair and was fighting against the ming giant, Acteon, who had be the loyal ve of Anderson, and Snox, who had turned invisible and was hiding at the furthest distance from the battlefield.


    At this very moment in time, the only person who could help him was most probably that primary consciousness of Evil Bugs, who had concealed himself and couldn¡¯t be traced. If he didn¡¯t want to watch the entire battle go in the direction ofplete failure, and lose all hopes of seizing his body back, then he muste out and do something!


    Greem continued shouted for one more round. Right as he was about to give up hope, a strange urrence suddenly happened right on the battlefield!


    Odd noises of bones cracking suddenly were heard.


    Dead bodies of apprentices who appeared to be long dead started to struggle and climb back up, dragging their twisted and deformed body and limbs, staggering their steps and moving towards Anderson¡¯s direction. At the beginning, their movements were slow and stiff, but just after three to five seconds, their movement suddenly became nimble and swift. They started to run, crawl, leap... moving as nimble as a monkey, they kept climbing up from the bottom of the altar and crazily charged towards Anderson who had a slightly startled expression.


    Meanwhile, that Acteon who didn¡¯t put out a great performance since the beginning of the battle suddenly had his body tremble violently. All sorts of beetles and scorpions began to fall out from behind his ck robe. And strangely, these bugs actually split into two distinct groups, forming into two waves of bugs and that started to crazily bite and kill the other.


    Hmph. This guy had finally done something!


    Greem stood still and nced around the battlefield.


    Those apprentices who transformed into bugs-men by Evil Bugs had been dead for a long time, the thing that controlling their dead bodies now was actually some Carrion Beetles hidden within their body. They were like a group of fighters with no fear of death, clustering below Adept Anderson and piled up into a small hill of corpses, continuously leaping into the air and attacking with their teeth.


    After all, this ce was an isted space expanded with the power of the tower, thus it could only reach a certain height. As the result, when thirty odd apprentices stacked on each other and formed into a small hill, it seemed they might really able to drag Adept Anderson down from the air.


    The elemental barrier covering outside of Adept Anderson¡¯s body could defend against offensive magic spells, and as a result was near invincible. However, when faced with physical attacks at a close-quarter, thisyer of protection became rather ordinary.


    Upon looking at the frightful faces of ugly and twisted bodies kept leaping in front of him, howling andunching attacks, Adept Anderson furiously tossed out a tornado onto the hill of corpses. The violent wind des and the dreadful vortexes instantly ground them into pieces.


    But in the next seconds, a loud boom exploded from the scene. Countless frightening flying bugs burst out from the broken bodies of apprentice, clustered into a dense dark cloud and instantly flooded Adept Anderson¡¯s body.


    The assault of such magnitude might cause some troubles for Anderson, yet would not enough to kill him. Therefore, when Greem saw what happened, an aggressive gleam flickered in his eyes. Without hesitation, he threw out the trump card that he had prepared for a long time.


    Self-explosion of golem!


    After received an order from Greem¡¯s spiritual consciousness, the summoning core of Adept level golem which Anderson ced in his pocket immediately exploded!


    It was actually a summoning core purposely modified by him. When he was fighting with Alicest time, he bore patiently and only activate one Fire Lord. Thus, in Anderson¡¯s subconscious mind, Greem only owned one single summoning core of Adept level.


    As the result, during the period Anderson had the control over Greem¡¯s body, after he found the summoning core, he had lowered down his guard against Greem. He never expected that Greem had hidden another summoning core on Alice, while the one that remained with him was a summoning core that had been thoroughly modified, waiting for Anderson to find it.


    And at this moment, taking the opportunity when Adept Anderson was trapped by Evil Bugs¡¯ minions, Greem had finally given out the order to the core to explode.


    In the next second, a hugeva pir exploded from within this isted interspace. Extreme high temperatures, deadly heat, raging and violentva, and terrifying me jets shot in all directions, all of which had formed into a world ofva that could annihte every single living being, coiling and spreading towards Anderson at top speed.


    The swarm of bugs that spread all over the ce immediately suffered from a devastating blow. Among the tens of thousands of bugs, only a handful of them managed to survive. Inside of Acteon¡¯s body, within the bugs tide that was crazily fighting for the control over the body, a shrill bug cry suddenly echoed out.


    ¡°Greem, you bastard, you...¡±


    But before his high-pitch curse could be finished, the voice was flooded by a more frightening and savage hiss of bugs.


    Apparently, the battle happening on his side was in a very dangerous state as well, and it was a life-and-death struggle!


    ¡°Serve you right! Who let you use me as your escape goat. I really hate to be used by someone else, take this as a lesson. You better focus your attention on your internal war! And be careful, don¡¯t let that puppet consciousness to devour you. If that really happened, it¡¯ll be really interesting!¡± Greem sneered in a disdainful manner.


    In the far distance, the figure of Anderson had been enveloped by the raging explosion of Elementium and turbulences, and no one could peek at what was happening inside. Greem had no choice but to turned around and walked towards Mary.


    Indeed, the power of bloodline could allow an apprentice to grow up in a very short amount of time. But once the source of the bloodline fell into the hand of enemies, then the apprentice would be a puppet who had nomand over oneself and would be left at the mercy of someone else!


    The current Mary had turned into a ghostly assassin that went on rampage. She kept leaping and dashing around the Fire Lord at lightning speed, while the crimson longbow in her hand kept bursting out sounds of ¡®twang¡¯s, unleashing one after another crimson arrow and hitting the vitals of her opponent. It was obvious that Fire Lord only specialized in offensive and wasn¡¯t really good in capturing and trapping. Therefore, after thrusting crazily toward Mary for a few times, relying on her high Agility, all its attempts were dodged by her with ease.


    Yet, as Mary was an ¡®ally¡¯ of its master, the Fire Lord couldn¡¯t wantonlyunch attacks at her. Thus, when Greem was fighting Anderson with all his effort, the Fire Lord was locked in a tough battle against Mary!


    At this point in time, Greem came over to their battlefield with his lofty body. When Mary intruded into his Ring of Fire, the me in the air immediately transformed into ming chains and tied her up tightly, pulling her in front of Greem.


    Although Greem just became an official Adept, but when he wanted to deal with a Pseudo-Adept, he could still handle him or her with ease.

 Chapter 157

    Even Greem¡¯s current overall strength was insufficient to entirely capture Mary.


    Crimson armor had appeared on Mary¡¯s body to repel the ming chain and had gained her some time to struggle.


    This crimson armor had been modified for her by Greem! But now, it had actually be an aplice to help Mary fight against him. Greem¡¯s mind was filled with mixed emotions.


    However, no matter how hard Mary tried to struggle, her tall and slim body was still dragged toward Greem, inch by inch.


    In next second, Greem¡¯srgeva palm, spread like a folding fan, grabbed Mary¡¯s head. The boiling hot, bright redva rock instantly scorched her skin and made it split. The foul scent of roasted flesh suddenly filled the surrounding air.


    Even with such cruel torture, it was still not enough to free Mary from Anderson¡¯s spiritual shackles. She bared her pale-white fangs at Greem and portrayed a murderous look, without even the tiniest bit of care towards her face, which had been burnt beyond recognition. She just kept biting crazily at theva hand.


    Greem had a feeling that perhaps with just a gentle squeeze, the vigorous life that kept struggling in his palm, the once beautiful and splendid head would explode like a watermelon that was thrown forcefully to the ground. With that, he would be able to free himself and seriously deal with the wounded Anderson.


    If he just let Mary barge around wantonly, even a small soldier could be an important element that turns the entire situation around. In order to solve this problem, he just had to give a gentle squeeze!


    The consequences of his decision had instantly brought Greem into a dilemma.


    However, right at this moment, the raging sea of me at the far side suddenly shrank. A familiar figure was seen staggering out from within.


    Apparently, the golem¡¯s self-explosion just how had inflicted severe damage to Adept Anderson¡¯s corporeal body. With the naked eye, one could see his body was now fully covered in burn marks after being scorched by fire, and there was even some damage on his face. It was clearly because of the flying ck bugs.


    His left eye was missing; blood kept flowing and dripping down from the ck and gruesome looking hole where it used to be.


    His Adept hat was gone due to the explosion; a few strands of dried, yellowish hair were seen waving above his skinny, shriveled head. A cold gleam, murderous and hideous, shone from his remaining right eye. It stared straight at Greem¡¯s face, portraying an aggressive look of not stopping until death!


    Obviously, the sudden explosion had not been something his elemental barrier could withstand. The long robe on Anderson¡¯s body had been ripped to pieces and be shreds of fraying cloth that barely covered his body. Bloody wounds of all sizes covered his skinny and bony chest and traces of burns could be found all over his body.


    ¡°Good... you¡¯re very good...¡± Anyone could hear the enmity in Anderson¡¯s words. ¡°You really caught me by surprise. Very good... but, a mere Adept level summoning core is not enough to kill me. Now, it is your turn to face your death!¡±


    While burning in the raging me of anger, Anderson raised his right hand into the air and loudly started to recite a profound and hard to understand magic spell incantation. In an instant, innumerable dark spears came shooting toward Greem like a heavy rain.


    While looking coolly at this overwhelming attack, Greem murmured under his breath, ¡°Three... two... one... burst!¡±


    The entire isted inter-space suddenly shook violently; one could even see spatial ripples in the air with the naked eye. Cracking noises were hearding from the loft altar as numerous tiny cracks starting to spread across the stone wall like spider webs. Blood-colored mist burst out from the tiny cracks, like blood flowing from someone who was wounded.


    Even when it had been hit with the self-explosion of an Adept level summoning core, the elemental barrier enshrouding Anderson hadn¡¯t shatteredpletely. However, for some unknown reason, this time, it started to disintegrate amidst the violent quaking.


    The tight connection between Anderson and the Swampy Tower was suddenly cut off!


    Adept Anderson was stunned, and then he suddenly realized something. ¡°Alice! It is that hateful little girl! I¡¯m going to rip all of you into pieces. Then I¡¯ll use your body and make the ugliest, evilest misshapen corpse, trapping your souls in it forever... all of you deserve to be killed...¡±


    The me Fiend that was the transformed Greem smiled. Then he said, ¡°You better deal with her first!¡±


    Right after he finished saying that, a red light shed from Greem¡¯s hand, and a strange magic spell was seen prated Mary¡¯s head. After that, he brought her up in the air and forcefully threw her towards Anderson.


    His action was like a signal, for a brand new battle instantly broke out!


    The Fire Lord strode forward with heavy steps, charging toward Anderson. While it was on its way, it tossed out a series of Magma Fireballs toward the enemy. Meanwhile, Greem was hiding behind it. He stretched out his hand and the Secret Scroll of Voodoo coiled around his waist instantly appeared in his palm.


    As the cover of the magical book unfolded itself, pages within it started to flip quickly. Whenever the goat-skin paper stopped at a certain page, a violent Fire element magic spell would cast out from it and fly fiercely towards Anderson.


    The pages kept on flipping; one after another Fire element magic spells were activated and flew out from it. Very soon, Adept Anderson was surrounded and flooded by a raging sea of me.


    ming Storm!


    Chain of Fireballs!


    Explosive Fire Pirs!


    Thermal Shock!


    Venom me!


    ......


    One after another, violent Fire element magic spells almost turned that particr area into a raging ocean of me. They were mixed with physical attacks and venomous attacks, so the enemy could hardly defend against them.


    However, all of them collided right into the Shattering Wave that had been unleashed by Anderson. The attacksunched by both sides fought against each other in the center of the battlefield. The Elementium turbulence shooting out from the collision brushed and washed through everything in the area, turning everything into tiny bits of debris that couldn¡¯t be seen with the naked eye, and continued pushing and sshing into the far distance within the isted inter-space.


    Anderson once again barged out from the ocean of me while roaring furiously. Thest-minute Wind Barrier he had unleashed by him broke into pieces with the impact, causing more wounds on his body. Nevertheless, arge incorporeal hand produced by him was now holding a severely mutted human body. Not even a piece of intact skin could be found on the miserable looking thing.


    It seemed he had used Mary¡¯s body as his shield just now. Only then could he barely avoid thebined attack from Greem and Fire Lord. Without the endless supply of energy from Swampy Tower, Anderson had also lost his defense, the elemental barrier that could protect his safety. In a situation where he had to face two opponents alone, his tiny bit ofbat experience and spell casting skill were nothing worth mentioning.


    The second half of the battle quickly elevated into an intense situation!


    Anderson sprung up into the sky again. Riding on a vast wind and flying in midair, he used Tornado Storm, Sound Burst, Dark Dragon Spear, and Wind des to assault Greem. Meanwhile, Greem and the Fire Lord were chasing behind him, using magic spells of even more violence, such as Fire Core Explosion, Magma Fireball, and Firestorm to counterattack.


    Magic spells that emanated intense Elementium ripples kept striking through the sky. They either exploded into fireworks on the opponent¡¯s protection barrier or were dodged and fell to a far corner of this isted inter-space, turning that corner into a small sea of me or deadly tornados.


    Relying on its invisibility, Snox was lying t on its stomach and hiding carefully in a remote corner. While covering its head with both hands, it watched as the frightful magic spells flew over it; the fear in its mind had reached a level beyond words. Whenever a fireball exploded close by, countless dirt and debris would ssh toward its direction, hitting its body and causing it to be covered in bruises.


    But Snox didn¡¯t pay any attention to the injury. Instead, it opened its eyes wide and put all of its efforts in identifying which magic spell might fall onto its head.


    ¡°The Mighty God of Goblins, please give me your blessing and don¡¯t let any magic spell fall on me!¡±


    Though the isted inter-space looked spacious, it just couldn¡¯t contain the torture wantonly put out by two Adepts and one Adept level golem. In addition to that, the target of Snox¡¯s prayer was obviously not a deity local to the Adept World. As a result, no matter how much or how madly it prayed, a Magma Fireball still came straight to it, with a long tail of dark smoke behind.


    ¡°Damn it! I hope you are not deceiving me...¡±


    While crying out in terror, Snox pulled out a strange round orb from its pocket and threw it forcefully onto the floor.


    After a loud explosive boom, a huge deep pit with a five meter diameter was created on the floor of the inter-space. It was surrounded by numerous tiny cracks arranged in a spider web pattern. In the next moment, the raging fireball hit and a sea of fire immediately coiled up every single inch of space in this area.


    Under an elemental attack of such magnitude, perhaps even a Pseudo-Adept would find it tough to protect himself, while any apprentices below the level of Pseudo-Adept simply had no chance to survive. Yet, after this deadly explosion of Elementium gradually faded away, an invisible energy shield actually appeared inside of the deep pit, and Snox was seen coiled up inside of it with its face turned deathly pale. Its eyes were still filled with the image of blooming fireworks.


    The energy shield didn¡¯tst for a very long time, but it had saved Snox from the attack of a ¡®stray fireball.¡¯


    Snox patted around few times on its body and felt nothing; then it pinched its thigh forcefully. The pain made it jump up.


    ¡°Gazlowe, I love you! I shouldn¡¯t have doubted you...¡±


    With regards to this Full Covered Energy Deflection Force Field ¨C Goblin Improved Version 3, Snox had no more doubt. Although it cost ten magic crystals to activate it every time, no matter how much it cost, it would never be more precious than its own life!


    Without hesitation, Snox pulled out another two goose-egg-sized energy shield activators from its pocket. While watching at the center of battlefield where the intense battle was going on, it wore a big silly smile and said, ¡°Come on,e on, I¡¯m not scared anymore...¡±


    A moment ago, it had feared the stray magic spells in the air like they were some ferocious tigers, but now it actually hoped it could be visited by some of them, so it could give the treasures holding in its hand another test!


    It was worth mentioning, after some time pestering that Gazlowe, the goblin engineer, Snox did find and exchange some strange and peculiar objects. Although all of these objects had names that sounded mighty and incredible and each of them possessed some miraculous ability that could hardly be imagined by anyone, anyone who had experience in dealing with goblins would know that, though they were indeed miraculous, they were also very unstable!


    To perfectly illustrate this, when Snox was eagerly wanting to carry out a second test of this miraculous energy shield, it... it actually exploded by itself. Fortunately, the mini explosion of the energy shield activator knocked Snox tens of meters away, just enough for it to escape another Fire Core Explosion. Or else, even if Snox had survived, it would have suffered a severe injury.


    Snox rolled up from the floor, looking at the activator, which had melted into molten iron in the sea of me. Its legs were trembling in fear.


    ¡°That damn Gazlowe, how dare he sell me a counterfeit and inferior product! Once I return, I¡¯ll settle this score with you...¡±


    After cursing furiously at the sky, Snox had lost all its courage to be so arrogant. Carefully, it took out its magic wand and cast an Invisible spell on itself before hiding in a remote corner once again.

 Chapter 158

    The formidable strength of a veteran Adept was indeed way beyond anyone imagination!


    Even though he had suffered from the impact from the self-explosion of the golem, had the control of main hall in Swampy Tower destroyed, and was besieged by both Greem and the Fire Lord, thebative strength that Adept Anderson put out was still way stronger than anybody else in this ce.


    And right at this moment, the Chip who had been quiet for a long time finallypleted the damn reconstruction of the temte.


    ¡°Beep. Reconstruction of the target model has beenpleted. Shall I show them to you right now?¡±


    ¡°Show me! Show me quickly!¡± Greem replied impatiently.


    ¡°Beep. Below are the data for the target:¡±


    ¡°Anderson. First Grade Human Element Adept. Expert in Wind and Dark Elements. Strength ¨C 1.2, Agility ¨C 1.3, Physique ¨C 2.1, Spirit ¨C 8.4.¡±


    ¡°How about my data?¡±


    ¡°Beep. Below are the data for the target:¡±


    ¡°Greem. First Grade Human Element Adept. Expert in Fire Element. Strength ¨C 4.6 (1.4) Agility ¨C 0.6 (0.8), Physique ¨C 3.6 (1.2), Spirit ¨C 1.6 (0.9). Currently in the state of Transformation of me Fiend.¡±


    While looking at thetest body attributes of his own, Greem finally understood why there was such a huge gap between an Adept who just advanced and a veteran Adept. He was currently under a special state of transformation of the me Fiend, that was why all of his body attributes, except for Agility, had skyrocketed. Both his Strength and Physique was now stronger than Adept Anderson¡¯s. However, his Spirit, which was the most important attribute for any Adept, was far weaker than that of the opponent.


    Most probably, if not for the the transformation of the me Fiend, those numbers inside the parentheses were his body attributes¡¯ actual numbers!


    Judging from the data provided by the Chip, Anderson¡¯s Spirit wasn¡¯t too much greater than his, it was only eight to nine times more! Taking the environment of the battlefield,bative skills and experience of spell casting into consideration, although there was a huge difference between their body attributes, there was still room for Greem to fight against Anderson.


    Though Anderson was a research-type Adept and not an expert in fighting, as a veteran Adept, among all magic spells he mastered, he still owned an achievement that no one else¡¯s could everpare to. As his affine elements were Wind and Dark element, therefore, Anderson had found a way to merge Dark Elementium into all his Wind element magic spells.


    With that, when any Wind element magic spells that he cast hit the enemy, the spells would always bring the double elemental damage of Wind and Dark. As for his personal defense, after losing the aid and support of the Swampy Tower, Anderson had no choice but to unleash his Wind Barrier to escape from the radiating damage brought on by the frightening Fire element magic spells.


    As for those magic spells he failed to dodge, Anderson would use Mary, whom he still held in his hands, as his humanoid shield.


    By doing so, not only could he use Mary to block off the attack, he could also make that damn kid, Greem, hesitate when attacking, killing two birds with one stone, what was the sense of not doing that?


    Yet, little to his knowledge, on the face of the darkened, charred body that he held in his hand and used as a shield, two tiny slits suddenly cracked open, and a shivering, a crimson glow was seen shining through from these slits. Finally, the spell Greem sent into Mary¡¯s body not too long ago had taken effect!


    Mary¡¯s mind was in a whirl. The severe pain came from the surface of her body didn¡¯t mean much to her now. Inside of her body, under an unknown influence, her blood was slowly heating up and beginning to boil. The boiling hot blood was rushing through her dried and charred body at high speeds, passing through a few internal organs which hadpleted the vampire modification and activated them, making them continuously burst with incredible vitality.


    All this was the mutated energies her body had absorbed during the blood sacrifice ritual just now and had yet to be fully digested. As her body was badly wounded now, these mutated energies had transformed into vitality energy by her powerful vampire instincts, using them to repair her heavily damage body.


    The temperature of her blood was still increasing slowly. It felt like as if all her blood vessels were injected with molten iron. Tiny cracks started to appear on Mary¡¯s charred and darkened skin, the hot air flow kept bursting out from these cracks. Mary, whose source bloodline was controlled by Anderson with a consciousness rune, couldn¡¯t bear it anymore and let out a painful groan. Interfered by this powerful external factor, her vampire instincts had finally suppressed the order forcefully implemented by Anderson.


    The charred body opened up a darkened mouth and exhaled a stream of hot steam.


    Mary was back again!


    Amidst the intense battle, Anderson suddenly sensed something was not right in his hand. It felt like the vampire he held in his hands was...


    Before he could ponder any further, the charred body that didn¡¯t move and looked like a dead body moments ago suddenly turned her head around, giving him a cold and frightening smile. From within her darkened mouth, he saw two rows of pale-white teeth that made his heart tremble, while two vampire fangs were growing longer at an incredible speed and protruding from her lips.


    In the next second, the charred body suddenly opened her mouth wide and ferociously, she bit into Anderson¡¯s neck.


    Anderson had just used a Dark Dragon Spear and shattered theva armor of Fire Lord and was about to continue his attack by throwing a Wind Vortex into its wound so he could inflict an injury that it could barely recover from. Yet, right at this critical moment, Mary who had been controlled and held in his hands suddenly betrayed him. The fear that struck Anderson¡¯s mind could no longer be described with any words.


    A crazy shriek instantly rolled off of Anderson¡¯s tongue. Using both hands he quickly formed more than one hundred Wind Vortexes which had beenpressed into the size of thumbnails and sent all of them onto Mary¡¯s body. Each and every single one of these wind vortexes was like a mini sized meat grinder, wherever they passed, no matter how high the Mary¡¯s Physique was, there was no way she could withstand their slicing and cutting. All her bones, tendons, blood, and flesh were like pieces of cheese that met with a drill head, there just now way they could stop these Wind Vortexes from moving further.


    When more than one hundred of such deadly objects exploded in her body, the frightful damages they brought to Mary were self-exnatory!


    In the next seconds, Mary¡¯s chest simply exploded like it had just gone through a thorough dissection. Fresh dark and purple-colored blood, pieces of intestines that fallen apart, and fragments of flesh whose origin could not be recognized, all of them burst and sshed out from inside in one go. They even besmeared Anderson who was standing close to her into a bloody man!


    With such a terrifying damage to the corporeal body, if it were any other people, perhaps the pain alone would have been enough to kill that person! Yet, Mary didn¡¯t show any response to it. Instead, all ten fingernails of her started to grow crazily, and using all her strength, she clung tightly onto Anderson¡¯s body, while sucking and gobbling the sweet and abundant blood.


    The sounds of gobbling were so loud that they could even be vividly heard from a far distance!


    At this point in time, Mary had lost her shape as a normal human being. From below her neck, the flesh on the front of her body was nearly missing entirely, and there wasn¡¯t anything could be found in her abdomen. The only thing left were the fragments of blood vessels that were falling apart, chunks and slices of minced flesh that barely hung onto her twisted backbone. Except for these, all her internal organs were gone!


    Though she had lost all her internal organs, the blood that flowed down through her throat didn¡¯t disperse and spill all over the ce. It was as if there were some totally invisible organs and blood vessels remaining and guiding the blood that carried with abundant elemental energy through a winding passage within her chest and abdomen, using the crimson-colored bloodstream to redraw the outline and position of all her organs.


    Mary¡¯s heart was nowhere to be found after the explosion. But right at this moment, a couple dozens and hundreds of bloodstreams converged and interwove together in front of her backbones, and in just a brief moment of three seconds, these streams of blood had formed into the shape of a heart.


    Very soon, the blood on the outeryer of the heart had dried up and coagted, hardened and turned into a bloody, thinyer of diaphragm. Through this half-transparent diaphragm, one could clearly see that more blood was gathering inside and constructing aplete heart.


    A light pumping sound was heard.


    The heart suddenly pumped once ¨C a sign of it starting to perform its duty and responsibility!


    In a very short amount of time, the emptied chest of Mary had been covered by a thinyer of bloody diaphragm. Underneath thisyer of diaphragm, countless bones and organs were regrowing in an incredible speed, creeping and moving like a factory of flesh that stunned anyone who looked at them. The only thing was, they were using Anderson¡¯s blood as their raw material, and the end product was a brand new body!


    Compared to the trifling matter of fixing her body, the transformation of Mary¡¯s spiritual ripple was the thing that was truly astounding. From being just one step away from the gate of death, it became beaming with vitality, and her Spirit started to skyrocket. The changes that happened to her were like riding a roller coaster, and the huge difference of before and after simply made one¡¯s eyes go wide and made them tongue-tied.


    In contrast to Mary¡¯s skyrocketing presence, Adept Anderson who was being pushed closer and closer to the gate of death had his flesh and blood vanish quickly, as his body withered and wizened.


    He cast a couple of magic spells in a row, making Mary¡¯s body riddled with blood, but still couldn¡¯t get her off of his body. Sensing that his blood essence and vitality was fading quickly from his body, Anderson stretched his trembling right hand and grabbed Mary¡¯s head, wanting to use a magic spell to shatter the source of his cmity.


    But it was too bad, just as his hand reached half way, it was coiled up by a ming whip thrown over by Greem.


    ¡°Mary, take this opportunity and quickly form your own blood core. Whether you¡¯ll be a dragon or a worm will all depend on this moment!¡± Greem¡¯s deep shout filled with powerful spiritual force burst within Mary¡¯s mind.


    Mary¡¯s body trembled, as if she suddenly realized something. She immediately stopped using the blood of Adept Anderson she sucked to fix her body, instead, she gathered a great amount of them into the newly formed heart, making them m and rock amongst each other repeatedly.


    Noticing that Mary was having a hard time in her progress of breaking through into the realm of Adept, Greem stomped his feet furiously. He injected his powerful Fire element energy into the bloody altar, causing the altar which had suffered from a great torture because of the battle to let out itsst cry, and squeeze out thest drop of its energy.


    The raging mutated energy billowed crazily and rushed into Mary¡¯s body, thrusting into her vampiric heart which had turned into a furnace of blood. If any other Pseudo-Adept was invaded by such a frightening mutated energy during the process of advancing, he would have certainly exploded into a huge firework of blood and flesh. No one could absorb any foreign energy of different element without precipitating and filtering it, yet, the vampire wasn¡¯t scared of this at all!


    The formidable bloodline innate talent of the vampire had given its blood the ability of assimtion. It could turn the blood of any element into its own blood element energy, and any bloodline factor could only be modified into the factor of the vampire. In the history of Adept, there were only records of vampire assimting other people¡¯s bloodline ability, and no examples of anyone seeding in assimting the bloodline factor of the vampire.


    There wasn¡¯t any reasonable exnation to this, as the bloodline innate talent of a vampire was always so domineering!


    That was why Greem was never worried about Mary exploding due to this mutated energy, instead, he was actually worried if this energy would be sufficient to support Mary in helping herplete forming her blood core.

 Chapter 159

    After he handed the task of guarding Mary over to the Fire Lord, Greem finally had some time to clean up the battlefield.


    The spiritual connection with Alice had broken long ago, and the reason was unknown. Greem had a vague feeling that something was happening in the outside world.


    To prevent him from being at a loss of what to doter, Greem thought it was better to first adjust his condition to the best he could; only then would he leave this ce.


    He had took back the storage waist belt that had been taken away by Anderson, together with all of his magical equipment. But it was a pity; since he had be an official Adept, this Apprentice Adept level equipment was no longer useful to him.


    At this moment, some rubble not far away started to roll about, revealing a short, vague figure of green.


    ¡°Master, master! You¡¯ve really be an Adept! This is excellent! Congrattions my master...¡±


    Greem looked at the goblin, whose face was kindled with joy mixed with ttering expression; he couldn¡¯t help but be surprised. During the devastating war that had happened not long ago, the raging magic spells had nearly plowed through the entire isted inter-space. Even the bloody altar, protected by magical arrays as it was, had copsed and disintegrated. Yet, this goblin ve who didn¡¯t have much self-protecting ability actually survived?


    It looked like this fellow also had some secrets that nobody else knew!


    With a smirk, Greem snorted coldly and said, ¡°Go search that ce. Anything left over by those apprentices is yours!¡±


    ¡°Thank you, master! Thank you...¡± Snox was so happy that even the voice of its cheer had changed.


    In this major war, although Snox hadn¡¯t contributed anybative strength, just the fact that it had forced itself to disguise as Alice was worthy of praise. Therefore, Greem waved his hand and gave the right of looting the battlefield to Snox.


    After all, the apprentice level equipment and items were no longer something of significance to him. In addition to that, there was another important task that he needed to attend to right now!


    Greem strode forward, and soon he came to a pile of rubble. An explosive fireball was thrown over, blowing away all of the wreckage and rubble, revealing a dark robe that showed signs of movement underneath.


    ¡°Acteon, do you think that I¡¯ll forget about you? It is time for us to settle the score between us!¡± Greem said with a cold voice.


    Since the primary enemy had been defeated, this ¡®ally¡¯ who had always harbored evil intentions toward him couldn¡¯t be spared as well.


    A Magma Fireball wrapped in raging mes was tossed onto the dark robe. The exploding elemental mes immediately ripped the cloth apart. Amidst the scorching me towering into the air, countless ck scorpions screamed, cried, and eventually burned to ashes.


    Greem focused his mind and sensed around, making sure that he didn¡¯t leave out anything. Only then did he turn around and leave this sea of me which had turned into a miniva pool.


    At the same time, Mary had long sucked dry thest drop of blood inside of Adept Anderson¡¯s body. She was now hovering in midair, three meters above the ground, fully naked, with her head buried between her knees and her arms wrapped around them. Tiny threads of crimson waves kept rippling out from inside of her body.


    The dead body of Adept Anderson was lying t on a pile of rubble. His withered skin was clinging tightly to his bones, and not much flesh could be found in anywhere on his body. He had totally turned into a mummy.


    She had enjoyed Adept Anderson¡¯s fresh blood all by herself. For a vampire who lived on blood, it was definitely the rarest nourishment. It was especially true when she was at the critical moment of advancement. It had simply be the strongest aid to help Mary be an official Adept.


    A powerful yet subtle wave of condensed air suddenly burst out from Mary¡¯s body. At the same time, she unfolded and stood tall, her body still in midair. She threw her head back and let out a crystal clear cry that pierced everyone¡¯s ears.


    Her skin was silky smooth and glittering; her body was curvy and well-shaped; her fair, long legs were slim and slender; she had a pair of crimson eyes that shone like rubies; and her long, bright red hair was hanging loosely down her back... When her naked feet stepped on the ground, a red mist immediately climbed around her body.


    A few momentster, when the red mist faded away, a perfect, luxurious crimson armor had appeared on Mary¡¯s body. She was giving Greem a dimply smile.


    ¡°I really have to thank you for this time. If not for this, it would have been extremely difficult for me to be an official Adept.¡±


    ¡°Are there any side effects?¡±


    ¡°Trying to control an Adept is not something easy. When I was forming my blood core just now, I wiped away all of the restrictions on my soul. From now on, I¡¯m considered totally free!¡± It was obvious that after seeding in bing an Adept, Mary was in an extremely good mood. After she had a few words with Greem, she couldn¡¯t bear it anymore and started to examine her transformation after the advancement.


    With just a light push of her feet, Mary started to dash around at lightning speed and in a ghostly manner. While running around, she used her toes to kick gravel asrge as a milling stone into midair, and with a sh of her body she pierced through from the center of it.


    After she passed through it, behind her was a pile of small stones and dust.


    Greem simply picked up a broken piece of gravel and examined it. The edge was t and smooth; obviously, just in offensive strength alone, Mary had taken a qualitative leap. There was something even more extraordinary. With just a gentle squeeze, the broken gravel shattered and turned into dust that fell to the ground. It was corroded by Mary¡¯s Blood element energy and crumbled with a squeeze!


    Mary¡¯s body flickered and shed around. Her soft and agile body actually left behind numerous vague afterimages in the air. Sometimes she would transform into a tiny bat and fly inches above the ground; sometimes she would transform back into human shape and run at high-speed. At the same moment, there were six to seven afterimages of different postures appearing in the scene; each of them looked so real and condensed, no one could differentiate which was real and which was just an afterimage.


    Taking the opportunity, while Mary was examining her overall strength, a blue light flickered within Greem¡¯s dark eyes. Very soon, he had gathered enough data.


    As a result, thetest of Mary¡¯s body attributes after bing an Adept were projected into Greem¡¯s mind.


    ¡°Mary. First Grade Bloodline Adept. Vampire. Expert in Blood Element. Strength ¨C 2.6, Agility ¨C 4.7, Physique ¨C 2.6, Spirit ¨C 0.7.¡±


    While reading through Mary¡¯s data, Greem¡¯s mind was fully filled with envy.


    Without the help from the transformation of the me Fiend, his body attributes were in no wayparable with Mary. Although Bloodline Adepts only mastered few magic spells, they owned an intrepid body that could perfectly match their magic spells.


    It was fortunate that Greem still had the backup of his golems; or else, if he was to fight Mary alone, there wouldn¡¯t be any advantage left for him!


    Since Mary had seeded in her advancement, there wasn¡¯t any real reason to keep staying in this isted inter-space. Greem called Mary and Snox, held their hands with each hand, and walked toward the edge of this space.


    While walking, a burning hot me started to emerge from Greem¡¯s body. After bing an Adept, Greem was more proficient in controlling Fire Elementium. Under hismand, a glowing red fire pir hit the spatial barrier, and very soon it melted out arge hole that allowed them to pass through.


    Though the fire pir radiated a frighteningly high-temperature, it didn¡¯t bring any harm to Mary and Snox, who were standing so close to it. Judging from this alone, one could tell that Greem had made significant progress in his Fire element innate talent.


    As for where exactly this iste inter-space was located, none of them had any idea. But presumably, as Adept Anderson wanted to obtain the enhancement provided by the Swampy Tower, it was impossible for him to build it in a remote ce. It was certainly still within the boundaries of the Magical Swamp.


    When they melted through the barrier and squeezed out from the secret space, they found themselves standing inside of the earth.


    Greem closed his eyes and sensed for a brief moment. Their current location was merely twenty meters below the surface. After telling Mary about it, Greem¡¯s body exploded into a ming torch and shot right up into the soil.


    Right after they disappeared from the scene, some changes suddenly happened within the emptied and quiet, secret underground space.


    After Greem and others had cleaned up this ce, besides the rubble that was scattered all over the ground, the only thing left was the extremely frightful looking dried corpse of Adept Anderson. However, right after Greem¡¯s aura disappeared, thergest pile of rubble found in the center of the secret space suddenly copsed. A swarm of ck scorpions burst out from within.


    Compared to when they were at their peak, there were less than one hundred of these ck scorpions left. It was indeed miserable. Right at the heart of these scorpions, on the back of a ck bug who looked bigger and stronger than others, a miniature face of Acteon actually showed up.


    Looking at the edge of this secret space starting to copse slowly as the integrity of the structure was damaged, Evil Bugs Acteon let out a hateful bug cry.


    ¡°Trying to kill me? Greem, you¡¯ll never seed in your lifetime. Hmph, since you don¡¯t want this dried corpse, it will serve as my war trophy. Once I swallow it and be an Adept, it will also be the end of your happy days!¡±


    While roaring furiously, Acteonmanded his bugs to cover Anderson¡¯s remains.


    Soon, the only sound left in the scene was the dreadful noise of biting and crunching!


    ............


    The once mysterious and gruesome Magical Swamp had nowpletely turned into a real death zone.


    Covered by the thick fog, a fireball suddenly soared up high into the sky and exploded from within an abandoned garden located in a remote corner.


    The fireball came in fast, and it faded away just as quickly.


    When the me dispersing in all directions finally vanished into thin air, three strange figures of different heights appeared from the center of the fireball.


    Because it was the first time he had tried the Fire Teleportation, Greem still didn¡¯t have a precise control over the distance. As a result, the position where the trio appeared was ten meters above the ground.


    For Mary, hovering in midair was a piece of cake; but obviously, it was a different story for Greem.


    Therefore, a faint cry was heard, as Greem took Snox with him and fell to the ground like a heavy rock.


    On the ground, a Baby Demon was dragging its body and wandering around aimlessly, but it was suddenly frightened and startled by the fireball that exploded over its head. Just as it was staring nkly at the few bizarre figures who had suddenly appeared, their bodies started to grow bigger and bigger while moving closer to it...


    The Demon Baby let out a sharp cry as it woke up, and prepared to run away from where it had stopped. But it was toote!


    In the next few seconds, a muffled boom burst out, as Greem fell andnded steadily on the ground, throwing up a huge amount of dust.


    ¡°Garden of Whispers! It is surprising that Anderson actually built the secret space underneath the Garden of Whispers. Surely he was secret enough!¡± Mary gradually descended beside Greem. Her crimson eyes were cast over to the Swampy Tower, barely visible within the misty fog in the far distance.


    As both of them were exchanging nces and puzzled over the quietness surrounding this ce, light and shadow suddenly shed through their eyes and their heads started to feel dizzy. In just a brief moment, they actually reappeared back inside the fifth floor of the Swampy Tower. In front of them was an old man, d in a ck robe, who had a cold and arrogant expression.


    ¡°Both of you have made the breakthrough and be Adepts? Where is that Anderson?¡±


    Though he didn¡¯t say much, the terrifying pressure of a high-grade Adept instantly startled Greem and Mary, and Snox simplyid t on its stomach on the floor, trembling violently without being able to stop.


    He was a Second... Second Grade Adept!

 Chapter 160

    TL NOTE: I have picked this up after months of no activity as I loved this story and do not want it to end. This chapter is 50/50 MTL and hand tranted. Please point out any grammar/spelling/syntax mistakes. If you like this please up vote!


    Thanks!


    **********************************MAIN STORY*************************************


    Currently, the story is still at the magic hall.


    Three wizards, who stood by the pestle, are looking at the suspiciously imprisoned Green and Mary.Also located at the corner of the hall, Alice, who lost everyone lost contact to, was lying quietly and seemed to lost her consciousness.


    Among the three men, Green knew one of the wizards was named Kogan, and while the other two were the sorcerers of the Saluwa family.One of the sorcerers of the Saluwa family, was an old man wearing a ck robe, although his body is not a too amazing spirit of the fluctuations, and whenever Green¡¯s eyes contact him, there is always was always frozen biting chill down his spine.


    "Anderson is dead?"The ck robe old man coldly ask.


    The other two wizards stayed dead silent, without any desire to speak


    Green would like to speak, but science he cannot understand his predicament with the Salo family, he did not speak more, as speaking too much may be at his disadvantage,ter on, he nodded silently.


    "Retards are of cause retards!Cowards like him are soft-shell eggs and was even kill by his own apprentices, he is purely a retard! "The ck robe old man lean towards one of his subordinates and said: "You go and see how much of Anderson is left!"


    The Kogan wizards subordinate bowed and turned away.


    If the space barrier was not broken, it would not be too difficult to find, but since a big hole in the space barrier, it was rtively easy to find.


    After a moment, the Kogan had returned, and with his hands are carrying Anderson¡¯s remains.But to their horror, the remains had been mingled by the countless ck scorpion drilled out.


    "He is truly dead!"The ck robe old man coldly said: Looks like a good deal to us!Trading a retard for three wizards, we are not at a loss! "


    Green looked slighly download and covered his eyes in horror.


    From the discourse of the second-order wizards, it is clear that the Saloubo family knew Anderson¡¯s every move, and even the blood sacrifices that he arranged secretly.It is conceivable that if the Anderson Wizards seed and be a second-order wizard, then the group of people shoulde to congratte him and sign a new witchcraft contract with him.


    From this icy reality, it reveals the fact that the life of the apprentice in the eyes of these official wizards is simply a resource that can be freely essible and to be consumed if necessary.Perhaps the wizards at high-level are strictly prohibited this kind of behavior, but for each wizard family, as long as they can enhance the power of their own family, such things are rathermon!


    Since the Saluwa family is also looking forward to the Anderson Wizards to be sessful, then now ... how will they dispose of Green and Mary?Shit, that Evil Worms still did not die!Looking at the situation, Evil Worms was using Anderson¡¯s the magic force in his remains and promoted the wizard himself to wizard-hood!


    Green mind thoughts are chaotic, and he no longer bothers to think. He took a deep breath and wait for the second-order wizard to decided.


    The Wizards are the most valuable property in any family, and can not easily be discarded and wasted, so it will be impossible to kill them for them Anderson¡¯s revenge.Most likely, they will face a far more stringent than the normal agreement witchcraft contract!


    "Still hiding in there?Come out also let me see what are you made of! You are actually able to devour the Andersen down to the bones! "


    Near second-order wizard, countless scorpions from the human eye socket eyes and ears and other holes in the crazy gush, and then again condensed out of the Nirvana into a terrible shaped human body.


    In face of second-order wizards, even the gloomy introverted Evil Bugs also be trembling, bowing respectfully to them and waiting for his fate.


    Kougan cold eyes on Anderson¡¯s only remaining on the dder hit a turn, and nced at a glimpse of three people, turned to please said: "Master Fergen, how do you want to deal with them?"


    "Well, what can be done? Signing a contract and throw them to the battlefield. Originally this errand is Anderson¡¯s share since Anderson is gone, let them three takes his ce.If the life then they can naturally enjoy the treatment of family, if they die then they can just me their life is not good enough! "


    Heard the words, Green and the others were disappointed but was also relieved.


    How does the battlefield look like? Howe we have never heard of it?Is it very dangerous?


    A series of questions in Green¡¯s hear flow. Although through the chip can ess to the knowledge of witchcraft and ancient legend, but little about the ne war is known.Even if some books involved in the surface war, but also a half-wed, not borate, it is difficult to glimpse what happens.


    The reason for this situation was presumably high-level wizard purposely block the information from leaking out.


    It seems that everything about the ne war is not an ordinary wizard apprentice can get involved!


    After what Anderson did, all of the wizard apprentice died on the ground, and cause the magic swamp resource point to bepletely paralyzed.Three wizards from the family, in addition to the pressure of the second-order wizard Fergus adults and the Kougan wizard, the other wizard alsoes to rece Anderson take over the swamp tower.


    As long as a formal wizard sits here for around three or five years, this ce wille back to life. But as for Green, Mary, and Evil Bugs, they can only return to the family manor with the Ferguson, to wait for the beginning of the war.


    In the twinkling of an eye, the magic swamp that once lived for seven years has be a past and reminiscent of Green¡¯s long life journey.


    ...............


    Saloubo family manor, Fernando City.


    Green face purged through the bustling streets, silently walked into a street of the secret hut.


    This is a special sale of curious alchemy items Goblin shop, as the owner of the Goblin Kobe is standing on a wooden stool, speaking loudly to two female and one male wizard apprentice enthusiastically marketing his magical alchemy device, which is acquired from the goblinmunication sphere.


    One of the items included: being able to instantly promote the owner of the rocket boots quickly forward (But please note, before the starting that there is no rock or obstacle in front) ... ...


    or able to make horror noise item* (sometimes ... just only sometimes it will explode, so ...)


    Able to create a full cover type of energy shield magic core (remember, pick up the magic core on the ground kowtowing to see the energy shield.If you do not see ... please kowtow a few times! )


    Can take you to heaven to fly random Goblin aircraft (of course, absolutely "random"!)


    Can make you return safely to the ground with this parachute cloak (this seems to be a standard on the item, or how youe down after you go up.Well, freending is also a good choice! )


    ......


    ......


    Green frown looked at the shop inside the auditorium to alchemy device, although his heart is full of disdain, he did not speak any words.


    Such a thing for the current him has been useless, but for theck of life-saving means of the wizard, the apprentice is a good choice.


    Although the Goblin shop¡¯s items always have big or small problems, each one yed a role, but can save lives in a crisis!


    At least after Card had opened the store for a month, there had been zero returns form apprentices.


    Of course, that is, if they are still alive to return the item.


    See Graham¡¯s arrival, Goblin Card immediately gave up on the three apprentices, jumped out of the stool, ran in front of the owner nodded to say hello.The three apprentices had some look unhappy, but turned to see Green who wears dark red wizard gown, immediately bow to him, and then slowly walked out of the Goblin shop.


    They have long heard that there is a new wizard backing this Goblin shop, but it is there the first time to personally see him.After they have left him over 100 meters, the three people begin to breathe again.


    "That adult is handsome!His body really good and robust, a head taller than Hans ... ... "


    "Yes ah yes ah, especially his dark red long hair, coupled with his handsome young face, simply handsome!"


    Listening to the two femalepanions burst of shouting faint hair, the male apprentice could not help butin: "How dare you! That is an official wizard!Did you not listen to those old apprentices repeatedly said, if you see the official wizard do not look at him in the eye.If you break this rule, they might even punish you!And wizards face can be faked to look young, maybe he is a hundred years old man! "


    One of the female apprentices disdain him and said: "Hans, you do not bitter.Wizard Green, we have already inquired, and he is really a less than 20 years old young wizard, andes from a backwater ce "


    "Yeah yeah, I¡¯ve heard that!"Another female apprentice could not help but to add: "heard with him to the family there are two other wizards, especially the Mary vampire, simply ... ... is all of our female apprentice¡¯s idol.She looks not only very beautiful but also have strongbat power, I heard that just to defeat the century hundreds of years of Kiel! "


    "What?Did she beat Kiel Wizard?How could this ... ... Kiel Wizard, but the family¡¯s most famous refining wizard ... ... "


    "Yes, you have seen that Evil Worm Wizard?I heard that he looks terrible ... ... "


    Three people all the way to discuss the gossip, and slowly drifting away.


    ***************************************LEGAL NOTICE************************************


    (c) All rights reserved 2017. No redistribution or right in any kind is granted without explicit written permission. Only a license to read and review this trantion is granted. All readers are strongly rmended to obtain legal copy/license of any original work or derivative work before essing this content. No copyright infringement is intended.

 Chapter 161

    Here is the chapter 161, brought you by Johnsmith1001!


    Just to rify what i mean for 50/50 MTL is machine assist trantion is the usage of an MTL to pre-fill the trantion and suggest possible words. It is still done by a human and verified by an human. I appologise for the poor grammer, and if anyone wants to be an editor please email me at


    Edit: Position Filled by Abduh


    If you don¡¯t have a steemit ount and wish toment please go my site: http://jstrantion.blogspot/2017/10/ch161.html.


    The chapter will also be posted there after one week on steemit.


    Also please let me know inments (steemit or blogger) if you prefer the usage of wizard/witch vs adepts for move information see my post at novel updates.


    Straw poll is here


    Please no replicator sites, it is NOT weed.


    Earlier chapters can be found at here


    Thanks!


    **********************************MAIN STORY*************************************


    In this moment in the Goblin Shop, Green and Card are located in the back storage room having a secret conversation.


    "Master, this is the information and magic crystal you requested."Goblin Card respectfully presented the leather pocket, which is full to the rim of items Green needed.In addition to the items, the bag contains a crystal of knowledge on knowledge Green requested.


    Green picked up the crystal of knowledge, and ce it on his forehead. Instantly, he hear the sound of the chip resonating in his mind.


    "Beep! External data interface found. Do you want to import data to main storage?"


    "Import!"


    "Beep! Order epted.Starting data entry ... "


    Following the cyan instructions in his lower retina, Green has transferred all of the knowledge of all the crystals to his mind. As for the remaining data processing. He has left all of it to the chip to do.


    After processing the crystal of knowledge, Green opened the leather pocket, which contains various attributes magic crystal nucleus, which includes some of the mostmon five element crystals, and also rarer ones such as darkness, nt, poison and light ... ... As for their rankings, everything from beginning level to quasi-wizard level for each type of crystal.


    Unfortunately, there is no wizard level magic crystal!


    However, it is not outside of his expectations, Green has long been acknowledges that they are not easy toe by, so there is no surprise for him. Green took a simple count of it and then ce it to his bag.


    After bing a fire ss wizard, his apprentices level magic golem are no longer as great as before.But when in a pinch, these low-level magic puppet can still y a small, yet important, role.So Green slowly collected the knowledge, and carved his own magic puppet army.


    On his own when he is a wizard apprentice, Green had notice the current knowledge for wizards are too narrow and one-sided.In his mind, a quasi-witch is no different then a wizard apprentice with mental power of 20 points, and such level of the wizard is nothing but the difference of mental power!


    But after his dangerous ascension to a wizard,Green was finally able to see the strength gap between a wizard an a apprentice.


    In order to be a wizard, it is not as simple as have reaching the mental of 21 points, but a change in the original spirit of the existence and the qualitative change in the process.Before the ascension, his spiritual power has 20 points, but after, it was reduced by 0.9 instead!


    This was not to say that his mental strength is declining, but the wizard and the apprentice¡¯s basic character power measurement had beenpletely different.Apprentice¡¯s character attributes are basically based on the physical data of ordinary adults, and then it is used to measure the strength of apprentices rtive to other adults,while wizards is a ss of magical beings.


    Wild monster and beast have natural magic talent, and magic crystals located in their bodies, hence they have better ability in manipte magic elements.The wizards are obviously imitating them, but as all imitation, they are no at the same level.


    Magic monster¡¯s crystal are a physical phenomenon, and after they are key it can be found. ,pare to a wizard¡¯s core, which is a virtual core, and that it only exist in there consciousness.


    Even after ying a wizard, it is impossible to seize a wizard¡¯s core simr to what isdone with a magical beast. But the mind cores is sure to exist, because all the wizards only rely on it to manipte the magic elements.


    If the standard of the mentality of a wizard just 1, then the current Green is substandard. His mentality is only 0.9!But it is due to the fact he ascend differently. As long as the time, he will eventually reach the stand one for mentality.


    More than a month after the arrival of Fernando, Green measured the gap between the wizard and quzi-wizard.If a quasi-witch¡¯s mental power upper limit is 20 points, then the wizard¡¯s 1 point of mental power is almost equal to the quasi-wizard¡¯s100 points.


    This means that, aside from the mental suppression, magical equipment, magical knowledge and magical techniques and other differences, even if the spirit of the strength of a single, a wizard alone is also enough to dominate five quasi-wizards. .If you let go a wizard go while, then a battle harden veteran can easily kill 7 to 8 quasi-wizard.


    Wizards are always wizards!


    As long as you have not reached the wizard ss, then you in the eyes of the wizard, it is just a lowly bug.Although most wizard follow the principle of protecting the source, many of the wizards will pick out apprentices with good potential for extra training and care.But in deep in their heart, they are still wizard apprentice and can not bepared to their own kind.


    Get the things he wanted, Green did not stay in the Goblin Shop too long, and head straight to the outskirts of the wizard tower.


    Compare to the magic tower located in the swamp, the magic tower of Fernando is a true magic tower.The whole magic tower have 17yers, eachyer with special means to expand the internal space, packed of highly advance magical facilities,pare to the backwater magic tower at the swamp.


    Despite such formidable magic tower, it is rarely filled with wizards.


    In addition to the 2nd order Ferguson, there are only three first-order family wizards.Therefore, during Green¡¯s stay in the magic tower for a month, the number of contacts with other wizards are less then the amount of fingers then he has on his hands,


    These wizards all have strange personality strange, and are either hiding in theboratory every day extremely dangerous witchcraft experiment, or go out to collect the necessary knowledge and resources. Therefore, it is rare to see them aimlessly wander around. Moreover, there is only 6 month under the start of the Sanlu family battle, therefore all the wizards are scrambling to prepare for the war, otherwise even veterans will be at hell¡¯s mouth.


    So the family wizards are finally getting busy!


    After this period of stability and recollection, Green¡¯s finally have a good concept of the battle field status.From the information he obtain, the war is a tough choice!


    What a wizard family to rise to frame? Go to war!


    Want to make a wizard family disappear?Go to war!


    A little bit of war, allows wizard to usurp the family¡¯s resources and wealth, is also the reason why wizard¡¯s family are worried.


    By choosing a target, and then invade the realm, leaching the massive amount of rare resources and knowledge of the mysterious, will make any backwater family in to a top family. And as these resources and knowledge continue to trickle back to the family,the family can cultivate more and more excellent new wizards.


    So, with a bit of war to obtain the resources and knowledge to train themselves more new wizards, and then the new wizards will be part of the family can open enter greater battlefields in the future to obtain more resources.Only in this way, the wizards family can embark on enviable virtuous circle, and grow up step by step.


    But win or lose is only the surface of the war.


    Once a wizard family lost in the realm war, arge number of wizards fall, huge amounts of resources investment without any return, then the patriarch wizard family is also have to bear such heavy blow.Going to the battlefield once or twice is good, however long encounters will attract hostile family or ill-intentioned family forces took the opportunity to invade the whole wizard family, and led the family to demise!


    The central part of the maind Tailin area, are littered with hundreds of wizard family, these wizard family through marriage, alliance, merger and other means to form arge and small coalitions, so that the rtionships between families are increasinglyplex and chaotic.


    And every wizard family or college, school, alliance and other wizards forces, all have their own secondary realms.


    The so-called secondary realm is actually a well developed small and medium-sized nes, although the overall strength of resources are notparable arge ne, and the power located in such nes are vastly weaker.


    Given enough time to grow and develop, then they grow and develop in to arge ne. But once it is found by the wizards in the depths of the sea, they were like thembs that in fount of wolves, and the invasion is inevitable.


    The wizard world is are gem in the sea of realms, with high level of materials and resources.If the wizards find another material ne in the depths of the the deep sea, they will try to assess their overall strength. Once they feel it is profitable, they will return to the wizard world to convene a powerful force to invade it.


    The war betweenrge nes andrge nes do not ur easily, as the invasion is too difficult, and the cost of resources is to high to get a decent return in the short term.Therefore, the invasions mainly ur in the realms of small and medium-sized nes!


    Individual strong medium-sized nes, may need to forces the level of Tallinn, North Witch, Wizard Association, Silver Union to invade sessfully.As for the general small and medium-sized nes, an ordinary wizard family is enough to do such a job.


    The measurement of the strength of family forces, isrgely based on the number of invasion of the realms each year, and the amount of resources that they can squeeze of the realms that they conquer. And within each wizard family, the realm¡¯s coordinates of the world they conquer are their valuable property, and must not be leak to any hostile forces.


    ording to legend, the Salu Bo family has two small secondary level realms, but they are rtively low degree of development of the regional cooperation model, far less then the return of envement of conquered realms.


    Regional cooperation model is used when the invasion of small nes of the wizard family forces is too thin, and is not enough to suppress the opposing forces in the realm. Therefore, in order to avoid incurring greater losses, the invasion of the wizards family and the face of indigenous settlement reached a regional cooperation, joint development of the name of the bteral trade.


    Although the invasion family forces need to give the indigenous some resources in order to have a deal, but when the items are resold to the wizard world, they can still can maintain a high return.Although the earnings are substantially less then forced upation and envement but the risk of war will be much smaller!


    And the Saulu Bo family by virtue of these two small secondary level realms, therefore are consider a mid level family in the local regional area. And this new surface war,could l bring the family three additional secondary level realms.


    ***************************************LEGAL NOTICE************************************


    (c) All rights reserved 2017. No redistribution or right in any kind is granted without explicit written permission from the trantor. Only a license to read and review this trantion is granted. All readers are strongly rmended to obtain legal copy/license of any original work or derivative work before essing this content. No copyright infringement is intended.

 Chapter 162

    The altar connecting the two worlds was located in Feidnan City¡¯s Adept¡¯s tower. This was to protect the world coordinates of the lesser ne.


    Half a year was not very long.


    After bing an adept, the greatest change for Greem was the immense slowdown in the speed at which his powers increased. The meditation technique used by apprentices was meaningless for adepts. Greem¡¯s daily meditation only brought about an increase of Spirit of 0.0001 every time. Even Greem would have suspected his daily meditations to have lost all of its effects had it not been for the chip¡¯s thorough monitoring of his body.


    Of course the Sarubo n had meditation techniques suited for adepts, but unfortunately, with Greem¡¯s current qualifications, there was no chance for him to get his hands on them. Greem could have a chance if he contributed a lot to the n¡¯s ne war this time. Otherwise, he can only silently bear with the turtling speed of his Spirit increase.


    On the surface, Greem, Mary, and Acteon were all adepts of the Sarubo n. But in truth, they were the n¡¯s prisoners. The Second Grade Adept Sir F¨¹gen had left a special curse in their mental world. They would instantly be killed by it should they leave Feidnan City at their own discretion.


    Thus the three didn¡¯t dare step a single foot out of the city even though they walked about freely in the City of Feidnan.


    On the other hand, Alice was mad at the fact that Greem and Alice had advanced into adepts.


    She kept suspecting Greem had intentionally sent her outside of the secret space, and let Mary take her ce instead, causing her to lose her chance to be an adept. As for all the risks and dangers Mary had to experience in the process, Alicepletely disregarded them.


    Anger makes people lose their rationality.


    Thus Alice has been clearing missions at an insane ratetely, epting all of the most dangerous missions around Feidnan City. It was hard to catch her in the Adept¡¯s tower with how busy she was every single day.


    As for Mary. After bing an adept, she rapidly became far more powerful. Mary became a terrifying killer on the battlefield with her super high speed, deadly melee attacks and her barbaric eye-for-an-eye style of fighting.


    Even experienced adepts more powerful than her would have trouble facing the wraith-like her if they didn¡¯t have special methods to control her movements. Otherwise, Body Refining Adept Kiel wouldn¡¯t have suffered defeat at the fangs and bow of Mary.


    But as Mary was beginning to catch the attention of people, Greem was once again keeping a low profile.


    Most of his prowess previously came from the golems. As the threat of apprentice level golems became smaller and smaller against future adept level opponents, Greem¡¯s advantage was diminished as well. Greem needed to increase his own powers, as well as find a means of obtaining numerous adept level summoning cores to regain his advantage inbat.


    The only adept level golem Greem currently had was the Fire Lord. Besides that, he also had a Second Grade Molten Giant core waiting to be processed. But it was way too hard to deal with an Elementium crystal core of this level with his current skills. Thus in the remaining time, Greem became a hermit, diligently converting crystal cores into battle golems of various attributes.


    He was trying to increase the numbers of the golems, striving to create a golem army with golems of different specialisations, given that he cannot increase the quality of the golems in the short term.


    Besides crafting golems and his daily meditations, Greem also collected other resources, seeking to fix the magic rune suit of me Fiend transformation onto his body permanently. In his remaining time, Greem examined the Scroll of Voodoo that had been soulbound to him.


    Greem had never heard of such a mysterious adept equipment. Now he was trying to uncover the uses of the Scroll of Voodoo bit by bit based on the information he could find in the library.


    Soul Gear?


    Greem first heard this odd name from Anderson. With this clue, he quickly found rted information and got an initial picture of the uniqueness of Soul Gears.


    Soul Gears are a kind of magical item! And they were a unique magical item that could grow alongside its soul host!


    Besides its ability to return to Greem¡¯s side after a certain distance, its greatest help to him was the six spell storage slots. 6 powerful spells that took a single second to cast. This was more than enough to give him thebat initiative and advantage when facing enemies.


    Greem found a new method of using the Scroll now that he had advanced into an adept.


    gue Curse!


    Write the name of an enemy onto the Scroll using their blood, and the enemy will constantly be inflicted by the gue Curse. This attack is autonomously done by the Scroll of Voodoo and didn¡¯t require any additional Spirit or energy on Greem¡¯s part.


    Thus, buried in his daily meditations, his golem crafting and his examinations of the Scroll, half a year passed in the blink of an eye. It was now the start of the n¡¯s ne war.


    ............


    Half a month before departure, the Sarubo n¡¯s adepts returned to the tower one after another.


    There were now seven n adepts in the tower!


    It¡¯s important to note that the total amount of First Grade Adepts of the Sarubo family was only seven before the addition of Greem and the others. The fact that seven adepts had shown up reflects how important this ne war was for the Sarubo n. They were sending almost all of their active forces.


    The Sarubo n adepts had returned to the tower in the most secretive manner to avoid being discovered by enemy ns. Had they found out about the power vacuum of the Sarubo n, trouble might ur. Their departing location was on the 10th floor of the Adept¡¯s tower.


    The party was led by Second Grade Adept Lord F¨¹gen, which included a total of 7 adepts.


    F¨¹gen looked coldly upon the party as they stood before the teleportation array. Calmly, he spoke:"Prepare yourselves! Later, we will be transported to the ounds, and regroup with the other parties there. This teleportation will break through ne barriers. This is an ultra-long range transportation. Those who have never experienced it should guard their own mental self. Do not extend your Spirit outside of this teleportation array! "


    F¨¹gen drew a magic rune concentrating a terrifyingly cold aura in the air with a single hand and sent it into the array beneath his feet.


    In a series of shes, the adepts within the array disappeared.


    Even though Greem had well expected the terrors of an ultra-long-range teleportation, but as his body was stretched andpressed within the teleportation array, Greem truly experienced the pain and torture of having his spirit origin at the mercy of Spatial Energy.


    Mottled and blurred patches of color took up all of his vision. Everything before his eyes looked like they were obstructed by a thick stained ss. It was all blurry.


    Even worse was the nausea of space flipping up and down.


    Greem had no means of telling the direction with the limited vision he had and the feeling of space bending in his mind. Of course, there was the possibility that there was no such thing as direction during the spatial transfer!


    It was hard to determine how long the ultra-long-range teleportation took. Greem hadpletely lost all sense of time and space.


    When he finally appeared at a teleportation array on another end, he shut his eyes and recalibrated for half a minute before he was back to usual.


    The first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was the bright and boundless gxy.


    Never had there been such a moment where Greem felt so at peace and his mind and mind so rxed. Above his head, high above the skies, was a thick transparent energy dome. Outside that dome was the boundless gxy and the exhrating energy sea of the multiverse.


    The sky is boundless. The stars are countless.


    Looking at the starry skies without the interference of the ne barriers, Greem felt like his entire being had sunk into the dark but shining night sky. The barrier between man and the world had disappeared. It was all so fantastical and beautiful.


    Greem drew his line of vision away from the night sky with much effort. Only then did he have the chance to survey the teleportation tform he was on.


    This was a massive pseudo-ne floating in the depths of the gxy.


    The inside of the pseudo-ne wasn¡¯t the mostmonly seen continent formmon to the material worlds. Rather, it was a mountain peak so massive it was beyond imagination. Steep cliffs. Forests of stones. There were terrifying peaks everywhere that stood tall like unsheathed swords.


    And the teleportation array where the party was was located on the top of such a peak. Someone had sliced the sharp peak, turning it into a t tform. Looking from atop, numerous holes had been dug in the peaks. Countless flying creatures that looked like two-footed dragons were weaving in and out of them.


    The array on the top of the sharp peak wasn¡¯t the only one. In Greem¡¯s vision alone, there were three to four more teleportation tforms exactly like the one beneath his feet. Teleportation light shed there as well. There were up to three other parties that seemed to consist of adepts as well.


    "Come with me! We need to first regroup with the others! " F¨¹gen called out and took to the air.


    Almost anyone who became an adept had their own unique method of flying.


    Some summoned flying creatures out of beast-ving rings. Some grew an odd pair of wings. Some called upon the wind Elementium particles to surround them and help them fly..... Greem summoned the Lightning Giant, and had it carry him and follow behind F¨¹gen towards a tform with several other people.


    It was hard to tell how huge this pseudo-ne was, but when they flew high up in the sky, Greem¡¯s pupils couldn¡¯t help but shrink. This......this was a pseudo-ne so huge it could be called a small continent of its own!

 Chapter 163

    The night sky hung low. The countless stars were spotted across it.


    The familiar stars seen from within the ne now hung directly above in the boundless skies, so close it seemed one could just fly up and pluck them.


    But Greem knew that each of these stars represented a ne world that carried the lives of hundreds of millions. Although they seemed really close, in truth, it would take at least a hundred years to cross the infinite sea of stars to reach them.


    The term "sea of stars" was not a metaphor. It was a description.


    Any two nes within the multiverse were separated by an extremely long distance. It is not emptiness that was between them, but rather energy tides so strong and powerful it¡¯s hard to even imagine. Where there were energy tides, there were high tides and low tides. There were times of storms and times of calm seas.


    In this seemingly empty space, chaotic energy flows were everywhere. The first thing any being needs to do when they enter the infinite space is to protect themselves from the damage of turbulent energy flows.


    Space was not empty. Energy reigns there.


    Energy tides flowed aimlessly in space. Sometimes they gathered in a ce, forming powerful and terrifying energy storms. These stormy areas easily extended up to hundreds of thousands of miles wide. Therge ones even went up to millions of milesrge.


    The energy corrosion strength at the eye of the space storm could go up to a shocking 10000 points. Even a Fifth Grade Adept would die if he was pulled into such a storm. Even at the edge of a storm, the strength of turbulent energy flows could reach up to 100 points.


    What this meant for any adepts that breached into an energy storm was that their energy shield had to constantly bear energy corrosion of up to 100 points. This......this was equal to the normal damage of an actual adept!


    Once the adept¡¯s energy shield is broken, a First Grade Adept would be minced into tiny particles within seconds by the energy flows. The particles would then be swept away by the energy tides to any corner in the multiverse.


    Thus a First Grade Adept would have trouble surviving in the sea of stars once they left the protection of the ne barrier behind. To rely solely on bodily strength to travel across space, this was something only Grand Adepts could do!


    The pseudo-ne slowly drifted in space.


    Sparkling fireworks could be seen everywhere on the world membrane that protected the pseudo-ne.


    That was the result of friction between the turbulent energy flows and the membrane. It looked beautiful from afar, but the strength of the energy contained was no weaker than the strongest attack an advanced apprentice could fire. If someone left the protection of the world membrane and entered the infinite gxies, their protective shield had to constantly bear no less than 50 points of energy damage.


    And this was the energy tides at their most calm.


    Even with Greem could only stay within the infinite gxies for no more than 15 minutes with his current power.


    Greem¡¯s temporary quarters was within one of the exceptionally tall stone peaks. It was a small room dug out of the stone. He has already been here for three days, but there was nothing to do. Everyday Greem could only meditate, stare at the stars or speak with the adept that lived nearby.


    He had thought the 7 First Grade Adepts in the party this time had been all of the Sarubo¡¯s n active forces. But when another three adept parties appeared before him, Greem realised that the Sarubo had hidden some of its adept forces. These adepts usually were hidden in those lesser nes.


    This was a need born out of reality.


    Lesser nes were smaller nes enved by adepts through barbaric strength and bloody means. The adepts¡¯ ruling structure would easily be toppled if theycked the necessary numbers to defend.


    Thus, tall Adept¡¯s towers were built in every lesser ne, stationed with numerous adepts. This was to ensure that the exploitation of the lesser nes¡¯ resources would proceed smoothly.


    This was the true core profit that every adept family needed to protect.


    The n outpost in the World of Adepts, on the other hand, was no more than a source of fresh blood to keep training new adepts. Of course, the value of the source of fresh blood could not be reced by any lesser nes. The n could continue to produce new adepts and strengthen itself as long as the n¡¯s roots in the Continent of Adepts were never destroyed.


    Thus many adept ns have extended their reach to all over the infinite sea of stars even though their roots remained in the World of Adepts. Every time they found a material world weaker than themselves, they would find a way to invade, and squeeze the sweet sweet nectar out of it, making their roots stronger, making them more powerful......


    The adepts that regrouped with Greem¡¯s party were adepts reassigned from the two lesser nes that belonged to the Sarubo n. If these experienced adepts were the mainbat forces of the Sarubo n, Greem¡¯s party were only a bunch of rookies. A bunch of rookies that haven¡¯t experienced the grind and refinement of ne wars.


    All sorts of unexpected situation could happen in the initial invasion of a new ne. The n¡¯s spine would be shattered if these veterans were lost in such a careless fashion. Naturally, this meant that the best scouts were the adepts such as Greem, the newly advanced adepts.


    Of course, no adept woulde out and so publicly and explicitly point this out to Greem. This was a conclusion Greem came to through his own evaluation and sorting of various detailed information.


    Their party was a scouting party meant to explore unexplored territory for the n. One mistake and their lives could be in danger!


    Greem could tell this was the case, but there was nothing he could do. After all, this is a process all adepts have to go through. Why else would the n spend a huge amount of resources on them!


    This mostly referred to those adepts of the Sarubo n. Greem, Mary, and Acteon, on the other hand, were basically like the bastards of the n. Hardly any resources for them, but a hell lot of work to be done.


    ............


    The fifth day on the pseudo-ne. The day of action had arrived.


    Greem¡¯s party were brought to a well hidden arcane hall under Sir F¨¹gen¡¯s lead.


    There, Greem saw the most shocking scene of his life.


    A single person, a single adept, sat in the middle of the hall, legs crossed.


    Below his body was a gigantic array Greem had never seen before. Behind him, an odd space vortex was opened in the middle of the air. Tens of thousands of golden chains that were somewhere between solid and nothingness extended out of the vortex, tightlytching on to the body of the man.


    The adept had a ck robe on his body. The hood was pulled down low, obscuring his face. The gigantic array was continually functioning, helping him resist the corrosion of the mysterious chains.


    Greem could feel a terrifying strength that could shatter space and shake nes around him even though he couldn¡¯t tell the power level of this mystery adept. From those chains of space, Greem could sense the aura of thews of nes.


    Was this.....the material projection of the strength of a certainw of nes?!


    Greem was shocked into silence.


    He had only understood a small and insignificant piece of thews of mes and it was sufficient to allow him to advance to an adept. But the adept before him was clearly grappling with a majorw of a certain ne. How unimaginably terrifying was this!


    Even the cold F¨¹gen became cautious as they approached this ce.


    F¨¹gen didn¡¯t dare to take a single step into the gigantic array. Instead, he bowed at the edge of the hall and greeted the adept:"Reverent Lord Sarubo, I¡¯ve brought the first batch of adepts to enter the ne. "


    All the n adepts were shocked as they heard F¨¹gen¡¯s words.


    Was this......was this mysterious adept the person who created the n thousands of years ago? Was this......Lord Sarubo? If it was him, didn¡¯t that mean they were looking at a Fifth.... no, maybe even Sixth Grade Adept!


    Almost instantly, everyone lowered their heads. They no longer dared to stare at this mysterious adept.


    As Sarubo adepts, the terrifying Great Adept who created the n was a deity in their hearts. Although they could not pray to him and believe him as a true god, they were still deeply impressed by his strength and power.


    First Grade Adept was most possibly the peak of their lives for many of the people here. A Fifth or Sixth Grade Great Adept was well beyond the realms of their imagination! It was a dream that couldn¡¯t even dare to think of!


    When their dream was put right before their eyes, none of the adepts could stay calm. Their mental flux started to boil and bubble, reflecting their excitement.


    The adepts didn¡¯t lift their heads, but a deep andpelling voice boomed in everyone¡¯s mind.


    "I have corroded a wormhole on this ne barrier. A spirit clone split off from my consciousness has found a suitable location on the other side.


    You are all First Grade Adepts. The brand of the World of Adepts isn¡¯t as strong on you. As long as you remain inconspicuous, the will of this ne will not retaliate too strongly. Your first mission there is to construct a forward operating base, to construct a simplified Adept¡¯s tower.


    Take note!


    Although I have suppressed most of the ne¡¯s retaliation on the other side, you will still need to get used to the newws of the ne on the other side.


    Remember, under the pretext of not exposing your identities to the natives, you must protect this forward base with your lives. You must protect my spirit clone. Your mission is done once I have finished a basic analysis of that ne¡¯sws.


    All of you will receive more than you can imagine!


    Now, prepare! I will send you over immediately. "


    The 7 adepts who were to be the vanguards listened respectfully to the mysterious adept¡¯s words as they prepared silently. With a wave of his hand, a single gold chain split off from the space vortex. In one swift move, it pierced all the adepts.


    The next moment, all 7 adepts disappeared into the vortex under the powerful pull of the strength of the new. They didn¡¯t even have the opportunity to scream.

 Chapter 164

    It might not take long to pass through a space vortex, but for Greem and the others, it felt like an entire century.


    The space constantly stretched andpressed and rolled over their bodies......An apprentice adept would have had their bodies disintegrated, their Spirit shattered and died a painful death in the process. Fortunately, the adepts were supported by a tough Physique and a powerful Spirit after their advancements.


    Even Greem had to try his very best to resist the odd twists of the mutated space.


    The mysterious adept Sarubo had clearly used a unique means to corrode a tiny wormhole on the ne barrier to avoid alerting the ne¡¯s ne consciousness. Countless space turbulence filled the space vortex. These were the result of Sarubo¡¯s battle against the news.


    With the power of Greem and the others, they would be minced to pieces instantly if they were caught in any of them.


    Fortunately, under the guidance of Sarubo¡¯s consciousness projection, Greem and the others did not get lost in the space vortex. They sped through the vortex, avoiding one after another terrifying turbulence. Soon, they appeared in another world.


    It was a silent valley in the middle of a vast mountain range.


    The ancient trees within the forests wererge and strong. Their branches easily extended to several hundred square meters wide. Tall mountains and vast forests were everywhere around. Ravines were strewn about the valley. The songs of birds and the calls of insects never stopped.


    But a disaster that could tear this entire world apart was slowly brewing amidst this beautifulnd.


    A small hole was opened in the middle of the field. In front of the hole, a ck-robed adept sat silently, his legs crossed. Many chains were wrapped around his body. One end of the chain disappeared into the body of the adept. The other end disappeared into the boundless space. It looked bizarre.


    The adept in the ck robe didn¡¯t dare to make anyrge movements with to the restrictions of the golden chains on him. A simple wave of a hand, a cough, all of these could result in severe retaliation from the chains, causing damage to the structure of space around him. This was a small material ne after all. The size of the continent within was a hundred times smaller than that of the Continent of Adepts. This was a ne world that could not support powerful beings.


    Trying to squeeze into this material world as a Sixth Grade Adept was no less hard than trying to shove a tiger into a cat cage. Moreover, as a being from the World of Adepts, Sarubo radiated a thick scent of his world from his body and soul. He could not fit in with the news here.


    Different ne worlds had differentws. Vastly different at times.


    The more powerful the soul of an adept was, the more resistance he received from a foreign ne.


    If Sarubo managed to break into this ne, it might be hard to find an opponent of his caliber. But as long as he has yet to dissect the differences of this ne¡¯sws, both his body and soul will continually be suppressed and repelled by the ne¡¯s consciousness.


    His power would be very limited before he gets rid of this foreign force. If his acts of resisting suppression were toorge, it would also attract the attention of the ne consciousness. Then more enemies would be attracted to where he was and as suppressed and weakened as he was, even he would not be able to resist mobs of weak enemies.


    Thus, as the standard procedure of ne invasions, the mastermind Sarubo was only responsible for creating a wormhole and projecting his consciousness to the other side. Then it¡¯s up to the following low-level adepts to swarm into the ne, corroding the world bit-by-bit.


    ............


    There was a sudden movement in the calm space vortex.


    Bo Bo Bo......


    Following the continuous ripples in space, one after another adepts were spat out of the vortex, tumbling on the ground.


    Greem climbed up from the ground painfully. But just as he stood up, he moaned and squat down once more.


    Terrifying ne suppression came from the skies above. Countless chains ofws appeared out of the space around him. All of a sudden, his power had been suppressed toplete insignificance.


    Goddammit!......


    It was a terrible feeling of depression, being subdued and twisted.......


    It felt like his mouth and nose had been covered with a thick wet cloth. Greem could hardly breathe!


    Even the plentiful and powerful Elementium within his body waspletely drained, much like a bottle without a bottom.


    The Body Refining Adept Kiel reacted the best out of the 7 adepts. After all, he still had a tough body even though his Spirit had been suppressed. The few elemental adepts with weaker bodies were pressed to the grounds, still frowning.


    In truth, their physique was not too weak as experienced adepts who had to search everywhere for resources to strengthen themselves. Them being too used to their power was the main reason they looked so bad now. Once the power within their body was taken away, even breathing and walking became a task.


    Greem slowly rose from the grass field and move a little bit.


    He could feel it. The news here were way too different from his original world. He had to slowly get used to thews here to regain his strength. As long as he didn¡¯t move the Elementium powers merged within his body, the suppression of the news would not be as strong and violent.


    After everyone had gotten somewhat used to the environment, they went before Sarubo, bowing as they waited for their orders.


    This was, of course, not Sarubo¡¯s true body. It was only a mental projection. But even then, the retaliation of the news was still so obvious on Sarubo. The suppression on these First Grade Adepts was insignificant inparison!


    "You have all made it through! Good. Now leave behind a few to terraform the environment. The rest of you scatter in each direction and seal all the paths to her. Make sure no outsiders can disturb my analysis of the news. Be very careful. The space ripples from your journey here just now may have drawn the attention of powerful beings in this ne. The second batch of adepts will arrive in a month. Before that, you must defend this ce with your lives! "After some quick advice, Sarubo¡¯s projection went silent.


    All the adepts looked at each other, then backed off and begun preparing the next steps.


    Although everyone, including Adept Keoghan, was First Grade Adepts, they still had to obey the orders of Adept Keoghan. After all, Sir F¨¹gen had emphasised this several times before the trip here.


    "We have just arrived. Our powers are at our weakest. So, for the time being, we should not initiate any grand gestures. I now set forth a rule. For the first three days, our range of activity will be limited to 1 mile. Do not initiate contact with the natives too early.


    Kiel, Viier, Cowen and I will stay at the base. We will try and construct a functioning base in the shortest time possible to hide Lord Sarubo and the space vortex. Acteon, Mary, and Greem. The three of you are responsible for the outer ring. Kill all the dangerous living beings nearby. Do not let them bust in here and disturb Lord Sarubo.


    Understood? "


    Everyone nodded their heads. Even Greem, Mary, and Acteon did not express any disagreements.


    This was well within expectations. As newly recruited adepts who had yet to be trusted, Keoghan would not possibly let them near the weakened mental projection. Thus it was expected that the experienced adepts were left in the base and the three outsiders sent to the outer ring.


    Everyone began seeing to their jobs once it had been assigned.


    The four people left in the base didn¡¯t actually have any less work than Greem and the others.


    Kiel in particr, as a Body Refining Adept, was an important person in the construction of the base. With one fist, he could down trees that were as thick as a man¡¯s embrace. With a few chops of his steel palms, branches as thick as a child¡¯s arm were removed. And alone, he could carry the half-a-ton trunk back to the base.


    The restrictions by thew chains were extremely strong as they had just entered the ne. They couldn¡¯t use any powerful spells. Even the simplest of cantrips were changed due to a change in news.


    You might have wanted to summon a little me for dinner, only to realise the little me is now a giant fireball. And there goes your pot. You might have wanted to summon a me tornado to attack your enemies, only to have a little me flicker in your palms. It¡¯s hardly enough to even warm the enemies....


    The difference in news made all spells function weirdly. The adept¡¯s individual strength was probably not much stronger than the ne natives before they get familiar with the news.


    Greem snapped his fingers to ignite a me at his fingertips. After the Elementium shed in the air, something appeared in his hands. A jade green frog.


    It was a normal frog with rough skin on its back. And it clearly was as surprised as Greem about him appearing out of thin air. After blinking its googly eyes and looking about, it leaped out of Greem¡¯s palm and with a few hops, it disappeared in the bush.


    Dammit! The difference in news was sorge? To have caused a fire spell to be a random nature summon?


    Greem calmed himself down andmunicated with the chip.


    "Chip, how¡¯s the new analysis going? "


    "Beep, this ne world is a low-level material ne. Elementium saturation rate is low, at 27% of the World of Adepts. Law simrity 69%. Expected analysis time is 235 hours 27 minutes 18 seconds..... Current analysis progress is 0.013%.....


    The long progress bar in Greem¡¯s mind was mostly upied by a blinding rate. The green that represented progress only took up a thin line on the bar. Even Greem with his self-proimed 20/20 vision could hardly see any increase of the green bar.


    Greem turned and looked at Acteon:"Which way are you going? "


    Although they hated each other thoroughly, they had to call a truce in this foreign world. Preserving their lives came first.


    Dim green eyes shed beneath Acteon¡¯s hood. He pointed in a direction and left. After Acteon¡¯s scrawny silhouette disappeared in the distance, Mary appeared beside Greem. Her eyes shot a questioning look at Greem as she slid her hand across her throat.


    Greem shook his head after a moment¡¯s thought, then left in another direction. Mary sighed due to a lost opportunity. Silently, she transformed into a bat and disappeared in a different direction from the other two.


    Her transformation was a Bloodline ability and she received very little repercussions from the change in news. This was her source of confidence in killing Acteon!

 Chapter 165

    Greem slowly walked into the forest.


    He was weakened now, but he was an adept after all. Even barehanded, he could deal with all non-magical creatures. Moreover, he had a vague feeling that his golems wouldn¡¯t be affected by thew changes. He was trying to find a hidden ce to verify if this was the case.


    Tangling vines and low bushes were everywhere in the forest. Fruits that were half green and half red swung on the branches above. The wind carried with it the sweet smell of grass and the moisture of the air.


    It was almost a quarter of a mile away. Looking back, Greem could only see tall trees that covered the sunshine. It wouldn¡¯t be easy for someone far away to notice anything that happened here.


    Greem took an earth summoning core from his storage belt and threw it to the ground. ck shiny dirt began to rise as the earth Elementium gathered around the core. In 5 seconds, the dirt had shaped itself into a humanoid y golem.


    Countless broken branches, decaying leaves, and insects were wriggling about the body of the golem as Greem hadn¡¯t filter the dirt used to form the golem.


    Greem frowned.


    Even though this was a beginner-level golem and wasn¡¯t as powerful as something like the Demon Alligator Hunter, but it shouldn¡¯t be this weak.


    A beginner y golem such as this one should be 2 meters tall and weigh six to seven hundred pounds ording to his tests in the World of Adepts. But here, the y golem was at most 1.5 meters tall, and it had lost 1/3 of its weight.


    It seems that the golem¡¯s strength had been reduced due to ack of magic Elementium even though the golem summoning was not affected by news. The tiny w wasn¡¯t enough to get Greem down. Just for this ne war, he had prepared over 300 golem summoning cores of all types, all hidden in his storage belt.


    These were the fruits of hisbor of the past six months. Greem firmly believed that if you cannot crush the enemy with raw strength, then flood them with terrifying numbers!


    Greem shut his eyes to get a sense of the mental drain of summoning the y golem. With his current Spirit, he could sustain over 100 y golems on the battlefield simultaneously. Next, Greem repeatedly tested the other golems, including the Water Elemental, the Stone Serpent, the Wind Critter, the Lightning Giant, the mehound and the Fire Lord....


    Greem took his time and effort to sense the mental drain of each and every one of them, etching it to his brain.


    The sudden increase in Spirit since his advancement to adept made his idea of a golem army much more realistic. With Greem¡¯s current Spirit, he could approximately support 100 beginner golems (y golems, mehounds, wind critters) or 25 advanced golems (water elementals, demon alligator hunters, stone serpents) or 10 pseudo-adept golems (lightning giants, water sprites, magma hounds) or 5 adept golems (Fire Lords)


    Greem had only one Fire Lord and very few higher level golems. The only strategy left for Greem was golem swarming!


    Just as Greem finished evaluating the golems, the chip suddenly let out a sharp siren.


    "Beep, discovered odd biological existence transmitting mental flux......¡±


    Greem turned around, his eyes bright as stars. Instantly, his vision pierced through hundreds of meters and locked onto an odd flying bug resting within a bush.


    This was a bug with a dark ck shell the size of a finger. It was resting on a thick branch, using the leaves to hide its body. If it wasn¡¯t for the chip, Greem wouldn¡¯t have been able to pick up on such a hidden "infiltrator" with his Spirit badly suppressed.


    Jerk. It was Acteon¡¯s spy.


    Greem frowned. Red shone in his eyes, and the bush where the bug was hidden instantly caught fire, ignited by the concentrated fire Elementium.


    The insect realised it had been exposed and started to p its metallic wings to leave. Sadly, Greem had locked on to it with his second "Ignite." The different news of another world had affected Greem¡¯s first spell, forcing him to cast another.


    The sudden me enveloped the bug. It began to scream like a human as it wriggled its fat body. It seems that Acteon had attached a strand of his Spirit on the spy bug, and was hurt by Greem¡¯s spell.


    500 meters away from Greem, in an empty field within the forest, the ck-robed Acteon let out a groan from under his hood.


    Acteon, much like Mary, had a special physique. He didn¡¯t rely too much on Elementium, and so the effect of the changedws was not evident on him either. This was what made him think of taking the chance to kill Greem.


    The reason he didn¡¯t choose Mary instead was because vampires were annoying and resilient creatures that were hard to kill. Greem, on the other hand, was merely an Elementium mage. Once his powers had been suppressed, killing him would be a breeze.


    But the images sent by the bug sent chills down Acteon¡¯s spine. That damn Greem had so many golems! It irritated and terrified Acteon to no ends.


    The vtile emotions were what caused a spike in his mental flux and allowed the chip to detect the existence of the bug. Acteon¡¯s mental world stung as the bug was consumed by the fire.


    Hmph! I¡¯ll let you live for a little longer!


    Acteon cursed and quickly disappeared from where he was.


    He looked calm on the surface, but in truth, nervousness filled his heart.


    That Greem¡¯s power didn¡¯t seem to have weakened. In fact, he seems to be way more terrifying now. If his army of golems surrounded him, along with the wraith-like Mary.....Acteon was confident in his power after he became an adept, but still, he had no chance against the both of them.


    So he ran as fast as he could after cursing.


    After all, he was scared that Greem would have a change of heart ande after him.


    ............


    Mary sped through the forest.


    The vampiric bat she had turned herself into moved freely in the forest. At times, she flew up towards the skies and looking down on the valley. At times, she dove into the forest thick with trees and weaved between the branches, vines, and leaves.


    Everywhere she went, countless critters were scared into hiding, where they looked upon this giant bat with frightened eyes.


    Mary would asionally break into the homes of powerful magic beasts, where they would attack her. Sadly, their immobile bodies could only eat the dust before Mary¡¯s lightning speed.


    Winged dragons, gryphons, rocs, four-arm apes, razor boars, sabertooth elephants, man-eating demons......


    Mary couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by the plentiful biological resources of this ne. It was way beyond her imaginations. The density of the creatures was even more impressive.


    Of course, inparison, the power of the creatures here was much weaker than those of the World of Adepts. It was rare to see any magical creatures in the forest!


    Theck of magical creatures might be a fortune for the average human. This way human settlements would be much safer and suffer much fewer sacrifices. But this was terrible news for those with supernatural powers. This gave them far fewer opportunities to train themselves and learn from the wild.


    The reason the adepts were so powerful was precisely because the World of Adepts was home to many equally powerful magical beings! To protect the peace of the human world, to allow the continued existence of humans, the adepts had to be more powerful, smarter and stronger than those beings.


    Thus the power of adepts was the natural result of millenniums of bloody battles against magical beings, not because of the rise of one or two talented adepts.


    If this necked powerful magical creatures or beings, it was natural that the natives here could not give rise to an extremely powerful individual. This was the ne development theory every adept firmly believed in!


    Why did the World of Adepts exile all adepts beyond the Fourth Grade? Precisely to maintain the bnce of power between the adepts and the magical beings, to ensure a cruel and unforgiving world for their descendants, to grind and create more powerful adepts.


    This was a theory Greem came to after coting the state of development of multiple areas, so Mary naturally knew about it as well. But she had never given a damn about any such theories. The only thing she cared about was whether there were delicious blood treats here!


    The giant rampant bat finally caught the attention of the ruler of this forest. A rare three-headed chimera took to the skies, rushing towards where Mary was.


    The chimera was a powerful magical creature with the head of a lion, the body of a goat and the tail of a snake. Normal chimeras had only one head that was capable of spewing mes that could resiliently stick to its victim. And once a chimera has three heads, it would simultaneously wield the powers of me, poison, and wind.


    In the World of Adepts, such a creature might barely make it as a middle-tier magical being, but here, it was considered an extremely powerful beast.


    Mary was excited that she had found a magical creature that attracted her attention. Instantly, she began baiting the three-headed chimera into a chase in the woods. Her body was much slimmer and much more capable of speeding through the thick canopies of all the ancient trees. Therge chimera with a wingspan of 12 meters, on the other hand, was having trouble.


    Amidst the sounds of snapping branches, the chimera charged through the forest like a bulldozer.


    The strong but immobile chimera was at a huge disadvantage against the bat in such narrow quarters. Thus the angered chimera took to the skies after a fruitless chase. With all its power and all three of its elemental attacks, it bombarded the area where the giant bat was.

 Chapter 166

    Violent and ferocious attacks of three elements instantly covered the area where the giant bat was.


    Exploding elemental fireballs, slimy and corrosive green globs of poison, continuous waves of ferocious wind des......


    Spells of three different elements, each with their own attributes now spew out of the three unique heads of the chimera, engulfing the forest in a magnificent and fiery funeral of magic.


    But just as the chimera roared and reveled in the feeling of dominating the battlefield, a slim and tall figure broke through the wave of Elementium. It charged from the forest, quickly nearing the chimera.


    The chimera was a magical being, but it also had powerful muscles and strength in a close quarters fight, Sharp ws and a powerful armored tail were all powerful weapons of the chimera. The three ferocious jaws tripled its threat to any enemy that dared to go close.


    But today was not this chimera¡¯s lucky day.


    Three magical breaths fired in a panic were easily dodged by the ghostly figure with a p of her thin bat wings. Its sharp ws that could tear apart a tiger were also deflected by the opponent¡¯s blood red armor. Nauseating blood thorns appeared on the surface of the armor, silently deflecting most of the chimera¡¯s blows.


    The very next moment, a bat-winged demon that looked like a young human girl dodged the three jaws by a hair¡¯s breath. As she dodged, a chain of blood red magic arrows shot through the lion head in the middle.


    The closely woven and tough scales of the chimera were no better than paper in front of the magic arrows. They shot through its eye and exploded inside the skull, sting the skullcap far away. Scarlet red blood mixed with spots of white brain matter sttered everywhere.


    Mary¡¯s petite body was like a buzzing fly about a lion aspared to therge physique of the three-headed chimera. But the blood red bow in her hands was a true weapon of killing, continuously sending blood red arrows to the chimera¡¯s weak spots.


    The piercing power of the arrows along with the bloodsucking effect of the blood-attribute energy made it an unreachable dream for the chimera to even deal a little damage to Mary. It had only been three minutes since the start of the battle, but the chimera was already riddled with holes, blood pouring out of everywhere.


    The chimera cried in pain. With a swipe of its menacing tail, it forced Mary back and turned itsrge body, desperately pping its scaled wings, trying to escape back to its den.


    But it was toote!


    Mary stopped in the air, her bat wings slowly beating and spat out coldly: "Now you want to run? You are toote! "


    The very next instance, a blood red beam shed across the sky and already Mary was on the back of the scurrying chimera. For the first time since the battle started, her blood red bow was pulled into a full moon. Terrifying blood energy gathered on the bowstring, concentrating into a crystalline blood red arrow.


    "Die! "


    Mary¡¯s finger let go following her battle cry. The blood red arrow pierced the chimera¡¯s green scales at lightning speed, exploding at the part where the three heads met.


    A big fountain of blood surged out of the chimera as it let out one final cry of sorrow that reverberated across the woods. Finally, it lost control of itsrge body and spiraled out of the sky.


    A terrifying magical being that had ruled these woods for over a hundred years had so easily died at the hands of the fledgling Mary.


    In all honesty, this chimera was no weaker than an actual adept. Sadly the difference inbat ability, equipment and theck of a powerful means of attacking made it a bumbling target practice. So, he had to suffer a humiliating defeat at the hands of the speedy assassin Mary.


    Mary licked her lips. She was still not satisfied. Like a wild beast, she let out a crisp and sweet roar with her voice, letting all the beasts of the woods know of her dominating will.


    Her skintight blood armor, the vast leathery bat wings, a perfect body and her domineering aura..... These were what gave Mary an attractiveness unique to herself, a special quality that merged both seductiveness with the chaos of bloody violence.


    If Mary was so beautiful she was a rose, she would absolutely be a thorny one and in particr, thorns with lethal venom on it!


    Mary stayed in the air for a few more moments as she waited for her will to be clearly transmitted to every corner of the forest before diving back down to the ground. She was going to savor her first blood treat in another world.


    Far away, in the base, Keoghan stopped summoning his voodoo creatures. He tapped into the faint ripples of magic to sense the battle far away.


    When he heard Mary¡¯s arrogant and overbearing roar, the always strict Keoghan broke into an ugly smile.


    "What a character! I like her. These kinds of exquisite vampires are hard toe by! It¡¯s unfortunate......"


    He turned to where Greem had disappeared and shook his head in disappointment.


    He could see that these two newly advanced adepts were very close. That Bloody Mary, in particr, heeded every word of Greem. It seems there was no chance for the male adepts in the n!


    Keoghan shrugged, took a few more toy-like robotic models from his storage space and threw them to the ground. The palm-sized models began to grow and expand as he continued to chant his spell.


    Soon, 4 bizarre robotic creatures 3 meters tall stood before him.


    Keoghan then drew a rune glowing with magic and put it into the core of the robotic beasts. Suddenly the robotic beasts started creaking and moving. After a slight dy, they joined the ranks of the construction army.


    Already there were a dozen voodoo creatures withrge and tough physiques and three to four giant y golems in the previously silent base. The adepts were filling the roles of taskmasters, ordering the magic creatures to and fro, carrying timber, ttening ground, shaping the earth......


    An outline for a simple and practical base was already surfacing.


    And it had only been two hours since they arrived in this odd and mysterious other world.


    ............


    200 miles to the east of the base, there was a human city.


    Inside the city hall, the polished floorboards were shining and the bright sun was flushing in through thettice window. As the light reflected on the floor, the whole room was brightly lit, like the halls of heaven.


    Ninther Mino walked into the hall with heavy steps. The crisp sound of stone shing against metal rang throughout the hall as his metal boots stomped on the white stone floor.


    As the only witcher who had advanced to a Spellbreaker Knight in the City of Herdurand, he was an important character for all the Witcher Knights.


    The glimmering knight¡¯s armor, the metal gloves with their clearly defined edges, the delicate knight¡¯s sword by his waist, the polished and shiny war boots, the metal bow on his back and the covered helmet under his arms.....When you put all this together along with his stalwart body measuring up to 2 meters and his handsome face, made him the dream prince of all nobledies of Herdurand City.


    Four simrly equipped witcher knights followed behind him as he stepped into this gorgeous and elegant city hall.


    The government officials sat around the long table stopped their boring speeches and turned to look in horror at these uninvited guests.


    Grand Duke Lington who was seated at the head of the table rang his golden bell and summoned his bodyguards. Then he spoke, unhappy: "Ninther, this is the sacred city hall, not your witcher knights¡¯ base. When not summoned, you have no right to step in here! "


    Grand Duke Lington was the owner of the City of Herdurand. In fact, he was the ruler of the entire Dn Province. Within hisnds, there were more than 3 major cities with a poption over 100,000 men, and 16 smaller cities with a poption below 30,000 men. The number of towns and viges were so numerous it was impossible to do a detailed count.


    He had one of the most power even amongst the nobles of the Continent of Witchers.


    Sadly, even with this much power, he had no means to make the arrogant witcher knights bend the knee. After all, all witcher knights on the continent belonged to the Central Kingdom. They took orders directly from the king himself. Even the nobles had no say.


    On the Continent of Witchers, this group of people was the ones who dominated and ruled. These powerful knights who had powerful Battle Skills, these witchers who were loyal to the king. And the purpose of their existence.....was to purge the continent of the evil spellcasters that appeared.


    In this proud nation where witcher knights ruled, several casters that awakened their evil powers would appear every year. They didn¡¯t have tough physiques, or a will of steel from constant training, or knight¡¯s equipment crafted to fit. But they could summon mysterious and evil mes out of thin air and freeze enemies in ice or let the dead climb out of their graves......


    These evil casters were a hidden but terrible threat to society and humans. Thus countless righteous and noble knights responded to the king¡¯s summons. Together, they ran to every rural and deste vige or town to judge and execute each and every evil caster who had exposed themselves.


    These noble knights called themselves witcher knights and formed a massive but organised power structure. And this Ninther Mino who stood before their eyes right now was a respected witcher knight who hadpleted their advancement: a Spellbreaker Knight.


    These witcher knights had a very respected status. They weren¡¯t even bound by thews set by the nobles. It was a pain for every government official in cities where there was a witcher knight base.


    This bunch of witcher knights marched in recklessly just as Grand Duke Lington was about to shout at his subordinates over the reduced tax profits.


    This made the Grand Duke so much angrier!

 Chapter 167

    The handsome Ninther was not bothered by the Grand Duke¡¯s anger.


    Ever since he became the youngest Spellbreaker Knight of the Dn Province, he had been the leader of the witcher knights here.


    Eliminating the darkness, protector of the weak, fearless!


    This 28-year-old youthful knight followed the precepts passed down by the holy knights strictly. He avoided all luxurious entertainments of the nobles and put all his efforts and energy into "the purging of evil".


    "Your honor, Grand Duke Lington, I heard you have a subordinate known as Sage Goth? I wish to see him immediately! "Ninther stood tall before the Grand Duke and said his target, ignoring the threatening looks of the bodyguards behind the Duke.


    Although the words were those of a request,ing out of his mouth, they sounded nothing like a request!


    The Grand Duke¡¯s face turned green in an instant. He waved the exquisite ruby-adorned scepter about in anger as he shouted furiously: "Goth is the guiding mentor I hired for my daughter. He is no Sage! He is not the caster you lot are looking for! You have no right to search a Grand Duke¡¯s property......"


    Unfortunately, the Grand Duke¡¯s protests werepletely ignored by Ninther. He stared coldly at the Duke¡¯s eyes, spitting out one word at a time: "I am not here to search for evidence, and I have no intention to bother this Sage Goth. Perhaps......"Ninther paused for a moment as he said this:"Perhaps we may need the powers of this Sage Goth for certain matters! "


    Even the Grand Duke Lington couldn¡¯t help but be surprised as he saw the hesitating look on Knight Ninther¡¯s face. Before he could reject Ninther again, a crisp and sweet female voice rang out from a corner of the hall.


    "Follow me if you wish to see Teacher Goth. "


    When he heard this familiar voice, the Grand Duke couldn¡¯t help but exim:"El, it¡¯s you? Quick, go back. Here......"


    A beautiful girl of about sixteen years of age and wearing a light yellow dress walked in from a small door in the corner of the hall. It was the Grand Duke¡¯s daughter Elena.


    "Father, don¡¯t stop Knight Ninther! This is also the will of my teacher. "


    The Grand Duke frowned and spoke: "Since it¡¯s Goth¡¯s will as well, then bring Ninther to see him! But these witcher knights will have to stay here. "


    Ninther nodded and turned to leave some orders with hispanions before following Elena into the inside of the Duke¡¯s home.


    The ce where Sage Goth lived was a tall tower. The only path to the tower was a narrow spiraling stone staircase. Ninther had a huge build, and the armor on his body was exceptionally heavy, which caused asional ttering as he walked up the steps and his armor shed against the walls.


    Ninther couldn¡¯t help but sneer as he watched the Duke¡¯s daughter in front of him.


    That Goth knew it the moment I arrived. The title of "Sage" was well deserved!


    But he was here to visit this "Sage" Goth, with orders from above to seek help. He had to tolerate this fellow and wait for another time to fulfill his oath even though this fellow had already revealed a trace of his true identity as a "spawn of evil."


    On the way, Ninther finally couldn¡¯t suppress the urge to ask: "Lady Elena, what do you learn from Sage Goth?" "


    "Language, Script, and History! "Elena replied without even turning her head. Her tone was cold and distant like she didn¡¯t want to speak more.


    "He probably teaches u astrology as well, doesn¡¯t he? " Ninther couldn¡¯t help but add.


    Elena¡¯s petite body shook. Still not turning her head she spoke: "Not all knowledge is evil! Even the king recognises the use of astrology. What is it, Knight Ninther? Do you intend to kill everyone who has learned astrology? "


    Ninther didn¡¯t reply.


    The stone tower had five levels. Sage Goth was waiting for them on the fifth.


    This was a wise old man wearing a long red robe with a monocle on his nose bridge. The long hair covering his shoulders were snow white, and his face was covered with wrinkles. His eyes were brown but the light had faded from the pupils, leaving only a sharp glint at the bottom of his eyes that gave him an air of refinement.


    Ninther looked all around this narrow room. Although there were books and parchmentsid everywhere, there was a sense of order amongst the mess. There were more books of every kind on a huge bookshelf that reached all the way to the roof in the corner of the room.


    Books weren¡¯t all that valuable in the Continent of Witchers, but they were still something that was beyond the reach of peasants. Looking at the size of it, Ninther suspected that even the public library of Herdurand paled in size and value to the collection here!


    "You must be Goth! I am Ninther. I am here under the orders of ....." Ninther stepped forward and loudly introduced himself, beating his chest once as he did so. Sadly, he was interrupted by the old man.


    "Of course it was Wells that sent you! Otherwise, you would not have been able to see me! "An odd smile appeared on the elderly¡¯s face:"He must have sent you to ask me whether the nightmares of the past month were real. "


    Ninther¡¯s face couldn¡¯t help but twitch.


    The messenger pigeon from Ayran Castle, the headquarters of the witcher knights had arrived in his hands for less than an hour and this hermit already found out?


    Ninther coldly asked:"This must be the special ability you awakened, isn¡¯t it? Is it precognition or divination? Or is it soul envement? "


    His tone was full of disdain. It wasn¡¯t the first believer of evil of this sort that he had judged himself.


    Precognition, it allowed the believers of evil to sense looming danger before it happened, and avoid the witcher knight¡¯s pursuit ordingly. The greatest weakness of this ability was its limitation to sense only things that had to do with oneself. It could not be used to help others.


    Divination was slightly better. The user could tell the future fate of certain events through the use of ceremonial equipment such as animal bones, cards or crystal balls. Unfortunately, the results of divination were often vague and unclear, unlike the clear future images of precognition.


    As for thest type, soul envement. This was an extremely cruel and terrifying evil spell. Casters that awakened to this ability could enve the souls of the dead and bend them to their will. They could be used to gather information, uncover private secrets, or even drain the life of the living..... Whichever it was, they were all evil acts that Ninther hated with a passion.


    Sage Gothughed in the face of the young knight¡¯s provocation. He didn¡¯t mind at all. Instead, he took out a crystal ball the size of a duck¡¯s egg from his wide sleeves and passed it to the knight.


    "What Wells wishes to know, I have already etched into this crystal ball. You only need to deliver this crystal ball to his hands. "


    Elena, who had been silent by a side, opened her eyes wide in shock, looking at her teacher with worry in her eyes. With the Grand Duke¡¯s protection, the witcher knights would have no means to discover her teacher¡¯s identity as a medium as long as he insistently denied his possession of any special abilities.


    But now that he had taken out the crystal ball with his own hands, he was practically admitting his identity to Ninther the Spellbreaker Knight.


    This......


    As expected, Ninther couldn¡¯t help but unsheath his sword and point it at the old man¡¯s heart when he saw the crystal ball, even with the special orders from headquarters.


    "Hmph! As expected, you are a heretic. You had better follow me to see Sir Wells in person after all! "


    "Don¡¯t......"Elena shouted as she charged forward to protect her teacher, but was stopped by the elderly man.


    Even with a sword to his chest, there was no fear on his face. Instead, he asked calmly:"Truly the evil-loathing Ninther! But Sir Ninther, I have a question for you. How old do you think I am? "


    The opponent¡¯s calm conduct confused Ninther.


    Sage Ninther was someone specifically named to be seen by the only Fourth Grade Holy Knight that was revered by all witcher knights. If the old man truly had precognitive abilities, why did he not run but wait here when he found out that I wasing?


    Hesitation appeared on Ninther¡¯s handsome face. Probingly, he asked:"Eighty?" "


    This was a very high age for the Continent of Witchers, where the average life expectancy was 70.


    Sage Goth smiled as he shook his head. Suddenly, his tone turned deste and low.


    "27! I¡¯m only 27 this year! "


    It wasn¡¯t just Knight Ninther, even Elena couldn¡¯t help but let out a gasp of surprise.


    Although they had been together for 5 years, she didn¡¯t know of her teacher¡¯s secret.


    "Ever since I awakened the powers of a medium at the age of 13, I have aged several times faster than everyone else. Every time I used my ability of precognition, my life force is what is drained from me! I have had the same nightmare every night for the past 5 years in particr. A group of......A group of powerful demons appears in our world, taking away all that we have, turning everyone into ves......"


    "This is not my divination. This is what our world wishes to tell me! So I used certain means to pass my dream on to you Sir Wells. Perhaps, in this world, only a powerful person such as himself can lead the people and fight against the terrifying demons in the dream in unity......¡±


    Sir Ninther¡¯s face became deathly pale.


    The matter before his hands was clearly out of his control. He didn¡¯t even have any means to determine the truth of the words of this believer of evil. Even though his instincts forged by constant fighting against believers of evil told him not to trust any of them, but deep in his heart, Ninther had a feeling that this Sage Goth was trustworthy.


    Sage Goth thrust the crystal ball into his arms as Ninther was hesitating. He then turned to the window, and with his arms spread out, shouted to the skies.


    "Mother World, I have done what you asked me to. Ever since you drew me into that terrifying dream world, I have wanted to ask, does our world have a future? Mother World, if you hear me, please tell me......"


    As he shouted, a holy milk-white light surfaced around his body. But Goth didn¡¯t seem to realise. He stumbled as he sunk into a terrifying dream world.


    "No......no......no......this shouldn¡¯t be how it is! Our world shouldn¡¯t be like this......Mother World, please let me see the face of that terrifying demon......"


    Sage Goth¡¯s body shook as he said that.


    "So this is how you look! Demon......I¡¯ve seen you......"Sage Goth turned around, his face flushed with excitement:"Quick, tell Wells, they are at the eas......aghhhhhhh......¡±


    Ninther could see clearly. Just as Sage Goth was about to say something in his fervor, his eyes had been poked blind by someone. Two bloody holes were what was left.


    A spooky voice rang out in the stone room.


    "I couldn¡¯t have imagined that there were prophets in this world that couldmunicate with the ne consciousness. Hmph! Worthless worm, since you dared to spy on me, then you should die! "


    Following his words, the blood and flesh all over Goth¡¯s body withered quickly, leaving him as a pile of bones in seconds. Then, under the horrified gaze of two people, they turned into a pile of grey powder......


    Far away from the eyes of the two, in the forward base of the adepts, a human-shaped projection bound by heavy chains ofws opened his eyes, poked the air before him twice lightly and blew a breath of air.


    But even such minor actions triggered the retaliation of the chains ofws.


    The projection grunted. He expended huge amounts of energy to stabilise this body, ensuring it didn¡¯t break down.


    Finally, after a long time, he shut his eyes again and went back to his eternal silence.

 Chapter 168

    Three dayster.


    Greem and the others who had been out to scout had returned to the base, bringing with them the information they had collected.


    Although it had only been three days, the once grassy field where the adepts had arrived in was already looking like a small town.


    A tall stone house stood from the ground, covering the projection and the space vortex within. There were no windows on the structure, only an arcane entrance in the front. Row after row of wooden and stone houses were built with the stone building in the center, spread around on the outside haphazardly.


    The ones responsible for guarding the outer rim of the forward base was a bunch of voodoo beasts of all sorts. There were lions, tigers, jaguars and many more, but without exception, there was the special flux of magic organs from within their bodies. The voodoo beasts with the power of intermediate apprentices might not be much to an adept, but they were most suited to deal with any normal native or beasts that wandered into the base by ident.


    On the other hand, the security system within the base were the numerous and plentiful magic arrays and troops of weird-looking robotic beasts. These robotic beasts were clearly exquisite products from the Castle in the Sky, as each of them had the power of an advanced apprentice. Considering their bodies that had high resistance to damage, with good cooperation, surrounding and killing a pseudo adept was an easy matter.


    Besides all this, there were also a few winged dragon knights.


    Judging from their appearance, these were created by using voodoo magic to modify some sort of humanoid being and sew them to the back of winged dragons, giving them the ability of both flight and long ranged attacks. The ingredients were probably taken locally and the product just finished, considering their bloody bodies.


    The entire lower half of the humanoid beings had been amputated and forcibly merged onto the winged dragons back due to the rushed job. It was still bloody where the flesh of the two creatures met. The thick corpse-weaving thread could still be seen clearly.


    A winged dragon knight beat its wings and stopped Greem¡¯s path as he returned.


    The humanoid on the dragon¡¯s back was a male with arge physique and solid muscles, baring his chest. In his hand was a magic weapon shaped like a spear with light blue light flickering about it. He bent his body and sniffed. Perhaps because he sensed the thick adept¡¯s smell around Greem¡¯s body, he flew back into the woods after bowing and giving his respects.


    Greem paid no attention and walked boldly forward. Twenty or so y golems dragged a dozenrge forest creatures behind them as they followed behind Greem. The pained howls and screams of the creatures filled the woods as they were dragged into the base.


    Adept Keoghan, his robe still caked with blood, came out after hearing the calls of the creatures. An expression of wild surprise and delight filled his face as he saw one after another living sabertooth elephants, four-arm apes, swamp alligators, and gryphons.


    "Hahaha......Just in time! I was missing ingredients! Quick, send them over......"


    Only then did Greem realise that Keoghan also had such talent on the modification and creation of voodoo beasts. All the new voodoo beasts he saw earlier were probably his handiwork. It¡¯s important to note that those winged dragon knights each had the power of a pseudo-adept!


    The temporary base leader rubbed his hands together in excitement as he ordered the y golems to send the "ingredients" into the giant ughterhouse. Looking at the nimble and agile golems, Keoghan couldn¡¯t help but exim: "I have long heard of your amazing talent in the creation of elemental golems. It seems you live up to your reputation." If this had been the case, you should have gone down the route of the Profound Adepts. Being a puppet master is not bad at all. "


    Greem was standing beside Keoghan when he shook his head and spoke: "The roots of an adept, ultimately, lies within oneself. My talent in creating puppets might be enough for me to dominate for a while, but it¡¯s not beneficial for my own growth. Between a powerful First Grade Puppet Master or a weak Second Grade Elementium Adept, I would rather pick thetter! "


    Keoghan stopped smiling and narrowed his eyes as he said, surprised: "To think you already have such an understanding so quick after your advancement! Very good......If that Anderson had understood this 300 years earlier, perhaps he wouldn¡¯t havended such a tragic end......¡±


    Greem remained silent.


    Keoghan smiled awkwardly as he instructed Greem: "Go rest! We might still need to have a meeting tonight! "


    Greem nodded. One after another, the y golems walked to his side and dispelled the earth Elementium and dirt that formed their bodies, their summoning cores lightlynding in Greem¡¯s hand.


    Greem kept the summoning cores and swiftly went to a row of the simple stone houses.


    A dozen of stone houses of the same design stood in a row. Some of them were shut tight, the emblems of their upants etched onto the door, glowing with magic. Other stone houses were wide open, with nothing inside them.


    The houses with emblems on the door were clearly upied, so Greem just picked one of the empty houses and went in. Following a red sh on the door, the image of a burning iron fist raised towards the sky appeared on the stone door. This was the emblem Greem chose for himself, meant to express the path he had chosen for himself.


    He had already checked earlier. There was no sign of Mary or Acteon¡¯s emblem. It seemed that they had yet to return. Greem crossed his legs on the stone bed and shut his eyes as hemunicated with the chip.


    "Chip, what¡¯s the progress on the new analysis? "


    "Beep, current progress is 97.14%. Estimated time remaining: 3 hours 27 minutes 11 seconds....."


    Greem nodded in satisfaction. He could finally rx.


    Those who have never broken into another world would never understand the terror of ne suppression. Like a lion tossed into a sea, the change in environment would make every action in daily life so much more difficult and painful.


    Adepts were, after all, a being that rooted their strength in thews of the world. Once there was a change inws, they would feel the deepest and most intense of its effects.


    Ever since he entered this ne, Greem had felt like his nose and mouth were covered with a thick wet cloth. Even breathing had turned into a chore. His Spirits that had reced his eyes had been suppressed within his body, with no means of extending outwards, barring him from detecting every single little change around him as he had before.


    This limited his powers greatly.


    A lion might not survive if it fell into a sea, but adepts were way smarter than that. As long as they could analyse the source of the change in news, adepts could adjust thews and allow themselves to be ustomed to the environment and regain their strength.


    ............


    The adepts¡¯ meeting happened in tandem with dinner.


    Arge campfire was burning in the middle of the camp. The seven adepts sat around it, enjoying golden ribs cooked to perfection as they listened to the information gathered by Greem, Mary, and Acteon.


    Adepts were always a group of clear-headed and knowledgeable individuals.


    Even though Keoghan hadn¡¯t set out any specific tasks for them, Greem and the others had already swept the forest, drew a map, investigate this ne¡¯s power structure andpleted many other tasks.


    It could be safely said, in just three days, the three had made sure that even half arge-sized beast or magical being could no longer be found within 25 kilometers of the base. The three each threw a ball of smoke to Keoghan. After he inhaled it into his body, he waved his hand and the previously t ground started to rise like waves.


    Once all the earth Elementium in the air had gradually settled down, the geography of the base¡¯s surroundings was perfectly presented before everyone. The ridge of mountains, the cascade of rocks, the dense forests, the flowing rivers, the dark caves, the deep canyons....Without needing to step out of the base, they had a clear view and understanding of the surrounding¡¯s geography.


    The first to speak was Acteon. His voice was hoarse and low and had a tinge of a bug¡¯s hissing attached to it.


    ¡°I did not discover much in the direction I went. After going past 15 kilometers of forest, there is a human settlement. I found a small human city there. There is also a small town and three to four viges nearby.


    I caught several natives from a small vige and interrogated their souls. This ce is located in the east and is known as the Great Greend Forest. As for the powerful beings of their ne, they had very little knowledge of them. I only managed to find out that the organisation known as the Witcher Knights are pretty powerful. There¡¯s nothing more besides these.


    If we really want to understand this ne¡¯s power structure, we might have to enter the human city for a clue......"


    The next to speak was Mary.


    "The direction I went in should lead towards the depths of the forest. The deeper I went, the denser the trees and the more beasts and magical creatures there were. Some of them tasted pretty good! "Mary licked her red lips: "I found the rallying points of severalrge magical beings. There¡¯s the man-eating demon¡¯s tribe. There are two dozens adults and they are located here......There¡¯s a group of poison dragons of around a dozen located here......There¡¯s a den of gryphons with 5 adults and 3 cubs here......"


    Mary lived up to her reputation as an agility-focused adept. In just three days, her investigation radius covered a range of 100 kilometers. Judging from her familiarity with the locations, she had probably personally visited each rallying point. Of course, this meant she had already had a feast of her own!


    Then it was Greem¡¯s turn.


    "The forest on my side is less dense. 10 kilometers of trekking brings you outside of the forest. There are 3 small human viges at the edge of the forest here.....here.....and here......One of the viges is pretty developed. I saw many mercenaries and hunters there. Their range of activity is prettyrge and are very likely to wander into our base.


    I caught a mercenary and from the information I got, the main fighting force of this ne is that group of witcher knights. From his depictions, it seems that a normal witcher knight is at the standard of an apprentice adept, and the so-called Spellbreaker Knights can reach the level of a First Grade Adept.


    There the Spellbreaker Knights there are Radiant Knights, Dragon Knights, and Holy Knights. Unfortunately, this means that we might encounter a group of magic fighters that will hate adepts with a passion in this ne. "


    The power structure of both nes was very different. It would need an actual confrontation for both parties to have a better understanding of the other¡¯s abilities and powers. But based on Greem¡¯s information, it seems that it is highly possible that a Fourth Grade opponent will appear in this ne.


    For this group of First Grade Adepts, that was way too powerful!

 Chapter 169

    Based on the information brought back by Greem and the others, along with Keoghan¡¯s conversations with Lord Sarubo, the adepts quickly determined that this was a small-sized material ne where the highest tier of power was limited at the Fourth Grade.


    Magic Elementium wascking.


    Arcanology was iplete.


    The characteristic of magic in the entire ne hindered the casting of spells. This meant that way more effort had to be put in to sessfully cast spells. Even so, there was still a rather high chance of the spell failing.


    The powerful Elementium maniptors and casters could not maintain their ss advantage before the sses that relied mostly on physical damage due to the difficulty of casting. That was why the terrible situation of witcher knights oppressing casters happened on this ne.


    How were a bunch of "barbarians" wearing heavy armor, carrying metal shields, riding horses and wielding swords fit to chase the great casters all over the world?


    Even though the adepts present had no sympathy for the casters of this ne, but just thinking of their "counterparts" being hunted like wild beasts by a bunch of knights that could only brandish about their barbaric and uncivilised strength filled them with anger.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but worry once he thought of how low the ne¡¯s limit of power was. He asked Adept Keoghan: "Sir Keoghan, if this ne can only hold power up to the Fourth Grade, then Lord Sarubo....."


    Greem didn¡¯t finish his sentence, but everyone present understood.


    Lord Sarubo was a terrifying Sixth Grade Great Adept. With how much power he had, would he be able to squeeze into this ne?


    Before Keoghan could reply, a deep but gentle voice rang in everyone¡¯s mind.


    "Of course not! This ne could never amodate all of my powers. "It sounded like that Great Adept Sarubo¡¯s voice:"I have no intention to project all my strength in. All I need is just a fraction of it. What you all need to do now is to protect this ce and wait for the arrival of the reinforcing adepts.


    They will build an Adept¡¯s tower here.


    Once the tower is done, then I may be able to project all my strength within the radius covered by the Adept¡¯s tower. Then, if the so-called "powerful beings" of this ne daree, I will be able to put them to eternal rest! "


    Greem gritted his teeth and asked hesitatingly: "Then why didn¡¯t you let a Fourth Grade Adept break into this world first? It must be easier for him to enter this world than for you too! "


    "A Fourth Grade Adept?" Hahaha......Little brat, you underestimate the ne¡¯s suppression of adepts. One one end you have to maintain the space vortex so it¡¯s not closed by space¡¯s ability to regenerate, on the other you need to suppress the flux andmotion of the space vortex such that it is not detected by the outside world, all while battling against a powerful ne consciousness. Do you think a Fourth Grade Adept is capable of this? "


    Several adepts nodded their heads.


    They had an in-depth and thorough experience the past few days. The various pains brought about by the ne suppression of a hostile world had almost driven them insane.


    If a Fourth Grade Adept had been put in Lord Sarubo¡¯s position, would he be able to maintain his battle strength under this heavy suppression and limitation? Could a Fourth Grade Adept at his limits maintain his power advantage before the enemy if he was attacked by an individual of the same tier from this ne?


    At that moment, everyone present went silent as they contemted the meaning behind the words of the projection of the Great Adept.


    If they hadn¡¯t heard wrong, this forward base is probably the safest ce on this ne. At least for the adepts, this was the case!


    If they met an unopposable powerful enemy outside, they could lure them here and use the power of the Great Adept¡¯s projection to vanquish the enemy. Of course, this was only possible after the Adept¡¯s tower had been built. Before the tower was constructed, the amount of power the Great Adept¡¯s projection could spare was very limited and needed to be used with great care.


    Everyone wanted to ask what tier of power was the amount the Great Adept could spare currently, but this concerned ssified information about this invasion. Asking such a question would only invite the doubts and suspicions of the Great Adept. Everyone decided to remain silent instead.


    The Great Adept needed one month¡¯s time of buffer to bring in the second batch, having brought this first batch over. This information alone already hinted at the amount of power he had. Thus several quick-thinking adepts had silently begun to make estimates of their own while changing the topic of conversation to questions on spells.


    The following task assignment remained the same as before. The 4 n adepts were responsible for the construction and furnishing of the base, while Greem and the others were responsible for the outer rim. But this time there were no limitations!


    Adept Keoghan set out strict requests for the three before they left.


    They were to lie low for the time being and not alert or draw the enemy¡¯s attention to anywhere near the base. In the meantime, the three adepts had to use all the means at their disposal to nt eyes within the ranks of the native humans, turn the forces of the enemy to their side and use them to monitor all regions near the base.


    If there were small groups of enemies, the three could secretly kill them depending on the situation. If the enemy forces came in withrge numbers, then they had to try to redirect them to another region. At least before any unopposable Second Grade opponents appear, the three would not get any reinforcements or assistance from the base.


    The three had already expected this. There was nothing toin about. After a quick rest at the base, they set off on their journey once more.


    ............


    Colca Vige, a tiny vige close to the Great Greend Forest.


    There were many of such simple viges within the Greend Forest. They were the kind of extremely small viges where you would be able to see all the houses from one end of the vige. The total poption of the vige did not even reach 60.


    Due to the numerous beasts within the mountains, most of the residents were hunters. Years hunting had given them the ability to deal with beasts, as well as proficiency in bows and setting traps.


    Most slept early in the mountain viges.


    The sky had just gone dark, but already there were little lights to be seen within the vige.


    In a small wooden house by the edge of the vige, seven or eight men dressed like hunters were warming themselves by a firece, the steam rising from the wooden cups in their hands obscuring the concern on their faces.


    "We can¡¯t go on like this! It¡¯s been half a month since we saw the tracks of arge beast. I went to the beast trap on the east to see. There was absolutely no catch. "A hunter with a scar on his face started the conversation.


    "Yea, it¡¯s been really weird recently, almost like all the beasts has gone into hiding......."


    "It¡¯s the same over at my side......Even 15 kilometers deep, I still can¡¯t even find wild chickens or ducks......¡±


    "Yea......"


    ......


    Everyone chattered and discussed, with plenty of confusion and iprehension in their words.


    "Could a scary magical being have shown up? "A smaller built hunter asked out of the blue.


    All of a sudden, everyone went silent.


    Nothing was scarier than running into a magical creature for these hunters making a living in the woods. Even though they were well equipped to deal with forest beasts, but they would have no chance to even escape if they met a magical creature.


    "Those creatures all live deep in the mountains and have their own bases. They shouldn¡¯te out for no reason, right? "A young hunter couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    "The herd splitting off, avoiding disasters, loss in a tribe war, or the appearance of an even stronger magical creature......This could all make those scary creatures move their homes......"An experienced veteran hunter replied coldly.


    Everyone fell silent again.


    "How about we gather tomorrow and explore the depths of the forests? After all, we can¡¯t just let this problem be......"A hunter asked probingly.


    His suggestion immediately got the agreement of everyone, and the discussion heated up.


    But just as everyone was in the midst of their passionate discussion, "dududu" came the sound of the door being knocked.


    Everyone was surprised.


    It couldn¡¯t be someone from the vige. Otherwise, they would just walk in. Who would knock the door so politely in the cold wind? But their vige was on the waist of the mountain. The cliffs were steep and the roads were windy and hard to traverse. How could someone have made it here after dark?


    Also, many traps had beenid around the perimeter of the vige to prevent wild beasts from breaking into the vige in the night.


    "Who is it? "The owner of the house stood up and asked in a gruff voice.


    No one replied, but the knocking on the door didn¡¯t stop.


    Just as everyone felt a chill run through their hearts, a weird chittering sound came from above. With a "bata" sound, some odd things began falling from the roof onto their bodies.


    "They are scorpions......"


    A hunter with a sharp eye shouted in surprise and began to shake his body, trying to chase away these ck scorpions he had never seen before. But following light stings all over their body, the hunters froze. A sensation of paralysis they have never felt before spread through their bodies.


    The hunters that had been stung by the scorpions¡¯ tail froze on the spot, their mouth and tongue mildly shaking, their eyes reflecting an expression of fear and terror, but they had lost all ability to move.


    One after another odd scorpion with bloated abdomens appeared in the house under their terrified gaze and crawled across their bodies onto their faces. Using their sharp joints to open their mouths, the odd scorpions dove inside without hesitation.


    Every hunter looked in horror at their closestpanion. They could very clearly see a bloated spot slowly moving down the throats of theirpanion. They themselves could only feel an intense paining from their throats as their trachea and esophagus burst from the insertion of the foreign object. The terrifying scorpion was still tunneling its way downwards!


    They wanted to scream for help, but their throats had been blocked. They wanted to use their hands to dig the scorpion out of their throats, but their bodies were so paralyzed even moving their pinky was impossible.


    Such a scary scene terrified all the hunters. One after another, they eyes flipped over and they fainted in pain. Only the toughest of them, Hanks managed to endure the pain and not faint.


    And so, he had the luck to see the silhouette of the mastermind.


    He didn¡¯t know when, but a mysterious man in a hood had walked into the house and was slowly sitting down by the firece.


    In the dim light, Hanks could see the two ghostly green will-o-wisps of eyes and the face that was too ugly for any human eyes under the hood.


    Was this a bug or a human?


    Hanks consciousness sunk into the eternal darkness as he contemted this silly question.

 Chapter 170

    Blue Hillock City.


    Blue Hillock City was named Blue Hillock because there was a hillock 1.5 kilometers from the city. It was a hillock covered by a field of blue tulips. When the season of blooming came, the hillock was so beautiful it made people never want to leave. For that, it was well-known across the entire Continent of Witchers.


    Even though it wasn¡¯t the blooming season currently, Blue Hillock City was still crowded and lively. Especially when night fell, nobles and merchants onvish carriages that weaved through one after another entertainment establishments came in endless streams, making the city even more so lively than it was in the day.


    Mary was high in the sky under the curtain of night. The bright moon shone behind her,plementing her already slim and perfect figure.


    If someone in Blue Hillock city raised their head to appreciate the moon at this moment, they might have seen the silhouette of an elegant and perfect youngdy. A pair ofrge bat wings were opened wide against the wind behind this beautiful girl, adding a touch of mystery and wickedness out of nowhere.


    Even Mary wasn¡¯t sure when, but she had fallen in love with this feeling of looking down from high above the skies.


    The ignorant city at her feet mored, ignorant of the terrifying disaster that was about toe. An unrestrained feeling of absolute control rose in Mary as she looked down from above the night skies.


    This feeling was perfect and alluring!


    The raging winds high up in the sky swept the blood-red cape and made it billow along with the wind. Leather wings lightly pping, Mary¡¯s slim body remained still, proudly standing in the skies, as if it was forged of iron.


    This Blue Hillock City was initially Evil Bugs Acteon¡¯s hunting grounds, but after Mary went to him for a "heart-to-heart" talk with a huge smile on her face, Acteon requested to go to the few small mountain viges by the west of his "own initiative".


    Thus Mary was in charge of this human town, Acteon was responsible for blockading the human viges to the west and Greem had to slip into the depths of the forests in the back and capture more flesh ingredients for Keoghan.


    Mary wasn¡¯t the least bit worried or concerned even though she was forced to part with Greem. She might rely heavily on Greem¡¯s n usually, but this did not mean that she was an idiot without a brain of her own.


    There would never be an idiot amongst those who managed to be adepts.


    Mary was already thinking of her action n for theing period as she rode the night winds to this small city of only 20,000 people.


    Undercover operation!


    If she wanted to go undercover she had to hide but just going into hiding alone won¡¯t give her information about the outside world. That¡¯s why she needed a more high-profile and more efficient means of going undercover.


    Looking down from the skies, Mary quickly noted down several important locations from the outline of the buildings. The locations she noted down were all areas where the crowd was the densest and where the lights were the brightest.


    Mary bit her lip and let out a shriek, then folded her wings and dove down to the city at her feet. Her entire body was like a sharp arrow shot out of a bow. When she was 30 meters away from the ground, Mary fluttered her wings and her body turned into a cluster of ck shadows, merging into the boundless darkness.


    ............


    Tulip Hotel.


    Even amongst the numerous entertainment spots of Blue Hillock City, Tulip Hotel was the most famous and the most ssy one of them all.


    It was alreadyte in the night, but still, the za before the door of Tulip Hotel was parked full ofvish four-wheeled carriages. On the borders of the carriages carved out of fragrant rosewood, were crest after crest of prominent families.


    In one of the grandest and mostvish rooms of the hotel, four people, one man, and three women were entangled intimately together into a heap of flesh on an exquisite bed. But just as the bald-headed man was on the verge of climax, the door of the room suddenly opened. A tall, graceful and sexy beauty in red armor walked in.


    A bunch of thugs that looked like goons surged in behind the beauty, surrounding the beauty with their numbers. All of them looked at her in anger, but no one dared to block her path. Amongst the group, the few leaders had blood all over their face, with a fresh red swollen handprint on each of their faces.


    His "pleasure time" interrupted, the bald man was extremely angered. Wrapping the nket around his body, he got out of bed, ignoring the exposed bodies of his femalepanions.


    Ear-piercing screams rang out in the room!


    "Shut up! Scream and disturb our guest here again......and I¡¯ll toss you naked into Downwater Works.


    Downwater Works was the most well-known ghetto in Blue Hillock City. If theynded there, their fates were obvious. They weren¡¯t scared of being abused by the men, but more scarily were the asional stories of cannibalism and the hordes of hungry men in there.


    Thus the very next moment, all the screaming stopped!


    "You are the one in charge here? "The Mary who had broken in had gotten rid of all her inhuman traits. Her appearance was just like that of a female mercenary with tremendous strength.


    But with a slight smile and a ripple in her blue eyes, an intangle power of seduction instantly charmed all the men in the room. Even the few fellows who were beaten up by her had lost the anger in their eyes and were looking at her in a perverted manner.


    "Who are you? How dare you break into my ce! Heheh......Youngdy, have you never of heard of me, the Bald Eagle? "The manughed sinisterly as he ran his hand across his bald head.


    Even though he was also affected by Mary¡¯s innate power of seduction, he was a man of cruel and merciless means as well. The effect of Mary¡¯s seduction was much less severe, allowing him to maintain his rity of thought. Of course, this also had to do with Mary having no intention of seducing him!


    This was just a passive effect due to Mary¡¯s own ability of seduction!


    "What? You want to talk to me in front of so many people? The great Bald Eagle needs such a disy of power just to talk to a weak little girl? "


    The bald man snorted coldly and sent a message to his subordinates with a look of his eye. Soon, someone had gotten his right-hand men, Quicksword Jake and ckde Ender toe over.


    The two seemed as if they had put on their clothes in a hurry, but from their steady strides and sharp gazes, it was clear that they were nothing like the goons earlier.


    "Boss......"


    "Boss......"


    The two stood behind the bald man. One was lightly tapping the slender sword by his waist, while the other took out a heavy dagger and toyed with it with his agile hands. The looked at Mary with cold eyes, asionally letting out a wickedugh.


    The bald man managed to calm down with his right-hand men finally by his side. The useless subordinates awkwardly exited the room under his instructions, bringing with them the three naked girls who were pale in the face now.


    When the door had been shut, the bald man threw aside the nket and slowly equipped the leather armor, bracelet and shield piled in a corner of the room.


    Fully dressed, he crossed his arms and stared arrogantly at Mary:"Speak! Now you can tell me your goal! "


    Threads the color of blood slowly begin to surface deep within Mary¡¯s blue pupils. Her heart was filled with endless joy when she looked upon the three people before her.


    Three Pseudo-Adepts!


    These three warriors of another world had power equal to pseudo-adepts!


    Mary smiled.


    ............


    A momentter, the door to the room opened wide again.


    The countless goons who were waiting with weapons in hand were shocked to find their arrogant and overbearing boss nodding and bowing before the beauty in red armor. The two right-hand men had also shrunk behind the beauty. They brought a chair over for her to sit on, then offered tea and water. It almost seemed like they were afraid of not offering satisfactory service to the beauty.


    Mary smiled slightly and sat on the chair. She then used a handkerchief and lightly wiped off the bloodstains at the corner of her mouth.


    On the necks of the bald man and his two subordinates, a pair of small injuries was quickly healing, leaving behind only an undetectable scar.


    Mary had the ability to Embrace ever since she became a vampire adept. With this ability, she could create hordes of blood servants loyal to herself. Sadly, she would lose a bit of her blood essence every time she created a new servant. So Mary could only choose important figures as the target for her Embrace.


    And this bald man who had all of Blue Hillock¡¯s underground world in his palm was undoubtedly a person she had to gain control over. Controlling him alone gave Mary immense control over the entirety of the city in an instant.


    With the help of Bald Eagle, Mary quickly understood the power structure and situation of Blue Hillock City.


    The true owner of Blue Hillock was naturally the casten, Count Vanlier. Bald Eagle was only his subordinate who hid in and managed the underground.


    So,te in the night of the second day, Mary was secretly sent into the castle after an borate dress up.


    Even the 50-year-old Count Vanlier, a man who had a little ck beard and the elegant appearance of a gentleman, was astounded by this foreign beauty sent over by his loyal subordinate.


    So, Mary was boldly sent to the Count¡¯s bed under everyone¡¯s gaze, passing through a troop of elite bodyguards.


    And on the second night Mary entered Blue Hillock City, its ruler had be her most loyal blood servant and ve.


    In truth, with Mary¡¯s current power, she could take over this city without much resistance. But to do so without anymotion and without being noticed, she needed to resort to other means!


    To ensure her control was deep and thorough, she even took the effort to Embrace the Count¡¯s remaining subordinates. Of course, these were all individuals who were at a level equal to Pseudo-Adepts. In this other world where arcanology was iplete, the foreign existence of such a thing as a vampire was beyond the limits of the imagination of the natives of the ne.


    By focusing on the important figures, Mary had be the true owner of Blue Hillock City in just 3 days. She was now a true "Monarch of Darkness" that was hidden away from the rest of the world.


    And the information she had gotten from both official means and underground means quickly and continuously streamed back to the adepts¡¯ base.


    Soon, a message about Witcher Knights drew her attention.

 Chapter 171

    A squad of witcher-knights were stationed in Blue Hillock City, since it was the closest city to the Great Greend Forest.


    Based on the information provided by Bald Eagle, this squad of witcher-knights had left their posts seven days ago. They went into the Greend Forest after hiring some local mercenaries but had yet to return.


    This meant that the witcher-knight squad was already active in the forest before the adept squad had entered this world!


    Mary didn¡¯t dare dy this news. Quickly, she sent it back to the adepts¡¯ base while at the same time she informed Greem, who was catching magical creatures deep in the forest.


    Greem was leading his group of golems in the extermination of a tribe of man-eating demons when he received Mary¡¯s alert.


    There were a total of twenty-seven members in the man-eating demon tribe; twenty-two of them were adults, while five were children. With a height of 3 meters, a massive physique nearing five hundred pounds, and Strength that could easily reach 14 points, each and every adult male demon had power that could rival a pseudo-adept. Even the slightly weaker female demons were as powerful as advanced apprentices.


    If a tribe like this was left to the natives to exterminate, it would probably require three hundred to five hundred well-equipped and expertly trained elite warriors to do so. Even if they seeded in the extermination, at least half the group would die in the attempt!


    Yet in the hands of an adept, such a task was extremely simple.


    If all he wished to do was ughter the lot of them, Greem could just summon the Fire Lord, and it would be done. But if he did that, his n of capturing live specimens would note to fruition!


    Instead, Greem used a bottle of Weakening Drug to pollute the demons¡¯ water source. While they were weakened, Greem summoned six terrifying stone serpents and captured the entire tribe in one fell swoop.


    An adult male demon possessed 16 points of Physique and 14 points of Strength. Coupled with their incredible regenerative abilities, these demons wereparable to slightly weaker Body Refining pseudo-adepts. Unfortunately for them, this Weakening Drug had been synthesized specifically for this demon tribe. Once ingested, both their Physique and Strength fell below 10 points and severely limited the demons¡¯ power.


    On the other hand, a stone-serpent golem at the pseudo-adept level had 16 points of Strength and 18 points of Physique. Only when the demons had been infected did the serpents surge forward. They didn¡¯t even attack the demons; instead, they merely used their stone bodies to forcibly constrict the demons into one spot.


    It was then Greem¡¯s turn. Using the Scroll of Voodoo to cast Sleep, he caused all twenty-seven demons to fall to the ground, one after another. Thick wooden bats and stone clubs tumbled from their hands, smashing holes into the ground.


    After instructing the stone serpents to open their mouths and swallow the sleeping demons, Greem could finally turn his attention to themunication crystal..


    Witcher-knight squad......entered seven days ago......


    This information attracted Greem¡¯s attention.


    Calcting the number of days, Greem figured the squad had entered the Greend Forest before the adepts had arrived. Thus, their goal couldn¡¯t possibly be the adepts¡¯ base. The knight¡¯s mission had to be something else.


    Could it possibly be that some native casters had hidden themselves in the Greend Forest? And by doing so, did they draw the witcher-knights into the forest? It seemed far-fetched. But given the witcher-knights¡¯ purpose, Greem might just be right!


    Therefore, Greem had the stone serpents send the captured man-eating demons back to base, while also summoning 10 wind critters and dispersing them into the surrounding woods to look for the witcher-knight squad¡¯s tracks.


    The wind critters were low-level golems Greem created using beginner-level wind attribute crystal cores. They weren¡¯t very powerful, and looked liked clusters of swirling wind only one meter high. Their Strength, Physique and Spirit were all less than 5 points. Frankly speaking, their battle strength waspletely non-existent. Their only advantage was their high agility and the ability to fly.


    Honestly, this is a redundant statement- it would actually be weirder if a mini-whirlwind made from green air couldn¡¯t fly!


    Greem attached a thread of his Spirit to all ten of the wind critters before letting them go. As they silently floated above the forest canopy, their light green bodies were almost invisible against the background of the blue skies. They wouldn¡¯t attract the attention of enemies.


    This quality was precisely why Greem created them- to be his sentries, his eyes in the sky!


    Ten wind critters meant ten different points of mental sight. Naturally, the information sent back by the critters was also extremely massive. If Greem had to rely only on his Spirit, he could probably only maintain a vaguemand on each critter. But with the help of the chip, Greem decided not to waste any Spirit on instructing the wind critters on their flight path. Instead, he left it all to the chip.


    The chip would direct the wind critter to meticulously search and patrol above the forest, using the most optimum flight path to cover as much area as possible. Now, Greem only had to find a safe ce to rest and silently wait for good news from the chip.


    As expected, when night fell, the chip had good news.


    The witcher-knight squad had been found!


    ............


    On a mountain ridge, forty kilometers away from the adepts¡¯ base camp, three or four campfires had been lit.


    Even though there were many dangerous magical beings in the forest that weren¡¯t afraid of fire- and were even sometimes actually attracted to light- the knights had trekked several dozen kilometers worth of mountain roads after an arduous battle, and needed the fire.


    The mercenaries swiftly set up their tents and sat around the campfire and started to prepare a feast for dinner.


    A wild boar caught on the way here was skinned, had its organs removed, and was washed in the river. The mercenaries then put a wooden stick through it and slowly roasted it over the fire. The experienced mercenaries rotated the stick while they used brushes to evenly ther the boar with spices and sauces they had prepared beforehand.


    An amber-hued oil seeped from the pork. It had been roasted to a perfect golden color. The oils dripped onto the ming coals below, sizzling and releasing a fragrant, thick aroma that filled the air.


    The joy of a magnificent victory filled the entire camp.


    The ones bustling about the camp were all the hired mercenaries. The thirteen witcher-knights, on the other hand, were helping each other out of their heavy armor and performing basic treatment on their wounds.


    Today their squad sessfully located the den of heretics, hidden deep within the Greend Forest, and trapped all seven of the heretic spellcasters within. After an insane battle, the knights managed to capture a single spellcaster and killed the other six. Everyone in the squad had been injured, but there were no casualties as of yet- much to the knight leader¡¯s relief.


    As for the four mercenaries who had died in the battle, they were beneath the consideration of the leader of the knights. Mercenaries put money before anything else, and as long as he gave them the remainder of the promised reward, they would be nothing but thankful. Not even a drop of dissatisfaction would enter their hearts.


    Mercenaries had always done these kinds of dangerous jobs!


    Ever since they epted the request, they had all mentally prepared for the possibility of never returning. Now that they hadpleted the mission, and Sir Knight had promised them grand rewards, even the pain of losing four of their friends was quickly reced by their excitement for the future.


    Laughter was everywhere in the camp, and a boisterous atmosphere filled the ce.


    A scrawny silhouette, bound tightly at the hands and feet, formed a strong contrast to the celebrating knights and mercenaries. Strictly speaking, he was still a teenager who had yet toe of age! Extended periods of malnutrition made his entire body weak and skinny. His body, hidden underneath a tattered grey robe, was extremely scrawny, to the point you could see his ribs.


    The skin not covered by his clothes was covered with ckish green bruises and numerous small scars. A rope was tied around his mouth, holding a rough stone that acted as a gag. This was to prevent him from casting spells in secret!


    Unable to chant or use hand seals, the boy- who had just recently awakened to that strange power- waspletely incapacitated. He could only nt his body and lean on the roots of the trees, ring at each smiling face in the camp with eyes of vengeance.


    These were all his enemies!


    It was these people that made him run from ce to ce, made him homeless despite having a family, and forced him to roam about lonely forests and farawaynds where nobody lived, like a lonely phantom. If it wasn¡¯t for a kindhearted panion" that led him to the house in the woods, he would probably have ended up being some beast¡¯s meal within Greend Forest.


    But the calm and peaceful days didn¡¯tst very long. The forest camp that the wandering spellcasters had created was destroyed by the witcher-knights who had tracked them down. And hispanions...thepanions he had been living with for half a year died underneath the swords and des of the knights- just like that!


    The knights were murderers, and the mercenaries were their aplices!


    A me was lit in his heart as he looked upon their smiling faces. Anger, sorrow, vengeance.... these uncontroble emotions slowly rose within him, and he had to grit his teeth to hold back his tears.


    If I get the chance to escape, I will use the most cruel and most insane methods to kill all of them! One after another!


    He screamed madly in his heart, but he knew that this was only a delusion.


    His mood quickly changed, and despair engulfed his soul once more!


    At this torturous moment, he opened his eyes wide. Lifting his head in surprise, he stared unflinchingly at a spot above the camp.


    There was something odd there~


    This......this was the unique elemental flux of Wind Elementium!


    There was clearly nothing there in the dark sky above the rowdy camp. However, this teenager sensed the unique concentration of Wind Elementium there thanks to the elemental talent that he had awakened.


    Natural concentration of Elementium? Impossible!


    Just eight minutes ago, there was nothing odd there. There was no way Wind Elementium would concentrate at that spot for no reason!


    The very next second, the teenager had to grit his teeth to avoid shouting out in surprise.


    Three more unique concentrations of Wind Elementium had appeared in the sky, slowly circling there.


    It seemed as if......as if they were searching for something!


    Something was about to ur! Something was about to happen in the camp!


    Hope burned in the teenager¡¯s eyes as he silently observed the surroundings of the camp.


    Soon, he made an even greater discovery.

 Chapter 172

    There was movement beneath the ground!


    He was the only one to sense the elemental flux; perhaps because he was the only one present with any spellcasting talent.


    This world¡¯s arcanology was iplete and broken. Regardless, he was still able to sessfully awaken his elemental talent and be a spellcaster. This demonstrated the monstrouspatibility between his soul¡¯s talent and one of this ne¡¯sws. If he had been born in the World of Adepts, he would certainly have be a powerful warlock that could master spells effortlessly.


    Warlocks were an extremely unique existence, even amongst spellcasters. Most warlocks gained the ability to cast spells due to suddenly awakening the power of their ancestral bloodline, while other warlocks awoke due to their soul¡¯s unique talent.


    Draconic Warlocks and Blood Mages often arose because of their bloodlines, while Necromancers, Alchemists, and Destiny Mages stemmed from inborn talent. The two ssifications were distinct and separate, with no chance of a warlock being born with both bloodline and talent!


    In anyplete material ne, as long as Elementium was present, there would always be genius talents that could awaken their spellcasting abilities under the influence of the narws. Unfortunately, the Witcher Knights had already secured an indomitable position in this ne. As such, the existence of smaller spellcasting groups had been suppressed.


    This was much like the World of Adepts. There, adepts were unmatched and ran rampant, squashing the potential of all physical sses. Jobs that once required warriors, rogues, or priests were now dominated by adepts.


    Using the flexible and mysterious nature of spells, along with the division of spell masteries, the adepts managed to create specialized branches to mimic and rece once unique jobs. Body-Refining Adepts could be seen as a recement for the warrior job, while agile adepts like Mary were no weaker than the strongest assassins. Even priests were reced by countless alchemical tools, potions, or variant spells.


    Upon closer inspection, one would find that the adepts had slowly made up for their own deficiencies over the tens of millions of years of their development. In doing so, they had be a persistent nightmare of untold small and mid-sized nes.


    Even though the teenager had been bound and could not move, his talent and innate ability still allowed him to see more than the others in the camp. He held his breath and focused on his senses, silently waiting for the arrival of a change!


    ............


    Thirteen witcher-knights and eleven mercenaries.


    Amongst them, there was only one witcher-knight with the ability of a pseudo-adept. He seemed to be the captain of the squad. There were three knights with the ability of advanced apprentices, while the rest were all rookies at the beginner level.


    They were also equipped with standard knight¡¯s armor, longswords, and longbows. This meant that they had an outstanding mix of close and mid-range attacks, as well as their powerful defense. Observing close range through a wind critter, Greem realized something peculiar about the knights.


    More urately, he found something mysterious on the knights¡¯ equipments!


    There were obscure patterns made ofplicated lines on their shields, longswords, and bows. Furthermore, some crystalline jewels had been embedded in them. A normal person would have thought of them as decorations, but Greem could feel traces of magic on them.


    Beginner-level runic carvings? !


    Using the mysterious patterns to form simple runes, coupled with the magic stones and elemental crystals as energy sources, these knights had found an alternative way of tapping into the powers of Elementium.


    Greem watched the camp silently from a hidden spot and couldn¡¯t help but think it was amusing.


    A bunch of imposter elementium users had reced the actual spellcasters. This made Greem, who hade from another ne, silently wonder at the oddity and twistedness of the developments here. As expected, if you visited enough realms, you could witness all sorts of odd and unusual situations.


    The World of Adepts was definitely a high-magic ne where human adepts were at the top. But this might not be the case in other nes. From what Greem knew, the goblin Grand Duke that Snox had been in secret contact with lived in a small ne where it was goblins who held the superior position.


    Humans¡¯ role had been reversed there, and they were the ves of the "short and stupid" goblin race. However, that kind of treatment was still considered decent. In certain notable nes, humans and humanoids were the livestock ofrger magical creatures. Their situation was trulymentable. A fate so terrible, most could not bear to dwell on the idea.


    After silently contemting, Greem went back to watching the knights. Those mercenaries, on the other hand, were not worth his attention.


    A bunch of fools that dared to pretend to be swordsmen because they had leather armor and worthless swords, who dared to call themselves godly marksmen just because they had a hunter¡¯s bow on their backs, and who dared to call themselves powerful warriors simply because they had a rotten wooden shield....these kinds of people had neither ability nor talent. All they had was a little strength.


    Thus, Greem ignored them after a quick look at their gear.


    Greem observed them for half an hour. Once he had sufficient information, and the golems had reached their positions, Greem gave the order to attack while he remained hidden in the woods.


    The one in charge of this attack was naturally the chip. It was exceptional at managing and organizing resources. The main force of this attack was the poor Lightning Giant, who had been relegated to be a backup for so long. Using the Fire Lord might have yielded the best results for an all-out attack, but Greem wanted to capture some prisoners. Since the Fire Lord only had indiscriminate and overbearing spells, Greem was worried that these small fries wouldn¡¯t be able to survive.


    Therefore, the Lightning Giant who had been sidelined was now back as the main force on the battlefield!


    [ Author: The Lightning Giant¡¯s entrance will always be so cool. It even brings with it its own sound effects.]


    Sudden shes of lightning instantly illuminated the night sky, and as the giant appeared in the sky, there was an ominous rumbling of thunder.


    Some mercenaries that were still indulging in the feast had yet to clear their heads. They stopped eating and looked about confusingly while muttering. "So weird! The weather was clearly good. Why¡¯s there lightning?"


    Some of the more alert fighters lifted their heads. Their expressions suddenly fell when they saw the terrifying humanoid wreathed in lightning floating in the sky.


    The difference between the well-trained witcher-knights and the motley crew of mercenaries was evident when faced with this imminent danger. Immediately the witcher-knights tossed aside their silverware and wine sses, then sprinted to where they had put their equipment. The mercenaries, on the other hand, stared wide-eyed at the mysterious giant. It was only until they saw the knights¡¯ actions that they started scrambling for their weapons.


    The inside of the camp was in chaos!


    But why would the Lightning Giant give them the time to equip themselves?


    The giant raised itsrge, hazy hand as a terrifying thunderstorm quickly formed above the camp. The bright moon and brilliant stars of a once beautiful evening had be covered by a world of piercing lightning and roiling ck clouds. One after another, forked lightning struck down from the clouds across the length of the entire camp.


    The effect was still limited by this low-magic ne, where magic was weaker. Otherwise, the magnitude of the thunderstorm could still increase several times. Even so, a weakened thunderstorm already brought about catastrophe to the people panicking below.


    Every st of forked lightning would change direction when nearing the ground, sting towards the metal swords and armors of the knights and mercenaries. The intense high-voltage currents crackled through their bodies. Every st of lightning would affect three or four people before dissipating.


    With every lightning bolt that fell, a few pained silhouettes would stagger and fall within the camp.


    The lightning giant had already reduced the lethality of its lightning as much as possible, under Greem¡¯s request, and concentrated on stunning and crowd control.


    Although the thunderstorm wasn¡¯t considered powerful, having 20 points of damage at best, it still managed to cripple most of the mercenaries in the blink of an eye.


    However, as expected, the witcher-knights were a special job that often crossed paths with "heretic spellcasters". Even faced with an overwhelming flood of magical attacks, they did not lose their cool or scatter. Instead, they squatted, raised their small shields, and activated the unique "rune arrays" within. Using the small energy shields, they blocked most of the falling lightning sts.


    Protected by the cover from theirpanions, some of the witcher-knights even pulled out their metallic longbows to start firing waves of elementally charged magic arrows.


    Enchanted longbows? No! It was only a simple and crude embedded crystal. Compared to the developed and perfected enchanted weapons of the World of Adepts, the energy efficiency of these crystals were disgustingly low.


    This was such a crude magic bow that even a beginner apprentice from the World of Adepts wouldn¡¯t choose to craft such an item.


    Even though these bows were a crude means of utilizing magic, they were already the best magical tools on this ne. The reason the witcher-knights were able to dominate and oppose nobility all over the country was precisely thanks to this "trash equipment" that Greem couldn¡¯t care less about!


    While everyone in the camp had been distracted by the Lightning Giant, the y golems that had been lying in wait, underground, finally surfaced under the instructions of the chip.


    The knights that had been concentrating on the Lightning Giant felt the ground give out under their feet. The very next moment, they had sunk into a mud pit that appeared out of nowhere. The shocked knights furiously struggled to get free.


    Sadly for them, something more surprising happened!


    The mud pit that had trapped their lower bodies instantly turned back to ordinary dirt. In the blink of an eye, six of the thirteen witcher-knights were magically trapped by the earth. As the knights scrambled to save theirpanions, clusters of dirt in the camp began to swell, gathering into multiple y golems.


    Under the knights¡¯ frightened gaze, the y golems charged towards the knights on legs that were as thick as pirs. At the same time, the figures¡¯ fan-like y hands and heavy fists swung down in a cascade of blows towards the knights.


    The knight captain let out a battlecry as he drew his longsword. With his energy shield in one hand, and a magic longsword with elemental mes in the other, he parried the strikes of the y golems. Under his directions, the remaining knights also put on their mail, grabbed their weapons, and rushed forward.


    The witcher-knights formed a loose circle, protecting their trappedpanions behind them while starting to engage the y golems.


    Without elementium attached, mundane weapons could not possibly damage the y golem¡¯s sturdy body. But with the magical weapons, along with the ability to use a type of special knight battle technique, the knights were miraculously able to force a stalemate against the y golems.

 Chapter 173

    If Greem was still that adept apprentice with only a couple of golems, the "battle" before him might actually be a little more stimting and exciting.


    Sadly......


    The number of low-quality golems, like the y golems, in Greem¡¯s storage belt had already hit triple digits. Even intermediate golems like the stone serpents were being summoned in squads. Greem¡¯s golem army was already shaping up nicely, with the exception that his collection of pseudo-adept level golems was stillcking.


    The y golems were extremely tough to deal with when they appeared in suchrge numbers.


    In all honesty, a y golem with the power of an intermediate apprentice should have a difficult time fighting against a disciplined witcher-knight. The golems made of y weren¡¯t as tough as stone golems or steel golems. The crude magical weapons and knight battle techniques of the witcher-knights could reliably destroy half a y golem¡¯s body with a single strike.


    Unfortunately, this group of witcher-knights evidentlycked experience fighting against arge number of elemental golems. They had no idea that there was an extremely important elementium core within each elemental golem. Far too many of their attacks were wasted on the y golems¡¯ dense limbs and their soil-like heads.


    Every y golem that had sustained heavy damage to their limbs would sink beneath the ground. Once they repaired their bodies and emerged again, they were no different from a brand-new golem.


    In the eyes of the witcher-knights, this group of over forty y golems was an an unending army that continuously sprang from the ground. It was not something that could be destroyed by human strength.


    At the start of the battle, every time an eye-catching knight battle-technique was executed, it would cause two or three y golems to crumble and fall, resulting in the knights cheering in excitement. But now, as the golems endlessly rose from the dirt, the knights became too exhausted to deal with the heavy mud fists and unexpected mud spears.


    While coughing up blood from their umted injuries, more and more witcher knights were bashed to the ground by the y golems¡¯ fists, and the circle where the battle was taking ce slowly began shrinking. Soon, only the knight captain and his two deputies were still resisting. The y golems surrounding them, however, had already formed three or fouryers around them.


    Seeing that the battle was basically over, Greem stopped hiding. With determined strides, he walked out from the darkness. Slowly, he stepped into the disheveled camp.


    His appearance instantly drew the attention of thest three people!


    These three instantly understood Greem to be the mastermind behind tonight¡¯s attack when they saw his ck robed silhouette.


    They looked at each other, grit their teeth and made a firm decision in an instant.


    The two deputies shouted as they tossed aside the badly battered shield. Quickly, they drove the me longswords to the limit of its power and charged towards Greem, cutting down all the y golems in the way as they did so.


    But just halfway, they were stopped by the horde of golems.


    The two deputies let out another battlecry and their faces flushed red. While they still had the strength left, they threw the two dense me swords forward. The impact of the swords caused most of the golems in front of them to copse and fall to the ground.


    The knight captain took advantage of the opening made by his deputies. White light shed around his body. He became like a sprinting jaguar, breaking through the scattered blockade of golems. Intense mes red about the longsword in his hand as he shed at the evil heretic with all his might, the sword leaving behind several afterimages.


    The hot wind slightly lifted the hood from Greem¡¯s head, allowing the airborne knight captain to lock eyes with Greem¡¯s burning pupils.


    Even though the captain¡¯s charge was so powerful, and his burning longsword was but a short distance away from the heretic¡¯s brow, there was no trace of fear or hesitation in his opponent¡¯s burning eyes.


    The knight captain¡¯s heart shook.


    It was the first time in his life he had seen a pair of eyes burning.


    Not a metaphor, nor an illusion, but an actual pair of ming eyes that were spewing out terrifying jets of me.


    His ming longsword zed like a torch and was now less than a meter away from the heretic¡¯s head. At this distance, with the speed at which he was charging at, his strike wouldnd in a fraction of a second.


    As the captain mustered up all his strength to deliver a crippling blow to those fearsome, ming eyes, the ground erupted. The ground in front of the heretic¡¯s feet split apart and arge, imposing monster emerged.


    Coincidentally, the captain¡¯s me longsword sliced into center of the terrifying monster¡¯s stone head!


    Stone shattered; dirt and sand fell to the ground......


    The longsword cut throughyers of stone before finally bing stuck in the thick and dense stone.


    The pseudo-adept level stone serpent broke apart the ground, bringing with it the me longsword stuck in its head, as well as the captain himself. As the serpent fully rose from the ground, it exposed its full size of ten meters.. Tons of dirt, sand, and stone tumbled down from itsrge mouth and around its pitch ck eyes, knocking the captain around.


    Even so, the knight captain still did not let go of the longsword stuck in the stone serpent¡¯s head.


    The two deputies, on the other hand, had copsed due to exhaustion after thatst blow. Several y golems charged forward and quickly restrained them.


    Right now the only person who could still move was the knight captain, still dangling from the stone serpent¡¯s head.


    Greem impatiently snapped his fingers when he saw the opponent¡¯s stubborn and futile struggle. A thunderous st of lightning from the sky struck the captain. In the very next second he fell like a piece of rotten wood, smashing a hole in the ground where hended.


    Having cleaned up thest of the resistance, the camp was finally silent.


    One after another, y golems began cleaning up the camp in an orderly fashion.


    The rubble from the aftermath of the battle was cleared away, and the shattered ground patched up. The campfire was lit again, and a new skinned boar was ced on the rack above the fire....


    The teenager bound to a tree shivered. For a moment he felt like time had reversed back to when events had just started. The surroundings before his eyes were still the same. The only difference now was that the sole person in the camp was the mysterious man in the ck robe.


    Of course if you counted him, the prisoner, as well, then there were two!


    "Can you roast?" The man in the ck robe said, suddenly turning to look at the teenager.


    The unexpected question caused the teenager to be at a loss. First he nodded, then he shook his head. For a moment, even he wasn¡¯t sure what his reply was.


    "You better be able to! Otherwise, I¡¯ll eat you!" The man in the ck robe released a stream of fire at the tough leather rope binding the teenager, incinerating it into ashes: "Come and help me roast the meat! "


    The teenager flexed his numbed limbs, dusting off the ashes left on his skin.


    The ck ashes dispersed, revealing his undamaged skin below.


    The corner of his mouth twitched.


    It¡¯s important to note that the ropes were binding his body tightly and were pressed into his skin. Yet the mysterious spellcaster was able to wield fire to incinerate the rope and leave his skin untouched. This......this terrifying elemental control was worthy of worship!


    In his heart, this mysterious ck robed man that had appeared out of nowhere was a powerful deity sent from the heavens to save him. How else would a human be able to control elemental fire to such a precise degree?!


    His heart filled with faith, the teenager took the rock out of his mouth and ran to where the mercenaries had left their stuff, drinking until he was full. Then, he washed his hands and face before walking to the campfire and doing his job of roasting the meat.


    Greem sat by the campfire, but ignored the teenager. He was still silentlymunicating with the chip in his mind.


    "Beep; battle report......


    ¡°Twenty-three total ne natives captured, of which thirteen are witcher-knights, ten are human mercenaries. One person escaped....


    ¡°Golem squad. Thirty-seven y golems mobilised, one pseudo-adept-level stone serpent mobilised. Casualty number is 0......


    ¡°Initial battle strength estimate: witcher-knights are equal in power to apprentice adepts. Individual power merged with primitive magical weapons and knight battle techniques, suited forrge-scale battlefield melees......"


    Greem was slightly stunned.


    "How did someone escape? Where is this guy? "


    As Greem had that thought, the chip instantly switched to the viewpoint of a wind critter far away.


    A scrawny and agile mercenary was running for his life in the dark and lightless woods, not even taking a single look behind him. The protruding branches whipped and shed him, leaving wounds all over his body, but he would not slow down his steps even a little.


    Honestly, Greem had cleared the forest way too thoroughly, causing all the wild beasts to vanish. Otherwise, with the mercenary¡¯s reckless sprint, he would have eventually ended up in the belly of a wild beast.


    "Beep; this mercenary took advantage of the chaos and escaped the camp. Asking host; should the Lightning Giant be sent to capture or eliminate him?"


    Greem¡¯s eye gleamed for a second before he coldly said, "Based on the direction he¡¯s running, he should be headed for the human town in the west! Evil Bugs has set up arge web there. Hopefully, that mercenary has the luck to break through. No need to care about him. If he wishes to die, then let him have a taste of Evil Bugs!"


    "Right. I felt like these knights have very average power individually. They¡¯re only normal people who¡¯ve received special physical training. Why would you rate them as powerful as apprentice adepts?"


    "Beep; the evaluation this time is a conclusion drawn from thebined strength and power of the two parties, viewed from all angles and perspectives......Witcher-Knight is a unique job ss that requires the aid of many external objects to unleash their strength. Their standard equipment should be a powerful mount, customized magical equipment, and powerful individual battle techniques. With all this taken into consideration, a fully equipped witcher-knight should not be weaker than an apprentice adept of the same level......"


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but fall deep into thought when he heard this.

 Chapter 174

    Warm sunshine pierced through the spotty canopy, spilling onto Mok and making him feel a little relieved.


    Some birds nesting in the trees nearby were startled and let out calls high above the canopy, breaking the peace of the woods.


    Even though his head was bruised and the corners of his mouth were swollen from an entire night of running frantically and blindly through the dim woods filled with branches, vines, and bushes, ultimately he seeded in escaping the nightmare that was in the woods.


    Mok kept turning his head to look, even though nothing had been pursuing him, as if some invisible demon was following right behind him.


    Suddenly, it was bright. The massive forest ended right before a green grass field below a gentle slope. Mok could see the sharp corners of a vige¡¯s wooden houses and the chimney smoke from afar.


    Mok felt relieved when he saw this.


    Stumbling out of the woods, Mok ran towards the small mountain vige without another look back.


    That was the vige of Colca!


    As a small vige on the edge of the Greend Forest, it was not very prosperous. However, it was still a good ce to replenish food and water stocks. Therefore many mercenaries and adventurers that made a living in the Greend Forest enjoyed resting in Colca Vige.


    It was deadly silent in the small vige.


    Logically speaking, this was the time the vige hunters were at their busiest, forming parties and venturing into the woods to check if their traps had caught anything. This was the time when the elderly of the vige gathered to chat at one end of the vige; while the women started drying animal leather that had just been tanned......


    Mok looked in confusion at the empty vige before him. He didn¡¯t even see any of the rowdy brats that were always ying in the vige¡¯s clearing.


    Was everyone in the vige absent?


    No, someone was in the vige!


    Mok was a mercenary after all. Even though he wasn¡¯t good at fighting or killing, his observation skills were well-honed. He could vaguely see the light reflecting off eyes behind each tightly shut wooden door. He could even hear several people breathing heavily.


    "Hank! Thor! Dhaka! Are you here? It¡¯s me, Mok! Why are you all hiding? Do you not recognise me? I¡¯m Mok of the ck Bear Mercenaries......"


    Having heard Mok¡¯s shouts, the door of a wooden house in the vige opened. The familiar silhouette of the hunter Hank appeared behind the door. Mok didn¡¯t know why, but Hank did not wee him warmly as he had done in the past. Instead, he stood silently in the shadow of the door, slowly letting Mok inside.


    The frightened Mok had spent an entire night running through the forest. He had long since been exhausted and hurriedly ran into the house.


    "Hank, I don¡¯t care what you have, just get me something to eat and drink first. I still need to rush back to Blue Hillock City after I get a quick rest. Let me tell you something, Hank. You need to warn everyone in the vige not to enter the mountains again for the time being. There......"


    Mok had adjusted his eyes to the darkness inside and was shocked to find all twelve of the vige¡¯s hunters inside. They stood silently in the house, their faces hidden by the shadows that obscured their expressions.


    "Are you having a meeting? Don¡¯t you know how to light amp?"


    Mok¡¯s words were interrupted by the room turningpletely dark. Hank had closed the door!


    With the door shut tight, the inside of the wooden house became even dimmer and more ominous!


    Mok shivered. For the first time, he realised the strangeness of the situation before him.


    He had just taken a step backwards when someone grabbed him from behind. Another two men charged forward, gripping his arms and shoulders with theirrge, firm hands.


    "What are you doing? It¡¯s me... it¡¯s me, Mok......"


    Mok struggled with all his might. His right hand tried reaching for the dagger at the back of his waist, but the three people surrounding him were thoroughly restraining him. Mountain hunters naturally possessed great strength. And since there were three of them holding him, Mok was unable to fight back.


    Mok, who was cursing and screaming, was approached by a hunched silhouette.


    He had white hair, a white beard, and a face full of wrinkles. It was the elderly vige head of Colca Vige, Grampa Norham.


    Before Mok could even say Norham¡¯s name, the old man with thepassionate face abruptly opened his mouth. And it didn¡¯t stop opening. The corners of Grampa Norham¡¯s mouth were torn from opening his mouth wider than it could go. It was torn all the way to the base of his ears.


    But it wasn¡¯t a mouth he opened. It was... it was a hideous mandible split into four parts! Small sharp teeth lined the edges of the mouth. It was horrifying to look at! Within the mandibles, a hideous and odd scorpion scurried out of the bloody red throat.


    Grampa Norham slowly walked forward and used the mandibles to pry open Mok¡¯s mouth, spitting the hideous scorpion into his mouth.


    Mok was deathly terrified at this point. He squirmed and struggled with all his strength, letting out muffled and sorrowful wails from his mouth.


    Sadly, nothing he did mattered!


    The horrifying scorpion sessfully squeezed its way inside his throat. After a moment, the three men let go of his arms, but Mok was no longer struggling. The pained expression on his face had vanished, turning into a numb and vacant look.


    He put down his arms. A dark red glint lit up deep within his pupils. Like the other hunters, he waited silently in the darkness for his master¡¯s orders.


    At the same time, a nearly invisible wind critter was floating above the wooden house. It seemed to be silently waiting for something.


    "Hpmh! Greem, you¡¯ve overstepped your boundaries!" A mental flux that sounded like the screeching of insects suddenly rang within the consciousness core of the wind critter.


    "This is not overstepping my boundaries! This is just tracking!" Greem¡¯s listless voice was also transmitted through this temporary mental link. "As you can see, I¡¯m tracking my prey! Should I go to Keoghan andin about you intercepting my prey while I¡¯m hunting?"


    "Hmph! You can goin if you wish to! Keoghan gave me the order to seal off the mountains and woods here and not let anyone through. I¡¯m merely following my orders. What about you, huh? A powerful me adept, yet you let a mere mercenary walk through your territory untouched. Perhaps you should exin your ipetence to Keoghan!"


    "There¡¯s no need... since you¡¯ve intercepted the prey, I¡¯ll let the issue slide. I¡¯m leaving!" Once Greem finished speaking, the wind critter slowly rose, as if it was about to leave.


    "......¡± Acteon, who had been hiding in the darkness, immediately became vignt.


    For as long as Acteon had known him, Greem had never been such an easygoing person. He couldn¡¯t help but feel something was wrong with Greem giving way so easily this time.


    Just as Acteon was racking his brains for an exnation, a mental flux was transmitted from the wind critter that was high in the skies now. "Oh right, Acteon. Do you always neglect to check your targets¡¯ bodies before turning them into bugmen?"


    Having said that, the wind critter dashed to the woods without even looking back.


    Just then, the temperature of Mok¡¯s body started rising rapidly. Almost instantly, his entire body was converted into a human bomb. When his blood and flesh heated up to the critical limit, he exploded with a bang.


    Most of the "bugged" hunters were standing close together in the house, causing Mok¡¯s explosion to drag the other seven bugmen to their deaths. They melted in agony, riddled with holes by the bone fragments and boiling blood that went flying everywhere.


    Acteon had ced a heart-devouring bug, that he bred personally, inside each of the bugmen. In that instant, eight heart-devouring bugs had died. It was easy to imagine the Spiritual pain Acteon felt at that moment.


    The very next moment, Acteon¡¯s angered screams and curses filled the skies.


    Sadly, the wind critter had already escaped!


    ............


    When Greem brought his prisoners back to the adepts¡¯ base, the teenager followed beside him.


    The teenager¡¯s name was Edwin. His hometown was in a faraway ce known as Clyde. There, they produced fragrant grape wine and were famous for having breathtaking scenery. Unfortunately... after he awakened that odd talent, he was forced to leave his hometown and lead a life of vagrancy and hiding.


    Even if he hid in the depths of the Greend Forests, he would still be tracked down and trapped by the witcher-knights, who were as crazed as mad dogs. Six of the seven people with whom he had lived together for half a year were now dead. He was the only survivor. The witcher-knights had only spared him because they wanted to publicly execute him in the city.


    However, his life hadpletely turned around afterst night. From now on, he was on apletely different path!


    It had only been two or three days, but the base had undergone great change once again.


    Standing tall was a stone tower three levels high. A dozen robotic beasts were levitating on the outside of the tower, carefully carving unique rune patterns on the walls of the tower.


    This was not a true adept¡¯s tower yet, but after being strengthened with Runes of Toughness, Runes of Magic Resistance, and Runes of Divination-Obscuring, it sufficed as a temporary residence for the adepts. The crafting of higher quality magical items and potions required the use of alchemybs and alchemy stands.


    That was why the construction of an adept tower was of utmost importance!


    Upon returning this time, Greem realised that the voodoo beasts in the outer rim of the base had doubled. Furthermore, Greem found traces of the beasts he had delivered previously on some of the stronger adept-level voodoo beasts.


    These included the Bloodthirsty Man-eating Demons, the Wild Giant Apes and the Toxic Giants......


    These powerful adept-level voodoo beasts were very crudely crafted. Their biological systems were unstable. Just one look, and Greem could tell that these were inferior products created on the spot. Although these beasts would not suffer any loss to their strength and would easily reach the level of adepts, their life force would only sustain them for one to two months before failing.


    Just as Greem was passing the prisoners over to Keoghan, the teenager Edwin was looking over everything in the base with feelings of worship.


    This was the holynd of spellcasters of his dreams! This was a ce he was willing to defend with his life!

 Chapter 175

    Chapter 175 A Brewing Storm


    Blue Hillock City, Tulip Hotel.


    A pale but mean-looking thug strode across the crowded lobby and went past the suites filled with waitresses. He walked along an inconspicuous alley into a hall guarded by several tough men, before finally turning into a remote location at the backyard of the hotel.


    The ones waiting here were all young but amazingly talented people. There were even exceptional individuals amongst them that the casten had recruited from several major cities nearby. Their talents were in various fields, but there was amon simrity to their appearances. The men were handsome, while the women were beautiful. Everyone one of them had paleplexions, vaguely resembling ancient nobility that never went out in the sun.


    These young men and women gathered in small groups in the hall, corridor, and on the sofas, having passionate conversation with each other. Strangely, the use of odd words such as ¡®blood treats¡¯, ¡®Embrace¡¯ and the sort permeated their conversations.


    Swiftsword Jake was used to this scene. He quickly went past everyone, and rushed to the secret room at the innermost section of the building. The group of people might look like they were flirting with each other, but in truth, they were spread out and positioned in such a way that they closely guarded the secret room.


    Should any outsider that didn¡¯t belong to their ¡®clique¡¯ enter, they would likely be brutally torn to pieces in minutes.


    The youths guarding the door took a good look at Jake before silently opening the wooden door behind them.


    There was almost no furniture in the secret room, with the exception of bed sorge it could be considered opulent. Two extremely attractive women, that were hardly wearing anything,id on both sides of Mary, diligently serving her.


    A naked young girl hung on the room¡¯s ceiling, pinned by daggers on her limbs and chest. Drops of bright red blood seeped through the wounds, dripping down the dagger. Flowers of blood slowly bloomed on the bodies of the three people on therge bed, drop by drop, dyeing them crimson.


    The three, however, were not worried by this at all. In fact, the two beautifuldies even used the tip of their tongue to catch the dripping blood, letting out seductively lewd moans as they did so. They were thoroughly enjoying it!


    The scene within the room was so extravagant and seductive, yet Jake didn¡¯t dare to stare. He bowed and spoke softly, "Mistress, the witcher-knights you had us observe have made a move. Around a hundred people suddenly surged into Blue Hillock City today. Though they tried to be covert, I¡¯ve already sent someone to probe them. They are witcher-knights from outside. They¡¯re spread all across the city, but the leaders have already made it to the camp!"


    Mary suddenly sat up and coldly stared at her subordinate, "You have already probed them? You didn¡¯t startle or alert them, did you?"


    Mary¡¯s blood red pupils lit up, and instantly the debaucherous atmosphere within the room vanished. All the blood servants immediately stopped what they were doing and anxiously waited for instructions from their master.


    Mary¡¯s threatening stare terrified Swiftsword Jake. Hurriedly he exined, "There¡¯s no need to worry, Mistress! We did not use any of our own men to probe the knights. We had several street urchins annoy the targets. Some of them saw the unique runic weapons of the witcher-knights under their robes."


    Mary finally nodded in satisfaction upon hearing this. Rxed, she lied down once more.


    "Do not forget your identity. You are a gang subordinate to a local noble. Just monitor them. Do not overstep your boundaries. As long as you do not do anything that oversteps the boundaries of your identity, they will not suspect you. Also, I need to know their purpose here!"


    "This is simple! Mistress, the leader of that group of knights had already gone to visit the casten in secret when I came here to report to you!"


    "Mm? They went to visit Vanlier? Hahaha... this is rare good news!"


    ............


    Witcher-knight camp.


    As Ninther strode back from outside with anger on his face, his direct subordinates were diligently organizing their equipment and treating their weapons and armor. These jobs were usually done by squires or servants, but now they had to do it themselves.


    "Sir, did you get anything out of the meeting with Count Vanlier?" A deputy walked forward, and helped him unsp the thick robe on his body. The other deputy also stepped forward and helped him remove the heavy armor, revealing the intricate silk underclothes beneath.


    "Hmph! What could I have gotten?! Each of these nobles is slimier and slipperier than the one before them. He imed that the witcher-knights here were not under his jurisdiction, and therefore he had no idea where they went. He only knows that they hired some local mercenaries before entering Greend Forest." Ninther sat down heavily in a chair, his face still fuming with anger.


    Using certain means, he determined that the ne invaders had appeared in the Greend Forest. Rushing there with arge number of followers, he arrived only to find that the witcher-knight squad stationed there was absent. From the exnations of the apprentice knights that had stayed behind, the squad had moved out upon hearing news of a group of heretics.


    Even though exterminating heretics was the duty of each and every witcher-knight, Ninther wished they hadn¡¯t heard of that goddamn news at this critical juncture. After all, all one hundred of the witcher-knights here were reassigned here from other ces; they were utterly unfamiliar with the environment inside Greend Forest.


    It was aplete joke to have a bunch of horse-riding knights search for enemy tracks in a forest. If the party had a dozen people who were familiar with the local environment, everything would have been much easier!


    "Sir!" A tall knight strode in from outside, "There are some fresh faces outside the camp. I¡¯ve had some people look, and it seems they are the spying subordinates of the local gang. What do you think we should......"


    "Ignore them!" Ninther waved his hand frustratingly, "We entered the city with so many men. That Count Vanlier is probably deeply concerned! It¡¯s normal to have some eyes on us. We¡¯re heading to the forest the day after tomorrow anyway, after a quick rest. If they want to follow us, then let them do so."


    Then, Ninther called for the tall knight, "Edward,e and take a look. Which route is the most suitable for when we enter the mountain the day after tomorrow? Perhaps we should split into ten smaller squads. This should make the search go faster!"


    Right now, arge parchment had been ced on the wooden table. On the parchment, lines of different thickness and colors illustrated the geography around Greend Forest, as well as the direction of rivers.


    The entirety of Greend Forest was wide on the northern end, and much narrower on the southern end, making it look roughly like a gigantic drumstick covering several hundred square kilometers. The central area was the Haynes Mountains, while the forest itself shared borders with threerge provinces.


    The Blue Hillock City they were at was located near the southern end of the forest, where it was at its most narrow. The city was also the most suitable outpost for the vanguard of an army in the south, in the Duran province. A little further, and there were only small towns and viges with very low poptions. They were sufficient as a restocking point for small groups of mercenaries, but not for arge witcher-knight army.


    Indeed, this knight army numbering over a hundred men was only a vanguard for the arriving main force. An army of knights numbering up to three thousand men was gathering at the capital of Duran province. Based on estimates, it would take them another 15 days, at their quickest, before they could arrive.


    The sole mission of the vanguard was to establish a base for the main force, then to investigate the location of their enemies. Even a little information would be good.


    Such arge-scale gathering of witcher-knights was the first in a hundred years. A gathering of knights on the same scale was also happening far away in the north, up in the two other provinces bordered by Greend Forest.


    The gathering of so many witcher-knights was certain to incite fear and terror among the local nobles. The nobles were prone to believe that the secret movements of the knights were a sign of the king stripping the nobles of their power. It was extremely likely to cause local bacsh from the nobles.


    Thus, finding the enemy quickly, defeating them, and exterminating them was the main problem the vanguard leader had to solve.


    Supposedly, even two of the three Dragon Knights in direct service of the king himself had left their posts and were rushing here to eliminate this group of invaders that could bring disaster to this ne. Apparently, even the legendary Holy Knight Sir Willis would personallymand the battle against the ne invaders then.


    That¡¯s a Holy Knight that was at the Fourth Grade!


    One has to note that he¡¯s the only Fourth-Grade Holy Knight of this ne!


    Ninther could feel his heart ame when he thought of having the chance to fight and charge alongside this legendary war god of a knight. He was willing to sacrifice his own life for the holy mission of "protecting the world", thus fulfilling the oath he made when he became a witcher-knight.


    Eliminating the darkness, protector of the weak, fearless!


    Ninther silently chanted the motto of the knights, the glint in his eyes bing brighter as he did so.


    ............


    The abnormal situation in Blue Hillock City was quickly transmitted by Mary back to the adepts¡¯ base.


    But the four n adepts were busy with constructing the temporary adepts¡¯ tower as well as creating guardian voodoo beasts. None of them could spare any energy to reinforce Greem, Mary, and Acteon.


    The only thing they could do now was construct arge-scale illusion barrier as soon as possible, reducing the chances of the enemy finding the camp from the skies. As for this wave of a hundred witcher-knights, Greem and the rest had to find a way to kill them themselves.


    If they let the opponent split into multiple squads and wander about the forest, who knew if they would identally wander into the illusion barrier.


    Even though there were plenty of disagreements and discord between them, when the hostile army was arriving, Greem and the rest could only swallow their grudges and work together. Therefore, they met in a hidden valley to discuss their action n.

 Chapter 176

    Chapter 176 Gathering of the Three


    The location of the meeting was set in the mountain ridge at the edge of the forest.


    Greem was wearing a ck robe, calmly sitting there as he poked the crackling fire with a stick. The campfire before him flickered, bright one moment, dim the next.


    The impromptu meeting point seemed empty. With the exception of the trees swaying in the wind, there was nothing, not even the golem army Greem always brought with him.


    It didn¡¯t take long before a sound came from the trees in the west. A man, also in a ck robe, came out of the woods with a group of subordinates who walked with abnormal postures.


    It was Acteon and his bunch of bugmen!


    It seems Acteon had absolutely no trust in his twopanions, even though he chose to attend the meeting. He even brought the bugmen force that he had just managed to amass for his own safety.


    Shortly after stepping out from the trees, Acteon stopped.


    He was not friendly enough with Greem to share a seat and drink with him by the same fire. Moreover, he wasn¡¯t an idiot. Wasn¡¯t the pile of rocks by Greem¡¯s side, that looked like a natural formation, his stone serpent in disguise?


    Two y golems were hidden in the earth beneath the fire, while a fire elemental would probably leap out of the fire itself at any moment. There were even those almost invisible wind elementium golems floating above the top of the trees nearby.


    If Acteon had gone to Greem¡¯s side, it would be no different than putting your neck before the fangs of a tiger. When that happened, your life was all up to the tiger. Acteon would never do something idiotic like that!


    After he arrived, Acteon kept observing Greem¡¯s golem army that was hidden all over the ce. Greem, too, was assessing Acteon¡¯s bugman army.


    It seems they had been able to retain their external human shape. They were only stiff and slow in their movements. With Greem¡¯s really ¡®good¡¯ eye for evaluating things, he could tell that the bugmen were not significantly stronger then they had been in their previous lives. This meant that Acteon didn¡¯t intend to rely on them for battles.


    If their individual strength had not increased, then the bugmen were definitely for another special purpose! Was it to have them be the host body of numerous scorpions? Or do they have some special ability to transform?


    For a moment, even Greem had no clear idea of the use of Acteon¡¯s bugmen army.


    Ever since he became an adept, Greem¡¯s greatest feeling was that the constraints ofw and morality on him had vanished. Hisprehension of the fire-elementalws let him sense the existence of the ne consciousness for the first time, and indirectly let him experienced the power and profundity of the adepts.


    Anyone that became an adept had terrifying means that drew directly from the narws. Even a low-level apprentice spell would have the powerful ability of affecting the soul and interacting with news- if it was cast by the hands of an adept.


    This made battles between adepts extremely precarious. Even a slight misstep could put you in big trouble!


    When Acteon was still an apprentice, he only had the ability to split into bugs and share damage between all his bugs. These abilities could easily be dealt with as long as you prepared specialized means to do so. But now that Evil Bugs Acteon had be an adept, along with this period of time that he used to improve and cover up his deficiencies, his powers and methods were once again mysterious and unknown.


    Even Greem was not willing to break into open conflict with such an unpredictable opponent withoutplete certainty of victory.


    Just as the two were assessing each other, while staying a hundred meters apart, Bloody Mary arrived!


    She didn¡¯te alone.


    The pping sound of beating wings rumbled endlessly as seven bloodsucking bats emerged from east of the woods. Theynded on the ground and turned into humans. The first of them was naturally Mary, whom Greem hadn¡¯t seen in several days. The ones following behind her were the army of blood servants she had just amassed.


    These little fellows had justpleted their transformation into vampires, and had no chance to experience the power of the adepts. As such, they bared their fangs and threatened everyone present the moment theynded, in a show of loyalty towards their mistress.


    Greem and Acteon ignored their provocation, paying attention to the individual power they had.


    Of the seven blood servants, three were powerful men that could rival pseudo-adepts, while the other four were as powerful as advanced apprentices.


    This amount of power might not beparable to the subordinates of the other two yet, but one needed to factor in the fact that Mary had created this army in the matter of several days. Once Acteon included the factor of time, he had no choice but reevaluate Mary¡¯s power.


    Three adepts!


    Three adepts that advanced on the same day!


    As they gathered once more in this other world, even though their wary eyes were still filled with distrust, they all considered each other as strong and worthy opponents in their hearts.


    At least for Acteon, this was the case. He had always thought of Mary as a decorative character. He had absolute confidence he could crush Mary without Greem¡¯s meddling. But now, it seemed Mary would be as terrifying as Greem if she was given the chance to show her power!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help butugh bitterly in his heart when he saw Mary¡¯s gloating expression.


    Mary was still too driven by her need to show her superiority.


    Even though they were already inseparable ¡®strategic allies¡¯ and ¡®battlepanions¡¯ whose lives were intertwined, Greem¡¯s excessively dominant position in their rtionship had provoked Mary¡¯s fragile and sensitive heart.


    Mary¡¯s actions this time were both meant to intimidate Acteon, as well as to unt her strength in front of Greem!


    Acteon might only be able to see the strength and power of Mary¡¯s subordinates, but Greem had done extensive research on her body. He could see past her superficial strength to see her weakness.


    How could there be no price for creating blood servants?


    The Embrace might look like she was taking the blood from the victim, but in truth, she was transfusing part of her blood essence into the victim¡¯s body to achieveplete control over the victim.


    With Mary¡¯s power, there might not have been a problem if she had taken her time to create the blood servants, along with the nourishment of plenty of blood treats. But for the sake of looking strong, she had Embraced so many blood servants in such a short time. This also meant that she would becking arge amount of her blood essence in the short term.


    This was a tremendous loss that was hard to be mitigated, even with days of devouring blood!


    Now that the three had arrived, the battle conference began.


    First, Mary gave a simple description of the witcher-knights¡¯ strength.


    The witcher-knights that were about to advance into the Greend Forest this time numbered 117. Most of them were low-level witcher-knights. There were only fifteen of them that were Spellbreaker Knights, who had power rivaling the adepts. This also meant that in the following days of fighting in the woods, the three of them would have to deal with enemies five times their number, as well as an army several dozen timesrger than their own forces.


    Without the fifteen Spellbreaker Knights, any number of witcher-knights were only prey waiting to be hunted. But with spellbreaker knights now in the mix, their hunt was going to be significantly harder.


    One mistake and they could lose their lives!


    None of the three here had any intention or spirit to bravely sacrifice themselves. The only reason they were here was because the situation gave them no other choice. Moreover, they wanted a taste of ne wars. As long as there was benefit to be gained, they would do the job. Of course, the dangerous tasks were something no one wanted to do.


    Adepts were a group of cold and selfish individuals. All their ns and schemes were for themselves, and themselves only.


    Everyone wanted the jobs that gave huge rewards with no risk. And everyone wanted to avoid the jobs that were risky and demanded great sacrifice!


    ording to Mary, the group of witcher-knights intended to split into twelve smaller groups once they entered the Greend Forest. Then they will keep a certain distance from each other while sweeping through the entire forest.


    Greem and Acteon were naturally delighted to hear this news!


    In their eyes, a scattered iron fist was amb waiting to be culled. It may be a thorny encounter, but it was far from enough to deter them.


    However, the enemies were way too spread out. There was only three of them. It was hard topletely keep track of the enemies¡¯ movements. Should any of the enemies identally wander into the adepts¡¯ base, the situation would be out of their control.


    The Continent of Witchers might strongly reject the existence of spellcasters, but the witchers themselves still used primitive magical equipment. If any of them had some kind of long-distancemunication tool with them, they would be able to reveal the location of the adepts¡¯ base; the three of them would fail their mission that way.


    Perhaps an even stronger wave of witcher-knights would attack the adepts¡¯ base directly, under the lead of higher grade knights. Then, not only would the adepts¡¯ camp be in danger, even Greem and the others would have nowhere to rest, caught between the two and crushed to oblivion.


    So after the three had a quick discussion, they agreed that they could not let the witcher-knights wander about just for the ease of hunting. They had to find a way to contain the knights before they even entered the Greend Forest.


    And doing so required them to have a full-on battle with the knights!


    All three of them were decisive adepts. After a brief summary of the information they had, they quickly produced a simple battle n and divided the tasks between themselves.


    Fifteen minutester, Acteon turned back, bringing with him his bugman army and retreating into the woods, disappearing in the depths of the forest.


    Mary let out a whistle, and instantly her blood servants turned into bloodsucking bats, beating their wings as they circled around her.


    Greem called out, seeing that she was about to leave.


    "Mary, catch!"


    A y urn the size of a fist flew towards Mary, who was about to take off.


    Mary caught the urn. Still confused, she shook it. The sound of a viscous liquid sloshing about came from inside. Her eyes lit up. She opened the urn and the thick and pungent odor of blood filled her nose.


    The bloodsucking bats circling around immediately became excited.


    Mary smiled as she kept the urn. The next instant, she vanished from the spot in a red sh!

 Chapter 177

    Chapter 177 Bait


    Colca Vige had be a ghost vige!


    This colossal news started to spread quickly through Blue Hillock City. Soon, it found its way to Ninther¡¯s ears.


    ording to mercenaries who frequently entered Greend Forest, the Colca Vige, near the edge of the forest, had be a ghost vige overnight. All the vigers had vanished! More surprisingly, everything within the vige had been untouched. Be it food, clothing, the houses, or even the animal leather and mountain herbs treasured by the vigers- all of it had been left where it was. The only thing missing was the living.


    From vigers, hunters, all the way to the hunting dogs, the cows and the sheep- as long as it was a living thing- everything had vanished, with not a single track that indicated that they had left.


    The few mercenaries that passed by were terrified, and med it all on the supernatural. Immediately, they ran all the way back to Blue Hillock City and reported the incident to the casten.


    And so, in a single day, all sorts of rumours took Blue Hillock City by storm!


    Some said that a monster had appeared in the forest. Some imed that the vigers were infected by some sort of gue. Some were even more preposterous, spreading the news that some terrifying heretics had appeared there......


    As everyone in Blue Hillock City panicked over the incident, Ninther had already invited the mercenaries into the camp and had to describe all the details they had seen.


    That very night, all one hundred of the witcher-knights suddenly left Blue Hillock City, rushing swiftly towards Colca Vige where the mysterious disappearances had urred.


    Twenty kilometers of mountain road was nothing for the witcher-knights, who were used to traversing long distances. Moreover, most of the knights here were elites from all over the country. Their mounts were also no ordinary warhorses, but specially trained magic colts.


    These magic colts wererger and stronger than ordinary warhorses, possessing fangs and sharp teeth simr to beasts of the woods. More terrifyingly, special scales that were akin to scale armor grew on their bodies, allowing them to shrug off attacks from sharp weapons.


    These magic colts yed a significant part in ensuring the witcher-knights were able to ride unchallenged throughout this entire ne.


    These magic colts were only avable for the elites amongst the witcher-knights, so it was hard to even see one in a ce as rural as Blue Hillock City.


    Thanks to the magic colts¡¯ beast-like agility, and sharp ws that excelled at climbing cliffs, the witcher-knight army managed to quickly arrive at Colca Vige, situated in the middle of the mountain.


    When they arrived, it was almost dawn already. A thin ribbon of white light had already surfaced on the horizon far away.


    Still, walking into the deste vige still sent shivers down the spines of the knights.


    Most of the witcher-knights stayed outside the vige. Only the elites who had advanced into spellbreaker knights followed Ninther on their horses into the small vige. Besides proficiency in all sorts of knight battle techniques, some of these elites also possessed several other unique skills.


    Several dozens torches the size of an arm were ced all over the vige!


    Multiple witcher-knights who were skilled at tracking immediately started a detailed search of Colca Vige. Soon, some hidden clues started to surface.


    Plenty of odd bug sheddings and broken insect exoskeletons were found. They even foundrge amounts of torn clothes, and human limbs that hadn¡¯t been cleanly devoured, in a straw house.


    Judging from all the clues, Colca Vige had been attacked without warning two nights ago.


    The direction of the attackers pointed towards the northwest of Greend Forest nearby, while the attacker themselves seemed to be some kind of terrifying magical insectoid creature.


    Just as the elite knights gathered to discuss their n of pursuit, a horrified yell came from the direction of the witcher-knights outside the vige.


    "Bugs......bugs......"


    "They are bugs......"


    "Everyone be careful!"


    The chaotic noise caused Ninther, the leader of the army, to have a change in expression. Almost instantly, he leapt onto his magic colt and pped it on the back, charging out of the small mountain vige.


    The witcher-knights outside the vige were inplete disarray now. Under the light of numerous torches, the knights closest to the forest were stamping their feet without stop, as if they were fighting with something. Three witcher-knights had already fallen beside them, no longer moving even an inch.


    Ninther had just ridden his magic colt there when he was shocked by the horrifying scene before him.


    Scorpions; lots of scorpions, waves of scorpions, mountains of scorpions......


    Countless ck scorpions were already crawling on the bodies of the three witcher-knights that fell to the ground. The odd sounds of armor and bones being chewed didn¡¯t stop. Very quickly, two of the five knights, still struggling amidst the swarm of bugs, were stung by the ck stingers of the scorpions and fell in a daze.


    The other three grabbed onto ropes tossed over by theirpanions, and were fortunate enough to have been dragged out of the swarm.


    "Where did these bugse from?" Ninther asked loudly.


    "From the inside of the forest! They swarmed out of the forest and attacked us while we were resting......" An elite knight that had stayed behind shouted back.


    "Set fire to them......use fire to burn them......"


    Following Ninther¡¯smand, torch after torch was thrown into the swarm of bugs, falling like raindrops in the ocean. Some witcher-knights even disassembled the hunters¡¯ wooden houses and threw the straw and wooden boards into the fire. As the crackling sound of burning fat, and the pungent odor of scorched flesh filled the air, the rampaging swarm was finally scared, retreating back into the forest like a tide.


    "Sir, look!" A witcher-knight suddenly eximed.


    Ninther followed the direction he was pointing at, and with the help of the strand of dawn light, he was able to see a mysterious ck silhouette in the depths of the forests, where the swarm of bugs had disappeared.


    It was a mysterious silhouettepletely covered in a ck robe. It had arge frame, and a pair of ghostly green eyes that were silently looking over from under the shadow of its hood.


    "Heretic!" Ninther said, his rage saturating every syble of the word.


    There was no need for his instructions. Already, a dozen rune bows had been drawn into full moons. Qiang! Qiang! Qiang!......a series of cracks could be heard as the bowstring were released. A dozen me arrows streaking red light shed through the dark sky, turning the spot where the silhouette was standing into a burning field.


    The odd, ck-robed silhouette only flickered for a second at the edge of the sea of fire, before vanishing into the depths of the woods.


    "Chase!" Ninther waved his arm vigorously, and turned his head to shout backwards, "Edward, you lead the army forward. I¡¯ll go intercept him with some troops!"


    Having said that, Ninther brought along seven or eightpanions. They drove their magic steeds to their limits and quickly disappeared into the dark woods.


    The red sun was already halfway past the horizon. The darkness in the woods was slowly receding.


    The thin mist slowly dissipated under the sunshine, spreading moist air inside the forest.


    The mysterious silhouette constantly flickered in the depths of the woods far away. Ninther had shot several me arrows with his bow, but the shadow had managed to dodge them all while still retaining its speed.


    The magic colts were like terrifying demons, dashing through the woods, scaling cliffs and crossing rivers with ease. The magic colts only needed to jump, aided by the boost of their sharp ws, to cross a small hill nine meters high. The colts could run as if they were in flight, regardless of how rocky and uneven the roads were, as if they were sprinting on t ground.


    The well trained witcher-knights bent their bodies and leaned onto the backs of the magic colts. They rode on the colts as they jumped and sprinted across vines, bushes, and woods with weeds half the height of a human, closely tracking the mysterious flickering silhouette.


    This was not recklessness or fearlessness on the part of the witcher-knights; rather, it was part of theirbat style and methods.


    On the Continent of Witchers, the heretics were few in number and always the targets of pursuit and chase, never able to form an organized or powerful force. Thus, the witcher-knights would always track the heretics relentlessly once they found them, rarely wondering about boring and pointless things like the possibility of the opponent setting a trap.


    Yet they had no idea that as they were riding on their horses and speeding across the dense woods, several other mysterious silhouettes was already on their tail, quickly approaching them from above the forest canopy.


    This was a group of odd bloodsucking bats.


    They had wide bat wings and agile movements, effortlessly weaving through the dense foliage, silently closing in on the group of witcher-knights.


    The knight at the rear of the formation was a veteran. His magic colt was already fairly old, and it couldn¡¯t keep up with the stamina and explosive movements of itspanions. Seven minutes of riding had put a distance of a dozen meters between him and hispanions in front.


    With the speed of the magic colts, this distance could hardly be called falling behind. But even so, this distance still caused him to be caught in an ambush.


    Even though he hadn¡¯t heard anything, the senses honed from numerous years in the service alerted him to something odd behind him.


    Vignt, he grabbed the hilt of his sword, bent his body, and turned around slightly to look.


    There was no movement at all in the dark woods. Not a single enemy appeared in his sight.


    Was the bad feeling in his heart just him being oversensitive?


    Just as he was hesitating, he caught a glimpse of something odd above him from the corner of his eyes.


    The enemy was above!


    A bloodsucking bat that had swooped down in front of him suddenly charged forward before he could do anything. In a fraction of a second, Its furry body transformed into a young man with blood-colored eyes and sharp ws.


    The young man in the air knocked the witcher-knight off his magic colt, and the two started a savage fight as they tussled. Before they had evennded, more bloodsucking bats charged forward, transforming into vampires. They ignored the knight¡¯s attempt to resist and struggle, quickly leaping on him.


    In just a few seconds, the witcher-knight had been drained of blood and killed, savaged by the attacks of half a dozen vampires. Just then, the witcher-knight closest to the rear of the group up ahead faintly heard the sound of savage fighting and thrashing behind him as he rode. When he turned back to look, all he saw was a mouth lined with sharp teeth rapidly closing in on him.

 Chapter 178

    Chapter 178 The Great Battle of Vampires and Spellbreaker Knights


    The red sun had already risen above the horizon, but the depths of the woods were still dimly lit.


    As the witcher-knights were hot in pursuit, dashing across the dense woods, groups of bloodsucking bats nked them from behind. Swiftly, they pounced and tackled the witcher-knights in the rear, one after another.


    With their leathery wings and the ability to fly silently, along with their ability to shift rapidly between their batform and human form, none of the witcher-knights were able to defend against the sudden attack when they dove down from above.


    Of course, any knight that made it into this army was no weakling. Even if they were caught by surprise, they were still able to counter attack, severely wounding the attacking vampires. But their bravery in the face of death was useless against the vampires. All they had to do was devour a little fresh blood, and all sorts of serious injuries would be healed in a matter of seconds.


    And so, with their tactic of tackling and then surrounding......then tackling and surrounding again, the groups of vampires took turns and were able to silently kill seven of the witcher-knights.


    Until......


    A pained scream rang through the forest!


    Half of the witcher-knights heard the tragic scream from behind them, even as they were busy chasing the heretic. They turned their heads and were surprised to find a bunch of strange demons tackling one of theirpanions that had fallen behind, quickly bing overwhelmed in a swarm.


    A spellbreaker knight let out a battlecry, and tugged on the reins of the warhorse. The magic colt lifted its front limbs, and turned around while its body was still in the air. It kicked a giant tree with its thick hind legs, and rushed forward with the momentum.


    Two dozen witcher-knights in the rear turned around following his battlecry, but their movements were not as smooth or natural as the spellbreaker knight. As a result, they were twenty or thirty steps behind him.


    However, their arrows arrived before they did!


    With a loud snap of the bowstring, a me arrow streaked through the air and pinned a vampire to a tree behind him. The arm-length bolt had sunk into the vampire¡¯s heart, securely pinning him to therge tree. Only a small length of the bolt protruded out of the vampire¡¯s chest.


    A human would have died from a pierced heart. But this vampire was still lively, vigorously trying to struggle free. The vampire ignored the burning from the arrow¡¯s elemental mes and grabbed the end of the arrow with his sharp, wed hands, trying to pull it out with all his might. Sadly, it wouldn¡¯t budge.


    With no other choice, the vampire used its limbs to leverage itself against the tree trunk, pushing his body out from the end of the arrow. This action undoubtedly caused the wound on his chest to be evenrger, leaving behind a hole one could see through.


    But the vampire didn¡¯t care about the injury and leapt on the witcher-knight that was still struggling on the ground. A momentter, when he climbed up from the opponent¡¯s body, the terrifying gash on his chest had already disappeared. The exposed skin was still white and smooth.


    "Monsters......These are a bunch of monsters......"


    The spellbreaker knight that saw this roared. He tossed aside the runic bow- it was too weak-and drew his runic sword. As his palm ran across the cool de, ayer of magic mes swallowed the sword, turning it into a terrifying torch.


    With a shout, the colt beneath him suddenly elerated, and piercing through the crowd of flying vampires. A dozen me trails crisscrossed in the sky and slowly dispersed. The dozen vampires, that had just finished with the broken corpse of the fallen witcher-knight, suddenly split into several pieces and exploded into a rain of blood, flesh, and pieces of bones.


    These were low-level vampire spawn after all. They were far less intelligent and resilient than true vampires. Even their bloodsucking regenerative abilities were significantly weaker. Thus, they could only die a horrible death under thebined strength of the spellbreaker knight¡¯s battle-technique and ming longsword.


    The sess of the spellbreaker knight boosted the morale of the waning witcher-knights. They activated the runic swords in their hands, shouting as they charged towards the remaining vampires.


    This was the terrifying strength of the knights of this ne? Suppressing the strength of arcanology, diverting their attention to strengthening the physical body, as well as the use of special battle techniques?


    Mary pondered silently, before opening her blood-red eyes.


    After that amazing strike, the spellbreaker knight turned around and shouted to boost the morale of hispanions. Just as he pped his colt and was about to begin another charge, his muscles tensed, and his body stiffened.


    The magic colt below him already felt what he was thinking. Under his urging, the magic colt slowly turned its body. The spellbreaker knight¡¯s eyes shed. His cold eyesnded on the top of a tree far away, which was shrouded by leaves.


    A hundred meters away, on top of that tall tree, theyers of branches and leaves had hidden the enemy¡¯s body, but they could not hide those terrifying pair of crimson eyes. When his gaze met with the enemy¡¯s, a heavy air of blood spread across the battlefield.


    This was a heretic that was as powerful as he was! Was today¡¯s urrence a trap they hadid out beforehand? No, I must ry this news to Ninther......


    Faced with the situation before him, several ominous thoughts surfaced in knight¡¯s mind. But just as he was distracted, the pair of bloody eyes suddenly disappeared..


    This was bad!


    The spellbreaker knight gathered his focus while raising his left arm. The small shield on his arm activated to form an oval energy-shield that covered the front of his body entirely.


    The energy shield had just barely formed when a swift impact smashed into it. Five terrifying w marks appeared on the the semi-translucent shield.


    The spellbreaker knight grunted, and used the energy shield to divert the slim silhouette pushing against it. A me de shed forth from his right hand.


    Normal witcher-knights could only use the runic weapons to achieve abined strike of physical and elemental force in melee range, while relying on the runic bows for long-ranged attacks. But spellbreaker knights were able to rely on a unique way of attacking to infuse elemental energy into the invisible shockwaves of their blows, forming a mid-range knight battle technique.


    The range of such knight battle technique attacks were not veryrge. Most of them could reach five to ten meters away. Once they exceeded this range, the shockwave would disperse, and the attached elemental energies would naturally disperse as well, causing the might of the attack to severely deteriorate.


    But this kind of elemental shockwave, that could extend freely and escape the constraints of the weapon itself, could bring about horrifying damage to enemies within ten meters. The crude elemental shields conjured by normal heretics could not defend against the double blow of elemental damage, and the shockwaves¡¯ ability to break through defenses.


    As such, the deciding factor for any witcher-knight advancing to spellbreaker knight was their ability to condense and unleash this unique shockwave!


    Of course, this was a secret closely guarded by the witcher-knights. Today, Mary was about to use her body to personally experience the terrifying power of the knight battle-technique.


    The me des were like burning scimitars shing through the skies, quickly chasing after Mary¡¯s retreating silhouette and stopping her from escaping.


    A fierce grin appeared on Mary¡¯s pretty face. She didn¡¯t retreat. Instead she stepped forward, her sharp ws shing and leaving behind eightyers of visible bloody marks in front of her. In the next second, the blood marks shed with the me des,busting into a small firestorm.


    The countless fine me-de shards caught in the violent explosion flew everywhere, whistling through the wind like bullets shot from a gun. Normal elemental shields would not be sufficient to defend against such concentrated and wild attacks!


    The spellbreaker knight tightened his grip on the shield in his left hand, and the sword in his right hand. While staring at the burning field, a st of wind struck from above.


    The spellbreaker knight looked up in surprise, just in time to see Bloody Mary dropping down from above.


    The explosion of the ming fragments had also wounded Mary. Most of the me-de shards had been deflected by her summoned crimson protection. Layers of blood-red roses dispersed the numerous attacks.


    However, some of the shards still managed to pierce through her blood-red defense, leaving scratches all along Mary¡¯s body and limbs. The fine shards remained embedded in Mary¡¯s body, their fires still persistently burning......


    Yet even faced with such wounds, Mary was not any less courageous. She did not retreat to treat her wounds, but chose to sneak above the enemy to attack once again.


    The unexpected sneak attack did not give the knight enough time to form the shockwave within his body. He could only tightly grip the magic colt with his legs and drive it forward. He rested his back on the horse¡¯s back, the shield on his left hand blocking Mary¡¯s ws that struck down again.


    The sharp ws screeched as they shed on the semi-translucent shield. The violent impact was notpletely deflected. The shield was pushed down, causing the spellbreaker knight¡¯s back to crash heavily into the magic colt¡¯s spine.


    The colt beneath him let out a pained whinny as it continued to run forward.


    Mary, who had been pushed away by the tremendous recoil, immediately unfurled her bat wings and leapt towards the knight as if she defied physics itself. A blood red longbow suddenly appeared in her hands, and a mysterious scarlet, crystalline arrow converged on the half-drawn bowstring.


    "Go!"


    With a shout, a hundred blood red arrow images filled the space between Mary and the spellbreaker knight.


    Goddamn, what is this attack!?


    The spellbreaker knight, who had never seen a close-ranged adept attack like this one, was shocked. He swung around and instantly and sent a cross cut from his sword, neutralizing most of the scarlet arrow rain. The energy shield on his left hand was directed about frantically, barely deflecting some of the arrows that shot past the cross cut.


    Even so, both him and his mount were peppered with blood arrows that had managed to pierce through his shield and battle technique, covering them with numerous wounds. If it wasn¡¯t for the protection of his runic armor, and the scales of the magic colt, the attack just now would have severely wounded them.


    The spellbreaker knight let out a battlecry and turned his horse around, charging towards Mary, who was catching up on foot.


    One of them was a mysterious vampire adept from a different ne; the other a powerful spellbreaker knight that stood high in this ne. The two powerful beings of different races with differentbat styles, savagely shed against each other, just like that!

 Chapter 179 Unsuccessful Bait

    Chapter 179 Unsessful Bait


    Theoretically the vampire adept and the spellbreaker knight were fairly even in power.


    However, the racial advantage was evident when the two started fighting with all their strength.


    On one hand, you had a terrifying vampire whose race could be found in all high-magic nes, while on the other you had a normal human who had only strengthened his physical strength andprehended some special uses of Elementium crystals. The spellbreaker knight might be able to force a stalemate against Mary by using his skilled and potent knight battle-techniques.


    However, once the battle had turned into a critical fight on the edge of life and death, the terrifying traits of Mary¡¯s race became the deciding factor. Her resilient Physique and regenerative ability far outssed her opponent and gave her the edge. After three rounds of battle, Mary had the advantage on the battlefield and was slowly turning the advantage into aplete beatdown.


    Mary, being a vampire adept, did not need to suck the blood directly out of her opponents to regenerate. As long as she did a substantial amount of damage, she could gain an endless stream of blood energy from her opponent¡¯s blood that sshed everywhere.


    An opponent that became stronger as the fight went on, whose strength did not decrease as their wounds increased, was the scariest nightmare for the spellbreaker knight. It didn¡¯t matter how severe a wound he dealt to Mary. As long as Mary was able to deal an equally severe wound to him, he would never have a chance of defeating her!


    For that one moment, the spellbreaker knight thought he was fighting against himself...no, fighting against his own blood! Every sh he made wasn¡¯t making his opponent bleed, it was making him bleed. His opponent only needed to trade him blow-for-blow, and she would go unscathed in this fight.


    He would only continue to weaken!


    The angered shouts and cries of many witcher-knights could be heard from the nearby battlefield. They must have met the same problem as he did! If this had been a normal situation, he would have broken through the opponent¡¯s blockade, gathered with hispanions, and fought together against this powerful enemy.


    However, he couldn¡¯t do that today.


    The demon before his eyes was clearly the that terrifying group¡¯s leader and had strength far above them. If he led her to hispanions...there would probably not be a single one of them who could escape from her mysterious shadow that was as fleeting as a phantom and constantly flickering about.


    He was still hanging on with all his might, waiting for reinforcements and help from hispanions.


    The knights in front would most definitely realize that thirty witcher-knights had fallen behind and send people to look for them. As long as he join up with one or two of his spellbreaker knights, defeating this terrifying blood demon was not an issue with their cooperation and teamwork.


    As expected, the unique sound of magic colts sprinting rang out in the woods far away.


    The spellbreaker knight, who waspletely exhausted and pale in the face, instantly got his energy back and continued to fight with vigor. Sadly, as he waved about his me longsword and sent out two me des to push away the demon, she charged forward instead of retreating as he predicted. She cancelled the protection of her crimson armor, allowing the me des to slice through her body and explode like fireworks behind her.


    Using the opportunity she bought with her severe injuries, she dodged past the knight¡¯s sword and shield and leapt onto his body. She wrestled with him using all her savage might.


    The spellbreaker knight might be wearing aplete set of knight¡¯s armor, but there were gaps in between each individual piece. This doomed him to the fate of being torn at by Mary¡¯s cruel bites and rending ws.


    Thus, the witcher-knight reinforcements watched bleakly as a spellbreaker knight, who they hailed to be strong and valiant, was tossed off his horse like an emptied waterskin. The magic colt whinnied in pain before also falling, a bloody hole on the back of its head spurting blood out in a fountain.


    The terrifying person bathing in blood had a voluptuous figure, but in the eyes of everyone present, she was no different than a demon merely wearing the skin of a seductive beauty.


    Mary extended her wide bat wings, floating in the sky with blood covering her body. She raised her chin and using her lithe tongue to swallow the blood slowly dripping from her bloody hand.


    Behind her, a dozen witcher-knights had been tackled off their colts by the vampires flying in the sky. The knights screamed in terror with all their strength as the vampires swarmed them. As for the other witcher-knights, only their corpses remained, strewn about the woods. The magic colts that had lost their owners stomped, sprinted about, and ran away in a panicked frenzy, soon disappearing in the miserable morning mist......


    Ninther, who had led the reinforcements back, let out an angered howl that spread throughout the battlefield. He waved his runic sword, thick as a pir of me, and drove his colt forward in a frenzy.


    Mary grinned wickedly before turning around, beating her leathery bat wings and flying up into the canopy. Her blood servants, that just had a feast of their own, let out howls as they followed her away from the battlefield.


    With the vampire¡¯s phantom-like flying speed, the witcher-knights would have no chance of catching up with them in the woods.


    Ninther rode his horse slowly around the terrible battlefield within the woods, having chased away the vampires. The grotesque appearance of each corpse was shocking, but Ninther forced himself to look at each corpse, one by one. Ninther got off his horse and kneeled before the spellbreaker knight¡¯s shrivelled corpse, and silently chanted the knights¡¯ motto, sacred in the hearts of every witcher-knight.


    Slowly, the knights got off their horses and recovered the bodies of theirpanions who fell in battle.


    The entire woods were filled with a dense sorrow.


    "This is a kind of heretic we have never seen before! They should be the group of people our superiors were looking for." The calm and steady Edward rode his horse to Ninther¡¯s side and asked softly, "What do we do next?"


    "Why did they suddenly attack us?" Ninther slowly asked softly as he stood up.


    "Er......" Edward couldn¡¯t help but be stunned, "We¡¯re enemies. Isn¡¯t it natural that they came to attack us?"


    "No!" Ninther raised his face, a brilliant gleam shining in his light brown eyes, "Based on their coordination in both their baiting and their attack, they are beings with extremely high intelligence. Currently, only two heretics have shown their faces, but there are fifteen spellbreaker knights on our side. In a situation with such a huge difference in numbers, they still chose to show their faces and set a trap. All this just because they hate us?"


    "You are saying......"


    "If they revealed themselves here, then there must be a reason- they had no choice but to reveal themselves! And if I¡¯m not wrong......"


    "Their den is nearby, so they have no choice but to find a way to draw us away!"


    The two spellbreaker knights, Ninther and Edward, looked at each other and instantly understood what the other was thinking. They didn¡¯t continue to speak, instead turning around and carefully recovering the body of theirpanion.


    ............


    Greem was sitting crossed-legged on the crest of a far-off hill, but his Spirits had extended all the way to the battlefield fifteen kilometers away.


    He didn¡¯t personally participate in this battle, but thirty of his wind critters were spread over the entirety of the wide battlefield, giving him perfect vision over every action taken his allies and enemies.


    Mary had led her numerous blood servants and vampire spawn in an ambush, killing one spellbreaker knight and twenty-three witcher-knights. This could have been said to be a perfect result. Unfortunately, Ninther was a decisive man. He gave up on pursuing Acteon, and turned back to drive away the vampires, saving the remaining eleven witcher-knights.


    This tiny blemish might not be much! As long as Acteon and Mary had enough time, as well as enough space to battle in, they could slowly chip away at this hundred man witcher-knight army. There wouldn¡¯t be any problem. Even the fifteen-wait, no- fourteen spellbreaker knights would no longer be able to disrupt or prevent this from happening.


    When the adepts who possessed all kinds of odd techniques were pit against the spellbreaker knights who only had powerful melee attacks, their advantage in battle wasn¡¯t just a little. It was an overwhelming andplete advantage. If they were taking turns to fight on an arena, just Mary alone could wipe out all fourteen men from the squad of spellbreaker knights.


    But if they all swarmed simultaneously, Mary could possibly only deal with two people at the same time with her current power. She would probably have a hard time if she faced three spellbreaker knights at the same time. Any more than that, and Mary would have to run.


    Acteon was about the same as Mary. The limit to the number of people he could battle at once was three spellbreaker knights.


    Greem, on the other hand, could deal with five spellbreaker knights at once if he coordinated well with the Fire Lord. Of course, if that happened, he wasn¡¯t sure if he would be able to sessfully retrieve the Fire Lord after the battle.


    Regardless of how they calcted, as long as the opponent managed to join together, their advantage over the three was extremely obvious. To have only killed a single spellbreaker knight in that battle, this was way too innefficient!


    Just as Greem was spacing out and thinking, the witcher-knights in the distance started to move.


    They split into twelve squads, keeping a distance of less than thirty meters between each other, slowly riding their horses in a fan formation as they moved towards the location of the adepts¡¯ base.


    Now it was Greem¡¯s turn to curse and swear!


    With no choice left to him, Greem could only cast a spell to signal Acteon and Mary to return to his side.


    "What¡¯s the matter? Why are we not continuing?" Mary had just consumed all the blood in the body of a spellbreaker knight. She was in an agitated state, with energy flowing all through her body. It was obvious that she was unhappy that they had abandoned the n of baiting the opponent.


    Acteon who was standing alone by the side, didn¡¯t go close to the two. He silently waited for Greem¡¯s reply, his ghostly green eyes hidden under the shadow of his hood.


    "I¡¯m afraid the n will no longer work!" Greem smiled bitterly and helplessly, "The enemy¡¯s leader is also a perceptive man. Their actions are very decisive. It seems they¡¯ve seen through our ns. Now we can only fight them head on."


    Mary was obviously skeptical about this. Silently, shemanded a squad of vampires to nk and tackle witcher-knights at the edge of the formation- only to find that the squad of witcher-knights were led by two spellbreaker knights.


    Moreover, as the vampires were upied with the witcher-knights, the other squads of witcher-knights had quicklye to their aid. Under the two-fold attack of runic bows and des, the group of twelve vampire spawn were decimated before they could even kill a single witcher-knight.


    Acteon was equally skeptical, and sent a clone made of scorpions to bait the enemy, only to have it be destroyed by a terrifying volley of me arrows from the witcher-knights.


    The direction of the army¡¯s search still did not change!


    Only then did the two finally believe that the n had failed and agreed with Greem¡¯s proposal of a head on battle.


    The three immediately split up and began to prepare!

 Chapter 180

    Chapter 180 Battlefield of Lava


    It was decided that the location for the final battle was would be a valley that was slightly tter.


    Of course this location was not the most ideal ce for the final battle. However, this was already the best spot that Greem could find that was located between the witcher-knights and the adepts¡¯ base.


    Due to the continuous harassment by the vampires and the bug swarm, the witcher-knights had to tighten their formation to avoid exposing any openings to the enemy. This caused their marching speed to be as slow down to a tortoise¡¯s speed. But even so, they still arrived at the decided battlefield at midday.


    This was a ce with sparse vegetation and less mountainous terrain. On both sides were rocky hills and flowing streams. Mountain ranges and steep cliffs were everywhere to be seen. If the witcher-knights wanted to continue north, this was the best location for an army their size.


    But now, this ce had turned into a ce of risk and danger that struck despair into the hearts of the knights.


    A frightening volcano stood in the path of the witcher-knights.


    This was a volcano created by human means. Even though it might lose to natural volcanoes in terms of might, it still had the terrifying ability to determine the oue in such a small battlefield.


    Two tall, human-shaped forms stood by each other at one end of the valley. Their domineering bodies werepletely covered in red and ck rocks. Intense red heat radiated from their bodies, scorching the rocks on the surface of their forms and turning them into half-moltenva.


    Their legs, thick as me pirs, were stuck in theva pool below. There was dark redva that was slowly flowing in a hundred meter radius around them. The green grass and tall trees around theva were slowly being lit up by the intense heat. They withered, yellowed, dried out, and slowly tiny sparks of me started to spread......


    With theva pool at the center, the entire valley had be a piece of scorched earth. The ashes of nts at the edge of the field went all the way up to one¡¯s ankle.


    Even though they were forced to fight the witcher-knight army head on, Greem chose to pick a battlefield whose geography would be beneficial to himself. The two steep and mountainous slopes on each side prevented the witcher-knights from surrounding and nking him.


    If the witcher-knights dared gather around theva pool, Greem didn¡¯t mind using his overwhelming and terrifying spells to teach them the terror of meeting an elementium adept on the battlefield!


    A bizarre battlefield, and a bizarre enemy. The witcher-knights were at a loss, having never been in such a situation before. It wasn¡¯t the first time they fought with a heretic, but every time it was the heretics that would be running and hiding from them. It was only when they had been driven to their wit¡¯s end that the heretics would turn around and fight back like a mad dog.


    But......in a situation like the one before their eyes, the heretic was the one that appeared before them, bearing a dominating aura as if he wanted to exterminate them. This was apletely new and unknown feeling for the knights!


    The feeling was a fresh one, but the death trap set by the enemy was also truly terrifying.


    The hearts of every witcher-knight were heavy when they looked at the ever-expandingva pool and the charred trees that had been reduced to charcoal.


    If they wanted to charge at an enemy like this, wouldn¡¯t they have to ride their colts into the pool ofva, wading through a hundred meters of burning rock to get close to the enemy? It might only take five seconds to cross a hundred meter gap when they drove the colts to the limit, but on that viscous and flowingva, could the colts even sprint? How manypanions¡¯ lives, those who had been with them for years, would need to be sacrificed to pave a bloody path to the opponent?


    Countless questions surfaced in everyone¡¯s hearts, instilling a sense of tragedy and grief into each and every one of their actions.


    From on top their magic colts,the fourteen spellbreaker knights slowly stood before the battlefield, examining the terrifying territory their enemy had chosen.


    This was a new enemy!


    This meant that the three heretics had shown their true faces now, if they included the two enemies that appeared previously.


    Ninther rode out of the knights¡¯ formation and drove his colt two steps forward, coldly looking at the tall silhouette standing in the bubbling pool ofva. Two tall humanoids wreathed in me. One was the heretic, while the other was an evil golem he had summoned.


    Ninther had to admit that the heretic before him was more worthy of his admiration, and even more terrifying, than the two sly and wicked heretics earlier.


    Even before they had started the battle, this fellow had sessfully used this unique battlefield he had created to weaken the morale of the witcher-knights. Even though all the witcher-knights were fearless and willing to sacrifice themselves, when confronted with the thought of bing a stepping stone for others to reach the enemy, a sense of grief and tragedy had reced the passion and vigor they needed for an all-out fight.


    It was no longer an impassioned battlecry that rang in the hearts of the knights, but a tragic aria for the sacrifice they would have to make!


    When the warriors stepped foot on the battlefield, they weren¡¯t thinking of how to fight to their best abilities, of how to forge a brilliant victory with their burning blood, but of how they were to sacrifice themselves. This......this definitely can¡¯t be called a high morale!


    p p p......


    Ninther extended his gauntleted hands and started pping in awe of the opponent¡¯s unpredictable psychological tactics.


    The sound of nking metal had a ring of arrogance and determination to it, driving away the pointless worries of the witcher-knights. All the knights raised their heads and looked at their great leader, who had led them from one victory to another. Slowly, the grief and sorrow in their eyes faded, reced with the coolness and determination unique to the noble knights.


    Even if they were fated to die today, they would die with the pride, grandeur, and dignity of a witcher-knight! After all, the one leading them was the pride of all witcher-knights¡ªSpellbreaker Knight Ninther!


    Seeing that he had managed to raise the morale of hispanions, Ninther solemnly instructed, "Alvar, bring one squad with you and cover the left......Anthony, you cover the right with two squads......be cautious, be careful of sneak attacks from the two other heretics that have yet to show themselves. Prioritise defending and guarding. Do not recklessly chase after the enemy!"


    "Understood!" The two spellbreaker knights bowed and epted their orders.


    "Benson, bring 3 or 4 squads with you. Cut some trees to make a path immediately. Be swift......¡±


    "Understood, I¡¯ll be on my way!" A spellbreaker knight with a mean face, and an especiallyrge body, replied loudly. He got down from his horse and immediately led a group of witcher-knights towards the closest patch of trees.


    "Edward, when the opportunity of an attack presents itselfter, you, Daniel, and Joseph will each lead your own troops and guard the rear. I¡¯ll lead the charge with the rest of the spellbreaker knights and kill this overconfident heretic in one blow."


    "No, Ninther, let me lead the charge! The army needs your instructions. It¡¯s better for me to lead the attack!" Edward widened his eyes and rebutted immediately.


    One after another, the remaining spellbreaker knights offered to lead the charge!


    "No, it must be me who leads the charge!" Ninther extended his hands and stopped the knights, "Once the battle starts, not much instructions will be needed. The enemy¡¯s n is simple. The heretic wants to throw us into chaos before him, forcing us to go around or split up our forces. It¡¯s only then that the other two heretics have a chance to ambush us!


    ¡°Thus, it is the man standing before us that is their leader, as well as the shield on their side. What we need to do is use our most powerful and savage attacks to shatter their shield and cause their n of obstructing us to fail.


    ¡°Then, the two heretics hiding in the darkness will lose the element of surprise and be forced to enter the battlefield in order to salvage the losing fight. That is the moment you will surround and attack them with all your might!


    ¡°So I beg of you, allow me to take on the burden of leading the charge!"


    Everyone looked at each other after having heard Ninther¡¯s exnation, and could only nod in agreement.


    Indeed, they had to use their strongest and sharpest squad of witcher-knights to break the opponent with brute force. WIthin the witcher-knights, it was definitely Ninther who was the swiftest and greatest knight. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have been the leader of this knight army at such a young age.


    The witcher-knights in front of theva pool immediately regained their discipline and order under the Ninther¡¯s instructions. The ones in charge of covering the rear went to cover the rear; the ones in charge of cutting down trees to pave a road, went to cut trees. Most of the remaining witcher-knights patrolled the battlefield, wary of the movements of the tall burning humanoid in the sea of mes.


    The nine spellbreaker knights, with Ninther as the leader, had gathered at the front of theva pool. They held their breaths and concentrated as they waited, looking as if they were about to enter a death charge.


    But their battle ns were merely something they came up on their side only; the unpredictability and chaos of the battlefield was far above their expectations. With Greem¡¯s powerful abilities, he would never let them destroy the advantageous battlefield he had crafted with such care!


    As the group of witcher-knights, who had removed their heavy armor, moved heavy logs andrge boulders to the edge of theva pool, both Greem and the Fire Lord raised their up hands high and jointly cast a fire spell¡ªMeteor Shower.


    Under their will,rge swathes of rolling me clouds gathered in the skies of the valley. Then, one after another, fiery meteors plummeted from the sky, dragging with them a thick ck tail. Their target was the witcher-knights who had removed their armor, and whose defense had been greatly reduced.


    "Defend, everybody defend......" A spellbreaker knight with a loud voice shouted.


    More witcher-knights made it to the front of the formation. The runic bows in their hands had been drawn to a full moon, and one after another, me arrows were shot out to intercept the zing meteors crashing down.


    Most of the me meteors were shot by the arrows and exploded into fireworks before hitting the ground. The shattered mes spread out to form an even greater burning sea, but the terrifying physical impact of the me meteors had been mitigated.


    Resisting the low temperature of the sea of mes was no problem for the witcher-knights, even without their heavy armor!

 Chapter 181

    Chapter 181 Surrounded


    With Greem¡¯s habit of thinking things through before acting, there was no way his assault would end right here once the fight had started!


    Greem, who had long turned into the terrifying me Fiend, gripped the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his left hand while starting to loudly chant the obscure and profound words of a spell.


    Following the powerful magic chant, the edges of theva pool began to boil and swell. One after another, frightening fire spirits, magmakin, andvahounds bathed in viscousva rose from the pool, roaring as they charged up the shore.


    The witcher-knights were long prepared for the opponent¡¯s counter attack. Over thirty witcher-knights, armed to the teeth, let out battlecries as they rode their horses and stormed forward, engaging with the fire beings at the edge of theva pool.


    Once again, a towering gigantic shape rose in the center of the pool as everyone was engaged in an intense skirmish. It was the Fire Deity! As a summoned being, it was not as reserved as the golems. The moment it appeared, it strode across with heavy steps, approaching the shore and bringing with hit a sea of mes that stretched towards the sky.


    The witcher-knights could only continuously retreat under the pressure from the terrifying heat wave and the streams of me. They had to avoid the fire damage that wasing from everywhere. Under the lead of the Fire Deity, the previously disadvantaged me beings received a huge boost in morale. Immediately, they started another charge at the knights!


    The several hundred square meterrgeva pool was slowly edging forward with the help of the fire creatures. It almost seemed as if the entire valley was eventually going to be a new volcanic region.


    However, the knights¡¯ retreat was only a feint. Once the fire beings, and the ten-meter tall Fire Deity in particr, had left theva pool, the spellbreaker knights led by Ninther immediately struck them with their fiercest attacks.


    The spellbreaker knights raised their small shields, and used energy shields to deflect the downpour of fiery rain. Enduring the violent blows of fire, knights used the runic swords in their hands to sh at therge body of the Fire Deity. The knights had already swapped out the magic crystals that they used beforehand. This time, it was no longer a ming torch that appeared when the spellbreaker knights activated their longswords, but the power of frost, with ice crystals and snow floating about.


    Countering fire with ice. It was obvious that the knights had their own unique experiences and battle techniques when fighting against heretics.


    The powerful knight battle techniques that were shrouded in the freezing power of ice shed at the Fire Deity, tearing its body and freezing it, causing the Fire Deity¡¯s movements to be slower and stiffer. Surprisingly, an adept-level Fire Deity was unable to endure even a single round of the spellbreaker knights¡¯ blows, shattering into pieces and howling as it crumbled.


    The fragments of the fire-attribute Fire Deity were covered, amazingly, with ice shards of various sizes. Even the terrifying mes themselves were frozen within the light blue ice crystals.


    Ninther lifted a huge ice crystal the size of a cart with his sword, and tossed it into theva pool, where itnded right before Greem¡¯s gigantic body. The object frozen within that crystal was therge head of the Fire Deity. Its terrifying expression was perfectly preserved, trapped in its death howl.


    Was this a terrible attempt at provoking him? Even though these kinds of tricks couldn¡¯t possibly have any effect on adepts, who were famed for their intelligence, the efforts of the witcher-knights¡¯mander were stillmendable and worth some kind of response!


    Greem roared loudly, hisrge me Fiend body stepping through the boilingva, striding towards Ninther.


    Ninther was excited when he saw this. Immediately, he put away his runic sword and started using ice arrows to shoot at Greem, retreating as he continued to shoot. It looked like he wanted to draw his opponent out of theva pool.


    The roars of the Fire Lord who remained behind was even louder, so loud it even shook the earth. One after another, frightening area damaging fire spells covered the skies as they shot towards the witcher-knights. The Fire Lord had no intention of avoiding the fire beings at its side when it cast the spell. In fact, it consciously threw all of the most violent and explosive spells towards the frontline.


    The Fire Lord¡¯s attacks mostly consisted of area damage spells, while Greem¡¯s attacks consisted of concentrated single-target spells. Fearsome spears the size of a human¡¯s waist flew towards the enemy repeatedly, and every so often, the creature would even point and cause a terrifyingva pir to st out from beneath the body of its target.


    Two witcher-knights that were closer to the edge of the fire pools were the ones sted into the air by theva pirs, then blown to pieces by the me spears that sped through the air. Their bodies had been burned to unrecognisable char and ashes by the rain of fire before the blood and flesh even hit the ground.


    The tragic state of theirpanion¡¯s death angered many witcher-knights. One after another their ice arrows, filled with vengeance, shot towards Greem like a violent tempest. Unfortunately, all of the arrows were blocked by three pieces of Lava Shield orbiting about Greem¡¯s body.


    Aspared to the me Shield, the Lava Shield had better fire resistance, as well as a greater resistance against physical damage. Naturally, it did not fear the damage of such a meager rain of arrows.


    After walking forward a bit further, Greem stopped fifteen meters before the edge of theva pool. Heughed loudly as he attacked the witcher-knights with multiple deadly single-target spells.


    The damage of long-ranged spells was greatly reduced on the spellbreaker knights aspared to the witcher-knights. All the spellbreaker knights had mastered mid-ranged knight battle techniques and could intercept the iing fire spells. After a few ineffective attacks, Greem focused his firepower on the weaker witcher-knights.


    Ninther was angry. He could no longer hold back after seeing Greem sniping two or three of his weakerpanions.


    If he could not draw this evil heretic onto the shore, then he would go into the sea of mes to attack him!


    Under Ninther¡¯s silent hand signals, all the witcher-knights started shooting waves of ice arrows as if their lives depended on it. Surprisingly, the target of the ice arrows was not Greem and instead they allnded on theva in front of Greem.


    The power of ice that exploded from a small ice arrow couldn¡¯t even form into a snowke before it was devoured by the boilingva. But even the hottestva cannot resist a constant bombardment of ice arrows! Theva pool around Greem solidified at a visible speed. Ayer of light blue ice crystals appeared on the surface of theva, suppressing the heat and mes from below.


    This kind of ice crystal couldn¡¯t keep theva frozen for very long, but it didn¡¯t need to be for long!


    The spellbreaker knights, that had been waiting for an opportunity, surged forward under Ninther¡¯s lead, and their target was obviously Greem, who had been trapped in the middle of the ice crystals.


    Finally!


    Ninther wanted to draw Greem onto the shore, but Greem also wanted to draw the spellbreaker knights into theva pool!


    Both parties circled each other with their mind games, yet at the same time they both understood each other¡¯s intentions. And so one side had a trick within a trick, while the other decided to go along with the other¡¯s ploy. As for who would gain an edge in the end, that naturally depended on who was more powerful!


    It was an exaggeration to say that Greem was not nervous at all, looking at the spellbreaker knights who were roaring as they charged towards him. After all, he was about to have a deathmatch with nine spellbreaker knights that were of the same power level as him! Until now, Greem¡¯s interaction and battle experience with these spellbreaker knights was still too limited. He didn¡¯t have aplete understanding of their battle tactics and couldn¡¯t analyse them toe up with a solution.


    Thus Greem was also taking certain risks in baiting the enemy himself this time!


    Ever since he started on this journey of bing an adept, Greem had always hid behind the scenes in battles. The ones doing the heavy lifting had always been the golems that he crafted. This effectively reduced the risks and dangers that he personally had to face, but also caused him to fall behind in refining his personalbat skills.


    The group of spellbreaker knights before him were a sizeable threat, but they were far from pushing him to the edge of life and death. Therefore, Greem was nning to take this opportunity to train hisbat skill. Otherwise, if he truly met a powerful enemy that the golems couldn¡¯t deal with in the future, he would have to pay for his weakness with his blood!


    Therefore, even though he knew he could get out of the awkward situation here with a simple Fire Teleportation, Greem chose to stay here and fight without any hesitation.


    Greem roared loudly, and burning streams of me sted out of the three-meter tall me Fiend. Under his agitation, theva pool started to vibrate violently, and the speed at which the newly formed ice crystals were melting sped up abruptly.


    Explosions erupted where the ice crystals were at their weakest, and hot air currents surged up in a rush from below. If any magic colt were to walk over those spots at this moment, it would definitely have been scalded, burned, and sted several dozen meters up into the sky.


    The ice crystals that had once formed a sheet of ice, had been sted into several small inds and crystal shards with barely enough space to stand on, floating amidst theva pool. The blistering pirs of air rose and fell, one after another. This turned theva pool into the devil¡¯s yground, filled with traps everywhere.


    Even though Ninther, still high up on his colt, knew that this could be a killing field that the heretic had crafted for the knights, he still charged forward with no hesitation. The nimble and swift magic colt leapt from piece to piece of the shattered ice crystals as if it was flying. Within two leaps, it had already closed in on Greem.


    And so, on one end was the leader of the three powerful adepts, and on the other was the leader of the witcher-knights- the two had their first contact on the battlefield!


    The runic sword, covered in a thick shroud of ice energy, heavily shed onto the Lava Shield that was floating before Greem. The powerful physical impact instantly shed an opening the size of a fist on the Lava Shield. The overwhelming power of frost surged through the shield, freezing arge patch of raging mes on Greem¡¯s chest.


    Greem, on the other hand, didn¡¯t give ground either.


    Using the momentum as he turned his body, he swung his sizeable ming hand, crashing into the magic colt Ninther was riding on. Instantly, the colt turned into a sizzling fireball as it was blown away.


    Greem wanted to add in a powerful single-target spell for good measure, but the spellbreaker knights following behind Ninther had already arrived, leaping towards him. Greem had no choice but to give up on the idea. For a moment, the bombardment of fire spells at close range and the powerful physical attacks of the me Fiend¡¯s body were executed to perfection, precisely dealing with the attacks of the spellbreaker knights that had surrounded him.

 Chapter 182

    Chapter 182 An Uphill Battle


    The scene before him was very much like the arcade games from his previous life.


    Except now he was the one ying the part of the viinous Boss.


    His three Lava Shields were two meters tall, one meter wide, half a meter thick and made of countless molten rocks that still burned with patchy mes. Red-hotva was still dripping out of the gaps between the stones.


    The spellbreaker knights that leapt in session were all swinging the runic sword in their hands with all their might. Knight battle techniques rained blows of varying colors, crashing onto the Lava Shield and whistling through the air as they did so, shattering the magma, causingva to ssh everywhere.


    The spellbreaker knights could only dash past Greem and try to hit the me Fiend with their most destructive attacks at the moment his back was to them. This was because there weren¡¯t many ice crystal shards left around Greem¡¯s me Fiend body that could be used as a foothold.


    Greem, on the other hand, had turned into a an ungainly giant. He used the Lava Shield to block enemy attacks, while savagely attacking the weak opponents before him; with his fearsome hand shrouded in blistering mes, with his five-meter long me whip formed from concentrated me Elementium, and with fire spells that radiated terrifying Elementium flux.


    Some spellbreaker knights were able to bend their bodies or leap to dodge Greem¡¯s terrifying attacks with their agile bodies. But there were always some who failed to dodge. Faced with a whip that was cutting through the sky, they could only cower and maximize their shields to mitigate the opponent¡¯s attack.


    Faced with Greem¡¯s Strength of 20 points from the me Fiend Transformation, the spellbreaker knights¡¯ pitiful average of 14 Strength was not even worth looking at.. They only had to have minimal contact with the whip, and they would turn into Angry Birds, blown away far off into the sky.


    But the most troublesome attacks from Greem weren¡¯t his slightly clumsy physical blows, but the Ring of Fire that was everywhere.


    Greem, who had a me Body and had transformed part of his body into Elementium, sessfully mastered the Ring of Fire once he advanced to a me adept. This was a domain-type fire spell!


    When Greem bellowed and activated the Ring of Fire, a light red Elementium barrier shaped like a sphere enveloped a hundred square meters area around him. Everything in this area started burning!


    The ground was burning, the grass and the trees were burning, even the sky was burning......


    Everyone that entered Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire had to endure a astounding 13 points of fire damage every second. This level of energy damage was equal to a single offensive spell he activated back when he was a beginner-apprentice!


    There was ava pool below, and Greem with his vicious attacks from above, along with the continuous fire damage they had to endure every second......


    Only the spellbreaker knights, that had some elemental resistance, were able to endure such devastating battle conditions. If it had been a witcher-knight, they wouldn¡¯t even need to be attacked by Greem; just the elemental damage within the Ring of Fire was enough to reduce most of them to ashes.


    The spellbreaker knights had fought with adept-level casters countless times, across several centuries¡¯ history of exterminating heretics. But if one wanted to discuss the difficulty or mysteriousness of a fight, the terrifying me humanoid before them could easily outss ten normal heretics added together.


    The spellbreaker knights rode on their magic colts, leaping on the bobbing ice crystal shards and shing at Greem¡¯s Lava Shield with various angles every so often. In the blink of an eye, two of the three shields had been destroyed. Even the only one left was badly damaged and couldn¡¯t hold up for much longer.


    On the other hand, two of the nine spellbreaker knights had been hit by Greem¡¯s melee attacks, and were sent flying out of theva pool, screaming in pain. The magic colts under them also fell into theva.


    Theva pool below Greem looked like a dark red patch. It wasn¡¯t very shy, but everything in the pool was terrifying half-molten magma. The moment the magic colts fell in, oily ck smoke started rising from their hair, skin, blood, and flesh. Their skin and flesh sizzled as they burned, a sound so terrible no one could bear hearing.


    The colts had no time to even whinny in pain, and had already been devoured by the roiling magma, leaving only a cluster of bubbles on the surface of the viscous dark red liquid.


    There were a sizeable number of witcher-knights at the shore, enduring the me damage from the Ring of Fire, shooting ice arrows into theva pool with all their might to create ice crystal footholds for the spellbreaker knights. After shooting three to four waves of arrows, they had no choice but to swiftly retreat out of the area covered by the scarlet barrier. But just those short ten seconds inside the barrier had already caused all of their exposed skin to be covered with horrifying blisters. Even slightly touching those blisters sent pain straight to the heart.


    They suffered so much even though they were only on the edge of the barrier; the spellbreaker knights surrounding Greem and enduring his attacks had to endure ten times the punishment that they did.


    The two spellbreaker knights that were blown out of the battle were indeed courageous men. Immediately, they got fresh mounts from their witcher-knight subordinates and immediately charged back into theva field.


    Since the start of the battle, Greem had only suffered inconsequential and insignificant injuries, having used the many protectiveyers of defensive fire spells. Now that most of his defensive spells were about to be broken, he finally started to retreat and swap positions with the Fire Lord.


    This was actually a verymon sight in fights between casters and close-ranged melee fighters!


    With the protection of defensive spells, casters could bring about intense elemental damage to their opponents without suffering even a single bit of damage, as if they were the mightiest beings alive. But the moment their defenses were broken, they would almost certainly be killed in a sh by their opponents if they chose to continue engaging the opponents at a close range.


    So the moment things were turning sour, Greem threw out two me Shockwaves, sting back the spellbreaker knights around him. Then, he retreated withrge strides, trying to get to the center of theva pool.


    However, Ninther had been waiting for an opportunity and would never let him escape at this critical juncture. Once more, he drove his magic colt forward, leaping from shard to shard and finally jumping towards Greem.


    Greemughed twice, grimly and chillingly. He waved the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his left hand several times, and fourva pirs rose from theva pool in one go, sealing Ninther¡¯s path forward.


    But it seemed as if Ninther had given up on any thoughts of retreat. He was not forced backwards. Instead, he stepped on top of his magic colt and leapt from it with a shout, amazingly leaping over theva pirs that were zing into the sky.


    He was able to leap over, but his magic colt could not do the same.


    Thus, following pained and tragic whinnies and howls, the magic colt crashed straight into ava pir, its entire body quickly engulfed by the bone-meltingva. The colt¡¯s whinnies stopped. Only some hair, flesh, and charred bones scattered about the ck smoke and cluster of me, before finally settling down and sinking into theva pool below.


    In an instant, even thisst shred of the colt¡¯s existence had vanished!


    Greem had no time to pay attention to the valiant way in which the colt died. All of his attention had been drawn by the shape that was leaping across.


    What was it, did Ninther want to duel him one-on-one? The hero against the demon king?


    Greem halted his retreat. His empty right hand instantly turned into a terrifyingrge hand, shrouded in onyx smoke and intense mes, and grabbed towards towards the flying Ninther.


    Ninther might be able to resist the Ring of Fire¡¯s damage with his body¡¯s magic resistance, but the overbearing heat from Greem¡¯s body went up to three thousand degrees. If it was converted to fire elementium damage, it would go up to 110 points. Let¡¯s not talk about a human. Even a metal pir would turn to putty in three seconds if it was gripped tightly by Greem¡¯s me hand.


    But before therge hand could close its grip, a shing cerulean de sliced through the palm and cut Greem on his broad chest that was bereft of elemental protection.


    Greem jerked his head back and let out a pained roar that rang throughout the woods.


    "I¡¯ll kill you, Ninther!"


    Ninther, who had activated his Evil-Killing sh at a close distance, should theoretically have fallen into theva pool at this point. But he had already prepared for a situation like that and suddenly threw out an odd flying metal w, which attached itself to Greem¡¯s arm. With a slight jerk of the rope, he leapt towards the sky once more.


    Greem loudly roared as his two hands smashed against his own chest. The mes from inside the me Fiend¡¯s body followed the cracks on the surface of its body and sted through in terrifying streams of me.


    These kinds of indiscriminate radial attacks were the scariest!


    The spellbreaker knights were adept at trading blow-for-blow, as well as using their concentrated knight battle techniques to shatter their opponent¡¯s single-target elemental attacks. However, when faced with this kind of unreasonable and indiscriminate attack, their expressions would sour as they could only hide their bodies behind the energy shield, that covered an area of one square meter, and resist this wave of mes.


    Even with Ninther¡¯s rich battle experience and skillful fighting techniques, he could only endure the attacks of his enemy at this moment.


    Boom. A muffled st rang out.


    Ninther was like a tiny boat thrown about in a violent storm¡¯s surging waves as he was sted far away by the ferocious shockwave and streaming mes. The metal w that connected him to Greem didn¡¯t evensted two seconds. Already, it had turned into a pool of red hot g, blown and scattered all over the ce.


    Ninther was blown twenty meters away. It almost seemed like he would fall into the edge of theva pool, but already a swift spellbreaker knight had already driven his horse close, skimming theva¡¯s surface as he caught Ninther and sessfully bringing him back to their side.


    Greem loomed at the center of theva pool. He raised his left hand and looked at the wide gash on his chest. He could a feel an intense pain that pierced his heart.


    After his me Fiend Transformation, this elemental body was mostly filled with molten rock and swirling magma; yet it was also filled with potent me energy that had been steeped in Greem¡¯s will and Spirit.


    At this moment, that me energy was an extension of Greem¡¯s consciousness, and the ces where the me energy extended to was Greem¡¯s body. Thus, even though it was burningva that bled out of therge hand and chest wounds that Ninther caused, the one that was hurting was still his consciousness that was suffused throughout this form.


    Greem plunged his left hand into theva pool below him. After a short while he removed it, and this badly wounded left hand was as good as new again. Once more, he bent his body to scoop up plenty ofva and spread it on his chest. His injury there healed instantly as well.


    The unexpected injury triggered Greem¡¯s rage. He roared loudly as heunched a new wave of attacks!

 Chapter 183

    Chapter 183 Counterattack


    How terrifying were two me giants fighting at their full strength?!


    The witcher-knights could tell you this with their intense and personal experience.


    The me Fiend that Greem transformed into, as well as the Fire Lord, endured numerous ice arrows as they walked to the edge of theva pool. Instantly, the fire spells that filled the skies turned the witcher-knights¡¯ shelter into a terrifying sea of mes.


    One after another, y golems coordinated with the stone serpents, and appearing on the battlefield. Every time they appeared out of nowhere, the monsters would pick up a surprised witcher-knight and tossed him into theva pool. The rest of the job was finished by Greem and the Fire Lord!


    Using this method, Greem had already killed four witcher-knights in a row.


    To draw the spellbreaker knights to him, Greem took the extra risk himself, boldy leaving theva pool and bringing the Fire Lord onto the shore with him. Even the rough muddy shore melted into part of theva pool, flowing with red hotva as the two me giants stepped onto it.


    Thus when the me Fiend strode across the shore, it left behind a dark red trail ofva behind.


    This was a rare chance. Even though Ninther knew it had to be a trick, he couldn¡¯t help but lead his spellbreaker knights forward and surround the enemy.


    Ninther wanted to force Greem into a direct confrontation and Greem didn¡¯t seem to have much of a choice. If this battle started to go overwhelmingly in his favor, the spellbreaker knights that could see no chance of victory would most likely give up on this battle.


    And to let a still-organized witcher-knight army retreat from the battlefield might make the job of surrounding and exterminating them too hard for Acteon and Mary, who were meant to nk them. With their strategy revealed, they would most likely attract even scarier and difficult opponents.


    From the start of battle, Greem had already made the resolution to decimate the knight army.


    For this purpose, he took the risk to go to the frontlines, in order to attract the attention of the spellbreaker knights here and create the best opportunity to cripple and destroy this witcher-knight armyter.


    Now, the ensuing battle quickly reached a most intense stage.


    Eleven spellbreaker knights formed a small group, surrounding Greem and the Fire Lord, as they charged and shed within. Greem and the Fire Lord were knocked about, as the defensive spells on their bodies were cut into wisps of mes as quickly as they formed them. Scores of shes and cuts covered their entire bodies.


    Even so, the two ming titans managed to bring out their battle strength to their limits and resist the knights. At one point, they even managed to instantly kill a spellbreaker knight, who wasn¡¯t able to dodge, with an elegantbination attack.


    Though in doing so, Greem had also lost two advanced-level stone serpents and one pseudo-adept level stone serpent.


    As Greem was slowly bing unable to endure the non-stop attacks from the enemy, he finally waved the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter and summoned another Fire Deity.


    In a sh, three tall and enormous fiery giants stood side by side, with two pseudo-adept level stone serpents and a dozen y golems on the edges. Greem had finally formed a battle line that was capable of both defense and offense with his army of golems.


    The stone serpents and y golems were in charge of defense, obstructing the spellbreaker knights¡¯ reckless and relentless charges. The three me giants were in charge of releasing fire spells with all their might, trying their best to turn everything around them into a sea of mes.


    At this moment, the spellbreaker knights finally realized the huge difference between the heretic before them, and the heretics that they had always fought before. There were always powerful heretics among the ones they fought in the past. But as long as the witcher-knights were willing to make some sacrifices to shatter the tough shields of their opponent, they would only need a single strike to kill them.


    Yet the heretic before their eyes had immense Strength, Physique, and iparable elemental attacks that other heretics did not have. Even though his speed wascking, the weakness was covered by theva domain he had created for himself. To use the opponent¡¯s weakness to attack was simply too hard!


    If there weren¡¯t so many golems sacrificing themselves at every turn, and if there weren¡¯t the immensely powerful Fire Lord, then the powerful spellbreaker knights only needed three or four people to defend against Greem¡¯s attacks, and the rest could swiftly execute him.


    But now, as theva pool continuously expanded, the ces where they could safely stand were rapidly decreasing, and the damage that they dealt to the evil heretic was quickly decreasing as well.


    Once the battle had reached this point, Ninther had no choice but to make a painful choice.


    Admit the loss of this battle and quickly lead the remaining troops out of this sorrowful and upsetting battlefield, Or continue hanging on, waiting for that opportunity to seize victory that might be right around the next turn. As long as they could kill this me giant and obtain the victory on this main battlefield, the other two heretics hiding in the darkness were no big deal.


    It was precisely because Greem kept showing up and giving them asional chances, that the entire spellbreaker knight squad was chained and bound to theva battlefield. Having already suffered so many losses, if they retreated without any results to show for it, it would be a fate even worse than death for the spellbreaker knights that thought of glory as their lives.


    Greem used this precise psychological unwillingness and hesitation of his enemy to drag the battle into the state it was in now.


    But after the second spellbreaker knight was killed under the coordination of Greem, the Fire Lord, and the Fire Deity,Ninther made the painful decision.


    The long and sombre sound of a horn rang across the battlefield. The witcher-knights started to retreat from the battlefield, one after another. They were ready to end this painful suffering where no light could be seen at the end of the tunnel.


    The spellbreaker knights continued harrying Greem and his golem army to allow the witcher-knights a smooth retreat. Blow after blow of powerful knight battle techniques reduced the y golems into mud, sshing everywhere.


    Sadly, the difference in the depth of their strategic thinking caused Ninther to fail to realize the difference between himself and the enemy in who they chose to target. The spellbreaker knight squad he led ced the deciding factor on defeating the enemy leader, Greem. However, Greem had ced all of his hopes of victory on defeating this group of spellbreaker knights!


    Why would it matter how many more witcher-knights there were? Even if was only Greem alone, he was confident he could exterminate all of his enemies within these vast mountains. The only one that concerned him were these spellbreaker knights. Thus, even if he let all the witcher-knights go, he was determined to not let a single one of these spellbreaker knights leave alive.


    Following the retreat horn being blown, the witcher-knights quickly retreated from the valley. A gap of about two hundred meters appeared between the spellbreaker knight squad and the witcher-knight army.


    Seeing this, me Fiend Greem let out a roar that shook the skies. It was finally the time for the decisive blow!


    The first sacrifice was naturally the Fire Deity that could be summoned at any time.


    It shook its ten meter tall and terrifying bod, and charging into the middle of the spellbreaker knight¡¯s squad formation. Then it blew itself up, generating a terrifying explosion that seemed as if it would rend the skies and rip the ground asunder.


    The sudden blow instantly destroyed the formation the spellbreaker knights had created.


    Since the start of the battle, the twelve remaining spellbreaker knights used their well-trained riding skills and potent knight battle techniques to weave about the battlefield. They constantly charged and rode about, using their dazzling horsemanship to ride about and draw the enemy¡¯s attention as they looked for chances to dash in once more.


    Often times a spellbreaker knight would have justnded an Evil-Killing Blow on the enemy before continuing right past the target, while a second knight would already be charging, his Explosive Cross sh waiting to be executed. Meanwhile, a third knight would be elerating and ready to charge at any time......


    It was precisely thanks to this constant attacks and well-honed intertwining and positioning that they were able to crack the defenses and y the enemy, regardless of how powerful they were.


    But now an artificial volcano had appeared in the middle of the battlefield, following the Fire Deity¡¯s terrifying explosion. Intense heat, scorching streams of me, zes that filled the skies as well as moltenva that went flying everywhere.... all of thispletely disrupted the attack patterns of the knight squad. Everyone could only attempt to flee the vicinity of the volcano with all their might, with no time to care about their formation or attack pattern!


    And this was precisely what Greem wanted.


    This kind of magma hell and this harsh environment might be unbearable for humans, but the me Fiend and the Fire Lord they were like fish in water. Theyughed loudly. With a strange motion they vanished from the spot, appearing next to a spellbreaker knight that had been isted from hispanions.


    Two clusters of explosive mes that suddenly appeared out of thin air frightened the spellbreaker knight¡¯s colt. Yet before he could even react, Greem and the Fire Lord¡¯s great shadows had already appeared within the mes.


    me Teleportation!


    The moment they appeared, the tworge me beings extended their palms, and instantly engulfed the spellbreaker knight¡¯s body with all sorts of violent and ferocious fire spells.


    Firestorm.


    me Pir.


    Ignite.


    Chain of Fireballs.


    Greem, who was had yet to disy all of his strength, held back no longer. He executed his fire spells to the very limits of their power. Under thebined effort of Greem and the Fire Lord, how could a spellbreaker knight with merely a basic elemental resistance hold out against this degree of fiery bombardment?


    The opponent¡¯s tough body was swiftly torn to pieces by the vicious spells. Even the magic colt beneath him exploded into tatters of flesh, sent flying in all directions. But before their bodies had been blown out of the centre of the explosion, they had already been turned to dust and ash by the shocking me streams and violent shockwaves.


    "Edward!" Ninther¡¯s pained cries could not save the life of hispanion.


    Edward was his most capable assistant in the knight squad, and was also an exceptional spellbreaker knight that was only second to himself. But when faced with thebined power of two adept-level opponents, no amount of anger and unwillingness could make the spellbreaker knights, who had no special means of preserving their lives, any more than a pile of meaningless flesh no different than an ordinary mortal.


    "Retreat......retreat......retreat quickly!" Ninther gritted his teeth several times. Finally suppressing the desire to charge at Greem and fight to his death, he loudly shouted at thispanions that had been blown and scattered all over the ce.


    Sadly, Greem would never let them run away just like that in this situation!


    Boom! Boom! Two bursts rang throughout the battlefield as two me Teleportations were executed. The me Fiend Greem had transformed into, and the Fire Lord, had teleported into the path of retreat, securely standing at the mouth of the valley between the spellbreaker knight squad and the witcher-knight army.


    A new blood bath was about to begin!

 Chapter 184

    Chapter 184 Extermination


    If the battle before was just a more intense battle to y evil, the battle now was a bloody brawl that concerned their very lives.


    The Fire Deity¡¯s self-destruction had created a terrifying crater in the middle of the valley. Theva in the pool far away was quickly flowing here. Streams of fire radiating unbearable temperatures were filling the hole bit by bit, igniting everything in their path.


    It probably wouldn¡¯t take another fifteen minutes before the entire valley would be covered in boiling magma, turning the entire ce into an evenrgerva pool.


    Thus, with a powerful enemy before them and a sea of mes catching up behind them, the only escape route for the remaining eleven spellbreaker knights was to break through Greem¡¯s blockade.


    This was the only way they could live.


    Odd screeches rang out from the woods around the valley. Large groups of bloodsucking vampires swarmed out from within, hurtling towards the witcher-knights that wanted to turn back and save their leaders. As for the woods that the witcher-knights were in, the earth beneath them violently split open. Countless horrifying scorpions surged forth from below the ground, instantly disrupted the formation of the witcher-knights, who had no one to direct them.


    Having sent all their subordinates to deal with the witcher-knights, Bloody Mary and Evil Bugs Acteon turned into a red sh and a cluster of ck smoke, rushing out of the woods and leaping over Greem and the Fire Lord to charge straight at the disorganized spellbreaker knights.


    Greem whistled and called over his Lightning Giant as well as two pseudo-adept level stone serpents, and had them blockade the mouth of the valley in his ce. He and the Fire Lord, on the other hand, grinned wickedly as they disappeared in a st of elemental me that appeared out of nowhere.


    Now that the spellbreaker knights¡¯ formation has been disrupted, it was the perfect time to take advantage of the chaos to ughter the lot. Even Mary and Acteon couldn¡¯t resist the urge to attack- why would Greem, who had worked so hard to create this situation, let up now?


    Don¡¯t think that just because they were powerful adepts that came over from another world, that they were able to ughter the knights. Even though their physiques and equipment were superior, allowing them to crush and overwhelm these spellbreaker knights that imed to share the same grade as them, ughtering the knights en masse was still an impossibly difficult taskpared to driving them off.


    In a one-on-one duel, Mary and Acteon had a seventy to eighty percent chance of victory. But if they were to face two enemies at the same time, their chance of victory would drop to forty or fifty percent. Greem, on the other hand, had the Fire Lord, which was like having an adept-level clone following beside him. As long as he found an opportunity, he could instantly teleport to his opponent¡¯s side and the two me giants would bombard the enemy with spells.


    A spellbreaker knight that could resist one round of such a bombardment- not one existed!


    The y golems were also endangering their lives to entangle and disrupt the spellbreaker knights at all costs, under the Greem¡¯s instructions. They didn¡¯t need to face the enemy head on. All they had to was go underground and hinder the movements of the magic colts.


    At one moment, the battlefield was crowded with eighteen y golems, three advanced-level stone serpents, the three adepts, and the Fire Lord. Such a chaotic scene might be disaster for the spellbreaker knights, but for the adepts possessing odd and mysterious abilities of their own, there was no better battlefield.


    Mary had her bat wings, and her speed was several times that of the spellbreaker knights in such a constrained area. In this harsh environment, she weaved about the crowd and often used her crimson longbow to shoot at the spellbreaker knights, while asionally closing up to the enemy¡¯s side and using her sharp ws to engage in a bloody melee.


    Mary had taken full advantage of her speed!


    Acteon, on the other hand, was still as mysterious as usual.


    The ck smoke he had turned himself into constantly dispersed and gathered around the enemy. Sometimes, he would turn back into his human form,ughing wickedly as he opened his mouth and let out swarms of flying bugs that filled the skies. Other times, his body would simply scatter into tens of thousands of odd scorpions and instantly swarm the enemy.


    When he was attacked by the enemy, he would just turn back into ck smoke and quickly escape to another ce.


    The spellbreaker knights could only employ fire against such an opponent. Not even their frost swords could do anything to Acteon. After such a prolonged battle, the spellbreaker knights still didn¡¯t know if Evil Bugs was man or bug, not to mention trying to find his weak spot!


    The exceptional magic resistance and flexible runic weapons that the spellbreaker knights took pride in were no longer useful when faced with these arcane casters from another world.


    It didn¡¯t matter how badly they wounded Mary; as long as someone amidst the spellbreaker knights was bleeding, Mary¡¯s wounds would heal by themselves within a matter of seconds. It didn¡¯t matter how many times the evil swarms of bugs were dispersed; when they flew to another spot and gathered, the ck-robed Acteon would appear once more.


    It was constant torture for the spellbreaker knights to fight against these tenacious and undying cockroaches. If they still had their stamina, if their formation was still tight, they might be able to kill Mary and Acteon by umtion of damage due to their advantage in numbers and their constant attacks.


    But now, under the corrosion of theva pool, they could hardly even find ces that were safe to stand. In such a situation, even their survival was a problem- not to mention surrounding the enemy!


    If Evil Bugs Acteon and Bloody Mary could be said to bring chaos and suffering to the spellbreaker knights, then Greem¡¯s entrance could be said to have spelled death for them!


    Not even Acteon dared to let both Greem and the Fire Lordnd an entire round of spell bombardment on him. Greem, who was an expert with fire Elementium, was able to have a might of over 140 points with every fire spell he cast. The crude equipment of the knights were fashioned to defend against physical attacks, and could hardly resist this level of spell damage.


    Fire Core Explosion!


    Chain of Fireballs!


    Firestorm!


    me Pir!


    Doomsday Volcano!


    me Wall!


    ......


    ......


    One after another, powerful fire spells were released by Greem and the Fire Lord. Every spellbreaker knight that they targeted would be sted into oblivion, shattered into pieces. Not even a corpse would be left.


    While Greem blew up four spellbreaker knights in one go, Mary had only been able to take down one spellbreaker knight. Acteon, on the other hand, had also only killed one spellbreaker knight.


    There was no way around it. After all, fire spells belonged to the battlefield. The lethality and damage of fire spells would always be the greatest in a war. Even though Mary was the same grade as Greem, she was only an agile assassin in the end. Her efficiency and ability of direct skirmishes on the battlefield was insignificantpared to Greem.


    Evil Bugs Acteon, on the other hand, leaned towards being an evil adept. His abilities were numerous and bizarre, often catching his opponents by surprise. Yet when it came to brute force, his abilities were awkwardly weaker!


    To avoid Greem getting all the kills, they could only charge forward with no regard for their lives, battling two spellbreaker knights at a time each. Thus, the only one left for Greem was Ninther, who was nowpletely alone!


    Compared to his charm and elegance at the start of the battle, Ninther had now turned into a lone wolf cornered by a hunter.


    The shape of his once delicate knight¡¯s armor had been bent due to the absurdly high temperatures of the surroundings. Scorch marks, from being burnt and exposed to smoke, covered the armor. All of his hair, skin, and nails had fallen out, reced with blisters and burns that were constantly bleeding. With every blow that he dealt out, the blisters on his body would burst, and ckish pus and blood would go stter everywhere.


    The him at this point was bathed in blood!


    He didn¡¯t even know how many magic colts he had swapped out. The magic colt he was riding right now was also severely wounded and exhausted.


    Ninther suddenlyughed, bitterly watching Greem as he slowly walked towards him. He got off the magic colt with much difficulty and patted it on its back.


    "Go. If you have the opportunity to escape then go!"


    Perhaps the colt understood Ninther¡¯s words. It let out a long whinny, took a look at the mighty Greem, and quickly ran away in fear. Without the burden of the knights, it might actually be able to find a way out through the steep stone cliff surroundings before theva arrived.


    With great difficulty Ninther, who had chosen to stay behind, took off the red hot armor. He gripped the runic de tightly with his bloody, burnt hands. He looked calmly upon Greem, who was striding over, as if he was about to die alongside the enemy.


    Greem shook his head when he saw Ninther¡¯s provocative eyes. He waved his hands, and the Fire Lord strode past him towards this final enemy.


    Disappointment filled Ninther¡¯s eyes.


    This enemy was far too careful. Even when he had the absolute advantage, he still didn¡¯t let it go to his head. He was willing to let go of the sweetest fruit of victory in the entire battle!


    It¡¯s important to note how much of an honor and glory it was, as themander of such arge battle, to personally take the head of the enemy leader! Yet the opponent let go of this chance so easily and simply!


    For the first time, Ninther started to understand why he had lost today.


    The opponent... all of the opponents, from the mastermind to the summoned beings, were a bunch of fellows that didn¡¯t give a single damn about a knight¡¯s honor!


    Ninther had activated inumerable knight battle techniques from the start of the battle until now. Both his stamina and will were at their limits. Looking at the me giant that was slowly nearing, he pulled out two Elementium crystals pulsing with energy, and stuffed them into his mouth. He ran towards the opponent while screaming.


    One of the Elementium crystals was red, while the other was blue. Clearly, they were one fire crystal and one ice crystal.


    The two Elementium crystals of opposing elements, along with thest bit of blood essence he forced out, would be able to deliver critical damage to the opponent once he self-destructed, even if he couldn¡¯t kill the opponent.


    This was his only means of damaging his enemy at this point!


    Greem silently smiled, a cold expression on his face, as he looked upon the charging Ninther and the chaotic elemental flux in his body.


    Before Ninther could self-destruct, the Fire Lord vanished in a st of fire. The earth beneath Ninther loosened and a stone serpent with its mouth wide opened rushed out,pletely swallowing him. The stone serpent then swiftly sunk into the ground again.


    A short momentter, a muffled bang echoed from deep within the ground.


    The entire valley silently shook. Countless deep cracks appeared as the earth quaked. The woods nearby shook along with the ground.


    At that moment, countless leaves fell, and dust filled the skies!

 Chapter 185

    Chapter 185 ne Feedback


    The witcher-knight army that had desperately hung on until now had finally crumbled!


    The decimation of their leaders only brought despair to them.


    Edward had died, Anthony had died, Alvar had died, Joseph had died......the list of the dead horrified the soldiers. Now that Ninther¡¯s name had been added to the list, it was enough to destroy the witcher- knights¡¯ confidence and will to continue fighting.


    Daniel, Benson, and the two more spellbreaker knights had yet to die, and were still fighting to the death with the other two heretics. But if the witcher-knights wanted to save them, they had to first get rid of the swarms of vampires and bugs, then break through the army of elemental golems standing at the entrance of the valley.


    After all this, they still had to deal with that terrifying me humanoid.


    The low and tragic sound of the retreating horn rang out again.


    The witcher-knights finally retreated, even leaving behind theirpanions that were still tangled up by the vampires and the bugs!


    The once proud and high-spirited witcher-knights were now like dogs that had lost their homes and their will, running in shame with their tails between their legs. Their chaotic and frantic shapes could be seen everywhere in the vast, primal woods as they escaped. The pained whinnies of magic colts could be heard all across the forest.


    Before they could thoroughly escape this deste battlefield, a horrifying screech that frightened their souls came from the skies above the woods. Multiple gigantic shadows swooped above the canopy, letting out terrifying screeches to let the world know of their arrival.


    A feeling of dread surfaced in the hearts of the already frightened witcher-knights. Quickly, all of them whipped their colts, crashing through the woods, trying futilely to use their speed to outrun the terrifying ck shadows. Their will to battle and their spirits had been broken. They didn¡¯t even have any intention to stop and test the enemy¡¯s¡¯ strength. They were only thinking of how to leave thisnd of nightmares as fast as possible using the speed of the magic colts!


    But the ominous creatures above them hadn¡¯t appeared for long, when a group of terrible magical creatures appeared in the woods in front of them. Based on their appearances, it seemed their races included almost all of the powerful beings that could be found in Greend Forest. They were all of difference races and species, but they had onemon characteristic- their ghostly green eyes......


    Greem stood on the entrance of the valley, looking distantly in the direction the witcher-knights ran.


    He could also see the silhouette of the winged dragon knights flying above the skies of the woods. The situation below was obstructed by the sea of trees and was unknown to him, but now that even the winged dragon knights had been sent out, why wouldn¡¯t the other voodoo beasts be as well?


    It seems that even though Adept Keoghan had rejected Greem¡¯s request for help, he still made some arrangements of his own behind the scenes. Now that Greem and the other two had managed to defeat the enemy in one blow, he could onlye out from the shadows and finish the rest.


    Mary and Acteon, who were fighting two spellbreaker knights and trying to obtain spoils of wars of their own, were having a tough battle. Regardless of which battle Greem tried to join, he would be shouted at angrily and firmly rejected.


    There was no choice. If any spellbreaker knight was sted by Greem and the Fire Lord¡¯sbined force, he would be left without even a corpse. This was what made Mary and Acteon so very angry!


    Otherwise, if all fourteen spellbreaker knights had been perfectly captured without being harmed, they would have been the perfect materials for these two to increase their power!


    Thus, the only four spellbreaker knights left on the battlefield were spoils of war that they coveted. If any outsider tried to close in, they would attack them with their fiercest means.


    From this, it could be seen how imposing these two people who were eager to improve their bloodlines were!


    After looking about the battlefield and ensuring that his battle was over, Greem groaned and reversed his me Fiend Transformation.


    As the red hot magma fell from his skin, and the molten rocks slowly solidified, Greem let out a pained groan.


    He had constantly been on the frontline of battle today, so the number of attacks he had to endure was also the most numerous. The elemental golems might not have physical senses and wouldn¡¯t be exhausted, but he did, and he would.


    During the me Fiend Transformation, most of the damage would be healed by the magma that he took in, but the pain he felt would still be clearly imprinted in his memories. After transforming into a me Fiend, his Physique was greatly improved, and so most of the damage would be mitigated by his powerful regenerative ability, reducing the amount of pain he felt.


    But now that he had reversed the transformation, his Physique was quickly decreasing, and the bodily pain that had been suppressed instantly came back to him, causing even Greem, who imed to be calm and tenacious, to groan in pain uncontrobly.


    However, pain wasn¡¯t the only thing that the battle brought him. Greem could vaguely feel that his Spirit had improved by a decent amount. And the source of the increase in power was very clearly the narws.


    Even though he was an adept from a different ne, he had analyzed the ne¡¯sws. For every enemy he killed, he was able to obtain ne feedback from the nar consciousness. This was an indescribably unique feeling, like a peculiar form of energy he had never felt before.


    The source of the great increase in his Spirit was precisely this mysterious and amazing ne feedback!


    As an invader from another ne, he was most certainly hated and marked as a hostile force by the nar consciousness. Yet when ced in this mysterious world governed by the narws, he could still obtain the reward he deserved from thosews. As long as his actions fulfilled the basic requirements of the narws, then even the master of the ne-the nar consciousness itself- could not stop him.


    When a undeveloped and immature nar consciousness used the strength of the ne to form a perfect and self-contained ne world, the denseyers of narws would often limit the nar consciousness itself!


    Greem had killed the citizens of its ne, but it could only obey the narws and give Greem the rewards he earned for killing. What an absolutely ridiculous thing!


    But in a material ne where a nar consciousness had been born, this was a normal urrence!


    The hazy nar consciousness might be able to push the world towards a certain direction, through those that could feel its will, but it could not topple or change the narws it had personally created.


    Moreover, this was a small-sized ne of knights. Even the nar consciousness itself wasn¡¯t too bright and aware. To form a clear and coherent thought, and then send that message to its citizens, was a task that was impossible for an undeveloped nar consciousness.


    Even the nar consciousness of the farrger and much more mature World of Adepts could not do something like this, much less this small-sized ne!


    Thus Greem and the adepts boldly attacked this knight¡¯s ne, never concerned about ¡®it¡¯ informing the ne¡¯s powerful beings through dreams and sending them to intercept the adepts.


    It wasn¡¯t that ¡®it¡¯ didn¡¯t want to, it was that ¡®it¡¯ could not do that!


    A newly born nar consciousness was like a baby still growing in the womb. It might be able to reflexively act against things that pose a danger to it, without anything resembling an adult thought process, it could not form a proper response.


    Thus, even though the most powerful beings of the ne had mastered part of the narws, and felt the existence of the nar consciousness, they could not construct a stable and clear mental link with the consciousness. They may be able to feel the unease and anger of the nar consciousness, but they would have a hard time finding out the target of those feelings.


    At times like this, exceptional prophets became invaluable!


    In allrge material nes, top-ss prophets would always be a valuable and strategic asset that was deeply valued byrge organizations.


    Sadly, in this ne where the witcher-knights dutifully carried out their tasks, it was hard to have such a prophet that could see into the ne¡¯s future. Of course, this was only because Greem was poorly informed. If it wasn¡¯t for the Sixth Grade Great Adept on their side, the location of their adepts¡¯ base would probably have been exposed to the most powerful beings on this ne!


    Although the Sixth Grade Adept was always cooped up within the base, his existence was extremely crucial for this forward base!


    It was hard for Greem to have a clear picture of all these things.


    Right now he was immersed in his own mental world, checking out the bodily data the chip had gathered.


    "Greem, First Grade human Elementium Adept. Body has been elementalized. me Mastery. Strength: 1.5; Agility: 0.8; Physique: 1.4; Spirit: 1.3.¡£ "


    Er, he had only been to this other ne for fifteen days, and his Strength had increased by 0.1, his Physique increased by 0.2, and his Spirit increased by 0.4.


    This kind of terrifying improvement was rare for him ever since he became an adept.


    Now, even if he diligently meditated everyday, the increase in his Spirit was often decimals with three to four zeroes before the number. If it wasn¡¯t for the aid of his chip, he would have thought he wasn¡¯t improving!


    Without exceptional talent or a massive amount of rare resources, most adepts could only rely on the slow grind every day to raise their Spirit.


    It was natural that people like Anderson and Keoghan had advanced for several hundreds of years, yet were still First Grade Adepts. Going along this normal route would make it almost impossible for one to advance to a Second Grade Adept. The main reason for this was probably the slow increase in Spirit.


    Greem had the help of the chip. The efficiency of his deep meditations were several times those of others. Yet even he could not stand the crawling speed at which his Spirit increased. If it was any other person, they would probably have fallen into despair at theck of a path forward!


    At this moment, Greem was instead able to understand Adept Anderson¡¯s feelings. If he hadn¡¯t been driven mad by the slow grind day-by-day, he probably would not have resorted to such extreme choices or means.


    Perhaps he had already gonepletely mad as he nned the blood ritual!

 Chapter 186

    Chapter 186 Reinforcements Arrive


    The adepts¡¯ base became even busier after the victory.


    The winged dragon knights beat their wide fleshy wings, rising andnding all about the camp, sending the witcher-knights to and fro. These exceptional spoils of war were sent into Adept Keoghan¡¯sb the moment they reached the base, and what was waiting for them was a terrifying nightmare they had never experienced in their lives.


    Greem saw the native teenager amidst the people bustling about with work. He was now an important assistant for Adept Keoghan, helping him do some auxiliary tasks in the modification and construction of voodoo beasts.


    Keoghan passed the work of checking the inventory for fresh ¡®materials¡¯ to the teenager, and walked over when he saw Greem return.


    "You did well this time! Lord Sarubo mentioned your name just now. It seems the Lord has been paying attention to you!" Keoghan couldn¡¯t help but pat Greem on the shoulder and praise him.


    It was obvious that Adept Keoghan felt respect and admiration for Lord Sarubo from the bottom of his heart.


    But once he thought of the fact that nothing in the adepts¡¯ base could escape the vast yet fine mental senses of Lord Sarubo, Greem felt a shiver go down his spine. But he could only respond kindly to Keoghan¡¯s act of intimacy. He even chose to ignore the bloody handprint left on his shoulder.


    "Why¡¯s that little fellow still alive?" Greem asked curiously.


    When he passed the teenager to Keoghan, Greem had thought he woulde back to find his body attached to another voodoo beast!


    "Our n here is to rule this ne, so local puppets are a must. He has an exceptional talent. As long as we perform some slight modifications, he could easily be one of the best spellcasters from this ne. When the timees, it¡¯s easier if he represents us instead of having us do everything." A wicked grin appeared on Keoghan¡¯s cold face.


    "How are the resources in this ne? Howrge of a benefit can we get?"


    "From the current analysis, the assets with the most strategic value are the white-starred alocasias, the fire-dragon herbs, the royal-blood herbs, the seasoul stars, the spacestones and the breeding flowers."


    "There are spacestones and breeding flowers in this ne?" An expression of disbelief appeared on Greem¡¯s face.


    All material nes developed from tiny little pseudo-nes, and the time taken for such development often required several hundreds of thousands of years. Thus, in the course of its long development, the inside of a ne had a high possibility of containing spacestones that drifted from the depths of the gxy.


    This spacestone was one of the main materials used in constructing long-range teleportation arrays.


    Even in the resource-rich World of Adepts, these were a strategic resource strictly controlled by high grade adepts. A normal adept n would not have ess to it.


    The breeding flower, on the other hand, was also an interesting thing.


    It¡¯s a rare nt, but also a unique herb.


    Using the breeding flower as the main ingredient, the alchemist adepts can brew a mysterious potion that allowed powerful adepts to give birth. It¡¯s important to note that in the development history of the adepts, it was extremely difficult for adepts above the Second Grade to have an offspring.


    On one hand you have a high grade adept, and on the other you have a normal human. The chance of having a normal offspring was astronomical. If both parties were high grade adepts, the chances be even lower.


    After all, adepts were a group of individuals that constantly changed, modified and mutated their body in the process of advancing, almost as much as magical creatures. Moreover, a great deal of the mutations were natural, random mutations. Don¡¯t look at how most high grade adepts still retained a human appearance. If you were to take a detailed look at their bodily essence and source, you would realise they were quite different from humans.


    Some high grade adepts¡¯ mutations were even more thorough, to even have mutated their soul¡¯s essence into somethingpletely unrecognizable. If a high grade adept got together with a simr partner, their chance of giving birth to a normal human baby was almost zero.


    Frankly speaking, their chance of giving birth to a magical creature was higher than giving birth to a human child!


    Thus, why was it that the adept ns ced so much importance on the continuation and legacy of family bloodlines, such that they encouraged the low grade adepts to quickly leave behind some bloodlines and offspring for the n? This was the main reason!


    If a talented adept appeared among the descendants of arge n, he wouldn¡¯t even need to expend the effort to find beauties. His family would automatically find all sorts of attractive women, even all sorts of races for him to pick from.


    This was both a boon for the adept as well as a means for the n to continue their bloodline!


    Therefore, any means or medicine that could aid the chances of conceiving became a rare resource that was in great demand by high grade adepts. The breeding flower was one such amazing nt, that allowed the superior genes of both the father and mother to perfectly merge and give rise to a baby with amazing and powerful talent.


    As for whether the baby was still a human, no one really cared!


    The discovery of breeding flowers in this insignificant knights¡¯ ne was undoubtedly going to bring about immense benefit for the Sarubo n. And as the n grew, they, as the batch of adepts who led the excavation of the new ne, would also be greatly rewarded.


    The veteran adepts might not care about such rewards, but for newly advanced adepts such as Greem, who had no wealth at all, this meant that he would not need to run about outside to gather resources for a hundred years.


    In a situation where he was not pressured to find resources to advance, Greem had at least two hundred years of leisure time to slowly umte knowledge and research the direction of his future development.


    After exchanging a few more words with Keoghan, Greem returned to the row of stone houses, decided on a random house, shut the door, and went to rest. At the battle in the valley this time, he had participated fully and functioned as the core of the strategy- all the way from the start of the baiting, to the counterattack, to the final battle.


    And ordingly, his Spirit was drained and badly ¡®bruised¡¯. These losses would not recover by themselves. He could only rely on a long rest to fix them!


    At least there would not be any threats around the adepts¡¯ base after exterminating those witcher-knights. There would be a period of peace! As for when the next batch of enemies would arrive; that was out of Greem¡¯s control.


    Understanding this, Greem let go of all his concerns, summoned the Lightning Giant to protect him, and fell into a deep sleep on the stone bed.


    While he was sleeping, Mary had returned to the base, bringing with her two withered spellbreaker knight corpses. Even though such spoils of war didn¡¯t have much value to them, Keoghan still dly received them.


    After all, aspared to Acteon, Mary had brought something back. Acteon hadn¡¯t even left a withered corpse behind. However, he did have a group of odd ck beetles the size of a washing basin. There were about twenty-one or twenty-two of them. It looked like they were his newest gains.


    Adept Keoghan was a veteran adept that had advanced for three centuries after all. He was able to swiftly determine that these were a group of carcass beetles, based solely on their unique appearance. Even though these were only young beetles, they still had terrifying power.


    Carcass beetles could be considered a kind of horrifying magical creature that lived in groups.


    They had tough shells that didn¡¯t lose to Body Refining Adepts. They could fly, tunnel, and use their sharp teeth or ws to attack their enemies. Adult carcass beetles even boasted superior magic resistance, such that even spell attacks below 100 points of damage couldn¡¯t scratch their bodies.


    With all of these advantages together, a swarm of carcass beetles were not an enemy an adept wanted to make.


    The scorpions he used to feed with flesh and Spirit previously were too inferior, and couldn¡¯t be used in important battles, or fights between adepts. But now that the carcass beetles had appeared, it meant that Acteon had managed to raise his evil bug swarm to a level that matched him as an adept.


    When all these carcass beetles matured, then Acteon would be a terrifying individual- even amongst the First Grade Adepts!


    Mary gritted her teeth and left after walking to and fro where Greem was resting for a bit.


    An entire army of witcher-knights had died in the woods. If she didn¡¯t seal the news quickly, the entire Duran province might be alerted. Therefore, Mary hurried back to Blue Hillock City in order to use her influence there to nip all kinds of troublesome news in the bud before they could spread.


    Acteon, who had a simr burden, didn¡¯t stay in the base for long, and quickly left for the woods. He needed to set up bug traps on all the key entrances to the mountain to avoid any news from getting outside.


    There were two mountain viges and a small town on the edge of Greend Forest. He had only taken down Colca Vige. If the hunters or adventurers from the other vige or town broke into the battlefield and found something, their efforts to conceal the truth would have been for nothing.


    Coincidentally, the batch of carcass beetles he had just bred needed arge amount of blood to grow. This time, Acteon had already nned on conquering the remaining vige and town. He could snuff out all sources of information getting out while also increasing his own strength; why wouldn¡¯t he do it?!


    ............


    It took four days before Greem finally woke up from his deep slumber!


    He didn¡¯t want to wake up so early, but the odd energy flux by his side made it hard for him to sleep, so he had to wake up ahead of time.


    He had just opened his eyes when he felt a strong and intense flux in space.


    This space flux was so familiar, and so hard to forget, that Greem could determine what it was immediately.


    Internar ultra long ranged teleportation!


    Thest time their group had been brought over from the Sarubo n¡¯s pseudo-ne tform was through such a ultra long ranged internar teleportation. The teleportation that time was a painful and torturous experience for Greem, so he remembered it very clearly!


    But even though he understood the nature of the space flux, more questions surfaced in Greem¡¯s mind.


    ording to Adept Keoghan, the second batch of adepts should be arriving one month from now! But now... Greem checked the notification on his chip- they had only been on this knights¡¯ ne for no more than 18 days, 11 hours, 33 minutes, and 31 seconds.


    The question had just surfaced in Greem¡¯s mind when he revealed a cold grin.


    As expected of a Sixth Grade Adept that could manipte and toy with others!


    He had said it would be one month, but in truth he only needed 18 days to send the reinforcements over. Thus, even if there were traitors among them, or if any of them had been captured by the natives of this ne, the information they would reveal would be inurate and hardly cause any impact on the following actions.


    That projection of Lord Sarubo probably tricked even Keoghan!

 Chapter 187

    Chapter 187 Upstaged


    When Greem removed the defenses on the door, unsummoned the Lightning Giant, and walked out of the stone house, he realized that several adepts were also standing outside of their respective doors, looking at the crude tower.


    The expressions on their faces were varied.


    Seeing that Greem hade out, everyone nodded and greeted him, then went back to staring at the tower.


    Just then, shockwaves caused by the spatial flux could be seen!


    Several spatial folds, that looked like ripples on water, started to spread out in all directions. When the ripples reached the defensive array, the two forces shed and sent out more ripples in other directions. There were already plenty of spatial shards all over the ce.


    Fortunately, the previously set up defensive array managed to prevent the spatial flux from spilling over, and prevented the shockwaves from spreading beyond the illusion barrier. Otherwise, with the intensity of the spatial shockwaves, the most powerful beings of this ne would have been able to detect the fluctuations of this area through the narws they had mastered.


    The spatial flux became even more dense.


    Finally, the rippling spatial folds copsed into one spot within the tower, and following an explosive ripping sound, a teleportation door slowly opened.


    No one in the base was able to get any information about the teleportation this time, and so no one knew about the size and quality of the reinforcements. Everyone had lost their interest in talking at that moment. They just silently waited on the spot for the final result.


    An hour after the teleportation door had disappeared, the entrance to the tower gradually opened. Groups of adepts walked out from within, with Sir F¨¹gen at the lead.


    The ones that had arrived were Second Grade Adept Sir F¨¹gen and twenty three other Sarubo n adepts.


    These n adepts were clearly veterans that were usually stationed in all the lesser nes. Therefore, they needed no instructions. Already they were flying about, doing simple surveys of the adepts¡¯ base, and making adjustments based on their observations.


    Sir F¨¹gen, on the other hand, walked towards Keoghan and the rest, and began to ask detailed questions about the situation around the base.


    Robotic beasts, voodoo beasts, and stone golems were summoned to clean up the buildings within the base. The pockets and bags of the n adepts were all filled to the brim. It was obvious that they came prepared, and so their movements were especially crisp and swift.


    Just as the few of them were speaking, several buildings on the edge of the camp had been demolished. The robotic beasts waved about with their metallic arms and grabbed the bricks and stone, sending them to the outside section of the base. The stone golems were quickly ttening out the ground.


    Looking at what they were doing, it seemed as if the reinforcing adepts were unhappy with the originalyout of the base, and it seemed as if they wanted to demolish everything and start over. More of the adepts were gathered near the crude tower, pointing and gesturing here and there, like they were discussing the construction of a new adepts¡¯ tower.


    Keoghan and the other veterans who stayed in the base stood respectfully beside Sir F¨¹gen, carefully answering each of his questions. When F¨¹gen heard that two adepts had gone undercover outside the base and had sessfully taken over control of the viges around the forest, as well as a small human city, a satisfied smile appeared on his usually cold face.


    As they were speaking, a few adeptsmanding a group of stone golems had appeared before Keoghan¡¯s voodoo beastb. When he saw them about to use their stone fists to demolish theb, the native teenager ran out while screaming, iling his hands as he stood before theb.


    An adept floating in the sky waved his hand, and a huge bush of thorny, dark green man-eating flowers appeared from beneath the ground, restraining the teenager in an instant. Then, the adept flew in front of the teenager and used his ck fingertip to cut open the teenager¡¯s skin. He took a little blood and tasted it, nodding in satisfaction.


    The next moment, the adeptid out a soul array on the teenager¡¯s head, looking as if he was about to squeeze out all of his soul¡¯s memories.


    The edge of Keoghan¡¯s mouth twitched a little as he turned around and exined to Adept F¨¹gen softly, "Sir, this native youth has a bit of casting talent. I was thinking of raising him to be our eyes and ears, as well as our puppet. Don¡¯t you think......"


    "There¡¯s no need!" Sir F¨¹gen didn¡¯t seem to care about what his subordinate was doing, "It¡¯s just a lowly native anyway! We can arrange for such things once the situation of this base has settled. Absorbing his soul¡¯s memories will help the neer adepts to more quickly understand the situation and this world, and greatly increase their work efficiency. This is beneficial for the base¡¯s development!"


    Keoghan stuttered for a moment, took some deep breaths, and didn¡¯t say anything more.


    In the time they used to speak, the soul array that the adept was drawing had beenpleted. Following the pulses of white light that gathered in the array, the native teenager slowly stopped moving. His entire soul¡¯s consciousness had been extracted by the array, gathering into a white bead.


    The adept put the bead to his head for a few seconds, then opened his eyes and nodded in satisfaction. He then tossed the bead to the adepts beside him, and soon everyone had used their Spirit to inspect the teenager¡¯s memories stored in the bead, quickly understanding the basic situation on this ne.


    More talented adepts could already fluently interact with the native¡¯snguage and words. For these adepts who possessed powerful Spirits, browsing through another soul¡¯s memories took just a matter of seconds.


    Perhaps the entire life story of that native teenager took only three to five seconds of their time to understand!


    The voodoo beastb had finally been demolished, and the voodoo beast ¡®material¡¯ that took great efforts to obtain was exposed. A few interested adepts flew over and started rummaging about, taking away with them the few surviving witcher-knights and the withered spellbreaker knight corpses.


    As for the rest of the ¡®trash¡¯, they were thrown out, along with the bricks and stone.


    "Sir, what should we do?" The smile on Keoghan¡¯s face didn¡¯t go away as he bowed and asked respectfully.


    "The adepts¡¯ tower in the base needs to be constructed quickly. There¡¯s nothing for you to do here in the meantime. I¡¯ll send two adepts to take over the human city. You will follow after them and help them with their jobs. Be careful, don¡¯t let the forces and organizations here disturb the base. That¡¯s all I ask of you!" Finished speaking, Adept F¨¹gen turned around and left to gather his subordinates.


    The stiff and unnatural smiles hung on everyone¡¯s faces. They had lost the desire to talk to each other, and just silently lowered their head to think. The atmosphere was tense and sombre.


    ............


    When night had arrived once more, the seven people, including Greem, had arrived in Blue Hillock City.


    The group consisted of five veterans of the base here, and two adepts that had just been sent over.


    Everyone hid their silhouettes and silently floated through the night sky, three hundred meters above the ground, looking down upon this boisterous human city.


    Blue Hillock City was a tourist spot famous throughout the country after all. Moreover, it bordered the resource-rich Greend Forest. Added together, all of these geographical advantages caused the city to have a veryrge concentration of the rich and noble. They were the leaders ofmercial chains, or nobles that came here to y, or artists that have long heard of the beauty of this ce...


    Regardless of which they were, their presence in this city brought about a lot of liveliness and activity, causing the city¡¯s nightlife to be colorful and extravagant!


    Without letting them wait for too long, a scrawny creature of darkness rose from the shadows of the city, batting its wings and swiftly flying before them.


    "Sirs, this one hase to fetch you under my master¡¯s orders. Pleasee along with this one......"The bloodsucking bat instantly transformed into a well-dressed young noble, bowing respectfully before the adepts.


    Before he could finish speaking, the adept leading the group raised his left hand and a stream of me hit the youth¡¯s shoulder instantly, burning him and causing him to screech in pain.


    "From now on, I am the master here! "The adept coldly said, "Bring me to Adept Mary!"


    Everyone¡¯s gaze jumped for a second. They clearly didn¡¯t expect this Adept Muret that Sir F¨¹gen sent over to so boldly rob Mary¡¯s position of leadership here before he had even met Mary. Even though Sir F¨¹gen had told them to aid this Adept Muret, the reckless and rude manner in which he was treating Mary had exceeded everyone¡¯s expectations.


    Keoghan snuck a look at Greem.


    However, Greem was still smiling and looking at the night scene of the city below, as if he wasn¡¯t aware of what was happening.


    The youth that hade to wee them was only a vampire spawn after all. His position was even lower than those blood servants that Mary had personally Embraced. Faced with the wrath of a powerful adept, he didn¡¯t dare to argue or struggle, instead begging for mercy with all his might.


    Adept Muret waved his hand and extinguished the fire having, relieved some of his anger.


    The vampire spawn didn¡¯t dare to dy. Immediately, it endured the intense pain and turned into a bloodsucking bat, flying down towards a spot in the small city below.


    The others followed along.


    The ce Mary ¡®received¡¯ the others was still the same hidden bedroom asst time.


    The well-dressed young nobles in the shadows of the garden, corridors, and corners gathered together to gossip, curious as to the identity of these mysterious guests that arrived all of a sudden.


    Mary used her Embrace to turn the more powerful and influential people into her subordinates. The other group of vampiresprised mostly of young nobles were ones she created through other means. As for the vampire spawn with even inferior status, they didn¡¯t even have the right to enter this hidden area!


    The adepts entered under the watchful gaze of the numerous vampires, walking into the terrifying pool of blood Mary had specially ordered for herself.


    The opulent and extravagantlyrge bed had now disappeared, reced with arge, five-meter square blood pool. Maryfortably rested in the pool, enjoying the service of four beautiful vampire girls around her.


    One was softly massaging her arms, while another was holding a golden cup, waiting for her to take a drink. Thest two were using toothpicks to send peeled grapes straight into her mouth......


    It wasn¡¯t spring water that was rippling about the pool, nor was it a warm andfortable hot spring, but thick and viscous blood!

 Chapter 188

    Chapter 188 Conflict


    The arrival of the adepts did not affect Mary¡¯s enjoyment of her blood bath.


    Keoghan and the rest were not fazed.


    However, Muret and Latour, the two adepts that had been assigned here, had a grim and sour expression on their faces. They were so ck they was practically dripping ink!


    The two had already felt the anger and resentment of the other adepts on the way here. But as veteran adepts of the n, they only had disdain for this bunch of fresh blood in the n.


    A bunch of adepts that had never experienced a ne war were no different from a chick that had just learned to walk. So what if they were full of resentment? Did these people dare to oppose the n¡¯s orders?


    Yet what surprised them was that even though several more experienced adepts hadn¡¯t confronted them, a tiny vampire that hadn¡¯t advanced for even half a year had appeared and was publicly challenging them.


    "You must be the newly advanced Adept Mary! You should have received Sir F¨¹gen¡¯s message. From now on, Blue Hillock City will be managed by the two of us. You must hand over all the puppets and spies you control immediately!" The two adepts looked at each other, and Adept Latour, who was the assistant, went forward to talk with Mary.


    Maryzily stretched her body in the blood pool. Her snow white skin and the blood red water contrasted with each other, making her even more mysterious.


    "Blue Hillock City is right here. Take it if you want to! I¡¯m toozy to think about all that! But some of the people here are already my blood servants. Their existence is part of my power. You wouldn¡¯t want to take away my wings and fangs, would you?! Mmm? ......"When she finished speaking, Mary snorted and looked upon the two adepts with contempt in her scarlet eyes.


    "How bold! You dare oppose Sir F¨¹gen¡¯s orders?" Adept Latour was a gloomy person by nature, but his face was flushed after being provoked by Mary¡¯s patronizing attitude.


    "This is considered opposing orders? Sir F¨¹gen wants me to cooperate with you; I am very cooperative! As long as you don¡¯t touch my subordinates, you can do anything you want with Blue Hillock City. I have no objections! Unless you are saying that the two of you added together are not enough to control this small city full of normal humans? If that¡¯s really the case, then I can¡¯t help butugh..."


    "You......" Latour¡¯s gaze suddenly became extremely threatening.


    They had already gotten ahold of the basic information about the city before they arrived. Objectively, Mary had done a very good job, seeing how little time she took topletely gain control of Blue Hillock City! When it came to the authorities, she controlled the ruling nobility of the city; when it came to the underground, she controlled the head of the thugs and all the other shady figures. It could be said that most of the critical positions in Blue Hillock City had already been reced with Mary¡¯s subordinates.


    In such a situation, how were they supposed to control and manage Blue Hillock City while still avoiding her subordinates? Were they supposed to go and take control of the city guards and thugs in the streets one-by-one? Ignoring how counterproductive and time consuming this method was, even if they did manage to do it, wouldn¡¯t that make the puppets they controlled the subordinates of Mary¡¯s own underlings?!


    Latour was enraged when faced with such explicit provocation. He was still under the effects of the narws¡¯ suppression, but he didn¡¯t want to just endure the scorn of a female vampire adept.


    Latour roared as his scrawny face started to stretch forward, turning into a snout that resembled a canine animal. Thick and heavy ck hair quickly grew out, instantly covering his entire body.


    Fangs, ws, ck hair, green eyes......


    These were all ssic traits of wolves, and exposed Adept Latour¡¯s identity. He was a Bloodline Adept. The only thing that was yet unknown was which magical wolf was his chosen bloodline path!


    But before Latour couldplete his transformation, a fountain of blood came crashing down. The next moment, a crimson silhouette cut through the blood and started to fight with Latour, weaving about like a phantom as it did so.


    No one in the room was fazed. Everyone put up an energy shield and kept out the blood that was sshing everywhere. It seemed they had no intention of interfering in this conflict.


    The fire on Adept Muret¡¯s body had just ignited when he turn his head and looked at Greem, who was giving him a wide smile. Two clusters of mes burned in the eyes of both adepts. Two silent streaks of me shed with each other, leaving sparks in the air as they shot towards each other.


    Just as quickly, the fountain of blood had fallen back into the blood pool.


    Mary stood proudly above the blood with her snow white feet exposed. The crimson armor on her naked body only covered her chest, her shoulder and the parts below her navel, leaving most of her elegant white skin exposed to the air.


    There were five terrifying w marks that went straight to the bone on her right arm that were still giving off a ck smoke that wouldn¡¯t go away. This was clearly the special effect of Latour¡¯s ws.


    Butpared to Mary¡¯s light wounds, Adept Latour was almostpletely bathed in blood.


    Even though both of them were bloodline adepts, Mary¡¯s vampire bloodline was adept at agility, while Latour¡¯s wolf bloodline was famous for being ferocious. In such a narrow area, both parties couldn¡¯t possibly use all their strength or initiate an actual deathmatch. Thus, Latour was clearly disadvantaged in this battle of speed in such narrow quarters.


    In the short few seconds just now, Mary had already left several dozen of wounds on Latour¡¯s werewolf form with her ws. Moreover, as the blood spilled out of the wolf¡¯s body, a red radiance vaguely flickered across Mary¡¯s body. Under the suppression of the red radiance, the ck smoke on her arm wounds was slowly dissipating while the edges of the wounds were showing signs of regeneration.


    After turning into a werewolf, Latour¡¯s intelligence had an obvious degradation.


    Triggered by the numerous wounds on his body, blood began to show in his ghostly green eyes. He opened his wide fanged mouth and breathed heavily, letting out white breath as he did so. His body crouched slightly, and his hind legs covered in ck hair pressed against the ground. A low growl rumbled in his throat as an intense and savage fighting intent quickly gathered about his body.


    A curling grin appeared on Mary¡¯s pretty face. Herrge leathery bat wings opened with a woosh. The blood pool beneath her was almost boiling, and fountains of blood were rising and falling. A bloody mist gathered around her, wrapping around her like a crimson cape.


    Several blood servants outside the room started screeching in anger. Their eyes turned blood red in an instant, and they bared their fangs and threatened the werewolf. They had sealed the entrance, and were waiting for Mary¡¯s orders to rush forward and fight the enemy to their deaths.


    In the world of vampires, blood servants had no choice but to obey the source of their bloodline. This kind of control even outssed most of the contract spells that existed.


    "Enough! Everyone stop......" Adept Muret could no longer stand the sight. He shouted in a solemn tone, "Sir F¨¹gen sent us here to deal with a problem, not for you people to create more trouble! If anyone else moves they will be defying my authority......"


    As he spat out thest word, Muret¡¯s entire body burst forth with mes that reached the sky, turning into a human torch. The temperature in the room instantly went up to a thousand degrees. Some of the wooden materials that were exposed outside instantly started smoldering, letting out crackling sounds.


    A few vampires that were close to the door couldn¡¯t endure the high temperature, and quickly dehydrated. Their previously smooth white skin instantly became withered, dry, and wrinkled. In less than three seconds, the front of their bodies had beenpletely burnt ck. There was even ck ash that was slowly falling off.


    Greem flicked a finger, and a red barrier emerged from his body, enveloping the room. The elementium mes that was violently surging forth from Adept Muret¡¯s body paused at that moment, as they could no longer spread their high temperatures and heat outside of the red barrier.


    Muret finally looked at Greem once again.


    "To think that you chose fire as your mastery! Very rare indeed... I wish to have a good conversation with you if we have the opportunity!"


    Once he finished speaking, Muret turned and red at Latour, who was about to explode in anger, before raising his head high and leaving the room first.


    The vampires standing guard by the door gave way under Mary¡¯s instructions. They bared their fangs and attempted to intimidate him, but none of them truly dared to attack a veteran adept!


    The werewolf Latour growled and roared, finally managing to use his will to suppress the savage fighting spirit, that had almost burst within him, with much difficulty. A shroud of ck smoke rose, and Latour changed back from his werewolf form, bing a human once again.


    The regenerative abilities of werewolves were indeed exceptional. The scratches all over his body had vanished in less than five seconds. Latour red at Mary with his ghostly green eyes, then turned to look at Greem for a moment before silently walking out of the room.


    Both parties had separated on bad terms, so naturally there was no possibility of sitting down and having a peaceful discussion.


    The two adepts were still fuming and took the skies. They quickly found a noble¡¯s manor they found to their liking 1.5 kilometers away from the city. They didn¡¯t even bother to hide their identity. The two broke into the manor, and in less than fifteen minutes, they had be the new owners of thend. The original owners of the manor had either been turned into corpses, or converted into puppets under someone¡¯s control.


    And so, Muret and Latour settled on the outskirts of Blue Hillock City!


    Mary finally reverted from her state ofbat after the two annoying fellows had gone. She softlynded on the edge of the blood pool, looking at Keoghan and the rest amusedly.


    "What, all of you had your necks pushed so low you can¡¯t raise your heads? A bunch of guys, and yet you are all cowards. Don¡¯t think I¡¯m an idiot! All of you don¡¯t stick your necks out, yet still bring those two guys to rampage at my ce. Were you guys about to let me be the cannon fodder? Let me be the one who sticks her neck out? Let me tell you all something. If you don¡¯tpensate me for my losses today, don¡¯t even think I¡¯ll let you treat me like an idiot next time!"


    A wicked grin appeared on the faces of Keoghan, Kiel, and the rest. For the first time, they felt like Mary¡¯s straightforward personality was a pretty good thing.


    As adepts, fair and equal trades were the key to ensuring long term cooperation and benefits.


    Their identities were awkward and unsuited to having a direct conflict with those two fellows. Paying a little price and having Mary do it in their ce was a natural thing to do.


    The sounds of intense bargaining rang out within the room!

 Chapter 189

    Chapter 189 Dragon Knight Appears


    Herdurand City.


    It was the time of the day where the sun was at its brightest. Therge square before the spacious and majestic city hall had been filled with arge crowd. People could hardly even move about. Groups of city guards armed to the teeth pushed the crowd about with the halberds in their hands, ensuring that the surging crowd didn¡¯t go into therge empty space in the center of the square.


    It was the start of spring, and the light winds that blew about still brought with them a little chill. Even so, the city guards in charge of keeping order were still very exhausted and sweating profusely.


    The citizens squeezed into the square. Regardless of gender, they were all holding bouquets of fresh and beautiful flowers in their hands. They stood on their toes and grabbed onto poles, desperately looking about the horizon, as if they were waiting for something. There, in the blue skies, was nothing worth noting except for a few white clouds floating about.


    A squad of witcher-knights and a squad of the governor¡¯s guards, with their distinct armors, were facing each other as they stood on both sides of the city hall. The two parties couldn¡¯t be said to be tense, but the atmosphere was still solemn and stern, aspared to the mood in the square below.


    Whenever the gazes of the witcher-knights on their magic colts swept across the other side, there would be a slight and unnoticeable sense of disdain in their eyes. Yet when their eyes looked towards the skies, an excitement hidden in their expectant eyes would surface.


    The personal guard belonging to Grand Duke Lington could be called ferocious and powerful whenpared tomon city guards. But the warhorses under them were clearly inferior to the witcher-knights¡¯ magic steeds, who possessed superior size and ferocity.


    And if one also put into consideration the runic swords of the witcher-knights, the gap between the personal guards and the witcher-knights was sorge it couldn¡¯t be crossed.


    On the Continent of Witchers, only those who had sworn their loyalty to the king and passed the witcher-knights test could get the standard equipment of magic colts and runic weapons. And these were resources that were strictly kept in the hands of the central government. The outside world had no means of getting colts and runic equipment inrge amounts, causing the witcher-knight army to be the strongest armed force on the Continent of Witchers.


    As most of the witcher-knights thought of themselves as knights that served directly under the king, they did not recognize the authority of local nobles when they were out on missions or stationed in various ces. Thus, every year, the forces of the local nobles would have plenty of disagreements with the witcher-knights overws and jurisdiction.


    This caused the forces of the local nobility and witcher knights to often engage in armed conflict when disagreements intensified. Hating each other had be amon urrence between the local forces and the witcher-knights.


    However, the insignificant enmity between subordinates did not affect the courtesies and good rtions between the higher-ups.


    The long table used for city council meetings had been pushed to one side in the bright and spacious city hall. It was now filled with te after te of fragrant delicacies and drinks. Delicate stir-fried foie gras, steak covered in sauce, goldenmb that had been perfectly roasted......


    However, no one was paying attention to the food at this moment. Everyone were waiting impatiently for the arrival of those few important figures.


    At the entrance of the hall, nearly a hundred men wearing the armor of spellbreaker knights stood in two straight lines, raising their heads and looking about. A dozen Radiant Knights had gathered together behind them, and were silently conversing.


    By the standards of the Continent of Adepts, these radiant knights were all terrifying and powerful beings that had reached the Second Grade. Yet on this day, even they were not the protagonists. Instead, they were merely members of the crowd, waiting impatiently for the arrival of the true protagonist.


    As Second Grade members of their ss in the witcher-knight group, the radiant knights¡¯ power was naturally much stronger than the spellbreaker knights. The spellbreaker knights usually wore a full set of knight¡¯s armor. Most of their body would be hidden beneath the tough armor.


    With the runic armor¡¯s twin resistances to physical and magical damage, the defenses of spellbreaker knights had reached an outstanding degree. In the few wars against evil on the Continent of Witchers, it was the spellbreaker knights that endured the spells of the heretics head-on, charging through their lines with brute force and killing them.


    It was easy to imagine how powerful their defenses were!


    Compared to the spellbreaker knights, the armor of the radiant knights had dramatically shrunk instead.


    The delicate and fancy armor was no longer a clumsy full-body armor, but individual armor parts that could be removed easily. These armor parts would only cover the chest, groin, shoulder, the arms, and some other key parts of the body. To ensure agility and swiftness of movement in battle, the rest of the radiant knight¡¯s bodies were covered with leather armor, or even left exposed.


    If a spellbreaker knight could be said to have mastered simple weaponization of the runic energies, a radiant knight had reached the level of using runic energies to enhance their physical strength.


    What few armor parts the radiant knights wore all had mysterious patterns carved on the inside. When they met the enemy, they only needed to activate these runic arrays to draw power from the rune energies, turning them into a powerful runic knight.


    The reason they were called radiant knights was because their bodies would radiate a soft glow, like the runic weapons, when they drew the runic energies into their body. At that moment, they were essentially a human-shaped magical weapon.


    Would a rampaging magical sword need defenses and armor? Of course not! All they needed to do then was attack, attack, attack......


    The impatient crowd had been there since the rise of the sun until now, but not one person was dissatisfied or cking off. Even Grand Duke Lington, who was always calm and measured, was pacing about the city hall and asionally looking at the skies faraway.


    It was obvious that the protagonist of today¡¯s weing feast was an extremely important person, such that even Grand Duke Lingtom was waiting expectantly, silently enduring the torturous wait!


    Finally, amidst everyone¡¯s anxious waiting, a crisp ring sounded from a bell in the watchtower at the city¡¯s wall far away.


    Everyone was excited. They put their hands above their brow and looked to the west.


    They came!


    They really came!


    It was a bright and sunny day today, and two tiny ck dots had appeared on the edge of the horizon in the distance.


    In less than two minutes¡¯ time, the two ck dots gradually grewrger.


    A loud dragon¡¯s roar rumbled across from a distance, causing everyone that heard it to be stunned and nervous.


    But before they could figure out the source of this odd and unwarranted fear, the two ck dots had already appeared above Herdurand City, their great and massive bodies on disy before the crowd.


    These were two terrifying Green Dragons, with bodies that were twenty meters long. If you included the long tail, covered with bony thorns and a spindle-shaped end, that the dragons were dragging behind them, the total length of the two Green Dragons were a staggering thirty meters.


    Like alligators, they had jaws that were filled with sharp teeth, and the lines of their long faces were clearly defined. Layers of fine emerald dragon scales perfectly covered every inch of their bodies. The dragon ws beneath their bodies were thick and powerful, the sharp edges gleaming with a cold light.


    Themon Green Dragon of a normal material ne only had one pair of wings, but the Green Dragons of this ne had two pairs of wings. This undoubtedly gave them an even more terrifying flight speed!


    As the gigantic bodies of the Green Dragons circled above the square, the olive-coloured eyes of the dragons looked down upon the crowd below. They couldn¡¯t help but raise their heads and let out a resounding dragon roar that shook the heavens and the earth.


    The dragon¡¯s mighty auras fell upon the crowd below!


    Amotion instantly ured amidst the crowd in the square.


    Many timid women and children let out screams, creating chaos in the crowd.


    The dragons seemed to have an odd liking to creating chaos, as the depths of the Green Dragons¡¯ eyes glimmered for a moment. They were clearly happy with their handiwork. Jefferson, who was seated on one of the Green Dragon¡¯s backs, let out an expression that was neither smiling nor crying.


    As one of only three Dragon Knights on the continent, Jefferson had ridden the Green Dragon Ysondre and visited countless human cities. Every time he saw a dense crowd, the Green Dragon, that had just reached adulthood, would do something like this. Just looking from this point, it wasn¡¯t without reason that many ancient tomes listed the Green Dragons as an evil dragon.


    Jefferson patted the neck of the Green Dragon and signaled Kalyk, who was on the other dragon. The two Green Dragons dove downwards, beating their wings andnding on the emptied space in the center of the square.


    The winds created when the gigantic dragons beat their wings was akin to a small storm. The crowd near the centre was blown all about. The flowers and the hats on their heads disappeared in an instant, as if they had grown wings.


    The crowd had waited this long to witness the great dragons. Now that they had seen the strong and overbearing silhouette that resembled a mountain flesh crouching in the square, everyone was so frightened that they held their breath.


    All of the nobles, along with the knights that had been waiting in the city hall, walked out one after another, weing the two great dragon knights with their impassioned gazes and ps.


    The atmosphere had suddenly be lively.


    Yet as the two parties were shaking hands and exchanging greetings, several hooded figures in the crowd were watching the urrences in the square with greedy and fervent gazes from a long alley.


    Once everyone had entered the city hall, the hooded figures exchanged looks and secretly slipped into another alley.


    "Not only have the radiant knights shown up, even the dragon knights have. We have to report this information to Mistress Mary!"


    "Very well- I¡¯ll go immediately. The rest of you stay here and continue monitoring. If those two dragon knights make any significant movements, we must hurry and report it....¡±


    "Yes, I understand......"


    "You should leave soon. Be careful on the way."


    After a quick conversation, a cloaked figure took advantage of themotion in the city and snuck out of Herdurand City. When he reached a ce with no one around, he turned into a puff of smoke, emerging as a bloodsucking bat and taking to the skies, undertaking the 200 kilometer trip to Blue Hillock City.

 Chapter 190

    Chapter 190 Scheming in the Night


    The banquet was still going on.


    Attractive nobledies dressed in beautiful clothes, girls as shy as fawns, as well as seductive and alluring beauties......


    These beautiful women, that were usually out-of-reach and cold to most suitors, were all flocking around Jefferson. Either giggling while covering their lips with their silk fans, or blushing while pressing themselves onto him, or sending seductive gazes from afar. Though the beauties here were far less distinguished than those in the royal court, there were many of them, each with their own appeal, like flowers waiting to be plucked at his whim.


    After much effort, Jefferson managed to free himself from thedies and met with the dozen radiant knights that had been patiently waiting in a secret room behind the city hall.


    "Vieri, tell me! How has the preparation been going?" The moment he entered the room, the faint smile on Jefferson¡¯s face had vanished, reced with a dense killing intent.


    After greeting Jefferson and bowing to him, the radiant knights took their seats. Vieri, who was in charge of the operation this time, stood up to exin their progress in rallying the knights.


    "......7 knights from Gond City, 11 knights from the City of Cobar, 8 knights from Schaeffer City. As of now, the witcher-knights that have rallied in Herdurand City number 1513 men. The knights¡¯ camp is being expanded; the supplies and equipment are arriving in a timely fashion. The reorganization and training of the troops is being overseen by Knight Gutt.....the vanguard knights are led by Ninther and have arrived in Blue Hillock City. No information have been sent back thus far......¡±


    Jefferson suddenly interrupted Vieri¡¯s report, "How long has it been since Ninther set off?"


    "It¡¯s been seven days!" Vieri hesitated before speaking, "They reported three days ago when they reached Blue Hillock City. It seems they found something odd there. But they haven¡¯t been in contact since......"


    "Send some people to get in contact with them as soon as possible. Make sure they don¡¯t go in too deep. You may have heard about the ne invasion this time. This is not a foreign creature identally wandering into our ne. It¡¯s a more powerful material ne that has their eyes set on us. To avoid them nting their roots here, we have to chase them out before they cement their position."


    A Third-Grade Dragon Knight was almost the most powerful being on this ne already. Jefferson¡¯s words undoubtedly had immense authority. Thus, the numerous radiant knights present couldn¡¯t help but look at each other, their minds filled with shock and fear.


    Finally, it was Vieri who couldn¡¯t help but ask, "Sir Jefferson, do we know which ne the invaders are from?"


    "It doesn¡¯t matter which ne they are from. All you need to know is that their ne is of a higher grade than ours!" Jefferson was also filled with worry, "As long as they¡¯re not from those terrifyinglyrge nes, there¡¯s nothing to fear! This is our world after all. Even if they managed to force their way in here, they¡¯re still subject to the suppression of the narws and can¡¯t exhibit much of their strength. Don¡¯t you people forget, Sir Willis has the power of a Fourth Grade- the limit of this ne!"


    The radiant knights present nodded in agreement with the words of the great Dragon Knight Jefferson.


    The power limit of this ne was Fourth Grade. No outsider could exceed this limit. Even if the intruder possessed the power of a Fourth Grade, once they broke into the knights¡¯ ne they would be suppressed and weakened by the narws. What would they use to fight against Sir Willis, whose power reached the absolute limit of Fourth Grade then?


    Even if the invaders¡¯ power normally exceeded the Fourth Grade, they would be suppressed to a maximum of Fourth Grade once they entered the knight¡¯s ne. And when that happens, who knows who will be the final victor! However, the witcher-knights have the home field advantage. If it came down to a battle of life and death, they would always have a numerical advantage over the trespassers.


    This was the sole consoling thought of all the people present!


    But just as this group of witcher-knight higher-ups was gathered together and immersed in their discussion, four ck shadows were silently roaming about the night sky above the casten¡¯s castle. A bloodsucking vampire the size of a washbasin, with deep ck fur all over its body, folded its wings and slowly crawled on top of the roof of the room the knights were gathered in.


    This was a nation of knights after all. Their control and application of arcanology was still crude and superficial in every aspect. If this had been the World of Adepts, any random magic rm or protective array would have been able topletely cover the secret room, shielding it from any scrying attempts from the outside world.


    However, arcanology was not widely applied in such a manner here. Thus, as these high-grade knights were gathered to have their secret meeting, their main means of security was having some witcher-knights standing guard and patrolling.


    Surely, they would be able to stop most means of spying from the outside world through such means. But when their enemies were not humans, and instead a bunch of mysterious adepts from another ne, their guards and patrol squads were rendered excessively crude, basic, and insufficient.


    Even if they were to wrack their brains, they wouldn¡¯t expect the spy to be right above them. Even the witcher-knights, with their vignce and sharps senses, couldn¡¯t detect a bloodsucking bat when it stops beating its wings and slowly glides down from the dark night sky.


    Seeing that one of theirpanions had sessfullynded atop of the secret room, the remaining bloodsucking bats quickly pped their wings and flew towards the square in front of the casten¡¯s quarters.


    Far away, even with a distance of a kilometer between them, they could still clearly see the two giant green dragons lying on the brightly-lit square.


    Right now, several carts were slowly being driven into the square.


    The carts weren¡¯t loaded with food such as grain, fruits and vegetables. Instead, one after another were filled withrge domestic animals letting out sorrowful shrieks of panic and fear. From the looks of it, it was the Charost beast that was most often raised by the natives of this ne (Author: a kind of creature that is simr to domestic pigs on earth.)


    Perhaps because they could smell the unique stench of dragons-the creatures at the very top of the food chain-the cows, goats, and the charosts began to panic once they entered the square. Loud and noisy bleats and shrieks filled the air of the silent square.


    The two green dragons instantly raised their slender necks when they heard the final calls from their food. Theirrge mouths opened slightly, and the light green saliva dripped from between their crystal-white fangs. Their saliva was clearly quite acidic, dripping to the floor and and leaving tiny sizzling holes in the stone floor.


    The two green dragons couldn¡¯t hold back their desire to feed. They instantly got up from the floor and leapt to the side of the carts in one movement. With one bite of their jaws they shredded the wooden cart dividers and dragged the domestic animals out, pinning them with their ws while tearing at them and feeding.


    Even though green dragons were a top-level magical creature, they were still wild beasts by nature. As such, the sight of their feeding was extremely savage and bloody. They didn¡¯t even care for the human servants around them when they fed.


    The cart driver quickly jumped off the cart and ran when he saw the dragon leaping over. If he was too slow, he would either have fallen to his death as the dragons lifted the cart into the skies with their jaws, or he would have turned into a dessert for the dragons¡¯ meal.


    It was clear that these two green dragons had enjoyed countless offerings from the humans, as they were especially picky even while they feasted. For many of the domestic animals, they would only pick the fattest and juiciest parts of their meat.


    Using theirrge bodies, they pushed their food over and pinned them down with their sharp ws. Then, they used their sharp scythe-like fangs to bite into their favourite parts, throwing aside the rest of the body that they didn¡¯t want. The entire process was truly bloody and cruel! In just a few moments, the once neat and clean city square had turned into a bloody ughterhouse filled with the stench of blood, and littered with the broken remains of domestic animals.


    Of course, those few tiny things flying about the dark horizon far away did not escape the green dragons¡¯ powerful sense of smell and elementium.


    The green dragon Ysondre lifted its head, looking at the insignificant bugs, faintly radiating traces of darkness, with its amber-coloured eyes. After a few moments of painful deliberation, it gave up the urge to fly into the sky and hunt them.


    It was only a few tiny weaklings radiating feeble amounts of dark elementium flux. They probably posed no harm to this human city. Moreover, his master had repeatedly warned him not to hunt as he willed in human cities.


    Thus, with the fest still before him, Ysondre quickly forgot about the annoying bugs and focused on enjoying the humans¡¯ offering.


    This was the first time vampires had appeared in the knights¡¯ ne- otherwise there was no way the green dragon Ysondre would have let them be so easily. If the green dragon could hear the conversation of the vampire spawn a kilometer away, Ysondre would have sworn to turn them into dust, even if it had to chase them to the ends of earth!


    "I didn¡¯t expect these green dragons to eat the food offered by the humans!"


    "Yes, this might be our chance......"


    "Yes, it has to be the blessing of our blood ancestor. For these two giant lizards to be such idiots......"


    "Hurry up and inform our respected blood ancestor and have her find some way to get some powerful poisons. If we could incapacitate these green dragons, we might have a chance to taste dragon blood......"


    "This idea is ingenious! You lot stay here and look, I¡¯ll go and inform our respected blood ancestor......"


    The vampire spawn flew about the dark night skies, closely monitoring every action of the green dragons, while exchanging passionate words. Soon, a bloodsucking bat turned around while beating its wings as it took to higher skies, flying towards the direction of Blue Hillock City.


    Yet at this moment, the Great Duke Lington was also having a secret meeting with his subordinates in another secret room within the casten¡¯s quarters.


    "Have we still not figured out their goal?" It was the Great Duke Lington who spoke, a huge frown on his face.


    "No clear goal." A veteran general wearing golden armor, his face worn with age, shook his head and spoke, "Perhaps even they themselves aren¡¯t sure what their goal and target is?"


    "But I¡¯ve personally gone outside the city to see their base, which is constantly expanding. The expanded base could fit 3000 witcher-knights at the very minimum." A young general solemnlymented.


    "3000? So many of them......"


    "God! That¡¯s 3000 witcher-knights! Even during thest war against the heretics there weren¡¯t so many witcher-knights rallied together!"


    "We can¡¯t let them go on like this. Even with the current numbers of witcher-knights, they already pose a serious threat to our Herdurand City."


    "How many more troops can we draw from the surrounding cities?" Great Duke Lington calmly asked.


    "There are currently twenty-thousand city guards stationed in Herdurand City. If we include your ten-thousand personal guards, we can maintain a numerical advantage of approximately 25 to 1 against the witcher-knights. But if their numbers keep increasing, we would have a hard time maintaining the bnce inbat strength. Sir, as you should know, making city guards go against witcher-knights with a numerical advantage of less than 20 to 1 would be no different than sending them to their deaths!"


    The veteran general¡¯s words drew everyone¡¯s agreement, and they could only lower their heads in frustration.


    They had to have an absolute numerical advantage. Using mere strategy to pit a mundane army made of normal humans against the supernaturally-powered witcher-knights would be a hopeless endeavour!


    \When faced with the overwhelming number of witcher-knights, as well as the numerous spellbreaker knights, radiant knights, and the two dragon knights that were so powerful that they struck despair into their enemies, no one coulde up with any courage or will to fight..


    Right now, everyone could only pray as hard as they could that the de of the witcher-knight army wasn¡¯t pointed towards themselves!

 Chapter 191

    Chapter 191 Scheming Against Dragons


    It was close to dawn when Mary snuck into Herdurand City.


    Besides her army of blood servants and vampire spawns, the three adepts Greem, Keoghan as well as Ferrier followed her into the city.


    They broke straight into the noble¡¯s mansion closest to the city square. In less than eight minutes, they hadpletely taken control of all fifty or so residents within the entire mansion. If it wasn¡¯t to avoid any outsiders from detecting abnormality, the more efficient way of doing things would be to kill those residents. Now, they had to have Ferrier, who was adept in brewing potions, turn them into obedient puppets using Heart-Loss Powder.


    Ferrier sounds like a very feminine name, but in truth the owner of the name was a very rugged and burly man. ording to Keoghan¡¯s words in another, more private conversation, Ferrier was truly a female when he advanced to an adept. He had only turned out like this after an ident during an experiment.


    Of course, this was only referring to Ferrier¡¯s appearance. As for whether Ferrier¡¯s gender identity and anatomy was male or female, there was no way to find out. At any rate, Greem and the rest had absolutely no interest in this!


    Greem had long despaired when it came to the group known as adepts.


    There was no way there could be a normal person amongst those that could advance to adepts!


    The passion and thirst with which adepts pursue knowledge was no less than that of the great scientists back on Earth in Greem¡¯s previous life. However, while the scientists on Earth had an ingenious brain and countless amazing ideas, most of their time was spent huddled up in theirbs, not being able to turn the various ingenious and unbelievable ideas in their brains into reality.


    Thus the scientists on Earth thought a lot, but hardly ever put to actions their thoughts. Constrained by the limits of their power, as well as financial situation, most of their ideas could only remain as dreams.


    But the adepts of this world had no such constraints!


    They were like a group of liberated mad scientists- with not just the insanity of scientists, but the ability to turn their insanity into reality!


    Thetter was what was the most terrifying!


    The first thing the group did after they had settled in was to set up a hidden barrier within the mansion, and use the strength of spells to hide the overly obvious elementium flux radiating from everyone¡¯s body. Then they hid in their rooms, secretly spying on the two terrifying green dragons curled up on the square, snoring as they slept.


    Greem removed his ck adept¡¯s robe, and changed into noble¡¯s hunting attire that was good to move around in. This was to avoid staying conspicuous. The attire was a body-tight clothing nobles would wear when they went out on outings, or to y and hunt. The lower half was a pair of leather pants, designed for horse-riding. The upper half had two rows of buttons down the front, much like tight-fitting vests from Earth in Greem¡¯s previous life.


    With Greem¡¯s height of two meters, such a neat, crisp and delicate costume coupled with the long crimson hair over his shoulders and his handsome looks made him look extremely gorgeous.


    It had only been a short time since he became an adept after all. He had yet to have been twisted by the evilness and strangeness of the spells of adepts. Thus, with a little dressing up, Greem instantly transformed into a handsome noble youth.


    Mary, on the other hand, had changed into a bright red muslin dress. She was as beguiling as a bottle of thick and fragrant wine, wine so captivating it could draw most human males in and drown them.


    With how the two were dressed, they were a very fitting pair, like a handsome noble youth together with a seductive nobledy. One would look forward to the fantastic scene of the two dancing together amidst a crowd.


    However, it looked extremely unnatural and twisted when the other two adepts put on the human nobility¡¯s clothes. The look of an adept was too strong on them. The cruelty and savagery of adepts between their brows couldn¡¯t be wiped away.


    But neither Keoghan or Ferrier seemed to care. The two looked at Greem and Mary, and a wicked smile surfaced uncontrobly on their faces.


    Two brats that had just advanced to adepts. There were still too many emotions and marks of a human on them. Still too much passion. Now is the time indulge in debauchery, to immerse themselves in pleasure. Only once they had experienced near a century of the vicissitudes of life, only once they had enjoyed all the pleasures of humanity- beauties, authority- will they finally realise that the infinite knowledge is the only thing worth their lifelong pursuit on the journey of adepts.


    Thus when they saw Greem and Mary, they couldn¡¯t help but recall the period of debauchery and indulgence when they themselves had just advanced to adepts. Naturally, the expression on their faces was really weird.


    Greem was in no mood to slowly consider the odd mentality of the two elderly adepts. He went to the front of therge wooden window and pulled aside one edge of the curtain. Greem silently assessed the giant green silhouette of which he could only see a vague outline from the distance.


    Because he could not cast spells freely here, Greem had to rely on the chip¡¯s passive probing ability to silently feel the power of the two green dragons.


    "How is it? Did you find anything? "Keoghan went to the other side of the wooden window, and snuck a look out of it much like Greem was doing.


    "These should be two barely adolescent green dragons. One is male and the other is female. As for their power....I can¡¯t get a good enough look from here, so I only have a simple estimation......"Greem¡¯s forehead was all scrunched up. Clearly, the green dragons¡¯ power was the most important thing he had to figure out.


    "Oh? You can tell whether its male or female? "Keoghan, who was standing right beside paused for a second, rubbed his eyes and stared intensely at the dragons, but still, the only thing he could see was their emerald scales with their perfect and smoothly flowing lines. Keoghan couldn¡¯t see any distinguishing characteristics on their bodies that betrayed their genders.


    "Hurhur......"Greem let out an awkwardugh: "Don¡¯t think of finding any obvious gender characteristics on their bodies. You need to look at their dragon horns and their build. The one on the left has horns that arerge and rough, the degree at which they curve is alsorger, along with the slightlyrger build makes it definitely a male......The one on the right has shorter and slimmer horns, and a slightly slimmer build as well which makes that a female......"


    Having Greem exined these to him, Keoghan looked at the dragons one more. As expected, he managed to spot these tiny differences that differentiated the dragons.


    "These are also things you read from books? "Keoghan asked, shocked.


    "It is introduced in the seventh chapter of the third volume of The Tome of Giant Dragons......There are also some descriptions pertaining to this in the summary of the Encyclopedia of Dragonspeak......and also......"Greem replied in a serious manner.


    "Wait. Wait. Wait......Where did you read all these books? Have you actually been nning to go dragonying? "Keoghan was so stunned his mouth was wide open.


    "It¡¯s all stuff I happened to flipped through at the Underground World¡¯s adepts¡¯ tower¡¯s library, I just happened to memorise them......"


    "......"


    Keoghan tilted his head and looked at Greem like he was a monster. He couldn¡¯t help but mutter: "You little brat, do you actually have perfect memory? I don¡¯t understand......I don¡¯t understand......"


    Then, Keoghan couldn¡¯t help but follow up with a question: "Since you can identify the genders of the dragons, can you tell the power of the two dragons before us? "


    Greem twitched his mouth and replied: "Even green dragon whelps have adept-level power. These dragons are already adolescents, so their individual grade must be above Second Grade......But considering that they are still young, and theck of elementium in this ne, they must not have reached Third Grade yet......Their power levels are probably just barely above Second Grade, or in the middle of Second Grade......"


    Greem nodded. He agreed with Greem¡¯s judgement.


    Even though the two green dragons had yet to reach a shocking Third Grade, just their power of Second Grade was enough to roll over the four of them. To put it in more blunt and pessimistic terms, just these two green dragons were enough to obliterate the adepts¡¯ forward base!


    While the two were softly conversing, Mary pushed open the door and walked into the room.


    "We got the things. They are all at the kitchen downstairs. "Mary couldn¡¯t help but cover her nose, and wave her hand before it: "They really stink! I am definitely not touching them. "


    Ferrier smiled slightly, and turned to leave the room.


    Dragon feces were something most people would avoid. However, for potions masters such as himself, they were a very decent ingredient for brewing. Moreover, wasn¡¯t the purpose everyone dragged "him" out here to have "him" brew a potion specifically designed for dragons?


    The dragons, having a powerful physique and exceptional magic resistance would be immune to most low-grade spells. Normal poison and paralyzing drugs would also have no effect. Thus, trying to kill them through poison was only a fantasy, but using them to incapacitate them for a while was still possible.


    External curses and offensive spells had no way of piercing the scales of the green dragons. Crossbows and daggers were naturally even less effective. Thus, any external attacks were unlikely to have effect without alerting the Third Grade Dragon Knights.


    Using potions to drug a dragon would be a very unreliable means in most situations, but it was the most suitable in the situation now.


    To ensure that the two green dragons¡¯ life wasfortable, the city hall had even specially hired a group of paupers to take care of them. Transporting fresh livestock for them, cleaning the remains of their meals as well as their feces......This work was extremely dangerous and most peasants would never do such work. It was only the paupers who were willing to do anything for a spoon of rice that would take such risks.


    Thus Mary sent out a couple of vampire subordinates to bribe some of the pauper servants withrge amounts of money and have them secretly cart out some of the green dragons¡¯ feces and saliva. With these things, Ferrier, who was a professional potions master, could brew a potion specifically targeted at, and strong enough to knock out the green dragons!


    Ferrier set up a small secret room downstairs to focus on mixing the potion, while Mary sent outrge numbers of her vampire subordinates all across the city to gather information regarding the inner workings of Herdurand. Greem and Keoghan, on the other hand, were guarding by the window, silently observing the two green dragons.


    The operation was designated for tonight, as information shows that there will be anotherrge-scale feeding session tonight before midnight. Therefore, if they had any ns, it had to be based around this feeding session.


    Yet, just as dusk arrived, something happened on the square!


    One of the dragon knights exited the casten¡¯s quarters under thepany of the crowd. After some quick farewells, he leapt onto one of the dragons and took to the skies, whistling towards the east.


    That was where Blue Hillock City was!

 Chapter 192

    Chapter 192 Hunting Green Dragons


    Two green dragons.


    One left, one remained.


    This undoubtedly made the operation at night even easier.


    However, the dragon that left left some bad implications in everyone¡¯s minds.


    The ce the opponent was flying towards was very likely to be Blue Hillock City. Moreover, they were a Second Grade Green Dragon, along with a Third Grade Dragon Knight. Thisbination made for up the knights¡¯ weakness of easily being kited by spellcasters. If something happened to the adepts¡¯ base or Blue Hillock City, their efforts before would be utterly wasted.


    There must not be any damage back there!


    Thus, Mary snuck out of Herdurand City and cast a spell tomunicate with the three remaining adepts in Blue Hillock City, sending the information regarding the dragons and the dragon knights back.


    The original n to hunt continued.


    The speed at which the dragon flew was exceedingly fast. If something truly happened back in Blue Hillock City, it would be pointless for them to give hurry back anyway. Therefore, why not stay here and continue with the n? After all, with their borate n, hunting the green dragon was entirely possible. Letting this opportunity go would be a pity.


    Thus these courageous and bold fellows quickly gathered onest time in the mansion, then left the noble¡¯s mansion separately, each of them with a wicked grin on their faces.


    ............


    The green dragon Rissana was bored.


    As a teenage female dragon, Rissana was only 118 this year. This was the point in the long life of dragons where they were the most active and energetic, and where they most longed for wealth.


    As she had only left the dragon cliff for less than six years, Rissana had yet to have the time to create a den that belonged solely to herself. The knights¡¯ kingdom had built a luxurious and grand pce for her, and filled her quarters with shiny gold coins. But there were no treasures that truly caught her eye!


    In these six years, she did not have the chance to go out on her own to plunder and loot wealth. Most of the time, she could only curl up in the superficial pce and sleep to pass the time.


    Her days were dry and boring!


    This was a continent ruled by humans.


    All kinds ofrge and small human cities were spread across the continent, each of their treasuries filled with wealth that would make a dragon drunk with joy. Sadly, most of these human cities had owners, and were under the protection and guardianship of the knights¡¯ kingdom. And there were plenty of terrifyingly powerful beings that struck fear in the dragons within the knights¡¯ kingdom!


    To obtain wealth and authority that belonged to her, Rissana the female dragon that had juste of age responded to the summons of the great knight Kalyk, bing the contracted partner of a powerful Third Grade knight.


    Rissana had heard from Kalyk, that the venture this time was to go into Greend Forest on a crusade against some evil invaders or something. Rissana was not interested in this!


    She couldn¡¯t be bothered to care about these tiny bugs that squeezed their way in using the loopholes of the nes.


    Who was she? She was Rissana, the youngest, most beautiful, most powerful Second Grade green dragon in the most recent hundred years of the dragon cliff¡¯s history! The young dragons that pursued her could fill an entire dragon¡¯s valley; the poems praising her beauty could be read for three days and three nights in a row the human knights that envied her power could form mountains and seas......


    But now she could only curl up on the wet and cold stone floor, toying with the corpse of a human servant with one of her sharp dragon ws, passing the time by in boredom.


    This was an extremely unlucky fellow, to have stood in front of the great Rissana when she was in a bad mood. Rissana had only breathed slightly more heavily, and the dragon¡¯s breath that brought with it a light green poison mist had already crippled the unlucky fellow.


    This unlucky guy was still able to struggle and twitch on the ground initially, but after Rissana let out another two poison breaths in her boredom, hepletely stopped!


    The other human ves serving her were all shivering in fear, their faces a pale white. A disgusting smell of urine even came from one of them. Thus, Rissanashed out her long thorny tail, that was like a meteor hammer, and the pitiable fellow was turned into a spread of unrecognizable meat paste.


    Just as she was getting increasingly bored and was contemting killing another human to relieve her boredom, the sound of cart wheels rang from the streets outside the square. The sorrowful shrieks and cries of the livestock couldn¡¯t stop as the carts carrying their load entered the square one after another.


    Was it time to feed?


    The green dragon that had just enjoyed a feast yesterday and wasn¡¯t too hungry waszing around and couldn¡¯t get her spirits up. Rissana raised the tip of her nose and sniffed. Instantly, she straightened her body, herrge dragon eyes fixated on one of the carts.


    These were a bunch of goats whose bodies seemed to somewhat skinny. These were goats that had been domesticated and bred for food, thus the taste of their meat was far less delicious than wild goats. But the green dragon could smell a tinge of the smell of Dragondrunk Fruit on one of the goats.


    Dragondrunk Fruit was a unique fruit that giant dragons loved to gorge upon. Don¡¯t judge them on their small size, for these Dragondrunk Fruits had the special ability to cause giant dragons to fall into an intoxicated state and start hallucinating. Of course, the effect of Dragondrunk Fruit wasn¡¯t so obvious on other living beings, and was limited to mostly dragons. Thus, this was a fruit that must be nted near any dragon cliff or dragon valley.


    Giant dragons were never good at taking care of such fragile nts. Moreover, they had arge appetite, and the amount they gorged down every time was shocking. Therefore, giant dragons would usually enve some weaker races, for the explicit purpose of having them tidy their dens, guard their territory and most of all, to take care of the orchards of the giant dragons that they so love.


    Rissana did not expect to smell Dragondrunk Fruit anywhere outside the dragon valley. Did this goat identally eat Dragondrunk Fruits somewhere?


    Still with some questions in her head, Rissana lowered herrge head and opened her mouth. With a light curling of her agile tongue, the special goat had been dragged into her mouth, and she had already started chewing.


    The goat¡¯s blood that had an intense odour to it brought with it a tinge of the taste of Dragondrunk Fruit, but upon more careful tasting, it seemed odd, as if there was some other mysterious substance mixed in the goat¡¯s blood.


    This feeling......this feeling was somewhat odd!


    The green dragon that was silently tasting her food opened her eyes wide. Something wasn¡¯t right. It seemed like she could no longer feel the existence of her tongue......


    When she realised the unusual circumstance, an intense feeling of paralysis quickly spread in her mouth, and very rapidly went to her stomach. Rissana could no longer support her heavy dragon body. With a loud thump, her body crashed into the square.


    The four hiding in the noble¡¯s mansion didn¡¯t dare dy once they saw the green dragon fall. Immediately, they used all the means at their disposals to rush to the green dragon.


    Adept Ferrier who was a potions master had indeed specifically strengthened the effect of the potion with the dragon as the target, but attempting topletely incapacitate a Second Grade green dragon with such crude materials, and especially a green dragon who had a poisonous physique herself, was but a pipe dream.


    Thus, the paralysis potion Adept Ferrier created could only paralyze the green dragon for three minutes. If they were not able to find a way to kill the green dragon in these three minutes, once the effect of the drug wore off, none of them would be able to escape the pursuit of an angered dragon!


    The first to reach the green dragon¡¯s side was Greem, even though Mary had the greatest speed amongst the four.


    A me pir that went straight towards the sky appeared in the middle of the square, and the me Fiend Greem had transformed into walked out of the fire with a wicked grin on his face. With a quick wave of the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his right hand, a Fire Deity engulfed in violent mes appeared nearby.


    It looked about its surroundings, before roaring and charging towards the mass of city guards standing on the outside of the square.


    That was not the end of it. Greem strode forward, and the Scroll of Voodoo automatically flew into his left hand, its pages rapidly flipping. Every time the parchment stopped on a page, a powerful fire spell would instantly form, violently sting onto the green dragon¡¯srge body.


    A savage Fire Core Explosion had just arrived, and another pir of red mes would st into the skies with the green dragon at its center. The fire had just slightly died down and another Magma Fireball would have crashed into the dragon¡¯s body......


    It was literally one violent fire spell with every step Greem took. When Greem¡¯s three-meter-tall body arrived before the green dragon¡¯s body, all five instantaneous spell stored within the Scroll of Voodoo had been expended, and the surroundings of the green dragon¡¯s body had been turned into a ming sea of magma.


    Besides the powerful me damage, the five violent spells Greem hurled out earlier also had tremendous physical damage. The green dragon¡¯s curled up body had been sted ck. Even the ground where ity on had caved downwards severely, forming a crater much like where a meteor had hit.


    However, even after enduring the bombardment of such violent spells, Rissana¡¯s dragon body still didn¡¯t show too many signs of damage. While the individual dragon scales at the center of the explosions had been distorted and somewhat deformed by the high heat, but the defense of the dragon scales that were both resistant to magical and physical attacks still deflected most of the damage from Greem¡¯s spells.


    Greem threw aside the Scroll of Voodoo, seeing that the effect of spell damage wasn¡¯t very good. He tossed out Fire Lord¡¯s elementium core, then let out a loud roar. The mes all over his body started to wildlypress within his body, quickly gathering into a gigantic executioner¡¯s de in his hand.


    At the same time, Mary¡¯s silhouette, quick as a phantom, had also appeared in the square.


    The crimson longbow in her hand was instantly drawn to a full moon, and a single arrow with crimson runes vaguely floating about it formed on the bowstring. Very soon, once her imposing aura and power had reached their peak, Mary let out a shout, and the blood red arrow turned into a sh, immediately sinking into the green dragon¡¯s chest.


    The green dragon was covered by emerald scales all over its body. However, while the scales on the spine and the sides of its body were the thickest andrgest, the dragon scales on its throat, below its neck, and on its abdomen were the thinnest and lightest.


    Greem¡¯s bombardment earlier was mostly focused on these light dragon scales, and had already somewhat damaged the dragon. Under the copsing of the scales, bright red flesh was exposed.


    Mary¡¯s full power shot from her crimson longbow had sunk into a part where there was no longer any dragon scales.


    The arrow pierced the body, and the violent bloody energy exploded within the flesh of the green dragon!


    A blood fountain suddenly spilled out from the abdomen of the green dragon. One could see broken bodily organs, pieces of meat ground into paste and purple-ck dragon blood in the sticky pool of blood water.


    Even though her body had been paralyzed with no means to move, the green dragon Rissana still let out a sorrowful and pained moan. The call for help was obvious.


    Just then, Keoghan who was enveloped in ck smoke, and Ferrier who had grown a pair of green wings of wind behind his back also arrived on the battlefield.


    The numerous vampires that Mary had brought, on the other hand, turned into a swarm of bloodsucking bats beating their wings as they surged into the square. Their target was the city guards standing guard near the square!

 Chapter 193

    Chapter 193 Race Against Time


    In just fourteen seconds, Greem and Mary had alreadypleted their first round of attacks on the green dragon.


    These attacks brought about tremendous damage to the green dragon.


    If a simr amount of damage had been inflicted on a radiant knight, it would probably be more than enough to severely wound them. However, when it was inflicted on a green dragon¡¯s massive build, it was barely a light injury.


    On the fifteenth second, Keoghan and Ferrier took over and started the second round of attacking the green dragon. Meanwhile, Greem and the Fire Lord hade together to cast arge-scale fire spell in unison.


    One after another, screeching bloodsucking bats circled around the surroundings of the square. Every time they saw city guards closing in, they charged down with an ear-piercing screech. Their bodies were still midair, and they were already rapidly transforming into their human forms. They charged recklessly into the mass of city guards, triggering wave after wave of bloody ughter.


    The Fire Deity that Greem had summoned earlier mainly relied on fire spells as its main means of attack. Its threat against the green dragon¡¯s powerful magic resistance was negligible. Therefore, Greem sent it to the outer rim to recklessly bombard the buildings around them and cover the few paths that led to the square with seas of me.


    Greem and Ferrier were able to sessfullyplete the second round of attacks on the green dragon with the help and cover of these servants.


    As a potions master, Ferrier had secret leather pouches hidden all over his adept robe and belt. He flew above the green dragon, and with a light twitch of his fingers, vials and test tubes of all kinds and colors were clenched between his fingers.


    Five vials fell in an elegant curve and dropped on the body of the green dragon Rissana. They shattered, and swathes of grey smoke engulfed part of the dragon¡¯s body. The grey smoke behaved like a living being. It didn¡¯t spread out rapidly, as smoke usually did, and instead closely gathered about the body of the green dragon, squirming and writhing.


    The dragon¡¯s scales that were enveloped by the smoke quickly became tarnished and corroded.


    The emerald scales turned into a lead-grey colour, before once again turning into a colorless white. Without the protection of the scales, the grey smoke came in contact with the flesh beneath, and the sound of sizzling flesh being corroded could be heard everywhere.


    Three more test tubes were thrown downwards, shattering on the green dragon¡¯s long and curved horns, as well as on its back. Immediately, several rings of maroon curse-halos started to sh over the dragon¡¯s body. Even though the dragon¡¯s powerful physique resisted most of the power of the curses, some of their effect still managed to prate the green dragon. Even the mes of anger in itsrge eyes dimmed a little.


    Ferrier didn¡¯t try to close in on the dragon. Instead, he stayed midair with the wings of wind, incessantly throwing all sorts of potions and drugs onto the green dragon¡¯s body. Each vial would create some unique magic effect when it shattered. Perhaps it would be curse halos, or perhaps it would be corrosion spells, or offensive spells...


    Ferrier also summoned Bloodsucking Vines and Blood Snakes with his vials, and had them drill their way into the green dragon¡¯s body to harmfully attack its flesh.


    As for Keoghan, his attacks were even more bizarre.


    He charged towards a bloody injury on the green dragon¡¯s abdomen. With a shout, he enhanced his right hand with a Spell of Sharpening and a Spell of Puncturing, then thrust it fiercely into the flesh.


    Green dragons possessed tough, tense flesh. Even without the protection of dragon scales, it would be as tough as normal enchanted leather armor. Thus, Keoghan could only thrust his right arm in up to his wrist before stopping. Moreover, Keoghan¡¯s right arm came into contact with the green dragon¡¯s tough muscles and dragon blood, which had powerful acidic properties. His arm was instantly wounded all over.


    Keoghan didn¡¯t mind the injuries on his arm. He let out another shout, andpleted a unique transformation. The right hand he had thrust into the dragon¡¯s abdomen suddenly became thick and soft. Even the color of the exposed skin outside had turned into a green-grey color.


    In the blink of an eye, Keoghan hadpleted a transformation of part of his body into a tentacle, and through that he continuously injectedrge amounts of blood and flesh, that were infected with uniquely epidemic viruses, into the body of the green dragon.


    Instantly, it seemed as if the flesh and blood within the green dragon¡¯s body was boiling. The dragon scales all over its body swelled up and down, as if there were countless beasts of blood and flesh drilling recklessly within its body.


    The green dragon was suffering in tremendous pain, and once again let out a sorrowful cry that shook the heavens and earth. Her call for help was evident.


    In truth, when the green dragon¡¯s distressing call had first rang out across the sky, everyone¡¯s hearts were struck with fear by a powerful flux of power from inside of the casten¡¯s quarters in the distance.


    A human-shaped silhouette of light, dressed in an untidy fashion, charged out from a pce somewhere, roaring as he strode towards the direction of the square. In response to this, a dozen light silhouettes came out of the buildings around the pce, one after another, letting out battlecries as they charged towards the square.


    These human-shaped silhouettes were naturally the radiant knights stationed within Herdurand City. Once their power had been activated, the runic energies around them poured into their bodies, immediately turning all of them into beings of light.


    Judging from the radiant knights¡¯ positioning near the pce, it was obvious that the focus of their protection was on the great dragon knight. As for the green dragon Rissana¨C would a powerful giant dragon fear the sneak attack of unknown enemies?


    Amongst the mass of radiant human shapes, there was one that was obviously a great deal brighter than the rest. His existence was like a miniature sun that illuminated the entire night sky. Every action he made brought with it powerful might and a terrifying feeling of absolute dominance.


    As he yelled and tramped towards the square, powerful energy shockwaves rippled about his body, almost as if the heaven and earth were mildly shaking with each heavy step he took.


    Sadly, he couldn¡¯t fly.


    The radiant knights couldn¡¯t fly either!


    This was perhaps the greatest tragedy befalling all individuals of knight or warrior sses. Just as the world had blessed them with iparably powerful and tough physiques, as well as terrifying strength without equal, they had also been robbed of their agility.


    Regardless how they blustered and cursed, even breaking through walls and houses as they headed in a straight course for the square, it remained a fantasy for them to cross 1.5 kilometer distance with a single step.


    Rissana¡¯s repeated cries of sorrow had obviously greatly worried the dragon knight. He roared as he smashed through multiple walls, wildly rushing towards the square.


    To save time, he even used Charge, a battle technique knights only used when assaulting enemies, to cross the distance.


    After twenty-seven seconds of chanting, the powerful fire spell Greem cast together with the Fire Lord had finally beenpleted.


    A single red dot, bright as the Morning Star, appeared in the inscrutable pitch-ck sky in everyone¡¯s view.


    The red dot started to be bigger, carrying terrifying kic energy, bringing with it clouds of me that filled the skies. It pierced through the clouds and quickly crashed down from the sky, going straight for the Second Grade green dragon that had already suffered so much abuse.


    Meteor Crash!


    This was a powerful spell with frightening might.


    Only a powerful elementium golem, with attributes of both fire and earth like the Fire Lord, couldunch such a devastating spell. Greem¡¯s function in the joint casting this time was only to provide the Fire Lord with plenty of fire elementium, shortening the chanting and channeling time of this superior spell as much as possible.


    The Third Grade dragon knight Kalyk, still one kilometer away, opened his eyes wide in anger as he saw the terrifying might of the ming meteor falling from the sky. He shouted loudly as he concentrated energy in his hands to form a spear, throwing it towards the ming meteor with all his strength.


    The meteor had been engulfed in mes due to friction when it pierced through the clouds, turning it into a literal ming meteor. The energy spear crossed two kilometers of space and sped towards the meteor. However, before it could make full contact with the ming rock, the spear had already been evaporated by the intense heat and clouds of mes that filled the skies.


    But the ming meteor was still affected by the impact of this powerful blow near the side, causing a slight shift in its trajectory. It brutally crashed to the green dragon¡¯s side.


    The meteor didn¡¯t get a clean hit, and the square had to endure its terrifying kic energy.


    A deep hole appeared where the meteor hadnded, and densely scattered cracks like spiderwebs appeared in the stone floor around it, spreading outwards. The city square went silent for three seconds, before erupting from the violent impact.


    The stone floor, rocks, and the buildings on top it were the first to be blown up. They quickly became debris in the explosive shockwave spreading outwards in a ring shape, turning into a storm of countless fine rocks that ferociously sted outwards.


    Even though Greem and the other three had already made preparations, gathering around and erecting a secure barrier, they were still pushed outwards for nearly a hundred meters by the ferociously explosive shockwave.


    Meanwhile, the green dragon in the core of the explosion was the greatest victim.


    A small part of the explosive shockwave ravaged the dragon scales on its body, while the sharp bone protrusions all over its spine were even softened and snapped by the high heat. The intense searing jets of me burned away all the exposed flesh, while one of its wings had been hit by the meteor, turning into meat paste, before further being reduced to ashes.


    The magma pirs that spilled forth from the meteor¡¯s deep crater fell onto the green dragon¡¯s body, sizzling as they roasted and scalded its flesh.


    The mournful calls of the green dragon Rissana, on the other hand, gradually grew weaker.


    As the local authorities had prohibitedrge groups of witcher-knights from being stationed within the city, most of the soldiers in charge of patrol near the square were merely city guards. As such, they were also the greatest victims of this horrifying spell.


    In a battle of powerful beings, normal humans were only tiny ants that could be killed with a wave of a hand!


    Even half of the numerous vampires that Mary had brought along were engulfed by the terrifying streams of me that incessantly surged forth, reducing them to cinders. It was natural that the human warriors, who had not a bit of ability to defend themselves, suffered even more losses. Even if one disregarded the terrifying mes that reached nearly a hundred points in terms of attack strength, just the rain of rocks sted out by the shockwave was sufficient to turn them into sieves with bloody holes.


    Yet even under such a ferocious blow, everyone could still sense the weak life force of the green dragon amidst the mes and magma.


    The potent life energy of this Second Grade green dragon was shocking!


    Even after such a severe blow, it... it still hadn¡¯t died.


    What¡¯s more, everyone could sense the anger that had been suppressed to its limit slowly gathering in the green dragon¡¯s body. Once this powerful strength erupted, it would turn the world into a sea of mes and anger!

 Chapter 194

    Chapter 194 Chaos


    It was theoretically possible for a group of First Grade adepts to scheme and y a Second Grade giant dragon.


    But in truth, it was extremely difficult, so much so that it wasn¡¯t viable.


    The greatest problem was with the giant dragon¡¯s ability to fly.


    However, today, four First Grade adepts who had yet to experience nar wars almost seeded in aplishing a terrifying and shocking feat¨C dragonying!


    But ¡®almost¡¯ was ¡®almost¡¯ after all!


    Greem and the others could only give up in pity when their attacks on the green dragon could hardly extinguish thest dying mes of its life, while the fuming knights were closing in on the square.


    There were too many variables and unexpected elements in today¡¯s battle. Thus, one should not look down upon the power of giant dragons based on today¡¯s events.


    Firstly, if it was a Second Grade green dragon, with freedom of movement, then even ten more First Grade adepts couldn¡¯t have done anything to it. Therefore, Adept Ferrier¡¯s astounding dragon paralyzing drug was thergest factor for sess in this battle.


    Secondly, today was a rare asion where green dragon Rissana was left alone!


    In its daily life, Rissana would either be together with the Third Grade dragon-knight Kalyk, or peacefully sleeping within her beautiful pce. Naturally, there were strict patrols of witcher-knights outside the pce in charge of her protection.


    However, the delicate political rtionship of the actors within Herdurand City caused Great Duke Lington to put up a strong front against stationingrge groups of witcher-knights in the city. Thus, the green dragon that lived in the city square could only have city guards as her defenders, while the servants serving the giant dragon were temporary hired hands from the ghetto.


    All of these details ultimately brought about a life-threatening disaster to the green dragon. In less than three minutes, she had been beaten to the brink of death by four adepts who had been waiting for this moment.


    Unfortunately, be it Greem¡¯s transformation into the me Fiend and his desperate shes with the giant executioner¡¯s de, or Mary lying on the green dragon¡¯s bloody chest and drinking its blood with wild abandon, or Keoghan¡¯s transformation into a giant tentacled monster constantly devouring the dragon¡¯s flesh, or even Ferrier¡¯s incessant infection of the dragon¡¯s wounds with terrifying viruses and gues...


    Even when every single one of them used all the terrifying means at their disposals, or when the green dragon Rissana¡¯sst flicker of life was so dim it seemed like it could go out the very next second... still, the green dragon did not die!


    Under Greem¡¯smand, the Fire Deity at the outer rim of the squareunched a counter-charge towards the knights who were rushing over with heavy steps. Sadly, just as it reached halfway there, a dozen Crescent Moon shes, Evil-Decimating shes, Holy Radiant Swords, and other simr powerful knight battle techniques containing the anger of the knights, crashed into him.


    The radiant knights only needed to rely on their powerful bodily strength to activate the violent runic energies; unlike the spellbreaker knights, that needed to rely on runic weapons to even use knight battle techniques. The Fire Deity exploded in a fiery death as it was hit by a dozen knight battle techniques charged with highly concentrated energies. It didn¡¯t even have the chance to struggle!


    The radiant knights had now charged to the edge of the square. They were barely five hundred meters away from Greem and the others. Only a hundred meters more, and they would be in range to st Greem and the others with their knight battle techniques. When that happened, they were confident that they only needed one wave of attacks topletely wipe these annoying pests off the face of this ne.


    The scene of the Fire Deity being instantly destroyed by the radiant knights was deeply rming. Seeing the powerful opponents that were quickly closing in, Greem and the others could only give up on their urge to y a dragon, regardless of how unwilling they were to do so.


    Without another word, Greem retrieved the Fire Lord and leapt away with a me Teleportation.


    Greem vanished in a gigantic cluster of fire that suddenly appeared, only to reappear at the edge of the other side of the square, appearing in a pir of fire.


    Greem waved hisrge hand with a wicked grin on his face, and violent Chain Fireballs sted the city guards around him, sending their flesh and bones flying everywhere. Once the flux of the mes around him had stabilized, he turned his body and once again swiftly cast me Teleportation.


    Keoghan and Ferrier were not very adept at flying, and they didn¡¯t dare to dy. Each of them used the best of their abilities, either turning into ck smoke, or growing a pair of wings of wind, and rapidly fled the battlefield as well.


    Only Mary was too greedy, desperately devouring the flowing dragon blood, even as the acidic and poisonous blood stained herpletely green. Only when the radiant knights were almost three hundred meters away from her did she reluctantly take to the skies. The giant bat wings on her back suddenly opened, and she quickly escaped from the square.


    "Hmph. Bloody reptile, stay! " A cold snort full of anger suddenly rang out, and then a single dreadful sun, burning with power, rose amidst the numerous radiant knights, indiscriminately radiating shocking power flux in all directions.


    Third Grade Dragon-Knight Kalyk!


    Following his angry shout, an energy spear formed from concentrated runic energies quickly gathered in his hand. As Kalyl threw it with all his might, it turned into a beam of light that shed through the skies, directly shooting towards Mary who was pping her wings in the sky.


    Mary turned her body a little, revealing light glowing on her crimson longbow, and a dozen blood-coloured arrows hit the tip of the energy spear. Unfortunately, it was like a mantis trying to stop a cart. The blood-colored arrows had less than 13 points of attack strength and were like bubbles beneath a sun when put before the concentrated energy spear. They disappeared almost instantly. Even though their numbers were superior, they could hardly pause the unstoppable advance of the spear.


    "Don¡¯t block it, dodge. Quick!¡± It was toote when Keoghan and Ferrier shouted.


    The energy spear shot towards Mary¡¯s chest with a might that seemed as if it would rend the world apart.


    With a Third Grade dragon knight¡¯s concentrated runic energy, the explosion from the spear would be enough to blow Mary to bits, with not a single bit of flesh or blood left.


    At this dangerous moment, an explosive fireball appeared from the sky and exploded beside Mary. The violent me shockwaves had no effect on the energy spear either, but it managed to st Mary away at a key moment.


    The energy spear did not pierce Mary¡¯s torso; it only managed to go through her leg.


    The energy storm that erupted the very next moment engulfed arge half of Mary¡¯s body like a blender.


    Mary¡¯s broken body shot out like an arrow from the energy storm that suddenly erupted, ultimately able to prevent the closely following energy ripples from catching her entire body. When she escaped from the energy tide, only a small part of her perfectly seductive body was left. Everything below her chest was gone.


    Such a terrifying wound would have been lethal to any other person, but on a vampire, it still wasn¡¯t fatal.


    Thanks to the nourishment from therge amounts of dragon blood she had sucked earlier, the missing lower half of her body quickly started to grow again. Mary continued her speedy flight.


    "Quick, let¡¯s leave!" Keoghan shouted.


    The adepts escaped desperately, without even pausing to look. Four mysterious trails of different colors were drawn in the sky, slowly dispersing after a long time.


    These few adepts were masters in the art of escaping, but the vampire horde that had stayed behind to cover their rear were exterminated by energy spears the moment they took to the skies. Only some smarter ones transformed into bloodsucking bats, weaving through the crowd instead of taking to the skies, and quickly escaped into the surrounding alleys.


    Using such methods, a few vampire elites were sessfully able to escape knights¡¯ pursuit, hiding in the underground sewers of Herdurand City.


    ............


    The sudden attack by the mysterious heretics instantly shook the city of Herdurand.


    For the rest of the night, troop after troop of witcher-knights charged into the city, taking it under their control. They then searched for evidence of the outsiders by going through each and every house.


    Naturally, the normal citizens had no ability to resist the witcher-knights and could only let them investigate their houses. However, rich merchants and influential nobles would not ept such humiliation lying down. Armed conflicts of varying scale happened all over the city.


    Sadly, the giant-dragon partner of the honorable Third Grade dragon knight had been severely injured, and was on the brink of death. This had utterly enraged the authorities of the witcher-knight army! Therefore, amongst those who dared to stop the advance of the witcher-knights in their search, the servants and guards were killed without exception, while the merchants and nobles were caught and imprisoned in the witcher-knight¡¯s camp.


    For one night, the entire Herdurand City was in chaos!


    The angry merchants and nobles blocked the entrance to the casten¡¯s quarters, unceasingly expressing their greatests protests towards the city hall. But the rulers of the city, led by Great Duke Lington, never showed their faces. As such, various malicious rumours started to spread. Many citizens were secretly discussing the possibility that the Great Duke Lington had been put under house arrest by the Lord dragon knight.


    Just as chaos happened back there, the Greend Forest several hundred kilometers away weed an important character.


    Riding a flying giant-dragon at nearly a thousand feet in the sky was not a veryfortable or casual business. At this height, just the wind blowing at you could take away everyst bit of warmth in your body. Even a person wrapped in coats and furs would feel the chill all the way down to their bones.


    But with Jefferson¡¯s powerful Third Grade dragon knight physique, he wouldn¡¯t feel even a bit of difort in such an environment.


    He bent down to look at the sea of trees that stretched on and on. Everything in his vision was a verdant green that went up and down. It was probably delusional to try and find a troop of a hundred witcher-knights in such a vast forest.


    Jefferson lightly tapped the green dragon beneath his body. Ysondre understood, and folded his wings to rapidly dive downward, stretching his neck and letting out a long dragon¡¯s roar that rang across several dozen kilometers as he did so.


    He couldn¡¯t find that troop of witcher-knights, but as long as they were still in this forest, they would naturally find a way to contact him when they heard this signature dragon¡¯s-roar.


    Thus, the green dragon unfurled hisrge dragon wings slightly less than a hundred meters away from the canopy. It circled about the mountainous sea of trees, asionally letting out loud, clear roars. With the giant dragon¡¯s stunning flight speed and loud voice, the witcher-knights should be able to hear it, as long as they weren¡¯t deaf.


    Sadly, even after several rounds of circling about the vast forest that stretched for several hundred kilometer, they still had not detected any sort of feedback from the forest beneath them.


    Had Ninther brought the troops deep into the woods?


    Jefferson frowned, but the doubt in his heart was extinguished the moment it rose.


    Ninther was not like those newly advanced spellbreaker knights that were prone to rash decisions. If he had nned to bring the knights deep into the forest, he would have sent someone to inform the others of his actions. However, Jefferson had not managed to get any useful information from Blue Hillock City. It was almost as if the hundred-man army of witcher-knights hadpletely vanished in the woods.


    It seemed there was something odd about this stretch of woods!

 Chapter 195

    Chapter 195 Returning to the Base


    In the adepts¡¯ base.


    A group of adepts were gathered in one corner of the base. Their heads were raised, silently gazing at the ck dot constantly circling far away on the horizon.


    Beside them, an extremelyrge illusion barrier hid the entire valley, causing it to blend into the woods around it. From the skies, one couldn¡¯t tell anything was odd with the scene.


    Meanwhile, behind them the entire adepts¡¯ base was as busy as an enormous construction site. Countless robotics beasts, voodoo beasts, and elementium golems were busy working, while the outline of an adept¡¯s tower was slowly appearing.


    A nine-level adept¡¯s tower that stood two-hundred meters tall was supposed to be erected here, ording to the original n. Aspared to the mid-tier adept¡¯s tower in the World of Adepts, this tower would prioritize defense and offense, while the nonbat facilities within would be greatly reduced.


    Such an adept¡¯s tower might not be veryfortable to live in, but when the World of Adepts wanted to rapidly expand outward, it was a necessary war fortress. Every time adepts arrived in a foreign ne, the first thing to do was to construct such a simplified war tower.


    Once they built the tower, the adepts who had entered the ne would be free from the narws¡¯ oppression within the adept tower¡¯s radius. This created a beneficial battle environment for the adepts on their home territory.


    Currently, the three underground levels of the adept¡¯s tower had beenpleted. However, above ground, only a basic structure for the first two levels had been constructed. Under themand of the adepts, several robotics beasts were carefully carving arrays on the inner walls of the tower.


    This was another world after all. It wasn¡¯t possible to use the exceedingly costly internar ultra-long-range teleportation to transport all of the construction materials over. Thus, all of the luggage the second batch of adepts brought with them were rare materials and resources. The stones and timber used to construct the tower, on the other hand, could only be gathered here.


    If this were a normal adept¡¯s tower, the body of the tower would be built from numerousyers ofpound rocks. The outer wall would be constructed of strongly magic-resistant materials, such as obsidian and steelrock, while the inner wall would use special rocks with excellent magic conductivity such as augite, bloodstone, and volcanic rock.


    Of course, the specific rocks which were selected to construct the tower would be adjusted based on the individual attribute of the adept stationed in the tower. An adept¡¯s tower built in this fashion would naturally contain a living environment that waspatible with the stationed adept¡¯s attribute, and could greatly elerate the rate of the adept¡¯s growth.


    Sadly, theck of resources in this world turned all of this into mere fantasy. This simplified war tower could only be built out of resources gathered in the woods. The materials used to form the tower were all taken from the mountains nearby.


    The adepts had alreadymanded therge number of elementium golems to excavate a nearby hill,pletely mining out everything inside. It was with such a method that they were barely able to keep up with the huge consumption of rocks for the adept tower¡¯s creation.


    These normal rocks didn¡¯t have such outstanding magic properties as the precious rocks usually used for construction, and their quality was hardly satisfying. In order topensate for the inadequacies of the wall itself, the adepts had to carverge numbers of Strengthening arrays on the tower walls.


    This undoubtedly caused an even greater consumption of rare materials and resources!


    The initial investment of resources required for the invasion of another ne was astounding.


    Don¡¯t think of it as just a simplified war tower. Even this structure alone could exhaust several decades worth of a small-sized adept n¡¯s reserved resources. Moreover, if the war turned sour, the adepts and resources that could be sessfully retrieved from the other ne were very few. Most of the investment would have been for nothing.


    This was why ne wars were both the only shortcut for small and mid-sized adept ns to grow, but also an appalling nightmare that could destroy the foundations of a n.


    As such, every adept n was extremely cautious when faced with an unknown ne. They would seal all information, to avoid opposing ns from finding out their ns, while amassingrge numbers of resources. This would allow them to construct their war tower in the shortest time, such that they may have a solid foundation in the following ne war.


    Indeed, the true ne war had yet to start!


    The several battles that Greem and the others had engaged in were at best overtures and appetizers before the start of the ne war. A true nar war was infinitely more savage and bloody than a normal war. It was not something that the likes of Greem and the rookies would be able to imagine with their inexperienced minds!


    Looking at the ck dot persistently circling on the horizon, an adept couldn¡¯t help but start cursing in anger.


    No one would dare make anyrge actions within the camp while there was such a threat circling above their heads. The progress of the construction would inevitably be affected.


    "Sir F¨¹gen, don¡¯t you think we should send some voodoo beasts to lure it away?" Someone couldn¡¯t help but suggest.


    "We cannot act recklessly! Right now, there isn¡¯t a single adept within the base that is a match for a Third Grade dragon knight. If we exposed the location of the base, it probably wouldn¡¯t take more than a couple of hours before the most powerful beings of this ne appeared. Then, the expansion n the n has prepared for several decades would have to be given up!" Adept F¨¹gen shook his head coldly and rejected the suggestion of his subordinate.


    "But allowing the dragon knight to keep circling around here is not a solution either!" An adept sighed, "The illusion barrier can only extend up to a height of 80 metres. Once the war tower is erected, it would definitely be the most obviousndmark in this stretch of woods. As long as the dragon knight isn¡¯t blind, he would definitely see it. When that happens..."


    "Hmph," Adept F¨¹gen shook his head and spoke, "What do you take the dragon knights of this ne for? To use a Third Grade dragon knight as a patrol scout? In my opinion, this dragon knight is searching for thest group of witcher-knights we exterminated. As long as he can¡¯t find them, he will definitely... hmm?"


    Just as they were speaking, the dragon on the horizon far away suddenly stopped his actions. After a quick pause and a loud dragon¡¯s roar, the dragon knight drove the dragon southwest without any hesitation.


    Based on the direction, he was probably returning to Blue Hillock City!


    Adept F¨¹gen was stunned for a moment, before turning back and giving out an order, "Immediately contact Muret in Blue Hillock City. Check if anything important happened. I have a feeling that the dragon knight was in a hurry when it left earlier, almost as if something had happened!"


    "Understood!" The few adepts behind him bowed and epted the order, then promptly turned to leave.


    A short whileter, an adept hurried back.


    "Sir F¨¹gen, big news! Big news!"


    ............


    It was the early morning of the second day when Keoghan and the other three returned to Blue Hillock City.


    Before they could even sit down and take a breather, a personal order from Second-Grade Adept Sir F¨¹gen had already been brought before them. Thus, they once again rushed towards the adept¡¯s base!


    There, Sir F¨¹gen asked details about their actions in Herdurand City.


    All the n adepts who stayed in the base looked at each other in amazement when they finished hearing Adept Keoghan¡¯s retelling of events. They could hardly believe what they heard. Even Sir F¨¹gen lowered his head and remained silent after hearing the entire thing.


    Assaulting a Second Grade green dragon? Throwing a city closely guarded by hordes of soldiers into utter chaos, while beating the other dragon-knight¡¯s dragon partner to the brink of death?


    Such an absurd and unbelievable story. Even the most cliched novels about heroes and dragons wouldn¡¯t beat this, would it? This was a Second Grade dragon!


    In all seriousness, even if it had been Sir F¨¹gen who had engaged a dragon alone, he probably wouldn¡¯t have been able to do much to a Second Grade green dragon! After all, dragons could fly and possessed shocking magic and physical resistances. Moreover, adolescent dragons even possessed Dragontongue magic. Wasn¡¯t this equivalent to abination of both elementium adepts and body refining adepts? And abination that could even fly!


    This was why dragons had the terrifying ability to challenge enemies above their Grade levels, regardless of what ne they were in!


    The only reason the Third Grade dragon knight would choose Second Grade dragons as their partners was because they had absolutely no means to beat these Second Grade dragons that had thick hides, could fly, and spit their saliva all over the ce!


    Yet the four adepts before him, with two of them being rookies that had barely advanced for a half a year, together managed to beat a Second Grade green dragon to the brink of death? It sounded unbelievable. But judging from the clues, it seems this was the only thing that could the dragon knight¡¯s odd actions previously!


    It was undoubtedly important to search for the witcher-knights in the forest, but it was far more important that hispanion¡¯s partner had been beaten to the brink of death back in their home base¨C so important that he had no choice but to rush back to Herdurand City.


    After thorough deliberation, F¨¹gen could only choose to believe them.


    But with this happening, it was hard to predict how the following events would unfold!


    First, they exterminated a witcher-knight vanguard armyposed of a hundred men. Now, such a bold assault happened in Herdurand. If the opponents were not able to figure out that the invaders they sought were hiding nearby, they would be a group ofplete morons!


    Cutting off the legs of a Third Grade dragon knight was indeed fairly good news, but this came at the price of the enemy possibly arriving earlier. Whether this was for better or worse was very debatable.


    Sir F¨¹gen didn¡¯t dare let these few people out to Blue Hillock City anymore. He had finally recognized that this couple of adepts were not people that abided by conventional rules. If he let them out, they would surely create another hugemotion in a few days. With a bitter smile on his face, he could only keep them in the base.


    Greem and the other three, on the other hand, had also obtained spoils of war from Herdurand City. They needed a safe, quiet ce to digest and turn them into part of their strength. And so they easily agreed to stay. Mary, in particr, could be said to be the one that benefited the most out of the four.


    Vampires would always be busy chasing after the blood of the powerful!


    Keoghan, Ferrier, and Greem had at best obtained some green dragon flesh and blood as excellent crafting materials. But Mary could directly convert the consumed dragon blood into blood energy to increase the limits of her power. This terrifying ability was the scariest trait of the vampires!


    And so, Mary went into seclusion the moment they returned to the adept¡¯s base!


    This was the third time Mary had gone into seclusion. For Mary, each solitude was a chance to massively increase her power!

 Chapter 196

    Chapter 196 Skirmish in the Woods


    A small five-person adventure group trekked through the woods with difficulty.


    From their formation, it was clear that this was an adventuring party with powerfulbat strength.


    An extremely strong warrior was carving a path at the very front, using therge sword in his hand to cut a narrow route through the dense vegetation. A scrawny rogue was following behind the warrior, his mousy eyes, cautiously on the lookout, incessantly drifting about the shadows around them.


    Besides those two, there was an archer with an arrow already knocked, his expression alert. There were also two powerful spellbreaker knights who had taken off their heavy knight¡¯s armor, and were currently only wearing chainmail.


    The bushes were dense, and the trees stretched forever.


    Coming into this ce, and all you would see is darker and lighter shades of green. It was honestly difficult to even find any other color.


    The thick and knotted roots of ancient trees, the resilient vines that wound together, the bushes and vegetations that grew everywhere, as well as all sorts of wildflowers and weeds that couldn¡¯t be named, were more than enough topletely fill the spaces between each of therge, ancient trees. It was undoubtedly an exceptionally tortuous task for any traveller, without preparation, to walk through such primitive woods.


    Flowing rivers, streams in the mountains, and solemn valleys... these were allmon sights in the woods. If the terrain had been t, crossing through these ces would not take more than a couple of minutes. Yet here in this dense forest, they often had to take two to four hours of great effort to pass through.


    The warrior, rogue, and archer were veterans who often spent their time doing jobs in the Greend Forest, and were therefore unfazed by the difficulty before them. However, the two spellbreaker knights that were closely following behind, now without their magic colts, were having an absolutely difficult time getting used to the pain of journeying through the hills and rivers.


    The had only gone less than four kilometers into the woods, yet the two spellbreaker knights were already sweating all over. The simple chainmail on their bodies felt as heavy as a mountain.


    Even so, neither of the spellbreaker knights expressed their difort, and neither of them suggested a rest. They grit their teeth and endured, walking behind the three adventurers step by step, exploring the woods before them slowly.


    The group finally stopped for a break after arriving at the bottom of a small cliff.


    The two spellbreaker knights painfully dragged their heavy bodies to the side of a flowing mountain stream, scooped up the cool water and had a hearty drink. The warrior who led the party did the same.


    If it hadn¡¯t been for the path he cut open, these two knights, who were used to wrapping themselves up in their tin cans, would never have been able to reach here by themselves.


    The archer was a middle-aged man with a lean build, sharp facial features, as well as a piercing re. He didn¡¯t rest by the side of the river and drink deeply like hispanion. Instead, he leaned on an ancient tall tree at the bottom of the cliff, constantly assessing his surroundings while asionally turning his ears to listen for movement in the woods.


    Any trace of strange sounds and he would have his finger on the bowstring. If he felt anything out of ce, the sharp arrow on his bow would instantly shoot out.


    The rogue, on the other hand, was an agile fellow. While everyone was resting, he climbed to the top of the cliff and looked about, periodically leaning down and using hand signals tomunicate with the archer.


    "How is it? Did Jack find anything?" A spellbreaker knight couldn¡¯t help but ask once he was done drinking.


    Jack was the rogue¡¯s name.


    The archer shook his head, his face white as a sheet, "Nothing at all! This forest is way too quiet. I have been making a living in Greend Forest for five years, and I have never seen the woods be so quiet; so quiet, not even a small animal can be found! Sir, this forest has been enveloped by an ominous feeling. Why don¡¯t we go back?"


    The slightly younger spellbreaker knight, his face full of determination, sternly replied, "You lot cannot go back now. We hired you toe here for the purpose of finding the den of those heretics. Before we find anything, none of us here are allowed to go back! If you escape on your own, you will still receive the harshest punishment when you get back. So let go of your pointless thoughts, and focus on how to safelyplete the mission!"


    The older spellbreaker knight took out an old parchment map from his arms, and started to evaluate their current location. It was obvious that the road that they still needed to search was very long, evident from the bending and curving route drawn on the map.


    The warrior shrugged and put on a helpless expression upon hearing the spellbreaker knight¡¯s words. Meanwhile, frustration and hesitation appeared on the archer¡¯s face.


    While he was in a daze, a vine dangling from the tree he was leaning on curiously moved without any wind blowing. Silently, the vine that almost touched the ground started to curl like a snake, raising itself upwards.


    The tip of the vine split apart, revealing a set of sharp teeth like that of a beast.


    Just as the vine was slowly inching forward, its sharp teeth about to touch the archer¡¯s exposed neck, the rogue on the cliff leapt downwards. The throwing daggers in his hand screeched through the air and shed past the archer¡¯s ears, hitting square on the tip of the vine.


    "ng!" The crisp and clear sound of metal shing. The archer¡¯s body trembled. Aware of the danger, he didn¡¯t turn around, and instead flipped forward instantly.


    The vine wasn¡¯t cut or damaged by the throwing dagger. It even let out a metallic sound simr to shing swords when it was hit. The lunging vine didn¡¯t manage to bite the archer¡¯s neck, having been stopped by the dagger. It¡¯s sharp teeth bit nothing, letting out an odd grinding sound as the teeth gnashed together.


    It evidently knew it had been exposed, as a weird cracking sound rang out from the roots of the old tree beneath the cliff. The tree pulled out its fine yet dense roots from the ground, entangling and fashioning them into limbs that resembled human legs, before slowly walking towards the humans.


    Moreover, the dozens of vines dangling from its body started to move, their tips splitting into mouths with sharp teeth, letting out terrifying snapping sounds.


    "Dammit... what kind of monster is this!" The warrior roared as he waved therge sword in his hand and charged forward.


    As a small adventuring group, he was the only one who could charge forward, do frontal assaults, and other sorts of dangerous activities. His two otherpanions couldn¡¯t take on such an odd and powerful magical creature from the front. On the other hand, the two spellbreaker knights, as the employers, had the right to remain neutral until the adventurers failed.


    The archer quickly put some distance between himself and the tree-shaped magical creature. Snapping sounds came ceaselessly from the bowstring in his hands, as one arrow after another shot towards the enemy in a straight line. This was the first time he had ever seen a magical creature like this. With no means of identifying the enemy¡¯s weakness, he could only choose to attack the enemy¡¯s thick tree trunk.


    The rogue clearly had the same idea, as the envenomed throwing daggers in his hands were also desperately thrown towards the enemy¡¯s thick body.


    Unfortunately, most of the their attacks were brushed aside by the madly waving vine serpents. Even when some arrows and daggers made it through, they didn¡¯t seem to have any effect.


    Evidently this terrifying magical creature was not scared of attacks from such small sharp weapons!


    The warrior shed the tree several times, sending wrinkled and rough tree bark, as well as tree sap, flying everywhere. But before he could do more damage, a thick root came up from the ground, binding his legs and making him fall t.


    The ancient tree moved its forked ¡®legs¡¯, slowly moving towards the warrior. The vine serpents dangling from its branches snapped their jaws, as if they were about to devour the warrior whole.


    The two spellbreaker knight looked at each other and nodded, before immediately activating the runic equipment on their bodies. The small shield bound to their left hands emitted a semi-translucent energy shield, while a sliver of elementium me appeared on the runic sword in their right hands, before slowly extending to the rest of the de.


    Energy shields and me swords.


    These two spellbreaker knight were also experienced soldiers. They knew that fire was undoubtedly the greatest counter to such beefy nt-type creatures.


    One spellbreaker knight stepped forward, the me sword in his right hand shing forward vigorously. The me de extended outwards and left a burning crescent moon trail in the air, slicing through the roots binding the warrior.


    The roots broke, sending viscous green sap flying everywhere.


    The ancient tree-shaped creature shook in pain, and all the vine serpents moved to the front of the trunk, snapping at the spellbreaker knights.


    One had to admit that the spellbreaker knights, with their runic equipment, were the natural enemies of all magical beings!


    The energy shield with no elemental alignment could block curses and almost all spells, with the exception of spells with pration effects. They also had exceptional defense against physical attacks. This ensured the personal safety of the spellbreaker knights. With the addition of the me longsword in their hands, which dealt double attribute damage of both physical and fire types, they could deal incalcble amounts of damage to the enemy.


    If this ancient tree, with its tree bark armor, had been left to the adventurers to deal with, at least seven or eight casualties would have been needed to take it down. But with the spellbreaker knights¡¯ powerful defense and offense, they were able to set the ancient tree on fire, while only paying the price of the warrior being lightly injured.


    Indeed, when the spellbreaker knights cut a deep opening on the ancient tree¡¯s body and used the mes to ignite the green sap, the entire tree started to let out ear-piercing scream. It was like that of a human¡¯s as it painfully burned in the sea of fire.


    The three-man adventure group was naturally ecstatic at being able to sessfully eliminate such a powerful magical being.


    However, before they could loot the spoils from the burning body of the ancient tree, the two spellbreaker knights gravely shouted, "Hurry up ande back! Get ready. The true enemy is about to arrive!"


    The three-man group was horrified.


    Such... such a powerful magical creature still wasn¡¯t the enemy¡¯s main force?


    Just as they were hesitating, the overwhelming sound of thrashing winds suddenly filled the entire woods nearby.


    Arge ck shadow started to emerge from all over the woods, screeching as it surged towards them.


    "Bat swarm! It¡¯s a bat swarm..."


    The next moment, their shouts were drowned out by the bloodsucking vampires that surged forth like a tide!

 Chapter 197

    Chapter 197 ughter in the Woods


    In less than seventeen seconds, the three-man adventure group had turned into corpses.


    The two spellbreaker knights remaining stood back to back and were fighting off the vampire swarm with their energy shields and ming longswords.


    It was unfortunate that most of the swarm consisted of vampire spawn, who were much weaker than the first generation of vampires that Mary had personally Embraced. As they gathered together, surrounded, and circled the spellbreaker knights, not only were they unable to break through the opponents¡¯ defenses, many of theirpanions were even killed by the runic longswords shrouded in mes as well as and the me des that burst forth every so often.


    As the vampires engaged in a brutal fight, a red silhouette appeared on the low cliff beside the battlefield. A slim female proudly stood there.


    Bright red armor, crimson longbow, seductive body, perfect looks, and that pair of crimson eyes glowing bright red...


    Mary stepped on the stones of the cliff, her wless figure disyed before everyone. However, her attention didn¡¯t seem to be on the battle before her, and was instead drawn to the woods nearby.


    With the vast sea of trees and dense foliage, it was extremely difficult to see through theyers of green and to see what was below. But now, using countless Magic Eyes spread throughout the vast forest, she was able to see everything within a radius of ten to fifteen kilometers.


    The stationary Magic Eyes, along with the agile vampire scouts, turned the dense forest into her ally. It was no longer an obstacle, but an advantageous homefield that allowed her tounch attacks as she willed, exterminating numerous small squads of witcher-knights at the same time.


    The witcher-knight army had suddenly stationed themselves in Blue Hillock City half a month ago.


    Their arrival had undoubtedly attracted the protests of the Blue Hillock City governor as well as its local nobles. Sadly, when faced with the overwhelmingly powerful dragon knight, the local forces had no choice but to keep their heads down and obediently follow the instructions of the opponent.


    Meanwhile, the authorities of Blue Hillock City that had been turned into Mary¡¯s blood servants had settled down, and were continuously feeding information about the witcher-knights¡¯ movements to the adepts¡¯ base.


    The two dragon knights had finally been able to determine that the evil invaders were most definitely hiding in the southern area of Greend Forest, a vast area of dense trees that stretched for a hundred and fifty kilometers. And the opponent¡¯s identity was obvious! It was the heretic adepts that came from the World of Adepts!


    This was clear from examining the injuries of the poor green dragon.


    Amongst the massive nar world in the infinite sea of stars, the World of Adepts was always a nightmare that small and mid-sized material nes were never able to get rid of.


    This was a terrifyinglyrge-sized ne that very much favored invasions!


    A group of evil adepts that chased after knowledge with an impassioned madness, while ignoring all rules of society, lived within the ne. They had twisted minds and travelled about the depths of the sea of stars in groups, using their evil magic to find weak nes that could bring about resources and wealth for them.


    They appeared fair and just! Everywhere they went they shouted for fair trade and equivalent exchange, as if they were a group of casters that kept to a strict set of principles. But the moment they realized the opponent didn¡¯t possess sufficient power to resist them, they would put on another face.


    The adepts would use powerful martial strength, terrifying voodoo beasts, and horrifying gues to weaken the wills of those who opposed them, then forcibly enve their enemies.


    They would prop up obedient puppets in every ne they conquered, turning them into leaders and having them order the natives to excavate mines, dig for jewels, and use every bit of their strength to exploit all the precious resources of the ne.


    In the hearts of all the weak and small material nes¡¯ natives, the adepts were a bunch of horrifying spellcasters that had twisted minds and insatiable greed, possessing powerful and evil magic to back up their desires.


    Once these adepts were allowed to break into a ne and put down their roots, the only thing awaiting the ne was endless humiliation and a life of very thatsted for a thousand years. It wouldst until thest bit of the ne¡¯s resources had been exploited!


    Therefore, the moment they determined that the invaders were a group of evil adepts, the higher-ups of the knights¡¯ army hastened their actions.


    The witcher-knights haven¡¯t finished rallying? Then we rally while we fight!


    The resources for a nar war have yet to be prepared? Then we prepare while we fight!


    The enemies¡¯ den has yet to be found? Then we search while we fight!


    The first group of witcher-knights that gathered in Blue Hillock City numbered around 2300 men, while the spellbreaker knights, that had the power of First Grade adepts, had also reached 150 men. The radiant knights that represented the higher-ups of the knight¡¯s army, and who had power rivalling that of Second Grade adepts, numbered 20 men.


    There were even two dragon knights with the power of Third Grades.


    Sadly,Dragon Knight Kalyk¡¯s dragon partner had been gravely injured, and could only be sent back to Dragon¡¯s Cliff to rest for the moment. This caused the witcher-knight army to lose an extremely mobile force!


    The army of the witcher-knights had already been amassed. They only needed to determine the true location of the enemy¡¯s den, and then they would be able to charge forth with the force of lightning to thoroughly exterminate the enemy.


    Unfortunately, due to theplex environment of Greend Forest, the dragon knight¡¯s numerous high-altitude investigations yielded no clues as to the location of the evil adepts. With no other choice, the higher-ups could only send outrge numbers of small squads, paired together with adventurers and mercenaries, tounch arge-scale sweep of Greend Forest¡¯s southern area.


    Meanwhile, to stop the knights¡¯ search operations, the adepts had emptied all of their reserved resources to construct arge batch of grim voodoo beasts, sending them into the surrounding woods.


    Thus, countless savage and horrible battles that were bloody beyond imagination erupted in this vast sea of trees stretching for hundreds of kilometers. Of course, the number of human mercenaries, knights, and voodoo beasts that fell under the dappled shadows of the canopy was countless as well.


    After a dozen days of bloody back and forth, the higher-ups realised that their search squads, led by witcher-knights, might be able to stave off the voodoo beasts that used all sorts of weird and peculiar abilities. But the moment they met the evil adepts wandering about the depths of the woods, they were dead, without even the chance to send out even the simplest of information.


    Therefore, to increases the survivability of the search squads, most of the squad leaders were reced with the powerful spellbreaker knights. These spellbreaker knights travelled in pairs and would mostly be able to survive even under the assault of adepts, as long as their luck wasn¡¯t absolutely terrible. Moreover, they would be able to bring back exceptionally valuable tactical information.


    On the other hand, thirteen adepts were pulled from the base, along with the vast numbers of voodoo beasts, and sent to the woods in the south to hinder the knights¡¯ continuous searching.


    The vast number of voodoo beasts fought alongside the evil adepts, and created a line of extermination within the southern woods of Greend Forest, engaging the endless hordes of knights squads in repeated bloody and cruel pursuits and hunts.


    However, as individual radiant knights started to impersonate spellbreaker knights, going undercover in squads, the situation on the battlefield started to be increasingly chaotic and terrible. Everyday, one could hear news about the extermination of knight squads or of adepts being killed.


    For example, in the battle that was happening below the cliff now, Mary clearly had an overwhelming advantage inbat. As long as she joined the fight, and broke the united defenses of the two spellbreaker knights below, the swarm of vampires would most definitely be able to devour the two.


    However, Mary, who was standing proudly on the cliff, only took a quick look at the battlefield with her bright red eyes before proceeding to ignore it. Even though her subordinate vampire spawn were suffering heavy casualties, she had no intention of helping.


    With their backs to each other, the two spellbreaker knights were still fighting off the attacks of the bats, and started to show signs of worry in their eyes. The slightly older spellbreaker knight kept ncing at Mary. He finally couldn¡¯t wait and longer when he saw that the opponent had no intention of joining the fight.


    Following a deep shout, the aura around the middle-aged knight started to increase rapidly. Violently surging runic energies gathered within the rune swords in his hands, ultimately turning into a radiant crescent moon, shing towards the position Mary was standing at.


    Mary¡¯s body shed away from its original position. Her bat wings unfolded and she floated in midair, looking down on this middle-aged knight with a trace of disdain in her eyes.


    When this battle technique that was mostmonly used by the knights¨CCrescent Moon sh¨Cnded on the cliff, the highly concentrated runic energies instantly exploded. The strength of the energy was no less than a spell with 150 points of power. If Mary hadn¡¯t dodged, just that blow alone would have severely injured her!


    It was almost as if a miniature sun had exploded on top of the cliff, as the violent runic energies instantly sted apart half of the cliffside. The side of the cliff facing outwards started to crumble in a flurry of dust and crumbling rocks. Countless shattered stones and a ton of debris started to roll downwards, instantly flooding the battlefield beneath the cliff.


    After some difficulty, the two knights were able to free themselves from the torrent of dirt and rock, and were finally able to find a spot to stand after retreating a hundred meters backwards.


    Bright runic lights shone on the body of the middle-aged Radiant Knight. He gazed upon Bloody Mary, still floating in the air, his eyes betraying an expression of thought.


    If she knew that I am a radiant knight, why wouldn¡¯t she retreat? Could it be...


    There was no time for him to think. In the woods one kilometer northwest, a suddenmotion that exceeded the violent elementium flux earlier erupted. The radiant knight¡¯s face fell when he felt the terrifying elementium flux and saw the magic mes suddenly erupt.


    "It¡¯s the me Demon!" The young spellbreaker knight couldn¡¯t help but exim, his eyes betraying shock and fear that couldn¡¯t be hidden.


    After the bloody battles of the past few days, the knights and adepts had a better understanding of each other¡¯s forces.


    The most terrifying force on the knights¡¯ side was most definitely that group of radiant knights. They were slightlycking in mobility, but their powerful runic powers gave them iparably powerful attacks and an imprable defense. In all seriousness, the only thing the adepts could do when they met radiant knights was retreat. They had absolutely no chance of beating them in a fight.


    On the other hand, some terrifying characters had sprung up on the adepts¡¯ side as well. Such as Bloody Mary before him, who was always surrounded by terrifying bat swarms; or Evil Bugs Acteon, who couldmand tens of thousands of poisonous bugs. There were also other scary adepts with all sorts of odd abilities...


    But none of them were as scary as the me Demon!


    When the three-meter tall me Demon, d in brilliant red mes all over its body, stepped onto the battlefield with his two fire golems, the doubled number of fire spells coupled with the Fire Deity¡¯s explosions were enough to instantly kill a spellbreaker knight of the same grade.


    Thus, whenever a knight squad met the me Demon in the depths of the woods, it would be the end of their fates right then and there!

 Chapter 198

    Chapter 198 The me Demon


    The light of mes flickered in the woods far away. Intense fires ravaged about.


    The death cries of the apanying mercenaries and the angered roars of the spellbreaker knights could be heard clearly!


    The expression on the middle-aged radiant knight¡¯s face suddenly changed. He had no time to be entangled with Bloody Mary. Immediately, he charged towards the battlefield in the distance.


    As part of the army¡¯s higher ranks, he knew very well that there were only two spellbreaker knights in the squad there. Facing the terrifying me Demon with such a force would definitely result in heart-rending casualties.


    If one were to form an analysis based purely on the Grade of the individual, both the spellbreaker knights and the adepts were at the First Grade, and should have the power to kill each other. Theoretically, the two spellbreaker knights facing the single First Grade adept on the battlefield there should have the advantage.


    Unfortunately, such an idealisticparison had never proven true.


    On one hand, you had the evil adepts that came from a powerful ne, while on the other you had closebat knights from a weak ne. If one were to remove the hampering effect of the ne¡¯s suppression, a First Grade adept could be said to have an absolute advantage against a spellbreaker knight of the same grade.


    The frail adepts might fear those elusive assassins, but when faced with these tough and beefy knights, they had a clear battle advantage thanks to their ss. You are tough? Well, if one spell can¡¯t blow you away, I¡¯ll cast two! If two isn¡¯t enough, I¡¯ll cast three!


    As for a melee fight? Hehehe, no adept would be idiotic enough to engage in a melee with the tin-can spellbreaker knights. It was delusional for the spellbreaker knights to catch up to the nimble adepts in the dense woods, especially considering their horrendous speed.


    Be it me Teleportation, or Shadowstalk, or elementium wings of wind, the adepts had plenty of means to keep a safe casting distance between themselves and the immobile knights. Most of the time, the adepts were the ones kiting the knights. It was very rare that the knights were able to trap and surround the adepts in one spot.


    Of course, not all adepts had such mobile abilities. Just in the past fifteen days, there were already three adepts that had died on the battlefield. The remaining adepts all had powerful movement abilities, as well as powerful and deadly spells.


    With just these two traits, as long as they didn¡¯t bump into radiant knights, the adepts would have over a seventy percent chance of winning in fighting against the spellbreaker knights. This was why the knight¡¯s camp had lost twenty spellbreaker knights, while the adepts had only lost three adepts.


    Because of this, the radiant knight flew into a rage when he saw the terrifying me Demon ughtering their elites in the distance. He charged towards the battlefield as quickly as he could while being cautious of any attacks from Bloody Mary.


    However, things didn¡¯t turn out the way he thought they would!


    The radiant knight thought that Bloody Mary would slow him down to the best of her abilities in order to buy time for the me Demon. But who knew that Mary waspletely unfazed by his departure? Instead, she unfolded her wings and leapt towards the young spellbreaker knight.


    Now, the radiant knight¡¯s face had truly be dark!


    He finally understood why Bloody Mary appeared here.


    If he insisted on saving the two spellbreaker knights, then the knight he left here would not be able to escape the fangs of Bloody Mary. But if he didn¡¯t reinforce the two knights...


    The crackling sound of fire in the distance became even more intense. A bright red me pir, almost turning a blinding white, sted into the sky and enveloped the trees in a hundred meter radius. It was a terrifying world of mes. At the same time, a dome-shaped me barrier appeared out of nowhere. It was the me Demon¡¯s signature, Ring of Fire!


    The middle-aged radiant shook his head in anger and sighed before turning around and charging towards the female vampire, who was still circling around the young spellbreaker knight. Now that the me Demon had even activated his Ring of Fire, it was obvious what the fates of the two spellbreaker knights would be.


    Rather than saving two subordinates who were most probably dead, it was more important to protect thepanion right beside him!


    Mary cursed under her breath when she saw the radiant knight hurrying back. With no choice left, she could only escape out of the opponent¡¯s attack radius in a couple of shes. She might have the ability to kill a spellbreaker knight, but against a radiant knight one grade above herself, she could only retreat. She dared not even expose herself where the opponent could reach.


    The spellbreaker knights were able tobine the external runic energies with the life force within their bodies to create a powerful knight battle technique, simr to an invisible force that could be expelled outwards. This allowed their attacks to break free from the limits of their weapons, and possess somewhat long-ranged abilities.


    Moreover, as the concentration of the energy was far higher than the concentration of elemental spells, these kinds of mid-ranged knight battle technique not only had powerful anti-defense properties, they were even able topletely negate or annihte the spells of casters while they were in midair. This was where the name Spellbreaker Knight came from!


    And radiant knights were undoubtedly even stronger than spellbreaker knights.


    Their strength mainly came from their ability to utilize runic energies to strengthen themselves, somewhat akin to the body refining adepts of the World of Adepts. However, while the body refining adepts used various poisons or extreme pain to exhaust the potential of their bodies and strengthen their physique, the radiant knights used runic energy to temporarily grant themselves immense physical strength.


    Even though their paths were slightly different, both possessed equally powerful physicalbat ability.


    Thus, Mary could use her agility to toy with a spellbreaker, but when she met a radiant knight, retreat was her only option. Fight? With Mary¡¯s current ability, even breaking through the defense of a radiant knight¡¯sbination of runic energies and their life force was an immensely difficult task.


    Conversely, if the distance between the two was shortened, Mary could be killed in one blow instantly by the radiant knight if he found an opportunity.


    Mary¡¯s blood-energy infused crimson armor could only endure up to 110 points of elemental damage. Meanwhile, radiant knights were able to let out blows ofbined energy that could reach 150 points with every strike they made. Instantly killing a melee adept like herself was but an easy task. That was why Mary didn¡¯t dare move within ten steps of the radiant knight.


    Looking at the sly Bloody Mary, the middle-aged radiant knight¡¯s heart was filled with immense humiliation that couldn¡¯t be expressed with words.


    This was a weak and powerless adept who was an entire Grade below himself, yet she was able to render a Second Grade knight helpless with her exceptional agility. The radiant knight¡¯s attacks were indeed powerful, but would it matter if he couldn¡¯t even hit the enemy?!


    In the short dy here, the battle in the distant woods had already reached its conclusion!


    As the terrifying forest fire started to spread outwards, the sounds of exploding fireballs started to diminish before eventually vanishing.


    Countless pairs of eyes on the nearby hills, cliffs, and the top of the canopy were looking towards the direction of the battle. At that moment, many grieving sighs were let out in the depths of the forest at the same time.


    Greem waspletely unfazed by the battle¡¯s various onlookers.


    With seven or eight wind critters floating above the forest nearby, and a dozen y golems swimming under the ground, not even the smallest motions within a radius of five kilometers were able to escape Greem¡¯s senses. It was with this absolute control of the battlefield that Greem was able topletely disy the numerical advantage of the golem army, and maintain an absolute pressure on the enemy within a small battlefield.


    Besides the necessary local mercenaries, the squads always consisted of single spellbreaker knight leading two witcher knights, or two spellbreaker knights travelling in a pair. asionally, radiant knights would be mixed into the count to bait the adepts into attacking.


    This arrangement and number of personnel was the ideal battle formation that was realized after half a month of bloody battle.


    There were approximately a dozen evil adepts wandering about the forest, usually fighting alone, with the exception of the necessary servants and summons that theymanded. It was very rare for adepts to fight together. This was the case was due to the distrust amongst adepts that hindered any sort of cooperation.


    However, once the knight squads gathered into an army that a single adept was no longer able to fight against, the adepts would gather together and fight, regardless of how unwilling they were. After a few battles that ended up as bloody ughters, the higher-ups of the knights¡¯ army had no choice but to split the army into smaller squads and start a game of cat and mouse with the adepts in the woods.


    Most of the time the adepts were the cats, while the knight squads were the mice.


    Every time the were assaulted by adepts, the first casualties were always the mercenaries in the squad. The knights, on the other hand, were able to retreat while using their powerful strength to fight, as long as their opponents weren¡¯t the more powerful and terrifying adepts. Besides being a little flushed, most of the time there wouldn¡¯t be any threat to their lives.


    However, if the attacking adept had bad luck and bumped into a squad with a radiant knight, the position of cat and mouse would immediately be reversed. The three adept casualties had died at the hands of radiant knights in this fashion.


    The adepts that continued to intercept enemies were either quick at escaping, had resilient physiques, or looked on cautiously before they made any moves. As long as they were able to do any one of those, they were able to keep their lives and not die humiliatingly in a dark corner of the forest.


    Meanwhile, Greem had his army of elementium scouts. Along with his unique Fire Teleportation ability, which made him the perfect fit for such a chaotic and messy battlefield, he constantly obtained kills left and right.


    Most other adepts had to be careful and repeatedly probe the enemies, even if they found a squad, so as to not fall into the hands of radiant knights. However, such caution very easily caused the target to be aware of their existence, causing a perfect hunt to be a meaningless chase and pursuit.


    The knight squads in the forest would call for help from each other. If they realized theirpanions were being pursued, the nearby squads would rapidly hurry over to reinforce them. When that happened, it was the adept¡¯s turn to run!


    Such a process of probing, counter-probing, pursuing, and counter-pursuing was the least efficient means of fighting.


    However, Greem had enough eyes in the sky to simultaneously track two or three different squads at the same time. Regardless of how well the radiant knights¡¯ impersonations were, some clue that exposed their identity would reveal themselves under Greem¡¯splete and absolute monitoring.


    Thus, Greem had plenty of time to choose prey that he could devour in a single bite, as well as set up traps beforehand. As the unnecessary probing and hesitations were eliminated, Greem was able to obtain great results every time he struck.


    His chosen prey would never have a chance of escaping, which also saved him from going through the process of pursuing and hunting them down. As long as he was able to control and dy the squads nearby to prevent them from reinforcing his prey, then even two spellbreaker knights were not enough to stop his ughter.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the Scroll of Voodoo having a cooldown that limited the flurry of spells, and if it wasn¡¯t for Greem reserving nearly half of his strength to deal with any unforeseen events, his destructive speed might even increase further.


    Even so, the terrifying name of the me Demon was quickly spreading amongst the knights.

 Chapter 199

    Chapter 199 Night of Terror


    It was a temporary camp.


    The camp was located in the middle of a pile of rocks.


    The two to three meter tall rocks were messily stacked upon each other. They may not have look very ordered or well-arranged, but they were able to bring about some sense of security for the campers.


    The mist was damp and heavy.


    Even though it was already deep into the night, the travellers camping amidst the pile of rocks had not started a campfire to get rid of the moist air. No one was speaking either. Under the ck shadows of the towering rocks, a handful of adventurers wrapped their bodies with thick animal furs and cloth, trying hard to fall asleep.


    However, the scene they saw during the day Had been too shocking¨C so shocking that no one in the camp could sleep.


    "Sylow, do you think we can return home alive?" The hunter, Poole, lightly jabbed the sides of hispanion from the same vige and whispered softly.


    Sylow was an archer. He was the best archer back in the vige they came from.


    Sylow turned his body, but didn¡¯t answer hispanion¡¯s question.


    However, Poole vaguely realized that hispanion was slightly shaking when he touched him earlier. He didn¡¯t ask hispanion the reason, for at this very moment, his body was also shaking uncontrobly.


    That terrifying me humanoid asrge as a demon. That deafening sound of explosion that shook the entire forest. The sea of mes that seemed like they would consume everything. Two lord knights and three mercenaries had so easily died in the sea of mes, bing yet more souls reaped by the evil adepts.


    Each of those characters were likely infinitely stronger than himself!


    When he recalled the scene he had seen while crouched on the top of the tree that evening, Poole felt like even his soul was shaking. It was almost as if... almost as if he himself had turned into the knight engulfed by the violent mes, only capable of letting out his life¡¯sst sorrowful cry!


    Pressured by the terror in his heart, Poole found the courage to turn around to face a shadow at the other end of the camp and asked softly, "Sir Morse, will we be able to return home alive?"


    "Silence! Do you want to draw those adepts over?" The spellbreaker knight Sir Morse, who was hidden by the shadows, scolded softly. But then his tone became gentle, "Don¡¯t think too much. Our mission is to investigate the surroundings of Serpentfowl Cliff. Just 1.5 more kilometers tomorrow and we can aplish our mission. Then you will be able to im your reward from the base. That¡¯s 30 gold sorens! More than enough for you to livefortably for ten years!"


    Perhaps due to the thought of a peaceful life after obtaining the reward, Poole was able to slightly let go of his concerns. He wrapped himself tightly in the thick fur once more, trying to get a little warmer.


    Poole had no idea that the earth was starting to rise in a spot at the middle of the base as he was trying to fall asleep. As the earth finally gave way, countless ck scorpions surged out, forming into five separate ck tides of bug that silently streamed into the surrounding darkness.


    After a short moment, Knight Morse¡¯s angered roar rang out in the darkness.


    "Get up... everyone get up... Evil Bugs is here!"


    Following the sh of light from an energy shield¡¯s activation, the me longsword in his hand was also ignited. The blinding light of the me instantly illuminated the crude camp. There were five people in the camp. Besides himself, there were two witcher-knights and two mercenary hunters.


    Unfortunately, when the flickering light illuminated the camp the only ones that were able to leap out of the furs were himself and a witcher-knight named Gurm. The other three didn¡¯t respond at all. Looking from a distance, the only thing they could see were the furs and felts creeping about as the bugs within crawled around.


    "Dammit... " Morse cursed angrily, "Get your weapons and prepare for battle."


    In truth, there was no need for him to remind him, as Knight Gurm was already swatting away the numerous scorpions on his body, using his resilient will to resist the waves of nausea while drawing out his runic longsword.


    These scorpions had repeatedly stung him with their poison stingers once they crawled into his felt, yet oddly enough there was no pain. If he hadn¡¯t been alerted by Sir Morse¡¯s loud roar, he would¡¯ve probably died silently in his sleep like the other witcher-knight.


    The burning me longsword was vigorously stabbed into the ground, causing a violent me shockwave to instantly engulf the camp.


    Under Knight Morse¡¯s powerful explosion, the scorpions that had been frantically scurrying towards them were devoured by the ferocious elementium mes. The ear-piercing cries of the dying bugs could be heard everywhere in the camp.


    However, the tunnel that appeared in the middle of the camp suddenly copsed, spewing forthrger beetles that flowed forth under the illumination of countless tiny mes on the battlefield. They gathered together, forming a terrifying, creeping pile of bugs, slowly rising in height.


    Very soon, a human outline made of the terrifying bug swarm appeared in the camp.


    The two knights couldn¡¯t hide the despair in their eyes when they saw the evil adept¡¯s odd method of appearance. It was like the insides of their hearts were soaked in snow and ice- all they felt was cold.


    Evil Bugs Acteon had appeared!


    ............


    In a cave under a cliff, six kilometers northwest.


    The bright campfire was still burning strong.


    The entrance of the cave was covered with a thick pelt. Moreover, the outside of the cave was covered by dense vegetation. There was no worry that the light of the fire would be seen from outside.


    The four people in the camp were sitting around the campfire, silently wiping their weapons and armor, with no intention or desire to have a conversation.


    They were very fortunate to have reached this hidden cave before sundown under the hunter¡¯s lead. This was why they were able to set up a camp with a fire to drive away the moist air of the forest. Otherwise, had they camped out in the open, they would never dare to start a fire.


    In Greend Forest, where it there were leaves and bushes for miles, even a little firelight within the darkness could clearly be seen from ten kilometers away. Even though there were no longer any beasts or magical creatures in this piece of woods, there were still the evil adepts who were far scarier than any wild beast.


    In two days time, this four-man squad had only managed to progress no more than fifteen kilometers, and already they had been attacked fifteen times by voodoo beasts.


    These voodoo beasts roamed the forest in packs. The moment they sensed any humans nearby, they would charge forth fearlessly like a bunch of mad hounds. They could be gue hounds, or mad bulls, or poison dart frogs... of course, they also met an odd creature created bybining winged dragons and humanncers.


    Not a single one of these odd creatures were normal. They either brought terrifying gues or viruses or were bloody and disgusting creatures that were clearly the amalgamation of several wild beasts!


    It was thanks to the spellbreaker knight¡¯s powerful mid-ranged me de that they were able to fight their way here.


    Very fortunately, even though they were attacked by hordes of voodoo beasts, they had yet to meet those evil adepts!


    The southern region of the Greend Forest was mountainous, while its forest stretched for countless miles. Once one entered the dense woods, it would be hard to tell if anyone was near, even if they were only a hundred meters apart. Thus, it was virtually impossible to totally stop the progress of the knight squad with only a dozen adepts spread out in thisrge area.


    It wasn¡¯t particrly unusual that they were able to reach here without meeting any adepts.


    However, back in the evening, they had witnessed a battle far away from the top of a hill that caused the squad to be deathly silent. A group that was not much weaker than theirs had been exterminated under the assault of the me Demon!


    Deep in their hearts, the knights were extremely upset with their superiors¡¯ decision to send them on a suicide mission to investigate the forest. However, after a little thinking, it was a reasonable choice. With such a vast forest before them, the 2000-man witcher-knight army could only roam about aimlessly if they didn¡¯t have a specific target.


    When that happened, even the massive amount of supplies required to sustain 2000 men was sufficient to cause the army to copse, before they could even find the enemy and wage war on them!


    Thus, even though there were witcher-knights painfully dying in the depths of the woods every day, the army¡¯s higher-ups insisted on the n of having investigation squads search the forest.


    After paying the price of two dozen spellbreaker knights¡¯ lives, and over fifty witcher-knights, they had finallypleted the search of the outer area of the forest. The adepts¡¯ defensive line was slowly shrinking. Perhaps in another three to four days, they would be able topletelyb this vast forest of hundreds of kilometers and find the den the enemies were hiding in.


    Then, it would be the wonderful time to rouse their army and exterminate the evil adepts¡¯ den in one fell swoop!


    But while the idea was wonderful, having ite to fruition required even more work and sacrifice. As for whether they would be able to live to see that wonderful moment, the two spellbreaker knights in the stone cave had no idea.


    However, just as everyone was gazing into the fire in a daze, an odd knocking sound rang out from the entrance of the cave.


    "ng. ng. ng.... anybody here?"


    "Who is it?" A hunter replied in shock. Then he realized he was in the middle of nowhere. Where would a door havee from? Where would a visitor havee from?


    "A lonely traveler! If you have no qualms, I¡¯ll being in!" The voice from outside sounded really weird. It was stiff and hoarse,pletely unlike any human¡¯s voice.


    "Since you have made it here, thene in if you will! No need for any theatrics outside!" The spellbreaker knight Entos slowly got up, light radiating from his energy shield and his me longsword.


    All of a sudden, he turned to look at hispanion, who was sitting beside him, in surprise.


    Heim, who was also a spellbreaker knight, was sitting on the ground, but veins were bulging on his forehead, his head was flushed, and his teeth were grinding together so hard they were letting out a screeching sound.


    "What¡¯s happened to you?" Entos asked loudly.


    "I¡¯m... falling... under... someone¡¯s... control," A simple sentence, but Knight Heim had to pause between each and every word. After he said that, even his eyes started to be red.


    Knight Entos immediately activated the me longsword in his hand. The elementium me that suddenly erupted instantly illuminated the entire cave, as well as Knight Heim.


    The first thing he saw was several semi-translucent threads floating behind Knight Heim, who was sitting on a felt. All the threads had dug into his body, while the other ends silently extended to the top of the cave.


    "Dammit, it¡¯s Marite!" Knight Entos roared in anger, and a me de shed through the air, slicing through those seven or eight odd threads.


    With the help of hispanion, Knight Heim was finally able to break free from the control of the threads. Quickly, he jumped onto his feet and shouted, "Everyone get ready. It¡¯s the evil adept Marite..."


    Yet just as he was shouting, the two mercenaries who were also sitting beside the fire stood up clumsily. An odd grin appeared on their faces before they leapt towards the knights, weapons in hand.

 Chapter 200

    Chapter 200 Battle in the Night


    The adepts¡¯ base.


    In a dark and dim stone chamber.


    Eight stone tforms were ced around the empty hall. Odd specimensposed of human body parts and magical creatures were disyed on the tforms. Two or three adepts gathered about the edge of a stone tform, dissecting a specimen on the tform, with serious expressions on their faces.


    A naked man with an excellent build was lying on the tform closest to the stone chamber¡¯s door. The front of his body was widely spread apart like an open book, from the throat all the way down to his crotch. The bright red flesh, the dripping blood, the wicked faces of the adepts¨C all of these created a haunting atmosphere in the chamber that couldn¡¯t easily be described!


    This man had a pug nose, ck hair, a square face, and tan yet smooth skin. Just a quick look at his clearly defined muscles andrge skeletal structure, and one could tell that he was a strong warrior who was used to frequent and intense training.


    There was a tattoo of a sword and shield on his left shoulder. If any of the natives of this ne that were familiar with the local culture were here they would surely scream in surprise, for the strong man being dissected was an official witcher-knight.


    Three adepts were gathered around him.


    One of the adepts was using a scalpel and a small saw to continuously remove bloody human organs from the witcher-knight¡¯s body. The assisting adept was continuously casting spells to preserve these freshly plucked organs, before cing them into containers filled with a dark red liquid.


    The third adept was regrly scribbling on a parchment, recording in detail the oddities they found in Specimen Number One.


    With every light stab and cut of the dissecting adept¡¯s scalpel, and with every bit of electrical stimtion, the witcher-knight¡¯s body would twitch slightly. His little finger, in particr, would continuously curl up and release.


    This meant that the witcher-knight¡¯s spiritual consciousness still existed in his body, even after all his internal organs had been removed. Moreover, it seemed he was able to feel the pain inflicted on his body.


    "Test Subject Number 1."


    "Witcher-knight. Male, body is in healthy condition, age 32 years old..."


    "Simrity of internal organs to normal humans is as high as 89%..."


    "Some parts of the organs show light inclinations of change..."


    "The bones in his upper body are tougher andrger. His surface skin is tough and tight. His bodily strength is approximately equal to an advanced apprentice..."


    "Assimtion of foreign energies found in the heart, liver, and various other internal organs. The effect of the mutated organs is somewhat simr to magic-infused organs..."


    "There are signs of over-exhausting the source of his life force. Initial estimates suggest that this is caused by the corrosion of the foreign energies..."


    "Magic scans confirm that the subject does not possess elementium talent..."


    "Initial conclusion: witcher-knights possess beginning symptoms of both body refining and magic-infusion. Their true identities are closer to human knights whose bodies have been strengthened by runic energies! As they don¡¯t possess any elementium talent themselves, the runic energies rapidly exhausted their life force while strengthening their bodies!"


    The witcher-knights¡¯ favourite mount¨Ca magic colt¨Cwas lying silently on a nearby stone tform. Its body had also been thoroughly dissected and divided into several separate pieces.


    The adepts showed expressions of disdain towards these magic colts.


    Too primitive! Too crude!


    The so-called magic colts were a mixed breed of human warhorses and a certain special wild beast, that were then fed some drugs that stimted their bodily strength as they were raised. These gave them some of the traits of the forest beasts, giving them powerful climbing abilities, and therefore bing the standard mount of the witcher-knights.


    ced even deeper in the depths of the dark stone chamber were no longer ordinary witcher-knights, but spellbreaker knights with even more muscr bodies. However, they had all be the test subjects of the evil adepts now. All the secrets hidden in their bodies would bepletely and utterly exposed.


    Compared to the witcher-knights, traces of elementium talent could be detected on the bodies of spellbreaker knights, who managed to advance one Grade further. Furthermore, most of the vital organs within their bodies had been irreversibly infused with magic. In all seriousness, the spellbreaker knights were a bunch of defective products who had spellcasting talent, yet forcibly went on the path of magic-infused knights.


    Analyzing the currently known data, these few adepts couldn¡¯t help but predict that the Fourth Grade Holy Knight who stood at the top of the knights¡¯ ne would surely have even more outstanding elementium talent. Yet very unfortunately, he didn¡¯t choose the path of a spellcaster, instead stepping on the strange path of a magic-infused knight.


    If this prediction proved true, it meant that the Fourth-Grade Holy Knight was essentially an adepts of sorts that went down the wrong path. Of course, with howcking the elementium energy was in this ne, it would have been a reasonable decision to give up on the path of adepts and to go down the path of magic-infused knights.


    After all, the deformities and iplete nature of this ne¡¯s development was not something a mere native of the ne would be able to control. To be able to be a Fourth Grade powerhouse on a small ne with such limited elementium energies demonstrated how much talent and potential he really had!


    The gathered data from the test subjects¡¯ dissections showed that the witcher-knights were merely a group of pseudo-magic-infused knights that had been polluted by runic energies, and had power equal to intermediate or advanced apprentices.


    The First-Grade Spellbreaker Knights, on the other hand, were a group of actual magic-infused knights. Their physiques were approximately equal to pseudo-adepts in the World of Adepts. This was why the spellbreaker knights were constantly at a disadvantage in battle, even though they were of the same Grade as the adepts. However, with the help of their runic weapons, they managed to have attack power and defensive abilities that rivalled those of adepts.


    Frankly speaking, the knights¡¯ ne was a small ne after all. After ten million years of development and evolution, they had indeed developed a unique structure and system of power. Yet in terms of the individual power of those of the same grade, they were stillgging too far behind the World of Adepts.


    The roaming First Grade adepts that dared to attack the knight squads, led by spellbreaker knights in the Greend Forest, fully demonstrated the massive disparity in the strength between both parties.


    On one hand, you had arge-sized ne that was infamous throughout the multiverse. On the other, you had a weak and isted small-sized ne. These two nes may have simr definitions of a First Grade being, but when put together, the difference in power was very obvious.


    Of course, the reason the adepts put so much effort into dissecting and researching the witcher-knights was not just to collect some information and data, but to better improve their efforts in cultivating gues and viruses that were targeted specifically at the knights.


    As the only native force on the ne that could put up a fight against the adepts, all they needed to do was take down these knights. The remaining native humans would not be able to resist the adepts and their powerful abilities. A human army, that numbered in the tens of thousands, was aplete joke when put before the adepts. A simple gue spell would cause a powerful empire to be and of death and tombstones in the matter of months.


    Once they lost the protection of supernatural powers, the strength of normal humans waspletely insignificant before the adepts!


    Thus, arge bug-breeding grounds and a runic energies researchb had already been constructed right beneath the stone chamber. With plenty of witcher-knight flesh for specimens, a unique gue insect that fed on runic energies was already being bred.


    If this n seeded, the adepts would be able to kill these annoying witcher-knights that stood in their way of conquering this ne without lifting a single finger.


    At the same time, the construction of the adepts¡¯ tower was quickly moving forward.


    As of now, the four lower levels of the adept¡¯s tower had already been constructed. The top of the structure had almost extended outside of the illusion barrier area of coverage. With all the currentmotion, the additional construction activities had to be halted until the situation was slightly calmer.


    Due to the uniqueness of the tower¡¯s structure, there was no way ofpleting the array carving by each level. The arrays had to be carved all together after the adepts¡¯ tower had beenpleted, such that the arrays would be connected together to form aplete defense system. Moreover, if necessary, arge-scale ceremony had to bepleted to activate the soul of the tower, and to fully integrate all elements within the war tower.


    These detailed jobs couldn¡¯t be done when the enemy was almost knocking on the door. Thus, to increase the odds of victory, the adepts had no choice but to fall back on that which they were most skilled: poison and gue.


    ............


    Greem stood alone on the tall cliff, silently looking down on the dark forest that was shrouded by shadows below him.


    Dark clouds filled the skies, and no light from the moon or stars could get through.


    This was a good night for killing!


    During the time he silently stood here, four elementium disturbances that could be observed with the naked eye had erupted in the woods far away, one after another. The most powerful elementium shockwave had even blown away half of a mountain!


    The violently surging elementium mes even caused Greem, who was fifteen kilometers away, to feel intense waves of heat on his face. The shockwave that followed soon after blew his hood off, exposing his cool and calm face.


    The four elementium disturbances hadn¡¯t urred in the same spot, but spread across four different areas. The frequency of the elementium disruption that exploded each time was different. The elementium within the disturbances all had slight differences.


    With the help of the chip¡¯s highly efficient data-gathering and analyzing abilities, Greem was able to deduce the identity of the adepts involved in the fight from the elementium that drifted here.


    The one fighting in the battle 3.5 kilometers southwest was Evil Bugs Acteon. One had to mention that his abilities had greatly improved in this period of umtion and powering up. The battlefield he was in was the quietest, and the elementium that drifted here was the least amongst the four battles in the night.


    If it wasn¡¯t for Greem¡¯s high vantage point, as well as the chip¡¯s powerfulputing abilities, he might have entirely missed the shockwave from the battle.


    A fight had also broken out 7.5 kilometers to the east. The two parties involved were body-refining adept Kiel, and two spellbreaker knights. After a tough battle, the spellbreaker knights retreated from the battlefield, but not without paying the price of one death, and severe injuries for the surviving knight. Kiel had also received some damage in the fight, and could only let the severely injured knight walk away.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel like this was a waste. He quickly sent this information to Mary, who was roaming about the woods far away.


    The battle 15 kilometers in the northeast was the most intense. The spellbreaker knight, that had been forced into a position of certain death, self-destructed. The method with which he used to self-destruct was simr to how Ninther did it.


    This made Greem suspect that all spellbreaker knights knew of such an annoying way to self-destruct.


    The one who forced the spellbreaker knight to self-destruct was an odd adept called Marite. It seemed he was a peculiar fellow who was able to manipte the bodies of others.


    However, neither of these three battles were the focus of Greem¡¯s attention.


    The only battle Greem was paying attention to was the one happening 23 kilometers to the northwest.


    Because this battle was between a radiant knight and Second-Grade Adept F¨¹gen!

 Chapter 201

    Chapter 201 Searching the Battlefield


    In the bloody battles of thest few months, three adepts had fallen to the sneak attacks of radiant knights.


    This was already a fairly sizeable loss for the Sarubo n.


    After all, the bottom line for the Sarubo n was set at eight adept losses in this nar invasion. If the numbers of adept casualties exceeded a certain number in this ne, it would cause a drastic effect to the Sarubo n¡¯s ranking within the Zhentarim Association.


    If the Sarubo n reassigned adepts from their subordinate lesser nes to fill in the vacancies of the n headquarters, it would cause an immense impact to the stability of their rule over their two subordinate nes.


    Thus, faced with the frequent assaults of the radiant knights, the only Second Grade Adept of the base, Sir F¨¹gen, had no choice but to personally step onto the battlefield and teach these ¡®magic-infused knights¡¯ a bloody lesson!


    This was a moonless night!


    The adepts were exceptionally active tonight. Besides the ten adepts who had always been fighting on the frontlines, Sir F¨¹gen brought five more adepts with him to join the battle.


    An unfortunate radiant knight had already been identified. The remaining knight squads around him were being dealt with by other adepts, while this radiant knight hiding in the knight squad naturally became the target of Sir F¨¹gen¡¯s hunt.


    It was obvious that Sir F¨¹gen didn¡¯t really trust Greem and the others. He had specifically brought his direct subordinates from the base to deal with the other knight squads and clear out the battlefield, disying a desire to keep other adepts froming close. Greem, who had long wanted to spy on the secrets of Second-Grade Adepts, could only fall back on such a method to gather information.


    Ever since he became a First Grade Adept, Greem felt lost concerning his future path. He didn¡¯t dare progress recklessly without gathering enough information and figuring out the proper way forward. However, most of this information was something that newly advanced adepts were unlikely toe into contact with.


    At least, before Greem signed a more intimate contract with the Sarubo n, he would have no chance of gaining ess to such information!


    If Greem were able to collect a little information about Second Grade Adepts at this point, it would undoubtedly be a lighthouse that shed light on Greem¡¯s future path. Even if he didn¡¯t know the means of progressing down this path, as long as he had a direction, Greem would be able to use the chip¡¯s powerfulputing abilities to reverse-engineer a method of moving forward.


    It was a blood-colored night, and the raging winds were howling in the night.


    Standing on a high cliff, one could taste the bloody ughter carried over by the night wind from afar.


    If Mary had been here, she probably would¡¯ve let out a long howl in excitement!


    Greem thought so to himself, but his eyes were still fixated on a spot in the darkness. Blue light continuously shed in his eyes.


    The battle had already started!


    One could already smell the ice-attribute particles in the night wind, alongside small traces of fire-attribute particles.


    Greem made an initial judgement that the innate powers of the Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen were probably ice spells. The immense power of his attacks had alreadypletely suppressed the radiant knight.


    In the end, radiant knights were only a group of ¡®magic-infused knights¡¯ that had very high magic resistance.


    Their strongest ability was their resistance to elemental spells. As theycked a systematic means of cultivation or meditation, they were wholly unable to manipte the elementium particles drifting about the atmosphere. Thus, whether it was to attack or defend, they had to rely on runic energies.


    And these so-called runic energies were only magical energies drawn from magic crystals with the use of crude runic arrays, that were then applied to weapons and armor. Such equipment would hardly even be called magic tools in the World of Adepts. At best, they were enchanted equipment, and were far inferior and much less efficient than magic tools.


    However, everyone had their own expertise, and the knights were experts in this particr field of utilizing runic energies. The knight ne¡¯s runic arrays were all designed and focused around the concept of merging the strengths of runic energies and the knights. Thus, when it came to the assimtion of runic energies with the source of their life force, their runic arrays did indeed have unique insights of their own.


    Even Greem was interested in capturing a radiant knight himself to investigate the secrets of the runic arrays on their bodies. Once he obtained the knowledge rted to their runic arrays, Greem had every confidence that the energy system of his golems would be able to be further improved. Even the me Fiend Transformation runes carved on Greem¡¯s body had room for improvement!


    The pitch-ck night sky was abruptly lit up by a blue light that appeared. Arge halo of ice that could easily be seen suddenly exploded in the middle of the woods. The surrounding ancient trees were instantly sealed in a world of crystalline ice.


    The crackling sound of ice particles in the air crashing against each other rang out throughout the sky. Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by the power of a Second Grade Adept.


    The knights¡¯ ne was a small material ne sorelycking in elementium energies. A First Grade spell might be able to have an effect of up to a 100 degrees in the World of Adepts. However, here, it might only have around 70 degrees of power. Moreover, the radius and duration of its effect would also be greatly reduced.


    Fortunately, most of the invading adepts had plenty of magic tools, spell scrolls, and magic staffs to empower themselves. With plenty of instant-cast spells at their fingertips, they were still able to drown the enemies with attacks, maintaining their advantage as casters while fighting against knights of the same Grade.


    The nighttime battlested for another half an hour before finally ending. The result was as expected; Sir F¨¹gen obtained an overwhelming victory.


    As the victorious adepts brought plentiful spoils of war back to the base, Greem was finally able to visit the location of the battle.


    This was the backslope of a small hill. Three gigantic rocks formed a circle, with a t ground of around twenty meters in radius within it. This was an excellent camping spot for an adventurer¡¯s squad.


    Sadly, this ce had been turned into a world covered in ice and snow!


    Greem walked out from the dark forest, confidently strolling about this area of snow and ice. Cerulean light continued to sh in his eyes, hidden by the shadow of his hood. All of his senses were utilized. His sight, smell, hearing, and his taste were all activated to feel the elementium in this camping spot.


    The three-meter tall rock had been covered by ayer of thick ice. Even the campfire in the middle of the camp had been sealed in an ice crystal, with the firewood and the fire itself also preserved within.


    Greem gave the crystal a light knock. It let out a nging sound. The ice¡¯s hardness was no less than normal steel. Greem was still able to vaguely see the shape and color of the burning campfire through the semi-translucent ice crystal. The bright red mes, and the white-hot center of the fire, could be seen clearly. It was almost as if time had beenpletely frozen and stopped at that one specific moment.


    Fire in ice? This kind of ice power that could even freeze mes most definitely contained traces of narws. Otherwise, it would never be able to create such a situation where two elementium with conflicting attributes were able to co-exist!


    Two human mercenariesid on the ground beside the rock. Their panicked and worried expressions were still frozen on their faces. Their hands had reached towards the weapons on their waists, while their other hands were pressed against the ground to push themselves up. Sadly, their lives would forever be frozen in that moment.


    One could tell that Adept F¨¹gen had instantly let out a terrifying Ring of Frost when he broke into the camp, immediately getting rid of any irrelevant characters.


    The signs of me explosions became even more obvious at the other end of the camp.


    Greem kept scanning through the various details scattered about the location, and a scene of the shocking battle that had ured here appeared in his mind. Greem followed the signs of the battle left by these two, continuously walking deeper and deeper into the woods, before finally arriving at the spot where the battle had ended 1.5 kilometers away.


    The trees in a quarter-kilometer radius had been razed to the ground. There were deep rents left in the earth everywhere. The bottom of these gullies were charred by fire, still letting out wisps of ck smoke.


    It was absolutely possible to estimate the intensity of the battle from the numerous scorch marks left behind by the radiant knight¡¯s powerful knight battle techniques. But now, ayer of crystalline ice hadpletely covered all the scorch marks, demonstrating F¨¹gen¡¯splete control over the battle.


    Here, the radiant knight had been frozen in ce by Adept F¨¹gen, with no means of moving even a single step, and forced to passively endure and defend against F¨¹gen¡¯s attacks. This was evident from the angle of attack and contact of the spells!


    Radiant Knights did indeed have very high magic resistance. Even so, they would not be able to resist an endless stream of spells.


    Once the knight exhausted the magic crystals within his runic arrays, F¨¹gen, with his plentifulbat experience, would never give him the chance to swap out the crystals!


    Greem stopped at the center of the battlefield. There was an ice pir half a meter tall here. The upper half had cracked and shattered, but the lower half was still hard as steel, letting out a dark blue gleam.


    This was where the radiant knight had been defeated and lost!


    Greem sensed the atmosphere once more, now that he was where the battle had happened. There were still some of Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s personal elementium signature left in the ice pir. However, besides this, Greem felt like there was something else.


    Mm, this was worth bringing back for research!


    Now that he had made his decision, Greem took out his Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter and summoned the Fire Deity. Then he used a summoning core to summon a rock serpent.


    Once the Fire Deity appeared, it started to chaotically st mes all over the ce to quickly destroy any markings left on the battlefield. Meanwhile, the gigantic rock serpent opened itsrge mouth and devoured the ice pir, along with the dirt frozen underneath it, before vanishing into the ground.


    After a quick survey of the battlefield, and having made sure nothing was left, Greem finally turned to leave.


    With the help of the night winds, the raging forest fire burned everything left to ashes. When the scene had been reduced to nothing but scorched earth, the dirt near the edge of the earth started to break open. Tens of thousands of ck beetles surged from underneath, forming into the silhouette of Evil Bugs Acteon.


    "Dammit, that bastard was here already!"


    Acteon cursed once more when he saw the ravaged earth, the billowing ck smoke, and the remaining fires before him.


    Then he turned to look at the ck skies around him. He couldn¡¯t be sure if the bastard had left any odd eyes or ears around here.


    After lowering his voice and cursing a couple more times, Acteon finally turned into a ck smoke again, drilling into the ground and disappearing!

 Chapter 202

    Chapter 202 Prelude to the Conflict


    The death of a radiant knight on the battlefield was no less shocking to the witcher-knight army than a massive earthquake.


    There hadn¡¯t been a single record of a radiant knight dying on the battlefield in nearly a thousand years. Of course, this had to do with the fact that heretic casters in this ne were much weaker than the radiant knights, as well as the radiant knights¡¯ own strength.


    Without the umtion of knowledge nor the legacy of a proper system, the naturally awakened heretics had powerful talent and enviable development potential, but no ce to systematically learn arcane knowledge or learn to apply their powers. Moreover, under the strict suppression of the witcher-knights, they were forced to hide their names and hide every time their identities were exposed, living a life fleeing and being homeless.


    Under such conditions, the Continent of Knights¡¯ heretics that awakened their power, naturally, were constrained by theck of knowledge and resources. They could only suffer as they stagnated around the level of an apprentice adept. Even if there were asionally geniuses that would advance to a First Grade caster by ident, they were hard-pressed to gain an advantage over the witcher-knights that travelled in groups. Once they met spellbreaker knights, the only path left to them was a death in despair.


    A caster that was able to threaten a radiant knight had never appeared in this ne.


    But now, the situation hadpletely changed with the appearance of these powerful invaders!


    The angered knights¡¯ higher-ups had a severe disagreement. Some wanted everyone to remain calm, continue the slow but steady search through the remaining areas, and quickly find out the location of the invaders. While some were extremely angered, believing the previous strategy to be excessively conservative and equivalent to sending their elite forces to be ughtered by the enemy.


    Both parties had a major falling out due to this issue, and neither side would give any ground.


    As the two Third-Grade Dragon Knights needed to escort the wounded green dragon back to the Dragon Cliff, they were currently missing from the knights¡¯ base. Consequently, under the pressure of this irreconcble conflict, the witcher-knight army finally split!


    The radicals were unable to hold back their rage any longer. After gathering nearly a thousand witcher-knights, they charged into Greend Forest without hesitation.


    At that time, the neighing, ferocious magic colts were all over Greend Forest¡¯s outer area.


    These terrifying beasts looked like thebination of warhorses and magic wolfs. They carried streams of witcher-knights on their backs, sprinting through the dense forest as if they had wings on their backs. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was mountainous areas, steep cliffs, or gushing rivers; they would be able to leap across and continue onward as if they were still walking on t ground.


    With the magic colts¡¯ extraordinary climbing abilities, a massive army of 7 radiant knights leading 34 spellbreaker knights and 828 witcher-knights pushed forward into the depths of the forest with immense speed.


    The horrifying voodoo beasts, incessantly surging forth from the depths of the woods, turned into piles of minced meat under the impact of the violent knight battle techniques.


    For one moment, nearly a thousand witcher-knights started a wild ughter against the numerous voodoo beasts within the woods, turning the forest within five kilometers into a bloody abattoir.


    ............


    There was a terrifying battlefield located deep in the forest.


    The witcher-knight army had arrived here. A massive cliff blocked the path before them. To the left was a slope densely filled with trees, and to the right was geography that was tter and had a spread of the trees that were thinner. As a result, the direction of the army naturally turned, heading towards the right of the cliff.


    Just as the knight army had altered their course, a horde of voodoo beasts numbering in the thousands swarmed forth, instantly shattering their formation and scattering troops, throwing them into chaos.


    Above the cliff and within the dense woods under the cliff, at the area where trees were sparse, behind the valley... in every single location of the area, one could see witcher-knights and voodoo beasts fighting in small groups.


    Everywhere was the sound of des against flesh, bones being cut, sshing blood, the roar of the knights, terrifying screeching of the voodoo beasts, the booming explosions from violent and ferocious knight battle techniques...


    Not a single patch of silence could be found near the cliff. Burly silhouettes swinging their swords could be found everywhere, as could the ugly forms of the voodoo beasts.


    Meanwhile, hidden amidst this chaotic and messy battlefield, Greem wandered about like a terrifying god of death descended upon humanity, his ck robe wrapped about him. He casually admired the cruel and bloody ughter before him, while using the wind critters to look for a suitable battlefield to join.


    There were eighteen more adepts who were looking for an opportunity around the battlefield, much like he was doing.


    Ever since they heard therge movements of the witcher-knight army, the adepts¡¯ base finally sent out nine adepts as reinforcements, causing the number of adepts on the frontline to reach neen people.


    Adepts would rarely form groups of three or five like the witcher-knights. The way they were cultivated since youth was far too different. This caused adepts to be ustomed to battling in an unrestrained fashion, without any regards for others. Moreover, none of them would trust another adept with their backs.


    Thus, they always fought alone!


    Even Greem and Mary, who had experienced numerous life and death trials together, would usually fight on their own if there wasn¡¯t a need to stick together. They would very rarely fight together.


    Perhaps this was the nature of adepts.


    Greem strolled along a river. On the other side of the river, a group of nearly a hundred witcher-knights were fighting to the death against a group of voodoo beasts equal number in number. After paying the price of three witcher-knights¡¯ lives, they were on the verge of exterminating this squad of voodoo beasts.


    Thus, when Greem walked past the battlefield, still wrapped in his ck robe, there were only a dozen feline voodoo beasts resisting against the knights.


    Five spellbreaker knights were mixed into this knight squad. When they saw Greem and his ck robe from at a distance, they let out a battlecry and charged towards him with thirty witcher-knights following closely behind.


    A seventy meter distance and a small stream five meters wide was not enough to deter their charge.


    Greem looked at the provoked enemies and shook his head without showing any expression on his face. He chose to avoid the knights.


    He might be able to defeat a squad this size, but the price he would need to pay for it was toorge. Moreover, there was another knight squad on the tiny hill beside them. There were two radiant knights in that squad. If Greem engaged them here but became unable to end it quickly, he would very likely attract the attention of those two radiant knights.


    Radiant Knights were not an enemy Greem could deal with!


    Greem extended the hand hidden under his robe. A washbasin-sized Magma Fireball shot forth from the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter. With a wave of his hand, Greem threw it towards the charging knight squad.


    The spellbreaker knight leading the charge frowned when he saw this. After sharing a look with thepanion beside him, tworge me des shot out from their longswords, intercepting the crimson fireball radiating astounding elementium flux in the air above the stream.


    Boom! A loud explosion rang out in the skies.


    The violent me shockwave cut the stream in half and the water droplets were instantly heated to their boiling point, shooting everywhere like bullets in the air.


    The charging knights quickly activated their energy shields. Cling. ng. The sound of a constant stream of blows rang out. They were able to block this wave of attacks without suffering any losses. However, when they finally put down their energy shields and the misty vapor had finally dissipated, they could no longer find the silhouette of the ck-robed figure.


    "It¡¯s the me Demon!"


    "It is him!"


    "Hurry up and alert everyone. The me Demon was spotted. Have everyone be more cautious..."


    Just as the few spellbreaker knights were thinking of a way to spread the news, Greem had already appeared in a low valley two-hundred and fifty meters away. Here, a group of nearly three dozen witcher-knights were trying their best to defend against the endless aerial attacks of three winged dragons.


    Very fortunately, there were no spellbreaker knights or radiant knights. And especially, there weren¡¯t any dragon knights in this squad!


    As such, Greem no longer hesitated when he saw such a feast. The Fire Lord and the Fire Deity appeared at the same time, charging into the knights¡¯ ranks without any regard for their lives. As there were no powerful enemies here, Greem didn¡¯t activate his me Fiend Transformation, choosing to fight with his enemies using his adept form.


    With the frightening prowess of the golems under Greem, just the Fire Lord and the Fire Deity alone were enough to easily take down this group of witcher-knights before him without having to lift a single finger. However, considering the numerous variables that could go out of control around the battlefield, Greem wanted to end the battle as fast as he could and joined the battle as well.


    An adept-level golem, a pseudo-adept level elementium being, fighting alongside an adept of me mastery. The three masters of me charged into the battlefield, instantly turning the area into a sea of mes and covering it in countless fiery explosions.


    The Chain Fireballs shot in session, the Meteor Shower that fell from the skies, and the Firestorm that ravaged over half of the battlefield...this round of ferocious bombardment instantly pushed the knight squad to the brink of their deaths.


    The witcher knights at the center of the explosions didn¡¯t have a chance to retaliate. Already, they had been sted and reduced to ashes by the countless powerful spells. Only the witcher-knights at the edge of the area of effect were able to barely keep up their energy shields, riding their badly burnt magic colts out of the me sea.


    But the only thing that waited for them outside the field of fire was the Magma Fireballs that Greem casually threw at them.


    Theserge elementium fireballs, wrapped in ayer of boiling magma on the outside, crashed into the ranks of the surviving knights with a trail of ck smoke billowing behind them, suddenly exploding when they hit a witcher-knight.


    The shattered magma shards shot out in every direction. The Magma Fireball¡¯s terrifyingva core sshed in every direction as well, instantly covering a radius of ten meters.


    Not every human couldfortably and easily soak themselves inva like Greem could. The temperature of the boiling redva would never go below 2000 degrees. The witcher-knights that were showered inva would instantly be scalded and burnt by theva. The flesh on their bodies, their bones, and even the magic colts below them would rapidly melt like wax into a pile of unrecognizable ash.


    The magic resistance of the witcher-knights was still not enough to resist a vicious spell this powerful!


    In under two minutes, Greem had exterminated a squad of thirty-three witcher-knights with ease, without activating his me Fiend Transformation or exhausting the instant spells stored in the Scroll of Voodoo.

 Chapter 203

    Chapter 203 Rallying Call


    The continuous explosions here had naturally attracted the groups of witcher-knights¡¯ attention.


    There were, of course, spellbreaker knights and radiant knights among those groups.


    Yet, when they drove their magic colts and charged onto this battlefield, the only thing they saw was a bloody ground still burning with flickering embers. The earth was full of craters and scorch marks left by the explosion of Magma Fireballs. The previously boilingva had already solidified into dark red magma.


    However, the heat had yet topletely dissipate. The entire battlefield was filled with intense heat waves that blew against the knights¡¯ faces.


    The only thing left abou thirty witcher-knights were bits and pieces of broken limbs left on the edges of the battlefield. Everything else had already been consumed by the mes and magma, with nothing left to be found.


    The murderer, on the other hand, had long since fled from the scene, disappearing without a trace.


    The knights halted their colts, and looked upon this apocalyptic looking battlefield with their eyes wide open. The anger and frustration in their chests hurt and burned like the boilingva on the ground.


    "Send my orders out! The army is to keep close and maintain a tight formation. We cannot continue with such chaotic and scattered skirmishes! Have all the knights gather towards the central area!" A radiant knight whose hair had gonepletely white, and who had a determined and resolute face, shouted loudly to his soldiers. Behind him, arge g depicting a sword and a shield billowed high in the wind.


    A long, deep-sounding horn reverberated throughout the woods.


    Greem had just rounded a mountain when he saw another battlefield on a gentle, green-grassed slope. A dozen witcher-knightsy about the entire area. A short silhouette was strolling about, as if it was searching for something.


    When he heard Greem¡¯s footsteps, the short form straightened its body, and a pair of dull and stiff eyes under a hood¡¯s shadow looked towards Greem.


    Marite!


    me Demon!


    Although the two didn¡¯t have any sort of interaction, they were on the same side of the conflict after all. When they met each other on the battlefield, both parties usually nodded at each other before passing by.


    Yet at this moment, the deep and long sound of a horn reached here from across the mountains.


    The two of them may not have understood the meaning conveyed by the horn, but if the witcher-knights were sounding a horn at this moment, then there was no question that they were about to shrink their formation!


    "The enemy is shrinking their formation. What about it? Do you want to take a look together?" Greem turned to gaze at the direction the horn came from, and let out an invitation.


    Once the enemy shrunk the formation their movements would be much slower, but their safety would be guaranteed. If the adepts wanted to continue their attacks, the likelihood that they would bump into spellbreaker knights and radiant knights would increase exponentially.


    At this moment, having apanion at their side to keep the enemies¡¯ numbers in check would be a good thing!


    Marite was also a veteran adept, whose elementium affinity was the nt attribute. The only bizarre thing was how he chose to turn his entire body¡¯s flesh into wood. It was rumored that he had the unique ability to use puppet strings to control the bodies of others.


    In truth, this was an extremely strange ability!


    Marite rolled his stiff and woodlike eyes as he considered Greem¡¯s suggestion, before finally nodding and agreeing.


    The two didn¡¯t speak any more and turned towards the direction where the horn¡¯s sound had came from before hurrying over.


    Even though they had verbally agreed to bepanions, Greem did not try to get any closer towards Marite. Conversely, neither did Marite. Both parties always kept a distance of at least thirty meters between the them.


    This was actually an unspoken rule between adepts!


    On the battlefield, any living being that dared toe within thirty meters of an adept would automatically be considered an enemy, even if it was a panion¡¯ from the same faction.


    If it was an agile adept like Mary, even walking within fifty meters of any adept would cause hostility and extreme reactions from the opponent. This had nothing to do with vengeance or emotions. It was just a self-preservation instinct!


    After all, thirty meters was the limit most adepts needed to react appropriately to any dangers. Any closer, and some weak elementium adepts would have to worry about being instantly killed by body refining adepts or some strange spell.


    Trust? Come on, this word had never¨Cand would never¨Cexist amongst adepts!


    An adept letting you within thirty meters of themself was already cing the greatest trust in you! Any closer? Unless you were a servant they hadplete control over, or an utter weakling, they would battle before you could even say anything.


    The two sprinted rapidly in the forest.


    Every five seconds, Greem would vanish in a st of elementium mes that appeared out of nowhere. The next second, he would appear in an empty space one or two hundred meters away.


    On the other hand, Marite also clearly possessed unique movement abilities. After walking forward a certain distance, he would inexplicably step into arge ancient tree. Much like a drop of water falling into a stream, there was no dy or stiffness. Then, his body would emerge from a tall tree one or two hundred meters away as well.


    The entire process was natural and smooth,pletely void of any elementium flux that could be detected by others. This created a strong contrast with the stiff and unnatural movements of his limbs. Anyone looking on would frown at the disparity.


    Of course, with the cautiousness of adepts, they would never show their true abilities with apanion by their sides.


    Greem, for example, had a fixed five second period between every Fire Teleportation he cast. But whether that was the actual cooldown was something that was not known to anyone else. If anyone tried to plot against him using this aspect of the Fire Teleportation, they would likely get a huge surprise when it came down to a fight of life and death.


    Although the two were silently rushing towards the battlefield, they were also sneakily observing each other, gathering information about them. This didn¡¯t mean that they wanted to do anything to each other. It was only an instinct that resulted from the adepts¡¯ wariness.


    Gathering more information constantly might save their lives one day!


    Evidently, Greem was confused as to how Marite was able toplete a close-ranged teleportation without any sound,motion, or elementium flux. However, with the aid of the chip¡¯s powerful analysis ability, he quickly found Marite¡¯s secret.


    Greem, under the powerful elementium sight of the chip, was surprised to find that Marite¡¯s close-ranged teleportation was not random. In every ancient tree that he walked into and out of, Greem was able to see a magic brand steeped in Marite¡¯s personal signature.


    These magic brands hidden deep in the trees functioned like location nodes, pointing out and marking a location in space, allowing Marite to keep his coordinates and position as he teleported about.


    It was no wonder that Marite walked through the forest so naturally and casually without letting off any elementium flux. He had already nted his own elementium aura within countless trees. This was a decent idea!


    Now that Greem had managed to see through the opponent¡¯s mystery, the confusion he felt earlier also vanished entirely.


    Greem smiled and continued hurrying down the road.


    Meanwhile, as he was secretly observing Marite, Marite had undoubtedly also been secretly watching his every action.


    Fire Teleportation. A simple fire-attribute mobility spell, yet the actual conditions of its use were only clear to those who were familiar with it.


    The strengths and weaknesses of Fire Teleportation were so obvious, which made it both a favorite and a headache of fire-attribute adepts.


    Its strength was in its rapid teleportation. As long as it wasn¡¯t an area covered by an elementium barrier, one would be able to teleport anywhere within one¡¯s vision. Moreover, the dy in effect was extremely short.


    Its weakness was the excessively obvious disy when one teleported. The caster had to summon arge elementium me on the spot before the teleportation could be cast. Only then would the caster¡¯s body disintegrate in the elementium mes. After teleportation, a ring of fire would explode on the location visually determined by the caster. Then the caster¡¯s body would reassemble within the burning mes.


    A very simple fire spell, but it was apanied by arge roaring me and a blinding ring of fire. The adept¡¯s enemies wouldn¡¯t even need to see the mes to find the adept. All they needed was to listen for the sound of exploding mes to track it.


    Honestly, arge exploding ring of fire would actually be hard to miss!


    Thus, the stealth factor of Fire Teleportation was far too terrible, and it was undoubtedly the most shy among all the close-ranged teleportation spells.


    For an adept, shiness meant being exposed, and being exposed meant danger!


    This was precisely what all adepts actively avoided.


    What really confused Marite was how Greem had so quickly mastered Fire Teleportation.


    It was important to note that while Fire Teleportation was a simple spell, there was a very important prerequisite before one could cast it. It was the transformation of the body into elementium!


    This was a necessary condition. No other means could circumvent this.


    Without an elementium body, it was hard to disintegrate and reassemble your body within the elementium mes. And without disintegrating and reassembling your body, how were you supposed to aplish the Fire Teleportation that could cross distances of over hundreds of meters?


    This was why Fire Teleportation was generally an exclusive ability of me mastery adepts.


    But how long has it been since Greem had advanced to an adept? ording to the information from within the family, it seemed to have been less than six months since he advanced? How did he manage topletely turn his body into elementium in such a short time? Could he have turned his body into elementium before he advanced to an adept?


    Precisely because of how much he knew, Marite¡¯s mind was swarmed with questions, not able to find the correct answer.


    However, the abilities of each adept was their most secret treasure, never to be shown to any outsiders. Thus, Marite could only kept his questions to himself and silently hurry down the road.


    The two also met some other panions¡¯ along the way. After a simple greeting, they would join the group and continue on the path.


    Very soon, this small group of five adepts arrived at the target area.


    This was a wide valley that was much tter than the surrounding geography. While the trees here were equally as ancient, and the leaves just as dense, there weren¡¯t too many bushes or vines in this part of the forest. Therefore, it had be the temporary rallying spot for the knight army.


    The witcher-knight squads arrived from all over the forest and gathered here. The noise of people talking and the horses whinnying could be heard from several kilometers away.


    A tall,rge g bearing a sword and shield emblem billowed in the wind and was stuck to the ground in the center of this ce. Seven particrly muscr and mighty knights stood below the g. Around thirty spellbreaker knights with shining armor, and an aura of might and power, stood around the seven knights.


    When the adepts and the knights locked eyes, a powerful aura surged forth from the bodies of both parties, shing from a distance.

 Chapter 204

    Chapter 204 Trying One¡¯s Hands


    Five adepts against seven radiant knights, thirty-two spellbreaker knights and a thousand witcher-knights?


    Of course this was impossible!


    However, even when faced with this army of knights, the adepts kept up their arrogant smiles and looked down upon their enemies with disdain.


    There wasn¡¯t any reason for this; it was just the natural disdain spellcasting sses had for warrior sses!


    If this was a battle in an arena, the five adeptsbined wouldn¡¯t be enough to beat a single radiant knight. That said, the prowess of the adepts came in the form of their terrifying mobility and strange spells. As long as there was arge enough space to maneuver about, even a single First Grade adept wouldn¡¯t fear several radiant knights chasing after him.


    The magic colts may have exceptional survival and climbing abilities, but they could notpare to the adepts¡¯ pure speed.


    The radiant knights had powerful meleebat prowess, yet they couldn¡¯t do anything to keep back these evil adepts that were as annoying as a swarm of vampires. If they drove their horses and charged forward, these adepts would most definitely scatter, while keeping close enough to bait the knights deep into the forest.


    Should the knights really dare to continually chase after the adepts, the witcher-knights in the rear would turn into the prey of any other adepts.


    It¡¯s important to note that most of the witcher-knights¡¯ advantages couldn¡¯t be disyed in this primal forest, with itsplex geography and poor environment. Conversely, it was the nimble adepts, who had no unnecessary attachments or concern for others, that held the home field advantage. They were able to strike at any time, while retreating at the first sign of danger with no need for any hesitation.


    The adepts wouldn¡¯t even bat an eyelid even if the hordes of voodoo beasts that were spread across the forest were all killed. Moreover, some adepts would intentionally send hundreds of voodoo beasts to their deaths, all in order to create a chance to ambush the knights.


    As such, the radiant knights could only look on and harass the adepts as they moved around the army, never daring to actually give chase. Last night¡¯s death of a radiant knight was enough proof that an existence powerful enough to kill a Second Grade knight was hiding amidst the adepts.


    Unlike before, the radiant knights could no longer take actions alone while being confident in their safety!


    ............


    The adepts¡¯ faces soured as they looked upon row after row of witcher-knights.


    Harassing and ambushing a few witcher-knights was no problem. However, when the enemy had gathered together into an army, the risk they needed to bear when attacking was incalcble.


    "Any instructions from the base?" Adept Ferrier, whose body was enveloped in ayer of wind elementium particles and bearing a pair of wind wings behind his back, asked solemnly, "They wouldn¡¯t go so far as to make us charge against an enemy formation with radiant knights in there, would they?"


    The few adepts nodded their heads in agreement. It was obvious that they were concerned about the uing battle as well.


    Greem silently took a look at all the adepts present and realized that all the adepts who agreed with Ferrier were adepts of more unconventional professions. Not a single one of them were proficient inbat.


    Ferrier was an Esoteric Adept, and most of his research leaned towards synthesizing potions and drugs. If it wasn¡¯t for his dabbling in wind spells, an adept like him, who was not proficient atbat, would probably be part of the batch of adepts quickest to die on a nar war¡¯s battlefield.


    The remaining adepts were all ones who were focused on illusion or array research. They were the same as Ferrier¨C not proficient at fighting on the battlefield. Sending them to a battlefield was aplete waste of their talents!


    However, the Sarubo n was sorelycking in men right now. It was not feasible to conquer the knights¡¯ ne in one go with just a handful ofbat adepts. Thus, the n forcefully conscripted these adepts. The Esoteric Adepts that spent their lives hunched over in theirbs had no choice but to step onto the battlefield and fight with all their might for the sake of the n, and for the sake of their own lives!


    They may not have killed too many knights earlier in the massive six-month forest battle, but their existence alone kept the witcher-knights¡¯ movements in check. Because of them,bat adepts like Greem, Mary, Acteon, and Marite were able to find opportunities and openings tounch multiple attack and y the backbone of the knights¡¯ army- the spellbreaker knights.


    Of the five adepts gathered here, Marite was undoubtedly the closest to Second-Grade Adept Sir F¨¹gen. Everyone couldn¡¯t help but look towards him.


    "No need... to engage head on... dy... until nightfall... the base... will act... "


    The transformation of Marite¡¯s flesh into wood had evidently affected his throat. Not only was his voice hoarse and dry, his constant stutter also bothered the adepts. However, his words were simple and easy to understand, helping everyone feel relieved.


    All these people were adepts with countless tricks up their sleeves. Now that they had a clear way of proceeding with the battle, action ns were quickly surfacing in their minds.


    "We cannot let them gather together so easily!" Greem took a step forward and spoke coldly, "You guys cover me for thirty seconds, I¡¯ll throw their formation into chaos!"


    Once he said that, Greem didn¡¯t wait for a reply and tossed out the crystal core and summoned the Fire Lord. Then, Greem¡¯s body started increasing in size as mes erupted all over him, quickly transforming into the me Fiend.


    The me Fiend that Greem transformed into stood side by side with the Fire Lord, loudly chanting and casting a spell. Under theirbined channeling, the clear sky was rapidly engulfed by the gathering me clouds.


    A me cloud nearly one square kilometer wide roiled and rumbled in the skies, painting the entire world a dark, dim red. One after another, red-hotva bubbles the size of wash basins expanded within the me cloud. As the fire and earth elements that gathered slowly increased, the me cloud could no longer bear the weight of theva.


    And just like that, in only twenty-three seconds, arge Meteor Shower had already formed.


    As the first bubble popped, a Magma Fireball the size of a human head, filled with concentrated fire elementium, crashed down towards the area the witcher-knights were gathering at, dragging a long ck tail of smoke.


    Then the second fireball, and the third...


    Repeatedly, the ck and crimson fireballs crashed downwards, leaving marks of their burning mes in the sky that very slowly dissipated.


    "Dammit. These evil adepts!" The white haired radiant knight shouted his orders, "Meusel, you lead the army away. Get them into formation as you move. Do not let the formation be swept apart by the enemies¡¯ voodoo beasts! Collier, Aneos, the two of you follow me. We will y that reckless adept brat."


    As the orders were quickly sent out, the knights¡¯ army gathered here finally moved. The leader was Knight Meusel, who was raising the witcher-knights¡¯ army g high in the sky.


    Just then, the first wave of meteors reached the tree canopy.


    "Fire... "


    One after another, runic arrow shot out and hit the meteors above the canopy. Even if there were asional meteors that were able to break through the rain of arrows, a spellbreaker knight would hurry over and strike out with hisrge de, generating a terrifying me de that would sh forth and split the ming meteor in half.


    The meteors that exploded in the skies would rain down fire andva that melted the skin. Fortunately for the knights, without the meteor¡¯s powerful physical impact, the remaining me shockwave could not harm the safety of the witcher-knights. The witcher-knights raised their left hands, using their energy shields to deflect the mes that rained down on them, while pping their colts and hurrying out of the area.


    Under the lead of temporary leader Charles, two radiant knights drove their magic colts forward as fast as possible, charging like an arrow towards the me Demon, who was still channeling his spell.


    A distance of 750 kilometers was only dozens of seconds away for knights as powerful as themselves.


    The remaining adepts were reluctant when they saw the three radiant knights charging towards them, but they had no choice but grit their teeth and stop them.


    Marite was the first to act.


    His silhouette shed, and already his stiff and dull body had appeared beside the three radiant knights. Without uttering even a single word, his hand extended from beneath his ck robe. Countless spider-thin threads extended from the tips of his strange, wood-patterned hands.


    It was delusional to ambush the radiant knights with the strength of his attacks. The target of the threads were not the radiant knights on their horses, but the magic colts beneath them.


    Tens of thousands of wooden threads were cast into the sky. They seemed weak and easy to break, but if they ever came into contact with a human body, it would easily break through with no regard for the armor the victim was wearing.


    Knight Charles, who was standing at the front, let out an angered snort. The runic longsword in his hand shone brilliantly, and a Crescent Moon sh so wide andrge that it struck fear into his enemies shed forth, its sharp edge pointed towards Marite¡¯s chest.


    The angered blow of a Second Grade knight was naturally far beyond the limit of a First Grade adept¡¯s defense.


    The Crescent Moon sh had just left the longsword, but Marite was shocked when he looked down and found a white mark appearing on his chest. The white mark gave him an immense sense of danger. Already, it was tearing his skin and working its way inside.


    Marite felt as if his soul had been locked on by the opponent and the Crescent Moon sh would most definitely hit him.


    This was only a feeling, but Marite believed this to be true!


    "Dammit! This is the power of faith!"


    The energies surging into the wooden threads became even more violent. More energy threads started to emerge from his fingers, speeding towards the three magic colts. Marite quickly retreated as he did so, stepping into a tall tree and instantly vanishing from the spot.


    Most of the energy threads were dispelled by the force radiated by the three radiant knights, but some still managed to find their way into the magic colts. The three colts let out pained cries, and their sprinting bodies quickly slowed down.


    The terrifying Crescent Moon sh turned mid air rapidly cutting in half the tree Marite was hiding in. The force it radiated then reduced the tree to wooden splinters.


    Marite coughed intensely as he tumbled out of a tall tree a hundred meters away. Countless fine cracks had appeared all over his body. Even the slightest of movements would cause splinters to fall from his body. Marite leaned against the tree and straightened his body with difficulty. He raised his head and looked upon the radiant knight with hatred in his eyes.


    Green streaks of blood were slowly dripping out from his eyes, ears, nose, and his mouth. It seemed like he was severely injured.


    To stop a Second-Grade Radiant Knight with the power of a First Grade adept, and getting away only severely injured, was already a magnificent show of prowess on the part of Marite! If it had been the other adepts in his position, they would probably never have had the chance to escape.


    Seeing the poor condition Marite was in the other adepts, who had been raring to go at the knights, regained their cautiousness.

 Chapter 205

    Chapter 205 Schemes and Trickeries


    Adept Ferrier flew into the air.


    From a distance, he threw several vials before the path of the charging knights.


    Large pools of purple liquid seeped into the dirt. Less than two secondster, the ground shook and gave way as arge patch of thorns extended from beneath. The thorn tentacles, thick as a baby¡¯s arm, extended chaotically in all directions. The thorns glowed with a mysterious shine that was unlike metal or wood.


    In a few breaths¡¯ time, this forest of thorns that sprouted out of nowhere hadpletely hidden the silhouettes of the adepts.


    Sadly, even a wall of thorns such as this one was not able to stop the advance of the knights.


    A thick Crescent Moon sh stuck close to the ground as it sted forth, plowing a deep ridge into the ground. Everything that stood before the wailing Moon Crescent sh split into two, be it hard rocks or thorn walls, and gave way to the knights.


    Before the two other adepts could cast their spells, the three radiant knights had already broken through all the obstacles in their way and appeared before the adepts.


    The two adepts couldn¡¯t care for attacking the enemies anymore. Immediately, the two gave up on the spells they had almost finished casting, hurriedly escaping from the radiant knights¡¯ charge. An in doing so, they exposed Greem who was still channeling his spell!


    Greem had been stuck in ce due to his channeling of the spell, but he had always been paying attention to the other adepts¡¯ performance. Marite¡¯s performance was unexpected and Ferrier¡¯s performance was fairly standard. On the other hand, the performance of thest two adepts was very questionable.


    Even if they were notbat adepts, they would have at least one or two simple and practical instant cast spells, wouldn¡¯t they? Yet they gave up on covering him so easily. It was obvious that they had hostile intentions, and wanted to kill Greem using the knights¡¯ hands.


    Of course, if Greem had been the directing caster of this Meteor Shower and the Fire Lord had been the aid, stopping the channeling of the spell would most definitely have inflicted severe spell bacsh on Greem. And in such a moment of life and death, Greem¡¯s fate would be determined by even a slight dy in his movements.


    That said, would Greem ever make such a mistake?


    Greem forcefully stopped the channeling of the Meteor Shower without even blinking. The only thing that happened was the flickering of mes on the Fire Lord¡¯s body.


    Two or three pairs of eyes looking from the shadows of the woods in the distance dimmed, betraying expressions of frustration and annoyance.


    Dammit, that Greem is sly, as expected. Such a massive and powerful spell and he chose not to direct it himself. He let that elementium golem direct it instead! Because of that, forcefully stopping the spell would only inflict most of the bacsh on the golem instead of him. The effect on himself was minuscule.


    There was no time to think. Greem reached into the Fire Lord¡¯s body and grabbed hold of the summoning core before vanishing from the spot in a st of fire.


    His feet had just vanished, when a violent Exploding Cross sh sted the ground where he was just standing. Then, the three radiant knights stopped their muscr magic colts before the pir of dirt that had been sted into the air.


    Even though they had managed to kill a single adept, they were able to stop the evil adept¡¯s spell.


    The three radiant knights seated high on their horses looked down coldly at the adepts desperately running away. They did not choose to pursue them.


    Without a sufficiently powerful mount, it was exceptionally difficult to chase after these adepts with their numerous strange means. Moreover, if they identally fell into an adept¡¯s trap, even a peak Second Grade radiant knight like himself wouldn¡¯t im that he would be able to remain unharmed.


    The powerful green dragon that was beaten to the brink of death in Herdurand City was a perfect example of this!


    In truth, even though they were both at the Second Grade, if one were topare a radiant knight with a green dragon, a single green dragon would easily be able to defeat three to five radiant knights.


    Green dragons were massive in size. Thus, whenparing across the same Grade, the amount of Strength and Physique it possessed far outssed the tiny human knights. Moreover, green dragons could fly, let out dragon breaths, and possessed dragon scales with shocking defensive ability. All of these racial advantages added together to give them the prowess to punch above its Grade and challenge a Third Grade knight.


    It was such a terrifying green dragon that got beat to the brink of death under the watch of numerous knights. It was extremely close to losing its life in Herdurand City.


    In ordance with the Dragon¡¯s Pact signed between the Kingdom of Knights and the Dragon Cliff, the two dragon knights had no choice but to escort the green dragon and hurry back to the location of the Dragon Cliff¡ª¡ªDragon¡¯s Valley. Thus, for this period of time, the only higher-ups in the knights¡¯ camp were these radiant knights.


    It was precisely theck of a firm authority that caused a splinter in the opinions of the radiant knights. This ultimately resulted in an angered decision to break apart. Some of the knights stayed, while the rest marched into the woods, resulting in the awkward situation they were currently in.


    "I¡¯ll chase them even further away? "Knight Aneos couldn¡¯t help but ask with a grave expression on his face.


    "There¡¯s no point! "Charles took a look at the surrounding woods and shook his head: "I can tell that there are some more of those evil adepts hiding in the woods nearby. I fear that something might happen with the main force if we were away for too long! Never mind, ignore these annoying pests. As long as we find their den, I don¡¯t believe that they will keep running about as they are doing now......"


    The two radiant knights, Collier and Aneos nodded in agreement. The three knights didn¡¯t pursue Greem and the others. They turned around and whipped their horses, chasing after the main force, disappearing in the depths of the forest.


    Greem had cast a Fire Teleportation. When he once again appeared, he appeared at the hill closest to where Marite was. The two kept a distance of seventy meters between themselves. Greem had no intention to get any closer.


    Since Marite was already severely injured, closing in any more would draw Marite¡¯s suspicion and hostility. Thus Greem stopped his body at a distance and put on a gentle smile on his face.


    "Your injuries aren¡¯t too severe, are they? Is there anything you need help with? "


    Marite turned his stiff and wooden eyeballs, stared at Greem for a moment, before shaking his head with difficulty.


    Then, he walked with an odd posture to arge tree that was so wide it needed five men topletely hug the tree and thrust both of his hands into the tree trunk. As green halos quickly shed about Marite body, the fine cracks quickly healed at a speed visible to the naked eye.


    In contrast, the tall ancient tree shook and shivered.


    The countless green leaves on its dense and rich canopy rapidly withered and yellowed, before falling to the ground one after another. It seemed like only a blink of an eye, and already this resilient tree with rich life force had already reached the end of its life, dried, aged and withered.


    When Marite finally took his hands out from the ancient tree, the wounds on his body¡¯s surface had all vanished. He appeared full of energy once again. Of course, this was only his outward appearance. As for whether there were any injuries or damage left in his body- that was not for outsiders to know!


    If any member amongst the adepts showed any weakness, it would be the equivalent of shouting "Shoot Me!" at other adepts. Perhaps in the very next battle, this weak member would be the prey of other adepts along with the enemies.


    In a ce such as an other ne battlefield, it was too easy to kill another adept as long as you left no evidence!


    Thus, sometimes, adepts would be even more terrifying and savage after they have been injured! The most important reason for this was that not putting up a facade of strength would invite countless trouble one other adepts saw their weakness.


    In the world of adepts, one needs to be more savage and cruel than others to keep any opportunistic fellows at bay. Most of the time, thepanion hiding behind your back was far more terrifying and far more lethal than the most powerful enemy!


    What a wounded adept needed most from others was not sympathy or help but apathy. It was only when no one was paying attention to them that they could find an opportunity to hide in a corner and lick their wounds.


    Greem nodded at Marite without speaking another word. He tilted his ear and listened for the terrifying thunder reverberating from a distance, before vanishing from the spot with a Fire Teleportation. From the looks of it, more adepts hadunched an ambush on the main force of the knights. From the means of attacks, it was probably thebat adept nicknamed Thunderbird.


    It was only until Greem¡¯s shing me halo had slowly disappeared in the woods far away that Marite was able to let out a sigh of relief. His right foot had silently been impaled into the dirt in the "confrontation" with Greem earlier. If Greem had dared to move within thirty meters of himself, the wooden roots that broke forth from the ground then would most definitely be enough to buy five seconds of time for himself.


    Then, Marite would be able to make a choice for himself, be it fight or flight!


    Marite shook his body, and the massive root that was stuck in the ground quickly shrunk back into his right feet. He turned his stiff wooden eyeballs and stared at a bush a hundred meters away, before turning and disappearing into a tall tree right next to him.


    Nearly eight minutester, when this area of the woods had gonepletely silent, the ground beneath the bush Marite stared at before he left started to crack. Evil Bugs Acteon emerged from the ground and slowly reformed his body.


    He closed his eyes and sensed his surroundings. There was indeed none of Marite¡¯s odd soul flux in the forest nearby. Acteon¡¯s ghostly green eyes betrayed a hint of anger and frustration.


    A ck shell, a horrifying insect¡¯s mouthpart, and countless oddpound eyes of all sizes. Compared to thest time he appeared, the bugmen traits on Acteon were bing increasingly obvious. This time, there were even two tiny ck feelers on his bug-like head. The feelers glowed with a strange purple light, as if there was some unique magic contained within them.


    Even though Acteon already knew that these veteran adepts were all sly and had strange tricks up their sleeves, he had still been discovered by Marite when he snuck up trying to find an opportunity. The stare Marite gave before he left was clearly a warning!


    However, for the fearless Evil Bugs Acteon, such a warning would not be taken to heart.


    Acteon turned his bug head about, turning his attention to the rowdy battlefield in the distance. After a few moments of listening, his silhouette started to fall apart, breaking apart into tens of thousands of strange ck bugs. They vanished back beneath the ground, silently digging their way towards the battlefield.


    When the area had finally gone silent again, a pair of eyes suddenly appeared on the thick tree trunk of an ancient tree. It blinked several times as it looked at the bug hole left behind by Acteon. Then, the pair of strange eyeballs betrayed an expression of mocking joy before slowly disappearing.


    It was only now that this forest area regained its peace and quiet!

 Chapter 206

    Chapter 206 Bloody Battle in the Woods


    The witcher-knight army¡¯s progress through woods was extremely slow!


    If the magic colts were allowed to run at full speed, then covering twenty kilometers in an hour was absolutely no problem. However, if they were allowed to do so, the formation of the thousand-man army would undoubtedly be extremely loose. If they were once again charged by the numerous voodoo beasts patrolling around them, the entire army would instantly be scattered everywhere, turning as loose as sand.


    Moreover, the only ones able to hold their own were the seven radiant knights. The witcher-knights wererger in number, but in the eyes of the adepts, they were just moving delicacies. The spellbreaker knights might be able to resist the evil adepts if they worked together. However, they would instantly attract hordes of hungry wolves if they were ever alone.


    To ensure the integrity of the army¡¯s formation, the radiant knightsmanded the witcher-knights to slow down their pace and progress at a speed simr to a stroll through the woods.


    All the wildlife in Greend Forest had disappeared, converted into horrifying voodoo beasts of all sizes by the adepts. Besides that, some magic traps hidden within the woods had also created quite a lot of trouble for the army¡¯s progress.


    Quicksand traps and gravity traps were the better ones. Fireball traps, acid traps, and noxious cloud traps were lethal for the witcher-knights.


    The adepts had absolutely brought their evil intelligence to bear!


    The magic traps were all set up on the path that the knights had to pass through, while their activation conditions were weird and varied.


    Some of the traps were hidden beneath the ground. Touching a single rock above it would cause a fireball to fly out from beneath. It wasn¡¯t too powerful, but it was sufficient to roast a witcher-knight and his colt to ashes. Some traps were set on branches three to four meters above the ground. The moment a dangling vine was brushed, extremely corrosive acid would pour from above.


    Some of the activation conditions for noxious cloud traps were even stranger. Once the life forces in its proximity reached a certain number, it would explode with a boom.


    Thus, when the witcher-knights bringing up the rear drove their colts by, they would always see several charred ck corpses, or some broken bodies whose heads had been corroded full with holes, as well aspanions whose bodies had been dyed all sorts of odd colours...


    They could only put their deadpanions to a side of the road and perform a small prayer before continuing on their way. However, they couldn¡¯t simply give up on theirpanions who were severely injured or poisoned.


    With the burden of these sick and wounded the progress of the knights slowed even further.


    The shouts of knights scouting ahead of the formation could be heard asionally. Every time this happened, there would always be some peculiar spell falling from the sky andnding in the formation. It could be a low-grade Magma Fireball, or a cloud of terrifying noxious poison, or arge patch of acid swamp...


    Most of the spells would be preemptively triggered by countless runic arrows before they couldnd. Even if there were spells that made it through the rain of arrows, they would be destroyed by spellbreaker knights and their me des. Even though they didn¡¯t deal much damage to the knights, the spells kept the knights alert and concerned. As they rode through the forest on their magic colts, they would cast their wary gazes everywhere; from the bushes, to the canopy, to the rocks and pebbles on the ground.


    Even the middle of the formation wasn¡¯t absolutely safe.


    This was because there would asionally be stealthy voodoo beasts emerging from the dense canopy or the messy piles of rocks along the road. If the knights were not on their guards and got scratched by the voodoo beasts¡¯ foul ck ws, even the witcher-knights¡¯ resilient physiques wouldn¡¯t be able to resist the biological poison specially engineered by the adepts for them.


    A normal path through the woods less than ten kilometers long took them two hours to walk through. Moreover, casualties outside ofbat numbered as many as sixteen. The seven or eightpanions who had been poisoned in particr could only be bound to their magic colts, barely keeping pace with the rest of the army.


    When the sun was at its highest and noon hade, a new problem arose.


    This was an army with no reinforcements. They charged into the forest with no hesitation, and with the absolute resolve not to return before finding the enemy¡¯s den. As such, every member of the army had only brought along three days of food and water when they set off.


    If this had been a simple adventure, such preparations would¡¯ve been enough for them to thoroughly search and explore a forest two-hundred square metersrge. However, under such savagely endless battles, the drinking water was very evidently running out too quickly, even though food was enough.


    What was more terrifying was the fact that they had discovered on their way, to their anger, that almost all the streams and springs that could be used for drinking water had been upied by undead beings radiating a light yellow, pestilent gue cloud. This meant that all the water sources on the ground had been severely polluted and couldn¡¯t be used for drinking anymore!


    Humans were not machines. They could not keep up their alertness and high intensity ofbat-readiness for long periods of time. Witcher-knights had physiques several times better than that of a normal human, but after five to six hours of cruel battles and a difficult march, their stamina had inevitably fallen to the absolute lowest.


    With no other choice, the higher-ups of the knight army set up camp on a high hill and allowed the knights, who had been working for the entire day, to have a safe ce to rest. The many spellbreaker knights formed patrolling groups of three to five, walking about the woods nearby to prevent those evil adepts from harassing the army.


    The seven radiant knights, on the other hand, gathered in a small temporary camp that had just been set up to discuss their following action n.


    The evil adepts¡¯ den was located in this stretch of the Greend Forest, the southern area of which was nearly two hundred kilometers big. After the bloody investigation earlier, the witcher-knights had used their lives to thoroughly check half of the suspicious locations. Thus, what remained before the seven radiant knights was arge forest nearly a hundred square kilometers in size.


    The radiant knights that sat here were all radicals who hated evil with a passion. Otherwise, they would not have been able to tolerate the scattered and gradual investigation method earlier. They wouldn¡¯t have unhesitantly charged into the forest in their fit of anger.


    ording to the original n, they would ignore the adepts scattered around the outer area of the forest, and have the main army march forcefully into the core of the forest. Then and there, they would set up camp and send their subordinates in every direction. They were confident they would be able to find the enemy¡¯s den easily when that happened.


    Even if there were casualties, that would be better than sending exceptional spellbreaker knights and squad after squad of elite witcher-knights to be ughtered at the hands of the enemy, wouldn¡¯t it!


    One has to point out that in the knights¡¯ ne, where the heretics were perpetually suppressed, the image of the spellcasters as weak and cowardly was deeply imprinted in the hearts of the witcher-knights. Even those higher-ups of the knights¡¯ army had never thought of the invading adepts as an exceptionally powerful force.


    From their perspectives, the adepts were only a bunch of shrewd and treacherous individuals who were good at hiding and setting up ambushes. As long the knights swept through and destroyed their roots with a force like lightning, they would scatter like mice who had lost their den. They would run and hide in fear, no longer capable of putting up any organized resistance!


    In truth, these radical knights¡¯ simple and violent n was indeed the quickest and most suitable way of dealing with the invading adepts. However, they overestimated their own prowess, and underestimated the means of the adepts.


    If they were able to gather all of their armies, and gathered all the powerful beings of their ne, this n of absolute simplicity and violence would undoubtedly be the best way forward.


    Sadly, all the powerful beings of their ne at Third Grade or above were absent. In addition, the internal conflict had caused the knights¡¯ army to split. These two factors severely weakened thebat potential of this army.


    Even as this group of radiant knights gathered to discuss their next step forward, the counter-attack from the adepts¡¯ base had already arrived.


    By evening, hordes of terrifying beasts had already fully surrounded the hill that the knights were resting on. Then, under themand of the evil adepts, wave after wave of voodoo beasts charged into the defensive lines set up by the knights, engaging in a cruel, savage, and bloody battle with them.


    It was arge forest. The loose defensive line stretched for nearly two kilometers. The seven radiant knights each led numerous spellbreaker knights and guarded multiple points on their own, stubbornly exterminating waves of frightening voodoo beasts. The hilltop, on the other hand, had been turned into a temporary infirmary. The witcher-knights who were severely injured and could no longer fight were sent here, awaiting treatment.


    Due to theck of necessary means of treatment, the only method avable to the witcher-knights acting as medical personnel was slicing off the rotting or dead muscles with daggers and washing the wounds withrge amounts of water before bandaging them.


    This method of treatment might be effective for normal external wounds. However, most of the injured knights in the infirmary had been attacked by voodoo beasts, who had ws contaminated with gues and viruses. Before the gues and poison within the knights¡¯ bodies were dispelled, not only would their wounds not heal, they would even worsen and rot as time passed.


    This was only because the witcher-knights all had tough and resilient bodies. If it had been a normal human warrior, all the blood in their body would have coagted and their flesh would have rotted, ending in death. It was only the witcher-knights that were still able to stubbornly resist against the effects of the gues and viruses. But this, in another sense, also extended the time they had to suffer and struggle!


    The attack of the voodoo beastssted from the evening until the the sky darkened!


    The attacksted for four hours. Nearly ten thousand voodoo beasts fell on the frontlines of the battle, while the activebat forces of the knights¡¯ army went from the initial seven-hundred people to barely four-hundred people left. With the help of their courageous steeds and powerful runic equipment, the witcher-knights may have suffered severe losses, but the number of actual deaths were very few.


    After four hours of continuous battle, 87 witcher-knights had lost their lives, but the number of knights that lost the ability to continue fighting due to attacks from the voodoo beasts numbered as high as 235 men. Even those knights that continued keeping guard outside carried several wounds. They just had not suffered wounds grievous enough to cripple them.


    Ten thousand voodoo beasts were dead, and most of them were in by the seven radiant knights. Moreover, in the first hour of the battle, every sharp and fearsome Crescent Moon sh that sted forth would carve a path of blood through the voodoo beasts, causing the number of beast deaths to skyrocket.


    An hour of continuous hacking and shing, along with the asional activation of savage knight battle techniques into areas where the voodoo beasts were most densely gathered- such intense battles were tough, even for radiant knights.


    They would let out a terrifying Crescent Moon sh every three to five minutes at the start of the battle. After fighting for a little while, they could only activate a Crescent Moon sh every fifteen or thirty minutes. By the end of the fight they werepletely exhausted and could no longer use their ferocious knight battle techniques. They could only chop at the voodoo beasts with their powerful strength and tough bodies, much like any other witcher-knight.


    The numbers of the voodoo beasts were not countless!


    In the month¡¯s time before this, the adepts had captured all the wild beasts and magical creatures in this stretch of forest, modifying them into voodoo beasts. Yet just today, more than seventy to eighty percent of the voodoo beasts had lost their lives before this witcher-knight army that numbered less than a thousand.


    However, the result of this battle was extremely glorious, for... it was nightfall!

 Chapter 207

    Chapter 207 Ghouls


    As night fell, the battle slowly stopped.


    Surprisingly, those terrifying voodoo beasts that never tired nor feared death retreated under the orders of the adepts. They hid in the distant woods and for a moment it was hard to figure out their intentions.


    Looking down from above the hill, one could see the ghostly green or blood red eyes of the voodoo beasts all over the dark forest.


    The white-haired Knight Charles leaned on his runic longsword, standing on a corner of the tall hill, gazing at the woods in the distance. It left like a one-ton boulder was pressing upon his heart. Even breathing was difficult.


    In all seriousness, the witcher-knights on this hill were entrenched in this battle because they responded to his rallying call. Now, everyone was trapped on this hill. They could not move and could only wait for the next attacks from the adepts.


    What were those adepts hiding in the darkness plotting? Would they be able to sessfully repel the attacks of the enemy, andst until the enemy had exhausted all their strength?


    Countless stray thoughts whirled about his mind and for one moment, he nked out.


    The sound of footsteps sounded from behind.


    Even without turning to look, Charles was able to tell who it was from their familiar footsteps.


    As expected, the loud and steady voice of Knight Meusel rang out, "The enemy has temporarily retreated! The injured knights have also been treated."


    Charles¡¯ determined expression turned into a downcast one as he spoke in a grave voice, "How are the losses on our side? How many knights are left that can ride a horse to battle?"


    "......" After a moment¡¯s silence, Meusel¡¯s voice had also be much more solemn, "The number of men that can still fight on a horse is 386. The rest... "


    They had lost nearly a hundred men in the first battle within the woods, under the ambush of the stealthy adepts. Another twenty or thirty knights had died on the arduous journey here. After the long and bloody battle earlier, only 386 men remained of the knights¡¯ main force. That meant that the battle earlier had caused a casualty of another three hundred men from the knight¡¯s army.


    Even though most of the casualties were frombat ability loss due to infection by the bio-toxins on the voodoo beasts¡¯ ws, what was the difference between death and having no fighting strength when they were under siege by the enemy? In fact, most of the time, it might have been easier for these severely injured knights to have just died under the ws of the voodoo beasts.


    After all, the witcher-knight army was known for its fast and ferocious attacks, as well as its quick speed across the battlefield. How were they supposed to break through the enemy¡¯s siege with three hundred casualties on their backs?


    The other radiant knights quickly gathered around Charles, firmly and stubbornly waiting for his orders.


    The muscles on Charles¡¯ face twitched slightly.


    How easy it was to just give an order! Yet, behind each order was pile after bloody pile of witcher-knight corpses.


    As the knights¡¯ leader, he knew clearly what order he needed to give out to save the lives of the remaining witcher-knights. However... once the words were about to leave his mouth, his snow white beard shook uncontrobly. He couldn¡¯t say it.


    Abandoning theirpanions! Giving up on their allies!


    Since when did the sacred and invible motto of the knights turn into numbers that could be added and subtracted on a paper?


    The more practical Meusel saw the pain of choosing on his leader¡¯s face and calmly spoke, "It is no longer possible to have everyone break through! Even if we left the sick and injured behind, we cannot get everyone else out. So Charles, please, bring the rest with you and break through! I¡¯ll stay behind with the other radiant knights and defend this hill. You bring some of the knights back to base and... ask for help. Windsor and the others won¡¯t hang us out to dry!"


    Meusel stopped when he spat out the words ¡®ask for help¡¯.


    As a proud radiant knight himself, it was undoubtedly another extremely difficult task to have Charles lower his head before that stubborn and conservative Windsor. However, the current situation left him no other choice.


    The muscles on Charles¡¯ face shook even more violently.


    Finally, the leader of the radical knights made his decision. He spoke, determined, "No, Meusel. The one returning shouldn¡¯t be me. I bear the greatest responsibility for this reckless march into the forest. So, I¡¯ll stay behind to reinforce the morale of the troops. You, Collier, Aneos, Jos¨¦¨C the four of you lead two hundred men back to request for reinforcements. You can tell Windsor that as long as he is willing to help, I will... I will be willing to hand over all of my authority... "


    All of a sudden, death-like silence filled the scene.


    Pain and struggle surfaced on the faces of all the knights of the radical faction.


    The moment Charles gave this order, it meant that the this faction would always be inferior to the knights of the conservative faction. This was something even more painful than death for the proud and arrogant knights.


    Yet, just as everyone¡¯s feelings were being turned upside down, a scream filled with terror rang out from a corner of the hill. Then, it came like a sweeping storm, as pained screams filled the entire camp.


    "What¡¯s all the fuss about?" Meusel drew his radiant runic longsword and shouted, "Keep calm, the enemy has yet to... "


    Before he could finish, his expression changed.


    A pungent odor of rot had spread throughout the camp along with the night mist that appeared in the woods. Like the cowherd¡¯s flute that enchanted the hearts of the people, when this pungent odor spread throughout the camp, the dying knights lying all over the hill had a sudden and terrifying change.


    The knights could see this clearly as a weak and injured knight lying closest to them started to cough violently. His pale face started to be flushed red. His teeth ground against each other and let out a screeching noise. Milk white foam surged forth from his mouth and nose.


    His eyes were opened wide, so wide that the corners of his eyes had started to split. Purple and ck blood started to flow from every orifice. His body started to bend and contort into all sorts of unimaginable shapes.


    When the blood finished flowing, he started to scratch at his own body with all his strength. The strength with which he scratched his body caused deep gashes to be left all over his skin and body. Blood flowed endlessly.


    A witcher-knight in charge of taking care of him stepped forward to stop him. However, even using all his strength, he could not stop the knight¡¯s self-destructive acts and was bitten on the hand instead.


    The radiant knights all had exceptionally powerful physiques, but even they were feeling ufortable about what they were seeing. They looked about in fear before realizing the cause of the chaos in the camp.


    The mist!


    No. More specifically, some mysterious substance was mixed into the mist!


    The injured knights within the camp were undoubtedly the ones who were weakest, both physically and mentally. Thus, one could see with the naked eye how some mysterious ck particles within the mist surged into the wounds on their bodies like swimming fish. When one looked from a distance, they could see that every injured man on the hill was shrouded in a thick ck fog.


    The injured knights within the thick fogs struggled in pain, tearing at the armor and shirts on their bodies, even scratching and hurting their own flesh and skin. It was as if they wanted to tear their skin off.


    As the ck fog seeped into the bodies of the injured, their bodies started to change massively.


    The skin on the surface started to dissolve. The bright red muscles and tendons were exposed to the air, causing all the knights to appear extremely red. However, very gradually, the blood-red color started to fade and a sort of sticky and disgusting liquid began to fill the surface of their bodies,pletely soaking them.


    The thick muscles and tendons started to meld together. Insufficient stretching caused their bodies to be thin and scrawny. However, it was obvious that the strength in their bones and muscles had greatly increased. They screamed and roared in anger. Initially, it still sounded like the pained and sorrowful cries of a human. By the end, it started to sound like a wild beast, only left with an odd growl.


    Sharp fangs, ws and spines started to grow rapidly. When ¡®their¡¯ ws unconsciously ran across a boulder, it let out the screeching sound of scraping as bright ming sparks appeared.


    Right in front of the radiant knights, and right on this hill, a previously injured knight on his deathbed had rapidly converted into an undead. They had been forcefully converted by evil powers into an undead being that had never before appeared on the knights¡¯ ne¨C a ghoul!


    Having beenpletely changed to an undead, this ghoul turned its body and crouched on the ground. Its eyes, missing their eyelids, suddenly turned around, revealing milk-white and turbid eyeballs, so white one couldn¡¯t see the pupils in them


    Even though they had no pupils, this was no obstacle for the ghoul. Its unique senses made it especially sensitive to life force! It opened its mouth wide, revealing sharp fangs, before letting out a deep and threatening roar directed towards the radiant knights.


    It bent its body, and with a powerful kick of its strong hind legs, the ghoul leapt towards the witcher-knight closest to it like an arrow shot out of a bow.


    The witcher-knight was evidently stunned by the scene before him. He stumbled backwards in fear, but never ever thought of drawing his sword and resisting. This... this was apanion he used to know!


    As a radiant knight, Meusel had undoubtedly experienced far more terrifying and strange things in his lifepared to the young witcher-knights. He quickly struggled free from the shock and fear. With a quick step forward, he drew his sword and smacked the leaping ghoul¡¯s body with the t side of the de.


    "Stay down!"


    The ghoul was smashed and sted away along with his roar, and crashed into a small tree as wide as a human¡¯s waist ten meters away, knocking it down. Crack! The loud snap of breaking bones cracked in the ghoul¡¯s body.


    However, it was obvious that this blow did not cripple the ghoul.


    It rolled about the ground several times. When it finally got up, most of the bones on the front of its body had beenpletely shattered. However, it struggled and got up from the ground as if the wounds didn¡¯t bother it, dragging its broken body and leaping towards Meusel once more.


    "Die!"


    Meusel finally recognized the reality. He no longer held back. Therge sword in his hand glowed brilliantly, and like a sharp knife sliding through a piece of paper, he silently sliced the ghoul in two. However, the mild pause of the de he felt when the longsword shed through the spine of the ghoul caused his expression to sour.


    He was an actual Second Grade radiant knight!


    If even he felt a slight dy when he cut through this monster, how would the other witcher-knights fare against these monsters?


    There was no time for him to think, as the entire camp was instantly engulfed in a rain of blood!

 Chapter 208

    Chapter 208 Full On Counterattack


    Such an evil undead like the ghoul had never appeared on the knights¡¯ ne.


    Some wild undead beings asionally appeared in rural areas. However, most of those were low-level skeletons with creaking bones, or withered corpses that shambled about slowly. The worst of those were only spectres that had lost their souls.


    As for an elite undead such as ghouls- they never appeared naturally without the existence of an undead maniptor.


    Today, under the infection of the gues and viruses of the voodoo beasts, along with the catalyzation of the ck fog, the injured witcher-knights were unable to resist the powerful magic and were all converted into strong and lithe ghouls. Perhaps because the physiques of this group of knights were extremely exceptional, the ghouls that they turned into also possessed extraordinary strength and physique.


    Of course, the agility unique to ghouls was once again amplified as well!


    They were like a group of humans who had been skinned, then soaked in pungent water for several days and nights. Their entire body had a pale color to it, like the drowned. What¡¯s more, the surface of their body was sticky, moist, and let out an extremely pungent odor.


    The converted ghouls gathered into groups under the horrified gaze of the witcher-knights,unching an attack on the surrounding humans. One after another, surprised witcher-knights were barely able to draw their longswords before they were tackled to the ground by the pouncing ghouls.


    Their sharp ws and immense physical strength made attacks unnaturally powerful. The knights¡¯ armor, as thick as an entire finger, was easily shredded and prated as if paper. The ghouls crouched on the witcher-knights¡¯ bodies, baring their sharp fangs and biting the knights on their necks.


    Just a single bite and the knights would lose half their necks. Their bloody cervical spine, shattered throat, the fountains of blood that gushed outward... all of this instantly caused the knights to lose their ability to resist. They could only press their hands against the gaping holes on their necks as they drowned in the blood flowing from their orifices, not even able to let out a final call for help.


    Of course, there were some knights with quicker reactions that were able to draw their runic longswords and fight valiantly against the ghouls that charged forward.


    However, most of the excess fat and unnecessary organs within the ghouls¡¯ body had already been dissolved. Under the nourishment from all the flesh and blood on their bodies, the ghouls¡¯ bones had be extremelyrge and dense, while their muscles and tendons had be as thick and tough as steel wire. This caused every sh of the witcher-knights to feel like a cut on an extremely tough and old tree. The resistance they felt from their des shocked them.


    With no choice left to them, all the witcher-knights had to activate the runic arrays on their longswords. As the scarlet or azure runic energies flowed across their longswords, the fight against the ghouls became slightly easier.


    As hard and tough as the ghouls¡¯ bones and bodies were, they were no match for the sharpness of the runic weapons.


    The witcher-knights quickly regained their advantage, pushing the numerous ghouls to a corner of the camp. However, in that mere fifteen minutes of chaos, another forty witcher-knights had be the victims of the ghouls¡¯ sharps fangs and ws. Their flesh that had been ravaged and torn to several pieces, as well as bodies that had been bitten and mauled all over, filled the chests of the witcher-knights with a fiery anger that could burn the skies.


    Those ursed adepts! They should be diced into a thousand pieces!


    Knight Meusel strode forward, and with a single horizontal sh, he released a destructive me de that appeared as an unstoppable red scimitar. It shed forward for fifty meters, finally disappearing when it sliced through arge tree. In the time it sliced through the air, the pale and bloated bodies of seven ghouls had silently split into two, their ck and sticky blood soaking the dirt beneath their feet.


    "Do not get caught up in a battle with them, hurry to your colts, we... " Meusel¡¯s loud and powerful voice suddenly stopped, reced with a face full of shock and fear.


    In a corner of the camp, where the knights had ced their colts, the ck fog was present and had already engulfed the entire area.


    Under the effect of the magic, colts repeatedly fell to the ground with pained cries. Blood was flowing endlessly out of every pore in their bodies.


    Purple and ck blood!


    The magic colts who had spent years as thepanions of the witcher-knights were almost dead!


    For one moment, even a radiant knight like Meusel couldn¡¯t help but feel nauseous. Everything before his eyes seemed to blur.


    They were knights, after all! Knights that spent their lives on the backs of horses, dominating battlefields with the help of magic colts!


    The delicate but hard knight¡¯s armor. The delicate shield that could generate an energy barrier. The iron gauntlets, iron kneepads, and metal pads that ensured both agility and defense, as well as the runic longswords and runic bows that were forged from unique metals... disregarding all the minor decorative ornaments, just a set of runic equipment alone weighed forty-five kilograms.


    Only the sturdy magic colts could carry such heavy equipment as well as the weight of the knights. Disregarding riding across mountains and rough terrain, even running two rounds around the camp would have exhausted a normal warhorse.


    The radiant knights saw ck before their eyes and almost fainted when they saw their magic colts being ughtered by the adepts.


    Yet just at this very moment, countless screams, cries, and roars rang out in the woods around the camp. That group of ursed voodoo beasts had chosen to attack again!


    Suddenly, the dark night sky above the hill, along with the canvas of bright stars, had once again been reced by roiling red clouds. Several hundredva bubbles of all sizes were forming in the clouds. Every time one of the bubbles popped, blinding red light and burning mes would spill out from within.


    The red clouds shook and thundered. Arge Meteor Shower was about to form in the blink of an eye!


    The leader of the knights, Charles, stumbled two steps forward, and coughed out blood on the ground before him. Several of hispanions rushed forward to help him up, but he pushed them away. Charles drew his longsword with all his strength, and blinding mes instantly rose on the de.


    "Leave, hurry and leave... ignore the injured and the magic colts in the base! Quick, have everyone gather and break through in one direction!" Charles waved hisrge sword and shouted his orders with all his strength, his snow white beard already stained with blood.


    Having given his orders, Charles felt the blood in his body boiling. A violent and imposing force started to gather wildly around him. When his aura of might had reached its peak, Charles let out a shoat that shook the entire forest as heshed out with the me longsword in his hand. A bright red de shed apart the skies and sted into the surging red clouds.


    The very next moment, the Meteor Shower that had nearedpletion went out of control!


    The unstable fire elementium that had been densely concentrated had their internal structure destroyed by that red de, instantly causing Greem to lose control over the me cloud. A gigantic apocalyptic volcano erupted above the skies, forming an enormous me pir that looked like a mushroom cloud, before turning into a sea of mes and falling to the forest beneath.


    In a hidden valley one kilometer away, Greem crouched within a giant array, violently coughing blood. The mes on the body of the Fire Lord, who was standing next to Greem, let out crackling noises as if it had received severe spell bacsh as well. Its usually bright red protective mes had dimmed. The fires on several parts of its body had even gone outpletely, revealing the uneven and ugly magma body beneath.


    Greem finally struggled out of the severe spell bacsh after a good eight minutes. He took out potions, powders, and medicines of all sizes, immediately swallowing five vials before exhaling.


    Dammit! To avoid being attacked by the enemy¡¯s knight battle techniques, he had even intentionally guided the me clouds to a height of two hundred meters in the sky when he cast Meteor Shower. Who knew that he still wouldn¡¯t be able to avoid the terrifying attacks of the radiant knight.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!...


    If knight battle techniques had such long range and still retained such terrifying might, what were the adepts supposed to use to fight against them? The adepts would most likely be shed to death by the knights from a distance when they were still desperately trying to chant their spells!


    It¡¯s important to note that with the exception of very few basic instant-cast spells, most powerful orrge radius spells needed chants and hand-signs to bepleted. On the other hand, knight battle techniques were able to be used with a wave of a sword and had an astounding concentration of energy.


    Greem knew that the one who disrupted his spell was a Second Grade knight and that it was all too usual for this to be a result when a Second Grade knight fought against a First Grade adept. However, the utter sess so far had caused Greem to be somewhat impetuous! Otherwise, with his usual forbearing and patient personality, he would never have chosen to be the idiot to attack first!


    Perhaps, right at this very moment, countless adepts in the woods nearby were waiting for an opportunity tough at his failure!


    Greem recovered a little and took back the Fire Lord¡¯s core that had exhausted most of its energy. He then summoned the Alligator Hunter and sunk into the ground with it. A short momentter a massive me pir exploded within the magic array, erasing all signs and traces of him that he had left behind.


    The adepts wandering nearby were far too numerous, so Greem didn¡¯t dare let any part of his body be obtained by an enemy. In particr, blood! Greem himself was capable of casting twelve or thirteen long-ranged curse spells that used blood, skin, and other body parts as catalysts.


    If it was those terrifying adepts that specialized in curses, it was said that even the air one exhaled could be utilized to collect enough personal information about the victim. If they were able to obtain any hair or blood from one¡¯s body and hosted a grand curse ceremony with these items, they could even kill all living beings with your bloodline in one go.


    Moreover, it didn¡¯t matter where they were¨C there was no escaping from this type of formidable bloodline curse!


    As a member of the adepts, cautiousness, care, and keeping a low profile was the best way to stay alive. Never ever offend another adept without reason. If you had no choice but to start a blood feud with another adept, remember to kill the opponent when you had the chance, even if you had to pay a painful price to do so.


    Otherwise, any single adept going into hiding to exact his vengeance on you would make you pay a price hundreds or even thousands of times more painful than you had to pay now.

 Chapter 209

    Chapter 209 Intimidation


    Countless shadows were running through the woods under the dark curtain of the night.


    The witcher-knights, who were once the rulers of this ne, had now be frightened birds fleeing from a bloodthirsty hunter.


    They took off their heavy armor, tossed aside their iron knee pads, and threw away their helmets. Some knights even let go of their runic bows, only keeping the single runic sword and slim shield with them.


    They panicked like dogs without a home, running quickly through the night¡¯s thick and enigmatic mist. Some knights tripped on thick tree roots, while others fell off cliffs of four or five meters.


    Three radiant knights led the charge in front, while the other four led a group of spellbreaker knights to cover the rear. The army retreated as they fought, forcefully opening a path of blood and flesh through the forest, breaking through the heavily surrounded hill.


    Initially, all the witcher-knights were still able to follow behind that radiant me longsword. However, as the howls in the forest around them started to be more and more frequent, and closer and closer, everyone started to panic.


    Some knights werepletely exhausted, while others were heavily injured. Most of them were hanging on by sheer will. They leaned on and encouraged each other as they desperately ran along with the crowd. Of course, there were also some frightened witcher-knights that chose to leave the main force. In just a few seconds, they would disappear into the dark forest.


    Most of the adepts¡¯ attention would be attracted to the main force of the knights, especially in such a cruel battlefield. As long as they could break through the defensive line of the voodoo beasts on the outer rim, then the individual witcher-knights were indeed very likely to escape.


    Honestly, their line of thought was not without its logic!


    However, could the few witcher-knights, withoutplete armor or their powerful steeds, resist the hordes of voodoo beasts and ghouls when they were so badly weakened? This was undoubtedly a problem they had to solve on their own!


    Finally, an adept in the darkness couldn¡¯t hold back any longer!


    A dark green ball of light the size of a human head raced out from the darkness nearby,nding right in the middle of a group of frantically running knights. The ball of light exploded, and countless acid arrows radiating bright light shot in every direction.


    The three closest knights were riddled with holes by the acid arrows before they could activate their energy shields. Their heavy bodies fell to the ground, still letting out ear-splitting sizzling as their corpses were corroded with acid. In less than seven seconds, the three witcher-knights were dead and their bodies had dissolved into a pool of green liquid.


    Most of the knights further away were able to activate their shields in time and shield themselves from the acid arrows. Only one knight was a touch too slow and was pierced through the leg.


    The injured witcher-knight let go of his runic longsword, writhing in pain on the ground. No one could bear the blistering sounds as his flesh corroded. Apanion he was acquainted with stopped and drew a dagger. He ripped apart the legs of hispanion¡¯s pants and was about to slice off the flesh that had been corroded.


    However, what he saw was arge and bloody wound that had beenpletely rotted. The entire right leg had turned a green color, and the terrifying color was rapidly spreading upwards.


    "Can you bear the pain? This leg is done for!" Thepanion shouted and tossed aside the dagger. He drew his longsword and raised it high, intending to amputate hispanion¡¯s leg to save his life.


    Yet at this very moment, odd breathing and the sounds of sprinting footsteps rang out. Arge swarm of voodoo beasts with a few ghouls mixed in surged forth.


    The two terrified knights had no time to even resist. Their shapes were instantly swallowed by the tide of monsters.


    A middle-aged adept wearing green leather armor was cackling in the depths of the woods. A ball of green light floated before his chest. asionally, a green beam of light would shoot forth from the ball,nding in the knights¡¯ formation in the distance. Every time this happened, two or three witcher-knights would lose their lives.


    Just as he was at the peak of his excitement his expression changed, and he rolled to a side of the ground. Almost at the same time, a red me de shed through the air from the darkness, sting through eleven trees before it gradually dissipated.


    The expression of the adept in green armor soured.


    If he hadn¡¯t dodged in time, that me de would definitely have sliced him in half from the waist downwards. Even if he had cast all the protective spells he had on himself, it wouldn¡¯t have done anything against a knight battle technique of this prowess.


    The difference in power was far too obvious!


    Gah! An old dog iling in water, and he dares to bite back!


    The adept in green armor cursed under his breath. At the same time, he tapped the human bone ne on his chest, and his entire body suddenly became obscure and intangible before quickly vanishing from the spot.


    Before he could escape into the darkness of the woods, a blinding me longsword whistled through the air and pinned him to an ancient tree behind him.


    The adept in green armor howled in pain. Even though the ming runic-sword had gone through his chest, he had yet to die. Instead, he quickly grabbed a green staff out of the air and tried to escape for the second time.


    Unfortunately, the energy mes on the runic sword became even more intense, instantly reducing his body to ashes and leaving behind a horrifying skull and a green staff on the ground.


    Charles walked forward from the darkness with determined steps, stopping before the tree and drawing his longsword out. He grabbed the adept¡¯s skull from on the ground, and raised it above his head while shouting into the distant woods, "Come... keeping! This will be your only end!"


    For one moment, the woods became slightly silent!


    Countless gazes prated theyers of branches and leaves, silently staring at the terrifying skull the radiant knight was holding in his hand.


    Just a foolish idiot!


    Many people were coldly mocking in their hearts, but deep inside they were highly cautious.


    From the start of the battle until now, the one torturing and toying with this thousand-man knights¡¯ army had always been a group of First Grade adepts. Even though there were radiant knights within the army that could utterly dominate them, and even though there were seven of them, the adepts had never feared them at all. Some ambitious adepts were even scheming to capture a radiant knight.


    However, at this moment, when they saw the death of that reckless idiot, all the adepts had no choice but to remind themselves to stay cautious. Second Grade Knights were Second Grade Knights after all. Even if they were in an awkward position, they were still extremely powerful beings that could kill them at any time.


    These adepts could y the sly and wicked big bad wolves before the witcher-knight sheep, and even the spellbreaker knights. However, in the face of the mighty radiant knights, they could only curse silently in the shadows. The fragility of Second Grade knights was only whenpared to Second Grade adepts. These radiant knights still possessed the ability to dominate First Grade adepts.


    As long as the adepts understood this, they would be able to preserve their lives, even if they had to suffer a little humiliation.


    Several adepts looked at this scene in humiliation, keeping their hatred within themselves and gritting their teeth. That said, the adepts that had always favored beating the enemy with their brains and knowledge would not charge forward because of a moment¡¯s passion.


    The powerhouses amongst the First Grade adepts couldn¡¯t help but wrack their brains for ideas once more!


    ............


    Greem rode high above the back of the Alligator Hunter in the dim woods, quickly pursuing the witcher-knight army.


    Behind him, countless y golems and wind critters formed a strict blockade, allowing him to constantly monitor every change within two and a half kilometers around him.


    Just as he was quickly sprinting through the forest, a wind critter on the outer rim suddenly sent an odd image back.


    Greem thought for a moment before halting the Alligator Hunter¡¯s advance. He took out his Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter and waited silently.


    Very soon, thunderous crackling rang out, and a man engulfed in tens of thousands of lightning arcs appeared in the skies above.


    Blue armor and a refreshingly bald head, with numerous strange runes carved densely in his scalp. From the looks of it, he was a forty-year old middle-aged man.


    Greem recognized him. He was abat adept from their base who was skilled at manipting lightning, nicknamed Thunderbird.


    In all honesty, even though they were all from the same adepts¡¯ base, most of them wore thick and heavy robes or veils, even hiding their faces with spells. Thus, this was the first time Greem had seen Thunderbird¡¯s true face.


    "You are Greem, aren¡¯t you?" Thunderbird asked coldly, "Go to Spider Valley five kilometers away for a meeting. Boss Hyde invites you to work together to deal with that radiant knight. I¡¯ve already brought the message to you. Whether you go or not is your business!"


    Having finished speaking, Thunderbird did not even linger. With a sh of lightning, he disappeared from the spot.


    Greem raised his head and looked at the lightning scorch marks that lingered in the night sky, somewhat stunned, "A meeting?"


    Almost immediately it seemed as if he understood something, and coldly spat out, "Hmph! It seems there¡¯s finally someone that can no longer stand the arrogance of the Second Grade knights! A meeting? It seems they are nning some kind of action! It wouldn¡¯t hurt to check it out."


    Then the Alligator Hunter turned and sprinted towards the Spider Valley in the distance.


    Spider Valley.


    As its name implied, Spider Valley was a terrifying ce that was home to many spiders!


    The moment one entered this valley, one would see the dense white spider webs throughout the dim woods, along with terrifying spiders crawling about the branches.


    Oddly enough, even though the species and colors of the spiders were extremely varied, thergest of the spiders here were only the size of a fist. One would not be able to see any of the Huntsmen Spiders or the Deinopidae, or Ghostface Spiders, that were typically asrge as a calf.


    Of course, Greem knew why this was the case.


    That was because he was the one who personally swept through Spider Valley. Anyrge spiders that had even a little value had already been sent back to the adepts¡¯ base by him. Thus, the Spider Valley was now not exactly true to its name!


    The gathering spot was set not far from the entrance of the valley. When Greem hurried over, there were already four people silently waiting there.


    Marite, Acteon, Phantom and Boss Hyde.


    Greem naturally already knew who Marite and Acteon were. Most of his attention was on the other two.


    In all honesty, this person was not a simple person at all. He was able to have an adept, who usually only respected knowledge and prowess, acknowledge and call him ¡®Boss¡¯!

 Chapter 210

    Chapter 210 Meeting


    Even though Phantom looked like an alluring beauty with a seductive figure, Greem knew that she was a master of illusions. Therefore, his brain consciously ignored her beauty when he looked at this female adept.


    Who knew if she was hiding a fat, ugly body beneath that shell of seductiveness and beauty!


    Greem could have used the unique prating ability of his elementium sight to look at Phantom¡¯s true face. However, an invasive probe against an opponent of the same grade was undoubtedly offensive, and was very likely to invite hostility from the opponent.


    Whenever there were other adepts around him, Greem would consciously shut off his active probing abilities, only allowing the chip to do passive auxiliary information gathering.


    Furthermore, the reason Greem recognized her as a female adept rather than a witch was because the term ¡®witch¡¯ was a very specific term in the world of adepts. ¡®Witch¡¯ referred to those female adepts who possessed ancient legacies. A witch was most definitely a female adept, but a female adept was not necessarily a witch.


    Adept Phantom, who stood before him, walked down the path of an orthodox elementium adept. She had absolutely nothing to do with the bunch of witches that lived on the northern side of the Continent of Adepts.


    There were many adepts who specialized in illusion. However, most of them were better in an support role. Not many of them were suited for the bloody battlefield. After all, any adept would be embarrassed to go out if they didn¡¯t at least have an illusion-breaking staff or spirit concentration ne on them. With themon usage of such auxiliary tools, thebat ability of adepts that specialized in illusions naturally took a severe blow.


    However, the fact that Phantom was one of the adepts invited here was sufficient to prove that she had her own unique ability and mastery within the domain of illusions. Otherwise, it would have been absolutely impossible for her to be invited to this group ofbat adepts.


    Greem shifted most of his attention to that ¡°Boss Hyde¡± after quickly assessing Phantom.


    It was obvious that Hyde chose the path of an Esoteric Adept. His two meter tall body wasrge and burly, but there were obvious signs of mechanical modifications on his body. His left forearm had beenpletely amputated and reced by a mechanical arm glowing with a bronze sheen. No artificial skin had been ced on top of the arm, and from the exterior, one could see the metallic chains, gears, axles, and countless other mechanical parts inside.


    Just one look and you could tell that many parts of Adept Hyde¡¯s body had been modified. Mechanical arm, mechanical legs, metal eye, numerous strange mechanical equipment fitted on the surface of the body...


    If Greem was allowed to define Adept Hyde¡¯s existence, he would have said that Hyde was most definitely an intricate machine, a... robot that had bits and pieces of human flesh and blood attached onto the surface of the machine.


    Greem was quite curious. If he split apart Hyde¡¯s chest, would he see warm flowing blood oryers of turning gears and rods?


    The prowess of people that went through such cruel bodily modifications lied in their energy output that far outssed any normal adept, as well as their numerous peculiar abilities that dazzled their enemies.


    Moreover, it was important to note that the bodies of most adepts were still considerably weak. Without any spells cast on them, they were a bunch of individuals with weak bodies and poor strength that needed to gasp for air after climbing several floors. However, once they were enhanced with spells, they would suddenly be omnipotent gods that could control all within their reach.


    Mechanical adepts, on the other hand, could rece their weak bodily organs with magic-infused machinery that possessed amazing strength through various artificial modifications. In doing so, their bodies would naturally possess magical effects, even without casting spells. Moreover, these effects wouldst forever.


    Mechanical adepts might lose the appearance and pleasures of a human, but they gained supernatural prowess in exchange!


    It was rumored thatrge numbers of Esoteric Adepts gathered at the Castle in the Sky, in the Continent of Adepts western seaboard, and that most of them were mechanical adepts. The Castle in the Sky, the adepts¡¯ city that floated ten thousand meters in the sky represented the highest achievements and the peak of magic-infused machinery.


    Even though Greem wanted to find out more about this Adept Hyde, a light mechanical hum rang out and a strange flux appeared around Hyde, obstructing further probes from him.


    Greem smiled awkwardly and nodded at Hyde and Marite before walking to the side and waiting patiently.


    They didn¡¯t wait long.


    A momentter, thunder rumbled in the skies, and Adept Thunderbird appeared in a sh of lightning. Bloody Mary and a strange adept cloaked in a ck robe appeared behind him.


    Seeing that everyone he invited had arrived, Adept Hyde cleared his throat and began with an odd mechanical voice, "Everyone, I gathered you here today for the sake of those damned radiant knights. If we let them safely break out of the envelopment we created, all the sacrifices and prices we had to pay would have been for nothing."


    All the adepts chose to remain silent in the face of such a cliche introduction.


    The fight turning sour would likely cause the n¡¯s expansionist ns to fail, and when they were chased out of the ne by the natives, the n¡¯s promise of rewards and resources would not be fulfilled. However, if the adepts present were forcefully pushed onto the battlefield as cannon fodder, they would only put out a perfunctory effort, never giving their all and prioritizing their own survival.


    Adept Hyde, who intimately knew the nature of adepts, quickly changed the topic of the conversation.


    "I intend tounch an ambush specifically against that radiant knight. If you wish to participate in this operation, then stay and we will discuss the specifics. If anyone here is unwilling to participate, you may leave now! The only thing I can guarantee, if this n seeds, is that everyone will get what they want the most!"


    The expressions on the adepts faces finally changed!


    As adepts upholding the principle of equivalent exchange, they would instinctively choose to avoid any task that proved without benefit or too dangerous to themselves. Ambushing a Second Grade knight was undoubtedly a dangerous task thatnded well beyond their abilities!


    However... if they could get the resources and knowledge that they wanted the most by doing so, taking a little risk seemed eptable.


    The light in everyone¡¯s eyes brightened for a second, as if they were silently thinking about something.


    The Hyde¡¯s mechanical eye swept around and lingered for a moment. He was slightly relieved when he saw that no one had left. Everyone here were powerful adepts that he had chosen after careful consideration. They had strange magic abilities that could not beprehended by outsiders.


    If anyone here had left, it would have caused disturbances and ws in his n. If needed, he would have to lower his criteria and pick people from the remaining adepts who could substitute for those who left.


    "Since no one left, that means that everyone is willing to participate in this n. Very well, let us begin discussing our wants and needs!"


    No adept would be willing to tell the public such private information. What happened next was one-on-one negotiations between Adept Hyde and each participant. Hyde¡¯s lips moved slightly, but no sound came out. It was evident that he was secretly conversing with an adept.


    After approximately seven minutes, Greem got a notification from the chip in his mind.


    "Detecting unique mental connection. Initiator: Adept Hyde. Requesting instructions from host. Authorize connection?"


    "Authorized!"


    The next second, the odd metallic voice belonging to Adept Hyde appeared in Greem¡¯s mind.


    "Greetings, Adept Greem. Time is short and I¡¯ll be direct. If I invite you to participate in this dangerous hunt, what do you want in return?"


    "......" Greem hesitated for a bit before slowly speaking, "I wish to obtain the portion of knowledge that concerns the merging of runic energies and life energies!"


    "Uhh... this request is a little tough! After all,plete knowledge about the merging of energies is most likely in the hands of the massive force behind the witcher-knights. Even if we obtained some fragments of runic knowledge after we kill the radiant knight, trying to reverse-engineer the merging of energies from that is still extremely difficult... "


    "If my judgement is not incorrect, Sir F¨¹gen captured a live radiant knight previously. Surely we must have obtained plenty of internal secrets from his mind."


    Adept Hyde¡¯s body twitched oddly in the distance. His mechanical eye glowed with a bright red shine as he once again earnestly assessed Greem.


    "I do not have the authority to reveal internal information from the base."


    "If I cannot directly obtain knowledge on the merging of energies, I wish to know how I may obtain such knowledge. In other words, I wish to know who else on the Continent of Knights possessesplete knowledge on merging. Of course, it is best if it¡¯s someone I can deal with!"


    "You are truly an adept with foresight! If I¡¯m not wrong, putting aside valuable resources, the most valuable thing on this ne is their runic knowledge. Lord Sarubo has ssified the energy fusion knowledge you are requesting as a ss Three strategic resource. It¡¯s impossible for it to be handed to you. As for the people here who possess the knowledge you seek¨C even though they have not been ssified as supervised figures, you will need to hunt them on your own. I can only provide a list of individuals!"


    "That is enough! I ept these conditions."


    The next second, a magical contract woven from Spirits appeared in Greem¡¯s mind.


    The chip dutifullypleted a detailed scan of this contract. After eliminating all logical, linguistic and magical loopholes in the contract, the chip presented a detailed contract to Greem. Greem had a quick look, and having verified that there was no distinction from the contents they had just discussed, cautiously left his magic emblem on the contract.


    It took another seven minutes before Adept Hyde signed contracts with the remaining adepts. Everyone started to be more friendly with the contract now in ce.


    To ease cooperationter, Adept Hyde had everyone do a basic introduction of their magical abilities. Adept Hyde was naturally the first, as he had to encourage everyone else to speak.


    "Hyde, mechanical adept, specializing in close quartersbat. Magic abilities roughly includes Energy Lightsaber and Awl of ughter... "


    The second to speak was Thunderbird.


    "Thunderbird, elementium adept, specializing in lightning magic. Currently possess the spells Lightning Storm, Lightning st, and Lightning Teleportation... "


    "Marite, bloodline adept, specializing in nt modifications. Mastered spells include Puppet Strings and Substitute of Wood... "


    "Evil Bugs, bloodline adept, specializing in bug-body modification. Mastered spells include Bug Maniption, Splitting Attack, and Damage Sharing... "


    "Phantom, elementium adept, specializing in illusions. Mastered spells include Realm of Dreams and Spell of Dream Departure... "


    "me Demon, elementium adept, specializing in fire magic. Mastered spells include me Fiend Transformation and Ring of Fire... "


    "Bloody Mary, bloodline adept, specializing in blood magic. Mastered spells include Bat Demon Transformation and Bloodsucking... "


    "Demon Shadows, elementium adept, specializing in curses... "


    Naturally, no one would reveal all their cards in such a situation. Thus, the introductions of their spells and magic were iplete. However, given that Adept Hyde had gathered everyone here, he most definitely had some kind of understanding as to everyone¡¯s abilities.


    Everyone kept silent and listened to Hyde describe his hunting n in detail!

 Chapter 211

    Chapter 211 The Target Enters the Web


    The battle in the woods raged on.


    Only now the battlefield had shifted fifteen kilometers away from the original hill.


    This was entirely a path of death paved with the corpses of voodoo beasts, leaving an indelible mark in the hearts of every witcher-knight that trod down this road.


    Neither party could sustain the battle at this point!


    On the side of the humans, less than two hundred witcher-knights had sessfully made it here from the hill, and each of them carried some injuries. The mental and physical stress they had to bear had reached the limit. Almost all of them were on the verge of breaking down.


    On the other hand, on the adepts¡¯ side, nearly thirty thousand voodoo beasts had been lost since the start of the battle. This was already the entirety of the voodoo beasts that the adepts had created in this past month!


    Even after paying the price of all their voodoo beasts, the only harvest the adepts gained was a bunch of dispensable witcher-knights. The only decent returns were the heads of some spellbreaker knights.


    The spellbreaker knight casualties were extremely heavy. Thirty-four of them had charged into the woods, but only fifteen were able to escape with the army. The rest had turned into piles of bones, or simr results at the hands of the adepts.


    However, the seven radiant knights that formed the higher-ups of the knights¡¯ army stood strong!


    Be it the continuous attacks of the voodoo beasts and ghouls, or the insidious ambushes of the adepts, nothing could shake the rock-hard defense of the radiant knights. Even the ck fog enveloping the woods had no effect other than causing them to cough a little blood and be slightly weakened.


    These radiant knights clearly possessed enviable resistance against this sort of terrifying virus that could destroy the bnce of runic energies in their bodies. It could also be that their bodies could bear this amount of damage, allowing them to keep on fighting with no impact on their strength.


    The spellbreaker knights and witcher-knights werepletely exhausted halfway through their escape.


    They stumbled after the shining forms of the radiant knights as their bodies revolted and struggled under the effects of the diseases. Under the effect of the ck fog, the remaining runic energies in their bodies rampaged everywhere, destroying their internal organs and causing them to cough up blood with every couple of steps they took.


    Purple and ck blood paste, filled with broken bodily organs!


    The spellbreaker knights had stronger bodies, and were thus able to maintain some modicum ofbat ability. However, they no longer dared to draw the strength of runic energy into their bodies. As a result, the runic swords in their hands once again became normal longswords, no longer possessing the keen sharpness they used to have.


    The witcher-knights, on the other hand, had lost all their ability to resist. They trudged painfully along like the sick and injured that they were, mindlessly trailing along with the formation. They had lost all ability to resist or fight, and could only rely on the protection of the spellbreaker knights and radiant knights!


    Perhaps the adepts realized this, as theymanded the voodoo beasts and ghouls not to kill the witcher-knights, but injure and wound them as grievously as possible without killing them, leaving the severely injured to remain in the formation.


    This undoubtedly slowed down the entire army.


    The seven radiant knights and fifteen spellbreaker knights had be the only protection for nearly two hundred witcher-knights.


    Every time the voodoo beasts surged forth inrge numbers, the seven radiant knights had to fight on the frontline with all their strength, using their tough bodies and destructive battle techniques to eliminate their enemies. The fifteen spellbreaker knights, on the other hand, stood guard around the witcher-knights, using their lonely figures and dim runic swords to hack at the enemy, slowly shaving away their numbers.


    One could say that this knights¡¯ army waspletely exhausted and had limitedbat ability after such a long battle.


    It was precisely because of this that the adepts didn¡¯t immediately refuse when Hyde made the suggestion to hunt the radiant knights. Instead, they saw the opportunity before them and became excited.


    ............


    The first wave of attacks were naturally led by the elementium adepts. In particr, Greem and Thunderbird were the most prominent ones.


    After all, fire magic was widely considered to be the most suited for ughter on the battlefield, even amongst all elementium magic. Thunderbird¡¯s lightning magic also had considerable use. However, lightning goes as quickly as it arrives. It was way inferior to fire magic when it came to prolonged damage.


    When Thunderbird and Greem started chanting in unison on top of a hill a half kilometer away from the knights, an apocalyptic scene once again appeared in the distant skies.


    Above, there were roiling and ming red clouds, while below you had violent and wild lightning storms.


    When repeated ming meteors dragged their ck smoke tails and crashed into the ground, the forest the knights were in had already been ravaged by violent lightning. Withered dead trees releasing ck smoke were everywhere.


    The radiant knights hastened the witcher-knights¡¯ escape from the area covered by the spell, while shing apart each and every falling meteor with all their strength. However, even with all their efforts, some red-hot meteors stillnded within the army.


    The outside of a meteor was a solid magma shell, while its core was made of liquidva and abundant fire elementium that went up to 3000¡ã Celsius. When they fell to the ground, besides forming a deep crater, the magma shell on the outside would shatter and shoot out in every direction along with the raging fire elementium and corrosiveva inside.


    Without the protection of their energy shields, even the spellbreaker knights would not be able to use their bodies to bear the might of such a terrifying heat wave andva rain. The witcher-knights? The moment they were engulfed by the meteor¡¯s impact was the moment they were fated to die. What¡¯s even more terrifying was the fact that no one could even find their corpses even after the attack was over and the hotva had cooled.


    Not just burnt to charcoal and reduced to ashes, but having what¡¯s left of their ashes trapped in the cooled magma. A true case of having nothing left to speak of their existence.


    Even though they only needed to run twenty or thirty meters to escape the area of effect, most of the witcher-knights were too exhausted and weak. They could only struggle within the sea of mes, howling in pain as they crawled forward, suffering until thest bit of their strength and life gave way.


    When they saw theirpanions howling in pain and stretching their arms for help, the few radiant knights and spellbreaker knights rushed into the sea of me with no regard for themselves. They grabbed theirpanions¡¯ bodies and threw them out of the me sea with all their strength.


    Yet at this moment, under the guidance of the adept, the burning clouds in the sky started to slowly move towards the area the witcher-knights were congregating in.


    Charles stared at everything happening before him with his eyes wide open. His ears were filled with the pained screams of witcher-knights before their deaths. He turned around in anger. He wanted to charge to the distance and y that ursed adept in one sh.


    However, at this moment, a tall silhouette stopped him.


    "You stay here and lead everyone out. I¡¯ll go!" Meusel grabbed his arm and shouted with a hoarse voice, before turning and striding into the woods.


    Half a kilometer of distance was nothing beneath the feet of an angered radiant knight.


    Just as the Meteor Shower hadpleted the middle phase and was transitioning into the explosive final phase, the angered Knight Meusel was already rapidly closing in on the caster¡¯s hill.


    Greem and Thunderbird were able to sense Meusel with their own means, even without a message form Adept Hyde. The two adepts didn¡¯t dare to look down upon an angered Second Grade Radiant Knight. The moment Meusel closed in on the hill, the two stopped their spells.


    Knight Meusel rushed to the top of the hill and stared at the two evil adepts cautiously looking at him. Instantly, he realized something.


    Perhaps because he considered this possibility before he came, Meusel had stopped his old friend ande here himself. Looking at the scene, Meusel knew that the scenario he feared most in his heart had finally turned into the reality he saw before him. Meusel was still unfazed. He calmly walked out of the dark forest.


    "Call all your allies out!" Meusel lightly waved his longsword as the hot mes once again engulfed the sword.


    Even though he waspletely exhausted, even though he was covered in burns everywhere, even though he was now surrounded by powerful enemies¨C when the runic energies once again surged through his body, the Radiant Knight Meusel stood tall with his sword before him, still possessing the strongly imposing aura that frightened all who looked upon him.


    However, this had absolutely no effect on the adepts, whose wills were so tough that they could hardly be affected by external factors. In a wave of cold cacklingughs, Evil Bugs, Hyde, Marite, and Mary appeared in the woods behind Meusel, surrounding him in a triangle formation.


    Phantom and Demon Shadows were nowhere to be seen.


    Their spells were mostly supportive in nature. Hiding in the darkness and casting their spells when they were most needed was much more threatening than appearing on the battlefield and assaulting the enemy head on.


    Even though the one they caught in their web was not the knights¡¯ leader that they had expected, it was still a Second Grade knight after all. No one dared to drop their guard. Instead, they immediately used their most ferocious attacks as they had nned on before this.


    Six adepts and six single-target spells instantly consumed Meusel¡¯s form.


    After the first wave of attacks had beenpleted, everyone quickly shifted positions, preparing their second wave of attacks as they did so.


    It was an utter fantasy to try and kill a Second Grade knight with a single wave of attacks, especially with the limited might of their attacks. Everyone was already prepared to grind the radiant knight to his death!


    As expected, a brutal me de shed forward, staying close to the ground and slicing right past Greem¡¯s side with millimeters to spare, before striking a row ofrge trees behind Greem and setting them on fire.


    The next second, Meusel charged out from the swirling elementium vortex with his energy shield in front of him.


    Adept Hyde sprinted forward in response to Meusel¡¯s charge.


    As the only mechanical adept (a branch of esoteric adepts), he had to be the meat shield when no body refining adepts were present.


    As the two quickly approached each other, Hyde¡¯s thick mechanical left arm started to vibrate slightly before a dome-shaped energy shield appeared in front of him. His mechanical right arm, on the other hand, suddenly started to rotate rapidly, turning into a deadly awl, shooting towards Meusel¡¯s chest.


    The skin on Hyde¡¯s back split apart silently, and six spinning round discs the size of a palm flew out from within, slicing towards his opponent¡¯s ribs from both sides of his body.


    Adept Hyde deserved to be called a mechanical adept specializing in close-quartersbat. It was just the start of the fight, and he already had aplete and continuous set of attacks.

 Chapter 212

    Chapter 212 Fish Bait


    Hyde¡¯s tricks were utterly useless before a Second Grade knight.


    Without even using his knight battle techniques, Meusel shattered the spinning des with simple shes before shing horizontally at the awl flying towards his chest.


    Oddly enough, the sharp awl shattered on contact. It instantly split into several dozen tiny spikes, shooting towards every part of Meusel¡¯s body.


    If it had been any other day, such a simple attack would not have even grazed Meusel.


    Today was not Meusel¡¯s day.


    Meusel roared and charged through the barrage with his sword before him. He rushed at Hyde and shed at his energy shield.


    With just a single heavy sh, the energy shield shattered and sted Hyde into the woods behind him.


    Meusel let out a muffled grunt as four bright red spots of blood appeared on his body. Those ursed spikes kept spinning even after they had dug into his flesh. Moreover, they kept letting out some sort of strange poison, numbing the flesh near the wounds.


    Meusel pped his chest heavily. Under the pressure of that violent force, the four spikes shot out of his body. Sticky white pus came out of Meusel¡¯s wounds along with the spikes, leaving a trace of a bitter almond smell in the air.


    Meusel performed a simple treatment for his wounds and prepared to charge over to kill that ursed adept. However, all of a sudden, something tugged at his legs, as a patch of thorny vines reached out from beneath the ground. There was a terrifying snake¡¯s head at the end of each vine, biting at the knee guards on his legs.


    Meusel raised his head, his gaze instantlynding on the adept near the edge of the forest whose actions closely resembled those of a wooden puppet. The adept was standing slightly right beside a tree. Both of his feet were buried under the earth, while his hands were plunged into the trunk of therge tree. One could vaguely hear the gurgling sounds of something being sucked.


    The surrounding adepts took advantage of the opportunity provided by Marite restricting the radiant knight, letting out their fiercest attacks without hesitation.


    Acteon, who was not far away, raised his right palm. A ck hole suddenly appeared on the middle of his pitch-ck palm as countless terrifying flying bugs buzzed and flew out from within, swarming towards the radiant knight. A dozen abnormal beetles with ck shells, green wings, and odd spots on their backs silently hid within the swarm of bugs.


    Mary did not charge forward recklessly when faced with a Second Grade radiant knight. Instead, she unfolded her wings and flew into the air, drawing her crimson longbow into a full moon, as the savage and ferocious blood energies instantly reached their peak.


    Schwing! A crisp crack rang out.


    The arrow left the bowstring!


    Meanwhile, above the air, a bright white lightning pir as thick as a bucket sted down. Its target was also the radiant knight who was stuck to the ground.


    Almost instantly, Marite had restrained the enemy and three adepts had let out ruthless attacks, plunging Meusel into a dangerous situation.


    Faced with simultaneous attacks from both the front and behind, Meusel raised high the runic sword in his hand. He waited for the energies in his body to gather to their limits before shouting and thrusting the sword deep into the ground.


    The next second, the murderous and unstoppable runic energies seeped into the ground and exploded!


    What kind of might did the all-out explosive attack of a Second Grade knight possess?


    Greem, who was standing fifty meters behind Meusel, instantly saw a patch of red through his elementium sight. All sorts of energy calctions projected by the chip rose exponentially, as ring warning rms rang continuously.


    However, these abstract calctions and data were insufficient to capture or describe even one ten-thousandth of what Greem was seeing before him.


    The ground was shattering. The forest was shaking. The entire sky turned a slight shade of crimson...


    Cracks as fine as spiderwebs quickly spread outwards through the ground, with the runic sword as the epicenter. The speed they spread at was obviously iparable to the few thick,rge, and wide cracks that struck fear into everyone¡¯s hearts. Numerous rming fissures with no bottom in sight quickly extended outwards in a haphazard fashion. Wherever it spread, therge trees copsed and the ground gave way, as gigantic dust pirs repeatedly sted into the sky!


    On the ground, a violent ring-shaped whirlwind had swept through the area, ttening everything on the ground like an invisible razor. Countless grass roots, dirt, and withered leaves were swept away by the whirlwind, sted into the woods nearby.


    There were no longer any trees, grass, or nts in a hundred meter radius around Meusel, just a bare patch ofnd. Even ayer of dirt had been blown off from the surface of the earth. A hundred meters away, countless towering ancient trees fell outwards in a ring, perfectly showing the world the terrifying energy contained within a Radiant Knight¡¯s fearful blow.


    No one¡¯s attack could break through that defensiveyer under such a destructive shockwave. It was only when the violent energy slowly started to dissipate that things could be seen.


    The tight formation they had formed around Meusel was now utterly scattered.


    The slender Mary was obviously not known for her strength and she was blown far away by the first wave of energy. She was nowhere to be seen.


    Acteon was not much better. He having trouble standing up and was forced to transform into his bugman form in order to anchor himself to the ground with his numerous pairs of arthropods. Even the flying bug minions he summoned had all been sliced and diced by the wind. Only the dozen carcass beetles struggled and gathered together, forming a shield of bugs and protecting him from the impact of the following force shockwave.


    One had to note that at that very moment, besides the violently flowing air waves, there were also countless force shards within the shockwave. Force shards that wereparable to sharp weapons hid within the tide-like energy waves and were sufficient to cut any being caught within them to pieces.


    Marite, who endured most of the force attacks head on was in an even worse condition. Not only had all the roots on his legs been severed, even his body that was exposed above ground had been riddled with cuts and holes. Just counting the visible wounds, there were three or four prating wounds that went right through his wooden body. The other, more minor wounds were even more numerous.


    Marite¡¯s life force instantly fell to its lowest after having received such severe injuries!


    Yet at the moment, the domineering Meusel had just drawn his sword from the ground. He stood straight with his muscr body, looking at the adepts¡¯ poor condition as a contemptuous smile appeared on his face.


    "You rats that only know how to hide and run, now I¡¯ll... ¡± Meusel¡¯s voice thundered like lightning. However, he couldn¡¯t finish his sentence. His expression suddenly changed as he coughed out purple, ck, and pungent blood from his mouth.


    The next moment, even his body started to shake a little.


    The adepts had good vision and instantly saw some things that resembled pieces of broken internal organs within the blood.


    "Kehkehkeh... " A cold and sinisterugh rang out from a distance, with a little metallic ring to it, "You knew that this patch of woods had been covered with terrifying viruses, and yet you still dared to draw runic energies so violently into your own body? As expected, the ignorant are the most courageous! Now you feel the bacsh from the energy, don¡¯t you? How about it? How many more attacks like the previous one can youunch? The more energy you draw upon here, the quicker you die. Kehkehkeh... in my opinion, you are better off lying down and waiting for your death!"


    Metal nged as a mechanical figure pushed aside the dust and branches on his body and rose from beneath the ground, striding towards Meusel, who was leaning on his sword.


    The remaining adepts had appeared nearby, one after another, tightly surrounding Meusel.


    "Do it!" With Hyde¡¯s loud shout everyone attacked, and another wave of relentless attacks devoured the knight¡¯s body.


    ............


    A kilometer away, Charles, who had just led everyone through the heavy siege and was currently resting in an area with few trees, suddenly stood up and gazed in the direction behind him.


    He felt a powerful and ravaging energy signature exploding there!


    Yet this signature was so familiar that it caused him put a name to it almost unconsciously.


    "Meusel!"


    With how powerful the Second Grade knights were, they would not usually use such a wasteful energy explosion. This type of energy st might appear to cover arge area, but in truth it consumed tremendous power to generate and was highly inefficient. It was far inferior in terms of lethality whenpared to the concentrated knight battle techniques!


    Only the spellbreaker knights that had barely mastered the utilization of energy favored this sort of grand knight battle technique. The radiant knights, on the other hand, knew that a me shockwave that covered an area of ten meters was far weaker than a simple yet concentrated sh.


    Meusel was a veteran radiant knight. There was no way he didn¡¯t understand this. Yet he stillmitted such an amateur mistake. This either meant that he was up against enemies that outnumbered him, or that he was no longer able to control the energies within his body!


    Regardless of which it was, it was obvious that he was in a dire situation!


    "You lead the army and continue forward. I¡¯ll go and bring Meusel back!" Before his wild shout had even dissipated, Charles had already disappeared.


    A strange pair of energy wings appeared behind Charles, giving him the ability to fly across short distances. Tall trees whistled past his body, the dense branches hitting his face and body as he flew by.


    He had already directed most of his energy to the wings and no longer had any additional strength to protect himself. Thus, he kept his eyes opened with all his strength, clumsily adjusting his speeding body and trying his best to avoid the trees. He no longer had any strength to avoid the dense branches and vines, and could only endure them with his tough body.


    A distance of a kilometer was quickly covered with the ability to fly.


    A short momentter, the barren battlefield appeared in his vision.


    Meusel crouched and shrunk his body on the half-copsed hill, trying his best to defend against the spells flying at him like a thunderous storm from all around him.


    Fire, lightning, blood arrows, wooden spikes, sharp awls...


    Terrifying spells of all variety rained down on Meusel¡¯s body. They were on the verge of riddling him with holes and turning him into a human strainer.


    Charles, who was watching all this happen before him, roared violently. His energy wings folded slightly, and instantly hended besides Meusel. He waved hisrge sword, and a terrifying force sted outwards, annihting all the attacks around him in a brilliant scarlet sword radiance.


    "Meusel, hang on, I¡¯ll... "


    Charles waved his longsword with one hand, shattering one spell after another that shot towards him, and grabbed Meusel with his other hand, trying to charge out of the battlefield.


    However, before he could finish his sentence, something sudden urred.

 Chapter 213

    Chapter 213 Courage


    Ever since he had charged into the battle, Charles had already prepared himself for all kinds of situations.


    He would never dare to look down upon the cunning of adepts.


    Unfortunately, what had happened now was beyond even his imagination.


    He... was attacked by Meusel!


    Meusel¡¯s eyes were wide open, but his gaze was not focused. Tears of blood streamed down from the corners of his eyes as an odd growl came from his throat. The bright radiance of energy shone from his hands as they plunged deep into Charles¡¯ waist. Some unknown substance was continuously being injected into Charles.


    Charles endured the intense pain and put his left hand over Meusel¡¯s chest. The dense light of concentrated energy quickly gathered on his hand. He just needed to expel the power and he would easily be able to shake off Meusel¡¯s attack.


    However, when he looked at Meusel¡¯s familiar face, and felt the weak heartbeat beneath his palm, Charles hesitated.


    This was an old friend he had known for over forty years after all!


    Even though he had been manipted by the evil adepts and became their aplice, his fire of life still hadn¡¯t been extinguished after all. If Charles actually blew him away with an energy st, Charles would probably personally extinguish Meusel¡¯sst flickers of life with how weak he already was.


    Tears couldn¡¯t help but flow down Charles elderly face when he thought of this. His palm pressed against the chest of his old friend and started to shake!


    Meusel had probably lost a long time ago. The scene of the adepts surrounding and attacking him earlier was probably an act they put up in advance. All of it, every single bit of it, was just to draw him in!


    It was only now that Charles saw everything clearly.


    The feet of his old friend Meusel had been pierced by a patch of wooden thorns and spikes and fixed to the ground, while seven or eight strange translucent threads rising from the ground had pierced multiple parts of Meusel¡¯s body. This was most probably the reason for Meusel¡¯s loss of control over his own actions!


    Moreover, several unknown substances were continuously entering Charles¡¯ body with Meusel¡¯s hands as the funnel. Some of these were microorganisms, wildly devouring his flesh and organs, while others were unknown curse halos, unceasingly exploding within him and quickly weakening his body and mind.


    Besides all this, the evil adepts around the battlefield were not holding back at all. One after another, powerful spells fell upon him like raindrops with no regards for Meusel, their ¡®ally¡¯.


    In his one moment of hesitation, the downpour of spells had already flooded him and Meusel.


    The violent elementium explosions and the mad and chaotic elementium tides erupted without end in that one small area, turning the entire ce into hell on earth. Even a Second Grade radiant knight could not endure elementium corrosion of such power!


    As Knight Charles let out a pained roar that shook the forest, and charged out of the energy storm vortex like a mad tiger, the only thing he still adamantly held onto in his left hand was Meusel¡¯s broken body.


    Indeed, after that wave of ferocious attacks, the radiant knight Meusel, who was already on the brink of his death, reached the end of his life. His heart had stopped. Meusel¡¯s body, having lost the protection of his energy shield, was riddled with holes and corroded everywhere by the violent elementium tide, depriving him of his human shape.


    Not just Meusel, even Knight Charles was in a terrible condition currently!


    His left eye had been sted away and blood surged out from therge, bloody, and gaping hole that was left. His body looked like it had just been dragged out from a mincer. Deep and terrifying wounds could be found all over his body.


    The moment he charged out of the energy vortex, he let go of his runic longsword and stabbed his right arm into his own waist. Bam! The sound of a muffled explosion rang out, as a small energy explosion released within his own body. Purple and ck blood flew everywhere, along with shattered and shredded meat.


    When Charles drew his bloody hand out from the gaping wound on his waist, he was holding between his fingers a strange beetle that screeched incessantly.


    Even though the strange bug had been temporarily stunned by Charles¡¯ energy explosion, the moment it left Charles¡¯ body, it immediately started to move again. It screeched continuously while biting at Charles¡¯ hand.


    Charles let out a battlecry and tightened his grip. The strange beetle was finally unable to endure the strength of a Second Grade knight, instantly crushed into a pool of blood.


    Deep in the forest, Evil Bugs Acteon suddenly let out a muffled grunt as the strange beetle died.


    It was clear that the death of this carcass beetlerva had also inflicted some bacsh on him.


    The sudden show of strength from Charles had also made the wounds on his body even more unbearable. The flesh on his ribs had almost been sted away by the energy that exploded in his body earlier. He stumbled about for a bit before finally falling to his knees.


    The severe injuries on his body, along with the bothersome curses in his body had turned into the straw that broke the camel¡¯s back. The bacsh from drawingrge amounts of runic energy into himself, along with the squeezing of his body¡¯s potential during his daily trainings, had finally caused him to be unable to suppress his internal injuries.


    He kneeled on the ground, but the world before him was still spinning unceasingly. He could feel the pain from all over his body, the wounds throbbing and hurting, slowly washing away thest remnants of his consciousness.


    "You evil... a...depts... " Charles cracked lips moved slightly, as if he wanted to use thest of his strength to curse at his enemies. Sadly, his broken body didn¡¯t let him continue.


    Charles dropped to the ground, fainting just like that.


    One had to admit that the bodies of the Second Grade radiant knights that had been engulfed in runic energies for long periods of time had most definitely reached supernatural standards. His body was so broken that he would hardly be recognized as a human, and not much flesh was left on his abdomen. Most of his organs had been crushed to mincemeat. Yet, even with such horrendous wounds on his body, he was still alive.


    It was clear how strong the Second Grade Radiant Knights were!


    However, with such severe injuries, his broken body had long lost its self-regenerative properties. Even if the adepts were to stop attacking, he would eventually reach the end of his life.


    Numerous adepts gathered around Charles. After quickly examining his condition, they burst into a passionate discussion.


    At this point of the battle, the harvest of two radiant knights was already extremely satisfying for the adepts. Moreover, the knights¡¯ leader was among the two. This was an important figure that was hard toe by. Moreover, messengers from the frontline had reached the base, and the witcher-knights at the edge of the forest were quickly mobilizing inrge numbers, rapidly closing in on this location.


    Having gone through an entire night of intense battles, the adepts were more than willing to retreat.


    This arduous battle of one day and one night had caused the witcher-knights to suffer heavy losses, losing nearly two-thirds of their forces. However, the casualties on the adepts¡¯ side was no small deal either. The voodoo beast army that they had taken great pains to construct had beenpletely exhausted, and even one adept had died in battle. If it wasn¡¯t for them obtaining a force of elite ghouls, along with their capturing of two radiant knights, this battle could be said to have drained away the foundation of their strength!


    As a result, the adepts could onlymand the remaining voodoo beasts to retreat when they saw therge number of witcher-knight elites swarm into the forest.


    The surge of reinforcements gathered with the remnants of the army at a mountain pass ten kilometers deep in the woods.


    When he rode his magic colt into this patch of the woods, Windsor was shocked by the tragic scene before him.


    Once, the mighty witcher-knights were the greatest pride of this world.


    Every time there was news of heretics on the rampage somewhere, this group of proud knights would jump onto their magic colts and rush to y the enemy. It could be said that wherever they went, evil would be vanquished and darkness would be exterminated! It was their generosity, passion, and willingness to serve that allowed this ne to be prosperous.


    Even during the two Heretic Wars in history, most of the records contained praises of the witcher-knights¡¯ valiant deeds and heroic actions, smiting evil wherever they went. Perhaps those heretics may have been able to rampage for a short while, but the moment the proud knights found them, they would crumble like dolls made of y and the world would be bright and peaceful once more.


    However, the scene before him shook Windsor to his very core.


    Deep in the dim forest, the witcher-knights that had disposed of their armor were strewn all across the battlefield, with the terrifying bite marks of voodoo beasts left on their bodies and on their faces. Their gazes were empty and dull. They leaned against each other for support as they stumbled about. Even when they saw theirpanions arrive for reinforcement, no joy or surprise showed on their faces.


    If it hadn¡¯t been for the slight rising and falling of their chests, Windsor would have thought that this was a group of stone figures crafted from y and blood.


    Finally, when a familiar face stained with mud and blood appeared before Windsor, he couldn¡¯t help but halt his magic colt.


    "Jos¨¦! What kind of attack happened to you lot? How did you suffer such heavy losses after only a single day? Where is Charles?"


    A series of questions were thrown at him, but the radiant knight named Jos¨¦ could only give a weak response.


    "All gone... all gone... " Jos¨¦ mumbled, "They are all gone."


    When they heard his tragic and pained cry, the remnants of the army, so exhausted that they had lost their emotional restraint, finally started crying.


    A sorrowfully heartbroken and tragic atmosphere filled the woods. The reinforcements couldn¡¯t help but shed tears for theirpanions!


    Too cruel! Absolutely too cruel!


    This witcher-knight army numbered one thousand men when it first entered the forest a day ago! But now, after scouring the entire mountain pass and even counting the radiant knights and spellbreaker knights, only a mere hundred and seventy-two men were left.


    Moreover, the knights that were fortunate enough to survive all carried severe injuries and were both physically and mentally exhausted. Their emotions and spirits were in their most terrible state. Windsor could no longer see any of the witcher-knights¡¯ pride and glory on them.


    Not just the normal witcher-knights, even the few powerful radiant knights were all currently in a deplorable condition. They had ghastlyplexions and gaunt faces. The severity of both their internal and external injuries were shocking!


    Windsor gazed into the dark woods in the distance. With his brilliant sense for war, he could feel the existence of the enemies! If it had been in the past, he would most definitely have led his subordinates into the darkness to start a ughter, revitalizing the spirits and passion of hispanions with the blood of his enemies.


    But now, the dark woods had be more terrifying than ever before! Even he, a Second Grade radiant knight, couldn¡¯t help but feel fear.


    Perhaps waiting for a new wave of reinforcements before continuing the search was the right n?


    He thought so silently.


    For the first time, Windsor lost his courage.

 Chapter 214

    Chapter 214 Dragon Valley


    Dragon Cliff.


    This was a taboo name for all the humans living on the knights¡¯ continent.


    There were still plenty of bards and poets spreading grand stories of Dragon Cliff¡¯s beauty in inns and bars of all sizes across the continent. However, the existence of Dragon Cliff remained as stories for most people. Rarely had people ever truly seen the ce for themselves.


    It was rumored that it was the ce the dragons lived in. It was rumored that endless wealth was hoarded there. It was believed to be the graveyard of many arrogant individuals that dared to challenge the dragons in hopes of bing dragon knights.


    But where was the Dragon Cliff? No one knew!


    This was a silent valley in a vast mountain range.


    This mountain range stretched for long distances in all directions. Arge forest grew atop the mountains, covering an area of nearly five hundred kilometers. Here, mountain peaks that pierced the clouds and dizzying cliffs were everywhere.


    Moreover, due to the dense foliage and numerous wild beasts in the woods, this had be a dangerous ce that no man dared set foot on. A true no-man¡¯snd.


    Right in the center of this beautiful and silent valley, a tall cliff stood amidst the clouds. This was the legendary and elusive Dragon Cliff.


    It was the time of afternoon where the sun was at its brightest. The great green dragon Aufreyr, who had just had his lunch at the outer rim of the forest, beat hisrge webbed wings and cruised about the Dragon Valley before finallynding near a smallke.


    Some bulls, gazelles, zebras, and other herbivores were drinking water from theke when they were frightened away by his presence. They ran far away before turning back and looking at this uninvited green dragon with cautious eyes. It was only until they realized he had already fed that they were able to rx.


    Aufreyr crouched by theke and drank his fill ofke water before contentedly folding his wings and strolling through the grasnd by theke.


    The weather was so perfect that he couldn¡¯t help but want to take a good nap.


    However, as the guard of Dragon Valley, his duty was to watch the entrance of the valley to prevent any outsiders from entering. Thus, he could only let out a frustrated snort and blew out a cloud of light green mist from his snout. It was only then that he managed to dispel that strong desire to sleep.


    All of a sudden, Aufreyr straightened his body, raised his snout, and started to sniff.


    He had detected an odd aura amidst the natural fragrance of the grass and flowers here. An aura that did not belong to Dragon Valley.


    It was a human! Moreover, it was a human he knew!


    Aufreyr¡¯s thick and strong hind legs gave a good kick to the ground and his heavy body shot upwards. Under the powerful beating of his wings he left the ground with some difficulty, flying towards the direction of the valley¡¯s entrance.


    Dragons¡¯ bodies were far toorge, such that it was slightly difficult for them to take flight from the ground. As a result, most of them liked to build their dens near the top of cliffs, where outsiders found it difficult to approach. From that height, their vision was unobscured, making it extremely convenient for them to tackle enemies from above.


    Aufreyr flew across the grasnd of nearly ten kilometers and saw a familiar shape by the entrance of Dragon Valley.


    This was a tall and burly human.


    Golden hair that reached the shoulders, golden circlet, golden armor, golden armband, golden bracer, and golden boots. This human radiated the debauchery and vulgarity of the newly rich from the top of his body to the very bottom. Golden radiance shone from every essory and bit of apparel on his body, making it hard to look at him directly.


    However, it was such a vulgar human as this that radiated a powerful strength that was unmatched by most mortals. Even when the green dragon Aufreyr, with his body that was asrge as a small hill, dove down at him while letting out a loud dragon¡¯s roar, he had no intention to dodge. Instead, he opened his arms and walked forward.


    With a muffled thud, therge green dragon gracefullynded on the ground, forming arge crater one meter deep and three meters wide into the green grasnd before warmly embracing the human.


    In truth, the so called ¡®embrace¡¯ was just the green dragon lowering his head before the human and allowing him to hug it.


    "Willis, since when did you have the time toe to Dragon Valley? Is that human king finally willing to let you go?" The green dragon tried his best to lower his voice, but when he spoke, the air around him still shook and quaked.


    "It¡¯s a long story, Aufreyr! I¡¯ll tell you when we have the time. I wish to see n Leader Raistlin now. Please ry this message to him!"


    "Uh... " The green dragon hesitated, "Willis, the n leader has been extremely angry ever since you guys sent back Rissana in that condition. The few elders in the n are trying their best to save Rissana now. I fear... "


    "Aufreyr, I am also a member of Dragon Valley. Did the n leader expressly forbid me from entering?" Willis questioned loudly. When he was angered, even a Third Grade green dragon could not endure the mighty and dominating power he radiated as a Fourth Grade Holy Knight.


    "He did not!" An awkward expression appeared on the green dragon¡¯s long face as he spoke, "Very well, I¡¯ll give it a try! As for whether the n leader will see you, that¡¯s something I cannot guarantee!"


    Having finished speaking, Aufreyr turned hisrge body around and opened his mouth, letting out a long and loud dragon¡¯s roar that had a certain cadence to it at the tall Dragon Cliff thirty kilometers away.


    After a short moment, an even louder dragon¡¯s roar rang back from the tall Dragon Cliff.


    "Well, the n leader has agreed to see you! Come with me!"


    The green dragon took to the sky once more, with as much difficulty as before, sending powerful gusts in all directions that blew away the dust nearby. Willis, the Fourth Grade holy knight covered in his golden armor, also pounded his chest. In the midst of strange contortions and expansions, he rapidly transformed into a green dragon that was far more magnificent than Aufreyr.


    The two green dragons roared and flew towards Dragon Cliff standing in the distance.


    Aspared to the vast stretch of forest outside the valley, there weren¡¯t many tall and ancient trees in the valley. There were onlyrge patches of green grasnd here, with sparsekes adorning the green like stars in the night sky, giving this ce a mysterious beauty as if it did not belong to this realm.


    As the dragons flew closer, the tall and towering Dragon Cliff finally revealed its true appearance.


    This was a tall cliff that took up an area of over four square kilometers. Numerous dark and dim caves dotted the steep walls of the cliff. Many green dragons stretched their slender and ferocious heads out of their caves when they sensed Willis¡¯ arrival, letting out dragon roars to greet him.


    The transformed green dragon Willis responded in kind, with a loud and clear dragon¡¯s roar.


    For one moment, the deafening roar of dragons filled the entire Dragon Cliff, making the ce exceptionally lively.


    On a patch of grasnd at the bottom of the cliff, a group of green dragon whelps that were only three to five meters long were ying by a clearke. They beat their small and tender wings, asionally flying into the sky with much difficulty before crashing face first into theke. Some whelps were yfully chasing after a few herbivores, scaring them and sending them running in all directions.


    It was obvious that these whelps had yet to master their dragon breath. There would always be some clumsy ones that flew too low to the ground and failed to fold their wings in time. They would crash into the ground, before crouching and crying in pain.


    Whenever this happened, one or two of the green dragon parents would fly out of their caves, diving down and skillfully piercing the body of a herbivore with their sharp ws before tossing it to their whelps¡¯ side.


    Then a group of whelps would surge forward, breathing out poison mists or spitting green saliva on the prey to kill it. They would leap forward joyfully when the prey had finally sumbed to the poison, and use their fine fangs that had just grown out to bite the flesh on the prey¡¯s body.


    It was such a bloody and cruel scene. Yet in the eyes of Willis, a green dragon himself, it all seemed so warm and sweet. As a half-dragon, the blood that flowed in his body was the blood of dragons!


    The ce the green dragons¡¯ n leader Raistlin met Willis was the meeting hall.


    This wide hall located in the middle of the tall cliff, at its very heart, wasrge enough to host twenty or thirty dragons at once. With the exception of the Dragon¡¯s Altar at the top of the cliff, it was the most sacred ce of Dragon Cliff. Raistlin would only gather the dragons here to talk when they faced a difficult decision.


    Thus, when Willis transformed back into a human and walked into the meeting hall, a bad feeling had already risen in his heart.


    There were three dragons waiting for him here.


    Green Dragon n leader Raistlin and green dragon n elder Singe and Phantim!


    They all had the terrifying prowess of Fourth Grade beings.


    "I wee you, my child." Raistlin¡¯s loud voice boomed throughout the hall and caused the walls to tremor, "I hope you bring us good news this time!"


    "I wonder what kind of good news father wants?" Willis asked gravely.


    "We smelled the evil aura of adepts on Rissana, whom you sent back. I hope your visit this time has nothing to do with them!" Raistlin lowered his body and put his imposing head before the two meter tall Willis. Hisrge amber eyes stared unblinkingly at Willis.


    "Oh great father, I may have brought news that you do not wish to hear!" Pain appeared on Willis¡¯ face as he spoke, "The king of the humans asked me to bring you a message. He wishes for the powerful Dragon Cliff to send green dragons to reinforce the frontlines, on the goodwill of all the past annual offerings the humans have provided us. It is said that the battle there is going terribly. The adepts hide in Greend Forest and bring about terrible deaths and losses to the witcher-knights!"


    "What is your stand then?" Not a single emotion was betrayed on Raistlin¡¯s ferocious face, "Tell me, my child!"


    "I... " The struggle was bing increasingly obvious on Willis¡¯ face, "Naturally, I do not wish the mes of world war to spread to Dragon Valley. Neither do I wish to see my brothers and sisters fall under the butcher¡¯s knife of the adepts. However... given that the adepts have already arrived, should we not stand out and defend our own ranch? After all, this is our territory. Our territory that we have managed for over a thousand years!"

 Chapter 215

    Chapter 215 Preparing for Battle


    Raistlin exchanged looks with the other two green dragons before speaking in his booming voice once more.


    "You disappoint me, my child! After all, as a half-dragon with a sheltered upbringing, you have never experienced the bloody and savage ne war! Did you think you could rule over everything else in this ne with the Fourth Grade you achieved through your dragon blood? Wrong. You are wrong."


    Raistlin straightened his body and roared in anger.


    "Fourth Grade is nothing! A Fourth Grade being can only barely qualify as a proper recruit in a ne world! Who are the ones invading this time? Adepts! The evil adepts!


    "I¡¯m sure you have heard of the cruelty and savagery of the adepts! And given that to be the case, do you think we should still enter this war for the sake of some meager human offerings? When the evil adepts have already cast their gaze on this unfortunate ne?"


    Willis¡¯ face was one full of pain and struggle when faced with questions of the green dragon n leader Raistlin, his father.


    "But... but father, the invading adepts this time are extremely weak. If we gather all of the dragons in Dragon Valley, we can still chase them out of this ne!"


    "Haha... my child, you are too naive! You have spent too much time on this peaceful and warm material ne, so much time that your thought process is confined within the narrow perspective of those pathetic humans. So what if you fight off this wave of adepts? The adept n invading this time might just be a small force. However, if they fail in their invasion, they would most definitely sell the coordinates of our ne to other forces and organizations. Then an even more powerful adept force will be the one to invade this world.


    "We, the dragons, have already dealt with the evil adepts in countless other ne worlds. Their greed and cruelty is rarely seen even amongst the few powerfulrge nes. If we had sufficient prowess, we could naturally keep them outside of our territory once and for all. But we do not! We are only Green Dragons, an insignificant branch of the Emerald Dragons of the Dragon¡¯s ne


    "Even if we mobilize the strength of the entire n and force a stalemate, it still wouldn¡¯t be any good. The breeding and development of a dragon is counted in thousands of years. A new batch of adepts will invade before our new members have evene of age!


    "When this world¡¯s coordinates were exposed before the evil adepts, its fate had already been determined!"


    Willis closed his eyes in agony.


    As the offspring of green dragon n leader Raistlin and a native human girl, Willis had the mixed bloodline of human and dragon. On one hand, he was a citizen of Dragon Valley; on the other, he was the highest authority of all witcher-knights in the human¡¯s kingdom and the most reliable right arm of the human king.


    Now he came here bearing the trust and faith of the king, yet he could not convince his conservative and stubborn father. The pain he felt in his heart, as someone split between two factions he loved dearly, was indescribable.


    "Father, I know you have no attachment or feelings for those humans. However, your son has travelled hundreds of kilometers to ask of you just this one request! Are you willing to let him go back with empty hands? Please, I beg of you, save the humans and the lives on this ne!"


    Raistlin was obviously put in a difficult position when confronted with Willis¡¯ emotional appeal. He turned around and argued loudly with the two n elders. The atmosphere was tense.


    Finally, Raistlin turned around once more and roared loudly at Willis, "I respect your decision. If you wish to fight for the humans, you may leave. If any dragons in Dragon Valley wish to follow you, I will not stop them. Remember, the doors of Dragon Valley will always be open for you. I¡¯ll wee you back with open arms any time you are tired, my child!


    "You can leave now!"


    Willis nodded in anguish when he heard his father and n leader¡¯s words, before turning and leaving the meeting hall.


    A short momentter, Willis¡¯ impassioned war deration rang out from above the skies of the tall Dragon Cliff.


    For a moment, the dragons raised amotion as they roared in reply.


    Half a dayter, three green dragons trailed behind Willis as he dashed across the sky


    and disappeared at the horizon¡¯s edge.


    Green Dragon n leader Raistlin, who had transformed into a human with Ultimate Transfiguration, stood at therge cave entrance of the meeting hall. He gazed at the silhouettes of the disappearing dragons and spoke softly.


    "Singe, did we make the right decision?"


    Fourth Grade green dragon elder Singe walked to his side. His massive dragon eyes were steeped in age and glowed with the light of wisdom.


    "I¡¯ve tried my best countless times to divine the future. The leader of the invading adepts is a terrifying Sixth Grade Great Adept. It is virtually impossible to defy him with the power of our n. Even if we tried our very best, the most we could do is dy the fall of this ne by one or two hundred years. Such a result is meaningless for us green dragons!


    "Unless you are able to ask for reinforcements from our progenitors¨Cthe Emerald Dragons¨Cwe cannot do anything by ourselves. We will only be defeated along with this ne.


    "I am only referring to the future vision I¡¯ve seen through the Dragon Altar. This is only the image that has urred the most among the myriad possible futures. As for what is to be done, that is up to you, the n leader, to decide! After all, the fates of all forty n members in the Dragon Valley lie solely on your shoulders!"


    Raistlin gazed into the distance, the light in his eyes dimming and growing faint.


    ............


    It had been thirteen days since thest great battle.


    The witcher-knights that retreated from the forest gave their base up, redirecting their army to the outskirts of Blue Hillock City.


    The conclusion of this bloody battle also gave relief to the adepts.


    They took advantage of this rare resting opportunity and swarmed into the depths of the woods, massacring the animals and creating new voodoo beasts en masse. Some adepts with unique tricks up their sleeves were also sent to Blue Hillock City, relentlessly harassing the knights¡¯ base.


    Greem took this opportunity to hide in his undergroundb, conducting all sorts of research in secret.


    Just a few days earlier, the third batch of reinforcements arrived.


    This time, only two adepts came.


    One male and one female. However, they were two Third Grade Adepts!


    Their arrival instantly filled the entire adepts¡¯ base with confidence.


    The very next day, the construction of the tower resumed again after its lengthy dy.


    At this point, a simple illusion barrier was no longer able to hide the existence of the war tower. If the opponent sent out any more dragon knights, they would be able to clearly see the tall tower the moment they entered Greend Forest.


    The two Third Grade adepts stayed in the camp to slowly get used to the change in narws, while the remaining adepts were busy with their own things. Greem had also sessfully obtained the information he needed from Adept Hyde.


    A hitlist.


    A list filled with the names of the rune grandmasters on the knights¡¯ ne!


    Sadly, almost all of the rune grandmasters were located near the capital of the knights¡¯ kingdom and were under heavy protection. Thus, if Greem wanted to get his hands on the profound knowledge on merging runic and life energy, there was no avoiding a long trip to the capital!


    And with the current situation, it was impractical to leave the adepts¡¯ base to go on a trip in the human¡¯s world.


    At least until the end of the next battle, Greem could not leave the adepts¡¯ base.


    The battle in the woodsst time had caused tremendous damage to the witcher-knights. However, with the fifteen days of rest and recuperation they received, fresh blood from all over the continent had been able to arrive one after another, replenishing the numbers of the army outside Blue Hillock City. The number of witcher-knights had reached a historic five thousand men!


    The storm of war started to brew once more over the edge of Greend Forest.


    The higher-ups in the knights used high and extravagant rewards to attract bounty hunters, adventurers, mercenaries, and even rogues and thieves of all kinds. Greend Forest was almost akin to an exceptionally lively market because of this. Every day, countless small squads of human adventurers wove their way through the woods, ying a game of cat and mouse with the evil adepts and their terrifying voodoo beasts and ghouls.


    Even though most of the squads never returned, as they were turned into materials for the adepts to create more voodoo beasts, there were one or two fortunate squads. The knightmanders pieced together the bits and pieces of information they brought back, and finally managed to get a basic understanding of the forest¡¯s interior.


    The adepts¡¯ tower in particr was extremely conspicuous and was hard to conceal from the scouts. All the higher-ups were alerted to its existence and it became a thorn in their hearts, a concern that made them lose sleep night after night. If it wasn¡¯t for the fact that the powerhouses of the knights¡¯ army had yet to arrive, a new battle might have already started.


    It was in such a tense situation that Greem excavated an underground pce of his own in a spot three and a half kilometers away from the base.


    Using therge number of y golems and alligator hunters under hismand, Greem dug a small underground pce fifteen meters underground, turning it into his personalboratory and spending every day in there.


    There were over twenty rooms in the underground pce, and important magic experiments were being conducted in every one of them.


    Four or five glowstones were ced on the dim and wet stone walls of the corridors. They let out a dim light-green radiance, barely enough to make the surrounding area visible.


    Greem appeared in the corridor, still engulfed in a thick and heavy robe. After a slight hesitation, he turned and entered the first stone room on the left.


    A massive ice pir was ced on the stone pedestal in the middle of the empty stone room. There was nothing else besides that. However, just this massive ice pir alone was obviously nomon object. Its mere existence caused the temperature of the stone room to drop to a shocking -157¡ãC.


    Snow and ice crystals covered the entire room. Even the floorboards, the ceiling, and the walls were entirely covered under ayer of bright blue ice. If these walls hadn¡¯t been reinforced and protected by magic arrays, Greem was sure that the chill would spread out of the room, turning the entire underground pce into a world of snow and ice.


    The only thing Greem could do in the stone room was stand before the ice pir and use his own elementium fire to continuously roast the ice pir. Then he would close his eyes and sense and feel the traces of narw released from the pir as the ice melted.


    Indeed, this ice pir was the product left behind in the fight between Second Grade Adept Sir F¨¹gen and the Second Grade Radiant Knight. Sir F¨¹gen had conjured the power of the narws to freeze the enemy within to capture him alive. For that reason, the remains of this ice pir were also a manifestation of narw of ice fragments.


    If Greem hadn¡¯t used his fire against it, this force of ice and snow would automatically absorb water elementium from its surroundings to maintain its existence. It would probably be at least one or two months before it would melt on its own. In this period, any living being that dared to touch the pir would have to endure chill damage as high as thirty degrees.


    This was almost as much as the all out attack of an advanced apprentice!


    It was clear how powerful Second Grade adepts were. Just a simple spell casually cast would have such terrifying might. Thus, Greem needed to slowly sense the intricacies of the narw powers within the ice pir to find the innate difference between First and Second Grade adepts!

 Chapter 216

    Chapter 216 Underground Maze


    Greem was finally able to melt away a thinyer of ice on the ice pir after fifteen minutes.


    He was doing the burning, but the one performing a detailed analysis of the ice pir¡¯s contents was the chip.


    After all, the chip was tens or even hundreds of times better than him at data collection and analysis. Moreover, this was only because the chip had been restricted by the limits of his Spirit. The chip¡¯s ability would continue to improve and expand as his Spirit slowly increased.


    Thus, Greem gave up onparing himself with the chip and focused on melting the ice pir bit by bit. Then he focused on analysing the contents of the ice crystals, the peculiarities of the arrangement of spirit elementium, as well as the forms created by thebination of the spirit elementium with the material elementium.


    Greem could feel the existence of spirit elementium everywhere inside the ice pir.


    From his past understanding, material objects were material objects, while elementium were elementium and Spirit was Spirit. All three were distinct units with different forms of existence, different characteristics, and different ways of functioning. However, after the analysis of the ice pir before him, Greem was shocked to find that his past understanding and distinction of these substances had been shattered.


    These three didn¡¯t seem to be independent units that could never assimte or merge!


    In Greem¡¯s understanding, material objects were visible, tangible objects that existed in the physical world. From anything as small as dirt, firewood, rivers, to something as big askes, seas, mountains, or entire continents. These were all parts of the material world, and were objects that could be sensed with human senses. Thus, material objects were the foundation of the material world!


    The Earth in his previous life was simr in this regard with the alternate world he was currently in.


    On the other hand, elementium was a mysterious substance that was invisible and intangible. It existed everywhere in the entire universe, like a boundlessly vast sea, engulfing the entire multiverse.


    From the perspective of the multiverse, all elementium was at a perfect bnce. However, if one were to just observe from a limited area, elementium behaved like tides, ebbing and flowing. They varied in quantity and density, never quite the same in different parts of the multiverse.


    In truth, the multi-faceted portrayals and features of the material nes had a very direct connection to the density of elementium particles in the area they existed in.


    Earth differed entirely from this alternate world in this aspect.


    Many mysterious and amazing ancient myths and legends about gods and deities existed back on Earth. Those ancient gods and deities seemed like they were omnipotent, capable of ravaging seas and iming the skies. However, in the Earth Greem used to live, no one had such amazing ability.


    If Greem had remained in the past, he might have only thought of these ancient stories as fantasies and dreams of people in the past. However, he no longer thought so!


    It was very likely that Earth in the past was a world filled with elementium energy that allowed the people of that time to possess the chance of oveing their weak physical bodies to master and manipte great power. However, with the ebbing of the elementium tide, the elementium energy on Earth started to fade once more. Humans were once again cast back to their mundane selves, forced to abandon arcanology and go back to the path of technology.


    Thus elementium, this mysterious substance, was the true reason behind changes in material nes!


    But what exactly was elementium?


    Normal humans had no way of observing elementium particles with the naked eye. Even if you spent every day soaked in elementium particles, and countless particles entered and exited your body with every breath you took, you still wouldn¡¯t have the means to sense and verify their existence.


    The only way humans could make contact with elementium particles was through meditation. By doing so, they used their Spirit as a bridge, allowing their tangible physical bodies to contact the intangible elementium particles.


    It was precisely because of the existence of elementium particles that Spirit became a source of power!


    Normal humans could stare all they wanted or move about all they wanted, but nothing they did would cause a change in the world. Their weak and feeble strength was insufficient to do anything to an entire material world. However, when a Great Adept just stared or stomped even once, the elementium directed by his Spirit would form into a force that could shake and challenge narws, change the colors of the sky, and shift the paths of mighty rivers.


    In the past, Greem had very clear distinctions for the three, and came up with detailed lines and traits that distinguished each of them. However, when he vaguely sensed the existence of Spirit elementium in the ice pir, the knowledge construct he had created in the past unavoidably started to fall apart.


    He was fortunate that he was able to sessfully transform his body into elementium when he was still an apprentice adept with the help of the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter. This caused his mastery over fire elementium particles to be even more skillful and practiced, allowing him to ultimately be an adept and rapidly improve into a powerful fire adept.


    Many books mentioned the term ¡®Spirit elementiumization¡¯ in their discussions of future advancement for adepts. However, none of them mentioned anything on how Spirit elementiumization was supposed to be done. At one point, Greem had suspected that this was the doing of the adept ns. By cutting off ess to such knowledge, the ns would be able to use it as a means to attract talent to serve them.


    The only way First Grade adepts could hope to improve was to join ns with ancient adept legacies and obtain this missing knowledge from them. Otherwise, the only other path left to them was to waste year after year slowly exploring the endless darkness, trying to find a path forward.


    Even though adepts had extremely long lifespans rtive to mortals, their lives were still limited whenpared to the infinite and endless pursuit of arcane knowledge!


    Supposedly, given that Greem had only advanced to an elementium adept, he would probably have to waste the first hundred years onpleting and reinforcing the elementiumization of his body. It was only one hundred yearster that he would be able to start exploring the issue of the elementiumization of his Spirit. However, he had miraculouslypleted his body¡¯s conversion and was already starting to worry about the elementiumization of Spirit a hundred years early.


    Greem would naturally expend all his efforts to explore and research when he got ahold of such a rare chance to examine Spirit elementium.


    Greem¡¯spatible attribute was with fire elementium particles, while thepatible attribute of Second Grade Adept Sir F¨¹gen was clearly the mutated ice elementium. The massive difference in both of their attributes caused Greem to clearly feel the bacsh of the ne¡¯sws of ice when he extended his Spirit, and probed into the spirit elementium released by the ice pir after it had been melted.


    When he held the ice pir with both hands and slowly burned it, an icy force that chilled him to the bones also started to pass through his Spirit connection and started to manifest on his body. When Greem finally let go of the ice pir and concluded today¡¯s research, his legs had already been frozen to the ground. If he even moved a little, countless ice crystals would fall from his body.


    Disregarding these external effects, even his Spirit had be visibly slower and weaker. This was clearly the effect of the chill¡¯s suppression on his talent for fire.


    This was only the remnants of a spell cast by a Second Grade ice adept, yet it could already obviously suppress his talent for fire. If the opponent that Sir F¨¹gen had fought then wasn¡¯t a Second Grade knight, but him instead, then Greem would probably have been frozen into an icicle before he could even cast a spell!


    First Grade elementium adepts were only using their bodies to sense elementium particles and guiding them with their Spirit. What about Second Grade elementium adepts? What was the form of their spells and how did they cast them?


    For Greem, these questions were mysteries with almost no solution!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a long sigh, "I really wish I could dissect a Second Grade adept right now!"


    Almost immediately after he had spoken, he shut his mouth and looked around. It was only after Greem realized that he was in the underground maze that he dug himself that he finally let out a sigh of relief. At the same time, he silently reminded himself that watching their speech was the only way the weak could protect themselves in this mysterious alternate world!


    Greem quickly went into the second stone room after he exited the first one.


    A tall,rge human lied on this stone tform, his chest already spread apart for the world see and every hidden part of his body exposed for curious eyes. Greem had also modified the stone tform itself into a unique magic array, causing the tform to slowly guide all sorts of elementium energies into the different internal organs of that man.


    Now what Greem had to do was to continuously observe and record daily the effects and changes caused by the elementium energies on the bodies¡¯ organs.


    The one lying dissected on the tform was a spellbreaker knight. If he had been put into the World of Adepts, one would see him as an existence that was on par with adepts.


    If Greem had dared to so boldly dissect and research an actual adept in the World of Adepts, the only fate awaiting him would most definitely be being pursued and hunted by all adepts. It was only in such an alternate world that he had the chance to capture an adept-level existence, much like himself, and dissect him like a white rat with no worries of any consequences.


    He would even be allowed to conduct some of the more secretive and taboo experiments.


    This might be the most appealing part of nar wars for the adepts!


    Meanwhile, numerous armor fragments and some unrecognizable objects filled the entire stone tform of the third room. The knight¡¯s armor was ced at the very center of the stone tform, and it was obvious what the runic arrays within them were.


    After so many bloody battles, the number of witcher-knights and spellbreaker knights that the adepts had killed and captured had reached a certain level. They were finally able to have a basic understanding of this ne¡¯s unique runic knowledge.


    In conclusion, the runic knowledge of the knights¡¯ ne was far more primitive whenpared to the World of Adepts. It was only in the one area of merging runic energies with the physical body that the knights had their own unique understanding and improvements.


    If the adepts were able to make this knowledge their own and performed some minor modifications and improvements, it would undoubtedly be able to allow adepts that manipted powerful elementium powers to also possess the same durable and resilient physical prowess of the knights. This could also, in a way improve, thebat ability of the adepts themselves. As a result, this was most definitely knew knowledge that everyone sought and desired!


    However, the rune shards that Greem collected only reached as high as the level of spellbreaker knights, and there was not much new knowledge that was worth analysing and building upon within them. Greem could only rece quality with quantity, collecting all sorts of different runic arrays and attempting to rely on the chip¡¯s powerful data analysis and deductive abilities to help him ess a higher level of runic mystery.


    Of course, this was only a side project. If he truly wanted aplete set of the knowledge about merging runic energies, he had to personally travel to the knights¡¯ kingdom to collect them.

 Chapter 217

    Chapter 217 Rose Manor


    Blue Hillock City.


    Numerous witcher-knights had gathered here, turning this ce into a rowdy military camp.


    Knowing that he could not contest the witcher-knights with his own forces, Blue Hillock City¡¯s casten Count Vanlier decided to just leave the casten¡¯s quarters to the knights and moved to Rose Manor located outside the city, living a life of seclusion.


    However, he would asionally host ballroom dance parties at the manor out, of respect for the witcher-knights, and warmly invite the young knights to participate. Count Vanlier had even specially invited the most famous chef from Herdurand City, as well as the numerous nobledies, socialites, and beauties in Blue Hillock City to entertain the young knights. Every day, the knights would live a life of debauchery, surrounded by beauties and luxuries.


    The noble knights, who had just experienced the traumatizing battle in the woods, seemed to have found the meaning to life once more. They tasted smooth wine and gourmet food, surrounded themselves with beautiful women, and talked with merchants that offered up empty praises, sinking utterly into a life of pleasure and enjoyment.


    Duke was one such knight!


    As someone born from a small noble family, he had always had the great dream of owning a runic sword of his own and riding a magic colt across the continent. His father, a small baron in a rural area, sold the only manor they had and sent him to the witcher-knight trainee camp.


    Moreover, he was diligent and fortunate enough to not only be a witcher-knight, but also identally advanced to a spellbreaker knight after fifteen years of rigorous field experience.


    He instantly became the pride of his family, as well as a famous witcher-knight leader back in his hometown.


    Countless sesses in his hunts for heretics had strengthened his faith in the witcher-knights, turning him into a faithful believer of the great Holy Knight Sir Willis. Thus, when the new Heretic War was about to break out, he led hispanions and hurried here, joining the ranks of the witcher-knight army that went into the forest.


    A single bloody and cruel battle in the woods allowed him to see the terror of the evil adepts for the very first time. Every time he recalled the hordes of evil voodoo beasts swarming like a tide out of the darkness, and his poorpanions that turned into the ugly ghouls, his heart would bleed and his soul would tremble!


    He would wake up from nightmares every night since he returned from the forest, drenched in sweat and soaked in fear. Almost all of the knights that returned with him faced the same problems that he did.


    It was precisely because of this that the knights¡¯ higher-ups had not stopped the knights from attending Count Vanlier¡¯s extravagant dinner parties. In fact, they dly encouraged and sent these emotionally damaged knights over to the parties.


    Their defeated knight¡¯s convictions could bepensated with the rich wine and good food, and their losses in battle could be won back on the bed.


    Handsome men and beautiful women were everywhere in the brightly lit hall. Even elderly men with several decades under the belt would dress handsomely as they walked about socializing with everyone.


    Most of the beautifuldies were wearing bright low-cut dresses, revealing their white backs and their deep cleavage, while the men wore delicate and elegant noble¡¯s suits or neat and smart hunting attire, waving their wine sses about as they had joyful conversations and invited thedies to dance.


    Male servants wearing neat uniforms pushed small silver carts into the room and ced delicate food on a longtable decorated with a sky-blue tablecloth. This was food reserved for individuals with certain status. Bronze candlesticks were ced on the table, along with tin cutlery and drinking horns decorated with silver rings.


    Meanwhile, one after another, beautiful maids wove through the guests with bright smiles on their faces, putting rich wine into the hands of the generously drinking guests.


    A small band was diligently ying at one corner of the hall. Once in a while, some bards or dancers would dance on the spot, further livening the atmosphere in the hall.


    On the other hand, outside of the hall were numerous quiet and peaceful corridors, gardens, pergs, fountains, andwns. These spots filled with greenery and flowers were the ces that men and women flirted.


    Moreover, there were specially designed small bedrooms at the back of the hall. They werevishly decorated, but more importantly, they had exceptionally sound-insted walls.


    However, right in the middle of this pleasant evening of enjoyment, several ck shadows secretly gathered in a hidden wine cer in the corner of the manor, quietly discussing something.


    "Has the target been decided? Our mistress is getting impatient!"


    "Please tell the mistress that we have decided on the targets. It will be a total of three spellbreaker knights. We will find a way to have them stay over tonight and when that happens... "


    "You must be careful. Keeping you here as a hidden piece was not an easy task. The mistress does not want you to be exposed too early. So remember, you must be absolutely careful and have a detailed and proper n before acting!"


    "Yes, Sir Bald Eagle, you can count on me!"


    "Mm!"


    The ck shadows exchanged a few word in the darkness, then quickly went in their own directions.


    One of the silhouettes suddenly turned into a furry ck mass, silently beating its wings as it sped across the many buildings in the manor. Shortly, it arrived at a delicate, small building two levels tall located at the back of the manor.


    It passed through a vent specially left open at a corner of the house and went inside before transforming once more in the master bedroom of the building. It turned into an elderly noble with a slightly balding head and wearing a delicate sleeping robe.


    He lightly pulled on a special string by the corner of the room, and the tworge doors at the side of the master bedroom opened as a group of beautiful maids walked in and swiftly changed the elderly noble into a smart suit. The butler wearing a tuxedo stood obediently by the side, waiting for the Count¡¯s orders.


    "Have all the guests arrived?" he asked with a voice thick with the ent of nobles. The elderly noble raised his arms and let the maids arrange his costume.


    "They are all here! Especially the ones master had mentioned to me. I have already sent people to entertain them!" The butler hurriedly took one step forward and replied softly.


    "Where is Duke now?"


    "Half an hour ago he was still conversing with the president of the Wade Chamber of Commerce in the front hall. Now, he¡¯s flirting with the Sera sisters by the grapevines in the gardens!"


    "And Barral?"


    "He was dancing with Madam Shearfre in the hall fifteen minutes ago. Now... he¡¯s already inside guest room number seven."


    "Drisek?"


    "He¡¯s been drinking with Knight Tomard and Knight Raul in the side hall. Apparently, he¡¯s already drank six bottles of grape spirits. I¡¯ve had people send another five bottles over."


    "Mm! You¡¯ve done a good job." The elderly noble nodded in approval.


    Just as the elder was about to step forward into the front hall, the obedient butler suddenly stopped him.


    "Master, this one has some news to report to you."


    "Oh? What is it?" The elderly noble asked in astonishment.


    "Sir Collier has arrived."


    "Collier? Do you mean that Radiant Knight Collier?" The elderly noble was surprised and immediately asked again. He lowered his head and let out a wickedugh before striding out confidently.


    Since even a radiant knight had graced him with his presence, there was no reason he shouldn¡¯t show his face as the host of this party!


    Thus, after a short moment¡¯s wait, the loud announcement of a servant rang out from outside the door.


    "Count Vanlier has arrived!"


    ............


    Countless ck shadows shifted and countless voodoo beasts roared...


    Everyone ran as fast as they could amidst the flickering light of torches. Their hurried and dramatic breathing could be heard clearly.


    A scarlet me cloud was roiling in the skies as meteors wrapped in burning mes whistled through the air as they crashed into the earth. Loud explosions and bright fires apanied them as each of the meteorsnded. The woods would tremble from the impact of the meteors.


    Every time this happened, even Duke couldn¡¯t help but tremble along with the forest.


    Because what came next was the terrifying me shockwaves and the branches, stones, and debris that covered the skies.


    The meteors that were destroyed midair would turn into rains of fire that fell from the sky, engulfing the entire forest in their burning embrace. The only thing Duke could do was keep his energy shield up, protecting himself from the rain of fire, running forward with all his strength amidst the shaking and trembling of the earth...


    Suddenly... a pale white monster so ugly and revolting one would gag at the sight of it emerged from a bush at the side, tackling the witcher-knight in front of Duke, biting and devouring the knight with its sharp teeth.


    When Duke raised his runic longsword with his trembling hands, the ghoul suddenly raised its head and looked at him. Then, it squatted before leaping high up into the air,unching itself at Duke.


    Duke looked at the terrifying fangs and ws bingrger andrger before his eyes before screaming and waking up from his nightmare, sitting upright in the bed. The two beautifuldies lying naked on the bed mumbled something before turning over and returning to their peaceful sleep.


    Duke wiped off the cold sweat on his forehead. He looked around the room before realizing that he was no longer on that terrifying battlefield, but in afortable and warm nest instead. Duke couldn¡¯t help but smile when he recalled the euphoria and intimacy of the night earlier. He leaned back as he tried to fall back into a sweet sleep.


    For some reason though, he had a vague feeling that there was something dangerous hiding near him. However, after an entire night of debauchery and enjoyment, even his wits and sensitivity to danger had fallen to their absolute lowest.


    Just as he was in a daze and wondering about the source of this unknown sense of danger, two bright red dots appeared within a dark spot in the room. This pair of red glowing lights appeared suddenly, and before he had even noticed it they were right before him, instantly drawing his attention.


    For some unknown reason, whenever Duke looked at the red lights his mind could no longer function properly. Even though he subconsciously felt something was off, his will, weakened by the pleasures of the past few days, was no longer sufficient to continue resisting the effects of those red lights.


    Pain and struggle appeared on Duke¡¯s face, but he was never able to shift his gaze away from those lights. Moreover, as strange patterns and flux started to appear from within the red glow, his will started to sink further and further in while the expression on his face started to be more and more peaceful and calm.


    Finally, he no longer struggled!


    "It¡¯s done, Bloody Mary. I¡¯ve put this guy under my control for now! It¡¯s up to you next." A sweet and crisp female voice rang out from the darkness.


    "Mm, thank you Lady Phantom. I¡¯ll deliver the things you requested as soon as possible once we return to the base. I¡¯ll have to trouble you for the other two as well!" Mary¡¯s voice also sounded out in the darkness.


    The soft sound of moving cloth could be heard in the room as the female adept known as Phantom exited the room, leaving the poor prey bewitched by her illusions to Mary.


    For a long time, Mary had only been able to Embrace a group of pseudo-adept level vampire subordinates in Blue Hillock City. She never had the opportunity to try and do such a thing to the more powerful witcher-knights, nor the spellbreaker knights that had even more powerful mental wills and magic resistances.


    Thus, Mary took advantage of this brilliant opportunity and bought Phantom¡¯s help at a tremendous price to have her crack the wills of the spellbreaker knights and shake their faith and determination. Even if Mary failed to Embrace these knights under the cover of the illusion, the spellbreaker knights would only think of the experience as a new nightmare, and the secret hidden in the Rose Manor wouldn¡¯t be exposed.


    Mary grinned wickedly as she closed in on Duke in the darkness!

 Chapter 218

    Chapter 218 A Brewing Storm


    Inside a secret underground hole near the edge of Greend Forest.


    Wild patches of grass kept the narrow entrancepletely hidden.


    A one meter long carcass beetle with green wings and a ck shell covered with corpse spots flew over, staying close to the ground. A dead human was impaled on its four razor-sharp legs. Judging from the human¡¯s clothing, he was a low-level mercenary that entered the Greend Forest in hopes of getting therge reward offered by the knights.


    The carcass beetle circled above the entrance, and finding nothing out of the ordinary, it folded its wings andnded near the entrance. It very quickly dragged the mercenary¡¯s corpse with it and disappeared into the underground cave.


    After it entered the cave, it dove downwards, going through narrow and winding paths before finally entering arge cave twenty meters underground.


    The cave had been turned into a massive bug¡¯s nest. The ground and walls were covered in an odd moss. It was soft to the touch, and would give way when someone stepped on it. However, the moss was exceptionally durable and had surprisingly strong resistance against acid and poison.


    A dozen dirt piles that looked like anthills were located in the middle of therge cave. However, these piles weren¡¯t made of any ordinary dirt, but a filthy substance made from mud mixed with wood splinters and the bloody remains of devoured and digested human flesh.


    The top of the dirt piles werepletely filled with pitch-ck holes. On a closer look, one could vaguely see oddrvae crawling within the dirt. Even though they were onlyrvae, their ear-piercing screeches, ugly appearance, and their terrifyingly savage and violent presence all hinted at their identity as horrifying monsters.


    The carcass beetle that just flew in circled in the air. When it passed by one of the bug¡¯s nests, it moved its scythe-like legs violently. The human mercenary¡¯s corpse was instantly torn into pieces of meat, falling onto the nest as his blood rained down.


    Thervae in the nest started to screech in excitement when they smelled fresh blood. They extended their white translucent heads from the holes, violently devouring the pieces of meat that fell on the dirt pile. Ear-piercing screeches burst out from the other nests that didn¡¯t get fed, filling the entire cave with deafening noise.


    As several carcass beetle entered and exited the cave, and as the fresh blood rained like a downpour, an opening was finally created in a nest by thervae inside. Over twenty carcass beetlervae crawled out,ying on the carpet of moss as they began the first significant evolution of their bug lives.


    Their milky white and semi-translucent bug shells immediately started to solidify and harden when exposed to the cold, damp air. Then, with loud cracking sounds, a seam that extended all the way across their backs started to form, slowly expanding towards each side.


    When the crack had berge enough, a wicked bug¡¯s head peeped out from within, letting out its first metallic screech into this cold world.


    Dozens of kilometers away, in a patch of dim woods, Acteon was coldly looking upon a human mercenary squad from the darkness. Acteon suddenly turned towards the direction where the bug nests were, as if he had heard that terrifying bug screech in the distance. Acteon let out a wicked smile.


    ............


    In the adepts¡¯ base.


    The height of the war tower was quickly increasing.


    In just a dozen days, the 213 meter tall war tower with two underground floors and seven ground floors had beenpletely constructed. Now it was undergoing the hasty process of magic modification.


    This simple and crude war tower had not been built from expensive and valuable materials. Instead, it had only been constructed withmon rocks and loose sand reinforced with magic. The quality of such materials made it inevitable that the tower could not take too much of a beating.


    Even disregarding bombardment from knight battle techniques, the terrifying weight of the tower itself would be enough topletely crush the foundation of the building to dust.


    Thus, as the adepts¡¯ tower slowly grew in height, a dozen adepts were tirelessly working away in the tower, carving multiple Strengthening Arrays on therge stone bs to improve the weight-bearing capacity of these stones. Moreover, these temporary arrays had to be carved in a way that did not hinder future defensive arrays that would be carved in the tower once it was constructed. As a result, even though the work seemed simple, every single array had to be engraved in a calcted position, with great attention paid to the way the arrays connected and rted to each other. This was not something that just any adept could do.


    Besides the construction of the adepts¡¯ tower, the most lively ce in the base was the voodoo beast craftingboratory. Large numbers of forest beasts were sent to the base from far away, and in less than an hour, they would all be turned into oddly-shaped voodoo beasts, swarming into the forest in waves.


    The job of guarding and defending the outer rim of the base was left to that group of elite ghouls. Each of them had prowess that rivalled that of advanced apprentices. They were a group of tireless guards, hiding in the bushes and the trees, preventing any living being froming within one and a half kilometers of the base.


    Besides these loyal guards, some adepts with strange abilities were also active near the edge of the forest, unceasingly monitoring the border for any activity. These reckless fellows, that stepped into these woods for a little reward andnd, had never been able to take another step out of the woods.


    The thing that caused the most damage to the knights in thest battle was undoubtedly the gue virus. It was the existence of this virus, that specifically corroded runic energy and magic colts, that caused the witcher-knights to turn into pathetic soldiers, losing the mobility they had prided themselves for.


    Such an effective tool had to be used to its fullest potential.


    Over this period of modification and improvement, an even more contagious gue virus had been created and had already been sent to the adepts hiding in Blue Hillock City through discreet means. Given their personality and abilities, the adepts would probably already have turned Blue Hillock City into a dead city filled with tombstones, if it wasn¡¯t out of fear of provoking the enemy into showing their hand too early.


    The numbers of witcher-knights in the camp outside Blue Hillock City was rapidly growing day by day.


    It seemed as if the powerful forces behind this ne had finally realized the danger of the adepts and were rapidly gathering all the strength they could muster. On the other hand, the adepts¡¯ base had been able to get news of the knights through discreet means. In particr, they knew that the most powerful being on this ne, the Fourth Grade Holy Knight Willis, had obtained reinforcements from the mysterious Dragon Valley and was hurrying over here.


    It was easy to foresee that the moment he arrived here would be the moment the witcher-knights moved out against the adepts.


    The only thing both sides could do now was to continuously build up their own military strength and increase the advantages they had.


    The witcher-knights and the adepts. These two factions were like mad machines of war that were continuously elerating and rushing towards each other at a terrifying speed. Perhaps the very next second, they would sh with all their strength.


    As for who would be the final victor¨C that had yet to be decided. The only thing known for sure was that this was destined to be a massive battle of life and death. A war that would be etched into the annals of history!


    ............


    It had been twenty-one days since thest bloody battle in the woods.


    It was a bright, sunny afternoon and the call of war had finally arrived.


    Greem, who was silently conducting experiments in his undergroundb, paused for a moment before taking out amunication crystal. The crystal shed with a blinding light.


    Greem extended his Spirit into the crystal, and Sir F¨¹gen¡¯s cold voice instantly rang out in his mind.


    "All adepts are to return to base immediately. All adepts are to return to base immediately. Adepts that have yet to return to base in an hour will be executed as traitors. Crow, gue, and Bloody Mary are to continue with the original n. Keep hiding undercover and wait for more instructions... "


    War had finally arrived.


    Greem¡¯s heart sank for a moment as well.


    No adept could be confident in their own safety in a nar war such as this. Even the calm and collected Second Grade Sir F¨¹gen probably had a decent chance of dying here. After all, when the battle started, he would most definitely be an important target marked by the enemy¡¯s powerhouses.


    As for the two Third Grade adepts, even though it had been quite a while since they arrived, they had yet to take a single step out of the adept tower. There was no telling how much of their strength they could exhibit while under the powerful inhibiting effect of the ne¡¯s suppression. A First Grade adept needed one day and one night to bepletely used to the narws here. A Second Grade adept needed five to seven days to get used to the change.


    How many days would a powerful being like a Third Grade adept need to do so?


    Greem quickly tidied hisb with this question in mind, before leaving the ce with a single Fire Teleportation.


    Other adepts, busy with their own tasks all over the forest, also received Sir F¨¹gen¡¯s message and hastily concluded the tasks at hand before quickly turning and heading towards the base.


    Acteon didn¡¯t return immediately upon receiving the message. Instead, he rushed over to the area where the underground cave was located. When his silhouette, hidden underneath thick robes, appeared before the entrance to the cave, odd noises rang out from within.


    One after another, terrifying carcass beetles with wicked appearances slowly climbed out from within, gathering around Acteon as they let out sharp screeches. Acteon¡¯s bug head, hidden underneath the shadow of his hood, also continuously let out odd screeches as if he wasmunicating with these beetles.


    Thirty-Nine carcass beetles!


    Each of them had terrifying power that rivalled pseudo-adepts.


    If they were all gathered together, none of the First Grade adepts could fight back against them. The only option left would be to run and save themselves.


    Acteon finally felt a sense of tion and pride when he looked at these loyal bug troops that surrounded him.


    That damn Mary and that ursed Greem. Now that I have my bug army, what will you use topare with me?


    Acteon strode towards the base feeling extremely satisfied.


    The carcass beetles took to the skies with their ck shells and green wings. The wings on their backs beat rapidly as they flew above the canopy, closely following behind Acteon like an ominous gray cloud.


    The skies were filled with flying adepts. Adepts sitting atop their giant magical flying tools, adepts shing through the air with green wings on their backs, adepts rushing towards their destination after transforming into beasts....


    For one moment, the scattered adepts were all hurrying towards the same ce.


    The adepts¡¯ base!

 Chapter 219

    Chapter 219 The Power of the Dragons


    Outside Blue Hillock City. Rose Manor.


    Having sensed the oddity outside, Mary moved silently to arge window in her room and lifted the curtain, gazing at the ck dots in the distance.


    They had yet to arrive, but already the terrifyingly vast and intimidating dragon¡¯s aura surged forth.


    The dragon¡¯s aura of might. This seemed like an intangible and mysterious thing, but its effect on normal living beings was very real and unavoidable!


    Be it normal warhorses, or the livestock kept at every other house, all the animals would go into a panic when they sensed the dragon¡¯s aura falling from above like a mighty tide. And when they smelled that unique stench ofrge draconic lifeforms scattered by the wind, their limbs would tremble and give way. They would crouch on the ground in fear, not being able to move even a single step from where they were.


    One, two, three, four, five...


    Mary¡¯s crimson pupils glowed mildly as she quickly understood what the ck dots in the distance represented. Even Mary couldn¡¯t help but wrinkle her soft eyebrows as the numbers continued to increase.


    Damn, there were five dragons! This battle was not going to be easy!


    In the time she hesitated, a gale had raged across the skies above Rose Manor as the five dragons cut across the air and flew towards Blue Hillock City.


    Mary saw the dragons more clearly this time.


    There were two Third Grade dragons and three Second Grade dragons amongst the five dragons. Moreover, four human knights wearing strange armor had been riding on the backs of those dragons. Based on their looks, Mary determined that they were most likely the Fourth Grade Holy Knight, along with the three Third Grade Dragon Knights.


    This strength was more than enough to crush the adepts¡¯ base in a head on fight!


    Meanwhile, at this one moment, countless pairs of eyes in discrete areas all over Blue Hillock City were closely following this group of flying dragons as theynded in the camp outside the city.


    It wasn¡¯t long before the news was sent back to the adepts¡¯ base.


    Thus, that was how the scene of Second Grade Sir F¨¹gen calling the adepts back came to happen!


    While the adepts hiding in Blue Hillock City were still trying to determine if the high-grade adepts would choose to rest before marching out, the witcher-knights¡¯ camp in the distance had already burst into action.


    Squad after squad of witcher-knights leapt onto their colts, fastened their supplies on the saddles, and charged out of the military camp in an orderly fashion, hurrying towards Greend Forest in the distance.


    So determined? It seemed like the enemy came prepared!


    The undercover adepts couldn¡¯t but think so silently to themselves.


    The dragons took to the skies once more, circling the sky as they let out dragon roars that rumbled through the air, before chasing after the vanguard and following them into the vast woods.


    Willis rode on the back of the Third Grade green dragon Aufreyr. They had just barely entered Greend Forest and already, even from a distance, they could see that tall and terrifying war tower standing alone in the sea of trees.


    This tower was so tall and magnificent that even those towering ancient trees were nothing but insignificant dots before it. Even from dozens of kilometers away, the vast stretch of woods could only hide its insignificant and unimportant foundation, while the very tip of the tower was obscured by the clouds in the sky.


    There was no need for any magical lighting or special effects. Just the sheer magnitude of this tower was impressive enough!


    This was the foundation of their ns that the evil adepts had built upon this ne? It was as intimidating as the ancient records described.


    Willis gazed at the war tower in the distance. He did not recklessly lead the dragon knights in a charge towards it, but instead chose to circle above the witcher-knight vanguards and guide their way towards the adepts¡¯ base.


    In all of the countless battles in the past, the witcher-knights had never been able to make it to the adepts¡¯ base. There were many reasons for it. The first of which was the sheer size and density of foliage in Greend Forest. Moreover, the geography of the forest was mountainous and rugged, causing the witcher-knights that had air presence to only be able to charge about aimlessly in the woods.


    This sort of undirected strategy had no efficiency to speak of.


    Thus, all the battles in the past were initiated by the adepts, causing crippling damage to the knights every single time.


    Now that they had dragons in the sky guiding their way, the knight army became like an agile snake. They wove their way across countless trees, climbed past hills and mountains, cut through streams and rivers. They crossed ravines and bottomless cliffs, recklessly heading towards the adepts¡¯ base.


    Oddly enough, it seemed as if the adepts themselves had realized that maintaining harassment outside of the base had lost any real meaning for this final battle. As a result, the adepts no longer fought with the witcher-knights for control over parts of the forest. They withdrew all their forces and turtled within a two and a half kilometer radius of the tall tower, forming defensive lines that were tough to crack.


    Moreover, the defensive lines were only spread out in the direction the witcher-knights wereing from. It seemed they had no defenses on the other three sides.


    Did the enemy not have enough forces to defend the tower on every side? Or was this some sort of trickery?


    Willis stood above his dragon as he thought to himself silently.


    He thought ofmanding the witcher-knights to take the long route, nk the adepts, and charge them at their weakest spot. However, after a quick moment¡¯s thought, he gave up on the idea.


    Who knew if there were any ambushes or traps in those empty areas! Rather than take the uncertain risk, it was better to sh directly with the enemy and crush all of their preparations with the knights¡¯ courage and numerical advantage.


    He no longer cared about the number of casualties in today¡¯s all-out battle. As long as they were able to chase away this batch of terrifying adepts, it would be worth it even if all six thousand men of the army had to die here!


    Six thousand witcher-knights! This was almost eight percent of the entire ne¡¯s witcher-knights. If they were to all die here, then even the knights¡¯ kingdom, with their tremendous influence and power, would find such a loss hard to swallow!


    Death was easy. However, to rebuild an army of this size needed two to three hundred years at the very least.


    Only Willis and the three dragon knights knew how determined he was this time. Those radiant knights could only listen to orders when put before these Third and Fourth Grade knights.


    With the help of the magic colts, the long line of witcher-knights rapidly closed in on the frontline.


    Finally, at an area one kilometer away from the enemy¡¯s defensive lines, Willis had the green dragonnd on a cliff and stop the army¡¯s advance.


    The witcher-knights had travelled for over two hours and took the cliff as a temporary camp, getting off their horses and taking a rest. They ate and drank a little, preparing for the massive battle that was toe.


    With the dragons as lookouts in the sky, the witcher-knights no longer needed to worry about surprise attacks from the evil adepts.


    Six thousand witcher-knights might not look like a lot when stretched into a long line. However, when they were all gathered together, they formed a domineering crowd. Almost every inch of the one kilometer radius of the camp was filled with the busy shapes of the witcher-knights.


    All of a sudden, ck clouds appeared in the sky above an area where the knights were most densely gathered. In the blink of an eye, a raging lightning storm was almostpletely formed. The witcher-knights beneath the ck cloud hurriedly got onto their magic colts and spread out in every direction to avoid the terrifying spell.


    The green dragons circling in the skies discovered the adept¡¯s location almost immediately. They dove down and covered the area where the mental flux came from with their devastating poison breath.


    Thunderbird lived up to his name as the fastest and most mobile adept.


    When he realized he had been locked onto by the dragons, he immediately sped out of the dense woods. In a series of lightning shes he escaped the attack range of the dragons.


    One after another, terrifying dragon breath razed the ground from above!


    This previously lush forest instantly turned into and of death and decay. The green trees, vines, thorns, and bushes corroded and withered in the green poison mist in a single second, turning into dead and dry nts.


    The dragons were extremely fast while flying. In just a slight dive, they had already closed in on the adepts¡¯ defensive lines.


    When the powerful bodies of the four green dragons sliced across the canopy, countless terrifying spells of all colors sted into the skies, chasing after the dragons.


    The very next second, the four green dragons personally demonstrated to the world once again why the dragons were able to be rulers of the skies even amongst all the nes in the multiverse!


    Their lithe and agile bodies rapidly turned and rolled in the skies, as the spells locked onto them followed closely behind and drew bright and pretty lines across the sky. With every barrel roll, some of the spells would collide and explode in a st of explosive fireworks.


    When the spells behind them had reached an insignificant number, the green dragons turned around with great agility and neutralized thest few spells with thick green dragon breath.


    Then they let out sky-rumbling roars as they flew upwards into the sky, full of pride, and once again showed off their elegant bodies high in the air without sustaining even a single scratch.


    If it wasn¡¯t out of fear of affecting his allies¡¯ morale, Greem would have burst out in apuse for the green dragons¡¯ performance.


    What were the rulers of the skies? What were the rulers of all living beings in a ne? This was a raw show of the dragons¡¯ immense strength!


    All those impractical fellows that fantasized about ying dragons only needed to look at their performance to understand the massive difference in strength between them and the dragons.


    Compared to the dragons, the adepts looked like a bunch of human-shaped magic sticks that could only stand about as they cast their spells. In terms of the practicality and flexibility ofbat, the dragons were far superior whenpared to the adepts!


    However, most of the adepts were not bothered by this.


    Compared to most of the magical creatures of the material nes, the spellcasting ability of adepts was not particrly amazing. However, back in the World of Adepts, they still very firmly held the dominant position and assumed a dictatorial role!


    Why? It was nothing special. It was just that the adepts had wisdom and knowledge, as well as the awareness to use external factors to their advantage!

 Chapter 220

    Chapter 220 Thwarted Dragons


    The adepts hiding in the darkness of the woods showed no fear, even when faced with these mighty and terrifying green dragons. Moreover, the gazes they directed at the dragons had be even more passionate and intense.


    How cool would it be to have a dragon as a pet!


    Perhaps because the dragons¡¯ performance had provoked him, an adept slowly rose into the skies from the forest a kilometer away from the dragons and confronted them from a distance.


    The adept had a wrinkled face and was wrapped in a ck robe. He held in his hand a long staff glowing with powerful magical radiance. Indeed, it was the one and only Second Grade adept in the base, Sir F¨¹gen.


    A single Second Grade adept was no real threat when pit against a group of adolescent green dragons. After all, even the weakest amongst them was at Second Grade! Moreover, the dragons¡¯ powerful bodies and ability to fly were unmatched even across all the material nes, allowing them to easily challenge enemies above their Grades. It was an easy task to fight against a human with the same grade as them, especially if it was an adept, who were known for their weak and frail bodies.


    A young green dragon that had left the Dragon Valley for the first time, and had only participated in a nar war for the first time, roared and charged out from the formation. It seemed like he wanted a duel with this Second Grade adept that had appeared out of nowhere!


    The other green dragons in the sky roared in unison, and the massive soundwave caused the entire forest to tremble.


    They did not stop the young green dragon¡¯s impulsiveness out of their desire for glory. Instead, they were cheering for him in Dragontongue.


    The young green dragon became even more excited. He pped his fleshy wings and rose even higher into the sky. When his aura had reached its very peak, he let out a loud dragon¡¯s roar that seemed as if it would rend the clouds apart, before diving quickly down at the insignificant and weak enemy.


    This was a terrifying lifeform that was over twelve meters long from head to tail, and six meters tall when it stood upright. Dark green dragon scales the size of bowls covered his entire body, gleaming and shining brightly in the broad daylight. The dragon¡¯s massive head was two meters long, with light green poisonous mist smoking out of his snout, making him seem all the more mysterious and terrifying. Whenever he roared, one could see the ghastly concentrated ball of acid at the back of his throat.


    Large and wicked spikes started on the back of his neck and went all the way to the tip of his long tail. Whenever he beat hisrge, finely-scaled wings, a powerful gale would flow about his elegant and perfect body.


    A green dragon!


    A young green dragon that had just grown out of being a whelp, and had just barely reached maturity!


    He might only be the Second Grade, but when his powerful body with flowing curves was disyed before everyone, it seemed as if his grade was no longer that important.


    Bringing with him an overpowering aura of might and his devastating roar, the Second Grade green dragon fell from the sky. Like a green meteor descending, he charged towards Second Grade human adept F¨¹gen with an unstoppable momentum.


    An ominous feeling rose in Willis¡¯ heart as he was directing the knights in the woods faraway. He frowned at hispanion¡¯s recklessness, but he couldn¡¯t find anything wrong or odd when he scanned the battlefield nearby.


    This undoubtedly put him even more on edge!


    The green dragon was charging! The distance was closing!


    In the blink of an eye, less than a hundred meters were left between the dragon and the ursed human adept.


    Disdain glowed in the green dragon¡¯s amber eyes when he saw that the human had no intention of dodging. He, who had plenty of hunting experience in the woods, had already simted countless action ns in his mind to deal with different situations.


    If the human adept dodged to the left or right, he would turn his head in the instant he passed by and engulf the adept in terrifying dragon breath. If the opponent dodged downwards, he only needed to fly down slightly and his sharp and thick dragon ws would instantly pierce the weak defensive barrier and tear the adept the pieces.


    Engaging directly with a green dragon? Not even magical creatures that were famed for the strength of their physical bodies dared to do something so suicidal!


    Yet the human adept before him still behaved oddly andpletely out of his predictions. Even when a terrifying green dragon was charging at him, he still chose to stand there calmly while he cast a spell. Even the loud dragon roars could not overpower the clear and crisp notes of his magical chanting.


    Sir F¨¹gen sted a green beam into the woods beneath him.


    Almost immediately, the previously quiet woods suddenly came to life!


    Continuous frightening green vines that were as thick as water jars rose into the skies, rapidly entangling the body of the charging green dragon and pulling it towards the ground. Terrifying wooden spikes gleaming with a metallic sheen covered the vines. As they tightened their grip on the dragon, the spikes crunched against his scale armor, letting out a screeching sound as they shed.


    Caught by surprise, the green dragon could no longer maintain its flight, crashing into the dense woods beneath like a falling meteor.


    A massive pir of dust rose to the sky as a powerful shockwave spread through the woods. Everyone could clearly see that the woods in a hundred meter radius around the dragon had beenpletely ttened by this deafening impact. Countless broken trunks, branches, and wood splinters shot out in every direction under the force of the violent shockwave, further damaging the trees around the area of impact. Numerous leaves fell from endless trees.


    Meanwhile, the Second Grade green dragon had just climbed out of the massive crater and was shaking its head in pain. Suddenly, countless adepts appeared from the woods around it and spells sted at it one after another.


    The green dragon straightened its body in anger and was about to unfold its wing to escape from these despicable and shameless enemies. However, its body suddenly faltered as several thick green vines burst forth from the ground once again, rapidly entangling the dragon and keeping it bound to the ground.


    The very next second, the violent spells exploded and devoured the green dragon¡¯s silhouette amidst its fearful and angered roars.


    The green dragon did indeed have exceptional magic resistance, but it also had limits. When faced with so many terrifying attacks, even he couldn¡¯t help but cry out in pain, despite his powerful defenses.


    The surrounding adepts were well aware of the green dragons¡¯ high magic resistance. As such, they did not use pure elementium spells, instead opting for spells with more mixed attributes and physical damage.


    Repeatedly, spells like Crimson Fireball, Magma Fireball, Violent Soundwave, and Space Distortion violently raged against the green dragon¡¯s body. Therge dragon scales were sted into pieces and the flesh beneath was quickly eaten away by the horrifying tide of spells.


    Just as the green dragon frantically struggled against the tide of spells and the green vines, even more opportunistic fellows swarmed out of the forest. Bloodthirsty magic wolves with rotting coats of dark fur, violent apes betraying a reckless and fearless light in their bloodshot eyes, slim and small bloodsucking bats screeching as they flew, as well as seven or eight odd beetles with green wings and ck shells spotted with corpse spots...


    These beasts took advantage of the green dragon being entangled by the vines and endured the bombardment of the adepts as they leapt onto the green dragon¡¯s body, frantically devouring the exposed flesh.


    The pain of being eaten alive put the dragon through intense agony. It opened itsrge mouth, and a terrifying breath of poison mist covered its own body.


    The extremely corrosive poison mist instantly killedrge swathes of the enemy.


    All the beasts engulfed by the poison mist melted into a sticky green liquid in an instant, as if they had been thrown into a pool of acid. Even their tough bones couldn¡¯t be preserved when they came into contact with the mist. The frail vampire spawn were the weakest of all. Contact with the mist would melt them into a pool of green liquid in three to five seconds as they screeched in agony.


    Only those odd beetles seemedpletely unbothered by the poison breath of a Second Grade green dragon. They continued to stubbornly bite away at the green dragon¡¯s flesh. The green vines seemed to possess powerful corrosion resistance as well, as they did not burn away under the green dragon¡¯s breath.


    The green dragon was extremely angered. Its wounded body struggled desperately to break free of the vines, while its bony dragon¡¯s tail that resembled a massive meteor hammer swung upwards, finally crushing one of the odd beetles into a fine paste of blood.


    A peculiar bug screech rang out through the woods, and the beetles seemed to have received some sort of instructions. All of them crawled to the underbelly of the dragon, crouching and eating at the flesh there. This was a very advantageous position. With the dragon¡¯s massive body, and its immobility in this situation, it was extremely hard for it to have its attacks reach its underbelly.


    Loud dragon roars filled the skies, and instantly the sky was blotted out by the massive bodies of the green dragons!


    The other three green dragons, still carrying the dragon knights on their backs, dove downwards like arrows shot from a bow, trying to save theirpanion.


    Sir F¨¹gen, who remained levitating above the canopy, waved the staff in his hand several times and once again summoned countless green vines to rise into the skies from the surrounding woods, wrapping towards the charging green dragons.


    sh. sh. sh...


    Three blinding suns suddenly rose on the backs of the dragons. Violent and concentrated energy des shed with the green vines. The vines that were able to resist even the powerful poison breath of a green dragon were unable to endure the Third Grade dragon knights¡¯ violent attacks, instantly being shredded to pieces and falling apart.


    In the time the green vines retreated, the three dragon knights shed at the trapped green dragon¡¯s side and the vines extending from beneath the ground were quickly cut.


    The unrestrained green dragon broke free of its bindings in anger, forcing away its enemies with arge breath of green poison mist before taking to the skies with all its strength, struggling and stumbling as it did so.


    Sadly, its badly wounded dragon wings were no longer able to support its continued flight through the sky.


    Its left wing waspletely broken, dragging behind its body and unable to be unfolded. The tip of its right wing had been cut off and severalrge holes had appeared on it. The wounds on his chest, below his ribs, and on his abdomen were the most severe. Large patches of dragon scales were missing and the wounds were bloody and messy. One could see the thick tendons and white bones within the green dragon¡¯s body through the missing flesh.


    Such terrible injuries had clearly robbed it of its ability to fly.


    After struggling slightly in the air, the green dragon cried sorrowfully as it fell downwards.


    Sharp winds whistled in the sky. An evenrger and more muscr green dragon dove down, enduring the tide of spells and grabbing itspanion¡¯s body with its strong hind ws. It beat its wings and flew into the sky with strenuous effort.


    The dragon knight standing on the back of the green dragon waved his longsword, and one after another, bright me des sted out, destroying the iing spells in terrifying shes of sword light. Even so, the spells that made it through his defenses and sted on the two green dragons still caused them to let out muffled grunts of pain.


    Dragon scales and dragon skin had exceptional magical and physical resistance; any other flying magical creature would already have been shot down from the skies.


    Two massive green breaths engulfed the nearby woods. The other two dragon knights hade to help with the remaining green dragons. The evil adepts quickly scattered and ran through the terrifying dragon breath and the dragon knights¡¯ terrifying de radiances, finally giving the two surrounded dragons some breathing room.


    The green dragons were finally able to fly away from the adepts¡¯ battlefield with much difficulty!

 Chapter 221

    Chapter 221 Faith


    Neither side seemed to have sustained any deaths in this first battle, but the knights had clearly lost a powerful ally.


    Willis felt anger rise in his heart at his green dragonpanion¡¯s severe injuries, but he grit his teeth and suppressed his emotions.


    He waved his hand and the witcher-knight army, already waiting in formation, started to advance slowly.


    The humiliation and pain the adepts inflicted on him would be paid back tenfold... a hundredfold. And the price they will be paying in would be their lives!


    Willis could already tell that the number of adepts on the other side were not very many. There were at best only two dozens of them. Moreover, most of them were low-grade adepts. There wasn¡¯t a single high-grade adept among them that could make him feel fear and respect.


    If that was all the force the enemy had, Willis was certain that the army was not needed. He alone, along with the dragon knights, would be more than enough to exterminate these evil adepts.


    However, for some odd reason, every time Willis looked at the gigantic adepts¡¯ tower in the distance, an indescribable and irrational fear would rise up in his heart. It was almost as if... as if there were some terrifying demon there, its mouth wide open, waiting for him to enter.


    It was precisely this sense of fear that caused Willis to recall the green dragons and have the witcher-knights advance instead. If there were truly any terrifying traps in that tower, the six thousand witcher-knights would be enough to force it out.


    What Willis needed to do was lead the green dragons to drive in the most ferocious killing blow, once all the hidden enemies had shown their ugly faces.


    The green dragon squad was a dagger to slit the enemy¡¯s throat, while the witcher-knights were a hammer to crack the enemy¡¯s tough shell. He knew this very well!


    Eleven muscr and powerful radiant knights appeared at the front of the formation. The intense light of energy radiated from their bodies. They would be the ones to lead the most savage charge at the enemyter. The ny-eight spellbreaker knights formed groups of two, with a group of a hundred witcher-knights following behind each pair.


    They were in the middle of a vast stretch of forest, with no t paths for them to start a charge. However, the knights in shining armor still pulled down their visors and pushed their magic colts forward slowly. The might and glory of an army several thousand men strong still caused the onlooking adepts to feel a little nervous.


    The knights¡¯ army had slowly begun to elerate!


    Sir F¨¹gen looked at the iron knights slowly closing in. While caressing the snake-eye ring on his left little finger, he coldly ordered, "Start Operation gue!"


    With his order, strange ripples started to repeatedly spread across the forest. Wherever the ripples passed through, the witcher-knights and the colts under them would start to go into a panic. Some of the magic colts would even frantically jump about while whinnying, tossing the knights off their backs.


    The colts were behaving abnormally, but the knights weren¡¯t much better either!


    Some witcher-knights started to clutch their throats tightly, painfully breathing as they did so. It felt like their internal organs had been set on fire. The searing pain was unbearable. For one moment, the entire witcher-knight army was in chaos as witcher-knights struggling in pain could be seen everywhere.


    The muscles on Willis¡¯ face started to twitch violently.


    Dammit! This wasn¡¯t a spell. It was a scheme!


    With their bodies¡¯ exceptional strength and magic resistance, no spell could silently invade the bodies of witcher-knights. However, just looking from above, over half of the six thousand witcher-knights were having an extreme reaction to the ripple earlier. This could only mean that the evil adepts had long ago done something to their bodies.


    Willis knew the only way they could so was through poisoning the food and water in the military camp.


    These idiots! Not realizing it even after they had long been poisoned!


    Willis red angrily at Windsor, the radiant knight leader standing right beside him. He drew therge knight¡¯s sword from his waist and stood tall on the back of the green dragon Aufreyr as he shouted loudly.


    "Eliminating the darkness, protector of the weak, fearless!


    ¡°This is the day we die in battle for our conviction and glory as knights.


    ¡°Charge! Charge! Charge!"


    Something extremely odd happened. As Willis loudly shouted the motto that the witcher-knights firmly believed in, a faint golden radiance, so faint it was hard to be seen, started to glow within his body. The radiance was like a powerful dispelling halo. Wherever it went, the light would instantly cause the witcher-knights to return to normal.


    The knights, now freed from the pain and chaos they were struggling in earlier, did not have elementium sight and naturally could not easily see this golden radiance. They thought of their recovery as an effect of their strength of conviction. They drew their runic longswords, loudly chanting the motto of the knights, and charged forward with all their might.


    As the witcher-knights that chanted the motto slowly increased, the golden radiance began to surround every one of them, so dense it looked as if all of the knights were wearing golden armor. With the help of this golden radiance, most of the gue virus that had been ignited by the mysterious ripples within the witcher-knights¡¯ bodies was eradicated, allowing them to regain their ability to fight.


    Even if there were viruses remaining, most of them were suppressed within the depths of their bodies with no opportunity to cause any trouble.


    Bastard! What was this? Shouting two stupid sentences allowed them to endure the effects of the gue viruses? How are we supposed to fight now?


    At this moment, countless adepts roared and cursed frantically in their hearts. Only Adept F¨¹gen narrowed his eyes and stared at the holy radiance in the distance that had expanded into a massive golden sea. He muttered resentfully in his heart, "The power of faith! Dammit! It¡¯s the power of faith!"


    It was only now that he truly understood why the Fourth Grade Willis was called a Holy Knight. It seemed Willis had basic mastery over the use and function of the power of faith, and was already able to use it on a battlefield.


    Much like the elementium powers used by the Adepts, the power of faith was also a kind of power. Moreover, it was a power that was at another level whenpared to elementium abilities.


    One could say that elementium powers were the concentration ofrge amounts of elementium particles, using Spirit as a medium to bind them together and allow them to disy their unique traits. However, the power of faith was much more intangible.


    The source of it was the soul. When many souls believed devoutly in a certain idea, an unknown force would naturally gather and concentrate into the manifestation of this idea. Even if it was just a normal wooden carving or a stone statue, as long as there were enough people worshipping it, unknown power would gather around it, allowing it to have mysterious powers that would be iprehensible to outsiders.


    At this moment, the Fourth Grade holy knight had be the bastion of faith for all of the witcher-knights and was obviously the object of all their faith and devotion. When he loudly chanted the inspiring knights¡¯ motto, he lit a fire in the soul of all the witcher-knights.


    The power of faith that had umted over decades started to spread, allowing the numerous witcher-knights to be miraculously healed, and allowed them to regain theirbat strength.


    Adept F¨¹gen was able to provide the most logical exnation, using his vast knowledge of magic, when faced with this odd phenomenon. However, the witcher-knights involved had no idea that this was the case. Ignorant fools were the most fearless. Perhaps because of this, or perhaps because their hearts and beliefs were sufficiently pure, all of the witcher-knights thought of this phenomenon as a miracle of the great holy knight.


    Thus, their burning conviction became even more resolute and passionate!


    Bright red or blue runic energies started to spread rapidly across their runic longswords as they raised them high above their heads. With ear-deafening roars, the witcher-knights rushed towards the war tower.


    Dammit, we need to find a way to eat away at these knights¡¯ power of faith! Otherwise, these fellows protected by the power of faith were like a bunch of knights bearing powerful energy shields. Even all the adepts added together would not be enough to stop their ferocious attacks.


    Adept F¨¹gen roared loudly in his heart while twisting the snake-eye ring on his finger, sending a message to a person in the distance.


    "We are all counting on you! Find a way to blunt the knights¡¯ edge! The n willpensate you doubly for all the losses that result from this. Do it!"


    Greem, who had been hiding in the forest all along, received Sir F¨¹gen¡¯s magical message, and could only shake his head bitterly. The adepts¡¯ base might actually fall if he didn¡¯t put some effort into this massive battle today. With the skin gone, what can the hair adhere to? Once the base had been destroyed, they, the invading adepts, might not have the chance to sessfully retreat back to the n¡¯s pseudo ne.


    Even Greem felt a chill creep within his heart when he thought of being stranded in this alternate world and being pursued by hordes of witcher-knights.


    Screw it! I¡¯ll give it my all this time!


    Greem made his decision. His hands reached into the front of his robe and unceasingly tossed out shiny golem summoning cores one after another. As the dense elementium particles quickly gathered, a massive dust cloud rose at the area he was in. The intensity of this earth elementium flux was so great that even Holy Knight Willis, standing at the back of the army, couldn¡¯t help but look in Greem¡¯s direction.


    Dong. Dong. Dong...


    The sound of heavy footsteps rang out from the dust cloud, as golem after y golem, as tall as a human, marched out and charged at the witcher-knights¡¯ formation.


    It would have been fine if it was only a dozen elementium golems. However, as the yellow dust cloud continued to expand, and the surging y golems continued to increase, even some adepts who were originally looking on with disdain in their eyes couldn¡¯t help but betray a solemn expression.


    This fellow. Through what means was he able to control so many elementium golems at once?


    The yellow dust cloud rumbled as something even more shocking happened. A massive snake made solely of rock and stone emerged from within, quickly slithering outwards. Everyone frowned when they saw itsrge body, as wide as water tanks, and when they felt the ground tremor.


    But this wasn¡¯t over yet.


    One, two, three...


    When five stone serpents emerged from the dust cloud and charged towards the battlefield behind the y golem army, all of the witcher-knights couldn¡¯t help but feel nervous.


    Dammit! How were they so many of them?

 Chapter 222

    Chapter 222 Hunting Grounds


    The expected collision did not happen!


    Greem hadn¡¯t had a brain stroke yet. He wasn¡¯t nearly dumb enough to have the y golems sh head on with the witcher-knights wrapped in their steel armor.


    Of course, if these were all stone golems instead of y golems, Greem wouldn¡¯t mind appreciating a glorious sh between steel and stone! However, it was probably best to forget it since they were made of y.


    y golem after y golem sunk into the dirt beneath them before they even made contact with the witcher-knights. Numerous dirt pirs half as tall as a man and as thick as a child¡¯s arm rose from the ground, spreading across the path of the knights¡¯ charge.


    The witcher-knights were the most powerful force on this ne after all. Each one of them had exceptional riding skills and agility. Theymanded the colts under them to leap up and dive low, sometimes even jumping towards a tall tree and bouncing off of it to avoid the impediment of the dirt pirs.


    Moreover, the radiant knights and spellbreaker knights standing at the very front of the formation were using all their strength to let out violent des of me and ice, ravaging through all the obstacles on their way forward. The y golems responsible for hindering the army¡¯s progress could only change their battle n when faced with such powerful enemies. They started to create swamps that coveredrge areas to slow the enemy down.


    Numerous forests of dirt pirs and endless patches of quicksand and swamps filled the battlefield. Even though the y golems hadn¡¯t killed a single witcher-knight, they had effectively slowed them down and stopped their march forward.


    While the witcher-knights fell into slight chaos, some y golems would emerge from the woods nearby and attack the enemy using Spear of Mud as well as Earth Spike. Small skirmishes between y golems and witcher-knights erupted everywhere on the battlefield.


    The y golems¡¯ ferocious attacks disrupted the neat formation of the knights, splitting the entire battlefield into countless smaller, chaotic battlefields.


    It was unfortunate that the y golems¡¯ attacks were still on the weaker side. The mud spears they threw at the witcher-knights were unable to pierce thatyer of golden armor formed by the golden radiance that gathered about the knights. Some y golems that were unable to escape into the ground in time had even been hacked to pieces of dirt and stone by the furious knights.


    The nearly one hundred y golems were disappearing at a speed that was visible even to the naked eye!


    The only ones that managed to cause some damage were the five stone serpents. Every time they dug up out from beneath the ground, the rocks and sand they sent everywhere, as well as their savage bites, were able to throw entire knight squads intoplete disarray. Regardless of how powerful the knights¡¯ armor of faith was, it wouldn¡¯t be enough to endure the twelve-ton weight of the stone serpents¡¯ bodies. All of the witcher-knights that were targeted by the stone serpents were inevitably squashed into blood paste.


    However, every time the stone serpents rampaged about the battlefield, their massive bodies would be hacked at by numerous violent knight battle techniques, sending rocks flying everywhere as their bodies slowly cracked and fell apart. If they took too much damage, the stone serpents could only burrow into the ground and wait for their bodies to slowly regenerate.


    Most of the time, this group of pseudo-adept level stone serpents could only throw the enemy lines into disarray. It was impractical to count on them to ughter the witcher-knights en masse.


    Greem had transferred the battlefieldmand of these golems to the chip in his mind after he summoned all the golems he had. With the detailed and dynamicmands of the chip¡¯s superiorputing power, as well as itsplete understanding of the overall situation in this battleground, this group of golems might continuously suffer casualties but they also effectively contained the momentum of the knights¡¯ army.


    With the aid of the chip, Greem no longer needed to put in his own effort tomand hundreds of individual fights. All he needed to do was to focus on himself and live up to his title as a master of pyromancy.


    Greem freely roamed about the battlefield.


    He turned into a terrifying me Fiend three meters tall, with violent elementium mes surging about his body, and slowly walked into the battlefield one step at a time. The soft ck dirt would be turned into half-molten boilingva everywhere he went. A red and ck path of magma could be clearly seen where he walked.


    Greem gripped the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his right hand and held the Scroll of Voodoo open in his left. The pages of the ancient tome incessantly flipped on its own, adding a sense of mystery to Greem.


    Greem was not willing to use up the six instant-cast spells stored within the Scroll of Voodoo. To maximize hisbat strength, he had reced the spells within it with all kinds of powerfulrge area-of-effect fire spells such as the devastating Fire Core Explosion and Firestorm.


    Use them to ughter these witcher-knights before him? Honestly, Greem was not willing to waste it on these small fries!


    Greem slowly strolled forward, lightly waving the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his hand as he did so and lobbing several Magma Fireballs into the areas where the witcher-knights were packed the densest. Meanwhile, Greem sted the fools that dared to rush at him into pieces with violent Chain Fireballs.


    The armor of faith might be able to help them endure simple spells, but when faced against the continuous bombardment of the Chain Fireballs, even the thickest armor in the world wouldn¡¯t be able to save them.


    Brave knights repeatedly charged forward while shouting the knights¡¯ motto, only to be sted to the ground by the exploding fireballs. Before they could even get up, the next fireballs would arrive and cause the damage to quickly stack up, break through the armor of faith, and st apart the armor on their bodies before they were consumed by the surging tide of fire.


    The witcher-knights were humans with blood and flesh after all. Without the protection of their shields and the blessing of their faith, even the most exceptional magic resistance would be no more than a joke before the savage fireballs!


    Fireballs exploded everywhere, sending blood and flesh sshing in every direction!


    The witcher-knights targeted by the Chain Fireballs had no means of escaping the area that was ravaged by mes. Their bodies, along with the bodies of the magic colts beneath them, would be torn into unrecognizable pieces of flesh in a matter of seconds.


    Moreover, the runic arrows they shot in retaliation were mostly blocked by the Magma Shields constantly spinning around Greem¡¯s body. Ever since Greem¡¯s protective spell had been upgraded from the Fire Shield, to the Inferno Shield, to the current Magma Shield, his defensive strength had gone up exponentially.


    Now any attack with less than 150 points of damage had no chance of destroying the Magma Shields in one shot. Attacks that dealt less than 150 damage could still deal some harm to the shields. However, the shields quickly regenerated as Greem continuously used his Spirit to repair them.


    As such, even though the Magma Shields had already been filled with runic arrow, they were unable to wear away at its defensive strength.


    Even the asional arrows that made it through were unable to pierce the magma armor on Greem¡¯s body. As intense waves of me surged out from Greem¡¯s body, those arrows would be burned white hot before melting like wax and turning into puddles of molten iron.


    On the other hand, there were witcher-knights that tried to charge forward and engage in close range with Greem. Greem¡¯s answered that with a flurry of strikes from his me whip. The me whipposed of pure and concentrated mes would cause intense burns wherever it hit a person¡¯s body. If it managed to wrap around a knight¡¯s body, Greem would immediately set the person on fire the very next second.


    Greem might be an elementium adept, but when he transformed into the frightening me Fiend he would have astoundingbat strength that rivalled the actual Abyssal me Fiends. Fireballs were his means of attacking from a distance. The me whip was his answer for fools that tried to close in. Any closer, and Greem would use his colossal burning executioner¡¯s de.


    A three meter tall me humanoid waving around a massive executioner¡¯s de made of me and magma was enough to cut down swathes of enemy without the use of any battle techniques.


    It was such a dominating weapon that even being close to it would cause one to feel an overpowering sense of oppression, as well as a burning sensation that ravaged the entire body. Moreover, Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire extended for thirty meters around him and was a domain-type spell. Any living beings made of flesh and blood that came within thirty meters of himself would have to endure fire damage as high as 13 points per second.


    This also meant that a fit, empty-handed human male entered Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire, he would die before two seconds had passed. The witcher-knights fared slightly better, but even they could only endure the burning for twenty-seven seconds at the very best. Moreover, this was with the help of the armor of faith. Otherwise this duration would be cut in half.


    Everywhere he went, Greem would leave behind the struggling shapes of countless witcher-knights. And everywhere he walked past he would leave behind the charred remains of squad after squad of witcher-knights.


    Of course, Greem¡¯s unscrupulous and bloody killing had drawn the anger of the radiant knights. They pped their horses and raised their runic longswords, bright as torches, high above their heads and roared as they charged towards him.


    Greem had no intention of confronting radiant knights.


    Every time this happened he would pause for a moment, and with a st of magical mes his massive ming body would vanish. The very next second, the terrifying me Fiend would appear in another area a hundred meters away.


    The messy, chaotic battlefield was clear as day like an open book in Greem¡¯s mind, with the wind critters looking on from above and the y golems below. Not a single change in any of the battlefields within one and a half kilometers of Greem could escape his perception.


    Every second, countless streams of vague information would flood in from the numerous points of consciousness Greem had established on his golems. And with the chip¡¯s filtering and analysis of the massive amount of data, Greem was able to clearly grasp an understanding of the battles around him. This allowed him to constantly go where it was the most advantageous for him.


    The battlefield he entered would never have radiant knights fighting in them. The path he walked down would never put him within arge group of spellbreaker knights. As for those determined witcher-knights¨C as long as they didn¡¯t band together in excessivelyrge numbers, they were unable to cause any real harm to Greem.


    The battlefield was chaotic, with numerous opportunistic adepts sneaking into the battles to start a ughter along with the hordes of y golems and voodoo beasts rampaging about the enemy lines. Even those radiant knights that wanted to pursue Greem could only chase behind him for a bit before having their attention drawn away by a new enemy and falling into another round of battles.


    Through the sacrifices of arge number of y golems and voodoo beasts, Greem turned into a predator on the battlefield, fearlessly hunting his prey!

 Chapter 223

    Chapter 223 A Disy of Power


    Greem shook his head when he saw Knight Windsor standing at a distance, engulfed in the bright radiance of runic energy. With a single Fire Teleportation, he left the spot.


    A hundred meters away, in an area sparse with trees, a group of a hundred witcher-knights under the lead of two spellbreaker knights were hacking away at a group of wolf-like voodoo beasts.


    All of a sudden a halo of mes exploded amongst their ranks.


    A bright red light shed before his eyes and as everything in his vision blurred and shook, Greem appeared on the scene.


    Once everything in his vision started to stabilize, Greem straightened his body and looked at the witcher-knights around him still seated high on their magic colts. A wicked grin appeared on his face made of me and magma.


    A light-red Ring of Fire sted outwards from his body, instantly covering an area thirty meters around him. All the trees, bushes, vines, and nts in the area started to wither and burn. Even the ground itself became scorched earth.


    Weng. Weng. Weng...


    The sound of snapping bowstrings rang out from runic bows as runic arrow after runic arrow, shrouded in concentrated ice energies, froze the Magma Shield into a bright blue shield of ice. asionally, three or four runic arrows would slip through and embed themselves in Greem¡¯s thick body of mes, leaving a fleeting blue sh in the sea of bright red mes.


    Greem roared loudly, waving the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter in his hand continuously. He summoned the terrifying ten-meter tall Fire Deity before tapping the scepter once more and ferociously bombarding the area around him with violent Magma Fireballs.


    The courageous witcher-knights wove about his body, using their ice longswords to leave striking sword cuts on Greem¡¯s body and shield every time they passed by. However, the only thing waiting for them was the violent and savage Magma Fireballs and Chain Fireballs.


    Greem had realized that those so-called ¡®powerful¡¯ and ¡®devastating¡¯ spells had no ce on a chaotic and dynamic battlefield. There was no time or space to cast such spells.


    You would lock onto a worthy enemy and start chanting and preparing a powerful spell such as the Fire Core Explosion. However, the moment you were done preparing, you would awkwardly realize that the enemy had long since ran away, or that another wave of enemies had appeared before you, hiding your target from sight.


    Whenever this happened, your only choice would be to waste the powerful spell on some low-level, weak ¡®trash¡¯ that wasn¡¯t even worth killing. This was intolerable for the adepts! They had to precisely manage every bit of their Spirit consumption at every moment!


    However, a mere elementium fireball, while quickly cast andunched, only had an attacking strength of a mere 30 points. It was hard to deal lethal damage to the enemy through their armor of faith and knights¡¯ armor with such a weak attack.


    After some consideration, the swiftly cast yet sufficiently powerful Magma Fireball be the natural choice for Greem¡¯s battlefield ughter!


    The Magma Fireball itself possessed 45 points of fire elementium damage, along with around 15 points of physical damage when the fireball exploded. Moreover, the fireball sentva sshing in a ten meter radius. With the 30% me damage increase from his me mastery, Greem forcefully elevated a simple and crude fire spell to a powerful area-of-effect spell.


    If a witcher-knight was hit directly by a Magma Fireball, his mortality rate was a 100%. Meanwhile, those individuals that were engulfed by theva ssh in the ten meter radius also had a mortality rate of 34%. On the other hand, while much stronger than the witcher-knights, the spellbreaker knights did not dare to engage Greem within the sea of mes either.


    Greem¡¯s me Fiend Transformationbined with the Ring of Fire was too overpowering. The witcher-knights did not dare to even enter the area covered by the faint red light, choosing to roam around the outside while retaliating with their runic bows.


    Only the two spellbreaker knights, along with four or five fearless witcher-knights, dared to charge to Greem¡¯s side and trade blows with him.


    The Magma Shield floating around his body was finally unable to endure thebined attacks of the two spellbreaker knights and exploded into several magma pieces. Greem¡¯s body had also sustained a dozen shes from the witcher-knights.


    Intense me waves and terrifyingva surged out from the shes, instantly igniting a witcher-knight stopping by Greem¡¯s side. He held his charred face filled with blisters in his hand as he crouched on his magic colt, screaming as he escaped from the battlefield.


    Greem, on the other hand, let out several muffled grunts.


    After all, once he hadpleted the me Fiend Transformation, the me andva on his body was equivalent to his blood and flesh. Continuous attacks would cause damage to him even with his now boosted Physique.


    Greem violently ordered the Fire Deity to self-destruct. Taking advantage of the enemies being stunned by the ensuing me shockwave, he quickly cast a spell and instantly killed a spellbreaker knight with a powerful Fire Core Explosion. He then re-positioned himself in a st of fire.


    Greem didn¡¯t choose the middle of the witcher-knight as the destination of his Fire Teleportation this time. Instead, he appeared in the woods beside a group of three hundred witcher-knights.


    The sudden explosion of his me halo was still as conspicuous as ever. As a result, the moment Greem appeared, he was instantly greeted by a hail of ice arrows and four or five savage energy des.


    The Magma Shield Greem had just concentrated around himself once more instantly started to tremble and fall apart.


    Greem grit his teeth and endured this series of attacks as he waved his scepter and summoned another Fire Deity. Then he raised his right hand high above his head andunched a Magma Fireball at the group of witcher-knights.


    The knights, however, were clearly prepared. Another wave of ice arrows and energy des instantly shredded the Fire Deity to pieces, sting the Magma Fireball in the air and causing it to explode in a cloud of mes as it did so.


    Greem let out another muffled grunt. The Scroll of Voodoo in his left hand started to flip rapidly before stopping on a page with a Meteor Shower stored within it. Greem hesitated for a moment, as he was still unwilling to waste this powerful instant-cast spell on this group of witcher-knights. He could only wait for the cooldown of Fire Teleportation before moving away once again.


    There wasn¡¯t just one or two adepts roaming about like Greem in this chaotic battlefield. Every adept that dared to fight alone had their own unique style ofbat, as well as their own unique means of ughtering enemies.


    The ones that drew Greem¡¯s attention the most were Acteon, Marite, and Hyde.


    After going just a few days without seeing him, Evil Bugs Acteon¡¯s abilities had improved significantly.


    There were no longer just ordinary scorpions and flying bugs swarming around him. Thrown into the mix were a group of odd beetles half as tall as a man, with ck shells and green wings. The ck shells on these beetles were extraordinarily tough. Even the witcher-knights shining runic longswords could not deal any damage to them, only leaving behind a shallow mark on the shells.


    The knights needed to hack away at the same spot numerous times before they could pierce through the armor and deal lethal damage. On the other hand, this group of strange beetles only needed to from groups of two to three and they could easily tear apart a witcher-knight.


    Even the armor of faith could not stop the beetles¡¯ sharp ws from piercing the knights¡¯ bodies.


    Greem saw with his own eyes the toughness of these beetles. A ck beetle was hit by a spellbreaker knight¡¯s violent me de. It flipped about in the air several times before regaining its bnce, with no damage done to its beetle shell. This clearly demonstrated that the outer shell of the ck beetles had even more resistance towards elementium and energy damagepared to physical damage.


    Carcass beetles!


    Who knew that Acteon had actually managed to cultivate a swarm of them.


    Even Greem grimaced when he looked upon the three dozen carcass beetles swarming about Acteon. He started to slowly think about how he would win if he battled with Acteon.


    On another battlefield one and a half kilometers away, the adept known as Marite had also drawn Greem¡¯s attention.


    Marite¡¯s movements were slow and stiff. However, he was still able to remain mobile with his ability of teleporting between trees.


    His style ofbat was not as violent and unrestrained as Greem¡¯s. Instead, there was an indescribable wickedness and ruthlessness to it.


    He would hide within the trees, waiting for small numbers of witcher-knights to walk by before gaining control over them with his strange puppet strings. After doing so for some time, he would gather a witcher-knight squad of around twenty or thirty men beside him.


    He would then direct this group of puppet knights to attack other witcher-knights. What happened next would be an internal conflict between knights!


    Should the witcher-knights ever pull their punches against the friends they knew so well, against their allies betrayed expressions of pain, they would likely die under the swords of their panions¡¯.


    However, it was obvious that the sess rate of Marite¡¯s puppet strings when controlling witcher-knights was not very high. Moreover, the number of puppets he could control was limited. Thus, the battlefields he was involved in were hardly ever as conspicuous as Greem¡¯s, with his me Fiend Transformation.


    The other person that attracted Greem¡¯s attention was the powerful Boss Hyde.


    He looked like a robot with metallic tentacles all over his body. Sharp tentacles gleaming with a metallic sheen danced about everywhere around his body. Every witcher-knight that stepped within twenty meters of him would be pierced by numerous sharp tentacles.


    These sharp tentacles had been enhanced with Spells of Piercing and were not something the knights¡¯ armor could defend against.


    They danced in the air, agile and lithe as if they were metallic serpents,unching terrifying piercing attacks from any angle around their enemies. On the other hand, the runic longswords of the witcher-knights, steeped in runic energies, could do absolutely no harm to the tentacles other than sending bright sparks flying everywhere.


    When the enemies surrounding him reached a certain number, countless spinning des would swarm out from within Adept Hyde¡¯s body, forming a scary wall of des around him. And all Adept Hyde needed to do was to quickly walk through the ranks of the knights with the wall of des around him.


    With a single charge he could cut through the entire formation, leaving behind him a bloody path filled with severed limbs.


    If he met an enemy he was unable to beat, Adept Hyde would instantly turn into a metallic top, drilling into the ground and escaping into the distance.

 Chapter 224

    Chapter 224 A Strange Battlefield


    Compared to the numerous odd tricks up the adepts¡¯ sleeves, the means of fighting avable to the knights of this world were way too primitive and crude.


    Even though the spellbreaker knights and the adepts were of the same grade, and weren¡¯t too different in terms of their level of strength, they had no methods of restricting and containing the adepts other than a couple of their battle techniques such as their me des, Explosive Cross shes, and Crescent Moon shes.


    Inparison, the adepts had confusingly strange spells and unthinkable means of ughter. Together, these factors allowed the adepts to easily kill a spellbreaker knight with a single wave of attacks.


    The difference in power between beings of a higher ne and beings of a lower ne was immensely huge, even whenpared with the same grade!


    With no other choice, the eleven radiant knights could only split up. Each one of them tagged an adept and followed closely behind their target. This effectively stopped the adepts¡¯ hunt. Yet at the same time, doing so split up the knight army¡¯s most powerful fighting force.


    Once all of the radiant knights had been lured away, the numerous arrays hidden underneath the battlefield finally activated simultaneously.


    Corrosive acid swamps, wends with poison mists, bloodsucking forests filled with vampiric magic vines, quicksand traps... all these terrifyingnds of death started to appear one after another, filling up every single piece ofnd in this stretch of forest.


    The numerous voodoo beasts and ghouls even took advantage of this unique geography that had sprung up to start guerri warfare against the witcher-knights. Once a witcher-knight was lured into these areas, there was almost no chance for them to escape alive.


    A radiant knight had charged into a bloodsucking forest to save a dozen-man knight squad and faced the most horrifying nightmare of his life in there.


    Countless bloodsucking magic vines burst out from the ground, wrapping towards him from every direction, their vines gleaming with a metallic sheen. Moreover, dreadful thorns filled the surface of each and every one of those vines, and a horrifying mouth with sharp teeth could be seen at the tips of the vines.


    The radiant knight had to endure immense danger before managing to escape, horribly disheveled by the experience. When he made it out, there were still a few severed vines on his armor. These vines continued to wriggle and move, their sharp wooden thorns scratching against the metal parts. The knight¡¯s magic colt, on the other hand, had beenpletely covered in a nasty green sap. Wisps of green smoke from corroding flesh rose from its body, letting out a pungent odor.


    The knights¡¯ leader Windsor gazed at the battle from a distance and saw with his own eyes how a group of eight witcher-knights had fallen into an acid swamp when chasing after some voodoo beasts. Half of the knights had identally fallen in along with their colts, and werepletely dissolved into skeletons within a dozen seconds. The rushing ghouls tackled the remaining knights to the ground, starting another round of bloody fighting.


    There were also the forests filled with poisonous mists. A witcher-knight squad walked into the mist, and one could only hear the angered shouts and roars from within, along with the howls of savage beasts. Not one person could see what was happening inside. That squad of witcher-knights never appeared again.


    Several deadly pieces ofnd were like death traps that ate humans whole. Any witcher-knights that walked into them would not be able to walk away unscathed. Moreover, the traps had split the wide forest into separate and smaller battlefields, causing the witcher-knights to be unable to rally again andunch their massive charge!


    "Sir?" Windsor grimaced at the sight and turned to the Holy Knight Willis.


    "Have them push forward while keeping an eye out for the hazardous areas. No matter what, we must crush the enemy¡¯s adept tower! I¡¯ll have the dragon knights act in coordination with you.¡± Willis¡¯ mighty figure stood tall on the back of the green dragon Aufreyr as he replied determinedly.


    "Then I¡¯ll lead the army at the front. It¡¯s up to you here, Sir!"


    Already, after a mere hour¡¯s battle, almost six hundred witcher-knights had already fallen in these woods. Their sacrifices had only caused the deaths of around a thousand voodoo beasts and ghouls.


    Those evil adepts, on the other hand, were like poisonous snakes hiding within their pitch-ck holes, waiting silently for the best opportunity to attack. When you finally saw them, it would most likely be their vanishing silhouette after they dealt a killing blow.


    Windsor, who had beenmanding the army from the back, was finally unable to hold back his anger when he saw all this. He led the 1500 men in the reserves and charged forward fervently.


    Holy Knight Willis stood behind the army, raising his head and letting out an odd and resonating roar. Three green dragons hiding in the woods behind him took to the skies amidst the roars, carrying the dragon knights on their backs. They unfurled their massive, leathery wings and rapidly glided across the canopy, swooping towards the magic traps on the battlefield.


    Every time they flew over those areas, they would open their mouths wide and let out a massive dragon¡¯s breath. The dense green poison dragon¡¯s breath would sink into the acid swamps and poisonous mist forests, ravaging the entire area.


    Countless voodoo beasts would run out, screeching in pain, as green poison mist slowly rose from their bodies. They never ran far before the ghastly miasma took their lives. One after another, the voodoo beasts copsed in the forest, their bodies rapidly rotting and falling apart. It was a horrifying scene to behold.


    The ghouls were undead beings themselves and were therefore immune to poison attacks. They climbed up to the canopy with their agile bodies, jumping from the treetops, trying to grab onto the dragons¡¯ bodies and drag them to the ground.


    Most of them were unsessful and were sted away by the violent winds stirred by the green dragons¡¯ flight. Even the asional ghoul that managed to grab ahold of a dragon would be split in half by the dragon knight riding on the back.


    The green dragons continued to dive downwards, spewing their poisonous breath before pulling back up and going for a dive once more.


    After two or three waves of such attacks, the magic arrays hidden in the ground were finally destroyed. Some of the magic traps started to falter, and the woods returned to normal. However, the pale-white bones and charred bodies left in the empty spaces of the woods served as a clear reminder of the terrifying events that had taken ce there!


    ............


    Inside the war tower.


    A dozen adepts were busily and frantically working.


    Their movements were rushed, but not disorderly. Each of them wasmanding arge group of robotic beasts, trying their best to finish thest bit of construction.


    The battle on the frontline was well underway!


    The voodoo beasts that the adepts¡¯ base had umted over the past fifteen days had been mostly exhausted. And while the elite ghouls were powerful, they were few in number, rendering them inconsequential in such arge battle.


    With no other options left to them, the adepts at the frontline could only rely on the arrays they had set up earlier to hinder the enemy¡¯s progress. However, with the interference of the dragons, the magic arrays were slowly being destroyed and the situation on the battlefield was quickly souring!


    The battlefield had slowly inched forward from two and a half kilometers to a mere kilometer away from the adepts¡¯ base. Some scattered witcher-knights had already been able to break into the area of the base. Even though they had been immediately exterminated by the numerous guards, it still fully highlighted that the adepts were running out of time.


    One hour? Half an hour?


    If they were unable toplete the construction of the war tower beforerge numbers of witcher-knights flooded into the base, then the fragile tower would not be able to endure the assault of the dragons!


    Thus, when the rms from the frontline consecutively went off, all of the n adepts brought out their best efforts, working hard toplete the tower.


    There were a male and a female in a hidden room within the tower. The two Third Grade adepts stood before Adept Sarubo¡¯s human-shaped projection, silently conversing.


    "Lord Sarubo, let us go out to hold back the enemies for a bit! As long as we are able to eat away at one or two of the dragons, we should be able to slow down their progress. This will give us more time toplete the tower!" The one speaking was a female adept in a green robe, her face hidden behind green mists. However, the greed and excitement in her tone when she said the word ¡®eat¡¯ was very obvious.


    The purple-robed adept standing beside her hadn¡¯t hidden his face, but the strange purple eyes spread all over his body sent chills down the spine. Numerous blinking purple eyes could be seen on his neck, face, and his hands. Moreover, it was clear that these eyes weren¡¯t some sort of carving or tattoo, but actual eyes.


    Whenever the eyes were opened wide, and rolling about looking in every direction, anyone would feel a chill right to the bones, feeling fear and respect that came from the bottom of their heart!


    "Indeed, Lord Sarubo. Let me and Sanazar go out and rampage through the enemy ranks. Exterminating those dragons should not be a problem!" Surprisingly, the purple-eyed adept that seldom spoke opened his mouth and agreed with hispanion.


    "No! The two of you rely too much on your physical strength. Even now, you still have yet toplete your analysis on the different narws. How much of your prowess can you disy under the suppression of these narws?" The human projection finally opened its eyes and asked coldly.


    The purple-eyed adept frowned before replying uncertainly, "Around 45%, I would say!"


    The green-robed female adept gave a forced smile, "I can only use 35% of my full power."


    "Hmph... " The projection snorted in disdain, "With this little strength, you are, at best, at the peak of Second Grade. It might be no problem for dealing with a few tiny dragons, but if you expose your strength now, the Fourth Grade Holy Knight might choose to act!"


    "Sir, since they have already arrived, why are they not attacking with all their might? What is that Willis fellow waiting for?" The purple-eyed adept asked, puzzled.


    "Kehkehkeh. You think he doesn¡¯t want to act? I¡¯m the one who¡¯s intimidating him! I¡¯ve split a strand of my Spiritual consciousness and have been using it to pressure and intimidate his will ever since he stepped foot into the woods. This will cause him to feel an unknown terror, yet be unable to find the cause of it. It is because of this that he has be so conservative and passive. Otherwise, he would have brought the dragons and charged straight towards the adept tower the moment the battle started. Do the two of you think you could stop his attacks?"


    The Third Grade adepts looked at each other, and the respect they felt for Lord Sarubo became even more reinforced.


    To be able to nt the seed of an idea and a feeling within the mind and will of a Fourth Grade nar powerhouse without him noticing, and being able to affect his important decision-making in doing so. This kind of ability was unthinkable!


    The two adepts no longer spoke, but shut their eyes and continued to analyze those annoying nar shackles.

 Chapter 225

    Chapter 225 Defensive Battle


    The mes of war had slowly inched forward!


    Several areas along the defensive lines had been breached. The witcher-knights rode tall on their magic colts while waving their blinding longswords, frequently appearing at the edge of the adepts¡¯ base. They engaged in deadly battle with the voodoo beasts, robotic beasts, and ghouls standing guard there.


    If the surroundings of the base hadn¡¯t been littered with numerous magic traps, the hordes of witcher-knights would probably have long since swarmed into the base and started their siege on the war tower.


    Even so, the space left for the adepts to maneuver themselves was slowly decreasing as the frontline gradually closed in to the adepts¡¯ tower. A final fighting force was slowly assembling in front of the gates of the tower. Thirteen adepts were defending this spot to their deaths, not giving even an inch of ground.


    Over three hundred summoned beasts and puppets of all kinds were active in this t, five hundred meter wide battlefield. The weaker voodoo beasts and robotics beasts had already fallen under the butcher¡¯s de of the witcher-knights.


    The forest to the side of the tower had received even more devastating damage. Vast stretches of me and ferocious storms were raging everywhere. Once the violent mes had started it was hard to extinguish them. In the blink of an eye, the woods in a radius of several dozen kilometers had been engulfed by a sea of fire.


    Squad after squad of witcher-knights scrambled out of the forest, rallying outside the adepts¡¯ base.


    There were still burn marks on their bodies and faces, left by the licking of mes, while fine cuts and scratches left by wind des could be seen on their armor. Even though walking through this horrifying ce had caused them severe losses, they still pushed forward with all their strength while keeping the hope of victory and hatred for the adepts fresh in their hearts. Finally, they arrived at the base of the domineering adepts¡¯ tower.


    The witcher-knights gathered in pairs as well as groups of three, replenishing and reorganizing their ranks. The nine radiant knights took the lead and led barely four thousand witcher-knights to continue their charge through the adepts¡¯st defensive line.


    If one turned back to look at what had been left behind on the path here, they would see that the losses were devastating!


    In this narrow strip of forest was less than five kilometers long, yet the massive knights¡¯ army had paid the price of two radiant knights, thirty-three spellbreaker knights, and two thousand witcher-knights to get here. Such terrible losses had exceeded everyone¡¯s expectations!


    This stretch of forest had turned into a graveyard. Everywhere you looked, you could see the broken corpses of witcher-knights and the scattered remains of their loyal colts. Now, all was being consumed as the forest fire spread throughout thend.


    If it hadn¡¯t been for the dragons¡¯ and dragon knights¡¯ continuous destruction from above that destroyed most of the adepts traps, the casualties would likely be significantlyrger!


    Compared to the sacrifices of the knights, only two adepts had fallen in battle.


    This also meant that there were a total of seven adept casualties out of those sent to the knights¡¯ ne by the Sarubo n. This... this was extremely close to the mental baseline that the n¡¯s higher-ups had set for themselves. Once the losses were more than nine, the n wouldn¡¯t be able to rapidly exploit this ne even if it did manage to conquer it.


    The roots of the n in the World of Adepts needed adepts to guard this ne. The two lesser nes in their possession also needed adepts to keep them in check. Withdrawing the main force of adepts within a lesser ne for a short period of time to engage in a nar war would not cause too much effect or impact to the situation in the ne. However, if the main forces of the n were held back in a certain ce for long periods of time, or suffered tremendous losses, the rule of the n would start to destabilize.


    The sessful invasion of the knights¡¯ ne could bring about massive profits for the Sarubo n, but maintaining their grip over the ne required the presence and of a powerful force. It was the same for the other two lesser nes. If the n¡¯s main forces were gone for too long, the native resistance would start a new wave of rebellion once they caught wind of the situation. When that happened, massive losses would ensue for the n!


    Thus, after two adepts had died to the ambushes of dragon knights, the n¡¯s elders finally decided to strategically withdraw, pulling the defensive line all the way to the gates of the tower.


    As of now, the internal construction of the tower was still keeping eleven adepts busy at work. Only thirteen adepts were left standing guard before the doors, including Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen.


    The ones standing at the very front of the formation were several adepts with tough Physiques. Three of them stood at the very front, with arge swarm of summoned creatures supporting them on the side. Greem and Adept Hyde also possessed supernatural Physiques after their transformations and were thus ced on the right and left nks to help the defense.


    Most of the adepts stood inside the defensive circle, continuouslyunchingrge and powerful area-of-effect spells into the dense knights¡¯ ranks. Those adepts that weren¡¯t proficient at fighting were mostly masters of unorthodox professions. Some of them were throwing out numerous vials or summoning creatures with all sorts of odd abilities, while others dragged out their bags of spell scrolls, frantically casting them at the knights.


    Two adepts, who were masters at curses, were wildly casting, tossing curse after curse of various colors into the areas the where the concentration of the knights was the mostpact.


    The witcher-knights at the front had just gotten within thirty meters of the adepts when some disgusting and colorful curse halos fell onto their bodies. Nausea started oveing them, robbing them of all their strength. It felt like ayer of thick mud had encased their bodies, making even simple actions like raising their hands and feet immensely slow.


    This caused the knights¡¯ most ferocious push to appear in hriously funny slow-motion.


    Moreover, countless terrifying magical nts continuously burst forth from the ground, entangling, piercing, and sucking the blood of the knights, creating tremendous trouble for the witcher-knights as they struggled forward with difficulty.


    The witcher-knights in the rear couldn¡¯t charge forward with all the chaos in front. They could only sheath their des and draw their runic bows, sending me and ice arrows raining down upon the adepts¡¯ defensive circle.


    Such meager elementium damage could not possibly have been any threat to the adepts under ordinary circumstances. However, the enemies were numerous and the adepts were exhausted.


    The three body-refining adepts started to expand and grow into imposing giants. They strode across the battlefield and crushed every witcher-knight in sight under their feet, all while maintaining a protective barrier using all their strength to block the knights¡¯ long-range attacks.


    The body-refining adepts were all immensely powerful and might have been able to endure such intense and concentrated attacks. The blood giants, vine monsters, stone golems, beholders, and other such summoned creatures following beside them, on the other hand, were much weaker. One after another they fell to the ground as they fought, their backs filled with arrows before they disappeared.


    Soon, the valiant knights were able to force their way through the numerous magic traps with their bodies of flesh and blood. They broke into the adepts¡¯ defensive circle and started a melee fight with the them.


    The three body-refining adepts stood guard in front, while Greem was responsible for protecting the left nk.


    Here he had to defend a long and seventy-meter wide defensive line all by himself. All of his golem army had beenpletely exhausted in the woods earlier. The only ones that could stand before him were the Fire Lord and the Lightning Giant, as well as two pseudo-adept level water golems.


    Once upon a time, the lightning giant had been Greem¡¯s most reliable and powerfulbat golem. However, with his advancement to an adept, these pseudo-adept level golems were no longer able to keep up with his footsteps. Even if they asionally appeared on the battlefield, they would end up as disposable tools.


    Still, no matter how terrible his situation was, it was much better than Adept Hyde¡¯s on the other side.


    No matter what, Greem still had four subordinates to split his pressure with. Adept Hyde had to defend such a wide battlefield alone.


    His robotic body allowed him to have endless stamina as long as he still had Spirit. If it had been any other adept, just running around clearing up the charging knights would havepletely exhausted him.


    Back in the woods, they could still fight while running, fight while flying, or just switch to another area when they met someone they couldn¡¯t defeat. Here, even if the enemy was a squad of spellbreaker knights, the only thing that could be done was to grit your teeth and push forward, defending the base with your life.


    Reinforcements? As long as no radiant knights appeared, the Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen would never lift a single finger.


    Thus, Greem was fortunate enough to be able to spare some of his attention to appreciate the might of Adept Hyde.


    If one considered the nature of adepts, one woulde to the logical conclusion that Hyde had hidden part of his powers. However, when the ones charging at him were a group of five spellbreaker knights, hiding any strength would be a difficult task. That is, of course, unless he no longer wanted to live.


    The very next second, Adept Hyde turned into a massive squid with a dozen thick, metallic tentacles. With the exception of his head and smaller portions of his body concentrated in the center, retaining their human shape, the other body parts quickly reassembled into several deadly sharp metallic tentacles, furiouslyshing towards the spellbreaker knights.


    No wonder Thunderbird had called him Boss Hyde. He definitely had overwhelming might when it came to melee fighting. Under Greem¡¯s stunned gaze, Boss Hyde sliced the five attacking spellbreaker knights into scattered pieces of flesh.


    Moreover, the price he paid in return were only some trivial wounds!


    Three of the metallic tentacles had been cut off, while another two had sustained different degrees of damage. When Adept Hyde transformed back from squid form to his human form,rge areas of his body¡¯s surface were missing. The numerous rapidly spinning gears and bearings in his body started to creak and grind, as if the running of his machinery had started to fall apart.


    At this moment, Greem¡¯s luck seemed to havee to an end!


    A radiant knight appeared before him, leading two spellbreaker knights and a hundred witcher-knights in a savage sprint. They roared and let out battlecries as they rushed forward. At this moment, Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen was having a massive fight with two radiant knights at the front of the defensive circle. Even the three body-refining adepts had to silently retreat from the area.


    Due to the limited space on the battlefield, the me Fiend Greem transformed into found it difficulty to create a magma pool that was vast enough to hinder the enemy, while the golems under his control were not sufficient enough to hold back such a powerful assault.


    Greem could only bet with his life on the line, shouting as he prepared to fight!

 Chapter 226

    Chapter 226 zing Light


    With Greem¡¯s current strength, transforming into his me Fiend form would cause all of his body¡¯s attributes to increase exponentially, making him much more powerful.


    However, everything has two sides to them!


    It was exceptionally hard to control the massive body of his me Fiend form, causing Greem¡¯s movement and attack speed to be severely reduced while he was transformed. The power of his attacks may have increased, but he was much slower. If he met agile opponents like Mary in this form, his attacks wouldn¡¯t be able to hit their mark.


    Then again, the me Fiend¡¯sbat style was more focused on defense and counters, and was therefore much less reliant on his speed.


    Violent fire spells bombarding enemies from afar was the long-rangedbat style. Mid-ranged fighting was a mix of the me whip and instant cast fire spells. If the enemy managed to close in, then the tandem use of theva pool and Ring of Fire would still deal massive damage to the enemy.


    Unless the opponent was immune to fire, they could only endure the terrifying me damage while also hacking away in a furious skirmish with the Greem¡¯s me Fiend Greem form.


    As such, Greem didn¡¯t try to avoid the swarming enemies when they charged at him. Instead, he let out a devastating roar and prepared for battle.


    The very existence of the me Fiend itself had turned the area he was standing at into a ck and red world of magma. Burning waves of me shot up from the ground everywhere. He stood in the boilingva and bent to pick up a gigantic magma rock from the ground. It was five meters wide and four meters thick. Greem held it before him and used it shield his body.


    With the temporary magma shield, Greem was able to bear the ice arrow bombardment of the one hundred knights.


    Meanwhile, the two water golems behind Greem had cast a snowstorm in the path of the knights. Savage des of ice and snow whirled within the chilling winds and covered the knights¡¯ bodies in ayer of ice crystals.


    Some knights with weaker resistance had even been frozen to the spot along with their magic colts, with no other option left to them but to raise their energy shields and bitterly endure being sliced by the sharp ice. Most of the witcher-knights were able to make it through the snowstorm sessfully, and appeared before theva pool where the magma bubbled and the mes burned.


    The radiant knight who led the charge was a middle-aged man with firm muscles all over his body. He had short dark brown hair, intense eyes, a straight nose, and a wide mouth. One look and you could tell he was a tough and stubborn man.


    He let out a shout, and the magic colt stood up on its hind legs as two energy des shed from 20 meters away at the massive magma shield Greem was holding.


    Shattered rock flew everywhere as magma sshed in all directions. A deep cut in the shape of a cross appeared on the shield.


    Greem peeked out from behind the shield and revealed a wicked smile. A magma fireball the size of a washbasin whistled through the air and flew towards his opponent. Sadly, the magma fireball didn¡¯t make it to its target. Two spellbreaker knight shed out with energy des and chopped it into four pieces while it was mid air. The fireball exploded in the air, sending a rain ofva pouring down on the knights.


    As the knights quickly drove their colts away to avoid being burnt alive, the lightning giant that had been hiding in the skies suddenly appeared, bringing with it all the rage of lightning and thunder. Three or four witcher-knights that didn¡¯t manage to defend themselves in time were instantly sted to smithereens, falling sideways from their colts as their charred remains fell apart.


    At the same time, the Fire Lord that was standing silently behind Greem had also finallypleted his casting. As he raised his hands high up, a Scarlet Firestorm instantly exploded in the center of the knights¡¯ ranks and ravaged an area of a hundred meters.


    In Greem¡¯s mind, the chip had already beamed over inspection data that indicated that the eye of the firestorm had reached a tremendous energy level of 117 points.


    To Greem¡¯s understanding, the knights of this necked armor that provided them with resistances. Even the runic equipment on the radiant knights could only endure energy damage of up to 100 points, while the spellbreaker knights¡¯ armor were only able to take 40 points of damage. The witcher-knights, on the other hand, could only defend against energy damage of around 15 points.


    Such terrible armor might be enough to deal with the naturally awakened heretics of this ne. However, it seemed so frail and weak when used against these evil adepts from another world.


    Countless witcher-knights struggled in agony under thebined attacks of the Scarlet Firestorm and the lightning storm, desperately trying to escape from the spells¡¯ area of effect. Their hair, skin, and armor fused together under the sweltering heat. If they weren¡¯t able to escape from the Scarlet Firestorm within three seconds, their bodies would melt like candles into a mess... a mess of unrecognizable grey pulp!


    The middle-aged radiant knight yelled in anger as he saw all this happening around him. He leapt down from his magic colt and ran towards Greem withrge strides. The steel warboots he was wearing rapidly turned red as he stepped into theva. his powerful energy radiance shed with the intense fire elementium, sending sparks flying into the sky.


    You finally entered!


    Greem had hidden behind this provisional shield all this time, but the chip in his mind had been functioning at its maximum speed. It fed the massive amount of data it had been collecting into the battle-monitoring system and was quickly sending feedback to Greem, providing him with the most ideal action n for this situation.


    Sir F¨¹gen was engaged with enemies, while the enemy Greem had to face was also a Second Grade Knight. From the difference in the level of their existences, he had no possibility of shing with this enemy head on!


    Running wasn¡¯t an option either.


    If he abandoned his position, there weren¡¯t too many ces he could escape to. Moreover, he would have to face the anger of the adept leaders if he turned back now. Even though it was far more dangerous to battle with the radiant knight using all his strength, he would at least be able to have an excuse if he retreated from the battlefield, even if he failed to stop the knight and ended with severe injuries.


    He also had the aid of the chip. Combined with the might of the golems, it wasn¡¯tpletely imusible that he might be able to cripple or even kill this radiant knight.


    It was most definitely impossible for him to defeat the enemy with his current abilities. However, the chip gave a 17% possibility that he would be able to kill his opponent. That said, the price he would have to pay for this...


    Greem grit his teeth and made his decision when he looked at the radiant knight storming across theva.


    Kill!


    The twenty meter gap was quickly closed. Greem raised the massive magma shield with both of his hands and threw it with all his strength just as the powerful radiant knight reached him. This magma shield whistled as it flew out, smashing towards the opponent as viscous red-hotva continued to flow on top of it.


    The scalding heat wave sted towards the knight even before the stone had reached him!


    ng! A metallic sound rang out.


    A single powerful sh from a runic longsword filled with energy radiance split the one-meter thick magma shield in half. It was no longer able to bear the radiant knight¡¯s domineering strength nor the damage from the runic energies. The two halves flew past each side of the knight, grazing him as they passed by.


    The radiant knight, having cleared all obstacles between him and his enemy, took a massive leap into the sky. The shining runic longsword drew a terrifying cross in the sky, shing towards Greem.


    The me Fiend that Greem had transformed into was exceptionally tough and durable. It even had numerous magical protections and an armor of magma. However, all of these added together was not much stronger than that magma shield. If he stood still and let his enemy hack away at him, then his entire body might actually have been prated by the enemy.


    The me Fiend, its entire body made of ck-red magma and terrifying mes, took a step backwards. Its massive hand of magma reached outwards, intercepting the radiant knight¡¯s longsword.


    Aooooo...


    A howl of pain and agony rang out. Greem raised his head and screamed. The hand he extended forward had been pierced by the longsword all the way to the hilt. Moreover, the violent runic energies within the longsword were surging out, sending de beams flying everywhere and mincing Greem¡¯s entire right arm into a rain of fire.


    It was at this moment!


    The mental flux from Greem¡¯s mind quickly trembled as he endured the intense pain from his body. As he stumbled backwards, the Fire Lord behind him finally activated the spell it had been preparing for so long.


    Fire Prison!


    The moltenva Greem had painstakingly created quickly gathered and rose under the radiant knight¡¯s feet, forming a prison and trapping the knight within.


    The middle-aged radiant knight raised his head and assessed the prison before him. The entire cage glowed with a red light as the radiance of fire flowed across the entire structure. Thick magma pirs held up the walls of the cage with red-hot magma flowing down each of the pir. The space between the bars was not enough for him to escape.


    The radiant knight raised his runic longsword and a savage destorm instantly engulfed the Fire Prison. The magma pirs half a meter in diameter were unable to endure such powerful energy corrosion and instantly snapped in half. Sadly, before the knight could escape, theva in the pool surged upwards and repaired the damage done.


    During this time, the lightning giant in the skies had appeared within the prison in a sh. A blinding elementium storm engulfed the space within the prison before the radiant knight could attack again.


    The lightning giant had self-destructed!


    The ferocious tides of lightning crashed against everything inside inside the prison again and again, causing tremendous damage to the entire Fire Prison in the process. If the Fire Lord hadn¡¯t been maintaining the prison with all his strength, it would likely have copsed long ago.


    The expression of the radiant knight trapped inside quickly changed. He frantically drew from the powerful energies in his runic equipment to fill his body and endure the damage from the lightning explosion.


    At any other time, thirteen seconds might pass by in the blink of an eye. However, at this very moment, thirteen seconds felt like an eternity of suffering!


    Finally, after the explosions from the lightning giant¡¯s self-destruction had finally calmed down, the radiant knight prepared to concentrate his energy to break out from this ursed prison once and for all. At that moment, another elementium golem appeared within the Fire Prison.


    A water golem!


    The next second, ice powers that sent chills down to the very bone ravaged uncontrobly within the cage, turning the inside into a world of ice and snow.


    Eleven secondster, another water golem charged into the cage and self-destructed!


    ......


    Having endured the continuous self-destruction of three elementium golems in a row, the radiant knight coughed up blood as he hacked at the magma pirs and broke free.


    Just when he was finally able to stabilize himself, he raised his head to find an extremely menacing and blinding scarlet light staring him in the face before itpletely engulfed him.


    It was zing Light!

 Chapter 227

    Chapter 227 Exterminating a Second Grade


    A sun slowly lit up between Greem¡¯s palms.


    This wasn¡¯t any spell that Greem had cast before. Nor was it some sort of magic-infused item. It was a concentration of pure heat and light!


    Greem had abandoned all the external forms of spells and instead concentrated all of the core of his fire powers. He manifested them using the powers of narws, causing zing Light, the purest form of power, to appear.


    It didn¡¯t have the mixed physical and fire damage of the Magma Fireball, or the terrifying me shockwave of the Explosive Fireball, and especially not the amazing radius of the Scarlet Firestorm. But having abandoned all of this, what was left to the zing Light was intensely concentrated light and... heat.


    It was just a ray of light!


    Its attack radius was not wide. Concentrated within Greem¡¯s palms, it was only asrge as an egg and its external form was like a thicker Scalding Ray.


    However, when it shot towards the middle-aged radiant knight¡¯s chest, a massive hole was instantly melted in that delicate and perfect golden armor. Furthermore, the flesh and blood under the armor instantly withered and vaporized when it came into contact with the ray of light. A massive hole had been burnt in the radiant knight¡¯s stomach before he even had the chance to dodge or defend.


    The flesh, blood, tendons, and bones around the wound had also been charred ck and sealed the blood vessels. As a result, not a lot of blood appeared around the wound despite it being such a massive gaping hole.


    This was not the end of it. The extreme heat from the light ray quickly sent terrifying energy into the body of the knight. The middle-aged radiant knight felt like he had swallowed a sun. Extreme heat and light radiated from within his body. The light and heat boiled his blood and burnt his body. The excess energy continuously spread out from his skin pores.


    For this one moment, he... he thought he was almost cooked alive!


    The radiant knight¡¯s face paled. Large drops of sweat ceaselessly flowed down his forehead and face. However, before they could even drip down, they were quickly heated and turned into vapor by his boiling hot skin, vanishing without a trace.


    He roared loudly, as surging runic energies flowed from the tip of his sword and formed a barrier of pure energy before him, temporarily blocking that terrifying ray of light. Despite that,as light and heat continued to gather on the barrier, a small indentation started to form and was quickly increasing in size.


    The radiant knight held his hand over the gaping hole on his stomach while using the other hand to muster as much runic energy as he could. He stumbled backwards with all his strength, as if he was trying to escape from the attacking range of the light ray.


    Greem adjusted the direction of the light in his hands with much difficulty, trying his best to ce the focal point of the light on the knight. Unfortunately, this attack was an application of fire narws that he had just recently thought of. His use of it was extremely ungainly and controlling it was very difficult. Thus, the range of the attack was a pathetic twenty meters. zing Light had a great deal of trouble staying locked onto agile targets.


    Two spellbreaker knights charged forward on their magic colts as fast they could, trying to use their bodies to block that terrifying ray of light. They were quickly stopped by the Firelord, and a desperate fight of life and death quickly broke out between the three.


    Seeing that the enemy had almost escaped from his attack range, Greem could only wave his hand and disperse the zing Light. He had only been channeling zing Light for seven seconds, and already Greem¡¯s massive magma hands had been burnt ck as char. Even Greem¡¯s body of mes could not endure such extreme heat!


    Moreover, his right hand was the one he had just regenerated fromva. Looking at the wounds from zing Light, he would probably have to find an opportunity to regenerate it again.


    Greem looked at the stumbling and retreating radiant knight, and a cold smile appeared on his ghastly, ming face. The Scroll of Voodoo hanging on his waist silently flew into his hands and started flipping.


    Not a single one of the six instant-cast spells stored within the Scroll of Voodoo had been used from the start of battle until now. Was it not so that he could use it at a key moment? Now that there was a radiant knight¡¯s head hanging in the bnce, would there be a moment more important than this?


    With no hesitation in his mind, the flipping pages of the Scroll of Voodoo finally stopped. A bright me halo burst forth from the page.


    Fire Core Explosion!


    This single-target fire spell could be said to be the most powerful one amongst the spells Greem had mastered.


    Destructive fire elementium concentrated to their limits would suddenly explode on a spatial node, causing space to copse and create an area ofplete energy annihtion. All living beings caught within this area would suffer destructive and devastating fire energy damage. Initial estimates suggested that the fire elementium damage at the core of the explosion would reach a shocking 115 points.


    It was only because the radius of effect was only a mere one meter that it had been ssified as a single target spell!


    The Fire Core Explosion did not explode on the body of the radiant knight, as he was still protection by his energy barrier. Instead, it blew up in front of the knight. Even so, the suddenly exploding spell had sessfully annihted the radiant knight¡¯s energy shield, catching his runic longsword and right arm in the destruction.


    The radiant knight howled in agony.


    The longsword, carved full of unique runic lines, started to let out ck smoke. Some of the runes of the de itself had even been destroyed by the powerful attack. The knight¡¯s entire palm was bloody beyond belief, revealing the ck and red tendons beneath, along with his pearl white bones.


    Hua hua hua...


    The pages continued to flip.


    Another magic halo surged forth from the Scroll of Voodoo.


    Explosive mes!


    This was an area-of-effect spell that closely resembled the Scarlet Firestorm. However, the area covered by the Scarlet Firestorm was supremely massive, causing the fire damage within to be only around 30 points. It was useful for clearing wide areas of a battlefield, but it wasn¡¯t much use against a powerful enemy. Explosive mes was much more concentratedpared to the Scarlet Firestorm. Its radius was only five meters, but the damage within reached a shocking 70 points.


    This was extremely high damage that could cause dreadful wounds to most enemies!


    Without the protection of the energy barrier, the Explosive mes sessfully engulfed the radiant knight in its area-of-effect. A strange magic rune appeared beneath knight¡¯s feet, and raging me energies instantly devoured his form.


    The second spell had just been cast, yet Greem didn¡¯t even stop to observe its effects. With a slight nudge of his consciousness, the Scroll of Voodoo in his hands continued to flip.


    Doomsday Volcano!


    Fire Core Explosion!


    Meteor Shower!


    Greem activated five instant-cast spells from the Scroll of Voodoo in one go, one after another.


    As it was the most powerful spell he currently had, Greem had stored two instances of Fire Core Explosion beforehand. It it wasn¡¯t out of consideration for the varying circumstances he could face in the future that might call for different types of spells, Greem would most definitely have stored six Fire Core Explosions within the scroll!


    Even so, the activation of five powerful spells in one go had still brought about a terrifying nightmare for the radiant knight.


    It felt like five powerful fire adepts were attacking him simultaneously at that moment. Moreover, it was as if it were five of the cruelest and savage adepts that were attacking him.


    The excessively rich fire elementium concentrated in a narrow area had severely destroyed the elementium bnce there. The scorching heat and terrifying elementium fires gave him the illusion that he was trapped in a ne of pure fire elementium.


    Even a mountain of metal would melt into a pool of liquid under the assault of such powerful fire spells. How much better could a radiant knight with a body of blood and flesh fare!


    A First Grade Adept challenging and seeding in ying a Second Grade being would never happen in the World of Adepts. The strict narws and the massive difference in power caused any hopes of using tricks or superiority topensate for the difference in grade to turn into a mere dream!


    This also indirectly reflected the strictness of the Grade system within the adepts¡¯ ne.


    However, it was no longer such an absolute situation in a nar war!


    As the surging elementium mes slowly dispersed, a person that had been ravaged by the spells, so much that he no longer looked human, fell out from within.


    The blood and flesh on his body had been withered and carbonized, and the molten armor had fused with his bones, making him look like a golden skeleton from afar. The grim heat had caused his remaining bones to continuously let out white smoke, as if thisst remaining part of his existence would also crumble into ashes.


    His runic longsword, knight armor, muscr body, his short brown hair... all the traits that belonged to that radiant knight hadpletely vanished, leaving behind an unrecognizable skeleton.


    Greem stumbled and reverted his me me Fiend Transformation.


    Those short seven seconds of zing Light had eaten away at the the purest core and source of his body¡¯s fire powers. This was not something that could be recovered by drinking a couple vials of potions. The only way to recover it was to meditate diligently, day after day, in order to have a chance of umting by relying on the powers of narws.


    After his zing Light, the me spell bombardment had only exhausted to spells within the Scroll of Voodoo. It had not drained any of his Spirit. Otherwise, he might have had to watch the enemy escape before his eyes!


    However, the major exhaustion of his Spirit hadpletely robbed him of all his strength. He could only grab the golden skeleton with one hand and the Scroll of Voodoo with the other as he stumbled back towards the tower.


    "Evil Bugs, you take me Demon¡¯s position!" Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s voice rang out from afar.


    It seemed that Adept F¨¹gen was still closely monitoring the battles from behind, even as he was entangled with two radiant knights.


    With this Second Grade radiant knight as his spoils of war, no adept would still object to his ¡®desertion¡¯ in the middle ofbat. After all, putting themselves into Greem¡¯s shoes, how many among the First Grade adepts here could have the terrifying might needed to exterminate a radiant knight by themselves?


    If it had been any other adept, they would probably be hounded by the radiant knights, not to mention unexpectedly turning the tables!


    Even thosebat adepts that took pride in their abilities couldn¡¯t help but sneak peeks at Greem, even as they were engaged in their own battles. The proud Adept Hyde was included amongst them.

 Chapter 228

    Chapter 228 Acknowledgement


    Exterminating a Second Grade radiant knight?


    Some adepts might arrogantly think it possible if they hadn¡¯t had any contact with such an opponent. However, after several battles over the course of the invasion, and their multiple run-ins with the radiant knights, all of the First Grade adepts had long since given up on such impractical thoughts.


    The Second Grade knights on this ne might be slightly weaker. However, when they shed at enemies with their radiant runic longswords, even their most basic physical attacks were as powerful as 60 points of damage, when converted to the measurements used by adepts. Those ferocious knight battle techniques, on the other hand, could even reach a terrifying 120 points of damage.


    This also meant that the adepts¡¯ magical protection and elementium barriers were not enough to shield them from the knights¡¯ attacks if they got close. The mostmon strategy the knights employed against casters was to raise their energy shields above their heads and charge through the bombardment of spells. Then they would reach the casters¡¯ sides to chop them, and all would be well.


    Simple, violent, direct!


    In fact, so simple that it even seemedughable.


    But it was precisely with such a strategy that the knights were able to forcefully exterminate all the naturally-awakened casters on this ne. Until they met this bunch of evil adepts from the World of Adepts...


    Greem retreated from the battlefield, dragging the golden knight skeleton with him. Meanwhile, Acteon led his swarm of carcass beetles and took over his position. The two inevitably passed by each other.


    Acteon¡¯s face was obscured by the shadow of his hood. Only his disgusting and protruding lotus-shaped mouth part could be seen. At the instant they passed by each other, he turned and looked at Greem. He spoke with his unique screeching voice, "You are very powerful!"


    Then his gaze mildly swept past the Scroll of Voodoo in Greem¡¯s left hand, before rushing onto the battlefield with his bugs.


    The disgusting feeling Greem felt in his heart finally started to dissipate after Acteon¡¯s slimy and sticky gaze left his body. When Acteon said the words, "You are very powerful!", his bloody and maniacal gaze, his ear-piercing screeching voice, along with the hidden implications behind his words, deeply unsettled Greem.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the Fire Lord silently waiting behind him and one single powerful spell he had specially reserved to defend himself still stored within the Scroll of Voodoo, Greem might have even suspected that Acteon was thinking of attacking him!


    Even though Greem was extremely weakened now, he still reserved some strength for a counter-attack. If anyone was unable to suppress their greed, he would be sure to use his most vicious attacks to shatter their foolish thoughts.


    Adepts were likerge and greedy lone wolves. In usual circumstances, they could band together to devour the enemy. However, if anyone within their pack showed any weakness or lethargy, they didn¡¯t mind getting rid of these weaklings!


    This cruelpetition might make it difficult for the adepts to cooperate wholeheartedly, but it also seeded in repeatedly creating cruel, savage, terrifying, and powerful individuals that could face any situation by themselves.


    In aplex and dynamic battlefield, so called ¡¯teamwork¡¯ wouldn¡¯t be of very much help. In fact, it was the well-rounded adepts that had a better chance of survival. One couldn¡¯t fault the nonbat adepts for treating nar wars as a massive threat to their lives.


    In a chaotic battlefield, you wouldn¡¯t have a body refining adept to help you deflect the hordes of enemies, nor an elementium adept to erect an elementium barrier for you. You certainly wouldn¡¯t have an adept that would bring you along as they retreated... you would always be fighting alone when you were ced in a battle.


    Here you solved all the difficulties you faced by yourself!


    If you ever fell into a dangerous situation because of your own weakness, you couldn¡¯t count on any panions¡¯ to valiantlye and save you. The best they could probably do is throw a fireball in your direction and drag a few enemies down with you.


    In the battle happening currently, for example, even though the three body-refining adepts, Greem, and Hyde had set up a crude perimeter, there were still numerous small fries that made their way through. Those adepts being ¡®protected¡¯ at the perimeter had to deal with the pesky fellows in front of them while exterminating the knights in the distance.


    The auxiliary adepts thatcked self-defense abilities and had to rely on their panions¡¯ protection were the quickest to die in such a situation. Perhaps this was why most Esoteric Adepts chose to put some effort into elementium spells as well!


    The battles at the perimeter were bloody and brutal, but so were the fights within the perimeter.


    Before Greem could get his exhausted body back through the crowd of adepts, a small squad of witcher-knights charged at him while yelling a pointless battlecry. "Exterminate the evil!" Of course, they quickly fell under the Fire Lord¡¯s violent fire spells.


    The fact that Greem had an adept-level golem as a bodyguard made him pretty untouchable!


    That said, Greem had to take a surprising five minutes before he could cross a hundred meter distance. Over three dozen witcher-knights had fallen behind him.


    When Greem finally made it to the adepts¡¯ base after much difficulty, every single adept couldn¡¯t help but greet him, even as they were still engaged in their respective battles. The adepts were generous with paying respects to apanion who could kill a Second Grade radiant knight all by himself.


    Having greeted the adepts and notified Adept Keoghan, Greem slowly withdrew behind the gates of the tower. He found a safe spot within it and started a basic treatment of his body¡¯s wounds.


    He took out a Tree of Life leaf and put it in his mouth, then retrieved several bottles of ointments and started to spread them on his severely burnt hands. Greem also swallowed a bottle of potion that stimted his Spirit to facilitate a rapid recovery. It was only after he had done all this that he sat down, grit his teeth, and endured the intense pain from all over his body.


    Right now, deep in his eyes, the chip had sent out a report on the condition of his body. It was in a terrible state.


    Name: Greem


    Race: Human (Half-Elementiumized)


    Gender: Male


    ss: First Grade Elementium Adept


    Attributes: Strength 1.5 (0.4) | Agility 0.9 (0.6) | Physique 1.4 (0.5) | Spirit 1.3 (0.1)


    Condition: Spirit exhausted. Severe injuries in the process of recovery...


    The numbers in the self-report were the current actual attributes of his body. It was only whenparing the two sets of numbers that he could truly feel the damage to his body.


    Greem sat cross-legged on the ground, silently waiting for his body to recover. Meanwhile, the tall and mighty Fire Lord guarded the tower gates while helping the potions master Ferrier in his extermination of the witcher-knights that made it too close to the tower.


    It seems that the n ced quite a lot of importance on Ferrier¡¯s talent for potions. Otherwise, they wouldn¡¯t have assigned him to a rear position.


    With the aid of the Fire Lord, Adept Ferrier could finally catch a breath after having struggled until now with his unrefinedbat skills. He turned and looked at Greem, who was putting on an expression of intense agony, before tossing a small green vial to him. Ferrier shouted, "Spread it on your wounds; it can ease the burns from your source power¡¯s mes!"


    Greem caught the vial and held it before him.


    Green liquid sloshed within the transparent vial. He opened the cork, and a unique aura belonging to life energy wafted out.


    Greem lowered his head and looked at his hands. He couldn¡¯t help but smile bitterly as he shook his head.


    His white and slender hands were ck as char now. Moreover, fine cracks had covered the entire surface of his skin. If he exerted even a little force his burnt skin would start cracking, revealing the ck finger bones beneath.


    The Leaf of Life he kept in his mouth was slowly but surely healing the burns on his hands. However, the burns this time came from the violent fire-elementalws radiating from the zing Light. His hands would not be able to recover before he managed to remove the strands of narws within his wounds.


    The newly grown flesh would instantly be deprived of their moisture by the heat from the fire-elementalws, causing his hands to remain charred and burnt. Even though he was the source of these fire elementiumws, the bacsh from them due, to his amateur handling of the powers, was still extremely terrifying.


    If he didn¡¯t find a way to absorb or neutralize these strands of narws, his hands would never be able to recover. This meant that he would not be able to weave hand signs and cast spells with his hands in the short term!


    Greem poured a drop of the potion onto his left hand to test its effects. Crisp crackling sounds rang out at the very moment the fragrant green liquid made contact with his withered flesh. Pieces of charred skin started to crack. Small wisps of me rose from under the flesh and were gradually extinguished as they were engulfed by the green liquid.


    That patch of skin gradually started to heal, bing smooth and radiant once again.


    Greem nodded at Ferrier with a smile on his face. He confidently spread the green liquid all over the charred portions of his hands. As the crackling continued, strands of fire-elementalws continued to be extracted and slowly dispersed in the air. At the same time, Greem¡¯s hands were slowly recovering, bing white and slender once again.


    On the other hand, the intense pain and itching from the process of the skin breaking and flesh growing had been suppressed by Greem using his powerful Spirit. Only Greem himself fully understood the experience he was going through now!


    In the meantime, a chilly gust of wind had blown into the tower. Adept F¨¹gen, wrapped in ayer of snow and ice, appeared inside and quickly found a corner in the hall to treat his wounds.


    "This is yours now!" Adept F¨¹gen casually tossed a massive ice crystal towards Greem. One could vaguely see the radiant knight encased within. "Use this to get on the good side of that little vampire lover of yours. Who knows, maybe you will make your way into her bed immediately! Kehkehkeh... "


    Even Greem was speechless when this strict and cool high-grade adept started teasing him. That said, the perfectly preserved body of a knight was far more valuable than that worthless pile of charcoal and bones he had.


    Thus, Greem quickly kept the frozen knight! Greed was still glowing green in his eyes as he did so.


    He knew very well that this meant that the leaders of the Sarubo n had acknowledged his efforts. This was probably their gift to him for fighting with all his strength!

 Chapter 229

    Chapter 229 Ferocious Attack


    The adepts¡¯ defensive circle was shrinking.


    Now all of the adepts had been pushed back against the tower gates. They erected a sturdy elementium barrier there, barely defending against the dragon breaths from the green dragons.


    In this period of time, another adept had fallen under the de of a radiant knight.


    Ta. An illusionist that was said to have learned some wind spells as well. Sadly, his talent for illusions couldn¡¯t be utilized to their fullest when facing numerous enemies, and his simple wind spells were unable to help him escape the pursuit of his enemies.


    As such, he was bogged down by a group of reckless witcher-knights on the chaotic battlefield before finally falling under the sword of Radiant Knight Windsor.


    At thest moments of the battle, Mary, Phantom, and Demon Shadows broughtrge numbers of ¡¯reinforcements¡¯ back with them. This allowed the adepts¡¯ defensive line to endure for another thirty minutes.


    Even disregarding everyone else, just Bloody Mary alone had brought five spellbreaker knight vampires back with her.


    In their human forms, the knights had powerful defense and devastating melee attacks. Moreover, the moment they were in any sort of danger, they could instantly morph into bats and scatter in any direction. The addition of this fresh blood undoubtedly gave the adepts an opportunity to take a breath.


    The adepts retreated right up to the gates, using them as thest line of defense. The three body-refining adepts formed a solid defense along with the vampire knights. They were the meat shields for the rest of the adepts.


    All of the witcher-knights that dared to attack the gate first had to endure wave after wave of spells before they even had the opportunity to engage in meleebat with the body refining adepts. It was at this time that Greem was able to observe the body refining adeptsbat style at a close distance.


    Body Refining Adepts often appeared to be muscr men with tough bodies and intimidating size. They rarely wore the light robes of adepts, instead choosing leather or metal armor as their defensive wear. Even their choice of weapons resembled mercenaries and warriors rather than spellcasters.


    As adepts that relied on their Physique and Strength to crush enemies, the most powerful weapon they had were their bodies. Even if they knew some spells, the main purpose of those spells were to enable them to close distances and engage in meleebat.


    Their height of two meters might not be advantageous when chasing after the horse-riding witcher-knights, but if the two ever shed and charged into one another, the witcher-knights would most definitely be the ones that ended up wounded.


    All sorts of magical lights shed on the bodies of the body refining adepts. They stood intimidatingly before the gates, knocking any witcher-knights that came into their sights off their horses, before tearing them apart with their hands. No obvious injuries had been left on their bodies, despite the gant and reckless attacks of the witcher-knights.


    It was almost as if their flesh had been forged from steel. Metallic reverberations would emanate from their bodies when swords shed against their flesh.


    The only ones that were able to wound them were the spellbreaker knights.


    If it was a fair duel, the elite spellbreaker knights might have had powerful bodies that could rival the body refining adepts. However, under the numerous enhancements multiple magic halos, the attributes of the body refining adepts increased exponentially. This made them far superior to spellbreaker knights.


    What was the effect of Strength and Physique being magnified and increased exponentially?


    Greem¡¯s scanning vision had a very clear view. Every punch thrown out by these body refining adepts could deal an astounding 40 to 50 points of damage. Their full-strength attacks could even reach a tremendous 100 points of damage.


    This... this was almost as powerful as Greem¡¯s best fire spell!


    Vicious physical attacks were coupled with their imprable physical defenses. These were probably the iron tools that body refining adepts relied upon to wrestle victory away from stronger opponents!


    While these body refining adepts had mastered some spells, they were not used in order to attack the enemy. These spells served an auxiliary role, allowing them to fully unleash their physical strength.


    Moreover, these body refining adepts were not barbarians that could only use their muscles. All of the armor and weapons they wore on their bodies were magic tools that had been carefully chosen. Some of them could boost the speed at which wounds healed, while others allowed them to cast spells like wings of wind or haste,pensating for theirck of mobility spells.


    The witcher-knights had no hope of organizing into a proper formation with these three human-shaped ughter machines before them. They were tossed and scattered about like loose sand. Meanwhile, the swarm of vampire knights had found an opportunity to kill more enemies. They formed a second line of defense, along with Acteon¡¯s carcass beetles, continuously exterminating the witcher-knights that sprinted forward recklessly.


    Don¡¯t judge the body refining adepts by their muscr and barbaric appearance. They were as sly and crafty as any other adept. The moment they met a radiant knight they couldn¡¯t deal with, they would instantly retreat back towards the gates. Then it would be the adepts¡¯ turn to bombard the knights with a furious storm of spells.


    Radiant Knights might be a whole grade higher than the lot of them, but even they had to avoid the rain of spells. Their bodies and armor could only endure elementium damage below 100 points.


    Once all these spells stacked together, the damage they could wreak was extremely shocking!


    In this world, the only ones that could endure a bombardment from a dozen First Grade adepts, and make it through to ughter them, were probably those Third Grade dragon knights. Inparison, the Second Grade radiant knights were still incapable of doing this.


    As the three Third Grade dragon knights stepped onto the battlefield, the situation quickly took a turn for the worse. The gates were now at risk.


    The tower gates weren¡¯t veryrge. Their width of five meters might be enough for three or four witcher-knights to charge forward simultaneously, but it was only enough for a single dragon.


    As a result, the battle quickly intensified when a dragon and a man appeared before the gates.


    The Second Grade Green Dragon Ysondre shattered the barrier in front of the gate with a single green breath, and Third Grade Dragon Knight Jefferson walked in with firm steps.


    The first to charge at him was Kiel.


    He had obviously activated some sort of special magic, allowing him to temporarily transform into a three-meter tall giant. Unique ck armor appeared around his almost naked body, with a terrifying horn on the spaulders.


    Kiel moved forward with brutally heavy steps that sent tremors across the ground. He bent his body and ran towards Jefferson. Behind him, countless magic halos were falling towards the dragon knight like an unending rain. Most of these were single-target spells, with the asional crowd control magic.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    The horn on Kiel¡¯s shoulder had shed with Jefferson¡¯s longsword. The violent energy ripples caused terrifying creases to appear in the surrounding space.


    Jefferson stood still on the spot, not taking even a single step backwards. Kiel, on the other hand, was like a ball that had just been smacked hard, flipping about as he flew across the room. For one moment, no one knew how badly wounded he was. The adepts could only see that there wererge pools of blood left everywhere he went, along with pieces of shattered armor.


    Kiel¡¯s body was still tumbling in the air when two green magic halos sunk into his body, greatly easing the injuries he had. Three more supporting magic halos shed, and his physical body was reinforced once more.


    Kiel was able to stand up right as hended, and he began to down bottle after bottle of healing potions. Sadly, as a body refining adept, his resistance to potions had also increased exponentially. Even if he drank a gallon of potions that had once been effective in the past, the effect was still insignificant.


    That said, insignificant help was still better than none. Kiel could only drink as much potion as he could in order to recover from his wounds.


    As Kiel was trying his best to recover, the second body-refining adept Munro had charged forward!


    Once again, he was defeated in a single blow!


    First Grade Body-Refining Adepts were still too frail when pit against a Third Grade dragon knight. If it hadn¡¯t been the massive enhancements to their bodies that shortened the gap in power, just that brief contact with the knight might have caused them to die.


    The spells continued to fall on Jefferson¡¯s body like rain.


    They turned into bloodsucking vines that grew rapidly and binding him to the spot, or turned into strange clouds of mist, crackling as they corroded the forcefield of life around him. Some were even terrifying elementium spells that engulfed everything nearby in a savage elementium tide...


    Yet all of this could not stop the dragon knight¡¯s advance.


    The bloodsucking vines were like spiderwebs caught in a wheel. As Jefferson walked forward, the thick and ghastly vines snapped in pieces, sending green sap flying everywhere. The poison mist and elementium spells might be immensely powerful, but they were unable to quickly wear away the thinyer of life forcefield around him.


    This life forcefield formed, from the merging of runic and life energies, might be intangible, but it most definitely existed. It had powerful defense that vastly outssed the elementium barriers the adepts used. Be it elementium spells, curses, illusions, or soul spells, none of them were able to break through this life forcefield and damage the knight¡¯s body.


    The only way to stop the dragon knight¡¯s advance was to engage in a frontal physical assault.


    Even though every adept that charged at Dragon Knight Jefferson was immediately knocked away, they could only continue to do their best to slow his advance.


    After the three body-refining adepts had be casualties at Jefferson¡¯s hands, it was the bloodline adepts¡¯ turn.


    Once they turned into magical creatures themselves, they also possessed powerful physical strength. The only difference was that they had not learned many melee battle techniques like the body refining adepts did.


    Once Hyde with his robotic body of tentacles and Mary with her crimson shadows had been severely wounded, the only ones left were the Esoteric Adepts.


    However, whenpared to the trash-like stone golems and earth elementium that crumbled in a single hit, the strange, massive shape formed by Acteon¡¯s carcass beetles exhibited surprising strength.


    The carcass beetles¡¯ tough shells, along with their odd ability to share damage amongst themselves, allowed them to constantly scatter and reassemble, weaving about the Third Grade dragon knight and buying the adepts a lot of time.


    However, Jefferson soon ran out of patience. With a single ferocious Inferno Whirlwind sh, he suddenly turned into a storm of slicing des, and disaster fell upon Acteon¡¯s swarm of bugs.

 Chapter 230

    Chapter 230 War Tower


    The brutal battle was still ongoing.


    The powerful Dragon Knight Jefferson was finally pushed back by the adepts.


    The severe injuries inflicted on every one of them was the price they had to pay in exchange. Even Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen was no exception.


    With the adepts¡¯ help, F¨¹gen was finally able to find a chance to wound his opponent with an explosion of his ice crystals, forcing the knight out of the tower. But when yet another dragon knight walked steadily into the gates of the tower, everyone despaired!


    Goddammit!


    The adepts had lost their will to hang on and were starting to consider their escape ns. Just then, the entire war tower suddenly shook.


    Complicated and intricate magical patterns and runes simultaneously appeared all over the walls, floors, and ceiling of the hall. A long awaited elementium aura surged forth, putting the adepts at ease. It was almost as if... as if they had suddenly returned to the World of Adepts!


    Had the war tower been activated?!


    Expressions of surprise and joy appeared on the adepts¡¯ faces.


    A translucent dome of light radiating a rich elementium aura shielded the gates of the tower, trapping the shocked Dragon Knight Kalyk within the tower. A savage green dragon was furiously tackling and tearing at the dome of light from outside. Sadly, all of his attacks were futile.


    Its sharp dragon ws and corrosive breath could not do anything to that thin dome!


    Kalyk¡¯s heart was filled with fear. He turned around and shed at the dome with all his strength. He stopped his pointless actions after realizing it was all a waste of time. Instead he turned and red at the weakened adepts.


    "Little fellows, this is your misfortune!" The expression on Kalyk¡¯s face became unusually wicked, "Since I can¡¯t get out, I guess it¡¯s time for you to die! Cry! Scream! Then you can go to your deaths... "


    The adepts did not appear to be afraid at all, even in the face of Kalyk¡¯s threat. Rather, a strange smile appeared on all of their faces. Kalyk could no longer bear the strange atmosphere in the hall. He was about to step forward and start his ughter when a soft and wicked voice rang out.


    "Cry? Scream? Those sound like what you are about to do right now! Little bug of an inferior ne, don¡¯t act arrogant because you have dragons backing you. Now I, Lord Violeteye, will face you!"


    As the voice rang out, a mysterious adept in a purple rope appeared in a corner of the hall. Strange purple eyes were everywhere on his body, coldly staring at the Third Grade Dragon Knight Kalyk.


    A Third Grade Adept!


    The mental flux radiating from his body was one that truly belonged to a Third Grade being. This... this was a Third Grade adept!


    The adept¡¯s appearance caused Kalyk to feel an indescribable difort. It was as if intangible shackles had cropped up and chained him. Even breathing became difficult. Moreover, a ferocious aura emanated from his body like a violent tide, continually dissipating under the restraint of these intangible shackles. Every single one of his actions now felt feeble and weak.


    Dammit, what is this?


    Kalyk was no longer able to hide the shock on his face. His eyes started to dart about the room, looking about for the source for his weakening. However, the very next second, the Third Grade adept before him hadpleted a terrifying bloodline transformation. With a twist of his body, he had turned into a monstrous seven-meter tall purple-eyed giant.


    Its massive and bloated body. Its indigo-coloured skin. Its ferocious and wicked appearance... yet its most eye-catching feature was still the purple eyes spread across its entire body.


    As the Evil-Eyed Giant charged towards Dragon Knight Kalyk with a thunderous bellow, Adept F¨¹gen rushed up to the second floor of the tower. The other adepts quickly recovered from the magnificent sight before them and rapidly left the hall.


    This was a battle between Third Grade powerhouses!


    With their powers being as weak as they were, this group of First Grade adepts didn¡¯t even have the chance to observe the two battle. Participating in the fight was out of the question. Even the shockwaves from the fight would easily crush the adepts. The adepts quickly followed after F¨¹gen and ran.


    The adepts felt greatly at home when they ran through the crude stone tunnels, like a sort of coziness from having returned to their source ne. Even though they had managed to get used to the narws here in the knights¡¯ ne, it was only ¡¯getting used to¡¯. It was much differentpared to actually assimting with the narws here.


    Thus, when the familiar aura of their homeworld appeared in the adept tower, these First Grade adepts who had just formed their core ofws were the ones who were most sensitive to its effects.


    The core ofws was both an enhancement and evolution for them, as well as an indirect form of restriction. Without the core ofws, they wouldn¡¯t be able to easilymand the narws of the World of Adepts. Moreover, the improvement of their powers from then onwards only required them to continuously strengthen their core ofws. All they needed to do was strengthen the connection between their soul¡¯s consciousness and the nar consciousness and help the two to assimte further.


    That said, it was precisely the core ofws¡¯ existence that ced a powerful brand on their bodies and within their soul¡¯s consciousness. A soul brand from the World of Adepts.


    Regardless of how many nes they conquered, or how many worlds they had travelled to, or even the location they were at within the multiverse, their bodies, minds, and souls would always belong to that great World of Adepts!


    This was determined from the day they were born in the World of Adepts!


    It was only when they were in the World of Adepts that their souls, bodies, and minds could truly be liberated. Only in the World of Adepts could their soul be at peace and serene. If the World of Adepts ever faced a catastrophe, the adepts relying on the world would also find their paths forward shattered. Progress would be difficult.


    This was the fundamental reason for the existence of the adept faction!


    Adepts were always evil and selfish. They worshipped the umtion of knowledge and resources, but preferred to use their intelligence and vast knowledge to defeat enemies. When adepts became sufficiently powerful, they would have the ability to leave the ne and survive and grow independently.


    Yet no matter how powerful they became, the World of Adepts would always be their roots. It would always be where the source of their souls were. As such, the powerful adepts that had extended their reach to numerous worlds formed a loose faction of adepts to fight and resist the invasion of other powerful races and nes in the multiverse, in order to protect their roots and their home.


    Greem and the others had all advanced to First Grade adepts in the World of Adepts. They were chained the moment they formed a core ofws within their spiritual consciousness¡¯ space. Their soul consciousness had already been bound together to the World of Adepts¡¯ nar consciousness. Be it fortune or failure, their fates were bound together!


    Thus, even the breaths of the adepts became smoother when they were suddenly basked in the World of Adepts¡¯ aura. One could see with the naked eye countless elementium particles spreading out across the tower from the stone walls. Particles of all colors gathered around the walls, making it look like they had all put on radiant and colorful clothing.


    Greem was a fire elementium adept so the particles surrounding him were all rich fire elementium particles. As he inhaled the surging fire elementium, Greem could feel an iparable sense offort spread throughout his body and mind. It was like every single pore of his body was desperately taking in these long-awaited particles.


    This was just a vague feeling he had, but in his mind, the chip was able to give him the most objective data report on what was happening.


    "Beep, environment monitor report. Fire elementium density quickly rising...


    ¡°11%...


    ¡°12%...


    ¡°13%...


    ¡°..."


    The adepts had long gotten used to the cruel and limiting environment of this small, elementium-sparse ne. Now that this world¡¯s nar chains had suddenly been severed, all of the adepts were overjoyed. In the depths of their hearts, the sense of approval and belonging they had for the World of Adepts was quickly bing stronger.


    They were only guests in this world. Their roots still belonged to the World of Adepts!


    At this one moment, almost all of the adepts were thinking something simr.


    Violent and turbulent explosions rang out from the other end of the long corridor. Even the tower started to shake slightly. This had to do with the massive battle on the first floor, but was also caused by the ferocious attacks of the witcher-knights outside the tower.


    This war tower was a crude and simplified version, after all. Its defense could not bepared to a proper tower. Thus, the adepts could not allow the ants outside to so freely continue their attacks.


    "Mypanions, the war tower has been activated!" Adept F¨¹gen raised his arms and yelled loudly, "Now get back to your own positions, and we will let those ignorant native reptiles know our power!"


    As F¨¹gen gave an impassioned deration of war, the sound of the chip rang out in Greem¡¯s mind.


    "Detecting mental connection request. Requesting instructions from host. Connect?"


    "Connect!"


    Greem had just given his order to the chip when that uniquely cool and chilly mental flux belonging to F¨¹gen sent a set of coordinates to him.


    The adepts present didn¡¯t say any more. All of them ran to their positions.


    Greem¡¯s battle position was in a hidden magic room on the third floor.


    The inside was heartbreakingly crude and simple. With the exception of a mysterious array in the middle of the room, there was absolutely nothing else in here. No decorations or furniture at all. Several magical arrays flowing with powerful elementium energies were exposed on the tough walls of the room. Just looking from here, Greem could see the energy circuits, the energy nodes, the runic arrays, the converter arrays... all of these things, both familiar and unfamiliar, were exposed to him.


    If this was an actual adepts¡¯ tower, all of these arrays would be hidden behind a wall. Why would they ever be exposed without any protection? Greem could be sure that even a single simple fireball to the wall would be enough to cause a massive w to open up in the tower¡¯s defensive system.


    Just from this, one could infer how much of a rush the adepts constructing the tower had been in!


    The simple array before Greem was no problem for him, even though it had only been awhile since he became an adept.


    Greem stepped into the array and stood in the magic circle at the very center. A stiff, robotic voice with a strange ent spoke in his mind.


    "Wee, Adept Greem! You have been given ess to this array. You may now control this offensive array. Activate array now?" This was the voice of the spirit of this war tower. However, it seemed that it was still in its most crude and primitive stage of intelligence, which was why the offensive arrays required actual adepts to function. Without the adepts, the arrays would not be able to function at their fullest capacity.


    "Activate!"


    With Greem¡¯s words, a whole new scene of the battlefield slowly appeared before his eyes.

 Chapter 231

    Chapter 231 ughter


    The entire room disappeared from Greem¡¯s vision when he activated the array.


    It was as if the war tower had bepletely transparent. Greem¡¯s sight and senses could extend undeterred to any corner of the battlefield.


    This was a unique angle, looking down at the battlefield from high above in the air. It was like Greem had suddenly be an invisible man floating forty meters above the sky, silently observing the dense crowd and rain of runic arrows below.


    A muffled boom rang out, and a massive stone crashed somewhere close above Greem¡¯s head. Arge dragon with fine green scales all over its body flew from the skies not far away. It opened its mouth and unleashed a terrifying dragon¡¯s breath onto the tower.


    Meanwhile, the Third Grade dragon knight standing firmly on its back was waving his radiant longsword. One after another, extremely concentrated energy des shed onto the tower¡¯s structure from a distance.


    Arge crack appeared on the transparent body of the tower before him. However, it was quickly repaired under the cirction of elementium energies. Still, a fine crack was left on the surface. It was clear that the tower that had just been activated would not be able to bear much more if the opponents were allowed to continue their ferocious attacks.


    Greem let out a deep growl, and his Spirit seeped into the array beneath him. Almost immediately, massive amounts of fire elementium flowed into his body through the tower.


    Without an adept¡¯s control, such an offensive array might only be able to just keep shooting out magic fireballs at the enemies. However, with someone like Greem at the controls, the might of its attacks instantly increased by several levels.


    Wuuu...


    A Magma Fireball asrge as a te whistled as it flew out of the tower, crashing towards the green dragon flying in the sky and the dragon knight on its back.


    This sudden attack clearly shocked the two. The green dragon¡¯s massive body turned slightly to avoid the fireball attack.


    However, just as the Magma Fireball was about to pass by the green dragon¡¯s neck, it suddenly exploded.


    The next second, a violent sea ofva and magma shards devoured the two. The scattered mes from the explosion also brought about death to the knights below.


    A tragic and deafening dragon¡¯s roar rang out throughout the battlefield. The green dragon, engulfed in redva, beat its wings and flew even higher into the sky, finally seeding in escaping the Magma Fireball¡¯s area of effect. On the other hand, the dragon knight on its back had a radiant life forcefield about him. It was obvious that he had not received any damage.


    The dragon and rider were not wounded, but the witcher-knights did not have such outstanding ability themselves.


    The knights, still drawing their bows and shooting runic arrows at the tower gates, had been showered by the rain of fire from above. An area of nearly 50 square meters had been set aze. They knights could only raise their energy shields and escape the area.


    Some who were slower at running even had their clothes lit on fire and were frantically scrambling to put it out.


    Yet this Magma Fireball only appeared to be a starting gun. Another four or five spells of various colors shot out from within the war tower in the next few seconds. All of themnded right in the areas that the witcher-knights were most concentrated in.


    A strange, dirt-yellow halonded on the ground, and the six witcher-knights within the halo suddenly felt their bodies be heavier. They kneeled on the ground with muffled grunts. Two witcher-knights at the edge of the halo were able to struggle and escape. The three in the center of the halo had beenpletely ttened against the ground. Blood flowed incessantly from under their thick armor. It was obvious that all the flesh and bones in their bodies had been crushed by the terrifying gravity.


    A gray halo shed somewhere not far off. Countless strange shadows suddenly surfaced in the air. These shapes were like shadow creatures with no physical forms. They continuously rushed into the bodies of the witcher-knights within the halo. Every time a shadow entered their bodies, the witcher-knights would let out a pained grunt.


    Those that were able to escape were still saved; they only took some shadow damage. That said, those that weren¡¯t able to make it out of the halo were kneeling on the ground, coughing up ck blood everywhere. Ruptured fragments of their organs could be seen in their blood.


    What was more terrifying was a crackling st of Chain Lightning.


    When the terrifying electric serpent weaved about the crowd, every witcher-knight that came into contact with it would instantly be burnt to char and fall to the ground. Just a single attack, and nine witcher-knights fell to the effects of the frightening electric spell.


    The devastating Chain Lightning gradually dispersed after exhausting all of its energy. All it left on the battlefield wererge numbers of ck corpses and a pungent charred smell.


    Greem¡¯s face also betrayed an expression of shock at the continuous bombardment of spells.


    The terrifying might of the war tower on this battlefield was stunning!


    If he was on the battlefield, a First Grade adept like himself would have to find a way to stop the enemies¡¯ progress while killing them. Moreover, he would have had to do a fine analysis and estimation of the rate at which he was burning through his Spirit in order to reserve some strength to deal with unexpected situations.


    In all of the previous battles, Greem had only been using sixty percent of his strength when attacking the enemy. Another twenty percent was used to maintain and control the situation on the battlefield, while thest twenty was reserved for emergencies. This was a high efficiency that he managed to achieve with the golems as his helpers. If it had been any other adept, even using forty percent of their strength on killing enemies would be a remarkable result!


    But now that he was within the war tower, his safety was guaranteed. Moreover, with the endless amount of energy surging into his body from the tower, along with the enhancement provided by the array beneath him, he could almost bring out 100% of his powers.


    The me Demon! A master of me maniption!


    As a powerful elementium adept with fire mastery, the abilities Greem had chosen for himself were in fact most suited for a battlefield. Once he no longer needed to worry about his safety, and could exhibit all the might of his fire spells, the battlefield turned into an apocalyptic hell of magma.


    Arge and wide Inferno Wall sealed the tower gates. The witcher-knights that wanted to continue to hack away at the elementium barrier could only grit their teeth and endure the burning of the magical mes.


    A massive Meteor Shower instantly covered the area before the gates. Meteor after meteor crashed from the skies, smashing gigantic craters into the ground. Terrifying me waves spread out again and again, leaving no ce for the knights to escape to.


    As long as a group of witcher-knightsrger than five appeared in Greem¡¯s vision, a Magma Fireball would instantly whistle through the sky andnd squarely on their heads. It didn¡¯t matter whether the Magma Fireball exploded on its own or was intercepted by the knights. The horrifying magma rain would still pour down without exception.


    Only those perceptive spellbreaker knights and radiant knights were able to dodge the continuous bombardment of Explosive Fireballs. The only thing they could do was shift from one field of fire to another field of fire. They were constantly surrounded by exploding magic fireballs and seas of fire that rose to the sky.


    Although most of the spells directed at them were intercepted, the unique continuous burning effect of fire spells gave them no ce they could stand still on around the adepts¡¯ tower.


    It hadn¡¯t even been fifteen minutes since the offensive arrays were activated, and already two spellbreaker knights had failed to defend against the endless storm of Explosive Fireballs and Magma Fireballs, dying amidst the towering sea of mes.


    It was the same even in the sky.


    There were two Third Grade green dragons amongst the dragons circling the tower. However, the moment they tried to close in on the tower, they would be chased away by the flurry of spells. None of them dared to fly within five hundred meters of the tower.


    No matter how powerful their magic resistances were, they still had to avoid a dozen powerful spells sting towards their faces.


    The tragic scene of the witcher-knights being tortured by the endless wave of spells below the tower caused the dragon knights to be extremely upset. Regardless of how much they tried to get the dragons closer to the tower, they would be forced away by the storm of spells.


    They were able to send debris flying and make rocks crumble with every knight battle technique theyunched before the tower had been activated. But now, their violent energy des would be stopped by a shining elementium barrier outside of the tower. They couldn¡¯t inflict any damage whatsoever.


    This translucent elementium barrierpletely angered the dragon knights. All the battle techniques they fired out would be blocked by the barrier, but the spells fired from within the tower could still st towards them.


    This annoyed feeling of having to endure attacks while being unable to return them caused the two dragon knights to yell in anger. Still, there was nothing they could do.


    Moreover, theirpanion, the Third Grade Dragon Knight Kalyk, was still sealed behind those tower gates by that translucent elementium barrier. They didn¡¯t dare to imagine what he might be going through!


    The army was in utter chaos. No one had any idea on how to continue their attack against the tower. Just then, the space above the tip of the tower distorted and two silhouettes mysteriously appeared.


    A female adept in a green robe, wrapped in a cloud of green smoke, and a male adept in a purple robe with strange purple eyes all over his body. Intense mental flux radiated from both of their bodies. It was two terrifying Third Grade adepts!


    "Kalyk! It¡¯s Kalyk!" Dragon Knight Jefferson¡¯s mournful voice rang out in midair.


    They saw very clearly. The head that the purple-robed adept held in his hand belonged to Dragon Knight Kalyk.


    The armor that dragon knights always wore had disappeared. His messy hair fell haphazardly across his face. The expression on his obscured face was hideous, and blood could be seen at the corners of his wide-open eyes. The exposed injury on his severed neck was not neat at all, with blood still dripping downwards.


    From the looks of it, the head had been forcefully twisted off of his body!


    The grisly death of theirpanion sent the dragon knights into a rage. Blood instantly rushed into their eyes as they drove their green dragons forward. The other two green dragons looked at each other. They let out a long and mournful dragon¡¯s roar and followed after theirpanions.


    Four green dragons. Two of them were Third Grade while the other two were Second Grade. Along with two Third Grade dragon knights riding on their backs, this was an absolutely terrifying formation in the knights¡¯ ne. Yet at this moment, there was an odd sense of solemness and tragedy about them, as if they were about to go to their deaths!


    A dragon¡¯s roar rang out from the forest in the distance. The green dragon Aufreyr took to the skies and rushed towards the battlefield with the silhouette of a mighty knight on his back.


    The Fourth Grade Holy Knight Willis was finally unable to tolerate it any longer. He was going to fight with his own hands!

 Chapter 232

    Chapter 232 Mutated Bloodline


    The War Tower.


    Due to rushed work, the facilities here was extremely rudimentary.


    With the exception of an elementium pool that spanned five entire levels, there were no other magical facilities in the two underground levels.


    Moreover, even the currently functioning elementium pool looked extremely crude and clumsily crafted. The walls of the pool were uneven, with plenty of nt roots and rotting leaves that could be seen from cracks in the walls. It was clear that the dirt used for construction had not been properly filtered.


    Eleven adepts floated above the elementium pool, continuously retrieving magic crystals from their storage spaces and tossing them into the pool. Yet the magic crystals piling up below their feet were vanishing into the elementium pool at a speed that was visible to the naked eye.


    A standard adept tower would constantly absorb drifting elementium particles from its surroundings and gather them in its elementium pool once it was activated. In doing so, the tower would be able form a stable source of elementium energy. Part of these energies would be used for the tower¡¯s upkeep and daily energy use. The rest of the energies would umte within the elementium pool, serving as a reserve.


    The longer an adepts¡¯ tower was functioning, the more shocking the amount of magical energies it would have in reserve.


    Under normal circumstances, attacking an adepts¡¯ tower such as this one would not be worth the effort. Without a way to exhaust the massive reserves of energy, it was virtually impossible to break into the tower.


    However, the war tower had just been activated. What energy reserves could it possibly have? As such, the Sarubo n adepts could only throw inrge numbers of magic crystals to maintain its functioning and to sustain the tower¡¯s energy consumption.


    Moreover, the tower was currently in the middle of a terrifying nar war. The tower¡¯s elementium barrier had to endure up hundreds of ferocious attacks every second. All of this naturally burned away at the magic crystals within the elementium pool!


    The energy consumption was extremely high, especially when you considered the bombardment of spells every five seconds and the dozens ofrge-scale spells that sted towards the witcher-knights outside, sending them into disarray.


    All of this consumed the magic crystals in the elementium pool!


    Even with eleven adepts frantically tossing magic crystals into the pool, the energy reserves still seemed to be slowly running out. This was undoubtedly a cause for concern.


    With the rapid cirction of destructive magical energy within the tower¡¯s defensive system, there would asionally be minor explosions and damage here and there. Every time the Tower Spirit¡¯s monotone voice rang out in the room, one of the adepts would have to rush to the damaged spot to fix the array.


    There was no choice. The construction had been too rushed and the tower¡¯s defense system had barely beenpleted in the nick of time. They were already extremely lucky that the tower could function properly! At least they hadn¡¯t been blown into the skies by a major mistake in the arrays. The slight errors, on the other hand, would have to wait until this war was over!


    However, with the start of the fight between the Third Grade adepts and the green dragon squad, the energy consumption quickly skyrocketed.


    Each n adept held in their hands a magic spatial tool with massive storage. They all opened the tools to their limits and tilted them downwards at the pool. Crystalline and transparent magic crystals fell like rain from the sky, building up yet another small hill in the middle of the elementium pool.


    Mysterious and profound runic arrays floated about the walls of the pool. The arrays shed with radiant light, and the magic crystals were crushed to powder by magical energies, turning into pure elementium energy that flowed into the arrays. These energies were then sent to every corner of the tower through the circuits on the walls.


    Every time the adepts¡¯ tower shook intensely, ayer of the magic crystals would be consumed. And when the adepts in the towerunched yet another wave of magic bombardment, the magic crystals in the pool would rapidly melt, like snowkes left under the hot sun.


    The n adepts responsible for maintaining the energy supply held their emptied spatial tools with bitter expressions. They took out another storage tool from under their robes. They opened the tools by chanting their passwords, grit their teeth, and continued to pour crystals into the pool.


    It was important to note that these were from the exhausting umtion of the Sarubo n over the past hundred years!


    Every magic crystal could be be traded for 150 gold adept coins back in the World of Adepts. Even a conservative estimate would put the number of crystals they had just emptied into the pool at thirty thousand crystals. Yet this was just the start of the battle! The consumption of magic crystals would undoubtedly increase to a frightening degree as the battle continued to intensify.


    This battle was most definitely burning away at mountains of gold with every moment that passed by!


    Of course, outsiders would not be able to understand the pain and troubles of a n adept.


    High in the upper levels of the tower, a dozen adepts happily steed in their offensive arrays, using the best of their abilities to turn the continuous supply of magical energy into terrifyingly powerful spells and sting them at the witcher-knights in front of the tower.


    A bunch of knights with only arrows and longswords? Trying to attack a fully activated war tower with no siege machines or effective organization?


    Today, the adepts used their most destructive spells to educate these arrogant frogs in their wells. And their tuition fee would be... their own flesh and blood!


    Greem freely controlled the offensive array and formed the surging magical energies into one powerful spell after another. Then he used his Spirit to direct the spells andunch them at the most suitable location. With the tower¡¯s defense system active, Greem exhausted virtually none of the magical energies within his body whileunching a continuous wave of powerful spells.


    Countless auxiliary arrays had been crafted around the offensive arrays. These arrays were able to affix special effects onto theunched spells, such as range increase, prization of attributes, and pration. With these additional effects in y, even Second Grade radiant knights couldn¡¯t endure their insane magical blitz!


    However, at this moment, most of Greem¡¯s attention was still focused on the Third Grades¡¯ fight happening above his head.


    He had to retreat during the Third Grade fight in the hall previously, and was sorely upset that he couldn¡¯t see it with his own eyes. But now, two Third Grade adepts battled against a group of green dragons and dragon knights above the tower. Greem¡¯s excitement and shock was imaginable.


    One had to say that these two Third Grade adepts were absolutely terrifying existences! They were like actual demons!


    The purple-robed adept that personally killed the Third Grade dragon knight seemed to be a bloodline adept. He once again turned into a monstrous purple-eyed giant, standing above the air as the purple eyes on his body continuously shot out hundreds of terrifying purple beams. Each individual purple beam might not have been very powerful, but when a hundred of those beams were concentrated on a single person, their might was iparable.


    Greem also suspected that these purple beams had some sort of special magical effect. Otherwise the green dragons wouldn¡¯t avoid them as frantically as they were. It was almost as if the dragons themselves couldn¡¯t be immune to the effects, even with their amazing physiques.


    That green-robed female adept also appeared to be an impressive individual. With a twist of her body, she turned into a terrifying Flying Venom Dragon and forcefully fought with the dragons.


    Flying Venom Dragon? Purple-Eyed Giant?


    Greem quickly scanned through his mind and found the relevant information.


    Flying Venom Dragon. A magical creature of the poison attribute. A hybrid dragon that could go up to the Fifth Grade. If one were to truly trace its roots, it was not a pure-bred dragon. In fact, it was one of the tens of thousands of hybrid dragon races that the dragons had created.


    It was rumored that the dragons¡¯ unbridled lust and Ultimate Transfiguration, that allowed them to transform into any race, had allowed them to continue undertaking their ambitious n of ¡®seeding¡¯ the worlds, regardless of size or race. Thus, unique hybrid dragons with dragon bloodlines could be found on almost any material ne.


    And the Flying Venom Dragon was one of many hybrid dragon races!


    They looked just like a green dragon that had been skinned. The surface of their bodies were covered with ayer of pungent and viscous green liquid instead of scales, and their most powerful weapon was their terrifying venom spit. If one were to look at the racial traits of the two dragons, the toxicity of the flying venom dragon¡¯s poison was three times that of the green dragon¡¯s, while its corrosiveness was five times that of the green dragon¡¯s.


    Perhaps because they were too ugly, the progenitors of the green dragons, the Emerald Dragons, refused to acknowledge their identity as a branch of the green dragons. This caused a feud between the flying venom dragons and the source of their bloodline¨C the green dragons.


    Also, both of these dragon races had the same progenitor and source of bloodline. This meant that as long as the flying venom dragons continuously devoured their progenitor green dragons, they would be able to rapidly strengthen their bloodline powers. Every time a flying venom dragon met a green dragon, a massive battle to the death would ensue!


    The purple-eyed giant seemed to be a branch of the Ancient Giants.


    In the period of time when the multiverse had just been born, and the order within the nar worlds had yet to be established, the most powerful race active amongst the worlds were all varieties of giants.


    Sand Giants, Evil Giants, Hundred-Eye Giants, Hermit Giants, Forest Giants, Sr Giants, Oceanic Giants, Cloud Giants, me Giants, Stone Giants...


    These terrifying giants, that easily reached a hundred meters tall, had ruled the material nes for up to a million years. Sadly, with the change of the narws, their powerful strength turned into a burden instead, and the giant races quickly retired from the stage of history.


    While most of the powerful Ancient Giants had vanished, their bloodline had passed down over the tens of thousands of years, creating powerful bloodline creatures.


    Today one could still find Frost Giants, Storm Giants, Hill Giants, Cyclopes, and Hundred-Arm Giants in the material nes. These were all giants with the blood of Ancient Giants.


    However, Greem had never heard of the purple-eyed giant that the purple-robed adept had turned into. He had reason to suspect that this was most likely a mutated bloodline that resulted from some sort of magical pollution.


    This meant that this was a mutated bloodline that hade out of a magicalboratory!


    Greem could see the shadows of the ancient Hundred-Eye Giant and the Beholder in this purple-eyed giant. As for whether there were even more odd bloodlines in the mix, that was not something that Greem could tell.

 Chapter 233

    Chapter 233 Overwhelming Defeat


    Blood and flesh was everywhere on the ground.


    The dragons roared in the skies.


    The witcher-knights used to be unstoppable in their own ne, but had finallly been forced to bow down before the might of the evil adepts.


    They, who had never experienced the cruelty of nar wars, could only charge forward with their hot blood and reckless valor. Still, they were unable to smash apart that translucent light barrier glowing with elementium radiance. Meanwhile, they were subjected to a rainfall of violent spells, tragically falling one after another.


    There were as many as 3,900 witcher-knights that had made it through the forest of death and to the tower. However, with the activation of the war tower, their numbers quickly dwindled. It was merely a fantasy to dream of breaking apart the tower with just their physical bodies!


    The entire battlefield was soaked in a storm of blood as the witcher-knights fell to the ground one by one, screaming and struggling.


    There was no longer a single patch of untouchednd around the tower.


    There were only exploding fireballs, sizzling acid swamps, and blinding lightning prisons...


    Countless heads, with their expressions of shock frozen on their hideous faces, were kicked about by the scrambling knights as they ran about. Numerous broken corpses with all kinds of symptoms of deathid haphazardly about the scorched earth and pools of blood. Flesh and charred bones mixed with all sorts of filthy substances, leaving none of the corpses recognizable to anyone.


    Shattered longswords, twisted runic bows, fragmented colt corpses, as well as the broken bodies of knights... they were everywhere on the battlefield, leaving an indelible mark on any who the saw scene!


    Compared to the battle between the powerful in the skies, the battle on the ground no longer affected the oue of the war today. The future of this ne rested solely on the backs of those shapes in the sky!


    The activation of the war tower hadn¡¯t only given the adepts a tform to exert their strength to the fullest. More importantly, it used its powerful control over elementium to forcefully create a free zone around the tower that freed the adepts from the effects of the local narws.


    Here, the adepts from another world no longer needed to endure the fetters of the narws. They could finally use all of their abilities. When the Fourth Grade Holy Knight Willis magnificently appeared in the skies before the adepts¡¯ tower, a strange illusory silhouette appeared before his path.


    It was Adept Sarubo¡¯s soul projection!


    Due to the upper limit of powers within this ne, Sarubo could only exhibit prowess equal to the peak of Fourth Grade, even if he projected all of his strength here. It might not sound like much of an advantage! However, this was a Fourth Grade projection with the vast knowledge and mind of a Sixth Grade Great Adept.


    Thus, when the two finally shed, even the intense Third Grades¡¯ battle instantly lost its spotlight.


    If one said that low-grade adepts still relied on the might of powerful spells or physical strength to fight with enemies, then the battle of high-grade adepts was a matter of manipting, utilizing, and countering with narws.


    The Fourth Grade human-shaped soul projection stood silently in the air. No matter what methods Willis used, he was unable to even touch it. Be it the poison mist dragon breath of the dragon beneath him, or his own violent and ferocious knight battle techniques, they would all pass through the projection, sting the tower behind instead.


    It was like... like that human projection didn¡¯t even exist on this ne!


    As Willis contemted how to change this helpless situation, the counterattack arrived.


    The projections attack took the form of numerous grey beams. Every time one of these beamsnded on a green dragon or dragon knight, it instantly caused the affected limb to wither and the blood and flesh to die. The terrifying aura of death could only be neutralized by life energy several times greater than the aura.


    Willis¡¯ powerful knight battle techniques had lost their advantage against these odd death beams, and his fragile human form could not resist corrosion by these death energies. With no choice left, Willis roared and transformed into a massive green dragon with fine scales covering his entire body. He had to use his tough and resilient dragon scales and his powerful life energies to dy the damage of the the death energies.


    Besides the death beams, the projection also continuously shot out sharp bone spears. Each spear had powerful pration abilities and could drill a hole through the tough dragon scales. Almost instantly, the Third Grade Green Dragon Aufreyr had been riddled with holes and fell with from the sky with a cry of agony.


    A one-sided fight. Apletely one-sided fight!


    Even though the two were both at the Fourth Grade, the projection¡¯s strange abilities were enough to crush Willis in all aspects. After all, Willis only had his overpowering physical strength. Based on Willis¡¯bat style, Greem was sure that he had an extremely unique dragon bloodline.


    This knights¡¯ leader, respected by all witcher-knights, was most likely a half-dragon. Moreover, the fact that he was able to sessfully cross the threshold into Fourth Grade probably had much to do with the dragon blood flowing through his body.


    Given this, it seemed that the Dragon Valley behind the knight¡¯s kingdom wasn¡¯t as simple as he previously thought!


    The witcher-knights on the ground were no longer a threat to the war tower. Under F¨¹gen¡¯s lead, all of the adepts joined hands and cast a terrifyingrge scale spell. A single monstrous ice crystal bombardmentter, and a Second Grade green dragon was sealed within a three-meter-thick ice crystal.


    With the powerful addition of the war tower, the already disadvantaged green dragon squad was instantly thrown into disarray. The three green dragons who remained, with the dragon knights still on their backs, were chased about by the terrifying monsters that the two adepts had turned into. Defeat was just a matter of time for them.


    Thirty minutester, following a pained dragon roar, the Green Dragon Willis fell from the sky. Hisrge dragon wings had been shackled by white bone-chains that had appeared out of nowhere.


    However, the projection didn¡¯t take the opportunity to dive down and deal the killing blow. Instead it raised its head and gazed at arge cloud on the horizon. He spoke coldly, "Are you not going to act after looking on for so long? Since when did ambushing from the back be a habit of you dragons?"


    The white clouds in the sky dispersed.


    Two exceptionallyrge dragons revealed themselves.


    Streamlined dark green dragon scales, wicked and terrifying horns,rge wings covered with fine scales, powerful hind legs, and their gigantic snouts filled with sharp teeth...


    Judging from the dark color of their dragon scales and their tremendously powerful dragon¡¯s aura that caused others to tremble in fear... these two were Fourth Grade Dragons.


    Unlike Willis and his mixed-bloodline, the two dragons that appeared now were actual Fourth Grade dragons. Moreso, they were adolescent dragons at the peak of their life cycle.


    The majestic dragon in front slowly beat its wings as it hovered in the sky. Itsrge amber eyes stared unblinkingly at the projection before it. Respectfully, the dragon said, "O powerful adept, the Taerar Green Dragons greet you!"


    The words the dragon spoke were naturally in Dragontongue. Most people wouldn¡¯t understand it, but how would the adepts known as ¡°servants and guardians of knowledge¡± not be able toprehend?


    The war tower¡¯s bombardment had paused under instructions from Adept F¨¹gen. The skies regained their peace.


    Both parties involved in the war looked at the projection as well as the two dragons that had arrived.


    In this sort of cruel nar battlefield, the true determining factors in the conclusion of this war were these powerful individuals. No matter how intense the battle below was, or how many casualties, once the powerhouses on your side fell, turning the tides was but a simple matter!


    It wasn¡¯t just the adepts within the tower that were waiting silently for orders from their leaders. Even the bloody and frantic radiant-knights below had stopped their attacks and gazed at the sky, waiting for their fates to be decided.


    No. Not just their fates, but also the fate of this entire ne!


    "The Taerar Green Dragons? I seem to have heard this name before. If I¡¯m not mistaken, they are... they are the subordinate race of the Thalgus Emerald Dragons!" The projection hesitated for a second.


    Although the adepts could understand Dragontongue, it was still difficult for them to speak in thenguage. This had to do with the vocal chord structure of dragons as well as their unique pronunciations. Thus, Adept Sarubo¡¯s projection could only reply with themonly usednguage of the adepts.


    "Your vast knowledge deserves my respect. I, the n leader of the Taerar Green Dragons, Raistlin, am here because I wish to bring away my n members!"


    "Only your n members?" There was a toying tone to Adept Sarubo¡¯s words.


    "Only my m members!" Green Dragon n Leader Raistlin¡¯s words were iparably firm.


    With a dragon¡¯s voice, even their whispers would be thunderous in the ears of normal people. Not to mention Raistlin had roared out these words firmly like he was making an oath.


    Under the war tower, in the forest and on the hills...


    Countless witcher-knights, spellbreaker knights, and radiant knights looked at each other when they heard this, but no one knew what the dragon and the adept were talking about. Only the few green dragons and Willis, whose wings had been bound and was struggling to get up, understood Raistlin¡¯s words.


    "No... we cannot give up!" Willis struggled to raise his head and roared loudly with all his strength, "They are all my subordinates, I cannot abandon them like this. Lord father, we still have a chance of victory! If we work together, we will definitely be able to defeat these evil adepts... "


    Adept Sarubo¡¯s projection smiled coldly as a wicked and chilly grin appeared on his face.


    Raistlin bent his body slightly, calmly looking at the struggling Willis with hisrge eyes.


    "Willis, my child, are you still unable to recognize your identity even now? These humans are only your subordinates and your men. But now the ones facing death are your actual nsmen! Do you intend to let Aufreyr and Ysondre die for a bunch of your subordinates?"


    An expression of agony and struggle appeared on Willis¡¯ face.


    He looked around him and saw the green dragon Ysondre frozen within a thick ice crystal, as well as Aufreyr lying in a pool of his own blood with white bone spears still stuck in his body.


    Willis closed his eyes painfully. Large tears trickled down his face.


    Even though he didn¡¯t want to acknowledge it, he knew it very well. They had lost this war!


    This ne had lost all hope!

 Chapter 234

    Chapter 234 Post-Battle Reward


    The dragons left!


    Even the three dragons that had been wounded took to the skies with the help of theirpanions. They disappeared on the horizon without even looking back.


    None of the dragons turned to exin the situation to the witcher-knights and naturally none of them tried to help the knights retreat.


    The resolve of the witcher-knights instantly crumbled when they saw the dragons take to the sky and leave. Be it the two abandoned dragon knights, or the numerous wounded witcher-knights, all they could do was stare wide-eyed as the cruel reality unfolded before them.


    Their past glory and valor was now scattered to the winds, never to be regained!


    A deep and rumbling horn rang out, signaling the surviving knights to finally start their retreat!


    For a moment the entire forest was filled with the frantic witcher-knights, fleeing like hounds that had lost their homes.


    They no longer cared about their injuredpanions or their knight¡¯s honor amidst their panicked retreat. They threw away their swords and knives, took off their armors, and drove into the woods, running away from this tragd of defeat without ever turning back.


    The adepts did not pursue the defeated knights. Instead they withdrew all of their remaining forces back into the war tower and started to distribute amongst themselves the jobs to be done.


    The reason the adepts weren¡¯t in the pursuit wasn¡¯t because they were generous individuals. Far from it. In fact, it was because there was no need for the adepts to do so.


    When the rulers behind the scenes of this ne had actively abandoned them, these witcher-knights were no longer a threat. If the witcher-knights were allowed to live, it was very likely that they would surrender to the adepts once the their rule had been solidified. Then the adepts would instantly get their hands on an elite group of subordinates!


    ............


    Fifty kilometers away, a group of green dragons crouched on top of a tall cliff, silently gazing in the direction of the tower.


    "Lord Father, why did you give up such a good opportunity earlier? The enemy was only a single Fourth Grade adept. With the strength that we had, we could easily have taken him down!" Willis asked angrily.


    It was clear that he was still extremely upset about Raistlin¡¯s decision.


    "You are still too young. You understand too little about the adepts!" Raistlin turned hisrge dragon head slightly, "Singe, you tell him!"


    As a n elder, the Green Dragon Singe was also the dragon prophet of the n.


    Almost every dragon n would have a dragon prophet of their own. Moreover, the prophet¡¯s status was only below that of the n leader. They were also the main, no, the only way the dragons couldmunicate with the great Dragon God!


    "Cough, cough... " The Green Dragon Elder Singe finally spoke, "Willis, you cannot me your father for his decision. That terrifying adept was not someone we can deal with. He is not a Fourth Grade Adept. Rather, he is a... a Sixth Grade Great Adept!"


    "So what if he is a Sixth Grade Great Adept?" Willis straightened his body in fury, "The upper limit of strength that this ne can contain is only Fourth Grade. The most power he could draw out here would be the peak of a Fourth Grade. If we threw everything we had at him, we could have exterminated his projection, crushing his foothold here in this ne!"


    "Things are not as simple as you think!" Elder Singe shook his head painfully, "He is a Sixth Grade Great Adept. This means that if he ever activated his personal origin domain, he could still break through the limit of this ne and project all of his strength here. Even though the price he would have to pay for doing so would be expulsion by the nar forces, as long as he could kill us in an extremely short time, the remaining low-grade adepts would still be able to gain control of this ne!"


    "That is why I said that this world¡¯s fate had already been determined when its coordinates were revealed to the evil adepts! If us Taerar Green Dragons had been any more powerful, we might have been able to beat them back where they came from. But if the price we needed to pay for that was you, Aufreyr, and the other dragons¡¯ lives, I would rather give up on this ne!" Green Dragon n Leader Raistlin looked down on the surrounding forest silently. Hisrge dragon eyes were filled with an indescribable sadness.


    After all, this ne had been the home that the Taerar Dragons had managed for several thousand years. It was impossible for them to not feel heartbroken now that it had been forcefully taken over by the adepts. The Taerar Dragons were still too weak. If they fought with the adepts, more than half of the adolescent dragons would forever be left on the cruel battlefield.


    And this was something that Raistlin would never be able to stand for!


    "...... " Willis dejectedly lowered hisrge dragon head.


    Even though he was reluctant to admit it, he knew that this was the only thing that his father could do for the sake of the n!


    "Let¡¯s return!" Raistlin suddenly unfurled his wings and roared angrily, "The adepts movements will be quick. We must hurry back to Dragon Valley. Moving the ancestors¡¯ graves and shifting the Dragon Altar; all of these need time! Let¡¯s go!"


    The few green dragons rose to the skies, apanied by their loud and magnificent dragon roars, beating their wings and heading towards the distance.


    ............


    The battle had concluded once and for all.


    However, the mes of war that had been ignited were not that easily extinguished.


    The war tower, having experienced a brutal ne war, had finally ceased functioning and revealed its bruised, battered, and ugly body.


    The materials used to hurriedly construct the tower were not proper magical stones. Naturally, its functions couldn¡¯t bepared to a proper adepts¡¯ tower. During the war, all of the tower¡¯s ws had been hidden by the activation of its powerful defense system. It had seemed so imprable.


    However, once the magic radiance surrounding the tower dissipated, the adepts were finally able to see the deep fissures and countless fine cracks that ran along the tower¡¯s structure. Some of this damage had been caused by external attacks, while others were caused by inferior materials bending under the stress of massive energy cirction.


    In conclusion, the war tower would hardly be able to exhibit the kind of incredible dominance it had previously without arge-scale renovation.


    Just as the n adepts were busy clearing up the battlefield, creating new voodoo beasts, and guarding the tower, Greem and the other adepts who performanced well on the battlefield received an audience with the great Lord Sarubo.


    Moreover, it was a private audience for each one of them.


    The location of the audience was set in a dim, dark, and mysterious hall.


    Having experienced the massive battle earlier, Greem finally had a basic understanding of Sixth Grade Great Adept Sarubo. He was definitely a powerful Immortal who had elementium affinity with negative energy and walked the path of an Undead Adept.


    That said, Greem had absolutely no idea which ss advancement Sarubo specifically chose.


    Adepts that had negative energy affinity could choose to deepen their elementium affinity and walk the path of the Dark Adept, master of magic curses. Alternatively they could also learn knowledge about biological dissections,monly belonging to the Esoteric Adepts, and craft undead creatures, walking down the path of a Summoning Adept that used undead to do their bidding. Of course if he didn¡¯t prefer entrusting his strength to other external entities, he could also walk the path of a Necromancer that strengthened his own body.


    Other than these mainstream adept ss advancements, there were countless other powerful adept sses that one could choose based on their own affinity and preferences. It was extremely hard for Greem to figure out the Great Adepts¡¯ path based solely on his performance today.


    However, there was no doubt that he was powerful.


    At least the dragons had chosen to yield before his intimidation instead of pitching their all into a final fight!


    As such, Greem disyed his utmost respect when he finally met this powerful Sixth Grade Great Adept¡¯s projection in the dim hall, paying full respects to his vast knowledge and terrifying prowess.


    "I have always been monitoring your growth!" The Great Adept surprised Greem the moment he spoke, "You are a fellow with plenty of talent for an outsider. You might be weak now, but there will be a day when you be strong."


    Greem bent his body to hide his shock.


    "There¡¯s no need to panic or fear!" The face of the projection was obscured within the shadows, but his tone was mild and gentle, "Foreign souls like you aren¡¯t that rare of a sight in the World of Adepts. As long as you havepleted your advancement in the World of Adepts, it means that you have obtained the Will of the ne¡¯s acknowledgement. Your identity as an adept cannot be stolen from you by anyone!"


    Greem could no longer hide the shock on his face.


    "You are still too weak to understand these things." The Great Adept was clearly in a good mood today, and unlike what hemonly did, he exined, "Lethon. The World of Adepts we live in. Every year several dozen, and even up to hundreds, of nar eruptions will happen here. These creatures or souls that came from outside might be a potential threat for weak nes. However they are a hard-toe-by assistance forrge nes like Lethon."


    "Are the adepts not worried that these outsiders could endanger the ne¡¯s development?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    "Endanger the ne¡¯s development?" The Great Adept¡¯s projection nearlyughed at the idea, "Little fellow, you have pretty wild ideas. Even us Great Adepts don¡¯t dare to disrupt and steer the development of an entire ne. And a small First Grade adept like yourself dares? Hahaha... "


    "But... but isn¡¯t it mentioned in the books that the most powerful adepts are able to embed part of their personal originws into the narws, thus allowing their ownws to be part of the narws?"


    "As you have said, only the most powerful adepts can do that! In our World of Adepts, the ones that can do that need to be at least an Eighth Grade Adept! And how many Eighth Grade Adepts are there in our world? Three. Only three!"


    Greem was stunned for a second.


    There were only three Eighth Grade Adepts in the World of Adepts? This number seemed to be the same as the number ofrge adept organizations in the World of Adepts. Could it be...


    "Alright, there¡¯s no need for suspicion or doubt. The reason I called you here is because your performance in the nar war was exceptional. As your reward, you can now take this me Fiend¡¯s heart for yourself."


    Having said that, a massive heart the size of a skull was tossed into Greem¡¯s hands. Its heavy weight left even Greem breathless.


    The crimson flesh, the thick tendons, and the disgusting aura of corruption. Therge heart was still beating stubbornly, and one could vaguely feel an intense aura of life radiating from it.


    The heart of a me Fiend.


    This was a powerful me Fiend¡¯s heart!


    The me Fiends had always been Second Grade creatures from the terrifying World of Abyss.


    Just as Greem was still reveling in joy over the me Fiend¡¯s heart, the projection spoke once again.


    "I heard you are extremely interested in the runic knowledge of this ne. Very well. I have a task here for you toplete! You need to... "


    Greem quickly stored the me Fiend¡¯s heart and paid attention to the Great Adept¡¯s words.

 Chapter 235

    Chapter 235 Raid of the Dragon Flight


    Skandre.


    As the capital of the knights¡¯ kingdom, Skandre was undoubtedly a magnificent and glorious city.


    It had been built on the mountain, with no city walls to speak off. Most of the architecture had be part of the mountainous geography.


    One was able to see the entirety of Skandre standing atop Mount Mingsu.


    Tall obelisks and domed hall roofs could be seen everywhere in the extensive pce. Fine corridors connected the numerous buildings as maids in court dresses hurried to and fro. If one were to look at an even closer angle, they would even able to see the tiny ant-sized human figures crowded in the busy market.


    The neat, orderly streets and the rowdy traffic all contributed to a pleasant and peaceful atmosphere that permeated Skandre!


    Yet at this moment, something was happening within the highest pce located on Mount Mingsu. Edward VII, an elderly yet energetic man, leaned against the edge of a wide balcony, looking silently upon the vibrant city below. Behind him Knight William, dressed in his exquisite knights¡¯ armor, loudly made his reports while holding his helmet with one hand.


    As a radiant knight at the peak of Second Grade, and on the verge of advancing to Third Grade, Knight William was the Captain of the Guards. And as the king¡¯s most trusted man, bore the great responsibility of the capital¡¯s safety.


    These days, most of the capital¡¯s defense had been redirected from the city as the knights followed Willis and the three dragons knights into Greend Forest to exterminate the invaders. As the capital¡¯s Captain of the Guards, the burden on Knight William¡¯s shoulders had been getting heavier.


    "Is there still no news from Willis?" Edward VII interrupted William¡¯s report with a frown on his face. He asked with a great deal of concern in his tone.


    "Still no news as of yet. Thest message we got was from Blue Hillock City seven days ago. Apparently, the knights have sessfully found the invaders¡¯ den. Even though they have been met with stubborn resistance, the overall progress is still considerable. It is only theck of supplies and reinforcements that keep them from crushing the enemy¡¯sst foothold. That said, Count Vanlier of Blue Hillock City has already sent all of his subordinates to help with the transportation of supplies. News of victory is expected within four or five days!"


    This was clearly good news, but Edward VII still could not drive away the haze in his heart. He wasn¡¯t sure why, but it felt like there was some illusory or phantom voice from the void sending messages of warning to him.


    What was happening? Even though victory was right before him, where did this lingering worry from the bottom of his hearte from?


    "Have there been any odd actions from the heretics in prison?" Edward VII suddenly stopped walking about but turned and asked loudly.


    "This... " Knight William betrayed an awkward expression, as if there was something he wanted to hide.


    "Speak... tell me quick... " Edward VII lunged forward and grabbed William¡¯s shoulders. He was practically shouting at this point, "Has there been anything odd?"


    "Those heretics that imed to be sages and prophets have killed themselves in their cells. Almost all of them were frantically screaming before their deaths... " Knight William hesitated for a second, but finally spoke, "It seems they had all been spouting insane words like... evil befalls and the dragons betray!"


    "Evil befalls, the dragons betray?" Edward VII took a step backwards in shock when he heard this and started mumbling to himself in his panic, "Impossible, this is impossible! The dragons signed the Dragon Covenant with my ancestors. There is no way... "


    Before he could finish his words, a deafening dragon¡¯s roar rumbled across from the distant horizon.


    Almost immediately a wave of ferocious and chilling dragon¡¯s aura instantly covered the capital.


    Knight William rushed forward, grabbed the balcony railing, and looked closely into the distance. He then turned around and shouted, "My king, it¡¯s a flight of dragons. A flight of dragons... "


    It had been one thousand seven hundred years since the founding of the knights¡¯ kingdom. The kingdom had a history of friendly rtions with Dragon Valley and the two parties had even signed the Dragon Covenant. This was what allowed the kingdom to gain the aid of the dragons in the continuous battles against other races, as well as helping suppress the rebellious nobles. Today, several magnificent and elegant pces had even been built behind Mount Mingsu to serve as the quarters of the dragonpanions to the three dragon knights.


    Despite their alliance, it was an unavoidable issue that the dragons radiated their terrifying aura of might everywhere they went. It was not something thatmon folk could bear. Thus, in ordance with the Covenant, no dragon was to harass or break into any city of the kingdom. And this Covenant had been properly upheld for up to a thousand years!


    But today, the dragons suddenly arrived in a flight.


    This... what were they trying to do?


    The panicked sounds of horns continuously red out on the mountain ridges to the side of Mount Mingsu.


    Lookouts had been constructed there, and it was obvious that the diligent soldiers had also discovered the appearance of the dragon flight.


    As the sound of horns passed throughout the entirety of Skandre, the citizens of the capital started to swarm out of their homes, looking about in confusion.


    It was clear that they didn¡¯t understand the meaning of the warning!


    Two bright spots of light shed on the faraway horizon. Then the rocks near the lookouts started to crumble, and the soldiers stationed there fell along with the tforms they had been standing on.


    Edward VII, who saw this happen right before his eyes, felt a tug in his heart.


    The dragons... the dragons were publicly assaulting the kingdom¡¯s military facilities? The situation at hand was clear, even without an exnation for it!


    The silhouettes of the dragons slowly expanded under the two¡¯s fearful gazes. A dense aura of strength so thick that it could drive men to suicide fell upon the city. The dragons had arrived at the City of Skandre.


    The dragons that were present were obviously adolescent green dragons. Even their appearances were extremely intimidating!


    Their bright and reflective dark green dragon scales were all at least asrge as washbasins. They had lean bodies with protruding bones and wicked ws that gleamed with a metallic sheen. Terrifying bone spikes covered their backs from head to toe, reflecting with a chilling light under the sun.


    Their bodies weren¡¯t as fat or bloated as somerge beasts in the forests, and their fine scale armor grew closely against their skin. Their perfect and flowing body lines provided them with the monstrous ability to dominate the top of the food chain on this ne.


    Chaos spread throughout the capital when the dense aura fell upon the city.


    Countless civilians that had never experienced such aura ran about frantically, screaming for their lives as if this was a scene out of the apocalypse.


    The leading dragon radiated an imposing aura and looked down upon the panicking humans as he raised his neck to let out a great roar of satisfaction.


    This dragon¡¯s roar seemed to be an order!


    As the roar rumbled across the sky, a dozen massive green dragons also followed his lead and let out reverberating roars, before beating their wings and flying towards the tallest or mostvishly decorated halls in the city.


    From his lookout spot high atop Mount Mingsu, Edward VII clearly saw one terrifying green dragon dive downwards at the massive storehouse of a famous merchant and let out a thick green dragon breath.


    The human guard stationed there instantly dissolved into a pool of green liquid amidst his tragic screams!


    Having gotten rid of the pesky bug, the green dragon tackled the storehouse. It used its thick dragon ws to tear apart the roof, revealing the mountains of wealth and goods within.


    The shattered beams and bricks of the roof fell down in a cascade. The dragon reached forward with its w, gripping box after box of treasure before beating its wings and flying towards thergest square of the city.


    Numerous dragons flew in every direction. All of them had a sense of purpose and direction when they flew, either heading towards merchant storehouses, storage facilities for auctions, or even the city¡¯s treasury itself. All guards and soldiers that dared to obstruct their paths would be reduced to withered bones under their poison-mist breath. Even unarmed civilians and servants were attacked if they were near where the green dragon was.


    Storehouse after storehouse was reduced to debris, while treasuries were torn apart as treasure chests and mountains of gold coins were grabbed by the green dragons before being piled together at the city square.


    There, three green dragons had transformed intorge, muscr men. They were busy packing their spoils into boxes with neat and orderly movements!


    Under Edward VII¡¯s shocked gaze, the flight of dragons beat their wings, took to the sky, and broke into his pce. They started ransacking there as well. Whenever their gigantic bodiesnded on a roof, the bricks and tiles would fall like an unending rain.


    Countless weak and frail princesses and princes escaped their pces under the escort of guards and maids, screaming as they did so. He even saw with his own eyes his favourite concubine crushed under a crumbling building before she could escape.


    A chaotic gale blew in front of him and Edward VII stumbled backwards.


    The dragon in the lead, with the most domineering physique, pped its wings and slowly rose from below. Its emerald dragon eyes,rge as washbasins, were staring unblinkingly at the two men on the tform.


    Knight William had already drawn his radiant longsword and was standing before the king. He was fully prepared to fight, but he didn¡¯t dare to make any sudden or reckless attacks against this gigantic Fourth Grade green dragon.


    Edward VII also managed to stand up with the help of numerous guards that came to his side.


    "Why? Why?" Edward VII screamed with all his strength, "Lord Nagupta, we signed the Dragon Covenant. Why are you suddenly attacking our cities?"


    "Attacking?" A human-like expression appeared on therge dragon¡¯s thin and long face: "No, no, no, you are mistaken......this isn¡¯t an attack! We green dragons have always been noble creatures that keep their promises. We would never do such a shameless thing as breaking an agreement between the two of us."


    "Not an attack? These actions are not an attack? You lead a flight of dragons right into the capital of your ally to rob and steal everything within it... and you dare say this isn¡¯t an attack?" Edward VII¡¯s voice had bepletely hoarse. His frantic and angered hand waving also caused him to be unable to stand firm.


    After all, he was 143 this year. Even though he had taken good care of his health, he was still an elderly man in this knights¡¯ ne, where the limit of a human¡¯s lifespan was two hundred years.


    As he questioned the dragon with all his voice, his shaking right hand retrieved a red gemstone the size of a pigeon¡¯s egg from around his neck and extended it outwards at the dragon.


    When Edward raised the ruby high in the sky, a shining light of energy emanated from within the gemstone, forming ancient and mysterious words within the air before them.


    "The Dragon Covenant is right here! I order you to withdraw from this city!" Edward VII roared with what was left of his vigor.


    "Haha... ancient covenants need to be acknowledged, but the tradition of dragons shouldn¡¯t be abandoned either. We are not here to attack you this time. Rather, we are here to collect our protection fees. Human king, you have had a thousand years of protection from the Taerar Green Dragons. It is now time for you to pay your fees." The Fourth Grade Green Dragon Nagupta¡¯s massive eyes swept across the gemstone projection with disdain as he spat out these words. He then turned and flew towards the city below.


    Edward VII raised the gemstone high above his head. He coughed out purple-ck blood before his body gave out and fell to the ground.

 Chapter 236

    Chapter 236 The Land Cursed by the Dragons


    Greem reached Skandre five days after the dragons had raided the city.


    Standing on a tall peak on Mount Mingsu, Greem very clearly saw the pitiful capital and its sorrowful civilians walking about the debris and waste.


    Along the way here, Greem had seen every human city of decent size raided by the dragons. This was the seventh human city he had seen that had been raided by the dragons. Moreover, it was the one that had been the most severely destroyed.


    After all, this was the greatest and most magnificent city of radiance in the knights¡¯ kingdom¨C Skandre!


    Sadly it had now been reduced to a broken city buried under rubble and crumbling walls.


    Countless civilians that had lost their homes in the chaos were rummaging about the destroyed buildings, looking for food and clothing. Winding lines of refugee carts filled the streets of the city. Shouting and whinnying were everywhere to be heard. Dust and smoke lingered in the sky...


    The buildings at the foot of the mountain were mostly still in decent condition. That was the civilian housing area and had not been raided much by the dragons. The damage to the architecture got increasingly worse with the height of the mountain. Greem saw that the more delicate and magnificent the building, the more severe the damage was.


    It seemed that the dragons were extremely well-versed in the art of raiding and robbing!


    Greem took off his hood and allowed his handsome face to be exposed under the sun.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh in his heart when he looked down upon the tragic capital before him.


    Once upon a time, the dragons had been the greatest trump card and protector of the human kings, as well as the solid foundation for maintaining their firm rule.


    Since the appearance of the Dragon Valley in this ne several thousand years ago, the human kingdom had built a strong rapport and alliance with the dragons.


    The dragons enjoyed the offerings of the humans, while the humans enjoyed the protection of the dragons.


    All of the powerful magical creatures in the wild and the ambitious nobles ruling over their ownnd considered the dragons of Dragon Valley to be the true rulers of the knights¡¯ ne. Their so-called king was only a pathetic bug kneeling before the dragons!


    One Thousand Seven Hundred years ago, the Edward family was a small local noble as well. However, they offered many treasures to the dragons and promised countless more. With the dragons¡¯ blessing, the Edward family rose to prominence. They defeated the other nobles, copsed the ruling kingdom, and formed the knights¡¯ kingdom.


    It was the Dragon Covenant that allowed the Edward family to bring about an era of peace and prosperitysting 1,700 years. However the massive annual tributes they paid to the dragons had also, at some point, caused the kingdom to fall into a crippled state, unable to maintain their absolute control over the ne.


    With a cmity now in their faces, not even the kingdom¡¯s perpetual loyalty and obedience could stop Dragon Valley from breaking the kingdom¡¯s spine and squeezing out thest bit of wealth and treasure from it.


    It seemed he was still one step toote!


    Those shameless dragons hadpletely robbed this city of everything it had.


    That said, Greem wasn¡¯t here for worldly wealth or money. He was here for a mission assigned by Lord Sarubo. Of course, it was also for that energy-merging knowledge he craved for.


    He could only hope his targets were still alive now that the entire capital Skandre had been reduced to rubble.


    Walking on the only stone path into the city, Greem saw people everywhere. Expressionless and exhausted, they pushed carts and herded their livestock, surging out of the city with their families. Mothers cried with their children in their bosoms, elderly men leaned against the remains of their homes without any expressions on their faces. Adults with vengeance, hate, and anger painted on their faces... their expressions were never the same, but they were all equally dishevelled and on the brink of tears.


    Greem had seen too many such expressions on his way here!


    This was the great capital famous throughout the kingdom. It had enormous wealth that was without end. As a result, it drew a lot of attention from the dragons as well.


    Everyday for the past five days, flights of dragons arrived from the distant horizon, raided the city, then left with their backs and ws full of their spoils.


    The merchants and the rich of the city had all escaped this city cursed by the dragons in order to avoid their raiding and robbing. The only ones left here were poor civilians with nowhere else to go.


    However, as the dragons¡¯ rampage continued, the city also gradually became increasingly empty. Even those civilians with nothing to their name had no choice but to painfully leave this familiar piece ofnd they had grown up on and move to somewhere new.


    Greem entered Skandre City by wading through such a chaotic crowd.


    Greem had tried his best and found a gray and old travelling cloak. Still, with every step he took, the edge of the cloth would lift up, revealing the delicate robe underneath with its shining magic runes. Some bad-intentioned crooks might not understand these patterns, but it didn¡¯t stop them from understanding its value.


    A group of unfortunate fellows with dishevelled clothes and mean appearances quickly appeared behind Greem. Every one of them was holding some sort of weapon, be it a club or a shiv.


    Greem passed by a tall tower with only half of its height remaining and turned into a small alley. Light gleamed in the eyes of the crooks. Their opportunity hade. The lot of them quickly strode after Greem.


    The fight didn¡¯tst long.


    If it wasn¡¯t out of fear of being discovered by the dragons, he would have only needed a simple fireball to eradicate all of these idiots. But now, Greem could only wield his fists and punch the crooks to the ground with his raw strength.


    As the group of rogues were rolling about the ground in pain, Greem grabbed ahold of a scrawny man¡¯s chin and lifted him from the ground.


    "Where is the capital¡¯s Runeforge Camp? Bring me there now, or else... " Greem¡¯s iron grip suddenly turned red hot, burning a ck handprint onto the man¡¯s face.


    "Heretic, you are a heretic... " The stumbling men instantly recognized Greem¡¯s identity and fell into a panic.


    Greem was only a fire elementium adept. He didn¡¯t possess much in the way of knowledge about the soul, otherwise he wouldn¡¯t need to use threats on these people to have them show him the way. Sadly, even after thoroughly interrogating every one of them, he still did not managed to get any information on that Runeforge Camp.


    Just as Greem frowned and contemted how to clean up these crooks, the crisp sound of a child rang out from the rubble beside him.


    "These people couldn¡¯t possibly know where Runeforge Camp is located!"


    Greem was slightly shocked. He released his Spirit and quickly locked onto this neer.


    He was a teenager, skinny to his very bones. He looked to be twelve or eleven, his hunched body hiding behind a crumbled wall. His aura was immensely weak. Without externally releasing his Spirit, Greem hadn¡¯t managed to sense him closing in.


    "You know Runeforge Camp?" Greem turned his head and looked at this fellow that showed up of nowhere, "You are a caster as well?"


    Greem very vaguely saw a trace of elementium aura about the child.


    "Follow me if you want to find out where Runeforge Camp is!" The skinny teenager¡¯s face was a pale yellow color, not unlike a malnutritioned stray on the street. Still, using his elementium sight, Greem saw the massive life energies hidden in his body.


    Having finished speaking, the youth wove several hand-signs and a light green rune appeared between his palms. Immediately after that, simr runes shed above the heads of the crooks present.


    In a matter of a few breaths, the youth dispelled the runes and turned to leave. Meanwhile, the crooks had already fallen asleep one after another. It seemed they had suddenly forgot everything.


    A very crude way of weaving signs, much like the certain means of a branch of curse adepts.


    More importantly, the spell that waspleted using these hand-signs radiated extremely insignificant elementium flux. Even though Greem was only ten meters away from him, he had to rely on the chip¡¯s powerful scanning powers to catch the elementium flux frequency.


    It seemed that the casters of this ne were still able to stubbornly survive, despite heavy suppression by the witcher-knights. They had even developed some interesting tricks in doing so.


    Greem patted the dust of his hands and quickly followed after the youth.


    A loud dragon¡¯s roar suddenly reverberated across the skies of the capital. The people remaining in the city immediately ran around looking for hiding spots. Almost instantly, not a single silhouette remained on the streets or alleys.


    Countless eyes, filled with anger, looked out from hidden spots in the city, closely staring at the three lithe figures quickly circling about the sky.


    The youth also hid in a crumbling house, looking at the dragons¡¯ movement through a crack in the roof. The three green dragons circled several times before lunging towards a pce at the waist of the mountain. Soon the screams and cries of women and the angry roars of men could be heard from the distance.


    Zeng zeng zeng...


    A dozen crossbow bolts shed against the leading dragon¡¯s scales, sending sparks flying everywhere, but none of them did any visible damage to it.


    These three dragons were clearly teenage dragons that had juste of age. Their hunting experience was greatlycking whenpared to the veteran green dragons from several days ago. The three dragons roared angrily at the retaliation from the pathetic bugs before them and let outrge clouds of poison mist in return.


    The world quickly fell silent once more!


    The three dragons leaped into the halls and immediately started their savage raid, wreaking havoc on the building as they did so.


    The scrawny youth looked on quietly as this hideous urrence continued. He knew he should feel satisfaction and joy at the price the nobles were paying. However, for some reason, his heart was filled with an indescribable anguish, rage, and a trace of sorrow when he saw this happening.


    He turned his head and saw no pity or sympathy on Greem¡¯s handsome face. Finally, he couldn¡¯t help but speak


    "Will you also enve us in the future, like the dragons are doing?"

 Chapter 237

    Chapter 237 Fate and Variable


    Perhaps knowing he couldn¡¯t get the answer he wanted from Greem, the youth didn¡¯t wait for one. He turned and ran out of his hiding spot.


    One hourter, at a slum at the bottom of the mountain, Greem finally met the man behind the youth.


    It was an old man with a ck cloth wrapped around his eyes.


    Greem couldn¡¯t ¡®see¡¯ any trace of magic cirction about him, nor sense any powerful mental flux. Yet for some reason, a sense of respect surged within his heart when he saw him.


    A sage? A diviner? Or a prophet?


    This blindfolded old man lived in a small and tiny grass shack.


    Greem had seen numerous odd characters in the nearby alleys on his way here. These people looked exactly like that youth that led him here. There was nothing remarkable about them on the surface, but their weak bodies always hid a powerful, vtile-yet-suppressed strength.


    Moreover, it was evident that these people were hiding near the shack, closely guarding this blindfolded elder.


    This blindfolded old man was obviously an important figure amongst the ¡¯heretics¡¯ of this ne!


    Greem finally understood how the skinny youth had so easily found him. With someone like this... pointing the way, even his arrival must have been well within the opponent¡¯s expectations.


    Greem really despised these fellows that spent their days looking into fate and the future. Even though they had the unique ability tomunicate with the ne, it was considered as amonly seen elementium magic. Their tricks and powers couldn¡¯t be stopped or deflected by any means.


    As such, no one dared offend an adept with divining powers in the World of Adepts. Otherwise you might die without even knowing the cause!


    "Wee, guest from another ne! I am Mas."


    The old man introduced himself as such. He didn¡¯t use the hostile word ¡¯invaders¡¯ in his speech. Rather, he used the neutral ¡¯guest¡¯. This fully expressed his desire for a cooperative rtionship!


    "It¡¯s a pleasure to meet you here, Mr Mas. I am Greem, an adept from the World of Adepts. I¡¯m sure you already have some understanding as to my purpose here, don¡¯t you?" Greem swept his hood behind his head and revealed his face before politely performing a proper adepts¡¯ greeting.


    Mas betrayed a bitter smile when he looked upon Greem¡¯s young and handsome face.


    "We have already tasted the godly might of the Lord Great Adept in your base. That little kid Goth tested his patience and was reduced to ashes by your Great Adept. Even people like myself were involved in the nar bacsh and lost our eyes! Lord Great Adept can counterattack an enemy thousands of miles away through the nar level¨C that is more than enough to deserve our respect!"


    That happened?


    Greem was slightly shocked, but he didn¡¯t show it on his face. He continued to sincerely look at Diviner Mas.


    Sage, diviner, prophet. These titles referred to the same group of individuals, but the change in the title matched the difference in their abilities.


    Sage. Almost all that started practicing divination had this title.


    They didn¡¯t always get feedback when they connected with the nar consciousness, and even when they did, the feedback they got would be chaotic and fragmented. These people were able to divine fortune and misfortune and were more likely to walk down a path beneficial for themselves.


    Diviners were even stronger than sages. Almost every single one of their divinations were able to result in feedback from the nar consciousness. That said, the feedback was mostly limited to themselves. The amount of information they got from the feedback would also be rted to the amount of power they had.


    These people had an elementary mastery over the power of fate, and were able to peek at fragments of the future through the narws. Theymonly became the leaders of their race or n and enjoyed an extremely respected status.


    Prophets were even more terrifying.


    They were often casters with immense power themselves. Not only could they see the future, they could even use their powers to distort or even change the flow of fate to some extent. It was because of this skill that adepts who were also prophets were extremely terrifying existences, even in the World of Adepts.


    Thus, even though Greem had no talent for divination, his background in the World of Adepts and the superior knowledge he possessed allowed him to see through the depths of Mas¡¯ powers.


    In truth it waspletely out of Greem¡¯s expectations that Mas was able to develop into a diviner under the witcher-knights¡¯ cruel suppression.


    These people might not have much in the way ofbat or attack skills, but they had the tremendous ability to see through the functioning of the narws. They were like eyes suspended above the long river of fate, gazing coldly at the men engulfed within.


    To Greem¡¯s understanding, there were plenty of diviners in the Silver Union back in the World of Adepts. They willingly gave up their magic powers, all in order to get a better look at the river of fate. They hid within the Silver Union¡¯s Diviners¡¯ Tower and never took a step in the outside world. Yet they still knew of everything happening everywhere on the Continent of Adepts.


    They never participated in conflicts or abused their powers. They continually and dutifully did their jobs as the eyes of fate. Day in and day out, they transcribed scrolls and organized their notes. They worked hard, writing down every single thing that they managed to divine, then stored them in hidden rooms within the Tower.


    Many powerful adepts had to personally visit these powerless ¡¯madmen¡¯ to clear up confusions about the past. They used their most precious, valuable knowledge and resources to obtain a chance to enter the Tower and do away with their doubts.


    But now, when a diviner from another ne stood before Greem, he couldn¡¯t help but start wondering.


    Would he be able to see his future path to power if he used the eyes of this other-world diviner?


    Diviner Mas started chuckling as Greem¡¯s mind was contemting the idea.


    "Sir Greem, don¡¯t count on me to help you. Every prophet is tightly bound to the ne they were born on. Even if I drained all of my strength, I would still never be able to extend my vision to a ce as far away the World of Adepts."


    "But did you not divine my arrival?" Greem asked, confused.


    "That is because you are now in this ne and away from that Great Adept!" An expression of frustration appeared on Diviner Mas¡¯ face, "If you continued to stay by the side of the respected Great Adept, I would never dare to cast my vision anywhere near. However, when you left Greend Forest, the path of your fate crossed mine. Thus I was able to see you and the purpose you bear!"


    "Sir Mas, as a man of powerful ability from this ne, do you not feel repulsion and dislike for my identity?" Greem thought for a moment before asking this difficult question.


    "Fate! What is fate? Most people misunderstand and believe that we rule above fate. That we can change fate because we can see through it. Diviners that hold such thoughts hardly ever survive." Mas paused for a second here, as if he just thought of someone or something.


    It was a whileter before he returned from his memories and continued, "In truth, these people are all mistaken. Even the most powerful prophet in this world is ultimately a ve of fate. No one can be the master of fate. Fate is a shackle, tightly chaining everyone and everything together. The path of everything¡¯s fate is silently revolving around certain rules andws. There is no possibility of breaking out of that."


    Greem listened silently.


    "What is fate?


    ¡°This is a question whose answer every prophet has sought for their entire lives, to no avail.


    ¡°Some prophets believe that fate is a certain end that results from the systematic operation of all the rules andws in the world. As long as all the conditions remain the same, there will only be one result. When the numerous results, ends, and conclusions umte, they form fate.


    ¡°Meanwhile, some prophets believe that fate is a unique force that exists independently, outside of the ordinary rules andws. Even though it coincides and walks along the current world most of the time, it also concurrently and continuously changes as it does so. The river of fate is winding and extends to infinity. It might even be divided into many levels, filled with unpredictable variables at every level. Thus the direction of the river of fate¡¯s flow is also ever changing. It is also epts and admits new factors.


    ¡°This viewpoint clearly puts fate on an extremely high pedestal. It believes that fate is one of the most superior, powerful, and highest-order forcews in the multiverse. This higher-orderw is not something that ordinary and inferior creatures can hope to control or manipte. The only thing they can do is to understand and ept it, then use it to their advantage.


    ¡°In all seriousness, every single person, every single substance, and every single elementium within the multiverse has their own unique fate. And this fate, this path they are to walk on can be more or less certain, more or less strong, and more or less definite with the existence of the fate¡¯s host, as well as the multiple factors in the multiverse.


    ¡°However, if a ne chooses to go into istion, then everything within the ne would be fixed and predictable. At a certain point, even the ne¡¯s fate itself will be predictable!


    ¡°Thus every nar world has to admit outsiders intermittently if they do not wish to be a stagnant pool of water. In doing so, they create variables for the fate of the ne. It¡¯s just that most of the time, even the ne¡¯s power of fate cannot determine whether this variable will be a beneficial or harmful one."


    Greem¡¯s body couldn¡¯t help but tremor as he listened to this other-world diviner¡¯s enlightening knowledge of fate.


    At this very moment he felt like he vaguely understood the reason he had identally appeared in the World of Adepts.


    Possibly, maybe, perhaps... he was one of the ¡¯variables¡¯ the World of Adepts had drawn in from the multiverse!

 Chapter 238

    Chapter 238 Transaction


    The conversation with Diviner Mas was pleasant and delightful!


    Mas sensed what was going through Greem¡¯s mind to varying extents.


    When two smart men gathered together, discussions were easilypleted. There was no need for roundabout small talk or probing questions. In a matter of sentences the two of them quickly arranged a possible future frame for coboration.


    Although Greem couldn¡¯t make decisions in ce of Lord Sarubo, he could rmend this batch of people to him. This was the main reason Diviner Mas was in such a hurry to meet Greem!


    It was only after the talk that Greem found out Mas wasn¡¯t alone. There was arge group of casters who had potential as adepts gathered around him. On the way here all the people Greem had seen possessed, at the very least, power rivalling advanced apprentices. Moreover most of them had pseudo-adept level casting abilities.


    Their leader Diviner Mas was a terrifying Second Grade.


    Sadly, the ss characteristics of prophets required them to abandon all casting abilities in exchange for the more powerful powers of divination. Even though his Grade was exceptionally high, he did not have much offensive ability. Quite the contrary¨C most of the time he needed the protection of his followers.


    That said, it was clear how powerful his ability was. Mas had been able to gather such arge group of individuals around him and settle in the hearnd of the knights¡¯ kingdom.


    This was mostly because Mas and his followers formed a mutually beneficial rtionship.


    Mas relied on his followers to protect him, while he was able to provide a blessing of fortune for these people while also allowing them to escape the pursuit of the witcher-knights.


    Such a group could only have appeared in the cruel and distorted environment of the knights¡¯ ne.


    Regardless of what their ns were, Greem was relieved to have these locals to help coordinate the adepts¡¯ actions. The execution of his mission in Skandre city had just be that much easier.


    In less than half a day Greem got his hands on the information he wanted. It was information about Runeforge Camp and the location of the king.


    Greem bore two missions on this trip to Skandre City. The first was an assassination order personally assigned by Lord Sarubo. Greem was ordered to kill Edward VII as soon as possible to catalyze an internal conflict within the kingdom. The second was Greem¡¯s personal mission. The energy merging knowledge he needed was hidden in that Runeforge Camp.


    He was determined to get his hands on that knowledge.


    Runeforge Camp was, in truth, thergest and most well-hidden weapon-manufacturing facility in the knights¡¯ kingdom. The standard runic equipment that all witcher-knights wore were forged at Runeforge Camp.


    For a long time, Runeforge Camp had been a special location countless local nobles had tried to infiltrate. The entire world knew of the witcher-knights¡¯ power. The first was the unstoppable charge of their magic colts, and the second was the tough defense and offense that their runic equipment afforded them.


    Any noble that had ambitions of taking the throne for themself would think about stealing the secrets of forging runic weapons, then secretly train their own runic warriors.


    Sadly, Runeforge Camp was one of the most important and ssified locations in the kingdom. Almost none had sessfully escaped once they entered. If it wasn¡¯t for Mas providing the information, Greem alone would probably not have been able to find the location of the camp.


    Late at night.


    In a crude and run-down wooden hut.


    Greem sat silently by the only table in the room by himself. He used the dim candlelight to read through the information in his hands.


    He had just requested this information and already someone had sent it over before nightfall.


    The information was very detailed andplete. It not only provided an urate location of the camp, it even included the spread of buildings within and their separate uses, as well as the strength and numbers of the guards at every spot.


    In all honesty, the person who first founded Runeforge Camp was a genius!


    They had hidden Runeforge Camp within Mount Mingsu to keep it away from public sight. Which is to say, Runeforge Camp wasn¡¯t a ce constructed on arge nd. Rather it was hidden in the belly of the mountain.


    There were only two paths that lead inside. One was through the witcher-knight headquarters, located on the waist of Mount Mingsu, while the other was through the back of Mount Mingsu.


    The former was the main path,monly used for transporting materials and supplies. It was always guarded by three to five radiant knights and outsiders had virtually no chance of breaking in through there. Thetter was a small cave dug into the middle of a cliff, used for dumping the waste from the manufacturing of the runic weapons.


    The cave was three hundred meters above the ground and the cliff it was on was treacherously steep. There was almost no possibility of scaling it. Tough metal railings had been fitted on the entrance of the cave as well. It was only opened temporarily for dumping waste. There would also be guards and patrols securing the area at all times. Ordinary men had no chance of sneaking in.


    Having finished reading all the information, Greem quickly started to construct a three-dimensional model of the camp in his mind with the help of the chip. As the numbers of the workers, craftsmen, and guards were slowly entered into the model, a realistic representation of Runeforge Camp came to life.


    With the firsthand information on Runeforge Camp now in his hands, what he needed to do now was think of a way to break in and make his way to the drafting room, located at the heart of the forging area. All of the information and parchments regarding the runic equipment was stored there.


    On the other hand the force stationed there was enough to make Greem wince.


    Normally, there were always five radiant knights guarding the camp. Three of them were responsible for defending the knights¡¯ headquarters, while the other two were stationed within the camp a single room away from the drafting room.


    However, with the frequent raids on the capital by the dragons, many radiant knights had been reassigned to ensure the safety of the pce. The number of radiant knights stationed at Runeforge Camp was currently at its lowest. Just two. One stayed at the knights¡¯ headquarters, which was near the entrance of Runeforge Camp. One was stationed inside Runeforge Camp.


    This was undoubtedly already great news for Greem!


    Still, a fully-armed and prepared radiant knight was a massive mountain he had to cross.


    He had to sneak into the drafting room without alerting anyone. If even a single guard spotted him, the radiant knight would be alerted.


    Greem might have been able to rely on theplex geography back in Greend Forest, along with the mobility of his spells to toy with the radiant knights. However, trapped within such a narrow underground path, he would lose most of his mobility. The moment he met a radiant knight would likely be the moment he died in his pursuits as an adept.


    Though he might have personally killed a radiant knight before, the circumstances were different. The radiant knight was worn out, while Greem had been preparing to kill the knight. It was a valiant result that he had only achieved after giving up so many of his golems. What he had to face now was a fully intact radiant knight with a home field advantage!


    He quickly simted up to hundreds of break-in attempts in his mental space, but every attempt ended in a failure due to the radiant knight¡¯s interference. The chip was left with one final conclusion. If Greem didn¡¯t find a way to eliminate that radiant knight, his n of robbing the drafting room would remain a dream.


    Besides this extremely troublesome problem, the assassination mission tasked him by Lord Sarubo was also a tough one.


    Edward VII was hidden in his pce at the peak of Mount Mingsu, protected by arge group of radiant knights and spellbreaker knights. That was the only ce left untouched by the dragon flight, and consequently it hadplete and intact defensive facilities.


    To defend against the possibility of a dragon attack, the amount of military force amassed there was truly imprable. The possibility of Greem breaking through all that defense and killing the king was miniscule.


    The more he read the parchment, and the more he understand about the pce, the more helpless he felt about his task.


    His power as a First Grade adept might have been enough for him to live a good life in the World of Adepts, but it was still a difficult and dangerous thing to walk about a nar battlefield. It was like walking on thin ice. A slight misstep and he would die!


    Just as Greem was engulfed in frustration and hesitation, footsteps sounded from outside the wooden hut, quickly followed by light knocking.


    Diviner Mas personally came to visit him!


    "I¡¯m sure you have seen the information. What do you think about your odds for the two missions?" Mas had just sat down and already he couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    Greem was honest as well. He spoke frankly, "If it¡¯s just me alone, there is no possibility ofpleting either of these tasks!"


    "Do you intend to give up?"


    "No! Not at all!" Greem smiled slightly as he said, "If it¡¯s just me, it¡¯s not possible. But if I had Sir Mas¡¯ help, I¡¯m sure things would be different!"


    Greem could clearly see how unbelievably detailed the information provided to him was. There was no way that this was information those half-ass casters obtained on their own. The only way this could have been obtained was through the prophecy powers of the diviner before him.


    If he had such a powerful ability, he might be able to use his amazing prophetic powers to find loopholes and ws in this sturdy defense that outsiders were not privy to. Wasn¡¯t this what he was the best at?


    That said, Greem probably needed to give something in exchange for using Mas¡¯ powers. After all, the information provided by Mas was more than enough for Greem to rmend them to Great Adept Sarubo.


    If he wanted the full cooperation of Diviner Mas, Greem had to offer something new and of value!


    For the rest of the night, the two negotiated within the wooden hut.


    Starting from the next day, Greem never took a single step out of the hut. He remained within the building, furiously writing on parchment after parchment. In just three days, he hadpletely transcribed some of the moremon magic books from the World of Adepts.


    This included the meditation techniques provided to the apprentice adepts, methods to train the Spirit, the branches and paths of the adept system, as well as basic temtes of some apprentice-level spells.


    With aplete magic system as reference, Diviner Mas could continuously cultivate more and more casters in this ne as long as he could survive the impending disaster. This was something that Lord Sarubo would never give him.


    Of course, in order to ensure Mas upheld his end of the agreement, Greem had sealed most of the content when he transcribed the scrolls. Without him personally undoing those seals, all the parchments would turn into ash in a zing fire.


    Now with the full cooperation of Diviner Mas, Greem finally had a small chance of sessfullypleting the missions!

 Chapter 239

    Chapter 239 Assault on a Rainy Night


    During the night, Skandre lost the rowdiness and liveliness it had in the past.


    With the exception of some sparse light near the pce and the city center, the rest of the city had been plunged into a deep and heavy darkness.


    Once night fell, a light rain washed over the city.


    Very few people could be seen on the broken streets. The homeless civilians shivered in unstable houses, using what remained of their roofs as shelter.


    This was the eleventh day since the dragon raid started on Skandre City.


    For the first few days, the dragons had only set their sights on the rich and powerful in the upper city area, rarely ever harassing the lower city and civilian areas. However, once they had robbed the wealthy of all that they had, their vision fell on the civilians. The civilians that formed sixty percent of the entire poption of the city.


    The dragons that had raided on the first couple of days had been adolescent dragons. They had used their powerful strength to crush the guards of the merchants and the nobles, then smashed apart the cers and storehouses that were filled with resources and wealth.


    Skandre City might have the most powerfulnd army on the Continent of Knights, but the weakened Edward VII hadmanded and reassigned all of the high-grade knights to the pce surroundings and forbid them from having any conflict with the dragons.


    Thus Skandre City lost all military protection it had, turning into a hunting ground for the dragons. Everyday, dragons flew thousands of kilometers here just to rob and steal.


    As the cities the dragons needed to raid slowly increased, the adolescent dragons in Dragon Valley eventually weren¡¯t enough for their raiding needs. Even some whelps on the verge of adolescence had been sent out, following behind therger dragons to practice their hunting techniques and sharpening their fangs.


    Under such cruel devastation, Skandre City was like an injured patient at the brink of death. Every day it struggled at the edge of life and death, waiting for itsst breath.


    Greem was wrapped in a thick ck traveller¡¯s robe, like a phantom in the darkness. He followed behind Leaf and Razor, silently weaving through the pitch ck alleys of the lower city area.


    Leaf was the teenage boy that had previously brought him to Diviner Mas. No. Teenage girl! Due to severe malnutrition at a young age, the fourteen year old girl Leaf was extremely thin, making it hard to distinguish any gender characteristics from her appearance. When she was found by Mas, the innate talent she awakened was simr to the Thought Maniption mastered by curse adepts.


    Due to theck of a systematic cultivation system, as well as proper resource utilization, Leaf didn¡¯t manage to find a caster who could teach her after her talents had awakened. This caused her to have no spells, other than the few innate spells she awakened naturally.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and sigh after a serious appraisal of her body condition. A little girl that had immense innate casting talentbined with a powerful pseudo-adept level Spirit, yet all her other attributes were so poor they couldn¡¯t evenpare with ordinary civilians.


    The thirteen year old teenage boy Razor was also in a simr condition.


    Razor¡¯s talent was the extremely unique metal affinity. He was naturally able to manipte and control some metal weapons. He also had pseudo-adept level powers, but had not mastered a single spell. Moreover, the quality of his physique was also in shambles.


    As a previous street urchin that was even lower than livestock, he had no rtives or even a name of his own. Even the name he had now was given to him by Diviner Mas, when Mas gave him shelter.


    However, even though they weren¡¯t very good inbat, their understanding and familiarity with Skandre City was iparable to outsiders. And what Greem needed was locals exactly like them!


    They turned down countless alleys in the dark, even going above two or three abandoned civilian homes. Soon a three-level tower appeared before them.


    They had to pass by such towers if they wanted to sneak into the upper city area from the lower city area.


    Looking from a distance, they could see three city guards gathered together and making small talk under a dim torch st a small arch-shaped gate.


    While Leaf went forward to deal with the guards, Razor went up to Greem.


    "Hey, big guy. Is your world really that powerful? I heard from the old man that you adepts are powerful fellows who can conquer most the multiverse!"


    Two shrouds of me burnt silently under the shadow of his hood. He wasn¡¯t upset at all by this overly curious brat. In fact he even felt an indescribable closeness with the kid due to how simr in age they were.


    A lot of the time, Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel relieved that he had been born in the World of Adepts, where adepts had a dominant social position. If he had unfortunately fallen into a terrifying ce like the knights¡¯ ne, he wouldn¡¯t have so easily made a name for himself, even with the help of the chip.


    "Adepts aren¡¯t as powerful as you think. There are countless other races and nes that are superior to even the adepts in the entire multiverse. You should be d that we adepts were the ones invading your ne. If it had been the Scourge Lords of the World of Disaster, your entire ne added together wouldn¡¯t even be enough for them to devour in a single bite!" Since they had plenty of time, Greem didn¡¯t mind entertaining the kid.


    It was only when Leaf waved her hand that the two quickly walked over to the dimly lit gate.


    The three city guards were still wearing their old standard leather armor. They held their spears in one hand and leaned against the wall, still retaining their postures from when they were conversing. Their eyes were opened wide but their gazes were unfocused and lifeless. They didn¡¯t even react when Greem and Razor walked by.


    Greem could very clearly see a strange rune shing on their foreheads.


    The three silently passed through the gate. When they disappeared into the darkness in the distance, Leaf cancelled the runes, allowing the three city guards to wake from their stupor. However, that short pause earlier had not disrupted their conversation. They were still engaged in their small talk as if nothing had happened.


    "Quite an impressive ability!" Greem gave a rarepliment.


    This little girl was able to discover such a unique way of using her talents even without any guidance. It was clear that she was also an extremely talented individual. It was unfortunate that she had been born on this knights¡¯ ne. If she had the fortune of being born in the World of Adepts, she might have be a powerful adept!


    "Of course." Razor clearly admired Leaf and immediately spoke in excitement when he heard Greem¡¯spliment, "Sister Leaf is an irreceably important character amongst us. Her ability is the strongest, apart from that old man and the few instructors!"


    "Shut up, Razor!" Leaf, who had been walking in front, suddenly scolded quietly, "If you can¡¯t control your mouth, I¡¯ll make you unable to speak for the rest of the night!"


    With her unique ability to manipte thought, all she needed was a simple psychological attack to the subconscious and she could temporarily rob others of their ability to speak. After all, the people of this world didn¡¯t have such simple and practical defensive thought magic essories like the Soul Brooch.


    The young Razor stuck his tongue out at Leaf and quickly shut up.


    Instructor?


    Greem smiled slightly and silently contemted.


    Leaf was already a pseudo-adept level thought maniptor. If that was the case, the instructor Razor spoke of could only be an actual adept-level existence. How unbelievably powerful were these guys¡¯ talents? To be able to sessfully advance into real casters while under the cruel oppression of the witcher-knights?


    Once they passed through that gate, they had made it into the upper city area.


    Compared to the low buildings and old wooden huts of the lower city area, almost every building in the upper city area had gardens of their own and were all magnificent mansions. Their target this time lived in a mansion close to the pce. It was natural that it would be difficult to sneak their way in there.


    Greem¡¯s terrifying magic abilities might allow him to easily turn this ce into a sea of fire, but it was extremely hard for him to sneak his way into the heart of the enemy¡¯s ce without drawing attention. Fire Teleportation was a decent mobility spell, but that st of fire and sudden explosion of the halo was far too conspicuous.


    If he didn¡¯t want to draw the attention of every guard in the upper city area, he had to rely on the power of these locals!


    The three stopped at times, plunging into dark alleys to avoid well-armed patrols.


    After a dozen days of raids, the upper city had been badly damaged. Fallen walls and broken beams were everywhere; crumbling buildings could be seen all around.


    This area, set between the upper city area and the pce area, was a ce that only the most powerful and respected of Skandre City could live in.


    Right now, dim candlelight pierced through the second floor window of a delicate mansion. This meant that the owner of the bedroom hadn¡¯t slept yet, despite the night¡¯s rainfall.


    Daphne lightly pushed apart the wooden windows and leaned on thettice. She gazed silently into the dark night sky.


    It was only at this time of day that those ursed dragons wouldn¡¯te whistling in and disturb her peaceful and fulfilling life.


    The street next to hers had just been raided by the dragons. Greena¡¯s house was razed and a dozen of her servants had died. John¡¯s home, on the street to the right, had also been visited by the dragons. Everything of value inside had beenpletely taken away.


    Every day, she and her other youngpanions would have to gather in the pce to avoid being hurt by the dragons. It was only at night that they were allowed to return to see if their homes were still standing.


    Such an oppressive life was just way too terrible!


    Daphne was filled with resentment every time she thought of her father having to constantly stay in that rowdy Runeforge Camp. He wasn¡¯t even able to stay by her mother¡¯s side!

 Chapter 240

    Chapter 240 Conspiracy


    The bedroom door opened and a gentle nobledy walked in with soft steps.


    "Daphne, it¡¯s time for you to rest!" Thedy walked over and hugged her shoulder, pulling her over to therge, delicate bed, "Get some rest. We still have to go to the pce tomorrow morning!"


    Daphne sent her mother away with reassuring words before letting out a sigh. Once she closed the door she turned around, only to see a strange pair of ghostly green eyes staring her in the face.


    Leaf lightly put the young, slim girl in the nightdress on her soft bed. She turned and said, "I have hypnotized her. She won¡¯t wake up until tomorrow morning. Hurry up and do what you want to do!"


    A tall figure walked out from the darkness in the corner of the room and walked silently to the bed.


    He lightly lifted up the girl¡¯s nightdress and stopped when her white waist was exposed.


    Greem extended his right index finger and quickly drew a strange fire rune on the girl¡¯s stomach. The entire rune shed and radiated an evil crimson light. It faded two or three secondster, disappearing into the girl¡¯s stomach.


    "It¡¯s done! "Greem put his hand down and closed his eyes to sense for the fire rune within the girl before nodding in satisfaction, "Let¡¯s return!"


    Leaf deftly tidied the girl¡¯s nightdress and covered her in the soft velvet nket. She then turned and leave.


    They silently snuck out of the mansion. Greem turned back and took onest look before turning into a dark alley. He let out a soft sigh before pulling his hood up, covering his face and merging back into the darkness.


    This was the power that a diviner possessed!


    The same radiant knight, and the only way he could think of dealing with him was how to kill the knight in a direct confrontation. But in the hands of the powerless Diviner Mas, he could use odd and unique ways to solve the problem.


    Such as using an opponent¡¯s rtives to draw them away at the crucial moment. In doing so the dangerous battle could be avoided!


    Lions and tigers can only talk with their fangs and ws, but a fox was so much more sly.


    Greem finally understood how Diviner Mas was able to survive right beneath the noses of the witcher-knights.


    The reason Mas was willing to contact him was probably because he saw benefit to be gained through the power of fate. There was no way he could have obtained the fundamental magic books from the Great Adept!


    Due to the difference in narws, these books were notpletely suited for the casters of this ne. However, with a system for reference, they could save hundreds of years of uncertain experimentation. Perhaps, with their current knowledge and power, they could easily construct an advancement system in a mere hundred or two hundred years thatpletely suited the casters of this ne.


    But how would this affect Greem in any way?


    Why would it matter if these casters chose to continue serving under Great Adept Sarubo, or started trouble by choosing to go independent?


    Perhaps it was because both parties had needs that could be fulfilled by each other, while having no direct sh of interest. Diviner Mas was willing to cooperate fully with Greem and even he had to pay a price in doing so.


    Greem was sure that the powerless old man would instantly vanish from his sight if he ever thought of killing him and he would never see Mas again. What came next would most likely be an endless pursuit from the leaders of the witcher-knights.


    Diviners indeed had intricate and iprehensible uses of their powers!


    Even though they might not have any strength by themselves, they could utilize the forces around them to achieve their goals. The people being used wouldn¡¯t even know they had be a tool for the diviners. They would continue to believe that this was fate¡¯s choice, and remain willing to be a tool of fate.


    Such a utilization of power was extremely interesting to Greem. However every time he thought about the price of manipting fate, he couldn¡¯t help but give on up the idea. Losing all of your own power was too scary.


    Rather than slowly weave a around your enemies and waiting for them to walk to their deaths, it was much better and more satisfying to burn your way there using zing infernos and scorching mes to reduce the enemy to ashes with your own hands!


    As expected, the more violent and hot-blooded fire elementium adept job was much more suited for him!


    ............


    The afternoon of the second day.


    It was almost always the time for the dragon¡¯s raid today.


    When the loud dragon¡¯s roar echoed from the distant horizon, all the remaining civilians in Skandre City instantly scattered to the winds. They went into hiding, silently waiting for the dragons¡¯ assault.


    It was a sunny day and the sunlight was pleasantly warm.


    Three small fellows followed behind the Second Grade Green Dragon Sears. They unfurled their wings and slid across the canopy, gliding rapidly across the mountainous forest.


    The three brats behind him were all First Grade young dragons. In his eyes they were all just naughty kids who only knew how to y all day long. It was honestly a ratherrge psychological burden for him to bring this bunch of kids, who had too much curiosity and yfulness, on a raid.


    But what choice did he have!


    There were over two hundred human cities of all sizes scattered across the Continent of the Knights. If they wanted to harvest everything before moving Dragon Valley, a lot of manpower had to be put in. The strong and powerful adolescent dragons had to cover tens of thousands of kilometers everyday just to raid the faraway human cities.


    Inparison, bringing a couple of dragon babies to a familiar ce five hundred kilometers away for some light training was already an easy job!


    Even though he called them baby dragons, these were already terrifying demons in the eyes of the humans. They were five meters from head to tail with a wingspan of four meters. Wicked and terrifying fangs, powerful hind legs, sharp dragon ws, and that invible dragon¡¯s aura of might... perhaps they could only be considered weak and immature babies in the eyes of adolescent dragons!


    As the dragon flight continued forward, Sears bent his body and looked down proudly upon the forest beneath him. A wave of powerful aura instantly covered the entire stretch ofnd.


    Under the gaze of his sharp eyes, the entire forest had already fallen into chaos. Countless creatures escaped from their dens, running into the distance without ever looking back. For one moment the creatures of the forest were in a frenzy, panicking as if the end of the world had arrived.


    The three young dragons behind him were extremely excited. They followed Sears example and raised their necks to let out bellowing roars that rang throughout the forest.


    All of a sudden, the whelp at the rear of the formation turned and looked behind. He lifted his snout and sniffed before excitedly beating his wings and diving downwards.


    The animals in the forest fell into even more chaos. All sorts of screeching and howling filled the woods as the beasts ran into trees and sent branches snapping and flying everywhere.


    Amidst this chaos, the lunging whelp sunk his powerful hind legs deep into the back of a razor boar asrge as a calf. His sharp dragon fangs mped on the boar¡¯s neck the very next second.


    Onerge shape and one small one rolled about the forest in the dense foliage. Theirrge rolling bodies crushed all the bushes in their way into the ground.


    Razor boars were violent and ferocious animals, fierce creatures even within the woods, but even they were prey when faced with green dragons. Even if its opponent was a little green dragon less than a hundred years old!


    Just as the whelp bit its prey to death, and was bending its body to tear at the boar¡¯s leg, wind blew in the sky above. Sears showed its wicked and terrifying body once more.


    "Little Chelsea, stop being so greedy. There¡¯s still a human city ahead waiting for us!"


    The whelp was enjoying its feast and wasn¡¯t willing to give up on the food before it. It growled sharply at Sears before continuing eating.


    Sears turned back and looked at the two other whelps who were eyeing the meat greedily and reluctantly said, "Remember, don¡¯t stay for too long. We will head for the human city first. Remember to catch up after you are done!"


    Having said that, he took the skies and circled the it with the two whelps. Then he beat his wings and flew forward, disappearing past the hill in the distance in the blink of an eye.


    Six silhouettes wrapped in ck cloaks silently watched the scene unfold from a low hill five hundred meters away.


    "It worked, Sir Greem!" Diviner Mas still looked as powerless as usual. He held a staff longer than his body in one hand and spoke in a soft voice, "That little dragon fell for it! We can begin the operation now."


    The shapes cast aside their cloaks, revealing fit bodies under leather armor and cloth robes. They leapt off the low cliff and rapidly moved towards the area the green dragon was feeding at.


    Greem slowly pushed his hood back and nodded at Diviner Mas, "Your ability is impressive! I hope there will be a pleasant conclusion to our cooperation!"


    Greem¡¯s silhouette vanished in a massive st of fire as he said that.


    Boom.


    Greem¡¯s body disappeared from the spot.


    Then mes burst forth in the distant woods as a tall and imposing man of fire suddenly appeared there. It roared and charged at that green dragon whelp.


    The suddenly exploding wave of fire ravaged the cliff, but all of the mes and the shockwave were blocked by a translucent defensive barrier.


    A young girl with a light blue mark on her face stood before Diviner Mas. Her hands were raised high and that barrier was erected by her.


    "Was that intentional? He needs our help yet he acts so hostile towards us?" The girl stabilized the energy output from her hands whileining at Mas.


    "It doesn¡¯t matter whether it was intentional." Mas shook his head as he sighed, "He¡¯s a smart man. He understands that we both need each other¡¯s help. In a fair trade, there is no such thing as someone asking for a favor from the other! It is a fair trade."


    "Then did he intend to intimidate us with this?"


    "No! This is only the nature of them adepts. They might im to be a group of individuals pursuing knowledge, but it doesn¡¯t fundamentally change their evil, cruel, and dark nature. They worship knowledge, but are not humble in any way. Their knowledge is vast but they are neverpassionate. More urately, the reason the World of Adepts is so powerful is because it gained power through the continuous robbing and exploiting of other nar worlds!"


    "Then will we be able to escape their control in the future?"


    "There is a chance in the future! But now, if we do not wish to forever be servants and ves to others, we must learn what we can from the adepts!"

 Chapter 241

    Chapter 241 Shifting the me


    Just as the two were having their conversation, the battle in front had already started!


    When he strode towards the dragon, Greem¡¯s two meter tall body had already swollen up to three meters in height. Ferocious elementium mes surged out from everywhere around his body, turning him into a terrifying human of me in a matter of seconds.


    Thick magma armor appeared out of nowhere, quickly covering the body of this me humanoid. Greem¡¯s steps became heavier and heavier. The originally red mes had be even thicker and denser, with a little more crimson to their color.


    The dragon feasting in the distance stopped its tearing actions and raised its head. It looked cautiously at this scary figure that hade within a hundred meters of itself.


    It had seen plenty of wildlife and magical creatures in its life, but this was the first time it had seen a lifeform like this. A humanoid creature? In his simple and shallow mind, humanoids were equivalent to weakness and cowardice. He had never seen such a terrifying humanlike creature!


    The opponent wasn¡¯t at all intimidated by its domineering aura, and was even challenging it actively!


    The whelp growled angrily. It knew something was wrong. It unfurled its wings and beat them rapidly, ready to take off at any time.


    Yet just as it was about to take to the skies, hovering just above the ground, Greem¡¯srge silhouette suddenly disappeared. The next second, a me halo sted forth above the back of the whelp. Greem¡¯s fist brought with it the massive weight of his body and smashed downwards.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    The green dragon let out a pained howl and fell downwards.


    It didn¡¯t fall straight to the ground. With an agile twist of its body, the whelp turned and faced Greem. Its thick hind legs and razor-sharp ws instantly ripped Greem¡¯s magma armor into shreds.


    Scorching jets of mes burst forth from cracks in the armor, sizzling as they fried the whelp¡¯s w. Greem¡¯s heavy magma fist followed up with yet another blow to the dragon¡¯s head. The whelp ignored the blow. It endured the intense pain and continued to frantically scratch away at Greem¡¯s chest with its ws, as if it wouldn¡¯t stop until it had dug his heart out.


    Greem had also taken severe damage with the shattering of his magma armor. He shouted in anger, and the surging elementium mesbined with the Ring of Fire. The temperature of his me streams increased exponentially. At this point, it was almost enough to melt a pir of iron.


    The green dragon and the me Fiend were entangled together. The drastic increase in temperature made the whelp feel like it had been plunged into a sea ofva. Sweltering heat relentlessly surged into the seams in its scales and wounds on its body, constantly burning its flesh and blood.


    It felt like... it was about to be cooked!


    The whelp struggled frantically and finally managed to use its hind legs to kick Greem away as they wrestled on the ground. It then swiped at Greem with its tail as he was flying through the air.


    Greem¡¯s massive me body turned into a fireball, crashing and snapping three tall trees before falling into the foliage below.


    The green dragon whelp got up from the ground with some difficulty. The front of its body had been roasted red and white from close contact with the me Fiend earlier. The pungent odor of burned flesh rose into the air along with ck smoke.


    The whelp bent its body in agony and allowed its boiling flesh to press against the ck dirt. It was only then that the pain lessened. Its angry dragon eyes stared closely at the location where the mes rose from. Its sharp senses kept a close check on every motion around him.


    There wasn¡¯t just one enemy!


    That me humanoid was the most terrifying one.


    But it also felt three others quickly gathering elementium aura in three other directions.


    Casters as well! It¡¯s those evil casters!


    The whelp couldn¡¯t help but panic.


    In all the guidance and teachings it had received since its birth, the description of the evil spellcasters were the most scary!


    If it had alreadye of age, the magic resistance of its dragon scales would increase massively and allow it to resist their terrifying magic attacks. However, it was only a whelp near adolescence. Its magic resistance was far from being able to ignore elementium attacks!


    The dragon whelp didn¡¯t dare continue waiting.


    Its powerful hind legs kicked against the ground and its slightly burnt wings beat quickly. It wanted to return to the safety of the sky.


    However, once more, as its body had just risen from the ground, the dense vines from the trees nearby charged towards it and instantly bound itsrge wings before it could reach the canopy.


    Even though most of the vines were torn apart by its powerful wings, the whelp was no longer able to control its stumbling body. It fell to the ground once more with a painful cry.


    It crashed against the tough dirt and fell into a daze. A ferocious roar rang out from the woods and a fierce barbaric humanoid figure charged at the whelp with its body bent down.


    There was no exnation or conversation. One green dragon and a human shed together just like that and started a savage battle. They wrestled and bit at each other like wild beasts.


    It was undoubtedly a humiliating experience to have a spellcaster fight like a warrior in such a crude way. However, to prevent the dragon from returning to the sky, both Greem and Cobalt, who turned into the barbaric giant, could only use their bodies to keep it bound to the ground.


    As the two were battling intensely in the forest, the vines on the trees and the thorns on the ground quickly wrapped towards the dragon¡¯s limbs and wings. It was the doing of the girl named Flower.


    Li¡¯l Hawk, the other caster hiding in the forest, pressed his lips together and whistled. The call of eagles echoed back from the distant sky. A dozen ck shadows dashed onto the battlefield like piercing arrows and joined the battle.


    As the three casters fought with the whelp, Greem got up painfully from a bush. Viscous crimsonva slowly flowed out from the shattered magma armor on his chest, quickly forming a river ofva before his body.


    Even though his Physique and Strength would multiply when he transformed into the me Fiend, his closebat prowess was still at an absolute disadvantage against a whelp five meters long and half a ton heavy.


    He grabbed arge rock from the ground nearby and roasted it with terrifying heat rays from his eyes. After the rock had been softened by the intense heat, he pressed it against his chest. It was only now that he had managed to seal the injury on his chest.


    Greem looked at the battle in the distance. He endured the throbbing pain from all over his body and closed his eyes while he silently started to prepare a powerful spell.


    To avoid leaving any obvious magical markings on the battlefield, he couldn¡¯t cast any of the area-of-effect spells like Meteor Shower or Fire Core Explosion. The only choice Greem had left were the spells with physical damage.


    Compared to the even fight between Greem and the whelp, the three native spellcasters were still at aplete disadvantage even when fighting together.


    The lunging eagles had no way of piercing the dragon¡¯s scales, and nearly half died from a single poison breath. These flying beasts couldn¡¯t do anything to hurt the whelp. The only thing they could do was interrupt its line of sight.


    The surging vines and thorns were also corroded away by the poison mist.


    The only one that could somewhat restrain the whelp was the berserked giant.


    Unfortunately, the green dragon had managed to use itsrger size, sharp ws, and powerful attacks to deal terrible damage to Cobalt.


    But this was enough.


    The whelp¡¯s fate had been determined when Cobalt managed to stop it in its tracks! Greem gained the chance to sessfully cast his spell.


    Perhaps because it also sensed the terrifying might gathering around the ferocious me humanoid, the green dragon tried its very best and broke free from the barbaric giant¡¯s assault. It bent its body and charged rapidly towards Greem.


    Now that the opponent had finished gathering power, taking to the skies would only cause him to be a moving target. Thus the whelp gave up on escaping and insteadunched an attack at the me humanoid.


    Greem let out a violent shout. Hisrge magma hands extended forward and a me whip crossed a twenty meter distance, striking the whelp¡¯s side. This blow was extremely powerful. The whelp stumbled and crashed against two trees before falling before Greem.


    Greem¡¯s spell had alsopleted at this moment. He raised his hands, and a terrifying sawtooth de formed of magma and wreathed in mes quickly formed.


    The whelp¡¯s tragic and agonizing howl rang throughout the woods. Several secondster, the woods regained its unnatural silence.


    Greem stepped on the dragon¡¯s neck and pulled out the sawtooth de with much difficulty. Dragon blood flew everywhere, spattering the red-hot magma armor and corroding it, filling it with green patches here and there.


    "Set up quick. The dragons will be back shortly!" Cobalt had transformed out of his berserked, barbaric giant state, turning into a middle-aged man with a stubble and a body full of tough muscles. He pressed against the wounds on his chest and shouted into the distant woods.


    A girl wrapped in green leather armor ran out from her hiding spot. Under the effects of her powerful nt energies, this entire stretch of forest started to change rapidly.


    The scorched earth was quickly covered by growing bushes. The charred and withered trees rapidly regained their life and color. The marks of battle were slowly vanishing. In less than five minutes the forest had returned to the state it was before. All marks and traces left by magic had beenpletely covered and hidden.


    The sound of footsteps. A teenage boy wearing an animal skin coat leapt out from the bushes holding an unconscious human in each hand. From the looks of their bodies, and from the looks of their clothes, it seemed they were... two powerful spellbreaker knights!

 Chapter 242

    Chapter 242 A Sudden Assault


    A sorrowful roar echoed throughout the mountains.


    The green dragon, along with the two whelps that returned to search for their missingpanion, dove into the woods. A short momentter, a mournful roar that caused even the ground to shake rumbled across the forest. The dragons took to the skies with their lithe bodies, circling above the trees as if they were looking for something.


    But no matter what they did, they couldn¡¯t ept the reality that theirpanion had died.


    Finally, amidst a wave of sorrowful dragon roars, the adolescent green dragon dove into the woods and picked up the whelp¡¯s corpse. It beat its wing and flew to the horizon with no hesitation. The two other whelps followed closely behind him, bringing the two spellbreaker knight corpses with them.


    It wasn¡¯t until after the woods had regained their peace that Greem and the others walked out from the bushes.


    "Just like that?" Greem gazed into the horizon and spoke with disbelief, "Those dragons are not stupid. Would they really believe such simple misdirection?"


    "The dragons are not stupid. They are just too reliant on their prophecies!" A strange smile appeared on Diviner Mas¡¯ pale and elderly face. At this point, Greem really thought he had a lot of potential to be a scammer on the streets. Mas continued, "As long as I¡¯m around, everything they see through their prophecies will only be what I choose to let them see. Moreover, the dragons have also been looking for an excuse to raid the pce. It¡¯s just that the excuse they¡¯ve got this time is a littlerger than they expected!"


    Greem nodded in agreement after quickly thinking about it.


    Due to the existence of the Dragon Covenant, the green dragons were not shameless enough to outright rob the pce. However, the fact that most of the dragons raiding Skandre in recent days had been dragon whelps, that caused havoc and massive deaths with every appearance, was enough to reveal the dragon¡¯s n to create an excuse.


    If the witcher-knights couldn¡¯t resist the urge to fight back against the green dragons, they would have a proper excuse to tear apart the Covenant and horde a lot more wealth before retreating from this ne.


    Sadly, they didn¡¯t expect that the excuse they were looking for came at the price of a whelp¡¯s life.


    This might have been their only miscalction!


    "When will theye to take their revenge?" Greem followed with a question.


    "Before the break of dawn tomorrow!" Mas spoke with utter certainty, "So if Sir Greem has anything he wants to do, you best use tonight¡¯s time to its fullest. Otherwise who knows what will be left of the kingdom in the all-out fight tomorrow!"


    "Very good! If all works out well, I¡¯ll leave tomorrow afterpleting the two tasks. I¡¯ll lift the magic seals on the scrolls before I leave!"


    "Then... let¡¯s hope for a sessful and pleasant cooperation!"


    "I also look forward to working with Sir Mas in the future!"


    Thisst sentence was Greem¡¯s sincere thoughts.


    Greem had truly felt the benefit of having a Diviner as an ally over the past few days of cooperation. No matter what they did, things almost went down well. Even the few risks they had to take were within their control and expectations. If he wanted to have massive ns for development in the future, cultivating a loyal prophet was a must.


    That Alice seemed to be a very good candidate!


    Witch of Fate? A witch bearing the name of Fate. It was certain that they walked down the same path as Mas. Mmm. When Greem returned, he would most definitely take his time to train Alice.


    ............


    The back of Mount Mingsu.


    Mount Mingsu was deathly silent and dreary when night fell.


    Ever since the construction of Runeforge Camp, the back of Mount Mingsu had turned into a restricted area. The witcher-knights sealed all the entrances into the mountain and constantly patrolled the ce to ensure there were no trespassers. Along with the steep and dangerous geography of the ce, with its many dangerous cliffs, no man or creature travelled this area.


    Greem had only managed to sneak in with the cover of nightfall. Two other casters had followed behind him. One was the transforming ¡®adept¡¯ Cobalt, and the other was that nt-attribute ¡®adept¡¯ Flower.


    Greem had witnessed their abilities in the fight earlier.


    Their Spirits were slightly stronger than pseudo-adepts of the World of Adepts, but their use of spells and magic was far more inferior. In an all out fight it was uncertain if they would be able to beat the most powerful pseudo-adepts.


    Their prowess, in fact, matched their identities.


    A small ne with no knowledge or resources. How could they possibly hope to cultivate any kind of powerful individuals?!


    It hadn¡¯t been long since night had fallen. Greem kept a tight count of the time. He drew a small magical array in the cave they were hiding in and silently triggered the fire rune in the distance.


    Almost at the same time that Greem cast his spell, Daphne, who had just returned home, fell to the ground in pain. She felt like seven or eight burning furnaces had been crammed into her body. An endless wave of heat radiated from within her, slowly boiling every bit of her blood.


    After consulting many doctors¨Cto no avail¨Cthe news of her daughter¡¯s condition finally spread to the ears of that radiant knight stationed in Runeforge Camp. Naturally, faced with the bad news that his daughter¡¯s life was hanging by a thread, he unhesitatingly rushed out of the camp and returned home.


    This news quickly found its way to Greem as well, with Diviner Mas¡¯ lookout spotting the radiant knight walking into his house.


    The assault started almost immediately!


    Below a cliff at the back of Mount Mingsu.


    The metal waste falling from above had piled into a mountain a dozen meters high. The smoking waste sizzled against the wet ground, causing the entire ce to be filled with a pungent odor and thick mist.


    In the past, some scavengers and wanderers would sneak here in the dead of night to scavenge for valuable things amongst to waste to sell for money. However, with the start of the dragon raids in Skandre City half a month earlier, no one came here anymore.


    Greem and the two others easily found their way to the bottom of the mountain using the dark of the night as cover.


    Greem raised his head and looked up through the mist. He could vaguely see a cave on the cliff three hundred meters above. The entrance was only four or five meters wide, with the edge of the cave gleaming from the light reflecting off its metal fence.


    Greem did a quick calction. A single Fire Teleportation wasn¡¯t enough to get him to the cave. If there wasn¡¯t a foothold somewhere in the middle, he would have to find another way up.


    ording to the n they had agreed on, the nt-attribute ¡¯adept¡¯ Flower found a spot beneath the cliff. She dug a hole in the ground and buried the seed of an Ironthread Vine. A single frail vine as thick as a finger quickly grew against the cliff as she chanted.


    As Flower¡¯s chanting proceeded, the vine continued to grow and its roots started to grow thick andrge in size as well. In a matter of seconds it had formed into stairs that reached into the sky, crawling all the way to the bottom of the cave on the cliff.


    "It¡¯s done! Get up!" Adept Flower whispered under her breath.


    Under her orders, three massive leaves grew from the vine. The three stepped onto a leaf each, and they shot straight up through the mist like a modern elevator.


    Soon the three found themselves right before the cave.


    The three adepts could very easily sense any movements inside the cave using their Spirit.


    No one was there.


    This was expected.


    It would be weird if the knights expected enemies to break in from such an impossible location. Thus the guards in charge of this ce¡¯s security didn¡¯t have a fixed station at the opening of the cave. Rather, they were supposed to check this location every once in awhile. Moreover, with the chaos in the capital, it was unclear if the guards would evene to patrol on a fixed and consistent schedule.


    The leaf slowly lifted Greem to the side of the cave, allowing him to get a clear look at everything inside.


    Inside of the cave was a small tunnel. There were specialized sliding rails on the ground covered with dust and metal waste.


    The only thing blocking Greem¡¯s path were several metal fences that were thick as a child¡¯s arm. Rust and cobwebs covered the entire structure, but it was clear it had been installed to keep out any trespassers.


    To avoid alerting any possible guards, Greem didn¡¯t choose to jump inside with his Fire Teleportation. Instead he gripped the upper portion of two metal bars tightly and silently drew from the fire powers within his body.


    No mes appeared; only terrifying and intense heat.


    The two metal bars quickly turned red and liquified in Greem¡¯s grip, before flowing down the cave.


    A path appeared before their eyes!


    "Come in. Let¡¯s finish this quickly!" Greem softly ordered before going into the cave.


    Runeforge Camp, without a radiant knight¡¯s protection, was like an unsecured yground in Greem¡¯s eyes. He could do whatever he wanted. Those spellbreaker knights stationed within were not even worthy of being put on his list of enemies.


    A dozen steps into the tunnel, in the side of the wall, was a small stone resting room for three guards. Greem casually threw a fireball into the room as he strode by before continuing on his path.


    Before the vicious fireball exploded behind him, Greem had already walked out of the waste dumping area and had progressed towards the entrance of the Runeforge Camp through arge and wide tunnel.


    Indeed, he was not rushing towards the heavily guarded forging area or drafting room. Instead he headed towards the camp¡¯s entrance.


    There were no more radiant knights in Runeforge Camp, but there was still one stationed in the knight¡¯s headquarters outside. If he caught wind of the raid and rushed over, he would very likely stop Greem and the others from escaping. Thus Greem, who was already nning to go all out on the troops in the Camp, walked unhesitatingly towards the entrance. The first thing he had to do was to cut off all connection the camp had with the outside.


    When the first fireball exploded behind the camp, every single guard in Runeforge Camp had been alerted. Countless guards surged out of their shelters and camps, and after a chaotic scrambling they finally managed to find the source of the explosion.


    Under the orders of the campmander, scores of guards grabbed their weapons and headed into the stone tunnel, running towards the location of the explosion.

 Chapter 243

    Chapter 243 Shattering the Stalemate


    The entire Runeforge Camp was located in the belly of the mountain, which had been emptied to make space for the infrastructure.


    Aside from therge halls of the central living and forging areas, almost all of the other areas were just long stone corridors connected with each other. It was undoubtedly a difficult task to find any enemies who had managed to sneak their way into such aplex web of tunnels.


    The two local adepts that had followed Greem into the camp didn¡¯t continue moving forward. They stayed in the waste dumping area and used the narrow corridors as a choke point to stall the enemies.


    Their presence drew most of the attention of the enemies to the back of the camp. The campmander wouldn¡¯t alert the radiant knight at the headquarters before the central area was at risk.


    And this gave Greem the chance to sneak by!


    The tunnels stretching across the entire Runeforge Camp were extremelyplex yet connected. This allowed themander to easily redirect the guards around the areas. However, at this moment, the nature of the tunnels also provided Greem with a great deal of convenience.


    Havingbined the map provided by Mas with the chip¡¯s high-speed battlefield data collection system, all of the enemies within Greem¡¯s sensory range were marked in his mind. Greem wove through the stone corridors with the help of the chip, using the confusing crossroads and the shadows to avoid the reinforcements and quickly head to the entrance of the camp.


    He might be able to avoid the moving guards, but there was no avoiding the lookouts stationed at the exit of the tunnels.


    Greem chose to make his way through these enemies forcefully. He emerged from the dark tunnels into the brightly-lit area. Before the lookouts could even sound the rms, terrifying streams of me had already engulfed their bodies.


    No human warrior could endure more than two seconds of the me streams shot from Greem¡¯s hands. Such a short period of time was not enough for them to sound the rms.


    Thus Greem casually strolled through the one and a half kilometer long tunnel and reached the entrance at the very front of Runeforge Camp.


    To prevent enemy attacks, this ce was armed to the teeth and the security was extremely strict.


    A hundred meter long stone tunnel was the only path into Runeforge Camp. Numerous guardhouses and crossbows were positioned along the sides of the tunnel exit. All of the materials and resources transported into Runeforge Camp had to be checked and verified multiple times before they were allowed into the camp.


    Sadly, all of the defenses were designed to deal with an external threat.


    It was probably because the person that designed this airtight underground fortress never expected enemies from the inside!


    Greem no longer needed to hide when he reached this point.


    Under everyone¡¯s horrified gaze, his silhouette stepped out from the darkness and transformed into a terrifying me Fiend. Magma Fireballs exploded one after another down the long stone tunnel.


    The result of such intense and dominating attacks was the copse of half of the tunnel. Even Mount Mingsu shook slightly from the impact of the explosions.


    Greem looked at the massive rocks that hadpletely sealed the tunnel, and turned his focus to the camp guards.


    The sound of crossbows bolts whistled through the air. Countless camp guards shouted as they rushed at Greem. There was even a spellbreaker knight and three witcher-knights mixed in with their ranks.


    Sadly the narrow geography and the cluster of guards made it hard for everyone to surround Greem.


    Greempletely ignored the human warriors, whose des were clinking against his magma armor, and focused his firepower on the more dangerous targets. Even without using the Scroll of Voodoo, just three Magma Fireballs, along with two Explosive Fireballs, made quick work of the few individuals that could have been a threat to him.


    Violent elementium mes and sshingva quickly turned the spot the spellbreaker knight was standing at into a magma hell. Many human warriors were scalded and burnt by the mes andva, running through the crowd and shouting for help as they were turned into human torches.


    Sadly no one could save them now!


    The remaining soldiers couldn¡¯t even save themselves.


    The human warriors around Greem weren¡¯t even worth his time. He didn¡¯t need to lift a single finger. Every person within range of the Ring of Fire clutched their throats and breathed painfully. Yet with every breath they took they were inhaling air at terrifying temperatures.


    This scorching air caused their windpipes and lungs to ignite like charcoal.


    At the end, even the clothes on their bodies had started burning. The swords and spears they held in their hands were heated as red as mes, sizzling in their palms.


    The me Fiend didn¡¯t need to attack. All Greem had to do was stand amid the soldiers and they would die one after another while clutching their throats in agony.


    Everything turned to dust where the me Fiend walked!


    Even the stone floor beneath their feet had started to glow red and soften. Red hotva was surging everywhere, quickly turning the ces where they stood into an area not unlike a magma pool.


    It was only now that themander of the camp realized the urgent and critical nature of the situation they were in. Sadly, the military strength left within Runeforge Camp was not enough to stop a rampaging adept.


    When the two native adepts finally met up with Greem in the tunnel leading to the forging hall, the remaining hundred or so guards were gathered in a corner, barely hanging on using the tough defensive structure and their runic arrows.


    The transforming adept Cobalt tried to force his way into the hall several times, but he was rebuffed at every attempt by a concentrated barrage of runic arrows. After all, the ce was small and narrow and didn¡¯t afford him much room to dodge about. Cobalt couldn¡¯t have endured the focused fire without any defensive spells or magical equipment.


    Greem¡¯s me Fiend form squeezed into the tunnel with a lot of difficulty and joined back up with the two adepts. This was an underground passage after all. Most of the ceilings weren¡¯t even four meters high, making it challenging for the me Fiend to maneuver its way about inside.


    The two native adepts looked at each other when they saw the me Fiend¡¯s terrifying demonic shape striding towards them in the tunnel. They could feel the suffocating heat in the air. Greem¡¯s terrifying power filled the two adepts¡¯ hearts with immense respect for the evil adepts.


    Greem¡¯s burning red eyes swept across the two¡¯s wounded bodies and nodded in acknowledgement, "Good job, you two! Leave the rest to me!"


    Adept Cobalt wanted to warn Greem of the four spellbreaker knights and the dozen witcher-knights still in the hall, but the silhouette of the me Fiend had already vanished before their eyes.


    The next second, a massive me halo exploded in the very midst of the crowd gathered in the hall. The me Fiend¡¯s massive body appeared in a zing radiance.


    me Shockwave!


    Ring of Fire!


    Violent and vicious waves of fire were amplified by the two fire spells, instantly turning Greem¡¯s surroundings into a raging sea of me. The remaining camp guards that were still able to put up a fight were quickly set alight without any resistance. They ran about screaming in pain.


    The only ones that were able to survive Greem¡¯s double me attack were the spellbreaker knights and witcher-knights. They raised the energy shields in their hands and charge at Greem¡¯s side while under the heavy assault of the me Shockwave. Their runic swords turned into freezing des. With a single sh they cut through the Lava Shield.


    However, in the small moment where their des were halted by the Lava Shield, Greem had already managed to summon a Fire Deity with a slight wave of the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter. It did only one thing when it appeared. Its only job.


    Self-destruction!


    The self-destruction of the pseudo-adept level Fire Deity instantly brought about annihting damage to the entire hall.


    Every single inch of the stone floor beneath their feet shattered. Even the resilient rock walls had an entire three-finger deepyer shaved off of them by the destructive me Shockwave.


    The camp guards at the center of the explosion had been instantly vaporized. Not even a fleck of their ashes could be found after the fire. The witcher-knights and spellbreaker knights by Greem¡¯s side fell to the ground and coughed up blood in agony. Greem quickly picked them off as he shot out Explosive Fireballs at each and every one of them.


    When the two native adepts walked into the hall, the entire ce had already been turned into a horrifying hell of boiling magma and a burning sea of mes. The enemy? Many apologies, but with how weak they were it was hard to find even a speck of their remains!


    The only people that could match adepts were spellcasters of the same Grade. Normal humans? They had no chance of ever matching up against the might of adepts!


    Meanwhile, the improvement in Greem¡¯s abilities was extremely apparent.


    From his initial cautiousness against the spellbreaker knights, to the now reckless and easy ughter, Greem¡¯s use of fire spells had improved by several levels. He was already starting to develop his ownbat pattern and style.


    The violence and prominence of fire spells was bing increasingly obvious!


    "Let¡¯s go. It¡¯s time to reap the fruits of our victory!" The me Fiend¡¯s body shook slightly. The chaotic mes slowly dissipated and the magma started to solidify as the elegant and mysterious Greem appeared once more.


    He nodded at the native adepts and turned towards a corridor by the side of the hall.


    This was the central hall of the entire Runeforge Camp. There were many passages that led to different areas from here. And the ce Greem headed towards was, naturally, the drafting room where the blueprints and ssified documents were stored.


    Looking at how easily Greem dealt with the situation, the two adepts couldn¡¯t help but look at each other again, their faces full of frustration and dejection. They were both First Grade spellcasters, but wasn¡¯t the difference inbat power way toorge?!


    In the past they were only able to feel the prowess of the evil adepts through Diviner Mas¡¯ descriptions. But when the opponent¡¯s terrifying powers were disyed right before their eyes, the massive shock that went right through their bodies and into their souls stomped their past pride and arrogance into the ground.


    They might have felt a little better if the opponent was intentionally using his overwhelming prowess to intimidate them. After all, that meant he noticed and cared about how powerful they were! But it was precisely Greem¡¯s nonchnce that caused the two native adepts to feel increasingly upset.


    Their existence had beenpletely ignored!


    How were they any different from being Greem¡¯sckeys?


    "You go and check for anything of value in the drafting room! I¡¯ll check about the forging area. We might be able to find some good stuff!" Adept Cobalt held his hand over his heart and spoke, before stumbling into another passage.


    Adept Flower shook her head in helplessness and dejection before walking towards the drafting room.

 Chapter 244

    Chapter 244 Full Harvest


    Runeforge Camp; drafting room.


    The two bronze doors were wide open and the bodies of two witcher-knights were spread before them.


    Heat still emanated from where the lock had been as red-white iron liquid slowly dripped down.


    This was an old storeroom. Disorganized piles of parchment sat on the stone tform in the middle. Some of them were spread wide open, others not so much. There were even emptied ink bottles and used quill pens scattered across the tform.


    Several ancient wooden stands along the stone walls took up the rest of the drafting room. Many wooden chests, parchments, and gray sacks were stacked on them.


    When Flower hesitatingly walked into the room, Greem had already begun to inspect the items on the stands. It was clear that Greem had an oddly sharp eye for item identification. He was able to figure out the value of any object in a matter of seconds.


    Themon or worthless objects were put back onto the stands while the expensive and valuable items vanished in the blink of an eye.


    "Spatial storage equipment!" Adept Flower couldn¡¯t help but gasp in envy.


    A spellcaster with space affinity had appeared for a short period of time within the knights¡¯ ne. He had made his name by crafting spatial storage equipment. Sadly, even a genius like that had died a painful death under the witcher-knights¡¯ butcher knife.


    The few spatial storage items scattered across the knights¡¯ ne had alle from his hand, but not only were they few in number, they were often in the hands of a select few powerful individuals. A First Grade spellcaster like herself had only heard rumors of them, but had never seen one with her own eyes.


    Greem turned around and saw the female caster taking out arge sack. It seemed she was about to use the most inefficient method and physically lug all of the loot out with her. He couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and sigh. Even though they were both casters, their situations were so different simply because of the worlds they had been born in.


    Greem removed a storage waist-pack from his belt and casually threw it over to Flower. There wasn¡¯t much storage space within the pack, but it was more than enough to carry a bunch of simple casting materials.


    Greem ignored her joyful and excited toying with the pack and drew his attention back to the massive pile of scrolls and drawings.


    Almost all of the runic knowledge, life source knowledge, and theories about this ne¡¯s system of operation, gathered throughout the thousand-year history of the kingdom, had been stored here. The treasury of the pce high above them was likely home to more materialistic and valuable objects such as antiques, treasures, or unique items.


    Greem¡¯s storage belt had limited space and there was no way he could bring everything here with him. He needed to do some filtering and selection!


    Greem randomly picked up an ancient scroll and swept through its contents. Most of it was crude guesses and assumptions about the source of life... useless stuff. Next!


    He picked up another scroll. This one was full of elementary and basic rune drawings... useless. Next!


    He lifted a volume of books this time. Hundreds of arrangement methods for different runes were listed within it in great detail. It wasn¡¯t very useful but it could still serve forparison and reference against the runic knowledge of the World of Adepts, so there was still some research value to it... basically useful. Kept!


    Greem grabbed a drawing on the table. It was a visualization of the meridian lines in the human body, much like those he had seen back on Earth. The intellectuals of this ne had probably seeded in merging runic energies with the life energy within the human body after an in-depth study of human anatomy! This was useful. Kept!


    Just like that, Greem flipped through one document after another, tossing aside those that contained only crude or known information. He only put the documents that were rare or had immense research value into his storage belt. Apart from these necessary drawings, drafts, and informations, Greem also found some exceptionally valuable ores and special magic stones on the wooden stands.


    Jade Moon Stone, Tsite, Dawnstone, Star of Elune, Nightseye, Living Ruby, Empyrean Sapphire, Shadowsong Amethyst, Crimson Spinel. All of these magic stones were exceptionally valuable, even back in the World of Adepts, and were being used as supplementary materials in the forging of runic equipment. Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and sigh at this.


    This ne¡¯sck of a systematic caster framework caused their alchemical knowledge to be severelycking as well. Without the use of profound alchemy ordinary human craftsmen would be hard-pressed to draw out the actual powers of such valuable magic stones. They could only shatter the stones and use the natural elementium affinity or natural traits to enhance their runic equipment with special effects.


    This... this was possibly the most wasteful way of using the stones!


    Of course, there was something that excited Greem even more than that. He had found three spacestones the size of his fist in an inconspicuous gray sack! Clearly, the people of this ne had also realized the oddity of these stones. However they couldn¡¯t understand their actual purpose or usage, and could only let them lie in this dim and dark hidden room.


    With the size of these three spacestones, any single one of them would allow a person to buy a small dukedom eight square kilometersrge in the Zhentarim Association¡¯s territory!


    Greem had to breath several times before he managed to calm himself down. He only continued to dig for treasures after making sure he had properly stored the spacestones.


    Honestly, when you managed to break into a hidden room belonging to the rulers of a ne, anything you found in there would probably be a treasure worth entire cities.


    Thus the next thirty minutes was Greem¡¯s most exhrating adventure ever since he came to this ne!


    Golden Apple. The main ingredient for resurrection ceremonies. Consumable.


    Orb of Deception. A tool that allowed one to perfectly hide their identity and faction. No known spells could see through its effect.


    ck Qiraji Resonating Crystal. It allowed long distance voicemunication and its effect could not be cancelled by any magical defense or nar barriers.


    Emblem of Fire. An odd magical object that originated from the fire elementium ne. The wearer of this emblem would be able to enter the fire elementium ne under the guise of a normal fire elemental.


    Shandera¡¯s Sheepstick. An ancient spell that could turn its target into a bleatingmb was sealed inside. (Unless the target was immune to transfiguration effects.) Duration: Five seconds. Ignores armor and magical resistance.


    ......


    ......


    Greem would have been content to get his hands on aplete copy of the runic knowledge. Yet with what he was gaining now, he couldn¡¯t help but feel like he had underestimated the potential profits of a nar war.


    In terms of size and resources, the World of Adepts was hundreds of timesrger than the small world of the knights¡¯ ne. That said, regardless of howrge and rich in resources the World of Adepts was, the number of powerful individuals that fought for those resources was also despairinglyrge.


    The knights¡¯ ne might becking in natural resources, but when all of it was used for only a single adept n, the profits were tremendous.


    The resources and knowledge that Greem managed to gather from this crude and tiny drafting room would probably have taken him over a thousand years to amass back in the World of Adepts. In particr, top grade resources such as the spacestones and the Golden Apple were not items that he would have had a chance ofing into contact with at his level.


    If he hadn¡¯t gone on this mission alone and had managed to sneak into one of the kingdom¡¯s treasuries, then, with his status as a First Grade adept, he would never have been able to get his hands on these treasures.


    Inparison, the normally rare materials like Mithril, Underground Wrought Gold, magic agates, arcane crystals, and Khorium ores didn¡¯t even make Greem feel even a little excited.


    Yet, just as Greem and the others happily examined their newly gained treasures, a deafening boom rang out from the passage in the distance. The next moment the entire Runeforge Camp shook slightly.


    The enemy was breaking through the copsed tunnel at the entrance!


    Greem instantly understood the source of themotion.


    It was time to retreat!


    The better his harvest here, the more cautious Greem became. Moreover, the main attraction¨C the drafts of the runic equipment, the rare rune illustrations, the exnation of runic energies, and the guide to utilizing runic energies were all in his possession now. The remaining items scattered about were no longer as important.


    Greem gave Flower a heads-up and quickly walked out of the drafting room. When he reached the central hall once again, the loud booming sounds in the distance had gotten a lot closer.


    Just then, the guy called Cobalt showed up, already transformed into a muscr and massive three-meter-tall barbaric giant. All of the items that he was lugging behind his shoulders, holding in his hands, and carrying around his waist were gleaming runic equipment. Greem even saw threeplete sets of Second Grade radiant knight armor among them. Most of the other items were also standard First Grade spellbreaker knight gear.


    Greem was excited to see this equipment. He casually threw an adepts¡¯ waist storage pack at Cobalt. Following the adept¡¯s principle of fair trade and exceptionally good oratorical skills, Greem easily managed to exchange a set of Second Grade radiant knight armor and runic weapons with Cobalt.


    Adept Cobalt was naturally happy to ept such an unexpectedly good trade!


    Soon the three gathered together and quickly hurried to the back of the camp with all of their spoils.


    Just as they reached the cave behind the mountains, the entrance of the camp was finally broken through by three radiant knights.


    The impact of their ferocious strength sent crumbling rocks flying everywhere, smashing craters all over the stone passage. A tall and radiant silhouette walked out of the dust and debris, intimidatingly assessing everything before his eyes.


    Rocks were still falling hazardously behind him in the narrow passage.


    One after another, lithe forms moved through the passage and quickly ran towards every location in Runeforge Camp.


    "Find those damned invaders! I want to slice them into a thousand pieces... " The radiant knight¡¯s angered shout rang throughout the camp.


    Greem felt the massivemotion echoing through the underground tunnel. He grabbed the shoulders of his two panions¡¯ and the three disappeared in a massive fire pir.

 Chapter 245

    Chapter 245 The Conflict Esctes


    Nighttime. The knights¡¯ kingdom was in turmoil.


    The actual battle reports hade in from the frontlines. More than half of the six thousand witcher-knights had died in Greend Forest, while the survivors had been scattered in the wild and were unlikely to regroup anytime soon.


    The cause for the dy in information was due to that ursed Count Vanlier taking up arms and rebelling. He had publicly surrendered to those evil invading adepts.


    Only five radiant knights remained out of the leaders that went to battle. They led a hundred of their subordinates back to Herdurand City, and that was how news of the battle got back.


    The sudden betrayal of the dragons!


    The departure of Fourth Grade Holy Knight Sir Willis with the dragons!


    One of the three dragon knights had died in battle, while the other two had been caught in the adepts¡¯ base.


    The terrifying adepts¡¯ tower remained standing in the depths of Greend Forest, now imprable and unassable!


    ......


    Bad news repeatedly came. Finally, the elderly king was unable to go on and started coughing blood.


    Just as he got news of the dragons¡¯ betrayal and the dire straits of his kingdom, news reached his ears about an attack on Runeforge Camp, the most important location for the knights. This increasingly angered all of the witcher-knights!


    The many radiant knights that stayed at and guarded the pce led their indignant subordinates out on the hunt, recklessly searching for suspicious individuals within Skandre City.


    Just like that, Skandre City instantly turned into a terrifying storm vortex, viciously dragging everyone involved into itself and tearing them to pieces!


    A night of unrest.


    When dawn broke, Skandre City finally regained a little of its peace.


    Yet, at this moment, the prisons of the capital had already been filled to the brim with crying and pleading prisoners.


    Before the shaken poption could even calm down, a wave of violent dragon roars rumbled across the distance.


    A massive flight of dragons hade!


    Having experienced seventeen days of dragon raids, everyone in the capital had long gotten used to this terrifying sound.


    But today was obviously different.


    Not only were the dragons much earlier than usual, they were all circling above the pce. It seemed they did note with good intentions!


    For a time, the skies above the pce were entirely covered by the wicked and intimidating bodies of the green dragons.


    Twenty-three adolescent green dragons. Five Third Grade green dragons, seven Second Grade green dragons, and eleven First Grade green dragons were here.


    They circled in the sky as the lead dragon let out a vicious roar. The weathered stone surfaces of the nearby mountains started to crumble and fall during the thundering roar, rolling down towards the bottom of the mountain in andslide.


    Having let out the anger and dissatisfaction in his heart, the green dragon beat his wings and hovered above the pce while letting out yet another massive roar.


    "Edward VII, get your filthy ass out here. Hand over the dragon-ying murderer, or we will raze your pce!"


    "Get out here... "


    "Hand over the murderer... "


    ......


    The dragons roared, one after another. The deafening sound caused even the pce itself to tremor.


    Countless pce guards hid within the watchtowers and above the pce walls. They held bows and crossbows in their hands and prepared for a fight at any moment, yet no one dared to start an attack.


    For the longest time, the magnificent and mighty dragons were the patrons of their hearts. They were their most powerfulpanions that they lived in harmony with. Every single human couldn¡¯t help but have mixed feelings about the situation now that they had be enemies.


    Their capital had been utterly ravaged, their cities attacked, and the people angered. Yet, after such a long time under the dragon¡¯s protection, everyone still hoped, deep in their hearts, that the dragons woulde to their senses and reestablish their friendship with the kingdom!


    It was such a mentality that caused the citizens of the capital to have mixed feelings towards the dragons. There were those who hated them, and those that wished for friendship, while even more were in a state of uncertainty...


    Confusion and uncertainty towards the dragons; towards humanity and the future!


    Eight radiant knights anxiously gathered before the king¡¯s bed, ced in a luxuriously grand hall. They helplessly watched on as a group of doctors tried their very best to save the king, whose face was flushed an unhealthy red. However, their king was clearly at the brink of his death. It was clear that he wasn¡¯t going to regain consciousness.


    "What do we do? The dragons are knocking at the gates. How are we supposed to negotiate with the dragons without the king?"


    "Indeed. The dragons do note with friendly thoughts. A bloody battle is imminent! But the king... "


    The radiant knights frowned deeply as they discussed. None of them had any idea what to do in the current situation.


    In the end, the most veteran radiant knight amongst them took off his helmet, revealing his pale white hair and weathered face as he spoke, "This is a time of difficulty for the kingdom. As knights of the Edward family we cannot abandon the throne in such trying times."


    Several radiant knights straightened their faces and replied in unison, "We will defend the kingdom with our lives!"


    "I¡¯ll give out orders now. August, Andeni, the two of you stay here. Make sure that the king remains unharmed!"


    "Understood!" "Understood!"


    "Sarah, ire. Find the princes immediately and evacuate the pce. Return immediately if we are able to make it through today. If... if war breaks out, don¡¯t care about what happens back here. Take them east. The further the better!"


    The two were both female knights. Their expressions were saddened when they heard this, but they forced their tears back down and nodded in acknowledgement.


    "The rest follow me to see what the dragons want."


    "We will stand with you!"


    Amidst some vague sobbings, the four radiant knights sorted out their equipment and marched out of the pce with tragic and passionate valiance.


    Yet, just as everyone was distracted by the tense standoff in front of the pce, a fully armed radiant knight was hurrying towards the back with two spellbreaker knights following closely behind. It was a time of turmoil and chaos. Large numbers of witcher-knights were stationed in various locations in the pce and even the pce guards were in a panic.


    At this time, the powerful radiant knights were like the foundation of the entire kingdom¡¯s backbone. Which ignorant guard would dare to stop and search a radiant knight at such a moment?


    Thus, Greem sessfully made his way near the hall with Cobalt and Flower following closely behind and managed to hide in a room right next to therge hall.


    At the front of the pce, the elderly radiant knight that strode out had attracted the attention of the dragon flight.


    The dragon at the lead with the massive body folded its wings when it saw the four radiant knights walking out. Itnded on therge tform.


    "Human, call your king out. Today, he must hand over the Gem of the Contract, as well as the dragon-murderer. Otherwise, we will raze this ce to the ground." The green dragon roared.


    "O respected dragon ambassador, what is it that angers you so? We of the knights¡¯ kingdom have always been the loyalpanions to the great dragons for the past thousand years. Yet now, it is you that are viciously attacking the capital and assaulting our cities. And today you evene here to demand some Gem of Contract and murderer from us! Is this somethingpanions and allies do to each other?"


    "Puny human, don¡¯t try and show off your speaking skills. The great Wrathion will not sit here and listen to your useless words. Have your kinge out or I¡¯ll force my way in!" The dragon in the lead was violent and aggressive. It was clear that he had no intention of letting this end peacefully.


    Greem, who was peeking from a side hall in the distance, let out a breath of relief.


    Fortunately for him, the leading Third Grade dragon had an excessively overbearing personality. Otherwise, if both parties had any sign of peaceful negotiation, he would probably have to take the risk and incite a conflict. He only needed to run to a group of ¡¯ignorant¡¯ witcher-knights and order them to attack the dragons to start aplete bloodbath.


    Luckily, the dragons were far more reckless than he thought. Such a forceful method of negotiation. It would be weird if the knights didn¡¯t react negatively!


    As expected, just as the elderly radiant knight drew his shining runic longsword to halt the march of the lead dragon, chaos broke out! No one knew whether it was started by a runic arrow shot by a panicking witcher-knight, or the dragon breath of a young green dragon, but a terrifying battle quickly exploded!


    Under the terrified gazes of countless pce guards, numerous acidic poison and wind poison dragon breaths rained down like a storm. All of the human warriors that were caught in them died a painful death before they could even escape.


    The warriors that were engulfed in the wind poison fell to the ground, their faces a deathly ck. They had been killed instantly by the poison. Those that were showered with acidic poison had their flesh dissolved like melting candles, turning into viscous green liquid and leaving only a pile of charred and withered bones behind.


    Bows and crossbows on the ground fired in unison. Waves of fire and ice arrows shed through the sky, barring the dragon flight.


    Clinking noises echoed throughout. Countless arrows were swiped out of the skies by the dragons¡¯ wings and tails, but some arrows still found their way into gaps in the scales of the younger dragons.


    For a moment, grunts and cries of pain rang out incessantly from the dragon flight.


    A few adolescent green dragons quickly dove down and used their massive bodies to shield the young dragons. Under the orders of the adolescent dragons, the dragon flight quickly took to the sky and gradually left the range of the crossbows.


    But this didn¡¯t mean that the dragons were going to retreat. In fact, it was the precursor to a ferocious attack.


    Dragon roars rumbled through the skies. With two adolescent dragons in the front, and three juvenile dragons following closely behind, five massive green dragons beat their wide wings and dove downwards at the pce at high speed.


    The five green dragons opened their mouths wide, andrge balls of horrifying acid quickly gathered behind their throats.


    The next moment, five dense acidic poison breaths had ploughed several paths of death through the crowd below. The crossbows attacks from the ground were mostly deflected by the dragons¡¯ scales. Even the asional bolts that found their mark into flesh wasn¡¯t enough to interrupt the dragons¡¯ wild breaths.


    The first group of dragons had just finished unleashing their ravaging breaths. Just as they turned their bodies and took to the skies once more, a second group of dragons had already started their high-speed dive. Behind them, a third group of dragons was already in formation, looking for the best diving angle...

 Chapter 246

    Chapter 246 The Battle of the Dragons


    Dragons were apex predators at the top of the food chain for all native beings of material nes.


    If any witcher-knight had doubted this truth in the past, today was the day bloody reality would correct them!


    It was easy to imagine the depth of despair in the humans¡¯ hearts! Their barrage of arrows did nothing as rows of five dragons groups dove from the skies and whizzed through the air, leaving paths of deaths in the wake of their terrifying dragon¡¯s breath.


    Skandre City had no city walls, having experienced a thousand years of peace and prosperity with their long allied history with Dragon Valley. Moreover, there were no defense facilities within the city that could threaten the dragons. Weapons such as catapults and ballistae werepletely absent from the army¡¯s arsenal of weapons. Thus the well-equipped pce guards could only run about in the face of the decimating dragon¡¯s breath before dying painfully in the midst of the green smoke.


    The only things that were able to damage the dragons were the violent sword techniques of the high-grade knights.


    Sadly, after numerous spellbreaker knights had managed to hurt the first few waves of dragons, when they were at the lowest point of their dives, the following dragon attacks were quickly adjusted to put the knights at the center of the damage.


    The magic resistance of the spellbreaker knights was still insufficient to help them endure the dragons¡¯ bombardment.


    Large clouds of wind poison breaths, along with quick and urate acid shots, quickly singled out and eliminated the high-grade knights who were mixed in with the guards.


    The four radiant knights, on the other hand, were engaged in an intense battle with the Third Grade Green Dragon Wrathion. Their attention was wrapped up in the tform in front of the pce. None of them could spare any strength to help their dyingpanions and subordinates.


    Only two of the four radiant knights had gone down the path of violent knights. Their runic energy enhancements allowed their strength to increase tremendously, giving them the ability to threaten a Third Grade dragon in closebat. The other two radiant knights had ced their focus on speed and technique. Even though this gave them more agile and lithe movements, it also limited their ability to break through the dragon¡¯s tough scales.


    The four radiant knights circled around Wrathion¡¯s massive body, avoiding his terrifying jaws, ferocious wing attacks, and his monstrous tail. It was only when one of them had managed to draw the dragon¡¯s attention that the others would charge forward and unleash their most vicious sword technique on the dragon¡¯s weak spot.


    Regardless of whether the attack was effective, the attackers would immediately retreat from the radius of the dragon¡¯s attacks. None of them could possibly receive an attack from the green dragon Wrathion, be it his breath, bite, swipe, or his tail whip.


    The dragons used two types of breath. One was the area-of-effect, damage-over-time, poison mist breath. This was also their favorite attack when they dove at enemies. At close range, the green dragons were still able to rapidly fire acid breaths at enemies.


    The acid breath didn¡¯t cover a veryrge area, but it could be rapidly fired. Moreover it was still a very threatening attack. Even with their defense and magical resistance, the radiant knights didn¡¯t dare take on the acid. Within a thirty meter radius this breath, that possessed both corrosiveness and toxicity, could easily dissolve their flesh and turn them into a pile of bones.


    The imposing Wrathion dared tond on the ground an engage in a brutal melee with the four powerful radiant knights because of these menacing attacks of his.


    In less than fifteen minutes, eight inch-long gashes had already appeared on his gigantic body. His right armpit had been badly wounded by destructive sword techniques. Patches of dark green scales had been sted away, leaving only arge and bloody wound behind.


    Such injuries may have looked scary, but they were only moderate injuries to the tough body of a dragon!


    On the other hand, two of the four radiant knights had already retreated from the battlefield.


    One of them had been hit on the chest by the green dragon¡¯s tail. Even though he had blocked the blow with his longsword, the tremendous impact still managed to shatter his ribcage and cause him to continuously cough up blood. The other knight¡¯s right arm waspletely dissolved by acid and he could no longer hold up his longsword.


    Even the two remaining knights were exhausted and injured all over. It seemed they were barely hanging on using thest vestiges of their strength.


    They couldn¡¯t have changed the conclusion of this fight. Through their immense physical strength and monstrous magic resistance, the dragons had always dominated the world. These were the sources of their dominance, and was what allowed them to challenge powerful individuals above their Grade. Thus, in truth, the Third Grade green dragon before them already had powers rivalling that of an ordinary Fourth Grade.


    The four radiant knights were only at Second Grade. The fact that they were able to inflict such damage on a Fourth Grade being with just their mortal bodies was only due to their reckless and desperate way of fighting!


    For a time the entire pce, and the entire peak of Mount Mingsu, was filled with the tragic cries of human guards and the ravaging gales brought about by the rapid dives of the dragons. Groups of people were running about everywhere as more and more of the earth became scorched under the corrosive dragon breath. The sight of scattered bones and pools of green liquid shocked and stunned everyone that looked upon them.


    Moreover, half-molten bodies of pce guards could be seen everywhere. They were on the pce walls, the rooftops, the towers, in the streets!


    Greem and the two adepts, who were watching the tragedy unfold before their eyes from the safety of the side hall, all had differing feelings and emotions about it. As native adepts of this ne, Cobalt and Flower were content to see the pce guards rightfully paying their dues as they were cruelly ughtered. Yet, at the same time, they couldn¡¯t help but feel a trace of indescribable sorrow at the scene! Greem, on the other hand, was a human from another world. He had absolutely no sympathy to spare for these people.


    This was actually a verymon mentality amongst all ne worlds!


    The adepts firmly believed that only humans from the World of Adepts could barely be considered as the same race as them. This was because those humans were shared their bloodlines. In the eyes of the adepts, the humans of other worlds were no more than groups of humanoid creatures.


    This was much like the attitude of yers in online games back on Earth. The adepts were a bunch of invading yer-characters, while the natives were only NPCs that happened to look like humans. Thus the adepts would never feel a slight bit of guilt at ughtering such natives.


    Greem thought that he would find it difficult to cross that line. Yet, as he watched humans from another world die en masse at the hands of dragons, he found that his emotions were extremely calm. It was like he was watching a y, a show performed on stage. He couldn¡¯t help but sigh at this discovery. The past few years of difficulties in the World of Adepts had undoubtedly tremendously changed him!


    Now that the time was ripe, Greem didn¡¯t intend to dawdle. He reached into the air and drew a crimson runic line in front of his eyes. When one strange me-shrouded rune had beenpleted, Greem blew at the rune lightly and it instantly vanished.


    Greem took out oddly-shaped orb and swallowed it in one go.


    "Alright, the runic seal on the books I gave you have been removed!" Greem turned back and calmly said, "Send my greetings to Diviner Mas."


    Having said that, he didn¡¯t wait for the two native adepts to reply. He pushed apart the doors and strode towards the hall in the distance.


    "How is it? Is there a response from Sir Diviner?" Adept Cobalt couldn¡¯t help but turn his head and ask, "Don¡¯t let that adept trick us!"


    Adept Flower pressed her right hand against her forehead. She closed her eyes and sensed with a spell for a minute or two before finally opening her eyes and nodding, "The magic seal has indeed been removed. Sir Diviner wants us to return immediately! Let¡¯s go!"


    Adept Cobalt nodded silently. He gazed at the silhouette of that terrifying adept, shrinking away in the distance, before turning and retreating from the pce with hispanion back to where they came from.


    They weren¡¯t here to help Greem in the first ce. They were only here as personal ¡¯bodyguards¡¯ to make sure that nothing happened before he removed the runic seals on those books. The agreement between both parties had actually beenpleted when the dragon flight had attacked.


    Diviner Mas had used his wisdom to help Greem draw away most of the radiant knights. If Greem was still unable to kill Edward VII, that could only be the fault of his own weakness.


    ............


    It was still that delicate and spacious bedroom.


    The tightly shut doors were forced open by a stumbling figure.


    They were wearing the blinding knight armor that belonged to the radiant knights. Terrifying marks that indicated it had suffered corrosion by the green dragons¡¯ acid could be seen everywhere. Even the visor had been badly damaged by an external force and had its shaped twisted and distorted. Blood covered the rest of his exposed skin, making it hard for anyone to recognize the knight¡¯s identity.


    The two radiant knights guarding the hall were shocked for a second. They had already drawn their runic longswords in preparation for a confrontation. However, they both let out a sigh of relief when they saw the person¡¯s costume.


    As they moved forward to help theirpanion up, the injured knight started screaming in a hoarse voice, "Quick... reinforce them... "


    Before the knight could finish his sentence, he had already fallen to the ground. His head rested limply against the floor. It was clear he was unconscious.


    "The situation in front must be extremely urgent. Otherwise they wouldn¡¯t have sent someone back to ask for help. I¡¯ll go take a look. You stay here and guard the king!" The more experienced radiant knight quickly made a decision. After barking out some simple orders, he rose and rushed towards the front of the hall, where the fighting was at its most intense. Several spellbreaker knights followed behind him.


    Even though the radiant knight that stayed behind was extremely anxious, he could only suppress his worries and do his job. Then his attention was drawn towards hispanion that had fallen to the ground.


    As high-grade knights, their Spirits might not be as sharp or powerful as spellcasters, but they were still far superior whenpared to ordinary people. He was able to recognize the aura of any of hispanions after slight contact. Yet his senses were acting up today. Even though he could very clearly sense an aura of familiarity about his ¡¯injured¡¯panion, he couldn¡¯t ce a name or face to the person.


    Did the dragons cast some odd spell on him?


    He lifted hispanion¡¯s body in his confusion, and turned him face up. Just as he was about to take off that distorted and damaged helmet, a sharp pain shot through his abdomen. It felt like a burning rod had stabbed all they through.


    He looked down in surprise, only to find his panion¡¯s¡¯ hand in his stomach. The hand was muscr and glowing red like fire. Moreover, it seemed like his panion¡¯ was still thrusting his hand even further inside.


    The next moment, a terrifying ze of fire had ignited in the room.


    A menacing me Fiend hade to life, right in his embrace!

 Chapter 247

    Chapter 247 Mission Complete


    An enemy!


    It was only when the me Fiend form was revealed that the radiant knight was able to determine the identity of his panion¡¯.


    The me Fiend¡¯s rapidly expanding magma hand had pierced through the knight¡¯s armor and flesh, intensely burning in his stomach. The tremendous pain, along with his anger and hatred for the enemy, instantly threw the radiant knight into a berserker rage!


    Any other human would have exploded and died if they had been injected with such violent fire energy. However, the radiant knights were well limated to ice and fire energies, having handled them for long periods of time. The mes in the knight¡¯s body could wound him but not kill him. In fact, he started his counter-attack using the massively increased Strength and Physique from his berserked status.


    The radiant knight had no time to draw his sword. The moment he went berserk, he charged at Greem. He raised an iron fist andunched a heavy punch at the me Fiend¡¯s chest, instantly shattering a Lava Shield. The unstoppable fist continued on its path, sending the massive me Fiend flying backwards.


    The me Fiend¡¯s steel-hard chest hadpletely copsed. The sound of breaking bones could clearly be heard within the room.


    Arge and bloody wound appeared where the me Fiend¡¯s hand had been pulled out of the knight¡¯s stomach. Purple-ck blood and shattered organs surged out of his body from the pressure of the vicious fire energies. However, even this blood and flesh didn¡¯t make it to the floor. They were vaporized by the intense heat as they were falling to the ground.


    The radiant knight let out a muffled grunt. He stumbled two steps forward in agony before dropping to the ground on one knee.


    Greem had crashed to the ground ten meters away. When he finally managed to get up, viscous blood-fire surged up his throat and he coughed it out onto the stone floor before him. On the ground, the me Fiend¡¯s purple blood burned with a strange fire.


    Their enemy was right before them. The two raised their heads and locked onto their opponent with hateful gazes.


    It isn¡¯t wise to wait. I had best kill the opponent while he¡¯s badly injured!


    A resolute thought rose up in both of their minds at almost the same time.


    The radiant knight extended his right hand outwards. Amazingly, strange red mes started to surface on his hand. He grit his teeth and pressed the energy mes against the wound on his stomach.


    Amidst the sizzling sounds of burning flesh, the radiant knight experienced an intense pain that he had never felt before. That said, he had seeded in using the searing energy mes to exterminate the remaining elementium mes within his body, as well as managing to use the fire to seal his massive wound.


    This was an extremely crude and simple treatment. Even now, any simple action would send pain shooting throughout his entire body. The more he exerted his strength, the more wounds would appear under the charred flesh. Purple-ck blood would continue to flow down slowly. Even so, sealing his wounds still allowed him to regain a portion of hisbat strength!


    As long as his movements were quick and the battle short enough, he would still have an opportunity to properly treat his wounds at ater time.


    Greem, on the other hand, had already swallowed four or five potion bottles of various colors. His bones and flesh cracked and snapped, and the shattered bone fragments were expelled from his body of magma. His copsed chest started to swell under the guidance of some mysterious energies.


    Still, the energy storm left behind in his body by the knight¡¯s attack was still ravaging his insides. For a moment this made it hard for him to gather enough magic to cast any spells.


    The spellbreaker knights gathered about the hall shouted battlecries and charged towards Greem.


    They too understood the situation. Both the radiant knight and the enemy had sustained damage from the earlier entanglement. As long as they were able to buy a little time for the radiant knight to recuperate, their chance of victory would increase greatly.


    Yet this group of spellbreaker knights that had not engaged in the battle of Greend Forest would never know how wrong they were. Distance was never a disadvantage for a powerful adept. Rather, it was an advantage!


    The Scroll of Voodoo, always by Greem¡¯s side, had already silently appeared in his hand as he was trying to catch his breath, and was secretly flipping through its pages on its own. A short momentter the Scroll of Voodoo stopped on a certain page. A blinding magic halo burst forth.


    me Halo of Repulsion!


    This was a unique spell that contained both fire damage and the ability to physically knock back enemies!


    Sessive me shockwaves spread outwards, with Greem at their center. Everyone that came into contact with the me halo had to endure the burning of mes as they stumbled backwards awkwardly.


    A single spell and all of the knights had been blown away, with the exception of some powerful knights that focused on honing their Strength and Physique. The remaining knights could no longer get close to Greem or interrupt his spellcasting!


    The sound of flipping pages continued...


    The pages finally stopped, and yet another powerful spell was used.


    Fire Core Explosion!


    This was one of the most powerful and mighty spells among the ones that Greem had mastered.


    The destructive me energies quickly gathered around the radiant knight under the guidance of Greem¡¯s gaze. In a single instant it could easily turn into a fierce explosive ze, causing immense elemental damage to the opponent.


    The radiant knight had justpleted his rudimentary treatment, but he was still exceptionally sensitive to elementium flux. The moment the wild elementium energies started to move, he instantly let out a battlecry and kicked off against the ground, sessfully escaping from the Fire Core Explosion¡¯s area-of-effect. At the same time that his body left the ground, his runic longsword started to glow brilliantly. A terrifying energy de quickly shed through ten meters of space tond on Greem¡¯s body.


    The me Fiend¡¯s massive size ensured that he could never be as agile as a human knight. Even though Greem could see the de shing towards him, the only thing he could do was try his best to step to the side. Energy quickly gathered around his me-red eyes as he dodged, shooting out a beam of Sr Ray and slicing towards the charging enemy from the side.


    Pu...


    Szz...


    Two different sounds rang out at the same time, with two distinct but muffled cries of pain mixed within!


    Fortunately, Greem had consciously prevented his vitals from being hit. Even though he had been hit squarely by the sh, the concentrated and lethal attack had only managed to tear arge gash from his right chest to the shoulder. Boilingva at intense temperatures sshed out of the meter-long wound. When thevanded on the smooth marble floor, it instantly heated up the ground to an unbelievable degree, softening and and liquefying the marble.


    On the other hand, the Sr Ray shot from Greem¡¯s eyes had been blocked by the radiant knight¡¯s sword. Astounding heat gathered on the de. Elementium energies shed with runic energies, emitting a burning and blinding light as they collided.


    The radiant knight quickly made a grabbing motion in the air with his left hand. A blinding energy spear quickly formed in his grip. He threw it with all his strength, putting a hole right in the stomach of the me Fiend. At the same time, the pages of the Scroll of Voodoo in Greem¡¯s hands rapidly turned. A Scarlet Firestorm instantly appeared where the knight was, returning the knight¡¯s blow with one of Greem¡¯s own.


    Single-target spells might have been concentrated and powerful in a closebat fight. However, melee sses could easily dodge or counter such attacks using various methods and skills. Thus, in order to ensure that the enemy was constantly damaged, Greem had no choice but to exhaust arge-radius fire spell.


    Greem was an elementium adept with fire mastery after all. Any fire spell would be much more powerful if he was the one doing the casting. Thus, again and again, the two enemies shed at a distance of less than ten meters. And once again the two ended in a painful stalemate!


    Yet at this time, the numerous guards in the hall had already made their way here and were bombarding Greem with a rain of runic arrows. Spellbreaker knights were mixed into the crowd, waving their swords about as they tried to charge at Greem¡¯s side.


    That said, none of these could directly threaten Greem¡¯s life. As long as he had five seconds of time to catch a breath, he could use the four powerful remaining spells in the Scroll of Voodoo to wipe them out.


    Sadly, where was he to find these five seconds in such a terrifying and crowded battlefield?!


    If he endured the enemies attacks and used an instant-cast spells to exterminate these annoying flies, the radiant knight might already have recovered from the previous round of attacks. The radiant knight would then easily be able to deal a killing blow in aposed and calm fashion.


    There was even scarier news. Greem¡¯s powerful Spirit senses had already detected another massive life force rapidly speeding towards the hall.


    A radiant knight!


    The radiant knight that left earlier had realized something was wrong and was rushing back to the hall.


    There was no time to hesitate anymore. Greem instantly activated the Scroll of Voodoo once more.


    The spell he chose this time was still the me Halo of Repulsion, with its powerful repulsive effect!


    As the swarm of human guards were reduced to ashes in the shockwave, and the spellbreaker knights were busy enduring the burning damage, Greem quickly took out a grey and inconspicuous wooden stick from his storage belt. He gripped it in his hand and decisively pointed it at the radiant knight.


    "Iivaiyrda*Norhan! Sheep Transfiguration Hex!"


    Green light shed across the wooden stick. The radiant knight that the stick was pointing at promptly burst apart into white fog with a muffled boom. Only a cute and petitemb was left on the spot.


    At the same time, the chip¡¯s notification rang out in Greem¡¯s mind.


    "Hexpleted. Effect is reduced by 40% due to powerful mental resistance. Duration: three seconds."


    Just a mere three seconds!


    This wasn¡¯t enough for Greem to forcefully y someone above his Grade!


    Just then, a powerful impact of ferocious energies shattered the doors of the hall. The other radiant knight broke into the room angrily, glowing brilliantly with runic light.


    Greem let out a silent sigh. He knew he no longer had a chance to kill the badly wounded knight. He could only take one step backward and vanish from the spot with his Fire Teleportation. Just as his silhouette disappeared, a terrifying energy de shed at where he had been.


    A zing fire halo appeared suddenly Greem was right before Edward VII¡¯s bed. A raging inferno surged in every direction. The doctors by the king¡¯s side quickly turned into human torches. The light of the burning mes filled the room. When the light finally dimmed, only charred bones were left of the poor doctors.


    However, when this heat wave surged towards the dying king, it was blocked by an invisible energy barrier. It didn¡¯t manage to hurt the king at all! The energy barrier hadn¡¯t been activated through a magic or runic array. Rather, it was an energy barrier that emanated from a mysterious ruby ne floating before the king¡¯s neck.


    It was clear that this was nomon object. In that moment of danger it was able to activate an energy defense on its own, protecting itself and the king within.


    An energy field?


    Greem was so shocked he almost shouted out loud.


    Energy fields were a self-defense mechanism unique to higher life forms. Even without the power of spells, these lifeforms would be able to form a defensive energy membrane, with their powers functioning as its core. These energy fields were able to block most external attacks. Some high-level magically enhanced objects had simr traits.


    This ruby couldn¡¯t possibly be a lifeform.


    Which meant... that it was, at the very least, a high-level magic-enhanced object!


    Greem no longer hesitated. He held nothing back from his Scroll of Voodoo. Two instantaneous spells violently sted forth, immediately shredding the energy field to pieces with their forceful power. Then the two spells quickly shot towards Edward VII, severing his head with sharp des.


    Before the two radiant knights could leap over, Greem grabbed the head and the ruby ne, leaving the hall in a ze of Fire Teleportation.


    It was time to escape!

 Chapter 248

    Chapter 248 End of a Dynasty


    Thirteen dayster, in the adepts¡¯ base.


    Thest time he saw the base, it was still a ghastly scene covered in blood and flesh.


    A raging forest fire had razed nearly thirty-five kilometers of forest at the southern end of Greend Forest. The ashes and dust left behind rose to the skies and covered the sun. Even Blue Hillock City had received three consecutive days of ck snow!


    Corpses and broken bodies were scattered all across this smoking ck scorched earth.


    The charred remains of magic colts and witcher-knights could be found at the center of some of the worst fires. Only a pile of ashes could be found on the ground where they used to be. Everything had been reduced to nothing. Just ashes and dust. It was only when you looked at the edge of the battlefield, brushing away theyers of thick ashes, that you might be able to find some odd substances formed from a mixture of melted bones and metal armor.


    In all honesty, over a thousand witcher-knights still remained when the radiant knights sounded the retreat. However, having lost their faithful mounts, hope of victory, their stamina, and their will, they couldn¡¯t possibly have outrun the ravaging forest fires with their two legs.


    The truth was that only a small minority of witcher-knights managed to escape from the nar war with their lives. This was the main reason that the knights¡¯ kingdom hadn¡¯t been able to get any information for a long period of time.


    Of course the revolt of Blue Hillock City Casten Count Vanlier had also yed a sizeable part in theck of information!


    As he was the first native force that surrendered to the Sarubo n, Count Vanlier received great rewards from the adepts for his loyalty. ording to the words of nobles that had pledged their allegiance to the adepts alongside Count Vanlier, the great adepts chosen by the heavens were a group of wise men and sages that possessed vast knowledge and the truths of the world.


    A friendly and amiable adept had even personally elevated Count Vanlier¡¯s bloodline, allowing him to turn from a normal human into a noble, long-lived species. From then on he was freed from the shackles of sickness, aging, and death. There was no longer a need to worry about the threat of death!


    Moreover, after Count Vanlier had been ¡¯cleansed¡¯ he even gained the ability to fly as he willed using his own strength. The terrified nobles immediately changed their standpoints and started to praise of the greatness and virtue of the adepts.


    The nobles had once pledged their loyalty to the knights¡¯ kingdom. But now they imed and used the kingdom of being a puppet government that exploited themon people and wagged their tails before the dragons.


    These rumors corresponded with the dragon disasters that had been ravaging the human cities in recent time, quickly spreading throughout the entire continent.


    For a moment, ¡°epting the adepts and driving away the dragons¡± became the most popr opinion among the lower working sses in the Continent of Knights!


    When Greem snuck his way back to Greend Forest through areas controlled by the knights¡¯ kingdom, what he saw surprised him.


    He originally thought that the adepts would only forcefully conquer the ne, and that Adept Sarubo would never have cared for these worthlessly small civilians that were as insignificant as dust. However, from what he had seen, it seemed that even a powerful adept understood the strength of the masses.


    They were misdirecting the masses and attracting them, pulling the opinion of the lower working sses towards the adepts!


    This was the quickest way to quell the possibility of resistance movements within a ne.


    Even if they used overbearing means to exterminate the knights¡¯ kingdom, there would always be stubborn loyalist forces hiding behind the scenes. These people would continuously provoke the dissatisfaction of the masses, stoking their anger and weaponizing it against the adepts. If the ne¡¯s order was disturbed for prolonged periods of time, the Sarubo n¡¯s profits gained from this ne would inevitably take a hit.


    Thus, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by the changes in the natives that he observed on his way back.


    Exterminating and absorbing the ruling sses was the simplest and quickest way to grab ahold of the most profits! On the other hand, absorbing the middle sses and attracting the lower sses to their side was a necessary means to crush support for resistance forces.


    Just looking at the tricks and schemes the n was using, it was clear that the Sarubo n adepts had their own deep understanding of the conquering and managing of a ne.


    Greem could even make bold guesses based on what was already happening. The adepts¡¯ base only needed to send out some adepts with good appearances. Once they disyed their so-called ¡®miracles¡¯ before the public, they would easily be able to win the favor of the masses. Then all they needed to do was sessfully drive away the dragons from the entire kingdom and the ne itself would truly be the property of the Sarubo Adept n!


    Lord Sarubo had a long discussion with the green dragon n leader during thest nar battle. Could they have decided on this n during that time? No matter how he looked at it, Greem thought that the current actions of the dragons were most definitely just a ¡¯performance¡¯ they were doing in tandem with the adepts!


    After all, there was no way this ne could still belong to them. The dragons being able to take this chance to amass and rob a massive amount of wealth before they left was, perhaps, a sort ofpensation! Meanwhile, their actions created an opportunity for the new rulers of this ne¨C the adepts. This was an opportunity to steal the hearts and win the favors of the masses.


    Of course, with his status as a First Grade adept, Greem could not possiblye into contact with such core secrets of the n. He had onlye to a simple conclusion after a basic evaluation and deduction of what he had observed on his way back to the base. Even though the chip¡¯s conclusion was a little dark and cruel, Greem firmly believed it to be the truth.


    This was perhaps because he was an adept himself now!


    The new adepts¡¯ base could no longer be considered a base. It was more like a rapidly developing city.


    The nearby trees had all been burned to ashes. This saved the adepts the trouble of cutting them down.


    When Greem returned, plenty of construction projects were underway. Several stone towers rose from the ground. Patches of mountainousnd had been reformed. Under themand of the adepts, groups of voodoo beasts pushed around debris, ttened ground, cleared the area... they were extremely busy with work.


    Of course most of the previous voodoo beasts had been destroyed in thest battle. This new batch of voodoo beasts had clearly been a rushed job. Most of them looked like centaurs. Their lower bodies were that of beasts. Dense dark hair, scale armor, wicked physiques, and terrifying ws. These were clearly magic colts. A muscr human body had been stitched to the top of the beast¡¯s body. It could speak and was agile enough to use weapons and tools.


    Wasn¡¯t this an abomination made from the lower bodies of magic colts and the upper bodies of witcher-knights?


    They even had an extremely nice name. The Runic Knights!


    Indeed, these voodoo beasts would all be equipped with standard runic equipment in the future. These beasts would be a troop of powerful armed forces that the adepts nned to cultivate in this ne.


    The adepts couldn¡¯t possibly always remain in this ne. Most of the administration had to be handed over to the native nobles to bepleted. All the adepts needed them to do was hand over the required resources and wealth on time.


    The method of dealing with these puppet nobles, backed by the adepts, was fairly simple. On one hand, you had to entice them with sufficient benefits, while on the other, you kept them honest with overwhelming force.


    The runic knights were the most powerful force that the Sarubo n nned to leave behind to maintain their rule.


    Lord Sarubo still met Greem in that war tower.


    Ever since the war tower had been constructed, the human projection looked no different from a clone of Lord Sarubo himself. Greem couldn¡¯t tell that this wasn¡¯t an actual human instead of a consciousness projection, even when he looked at Sarubo face to face!


    The first thing he did when they met was, naturally, hand over the mission items.


    Lord Sarubo had sent Greem to the knights¡¯ kingdom¡¯s capital with two missions. The first was to kill the ruler of the kingdom, Edward VII. The other was to obtain aplete set of runic knowledge.


    Greem had sessfullypleted both of these tasks.


    He handed over Edward VII¡¯s head as well as aplete set of the drafts of runes and the scrolls that contained knowledge about them. After a quick inspection of the items, Lord Sarubo nodded in satisfaction.


    Of course, Greem had made the best of his time on the way back. With the chip, he had scanned every piece of information from every document, draft, and scroll, saving them all within his mind. As a result, he quite willingly handed over the research.


    Lord Sarubo picked up the ugly human head that had been treated with some preservation spells. He casually threw the head into a strange array that had appeared from the floor.


    The magic array hovered in the air one meter above the ground. The entire array was formed from threeyers of brilliant magic halos and countless strange runes mixed within it. The human headnded within the array and bobbed up and down in midair. As several shining magic halo analyzed the head, a dark trace of the head¡¯s bloodline power was extracted from it. The substance floated above the head.


    When the trace of bloodline power had beenpletely extracted, Lord Sarubo opened his eyes and and drew in midair with his fingers. A powerful rune formed in the air and was cast into the array.


    The war tower shook slightly. A massive amount of energy that shocked even Greem circted through the defense system and surged wildly into this phantasmal array.


    The trace of bloodline power looked like a single strand of red thread, slowly floating in the array.


    For just that one instant, Greem felt like he could see through the shadows and saw thousands upon thousands of strange faces packed tightly within the floating red thread. They were old, young, or even infantile... their ages were different and their expressions were each distinct, yet all of them had a vague narw connection with this trace of bloodline power.


    The name of a powerful and mysterious spell surfaced in Greem¡¯s mind when he saw this scene.


    Bloodline Curse!


    This was a top-grade spell with extreme power. It was also one of the most vicious and cruel curses in existence.


    Edward VII was undoubtedly the most powerful man within the Edward Family of the knights¡¯ ne. Countless bloodline descendants, sons, and grandsons had been born, with him as the bloodline source. If one were to include the many bastards left by the royal family in the outside world, it would be an impossibly difficult task for the adepts topletely exterminate the Edward Family¡¯s bloodline.


    But it was different now that they had the Bloodline Curse.


    Moreover, they had the bloodline source, Edward VII, in their hands, as well as the Great Adept as the host of the spell coupled with the massive energy reserves of the war tower. Under Greem¡¯s shocked gaze, the rune that the Great Adept had just sent into the array vanished into thin air. The bloodline power had acted as a catalyst for the rune.


    Greem¡¯s sharp senses could feel the deep stirring of a certain narw the instant the rune vanished!


    For some unknown reason, a slight bit of enlightenment rose in Greem¡¯s heart!


    The lives of all that possessed the Edwards royal bloodline within this ne had probably reached their end!


    As expected, like an invisible needle continuously popping phantasmal bubbles, the spectral faces within the trace of bloodline power started to disappear one after another, their faces letting out agonizing cries as they vanished.


    The disappearance of a face meant the death of someone in the distance!


    Greem gulped ufortably.


    Even though Greem was an adept himself and had stained his hands deeply with blood, he was still thoroughly shocked and intimidated by such a brutal way of exterminating an entire bloodline. It was as if it was no more than a game.


    The Edward dynasty had been thoroughly extinguished!

 Chapter 249

    Chapter 249 ne Feedback


    Now that everything waspleted, it was finally the best part. The part Greem had been looking forward to¨C the rewards!


    He had only risked his life a little in the nar battle earlier, and had already been rewarded with a me Fiend Heart that waspatible with his affinity. What kind of rewards awaited him now that he had so sessfullypleted two missions?


    The ufortable feeling from witnessing the Bloodline Curse at work was quickly fading away.


    For some reason, Greem was bing excited!


    A magic crystal card worth a hundred thousand magic crystals, and one standard adepts¡¯ tower. These were Greem¡¯s final rewards from this trip to another world.


    Such a reward was extremely extravagant.


    It was important to note that most adepts received around thirty to fifty thousand magic crystals worth of profit in each nar war they participated in. Yet Lord Sarubo had instantly inted Greem¡¯s reward to one hundred thousand. This was clearly an acknowledgement of his prowess and diligence.


    That said, a hundred thousand magic crystals waspletely insignificantpared to the reward of the adepts¡¯ tower.


    This adepts¡¯ tower that Great Adept Sarubo had personally promised Greem waspletely different from the swampy tower he had lived at in the past.


    When all was said and done, the swamp tower was still considered a property of the Sarubo n. Adept Anderson was only managing the tower as the adept stationed there. The adepts¡¯ tower Greem had been rewarded was going to be Greem¡¯s personal territory. It would be owned and managed by him and him alone.


    This also meant that from now on, Greem would have a safe space that even the Sarubo n cannot enter or take away as they willed. Such an adepts¡¯ tower was worth at least two hundred thousand magic crystals back in the World of Adepts.


    However, such a reward clearly couldn¡¯t be given out in the knights¡¯ ne. Greem¡¯s new tower had to wait until they returned to the World of Adepts. He would have to pick a suitable location, and then the Sarubo n would be responsible for the following cost of materials and construction.


    This was obviously one of the methods that the Sarubo n used to incentivize and attract talent to stay!


    If Greem wanted to get this reward, he had to sign a new contract with Great Adept Sarubo. He was not to leave the Sarubo n for another hundred years. Greem thought for a moment and agreed.


    After receiving his rewards Greem left Sarubo¡¯s room, only to be called over by Adept F¨¹gen. The reason F¨¹gen was in a rush to see Greem was because he needed to ask him about his future ns.


    Now that the knights¡¯ ne was well in the hands of the n, the Sarubo n¡¯s rule would quickly spread throughout the entire world. Many adepts were needed to fill in the power vacuum left after the copse of the knights¡¯ kingdom. At the same time, the adept forces in the two lesser nes as well as the main headquarters couldn¡¯t be absent for too long. They needed adepts to return to their stations there.


    Thus, Adept F¨¹gen actively asked for Greem¡¯s opinion to see which was more preferable for him.


    Greem had to ask several questions before he found out that the other adepts in the base had already made their decisions before he came back. He might not care about the other adepts¡¯ choices, but there were two people he was concerned about. Mary and Acteon had both chose to stay in the knights¡¯ ne!


    He couldn¡¯t help but feel that their choices were odd.


    Then again, after a little thought, it seemed perfectly reasonable!


    Both Mary and Acteon were bloodline adepts. The way they increased their powers was vastly different from elementium adepts. In all honesty, both of them walked on a bloody path of ughter!


    As a vampire adept, Mary¡¯s growth revolved aroundrge amounts of fresh, high quality blood. This was a scarce resource in the World of Adepts. However, all of those fleeing witcher-knights, spellbreaker knights, and radiant knights here could be her prey. As long as she was diligent, she could obtain massive profits from her time here.


    If this was the World of Adepts, the adepts there couldn¡¯t possibly allow her to go around hunting and ambushing adepts for their blood.


    Simrly, Evil Bugs Acteon neededrge amounts of high quality flesh and blood to cultivate even more carcass beetles. Staying in the knights¡¯ ne and exterminating the remaining knights was a decent choice for him as well!


    Aspared to these two ¡¯old friends¡¯ that could get stronger and stronger through constant killing, Greem was only an elementium adept¨C and elementium adepts could not improve in the same way they did.


    What was more important and crucial to elementium adepts was their understanding and utilization of the narws. All of this required the umtion of an immense amount of knowledge and technique. There were no shortcuts to be taken. With the help of the chip, Greem could avoid going down the wrong path and being misguided and might also need slightly less time to umte knowledge. Still, gathering an immense amount of knowledge was a long and drawn-out process.


    Moreover, this knowledge was not readily avable in the knights¡¯ ne.


    After deep consideration, Greem decided to return to the World of Adepts.


    After all, that was the adepts¡¯ ce of origin. It was much easier to gather knowledge there than anywhere else. As for the resources he needed for his future development? His bulging, full storage belt already had that settled!


    Greem had intended to see Mary before he left, to reinforce their rtionship. Sadly, there were many internal affairs to be settled in the knights¡¯ ne. All of the adepts that had chosen to stay here had already been assigned posts all over the ne. Thus, Greem could only follow the twelve adepts back across the space vortex and return to the n¡¯s pseudo-ne.


    Greem once again saw Lord Sarubo¡¯s actual body here.


    The first thing Lord Sarubo did when he saw everyone was extend a bony hand towards them. He made a slight grabbing motion, and some unusually brilliant fragments had been extracted from everyone¡¯s souls.


    Greem felt a stinging pain in the depths of his soul, which quickly faded after a while.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be intimidated as he looked at the soul fragments that Great Adept Sarubo had extracted from the adepts. He startedmunicating with the chip.


    "Chip, can you determine what Sarubo extracted from my soul?"


    "Beep, inspecting chip data library... bzzzzzt, error detected. Data missing from data library. Warning. Warning. Chip data library has received slight damage. Some data has been lost... "


    "Chip, could you be more specific? Which data?"


    "Beep, data rted to the coordinates of the knights¡¯ ne... "


    So that¡¯s what it was!


    Greem finally understood.


    The information Great Adept Sarubo had extracted from everyone¡¯s souls was the coordinate information of the knights¡¯ ne.


    Now that the ne had already be the third lesser-ne belonging to the Sarubo n, it was also Great Adept Sarubo¡¯s personal property. If the coordinates of such a developed material ne was exposed, it could very well attract many schemes and hunters from his enemies.


    As a result, the first thing Sarubo did when the n adepts came out of the knights¡¯ ne was wipe away any memories about the ne¡¯s coordinates.


    This clearly wasn¡¯t the first time that the veteran n adepts had experienced this sort of thing. They were extremely calm and measured when their memories were taken from them. On the other hand, Greem, Keoghan, and a few other adepts betrayed an expression of fear and doubt. That said, anyone who could still stand here alive had to be sly and scheming. They quickly suppressed and hid their uncertainties.


    "Good job in the nar war this time. Your contributions will be noted by the n. When you go back, all of the rewards that have been promised will be realized. Mm, you may return now!" Great Adept Sarubo¡¯s head was still bent low beneath the shadow of his hood. Still, his low voice still echoed within everyone¡¯s mind.


    The adepts bowed in acknowledgement.


    They exited therge magic hall, nodded and greeted each other, then left in their own directions.


    Greem, Keoghan, Ferrier, and Kiel were clearly headed for the World of Adepts. Thus they walked together and sessfully used the long-range teleportation array within the pseudo-ne to return to the adepts¡¯ tower at the n headquarters.


    All four of them couldn¡¯t help but let out a muffled grunt when they walked out of the teleportation array.


    Body Refining Adept Kiel, who had the toughest Physique, only held his head as he fell into a daze for a moment. He quickly recovered. Potions Master Ferrier on the other hand, who had the weakest Physique, hadpletely fallen to the ground and found it difficult to even get up. Greem and Keoghan also tightly gripped their fists as they silently endured the pain brought about by the bacsh from the narws.


    Their bodies, minds, and souls had all been contaminated with a trace of the other ne¡¯s aura, having stayed in the knights¡¯ ne for such a long time. Thus there had to be a period of re-adaption to the World of Adepts.


    Harrison, who was stationed in that tower, felt themotion from the teleportation array. He appeared in the hall almost immediately after the four adepts had arrived. He quickly understood what was happening when he saw the adepts in pain.


    Under his orders, seven young apprentice adepts quickly came forth and helped the adepts to their own quarters to rest.


    The resilient Kiel waved his hand and pushed aside the two apprentices next to him. He had basically recovered after this short moment¡¯s rest. The mastery that body refining adepts had over their bodies was enviable!


    Greem¡¯s physique was also rather special.


    Havingpleted the elementiumization of his body, there weren¡¯t as many ws now as he had when he was an actual human. Thus he was the second adept to recover after Kiel.


    He waved aside the apprentices and silently watched as Keoghan and Ferrier were sent back to their quarters by the apprentices.


    The clear and crisp notification of the chip continuously rang out in Greem¡¯s mind as waves of nar bacsh continued to wrestle with his powerful Spirit in the depths of his soul.


    "Detecting pration of strange energies. Initial analysis suggests that these energies are extremely beneficial to an adepts¡¯ Spirit. Requesting instructions from host. Block these energies?"


    The shit? Block these energies when they are beneficial to Spirit? Do you think I¡¯ve got shit for brains?


    Greem instructed unhappily, "No need to stop the energies. Continue monitoring!"


    "Understood! Continuing monitoring... "


    In his mind, the graphs indicating Greem¡¯s bodily attributes were rapidly increasing. Every single attribute was shooting up at an amazing rate, and the speed at which they were increasing was elerating as well.


    Finally, when the sudden change in attributes had stopped, Greem managed to see for himself the change.


    Name: Greem


    Race: Human (half-elementiumized) Male


    ss: First Grade Adept


    Attributes: Strength 2.6 | Agility 1.1 | Physique 3.7 | Spirit 6.3


    Condition: Healthy.

 Chapter 250

    Chapter 250 Chaos Everywhere


    ne feedback!


    This was ne feedback!


    Greem shouted out silently in his heart.


    Even though he had yet to fullyprehend the mechanisms and principles of these nar feedbacks, it didn¡¯t stop him from reveling in the joy of having his powers increase exponentially.


    Countless narw chains were incessantly merging with certain contents within his mind. All of this was happening at a narw level that Greem couldn¡¯t ess with his naked eye or his Spirit. If Greem had advanced to a Fourth Grade adept, he might have realized that all of the contents of his mind that were merging with thews were runic knowledge that he had brought back from the knights¡¯ ne, as well as the resentment of powerful individuals that he had in.


    The narws trembled slightly. The ends of the nar chains hadpletely sunk into Greem¡¯s soul. They were slowly merging with theplete set of runic knowledge Greem had just obtained. Even though most of the runic knowledge was simr to the World of Adepts¡¯ widely used system, the part about merging energies waspletely new content.


    Most of Greem¡¯s ne feedback hade from this particr knowledge!


    The fact that Greem¡¯s base attributes could explode up to two or three times their original value was mostly thanks to thispletely new knowledge of merging runic energies.


    The other adepts might have been able to obtain varying amounts of knowledge concerning the merging of runic energies, but who couldpare with Greem? He had robbed the knights¡¯ kingdom treasury of knowledge¨C the drafting room of Runeforge Camp! The knowledge fragments that the adepts brought back with them from another ne had helped the World of Adepts inpleting part of its narws. As a result, the nar consciousness had naturally rewarded them with positive feedback!


    Of course, Greem got the most out of this process. Even the gains of the other three adepts added together would notpare to half of Greem¡¯s.


    The resentment of powerful knights that clung onto Greem¡¯s body had also provided him feedback from the ne. This sort of resentment couldn¡¯t be obtained by just any random acts of killing. One had to ughter, with his own hands, a powerful individual that had been acknowledged by the ne to gain such resentment.


    Having in mountains of witcher-knights, scores of spellbreaker knights, and even a radiant knight, the amount of resentment that had gathered about Greem was tremendous. All of these resentments had been exchanged for an immense ne feedback.


    If one were to look at it from this point of view, the World of Adepts actually encouraged killing beings of other worlds. The cruel, evil, and invasive nature of the adepts had infected the entire nar consciousness as well. This caused the World of Adepts to be a chaotic, evil, and savage nar consciousness towards other worlds!


    That said, the adepts possessed a trace of elegance amidst their brutality, aspared to demons of the lower realms. They were calm and measured madmen. It differed from the utter chaos and insanity of the abyssal demons!


    However, these nar secrets that ured at the level of the narws was not something that Greem could ess as he was now. Thus the only thing he could do, apart from passively receiving the ne feedback, was to record every change to his body using the chip. This could be useful for his future research.


    ............


    The abnormality of the returning Sarubo n adepts didn¡¯t draw any attention from the outside world.


    Of the seven adepts that set off from Feidnan City¡¯s adepts¡¯ tower, only four had returned. Mary and Acteon had chosen to stay in the knights¡¯ ne. Another adept had unfortunately died on the nar battlefield.


    Even though the war this time had sessfully given the Sarubo nplete control over a lesser ne, the headquarters had to endure the consequences of the sudden decrease in their number of adepts.


    The reason the Sixth-Grade Great Adept Sarubo had given such extravagant rewards to Greem was to keep him in the n for a hundred years. This was done in order to ensure that the n could sessfullyst through this period of weakness. The Sarubo Adept n had to wait for the resources from the knights¡¯ ne to be sent back before it could regain or even exceed its previous strength.


    Before they were able to do so, they had to keep a grip on powerful new adepts like Greem in order to avoid their weakness from attracting their enemy¡¯s attention!


    The Zhentarim Association¡¯s Forest Territory. This was a ce where countless adept ns stood and survived. Theplex geography, along with theplex rtionships of the ns, caused this to be an area of intense conflict where battles broke out every so often and tensions never ended. Large-scale adept conflicts had been forbidden in this area. However, small-scale territory wars and the skirmishes between individual adept ns were not included in this rule.


    Big fish eat small fish, and small fish ate shrimps!


    If any adept n showed weakness in its affairs, all of the territory and resource sites it owned would instantly be attacked and conquered by the surrounding adept ns. Every so often, news of wars and battles between ns and n leaders would spread throughout the entire Zhentarim Association.


    Moreover, news of the massive decrease in active adepts in the Sarubo n headquarters could not be hidden from the public. This meant that, in the short term, the thirteen worldly territories and nine resources sites belonging to the Sarubo n would most likely attract the greed of their enemies.


    Some small skirmishes were unavoidable!


    Now that Greem had performed so outstandingly in the ne war, and had signed a new adept contract with Lord Sarubo, he could be considered a trustworthy core adept of the n. Thus, some of the core secrets of the Sarubo n were gradually being exposed to him.


    The Sarubo n. A mid-tier adept n within the Zhentarim Association. They had seventy-three official First Grade adepts, four Second Grade adepts, and two Third Grade adepts. The number of adepts in even higher grades were not something that Greem could ess with his current status.


    It was with such a meager force that the Sarubo n had to defend their headquarters, while managing three lesser nes and a pseudo-ne that served as a transit hub between these four locations. If the adept forces were split between all of these worlds, there would be a slight shortage in manpower in all of the locations. The number of active forces were not enough.


    In recent times the n had gathered most of its adepts on the newly acquired knights¡¯ ne, causing a power vacuum in the other areas. Thus, the most urgent task was to gather the limited manpower they currently had to drive away the greedy enemies looking at them.


    As a result Adept Keoghan, who was being raised as one of the n¡¯s core adepts, had to deal with the worrying n wars the moment he returned from the nar battlefield.


    The Sarubo n¡¯s territories had already received severe provocation from their enemies for the past two or three months. A viscount¡¯s territory, about fifty square kilometer wide, had been invaded by the lord of a neighboring territory. The defensive strongholds on their outer rim had been lost one after another. The viscount could only turtle within his castle at the center of his territory with his remaining troops, barely fending off the attacks of the enemy.


    The territory was in danger of being taken over!


    At the same time, several resource sites belonging to the Sarubo n had also sent back alerts of a simr nature.


    A severe conflict had broken out between the apprentice adepts stationed there and the apprentice adepts of a neighboring n. They were desperately asking for adept reinforcements from the n headquarters!


    The trading firms and arcane shops that the Sarubo n had stationed in the territories of other ns had also reported incidents of robbery and raiding. The managers of those establishments were all frantically requesting help from the headquarters!


    Wave after wave of messages asked for help, and multiple magic notifications were streaming back to Feidnan City¡¯s adepts¡¯ tower like rain in a downpour. As there were too few adepts stationed in the headquarters previously, they could merely suppress the problem. Apart from sending out some pseudo-adepts and elite apprentices to stabilize and dy the damage, they had no means of solving the actual problem.


    This was why the first thing Keoghan had to deal with was such a chaotic and annoying situation.


    Of course, this didn¡¯t necessarily mean that a certain adept n was intending to wage a full-on war against the Sarubo n. The reason this situation had broken out was most likely because the other adept ns had gotten wind of the Sarubo n¡¯s abnormality. Thus they wanted to apply pressure on the n through several means in order to test the waters.


    If the Sarubo n¡¯s weakness proved to be true, then they wouldn¡¯t be able to send out enough adepts to deal with the provocations of the neighboring ns. The loss of a few world territories, and even a couple of resource sites, would be a natural result! As long as the Sarubo n was able to drive away the enemy with overwhelming force, all of these harassments and problems happening at the borders of their territory would instantly vanish.


    In the end, the battle between adept ns was still determined by the strength of their adept forces.


    It was fantasy to dream of upyingrge numbers of resources without enough adepts to defend them!


    Drive them back! Smash all the ws that the enemies extended into our territories!


    Simr battlecries and calls for action had be the unanimous opinion of all Sarubo n adepts.


    The n adepts were all highly confident in themselves, having just survived a brutal ne war. They shouted out their opinions during the n meeting organized by Keoghan. Everyone agreed to beat back the ambitions of their enemies with even more brutal attacks than the onesunched at them.


    Thus, what happened next was a frenzy of mission assignments!


    The silhouettes and shadows of enemy n adepts had already been reported at several battlefields. If they didn¡¯t hurry over, they wouldn¡¯t be able to keep the n¡¯s profits intact!


    After a quick discussion, Adept Kiel was headed towards Ker. There was a First ss resource site there that absolutely could not be allowed to fall into the enemy¡¯s hands.


    A First ss resource site. This was one of the ways the adepts ssified resource sites. The value of the resources cultivated within the sites could be divided into three sses. Third ss was the lowest. Usually, these sites were in charge of cultivating some low-level magic creatures or moremon resources. The magic swamp Greem hade from belonged to the Third ss!


    Second ss resource sites often cultivated unique adept-level resources. On the other hand, First ss resource sites often contained resources of strategic value to the n¡¯s development. This was why the safety and security of these sites had to be guaranteed.


    Adept Ferrier would be heading to Emerald Hills. An important batch of goods had been stolen from there. They desperately needed an adept to go over and defend the location.


    Adept Loris would continue to stay in Feidnan City.


    Thus, the task of going to Locker Castle in Kartia Hills and saving the losing viscount fell on Greem and Keoghan¡¯s heads. It was rumored that several enemy n adepts had already appeared there. A slight mishandling of the situation and the whole thing could escte into a small adept skirmish!

 Chapter 251

    Chapter 251 Gearing Up


    Kartia Hills, Locker Castle.


    How strong of a castle could a mere viscount have?


    In fact, since its very design and construction, Locker Castle wasn¡¯t meant as a purely defensive war fortress. It was constructed as a noble¡¯s castle, a semi-vi that was meant to be morefortable than imprable.


    The square of the castle was a garden itself. The main building took up a space of six hundred square meters, and the thin walls were only three meters tall. For the sake of its aesthetics, the entire castle had foregone any bunkers or watchtowers. Instead delicate artistic sculptures of half-naked beauties were littered across the ce.


    The width of the wall, that was supposed to stop the enemies, only had enough space for two soldiers to walk side by side. There wasn¡¯t even enough space to ce any facilities for war.


    Such a defense system might be sufficient when dealing with wandering bandits and robbers, but it was clearly ill-equipped to deal with an elite army sent out by the lord of another territory.


    Honestly, if it hadn¡¯t been for therge numbers of elite apprentices that the n had sent over, Locker Castle would probably have fallen seven days ago.


    However, ever since Viscount Donald¡¯s subordinate scouts had found signs of adepts in the enemy¡¯s base, the entire city had fallen into a panic. It didn¡¯t seem long before the castle would fall. Even those elite apprentices of the Sarubo n no longer dared to take a single step out of the castle. The only thing they had done for the past few days was fling some fireballs at the enemy forces from on top of the wall.


    The prowess of adepts was well-known!


    It wasn¡¯t just the soldiers and civilians who were cowering in fear. The normally arrogant apprentices were also nervous and anxious when they heard of the news. The two pseudo-adepts and the six advanced apprentices always gathered together during the day. However, the nature of their discussions was never how to stop the enemy¡¯s advance, but how to escape in time should the enemy adept decide to act.


    As for confronting the adept? Many apologies, but such a thought had never crossed through their minds!


    Fortunately for them, the adepts from the n had arrived before Locker Castle fell.


    Keoghan and Greem had arrived at Locker Castle in a wagon at dusk. The enemy¡¯s patrolling cavalry, responsible for sieging the city, had tried to stop them. A single Magma Fireball reduced their efforts, as well as themselves, to ashes.


    After losing eleven of their ranks, the remaining cavalry frantically escaped back to their camp in the distance. No more enemies were sent to stop this slow-moving wagon after that.


    Wasn¡¯t the reason they were sieging this tower to force the Sarubo n adepts to show themselves? Now that the Sarubo adepts had shown themselves, this was no longer a mundane war for territory. Rather, it was a showdown between two adept ns.


    This was a good chance to evaluate the strength of the Sarubo n adepts!


    ............


    The weing dinner for the esteemed adepts was held in the spacious guest hall on the first level of the castle.


    When the pitch ck wagon finally stopped before the gates of the castle, Viscount Donald, the six elite apprentices, and a whole host of nobles were waiting by the sides of the road. They looked fervently upon their saviors.


    Even though the n had already notified them of the adepts¡¯ arrival, they had no idea which of the adepts would be sent as reinforcements.


    That was why the elite apprentices immediately let out a breath of relief when they saw the familiar face of Adept Keoghan. Rxed smiles appeared on their faces. However, the tall and foreign figure that followed after Adept Keoghan caused them to mutter silently amongst themselves.


    A young and handsome face showed beneath the loose cloak. ck eyes weren¡¯t all that umon, but when paired with the long brown hair spread across his shoulders, and the crisp body-tight suit he was wearing, the perfection of his two meter tall muscr body was perfectly brought out.


    Greem¡¯s gentle and elegant air was mixed with the cruelty and depravity of an adept, merging to be his own uniquely wicked quality.


    This adept was extremely young!


    For a moment, shock and surprise betrayed the faces of the young noble women. But then, they were attracted by that Greem¡¯s unique air of wickedness. All of them blushed deeply as they shyly turned their faces away.


    Viscount Donald might be the lord of this castle, but even he was humble before Adept Keoghan, who represented the n. The viscount quickly strode forward and waved away the attendants. He personally raised his arm and helped Keoghan down from the wagon.


    "Sir Keoghan, you are finally here!" A fawning smile was stered on the viscount¡¯s face, "If you had been even a littleter, this humble one would have had to die for the n!"


    Adept Keoghan let out a coldugh.


    He knew Viscount Donald far too well. If anything had happened to the castle, the viscount would have been the first to escape along with his wives and concubines. That said, Viscount Donald went back a long way with Keoghan¡¯s family. The basic courtesies still needed to be kept up.


    It was only now that the viscount noticed Greem, who was standing right behind Keoghan. He couldn¡¯t help but hesitate for a moment when he saw this unfamiliar adept.


    "Sir Keoghan, this esteemed adept is?"


    "This is the newly advanced n adept Greem. He will be managing the situation here with me this time!" Keoghan did a simple introduction.


    The viscount couldn¡¯t stop himself from muttering under his breath when he heard that Greem was a newly advanced adept.


    "Sir Keoghan, is Sir Kiel, Sir Ferrier, and Sir Loris noting?"


    His words clearly betrayed his doubt in Greem, the newly advanced adept. If he hadn¡¯t been a friend of Adept Keoghan, the disrespect he had just shown would be enough to be punished by any other adept.


    "Hmph! The internal affairs of the n is none of your business." Adept Keoghan interrupted the viscount unhappily, "That¡¯s enough. There¡¯s no need to talk about irrelevant things. Have all this people leave! Adept Greem and I are still waiting to hear thetest battlefield report!"


    Having said that, Keoghan acknowledged the two pseudo-adepts standing at the front row and walked towards the castle. The four advanced apprentices, on the other hand, had beenpletely ignored without even so much as a nce.


    The temporary meeting started in a room on the second floor of the castle.


    Even though they were over a thousand people in the castle, only ten had the right to walk into this secret room.


    Adept Keoghan, Adept Greem, the two pseudo-adepts, the four advanced apprentices, Viscount Donald, and his most trusted knight. This knight was also themander of the viscount¡¯s army. Otherwise he wouldn¡¯t even have had the qualifications to enter this room.


    "In yourst report you mentioned that there were traces of adepts in the enemy camp. Do you have something more detailed?" Keoghan started asking impatiently the moment he sat down.


    Even though he had a lot of confidence in Greem and himself, it would still be a troublesome situation if there were too many adepts.


    "There are three." A pseudo-adept wearing a ck eyepatch on his right eye replied softly, "Lanja and I caught a noble from the enemy¡¯s camp. He imed that there were three adepts in the camp. It seems one of them is Adept Carlos from the Mikayne n. We don¡¯t know much else about the other two... "


    "Carlos... " Adept Keoghan frowned slightly and turned to tell Greem what he knew of this adept.


    Three adepts? This was not going to be easy!


    ............


    Just as a meeting was happening in Locker Castle, another meeting was also happening in the distant enemy camp.


    This was arge and spacious leather tent. The furnishings inside were extremely delicate and extravagant. Even the floor had been covered with a soft andfortable carpet. Even though they were camping outside, there was a fine bronze furnace right beside the tent. Fragrant smoke emanated from the furnace.


    Three mysterious adepts were seated at the back of the tent. Three pseudo-adepts were standing behind the adepts, betraying excited expressions. Only Lord Tras and his generals could sit in front of the adepts. The remaining nobles and knights had to stand around the tent, silently listening to the adepts¡¯ orders.


    A young pseudo-adept with a pigeon perched on his shoulder stood in the middle of the tent, loudly reading out the most recent report.


    "Greem. Male. Hardly twenty years old... "


    Surprised praises sounded out in the room, but this didn¡¯t stop the young pseudo-adept from continuing his report.


    "Time of advancement: Approximately three months ago. Location of advancment: a Third ss resource site of Sarubo n¨C their magic swamp.


    ¡°It¡¯s said that there had been two other young adepts that had advanced along with this Greem. They are Adept Mary, who¡¯s a vampire, and Adept Acteon, who has a unique pseudo-bug physique.


    ¡°However, they haven¡¯t been seen around since they entered the Sarubo headquarters at Feidnan¡¯s adept tower. This time, it seems only Adept Greem hase along with Adept Keoghan... "


    The purple-robed adept sitting in the middle couldn¡¯t help but let out a coldugh after impatiently sitting through the report, "A little fellow that had just advanced three months ago! He probably hasn¡¯t even stabilized his Spirit! Even a guy like Keoghan has been sent out. It¡¯s clear that the Sarubos don¡¯t have many forces left!"


    An elderly adept sitting to the left of the purple-robed adept and holding a cane in his hand asked softly, "Do the reports mention anything of this Adept Greem¡¯s spell masteries? What are his innate talents?"


    The young pseudo-adept lowered his head and scanned through the report once more before shaking his head and speaking, "O respected Adept Cochran, nothing specific is mentioned about this Adept Greem¡¯s abilities in this report. After all, he had identally advanced in a rural and remote area. Our information on him is still iplete!"


    "Have you guys not gone to the resource site he stayed in to gather more information?" Adept Cochran frowned in dissatisfaction.


    "My apologies, Adept Cochran. We have secretly sent men over to investigate." The young pseudo-adept froze before quickly exining, "But... it seems that an ident had happened during the advancement of those three adepts. Adept Anderson of the Sarubo n had died, along with all the other apprentices in that resource site. This... this is why the information we have on them is so iplete!"


    "That craven Anderson died?" The three adepts looked at each other, smiles of disdain appearing on their faces.


    The old and steady Cochran still wanted to ask some questions, but he was stopped by Carlos, who led this adept mission.


    "What is everyone worried about?" Carlos let out a sinisterugh, "Apart from Keoghan being slightly bothersome, our only opponent is a newly advanced fellow. When the fight happens we will have one person deal with him while the other two team up against Keoghan. Do you think they could have any chance to turn back when that happens?"


    Everyone nodded in agreement.


    Adept Cochran was actually slightly concerned, but Adept Carlos¡¯ analysis was perfectly logical, so he kept silent.


    The third adept, who was shrouded in a ck mist, remained silent throughout the discussion. It seemed like he had absolutely no interest in it.


    However for some reason even Carlos, who seemed to be leading the discussion, betrayed fear and respect when he looked at this man.


    "Then it¡¯s decided! We will begin our final battle with the enemy at noon tomorrow. We must crush these Sarubo adepts!" Adept Carlos shouted fervently.


    Everyone bowed their heads and acknowledged the order!

 Chapter 252

    Chapter 252 Only A Game


    The second day.


    Once again the siege began at dawn.


    A sparse line of a thousand men gathered before Locker Castle. The warriors in the front held shields in one hand and raised crude, thick wooden boards over their heads with the other. They slowly advanced towards the gates of the castle. Behind them were the militia in light leather armor, carrying spears and bows.


    Lord Tras¡¯ personal guards still remained within the camp and had not marched onto the battlefield. All of these guards were heavy infantry that wore thick metal armor. They carried solid oak shields and wielded heavy weapons such as ils, ymores, and morning stars.


    Looking from a distance, they appeared to be a group of terrifying ughter machines wrapped inyers of steel!


    Their numbers weren¡¯trge. There were only three hundred of them.


    However, just these three hundred heavy infantry had cost Lord Tras almost all of his wealth. This was an elite unit he had formed over ten years and after squeezing everyst drop of wealth from his territory. Tras had used this steel war chariot to raze thends of four barons in skirmishes that had happened in the neighboring territories. This army had allowed him to rise to prominence as a powerful lord.


    That said, given the number of apprentice adepts that were stationed in Locker Castle, the elite unit was very likely to suffer heavy losses. To prevent this from happening, Viscount Tras could only send forth those armed civilians and mercenaries to wear down the strength of the apprentice adepts.


    Soon, the battle erupted when the marching army reached within fifty meters of the city walls!


    The arrows, dense like a swarm of locusts, poured from the sky. Many fire arrows were mixed within the barrage. Even though they had the wooden boards to block the arrows, there were still people continuously sumbing to arrows that slipped through the gaps. Sparks of me danced on the wooden boards, quickly spreading across the dry wood.


    Finally, the advancing army was attacked by the defending apprentice adepts.


    Three smoking magic fireballs and two light green acid balls arced downward from above the walls,nding right in the vanguard of the advancing troops.


    The suddenly exploding fireball instantly engulfed an area ten meters in circumference, quickly turning all of the warriors within into human torches. They tossed aside the weapons in their hands and frantically ran about.


    Green acid mist exploded in the areas where the acid ballsnded. Every single warrior that was caught in the mist started to let out agonizing and haunting cries. The exposed flesh of a human warrior who had been directly hit sizzled as it quickly melted away. In just the blink of an eye he had been reduced to a pile of charred bones.


    Most of the other warriors had only been sshed with some acid on their armor and clothes. These kinds of attacks were not as lethal as fireballs, as long as they were able to amputate the body parts that were being corroded by acid.


    The warriors in the vanguard started to hesitate in the face of these horrifying spells. Even the speed at which they were advancing slowed considerably.


    Behind the formation, themander of the barrier troops started to shout at the soldiers.


    Under his urging, the warriors let out a yell and pressed on with their crude defensive tools.


    The sieging army hadn¡¯t taken another twenty steps before the second wave of spells fell upon them.


    However, at the same time the wave of attacks sted at the soldiers, five zing fireballs rose from the advancing army and shot towards the city walls.


    Spells had been cast form the enemy ranks!


    Above the walls.


    A Sarubo advanced-apprentice had just tossed a magic fireball, yet already he saw five intimidating fireballs rapidly closing in on him.


    "Quick, cover me!"


    The advanced apprentice rapidly retreated backwards while casting all his defensive spells on himself. Around him, five or six castle guards quickly covered the apprentice adept behind them with theirrge shields.


    Dong. Dong. Dong...


    The five fireballs exploded almost simultaneously, and their might was undeniable. The serious damage formed by the stacked attack was not something that could be stopped by mere metal shields.


    A violent and ferocious ring of fire exploded on the walls, instantly ripping everything within ten meters to shreds before reducing them to ashes.


    The seven guards that had covered the advanced apprentice died instantly. Even their bodies had been blown into several pieces andpletely disfigured. Only the advanced apprentice had managed to escape from the area covered by the fireballs, his face full of soot and smoke.


    This fortunate apprentice quickly hid in the crowd while taking out blood stopper ointments and healing potions to treat himself.


    Bastards! Those Mikayne apprentices were ying dirty!


    The Sarubo apprentices were immediately enraged. With no regard for their Spirits, magic fireballs were relentlessly thrown towards the areas that the enemy apprentices were hiding at. The opponent didn¡¯t let up either. They erected colourful defensive barriers around themselves and counter-attacked as they moved around dodging the enemy spells.


    For a moment exploding fireballs were everywhere, both below and above the castle walls!


    Greem stood silently in an opulent bedroom on the third floor of the castle. He had pushed aside the curtains and was gazing at the battlefield in the distance. He couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    This was unexpected!


    Not unexpectedly strong, but unexpectedly weak!


    Having experienced the brutality and terror of a ne war, Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel the intensity of battle and the spells in the World of Adepts were far less cruel and bloody whenpared to a ne war.


    More significantly, the actual difference was reflected in the deathly determination and wills of thebatants!


    On a nar battlefield, there was no escape except for death. Someone had to die. Once a battle was lost, not only did the soldier have to lose his life, even thend they lived in became a lesser ne that submitted to all the wills and whims of the conquering ne. It was because of this that ne natives were often extremely courageous and valiant in battle. They wouldn¡¯t stop until they died.


    Inparison, the battlefield before him was so loose and feeble that it felt like the actors involved were ying house.


    The soldiers on each side must have known that they were not the main characters on the battlefield. Thus each and every one of them was acting excessively conservative and defensive. There were almost a 1500 men in total above and below the city walls, yet the most intense battle and most casualties were only because of those ten apprentice adepts.


    Ever since the start of the battle, more than half of the hundred casualties were victims of the adepts traded blows. The actual deaths from the soldiers¡¯ bows took up less than thirty percent of total deaths.


    "What a boring game!" Greem let go of the curtain and mumbled in dissatisfaction.


    He returned to a wooden table and continued toying with the Second Grade Molten Giant¡¯s crystal core. Meanwhile, the chip in his mind was processingrge amounts of data at a high speed.


    The runic knowledge he had gained from the Runeforge drafting room was certainlyplete and detailed. Greem was finally able to further explore the deeper secrets of merging energies with this knowledge.


    Of course, these runes were knowledge from another ne. More research and investigation was needed to transnt and shift them to the World of Adepts for practical use. Thus, Greem had been continuously calcting and deducing the formation of these runes ever since he came back to the World of Adepts.


    After excluding the one hundred and twenty-two basic runes, and twenty-three variations of runes that already existed in the World of Adepts, only twenty-eight out of the one hundred and seventy-three runes obtained from the knights¡¯ ne werepletely new runes that had never before appeared in the World of Adepts. Thus, if Greem wanted to use the runic knowledge he had obtained in the World of Adepts, there was only one thing he could do. He had to slowly discover and find out the possible variations and functions of these twenty-eight runes in this world.


    For the past few days, all he had been thinking about were all of these strange runes. With the high-speed operation of his chip, new rune variations of those runes were produced for use in the World of Adepts. Greem had to then test and use these runes on several levels and aspects to determine whether the types of runes he had created could rece those otherworldly runes.


    This was undoubtedly a process that took up a massive amount of time!


    Greem had already met once with the goblin Snox since his return.


    He passed over most of the useless resources for Snox to trade away, and collected the elementium cores that Snox had gathered in the meantime. Only fifty-six of the ny-eight elementium cores gathered were suitable for modification into golems. Thirty Four of these were pseudo-adept level, while twenty-one of them could make advanced-apprentice-level golems. What was most exciting for Greem was the existence of an adept-level poison core within the pile of crystal cores.


    Greem¡¯s golem army had beenpletely exhausted in the other world¡¯s battlefield. He desperately needed to replenish his arsenal. Currently he had no other useable golems with him, apart from the Fire Lord. This weakened hisbat strength by more than thirty percent.


    Yet at the same time, the n¡¯s crisi had sent him running around everywhere. He just hadn¡¯t had the time to rebuild his golem army. This was very much a cause of annoyance for Greem.


    Before he left, Greem had used his newly gained status to exchange for an adept-level meditation technique from the Feidnan adept tower. Just this exchange alone had cost him twenty thousand magic crystals and seven n contribution points. It was easy to imagine how expensive his was. After that brutal fight of life and death in the other ne, Greem had only received a hundred thousand magic crystals and twenty contribution points!


    That said, given the effect of his meditations, this price was well worth it.


    His previously unbudging Spirit had finally started to change. This was undoubtedly a great motivator for Greem. As long as he persisted in his meditations, there was a chance of raising his Spirit to 20 points!


    And raising Spirit to 20 points was one of the fundamental conditions for advancing to Second Grade.


    ording to the chip¡¯s estimates, if Greem wanted to raise his Spirit from the current 6.3 to 20, with no external help besides daily meditations, the shortest amount of time he would need would still be a hundred and seventy-one years. Moreover, this was after the chip had finished optimizing modifications to the meditation technique.


    Those ordinary adepts who had neither knowledge or resources would be upied with collecting these things, even while they engaged in their meditations and research. If they wanted to rely on meditation to reach the 20 point Spirit limit, it would take them at least three hundred years.


    For example, Adept Anderson had already advanced to First Grade for almost three hundred years. Yet his Spirit was only at a measly 9 points. That was a massive distance from 20 points. Perhaps this was the main reason he had chosen to take such a huge risk to try and advance using the blood ceremony!


    If Anderson hadn¡¯t attempted this, with what little powers he had he would most likely have been one of the first to die in the ne war!


    Just as Greem was drawing and repeatedly outlining strange green runes in the air, the sound of light footsteps rang out from outside his room. A maid¡¯s voice was promptly heard.


    "Sir Greem, Sir Adept Keoghan asks you for a meeting!"


    "Is the battle about to start?"


    "Indeed! Sir Keoghan wants to you to be prepared!"


    "Understood!"


    Greem waved away this newly constructed and unstable rune and assessed the equipment he was wearing. Once he was sure he was done preparing, he opened the door and strode outwards.

 Chapter 253

    Chapter 253 The Wicked me Demon


    This pathetic excuse of a war, that more resembled a game and warm-up, finally ended when the adepts strode onto the battlefield.


    The attacking and defending parties were still fighting dispassionately in front of the castle.


    Even though warriors were dying under the barrage of arrows and bolts every minute, soldiers fell from their siegedders, and shouts echoed throughout the battlefield, the center of the conflict always revolved around the apprentice adepts.


    As the fight started to escte in intensity, a Sarubo pseudo-adept suddenly turned into a massive Beholder. It dragged two or three strange tentacles behind its body. Floating three meters into the air, it charged down the wall and ughtered everything in its way.


    The blinding lightning shooting out of its strange narrow pupils clearly had some sort of unique paralyzing effect. Every single person that tried to close in on the monster would start shaking intensely when they were engulfed in the brutal electricity. Then they could only looked on as their flesh and bones were carbonized in the heat.


    Moreover, all types of projectile attacks would be stopped by a semi translucent forcefield. Nothing could do damage to the Beholder.


    Just like this, a single transformed pseudo-adept had thrown the attacking army into chaos.


    With no other option left to them, a body refining pseudo-adept of the Mikayne n yelled and rushed to confront the Beholder.


    The two engaged in a great battle before the castle gates.


    This lit a fuse, and soon the remaining apprentices and pseudo-adepts quickly joined the fray.


    The center of the conflict started to continuously expand outwards, eventually forcing the ordinary soldiers on both sides to put off their own battles to avoid stray spells.


    Seeing that the apprentices on his own side were not gaining any ground, Viscount Tras waved his hand angrily. The three-hundred heavy infantry that had been standing at attention started to march forward.


    They formed a long wall of steel and iron, cooperating with the apprentices on their side and repeatedly denying their opponents the space to maneuver. Moreover, all of the powerful spells the apprentices hurled at them were absorbed by the tough magic-resistant shields they wielded. None of the spells did any significant elementium damage.


    Even an Explosive Fireball that a pseudo-adept had fired from under the cover of his ally had only managed to blow away three of the heavy infantry when itnded. After a short period of rest to recover from the impact, three of these people stood up once again and quickly returned to the formation.


    An Explosive Fireball that could deal 40 points of damage had only killed two ordinary warriors?


    This was uneptable!


    As the warriors of steel started to close in, countless terrifying alchemical arrows started shooting out from their ranks. These explosive arrows exploded on contact and were extremely expensive. Each of them cost a hundred and twenty gold coins. Each individual arrow could deal nearly 11 to 15 points of damage.


    In small numbers, these arrows couldn¡¯t do much to the advanced apprentices and pseudo-adepts, who all possessed some form of defensive spell. However, should the arrows rain down like a torrential storm, even the Sarubo pseudo-adepts would have to start shifting about to dodge the attacks.


    Still, these bulky soldiers wrapped in armor like steel cans weren¡¯t the only guys they had to deal with. The enemy apprentices were still there. As the warriors of steel continued to pile on the pressure, the Sarubo apprentices quickly found themselves at an obvious disadvantage. Defeat was imminent!


    Honestly, if it hadn¡¯t been for the n adepts looking on coldly from behind, this group of death-fearing fellows would likely have already retreated to the safety of the castle. However now they could only grit their teeth and weather the storm, trying their best to stall the enemy. Otherwise who knew what their punishments might be?


    ............


    Greem quickly reached the castle walls and stood silently by Keoghan¡¯s side.


    The nobles who gathered around Keoghan bowed and greeted him, but Greem didn¡¯t respond.


    "How is it?" A wicked smile appeared on Keoghan¡¯s face, "What do you think of the battle right now?"


    "It¡¯s nothing more than a child¡¯s game!" Two crimson sparks lit up deep within Greem¡¯s ck eyes.


    "That bastard Tras is really willing to spend. He¡¯s even got those explosive arrows for standard equipment. And just like that, he¡¯s already thrown away thirty to forty thousand gold coins... " Viscount Donaldined with a hateful expression.


    The two adepts ignored his words and continued to gaze at the enemy¡¯s base.


    "When the battle starts, they will try and go for you as the rookie. That will be where they try and win this battle! You should be careful!" Adept Keoghan gave a kind reminder.


    Having experienced a ne war, and without much conflict of interests between the two of them, Greem and Keoghan had be much closer.


    "I¡¯m only worried they don¡¯t show up!" Greem gave a chilling smile, "Oh, right. There¡¯s no punishment for killing enemy adepts in such a battlefield, right?"


    "Punishment?" Keoghanughed out loud, "We of the Sarubo n have far more connections in this area than those fools!"


    As they conversed, a Sarubo advanced apprentice¡¯s defensive spell was sted to pieces by three explosive arrows. Just as he fumbled about to erect another defensive barrier, an acid arrow flew over and embedded itself in his right leg.


    Pop!


    The acid arrow exploded, covering his entire body in sizzling acid. Even his face wasn¡¯t spared.


    "Aaaaaah...... "


    The advanced apprentice screamed painfully and frantically ran backwards, all while downing as many potions as he could.


    A few of the enemy¡¯s advanced apprentices saw the opportunity before them. Their eyes lit up in excitement and they quickly chased after the Sarubo apprentice.


    The Sarubo apprentice adepts were retreating as they fought. Their formation was pushed to the brink of breaking.


    "It¡¯s about our turn now!" Adept Keoghan nodded at Greem before ck smoke shrouded his body and lifted him to the skies.


    Even though the enemy apprentices were at an immense advantage, some of their attention was still ced on the adepts standing on the castle walls. The moment they saw those adepts move, they quickly started retreating without hesitation! Even though a juicy prey was right by their jaws!


    Keoghan¡¯s body was engulfed in the thick ck smoke as he silently floated onto the battlefield.


    At the same time, the sound of a terrifying me explosion boomed as Greem¡¯s tall body appeared beside one of the Sarubo apprentices.


    When they heard the explosion, the apprentices anxiously gripped their staffs and scrolls tightly . They were ready to deal with anything that came at them. It wasn¡¯t until they saw that the figure in question was Adept Greem that they let out a sigh of relief and bowed to greet him.


    "Take this. Go back and recuperate!" Greem casually threw out a bottle of Potion of Life.


    The advanced apprentice that had been covered in acid frantically caught the potion and bowed in gratitude. The st of acid earlier had not only imed one of his legs, but had also disfigured him. He might be able to make his skin go back to normal with the potions he carried, but he would have to find some other way to regrow his right leg.


    That said, now that he had this bottle of high quality Potion of Life, he wouldn¡¯t need to call in favors to fix his leg!


    As the apprentices hurriedly stumbled back to the castle walls, Greem and Keoghan slowly marched towards the enemy camp. One in the air, one on the ground.


    The three hundred magic-resistant heavy infantry standing in their way had never been considered a threat.


    But there were always idiots in this world!


    Seeing that the young adept walking over hadn¡¯t erected any sort of protective spell, Tras gave a hidden order. All of a sudden focused streams of explosive arrows shot out from within the ranks of the infantry.


    Their target was Greem!


    Even though Tras knew that there was no chance he could use these explosive arrows to kill an adept, he knew that he would win the first small victory of the day if he could just cause Greem to panic a little!


    All of the Sarubo n members looked on in anxiety as they saw the barrage of explosive arrows shoot towards Greem.


    Hurry and erect your defensive barrier! Quick...


    At this moment, countless people were shouting anxiously in their hearts.


    And also at this moment, under the gaze of every single person on the battlefield, a massive pir of me that stretched into the sky exploded on the battlefield.


    mes instantly enshrouded the tall, handsome, and young adept. The violent elementium mes quickly cloaked his entire body. No, they didn¡¯t cloak his body. Rather his entire body had turned into mes andva.


    The dense concentration of mes turned a crimson color, painting a dark scarlet silhouette in the evening sky.


    "A me adept! Dammit, he¡¯s a me adept... " Carlos, who had been watching silently from the camp, betrayed a sour expression.


    As Carlos cried out in shock,yers of fire and streamers of me had already covered Greem¡¯s body. The imposing Ring of Fire had also emerged from his body and was quickly expanding outwards.


    Phew phew phew...


    The sound of numerous arrows continued to whistle through the skies.


    The moment the explosive arrows came into contact with the Ring of Fire, their forged steel heads started to turn a bright red from the raging heat. The arrows quickly shed against the dense fire elementium. Before an arrow could even entirely enter the Ring of Fire and reach Greem¡¯s side, it had already been reduced to liquid metal.


    Before they could be activated, the explosive arrays carved on the arrows had already been damaged and destroyed alongside the arrows! And so an unexpected attack had instantly been crushed!


    The boiling-red pools of metal fell to the ground, burning the ck dirt where they rested and sending smoke billowing into the clouds.


    Meanwhile, the vicious mes emanating from Greem¡¯s body were still ravaging every piece ofnd and inch of space around him. The air was burning. The ground was burning. Everything that could ignite was burning!


    Greem¡¯s body suddenly started to expand within the zing inferno as a thick armor ofva rapidly covered his entire body and hid his face. A ming Lava Shield also formed in midair and started orbiting his domineering form.


    The Lava Shield had dense magma rock at it very core, with red-whiteva slowly flowing around it. zing me streams and surging elementium me shrouded his shield. Any living being would have to endure the continuous assault of heat and me if they came close to Greem.


    Greempleted his me Fiend Transformation and raised his burning visage. His eyes, zing brightly like two suns at noon, had locked onto the quickly retreating soldiers.


    "You still want to leave after attacking me? Kehkehkeh... I¡¯ll let you have a taste of the terror of adepts!"


    Having said that, Greem raised both of his hands high up. The wicked hands formed of magma and mes zed intensely, and a massive spell was instantlypleted amidst his battlecry.


    Meteor Crash!


    Editor Ryu: "he wouldn¡¯t need to call in favors to fix his leg!" Hahahaha... Greem owns you now, boy. Don¡¯t you know not to trust greeks adepts bearing gifts?

 Chapter 254

    Chapter 254 The Battle Begins


    On the battlefield.


    Everybody looked on intently.


    As Greem shouted and cast his spell, the sunny skies quickly turned crimson red. High above theyers of clouds, a massive and blinding meteor was crashing down, leaving a zing trail as it plummeted.


    Roiling mes, burning fires and a terrifyingly unstoppable momentum...


    The meteor had yet tond, but already everyone¡¯s hearts were beating furiously. They held their breath and looked on in terror as this apocalyptic disaster quickly crashed towards the retreating army of steel.


    "Idiots! He wanted to bait you into attacking him. That¡¯s the only way he has any excuse to exact vengeance on you and your men! Have them run for their lives!" Carlos furiously scolded the foolish lord. Green light shed around him, as if he had just cast Godspeed on himself. Without even bothering to hide himself he rushed towards the battlefield.


    The old adept Cochran couldn¡¯t help but shake his head as he watched the tremendous might of the falling meteor, "As expected, fire adepts are the most suited elementium adepts for the battlefield. Especially a terrifying person that has chosen fire mastery like this one. It seems your bunch of iron can-heads are not gonnae out of this unscathed!"


    Having said that, Adept Cochran raised his hand and waved, summoning a green wind bat. He mounted the bat and rushed towards the battlefield as well. The strange adept, perpetually shrouded in ck mist, had also turned into ck smoke and was dashing towards the burning fields.


    The arrogant Lord Tras was left behind, alone. His face was ck and green with anger, and he ground his teeth forcefully. He didn¡¯t believe that this young adept¨Cwith a single blow¨Ccould decimate the steel army he had put so much effort into. However, the two predictions from Adept Cochran and Adept Carlos put him on edge. An ominous feeling rose in his heart.


    This army of steel was the culmination of over a dozen years of hard work!


    Many anti-magic materials had been mixed into the alloy when he had forged the magic-resistant armor of his army. The World of Adepts¡¯ standard market price would have put a single set of armor at the price of at least four thousand gold coins. The elite warriors that wore those armors had also disyed powerful strength worthy of such expensive equipment.


    Ordinary, intermediate, and beginner apprentice-adepts couldn¡¯t even scratch the armor with their spells. Even advanced apprentices would have to retreat when faced with the magic-resistant armor and the magic explosive arrows. None of them would dare to challenge such a threat head on.


    The biggest proof of this army effectiveness came in the form of the battle earlier. An explosive fireball fired by a pseudo-adept had only managed to send two of the soldiers to their grave. Moreover, those two heavy infantry hadn¡¯t died from the spell and elementium damage. It was the shockwave and impact from the fireball that had shattered their internal organs.


    It was clear how well these armors defended against magic damage!


    Thus, even as the two adepts foretold their deaths, Lord Tras chose to calm down and gaze at that terrifying meteor drawing a long red trail across the sky.


    Under the everyone¡¯s gazes, the meteor finally crashed destructively into the ranks of the army.


    Time seemed to have stopped for a moment. Even everyone¡¯s vision seemed to pause for s second!


    This temporary pause might have been a single instant, but it felt like an eternity.


    A frightening shockwave finally shattered the silence, putting all of the meteor¡¯s violence and ferocity on full disy.


    The ground was shaking and the sky was bleeding!


    The zing meteor left an impact crater on the ground twenty meters in radius. The massive impact had shattered the meteor as well. Fragments of stone and rock shot outwards, with tremendous force behind each and every projectile.


    What came after the barrage of meteor fragments was the terrifying shockwave.


    Deafening winds were like invisible des, quickly blowing outwards in a circle. Wherever the shockwave passed through the ground would give way and debris would be sent flying. Every single thing that had once rested on the ground was instantly thrown into the distance.


    And after the shockwave had passed, down came to incinerating sea of mes.


    Of the three hundred men, seven or eight had been instantly erased by the impact of the meteor itself, without leaving even a trace of their corpses. When the rain of meteor fragments ravaged the area, most of the soldiers had been able endure the disaster with their sturdy shields. Only a small number of them had their heads split open by the fragments.


    However the shockwave that came next was truly unstoppable.


    Under the impact of the vicious and billowing airwaves, countless soldiers fell to the ground and started coughing blood after being sted away. They couldn¡¯t endure the sudden and intense change in air pressure. Their eardrums were punctured and their internal organs were shattered.


    Then, with all of them rendered helpless and weak, the sea of mes fell upon thend!


    Most of the three hundred soldiers had been devoured by this terrifying sea of mes, just like that. Only the lucky ones that were at the edge of the explosion had managed to crawl away and escape the damage. Still, their bodies had already been ignited by the elementium fire. All of them screamed and cried as they burned. The only thing they could do was roll about, trying in vain to put out the ravaging mes.


    The center of the battlefield had instantly been plunged into a storm of blood and gore. It was a terrifying sight to behold!


    The horse whip in Viscount Tras¡¯ hand fell silently to the ground.


    His gaze was unfocused and his mouth was agape. He looked at the scarred and scorched battlefield in disbelief. In his moment of shock, he hadpletely forgotten to send medics to save the remaining injured knights.


    Two hundred men!


    At least two hundred men!


    That terrifying meteor had just took away at least two hundred of his most elite units, scoured far and wide.


    Moreover, there were still countless human torches crying in agony at the edge of the field of fire. They ran about screaming for help, their noises gradually growing weaker and weaker before they fell to the ground, never to get up again.


    "Sa... Sav... Save... them... " Tras had wanted to shout with all his strength, but his voice only came out weak and soft. He even stuttered as he gave his orders.


    Tears of pain and sorrow fell from the corner of his eyes.


    It was over... all over! The steel army he had invested everything into had been decimated by that adept in a single blow.


    Viscount Tras¡¯ mind instantly snapped. His entire being was like a stray dog that had its spine ripped out. He could hardly even remained seated on his beloved horse.


    Kill him! You must kill him!


    Viscount Tras let out a manic roar within his heart. He straightened his body and looked at the mighty silhouette of the me Demon through his teary eyes.


    ............


    A single blow had crushed nearly seventy percent of the heavy infantry¡¯sbat forces.


    Greem looked at the struggling soldiers from a distance. He didn¡¯t finish the job with another blow.


    ording to the rules of the Zhentarim area, no adepts were to involve themselves in worldly wars. It was only when themselves, or the n¡¯s profit, were involved that the adepts were allowed to enter the war. Even so, they were not allowed tounch any attacks at the nobles or their subordinate forces.


    Of course, idiots that actively provoked the adepts and infringed upon their honor were not included in this rule.


    As such, no adept could fault Greem for returning the soldiers¡¯ attacks with such a devastating blow. However, now that the opponents had suffered such heavy losses, he stopped. If he continued to press the issue, despite having exacted his vengeance, even the Zhentarim Association wouldn¡¯t let it slide.


    Greem¡¯s three meter tall me body stood on the spot, silently waiting for the arrival of the enemy adepts.


    Two hundred meters to his left, Keoghan had justnded on the ground. He couldn¡¯t help but exim happily when he saw the dire state that the heavy infantry had been reduced to, "Idiots, the lot of them, set on fire. Burn them, scorch them, send the ashes back home to their mothers! That arrogant Tras is probably lying in a pool of his tears right now."


    The two didn¡¯t mind fighting together. However, as adepts, both of them had different styles ofbat. Greem¡¯s hundred-meter-wide Ring of Fire was indiscriminate. Even Keoghan had to burn if he walked into its radius.


    As a result, the two had to keep a distance of one to two hundred meters in order to avoid interfering with each other.


    The two raised their heads at the same time and stared at the three adepts that had gracefullynded three hundred meters away from them.


    "Carlos... Cochran... McThran!"


    Keoghan clearly kept a close ount of all adepts in the neighboring ns and organizations. Just a single nce and he could recall their names. His tone became especially heavy when he swept past the strange cloud of ck mist.


    Meanwhile, Keoghan was alreadymunicating with Greem in secret. He quickly gave a basic introduction of the three adepts before them.


    Carlos. First Grade Curse Adept (a branch of elementium adepts). Subordinate to the Mikayne n (Hostile). Known to be cruel and scheming. Well-trained at all debuffing and weakening curse spells.


    Cochran. First Grade Summoning Adept (a branch of esoteric adepts). Subordinate to a neutral adept organization known as ¡¯Wheel of Time¡¯. Well-trained at summoning otherworld creatures.


    McThran. First Grade Dark Adept (a branch of elementium adepts). Subordinate to the ck Glove Association (Neutral). Personality traits remain unknown. Natural affinity with dark elementium. All of his attacks have a strong corrosive effect.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask once Keoghan had finished his introduction, "Are adepts not forbidden from participating in worldly conflict by the Zhentarim Association? With how brazen they have been, are they not concerned about punishment?"


    "Hmph! Rules are dead things while humans are well alive!" Keoghan let out a muffled grunt, "They must have signed some sort of hiring agreement with Tras. And so, this suddenly turns into something that involves their ¡¯personal benefits¡¯ and therefore... "


    Keoghan didn¡¯t continue; Greem already understood.


    It seemed all the rules of the Adept¡¯s Association were only meant to be formalities and courtesies. The existence of the rules were only to avoidrge-scale adept conflict. No one cared about small skirmishes and fights.


    In the end, the cause for this battle was because the neighboring forces wanted to make a quick buck by profiteering off of the Sarubo n¡¯s weakness. It had nothing to do with fairness or justice. Even the excuse for war had long been forgotten!


    If the Sarubo n wanted to protect its properties and regain its strength, it would have to disy much more viciousness than its preying neighbors. Otherwise, if they waited until the higher-ups were able toe back, all that would be left waiting for them might just be broken and burned ruins.

 Chapter 255

    Chapter 255 The Might of Adepts


    There were no war derations like the ones ordinary human nobles so liked to use.


    Nor were there any insincere greetings.


    A fight between adepts erupted the moment everyone involved had arrived!


    The old adept known as Cochran continuously waved his hand about in the air. Every time, a strange shing rune appeared and a terrifying, otherworldly creature would step out of nowhere.


    Manticores, Destrachans, Ogre Magi, Wyverns, Formian Worker Ants, Yeth Hounds...


    Though none of these creatures were excessively powerful, each and every one of them had a strength that rivaled pseudo-adepts. More importantly, their numbers seemed... a little over-the-top!


    These otherworld creatures had traversed space under the influence of magical power. They leapt towards Adept Keoghan the moment they appeared. Keoghan let out a wicked grin and moved forward to engage.


    Of course, Greem couldn¡¯t possibly remain idle now that the fight on the other side had already started.


    Greem smiled graciously as he looked upon the two adepts that were gazing coldly at him.


    Have the summoning adept stall Keoghan while the two offensive adepts defeat me first? In truth, their n was pretty solid. That said, it depends on whether they had the power to back it up!


    The battle between the three adepts started when Greem strode forward.


    Carlos, the curse adept, quickly moved about, ensuring that he was always outside of Greem¡¯s intimidating Ring of Fire. Carlos muttered chants under his breath and waved a withered and rotted wooden wand at Greem, sending ck and grey curse halos shooting towards him.


    Some of the curse halos vanished after entering the Ring of Fire, their spell structures torn to pieces by the terrifying me streams. Most of the remaining halos were blocked by the quickly spinning Lava Shields, leaving only a few to actually afflict Greem with curses.


    However, while the number of effective curses were extremely low, they just didn¡¯t stoping!


    Greem let out a muffled grunt. The light from his bright-red me body dimmed. It was clear that he had been affected by the curses.


    Confusion!


    Stamina Drain!


    Spatial Confusion!


    ......


    Dammit, what were these damned spells!


    None of these curses did anything individually. However, when umted, they became a massive burden for Greem, who still had to deal with another enemy. The disastrous consequences of being affected by the curses at a key moment in battle were not something he even wanted to think about!


    Greem let out an angered roar. Ferocious fire energies surged out from his body, instantly erasing all of the debuffs on him. A crimson radiance gathered around his eyes as a terrifying Sr Ray shot towards Carlos¡¯ heart.


    Carlos, who had been wandering outside the Ring of Fire, let out a wickedugh and instantly vanished from the spot. Adept McThran had vanished along with him.


    This was bad! Something was wrong!


    Greem narrowed his eyes. His body paused for a moment before disappearing.


    A st of fire apanied by a soft boom appeared along with Greem at a spot a hundred meters away. Hisrge and mighty body stumbled for a bit before recovering. Arge cloud of strange ck smoke was lingering by the right side of his waist. His crimson body of magma, originally hidden under the zing fires, had been corroded by the ck smoke. The entire spot had turned a purple color.


    Carlos and McThran had also reappeared in another spot.


    Adept Carlos seemed to be fairly unfazed. Other than some slight burn marks at the edge of his purple robe there was no indication of injury. On the other hand, the ck smoke surrounding Adept McThran had thinned by a lot, revealing a scrawny but tall silhouette.


    Moreover, one could vaguely see clusters of small fires burning stubbornly at the edge of the smoke.


    The two scheming adepts had worked together andunched a sneak attack in the time Greem wasunching his own attack. Greem would probably have suffered several crippling losses if he hadn¡¯t escaped then and there!


    Greem called upon his fire powers and tried to extinguish the strange smoke lingering on his waist. That said, the ck smoke wasn¡¯t any trivial spell either. It was extremely hard to put it out.


    With no other choice left to him, Greem dug into his wound with his sharp magma ws, brutally cutting off the entire piece of his magma flesh and throwing it to the ground. He then bent down and scooped a huge handful ofva from theva pool beneath him to seal his injury.


    In the meantime, that repulsive Carlos had already resumed his disgusting act, revolving around Greem and tossing his curse halos about. McThran, on the other hand, had turned into a cloud of ck smoke and let out a sinisterugh. He dashed about the air, avoiding the Magma Fireballs that Greem had thrown at him.


    Every time he saw someck of agility on Greem¡¯s part he would take advantage of it. The ck smoke would dive into the Ring of Fire, enduring the burning effect of the elementium fires while leaving strange wounds on Greem¡¯s massive body.


    Greem would lose all sense of the parts of his body that had were corroded by the ck smoke, rendering the wounded spots weak to Carlos¡¯ evil curses.


    Just fifteen minutes after they started, Greem already found himself being suppressed by their well-coordinated attacks.


    Greem silently shook his head and let out sighs in his heart.


    A higher-order ne was a higher-order ne after all. The strength of the creatures within were not something lower-order nes could match.


    Half a month earlier he was still causing a ughter in the knights¡¯ ne, butchering First Grade spellbreaker knights as if they were chickens and dogs. Now, back in the World of Adepts, he was having trouble dealing with two First Grade adepts simultaneously.


    Fire spells may be the most suited elementium spells to ughter, but they had plenty of ws and insufficiencies when it came to the skirmishes and battles between adepts.


    What use were powerful fire spells if they couldn¡¯t connect with enemies? How effective could the terrifying Ring of Fire be if it couldn¡¯t engulf the enemies within itself? If Greem didn¡¯t continue to think of ways to enhance his abilities against the equally mobile and flexible adepts, he would lose any advantage that he might have had.


    Greem roared in rage. It was finally time to use all his powers.


    He tossed out an elementium crystal core, and all of a sudden the adept-level Fire Lord stood beside him. The massive Fire Deity had also emerged from the zing mes on the other side.


    The pseudo-adept level Fire Deity was hardly a qualified subordinate at this point. However, it could still make a little impact with its self-destruction!


    At that same time Greem extended his right hand, and a me whip made of concentrated me energy instantly formed in his hand. With the whip, Greem could make it much harder for McThran to break through Greem¡¯s defenses. The Scroll of Voodoo had also appeared silently in Greem¡¯s burning left hand. Its pages had already started flipping incessantly.


    None of the adepts involved in this fight were idiots. The strange form of the Scroll of Voodoo had already caused Carlos and McThran to knot their brows in frustration.


    Soul Equipment!


    This was most definitely a Soul Equipment!


    Unfortunately, they couldn¡¯t tell what effect the Scroll of Voodoo had. After all, all Soul Equipment had their own unique ability. It was hard to determine their effects just through their appearance. If they slipped up and gave the fire adept brat a chance, this soul equipment could probably turn the tides in a single blow!


    The two adepts proceeded with this in mind. Naturally, they slowed down their actions and became much more conservative with their attacks and defense.


    Greem wouldn¡¯t let them wear him down just like that. As a fire adept, and an elementium adept that was particrly good at creating his own home field advantage, he was going to snatch the upper hand back. Thus, as the three terrifying me demons roared and attacked with impunity, the battlefield quickly converted into a massive pool of roilingva.


    The foothold left for the two enemy adepts was quickly shrinking!


    ............


    The few Sarubo n elite apprentices were standing by the castle walls, gazing in awe at the battle of the adepts.


    If one were to describe the battle between the apprentices as explosive, the battle that was happening now was a volcano! It was as if a gigantic, live volcano had just been plunged into the battle. The raging fires and violent spells ravaged thend, severely altering the geography around Locker Castle.


    Even though the castle was five hundred meters away from the battlefield, everyone could still feel the oppressive heat and wind pressure pressing against their faces. The thundering sounds of explosions continued without end. Any single spell that an adept shot out was enough to cause the onlookers¡¯ hearts to clench tight in terror.


    If any of the adepts got too engrossed in their fight, they might very well identally wipe the castle away along with them.


    They weren¡¯t sure if that terrifying Adept Greem was the most powerful adept present. However, they were certain that he was the absolute scariest!


    Therge patches ofva pooled on the ground, theyers of ck and red me clouds in the skies, and the zing air inbetween.


    This domineering Adept Greem had forcefully turned this ce into his home field, all by himself. He had demonstrated to the entire world and to these future adepts, in the most raw and most insane way possible, the terror of a powerful adept!


    He also perfectly disyed the tremendous destruction that an adept was capable of. Anyone looking on would feel fear creep into their hearts!


    Near the end of the battle, the entire battlefield had turned a bright red. Even the two pseudo-adepts couldn¡¯t see through the elementium tides and peek at the progress of the battle.


    ............


    Greem¡¯s full prowess was only unleashed once the entire battlefield had turned into a sea of mes.


    With his elusive Fire Teleportation, and his agile speed within the sea of mes, he was no longer gued by his limited agility.


    The vicious fire spells also gave him iparable damage at long distances. Even a Magma Fireball fired off half-heartedly could deal astounding amounts of damage. Moreover, the me Fiend Transformation had caused his Physique to go up several times. The seven points of Physique he now had were nearing the levels of body-refining adepts.


    This meant that he had both terrifying long-range attacks as well as powerful melee strength!


    Greem, who had always been on the receiving end in this battle, seemed to finally have a chance to turn the tables with the home field advantage finally set.

 Chapter 256

    Chapter 256 Death of an Adept


    Dong!


    An intense explosion erupted.


    Greem¡¯s massive me body appeared within the sea of mes. The tremendously wide Ring of Fire instantly shot out from his body. For the first time, Greem was able to catch Carlos within the burning zone before he could escape.


    Carlos¡¯ gray defensive barrier was turning a bright red under the heat of the elementium mes.


    The very next second, two ferocious Magma Fireballs exploded right next to him!


    However, all of a sudden, a strange smoke of pure gray suddenly appeared. It formed the shape of a skull and dove into Greem¡¯s body, causing his vision to gopletely ck. He had been temporarily blinded.


    Carlos took full advantage of this window of opportunity and scrambled out of the Magma Fireball¡¯s explosive radius. One could still see the burn marks left all over his body as he frantically scurried away. He made a smart choice! Almost at the very instant Carlos had left, a gigantic magma hand rose from theva pool below, smashing at where Carlos was with all its strength.


    Dong!


    The entire ground trembled.


    A terrifying ck and red handprint half a meter deep was imprinted in the dirt. The roilingva quickly filled the crater.


    Then the mighty Fire Lord burst forth from the ground. It bent its body slightly and let out a silent roar in the direction that Carlos had disappeared.


    Greem, who had just finishedunching his attacks at Carlos, had also received McThran¡¯s blows at the same time. The two passed by each other,shing at each other with all they had. Greem¡¯s savage whip had dispersed nearly half of the ck smoke shrouding McThran, while McThran had also sessfully left behind a cloud of ck smoke the size of a grindstone on Greem¡¯s back.


    In the meantime, Greem had made countless attempts to bombard the enemy with the six instant-cast spells within the Scroll of Voodoo. However he could never quite catch McThran¡¯s figure.


    Theyer of smoke enveloping McThran wasn¡¯t just corrosive, it also had the unique ability to shield McThran from any sensory detection. Consequently, Greem had never managed to lock on to the adept despite having battled him for so long.


    This was also part of the reason for the awkward situation that Greem was dealing with.


    Even though Greem was trying his best to corner Carlos with the cooperation of the Fire Lord, thetter¡¯s strange curses would always interrupt him at a key moment and prevent him fromnding any crucial hits. Moreover, McThran would continuously harass and wound him as he chased Carlos about.


    His elementiumized body of mes might not have any fatal weak points, aspared to a human body, but it still yed an important role as the carrier of Greem¡¯s spirit consciousness. If the carrier fell apart, Greem¡¯s spirit consciousness would lose all protection he had. Greem would be then be rendered helpless to every whim and fancy of the enemy!


    Greem immediately changed his battle n, perhaps because he too realized the danger he was in.


    The next second, his tall body crashed into the sea of mes and instantly vanished from sight.


    This time, he had actually vanished. There were none of the telltale signs of a Fire Teleportation.


    Moreover, he didn¡¯t show up after vanishing. It was almost as if his entire existence had melded into the sea of fire.


    And thus, the Fire Lord was left alone in the battlefield, trudging about with heavy footsteps as it desperately pursued the sly Carlos. The Fire Deity, on the other hand, had already fulfilled its mission and died!


    As expected of a veteran dark adept; Carlos was both extremely proficient with his element and possessed exceptional battle awareness. Every time he repositioned himself, he would shower therge area beneath him with dark elementium halos. These scattered dark elementium weren¡¯t meant to damage his opponent. Rather, they were used to put out those terrifying elementium fires.


    However, even as Carlos did his best to put out the sea of elementium mes, the Fire Lord continued to spread the gift of fire as he chased after Carlos. With one in hot pursuit of the other, the entire battlefield was quickly stirred into a mess.


    As all of this was happening, Greem¡¯s spirit consciousness went undetected, flowing within the sea of mes.


    Every time he reached the center of a fire, the zing elementium mes would form a strange face of fire. The face had no body. Its eyes blinked as it looked about, quickly dissipating if Greem didn¡¯t find any enemies.


    Then, the very next moment, Greem would form another face at another spot in the field of fire, scouting for any signs of enemies.


    But while he was searching for McThran, the reverse was true for his opponent as well!


    A cloud of strange ck smoke weaved between the gaps in the burning fires as itmunicated with Carlos, who wasn¡¯t very far away. The two had never cut off their mental connection.


    "This brat is very well-hidden! He¡¯spletely elementiumized his body and can hide anywhere in the mes! It¡¯s way too hard to find him with such an inefficient way of searching!" Finally, McThran couldn¡¯t help but throw out his suggestion. "You try and attack his elementium golem to draw him out. We will try and surround him once more!"


    "Hmph... " Carlosughed sinisterly, "Why shouldn¡¯t you be the one to bait him? That brat hasn¡¯t even used the soul equipment in his hands. If you want to test its might you are wee to do so. I¡¯m not dumb enough to be a target for that!"


    "If that¡¯s the case, then we will both act together and crush that elementium golem first! Without a subordinate like that, his home field advantage will gradually shrink, and things will get easier and easier!"


    "Very well! Wait for my signal, and we will act on my count!"


    Carlos was rapidly moving through the zing inferno. Again and again, he showered the ground with dark elementium halos made of gray mist, instantly extinguishing all fire elementium in a hundred meter radius around himself. Behind him, the clumsy and slow Fire Lord was striding over. The ground trembled with every step it took. It raised its arms and tried to reform the sea of mes as it shot out several Explosive Fireballs at Carlos.


    Yet at this very instant Carlos, who had always been running away, turned around. He dodged the fireball speeding towards him, while gathering massive amounts of dark elementium in his hand to form a terrifying spear. The spear shot forward, piercing the Fire Lord¡¯s Lava Shield, and embedded itself deep in the Fire Lord¡¯s chest.


    At the same time McThran suddenly appeared behind the Fire Lord. His hands, both shrouded in ck smoke, plunged deep into the Fire Lord¡¯s zing magma body. Large ck patches quickly spread across its body.


    The Fire Lord might have adept-level abilities, but it wasn¡¯t an actual intelligent lifeform!


    Its resistance wound up the two veteran adepts, but there was no escaping its deathly fate at the hands of theirbined attacks.


    Greem sensed the warnings sent from the Fire Lord. His massive body quickly started reforming at the closest spot to the battle. Unfortunately, the sly Carlos had already exterminated all fire elementium in a hundred meter radius around him beforehand. As a result, Greem was still a good hundred and twenty meters away from the Fire Lord, even after emerging from the mes.


    ck spots and gray shadows quickly spread throughout the Fire Lord¡¯s gigantic body. Inevitably, they started to creep onto its most important part¨C the golem core.


    Greem grit his teeth when he felt the core at its limit. He gave hisst order to the Fire Lord. Self-destruct!


    Having apanied Greem for six months, and having crushed one obstacle after another, the Fire Lord could be considered the most powerful golem Greem had. Yet today, Greem could only choose to give it up in this border skirmish between two adept ns.


    Greem¡¯s resolution had also exceeded the two adepts¡¯ expectations and better judgement. The unique existence of golems had also turned the elementium core into a miniature elementium bomb! Especially when it was the self-destruction of an adept-level golem. The terrifying might was enough to frighten even two veteran adepts.


    Carlos had been wandering at a distance from the Fire Lord. He was able to retreat the moment he sensed the Fire Lord¡¯s abnormality. However, McThran wasn¡¯t so lucky. He was battling with the Fire Lord at melee distance. It was toote for him to escape when he finally sensed the boiling and chaotic elementium tide within the Fire Lord.


    Boom! A massive explosion shook the ground and the heavens.


    A towering mushroom cloud slowly rose to the skies.


    Violent gales blew in every direction, bringing with them the incinerating mes of the explosion. In just a single instant it had copsed half of the outer castle walls five hundred meters away. Horrifying heat and me streams sted out, reducing all life without elementium protection to ashes before blowing even the ashes to the winds.


    Buildings near the castle had crumbled and fallen apart. Even the heavily guarded side of the castle facing the battlefield had also been charred soot-ck under the heat of the terrifying mes. The buildings that were even closer to the walls had softened and copsed as if they were made of mud or molten cheese.


    If even the castle, shielded by a castle wall, had been reduced to such a state, what would one expect of the exposed armies of Lord Tras?


    Terrifying fires ravaged across their ranks. The poorly equipped vassal troops were instantly burnt to ashes, leaving weird human-shaped scorch marks on the ground. The ny warriors of steel, that had fortunately escaped from thest attack with their lives, were also engulfed by the tide of fire before they could escape this time.


    Their numbers were instantly cut in half!


    After the fire passed by, the scattered and remaining troops weren¡¯t even enough to form a battalion.


    Even Keoghan and Cochran, who were still engaged with each other, had to stop their fight as they looked on in shock. All of their attention was now on that terrifying field of fire.


    Wasn¡¯t this just a border skirmish between adept ns!? How... how did such a bigmotione about? Were they having a battle of life and death?


    Meanwhile, at the core of the explosion.


    The Fire Lord¡¯s massive and magnificent body had already vanished.


    Only a fifty meter wide and ten meter deep crater was left on the spot. Boilingva roiled within the crater. Monstrous heat and me streams, upwards of four thousand degrees, hadpletely shattered the space above the crater. Colorful dark red auroras floated about, painting a beautifully tragic image.


    However, any clear-headed adept would never be tricked by the beauty before them. Neither would they evere close to those phantasmally pretty lights. Because... those were the elementium mirages projected by the space outside the ne after the space within the ne had been shattered.


    No First Grade adept would be able to escape if they were caught in this zone of shattered space. They simply didn¡¯t have the defensive capabilities.


    Apletely burnt figure climbed out of the bubblingva at the edge of the crater. He slowly walked forward, stumbling as he tried to leave the site of the explosion. A long trail of burning ck footprints were left behind as he walked...


    Magical energies shed about the figure, and thest remaining wisps of fire on his charred body were finally extinguished.


    McThran opened his cracked, burnt lips and exhaled. Hot breath came out of his mouth. So hot, there were even sparks of mes as he breathed. He took out a potion from his bosom to treat himself, but all of a sudden, he stopped.


    Right before him was Greem. Greem¡¯s blood red eyes were like a raging inferno and were trained right on him. The Scroll of Voodoo in Greem¡¯s hand was madly flipping.


    A massive surge of elementium energies were quickly gathering!


    "No... we can talk... " McThran screamed with all his might.


    Sadly, everything he still had to say was devoured by a new wave of me and fire!

 Chapter 257

    Chapter 257 Alice Returns


    McThran was dead!


    A veteran adept with decent prowess had died for no reason in apletely insignificant battlefield!


    This shocking truth was hard to swallow for both sides of the conflict.


    Kartia Hills was a territory no bigger than sixty square kilometers, with one mid-sized and two small-sized cities, as well as seven or eight human viges. Even if all of the mansions and viges within Kartia Hills were razed and converted into its worth in magic crystals, it still wouldn¡¯t be enough topensate for the loss of a veteran adept.


    The true reason the three adept forces had allied with each other to attack was to test the waters. If the Sarubo n had indeed taken huge losses in the ne war, they would take a strategic retreat and voluntarily surrender some benefits that it couldn¡¯t defend. They would trade time for space to recover their strength.


    In fact, such border wars happened on a daily basis within the Zhentarim area. Countless adept ns and organizations were involved in the various tussles and disagreements. However, it was extremely rare to see an adept die in one of these conflicts.


    As the invading party, Carlos of the Mikayne n had no choice but to dere their loss. The two parties finally sat down to have a tough negotiation on the war reparations.


    The conquered cities had to be returned and the raided viges had to be reimbursed. The Mikayne n even had topensate the losses of the Sarubo n withrge amounts of rare resources. As long as the Mikaynes had no intention of escting the tensions into a full-blown n war, the curtains would be drawn on the incident today.


    As for how the Mikayne n was topensate the ck Glove Association for the loss of McThran, that was their problem to deal with.


    Greem and Keoghan immediately returned to Feidnan City after hastily concluding the affair.


    That said, after this battle, Greem¡¯s terrifying moniker as the me Demon spread far and wide.


    Battling two veteran adepts at once, yet still being able to forcefully exterminate one of them while he fended for himself. Such prowess was almost entirely unheard of in a newly advanced adept!


    It was said that numerous adepts had personally hurried over to Locker Castle, after the conclusion of battle, to examine the marks of battle. Every adept that set their eyes upon the ce put on a grave face of apprehension!


    In all honesty the location was thoroughly in ruins. It was no longer a ce fit for humans to live in.


    It was as if a violent volcano had erupted there. One could see horrifying magma left behind after the flowingva had cooled. There were some odd bulging magma rock formations littered across the field. If anyone cracked these open, they wouldsee barely damaged metal armor within. However, the flesh of the soldier within hadpletely fused with the molten armor. They couldn¡¯t ever be separated cleanly.


    Locker Castle had also been badly damaged. Arge portion of the castle had been melted and softened into a mud-like consistency during the fight. When the heat finally dissipated, and the rock cooled, all of the architecture had solidified into all kinds of weird shapes.


    Fortunately, with the amount of reparations the Mikaynes were paying, Viscount Donald would have more than enough to build five castles.


    Moreover, after this incident, all of those underlying currents that called for probing the Sarubo had been put to rest. Most of the ns and organizations that had wanted to benefit from the Sarubo¡¯s weakness had gone quiet, and resumed their stance of observing rather than attacking.


    However, at the same time, Greem also drew the ire and vengeance of the ck Glove Association!


    Greem did some basic research after returning to Feidnan. It turned out that the ck Glove Association was a small organization with only seven adepts. With the exception of their Association Head, who was a Second Grade adept, McThran was their most powerful First Grade adept.


    Greem smiled to himself andpletely disregarded the possible repercussions. That Second Grade adept couldn¡¯t possibly try and do anything to him now that he had the support of the n. Otherwise the Third Grades of the Sarubo n would make short work of the ck Glove Association.


    On the other hand, in his bloodlust, Greem would never back off from a fair fight between two First Grade adepts. That was why he had no reason to fear the Association.


    Given Greem¡¯s massive contribution to the Locker Castle fight, Keoghan had personally took out a portion from the war reparations topensate his losses in battle.


    Twenty thousand magic crystals, five n contribution points,rge numbers of adept resources, and three adept-level elementium cores.


    With these in hand, Greem chose to turtle up within the adepts¡¯ tower and work day and night to recover his fighting strength.


    In all honesty, McThran¡¯s strange ck smoke and Carlos¡¯ powerful curses had still left a tremendous effect on him. Greem only managed to recover to his best state after seven days, once he hadpletely dispelled all of the negative and malignant spells within his body.


    Through the battle this time, Greem had very clearly seen his own strengths and weaknesses. This allowed him to n the path he wished to take in the future.


    Fire spells were undoubtedly the strongest in the battlefield. This had been well verified. That said, the tremendous might of fire spells couldn¡¯t be unleashed to their fullest in the small skirmishes between adepts.


    One could even say that Greem had absolutely no chance of obtaining victory two against one if it hadn¡¯t been for the Fire Lord¡¯s self-destruction and the powerful instant-cast spells of the Scroll of Voodoo.


    Thus, strengthening himself was the only path forward if Greem wanted to ensure his continued advantage in battle.


    However, an increase in Spirit was not something that could be hastened. The only way his Spirit could increase would be through persistent daily meditations. Of course, the other way was to go searching for suitable Spirit potions or food materials with beneficial effects.


    But this too was a drawn-out process that required a great deal of time!


    Greem¡¯s best hope of quickly strengthening himself lied in magic golems and the runes from the knights¡¯ ne. Moreover, he had already promised the adept in the Underground World that he would visit the Castle in the Sky for thepetition. There were only six more months before then.


    After some careful consideration and thinking, Greem decided to first deal with those runes from the knights¡¯ ne. He would first use them to strengthen the magic runes on his body, as well as his magic golems, before delving into other things.


    His trip to the other world had also reaped him plenty of resources and rare materials. He needed a period of time to settle down and umte missing knowledge to reinforce his foundations.


    And so, for the next month, Greem didn¡¯t show his face outside of the adepts¡¯ tower. He hid deep within it, always lingering in the magicbs and conducting his experiments.


    Of course, it was not as if he hadpletely cut off any contact with the outside world. He still had some connections to have people run errands for him. The little loli Alice finally returned from her mission mania on the third day of his seclusion. She immediately went to find Greem.


    Honestly, after three or four months apart, Alice¡¯s improvement was shocking, even to Greem. At the speed at which she was improving, she might very well advance to adept in a year and a half.


    "Hand it over!" Alice extended her small hand the moment she barged into Greem¡¯s room.


    "What?" Greem was confused.


    "My souvenir, of course!" Alice rolled her eyes, "You went to tour another world for a whole couple of months. You couldn¡¯t possible have not brought any gifts back, could you?"


    Greem was speechless.


    "This... Alice, I think I¡¯m your master! Not the other way round. You, a servant girl, want to get something good from me without doing anything? Hmmmm... "


    Alice instantly switched from her pouting face to a bright smile when she heard this.


    "Oh my dear master, my beloved master, is there anything the cute Alice can do for you?"


    Greem¡¯s head hurt when he saw Alice¡¯s shameless transition. He let out a coldugh and spoke, "Wouldn¡¯t you know what a servant girl can do? You grew up in nobility after all."


    "Sleep with the master?" Alice let out an overjoyedugh as she eximed, "Sure! Of course! What do you think about tonight? Your cute Alice wille warm your bed tonight!"


    Greem nted his face into palm. He was utterly speechless now.


    Even though he knew Alice was a talkative person, Greem couldn¡¯t maintain his cool and calm attitude when the one talking had the appearance of a seven-year-old loli.


    He did a quick calction. Alice was almost seventeen already. Still, it was hard to treat her as someone of simr age to himself with this loli body and face.


    With how arrogant she was, Greem would have long tossed her aside if she was any less talented. However, having personally witnessed the wonder of a top-tier fate-wielding ¡¯scammer¡¯, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be intrigued by the title Alice bore on her back. The title of the ¡¯Witch of Fate¡¯.


    If... he was able to personally train a prophet that was loyal to his cause, it would have tremendous significance for his future development.


    It was precisely because of this thought that Greem had immense hopes for Alice. Greem wouldn¡¯t be ungenerous if it meant a chance to forge a good rtionship between her and himself.


    Greem raised his head and thought for a moment. The only thing he had that seemed to be useful to her yet not appear too stingy would probably be that!


    Havinge to this thought, Greem waved his hand. All of the magic barriers within his dwelling were instantly activated. Ayer of light radiance appeared everywhere on the walls, the ceiling, and even the floor. Now, even the fellows who had absolute authority of the tower couldn¡¯t listen in on his secret without alerting Greem¡¯s sensory detections.


    "You... what do you want... to do?" Alice took a step backwards frantically. Her hands grabbed her cor tightly, and her eyes darted about the room as if she was terrified.


    "Hmph! Only ghosts would be interested in that beansprout-like body of yours!" Greemmented in an upset tone, "You wanted a gift, didn¡¯t you? Here, this is my gift to you!"


    Greem took out a gray pouch and very reluctantly passed it to Alice.


    "All¡¯s good as long as you are not setting your sights on me! What¡¯s this? It looks really ugly... " Alice pinched her nose while picking up the pouch with two fingers.


    The pouch clearly was not any sort of magic-infused item. It was just a normal pouch sewn from rough linen. Not only was it old and in tatters, there was even a stuffy and rotten smelling from within.


    Alice instantly lost all confidence in its contents with how unpresentable the pouch was.


    She pinched her nose, pushed back her disgust and took out a strange grey stone the size of a fist from within the pouch.


    "This is the gift you brought me from another ne? A stupid stone!"


    Alice rolled her eyes and threw the stone aside.


    However, at the very moment the gray stone left her palm, it drew a brilliant silver line across the air. Before the stone even reached the ground, the silver line started to vibrate, and a small opening had opened in the space in front of Greem¡¯s and Alice¡¯s eyes. The stone moved as if it had a brain of its own. In the blink of an eye, it had almost vanished into a space wormhole and disappeared from this ne.


    Alice¡¯s sharp voice finally rang out.


    "A spacestone!"

 Chapter 258

    Chapter 258 me Fiend¡¯s Heart


    A spacestone!


    Before any disy of its power, the gray and dirty stone looked just like any ordinary pebble from the roadside. However, when its power finally activated itsted for only a short moment. In the blink of an eye it began disappearing in front of the two.


    Alice wasn¡¯t idling about as she screamed either. She reached forward with her small hand and pierced through space, forcefully yanking the spacestone out.


    Greem watched the whole thing unfold before him speechlessly. The corners of his mouth twitched uncontrobly.


    The odd spacestone!


    And what was even weirder¨C Alice¡¯s space affinity!


    Greem had seen it all with his own eyes. Alice had reached into the spatial rift barehanded. She wasn¡¯t concerned about being sliced by the space fragments at all! Of course, the chip¡¯s high-speed motion capture had discovered a thin membrane of space wrapped about Alice¡¯s white and delicate hand. The membrane was as thin as a cricket¡¯s wing.


    This membrane of space arose due to her affinity and had to be the main reason she was able to casually make contact with space fragments without getting hurt!


    Alice grabbed the spacestone tightly and pressed it against her forehead to feel the profound space flux within it. The smile on her small face grew wider and wider.


    All of a sudden, Alice leaned over and kissed Greem on the face. She then took a step backwards, held her skirt in her hands and performed a perfect maid¡¯s curtsey.


    "Thanks for this, Master! I really like this gift."


    Alice then ran out of the room, quick like the wind.


    It was clear that she could no longer wait to use the spacestone in some special experiment of hers.


    Greem actually understood Alice¡¯s excitement very well.


    She was currently stuck at the pseudo-adept level. The only thing she needed to do to advance to an adept was to master a strand of narw that rted to her affinity. Then she would have to use this strand of narw as the nucleus in order to form her consciousness core.


    Spacestones, on the other hand, were undoubtedly some sort of physical manifestation of the spatialws of the multiverse. Invariably, every single of one of them would contain extremely unique spatialw powers. And this was particrly suited for Alice¡¯s affinity! As long as she was able to draw this strand of spatialw power into her space of consciousness, the key step of advancing to an adept, the formation of the consciousness core, would be a breeze.


    Once Alice advanced to an official adept, she would instantly be a powerful adept with her unique space affinity.


    Even Greem felt his stomach turn once he thought of her skills being enhanced. Spatial Cut, Spatial Traversal, and the indomitable Spatial Shatter. Greem could only get pped around in a one-on-one fight against an Adept-Level Alice, if he didn¡¯t have the help of his golems and me Fiend Transformation.


    Thus, to maintain his dominance as the master, enhancing his own strength was necessary!


    Greem sealed the door once more and got up to walk to a hidden room within his dwelling.


    He had sealed all of his spoils of war from the knights¡¯ ne here. These were the stepping stones of his future dominance.


    Greem walked to a wooden table and pulled away the ck cloth covering it. A disgusting aura of corruption instantly pressed against his face.


    This was a me Fiend¡¯s heart, the size of a skull. It¡¯s crimson flesh, thick tendons, pulsing life energies, and chaotic aura unique to the underworld all mixed with each other, turning into the special and strange aura of blood and ughter specific to abyssal creatures.


    The me Fiend¡¯s heart had been detached from its body for a long time. However it still retained extremely powerful life force thanks to the stimtion of magical energies. A crimson aura shrouded the heart as it beat, causing everyone that looked upon it to feel nausea.


    Greem extended a single finger and gathered just a trace of magical energy at the tip. He touched the me Fiend¡¯s heart. Almost instantly, a cluster of dark green abyssal me ignited at the area Greem had touched.


    This me clearly had the wicked, corrosive, and devouring traits of the World of Abyss. It quickly spread from the me Fiend¡¯s heart to Greem¡¯s finger.


    Even with his elementiumized body of mes, Greem could feel slight pain from his fingertips. It seemed that this abyssal me had the ability to burn through his body of mes and directly damage his mental world.


    Greem frowned. Strong elementium fire quickly gathered at his fingertips and extinguished the abyssal me using superior numbers.


    As expected, this was a source of powerful strength!


    Greem bent his body and held his breath. Blue light shed deep in his ck eyes.


    "Beep. Detecting live sample of a unique being. Basic data has already been recorded. Please name the sample... "


    "me Fiend¡¯s Heart."


    "Beep. Live sample me Fiend¡¯s Heart has been recorded."


    "Show me the sample data for this me Fiend¡¯s Heart!" Greem ordered, and instantly a three-dimensional projection of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart surfaced in his mind, slowly rotating around. Meanwhile, a flood of information was disyed beside the projection,pletely filling up Greem¡¯s mental space.


    Greem shut his eyes to focus. He filtered out all of the excessively trivial data, leaving only the basic biological information that was convenient to his understanding.


    ......


    Muscle activity 46%. Can be improved...


    Energy storage capacity 1155 points. Can be improved...


    Energy output threshold 135 points. Can be improved...


    Life energies conversion efficiency 41%. Can be improved...


    Abyssal aura retention rate 18%. Can be reduced...


    ......


    Greem opened his eyes and straightened his body. He looked intently at the heart, unable to suppress his excitement and intense desire.


    With the slow increase of Spirit, this me Fiend¡¯s Heart might be hisst hope at maintaining his absolutely dominant strength!


    Ever since the first day he received this heart, Greem had been thinking about how to utilize the powerful strength within it. ording to the massive number of calctions and filtering done by the chip, the only time Greem could use the me Fiend¡¯s Heart was during his me Fiend Transformation.


    It was only during the Transformation, when his Physique and Spirit were amplified several times, that Greem couldpletely master and use the power of the Heart. Otherwise this energy heart taken from a Second Grade Abyssal me Fiend would turn out to be an unstable incinerator, instantly reducing Greem¡¯s human form to ashes.


    Having run through hundreds and thousands of methods of utilizing the energy heart, the chip presented Greem with a single feasible solution.


    The me Fiend¡¯s Heart would be sealed within his body on normal asions, and Greem would use his powers and aura to slowly modify the heart. Then, when it came to a battle, Greem would unseal the Heart afterpleting his me Fiend Transformation, allowing the Heart to be the energy-supplying core of the me Fiend¡¯s body.


    Just like that, Greem would be able to reinforce his battle strength!


    However there were a couple of problems to be solved before this could be done.


    First, Greem had to do away with the thick abyssal aura that was shrouding the heart. Or at least, he would have to suppress the abyssal aura to an eptable thickness. Otherwise, if he used the heart for extended periods of time and assimted with the heart, the chances of him being contaminated and turned into an abyssal creature would also increase.


    Even though abyssal creatures were well-known for their prowess, and Greem was not averse to possessing any sort of power, the chaos and violence in their nature was not something Greem wanted in his blood. From Greem¡¯s understanding, abyssal creatures were basically brainless magical creatures with +10 Physique, Strength, and Spirit, but also with -100 Intelligence.


    Was power without control still power?


    Thus, before he was able to eliminate this factor from the Heart, Greem had to be very careful with his use of it. He would not be overly reliant on the Heart.


    Secondly, ording to the chip¡¯s scans, there were still many areas in the me Fiend¡¯s Heart that could be improved. If Greem wanted to maximize the benefit he got out of this, he would have to use up a massive amount of resources.


    The data the chip provided was plentiful, but the most important info was what he had filtered out.


    The muscle activity of the heart determined the working efficiency of the heart. A mere 46% meant it could only operate at half of its peak strength.


    The energy storage capacity and energy output threshold, on the other hand, determined the current power level of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart. As the magic organ of the Abyssal me Fiend, the energy heart could store a certain amount of me energy within itself. This meant that it could store 1155 points of me energy while in a nonbat mode.


    And all of this was energy Greem could draw upon during a fight!


    However, regardless of the amount of storage capacity, the output threshold still limited the strength of the me energies that Greem could use.


    135 points meant that every single one of Greem¡¯s fire attacks could not exceed 135 points.


    Of course, this was still far beyond Greem¡¯s current powers.


    It was important to note that most of the spells of an actual First Grade adept were around 60-80 points. It was only because Greem had chose fire mastery, and in doing so gave up the spells of all other elements, that he was able to push the might of his fire spells all the way up to 115 points.


    This energy level was already Greem¡¯s limit.


    However, even at half capacity, the me Fiend¡¯s Heart still had a shocking energy output threshold of 135 points. It was clear how powerful Second Grade me Fiend¡¯s were!


    Moreover, an energy storage of 1155 points would be enough for Greem to fire eight attacks at 135 points with more than enough to spare. This......this was why the heart was so significant to the enhancement of his powers!


    On the other hand, the life energies conversion rate of 41% also meant that Greem would be able to convert his own life energy into me energy, even if he was inbat. This kind of ceaseless supply of power would turn Greem into a terrifying instrument of war.


    As long as he lived he would have an endless supply of power to tap into!


    Sadly, there was still much to be done before he could use this powerful heart. All of this would take time.


    Greem nodded in satisfaction and put the ck cloth back over the heart.


    Even though the ck cloth looked very ordinary, the moment it was draped over the heart the thick abyssal aura that filled the room instantly disappeared.


    This evidently meant that this ordinary-looking ck cloth was also a magical tool! A magic tool that was used specifically for covering all kinds of energy auras!


    Apart from the me Fiend¡¯s Heart, other things were also stored within this hidden room. Namely: two spacestones, four adept-level elementium cores, the mysterious Golden Apple, the Orb of Deception, the ck Qiraji Resonating Crystal, the Emblem of Fire, and Shandera¡¯s Sheepstick.


    However, most of these treasures were still far out of reach for Greem¡¯s current abilities. If he wanted to see through all of the arcane knowledge contained within these items, he would likely have to wait until he was several Grades higher!

 Chapter 259

    Chapter 259 Otherworld Runes


    Feidnan City, Adepts¡¯ Tower.


    Greem sat silently by the desk. A parchment had been spread open before him. He was slowly writing out a strange and odd rune based on his memories.


    After the chip¡¯s careful organization and filtering, twenty-three variations of existing runes and twenty-eight all new runes were found. The rune variations referred to otherworld runes that were extremely simr to the runes in the system of the World of Adepts. The only difference came about due to the different power systems of the two nes.


    However, apart from the rune-variants, there were still twenty-eight all new runes that had never existed within the runic system of the World of Adepts. If Greem wanted to modify them into runes that were usable for adepts, he would have to explore and create the runes himself.


    After three days of non-stop calctions, the chip had finally managed to decipher one of the new runes and was trying its best to convert it into a form that was functional within the World of Adepts.


    For example, the rune written on the parchment right now meant ¡¯restoration¡¯ back in the knights¡¯ ne. If this rune was carved in an array back in the knights¡¯ ne, it would be able to double restoration and regenerative power. However, when written in the World of Adepts, this was not the case. As the rune was finally finished, a light purple glow started to gather about the parchment.


    Then, an odd hand-monster-thing crawled out of the paper, slowly looking about.


    There was a really strange eye at the middle of the hand-monster¡¯s palm.


    It¡¯s eye was about the size of a human¡¯s, but its color was truly frightening. What was more horrifying was how it kept blinking and darting about the room as if it was monitoring the ce.


    Greem sat there unmoving, but already the fire energies within his body were slowly gathering together. He asked in a sombre voice, "Are you a magical creature, or are you some sort of otherworldly creature? Can you understand my words?"


    A notification rang out within his mind.


    "Detecting abnormal field activity invading host¡¯s sensory organs. Initial estimates suggest illusion activity. Requesting instructions from host. Interrupt?"


    The hand-monster finally gave up on its pointless wandering and turned to face Greem. Its strange eye suddenly shut tight. When it finally opened once more, the eye had turned a blood red color and a tide of red mist sted towards Greem¡¯s face.


    Greem was no longer able to tolerate the thing. He let out an angered shout and a violent Magma Fireball exploded right in front of him.


    Lava Shield appeared at the same time, sessfully stopping the magma fragments and boilingva from sshing everywhere. The odd hand-monster had also vanishedpletely. Even the desk had beenpletely ravaged by the spell, leaving only a mess in its ce.


    Greem let out a sigh in annoyance. He waved away part of the magical defenses around his dwelling and mentallymunicated with the tower¡¯s spirit.


    "Help me restore the room!"


    "Scans discover severe magical damage. Estimated repairs require 35 magic crystals. The cost has been deducted from your tab."


    After the mechanical voice of the tower¡¯s spirit disappeared, visible changes started to ur to the room, which was badly corroded by the explosion and theva.


    The floor that had lots of craters melted out of it started to swell, and soon returned to its previously undamaged state. Even the smoking and boilingva vanished entirely, as if it had been removed by an invisible eraser.


    Just a short momentter, Greem¡¯s dwelling had been restored!


    He once again put up the magical defenses around his room before sitting down at the desk once more tomunicate with the chip.


    "Chip, did you record the urrence earlier? Were there any abnormalities to be noted?"


    "Beep. Host had been subjected to an illusion attack. Source of attack is the unknown mystery rune!"


    "Illusion attack?"


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but start brooding.


    How did the Rune of Restoration turn into a rune-variant of the illusion series? The difference between the two was way toorge! Was there an error in the chip¡¯s calctions? Or were there just parts of the otherworld runes that he didn¡¯t understand?


    Honestly, thinking back, the experience earlier was far too realistic. Even now, in his mind when he closed his eyes, he was still able to see the strange hand and its excessively lively eyeball. All of that was just an illusion?


    At thest moment, the eyeball hadunched an attack at him. If he hadn¡¯t resisted, would he have walked away unscathed?


    Greem quickly shook his head and dispelled this dangerous thought even though he still had questions on his mind.


    No. He was going to try something so dangerous! Illusions were a powerful force in this world, and anything that was powerful must be dangerous in its own right. Thus, even if he was sure it was illusion, he would still have to set up the necessary defenses and preparations.


    After thinking about it, Greem still felt like it had been far too little time since he became an adept. The various resources he had in reserves were far toocking. For example, he had almost no means of defending against illusory and mental spells. He was relying entirely on his greatly increased Spirit to endure their effects. This was unlike his nature as resourceful adept.


    All of the items he had used for such purposes, while he was an apprentice, werepletely insufficient now that he had advanced to an adept. If Greem wanted to get some magic items and magic equipment that adepts could use, he would probably have to wait until his trip to the Castle in the Sky.


    After all, the Castle in the Sky was the home of the esoteric adepts, and most definitely the go-to ce for magic items of expert quality and quantity. Even some of the more powerful magic items that had appeared in the Zhentarim area had mostlye from the Castle in the Sky.


    It seemed the research on otherworld runes would have to be put on hold until he managed to collect some magic equipment that bolstered his mental resistance.


    Just as Greem was silently considering his future research paths, a familiar mental flux radiated from the magical defenses.


    Greem connected Keoghan¡¯s mental link without hesitation.


    "Come to the twelfth floor, Lady Sanazar is back!"


    Greem¡¯s heart shook for a second. Lady Sanazar was an actual Third Grade Bloodline Adept. Her true form was an extremely terrifying Flying Venom Dragon. Greem had personally witnessed her might back on the nar battlefield. She had forcefully driven the green dragons back.


    If a powerful adept like herself was sent back to this world, that meant that the upation of the knights¡¯ ne was going very smoothly. The n finally deemed it ok to send her back to stabilize the n¡¯s situation.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare dy. He quickly came out of his dwelling on the seventh floor and hurried to the twelfth floor to meet this current manager of the n.


    Sanazar was a Third Grade female adept. However, her face was always clouded by strange green mist, obscuring it from outside gazes. When she stood high on the stone seat and gazed down coldly upon everyone, all of the adepts couldn¡¯t help but lower their heads. None of them dared to look at her directly.


    The adepts would feel slight stinging pain all over their bodies if they even stood slightly closer to Sanazar.


    This was the energy radiation from Lady Sanazar¡¯s body, due to the excessively powerful concentration of magical energies around her. As long as she didn¡¯t actively hold her power back, this group of puny First Grade adepts could only silently endure the pain. Again, no one dared to voice any dissatisfaction orints.


    If one were topare a Sixth Grade Great Adept to a small nuclear reactor, the Third Grade Sanazar would be nuclear material with powerful radiation. Greem and the other First Grade adepts would at best be nuclear waste.


    Thus the adepts, who were as powerful as deitiespared to ordinary mortals, once again felt fear and uncertainty when put before the high-tier adepts.


    Right now, only three adepts, including Greem, had been stationed in the adepts¡¯ tower. Even if one were to include the three adepts stationed outside the tower, there were only six adepts being stationed in the Sarubo headquarters. This number was genuinely pitiful for a mid-tier adept n.


    Thus it was clear that the death of eight n adepts in the knight¡¯s ne had greatly reduced the strength of the Sarubo n.


    This was possibly the reason that Great Adept Sarubo was so quick in sending Sanazar back to guard the base.


    The World of Adepts was the roots of all adept ns after all. Only if the roots were thick and strong could qualified adepts be continuously pumped out and sent towards all sorts of nes to ensure the continued prosperity of the n.


    Adept Sanazar restedfortably andzily on the stone seat, silently listening to Adept Keoghan¡¯s report on the n¡¯s situations and the activity of neighboring ns. It was only when she heard Greem had fought two adepts by himself, and even killed an adept from the ck Glove Association seven days ago in a border war, that her gazended on Greem.


    Suddenly, for no reason whatsoever, Greem felt his body tense up. That stinging pain started to intensify.


    Greem endured the pain in silence before finally hearing Lady Sanazar speak.


    "I had heard from Lord Sarubo about you before I returned. He said you are the smartest and most ambitious of the n¡¯s First Grade adepts this time round. Very good! An adept without ambition wouldn¡¯t have the spirit to explore and adventure. However, ambition without intelligence to back it up will only cause adventure to turn into misadventure, sending you to an early grave in a situation where your power wascking."


    Having said that, Sanazar turned to Keoghan and instructed.


    "Send a message for me to that old fogey at the ck Glove Association. Just tell him that I, Sanazar, am back. And if he tries anything against our Sarubo n, I¡¯ll personally visit them and devour them whole!"


    The brutality and violence in her words was frightening.


    Moreover, Greem had a feeling that her promises of ¡¯devouring whole¡¯ wasn¡¯t so much a threat as something she really wanted to do.


    "Moreover, the n is sorelycking in fresh blood, so you lot can¡¯t be cking off either. From today onwards, every n adept has to take a few apprentice adepts under their wing and be responsible for their guidance and learning. The n will provide you guys with double the n contribution points for this!"


    Everyone had, in fact, expected this.


    Thus, they nodded in agreement without saying anything.


    "Very well. Since no one has anything to say, then we are done here! In the future, go look for Keoghan if you have anything you need. Do not interrupt my sleep, or else... "

 Chapter 260

    Chapter 260 Experiment Coborator


    Feidnan City, Adepts¡¯ Tower.


    Greem met the five apprentices assigned to him in his room.


    Two pseudo-adepts and three advanced apprentices. All of them were very young.


    In general, anyone that could make it to a pseudo-adept or apprentice adept by fifty years old had the potential to be an adept. And these individuals were the ones the n were willing to expend resources in order to cultivate! On the other hand, all of those apprentices that had made their way to advanced apprentices through grinding and time were well aware of their own situation. They knew it was virtually impossible for them to be adepts. All of them had already given up on that path and went on to the worldly realm to enjoy the offerings of local nobles.


    There was one female each among the pseudo-adepts and advanced apprentices assigned to Greem. They were fairly pretty and beautiful. However, using his elementium sight, Greem could still see the light residue left on their faces from magical facial reconstruction.


    The apprentice adepts bowed respectfully as they waited on Greem. They didn¡¯t even dare to breathe too loud. It was clear that even they had heard of Greem¡¯s terrifying name as the me Demon. However, one could tell from the excited gleam in their eyes that they were still extremely satisfied that they were able to be the disciples of the famed me Demon. Their excitement and joy was hard to hide.


    No one knew why, but even the reckless Alice showed up for this meeting.


    She put her hands on her waist and stood beside Greem. Her eyes circled the two female apprentices, darting about as if she was scheming something.


    "This is the first time we have met each other. Give me a simple report on your names and research direction!" Greem slowly spoke.


    The five apprentices looked at each other when they heard their teacher¡¯s instructions. The slightly scrawny male pseudo-adept was the first to step forward.


    "Kodar. Affinity: Dark Elementium. I just turned into a pseudo-adeptst year. My main research focus is biological mutation. I have some understanding of beast modifications as well... "


    "Meryl. Affinity: Earth Elementium. I turned into a pseudo-adept this year. I intend to walk the path of an elementium adept. I do not have any secondary professions currently... "


    "Am. Affinity: Fire Elementium. Advanced apprentice. I know how to do a bit of magical material processing... "


    "Toril. Affinity: Illusions. Advanced apprentice. Also a potions master... "


    "Lena. Affinity: Water Elementium. Advanced apprentice with no secondary professions currently... "


    Greem listened silently, blue light shing deep in his eyes.


    Using his elementium sight, he had already captured the bodily attributes of his apprentices. He had them do a basic report on themselves to make it easier to create a profile of them andplete their basic information.


    Thanks to the amazing information processing abilities of the chip, Greem got notifications from the chip on the five apprentices the moment they were done introducing themselves.


    Amongst the five apprentices, one has the potential the continue improving.


    Another¡¯s potential has beenpletely depleted. The fact that they have made it this far is thanks to the help of potions.


    One of them has immense potential for developing in this direction...


    While he already had an estimate of his apprentices¡¯ quality, Greem didn¡¯t show any emotion on his young and handsome face.


    "Now that you have been assigned to me, you will be considered as my apprentices from today onwards. I will even consider epting anyone with good performance as my actual disciple." Greem looked at the apprentices and saw excitement in their eyes, "Also this is Alice. She is my personal maid, as well as your senior. You cane find her if you have any trouble in the future!"


    Upon hearing Greem¡¯s words, Alice instantly puffed up her chest as if she was the boss.


    The few apprentices looked at each other and bowed to Alice in unison. The two young pseudo-adepts looked a little upset about it.


    In the World of Adepts, the difference between an apprentice and a disciple was extremelyrge.


    The identity of an apprentice only meant that you had studied under an adept. When necessary, you could use your identity as his apprentice to receive his shelter and help. However, a disciple was entirely different. A master-disciple rtionship was more akin to a magical contract. Both sides would have an even closer and more well-defined rtionship.


    Sometimes, when an adept died of an ident, his disciple would have the right to inherit his property.


    Thus, most of the time, the adepts were unwilling to create more trouble for themselves. As a result, most adepts would have plenty of apprentices while having close to no real disciples.


    "ording to the tradition of the Sarubo n, now that you are my apprentices, you possess the right to obtain free knowledge from me. Every seven days you will have a chance to ask me questions. Advanced apprentices may ask me one question while pseudo-adepts may ask two. Moreover, the subjects I am involved in include elementium golem creation, animism, dissection, nervous system studies as well as fundamental potions studies... if any of you are willing to be my experiment coborator, you will be able to share the fruits of my research and have free ess to my personalb!" Greem spoke without expression.


    The few apprentices couldn¡¯t help but betray an expression of hesitation and thought when they heard his words.


    Even though they were all considered valuable assets by the Sarubo n, it was still a dangerous thing to coborate with an adept in their experiments. Not anyone dared to try something like that.


    Most adept experiments include taboo and forbidden topics. The risk was obvious.


    Even though participating apprentices would be able to enjoy the fruits of the experiment and research, the damage to their minds and bodies was uncertain. No apprentice confident in their future would choose this path under normal circumstances. Only the fellows that had depleted their potential or were in desperate need of funds would take the risk and volunteer as experiment coborator to attract the teacher¡¯s attention and favor.


    "O¡¯ respected teacher, we were wondering what your experiment involved?" The pseudo-adept named Kodar couldn¡¯t help but bow and ask.


    "It is rted to illusions!"


    All of the apprentices looked towards Advanced Apprentice Toril. He was the only one with illusion affinity among them. He was clearly the most suited to be the ¡¯experiment coborator¡¯ from their group!


    Toril felt the burning but intangible pressure from everyone and had no choice but to take a step forward. He bowed and said, "Teacher, I am willing to participate in your experiments on illusions!"


    "Oh... " A gentle smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face, "Are you doing this voluntarily?"


    "Indeed!" Toril put up a very reluctant smile that looked even more terrible than if he was sobbing, "It is my honor to be able to participate in your experiments!"


    "Very well then, let¡¯s sign a contract!"


    Greem nodded in satisfaction. He waved his hand and grabbed a scroll out of the air. This magical scroll, forged of pure fire, had appeared out of thin air and was slowly hovering before Toril.


    Toril rubbed his eyes, leaned against the scroll, and carefully read through every use in it. After confirming that the content matched Greem¡¯s words, he carefully left his emblem on the scroll.


    The scroll crackled and disappeared in a whirlwind of fire.


    "If there¡¯s nothing else, you may leave. Toril. Make some preparations ande over at seven tonight!" Greem was in a very good mood, having found an experiment coborator like he had wanted. Even his smile was wider than usual.


    The apprentices bowed together and slowly left.


    Alice¡¯s rolled her eyes and quietly followed them out.


    One hourter she returned triumphantly, like a little fox that managed to steal the chicken from the farmer.


    "How was it?" Greem put down the book in his hands and askedzily, "How many of them did you beat?"


    "Five! All five of them got beaten up by me." Alice spoke arrogantly and in disdain, "With what little prowess they had, I could take them on all at once!"


    Greem frowned when he heard this, "You didn¡¯t hurt that Toril, did you?"


    ¡°Of course not!¡± Alice had been in a good mood ever since she got a spacestone from Greem, "I know he still has a job to do tonight, so I only trapped him in my Spatial Prison. He surrendered after realizing he couldn¡¯t do anything!"


    "The others?" Greem asked curiously.


    "I beat them ck and blue! All of them are going back to treat their wounds." Alice waved about a small fist like she was the queen of violence.


    Greem tilted his head. He could totally imagine everyone¡¯s helplessness before Alice¡¯s imprable Spatial Barrier. Honestly, if it wasn¡¯t for his powerful golems, Greem with just his fire affinity would have an impossibly hard time suppressing Alice.


    With her unbelievably broken space affinity, Alice had unimaginable offense, defense, and mobility. Just these three were enough to make Alice nearly undefeatable against ordinary pseudo-adepts. They couldn¡¯t beat her, nor could they even run from her.


    People who battled with Alice were in for an experience of pain and agony!


    ............


    Dusk fell, and Toril had already appeared at Greem¡¯s dwelling.


    Greem¡¯s task for him was extremely simple as well.


    He gave him a knowledge crystal used to store Spirit. There were ten extremely unique magic runes hidden within the crystal. What Toril needed to do was to write out the runes one by one, and as he did so, he needed to record his experiences.


    Greem had even set up a hidden room for this specific purpose, to have Toril finish this series of seemingly simple tasks. Of course, he had already hidden many monitoring crystals in every corner of the hidden room. These crystals would very clearly disy Toril¡¯s every action to Greem, who would be sitting in the room next to this one.


    To encourage this advanced apprentice chosen to be hisb rat, Greem had even promised to provide Toril with three books rted to potions studies.


    Thus, Toril unhesitatingly walked into the room.

 Chapter 261

    Chapter 261 umting Power


    The experiment was extremely sessful.


    Even more so than Greem estimated. In fact, much more so.


    Toril finally stumbled out of the room with a stack of scrolls in his arms. Apart from his pale face and his slightly dazed appearance, he seemed to be fine.


    Greem passed Toril the three books he had promised him and sent him back to rest. He then started to examine the scrolls Toril had passed him.


    As expected, two of the ten scrolls werepletely nk, despite having runes inscribed on them prior to the experiment. Toril didn¡¯t seem to have realized this.


    Greem thought for abit. He did a quick reorganization of the eight verified runes and tried out their effects, sessfully getting eight whole new runes that had never appeared in the runic system of the adepts.


    With these eight runes, today¡¯s experiment was not aplete failure. At the very least, didn¡¯t Greem manage to get something out of it?


    However he was still extremely curious about the two runes that had disappeared for no reason. He had a vague feeling that the direction of his research had gone off-track.


    In all seriousness, the new runes that had been engineered by the chip were all auxiliary lesser-runes. Not a single rune crucial to the merging of runic energies had been uncovered yet. As if... there was a deeperyer of secrets hidden within these runes that he hadn¡¯t grasped.


    What were runes?


    In the end runes were just a form, a manifestation of narws!


    The earliest recorded origin of runes began in the research of magic patterns. Some powerful magical creatures were able to unleash supernatural powers despite being ignorant of the knowledge and reason behind it. Magic patterns would naturally form on the bodies of such creatures.


    Adepts were originally an ordinary group of mortals. They started to notice the existence of magic patterns while battling against the magical creatures, and slowly started to use the patterns for their own might. First, they carved these same magic patterns onto their own bodies, allowing them to possess some unique supernatural powers.


    The encouraged adepts started to collect more and more of these patterns, umting them and starting to simplify and modify the patterns. After tens of thousands of years of groping in the dark, they finally managed to forge the runic system of the current age, indirectly reinforcing the dominance of the adepts in the process.


    Thus, in truth, runic studies could be said to be the subject of study that was closest to the true form of narws!


    These otherworldly runes from the knights¡¯ nes had yet to be deciphered after such a long time, especially those core to the entire runic system. Even basic rewritings of these runes had not seeded. This was a clear sign that there was something deeper to the creation of the core runes.


    What was it?


    How profound could the runic knowledge be when it came from a group of low-level natives of a lesser ne? A lesser ne that hadn¡¯t even formed a functional system of magic casters!


    Wait a moment...


    Greem paused all of a sudden.


    Not all of the creatures in the knights¡¯ ne were low-level lifeforms... there were still high-level lifeforms from the outside... the green dragons.


    Greem¡¯s eyes gleamed. He felt like he had just discovered something important.


    He had brought plenty of valuable information and history texts back from the Runeforge drafting room. However, all of his attention had been focused on the rune-rted content, never ever really reading through the kingdom¡¯s history.


    Now that Greem realized the potential link, he immediately corrected his mistake and spent the entire night rearranging the so-called ¡¯history¡¯ of the knights¡¯ kingdom.


    As expected, Greem uncovered some hidden secrets behind the back of the kingdom¡¯s history.


    The profession of witcher-knight had only appeared after the green dragons became the patrons of the kingdom. Moreover, high-grade witcher-knights always seemed to be rted to the dragons in one way or another.


    This gave Greem sufficient reason to suspect that the true source of the runes weren¡¯t the natives of the ne, but the dragons of the Dragon¡¯s ne.


    Having suddenly understood this, Greem didn¡¯t give it a second thought. He immediately used his right as an adept to move all the information and books that the Sarubo n had about dragons back into his room. This tireless study might have been an arduous process, but it greatlypleted his knowledge of the dragons.


    As a powerful race that dominated many material nes, the adepts kept a detailed research record on the dragons. As a result, the chip¡¯s progress on deciphering the runes became even smoother after the inclusion of this data.


    The chip could churn out some whole new runes almost every day by reverse-engineering these otherworldly runes. As for which of these runes were valuable and which of these were useless, that was a job left for Toril to determine.


    As expected of an advanced apprentice that had illusion affinity, he had extremely powerful illusion resistance. Even though the fragmented runic illusions often put him in a daze, and certainly had on one assion nearly trapped his spirit consciousness in an illusory dimension, he still managed to pull through.


    Moreover, therge number of books and free resources that Greem had provided him with spared him from the trouble of running everywhere to scavenge for resources. He could stay within the safety of the tower and calmly progress with his research. However, the price he had to pay for this was the testing of four or five new runes every single day!


    That said, as Adept Greem¡¯s experiment coborator, he had the opportunity to meet Greem almost every day. Thus, he was no longer limited to a certain number of questions per week. If one were to speak just in terms of his treatment, Toril¡¯s status was almost equal to an actual disciple of an adept.


    And this seemed to be the main reason he was willing to stay, despite the risk!


    Alice, on the other hand, had quickly be the boss of Greem¡¯s apprentices. Moreover, after bringing her group ofckeys to beat up the other apprentice groups in the tower, she quickly became the boss of all of the apprentices in Feidnan¡¯s adept tower.


    Alice¡¯s terrifying space affinity ensured that all the other apprentice adepts, even powerful pseudo-adepts in their ranks, would not be able to the beat her. Apart from the actual adepts, who could crush her with absolute strength, there was no match for Alice¡¯s powers. She had undoubtedly entered the ranks of the most powerful pseudo-adepts.


    Meanwhile, the goblin merchant Snox, that had seeded with Greem¡¯s blessing, continued to lean more and more towards him as his fame as the me Demon continued to spread.


    The World of Adepts was also a chaotic world where strength ruled supreme!


    Most businesses such as tradepanies, trade unions, and arcane shops were owned by adept ns and forces of all sizes. As a lonely outsider, Snox had to endure being pushed about by these organizations even as he tried to set up shop.


    Thus, Snox only dared to maintain his business within Feidnan City. If he took even a single step out of this area, his small business would instantly be devoured by hispetitors.


    However, with Greem¡¯s increasing status in the Sarubo n, Snox had increased his efforts to butter up to his apprentices.


    Greem¡¯s apprentices enjoyed the cheap resources Snox provided them with, while Snox indirectly drew arge group of bodyguards and martial power around himself. The two parties benefited from each other and quickly formed a symbiotic little group.


    Greem didn¡¯t really about all of this and left them to their own devices. He himself waspletely devoted to the deciphering and verification of the runes.


    Two months quickly passed by and Greem had sessfully deciphered six of the twenty-eight new runes. This sounded like a very small amount, but it was more than enough to extend his knowledge on merging runic energies to the level of the Second Grade radiant knights.


    This meant that Greem hadpletely mastered the secrets of the Second Grade radiant knights. He could start forging an army of powerful runic knights if he so wished.


    That said, the strength of the Second Grade radiant knights was found in themselves. The runic system only served an auxiliary role. Thus, even if Greem had forged a set of runic equipment with capabilities that matched the Second Grade, he still wouldn¡¯t have the men to unleash its powers and use its powerful offensive abilities.


    Even without this, Greem seemed to have plenty of Second Grade-level resources at his disposal!


    The Second Grade Molten Giant core he got from the Underground Lava Ocean, the me Fiend¡¯s Heart that Lord Sarubo had bestowed upon him, and the corpse of the radiant knight he had killed in the knights¡¯ ne. Unfortunately, Greem wasn¡¯t a professional Necromancer. Otherwise creating a couple of powerful Undead would be a simple matter.


    With this runic knowledge in his hands, Greem started to get busy.


    The resources he asked Snox for were already here and his treatment of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart was quickly underway. There were still four adept-level elementium cores and a Second Grade molten giant core waiting to be dealt with. Meanwhile, upgrading the me Fiend Transformation runes on his body with the new knowledge he¡¯d acquired had be his top priority.


    Even if Greem somehow managed to squeeze out some free time, he still had to use it to design and forge some runic equipment that suited his abilities and talents...


    All of these taskspletely filled Greem¡¯s daily schedule. There was absolutely no time to rest!


    The four adept-level elementium cores that he used to practice crafting golems failed twice. In the end, Greem only managed to craft two golem cores. One was the Decayer, while the other was the Roaring Monster.


    The Decayer was an adept-level golempleted by using a poison elementium core. It looked like a slime monster made entirely of viscous green matter. It had some unique abilities, such as Acid Spray, Poison Halo, and Splitting Multiplication.


    The acid that the Decayer spewed possessed extreme corrosiveness and toxicity. It could corrode the enemy¡¯s defenses very effectively. Its splitting multiplication also allowed the Decayer to split into two smaller Decayers, after receiving excessive amounts of damage. This would allow it to output even more firepower.


    As of now, the Decayer could split up to three times!


    This also meant that the Decayer could potentially turn into eight adept-level, acid-spewing cannons after some time on the battlefield.


    The Roaring Monster, on the other hand, was forged from an earth elementium core. On the outside, it looked like a five-meter-tall giant stone humanoid. Its unique abilities included Trembling Earth, Stone Toss, and Rock Armor.


    In all honesty, Greem particrly loved these kinds of golems with immense defensive abilities. They allowed him to fully disy the destructiveness of his fiery talents.


    And this Roaring Monster was undoubtedly the meat shield and bodyguard that Greem so desperately needed!

 Chapter 262

    Chapter 262 Change of Heart


    Time flew by, day by day.


    In the meantime, the resources Greem had been umting were vanishing at a rapid rate, gradually turning into part of his strength.


    The Second Grade molten giant-core had also been sessfully turned into a terrifying elementium golem¨C the Infernal Tyrant.


    Of course, due to the limitations of Greem¡¯s own abilities, this Infernal Tyrant couldn¡¯t possibly exhibit the full strength of a Second Grade. In fact it was weaker than even the weakest of Second Grades. Still, the earth and me energies contained in each and every one of its attacks had the amazing ability to crush a First Grade adept.


    After a detailed analysis by Greem¡¯s chip, the normal attacks of the Infernal Tyrant were estimated to reach a terrifying degree of 110 points of damage. This was only slightly inferior to Greem¡¯s most powerful single-target spell. Moreover, the earth-fire hybrid spell that the Tyrant possessed could even go up to 191 points of damage.


    This... this was close to the lower limit of a Second Grade adept¡¯s attack!


    The defensive spells of an ordinary First Grade adept could usually endure between 90 to 130 points of damage. This meant that the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s most powerful spell could potentially kill an ordinary adept in a single blow. That is, if the spell wasn¡¯t avoided or negated by the enemy.


    With the birth of the Infernal Tyrant, Greem was finally able to sweep away his frustration of losing the Fire Lord. Once again, he stood tall. Greem was much more confident in the trip to the Castle in the Sky now.


    ............


    Within his room.


    The entire ce had undergone massive modification. It no longer looked like the way it used to, but rather resembled an operating theater.


    The furniture had already been cleared from the room. Only a single neat and orderly stone tform was left in the middle. Several dozenplex and intricate robotic arms floated above the tform. All sorts of surgical tools could be seen at the tips of the robotic arms.


    Scalpels, surgical scissors, blood vessel forceps, forceps, needle holders, tissue forceps, sponge forceps, right angle forceps, surgical needles, cutting needles, bone nibbling forceps, and many more...


    All sorts of machinery could be found on the table; tools like knives, hammers, drills, chisels, needles, and even saws. Greem had borrowed all of these from Keoghan. Their original use was actually for the modification and creation of voodoo beasts...


    As today was the big day he transnted the me Fiend¡¯s Heart into himself, Greem had woken up early and summoned Alice. She was to lead the other apprentices and guard the door for him. Greem would hide within the room and aplish this difficult andplex task of transnting an organ all by himself.


    To avoid any interruptions by outsiders, Greem had decided not to use the magicbs of the adepts¡¯ tower. Nor did he ask for help from Adept Keoghan. Even the reason that he gave for summoning his apprentices was a lie. He told them he was going to be engaged in a dangerous magical experiment. Not a single word had been said of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart.


    Caution was Greem¡¯s way of protecting himself, having learned from his long stay in the World of Adepts.


    The only person he could partially trust in this foreignnd was Mary. Alice and Snox, on the other hand, were still pending verification. It would depend on their attitude and performance henceforth.


    After a long, dark, and sweet sleep, the beeping rms of the chip rang out in his mind. Greem finally woke from his deep slumber and slowly opened his eyes.


    This was a peaceful sleep, a rxing rest he hadn¡¯t had in a long long time.


    No dreams, no meditation¨C just sleep. Greem hadpletely recovered from the exhaustion and tiredness he had umted over the past few weeks.


    He rose from his bed, stretched, and did some simple warm up exercises. He only stopped after the chip hadpleted the examination of his body.


    "Beep, self examinationpleted. All attributes normal. Host body has been restored to optimal state... "


    Greem nodded in satisfaction and looked down to examine his tall and muscr body.


    He wasn¡¯t a body refining adept, and didn¡¯t have those perverted muscles that were tough as steel. However, his two meter height and perfectly crafted figure still gave him the perfect body. Well-built muscles, crimson and radiant skin, as well as the strange tattoos littered across his chest and back.


    A head of long crimson hair flowed down behind him, reaching all the way to his waist. When put together with the crimson light in his ck eyes, Greem radiated a wicked aura of mystery and wisdom.


    He had no choice in this matter. After undergoing the elementiumization of his body, crimson had be his standard color. This was a magical shine radiating from the concentration of massive amounts of me elementium. Ordinary concealing spells could no longer hide the crimson color he radiated all over his body.


    Even though there wasn¡¯t any dirt on his body, Greem put himself through a firebath out of habit.


    The elementium mes zed suddenly, pouring out from every pore on his body, forming a thinyer of crimson fire over his body. All of the dirt and dust on his body would bepletely burnt by thisyer of fire, leaving nothing behind to taint his skin.


    The ordinary sleeping robe he had on instantly turned to dust and vanished.


    Greem didn¡¯t bother with clothes anymore. He walked out of his bedroom naked and arrived in the workroom he had converted into an operating theater.


    Greem shut his eyes and examined the magical defenses within his room. He confirmed that all of the defenses that he had were activated. This ce was nowpletely defended and covered.


    He then calmlyy on the cool stone tform.


    There was a metal headband resembling a helmet ced on one side of the tform. Greem picked it up and put it over his head.


    When his Spirit seeped into the metal headband, all of the several dozen robotic arms hovering above the tform sprang to life, creaking as they did so.


    Greem snapped his fingers, and five extremely clear mirrors of fire appeared at various angles above the stone tform. With these me mirrors, Greem could observe the experiment from every angle without obstruction.


    The light from the surrounding walls quickly faded, plunging the room into darkness. A dozen crystal lights shone down upon the stone tform. The light was bright and gentle, clearly illuminating everything on and around the operation tform.


    At this moment, Greem was extraordinarily calm.


    "Chip, you may begin!"


    With this order, the chip immediately took over the controls of all the operating machinery.


    Cold steel shed in the air. A magic mechanical arm had floated to Greem¡¯s chest and stabbed into it with a sharp scalpel. A ripping sound rang out and the flesh was split apart.


    The speed at which it moved and the uracy at which it cut was stunning!


    Even Greem wouldn¡¯t have been so decisive and quick in his movements if he had been the one at the steering wheel.


    Perhaps because his physique was unique in some way, the scalpel hadn¡¯t cut through anyrge blood vessels. Blood wasn¡¯t spilling and sshing everywhere. Moreover, with Greem¡¯s current Physique of 3.7, his flesh and skin was as tough as an Iron Rhinoceros, even without the use of any magic.


    If it had been any ordinary mortal¡¯s weapons, slicing through Greem¡¯s skin would have been a difficult task on its own. All of the machinery used for the operation today had clearly been enhanced with magic!


    Havingpleted its task of slicing open Greem¡¯s chest, the scalpel arm quickly moved away. Another machine, this one with two humanoid arms, flew to Greem¡¯s side and lightly pried open his chest.


    Thus Greem¡¯s human heart, protected by his thick sternum and ribs, was exposed to the world. Even though this heart had been slightly mutated by the high concentration of fire elementium that surrounded Greem, its basic function and form was still very simr to that of the human heart.


    Greem looked on calmly. He didn¡¯t interfere with the chip¡¯s control.


    Even though he was the true owner of this body, he couldn¡¯t possiblypare to the chip when it came to its decisiveness and uracy in the operation. The chip was far superior when it came to the fine details of a delicate surgery.


    The saw and bone cutter flew over, and the ear-grinding noise of bone being cut rang out from Greem¡¯s chest. If it wasn¡¯t for the Spell of Sharpening and Spell of Reinforcement he had cast on the tools, they would never have been able to damage Greem¡¯s magically protected flesh and bones.


    The vibration of the metal de as it sliced through his bone, as well as the intense pain of his flesh being pried apart, was transmitted to Greem¡¯s soul. He could only endure it as he watched on with wide-open eyes. He had to see every single detail of the operation with his own eyes, in order to provide the chip with sufficient information to maintain its precise control.


    The ribs were slowly extracted, one after another, until Greem¡¯s heart was finally exposed.


    The saw and the bone cutter shifted away as more machines surged forward. They started the delicate task of detaching the heart from the body and the rest of the internal organs. Every time a blood vessel was cut, a thin heat ray would shoot forth and seal the vessel.


    Greem also started to control part of his body. He tensed all the blood vessels in his body in order to slow the flow of blood and prevent it from flowing out of his chest.


    A crimson light shone in the darkness.


    The me Fiend¡¯s Heart, already treated several times by now, slowly levitated to the operation tform, carried above a floating tray. A magical robotic arm slowly picked it up and held it above Greem¡¯s chest.


    Greem¡¯s eyes scanned across the me Fiend¡¯s Heart, taking note of the numerous strange runes that filled the crimson tendons and flesh of the heart. These runes, that were as small as sesame seeds,pletely covered the inside and outside of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart. Together they formed an extraordinarilyplex and profound runic array.


    A sharp pain shot through Greem¡¯s body. Thest main blood vessel that connected his heart to his body had been severed. The slowly beating heart was removed by a robotic arm.


    There was no time to wait or pause. The new me Fiend¡¯s Heart was instantly plunged into Greem¡¯s chest. Then, countless tiny robotic arms swarmed forward, using unimaginably intricate maneuvers to reattach the vessels to this new organ.


    The process wasplicated, but it was by no means messy. A dozen robotic arms worked in unison, the sound of them creaking as they worked rang out in the room...


    After advancing to an adept, Greem¡¯s life force and Physique had long exceeded that of an ordinary mortal. Moreover, with his elementiumized body, he couldn¡¯t die even after having his heart removed.


    Still, this heart transnt operation couldn¡¯t go on for too long. Otherwise his body might be affected, causing a reduction in his basic attributes.


    Honestly, due to the elementiumization of his body, he could no longer use the means that the body refining adepts used to strengthen their bodies. It was simply no longer effective. Consequently, it would be extremely difficult to raise his Physique if it ever fell.


    And having learnt of the violent, barbaric, and rampagingbat style of the me Fiend Transformation, Greem could no longer give it up in exchange for a weak and pathetic gueri form ofbat. It would be unbearable!


    Thus, the entire transnt operation quickly concluded under the unbelievably precise and urate control of the chip.

 Chapter 263

    Chapter 263 A New Agreement


    A light boom rang out in the room.


    As the new me Fiend¡¯s Heart beat for the very first time, Greem felt a burning stream flowing through his body. The powerful and plentiful feeling of having excessive amounts of energy coursing through his veins was so ufortable that even Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a groan.


    Even though most of the heart¡¯s abilities had been sealed away by the runes, it still used to be the heart of a Second Grade being. The power of a Second Grade abyssal creature was still too much for Greem to handle.


    Possession of powerful strength demanded the possession of an equally powerful body!


    The abyssal me Fiends of the lower realms were massive creatures that easily grew up to four meters in height. The resilience of their Physique could evenpare with the dragons themselves. Even though they had bodies of flesh and blood, burningva coursed through their veins. It was the evil and violent powers of me that surged within their bodies.


    Greem had brought suffering upon himself by transnting the magical organ of such a powerful creature into himself. Apart from the overwhelming me energies, what was more painful was that chaotic, violent, and brutal aura of the abyssal me Fiends.


    If Greem hadn¡¯tpleted the elementiumization of his body, he might have just turned to ash with the first beat of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart.


    Even though the me Fiend¡¯s Heart had now sessfully integrated with his body, he still felt pain all over his body. It was as if his blood was slowly being heated up and turned against him, used as a zing inferno to reduce his body to ashes.


    Fortunately, the sealed me Fiend¡¯s Heart only beat twice in a single minute. This ensured that Greem wouldn¡¯t be burnt to death by me energies that went out of control.


    In truth, this was only a short-term imbnce in his bodily systems brought about by the me Fiend¡¯s Heart introduction. As long as he had a period of time to rest and get used to his new heart, the problem would go away on its own. Once that happened, Greem¡¯s Physique might even have a chance of improving, thanks to the positive influence of the powerful me Fiend¡¯s Heart. This would bring him closer towards the resilience and savagery of a berserking adept.


    Greem endured the intense pain and slowly sat up. He lifted his body from the stone tform.


    Greem looked down. The ghastly cut on his chest had already been sealed by heat rays, leaving a long and ugly scar running across his wless skin. Such a massive wound wouldpletely heal in half a day, given his Physique. Of course, that was provided he had enough to eat. Moreover, it had to be quality food.


    Greem stumbled for a bit before regaining his footing.


    Even though power surged through his body, the only thing he felt was nausea and dizziness. These contradictory feelings shed against each other in Greem¡¯s mind, torturing him and plunging him into agony. He frowned in pain.


    Greem waved and his magical equipments flew out from the darkness. Once again, he was fully armed. As the designs for the runic equipment hadn¡¯t beenpleted, Greem was still wearing the soft adept¡¯s robe somonly worn by elementium adepts.


    The more traditional and conservative adepts still preferred their tall and pointy hats, but Greem had absolutely no interest in such outdated fashion.


    With the emergence ofrge amounts of magic equipment, there was a countless array of powerful options to choose from. The old-style adept¡¯s robe, adepts¡¯ hat, and flying broom that only featured a few enhancements were unpopr among the adepts these days. Only some old stubborn fools in the more conservative and ancient organizations remained. They continued to persistently refuse to use this newer equipment.


    However, Greem had no such issues!


    He was a ssic pragmatist. There was only one thing in his mind when choosing his equipment¨C its power and its effects. Old and new didn¡¯t matter.


    A casual wave of his hand swept a wave of fire through the room. All the blood stains and marks he had left behind were erased in a single move. Even the bone fragments that had been chipped off his bones when they were cut were reduced to ashes. Greem would never leave behind a chance for potential enemies to peek at the secrets of his body.


    Although Greem had half a mind to keep his original heart, he still destroyed it out of safety concerns.


    It was only after Greem hadpletelybed through his room that he released the magical defenses he had ced on it.


    Thus, the pseudo-adepts and advanced apprentices under him swarmed into the room and quickly cleared away the stone tform and robotic arms. Greem ignored them and asked the tower¡¯s spirit for a couple sets of magical energy meals. He wolfed it all down.


    The previously beneficial magical energy set meal was no longer effective or helpful for his Physique. However he was still able to derive immense sensory pleasure from eating gourmet food that suited his elemental affinity.


    The tower¡¯s spirit sent him a message as he was enjoying his meal.


    A certain Adept Angus from the Underground World adepts¡¯ tower was trying to contact him long-distance. The tower¡¯s spirit was trying to ascertain Greem¡¯s response.


    Angus? Wasn¡¯t he the adept that made him promise to visit the Castle in the Sky? If Angus had managed to find his way here, he probably had some basic information on Greem already.


    Greem, who already nned to visit the Castle in the Sky, agreed instantly.


    A ck rift slowly appeared in mid-air. A strange nt that resembled a sunflower crept its way out of the rift. Large amounts of light gathered on the surface of the sunflower. The light flickered and the silhouette of a ck-robed adept appeared.


    It was Adept Angus!


    "So d to see you again, Adept Greem!" A strange smile surfaced on Angus¡¯ cold and uncaring face. He put extra emphasis on the word ¡¯Adept¡¯ when he greeted Greem.


    After all, Greem had only been an apprentice adept that he could knock around thest time they met. Just one yearter, and Greem had already advanced to an official adept with equal status to himself. As such, even this Adept Angus was not confident that Greem would obey the contract they had agreed to earlier.


    The contract was one meant to bound an apprentice adept to his words. It had limited effect on an actual adept. As long as Greem was willing to pay the necessary rpense, he could choose to ignore the terms of the contract. On the other hand, Adept Angus would never take the risk of offending a mid-tier adept n in the central area all for the sake of forcing Greem into obeying the contract.


    This was why Adept Angus couldn¡¯t help but betray a trace of nervousness and concern when he saw Greem. He could see Greem¡¯s powerful figure and feel his mental flux, fierce as fire,shing against his face.


    "Nice to meet you, Adept Angus!" Greem nodded and replied politely.


    "Are you still willing to obey the terms of the contract we agreed to in the past?" Angus asked testingly.


    "Of course!" Greem smiled, "I have great hopes for the trip this time!"


    Adept Angus was visibly relieved after hearing Greem¡¯s answer.


    In his original n, having Greem participate in the apprentice level Golem Wars was already enough. That would ensure that their n¡¯s benefits would be protected. Now that Greem had advanced to an adept, the potential profits would be upwards of ten times greater if he managed to win in the adept-level Golem Wars.


    Of course this made him nervous!


    However, any sort of lying or trickery in the face of an actual adept of equal status was a despicable and treacherous act. Thus, Angus immediately came clean. He wanted to sign a new contract with Greem, and promised great profits that could even move Greem.


    It was clear that the profits the Byron n stood to gain from the Castle in the Sky were extremely massive. Why else was he so willing to offer such generous pay!


    With only three months left till the Golem Wars, Greem only had two months to prepare. He would then have to leave for the Castle in the Sky.


    The two made some small talk before agreeing on a meeting points for the trip. It was only then that both parties ended their conversation on a satisfactory note and cut off the long-distance magicalmunication.


    "You are preparing to go to the Castle in the Sky?" Alice had been beside him the whole time and had overheard the conversation between him and Angus.


    "Why? You want something?" Greem stared at her amusingly.


    It seemed Alice had figured out his temperament. She knew that he was a master that didn¡¯t care too much for status and ranks. This was why she dared to sit in for the conversation of two adepts.


    "Why don¡¯t you bring me and Snox along!" Alice suddenly became extremely excited and happy.


    "Why?"


    "Because the Castle in the Sky is the most prosperous ce for trade and merchanting across the entire Continent if Adepts. That goblin of yours has to go to the Castle in the Sky if he wants to fulfil his dream of bing a great goblin merchant!" Alice continued to dance about as she exined, "There are all sorts of innovative and interesting golems and machines there, not to mention all kinds of odd voodoo beasts, precious and rare magical creatures and materials, as well as countless types of esoteric adepts. However, even all this added together couldn¡¯tpare with the sheer marvel of the Castle in the Sky itself!"


    "The Castle in the Sky is the true alchemical magnum opus of the World of Adepts!"


    Greem listened to Alice¡¯s lengthy ramblings. He couldn¡¯t help but yawn and said nonchntly, "What does that have to do with you?"


    Alice¡¯s emerald eyes opened real wide. She shed her sharp canine teeth and said angrily, "How could I not follow after my master? After all, I am your cutest and most precious personal maid. Is there anything to question about this?"


    Alice¡¯s eyes were narrowed together. She tried her very best to act her cutest.


    It was clear that Alice was extremely interested in this Castle in the Sky. The arrogant girl was trying to suck up to Greem to get him to agree to the idea.


    "Very well, we will go together!" Greem thought for a moment and turned to pass some instructions to Alice, "Go and pass the news to Snox and get him to prepare for the trip. If the Castle in the Sky is as great as you say, we should try and get a spot for Snox to stay there!"


    If he wanted to create a new force that belonged to him and him alone, he would need an endless stream of resources and information. If that was the case, it was much better to have Snox stay on the Castle in the Sky rather than in Feidnan City.


    Greem also wanted to take this opportunity and see for himself this marvel of a city floating in the skies¨C the Castle in the Sky!

 Chapter 264

    Chapter 264 Assaulted


    Two monthster.


    Right before the break of dawn. The mist still clung in the air.


    A ck carriage slowly rumbled out of Feidnan City.


    The tall architecture of the city was quickly left behind as the carriage rushed forward. Large patches of farnd started to appear on both sides of the road. One could vaguely see the scattered farmhouses and viges through the thick and dense mist.


    As the sun hadn¡¯t rise yet, the road was still very dimly lit. It was very easy to damage the precious carriage when driving in such weather. As a result, there weren¡¯t very many people walking on the roads of Feidnan City. This was even truer the further they got from Feidnan City. Human buildings were built further and further apart. Tall and massive trees started to appear more frequently and in greater density.


    Greem pushed the curtain aside and was greeted with a face full of cold, moist air. It was a refreshing and slightly cooling.


    Just five kilometers out of the city, and already the forests on both sides felt a little primal and overgrown. This scene allowed Greem to imagine the past. Several years ago, humans, under the lead of the adepts, had forged their way through this primal forest with great difficulty and created settlement after settlement. He could imagine their pain and suffering as they fought tooth and nail against the creatures of the woods for every inch of thend they owned...


    In the earlier records and books about adepts, Greem had often read about adepts being the guardians of humans. They would aid the nobles in managing theirnds and fight off the attacks of terrifying magical creatures. They would eliminate the vicious beasts and ensure the security of the human settlements.


    But that was all in the ancient past!


    Greem could very clearly trace the development of the adepts over the past couple thousand years. The adepts had slowly risen above the human nobles, eventually rising to the the very top, to the ruling position of the entire race. They had then forcefully united the massive Continent of Adepts.


    The status of the adepts and the nobles hadpletely reversed at this point. The previous rulers of humanity now cowered before the powerful adepts. The nobles were now the representatives and servants of the adepts. The ordinary humans also became insignificant to the adepts, turning into the weak and pathetic ¡¯lower races¡¯.


    The strict rules of high-grade adepts forbade adepts from using the humans as experimental subjects as well as forbidding adepts from massacring ordinary mortals. Otherwise, the adepts might have long stripped the mortals of all they had. Even they themselves would have be theb rats of the adepts¡¯ experiments, or pitiful ves driven to their deaths.


    Just as Greem mulled over the history of the adepts, the coachman turned back and spoke.


    "Master, this trip is going to take a while. You had best take the time to rest well!" The coachman was a middle-aged man with an honest face. However, with his powerful elementium sight, Greem could very clearly see Snox putting on a fawning smile beneath the face created with the Spell of Concealment.


    "Mm, good work!" Greem nodded slightly and let go of the curtain.


    "Hmph! Good work?" Alice, who was curled up by a side of the carriage, and who was clearly still dazed from waking up, yawned as she said, "This is just part of his duty! It¡¯s what he¡¯s supposed to do. Oh right. Aren¡¯t you a powerful adept now? Couldn¡¯t you use your status to rent a Socrates Condor? We could get to Motta City in a single day!"


    Feidnan City was the headquarters of the Sarubo n. It was considered private property. As such, no flying ships were allowed tond within the area. Thus, they would have to go to the public City of Motta, one hundred and fifty kilometers away. It was only there that they could rent a flying ship to hurry to Silver Union territory.


    "We have plenty of time anyway. It¡¯s a good experience to cruise about like this. We get to see the local customs of the Zhentarim Area." Greem let out a gentle smile.


    Alice started rubbing her eyes, then stared earnestly at Greem, as if she was looking at some monster before her.


    "Fine fine fine!" As if realizing that his excuse was a little too forced, Greem couldn¡¯t help but exin himself, "The tower spirit gave me a warning a few days before we left. It seemed to have sensed someone casting divination magic on me!"


    "Divination magic?" Alice was suddenly excited, "You are saying someone is plotting against you?"


    "You are excited now that we have enemies?"


    "Of course! Think about how boring this trip would be otherwise!"


    "Have you never considered the situation seriously? If the enemy dares to plot against me, they would include every variable and factor in everything about me. That includes you. Are you not afraid of death at the hands of our enemies?"


    "Tsk tsk... why should I be afraid if you aren¡¯t afraid?" Alice spoke in disdain, "Since you already know about the enemy¡¯s existence, you must have made arrangements to prepare against them. Otherwise, do you think you would ever volunteer as bait? With your personality?¡±


    "......"


    ............


    Noon.


    The ck carriage slowly pulled onto a gray road amidst a sea of trees.


    This road, that should have been filled with travellers, merchants, and carriages, was now extraordinarily silent. All of the carriages stopped by the road. All the humans and the horses and the cowsy by the roadside, deep in slumber.


    Snox instantly halted the two handsome white horses at the sight of this. Before he could even let out a warning to his master, a light breeze of fragrance found its way into his nose. And so, the next second, Snox and the two horses pulling the carriage copsed.


    Greem pushed aside the curtains and looked at the scene before him. He leapt off the carriage and inspected the strange scene. He frowned. A bright redyer of fire hovered around his mighty figure. It was thisyer of fire that prevented Greem from sumbing to the odd potion.


    Greem¡¯s elementium sight had a clear view of what was happening. The moment he stepped out of the carriage, the moist forest air surged towards him. Some transparent powder mixed in the air crashed against the redyer of fire.


    They sizzled as they burned.


    Red mes sparked across the bright redyer and all of the powder was reduced to ashes.


    Inside the carriage Alice, who had been pumped up for a good show, had already copsed and was sound asleep. The tricks of an adept were not something she could defend against as a pseudo-adept, even if she was one of the most powerful pseudo-adepts alive!


    Three silhouettes of varying sizes appeared in the woods from the right. Their faces and figures were hidden beneath thick cloaks. They silently observed Greem.


    Greem hesitated for a moment. He didn¡¯t try and wake Alice or Snox. Rather, he sorted the equipment on him and followed the three mysterious adepts into the depths of the woods.


    After walking for five hundred meters, they arrived in a forest clearing.


    The trees here were far less dense, with a pond just two hundred meters away. Apart from the tall trees and the low-lying bushes, not a single person could be seen in the area. This was a good ce to settle any conflict.


    "You should know the purpose of our ¡¯visit¡¯, don¡¯t you?" One of the shorter cloaked men asked softly.


    His voice sounded like that of a middle-aged man.


    "The ck Glove Association?" A grin appeared at the corner of Greem¡¯s mouth.


    The short cloaked man pushed his hood down, revealing a green and wrinkled face, along with a hooked nose and a head full of dirty green short hair. He wasn¡¯t a human!


    The Head of the ck Glove Association. The one and only Second Grade Green Dwarf Adept¨C Pyro.


    Greem felt liked a heavy rock had been dropped onto his heart when Pyro¡¯s sinister green eyes locked onto him. Even breathing seemed more difficult.


    "Is it fine for the Head of the ck Glove Association to so publicly kill an official adept of the Sarubo n? Are you not worried that Lady Sanazar will personally visit you lot?"


    "Of course we wouldn¡¯t be able to endure the rage of Lady Sanazar... if it was us of the ck Glove Association that killed you today. However, if the ones responsible for your death wasn¡¯t the ck Glove Association, even Lady Sanazar would not have a reason to persecute us! She wouldn¡¯t dare break the orders of the Zhentarim Association and hurt the innocent us, would she?" The green dwarf Pyro spat out coldly.


    "What do you mean?"


    "Lord Pyro¡¯s words are easy to understand... " The scrawny and tall one of the trio suddenly pushed his hood down as well. The manughed wickedly, "Because he won¡¯t be doing anything today. We will!"


    This scrawny man had a paleplexion with dried and wrinkled skin. His voice was low and hoarse. However, when he uttered thest sentence, his head suddenly turned 180 degrees, revealing a woman¡¯s face behind his head. ¡¯His¡¯ voice also suddenly changed to that of a female¡¯s.


    The female face had her eyes shut tight. A strange smile was stered across her face, but there was nothing odd about the way she spoke. Moreover, she... wasn¡¯t a mask or a face drawn onto the head. She was an actual woman.


    "Two-face Kane!" Greem gasped.


    Even though it hadn¡¯t been long since he ascended to an adept, he still made sure to do his studies and had a detailed understanding of all the famous adepts of the Zhentarim area. With the extreme efficiency of the chip at his disposal, he kept detailed tabs on all the adepts, both famous and lesser-known, that belonged to any adept n, academy, organization, or force within the Zhentarim area.


    Green Dwarf Pyro hadn¡¯t been lying. Two-face Kane didn¡¯t belong to the ck Glove Association. He was a powerful wandering adept.


    Kane. Born to a normal noble¡¯s family in the central area of the continent. He and his twin sister were verified with magic talent at a young age and were sent to a small adept academy to study. His experience was simr to Greem¡¯s. He and his sister met a particrly terrifying and evil adept.


    He and his twin sister had decent talent, as well as an extremely unique innate mental link. Consequently, they fell into the favor of an evil adept and were chosen for an extremely dangerous experiment on the merging of lives.


    What happened next was easily predictable.


    The terrifying life-merging experiment had forged the souls of the brother and sister together. They shared a single body, with two faces, one in front of the head and one behind. The two shared one body with two souls, taking turns to use a single body.


    The sudden stimtion of their soul energies had allowed the twins to suddenly advance to adepts. Moreover, the chaotic nature of the merger had allowed them to break free of the adept¡¯s control.


    Two-face Kane and Lucy, who now simultaneously possessed the strength of two adepts, reinforced with an innate mental link, instantly began a ughter. They butchered all four adepts and twenty-seven apprentices that lived in the small adept academy before running away and disappearing from the public eye.


    As his soul was chaotic and his personality distorted, the Two-face Adept Kane spent most of his days wandering in the central area of the continent, avoiding the capture of the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s Department of Corrections. On the other hand, most adept ns ignored him. They didn¡¯t want to deal with such a powerful adept, and as such, they let ¡¯him¡¯ and ¡¯her¡¯ go unnoticed and unrestrained for all this time.


    However, who knew? The ck Glove Association was willing to fork overrge sums of money to purchase their services!


    Greem helplessly put on a bitter smile.

 Chapter 265

    Chapter 265 The Two-Face Adept


    The Head of the ck Glove Association, the Green Dwarf Pyro, quickly retreated with the other adept. The battlefield was left to the two adepts facing off.


    As long as they weren¡¯t involved directly in the battle today, the Sarubo would be hard-pressed to find a proper excuse to take revenge for Greem.


    Greem hesitated for a moment before putting away the wooden idol he was gripping in his hand. He didn¡¯t crush it.


    This was a magic talisman Lady Sanazar had given him.


    She had agreed to teleport over to his location and obliterate his enemy, as long as he crushed the wooden idol within a fifty kilometer radius of Feidnan City.


    However, it was clear that the enemy had expected this as well.


    None of the adepts of the ck Glove Association were acting personally. They had hired a powerful wandering adept to do their job instead. Greem would probably be in trouble if he summoned that violent Lady Sanazar now. After all, even if she teleported over, there would be no one she could kill. It was easy to imagine how mad and annoyed she would be then.


    Moreover... Greem was confident in his abilities, even if he was facing the infamous Two-face Adept. His abilities had improved recently and he had been itching for a chance to test his skills.


    As Greem was pondering his next step, the Two-face Adept had already started to move without any hesitation.


    The first to attack was the sister, Lucy. She was a master of the rare sonic magic.


    She shut her eyes and opened her mouth as wide as she could. Her hands pressed against the side of her mouths as she screamed. The powerful sonic waves sent ripples across the air. Strange patterns formed in midair as the waves quickly spread towards Greem¡¯s direction.


    Greem couldn¡¯t hear anything. Rather, there was nothing to be heard.


    Adept Lucy¡¯s Death Scream had long since exceeded the range of frequencies that ordinary humans could hear. The scream was in the range of ultrasound.


    Every single object ced in front of Lucy had disintegrated the moment the soundwave passed by them.


    The tall trees would first crumble into wooden pieces of various sizes. Then the pieces would disintegrate into wooden splinters the size of a thumb. And finally, the splinters would be sted away, turning into unrecognizable wooden dust as they did so....


    Grass was sent flying in every direction, as if an intangible hand had ripped them from their roots and tore them into pieces. Even the green sap propelled forward and sshed everywhere, bringing with them the terrifying kic energy of the sound wave. They riddled everything in their way full of holes, as if they were bullets shot from a gun.


    Even Greem¡¯s Lava Shield strained from the impact of the resounding soundwave.


    The Lava Shield, that had always been known for its extraordinary physical and elemental defense, was like paper before the soundwave. Itsbination of ck-redva and tough magma rock was ineffective. The shield cracked and peeled away. The ck-redva started boiling and exploding. Just one more push and the entire shield would crumble into pieces.


    At the same time, the chip in Greem¡¯s mind was sounding the rms.


    "Warning. Warning. Detecting intrusion of high frequency ultrasound. Advising the host to leave the area immediately. Tremendous damage is expected to be inflicted on the host body... "


    Dammit! The opponent¡¯s soundwave attack had prative effects. The Lava Shield was unable to deflect all of its effects.


    Greem endured the ufortable feeling in his chest and threw a Magma Fireball towards the enemy. He then paused for a bit before vanishing from the spot with his Fire Teleportation. After all, the soundwave attack was a directed spell. As long as he could avoid facing it head on, he would be able to avoid the effects of the soundwave.


    The screaming Adept Lucy instantly increased her efforts. The flying Magma Fireball exploded in midair as its magma shell was damage by the high frequency.


    Greem appeared in a zing fire fifty meters to the left. The moment he revealed himself, the Two-face Adept turned its head. All of a sudden, Greem found himself facing Kane instead of Lucy. Kane had been silently chanting in the back all this while. He was already in the final casting stages of a massiverge-area spell.


    "Hermedes, Freezing Tide!"


    Thest words of the chant waspleted. Kane made a circle with his arms, and arge blue ice crystal sted towards Greem, apanied by a chilling blizzard.


    Greem had already lost his Lava Shield and had already used up his only mobility spell. His expression soured. He took a step backwards and waved the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter he was holding in his right arm. mes shed above the scepter and a massive Fire Deity appeared before him, shielding him from the assaulting Freezing Tide.


    The pseudo-adept level Fire Deity, who had helped Greem deal with so many enemies in the past, was hardly enough to help him now.


    Even if it summoned a massive fire pir with all its strength, it was still unable to ward away the chilling winds and the ice crystals. A short momentter, the five meter tall Fire Deity was sealed within a block of ice. It was frozen stiff in the position it was in before, still trying its best to fight back.


    A few secondster the ice shattered, and the Fire Deity was reduced to a handful of ice.


    The poor Fire Deity. It didn¡¯t even get the chance to self-destruct this time!


    Meanwhile, Greem took full advantage of the short time the Fire Deity had bought with its life. The Scroll of Voodoo in his hands quickly flipped through its pages. A Fire Core Explosion quickly formed and shot towards the enemy.


    However, before this most powerful spell of Greem¡¯s could evennd, it was negated by Lucy once more. The head turned around again and a Death Scream sted in his direction.


    Thus, with the violent storm of icicles still shooting towards him, Greem had no other option left but to reposition himself with the Fire Teleportation again.


    In the following battle, Greem tried multiple times to use his Fire Teleportation to close the distance between himself and the Two-face Adept. He wanted to use his most ferocious instant-cast spells to throw his opponents off their flow. Sadly, he was beaten back by the well-prepared enemy every single time. As painful as it was, Greem couldn¡¯t help but acknowledge that there were adepts that couldpletely counter his abilities!


    Greem chose the path of fire mastery. This allowed the might of his fire spells to be far superior to other adepts. However, the Two-face Adept was a difficult opponent. The elder brother, Kane, was an ice adept, the exact counter to Greem¡¯s mes. The sister, Lucy, was a master of soundwave attacks. These attacks were naturally prative and could easily break through defenses. Greem would have a hard time dealing with her attacks, even if he transformed into the tough and resilient me Fiend.


    Moreover, the siblings had an innate mental link. While one was controlling the body to stall Greem, the other would be able to start chanting for a spell behind them. When the massive spell was at itsst stage of channeling, the siblings would switch ces once more, sting Greem with their most powerful spell.


    With their dual-soul advantage, the Two-face Adept pressed on,pletely driving Greem into a corner. Greem had no choice but to dash all around the battlefield, desperately searching for a weakness in the enemy¡¯s defenses.


    Honestly, Greem had never been in such an awkward and terrible position, even counting the outnumbered fight at Locker Castle.


    Greem quickly moved about the battlefield, returning the enemy¡¯s vicious blows with the instant-cast Magma Fireball. In the meantime, he was listening to the chip¡¯s suggested strategy.


    "Beep. Collection of enemy¡¯s data has beenpleted. Dataparison and analysis suggests that the host only has a 34% chance of victory in this battle... "


    "And if I send the Decayer forward?"


    "Chance of victory rises to 41%... "


    "Along with the Roaring Monster!"


    "Chance of victory rises to 53%... "


    Greem silently wiped away the cold sweat.


    His chance of victory was not much more than 50%, even after using his two adept-level golems. They were supposed to be part of his standard strength. How was he supposed to feel about this? Just a few days earlier, he had been fantasizing of crushing opponents of equal Grade to him!


    "And if I send the Infernal Tyrant along with them?"


    "Chance of victory rises to 128%... "


    "What if it¡¯s just me and the Infernal Tyrant?"


    "Chance of victory will be 93%... Warning: this percentage does not factor in any hidden powers the enemy might possess!"


    "That is enough!"


    Greem quicklymunicated with the chip and made up his mind.


    The mediocre Roaring Monster and Decayer were not enough to turn the tables on such powerful opponents. If he wanted to end this fight as decisively as possible, he would have to use the most powerful force he had at his disposal¨C the Infernal Tyrant!


    On the other hand, there was the me Fiend Transformation! But there was still that terrifying side-effect to worry about. The new runes hadn¡¯t properly set yet. Consequently, Greem had no intention to take the risk of transforming in the short term.


    Greem no longer hesitated now that he had made up his mind. He exhausted yet another instant-cast spell from the Scroll of Voodoo to deflect Kane¡¯s Freezing Tide. Then, he found an opportunity to flee to the outer rim of the battlefield and instantly tossed the brilliant golem core to the ground.


    The next second, a massive amount of fire elementium swallowed the green forest whole. A radius of five hundred meters had been engulfed in fire and smoke. Blinding red light filled the entire battlefield.


    Violent fire elementium gathered together under the horrified gaze of Two-face Adept Kane. A four meter tall demon of me slowly rose beside Greem.


    This imposing demon had power rivalling the peak of First Grade. What¡¯s more, its control over me energies was far superior to the me Fiend that Greem always turned into.


    When Greem transformed, fire and me streams would surge all over his body. This looked extremely intimidating, and also made him a terror as he burned down everything around him, but it was also an extreme waste of me energy. The me demon that had appeared in a zing inferno appeared very different from Greem¡¯s me Fiend form. The mes around his body was a dark crimson shade, appearing to be much more subdued and concentrated.


    Greem was right next to it, and had a perfect view of its body.


    This terrifying ruler of mes had not only subdued the ruthless fire, but had even concentrated them and turned them into a solid state, using the fire to forge his own body. Muscles, bones, and even internal organs formed of clusters of me burned before Greem¡¯s eyes. The dark crimson fire slowly zed on around the Tyrant¡¯s body, without any of its usual recklessness and violence.


    This was a true being born of fire¨C an Infernal Tyrant!


    The few adepts near the battlefield couldn¡¯t help but pay attention to the Infernal Tyrant. Even though it had yet to make a single move, everyone could feel its might.


    Dammit! Where did this bastard get his hands on an elementium golem of this level?


    For a moment, everyone brooded silently in their minds. Some were angered, while some were curious. Everyone had their own thoughts about the situation!

 Chapter 266

    Chapter 266 Infernal Tyrant


    "Dammit, do Kane and Lucy still have a chance?" The green dwarf Pyro asked grudgingly.


    The ck-robed adept beside him took out a handful of bone fragments from his robe and scattered it before himself. He knelt to look at the bones before shaking his head in disappointment.


    Murderous light gleamed in Pyro¡¯s green eyes, "I spent that fortune to hire you, and this is what you tell me?"


    The ck-robed adept spoke calmly, "Sir, as a Second Grade adept, I am sure you have a perfect understanding of the mechanisms behind divination magic. The more we know about the opponent, the more capable we are of eliminating factors beyond our control. This brat has been hiding in the adepts¡¯ tower this whole time. It was already a difficult task to pierce through the defenses of the tower and predict the path of his fate. Moreover, I am certain that Lord Kane had an eighty percent chance to beat this brat when we made our preparations three months ago."


    "You mean to say he suddenly obtained a golem of this level within these three months?" Pyro quickly calmed down and asked in a collected manner.


    "Indeed!" The ck-robed adept nodded, "This unknown factor has already informed me of the truth. The sudden increase of his prowess had urred right after thest time I sessfully used divination magic on him. It is clear that his fate had suddenly shifted during these three months. It is unclear how this happened! I suspect... he carries with him something that can affect even fate. A unique artifact, a magical item, or perhaps... a person!"


    Pyro wasn¡¯t very good with all this talk about fate. However, even if he didn¡¯t understand the mechanics behind it, he knew one thing for certain. His failure today was a certainty! As a decisive person himself, he didn¡¯t bother to wait and see the result of the fight. He immediately turned and disappeared into the depths of the forest, bringing with him this ¡¯failure¡¯ of a diviner.


    Feidnan City, Adepts¡¯ Tower.


    Lady Sanazar leaned against a soft bed. Her body was tilted such that she could observe the battle that was being disyed on the light screen floating before her.


    Sanazar was the one who gave Greem the wooden idol, but she had clearly omitted a crucial detail. As long as he kept the idol by his side, Sanazar would be able to observe everything happening within a hundred meter radius of the idol without the use of another magical medium.


    Thus, Sanazar had immediately activated her water mirror after sensing the elementium flux from the wooden idol. The first scene she saw was the appearance of the Infernal Tyrant.


    Of course, such an insignificant fight between First Grade adepts was nothing to a Third Grade adept like herself. However, even she couldn¡¯t help but be interested in the fight when she saw the rampaging me golem.


    A weak First Grade adept that had just advanced possessed an elementium golem that had power close to a Second Grade adept. This was quite unthinkable. It was almost certain that this little fe had secrets of his own. If it wasn¡¯t for Lord Sarubo¡¯s orders, she would totally drag him back and split his head open to see what he had hidden within...


    The brutal and savage Sanazar suppressed her curious desire and put herself in a morefortable position to enjoy the battle in the mirror.


    ............


    It was all well and dandy for the boss resting in her bed to be entertained, watching from afar. However, this was a matter of life and death for the adepts engaged in battle!


    The Two-face Adept, who had possessed the initiative in the battle earlier, was now in an awkward and trying situation.


    They weaved nimbly between the rain of fireballs, asionally destroying the unavoidable ones. As long as the fireballs were unable to make direct contact, the ice shield orbiting around them would be enough to defend against the attacks.


    They had no extra strength to dodge the me shockwave and sshingva from the explosion of the Magma Fireballs. The only thing they could do was to endure the damage with the ice shields formed from water elementium.


    Light blue frost floated around Adept Kane. He casually strolled past a flurry of fireballs. It seemed like a breeze to him, but in truth, he was extremely anxious at this point. A path of frost was left behind him wherever he went.


    If an enemy ever stepped upon this path of frost, they would instantly be frozen to the spot by the ice energy that surged forth. Although the effect wouldn¡¯tst for very long, that short pause would be unavoidable. Kane, as the owner of this path of frost, would be able to appear anywhere on it at any time he desired to.


    This path of frost wouldn¡¯tst for very long. It would melt in just five minutes. However, this short amount of time was more than enough for Kane to turn the battlefield to his advantage.


    Any adept would perform at their best within an environment that was advantageous to them. They would be able to battle in a style unique to their own abilities. That said, Kane had clearly run into trouble today!


    Greem was a master at creating a homefield ofva and magma. Kane also excelled at creating his own home field.


    Greem had his amazing Fire Teleportation, and Kane had his Frost Path Teleportation.


    One a master of ice, and the other a master of mes.


    The two were simr in strength, and fought with simr styles, causing the battle to quickly spiral into a tense conflict and stalemate between the two of them. At this time Kane¡¯s sister, Lucy, became the key to determining the oue of the fight. With her terrifying soundwave attacks that could prate even the most resilient of defenses, she could easily turn the tables in the fight.


    However, the situation was quickly flipped on its end after Greem summoned this beast of an Infernal Tyrant.


    It became an overwhelming force of nature the moment it appeared.


    Its powerful attacks, that reached up to 135 points in power, caused even the simplest of Magma Fireballs to be devastating blows that Kane and Lucy had trouble dealing with.


    Lucy was the one defending against the first Magma Fireball that the Infernal Tyrant hurled at them.


    Piercing Scream and Death Roar. Two soundwave spells had to beunched at this inconspicuous fireball to even destroy it. Yet still, the position where the fireball had exploded was a little too close to Lucy.


    Theva corroded through her defensive magic and sshed onto Lucy. She let out another piercing scream.


    But it wasn¡¯t a spell this time, it was just her natural reflex after experiencing intense pain!


    As a pair of siblings sharing a body, Kane was adept at mobility and magic defense, while Lucy was better at offense with her prative abilities. With no choice left to them, Kane had toe out from within and rece Lucy. He summonedyers of ice shields to cover their body.


    The injured Lucy quickly retreated within their body, treating her wounds and preparing her next spell.


    If the Magma Fireball was truly nothing more than a one-off attack, Kane was confident he could hold on for a little longer with his mastery of defensive magic. However, it was only when the demon of mes started bombarding him with gigantic fireballs that he realized something horrific. The enemy¡¯s attack remained steady at 135 points of damage! Every single attack was as powerful as thest one!


    He grit his teeth and deflected four Magma Fireballs. The Ice Demon Kane was already at his limit!


    He cursed angrily at this unbelievably powerful golem, going through several dialects as he did so. Ice Demon Kane gathered all the water elementium he could and converted it into ice energy to put out the mes eating away at his robe.


    Meanwhile, as he awkwardly dealt with the fires, he still had to change his position constantly. The use of therge trees to block the Tyrant was the only thing slowing its march. Kane didn¡¯t even dare to engage in a melee after seeing the Tyrant¡¯s ck-red hands and its terrifying body forged solely of concentrated mes.


    Ice shields could be re-summoned if they were destroyed. Ice barriers could be repaired if they were riddled with holes. However, as the battle progressed, the only thing that kept happening were the mes that ignited all over Kane¡¯s body. They burned and roasted his flesh, leaving him grimacing in pain. He couldn¡¯t keep up his defense for much longer.


    Because that ursed Tyrant was now starting to cast an area-of-effect spell!


    Most adepts were actually very well protected during a fight between adepts, thanks to the existence of defensive magic. Consequently, area-of-effect spells were rarely cast during a duel, as the power of such attacks were usually spread out over arge area, causing them to be much less powerful. Even the asional uses they saw in battle were often for the purpose of restricting movement.


    But this damned demon of mes... it... it could even deal 110 points of damage with a massive area-of-effect spell. Kane was so mad at this fact that he desperately wanted to shout out in anger at that moment!


    110 points!


    Even Kane, who thought very well of himself, could barely reach such intensity with his attacks. And this was assuming he used his most powerful single target spell! Yet the opponent was able to do more damage with a sea of mes that he casually tossed out than an attack that he had to prepare for an extended period of time.


    Kane had no choice but to teleport rapidly along his frost path. He had to avoid the pain of being roasted alive.


    The Infernal Tyrant might not have been very smart, and thus could only chase after Kane blindly, throwing fireballs as it did so. However, Greem was able to take perfect advantage of the situation. He instantly let loose a slew of seven of eight Magma Fireballs.


    These weren¡¯t meant to hurt Kane. Rather, it was to destroy his path of frost!


    Kane had clearly attached his Spirit flux to the frost path that he hadid across the battlefield. It was through that mental connection that he was able to lock onto a position and teleport there when he needed to. However, now that the path had been sted in four or five separate segments, they had beenpletely disconnected. Even though the path hadn¡¯t been utterly eradicated, the fragmentation of the path still caused most of it to be mentally disconnected from Kane.


    In a single blow, Kane¡¯s mobility had been greatly stunted! There was less space for him to move about now!


    In the meantime, Lucy had also shown herself several times. The violent Screeching st she¡¯d unleashed had even minced one of the Tyrant¡¯s arms to pieces.


    Sadly, this had absolutely no effect on a zing monster hell-bent on attacking. Especially not a monster with no concept of pain or fear. A massive halo of fire sted apart, and a new arm of ck-red fire formed once again.


    At the same time, having lost the protection of Kane¡¯s ice shields, Lucy was once again injured by the terrifying mes!


    This time, it wasn¡¯t just their robe being ignited. Even their body, hair, and flesh started catching fire...


    At this point, the siblings were no longer hoping for a victory, but an opportunity for escape.


    Unfortunately for them, just the Infernal Tyrant alone would be enough to deal with. However, they still had another opponent¨C Greem. He had turned into a Grim Reaper, moving about the edge of the battlefield and shutting down every opportunity of escape they had.


    Finally, the Infernal Tyrant made a final move. A terrifying Firestorm ravaged the battlefield. Kane and Lucy¡¯s screams rang out simultaneously, echoing in the burning winds.


    The next second, apletely charred and unrecognizable figure stumbled out of the sea of mes. But Greem was already waiting at the edge of the battlefield, the Scroll of Voodoo in hand.


    A ferocious Fire Core Explosion erupted on their bodies. This pair of sibling adepts that had gued the central continent for many years had finally reached the end of their lives!

 Chapter 267

    Chapter 267 Motta City


    Four dayster.


    Greem and his party had sessfully reached Motta City.


    As the only public city within a two hundred and fifty kilometer radius, Motta City did not belong to any force or organization. This was a public territory carved out by the Zhentarim Association.


    Greem could already see the lofty adepts¡¯ tower piercing through the clouds, even before he had entered the city.


    Pale radiance shed across the grey white tower walls. Magic halos shone brilliantly all over the tower before rising towards the top of the structure. Even though clouds were obstructing his vision, Greem could still make out some ck dots circling about the top of the tower. These dots flew among the clouds, asionallynding on and taking off from the tower.


    A long queue had formed before the city gates. Guards in ck armor were checking for documents in an orderly fashion. There were men, women, children, and elderly within the crowd. Chattering voices filled the air.


    Greem¡¯s ck carriage appeared to bepletely unremarkable whenpared the row after row of carts, all filled to the brim with a variety of cargo. However, a guard spotted the carriage. A short momentter, a guard captain hurried towards the carriage, bringing with him a troop of guards. They quickly cleared the crowd away and allowed the carriage to move into the city.


    There was no need for a reason or an exnation. The Sarubo crest embedded on the side of the carriage was the best pass anyone could ask for.


    No one on this massive stretch of a continent had ever tried to impersonate the venerable adepts. That was because the consequences were unbearable. Death was the best oue the impersonator could hope for!


    This was a grand and beautiful city!


    An unending stream of people crowded the streets. Load-bearing carts drove across the stone road. All sorts of cargo was piled on the transports, most of them being luxury goods like cigars, wine, oil, and tea.


    Greem lifted the curtains and looked outside. Men and women of all races and culture passed by the window. A vague feeling of bizarreness rose in his heart.


    The poption on the Continent of Adepts had long gotten used to their own methods of recognizing important people they couldn¡¯t afford to offend. Greem¡¯s carriage might be unremarkable, but the adept¡¯s n crest on the side of the carriage was a bright red warning.


    The crowd turned away from the carriage, walking as far away as they could. No one dared to stop the carriage as it thundered through the city.


    "You and Snox go and look for a ce to stay and reserve a seat for us on a floating ship. I¡¯ll pay a visit to the adept¡¯s tower!" Greem gave simple instructions and leapt off the carriage. He pulled the hood over his head to hide his appearance and slowly disappeared into the crowd.


    The first thing to do when visiting a territory was to pay a visit to the local adept organization. This was a tradition and habit of most adepts! After all, most local adept organizations would make some of their adept facilities open to the public. This often included a public library.


    And habitually gathering knowledge was one of the mostmon things for adepts to do!


    Alice was still sulking over the fact that she had missed the battle between Greem and the Two-face Adept. She had fallen asleep and had not been able to witness the fight with her own eyes. She looked on as Greem disappeared into the crowd. She propped up her in her palm angrily and spoke, "We will go to the floating ships first!"


    The coachman Snox had transformed into shouted, brandished the horse reins, and drove the horses forward.


    As a rare public territory within the Zhentarim Area, this ce waspletely open for any adepts to visit. Even adepts that had fallen out of favor in internal conflicts or n wars could recuperate here, and replenish their stocks of moremon adept resources.


    Some adepts that harbored ambitions of starting new ns would use the public adepts¡¯ tower as their stepping stone. This would be where they gathered their forces and honed their strength before they obtained a territory of their own. They would establish public adept academies here, taking in and epting apprentices with no prominent backgrounds or upbringing.


    Through such a method, they would be able to establish a small force of several adepts and several dozen apprentice adepts in less than a hundred years. The next step forward for them would be forging a territory of their own. They would have to try their best to survive and wriggle between the cracks left by the numerous n and organizations, slowly building up their strength and numbers.


    All the usefulnd within the Zhentarim area was already under the control of the various ns. Stealing crumbs from under their jaws would be a matter of absolute strength and power!


    Seed, and they would be a member of the one thousand ns thriving within the Zhentarim area. Failure, and the only option left for them would be to retreat back to the public territory. They would have to continue amassing their forces and umte strength for their next attempt!


    The reason the ck Glove Association had been so active in helping out in the previous n war was for the same reason. They too wanted to obtain and of their own, to raise their g and to create a n that belonged to them!


    Sadly, the most powerful First Grade adept within their organization had been murdered. The Two-face Adept, whose services had cost them, had also failed in their mission. This meant that the ck Glove Association¡¯s efforts, and their efforts for the past hundred years, had been for absolutely nothing. The Second Grade green dwarf Pyro would have to wait another hundred years before he could regain the strength needed to form the Pyro n.


    A Second Grade adept!


    This was most definitely a significant and important individual even amongst the adepts!


    If such a person wanted to join a n, he would be warmly weed into the core of the n. All sorts of precious resources would go to cultivating and strengthening them.


    However, even a powerful adept like this one would be hard-pressed to defend against any existing small-sized adept n if he ever wanted to establish his own n.


    With the amount of wealth he had obtained from the knights¡¯ ne, Greem could purchase and of over a hundred square kilometers wide within the Zhentarim area. However, what use was that? With greedy ns and starving organizations all looking on in interest, what was he to use to defend hisnd after he bought it?


    Perhaps the very first one to invade him would be the n that sold him thend.


    Resources and territory was extremely important on the Continent of Adepts, but the strength to defend your resources and territory was even more crucial!


    Greem walked among the crowd, slowly progressing towards the adepts¡¯ tower.


    Ordinary people started to decrease in number, while the number of apprentices wearing uniforms of various academies started to increase.


    There were middle-aged men within these apprentices, as well as elderly men. However, most of the apprentices were still young men and women in their twenties. These people were mostly Beginner and Intermediate apprentices. Only a few Advanced apprentices were mixed in with the crowd, and not a single pseudo-adept was in sight.


    This was expected!


    After all, the quality and talent of the students in a ce with plenty of public academies had to be greatly inferior whenpared to the adept ns. The ns were also far richer in resources, having territory and resource sites under their control. Theck of resources and the inferior talents of the student pool were what led to this situation, where the general prowess of the student poption was extremely weak.


    Moreover, even if the adept academies seeded in cultivating a pseudo-adept, they would never let them go out so easily. These pseudo-adepts would be a valuable asset of the academy, and would be very well protected.


    Greem was cloaked in a ck robe. Even though he was not wearing any insignia or emblem that betrayed his identity, the unique mysteriousness and pride of an adept still told the apprentices who he was. Everyone who saw him frantically bowed to pay their respects.


    The apprentices that managed to survive in the crowded Motta City were not naive. They might not be very talented or powerful, but they were extremely good at recognizing people for who they were.


    Even though Greem had kept a low profile, the edges of his adept robe still showed with every step he took. The robe was packed full of mysterious and profound magical patterns and runes. A single delicate silver chain bound the Scroll of Voodoo to Greem¡¯s chest. The magic book glowed with a golden runic light as he walked. Anyone could tell that this was no ordinary item.


    Two slivers of dark crimson hair flowed down the sides of the hood onto his shoulders. Sunlight shone upon the hair, causing them to look like two clusters of burning mes. A cold face with well-defined features and a pair of eyes that gleamed like stars were hidden underneath the shadow of his hood. Just a single peek would leave a memorable impression on anyone who looked.


    ............


    Greem marched confidently into the doors of the tower.


    A dozen apprentice adepts that had been guarding the door instantly saw Greem walking in. Their eyes lit up. However, before they could even react, a round-faced apprentice with short hay-colored hair was already standing before Greem. He bowed.


    "O respected adept, this apprentice Thor is at your service!"


    The other adepts quickly betrayed an expression of frustration. That said, they didn¡¯t dare to cause any trouble before an adept. The only thing they could do was re at Thor before leaving to attend to their own business.


    Greem didn¡¯t mind these little tricks of the apprentices. He lifted his head and looked around the ce.


    Neat and clean marble floors. Fresh air with a dense concentration of magical energies. Rows of small stone rooms by the walls of the tower. Tunnels and corridors that sprawled in every direction...


    There were many people moving about here, but the ce was fairly quiet.


    All the apprentice adepts walked in groups of three to five, carrying heavy stacks of scrolls and parchments in their hands. Even if they needed to speak, they would lower their voices. No one dared to create amotion within this arcane hall.


    Greem¡¯s first impression of this ce was its simrity to the atmosphere of universities back on Earth.


    "Bring me to the public library here. I want to go through some information!" Greem instructed.


    "Understood! The library prepared for visiting adepts is on the fifth floor. Pleasee with me!" The apprentice Thor was clearly used to such requests. He politely paid his respects and led Greem towards a floating disc in the corner of the hall.


    This floating disc was akin to the elevator of Earth. However, it didn¡¯t run on the strength of machinery or the power of electricity. Around twenty or thirty people could stand on this five meter wide floating disc. That said, Greem had observed that not a single apprentice dared to set foot on the disc.


    This seemed to be a privilege of adepts!


    Thor controlled the disc using the control panel, and a thick stone b engraved with delicate carvings slowly started to float towards the top of the tower. One could see apprentice adepts walking around with books in their arms as they passed by the corridors on each level.


    The fifth floor of the tower.


    The apprentice Thor stopped after bringing Greem before a radiant door of light.


    "Sir, this here is the adept-level public library. Only adepts are allowed inside, so... "


    "Mm!" Greem nodded in understanding. He waved his hand casually and threw three magic crystals to Thor.


    "Sir, this is too much!" Surprise and joy surfaced on Thor¡¯s face, "Just one crystal would be enough!"


    "I have two servants. A short whileter, a female pseudo-adept called Alice mighte and look for me. Don¡¯t forget to call her over!"


    "I understand, Sir! Thor will do as you say." Thor guaranteed resolutely.


    Greem smiled slightly before walking into the door of light.

 Chapter 268

    Chapter 268 Departure


    A small library was behind the door of light.


    The entire ce was no bigger than twenty to thirty square meters. There was a row of wooden shelves by the wall. Books were scattered across the shelves. Weak and pale light glowed on the surface of each and every book. It seemed that they were protected by some sort of magic.


    There were very few adepts in the library as well. Only two adepts stood by the shelves, silently flipping through the pages of their books.


    "Did you just arrive? To avoid any trouble, it¡¯s best that you wear your organization emblem on your chest!" An elderly adept sitting at a desk by the entrance put down the book he was reading. He frowned as he advised Greem.


    It seems even a public territory would run some background checks on wandering adepts!


    Adepts like the Two-face Adept were wanted criminals for the Zhentarim Association. Ordinary public territory would probably be restricted from ess for such adepts.


    Greem took the silver crescent moon emblem of the Sarubo n out of his storage and pinned it on his chest. The elderly adept responsible for watching over the ce was stunned for a second before speaking, "You are from the Sarubo n? I don¡¯t recognize you! Could you be the me Demon people have been talking about recently?"


    The two adepts who were focused on their reading raised their heads when they heard this. They too started to assess Greem.


    "Is there any problem?" Greem asked curiously.


    "Of course not! It¡¯s just that... " The elderly adept paused for moment, "I heard the conflict between the Sarubo n and the ck Glove Association is pretty bad. Some of the adepts from the ck Glove Association are fairly active within Motta City. You best be more cautious when entering and exiting the city!"


    Greem could tell that the elderly adept was well-intentioned. He smiled as he nodded in acknowledgement, before walking over to the nearest bookshelf.


    He randomly picked up a hardcover book with a blue front cover...


    Gulliver¡¯s Travels.


    It seemed to be a record of an adept¡¯s travels. Even though it did not involve any profound orplex magical knowledge and theories, there was still reference in learning about the unique magical creatures and nts described and recorded within the book.


    The price of this book was ten magic crystals.


    Greem put it aside.


    Such a book wasn¡¯t very valuable, but it was still good to increase the avable data within the chip¡¯s data library!


    Greem picked up an ancient parchment. It seemed as though a certain potion recipe had been drawn on the parchment. It was a potion of the poison series. However the brewing, ratio of the involved materials, as well as the precautions, had all been censored by a pale magical light.


    It cost four hundred magic crystals!


    Greem hesitated for a moment before putting it back on the shelf.


    He had no intention to be a potions master in the short term. Moreover, a physical poison attribute recipe like this one wasn¡¯t too useful to an adept. Spending four hundred magic crystals on this was unnecessary.


    Greem picked up a couple of other books. Most of them contained extremely ordinary and fundamental theories. asionally, he would discover books with better and improved magical models. However, these books would be extremely and unbelievably expensive. Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head in disappointment as he made his way through the books. He had flipped through almost half of all the documents here, but he had only managed to pick out three books of some limited value.


    In truth, this was unavoidable!


    After all, this library was only a public library that the Motta adepts¡¯ tower opened to the public. Only wandering adepts or those with limited finances would visit this ce.


    The truly valuable knowledge was clearly stored in another ce, and was only avable to the actual members of the adepts¡¯ tower. Only groups of adepts with no roots to speak of, such as the ck Glove Association, would be willing to use this ce as a headquarters. If they took on some of the daily duties of the tower, they could be recognized as an official member of the tower. They would then be one of the protectors of the public territory!


    "Hey. Sarubo brat. There¡¯s a little girl looking for you outside... " The elderly adept called to Greem.


    "Understood!" Greem took the three books to the entrance and forked over the magic crystals to the elderly adept. The elderly adept quickly started to removed the protective enchantments that had been ced on the books.


    When Greem walked through the door of light, he saw Alice.


    Thor didn¡¯t seem to be present. It seemed he had been sent away by Alice.


    "I have already reserved the tickets for the ship that leaves tomorrow afternoon. We will be staying at Br Inn tonight!"


    Alice appeared to have epted her fate as a servant after this period of time. She was no longer as upset and temperamental as she used to be. Once she had calmed down, she was an extremely smart and helpful servant. Her intellect as a pseudo-adept saved Greem from plenty of unnecessary trouble!


    Greem followed Alice to the inn and ordered the waiter to send the food to their room. He, on the other hand, quickly recorded the contents of the three books into the chip¡¯s data library before continuing his research on the strange otherworld runes.


    Having received the warning and reminder from the elderly adept, Greem dismissed his original n to stroll through Motta City. He decided to stay in the inn for the remaining time instead.


    It was only when Alice and Snox came to remind him that it was time to board the ship that he stopped his research!


    ............


    When Greem brought Alice and Snox to Motta City¡¯s flying stop, he could see a flying ship slowlynding on the green fields on top of a hill.


    There were no hot-air balloons or propellers attached to the transport. The bottom of the flying ship was glowing with brilliant golden light. A faint pulsating magic array was generating air currents beneath the ship, allowing it tond steadily on the ground.


    The flying ship that Greem had flown inst time seemed to have an edged bottom. It was clearly less capable of bearing a load whenpared to the t-bottom flying ship before him.


    A crowd buzzed about thending tform.


    Several carts filled to the brim with cargo were already waiting here. Muscr and strong workers were shouting chants as they carried cargo out of the ship and moved a new load of cargo back onto the ship.


    Some individuals wearing adept robes were casually conversing on the fields around the tform. They also appeared to be waiting to board.


    In just a single hour, all of the cargo had been loaded onto the ship.


    Thus the passengers, adepts, and the nobles started to board the ship. They stood by the railing of the ship and waved at the people below it.


    Shouts and sounds of crying rang out from the field below the ship as rtives said their farewells.


    Soon, the energy flux emanating from the array at the bottom of the ship intensified. The ship trembled as it was wrapped in a thickyer of wind particles before slowly taking off from the ground.


    Far away in a wooden hut, two adepts gazed at the ship as it gradually rose into the clouds. Their eyes were filled with hatred and anger, as well as an intense frustration and resentment.


    "Sir, are we letting him leave just like that?" A middle-aged adept with sharp features spat resentfully.


    "What else can we do but let him leave?" The other adept was the head of the ck Glove Association¨C Green Dwarf Pyro, "This is Motta City. It is not a ce where we can do whatever we like! That old fogey has already warned me. If I dare to kill any visiting adepts within Motta City, they will deny shelter to all of us! Then the toxic loaches of the Sarubos would probably be waiting to swallow us whole!¡±


    "This me Demon fellow is pretty alert as well. He hid within the inn for the entire time he was here. All of the ns we had made for him ended up useless. Was he tipped off by someone?" The thin adept with sharp facial features was still resentful over the entire incident.


    "I already know who! It¡¯s probably the fault of those old fogeys again. They secretly warned the brat!" A vicious light gleamed within Pyro¡¯s eyes.


    "Sir, you should be more cautious within the Association as well!" The thin adept hesitated for a moment, "I heard... "


    "What?"


    "I heard some organizations have already made contact with Fernand and Valier!"


    Pyro was shocked for a moment.


    He had spent over two hundred years to gather this group of six First Grade adepts. It was already heartbreaking to have lost the most powerful, McThran. If the remaining adepts were drawn away during this time of turmoil for the Association, how was he to aplish his dream of a Pyro n?


    "What have you heard? Tell me all about it. Quick... "


    The two adepts started to converse quietly within the shelter of the wooden hut.


    Greem, ignorant to all of this happening, was standing by the edge of the ship. He silently looked down upon the scenery below him.


    The higher the flying ship flew, the smaller everything on the ground appeared to be.


    Even the lofty adepts¡¯ tower seemed to be slimmer and smaller, like a thick cigar ced on the top of a huge cake.


    Looking from above, the territory of Motta City looked like a mix of gray-white ground and structures of every color. The surroundings of the city was filled with vast stretches of golden wheat fields and rectangr human towns. If one were to look even further into the distance, one could see the mountainous forest and the gray paths winding through the trees.


    The roads that the humans had paved through the forest twisted and turned. Some slimmer and more narrow paths asionally branched off the main road. From a distance, the gray-white paths looked like blood vessels spreading across the green forest.


    The surrounding temperature had clearly dropped as the flying ship continued to rise in altitude. The chilly winds blew across the deck, causing everyone to shiver in cold.


    This tiny problem was clearly not of an issue to a certain adept. Ayer of pale red light surfaced on his body, and Greem was warm once again.


    Ever since he picked fire mastery, all of the other elementium particles had basically started to distance themselves from Greem. This meant that it was much harder for Greem to cast spells of other elements with his own strength. He wasmitted to the path of fire maniption!


    Thankfully, there was still such a thing as a magical wand in this world. A magical wand enchanted with the Spell of Watercraft could prevent Greem from dying of thirst in a desert. A magical wand enchanted with Fly could prevent him from falling to his death.


    If these options were unavable, he still had golems of various elements and forms stored within his storage belts. All of these could be used for various purposes.


    Greem was never concerned about his safety, even if he was high above in the skies a thousand meters above the ground.


    He quickly got used to the scenery below the ship. It was no longer worthy of his attention. Thus, he shifted his gaze to the ship¡¯s deck.


    The few nobles on the ship had clearly been unable to endure the chill at this altitude. Most of them had retreated into thefort of the cabin, leaving only adepts on the deck. Pale magical glows enveloped their bodies. Clearly, all of them had some form of magic and means to drive away the cold.

 Chapter 269

    Chapter 269 On the Flying Ship


    The ticket price of the flying ship was calcted on a per person basis.


    It wasn¡¯t really expensive, but neither was it cheap. Two hundred magic crystals for every passenger.


    This basically made it impossible for ordinary peasants and low-level apprentices to ever take a ride on the flying ship!


    Greem would never receive more than ten magic crystals per month back when he was an apprentice adept. If one deducted the basic cost of borrowing books, renting theb, and purchasing magical materials from his ie, he would barely have any crystals left at the end of each month.


    And if he wanted to increase his ie? The only way would be to take on the apprentice missions put out by the Adept¡¯s Association.


    However, such missions often required travelling to faraway ces. Moreover, there would asionally be a need to take the risk of venturing into hazardous areas. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the wild ins, the ancient woods, or some hidden ruins. All of these would contain hidden threats that were lethal to apprentice adepts!


    Two hundred magic crystals was an unimaginable sum of money for most low-level apprentices. Only pseudo-adepts would be able to bear such a cost. Thus, almost all of the people on the deck, with the exception of Snox and Alice, were adepts.


    Most of the adepts had already obscured their faces using elementium particles. One look and Greem could tell that these were lone wolves that didn¡¯t like being involved with others. Those adepts that didn¡¯t hide their faces were mostly wearing cloth robes. Their expressions were peaceful and calming, as if they didn¡¯t want to initiate any form of conflict with others.


    Greem contemted for a moment.


    He had heard of such adepts in books that discussed these types of adepts.


    These adepts disliked conflict. They preferred to do research in silence, slowly umting knowledge and spending most of their lives in theirbs.


    This was why they were known as schr adepts.


    Now that Greem had already chosen fire mastery, it would be difficult for him to walk down the path of the schr adept. That said, his personality was not suited to being a schr in the first ce. Greem had always been enhancing his ownbat prowess ever since the chip activated. The magical research he conducted was only for the sake of modifying and strengthening his abilities.


    Even though he was extremely interested in the creation of golems, he knew very well his own ce in the world. Being abat adept was his true profession. Golem creation was only a secondary profession that acted as an auxiliary source of power for him!


    Schr adepts, on the other hand, were the exact opposite.


    They rarely experimented withbat techniques or the art of killing. Instead, they took on secondary and auxiliary professions as their main specialty. Thus, countless nonbat professions continued to develop. These were the potions masters, enchanters, golem masters, summoners, alchemists, and array masters.


    These people formed a massive branch within the adepts. These were the esoteric adepts.


    These people, whose motto was ¡¯Knowledge is power!¡¯, had to do something to distance themselves from the maniacs that liked to engage in battle and murder. Thus they put on silver robes and formed apletely distinct adept organization in the west of the continent¨C the Silver Union.


    They might not have much individual prowess inbat, but their strange powers and sheer numbers allowed them to force their way into the ranks of the top three most powerful adept organizations on the Continent of Adepts.


    And Greem¡¯s destination this time was the heart city of the Silver Union¨C the Castle in the Sky.


    It was rumored that all of the silver-robed adepts had rallied together, put together all of their wisdom, and merged a tremendous amount of otherworldly knowledge to forge a mighty city over the course of a thousand years. An adepts¡¯ city that floated in the skies!


    It was precisely because of this miraculous Castle in the Sky that the Silver Union was able to remain influential and powerful, even after ten thousand years. It was because of this magnificent feat of knowledge that the city had be the holy city for all esoteric adepts on the Continent of Adepts.


    Every year, all newly advanced adepts that wanted a future as an esoteric adept would treat the Castle in the Sky as their ultimate destination for pilgrimage. They would personally visit the city, regardless of what difficulties they might face. Moreover many newly advanced adepts, having experienced and fallen in love with the learning atmosphere and amount of resources avable in the city, would simply choose to stay there.


    This undoubtedly strengthened the talent and power within the Silver Union!


    There were countless talents and geniuses within the Silver Union¡¯s territory as well. Along with the various potions, magic items, magic equipment, and golems avable there, the ce was also a hotspot for trade. If other adept organizations and forces wanted to get their hands on these top-grade resources, they would have to traverse thousands of kilometers to visit the Castle in the Sky and deal with the Silver Union.


    All of these advantages added together caused the Castle in the Sky to be the most prosperous and lively trade city on the Continent of Adepts. It was where talent, knowledge, and resources congregated!


    However the journey to the Castle in the Sky was not an easy one.


    Currently, several major areas within the Continent of Adepts had been developed. The Zhentarim Association¡¯s territory was located in the central area of the continent, while the Silver Union reigned over the territories to the west. These two major forces were the closest to each other.


    Sadly, a true connection of transport between these two ces had yet toe to fruition.


    The Wendu territory in the westernmostnd of the Zhentarim Association was still 185,000 kilometers away from the Silver Union¡¯s territory. Most of the primal forest that connected the two territories were Third Grade areas that had yet to be explored. There was absolutely no way to pass through these areas.


    Third Grade areas referred to terrifying locations where even Third Grade adepts would have to worry for their lives.


    The Great Adepts that chose to leave the continent had worked together to exterminate all creatures above Fifth Grade. This was to ensure the preservation of the Continent¡¯s ecosystem, as well as to encourage the other adepts to continue working hard. This caused an extremely delicate bnce to exist between the adepts and the ferocious magical creatures.


    However, the settlements the humans had carved out took up only twelve percent of the totalndmass on the entire Continent of Adepts. Consequently the magical creatures had a farrger space to live in aspared to the humans. Their numbers and variety were far superior to the humans.


    The primal areas surrounding the human settlements had beenpletely explored by the adepts. These ces were fairly safe. Still, not even First Grade adepts would remain safe if they walked over five thousand kilometers into primal territory. And if it were about a whole fifty thousand kilometers deep into primal territory, all adepts below Second Grade would most certainly die!


    Therefore, since ancient times, countless adepts had died for the cause of connecting the human settlements, their bodies left behind and buried in the depths of the wild forests. It was thanks to their relentless attempts and arduous exploration that the adepts were finally able to find a path through the vast stretches of forest. A narrow corridor in the air.


    The numerous flying ships crafted by the Silver Union travelled along this asionally dangerous aerial corridor, ceaselessly transporting resources from all over the continent to the Castle in the Sky. They would then ship the top-grade products manufactured in the city to every corner of the continent.


    As the flying ship that Greem was flying on was still within the Zhentarim Association¡¯s airspace, it was still rtively safe. However the moment they reached the Wendu territory they would have to face the 185,000 kilometer-wide forest. They would have no choice but to take on certain risks then!


    Greem took a couple more looks at the amazing scenery below the ship before getting sick of it. He turned and entered through the narrow cabin entrance.


    The cabin was the same as any ordinary cabin. Greem walked down ten steps and appeared before a narrow and dimly lit corridor. Five doors stood on each side of the corridor. A bronze que had been fixed to each of the doors with a single fundamental rune carved upon each door.


    Some meant ¡¯flora¡¯, while others meant ¡¯sun¡¯, and some others ¡¯knowledge¡¯...


    None of the runes on the ques were repeated. These were clearly used to allow adepts to distinguish between the different rooms!


    The runes on some of the bronze ques were already lit up. It seemed there were already adepts upying these rooms.


    Only adepts were allowed to stay in the first and second levels. Even Alice, who was a pseudo-adept, could barely get a cabin on the third level. This was the same level as the human nobles. On the other hand, servants like Snox could only squat in the damp, dark fourth level.


    The low-ss servants were not allowed in the upper levels during the flight. This was to prevent them from affecting or interrupting the good moods of the adepts and noble lords. Their meals and biological needs had to be dealt with on the fourth level. They had to endure any sort of humiliation or bullying in silence. Otherwise the guardian adept responsible for guarding the safety of the ship had the authority to throw them overboard.


    Even though Alice already had some understanding of the situation, she was still unavoidably upset when she had to endure this inferior treatment. She pouted and walked towards the end of the corridor with Snox. The steps to the lower levels were there.


    After all, this was a world where adepts reigned supreme. If Greem wanted to let them stay by his side, he would likely draw the ire of the other adepts. Some privileges were reserved only for adepts!


    This was a ssist atmosphere that the adepts had intentionally created. It could not be easily shattered.


    Greem randomly picked an unupied room and pushed the wooden door open.


    Perhaps due to the rune on the que detecting magical energy, it started to let out a pale glow.


    This room was simply a small cabin room. There was a wooden bed affixed to the corner of the room. The bedsheets were fairly clean. Apart from this, the only furniture in the room was a small desk and chair. These were made of redwood and seemed to be fairly sturdy.


    A window the size of a washbasin was ced in the wall, right above the bed. The window was made of a transparent crystal ss. The material was most likely hard vulcanized crystal. Such crystal ss might look thin, but it was difficult to break with ordinary knives and swords.


    Greem performed a basic inspection of the room. Having confirmed that there were no hidden arrays or special energy fluxes in the room, he closed the door and sat on the chair.


    He reached into his storage belt and rummaged around for a bit. Finally, Greem pulled out a thick and heavy book with gold lining and a ck cover. He started flipping through the pages, focusing all of his attention on its contents.


    A small line of words appeared in his sight at the lower right corner of the page he had flipped to.


    The soul reigns above the material, and the mind is the product of the material and the Spirit.


    ¡ª Kane.


    These... these were Kane¡¯s notes on magic. Kane of the Two-face Adept.


    Password of the Mind!


    Honestly, the fire spells that Greem had mastered all prioritized might. They had tremendous firepower. This truly made him powerful and gave him an edge inbat, but it also prevented him from obtaining any decent spoils frombat.


    This ¡¯Password of the Mind¡¯ had been a fortunate acquisition. If Greem hadn¡¯t been agile and quick enough to grab it from the enemy¡¯s storage belt, it probably would have perished in the ferocious mes, along with all the other items the Two-face Adept had on them!

 Chapter 270

    Chapter 270 The Esoteric Duels


    Four dayster.


    After passing by seven public cities, the flying ship finallynded in Guardia Port, located in the Wendu area.


    Any further west and they would have been crossing through the unpopted primal forest. The small flying ship they were on couldn¡¯t possibly be up to such a difficult task. If they wanted to sessfully reach the Silver Union territories, they would have to transit to another, more resilient, transport. An aerial fortress¨C the floating battleships.


    When Greem, Alice, and Snox finally descended from the flying ship, they were immediately greeted by the sight of a terrifyingly massive ship. All of them were shocked.


    This was a gigantic ship,pletely ck on the outside. Its size was at least ten times that of a normal flying ship. Three towering masts were situated on the front, middle, and back of the ship. A massive sail, much like the ones used on ordinary ships, had been ced on the top of the masts. However, Greem sensed that these masts weren¡¯t driven by wind.


    Greem¡¯s vision was extremely sharp. Even with a quarter of a kilometer distance between himself and the ship, he could still see the strange runes and magical lines drawn on the surface of the masts. The masts reflected a cold metallic gleam under the bright sun. Just a single look was enough to tell of its resilience and toughness.


    There were countless portholes on the body of the ship. However they had all been covered with thick metal boards, blocking everything within from sight. Even so, Greem, with his experience from the previous world, knew very well that battleships couldn¡¯t be divorced from cannons. These portholes were most likely where the cannons fired out of.


    The only thing Greem wasn¡¯t sure of was the type of magic weapon hidden within the ship.


    There was also a two-level forecastle on the ship. However, it didn¡¯t seem to have been constructed for shelter. It appeared to be a tform for adepts to cast their spells from.


    The pitch-ck floating battleship was parked on the hill, standing silently against the backdrop of the sky. From a distance it looked just like a scary steel monster. It radiated a cold and powerful aura.


    This was likely the floating battleship that the Silver Union had specifically created to pass through the dangerous aerial corridor!


    When Greem finally shifted his gaze away from the battleship, he realized they hadn¡¯tnded in a city. Instead, they hadnded on an airport used specifically for transporting cargo and transferring passengers.


    Rows ofrge and sturdy wooden buildings could be seen by the edge of the forest. Countless humans and servants of other races and odd appearances were walking in and out of those buildings. It was clear that those were the warehouses of the airport. On the other side, far away from the forest, rows of stone buildings towered. Numerous people dressed like adepts stood before the empty space in front of the stone houses. They pointed and gestured towards the port. It appeared as if they were discussing something.


    A tall and slim tower stood at the middle of the airport. Mysterious runes glowed on the surface of its walls. Faint detection waves scanned across the air. Their range extended to the forest over several kilometers away.


    A watchtower!


    These towers didn¡¯t have much space inside. It was not possible to station too many adepts within them, nor was it possible to outfit them withrge and powerful war machines. The towers were mainly constructed to watch for possible threats.


    A vast and mountainous stretch of ck trees extended behind Greem.


    This was the outer rim of the human settlements within the central area. There were no longer any signs of human poption in the forest surrounding this ce. Naturally, there were norge-sized settlements in sight either. However, asionally, there were still hunting parties and adventure parties that were active along the edge of the forest. Some adepts searching for materials would also make their way into the forest.


    A low and hoarse voice rang out beside him as he surveyed this airport.


    "Wee, Sir Greem!"


    Greem turned and immediately found Adept Angus¡¯ wrinkled old visage staring him in the face.


    "I¡¯m d to see you again." Greem nodded in acknowledgement.


    "You have just arrived, haven¡¯t you? You should find a ce to rest first! The tickets to the Castle in the Sky have already been arranged. We will set out in three days time." Adept Angus was clearly much more politepared to before.


    "Isn¡¯t there a floating battleship right over there? Why the long wait?" Greem asked curiously.


    "The floating battleship is ready, but we don¡¯t have enough adepts!" Angus gave a simple exnation, "Even though we have been developing this aerial path for over a thousand years, and already have a basic understanding of the magical creatures spread along the corridor, the route is still an extremely dangerous one. To ensure everyone¡¯s safety, the floating battleship always stays in the airport for a couple of days. It will only take off once a sufficient number of adepts have gathered for the trip."


    "Sufficient number of adepts?" This was the first time Greem had heard of this, "Approximately how many adepts do we need?"


    "Usually, sixty adepts should be enough. The number of required adepts can even be reduced if a couple of high-grade adepts show up."


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be stunned by this number.


    Sixty adepts?


    Even the Sarubo n wouldn¡¯t be able to gather adepts in such numbers or scale. Yet a single trip to the Castle in the Sky required so many adepts. ording to his understanding, these floating battleships would take off every fifteen days.


    Based on this, it was easy to calcte the number of adepts travelling to and from the territories. This was an unimaginable number!


    Adept Angus gave an understanding smile when he saw Greem¡¯s expression of shock.


    "No need to be surprised. There¡¯s much more to be surprised at once you arrive at the Castle in the Sky. The number of adepts there will blow your mind. Let¡¯s go. I have already arranged a ce for you to rest. Just wait here patiently for three days. Another flying ship will arrive here in three days¡¯ time. We will have the required sixty adepts then!"


    So that¡¯s how it was!


    Greem was finally able to put his questions to rest. He brought along Alice and Snox and followed Angus to the row of stone houses.


    The rooms here was also extremely crude and simple. Only a table and chair was ced in the room, apart from the wooden bed. Not a single unnecessary piece of furniture had been put in the room. Of course, if the adepts didn¡¯t like the facilities here, they only needed to travel ten kilometers to the east. A small human city had been founded there. There was plenty of entertainment to be found there.


    However, Greem had no intention of seeking entertainment. He quickly settled in his room before dragging Adept Angus to a hidden room for a discussion.


    After all, he still knew nothing about the specifics of this trip. Greem had no idea of what to do or how to do it after he arrived at the Castle in the Sky. This was far too passive for Greem. He preferred to always have an action n in his back pocket!


    If the request was only to win a small contest for the Byron n, he wouldn¡¯t be worried. However, now that he wanted to leave Snox on in the Castle in the Sky, he would have to n ahead. The more he understood about the situation, the better his chances.


    As Angus started to give an in-depth description of the whole thing, Greem finally started to understand the basic governing structure and rules of the Castle in the Sky, as well as an initial idea of this so-called tournament he had to participate in.


    ording to Angus, the Castle in the Sky was not just a simple adepts¡¯ city. The entire city was split into three circles. The inner circle, the central circle, and the outer circle.


    Only high-level members of the Silver Union were allowed into the inner circle. The main control core of the Castle in the Sky was located there. Moreover, the famous Diviner¡¯s Tower, the Vortex Tower, the Obelisk, and the legendary Storm Fortress were all located within the inner circle.


    The only way inside was to join the Silver Union and rise to be one of the parliamentary members. Otherwise one would never be able to take a single step into the ce for as long as they lived!


    The central circle was the main area of activity for the normal members of the Silver Union and the esoteric adepts. Only adepts that had been recognized by the Silver Union were allowed to stay and study in the ce.


    Most trading activities was concentrated around the outer circle of the Castle in the Sky. Non-Union members were also allowed to set up shops there. However, the right to own a store in the outer circle was decided by a test every ten years. This test came in the form of a fair and just Esoteric Duel.


    The Esoteric Duels came in many forms. There were the duels between potions masters, the duels between alchemists, and the duels between golem masters... all arts that were categorized as those of esoteric adepts were included as possible forms of duel.


    Apart from the shops managed by the Castle in the Sky, the shops avable to outsiders was limited. As is the case in an economy, high demand begets high prices and intensepetition! Any adept n or organization that wished to possess a shop on the Castle in the Sky had to find a way to win the Esoteric Duels in order to win the right to stay in the city.


    Every existing shop would have to ept challenges by outsiders during the years of the duels. Both sides would invite esoteric adepts to fight for them in a fair and just duel. The winner would stay, and the loser would have to leave the Castle in the Sky!


    The Byron n¡¯s shop had a long history of over seventy years. This was also the main way their n obtained high-grade resources. They couldn¡¯t afford to lose this shop.


    This year, their shop had received a difficult challenge from the Gerto n. As the challenged, the Byron n had the right to choose the topic of the Esoteric Duel. Naturally, they chose the Golem Masters¡¯ Duel.


    In truth, this was also one of the rules that the Silver Union had intentionally created to elevate the status of the esoteric adepts across the continent!


    By facilitating these duels, all adept ns and organizations that wanted a spot on the Castle in the Sky had to try their best to cultivate a capable esoteric adept. If they couldn¡¯t cultivate one themselves, they would have to hire an esoteric adept from the Castle in the Sky.


    The status of the esoteric adepts rose in this manner, swiftly and quickly rising to be irreceable parts of the ns and organizations. Some talented but poor esoteric adepts would be able to take advantage of this opportunity to gain enough resources to further their research.


    However, this spelled trouble for adept ns who didn¡¯t have enough resources to train an esoteric adept themselves.


    After all, the cost of doing so was not something that a small-sized n could ever hope to shoulder. A proper esoteric adept, be it an alchemist that could craft magical items, or potions masters and golem masters, required a massive investment of resources to be qualified in their fields.


    Most esoteric adepts came to be after hundreds and thousands of failures in their research and cultivation. The amount of resources lost in the process was an astounding number that could throw anyone into shock.

 Chapter 271

    Chapter 271 n and Preparation


    The discussion with Angussted through the night.


    Greem had managed to grasp a basic understanding of the rules of the duel. In general, there were two ways in which a Golem Master¡¯s Duel could be carried out. The first was the mass melee, where numbers decided the victor. The second was the golem duel, where quality was key to winning.


    Every golem master had an upper limit to their Spirit. The number of golems they could control simultaneously was limited by their Spirit. Thus, the mass melee duel was a test of the golem master¡¯s Spirit limit and their control over the golems with the limited Spirit they had.


    They second form of the duel, the golem duels, was the one that was most preferred by the majority of the golem masters.


    The two opposing golem masters would send a single golem each. The borate golems they painstakingly crafted would then battle on the stage, much like a duel between humans. The golem that was more powerful and better crafted would be the victor.


    Of course, this was also a test of the golem master¡¯s skill at crafting golems. The more skillful and powerful golem masters would always be able to imbue their golem with more strength andbat prowess. However, it was in truth a test of financial strength. The more money the n had, the better the quality of the golem.


    A terrifying golem crafted purely of Underground Wrought Gold would destroy a golem made of ordinary magical metal, even if the difference in their crafters¡¯ skill was astronomical. Even a master wouldn¡¯t be able to beat a rookie if he had a colossal amount of rare materials to work with.


    ording to Angus, the Gerto n that had challenged them this year had recently been stockpiling all sorts of rare metals. It was rumored that the opponent was secretly crafting a uniquebat golem for the sole purpose of winning the duel this time. That said, the Byron n hadn¡¯t been able to get any specifics.


    After Greem parted with Angus, he immediately locked himself into the stone room. He started an intense research of this profession known as golem master.


    Of course, golem master was just the general name for adepts of professions of simr types. If one was to be detailed about the specific professions, they could probably churn out a dozen different branches of golem masters. They crafted a huge range of things. From animated statues, to magical puppets, mechanical constructs, robotic beasts, alchemical lifeforms, biological creations, elementium golems, magic-driven machines and many more...


    The difference between each and every branch might not be obvious to an outsider. However, from the perspective of a golem master, every single branch had massive differences in their very nature.


    For example, the golems crafted by Greem¨Cwho was, frankly speaking, only half of a true golem master¨Cwaspletely distinct from animated statues and magical puppets.


    Usually, animated statues and magical puppets consumed various precious magical metals in the process of their creation. Good magical conductors were used to craft the core of the puppets, while strong magical resistors were used to forge an unbreakable body for the puppet.


    Humanoid joints, actuating mechanisms, hidden energy channels and delicate control circuitry... these made a proper magical puppet.


    The energy source that powered these puppets was the energy crystal embedded within their bodies¨C these were the magic crystals so often used as currency.


    Compared to the magic golems, these puppets often featured tangible and solid bodies. The true job of a golem master was designing the intricate patterns and arrays that went into the internal structure of the puppet. The better the connection between the core and the rest of the body, the more agile and smooth the movements of these heavy and colossal puppets.


    A magic golem was, as its name implied, nothing more than an elementium golem.


    They had no tangible bodies before they were summoned, only a summoning core carved full ofplex magical arrays. They relied on their core to gather wandering elementium energies to create their temporal forms. The magical arrays would draw from their surroundings, then shape the elementium into the desired form of their bodies.


    From a perspective focused purely on strength, a magic golem was clearly far inferior to the animated statues and magical puppets. This was because these animated beings often had actual tangible bodies that were tough and resilient. That said, magic golems had an advantage that magical puppets could never hope to possess¨C the ease of transport.


    Magic golems could disperse their temporal forms when they weren¡¯t needed. They could turn into a crystal the size of a pigeon¡¯s egg, perfect for carrying about in a pocket. On the other hand, animated statues and magical puppets easily went up to four or five meters in height. They were often gigantic metallic creatures with tremendous weight that reached a dozen tons. Moreover, they couldn¡¯t be folded or shrunk in size.


    There was no way you could drag them along with you on your adventures, regardless of how powerful they were. A tremendous number of magic crystals had to be burned just for them to walk. The consumption would go up exponentially if they ever engaged inbat.


    This was why animated statues and magical puppets were often only used as static defense.


    They could patrol and guard castles and towers, and in doing so, prevent enemy attacks. They were much more efficientpared to adepts or human guards when it came to this particr job. They could even recharge using the energy pool within the adept facilities when they rested. This would save arge number of magic crystals for the golem master.


    However, Greem had heard rumors of a unique spatial storage tool that could be used to store animated statues and magical puppets. Only the most powerful and skillful golem masters could craft this magical gear. They were known as golem talismans. However, these golem talismans cost a lot to make. They were almost as expensive as the most powerful of golems. As a result, these talismans wouldn¡¯t possibly find their way into widespread manufacture and use. They could only be used to carry powerful elite golems.


    All of these reasonsbined was the reason Greem believed magical golems were more suited to him.


    However, when it came to a duel with an actual golem master, cost and transport were no longer factors that mattered. The only important thing was thebat effectiveness of the golems.


    Both of the participating parties were First Grade adepts. They couldn¡¯t possibly create magical beings that exceeded their own Grade. In this particr case, theck of a stable and resilient form would be a definite disadvantage for a magical golem when it was pit against a metallic puppet. If Greem wanted to obtain the final victory, avoiding a frontal sh was the only way forward!


    Even though Greem was extremely confident in the Infernal Tyrant, he felt it was best to prepare some strategies for the uing battle. After all, it was hard to predict what kind of situation might ur during the fight. Otherwise there was a possibility of the Infernal Tyrant losing. Especially if it faced a golem crafted of precious metals that it couldn¡¯t damage.


    After all, absolute strength would be able to crush any sort of fancy tricks and maneuvers!


    ............


    Time was always precious for an adept!


    Three days of waiting might be tiresome for an ordinary person, but this wasn¡¯t enough time for an adept engulfed in his research to even take a nap.


    Three dayster, a new flying ship arrived, bringing with it fifteen adepts.


    And thus, having gathered a sufficient number of adepts, the floating battleship quickly took off!


    The battleship had much more roompared to the flying ship. However, most of the room was reserved for the massive amounts of cargo it was carrying. What was left of the space was also used for the much needed war machines. The rooms that the adepts stayed in wrtr still as small as they were on the flying ship.


    The adepts were both the guests and the guardians of this ship.


    There were only five Silver Union adepts stationed on every floating battleship. Moreover, their job was mostly maintenance and management rather thanbat. If the battleship fell under attack during its journey, it was the responsibility and obligation of the adepts onboard to defend it.


    Every single adept on board had already signed the relevant magical contract with regards to this.


    If an adept refused to help when needed, the Silver Union would have the right to exile them from the ship. It didn¡¯t matter how powerful of an adept you were. Your fate would be sealed the moment you were thrown off the ship!


    Alice grumbled unhappily when she heard of the terms Greem had to agree to, "Those Silver Unions adepts are way too calcting! Isn¡¯t this basically double-dipping? They take your money and make you a free bodyguard for their ship at the same time!"


    Snox nodded vigorously as well, fiercely expressing his approval of Alice¡¯s statement.


    Greem smiled and said, "This is their territory. Of course we have to y by their rules. Be a little more careful, you two. Try not to make such offensive statements once we reach the Castle in the Sky. Otherwise, even I can¡¯t save you if you anger the Silver-Robed executors!"


    Angus curiously observed this trio.


    An adept, a pseudo-adept, and an odd green goblin!


    With such a massive difference in their statuses, it was hard to imagine how they came together.


    In the World of Adepts, only adepts of equal status were worthy of association. The rest could be reduced to servants or human resources. There was no possibility of equal status between different sses.


    An adept might appear to be caring and kind to a pseudo-adept. However, this pseudo-adept would have to be his disciple or his direct blood rtive. There was no possibility of good treatment outside of this.


    As for an adept talking nicely to a green goblin? The only far-fetched possibility where this could ur would be in the case of an experiment. After all, you wouldn¡¯t want to frighten your test subject and ruin your experiment!


    However, the scene before him was clearly out of the norm.


    The newly advanced Adept Greem was clearly interacting with that pseudo-adept girl and that green goblin on a fairly equal level. This was seen as a humiliating act in the eyes of most adepts.


    Greem had only just advanced to an adept after all. Perhaps he had yet to discard his past habits and attitudes. He would probably change once he had gotten used to the life of an adept!


    Adept Angus told himself so. He didn¡¯t step forward to correct Greem¡¯s ¡¯mistake¡¯.


    All of the cargo the battleship needed to transport was already within the ship. The moment the number of adepts was sufficient, the passengers started to board the battleship.


    This was the first time in his life that Greem had seen so many adepts gathered together.


    Even the mobilization of the Sarubo n¡¯s full force during thest nar war had not reached such terrifying numbers. Only two or three dozen adepts had appeared on the battlefield back then. Today, however, all kinds of adepts of odd appearance and fashion had appeared before him. They wore clothes of all kinds, leather armor, magic armor, and metal armor, forming a massive crowd. Yet despite their numbers and their status, they quietly queued up in an orderly fashion as they boarded the battleship.


    This... was a shocking sight to behold! Greem could feel the dryness in his mouth and tongue as he witnessed this scene!


    If you lived like a hermit in a small and rural territory, your status as an adept would afford you an extravagant life of luxury. A life of debauchery that trumped even those of the nobles. You would be the center of attention during the banquets and feasts, the target of affection of the beautiful noblewomen and prettydies.


    Wine and beauties. Absolute power. All of this would go to your head, causing you to believe yourself to be the ruler of this world.


    However, it was only when you stepped out of this cage of your own making, and travel to this ce, that you would realize the truth. You were just as insignificant as you used to be as an apprentice adept.

 Chapter 272

    Chapter 272 On the Battleship


    The floating battleship slowly rose above the horizon like a graceful leviathan.


    Numerous mysterious arrays were pulsing on the bottom of the ship. A massive amount of wind particles were being ejected out of those arrays, sending the ship dashing across the skies like a fish swimming in water. It quickly disappeared into the vast sea of ck trees.


    The moment the battleship entered the forest, the three massive masts towering on the ship¡¯s deck started glowing. A huge semi-translucent barrier of light covered the entire ship. Runes shed about on the barrier as strange energy ripples flowed over it. There was no specific order or pattern in which the energy moved, but Greem could tell that they served some sort of purpose.


    He closed his eyes to sense the flow of energy.


    Light Refraction, Concealment, Aura Obscurement, Spirit Avoidance...


    The Spells of Light Refraction and Concealment were used to hide the ship from sight, while the Aura Obscurement was to prevent the life aura of the passengers from leaking outside and attracting unnecessary enemies. Spirit Avoidance was a spell used on small lifeforms. It would guide those critters to subconsciously move away from the battleship, preventing them from crashing into the ship and diminishing the effect of Concealment.


    Sadly, these spells were only useful against lower lifeforms and lower-level magical creatures. They were absolutely useless against the truly powerful magical creatures that lurked within the forest.


    There were still some other runes floating around the barrier enveloping the ship. However, Greem¡¯s knowledge of runes was limited and he was unable to decipher every spell contained within the barrier.


    He stood upon the deck and bent to look down. A tiny silver stream wound between the sea of ck trees.


    A flock of blue birds slowly flew past below the battleship.


    me-red crowns, light-blue leathery wings, and long and colorful tails. They appeared to be mutated rocs. They shouldn¡¯t underestimate rocs because of their pretty appearance. They were true carnivores. Each and every one of them were savage and ferocious in nature, with an extremely territorial behaviour.


    However, even a mutated roc was no more than an ordinary creature. It had no elementium abilities or control over magic, and was no danger at all to adepts.


    Thus, this flock of rocs didn¡¯t even notice the battleship when they passed by!


    The woods seemed somewhat different from the ones Greem was used to.


    Back in the Zhentarim area, he had seen his fair share of vast forests that extended over hundreds of kilometers. However, those trees almost seemed to be green. Here, all the trees were a dull grey and ck color.


    It was a bleak and mildly odd color!


    Greem had a unique feeling ever since the battleship had entered the ck forest. It felt like there was a trace of chaos and violence mixed within the energies. The sky and the earth had a certain atmosphere to them. An extreme atmosphere. So deste and depressing that one couldn¡¯t help but want to scream in anger and frustration.


    Perhaps this was the original appearance of the Continent of Adepts!


    The floating battleship silently glided through the skies, not attracting any attention from the ferocious beasts beneath it.


    The adepts on the ship were many in number. Of course, there were some amongst them who already knew each other. The adepts quickly gathered in groups of two or three and started to talk amongst themselves. Some, more sociable adepts, were taking this opportunity to walk around, making as many new friends as they could. Even though their advances would be asionally rejected, most of the adepts were willing to talk. After all, conversation with another adept meant a chance to exchange information and research.


    Greem was also brought along by Adept Angus to greet some adepts Angus was acquainted with. Some of them were powerful adepts that were famous even within the central area of the continent.


    Greem was not opposed to this.


    He had two lives¡¯ worth of experience. He knew very well that connections were a hidden resource. Sometimes they could even prove to be more valuable than individual strength!


    There were both males and females amongst the adepts they visited.


    However, all of the younger adepts were decent-looking, even if they weren¡¯t just outright charming.


    Most male adepts clearly cared less about appearance whenpared to the female adepts. On the other hand, there would almost always be scars and marks of idents on the bodies of the veteran adepts. This was a result of continuous exposure to dangerous and taboo experiments.


    There was one such adept amongst those they visited. All of his body was intact, with the exception of his face. All the flesh and blood had been corroded away, leaving only a thin and wrinkledyer of skin clinging to his skull. He looked like a talking skeleton when they conversed.


    Adept Angus secretly sent a magical voice transmission to Greem and told him the truth behind the adept¡¯s appearance. The damage to the face had been caused by a failed magic experiment.


    If it was simple flesh wounds, adepts had plenty of tricks up their sleeves to repair the damage. Even missing flesh could be regenerated. However, if the damage from the magic had reached all the way to the source of their souls, it would be virtually impossible to heal.


    Inparison, the female adepts were much more conscious of their appearance. Greem could always detect the marks of magic modification on their bodies and faces. Of course, only Greem could detect such minor and fine modifications with such uracy. After all he had the chip, and the chip waspletely unmatched in terms of its efficiency at gathering andparing data.


    Most female adepts were extremely pretty, with exceptional figures. They would always draw the gazes of the male adepts whenever they engaged in a conversation. They didn¡¯t seem to mind the unscrupulous looks of the male adepts. They would even actively flirt with the males, as if they perceived their body and their beauty as a resource to be traded.


    Tall, muscr, and handsome young adepts like Greem, in particr, were their preferred targets. Their fiery gazes, flirtatious words, and lewd acts were unbearable for Greem.


    He already knew this was the nature of adepts. Many no longer cared for the habits and behavior of worldly society once they became an adept. They were much more willing to speak their thoughts and indulge in their desires. However, such an ¡¯open¡¯ and public manner of flirtation was still unbearable for Greem!


    Alice, who was trailing behind Greem like a little bug, was pouting with her tiny mouth. She red angrily at every pretty female adept that came close to Greem, continuously grumbling under her breath. Her voice was extremely soft, and no one could hear what she was saying.


    Alice might be arrogant, talented, and confident in bing an adept. Still, she didn¡¯t dare to do anything before these adepts that might offend them.


    She might be an exceptional future witch with unlimited potential and terrifying talent amongst the apprentice adepts. However, potential was potential. Before Alice could convert this potential into power, any simple incident could spell an early end to her future as a ¡¯Witch of Fate¡¯.


    There were countless examples of individuals who didn¡¯t know how to restrain themselves and, consequently, brought upon themselves the anger and wrath of others. All of these unfortunate idiots were once shining talents with bright futures!


    Thus, even if only for the sake of her life, Alice didn¡¯t dare to openly provoke a whole group of female adepts. For some reason though, every time Alice looked at these female adepts, be they trying to seduce Greem with innocence, elegance, or eroticism, she felt an anger surging from the bottom of her heart.


    This bunch of shameless hags! The only thing they knew how to do was wave about the two pieces of meat hanging from their chests to seduce men. Aplete disgrace for witches all over the world. Serves them right to be the vassals and servants of male adepts...


    Greem could sense the bubbling emotions behind him. He let out a bitter smile and brought the grumbling Alice back to their cabins after giving Angus a heads-up.


    For the next few days Greem stayed within his room, never taking a single step outside. He was ceaselessly researching for a way to imbue the golem cores with the power of the otherworldly runes. Every time Greem was exhausted from his work, he would meditate rather than sleep. He did all he could to regenerate his Spirit as fast as possible.


    Meanwhile, he was slowly getting used to the energy surges from the me Fiend¡¯s Heart. The explosions of energy that happened twice every minute were gradually bing bearable. Unfortunately, there was still a faint trace of abyssal aura surging forth along with the me energies. Even Greem wouldn¡¯t have been able to detect these traces of abyssal aura if it hadn¡¯t been for the chip. The chip¡¯s ability was so fine that it could even monitor the cells of the body at a gic level. Without it, he wouldn¡¯t have been able to detect the abyssal aura slowly but gradually corroding and modifying his body.


    In just a matter of a dozen days, some of his organs were already showing signs of bing infused with magic.


    This was both bad and good news for him.


    The good news was that the infusing of magic with his organs was strengthening his Physique. Ever since he transnted this Second Grade me Fiend¡¯s Heart, the speed at which his Physique was increasing had almost exceeded the speed of his Spirit increase. He had, at one point, almost considered bing a body refining adept instead.


    His powerful body, as well as his intangible and wicked aura of charm, gave him a strangely attractive feel.


    However, the bad was equally obvious.


    If the magic-infusion started to go out of his control, his existence would probably move away from that of an adept¡¯s. Instead, he would start to be more and more like the demons of the lower realms!


    On one hand, he coveted the increase of power brought about by the abyssal aura. On the other, he feared the possibility of falling to the level of an abyssal creature. As a result, Greem ordered the chip to closely monitor every single change urring within his body.


    On his fifth day on the ship, one of his organs reached eleven percent infusion. Greem took out a vial of potion from his belt and drank its contents without hesitation.


    The viscous and purple liquid had just slid down his throat, and already a pungent odor had permeated the entire room. An indescribable and odd feeling started to spread in his mouth and stomach, before gradually emanating towards the rest of his body.


    Greem raised his hands and watched as wicked traces of crimson smoke started to seep through his skin, before they dispersed in the air.


    Since he already knew the dangers that the me Fiend¡¯s Heart posed to himself, Greem had already prepared potions to deal with the situation. The potion was able to slowly but surely extract the abyssal aura from within his body. Of course, Greem was unable to craft these potions by himself. He had exchanged for these potions with Ferrier using a dark blue gem the size of a fist.


    He would have to control the quantity of the potion he ingested each time, such that it would be able to extract the abyssal aura without triggering a decline in his Physique. The only downside was the terrible smell. He was stinking.


    An intolerable odor was emanating from all over his body!

 Chapter 273

    Chapter 273 Danger Everywhere


    The attacks on the battleship didn¡¯t stop once it passed five thousand kilometers into the ck forest.


    Fortunately, the flight path the Silver Union used was one they discovered after a thousand years of bloody exploration. This path already avoided the hunting and living territories of the high-grade magical creatures. Even though the attacks were many, most of the enemies were only First Grade creatures that lived in groups. The number of Second Grade creatures that appeared could be counted on a single hand.


    With the cooperation of the numerous adepts on board, along with the powerful barrier erected around the ship, they had been able to drive away the creatures.


    The floating battleship was cruising at a thousand meters in the sky. Normal magical creatures with no flying abilities couldn¡¯t even reach them.


    Greem had personally witnessed a terrifying Second Grade Hill Giant climbing out of the ground when the ship passed by arge ck chasm.


    The giant was at least thirty meters in height. It was literally a moving hill.


    The Hill Giants were a branch of the Earth Giants. They were naturally tough, resilient, and immensely strong. Every part of their body was pieced together withrge grey and white rocks. Like the dragons, they loved their sleep. Every time they ate and drank their fill, they would find an area with dense earth elementium concentration to dig underground and find a spot to sleep.


    The reason the floating battleship chose to fly through the Giant¡¯s territory was because it had no ability to fly whatsoever. Moreover, the giant was usually hiding underground and sleeping most of the time. It was very unlikely to draw the giant¡¯s ire by driving through its territory.


    However, their luck clearly wasn¡¯t so good this time. They had arrived just as the Hill Giant awoke.


    It sensed the thick aura of human blood and fleshing from the sky and slowly climbed up from below the ck chasm. It lifted its humanoid head, opened its massive mouth, and let out a deafening and wrathful roar at the battleship.


    All of the magical creatures in the ck forest were extremely territorial. There was no room for diplomacy. They would fight you with all they had the moment they found you trespassing in their homes.


    That was why the Hill Giant didn¡¯t give up. He strode across thend with heavy footsteps, destroying a wide path through the forest as it crashed through the trees, closely following below the ship. Every time it got close enough, the Hill Giant would roar with all his might and raise his massive stone hands up into the skies. The yellow-brown earth elementium would instantly gather together to form a massive rock.


    It would then throw the boulder towards the ship, the rock whistling through the air as it did so.


    The adepts on the ship bent over the railings to look at the giant. All of them went pale when they saw the massive rock shooting towards them. It was a rock that was almost asrge as a house after all! Even Greem could feel his heart tighten for a moment, but his eyes were locked on to the flying rock. Data was quickly being collected and analyzed.


    "Beep.


    Mainposition of rock: earth elementium and various impurities.


    Density of rock: 1.73 kilograms per centimeter cubed.


    Size of rock: Approximately three meters cubed.


    Weight of rock: Approximately 5.24 tons.


    Estimated maximum possible height reached by rock: 729 meters... "


    "What is the altitude of the floating battleship now?"


    "Beep. The current altitude of the floating battleship is 1142 meters... "


    Greem was finally able to set aside his concerns after going through the detailed data provided by the chip. Instead, he focused on observing the body data of the Hill Giant.


    These higher-grade creatures were extremely powerful, and had a massive amount of energy stored within their bodies. These energies would cause a defensive field simr to a barrier to form around their bodies. Usually, the chip would not be able to prate through the barrier from such a distance and collect any data. However, now that the Hill Giant was continuously attacking the ship, the chip was able to analyze the strength of its attacks and the consequences of its actions on its surroundings. Through this data, the chip was able to indirectly calcte and provide a basic estimation of its strength.


    Race: Hill Giant.


    ss: Second Grade Earth-Attribute Higher Lifeform.


    Size: 31-33 meters in height, 8-10 meters wide.


    Weight: 97 tons.


    Attributes: Strength 27 | Agility 10 | Physique 25 | Spirit 14


    Even without the use of any of its earth abilities, this Second Grade Hill Giant could easily roll over any human adepts of the same grade simply by relying on its terrifying weight and Physique.


    Greem didn¡¯t expect anything of the Second Grade adepts waiting on the ship. If any of them were to try to duel the Hill Giant, they would bepletely crushed and reduced to dust.


    The Grade of a lifeform was a good basic indicator of its strength, but it was not absolute.


    Some powerful races born forbat would have tremendous bonuses to their power. What Grade they were at didn¡¯t truly reflect theirplete prowess. For example, the Hill Giant¡¯s massive size had provided him with immense bonuses to his Strength and Physique. These additional attributes made it a far more terrifying foe whenpared to ordinary Second Grade body refining adepts.


    Greem repeatedly looked over the Hill Giant¡¯s attributes projected by the chip, and couldn¡¯t help but be awed by the creature.


    This was just one of the Second Grade magical creatures that existed in the ck forest! Moreover, it wasn¡¯t even the most powerful one! The Hill Giant was considered a magical creature with barely average abilities!


    If the floating battleship wasn¡¯t cruising at such a high altitude, and all sixty adepts were walking on the ground, disaster would probably befall them. The Hill Giant only needed to use its hill-size body to charge through the adepts¡¯ ranks and they would suffer grievous losses.


    Greem might have made a name for himself as the me Demon, but even he wasn¡¯t sure if his Magma Fireballs would do anything to the enemy¡¯s defensive barrier and body of rock.


    The most likely oue of battling with such a monster was death. He would probably be crushed into human paste before he could even st a single rock off the giant¡¯s body!


    The rocks whistled and soared through the air. The kic force driving them upwards was slowly exhausted, and they fell towards the ground once more.


    Every rock would cause the adepts to gasp in terror.


    The runic arrays at the tail of the floating battleship glowed brilliantly. The ferocious wind particles blew on with even more strength than before, and the ship charged through the clouds, quickly speeding away from the giant¡¯s territory.


    The Hill Giant was initially able to follow behind the ship with its massive steps. However, as the ship continued to elerate, the giant was gradually left behind.


    Finally, when the battleship disappeared into the horizon, all that the adepts could see was a speck standing on top of a cliff, roaring angrily in their direction.


    After leaving the Hill Giant¡¯s territory, the battleship had also passed through the territory of a strange mirage beast.


    An adept suddenly pointed at the forest and cried out, "Look... what¡¯s that?"


    Everyone hurried to take a look.


    Everything seemed so peaceful within the depressing ck forest. It was so silent and quiet, as if nothing was happening.


    However, everyone could feel a deep dark shadow flowing through the forest beneath the thick tree branches and dense foliage. The shadow was stalking beneath them.


    "That¡¯s a mirage beast!" A Silver Union adept wearing a silver adept robe exined with a smile on his face, "It¡¯s a strange magical creature that¡¯s simr to the corruptor. It is able to create fantastical illusions akin to mirages in the desert, then silently devour the creatures caught in its magic. It is also Second Grade, but it is far more terrifying whenpared to the Hill Giant. Avoiding the Hill Giant in the ck forest is no problem as long as you are being cautious. However, there is absolutely no chance of escape from a mirage beast!"


    "I have also heard of this creature!" A tall and skinny adept quickly added, "They like to press their bodies against the ground, creating images of clearkes, beautiful gardens, and mansions full of treasures above their bodies. The realm of illusion is, in fact, their stomachs. They would lure their prey inside, and then the prey would have their bodies dissolved by the illusion while beingpletely oblivious to the situation."


    "Thank god they don¡¯t have any means of attacking over long distances!" An adept finally expressed everyone¡¯s thoughts.


    The adepts nodded in agreement.


    The Silver Union adept was clearly dissatisfied with everyone¡¯s attitude. He shook his head and warned, "Don¡¯t go feeling relieved. The most trying part of this journeyes after we pass through the mirage beast¡¯s territory."


    "What is there after this?" An adept asked.


    "Winged Lions!" The Silver Union adept frowned as he spoke, "The next territory we are passing through belongs to the Winged Lions. Everyone had best be careful!"


    There were many adepts on board, but not all of them had heard of these creatures known as the Winged Lions. Thus, the voices of chattering adepts quickly filled the ship.


    Some more familiar and friendly adepts had started exchanging information with each other.


    Greem paused for a second.


    Winged Lions?


    He had heard of these magical creatures before.


    Ordinary humans always had trouble distinguishing the Winged Lions from the Gryphons. They were extremely simr creatures, with traits of lions mixed within. However, they were two entirely different beings.


    Gryphons were winged beasts with the heads of eagles and the bodies of dragons. This meant that they had heads and beaks of eagles, and the bodies and ws of dragons, as well as a pair ofrge fleshy wings.


    Usually, adolescent gryphons were no more than First Grade magical creatures that lived in groups. Other than their decent physical strength, their power lied in their speed and ability to make diving attacks from the sky. Their screeches and cries also had a trace of ability to disrupt and confuse.


    Other than these traits, there was nothing remarkable about the gryphons!


    Adolescent Winged Lions, on the other hand, were Second Grade magical creatures that lived in groups. They would usually live within a family unit, consisting of two Second Grade adolescent winged lions, and three to five First Grade winged lion cubs.


    Compared to the gryphons, the winged lions were lions with massive wings.


    They were able to cast light-attribute spells, along with possessing tremendous physical strength. One could say they were the natural enemies of certain types of dark-attribute adepts!


    All of the dark adepts wearing ck robes couldn¡¯t help but frown deeply when they heard the Silver Union adept¡¯s caution. They had clearly heard of this annoying light creature as well. If they were toe into conflict with the winged lions, all of their curses, corrosive attacks, and acidic attacks would be renderedpletely useless. They would be reduced to spectators in the fight.


    The floating battleship flew above the forest, twisting about the narrow path amongst the towering mountain peaks. The ship was trying its best to pass through and avoid all of the hazardous areas.


    Still, a long and low growl rang out in a nearby cliff. Three to five ck shadows took the skies, quickly gliding in their direction.

 Chapter 274

    Chapter 274 The Winged Lions


    They were Winged Lions!


    Two dozen adepts were already in position under the Silver Union adept¡¯s organization, silently waiting for the arrival of the Winged Lions.


    The Silver Union used this flight path once every fifteen days. They knew very well what race and grade of magical creatures would appear at which areas. Other than situations where extremely dangerous creatures were migrating, or when the creatures of the ck forest were falling into a riot, the path was a safe one.


    However, there were always exceptions, especially within the ck forest, where no one could estimate the danger lurking within. Unknown terrors were always lying in wait.


    Powerful magical creatures would usually own arge territory of their own. They were the only kings within this territory and they would never allow other creatures with simr strength to enter their territory or hunt within it.


    Higher-grade magical creatures were almost always as intelligent as actual adepts. They knew how to split their territories into an inner living area and an outer hunting area. However, there would always be contentious areas within neighboring territories.


    Thus, the conflict between magical creatures often broke out within the ck forest!


    The reason the flying battleship decided to go through this path despite knowing it to be the territory of the Winged Lions was simple. Just fifty kilometers to the west was the territory of arge group of wyverns.


    Even though these wyverns were only First Grade lower magical creatures, and were far weaker to the Winged Lions, they had strength in numbers. Over a hundred of them flew together. This, coupled with their bloodline as hybrid dragons which gave them tremendous strength, powerful bodies, and the ability of flight, meant they did not fear the Winged Lions at all.


    In fact, if one were to consider every single factor, the Winged Lions were slightly weaker than the pack of wyverns!


    The floating battleship gradually decelerated. Once it had slowed down to a certain speed, it started to weave in and out of the clouds, sticking to the mountain ridge as it flew forward.


    Now that the ship had slowed down, the excess energy saved from powering the ship was used to strengthen the outer barrier. The thickness of the barrier increased slightly.


    Winged lions were wickedly fast in the skies. Trying to get rid of them by outrunning them was aplete joke. It was much safer to stave off their attacks as the ship traveled!


    Greem had been assigned to the front-middle of the ship. There was an adept standing five meters behind him, and another five meters in front of him. They stood in silence, waiting for the winged lions to attack. Their job was simple. They were to retaliate with their strongest spells when the winged lions tried to tackle the defensive barrier.


    It might be tough for them to hurt the winged lions with what little power they have, but the main purpose was to exhaust the winged lions and drive them away.


    Greem was still wondering why the Silver Union didn¡¯t just gather a group of powerful adepts to exterminate these winged lions. After all, they weren¡¯t all that powerful. Exterminating them would make the flight path even safer for everyone. The chip quickly provided him with an answer!


    The reason they didn¡¯t choose to exterminate these winged lions was precisely for the safety of the flight path!


    A forceful extermination might ensure the safety of the flight path in the short term. However, at the same time, it would also create a power vacuum in the area. The magical creatures were intelligent beings as well. The moment the powerful ruler of this area was gone, other powerful creatures would choose to move into this area.


    If that happened, getting used to the attack patterns and habits of the new magical creature would bring about a whole new host of problems for the Silver Union!


    Thus, after lengthy consideration, they decided to allow these powerful but non-threatening magical creatures to stay. This was the wisest and most well-informed decision the Silver Union coulde up with.


    After all, once the territories of the magical creatures were settled, the adepts only needed to prepare certain tricks to deal with each trouble that popped up. In doing so, they could easily pass through the area with minimal losses.


    Lion roars echoed from below the ship as Greem was absorbed in thought. Five radiant silhouettes appeared before his vision.


    Winged lions... so these were winged lions!


    Greem looked into the distance and saw several odd beasts that closely resembled lions.


    The winged lions were no different from the ordinary lionsmonly seen in forests. The only difference was how much more powerful and muscr they were.


    In particr, the two winged lions flying in the front, one male and one female, were as muscr and massive as a rhinoceros. A pair of wings made of shiny silver feathers extended from their ribs. The pair of strange twisted horns growing from their heads was also an extremely obvious trait.


    The three First Grade winged lion cubs behind them were several sizes smaller than their parents. That said, their ferocious and savage appearance still betrayed their status as the kings of the forest.


    The floating battleship had already removed the magic cloak on the outeryer. A semi-translucent barrier enveloped the ship, protecting it as it made its escape.


    A brilliant silver light radiated from the bodies of the winged lions. They beat their wings and dove towards the battleship, making an elegant and perfect curve in the air. As the position they were attacking was the other side of the ship, Greem didn¡¯t start attacking them. Rather, he turned around to look at how the adept opposite him dealt with the lions.


    Greem didn¡¯t know which area of Zhentarim this adept came from, but he could see that the adept was wearing green leather armor, ck pants, and a machete at his waist. He was even holding a massive bow asrge as himself in one hand. Right now, the gigantic bow had already been pulled into a crescent moon. ck light glowed around it. Greem could vaguely see the shape of an arrow gathering within.


    This adept was clearly an experienced veteran as well. He didn¡¯t fire his magical arrow early. Rather, he was patiently waiting for the best timing to strike. An adolescent winged lion had reached the barrier. The twisted horns on its head rammed into the barrier. Blinding white light surged forth from the tips of the horns and shed against the runes on the barrier.


    The barrier started to weaken and thin out. Just a moment more and the horns would pierce through the barrier. The adept finally struck.


    Ci. A sharp whistle in the air...


    A ck magical arrow shot out of the barrier, quick as lightning, and embedded itself into the winged lion¡¯s protective barrier. The magical arrow exploded before the winged lion could even react. Arge cloud of ck mist enveloped the front half of its body. Sizzling sounds could be heard as the mist corroded away at the defensive force field.


    The winged lion, caught by surprise, had been sted away. It somersaulted in the air several times before finally expanding its wings and stabilizing itself.


    The front half of its body had been stained a ck color by the spell shot at it earlier. The adolescent lion let out a raging roar as a blinding white light quickly engulfed its body, expelling all the outside energies that had found their way into its body. A short momentter, the white light faded away and the winged lion waspletely recovered. Even its wings, that had been corroded to a ck color, had be white once again.


    Light-attribute recovery spells!


    Greem licked his lips. Envy was showing in his eyes.


    The winged lion beat its wings and circled around the outside of the ship. Its ferocious gaze was trained on the adept that had slightly wounded it earlier. The lion let out a few angry roars and continued to fly around the battleship. It was calmly looking for the weak spots in the defensive light barrier.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel a strong desire burn in his heart as he looked upon these winged lions flying through the skies. He desperately wanted to leap out and catch one to serve as his own familiar. Flight,bat, and recovery? These magnificent steeds were the most suited to be the mounts of adepts!


    Those odd horns on their heads, in particr, seemed to be extremely powerful. They could gather light particles and use them to attack the enemies. Or they could use the light elementium to heal and regenerate their own bodies. The effect of their magic was no less effective than that of adepts that specialized in healing magic. If he owned a winged lion like that, wouldn¡¯t it just be like always having a healer by his side? If he ever sustainedbat injuries, he would no longer need to pinch his nose and swallow those strange potions with unknown contents!


    Greem clearly wasn¡¯t the only one with such thoughts. Almost all of the adepts looked at these magnificent flying beasts with burning desire in their hearts. However, everyone knew very well what they were made of. They wouldn¡¯t make such unwise moves such as trying to capture a Second Grade winged lion.


    The adepts had the advantageous position while they were within the battleship. Every time the winged lions wanted to dive and attack the barrier, they would fire their spells in unison and force the enemy to disengage. No one was dumb enough to charge out into the sky and start a battle of life and death with this group of winged lions!


    Meanwhile, Greem was also doing his best. A winged lion cub flew past the side of the ship he was on. The chip provided Greem with the speed and flight course of both the cub and the ship, and he was able to throw out a Magma Fireball in advance. Once the winged lion cub reached the position of the fireball, Greem immediately detonated it.


    A resonating boom!


    The cub waspletely engulfed by the explosive mes and boilingva.


    When it finally made its way out of the explosion with a tragic howl, much of its body had already been charred ck. Sharp magma fragments had pierced through the defensive force field around its body and had found their way into its flesh. Blood spilled from the sky.


    The winged lion cub¡¯s cry had also attracted the attention of the other winged lions.


    Several beams of white light shot towards the cub, and its terrible wounds vanished in an instant. It had regained its earlier magnificence.


    However, having been wounded once, the cub no longer dared to close in on the battleship so recklessly. It unfurled its wings and distanced itself from the ship. Then it started to shoot out white light from its horns, using it to assault the defensive barrier from a distance.


    This white light was extremely pure light energy. It was difficult to intercept these attacks with magic. The light elementium that shed against the defensive barrier would also explode and cause light bursts every so often, causing all of the adepts who were looking to be blinded by light.


    The duration of the blinding effect wasn¡¯t very long. It onlysted three to five seconds.


    However, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the disaster that might have urred if there wasn¡¯t ayer of defensive barrier between the adepts and the winged lions!


    As Greem battled, he gathered data on the winged lions with the help of the chip. The feedback from the chip proved a terrifying fact. If he engaged in a fair duel with one of those First Grade lion cubs, he would have no more than a thirty percent chance of victory.


    Of course, this percentage was calcted without the inclusion of his golems and his me Fiend Transformation. This was also the meager chance of victory that most adepts had!


    Greem could truly feel the strength and terror of the magical creatures that resided within the ck forest.


    Without the battleship¡¯s cloak, the protection of the barrier, or the aid of numerous magical tools and items, the human adepts were no more than fodder when pitted against these wild beasts!


    No wonder the three adept organizations on the Continent couldst this long!


    If the human adepts hadn¡¯t gathered together and united their strengths, they would probably have been overwhelmed and reced by a tide of powerful magical creatures. Their rule over the World of Adepts would havee to an end.

 Chapter 275

    Chapter 275 The Harpy Kingdom


    The battle with the winged lions was more like a game!


    It was no matter of life and death.


    The floating battleship continued to maintain a thick defensive barrier as it slowly flew away from the winged lions¡¯ hunting area.


    The adolescent winged lions also seemed to be uninterested in damaging the ship. Rather, they were training the cubs to fly and hunt. Even though they would asionally tackle the barrier with all their might, they spent most of their time circling above the ship, roaring and trying to intimidate the adepts.


    Both parties fought as they flew, and finally, when the floating battleship crossed a raging river, the winged lions stopped their pursuit. They hovered in the air and roared threateningly at the ship before returning home.


    It seemed that this ten meter wide stream was the border between them and another group of magical creatures. A blood war would probably erupt between the two if the winged lion crossed the border!


    The battleship gradually started to elerate after leaving the winged lions behind it. It continued to cruise along its nned path within the forest.


    ording to the Silver Union adepts¡¯ briefing, the next area they were passing through was the first danger zone along the flight path¨C the den of the harpies.


    In truth, Greem was so shocked by the news that his eyes almost fell out. The weak harpies were the first dungeon boss they were facing?


    How was this possible?


    Greem¡¯s impression of the harpies was that they were extremely weak. These creatures with the heads of female humans and the bodies of vultures should be extremely low-level magical creatures. A single magical fireball would be able to kill an entire group of them. How were they more dangerous than winged lions and Hill Giants? How did they form a danger zone on their own?!


    A lot of the adepts were clearly as confused as Greem.


    Thus, the Silver Union adept gave them a basic exnation on the characteristics of harpies.


    Indeed, most of the harpy tribes that the adepts met in the wild were extremely useless and weak. So feeble and frail that they were no threat at all. The reason was because the size of the harpy tribes were often way too small.


    Harpy tribes with only around a hundred members weren¡¯t even worth an adept¡¯s time. Ordinary mercenaries and adventurers only needed sufficient preparation, and they too would be able to exterminate an entire tribe.


    This was because there were no low-level harpies with magical power within these tribes. The only thing they could do in a fight was drop some boulders from overhead and dive at enemies with wooden spears in their ws.


    That said, the harpy tribes had a very prominent characteristic.


    The moment the number of their tribe members swelled above five hundred harpies, a harpy witch with magical powers would be born in the tribe. They would shed most of the feathers on their bodies. Other than their wings and the ws of their feet, they were basically no different from human females.


    Moreover, if there were over a thousand tribe members, a terrifying head witch would be born among the harpy witches. This was a powerful caster that was no weaker from human adepts. They even had the agility of assassins to go along with their tremendous magical powers.


    The harpy tribe they were about toe into contact with was a massive tribe of over ten thousand harpies. Thus, there were over a thousand harpy witches born within the tribe.


    A thousand agile spellcasting harpy witches. This was a fearsome opponent no matter where it was on the Continent of Adepts. Even powerful magical creatures like the winged lions wouldn¡¯t recklessly offend this swarm of harpies. They would drown in their numbers within moments.


    Thus, the obstacle before them was no mere harpy tribe. It was a fearsome harpy kingdom! Not only did they have an extremely intelligent leader, they also had proper distribution andposition of sses spread across all the harpies.


    This meant that they hadmanding officers, spellcasters, and so many warriors they could blot out the sun. It was a risky venture every time the floating battleship passed through here.


    However even if this ce was a danger zone, it was still possible to pass through if everyone worked together. This was much better than trying to break through the surrounding death zones!


    Right now, the battleship was already fifty thousand kilometers deep into the ck forest. If they strayed from the flight path at this point, it was very likely that they would stumble into the territory of Third Grade magical creatures. Their chances of escaping the attack of a Third Grade magical creature were almost non-existent with how weak they were.


    There had already been three such cases of battleships being destroyed by Third Grade magical creatures over the past hundred years. All of the passengers involved died. Even though the Silver Union sent out top-grade adepts to exterminate and exact vengeance on the responsible magical creatures, the dead would nevere back to life.


    Thus, even if they knew the might of the harpy kingdom, they had no choice. The Silver Union could only choose to fly across the border areas of the harpy kingdom if they wanted to avoid the more terrifying Third Grade creatures.


    ............


    Three dayster.


    The first brutal battle since Greem boarded the ship broke out because of a coincidental meeting!


    They had, very unfortunately, walked into a hunting party sent out by the harpies.


    It was a small party of no more than thirty harpies, and most of them were just ordinary harpies. They were two mutated harpies amongst their ranks. One of them was a harpy assassin, while the other was a low-grade harpy witch.


    These stubborn fellows wereplete idiots. Even though they were much weaker whenpared to the adepts, they still insisted on blocking the way of the ship. Almost all of them were killed in a single wave of spells. Sadly the two mutated harpies were able to escape.


    The very next day, the floating battleship was surrounded as it flew over a chasm. The harpy army had hurried over the moment they received word about the ship!


    The floating battleship cruised forward with great difficulty.


    The harpies were circling and flying around the egg-shaped barrier. Their piercing shouts were so loud they could even shatter the eardrums of anyone listening to them.


    Most of the harpies didn¡¯t have any control over magic elementium. They beat their gray wings and charged at the defensive barrier with wooden spears in their ws. These crude attacks might work against ordinary beasts, but they werepletely useless when used to attack a defensive barrier.


    As such, a thousand harpies attacking in unison achieved absolutely nothing. Other than causing some ripples across the barrier, they only thing they achieved was exhausting a little of the ship¡¯s reserve energy. They had absolutely no chance of cracking the defensive arrays!


    However, there were some unique individuals that had undergone mutation among their ranks.


    Harpies were usually creatures with gray feathers and ugly appearances. They looked more like birds than humans. However the mutated individuals had already shed the feathers on their bodies. Only a few patches of blue feathers remained on their joints.


    Their exposed skin was white and smooth. Their figures were slim and curvaceous, with exceptionally delicate and perfect facial features. However, their eyes were as red as blood, their fingers crooked and sharp, and a pair of horrendous ws grew beneath their thighs where their feet was supposed to be.


    Honestly, if one were to ignore those ugly wings and ws, these harpy witches could be said to be extremely beautiful humanoid creatures!


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, some mixed-blood harpy witches had joined the adept organizations on the East Coast. Those were the mixed-blood descendants born of human adepts and harpy witches.


    Of course, this also proved that some human adepts had really unusual tastes!


    The adepts attacked with all their strength to drive the harpies away. They couldn¡¯t be allowed to deal more damage to the defensive arrays protecting the battleship. Spells of every color and effect exploded like fireworks around the ship. One after another, the harpies were engulfed by powerful elementium vortices.


    A snowstorm enveloped most of they sky, the chill quickly applying ayer of light blue frost over every single harpy caught in it. Countless harpies tried their best to beat their gray wings, but they could only feel their wings bing heavier and heavier.


    Eventually the harpies started to fall from the sky, screaming as they did so.


    They quickly regained their ability to fly after they left the area covered by the snowstorm. Still, the appearance of the storm had disrupted the pace and rhythm of their attack, sowing chaos into the ranks of the harpies.


    A wind adept standing not far from Greem released a wind spell with arge area-of-effect. The peaceful skies were suddenly filled with danger and terror. Invisible tornadoes of wind hid in the air. Any harpies that identally stumbled into this area would be sliced to pieces by the swirling winds. Pungent mists of blood would erupt in the air.


    Greem, on the other hand, didn¡¯t summon his golems or use his me Fiend Transformation. Instead he took out his Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter and behaved as any other fire adept would, slowly firing off one fire spell after another.


    He ceaselessly chanted and cast spells. His loud and firm chanting of profound and difficult spells rang out, and a red pir of fire was conjured in mid air. Powerful ripples of fire spread out from the pir. All of the harpies engulfed by the ripples would be burnt to death. Even those that survived had their wings charred and ruined, and were sent falling a thousand meters towards the ground.


    The ordinary adepts had no ability to fly after their feathers had beenpletely reduced to ashes.


    As Greem continued to channel several powerful fire spells, he looked about at the chaos going on around him. Periodically, fire would burn in his eyes and a powerful Scalding Ray would shoot out towards the harpies.


    It was way too much of a waste to use Sr Rays against these unarmored and unprotected harpies. The inferior Scalding Ray was more than enough to get the job done!


    The Scalding Ray shot out continuously, piercing through the bodies of the harpies and sentencing them to a painful death as they fell from the air. ck patterns would spread all over their body as they fell.


    The poison from the Scroll of Voodoo would quickly take their lives even if the Scalding Ray hadn¡¯t managed to kill them.


    Feathers and blood filled the air around the battleship.


    The harpies were being ughtered by the adepts!

 Chapter 276

    Chapter 276 The Hunt


    Three slim and beautiful silhouettes were gathered together deep in the back ranks of the harpy army as the adepts recklessly exterminated the attacking harpies. It seemed they were in the middle of some sort of discussion.


    "It is almost time!" A head witch with a pair of snow white feet and a red feather robe draped over her shoulders instructed, ¡°Lana, make sure you act quicklyter. Catch as many as you can once Natalia breaks through the barrier with her innate ability. You must leave the moment you receive the signal. Otherwise it would be a troublesome affair trying to save you after the barrier closes. Do you understand?"


    "Understood!"


    "Understood!"


    The two witches standing beside her bowed respectfully.


    Ordinary harpy witches were simr to the apprentice adepts in human society. They had some elementium casting ability, but their Spirit was still insufficient for their spirit origin to be elevated to the next level. Only harpy witches that had reached First Grade could change their appearances.


    An ordinary harpy witch would shed their feathers when they advanced to First Grade. When they advanced to Second Grade, their trademark ws would also morph into human feet. If they were fortunate enough to advance once more and turn into Third Grade harpy witches, their physical bodies would be no different from a human adept. The only difference would be in their bloodline.


    All three of the harpy witches had beautiful feet rather than the ws somonly associated with harpies. This meant that each of them were harpy witches over Second Grade, and had alreadypleted their second evolution.


    An army of a hundred First Grade witches gathered around the three Second Grade harpy witches, silently guarding them.


    Any male would probably fall into a daze if he was standing among their ranks. Every single one of the witches here had pretty faces, alluring figures, and ample bosoms. Strangely enough, not a single male could be seen among their ranks!


    The head witch finally gave the order and the army of witches moved out after hiding for so long.


    Piercing screeches rang out in the sky. One after another, the agile and elegant harpy witches flew out from the ranks of the ordinary harpies. They quickly circled around the battleship, hurling wind des and lightning balls at the defensive barrier.


    The addition of this army of spellcasters instantly caused the resilient defensive barrier to tremble intensely. More and more of the mysterious runes appeared on the surface of the barrier.


    The types of magic the harpy witches could cast was extremely limited. It was usually limited to just wind and lightning magic. The strength of their attacks was also pathetic, ranging between thirty to fifty points of damage. However, regardless of how weak they were, there was no stopping the strength of their numbers. There were a hundred of them after all. The wind des and lightning balls continued to crash against the defensive barrier, cing tremendous stress on the magic arrays.


    "Stop attacking the ordinary harpies. Shoot those damned spellcasters out of the sky! Hurry, hurry, hurry... " The Silver Union in charge of coordinating the adepts was in a panic. He shouted all over the ship as he took out a Fireball Wand from his waist, instantly shooting five fireballs towards those harpy witches.


    The other adepts instantly adjusted the direction of their attacks, focusing their fire towards the spellcasters.


    ............


    Inside the cabin.


    Alice was lying beside the window of the tiny room with nothing to do. She rested her head on her tiny hands, looking on as the colorful battle erupted outside.


    One after another, the ugly and savage harpies tackled the barrier. They used their spears, their beaks, their ws, and anything they had to tear at the semi-translucent defensive barrier. At one point, the disgusting faces of the harpies had evene within ten meters of Alice. There was an imprable barrier and a window between the two.


    Moreover she was already a pseudo-adept, and a cute pseudo-adept who had mastered spatial magic at that! Still, there was no ce for her on the battlefield like this.


    At the start of the battle all of the servants, followers, and apprentices had been ordered to stay within the cabin. As such, she could only look on coldly as the harpies were brutally ughtered. Reduced to cinders, electrocuted, having all the water in their bodies extracted by dark magic...


    There were all kinds of magic, and the harpies could attest to this. After all, they were the ones dying in a variety of odd and peculiar ways!


    Alice¡¯s eyes suddenly lit up when those harpy witches appeared. She pressed her face against the window, looking enviously at the plentiful bosoms of the witches bouncing about as they flew quickly around the ship. She looked down at her seven year old body and her t and smooth chest. Her expression instantly soured!


    Dammit! Even a bunch of humanoid monsters arerger than me! Bastards! You lot aren¡¯t even humans, what¡¯s the point of having suchrge breasts? Curses upon you hags...


    However, just as Alice was indulging in her own stupid thoughts, a light ripple in the air caught her attention.


    Spatial flux? Hm? Why would there be spatial flux here?


    Alice closed her eyes and tried to sense the spatial flux. The spatial ripples hadn¡¯t urred within the defensive barrier. Rather, they wereing from the outside. Didn¡¯t this mean... the one manipting space wasn¡¯t an adept on the ship, but a harpy witch?!


    Even though Alice was still angry at Greem, she was fully aware of how reliant she was on him right now. Thus Alice quickly contacted her so called ¡¯master¡¯ using their mental link.


    ............


    Spatial flux?


    Greem fell deep into thought the moment he received Alice¡¯s message. He was doubtful.


    Spatial Magic wasn¡¯t so easily mastered!


    Time and Spatial Magic were heralded as the hardest to learn within all the branches of magic. Usually an adept wouldn¡¯t even be able to learn these magics if they didn¡¯t have the necessary affinity.


    The Fire Teleportation that Greem himself had mastered might look like Spatial Magic, but its true nature was just a clever use of fire magic. It waspletely different from Spatial Magic.


    Harpies, on the other hand, had even more mediocre talents whenpared to adepts. Most of them only had wind affinity or lightning affinity. Wasn¡¯t the chance of one of them awakening a spatial affinity way too low?


    Even though it was a remindering from Alice, Greem wasn¡¯t too convinced. However, considering the power of spatial magic, Greem decided to y it safe. He quickly and subtly cast a small spell on himself.


    Apart from this, he didn¡¯t share Alice¡¯s warning with the Silver Union adept. After all, this was information he himself wasn¡¯t too sure about. If it proved to be wrong, he would end up as a joke amongst the other adepts.


    However, a massive disturbance urred at the back of the ship as Greem was still hesitating!


    The sudden appearance of the harpy witches had drawn the attention of all the adepts. Powerful and mighty spells sted towards their dancing figures, leaving colorful fireworks in the air as they exploded.


    Yet, as their gazes were drawn to the witches, the Second Grade Harpy Witch Natalia had taken the opportunity to sneak over to the other side of the barrier.


    A ck vortex appeared in her hands and she pressed it against the imprable barrier. Arge hole suddenly opened in the barrier, which was supposedly able to defend against all elementium damage. The runic energies of the barrier were absorbed by the strange ck vortex, causing a massive opening in the defense system.


    The Second Grade Silver Union adept who was silently guarding the magic arrays at the core of the ship raised his head up in shock. He could sense a breach in the defensive barrier.


    What was happening? Had the defensive barrier been destroyed? No, everything was still functioning!


    A strange flux suddenly appeared on the deck of the floating battleship as the adept was still recovering from the shock. The space had been shattered and a rift had opened in mid air. Two strange harpy witches walked out of the rift and appeared before the human adepts.


    Some adepts were still caught up in ughtering the harpies on the outside. The two harpy witches with perfect figures and light blue wings moved before the adepts had even noticed the trouble behind them.


    A sharp and piercing scream filled the entire ship. All of the adepts affected by the strange soundwave felt their vision blur. They were no longer able to control their bodies or draw upon their magical powers.


    The two Second Grade harpy witches used their agility to dive towards the adepts, quickly capturing several adepts and throwing them into the spatial rift beforeing back for more. They had already caught five human adepts in a matter of seconds.


    All the adepts on the ship started to panic as this urred. They threw their most powerful spells at the enemy that had mysteriously appeared on board, while desperately avoiding capture by the harpies.


    However, any adept would be hard-pressed to escape the piercing screams and agile shapes of these Second Grade magical creatures. Greem was an unfortunate one as well. He was right within the hunting range of the two harpy witches!


    A creaking sound started to ring out in the air. The spatial rift that had been forcibly torn open was slowly closing under the powerful regenerative ability of space itself. The rift trembled slightly. It was obvious that it couldn¡¯tst much longer.


    A massive wave of runic energies surged forth around the hole in the defensive barrier, reducing the massive opening into a small hole the size of a fist. The defense system of the ship would once again beplete the moment this hole disappeared. At that point, the two harpy witches would no longer be able to escape using the spatial rift.


    "You two hurry up... I can¡¯t keep it up for much longer!" Natalia shouted at the two harpy witches as she did her best to maintain the hole in the barrier.


    The two harpy witches looked at each other and made a decision.


    "We will capture onest round of adepts!"


    The two silhouettes let out another piercing scream as each of them dashed towards a target of their own, quick as lightning.


    And the target of the head witch was Greem!

 Chapter 277

    Chapter 277 Arrival at the Union


    The harpy head witch was extremely fast!


    There was no way Greem could possibly escape her grasp at the speed at which she was lunging at him.


    Thus Greem stopped moving. His fire elementium started to boil and surge around his body. Just half a second more, and Greem would be able to turn into elementium and teleport from the spot.


    Unfortunately a stunning scream found its way into his ears right as he was about toplete his spell.


    Greem stumbled as he lost control over his body, which had just turned into mes. He had failed to escape in time.


    The head witch¡¯s cool hand gripped his body before he could calm himself down and think of anything else. Violent lightning energies surged into Greem¡¯s body, instantly crippling him and taking away every ounce of strength he had left in his body.


    The head witch grabbed his body and quickly dashed towards the crumbling space rift.


    Greem barely managed to regather his scattered thoughts during this short buffer. He looked at the space rift right before his eyes and used what was left of his strength to wave his Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter. He then activated the small spell he had prepared in advance.


    Boom. A muffled explosion rang out.


    The Fire Deity suddenly appeared on the deck.


    Before it could even announce its arrival upon this realm with a massive roar, its ming body was reced by Greem¡¯s tall figure. The Fire Deity mysteriously appeared in the witch¡¯s hand and was brought along into the spatial rift.


    Fire Deity Summon!


    Puppet Substitution!


    This wasn¡¯t a teleportation spell of the spatial magic series. Rather, it was a me golem substitution that waspleted using the mental signature left on the Fire Deity.


    The head witch almost seemed to have realized the change at the moment she charged into the spatial rift. However, she could no longer stop the momentum of her body. She and the other harpy witch disappeared into the spatial rift, and the pitch-ck vortex finally closed.


    The hole on the defensive barrier had finally disappeared as well.


    The floating battleship shook vigorously for a moment. Ferocious and violent runic energies surged out of the core of the ship, reinforcing the defensive abilities by a hundred, even a thousand fold,pletely wiping out the spatial disturbances left behind by the harpies.


    The harpies outside the boat seemed to have received an order. They quickly scattered in every direction, screeching as they did so. They beat their gray wings and flew every which way as they retreated from the battle.


    For a moment, the entire sky was filled with gray silhouettes. The mutated harpy witches were mixed within the crowd, making it hard for the adepts to identify the culprits of the earlier attack!


    Peace returned to the battleship a short moment¡¯stter. The shrouded sun once again shone upon the adepts.


    They looked at each other aimlessly, still stunned from the terrifying attack that had urred earlier.


    What happened just now?


    Everything was going smoothly! They were doing their best to ughter the reckless harpies, how did... how did a couple of harpy witches break inside of the barrier and kill... no, abduct six of them?!


    Greem was in shock as well. Even the me Fiend¡¯s Heart that had been sealed in his chest started to beat rapidly, causing his blood itself to boil intensely. He had to expend a lot of his energy before he was able to suppress the fiery riot happening within his body. It was a long time before he calmed down.


    When he turned his head to gaze at the distance, he could no longer see the harpies¡¯ fleeing silhouettes on the horizon. The adepts looked around the deck. There were six less adepts on the ship, and some of them were acquaintances of other adepts that were taking this trip.


    Greem was still confused about the harpies abducting the human adepts, but the chip quickly filled in the details with itsrge library of knowledge.


    The harpies were an usual race. There were only females in their tribe, but never males. This meant that the harpy kingdom was a kingdom of females. There wasn¡¯t a single guy that lived with the harpies. Thus, they had to rely on other races if they wanted to mate and leave offsprings for the tribe!


    The harpies were usually istionist creatures. It was only when an individual harpy had reached mating season that they would go out to hunt for males of other races. They would then catch them and bring them back as mates. The harpies might seem absolutely weak and pathetic, but their genes were extremely strong and resilient. It didn¡¯t matter what sort of odd race they mated with, the offspring would always be a harpy of pure bloodline.


    Of course, some adept schrs believed in another theory; a theory that the offspring of the harpies were of mixed descent. However they would abandon all the offspring with impure bloodlines, choosing to rear only those with pure bloodlines. This was how they managed to retain the purity of the tribe¡¯s bloodline!


    ording to ancient texts, the offspring of harpy witches and human adepts were more likely to have magical talent.


    As such, there were many cases of human males being abducted as mating tools in areas close to harpy settlements. However cases like today, where they actually seeded in abducting adepts, had never been heard of!


    All the adepts on board couldn¡¯t help but cast their gazes at the coordinating Silver Union adept.


    "Are we not pursuing them? Are we letting them take away ourpanions just like that? " An adept couldn¡¯t help but demand angrily.


    "How do we chase them? Where do we chase them to?" The face of the Silver Union adept instantly soured, "These are the depths of the ck Forest! Any change to the flight path could spell doom for this ship. Do you really think that we should invade the harpy kingdom for the sake of some unfortunate fools? There are over ten thousand harpies and over a thousand harpy witches there... "


    The adepts fell silent!


    Everyone was upset about the situation. Yet the moment that the thought of death crossed their minds, any dissatisfaction or ideas of saving their allies quickly vanished.


    The Silver Union adept turned and eyed Greem. He nodded and said, "You are very lucky!"


    He then announced loudly, "The Silver Union will be responsible for thepensation of the ns and organizations those adepts belonged to. However, all of you should already have prepared yourself for such an oue the moment you stepped on this ship. We will try our best to fix the loopholes in our defensive barrier. We assure you that such a thing will not happen again! ... "


    The silver-robed adept continued to ramble on with an encouraging and motivating speech, but all of the adepts were still frowning deeply. They had lost all their confidence for the journey forward.


    Just then, the Second Grade adept of the Silver Union emerged from under the deck. He took a long cold look at everyone.


    "I know what you are afraid of! I can represent the Silver Union in giving you our word. The same thing will never happen again. To think that two mutated harpy witches had appeared amongst the ranks of the harpies, and that one of them was the rarely seen space caster. This waspletely out of our expectations. I have already made the necessary modifications to the array. It is absolutely impossible for them tounch another attack like that one. So everyone can put aside your concerns, and we can continue on our way!"


    Having said that, the Second Grade adept went back under the deck, returning to the core control room.


    The adepts could only look at each other helplessly. There was nothing they could do but ept the reality before them. One by one they returned to their rooms to rest.


    Greem smiled as he listened to Adept Angus¡¯ words of care and concern, before silently returning to his room.


    It was only when Greem locked the door and sealed the room with a simple magical array that he betrayed his true feelings. His face fell, and the smile was reced with a frown. He sat on the crude wooden chair as he recalled the fight earlier.


    If he had been slightly weaker, or even without his preparations in advance, all of his ambitions would have gone down the drain. He would be reduced to the terrible state of being a mating tool of the harpy witches!


    A massive kingdom of over a thousand harpy witches. There didn¡¯t need to be too many adolescent witches amongst their ranks. One tenth of them would mean a hundred harpy witches waiting to mate with you. Moreover, the rate of pregnancy with adepts was never high. They were beings with extremely low rates of birth. Thus, if once wasn¡¯t enough, then twice, and thrice...


    Just thinking of the nightmarish hell of being a prisoner and mating ve was enough to make Greem cringe in fear. He could feel the muscles on his face start to twitch uncontrobly. An unrestrained anger filled his heart. He was so frustrated that he just wanted to go out on a killing spree.


    Greem instantly identified this as a side effect of the corruption from the abyssal aura. He didn¡¯t dare to dy. He quickly took out several vials from his belt and swallowed their contents.


    These were all potions that could calm the nerves and suppress his emotions. Even though drinking them inrge doses would cause certain side effects, Greem knew his emotions were running out of control, and was not going to fret over some insignificant consequences.


    Perhaps the ident in the harpy¡¯s territory hadn¡¯t been an ident, but a premeditated attack. This was why the battleship¡¯s journey was unusually smooth and unobstructed after the harpies had seeded in their abduction. The adepts quickly and sessfully left from the harpy kingdom.


    Fifteen dayster, the floating battleship passed by the territory of the Forest Spirits.


    Both parties shed in a tremendous fight, and the battleship managed to charge through the ce, suffering some damage in the process....


    One monthter, the floating battleship passed through the Frost Giant¡¯s territory.


    Once more, they were able to forcefully make their way across using the resilient defenses of the ship...


    Two monthster, the battleship was attacked by arge flock of thunder rocs at the final danger zone along their flight path.


    The defensive barrier had even been breached twice.


    Two adepts died before they managed to drive away the enemies...


    Finally, on the seventy second day since the adepts boarded the floating battleship, they passed through the ck Forest. They had finally arrived in the territory controlled by the Silver Union.


    The floating battleship dragged its broken body across the sky, slowly cruising out of the ck Forest.


    Greem stood at the bow of the ship, gazing at the ins in the distance. The evesting stretch of ck was slowly fading away, reced by the long-awaited green ins and brown earth.


    A tall adept¡¯s tower stood silently in the horizon. The striking brilliance of magical arrays flowed along the length of its structure. Several magical ripples scanned the entire area. A small watchtower had been ced every few kilometers along the edge of the ck Forest. A weak magical flux could be felt emanating from them.


    The massive adept¡¯s tower and the smaller watchtowers worked together, forming a defensive web to protect thisnd that humans so desperately needed to survive.


    Several ck shadows appeared in the distant skies, as if they had discovered the ship.


    A group of adepts riding on gigantic eagles were hurrying over!


    The Silver Union adept appeared in front of everyone once again. He announced loudly and excitedly, "My friends that havee from faraway ces, and journeyed over such long distances, wee to the territories of the Silver Union.


    "The Silver Union wees your arrival!"

 Chapter 278

    Chapter 278 Sigma City


    The adepts flew for another seventy kilometers before arriving at the first city under the rule of the Silver Union¨C Sigma City.


    As one of only two entrances into the Silver Union¡¯s territory, the magnificence and liveliness of Sigma City was beyondpare. Even adepts from prestigious ns in the central area would drop all their arrogance and pride and use their utmost effort to learn of all the rules and regtions within the Silver Union¡¯s territory.


    Greem had gained a basic understanding of the situation on the way here.


    The Silver Union¡¯s territory stood at the west coast of the continent, and there was one group of individuals you should never offend while you were here. The silver-robed Union adepts.


    Of course, if you were confident in your ability to kill a silver-robed adept without being discovered... Greem saw plenty of those small watchtowers along the way. There were also numerous mysterious spherical constructs patrolling in the air.


    All of these appeared to be part of a massive security system.


    It was pure fantasy to even dream of killing a silver-robed adept without being discovered.


    With the help of divination magic and image reying magic, the murderer would easily be identified as long as a single clue was left behind!


    The best way to ensure your own safety and prosperity here was to avoid conflict with the silver robes.


    The second group of individuals that one shouldn¡¯t provoke were the esoteric adepts. It didn¡¯t matter how broke or how bad they appeared to be faring.


    The Silver Union was an organization formed from a group of esoteric adepts. The silver-robed adepts were the executors of the Union, while the esoteric adepts were the very foundation of the Union. This was why the esoteric adepts had iparable status within the territories of the Silver Union. There was already obvious oppression and bias against adepts of other branches.


    Fortunately the authorities of the Silver Union weren¡¯t short-sighted fools. They would often take the side of the esoteric adepts in cases of conflicts and tensions between adepts. However, they would always ensure that the talented adepts of other branches were still well-treated and given due respect.


    The floating ship finally ended its journey at Sigma City.


    Travel within the safe territories was usually carried out using the smaller flying ships. The flying battleship was reserved solely for the journey through the ck Forest.


    The adepts quickly went their own ways after they got off the ship.


    Everyone had their own distinct reason foring to the west coast. Even though they all had to visit the Castle in the Sky eventually, it was still a twenty day trip from Sigma City. Thus everyone went on their own ways, on their own errands as they headed towards the Castle in the Sky.


    The Byron n also had an outpost here in Sigma City. However, the outpost was located in the west side of the city. Greem and Angus would have to walk through half of the city to make their way there.


    Greem could see that Adept Angus was in a hurry. It seemed he was desperate to reach the outpost for an update on the situation. Greem, on the other hand, wanted to observe the local culture. After all, this was his first time in a territory controlled by one of the massive adept organizations.


    The two had a quick discussion. Adept Angus settled on a meeting spot before hurrying to the outpost with the few n members he had brought with him.


    Greem, Alice, and Snox were left alone.


    This was apletely different city. A unique city.


    There were no towering walls around the city, or massive watchtowers built around its perimeters. Its streets were neat and orderly and its buildings were tall,rge, and made of marble. Apprentice adepts wearing short grey robes were everywhere in the streets, along with muscr mercenaries and adventures.


    However the loaded carts and carriages were even more numerous. There were also merchants, warriors, wanderers and civilians in the crowd.


    Perhaps due to the humid and warm weather, most of the locals wore clothes made of thin and light cloth. They dressed in an extremely colorful fashion. All of their clothes were dyed in bright colors: white, red, blue, yellow, and so many more. The ordinary humans were wearing long sleeved tunics, loose pants, and leather boots. Their expressions were rxed and joyful, unlike the dull and depressed expressions that the citizens of other human settlements so often wore on their faces.


    Every so often, Greem would see some adepts walking through the streets, their massive stone golems and steel statues rumbling behind them. The crowd made way for them as they passed, but none of them seemed especially fearful of the adepts.


    The adepts here seemed to have integrated with the civilians. There wasn¡¯t much mystery or obvious difference in ss between the two parties.


    If Greem was to give an evaluation of his own, Zhentarim was extremelyrge and rich in resources. However, there were too many ns within Zhentarim, causing countless conflicts and battles throughout the years. Even after the formation of a loose alliance of the ns, the ability of the Zhentarim Association was still limited. They could not restrain the ns or execute any of theirws in an efficient manner. There wasn¡¯t much they could do.


    It was much different here.


    This was a territory ruled and owned solely by the Silver Union. This was whyw and order was very well upheld here. No outsiders dared to challenge to authority of the Silver Union here!


    Moreover, the Silver Union¡¯s policy of weing travellers and encouraging trade resulted in a huge influx of outside adepts and elites. The arrival of these talents undoubtedly elerated the speed at which knowledge and resources gathered about the Silver Union.


    This ce was clearly much more lively and much more peaceful whenpared to the Zhentarim area!


    Greem¡¯s tall figure of two meters in height was a curious sight whenpared to two tiny fellows who were only one meter in height. They drew plenty of gazes as they walked down the street. However anyone that dared toe close to Greem would instantly feel an aura pressing upon them. This was the calm, wise and ruthless aura unique to adepts, as well as mental suppression from a being above them on the food chain.


    Greem looked silently at the crowd as they panicked and hurriedly made way for him. The apprentice adepts were also looking over with expressions of shock. He was a little speechless at their reaction. In the end, he silently retracted his aura and tried his best to suppress his mental flux.


    He was far too used to living in the Zhentarim area. He didn¡¯t need to consider the effect of his mental suppression when he went out in public. Greem still retained his beliefs from his previous life, and believed that all life was equal. He wouldn¡¯t ever treat the ordinary mortals as livestock and servants. However, the arrogant and prideful attitude of the adepts had subtly shifted his attitude as well.


    Inparison, the Silver Union had intentionally created a much more equal societal atmosphere. This was a superior decision whenpared to the Zhentarim Association, as so many more elite and talented individuals were still able to demonstrate their abilities, even though they weren¡¯t adepts. If Greem had the freedom of choice, he genuinely believed the environment in the Silver Union would be far more suited for him!


    "Are we just going to stand here all day?" Alice tiptoed and tried her best to see over the crowd. She appeared to be extremely excited to go touring around the city, "That ce seems really lively!"


    Snox also spotted some creatures of other races mixed within the crowd. These were either the servants of adepts, or humanoid creatures that had obtained proper citizenship. They mingled with the apprentices, warriors, and the mercenaries, chatting happily as they carried the corpses of several magical creatures on their backs. They walked into store after store and arcane shop after arcane shop, trying their best to sell their spoils of war from hunting.


    Greem cautiously removed Snox¡¯s Spell of Concealment and he went back to his appearance of a goblin.


    He stood in the crowd and looked at the people¡¯s reaction to him. It was only when he saw that no one was disgusted or shocked that Snox was able to let out a sigh of relief. For the first time in his life, he would be able to puff his chest and stand up straight. He was finally able to show his true appearance in a human city ruled by an adept with no fear for how he was treated.


    "I love this ce!" Snox screamed frantically at the bottom of his heart.


    Greem felt the passion and joy from his two followers and couldn¡¯t help but let out a smallugh as he shook his head. The three of them quickly made their way into the crowd once more.


    Having retracted and suppressed his mental flux, Greem looked just like a young noble with an extraordinary temperament. He was handsome and charming. Even without the suppression from his Spirit, his two-meter tall body was still an intimidating sight. All the pedestrians would naturally make way wherever he walked. No one dared to stand in his way.


    Greem¡¯s gaze wandered about the shops by the side of the road as he walked.


    A florist, tailor, grocery store, leather dealer, pharmacist, a pet store...


    Greem even saw an interesting shop on the way. Tolson¡¯s Lost and Found. It was a small business that helped citizens find their lost possessions using divination magic. The owner of the store was an advanced apprentice. Clearly he was looking to use his magical talents to earn a little pocket money!


    The florist shops, on the other hand, didn¡¯t sell ordinary flowers. It wasn¡¯t roses, tulips, or blue lilies that they sold. Rather, the products they offered were adept resources. These were things like Glowmoon Flowers, Sr Flowers, Golden Ginseng, and Dragonbone Grass. These nts were either useful for apprentices¡¯ meditation, cultivating and improving bloodline powers, or were justmon materials used by potions apprentices...


    The tailor¡¯s also sold apprentice and adept robes with special magical enhancements. They even sold some adept storage tools within their shops.


    The leather dealers bought the corpses and skins of magical creatures from the adventurers or apprentices. They also paid for the blood, bones, and flesh of these magical creatures.


    The flesh of magical creatures was imbued with elementium. As long as the poison could be extracted from their flesh, the meat would be a perfect magic-infused material for cooking. The bones could be carved into simple decorative ornaments and essories with the proper work put in. These essories would have certain magical powers.


    While adepts would never need such weak items, they were considered precious and valuable objects by apprentices and the nobles.


    Greem finally understood, after a walk through the streets with Alice and Snox. As the eastern entrance into the ck Forest, Sigma City only sold resources targeted at the middle ss. Ordinary citizens would never be able to afford these items.


    Greem shook his head in pity after a quick tour.


    These resources might be useful for Alice, but they were too ordinary andmon for a true adept. It seemed there was probably a particr ce where adepts went to trade when they were looking for resources.


    Greem turned and looked at the massive adept¡¯s tower standing at the center of the city. He turned to leave some simple instructions with Alice and tossed a magic crystal card her way. Greem then left Alice and Snox to their own devices as he headed in another direction.

 Chapter 279

    Chapter 279 Core Magics


    It was a necessity to gather local knowledge wherever you went.


    This was almost an instinct engraved into the souls of each and every adept!


    Even though it might not be possible to get his hands on any rare or unique knowledge, Greem would be happy to collect any knowledge on the west coast and its cities.


    The flying ship going onwards to the Castle in the Sky arrived on their second day in Sigma City.


    Having experienced the local culture within the Silver Union, Greem and the others set out towards the holy city of the esoteric adepts¨C the Castle in the Sky.


    Night.


    Greem was draped in a ck robe. He sat by his table, continuously writing on a scroll with a white quill in his hand. It seemed he was calcting something. Countless symbols, forms, and numbers filled the parchment. Blue light gleamed within his ck eyes as his quill continued to scratch against the parchment. It was clear that the chip was also calcting something at a very high speed.


    In honesty, most of the calctions and deductions werepleted by the chip. Greem¡¯s job was organizing and writing out the numbers that the chip output. He then used these numbers as a foundation and started considering his future development.


    His sense and control over the other elementium particles had gradually weakened after he chose fire mastery. Yet at the same time this allowed his fire spells to have more room for improvement.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the range of the Fire Teleportation, or the ssh damage of the Magma Fireball, or the core damage of Fire Core Explosion. All of his spells had reached the very limits that his Spirit could allow. The one hundred and fifteen points of fire damage that the Fire Core Explosion could output was already at the very limits of what First Grade adepts could usually do. Most ordinary adepts could only do between eighty to a hundred damage with their spells. Those who could do above a hundred were so few they could almost be counted with two hands.


    A system of fire spells quickly built up within the data library as the chip continued to expand the amount of knowledge it had. Greem vaguely saw the path forward, and the path to self improvement, with the gradual deciphering and inclusion of the otherworldly runes to his powers.


    ording to the chip¡¯s calctions, Greem¡¯s use of his powers in pastbat had been extremely inefficient. It was almost the most inefficient way he could have used them. Regardless of whether it was his spells, or the exponential increase in Physique brought about by his me Fiend Transformation, Greem had never been able to bring out their might to its fullest.


    Rather, they existed in a state of extreme waste and inefficiency!


    Greem would always choose a different style ofbat depending on his enemy. The long-ranged elementium adept style, the magic-enhanced meleebat style, or using both together.


    He had yet to form a cohesive, consistent, and systematic style ofbat. Most of the time, Greem relied on his wasteful and excessive output to overwhelm and crush the enemy.


    This might not be much of a problem if he was the one with the upper hand. However, such a crude and savage way of fighting was bound to backfire if used against an enemy more powerful than himself. Greem wanted to take this opportunity while revamping his abilities to decide on some core magics. He would then forge his own style ofbat around those core magics and spells.


    Having experienced numerous fights, Greem clearly felt the importance of mobility spells for abat adept. That was why the first spell Greem thought of when deciding on his core magics was the Fire Teleportation he so frequently used.


    In all honesty, Greem might not even have had a ten percent chance of surviving all his past battles if he hadn¡¯t been able to cast Fire Teleportation. Greem was only able to escape death when faced with powerful enemies because of it. Otherwise, his only option would have been a fight to the death.


    If he wanted to settle on abat style, it would have to revolve around Fire Teleportation.


    The mobility spell was decided. What about the offensive spells then?


    There was a period of time where Greem believed his core offensive spell was Fire Core Explosion. After all, it was the most powerful and lethal fire spell in his arsenal. However the data that the chip coted indicated otherwise. The spell that Greem used the most in battle was the quickly cast Magma Fireball.


    Greem only needed half a second to summon a Magma Fireball with his current abilities. However, if one was to include the strain that his Spirit could endure, along with the disparity in the speed at which elementium gathered, Greem could only consistently summon two fireballs in three seconds time.


    The Magma Fireball itself had forty-five points of fire damage, along with fifteen points of magma and explosive physical damage. The magma would even ssh in a ten meter radius. When paired with the thirty percent bonus damage from his fire mastery, a single Magma Fireball could deal a terrifying sixty points of damage.


    This might be much lower than the one hundred and fifty five points of the Fire Core Explosion, but the Magma Fireball could be fired at a tremendous speed!


    Where on a chaotic and intense battlefield would you be able to find a safe ce to calmly chant your spell and channel such a powerful attack? Inparison, instant-cast spells like the Magma Fireball were far superior, as they allowed the caster to control the pace of the fight.


    Even if there was truly a need for a powerful spell to crack the enemy¡¯s defense, Greem could store six of them within his Scroll of Voodoo for use in any situation. There was absolutely no need for him to risk his life and chant in the middle of enemy fire.


    Thus, the first group of core magics was decided. There were three of them. The mobility-type Fire Teleportation, the offensive Magma Fireball, and the defensive Ring of Fire.


    There was a good reason why Greem chose the Ring of Fire as his defensive spell over the Lava Shield!


    The Ring of Fire might be significantly inferior to the Lava Shield when it came to physical defense, but it was far more efficient when it came to defending and damaging enemies at the same time.


    A barrier of fire that easily engulfed an area of a hundred meters. No enemy would recklessly step into this area while they fought with Greem. The ten points of fire damage per second would never stop. You would have to endure the damage for as long as you were within the Ring of Fire.


    Moreover, thebat potential of these three spells could still be greatly improved. All that Greem needed to do now was organize the spells into a proper system, and create abat style revolving them.


    Someone knocked on the wooden door, just as Greem was busy with his calctions for the potential improvements on the three core magics¡¯ magical models.


    Dong. Dong. Dong.


    " Who is it!"


    Greem couldn¡¯t possibly be in a good mood after being interrupted at such a key moment.


    "Sir Greem, it is me!" Adept¡¯s Angus¡¯ voice rang out from behind the door.


    Greem hesitated for a moment before clearing away the documents on his table. He covered the parchments of paper that contained secrets about his own body before walking to the door and removing the magical defenses.


    Adept Angusplexion looked pale and terrible. He had visited in the dead of the night, and it seemed like he had something he wanted to talk about. Still, he was hesitant to speak.


    "Sir Angus, we can already be considered friends after such a long trip together. Is there anything that can¡¯t be said between friends?" Greem could see his difort, and took the initiative to ask.


    "This... " Angus couldn¡¯t help but hesitate once more before finally speaking, "I just got news from the n. There might be trouble for the duel this time!"


    "What happened?"


    "The adept from the challenging n has actually created a Steel Knight. Apparently, the golem is extremely powerful. It has already defeated the esoteric adepts of two firms. It is chaos in the n right now... "


    Greem¡¯s eyes focused, "Your n intends to ask for a truce?"


    Angus nodded reluctantly, his voice hoarse and dry, "Very possibly. The n has already sent some ambassadors in secret. If their conditions aren¡¯t too strict, the n will be willing to give up on the duel and admit defeat!"


    Angus quickly consoled Greem when he saw him falling deep into thought, "You have no need to worry. The n will still give you the promised rewards even if the duel doesn¡¯t take ce. That much I can ensure!"


    Greem shook his head as heughed out loud, "That¡¯s not what I am worried about. I am only disappointed that I might miss a chance to have an exchange with another esoteric adept."


    Angusughed as well, "Do you still need to worry about this once you arrive at the Castle in the Sky? The duels and challenges for the shops might only happen once every ten years, but the arena there is never empty. As long as you are confident in your golem and are willing to bet on it, you can go to the arena every single day if you so wish!"


    The two made a little small talk after this, and Angus finally left.


    Greem went back to his table and started to think of his ns for the future.


    His original n was to win the duel for the Byron n. Then he would take the opportunity and leave Snox in their care at the Castle in the Sky. After all, Greem couldn¡¯t possibly stay at the Castle in the Sky for long periods of time. Snox, as a goblin, would also find it virtually impossible to make a name for himself if left alone.


    It might be rude and pushy to put forth such a request if the expected esoteric duel was canceled and the promised rewards already given to him


    How was he supposed to leave Snox in the Castle in the Sky then?


    It was important to note how much force was needed to defend your ce in the Castle in the Sky. There was a Second Grade adept from the Byron n stationed in their shop! If even such a force found it hard to defend themselves, how was a goblin with nobat ability whatsoever to survive in this savage andpetitive ce?


    The more Greem thought about it, the more he realized how far ahead of himself he was getting.


    He was alone right now. The two so-called subordinates he had were extremely weak. One was only a pseudo-adept, and would soon be starting a ¡¯Battle of Fate¡¯. Her fate was unknown and unclear as of yet. The other had adept-level Spirit, but had absolutely no way of using it inbat.


    These two werepletely useless when it came to conflicts.


    Right now, Greem was in the process of improving his abilities and influence. He needed to gather all the strength and resources he had, cultivate them, and ensure that all his resources would grow and increase in number. He didn¡¯t have any excess energy to set up for the future.


    If the adept force he envisioned seeded in the future then it would be possible to do so, allowing him ess to more options in the future. However, what he should do right now wasn¡¯t to spread his energy too widely. He had to pull back all the fingers he had extended outwards and form a solid fist to ensure that his each and every punch would be a powerful blow!

 Chapter 280

    Chapter 280 Castle in the Sky


    Twenty dayster.


    Greem was extremely excited to see the legendary Castle in the Sky. He woke up early in the morning, had his breakfast, and quickly hurried to the deck.


    The deck was already crowded with people. Even the adepts who always hid within their rooms had appeared in the crowd. Everyone was silently waiting for the Castle in the Sky to appear before their eyes.


    The flying ship wove between the clouds. White fluffy clouds were shredded into pieces as wind particles were ejected from the magical arrays, leaving a white path of clouds behind the ship as it continued forward.


    All of a sudden light shone upon the excited crowd.


    The ship had passed through the clouds and into a clear stretch of sky.


    The sky was so blue.


    Gray roads ran in every direction across the endless grass fields. Alchemical castles were scattered across the fields, and pastures filled with cows and sheep could be seen everywhere.


    And right in between the heavens and the earth was a great, magnificent, holy, and yet mysterious, city floating in the air, silently awaiting their arrival.


    From a distance, the Castle in the Sky looked just like an upside-down pyramid. The top wasrge and round, while there was an edge at the bottom of the structure. The bottom of the city was clearly dirt that had been dug from the ground. All of the dirt had been turned into the shape of an inverted mountain after receiving the magical treatment.


    A massiveke of nearly seven square kilometers could be seen right below the Castle in the Sky.


    With just a single look at its size and shape, anyone would easily be able to infer the origin of the Castle in the Sky!


    There was some sort of repelling force field around the Castle in the Sky. All the clouds floating in the sky were pushed aside by an invisible barrier in the air when they neared the Castle. There was aplete absence of any clouds within a fifteen kilometer radius of the Castle.


    The ship had plunged right into this absence from theyer of clouds.


    An odd sound of grinding gears rang out in mid air, and several massive boulders that had been suspended in the air slowly moved towards the ship.


    "This is the first inspection before we are allowed into the Castle. Everyone, please do not resist, and in particr, do not attack those robotic guards!" A silver-robed Union adept loudly instructed the adepts on the ship. Due to some sort of mysterious spell and authority he had been granted on the ship, his voice was transmitted to every single lifeform here, even though he wasn¡¯t all that loud. Even those adepts who remained shut in their rooms were able to hear him.


    Robotic guards?!


    Greem looked at these huge rocks doubtfully.


    There were five of them in total.


    Each of the boulders were three meters tall and two meters wide. Their surfaces seemed fairly rough, with dirt and sand mixed between the cracks of the rocks. There were even some vines and small nts that grew on them. They looked just like boulders that had been removed from the peak of a mountain.


    However, the moment they reached the boat, their true nature was revealed. Blinding light emanated from within the rocks, and countlessplicated rune patterns and magical symbols appeared on their surfaces. The boulders started to shake and tremor, and pieces of rock started to shift and move to reveal several ck holes on the boulders.


    Some metallic arms extended from the holes and reached towards the ship.


    A strange bloodshot biological eyeball moved about at the ends of the robotic arms. These eyes moved from right to left as they scanned everything within sight.


    The eyeballs let out a strange blue ray as they slowly scanned every single person on the ship.


    The five boulders surrounded the ship, keeping a perfect perimeter around it. Aplete of blue light enveloped the ship, making sure that nothing went unnoticed. Even the thick hull of the ship wasn¡¯t able to stop these blue rays. Even the people in the cabins werepletely exposed to the eyeballs.


    Of course, the adepts had already heard the Union adept¡¯s reminder, and none of them tried to cast spells to obstruct the blue light. These rays were clearly a sort of low-level magical scan. They were usually used to identify lifeforms, as well as check for magical effects such as Concealment, Transformation, and parasitic lifeforms. None of the adepts¡¯ secrets would be probed.


    It was all well and fine when it scanned the adepts. However the blue ray stopped for a moment when it reached Snox. An identity talisman that hung around Snox¡¯s neck started to shine with a magical brilliance of its own, and the blue light continued its scan. The rms had not been triggered.


    Greem had specially visited the silver-robed adept to get his hands on this talisman.


    Without it, beings of other races such as Snox the goblin would find themselves buried underneath bureaucratic procedures and red tape. The magic emblems of his contracted master Greem, as well as the guarantor adept Angus, were contained within the talisman. If Snox lost this talisman, he would either be detained or exiled by the guards of the Castle in the Sky.


    The inspection didn¡¯tst for long.


    The boulders retracted their metallic arms once the blue light had scanned every inch of the ship. Once again they transformed back into ordinary-looking rocks levitating in the sky as they slowly left.


    Greem looked around the area. Almost every ship that made it out of the clouds was surrounded by several robotic guards and had to undergo inspection. The brilliant blue light could be seen on every single ship.


    Their ship continued forward after the inspection waspleted. It slowly closed in on thending tforms on the outer circle.


    As the distance continued to decrease, the mysterious veil over the Castle in the Sky was slowly lifted and its true face was revealed before the eyes of the adepts.


    Most of the adepts here had already read of countless descriptions of the Castle in the Sky. However, they were still stunned by its sheer scale and magnificence when they saw its true appearance.


    If one were to look from above, the Castle in the Sky looked just like three rings, each contained within another. These rings clearly segmented the city into three distinct parts. These was likely the inner circle, the central circle, and the outer circle!


    All the fantastical buildings were built along these rings. Every single piece ofnd there was worth their weight in gold. Numerous buildings and nts were packed together tightly on every inch of thend, leaving no space unused. The area between the threerge circles had been partitioned by a sort of mysterious power. It was virtually impossible to cross through with sheer force. The only way across was to use the special bridges built between the circles.


    Looking down from Greem¡¯s angle, there were plenty of wooden buildings hidden in the shade of the trees. Yet at the same time there were also plenty of stone houses and futuristic metallic architecture. Tall towers, round and dome shaped pces, odd and bizarre architecture from the cultures of other races... this ce looked like some sort of exhibition for unique buildings. All sorts of strange and exotic buildings could be found here.


    The crowd, as small as ants to eyes up in the air, walked through the broad white streets. The city seemed to be extremely lively.


    An actual mountain had even been moved into the inner circle. Several massive and magnificent feats of architecture had been constructed on that mountain. They had the high ground, looking down intimidatingly upon the entirety of the Castle in the Sky.


    Some more boulders levitated above the Castle in the Sky. These were evenrger and bulkier. They seemed to be guarding the numerous entrances above the Castle. Several adepts could be seen entering and exiting through those entrances as they rode on their massive flying mounts.


    Greem surmised that the mountain location was a military facility where the soldiers were stationed. It was probably part of the huge and strict defense system here.


    The smaller alchemical guards existed in evenrger numbers. They were part of the city, along with the massive load-carrying birds in the sky. They were what made up the orderly and bustling city.


    The flying ship was stopping at a flight tform on the outer circle.


    There were one of these tforms almost every two and a half kilometers. Numerous shipsnded and took off from these tforms, filling the ce with activity.


    Greem, Alice, and Snox walked down from the flying ship under Angus¡¯ lead. They stepped upon the clean and spotless marble floor of the Castle in the Sky. They looked at the fantasy scene right round them, their faces still full of wonder and disbelief.


    Warm sunlight shone down from above, showering this alchemical city in its warmth. Countless shards of light reflected off of the surface of the beautiful buildings.


    This made the Castle in the Sky seem that much more gorgeous, like a city shrouded in gold and glory!


    Most of the people walking past Greem and the others were also adepts. Some apprentices were mixed among their numbers, and even some beings of other races walked in the crowd, dressed in opulent and elegant clothes. Ordinary men weren¡¯t even allowed to set foot upon this city. After all it, was a great city. One that represented the greatest alchemical achievements of the World of Adepts.


    Greem paid extra attention to the workers on the flight tform. The workers doing their best to remove the cargo were tall and powerful steel statues, every single one. They might be a little clumsy, but they were tens and even hundreds of times more efficient than their human counterparts.


    The ones coordinating their actions were apprentice adepts.


    It was fairly clear at this point. The lowest ss citizens in this Castle in the Sky were these apprentices!


    Several alchemical carriages stopped before them, right after Greem and the others stepped out of the flight tform.


    Golden carriages, golden wheels, golden servants. Even the two horses drawing the carriage were golden in color...


    The two handsome golden horses stopped before Greem. They let out a snort and stomped their hooves, just like a real horse would.


    However, Greem was able to see much more than their appearance with his Spiritual sense.


    These weren¡¯t actual lifeforms. They were alchemical creations, ormonly known as alchemical lifeforms.


    "We will meet at 167 Champs ¨¦lys¨¦es Street!" Adept Angus was the first to hop onto a cart. He gave a slight nod in Greem¡¯s direction before driving away into the distance.


    The alchemical horses, despite being madepletely of metal, were not dull or slow in their actions in the slightest, even when they were at the height of their sprint. Their tough metallic hooves didn¡¯t even ring out as expected when they trod against the clear marble floor.


    The carriage was like a small raft in ake. It calmly and quickly navigated through the crowd and soon disappeared into the city.


    Greem looked upon this fantastical scene before him with a tremendous shock in his heart. He couldn¡¯t help but be reminded of the fictional sci-fi worlds back on Earth. The chip, too, had been ringing non-stop ever since he left the ship.


    "Beep, discovered unknown alchemical creation... "


    "Beep, detecting unknown force field... "


    "Beep, detecting unique lifeform... "


    "...... "


    Every thing here hadpletely exceeded his expectations. He felt like he had been ced in a future version of Earth itself.


    Did arcane knowledge, when brought to its limits and fullest potential, ultimately end up back on the same path as technological civilizations?


    Alice was uncontrobly shouting and pointing at everything she saw while Greem was frozen in thought. She couldn¡¯t help but gasp in wonder every time she saw a mysterious object she had never seen before.


    Snox on the other hand, was crouching on the floor, touching the alchemical carriage and inspecting the horses. He even used his teeth to bite into the carriage and the wheels, just to confirm his suspicions about the material. The infatuated smile on his face betrayed his thoughts. Snox must have believed that he had arrived in the legendary city of gold!


    "Let us go as well!" Greem closed his eyes for a moment to calm himself down, before turning to give instructions to his two followers, "Let¡¯s settle down at a ce before we go out to tour the city!"


    The three got into the alchemical carriage before them.


    "To 167 Champs ¨¦lys¨¦es Street!"


    The alchemical carriage immediately started moving the moment Greem gave his orders!

 Chapter 281

    Chapter 281 Combat Ability Assessment


    They sped through the streets.


    The carriage afforded them a perfect view of the scenery outside.


    Dark and moist caves, twisting and nted wooden huts, tall fortresses of solid stone, alchemical castles full of mystical elements... everyone felt like they had walked into a city of fantasy. They could see mysterious and strange buildings everywhere along the streets.


    There were plenty of people walking to and from some of the buildings. These ces were extremely lively. On the other hand, some of these buildings were too scary and grim and there weren¡¯t very many customers walking into them. There were even some buildings that had such bizarre designs that it was hard to even determine their purpose...


    It was clear that the Silver Union hadn¡¯t set any regtions on thesends after they sold them. If someone wanted to turn it into a shop after they bought it, it was their choice! Turn it into a warehouse? They could do as they like! There was absolutely no problem either if they wanted to temporarily convert the building into a haunted house!


    As long as you paid your rent on time, and ensured that your business did not, in any way,promise the Castle in the Sky, no one cared what you did on your ownnd.


    This was probably the main reason for all of the peculiar architecture in the outer circle!


    The Castle in the Sky was split into the inner circle, the central circle, and the outer circle. The respective areas they took up was in a ratio of 1:3:6. The outer circle had the most surface area among the three. The total number of shops leased to the non-Union members numbered three hundred and forty eight.


    This might seem like a lot, but it was a meager amount when split between everyone on the Continent that wanted one of the shops.


    The demand fornd was extremelypetitive, especially when you considered the parties involved in thepetition. There were plenty of terrifying individuals who didn¡¯t belong to any adept organization who were looking for a ce to settle here. These fellows were often powerful Second Grade adepts who weren¡¯t willing to be subjected to the restraints and obligations of belonging to a group. There were even Third Grade adepts among these people.


    Thus, it was particrly important to be cautious about every single inconspicuous person and shop you saw in the outer circle. If you had no idea of their background and identity, it was best to not offend them. Manners should always be upheld. A slight misstep and you could offend one of these powerful individuals keeping a low profile. These people had plenty of tricks up their sleeves to kill you without being found out.


    The alchemical cart slowly stopped before the Byron n¡¯s shop.


    "Two magic crystals!" The alchemical steed turned around and spoke in human tongue.


    Greem was surprised for a moment, but quickly tossed two magic crystals in the horse¡¯s direction. They swallowed the crystals and slowly galloped away.


    An apprentice was already waiting on the spot. The Byron crest pinned on his chest told Greem that this was the right location. The apprentice quickly led Greem and his party into the backyard. Most of the shops here served several purposes at once. The front of the buildings were stores, while the backs were constructed as residences.


    Byron Materials!


    The store¡¯s name was simple and efficient. The main products of the store were the unique resources from the Underground World. In particr, the most valuable materials they sold were the Nighteye Stones and Ghost Mushrooms.


    A middle-aged female adept was waiting for Greem in the backyard. Her appearance was fairly mediocre, but the red robe she was wearing was extremely eye-catching. However, what stood out even more was her strength!


    Greem was slightly shocked for a moment when he saw her for the first time. He quickly walked forward to greet her with the proper adept¡¯s greeting.


    Even the usually bold and audacious Alice was being respectful. She dragged Snox all the way to the other side. She didn¡¯t dare to even eavesdrop on the conversation between the two adepts.


    "You are the golem master that Angus hired? You seem really young, aren¡¯t you?!" The female adept in the red robe asked coldly.


    "My greetings to Lady Nunnally! I am Greem, an adept of the Sarubo n."


    "You don¡¯t seem to be an esoteric adept!"


    "Indeed, my Lady! I am an elementium adept. It was only because of my unique insights on elementium golem creation that I caught the eye of Adept Angus."


    "Elementium golems? Those things probably aren¡¯t as powerful as metallic golems, are they? Do you have any confidence in the esoteric duel this time?" Even though the red-robeddy was a Second Grade adept, she was extremely hesitant when it came to these specialized areas of knowledge.


    "Adept Angus has already informed me of the situation on the way here. It seems something has happened to the duel... "


    "Nothing has changed!" The red-robed female adept replied firmly, "They were far too demanding with their conditions. There is no way we could have epted them! The duels will continue. Now, I ask you, do you have any confidence of beating the enemy¡¯s golem knight?"


    "Mydy, I wish to take a look at the statistics and abilities of the enemy¡¯s golem before I give you my answer." Greem put some thought into it, but didn¡¯t give a direct answer.


    "This is for you!" Lady Nunnally tossed an image-recording crystal to Greem, and gave a frigid ultimatum, "You have a single night to think this over. Give me an answer tomorrow morning. If you are not confident in beating the opponent, we will have to find some way to get an actual esoteric master to represent us!"


    Esoteric masters were specialized adepts. A golem master who was an esoteric master would be someone who had already decided on golem creation as his main profession. These people might be extremely weak themselves, but all of their golem creations were extremely powerful.


    Trying to hire an esoteric master within the Castle in the Sky was a very difficult task! The number of resources and favors that needed to be called in was unbelievable. If the Byron n had to resort to this measure, their victory would be an agonizing one. They would probably have to give up all of the store¡¯s ie for the next ten years to pay back the debt they would rue in doing so.


    However, this shop was a crucial existence for the Byron n.


    Other than the profits from selling resources from the Nigond area, the shop was also a shortcut for the Byron n when purchasing resources from all over the continent. All of the adept resources used within the n would probably be cut in half the moment they lost this foothold at the Castle in the Sky.


    It would be ten times harder for the n to cultivate their adepts then.


    This was extremely disadvantageous for the development of an adept n!


    The Second Grade adept of the Byron n was understandably nervous and upset about this whole affair.


    Nightfall.


    Greem hid within the residence that the Byron n had prepared for him, earnestly and carefully browsing through all the contents within the image-recording crystal.


    Contained within the crystal was an image recording of the opponent¡¯s golem knight in action.


    The battle didn¡¯tst very long, but it was enough for the chip to gleanrge amounts of useful information for Greem to use.


    The chip sessfully retrieved the basic statistics and attributes of the golem knight afterbing several times through the details.


    Golem Knight.


    Combat Golem. Awakened Construct.


    Three meters in height.


    Made entirely with some sort of metal that gleamed a dark ck color. The appearance of the golem was that of a knight¡¯s. It had heavy armor, a shield in its left hand and a sword in its right. Its meleebat abilities were far superior whenpared to ordinary magical statues and golems.


    Basic Attributes: Strength 14 | Agility 9 | Physique 12 | Spirit 7 | ......


    This was abat golem that had undergone several modifications and enhancements. Not only did it have an immortal body made of magical alloy, it even possessed terrifying amounts of strength. However, the most troublesome aspect of the golem was its intelligence insanebat instincts!


    Indeed, this cold and metallic golem made purely of magical alloy surprisingly possessed elementary intelligence. Calling such a thing a magical golem was a slight to its true nature. The more suitable name for it was a construct lifeform.


    A construct lifeform that had undergone several construct awakenings. A construct lifeform that possessed elementary human intelligence. Of course, if it was able to raise its intelligence that much more, pushing its Spirit from seven points to eleven points, it would immediately go from a construct lifeform to a metallic lifeform.


    A unique lifeform with metal for a body and elementium energy for blood¨C a metallic lifeform!


    Construct lifeforms were still considered as servants of adepts. However, a metallic lifeform was of equal status to the adepts.


    Ordinary golems couldn¡¯t possibly possess intelligence. Their creators would have to mix in some powerful spiritual consciousness during the Construct Awakening to create a certain chance of the golem awakening to elementary intelligence. It wasn¡¯t possible to create intermediate intelligence with any magical means known to adept-kind. The golems would have to slowly evolve and improve upon their intelligence to raise it to intermediate.


    The Golem Knight shown in the image crystal didn¡¯t just seem to possess elementary intelligence. It even seemed to have retained some battle techniques belonging to actual knights. This was a clear indication of the golem¡¯s origin. The spirit consciousness that the opposing esoteric adept had awakened in the body of the Golem Knight was most definitely the soul of a high-grade knight.


    Moreover, it would have to at least be a Second Grade knight!


    It was virtually impossible to find such a powerful knight on the Continent of Adepts. The soul could only havee from a lesser ne.


    Moreover, the enemy spared no cost or resources when constructing the golem. Even the shield and sword it held in its hands were rare, valuable products.


    The heavy tower shield was mainly made using Mansordar Alloy, famed for its resilience and toughness. The magical resistant Star Iron was mixed into the shield, allowing it to have fearsome physical and magical defensive abilities.


    The knight¡¯s longsword was made purely of eternium. It might be slightly softer whenpared to the Mansordar Alloy, but it was an extremely good conductor of magical energy. The sword made it very easy for the golem to cast its battle techniques. The edge of the sword had even been ted with ayer of adamantite, giving it basic Piercing and Armor Reduction effects.


    Honestly, this sword and shield pair could already be considered as elementary magical weapons. They were so much more powerful than the usual magic-infused weapons.


    Even Greem wasn¡¯t as confident as he had been after witnessing the impressive performance of the Golem Knight.


    Just the rare metals used in creating the Golem Knight would cost at least 70,000 magic crystals. If we were to include the time and effort put into its creation, along with the soul of the Second Grade knight, the golem alone would cost a 120,000 magic crystals at the very least.


    The Second Grade Molten Giant Core that Greem had used in creating the Infernal Tyrant couldn¡¯t possibly sell for more than fifty thousand magic crystals.


    Even though Greem was reluctant to do so, he had to admit that his Infernal Tyrant didn¡¯t seem to have a chance against the Golem Knight, even when considering his odds from every perspective and every angle.


    Just the amount of resources spent on their creations was enough to tell of the massive difference in their abilities!

 Chapter 282

    Chapter 282 The Mushroom Cottage


    The basic attributes of the Golem Knight were as follows: Strength: 14 | Agility: 9 | Physique: 12 | Spirit: 7


    The Infernal Tyrant, on the other hand had: Strength: 9 | Agility: 7 | Physique: 11 | Spirit: 18


    Each of the golems had their own respective advantages.


    The Golem Knight was extremely strong and powerful, with a tough shield and a sharp sword. Its melee battle techniques would also make it very easy for the golem to endure the bombardment of spells and close in on the enemy. However, it only had seven Spirit. This meant that the amount of energy it had stored within itself wouldn¡¯t be enough to sustain its consumption over a long period of time.


    This was perhaps its only w!


    The Infernal Tyrant, on the other hand, had sufficient Physique and Strength to roll over most adepts and golems. However, these statistics were utterly pathetic whenpared to the Golem Knight. That said, it had a massive amount of Spirit that allowed it to continuously cast spells without fear of running out of energy. Still, the Tyrant was probably inferior inbat against the Golem Knight.


    Of course, this was mostly because of the difference in their equipment!


    The Golem Knight¡¯s body was made of ordinary magical alloy. This was the only way they could have done it. They had no other choice. After all, if all three meters and seventy six tons of the metallic golem were made with Mansordar Alloy, the cost of creating the Golem Knight would probably go up by about five times.


    The Gerto golem master had used magical alloy to forge the golem¡¯s body and gave it a tower shield made of Mansordar. This was to lower the manufacturing cost while also maximizing itsbat potential. In doing so, the golem master had ensured the best bnce between cost andbat strength. The insertion of the high-grade knight¡¯s soul further cemented the utter dominance of the Golem Knight among golems of the same grade.


    The Infernal Tyrant was better at long-ranged attacks inparison.


    Thus, the battle between the two was actually very simr to a fight between an elementium adept and a body refining adept!


    The Infernal Tyrant¡¯s elementium body wouldn¡¯t be able to endure the blows from the fearsome adamantite sword, if the Golem Knight got close. The Infernal Tyrant would be severely weakened if its body was torn apart. Victory would truly be out of reach then!


    As such, the key factor to victory in this duel was the Tyrant¡¯s ability to keep its distance from the enemy and slowly wear it down with a continuous bombardment of fireballs.


    Still, this was too precise of a control andbat strategy for the Tyrant to execute, even with its eighteen points of Spirit. Intelligence was not entirely the same as wisdom. This was something that all adepts knew very well!


    If Spirit was all that mattered, why would there be a need to umte knowledge day after day? Why should adepts dedicate their efforts to improving their battle and casting techniques? All that the adepts would need to do was hide in their adepts¡¯ tower, drinking their potions and meditating endlessly to increase their Spirit...


    Thus, if Greem wanted to have the Infernal Tyrant perfectly execute this strategy of kiting and harassing its opponent, he would have to do it himself. He would have to be in the fight. He would have to control the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s body and use the chip¡¯s powerful calction abilities to execute aplete beatdown.


    And if Greem wanted to carry this out, he would have to do some modifications and adjustments to the Infernal Tyrant!


    The second day.


    A long list of items was ced before Lady Nunnally when she appeared before Greem.


    Contrary to Greem¡¯s expectations, the Second Grade Lady Nunnally wasn¡¯t upset at his demands at all. She was extremely happy and excited, and quickly turned around to order Angus to gather all the items for Greem.


    It seemed that Lady Nunnally had been humiliated in the previous negotiation with the Gerto n. This was why she utilized all her authority to fully support Greem when he indicated his confidence in the duel.


    The fight was scheduled to happen seven dayster. There wasn¡¯t much time left for Greem!


    ............


    Liana¡¯s Mushroom Cottage.


    This was the home of a witch, located in the middle of a small, dark swamp.


    And of no more than seven thousand square meters felt like a massive ck swamp due to the effects of certain strange magical arrays.


    There were pungent and murky pools of water all over the ground. The thickness of the slowly flowing water was extremely disgusting. Wet mist rose from the ground, gathering all over the dark swamp and blotting out the warm sunshine that was everywhere in the Castle in the Sky. The dark swarp appeared all the more gloomy because of this.


    Greem held Alice¡¯s hand as they slowly walked between these pools of mud. He didn¡¯t dare to let the murky water touch either of their legs.


    The chip¡¯s data had already informed him of the true nature of this liquid. All of the pungent water was poison with extreme lethality. Even the air within the swamp had been filled with poison. An ordinary person would have instantly died if they took a single breath of the air here. Only an adept like himself could continue breathing like normal.


    Still, every time he took a breath, the intense heat within his body would have to kill thousands upon thousands of poisonous and harmful viruses. His body was no longer afraid of these biological poisons after it was elementiumized! Consequently, every time he exhaled, a visible breath of ck air would be expelled along with his breath.


    These were the corpses and remains of the dead viruses.


    Most of the resources for modifying the Infernal Tyrant had already been prepared by the Byron n. However there were still some rare materials that were missing. ording to Lady Nunnally, the Second Grade witch that lived here in this Mushroom Cottage, Liana, had stocked up on some of these materials. This left Greem with no choice but to personally visit Liana.


    The reason Lady Nunnally gave for not visiting herself made Greempletely speechless.


    Lady Liana seemed to be a witch with a really odd witchplex. She had an extreme and utter disdain and hatred for all ¡¯fake witches¡¯!


    In her opinion, only those that upheld the traditions and beliefs of the ancient witches, and those with the legacies of the ancient witches could be considered true witches. The truth of the witch¡¯s path was in their choice of fate and their subservience and loyalty to the Witch Queen. Those who no longer believed and hailed the Queen as their patron could only be called female adepts, not witches.


    Unfortunately Lady Nunnally, who called herself a witch, was one of the individuals that Witch Liana hated so much!


    Greem could already see through the mist and the trees before he even set foot in the dark swamp. He could vaguely make out the Mushroom Cottage. However, there was still an odd and vague distance between himself and the cottage, despite walking for awhile and frequently changing his direction as he went.


    He turned back and looked, but even the entrance he came from hadpletely vanished.


    The dirty water started stirring, as if some odd magical creature was moving beneath. The ghost trees started waving in the wind as well, creating an extremely frightening atmosphere!


    Greem could feel the shivering from Alice¡¯s hand and smiled, "Are you scared now, Alice?"


    "Hmph! I¡¯m definitely not scared!" Alice was still keeping up a tough front, "You think I have no idea of the tradition of us witches?"


    "What tradition?"


    "All the witches believe in the Witch Queen. All killing is forbidden between fellow witches. Those who break this rule would be themon enemy of all witches!"


    "Oh? There was such a thing?" Greem asked curiously, "Then if it was you who identally fell into the poison puddles, would it be considered their fault?"


    "Of course! Otherwise, any witch would be able to use such ¡¯idental¡¯ means to get rid of other witches they don¡¯t like!"


    Alice had just finished speaking when a cloud of white mist quickly gathered by the pool of water beside her. The mist formed into the shape of an elderly¡¯ woman¡¯s face. It was a hideous and deathly pale face.


    "Little brat, don¡¯t be so sure of your words. You aren¡¯t a real witch as of yet. Killing you wouldn¡¯t be a vition of our vows!" The old witch in the mist cackled sinisterly.


    "But I¡¯m already a candidate for the Witch of Fate now! If you kill me, that would be considered interfering in the selection of the Witch of Fate." Alice might look young, but she was still extremely knowledgeable. The words she spoke rang true.


    "Aren¡¯t you a feisty one? Very well. Thanks to this little brat, I¡¯ll make an exception and meet you two!"


    The pool of murky water quickly returned to being a pool of water after the old witch said that.


    The ghostly trees started to let out screeching noises as they slowly crawled to two sides, revealing a path as they did so.


    The Mushroom Cottage appeared right before them all of a sudden, cutting right through the mist.


    Greem held Alice¡¯s hand as they walked forward onto a gray grass field in the middle of the swamp. The Mushroom Cottage was located in the middle of this field.


    The field wasn¡¯t veryrge. It was only about seven hundred square meters in size.


    The Mushroom Cottage was even smaller. It was only one and a half meters tall and less than five meters in radius.


    However it wasn¡¯t the size of the Mushroom Cottage, but rather its rundown condition and crudeness that surprised Greem.


    This Mushroom Cottage resembled one of those broken huts you¡¯d see in the ghettos of the poor.


    It was crumbling and nted, with plenty of cobwebs hanging off the roofs. Even the moss and other nts that grew on the Cottage appeared to be pale and deathly, without any signs of life.


    "Come on in! The two of you." A piercing old voice came from within the house.


    Greem grit his teeth. He had no other option but to bend down and enter the Cottage with Alice.


    To his tremendous shock, the inside of the house wasn¡¯t as small and cramped as he expected. Even with his height, he was still able to stand straight. There was even fifty centimeters of space before he hit the ceiling.


    The Cottage also had a secondyer on the inside. Greem could see through the cracks and make out a crude and simple study room.


    Arge pir stood in the middle of the house. It was twisted, nted, and filled with moss all over.


    A massive, ugly cauldron was boiling above a roaring fire pit in a corner of the house. Its contents seemed to be some sort of unknown green soup. There were all sorts of odd contents bobbing about the pool of liquid. White eyeballs, the arms of unknown creatures, and even human skulls...


    An indescribably pungent odor hung in the air. Greem¡¯s took a single breath and his face went green.


    Dammit, there was poison in this soup!

 Chapter 283

    Chapter 283 Contract and Death


    Greem had to drink three or four antidotes beforepletely getting rid of the poison within his body.


    Even he, with his elementiumized body and powerful resistance to poison, he had to stop breathing in order to not take in any more of house¡¯s air.


    However, Alice had apletely different reaction to the smell. She was standing on her toes, trying her best to take in as much of the ¡¯heavenly smell¡¯ as she could. It was as if she was smelling the most delicious and fragrant delicacy in the world. If it wasn¡¯t for Greem holding her back, Alice would probably already be gorging on the stew in the cauldron.


    Greem took a quick look around the cottage.


    Several ck metal hooks were hanging down from the ceiling. All kinds of jars and bottles of various colors were hanging from the metal hooks. The containers were filled with a dark and murky liquid, with the eyeballs of various magical creatures soaking in the jars.


    There were bothrge and small eyeballs, t and round ones, and even some with eyeballs dragging their bloody veins behind them as they swam to and fro within their containers...


    Arge green jar swinging before Greem¡¯s eyes had a giant¡¯s eyeball immersed within the liquid. Greem could tell this was a giant¡¯s eye because of its sheer size. A single eye alone had taken up all the space within the one meter tall jar.


    The massive eye even blinked when Greem walked forward to take a closer look!


    "Beep. Detecting high-energy magical organ... initial estimates suggest the organ to be at Second Grade!"


    "Are you able to tell what creature this eyeball belonged to?" Greem silently conversed with the chip.


    "Beep. Data reference and examinationpleted. Estimates: Cyclops, 63%... Beholder, 21%... Evil Giant, 4%... the remaining matches only have a 1%patibility. Is there a need to disy the data?"


    "No need!"


    The Cyclops was a fearsome giant that had both powerful physical strength and tremendous control over the earth. A Cyclops might be slightly weaker and smaller than the Hill Giant that Greem saw in the ck Forest, but it had the odd ability of petrification.


    This was what made it an extremely powerful Second Grade magical creature!


    As Greem¡¯s vision continued to move about he noticed a wooden desk in another corner of the room. It was extremely messy and disorderly. There were plenty of ink bottles tipped over, spilling ink all over. Numerous yellowed scrolls and parchments spread across the table. A massive and unstable stack of books, so high it almost touched the ceiling, was teetering on the verge of falling....


    A strange witch with messy hair was crouched upon this equally messy table. She wasn¡¯t very tall. In fact, she might have been slightly shorter than Alice. The witch had to stand on the tall wooden stool to be seen.


    She seemed to be wearing a ck adept¡¯s robe.


    However, Greem couldn¡¯t even be sure of this!


    The wrinkled robe she was wearing was just way too dirty and stained. There were oil stains, ink blotches, and all sorts of unknown potion stains on the robe. The original color of the robe had already beenpletely covered by a thickyer of dust and dirt. Only a single trace of an elegant and beautiful golden thread at the corner of her robe suggested that this was an adept¡¯s robe.


    Greem had even suspected, when he first saw her, that Witch Liana was a member of the Death Witches. After all, he had seen far too many items rted to death ever since he walked into this cottage. However Alice, who was still holding his hand, had secretly told him the truth using a mental connection. Liana was a Witch of Despair. Her area of expertise was hope and revival.


    Well, it might be a little out of his expectations, but Greem had to silently ept the truth!


    "Tell me your intent ining here! You aren¡¯t the first fool to trespass into my Swamp of Darkness, but you are the first one to be able to make it here alive. If you don¡¯t have a good reason for this intrusion, kehkehkeh... " A sinisterugh slipped from the old witch¡¯s wrinkled face. Her set of yellow and missing teeth were revealed as she smiled. Still, Greem was more terrified by her eyes. They were like those of a dead fish; not budging even a single inch.


    "Respected Lady Liana, I am here because I wish to purchase a bottle of Dead Soul¡¯s Water. I heard that your Mushroom Cottage was the only ce in the Castle in the Sky where I could get it. This is why I had no choice but to risk your displeasure to stand before you!"


    Greem could only tell the truth when ced before a crazy and powerful witch like Liana. Who knew if this hag had some disgusting spell she could use to verify the truth of his words.


    "Dead Soul¡¯s Water? The one used to protect wandering and exposed souls from damage once they left their bodies?" The old witch stared at Greem with her stale dead eyes andmented coldly, "It seems you have already done your research beforeing here. What do you wish to exchange for a bottle of Dead Soul¡¯s Water?"


    "A top-grade Nighteye Stone, a twig from a Tree of Life, and a hundred grams of Stardust from the Spaceworld." Greem didn¡¯t dare to hesitate. He instantly took out all of the items that were prepared for the trade. Of course, none of these items were his possessions. They were materials given to him by the Byron n.


    The Dead Soul¡¯s Water was a Second-ss Rare Material. Its market price was around seven thousand magical crystals. All three of the objects Greem offered were worth above three thousand magic crystals each. When put together, they were more than enough to purchase Dead Soul¡¯s Water.


    Unfortunately, the only person in the entire Castle in the Sky who could synthesize the Dead Soul¡¯s Water was this Lady Liana. The sess of the trade depended on her mood. Greem held his breath and waited for her reply after cing three crystal boxes on the table.


    "A fair price! However..." A sinister smile suddenly appeared on the old witch¡¯s face, "I am not in a good mood today, so I choose to refuse your offer!"


    "......"


    Greem felt utterly speechless for a moment.


    He didn¡¯t dare to argue with such a terrifying Second Grade witch.


    "Hey, old hag, don¡¯t go overboard!" Alice couldn¡¯t help but interrupt their conversation, "The stuff we are offering you is already worth way much more than you Dead Soul¡¯s Water. What reason is there to not ept the trade?"


    Greem¡¯s face changed. He quickly pulled Alice behind him and shielded her.


    "Mydy, she is only a child. Please forgive her for her ignorance!"


    "What are you scared of?" Alice was still running her mouth off behind Greem, "She¡¯s a witch and I¡¯m a witch candidate. My identity alone guarantees that she won¡¯t kill me! Why should I be afraid of her?"


    "Kehkehkeh... interesting. Very interesting... " The old witch let out a coldugh, "It¡¯s been so many years, and this is the first time someone has been so arrogant before me. Young boy, I¡¯ll make an exception and give you a chance. As long as you turn this little brat¡¯s magical contract over to me, I¡¯ll give you a bottle of Dead Soul¡¯s Water. How is it? Pretty good conditions, aren¡¯t they?"


    All of a sudden, Alice¡¯s body trembled. She tightened her grip on Greem¡¯s hand and no longer dared to speak anymore.


    Greem forced a smile as he slowly backed away, "Lady Liana, Alice is only apanion of mine apanying me on this trip. We... "


    The old witch Liana extended a wrinkled and ghostly right hand at them before he could even finish speaking. She made a grabbing motion in the air. Greem and Alice simultaneously felt a sting in their souls. An illusory and intangible magical contract suddenly appeared, hovering in the air.


    "A ve contract!" Blood red light gleamed in the depths of the old witch¡¯s deadly dull eyes, "Well, aren¡¯t you a brave one!? To think of enving a candidate for the Witch of Fate. Do you intend to humiliate all the Northern Witches in doing so? If you dispel this ve contract and hand over that pathetic excuse of a loser, I¡¯ll let you leave alive. I¡¯ll even let you leave with the Dead Soul¡¯s Water. Otherwise don¡¯t me me for getting rid of a certain loser for the sake of the dignity of all witches!"


    The entire Swamp of Darkness started trembling at her words.


    Thicker and heavier mists started to rise from the ground, causing the already dim house to gopletely dark.


    Greem felt all of the magical eyeballs in the various containers turn and look towards him at this very moment. A suffocating feeling of death hanging above his head rose in his heart.


    "Speak! Will you hand over the contract and leave with the Dead Soul¡¯s water, or will you die right here on this very spot? Speak... " The old witch¡¯s fearsome voice echoed within the small and silent cottage, sending chills all the way to Greem¡¯s bones.


    Gegegegege...


    Slight sounds of chattering teeth rang out from behind him.


    Even the reckelss and fearless Alice was frightened now.


    The subtle tremors in the air started to be more and more frequent. Perhaps with only one more second, Alice would be able to open a spatial riftrge enough for both of them to escape.


    Sadly, there was no such thing as ¡¯perhaps¡¯ when you were confronted with a Second Grade witch!


    The spatial rift disappeared the instant it appeared.


    Psst. The spatial rift hadn¡¯t even stabilized before it disappeared in a cloud of green smoke, leaving a bright green mark glowing in the air.


    "Now you think of escaping? Kehkehkeh... toote!" The old witch extended a finger, and a ghostly face made of gray smoke instantly appeared beside Greem. The apparitionughed sinisterly as it dove into Greem¡¯s body.


    The next second, Greem froze. He could feel his intimate connection with the fire elementium beingpletely cut off. As if... as if he had suddenly been ced in an anti-magic barrier, and there was no longer any fire elementium around him.


    Greem¡¯s tall body stumbled, almost falling to the ground.


    Havingpleted the elementiumization of his body, there was no difference between himself and fire elementium. He was fire elementium, and the fire elementium was himself. Now that his Spiritual connection with fire elementium had been cut, Greem didn¡¯t even have the energy to support his own weight.


    Dammit, there was such a w to body elementiumization? Why have I never heard of this in any of the books I read? Is this the ability of high-grade adepts? The ability to cut off the connection of lower-grade adepts to their elementium particles?


    Greem lost a lot of strength now that his connection to the fire elementium was severed. He pressed his arm against the twisted pir to support himself. This was the only reason he didn¡¯t copse to the ground.


    Hissssss...


    An odd sound came from beneath as a massive ck Python thicker than his leg crawled up the pir and found its way around Greem¡¯s arm. The ck python rose its head high, slowly closing in on Greem¡¯s face.


    Greem could even feel the pungent breath brushing against his face when the python hissed.


    The old witch¡¯s voice rang out once more.


    "Last chance to make your decision! Hand over the contract, or...


    ¡°Die!"

 Chapter 284

    Chapter 284 The Unpredictable Witch


    "Beep. Detecting intrusion of unknown forcefield. Host¡¯s Spiritual senses are rapidly weakening."


    "Beep. Detecting dangerous high-energy magical lifeform closing in. Rmending the host keep distance from said lifeform."


    "Beep. Detecting foreign mental-suppression-causing intimidation effects on the host. Requesting instructions from host. Counter-attack?"


    "Beep. Detecting... "


    "......"


    Liana¡¯s death threat rang in his ear, and the chip in his mind continued to beep ceaselessly. Repeated rm bells went off in his head, almost driving him insane.


    However, it was precisely the danger and urgency of the situation that caused Greem¡¯s Spirit to be even sharper and more focused.


    Greem was surprised at what he was seeing. His elementium sight provided him feedback based on the enemy¡¯s hostility. The entire Mushroom Cottage was painted a bright red, as every single possible minion of the witch was glowing crimson. However, only the old witch¡¯s crooked and short body was reflected in his vision as... a huge yellow spot!


    Red represented hostility. The deeper the color, the greater the hostility of the enemy. Green represented friendliness, while yellow was neutrality. Yellow meant that the opponent didn¡¯t have any strong opinions towards him.


    How was this possible!


    The old witch was literally cing him at the brink of death. It seemed like she was able to kill him the very next second. How was it possible that she was neutral towards him?


    As Greem was still stuck hesitating, the yellow spot quickly started to turn red.


    It seemed Greem¡¯s hesitation had angered her and cause her to slowly be more and more hostile towards him!


    No. No. This old witch¡¯s goal isn¡¯t as simple at this. She wasn¡¯t too keen or eager on killing him, even after discovering that Alice had signed a ve contract with him. She was still neutral. It was only when he started hesitating that she actually contemted killing him...


    Greem¡¯s mind rapidly turned as he scoured his heart for every single tradition and secret of the Witches of Despair that he knew of.


    Greem asked probingly, "Will Lady Liana let me go if I willingly let go of this contract?"


    The old witch might have the odd ability to force the magical contract to materialize, but there was no way she had any way to change the contents of the contract.


    After all, magical contracts were fundamental rules protected by the narws. It was only when the two parties involved in the contract willingly gave up on the contract that it could be dispelled. Even a Great Adept had no means of bypassing the narws to modify or get rid of the contents of a contract.


    Greem had merely expressed his intent to give up on the contract and he could already see Liana turning into a bright red spot under his hostility vision.


    "Very good! Very good!" The old witch¡¯s voice suddenly became gentle, "You can let go of the contract now. Once the contract disappears, the girl stays, and you can leave with the Dead Soul¡¯s Water!"


    If it wasn¡¯t for the chip¡¯s amazing hostility sensor, Greem might actually have been tricked by her facade. The old witch might have expressed approval, and even squeezed out an ugly smile, but Greem knew the truth. He could feel the shivers running down his spine as he gained a perfect understanding of her true feelings.


    Now that he knew what she was looking for, Greem immediately acted without hesitation.


    "Uelr Ar!" Greem made a grabbing motion with his left hand as he shouted. The Scroll of Voodoo silently appeared in his hand. The thick grimoire instantly opened, and its tough kraft paper pages rapidly flipped over and over. Soon the book stopped on a certain page.


    Scarlet light glowed on the book. One by one, each and every rune, symbol, line, and image on the page started to glow. The shape of a boiling fireball rapidly appeared above the page. Crimson radiance gathered about and filled the shape. The silhouette slowly turned into a real fireball. A fearsome, one meter in diameter fireball.


    Greem guided it with his Spirit, the Explosive Fireball instantly locking onto the old witch and her sinister smile. It whistled as it wasunched across the air.


    There was less than five meters between the two. The fireball was fast and furious. It had appeared before the ugly witch almost the very instant it was fired.


    At the same time, Greem waved his left hand and pushed Alice towards the door of the Mushroom Cottage. He whispered silently and quickly, "You leave first. I¡¯ll follow after you as soon as I can. Hurry... "


    Alice waspletely stunned and confused by what was happening.She turned around to look in a daze as she ran towards the door.


    All of these actions might have seemed extremelyplicated and lengthy, but itsted no more than two or three seconds for everyone involved.


    The adepts were known for their Spirit. The speed of their thought processes were much faster than the average person. The extreme detail their Spiritual senses could go into allowed them to think and move extremely quickly. While the ordinary person might still be stuck in thought, an adept would already have gone through seven or eight lines of thought and would already be putting those thoughts into action.


    Greem continued to monitor the old witch¡¯s reaction through the chip¡¯s sensors.


    There was a powerful forcefield around the witch. There was no way the chip could see through the forcefield and observe anything about her intent. However, when the witch was using every bit of her Spiritual strength to suppress and beat down Greem¡¯s Spiritual senses, the chip was able to use the minor and subtle changes in the Spirits and elementium around them to do a quick, basic analysis on her intent.


    An ability that afforded Greem such detail might not be very useful in an actual battle.


    With how powerful the Second Grade Liana was, Greem couldn¡¯t possibly endure a single Second Grade spell. Even if he was able to analyze the enemy¡¯s intent, would it matter? He still wouldn¡¯t be able to block or dodge the attacks.


    The difference in their strength remained!


    Combat techniques and experience only mattered in a battle between equals. A battle with someone above his Grade? That was an act of pure suicide!


    Greem¡¯s use of the chip to monitor Liana¡¯s hostility wasn¡¯t for the purpose of winning the fight. It was to verify his theory on the witch¡¯s actions!


    As expected, when Greem ¡¯courageously¡¯ attacked Liana, the hostilitying from her quickly dissipated. And when Greem tried his best to ¡¯protect¡¯ Alice and let her leave, all of the remaining hostility disappeared. The yellow color was even starting to shift towards a light green, indicative of friendliness.


    Bingo. He made the right gamble!


    Greem was rejuvenated by the sight of this. He immediately turned and ran without hesitation.


    Now that the stage had been set, it was up to the old witch on how to conclude the act!


    A short momentter, Greem and Alice were bound by the terrifying ck python and brought back to the witch.


    To Greem¡¯s shock and horror, the fearsome ck python was also a Second Grade magical creature. Moreover, it seemed to be Liana¡¯s magical pet. It shook and its tail, and its ck and scaled snake¡¯s tail extended up to a dozen meters. It easily bound Greem, who had lost all his spellcasting ability, and dragged him back along with Alice.


    The Explosive Fireball that Greem fired from his Scroll of Voodoo was swallowed by the ck python in a single bite. The fireball exploded, and the only thing that happened was some slight ck smoke came out of its nostrils.


    It had swallowed and devoured an explosive fireball and had not sustained a single injury. Greem was utterly terrified. His confidence that came from killing a Second Grade knight on the knight¡¯s ne was instantly shattered into a million pieces.


    Dammit! Why was there such a massive difference between Second Grades from the World of Adepts, and the Second Grades of other nes!?


    "Not bad! Kehkehkeh... " A frightening smile appeared on the old witch¡¯s face, "To raise a hand against a Second Grade adept for a little brat. No wonder this little brat was so willing to be your ve! Not bad. Not bad. Not bad at all... "


    Confused expressions appeared on Greem¡¯s and Alice¡¯s faces. They werepletely dazzled by what was happening.


    However, only one was truly confused. The other one was just putting up an act!


    The old witch Liana looked at the two people staring at her in confusion and leapt off the wooden bench with difficulty. She walked to the wooden table. She held a long staff in one hand, and lifted the ck robe dragging against the ground with the other. She narrowed her eyes as she assessed the two, before nodding in satisfaction.


    "I know both of you are extremely confused. Still, this old hag doesn¡¯t have that much time to exin to either of you. Hey. Kid. Your little maid will need to stay here at my ce for up to ten days. You cane and fetch her ten dayster! I¡¯ll properly educate her on how to be a true witch in this time! And you... can leave."


    Witch Liana waved the staff in her hand and Greem felt light sh before his eyes.


    He found himself standing alone at the entrance of the swamp the very next second.


    With a ck pot in his arms!


    Greem raised his head. The mist was getting heavier. It was hard to see through the Swamp of Darkness anymore. Aplex and indescribable feeling was betrayed in his eyes.


    A short momentter, he shook his head and left.


    ............


    Seven dayster.


    Guriad Arena.


    As a specialized arena for esoteric duels, Guriad Arena was famous throughout the outer circle. Many esoteric adepts loved toe here and settle their disagreements with a good duel.


    Today, the Byron n from the Zhentarim Dagon area and the Gerto n from the north of the Silver Union¡¯s territory were using a golem duel to fight over possession of the right to stay in the Castle in the Sky.


    If the Gerto n won, the Byron n would lose theirst outpost in the Castle in the Sky. They would no longer have any ability to purchase resources from the very center of the Silver Union. If the Byron n won, the Gerto n would have to pay massivepensations as the challenging party.


    It was said that the amount of resources at stake was enough to bankrupt a small n!


    That was why this particr golem duel had drawn the attention of numerous shop owners and adepts stationed in the city.


    Some of them wanted to personally witness the fall of the Byron n, while others only wanted to collect some data on the battling golems. The fight hadn¡¯t start yet, but already the seats were sold out.

 Chapter 285

    Chapter 285 The Arena


    A circr amphitheater, an oval stage forbat, an imprable energy barrier, and an arena full of passionate spectators...


    Guriad Arena. In terms of design and architecture, it wasn¡¯t much different from Greem¡¯s past life memories of the Colosseum.


    When Greem finally entered the arena alongside the Byron adepts the whole arena went silent. The adepts and apprentices remained quiet in their seats, assessing Greem and the Byron adepts with odd and doubtful gazes.


    Some adepts who were familiar with each other couldn¡¯t help but start murmuring when they saw Greem. Greem could only see their mouths move, but not a single sound came out of their throats. It was obvious that they weremunicating using magic.


    "No need to get nervous! The Byron n will help you deflect any kind of variable or interference that mighte from the outside. You just do your best to beat the opponent." Adept Nunnally ground her teeth as she sent a voice transmission to Greem, "Remember, you must win!"


    Even though she knew that this would probably put more pressure on Greem, the path to retreat was already shut off for the Byron n. Thus, after giving Greem a wicked and mean ¡¯encouragement¡¯, Nunnally sat down and waited for the oue in silence.


    Angus let out an awkwardugh. He looked at Greem with an expression that suggested at theplexity and difficulty of the situation, but he didn¡¯t say anything more.


    The stage wherebat took ce was around five hundred meters in diameter. The floor had also been magically hardened. The entire ce could endure the chaos and damage caused by a fight between two magical golems. There were about two hundred seats in the spectator stands. All of them were already filled. There were about forty to fifty adepts amongst them, while the rest of them were elite apprentices from various ns.


    Amotion started up just as Greem was calmly observing the ce.


    "Here theye! It¡¯s here... "


    "Quick, look! That thing is here again... "


    "We get to see the Golem Knight in action again ..."


    "......"


    The noisy voices of chattering adepts and apprentices filled the arena as they talked about the Golem Knight.


    Greem stopped looking around and turned to see the opponent he was about to face. A tall and powerful metallic golem entered the arena, following behind a group of adepts. The group hadn¡¯t even gotten close, yet already Greem could hear the heavy footsteps of the metallic golem and the unique sound of its grinding joints.


    There were seven adepts in all, both male and female.


    All of them were wearing an emblem with a roaring bear¡¯s head on their chest. These were the Gerto n adepts.


    The one walking at the very front was a bald and muscr man wearing a thick and heavy bronze armor. As a Second Grade adept himself, he was the n leader of the Gerto n. His eyes shed with Adept Nunnally the moment he walked into the arena. A deep-seated hatred was carved into his gaze.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but have suspicions when he saw this happening. There were probably some other tensions and conflicts between the two ns other than the bet with the golem challenge. At this point, there was no longer any room to back out. Thus, Greem gave up on mulling over unnecessary thoughts and shifted his attention to his opponent¨C the golem master and his Golem Knight.


    Greem¡¯s eyes swept across the seven adepts and quickly identified the golem master.


    Of course, this wasn¡¯t because the golem master was any different from the other adepts. He had already seen a portrait of this golem master in the information the Byron n provided him with.


    This was a short, crafty old man with wrinkles over all his face and a white goatee below his chin. Greem could sense his aura. He didn¡¯t seem to be much more powerful than Greem himself. His Spirit probably didn¡¯t even exceed ten points. Otherwise there was no way Greem would be able to detect the strength of his aura.


    Greem had finally gotten a basic understanding of First Grade adepts after all this time.


    One could be considered an adept once they sessfully formed their adept core and were able to sense the strength of the narws. Under normal circumstances, a newly advanced adept would have no more than one point of Spirit. The basic condition for bing a Second Grade adept was raising that one point to twenty-one points.


    Thus, the greatest amount of Spirit that a First Grade adept could have was twenty points!


    A First Grade adept at their very peak would have twenty points of Spirit, while a newly advanced adept would only have one point of Spirit. Although truebat ability wasn¡¯t defined purely by the amount of Spirit, the difference between an adept at their peak and a rookie adept was still extremely obvious.


    First Grade adepts would often treat the first ten points of Spirit as a threshold for a certain standard. Adepts that passed this threshold of ten points were called elite adepts. Those who never crossed this threshold would almost always remain as rookies and amateurs.


    The Adept Anderson that died at the Greem¡¯s hands, on the other hand, had advanced for three hundred years already. Yet he still hadn¡¯t manage to break the threshold of ten points. These fellows that had no potential for improvement could only be known as veteran adepts, even to their graves. They had no qualification to call themselves ¡¯elites¡¯.


    In truth, nearly sixty percent of all First Grade adepts on the Continent were unable to cross this threshold in their entire lifespan.


    The Gerto golem master before him, Rouneau, had already exhausted most of his life force, yet his Spirit remained on the level of any other adept. It was clear that he had no chance of breaking through to Second Grade.


    This was one of the awkward truths that esoteric adepts had to face.


    They spent too much time searching for the best forms, scouring for their ideal rare metals, ceaselessly improving and modifying their golem arrays, and trying their best to forge the ultimate golem... every single one of these tasks were enough to grind away at the years of an esoteric adept. All of these tasks added together would quickly exhaust the entire lifespan of an esoteric adept¡¯s brilliant and amazing life!


    Thus, in general, there were very few Third and Fourth Grade adepts amongst the esoteric adepts, and even fewer Great Adepts above Fifth Grade.


    Even most of the high-grade adepts that the Silver Union had right now didn¡¯t advance to their level through their own efforts. It was mostly because they made immense contributions in their research that they were able to get the Union to invest heavily in them. Most of them were high-grade adepts that had risen to their level through the umtion of an uncountable number of resources.


    These people were known as the Chosen Ones among the esoteric adepts!


    This was a source of hope for those who were untalented and unfavored. If they knew they had no hope for advancement, they could throw themselves into their research as esoteric adepts. If they ever came up with an innovative branch of knowledge, or a new line of thought, they could possibly be noticed by the Silver Union Senate, and be selected as a Chosen One.


    Sadly, Golem Master Rouneau was not someone with immense potential either. He had not been selected as a Chosen One. This was why his power was almost equal to Greem¡¯s, despite his seniority. He even seemed to be slightly weaker than Greem.


    However, the fight today was a fight between golems, not a fight between their masters. Greem took a quick look at Rouneau and shifted his gaze to the Golem Knight behind him.


    This was a metallic golem that had the appearance of a human knight. tinum-colored armor, a full helm, and a massive sword and shield on its back. Its movements might not have been as agile and smooth as humans, but they were far more organic than your regr golem.


    The silver-robed adept waiting by the stage spoke, seeing that both parties had arrived.


    "Now that you have both arrived, please let your chosen esoteric adept enter the stage! Remember, adepts are not allowed the attack each other. Only your golems are allowed to fight with each other. Any party that vites the rules will be awarded the loss. Please be careful with your spells! Very well, you may enter the stage now!"


    The silver-robed adept might only be First Grade, but he represented the Silver Union. Even the Second Grade adepts of the two ns didn¡¯t dare to be disrespectful to him. Greem and Rouneau quickly stepped up and stood before the silver-robed adept.


    The silver-robed adept looked at the Golem Knight first. An expression of great desire and admiration appeared on his face. However he couldn¡¯t help but be stunned for a second when he looked towards Greem "You are Greem? Representing the Byron n? Where¡¯s your golem?"


    Greem took a summoning core out of his belt and threw it to the ground. The sound of a fiery explosion rang out, and a massive and powerful giant rose from the mes, standing silently beside Greem.


    "An elementium golem!"


    "To fight an magical puppet with an elementium golem. The Byrons must have gone mad... "


    "Indeed. Are the Byrons such fools? To use an elementium golem against a magical puppet... "


    A wave of noise rose as chattering and murmuring spread throughout the crowd, quickly drowning the Byron n adepts with their voices.


    Adept Nunnally coldly scanned the entire ce with her Spiritual flux. All the moring died down instantly. A Second Grade adept was almost always respected, regardless of where they went. Before they humiliated and insulted the Byron n, they would have to consider whether they had the ability to endure the wrath of a Second Grade adept.


    Everyone had a clear understanding of the situation.


    The Byron n had clearly sent an elementium adept to this duel. The golem he used for the duel was even an elementium golem. Either of these factors alone were enough to lose them the duel. Both of these factors together probably spelled certain defeat.


    So what if an elementium adept was good at a fight? The adepts weren¡¯t allowed to cast spells at any target but their own golems in an esoteric duel. The strength and prowess of an elementium adept waspletely wasted here. Moreover, the elementium golem had too weak of a body. It wouldn¡¯t be able to endure the violent and brutal blows of the magical puppet. It seemed that today¡¯s oue had already been sealed in fate.


    The silver-robed adept couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh and waved his hands to have the two enter the stage.


    Rouneau led the Golem Knight onto the stage and Greem brought his Infernal Tyrant along with him. A temporary entrance had been made in the barrier, and the two entered from there.


    As the entrance slowly disappeared, the arena once again became an enclosed space.


    When looking from the inside, a grey barrier of light hadpletely covered the ce. The view of the outside had also been obscured by ayer of mist. Neither Greem nor Rouneau could see the spectators nor hear any of their noise.


    This was set up to prevent outside interference in the duel!


    Greem brought the Infernal Tyrant to one side of the barrier and waited for the start of the duel. He turned just in time to catch the sinister smile on Rouneau¡¯s face.


    "Kid, you had best yield quickly! Don¡¯t get too heartbroken when your golem is torn to pieces!"


    Greem shook his head as heughed. He had no intention of talking to someone that was about to lose to him.


    "I hereby announce, that the duel has started!" The silver-robed adept¡¯s voice rang out within the stage.


    Greem instantly took out a vial of grey potion and swallowed everything in one gulp.

 Chapter 286

    Chapter 286 The Battle of the Golems


    Everything went ck for a short two seconds.


    When he finally regained consciousness, he was ced within a crimson sea of fire.


    No, he hadn¡¯t been thrown into a fire, but... it was his spirit consciousness had been inserted into the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s control core. He had be an actual Infernal Tyrant!


    The crisp mechanical voice of the chip rang out in his mind the moment he woke up.


    "Beep. Spirit relocationpleted. Connection passage stable. Consciousness relocationplete. Compatible affinity.... all factors have reached expected targets. Requesting instructions from host. Begin control? Warning. Amount of Dead Soul¡¯s Water protecting spirit consciousness is limited. Estimated time remaining for spirit relocation: 2 hours, 17 minutes, 39 seconds. Countdown begins... "


    A giant screen of light filled with numbers appeared in his mind. The countdown timer until the effect of the Dead Soul¡¯s Water was lost was written in the notification.


    "Assertplete control over this body. Prepare for battle!" Greem calmly replied.


    His Spirit frequency quickly adjusted and Greem was finally able to ¡¯see¡¯ everything that was happening.


    The ¡¯Greem¡¯ right now was no longer in his original body. He had transferred all of his spiritual consciousness into the control core of the Infernal Tyrant.


    Without the nurturing of the body¡¯s flesh and blood, a human¡¯s soul would typically fall into a state of constant weakening and withering. The reason Greem had to obtain the Dead Soul¡¯s Water was to protect his soul from the cold chill of the crystal core. Without it, he probably wouldn¡¯t have been able to exert enough strength to win the battle!


    It was a patch of bright red the moment Greem relocated his consciousness. He couldn¡¯t see anything or hear anything. It wasn¡¯t until he adjusted his Spirit frequency to that of the Tyrant¡¯s that he was able to sense anything.


    The Infernal Tyrant was an elementium golem. The way it ¡¯sees¡¯ and ¡¯listens¡¯ had massive fundamental differencespared to human beings. They might have humanoid features such as a mouth, ears, and nose. But these were just appearances that the Tyrant imitated with the use of its mes. The main way it sensed the outside world was with the use of Spirit.


    Why was it that even a cold metallic golem needed the Spirit attribute? That was because Spirit was the only thing that allowed them to sense the material world, to differentiate between enemies and allow them to carry out the orders of their creators. Without Spirit, a metallic golem would be nothing more than a deaf and blind golem with no ability to see or hear!


    Greem had been put into an elementium body, and removed from his familiar human shell. Without his ears, eyes, nose, and mouth, he could only rely on the powerful Spiritual senses of an adept.


    Greem¡¯s spiritual appendages extended from the control core, following along the energywork within the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s elementium body, and finally reached out of the Tyrant¡¯s head, where the eyes were supposed to be. Every single material object was revealed in their most basic and original forms.


    The world that had lost its color, feeling, taste, and temperature was presented in Greem¡¯s mind in apletely different form.


    He ¡¯saw¡¯ the floor beneath him in a different manner, he ¡¯saw¡¯ the various elementium particles wandering about in the air in a different light, and he ¡¯saw¡¯ the enemy waiting on the other side of the stage¨C the Golem Knight!


    A intense and brilliant shroud of light enveloped the Golem Knight¡¯s body. Powerful energy radiated colorful and blinding lights, preventing Greem¡¯s spiritual appendages from probing into its body.


    However, with the elementium sight¡¯s powerful ability to see through energy and the chip¡¯s detailed recording of every single piece of data, Greem slowly became able to see through the body of the Golem Knight. The metallic armor started to be semi-translucent. Some energy passages flowing within the runic circuits were revealed.


    Bright surges of energy were flowing through the numerous circuits. They continued to surge and circte throughout the body, providing needed energy to all parts of the golem¡¯s metallic form. There were even some small energy hubs functioning and outputting energy in certain crucial body parts. These hubs stored the energy and then output energy to entirety of the golem¡¯s body. Pure and bright yellow energy coursed through these artificial ¡¯blood vessels¡¯, allowing the Golem Knight to exhibit terrifyingbat prowess!


    The Golem Knight¡¯s main energy reaction was located slightly below the middle of its chest, while its consciousness control hub was located where a human heart would be. That part of its body was protected by the thickest pieces of armor. Trying to break through the armor with physical and magical attacks from the outside was destined to be an arduous and futile task.


    Still, someone had to do the job, regardless of how difficult it was!


    Greem¡¯s consciousness moved slightly, and the huge Infernal Tyrant instantly took two steps forward. Its giant fists of me were gripped tightly into a fiery ball of destruction as it bent its body and let out a warcry at the Golem Knight.


    As Greempleted his battle preparations, Rouneau in the distance had also given a series ofmands to the Golem Knight before him. He patted the golem¡¯s cold steel back and shouted excitedly, "Fight, my warrior! Defeat the enemy and tear that me giant to pieces... "


    The Golem Knight reached backwards with its hands as Rouneau shouted. It grabbed the massive tower shield and sharp knight¡¯s sword and readied itself. The Golem Knight then bent its body and charged at the Infernal Tyrant like an actual human knight.


    A three meter tall metallic magical puppet and a four meter tall me golem charged at each other simultaneously. The overwhelmingly ferocious momentum of the fight instantly lit up the atmosphere in the arena. Even the apprentices in the spectator¡¯s seats were gripping their fists in excitement, gritting their teeth and waiting in anticipation of a fiery fight! A tremendous sh the likes of twos crashing into each other!


    The distance between the two rapidly closed.


    The Infernal Tyrant, with its mastery over the elementium, quickly extended one of its hands. A chain of Explosive Fireballs fired off, shooting towards the charging Golem Knight. This chain of fireballs were all the size of washbasins. The temperature at their cores reached a terrifying two thousand degrees. The surrounding air had already been twisted and the light refracted by the sheer heat of the fireballs shooting through the air.


    The Golem Knight raised the tower shield in its left hand and braved the gauntlet of fireballs, recklessly continuing its crusade towards the enemy.


    Beng. Beng. Beng....


    The Explosive Fireballs crashed against the shield and exploded. Violent and oppressive me shockwaves formed as they blew up in the air. Again and again, the shockwaves spread across the air between the two golems. The shattered fragments of the fireballsnded on the hardened stone floor and continued to burn stubbornly.


    Dong. Dong. Dong...


    Muffled explosions rang out repeatedly, but the Golem Knight had made it. It stepped through the sea of fire, enduring the violent storm of mes, and charged at the Tyrant.


    The very next second, a blinding and fearsome de light sliced through the air. The giant me humanoid had been cut into shreds of fire.


    Boom. The sound of a fireing to life.


    The Infernal Tyrant appeared far behind the Golem Knight, under Greem¡¯s control. The Infernal Tyrant continued staring at the enemy a hundred meters away. It was still following through its downward sh. The Tyrant raised a magma hand shrouded in mes as an unstable Magma Fireball formed in less than half a second.


    It shook its hand lightly, and this enhanced Magma Fireballunched towards the Golem Knight¡¯s back. The Tyrant then took a step backwards and made a grabbing motion with its hands. Several spears of mes with mesmerizing patterns across their shafts quickly formed as the mes gathered. The Infernal Tyrant ceaselessly threw the spears at its opponent.


    The Golem Knight quickly locked onto the Infernal Tyrant once more, with the help of Rouneau¡¯s remote control of the puppet. It turned around and easily deflected the rain of spears, then readied its sword and walked towards its enemy.


    As the two golems were ying catch-up, Rouneau raised his head to look at Greem, who was standing still at the edge of the stage. He let out a coldugh in his heart, "Spirit transfer? Heh. This might make your golem a little more agile, but the golem core will be destroyed when you lose this battle. The spirit consciousness nested within will take tremendous bacsh damage when that happens. The effects are severe for a newly advanced adept like yourself. If you are lucky that might mean a reduction in your Spirit, and if you are unlucky, your spirit consciousness might just be shattered, turning you into a madman. Hmph! What an ignorant young man. I¡¯ll teach you a lesson you will never forget!"


    Greem once again used his Fire Teleportation to put some distance between himself and the Golem Knight. The originally clumsy fellow suddenly made a sharp turn and quickly locked onto the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s location. A massive amount of energy was ejected from its back.


    The energy st pushed the Golem Knight forward, and its clumsy body suddenly became quick as a bird in flight. It shot through the air like a cannonball, carving two ditches into the ground as its leg dragged against the floor. It was almost upon the Tyrant in less than a few seconds.


    Five meters!


    In all seriousness, this was the first time the two golems had been so close to each other since the start of the fight.


    The next moment, the Golem Knight ced the shield on its back and gripped the sword with both of its hands. It unleashed a ferocious series of blows towards the Infernal Tyrant.


    Greem slowly retreated.


    As he retreated, he used the roaring mes to slowly roast the metal body of the opponent. He continued to dodge the storm of lightning-fast attacks as he did so.


    Any other golem might have been able to rely on their resilient steel bodies to trade blows with the Golem Knight. However, the Tyrant only had a body made of elementium. It didn¡¯t matter how resilient the body was, it would never be able topare to the true steel of the opponent.


    The Infernal Tyrant lost one-tenth of its elementium body in a few seconds.


    The intense mes and scorching heat from the Tyrant¡¯s body had also started to soften the golem¡¯s body. The decorations and delicate patterns at the borders of the armor had already been marred and damaged.


    That said, the damage wasn¡¯t significant at all. The Golem Knight had a metallic body as thick as four fingers put together. The magical alloy also had decent elementium resistance. The Infernal Tyrant would probably have to keep at it for another fifteen to thirty minutes before it could melt through the armor with its mes.


    And so, the two gigantic adept golems crashed together in a deathly battle under the excited gazes of the crowd!

 Chapter 287

    Chapter 287 An Uphill Battle


    The ravaging mes continued to spread across the stage into a sea of fire.


    Two massive creatures fought with each other in the middle of the mes.


    Both of them were golems without a single piece of flesh on their bodies, yet the intensity of their fight was still enough to excite the audience.


    The Golem Knight was a melee golem. It might have had some mid-ranged attacks, but against a powerful opponent like the Infernal Tyrant, it would have to connect with its de to deal any significant damage. The Golem Knight gave up on its defensive tower shield. It had to prevent the opponent from using Fire Teleportation to leave its attack range, and the only way to do that was to stall the Tyrant by going all out with its sword techniques.


    Every time the Infernal Tyrant wanted to disengage with a Fire Teleportation, it would be interrupted by a savage battle technique. The Tyrant would then be forced to stay in ce and endure the ceaseless blows from the Knight¡¯s sword.


    Its ming left arm was severed and instantly regenerated...


    The two legs below its body were cleaved into two and instantly regenerated...


    The de cut right through the Tyrant¡¯s right shoulder, sending ming sparks through the air, and it instantly regenerated...


    A massive hole stabbed into its stomach and it instantly regenerated...


    The Infernal Tyrant was the most loyal and resilient target practice. One by one, it used its me body to endure the shes from the rampaging knight. It did so even as mes went flying everywhere and sparks filled the air.


    As expected of a terrifying golem born from fire; the Infernal Tyrant bled mes even as it was repeatedly injured. Its severed arm fell to the ground and burst into a massive fire. Its legs exploded into a sea of mes. Even the ¡¯blood¡¯ flowing out of its wounds was boiling magma.


    Fire!


    Fire everywhere!


    Extreme mes that burned without fuel. The Tyrant¡¯s severed body parts became a fearsome threat when paired with the Ring of Fire, which had been activated around the Infernal Tyrant. A hundred meter section of the battlefield had already turned into a ck and red world of perpetual magma.


    The hardened stone floor had been scorched into viscous magma. The temperature of the air rapidly rose as the fires continued to burn. The temperature surrounding the two golems had reached a shocking seven thousand degrees.


    All substances unprotected by magic would instantly vaporize at this terrifying level of heat. Even the stone floor, enhanced with magic, couldn¡¯t endure the heat. It started to be magma. The two golems were practically fighting in fire andva.


    In truth, the Infernal Tyrant could probably still escape from the Golem Knight¡¯s harassment by using both Greem and the chip¡¯s precise controls. Still, Greem gritted his teeth and stood his ground in order to reach for the final victory.


    Indeed, at this point, it was hard to tell who had the upper hand!


    The Golem Knight boldly hacked away at the Infernal Tyrant. Every sh of its longsword, and every punch of its massive fists, would bring tremendous destruction to the Tyrant¡¯s me body. The severed body parts might be able to regenerate using me elementium reserves within its core, but the loss of me energy was certain. It was hard to replenish these energies from the air in a short period of time.


    The reason the Infernal Tyrant was able to rapidly create a home-field advantage for itself was due to this rapidly exhausting fire energy.


    Greem had only been focused on one thing as he controlled the Tyrant during this period of time!


    Greem had locked onto the Golem Knight¡¯s right knee joint and was focusing the zing Light gathered in his hand right at that joint. He intended to use the fearsome and pure zing Light to melt the metal at the Golem Knight¡¯s knee joint, causing the metal to distort under the heat and the stress of the weight it had to bear. This would severely weaken its mobility.


    It seemed that Golem Master Rouneau had used a humanoid design in the creation of the Golem Knight. This gave it swift limb movements and made it convenient for the golem tounch some of its more powerful knight battle-techniques. While this gave the Golem Knight agility far beyond the means of other ordinary metallic golems, it also inherited the ws of a human construction.


    Its joints were its greatest weakness!


    Both the energy reactors and the control cores were hidden beneath its thick armor. This was where its defense was the strongest. Ordinary attacks could not break through its tower shield and knight¡¯s sword to crack that shell. As such, Greem went for the second best option and tried his best to damage the opponent¡¯s lower joints.


    Mansordar Alloy was also used to create that part, and it had the same defensive capabilities as the magic-resistant tower shield. However, even the toughest of metals had their limits! The Infernal Tyrant was a top-grade golem casting the fearsome zing Light. Even if the Golem Knight intended to protect its joints, it was no match for Greem¡¯s mad resolve to melt it with overwhelming heat!


    The two temporarily separated from each other after fifteen minutes of arduous fighting. Both of them were already badly damaged and could hardly continue fighting.


    The Infernal Tyrant had lost 46% of its energy reserves and certain parts of its body had already been destroyed over ten times. With the help of the chip¡¯s detailed sensors and guidance, the Tyrant was wounded, but not dead. The golem core was still untouched.


    The Infernal Tyrant, despite its miserable appearance, was quickly able to return to peak condition after consuming 7% of its energy reserves. The Golem Knight on the other side of the arena also seemed to be in decent condition. After stepping out of theva pool, it quickly brandished its sword and charged at the Infernal Tyrant.


    Just like that, the second round broke out in a new battlefield outside of theva pool!


    The audience of adepts and apprentices silently watched. Their expressions were somber and serious. For the first time since the fight started, they had lost their confidence in the oue of the battle. That was because they saw very clearly what was happening. The Golem Knight¡¯s knee was no longer as flexible as before, when it had initiated its second charge at the imposing me golem.


    Rouneau, who watched from a distance, waspletely shocked at the situation. This wasn¡¯t how the fight was supposed to go!


    As a golem master himself, Rouneau knew very well the strengths and weaknesses of metallic golems.


    Ordinary metallic golems were made of magical alloys with exceptional physical defense and eptable magic resistance. This ensured that they had a perfect defense against piercing and shing weapons, such as swords and spears. However, such golems were vulnerable to blunt, heavy weapons. They couldn¡¯t endure the ferocious blows of maces, axes, and ils for long periods of time. The impact of such heavy blows could easily damage and disce the magical arrays and runic circuits within the golem¡¯s body.


    This was why most ordinary magical puppets and animated statues were made to be as round andrge as possible. They used their thick metallic bodies and heavy weight to bear the brunt of heavy blows and to reduce the impact on their fragile inner makings.


    Rouneau had fused a high-grade knight¡¯s soul into the Golem Knight in order to maximize the benefits from using a precious Mansordar tower shield and a magical sword. The Golem Knight had been created with the slim figure of an agile fighter to bring out the soul¡¯sbat abilities.


    The weakened defense could bepensated for by the tough tower shield. This Golem Knight had both the offensive abilities of an agile fighter and the defensive abilities of a shieldbearer.


    It was because of the knight soul¡¯s exceptional defenses, offense, and battle techniques that the Golem Knight had the powerfulbat strength to crush the golem constructs of two shops in a row.


    Still, he never expected his Golem Knight to face an enemy as powerful as the Infernal Tyrant at this time and ce.


    The enemy¡¯s elementium golem demonstrated unimaginable prowess in meleebat under the precise control of its golem master. One golem was a metallic puppet made of steel and iron, while the other was an elementium golem shrouded in mes. Yet the Golem Knight was unable to gain the upper hand in a melee fight!


    Rouneau saw what had transpired earlier. The me-being had dodged every single one of the Golem Knight¡¯s powerful battle techniques, even before they wereunched. The me golem had even used parts of its body to minimize the damage from the attacks it couldn¡¯t dodge. None of the attacks could exhibit their true might.


    The Tyrant¡¯s attack, on the other hand, was firm and stubborn. It continued to damage the Golem Knight¡¯s joints and weaken its mobility.


    Rouneau couldn¡¯t help but feel his heart burn with anxiousness as the two massive creatures continued to wreak havoc on the stage.


    Initially, he was still able to remain silent and uninvolved in the fight between the two. After all, the knight¡¯s soul inside the puppet was far more proficient atbat than he was!


    However, Rouneau went into a rage when he witnessed an infuriating scene. The fearsome me golem had traded a massive wound on its body for more minor damage to the knee joint.


    Dammit! This enemy even knew how to trick the Golem Knight¡¯s battle instincts!


    The Golem Knight would always be faced with choices in battle; whether to strike and inflict more damage on the opponent, or to defend and prevent the enemy from continuing to wound its leg.


    But the me humanoid was always exposing its own weaknesses to the Golem Knight and tricking the Knight into attacking it. While the Knight was preupied with dealing damage, the me golem would slowly dole out damage to the knee joint, little by little.


    The Golem Knight only possessed a rigid soul that was the product of a forced fusion. It would recklessly continue to attack as long as it judged that the damage it caused greatly exceeded the damage it received. This particr trait was being exploited by the ursed me golem.


    The opponent exhaustedrge amounts of its energy reserves to trade for some insignificant damage on his golem. However, the damaged location was extremely unique. It was the Golem Knight¡¯s right knee joint.


    Rouneau didn¡¯t dare leave the Golem Knight to its own devices once he understood what was happening. He forcefully gave a newmand and made the Knight prioritize defending or dodging when its legs were attacked


    Unfortunately, the Infernal Tyrant was already counter-attacking at this point!


    ............


    The image before Greem¡¯s eyes shook intensely.


    Multiple beeps rang out in his mind as the chip continued to issue rms and warnings.


    "Beep. Warning. Warning. 78% of energy reserves exhausted. Estimatedbat time remaining: 25 minutes, 17 seconds."


    Greem had let the Infernal Tyrant suffer tremendously in order to try and cripple a single leg. Sadly, even after exhausting most of the Tyrant¡¯s energies, the opponent remained wounded but not crippled. It still retained powerful mobility and offense.


    The Golem Knight had also be increasingly careful under Rouneau¡¯s instructions. There were fewer chances for the Infernal Tyrant to attack.


    At this rate, the opponent only needed to defend and counter-attack, and they would be able to exhaust all of the energy remaining in the Infernal Tyrant.


    Greem gritted his teeth and decided on a gamble! A risky gamble to turn the tides!

 Chapter 288

    Chapter 288 Golem Self-Destruction


    Wuuu.


    The knight¡¯s sword shed at the Infernal Tyrant, causing violent winds to blow in every direction.


    The de missed by fifty centimeters, but the ferocious air pressure still sliced apart the protectiveyer of fire on the Tyrant¡¯s chest. A white mark was left behind on its chest.


    The sword had just swept by, and already the tower shield mmed into its face. Again, even before the shield had arrived, the powerful wind pressure had already put out the mes on the Tyrant¡¯s body.


    Even the insignificant air appeared to have turned solid at this moment!


    The energy reserve bar in Greem¡¯s mind instantly fell by 2%. He had no choice but to give up on enduring the shield m and quickly retreated. He frantically threw out Explosive Fireballs as he backed away, preventing the enemy from following up on its previous attack. Two Sr Rays shot out from the Tyrant¡¯s eyes and sliced horizontally towards the Golem Knight¡¯s neck.


    Explosive Fireballs continuously exploded between the two golems. The concussive me shockwaves caused the two giants to stall in ce, like tiny rafts rowing against the tide. It was hard for them to take a single step in the elementium storm.


    An Explosive Fireball could deal over 70 points of damage and was no small threat, even to an official adept. However, neither of the magic golems were damaged by the multiple explosions.


    One was a metallic golem made of steel and iron. It couldpletely ignore all damage under 80 points. Any damage above 80 points would also be mitigated and reduced by the magical alloy¡¯s magical resistance. An attack had to deal at least 100 points of damage to have any hope of leaving behind a visible wound.


    The Infernal Tyrant, on the other hand, waspletely immune to weak fire damage. Only swift and fierce physical attacks, like those from the Golem Knight, could causesting energy loss.


    Greem hadn¡¯t fired the Explosive Fireballs in hopes of dealing damage to the enemy. Rather, he was counting on the shockwaves from the explosives to break the Golem Knight¡¯sbo chain. Otherwise, there was a real possibility that the Tyrant could just be chained to death.


    This was the truly fearsome skill of high-grade knights!


    You were never sent flying with a m of a shield or the sh of a de when you engaged in a melee. Once theynded the first battle technique on your body, you would lose all control over the fight. The only option left would be to slowly retreat backward as they continued to overwhelm you with their lightning-quick shes until you were sliced to ribbons.


    Greem¡¯s Tyrant hadn¡¯t managed to dodge this string of attacks in thest bout. It was chained several times by the Golem Knight and instantly lost 17% of its energy reserves. Thus, Greem was now always primed to fire some Explosive Fireballs to interrupt the Golem Knight¡¯s chain skills.


    Greem was now able to predict the Golem Knight¡¯s actions to a certain extent. He used his elementium sight¡¯s ability to see the flow of energy within its body as well as the chip¡¯s analysis.


    Every time the energy in the Golem Knight¡¯s body started to gather at the right wrist, the shoulder, and the waist, it meant that it was about tounch a Spinning sh. Every time energy gathered at its feet and back, it meant that it was about to Charge. And when energy gathered at the legs and the right wrist, it was very likely to be a Forward Stab.


    After such a long time inbat, the chip had perfectly captured and analyzed all of the tricks and techniques the opponent possessed. The price the Tyrant had to pay for this knowledge was the loss of 85% of its energy!


    The Infernal Tyrant had never been hit by any of the enemy¡¯s attacks once the chippleted its analysis. In fact, every time the opponent was about tounch an attack, the Infernal Tyrant would be able to predict the direction of the attack and instantly reposition itself. It would then take the small window of opportunity where the Golem Knight was stuck in its attack motion to repeatedly attack the Knight¡¯s right knee joint.


    There was originally a knee guard on that spot. However, that piece of armor had beenpletely melted and destroyed by Greem¡¯s constant effort. The Golem Knight¡¯s ball-shaped knee joint waspletely exposed.


    Perhaps because of Rouneau¡¯smand, or the battle instincts of the Golem Knight itself, it quickly took up its massive tower shield and started protecting its lower limbs the moment it realized its knee joint was exposed.


    Though in doing so it lost its mobility. Both its movement and attack speed had been reduced by over 40%.


    Greem took this opportunity to control the Tyrant and put some distance between the two golems. He then started to bombard the Golem Knight at a distance. One after another the Magma Fireballs and Fire Core Explosions sailed through the air and ravaged the slow, immobile Knight.


    Pure elementium spells weren¡¯t that effective against metal cans like the Golem Knight. Single-target spells that had both physical and elementium damage, like the Magma Fireball, had far more condensed and concentrated energy. Of course, zing Light was also very effective in dealing damage!


    However, zing Light wasparatively harder to form and required constant channeling. This made it easier for the Golem Knight to catch up and attack the Tyrant. Greem tried to cast zing Light several times, but he had to give up the idea in the end. Instead, he ravaged the opponent with streams of Magma Fireballs.


    Greem had even turned off his favorite Ring of Fire to reduce the energy consumption rate. The only two spells he was using were Fire Teleportation and Magma Fireball. Even if only two or three out of every ten attacks hit the opponent, it was more than enough to wear away at the Golem Knight.


    Theva ssh from the Magma Fireball was extremely thick. It would cling to the Golem Knight¡¯s body and continuously inflict small amounts of damage to the armor. The fragments of rock that formed after the magma cooled were also the greatest enemies of mechanical gears. They would easily get stuck in the turning gears and cause them to twist and deform.


    At this point in the battle, almost everyone with a pair of eyes could see that the Golem Knight¡¯s past glory had faded. Even though it still had the initiative on the battlefield, it was dealing minimal damage to the Infernal Tyrant. Most of the time it was only chasing behind the me golem¡¯s ass.


    On the other hand, the Infernal Tyrant hadplete control over the pace of battle after finally getting over that difficult start. It nimbly moved across the stage and continuously wore away at the Golem Knight¡¯s body bit by bit with an unending assault of Magma Fireballs.


    Only the outeryer of the armor appeared to be melting, but that didn¡¯t mean the Knight was winning. When it failed to destroy the elementium golem¡¯s core in a melee fight, it had lost its control over the entire fight.


    Its injured right leg was also a major cause for concern!


    The tower shield might allow the Golem Knight to protect this point of weakness, but it was also a burden on the Knight¡¯s speed. The Knight could no longer catch up to the Tyrant. It might have been able to do so if it tossed aside the shield, but then the joint...


    For a moment, even Golem Master Rouneau fell into a daze. He hesitated and no longer barkedmands at his golem.


    Just then, Greem decided tounch an attack of his own initiative.


    There was no choice. The Infernal Tyrant had exhausted over 89% of its energy. There was no possibility of wearing down the enemy with a marathon. He had to conclude the battle soon.


    The Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter suddenly appeared in the Tyrant¡¯s hand. A massive pir instantly exploded in front of it, and the equally massive body of the Fire Deity appeared on stage.


    Everyone was shocked for a moment.


    After all, the ten-meter-tall body of the Fire Deity was far too intimidating and deceptive.


    However, all the adepts let out a sigh and shook their heads in disappointment once they used their Spiritual senses to get a feel for the Fire Deity¡¯s true power level.


    What use was a pseudo-adept level elementium being in a golem fight of this level?


    The Fire Deity bent its body and charged towards the Golem Knight before the audience couldment any more.


    A distraction? Self-destruction? Or just...


    The Fire Deity self-destructed before Rouneau even had the time to give anothermand to the Golem Knight.


    A me halo ravaged outward with the sudden explosion, instantly enveloping the Golem Knight in all its wrath and fury. Even the earth and skies turned into a chaotic sea of mes. A cage made of pure elementium fire materialized out of nowhere as the violent fires and the fearsome streams of me coursed all over the stage. The Golem Knight had been trapped within.


    The next second the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s domineering body, shrouded in mes, appeared beside the me cage. A mysterious smile appeared on its ck and red face and an odd ck grimoire flew into its hands.


    The Scroll of Voodoo!


    As a piece of Soul Equipment, the Infernal Tyrant was able to use the Scroll of Voodoo once Greem had transferred his spiritual consciousness into the Tyrant¡¯s core.


    A deep and powerful roar rang out in the air. The Infernal Tyrant quickly channeled the powerful spells contained within the Scroll and several Fire Core Explosions detonated against the Golem Knight¡¯s body.


    The Fire Core Explosions each dealt up to 191 points of damage. Every single one of them could send an unprepared adept to their grave. Six unbelievably powerful Fire Core Explosions had burst within the me cage. The umted magic effect was enough to send chills down the spines of every adept present.


    The center of the explosion had reached a terrifying ten thousand degrees. The damage to the Golem Knight was enough to destroy it.


    The Golem Knight could tell it was at a disadvantage. It frantically shielded its body with the tower shield and gathered all of its energy to charge through the me cage. Unfortunately, the damage to its leg limited the speed at which it could move. The jets of me quickly caught up after it barely broke out of the cage.


    The Golem Knight, despite being able to endure the seven thousand degrees earlier, was no longer able to tolerate the heat this time.


    The surface of the tower shield had turned a bright red from the heat and quickly softened. The molten liquid continuously flowed down. The shield was getting thinner and thinner. Finally, the shieldpletely eroded and scorching fires engulfed the Golem Knight¡¯s body, making a mess of its delicate armor.


    All of the patterns and border carvings had melted in the heat like wax near a fire.


    The Golem Knight tried its very best to escape from the zing fire, only to find a shadow towering over itself.


    A massive ck-red silhouette stood before it.


    Boom. A massive explosion. The monstrous me humanoid smashed one of its arms into the Knight¡¯s weakened chest. It pulled, and a mechanical heart pulsing with magical energies was forcefully removed from the puppet.


    The Golem Knight stalled when it lost its control core. Its whole body glowed a brilliant red.


    Three secondster a shocking explosion erupted on the stage. The energy bnce within the Golem Knight¡¯s body had gone out of control. It had self-destructed!

 Chapter 289

    Chapter 289 A Banquet


    The victor had been decided.


    A joyous Adept Nunnally and smiling Angus greeted Greem as he stepped out of the arena with the Infernal Tyrant.


    The Gerto adepts stared angrily at them, their faces full of killing intent.


    Both parties looked at Greem and the Tyrant, but no one paid any attention to the disheveled and defeated Rouneau.


    "Very well. The esoteric duel today has concluded." The silver-robed adept stepped up as the mediator, "Shop 167 of Champs ¨¦lys¨¦es Street will continue to be managed by the Byron n. As the losing challengers, the Gerto n has to pay theirpensations to the Byron n within three days. If thepensation is not paid on time, the Silver Union will exile the Gerto n and all property they have in the Castle in the Sky will be forfeited and put up for auction. I hope this will not be the case. Very well, now that the duel hase to a close, you may all leave."


    The silver-robed adept took onest look at Greem and his golem before silently leaving.


    "Let¡¯s go! We have to go back and have a proper celebration after this!" Even a cold and grim fellow like Adept Angus couldn¡¯t help but betray a smile. It was clear how significant of a victory this was for the Byron n.


    The Byron adepts surrounded Greem, and together they returned to their n outpost in high spirits.


    Nunnally smiled coldly as she spoke to the bald-headed man, whose face was turning a deathly green, "We can settle our debts in the future, Nako. I hope to see thepensation paid as soon as possible. You know where I¡¯ll be. I¡¯ll be waiting for the good news!"


    Every single muscle in the Gerto n Head¡¯s body tensed up when he red at Nunnally. You could hear the crackling and popping sounds from snapping muscles in his body.


    "Nunnally, you bastard. I want you dead... I¡¯ll make sure you die a horrible death... "


    However, even a Second Grade adept didn¡¯t dare to start a fight here, regardless of how angry he was. The Silver Union¡¯s esoteric adepts might not have been worth much in a fight, but their army of magical golems was a fearsome lot.


    The consequences of attacking Nunnally here would be severe. Despite being Second Grade, not only would Nako be unable to escape the Castle in the Sky, even his n would bepletely destroyed in the punishment that came after.


    Fortunately, the Gerto n had already won two esoteric duels before this. Even though these were the more rural areas of the outer circle, and were far less prosperous than Champs ¨¦lys¨¦es Street, it was enough for his n to establish a foothold in the city. Still, Nako¡¯s heart bled when he thought of the massive amount of resources he had to give to the Byron n three days from now.


    ............


    The fight at the arena propelled Greem to fame within the Twelfth District of the outer area.


    The outer circle was like the face of a massive clock. Champs ¨¦lys¨¦es Street, where the Byron n stood, was located at the twelve o¡¯clock position, which was why it was also known as the Twelfth District. There were around two dozen shops here, and every single one of them was backed by famous adept ns from the Continent.


    The fact that Greem¡¯s name had spread among them was thanks to the might of the Infernal Tyrant!


    Outsider adepts like Greem were the most popr within the outer circle. The price of hiring them was far cheaper than the esoteric masters. The strength of these outsider adepts might vary, but a sessful gamble on one of them could allow a n toe back to life and preserve their spot in the Castle in the Sky.


    Greem¡¯s representation of the Byron n this time meant that it was possible he could represent their ns. Thus, every single outer circle n was extremely willing to associate with a pseudo-esoteric adept who had a bright future ahead of him.


    ............


    Dusk.


    The dark curtain of night had enveloped the Castle in the Sky, but lights were glowing brightly at the Byron n¡¯s ce.


    A small celebration banquet was being held in the hall on the first floor. All seventeen shops of the Twelfth District had sent representatives to the banquet to celebrate and congratte the Byron¡¯s victory.


    With the conclusion of the esoteric duels, most of these seventeen ns had sessfully defended theirnd. However, there were still five new ns that had managed to rece the previous shop owners. Everyone was taking the Byron n¡¯s banquet as an opportunity to scheme and establish deals under the table.


    The old ns needed to reach new agreements, and the newer ns needed to make concessions or demonstrate sufficient influence to join their social circles. Some of the weaker ns also needed to establish alliances to ensure their continued prosperity.


    As such, almost every n representative and stationed adept were extremely busy during this banquet. They repeatedly went into hidden rooms and met with one representative after another. The only ones who had fun at this banquet were the newly advanced n adepts that had been sent to the Castle in the Sky to experience and learn the intricacies of negotiation.


    The banquet wasn¡¯t a veryrge affair, but the decorations were quite unique.


    The walls and floor had been decorated with glowstones. With how brightly they lit up the hall, no other lighting was needed.


    A dozen dinner tables were ced in an orderly fashion in a corner of the hall. Gold and silver tes and bowls filled the tables. Only delicacies were served. There were dishes like pan-seared ox¡¯s kidney, quails stuffed with spices and fruits, shortbread withrk and partridge meat fillings, steak cooked with wine and onion, dormice soaked in honey...


    The waitresses serving the adepts in the hall were beauties of various races and appearances. There were the slim and light cat girls with delicate facial features, grey cat ears, and bushy tails on their backs. There were the subi of the lower realms. Tall, curvaceous, pale skinned, seductive figures with tiny horns on their heads, bat wings on their backs, tails of bone, and hooves for feet.


    Apart from these two, there were also female elves with soft bodies and pointed ears, as well as tiger girls with fierce personalities and fur growing by the side of their faces. Greem even saw a fifty-centimeter dwarf girl among these beauties...


    Of course, without exception, they all had a tiny runic brand beneath their flimsy dresses. The Byron emblem was in the middle of these runic brands. The runic arrays surrounding the emblem served the purposes of sealing, locating, and various other functions that Greem couldn¡¯t decipher.


    Greem already knew that the World of Adepts was a massive ne that had enved thousands of lesser nes. The resources taken from these nes were endless, and the ves that they had obtained covered a huge range of races.


    Of course, he had never had the opportunity toe into contact with these high-quality resources when he was only an apprentice. It was only now that he had be stronger and made a ce for himself alongside the stronger adepts that they were now being presented to him.


    A beauty of another race might have been the princess or queen of an enved race back in their own ne. Here in this brightly lit adept¡¯s banquet, however, they were nothing more than ves and maids that could be toyed with in whatever manner the adepts enjoyed.


    Some of the younger male and female adepts were surrounding these servants and talking about their appearances. They would even asionally undress them and touch their bodies all over as if they were extremely interested in their biological construction.


    Greem was also favored by the young female adepts, with how handsome and charming a newly advanced adept he was. Three or four young female adepts from various ns had surrounded him and were passionately flirting with him.


    Honestly, the moral limits of the young men and women had beenpletely removed when they became adepts. As talented individuals being cultivated by their ns, their futures were bright ones. This was why all of them were more willing to indulge in the pleasures of life, using the authority of their position to enjoy beauties and delicacies! After all, what awaited them afterward was a long and arduous journey of umting knowledge!


    They were still young and had no right to join the leaders of the n, which gave them plenty of time and energy to pursue pleasure and enjoyment. Greem had heard plenty about how debaucherous and wasteful these youths were in their private lives. Every single one of these young male and female adepts had a harem of pretty boys anddies waiting on them at home.


    However, those were only their sexual partners. If they really wanted an actual partner for life, they would have to choose from adepts of the same Grade.


    As long as two young adepts favored each other, they would instantly get into a rtionship. The bold and direct nature of these female adepts when it came to carnal rtionships was too much for Greem, the ultimate hermit, to deal with.


    There were also other, smaller social circles in the hall aside from these youths.


    One of them was the bloodline adept¡¯s circle.


    Those who could step foot in here were all elites among the bloodline adepts. The greatest indicator of this was the dense bloodline aura they radiated, as well as their obvious appearances. Most of them were simr to the creatures their bloodline came from.


    The Synos n managing the ck Rose was a n of bloodline adepts. Their n¡¯s bloodline legacy was that of the Shadow Serpent. This was a terrifying shadow creature that was widely known to be able to reach the ranks of Sixth Grade.


    That was why all of the adepts from the Synos ns had a ck serpent¡¯s head in ce of a human one. It was the same whether they were male or female. All of them looked like a serpent. Their bodies also showed vague signs of blurring, as if they were constantly under the protection of shadows and darkness.


    These bloodlines adepts clearly disliked intimate rtionships with adepts of other races. Their considerations and priorities when picking a partner or lover were focused on the opponent¡¯s bloodline concentration and their Grade level. Appearance and personality was only a secondary thought.


    There was also a group of mutated adepts in the hall that had undergone severe body modifications. Perhaps parts of their bodies had been reced with that of wild beasts, turned undead, or reced with mechanical parts. Either way, the marks of magical modification had been left on each and every one of their bodies.


    There wasn¡¯t much left about them that was human!

 Chapter 290

    Chapter 290 Fortune and Misfortune


    "You are really strong. Your vitality and vigor seem to be exceptionally strong as well... "


    Winnie from the Clyde n pressed against Greem¡¯s chest with her hand. She licked her red lips seductively and smiled.


    "Yes... more importantly, he smells really good!"


    Caroline closed her eyes and breathed in the smell, betraying an expression of intoxication.


    The other female adepts were also giggling as they talked about Greem.


    Both Winnie and Caroline were tall and beautiful with seductive figures. Their dresses were extremely revealing. Soft, light robes of cloth revealed their curvaceous lines to everyone. The bold cuts to the front of the chest exposed an abundance of their white breasts to the male adepts¡¯ lustful gazes.


    In truth, a newly advanced adept was at the peak of their appearance in the first hundred to two hundred years of their advancement. Young adepts during this time ced a great deal of emphasis on their appearance and looks. They were willing to investrge amounts of time and resources into maintaining them.


    Every young adept that stepped foot in this banquet hall was a handsome man or a beautiful woman. It was obvious that they were already fairly familiar with each other after a long time socializing here in the Castle in the Sky. Now that a new face like Greem had joined their circle, all of the young female adepts were trying their best to pursue him!


    Especially since Greem was so exceptionalpared to the other male adepts.


    Greem had a young and handsome face. ck eyes, dark-red long hair, and a body-tight leather suit further brought out the charm of his figure. His aura of wisdom and knowledge was mixed with the calm indifference and depravity of an adept, all turning into his own uniquely wicked quality.


    Greem calmly dealt with the female adepts¡¯ passionate advances as he listened to Adept Angus introduce thedies.


    "Winnie is actually pretty good. She¡¯s pretty and has a hot body. She¡¯s really wild in bed as well. If you want to, you can definitely get in bed with her by tonight. Caroline is the granddaughter of the Second Grade Lareina. If you can charm herpletely, I guarantee no one would dare cross you as long as they are within the Aliford area. The one in the low-cut yellow evening gown beside you is probably the most debaucherous and kinky one of them all. With your conditions as they are, you could probably convince her to sleep along with you and Winnie... "


    Greem looked around the hall as he listened to Angus¡¯ endless rambling. He found him engaged in a passionate conversation with two pseudo-adepts in a corner of the hall.


    He even raised his cup and let out an odd and perverted smile when he felt Greem looking at him.


    What was this! A group wild and debaucherousdies. Even though they were already pretending to be noble and elegant right now, if you raided their homes you would probably find hordes of male concubines and strong ves in their personal collection.


    Sleeping with such people was a terrible idea. Was he toying with them, or were they toying with him?


    Greem wasn¡¯t much for the idea of emotional and physical loyalty in a rtionship. But Greem couldn¡¯t imagine that these experienced female adepts would enjoy sleeping with him. Greem could only politely rebuke them as he silently screamed for help.


    This was going be an arduous night!


    ............


    This was gonna be an arduous night!


    Is there anyone who cane and save me!?


    At the same time, in a different location, Alice also looked up at the skies filled with stars. She let out a tragicment of despair.


    The Mushroom Cottage.


    It wasn¡¯t until night fell that the perpetual mist would lighten a little, allowing the bright moonlight to pour into the small house and give it a hint of peace and silence.


    Alice had been stripped of her clothes and tossed into a boiling cauldron. She silently endured a lifetime¡¯s worth of torture inside it.


    The bubbling brew was a sickly green color!


    Adept Liana, who as short as a dwarf, stood on a tall tool stirring the mixture with all her might. She asionally tossed in some odd powder and unknown substances into the cauldron.


    Once in awhile, she raised the stirring spoon to taste the brew, and then she would go back to tossing more things into the cauldron if she was dissatisfied.


    Guano, mermaid tears, werewolf eyeballs, wight shroud powder, ghost ashes, ck dragon¡¯s saliva, poison sac of a retriever...


    Alice waspletely frightened out of her wits! She had to listen to this mentally unstable witch mumble silently to herself as she continued to throw in more and more of these mysterious objects into the cauldron.


    Seven days ago, when she had just arrived at the Mushroom Cottage, Alice was extremely attracted by the soup. She had to control her impulse to drink everyst drop of it. However, now that she was part of the brew and being cooked alive by the old witch, it was truly a miracle that Alice hadn¡¯t gone insane.


    She had a vague feeling that the old witch wasn¡¯t trying to make her into supper but... to instead use her to conduct some sort of secret experiment. That was because the old witch would draw a whole lot of blood from her with arge syringe. She would then toss her into this dirty cauldron. This happened every single day.


    Alice couldn¡¯t see through the secret behind the witch¡¯s actions, but she was already disgusted by this life of being a prisoner andb rat after only seven days. What disgusted her, even more, were the revolting materials she was swimming in.


    Witches¡¯ traditions were often extremely bizarre and ludicrous whenpared to the strict and orderly system of the esoteric adepts. Some of their traditions were so bizarre that they wereughable.


    Take a look at what esoteric adepts used!


    They used Star Iron, Obsidian and Horus¡¯ Meteorite with exceptional magical resistance, Mansordar Alloy and Underground Wrought Gold with immense toughness, magical alloy with good malleability, mithril with high magical conductivity, and even Pyre Stones, Empyrean Sapphire, and Shadowsong Amethyst that had natural elementium traits...


    All of these materials could be sorted by types, traits, the method of use, and points of caution. Just the sheer number of magical materials required the establishment of a new area of study to decipher, in detail, the traits of the materials, the locations where they could be found, the method of gathering, the points of caution when preserving the materials, and the means used to unseal them for experimentation. All of these things had been coted into a book and was one of the fundamental subjects of study for esoteric adepts¨C Material Studies.


    The witches, on the other hand, kept their legacies to themselves. Each and every one of them had secrets of their own that they never shared among themselves. The magical materials that they used were so weird and odd that it was unbelievable. Most of the time they knew very well what materials were needed for a curse, thanks to their personal legacies. However, very few witches would be able to figure out why they needed those materials.


    The witches had always refused to share the magical knowledge within their system. They also disliked dealings with the outside world. This was why the Northern Witches had a legacy of knowledge that waspletely distinct from the mainstream adepts on the continent.


    In the eyes of other adepts, the Northern Witches were all insane women with bizarre abilities. Even though they weren¡¯t that much more powerful, they were a pain to deal with. A real pain!


    The curses they were so skilled at often involved narws of extremeplexity and profundity. It was very difficult to dispel these curses. Even if an adept was of a superior grade, they wouldn¡¯t dare to offend a Northern Witch in possession of a proper legacy.


    Alice hugged her arms together as she sulked and soaked within the green brew. Only a small part of her head stayed above the liquid. The rest of her body waspletely immersed in the sticky green soup. She put on an upset expression and tried to tolerate the weird energies that continuously seeped into her body through her nostrils and skin.


    Every time she couldn¡¯t stomach the ufortable feeling, and wanted to distance her nose and mouth from the stinking brew, she would be stopped. The ck serpent hanging from the ceiling would hiss as it extended its body downwards.


    Alice had no choice but to soak herself in the green brew and let the liquid cover her mouth. Only her nose hadn¡¯t been submerged under the brew.


    You stupid master! You are way too cruel! To leave this cute Alice with this old hag to do as she wills! You wait for me. Once I get out of this old witch¡¯s ws, I¡¯ll try my very best tond my most carefully crafted curses on you!


    Alice already understood what had transpired by now.


    Greem¡¯s action of protecting her thest time had to be an act he put up. Alice¡¯s affinity for fate might have been very important to him, but it wasn¡¯t important enough for him to throw his life away for it. So... he must have had an ulterior motive for trying to cover her thest time.


    Mm! That must be the case!


    He must have seen through the purpose behind the old witch¡¯s actions and came up with the perfect facade. Hmph! This old witch thought she had perfect control of the situation and never expected to be tricked by an insignificant newly advanced adept. She really has gone senile.


    Then, should I reveal master¡¯s little trick to the old witch?


    Nope. Definitely not.


    The old witch promised to let her go after ten days. Now that she already endured seven days, there were only three days left until she regained her freedom. If something happened now, Alice would likely be dragged into the trouble as well.


    She could envision a future where she was trapped in this dark and lightless ce for eternity, enduring the bizarre experiments of a crazy old hag. Just thinking about it was enough to make Alice go mad!


    I curse you... no. Oh my beloved master, as long as you save Alice from this hell, Alice won¡¯t ever stir up any trouble for you again.


    For the first time in her life, Alice threw away her pride and recklessness, praying religiously to fate.


    Perhaps a Witch of Fate could only receive the blessings and protection of fate if they religiously believed in thews of fate!

 Chapter 291

    Chapter 291 A Deal in the Night


    The Outer Circle. Byron n¡¯s outpost.


    Snox the Goblin passionately worked away at something in a small room away from the banquet.


    A basic magical machine had put up a white screen in front of him. Duke Gazlowe, the one who hailed himself as the greatest inventor, engineer, and trans-nar merchant of the Goblin Empire, appeared on the screen. He wore a thick monocle lens and sprayed saliva all over the disy as he shouted at Snox.


    "No! Never... " Gazlowe waved his thick and hairy green arms about, "We won¡¯t talk unless the price is lower than seventeen magic crystals... I¡¯ll never let a vampire like you take advantage of me again. Not to mention, you haven¡¯t gotten me anything of value despite us knowing us each other for such a long time. You... You are not qualified to be a trans-nar merchant. The best you can hope for is to be a shitty goblin that goes around picking up trash... "


    The opponent¡¯s insults had clearly provoked Snox as well. Anyone who attacked his dream of being a trans-nar merchant was inviting his utmost anger.


    "You freaking coward that can do nothing but hide behind that screen of yours. This Transportation Tool you gave me is a shitty second-rate product and you have the guts to scold me? It can¡¯t transport anything more than five hundred grams worth of stuff, and an error happens every three or four transportations. Who knows which corner of the universe your shitty machine has sent all my treasures to? Am I supposed to be the one to bear the losses incurred by your machine?"


    "Bastard. You uncultured swine of a goblin. You don¡¯t even understand what a terrifying amount of energy is required to pierce through ne barriers and send items across. You have no energy furnace, no reactor, and no energy source. You are a filthy excuse of a goblin with absolutely nothing. Do you want arge and stable passage with a few low-quality energy crystals? Not even the adept you are serving would have technology like that, much less the Goblin Empire!"


    "What should we do then? We are always having this argument. Who will bear the losses incurred by using an unreliable machine such as this one?"


    "If you can get me some useful adept tools or unique energy treasures, I will willingly bear the losses caused by space turbulence."


    "Hmph! Don¡¯t think me a fool just because I¡¯m a little ignorant. Your machine is way too unreliable. It is unsuitable forrge-scale trans-nar trade. Moreover, all of the trade we have been doing so far only needs to be done once. You no longer need any more of the same material once you get the sample and analyze it. Inparison, I am only getting meager returns after spending so much effort searching for resources. I won¡¯t evermit myself to such a fool¡¯s errand again!"


    "Er... " Gazlowe adjusted the sses on his faces, and for once, reassessed the goblin before him with a serious expression.


    Who knew? Indeed, who knew? A little goblin living under the envement and trampling of the terrifying adepts could understand such aplex idea, despite having absolutely no technological knowledge. He couldn¡¯t help but look at Snox in apletely different light.


    "Very well, little Snox! Since we both have something in our possession that the other needs, I suggest we show some sincerity to each other. I can raise the prices appropriately, and as for you... it¡¯s about time you start showing me some of the actually useful items!" An expression of true sincerity appeared on Gazlowe¡¯s wrinkled green face.


    "My existence has value to you and the goblins?" Snox asked doubtfully.


    "Of course!" Gazlowe pushed his sses upwards again, "You should know that the World of Adepts you are in right now is an infamous,rge-sized ne within the multiverse. It is a great dealrger than the Goblin Empire on my ne. I decided to throw the Transportation Tools into the space turbulence so that they mightnd in any corner of the multiverse as they followed the drifting currents of space. We in the Goblin Empire have no ability to make a new passage to the World of Adepts, even if you wanted me to do so. Not to mention the fact that we would never ever attempt to do so. After all, the adepts are said to be very horrifying and invasive lifeforms!"


    "So, what you are saying is that we have to rely on this shitty machine to trade?"


    "Indeed!"


    "Fine. What do I need to make note of when I use this Transportation Tool?"


    "Firstly, you need to find a powerful energy source if you wish for the Transportation Tool to function stably."


    "For instance?"


    "An energy pool for example... "


    "You think a small goblin such as myself can ess the energy pool within the adept tower? Next... "


    "Natural gathering spots for elementium. Such as the heart of a massive storm, or the bottom of a volcano."


    "Are you actually being sincere about this? Wouldn¡¯t I just be killing myself if I went to those ces you mentioned?"


    "Or some high-grade energy crystals. They would have to be at least ten times stronger than the stuff you are using right now to ensure a stable connection."


    "High-grade energy crystals? What¡¯s that? Can¡¯t you be a little more specific." Snox grumbled as he searched about his pouch in frustration. In the end, he got sick of the trouble and just poured everything out of the pouch, allowing it to spill all over the table.


    "Hang on... hang on... " The frantic voice of Gazlowe rang out from the screen, "What¡¯s that silvery-white metal?"


    "Mm?" Snox followed Gazlowe¡¯s descriptions and took out a heavy metal ball from within the pile of items.


    This looked like a round metal ball carved from tinum, but it didn¡¯t have the smooth feeling of tinum. The surface of the ball was uneven and filled with countless tiny patterns and carvings. Snox couldn¡¯t feel any energy radiating from the thing, but it was, in truth, a true mechanical heart.


    A mechanical heart. A living alchemical heart that the Golem Masters used to forge high-grade puppets and statues. It was a crucialponent in the creation of a magical golem. The strength of the Golem Knight wasn¡¯t just due to its tough shell made of precious metals. The mechanical heart was what turned the cold metallic creature into a living lifeform.


    This mechanical heart¡¯s abilities had even improved significantly after Rouneau inserted the Second Grade knight¡¯s soul into it. As long as there was aplete metallic body for it to be installed into, another powerful metallic golem would easilye to life.


    Such a powerful object shouldn¡¯t possibly be Snox¡¯s possession. It was the spoils of war his master Greem had obtained from the golem duel.


    Greem had also thought of keeping the mechanical heart for himself when he uncovered its secret. With the heart, he could forge an indestructible soldier of steel. Unfortunately, he wasn¡¯t able to find out anything more about the golem talisman.


    Without the golem talisman, Greem would have to drag the heavy metal item along with him as he traveled around the world. Magical puppets were indeed fairly strong, but the fact that they couldn¡¯t be carried around easily was enough to render them useless.


    It might have been useful for Greem to have several of these to guard his base or adept tower in the future. However, right now... it was much better to have a few high-grade elementium golems with him!


    Thus, Greem tossed it over to Snox and had him exchange the heart for several high-grade elementium cores. Snox wanted to be a goblin merchant anyway. He was the best person to send on these errands.


    Right now, Snox held the mechanical heart in his hand as he looked curiously at the screen.


    "This mechanical heart is useful for you?"


    "Of course it¡¯s useful. If I¡¯m not mistaken, it¡¯s a sort of magical mechanical core that the adepts created using magic. It¡¯s even one of those cores with high intelligence. We of the Goblin Empire developed a civilization revolving around magic-powered machines. Though we can create magical mechanical cores of our own, we never developed a means of inserting a living being¡¯s soul into the thing."


    "So, it¡¯s worth a lot, isn¡¯t it?" Snox let out a wicked grin as he tossed the metal ball in his palm.


    "Er... " Gazlowe went silent.


    "Alright, say it. Tell it to me straight, how much are you willing to exchange for this mechanical heart. Don¡¯t try and use those low-quality things like rocket boots and parachutes to cheat me again. Also, this mechanical heart is way over the weight limit. You sure your Transportation Tool can send it over?"


    "......"


    Gazlowe seemed to have understood something important after a long period of silence. A fawning smile appeared on his green and oily face once more.


    "My beloved Snox, I present to you the greatest war machine in the Goblin Empire¨C the Magic Mecha. You will no longer need to fear your enemies with this thing. It will be your greatest and most loyal soldier, obliterating every enemy in its sights! "


    "Oh? Are you talking about those terrifying metallic things the size of a hill? I don¡¯t intend to start a constructionpany any time soon. What am I going to use this thing modified from your tree-cutting Goblin Shredders for? Just the metals and spare parts I would need to gather to construct it would take up a hundred years of my time. How is this thing useful to me?" Snox¡¯s intelligence had clearly gone through the roof today. He shouted angrily at the screen, no longer the naive and foolish goblin he used to be.


    "Don¡¯t get angry, my beloved Snox. I¡¯ll introduce you to another ultra-scary weapon¨C the Magic Cannon. With this cannon, you can be undefeatable. No enemy would be able to defend a single st from it!"


    "Nope. Nope... I¡¯m a pacifist goblin merchant. You can sell those violent weapons to some other guy! I only need high-grade elementium cores. These are things my master has ordered me to gather. The more the better... "


    "Very well. Very well. Elementium cores it shall be. At what price do you intend to sell the heart for?"


    "The blueprints for that Magic Mecha and apleted Magic Cannon, along with a hundred elementium cores above Second Grade!"


    "Bullshit!" Gazlowe leaped three feet into the sky, "Why don¡¯t you just go and rob someone at that price? Your mechanical heart isn¡¯t even worth this much!"


    "Then how much can you give in return?"


    Gazlowe extended three fingers, but then hesitated for a moment, gritted his teeth and extended a fourth finger.


    "Four Second Grade elementium cores. That¡¯s all you can get!"


    ¡°Liar... ¡° Now, it was Snox¡¯s turn to jump three feet into the sky, "This is daylight robbery... this is bankrupting my entire establishment. You are the greediest, most shameless, and stingiest goblin I have ever met. This price isplete highway robbery!¡±


    The two goblins clearly had an unbelievable amount of stinginess and perversion carved into their very bones. Yet, at the same time, both of them were so greedy and shameless. The two goblins continued to point at each other, flinging every single insult they knew across the brilliant screen of light. After a few bouts of exchanged insults, the two would get together and start a round of actual negotiations.


    And just like that, a bizarre internar trade waspleted in the dead of night!

 Chapter 292

    Chapter 292 The Deep Reserves of the Silver Union


    Castle in the Sky. The Inner Circle¡¯s Main Hall.


    This was a massive hall constructed inside the mountain. It took up and of nearly three hundred thousand square meters.


    Still, a description like this wasn¡¯t entirely urate.


    More specifically, this mysterious and magnificent hall was the first to be constructed. The Silver Union had only constructed the mountain as a shell around it to hide the hall¡¯s existence. Most of the architecture in the inner circle had been constructed after the mountain and the hall. Their purpose was to serve as research facilities and cover for the mysterious hall within the mountain.


    It was only when you had the opportunity to be a Silver Union adept, and rise to be a member of the Senate, that you would have the qualification to step foot into this mysterious hall. It was here where you learned and researched the ultimate secrets of the esoteric adepts.


    You would be shocked to find this ce to be a sea of runes and machinery.


    The hall interior was a vast and endless space that stretched as far as the eye could see. Hundreds of billions of gears, axles, springs, levers... and an innumerable amount of metallic parts andponents floated within this space.


    They came in all sizes and shapes. The only simrity was their color. Each and every one of these parts was tinum in color, and a single mysterious golden rune had been inscribed upon each.


    Some of these metallicponents were asrge as an entire ind, while the smallest ones needed the use of a microscope to be seen by the naked eye.


    They appeared to be floating in the space in a disorderly fashion, but if someone was able to look from a high enough vantage point and see everything within the mysterious space, they would be stunned to find a reason and rhythm to their movements.


    The hundreds of billions of runic machines were moving about the space ording to a certain powerfulw.


    The mechanical parts and metallicponents of various sizes drifted around. Whenever two differentponents ran into each other, they woulde together and form a newponent. Once numerousponents merged in this fashion, a mysterious and new runic mechanical construct would be born in the mysterious space.


    No one knew what purpose or function this construct served.


    It could have been part of a mechanical clock, or part of the body of a powerful runic golem, or a meaningless congregation of gears. Of course, it could also have been the prototype of a mysterious, never-before-seen machine.


    Unfortunately, thesepound mechanical constructs neversted for too long.


    The newly formed runic mechanical constructs would soon disassemble into their baseponents when they crashed into another construct. Bizarrely enough, these disassembledponents would bepletely different from how they were before they had merged into a new construct!


    Thus, hundreds of billions of silver parts drifted in the hall¡¯s space, ceaselessly repeating the process ofbining and disassembling. It didn¡¯t matter how much they merged and split. They were contained within that massive empty space and would never spill out of the hall.


    It was as if... as if there was an invisible barrier in the hall!


    This was the most ssified and most important location of the Castle in the Sky¨C the Mystic Realm of Machines.


    Today was yet another ordinary day within the Mystic Realm.


    A dozen adepts in silver robes crossed through this sea of runic machinery under the protection of a curtain of silver light. A silver emblem was pinned to their chests. These were the senate members of the Silver Union. These were the people with the most enviable status and authority in the Castle in the Sky.


    However, even these men were nothing more than tireless gardeners and workers when they were here in the hall.


    All lifeforms without the protection of Esoteric Talismans would die within this mysterious space. The assembled flood of grinding gears was enough to crush anyone into meat paste, and the energy storms released from the suddenly disassembling constructs could vaporize any adept that went too close.


    The entire Castle in the Sky was a massive energy collector. A tremendous amount of magical energy was gathered daily and inserted into this mysterious space, providing it with an endless stream of energy. In return, the mysterious space provided the Silver Union with numerous powerful runic machines.


    Every day, some silver-robed adepts would enter the mysterious space and unfurl a runic scroll within the endless sea of runic machinery. This would usually be a scroll that contained the endless blood and sweat of esoteric adepts past and present.


    When the silver light engulfed the entire space, countless gears, bearings, grinding wheels, dowels, springs, pipes... and many more strangeponents of all shapes and sizes were drawn towards the scroll, like bees to nectar. They hovered above the scroll, assembling themselves ording to thews inscribed within the scroll.


    There was no need for any external force. Just a golem scroll withpletews and a self-consistent system caused the parts to automatically assemble into an elegant and powerful silver golem construct. The power of thews would further enhance the silver golem, allowing it to possess extremely highbat intelligence upon creation. It would be able to perform all sorts of difficult actions as long as they were inscribed upon the runic arrays within their bodies.


    As long as the power of thews within the scroll did not conflict with it, the silver golem would be able to sustain itself indefinitely. A slight inconsistency within the systems andws would cause the golem-construct to break into thousands of pieces, returning to its baseponents.


    The silver-robed adepts were responsible for recording the construction process of the golem, as well as the process of its disassembly. These records were then handed over to the esoteric adepts to correct and fix the mistakes within the scrolls. It was through such a method that the esoteric adepts were able to continuously go through trial and error, ceaselessly improving upon the golem-construct until it reached their desired standards.


    Then they would hand over the blueprints to the golem factory and have them mass manufacture the final product. This allowed them to save on the expensive and lengthy trial process of golem research.


    Of course, the Mystic Realm saved them a lot of resources and time in designing new golems. Still, how easy could it be to design a mature and powerful construct golem from scratch?


    There were over ten thousand esoteric adepts in the Castle in the Sky, but less than one in ten of them had the right to wear the silver robe. The numbers of senate members were even fewer, with only one in a thousand esoteric adepts being able to attain that rank. Less than ten people held the highest rank, which gave them the right to ess the Mystic Realm of Machines and engage it for research.


    Every single one of them was a Senate elder, and every single one of them had tremendous authority and influence within the entire Silver Union.


    The Silver Union had split their members into five ranks based on the authority they held within the organization. The lowest ranked were the ordinary silver-robed esoteric adepts. These were often the First Grade adepts, and they functioned as the base of the organization. They too had some privileges while they stayed in the Castle in the Sky.


    Above the silver-robed adepts were the silver-robed executors. These executors were the more powerful Second Grade esoteric adepts and were responsible for the security of the Castle in the Sky. They had partial authority over the Aerial Guards. The executor headquarters was located in the nests above the Castle in the Sky. That ce was also the where the Aerial Guards were stationed.


    If the ordinary silver-robes were the citizens of the city, the silver-robed executors were the police. The Aerial Guard was a golem-construct army under the control of the silver-robed executors.


    Above the silver-robed executors were the Third Grade silver-robed senate members!


    Most of these senate members were esoteric masters themselves. They were the core members of the Silver Union that drove its progress forward. They were the ones that managed most of the Silver Union¡¯s daily errands as they discussed the issues to be resolved, in the Senate Hall.


    Even higher than the Senate members were the Fourth Grade Senate-Head and senate elders.


    The Silver Union currently possessed one senate-head, one vice senate-head, and seven Senate elders.


    These nine people were the corebat strength of the Silver Union. These nine people guaranteed the Silver Union its status as one of the three major organizations on the Continent of Adepts. Their existence was what ensured the tens of thousands of years of prosperity for the Silver Union.


    The Silver Union always made sure that there were at least nine Fourth-Grade esoteric adepts within the organization. If someone died because of old age or unexpected factors, the Union would try their very best to fill the gaps as soon as possible.


    Thus, the nine Fourth-Grade adepts would always appear as the most powerful force that the Silver Union had, and no one knew whether they were hiding some of their strength. The true prowess of the Silver Union would always remain a mystery to outsiders!


    The only ones the adepts ever talked to were their powerful and loyal golems. After all, they devoted their entire lives to theboratory. This caused them to developwful and orderly personalities. Consequently, many outsider adepts found the Silver Union to be a fantastical, powerful, and strict organization after they visited the Castle in the Sky.


    The Castle in the Sky had also be a massive stage for all types of magical golems. This was because nearly sixty or seventy percent of all esoteric adepts on the Continent were gathered in the Silver Union. Until now, the greatest mystery, and the one thing that all adepts were most curious about was the number of powerful magical golems the Silver Union had stored in their reserves!


    Though the Union sold plenty of golems to the adept ns for the purposes of war, they kept even more of the manufactured golems for themselves. No one knew the specific number of golems the Union hid, but everyone knew it was an unbelievably huge number.


    The unusual sound of rms rang out within the Space Monitoring Committee, located within the Executor Headquarters in the Central Circle.


    "Warning. Warning. Unusual spatial flux detected. Initial estimates suggest spatial anomaly to be a small otherworldly wormhole. The target area is being determined"


    "Target area has been determined. Origin of space flux located in Outer Circle, Twelfth District,167 Champs ¨¦lys¨¦es Street. Records indicate the location to be managed by the Byron n of Dagon, Zhentarim... "


    "Aerial Guard Squad 935 is on its way. Requesting silver-robed executors to head over to the area as reinforcement... "

 Chapter 293

    Chapter 293 Danger at the Outpost


    Greem was woken out of his sleep by themotion.


    He could hear anxious door knocking sounds clearly, even in his bedroom. Not even simple magical defenses were able to keep themotion out.


    Greem curiously removed the defenses and opened the door, only to be greeted with a shocking sight.


    Thend owned by the Byron n was split into two parts. The part facing the street outside functioned as a shop, while the other part was the storehouse and lodgings. Yet, at this moment, the skies above the n outpost had been obscured by a gigantic ck shadow.


    A floating ship shaped like a whale hovered high the air. One after another, several massive shapes leaped from the ship, their heavy bodies smashing craters into the ground as theynded.


    Amid the sound of grinding gears, the four-meter-tall metallic golems rose from the craters. A fearsome red light shone from the magical gems in their metallic eyes.


    There were humanoid golems, spider golems, as well as spherical constructs hovering over the ground, with a dozen metallic appendages extending from inside their bodies...


    "Aerial Guard Squad 935 will ce this area under lockdown under orders. No individual is allowed to enter or exit at will. Everyone is to wait silently for the executors¡¯ investigation to conclude! All who disobey will be killed without exception... "


    The metallic golems spoke with their emotionless mechanical voices. They quickly moved and sealed all the entrances and exits to the Byron outpost.


    Once twenty-nine of these First Grade metallic golems hadpletely secured the perimeter, an even more intimidating War Statue flew down upon a hovering disc.


    This was a fearsome animated statue of war. It¡¯s humanoid body stood ten meters tall. Colorful patterns covered its entire body, giving its every action a terrifying aura of might. It gripped a metallic ax in its hand. The de was sorge that it was almostical; just the axede alone would be enough to form the gate of any other city.


    The earth quaked with every step the war statue took. Everyone who watched it move was certain that if it went berserk, it could tear down the entire outpost in less than a couple of minutes.


    As the Byron outpost¡¯s authority figure in the Castle in the Sky, Lady Nunnally was already present at the first sign ofmotion. Unfortunately, her status as a Second Grade adept was not enough to intimidate anyone present! Just those war statues alone had power rivaling the Second Grade.


    Moreover, this was the headquarters of the Silver Union. All the war golems and puppet-constructs within the Castle in the Sky were enhanced by magic while they were here. Even a Second Grade elementium adept would have a hard time taking down a golem of the same Grade as themselves.


    Not to mention the fact that retaliation was a suicidal act in and of itself. Anyone that dared to raise a finger against the Aerial Guards would be poking a massive ho¡¯s nest. In less than a couple of minutes, all of the war fortresses hovering in the sky would descend upon the intruders. The small n outpost would be flooded by the tide of terrifying golems that came afterward.


    This was why Lady Nunnally didn¡¯t dare expel the Aerial Guards. The only thing she could do was protest it as loudly as she could and argue against the intruders.


    "Please wait here patiently. A silver-robed executor will soon be here to exin the situation. Please have all your personnel cease all suspicious activities before that."


    The war statue ignored Nunnally¡¯s protests and spat out a warning in the process. Red light projected from the red-gemmedpound eye embedded in its head. In a single instant, the statue had done aplete scan of the entire outpost.


    The war statue seemed to have discovered something when it scanned in a certain direction. The red light started to sh rapidly. The crimson light that had been scattered in every direction started to gather and slowly focus on the room next to Greem¡¯s.


    Greem stood behind the door of his room. His mind fell into turmoil when he saw the war statue¡¯s detection rays converging on Snox¡¯s room.


    Goddammit. What is that idiot doing? To even have the infamous Aerial Guardse after him! Don¡¯t drag me down with your suicidal acts!


    Greem cursed furiously in his heart as he silently called upon Snox, using the mental link established from their contract. The connection was almost instant since they were practically next to each other. Snox hadn¡¯t set up any magical barriers in his room either.


    "You stupid goblin. What did you do this time? Do you know what you¡¯ve done? The city guards of the Castle in the Sky havee for you. Quick. Tell me. What did you do?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but start cursing at Snox the moment the mental link was established.


    "Master, I... " Snox cowered in fear as he spoke, "I exchanged some good stuff with a guy from the Goblin Empire¡¯s ne using the mechanical heart you gave me. I was just about to report to you... "


    "Forget the bloody report! We can celebrate after. Just think of some way to get these Aerial Guards off ourwn!" Greem scolded again, "Oh right. What method do the two of you use tomunicate?"


    "Master, this is how it is... "


    Snox didn¡¯t dare hide anything with danger knocking right on their doors. He told Greem everything about his contact with Gazlowe.


    Greem immediately fell deep into thought after Snox exined what had happened.


    What should he do now? Give Snox over? If he handed Snox over to the authorities, themunications between the Goblin Empire would end right there. If any major force got their hands on that Transportation Tool, they could make a huge fuss out of the issue.


    A ne of goblins? This was an opportunity for the adepts! It was another lesser-ne that they could rob and exploit to their desire! Countless metal and mineral reserves,rge numbers of skilled ves with knowledge of mechanical construction, and an unimaginable amount of unknown resources... any single one of these factors was enough to spur the rise of a n. It would be a waste to let such a treasure slip through his fingers!


    But how was he supposed to exin that spatial transfer if he didn¡¯t hand Snox and the Transportation Tool over?


    After several seconds of thought, Greem quickly made up his mind. He had made a decision.


    Just then, the space above the outpost tremored. A stable portal slowly opened in the middle of the air and three silver-robed executors proudly walked out from within.


    "Lady Nunnally! Very nice. With you present today, we can solve this problem without a hitch!" The male executor in the lead was wearing a silver headband on his head. Magical runes had been carved all over the essory. It was clear that this person knew Nunnally.


    The three silver-robed executors, one female and two male, were all First Grade adepts.


    Usually, in the World of Adepts, power was the only thing that demanded respect. These three adepts would usually have to bow down cautiously before the might of the Second Grade Nunnally. However, this was the Silver Union¡¯s territory. A Second Grade adept like Nunnally couldn¡¯t do as she wanted here. In fact, she had to negotiate peacefully with this bunch of intruders.


    "Sir Randolph! I was wondering why you made a sudden visit to my n¡¯s outpost... " Adept Nunnally had stayed in the Castle in the Sky for a long time, after all. Moreover, she was still a Second Grade adept! Even these silver-robed executors didn¡¯t dare to offend a Second Grade adept without good reason.


    "Lady Nunnally, you might not be aware, but we detected a spatial wormhole in your n outpost earlier. That¡¯s why... " Randolph put on a courteous and superficial smile as he exined.


    "What did you say? A spatial transfer or a spatial wormhole?" Nunnally frowned. She couldn¡¯t believe her ears.


    A spatial transfer meant that a small Transfer Array had been hidden in the outpost and had been used for long-distance transfers within the ne. This was forbidden in the Castle in the Sky!


    However, if it was a spatial wormhole, this meant that someone had broken the nar barrier of the World of Adepts and was trying to contact another ne! This was... even though plenty of adept ns did such a thing, most of these contact points existed within their own adept¡¯s tower in order to prevent outsiders from detecting spatial abnormalities.


    Which adept would be foolish enough to try that in the Castle in the Sky? Even though the World of Adepts did not fear an invasion from another ne, opening a spatial wormhole in the hearnd of the Silver Union was far too reckless!


    Nunnally waspletely caught up in the confusion. Just then, Greem shouted out awkwardly, "Lady Nunnally, this... might be a misunderstanding!"


    Everyone¡¯s gaze shifted to Greem.


    "A misunderstanding? What kind of misunderstanding?" Randolph narrowed his eyes and let out a coldugh, "Lady Nunnally, this is a fresh face! Is he a newly advanced adept from your n?"


    Honestly, Greem¡¯s powers were stillcking. Anyone could see that he was a newly advanced adept. Consequently, it was hard for him to earn the respect of anyone with just a nce.


    "Our n hired him for the esoteric duels. His name is Greem, and he has a fairly powerful elementium golem under his control!" Adept Nunnally gave a simple exnation, then turned and frowned at Greem, "Greem, what did you mean by this being a misunderstanding?"


    "I mean to say that if you are here because of the spatial abnormality earlier, I¡¯ll have to confess. I was the cause!" Greem answered firmly.


    "A newly advanced adept like you can open a spatial wormhole and ess another ne? Ha... "


    Randolph raised his head. He was right about tough and ridicule the bizarre suggestion, but his jaw stopped when he saw what Greem held in his hand.


    "A spacestone!"

 Chapter 294

    Chapter 294 A sh of Words


    What was a spacestone?


    Most adepts would never be able toy their eyes upon the true appearance of the legendary spacestone!


    Most books that described the spacestone only contained a simple description of its importance as the core material of internar, ultra-long-distance teleportation arrays.


    This description wasn¡¯t incorrect, but it wasn¡¯t entirely urate either.


    The construction of an internar teleportation array was still possible without a spacestone. However, an adept¡¯s tower would have to serve as a spatial coordinate for the spatial transfer. Arge number of magical crystals would have to be exhausted during every transfer as well.


    All of this meant that an internar teleportation array without a spacestone consumed arge amount of money and resources. There was also a long period of time before the infrastructure was built.


    The cost and time investment of such a teleportation array might have been eptable if it was used formunications and supply during peaceful times. However, this was far too slow and expensive if it was to be used in nar wars, where time was a crucial resource!


    An additional wave of reinforcements sent one day earlier to the battlefield could drastically alter the oue of a cruel and bloody nar battle. If the teleportation took too long, the forward base could potentially be toppled by locals using their numerical advantage. All of the previous investments would then have been for nothing.


    A more terrifying possibility was that of the n adepts being stranded in the other ne.


    This would be a massive blow that no n would be able to bear!


    Take the Sarubo n for example. Even though they obtained the final victory in the war, they lost plenty of adepts in the process. In every ne, this strained the human resources they had to their very limits, resulting in the headquarter¡¯s instability in the World of Adepts.


    Truthfully, if it hadn¡¯t been for the timely return of Keoghan, Greem, and the other adepts, the Sarubo n might have lost thirty percent of its territories before stabilizing the situation. These losses could have been regained with the gradual strengthening of the n afterward, but the n would be weakened by the loss of thesends in the meantime.


    If the Sarubo n had owned spacestones at the start of the war, there wouldn¡¯t have been a need for a war tower. With a spacestone, they could have constructed an internar transportation array anywhere they wanted, and all of their military forces and supply lines could have been constantly transported into the other ne.


    By the time they were discovered, they would already have had a massive army of voodoo beasts and a group of well-prepared adepts.


    A teleportation array constructed using spacestones was able to absorb the spatial energies from the space around it and reduce their reliance on magic crystals. This would save a lot of money for an adept n.


    On the other hand, it was precisely this quality of the spacestones that made them a necessary strategic resource for any n with ne-invading ambitions. The appearance of a single spacestone would cause a massive conflict. All of the adept ns would furiously sh with each other as they tried their best to bring the spacestone into their possession. This was why very few of them were owned by individual adepts.


    This precious resource would be grabbed byrge ns and organizations the moment it appeared. Small ns had no chance of securing one.


    As such, even the Byron n adepts were shocked when they heard Randolph¡¯s exmation. All of them looked at the grey stone in Greem¡¯s hand.


    This was a spacestone? Didn¡¯t it look a little too unremarkable for how important it was supposed to be?!


    Greem shook the grey stone slightly while everyone was still frozen in surprise and doubt. An odd silver trail appeared where the stone passed by. Slight spatial distortions appeared around the stone as well.


    The adepts were utterly shocked now!


    To so easily distort space without the aid of spells or arrays. As expected of the famous spacestone!


    All the adepts betrayed an expression of greed and pity after getting over their shock.


    An exceptional resource indeed! Extremely exceptional! But why was it exposed in front of everyone in such a manner?! If only... if only they themselves were the only ones who knew about this...


    The three silver-robed executors looked at each other and instantly came to a decision.


    Adept Randolph stepped forward and shouted, "Sir Greem, as you have conducted an extremely dangerous spatial experiment within the Castle in the Sky without permission, the involved items will be confiscated under the name of the Space Committee. You can appeal to the Space Committee within three days, and the Senate will be the judge for your appeal. You can now hand over the items involved in the experiment... "


    "Hang on."


    A voice interrupted Randolph¡¯s speech. It was the red-robed Nunnally.


    "Sir Randolph, it is true that dangerous experiments are forbidden within the Castle in the Sky. Punishment is due. However, if my memory serves me right, the punishment cane in the form of a fine as long as the experiment has not harmed the safety of the Castle in the Sky or its civilians. Sir Greem is a valued guest of our n. We of the Byron n are more than willing to help him pay the fine!"


    "You... " Randolph flew into a rage and red angrily at Nunnally.


    He was an executor of the Castle in the Sky. Of course, he knew the truth of Lady Nunnally¡¯s words. If this had been any ordinary situation, he would have been willing to get into the good graces of a Second Grade adept and allow this problem to resolve itself.


    However... the issue this time involved a spacestone!


    Moreover, this particr spacestone was farrger than the standard spacestone used for the construction of an array. He would likely be censured by the Senate members if he returned without this gem.


    "Lady Nunnally, the punishment you have mentioned only applies under ordinary circumstances. The experiment involved this time was an extremely dangerous spatial experiment. This infringement cannot be settled with a fine." Randolph exined firmly. His voice was strong and powerful, betraying his determination in this issue.


    Despite this, Adept Nunnally wasn¡¯t about to give up so easily. After all, this was a spacestone hanging right before her eyes. It could bring about tremendous benefits to the n.


    Offending the executors on the Castle in the Sky was not a very smart move, but it would be worth it if the reward was a spacestone. As long as they didn¡¯t do anything illegal in the Castle in the Sky, the executors couldn¡¯t go out of their line to strip the Byron n of theirnd either.


    She had a clear perspective on the situation right now.


    Even though these executors imed that they could get the spacestone back with an appeal to the Silver Union, no one believed them. The spacestone would be as good as gone if it ended up in their hands.


    These dull fellows might not be all that good in a fight, but they were the absolute best at using the words and letters of the ¡¯Sky Codex¡¯ against you. Who knew whatw they would recite from that three-meter-tall Codex to confiscate this spacestone for eternity?


    Of course, they wouldn¡¯t actually rob Greem of the thing. The Senate members would surely offer a generous sum in exchange for the spacestone. That said, could whatever they offered ever measure up against the bounties of an entire lesser ne?


    Honestly, almost every single established n or organization owned the coordinates to some nes that they had yet to conquer. The reason they hadn¡¯t conquered these nes was due to the immense losses they would have had to suffer in a nar war.


    Every single established n needed a period of umtion. It was only when they had sufficient supplies and fresh blood that they would consider engaging in a nar war.


    The only reason someone wouldn¡¯t eat a delicacy ced in front of them was if they feared choking!


    The existence of a spacestone would allow them to sneak into a ne and secretly construct a transportation array. Large troops of n adepts and soldiers would pour into the ne before the natives could even react.


    Would a lesser ne have any chance of resisting when that happened?


    The construction of a single array and the construction of a war tower. The difference in difficulty between these two tasks decided the oue of a nar war!


    Thus, Adept Nunnally had to try her best to obtain this spacestone.


    The benefit involved in this was far too significant for her to ignore!


    These executors might have had plenty of influence while in the Castle in the Sky, but robbery still wasn¡¯t an option for them. Seeing that the Aerial Guards alone weren¡¯t able to make Nunnally back down, Randolph had no option but to make another deration. They were to bring Greem before the Senate instantly.


    The issue would have to be resolved by the members of the Senate!


    The Senate was the highest authority of the Castle in the Sky. They managed and ruled over the city, with a total of ny-seven members. Almost all of them were Third Grade adepts. Most of them were also high-grade esoteric adepts cultivated by the Silver Union. Some among their number were famous Third Grade adepts that had been hired from outside of the Union.


    The Senate Hall was one of the most important magical buildings in the Central Circle.


    The area under the Silver Union¡¯s control was extremelyrge. All of the human settlements in the southwest of the Continent were under its patronage. The entire territory was split into fifteen different areas and kingdoms of various sizes. A Senate member would be stationed at each and every one of these areas to manage thend.


    Moreover, the Silver Union had Senate members stationed in the territories of the Zhentarim Association, the Northern Witches, and the Adept¡¯s Association to encourage trade andmunication. Consequently, ny-seven Senate members might have sounded like an impressive number, but it wasn¡¯t nearly enough for all of the ces the Union needed them in.


    Only a total of thirty to forty Senate members worked within the Castle in the Sky. Moreover, these important figures weren¡¯t constantly waiting around in the Senate Hall. Most day-to-day matters were dealt with by groups of five Senate members!

 Chapter 295

    Chapter 295 Piro, the Ratman Senator


    "Your name is Greem and youe from the Sarubo n in the Zhentarim Association?"


    From the tall bench, a senator with the head of a rat and the body of a human raised his head. He pushed the gold-framed sses resting on his nose upwards and looked at Greem quizzically.


    "Indeed, sir!" Greem tried to reply as calmly as he could.


    The sight of a rat in a silver robe, t cap, and gold-framed sses slowly flipping through the pages of a book was enough to make anyoneugh.


    But Greem didn¡¯t dare! He really didn¡¯t!


    After all, the guy might have looked ludicrous, but he was actually a Third Grade adept!


    Moreover, Greem was currently being tried as a criminal. He could very well bring more punishment upon himself with an act of disrespect like that.


    "You vited the Space Managementws during your stay in the Castle in the Sky and opened a small spatial wormhole in your attempt to ess another ne without prior permission. This act of infringement brought about a certain level of threat and harm to the Castle in the Sky. Do you plead guilty to these ims?" The ratman senator Piro slowly read through the document Randolph had handed over and repeated the crimes written on it.


    "Sir, I do not deny my conducting of a spatial experiment against the rules. However, I plead innocent to the im of my actions endangering the Castle in the Sky!" Greem couldn¡¯t help butugh at the judicial courts of this world. Still, a lot of benefits were tied up in this trial. He resisted the urge tough and use logic to get himself out of this mess.


    "Do you have anything to add to Sir Greem¡¯s response?" Piro turned to ask Randolph the Executor.


    "Sir, we of the Space Committee are only acting ording to thews of the city. The defense system detected a spatial wormhole. The strength of the spatial flux is estimated to be around XXX dachs. The radius of the wormhole is one meter wide. The target area is a low-magic lesser material ne. The coordinates of the target area are somewhere between star regions 0713 and 0941. As the target area is an unknown star region, there is a possibility of contaminating the city when essing said ne. This was why we three executors agree that Sir Greem¡¯s irresponsible actions are deserving of a harsh punishment!"


    Silver-Robed Executor Randolph¡¯s statement was firmly worded. Greem couldn¡¯t help but roll his eyes all the way back into his head when he heard Randolph speak.


    You already detected that the ne on the opposite side of the wormhole was a low-magic ne, yet you worry about an invasion? This was just being illogical!


    However, Greem had no choice but to y along with Randolph¡¯s facade. He had to keep the Transportation Tool a secret.


    "Sir, I believe Sir Randolph¡¯s usations are far too assertive. He has no direct evidence to support his ims of..." Greem was still trying to defend himself, but Senator Piro had already banged his gavel against the table.


    "Lady Nunnally, the trial today is meant to examine Greem¡¯s act of opening a spatial wormhole without permission. Why are you present here?" Piro turned towards Nunnally.


    "Senator, Greem is a guest of the Byron n. He has only just obtained a victory for us in the esoteric duels. He came here in a hurry, and we of the Byron n didn¡¯t have the time to exin thews of the city to him. This was why this misunderstanding has urred. I hope the Union courts can take this into consideration when issuing the punishment. We of the Byron n are willing to help him bear the burden of the fine!" Nunnally clearly didn¡¯t want to lose the spacestone.


    "But that is a spacestone!" Piro might have looked like an elderly schr, but he wasn¡¯t a stubborn man stuck in traditions. He let out a wicked grin as he brought up the key factor in this disagreement.


    "Sir Greem hasmitted a crime. If you wish the Silver Union to let this issue slide, you will have to hand over that spacestone. Of course, we won¡¯t be taking it or nothing. We will buy it from you at a price eptable to both parties. On the other hand, you, Nunnally, shouldn¡¯t try to interfere with this issue any longer. I can use my authority to provide the Byron n with 2% of my personal assets. This will be your reward for staying out of this issue. What will it be?" Piro smiled as he shut off Nunnally¡¯s impractical fantasies of getting the spacestone.


    She hesitated for a moment before epting. She had no other option when confronted by this pushy senator.


    Frankly, Greem¡¯s opinion didn¡¯t matter all that much now!


    All he could do was request argerpensation to minimize his losses.


    "Speak, brat!" Pirot also seemed to be extremely satisfied by this unexpected harvest. He was in a very good mood, "What do you want aspensation?"


    Losing the spacestone was well within Greem¡¯s expectations. He put up an extremely upset and heartbroken expression as he quickly thought of thepensation.


    "Sir, I am personally interested in magical golems. I came here to the City in the Sky to gather more knowledge regarding magical golems as well as to collect the resources needed to craft such golems. I also happen to be extremely interested in golem talismans..." Greem spoke while keeping a close eye on Piro¡¯s expressions.


    Negotiations often depended on the opponent¡¯s bottom line. If he asked for too little it would be a great loss of the spacestone. Ask for too much and he might cause Piro to be upset. This was why Greem stopped speaking after mentioning the golem talisman. He could already see Piro¡¯s thin whiskers trembling at the very mention of the magical tool.


    "Golem knowledge, resources, and a golem talisman... " The senator frowned as he considered, but he soon gave a reluctant nod, "We cannot provide you with the ssified high-ss knowledge from the Union, but we can provide you with knowledge on the moremon and generic magical golems.


    ¡°Resources, on the other hand! I can provide you with a set of resources from our reserves. It should be enough for you to craft a total of twenty magical golems. You can choose the specific materials you want.


    ¡°Golem talismans... this is the most troublesome request.


    ¡°The Union forbids us from selling this strategic resource to non-Union members. That said, I do have a crude product from earlier times that does not fall within the boundaries of the Union¡¯sws. I can give this talisman to you...


    ¡°Of course, that is if your spacestone is worth this much!"


    Piro stroked his whiskers as he told Greem of his offer, but his eyes were already fixated on the spacestone in Greem¡¯s hand.


    Its size, its quality...


    Piro¡¯s pointy face quivered as he grabbed the spacestone. He conjured up several clouds of ck smoke and struck them into the spacestone to ascertain its attributes. An expression of surprise and joy appeared on his face after a short inspection.


    It seemed that the quality of the spacestone was far above his expectations!


    "Randolph, bring him to my adept¡¯s tower. Give him the knowledge and resources I mentioned. He can pick what he wants. Also, brat, this is yours now!"


    A crystal talisman shaped into a brooch was thrown to Greem¡¯s hands.


    A golem talisman!


    This was a golem talisman!


    Greem suppressed his excitement and quickly put away the golem talisman. He bowed and paid his respects to Piro before following Randolph out of the court. He could tell that Randolph had some sort of special rtionship with Piro. Otherwise, Piro wouldn¡¯t have specially ordered Randolph to be the one to lead Greem to the tower.


    Moreover, there were over twelve courts surrounding the circr hall, with four other Third Grade senators in the courts. Yet Randolph had specifically brought Greem to Piro¡¯s court. Greem wouldn¡¯t have believed it if there wasn¡¯t some sort of nepotism involved in this.


    ............


    Piro¡¯s adept¡¯s tower was located in the Central Circle.


    A golem butler was already waiting on Greem and Nunnally when they arrived at the tower.


    Nunnally was smart enough to wait outside with Randolph. Only Greem went into the tower following the butler¡¯s lead.


    Perhaps because Piro didn¡¯t want Greem to have any chance of seeing through the secrets in his tower, an electric fence appeared in front of Greem immediately after he entered the tower. The electric fence split the insides of the tower into several different paths. A short-distance transportation array stood at the end of each path.


    The golem butler walked down a path of its own discretion. Greem had no choice but to follow behind.


    When the light of the array finally faded, Greem found himself in a grand and massive private library. Countless books, scrolls, and parchments were arranged on the rows of bookshelves that lined the walls of the circr room.


    Most of the books flowed with the brilliance of magical protections. They appeared to be connected to the defense system of the library itself. Numerous odd fairies wove around the shelves. They seemed to be performing maintenance and management on the books.


    Naturally, these fairies weren¡¯t living beings either. They were living golems that had been created with the use of some unknown unique material.


    "The master wants a set of generic Second Grade golem knowledge prepared for this person." The golem butler¡¯s voice was metallic and mechanical, but the words were clearly pronounced.


    The roomful of fairies instantly started to flutter about upon receiving their orders. They quickly flew from shelf to shelf and picked out books with their slender arms.


    Soon, a two-meter-tall and three-meter-wide mountain of books piled up before Greem.

 Chapter 296

    Chapter 296 Magical Energies


    An entire two hourster, Greem exited Piro¡¯s adept tower.


    Adept Nunnally stared at Greem as she calmly spoke to him on the way back to the outpost, "If you still have spacestones in your possession, the Byron n will be willing to buy it from you at an extremely high price. We won¡¯t disappoint you!"


    Despite howposed he usually was, even Greem almost panicked at how intensely she gazed gazing at him. Still, he was able to keep up the facade. He smiled awkwardly as he said, "My Lady, that spacestone was a spoil of war from the nar war I have just returned from. It¡¯s only because I was unfamiliar with its attributes that I conducted such a reckless experiment. You have already seen the oue... "


    Greem betrayed an expression of regret after saying that.


    Adept Nunnally calmly looked at Greem, only shifting her gaze away after a long period of time. She fell silent.


    The atmosphere became slightly awkward.


    When they finally returned to the outpost, they found that the ce had returned to its usual peace.


    The squad of soldiers from the Aerial Guards had already retreated, and the outpost had returned to normal. Even the damaged grounds had been restored by the stationed adepts.


    The resources promised by Piro might have seemed insignificant, but they were enough to stuff the Byron n to its fullest. With these riches, they could easily develop the best store in the Twelfth District. This was why Nunnally instantly gathered all the n adepts upon returning. They had to discuss and make arrangements for their future developments.


    Of course, Nunnally would privately consult Adept Angus. She would grill him for the details on Greem. Some of the intelligence done on Greem would also be spread across the Continent through secretive means.


    Still, this was a futile effort. The speed at which Greem had risen to prominence limited the spread of his fame. Most Zhentarim ns probably had yet to hear his name. Even Greem¡¯s infamous title of the me Demon had only started spreading through the areas around Feidnan City.


    It was hard for anyone who tried to get more information on Greem.


    After all, with the fall of the swamp tower, all of his apprenticepanions from the past had died. Everything that happened there was covered by the dust of time and age.


    Greem, on the other hand, had no additional strength to consider the Byron n¡¯s attitude towards him.


    He returned to his room the moment he got back to the outpost. He ordered Snox into his room and the two had a secret discussion.


    Once the shining magical defenses surrounded his room, Greem turned and red at Snox. He spoke with a severe tone, "Speak! What did you get from putting me into so much trouble this time?"


    However, Greem was immediately shocked by what Snox showed him.


    Blueprints for a Magic Mecha!


    A sample of the Magic Cannon and a corresponding blueprint!


    Seven elementium cores of high purity!


    Greem ignored Snox as blue light gleamed in his eyes. The chip scanned the blueprints as fast as it could and quickly constructed a model in Greem¡¯s mind based on the information.


    Soon, a massive and clumsy mechanical construct appeared. It was a hundred meters tall and radiated a terrifying magical brilliance. The ferocious sounds of an energy motor rumbled in Greem¡¯s mind.


    It relied on its tough body and overpowering weight to crush the enemies.


    When such arge machine trampled through an army of mortal men, just the sound of it crushing bones beneath its feet was enough to demoralize the enemy. However, mortal men were the only enemies it could fight. It was hopeless to dream of using such ¡¯trash¡¯ to fight against an adept. A simple Swamp spell would be enough to cripple it.


    However, even the Magic Mecha wasn¡¯tpletely useless. There was value in researching the energy barrier protecting its core as well as its method of utilizing ¡¯magical energies¡¯.


    It was clear that the Goblin Empire had noplete magical system. The goblins themselves were likely a poption that had no magical abilities whatsoever. Theycked the ability to utilize elementium energy themselves and thus turned to the merging of elementium energies with mechanical constructs.


    No wonder they called this gigantic mechanical giant a Magic Mecha. This was practically the Gundam of another ne. The difference between this machine and the animated statues of the World of Adepts was the energy used to power it. Contrary to the mysterious arrays and runes used in those statues, this machine relied solely on the usage of elementium energies in a mechanical construct.


    A magical machine!


    Mm! Magical Machine was the name that best suited its properties!


    Afterprehending this machine from the Goblin Empire, Greem quickly turned his attention to the books he had just obtained from Piro. He scanned the information from them and quickly constructed a data library from the new knowledge.


    From a fundamental perspective, the magical machine was somewhat rted to the animated statue of the World of Adepts.


    Both of these creations used their massive bodies and imprable shells to crush their enemies.


    The difference was that a living mechanical heart existed within animated statues. This gave them elementary intelligence. They could function after receiving some simple orders from their creators.


    Magical machines, on the other hand, were only machines. They might possess fantastical magic energies as their power source, but they had no autonomy of intelligence to speak of. They could only function if an intelligent being was controlling them.


    The core of the animated statue was the mechanical heart, while the core of the magical machine was a small control tform.


    This was perhaps the only difference between the two!


    The Magic Cannon was, strictly speaking, a method of utilizing magical energy. It was able to draw out energies stored within magic crystals and fire the purest form of energy.


    After loading the Cannon with a fire elementium crystal, its attacks resembled those of magical fireballs. The goblins called these fireballs ¡¯energy napalms¡¯. If it was loaded with ice elementium crystals, it fired freezing rays. Loaded with electric elementium crystals, it would turn into a taser. Loaded with negative energy crystals, it would fire corrosion rays...


    These goblins might not have had any talent at casting, but they were extremely skilled at the harnessing of energies. Greem did a simple calction. Even an ordinary Magic Cannon would be able to do shocking single target damage of between 20 to 30 points of damage.


    This was slightly lower whenpared to adepts, who could easily fire magical attacks of up to a hundred points of damage.


    However, Magic Cannons were not magical tools. They didn¡¯t need to be used by adepts with an elementium affinity. The Cannon was a simplified elementium crystaluncher. Even an ordinary person could instantly possess the strength of an advanced apprentice the moment they obtained this weapon.


    The goblins weren¡¯t idiots either. There was no way they sold their most powerful weapons to Snox. If this Magic Cannon was just their most basic magic-powered weapon, then they only needed to innovate and create a magic-powered weapon that could deal a hundred points of damage in a single shot. In doing so, they would be able to instantly equip all their citizens with firepower equivalent to that of adepts.


    The Cannon¡¯s cooldown was fairly short. It fired one shot every five seconds. This allowed them to fire at an iparable rate when they faced off against adept apprentices.


    Ten ugly goblins equipped with these Magic Cannons could easily crush a group of ten apprentice adepts armed to the teeth. If magic-powered weapons were spread throughout their entire poption, the strength of the Goblin ne would be enough to rival those of mid-sized nes.


    Greem¡¯s mad thoughts were quickly dismissed by the chip. The reason provided by the chip was a logical one as well.


    The Goblin Empire could not possibly reach a level envisioned by Greem. The main factor restricting their growth was theck of elementium crystals.


    Their sess and innovation might havee from the limitations of the low-magic world they lived in, but it was the same low-magic world that held them back!


    It was precisely because of the low-magic environment they lived in that theycked magical talents. This forced them to go down the path of magical-machine technology. However, the magical-machine technology required a massive energy source if it was to rapidly develop!


    The low-magic Goblin ne couldn¡¯t possibly possessrge elementium crystal reserves. Thus, the development of their magical-machine technology required an alternate source of energy. Greem actually had high hopes for the Goblin Empire¡¯s development when he thought about it from this perspective.


    As long as they were able to solve the problem of an energy source, they could easily rely on their usage of magic-powered weapons and machines to rapidly rise into a powerhouse of the multiverse.


    Honestly, even Greem felt that conquering the world wouldn¡¯t be a problem if he was able to gain control of this group of goblins. However, it was nearly impossible for him to suppress these wild goblins before he obtained absolute power. He had to wait in patience.


    Once his own powers increased, and the influence and military strength he held reached a level capable of dealing with a nar war, he would consider invading and conquering this Goblin Empire.


    With this understanding, Greem encouraged and consoled Snox. He even set aside a batch of resources and money for Snox to use for continuedmunication with the goblins of the other world. However, Greem made a rule for Snox to follow. This was to avoid excessive strengthening of the Goblin ne.


    He made a list of items that could be traded and items that were forbidden from trade.


    Greem asked Snox to attract Gazlowe with continuous trading but to never allow this savage wolf to evolve into a ferocious tiger. Every item involved in the trade had to be vetted by Greem before the actual trade.


    Of course, Snox agreed to Greem¡¯s requests.


    Trust, pride, dignity, and loyalty to his race werepletely irrelevant in Snox¡¯s eyes. His only priority was getting into the good graces of his master. Selling his race to his master? As long as the price was right, he would dly do it in the blink of an eye and with a wide grin on his face!


    Moral dilemmas and guilt? My greatest apologies. Snox would never possess such unnecessary emotions for even the slightest second.

 Chapter 297

    Chapter 297 Do You Believe in Fate?


    The moon climbed up the horizon once more. Cold and deste moonlight pierced throughyers of mist and shone into the Mushroom Cottage.


    Alice leaned against the cauldron, which was glowing scarlet from the fire beneath it. Despair, sorrow, and numbness were the only things that filled her bloodshot eyes!


    Crying, begging, cursing, swearing...


    She had already done everything within her abilities over these past few days.


    However, it didn¡¯t matter whether she put on a facade or wore her heart on her sleeve. The old witch remained as resolute and stubborn as before andpletely ignored Alice¡¯s pleas. The only thing that the old witch would do was stand upon her tall stool as she stirred the mixture in the cauldron with a massive wooden spoon. She would mumble and mutter some nonsensical stories under her breath as she did so.


    The ursed python was still waiting above the lid of the cauldron. Every time Alice tried to escape, it would appear in a timely manner and force her back into the cauldron.


    A gloomy swamp, a scary cottage, an ugly witch, and a chilling python...


    All of this sounded like a dark and fantastical fairy tale!


    However, to Alice, these things only meant an intolerable amount of suffering and torture.


    She couldn¡¯t sleep, nor did she dare try.


    Every time she fell asleep, the spatial barrier around the surface of her body would vanish and the only thing that awaited her was the boiling brew. The pale, smooth skin on her small body would be scalded. Blisters and wounds would instantly cover her body.


    And when she screamed and writhed inside the cauldron, the old witch would hurry over in excitement, regardless of where she was. The witch would thendle out a spoonful of the blood-red brew and drink it immediately. In her own words, brew soaked in Alice¡¯s blood always had a taste of fate mixed within!


    The only thing Alice could do was stay awake. She used every fiber of strength in her body to resist the weariness she felt. When she felt like she was no longer able to carry on, she would silently dispel the spatial barrier around her left hand and allow the heart-piercing pain to wash over her skin. It was only through such action that she was able to stop the weariness from consuming her.


    After thest couple of days, her left hand had beenpletely scalded. Not an inch of it was left untouched. Thick purple-ck scars and bruises wereyered upon her skin. New burns kept being inflicted before old wounds could be healed.


    Alice barely managed to hold out during thest two days by doing so.


    When Greem¡¯s tall figure finally appeared at the cottage, her Spirit was already on the verge of breaking! She was nearly unconscious andpletely numb to all external stimuli. Surprisingly, even under such circumstances, she still maintained a thinyer of spatial barrier around her to protect her body from the boiling brew.


    Greem¡¯s me Fiend Heart jumped intensely when he saw the terrible state Alice was in. For a moment, the seal was almost undone as the mes of anger spread across his body.


    "Ten days have passed; I will be leaving with Alice!" Greem coldly spat out these words. He reached into the boiling cauldron and quickly carried Alice out of the water.


    Two clusters of me burned in Greem¡¯s pitch-ck eyes when he saw Alice¡¯s wounded left hand, and the blisters left all over her body. He used thest vestiges of his rationality to suppress his anger and marched out of the cottage with Alice in his arms.


    Oddly enough, the short old witch only smiled as she looked upon all this. She did not interfere or interrupt Greem¡¯s actions.


    It wasn¡¯t until Greem¡¯s tall figure had beenpletely obscured by the mist that she put dropped the smile and let out a haunting shriek, reminiscent of a nightingale.


    "Fate! Fate! Fate... "


    ............


    When Alice finally woke up, she found herself in a clean and neat room.


    The decoration was simple and basic.


    A single bed, a chair, a brown desk; this was all the furniture there was.


    A towering figure sat before the wooden desk, silently reading his books.


    Alice turned under the soft sheets. She could feel that she was naked from the smooth feeling of the cloth against her skin. A cooling sensation came from the wounds all over her body. It mixed with the stinging pain and caused unbearable itches on her skin.


    Alice raised her left hand. The severalyers of white cloth wrapped around it had practically turned it into a dumpling. She put her hand against her nose and sniffed. She could smell styptic cream and skin regenerating ointment.


    Her tongue was bitter and numb. She opened her mouth and found a Leaf of Life in it.


    Hmph! Throwing me to that old witch without a second word. Now you want to use these little tricks to gain my favor back? You wish!


    For some reason, Alice¡¯s tears streaked down her cheek uncontrobly, even though she was being dismissive of Greem¡¯s care.


    With the sharp senses of an adept, not a single bit ofmotion, no matter how minor, would escape his notice.


    Greem¡¯s tall figure had already appeared at the bedside when Alice started crying. He bent down and looked at her.


    ¡°Do your wounds still hurt?"


    "Mm!"


    "I have already applied ointments for you. You should be able topletely recover in two or three days with your Physique. There won¡¯t be any obvious scars!"


    "Mm!"


    An awkward silence fell over the two after the simple conversation.


    They had both been apprentice adepts once. They had both crawled and wed their way up from the very bottom. They had experienced all manner of fearsome suffering. Inparison, the torture this time wasn¡¯t necessarily the worst. It didn¡¯t matter which apprentice adept they were. All of them had to shoulder this pain on their own. No one would share the agony with them, even if their blood ran dry and their tears were exhausted.


    This was why all adepts and apprentices developed a cold and uncaring personality.


    This was also why Greem, who tried to be caring, and Alice, who was the one being care for, had no idea how to continue the conversation.


    "Alice, you were there for ten days. Do you know why the old witch treated you like that?" The question popped into Greem¡¯s mind, and he couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    "What reason could it be for? It must be because she¡¯s gone insane! She¡¯s a crazy hag... " Alice clenched her teeth in hatred when she recalled the torture she had endured.


    "I have an odd feeling... " Greem frowned and hesitated.


    "What feeling?"


    "It seemed like she was trying to help you!" Greem paused for a moment before confessing his thoughts on the issue.


    "Help me!" Alice¡¯s eyes were opened wide. They almost popped out of her skull from the ludicrous suggestion. She waved her dumpling-hand around angrily as she roared, "After everything she did to me, and you say she¡¯s trying to help me? Have you gone mad as well?"


    Greem wasn¡¯t daunted by Alice¡¯s tantrum. A thoughtful expression appeared on his face.


    "You and I both know very well what the Northern Witches are like. They are an istionist group of individuals who are extremely particr about their traditions and legacies. You and Liana belong to two different branches of witches. She wouldn¡¯t easily harm you in fear of interfering in the selection of the Witch of Fate."


    "What about that?"


    "If the two of us aren¡¯t mistaken in that manner, don¡¯t you find her actions odd?"


    "Of course her actions are odd, she¡¯s gonepletely mad!"


    "Alice, calm down. Don¡¯t let anger blind you. Try and think. In doing what she did, what message did she want to send you?!"


    Alice still shook her head in confusion.


    "Her actions clearly angered you. But it also made you feel your own weakness and helplessness in that situation. What did you want the most when your emotions were at their peak?"


    "Power!"


    "Yes! Power! You need the power to strengthen yourself. You need the power to exact revenge. If that¡¯s the case, where does your powere from?"


    "Where does powere from?" Alice repeated in a daze.


    "You awakened the talent to be a Witch of Fate! Even though numerous other Witches of Fate awakened at the same time, you must know the source of your power if you trace it to its origins!"


    Alice shook her head as if she still didn¡¯t fully understand.


    Even though she was extremely talented and smart, herck of experience made it difficult for her to keep up with Greem.


    "You must always remember the source of your power." Greem patiently taught her, "You awakened the talent of the Witch of Fate. The source of your power can onlye from a single thing¨C fate. Alice, let me ask you; do you believe in fate?"


    Alice lifted her head and locked eyes with Greem. For the first time, she started to consider the true meaning of her talent as a Witch of Fate.


    Believe in fate? Do I believe in fate?


    Again and again, Alice repeated the question to herself. She fell into a stupor for a moment.


    Indeed, ever since she awakened to her spatial affinity, manipting space became second nature. She couldmand and control space as she willed. It was thanks to this powerful talent that she was able to dominate all opponents of the same level.


    Her powerful strength caused her to be lost.


    Everyone¡¯s fear and respect made her arrogant.


    One by one, they seeded in causing her to get drunk on her power, and she forgot the origins of her true power!


    Fate?


    Fate!


    Alice recalled her time so far as an apprentice adept. She had never seemed to have consciously tried to understand or master the concept of fate.


    She was at ease with enjoying the glory brought about by her talent in fate without ever trying to understand it.


    What now then? At this moment, when she finally felt the humiliation of the weak, and once again desired for power, what should she do? Meditate day after day like those other adepts? umte resources to strengthen herself? Or...


    Alice suddenly felt even more lost.


    Even if she had a clear idea of her path forward, and understood the true nature of her strength, how was she to experience that intangible and illusory fate?


    Would shouting ¡¯Fate, I believe in you!¡¯ into the sky allow her to gain power?


    Her thoughts were all over the ce, but she couldn¡¯t find a correct path out of thebyrinth. Alice raised her head and looked hopefully at Greem.


    "What should I do? Teach me!" Alice, for the first time, requested with all her sincerity.


    "Do you believe in fate?" Greem asked once more, his tone heavy and serious.


    This was both a question and an answer!

 Chapter 298

    Chapter 298 The True Essence of Fate


    A follower of the Witch of Fate didn¡¯t believe in fate?


    This question might seem like a ridiculous one, but it struck Alice like a thunderbolt.


    "Of... Of course... I... believe... in fate... "


    Alice stuttered, her voice growing fainter.


    Ever since she obtained her unique spatial talent, she had always considered it as her own innate ability. She had never considered the idea of having to discover the source of her talent. Alice was asionally reminded of this intangible ¡¯fate¡¯ that granted her this talent and praised it when she did. However, she had never considered ¡¯fate¡¯ as anything more than a non-existent deity. Se had never truly thought about it.


    There were less than nine years until the Witch of Fate selection. When that happened, all of the witches who had awakened the bloodline of the Witch of Fate would gather in the Northern regions. A final showdown would decide the identity of the true Witch of Fate.


    And there could only be one!


    Once the ceremony crowned a candidate as the Witch of Fate, all of the other potentials would die in untold suffering. The power of fate would be robbed from their cold dead corpses and bestowed upon the true Witch of Fate. That was why Alice would either be dead or alive in eight years.


    She would face the first trial of life and death in her journey of fate!


    What, then, decided her fate?


    Strength and power? If Alice had power rivaling a Second Grade adept eight years from now, she would be able to sweep through the other candidates with no trouble. There was no chance anyone could take the title of Witch of Fate away from her at that point.


    But was this possible?


    Eight years. It was neither a long nor short length of time.


    If Alice put in the effort, she would likely advance to an official adept, but she had no chance of leaping all the way to Second Grade adept! It was expected that many candidates should be able to be adepts by then. How was she to distinguish herself then?


    Her spatial talent was exceptional, and her powers sufficient, but how weak were the other candidatespared to her?


    In this brutalpetition, no candidate ever willingly gave up their lives to save another. The Witch of Fate selection would be steeped in blood and death. The unprepared were doomed to be stepping stones for others.


    They would writhe in pain and look on as someone else ascended the throne of fate, robbing them of all that defined to them... their talent, their bloodline, and their powers!


    Alice¡¯s face drained to a pale white at the thought of that fearsome scene.


    For the first time in her life, she felt her body filled with motivation. She gripped her tiny fists and cheered herself on.


    "Alice, you can do it. Go, go! Work hard! I¡¯ll be the greatest witch! Ow... "


    She didn¡¯t manage toplete her self-encouragement speech; Greem had hit her on the head.


    "If your goal is only to be the greatest witch, I can guarantee you that you will not be the Witch of Fate!" Greem red at her, "It seems I need to reconsider investing in you!"


    "Why?" Alice angrily shed her canine teeth, "How am I supposed to beat them without bing the best?"


    "Use your brain, idiot!" Greem shook his head, as if he couldn¡¯t deal with Alice, "You are fighting to be the Witch of Fate! The Witch of Fate! The core of your profession will always revolve around that one word. You don¡¯t need to be the strongest. You need to be the one closest to fate!"


    Alice¡¯s body was no more than eight years old, and her mental age was no more than fifteen or sixteen. She was smart, intelligent, and possessed a good grasp of profound knowledge due to her talent. Still, she was unable toprehend the concept of fate whenever they talked about it.


    "So I don¡¯t need to busy myself with strengthening anymore? I should just use all my time to research fate?" Alice asked hesitatingly.


    Bang.


    He hit her head once again without warning.


    "Why did you hit me again?" Alice grabbed her head with her hands and pouted. She was on the verge of crying, "Didn¡¯t you say that the Witch of Fate relied on fate rather than strength?"


    "Why can¡¯t you understand?" Greem looked at her, "Strength is your guarantee for survival, while fate is the key to your victory! You must first strengthen yourself to ensure your survival so that you have a chance at victory. I can assure you that the first batch to be eliminated from the selection will be witches who have yet to reach adept level."


    "Then?"


    "And if those adept-level witches can¡¯t do anything about each other, fate will be the only thing they can rely on!"


    "But how do you increase fate?"


    "That¡¯s simple! Just advance to an adept first to make sure you survive. Then, work hard on divination! That is the true factor that determines your fate!"


    "Then what do I need to do now?"


    "You just need to do one thing now. Try and convince yourself to truly believe in fate. Not lip service or superficial faith, but a true, unreserved belief in faith. You can lie to me, but you cannot lie to yourself, and especially not fate! That¡¯s why... little brat, from today onwards, try your best to be a believer of fate!"


    Alice nodded, her hands still protecting her head.


    ............


    Greem returned to his wooden desk once Alice fell asleep again. He took out the crystal brooch talisman and examined it.


    This was the golem talisman that Piro had given him.


    With this item, Greem could bring his metallic statue around with him once he created it. When he first obtained the talisman, he had dreamed of using the chip¡¯s scanning and analysis abilities to see through its secrets, reverse engineer it, then mass produce it.


    However, this impractical dream was shattered after thest few days of research!


    Dammit! This golem talisman wasn¡¯t what he expected. Instead of a massive lesser-ne where a metallic golem could be stored, it was an odd spell. This talisman that could stow away a ten-meter-tall war golem wasn¡¯t a spatial tool! Rather, it was a sealing spell!


    Greem became furious upon discovering this fact.


    He originally thought that he would be able to clone and copy the golem talismans once he overcame the technological barrier. This would have been easy with Alice¡¯s spatial talents and the spacestones in his possession. But who knew? It still ended up as a failure.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be amused by his past fantasies.


    If the golem talismans were so easily reverse-engineered, the Silver Union wouldn¡¯t have been able to maintain a monopoly for several thousand years. Even today, the high-grade adepts of the other major forces still had to traverse billions of miles to request help from the Silver Union if they wanted to carry their golems with them.


    So many powerful adepts gathered at the Adept¡¯s Association in the east of the Continent, but they too were unable to see through the sealing spell used in the talisman!


    Greem gave up after two days of research and confirmed that he wasn¡¯t able to see through the spell as of yet.


    He kept the golem talisman and began considering his journey forward.


    His main mission on this trip had already beenpleted. Even though he wanted to stay for a little while longer in this territory, where esoteric adepts gathered like flies, he worried about the spacestones in his possession. He felt like it was safer if he returned to Feidnan City as soon as possible.


    Now that Greem had made up his mind, he quickly contacted Adept Angus and had him reserve a ticket back to the Zhentarim Association ten days from now. He and Snox then took this opportunity to go on a shopping spree. They swept through the shops in the Outer Circle and frantically collected everything useful to them.


    Greem received a sizeable crystal reward for winning the Byron n¡¯s duel. He went all-out and bought everything he wanted. He exchanged his entire reward for innumerable materials, resources, and knowledge.


    When Greem had first started shopping, he had hoped to purchase a stock of potions that could help increase his Spirit. However, he quickly gave up after going through a couple of shops.


    It was simply too expensive! Way too expensive!


    Eris¡¯ Nightmare. A Spirit potion that was extremely effective, even for adepts. Every dosage would bring an increase of 0.12 Spirits.


    The base price was set at 1400 magic crystals per vial. It had severe side effects as well.


    As implied by its name, the adepts that consumed this potion would find themselves trapped in a bizarre dream realm every night. They would not be able to break free with their own strength or external stimuli.


    They endured a nightmarish experience thatsted two hours before they could wake up.


    Such a horrifying side-effect brought about severe safety concerns for adepts that drank it!


    The other potion, the Evil Spirit Water, was even worse.


    Adepts would be swarmed by wraiths and undead for a lengthy period of time after consuming this potion. If they didn¡¯t prepare the necessary defense procedures, then it was very likely they would be possessed by evil spirits.


    This was why most adepts that drank the Evil Spirit Water never dared explore old ruins and graves. They became a living undead ma, attracting all the souls nearby towards them. Any sane adept felt chills running down their spine at that very idea.


    The other adept potions were the same. All of them had high prices and negative side-effects. If Greem wanted to raise his Spirit with potions, he would have to increase his wealth ten times over.


    Just like that, he spent his remaining days moving through the various stores and shops. Soon, the date of departure arrived!

 Chapter 299

    Chapter 299 Battle in the Night


    The return trip was much more pleasantpared to the lively trip here.


    Even though they passed through the same ces, there were fewer magical creatures that dared to chase after the battleship.


    Greem was confused at first. However, after talking with some of the apanying passengers, he discovered that the Silver Union was enraged after the abduction incident executed by the Harpy Kingdom.


    Consequently, the Silver Union had gathered a group of Third Grade adepts and invaded the Harpy Kingdom. They slew nearly a thousand of the ugly creatures, including a hundred harpy witches.


    Unfortunately, they only saved two of the kidnapped adepts. The remaining few had clearly been unable to endure the ¡¯savage¡¯ mating process and were drained of all their essence.


    The two survivors were both body refining adepts. Their Physiques wereparable to magical beasts.


    Sadly, even they had been squeezed to the brink of death by the time they were finally rescued. It appeared it was going to be hard for them topletely recover without one or two years of rest!


    The explosive reaction of the Silver Union caused the magical creatures to grudgingly settle down.


    Two and a half monthster, Greem, along with Alice and Snox, finally returned to the center of the Continent.


    Their first destination was Guardia Port, the public city at the very west of the Zhentarim area.


    They stayed there for two days before a flying ship heading towards the central area arrived. Five dayster, they sessfully returned to Motta City.


    They didn¡¯t dare stay in Motta City for too long. The three of them quickly bought a small wagon and hurried out of the city.


    ............


    A dark forest. A temporary campfire crackled and sizzled.


    Snox busied himself preparing dinner.


    He put up a metal stand over the fire and ced the pot on it before moving to prepare the ingredients.


    Alice propped her head up with her hands as she silently gazed into the distance.


    She had been like this ever since the strict scolding from Greem.


    Greem informed Snox that he was going out, then he stood up and walked into the dark forest. Before dinner started, he wanted to see for himself what the outside world of the World of Adepts looked like.


    The Continent of Adepts¡¯ trees always grew tall and straight. Their leaves flourished in dense patches as well, almost blotting out all of the light from the sky. The only sources of light came from the faint and deste glow of Moonlight Grass and Glow Shrooms.


    There weren¡¯t very many bushes or fields of grass that grew above knee height. A thickyer of withered and yellowed leaves covered the ground, where a vast stretch of green grass spread.


    There were very few critters here.


    After all, this was fairly close to the road. Large magical creatures wouldn¡¯t show up around here. Consequently, apprentice adepts were able to freely use the wild beasts nearby as target practice. This was why Greem couldn¡¯t find the presence of a single carnivore or herbivore after walking a quarter of a kilometer into the darkness.


    All of a sudden, just as he was about to turn back in disappointment, he stopped.


    He turned and looked towards his side. He was keeping his guard up.


    A towering figure made his way over with heavy footsteps.


    His feet crushed rotting leaves as he strode over, the nts snapping and crackling as they were shredded to pieces. The sound reverberated far throughout the silent, shadowed forest.


    Greem licked his lips and narrowed his eyes. A faint blue light started to flicker about his irises.


    He waspletely prepared for a battle.


    Meanwhile, he had already sent a warning to Alice and Snox through their mental connection.


    Under Greem¡¯s elementium sight, a bright, blinding-red light emanated from the figure. This was a sign of extreme hostility, as well as severe danger. Greem felt a potent, yet suppressed, aura on the person.


    The energy reactions from the unknown man were intense in Greem¡¯s visual projection. Most of the energy nodes were spread across the person¡¯s limbs, joints, and key organs. It was because of this that Greem could tell the identity of the unknown man. He was a body-refining adept!


    It was almost the dead of night in the middle of a silent and unpopted woond. His opponent¡¯s intent was obvious. Greem couldn¡¯t help but be curious. He had maintained a low profile when he returned. How had the ck Glove Association tracked him down?


    "You are the me Demon Greem?" The tall shape spoke but kept a thirty-meter distance between them.


    His voice was low and thick. It was a male¡¯s voice.


    Just then, the man took a step forward and a sliver of moonlight pierced through the canopy. It fell upon the man, illuminating his true appearance.


    This was a powerful body-refining adept wearing crimson metal armor. Crimson ripples surged in the air around him. He carried a gigantic two-handed greatsword on his back. His face was wicked and distorted beneath the moonlight. Several horrendous scars wriggled across his face like centipedes crawling about.


    He wore crimson gauntlets as well. Every time he balled his fingers into a fist, Greem could see sharp des sticking out of the knuckles. Just the sight of such a thing was enough to send chills into the heart of an ordinary man.


    "Bloodhand Butcher?" Greem probingly asked.


    The opponent¡¯s appearance was fairly unique, after all. He was quickly able to recall some of the more infamous characters from these areas.


    "Knowing my nickname won¡¯t help you. You must die here today!" The Bloodhand Butcher said as a wicked ¡¯smile¡¯ was syed across his face.


    His firm and threatening voice hadn¡¯t even dissipated on the wind when a red shadow shot towards Greem. His monstrous metal fist punched through the air. Violent winds blew in every direction, scattering a pungent odor of blood into the air. It was directed at Greem¡¯s heart.


    A ck and red Magma Shield suddenly appeared between the two.


    The mes didn¡¯t even have time to spread across the surface of the shield before a crimson fist smashed right into the center of it.


    Boom! The Magma Shield exploded.


    For the first time, Greem¡¯s Magma Shield had been shattered into sparks and rubble before it could finish materializing.


    The wind howled. The metal fist broke through his defensive barrier, the fire still zing on it, and continued on its path towards Greem. The swift and powerful strike had been partially obstructed by the Magma Shield, but it could still deal as much as sixty points of elementium damage.


    Most elementium attacks tended to be unconcentrated. However, the enemy¡¯s iron fist was a vigorous and concentrated blow. All of its strength had been gathered into a single fist. Its offensive ability was beyond that of an elementium attack.


    Greem was caught by surprise. He hit himself on the chest and a brilliant ¡¯me Halo of Repulsion¡¯ activated.


    The me Halo of Repulsion was nothing more than a scorching me shockwave that spread out it a halo. Everything within its range had to endure damage from the mes, as well as a certain level of physical impact.


    This was why the spell was often used by fire adepts to create distance from their enemies!


    That said, thisst minute me Halo activation was not going to do much against a body-refining adept. Greem stumbled backward. The punch¡¯s air pressure struck his chest and sent him flying.


    Greem heard his ribs cracking from the impact while he was still sailing through the air. He spat out ck blood at the same time.


    The crimson silhouette roared. The blood-colored aura shrouding his body sted away the fearsome mes reaching towards him. A single stomp and the opponent charged towards Greem¡¯s falling body. Two iron fists sent a barrage of punches, and a curtain of furious crimson shadows flew at Greem.


    Boom.


    mes appeared in the dark forest.


    Greem¡¯s tall body instantly disappeared in the pir of fire that had erupted out of nowhere.


    mes burst apart in an empty space a hundred meters away as Greem stumbled out of the fire.


    The crimson attacker roared once more. His body twisted in midair and once again sped towards Greem like an arrow fired from a bow.


    "Die!" Greem growled and lifted his hand. Three Explosive Fireballs exploded towards the enemy in a triangle formation. Greem lifted his right palm again, right after the Explosive Fireballs wereunched. A Magma Fireball quickly formed in his hand.


    The crimson silhouette did not choose to avoid the fireballs shooting towards him.


    Bloodhand Butcher was an experienced body-refining adept. He knew very well what would happen if he dodged. If he stopped for even a moment, a storm of elementium spells would drown him before he could get close. The terror of a fire adept was fully demonstrated when they were able to put distance between themselves and the enemy.


    Without any hesitation, the Butcher raised his arms up to cover his face. A powerful crimson forcefield trembled around him. He chose to endure the attack.


    Bang. Bang. Bang...


    Three consecutive explosions. The dark forest was painted a bright red.


    The violent elementium mes dragged everything within a twenty-meter radius into a realm of fire and ash.


    The tall, straight, and thick trees were instantly ignited, turning into towering torches in the night. Wood splinters were set on fire by the ocean of mes. The intense fire was blinding.


    The Butcher fearlessly crashed through the center of the explosion. He had just reached the edge of the sea of mes when a speeding Magma Fireball entered his sight.


    Dammit! The speed at which the me Demon fired spells was terrifying indeed!


    He cursed internally as he drew the sword from his back. He shed forward, a deste crimson light streaking through the air, and shed the fireball in half.


    He tried once again to charge through the explosion, but a massive me fist was waiting right behind the Magma Fireball. It smashed him directly in the face, knocking him right back into the mes he had attempted to escape from.


    The scarletva from the shattered Magma Fireball fell upon the green grass, instantly scorching the earth. An oppressive figure, shrouded in dancing mes, silently stood before the Butcher. It cut off all routes of attack avable to the enemy.


    Greem finally saw a chance to counter-attack with the Infernal Tyrant covering him. He grabbed three potions from his belt and drank everything at once.


    After quickly treating the wounds he had sustained, Greem lifted his head. Two bright sparks lit up within his ebony eyes.


    A massive amount of wild, zing me energy started to gather around him!

 Chapter 300

    Chapter 300 Bloodhand Butcher


    The fight deep in the woods wasn¡¯t the only battle.


    A massive elementium explosion erupted in the camp as well.


    The sudden tide of elementium ravaged everything around it. The temporary camp was destroyed and turned into an expanse of elementium. Even Greem felt the destructive aura from a distance.


    Through the soul contract, he ascertained that Alice and Snox were still alive. They were frantically running away from the destruction. However, were there people chasing after them? Would they be able to escape the pursuit of an adept?


    He had no answers to these questions!


    If he wanted to rescue them, he first needed to defeat the ursed adept before him¨C Bloodhand Butcher.


    In the time that Greem hesitated, the Infernal Tyrant had already shed with the Butcher.


    The Tyrant¡¯s massive body of mes had been shed several times while in the sea of fire. The ferocious mes that ravaged everywhere had also burned the Butcher. He screamed in pain as the longsword in his hand started to heat up from the mes. Soon, the sword had turned into a bright red piece of iron.


    Even more crimson energies emanated from the Butcher¡¯s resilient body. They enveloped him and prevented him from being reduced to ashes by the mes. However, this protection wouldn¡¯tst for long. He had to crush this elementium being as soon as possible, or the crude crimson barrier he had just erected would eventually be breached.


    The crimson energies extended towards his sword, giving it powerful corrosive powers. Every sh of the sword delivered tremendous damage to the Tyrant.


    Often, the Butcher had to rely on his swift footsteps to move about and dodge the violent fire spellsunched in his direction. He felt a stinging pain whenever one of those terrifying elementium fireballs exploded nearby.


    Was it 130 points, or 140 points?


    Without an urate measurement, the Butcher had no idea how powerful the attacks were. He didn¡¯t want to know either. The only thing he needed to know was that he had to dodge whenever the me humanoid directed its palms at him. He wasn¡¯t confident that his Physique could endure that sort of explosion if he was ever hit by the fireballs!


    He had already found out about the target¡¯s fearsome elementium golem through the information provided to him, but the strength of the golem had clearly gone beyond his expectations.


    As a body-refining adept with 17 points in Physique, the Bloodhand Butcher had a shocking amount of physical and magical resistance. He even rivaled some of the beefier and defensive magical creatures in the wild. He easily took on attacks below 60 points of damage even without the crimson armor he wore.


    This meant that a group of apprentice adepts had absolutely no way chance of harming him, even if he waspletely unarmed. In fact, he could endure all of their blows, charge at them, and use his massive sword to crush them like bugs.


    Even so, the Bloodhand Butcher didn¡¯t dare take a fireball from the golem head on. He had a feeling. If he was hit by the fireballs, it would definitely do serious damage.


    His instincts were fairly urate.


    The data disyed in Greem¡¯s mind. Every single spell the Tyrant cast reached a shocking 150 points. This was far above the highest limits that ordinary adepts could reach!


    The human body was undoubtedly the weakest among all creatures that had ess to supernatural powers. Consequently, the concentration of elementium that could be stored and umted within a fixed area of their flesh and blood was significantly lower than magical creatures.


    This was reflected in their spells. The strength of an adept¡¯s elementium attacks was limited by the strength of their bodies and several other factors. It was virtually impossible for their spells and attacks to be as concentrated and savage as a magical creature¡¯s.


    This was why Greem¡¯s attack was no stronger than 115 points, despite having undergone elementiumization of his body, as well as having chosen me mastery. The Infernal Tyrant was a powerful elementium golem indeed. Its Second Grade summoning core was above its own personal Grade. While it might not have the body to fully exhibit the power of such a core, the spells that it cast were unbelievably terrifying.


    150 points!


    This was enough to kill some ordinary adepts in a single shot!


    Greem endured the throbbing pain from his chest and straightened his body. He tried to sense themotion in the distance.


    Alice waspletely out of breath from running, but she still took what time she had to send a warning to Greem. It wasn¡¯t an adept that attacked the camp, but two.


    If Greem included the body-refining adept with him, the number of adepts after his life had reached a total of three!


    And he was no more than a newly advanced adept!


    Greem had a clear idea of the opponent¡¯s strategy.


    The body-refining adept would stall him, while the other two adepts would kill his servants. The three of them would then surround Greem and exterminate him!


    It seemed that the opponent had no intention of letting any news of the incident escape to the outside world. This was why they were willing to let go of their dignity as adepts and chase after his servants.


    If that was the case, there was no longer a need to hesitate. Killing this body-refining adept before the other two arrived was his only way out of this predicament.


    Greem lifted his head and looked at the crimson man dashing around the Tyrant. He uttered several arcane sybles as he pointed at the enemy. The mes around the crimson silhouette quickly gathered together. All of a sudden, a strange chain of mes materialized and wrapped around the Butcher¡¯s body.


    This chain only dealt 15 points of physical damage and 5 points of elementium fire damage. It waspletely insignificant to a body-refining adept with 17 points of Physique and 14 points of Strength. He only needed to exert a little force to shatter the chains. However, a towering pir of me had exploded beneath the Bloodhand Butcher in the short moment it took him to break free.


    An expression of fear appeared on his wicked face. The ferocious crimson energies exploded, instantly shattering what was left of his restraints while dispersing the fire pir. He kicked the ground and barely escaped before the mes gathered together once more. Deep imprints of his feet had been baked into the scorched earth.


    He didn¡¯t even have any time to take a breath. Fireballs from both the Tyrant and Greem flew towards him, one from the left and the other from the right.


    The Bloodhand Butcher¡¯s face fell. He quickly sped up and dashed across the field of fire. Only a faint crimson afterimage was left where he had just been. The fireballs continuously exploded behind him as he ran. A few trees creaked and copsed in each of the explosions.


    Dirt was even raining down on him after being sent flying by the explosions!


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    The Bloodhand Butcher cursed again and again. He was so mad he could feel his lungs burning with rage.


    The ursed target was standing twenty meters away from his golem. The two of them unceasinglyunched their fire spells at him. Every time he tried close the distance, he would be greeted by a barrage of Explosive and Magma Fireballs.


    Moreover, the two Rings of Fire they activated had ovepped. Consequently, the Butcher had to deal with 30 points of fire damage every second, even while he dodged at high speeds. The damage might not have been much to his tough body, but the heat could still ignite the clothes he had on.


    If it wasn¡¯t for his crimson armor, he would practically have been running nude at this point!


    He was a body-refining adept after all. Speed was not his proficiency. His main method of attack was through the use of his two-handed longsword imbued with corrosive blood energies. If the opponent kept him at a distance, the only thing he could do was passively endure their blows.


    Wuuuu. He heard a sharp whistling.


    A broken tree trunk sailed through the air towards Greem.


    t was blown to bits by a Magma Fireball while it was still in the air, exploding into debris and sparks.


    The next second, a one-meter-wide stone flew at Greem again.


    That was also reduced to pebbles by the fireballs in the air.


    Greem pivoted and lifted his hands. A Magma Fireball he had been charging up shot out like a bullet.


    The flickering sea of mes was suddenly blown apart as the Bloodhand Butcher charged out of the fire with his sword in hand. A crimson sh chopped the enhanced Magma Fireball top pieces before it could explode. The roilingva within it was sted away as well.


    The Butcher let out a yell that shook the ground and the skies. The blood energies circting around his body increased in intensity as the sword in his hand became a curtain of shes slicing at Greem.


    In ordinary circumstances, Greem would probably have leaped away with a Fire Teleportation.


    His Physique was decent as well, but entering a melee with a professional body-refining adept was a suicidal act.


    However, the battle today was a dangerous one. If this dragged on any longer, he would be surrounded by three adepts. That would be the end of him. Greem didn¡¯t run when faced with the menacing sword array flying towards him. He made a circle with his arms and a terrifying stream of meposed of extremely concentrated fire elementium surged towards the enemy.


    Pu!


    The rain of cuts that spun like a top didn¡¯t stop at all. They shed against the stream of fire and forced their way upstream. Bit by bit, they were pressing towards Greem¡¯s body. The red me stream was split into two before the spinning sword, flowing harmlessly to either side.


    There were less than ten meters between the two now. Not a single obstacle stood between them besides the flood of fire.


    Both of them were gritting their teeth and hanging on!


    The Butcher was trying to break through thisst barrier and use his swift shes to cut the target to pieces. Greem was using every fiber of strength he had to increase the intensity and strength of the me stream to buy time for the Infernal Tyrant. He needed five precious seconds for it tounch a powerful attack.


    Szzzzzz.


    The edge of the de hade within half a meter of Greem¡¯s fingertips amid the odd sizzling sound of fire shing against steel.


    Finally, after five seconds of channeling, the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s spellnded on the Butcher¡¯s body!

 Chapter 301

    Chapter 301 Serpentine Adept


    A burning pain.


    A simple fire spell!


    The only uniqueness of this spell was its ability to convert part of the fire damage to harm the Spirit rather than the physical body.


    In fact, this spell could be considered mutated.


    When the Infernal Tyrantunched this simple mutated spell from its hands, it possessed 160 points of dual-attribute elementium damage.


    Bloodhand Butcher let out a surprised scream, and his spinning bodypletely froze. The stunned Butcher was then instantly flooded by sizzling red mes.


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t get an urate reading of the center of the torrent of me¡¯s precise temperature.


    All he could see was a bright red patch in his elementium sight.


    The extreme heat had even caused distortions in the air. The twisting shadows and blinding red lights made it hard to so much as look at the fire. Not even Greem¡¯s Spiritual sense could probe into the center of the fire, where the red light glowed the brightest.


    Aaaaaah!


    An anguished cry, like that of a beast, rang out in the woods. A towering figure charged out of the torrent of fire.


    Red mes still burned around him, but the temperature was much lower. Greem was finally able to see through the fire with his Spirit and witness the Butcher¡¯s wretched state.


    He was in a terrible state indeed!


    The fearsome heat had already eaten away half of the flesh on his body. Finding even a single untouched area was hard.


    The mes had carbonized a half-centimeter-thickyer of flesh and blood on the Butcher¡¯s body.


    The ck remains cracked as he walked forward, revealing the smoking flesh and strong muscles beneath. His stomach had a massive and shocking hole burned through it.


    The crimson armor he wore couldn¡¯t endure the ravaging of the me torrent. It had already been turned liquid, dripping towards the ground. The rest of the metal had fused with the Butcher¡¯s skin and flesh, turning into an inseparable part of his body.


    The Bloodhand Butcher had charged out of the fire with his arms covering his face. They had received the impact from the torrent head on. Not a single piece of flesh remained on his arms. The molten gauntlets and bracers coated his white bones with ayer of golden metal.


    He uncovered a vile and horrendous face when he put his skeletal hands down.


    He no longer had a face. His hair, nose, skin, and even the flesh of his face had all been vaporized. Only a ck, bleeding hole remained where his right eye once was.


    The Butcher stared at Greem with the only eye he had left. His gaze etched the hatred and resentment into his soul. The exposed teeth screeched as he ground them together. It was almost as if he wanted to eat Greem alive.


    Two adepts in odd costumes slowly walked out of the forest behind him. One took the left, and the other walked towards the right, subtly limiting the space that Greem could maneuver.


    Having missed his opportunity to kill the Bloodhand Butcher, Greem stopped moving. The Infernal Tyrant rose its arms and stood on guard beside him.


    One against three!


    The situation was undoubtedly extremely disadvantageous for Greem!


    He quickly called for Alice in his heart, but he didn¡¯t get a response. It was hard to verify her status through the crude soul contract they had.


    Greem¡¯s heart sank.


    His extreme anger and the close call with death provoked him. Rage boiled within his body, and the blood in his body rose in temperature. Thump. Thump. The sealed heart in his chest sounded the drums of war.


    "You killed Alice?" Greem¡¯s voice was unnaturally low and hoarse as if he was trying his best to suppress his emotions.


    "Do you mean that adorable girl?" The adept on the left pushed his hood back and revealed a hissing snake¡¯s head, "She tasted pretty good!"


    This enemy was a powerful bloodline adept!


    Even Greem, with all the ruthless killing intent currently bubbling in his heart, couldn¡¯t help but be shaken when faced with a bloodline adept. These were, after all, the adepts who were most known for theirbat prowess.


    Esoteric Adepts were undoubtedly the weakest in the four branches of adepts.


    They were good at golem creation, or potion concoction, or alchemy and magical enhancements, or otherworldly summonings. It didn¡¯t matter which it was. If an esoteric adept wanted to be good at their craft, they would have to spend half of their lives on research.


    That was why the specialized esoteric adepts were the weakest inbat!


    The elementium adepts and the body-refining adepts had simr advantages and disadvantages to their strengths.


    Elementium adepts had exceptionally high Spirit, which allowed their elementium spells to be extremely powerful under amplification from their potent Spirit. However, their Physique was often weak, being the most significant w of elementium adepts.


    Body refining adepts forged and refined their bodies as if it was a human-shaped magical tool. They filled every single action with strength and power. Unfortunately, their means of attack were mostly limited to close-range physical attacks. The way they fought was simr to warriors or assassins of other worlds.


    Bloodline adepts, on the other hand, usually fought like elementium adepts. The only difference was theirck of variety in the spells they had mastered. However, the moment they sessfully called upon their bloodline origin, they would instantly turn into an ancient magical creature, possessing both the long-ranged attacks of elementium adepts and the muscr bodies of body refining adepts.


    Thus, the strongest of the four branches of adepts were the bloodline adepts!


    The bloodline adepts would always be the most dominant and oppressive in a fight of adepts of the same Grade!


    The adept on the right also took his hood off, revealing a pretty woman¡¯s face. A diamond-shaped tarot gem was embedded between her eyes, letting out a colorful glow under the moonlight.


    She seemed to be an elementium adept that took the path of illusion!


    The two adepts coldly assessed the Butcher¡¯s pathetic appearance. Even though they put up a facade of confidence, the hint of caution in their eyes gradually became thicker and thicker.


    The two of them might have had tricks of their own to deal with the Butcher, but it wasn¡¯t easy to reduce him to this terrifying state. It seemed this Greem person had fearsome powers that could rival their own. Consequently, they didn¡¯t leap into battle upon arriving. Instead, they started circling Greem and the Tyrant.


    "Which one are you gonna take?" The snake-headed adept turned to look at the female illusionist.


    "You are the most powerful of us all. Of course, you should be the one to deal with that Greem guy. I¡¯ll deal with the elementium giant!" The illusionist beauty smiled seductively. Even Greem could feel his heart beat faster at the sight of her smiling.


    "Hmph! Your charms and illusions are useless against an elementium being, aren¡¯t they?" The snake-headed adept snorted in dissatisfaction. Still, it was clear that he was d about her respectful attitude.


    "Hehe, you, sir, are the one dealing with him after all! I merely need to dy this giant for a bit, and I¡¯m sure you will already have defeated the opponent. Why would I ever be in any danger that way?" The beautiful illusionist spoke casually as if this was the way it should be.


    "Hmph."


    The snake-headed adept couldn¡¯t be bothered to deal with the woman any longer. He turned and red at Greem. His odd, amber-colored vertical pupils were calm andposed. Greem¡¯s figure reflected in them.


    Greem turned around and the two locked eyes. He instantly felt his Spirit stall, and difort crept up his body!


    At the same time, a ring rm had gone off in Greem¡¯s mind.


    "Warning. Warning. The intrusion of foreign energies detected. Host¡¯s body is taking damage! Instructions requested from the host. Expel energies?"


    Eye powers?


    The discovery unsettled Greem. He could feel the slight numbness in his body. Without any hesitation, he quickly gave the order, "Immediately expel the energies. Chip, can you determine the nature of his eye power?"


    "Beep. Foreign energies expelled. Initial estimates suggest the effect of the energies to be petrification!"


    Eye of Petrification!


    Was this the racial talent of the opponent¡¯s bloodline?


    "Chip, can you determine the opponent¡¯s bloodline origin?" Greem gave the order as he summoned a Lava Shield to obscure the opponent¡¯s gaze.


    The existence of the snake¡¯s head and the Eye of Petrification were big hints. The chip should be able to deliver some information.


    "Beep. Data reference and examinationplete. There are a total of eleven ancient serpentine bloodlines with the Eye of Petrification. The opponent has fine and tightly packed scales. The color of the scales is dark gray. The opponent¡¯s eyes are amber in color, with the existence of some dirt-brown spots. ording to trait analysis, the initial estimates are as follows: Giant ck Mamba, earth elementium creature, 66%patibility. Giant Serpentman, a branch of the ancient Medusas, 27%patibility. Other matches have less than 1%patibility and will not be listed here..."


    "Show me everything rted to the Giant ck Mamba!" Greem was practically screaming at the chip. However,munication on the Spiritual level was always the quickest. It didn¡¯t matter how sophisticated the thought was; it would be able to get through in the blink of an eye.


    The very next moment, all the information the chip had on the Giant ck Mamba disyed in Greem¡¯s mind.


    The data wasn¡¯tplete, but it was enough to give Greem an idea of the strength and terror of this ancient creature.


    Giant ck Mamba. Earth elementium creature. An ancient apex predator. One of the most dangerous and terrifying species. They embodied superior physical strength and terrifying Spiritual powers. They were able to inject the energy of petrification into their enemies through the use of their eyes. The innate talents they possessed included the Eye of Petrification and Stonefall Purgatory.


    As Greem slowly stepped backward, the serpentine adept hissed as his entire body started to swell and grow in size. In the blink of an eye, he turned from a humanoid adept to a ck snake ten meters long. Its body was as thick as a water tank.


    The giant snake lifted its head and trained its terrifying gaze on Greem. Dirt-yellow dust rose from the ground, forming an armor of rock around its body. Mysterious and profound patterns filled its armoring.


    The snake raised its body high up, now that it hadpleted itsbat preparations. Its mouth split open to reveal the white fangs and forked tongue within.


    "me Demon? What an arrogant title! This name will no longer exist after today!"


    The snake spat out its deration of war and lunged forward. It bared its massive fangs and bit at Greem, who was already shrouded in destructive mes.


    The battle erupted!

 Chapter 302

    Chapter 302 A Fearsome Fight


    Colorful lights illuminated the forest.


    When the light faded and darkness once again fell upon the earth, the Infernal Tyrant had already vanished from its spot. It had disappeared.


    And neither was the female illusionist.


    An illusion? A sealing spell? Or some other strange urrence?


    Greem had no time to think. He cast Fire Teleportation, disappeared, and reappeared a hundred meters away from where he was earlier.


    Crunch.


    The serpent the bloodline adept had turned into snapped its jaw closed. A tremendous noise echoed through the woods. A massive tree where Greem had just been standing under had cracked in half. Shattered wood splinters went flying in every direction. The tree creaked as it fell towards the ground.


    The dark woods continued to rumble as the giant serpent¡¯s body charged through, crashing into the trees in its way and knocking them down like a berserk golem. It rapidly slithered towards Greem. It crushed everything in its way. The grass blew away, and a trail of dust had appeared behind the snake.


    The oppressiveness of its presence, the ferocity of its might. Not even Greem dared to imagine the consequence of being hit by such a massive creature!


    Greem shouted when he saw the massive shadow closing in on him. He stared at the pair of strange amber-eyes that glowed brightly in the inky night. An endless stream of abyssal mes surged out of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart along with the throbbing of me energies. They coursed through his veins and quickly traveled throughout his body.


    mes emerged from Greem¡¯s body as he quickly increased in size.


    The skin on the surface had cracked from the violent energies, causing wounds to appear all over. However, surgingva quickly filled in these wounds, turning his body into a me Fiend¡¯s body forged of flesh, fire, andva.


    Two thick, wickedly curved horns slowly appeared above his head. Greem painfully moved his body. His massive hooves stomped upon the scorched earth. The intense heat instantly caused the moisture in the dirt to evaporate.


    Redva flowed from beneath the earth. It quickly gathered and formed a massive pool of fire and magma beneath Greem¡¯s hooves. More and moreva and fire gathered in Greem¡¯s right hand. An unbelievable, exaggeratedlyrge executor¡¯s de had formed in just a short moment.


    Burning mes, redva, dense ck smoke, and the pungent odor of sulfur.


    A five-meter tall me Fiend rose up in this terrifying world of ck and red magma. The inside of its body was red hotva, while solidified magmaposed the surface. Wicked magma spikes could be seen growing out of its oversized joints.


    The transformed Greem roared at the charging Giant ck Mamba. Smoke and mes vented from hisrge mouth and nostrils. Its terrifying aura of might was equally as shocking as that of the serpent!


    "Die!"


    The me giant roared, and the two colossal titans shed.


    A low, muffled boom rang out in the woods.


    The violent shockwave rippled outwards. Everything caught in it was shredded to pieces and blown away. All the trees, grass, bushes, and even the mes.


    The tworge bodies were entangled with each other as they stumbled for a distance.


    The Giant ck Mamba raised its long neck and let out a pained screeching noise. The me Fiend burned the snake wrapped around it as if the Fiend was a boiling pir of magma. Its scales and flesh were practically roasted above a pit. ck smoke enveloped the snake as its body turned bright red from the heat.


    Still, it didn¡¯t dare to loosen its grip. In fact, it contracted every single muscle in its body and bound the me Fiend as hard as it could. The me Fiend¡¯s body creaked under the tension.


    The serpent coiled its body and ced its giant face before the me Fiend¡¯s zing head. Its eyes gazed into the eyes of the me Fiend.


    A dirt-yellow surge of petrification energy took advantage of the Spiritual connection that had been formed and extended towards Greem¡¯s mental world!


    If it directed the Eye of Petrification in a particr direction, it would petrify and turn the enemy¡¯s body to stone. Of course, the degree to which it would be able to cripple the enemy depended on the enemy¡¯s resistance. However, if it channeled those petrification powers towards the enemy¡¯s mental world through a Spiritual or soul connection, the enemy would instantly lose all ability to resist. They would bepletely vulnerable and exposed to all other attacks.


    Greem would never just sit around and wait for this disaster to ur. The me Fiend reached forward and grabbed the serpent¡¯s neck, calling upon the abyssal mes in its body to burn and wound the snake. At the same time, a surge of fire energy made its way to the me Fiend¡¯s eyes, and two terrifying Sr Ray beams shot out towards the snake.


    The brown beam from the Eye of Petrification shed with the blinding red Sr Rays.


    The shing energy moved back and forth in the air. It moved towards Greem at one moment, and at the next, it would push in the serpentine adept¡¯s direction. Every time it inched towards one of them, the person would immediately let out a wild roar and draw out as much energy to push the beam backward.


    A giant serpent and a zing demon. The two titans remained entangled with each other as they rolled in the sea of magma. Their fearsome eye powers were still locked in an intense struggle. For a short while, the two engaged in a stalemate.


    In a section of the dark woods, the severely wounded Butcher was swallowing as many potions and regenerative brews as he had with him. He used every single spell and treasure he had on him that could help regrow his flesh and muscles.


    Sadly, as he was a body-refining adept, most of his physical potential had already been drawn to its limits. Stimtive drugs and regenerative potions had minimal effect on him whenpared to other adepts.


    The Butcher barely managed to use his blood energy to extinguish the fires on his body. After a series of medical treatments, he was able to stabilize his wounds. An intolerable itch and stinging pain came from all over his body. The muscles on his body were quickly regenerating and recovering. He didn¡¯t look as grotesque and terrible as he did before!


    He called upon his blood energy to rapidly heal his broken body. Meanwhile, he looked on at the battle in the distance with the one eye he had left.


    Only a short time had passed, but already the fight between the two giants had shifted nearly two kilometers away. The ground quaked, and fires zed in the sky. Their match was even, and the oue undecided.


    The Butcher felt fearful as he looked on.


    If...if that Greem person had used this against him right at the start of the battle, how long could he have endured in that fiery hell? Fifteen minutes, or seven?


    Disregarding the fearsome me Fiend form, just the abyssal mes, and streams of fire shrouding his body would have been too much for the Butcher to bear. The me Fiend wasn¡¯t known for its strength, but it still had 12.3 points in Strength, not to mention its robust Physique.


    The Butcher was sure that he was nothing more than cannon fodder when put in front of a monster like this one. Bloodhand Butcher also had 17 points of Physique and 14 points of Strength. He was an elite adept even among the First Grades.


    However, he knew very clearly that even the elite adepts were divided into several tiers.


    The elite adepts that only had one attribute above 10 points were known as faux-elites. They might be able to demonstrate dominance in a specific aspect, but they were not all-rounded talents and had inconsistent performance. Thus, most people didn¡¯t consider them proper elites.


    Only those who had managed to gain 10 points in every attribute could be considered elite adepts. These adepts were also the main military force in the more prominent ns. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was a nar war or a n war. They were always the vanguards.


    Strictly speaking, Bloodhand Butcher was also one of these elites.


    His Physique had exceeded the threshold of 15 points and was at a total of 17 points. Unfortunately, his Strength, Agility, and Spirit stillgged behind. There were adepts above himself. Those were the elite adepts that had managed to cross the 15 point threshold for every single attribute. These individuals were often the reserve strength of adept ns, kept in safety to attempt an advancement to Second Grade. ns often hid them and kept them a secret from the outside world. It was rare for these individuals ever to go outside.


    However, whenever such an adept appeared, they could single-handedly crush any ordinary adept!


    This strength was why the Butcher couldn¡¯t help but feel his body and soul and tremble in awe when he watched two adepts of this level battling before his eyes.


    "What are you looking at? Hurry up and help!"


    A Spiritual voice suddenly boomed in his mind. The voice belonged to that of hispanion, the serpentine adept.


    The Butcher betrayed a wicked smile as he looked at the two titans engaged in their brutal fight. He ignored the tears and pain that his smile had just caused on his barely recovered facial muscles. Blood dripped from his face.


    He extended a hand, and the two-handed longsword that had been blown away flew into his hand in a crimson streak.


    He red at the me Fiend, who was still bound by the serpent¡¯s body and let out a rumbling roar. Blood energies gathered around him once more as he marched towards the battlefield.


    Greem felt a slight tremor in the ground, and a severe expression appeared on his zing face. The me Fiend suddenly came up with a burst of strength and created a little space for himself. His massive hands reached into his body and took out two gleaming crystals, which he then threw at the Bloodhand Butcher.


    This momentary distraction had allowed the ck Mamba to tighten its grip once more, constricting the me Fiend and causing his body to groan from the pressure. Massive cracks had already started appearing all over the me giant¡¯s body.


    The petrification energy from the snake¡¯s eye had also gained plenty of ground. It was only several inches away from the me Fiend¡¯s burning eyes!

 Chapter 303

    Chapter 303 Tragic, Tragic, and Tragic


    Dammit! Stop!


    Greem roared with all his might. His unsealed heart began beating rapidly.


    Fire energies surged out of his heart and coursed through his body, providing Greem with an endless fountain of strength.


    Once again, the bnce of the battle tipped towards Greem.


    The two gleaming crystals Greem threw into the distance had justnded. Two fearsome golems with different appearances materialized where the cores fell.


    The Decayer and the Roaring Monster!


    The Decayer looked like a slime monster with viscous green liquid thered all over its body. A strange green radiance emanated from its body. All the nt life that it neared would wither and die. Only a slimy, poisoned path followed where the Decayer walked.


    The Roaring Monster was a gigantic stone golem five meters tall. When it roared and charged towards the battle, the ground itself would tremble and shake, making it hard to stand still.


    If it were any ordinary circumstance, Greem wouldn¡¯t have had the ability to summon three golems at once. His Spirit wouldn¡¯t have been able to bear the strain of calling forth the Decayer and the Roaring Monster after having already released the Infernal Tyrant.


    This situation was the first time all three of his adept-level golems appeared simultaneously in battle!


    All the troublesome situations he had gotten into in the past had only warranted the use of the Infernal Tyrant alone. If it were a simple battle, even Greem alone would be enough to deal with it. That was why these two mediocre, adept-level golems never had a chance to shine since their creations.


    However, the newly enhanced me Fiend Transformation caused an exponential increase in Greem¡¯s Spirit. The rise in Spirit had also caused his other attributes to increase. All of them had exceeded 15 points except for Agility. Thus, he had the spare Spirit to summon the Decayer and Roaring Monster.


    The Bloodhand Butcher felt despair at the sight of two adept-level golemsing at him from both sides.


    These dull, dumb elementium golems, which only rivaled newly advanced adepts in strength, would be no problem if he were unwounded. He could crush them all regardless of how many there were.


    But now.


    The Decayer stopped a distance away from the Butcher. Its viscous body shook, and swift green light shot towards the Bloodhand Butcher. The rumbling stone golem also picked up a massive boulder and threw it towards him.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    The Butcher cursed as he waved his sword. Two crimson stsunched from his sword, shattering the enemies¡¯ attacks before they could reach him.


    The pungent acid was blown away by the crimson energy, and quickly spread across an area of fifty meters. The woods, already ravaged by the fight earlier, was once again corroded by the poison. The remaining trees and grass sizzled in the acid gas.


    A strange and pungent smell instantly filled the entire area.


    The boulder also shattered into thousands of shards that flew everywhere. The rocks carried powerful kic energy and were no different from crossbow bolts fired at a close distance. They left behind deep holes wherever they pierced.


    If the Butcher was at his peak condition, these shockwaves from the sh might not have even been able to pass through the blood barrier he had around his body. Right now, the rocks were able to hit him on his regenerating wounds. He stifled a grunt as he endured the pain.


    The Butcher no longer thought about aiding the serpentine adept. He was barely holding his own against the two adept-level golems.


    Greem couldn¡¯t spare any energy tomand the golems, but the chip could effortlessly do it in his ce.


    The Roaring Monster charged forward under the chip¡¯s orders and shielded the Decayer. Meanwhile, the Decayer fired off acid attacks at the Butcher, leaving him no option but dodging and drawing out the fight.


    Now that his golems had managed to stabilize the situation, Greem turned all of his attention to the fight with the Giant ck Mamba.


    If this particr ck Mamba were an actual ancient magical creature, Greem would never dare to engage in a melee with it. He would have fled far as he could and never looked back. After all, magical serpentine-creatures had always been known for their endurance and ability to oust their opponents.


    However, the enemy Greem fought against was only the bloodline transformation of a serpentine adept. Just like his transformation, there was a time limit to the ability. The more intense the battle, the quicker the bloodline energies were exhausted, and the shorter the time of the transformation!


    Greem¡¯s time limit was far shorter than his opponent¡¯s bloodline transformation in ordinary circumstances. However, the unsealed me Fiend¡¯s Heart was now able to pump pure fire energy into his body and reduce the power consumed to maintain his me Fiend form.


    He had gained the ability to engage in a sh like this and wear out the opponent with pure strength.


    Greem wanted to leap away with a Fire Teleportation and barrage the enemy with spells instead of doing something like this. After all, he was the me Demon and known for his ferocious fire powers. Sadly, the summoning of three adept-level golems upied over eighty percent of his Spirit. The Infernal Tyrant was even powerful enough to rival an elite adept, and its maintenance required that much more Spirit.


    What remained of his Spirit was barely enough to sustain the Ring of Fire, which was relentlessly roasting the serpent. Other spells? It was unfortunate for Greem, for even if he could get the space he needed to cast, he had no more energy to spare.


    Of course, the six powerful spells stored in his Scroll of Voodoo didn¡¯t cost anything to cast. He had hidden the Scroll in his chest, but the current circumstance didn¡¯t allow him a chance to use it.


    Greem reached forth and grabbed the ck Mamba¡¯s long neck. He pried it away from him, barely stopping the snake from biting him with its threatening fangs. The sh between its Eye of Petrification and his Sr Ray was still ongoing. Both parties had already sustained damage from the overflowing energies.


    Large patches of dark spots had started appearing on Greem¡¯s zing body. A thin shell of stone slowly spread across his body, fighting for control with the me energy.


    The mes had also almost roasted the Giant ck Mamba as well.


    A thick and fragrant smell of cooked meat wafted throughout the battlefield. An acrid smell of burnt and charred objects permeated the odor.


    Clusters of red me flickered on the serpent¡¯s body. They were starting to spread all over its body. The Sr Ray had also left a burn mark on the snake¡¯s neck that looked severe.


    The serpentine adept fumed!


    He had never faced such humiliation in his hundred years of dominating in the Zhentarim area. Every time he transformed into the Giant ck Mamba he ruled the battlefield. It was his stage to perform on.


    Fine grey scales covered its entire body. Not a single spot was exposed. These scales were tougher than tower shields enhanced with magic. They also had superior magic resistance. Due to these strong traits, the Giant ck Mamba was practically a bulldozer wrapped in heavy armor. It could crush all enemies under its body with its overbearing strength,sting lifeforce, and enduring defense.


    That wasn¡¯t to say that there were no ws in the ck Mamba bloodline.


    The problem was that it was hard to take advantage of its weaknesses and ws.


    It was impossible to exploit the serpent¡¯s weakness if you didn¡¯t at least have a robust Physique that could endure its charge, constriction, and petrification. There was no need to even think of defeating it!


    Thus, for awhile, the serpentine adept had been a difficult opponent for all the elite adepts.


    Who knew? It was only a simple assassination mission, and he was pit against a person terrifying enough to deal with his Giant Snake Transformation.


    What was even more unbelievable was the fact that his opponent was a newly advanced adept!


    The serpentine adept wanted to shred the person who introduced this mission to him to pieces.


    What in the bloody hell? Was there supposed to be such a newly advanced adept with such might in this world?


    The serpentine adept even wondered if this was intentional sabotage. Had someone nned this conspiracy against the serpentine adept and put him in this awkward position?


    He would probably have escaped a long time ago if it was possible!


    The misinformation before the battle had led him to believe that this was going to be a simple one-sided battle. That was why he had recklessly hurried over and instantly tried to settle the fight with his domineering body.


    Unfortunately, the serpentine adept met a painful revtion when he shed with the enemy. It had now be nearly impossible even to disengage.


    Their bodies were too tightly entangled. The two pitted everything they had in this fight. A slight distraction would cause the opponent to put in everything they had to end the battle right there. If he let go even a little, the zing w that gripped his neck would instantly tear his body apart.


    If the opponent¡¯s fearsome mes entered his body, they would be able to roast him from the inside and turn him into a dead serpent!


    The serpentine adept had repeatedly considered letting go of his pride and dignity to ask for a truce. After all, this was a meaningless bounty mission. He didn¡¯t have a vendetta against the enemy.


    The serpentine adept was still engulfed in his thoughts when two silhouettes, one tall and the other short, appeared on the battlefield. Lights shed in the air.


    The towering figure was the Infernal Tyrant that had been sealed into the illusion barrier. The shorter person was the beautiful illusionist.


    The fight against the Tyrant in the pocket dimension hadn¡¯t gone well either. Elementium golems were rtively immune to charms and illusions.


    As such, the illusionist couldn¡¯t help but screech when she fell out of the pocket dimension, "Are you two not done with the target? Come and help me, quick..."


    She stopped mid-sentence.


    Her pretty eyes opened wide as she looked at the forest. She couldn¡¯t believe her eyes.


    "What are you guys doing? How did it end up like this!"


    A ten-meter long snake entangled with a five-meter tall me giant. The two rolled and fought in a field of fire dotted with pools of magma. Every blow shook into the earth, and elementium tides sted in every direction.


    If this was still a stalemate, then the other continuing fight was going terribly against their favor!


    A green slime golem worked together with a stone golem as they chased the Butcher back and forth. The Butcher had been wounded all over by the two golem¡¯s strange spells. There were green and ck bruises all over his body. He was even limping as he ran around. It was a tragic scene to behold.


    The Infernal Tyrant broke free of the illusions while the illusionist was stunned at the sight of the battleground. It raised its arms and a massive fire spell formed before it.


    Its target was the illusionist!

 Chapter 304

    Chapter 304 Conclusion of the Battle


    Aaaaaah!


    An ear-piercing scream rang out through the field, shocking everyone in the fight.


    A terrifying Scarlet Firestorm erupted in the woods!


    The Infernal Tyrant gave up on the single-target spells after having repeatedly been misled in the illusion barrier. The chip issued it amand to instantly cast a massive spell.


    The fearsome Scarlet Firestorm! It was a spell that enveloped an area two hundred and fifty meters wide!


    Surging waves of fire quickly consumed the mirror images that the illusionist had just summoned. An egg-shaped barrier appeared amidst these red waves.


    The Infernal Tyrant wasn¡¯t done yet, however. It raised its hands high up and cast a slightly smaller area-of-effect spell above the barrier. Meteor Shower.


    One by one, meteors streaked across the skies, trailing ck smoke behind them. Under the Tyrant¡¯s guidance, they turned into homing missiles and crashed against the barrier. Every single explosion caused ripples to spread across the energy barrier.


    The barrier moved about within the sea of me and the rain of meteors, trying its best to break free from the disadvantageous situation. Sadly, the Infernal Tyrant precisely directed the meteors towards the enemy, making sure the barrier was always within range of its attacks.


    One ran for their life while the other pursued mercilessly.


    The two started a game of cat and mice on the battlefield!


    mes erupt, and explosions red wherever they went. A forest fire had been started in the woods as the trees burned and zed.


    Illusionists were not proficient inbat at all. They were a fringe minority in a profession that functioned as support fighters. Illusionists were terrifying opponents for adepts whocked methods of protecting their Spirit. Their enemies would often die without even finding out the correct location of the illusionist.


    However, an illusionist¡¯s options were insufficient when faced with an elementium golem that couldn¡¯t be charmed or confused. Moreover, the enemy¡¯s fire spells were unusually potent. She couldn¡¯t even counterattack. The only thing she could do was mislead and misdirect the golem¡¯s attacks with her illusions.


    But fire spells were extremely annoying!


    They didn¡¯t need to hit the enemy to have a significant effect. The mes that spread out from the explosions would slowly restrict the space avable to the enemy. In just a short while, the entire battlefield would be engulfed by fire, leaving nowhere for her to run!


    She still maintained her brilliant egg-shaped barrier. Strange runes and strange lights sporadically shed and rippled on the barrier¡¯s surface. Misdirection, Consciousness Avoidance, Light Refraction, Stealth...several illusion spells of varying effects were continuously used to redirect the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    Even so, the violent shockwaves from the spells made it hard to keep her defenses up. She was also forced to call upon wind particles to hasten her steps and avoid the spreading mes.


    She was hanging on with all her strength!


    There was still hope.


    As long as the serpentine adept was able to kill the target, these summoned elementium golems would instantly seed in their mission, and she would obtain the item that she badly needed.


    She continued to cling on to this hope as she ran about the battlefield. Her determination held steady, even as the mes ignited the corners of her robes.


    Meanwhile, the battle that her hopes hung upon had be even more intense.


    The fight between the giant snake and the zing demon had reached a critical turning point.


    Both of their Strength and Physique had deteriorated from the long and arduous battle. They were both exceedingly wounded.


    They were still tangled up with each other.


    The serpent¡¯s long and thick form had coiled around the me Fiend¡¯s body. It started to stretch as Greem struggled and pushed out to break free from the constriction. The raging fires and hot streams of me continually seared its flesh. Over forty percent of its body had been cooked and charred. The smell of burnt meat was nauseating.


    Even so, the Giant ck Mamba still attacked Greem with every ounce of its strength.


    Poisonous breath exhaled from its mouth as the gleaming Eye of Petrification continued to release petrification beams. Even slight contact with the shaft of energy would turn the flickering fires on the me Fiend¡¯s body solid and turn it into stone. The fierce fight with the snake would then crush his body.


    Again and again, the giant snake tried to bite the me Fiend in hopes of injecting its venom into the enemy¡¯s body and cripple him. However, Greem kept a tight hold on the snake¡¯s neck, making sure it couldn¡¯t sink its fangs into him.


    The snake¡¯s tail iled like a massive whip. It flicked about and hit the me Fiend¡¯s back as it continued to restrict its movements. Every blow left fine cracks in the body of the me Fiend.


    Fire and magma would flow out of the cracks, scalding the snake and causing it to hiss in pain. Every part of its body that was sshed by fire would immediately be charred ck. The flesh inside would also lose all its lifeforce and burn in an instant.


    After all, this...this was the purest form of fire energy!


    The me Fiend¡¯s counterattack was equally fearsome.


    A massive amount of fire energy had gathered in the hands that gripped the snake¡¯s neck. The exponential increase in heat caused the snake to writhe about in agony. The zing hands had burned through the snake¡¯s scales and were digging into its flesh. The unique fragrance of roasted snake meat pervaded the battlefield alongside clouds of ck smoke and the sizzling sounds of fire.


    The Sr Rays shot from the me Fiend¡¯s eyes raked across the snake¡¯s body, sizzling as they did so. Every ray left deep and ck burn marks on the tough grey scales.


    The abyssal mes shrouding the me Fiend were the serpent¡¯s real enemy.


    It felt like he was drowning in an eternal hell of magma!


    His magic resistance had reached extraordinary levels after the Giant ck Mamba transformation. However, it was still far from allowing him to be immune to fire.


    The abyssal mes were even more wicked and evil than the elementium mes. They burned the flesh, but they also ate away at the enemy¡¯s Spirit.


    That was far more terrifying and difficult to deal with than an ordinary burn!


    An expression of genuine fear appeared on the snake¡¯s hideous face after half an hour of battle.


    The bloodline powers in its body were fading!


    The bloodline powers in the bodies of bloodline adepts weren¡¯t unlimited. They had to umte and cultivate the bloodline powers to support the manifestation of their bloodline origins. These transformations allowed them to possess the astounding physical strength and innate talents of ancient magical creatures duringbat.


    But this act exhausted the bloodline powers they had umted!


    A temporary bloodline transformation was sufficient for them to overwhelm enemies of the same Grade. It was extremely rare for their bloodline powers to be thoroughly exhausted. Sadly, today, the half an hour of continuous transformation and the intense battle had utterly exhausted the serpentine adept. His bloodline powers were quickly receding.


    The Giant ck Mamba let out a sudden screech as its body started to wither and devolve. In the blink of an eye, the snake had reverted to his human form.


    The cruel abyssal mes instantly engulfed the serpentine adept¡¯s body, now that he had lost the protection of his scales and his great Physique. He screamed in pain as he dashed away from Greem.


    Unfortunately, Greem would not let him get away!


    The me Fiend roared, and magma pirs erupted in a ring. Savage streams of fire intersected and climbed along the magma pirs to form a Fire Prison.


    The serpentine adept¡¯s escaping figure crashed into the thin yet durable of fire. The Fire Prison knocked back and sizzled at his body.


    Greem grabbed the serpentine adept with his zing magma hands. The fearsome abyssal mes instantly devoured the adept¡¯s form.


    Only his head had yet to be enveloped by the mes. He screamed in pain as he struggled in Greem¡¯s grasp. He frantically shot petrification beams in every direction, trying in vain to force the me Fiend away.


    Greem would never let an opportunity like this go. He squeezed with his hands, and the serpentine adept¡¯s bones started to groan from the pressure. Greem reached out with two ws made of magma and stabbed the serpentine adept in the eye as he was still squirming. He then pulled.


    Aaaaaah!


    The serpentine adept¡¯s agonizing screams echoed through the woods. Greem had plucked the two amber Eyes of Petrification from his eye sockets as if they were magical gemstones embedded in stone. Greem then put the eyes in his pouch.


    The serpentine adept¡¯s strength continued to fade.


    He had lost all ability to resist when his bloodline powers were exhausted. Greem instantly crushed his body and kept every item the serpentine adept had left behind.


    Greem even preserved the head of his opponent.


    He would have to rely on this head to figure out the identity and background of the serpentine adept!


    The death of the serpentine adept had shocked the other two adepts. They instantly turned tail and ran at first sight of trouble.


    As expected of an illusionist; the beautifuldy was proficient at hiding herself. She grit her teeth and endured an Explosive Fireball that the Infernal Tyrant had directed at her. She suffered the burning pain on her back as she leveraged the impact of the me shockwave to escape from the battlefield. She quickly vanished into the dark woods.


    The Bloodhand Butcher also wanted to run. Sadly, he had suffered grievous wounds to his legs. The Butcher failed to escape, even after several attempts at charging away from the fight. Atst, he died to the massive stone fists of the Roaring Monster.

 Chapter 305

    Chapter 305 Returning to the n


    Greem performed a simple sweep of the battlefield. He then called the Infernal Tyrant to his side to protect him as he retrieved the Decayer and Roaring Monster and reverted from his me Fiend Transformation.


    Greem fell to his knees and winced in agony the moment he returned to his human form. A devilish shroud of abyssal mes enveloped his body.


    The problematic fight had cost him a lot as well. By prematurely unsealing the me Fiend¡¯s Heart, the abyssal mes severely corroded and invaded his body. If he didn¡¯t get rid of this aura as soon as possible, it was very likely that he would mutate into a demonic being of the lower realms.


    However, Greem couldn¡¯t leave the woods yet.


    He endured the pain and used his powerful will to force the fire energy into the me Fiend¡¯s Heart. He quickly sealed it without hesitation.


    The me energies surging from the me Fiend¡¯s Heart were extremely beneficial to his me Fiend form. On the other hand, they were far too wild and ferocious to be controlled by his human body. Greem would have likely been burned to death by the fire energies if it wasn¡¯t for the elementiumization of his body!


    He kneeled on the scorched earth as he breathed painfully. He extended a trembling finger, and a bright yet small cluster of me ignited at the fingertip. Greem started to draw in the air. Several strange and twisted burn marks branded the air. When hepleted a fire rune, it would naturally absorb the wandering fire elementium particles and ignite.


    The me Fiend¡¯s Heart would then absorb the rune. The abyssal aura on Greem¡¯s body would weaken and dissipate with each fire rune that went into his body.


    However, his efforts couldn¡¯t do anything about the evil aura that had corrupted his bloodline.


    His unrefined methods were not going to be able to get rid of the abyssal aura¡¯s source. He would have to return to the adept¡¯s tower and search for suitable resources before he could do anything about it.


    Greem forced himself to stand up and pointed in a direction.


    "Bring me there!"


    The Infernal Tyrant immediately bent its body and grabbed Greem after receiving its orders. It then marched in the direction that Greem had pointed.


    A towering, fiery silhouette stomped through the dark and dim forest.


    Its body was even more immense than the ancient trees growing in the spot. The branches and the ground caught on fire wherever it walked. The zing fire turned everything into ash, leaving a ck, ashen trail behind it.


    The Tyrant¡¯s overwhelming strength and fearsome aura were as apparent as the corridor of mes it had left behind. Any creature that sensed its existence immediately ran away as far as it could, regardless of whether they were predator or prey.


    It threw the entire forest into chaos. Countless birds dove out of their nests and escaped towards the horizon. For one moment, the creatures of the forest were in a frenzy, panicking as if the end of the world had arrived.


    The Tyrant ignored these weaker lifeforms and continued on its path undeterred.


    Finally, it stopped in a dense stretch of forest nearly five kilometers northwest of the battlefield.


    A me halo sted outward, and the tightly-packed trees instantly burst into mes. A human-shaped stone in the middle of the fire attracted Greem¡¯s attention.


    Greemmanded the Infernal Tyrant to pick up the stone. He scanned the rock with his elementium sight and saw Alice¡¯s familiar face on it. Fortunately, her pulse was weak, but she wasn¡¯t truly dead.


    Unusual energy surged from within her, protecting her innards and organs fromplete petrification. Otherwise, with her apprentice-level lifeforce, she would not have been able to endure until Greem¡¯s arrival.


    It was the spacestone!


    Who knew? Alice had sealed that spacestone into her body to hasten the increase of her powers. This action might have caused damage to her body over time, but it had also saved her life in this scenario.


    Greem was still thinking about a method to save Alice. Meanwhile, a piece of the gray stone wall at the bottom of the cliff fell off. The goblin Snox removed the gray cloak he had used to hide his body and stumbled towards the Infernal Tyrant.


    "Master, master...it¡¯s so good to see you again!" Snox then turned his eyes to the Alice statue in the Tyrant¡¯s hand. His beany little green eyes blinked, and two tears streaked down his face, "What a shame. Lady Alice...has she..."


    Snox started sobbing and wailing at his heartbreaking discovery.


    "That¡¯s enough! Save it for when she¡¯s actually dead." Greem could feel his blood boiling. Alice was also in need of emergency medical attention. He had no time to spare, "Alice is still alive. We need to hurry."


    With that, Greem quickly gave an order. The Infernal Tyrant grabbed Snox before he could even react, turning and running towards Feidnan City.


    ............


    Lord me Demon had returned.


    People whispered that he came back with the heads of two adepts.


    Gossips and rumors quickly spread throughout Feidnan City. Every Sarubo apprentice adept walked about with gleaming eyes and excited looks as they spread various versions of Greem¡¯s adventure.


    ording to their descriptions, the newly advanced Adept Greem had be the strongest of all the First Grade adepts in the n. His poprity and influence had even overshadowed Adept Keoghan, who had always been the leader of the First Grade adepts.


    The Sarubo n adepts started to be active with the return of the me Demon. Some people were even spreading rumors that the Sarubo n was secretly preparing for battle with an opposing force.


    This rumor was undoubtedly the one topic that the neighboring ns and organizations were most interested in.


    Thus, for some time, plenty of outsiders with ulterior motives flowed in and out of Feidnan, trying their best to figure out the Sarubo n¡¯s motives.


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    A secret room on the twelfth floor.


    The bored andzy Lady Sanazar was lying on herrge stone bed. Dense green mist enveloped her body, making it hard for others to see her appearance.


    Keoghan, who was usually in charge of the daily affairs of the n, reported on the n¡¯s activities.


    "Greem has yet to exit his dwelling after borrowing a batch of resources from the n, including things like Sea Agate, Greenhead Ginseng, and Iacu¡¯s Water.


    "The girl he brought back with him is still receiving treatment from Adept Ferrier. The petrification energy had seeped into her lungs. It is quite troublesome to get rid of it."


    "And the two heads he brought back with him? Have you managed to find out their backgrounds?" Sanazar changed her posture and tore a five-kilogram piece of Underground Fire Dragon meat off therge tray before her. She started munching on the morsel in the green mist.


    These Underground Fire Dragon¡¯s that possessed the ability to let out sulfuric me breaths could only be found in volcanic areas. Their meat was tough and sour. The texture was simr to that of an Iron Rhinoceros¡¯ hide. There were even toxins in the flesh. It was utterly unsuited for human consumption.


    That said, the Underground Fire Dragon was still considered a hybrid draconic creature. Long-term consumption was beneficial to the bloodline powers of hybrid dragons. Consequently, they became a snack for the Third Grade bloodline adept Sanazar. She would asionally devour one or two of these creatures in her free time.


    Purchasing Underground Fire Dragon meat was a long-term mission on the list of tasks in the Feidnan City adept¡¯s tower.


    Adept Keoghan bowed even lower when Lady Sanazar spoke.


    "The backgrounds of both have been investigated.


    "The serpentine adept is Sak, a member of the Ximan n in the Shia area. They are an adept n known for possessing the bloodline of serpentine magical creatures. They are a mid-tier adept n ranking at 130. The n leader Dibas is a mid-tier Third Grade adept. He even possesses power rivaling that of a Fourth Grade once he transforms.


    "Our investigation suggests that the attack on Greem wasn¡¯t the intent of the n. Instead, it was a mission that Sak had undertaken on his own.


    I have already notified andmunicated with the old fogeys of the Zhentarim Association. They have acknowledged the evidence we submitted and permitted us to take limited actions against the Ximan n. We can either exact vengeance upon them, or have thempensate us to resolve this issue!


    "The Bloodhand Butcher didn¡¯t seem to be backed by any adept organization. He is a solo wandering adept. We have heard of him being active in Motta City before this, but we have yet to find conclusive proof of his connection to the ck Glove Association.


    "We have also started to gain leads on the escaped illusionist. However, there must be some massive force backing the enemy. All of the divination we have conducted has not yielded any results. It¡¯s almost as if they have blocked all divination spells."


    The ear-grinding sound of tearing flesh became even more pronounced.


    "It seems that these people were very well prepared. If they had sessfully assassinated the brat, our diviners would never be able to get a single clue on the enemy!" Sanazar gave an order in her dissatisfaction, "Send a message to the Ximan n. If they don¡¯t offer a sufficientpensation, I have no qualms eating a couple of their core members. Also, have you managed to figure out how Greem managed to beat the three of them?"


    "No!" Keoghan shook his head helplessly, "The battlefield has been obscured by the enemy somehow. We couldn¡¯t find anything with divination. I have sent personnel to inspect the battlefield, and it seems...it seems..."


    "Seems like what?"


    "It seems like Greem had beaten Sak with his power alone!"


    "You mean that brat beat an elite adept and two veteran adepts by himself, with only his strength? Does he have the ability to pull off such a thing?"


    "It is possible!" Keoghan frowned as he exined to this usually apathetic n elder, "He seems to have an odd ability to control elementium golems. The number and quality that he can control are far superior to other golem masters."


    "Elementium golems?" Sanazar couldn¡¯t help but let out a coldugh, "The next time someone tries and kill that brat, they will probably bring a whole group of sealing masters with them! Hmph! A bunch of useless trash! Three adepts that have lived for almost four hundred years couldn¡¯t even beat a newly advanced adept. A thorough death indeed!"


    Keoghan shook his head but didn¡¯t dare to give a reply to the Lady¡¯sment.


    "Tell that brat Greem that the n will take his side on this issue. Do whatever he needs to. Attack those that offended him and kill those that need killing. Get rid of all the fellows that dare to test the Sarubo n! Split all the benefits he gets from this with the n, four to six. He gets four, and the n gets six. I¡¯ll help him deal with anyone above Second Grade. Just get out there and do as he likes."


    A murderous aura filled the room as she spoke!

 Chapter 306

    Chapter 306 Elementium Fire Pool


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    A small elementium fire pool bubbled in a secret arcane room filled with mist.


    Greem silently meditated in the pool.


    There was no natural volcanic magma pool in the tower that he could use for recovery purposes. The fire elementium in this seven-meter-long, five-meter-wide, and one-meter-deep pool had been extracted from the energy pool at the bottom of the tower.


    Seventeen percent of the energy that the adept¡¯s tower gathered daily was needed to maintain this pool. If one were to consider the additional cost of purifying the elementium energies into pure fire elementium, this small pool took up a total of 31% of the tower¡¯s daily energy reserves.


    Converted to magic crystals, it would cost 120 magic crystals a day.


    This cost was more than enough to hire a pseudo-adept to apany you on an adventure into the woods!


    But right now, all of these resources were only used to create afortable environment for Greem to recover.


    Greem sshed the redva against his chest and savored the warmth as it trickled down his skin. The boiling heat from being soaked inva seeped through his skin and found its way into his body. Greem felt incredibly at ease here.


    The boilingva wasn¡¯t realva, but instead a liquid fire that formed after the fire elementium reached a certain level of concentration. It wasn¡¯t as viscous or thick as natural magma, but it was a great deal purer.


    His dark red hair spread across his shoulders. The red crystallineva soaked the tips, but they didn¡¯t burn. Crimson sparks asionally rose from theva and Greem¡¯s long hair slowly absorbed them.


    His dark red hair became fuller and more lustrous as it took on more and more fire elementium. A strange and wicked scene indeed!


    A massive amount of fire elementium surged through his body as he entered a deep meditative state. It coursed through his body, purifying every nerve, bone, tendon, and bit of flesh. The dense fire elementium had taken up every inch of his body, leaving nowhere for the evil abyssal aura to hide. Finally, the aura turned into strands of ck smoke and was expelled from Greem¡¯s body, quickly dispersing into the air.


    The World of Abyss was also known as the ¡¯Bowels of the World¡¯. It was a terrifying ce.


    There was an uncountable number of demons there. Cruel, bloody, twisted, evil, chaotic; you could list every single negative adjective as their traits, and you wouldn¡¯t be wrong. These gigantic monsters had a fearsome strength and a deep passion for murder. They reveled in the pleasure of destruction.


    What was more horrifying was the nature of these creatures. The devilish personalities the World of Abyss had bestowed upon them made them incapable of feeling any guilt for their senseless killing and reckless destruction.


    There might be evil races in the multiverse thatmitted genocide and murder for survival, territory, resources and even dignity. However, the abyssal creatures only did it to hasten their evolution. In fact, most of the time they killed for entertainment!


    The me Fiend¡¯s Heart that Greem had transnted into his body couldn¡¯t avoid the same effects. There was far too much ugliness, evil, and chaos mixed into it. Just as Greem had been eyeing the strength and endless energy the me Fiend¡¯s Heart provided him with, the distant Abyssal Will had also projected part of its aura into Greem¡¯s soul through the Heart.


    In all seriousness, this resembled a fair trade!


    Greem obtained a mighty Heart that could sustain his me Fiend transformation. In exchange, he lost the humanity in his soul.


    The process was slow and gradual, and the effects weren¡¯t immediate.


    Greem might not be able to avoid the corruption caused by the aura, but resisting its effects allowed him to train his will.


    As an adept with vast knowledge and a wise mind, he wanted to ensure that everything was within his control. Thus, he had never taken a single step out of the elementium fire pool ever since he returned to Feidnan City. He tried his best to purify and lessen the effects of the abyssal aura.


    The adepts were powerful because of their knowledge and wisdom. Greem would be crippled if he became corrupted and turned into a murderous madman!


    As long as he was not a fool, he would never allow himself to fall to the level of a demonic creature.


    Greempleted his meditation. His Spirit had just exited the state of meditation when he received a message. He reached out and conjured a red rune before sending it into the controls at the center of the room. The doors opened immediately.


    A red barrier of light prevented the hot air from spilling out of the room.


    The advanced apprentice who walked in was Am.


    He held a metallic tray forged from a magical alloy in his hands. Jars and bottles of various colors, shapes, and sizes were arranged on the tter.


    Am also had a Physique with a fire affinity. Am was like a fish in water here. Every single pore in his skin wanted to open wide and take in the thick fire elementium in the room. However, he had no choice but to maintain a barrier around his body to avoid his clothes from being ignited by the heat. In doing so, he cut himself off from the fire elementium.


    Even with the powers of an advanced apprentice, Am didn¡¯t dare walk within ten steps of the elementium fire pool.


    He could see, very clearly, the distortion in the air that the heat caused. Several odd strands of crimson light floated in the air. They seemed harmless, but the temperature at their cores reached a shocking three thousand degrees.


    Am would probably be turned into ash at this temperature, even if he wore enchanted armor!


    The sound of sshing water rang out in the room. Greem continuously sshedva onto his body. The temperature in the room continued to rise to unbelievable heights with every movement he made. A zing barrier of fire had naturally formed around the elementium fire pool, even without Greem activating his Ring of Fire.


    Am snuck an envious peek at Greem, who was ying with the pool¡¯s fire. He gulped.


    He might have a fire affinity, but the pool would instantly vaporize him if he were tossed into the pool. Only adepts who had elementiumized their bodies could enjoy the pleasure of bathing in me.


    It was no different than a torturous death for everyone else!


    "Sir, these are the potions that Adept Ferrier sent for you."


    Greem had asked for help from the potions master to get rid of the abyssal aura remnants on a more fundamental level. He had to endure another fifteen days of this painful struggle against the abyssal aura.


    "How is Alice? Who is taking care of her?" Greem asked.


    "Lena is. ording to her, they¡¯ve expelled almost all of the petrification energies from Alice¡¯s body. She is now recovering at Adept Ferrier¡¯s ce. She should be able to start walking again in five day¡¯s time." Am replied respectfully.


    Greem acknowledged him with a silent ¡¯mmm¡¯, but didn¡¯t say anything more than that. He had also received a telepathic message from Keoghan.


    The two talked over the mental connection for several minutes.


    Once they finished, Greem rested his arms on the edge of the pool andid down on his back. He couldn¡¯t help but muse to himself, "Counterattack? Splitting the benefits? It seems Lady Sanazar has permitted me to gain something out of this! Well, I was going to build a tower and form a personal n eventually. I suppose I¡¯ll take this chance."


    ............


    Fandear City.


    Fandear was a small and prosperous city in the Laxia area that belonged to the Ximan n.


    Wylick Castle, constructed one and a half kilometers into the western outskirts of the city, was the private property of Adept Sak.


    In the past, this was the favorite ce for the nobles anddies of Fandear City. The entire castle would be brightly lit when night fell. Numerous extravagant carriages would be seen in the square before the building. Nobles with any influence would take pride in receiving an invitation from the respected adept and gather here for a night of drinking and feasting.


    However, the entire ce had be silent and vacant after the news of Sak¡¯s death.


    The gates of the castle were shut tight. A hundred servants, waiters, butlers, and guards hid in their rooms, nervously awaiting their unknown fate.


    Two youths, one male and one female, nervously talked in a bedroom on the third floor of the castle.


    "Celia, you must leave now..." The young man wore noble attire. His face betrayed an expression of worry and concern as he paced around the room, "We cannot wait until the people of the n arrive. Grandpa is dead now. We will be affected by this event as direct descendants of his bloodline."


    The young man stopped before the girl and grabbed her shoulders. He shook them as he spoke, "Wake up! I¡¯ve heard that the n doesn¡¯t intend to take revenge for Grandpa Sak. In fact, they want to hand us over to resolve this conflict. If you don¡¯t want to be a ve, you have to leave her as soon as possible."


    "I won¡¯t...I won¡¯t..." The delicate and pretty girl spoke. Her eyebrows were furrowed, and she was evidently lost.


    If someone looked, they would see light grey patches near the parotid nds on her face.


    If a Ximan adept had been here to see this, they would have been able to recognize this as an indication that the girl was awakening to her serpentine bloodline. When she started to mature, and her bloodline thickened to the extent that her innate talents could manifest, her head would gradually take on the traits of a snake, much like Sak.


    However, the fact that only a trace of bloodline awakening was manifesting when she was already almost sixteen meant that she had limited potential. Even so, the initial rousing of her bloodline powers had given her strength rivaling advanced apprentices.


    Of course, she was still unable to properly use the power within her whenpared to the more weathered and experienced apprentice adepts!


    Her bloodline talent was extremely limited for a descendant of Adept Sak. Her elder brother didn¡¯t even have any signs of bloodline awakening. He was a thoroughly ordinary man.

 Chapter 307

    Chapter 307 Doubts


    Having a weakened bloodline was a difficulty shared by most ns!


    The massive change in gic makeup due to adept advancement made it impossibly hard for them to continue breeding like ordinary mortals. Even the asional fortunate adept often gave birth to mundane humans or deformed infants.


    However, if the parents were sufficiently powerful or had adequately concentrated bloodline powers, their offspring would most likely inherit their powerful bloodline talents. Still, powerful adepts often found it harder to conceive.


    Most adept ns, mainly bloodline ns, would try and keep their bloodline free of impurities. They forbade marriage with individuals who did not belong to the n.


    The disparity of treatment between n members who had awakened their bloodline powers and those who hadn¡¯t was shockinglyrge in the Ximan n.


    The n would cultivate bloodline descendants like Celia. If she was fortunate, there was still a chance for her to advance to First Grade. However, if they judged her bloodline powers insufficient for advancement, her fate would be sealed. She would be a breeding tool for the other high-grade bloodline adepts of the n.


    Celia had the luck of being born from a strong grandfather. She was able to live out her childhood in Wylick Castle peacefully.


    Now that the tree sheltering her had fallen, their fates were unknown!


    Her rational mind told her to leave this castle immediately, but the sheltered Celia couldn¡¯t find the courage to abandon this safe haven.


    She had gone to the forest to train after awakening her bloodline powers. However, she hadpleted her training under the escort ofrge groups of mercenaries and apprentices. She hadn¡¯t obtained anybat experience or survival skills in the process!


    Her inexperience was why Celia hesitated even when her brother was telling her to run.


    Perhaps the n would not be as indifferent as they thought. Maybe there was still a chance for things to turn around. Possibly, Grandpa Sak was only grievously wounded and was in hiding to recover from the fight.


    A feminine voice hissed from outside the door as the two continued their discussion.


    "Hide? Run? Kehkehkeh. Don¡¯t even think about it! You might have forgotten the blood coursing through your veins. That is the blood of the Ximan n. It is way too easy to track you down..."


    The door opened, and a male adept with a grey snake¡¯s head walked in.


    It was Exar!


    He was the adept that the n had appointed to deal with the aftermath of Grandpa Sak¡¯s death.


    The two people in the room looked at each other. Their eyes betrayed the fear they felt.


    They knew very well who Adept Exar was. He had always maintained a rocky and hostile rtionship with their grandfather. The n¡¯s choice to send him over told of the elders¡¯ decision!


    Celia stuttered as she spoke when she looked into Exar¡¯s wicked eyes, "What is the n¡¯s position on Grandpa Sak¡¯s death?"


    "Of course." Exarughed coldly, "They won¡¯t pursue the issue! After all, Sak was the one who initiated the hostilities. His killer has already submitted all the evidence to the Zhentarim Association. The old goats of the Association have been pressuring the n to hand over the individuals responsible for breaking the peace of the Zhentarim area. Kehkehkeh. But Sak is already dead. What can the n give to the Association now? You unfortunate scapegoats, of course!"


    "But Grandpa Sak is the most influential elite adept in the n. There¡¯s even a use in his contract with the n that guarantees protection for his descendants. Is the n going against the contract?" Celia was losing her voice.


    "Hmph! There was indeed such a use in Sak¡¯s contract. But don¡¯t you forget, Sak didn¡¯t die in service of the n. He secretly took on an assassination mission and got himself killed in the process. Because of his actions, the n is in an extremely disadvantageous situation!"


    "What did the n elders say?"


    "This problem resulted from Sak¡¯s actions. The n has no obligation to help him deal with the consequences. The n and the Association have agreed to hand over all of Sak¡¯s properties and assets to that Sarubo brat. And you guys. The descendant¡¯s of Sak¡¯s bloodline have to be handed over as well."


    Exar paused and red at the two at this point, "The n sent me over to retrieve the serpentine bloodline of the Sak branch and avoid leaking it to the outside!"


    The youths¡¯ faces instantly went pale.


    All bloodline adepts would split off from their main branch and bestow their bloodline to outsiders to form sub-branches of the n. Branching like this enriched the diversity of their bloodline powers and took in fresh blood to serve the n. These offshoot branches might have obtained the n¡¯s bloodline, but they were robbed of it the instant they did something that vited the n¡¯s rules.


    The process of retrieving the bloodline was a ruthless and terrifying one!


    The Ximan n had been forced to hand over the members of the Sak branch to cate their opponent¡¯s rage. Both the Sarubo n and the Zhentarim Association has been applying pressure on them over this issue. However, the n was unwilling to see their bloodline in the hands of outsiders. Thus, they sent Exar out to Wylick Castle to conduct the retrieval ceremony.


    Nightfall.


    He dragged Celia into a hidden room in the castle. Her terrified screamssted the entire night.


    Twelve dayster.


    They sent all thirty-seven members of Sak¡¯s household to Feidnan City. The leases for Wylick Castle, Fandear City, and five kilometers ofnd around the city had been signed over to the Sarubo n as well.


    They split the assets ording to the agreement. Fandear City went to the Sarubo n, while Greem got Wylick Castle and 1.5 kilometers ofnd around it. Five members of Sak¡¯s household had been given to Greem as well. There was one direct descendant that had awakened the n¡¯s bloodline and four n apprentices.


    The other people had already been dealt with by the Sarubo n, including Sak¡¯s grandson himself. He had no extraordinary abilities and looked just like an ordinary person to everyone. They executed him before he was even presented to Greem.


    Greem personally inspected these five ves in his dwelling on the seventh floor.


    He had been excited when he heard that one of the five ves once possessed bloodline powers. However, his mood instantly soured when he saw the five people brought before him.


    The list said that the girl in front of him was fifteen years old. That said, her grey and listless eyes, along with her aged and wrinkled face, could only appear on an old hag. Greem couldn¡¯t feel a trace of bloodline power in her body. Neither could he feel any trace of elementium abilities.


    She seemed to be an ordinary person. No, she was more tragic whenpared to one!


    Dammit! The Ximan n was heartless indeed. They hadpletely drained her of all her bloodline powers. Not a single strand remained for him.


    He had no choice but to kill off a Sak descendant like this one. No one was willing to leave a potential enemy alive and allow them to seek their vengeance in a couple of decades. Not to mention the fact that she hadpletely lost her value as a research subject to Greem.


    Greem shook his head and moved on.


    The Sarubo n had investigated the other four apprentice adepts. They had no bloodline rtions with Sak. They had only gone to Sak for knowledge and resources. There was no need to kill them off.


    Greem forced them to sign a new contract of servitude and left them with the recovered Alice. He had her bring them back to Wylick Castle to settle the assets and servants there.


    Greem could grit his teeth and live with the fact that the Ximan n had taken back Sak¡¯s bloodline. If even Sak¡¯s resources and personal collections in the castle had been ¡¯retrieved¡¯, Greem would have no choice but to go and ¡¯speak¡¯ with the Ximan n.


    The next concern Greem had, now that Sak was dead, was the escaped female illusionist.


    He had a feeling that she was the key to unraveling this mystery!


    After thinking it through, Greem felt like this issue wasn¡¯t as simple as he had first thought. Bloodhand Butcher might be associated with the ck Glove Association, but there was no way they could have hired someone like Sak.


    Greem had a vague feeling that there was another mastermind behind this attack. Their n didn¡¯t seem to include him alone but included Alice as well.


    That was obvious from how they sent the Bloodhand Butcher after him while dispatching two of the more powerful adepts after Alice and Snox.


    Snox survived because of his unparalleled mastery of Invisibility and Partial Transformation. Alice had survived only because of her luck.


    Honestly, Greem would never believe that a pseudo-adept would be able to survive the naturally talented attack of an elite adept. If Greem hadn¡¯t given her the spacestone, the only thing he would have seen was an entirely petrified statue of Alice.


    All these signs point towards a truth. It seemed that the enemy¡¯s priority was Alice, but not himself.


    These were incredibly suspicious on their own!


    The investigation into the female illusionist hadn¡¯t yielded any results, despite scouring the entire Zhentarim area. It was as if no one had heard of someone of her appearance. Greem couldn¡¯t help but start thinking. Her looks that night might not have been her actual appearance.


    Why was it that they went to such lengths to hide their own identity?

 Chapter 308

    Chapter 308 A Haunted Castle Adventure


    Thirteen dayster.


    Alice arrived at Wylick Castle under a torrential downpour.


    A ck carriage passed through the broad, arched gates and drove onto the stone-paved road. Numerous servants, including the gardeners, kitchen staff, maids, guards, and the butlers were already waiting for their new master when the carriage finally circled past a mermaid fountain and stopped before the three-story castle.


    Their expressions were awkward and fawning. The unconcealed panic in their eyes was easy to see.


    The ones that stayed were those that had signed contracts with the previous owner of the castle. That was why the castle¡¯s assets included them.


    Everyone couldn¡¯t help but be relieved when they saw the few people that walked down the carriage.


    It was Kerr, Warren, and the other two apprentice adepts. They were familiar faces that had served in the castle for the past five to six years as well. All the servants finally rxed when they saw them.


    However, they were all confused and stunned for a second when Alice walked down in her pale yellow dress. It wasn¡¯t until the four apprentices introduced her that the staff immediately bowed and greeted her.


    "Alright, you can all get back to your work now!¡± Alice waved her hand impatiently, "Make sure to do my room first. Whoever is in charge of this ce needs toe and report to me. Everyone else can get back to work!"


    Everyone obeyed frantically.


    One hourter, after enjoying a simple bath, Alice met the head butler of the castle in a bedroom on the second floor.


    He was an old man with white hair, neat clothes, with a pair of gold-framed sses resting on the bridge of his nose. He was an elderly butler that had been in the service of Wylick Castle for over fifty years. Of course, the fact that he had the honor of serving a respected adept meant that he carried a noble title.


    Most of the workers employed in an adept¡¯s private businesses tended to be low-ranked nobles. In fact, this was amon sight!


    After all, there were far too few among the peasants that could read and count.


    "Speak. What kind of assets are there in Wylick Castle? I want a detailed report!" Alice wore a soft silk robe. She leaned against her seat and behaved in a manner unbefitting of her age.


    She had juste out of the bath. Her long blonde hair was still dripping wet. Drops of water would asionally fall onto the carpet below. Alice had brought the silk robe over from her wardrobe. It was barely long enough to cover her knees. When she tucked her body against the couch, the cloth would be pulled backward, revealing her little white legs and her slim feet. Her ten delicate little toes were like freshly blooming petals as well.


    Apart from the old butler, the four new apprentice adepts were also present. Two of them were advanced apprentices, and the others were intermediate apprentices, but all of them were keeping their heads low. They didn¡¯t dare to stare at this maverick of a young girl.


    Alice tugged on the fabric that had slipped down her shoulder and hid the bright and colorful magical tattoos on her body. Every time she saw these mysterious, intricate, delicate, and three-dimensional tattoos on her upper body, it reminded her of the surgery. The fearsome pain of Scalding Rays carving their way through her skin as sheid upon the operation tform.


    Greem had tattoos as well. Alice had known this for awhile.


    She even knew how unbelievably potent Greem¡¯s tattoos were.


    The previous version of the me Fiend Transformation could double his body¡¯s attributes. It might not havested for long, but it was already an enviable ability. With the addition of the otherworldly runic knowledge, the new Transformation could provide Greem with three times his usual stats. This upgrade was indeed unbelievably powerful!


    The new me Fiend¡¯s Transformation provided Greem with a fierce and powerful form, while the transnted Heart supplied him with an endless source of fire energy. These two factors forged a new existence when they werebined¨C a terrifying, mad demon of mes.


    As her master¡¯s personal maid, Alice had the most urate understanding of Greem¡¯s real power.


    She could feel her blood boil when Greem called her over to his hidden room and mysteriously asked her whether she wanted a set of tattoos like his.


    Her answer was obvious.


    As a person with supernatural powers, Alice would never refuse an opportunity to increase her abilities. Naturally, she agreed without hesitation.


    However, she immediately regretted her decision when she was lying naked on the alchemical table for surgery.


    It was way too bloody painful!


    Was this a magical tattoo? No. It was most definitely not.


    What difference did this surgery have whenpared to the magical patterns and arrays that alchemists carved into their magical tools? The only actual difference was the subject! Those were cold, unfeeling objects, while she was a living, breathing person!


    The Scalding Rays had burned through her flesh, leaving fine grooves of all sizes and depths in the skin. Unique alchemical materials were then poured into the grooves. There was also a rare substance within the concoction that stopped the flesh from regenerating. This treatment was to prevent the subject¡¯s exceptional Physique from healing the wounds too rapidly and causing the magical circuits to lose their powers.


    This massive tattoo covered the entirety of her upper body. Naturally, this meant that it couldn¡¯t avoid winding through some of the more sensitive areas.


    Alice had needed to use all of her will to control her body and resist trembling in pain, itching, and other physical sensations when the Scalding Ray had made their way across her sensitive areas. After all, the process of carving the tattoos into the body was a fine and delicate one. Any deviation in the position of the patterns could cause the symbols to lose their effects.


    Thus, Alice had forced herself to turn into an unfeeling, human-shaped object while remaining perfectly conscious. It was the only way to avoid interrupting the surgery.


    The four hours of inscribing the lines into her body was an endless and torturous nightmare!


    Alice couldn¡¯t get up from the surgery table when Greem finally told her that the operation was finished. In the end, it was her master Greem that had the good sense to carry her back to her room. She had to rest for half a day before she regained all of her physical senses.


    Greem specialized in fire, which is why he carved the me Fiend¡¯s Transformation into his body. Alice, on the other hand, had awakened the bloodline of the Witch of Fate. Her affinity was for the space attribute as well. That was why the tattoo that Greem carved on her was different.


    Naturally, he had tailored it to Alice!


    "Apart from the castle itself, Wylick Castle also has a small manor that is responsible for providing the castle with the daily meals. There are a total of XXXX ves, XXX buildings and XXX square feet ofnd under the Castle¡¯s management...


    "There is also an arcane shop in Fandear City, along with two cksmith¡¯s shops and two bakeries.


    "There are XXX buildings within the Castle, XXXX rooms, XXXX servants and XXX barrels of wine in the cer. The current amount of gold coins stocked in the castle totals to..."


    Alice finally got impatient listening to the butler listing every single asset in the castle. She waved her hand and interrupted him.


    "You can write all of these worldly treasures down on paper and had it over to me. What I want to know is the private treasury and collections of the dead Adept Sak." A smile surfaced on Alice¡¯s delicate porcin face, "You guys couldn¡¯t have done away with these things already, could you?"


    The four apprentice adepts betrayed panic in their eyes. The noble butler lowered his head even further.


    "We wouldn¡¯t dare, Lady Alice. Adept Sak kept his collection on the third floor of the castle. Hisboratory and study room are on the third floor as well. He forbade everyone from entering. Even Lady Celia couldn¡¯t enter without permission," An awkward smile appeared on the butler¡¯s face, "That is why we have no idea what¡¯s inside!"


    "Oh? There was such a thing?" Alice¡¯s eyes sparkled.


    Honestly, which apprentice adept wasn¡¯t interested in the magicalb of a veteran adept? It was sure to be an exciting experience to go treasure-hunting there!


    Alice immediately rushed behind a changing screen. When she finally appeared before the others again, she was wearing a short grey gown fitted to her size. Alice held a small and delicate wand in one hand, with a golden bird¡¯s cage in the other. She had a Tiara of Wisdom on her head and a row of ss vials ced around her waist. She had set all sorts of mysterious magical rings on her ten pale and delicate fingers as well.


    Even the buckskin boots she wore on her feet seemed to faintly glow with the light of magic.


    "Very well, very well, I am prepared now!" Alice shouted excitedly, "Let us now go explore Sak¡¯sb."


    "Us?" The four apprentices raised their heads. A sick feeling washed over them.


    "Of course it¡¯s us!" Alice balled her hand into a fist and waved it in the air. She couldn¡¯t wait to start, "You are alling to protect me. Of course, you will have toe with me!"


    The four apprentices instantly went pale.


    ............


    Sak¡¯sb was located on the third floor of the castle¡¯s main building.


    Alice and the four apprentices sessfully stepped foot on this unfamiliar ground after they went up the wooden spiral stairs.


    A silent, dim corridor loomed before them.


    Small candlesticks had been ced on both sides of the walls of the corridor with a little distance between each of them. Perhaps because it sensed the presence of life energies, one of the candlesticks closest to them silently sprang to life. Then, one by one, the candlesticks started to light up, leading into the depths of the corridor.


    That said, the light was extremely dim, and was barely enough to illuminate a fifty-centimeter radius around the candlestick.


    The tiny yellow lights flickered in the darkness, adding a tinge of supernatural mystery to the dark hall.


    Everyone couldn¡¯t help but gulp in nervousness.


    Arcane rooms, magical traps, voodoo beast guards, mysterious monsters, fearsome magical radiation...


    Everyone felt their legs cramping up at the thought of these precarious existences. If Alice hadn¡¯t been staring at them from the back, all four of them would have run away a long time ago.


    Exploring theboratory of a veteran adept wasn¡¯t much safer than exploring an ancient ruin!


    Sak had been an elite adept. No one would believe your lies used to trick children if you told them that he hadn¡¯t set up any security systems around hisb.


    That ursed Alice. She was still arrogantly shouting before they moved out. Now that they had stepped foot on the third floor, she immediately retreated behind the four apprentices, as if that was the way it was supposed to be. She wasn¡¯t even ashamed of her actions.


    "Will, you go first!" Alice waved her tiny fist about as she ordered them.


    The guy named Will was only an intermediate apprentice. He was, without any doubt, the weakest of the four apprentices. He looked back at hispanions to see them avoiding his gaze. He knew there was no avoiding this. No one would help rid him of this job either.


    Will had no choice but to grit his teeth and take out a white finger bone. He used it to apply a white bone shield around him before cautiously making his way into the corridor.

 Chapter 309

    Chapter 309 Haunted Corridor


    Everything started to dim when they stepped into the corridor!


    The dull walls started to decay, and their paint began to peel at a rate visible to the naked eye. More and more pieces fell off before withering and turning to dust in the air. Once the surface of the wall had peeled off, it revealed a rusty, metallic surface. An intimidating nging rang out in everyone¡¯s ears.


    "This appears to be some form of illusion!" Kerrmented softly.


    "Does anyone have anything to counter illusions?" Will¡¯s voice was trembling.


    Advanced apprentice Warren searched through his belt for a while before taking out a ck jar. He asked in a soft voice, "I have some Psychedelic Grass. Does anyone need it?"


    "Me," the other three apprentices replied simultaneously.


    They were overjoyed.


    Psychedelic Grass was a type of herb with sawde-tipped leaves. They were one of the fundamental ingredients for concocting hallucinatory potions. If the Psychedelic Grass was ground to paste and smeared on the tip of the nose, it could refresh the spirit and increase the body¡¯s resistance to illusions.


    The four apprentices did precisely this. They turned around and were about to ask Alice if she needed the Grass as well, only to find her holding a brilliantly glowing gemstone in her hand. She was observing the changes around them.


    The gemstone was diamond-shaped and translucent. A refreshing and calming soft glow emanated from within it.


    A Gem of True Sight!


    The muscles of their faces started to twitch. They were utterly speechless for a moment.


    This magical gemstone allowed the owner to see through invisibility and illusions and was extremely expensive. The lowest listed market price was four hundred magic crystals. The few of them couldn¡¯t possibly afford it with their meager funds. They might all be apprentice adepts, but a slightly more respectable pseudo-adept like Alice could thoughtlessly take out a gem like this one.


    Wasn¡¯t this the difference between apprentices a little toorge?!


    Alice shook the Gem of True Sigh and moved towards the wall. The withering and decaying sight instantly dispersed. The walls went back to their dark brown wooden pattern. It had returned to how it was before.


    As expected, it was an illusion!


    The apprentices were finally able to rx when they saw this.


    Will frowned and slowly inched forward.


    If they measured the length of the corridor based on the length of the castle, it shouldn¡¯t have been any longer than a hundred meters. This distance should have been short enough for them to see the end of the corridor, even if the lighting was terrible. Oddly enough, their vision couldn¡¯t extend more than seven or eight meters from where they stood.


    The scenery in the distance looked as if the darkness had devoured it. The group couldn¡¯t see anything at all.


    It seemed this was another illusory effect!


    Will slowly moved forward, his eyes continually sweeping past his surroundings and his feet. He stopped walking every time he felt something wrong or different, and Will only continued when he was sure it was safe.


    The darkness before their eyes slowly faded away.


    The candlelight on both sides of the wall flickered with a dim yellow light. The light projected their shadows onto the walls. One moment they would extend and the other they would shrink. One moment their shadows would be on the right, and the next they would be on the left. It was almost like a stalking monster lived in their shadows. The wooden boards beneath their feet were old and rotten. Every step they took caused the floor to creak noisily.


    A fifty-centimeter square wooden painting frame hung to the wall on the left side. The shadows had obscured it, causing the party to miss the painting until now. Now that they were finally close enough, Will was able to discern its contents.


    The painting was of countryside fields. There were mountains in the distance, rivers by the crops, and a small hill was in the middle of the picture. A faint silhouette stood on the hill and was facing forward.


    The technique of the artist was excellent. That said, who knew what the artist thought when he drew this? The artist had painted the entire painting with ck and white only. What should have been a picture of a beautiful countryside scene had been turned into a sinister and ghostly image.


    Will shook his head and turned his attention back to the ground he was stepping on.


    The creaking noises continued as he walked. He couldn¡¯t focus and pay attention to the other changes around him. He finally stopped to listen for odd movements and sounds, but the creaking noises continued toe from behind him.


    "Can you guys walk more soft..." Will couldn¡¯t help but turn around to scold hispanions, but what he saw shocked him.


    Hispanions indeed followed behind him, but...their faces were pale white, their facial features distorted. Two streaks of bloody tears dripped down their cheeks.


    "What happened to you? " Will asked with a trembling voice.


    Wicked and terrifying smiles appeared on their faces as sharp ws extended from their fingers. They howled and wailed as they surrounded Will.


    Will stumbled backward in fright. He was no longer able to endure the terror of the sight. He turned around and quickly started running.


    Will ran across the river and past the fields. He was out of breath and had no choice but to stop on a small hill to catch his breath.


    I must have finally escaped those terrifying monsters, haven¡¯t I?


    Will looked about fearfully, only to find himself in a wholly different ce.


    This...this wasn¡¯t the dim corridor he had been in.


    Will looked at the sinister mountains in the distance, the gray fields he had run past, and the ck river before him. There was a floating wooden frame in the distant air. It was like a window to the outside world. Through it, Will saw a pale silhouette leading Kerr, Warren, and the others as they slowly walked down the corridor.


    Judging on his position and angle, Will was shocked to find himself in the painting he had just seen. The human figure in the drawing had already reced him!


    Dammit! Was this illusion or reality?


    For a moment, even Will couldn¡¯t tell if he was under the effect of illusion or whether the painting had trapped him inside. Thus, he frantically ran towards the wooden frame, waving his hands about as he shouted for help.


    Oddly enough, it didn¡¯t matter what he did. The wooden frame remained the same distance away from him as if he would never be able to reach it.


    ............


    Back to the dim and dark corridor.


    Kerr couldn¡¯t help but frown, "Will, can you hurry up? If we shuffle like you are doing, god knows how long we are going to take to investigate the entire floor!"


    Will mumbled an acknowledgment and finally hastened his footsteps.


    The corridor wasn¡¯t even all that long at the start. The party quickly arrived in front of a wooden door.


    The party moved closer to inspect the door. They didn¡¯t sense any traces of magical flux on the wooden door. There shouldn¡¯t have been any magical traps set on this thing.


    Under everyone¡¯s encouragement, Will worked up the courage to push the door open.


    Creak. The wooden door eventually opened.


    The inside was a small and delicate library. The interior space wasn¡¯t vast, but a significant number of books and scrolls had been stuffed onto the wooden shelves by the wall. Most of the books glowed with faint magical light. It was evident that these weren¡¯t any ordinary items.


    Books. So many books.


    The apprentices already treated the umtion of knowledge as instinct. They immediately wanted to walk into the room and start searching for books that interested them. But right that moment, a sound came from behind them. Alice¡¯s immature coughs rang out.


    The apprentice adepts froze. They quickly made way and bowed respectfully, "Lady Alice, please!"


    Alice coldlyughed as she took a step forward, "Take a better look before you start splitting the spoils among yourselves!"


    She raised her tiny arm and the soft white light from the Gem of True Sight projected into the library and onto Will!


    The ordinary scene immediately plunged into a nightmare the very next second. A horrifying image fell upon everyone¡¯s eyes.


    The wooden door had vanished. The path before the apprentices wasn¡¯t a library, but a strange ck crack in the wall. A painting hung at the end of the ck fissure. Several shadows moved about in the painting as they looked at the party.


    Will, who had been standing by the door, turned an unbelievable shade of white under the gem¡¯s glow. Even his skin seemed to be translucent. It was a sinister, ghastly thing to see.


    "I have already opened the door. Quick, enter!" Will turned around and smiled as he encouraged the party to walk in.


    His face was so white it was almost as if it had been smeared with ashes. Two lines of bloody tears could be seen streaking down his face. When he let out a sinister smile, his muscles distorted tremendously, as if he was a demon from another world.


    Dammit! When was Will reced with this thing!


    The next second, three spells of various colors crash onto ¡¯Will¡¯ without any hesitation.


    Shadow Arrow!


    Frost Dagger!


    Lightning w!


    The energy levels of these attacks were only between 12 to 15 points. They didn¡¯t do much damage, but they were spells that the apprentices could cast quickly. The fake Will immediately realized something was off. However, he wasn¡¯t able to dodge in time, and all three of the instant-cast spells hit his body.


    The white bone shield levitating around Will didn¡¯t seem to exist at all. All the spells went right through it and hit their target. The fake Will screeched in pain from the damage. His voice was hoarse and cold,pletely different from a human¡¯s voice. Moreover, even though his body had been shredded to pieces by the spells, not a single scrap of flesh or drop of blood spilled. Instead, he slowly dispersed into the air as if he was a substance made of energy.


    The fake Will knew that he had been exposed. Its body quickly transformed and started turning into a translucent energy substance. It silently melded into the wall beside it.


    The three apprentice adepts missed their second wave of attacks. They only managed to make a massive hole in the wooden wall, revealing a dark space behind it.


    A cold and sinister wind blew from inside the hole. The party couldn¡¯t help but shiver at the urrence.


    "Damn It! It¡¯s a spirit! " The advanced apprentice Warren cursed angrily, "Our attacks earlier weren¡¯t enough. We didn¡¯t do enough to damage it. Everyone must be caref..."


    He didn¡¯t finish his sentence. A light shed near the wall, and a transparent form came out of the wall and shed Warren¡¯s left arm with its sharp ws.


    "Aaaaaah!"


    Warren screamed in agony.


    Two spells immediately fired at the spirit, but they only managed to damage the wall further. Once again, it had hidden in the shadows.


    Warren endured the pain and tore the damaged cloth off his shoulder. He could see several deep w marks on his arm. The wounds had extended all the way to his bone. Moreover, the injury was turning blue and ck. Ayer of crystalline frost had already frozen the flesh around the wound and was slowly creeping towards the rest of the arm.


    "Damn! It¡¯s a pseudo-adept level spirit. Everyone be careful!" Warren shouted at the top of his lungs.

 Chapter 310

    Chapter 310 Seal


    Spirits and the like are one of the most troublesome guards to deal with.


    If it had been ordinary voodoo beasts, four apprentice adepts would still have been able to kill them, even if they had to suffer some losses in the process. However, it was challenging to get rid of spirits.


    Firstly, these spirits didn¡¯t possess actual physical bodies.


    In low-magic worlds, death was inevitable once you stopped breathing. The death of the body meant that the spiritual consciousness had dispersed and vanished. The soul could not exist independently of its host.


    However, this was not the case in high-magic worlds. Individuals who had possessed powerful wills in life, be it adepts or magical creatures, would still be able to exist in the material ne through their powerful mental will. They would be able to preserve their spiritual consciousness.


    They would use their powerful hatred and regrets for their core and gather elementium substances as their bodies. Once they became powerful enough, they could even materialize in the material world.


    Their bodies were both intangible and tangible, which allowed them to switch between the two states freely.


    When they transformed into intangible objects, their bodies would not be affected by physical substances. They could pass through any unprotected materials, such as stone, wood, and metal. Only elementium energies under the control of adepts or magical forcefields could prevent them from entering.


    Spirits did not receive physical damage while in their intangible form. However, theck of a strong body made them susceptible to elementium attacks. They were easily wounded.


    When they transformed into their tangible form, their rich elementium bodies would possess both physical and elementium damage. The effect of this was the ability to absorb the life force of any living being. They could also cause severe negative-energy damage. For example, the spirit before them dealt frost damage when using a physical attack.


    The spirits still had extremely high resistance and immunity to physical damage in this form. Their damaged bodies naturally recovered through the absorption of wandering elementium. Thus, the most effective method to kill spirits was to use elementium attacks.


    For the next seven minutes, the spirit stalked them like an assassin. It continuously appeared from the walls, the floor, and even the ceiling, striking the apprentices once before disappearing once more.


    The spirit was fast and stealthy. Most of the apprentices¡¯ retaliations didn¡¯t find their marks. The spells would crash against the walls or floor and do absolutely nothing to the spirit. Moreover, the attacks on the apprentices were adding up. Their wounds increased, their flesh had started rotting, and more and more parts of their bodies were frozen. It was hard to regenerate even with the use of the medicine they had with them.


    Bizarrely enough, the spirit seemed to have a vendetta against the apprentices alone. It only attacked them and wholly ignored Alice, who was casually walking along.


    Alice was perfectly happy with how things were as well. She held the Gem of True Sight against the wall and examined the paintings on it one by one.


    Much like what she saw in the swamp tower, none of the paintings in the walls here were ordinary. If it weren¡¯t some type of spirit sealed within, it would be a strange monster with mysterious abilities.


    Every time Alice peered into a painting with her gem, the monster sealed within would screech and hide into the depths of the picture to avoid the light from the gem.


    Finally, Alice found a sinister scenic painting on a wall by the side. Naturally, she also found Will, who was frantically calling for help from within.


    The scene in the painting had turned to night by now.


    The grey grass near the small hill started to overturn under the deste moonlight. Shambling figures rose from beneath the ground. Their howling filled the entire world of the painting


    These were fearsome mummies that had slept underground for many decades. Their bodies had shriveled entirely. Their stomachs had shrunk, and their remaining hair was yellow and withered. Countless corpse beetles crawled between their eye sockets, nostrils, and mouths.


    Their actions were dull and slow. Unknown ck kes even fell off their bodies as they stumbled around.


    They wandered without any particr purpose.


    However, their shriveled nostrils were able to pick up on the smell of the wind; the warm smell of flesh and blood that belonged to a living being. It was a smell that would send any undead into a frenzy.


    Everything changed in the very next moment!


    The mummies started howling and growling loudly. A pungent odor of decay came from their mouths.


    They got down on all fours and lunged towards Will¡¯s location with the speed and agility of a hunting hound. Their actions were as fast as lightning. Will hadn¡¯t even managed to break free from the shock when they had already had arrived before him.


    The spinning bone shield repelled the mummies. A rain of bone fangs shot out from Will¡¯s hand, riddling the mummies around him full of holes.


    But none of this curbed their desire for warm blood.


    The mummies¡¯ growling became even more frequent, and the entirend started to crumble. More mummies emerged from the ground and leaped towards Will¡¯s position.


    Dammit! Why was there so many of them?


    Will cursed angrily.


    His elementium affinity was negative energy, and he walked the path of a Whitebone Adept. He wasn¡¯t unfamiliar with these undead mummies. In fact, Will was better acquainted than any other apprentice adept when it came to these monsters. He might be able to deal with one or two dozen mummies, but a horde of hundreds or thousands of mummies was way too much! He wouldn¡¯t be able to survive even if he could split himself in three right now!


    Will continuously released all sorts of bone tools from his pouch. He activated the negative energy within them and tossed them into the mummy horde. What happened next was a shocking eruption of negative energy. All the mummies enveloped by the tide of power were shredded to pieces instantly. The fragmented soul consciousness that remained in their bodies was dispersed as well, leaving them with no way to control their broken bodies.


    Will¡¯s research focused on negative energy after all. He knew very well how to kill undead efficiently.


    However, he didn¡¯t have very many of these powerful bone tools.He went pale after throwing four or five of them at the enemy. There was nothing left in his pouch.


    Will couldn¡¯t help but let out a scream of despair as he looked on at the lunging horde of undead.


    Then, the frame shimmered, and a massive hand extended in from the outside. This hand was like the small arm of a girl that had been erged by hundreds of times. The skin was smooth and white. The fingerprints and pores were all present. Will could even see the red nail polish that was applied to her nails.


    The giant hand reached inside and instantly appeared above the hill. It grabbed Will and quickly exited the painting.


    The mummies surrounding Will couldn¡¯t possibly let him go just like that. They stacked together and roared as they grabbed the hand and tried to stall it.


    Their actions angered the owner of the hand. The hand shook, and everything within the world of the painting shattered to pieces. The swarm of mummies broke as well.


    Now that it had dealt with the undead, the giant hand quickly withdrew and disappeared through the wooden frame portal.


    Alice waved the Gem of True Sight around as she chased away the ursed spirit that had tried to take the opportunity to attack her. Meanwhile, she drew her right hand out from the wall.


    Bop.


    Her arm came out and Will the apprentice was dragged out of the painting as well.


    The spirit was enraged to see the prey it had caught be saved.


    It let out an ear-piercing screech, and white smoke started to obscure the painting. Countless mummies charged towards the exit as if they wanted to get out of the picture as well.


    Alice let out a coldugh and shook the Gem of True Sight. A series of twisted and distorted magical runes surfaced in the middle of the painting.


    "Amiasa, Slumber of the Dead!"


    Alice quickly finished her chant, and a bright white light glowed within the painting. A mysterious white vortex appeared out of nowhere and dragged the wailing spirit back into the canvas.


    When the light faded away, the painting had returned to its original appearance.


    Mountains in the distance, a river, grey fields, a small hill, and a spirit wailing on the top of the hill.


    She managed to seal the enemy!


    Alice turned and smiled at Warren, "Hey, big guy! I really won¡¯t be responsible again if you take one more step backward and wake the monster sealed in that painting!"


    Warren turned around with his left hand cradling his wounded right arm. Only then did he realize how close he had gotten to the wooden frame on the other side when he retreated.


    A mysterious spirit boat was crashing through the towering waves in the painting as it sped forward.


    Warren might not know what monster was sealed within, but he had already seen what happened to Will. He had no desire to tempt fate.


    He quickly moved away from the painting!


    It seemed that the guardians of this corridor were the creatures in these sealing paintings.


    Progress was much more rxed now that they understood what awaited them.


    Alice used her Gem of True Sight to shine the way for every bit of distance they covered. They quickly uncovered the existence of magical traps this way. All they needed to do was take turns to attack and seal any enemies before they coulde out and cause trouble.


    It was evident that this was the primary location where Adept Sak performed his secret experiments. The number of magical traps he had prepared was numerous.


    Monsters sealed in paintings, rms hidden in candlesticks, and killing contraptions hidden underneath the floorboard were only a few.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the fate of an intruder. Sak would be able to pick up on the abnormality even if he was a thousand kilometers away. All he needed to do then was rush back and seal the exit. The depths of the corridor would trap the enemy.


    All magical traps and contraptions, as well as voodoo beasts, required an adept¡¯s management to exhibit their fullest potential.


    However, now that Sak was dead, it didn¡¯t matter how many and how tightly-packed his defenses were. They would eventually be overwhelmed.


    Thus, after an entire night¡¯s worth of torturous exploration, the party sessfully reached the end of the corridor. They had arrived before the door of theboratory!


    A strange human face surfaced on the wooden door.


    "Password. Speak the password or be denied entry!"

 Chapter 311

    Chapter 311 Fishing


    Szzzzzz.


    Violent acid sshed against the human-faced door. It destroyed the face before the magic arrays could even activate.


    The four apprentices winced as they looked at the mess before them. They took a look at the strange slime golem that Alice had just summoned and howled silently in their hearts.


    Christ! Why didn¡¯t you summon an adept-level golem earlier if you had one? You had to wait for us to get all beaten up before sending this out to take out the trash!


    Of course, the few apprentices might have been cursing all they wanted in their hearts, but they were even more respectful when talking to Alice now.


    Of course, they had to! Anyone would probably act like them if they were faced with a pseudo-adept that could summon an adept-level golem at any time. If she didn¡¯t like them, she could send an Acid Spray their way, and their bodies wouldn¡¯t even leave bones behind!


    The Decayer¡¯s 50 point acid attack destroyed even the magic door and its secure defenses. They probably weren¡¯t even enough for the Decayer to swallow in a single bite.


    The following exploration was much morefortable with the help of the Decayer.


    Sak might have been a veteran elite adept, and his traps might have been deadly and well-hidden. However, without Sak¡¯s control, or the aid of the system within an actual adept¡¯s tower, the traps were merely inanimate objects. They couldn¡¯t possibly stop the violent destruction of the Decayer.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was a magical door or trap, or even a pocket-dimensional sealing spell. The Decayer just threw a little green spit their way. Everything would then turn into white smoke amidst the sizzling sounds of corroding acid. Naturally, the traps no longer worked after that.


    The party found Sak¡¯sb, treasury, and study room at the end of the corridor.


    Alice puffed her chest and led the Decayer into the room first. She took a look at everything in theb and waved her hand.


    "Go, find everything of value in this room. This Lady will naturally reward you if you bring back enough items of sufficient quality. Go, go, go..."


    The four apprentices behaved with a frenzied glee once Alice delivered her instructions. They excitedly shouted as they rushed to each corner of the room. After all, this was a magicalb set up by a veteran elite adept. Any discovery was more than enough for them to utilize.


    The good stuff naturally belonged to Alice. They would be content with all the insignificant treasures here!


    Alice stood unmovingly on the spot. She put her hands behind her back and closed her eyes as if she were waiting for something.


    As expected, an indescribable feeling of danger crept up in her heart as the party was happily searching for and splitting the resources and treasures they found.


    Yes, it was this feeling!


    Alice¡¯s heart tremored. A sharp brilliance gleamed in her eyes.


    She had felt this sudden unease back in the forest camp earlier. They were attacked right after that. Alice couldn¡¯t be more familiar with this feeling!


    For the first time in her life, she, Alice, a mere pseudo-adept, had felt real helplessness when faced with a powerful enemy!


    Spatial Barrier; forcefully crushed by the serpentine adept!


    Spatial Cut; diverted to who knows where by that stupid illusionist.


    The bird cage; not even enough to break through the defenses of the two adepts.


    She had been about to run away from the camp when that strange Eye of Petrification hit her. The overflowing energy of petrification ravaged through her body, quickly numbing her legs and turning them into lifeless stone.


    Alice had been left with no choice but to escape with Snox even as she resisted the corrosion of the petrification energy.


    Sadly, the two adepts had prepared for the situation. They were able to urately locate Alice¡¯s position every time she teleported and kept up a heavy pursuit. On the other hand, most of her powers had been used to suppress the petrification. The frequent use of spatial energy had caused more and more of her body to be petrified.


    In the end, Alice had to leave Snox alone and escape in a different direction. It still wasn¡¯t enough to elude the enemies behind her.


    After onest teleportation, Alice had no longer been able to control the petrification energy in her body and slowly turned into a statue with her face frozen in fear.


    What kind of feeling was that?


    She had felt every inch of her body losing their senses. She had felt her organs be hard and heavy. She felt her body lose control and her consciousness fade. She had wanted to scream, but her vocal chords had turned to stone. She had wanted to cry, but she couldn¡¯t even let a single tear flow out.


    A petrified body but a still-existing soul had looked on in terror and agony as thest fragments of her consciousness faded. The experience was iprehensible for anyone that hadn¡¯t experienced it for themselves!


    The two adepts had hurried over to find her wholly petrified body.


    The serpentine adept had wanted to crush her with a simple strike andplete the mission. However, the female illusionist suggested otherwise. Once Alice¡¯s soul had dispersed entirely, this would be a decent collection item!


    Alice¡¯s petrified shell of a body had trapped her. She had cursed and cried and begged and despaired countless times as the two adepts had waited. Sadly, Alice had been a lonely prisoner in her dark mental world. She could not break through or convey her voice or thoughts to the outside world.


    She had absolutely no idea of what had transpired next.


    The call for help from the Bloodhand Butcher might have saved her. The two adepts had hurried away and failed to detect the trace of spatial flux from within her body.


    That was the power of the spacestone!


    It had been a long, long time before Greem¡¯s familiar mental flux pierced through the dark and deathly silent mental world. It was then that Alice had cried out loud.


    It was only then that Alice had thought of the ability to cry when she wanted to as a blessing in and of itself!


    Perhaps Alice might only have been sealed shut in her cold and dead mental world for a single night, but the significance of that one night was unprecedentedly enormous for her. It had been an incredibly long time in her mind. Long enough to make her go mad. An eternity that had caused her to hover at the brink of a breakdown.


    She had called for help, but none came. She had been afraid, despairing, crying, howling. But none of this had any meaning! She had been the only one in her cold and deste world!


    The spatial talent that she had always relied on appeared to be so fragile and useless. Don¡¯t even mentioned saving her; she hadn¡¯t even been able to use her talent to kill herself.


    Her mind had undergone countless changes and browsed through many thoughts in the dead darkness. She hadn¡¯t been able to keep track of all of it herself. When Alice had given up on her pride and gave up on the temporal strength of the outside, she, for the first time, religiously and diligently used every bit of her soul¡¯s power to pray and pay respect to the one thing that could bring her hope.


    Fate!


    She had prayed zealously.


    No longer trying to negotiate with fate, no longer trying to ask for something from fate.


    Alice had been willing to be a believer in fate and shoulder her mission and be...


    Greem¡¯s mental flux had suddenly broken through her dark cell like a deity descending upon the mortal world, right as she had recognized the true nature of her powers and strength.


    Alice had desperately wanted to cry at that moment, yet she had smiled silently in the darkness!


    Naturally, Greem had no way to know of this subtle change in Alice¡¯s mind.


    After all, he also had been too busy dealing with the corrosive petrification energy and the rampaging of his abyssal aura at that time. He could only hurry and rush Alice and Snox back to the Feidnan City. There had been no time for him to think about any changes that had happened to Alice.


    Greem had only realized that Alice had changed when she was designing her magical tattoo for Greem.


    The usually violent and sly Alice had willingly given up on theponents that could strengthen her spatial talents. Instead, she had asked Greem to enhance the sensitivity and insights of her Spirit.


    This request had been entirely out of the blue and was far beyond Greem¡¯s expectations. It was at that moment that Greem realized the change that had happened to Alice.


    Alice had honestly started to believe in fate. She was willing to put her faith in fate. It was a difficult thing to do, but she did it!


    After all, a spatial talent was a tangible thing. Greem only needed to strengthen it a little, and Alice¡¯sbat prowess and survival skills would increase exponentially. Fate, on the other hand, was intangible, unseen and mysterious. No one had any idea where it came from and no idea how to train and cultivate it.


    Throwing resources at such a thing was considered a massive waste!


    At least, that¡¯s how most adepts thought of the issue.


    However, Greem didn¡¯t belong to this group of adepts.


    Honestly, Alice¡¯s spatial talents were very desirable. Still, they couldn¡¯tpare to the title of the Witch of Fate. Only thirteen witches possessed titles in the World of Adepts. They were the core and the skeleton that held together therge group that was the Northern Witches.


    After tens of thousands of years, the thirteen branches of the Northern Witches had all experienced their own prosperities and declines. The chapter of the Witch of Fate was undoubtedly part of the groups that had gone extinct.


    However, as long as the legacyws of the Witch of Fate were still part of the will of the World of Adepts, their legacy would never wholly go extinct.


    Numerous inheritors of the Witch of Fate and her considerable talents indicated the revival of the Fate branch after a thousand years of silence!


    The leaders of the Northern Witches had sent out many guides to bring these inheritors back to the Tower of Fate because of this.


    The Battle of Fate would happen eight yearster, as was scheduled!


    It didn¡¯t matter who lived. That person would sessfully be the true Witch of Fate. A new branch would rise among the Northern Witches.


    The people that were so stubbornly pursuing Alice at this time were most likely preparing for the Battle of Fate.


    It could be that an overbearing force backed one of the candidates, and this force was trying to help her get rid of thepetitors. Or perhaps some influence within the Continent of Adept didn¡¯t want to see the Northern Witches continue to grow in strength. That was why they might have sent attacks to interrupt the inheritance ceremony of the Witch of Fate.


    It was the first time Alice had so clearly felt the danger she was in!


    The trip to Wylick Castle was a risk that she had taken. More importantly, it was her going fishing!


    Still.


    If she was the bait, who was the fish?

 Chapter 312

    Chapter 312 Fish and Bait


    The danger arrived swifter than anyone could have expected!


    A second ago, Alice was still patrolling theb and examining her spoils of war. The very next second, the entire magically fortified roof was sted away.


    For a moment, broken pirs, crumbling walls, damaged arrays, and raining sand and debris covered the entirety of the castle.


    Gasps and screams rang out throughout the castle.


    Alice raised her head.


    One could easily see the night sky, even as the wooden beams and crumbling rocks fell around the building. A massive, flying magical creature hovered above Alice, projecting a fearsome shadow onto the castle below.


    Alice had expected someone to attack, but she never expected them to raise such a hugemotion.


    In the sky.


    An eight-meter long faux-dragon with grey scales and metallic looking skin beat its wings. It had a devilish and sharp snout, short front limbs, and powerful hind legs. It had a three-meter-long tail with a spindle-shaped end dragging behind its body as well.


    The massive pair of grey wings sent howling winds blowing in every direction. No one could open their eyes with all the dust blowing at them.


    The reason they are described as faux-dragons is that they had none of the intimidating and chilling dragon¡¯s aura of might that an actual dragon possessed. However, their bodies still possessed many draconic traits. Alice was confident that they were a sort of hybrid dragon!


    It was a mixed-blood hybrid dragon born of a union between a dragon and another species!


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but suspect that this hybrid dragon¡¯s parent was arge rodent. After all, this ¡¯dragon¡¯ had a thin snout, whiskers, and even a grey and furry tail.


    Given the lust of the dragons and their Ultimate Transfiguration, it wasn¡¯t outside the realm of possibility.


    Still, Alice quickly tossed aside these useless thoughts and focused on the beautifuldy sitting on the back of the dragon.


    It was her! As Alice had expected! It was her!


    The mysteriousdy that the Sarubo n had been unable to track, despite the massive amount of resources they had put to use, had managed to chase her down!


    Alice betrayed an expression of shock and fear. She tried to hide behind the Decayer¡¯s body while secretly turning the wooden ring on her right pinky.


    A subtle magical message was secretly sent out!


    "There¡¯s no need for an act anymore!" The beautiful illusionist on the hybrid dragonughed with disdain, "Don¡¯t think about sending a message or anything like that. From the moment this started, all of the magical messages from here are being intercepted. You have no chance to call for reinforcements!"


    Alice¡¯s face froze when she heard the woman speak. She quickly raised her right hand and frantically tried tomunicate and ask for help. Sadly, a static noise was all that came from the wooden ring. She had no way of using the magical ring to contact Greem or ¡¯that¡¯ person.


    Alice was truly afraid now!


    Dammit! The fishing n worked, but now what about the hunters?


    The green, slimy Decayer slowly moved forward and stood before Alice. A brilliant green halo was glowing around it.


    Poison Halo!


    All life within a hundred meters of the Decayer would be poisoned and robbed of their life when the halo passed through.


    The apprentice adepts hiding in the corners of theb grabbed their throats with their hands as they fell to the ground and struggled in agony. The ones with low magic resistances were dead within moments, while the stronger ones rolled around on the ground. They frantically grabbed antidotes from their pouches and swallowed as many as they could.


    However, with how much they were struggling, it didn¡¯t seem long before they would die!


    The ordinary servants and ves on the lower floors did even worse. The moment the halo shed, they had already copsed without a chance to call for help.


    The Decayer would never care about its surroundings when it wanted to attack the enemy.


    Of course, Alice, as its temporary master, was able to enjoy immunity to his attacks!


    The illusionist quickly took out a white pearl and put it into her mouth. The green shade that had surfaced on her face quickly faded away. The hybrid dragon she rode on seemed to have inherited the powerful resistance of the dragons. It exhaled two clouds of ck smoke from its nostrils and sneezed. That was all it took for it to endure the Decayer¡¯s poison attacks.


    Dammit! If I had known the n was so weak, I would have brought master¡¯s Infernal Tyrant with me!


    Alice cursed angrily, but she knew that this was only her fantasy.


    With her status as a pseudo-adept, she had to wear several pieces of magical equipment to raise her Spirit, and still she could barely summon the weakest of the golems¨C the Decayer. Even if her master was able to overlook any damage to his golems and handed the Infernal Tyrant core to her, she couldn¡¯t possibly seed at summoning the Tyrant anyway.


    The dragon dove down at Alice under the illusionist¡¯s orders. Its body caused powerful winds to blow at Alice even before it crashed into her.


    The Decayer¡¯s jelly-like green body shook, and a massive wad of green acidunched at the opponent. The glob of green acid exploded after flying a short distance and covered an area of ten meters. It coated everything in the area with acid.


    Oddly enough, the Decayer¡¯s ¡¯spit¡¯ had missed its mark, despite howrge the dragon was!


    Stupid illusions!


    Eight silhouettes of the dragon and the illusionist appeared in the sky. They circled above the damaged castle. The Decayer¡¯s Acid Spray continued to miss, only seeding in hitting a couple of illusions.


    However, the massive wind des that the enemy shot at them were not an illusion. Every st damaged the body of the Decayer and sent acid sshing everywhere.


    The Decayer was not a worthwhile opponent for the illusionist and her dragon when fighting two against one!


    Alice had no choice but to join the battle now that she could see that they were at a disadvantage. She fired several spatial des towards the sky like a crescent scimitar.


    These attacks caused the hybrid dragon to be fearful and cautious in its movements.


    Frankly speaking, the dragon might have an intimidating appearance, but it wasn¡¯t all that powerful.


    It had no devastating dragon¡¯s breath, no elementium talent, and no intimidating dragon¡¯s aura of might. Even it¡¯s grey scales couldn¡¯t cover its entire body. The more important parts of the body, such as the stomach and the wings, were not protected by the scales.


    These were all fatal spots that an enemy could strike at in a close fight.


    However, the illusionist¡¯s innate abilities were excellent cover for the dragon.


    Thanks to the powerful confusion effect from the tarot gem on the illusionist¡¯s forehead, most of the Decayer¡¯s attacks were missing their marks. The Decayer could only endure the enemy¡¯s blows. If it weren¡¯t due to the massive ssh radius of the Acid Spray, the illusionist would likely have already charged forward and killed it.


    The illusionist could see that Alice was trying to help the Decayer as well. The tarot gem on her head shone with a prismatic light again, and Alice was instantly affected.


    The illusionist had misdirected Alice and caused her to lose her sense of direction. She had mistaken the Decayer for an enemy. The spatial des were like transparent razors, instantly cutting at the Decayer¡¯srge and sticky jelly body.


    The body of the Decayer was acidic as well. They sshed against the walls of the castle, and even the sturdy stone material wasn¡¯t able to endure the acid. They quickly melted and softened. Large pools of green glowing acid eroded the ground. The sizzling sounds of corrosion continued to ring out.


    It had been one against two earlier, and now it was even worse! One against three.


    The illusionist immediately changed targets as well. The giant wind des and terrifying wind vortices whipped in Alice¡¯s direction. The Decayer could only fire acid arrows to intercept the attacks. It even had to cover the attacks it couldn¡¯t deflect with its own body to protect Alice.


    Some of the acids still sshed from the Decayer¡¯s body andnded on Alice, causing her frail body to sizzle from the corrosion effect. She wasn¡¯t able to tell that something was off. Alice was still stubbornly shaving away at the Decayer.


    Alice¡¯s spatial talent might have been powerful, but that was only rtive to the apprentices that were of the same Grade as her. When she faced a real adept, the opponent had hundreds of ways to torture her to death.


    Alice¡¯s life hung by a thread!


    ............


    Just as the battle raged on above the castle, two towering figures hid within the shadow of the castle on its southwestern side.


    "My Lady, isn¡¯t it about time for you to go?" A tall and intimidating me humanoid gazed at the battle in the distance. He couldn¡¯t help but speak to the other person.


    The voice appeared to belong to Greem.


    "What are you in a hurry for!" The female adept wrapped in green smokeughed softly without any regard for the situation, "You have been protecting this Alice girl way too well. She¡¯s almost forgotten how to fight. She is a pseudo-adept, and she dares to strike at an adept? She would probably do something dumb like this again if she didn¡¯t receive a punishment!"


    Greem rolled his eyes. He almost couldn¡¯t resist the urge to rebuke his overbearing superior.


    If you hadn¡¯t promised to guarantee her safety, even Alice wouldn¡¯t be so dumb as to take the initiative to strike at an adept. If it had been any usual circumstance, she would have used her spatial talents to teleport away and run as far as she could.


    Alice was still very talented at escaping!


    Her Spatial Teleportation didn¡¯t require the use of any tool or array. It was the most potent spell for escaping.


    It was withoutpare.


    As long as she only thought of escaping, no one would be able to stop her.


    The one thing she definitely should not have done was to trust her instincts. She thought she would seed at baiting out the enemy hiding in the shadows. She thought she would be safe. This naivete was why she was bold enough to trade blows with an adept.


    It¡¯s the stronger swimmers who drown!


    It was a typical error of all the people that believed in fate and divination!

 Chapter 313

    Chapter 313 Fate


    I will not die!


    I definitely won¡¯t die!


    Alice exuded confidence even with the terrible situation she was experiencing.


    Not for any other reason but the fact that she did not sense death from fate.


    If death wasn¡¯t a possibility, then why shouldn¡¯t she go down the most dangerous path, andmit to the riskiest actions to reach the best oues!


    If Greem could tell what Alice was thinking, he would probably be fuming right now!


    She had jumped from one extreme to the other.


    The Alice in the past had only relied on her spatial talents. She hadpletely ignored the intangible and invisible fate. Even when Alice asionally sensed something, she rarely acted in ordance with Fate¡¯s instructions. However, now that Alice had finally felt the limitations of her spatial talent, she had ultimately fallen for the mysterious and limited powers of fate.


    She was like a reckless zealot that trusted blindly in fate, a madman that charged under heavy fire without any regard for her life, all because of that one promation from fate that she wouldn¡¯t die.


    Reality seemed to concur with her expectations. Countless attacks and dangers poured down upon her, but she was always able to avoid or walk past these risks due to all sorts of coincidences and reasons. She was wounded, but it was still far from being enough to kill a pseudo-adept.


    Greem¡¯s me projection and Sanazar herself were only watching the battle with yful gazes. They silently waited for Alice¡¯s life to be threatened before they descended as saviors.


    However, the moment they waited for didn¡¯t arrive even after a long wait. Instead, the tides of the battle seemed to have mysteriously turned.


    And all of this was because of the Decayer¡¯s unique ability¨C Splitting Multiplication!


    The damaged Decayer was finally unable to endure the tremendous damage from all three individuals. Its body had exploded! It was like jelly that had been blown up. Tons of acidic substance sshed in every direction, before turning into a pool of liquid on the ground.


    Alice was finally exposed to the enemy.


    Every party involved in the battle was thrilled. The terrible performance today had finallye to an end. At this very moment, however, the green liquid suddenly started to gather under the guidance of an unknown force.


    Just like that, two Decayers appeared under everyone¡¯s surprised gazes, be they hiding in the shadows or fighting in the light.


    The two new Decayers appeared to be half as tall as the previous one. They were also significantly smaller. However, their firepower was still as ferocious as before!


    The Splitting Multiplication significantly reduced the defense of the new Decayers. That said, this wasn¡¯t a significant problem for an aggressive and offensive elementium golem like the Decayer. The two Decayers took up positions on the left and the right respectively. Two bright green acid arrows shot at the sky every time their short and stubby bodies trembled.


    These acid arrows exploded at first contact, sending acid sshing over an area. The area covered by the acid wasn¡¯t extensive. It was only seven or eight meters in diameter. However, when the two acid balls fired together, they significantly limited the space in the air.


    Moreover, the acidic liquid was misty and could disperse in the air. Thus, the retention rate of acid in midair was extremely long.


    The two Decayers continued to attack, and the skies above the castle quickly saturated with an acidic green mist. A pungent odor was present as well.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    The female illusionist cursed repeatedly. For the first time since the battle started, she directed her hatred towards the strange elementium golem.


    She misdirected all of the opponent¡¯s attacks to the spaces around her. However, the hybrid dragon¡¯s body was enormous. It was unavoidably hurt by the annoying green mist when it flew in the sky.


    It would have been fine if it was its torso that was being corroded. After all, grey scales protected that spot. A little acid wasn¡¯t enough to kill an adept-level hybrid dragon. Unfortunately, if it were its wings that were corroded by the acidic liquid, there would be no way to protect them. There were no scales there.


    Thus, thick white smoke started to rise from the dragon¡¯s wings as it circled in the air. The fearsome acid sizzled as it ate its way into the dragon¡¯s leathery wings. Small punctures were already appearing on the wings, and even these quickly expanded and turned into more severe wounds.


    The hybrid dragon¡¯s ability to maneuver about had been profoundly affected. Its wings, riddled with holes, were also no longer able to keep it in the air for much longer.


    However, the illusionist¡¯s powerful attacks had also destroyed the two Decayers as the dragon finally started faltering.


    But four even smaller Decayers appeared in the castle ruins under her furious gaze.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    The female illusionist didn¡¯t know what words to use to express her anger and frustration at this moment.


    Who freaking made this disgusting golem? How many times could it split?


    If the basic damage of the original Decayer were at 50 points, the Decayers that had undergone a single split would have their output reduced to 40 points. The Decayers that underwent two divisions then had their damage cut to 30 points.


    However...


    Those were four extraordinarily green and extremely ¡¯cute¡¯ Decayers! Four!


    The total damage they dealt reached unbelievable heights when stacked together.


    Every time the female illusionist tried tounch a charge with the hybrid dragon, four acid arrows would greet her right in the face. The attacks might miss from being misdirected, but the acid ssh still made it difficult for her to dodge.


    The four mini Decayers had turned into a dyeing machine. Their diligent shots quickly dyed the skies a sickly green. The pungent odor of acid was nauseating!


    The acid was extremely sticky. It was blown about by the wind. It was tough to get rid of the acid when itnded on the dragon. The acid had finally severely damaged the massive wings. They were no longer able to maintain flight.


    The hybrid dragon¡¯s movements became increasingly clumsy!


    The female illusionist could tell what was going to happen. She let out a battle cry and leaped off the dragon, sessfullynding on another side of the castle as the dragon crashed into the ground. The earth trembled from the impact.


    Rumble!


    Another side of the castle copsed from the impact. Tons of sand and debris tumbled to the ground like andslide. Two massive ws gleaming with a metallic sheen nged as they grabbed onto the crumbling walls.


    The dragon¡¯s ugly mouse-like face appeared in front of everyone. Then, its scaled and skinny body, as well as its broken wings, were revealed as well.


    The dragon wasn¡¯t going to be flying any time soon, judging from the state of the dragon¡¯s wings!


    Runes were already glowing around Alice. She had taken the opportunity to use Spirit enhancing arrays to break free of the illusionist¡¯s control. She felt intense pain from every part of her body when she woke up.


    She had received plenty of damage from the battle earlier. Alice wasn¡¯t in any mortal danger, but the number of wounds she had umted was toorge to count. She had not been able to feel pain while her Spirit was under the enemy¡¯s control. The only thing Alice had cared to do was relentlessly attack. However, now that she had finally managed to wrestle control of her body from the enemy, the sudden surge of agony from all her wounds was enough to cripple her in an instant.


    The dragon was also using the ruins of the castle to creep towards the Decayers.


    It might not have long ranged attacks, but it still had tremendous strength.


    It leaned against the wall and dodged as it moved forward. It even picked up broken furniture and other heavy things to throw at Alice and the Decayers.


    The Decayers had powerful long-ranged attacks, but their defenses were far inferior to the Roaring Monster. They had no better way to cover for Alice than to intercept the projectiles with their acid arrows.


    The illusionist, on the other hand, had utterly vanished!


    ............


    Back in the shadows in the distance, the Third Grade female adept Sanazar couldn¡¯t help but turn and ask Greem.


    "Hey, brat. What do you think? Will Alice die if we choose not to act and save her?"


    "Er......"


    An expression of deep thought appeared on Greem¡¯s zing face.


    Indeed. Would Alice die?


    The reason Alice was so calm was that fate had told her that she wouldn¡¯t die. Which is to say, fate¡¯s calctions should have included her two reinforcements.


    Sanazar and Greem both had a clear view of the situation with their personal methods of spying on the battle. The female illusionist had already snuck to Alice¡¯s side while the dragon had been attracting the attacks of the Decayer. She now closed the distance after applying Invisibility to herself.


    The illusionist could easily kill Alice at this distance as long as she was willing to endure a round of attacks from the Decayers.


    If Lady Sanazar wanted to act, she would have to move now.


    However, even Greem himself still hesitated.


    He wanted Sanazar to act and save Greem, thereby ending this stupid show. He also wanted to wait and see if this most powerful force known as fate had other means of protecting Alice.


    Greem surveyed the surroundings. Almost everyone around the castle was dead. Where could Alice¡¯s saviore from, if she still had one?


    Alice was undoubtedly one of Greem¡¯s most treasured subordinates that he had invested most of his resources into. Letting her die here like this would be a massive waste. But Greem seriously wanted to know. Was fate really that powerful and mysterious?


    The two thoughtspeted in his mind. He couldn¡¯t help but feel unnerved.


    "Chip, could you calcte the possibility of Alice surviving if we refuse to act?"


    "Zero. Disregarding unknown variables that exist outside of our control, the chance of Alice surviving is zero!"


    Damn it! If Alice couldn¡¯t survive without help, then they had to act.


    Greem wasn¡¯t willing to use the life of a vital subordinate to test the limits of fate.


    However, an unexpected change happened on the battlefield just as Greem was about to request Sanazar to help.


    Dammit! How did ite to this!

 Chapter 314 Witch

    Chapter 314 Witch


    Aaaaaah!


    A deafening shriek filled the entire battlefield!


    All of a sudden, a gale blew over the top of the castle. Soon, it turned into a powerful tornado that rose towards the sky. A girl with a small figure raised her hands and lifted her head towards the sky as she stood within the eye of the storm. Alice balled her fists and let out a sharp, ear-piercing shriek of anger.


    As the sound waves spread outward, ripples started to appear in the air and slowly began to make their way outwards as well.


    These ripples might not have caught the eye in any manner at all. However, it didn¡¯t matter what they touched; the moment they made physical contact, everything was ripped and reduced to shreds, leaving only dust behind. Dust that couldn¡¯t even be seen with the naked eye.


    Everything around the castle¨Cthe crumbled ruins, the broken furniture, theboratory equipment protected with magic arrays¨Cstarted to hover in the sky when the rippled touched them, almost as if gravity didn¡¯t work on them. They slowly disintegrated and turned into a massive cloud of grey dust.


    The powerful shockwaves trembled when they had traveled five meters away from the young girl. The ripples outlined the silhouette of a tall female figure.


    It was the illusionist!


    She didn¡¯t seem to have expected a pseudo-adept to be able tounch such a powerful spatial attack. She stumbled backward while ceaselessly drawing upon her magical energies to strengthen her body.


    She could feel what was happening to her body very clearly.


    These spatial ripples didn¡¯t seem like much, but they had a fearsome lethality that outmatched most spells. Energy barriers were able to deflect and neutralize elementium spells, but they were helpless against spatial magic.


    The spatial ripples appeared to be a singleplete entity, but they wereposed of hundreds to thousands of differentyers of space. When the ripples hit the illusionist¡¯s body, all of her skin, flesh, organ, bones, and tendons simultaneously separated into entirely differentyers of space.


    Any minor change in her location at this moment would cause distortion and dislocation between the differentyers. Thus, under the dominating natural tendency of space to mend itself, your flesh, organs, and every fragile part of your body would be exposed to the thousands of forces applied in thousands of different directions.


    Moreover, you couldn¡¯t defend against this spatial energy with just an energy barrier!


    The illusionist had already been running away from Alice the moment she realized something was wrong. At the same time, she continuously strengthened the resistance and toughness of her body using what magic spells she knew.


    If she had been a body refining adept and had trained her organs to be as resilient as steel, she might have been able to use her physical body to endure this attack.


    Unfortunately, she was not!


    The illusionist quickly retreated as she coughed intensely.


    Purple and ck blood, as well as shattered organ fragments, came out from between her red lips.


    120 points!


    How could a young girl with the power of a pseudo-adeptunch such a powerful spatial ripple?


    This...this was beyond her expectations!


    120 points.


    110 points.


    100 points.


    ......


    80 points.


    60 points.


    ......


    The strength of the spatial ripples quickly fell off the further they drifted from Alice. The illusionist finally stopped moving. She was seventy meters away from Alice now.


    The spatial ripples here could only deal 20 points of damage. This damage was low enough for the illusionist to bear.


    The illusionist stopped retreating when she reached here. She endured the waves of ripples and silently prepared a spell. She had wanted to torture and humiliate Alice before she killed her, but judging from what had just urred, it was probably safer to get rid of this brat.


    The girl couldn¡¯t possibly sustain such arge-scale spell for an extended period of time with her power alone. She would instantly exterminate her with a violent wind vortex the moment Alice stopped!


    "Let¡¯s see how long you can keep going!" The illusionist mused in anger. A wicked smile appeared on her face.


    The four Decayers also tried desperately to escape Alice¡¯s Spatial Storm.


    Sadly, the terrifying and universal tearing of space within the Spatial Storm was far too effective against these creatures with weak defenses. The four Decayers were shredded once more before they could even retreat to a safer area.


    A short momentter, eight even smaller mini Decayers that had undergone their third splitting appeared before thebatants. They frantically ran towards away the moment their bodies had gathered together.


    Only six mini Decayers managed to escape from the Spatial Storm¡¯s area of effect. Two had been destroyed and died within the invisible spatial ripples.


    The hybrid dragon also reconsidered its previous thought of lunging at Alice. It stopped at the edge of the storm. It sensed the destructive nature of these ripples. It hesitated and patrolled around the outside of the phenomenon.


    "You have a good eye for picking subordinates. If I¡¯m not mistaken, she¡¯s on the verge of advancement. Tsk tsk. A little witch with spatial talent. If you properly cultivate her, she would probably end up being a great aid to you." Sanazar started praising Greem in the shadows.


    After all, Alice had been able to let out a fearsome attack of 120 points, even though she was only a pseudo-adept. While there was the factor of her stimting and exhausting her life force and potential in it, there was no denying that Alice had tremendous talent!


    Greem smiled bitterly.


    Only he understood what was happening. There was no way Alice would be able to summon such a horrifying Spatial Storm on her own. She must have drawn upon the powers of the spacestone sealed within herself!


    She channeled the spatial energy contained within the spacestone and released it in such a wild and reckless manner. This undoubtedly ced a heavy burden on Alice¡¯s weak body.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but start worrying!


    One minute had passed.


    The ferocious storm raged on, as powerful as it had been earlier.


    The illusionist barely kept up her smile.


    Three minutes passed.


    The Spatial Storm still persisted, and there were no signs of it weakening.


    The illusionist¡¯s smile gave way to a severe expression.


    Five minutes.


    The Spatial Storm was still going strong.


    The corners of the illusionist¡¯s mouth started twitching heavily. An expression of utter shock betrayed her eyes.


    "How is this possible?"


    "How is this possible?"


    Amazingly, two people had just said the same thing in two different parts of the castle ruins.


    "No. We can wait no longer. " Sanazar was a Third Grade adept and had a better eye for things whenpared to Greem, "Get ready to save Alice. I¡¯ll go and capture that illusionist. Be careful. Your little maid actually might advance soon. You can¡¯t let her waste her powers like this."


    Sanazar¡¯s body started to swell and expand once she said that.


    In a couple of seconds, she had transformed into a fearsome Flying Venom Dragon twelve meters long. Her strong hind legs kicked against the ground. Her body, covered with green viscous liquid, took to the skies with the help of her giant wings.


    Her massive and eye-catching body circled in the sky and quicklynded on the castle ruins where the fight was taking ce. The dragons¡¯ aura of might fell upon thend, causing the hybrid dragon to be scared out of its wits. It immediately crouched on the ground and shivered in fear.


    The brand of the dragons had been carved into the gic bloodlines of the hybrid dragons. When they faced a true dragon, the bloodline chains of absolute hierarchy would do their work, and these faux-dragons would behave even worse than some of the weakest creatures alive.


    The illusionist hadn¡¯t expected an ¡¯ordinary¡¯ little pseudo-adept to have the capacity and ability to have a Third Grade adept as her bodyguard. She immediately turned tail when she caught sight of Sanazar¡¯s trademark green body.


    Countless silhouette and mirror images of herself appeared in the castle ruins. Each one of them used a unique method of their own to escape into the distance.


    Some called upon wind elementium to cover their bodies and fly into the distance, while others threw out magical tools and summoned a wind bat to take them away from the ce, while some others applied wings of wind to themselves to soar as high as they could. There were even some images that quickly obscured their forms using Invisibility spells and ran into the ruins of the castle.


    Sanazar only paused for a moment when faced with the countless swarm of illusionists. A massive glob of green ¡¯spit¡¯ wasunched from her throat and instantly exterminated eight of the mirror images that weren¡¯t able to escape.


    It was apparent that the Flying Venom Dragon was mighty but could not see through these illusions on her own.


    "Over there, Lady Sanazar!" Greem hadn¡¯te along with his physical body. His form was a fire projection and had no offensive abilities whatsoever.


    However, this didn¡¯t stop him from using his elementium sight to gain perfect control over the situation of the battle.


    Pupupu.


    Six acid arrows shot out consecutively, all of them aimed at the same corner of the ruins.


    The concentrated acid instantly dyed the stone and rubble a green color. A thievish grey mouse peered out from within the cracks.


    Its ck eyes turned around humanly, and it quickly started running without another word.


    "I have already locked on to your scent, and you still try to run? Stay!" Sanazar knew that this was the real form of the female illusionist when she saw this.


    The Flying Venom Dragon roared and dove towards the ground.


    Its massive body collided with the unstable remains of the castle, rupturing an enormous hole in the side of the ruined architecture. A terrible howl rang out from within the dust. All the smoke started to disperse.


    The battle didn¡¯tst more than three seconds!


    Soon, only pained cries of agony came from inside the cloud of dust.


    The Flying Venom Dragon¡¯s massive body parted through the smoke and appeared before Greem. An old hag, her leg almost entirely bitten through, hung from Sanazar¡¯s devilish mouth. She was barely breathing.


    A witch?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes.

 Chapter 315 Backlash

    Chapter 315 Bacsh


    The enemy being a witch was outside of his expectations, but entirely within the bounds of reason!


    Greem almost mistook the old witch for Witch Liana from the Castle in the Sky, with her crooked spine, old face, and muddy eyeballs.


    After all, all the old witches seemed to look exactly this way!


    So ugly it was hard to even look straight at them.


    The pretty illusionist from earlier must have been a disguise of this old hag.


    Who knew that it was such an ugly and evil hag that hid underneath that beautiful appearance. Greem couldn¡¯t help but be disgusted by the thought.


    They had caught the culprit. What came next was Alice.


    It was evident that the danger from earlier had caused her to go berserk.


    Her eyes had rolled into her head, and she was still screaming in the sky. It seemed as if her Spirit was in a state of extreme chaos.


    The spatial energy within the spacestone continuously released, with her as the medium. If they forcefully stopped the channeling process, Alice would have to endure the tremendous bacsh from the spacestone. There was no way she could survive such a bacsh with her power.


    The spatial ripples were also a headache for Greem. He couldn¡¯t even get close this way!


    The only thing he could do was close his eyes and focus. He tried to call on Alice through their soul contract. Perhaps because their mental connection had been disconnected for an extended period, the reconnection process was exceedingly slow as well. The link was choppy and unstable. It seemed the spatial ripples were also a huge obstacle to their mentalmunication.


    "......Ma......ster......I feel...... awful......"


    "You are safe now, Alice. Stop using the power within the spacestone!"


    "......Master......I......really want......to......possess......such......power......¡±


    "There¡¯s a proper process to umting strength and power. A power that you can manage is the only true power! Bacsh is the only thing waiting for you if you try and climb all the way to the top in a single step!"


    "I......understa......nd"


    Silently, the spatial ripples weakened and disappeared.


    Alice¡¯s body trembled in midair when the ripples finally vanished. Her thin frame started to descend like a withered leaf in autumn.


    But a warm hand caught hers.


    "Come, let us return!"


    A brilliant magic array appeared in the air. Countless glowing runes surrounded the three of them. The white light grew even brighter until it was impossible to look at directly. A sharp explosion rang out, but the individuals had already disappeared from the ruins of the castle.


    ............


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    In a hidden room on the tenth floor.


    Dong. An explosion rang out. White light shed, and Sanazar, Greem, and Alice appeared in the middle of the room.


    The blinding white light slowly faded from the magic array at their feet. The spillover spatial energies crashed against the stone walls of the room, but the defensive arrays that surfaced quickly neutralized them.


    A Teleportation Array was a necessary facility for all adept¡¯s towers, especially with the rigidity and power of runic knowledge in the World of Adepts. It wasn¡¯t all that hard to make one. The downside was its cost. Every usage of the array would cost at least a thousand magic crystals. The further the teleportation distance, the more exponential an increase in the crystal consumption. Very few adepts used it to travel.


    Moreover, the authority over the controls of the Teleportation Array in an adept¡¯s tower remained in the hands of trusted adepts. First Grade adepts like Greem would never have a chance ofing into contact with it. If it weren¡¯t for Alice¡¯s unique situation that could provide the Sarubo n with yet another incredible adept, even Sanazar wouldn¡¯t have been in as much of a hurry to rush back by using the Teleportation Array.


    "Bring her down to treat her condition. I will arrange an advancement ceremony as soon as possible." Sanazar raised the golden birdcage to her eye andughed sinisterly, "Leave these two rodents with me! I¡¯ll be able to get something from their minds."


    The shrunken hybrid dragon and the old hag had been knocked unconscious and were lying within the birdcage. All sorts of strange and mysterious runes circled their bodies.


    Greem¡¯s fire projection bowed to Sanazar before leaving with Alice in his arms.


    In his dwelling on the seventh floor.


    The fire projection careful ced Alice on her bed before handing over the Decayer¡¯s core back to Greem. The projection then carefully merged with Greem himself.


    The fire projection was an alternative way of using fire spells that Greem had managed to discover recently. It was thanks to the sizeable amount of golem knowledge from the Silver Union that he had been able to do so.


    Sadly, the amount of energy that the fire projection could store was insufficient. It did not possess anybat ability like a golem, and could only serve as a weak fire clone of Greem himself. Still, some aspects of it were far superior to golems.


    Golems were, truthfully speaking, elementium lifeforms imbued with certain traits of golems. They might have possessed instincts, but notplete intelligence. They had to listen to their summoner¡¯s orders and could not act on their own initiative.


    The fire projection was more like Greem summoning a fire elementium and projecting part of his soul consciousness into the fire elementium. This spell allowed him to control it like he would a golem.


    Sadly, once the initial fire projection formed, it would create a self-sustaining cycle that was shut off from the outside world. It would no longer be able to draw upon the energies of the outside world to replenish its powers. Thus, the fire energy generated during the summoning of the fire projection determined the length of time that it couldst.


    The chip¡¯s data demonstrated that consuming one point of Spirit during the summoning of a fire projection could maintain its existence for ten hours. Of course, this calction did not includebat exhaustion. Greem¡¯s current Spirit was not precisely at seven points yet. If he used all of his powers, he could summon a clone that could rece him for up to three days.


    Greem believed that the continuous development of the Fire Projection spell would eventually allow him to create a fire clone that was as powerful as himself. Then, he would be able to fight two against one and fully gain an advantage in any battle he was involved in!


    Greem immediately started a full body check of Alice once he dissolved the fire projection. The results shocked him.


    Alice¡¯s condition was very odd. It seemed like she was merging with the spacestone sealed in her body.


    However, given the difference in their powers, the current situation didn¡¯t seem to be Alice actively merging with the spacestone; the spacestone was actively assimting Alice into itself.


    That was not a good thing!


    If Alice¡¯s Spirit was powerful enough to control the spacestone, she could have easily been the one to guide and host this merging process. She would then have been able to turn the strange spatial powers of the spacestone to her use. However, Alice was apparently at a disadvantage in the merging right now. She was the spacestone¡¯s target of assimtion.


    If this situation continued unchecked, the assimted Alice would probably lose her independent will and turn into some kind of strange space creature.


    "Chip, reflect the results of Alice¡¯s scan!" Greem frowned as he ordered.


    "Beep, instructions received."


    A soft beep rang in his mind, and a three-dimensional scan of Alice appeared in Greem¡¯s mind. Her abdomen was where the spacestone had been sealed. Strands and threads of foreign silver energy were spilling from that location and were quickly merging into Alice¡¯s bloodline.


    "Chip, can you analyze theponents and effects of this foreign energy?"


    "Beep. Foreign energyposition: Active spatial material.


    Effects are as analyzed:


    Toughness: 217(Comparable substance: Underground Wrought Gold: 167)


    Flexibility: 98(Comparable substance: Mithril: 139)


    Magic Conduction Rate: 82%(Comparable substance: Mithril: 91%)


    Attribute: Space (Noparable material)"


    Greem silently read through the results of the analysis. He couldn¡¯t help but be surprised by the power of the spacestone. No wonder this unique treasure could hardly be found within nes. Only trace amounts of it existed in the depths of the boundless universe.


    Disregarding everything else, just its ability to absorb and manipte spatial powers was a unique trait that belonged to it alone. It was such an unfathomable trait.


    What kind of power was spatial power?


    Most adepts only had a vague understanding on this point. They just knew how to utilize it, but it was hard for them to organize ande up with a proper knowledge system on space. Otherwise, there wouldn¡¯t be so few space adepts in the World of Adepts. Only those with the affinity and talent could manipte space.


    If this spacestone had been in Greem¡¯s hands, there was nothing much he could do other than record a bunch of tiresome statistics than he didn¡¯t know what to do with. Only a person with spatial affinity like Alice could cause such a remarkable change to ur in the spacestone.


    It was way too hard for Greem to judge whether this mutation was benign or malign with what knowledge he currently had. He thought for a bit longer and decided to wake Alice up first.


    A rune glowing with a faint red light appeared in the air as Greem drew with his fingers. The rune slowly descended into Alice¡¯s head.


    A short momentter, Alice¡¯s body started to move. Her eyes began to open.


    "What happened to me?" Alice quickly got up from the bed and looked around the room in confusion.


    "You identally absorbed the powers within the spacestone back in Wylick Castle. Now..." Greem caressed his chin as he tried to think of a way to exin the situation.


    "What now? Is there a problem?" Alice closed her eyes to sense. She felt an indescribable power coursing through her body. She was getting more and more powerful with every passing moment, "My condition right now seems to be very good!"


    Greem shook his head and helplessly said, "Don¡¯t get too excited. You should look at your stomach first!"


    Alice lifted her head doubtfully. She assessed Greem¡¯s expression but couldn¡¯t find anything false about it. A sick feeling rose in her heart.


    Rip.


    She tore her robe apart. She looked down and cried out in shock.


    Her stomach had be almost transparent!

 Chapter 316 Alices Choice

    Chapter 316 Alice¡¯s Choice


    Alice trembled as she extended her hand towards her stomach.


    It was almost as if there was a strange light source within it. Odd silver energy continuously flowed out from that part of her body. The silvery power seeped into her skin, flesh, bones, and tendons, dyeing every part of her body a silver-white.


    Alice could see through her semi-translucent stomach. Her intestines and stomach were exposed to the naked eye. There was also the liver, the galldder, and several other organs she couldn¡¯t name. These internal organs also started to turn transparent under the effect of this mysterious energy. Even her blood vessels and the blood surrounding her body parts had begun to be translucent.


    Alice¡¯s handnded on her stomach. She trembled in shock.


    Her hand went right into her stomach as if there was nothing there to stop it. She didn¡¯t feel anything.


    Her skin, her stomach, her flesh; everything was visible to her eyes, but she couldn¡¯t touch them. It was like those parts of her body were in a different dimension from the rest of her body.


    "I...what¡¯s happening to me?" Alice¡¯s face was flushed white. She turned and stammered a question at Greem.


    "Shouldn¡¯t I be the one asking you that question?" Greem frowned, "After all, spatial energy is your area of proficiency."


    Honestly, there was far too little reference knowledge when it came to time and space magic.


    Greem could only tell that this was a bacsh from Alice drawing upon the spacestone¡¯s power. However, it was hard for him to understand, describe, or exin the reasons and mechanisms behind the urrence.


    "What happens if this spatial energypletely pollutes me?" Alice quickly calmed down and asked the most pressing question.


    "ording to my evaluation, you would most likely be turned into a sort of space creature or spatial being!"


    "Then we must stop this merging process. I¡¯ll use my spells to remove the spacestone now!"


    "Don¡¯t be in too much of a hurry, Alice. I already checked your body for you earlier. Merging with the spacestone isn¡¯t necessarily a bad thing. With how much power you have umted, it would ordinarily take you another three to five years to advance to an adept. However, if you took proper advantage of this assimtion, you don¡¯t need to wait for that long! Advancement should happen soon!"


    "Really?"


    Alice immediately went from upset to excited after hearing Greem¡¯s words.


    Alice was finally unable to tolerate the puny fragility and weakness of an apprentice after all that had happened in the past couple of weeks!


    Adepts ruled this world. If Alice wanted to earn the necessary respect of those who roamed this world and protect her interests, she would have to advance to an adept.


    It was foolish to assume how influential Alice might have been from her position and status among the apprentice adepts. She received envious looks from everyone wherever she went. However, as long as she had yet to advance to an adept, she would not be able to enjoy real freedom and liberty.


    The massive difference in status between her and an adept was enough to cause her to stop breathing when she faced one. That was why there was no need to discuss dignity in a fight against an adept.


    That was also why she so desperately wanted to advance to an adept!


    "What do I need to do?" Alice¡¯s small face was agitated, but a passionate glow gleamed in her eyes.


    "Adjust your physical condition." Greem thought for a moment, "Don¡¯t interrupt the assimtion process with the spacestone. Try to take hold and gain control over this power. I will arrange your advancement ceremony as soon as possible. When that happens, you will take advantage of this spatial power toplete your advancement to an adept."


    "What about the side-effects of merging with the spacestone?"


    "An insignificant issue. As long as you can advance to an adept, there are plenty of ways to make up for it retroactively!"


    Alice gave it a little more thought before nodding in acknowledgment.


    Greem left the room to Alice and went to a smallb he had built.


    Many long tables and wooden boxes had been arranged in a row in the middle of the hall, along with several experiment tforms and a small alchemical tform.


    Greem no longer needed to head to the alchemicalb to create his lower-grade golems. He could quickly craft them right here in his room. This arrangement prevented schemers and enemies from being able to see the process and secrets of his golem creation!


    Greem walked to a stone tform and took off the ck cloth covering it. A fifty-centimeter tall ss bottleid before him. A mysterious blue solution filled the container. A pair of unique magical gemstones floated and bobbed about in the liquid.


    These were a pair of amber-colored magical gemstones the size of an egg. Dirt-yellow clusters of energy circled around the center of the of the gems and looked just like the eyes of a peerless wild beast that had just been opened wide.


    A numbing and paralyzing sensation would overwhelm the body even when looking through the solution and the container.


    A substantial and oppressive force of earth energy weighed down on Greem.


    The Eyes of Petrification!


    These eyes were the most significant spoils that Greem gained from killing Sak.


    Of course, Greem had also managed to discover some books and notes rting to bloodline evolutions in the opponent¡¯s storage ring. However, with theck of a sample of the giant serpent bloodline, he had no means of investigating or researching it, despite his desire for the strength of a bloodline power. Greem was much like a skilled cook without the necessary ingredients right now.


    These bloodlines were extremely important to the bloodline ns, and they kept a close guard on them. Any individuals that possessed bloodline powers were written down in the n¡¯s records the moment they were discovered. It didn¡¯t matter whether these people died in an ordinary fashion or an ident. Their n would always send people out to investigate and ensure that the n¡¯s bloodline wasn¡¯t leaked to outsiders.


    Greem¡¯s decision topletely cremate Sak was the right one.


    If he had kept Sak¡¯s body intact, the Ximan n would likely have even risked war to retrieve Sak¡¯s corpse.


    Thus, this pair of Eye of Petrifications could be considered the most valuable parts of his body. Greem had been researching magical statues and magical puppets. Hecked this sort of magic gemstone with unique abilities. Thus, he used an organic protective solution with biological properties to preserve the Eyes of Petrification in their best state.


    Ayer of red light appeared in Greem¡¯s eyes and cut off the petrification energies emitting from the Eyes of Petrification.


    Honestly, these energies had caused him tremendous trouble in the previous fight. If it weren¡¯t due to the me Fiend¡¯s exceptional resistance to all basic elementium, he would have been turned to stone as well.


    He might have won that fight and turned Sak into ground meat paste and grey ashes, but the extraction of the petrification energy had caused him a lot of trouble as well. The energies had even mixed with the abyssal aura at one point and created a massive mess for him to clean up.


    Greem had put a lot of thought into how to use this pair of eyes as well!


    He once again covered the container with the ck cloth, and the slight feeling of numbness faded away as well. He didn¡¯t look down on this ck cloth because of how inconspicuous it seemed. It was also a magic-enhanced item that obscured all traces of magic covered by the fabric.


    Greem walked to the second tform. The variety of metallic parts and mechanical constructs were strewn across this one. However, most of them were only semi-finished products. Even if someone were to put them all together, it was just enough to create the metallic arm of an animated statue.


    These pieces were Greem¡¯s handiwork and his preparation for the magic-powered war golem he was attempting to make.


    After this period of research and discovery, Greem had finally been able to gain a thorough understanding of the knowledge he had brought back from the Silver Union. He had also discovered some oddities because of this.


    Ancient adepts had defined the magic golems as metallic golems that could aid the adepts inbat when they first brought these entities into existence. The initial motivation for creating them had been for battle!


    This line of thought had caused all sorts of elegant and precise designs to be unsuitable for a golem. This reason was why magic golems were rarely ever outfitted with precise and delicateponents simr to that of a human¡¯s body. The adepts had made the magic golems to be as practical and straightforward as possible so that they could be qualified meat shields and vanguards.


    Ordinary metallic golems often only had two clumsy and dense metal pirs as legs. They had none of theplicated parts of a human body, such as a divide between the thigh, leg, feet, and the toes. The more precise and the more delicate the design of the metal golem, the weaker its resistance to blows. It was far more practical just to forge a lump of metal using a magical alloy with the highest toughness.


    This simplicity was why most of the metallic golems that Greem had seen were incapable ofplex battle techniques. They could only roll over and crush enemies with their imprable bodies and terrifying weight.


    The adepts weren¡¯t necessarily wrong in their thought process!


    After all, they only trusted their own powers. Creating golems was just to provide themselves with a way to be covered while they cast their spells. Most adepts built their golems per their needs, and never honestly treated the golems as an aid nor dedicated their efforts to research and refine their potential.


    Greem took a wooden box from a corner of the stone tform. He opened the box and revealed five crude wooden golems ced within.


    He took one of them out and assessed it.


    The wooden golem had with the rough anatomy of a head, a torso, and four limbs. All of this was carved out of hemlock timber. The different parts of the body had been fixed together with iron nails. Coiled wireposed the more delicateponents such as the hands and feet.


    Greem even created a pair of wings out of wood kes and snowrabbit fur on the back of the golem. He had merely pinned the fur to the back side.


    Frankly speaking, Greem¡¯s woodwork skills were non-existent.


    ording to the golem creation manuals, a proper wooden golem had to be carefully carved by a professional workman, using specialized timber, to be considered a qualified and epted product. The wooden golem in front of Greem had clearly not undergone any method of polishing either. The surface of the wood was rough, and a crack had appeared on the right leg. Anyone would be able to tell that this was a defective product.


    The creator of this golem had used too much strength when pinning the wire feet into its legs.


    Greem could only shake his head in disappointment at his craftsmanship.


    Well. It was meant for practice anyway. It was okay, even if it was a little shoddy!

 Chapter 317

    Chapter 317 Golem Lifeform


    Greem pressed the wooden box slightly, and a hiddenpartment appeared.


    A ck stone rested silently within.


    Greem picked up the stone with his fingers and brought it before his eyes. The chip¡¯s powerful magnification and scanning abilities caused the ck rock to berger andrger in his vision.


    The first things that he saw were the fine lines and patterns carved into the stone. They circled and ovepped with each other, connected through the borate runic drawings. This method had created several small arrays on the item. Once wandering elementium in the air came into contact with the stone, it would merge with it and light up one or two of the arrays.


    The reason Greem could see this was thanks to the chip¡¯s powerful ability to magnify the image of the stone by a hundred times. Without chip¡¯s aid, Greem would only have been able to see it sparkling slightly without any direct way of observing the mechanisms behind it.


    Golem stones. These were specialized materials that the Silver Union had restricted from being sold to the outside. They were used to activate golem constructs temporarily. It was a consumable that esoteric adepts tended to exhaust at a tremendous rate!


    The golem stone in front of Greem was only asrge as a segment of his finger. It could only be used to activate some small golem constructs. He needed a mechanical heart if he wanted to activate arge or mid-sized golem construct like the metallic war golem.


    Greem wouldn¡¯t have received this particr restricted item if he hadn¡¯t visited the adept¡¯s tower belonging to a Senate member.


    "Chip, make sure to record everything!" Greem calmly ordered.


    "Beep. Fifth experiment file for the golem stone has been constructed. Beginning dynamic data capture.¡±


    Greem crushed the golem stone without hesitation.


    A sizeable cloud of white smoke blew out from the remains in a matter of moments.


    The white smoke seemed to possess intelligence. It didn¡¯t scatter around aimlessly. Instead, the smoke gathered together and hovered in the air. It soon discovered the existence of the wooden golem. The cloud of smoke started to stir and circle before finally diving into the body of the wood golem.


    The next second, the wooden golem suddenly sat up from the stone tform, as if it were a newly revived living being. It started coughing severely.


    At the same time, the various arrays that Greem had drawn onto the wooden golem¡¯s body using invisible ink started to glow and surface on the golem¡¯s brown body.


    Most of them were lit up.


    Of course, there were exceptions!


    The crack on the wooden golem¡¯s right leg had damaged the magic array on that spot. Crackling sounds rang out, and ck spot started to spout from the golem¡¯s right leg.


    The golem rose to life and struggled as it stood upon the stone tform.


    It was evident that the terrible damage to its right leg caused its movements to be slow and dull.


    Honestly, Greem¡¯s craftsmanship was way too terrible!


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the wire hands, the wooden frame wings or the body fixed together with iron nails. The entire thing looked like the casual handiwork of a toddler. It was so crude that it was hard to take it seriously.


    However, the activation effects of the strange white smoke seemed to improve all of these!


    The wooden golem finally stood up. It tried moving its creaking wrists, neck, and shoulder as it put an arm against its chest to bow at Greem, "So d to meet you, my master! Billy, the wooden golem, reporting for duty!"


    There was a young voice with a hint of childishness to it.


    It wasn¡¯t the first time he had seen such ¡¯trash¡¯ made of wood scraps, iron nails, wires, and clothe to life. However, the elementary intelligence that they possessed truly filled Greem¡¯s heart with a strange and surreal feeling. Their intelligence was equivalent to an ordinary human after all.


    What a weird world to live in!


    "Give me a report on your body¡¯s condition!" Greem gave his first order to Billy the wooden golem.


    "Er..." Billy tried to move every part of his body. He even pped the two ¡¯wings¡¯ on his back to examine their condition.


    "Master, this body is pretty shitty."


    "There¡¯s something wrong with my heart. It¡¯s making it hard for me to breath." The wooden golem hit its chest with its ¡¯iron hands¡¯ and wheezed.


    Greem shifted his gaze to the golem¡¯s chest. He could see a magic crystal embedded in the array underneath the wooden shell. The formations circted power at an incredible speed and continuously drew energy from the crystal into the runic circuits.


    However, the parts where the arrays were connected were obstructed. Some arrays had power, while some other remained dim. All of this caused Billy¡¯s movements to be clumsy and choppy.


    "Beep. A scan of the energy control core has beenpleted! Thirty-seven points of failure discovered. Three are a result of technique failure. Thirty-three points are a result of shoddy workmanship, one is a result of deterioration of the material. Final assessment: 28% energy efficiency rate."


    "How much would the energy efficiency rate increase by if the craftsmanship was improved?"


    "Beep. After eliminating all material and crafting failures, the estimated energy efficiency rate could reach 57.33%."


    "How is it so low? The energy efficiency rate is barely half!" Greem asked in confusion.


    "Inferior choice of material caused severe energy overflow. To increase the energy efficiency rate of the golem, the following materials are rmended for the process of crafting: Ent¡¯s Core, magical alloy, mithril......"


    Damn! You get what you pay for!


    Everyone knew this.


    But wasting all of these precious resources on a practice golem was too extravagant.


    Greem quickly rejected the chip¡¯s suggestion.


    "Let me see you fly!" Greem ordered.


    Billy stood straight. The pair of ugly wings started to beat rapidly. Cold winds blew towards Greem as the wooden golem slowly hovered above the tform.


    Greem saw that the light from the wooden golem¡¯s energy core had increased by several levels through the use of his elementium sight. Some of the runic arrays that had conflicting energy circuits started to glow with blinding radiance.


    "Billy, stop flying right now!" Greem immediately gave themand when he saw where things were heading.


    Sadly, it was toote.


    A small explosion urred, and thick ck smoke immediately started to rise from within Billy¡¯s wooden body. Fine cracks had also appeared on its chest because of the st.


    "Aaaaaah......I......can¡¯t......continue anymore......I¡¯m going......to die!"


    The golem that had risen to Greem¡¯s eye level paused and distorted amid its screams and cries of terror. It then plunged downwards.


    Greem quickly extended a hand and caught it.


    The wooden golem coughed a few more times with its broken and twisted body before utterly stalling. The strange white smoke came out of the golem¡¯s body once more and dispersed in the air.


    Wooden golem Billy had indeed died!


    A golem lifeform with elementary intelligence had reached the end of its lifespan in less than a hundred and twenty-six seconds!


    The primary cause of its death was the poor craftsmanship of its wooden body. If Greem had been slightly more careful in creating this wooden golem, he might have been able to obtain the wood golem Billy as his subordinate.


    However, a golem with a crude body like this one had nobat ability or special powers. Greem would even have had to switch out the magic crystal in its frame periodically. Honestly, there was absolutely no point in having a low-level golem lifeform like this one!


    Greem wasn¡¯t a kid that needed a tool for apanion. He didn¡¯t feel a thing at the death of an artificial golem lifeform like this one!


    Greem quickly gathered and collected part of the white smoke before itpletely dispersed.


    He had gained aplete understanding of the foundational knowledge of golem creation at this point. The only thing he had yet to figure out was the mechanisms of the golem stone and theposition of the white smoke.


    How did it seep into the golem¡¯s body? How did it then take control of the runic system? More importantly, where did the elementary intelligencee from?


    These were the actual core questions that Greem was trying to figure out with his repeated experiments!


    He had already experienced a nar war. He knew that the true nature of a nar war was exploitation and robbery!


    Why did the adepts put so much effort into looking for multiple ne world coordinates in the infinite gxy? Was it to drop by and say hello to the locals? Was it to drink some coffee, talk about the weather, and exchange their ideas about life?


    Only weaklings would have such childish and idealistic dreams!


    What drove the adepts to cross hundreds of thousands of billions of kilometers through the universe, risk the danger of suppression from the nar will, and endure the siege of the locals were the attractive resources and the mountains of ves that these other nes had to offer!


    Once they conquered a ne, all of the resources and poption of the ne were at the behest of the adepts.


    If such wealth and resources fell into the hands of one adept, it would allow them to rise to power quickly. They no longer needed to travel tens of millions of kilometers in pursuit of small amounts of resources. Nor would they need to explore fearsome ruins to earn magic crystals for their research purposes.


    Truthfully speaking, most of an adept¡¯s life was exhausted on their journey over the continent to gather knowledge and resources!


    To avoid this from happening, they had to have sufficient strength to conquer a ne.


    Individual strength was one way to do it!


    The strength of a group was another!


    For Greem to invade a physical ne with what little power he had at this point was a suicidal act!


    Even the weakest material ne was home to domineering individuals with Third or Fourth Grade strength. They might not be able topare with the powerhouses of the World of Adepts, but they were more than enough to crush a small First Grade like Greem.


    Thus, Greem¡¯s personal goal was to rise to Second Grade.


    Once he reached Second Grade, he would have reached the lowest possible required power level to invade a lesser ne!


    And his most significant aid in the invasion would undoubtedly be the economical but powerful golem army. Only these loyal elementium lifeforms and golem lifeforms would never betray him. They were the only ones he could use without any reservation.


    For an extended period of time after this, Greem nned to enhance the strength and numbers of his golems apart from his own powers.


    Mary, Alice, and Snox were champions that Greem was trying his best to win to his side.


    It wasn¡¯t possible to conquer a massive nar world with only a single person¡¯s existence. Greem needed to find some worthwhile and trustworthy assistants!

 Chapter 318

    Chapter 318 Advancement Ceremony


    Greem ced the broken wooden golem back on the stone tform. What came next was aplete and detailed dissection.


    Since it was hard to decipher the secrets contained within the golem stone directly, Greem had to approach the subject from another angle. He examined the traces left behind by the white smoke and saw what mysterious changes had happened within the wooden golem after it awakened its elementary intelligence.


    If the wooden golem¡¯s simple body were hardware, the white smoke was the software system that managed the entire thing. Greem was curious about the nature of the white smoke. Was it a magical effect, or the soul of a lifeform that had undergone memory washing and treatment?!


    Greem had already suspected this to be the case when he first tested the golem stone. It was very likely that the white smoke wasposed of soul fragments that the Silver Union had extracted from certain intelligent creatures. It would have to be humanoid creatures for them to achieve such levels of intellect.


    For example, the native ¡¯humans¡¯ of lesser nes.


    The Silver Union¡¯s reported internal price for a low-level golem stone was fifteen magical crystals. In truth, its price reached upwards of forty magic crystals in some ck markets. Greem had done a simple calction. Because native human souls were often weaker than the humans of the World of Adepts, sessfully crafting a low-level golem stone required three to five native human souls to be sessfully crafted.


    These native humans from lesser nes were not worth anything at all. It was easy to purchase thousands of ordinary ves with a single magic crystal.


    Sadly, only ves with unique abilities and unique talents were worth bringing back to the World of Adepts. Otherwise, their worth might not even pay for the cost of transporting them using the ultra-long-range teleportation arrays. That was why it was rare to seebat ves from other nes in the World of Adepts.


    Very rare, but not wholly impossible.


    There were master architects and cksmiths of the dwarves, the gourmets of the halflings, the beauties of the elves, the fairies of the Fairy World. Some powerful adepts even kept subi, lust demons, dark elves, and other ves of the sort in their towers.


    These quality ves were favorite products, even in the World of Adepts. If an adept n discovered these particr races within the lesser nes that they conquered, they would gain immense wealth through the sale of ves.


    However, the majority of the poption in these lesser nes were stillprised of native lifeforms with absolutely no unique talents. These people were not worth anything. Selling them off in the World of Adepts wouldn¡¯t even earn enough magic crystals to pay their transportation fee. Thus, these individuals were often forced into the mines to dig for rare ores and materials to maximize the profits of the World of Adepts.


    If the Silver Union were able to set up a production facility in their lesser nes and convert the massive poption ¡¯resource¡¯ into a more convenient form for transportation, they would undoubtedly be able to make massive profits. It was even more so if they could use the resource in the creation of a more valuable alchemical item. For example, golem stones.


    After all, massacres were forbidden in the World of Adepts. Such an evil, inhumane operation could only ur on the unsupervised lesser nes!


    Greem finally discovered signs of soul possession in the wooden golem with the help of the chip. This evidence indirectly proved his suspicions.


    The Silver Union had always conducted savage and bloody business in the lesser nes they owned!


    Of course, Greem did not intend to criticize or use them of any wrongdoing.


    After all, every single n did something simr. The ns only differed in the extent to which they did it!


    Perhaps it was because of such actions that other nes considered the World of Adepts a force of evil, and the adepts hailed as heartless creatures that haunted the dreams of the living.


    He might have been able to understand the mechanisms andposition of the golem stone, but this information wasn¡¯t much help to Greem. After all, the golem stone was merely a container. Most of its functions and effects came from the white soul smoke contained within it. And Greem was not very well acquainted with soul studies. He still had no idea how the esoteric adepts had extracted the soul, nor how they refined it, cleansed it, or stored it within the golem stone.


    These topics were often the domain of necromancers! They were the ones who were masters of soul studies!


    Could the Silver Union have hired arge group of necromancers to work for them? Or had they invented a device that could carry out theplex and delicate tasks involved in the process?


    There were too many possibilities. Greem would need to sneak into the Silver Union¡¯s lesser nes and take a look at their golem stone production facilities if he wanted to know more about them.


    However, the various organizations had always kept a tight grip on the lesser nes under their control. It was impossible to sneak into one without joining their organization or signing some form of soul contract.


    It was evident from how the Sarubo n treated the Knight¡¯s ne.


    Greem was already a core adept of the Sarubo n. He had also contributed a great deal during the nar war. However, the ne coordinates had been ripped out of his brain the moment he chose to exit the knight¡¯s ne.


    Even with the chip¡¯s help, Greem still couldn¡¯t recall the position of the ne. In clearing his memory, the Sarubo n no longer needed to worry about the coordinates leaking to the outside world.


    Greem had killed two adepts in a fight in the forest back then. He had managed to find some notes and books in their possession. After reading through their contents and doing some organization, Greem once again confirmed his future development path.


    He had already elementiumized his body, but this was only semi-elementiumization. If Greem wanted to reach for Second Grade, he needed to prepare for spirit elementiumization.


    The chip estimated that Greem would have to undergo a hundred years of umtion before he couldplete his spirit elementiumization. Moreover, he needed to be in specific environments such as volcanos during this long process of elementiumization.


    Thus, Greem had ceaselessly studied the maps of the Zhentarim area to find a location suitable for his hermitage. However, before he could go ahead and start worrying about that, he had to deal with Alice¡¯s problem.


    After all, Alice¡¯s talent as a Witch of Fate was something that he prioritized as well. If Alice seeded, she would y a vital part in the ns for his life!


    ............


    Greem received a magical message from Keoghan the moment he exited theb.


    The n had prepared the resources for Alice¡¯s advancement. The ceremony could start any time she was ready. Of course, Greem would have to pay for all this!


    Soon, someone knocked on his door.


    Greem opened the door to find a male pseudo-adept subordinate to Keoghan. It was Maiguta.


    A group of adepts followed behind him, carrying a variety of boxes of different sizes.


    "Sir Greem, these are the advancement resources that Sir Keoghan asked me to send to you. Please find them enclosed!"


    Greem could almost feel his eyes watering when he took the list from Maiguta.


    Fate was such a bitch sometimes!


    His advancement wasplete torture. It was arduous and trying. A single and unfortunate slight turn in the series of events and he would have been the victim of a blood ceremony. On the other hand, Alice only needed to stay in her room and enjoy life. She could rack up the nutrition and gain some weight. Her ¡¯master¡¯ Greem would take care of everything for her advancement.


    This disparity was a difference in their fates!


    Greemmented for a moment, then regained hisposure. He started to go through the list and examined the goods before signing the receipt and sending the apprentice adepts away.


    It was a considerable sum of money that he had spent. The instant he ced his emblem on that receipt, his assets had shrunk by one third. Who made Alice his ¡¯personal asset¡¯? This arrangement was why the Sarubo n had no obligation to take on this expensive advancement fee for him.


    That said, Greem wouldn¡¯t allow it even if Adept Keoghan wanted to take on this cost for Alice.


    Alice belonged to him first, before she could be considered as a Sarubo n adept.


    That was something that Greem would always insist upon!


    The other apprentices under Greem had caught wind of the news and had hurried over to see him.


    Their arrival was timely. Greem had wanted to leave the treatment and processing of these resources to them.


    Saro was a rare fruit from the primal jungles. Consumption of the fruit would strengthen an individual¡¯s vitality. Moreover, there were no side effects to use.


    Primal Worm was a bizarre worm cultivated with the use of magic. It could noticeably increase mental tenacity when eaten during advancement and was considered a rare resource often used during an advancement.


    Rancid Potion was a potion that increased Spirit through the burning and exhaustion of life force and potential.


    The Water of Life was a miraculous item of the elves of other nes that replenished the life force lost from the advancement ceremony.


    ......


    ......


    There were all sorts of things in the resources sent over by the Sarubo n. Every one of them was a precious resource with particr uses. They were all exceptionally beneficial to an advancing adept.


    All of the resources had been sealed within a unique magical array to prevent them from losing their efficacy over time. When the items were ready to be used, they would undo the seals and process the materials with a specific methodology.


    Greem left this arduous work to his apprentices.


    He, on the other hand, put in all his effort to calcte the odds of sess for Alice¡¯s advancement!


    ording to all the information and data that he had, with the effects of the auxiliary resources taken into ount, the chip projected the sess rate to be 67.71%.


    Alice¡¯s had superior talent, the numerous resources that she had ess to, and the good fortune of the Witch of Fate. Even all of this added together barely pushed her advancement sess rate above the halfway mark.


    That alone was enough to demonstrate the difficulty of advancing from a pseudo-adept to an adept!


    When they had prepared everything, and Alice had adjusted her condition and mental state, she took all the prepared resources and got ready to enter the hidden ceremony room.


    Alice had put on a long robe to prevent anyone from discovering the odd condition of her body. She didn¡¯t want anyone to see her dematerialized stomach.


    She received Kodar¡¯s, Meryl¡¯s, Am¡¯s, Toril¡¯s and Lena¡¯s blessings.


    "You can do this, Big Sis!" As one of the only two pseudo-adepts subordinate to Greem, he was the first to give his blessings.


    "You will definitely be a beautiful witch!" Meryl softly whispered into Alice¡¯s eyes.


    The advancement to adept was also a refinement of the core human existence. This opportunity could allow Alice to break through fate¡¯s seal and enable her to break free of the curse that had forever sealed her body when she was eight.


    "Big Sis, I¡¯ll have to call you Lady Adept the next time we meet." Am giggled.


    "I believe in you," Toril shouted from aside.


    "You must seed!" An envious but passionate light gleamed in Lena¡¯s eyes.


    One more person had followed behind the apprentices. It was Snox.


    This fellow brought a wooden carving of a female goblin for Alice. He even insisted that this was the goblins¡¯ good luck charm.


    However, advancement was a significant event. Any unknown items that could disrupt or affect the ceremony couldn¡¯t be allowed in. So, Greem immediately confiscated the carving the moment Snox took it out.


    Alice stood by the door and took a look at everyone before cing her gaze on Greem.


    "I will wait for you!" Greem¡¯s blessing was direct and straightforward.


    Alice nodded then turned and walked into the room with determined steps.

 Chapter 319

    Chapter 319 The Art of Divination


    There was an empty arcane room.


    There was nothing else here apart from a remarkable and mysterious array on the floor.


    "Not even a chair to sit on."


    Alice pouted as she grumbled. She slowly walked before the array and bent to examine the patterns.


    It was a purely defensive array. Once it was activated, the entire room would be on lockdown. Alice didn¡¯t need to worry about any interruption from the outside while shemenced with her advancement!


    Alice inserted her magical emblem into the array. In doing so, she could obscure everything. Even Greem, the owner of the room, would no longer be able to sense or see what happened in here.


    Everyone had their secrets. Even if Alice had already epted Greem as her master, that didn¡¯t mean that she would give up her rights and privacy.


    The defensive array slowly started to activate. Faint light surfaced on the walls, the ceiling, and the floor. The room severed all connection to the outside world.


    Alice sat crossed-legged in middle of the room. She started taking out all of the resources and items she needed to use for the ceremony and ced them by her side. With her smarts and a powerful memory, she could instantly recall the position of all the items with absolutely no errors.


    These items were all ced within her reach to make it convenient for her when she needed them.


    She had ced the consumables mostly to her right. There were a total of seventeen or eighteen different herbs and medicines. They were either used to increase Physique, enhance Spirit, or to calm her mind. Every single item and potion had a unique application. All of them could increase her chances of a sessful advancement.


    The items ced in front of her were magical tools that were rted to the ceremony. The most obvious one was a crystal altar. The other things were situated around it.


    Adepts were an arcane group whose origins were full of primal, savage, and ignorant voodoo practices. Tens of thousands of years of development had passed, but some of the details still retained the style and trappings of their ancient arts.


    The adepts of the past had conducted extraordinarily bloody and cruel human sacrifices. They killed the people of opposing tribes and bathed in their blood to obtain strange but powerful abilities.


    The adepts were a lot more civilized now and used all sorts of materials to rece the blood and flesh of living beings. However, the ritual was fundamentally still the same.


    Restoration food and potions were on her right.


    After all, the advancement ceremony was a long and trying process for most people. Even those who managed to advance would be utterly exhausted, if not grievously wounded. Thus, the post-ceremony recovery was something that needed attention as well!


    Having ced everything where it was supposed to be, Alice softly removed her long robe and revealed her body.


    The transparent effect had already extended to her chest.


    She could still sense the parts of her body below her chest. She could also move her body as she wanted to. However, she couldn¡¯t see those parts of her body nor touch them with her hand. The skin near her chest had also be semi-translucent. She could see the blood vessels, muscles, and the heart inside her body.


    The energy pollution from the spacestone was still ongoing. In fact, there were signs of the contamination speeding up.


    Alice had no reference for what she would be after being entirely polluted by the spacestone. However, ever since she received her magical tattoo, the aura of intangible fate had be increasingly clear.


    Every time she wondered about the nature of the spacestone¡¯s pollution of her body, a terrible feeling would course through her body. Alice even vaguely sensed that this was the World itself rejecting her existence.


    Perhaps this was the most obvious hint that fate could give her!


    Since she was confident that this change was a malignant one, there was no need to hesitate. Alice had to use this advancement ceremony to stop this change to her state of existence.


    Thus, Alice started to feast without hesitation.


    Saro, Primal Worm, Underground Fire Pulp, Vurg Potion, Purple Watershroom.


    She ate all sorts of things and couldn¡¯t help but let out a burp after she finished.


    The powerful effects of the various items started to course through her body, stimting her physical body as well as her mind. Alice gripped her fists and silently endured the barrage of life force that charged and crashed through her entire body.


    Her blood started to boil.


    Alice¡¯s face flushed bright red. Drops of sweat flowed down her head. She seemed like she was at her limits.


    She had been disadvantaged because of her weak Physique. Even with so many resources to strengthen herself, the flood of energy within her body had already exceeded the limits of her control by far. Thus, the sudden boost in her body¡¯s fundamental attributes not only provided her with a false sense of endless power, but they also continuously damaged and repaired her internal organs.


    Alice endured the ferocious pounding upon her body and grabbed a bag full of magical crystal dust. She spread the dust and drew a magic circle with it. She cautiously ced the crystal altar within the circle and lit up four candles on each corner of it.


    When she had prepared everything, Alice knelt before the altar. She silently started to reach for theplex and profound Law of Fate.


    The magic circle was to cut off the interior from the outside.


    The circle had no start nor end. It represented permanence. The inside edge of the circle was considered a ce beyond ordinary time or space. The altar within the circle had its own temporal and spatial structure.


    Alice had the bloodline of the Witch of Fate. Her power didn¡¯te from some deity or powerful adept. Instead, it was from the Branch of Fate that had ultimately merged with the narws of the World of Adepts.


    More frankly, the bloodline powers of the Witch of Fate came from Zithermoon ¡¯Meisa¡¯.


    Once upon a time, the Witch Queen led thirteen powerful witches and together they created the Northern Witches, forging a ce for themselves beyond the cold and destend of ice and snow in the north of the continent. They had cut through jungles and paved new roads. Countless witches had paid with their lives to wrestlend from the hands of forest creatures, magical creatures, mutated monsters, and corruptors. They erected one adept¡¯s tower after another and eventually, the Kingdom of the Northern Witches came to be.


    Then, the ¡¯Upheaval of the Adepts¡¯ happened. All Great Adepts above Fourth Grade were forced to leave the ne, never to set foot on the World of Adepts again.


    The world consciousness of the World of Adept had suitably opened up some of its worldws in exchange for the adepts¡¯ departure. Great Adepts that had reached certain heights of power could leave their markings within thews of the world.


    To ensure that the legacy of the Northern Witches would always exist, some witches chose to stay when the Witch Queen left with her entourage of powerful subordinates. These witches merged their body and soul with thews of the world.


    In doing so, the legacies of the thirteen witch branches became part of the world¡¯sws. They no longer needed to worry about their legacy vanishing!


    Thus, if Alice wanted to advance, she definitely shouldn¡¯t go down the path of an ordinary adept. She shouldn¡¯t umte knowledge, then strengthen herself, then form her adept core andmunicate with the narws. The witches walked apletely different path of inheritance!


    Thews of the world contained the knowledge and power they required. What they needed to do was use their bloodline to win the approval of thews and receive recognition from the world consciousness.


    As such, Alice prayed zealously before taking out a crystal dagger from the pile of items. She stabbed it into her open palm, then extended her arm forward and let the blood drip onto the altar to paint it scarlet.


    A bright silver radiance covered the entire altar the moment her blood fell onto it.


    The magic circle made of crystal dust caught on fire as well.


    Countless silver chains reached out of nowhere and started to wrap themselves around Alice¡¯s half-vanished body.


    Alice trembled while her body started to shake intensely.


    A flood of knowledge and witchcraft legacy started to surge into Alice¡¯s mental world through the materialized chains ofws. The speed at which they moved seemed like it would rend Alice apart!


    "Aaaaaah!"


    Alice¡¯s frail body shook and shivered. A trail of blood streaked from her eyes. Her facial muscles distorted from the endless agony.


    A gigantic scale forged of concentrated silver light slowly appeared in her mind. It stood before her like a sacred and magnificent entity.


    An unusuallymanding voice boomed out in the air.


    "Fate! ! ! Fate! ! ! Fate! ! !"


    "Obey thews of fate. Abide by the ancient covenants. I shall present unto you the legacy of fate.


    "And what do you intend to exchange for this legacy?"


    Countless books and knowledge crystals appeared on one side of the gigantic scale when the voice spoke. The scale instantly fell towards one end, leaving the other hanging high in the air.


    Alice¡¯s mental projection appeared before the scale. She looked at the massive hill-like scale and spoke firmly, "I am willing to exchange my everything for it."


    The very next second, her frail body appeared on the other side of the imbnced scale.


    Sadly, her existence was like a feather. It didn¡¯t even shift the scale by a tiny bit.


    "Your power is insufficient to take away all this knowledge, therefore..."


    As the booming voice spoke once more, the books and knowledge crystals on the other end of the scale started to decrease at a visible rate.


    The massive scale remained unmoved after removing half of the items.


    They continued to decrease.


    Every time one of them was removed, Alice¡¯s heart would bleed in pain, but there was nothing she could do about it.


    Soon, only a dozen books remained of the mountain of books.


    Only now did the scale tremble. The two sides started to shift.


    Eleven books.


    The needle at the middle of the scale started moving.


    Eight.


    The needle was still moving, but there was still a sizeable distance before it reached equilibrium.


    Four.


    The needle slowly neared bnce.


    Quick, quick, quick. Please.


    Alice gripped her fist tight and willed the scales to tip faster.


    Finally, a blinding silver light shed within Alice¡¯s mental space when the scale returned to equilibrium.


    "Congrattions, candidate of fate. You have sessfully obtained a gift from fate. Please ept it graciously!"


    At this point, only a single book remained on the other end of the scale.


    The Art of Divination!

 Chapter 320

    Chapter 320 Strange Alice


    "The Art of Divination?" Greem shouted in surprise, "You said you gave up all your powers and only got that one book in exchange?"


    "This was what you said, wasn¡¯t it!" Alice spoke as if this was as it should be, "The Witch of Fate follows the path that fate guides her to. Am I wrong in doing so?"


    "But I didn¡¯t ask you to give up everything you have, did I?" Greem felt like he was going mad, "You...you even gave up your spatial talent! What are you going to use topete for the title of Witch of Fate?"


    "Fate, of course!" Alice was still smiling happily, "You still have no idea, do you? My divination is really urate!"


    Grem wentpletely silent.


    If he had previously thought of those divining fellows as scammers and fakes, he now thought of them as a group of madmen. Of course, that included the idiot in front of him!


    He hadn¡¯t expected this to happen.


    Alice had sacrificed everything she had during her advancement to obtain fate¡¯s favor.


    And in the process, she lost everything she had, including her spatial talent!


    She had sessfully be an adept.


    However, she had lost all of her powers, and was left with ¡¯The Art of Divination¡¯. God knew what it was useful for.


    It was true that Greem had initially nned for Alice to continuously strengthen her talent as the Witch of Fate and wield that as her primary profession. Still, that should havee after the Battle of Fate!


    Alice should have been looking to improve herbat prowess and then look into changing sses after winning the Battle of Fate. That was the most secure path to victory. What was she going to use to beat her well-preparedpetitors now that she had lost all her powers?


    A witch that only knew how to divine!


    Greem covered his face with his palm. The more he thought about it, the more his head hurt.


    God, are you kidding me? My spacestone! My initial investments! All of this! Gone down the drain.


    Perhaps because she could see Greem¡¯s resentful look, the joyful and gleeful Alice quickly cowered. She awkwardly moved to Greem¡¯s side, grabbed his robe and started shaking it, "Don¡¯t you worry, my divination is incredibly urate. I will be able to protect myself then!"


    Greem sighed helplessly. He finally shifted his attention to the divination arts that Alice had repeatedly mentioned.


    "What kind of ability does your divination have at this point?"


    "It can answer some of my questions, and...it can help me...find things!" Alice stuttered as she spoke.


    Oh, as expected, what a powerful ability!


    Greem wanted to sit down and cry out loud now.


    "Then, tell me. Where is the legendary ¡¯Pendulum of Misfortune¡¯ located!" Greem thought for a moment and once again looked at Alice with his eyes full of hope and expectations.


    Fine. Fine. It was alright if Alice lost herbat ability. She had lost that. If she could be an all-seeing prophet and a living encyclopedia because of this, the price she paid might not have been too excessive!


    "The ¡¯Pendulum of Misfortune¡¯? That¡¯s a magical tool that once belonged to Great Adept Quise! I can¡¯t find an item of this Grade with my current ability!" Alice couldn¡¯t help but roll her eyes.


    "Holy Agate?"


    "Nope..."


    "Dragon¡¯s Tooth?"


    "Nope..."


    ......


    ......


    "How much longer can I live."


    "I don¡¯t know..."


    ......


    ......


    "What¡¯s Lady Sanazar¡¯s favorite food?"


    "I don¡¯t know..."


    ......


    ......


    "Where do I need to go find a volcanic world suited for my purposes?"


    "Ailovis!"


    The two went back and forth.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was a legendary top-tier magical tool or gear that only existed in ancient records, Alice just shook her head in ignorance. Greem lowered his standards again and again. As long as the questions he asked involved any Great Adepts, Alice¡¯s answers would be a firm ¡¯no idea¡¯.


    Just as he was about to give up, he took the opportunity to ask the question that had gued him for so long. And Alice was unexpectedly able to give him an answer.


    Ailovis?


    What the heck is that? Why have I never heard of it!


    Thankfully, the benefit of having the chip was its ability to help him ¡¯recall¡¯ anything that he couldn¡¯t remember or bother to remember.


    Ailovis. Ailovis.


    Right. It appeared to be a rtively well-known hazard zone in the east of the Zhentarim area. That ce was close to the ck Forest. Magical creatures often came out of the woods to harass and assault humans. It was why the location wasbeled and listed as a perilous ce.


    Why would there be an underground volcano there?


    It was important to note that adept ns of all sizes had already imed most of the resource-rich areas in the center of the continent. A ce with an underground volcano was considered as a natural resource site. The geographical location meant that rare resources not to be found on the surface world would even appear there.


    If there truly was an underground volcano in Ailovis, there was no reason that there wasn¡¯t an adept n already stationed there!


    Greem betrayed a doubtful expression and couldn¡¯t help but grab a map of Zhentarim from the table. He started studying the map.


    "Are you sure the underground volcano I¡¯ve been looking for exists there?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask again.


    Perhaps because his question was far too formal, Alice¡¯s body started to shake. Her two purple eyes became pitch-ck. It was as if she had turned into apletely different person. Her emotionless face spoke with a sinister voice, "Go! Go there! You will find what you want there..."


    Having finished speaking, Alice shivered and regained her consciousness.


    "I...what happened to me? I...what did I say just now?"


    Greem noticed that the ck had faded from Alice¡¯s eyes. Her blinking eyes were once again lively.


    "No...nothing at all." Greem smiled as he consoled Alice.


    However, that wispy and ghostly voice still echoed in his mind.


    "Chip, did you manage to record the situation earlier?" Greem silently said in his mind.


    "Beep. Recordingplete!"


    "Do you have anything to report from your analysis?"


    "Beep. There are the following possibilities: the true form of the Witch of Fate 87%, nned assimtion 11%, spirit possession1%. Remaining possibilities only have less than 1% probability ofing true and will not be disyed at the moment."


    The actual form of the Witch of Fate?


    If Greem wasn¡¯t mistaken, he hadn¡¯t felt a single trace of a human¡¯s aura emanating from Alice when she had transformed earlier. Instead, there had been an odd feeling, as if he had faced a higher lifeform.


    Didn¡¯t that mean that Alice could be a bizarre and iprehensible existence if she continued down this path of the Witch of Fate? However, Greem quickly let the issue slide when he thought of himself.


    He couldn¡¯t be considered a pure human either at this point!


    He had alreadypleted his physical elementiumization. If Greem wanted to rece his flesh and blood body with elementium matter, he could. He didn¡¯t need to suppress the elementium, which allowed him to remain on the edge of being both an elementium lifeform and a human.


    Greem was still unwilling to give up his physical form.


    Thus, he could only use his blood and flesh as his body¡¯s framework, with the fire elementium as the nutrition and energy source that maintained his current form. In doing so, he had to endure a 27% decrease in hisbat prowess!


    There was no choice. When the fire elementium that gathered in Greem¡¯s body exceeded a particr concentration, the first to give way and crumble would be thatst bit of his physical body.


    There was nothing Greem could do about this! It was one or the other.


    Greem cast aside these disturbing thoughts and spoke calmly, "Very well! Now that you have lost your ability to protect yourself, you aren¡¯t allowed to go out for this awhile. Stay in this tower and master this Art of Divination thing! It¡¯s the only thing you have!"


    "Who said I couldn¡¯t defend myself?" Alice let out a mysterious smile, "I¡¯ll let you know, I still have it!"


    Alice raised her small, pale right hand. A strange ball of silver light surfaced on her palm and hovered in the air.


    "The spacestone?!" Greem was extremely well-acquainted with this unique feeling. He spat out the name of this rock one syble at a time.


    Right, there was still a spacestone sealed in Alice¡¯s body. Her bizarre advancement had shocked him so much that he had almost forgotten the existence of that rare rock.


    However, the spacestone had gone berserk earlier. It had seemed like it wanted to devour Alice whole. But now, Greem went closer and examined the silver ball of light in Alice¡¯s hand. He couldn¡¯t hide the shock on his face.


    Isn¡¯t the spacestone a solid? Why is it in this intangible form right now?


    Alice was like a small girl that had just been gifted a precious toy. She grabbed this ball of light and started squeezing and stretching. The silver ball of light changed into several different forms as she toyed with it like a ball of flour.


    "Stop making a riddle out of this. Quick, tell me. What is this?" Greem lightly hit Alice on the head in his impatience.


    Too many strange things had already happened today. Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to try and figure out the cause, and so he turned to the most direct source for an answer.


    "You should know that the spacestone had already merged with most of my body prior to the advancement. It had almost devoured mepletely. This process was originally irreversible, but the sess of the advancement ceremony caused the power ofws to expel the stone. After all, it cannot defeat the narws of the World of Adepts, regardless of how powerful it is!"


    "Then, why did its form change?" Greem was still doubtful.


    "Because it has already assimted with my mental consciousness!"


    "So did it manage to assimte with you, or did it not?" Greem was going insane from this question.


    "Honestly speaking, it managed to assimte the me before the advancement, but was then assimted by the me after the advancement! Thus, it has be part of my mental consciousness. I can now manipte it as I will."


    "Then...what does that mean?"


    "It means that I can borrow its spatial powers!"


    The smiling Alice had just been standing before Greem, but as she finished speaking, she had silently appeared behind Greem.


    Moreover, Greem hadn¡¯t felt any spatial flux in the process.


    Fuck!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air.

 Chapter 321

    Chapter 321 The Truth of the Chaos


    Alice¡¯s instant teleportation in the past had been an application of her spatial talent.


    Back then, an intense and apparent spatial flux had apanied her usage of spatial powers. Much like a boulder thrown into a pond, everyone would know that she was doing spatial transfer and teleportation.


    However, the teleportation Alice had just used caused absolutely nomotion at all. Even though Greem was staring right at her, he still failed to catch her movements in time.


    Still, who was Greem?


    With the help of the chip, he had been able to use slow-motion rey to discover the truth behind Alice¡¯s instant teleportation.


    In the past, Alice always made a spatial rift sizeable enough for herself when she teleported. Then she hid in the folds of space and tore another spatial rift at her target location. The smooth execution of the process made it seem like Alice could disappear and then instantly teleport to another spot.


    But this time, Alice had genuinely seeded in her instant teleportation!


    Her body hadn¡¯t moved at all. The surrounding space had suddenly wrinkled and distorted, then the area around her had already been ¡¯squeezed¡¯ and ¡¯disced¡¯ to a new location. As no damage was caused to the space in the process, only a very minor spatial flux registered.


    If we were topare space to water, Alice would have been a fish in the past. She could weave anywhere through the water, but the sshes and the ripples she caused were present for all to see. Now, Alice was a drop of water. She had merged entirely with space. Distinguishing between one and the other was difficult!


    While Greem silently analyzed the miraculous change that had happened to Alice, she was still ying with the silver ball of light in her hands. The silver light was like a ball of fireflies, continuously changing shape in her little hands.


    One moment it would stick onto her white arm and stretch into a silver tattoo, the next it turned into a whirlwind and gathered to her arms in the form of a silver staff. It yet another moment it would circle her head before transforming into a delicately crafted tiara.


    Bracers, bracelets, armor, cape.


    The silver light was like a liquid metal that could be controlled by the human will. It flowed along Alice¡¯s body, ceaselessly transforming into all sorts of shapes and appearances. It didn¡¯t matter how much the sphere changed; it continued to glow a bright silver color.


    This spacestone that had wanted to devour Alice had be exceedingly tame and gentle after being assimted by Alice¡¯s mental consciousness. The various traits that it disyed caused Greem to think of a certain word. Soul Equipment!


    He also had a piece of Soul Equipment himself. It was the Scroll of Voodoo tied to his waist. He had exhausted plenty of resources to obtain this Scroll of Voodoo. It was already bound to his soul.


    He didn¡¯t need to use magical chants to control his Soul Equipment, unlike ordinary magic gear and tools. He only needed to think, and the Soul Equipment would move as he wanted.


    The harmony between Alice and the liquid spacestone vaguely resembled this particr trait of Soul Equipment!


    Greem raised his head and looked at Alice¡¯s excited face as she toyed with the silver light. A blissful smile filled her entire face. Greem suddenly remembered something as he looked on.


    "Alice, why is your body still sealed in your eight-year-old form if you have already advanced? Are you still unable to break through the seal?"


    "Hmph! I don¡¯t want to grow up! " Alice raised her head arrogantly, "Wouldn¡¯t I be suffering a big loss if I restored my sixteen-year-old body while serving a perverted and horny master?"


    Several ck lines surfaced on Greem¡¯s face.


    However, Alice quickly giggled and said, "Seriously speaking, I have only just advanced to a witch. There¡¯s still an immense distance before I reach the Witch of Fate. The seal on my body will probably have to wait until I truly be the Witch of Fate."


    Greem nodded his head. It was the exnation that made the most sense.


    "You really can¡¯t cast any other spell right now?" Greem asked doubtfully.


    "Yup! Ever since I advanced, all the spells I had mastered have vanished from my mind. My spatial talent has also disappeared. The spatial transfer earlier wasn¡¯tpleted with my personal strength, but with the help of this spacestone!"


    "That wasn¡¯t a spatial transfer earlier!" Greem shook his head with a smile. He finally decided to give Alice a much-needed lesson in magic, "How could it be called a spatial transfer if you didn¡¯t even rend the space apart? In my opinion, it¡¯s better to call it Spatial Relocation!"


    "Spatial Relocation?" Alice opened her eyes wide in confusion.


    Her control over her spatial talent in the past had been as natural andfortable as breathing and drinking was for ordinary humans. It was why she didn¡¯t have a good understanding of the spatial phenomena that she caused. She couldn¡¯t even tell the difference between Spatial Transfer and Spatial Relocation.


    Now that Greem had started speaking, he didn¡¯t intend to hide anything. He told her about the concept of Soul Equipment as well. That said, even Greem couldn¡¯t exin how a miraculous item with the power of space could suddenly be a piece of Soul Equipment.


    Greem had tried to have Alice split out part of the silver ball of light for him to see if he could conduct some experiments and research on the substance. Unfortunately, any of the liquid spacestone that left Alice¡¯s side would mysteriously return to her within two hours.


    That was the same effect as the Scroll of Voodoo!


    Greem also asked Alice about some of the details on the divination arts. After an extended period of consideration, he concluded that the Witch of Fate was very much a potent profession, contrary to his prior thoughts of it being a powerless support role!


    Thews of the world were fair in the end!


    It was precisely because certain professions were far too powerful that the world would impose upon them unnaturally strict restrictions.


    Alice had to give up on all her other powers if she wanted to obtain the ability to divine and prophesize. If she hadn¡¯t assimted the spacestone by ident, she wouldn¡¯t have had any bit of offensive or defensive talent left.


    Domineering strength or expansive divination abilities. You had to give up on one if you wanted the other.


    It was probably one of the ways that the world consciousness prevented overly powerful individuals from being born!


    "There¡¯s nothing else left, is there? If so, I¡¯ll go back and stabilize my Spirit." Alice apparently couldn¡¯t wait to discover her new abilities.


    "Onest thing!" Greem stopped her in time, "We¡¯ve gotten leads on the identity of the old hag that disguised herself as the illusionist. A witch named Angelina had sent her to assassinate you."


    "Angelina? The leader of the Witches of Deceit!" Alice almost leaped up in shock. She practically shouted this name when she heard Greem¡¯s words.


    "You know this person?"


    "Of course. Don¡¯t you forget, I used to be an apprentice witch of the Moya n. If I hadn¡¯t lost to you by ident, I might already have returned to the Northernnds with Granny Endor."


    "To which branch of the witches does the Moya n belong?" Greem asked in all seriousness.


    "We of the Moya n belong to the Pale Witches. We are a great witch n that has a history of thousands of years." Her tone couldn¡¯t help but reveal her pride when she spoke about the Moya n.


    "Isn¡¯t it amon urrence for your witch branches to rise and fall throughout the ages? I read it in the books. And if anything was rted to the revival and restoration of a branch, it is forbidden for the other witch branches to intervene in the process. Why would the leader of the Witches of Deceit actively act to intervene in the revival of the Witch of Fate?"


    Alice¡¯s eyes went dim at Greem¡¯s question.


    After a long pause, she spoke resentfully, "The witches now can hardly bepared to the witches ten thousand years ago. The Witch Queen was still present then. All the witches gathered about her, and together they were a dominant force. With the Witch Queen¡¯s departure into the infinite universe, the other witches left in the World of Adepts had started to bex and disunited. Only seven branches remain of the thirteen witch branches.


    "Only seven branches remain in the Northernnds. The Witches of Deceit, the Pale Witches, Agony Witches, Death Witches, Coldwinter Witches, Dark Witches, and the False Witches. If a new branch were to rise once again, it would unavoidably change the political scene of the Northernnds. Thus..."


    "Is she not worried about fate¡¯s bacsh now that she has intervened in the selection of the Witch of Fate?"


    "Perhaps. Perhaps a descendant of her own family has awakened the bloodline of the Witch of Fate. Only something like this could cause her to risk the bacsh of intervening in the selections!" Alice couldn¡¯t help but suspect that this was the case.


    "......"


    Greem was utterly speechless for a moment.


    As expected, even the knowledge in books wasn¡¯t always trustworthy!


    The size of this world and the trickeries that hid below its surface had far exceeded his imaginations. If he continued to believe blindly in ancient textual records, he would probably end up in a disadvantageous situation in the future.


    Once Greem and Alice were finished talking, the Third Grade adept Sanazar summoned her.


    With Sanazar personally asking Alice to join the Sarubo n, Alice eagerly epted her offer to serve the Sarubo for an eight-year period temporarily.


    Alice¡¯s identity as a candidate for the Witch of Fate was already an open secret. Sanazar might not have cared for the mysterious inheritance methods of the Northern Witches, but she had most definitely heard rumors.


    With more and more candidates popping up across the world, the Northern Witches weren¡¯t the only ones that had be excessively busy. Some of the other forces in the World of Adepts had also started to interfere in this ceremony.


    They didn¡¯t dare to challenge the Northern Witches directly.


    However, now that a candidate for the Witch of Fate had appeared in theirnds, they would put in all their effort to win her to their side and cultivate her powers.


    If their candidate won in the Battle of Fate, they could take the opportunity and obtain a piece ofnd in the Northern areas. In doing so, they would sessfully extend their reach into the traditional territories of the Northern Witches.


    As such, the candidates for the Witch of Fate were both highly desired talents and troublesome individuals at the same time.


    If a n had sufficient resources, they could participate in the event and hope to win great benefits with small investments. As long as they were able to kill off all other challengers before the Battle of Fate, their candidate would sessfully ascend to the legendary throne of the Witch of Fate, even if the candidate was unbelievably weak and useless.


    However, it was very much advised that they kept their hands clean of the matter if their n was weak and powerless!

 Chapter 322

    Chapter 322 Joy and Anxiety


    A small banquet was held at Greem¡¯s dwelling.


    A long table full of delicate foods and twenty to thirty guests were there.


    There weren¡¯t very many people, but the atmosphere was vivacious.


    Adepts, both within the tower and those stationed outside, had all arrived, each with a personal entourage of apprentices. The ones that were allowed to follow by the adepts¡¯ sides were all well-trained pseudo-adepts and talented advanced apprentices.


    The ones responsible for receiving the guests were Greem¡¯s five apprentices and Snox the goblin.


    Even though they were all busy dealing with the guests, Kodar and the rest were ecstatic. They enthusiastically served everyone who attended the banquet. Every so often, they couldn¡¯t help but shift their gazes to the beautiful youngdy at the center of the attention.


    Indeed, Alice had yet to break through the seal on her body after advancing to a witch. She still looked like she was when she was eight. Naturally, the very sight of a ¡¯small¡¯ person mixed with a group of real adepts was extremely eye-catching!


    However, none of the apprentices present at the party dared tough at the sight.


    Alice¡¯s current status and standing were utterly different from theirs.


    Once one became an adept, there would be an invisible but vast ss divide between you and apprentice adepts.


    Rumors were quickly spreading in the outside world. Most people already knew Alice had lost all her magical abilities and turned into a pure diviner. Still, an adept was an adept! It didn¡¯t matter how weak the adept was; their weakness was only rtive to other adepts.


    Alice was still an insurmountable mountain to these apprentices!


    Adepts had their own social circles, and so did the apprentices.


    While the adepts were gathered together and engaged in small talk, the apprentices had also formed their own more modest groups. They passionately gossiped about the happenings within the n and its territories.


    Some of the more sociable apprentices took the opportunity to walk about and get acquainted with the more talented apprentices.


    Three days ago, Alice had been just like them, only another apprentice adept. However, she was now a significant person that they all had to treat with respect. Such a motivational story had aroused the passion and enthusiasm of every single apprentice. The atmosphere had also be more and more energetic.


    "Congrattions, Alice!" The first to congratte Alice was Kiel, the body-refining adept perpetually stationed in Feidnan City. He took out a small and delicate wand with a fist-sized turquoise embedded on the top, "This is a Ghost Scepter. An adept-level evil spirit is sealed within. It is pretty decent when used to defend yourself. This wand will be my gift to you!"


    "Thank you!" Alice let out a sweet smile and happily epted the gift.


    Adept Ferrier, who stood right next to Kiel, rolled her eyes and spoke, "Who knew that you even had any idea on how to win a girl¡¯s favor. Well, if that¡¯s the case, I¡¯m also giving Alice a gift. Here you go, Alice. This is a Hydration Potion. It can allow your skin to retain its smoothness and radiance for a long period. You have justpleted your advancement. Right now is the time to take good care of your own body."


    "Thank you, Sis Ferrier!" The smile on Alice¡¯s face became even sweeter.


    Keoghan and Harrison couldn¡¯t help but look at each other with bitter smiles when they saw both of theirpanions already giving out gifts. They started rummaging about their storage tools for some kind of present.


    Finally, Keoghan took out a pure and clear white crystal. It was incredibly suited to be used as a divination crystal. Harrison, on the other hand, gave Alice a Spell Reversal Ring. It was able to reflect a direct spell back at the caster and was a very decent defensive tool.


    Alice was a small ¡¯miser¡¯ herself. Having received so many treasures and presents, she grinned so broadly that she couldn¡¯t even open her eyes. She quietly stood there smiling at herself with all these treasures in her arms.


    "We should probably go and find somewhere else to celebrate! The small ones won¡¯t be able to have fun while we¡¯re here." Greem smiled and led the few adepts to another room.


    The atmosphere of the banquet became all the more lively with the departure of these old fellows. All of the apprentices that had been behaving cautiously in the presence of the adepts were finally able to have their fun.


    Everyone quickly surrounded the few apprentices that were under Greem and Snox himself. All the apprentices chattered and asked about ¡¯Adept Alice.¡¯ The envy in their voices was clear as day.


    The existence of the lesser nes demanded the reassignment of more and more of the n adepts to the other nes. Consequently, the Sarubo adepts stationed in the World of Adepts had always been at a rtively low number. Every single n adept meant more authority and benefits gained.


    The adepts themselves might not have cared too much for the marginal increase in resources, but these resources were a massive help for the apprentices under the adepts.


    If the Sarubo n were a massive school of whales, the apprentice adepts surrounding them would be schools of fish that lived on the food scraps of the whales. If they could maintain good personal rtionships with an adept, they would stand to gain plenty.


    There weren¡¯t all that many adepts stationed within the Sarubo n in the first ce. Now, the me Demon¡¯s circle alone represented the authority of two adepts. All of the me Demon¡¯s subordinates would undoubtedly benefit from their association with Greem. Kodar, Meryl, and the other pseudo-adepts would have more resources invested in them.


    These benefits were enough to drive any young pseudo-adept mad with envy!


    Greem and the adepts ignored themotion happening between their apprentices and quickly went on their own ways after some small talk. They might all be Sarubo adepts, but every one of them had secrets. They didn¡¯t readily share the contents of their research and experiments with others.


    Thus, it was apparent that the rtionships of adepts were often superficial and nonmittal. Most bonds they had were only out of practical reasons!


    The power of Greem, the me Demon, was very well known by now.


    The strength he demonstrated in the nar war and the n wars had already exceeded veteran adepts like Keoghan. Moreover, Alice was also an enviable Northern Witch with a holy blessing to be a candidate for the Witch of Fate.


    It was important to note how much weight this title carried. If Alice became the Witch of Fate, she would instantly have as much authority and resources as the other Fourth Grade leaders of the witch branches, even if she was still a First Grade adept herself. ording to the ancient traditions and legacies, all the other witch branches had to release the territories of the Witch of Fate that they had taken over. They had to give the Fate branch another chance to rise again!


    It was both a tradition, as well as an ancient covenant!


    When any of the witch branches overcame their difficulties and rose once more, the other branches had to provide them with the necessary protection and support. It was thanks to this tradition of mutual aid that the thirteen witch branches were able to ensure the existence of their legacies. It was thanks to this that they would always keep a hold on the Northernnds of the Continent of Adepts.


    Thus, it was an incredibly worthwhile investment to support a candidate for the Witch of Fate. However, if Alice wanted to gain the full support of the Sarubo n, she would have to undergo more negotiations and discussions.


    After all, the information Sanazar had gotten from interrogating the assassin revealed the intensepetition of this selection. There were plenty of elite descendants of other witch branches mixed within the candidates.


    The reason Angelina, the head witch from the Witches of Deceit, had sent someone after Alice was because her granddaughter had awakened to the bloodline of the Witch of Fate. She had sent numerous subordinates to y all known candidates to ensure that her direct descendant would sessfully be able to ascend as the Witch of Fate.


    Angelina had also been able to avoid the usations of interference from the other witches. She had done so by iming her actions of aiding a rtive to be legitimate. That was why her efforts had been so brazen and unscrupulous. It was intolerable.


    Some of the other adept ns and organizations had started to falter in their support for candidates due to this. Angelina was a massive obstacle to their ns.


    After all, Angelina was a Fourth Grade witch herself. She had over a hundred adepts as her subordinates. They couldn¡¯t ignore the raw power shemanded.


    In all seriousness, the Sarubo n would never invest in Alice if Greem wasn¡¯t already involved in the Battle of Fate. In their eyes, Alice was doomed. Not to mention, the Sarubo n itself didn¡¯t quite have the strength to sh with the Witches of Deceit directly.


    This reluctance to support her was evident by today¡¯s banquet.


    All the adepts had only given their blessings and gifts to Alice as individuals. Sanazar, who represented the Sarubo n, didn¡¯t even show up. Moreover, the service contract between the n and Alice onlysted a mere eight years. It expired right before the Battle of Fate started.


    All of this was more than enough to demonstrate the Sarubo n¡¯s attitude!


    They did not favor Alice¡¯s fate.


    In fact, the Sarubo n might even have handed Alice over to the Witches of Deceit if it hadn¡¯t been for Greem¡¯s sake and Alice¡¯s sessful advancement. They would at least have been able to exchange for some benefits from the Witches of Deceit in doing so.


    Thus, the smile on Alice¡¯s face quickly faded after joyfully sending off her guests and bidding farewell with Greem. Her smile was reced with a look of concern and anxiety once she returned to her dwelling.


    She might have the body and looks of a girl, but she had the sharp mind of a sixteen-year-olddy.


    How could she possibly have missed the attitude of the Sarubo n!? Especially with how obvious they had been in their actions.


    Should she leave now and hide somewhere far away, or should she seek the shelter of Greem and be his subordinate?


    All of these problems gued her!


    She might have been the apprentice witch of the Moya n, but Alice knew what kind of situation she was in. Her association with the Moya n wasn¡¯t enough for the head of the Pale Witches to sh with Angelina to protect her.


    The witches had always been united in their actions.


    They even made necessary internal sacrifices to maintain this unity.


    On the one hand, you had the direct descendant of the head witch of the Witches of Deceit, and on the other, you had an ordinary member of the Pale Witches. If left to the Witch Council to decide, they would most definitely give up on the lesser individual. The decision would work against Alice.


    Thus, Alice was determined, as never before, in her dilemma between the Moya n and Greem. At least Greem genuinely protected her. At least Greem sincerely tried to increase her chances of victory.


    Alice saw this very well!

 Chapter 323

    Chapter 323 Negotiations


    There was a dark green sea of forest.


    If one stood at the top of the cliff, they would be able to see the magnificent city and the towering adept¡¯s tower in the distance.


    Feidnan City. Apletely inconspicuous human city. Witch Nina wouldn¡¯t have heard of this city¡¯s name if it hadn¡¯t been for the Sarubo cing their headquarters here. Neither would she have crossed thousands of kilometers toe to this ce.


    An old witch with a crooked spine, a grey robe, and a grey witch¡¯s hat cackled sinisterly behind Witch Nina.


    "Nina, what is your n in inviting them? Do you intend to betray the Northern Witches? You best be careful. If I catch any weakness of yours, you can be sure that the Witch Council won¡¯t be letting you off easy!"


    Nina was a tall woman wearing white armor that hugged her well-proportioned body. Her face wasn¡¯t excessively pretty, but her bright and crystalline blue eyes were enough for one to list her among the most celebrated beauties.


    She stood tall on a boulder above the cliff. A giant, green-feathered thunder roc rested right beside her.


    It was apparent that she had traveled a long distance to arrive here. The long journey had utterly exhausted the thunder roc. There was no longer a trace of its wild and savage aura that befit a Second Grade magical creature like itself.


    Second Grade Witch Nina took one more look at Feidnan City and turned to appreciate the beautiful scenery of the forest. She never let her gaze fall upon the poison witch¡¯s ugly face no matter what she did.


    "You will know what I want to do soon! Don¡¯t forget, Endor. Before you find any weakness of mine, you will have to abide by the Council¡¯s ruling. Leader Angelina is willing to exchange Iceseal City and its surroundingnds for one of your apprentice witches. Your leader has already acknowledged this transaction. Do you dare to go against the Witch Council?"


    Precisely because she knew that Nina was right, Endor the Poisonous Witch betrayed an agitated expression. Still, she continued to argue, "You lot are only using your identity as the convener of this hundred-year assembly to force the resolution through the council. Only three branches voted. The other witch branches either refused to participate or happened to have their leader present at the council. That¡¯s the only reason you managed to get the False Witches to agree to this disgusting resolution."


    "And because of that, you hurried over here to stop me?" Witch Nina turned around, her sharp eyes gleaming a bright blue, making it hard for Endor to look her in the eyes, "You handed over an apprentice witch to be the ve of rotten men, and you still want her to be the Witch of Fate? Why? To continue humiliating the Northern Witches?"


    Poisonous Witch Endor was only a First Grade adept. She helplessly lowered her head beneath Nina¡¯s terrifying mental suppression. An expression of sorrow and humiliation appeared on her face.


    She had raised Alice from a young age. The rage and anger in her heart nearly exceeded their limits now that she had to watch her die!


    She knew that this was a scheme by the opponent. She knew that this would cause tremendous damage to the Pale Witches¡¯ morale. However, even Endor, the great-grandmother of Alice, couldn¡¯t do anything when faced with the Council¡¯s resolution. This helpless sorrow was iprehensible to outsiders!


    She had no way of stopping Nina¡¯s operation. On the one hand, she didn¡¯t possess the ability to do so, and on the other, it would offend all the Northern Witches. As a Northern Witches herself, Endor would never do such a thing!


    Her expression shifted several times. Tears streaked down from her muddy eyeballs. Endor finally shook her head in agony, "Don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯t stop you from executing the Council¡¯s orders. I only ask of you to be done with Alice as quick as possible. Please do not torture her again!"


    The temperamental and cruel poison witch would beg on her knees?


    Even the resolute and decisive Nina couldn¡¯t help but hesitate. She quickly nodded.


    "I will. Alice has done nothing to betray the Northern Witches. Her soul can still be epted by the Northern Witches once her blemish as a ve is cleansed with her own blood!"


    Endor fell silent.


    The Northern Witches had always been a matriarchal society. Most witches thought of males as tools, rather than equals. There were male adepts in the witch¡¯s territory as well. However, they were all suppressed by the powerful and dominant witch leaders. Thus, the Northern Lands had turned into a different society where witches held the ruling position.


    It was due to this mentality that every witch from the Northern Lands tended to be an arrogant and proud individual. Every single one of them had the power to back their attitudes. More importantly, they were an incredibly united group. The other adept organizations didn¡¯t like them very much, but they weren¡¯t about to go and provoke these ferocious, domineering women.


    Wild winds started to blow on the distant horizon as the two witches concluded their discussion. A green silhouette shed and the Third Grade Sanazar appeared from the skies. She hovered in the air before the two witches.


    At the same time, a tall male appeared beneath the cliff with a sh of fire.


    They had finallye.


    The two witches approached Sanazar with different feelings bubbling in their hearts.


    "Nina of the Northern Lands greet Lady Sanazar on behalf of the Witch Council!"


    "Endor of the Northern Lands greets the respected Lady Sanazar!"


    Sanazar couldn¡¯t help butugh coldly through the green mist shrouding her body.


    "No need to be so polite. No need to use your Witch Council to intimidate me either. These tricks are useless here in Zhentarim. Speak, why have you invited me here?"


    Sanazar¡¯s tone was quite hostile, but even the arrogant Nina didn¡¯t dare to behave with disrespect when faced with a Third Grade adept.


    She turned and looked at the silent young man at the bottom of the cliff and finally said, "Oh respected Lady Sanazar, I havee on behalf of the Witch Council to retrieve Alice, the apprentice witch of the Moya n. Here is the Council¡¯s resolution letter!"


    Having finished speaking, Nina took out a parchment scroll from her armor and lifted it in front of the cloud of green mist.


    The mist shivered, and a w with green scales emerged. It grabbed the scroll and returned to the mist.


    A short momentter, the scrollnded back in Nina¡¯s hand.


    "I have read it. Alice is indeed located in our n. What about it? Do you intend to take her away forcefully?" Sanazar¡¯s taunting sneer came from within the green mist.


    This situation was how it was.


    This resolution letter might have had absolute binding force for all the witches, but this was Zhentarim, not the Northern Lands. The decisions of the witch leaders could not possibly affect or direct the internal affairs of the Sarubo n.


    "My Lady, we will reward you handsomely as long as you are willing to let Alice go. Leader Angelina has already spoken. We are willing to provide you with two hundred thousand magic crystals or resources of equal worth. As long as you agree, we will send all of these items to your adept¡¯s tower within ten days. Moreover, one of our n¡¯s witches seemed to have offended you and was imprisoned by you. Our leader is willing to gift you another hundred thousand if you are willing to let her go."


    An ear-piercing shriek came from within the mist. It sounded both likeughing and crying. Soon, a round object was tossed out from within the green cloud.


    "Well then, let¡¯s fulfill the second agreement! As for the first one; Alice doesn¡¯t belong to me, but to Greem. Go and discuss with him, not me!"


    Witch Nina caught the object that Sanazar had thrown at her. She lowered her head and looked, only to realize that this was the bloody head of the witch she had been looking for. There was a bloody wound at the neck of the head. It seemed that the head had been twisted off the witch¡¯s body while she was alive!


    Rage filled Nina¡¯s heart, but she quickly sensed a weak soul aura from within the head. Her frown loosened and she suppressed her anger.


    "I have returned the head to you! I didn¡¯t destroy her soul because I respect the Northern Witches. If you hurry back and find a body for her, you might still be able to save her. What is it? Don¡¯t you want it? If you don¡¯t want it, I¡¯ll take it back and feed it to the dogs!" Sanazar¡¯s tone was just like herself, cold and taunting.


    "Of course we want it!" Nina¡¯s practically squeezed the cold words out through her teeth, "We will remember your help today! The ten thousand magic crystals will be sent to you within ten days! However, about that Alice..."


    Boom.


    An explosion of fire and a tall and handsome young male adept appeared on the cliff. He smiled as he nodded to Endor. He then lifted his head and looked at Witch Nina.


    "Lady Sanazar said it very clearly already. You will have to talk to me about everything regarding Alice!"


    Nina looked at the opponent with disdain.


    She thought of herself as tall, but she was still half a head shorter when ced beside this man. It made her unable to exert her intimidating aura by looking down upon her opponent. Moreover, the First Grade young adept remained unfazed when faced with her overbearing mental suppression.


    This made her all the more upset!


    If it hadn¡¯t been for the meddling Third Grade shitty dragon beside her, Nina would definitely have beaten up the male adept. She would have made him cower before her presence. However, Nina had to endure this situation. After all, she didn¡¯t possess the martial upper hand. Nina had no choice but to deal with this stinky male adept. Alright, fine, the truth should be reflected as it was. The male adept didn¡¯t smell at all. In fact, there was an attractive liveliness to his being that wasn¡¯t present in other adepts.


    Likely, this was because he had just advanced! There was none of the depravity of other adepts. Instead, there was a pulsing life force and elegant aura to this young man.


    His stature, his face, his aura...it didn¡¯t matter how much one looked at him! He gave off a calm and wise feeling!


    Sadly, Nina had never found such a male within the entirety of the Northern Lands. Otherwise, if she was able to catch someone like him as her lover, wouldn¡¯t it just be...


    A sh of red had appeared on Witch Nina¡¯s cold face without her knowing. An iprehensible smile also betrayed her face.

 Chapter 324

    Chapter 324 Love and Transaction


    Several ck lines appeared on everyone¡¯s foreheads.


    Greem, the subject himself, couldn¡¯t help but betray an awkward expression. He let out an angry snort. Blinding scarlet light appeared from within his body. The fire elementium in the air quickly gathered, forming an armor of fire over his body.


    The air around Greem suddenly became hazy.


    Under ordinary circumstances, Greem¡¯s actions would have been considered a provocation from a First Grade adept to a Second Grade adept. If Sanazar hadn¡¯t been here, Nina would have been able to punish him as she wanted. The Sarubo n wouldn¡¯t have had a proper reason to pursue Nina for her actions against Greem.


    However, now that Lady Sanazar was present, Greem had to be more domineering in his actions!


    However, Witch Nina didn¡¯t seem to have realized Greem¡¯s affront. She raised an eyebrow, and her smile became even broader. There was also a trace of appreciation in her eyes.


    It would be a mistake to look down upon the Northern Witches just because they were mostlyposed of females. They were well-known fighters, even amongst the threerge adept organizations. The reason the witches were able to secure the Northern Lands on the Continent of Adepts, where magical creatures ran wild, had a lot to do with their ferocious talent forbat.


    Every leader and head of the witches had attained their position through raw strength and power. All of them were extraordinary fighters in their own right.


    It was this kind of mentality and personality that drove Nina¡¯s friendly attitude towards Greem. His strong front had bought him Nina¡¯s favor!


    "Lady Nina, why don¡¯t we have a proper discussion now that you are here. Alice is mine! You are challenging the dignity of the Zhentarim adepts ining here to confront us!" Greem gave a stern warning with proper logic to back his words.


    Nina was a powerful and veteran adept after all. His words only fazed her for a moment before she regained her usual cold decisiveness.


    "We canpensate you for your troubles!" Nina smiled, "You must be the male adept that took in Alice, aren¡¯t you? You must be gravelycking in resources since you¡¯ve just advanced. We of the Witches of Deceit will not negotiate. We will fulfill any of your demands as long as it is within our abilities. This arrangement should save you a hundred years of time. You no longer need to run about and risk your life for some meager amount of resources. Why not ept our offer?!"


    Greem had yet to react to Nina¡¯s words, but Endor¡¯s face had already changed.


    Anxiety filled her heart as she stared at Greem with her sharp eyes from underneath her hood. As someone who had experienced the same struggle for resources, Endor knew how attractive an offer this was to a newly advanced adept!


    The development of all adepts followed a basic pattern on the Continent of Adepts.


    Once an adept advanced, they had to find a ce to stabilize their Spirit. They would then get used to the lifestyle of an adept, as well as the social circles of adepts. More importantly, they took this time to adjust their attitude from that of an apprentice to one befitting an adept.


    This process would happen while the adept¡¯s Spirit was stuck around 1 point. It typicallysted ten years.


    Once their powers had started to settle, the adepts then began to realize the despair that was meditation. The insignificant increase in their Spirit through meditation was enough to cause any adept to break down. Even a hardworking adept that meditated daily would not be able to feel their Spirit growing at any significant rate.


    Some of the more free-spirited adepts performed a little calction. A minimum of eighty-seven years was needed to raise one¡¯s Spirit from 1 point to 5 points if one spent all their time meditating. A minimum of eighty-seven years was required for an adept to advance to the ranks of veteran adepts. Moreover, the process of increasing Spirit to ten points and promoting to an elite adept would require a minimum of two hundred and seventy-three years.


    This calction had yet even to include the time that adepts needed to spend on their experiments, nor their scouring for resources and knowledge.


    Thus, it was impossible for a First Grade adept to reach the 20 point Spirit limit purely through meditation.


    Those that remained cooped up in their tower and obsessed over their experiments and meditation would never reach Second Grade.


    The only thing that could change this was the aid of knowledge and resources.


    That was why most newly advanced adept couldn¡¯t help but go adventuring in the Continent of Adepts once they had stabilized their Spirit. It was a necessary path to gather knowledge and resources. Nearly twenty percent of newly advanced adepts died in this manner. They fell during their adventures to umte power.


    If a newly advanced adept were able to get his hands on a giant pile of resources at this moment, they would be spared of the pain of running all over the continent. There would also be none of the risks associated with adventuring and exploration. They could grow and develop their powers in safety.


    The Poisonous Witch Endor had already earned a name for herself in both the Northern Lands and the central areas of the Continent. However, even after exhausting most of her life, her Spirit had barely crossed the 10 point threshold. She was just barely an elite adept.


    At the speed at which she was improving, she would never be able to reach Second Grade in time. That meant that she had no opportunity to extend her lifespan.


    The cause of all this had much to do with the time she wasted on adventuring in her youth.


    Endor couldn¡¯t help but be concerned that Greem would change his mind with Nina¡¯s offer.


    After all, this was far too attractive an offer!


    Even Endor might not have been able to resist the deal if she had been in the same position in her youth.


    Greem smiled.


    Wisdom reflected from behind his eyes. An aura of mystery arose about him as his cool facial featurese together to form a wicked smile.


    Greem wanted tough out loud right now.


    Worried about his spiritual improvement being too slow? Haha. His problem was the exact opposite. He wasn¡¯t worried about his development being too slow, but about it being too fast.


    In less than three years since he advanced to an adept, his Spirit had increased from less than 1 point to the current 6.4 points. While much of this was due to the nar feedback from the invasion of the knights¡¯ ne, it also had much to do with his personal umtion and management.


    What he needed now was time to settle down and stabilize his rapidly increasing Spirit. He didn¡¯tck knowledge or resources either. The spoils of war he had gotten from the numerous battles he had undertaken was enough for him to live out the first hundred years of his life in peace. Thus, Nina¡¯s conditions were...


    "I am extremely sorry Lady Nina, but I¡¯ll have to reject your offer!" Greem was extremely straightforward in his reply.


    Nina¡¯s smile vanished in an instant. She asked coldly, "Are you sure you want to reject the friendly gesture of a powerful witch n? You should know what you are rejecting. It isn¡¯t just two hundred thousand magic crystals worth of items, but the goodwill of the Witches of Deceit!"


    "Of course I know what I¡¯m rejecting!" An agitated expression suddenly appeared on Greem¡¯s face, "However, I will never hand Alice over, regardless of how many resources you are willing to offer!"


    "Why? Two hundred thousands magic crystals to buy a mere apprentice witch and you..."


    "My greatest apologies, Lady Nina, but you are mistaken! Alice isn¡¯t an apprentice witch anymore. She had justpleted her advancement to a witch yesterday."


    "Ah......"


    "Gah!"


    It wasn¡¯t just Nina that was shocked. Even Endor¡¯s mouth had opened wide from the news.


    How was this possible? She had brought up Alice on her own. Alice had just risen to a pseudo-adept. How had she advanced to a witch in such a short time? Was he intentionally lying to Nina?


    Even Lady Nina couldn¡¯t help but cast her gaze at the green mist.


    Sanazar¡¯s ear-piercing voice came out from the mist once again.


    "I can verify his words. That little girl sessfully advanced yesterday. Thus, we have no apprentice witch Alice here in the Sarubo n. What we do have is a proper Witch Alice!"


    Nina looked at the green mist doubtfully and turned to look at Endor again. She was still full of suspicion, but she didn¡¯t dare doubt the truth of a Third Grade adept¡¯s words.


    Nina might have been caught unprepared by the news of Alice¡¯s advancement, but she only thought of it as a mistake in the information from the n. She wasn¡¯t nearly as shocked as Endor was.


    No! The more exceptional she was, the more the reason to kill her off!


    A cold gleam reflected in Nina¡¯s crystal blue eyes.


    "Three hundred thousand. As long as you are willing to give up on Alice, I will......"


    "Lady Nina, are you sure that a witch-level candidate for the Witch of Fate is only worth three hundred thousand?" Greem¡¯s words were dripping with sarcasm.


    Nina¡¯s mouth twitched.


    "Four hundred thousand!"


    Greem didn¡¯t reply, but the disdain in his eyes said it all.


    "Five hundred..." Nina was already grinding her teeth together. The little bit of admiration she had for Greem disappeared. The ferocious re she was directing at Greem was like that of a predator in a dark forest.


    Five hundred thousand magic crystals! This price was more than enough to hire a Second Grade adept to serve as a bodyguard for two entire years!


    Sanazar¡¯s sinisterugh rang out from within the mist.


    It seemed even she couldn¡¯t remain unfazed but the sum of money that Nina offered!


    Endor¡¯s mouth just opened wider and wider. Her brain couldn¡¯t quite process what she saw with how bizarre things had started to turn out.


    My good god. Five hundred thousand magic crystals. Even with her fearsome reputation and her station at the Zhentarim area, the Moya n only paid her three thousand crystals a year. And this Witch Nina was willing to use five hundred thousand magic crystals to exchange for a newly-advanced witch?


    Five hundred thousand magic crystals were probably half of the Moya n¡¯s annual earnings in the Zhentarim area!


    Greem¡¯s low, cold voice was once again transmitted to everyone¡¯s ears, even as Endor¡¯s brain still tried to process the difference between three thousand and five hundred thousand.


    "I still reject your offer!"


    "Why?" Witch Nina¡¯s eyes were bloodshot. She marched forward and stared into Greem¡¯s eyes with almost no distance between the two of them. The tips of their noses almost touched.


    "Why?" Even Endor mumbled by the side. Truthfully, she also wanted to know why at this point.


    "Because I have fallen in love with Alice!"


    Greem¡¯s words were like a bolt of lightning that split the sky apart. The entire ce fell dead silent!

 Chapter 325

    Chapter 325 Worth


    A deathly silence washed over the entire ce, followed by Nina¡¯s hystericalughter.


    "You. What did you say? You fell in love... with Alice? Haha...that is way too funny."


    The green mist remained unmoving.


    Endor¡¯s ugly wrinkled face waspletely frozen. Even her muddy eyeballs didn¡¯t move.


    On the other hand, Greem was calm and solemn. It was difficult to read his emotions with the serious face he presented.


    Nina straightened her body midway through herughter. She looked around her and finally fixed her gaze upon Greem.


    "Did you mean what you said? You weren¡¯t joking..." Nina questioned doubtfully.


    Greem nodded without betraying a single emotion. It didn¡¯t seem like a facade at all.


    Nina rubbed her head and her eyes. She ground her teeth, but she found herself incapable of saying anything mean.


    An adept that would give up everything for love, existing in this day and age? Save your lies to dupe the idiots! You would only find such a person in the novels of ordinary men. In reality...


    Nina could have confidently exposed Greem¡¯s ¡¯lies¡¯. However, there was a small voice in her heart that kept whispering to her that this wasn¡¯t impossible.


    This conflicting feeling caused her to be increasingly frustrated and annoyed!


    A peerless, murderous aura emanated from the green mist.


    The existence of Third Grade Sanazar was like a bowl of bone-chilling water. It instantly extinguished any delusions and malignant thoughts that Nina might have had!


    "Well, very well." For a moment, even Witch Nina didn¡¯t quite know what to say. She climbed onto her thunder roc with difficulty and left onest provocation as she did so, "Protect your love then. I will see you again."


    Having finished speaking, Nina rode the Second Grade magical creature, that harnessed the immense powers of thunder, and took to the skies with a deafening boom of thunder. The roc dashed into the clouds and vanished at the edge of the horizon within moments.


    The stunned Endor still wanted to have some words with Greem after Nina¡¯s departure. However, she felt the oppressive aura from within the green mist.


    Endor had no choice but to get on her magic broom. She wanted to say something but quickly left after leaving onest sentence, "Alice is still young."


    A mild breeze blew through the woods, and the trees waved in the winds.


    Only two people remained on the previously crowded cliff.


    Greem stood awkwardly on top of the cliff. He silently waited for thest round of questioning.


    "Why?" The question finallynded.


    "My Lady, how would you choose between five hundred thousand magic crystals and the goodwill of the Witches of Fate?" Greem didn¡¯t dare to run his mouth off when it was Sanazar that stood before him. After all, she had continuously protected him in several past conflicts.


    He had no choice. Greem had toe up with a massive lie to silence the Northern Witches. The adepts were pragmatic beings. They would never believe someone¡¯s words if they didn¡¯t have a good reason!


    Since the Northern Witches were certain that Greem had ulterior motives in protecting Alice, he had toe up with an exnation worthwhile enough and massive enough to deceive them. Otherwise, they would continue to suspect and doubt the actual motives behind his actions. The excuse of love was both clich¨¦d and hrious. However, it also happened to be the perfect excuse to shut the Northern Witches up.


    You suspect me of having ulterior motives? Well, I indeed have ulterior motives. What I want is Alice herself!


    This excuse might be over the top, but it was sufficient to stop any thoughts of negotiation that the witches might have had.


    That said, this excuse definitely wouldn¡¯t work with Sanazar!


    Greem would not experience a particrly good ending if he dared to im that love was his reason for protecting Alice. He was sure that the temperamental Sanazar would crush him with a single blow if he said something as ridiculous as that.


    To entrench the Sarubo n in a conflict because of a non-existent love affair! Anyone would be frustrated at the thought of making enemies in such a random manner.


    Greem had no choice but to talk in terms of practical benefits when it came to Sanazar.


    Cold and disdainfulughter came from within the mist.


    "You can guarantee that Alice will be able to survive the Battle of Fate? Why is it that I have heard rumors of her sacrificing all her powers to advance sessfully!? Are you sure a useless fool like her can live to see the throne of Witch of Fate?"


    An agreement between Greem and Alice actually limited the information that Sanazar had. They wouldn¡¯t reveal the existence of the mutated spacestone. Alice¡¯s number one trump card should never be leaked until she became the Witch of Fate!


    "She can and she will! I guarantee it!" Greem answered firmly.


    "On what grounds?"


    "On the steel golem that I am crafting for her right at this moment! I will also allow her to use my Infernal Tyrant!"


    "Er......"


    Sanazar had witnessed Greem¡¯s Infernal Tyrant in action as well. In fact, she wholly approved of its abilities. It was no problem for the Tyrant to take on an elite adept in a one-on-one duel!


    If Greem were able to personally tailor a steel golem for Alice, with what skill he has disyed so far, she would be in an extremely advantageous position. The twin threats of the steel golem and the Infernal Tyrant were iparably fearsome! Even a fool would participate in the Battle of Fate with such might at their side.


    Sanazar fell silent once more.


    Her voice finally rang out from the mist after an extended period of consideration.


    "When you seed, I want the permanent management rights to the territories of the Witch of Fate. The Sarubo n can bear the burden of all the resources you need to craft the steel golem. I can guarantee Alice¡¯s safety as long as she remains in the Sarubo n. It is settled then!"


    Sanazar didn¡¯t even give Greem a chance to reply. The green mist rose to the skies once she finished speaking, and disappeared from the spot in the blink of an eye.


    ............


    It was Alice and Snox that waited for Greem when he finally returned to his dwelling.


    The two of them held a set of tarot cards in their hands. It seemed they were entertaining themselves with a card game.


    Alice had stuck all sorts of stickers onto Snox¡¯s green face. Alice, on the other hand, hadn¡¯t seemed to have lost a single game. In fact, she was still in the mood to eat an apple as she yed. Arge pile of odd little gadgets was ced right in front of her. Snox wore the bitter expression of a constipated man.


    "You are back!" Alice leaped off the chair in her excitement. She ran to Greem¡¯s side and lifted her head to ask, "How did the negotiations go?"


    Alice¡¯s huge eyes blinked as she asked.


    "Don¡¯t you know how to divine? Can¡¯t you see the results without me telling you?" Greem asked curiously.


    "Lady Sanazar was present. Her aura was far too powerful. I can¡¯t see through the urrences around her with my abilities right now." Alice¡¯s small face instantly soured when she talked about this.


    "You aren¡¯t afraid of me selling you off?" Greem asked her teasingly.


    "Hehehe. I might not be able to divine the exact information I want, but there¡¯s always some vague feedback! I only need to know that it¡¯s good news for me!" Alice immediately went back to her jovial mood.


    "I sold you!" Greem couldn¡¯t help but grunt.


    "How much did you sell me for? How many magic crystals did they use to buy me? Quick! Tell me..." Alice was suddenly filled with energy.


    Behind her, Snox trembled as he extended his hands and reached towards the piled up ante on Alice¡¯s side.


    "What do you think?"


    Alice tilted her head and thought for a bit. She extended three fingers but quickly extended another two.


    "Fifty thousand!"


    Greem smiled as he shook his head.


    "Too much or too little?" Alice closed her palm as she betrayed an expression of anxiety.


    "Too little!"


    Alice was happy to hear this. She lowered her head and thought for a bit before gritting her teeth and saying, "A hundred thousand! The price couldn¡¯t possibly be any higher! I know how the Northern Witches are. They might be powerful fighters, but they are all idiots when ites to making money!"


    Her tone dripped with contempt.


    Greem shook his head as he added, "I have already told Witch Nina of your advancement to an adept!"


    "It was Witch Nina that came? She¡¯s one of the more powerful witches amongst the Witches of Deceit!" Alice couldn¡¯t help but mumble, "Then it¡¯s two hundred thousand?"


    Greem shook his head still.


    Alice¡¯s breath started to be heavy.


    She was from the Northern Lands herself. She knew very well what two hundred thousand magic crystals meant to a witch n.


    Don¡¯t even mention an ordinary witch. This amount of money was more than enough to hire a Second-grade witch as a bodyguard.


    "Three hundred thousand." Alice had practically squeezed these words out through her teeth.


    Even Snox had stopped his thieving actions to turn and look at Alice. His eyes spilled over with gleaming magical crystals.


    If there were three hundred thousand magical crystals piled right here in this room, it would probably be enough to drown him in crystals, wouldn¡¯t it?! Was Alice worth this much?


    Alice felt like her heart would stop beating when Greem shook his head again.


    "Four hundred thousand crystals!" Alice screamed at the top of her lungs.


    She even had half a mind to sell herself at this moment.


    That was four hundred thousand magical crystals after all!


    However, Greem shook his head once more and looked at her pitifully. He then spat out a shocking sum.


    "Five hundred thousand! And then I rejected them!"


    Alice¡¯s breath instantly paused.


    The apple she was eating ttered as it fell to the ground and rolled away into the distance.


    Snox¡¯s mouth opened so widely that it was hard to believe that was how his anatomy was supposed to be. Snox pointed his finger at Alice, his face full of shock and disbelief.


    "Why didn¡¯t you sell me? Why didn¡¯t you sell me off? Why..." Alice¡¯s eyes overflowed with a thick shroud of confusion and inability toprehend.


    Snox nodded intensely at Alice¡¯s question. He had the same doubts.


    Greem smiled bitterly and looked at the solemn Alice. He finally spoke, "Because I feel like you can be worth much more than that!"


    Greem then turned to leave the room.


    Even though it was a cold and practical reason Greem had left her with, Alice couldn¡¯t help but feel her nose twitch. Her tears started to streak down her face without her knowing.


    She sobbed as she turned and looked at Snox, her only ¡¯rtive¡¯.


    "My dear Snox, would you sell me for five hundred thousand magical crystals?"


    Snox froze. He frantically nodded then shook his head with all he had. He didn¡¯t even know what he wanted to express in the panic he had fallen into. Snox instantly covered his head and stopped moving when he saw Alice extending a hand towards him.


    She caressed Snox¡¯s head then left the room; her heart crowded with various emotions.


    What was it with today? Why was everyone behaving so weird?


    Snox scratched his head in confusion. He looked around, and in seeing no one present, he quickly shoved all the ante he had lost in the card game back into his storage belt before sneaking away from the room.

 Chapter 326 Conspiracy

    Chapter 326 Conspiracy


    North Zhentarim, Ibis City.


    Ibis City was the only public city within the Zhentarim area that was within the Northern Lands¡¯ proximity. All merchant groups that wanted to make their way into the witch¡¯s territory had to set off from here. As such, this city had the highest poption of witches among the towns in the center of the Continent.


    The Northern Lands were located in the very north of the continent. A vast forest over fifteen thousand kilometers in size stood between them and the center of the Continent. Communication and trade between the Zhentarim and the Northern Lands were particrly tricky due to this.


    The Zhentarim and the Silver Union maintained contact with each other through their floating battleships. On the other hand, the Zhentarim and the witches did so through the use of the numerous merchant groups that trudged through the forest.


    A tremendous number of adepts and apprentice adepts gathered in Ibis City to protect the merchants from the dangers of the woods. On the one hand, they were able to umte wealth by providing their services to the merchants; on the other, they could take the opportunity to refine theirbat skills.


    Both merchants and adepts benefitted from this arrangement, causing the trade route through the ck Forest to be one of the most lively ces in the area!


    Within Ibis City.


    A hidden room at a Witches of Deceit¡¯s outpost.


    A giant cloud of ck smoke emerged from a magic array on the ground. The smoke quickly coalesced and outlined a beautiful figure wrapped in a royal dress.


    The gaze of the person within the smoke was so sharp and piercing that it was hard to stare them in the eyes.


    "Nina, the new batch of goods are already on their way. They should arrive in forty-three days. You must send people to receive the items promptly. There are many precious resources amongst the goods this time. There are Dreaming Glories, Whispervines, Terrocones, as well as fifty kilograms of Khorium ingots. There¡¯s also arge shipment of frost potions. The total estimated value is over 2.8 million magic crystals! Make sure nothing happens to them!"


    "Understood, n leader."


    "Also, what has be of the task I handed to you?"


    The decisive Nina couldn¡¯t help but hesitate when the task was mentioned.


    "What is it? Did something happen? Did they kill Fran?" The voice of thedy in the smoke suddenly sharpened.


    "No, n leader, Witch Fran is not dead! They destroyed her body, but her head and soul have been perfectly preserved. She is currently recovering in the outpost."


    "Then what problem could there have been?"


    "I have offered five hundred thousand magical crystals for Alice of the Moya n..." Witch Nina stuttered as she spoke.


    ¡°Five hundred thousand? Have you gone mad? The total annual ie of the n is no more than 3.7 million! Did you use five hundred thousand to buy a mere apprentice witch? You..."Thedy in the smoke couldn¡¯t help but step forward. Her furious voice had risen three octaves higher.


    "He rejected the offer!"


    "......¡± Thedy in the smoke fell silent. She finally spat coldly after a long period of thought, "What happened exactly? Who is the ¡¯he¡¯ you spoke of earlier?"


    Witch Nina raised an eyebrow in an expression of helpless frustration. She recounted the details of the urrence seven days ago.


    Thedy in the ck smoke listened solemnly and couldn¡¯t help but ask a question by the end of Nina¡¯s story, "He mentioned that the Moya brat has advanced. Is that true?"


    "It has been verified. I have even personally infiltrated Feidnan City and obtained first-person confirmation from the apprentice adepts in the city. The Moya brat had to sacrifice all her abilities and talents and barely advanced to a witch. It is said that she obtained the ability to divine in exchange!" Witch Nina couldn¡¯t suppress her curiosity when she spoke of this. She asked, "n leader, how are things going on Snowlotus¡¯ side?"


    Thedy remained silent for a moment before she finally said, "Snowlotus¡¯ frost talent is shocking. She had already advanced to the peak of pseudo-adept awhile ago. Advancement will not be a problem if she prepares and umtes her powers for another six months..."


    The two witches became silent once again.


    Sheltered flowers were never as resilient as wildflowers. Everyone knew this to be true!


    The Moya brat had advanced six months earlier than Snowlotus, despite Snowlotus¡¯ talent and the massive amount of resources and knowledge avable to her. She was bound to be a big problem in the future. The two witches knew this to be the case, but neither wanted to be the one to point it out.


    "What reason did the Sarubo n use to refuse our offer? Do they, the outsiders, intend to interfere in the internal affairs of the Northern Witches?" Thedy in the ck smoke once again spoke after the pause.


    "The one managing this issue doesn¡¯t seem to be the Sarubo n, but a male fire adept that has just advanced. ording to my sources, the Moya brat has indeed signed a master-ve contract with this adept. And the reason that the male adept gave was...was..." Witch Nina couldn¡¯t help but hesitate once more.


    "What was it?" Thedy in the smoke red at Nina with a dissatisfied look.


    Nina still felt that silent pressure weighing upon her shoulders, even though they were thousands of kilometers apart and onlymunicated through this magic array.


    "He ims to have fallen in love with Alice!" Witch Nina grit her teeth and spoke.


    Another long pause of silence filled the room.


    A boundless, unrestrained, and charmingughter rang out from within the smoke.


    "Love? Haha. Love! Haha............" Theughter was crisp and pleasing to the ears, but it soon turned into a chilling threat, "Nina, you have been getting increasingly foolish! You would believe such a ridiculous excuse!"


    "But the reality leaves me with no choice but to ept it as it is. n leader, I have already investigated with great effort. The male adept has no rtives or connections. There is absolutely no one supporting him in the shadows. Even his advancement seems to have been an ident. His joining of the Sarubo n only happened after his advancement."


    Thedy in the smoke listened without speaking.


    "His rtionship with the Sarubo n isn¡¯t all that close. The Moya brat doesn¡¯t seem to have anything much to do with the Sarubo n either. It is because of this that I am sure. The one that wants to protect Alice isn¡¯t Sarubo¡¯s Sanazar, but that male adept."


    "With what qualification does he have the confidence to protect Alice? You said he was an adept that just advanced?"


    "Understood! His name is Greem. He is a fire adept, and reports show that it hasn¡¯t been more than two years since his advancement!"


    "A young male adept that only advanced two years ago rejected your offer of five hundred thousand magical crystals?"


    "Understood!"


    "Is he mad or foolish? Does he truly believe he can train Alice to a level where she can beat Snowlotus? Snowlotus might be six months behind her at the moment, but..."


    Thedy in the smoke couldn¡¯t help but frown in frustration at this moment.


    The Moya brat¡¯s act of sacrificing all her abilities in exchange for the talent to divine might not have seemed wise, but it caused an ufortable thought to sprout in thedy¡¯s mind. Wasn¡¯t the core power of the Witch of Fate their ability to divine?!


    Giving up on all her offensive and defensive abilities would make her the weakest and most vulnerable candidate in the Battle of Fate. Was she so confident in surviving the brutal contest of life and death with only her art of divination?


    If she died during the first round of selections, what was the point to strengthening her talent for fate to the fullest extent?


    If...if she could survive this Battle of Fate, she might be one of the most influential Witches of Fate in the past thousands of years. But what was she going to rely on in order to survive?


    The candidates would all be sent into the Tower of Fate during the Battle. No outsider or external force could help them. They needed to kill each other under such circumstances, all while avoiding the remaining traps, golems, and beasts hidden in the Tower.


    How was a brat without anybat power to survive in such an environment? Any random golem beast would be able to tear her to pieces! Moreover, she had no offensive spells whatsoever. How was she supposed to obtain victory and beat her opponents this way?


    Was she supposed to endure the enemy¡¯s ferocious attacks, close the distance, and then stab the opponent to death with a dagger?


    Of course, if the Sarubo n were willing to equip her with magic scrolls, potions, and wands, she would undoubtedly still possess some ability to fight! That said, such measures might be effective against apprentice adepts, but what use could they be when she faced against adept-levelpetitors?


    Would the Sarubo n actually be willing to invest in her when her chances of surviving were so low?


    The more thedy in the smoke thought about it, the less she understood the rationale behind their decision to protect Alice. She couldn¡¯t see through the actual reason for Greem¡¯s actions.


    Could it really be because of love?


    "n leader, what do you intend to have Snowlotus do?" Nina asked, "Should she emte Alice, or... "


    "It ispletely impossible to have her give up all her abilities with her personality and her achievements so far. Moreover, the Battle of Fate has always been a bloody and cruel affair. Snowlotus would be hard-pressed to survive until the end if she gave up her powers."


    "Is it not possible, even if we got rid of all opponents that could threaten her?"


    "We cannot aplish such a feat!" Thedy smiled bitterly, "Fate was always so hard to understand and manipte. The best we can do is extinguish the most powerful and threatening of thepetitors. It is far too difficult to kill every single one of them! Moreover, the other branches of witches have already started to express their dissatisfaction at my actions. They are already putting pressure on me. If we weren¡¯t able to do it in the past few months, there is no way we will be able to aplish it moving forward!"


    "......" Witch Nina fell silent.


    They had already publicly interfered in the revival of the Witches of Fate. In all seriousness, this was already going against themandments left behind by the Witch Queen. If they had been more discreet in their methods, and left no evidence for the other branches totch onto, then the other witch leaders wouldn¡¯t have been able to do anything.


    However, once those conservative old hags understood what was happening, things became a lot harder. They actively sheltered the remaining candidates that were under their protection. There wasn¡¯t much else that the Witches of Deceit could do.


    "Then what should I do?" Witch Nina asked.


    "Give up on Alice first. I need you to go to the Moya¡¯s area in the west of Zhentarim. There seems to be another candidate advancing at that ce. Exterminate her first. I have already sent you the relevant information. Hurry and get it done!"


    "Understood!" Nina was shocked to hear this news. She bowed respectfully and acknowledged the orders.


    It seemed even fate itself had started to sense the urgency of the situation. So many troublesome individuals had begun to sprout out of nowhere.


    Stand in our way? Then we will crush and kill until you submit!


    A murderous aura hung on Nina¡¯s face.

 Chapter 327 Bustle

    Chapter 327 Bustle


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    Within Greem¡¯s dwelling was a specially constructed massive golem hall.


    The hall was a mess right now.


    Wooden boxes of all sizes were piled in the corner of the hall. Several of them were already open, and neat stacks of metal ingots were visible inside. The metal ingots were rectangr. They gleamed with a deste glow under the soft and bright light of the hall.


    These were all magical alloys. A specific ratio of magical ores had been mixed into the nuggets, allowing them to possess supernatural effects that ordinary metals didn¡¯t own.


    Located in another corner of the hall was a simplified magic furnace. Three different mysterious arrays shone underneath each of the furnace¡¯s three feet. Violent energies were surging from the adept¡¯s tower into the interior of the furnace through these arrays. The power quickly turned into roiling elementium mes and swirled within it.


    Two muscr, sweaty dwarven cksmiths stood on wooden benches ced beside the furnace. They swung their massive iron hammers upon a piece of magical alloy. The alloy had already turned a reddish white from the blistering heat.


    The thunderous nging of steel upon steel deafened the ears!


    Three apprentice adepts surrounded the magic furnace. They continuously adjusted the magic arrays under its feet, ensuring that the temperature of the elementium mes within kept at 5,380 degrees. This temperature was enough to melt most magical ingots.


    Apart from the three apprentices managing the furnace, there were also a dozen other apprentices bustling about.


    Some of the adeptsmanded three separate three-meter tall giants and had them transport the metals to the furnace. Every time the furnace wall opened, several terrifying jets of me would surge forth due to the intense pressure within.


    The apprentices fared well against the fire. A red barrier surrounded their bodies, adequately protecting them from being burned by the mes. The giants didn¡¯t have such a convenient ability. They could only endure the pain as their flesh sizzled in the heat while they continued to stuff the ingots into the furnace.


    Once the heat had softened the ingots, the adepts removed them from the furnace and handed them over to the two dwarven cksmiths.


    Greem was sitting bat a stone tform on the other end of the hall. He carefully and earnestly sketched designs for golem parts. Countless other sketches and scrolls littered the tform. These documents depicted all sorts of fantastical golem beasts of various shapes and purposes.


    A tinum humanoid golem, one hundred and eighty meters tall, was silently doing secretary work beside Greem.


    "Magic Pen... triangles. Find me the exploded view of the spider golem¡¯s head. Mm, that¡¯s right. Go. Get me that sample of magical alloy Number Seven. Put it there first and hand me the basic attributes for the swordspider golem."


    This humanoid golem was able to urately and quickly finish every task that Greem assigned to it. It was due to the golem¡¯s help that Greem was able to put aside the more insignificant details and focus on the design at hand.


    The chip¡¯s data library contained the blueprints and attributes of hundreds and thousands of golem parts and golem constructs. Still, Greem found it hard to find any part thatpletely satisfied his needs, despite rummaging through all this information.


    Greem still had the memories of his previous life. He knew very well the fundamental difference between the robotic guards on Earth and the metallic golems of this world. The robotic constructs of Earth were built to be dexterous and urate. The power of their artificial intelligence and firepower determined their strength inbat.


    Inparison, the metal golems of this world didn¡¯t always take their designs based on human forms. After all, there was the existence of supernatural powers. Moreover, humanoid golems had way too many fatal ws and were ill-suited to bebat golems.


    For example, the metallic golem that the Tyrant defeated was also a humanoid golem. Its mobility had been severely reduced once the Tyrant had sufficiently damaged its legs. It then became a target for the enemy to take potshots at.


    Greem wanted to avoid this awkward situation with the steel golem he was about to tailor for Alice¡¯s needs. Thus, with the help of the chip, he quickly narrowed down his options and decided upon the more mature and developed form of a spider.


    The chip might have been extremely proficient at data analysis,parison, and processing, but it still needed a length of time to rebuild models and reconstruct new systems and processes when faced with the construction of an entirely new golem.


    That was why Greem had created this hall in his dwelling. He wanted to gradually umte experience in forging a golem beast and prepare himself for the final product.


    In Greem¡¯s expectations, the spider golem had a rounded, metallic disc-like body. It would be a beast of terror, with four pairs of ultra-strong metal limbs extending from its torso. It didn¡¯t need a humanoid head or body to attract focus fire from the enemy.


    There should be space inside the golem for Alice to enter. It would further ensure her safety.


    The primary means of attack avable to the spider golem had been temporarily decided to be the Magic Cannon that Snox had bought from Gazlowe. After the optimization and adjustments calcted by the chip, the Magic Cannon¡¯s energy beams had be more concentrated and focused. This optimization allowed it to pierce through better and break the defensive barriers of potential enemies.


    The golem¡¯s defense would beposed of several factors. The first was the toughness of its body, forged from magical alloy and unique metals. The second was the reactive energy barriers that Greem would ce on several parts of the spider golem¡¯s body. These two factors worked together and provided the golem with both physical and magical defenses. Alice¡¯s safety would be further guaranteed with these protective measures!


    After all, the n that Greem prepared for Alice was to use the spider golem for defense. The real offense came from the Infernal Tyrant.


    Her Spirit wasn¡¯t enough tomand a golem at the level of the Tyrant. However, now that she had advanced to a witch, she only needed to raise her Spirit to three points before the Battle of Fate.


    If she ever came across an enemy, all she needed to do was take shelter within the spider golem and summon the Infernal Tyrant. Even Greem would have to run away from her while she was in this state!


    The mysterious spatial powers that Alice possessed after assimting the spacestone would be her trump card. Greem did not include it in his calctions.


    Greem was unable toe up with the detailed statistics of each part of the golem through simple calctions. The chip¡¯s analysis was not yet robust enough, given the amount of knowledge that Greem had collected. Right now, Greem had to craft some smaller spider golems to verify his thoughts and theories.


    The disc body of the spider golem had to be redesigned. New magical alloy with a better ratio of metals had to be found. A method of bncing the spider golem and preserving its speed, even after taking damage to its limbs, had to be conceived. The structure of its energy core was also a matter to be considered. How could its energy output be maximized...


    Each of these tasks required a considerable number of calctions by the chip to obtain the best results and the most optimum set of data. Then, Greem would have to verify that data through practical application before he could safely use it in the creation of the golem.


    As such, Greem had spent most of the past few days sitting in this golem hall, working tirelessly on Alice¡¯s personalized golem.


    ............


    In another room adjacent to Greem¡¯s.


    Alice casually sat cross-legged in an arcane hall as big as the one Greem was working in. She held a small hammer forged of tinum in one hand, and asionally smashed the tortoiseshell before her.


    There was nothing in this hall, aside from Alice and two big baskets. No furniture, no items, and no decorations.


    The jade green shells instantly shattered into four or five pieces of various sizes when hit by the hammer.


    Every time this happened, Alice would lie on the ground before the shell in excitement. She would examine the damage to it in great detail and mumble iprehensible chants as she did so.


    Of course, most of her efforts yielded no results. She wasn¡¯t even able to obtain the most basic indications of fortune or misfortune.


    That said, it wasn¡¯t all in vain. Once in a while, mysterious patterns would appear on the shell shards. Disjointed and fragmented scenes would then emerge in Alice¡¯s mind all of a sudden.


    Sadly, most of these images were too blurry or chaotic for Alice to understand the message that fate was trying to convey.


    Alice¡¯s divination attempts to scry Witch Nina had all failed without exception. It was almost as if there was a powerful forcefield around Nina that prevented divination spells from getting through it. No information could feedback to Alice.


    She was trying to scry a Second Grade witch with the powers of a First Grade witch. Alice honestly had massive guts for a person her size. She was far too courageous.


    Her Spirit was only able to sustain five divinations per day. Once she used up all five chances, it wasn¡¯t Spirit or stamina that would be consumed when she tried to divine. It would be her life force.


    Alice had already failed four times today. The constant failures frustrated her to no end.


    She tossed the broken shells into the trash basket on her left before taking out another palm-sized tortoiseshell from the basket on the right.


    It was a piece of a dragonturtle shell.


    The dragonturtles were considered to be hybrid dragons due to the dragon bloodline flowing in their veins. Consequently, their shells and scales were extremely suited for divination materials.


    Trying to scry a higher grade adept with her abilities seemed to be something that would remain a fantasy. Alice frowned. Just then, an idea struck her as she worried about how to use thest divination of the day.


    Scrying a higher grade adept wasn¡¯t likely to seed, but it was probably a lot easier to scry an opponent of her level, wasn¡¯t it?


    Alice¡¯s eyes lit up. She softly chanted as she smashed the shell with the tinum hammer in her hand.


    "O power of fate, please show me the most powerful enemy in the Battle of Fate!"


    The hammer fell.


    A blinding radiance emerged!

 Chapter 328 Magic Generator Furnace

    Chapter 328 Magic Generator Furnace


    A cave carved out of ice.


    The slim silhouette of a woman.


    Countless white lights surrounded her like a dreamlike scene out of a fantasy world.


    When the lights glowed, the mist of ice burst apart to reveal a beautiful face. The woman looked around in confusion.


    The divination onlysted three seconds, but that was more than enough for Alice.


    She didn¡¯t dare hesitate. She immediately took out a translucent, fist-sized crystal ball and silently recorded the image in her mind.


    Finally. All of today¡¯s divination slots had been used up. Alice¡¯s Spirit had also beenpletely exhausted.


    Alice covered her mouth as she yawned. She fell asleep before she could even finish stretching her body.


    Her curled hand loosened in her sleep. The shining crystal ball ttered to the ground and rolled away from her.


    It only stopped when it ran into the foot of a towering figure.


    Greem bent to pick up the crystal ball and ced it against his forehead.


    "Beep. An unknown mental passage is detected. Connect?"


    "Connect!"


    The three-second recording ended almost as quickly as it started. Greem wasn¡¯t even able to get an urate look at its contents. Thankfully, the chip had dutifully recorded everything and saved the scene in its data library.


    "This must be fate¡¯s feedback from Alice¡¯s divination! Chip. Analyze this recording with all your power. Dig out every single bit of information that we can use to our advantage!"


    In the next second, the chip had split the three-second recording into a thousand static images. They drifted into Greem¡¯s mind one by one.


    Greem felt his Spirit plummeting. He had instantly lost 2 points of Spirit when the chip converted it all into mental energy to sustain its massive operation.


    Two points of Spirit, at Greem¡¯s current level, meant twoplete First Grade spells. If these spells were Fire Core Explosions, a single one would be enough to kill an ordinary adept. And if they were Meteor Showers, two points of Spirit would be enough to turn an area of five hundred meters into a hell of fire.


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown at this drastic and sudden decrease in his Spirit.


    Greem gave the chip free reign in processing the static images in his mind. Meanwhile, he walked to Alice¡¯s side and picked her up. He carried her in his arms and brought her to the bedroom next door.


    Greem put her on the bed, helped her remove her shoes and socks, then covered her with a nket.


    Once everything settled, he left the room, rubbing his head as he did so.


    The exhaustion of Spirit caused him to be unexpectedly tired. It was best to get some sleep! Perhaps the chip might be able to draw an initial conclusion by then.


    Greem yawned as he returned to his room.


    ............


    At this moment.


    Several hundred thousand kilometers away, in the distant Northern Lands.


    Snowlotus opened her eyes.


    She was a beauty that looked as if she had been carved out of the most pristine block of ice and snow.


    Her features were delicate and beautiful, yet held a cold edge to them that caused them to look stiff and unyielding. When she opened her eyes, a torrent of chilling aura surged through their depths.


    A crystalline ice armor had formed around her body. Traces of frost enveloped her body, crackling with the sound of moisture in the air freezing into ice. Even the light around her seemed to have be dimmer due to this.


    Snowlotus nced around this world of ice and snow.


    Sharp ice pirs and jagged spikes littered the cave. It was a patch of brilliant white wherever Snowlotus looked. There was no other color to be seen. It was deathly quiet her.


    There was no one around her, and no possibility for anyone to be around.


    This frozen realm had formed through the use of a tremendous number of resources. The temperature in the air had reached a hundred and forty-five degrees. If an ordinary person stepped into this environment, they would die in an instant. Their blood would freeze within moments, and their heart would stop. Even a pseudo-adept with a talent for frost had to protect her internal organs with ice particles to survive.


    If there were no outsiders or onlookers, where had that moment of shock and feare from?


    Could it be...that someone was scrying her?


    Did this have anything to do with grandma¡¯s prior arrangements?


    Snowlotus didn¡¯t approve of the assassination of herpetitors. She had absolute confidence in her abilities from such an extended period of training and cultivation. Sweeping aside those enemies would have been no problem, even without the help of the n.


    Snowlotus had a growing feeling of unease as the body count of candidates increased. She sensed that fate¡¯s blessing was slowly distancing itself from her.


    Such scrying attempts by unknown enemies had mostly failed in the past. Even those that seeded hadn¡¯t gone unnoticed. Fate would always send her a vague hint that reminded her of what was happening. When had something like today¡¯s event urred? The fear from her soul had sprung out of nowhere, without any prior indication or warning.


    If she continued to have the candidates of fate ughtered without restraint, fate itself would one day abandon her!


    Perhaps it was time to speak with Grandma Angelina.


    ............


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    Snox was hiding in his room. He stepped onto a tall wooden bench and had a ¡¯friendly,¡¯ ¡¯warm,¡¯ and ¡¯intimate conversation¡¯ with the despicable, perverted, stingy, ungenerous, gold-hoarding Duke Gazlowe of the Goblin Empire.


    "No way," Snox leaped three feet into the air. He waved the ¡¯Elementary Golem Creation Handbook¡¯ as he roared, "You should know that this is a top-tier secret tome that I stole from the evil adepts at the risk of my life! And you want to exchange it for only two hundred magical crystals?"


    "Little brat, you should know how much two hundred magic crystals is in our Goblin Empire. It¡¯s enough to buy ten square kilometers ofnd and everything on top of it. Even if you didn¡¯t want to purchasend, two hundred crystals could allow you to hire a squad of fifty magical mechanical mercenaries. That¡¯s why two hundred magical crystals are already..." Gazlowe¡¯s voice suddenly turned sharp before he finished speaking, much like a chicken that had just gotten cuffed at the throat.


    He could see very clearly what Snox was doing through the light screen. He was taking out handfuls of gleaming, shining magical crystals from his belt!


    Clink. Clink. Clink.


    The crystalline, magical crystals fell from Snox¡¯s hand like raindrops. They let out a crisp sound as they crashed into the solid stone floor. The clinking was so soul-stirring and attractive that Gazlowe¡¯s rage bar filled to the max in a single instant!


    Duke Gazlowe pushed his monocle aside and pressed his ugly face against the screen.


    "Goddamn Snox, you freaking jerk. Remember to never, ever, ever, ever unt your worldly wealth before the great Duke Gazlowe. As the greatest inventor, most respected engineer, and lord of the Goblin Empire, my mind filled with infinite knowledge is the only wealth that a clever goblin should be proud of."


    Snox betrayed an expression of disdain at the opponent¡¯s outburst.


    He grabbed yet another handful of magical crystals and pressed it against the screen. He asked tauntingly, "Then may I ask the greatest lord of the Goblin Empire how much his brain is worth?"


    "Not the greatest lord, but the most respected lord." Gazlowe angrily corrected Snox¡¯s mistake, "Moreover, my brain is priceless!"


    "Priceless? Doesn¡¯t that mean it¡¯s worth nothing?"


    "It¡¯s priceless! Not worthless!" Gazlowe¡¯s shouts filled the entire room.


    "Tsk, doesn¡¯t that mean the same thing!" Snox held the crystals in his hand as he snickered, "If you aren¡¯t willing to pay with magical crystals, what are you going to use to exchange for this top-tier secret tome?"


    Gazlowe quickly calmed down once it came back to the transaction.


    "We are a low-magic ne over here. The number of magical crystals we produce is meager. Moreover, you don¡¯t seem to becking in crystals over there."


    "Mmhmm...continue..."


    "Then I will use...the spider tank to trade with you!"


    "Spider tank?"


    "Didn¡¯t you mention that your master was crafting a spider-shaped golem beast recently? We have something simr in the Goblin Empire. The equally powerful and mature machine¨C the spider tank." Once the conversation turned to his profession, Gazlowe instantly transformed into the most passionate and devoted magical engineer.


    "It is made entirely of tungsten alloy and has superior toughness and malleability. The main body of the machine has the form of a spider and possess four pairs of metallic limbs, a three hundred and sixty-degree rotational magic cannon, foldable metallic saw ws, a close-range methrower at its tail and..."


    Snox immediately interrupted Gazlowe before he could finish. His face was extremely hostile.


    "Your Transportation Tool can only transfer five hundred grams worth of items. Are you sure you can send me the stuff you promised? Or are you going to open a small spatial wormhole like thest time? If you can¡¯t aplish this task, what does it have to do with me regardless of how powerful your machine is?"


    "Er," Gazlowe froze, "That sort of spatial wormhole can¡¯t be used too frequently! Even the magic-generator furnace in myb was damaged to get the golem heart thest time. I used so many resources to fix my furnace."


    "Magic-Generator Furnace? What¡¯s that?" Snox¡¯s big ears immediately perked up.


    He might not understand what the words meant, but his greedy goblin nature had already smelled the scent of gold!


    "Do you know why I, Gazlowe, am unashamed to call myself the greatest inventor of the Goblin Empire? It is precisely because I invented the magic-generator furnace, a device that can continuously extract energy from the gxy. We of the Goblin Empire might not have mountains of magical crystals, but we have an endless supply of magical energy with this magic-generator furnace. The future advancement and rise of the Goblin Empire will be forged by my hand alone." The slightly passionate Gazlowe instantly be a zealous believer when his magic-generator furnace was mentioned.


    "There¡¯s such a great invention?" Snox¡¯s beady green eyes opened wide. He immediately put up a fawning expression, "Then... o¡¯ greatest inventor Sir Gazlowe, can you let me take a look at this great, epochal invention of the ages?"


    At this moment, Snox¡¯s green face filled with excessive admiration and adtion!

 Chapter 329 Bloody Sorceress

    Chapter 329 Bloody Sorceress


    "Magic-Generator Furnace?" Greem contemted in silence, "Are you sure this is the name he mentioned?"


    "I am, master! I am one hundred percent certain!" Snox still had that fawning expression on his face, but a sly and scheming light glowed in his beady eyes, "I even gave him the book for free to win his trust. I didn¡¯t ask for anything in return, but a chance to take a look at this unusual item he described!"


    "And?"


    "He lifted the light screen and brought me on tour around his magicalb. We saw the spider tank."


    "And the magic generator furnace?"


    "Of course I saw the furnace as well!"


    "Mm, you¡¯ve done well!" Greem nodded in satisfaction, "You must have recorded it, didn¡¯t you?"


    "Of course, as long as it¡¯s your orders, this goblin Snox will do everything in his ability to aplish it." Snox quickly took out an image-recording crystal the size of a button, "I recorded everything inside!"


    Greem once again smiled in approval.


    Snox¡¯s obedience and smarts surprised even Greem.


    He had expected Snox to be opposed to betraying his race. Who knew that he would ept all this without any hesitation? In fact, Snox had even taken the initiative on his own. He was actively helping Greem uncover the secrets of the goblin duke.


    Naturally, Greem couldn¡¯t be stingy with such a loyal subordinate.


    Greem instantly rewarded him with a considerable number of magical crystals. He even gave Snox a storage belt. Not even Alice owned one. Snox no longer needed to wear seven or eight belts on his body with this new gear.


    Greem instantly projected his Spirit into the image-recording crystal once Snox left.


    His expression changed in less than seven minutes. He slowly ced the crystal on the table with a feeling of utter shock.


    Goddammit! This wasn¡¯t some magic generator furnace! It was a space furnace!


    No. More urately, this was a kind of prototype for a space furnace!


    Greem suppressed his excitement and reyed the image from the crystal in his mind. He paused it upon seeing the towering ¡¯magic-generator furnace¡¯ in the goblin-hall.


    It was quite an intimidating giant steel monstrosity.


    An initial estimate, judging from the recording, put it at three hundred meters tall and one hundred meters in diameter. It was practically a giant metal can. It looked like a giant capsule when it stood in the hall like that. However, some unique alloyposed the outside of the container, and it gleamed with a deste blue light. Also, its insides didn¡¯t contain a material substance, but unstable, roiling, and ravaging space energy!


    Goblins might be ignorant, but the adepts hailed as the ves of knowledge couldn¡¯t be as ignorant as they were.


    Even with a light screen between the device, even with five hundred meters of distance between the screen and the furnace, the recording still perfectly preserved theplex spatial flux and forcefield lingering around the entire hall.


    This flux meant that the goblins were mistaken. What burned inside the furnace wasn¡¯t the elementium energy they thought it to be, but chaos energy from space.


    Space energy was chaos energy, not elementium energy.


    The two were distinct existences. Their names were simr, but they were two remarkably different things.


    ording to ancient knowledge, the multiverse they lived in was epassed by an endless sea of space energy. The higher realms, material nes, elementium nes, the lower realms... the infinite, swirling sea of spatial energy permeated everything within.


    Chaos energy possessed iparable instability and ferociousness. Moreover, it seemed to have an evil ability to twist and distort souls and personalities. There were way too few races and beings that could directly harness this energy. However, every individual or race that mastered control over chaos energy were powerful beings that stood atop the universe!


    Almost all material nes naturally developed nar barriers to block out the spatial energies and prevent the beings residing within from being corrupted and polluted by the chaos energies in space. These ne barriers were like fetal membranes that cultivated and nurtured millions of living creatures. They would calm and tame the space energies that made it through the defenses and turn them into gentle elementium energy. They would then disassemble and reduce the elementium power into different elementium particles with their respective traits based on the narws.


    Adepts, magical creatures, elves, spiritualists...the supernatural power they possessed came from this ubiquitous elementium energy. This power was tame, gentle, and could be controlled and manipted through the use of the spiritual consciousness! It was the source of an adept¡¯s strength, and one of the only powers that adepts could directly harness and absorb.


    Chaos energy, on the other hand, was feared by all adepts. They treated it like poison. Any involvement with it meant death!


    Alice had suffered at the hands of chaos energy before when she assimted the chaos energy of the spacestone in her ignorance. If the idental advancement hadn¡¯t stopped this process of assimtion, Alice would have transformed into a spatial being.


    However, it wasn¡¯t as if there was no chance of harnessing chaos energy.


    The adept¡¯s tower was able to absorb chaos energy and break it down into elementium energy, which the tower stored in an elementium pool. It was then used to power the tower¡¯s functions.


    However, this was a process conducted through the adept¡¯s tower.


    A single tower could easily reach several hundreds of meters in height. The space within the tower could fit hundreds and thousands of adepts. Only a magical building of this scale, crafted from numerous rare resources, coulde into contact with chaos energy without suffering any damage to itself.


    That was why Greem was shocked to find a bunch of otherworldly goblins that could harness chaos energy with crude machines despite having no elementium talent.


    This...how could this not surprise him?! How could he not be shaken by the wonders of the world?!


    Greem looked at the coiling wires and steaming constructs, as well as the goblin engineers with their ¡¯space helmets¡¯ on their heads. He felt the world turning upside down.


    The most ignorant were the most fearless after all!


    Were they not afraid of the space furnace exploding andpletely razing the Goblin Empire? How could the violent and destructive chaos energy be tamed by a bunch of goblins that couldn¡¯t even cast an elementium fireball? It wasn¡¯t scientific!


    Countless curses and swear words thundered through Greem¡¯s mind.


    That said, this turn of events had also caused Greem to develop a far more significant interest in this goblin ne.


    If he were able to create an army in the future, this Goblin Empire would be his first choice for an invasion. As long as he was able to get his hands on their technology and thoroughly examine this ¡¯magic-generator furnace,¡¯ he would easily be able to create a magical mechanical empire for himself! The strange and varied powers avable to the adepts made this a straightforward task.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but get excited at the prospect of possessing such power.


    ............


    The Knight¡¯s ne.


    The cries and calls of bugs continued within the primal green forest. The sea of trees waved as the winds blew across the ce.


    A small group was traversing through the woods with much difficulty.


    The one standing at the very front was a muscr man in chainmail. A double-edged war axe in his hand swung about like it was weightless. He carved a broad path before them with every sh of his axe.


    However, even though a makeshift path had been created, there were still many bushes, vines, and brambles by the sides. It made their movements exceptionally difficult and tiring.


    There were only five people in the group. The other members were equally as muscr as the first man. Their gray cloaks were bulky, and it seemed as if they were all carrying somerge weapons with them.


    "Locard, how much longer until we reach our destination? I hate this humid and warm environment," p. A guy in the middle of the formation grumbled as he pped the mosquito that hadnded on his face. There were far too many of the pesky insects.


    As expected of mosquitos in a primal forest, every single one of them was the size of a finger. Their wrinkled abdomens could even swell to the size of a fist when they were full of human blood.


    Blood sshed all over this guy¡¯s face when the mosquito¡¯s abdomen broke.


    "Dammit, dammit, dammit." The terrible environment had caused his mood to sour, "I hate this mosquito, I hate this forest, I hate everything. I don¡¯t want to run anymore. I would rather turn back and fight with those bloodsucking devils. I would rather die in glorious battle than rot in this goddamned forest."


    "Silence!" The man at the end of the group was the leader. He scolded angrily, "No one is stopping you if you want to die, but don¡¯t drag the rest of us with you. Do not forget your pride as a radiant knight, Sim!"


    "Pride, honor......" The man named Sim was clearly at his limits, "You keep yelling pride, day in, day out. What pride and honor is there now that we¡¯ve been reduced to dogs chased by those ursed adepts? Their evil arts have also exterminated the royal bloodline. What can we do from here on out?"


    Sim¡¯s careless words plunged the members of the group into silence.


    The disastrous defeat at Greend Forest. The dragon raids on the capital. The dragons¡¯ raiding of the entire continent...none of this couldpare to the impact of the royal bloodline¡¯s termination!


    With the forceful domination of the adepts, these previously glorious witcher knights had be dogs without a home, chased by packs of wolves and jaguars, torn to pieces.


    However, those people that wanted to attack them and exchange the heads of the knights for rewards from the adepts were no real threat. The pursuing adepts were the true nightmares they needed to avoid!


    The Bloody Queen was no longer elegant. She had turned into the Bloody Sorceress, an existent that these radiant knights and spellbreaker knights feared from the very core of their being.


    Evil Bugs was no longer as weak as before. This demon of bugs had also be an unstoppable terror with every piece of flesh he consumed. Many of theirpanions had died before their eyes in that very manner, torn to pieces by swarms of insects.


    "Silence. I think I hear something." The man with the axe in the vanguard hushed them.


    Everyone quickly shut up and listened carefully to every movement in the forest.


    There indeed seemed to be a vague sound ringing in the calming sound of trees waving in the wind.


    It was the sound of beating wings.


    "It¡¯s the Bloody Sorceress! Quick, run..."


    The leader¡¯s expression changed all of a sudden. He started shouting.


    A ck cloud of bats surged forth from the woods amid their shouts. They pressed down upon the knights like an ominous cloud.


    The Bloody Sorceress was here!

 Chapter 330 Bloodsucking Bat Swarm

    Chapter 330 Bloodsucking Bat Swarm


    A vast forest with green trees and lush, full leaves.


    An odd buzzing sound suddenly reced the chirping of insects. It was the sound of beating wings.


    Pupupu.


    A dense swarm of bats surged out of the forest like a ck cloud. They surrounded the group of knights in an instant.


    ck shiny fur, red eyes, white fangs, and a body asrge as a wash basin. These weren¡¯t the typical bat species that resided in the woods, but a swarm of bloodsucking bats that had been mutated with evil magic.


    They were unqualified to be called real vampires. At the very best, they were only blood servants and spawn created by an actual vampire.


    Throwing these weak entities against the two radiant knights and three spellbreaker knights was a futile effort. It was like smashing an egg against a rock. The knights would crush them within moments. All five of the knights cast aside their rough cloak and quickly gathered together with their backs against each other. They were nervous, almost as if they were afraid of something.


    A tall figure wrapped in a bright red dress stood on a thick branch in the distance. She looked through the leaves at the knights. Beside her, on every single branch of the massive and ancient tree, were bloodsucking bats dangling upside down.


    Compared to the bat swarm currently engaged in the fight, the one hundred bats here were Bloody Sorceress Mary¡¯s elite guards. Each of them was asrge as a calf in their bat forms. They had grey fur, a small head, and a humanoid face.


    They hung from the branches and looked around the woods vigntly. They asionally released high-frequency sound waves from their mouths and maintained closemunication with the scouts in the distance.


    Eight more humanoid vampires surrounded Mary. Every one of them dressed as knights. They were the trump card that allowed Mary to fearlessly hunt down her enemies¨C her Blood Knights.


    There were a total of eight Blood Knights.


    Three of them were Second Grade, and the other five were First Grade.


    Their previous incarnations were the radiant knights and spellbreaker knights that used to rule this ne.


    However, through Mary¡¯s Embrace and the use of magic, their souls had fallen under her maniption. They had lost sight of their true natures and personalities, turning into first-generation vampires that obeyed Mary¡¯s every whim. This process had also caused their intelligence to be severely affected. They had forgotten most of their battle techniques due to this.


    That was why a Second Grade Blood Knight could only exhibit prowess equal to a First Grade elite adept, despite possessing a resilient body and powerful regenerative ability. It was undoubtedly a regret that Mary harbored!


    The other First Grade Blood Knights were also only adept-level vampires.


    The first bats to attack were like wolves circling their prey. They screeched as they wove in between the trees. Six hundred bats gathered in a space norger than a hundred meters. They blotted out all light with their bodies alone.


    More mysterious was how the sheer number of bats managed to avoid colliding with one another despite their quantity. One had to be impressed by their expertise at flying!


    Six months of being refugees had severely weakened this group of witcher knights. Without the support of a kingdom, they no longer had magic colts to ride, magical crystals to supply them with energy, food to fill their bellies, clothes to keep them warm, or beds to let them rest. All of this had caused theirbat strength to deteriorate tremendously.


    With no colts avable to them, they had to traverse mountains and rivers with their own feet. With no magical crystals, their runic swords became fire pokers, no longer able to emit zing elementium me. They had to draw upon their internal energy reserves if they wanted to fire mid-range energy des.


    It was a strain on their stamina!


    Even so, the Knights held onto the runic swords in their hands. Blinding radiance came from within their bodies. Their power was still as ferocious and violent as before!


    One energy de after another fired at the bats. The attacks ravaged everything in their paths.


    Tall trees, thick branches, and even the ck leathery bodies of the bloodsucking bats were split into two by the des before exploding into bits of blood and flesh.


    The five-man team wasposed of veterans. The group quickly moved through the woods as they opened a path with their energy des. It seemed as if they wanted to stake their lives on escaping their current surroundings.


    The swarm of bats couldn¡¯t seem to do anything about it either.


    After all, they were unarmored, or at best, lightly armored after they transformed into bats. Trying to endure the energy des that dealt thirty to fifty points of damage with their frail bodies was impossible.


    They could only screech and use their numbers to harass and slow down the enemies¡¯ movements.


    The bats that made it close to the knights died a terrible death.


    The runic swords forged of special steel danced in the hands of the knights. The des shed like lightning. Five longswords formed a circle of des, culling all bats before they coulde close.


    Mary was utterly apathetic to the ughter happening to her subordinates.


    Only the Blood Knights and low-grade vampires beside her were worthy of her concern. She didn¡¯t feel pain at the death of these blood servants and vampire spawn. She just needed to find a human city for a blood offering banquet and the numbers of these servants would be replenished.


    These guys were sacrificial pawns in the first ce. There was no need to worry about the worth of their lives!


    That said, it was still hard to replenish their numbers while they were in this rural forest. That was why Mary didn¡¯t intend to let too many of them die.


    She waved her hand slightly, and half of the one hundred low-grade vampires lunged forth, beating their wings as they joined the swarm of bats.


    "Careful, the vampires are here!" The leader of the knights reminded hispanions.


    Countless numbers of their allies had fallen to the fangs of these vampires over the course of thest six months. They had either ran out of stamina or had been careless in their defense.


    The vampires did not have exceptional offensive or defensive abilities, but they were excellent atbat.


    They mingled with the ordinary bats, and they only pounced when an opportunity presented itself. By the time they reached their target, they would already have transformed into their human forms. They wouldn¡¯t even dodge the knight¡¯s attacks. Instead, they would grab on to the knight, tearing and biting away at all exposed flesh and trading wound for wound.


    There was no way to defend against such fearless attacks!


    The knights might have been able to deflect the vampires if it were only one or two of them that attacked them each time. However, even a spellbreaker knight would fall prey when it was a group of vampires that were attacking him.


    With the addition of the vampires, the five knights¡¯ battle quickly turned into an arduous one.


    The radiant knights had far better Physique and Strengthpared to the vampires. Killing them was as easy as slicing vegetables. Thus, the vampiresmanded the bat swarm to dy the radiant knights. Meanwhile, all the monsters quickly gathered up and assaulted the protective circle of the spellbreaker knights.


    A spellbreaker knight, engaged in violent and bloodybat, was too preupied with hacking at a vampire that had flown past him. He failed to notice the bush beneath his feet.


    He stumbled two steps and suddenly found himself outside the defensive formation.


    The ident caused him to panic. He waved his sword about and tried to rush back to hispanion¡¯s side before he even managed to bnce himself.


    But it was toote!


    Rustle.


    Countless bats surged into the midst of the knights from the gap that had just opened in their formation. They used their strength in numbers and forcefully threw the knights into chaos.


    A swarm of vampires descended from the skies as they were distracted. They assaulted the stray knight with their bodies.


    Blood sshed everywhere, and limbs scattered in every direction!


    The stray knight slowly pushed further and further away in this storm of blood and flesh. He quickly disappeared from sight.


    Pupupu.


    Consecutive energy des sted into the sky. The bats swarming the knights were instantly sliced to bits. Blood filled the air and stained the knights crimson.


    They didn¡¯t even have time to suppress the agitated energy within their bodies. A new batch of bats sped forth from every direction, once again pinning them to the spot.


    The knights could vaguely hear the battle cries of their straypanion through the horde of bats. However, the sounds soon stopped following a sorrowful cry. Only a sickening sucking sound remained.


    "No, leader, we must save Stophe!" Locard, the man with the axe, was already panting in exhaustion, his muscles covered in sweat.


    "Save? Can¡¯t you see he¡¯s already dead?" Sim roared as he continued to hack and sh.


    This team had already suffered casualties. If they continued to stay here for a dead man, none of them would live to see another day. That was why he was so annoyed by Locard¡¯s brainless suggestion.


    "I don¡¯t care, and I will not abandon any of my brothers... " Locard¡¯s eyes had already turned bloodshot from all the killing. He yelled in anger and turned towards the distance, waving his axe and cutting his way towards hispanion.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    As expected, the knight leader had already made his decision before Sim could even curse.


    "You bring Sim and leave first. I will return with Locard. We will meet at the agreed location."


    The leader¡¯s body enveloped in light the very next second. The runic energies came from within his body and formed an armor of light. It gave him more power and a savage strength.


    When the blinding curtain of des fell upon the bats, their corpses dropped like rain.


    "Go! Hurry! I will catch up with you soon..."


    The leader yelled and charged into the woods.

 Chapter 331 The Mantis Stalks the Cicada

    Chapter 331 The Mantis Stalks the Cicada


    The battle quickly intensified with the splitting up of the knight squad.


    "Master, let me and Kansas assault them. We¡¯ll ensure that they do not escape!" The one that spoke was the strongest Blood Knight under Mary¨C Blood Knight Windsor.


    He seemed to have been the famous leader of the conservative faction of the knights before he became a Blood Knight. Sadly, at this moment, he had lost all his pride and honor as a radiant knight. He kneeled before Mary as a loyal ve.


    Blood Knight Windsor didn¡¯t disy even a trace of hesitation or unwillingness to raising his de against his formerpanions. In fact, Mary saw excitement rising in his blood-red eyes. It was excitement for the uing ughter.


    "Go, my warrior! Demonstrate your courage with the heads of the enemy!" Mary¡¯s ruby-like eyes gleamed as she gave her orders, "Apart from those two radiant knights, you may do as you like!"


    The remaining vampires rushed out after hearing Mary¡¯s crisp and seductive voice. They followed the other Blood Knights and charged onto the battlefield.


    When everything around her had fallen silent once more, a person appeared beside her. It was Count Vanlier, the vampire that was first Embraced by Mary.


    He had been the highest authority figure of Blue Hillock City before he became a vampire. However, such worldly titles were worthless in the world of vampires, where power was everything. ¡¯Count¡¯ Vanlier had abandoned his past identity to keep Mary¡¯s favor. He willingly became an insignificant, low-grade vampire at her side.


    In this group, where courage and power were most important, a person like himself would not be noteworthy. He had neither talent nor expertise. Still, this wasn¡¯t a problem for the sly and crafty Vanlier. After fifteen days of following Mary, he quickly became an irreceable strategist with his exceptional schemes and nasty tricks.


    Moreover, this old fox knew how to remain in the shadows.


    That was why hepletely hid himself while Windsor and the other Blood Knights were with Mary. It wasn¡¯t until Mary was alone that he would hurry over and use his brilliant mind to share his master¡¯s troubles.


    "How is it? Have you found any traces of that bug?" Mary asked without even looking back.


    Ever since she had discovered Vanlier¡¯s iparable talent for scheming, she had assigned a dozen low-grade vampires to be his subordinates. It was with these dozen vampires that Vanlier quickly became Mary¡¯s most valued information agent.


    Blinding light exploded on the battlefield in the distance. It was like several small suns had risen in the forest. It destroyed the trees, and the forest trembled from the impact. Swarms of bats swooped about the woods, trying their best to avoid the chaotic wave of energy.


    Mary could feel a sting in her soul.


    It was the soul bacsh from the death of a blood servant directly under her.


    It was evident that the battle in the woods had reached its peak. It was a moment of life and death for all involved. Even so, Mary had no intention of helping. She stood proudly above the tree.


    Empowering themselves was one way for vampires to rise to power, but possessing numerous strong servants was also another!


    Her panion¡¯ that had already returned to the World of Adepts was also an adept exceptional at forging powerful and reliable subordinates. As expected, she had been affected by him! Mary had also fallen in love with this barbaric way of fighting. Roaming around and drowning the enemy with your superior numbers when you caught their weakness.


    However, Mary knew she didn¡¯t quite possess the ability to n like him. That was why she ced a lot of her trust and hopes on this sly vampire that had appeared out of nowhere, giving him more and more authority over her servants.


    "Master, the scouts outside have not found any traces of that bug. However, I can be sure that he is preparing an ambush around us." Vanlier transformed into an elegant human noble and analyzed the situation for Mary, "This here is thest den for any fleeing knights. If he doesn¡¯t want to miss an opportunity to strengthen his army of bugs, he will have to fight with us for thisst bit of resources."


    "Mm, go on!"


    "Evil Bugs isn¡¯t on good terms with the master. He knows this as well as we do and will be prepared for you. He will be slowly eating away at the enemy¡¯s squads on the outside. This is something that both of us will be doing. However, if anyone tried to attack the witcher knight camp, the other person would strike, regardless of the results of the fight."


    "Isn¡¯t that why I gave you so many men? To dig that bug out ahead of time?"


    "I fear this may be impossible!" Vanlier betrayed a bitter smile, "Sir Evil Bugs is most proficient at hiding. As long as he remains in the ground, my dozen scouts won¡¯t be able to find him."


    "Perfect. If Evil Bugs doesn¡¯t want toe out, then let him keep hiding in the darkness!" Mary narrowed her eyes and said pridefully, "We can take this opportunity to grow stronger. I will see what he has to fight against me once the snowball turns into a mountain."


    "Mydy, we must be more cautious when we act as well." Vanlier was concerned, "I am worried that Sir Evil Bugs might lure the witcher knights to our location and force us into the final fight ahead of time!"


    "Mm, I understand!" Mary was no longer the reckless girl that fought without any use of her brain. She thought for a moment after hearing this, " The loss of familiars might be tremendous after this fight. However, once those two radiant knights make it through the Embrace, we will have benefitted from the exchange! I will assign another hundred men from my familiar army once the battle ends. You must keep a close eye on that bug. Do not let hime out and disrupt my ns! Do you understand?"


    "Understood!" Vanlier immediately bowed.


    The battle in the forest suddenly extended into the distance as the two were having their discussion. It seemed the radiant knight was no longer able to endure the attacks of two Blood Knights. He had started to break out of the surroundings.


    "Let¡¯s go and take a look!"


    Mary took to the skies with Vanlier. The two of them turned into a red bat and a gray one as they dove into the forest.


    A few of their subordinates that had been in hiding nearby emerged from the bushes, the trees, and the grass after ensuring nothing abnormal had happened after their departure. They then pped their wings and followed after Mary and Vanlier.


    The sound of energy explosions continued to ring out, but the source of the noise was gradually getting further and further.


    Finally, after seven minutes, the ce where Mary had just been fell silent once again.


    The silence didn¡¯tst too long. A different and equally odd sound shattered the peace.


    The ck earth around the tree started to swell. Once it expanded to a height of one meter, it broke, and countless horrifying bugs swarmed out of the hole.


    These bugs weren¡¯trge. Each of them was only the size of a fist. However, their ck shells gleamed with a faint trace of magic.


    The ck beetles didn¡¯t disperse once they climbed out of the hole. Instead, they gathered together and slowly formed an odd humanoid shape.


    Finally, the human body made of bugs stabilized. Countless crawling beetlesposed Acteon¡¯s ugly and horrifying face.


    "Mary...Mary..." Acteon let out a chilling hiss from within his bug body, "Do you think you are my opponent without that brat?"


    "You want to lure me out and kill me? Kehkehkeh. I too want to devour your swarm of bats and use your blood to forge my great body of bugs. It is almostplete."


    "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight... ooh. Who knew? You already had eight adept-level vampire subordinates! Still, your power is insignificant whenpared to the great Acteon, kehkehkeh...¡±


    Acteon hissed, and severalrger ck beetles crawled out of the hole. They had ck shells, green wings, and corpse spots on their backs. His number of carcass beetles had reached a shocking thirty-four.


    These carcass beetles were not young like they used to be. After continuously feeding them blood and flesh for the past six months, all thirty-four of the carcass beetles had matured to their adult form. Every one of them could rival an adept.


    Even though Acteon¡¯s own body was only at the level of a newly advanced adept, he had confidence in beating any elite adepts with the help of these subordinates. He had absolute faith even if he had to face Greem once more!


    "Greem...Greem...don¡¯t you want to kill me? Well then, I¡¯ll exterminate your aplice first. Then I¡¯ll return to the World of Adepts for you! Kehkehkeh."


    Evil Bugs Acteon hissed and vented his anger before shutting his eyes tomunicate with the insect spies he had ced in the distance. He was surprised to find two ¡¯fish¡¯ that had barely escaped the web. And one of them was a prey he craved after¨C a radiant knight.


    This discovery caused him to be extremely happy!


    The tens of thousands of ck beetles turned into a flood and once again entered the hole under his instructions. They followed the tunnels they had dug underground and quickly closed in on the target.


    In just a few seconds, not a single beetle remained on the spot that had previously been a hell of creepy crawlies.


    ............


    Fifteen kilometers away, by a river in the mountains.


    Two disheveled and bloody figures climbed out of the running stream. They crouched on the shore and panted in exhaustion.


    Countless ck shadows were weaving and circling the woods in the distance as if they were looking for something. Fear crept into their hearts. The two men immediately cast their bodies into the cold water once more, leaving only their eyes and noses above the water. They silently monitored the situation in the distance.


    With the cold river water hiding their body heat, these bats that had exceptionally sensitive noses to the aura of humans had utterly lost track of their prey. They found nothing after patrolling several times and had no choice but to disappear into the horizon and search elsewhere.


    "Wait a little longer! We will go out once they are far away!" The radiant knight named Soros instructed softly.


    Sim could only endure the pain from the numerous wounds all over his body and continued to soak in the water.


    The woods around them slowly became quiet.


    It became increasingly silent, so much so that the two of them started to panic!


    The disgusting and pungent smell of rotting corpses suddenly spread out throughout the silent woods.

 Chapter 332 But Who is the Oriole?

    Chapter 332 But Who is the Oriole?


    The battle erupted!


    The two knights were aware of the danger the moment they smelled corpse rot.


    However, a ck flood of bugs had already surged out of the bushes before they could get out of the river.


    Soros knew what these were from his numerous encounters with Evil Bugs. These were no ordinary mutated bugs, but young carcass beetles that had been nurtured with human flesh. They might not berge, but their shells were as durable as metallic armor that was one finger thick.


    The toughness of their shells was still insufficient to protect them from death. Soros could kill every one of them with a single sh of his sword. However, there were just way too many of them. Even Soros, with his crushing strength and power, had no means of enduring the surging flood of bugs.


    The young carcass beetles had no extraordinary means of attack. They only needed to use their venomous fangs.


    They fed on rotten meat. It was natural that the bugs¡¯ fangs also possessed venom. Toxins would cling to the wound where they bit the victim. The flesh would rot and stop the injury from healing.


    That was why even a radiant knight had trouble protecting himself when faced with a swarm of these tiny, yet sturdy, bugs.


    The already injured spellbreaker knight Sim had already been drowned in bugs after killing a dozen of them. Only a human-shaped pile of bugs remained on the spot.


    ...


    A brilliant and blinding light emerged from within Soros¡¯ body. The explosion of energy sted away all the beetles that had gathered around him.


    A monstrous storm of energy gathered about his runic sword. However, he hesitated right as the powerful sword technique was on the verge ofunching.


    This one sh might cause tremendous damage to the bug swarm, but Sim had no chance of surviving the impact either.


    Just one moment of hesitation and an intense pain shot up his legs. The carcass beetles had once again closed in on him. They had bitten through his steel boots and dug their ws into his limbs.


    At the same time, a small energy storm erupted in the middle of the pile of bugs.


    Bugs were sent flying in every direction, along with broken bug limbs and disgusting fluids.


    Spellbreaker Knight Sim roared as he charged out of the mountain of bugs.


    Savage energy flowed around him as he let out a battle cry. He grabbed a beetle with each hand and forcefully crushed them to paste with his bare hands!


    Soros was surprised but happy to see this turn of events. He shouted at hispanion, "Quick! Come over, and we will break out of this together!"


    "Leave me," a severe expression appeared on Sim¡¯s rough face, "Sir! Attack now! Leave me, I... I can¡¯t go on..."


    Soros paused, but he quickly understood when his gaze shifted to Sim¡¯s body.


    Several bulges had appeared underneath Sim¡¯s muscr body and were quickly moving.


    Some beetles had dug into his body and were wildly feasting away at his flesh.


    Sim looked at the unwilling Soros as more and more violent energy rose within him.


    "Sir, I¡¯ll be going ahead!"


    Sim yelled and self-destructed!


    The iparably destructive wave of energy instantly destroyed an area of twenty meters, bringing with it pieces of bone and flesh.


    Countless bugs were hit by the bones and gore as they shot away from the center of the explosion. They were riddled with holes and died.


    The debris didn¡¯t hit the beetles that stayed at a distance, but the ferocious shockwave still sent tremors through their bodies. Their organs and brains were crushed to paste in the impact. They too were dead.


    A single st and nearly a hundred young carcass beetles had died along with Sim!


    "Sim......"


    Radiant Knight Soros opened his eyes wide in anger at this scene. His eyelids nearly split from the strength he exerted. He no longer hesitated with the violent blow that had been gathering in his hands.


    An even wilder and more powerful storm of energy exploded within the swarm of bugs!


    The dome-shaped shockwave unfurled outwards, blowing away all the beetles. Nothing could resist wherever the shockwave went. It destroyed everything.


    This attack visibly demonstrated the power of a Second Grade knight.


    Knights, as a profession, might not have the agile long-ranged attacks of casters. However, they better trained at gathering and concentrating energy at close range. Adepts could never hope to rival the sheer destructiveness of knights at that distance.


    After all, most of the adepts¡¯ energy came from the wandering elementium energies. These were powerful but unconcentrated. Inparison, every ounce of a knight¡¯s energy came from within their bodies. They hadplete control over this energy.


    It was why elementium adepts were doomed to death if the knights were able to close the distance. The reason bloodline adepts were respected and hailed as the most powerful was due to their expertise in both close and long range. Their ability to engage in bloody melees was no weaker than their ability to sling spells at a distance.


    This left them with no obvious weakness!


    Even Soros couldn¡¯t easily fire an attack as powerful as this.


    If it had been in the past, he would only have needed to swap out the energy crystal in his sword. He would have been able to fire plenty of such attacks with the supply of energy from crystals. But now, they were dogs without homes. Where were they to go and find new magical crystals for this purpose?


    Thus, Soros¡¯ legs gave way after firing this shocking st using only the energy reserves within his body. He almost fell to his knees.


    At that moment, odd rustling sounds came from the bushes in the distance.


    Several gigantic beetles with ck shells, green wings, and corpse spots slowly flew towards him.


    Dammit! The real carcass beetles were here!


    sh. sh.


    Two bright energy des shot out of his sword. The two carcass beetles leading the charge were blown away, somersaulting through the air as they received the impact. However, no visible mark seemed to have marred their shells. They beat their wings, readjusted their positions, and continued to fly towards the radiant knight.


    Dammit! These beetles were even tenacious than before!


    Soros was a radiant knight. Those two blows contained at least fifty points of damage. However, these beetles were able to endure the strike without any noticeable injury. His face couldn¡¯t help but sour at the sight of this.


    Fortunately, these carcass beetles weren¡¯t exactly the fastest things in the world. It was hard for them to surround and kill a Second Grade radiant knight unless their numbers reached a critical mass.


    Soros didn¡¯t dare stick around. Energy surged to his back and transformed into a brilliant pair of wings. With the help of the wings of lights, he dashed forward. His speed increased again and again. His feet had started to leave the ground. It seemed he was about to take to the skies.


    The wings were a battle technique the radiant knights had researched and developed themselves after long periods of contact with runic energy.


    In the end, this was just another unique way of utilizing runic energies!


    A ck shadow saw Soros take the sky and leave the bugs behind. It quickly flew into the sky, like a st of lightning, and crashed with Soros.


    Dong.


    A muffled crash and a minor shockwave blew apart the two figures. Soros¡¯ wings of lights extinguished and he crashed toward the ground.


    The mysterious ck shadow fell along with him.


    Soros¡¯ body had been enveloped in thick armor and surging energy waves when they crashed. Moreover, the speed at which he flew was swift. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the impact that the ck figure had to endure himself.


    The dark figure fell onto a bush.


    Countless ck spots fell off the body made of ck beetles as ¡¯he¡¯ scrambled to get on his feet.


    Those weren¡¯t ck spots, but dead beetles.


    Even Acteon couldn¡¯t remain unharmed after the crash earlier!


    The stunned Soros shouted in anger when he finally saw the mastermind behind the ck bug swarm before him. One after another, threatening energy des sliced towards Acteon¡¯s body of bugs.


    Three carcass beetles pped their wings and moved in front of Acteon. They used their armor-like shells to endure all the blows.


    However, Soros had already lunged forward before they could recover from the attacks. His sword of light pierced forth several times in a row, instantly stabbing the beetles through their mouths and crushing their innards to pieces.


    The carcass beetles might have had durable shells, but their insides weren¡¯t quite as resilient. All three of them died with a single stab of the focused sword of energy.


    The stumbling Acteon hissed at Soros when he saw three of the carcass beetles, that he had so carefully cultivated, die. He spewed forth countless scorpions out of his mouth and lunged at the knight.


    Soros waved his de. The energy des no longer fired at the enemy but gathered along the runic longsword. The consecutive shes protected him from the scorpions.


    All the scorpions that crashed into the storm of swords disintegrated and were minced to pieces. Pungent purple fluid sshed everywhere.


    Soros continued to deflect the bugs with his sword as he closed in on Acteon.


    His only weakness as a knight was hisck of mobility. There was no way to escape a siege other than to carve his way out!


    As Acteon suppressed the knight¡¯s speed, the numerous carcass beetles had already caught up. It was far harder to break the enclosure now!


    "Don¡¯t even dream of escaping now! Stay here and became part of my bug body."


    Acteon shrieked in what was supposed to be a maniacalugh. The ear-piercing hiss was painful to the ears.


    The battle was quickly approaching its climax!


    Yet at this very same moment, a gray-furred, red-eyed bat was crouching upon a tree branch two hundred meters away. It gazed upon this intense battlefield.

 Chapter 333 Battle of Bugs and Vampires

    Chapter 333 Battle of Bugs and Vampires


    The battle in the woods had reached a climax in a matter of minutes.


    On the one hand, you had the merciless hunter, and on the other, you had the fearless prey.


    There was absolutely no room for negotiation between the two. It was why this had turned into a battle of life and death in an instant!


    No one present could stop the radiant knight with his indomitable power. Even Acteon, with his strange arts and magic, was shed again and again by Soros. Corpses of bugs were sent flying everywhere. His body of bugs had already been crippled and severely damaged.


    However, Acteon seemed to have turned into an immortal afterpletely turning his body into bugs. It didn¡¯t matter how frantically the enemy ravaged his body. He was always able to recover with an endless swarm of scorpions within a second.


    Moreover, more and more carcass beetles gathered around Soros as the knight was distracted by Acteon. They had gradually sealed all paths of escape.


    Five carcass beetles might not have been able to do anything to a Second Grade knight. In fact, they were at risk of being killed if they showed even a momentary weakness. However, when two or three dozen of them gathered together and formed a wall of bugs, Soros could no longer ughter them, even if he wanted.


    The carcass beetles opened and shut their pincers continuously. Their pincers could sever a thick piece of lumber in two with a single cut. If Soros hadn¡¯t formed a resilient energy armor with the use of his runic energy and runic equipment, he would have been dissected already.


    However, there was a limit to the runic energy within his body. He couldn¡¯t endure long periods of wasteful exhaustion. Breaking out of the siege was his only option.


    The battle quickly became increasingly intense!


    ............


    An odd army was quickly closing in on the river as the fight progressed.


    Severalrge gray bats were silently gliding between the trees and their branches.


    With the help of the scouts to guide their way, they hurried towards the battlefield without hesitation.


    Mary stood on top of a tall tree along with her eight Blood Knights. They were almost three hundred kilometers away from the fight.


    The sly Vanlier was bending his body beside Mary and gesturing at the battlefield as if he was talking about something.


    It was thanks to Vanlier¡¯s scheme to set out this borate bait that the vampires intentionally let Soros go. It was only the allure of a radiant knight that could draw Acteon out of hiding.


    However, at this moment, all the actors had already stepped onto the stage. Schemes and tricks no longer mattered. The next step depended only on their power and the ferocity that they brought to the fight!


    Thus, Vanlier wisely retreated behind the Blood Knights.


    Acteon still raised his head and looked at Mary in her red dress despite being engaged in the battle.


    The two stared at each other from a distance.


    "The food is delicious... but a too little to share between two." Acteon¡¯s bug hissing was sharp and hoarse. It hurt to listen to him speak.


    Mary¡¯s leathery wings beat behind her back, allowing her to hover in the air.


    She looked down at the bloody battlefield and licked her crimson lips. Her blue eyes slowly turned blood red.


    "Indeed! This ce is way too small! Too small to fit the two of us! What is it? Have you already decided to retreat?"


    "Wasn¡¯t it you that wanted to find me? I came here today, and you came here as well. How about it? Shall we fight right here?"


    "A fight is a fight!"


    The two of them were both decisive and savage individuals. They had already decided on a deathmatch within a matter of seconds. Moreover, they had made their decisions with a struggling radiant knight still fighting in between them.


    There had never been such a moment where the existence of a Second Grade knight was so insignificant. So insignificant to even be ignored by the others present!


    Mary raised her head and let out a blood-curdling shriek. Surging crimson energies instantly enveloped her body.


    Her red eyes gleamed with a chilling light as two sharp fangs protruded from her lips. Her tall and slim figure swelled and increased in size. Strange crimson patterns spread all over her pale white body.


    Mary opened her mouth and let out a terrifying cry reminiscent of a wild beast. Her slender fingertips quickly extended and turned into sharp and curved ws.


    "Fight!"


    Her leathery bat wings had unfurled to their fullest. She pointed her finger at Acteon and shouted a deration of war. She then dove downwards at Acteon.


    The Blood Knights behind her also raised their longswords above their heads and charged downwards, enveloped in crimson energy. A hundred vampires followed along with them in their bat forms.


    What would happen when a vampire mob shes with a carcass beetle swarm?


    The scene before our eyes gave us the perfect answer!


    At that moment, blood sshed in every direction, and severed limbs were everywhere. Chaos had swept over the battlefield in an instant.


    The vampires were at a disadvantage in the first wave of attacks!


    Their sharp fangs were utterly harmless when pitted against the armored shells of the carcass beetles. Meanwhile, their light and athletic bodies were frail and weak when exposed to the sharp limbs and monstrous pincers of the beetles.


    When both parties shed in midair, only the eight Blood Knights managed to inflict damage. None of the other vampires seeded in injuring the beetles. In fact, the carcass beetles¡¯ pincers had wounded several dozen of the vampires.


    The Bloody Sorceress herself was bathed in blood after personally leading the charge. Scores of cuts and shes covered her pretty face and pale skin. Still, these external wounds didn¡¯t dampen her battle spirit. Rather, they caused her to be even more savage and enraged.


    When the carcass beetles had charged at her, her bloody ws had stabbed into the wicked mouths of two of the beetles. Her terrifying blood energy instantly corroded their insides and exterminated their lives. What she suffered in exchange were two bleeding and bloody hands!


    Her two arms looked as if they had gone through a grinder. Countless cuts of varying degrees were scattered all over them. It was hard to keep track of the number of injuries she had sustained at the moment she struck the beetles.


    Now that she had passed through the carcass beetles on the outside, Mary had to face the endless swarm of bugs and Acteon himself.


    His body had already merged with the insects. It was hard to tell which was his real body and which were the insects he controlled.


    "Kehkehkeh... want to kill me? Can you kill all of these? The entire swarm is my body and an extension of my will. If you want to kill me, you will have to kill every single one of these bugs. Kehkehkeh. Can you do it?" Acteon let out a maniacal hiss as he stood proudly amidst the swarm.


    "We¡¯ll know if I can do it once I try!"


    A cold light reflected in Mary¡¯s crimson eyes. She made a grabbing motion with her left hand, and a crimson longbow mysteriously appeared out of nowhere. She drew the bowstring with her right hand as a scarlet, crystalline arrow instantly formed on the bow.


    Peng.


    A sharp and explosive ring.


    The crimson arrow had been on the bowstring the previous second, and the very next, it had already appeared in Acteon¡¯s creeping chest.


    He looked down in shock.


    A short momentter, the ferocious blood energies within the arrow erupted. Red bloody mist immediately covered an area of five meters.


    This blood mist was different from the usual mist that had formed from blood. It possessed an astounding corrosive ability.


    Rustle.


    Bug corpses fell to the ground.


    The front of Acteon¡¯s body started to peel off. Everything that had been corroded by the blood mist fell to the ground. The beetle corpses formed a thickyer beneath his feet.


    However, a swarm of bugs instantly crawled onto his body and his missing parts were quickly reformed. He had just recovered when he was attacked.


    "I already said it. You cannot kill me!" Acteon raised his creeping face and showed a smile to Mary, who was standing twenty meters away, "You¡¯ve had your turn, now it¡¯s mine."


    The moment he finished speaking, he raised his right hand. A hole copsed in his palm. Countless tiny flying insects fired from his hand. They fell upon Mary like an ominous cloud.


    Mary was a vampire adept with incredible speed and agility in the first ce. Such a slow attack would never hit her.


    Her body shed, and a series of strange afterimages floated in the air. She appeared behind Acteon, fifteen meters away, like a phantom of the night. Another crimson arrow shot at her enemy.


    Weng. Weng. Weng.


    Mary demonstrated the prowess of her eight points of agility. She used her ghostly footwork to its limits and circled Acteon at her highest speed. She dodged the pursuing bugs and urately put one crimson arrow into Acteon¡¯s body after another.


    The exploding blood mist always brought tremendous damage to Acteon. His body of bugs was continually missing pieces left and right. The pile of corpses had already covered his legs.


    However, Acteon ignored all this damage. He continued to let out those small flying insects. It was almost as if he wanted to cover the surrounding space with these flying bugspletely.


    Even Bloody Sorceress Mary couldn¡¯t entirely avoid these bugs with her speed. Once they reached a specific density, she would be unable to dodge them, regardless of which direction she went in.


    The crimson patterns on her armor repeatedly glowed and shed. The shes meant that it was enduring a countless number of attacks in a single instant. Individual bug bites might be so weak as to be harmless. However, it was hard to dismiss their attacks when a thickyer of them hung onto Mary¡¯s armor.


    She had no choice but to force her crimson energy to surge out every dozen seconds. The ferocious power would exterminate these annoying pests.


    However, theck of blood offerings posed a severe limitation to Mary¡¯s regenerative ability. The wounds on her body were recovering at an exceedingly slow rate.


    The blood energy reserves within her body rapidly plummeted as well.


    The battle between the two adepts had turned into one of attrition with no swift conclusion in sight!

 Chapter 334 Hunter and Prey

    Chapter 334 Hunter and Prey


    A chance!


    An unexpected chance at survival!


    Soros had no idea how this opportunity had presented itself before him.


    He only knew that his ¡¯saviors,¡¯ the vampires, had suddenly entered the battle when he was at his limits against the carcass beetles!


    Just like that, the two group of monsters that had ughtered countless knights started a bloody fight right before his eyes. It was a brutal and savage ughter.


    Meanwhile, the pressure that Soros faced had considerably lessened. He didn¡¯t need to attack those monsters. They were already shing like it was the end of the world. Neither group had time to pay attention to their prized prey.


    Soros could vaguely see the battle between the Bloody Sorceress and the Bug Demon in the distance. They were both weaker than him. However, the ferocity and recklessness of their struggle shocked even the Second Grade Soros.


    This battle wasn¡¯t a fight between humans, but a battle of monsters and demons!


    Tens of thousands of insects of various species surrounded the immortal Bug Demon. His body wasposed of many such creepy-crawlies. He was able to recover his body within seconds after it was damaged.


    Soros couldn¡¯t believe the sight. He couldn¡¯t even imagine the torture and exhausting struggle he¡¯d have suffered if he was the one fighting against the Bug Demon.


    That wasn¡¯t fighting against a single person. It was struggling against a massive swarm of bugs. Perhaps only the woman fighting against the monster could feel the real difference between the two things.


    Soros called her a ¡¯woman,¡¯ but he had never considered her as such.


    There had never been a woman like her in Soros¡¯ memory. She had ghastly wounds scattered all over her body and blood covering every inch of her skin, yet she still recklessly charged through the swarm of insects.


    She wasn¡¯t a woman, but a nightmare. The nightmare of all witcher knights¨C Bloody Sorceress Mary!


    Several groups of bloodsucking bats fought with the tide of insects on the fringes of the battlefield. Eight Blood Knights that had lost their pride as human knights were battling with the carcass beetles besides Soros. And right in the middle of the battlefield was the showdown between the Bloody Sorceress and the Bug Demon of Terror.


    Soros was on the verge of a breakdown. He was, after all, surrounded byyer afteryer of monsters.


    He didn¡¯t even dare to raise a hand against them; he might agitate the monsters into work together and exterminating him first. He had no way to endure attacks from all these creatures, even if he was a Second Grade knight.


    That said, waiting for the monsters to finish their fight wasn¡¯t a good idea either.


    It didn¡¯t matter which side obtained the final victory. Neither would share with the joy of victory with him.


    Thus, the exhausted Soros had no choice but to protect himself and slowly inch away from the battlefield with every opportunity he got.


    However, it wasn¡¯t that easy to avoid every single encounter in such a chaotic fight.


    Soros slipped up. An odd squeak came from beneath his feet. He had stepped on a palm-sized scorpion and crushed it. Only a pool of purple, viscous liquid and a minced bug corpse remained on the ground.


    This tiny mistake had instantly attracted two young carcass beetles towards him.


    He parried the beetles¡¯ pincers with his runic longsword as he retreated. In his panic, Soros ran into something.


    He turned back and silentlymented his fate when he saw what it was.


    Dammit, a vampire!


    This vampire was no stronger than an advanced apprentice. It was defending against a young carcass beetle with much difficulty. Wounds had appeared all over its body. It was clear that the vampire was at a disadvantage.


    It discovered Soros at that moment. It could sense the pulsing life energy from his body. The vampire instantly abandoned the fight and recklessly lunged at the human. The low-grade vampire opened its bloody mouth and revealed its sharp fangs as if it wanted to suck the blood out of Soros.


    Soros¡¯ resentment had reached its peak when faced with such an idiotic enemy.


    There were three young carcass beetles and one low-grade vampire. Soros could instantly destroy such weak enemies with a single hand with his eyes closed. Who would bother to ¡¯y¡¯ with these idiots if it wasn¡¯t out of fear of attracting even more enemies!


    Soros waved his de when faced with these fearless idiots. A single sh of his sword reduced the vampire to pieces.


    As expected, the vampire¡¯s death cry had brought about new problems for Soros. Two pseudo-adept level vampires lunged towards him, the knight responsible for the death of their brethren.


    Seeing as he could no longer remain unnoticed, Soros roared in his rage. Light surged about him and once again lit up his runic longsword. Ferocious runic energy instantly exterminated the monsters around him as he waved the sword. He immediately took the opportunity and dashed away.


    A pair of insects in his way? Death upon them!


    A swarm of bugs in his way? Death upon all of them!


    Vampires surging from every direction? Violent energy des shed in every direction. Death without exception!


    Soros no longer dared to hide any more of his power at this crucial point of life and death. He desperately called upon everyst drop of runic energy in his body, gathering them to the tip of his sword and recklessly executing every enemy that came close to him.


    He did this until a fiery blood-red figure appeared before him!


    Soros instantly stopped his frantic shing. His broad chest heaved. Large beads of sweat and pungent blood from unknown sources covered his bulging muscles.


    The Bloody Sorceress had appeared before him. She stood in his way, beating her wings and slowly descending from the skies.


    Soros hadn¡¯t previously managed to get a good look at Mary¡¯s condition due to the distance between them earlier. However, he had a perfect view now that they were only ten meters apart from each other.


    How terrible!


    What a truly terrible state!


    Mary once had an enviable figure and an iparably beautiful face, but now...


    The thin blood mist that had surrounded her was no longer able to cover her body.


    Cuts and shes of varying depths carved her delicate face. The wounds had turned green and purple, but oddly enough, not a single drop of blood had flowed out of the massive gashes. The once beautiful face had now turned into an ugly sight. So ugly that even Soros wanted to turn away in disgust.


    Mary¡¯s slim body had also been severely wounded. Grisly tears and cuts were everywhere. The tens of thousands of insects had bitten away at her crimson armor, riddling it with holes. The gear no longer served any protective purpose.


    But none of this truly mattered.


    What was even more shocking was the state of Mary¡¯s energy. Her pulsing and surging blood energy had reached its limits. It had almost beenpletely exhausted.


    Mary stood before Soros. Her blood red eyes fixated on him. Nothing could hide the thirst and greed in those eyes.


    It was frightening to be stared by such eyes!


    Even though Mary was only First Grade, and even though she was severely exhausted, Soros, a Second Grade Radiant Knight, still felt unknown fear rise in his heart when exposed to Mary¡¯s unreserved gaze!


    It was sometimes hard to determine the identity of the predator and the prey based solely on size and power!


    The two of them had only exchanged looks once. However, it was already clear as to who was the prey, and who was the predator.


    "Mary, did you think I would so easily let you consume blood and regenerate right before my eyes?" A bug swarm rose behind Soros. Acteon¡¯s peculiar body appeared, "We are both at our limits. However, I still have my body of bugs, and you still have your blood arrows. Let us continue! Let us see who will be the first to fall! As for replenishing on blood¨C don¡¯t even think about it!"


    The ground around Soros shattered as Acteon spat out his threats. Even more tiny beetles swarmed out from underground. For a moment, the ce drowned in the sound of ttering of shells grinding against shells as the beetles fought to get out of the ground!


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! You two monsters can fight if you want to? Why are you gathering around me? Do you think I, a radiant knight, can easily be bullied into submission?


    The anger within Soros¡¯ heart at this moment was insurmountable.


    However, Mary the Bloody Sorceress stood before him, and Acteon the Bug Demon of Terror stood behind him. It didn¡¯t matter how furious he was. Soros could only suppress his emotions and wait in silence. He prepared to deal with any situation that might arise from the fight that was about to break out.


    After all, he was running out of runic energy as well!


    For a moment, all three powerful individuals froze on the spot.


    As a vampire, Mary would be able to restore all of her strength if she had an opportunity to take a single bite out of Soros. She would easily be able to crush that ursed bug with her renewed vigor. However, if Mary couldn¡¯t take down the Second Grade knight in a single instant, she¡¯d have to endure the assault from Acteon. Even Mary, for all her reckless courage, didn¡¯t dare to imagine her tragic oue if she had to simultaneously take on a Second Grade knight and the powerful Bug Demon!


    Evil Bugs Acteon could sense Mary¡¯s hesitation. A wicked smile appeared on his face.


    At this crucial moment, all three individuals sensed an abnormal disturbance in the air. They all raised their head and looked to the skies. Their expressions instantly changed.


    The bloodsucking bat that Vanlier had transformed into was gripping a muscr human knight in its ws. It hovered fifty meters in the air with great difficulty.


    "Master, I have brought you your food." Both the bat and the human started to fall just as he started speaking.


    After all, vampires weren¡¯t exactly known for their strength. It was difficult for a bat the size of a wash basin to drag a hundred-kilogram adult male across several hundreds of meters. This...this seemed exceptionally impossible no matter how you thought about it.


    However, none of the three had any time to think about anything else. The three had already moved on instinct when they saw the bat and the unconscious knight.


    "You are asking for your death!" The shocked and angered Acteon shouted and raised both of his arms. A ck cloud of strange flying insects spewed out from within his body. Their target was the human knight in the sky.


    Meanwhile, Radiant Knight Soros shed with his massive sword. An energy de shot towards the bat and the human like a bolt of lightning.


    They were quick, but a red shadow was even faster than they were!


    Crimson light shed in the air, and Mary had already soared high into the skies with a push of her wings. She grabbed Vanlier and the human knight before the insects and the energy de could catch up. Mary quickly made her way high up into the clouds.

 Chapter 335 Vampiric Reconstruction

    Chapter 335 Vampiric Reconstruction


    The entire ce became silent for an instant.


    Every living being in the battle couldn¡¯t help but raise their heads and gaze at the brilliant red figure in the sky.


    A beautiful image appeared beneath the cerulean sky.


    An alluring crimson silhouette embraced a majestic knight. She leaned against the knight¡¯s chest as she beat her wings. The two of them slowly circled in the air.


    The beauty and the knight!


    One slim and delicate, the other strong and muscr.


    Whenpared, the differences in the figures of the handsome man and the beautifuldy created a striking visual contrast. There was an odd sort of surrealism to the sight.


    Acteon, in particr, was disturbed at this turn of events. He was barely able to suppress his anger. He would already have charged up into the sky and resumed the fight if he wasn¡¯t concerned about being beat by Mary in her current condition.


    Bloody Sorceress Mary and her embrace with the knight had no romance or beauty to speak off. There was only the call of death and decay.


    Mary¡¯s fangs dug into the knight¡¯s veins. Fresh blood flowed into her body through the teeth, replenishing and rejuvenating her exhausted blood energy. Miraculously, all the wounds on Mary¡¯s body closed and healed at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    Soon, a crimson halo radiated from her body, and not a trace of damage remained on Mary. Even her skin had once again be glowing white. There was also a faint and healthy red glow from having an abundant amount of blood.


    Goddamned vampires! Fearsome vampires!


    Wounds and injuries didn¡¯t matter. As long as there was blood, and as long as they were alive, the vampires could recover instantly through the consumption of blood.


    This recovery was the outstanding trait of vampires!


    Seven minutester, Mary casually loosened her grip. A dried and wrinkled corpse slowly descended from the sky.


    Mary stuck out her agile tongue and licked the blood stained on her lips. She bent her body and looked down upon the emotionless Acteon. She pointed with her finger and shouted, "Fight!"


    The halted battle once again erupted into action!


    "Mary, don¡¯t think that I...am afraid...of you." A reasonable sentence, but Acteon stuttered as he spoke. It wasn¡¯t entirely because he was fearful of Mary. Instead, three crimson arrows had embedded themselves in his body in session. The bolts were blowing him up as he was speaking.


    Once more, several gaping holes had appeared in his body, and once more, they quickly regenerated with the bugs around him.


    Acteon grabbed a carcass beetle and used it as a shield against Mary¡¯s arrows. His other hand continuously gathered spears made of creeping beetles andunched them at his enemy.


    They had both sustained losses, but Acteon was the first to think of retreat.


    He had no choice. Every time he regenerated, his body cost him part of his Spirit. Commanding the carcass beetles in battle was also taxing his Spirit. He might have been able to continue the fight for a little longer if he had reduced the number of beetles inbat. That said, his Spirit was almost at its end. Drawing out the fight was not going to work out in his favor.


    Of course, Acteon might have been able to exhaust Mary and oust her if it hadn¡¯t been for the incident earlier. His Spirit was more resilient andsting. After all, the Queen Bug allowed him to save much more of his Spiritpared to an ordinary summoner.


    However... in fact, there weren¡¯t that many ¡¯however¡¯s.


    The scales of victory had tipped in Mary¡¯s favor when she had consumed all the blood from a Second Grade knight!


    The value of a Second Grade knight could not be ignored, regardless of how it was used!


    Acteon¡¯s defeat was confirmed when Mary had the decisiveness to waste away a Second Grade knight in this fight.


    Acteon took onest, hateful look at Mary before whistling and retreating with the remainder of his subordinates. The swarming insects returned to the hole in the ground. The carcass beetles fought as they fled and safely made it into the hole.


    Acteon took a simple look at his subordinates, and his heart ached.


    Only twenty-three of the thirty-four carcass beetles he had spent so much effort cultivating over the past six months remained. More than one-third of his carcass beetles had died on this ursed battlefield!


    Acteon dejectedly dispersed his body once all the insects had retreated into the ground. He disintegrated into numerous tiny bugs and went into the hole as well.


    The vampires didn¡¯t try to interfere too much with the swarm¡¯s retreat. Instead, they took the opportunity to exterminate all the enemies that had yet to make it back into the hole. Mary would never lose her cool and do something as foolish as chasing the enemy into the ground.


    Perhaps Evil Bugs Acteon was praying for her to do that!


    Only groups of vampires lingered on the empty mountain once the insects had disappeared. Two Second Grade Blood Knights had also surrounded Soros. His face had gone pale as he awaited his final fate.


    Soros looked at the Bloody Sorceress slowly making her way towards him and the two former panions¡¯ fighting with him. He tried countless times to muster the courage to gather his energy and self-destruct. However, he always failed mysteriously as his body shivered in fear.


    The rustling of beating wings came from above. Vanliernded and transformed into his elegant human form, appearing before Soros.


    His lifespan had also extended since he became a vampire.


    As a human, he was at the end of his lifespan. However, his life had just started now that he had turned into a vampire.


    Vanlier, having experienced the fantastic feeling of regaining his youth, had embraced his new identity without hesitation. He became the first native of the ne to wholeheartedly ept his transformation from his very soul.


    "O respected Sir Soros. I am sure you understand the situation you are in. Do you still intend to use your life to resist us, the great vampires? As long as you are willing to give up that frail human body and join us, I, Vanlier, will be more than willing to speak well of you before her majesty, the Great Queen Mary!" Vanlier smiled at Soros from ten steps away. He rubbed his hands together as he showed off his glibness.


    "I would sooner die than turn into mindless puppets like them!" Soros scolded as he waved his longsword. His voice was loud and fierce, but there was a softness to his choice of words.


    Vanlier smiled even brighter.


    "Sir Soros, you misunderstand something about this. If you actively reject the transformation into a vampire, Her Majesty will inevitably have to harm your intelligence when she Embraces you. However, if you willingly ept all this from the depths of your heart, you can be like me. Not only will you be able to retain your full consciousness, but you will also even be able to set foot on a new journey of life. Asting and powerful one."


    "Do you mean what you say?" Soros¡¯ voice shook as he spoke. Even his hand trembled.


    He had still been looking at Vanlier when he started speaking, but his eyes couldn¡¯t help but drift towards Mary when he spat out thest few words.


    "As long as you sincerely submit to me and be my ve, I will allow you to keep your intelligence and all of your abilities. Choose, Soros!" Mary¡¯s words were very much like herself; cold and direct, without any room for doubt or hesitation.


    The Second Grade Knight Soros grit his teeth for a moment. Finally, he lowered his head dejectedly and tossed his longsword aside. He kneeled on one knee and spoke, "I, Soros, am willing to submit!"


    A gleam of joy and excitement shone in Mary¡¯s crimson pupils. She lowered her body and nodded at Vanlier, "Go! Get them to clean up the battlefield properly!"


    "Understood!" Vanlier was happy to hear this. He turned and left after bowing in respect.


    Mary¡¯s words had affirmed his value. This acknowledgment meant that he had been given total authority over all the vampires, except for the five remaining Blood Knights.


    This promotion was a massive change for Vanlier, who had no skill atbat!


    Mary confidently stepped before Soros once Vanlier left. She looked down at him from above.


    The two Second Grade Blood Knights kept a close eye on Soros from both sides of him. The longswords in their hands would not spare him if he made any unusual movements.


    "Raise your head!" Mary said coldly.


    Soros obeyed her orders and lifted his head. His eyes shed with Mary¡¯s crimson eyes.


    "Remember, you can only retain all of your intelligence if you truly ept the Embrace from the depths of your heart. So now, open your soul to me!" Mary extended a sharp finger and drew her magical emblem upon Soros¡¯ forehead.


    Fresh blood flowed down his face.


    "I am willing...I am willing...I am willing..." Soros repeated to himself again and again. His voice was hoarse and muffled, but his intention was apparent.


    Mary¡¯s sharp nails ran over her wrist. Scarlet blood flowed.


    She lowered her arm and allowed the blood to stream down her finger onto the emblem on Soros¡¯ forehead. Oddly enough, Mary¡¯s blood and Soros¡¯ blood lit up the symbol when they mixed.


    The sizzling sound of corrosion came from the bloody markings on Soros¡¯ head. The blood had started to seep into his flesh and carved upon Soros¡¯ skull. Every drop of blood that fell on the brand was like boilingva. It hurt so much that Soros trembled in agony. The intense pain distorted his face.


    However, he knew well enough not to make any weird movements. He silently endured the strange vampiric reconstruction.


    A surge of strong blood energy infiltrated his entire body. It rapidly corroded, ate away at, and reconstructed all the flesh, muscles, and organs that it passed through. This process wouldn¡¯t have been so smooth and peaceful if Soros had drawn upon his runic energy to resist.


    However, the intense pain from the foreign energy¡¯s corrosion of the runic energy nodes in his body was still enough to make him scream out loud.


    Just like that, more and more of Mary¡¯s blood surged into his body, faster and faster!

 Chapter 336 Black-hearted Loli

    Chapter 336 ck-hearted Loli


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    The golem hall on the seventh floor was still as crowded as before.


    A magnificent metallic spider crouched on the floor in the middle of the massive hall. Many apprentice adepts were busy working on the spider while sitting on the scaffolding around it.


    Greem had finallypleted the metallic shell, which he had personally designed, after countless days and nights of endless work. He immediately hired arge group of apprentices once the dwarven smiths had departed and left the rune carving process to them.


    Right now, the spider-golem beast was no more than an iron can. Numerous runes needed to be carved into its body for it to be able to obey its master¡¯smands. It required control runes, energy circuits, reinforcement runes, elementary elementium resistance runes, consciousness control centers, energy storage nodes, and more.


    The main torso of the spider golem was a disc-shaped metallic cabin five meters in diameter. Fifty centimeters of a magical alloy formed the outer shell, while the gear structures of the magical machinery had been put to use inside the frame. That reduced the heavy use of magical alloy and allowed the golem to possess extraordinary limb agility and flexibility.


    Greem had already examined most of the magical statues and puppets of the Silver Union. Their bodies were almost always entirely forged from solid metal in pursuit of greater toughness and hardness. Golems formed in this manner could only move in a limited fashion due to the small number of joints they had. They traded away their mobility for imprable defenses.


    Such a line of reasoning wasn¡¯t necessarily wrong. After all, the purpose of the magic statues and puppets within the Silver Union was to serve as metallic meat shields and cannon fodder. Long-ranged attacks could be assigned to the elementium golems. These metal creatures didn¡¯t need to be agile or flexible. They only needed to be hard and resilient enough to resist the enemy¡¯s assaults.


    On the other hand, Greem had paid more attention to the spider golem¡¯s all-terrain ability and auxiliary powers when he designed the machine.


    Defense?


    The fifty centimeters of magical alloy might not be imprable and indestructible, but it was a solid defense. Greem estimated that two or three adept-level rock golems would have to continuously bash away at the spider golem for fifteen minutes to crack its shell. It wasn¡¯t going to be easy to harm Alice while she was hiding inside.


    Meanwhile, fifteen minutes would be more than enough for the apanying Infernal Tyrant to reduce everything to ashes!


    This arrangement was why Greem, after much deliberation, decided to ce less focus on the golem¡¯s defense. Instead, he chose to put more emphasis on its mobility and offensive abilities.


    Otherwise, a single Quagmire Spell would be enough to render this giant creature useless.


    In this regard, the multi-limbed and well-bnced spider form was the best choice!


    Modifying the spider golem beast was not an easy undertaking. Most of the crucial runes and circuits had to be carved on the inside of the metal shell. Reinforcement Runes had to be etched onto all of its limbs as well, along with Sharpening Runes and several others.


    It was to prevent the spider golem from utterly malfunctioning after receiving damage to parts of its runic circuits.


    There was also the problem of vision. Alice would be surrounded by thick heavy metal when she hid in the cabin. Her ability to sense and understand what was going one became a troublesome issue. To solve this problem, Greem attached a metal ball one meter in diameter on the front of the golem¡¯s disc-shaped torso. He hollowed the metal ball and filled the insides with plenty of magical gemstones, turning it into a head of sorts withpound eyes made of gems.


    He included Detection Crystals, Laser Stones,rge red gemstones that could fire heat rays, Energy Barrier Crystals that could erect defensive forcefields, and the two Eyes of Petrification that could draw upon the powers of petrification.


    Greem had searched through his stash of gemstones and put to use every single magical gem that could potentially maximize the spider golem¡¯s survival andbat potential. Disregarding the cost of the magical alloy used in forging the body of the golem, just these magical gems alone cost no less than thirty thousand magical crystals.


    It was apparent how much Greem was investing to ensure Alice¡¯s safety!


    ............


    As Greem was busy working in the golem hall, Alice was casually toying with her divinations.


    Yes, toying!


    Alice had finally obtained a better understanding of divination after a long time experimenting. Its strengths, weaknesses, limitations, how to maximize efficiency; she had gotten the answers to all of this.


    Firstly, there were no deities in the World of Adepts.


    This fact was the absolute most important thing to get right!


    The absence of deities meant that there wasn¡¯t a super lifeform hanging above Alice¡¯s head that could do as they wanted to her.


    Given that case, all the feedback that Alice got from her divination wasn¡¯t a gift from some omnipotent god. Instead, it was nar feedback that the narws had bestowed upon her.


    Which was to say she wasn¡¯tmunicating with a celestial existence with omniscience when she used divination. It was a cold and unfeeling system ofws that shemuned with.


    Thus, Alice had repeatedly been trying and testing out this so-called system ofws for the past few days. She would always do this once she had exhausted all her divination slots.


    The scale and severity of the narw system had already exceeded the limits of her imagination as a First Grade Witch.


    Divinations on the same subject at the same time could yield different results from the narws. Sometimes, they would even bepletely contradictory. Moreover, the more powerful the subject of the divination, the vaguer the information Alice obtained. More often than not, she would not receive any feedback at all.


    With her current abilities, Alice was unable to get any feedback if she divined subjects above Second Grade. Even when she did seed, the information was often vague and unclear. It was of no practical value.


    However, Alice¡¯s divination was still extremely useful when used against opponents of the same Grade.


    Her chance of sess when divining elite adepts was no more than thirty percent. She could, at best, seed twice out of the five times she divined each day. On the other hand, her chance of sess rose to seventy percent when targeting an ordinary adept. At least three of the five divinations would seed.


    If it was anyone below an adept, Alice had almostplete confidence at seeding.


    Unfortunately for that slightly threatening Snowlotus, she was below adept-level. And thus Alice, having fully understood the traits of divination, became a sly and nasty little girl during the past couple of days. She hid in her room every single day and spied on the private life of this future enemy.


    Indeed, she spied!


    Alice consumed almost all five of her divination slots on Snowlotus.


    For example:


    What was Snowlotus¡¯ elementium affinity?


    What spells was Snowlotus good at?


    What was Snowlotus¡¯ personality?


    What powerful magical tools did Snowlotus have on her?


    What were Snowlotus¡¯bat habits?


    Alice had used less than four days to obtain all the fundamental information she needed. Her following divinations took a strange turn after that.


    What was Snowlotus¡¯ favorite color?


    How many baths did Snowlotus take in a day?


    What were Snowlotus¡¯ sizes?


    How many times did Snowlotus use the toilet in a day?


    When did Snowlotus get her first period?


    Did Snowlotus have any experience rted to that?


    ......


    Every time Alice seeded in divining this information, she would immediately record it in a special notebook she kept for this express purpose. Again and again, Alice spent countless time and effort to pry out every bit of information on Snowlotus. Her jigsaw puzzle of fate slowly assembled, and a true-to-life image of Snowlotus was beginning to appear in her mind.


    She had ice elementium affinity, exceptional talent, and she was calm, wise, and beautiful.


    Snowlotus had exhibited an extraordinary talent for snow and ice at a young age. For this reason, she was specially sent by her Fourth Grade grandmother Angelina to the territories of the Coldwinter Witches. She grew up there and learned to harness her powers there. It wasn¡¯t until she awakened as a candidate for the Witch of Fate that she returned to her home.


    Her life wasn¡¯t very long as of yet, but there were many elements in her life that even Alice envied. The more Alice understood about her, the more she couldn¡¯t help but take a liking to such a ¡¯sessful¡¯ teenage girl.


    She had no idea how much her frequent harassing during this time had annoyed Snowlotus. Snowlotus had almost been driven to insanity!


    Frankly speaking, if it hadn¡¯t been because of her identity as a candidate of Witch of Fate, Snowlotus would have had no chance of sensing Alice¡¯s mischief.


    Two girls with different personalities and different fates. One lived in the central area of the Continent, while the other lived in the north. There were hundreds of thousands of kilometers between them. They had never met each other before, and they were unlikely to be acquainted with each other. Yet at this moment, both of their destinies had forcefully been brought together by the power of fate.


    Every time Alice seeded at divining Snowlotus, Snowlotus would feel a chill surge from the depths of her heart. It didn¡¯t matter where she was at that moment. It was almost as if a dead, cold phantom hand reached into her bosom, slowly groping her body and uncovering all her secrets.


    She would always be interrupted by the sudden chill when she deep in her meditation within the ice cave.


    Her channeling would always be interrupted by the ufortable feeling when she was practicing her ice spells.


    She would be suddenly awoken by the stimtion when she closed her eyes for a nap.


    She couldn¡¯t get a break from this unknown fear, even when she hid within her mother¡¯s adept tower.


    It was alright for the first few days. There was still some pattern and order to this uninvited harassment. However, it was utterly random afterward. It woulde during Snowlotus¡¯ meals, sleep, meditations, baths, and her use of the toilet. The odd feeling woulde out of nowhere, causing her to be extremely frustrated and annoyed. However, there was nothing she could do.


    The progress of Snowlotus¡¯ meditation had slowed down considerably due to the interference of this unknown element.


    Snowlotus, having reached her limits, finally walked into the small hut of Agatha the Witch.

 Chapter 337 Agatha the Witch

    Chapter 337 Agatha the Witch


    Snowlotus was hesitant to make contact with Agatha the Witch if it wasn¡¯t necessary.


    She had always felt that Agatha was too mysterious and sinister. It always seemed as if the old hag was up to some unknown scheme in her little hut. Unfortunately, Agatha also happened to have the most urate divinations of all the Witches of Deceit.


    Her entricity and ugly looks made her unpopr amongst her kind. It was why she always stayed in her own little, haunted house in Muttering Forest to the west of the city.


    Muttering Forest was the hearnd of the Witches of Deceit¡¯s territory. Usually, this meant that no powerful monsters or creatures appeared here. However, the existence of Agatha and her haunted hut had turned the Muttering Forest into a forbiddennd for all mortals. The faces of all the peasants would sour when you even mentioned Agatha¡¯s name.


    Even an ordinary witch was reluctant to step foot in here!


    Thus, even Snowlotus hesitated for a moment when shended before the entrance of the Muttering Forest. She descended from her flying broom and took a moment to steel her heart before stepping foot into the forest.


    Agatha¡¯s haunted cottage was approximately four kilometers away from the entrance to the forest. That said, Snowlotus hadn¡¯t descended from the sky prematurely out of respect for the old witch. Instead, it was due to the sinister nature of the Muttering Forest. You couldn¡¯t see through the silent trees and perpetual mists when you looked down from the skies above.


    Agatha wasn¡¯t well-regarded amongst her n, but the ordinary peasants had a different perspective on her person.


    Agatha was an expert at herbs and divination.


    Those who were brave enough to enter the forest, fortunate enough to make it to the haunted cottage, and willing enough to pay the price would be able to make a request of Agatha. They could ask for a potion to save their wives or request for divination of their chosen subject.


    That said, this wasn¡¯t easy for your ordinary man.


    Perhaps this was why a signboard had been ced by the side of the road. It was the first thing that Snowlotus saw through the endless mist when she entered the Muttering Forest. A crooked and lonely sign next to five narrow, winding roads.


    Withered and yellowed vines had grown all over the signboard due to ack of maintenance. There was even dust and cobwebs on the sign. The words on the board had been obscured, so much so that it was hard to discern what they meant.


    Snowlotus walked over and tore away the webs and vines. They snapped into many segments and fell to the ground. An ear-piercing cry shocked her just as she was about to wipe the dust to try and get some directions.


    An odd, pitch-ck shape descended from the skies. Itnded on the top of the signboard, tilted its head, and stared at Snowlotus with its blood red eyes.


    Redeye Crows. One of the moremonly seen low-level magical creatures within the woods.


    Snowlotus could sense the unique flux of Magic Eye emanating from the bird.


    "Mistress Agatha, Snowlotus is here to visit you. I hope you will be willing to see me!" Snowlotus announced respectfully.


    There couldn¡¯t be anyone else other than Agatha the Witch that could have set up Magic Eyes within the Muttering Forest.


    "So it¡¯s you, little brat! I still remember you, Snowlotus. You are Rena¡¯s daughter, Angelina¡¯s granddaughter. Who would have known? A dozen years and you are already this big," The redeye crow tilted its head from left to right and from right to left again as it inspected the girl. It croaked with its hoarse voice, "Juste on over, now that you have already arrived! You won¡¯t go wrong if you follow Filet. I¡¯ll be waiting for you at the Haunted Cottage."


    The redeye crow then beat its ck wings and took to the sky, flying towards the depths of the forest.


    Even though there were apparently four or five paths ahead of them, the crow didn¡¯t fly towards any of them. Instead, it quickly headed towards a balding ghost tree. Strangely enough, the redeye crow dove right into the menacing tree as though there was nothing there. It disappeared into the mist.


    An illusion?


    Snowlotus hurried after the crow. She gritted her teeth and passed through the illusory barrier.


    Bright lights.


    The sinister and depressing forest had once again reverted to a healthy forest after passing through the barrier. Tall, healthy trees, grassy green fields, and countless nameless flowers appeared. No sun was visible in the sky, but bright sunshine still showered down upon the flora, passing through the tree canopy and leaving mottled shadows on the ground.


    Snowlotus continued to advance into the forest under the lead of the redeye crow. She saw even more herb patches and flower gardens along the way. A variety of nts and flowers grew within them. Of course, the majority of them were still peculiar herbs that Snowlotus was unable to name.


    They took several more turns within the forest, passing through several herb patches and garden after garden. Snowlotus finally saw a rundown cottage hidden in the mist after one final twist.


    The wooden hut was approximately two stories tall. Its structure was old and tattered. You could even faintly see the dim flickering lights of candles through the cracks in the wooden walls.


    The crooked door creaked as it opened. A shambling and ugly old witch silently stared at Snowlotus as she leaned on her walking stick. The dim candlelight flickered at her back, leaving even more shadows over her face.


    That said, Snowlotus¡¯ enhanced vision still allowed her a clear view of the witch¡¯s face.


    Grey wrinkled skin lied beneath the shadows of the grey witch¡¯s hat and a dirty old robe. She had a hooked nose like an eagle¡¯s beak, dead fish eyes, and an iplete set of yellowed teeth.


    Witches could easily possess decent appearances and figures using their power. All they needed to do was give up a little of their time and resources. The fact that Agatha still possessed this disgusting appearance pointed towards several hideous truths. She either came into frequent contact with toxic and high-radiation substances, or she had an iprehensibly distorted personality.


    Agatha the Witch wore the traditional costume of an adept. It was rare to see someone wear it today with the improvements and ess to spells and magical tools. Only the more conservative witches still tried their best to uphold the tradition of the ancient witches!


    Snowlotus currently wore a light blue dress. One couldn¡¯t see anything much rted to the witches on her body, other than a few small essories that radiated magical energy. Upon closer inspection, she looked like a delicate beauty of ice and snow. It was hard to believe that she was an apprentice witch at the pseudo-adept level.


    "Come on in!" Agatha pushed aside the door, "You must have something you have to do if you came all the way here. Let¡¯s speak inside!"


    The environment within the room was the same as its outward appearance. Damp, dark, sinister, and frightening.


    Wooden boxes and ss containers of various sizes were piled up in the corners of the wooden hut. None of the household items for a witch were missing. The cauldron, the firece, the experimenting tform, and the rickety wooden table were all present.


    Agatha shuffled to the cauldron with difficulty. She used a greasy wooden spoon to stirs its murky contents before taking a sip out of the pot.


    "Tell me, what have youe here to my ce for? Is it a request for divination or a potion?"


    "Mistress Agatha, I... recently, I have constantly been harassed by someone with the use of their divination arts. I can¡¯t rid myself of the trouble, so I wanted to borrow your powers." Snowlotus hesitated for a moment, but finally decided to exin the purpose of her visit.


    "Divination arts?" Agatha lifted her head in surprise. Her dead fish eyes firmly fixed onto Snowlotus, "Impossible. You have Angelina¡¯s blessing on you. Ordinary divination spells shouldn¡¯t have any effect on you!"


    "Perhaps the opponent hadn¡¯t used an ordinary divination art?"


    Witch Agatha took a step forward and sniffed Snowlotus.


    "Mm... this is very odd indeed! Why do I smell a trace of fate?" Agatha lifted her head and looked at Snowlotus in shock, "I heard you awakened the bloodline of the Witch of Fate. Usually, this meant that you would have be one blessed by fate. But why do I smell fate¡¯s curse upon you?"


    Snowlotus hesitated again before speaking.


    "Grandma Angelina was worried that I would be unable to pass the Battle of Fate sessfully. She has already sent people after the candidates awakening all over the continent."


    "Foolish!" Agatha¡¯s walking stick knocked against the ground repeatedly, "She is the leader of the Witches of Deceit and a powerful Fourth Grade witch, and yet she still does something so foolish!"


    Agatha was pained and upset at this moment.


    "Did she forget the rules left behind by the Witch Queen? How dare she interfere in the internal affairs of the Fate Witches? The Fate Witches have lost their legacies for nearly a thousand years. Now is precisely the time for them to rise once again. It is an important matter that all Northern Witches have to pay attention to. Yet the leader interferes in this selection in such an obvious manner? Is she not worried about being cursed by fate? Is she not worried she would bring disaster upon the Witches of Deceit?"


    Snowlotus lowered her head. Dejectedness appeared on her bright, snow white face.


    Agatha couldn¡¯t help but stomp her feet and sigh when she saw Snowlotus¡¯ expression, "Cough. It seems even a powerful witch would make a mistake when it concerns her blood rtive. This too is fate!"


    "Lady Agatha, the bacsh can¡¯t be that bad, can it? After all, the Fate Witches have already lost their legacies for such a long time."


    "Hmph! What does a little brat like you know? It is specifically because of how long they have been extinct that their return is all the more important. With the ords between the ancient witches and the narws still in ce, would you ever expect themotion of the return of the Fate Witches to be small? This is a lost legacy returning after umting a thousand years of strength! Don¡¯t forget. The awakening of the Witch of Fate this time epasses the entire Continent. You would even hear of candidates awakening at the most southern parts of the Continent. Is this not enough to prove the weight of the situation?"


    "Lady Agatha, then I... "


    "Cough, I understand!" Witch Agatha sighed once more, "The more your grandmother does for you, the deeper thews of fate will ce the curse on you. No wonder you would be troubled by divination! Very well. I can¡¯t let you return with your hands empty now that you havee. Given that we are both Witches of Deceit, I¡¯ll help you find out which ignorant fellow it is that has been spying on you!"


    "Follow me."

 Chapter 338 No One Wins

    Chapter 338 No One Wins


    Agatha the Witch swept away all the items that littered her wooden table.


    She took out a crystal ball and ced it on the narrow space she had cleared out.


    "Come, put your hand over here."


    Snowlotus hesitated for a moment when she heard Agatha¡¯s orders. Still, she extended her slim and slender white hands and put them on the crystal ball.


    A cluster of faint white mists swirled within the ball as if it wanted to break out of the constraints of the crystal walls. Snowlotus could even feel the crystal ball trembling slightly from the impact.


    The mist suddenly stopped, perhaps because it sensed the aura of life. It instantly turned into the ugly and ferocious face of a hag! She opened herrge mouth filled with sharp teeth and chomped at Snowlotus!


    Snowlotus retracted her hands even though there was still ayer of crystal between them.


    A vengeful wraith!


    An adept-level wraith!


    Snowlotus would experience nightmares for several weeks if a spirit of this level even slightly cursed her!


    "Don¡¯t worry, Liz is gentle and cute. She was only ying a prank on you." A sinister smile appeared on Agatha¡¯s ugly face. A croak came from inside her sleeve. An equally hideous toad leaped out of there.


    The toad continued to leap forward on the table and finally stopped when itnded above the crystal ball.


    "Say hi! This toad is my partner, Wendy! Isn¡¯t she adorable as well?" The smile on Agatha¡¯s face became even ¡¯sweeter.¡¯


    The hideous toad was only the size of a fist. Abscesses of various sizes filled its purple and ck body. It even excreted a disgustingly viscous liquid from its skin. It had red eyes and a white belly that expanded and deted as it croaked. The toad didn¡¯t seem to be that much different from ordinary toads from natural ponds.


    "Dammit Agatha, you got us into massive trouble again!" The hideous toad finally spoke. Surprisingly enough, it had the sweet and childish voice of a young girl, "She stinks of curses from Fate itself. Do you also want to attract the attention of thews of fate?"


    "Wendy, don¡¯t go running your mouth about pointless stuff like this." Agatha spoke coldly, "This brat is the leader of the Witches of Deceit¡¯s granddaughter. If you don¡¯t want to get chased out of the Muttering Forest along with me, you had best get to work!"


    The toad¡¯s belly expanded once more as it uttered a bunch of strange sybles. It appeared that it was grumbling and swearing about something. However, its bulging red eyes quickly turned towards Snowlotus.


    "A talented little brat. You would have be a powerful witch even if you didn¡¯t awaken to your talent for fate. Given that to be the case, being chosen by thews of fate is not so much a blessing but a curse. Very well, very well, enough with the useless speech. Put your hand on the crystal ball, girl. We will wait for that diviner to show themselves!"


    "The diviner would always scry me five times a day. Moreover, she would always choose... moments where it¡¯s inconvenient for me. It¡¯s about thirty minutes before my daily meditation. I am sure they will try and do it again then!" A cold gleam of rage shed in Snowlotus¡¯ pretty eyes. She was extremely resentful of that fellow¡¯s actions.


    Thirty minutes quickly passed.


    The silent Snowlotus suddenly trembled. She once again felt that frustrating feeling that left her with no means of retaliation. A glow lit up within the white mist of the crystal ball. The fog quickly dispersed, and a strange scene in an unknown located appeared within the orb.


    It seemed to be an arcane room. There was no unique furniture in the empty room. A cute girl that appeared to be eight or nine years of age was lying t on the ground in the middle of the room. She shattered a turtle¡¯s shell with a tiny tinum hammer.


    The cute girl suddenly lifted her head, as if she had sensed something. She stared into the air in surprise. Her beautiful but sly eyes, through some unknown means, passed through the crystal ball and shed with Snowlotus¡¯ cold, resentful eyes.


    The two candidates of fate located in entirely different areas on the Continent of Adepts now looked at each other through the help of the strange connection of fate. Their spirits were temporarily connected.


    "Are you the one that has been scrying on me and my private life? Well, please stop it,dy, or else... " A hint of curiosity was contained within Snowlotus¡¯ angry gaze as she stared at this mysterious enemy. However, her heart trembled when she felt the opponent¡¯s adept-level mental flux.


    "Or else what? Are you going to send people to kill me?" Alice spoke from the other end of the mental connection in her slightly sharp voice, "It isn¡¯t as if you haven¡¯t done such a thing already. Thanks to you, I have already been attacked by people from your n. Now, please endure your deserved bacsh from fate!"


    Snowlotus¡¯ face became increasingly pale.


    With her arrogance, she had never bothered to care for these schemes and dirty ns. She had only heard of her grandmother and mother making ns behind her back. She had never actually tried to understand and participate in these activities. Her heart suddenly trembled when she finally heard Alice¡¯s furious usations. She could vaguely sense yet another thread between her soul and thews of fate snap.


    Snowlotus faintly heard the screams of the dead and the curses of the resentful in the air.


    Another candidate for the Witch of Fate had died. Moreover, her death also seemed to be due to her n as well!


    "You heard that, didn¡¯t you! These are the screams of fate and the tolling bells of your death!" Alice had felt the events that had transpired in the distance, "The more your n does for you, the further they push you away from fate. Did they really think that you could sessfully be the only Witch of Fate once they exterminated all other candidates? Hahaha. I really have no idea why thews of fate picked you as a candidate. Everything you have done has gone against fate itself. I can¡¯t wait to see your grim future."


    Snowlotus¡¯ hands that held the crystal ball trembled.


    She had only trusted in herself all this while. She had never believed in fate. Yet at this moment, where the streams of fate shed against each other at their most intense, Snowlotus seemed to be able to see through that endless river of time and peer at the moment of her death.


    A sizeable, bloody hole had pierced through her body. A fearsome mepletely reduced her hair and robe to ashes. In her weakest moment, the cute and delicate face of a girl appeared before her eyes.


    It was her!


    The one that would kill her was this damned little witch before her eyes!


    While Snowlotus shivered in a daze, a terrifying woman¡¯s face appeared on the back of the toad. It seemed to be the adept-level phantom that had been trapped in the crystal ball, Liz.


    The toad opened itsrge mouth, and a long and sticky tongue shot out towards Snowlotus¡¯ forehead. It quickly stabbed right into her skull.


    Strangely enough, not a single drop of blood flowed out from the wound.


    Then, Agatha chanted. A horrifying amount of resentment from the wraith surged into Snowlotus¡¯ mind through the connection with the tongue. Arge cluster of dark curses followed along with the phantom¡¯s animosity. The curses and hatred traveled along the mysterious fate connection and surged towards the other end.


    "Aaaaaah......" An ear-piercing screech. Alice grabbed her head with both hands and rolled about the ground in agony.


    Pu.


    The image within the crystal ball suddenly turned dim and disappeared. The trace of fate¡¯s connection was broken.


    Snowlotus also could no longer endure fate¡¯s bacsh. Her vision went ck as she fell unconscious.


    ............


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    Seven minutester, Greem appeared in Alice¡¯s room.


    The first thing he saw was an insane brat rolling on the ground and mumbling all sorts of nonsense.


    "Help me... I think a vengeful wraith has controlled me... "


    "Damned adepts... damned humans. You all must die. Die. "


    Twopletely different voices came out from the same body. One was Alice, while the other was an unknown voice. It was thick, hoarse, and dripping with hatred.


    At the same time, many ck spots appeared on Alice¡¯s milky white skin.


    These ck spots were bizarre. They appeared as if they had surfaced from within Alice¡¯s body and were quickly spreading all over. Alice¡¯s skin rotted and abscesses formed wherever they spread.


    Blisters filled with purple-ck blood and pus exploded one after another. ck blood sshed everywhere, and a pungent smell filled the room.


    Alice stood at the brink of death and endless agony. She rolled her eyes and fainted!


    Greem had just moved close to Alice. He hadn¡¯t had time even to examine her condition when she once again leaped up. Her cute little face was distorted entirely out of shape. She extended her sharp fingers and lunged at Greem.


    "I will kill you. I want to kill you."


    Alice grumbled wildly with the whites of her eyes exposed for all to see. Something clearly possessed her.


    Greem extended a finger, and a brilliant chain of fire appeared in the air out of nowhere. The chains bound Alice in one swift move and kept her suspended in the air. The chain entirely restricted her movements.


    The few apprentices that had hurried over after hearing themotion gasped. They looked at this scene with their eyes wide open.


    "What are you all standing about for? Go and get Adept Ferrier, quick!¡± Greem scolded.


    The apprentices quickly rushed to get help.


    "Chip, examine Alice. What¡¯s happened to her?" Greem ordered in an unamused tone.


    This Alice always gave him things to be concerned about. He was still trying to build a golem to protect her, and already she had somehow managed to get herself cursed in this high-security room!


    The intense blue light in Greem¡¯s eyes shed, and the chip had soonpleted its scan of Alice¡¯s body.


    "Beep. Alice¡¯s examination report ispleted.


    "Initial conclusions estimate this to be wraith possession along with dark curses.


    "The source of the spells can no longer be traced.


    "An intensely monstrous resentment has been detected in Alice¡¯s body.


    "It is rmended to expel it as soon as possible.


    "Moreover, one hundred and twenty-seven closely intertwined dark curses have been detected.


    "It is rmended that these be neutralized as soon as possible."


    Christ! What the heck have you done, Alice? Why would there be so many curses and so much resentment crammed into your body?


    Greem¡¯s handsome face twitched in disbelief. He had absolutely no words for this situation.

 Chapter 339 Fates Backlash

    Chapter 339 Fate¡¯s Bacsh


    Unique problems required specialists to be solved!


    If this had been an ordinary curse, it could have been resolved with a simple Purifying Potion. It cost forty magic crystals, and every single adept carried a couple of them on them.


    That said, Alice had kicked a ho¡¯s nest this time. What¡¯s more, it was the ridiculouslyrge kind. Greem had no choice but to ask for Ferrier. She was, after all, the potions master that the Sarubo n was investing in.


    Half an hourter, a massive cauldron had been erected in Alice¡¯s room. All sorts of valuable herbs were thrown into it in session. Ferrier ced Alice into the cauldron once the fire was warm enough.


    Troublesome!


    Extremely troublesome!


    Even Ferrier shook her head in silence when she felt the numerous intertwined curses and resentments in Alice¡¯s body!


    If they wanted to get rid of the resentment, they first had to purify the curses mixed within. If Ferrier wished to cleanse the curses, they would have to deal with the frantic attacks of the lingering resentment. It was far too troublesome!


    Fortunately, Alice was a divining witch that had lost ¡¯all¡¯ of her abilities. The wraith within her body couldn¡¯t do much with a weak adept like her. Greem just needed to use one of the Eyes of Petrification, and he was able to partially petrify her and throw her into the cauldron. The petrification ensured that Alice wouldn¡¯t be able to cause anymotion as they treated her.


    Greem tirelessly ran to Motta City as well. He visited a necromancer and bought a magical tool from him that was used to exorcise spiritual beings.


    He had no choice. The Sarubo n didn¡¯t have a professional necromancer. Greem had to seek external help when faced with such annoying resentment. Ferrier was only a potions master. She wasn¡¯t a professional curse adept. Thankfully, most of the knowledge that she had to learn was rted to curses. Greem had no alternative but to ask her for help in treating Alice.


    After he returned from Motta City, Greem instantly released Alice from her petrified state. He then stabbed a ck dagger into her forehead before the resentment within her body had any chance to break out.


    The palm-sized dagger wholly embedded itself into Alice¡¯s head, yet not one drop of blood flowed out of the wound.


    Alice shivered when the dagger pierced into her head. The de released her from the effects of the evil spirit¡¯s possession.


    "Too... too scary." Alice grabbed the sides of the cauldron with her hands and only kept her head above the water. Dazed, she asked Greem, "What did you use to save me? Why do I feel a little heavy-headed?"


    Greem didn¡¯t bother to entertain her. He turned his head slightly and his apprentice Meryl immediately brought a mirror over and ced it in front of Alice.


    She almost fainted once more when she saw her reflection.


    Strange runes flowed out of the ck dagger in her head and entered her brain through the tip of its edge. The bizarre sight was enough to send chills down anyone¡¯s spine!


    Alice had just moved her hand towards the dagger when Greem snorted coldly.


    "Go ahead and touch it if you aren¡¯t afraid of dying! If you pull it out, I can guarantee the sight of your brain exploding will be an amazing sight."


    "Then how long do I have to keep this thing on my head? Why do I feel like thinking has be a chore with this thing here?"


    "Hmph. You think you would be able to get away from the resentment of an evil spirit if it wasn¡¯t because of this dagger sealing away arge portion of your spiritual consciousness? Speak up now. How and which curse adept did you offend this time?"


    "I didn¡¯t offend any curse adepts!"


    "So where did these thingse from?"


    "I... I have been peeping in on thatpetitor. She should be the candidate that the Witches of Deceit are backing."


    "Then?"


    "Then... she got an unknown adept to deal with me. I was defeated before I even got to take a look at the person who cursed me!"


    "You should feel lucky for yourself. It is only a surge of resentment from an adept-level wraith that is guing your body. If the enemy were a little more heartless and sent the wraith itself over, you would probably have been dead within fifteen minutes." Greem spoke solemnly, "It seems we should start purchasing some magical tools that provide spiritual and curse resistance. Otherwise, it would be a pain if another situation like this one came up again."


    "Yea! Yea, I already mentioned this problem several times, but you have never really paid enough attention. Ouch!" Alice couldn¡¯t help but lift her neck above the water when she got excited.


    Who knew? Her healed skin started to blister once her body left the water. Rotting wounds appeared once again. The angry Alice could only wince in pain and submerge herself in the cauldron once more.


    The sickly green brew mixed with the blood from her wounds, causing Alice to be on the verge of throwing up.


    "I hate you, I hate you, I hate you," Alice cursed towards the sky with her small mouth, "I curse you to an eternity of suffering."


    Again and again, her screams and cries of agony spread towards the distance through some unknown and unseen means.


    ............


    "What¡¯s happened?"


    The beautiful witch that had hurried to Agatha¡¯s haunted cottage instantly questioned her when she saw the unconscious Snowlotus.


    This witch was already two hundred years old, but her delicate face was still as pretty as she had been in her youth, thanks to proper maintenance. Her full and bursting figure was curvaceous, even covered by her robe. She was exceptionally seductive.


    However, her care and concern for Snowlotus appeared to be genuine; there was no disguising the worry in her eyes.


    What¡¯s more, she was a terrifying Second Grade witch!


    "Lady Rena, the bacsh to Miss Snowlotus has already stabilized. You do not need to be worried about this." The First Grade Agatha had none of her earlier mystery and quirkiness. She offered up a fawning smile as she exined to Snowlotus¡¯ mother.


    Lady Rena was also an individual of ordinary talent. She had barely advanced to Second Grade with Lady Angelina¡¯s unrestrained investment and sinking of resources into her. Her advancement potential had beenpletely exhausted at this point. There was no hope for her to continue improving on the path of an adept.


    It was due to this that she was ordered by Lady Angelina to pursue unreserved pleasure and attempt to continue her bloodline. Rena kept a harem of male ves and had ambiguous sexual rtionships with several male adepts within the n at the same time. Fortunately for them, Rena was finally able to give birth to Snowlotus after much difficulty. Her daughter, who had exceptional talent to be an adept.


    It was thanks to this ¡¯credit¡¯ of hers that Rena¡¯s status in the n skyrocketed. She had quickly turned into an important authority figure within the territory that no one dared to provoke.


    Perhaps it was because of Snowlotus¡¯ significance to her, but Rena couldn¡¯t help but fear for her daughter¡¯s life when she discovered that her daughter had entered into the dangerous Battle of Fate. She couldn¡¯t ovee her anxiety and ended up begging her mother, the Fourth Grade Lady Angelina, leader of the Witches of Deceit, to interfere in the selection for the Witch of Fate.


    This was why she had hurried over to Agatha¡¯s hut when she received news of Snowlotus¡¯ condition.


    Rena repeatedly examined Snowlotus condition and was surprised to find her physical health to be well. It was only her mental flux that seemed to be weak and slow. She even screamed out loud asionally.


    It was as if she was trapped in a nightmare!


    "Is this what you meant by stabilized?" Witch Rena couldn¡¯t help but shout in her fit of anger, "My daughter has exceptional talent. Even my mother herself has acknowledged this and praised her for this. Moreover, she still has the blessing applied by my mother. How could she be trapped in a nightmare? Speak! Did you do something?"


    Agatha could only smile when confronted by this Second Grade witch that managed everything within the territory, "Lady Rena, this is already the best I can do! You should know that Miss Snowlotus is under the effect of severe fate bacsh. Moreover, it seems like she saw something she shouldn¡¯t have during her mental connection with the enemy diviner. Her spirit consciousness has received a severe impact. Staying within the nightmare at this point might actually be the better option. If we woke her up carelessly now, I¡¯m afraid... "


    "What are you afraid of?"


    "I¡¯m afraid her mental self will be severely damaged!"


    "Will this harm her advancement potential?" The fierce Rena immediately became nervous when she mentioned this.


    Agatha nodded her head with a grave expression on her face.


    "Dammit, dammit, dammit... " Witch Rena paced about the room anxiously, "I knew this would happen! Agatha, tell me the location of that ursed diviner. I will send people after her and tear her to pieces now!"


    Agatha¡¯s frail body trembled all of a sudden. She thought for a moment before reluctantly speaking, "Lady Rena, I would advise against that."


    "Why?" Rena straightened her body. A murderous aura hung on her pretty face.


    "I¡¯ll be straightforward with what I say. It is precisely because of what you have done for Miss Snowlotus that things are asplicated as they are. The more candidates you kill, the more thews of fate will reject Miss Snowlotus. Conversely, the other candidates will also receive the favor of fate. Have you not realized? The more candidates you kill, the quicker the remaining ones can advance to adept. This is fate maintaining bnce!"


    "Hmph! We of the Witches of Deceit have never believed in fate!" Rena snorted arrogantly.


    "But Miss Snowlotus has to!" Agatha patiently exined, "Miss Snowlotus is extremely talented. She has plenty of resources to aid her training as well. However, why is it that she is still stuck at the pseudo-adept level, while everyone else, even those candidates inferior to her, have already advanced? It is because we have interfered far too much!"


    "Are we to do nothing at all then? Should we let Snowlotus participate in that dangerous Battle of Fate without any preparation?"


    "My Lady, Miss Snowlotus¡¯ fate was no longer in our hands when she awakened to the bloodline of the Witch of Fate. The more you do, the more mistakes you will be making! Miss Snowlotus is already suffering the bacsh from thews of fate. On the other hand, that diviner has received the favor of fate. I fear Miss Snowlotus will be the enemy of fate if you continue to intervene in this matter. At that point, she honestly won¡¯t have any chance of winning!"


    "Are we not even allowed to retaliate after that damned diviner put Snowlotus in this state?"


    "It doesn¡¯t matter what you do. Be it by your hand, someone else¡¯s, or employing some underhanded scheme, all that you do will cause fate to distance itself further and further away from Snowlotus. It simply isn¡¯t worth it."

 Chapter 340 Seven Years

    Chapter 340 Seven Years


    "Agatha is right!"


    A crisp andmanding voice suddenly interrupted, shocking both witches in the cottage.


    The wooden door creaked as a slim figure wrapped in a royal dress appeared before the two.


    "Mother!"


    "Wee to my humble abode!"


    The two witches quickly bowed and paid their respects. They couldn¡¯t help but feel nervous in front of this person.


    After all, the neer was none other than the leader and of the Witches of Deceit¨C the Fourth Grade Lady Angelina.


    Angelina was over seven hundred years old, but if one were only to judge her by appearance, she seemed to be even younger than her daughter Rena. Anyone who wasn¡¯t privy to the truth would mistake Rena for the mother and Angelina for the daughter when they stood side by side.


    The haunted cottage fell silent with the arrival of the Fourth Grade witch.


    All the strange magical creatures reared within the bottles and wooden cages shivered in their confines. They didn¡¯t even dare breathe for fear of drawing the attention of this higher being.


    All the various secrets in the wooden hut were visible to Angelina with a single sweep of her Spirit.


    Her Spirit even paused for a moment when they passed through the hiddenboratory in the basement of the wooden hut.


    "Ipletely agree with what Agatha has said!" Angelina walked to the bed and sighed when she saw the unconscious Snowlotus, "I already called off all the assassination orders before I came here."


    "Mother... " Witch Rena couldn¡¯t help but take a step forward.


    "Say no more." Angelina immediately stopped her, "Both you and I must share some responsibility for how things have unfolded. A mistake is a mistake. We must correct them before things develop beyond the point of no return."


    "Understood, mother!" Witch Rena lowered her head dejectedly.


    Rena knew her mother very well. Her mother would never change her mind once she made a decision. She never let anyone get in her way.


    "You should settle down for the next couple of years as well! You don¡¯t need to concern yourself with matters in the n. Concentrate your efforts on helping Snowlotus. You must elevate and improve her powers as much as possible before the Battle of Fate. The return of the Witches of Fate is most likely an omen. The other extinct witch branches should return one after another soon. So... "


    Angelina paused for a moment.


    It was aplicated matter and could involve all the vendettas and rtionships of all thirteen ancient witch branches. The more actions one took during this time, the more mistakes they would make. Theseplications were also why Angelina decisively called off the assassinations!


    Rena¡¯s face flushed white when she heard that her authority had been stripped from her.


    "When will she wake up?" Angelina directed her question to Agatha.


    Cold sweat instantly covered Agatha¡¯s body when she felt the intense gaze of the Fourth Grade witch on her. She barely maintained herposure as she spoke, "Miss Snowlotus didn¡¯t suffer any physical injuries. It is only her mental consciousness that has received a severe blow. Her spirit origin should only need a little bit of time to recover if she can break free of the nightmares with her ability. However, if we were to awaken her forcefully, I fear... "


    "Then let her stay here at your ce for the moment. You can withdraw any resources you need from the n during this period. Make sure that no harmes to Snowlotus¡¯ talents and potential. Do you understand?"


    "Understood... understood." Agatha nodded frantically.


    "Also, keep a close eye on yourb. If I hear anything about it outside of the Muttering Forest, you know what I¡¯ll do to you?" Angelina stopped when she reached the door. She coldly spat out onest sentence before she left.


    Witch Agatha also seemed to understand what her n leader was referring to. She nodded her head repeatedly in agreement.


    "Indeed... indeed. I¡¯ll be cautious."


    Witch Rena stared at Agatha suspiciously once her mother had left, "What sort of taboo experiments are you doing in the shadows? Even my mother couldn¡¯t help but intimidate you over it."


    "It¡¯s nothing... it¡¯s truly nothing." Agatha put on another false smile with her ugly face and did her best to gloss over the issue.


    "Hmph! You had best not cause something terrible to happen. Otherwise, my mother won¡¯t be needed. I¡¯ll personally take care of you. "Agatha could feel her troubles increase with what Rena¡¯s next words: "Very well. Snowlotus will be resting here, so the small room on the second floor will be my temporary dwelling! You take good care of Snowlotus. Don¡¯te up and annoy me if you don¡¯t have good reason to! "


    Rena waved her hand, and the few apprentice witches she had brought with her surged into the cottage. The apprentices immediately began to clean up and tidy the entire ce.


    Agatha¡¯s wrinkled face was finally unable to keep up the facade. Her eyes and mouth started twitching in frustration.


    ............


    Seven yearster.


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    Seven years wasn¡¯t quite a long time, but it wasn¡¯t short either.


    Seven years for a high-grade adept was barely enough toplete arge-scale magical experiment. However, seven years was more than enough time for apprentice adepts to pass through heaven and hell.


    Adept Meryl walked out of the ssroom with a thick book in her arms.


    The gray-robed apprentices put on expressions of respect and fear when they saw her. They made way and split to both sides of the corridor as they bowed in respect.


    Adept Meryl had a faint smile on her face. She passed through the crowd and walked towards the floating disc.


    She was surprised to find a familiar face at the door to her room on the sixth floor.


    "Am, is that you? When did you get back?" Meryl asked in surprise. There was a trace of closeness and intimacy to her words.


    "I just returned. Lady Alice sent me to invite you over to her ce." Am appeared to be a little formal.


    He was fortunate enough to advance to pseudo-adept five years ago. Still, his achievements could not bepared to Meryl, who had already improved to adept two years ago.


    They had both been apprentice adepts. There was a little difference in their abilities and strength, but they had still belonged in the apprentice-level. There hadn¡¯t been too sizeable a gulf between them when they interacted. However, the dynamic between the five apprentices had changed now that Meryl had advanced to an adept.


    Kodar, as the veteran pseudo-adept of the group, wasn¡¯t resigned tog behind Meryl. Thus, he had forcefully attempted an advancementst year. The results were regretful. He had failed! While his life was not at risk, the damage to his mental space was still in the process of recovery, even after all this time.


    Of the remaining three advanced apprentices, Am and Toril had sessfully made it to pseudo-adept level. Only Lena continued to struggle at the advanced level.


    Moreover, the Sarubo n had designated yet another batch of apprentice adepts three years ago. Three more advanced apprentices had been put under Greem¡¯s care, and five new apprentices under Alice¡¯s direction.


    Meryl, on the other hand, was spared from the task as she had only just advanced. Her main priority was still the stabilization of her mental space. Still, she epted the responsibility of teaching within the tower of her own initiative. She enjoyed widespread, good reputation amongst the apprentices of the n because of this.


    For the past seven years, resources from the conquered nes continued to pour into the Sarubo n. Several n adepts had also returned to the headquarters with the de-esction of conflict and tension in the lesser nes. All this caused Feidnan¡¯s adept¡¯s tower to be lively once again.


    Second Grade Sir F¨¹gen and First Grade Gaya had brought back plenty of rare resources from other nes with their return. Three pseudo-adepts had advanced to adept under the n¡¯s support. This pushed the numbers of the adepts stationed in the headquarters to nearly a dozen men.


    There was Third Grade Adept Sanazar, the Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen, and nine First Grade adepts!


    Seven years time had passed, and the Sarubo n had finally managed to recover from their losses and damage from thest nar war! As long as things continued the way they were going, the n¡¯s power would rise steadily.


    If the just two Third Grade adepts of the n could sessfully advance to Fourth Grade, then they would even have a chance at rising to the pedestal of arge-size n.


    After all, the only strength that was acknowledged to be the peak in the World of Adepts was the Fourth Grade!


    A brilliant smile appeared on Meryl¡¯s face when she heard that Alice invited her. She quickly followed Am and arrived at the seventh floor of the tower.


    She already possessed the capital and capability to form an independent faction now that she had advanced to an adept. However, the friendship and bonds she had forged during this time caused Meryl to remain part of Greem¡¯s faction. In particr, she was very close to Alice.


    There were two reasons for this:


    The first was naturally because of their identity as women.


    Alice might have been sealed in her eight-year-old girl form, but if someone honestly did the math, they would find her to be a twenty-three-year-olddy. At least from a mental perspective!


    Meryl was about her age in that regard. Moreover, one was a subordinate of Greem, and the other a disciple of his. The simrity of their status caused them to be best friends.


    The second reason was privy to the two of them.


    Alice had once used her divination to help Meryl out with a problem that had been guing her for a long time. It was before Meryl had advanced. Furthermore, it was Greem that paid for the substantial costs of her advancement ceremony. Thus, the broke and poor Adept Meryl naturally became closer with Greem and Alice after she seeded in her advancement.


    Alice had firmly tied a massive wind eagle to the floor of Alice¡¯s room. Its badly charred feathers were an indicator of the terrible ¡¯abuse¡¯ it had endured.


    "Alice, you actually brought it back?" Meryl couldn¡¯t help but exim in joy when she saw the prey that Alice had brought back this time.


    "How is it, Meryl? Do you like it?" Alice stood beside the immobile wind eagle and stepped on its head. She bragged proudly, "I specially brought it back for you. You haven¡¯t gotten a suitable flying pet ever since you became an adept. How is it? Do you think it suits you?"

 Chapter 341 The Geniuses Begin to Show

    Chapter 341 The Geniuses Begin to Show


    It was decided that the celebration banquet would be held at Alice¡¯s dwelling.


    Aside from the apprentices and adepts of Greem¡¯s faction, the elite apprentices of numerous other adepts would also be attending. Most of them had amicable rtions with Kodar, Am, and the others.


    One thing to be noted of was Greem¡¯s personality. His easygoing attitude as their teacher had caused the apprentices under his care to be affected. The atmosphere within his entire faction was harmonious. The two adepts he cultivated were known as the least adept-like adepts. They had none of the attitude and fearsomeness of normal adepts.


    As the teacher of the adept¡¯s tower public lessons, Meryl had made contact with almost all of the apprentices within the n. Consequently, she was known as the most friendly, caring, and beautiful adept in the headquarters. Alice, on the other hand, seemed to have no idea what it meant to be an adept. She continued to mingle about with the apprentices under her care.


    In the past few years, she had traveled throughout the mountains and rivers around the Zhentarim area. She would bring along her gang of apprentices and charge to wherever there were magical creatures or ruins without any hesitation whatsoever.


    With the spider golem to protect her, the Infernal Tyrant as her aid, and her all-seeing divination, Alice had been able to get her hands on pretty much anything she wanted. Moreover, her divination arts also allowed Alice to attract fortune and avoid misfortune. She would always dodge disaster and traps as if she had god backing her up.


    This good luck made going out with Alice one of the mostfortable and rxing things for an apprentice.


    Alice was always, with the help of her little tinum hammer, able to tell whether there was a risk, where it was, and what the threat was when she went out. Thus, all the apprentices that followed her adventures only needed to do as she instructed. Danger beyond their abilities to deal with would always barely pass them by. The difficulties they had to deal with were consistently within the limits of their capabilities.


    Their adventures were never dangerous and would always yield bountiful rewards.


    More importantly, Alice was still that ¡¯rich olddy¡¯ she had always been. She never gave a second nce at most of the treasure. She would only take the few things that would help her, and the rest she would split between her followers.


    It was due to her generosity and miraculous abilities that Alice was quickly able to gather to her a group of apprentice-level believers and fans.


    Consequently, the entire tower was thrown into chaos every time Alice excitedly went to the mission hall to look for team members.


    While most adepts were busy gathering resources, umting knowledge, and living in their basementboratories, Alice was busy running left and right with a bunch of apprentices. She had practically set foot in every ruin and hazard zone within the Zhentarim that was worth visiting.


    There were still a couple of hazard zones and forbidden areas left, but those were dangerous locations, even for adepts. Alice could only give up on those reluctantly as she couldn¡¯t find adept-level teammates for these adventures.


    It was because of Alice and Meryl¡¯s poprity among the apprentices that every elite apprentice with any fame showed up at Alice¡¯s celebration banquet.


    The banquet officially started at eight in the evening.


    Compared to an ordinary noble¡¯s banquet, there were no beautiful maids here. Nor were there any bands to y lively music for the crowd. Only a long table had been set up in the corner of the room. A variety of aromatic wines and delicacies were on the table. Stacks of small tes sat on the side. Anyone who wanted to eat could help themselves.


    Apart from that, there was only the vast banquet hall. Everyone formed groups of three to five people as they gathered together to chatter. They were exchanging information, trading resources, or they were gossiping.


    The banquet was simple and rxing!


    The host of the banquet was naturally the goblin merchant of Greem¡¯s faction¨C Snox.


    Not only had he sponsored all the wine and food for the banquet, but he had also brought with him some of the more sought-after resources among apprentices. He had set up a small internal auction in the corner of the banquet.


    Greem had rarely shown his face during public asions in the past few years. He was always holed up in his room, silently working on who knows what. Meanwhile, Snox had been getting increasingly active.


    He had wholly monopolized the low-grade material markets and the apprentice resource markets through the use of Greem¡¯s influence. Also, he had put on sale some strange magical machinery and alchemical products that were rarely found anywhere else. All of this caused his goblin shop to grow in size and scale continually.


    The name of Snox had be more and more well-known within the area Feidnan City resided. Individuals of other regions and cities had also caught wind of him.


    Of course, Snox had a clear understanding of his status and position in all this.


    He was a green-skinned goblin after all. He had no actual status to speak of within this society of human adepts. The reason he was able to climb to his current height had much to do with the terrifying me Demon behind his back.


    Without Greem¡¯s support, a goblin like himself would have been captured by adepts and reduced to an insignificantb rat.


    Having understood his position, Snox used his brilliant mind and tireless efforts to build up his social circle slowly.


    This circle of his used Greem¡¯s apprentice adepts as the core.


    Snox had sold away essential resources to Kodar, Meryl, Am, and the others at a loss. Through such means, he was able to win their support and protection for his goblin shop. These actions paid for themselves after Meryl advanced to an adept.


    At a time when Greem was too preupied with his work, and Alice was always going on adventures, having Meryl supporting him was an unbelievable help. Along with Kodar and Am¡¯s help, Snox was able to run a sessful and booming business.


    Actually, there were already over two dozen apprentices working for Snox at the moment. Snox even had direct control over seven advanced apprentices. What¡¯s more, the number of apprentices that maintained friendly rtions with him were countless!


    This Snox was no longer a little goblin that anyone could bully.


    If anyone dared to provoke the great Goblin Merchant Snox, he only needed to wave his hand, and two dozen apprentices would appear and fight for him. If these subordinates weren¡¯t enough, he still had a card up his sleeve. He would suffer some losses, but if he gritted his teeth, he could rally two adepts and seven elite apprentices to his cause. If somehow these reinforcements were still insufficient, Snox would only have his ultimate skill remaining. He would have to run crying to Greem.


    There wasn¡¯t anyone that didn¡¯t know the name of the me Demon in Feidnan City!


    The banquet quickly split into three different circles. Even though there wasn¡¯t some crude rule that restricted everyone from entering another sphere, it was like an invisible chain. Everyone was bound to the spot they were supposed to be.


    The most authoritative circle was the one with Alice, Meryl, and a few of the elite apprentice adepts in Greem¡¯s faction. They gathered in the corner of the banquet and held a light red wine in their hands. They raised their sses and expressed their congrattions to Alice.


    Alice received her friend¡¯s congrattions giddily and drank everything in a single go!


    This circle of individuals contained some of the most intimate and core members of Greem¡¯s faction. They were also the military force that gave his faction what influence they had.


    Greem hid within his room and never went out. He was putting in all his efforts into improving himself. With what resources he had umted, he could choose to ignore how the Sarubo split the resources and positions of authority among its members. That said, his subordinates and disciples weren¡¯t spared the concern.


    Thus, they gathered together and pulled along Alice and Meryl for support. Naturally, they then became one of the more powerful factions within the Sarubo n.


    The intimacy and closeness of this group of individuals, along with their strikingbat power, was enough to keep most people at bay!


    me Demon Greem, the violent little Alice, and the gentlest Meryl; the three of them added together were such a significant force that even Second Grade Sir F¨¹gen didn¡¯t dare to make light of them.


    And so their positions within the n rose, again and again. The number of resources and benefits that the n gave them also increasingly favored them.


    The second circle of the banquet contained the elite apprentices of various adepts.


    These were mostly pseudo-adepts. The assional advanced apprentice was also a talented individual with unique and powerful abilities. They were the type of people who were never ignored wherever they went.


    They might not have belonged to Greem¡¯s faction, but they maintained good rtions with the members of the group through various means. These people were also the most powerful here, aside from the real adepts of the n.


    They might have been apprentices, but all of them had the potential to be adepts. It was not wise to underestimate any of them.


    This potential was why there were so many incidents of apprentice tensions resolving themselves when an opposing apprentice advanced to an adept. Most of the apprentice were smart people. They knew not to provoke a pseudo-adept without good reason. At least on the surface, everyone was friendly with each other. Everything seemed to be peaceful.


    The third circle contained thergest poption in every n¨C the advanced apprentices.


    Take the Sarubo n as an example. They barely had double digits worth of adepts. The n had to station most of these adepts at resources sites and essential outposts. Only a few remained in Feidnan City.


    After the adepts, there were the pseudo-adepts.


    They were slightly more abundant in number, but not by much.


    There were only about twenty to thirty pseudo-adepts within the Sarubo n. The pseudo-adepts were also the people that the n would invest the most in. It didn¡¯t matter which one of them advanced to an adept. They would instantly find that their status had risen immensely. They would be figures of authority with plenty of resources to their name.


    Apart from the adepts and the pseudo-adepts, it was the massively popted ss of apprentices that maintained and supported the rule of the adept ns. They were the advanced apprentices.


    Apprentices that were chosen from the resource sites and outposts to move on to the headquarters were mostly advanced apprentices. Even the asional intermediate and beginner apprentice would possess unique talents such as enchantment, herbology, or alchemy.


    There were over three to four hundred of these advanced apprentices in the Sarubo n!

 Chapter 342 Dreams of the Galaxy

    Chapter 342 Dreams of the Gxy


    Apprentices were the bedrock of a n¡¯s continued development.


    Only a proper and functional system that raised capable adepts could provide ns with qualified cannon fodder.


    Indeed, First Grade adepts barely qualified as soldiers when it came to nar wars, the most crucial aspect of any n¡¯s development. They were the primary force that charged to the frontlines of every conflict. They were the cannon fodder that a n needed to rely on to expand.


    Adepts needed the resources from nar wars in order topensate for the limited resources in the World of Adepts. It was only in doing so that organizations could cultivate all-powerful individuals that were capable of venturing outside of the world and exploring the gxy.


    As one of the fewrge and developed nes of the multiverse, the World of Adepts had one of the most resource-rich and biologically diverse realms amongst the other nes. However, its vastnds and bountiful resources were still insufficient for the needs of the ever-expanding adept poption.


    It didn¡¯t matter how vast the world was; it would never be enough.


    The World of Disaster was one such example!


    If one were to trace the timeline, the World of Disaster was, in fact, arge-sized ne that had developed even before the rise of the World of Adepts.


    With the explosive and exponential increase of powerful individuals within the world, there had no longer been enough resources to sustain their needs. The super beings that inhabited the World of Disasters were foolish as well. Apart from asional raids on smaller nes, most of their resources had stille from exploiting their homeworld.


    It undoubtedly allowed them to continue to grow in strength and numbers, but it was a catastrophe for the world that had nurtured them.


    The continuous damage to the nar power source caused the World of Disaster to fall into a decline gradually. The environment started to worsen and became no longer able to provide the necessary elements that all living beings required. Food, air, water. Everything was gone.


    Seeing the world they inhabited fall into ruin was finally enough to put a stop to the actions of those supreme beings. The state of the World of Disaster had rendered it incapable of sustaining any more transcendent people.


    Moreover, the most powerful beings that had advanced to the Ninth Grade through the exploitation of the ne¡¯s power source were at risk as well. Their power origin was linked to the ne itself. They would die when the World of Disaster fell apart.


    Thus, the eleven Ninth Grade monsters met for a discussion and came to an agreement. The world was to be sealed, and no other being would be allowed to rise to Ninth Grade through the forceful usurpation of the ne¡¯s source power. They even set down a new decree, that the Ninth Grade beings of the World of Disaster were to be fixed at eleven.


    The Ninth Grade transcendent beings then crowned themselves the Scourge Lords for their courage and might. Every one of them was a domineering individual that could ravage the entire multiverse.


    To prevent the continued decline of their world, the eleven Scourge Lords came to yet another consensus. Most of them hid deep within the and underwent a deep sleep to reduce the strain on the will of the world. Only fewer than five of the Scourge Lords were allowed to be conscious at any one time.


    These awakened Scourge Lords were responsible for excursions to foreign worlds to steal resources, poptions, and nar source powers to mend the wounds of the World of Disaster. Such vile and harmful actions had naturally earned them the hostility of most of the multiverse.


    Thus, a new dominant race rose within the multiverse as the Scourge Lords continued their wild invasions and exploitation of material nes. These were the Titans.


    It was a terrifying giant that could smash a small-sized ne to pieces with their bare fists.


    Newborn Titans possessed power rivaling Fourth Grades, and mature titans were no less potent than Seventh Grades. The most powerful of their kind all had the enormous strength of the Ninth Grade.


    They were powerful beings that hade into existence due to the will of the multiverse. The purpose of their lives was to hunt and exterminate the Scourge Lords.


    They would fight with the Scourge Lords to prevent their continued ravaging of the various ne worlds. Their fights happened all over the gxy, across almost every cluster of stars within the multiverse. They shifted from one ne to another, leaving behind a trail of dust and debris. Every ne that they had chosen as their battlefield had been reduced to fragments floating in the endless sea of stars.


    Countless numbers of Titans died under the frightening attacks of the Scourge Lords. The Titans¡¯ blood drifted through the depths of the gxy, asionallynding on some of the material nes and finding roots there. Strange beings with powers rted to the Titans woulde into existence in those ces.


    Powerful creatures, such as the Oceanic Giants, Gxy Giants, and the Earth Emperors sprang into being. All of them possessed part of the Titans¡¯ bloodline. This blood was also why the adepts of the Gaia n, who owned the bloodline of the Golden Titans, were hailed as the most powerful of the bloodline adepts.


    The war ended with losses on the sides of both the Scourge Lords and the Titans. Both parties retreated to their homes to rest and recuperate. Thus, a chance came to the weaker worlds. A chance to rise to power.s such as the World of Adepts, the World of Gods, and the World of Dragons had an opportunity now.


    Even so, these upstart worlds were never able to reach the heights of the Scourge Lords and the Titans.


    The World of Adepts might be sufficiently impressive in the multiverse, but only three Ninth Grade adepts had been born as of yet. On the other hand, the World of Gods, which had always vied for control over the multiverse with the World of Adepts, had over a dozen ¡¯major gods¡¯. These were entities with power that rivaled Ninth Grade beings.


    Sadly, they were divided internally, split into four or five separate factions, each with their own primary diety. There were deep-seated hatred and ingrained vendettas between each one of them. This was why they were unable to use their overwhelming numerical advantage against the World of Adepts.


    Meanwhile, the World of Dragons had a pitiful total of only a single Ninth Grade ¡¯Dragon God¡¯.


    That said, the dragons had always possessed enviable bodies and physical strength. Punching above their weight and fighting enemies above their grade had never been a problem. Thus, a single Ninth Grade ¡¯Dragon God¡¯ was still a match for both the adepts and the gods. In fact, his power even allowed him to carve out a ce for the dragon race and extend their reach many material nes.


    ............


    Within his home.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but close the book when he read to this point. He started fantasizing about the boundless gxy.


    As a transmigrator, and a man that had two lifetime¡¯s worth of ideology and thought, Greem couldn¡¯t help but desire to assess the world he inhabited from a higher and moreplete perspective!


    What kind of world was it?


    How did the veins of the world look?


    Was it an ident that he had appeared in this world, or was it a fated ¡¯variable¡¯?


    If his appearance was an intentional n, then what was the mission he carried upon his shoulders?


    Alice was holding a grand banquet in the room next door.


    Greem didn¡¯t even need to extend his Spirit to know this. He could sense everything happening nearby with his acute senses.


    Greem didn¡¯t object to Alice¡¯s wild adventures and opulent celebrations. In fact, he even sympathized with her.


    The Battle of Fate was finally upon her!


    It didn¡¯t matter how well-prepared she thought she was. The moment Alice stepped into the Tower of Fate, her life would no longer be within her control.


    The rise of the Witches of Fate was a consequence of the unstoppable narw forces.


    In the end, the Witch of Fate was only a host and representative for the powers of fate. Fate didn¡¯t want the strongest or the most powerful, but the mostpatible!


    Who would be the one chosen by fate?


    No one knew for sure.


    Even Greem had no guarantees that she would be the one to live, despite all that he had done for her.


    The uing Battle of Fate was a real battle of life and death!


    Alice was only twenty-three years of age currently. It was already decent that she hadn¡¯t gone mad from the pressure that she was facing right now. The immense pressure that was death hung before her eyes.


    A such, Greem was not upset at Alice¡¯s adventures for the past few years. Nor was he upset at her mingling with the apprentices, or her ying around. There was just sympathy.


    If she lost in this Battle of Fate, Greem would lose ten years of his time and an uncountable amount of resources, but Alice herself would pay with her life!


    As such, Greem had no intention of interfering with how Alice had intended to spend thesest eight years of her life. As long as she was smart and still valued her own life, she wouldn¡¯t truly waste away these years.


    The chance had already been provided to Alice, and now it was up to her to grab it!


    That said, much of what was to unfold still depended on ¡¯fate¡¯!


    The matter of the Battle of Fate had made Greem choose to remain within the adept¡¯s tower. He had been focusing on his research into the secrets of the multiverse as he waited for the day of the battle to arrive. Greem was already on the verge of despair when it came to the improvement of his own power.


    "Chip, disy my current bodily attributes!"


    "Beep. Order received. Self-examination in process......"


    Soon, Greem¡¯s attributes projected in his mind.


    Greem


    Human (half-elementiumized), Male


    First Grade Adept


    Attributes: Strength 2.8 | Agility 1.3 | Physique 3.9 | Spirit 7


    Condition: Healthy.


    Seven years! After seven years of arduous meditation, his Spirit had only increased from 6.3 to 7. He was no longer able to feel any increase in his Spirit ever since he reached 7 points.


    It was like his current Spirit had reached a threshold. He was no longer able to improve by even an inch.


    Greem finally found the fundamental reason for the difficulty in improvement after reading through numerous books within the n.


    His elementiumization was iplete!


    Right now, he had onlypleted his bodily elementiumization. The progress of his spirit elementiumization was going incredibly slowly.


    Thegging of his spirit elementiumization was what burdened his Spirit¡¯s improvement.


    That said, seven years of time had still allowed him to slowly get ustomed to the me Fiend¡¯s Heart sealed in his chest. His current skill was able to draw out all the might of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart. Greem didn¡¯t need to be concerned about pollution as long as he kept the unsealed time under thirty minutes.


    This improvement was one of the most significant reasons why Greem was willing to ¡¯lend¡¯ the Tyrant to Alice!

 Chapter 343 Witchs Secret

    Chapter 343 Witch¡¯s Secret


    The time was almost upon them.


    Regardless of whether it was fear or excitement that filled Alice¡¯s heart, the day of the Tower of Fate¡¯s activation was at hand.


    Taking into consideration theck of floating battleships from Zhentarim to the Northern Lands, there was only one way through the ten-thousand mile ck Forest. It was therge merchant groups that regrly traveled between the two ces.


    These merchant groups usually had rtions with some of the witch branches. The witches would send guards to protect the merchants, thereby guaranteeing the safety of the goods.


    However, the journey would take two months toplete. As such, Greem decided to set off six months early before the Battle of Fate.


    Greem left with Alice on an ordinary morning. No more than three people within the n knew where they headed.


    The trip to Motta City was reasonably peaceful. They then took a floating ship north. Nine dayster, they arrived in the most northern of the Zhentarim public cities¨C the city of Ibis.


    Greem¡¯s attention was instantly attracted by this lively and crowded city when he got off the ship.


    Ibis City appeared to be messier and chaoticpared to other cities of the same scale. However, it buzzed with much more life than any of those cities.


    Long trains of merchants herded their massive burden-carrying beasts through the markets, muscr barbarians wore beast hides and carried huge axes on their backs, wolfmen with the heads of wolves, and mercenaries walking in a group.


    Greem had never seen so many individuals of different races gathered in a single area.


    They all seemed to bebat species with imposing physical strength. They also possessed intelligence that could rival those of humans. These races also happened to be natives of some manner to the ck Forest. Consequently, merchant groups that needed to make it through the ck Forest often hired them as guards.


    "Let¡¯s go! We will find a ce to rest first then think about which merchant group to join!" Greem was no longer the one taking the lead once they reached this ce. It was Alice that took the reins instead.


    She might have been young, but she had already traveled through this part of the continent twice in her life. She was much more acquainted with the paths and the rules of this cepared to Greem.


    The two walked out of the airshipnding area under Alice¡¯s lead. They passed through a crowded market and entered Ibis City.


    Ibis City was closer to the Northern Lands than the other areas of Zhentarim. The number of witches stationed here was far higher than the number of adepts that the Adept¡¯s Association had here. Consequently, most of the buildings, with the sole exception of the great adept¡¯s tower at the heart of the city, were constructed of rough and untreated wood. They all gave off the raw and easygoing feeling unique to the northerners.


    Alice didn¡¯t bring Greem to visit the adept¡¯s tower here.


    Even though most wandering adepts would visit, it was a conspicuous act that would draw the attention of the witches. This was especially true at this critical period. All unfamiliar faces that wanted to enter and exit the Northern Lands would be under scrutiny.


    Greem had thought that Alice would bring him to the Moya¡¯s outpost in the city. He didn¡¯t expect Alice to wind through the city and bring him to a tradingpany by the name of Night Rose. The Night Rose was a subordinate organization that belonged to the Dark Witches.


    After skillfully negotiating with the manager of thepany, Alice seeded in reserving two spots within the merchant group at the cost of two hundred magical crystals per person. The identity she gave to thepany was of two ordinary adepts on a journey to the Northern Lands in search of unique resources.


    The date of departure was set to be three dayster as the goods of thepany were still waiting to be carted over. Consequently, Alice and Greem had no choice but to find an inn near thepany to settle down in.


    The manager of thepany hesitated for a moment when the two finally left. He waved and called over a subordinate to take the counter as he hurried to the courtyard of the building.


    Here, a giant golden tent had been erected on the grass field. One apprentice witch in short robes after another walked in and out of the tent.


    After a series of messages and envoys, thepany manager was finally able to meet with the actual person in charge of the transportation of the goods this time¨C Second Grade Dark Witch K.


    The space within the tent wasn¡¯t narrow at all. In fact, the decorations were extremely grand.


    An elegant soft carpet withplicated patterns lied beneath their feet. Curtains embroidered with gold hung around the tent. Every one of them had been crafted with care and delicacy. The work was exquisite. All sorts of strange life-like creatures had been embroidered onto the curtains. Most of them were magical creatures unique to the Northern Lands.


    A female silhouette with a seductive figure and a supine posture was leaning upon a small wooden table behind the semi-translucent curtains. The woman was silently reading her book.


    "Oh, you mean to say that two unknown adepts have joined our group?"


    "Yes, mydy. It is already the third group of adepts that have engaged our services. As you ordered, I immediately rushed over to give my report once they left."


    "What about their backgrounds?"


    "One male and one female. The two say they are here to look for resources and didn¡¯t provide much other detail."


    "A female?" Witch Kughed softly, "Hasn¡¯t there been a lot more female adepts heading towards the Northern Lands during this time?!"


    "Mydy, do you mean that they are... "


    "Who cares if they are? Now that they have engaged our services, they are our clients. We only need to send them to their destination safely. No need to care about anything else!"


    "But wouldn¡¯t it bring about trouble for the merchant group if their purpose is really ¡¯that¡¯?" The manager couldn¡¯t help but hesitate.


    "It might have been troublesome if this had been a few years prior." Witch K slightly smiled as she exined, "The Witches of Deceit went overboard, causing the other witch leaders to pressure them through the Witch Council. They forced their leader, Angelina, to swear not to kill any other candidate that will participate in the Battle of Fate. So the trouble you speak of no longer exists!"


    "I understand, mydy. I know what to do."


    "Mm, you may leave! Remember to notify them. We will depart three dayster as nned. They will have to find another group if they miss the ride.¡±


    "Understood." The manager kneeled on the ground and bowed respectfully before slowly retreating from the tent.


    The witches were well-respected within the entire Northern Lands!


    Not only did they possess incredible strength, but they were also the rulers of the Northern Lands, as well as the defenders and pioneers of thatnd.


    Frankly speaking, the entirety of the Northern Lands had been obtained through tooth-and-w struggles against the native creatures and wild beasts thanks to the witches and their followers.


    Thus, all citizens of the Northern Lands felt sincere gratitude, respect, and love for all the Northern Witches.


    In this regard, the Northern Witches were the organization with the most intimate rtions to the peasants among all the adept forces.


    ............


    At this moment, Greem and Alice had finally settled down within the inn.


    Inside their room, Alice had taken on the temporary role of Greem¡¯s teacher. She was teaching him all about the Northern Witches that he needed to know.


    Of course, Greem had already obtained a basic understanding of the origins and ruling structure of the Northern Witches through books and various other means. However, most of these efforts were futile and ineffective. They only gave him a vague impression of the witches, and could notpare to the in-depth exnation by a trueblood witch like Alice.


    She no longer needed to talk about the long andplicated history of the witches. Greem knew of this through books. Thus, most of Alice¡¯s priorities and focus was on the rtionship and specialties of the various witch branches.


    The Northern Witches appeared to be a massive and harmonious witch force on the surface. However, if one were to dig into their roots, they would find an inexplicableplexity within the internal politics of the giant organization. The intricacy of the situation was enough to suffocate anyone that tried to think about it.


    If they were indeed as united as their appearances suggested, why were there only seven left of the original thirteen branches?


    Even though it was true that each branch¡¯s rise and fall had their fates, it was a fact that six of the witch branches had gonepletely extinct. This situation could not be exined or glossed over by merely pointing towards fate!


    The seven witch branches that remained were Deceit, Pale, Agony, Death, Coldwinter, Dark, and False. The Witches of Deceit, in particr, were skilled at transfiguration and deceit. They were also Alice¡¯s biggest enemy currently.


    The Pale Witches possessed apanying spirits that were linked to their life force. These spirits were immune to most physical damage and even had casting abilities. Thus, provoking a Pale Witch was provoking a powerful witch and a powerful spirit at the same time. Fighting with a numerical advantage was what they were best at!


    The Agony Witches were proficient in curses. They were the group of individuals that produced the most curse adepts.


    The Death Witches were good at poison and gue. They also had their own unique technique for creating undead.


    The Coldwinter Witches were masters of ice and snow. They were also the most powerful andbat-oriented of the seven witch branches thanks to the synergy of their powers with the cold and unforgiving weather of the north.


    The ability of the Dark Witches was stranger. They were able to create a sort of unique soul energy pool and store their soul brand within it. In doing so, they no longer feared death inbat. They would revive in the soul energy pool within a dozen days, even if they gloriously sacrificed themselves in battle.


    The False Witches, on the other hand, had illusion as their innate talent. The False Witches were a mysterious group of individuals, even within the witches. Very few people have seen their actual faces.


    The witch that had attacked Alice outside of Feidnanst time was, in truth, a Witch of Deceit that had transformed her appearance. The transfiguration powers of the Witches of Deceit weren¡¯t as simple as a cosmetic change to their bodies. They also possessed some of the unique capabilities of their target when they transfigured and took on their form.


    It was one of the most powerful abilities of the Deceit Witches!


    The reason Alice had chosen the merchant group of the Dark Witches over the Moya n of the Pale Witches was to avoid suspicion and trouble.


    The n¡¯s performance and actionsst time had hurt Alice deeply!


    She no longer wanted to be betrayed by her n again.

 Chapter 344 Setting Out

    Chapter 344 Setting Out


    Three dayster.


    The gathering location was set to be the entrance of the Night Rose¡¯s headquarters.


    There was already a crowd when Greem and Alice hurried over to the ce. Several dozen carts had also been parked there. A squad of fully-armed guards spread across the area. They seemed to consist of warriors from other races mostly.


    Greem was interested in the secrets of their biology, but a few figures wrapped in heavy robes drew his attention.


    In truth, Greem and Alice also wore wearing thick traveler¡¯s robes to avoid any trouble. They had their hoods pulled over their heads, and not a single inch of their skin was exposed. That said, nothing could entirely hide Alice¡¯s conspicuously petite figure.


    There were four other ¡¯passengers¡¯ traveling with the merchant group aside from the two of them.


    The four of them had split into three different parties. Two women were traveling alone, and the other male and female were a pair like Alice and Greem were.


    Judging from the mental flux they were radiating, one of the girls traveling alone was a witch, while the other was an apprentice. The pair were adepts as well.


    "How is it, do you sense anything?" Greem silently assessed the newpany from under the shadows of his hood. Hemunicated with Alice through the use of his Spirit.


    "Unfortunately, all three of the girls are!" Alice couldn¡¯t help but roll her eyes.


    There were at least another seven or eight months until the Tower of Fate activated. Why were these peopleing out of the woodwork so early? To think that they would bump into so manypetitors when all they wanted was to ride along with the merchant caravans! Alice was speechless.


    As candidates of the Witch of Fate themselves, all of them had some degree of blessing from fate. Outsiders might not have been able to sense this aura of fate, but all candidates of fate were sensitive to it. They recognized each other¡¯s identities the moment they gathered together.


    Four candidates appeared in the merchant group. Three of them were adepts, while the other was an apprentice.


    The few adept-level candidates couldn¡¯t help but shift their gaze towards the apprentice. Their looks carried with them a trace of disdain and scorn.


    Some great talent must have awakened within them as candidates of the Witch of Fate. Yet, even under these circumstances, she remained unable to advance to a witch. People like these were destined to be eliminated. They probably didn¡¯t have a chance to participate in the Battle of Fate.


    Everyone present knew it in their hearts. Thews of fate were no phnthropists.


    Thews of fate had provided such great fortune to candidates all over the Continent, and one day they would take it back. Much like raising a poisonous insect by having a hundred of them fight within an urn, thews of fate had to bless the candidates to ensure they grew and developed as quickly as possible.


    Then, once the timing was ripe, the Tower of Fate would be activated, and the candidates would gather.


    With fate as the furnace and the candidates as the fuel, the mes of the legacy of the Witch of Fate would once again ignite.


    In this manner, the new Witch of Fate would be able to draw upon the flesh and souls of the defeated candidates and rapidly break free of the initial period of weakness. They would instantly rise to be one worthy to be a leader of the witches.


    As such, all the candidates were doomed to the fate of killing each other. There was no possibility of peace or cooperation!


    While Greem and Alice were silently assessing their opponents, their opponents were also doing the same to them.


    A strong fire-elementium adept. It was evident from the pulsing and surging fire elementium particles around the man¡¯s body. The other one?


    The two witch candidates couldn¡¯t help but betray an expression of confusion.


    Firstly, it was clear that she had advanced to adept-level.


    This was obvious from the energy aura that radiated from within her body.


    However, why was her mental flux so strange?


    It appeared one moment and vanished in the next. It behaved like that of an adept¡¯s for an instant, and like that of an ordinary mortal in the following second. The change in her mental flux was iprehensible to the two witches!


    The two witches had silently started to grab their crystal balls under cover of their sleeves. It seemed they wanted to scry on Alice.


    A light runic explosion came from their sleeves the very next second. A thick cloud of ck smoke emerged from within them.


    "Two idiots." Alice put on a cold smile of disdain. She grabbed Greem¡¯s sleeve with one hand and toyed with a tinum badge with the other.


    It was thanks to this badge that Alice had managed to deflect the scrying attempts of her panions¡¯.


    Themotion had attracted the attention of the crowd as well.


    However, the guards in charge of the caravan¡¯s security shrugged and took a few steps outwards after taking a quick look at the people involved. They didn¡¯t want to have anything to do with a fight between witches.


    From start to finish, the battle between Alice and the two witches had never included the apprentice. She had automatically been relegated to the status of a simple being who was utterly ignored.


    The apprentice bit her lips. Her body trembled when she sensed the tense atmosphere around her.


    Even though she knew there was no chance of winning, the strong desire to live on caused her to grit her teeth and set out on this desperate journey. There was hope as long as she participated. It was this pure thought that kept her going, even though she was frightened out of her wits.


    The conflict between the witches had affected the merchant group. Some of the ordinary mortals apanying the group betrayed expressions of fear and concern.


    Just then, an incredibly sharp and powerful mental flux engulfed the entire ce. It forcefully suppressed all the tension andmotion that was happening.


    Everyone¡¯s hearts trembled. They shifted their gazes towards the group of women that had just walked out of the Night Rose headquarters.


    They were all women, and they were all in ck robes. There were a total of eleven of them. There were young witches, old hags, prettydies, and ugly women.


    In particr, the leading woman glowed with a blinding and intense light. Greem and the others had to tilt their gazes away from her to spare their eyes from the stinging pain. Strangely enough, the ordinary people seemed unaffected by the light. They didn¡¯t appear to see anything out of the ordinary.


    "Since you have chosen us of the Night Rose, you had best keep to the rules and behave. We will be responsible for escorting you to your destination without a hitch." The woman stopped walking and coldly warned, "If anyone tries some scheme of theirs along the way, hmph... "


    Greem and the others took her words to heart. They bowed in respect before the witch.


    This respect was, in fact, the necessary formality that needed to be shown towards a higher-grade adept. Otherwise, the higher-grade adept possessed the right to punish the disrespect.


    After a light warning, the Second Grade witch boarded an opulent carriage without another word. The other ck-robeddies also boarded their carriages, one after another.


    A Second Grade witch, three First Grade witches, and seven apprentice witches in all.


    The blinding light might have obstructed Greem¡¯s eyes, but he was still able to get a good grasp of the number of witches in the party with the chip¡¯s ability to scan. Such figures and power were enough topare to small-sized ns in the Zhentarim area.


    Right here at the edge of the Northern Lands, a party of this capability was no more than the basic line-up to guard a group of caravans!


    As everyone had paid a hefty price of two hundred magical crystals, a delicate carriage had been prepared for every one of the passengers. However, Alice and Greem still chose to share a vehicle out of security concerns. Before they got into their carriage, Greem observed that the pair of adepts traveling together were also sharing a carriage.


    Alice excitedly whispered once they got on, "Are we going to do it on the journey?"


    Greem replied unamusedly, "You dare to do anything? There¡¯s a Second Grade Dark Witch with the group. Moreover, you will attract fate¡¯s bacsh if you are the one that took the initiative to strike!"


    Alice took out arge apple out of who-knows-where and started snapping and crunching away at it, "We will always find a way to do it as long as we want to. From my observations, all these people seem to be idiots. Wouldn¡¯t it be an easy matter to bait them to attack us?"


    "It¡¯s best not to do anything if we can." Greem thought quietly for a while, "I have a feeling that you will benefit more if you let them grow stronger!"


    Alice tilted her head as she thought about the issue. She started gnawing away at the apple at an even faster rate.


    At the same time, a private conversation was also held on the carriage of the other pair of adepts.


    "Brother, are we going to do it on the journey?" The female adept was the first to pull her hood off her head. She revealed a head of long golden hair and a delicate and pretty face.


    "We will see how it goes!" The other adept also pulled his hood off. His pitch-ck eyes, with not a single trace of white, looked extremely strange and wicked, "The two of them are traveling together. It¡¯s going to be troublesome. The little kid doesn¡¯t seem to have anybat abilities, but thatpanion of her¡¯s is no simple matter. That said, we can consider those fellows traveling alone as our targets!"


    The female adept lowered her head and thought for a bit. She then lifted her head and spoke, "No need to hurry. I¡¯ll find opportunities to probe them during the trip. You go and test that female adept. I¡¯ll have a word with the male adept."


    The male adept let out a silent sigh and finally nodded in agreement.


    The long caravan line started to move, even as the cogs of conspiracy in everyone¡¯s minds had begun to turn.


    The mercenaries at the front formed the vanguard. The Night Rose guards protected both sides of the caravan line. The dozen carriages that carried the witches and the apprentices mixed with the other caravans and slowly moved forward.


    ............


    The merchant carts and caravans lined up into a long winding serpent as they passed through the city gates in an orderly fashion.


    Two women stood in a fort on top of the city gates as the caravan line pressed towards the dark forest. They silently watched over this party.


    "Is the assessment done?" One of the women spoke in a chilling tone.


    "It is, mydy." The other woman bowed, "There are a total of six outsiders. Four of them are female."


    "Have you checked with the runic arrays?"


    "We have. The array reacted to all four of women. Two are adepts, and one is an apprentice."


    "And the other?"


    "The reaction of the array was somewhat peculiar, as if some unique magical tool that she had on her was interfering with our probing!"


    "Hmph! That is what¡¯s considered ordinary. Who cares if she can interfere with the array? All that matters is that there was a reaction. Remember to notify our sisters on the other end. Send all the information we just gathered to them. The quicker we find out their backgrounds, the greater Miss Snowlotus¡¯ chance of victory."


    "Understood. Your humble subordinate understands. I will go and do so immediately."


    Only the woman was left once her subordinate had gone. She looked at the distant caravan line and couldn¡¯t help but snort coldly, "Hmph! Another bunch is seeking their deaths! Do you really think that you stand a chance in the Battle of Fate? A bunch of fools... "


    She vanished from the spot before her voice had wholly spread out within the room!

 Chapter 345 Forest Journey

    Chapter 345 Forest Journey


    The long line of caravans rattled as they trudged through the dark woods.


    The trees on both sides of the road towered over the travelers. All the trees were above thirty meters and were thick enough that four people were needed to circle a tree. The tree foliage was extremely dense as well. The giant canopypletely covered the sky, only leaving thin strands of light shining upon the road.


    Even though it was daytime, the merchants had to light up torches to have a clear view of the path.


    It was almost as if the caravan line had moved into a silent and enclosed corridor. There were no other sounds apart from the rattling carts and the hooves of the horses.


    Silence!


    Unusual silence!


    One couldn¡¯t hear the chirping of ordinary forests or the pattering feet of leaping rabbits and foxes.


    Greem could distinctly feel a faint magical energy flowing through the ck Forest the moment he stepped foot in it. The elementium particles were at least one or two frequencies more active than the ones outside of the woods.


    "Chip, gather the environmental data for the ck Forest!" Greem thought for a moment and gave this order to the chip.


    "Beep. Constructing project. Gathering environmental data."


    In truth, the ck Forest took up more than sixty percent of the Continent¡¯snd mass. The territory upied by the Zhentarim Association and the three massive adept organizations were no more than forty percent.


    This meant that much of the World of Adept¡¯snd remained unexcavated. What stood in the way of humanity¡¯s progress was the boundless expanse of the ck Forest and its wild, primal grasnds.


    The World of Adepts was vast and had an almost perfect high-magic environment. When this was taken into consideration, along with the massivendmass of the ck Forest, you realized the terror that lurked in the wild. If only one in every thousand wild creatures had been polluted and mutated into a magical monster, then the number of magical creatures was still numerous enough to run over all the adepts put together.


    If the adepts wanted to expand their territories, they had to reach their tentacles into this monstrous stretch of woods.


    They needed to fell trees, pave roads, construct settlements, and erect adept towers.


    This process was not always a smooth one!


    Every step the humans took into the ck Forest would draw an intense bacsh from the woond creatures, magical beasts, mutated monsters, and polluted beings.


    It was tolerable if humans were only dealing with the asional assaults; the most these could do was cause minor losses. However, the entire settlement was at risk if a whole tribe of magical creatures struck, or if a powerful being instigated a stampede.


    Such massive assaults had happened countless times in the history of colonization on the World of Adepts. Every time this happened, it meant that the tens of thousands of peasants that had moved into the settlement were doomed to be the victims of the conflict between the adepts and the wild beasts. Most of the time, an adept¡¯s tower was the only thing that could survive the bloody fight. Everything else would be razed to the ground.


    Every piece of additional living space that the humans earned had gone through such aplicated and drawn out tug-of-war. It was only when the adepts whittled away the will and numbers of the magical creatures that they were able to force the beasts further back into the ck Forest.


    Thus, a sizeable territory over fifty kilometers in width and length required an investment of several decades. It was primarily the case if you included the entire process of colonization. The moving and establishment of a poption were repeated after the conclusion of every single battle that happened over thend. Exhausting tens of thousands of civilian lives and several dozen adept lives in this process was a familiar sight.


    Every adept that braved the storm and led their followers and servants into the ck Forest to forge a path of their own were real heroes that were worthy of remembrance throughout the ages!


    For ordinary men, the ck Forest represented mystery, wickedness, power, and especially death!


    However, this ce was a treasure trove of resources to the adepts!


    Magical nts that grew all over the ce, wildlife of immense diversity, abundant reserves of metal ores, and mysterious and powerful magic creatures were treasures to the adepts.


    Adepts could find a lot of rare resources that had gone extinct or exhausted in the adepts¡¯nds within the depths of the ck Forest.


    Apart from ne invasions, venturing into the ck Forest for ancient ruins and magical creature hunts had be the easiest and most convenient way of umting resources. Squads of three to five adepts did most of these.


    The prerequisites for ne invasions and conquering were far too strict. Not all adepts could achieve them. As such, exploration of the ck Forest had be their best option for training and gathering resources.


    Greem pulled apart the curtains and looked at the dark forest in the distance.


    Despite his perfect eyesight, he was unable to see too far into the forest without casting any enhancement spells. After all, the magical energies in this forest were too active! They were a massive hindrance to an adept¡¯s spiritual senses.


    Greem pushed the curtain even further aside and saw a pitch-ck owl on top of a tall tree not far away from the carriages. The owl was observing everything in the forest with itsrge eyes. It would asionally hoot at the transports.


    "That¡¯s an owl reared by the apprentice witches." Alice crouched beside Greem and looked on with boredom, "Harmless little critters. They can only serve as their eyes in the dark."


    "Why don¡¯t they pick a more powerful animal?" Greem asked doubtfully.


    "Tch... " Alice couldn¡¯t resist the urge to roll her eyes, "Do you think everyone is like you and doesn¡¯t need to worry about magical crystals? Those girls are broke. They can¡¯t afford to buy or even rear stronger pets!"


    "What¡¯s the benefit of having a pet like that?"


    "They can be your eyes and ears usually. They are decent flying scouts. Moreover, enchanted owls also possess a weak ability to see through invisibility. They are fairly suited to be guards. Of course, more importantly, rearing owls like them isn¡¯t that much of a strain to an apprentice witch¡¯s Spirit."


    "Then what kind of pets do witches generally have?"


    "The mostmon ones are naturally ck cats, flower serpents, red bats, and the crows. ck cats can give stealth and agility bonuses to their masters, and flower serpents have infrared sight. Red bats can cast weight-reduction spells and have sonar, while crows have night vision. Anyway, the witches love to transform themselves into all these weird critters!"


    "What about you? Why have I never seen your pet?"


    "Hmph... " Alice grumbled, "I¡¯ve always wanted to catch a hellhound, but sadly I haven¡¯t seeded yet!"


    "A hellhound?" When he heard this name, Greem instantly thought of a bizarre abyssal creature with harsh ck and red skin.


    This creature that was ugly from every perspective was Alice¡¯s ideal magical pet. Greem was speechless.


    "Why?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    "Because there was a witch that once caught a hellhound for a pet. She obtained the ability ¡¯Spell Lock¡¯ from doing so. Moreover, a hellhound can provide Spirit bonuses to its master. It is most definitely the best magical pet there is." Alice¡¯s eyes instantly started glowing when they raised the topic. She went on and on about her favorite abyssal creature.


    "But don¡¯t you think a hellhound is a little ugly and hideous? Also, from what I know, they all stink terribly. They have a pungent stench unique to the abyssal creatures from the lower realms!"


    "Do they really smell that bad?" Alice¡¯s face turned as she cautiously asked Greem. When Greem confirmed his answer, Alice rested her little face in her hands and frowned, "Then if I skin the hellhound and smear him with spices, it should be enough to mask the smell, right?"


    Greem drew a cold breath. He couldn¡¯t help but start worrying about Alice¡¯s future pet.


    ............


    The caravan line slowly proceeded through the ck Forest.


    They could already start to make out the silhouettes of small animals in the dim forest when they were fifteen kilometers away from Ibis City.


    However, with the mercenaries intimidating the beasts, none of them dared to draw close to the caravans. They growled from a distance before retreating to the depths of the woods.


    This road might not have been very popted or crowded, but the frequent passage of a dozen merchant groups had already cleared the path of most of the more threatening magical creatures. The remaining ordinary beasts would be turned into the mercenaries¡¯ dinner if they came too close.


    The scouts of the apprentice witches were the busiest of the group.


    The beat their wings and wove through the dense forest that was hard for humans to navigate. They avoided the dangerous beasts and birds of prey as they searched for rare nts and herbs.


    The moment they found something valuable, two or three apprentice witches would charge into the forest with a dozen mercenaries at their sides. They would retrieve the nt as quickly as possible. This was undoubtedly a lucrative ie for them as well.


    Of course, there were times when powerful creatures guarded the rare nts. In these moments, it was up to the witches in the group to take care of the beasts.


    They didn¡¯t include the yields during the trip in the ounts of the merchantpany. They were private possessions and spoils of war for the witches. Thus, after an entire journey of doing so, every apanying witch would find their collection exceeding even the pay that the merchantpany paid out. It was why every one of them was so excited and passionate about doing this treasure hunt.


    That said, thepany couldn¡¯t possibly stop for their treasure hunting. They could only explore a small area within five to ten kilometers of the road. Any further and they wouldn¡¯t have time to harvest the goods even if they found anything.


    Moreover, areas like these, which were close to the road, had already been exhausted from repeated searches by traveling witches over the years. Anything that was of value had already been scoured and taken from the ce. Thus, the witches of the group decisively gave up on such a game that was only a waste of Spirit and passed the chance on to the training apprentices.


    For these poor apprentices, that had no right to enjoy the resources of the n, even morsels that the witches didn¡¯t want were enough to keep them full. Consequently, they too were d to busy themselves with the task of searching for nts.


    And so, the caravan progressed in such a seemingly slow, yet truthfully quick manner, and soon arrived at the first camp of their long journey.


    It was barely noon at this point!

 Chapter 346 Magical Plants

    Chapter 346 Magical nts


    The caravan set up camp on a piece of emptynd to the side of the road.


    Judging from the marks on the ground this ce was frequently used by merchants all year round. There were already crude wooden huts and fireces on the spot.


    Sadly, theck of management and stationed staff caused these facilities to be damaged and ruined by the woond beasts.


    The caravan line was not about to stay here for an extended period anyway. The group was only stopping for a short rest.


    It took no more than an hour for the entire group to set up camp, have lunch, and leave. The reason they even took a rest in the first ce was to amodate the ordinary men in their party, which made up a majority of the group.


    The apprentice witches took the opportunity to explore even more distant territories while everyone rested.


    If they were lucky enough, they might still be able to find some wild resource sites in the depths of the ck Forest. Those ces were often where magical energies naturally gathered. Consequently, resources would grow abundantly in such areas.


    Any witch could find such a wild resource site after an extended period of searching. They would then try their best to hide the existence of such a ce. In doing so, they only needed toe by every once in a while, and they could harvest the resources that had grown again.


    Such yields were decent ie for most witches!


    Thus, groups of witches and apprentices hopped on their brooms and dove into the forest while the servants ate their lunch.


    Greem and the other guests were unfamiliar with the geography here. They were likely to get lost in the ck Forest if they went too deep. The merchant group would not wait for them if they weren¡¯t able to return within an hour. As such, traveling adepts like Greem could only sigh as they looked into the abundant, fertile forest. They couldn¡¯t venture in for a treasure hunt as the witches did.


    That said, with their adept-level powers, it was no problem for them to walk around a three to five kilometers radius of the camp.


    Greem intended to do so.


    ............


    Inside the dark and dim forest.


    Wild vines and bushes grew all over the ce. Thick tree roots wound through the ground where grass, moss, withered leaves, and all sorts of strange unknown flowers covered it like a dense carpet. Ordinary people would have a hard time even walking through this ce.


    Greem slowly walked forward. Blue light shed in his eyes. He carefully scanned all the nts around him.


    The chaotic arrangement of bushes only allowed for a narrow space through which a person could walk. Moreover, the extended branches and thorns could easily tear a gash through soft cloth robes. Thus, it was best to wear a thick traveler¡¯s cloak in such a ce to avoid trouble.


    The singr darkness of the ck Forest quickly faded away under Greem¡¯s elementium sight. The whole ce took on many different colors.


    A sizable bush obstructed Greem¡¯s way. One had to pass through the narrow space with their body positioned sideways.


    Blue light gleamed in Greem¡¯s eyes as he smiled slightly.


    When he walked forward, a light red barrier appeared around him.


    The barrier¡¯s radius wasn¡¯t all thatrge. It covered a distance of fewer than three footsteps around Greem. That said, the might of the field was not to be underestimated.


    The barrier instantly reduced every single nt that came into contact with it to ashes in a dramatic ze. A path of ash emerged through the dense greenery as Greem continued to walk forward. Several crimson vines twisted about frantically in the ck ash. They whipped and thrashed around, hitting the ground and everything around them.


    Some of the crimson vines were smart enough to retreat. They curled and hid in the bushes nearby once again. On the other hand, some of them tried to endure the mes. These vines were soon burned to ashes when they could no longer resist the heat.


    Greem¡¯s arrival seemed to ring the funeral bells for the magical nts in the woods. Scuffling sounds came from the direction of all the bushes around him.


    Countless bloodsucking vines, man-eating flowers, and poison-ivies hiding behind the bushes moved their forked roots and shambled away from Greem¡¯s path.


    It was almost as if he had shouted ¡¯open sesame.¡¯ An obstructed path presented itself before Greem. The many withered vines hanging from the trees also started to retract themselves and kept their tentacles to themselves.


    Right before Greem entered this ce, it looked extraordinarily peaceful and ordinary, as if it was a piece of inviting woods right behind afortable cottage. One would think they¡¯d be able to go in for a pleasant evening¡¯s rest after lunch. However, when the facade was torn apart by Greem¡¯s intimidating presence, the forest revealed itself to be a magical nest of monsters.


    Of course, this was the real face of the ck Forest. The calm and peace of earlier was only a mask for the magical nts to better lure in their prey.


    Greem quickly grabbed onto a retracting crimson vine. A fist-sized tumor in the middle of the vine caught his attention.


    The crimson vine struggled intensely in his grasp as if it sensed Greem¡¯s hostility. However, bright fire elementium quickly gathered, and a brilliant fire instantly engulfed the vine.


    The fire elementium went as quick as it hade.


    When the mes finally extinguished, the writhing vine had burned to ashes. The ashes fell to the ground, leaving behind a scarlet, thumb-sized crystal in Greem¡¯s palm.


    A blood crystal!


    This item was a type of crystal that could be used to replenish a person¡¯s vitality.


    Greem still remembered his time in the magic swamp. Back when he was still an apprentice, he had to make frequent errands to retrieve the blood sacks growing within the Bloodsucking Vines. Those blood sacks were several levels inferior to the blood crystal in front of his eyes!


    Back in the magic swamp, the Bloodsucking Vines couldn¡¯t find much fresh or delicious food. Consequently, the quality of their blood sacks was also quite inferior. How could those blood sacks possiblypare to the blood crystal he held right now?


    If Greem had still been an apprentice, then this blood crystal alone would have provided him with a Physique improvement of between 0.8 points to 1.1 points. But now...


    Greem threw the blood crystal into his mouth and bit it with his teeth. A sweet liquid with the fragrance of grass flowed down his throat and into his stomach. It was an extremelyfortable feeling of warmth. The chip¡¯s notification also indicated that his vigor and blood volume was at their peak.


    That was all!


    A blood crystal that could bring about a 1 point increase to an apprentice¡¯s Physique was only good enough to replenish his vigor. It had almost no other effect apart from that! After all, an adept¡¯s body underwent a unique refining process when they advanced. Most of the resources and materials at the apprentice level were no longer useful to them.


    Even though it couldn¡¯t increase their Physique, the blood crystal could still have a decent effect on their health if they ate it as a ¡¯snack.¡¯


    Having understood this, Greem put his hands behind his back and casually strolled through the ck Forest. With the help of his powerful elementium sight, no item that glowed with abnormal elementium radiance could avoid his vision.


    The blood crystal in the bloodsucking vines was a light red color; the roots and stinging tentacles of the man-eating flowers were a light blue. The leaves of the poison ivy were purple, and the sap of the Magespirit glowed with a milky-white color.


    Even Greem was busy upon seeing such rich magical resources for the first time.


    One moment, he would be tracing the vines of a Bloodsucking Vine back to its actual body behind a tree, and the next he was chasing behind a wriggling and shambling man-eating flower. Next, he would rip the Magespirits out of the earth as they screamed and cried.


    Evildoers were doomed to death at the hands of a greater evil!


    These hidden predators had finally met their match today.


    They had none of the litheness of magical animals, and could only hide from the pursuit of big bad Greem. Their short, stubby forked limbs made escaping a joke, and as hiding was impossible. What kind of stealth ability could keep them hidden from Greem¡¯s elementium sight?


    Just like that, an area two hundred and fifty meters wide was wiped clean of magical nts in less than an hour. Greem had utterly exterminated all of them with his barbaric methods of harvesting. He had practically dug three feet into the ground to catch all of the nts.


    He straightened his back and checked the time, before unhappily looking around the woods nearby. There, in the darkness, every blinking spot of light represented a target that was worth checking out.


    Unfortunately, he was out of time!


    By the time Greem followed the path he had taken back to the camp, the witches and apprentice had also returned. The servants had also finished their meals. After a brief rest, the caravans once again went on their way.


    Greem opened the pouch in his hand once he was in the creaking carriage. He showed Alice the spoils of war he hadbored over.


    There was none of the expected praise and surprise. Instead, all Greem got was a stern questioning and a pair of rolling eyes.


    "What? How did you do this? Have you never learned anything about herbology? Why are there only blood crystals, but none of the actual bodies of the bloodsucking vines? Do you not know that their bodies are worth more than the blood crystals?


    "What¡¯s this? Could this be the roots of a man-eating flower? Don¡¯t tell me you ran into humanoid man-eating flowers! A lot of adepts are willing to buy this magical nt for forty magic crystals. You couldn¡¯t have burnt them all, could you?


    "Also, why are all the Mageroyals damaged? Do you not know that you are supposed to preserve their roots perfectly when you harvest Mageroyals? Damaged Mageroyals are worth way less than those in perfect condition."


    Greem¡¯s mouth twitched as he listened to Alice¡¯s devilish nagging. For the first time in his life, he grieved over his ignorance of herbology.


    Dammit, wasn¡¯t it just plucking some magical materials?! Why was it such a hassle!?


    Greem¡¯s face quickly soured.

 Chapter 347 Witch Beauty

    Chapter 347 Witch Beauty


    A failure of a forest exploration!


    That was Alice¡¯s judgment after running through all of Greem¡¯s spoils.


    Her assessment undoubtedly made Greem¡¯s face even darker.


    His whole life had been turned around ever since he¡¯d obtained the help of the chip. Situations of ¡¯defeat¡¯ like this one were infrequent with the support of the chip¡¯s massive reserves of knowledge.


    Then again, this also had much to do with Greem¡¯s excessive tendency to collect only practical knowledge.


    He had always been excited and quick to enter into the chip all the data that could strengthen himself. When it came to less popr fields, such as herbology, he was slower at gathering knowledge.


    Alice took out a wrinkled old book from her pouch and threw it to Greem as he frowned and thought about his mistakes.


    "Take a good look through this book!"


    Greem took the book and looked at it. It was called Elementary Encyclopedia of Magical nts.


    Very well, he was indeed a beginner and rookie at herbology! The only thing he could do was to start picking up on all those works he hadn¡¯t in the past!


    Greem mentally sighed as he held the book in his hands and slowly started flipping the pages. In truth, he only needed less than five minutes to scan a hundred-page book like this one. The chip¡¯s current scanning and processing abilities were extremely powerful. That said, he didn¡¯t want to expose the existence of the chip in front of Alice¡¯s eyes. Thus, Greem had no other option but to slowly scan and umte the content of the book at a rate that most reasonable humans would.


    The caravan line sessfully made it to the second camping site before sundown.


    The ck Forest at night was scarier than it was during the day. The active area and aggressiveness of most magical creatures were far higher in the night as well. Traveling in the forest at night was a huge mistake.


    The caravan line left the green and white road with the help of the guards and mercenaries. They then turned onto a narrow road. After a couple more winding turns and lengthy twists, the party arrived beside a small greenke.


    Theke wasn¡¯t all thatrge, but the water was crystal clear.


    The mirror-like surface of the water reflected the blue sky, white clouds, and all the towering trees that surrounded theke. It was almost impossible for those who had just seen it for the first time to differentiate between the reality and the reflection.


    The sky quickly faded to dusk.


    The servants in the merchant group herded the horses and their carts to an empty field by the side of theke. The wagons, carriages, and caravans were then arranged in a set fashion. Campfires were lit, water was drawn, and stew boiled. The faint fragrance of fish stew spread out throughout the forest.


    Greem and Alice got down from the carriage and took a stroll around theke as they waited for dinner.


    Greem had noticed a Second Grade Dark Witch throwing a green seed in the middle of the campsite when she got down from her carriage. The few apprentice witches then set up arge, delicately magnificent tent on the location.


    Alice exined with a soft voice when she saw Greem¡¯s confused expression, "It¡¯s a magic array seed! A sort of variation on magic arrays. You seal a magic array within a special nt seed ahead of time. You can then nt the seed into the ground when you need to. The magic array will naturally extend and spread out as the nt rapidly grows from it. And when you need to leave the next day, all you need to do is seal the array back into the seed!"


    Greem frowned when he heard this.


    Alice¡¯s description was simple. However, everything didn¡¯t seem as in once he analyzed the possibilities.


    The individual powers of an adept were always limited. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was casting speed or casting strength, the adepts would invariably lose to a stable and well-prepared array. Even though it had only been a crude offensive array, his experience back in the war tower on the knight¡¯s ne had thoroughly opened Greem¡¯s eyes to the power of magic formations.


    Would he have time to defeat his future opponents if they possessed simr means of erecting temporary magic arrays like this one?


    "Approximately how much does a temporary array like this one cost? What sorts of arrays of this kind are there? Are there any limitations to their functions? Where can one buy it?"


    Alice felt her head swell at all the questions Greem hurled at her. She frantically interrupted him.


    "I have only seen high-grade adepts in the n using these things. As for their specific functions and effects, I have no idea."


    "Stupid!" Greem red at her, "Just because you can¡¯t get your hands on it doesn¡¯t mean that someone else can¡¯t get their hands on it. What happens if you run into such a thing during the Battle of Fate? Do you intend to do your research right then at the cost of your life? Of course, you must try your very best to prepare right now! Even if you can¡¯t obtain it, you have to find some way to understand its powers, strengths, and weaknesses. All this might save you during a critical moment!"


    Alice blinked her pair of pretty eyes as she silently listened to the lecture.


    It was at this moment that she started to have a vague idea of the difference between her and her master Greem.


    He had initiative, sensitivity to all things, and pragmatism.


    Whenever he encountered new knowledge or new objects, Greem would first match them with words such asbat, strengthening, practicality, and magical crystals. If they happened to be very well rted to these words, he would take all two hundred percent of his passion in order to make sure he mastered and obtained them. And if these new subjects happened to have nothing to do with any of the words mentioned above, he wouldpletely ignore them!


    How was this supposed to be an appropriate way of thinking for an adept!? Adepts were supposed to be servants of all knowledge!


    "I¡¯ll leave this thing to you." Greem gave a swift and decisive order, "You are a witch yourself. It should be easy for you to talk with the witches. It¡¯s your job to figure out everything about these temporary magic array things."


    "What about you?" Alice¡¯s head hurt from the amount of work she had to do. She grumbled unhappily.


    "Me? Of course, I¡¯m going on a date!" Having said that, Greem revealed a sly smile on his face under the shadows of the cloak.


    "Go, go, go... be careful of them eating you for dinner!" Alice pouted and said resentfully.


    Greem chuckled and turned towards the forest in nearby.


    ............


    Nightfall.


    The dark forest became even more terrifying and sinister as the moisture from the ground rose into the air!


    Greem stepped upon the damp soil and parted the light veil of mist hanging in the air. He slowly walked through the dark and silent woods.


    It wasn¡¯t as if there was no light at all.


    Fluorescent moss that glowed with a ghostly light, Bright Shrooms that shone like lightbulbs, and all sorts of fluorescent nts of varying colors helped illuminate his surroundings.


    It was not wise to go near anything too bright or eye-catching in the ck Forest.


    It was basic knowledge that all adepts who ventured into the ck Forest needed to know!


    Bright meant poison! Eye-catching meant trap!


    Both of these together meant considerable trouble waiting to happen!


    Greem lifted his nose and sniffed. He could smell the faint scent of a woman mixed in with the damp, decaying smell of the forest.


    Greem saw a set of footprints in the ck soil. They slowly disappeared into a bush to his left.


    He was nearly three kilometers away from the camp. Even the witches that went out on searches for resources never came this far.


    Greem hesitated for the moment. He finally started to wonder if it had been a wise decision toe to this meeting.


    He heard something just as he was contemting giving up. The sshing of water came to his ears through the thin mist. Greem could also faintly hear singing amid the sshing.


    The sweet voice of a woman!


    As expected, this was going to be interesting!


    A light red barrier appeared around Greem¡¯s body. He scattered the mist and walked in the direction of the singing with a smile of disdain on his face.


    There was a small pool embedded in the middle of the forest.


    The moonlight was deste and the water chilling.


    Towering trees grew around the pool. Their massive canopies formed a perfect circle, leaving only a small, bowl-sized hole above the water.


    A disc of silver light projected from above, much like a bright pir of light projected onto a dark stage. It illuminated a beautiful and nakeddy bending her body to cup water with her hands and bathe herself.


    The woman¡¯s taut skin reflected the silver light of the moon, causing her to shine with the radiance of a wless doll. As if she had heard Greem¡¯s footsteps, the beautiful woman stood straight up in the knee-deep pool water. She flicked her wet golden hair behind her back and smiled at the young man standing by the side of the pool.


    The witch before Greem was undoubtedly a beauty, regardless of whether you were judging with the aesthetics of an adept or an ordinary man. She had a full bosom, a slim waist, long legs, and smooth skin. When you took into consideration her gorgeous appearance and perfectly proportioned figure, she was the ideal lover.


    It was more so when she bared her chest before Greem¡¯s unscrupulous gaze. That intense physical temptation was enough to turn any man into an irrational beast.


    "This is my offer, Sir Greem! If you are willing to give up on that beansprout of a little girl, I¡¯ll be willing to apany you on this romantic trip through the woods!" The beauty licked her red lips, "I can do anything you want... "


    The heck£¿


    Mm, I like this scheme!


    The smile on Greem¡¯s face became even more radiant.


    He pushed the hood behind his head and exposed his handsome face to the cold moonlight.


    His eyes gleamed with the light of wisdom. His cold and sharp facial features. The slight trace of wickedness that hung around the corners of his mouth, and his tall, fit body. At this moment, Greem¡¯s unique elegance mixed with his intimidating and overwhelming masculinity turned about to attract the witch¡¯s gaze. And her desire!


    Who knew that this man, who had been hiding his face, was such a charming fellow!?


    The witch¡¯s gaze had be even more fervent.


    "If you want to, I can be your permanent partner. And sometimes, even your ve."


    For some reason, even the breeze that blew across the pool of water had a lick of zing heat to it.


    "This condition isn¡¯t good enough!" Greem¡¯s calm eyes wandered everywhere.


    Strangely enough, his gaze remained calm and unfeeling, even when he was staring directly at the most seductive parts of the witch¡¯s body.


    After all, appreciation was appreciation. The beautiful body before Greem could not provoke even an inch of his desire!


    The beautiful witch¡¯s body froze.

 Chapter 348 Berserker Witch

    Chapter 348 Berserker Witch


    The water was chilling, and the moonlight was hazy.


    The witch¡¯s expression had be more and more solemn.


    "What is it that you want?" She finally voiced her doubts, "You can¡¯t actually be childish enough to believe that you can control a little brat, push her up to the throne of Witch of Fate, and gain a powerful servant just like that, could you?"


    "And what if that¡¯s what I¡¯m thinking of doing!?"


    "Hehehe... ¡± The witchughed sinisterly, "Then you should go and take a look at the history of the Witches of Fate! Do you not know? All witches are loyal to only one person. The great Queen Witch! It doesn¡¯t matter if you have her under your thumb with a contract of immense power. The moment she bes the Witch of Fate, all bindings forcefully attached to her soul will instantly vanish!"


    "Then what good advice do you have for me?" Greem lifted his head and looked at the sky, "Speak up. I can¡¯t wait for dinner!"


    The witch forcibly suppressed her irritation and covered her body with a thin cloth robe that she had ced on a rock to the side of the pool. She allowed the wet fabric to caress her perfect body. She slowly walked toward Greem, lifted her head, and stared into his ck eyes. A beautiful smile once again graced her face.


    "You are an interesting person... and very strong." The witch extended a slim, smooth finger towards Greem as if she wanted to touch his well-defined muscles. She immediately yelped in pain and retracted her hand when her fingertip reached the red barrier.


    The witch ced her red finger into her mouth and sucked. She seductively smiled as she spoke, "No one canpletely control the Witch of Fate. However, if you are willing to change your position and support me instead, I can be your secret lover for three years. Moreover, I can also agree to the same things that that little witch has promised you!"


    "Is this how you managed to bribe that male adept to your side?" Greem asked without betraying much emotion.


    Light shone in the witch¡¯s eyes. She seemed to think that she had discovered something about Greem. She chuckled, "What have you been thinking about... that person¡¯s my brother! He truly cares for me."


    "Then you should tell him to make his sister wear a bit more when she goes out next time! I have no interest in some disgusting flesh that has undergone magical modifications." Greem¡¯s shadow shed and burst into a ball of fire. He disappeared from the spot, just in time to avoid the attacks of two green streaks.


    The two green balls of light didn¡¯t manage to find their targets. They turned around in the air and flew back to the side of the witch beforending on her shoulders.


    Greem reappeared twenty meters away. He couldn¡¯t help but be slightly surprised.


    "Green fairies?"


    Green fairies were a type of unique nt-attribute magical creature. They were only the size of a palm and looked like a naked human girl with the wings of a cicada. However, they had none of the gentleness and kindness of the nectar-eating flower fairies. They were carnivores; mean creatures with rapid speed and poisonous ws.


    The green fairies weren¡¯t powerful magical creatures, but they were enough of a nuisance to throw an adept off his spellcasting. The victim would not have any extra time to defend himself from the witch¡¯s spells!


    Greemughed when he saw the witch¡¯s ck face and the two green fairies that were about to lunge at him. His body once again turned into a st of fire.


    He was already deep in the woods when he once again reappeared.


    A thin silhouette finally emerged after Greem had vanished.


    "Ina, was there a need for that?" The ck outline walked to the witch¡¯s side and stared at the slowly dissipating fires in the distance, "No external force can help you once the Tower of Fate is activated. What use is there, even if you managed to convince this adept to your side?"


    "No, you don¡¯t understand," The witch¡¯s alluring gaze turned sharp and cold, "That brat is different from the others. She might be the most frighteningpetitor of them all!"


    The ck silhouette was stunned for a moment, "Could she possibly be more frightening than that Snowlotus?"


    "You can¡¯tpare them like that," The witch shook her head in frustration. It seemed like she couldn¡¯t figure out something on her own, "Snowlotus, the Witch of Ice and Snow, is already powerful, but she couldn¡¯t possibly cause me to feel this intense pressure in the depths of my soul. That brat, on the other hand......"


    The witch stuttered for quite a while. She didn¡¯t know how to describe that overwhelming feeling roiling around deep within her soul.


    "You couldn¡¯t have fallen for that adept, could you!?" The dark form was finally unable to suppress the urge to ask. The envy dripping from his voice was unmistakable.


    "Hehehe......" The sharp look in the witch¡¯s eyes had once again faded away into hiding. Her seductive gaze appeared once more, "Brother, are you jealous?"


    A pair of lips violently pressed against hers before she could finish speaking.


    "You are mine. you will always be mine......"


    The sounds of heavy breathing filled the woods, quickly followed by bestial cries and roars.


    The robe she had just put on ripped to shreds within moments. Two naked bodies tangled with each other and rolled into the pool.


    Soon, the mirror-like pool of water started rippling and sshing!


    The two green fairies beat their wings and dashed into the forest nearby. They hid within the vast darkness.


    ............


    "This pair of dogs! "


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but cover her big bright eyes as she cursed furiously.


    That said, wasn¡¯t the gap between her fingers a little wide? It didn¡¯t seem like they could stop her from seeing anything!


    She didn¡¯t forget to record all this into her image-recording crystal even as she scolded and grumbled.


    Alice hurried and packed away all the shattered shell pieces on the floor of the carriage when she remembered that Greem was on his way back. She then stealthily sneaked back to the campfire.


    Using her privilege as an adept, Alice half-robbed and half-bought a perfectly-treated guinea fowl from a half-wolf mercenary.


    The innards of the guinea fowl had beenpletely emptied and filled with mushrooms and chestnuts. Alice roasted it on the fire as she used a brush to apply ayer of spice on her dinner evenly. Golden oil continuously seeped out from the meat. It sizzled as the fire lightly licked it and cooked it to perfection.


    A thick and fragrant smell of roasted chicken hung in the air.


    Fifteen minutester, Greem stepped foot into the campsite. The first thing that greeted him was a perfectly roasted chicken that gleamed with a golden shine.


    "Eat it, quick. I especially left this for you!" Alice licked her lips as if she didn¡¯t mind at all.


    Greem put up a slight smile and tore off the juiciest drumstick. He passed it to Alice.


    Alice instantly took it and started to ravage the meat with a huge smile on her face. Her mouth was still full of food, but she continued to mumble something like, "Gwess you knwow a lwady¡¯s hweart."


    Of course, many watching eyes saw everything that happened by the fire.


    An old witch unhappily grumbled after she let down the curtains, "These are the witches that appeared in recent times? Always relying on male adepts and seducing them! Aplete disgrace to us witches!"


    The Second Grade Witch K rested silently on her couch in the middle of the tent. She spoke coldly, "Laura, there¡¯s no need to get upset. From what I know, this little Alice brat is, in fact, a favored candidate in the Battle of Fate!"


    "What? A child like this is favored?! "The three Dark Witches in the tent let out a gasp of surprise in unison.


    "I visited Sage Else a while back. She told me that this Alice was amongst the three hopefuls for the winner of the Battle of Fate!"


    "Sssss......" The three Dark Witches drew in a cold breath, all at the same time.


    No one was foolish enough to doubt Sage Elsa¡¯s words. However, the massive juxtaposition between the prophecy and reality was sufficiently jarring to confuse the witches.


    "What powers does she possess? From the looks of it, she must have sacrificed all her powers in exchange for the blessing of fate. But that powerful male adept can¡¯t help her with anything once she¡¯s in the Tower. What will she use to defend against the tower guardians and herpetitors?"


    "Indeed... does she intend to use herpletely harmless divination spells to kill someone?"


    "If she enchanted her little tinum hammer with some offensive spells, she might be able to use it to hit someone to death!"


    The Dark Witches took turns to make fun of Alice. Clearly, none of them thought well of her odds.


    "Oh, that¡¯s right, Lady K. Since Sage Elsa named three witches to be favored to win the Battle of Fate and one of them has to be Snowlotus of the Witches of Deceit, who is the remaining one?" One of the witches suddenly thought of this and asked curiously.


    "The other one... " Even the Second Grade K betrayed an expression of frustration when it came to this, "That girl is even worse than Alice. She...she... "


    "What about her." The other two witches asked together.


    "She advanced to a berserker witch!" K finally spat out this lump in her throat disdainfully.


    "A berserker witch!?" The three Dark Witches let out a gasp of surprise. They looked at each other but were utterly speechless.


    Odd things happened every year, but never as many as this year.


    Why were there so many odd sprouts that rose up in the Battle of Fate this time?


    Speaking of berserker witches, this was a unique term that outsiders might not have been familiar with. That said, almost all the Northern Witches knew what kind of profession it was.


    As only witchesprised the Northern Witches¡¯ highest authority, they had inherent ws when it came to professionpositions and skill choices.


    That was their severeck of meat shields and tanks!


    The high-grade witches were all impressive individuals with strange and unheard of powers. However, most of these abilities were long-ranged and support spells. Theirck of a powerful meat shield became extremely obvious when it came to group battles.


    The adepts had body-refining adepts to take the damage for their army. When necessary, bloodline adepts and golems could also hold the line. Inparison, what did the witches have?


    The high-grade witches had sat down and searched for a solution. After a long time, they hade up with a peculiar answer. They invented the perverted witch advancement known as a Berserker Witch.


    Apprentice witches of every branch could choose to be a berserker witch when they advanced. The moment the berserker witches engaged inbat, they would be able to convert all their magical energies into ferocious and iparable strength. They would turn into undefeatable warriors that swept across the battlefield.


    They had great magic resistances that improved even further once they went into their berserk state. This state made them capable of ignoring any and all attacks from opponents of the same grade. That said, they also lost their spellcasting abilities in exchange. The only thing they had left was their powerful physical attacks.


    But this was enough!


    All witches respected berserker witches. Without their sacrifices, theirpanions wouldn¡¯t have the room to cast their spells in safety.


    However, a candidate for the Witch of Fate turning into a berserker witch that smacked people around with a wooden bat was just a little too much of an upset of their expectations!


    What was going on in this world?!

 Chapter 349 Conversation in the Woods

    Chapter 349 Conversation in the Woods


    The road through the ck Forest was a safe passage paved with the lives of countless adepts over tens of thousands of years.


    Still, this so-called safety was only rtive. No one could guarantee that absolutely no harm woulde to the travelers.


    After all, most of the passage twisted through the space between the territories of several powerful magical creatures. Those beasts were not going to stick within their borders when they went hunting. It was a small matter if the party suffered losses to their goods when encountering a high-grade magical creature on their journey. More frequently, entire merchant groups went missing from such an encounter.


    Thus, it became a necessary task for the witches in charge of the merchant groups to visit the sages and diviners of their n.


    Though most of these sages and diviners were not of high Grades, their words were still of great value. Even the high-grade witches didn¡¯t dare to ignore their warnings. After all, this was the essential knowledge that concerned their lives!


    Perhaps it was thanks to the Dark Witches¡¯ sage, or maybe it was due to the abundance of fate candidates in the party, but the entire trip went without a hitch. Though some wild magical beasts attacked them along the way, the situation was still very much within the control of the witches.


    After a lengthy eight-seven day journey, the convoy line finally left the ck Forest.


    The green and white road started to widen, branching in several directions as they went on. There was more of a crowd now.


    When they first left the ck Forest, the majority of people they saw were groups of mercenaries in their hunting parties. There were always a couple of apprentice witches in these parties. When they saw the caravans, they would wave and acknowledge the merchant group to pay their respects to these brave warriors that dared to pass through the ck Forest.


    It was evident that the witches of the various branches existed in rtive harmony. At least, Greem didn¡¯t notice any apparent hatred and tension in the interactions between low-level witches.


    From the moment they passed through the ck Forest, they had set foot upon the territories of the Northern Witches.


    The first city they reached was Dian City, a town directly managed by the Witch Council.


    Dian City didn¡¯t belong to any of the witch branches. It was a city under the jurisdiction of the Witch Council and was simr to the public cities in the central area of the continent.


    Here, witches of all branches had to obey the rules of the Witch Council. They could not go against their will. The governors of this city had been selected from the various branches. They took turns to manage and rule over the city.


    The governor of Dian City for the past ten years was a Third Grade witch from the Agony Witch branch.


    That solitary witch leaped off the carriage before it entered the Dian City. She left the party without even turning back. A short momentter, the pair of adepts iming to be siblings also departed the group in secret.


    The direction they left in was the same as the witch that had left earlier. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what was going to happen next.


    The Dark Witches saw all of this happen and shook their heads in disapproval and disappointment at the witch¡¯s decision to leave prematurely.


    As long as she remained in the group, the Dark Witches had an obligation to protect her due to the contract they had signed. Even after they entered Dian City, she would still be safe. Killing between adepts was strictly forbidden onnds ruled by the witches. As such, they would have guaranteed her safety had she not left.


    She still chose to do so, and in doing so, she also managed to draw away the pair of siblings. Everyone could imagine what was going to happen next, even if they werepletely blind.


    Hmph! A candidate for the Witch of Fate that did not possess the blessing of fate. It was okay even if she died!


    The most unexpected thing for them was the departure of the other pair of adepts. They had said their farewells right before the entrance to the city and disappeared into the crowd before the gates.


    Greem and Alice ignored the bewildered looks behind them. They didn¡¯t enter Dian City. Instead, they followed the walls of the city west before moving north and continuing down the road towards the hearnd of the Northern Witches¡¯ territory.


    You could hear the whispering voices of the two as they walked.


    "Why didn¡¯t we enter Dian City? Don¡¯t you know that those three people are waiting for us outside?" It seemed to be Alice¡¯s voice.


    "They wait for us, but are we not waiting for them as well? If they truly dare toe at us, then we will beat them ck and blue! It¡¯s about time you start refining yourbat techniques anyway."


    ............


    Three dayster.


    Nightfall.


    There was an empty field in the forest right beside the road.


    Due to the convenient ess to this ce, along with the presence of a spring, many merchants and travelers chose to stop and rest here.


    Four or five waves of people had already arrived before nightfall. Their arrival was a lively addition to the small camp.


    There were no robbers or bandits, as this was the witches¡¯ territory. Even strangers were passionate and friendly in their conversations.


    The ones that arrived first were washing their faces, drawing water, and preparing dinner. The moment more people arrived, they would greet them passionately and invite them for a meal. Everyone started a campfire and cooked the food they had brought. The fragrant smell of dinner and joyousughter filled the air.


    The travelers were utterly shocked when Greem and Alice followed the smell and walked into this campsite.


    Even though both of them draped themselves in traveler¡¯s cloaks that hid their adept robes, the smooth fabric of the covers, and the golden embroidery on the edges, still spoke volumes about their status. Moreover, Greem¡¯s towering figure and calm aura, along with Alice¡¯s clothes, made their identities impossible to hide.


    The arrival of two adepts caught the others by surprise. The only apprentice witch in the crowd had also be nervous. She quickly stood up and paid her respects to Greem and Alice.


    Although witches had far superior statuspared to male adepts in the Northen Lands, a small apprentice witch still had no right to disregard an adept.


    "We just arrived from the central area. We need to know about the organizations around here. Could you tell us about it?" Greem no longer took the lead now that they were in the Northern Lands. Instead, Alice was the one that represented the two of them.


    She was a witch, and they would respect her much more than a male adept like himself. It would have a much better effect if she were the one doing the talking.


    "It is Naia¡¯s pride to serve mydy! Please, both of you, have a seat!" The apprentice witch waited upon them eagerly.


    Another campfire had been raised inside of the campsite, and a merchant group had taken this spot. They quickly gave up the better seats when they saw the two adeptsing over.


    The leader of the merchants had a slightly higher status than the apprentice witch. After all, they were the ones that hired the apprentice. However, under the circumstances, only the apprentice witch had any right to sit and talk with two official adepts.


    The leader of the merchants shifted to another campfire and quickly had some of his men send over freshly prepared mushroom soup and roastedmb chops. The three people sat in a circle around the fire. They talked as they ate. The atmosphere was peaceful.


    "What do mydy and my lord wish to know?" Apprentice Naia curiously assessed the two strange faces and asked politely.


    One adept was tall while the other was short. One was big, and the other was small. The two looked like a father and daughter pair from their appearance. That said, the cold and handsome male adept appeared to be too young. Also, the small witch wasn¡¯t just petite. Even the way she spoke and her expressions looked no different from a seven or eight-year-old girl.


    Still, everyone knew that no ordinary person could be an adept. Could an eight-year-old child be an adept? This idea was humiliating to the entire profession of adept. The small witch before her eyes might have looked young, but who knew whether she was actually a few centuries old!


    Naia knew very well not to judge people based on their expressions. She behaved with all the respect she could muster.


    "We only want to know about the situation and politics of the nearby organizations, as well as whether there are any unique resources around here." Alice didn¡¯t touch themb chops. She tasted the mushroom soup, and finding it to be alright, continued to sip it as she spoke.


    "Then allow me to tell you!


    "Right now, we are located somewhere between Dian City and Ancona City. Dian City is a city that you¡¯d have to pass by when you enter and exit the Northern Lands. I am sure you two visited the ce when you came here. If we follow this road north for another half a day, we would leave Dian City territory and enter thends of the Death Witches.


    "If mydy continues west, you will reach the territory of the Agony Witches within three days. Walk east for two days, and you will be within thends of the Witches of Deceit.


    "The resources around here actually exists in abundance. Dian City is a ce where merchants gather from all over. You can find almost all of the resources in the Northern Lands there. If you want to umte materials, it is best to return there.


    "Here in the Northern Lands, most witches that choose not to stay in a city¡¯s adept tower will find a secluded location and build an arcane cottage for their home. They will then bury themselves in the research subjects that they prefer. These witches will be more than willing to exchange knowledge with you if you visit them.


    "A hundred kilometers away from this road, in the northwest, there¡¯s a ce called Nora. There¡¯s a Spring of Fortune that asionally appears there. It is said that drinking the spring water will bring about one year of fortune and luck.


    "A hundred and fifty kilometers east of here, there¡¯s an obelisk left behind by the ancient witches. Witches that touch it will gain a unique spiritual inspiration...


    "XX kilometers to the southwest...


    "XX kilometers to the northeast..."


    Greem and Alice listened without interrupting They imprinted every word of what Naia said into their minds. Alice might have been born here, but she was brought out of the Northern Lands when she was very young. Most of her memories of this ce were vague and unclear.


    Now that she heard all this again, her memories began to rush back to her.


    When Naia finished, Greem took out a map of the Northern Lands. He had Naia mark out the locations of all the witch cottages that she knew of. He then nodded in satisfaction as he kept the map.


    Alice took out ten magical crystals and passed them to Naia. The apprentice received them with a massive smile on her face.


    With her abilities as an intermediate apprentice, she had earned no more than eight magical crystals, even after following and guarding this small merchant group for a dozen days. The fact that she could get ten magical crystals worth of ie by having a simple conversation made her extremely happy.


    It was then that Greem frowned. He turned his head towards the southeast.


    He looked at Alice. The twomunicated with their eyes and stood up simultaneously.


    "Tell the people not to take a single step out of this campsite tonight. Do not go out and investigate, regardless of themotion. Pass this to the merchants; this will be our payment for the dinner!" Alice took out yet another two crystals and tossed them towards Naia. She then turned and disappeared silently into the curtain of the night along with Greem.


    Naia¡¯s heart beat furiously. She held the magical crystals in her hand as she looked in the direction the adepts had disappeared. She had a vague feeling that tonight was not going to be a peaceful night!

 Chapter 350 The Promised Battle

    Chapter 350 The Promised Battle


    Both parties agreed to set the location of the battle one kilometer southeast of the campsite.


    At that spot was an empty and unpopted grass field.


    The siblings were already waiting when Greem and Alice finally arrived.


    "You keep your promises, as expected." The brother took off his hood and revealed those strange andpletely ck eyes, "These are the Northern Lands. Killing without discretion will cause us to be hunted by the witches. This spot is the perfect ce to settle our problems since there is no one here!"


    After three months of traveling as a group, both parties had some understanding of each other. Though it was impossible to find out more about their secrets, they still had a basic idea of each other¡¯s powers.


    In the eyes of the siblings, Greem was purely a fire adept. He was even the sort of person who would choose fire as his elementium mastery. This choice undoubtedly made his attacks even more devastating, but it also made him a priority target for his enemies. On the other hand, the girl known as Alice had nobat ability whatsoever. She only had some auxiliary support means to protect herself.


    Greem and Alice had also figured out the abilities and identities of this pair of siblings.


    The brother was Bill. He had only advanced a dozen years ago and was a no-name adept that specialized in physical modifications. He had reced his original organs with magical ones he had found in his travels to strengthen himself. Consequently, he possessed some unique abilities that were simr to those of magical beasts.


    His pitch-ck eyes were what was known as the ¡¯Eyes of Shadows.¡¯ These eyes were capable of subtly turning shadow substance and darkness into terrifying shadow creatures. Moreover, after undergoing the process of modification, his body possessed immense strength, high agility, and a shocking Physique.


    But no-names were no-names for a reason!


    It didn¡¯t matter if he used organ transnting and modifications to make himself to be stronger than an ordinary adept. It didn¡¯t change the fact that most of his magical organs contradicted and shed with each other as well as the host body. There was a thick tension between all these parts at the very source of their existence that was extremely hard to mediate and neutralize.


    It was a foolish path of strengthening the current self while giving up on future developments!


    The sister that had tried to seduce Greem was called Amanda. She was a potions master that specialized in herbology. She was good at brewing all sorts of potions.


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but sinisterlyugh when she saw that the two enemies had arrived, "Why are there only two of you? Didn¡¯t youe here as a trio? Ask that other witch toe out as well, will you?"


    The siblings looked at each other. Amanda shook her head and bitterly smiled as she said, "We know each other a little too well. As expected, it¡¯s hard to keep anything from you. Doris,e out! Let these two fellows witness our true power!"


    As she shouted, a lonely silhouette walked out from the trees behind Greem and Alice. It was the witch that had left the merchant group before the other two parties.


    "Quite smart, aren¡¯t you people?" Alice couldn¡¯t help but mock them, "You knew we were more powerful than you and learned how to cooperate. Wow! What is it? Do you intend to y rock-paper-scissors to split the spoils after beating us? Let me guess. You will be the one to lose!"


    Alice pointed at Doris, who traveled alone.


    "Hmph! No need for any of your tricks to drive us apart! We have already discussed this and signed a contract of cooperation. We will never attack each other until you are dead!" Amanda snorted coldly, "Who knew? A weak little shit like yourself with nobat ability whatsoever was assessed to be one of the three most promising candidates. I¡¯m not even sure whether tough at them for their foolishness or tough at fate¡¯s joke! It doesn¡¯t matter. Today, you must die!"


    "Well then, why are we still talking?! Let¡¯s start, quick!" Alice shouted as she tossed out a blinding red crystal.


    The next second, the domineering body of the Infernal Tyrant appeared in the field, shrouded with zing mes.


    The air instantly started to be intolerably warm!


    The male adept named Bill looked at Greem and betrayed a sinister smile, "You are very brave... but not very wise!"


    The ck vortex in his eyes spun as the shadows beneath Greem and Alice started to distort. Ferocious silhouettes climbed out of their shadows and lunged at them.


    Adept Bill¡¯s ck eyes continued to sh as he summoned more and more shadow creatures to attack his opponents. Of course, he had no intention of cing all his hopes on these shadow creatures alone. He let out a resounding roar as dense ck fur quickly started to grow all over his body and face.


    He turned into a ck panther standing on its feet within a matter of two to three seconds. His ws gleamed with the unique blue glow of elementium poison. He roared and charged at Greem and Alice.


    Potion Master Amanda wasn¡¯t idling either. Her fingers started to move as she threw several small vials into the battlefield. The bottles then exploded, and strange liquid sshed everywhere.


    This viscous liquid started to gather together as if it had consciousness. Four human-sized creatures climbed up from the ground. Most of their body was semi-translucent viscous liquid. The inside of the body, on the other hand, had leaves, sand, pebbles, and even worms trapped within.


    They had a head, torso, and four limbs, like any other ordinary human being. That said, there were no facial features. Nor were there any genitalia on their bodies.


    They marched towards Alice with heavy footsteps the moment they got up from the ground. As they advanced, they slung several pungent corrosive balls at their target.


    A few other vials had been tossed near Alice. Strange gray halos emerged from the bottles, quickly polluting Alice¡¯s mental world a dull gray color.


    Doris, on the other hand, stood silently behind Greem and Alice. It seemed her job was only to prevent the two from running away. She didn¡¯t intend to engage in the battle.


    Greem didn¡¯t intend to continue hiding his power now that the enemy had moved.


    The three adepts might have outnumbered them, but in the end, two of them were only newly advanced adepts that had just advanced in thest three years. Moreover, only Adept Bill¡¯s abilities were at the level of a veteran adept, at the very best.


    Greem himself, on the other hand, was an existence powerful enough to execute elite adepts!


    "Yamituo, mes, the lost foot... "


    It was almost as if an invisible volcano had erupted within Greem¡¯s body as he chanted the crisp and brief lines of his spells. Massive amounts of fire elementium didn¡¯t gather from the outside, but instead emerged from within his body. The bright red mes ignited everything around him. Greem¡¯s body also started to swell and increase in size as the tide of fire grew in size and intensity.


    His two-meter tall body already towered over most adepts. With the torrent of me energy, Greem instantly became a four-meter giant of mes. A sea of fire elementium solidified on the surface of his body and turned into an armor of me.


    Beng. Beng. Beng.


    Four Inferno Shields made of solidified mes materialized, one-meter wide and two meters tall. They spun around Greem¡¯s massive body.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it!


    A red me barrier started to extend outwards, with Greem as the center. Itpletely enveloped an area of two hundred and fifty meters in the blink of an eye. Everything inside the zone started to burn under the ravaging of heat and fire.


    The first to endure its effects were the siblings.


    The various shadow creatures that had emerged from Greem¡¯s shadow had their fragile bodies burned to ashes before they could even attack. The transformed Bill turned into a ck sh of light and bypassed Greem¡¯s Inferno Shield, even though the air had been distorted and turned red from the fires around Greem.


    Pupu.


    Two muffled explosions.


    Bill¡¯s sharp ws wholly destroyed two zing Inferno Shields, causing them to explode into sparks of fire.


    Bill grunted and appeared a hundred meters away. He red at Greem with hatred in his eyes. Large patches of burns had surfaced all over his ck body.


    A wicked and hateful expression appeared on Bill¡¯s long face when he witnessed the power of Greem¡¯s fire magic. He used his ws to take out a red crystal leaf from his pouch. He stuffed the leaf into his mouth and swallowed it as quickly as he could. A light that repelled fire instantly sted out from his body.


    His body already possessed some degree of elementium resistance. Now, with the added effects of the fire-dragon herb, Bill¡¯s fire resistance had increased exponentially. He no longer feared that ubiquitous Ring of Fire.


    He could feel the fire poison within his body quickly being expelled. The scorching air that suffocated him had also turned into a warm breeze. Bill put on a wicked smile as he bent his body. His thick and powerful hind legs kicked against the scorched earth. Once again, his entire being turned into a ck sh of light as he lunged towards Greem.


    A fifty-centimeter crater had been left behind where he had kicked the ground. Frightening cracks spiderwebbed the earth. This destruction alone was enough to demonstrate how much Strength and Physique Bill had in his transformed state!


    "Fool, are you still dreaming of fighting against all three of us alone? After turning into a beast, I have Strength equal to body-refining adepts. Today, I will... " Bill wildly shouted as he spun around Greem and repeatedly shattered his Inferno Shields.


    Before Bill could even finish his sentence, Greem¡¯s massive hand of me had dug into the ground. An enormous Lava Shield formed in the boilingva, which Greem swung and smashed into Bill¡¯s face.


    A muffled boom.


    Bill couldn¡¯t stop the momentum. The Lava Shield shattered on his head. His entire body fell to the ground and flew almost forty meters away.


    He finally got up after much difficulty and pulled his bloody face out of the muddy ground. His nose started to bleed now that dirt no longer stuffed it. His broad nose was also broken in three or four ces.


    Dammit, what was going on?! Why did that person¡¯s strength and speed suddenly increase by so much?


    Bill furiously spat away the dirt in his mouth. He was shocked to find two bloody fangs mixed with the earth.


    Bastard! He knocked my teeth out!

 Chapter 351 Display of Powers

    Chapter 351 Disy of Powers


    The ck panther crouched on the ground. Bill¡¯s stomach pressed against the earth as he roared angrily.


    But he didn¡¯t dare to charge forward.


    Just now;


    Just then;


    This terrifying being of mes that Bill thought he had correctly understood had conjured up a frightening surge of power. Its increased Strength and Agility hastened its clumsy and dull actions. It had suddenly gained power that it didn¡¯t previously possess and smacked him away with a hriously heavy Lava Shield.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the great Physique he gained from his transformation, that blow alone would have been enough to crush his skull and kill him.


    The wound on his face was significant, but his regenerative speed, coupled with his eight points of Physique, was still extremely decent.


    Bill roared once again. The fur on his paws started to disappear. His ws once again turned into human hands.


    Bill endured the intense pain and snapped the shattered and twisted pieces of his nose back into ce with his hands. With his powerful regeneration, the injuries on his face healed at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    Self-regeneration like this was extremely useful, but the pain he had to endure was also higher than if he had let it be.


    Bill let out another resounding roar once he healed. Thick ck fur filled his hands once again as sharply curved ws grew out.


    The ck panther paused for a moment before drawing strength into his limbs. Once more, he turned into a ck shadow and sprinted around Greem.


    Greem¡¯s me Fiend form might have been massive, but it wasn¡¯t clumsy. With the power of the pure fire energy surging from the me Fiend¡¯s Heart driving his body, and the increased attribute to strengthen his blows, the four-meter giant fought with the ck panther as if he was an apocalyptic demon from hell. On the one hand, he wielded the thick Lava Shield, and on the other, he brandished a twelve-meter long me whip.


    The terrifying power of the transformed fire adept caught all three adepts by surprise.


    After all, their divination powers were only enough to see through Greem¡¯s surface abilities. They were far from able to figure out all of his hidden cards!


    On the other side of the battlefield, Amanda was screaming at Doris as she evaded the pursuit of the Infernal Tyrant.


    "Go and help him, bitch! Do you want all three of us to die here?"


    The spectating Doris couldn¡¯t help but twitch at the curses hurled at her. Even though she wanted her two ¡¯allies¡¯ to be a little more beaten up, Amanda was right. Their n of killing Alice would go up in mes the moment Bill faltered in his fight against the fire adept.


    That was not a price that the two witches were willing to pay!


    If Alice was acknowledged as one of the three most likely candidates for the Witch of Fate, then the blessing she had from fate was most definitely stronger than either of theirs. This was not a situation they could stand!


    Even though Doris didn¡¯t have a ¡¯brother¡¯ that listened to her every whim and desire, her fortune was no weaker than Amanda¡¯s. As long as they could kill the more powerful Alice and turn it into a duel between the two of them, Doris believed herself to have a decent chance of winning.


    Doris lifted her head and looked at the battlefield, then shook her ck robe. She extended a right hand filled with mysterious runic lines, and her fingers started to wave. An invisible ripple spread through the air as she softly chanted the profound words of her spell. The ripples made their way towards the me Fiend, who was furiously chasing after the ck Panther.


    Greem brandished the me whip about and smashed the scorched earth into pieces with every blow. As the ck panther was just a little too fast, none of the lightning-quick strikes could catch its shape. All of them missed and hit the ground instead.


    Still, the agile ck panther didn¡¯t dare pause for a moment. Bill constantly had to change positions and dodge. Even a slight dy would allow the me whip to hit his body. The monstrous pain was only a secondary concern. The scarier possibility was the decrease in his speed.


    That was because a decrease in speed would mean he would have to face a shield m from the me Fiend. A shield attack with a Lava Shield that was as thick as a city wall.


    Dammit, that wasn¡¯t a shield! That was a hill burning with mes. Even he would have his bones snapped and broken if it hit him. It would hurt so much.


    The invisible ripples finally reached Greem.


    The Ring of Fire was utterly ineffective against the ripple. It did nothing to stop it. The situation was the same for the Lava Shield and the Inferno Shield. Even Greem¡¯s me body couldn¡¯t prevent the ripples from entering his body.


    Greem¡¯s vision blurred. The ck panther that had been running away from him suddenly split into two and ran in different directions. While he was still stunned by the change, the fleeing panthers once again divided into a total of four.


    All four Panthers roared in unison and simultaneously turned to charge at Greem.


    Greem waved his whip with all his strength. The mes instantly shattered two of the panther projections. The shield in his other hand had only barely raised up when air rippled across his left ribs and shoulder. Lava blood emitting intense heat spilled from the wounds.


    Greem stomped his feet in anger. Countless pirs ofva rose around him. He took the opportunity to crouch and cover himself with the Lava Shield. Meanwhile, he scooped up arge handful of magma from the pool ofva beneath him and used it to seal his wounds.


    "What¡¯s going on? Is it an illusion or some sort of cloning ability? Chip, scan, quickly." Greem silently roared in his heart as he treated his wounds.


    "Beep. Unknown forcefield flux detected. Source of power is three hundred and sixteen meters behind the host. Forcefield flux will continuously affect host¡¯s spatial senses. Rmend removal of forcefield source as soon as possible."


    Greem turned back abruptly.


    He finally saw Doris casting her spell at the edge of the battlefield.


    However, before he could even lock onto his opponent, his vision blurred once more. Everything in his sight became upside down and chaotic. It was a difficult task just to determine distance.


    Greem concentrated his Spirit, and the Scroll of Voodoo appeared in his hand. At the same time, a Scarlet Firestorm exploded in the area he had locked on with his Spirit.


    "Ah... Greem, what are you doing? Do you want to get rid of me as well?" Alice¡¯s sharp voice rang out from the area being ravaged by the Firestorm.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but curse repeatedly.


    Even though he had already locked on to his enemy earlier, he couldn¡¯t be sure if that ¡¯enemy¡¯ was Doris.


    The effects of the illusions threw everything he saw and sensed into chaos. Some of the sensory inputs from the chaotic world were real, while others were false, and some others were distorted.


    This sort of illusion, that mixed reality and truth with illusion and falsity, instantly plunged Greem into trouble.


    He waved his shield and whip about, trying his hardest to chase after every illusion. Still, an intense pain would always throb on some part of his body every once in a while. Sharp w marks had left no part of his body unharmed!


    The moment of confusion would have been enough for Bill to critically wound Greem if it wasn¡¯t for his wariness of a counterattack.


    "Stand further away, Alice... "


    Greem quickly sent a mental message to Alice through their soul contract¡¯s connection. He didn¡¯t wait for a reply. Greem bent his body. The pages of the Scroll of Voodoo started to flip rapidly in his hands until they finally stopped on a page.


    "Isatar, Haiman, World of Deep Red."


    Greem sang a few magical chants as he invoked a massive fire spell that devastated an area three hundred meters around him.


    The dark and lightless sky was now entirely reced by roiling ck and red me clouds. One after another, Magma Fireballs the size of a human head crashed towards the ground, dragging behind them a ck tail of smoke as they fell.


    Every fireball that hit the ground caused an intense explosion and a powerful shockwave. Of course, there were also the magma shards that flew in every direction and the rain of scalding magma.


    Greem had been forced to do this. He had no other choice but to cast the only sizeable area-of-effect spell in the Scroll of Voodoo¨C Meteor Shower. Having lost his spatial senses, Greem knew that only a broad and indiscriminate bombarding like this one could interrupt the opponent¡¯s Spiritual interference.


    A short momentter, Greem¡¯s Spirit trembled. His confused world had once again returned to normal!


    A crashing Magma Fireball hadnded five steps away from Doris. The explosion and following shockwave had snapped her out of her channeling. Greem had managed to break free of her illusion.


    Doris¡¯ ck robe was burnt ck by the surging mes. That said, the fire talisman on her neck still protected her from this minor amount of fire damage.


    Her body trembled as blood came out of her mouth. It was the bacsh from the interruption to her channeling.


    This amount of damage was insufficient to cripple her. Greem¡¯s zing gaze, filled with rage and hatred, caused chills to run up her spine.


    Dammit! I can¡¯t let him break free from the effects!


    Doris gripped the fire talisman on her chest and relied on it to resist the waves of rising me. She ripped off the cloth from her right shoulder and revealed some strange runic arrays on her arm. She loudly chanted the words of her spell.


    She might have been fast, but Greem wasn¡¯t slow either!


    For the first time in his life, Greem no longer dared to save the six instant-cast spells he had sealed in the Scroll of Voodoo. Without any rest, he immediately activated another single-target spell after the Meteor Shower. Fire Core Explosion.


    Words and chants spilled out of Doris¡¯ mouth. However, an intense feeling of death engulfed her body when she was two sybles away from thepletion of her spell.


    Dammit.


    She couldn¡¯t care about the activation of the illusion spell on her body. Doris instantly rolled sideways and frantically escaped into the distance without any regard for her dignity.


    Boom! A muffled explosion rang throughout the battlefield.


    The spot Doris had been standing on had turned a bright and blinding shade of red.


    Massive amounts of fire elementium gathered in the ce andpressed under the powerful effect of Greem¡¯s spell. They then copsed into a frightening ck hole in the air. It was a ck hole one meter in diameter. Right afterward, an unbelievably hot stream of mes sted out from within like an endless tide. Everything within two meters of the explosion was instantly vaporized.


    What a terrifying spell!

 Chapter 352 Black Panther Bill

    Chapter 352 ck Panther Bill


    Greem had paid a hefty price to attack Doris continuously.


    ck Panther Bill had shredded the Inferno Shields protecting Greem while he was busy activating the spells in the Scroll of Voodoo. Adept Bill then projected arge patch of shadows onto Greem¡¯s body of mes.


    Dark spots started to cover his crimson body. More and more shadow creatures were also materialized as this was happening, surrounding Greem with a horde of those monsters.


    That said, his Ring of Fire wasn¡¯t for show either.


    He didn¡¯t need to do anything to control this significant barrier. Anything within its area of effect had to endure fifteen points of continuous fire damage. It didn¡¯t sound like much, but fifteen points were the damage the enemies had to face every single second.


    If one included the fiery explosions when the Inferno Shields shattered, and the aura of mes that surrounded Greem himself, the damage quickly added up. Anyone that tried to break through theyers of defense to wound Greem had to endure a minimum of thirty-five points of fire damage per second!


    Bill had eaten a fire dragon-herb, elevating his fire resistance and allowing him to be immune to this bit of fire damage. However, the shadow creatures he summoned were not.


    Most of the shadow creatures were swallowed by the sea of mes the moment they emerged. They didn¡¯t even make it to Greem¡¯s side. Only the slightly stronger ones were able to endure the damage and strike at Greem himself. But even those creatures were instantly burned to ashes by the me halos that periodically surged out of Greem¡¯s body.


    Bill¡¯s Eyes of Shadows could, at best, only slow down Greem. It was a fantasy to think of using it to defeat the fire adept.


    However, Bill saw a chance and seized it. Several significant magical fluctuations burst forth from his body. His speed and strength increased exponentially. Bill activated almost all of the magical organs in his body to beat Greem.


    This was undoubtedly a massive gamble for him as well!


    The activation of every other organ in his body was a massive strain on his human body. Activating so many magical organs at the same time would likely cause his body to fall apart if he couldn¡¯t end the battle soon.


    It meant that Bill was pulling all the stops!


    Bill¡¯s sudden burst of power ced even more pressure on Greem¡¯s shoulders.


    He had to deal with the enhanced Bill, while also being cautious of Doris¡¯ illusions. It was an exceedingly tough battle to fight. And the primary cause for this arduous fight were the illusions and the fire-resistant equipment!


    Greem¡¯s established his power and dominance upon forming a defensive domain with the umtion of the Ring of Fire, Inferno Shield, Lava Shield, and his body of fire. What battle was there to speak of if his opponent didn¡¯t even dare to close in on him?


    It was this idea and mindset that guided him into investing most of his power and talent into strengthening the Ring of Fire. His own body relied more upon the increased attributes of the me Fiend Transformation to fight with enemies.


    Greem¡¯s lopsided development of his abilities had ced him in this awkward situation. The Ring of Fire turned into a delicate and barely useful skill when he was up against an enemy that was resistant or immune to fire. It could no longer restrict the enemies¡¯ movements. The weakness and ws of hisbat ability were then exposed for all to see!


    Moreover, Greem also had a severeck of equipment and spells to defend against higher level spirits, curses, and illusions. He had no better solution than to endure such attacks with the durable body of the me Fiend.


    These weaknesses were also another factor that constrained his power!


    Neither the transformed Bill nor the fleeing Doris was strong enough for Greem to be concerned. Their abilities were frustratingly tricky to deal with whenbined.


    Greem wanted to exterminate the weak and frail Doris, but she was sly enough to avoiding within two hundred meters of him. His Fire Teleportation also created way toorge of amotion. It always left too much time for the enemy to slip away.


    With Doris drawing away his attention to the side, Greem didn¡¯t dare to engage with Bill fully. After all, Bill¡¯s offensive abilities in his fully activated state were extremely shocking. Greem could not afford to be hit by thebined attacks of both Doris and Bill while he engaged with one of them.


    The ground suddenly tremored, just as the three adepts were entangled in their drawn-out fight.


    The unique nging of metal parts rang out through the forest as the ground quaked.


    Green-white lights shed near Doris¡¯ feet. She dashed across the field like a sprinting horse with the help of wind particles. Even with her speed, she only barely dodged the Explosive Fireball and Sr Ray that Greem had shot at her.


    When the ferocious tide of fire had died down, Doris raised her right hand and aimed her palm at Greem in the distance. She was preparing to activate Spatial Confusion once again when she realized something was off.


    Doris immediately turned around and was shocked to find a massive monster charging at her through the smoking, burning field. It lunged at her aggressively.


    It was a metal golem. A metal golem the size of a hill!


    The golem had a body in the shape of a spider. It had four pairs of thick and sharp metallic limbs, and a ck cannon gleaming with a devilish light on its back.


    Blinding purple energies gathered within the ck muzzle of the cannon while Doris stood still, frozen in shock. A bright purple sma bubble slowly floated towards Doris under everyone¡¯s horrified gaze.


    The sma bubble was slow. Extremely slow. It had almost no chance of hitting any target with legs or arms at the speed it flew towards the enemy. Doris would have been able to dodge it even if she had been crawling on the ground.


    The slow sma bubble, however, shifted directions at the very moment Doris dodged as if it could sense the shift in its target¡¯s position. It elerated and continued to fly at Doris.


    Doris shifted directions a total of three times, but it didn¡¯t work. It almost seemed like the sma bubble had a mind of its own. It always managed to keep up with the changes in Doris¡¯ position. Moreover, it was gradually elerating. The frightening killing intent behind the sma bubble was bing increasingly evident.


    Dammit! I definitely cannot allow myself to get hit by this thing!


    This thought suddenly appeared in Doris¡¯ heart for no particr reason. It was a random and sudden feeling, but Doris chose to believe it without any doubt.


    Perhaps this was a disturbing habit of all diviners. They always put too much faith in their intuition!


    sh. sh. sh.


    Three green wind des shed towards the sma bubble. However, they were quickly neutralized, and didn¡¯t even manage to slow down bubble.


    The sma bubble crashed into an invisible air barrier, burning a hole through it. The orb continued its pursuit,pletely unaffected.


    Doris took out many scrolls, wands, and magical items to try and stop the advance of the sma bubble, even as she ran from it. Sadly, none of these worked!


    It was apparent that the state of existence of the sma bubble was utterly different from an ordinary spell. It wasn¡¯t something that could be quickly dealt with.


    Nervousness and worry started to dawn on Doris¡¯ face. She frantically began to call for help from Bill and the missing Amanda.


    Alice¡¯s chuckling came out from within the spider golem as she entertained herself with this amusing sight. It was fun to watch this horrid witch be forced into this awkward and difficult situation by the Fel sma Cannon.


    "Doris, you wicked woman. Serves you right for chasing after me. Just die here today, you bitch."


    Finally, Doris was unable to deal with the immense pressure. She couldn¡¯t care less about anything else on the battlefield. Bright green lights radiated from her body as a pair of invisible wings of wind formed behind her back. She escaped into the distance without even looking back.


    Dammit! These bitches were unreliable!


    ck light shot out of Bill¡¯s eyes as he cursed. Even more shadow creatures emerged around Greem. Meanwhile, Bill prepared to make his escape.


    Boom. A muffled explosion of mes.


    Greem¡¯s giant figure appeared in his escape route. Together with Alice¡¯s giant spider golem, they had surrounded the ck panther adept.


    "You forced my hand."


    Bill roared. His athletic body leaped and sprinted across the field. An intense ck light had gathered on his terrifying ws even as he was still in midair. sh. sh. sh. Countless crisscrossing ck ws marks were left in the air as the ws shed with the Lava Shield in Greem¡¯s hand.


    The surface of the one-meter thick shield started to crack. mes erupted in every direction. The shield had almost disintegrated at the moment of impact. Greem¡¯s body wasposed of pure fire elementium. To some extent, it was even weaker than this Lava Shield.


    Thus, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what tremendous damage Bill¡¯s reckless attacks could have done to Greem¡¯s body if it had connected!


    However, now that Doris was out of the picture, Bill no longer held the advantage against Greem.


    Greem turned and tossed the disintegrating Lava Shield at Bill. Then, he picked up his Scroll of Voodoo as he leaped backward. The only Fire Core Explosion left in the tome instantly exploded around Adept Bill.


    The ck panther barely escaped from the area of effect after erecting severalyers of shields. Bill also had to draw upon the power of his magical organs once more for a temporary burst of speed and strength. Still, the explosion¡¯s streams of me had scorched most of his body.


    The fire-dragon herb¡¯s resistance only allowed him to be immune to fire damage below a hundred points. Anything above that could still wound him. That was why the one hundred and fifteen points of the Fire Core Explosion¡¯s fire damage and physical shockwave still managed to hurt him severely.


    Another tide of mes erupted around him as he struggled to get up and escape.


    Dammit! Fire Teleportation!


    Bill knew what it was, but his crippled body made it hard for him to run immediately. Consequently, the erupting mes managed to surround the panther. They gathered and formed into Greem¡¯s strong magma hand, firmly grasping the enemy in his palm.


    The restraints immediately drove Bill into a frenzy.


    He struggled madly and shredded Greem¡¯s hand with his murderous attacks. mes were sent flying everywhere. Meanwhile, one strange, profound rune after another started to light up beneath his thick ck fur. It was apparent that Bill was preparing to use one of his hidden trump cards.


    Greem¡¯s zing hands kept a tight grip on the panther. His mouth of fire opened slightly, and a terrifying stream of me sted towards Bill¡¯s struggling head.


    Boom.


    A muffled explosion.


    The ck panther¡¯s head exploded like a ripe watermelon!

 Chapter 353 Wanted Man

    Chapter 353 Wanted Man


    The distant horizon hadn¡¯t been silent ever since those two adepts had left in that direction.


    Clouds of me painted the sky red. Explosions were unceasing. Themotion made it hard for the merchants to fall asleep. They stood around the campsite as the ground trembled around them and the warm heat waves washed over them. Nervousness was the only thing they felt.


    If it hadn¡¯t been for apprentice Naia¡¯s repeated warnings not to leave the camp, there would probably have been people who ran away from fear.


    The leader of the merchants had consulted Naia countless of times and gotten the same answer every time. He could only forcefully suppress the fear within the group and get them to stay in the camp.


    Naia was the most excited one out of the people present. She stood at the edge of the camp and sensed the dense, active elementium fire particles in the air, her heart beating rapidly.


    She was the only one with elementium talent in the camp. Only she could clearly feel the intensity of the elementium flux in the distance. Even a proper witch wouldn¡¯t be able to cause such amotion. Only veteran or elite adepts could strengthen their elementium spells to this level!


    Thus, unlike the others in the camp, she looked into the distance not with fear, but with a zealous fervor.


    In truth, the battle hadn¡¯tsted long. At the very best, it was only thirty minutes. However, the fight in the distance felt like an eternity for these mortals with noprehension of supernatural powers.


    A green glow dashed across the skies above the camp towards the end of the battle. A slowly fading green light streaked through the night sky. The mes and explosions in the distance had also gradually stopped. The air had finally fallen silent once more.


    Did the fight have anything to do with those two adepts? Who won the battle? Why did theye here to fight?


    All sorts of questions rose in Naia¡¯s heart. Sadly, she was fated never to find the answers to these questions!


    The merchants waited silently. It had already been more than half an hour since there was any noise.


    Should they send someone to check the battlefield?


    More than one person asked, but Naia rejected all of their suggestions.


    Matters between adepts were not something that mortals and inconsequential individuals like herself could interfere. If their actions angered the adepts, it would be a simple matter for the adepts to ughter this camp of people.


    Three bright lights appeared in the sky while everyone was anxiously waiting for a conclusion. Three witches flew towards them on their flying brooms and stopped in the air above the camp.


    The old witch in the lead had sharp eyes. She detected the existence of the apprentice witch in an instant. Shepletely ignored the repeatedly bowing leader of the merchant group and directed her question at Naia.


    "Which n are you from? What happened here earlier?"


    "My greetings, Lady Hakkar!" Naia bowed in respect and said, "I am Apprentice Witch Naia of ck Crow Cottage. Earlier... "


    Naia was a reasonably good oratorical talent. She described everything that had happened in a mere matter of sentences.


    The three witches nodded after hearing Naia¡¯s exnation.


    One of the younger middle-aged witches couldn¡¯t help but speak, "Sister Hakkar, let us go and check it out for ourselves!"


    "Mm! Let¡¯s go!" The leader, Hakkar, nodded in agreement before turning towards Naia and saying, "Since you¡¯ve seen those two,e with us!"


    A strange ck rope that was neither wood nor metal shot out from the end of the flying broom. The line tied itself around Naia and brought her along into the sky as the witches flew towards the battlefield.


    They flew past a stretch of forest with an uneven sparsity of trees. The further they went, the hotter the temperature of the air. The looked to their feet and saw several massive trees had fallen in the same direction. Burn marks remained on their trunks.


    A little further and they couldn¡¯t see any shred of evidence that indicated a tree had existed in the ce.


    They had yet even to step foot on the actual battlefield, but already all sorts of scars and marks were scattered across the scorched earth beneath their feet. At the core of these burn marks was a one-meter-deep and two-meter wide crater. Liquid magma that had yet to solidify filled the crater. Spiderweb-like cracks had spread in every direction from these burn marks.


    The witches looked across the field under the night sky and found hundreds of these terrifying craters. They were spread all across the five hundred kilometer battlefield.


    The walked a little further and felt as if they had just stepped foot upon a world of magma and fire!


    There was no longer any dirt beneath their feet, only ck and red magma. Some of it had hardened, while other ces were still glowing red hot. Some had solidified into ck rocks of various shapes, while only the surface had set in the others. The insides of such stones still contained viscousva.


    A soft, gentle blue me would erupt and burst into the air every time ayer of the magma broke apart to reveal the slowly flowingva beneath it.


    The air here already couldn¡¯t be directly inhaled.


    A pungent odor of sulfur and smoke filled the air. The temperature had also reached a thousand degrees.


    The currents of cold and hot air at this temperature had utterly distorted their vision.


    Another hundred meters and they were right in the heart of the battlefield.


    Here, the roiling pools of magma and the slowly flowingva were still very much active. It was almost as if a violent volcano had just erupted on the spot and ravaged the entire ce.


    It was evident that no nt life could grow in this ce anymore, even after the effects of the spells vanished entirely. The ferocious fire elementium had utterly changed the elementium bnce of this ce. It would probably take one or two months for nature to help this area recover.


    The two middle-aged witches looked at the shocking sight before them. They started to calcte and deduce the possible amount of damage that the adept could have caused with his spells, and their faces began to turn green as they got their answers.


    Witch Hakkar extended a ck finger and drew a red rune in the air. A blinding light shed in the night as the red rune disappeared. Instead, a semi-translucent wrinkled face appeared.


    It was a simple spell of Spirit Assembly. It had extracted what traces of spirituality the earth had and temporarily concentrated and assembled it into intelligent life. The witches would be able to get some simple answers through interacting with this spirit.


    "O respected Spirit of the Earth, I wish to know what transpired in this location." Witch Hakkar took out a yellow crystal from her pouch and tossed it into the mouth of the old and wrinkled face.


    Adepts. Battle. Death.


    A mental flux utterly different from those of humans reverberated in the forest. Even Hakkar, with all her knowledge, could barely understand some of the more familiar sybles.


    However, the crystal had done the job. A severelycking and unstable image appeared in the air.


    In the image was a scarlet and onyx world of magma. A towering man of me gripped a ck panther in its hand. The giant breathed out a trace of translucent fire, which instantly blew the panther¡¯s head to pieces.


    Hakkar summoned a sh of ck light and paused the image at that moment. The Spirit of the Earth also dissipated then.


    "How is it? Are you able to recognize anything?" Witch Hakkar asked.


    "Yes! It is enough!" A middle-aged witch nodded and said, "The ck panther should be an adept known as Bill. He just arrived in the Northern Lands three days ago, after following the Dark Witches merchants here. A witch known as Amanda traveled with him. She has been confirmed as a candidate for the Witch of Fate."


    "Then the me giant?" Hakkar stared at the mighty giant in the image.


    "He should be a fire adept known as Greem. He came here with the same merchant group as Bill and Amanda. One of the favorite candidates, Alice, travels with him!"


    "These damned outsiders! What do they take the Northern Lands for? How dare they do as they like in ournds! It seems it¡¯s time for us to find the time to teach them a lesson," Hakkar spat out curses and continued, "Have Naia confirm their faces."


    "Understood!"


    The middle-aged witch cast a spell, and a three-dimensional projection of two adepts appeared before Naia. It was Greem and Alice.


    "That¡¯s them. They were the ones who visited the camp," Naia nodded in confirmation.


    "Very well. It¡¯s good that we got some confirmation," A wicked smile appeared on Hakkar¡¯s wrinkled old face, "ording to the instructions of the Witch Council, no outsiders are to intervene in the battles of the Witches of Fate. We can overlook Alice¡¯s and Amanda¡¯s actions. However, this Greem can¡¯t be let off easy."


    "You mean... "


    "List him as wanted! Immediately put out warrants for arrests once we get back to the city! Make sure to send the message to all the witch cities!" Hakkar¡¯s sharp voice rang out across the night sky, "Let him taste a little pain! How dare he murder someone in the Northern Witches¡¯nd!"


    ............


    Greem and Alice were already ten kilometers away when the witches sent out warrants for his arrest.


    "What happened? Didn¡¯t we agree not to expose the existence of the spider golem if possible? Why did you suddenly release it?" It appeared to be Greem¡¯s thick and clear voice.


    "You can¡¯t me me for that! You should know that Amanda purchased a sealing stone from god-knows-where and sealed the Infernal Tyrant. You can¡¯t possibly expect me to expose the power of the spacestone, can you?" Alice defended herself resentfully.


    "A sealing stone? Bastards! These guys have started to prepare measures against you! It seems it¡¯s about time for us to prepare a couple more trump cards of our own!" Greem shook his head and sighed, "Remember, do not ever expose the existence of the spacestone, regardless of what happens. Otherwise, you will have no secrets left. With the personalities of those candidates, they will probably be able to find some specialized and targeted measure against you if you even use it once."


    "Then what if I¡¯m truly in danger?"


    "Hmph! No such thing will happen. I will protect you!"


    "Then you didn¡¯t manage to protect me this time properly!"


    "An ident. It was only an ident! If it weren¡¯t for that annoying Doris, I would already have crushed that ck panther. The battle wouldn¡¯t possibly havested that long!"


    "Fine, I¡¯ll believe you for now. Oh right, where are we going next?"


    "The apprentice witch gave us pretty detailed andplete information. Witch cottages, Spring of Fortune, obelisks; all these ces seem to be quite interesting!"


    "Witch cottages. We must visit the witch cottages! I have a feeling that the witch cottage in the northeast will greatly benefit us. Let¡¯s go there!"


    "Sure, as you say. We will head there."

 Chapter 354 The Essence of the Adepts

    Chapter 354 The Essence of the Adepts


    The witch that Alice wanted to visit lived in the northeast.


    It was right on the border between the territories of the Witches of Deceit and the Death Witches. Neither Greem nor Alice had any idea which side the person they were visiting belonged.


    It would be pleasant if the witch belonged to the Death Witches, but if she was a Witch of Deceit, then Greem had no choice but to start formting an escape n.


    That said, this was Alice¡¯s suggestion. Her intuition from fate wouldn¡¯t lead her to her death. As such, Greem chose to treat it as if they were visiting a Death Witch.


    The two rested beneath a tree for a moment and dealt with the spoils of war from the earlier fight.


    Bill had reverted from his panther form into his human form after death, turning into a headless male adept. It was thanks to Alice¡¯s reminder that Greem found a storage ring on Bill¡¯s right pinky toe.


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but smile when he saw the rewards within the ring.


    There was a magic crystal card worth five thousand magical crystals, and another card worth one thousand three hundred crystals.


    Four or five books and notes on magic. Most of the content was rted to the dissection, removal, and transntation of magical organs.


    One fire-dragon herb estimated to be worth two hundred magical crystals.


    A ghost talisman that dispelled debuffs once a day. Bill had probably prepared this as a precaution against Doris¡¯ spiritual attacks.


    A low-level sealing stone. It could forcefully banish a summoned being from the nar dimension if thrown at the target. Amanda had used this to deal with the Tyrant in the battle earlier. While a sealing stone of this level could only banish the Tyrant for no more than three minutes, it was still a handy tool against the ¡¯unarmed¡¯ Alice.


    Four or five jars the size of human heads, filled with a strange liquid. All sorts of shriveled and discolored human organs were preserved within. The chip¡¯s analysis indicated that these were most likely to be Bill¡¯s original organs that he had taken out of his body.


    The rest of the items were bits and pieces of spell materials and daily necessities. They weren¡¯t worth much. It meant that not even a total of ten thousand crystals could be found even after scouring Bill¡¯s body. He was truly poor, despite being a strong adept that could rival veteran adepts.


    However, Greem went utterly speechless when he received further information from the chip.


    "Beep. One high-energy magic-infused heart has been discovered. Suspected to have been extracted from a Frostsaber Panther (Peak of First Grade). Estimated basic price is 2,600 magical crystals. Note: This magic-infused heart has already been transnted once. Energy loss of 23% has been detected. The cost is estimated to fall by one-third if transnted again.


    "Beep. Discovered one high-energy magic-infused gastric pouch. Suspected to have been extracted from a Devourer (First Grade). Estimated basic price is 1,400 magical crystals.


    "Beep. Discovered one high-energy magic-infused poison nd. Suspected to have been extracted from a wyvern (First Grade). Estimated basic price is 1,100 magical crystals.


    "Beep. Discovered one high-energy magic-infused liver. Suspected to have been extracted from an Earth Mauler (First Grade). Estimated basic price is one thousand and seven hundred magical crystals......"


    "Beep. As the host has died, all magical organs are estimated to start deteriorating within three hours. This process cannot be reversed. It is rmended that the host extracts the organs and preserves them as soon as possible to maximize potential profit."


    Several notifications rang out in Greem¡¯s mind consecutively. He couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    If this were a magical creature in front of him, he would have dissected it into pieces without any hesitation. After all, he was one of those adepts who only thought in rational and practical terms. But now.


    The corner of Greem¡¯s mouth twitched when he saw Bill¡¯s pale corpse. In the end, he shook his head and gave up on the idea.


    Adepts were adepts after all. They were not creatures for Greem to butcher. Even though he had killed him due to the difference in their standpoints, he didn¡¯t have it in him to butcher the corpse as he would a wild beast.


    That said, while mutting the corpse was impossible for Greem, it wasn¡¯t all that objectionable to examine the technique used in the transntation of the magical organs.


    Greem immediately started scanning Bill¡¯s entire body with the chip.


    This time, without any external energy fields to interrupt him, Greem was able toplete his scan without a hitch. The entire process had yielded extremely detailed results. Almost every secret kept in this corpse wasid bare before him in his mind.


    Honestly, Greem utterly despised Bill¡¯s ¡¯ideals¡¯ of indiscriminate eptance.


    ording to the chip¡¯s scans, Bill¡¯s original talents were for wind elementium. However, the magical heart he had transnted came from the Frostsaber Panther, a creature of ice attribute. This organ barelyplemented his innate wind talent. Even worse still, the gastric pouch he had transnted had originated from the Devourer, a creature with only earth for its attribute. Earth had absolutely nothing to do with wind elementium.


    The wyvern¡¯s poison nd and the Earth Mauler¡¯s liver also clearly went against his innate talents. A patchwork body fitted together like this couldn¡¯t possibly produce any outstanding effects. In fact, just the neutralization of all the shing attributes would take uprge amounts of his time and efforts.


    Energy loss and organs weakening became unavoidable!


    It was only now that Greem understood why Bill kept so many organ reconciling agents in his storage tool. This fellow had never solved the issue of the tension between his organs. Instead, he had been forcefully maintaining his condition through the use of potions.


    Bloody hell! The path of bloodline modification was a harsh path to tread upon, just as he had expected! A slight mishap and you could turn yourself into a monster that was neither human nor beast!


    Arge cluster of elementium mes ignited in his palm once hepleted the inspection. He pressed it onto Bill¡¯s headless body. The fire grew in size and ferocity in the very next instant, immediately swallowing and devouring the body in a ze of heat and smoke!


    "Whoa, what are you doing? Don¡¯t you find that a massive waste?" Alice couldn¡¯t help but speak, "This body is still worth a lot. There are so many good things inside."


    "Alice," Greem shook his head at her, "Remember, adepts are adepts, not magical creatures. Skinning them, devouring their bones, and drinking their blood might make us stronger. But can we still call ourselves adepts if we did that? Then what difference is there between the wise adepts and the mindless beasts that only know how to ughter and feast to empower themselves?"


    "There wasn¡¯t a difference in the first ce!" Alice pouted and said, "Isn¡¯t the ultimate goal of those bloodline adepts to turn into true and powerful magical beasts? To match their minds, behaviors, and their habits with those ancient monsters?!"


    Greem threw the question back at her, "Then ording to what you just said, what is a bloodline adept once they walk their path topletion. Will it be a powerful adept that stands before us or a powerful magical creature?"


    "Of course it has to be a magical creature!"


    "Then what is the meaning behind our pursuit and continuation of the legacy of adepts? If all the powerful adepts turned into magical beasts, what is the source of all adepts? Did wee from humanity, or from magical creatures?"


    Alice tilted her head as she thought. She fell intoplete silence.


    All the adepts she hade into contact with throughout her life had been individuals that put their personal benefit first as the utmost priority. The witches were slightly better. Their willingness to cooperate was far greater than the adepts of other ns and organizations.


    But even the witches behaved more like wolves with assignments and duties of their own within an organized pack. Cooperation¡¯s only purpose was to form a stronger power to obtain even more resources.


    If we were to get into it, bloodline adepts honestly didn¡¯t seem to be the essence of adepts. Instead, it was the elementium adepts who could im that title.


    Of the three existing Ninth Grade adepts, one was the founder of the Northern Witches. Salem, who bears the crown of Witch Queen, Monarch of the Witches and leader of the Ancient Witches. The other was Ignaz, first President of the Adept¡¯s Association, who had mastered the Laws of Earth. And thest was an esoteric adept; Saint Patrick, known as the ¡¯Creator,¡¯ and as the founder of the Silver Union.


    One could discern something about the true path of adepts from observing the most powerful of them. One was an ancient witch that possessed a legacy of her own. One was a principle adept. One was an esoteric adept. Only the bloodline adepts and the body-refining adepts were missing. That meant that these two types of adepts would never be able to be mainstream in the World of Adepts. They could only exist in various forms and structures within the ns and organizations of the adepts, never to be a dominating force of their own.


    The bloodline adepts possessed their unique bloodline legacy. This power saved them from the pain of umting knowledge at the mid and low adept levels, aspared to the agony their peers had to endure. The bloodline adepts also possessed advantages far superior to adepts of the same Grade. This advantage was why they were very well-regarded byrge organizations and ns.


    However, the bloodline limits imposed upon them became apparent when they reached the higher Grades. The bloodline that had helped them and drove them to sess was now a pair of shackles that bound their hands and feet. The upper limit of the source of their bloodline was a cage that trapped them!


    If they couldn¡¯t shatter the prison, they would no longer be able to improve and be stronger. However, if those adepts did ovee the limits of their bloodlines, they would have lost what they had always relied upon.


    The golden period where they could be stronger without even doing anything had passed entirely. Trying to get these people that had been spoiled by their bloodline to once again find a path forward was no easier than asking the blind for directions. It was why there had yet to be an adept who had advanced to Ninth Grade by relying on his bloodline!


    It was the same for the body-refining adepts!


    They might not have had upper limits to their Grade and their powers. However, their starting point and the potential of the human body was just way too low. It didn¡¯t matter how much they trained or refined their bodies. It was just simply too difficult to improve their physical attributes to the level of the Scourge Lords and the Titans!


    Consequently, the best and orthodox path forward for human adepts was the path of elementium. This path was the essence of an adept¡¯s future development!


    The bodies of human adepts were far too weak. The only thing they could rely on during their journey to the peak of the universe was the umtion of generations of knowledge.


    The first adepts might have been extremely weak, but the hundredth generation of adepts were beings that were capable of obtaining the dominant position in their ne. The two-hundredth generation was a generation that was capable of causing the multiverse to tremble at their name.


    All of this had everything to do with the long andsting legacy of knowledge!


    Human adepts were a group of individuals with minds, wisdom, and knowledge. They were not wild beasts that only knew ughter and consumption!


    Thus, human adepts were defined asmunal beings. In fact, they had to be collective beings! How else were they supposed topete with those dominant species and races that had ruled the multiverse for eons!?

 Chapter 355 Nightmare Garden

    Chapter 355 Nightmare Garden


    Greem and Alice reached the witch¡¯s cottage two dayster.


    It was an arcane cottage hidden within the Nightmare Garden. The one in charge of guarding it was First Grade Death Witch Sharon.


    The two of them eventually found the entrance into the Nightmare Garden in an unpopted area after Alice used her cuteness to pry the information out of some nearby vigers.


    ording to Alice, this ce was one of the ¡¯wild¡¯ mission sites specially set up by the Witch Council. An official witch was garrisoned there to be responsible for the assessment and assignment of the missions undertaken by apprentice witches.


    As this ce was not open to curious outsiders, the witch stationed in this ce had intentionally created an atmosphere of mystery and terror surrounding the cottage. It effectively scared away any nosy vigers who were curious about the affairs of the witches. That said, there were indeed quite a lot of rare magical nts in the Nightmare Garden. Disregarding an ordinary peasant, even some of the weaker apprentices would have trouble walking through this ce.


    The first thing Greem and Alice saw at the entrance was a grim and sinister garden enclosed by a nted and ancient metal fence. They could vaguely see the tall trees and strange nts through the half-opened gates. A thinyer of mist obscured everything else in the distance.


    A line of bloody words had been written on a worn-down sign by the side of the gates of the garden.


    Nightmare Garden. Trespassers shall die!


    All the metal fences in sight were rusted and nted. They barely managed to remain standing. Moreover, there were plenty of gaps in the perimeter that wererge enough for hounds to pass through.


    That said, your ordinary dog probably wouldn¡¯t even have the courage toe close to an area like this!


    "Let¡¯s go. These are tricks the witches use to scare those vige folks." Alice shrugged and reached to push the rusty metal gate. She walked into the garden as the rusty hinges creaked.


    To Greem, who was following right behind, Alice appeared to have suddenly melded into ayer of water. Her short and petite body became distorted all of a sudden.


    "Chip, keep a lookout for any trouble. Notify me immediately if anything abnormal happens!" Greem secretly gave an order to the chip.


    "Beep. Mission constructionplete. Detected unique forcefield fluctuation. Danger rating does not warrant a warning as of yet."


    It would be best if there were nothing wrong!


    Greem finally let go of his concerns and walked into the garden.


    As expected of a garden known as the Nightmare Garden!


    The first thing Greem saw was the massive orchard before him. The orchard was a nting grounds for all sorts of magical nts.


    This spot was a magical nt resource site that was asrge as the gardens of human nobles.


    The winding stone road beneath their feet was five meters wide. It was more than enough for two or three grown adults to walk side by side. To either side of the road were gardens protected by one-meter tall fences. All sorts of bizarre herbs cultivated within.


    Greem might not be a potions master, but he was still able to recognize most of the nt species thanks to the data library of the chip.


    The Nightmare Garden lived up to its name. None of the nts were of the ordinary variety. Almost every single one of them was a vicious and wicked nt that subsisted on blood and flesh. Any single one of them would cause a great disaster if they appeared in a society of ordinary humans.


    Human-Faced Mushrooms, Bloodsucking Vines, Man-Eating Flowers, Passiflora Caeruleas, Magical Konjacs, Snakehead Fungi, Dryads, Flower Fairies, and more were here.


    Most of these nts lived in groups. Greem had seen most of them back in his days at the magic swamp.


    The human-faced mushroom, for example, looked like little red mushrooms. There were a few dark red spots on their mushroom caps that looked like a smiley face drawn by children when connected. They woulde to life and extend slim hands and legs when they sensed the aura of humans. They would gather together and chatter with their child-like voices. As a matter-of-fact, these human-faced mushrooms were reasonably cute creatures.


    However, if anyone were to be tricked by their appearance and walked into the circle of mushrooms, they would be trapped in a mysterious dream-like illusion. The victim would fall into a trance-like state that they would be unable to break out of.


    One shouldn¡¯t judge them on their cute appearance. The mushrooms were, in fact, carnivores!


    Of course, there were also nts that grew alone. There would only be one of their type within the entirety of the massive garden. Dryads were one such terrifying nt. They did not needpanions to survive. All nts that settled near it would have their lifeforce forcefully ripped from them and ultimately wither and die.


    Still, the dryad nted in this garden was still growing. Once it grew to maturity, it would pluck its roots out of the earth and transform into a humanoid intelligent life. Transformed dryads were beautiful creatures. The males were handsome, and the females were attractive. Moreover, all dryads possessed natural charming abilities. They were one of the ideal contract creatures for witches.


    Wild dryads often hid in the depths of forests. They were a type of forest spirit and were extremely hard to catch. Even Greem didn¡¯t expect to see a young dryad in this garden.


    There were all sorts of other mysterious nts that Greem didn¡¯t recognize.


    He saw arge, dense patch of light yellow flowers. Their soft petals closed slightly together. The flowers waved along when a breeze passed by them. It was hard to tell what was so unique about them. It wasn¡¯t until Greem bent to take a closer look that he was shocked to find a realistic human face within each one of the closed flowers.


    Old, young, male, female, pretty, ugly; all sorts of faces appeared in the hearts of the flowers. They all looked different but had a singlemon trait. The eyes closed tightly on all their faces.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but describe the faces as ¡¯them.¡¯


    It was merely due to how realistic the faces looked to be. At one point, Greem had even mistaken the faces to have been taken from actual humans.


    Greem lifted his head in surprise. The patch of flowers blossomed with bright colors and plenty of liveliness, yet for some odd reason, he felt a chill run down his spine. A wave of chattering sounds overwhelmed him as a breeze blew across the flowers. It seemed like the human-faced flowers were secretly discussing something.


    "Beep. Detecting unknown forcefield interference. Rmending host leave the area immediately!"


    Perhaps the bad feeling wasn¡¯t just an illusion!


    Greem backed away and quickly left the eerie garden. He had a feeling that something terrifying would happen when those human-faced flowers opened their eyes.


    "Rx, this is one of the many resource sites that belong to the Witch Council. All magical nts are very strictly managed and cultivated. They wouldn¡¯t dare to attack you as long as you don¡¯t stray off the stone road. But if they managed to trick you into the flowerbed, then..." Alice didn¡¯t finish her sentence, but Greem understood what she meant to say.


    This situation was simr to the magic swamp Greem had spent many years in. There were far too many dangerous magical nts growing within a resource site. They were scariest monsters for ordinary humans. Even the weaker apprentice witches would be in great trouble if they came in here without prior preparation.


    Perhaps this was why the Witch Council arranged this ce as the location of the apprentice witches¡¯ trial missions!


    Of course, a ce like this had to be managed by someone!


    A strange morning glory rapidly increased in size just as Alice and Greem were wandering around the Nightmare Garden. The hoarse and sinister voice of an olddy came from inside it.


    "The Nightmare Garden is not open to the public today! It doesn¡¯t matter where you came from. How dare you trespass into my territory! Me, Witch Sharon! This is a massive offense! You have three minutes to get out of there, otherwise..."


    "Granny Sharon, your cute little Alice is here to visit you! Could you have forgotten me?" Alice didn¡¯t seem scared at all. Quite the contrary, she started to shout excitedly.


    Did she know the witch here?


    Greem immediately understood the situation. No wonder she picked this ce, among so many others, as the first ce to visit!


    "Alice. Which Alice..."


    The witch started to mumble to herself. Meanwhile, a naked, palm-sized flower fairy that looked like a miniature teenage girl climbed out of the morning glory. She had a pair of thin, transparent wings on her back.


    Honestly, the flower fairy looked remarkably simr to the green fairies Greem had previously seen. However, they belonged to a different category of forest spirit.


    One was good at nt-attribute support spells, had a gentle nature, and was often caught by adepts to serve as aides in theirbs and homes. The other was skilled at the nt-attribute poison spells, was wicked and ferocious, could dash about at high speeds, and was often kept as abat pet.


    The flower fairy took out a magic wand once it flew out from the flower. She pped her transparent wings and circled Alice. Faint green spots of light drifted in the air.


    "Alice! It¡¯s you indeed, Alice. Alice of the Moya n. Your name has been talked about amongst the witches recently. I thought it was another fellow with the same name as you. Who knew? It was you! Well, now that you have arrived,e in. But it¡¯s best to leave that guy who came with you outside. He¡¯s really big trouble right now!" The old witch also saw Alice through the eyes of the flower fairy. Her voice continued toe out of the flower.


    "Granny Sharon, Greem is Alice¡¯spanion. Do you really have it in you to leave Alice¡¯spanion out here alone with these nasty nts?" For some reason, Alice had gotten better and better at exploiting her identity as a ¡¯little girl.¡¯


    Sighing came from within the morning glory.


    "You are already a twenty-five-year-old grown adult, and you still do this to me. Very well, very well. Have that male adepte in with you!"


    The flower fairy smiled at them when she heard the witch¡¯s orders. She then turned and led them towards the cottage.


    With the flower fairy as their guide, they quickly approached the wooden cottage that they hadn¡¯t able to reach earlier. It only took Greem and Alice two or three minutes to reach the entrance of the house.

 Chapter 356 The Greedy Witches

    Chapter 356 The Greedy Witches


    It wasn¡¯t until Greem reached the front of the door that he realized the cottage was shaped like a bucket.


    It was like a massive wooden bucket stuck into the dirt. There were three ground levels to the building and an underground section.


    Even with the help of the chip, Greem¡¯s Spirit was incapable of reaching into the ground beneath the bucket cottage. A thick aura of death clung to the earth. He would have to alert Sharon¡¯s apanying spirit to break through the defenses.


    Indeed, the witch standing before Greem and Alice wasn¡¯t a true lifeform. Instead, it was a powerful apanying spirit with an independent consciousness and power rivaling a First Grade adept.


    She wore an extravagant dress like those of human nobles, and a red round hat on her head. She stood dignified at the door as she awaited the arrival of her two guests. She had a slim figure and a gentle, pretty face. Her light blue eyes were as bright as the purest of crystals, and her silver hair was soft and gleamed with beautiful light.


    If it weren¡¯t for her body blurring at the edges under the sunlight, Greem would have had trouble identifying her as a spirit.


    What shocked Greem was her aura and her beauty.


    The Northern Lands were the territories of the witches. Consequently, this was a different society, a matriarchal one ruled by women. With no need to seduce and please male adepts, the witches did not need to care for their looks and figures. Thus, they indulged in dangerous experiments and exposed themselves to the side effects, causing most of them to appear as ugly old hags.


    They might have been able to possess their seductive figures and charming looks once again if they invested a significant amount of resources into it, but what significance did such an act have in a world where women ruled?


    In this environment where only power and womenmanded, the witches did not need to waste resources to please their male partners. It was why Greem had hardly ever seen a single prettydy ever since he first came into contact with the witches. Moreover, they tended to be more ugly the more powerful they were!


    Alice instantly dashed forward and leaped into the embrace of the nobledy when she saw her.


    "Cheryl, Alice missed you so much."


    Greem was stunned for a second. He even forgot to breathe for a moment.


    ording to what knowledge he had, all spirits were intangible. They didn¡¯t possess actual bodies that could interact with the material world. Such creatures could pass through any metal, rock, wood, or water without magical protection. In fact, spirits could phase through any substance that was not protected by magic.


    This trait was the terrifying thing about ordinary spirits!


    They had no real bodies, and therefore physical means could not harm them.


    Supernatural powers were needed to deal with spirits.


    However, the spirit before him could freely switch between intangibility and tangibility. This ability, to some extent, demonstrated her power.


    As of yet, Greem severelycked any means to deal with Spirits. The results of a battle against a powerful spirit like this one were hard to foresee. After all, the books had been unmistakable on this. Apanying spirits were always as powerful as the Death Witch they were partners with.


    "Cheryl, where is Granny Sharon?" Alice lifted her head and asked while still in thedy¡¯s arms.


    "She¡¯s busy with an experiment downstairs, so she can¡¯t meet you guys. Just tell me if you have anything you need to say!" The nobledy held Alice¡¯s hand and brought her into the cottage. She turned and spoke as she walked, "Come in and sit now that you are here! You must have quite a lot of luck to have reached here!"


    The inside of the cottage was decorated in a straightforward fashion, and there was a certain beauty to it.


    Everything in the house suited the aura Cheryl exuded.


    "Cheryl, you said that Greem was big trouble earlier. What was that about?" Alice couldn¡¯t bear to wait any longer. She asked the moment she sat down.


    Greem also took a seat at her side and looked at Cheryl without speaking.


    "You guys still don¡¯t know, do you?" Cheryl sighed as she poured tea for the two guests, "You killed an adept in the Witch Council¡¯s territory earlier. While it was an outsider, your actions still drew the ire of the witches. They¡¯ve already added Sir Greem to the wanted list. I have a copy of the list over here by my side."


    "Wanted list?"


    "Wanted across the entire Northern Lands?"


    The first question was from Greem. It was evident that he stillcked knowledge of how the witch government functioned. Alice asked the second question, and she had gotten to the critical part.


    "Across the entire Northern Lands!" Cheryl nodded, "This means that any witch might try to catch Greem if they discovered him. They would then send him to the Witch Council for the bounty!"


    "But Greem killed that bastard Bill to protect me. Moreover, they were the ones who started the fight." Alice instantly exploded into a rage like a wildcat, with its fur standing on end.


    "I believe everything you say. That is why the Witch Council gave out a warrant for arrest, but not a warrant for execution," Cheryl sighed, "But do you think Greem will live to reach the Witch Council and appeal his case? The Witches of Deceit probably raised this entire issue. Their goal is to get rid of the only aid you have!"


    "Then, Cheryl, will Granny Sharon help the Witches of Deceit against Alice?" Alice betrayed a pitiful expression on her face.


    "Cough..." An awkward expression appeared on Cheryl¡¯s face, "Given our rtionship with Endor and you, I won¡¯ty a single finger on either of you. However, if you want to survive in the Battle of Fate, then you will have to stop relying on the strength of an outsider. Greem going on the wanted list is a ludicrous thing to have been done. Yet not a single witch objected to the act. Why was it? All because they do not wish for any external force to interfere with the selection of the Witch of Fate."


    "Then what should we do now?"


    "You can stay here for now. The Tower of Fate will activate in another four months. The two of you can wait until thest moment before showing yourselves again. By then there would be no point to the enemy¡¯s tricks and schemes, regardless of how many they have prepared."


    "But we definitely won¡¯t be able to hide from their investigations if we stayed here. Even Granny Sharon will be implicated." Alice hesitated.


    "Here might not be safe, but there are some ces where your safety will be guaranteed. Moreover, you will have a good training experience there!"


    "Where is this ce you are talking about?" Alice asked,pletely confused as to what Cheryl was referring to.


    "A lesser ne!"


    Greem and Alice looked at each other. They finally got it.


    Indeed! A lesser ne!


    The Death Witches had lesser nes that belonged to the branch themselves, especially with how powerful they were. If they hid there, Alice and Greem no longer needed to worry about a diviner finding their location, regardless of how powerful that diviner was. That said, all lesser nes were considered to be core secrets of their respective organizations. Would the Death Witches allow two outsiders to step foot on such forbiddennd?


    Cheryl showed a slight smile as if she saw through their concerns, "Sharon has the right to nominate the two of you as members of the Death Witches. However, the price you would have to pay to get the Death Witches to agree would be a hefty one. It¡¯s now up to you two and whether you have the wealth to move them. Even I can¡¯t help you on this issue!"


    "I agree with this!"


    "Indeed. As long as this brat can pay the ticket fee, I don¡¯t mind letting Greem and Alice have a tour around Greenwood World."


    "Two little fellows that haven¡¯t even advanced for ten years. Are you sure they cane up with resources enough to move us?"


    "Brat, you had best not be lying to us. If I find out I was dragged out from myb for a pile of useless trash, you can be sure that someone will pay for it. Also, Cheryl, don¡¯t casually represent Sharon in calling for an assembly the next time."


    "Yeah, all of us are busy people. If he can¡¯t give us anything, I suggest we tie him up and send him to the Witches of Deceit."


    No one knew when or how Cheryl had cast her spells.


    A dozen strange witches of varying appearances suddenly crowded the small living room. Judging by their translucent bodies, these weren¡¯t their actual bodies that had transported over. Instead, these were their spiritual projections.


    A dozen witch projections floated about in the air. Greem¡¯s breath almost stoppedpletely.


    Every single one of these witches had the power of a First Grade elite adept!


    Being witches, they might not be too harsh on Alice, but they surely wouldn¡¯t hold back against a male adept like Greem.


    "Sir Greem, the dozen other witches present here are all executors of the Death Witches. As long as two of them agree to my suggestion, then you will be allowed to hide in a lesser ne and wait until the activation of the Tower of Fate. Of course, we will take good care of Alice in the meantime. Thus, let us see what your fate shall be!" An expression of helplessness appeared on Cheryl¡¯s elegant face.


    This was a ssic case of buying his own life with money!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but smile bitterly. He lowered his head and started to think about what item in his possession he could use to impress these greedy hags.


    While he did hold quite a lot of good stuff in his private stash, most of these were things that were important for his ns and development. Greem¡¯s heart would profusely bleed if he had to use them to exchange for his life.


    The spacestone was out of the question!


    Of the three spacestones, one had been taken away in the Castle in the Sky, and the other and been assimted by Alice. He only had one more spacestone in his possession. It was an essential item for Greem¡¯s ns for nar invasions. This spacestone was most definitely not something he could hand over.


    Rejected!


    Golden Apple?


    While the conditions for its usage were stringent, it was a top-tier resource that could be used to revive a Fourth Grade being.


    Rejected!


    Orb of Deception?


    No, the survival of Alice in the Tower of Fate could hang upon this orb.


    Rejected!


    Emblem of Fire?


    The emblem was a critical item that he could use to sneak into the fire elementium ne. He couldn¡¯t trade this away.


    Rejected!


    Shandera¡¯s Sheepstick?


    It was a powerful crowd-control magic wand that could bypass most magical protection. If Greem gave this away, he would be hard-pressed to find a magic wand of simr power in a short time frame.


    Rejected!


    Greem was frustrated.


    Firstly, the item he offered had to be of sufficient value. Otherwise, it would not be able to move these cold and heartless Death Witches.


    Secondly, the item had to be something Greem couldn¡¯t use. Otherwise, he couldn¡¯t bear to part with it.


    Greem¡¯s Spirit wandered around the storage belt as he thought.


    All of a sudden, his Spirit came into contact with a couple of things. His eyes instantly brightened.


    Of course! How could he have forgotten them!

 Chapter 357 Murder of Cackling Crows

    Chapter 357 Murder of Cackling Crows


    What did the Death Witches like best?


    Corpses, souls, and any items that were soaked full of death energy!


    And Greem had quite a few of such items in his collection.


    The first thing Greem took out was a massive block of ice. One could see the frozen corpse of a human knight through the crystalline ice.


    "The corpse of a powerful human? Not bad, I like it," One of the semi-translucent projections floated past the block of ice and cackled, "But at our level, these ordinary things aren¡¯t enough to move us. Let me first see what Grade this corpse is!"


    A string of strange and awkward-sounding sybles rang out in the air as a magical gray light arced towards the corpse.


    The knight¡¯s body instantly glowed with a blinding red radiance!


    However, there were clusters of dark spots mixed with the red light, causing it to appear impure.


    "The body of a Second Grade knight? It¡¯s the body of a Second Grade knight..." The projection¡¯s voice suddenly became excited and loud.


    The other projections also became lively when they heard her exmation. Several probing spells prated towards the block of ice.


    "It¡¯s Second Grade."


    "Indeed, a Second Grade knight from another ne."


    "Sadly, the refinement of the body is far from perfect."


    "It is certain that this is the corpse of a knight native to some lesser ne. What could you expect from a world weaker than ours."


    The entire room was filled with the chattering voices of the witches as they discussed the corpse in front of their eyes. It was clear that they were interested in this thing.


    Every n and organization would have some lesser nes under their control. While the native individuals of other nes were much easier to deal with, even if they were of the same Grade, it was still not within a witch¡¯s ability to kill a Second-grade native.


    The Death Witches had some corpses of Second Grade ne natives in their inventory, but the higher Grade witches often imed these. The asional body that fell into the hands of theses First Grade witches would either be iplete or had to be exchanged for with a high amount of contribution points. That was why the green light of greed glowed brightly in all the witches¡¯ eyes when they saw the Second Grade Radiant Knight corpse.


    Even though the body wasn¡¯t of the best quality, it was still aplete corpse preserved in reasonable condition.


    There would necessarily be a decrease to its powers if it were turned it into an undead. However, using a Second Grade corpse that was in excellent condition would undoubtedly at least yield an undead at the level of a First Grade elite. An undead like this was a huge help for these Death Witches, who were still at First Grade!


    In fact, an undead of this level could undoubtedly obtain the position of amander in the army of the witches¡¯ undead.


    "Sisters, I have been thinking of raising a top-tier Skeleton General. Why don¡¯t you all let me have it first!" One of the slightly younger witches couldn¡¯t wait to put out her request.


    "A Skeleton General? Give up, Namu. Your undead craft still needs more practice. Don¡¯t waste it on such good material." A witch who had her face obscured mocked her colleague.


    "Yeah, yeah. Namu, your craftsmanship is the worst among us. Don¡¯t embarrass yourself now. This corpse even had his flesh and blood preserved. While it¡¯s been a while since he died, and the flesh is a little withered, it¡¯s still most ideal to turn him into a zombie."


    "Yes. That way, we won¡¯t waste the flesh."


    Greem interrupted as he listened to the ongoing discussion, "If everyone is satisfied, then have wee to an agreement?"


    "Little handsome boy, who knew you had good stuff like this, eh?" A sweet voice that could soften the bones of any male whispered near his ears, and a pair of white and smooth hands brushed his face. An unreasonably beautiful face appeared before Greem.


    Alice instantly started pouting in anger, despite having watched the entire spectacle in silence the whole time.


    "Hahaha, little Alice is getting angry!" The young witch with the seductive voice leaned into Greem¡¯s ears and whispered, "You are right, your item is a very satisfying offer!"


    "Then..."


    ¡°But, I will have to remind you. Given that Cheryl actively called for us sisters, it is clear that she will support sending you to the lesser ne. And your gift would be more than enough to bring you another supporter, regardless of which of us sisters you give it. However, you need at least three Death Witches to support you if you want to go into our lesser ne. So..."


    "So I¡¯ll have to win over another witch!" Greem sighed.


    "Bingo, you are right! Unfortunately, you don¡¯t get a prize for that." The seductive witch chuckled as she floated away.


    However, the very next second, her cheerful chuckling was utterly interrupted by Greem¡¯s ¡¯tycoon¡¯ moves.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    Greem threw another golden and shiny human knight corpse, glowing with the radiance of power, to the ground.


    The first corpse had been F¨¹gen¡¯s gift to him. This one was a spoil of war he had obtained through his strength alone. It was the true-blue body of a Second Grade radiant knight.


    "It¡¯s Second Grade."


    "Yet another Second Grade."


    "Did this brat wander to some ne of corpses? Why does he have so many Second Grade corpses?"


    "I want this for sure. No one fight with me over it." It was obviously Namu again.


    "Hmph! What do you think is yours?! Everyone here as executor rights. Now we let that brat decide who gets the corpses!"


    The Death Witch that was too beautiful to be a Death Witch once again floated back.


    "Yeesh. I didn¡¯t expect to misjudge a person! Very well kid, you win. Your offering is sufficient to win the support of two of us sisters. Now, of we twelve sisters, pick any two of us to be your guarantors, and you can enter the n¡¯s lesser ne."


    The beautiful witch¡¯s voice had just left her mouth when the whole room filled with the wailing and swooshing of ghosts.


    "Brat, pick me, or I¡¯ll release my ghosts to haunt you." This one tried to use threats of violence.


    "Kid, if you pick me, I can give you..." This one tried to win Greem over with benefits. She sent thetter half of her sentence over the more private mental connection.


    "Kid, do you want to enjoy a blissful night with your elder sister over here?! I can make sure you are entirely satisfied." This one was just straight-up trying to seduce him.


    For a moment, the room felt like it had been taken over by a murder of cackling crows. Countless sharp, or hoarse, or excited, or seductive voices and mental messages were sent Greem¡¯s way. Greem felt like his mind had been crammed full of demonic chantings. He couldn¡¯t even think.


    "Stop for a moment. Please, stop." Greem instantly ordered the chip to cut off all the mental connections the witches had established with him. He rubbed his forehand as he smiled bitterly, "It is thanks to Lady Cheryl that I have this opportunity in the first ce. So, I will have Lady Cheryl decide in my ce."


    The floating projections fell silent. Then, all of them turned to look at Cheryl.


    The dignified Cheryl was cheerfully looking on at the entertaining drama that was happening. The smile on her face instantly copsed now that Greem had thrown the whole mess to her.


    "Sisters, calm down!" Cheryl knew what was about to happen and immediately stopped the witches before they could erupt into chaos once more, "We are the proud and noble Death Witches! We can¡¯t let outsiders see us as jokes. I suggest we go through with Sir Greem¡¯s request for shelter before we slowly discuss the ownership of these items."


    "Seconded!"


    "Seconded!"


    "Seconded!"


    ......


    It was clear that the Death Witches were remarkably cohesive on the inside. Cheryl¡¯s simple suggestion immediately gained the agreement of the witches. Thus, Greem¡¯s safety was guaranteed. At least, within the Death Witches¡¯ territory, the warrant for arrest issued by the Witch Council only existed in name now!


    Moreover, Greem couldn¡¯t help but start thinking about the future, with these many Death Witches standing before him.


    "O respected Death Witches, other than the previous agreement, I also wish to purchase some items to guard against spirits, curses, and illusions. It doesn¡¯t matter whether it¡¯s a spell, an item, or a potion. As long as they work effectively, I will be willing to purchase them with items that you will be interested in!"


    "Oh, do you have anything else that can satisfy us other than those two Second-Grade corpses?" One of the more veteran Death Witches let out an ear-piercing cackle.


    "Take a look at this. Will this work?" Greem smiled.


    He took out a gray, spiral-shaped crystal from his pouch.


    The light from outside the window allowed the witches to see the object contained within the crystal. A faint gray mist furiously crashed against the gem, as if it wanted to break free of its prison.


    Every time it crashed against the crystal walls, the gray mist would turn into the ferocious face of a human male. The face cursed and roared in anger.


    "The soul of a Second Grade Knight."


    The eyes of the Death Witches once again shone with greed.


    If the Second Grade knight¡¯s corpse could be used to create a high-quality undead subordinate, then this Second Grade soul could most definitely bring about tremendous growth to the Spirit of their apanying spirits.


    That was indirectly increasing their own powers!


    Cheryl was finally unable to hold in her sigh.


    If she had known Greem had so much ¡¯good stuff,¡¯ she would never have called these greedy sisters over.


    For the first time, she felt genuine regret!


    "I have a Voodoo Puppet."


    "I can help you make a Wraith Doll."


    "Revenant Herb. I have a Revenant Herb here."


    "All those things they mentioned are consumables. I can teach you how to cast Soul Barrier."


    An old voice suddenly rang out amidst the wave of noise.


    "Little brat, ever heard of the Dead Soul Array?"

 Chapter 358 The Chaos of Fate

    Chapter 358 The Chaos of Fate


    All the witches fell silent when they heard the name of the Dead Soul Array.


    Everyone turned and looked at the old witch.


    "Silvia!"


    "Her?"


    Some of the witches were already gossiping.


    Greem was surprised for a moment.


    He had heard of this name from Alice. She was an old veteran First Grade Death Witch, undoubtedly the eldest of the Witches currently present. However, this wasn¡¯t what made her so remarkable. Instead, it was her choice of advancement that drew Greem¡¯s attention. She was an array master; a profession he had been searching for quite a while.


    Greem had never been able to forget the temporary array he had seen when they¡¯d traveled with the Dark Witches.


    There was no need for any preparations or understanding the profound knowledge of runic arrays. All the user needed to do was nt the array seed into the ground, and a convenient, portable array sprung up. An array like this could empower its user by thirty to fifty percent. This power was enough to turn the tables in an even fight!


    Unfortunately, such array seeds had limited uses. They were a kind of exhaustible array. Moreover, they were exceptionally expensive. Most adepts would not use them in small skirmishes.


    Silvia had a reputation among the witches. No one came out and argued with her for the Second Grade soul, even though they all still wanted it.


    Her spiritual projection floated before Greem, and the two of them started to negotiate.


    No one else knew the contents of their discussion or what sort of agreement they came to. Seven minutester, when Greem passed the gray crystal over to Cheryl, all the witches knew that they hade to an agreement!


    All the witches present today had projected their spirit through the use of the cottage¡¯s magic array; their actual bodies weren¡¯t here. Thus, they needed to rely on Cheryl as the intermediary toplete the trade with Greem.


    Greem would pass the two corpses and the crystal to Cheryl, and the goods the witches had promised him would arrive within three days.


    This, of course, included Greem¡¯s right to enter the Death Witches¡¯ lesser ne and wait until the activation of the Tower of Fate. On the other hand, Alice would move into the Greenwood ne for training. This was a well-developed mid-sized ne. There were special facilities created for the preparation of newly advanced adepts.


    Usually, the right to train there was reserved for the witches of the Death branch. However, seeing that Greem¡¯s ¡¯ticket fee¡¯ was of really high value, all the witches agreed to allow Alice into the Greenwood ne to strengthen her survival skills.


    Other than that, an array seed of the Dead Soul Array from Witch Silvia was sessfully handed over to Alice. With four months left, Alice had more than enough time to master the use of this array and further increase her power.


    ............


    Time slowly passed and the day of the Tower¡¯s activation neared!


    In this period, the entire Northern Lands had erupted into chaos by the uing Battle of Fate. Troubles and conflicts happened all over the ce.


    ording to the Witch Council¡¯s investigation, the number of candidates that had entered the Northern Lands had reached triple digits. A rough count gave a total of around a hundred and thirty of them. There were thirty among them who had advanced to witches. The rest remained stuck at the apprentice stage.


    With the nearing Battle of Fate, more and more apprentice-level candidates would advance to be witches.


    As the Witch Council had strictly forbidden the witch branches from intervening in the affair, all the candidates behaved in an extreme manner. They all knew their lives were most likely nearing their end.


    It didn¡¯t matter how many of them there were. Only one witch could rise above the rise and sit upon the throne of the Witch of Fate. The rest were doomed to be the stepping stone of the victor. Which candidate could possibly wait for Fate¡¯s choice in peace under such dire circumstances?


    They would still have some ability to fight for the title of Witch of Fate if they managed to advance before the Battle. However, for the candidates that weren¡¯t able to advance by then, the Battle of Fate would be the day of their sacrifice.


    They knew they would die, and that their flesh, soul, and knowledge would be the foundation of another person. Who could tolerate such an ending to their lives?


    Thus, as the days passed by and the Battle drew closer, all the candidates that thought their chances were insufficient, and those who had yet to advance, started to behave in mad, insane, and extreme ways.


    Nobody was quite sure when, but the names of the three favorites for the Witch of Fate had finally surfaced to the public.


    The three terrifying name had then be a nightmare for all the other candidates!


    Snowlotus, the Dancer of Ice and Frost!


    Sofia, the Berserk Witch!


    Alice, the Scrying Eye!


    Sages, diviners, and prophets of all seven witch branches continuously repeated these names.


    If nothing out of the ordinary happened, the true Witch of Fate would necessarily emerge from among these three individuals. The others could only remain in the background and be essories to the three of them.


    All the candidates in the Northern Lands flew into a frenzy once certain scheming parties leaked the list.


    Again and again they had defeated their enemies against all odds. Again and again they had turned danger into opportunity. Again and again, they had survived countless deaths. These candidates, who had grown and be stronger through all the obstacles they had faced in their life, naturally thought of themselves as those blessed by Fate.


    Yet, at this moment, they were hit by the truth. The truth that they were not the main characters of the story, but instead was the feast that Fate had prepared for the actual main characters. This massive disparity between reality and their expectations was enough to drive people insane!


    Countless weaklings that had just been trying to kill each other suddenly realized what they needed to do. They stopped their infighting and gathered together to form an alliance. They scoured the Northern Lands to find these three witches who were the real recipients of Fate¡¯s blessing.


    Snowlotus, the Dancer of Ice and Frost, fought decently against these hostile candidates. With the n supporting her, and her taking shelter in her mother¡¯s adept tower, Snowlotus had been able to deflect all sorts of attacks and schemes directed at her. Even so, the number of plots and attacks that she dealt with every day was far too much.


    While all of these attacks were deflected, it was still an unpleasant feeling to be continuously harassed.


    Snowlotus hid in her n¡¯s lesser ne, with no other choice left to her. It was only then that she managed to find peace in her daily life again.


    Strangely enough, there had been absolutely no news of Alice the Scrying Eye.


    It wasn¡¯t just the sages and the diviners of the witch branches that failed to locate her. Even the candidates were barely able to find out that Alice wasn¡¯t present in the World of Adepts, despiteing together to host arge-scale divining ceremony.


    Thus, with no way of catching Snowlotus and no way of finding Alice, these mad candidates turned their fury towards the only candidate remaining¨C Sofia, the Berserk Witch!


    Sofia had no one to rely upon and no massive background or n that could back her up. She instantly became the target of the candidates¡¯ continuous attacks.


    Countless divination spells targeted her daily, trying their best to dig out every single secret Sofia held. Naturally, all sorts of schemes and plots were designed for her in this manner!


    Thus, Sofia would step into magical traps when she walked, be poisoned when she drank, find poisonous bugs in her bread when she ate. Even when she tried to sleep, she faced dozens of sneak attacks.


    A single apprentice-level candidate wasn¡¯t all that scary. Even if she managed to figure out Sofia¡¯s weakness through the use of divination, she could not harm a powerful berserk witch. However, even a berserk witch would fall when a hundred candidates came together. After all, there were one or two dozen adept-level witches within the ranks of the candidates.


    The battle on Snowdrift ins was a bloody and brutal one!


    Sofia the Berserker Witch fought fourteen witches and sixty-seven apprentices alone. She escaped with grievous wounds and hid deep within the ins. Of the party that had surrounded her, three witches and twelve apprentices had died.


    This battle allowed the candidates to understand the power of those favored by fate. They finally realized how weak and insignificant they were whenpared to the stars of the show!


    Just as the candidates were busy considering forming yet another party to pursue Sofia, a rumor came out of nowhere. It was a rumor that caused the entire group to splinter and fall apart.


    It was said that every candidate of the Witch of Fate had, to varying degrees, some trace of the power of Fate on their bodies. If a candidate personally killed another candidate, they could absorb the opponent¡¯s Fate and strengthen their own.


    The rumor might have sounded ludicrous, but it was extraordinarily well-reasoned and descriptive. Moreover, it struck right at the deepest fears of these candidates.


    Thus, no one insisted on the idea of pursuing the favored candidates. In fact, no one dared to evene close to another candidate. They all had to fend for themselves. They were all at risk of being attacked by one of their own.


    The alliance instantly fell apart, and the candidates once again went their own ways.


    However, there were always people who wanted to try and verify the rumor, regardless of how ridiculous it sounded.


    The apprentice candidates quickly gathered together and worked together to escape from the witch candidates. Still, the apprentices continued to y tricks and schemes on each other, even as they ran away from the more powerful witches.


    Those with insufficient power and those who were not smart enough were the first to die to verify the rumor.


    When the news was finally proven false, they were no longer able to take back that unity and harmony they had previously maintained!


    There were those who gave up on life and ran to the human cities to enjoy what was left of it. There were some who tried their hardest and settled down to umte more power. There were also candidates who traveled far and wide, continuously visiting powerful witches in hopes of enhancing their abilities.


    The massive number of apprentices and adepts that ran through the various areas of the Northern Lands caused an uproar wherever they went, creating tremendous trouble and disasters for the locals.


    Rice fields were destroyed, and forests were set on fire, one after another. The viges were ravaged beyond repair by the various conflicts of the witches.


    All sorts of frightening spells, gues, and underhanded means were employed in their fights with each other. If the Northern Witches hadn¡¯t fanned out across thend to extinguish the fires and stop the gues, then the entirety of the Northern Lands would have been turned to dust by these madwomen!


    Finally, four monthster, when the Northern Witches were at their limits, the day of reckoning arrived! The Tower of Fate was activated!

 Chapter 359 The Tower Opens

    Chapter 359 The Tower Opens


    The Tower of Fate.


    The building was a unique tower that had been sealed for a long time.


    This ce was in Dragonblight, and far more barren and rural than even the wastnd known as Desce.


    Any outsider that entered the Northern Lands would have to go north of Dian City, through the territories of the Death Witches and the Coldwinter Witches, and then through the dangerous area of the Chittering Hunting Grounds before they could step foot on Dragonblight.


    The Tower of Fate stood tall in the center of Dragonblight.


    The only reason why this area was known as Dragonblight was due to the actions of the First Witch of Fate when she had built the Tower of Fate. Nine mighty dragons had been sacrificed here. If one was lucky enough to tour Dragonblight, they might dig out the shattered bone remains of ancient dragons in the hills nearby.


    This event was why this ce was also and cursed by the dragons that no outsiders dared to enter without good reason!


    At the peak of the era of the Witches of Fate, the radiance of the Tower of Fate was what illuminated the path forward for all Northern Witches. Moreover, the territory that the Witches of Fate owned included fiverge cities, countless followers, and a million citizens.


    Sadly, all of this had vanished and turned into the past as the light of the Tower slowly dimmed!


    The Witches of Fate had been extinct for a thousand years due to internal conflict. With their leaders gone, the followers and citizens of the Witches of Fate had died, one by one. What remained of those who survived were absorbed by the witches of the other branches. The territory of the Witches of Fate had also been split up and turned into the property of the other branches.


    Year 32,767 of the Era of Adepts. The twelfth day of the second month of the year.


    On the day rumored to be the birth date of the First Witch of Fate, a thunderous rumbling rang out from the lonely Tower of Fate that had slept for a thousand years. The light of the gray Tower of Fate once again lit up, despite the thick dust that clung to its walls. Its doors opened and invited the candidates and Northern Witches from all across the Northern Lands.


    Most of the witch branches had prevented their subordinates froming to this area in the past. Consequently, after a thousand years, a ce such as Dragonblight, where fate gathered together, had naturally attracted countless powerful monsters and magical beasts. They lived here in this ce and had, surprisingly enough, formed several dominant tribes.


    That said, they knew well enough never to touch the Tower of Fate that stood at the depths of Dragonblight.


    Thus, these creatures and the ancient security systems of the Tower of Fate kept out most thieving witches that harbored any thoughts of breaking into the silent Tower.


    However, today, with the opening of the tower gates, liveliness once again returned to Dragonblight!


    Today was the day the Tower of Fate activated, and today was the day the Battle of Fate came to an end. There were over a hundred candidates, but only one could step out of the Tower alive.


    As such, countless candidates immediately rushed towards Dragonblight when they felt the Tower of Fate activating. They dreamed of being the first to enter the Tower and being the one to obtain the initiative.


    Sadly, the wild monsters around Dragonblight were massive trouble for most of the apprentice-level candidates. It was virtually impossible to reach the Tower without ying a bloody path through the hordes of magical creatures!


    Meanwhile, all seven witch branches had sent their representatives to observe the ceremony and its results. They wanted to know the identity of the new Witch of Fate as soon as possible. Of course, more importantly, they wanted to know which of the seven witch branches¡¯ side she would take.


    ............


    The Tower of Fate.


    Nobody knew what material it was made of, but the body of the tower was a gray-white color. It was three hundred and twenty-seven meters tall. Not exactly thergest of the adept towers, but definitely the most mysterious.


    With the rejuvenation of the powers of Fate, and the reactivation of the energy pool and the defense system, all the dust, cobwebs, and dirt fell off the tower due to the revival of the defensive forcefield.


    Blinding magical lights started to appear around the body of the Tower. Mysterious magical runes shed within the sea of radiance. The altarmp atop the Tower let out a beam of light that stretched into the distant horizon. The beam of light pierced through the clouds and dispelled the gray darkness that had hung over Dragonblight for the past thousand years. The Tower of Fate once again appeared before everyone with its magnificent and perfect architecture.


    Several powerful witches sat on their glowing brooms and magical carpets, hovering in the sky. They looked down at the slowly opening gates.


    The gates might be open, but there was still a thinyer of light covering the outside of the tower.


    Before the Witch of Fate came to be, no visitors were allowed in the Tower of Fate. Only the candidates could enter through their resonance with Fate.


    Countless visitors had appeared in Dragonblight since dawn.


    The candidates for the Witch of Fate fought their way towards the gates as they deflected the attacks of monsters. Some traveled in groups, and others alone. The weaker ones died before they even made it to the Tower. Several spots of light would exit their body when they died. These lights would brightly glow as they soared through the sky and plunged into the gray walls of the Tower of Fate.


    Most of the candidates still managed to make it through the trial on the outside and arrived at the light barrier. They hesitated for a moment before extending a hand towards the boundary. They were then sucked into the Tower.


    By noon, a total of seventy-two candidates had already made it into the tower, including the odd witch known as Sofia, the Berserk Witch!


    She was a mighty witch with arge build and a pirate¡¯s eye patch over one of her eyes. She wore green leather armor and carried a thick wooden staff behind her shoulders. If it weren¡¯t for how recently she had advanced, she could probably have made it to the rank of an elite group leader within most witch ns.


    It was evident that the brutal battle that had happened two months earlier had left permanent scars on her body.


    Her blind eye had been turned to stone by an enemy using a strange spell. Moreover, this effect was permanent. Sofia wasn¡¯t able to reverse the change to her eye, regardless of what potions she used. She couldn¡¯t even regain her sight in that eye through the use of a transnted one.


    The scars on her body were countless. Still, these scars did not weaken her will or ability to fight. In fact, they made her seem all the more intimidating.


    Sofia had walked to the gates of the Tower of Fate with the head of a Winged Nightshade ced on the top of her wooden staff. It was clear that she had just plucked the head of the Winged Nightshade off of its dead body. There was still purple blood dripping out of the wound where its head was severed.


    Moreover, she didn¡¯t seem to like the high-grade witches in the air either. She red at them with a fierce look in her eyes as she walked by. Her eyes shed with provocation.


    The witches wanted to teach her a lesson, but given the strict orders of their leaders, they could only suppress their anger.


    Berserk Witch Sofia stood before the barrier of light. She turned to look at the witches with contempt in her eyes before finally touching the gate and disappearing into the Tower.


    "Isn¡¯t that brat way too arrogant?" One of the witches growled silently. The mes of anger burned brightly in her eyes.


    "Well, she does have the right to be arrogant," Another witch shook her head and exined, "It is either death or survival once she enters the Tower! If she dies, then everything is over. Would she be concerned about us torturing her soul over something like a provocation? If she lives, she bes the leader of the Witches of Fate in the blink of an eye. She might not be all that powerful still, but her status would be equal to our leaders. Then, it¡¯s probably us who will have to bow and pay respects."


    "Bowing to her? A Second Grade witch like me having to bow to a First Grade like her?" A high-Grade witch that had only advanced for two hundred years yelled.


    "There¡¯s nothing odd about that!" A senior witch shook her head and sighed, "As long as she obtains the acknowledge of the Tower of Fate, she will be the leader of the Witches of Fate. Even Third Grade witches would have to pay their respects to her as they do to their own branch leaders. Even if the new Witch of Fate is only First Grade, she will have equal authority as the Fourth Grade witch leaders in the Witch Council. She will have the power to decide the future of the Northern Lands. These are the rules left behind by Her Majesty, the Queen Witch! No one dares to go against them!"


    The witches who were unfamiliar with the ancient rules gasped. It was only now that they vaguely grasped the significance of the Tower of Fate¡¯s activation.


    A prolonged, deste howl by a magical wolf came from the ground as the witches continued their conversation. Mixed between the howls and the cries of the wolves was a hell of des of ice and swords of snow.


    All the witches looked at the representatives of the Witches of Deceit when they felt the cold aura on the ground.


    Witch Rena was among these representatives. She was the mother of the approaching witch. Snowlotus, the Dancer of Ice and Frost.


    Pride and relief rose on Rena¡¯s face when everyone looked towards her.


    She had brought up such a powerful witch that could lead the Northern Lands in the future. It was natural that she was happy and joyous about this. Her mother was the leader of the Witches of Deceit. If her daughter became the leader of the Witches of Fate, wouldn¡¯t this herald the rise of a new and powerful n of witches?


    And she, as the link between these two powerful witches, would undoubtedly go down in history as the witch with the most power in the history of the Northern Lands!


    Rena couldn¡¯t help but smile in confidence whenever she imagined this glorious future.


    Snowlotus, who had not appeared for some time, appeared before the Tower, wrapped in a cloud of chilling aura under everyone¡¯s gaze.


    Not a single trace of fear or panic could be seen on her face, even as several dozen wolves attacked her with strength rivaling that of adepts.


    An armor of ice hung upon her body as she casually strolled through the pack of wolves. Whenever a wolf charged to a side, an ice crystal one meter in width and height would appear. The wolves would be frozen on the spot if they even touched the cube.


    Even though the duration of the freezing effect was extremely short, it was more than enough for Snowlotus to kill it with a cone of ice. Or, she could slide away from the attacking wolf.


    It was thanks to these little tricks that Snowlotus had made it through the pack of wolves without taking any damage. She reached the gates of the Tower.


    Snowlotus lifted her head and looked at the witches from the various branches. A faint smile appeared on her snow-white face as she bowed respectfully.


    She locked eyes with her mother. Witch Rena subtly nodded her head.


    Snowlotus raised one of her beautiful eyebrows before slowly walking into the Tower as if something was on her mind.


    "Time should be almost up!"


    "Mm, another fifteen minutes and the Tower of Fate closes! Then thosete fellows won¡¯t have any chance to get in anymore!"


    Some of the witches started whispering to each other. Meanwhile, their eyes turned towards the Death Witches.


    A massive rumbling came from the outer edge of Dragonblight as they were still wondering about the situation.


    Just then, a gigantic spider-shaped golem arrived in front of everyone¡¯s eyes.


    It crushed and stormed through all the magical beasts of Dragonblight without stopping. The spider golem continued with its nging footsteps, dragging with it the blood and severed limbs of magical creatures as it marched towards the Tower.


    A muscr male adept leaped off from the back of the golem. Alice then poked out of the abdomen of the golem and used a small talisman to stow the massive machine.


    "I¡¯ll see you guyster, aunties and grannies!"


    The petite, eight year-old-sized Alice waved at the witches before diving through the barrier.


    The atmosphere suddenly turned awkward and solemn!

 Chapter 360 Lies and Deceptions

    Chapter 360 Lies and Deceptions


    The Witches of Deceit started to be restless when they saw the young adept standing beneath them.


    "Rena, let¡¯s capture this guy!"


    "Yeah! Such an arrogant man! To think that he still dares to show his face!"


    Everyone thought that Witch Rena would agree for her daughter¡¯s sake. Who knew? Instead, Rena betrayed a solemn expression as she silently shook her head.


    She sent mental messages to herpanions in private.


    "There¡¯s no need to rush. We¡¯re at the Tower of Fate. Act without thinking, and we might go against the rules of this ce. Moreover, if we were to assume the worst, and Alice seeds the throne of the Witch of Fate, she will have be an individual on the same level as our leaders. If we caught him now and Alice asked us to release himter, do we release him or not?"


    The other Witches of Deceit fell silent.


    "Be patient! As long as Snowlotus is the one to walk out of the Tower, do you think this kid can still get away?"


    The witches of the other branches also conversed as the Witches of Deceit whispered to each other.


    "How is it, Sage Else? Can you figure out which one of them will be the final victor?"


    "My sisters, you think too simply of Fate! The true oue will always remain hidden in the flowing river of Fate. It is difficult for us to grasp the flow of the world¡¯s fate from our narrow and lowly perspective."


    "Alright, alright. Stop giving us a lesson, Sage Elsa. Just tell us everything you saw just now."


    "Very well! I have categorized the candidates that walked into the tower earlier. The power of Fate in those two dozen witch-level candidates has already merged perfectly with their soul origin. If we were to think of the amount of their power of Fate as one unit, then the apprentice-level candidates only have shards of Fate within their bodies. Those apprentices have absolutely no hope of bing the Witch of Fate!"


    "Then those three favored ones?"


    "If we were to take the power of Fate within the witch-level candidates as one unit, then Snowlotus would have four units, and Sofia would have eight. As for Alice..."


    "What is it?"


    "She would have nine units of fate within her!"


    "You mean Alice will be the victor?"


    "No, no, no. I have only described the candidates starting points. The Tower of Fate right now is more like a furnace of fate. All the candidates within it are both the hunters and the prey. As long as they can kill off others quickly, they will be able to absorb their opponent¡¯s powers of Fate. Snowlotus¡¯ fate might have been affected by her n¡¯s actions, but as long as she can kill enough of the other witches and apprentices, she still has a hope to challenge the other two favorites."


    The witches finally understood. A trace of graveness appeared in their gazes towards the Tower.


    If everything before this had been the preparation to allow candidates to be one step ahead of theirpetitors, now was the moment where they could only count on themselves!


    ughter. ughter was the only real theme within the Tower of Fate right now!


    ............


    Within the Tower of Fate.


    The radiance of a teleportation spell shed in a grim corridor. A small and frail silhouette dropped out of the air.


    Ow.


    Alice had no time to rub her hurting ass. She held up the Orb of Deception in one hand and grabbed the golem talisman in the other. Her cute and big eyes opened wide as she looked at her surroundings like a sly gopher.


    Fortunately, the ce she had teleported to was utterly silent. There didn¡¯t seem to be any danger.


    After another dozen seconds, Alice had confirmed the absence of any enemies as well as any magical traps. It was only now that she rxed a little. She put away the treasures she had been holding and started examining this ce she hadnded in.


    She stood in a short and narrow corridor. The floor, walls, and ceiling were all made of stone. Ayer of dust clung to them. Both ends of the hall were thickly shrouded with darkness. Still, with Alice¡¯s vision, she could see that the corridor turned into another direction twenty meters away.


    At the end of her vision were two light yellow walls.


    Moreover, Alice also saw four or five stone doors spread across this short corridor.


    Should she open one of the stone doors and see what¡¯s inside? The most important thing was figuring out her position!


    Having settled on an action n, Alice tilted her head and thought for a while. She then took out a golem crystal from her storage tool and summoned her old friend¨C the Infernal Tyrant.


    The five-meterrge body of the Tyrant was unsuited to this small environment. Fortunately, the Tyrant was an elementium golem. Its body could make adjustments by changing the elementium concentration and distribution of the energy nodes in its body.


    After a period of struggling, the Tyrant painfullypressed itself into a three-meter-tall giant of mes.


    This body was still a littlerge for the corridor, but at least it wasn¡¯t aplete hindrance now.


    The Infernal Tyrant walked to a stone door under Alice¡¯s orders. An expressionless human face surfaced on the dusty stone door, perhaps because it sensed the aura of a living being.


    "Password or key tokens? If you have neither, you will be forbidden."


    The monotone voice of the magical door didn¡¯t manage to finish. The ming fist of the Tyrant bashed the face into the door.


    The door creaked, and a muffled explosion rang out. The magical door finally opened after being ravaged by absolute violence.


    There was a small stone room behind the door. Apart from a simple stone bed, stone desk, and some wooden boxes and closets that hadpletely rotted away, there were no other items of value.


    Apprentice dormitory!


    Alice identified the purpose of this room with a single look.


    Most adept towers would keep apprentice dormitories at the lowest level. Judging from this, Alice was likely at the very bottom of the Tower. It would be a long journey before she could reach the core of the Tower!


    Frantic and chaotic footsteps sounded from the left side of the corridor, right when Alice exited the stone room.


    The next second, a young witch with a sweet appearance charged out of the corner and sprinted towards Alice.


    A wolf-shaped voodoo beast kicked against the stone walls and leaped towards her.


    A candidate and a tower guard?


    Perhaps Alice¡¯s existence had surprised the young witch. The witch couldn¡¯t help but stop her running feet and tripped as a result. She rolled across the ground. The wolf voodoo beast also leaped down from the stone walls and slowly closed in on the two of them with its steady footsteps. Its salivating and fanged mouth was opened wide. The wolf¡¯s resonating growl was its way of intimidating prey.


    "Save me, please. I don¡¯t want to die..." Pincered between the wolf and Alice, the young witch shivered in fright as she pleaded, "As long as you save me, I will listen to everything you say afterward. You can even nt seals and restrictions in my body."


    A sweet smile appeared on Alice¡¯s face when she saw the frantically begging young witch and approaching beast.


    "You are so cute, sister! Who would ever be willing to kill you? Hide behind me; I¡¯ll deal with this voodoo beast!"


    An expression of utmost gratitude and relief appeared on the witch¡¯s face when she heard Alice¡¯s words. She couldn¡¯t even stand up. Instead, she immediately crawled towards Alice as fast as she could.


    A sh of evil intent appeared on her lowered face as she closed in on Alice.


    Five steps.


    Four steps.


    Three steps.


    Almost there. Just a bit more and I can kill this naive little girl.


    The young witch slowly edged close to Alice¡¯s side with feelings of nervousness. She reached for the poisoned dagger within her robe when she bowed to thank Alice.


    Sadly, the roiling mes that suddenly ignited on her body caused her smile to freeze on her face.


    The me giant standing behind Alice extended its massive hand and shot out a stream of burning fire, which instantly engulfed the witch in a sea of me.


    The temperature of the fierce mes reached two thousand degrees. It dealt up to seventy points of damage.


    Such an attack was lethal to a witch that had yet to erect a defensive barrier!


    Every article of clothing on the young witch had ignited. If it hadn¡¯t been for a few stress-activated magical items on her body, she would have died already. She endured the pain from all over her body and waved her poisoned dagger wildly in her moment of blindness. Of course, she didn¡¯t hit anyone.


    A Halo of Repulsion appeared, and her burning body stumbled away from Alice. The witch eventually fell before the wolf.


    Oddly enough, the wolf voodoo beast didn¡¯t attack her. Instead, it leaped in front of her and fired a ck ball of light at the Tyrant.


    Frantic chanting rang out in the corridor, and gray mist spread out from within the witch¡¯s body, which sessfully extinguished the mes.


    The witch, already burned ck by the mes, endured the intense pain and stood up by grabbing onto the wall. She hissed, "You evil brat! Did you see through my deception or had you been nning to kill me all along? Was there anything that gave away my performance earlier?"


    Alice snorted in disdain while hiding behind the Tyrant. She snapped her fingers, and two great Magma Fireballs hurtled in the witch¡¯s direction.


    There was no room for the witch and her voodoo beast to dodge in this narrow corridor. The Magma Fireballs took up more than two-thirds of the space of the hallway.


    Boom.


    Two burnt corpses remained in the corridor after the gigantic explosion. Half of the hall had also copsed under the massive impact of the fireballs.


    From under the protection of the Tyrant, Alice split apart the sea of fire. She appeared at the charred corpse of the witch and coldlymented, "Your performance was impressive. I didn¡¯t see any w in it. That said, your voodoo beast is a poor actor. I have the Orb of Deception on me. If it truly were a guard of the tower, it would have ignored me and attacked the Infernal Tyrant instead. So your death was not without reason!"


    Having said that, Alice brought the Infernal Tyrant along with her and left this ce without ever looking back.

 Chapter 361 To Each Their Own

    Chapter 361 To Each Their Own


    The path in front of her spread out in every direction like a spider¡¯s web. There were turns at every corner, and many rooms could be seen on both sides of the stone wall.


    If this had been an ordinary adventure, Alice wouldn¡¯t have minded taking her time to advance towards the core of the Tower cautiously. However, today was different. A strange and mysterious mist obscured everything.


    Alice didn¡¯t even know the name of the witch she had just killed. She felt like she had absorbed some sort of unique energy substance from the witch when she died. Even Alice¡¯s mind had seemed to be sharper and quicker than before.


    Deep in her heart, Alice had a feeling that this was a ughter contest. Whoever killed the most weaklings and absorbed the most of this unknown substance would have the advantage when everyone met in the core of the Tower.


    This feeling only existed as a vague sense of intuition for most of the witches!


    However, for Alice, this feeling felt like a directive from fate itself.


    Alice immediately ordered the Infernal Tyrant to plow forward, unlike her usual cautious attitude. In fact, she specificallymanded the Tyrant to create asrge of amotion as possible as they knocked down the walls and facilities around them.


    As expected, the uproar attracted enemies.


    They rounded a corner and found themselves face to face with five apprentice witches that had been waiting in preparation.


    All sorts of support spells glowed with various colors around their bodies. They held magic wands and scrolls with different effects and powers in their hands. A small army of stone golems, dirt statues, razor boars, savage wolves, ironback eagles, and other summoned creatures and golems stood before them.


    With their preparations, as well as the uniquely restricted environment, they might have been able to drive away an ordinary adept.


    Sadly, they had to meet Alice and the Infernal Tyrant with her.


    The Infernal Tyrant continued to step forward despite the sight of numerous enemies. It extended its arms, conjuring a blinding wall of fire right in the middle of the army of summoned creatures.


    The fire swiftly spread.


    The eighty points of fire damage from the wall of fire were not something that the apprentice-level creatures could endure!


    The tight formation of the crowd quickly broke down into disarray and chaos.


    Countless beasts and monsters were burned to death in the field of fire and reduced to glowing sparks in the air. Only the stone golems barely struggled and clung on to life with their magic resistance. However, their bodies that had been baked by the intense heat crumbled into pieces before they made it out of the mes. Even the dirt statue couldn¡¯t survive the attack from the Tyrant. It melted into a pile of mud.


    The faces of the five apprentice witches nched. They silently started retreating.


    With their limited knowledge and experience, when had they ever seen a summoned me giant of this power?!


    "Run."


    No one knew who it was that shouted first, but all of the apprentices turned and ran without looking back. Two of them even cast Godspeed and Haste on themselves to get a lead on theirpanions.


    A whistling Explosive Fireball flew into their ranks and exploded.


    The violent waves of fire filled the narrow corridor. The apprentices could never outrun the me shockwave regardless of how fast they could run on their feet.


    The five apprentices¡¯ defensive barriers broke under the strain of multiple me shockwaves. All of them copsed around the corridor. The two corpses at the center of the explosion had reduced to ashes. Not a single shard of bone remained. Only the apprentice witch that had barely made it to the end of the corridor managed to have something resembling a corpse. The fires had utterly charred even her body.


    In human society, these apprentice witches were individuals that every local noble would fight for to be able to invite them to their banquets. Here, they were no more than targets that were easily disposed of. They didn¡¯t even manage to defend against a single attack of the Infernal Tyrant. In fact, they hadn¡¯t even gotten to keep their corpses in death.


    The path that fate had chosen for them was aplete dead end!


    However, Alice had already given up on suchmentings and pity when she was ten. Ever since she had stepped upon this path towards bing the Witch of Fate, she had no other option but to continue forward.


    Alice closed her eyes of the corpses in the pile, and once again confirmed her deductions. Killing other candidates could bring about benefits for herself. These benefits were intangible, but Alice vaguely felt that she was slowly resonating with certainws in the depths of the gxy.


    Some iprehensible arcane knowledge started to seep into her mind. It felt like she understood something, yet it also felt like she hadn¡¯tprehended anything.


    Alice had no time to think about these profound changes. She called the Tyrant over and proceeded down the winding corridors.


    ............


    Arge, vast arcane hall.


    Several milky-white illumination crystals adorned the walls.


    The magic power in these crystals had been wholly exhausted over the years. They didn¡¯t even let out a faint glow.


    Tall bookshelves lined the walls. While there were still some magic books on the shelves, a battle earlier had destroyed most of them.


    Frost lingered in the hall. Ice crystals shattered as more and more moisture in the air froze. The ground was a mess, much like what you would expect after a terrible fight.


    Snowlotus, the Dancer of Ice and Frost, stood in the middle of the hall. She endured the pain from all over her body and slowly started to treat her wounds.


    Her crystalline ice armor had shattered, and several cuts had ripped open on her soft cloth robe. Her snow white skin was exposed for all to see. However, her white skin was now turning ck.


    Snowlotus took out a vial of blue potion and gritted her teeth as she poured it over the wound on her shoulder.


    The sound of eroding flesh sizzled in the room. The ck bruise beneath her skin started to wriggle like a living being. However, the power of ice surrounded the injury. It had nowhere to go. The ck bruise finally split apart under the pressure of the blue potion, and something emerged from the wound.


    The unknown object exploded into mist when it came into contact with the potion; a cloud that quickly dissipated in the air.


    An indescribably pungent odor filled the hall!


    Snowlotus finally had a chance to examine her surroundings once she had treated the worst of the wounds on her body and drank another vial of healing potion to allow her flesh to regenerate.


    Three witches were frozen various in poses in thick blocks of ice. Thet bared their teeth in hatred, and their expressions were also frozen for all to see.


    It was clear that these frozen witches were dead!


    Fifteen minutes earlier, Snowlotus had been lured to this hall by a witch she ¡¯identally¡¯ ran into. Two other witches who had been in hiding had then ambushed her. Snowlotus fought one against three, with the element of surprise against her. Despite sustaining wounds from the initial trap, Snowlotus still managed to turn the tides and kill the three enemies.


    She could feel the powers of Fate flowing into her body. Finally, she sensed that thews of fate that had distanced themselves from her were finally offering their embrace to her once again.


    It seemed that the rumor that killing other candidates would gather the favor of Fate was true. Mm. There was no time to wait. She had to act as swiftly as possible. The weak targets were going to be easily taken down by the otherpetitors.


    Having treated her wounds and scoured the battlefield, Snowlotus pushed apart the wooden door at the side of the hall and silently returned to the intricate corridors of the Tower.


    ............


    In another area at the bottom of the Tower.


    Berserk Witch Sofia was also fighting a fierce battle.


    However, only a few people would recognize her with her current appearance.


    Sofia was considered tall among witches with her original appearance. Her two-meter tall body was even slightly taller than Greem¡¯s. When paired with her humongous muscles and thick limbs, it was often hard to believe that she was a female if it hadn¡¯t been for the two mounds of flesh hanging from her chest.


    However, right now, Sofia¡¯s muscles were quickly increasing in size as the berserker powers surged through her body. Soon, she had turned into a four-meter-tall giantess.


    The muscles of her face were stretched and distorted. The eyepatch on her left eye had also snapped, revealing her stone eye. Cracking sounds came from within her bones as the Berserk Witch rushed forward. The thick wooden staff in her hand had mysteriously increased in size along with her.


    Two witches led a group of apprentice in an attempt to escape from Sofia. Sadly, the giantess was slowly gaining ground with her heavy footsteps that tremored through the floor.


    Countless colorful spells rained upon Sofia¡¯s body like a torrent, but she ignored all the apprentice-level attacks; rookies will always remain as rookies. Their spells were not even enough to break through Sofia¡¯s skin after she went berserk.


    Only the spells cast by the witches caught Sofia¡¯s attention.


    She grabbed objects that littered the corridor and detonated the spells before they reached her, or she merely swatted them out of the sky with her thick wooden staff. The Berserk Witch dodged what she could and deflected the rest. Sofia only chose to cover her face with her arms and endure a spell if she couldn¡¯t avoid or deflect it.


    As long as Sofia reached them, all defensive barriers and shields were meaningless before the might of her wooden staff. Her explosive strength paired well with the heavy wooden staff. Even an official witch wasn¡¯t able to take on a blow from Sofia herself.


    Anyone hit by the Berserk Witch had only one fate¨C to be crushed into meat paste.


    There was no other conclusion for those poor witches!


    The scrambling apprentices finally triggered some magical traps during their frantic retreat. A group of steel guards charged out of hidden spots in the walls withrge shields in hand. Their metallic bodies nged as they joined the ranks of Sofia in ughtering the witches.


    "Dammit! Don¡¯t steal meat from my mouth."


    Sofia flew into a rage when she saw a few apprentices die at the hands of the steel guards.


    "This is my feast. How dare you try and steal it from me. Die! All of you!"


    Sofia charged forward violently as she swung her staff. She instantly crushed four or five of the guards into broken fragments of metal.


    The group of steel guards quickly shifted targets. They gathered together uniformly and charged towards the Berserk Witch with thunderous steps.


    The conflicts in the Tower were bing more and more chaotic!

 Chapter 362 Mysterious Character

    Chapter 362 Mysterious Character


    The inside of the Tower had turned into a killing ground.


    Stone room after stone room, corridor after corridor, hall after hall. Cruel, bloody murders weremitted everywhere people were present.


    It was either two apprentice witches fighting to the death in an arcane hall, or a witch who was hunting down a group of apprentices, or a bunch of apprentices working together to defend against the guards of the tower.


    Even amidst these terrifying battles, there was one young apprentice that walked between all thepetitors, traps, and voodoo beasts. Her power was limited. In fact, one could even say she was the weakest of the candidates.


    For some reason, it was this frail little girl that could die to any singlepetitor or trap that mysteriously passed by one battlefield after another. She had wlessly avoided everything and everyone that could threaten her.


    Sometimes, the end of the corridor she was walking down would be a high-security room full of guards. Just a few minutes before she arrived, a group of apprentices would identally stumble upon the ce and draw away all the guards in the area.


    Most of the time, the girl was only one door away from hunters who were wandering about the corridors and exploring the various rooms. Judging by the mental flux she radiated, she would have been utterly helpless if she ever met a witch or a tower guard. She would even die if she met an apprentice of the same level.


    Still, the massive surprise was how she continuously steered away from trouble. Many of her enemies were inches away from her. They were one turn or one more open door away from spotting the weak girl. However, they were always distracted by a new enemy or a sudden ident and would be forced to leave.


    Once, and it might have been a coincidence. Twice and it could have been luck. However, it was an unending streak of luck and fortune that had apanied the woman ever since she had entered the Tower.


    She silently continued down the dark corridors.


    The enemies in front would pass by the end of the corridor, still engaged in their brutal battle.


    The steel guards hiding in the walls would sense intruders but be unable to move due to the thousand years of corrosion and rust.


    A voodoo beast that lost contact with its owner would smell the girl, but step on a severed head and slip before it could reach her.


    If anyone had been able to see through the walls of the Tower and witness this scene, they would most definitely marvel at the miracle happening to this girl. It was almost like a mysterious deity silently watched over her and shielded her with a pair of invisible hands.


    If Sage Elsa of the Dark Witches could have seen this girl, she would have screamed out in surprise. That was because the powers of Fate in this frail girl¡¯s body was so dense that it had reached a point of qualitative change.


    Neen points!


    The powers of Fate in this girl was as high as neen points. One more point and her fortune would be beyond what an ordinary witch could have!


    It was such a mysterious girl that possessed such tremendous fate, yet her power remained at the lowest level possible¨C a beginner apprentice. The wonder and reasons behind this were enough to make onlookers marvel at the immense capabilities of fate!


    The other candidates were unable to sense her existence. Only Alice and Sofia, who had raised their powers of Fate above ten points through continuous killings, had a vague sense of difort.


    Sofia smashed a steel guard assembled from living armor and crushed an apprentice¡¯s skull with a stomp of her foot. The Berserk Witch abruptly stopped all her actions and turned to look doubtfully in a particr direction.


    There was only a dusty wall there!


    However, Sofia had a feeling out of nowhere that an extremely dangerous beast was inching forward in that direction. If she ignored it, a perilous situation was bound to happen in the future.


    Still, despite all her attempts at sensing with her Spirit, she could not find any trace of life there.


    Was this an omen or an illusion? Or was it confusion in Sofia¡¯s Spirit brought about by the chaotic and intense powers of Fate within the Tower?


    However, a bloody witch with only one arm left barged into the room Sofia was in, right as the Berserk Witch was nning to check out the disturbance.


    Perhaps the witch had run here to avoid the pursuing enemies from behind.


    However, she once again screamed when she saw the dismembered steel guards and the monstrous Sofia. She opened a door at another end of the room and ran away without looking back.


    Sofia looked at the swinging door and sensed the corridor behind her with her Spirit. She hesitated for a second before finally picking up her staff and chasing after the fleeing witch, disappearing behind the door.


    Almost at the same second that Sofia charged through the door, the mysterious girl appeared at one end of the ck corridor and slowly walked towards the other end.


    That was the only path to the next floor of the Tower.


    At the same time, Alice, who had raised her powers of Fate to fourteen points, and Snowlotus, who had raised it to eleven points, were frantically rushing towards this ce by tearing down every wall and door in their way.


    The two knocked down the wooden doors on either side of thisst corridor and arrived at the stairs, right as the mysterious girl¡¯s frail form vanished above the spiral staircase.


    They discovered each other the moment they both arrived in the corridor.


    A very dense aura of fate!


    Alice and Snowlotus sniffed the aura of fate that had lingered in the air with confusion in their eyes. They then cast their gazes to the stone staircase at the end of the corridor before shifting their attention back to each other.


    Once more, eight yearster, their eyes shed.


    They recognized each other in almost an instant.


    "You!"


    "So it¡¯s you!"


    An expression of sudden realization appeared on both of their faces, but an ufortable feeling rose in the depths of their hearts.


    "Do you feel any premonitions?" Alice¡¯s short body appeared even weaker and delicate under the ferocious glow of the Tyrant¡¯s mes.


    "It seems a favored one just walked by here!" Naturally, Snowlotus knew what Alice was asking about. They might have been enemies, but she still felt the need to answer this question.


    That was because this could be crucial to their survival!


    A sinister smile appeared on Alice¡¯s cute face, "Which means there was another favored one other than the three of us! Someone who has never shown her face!"


    "Perhaps the three of us were only the supporting yers after all, and she is the true champion selected by Fate!" Murderous intent appeared on Snowlotus¡¯ face.


    "How about it? Work together to kill her off, then have our showdown after?" Alice suggested.


    "Very well. However, to ensure that we can cooperate properly, it¡¯s best that we sign a simple magical contract!"


    "As you say! You host the contact since it¡¯s your suggestion, then!"


    Snowlotus nodded silently. She started chanting a spell in a soft voice. Her words resonated in the air as magic imbued them. One after another, glowing runes slowly appeared. The runes flew in the air but never crashed into each other, as if there was an invisible hand guiding their movements.


    For a moment, over a hundred of these runes danced around in the air. Their bright colors illuminated the dark corridor. It was a lovely sight.


    The runes were finally guided to their position with the final word of Snowlotus¡¯ spell. Just like that, a magical contract was formed!


    "I have added uses to cooperate and to forbid friendly fire. Take a look and ce your soul mark on it if you find it eptable. The contract will resolve at the time." A trace of a smile appeared on Snowlotus¡¯ face.


    "Wow! Sis Snowlotus is so cool! That said, since it¡¯s rted to our souls, I must take a look at it!" An expression of envy appeared on Alice¡¯s face as she skipped towards Snowlotus.


    Sweet smiles appeared on both of their faces!


    Ten steps.


    Eight steps.


    Five steps.


    Alice¡¯s and Snowlotus¡¯ vision finally shed when they were so close they could hear each other¡¯s breath.


    The trace of murderous intent in the depths of their gleaming eyes couldn¡¯t be hidden, even behind those sweet smiles!


    The two smiling witches acted at the same time without the need for a signal.


    "Shandera¡¯s Polymorph!"


    "Deep Freeze!"


    Alice, who had nned this all along, extended her small hand. Shandera¡¯s Sheepstick appeared in her hand, and a gray light instantly shot into Snowlotus¡¯ body.


    At the same time, the unmoving Infernal Tyrant raised both of its arms as a ferocious pir of scarlet mes started to form beneath Snowlotus.


    Snowlotus wasn¡¯t backing down either.


    An expressionless woman¡¯s face appeared from the contract floating in the air. It pressed its lips together, and a chilling breath of wind blew towards Alice.


    Both of them had plotted this, and surprise caught both of them.


    They had fallen into each other¡¯s traps, even as they tried their best to sabotage and kill the other.


    Polymorph was a form of malicious transfiguration. Only sheer mental will could resist a curse like this if the victim didn¡¯t have magical tools to defend against it. However, the malicious transfiguration effect was absorbed by a strange doll on Snowlotus¡¯ waist when the gray light glowed on her body.


    Substitute Doll!


    A voodoo doll that could help its owner take on lethal attacks, curses, and hexes.


    A voodoo doll like this one was remarkably potent. It typically provided its owner with an extra life. That said, the resources needed to make it were precious. Moreover, it was a one-time-use consumable. There were very few people who had such a doll.


    The cruel me Pir engulfed Snowlotus,pletely enveloping her perfect crystalline body in a fiery ze.


    Alice¡¯s cute and petite body also froze within moments of being exposed to the chilling wind. She had turned into a pretty doll sealed in a block of ice.

 Chapter 363 The Situation Changes

    Chapter 363 The Situation Changes


    A brutal fight had started out of nowhere.


    Two pretty witches that had just been exchanging friendly words had struck each other with everything they had at the moment of contact.


    If the Polymorph had managed to affect Snowlotus, she would have died in the Tyrant¡¯s follow-up attack. However, her Substitution Doll had absorbed the transfiguration effect. Snowlotus, the Dancer of Ice and Frost, was able to act and defend against the me Pir.


    Crack, crack, crack.


    Snowlotus barely avoided being consumed by the mes after many of her ice shields shattered. When she finally escaped from the me Pir, still shrouded in smoke, she crashed right into Alice, who had just broken free of the ice.


    One had been charred ck, with burn marks all over her body. The other had light blue frost all over her shirt and her eyebrows as she coughed out ck blood from her tiny mouth.


    Both of the wicked witches had been severely wounded in their instant of inattention.


    Sworn enemies were fated to a brutal battle when they fought!


    Seeing that their greatest opponent had yet to die, both of the witches immediately started their next round of attacks without any regard for their wounds.


    Aaaaaah!


    A deste witch¡¯s cry rang out, and the five-meter wide and three-meter tall corridor instantly filled with many chilling currents that could freeze one to their bones. Several ice des and snow swords were hidden in the dire winds,shing out and cutting everything in this tiny space.


    Alice¡¯s face dropped. She immediately attempted to retreat into the distance without hesitation.


    However, her feet wouldn¡¯t move despite struggling several times.


    Alice looked down, and her expression became even more solemn.


    She didn¡¯t know when, but her red deer hide boots were once again covered in ice and frost.


    Just then, a zing stream of crimson fire sted from above her head, forcefully deflecting the whistling des of ice.


    Ice and snow shed right above Alice¡¯s head. The waves of heat and cold surged all over her body, causing her tremendous agony. One moment she felt like she had been thrown into a furnace, and the next her body shivered from the cold.


    However, the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s ability was more than enough to dominate a newly advanced adept like Snowlotus. Soon, the contact point of the mes and the ice started to push back towards Snowlotus.


    The Dancer of Ice and Frost went pale as she continued to channel her powers. She red at Alice. Her prey was right in front of her, yet she could do nothing about it. Snowlotus turned to leave, giving up on this pointless battle!


    The Infernal Tyrant¡¯s stream of fire immediately gained the advantage. It vaporized the ice crystals in the air and crashed against the Ice Wall that Snowlotus had set up in her retreat. When the fire finally melted the ice and spread to the wooden door behind it, Snowlotus was nowhere to be found.


    "Dammit, I can¡¯t let her escape! After her!" Alice had the Tyrant melt the ice on her feet and hastily gave an order to the Tyrant.


    With the Tyrant in front and Alice behind the golem, the two of them chased after Snowlotus by tracing the cold aura in the air.


    However, just as the three were engaged in the pursuit and ravaging the arcane halls of the ground floor, something happened. The Tower trembled as if some subtle change had urred.


    At this moment, it wasn¡¯t just Alice and Snowlotus that stopped their fighting. All the candidates at the bottom of the Tower had finished as well. They examined and looked for any changes around them with caution written all over their faces.


    The ones that managed to survive until now were either strong people or lucky ones. All of them were extremely perceptive to any changes in fate that could affect their futures. Right now, a dense aura of destiny filled the entire Tower. Their prided intuition and fate senses were frantically warning them.


    It was as if... there was some terrifying, unknown danger slowly marching towards them!


    "What happened? Why can¡¯t I sense my future anymore?"


    "Yeah, my divination spells seem to no longer work."


    "Something¡¯s wrong. It¡¯s like someone is manipting us from behind."


    "What should we do?"


    The fierce enemies that had just been tearing into each other a moment earlier all hesitated. Without fate¡¯s guidance, none of them knew what to do next or where to go.


    A blinding white light appeared beneath the candidates¡¯ feet during their sh of panic. A semi-translucent runic array appeared and engulfed everyone within its radius.


    The weaker candidates didn¡¯t even have a chance to struggle. They all disappeared into the white light. Only five or six of the witches managed to break free of the array and were not teleported away.


    "Short-distance teleportation arrays?" Alice mumbled to herself after breaking free of the runic array with the Tyrant¡¯s help.


    The energy aura surging through the array was very familiar to Alice. It was the unique frequency of spatial teleportation.


    Someone had initiated spatial teleportation within the Tower. That meant that someone had obtained part of the authority over the Tower¡¯s controls. This news was not a good thing from any perspective!


    Perhaps it was indeed time to have a truce with the other two and do away with this mysteriouspetitor first.


    Alice started to contemte this possibility as she led the Tyrant toward the next floor of the Tower.


    She sensed it very clearly. All the candidates that had been teleported away had gathered somewhere upstairs. The mysterious candidate was scheming something in doing this; she did not mean well. Most likely, the girl wanted to interrupt Alice, Sofia, and Snowlotus¡¯ hunt.


    It could not be allowed! It didn¡¯t matter what the mysterious girl¡¯s intentions or ns were. They could not be allowed toe to fruition. Otherwise...


    The other witches that hadn¡¯t been transported believed the same as Alice. They paused for a second before following different paths and making their way toward the second level.


    ............


    Everyone that had been teleported felt their vision go ck.


    However, they quickly regained sight before they could panic.


    The silence in the air broke. A tide of moring noise came from all around the group.


    That was the sound of cheering, loud as crashing waves. The noise ferociously dug into their ears. When everyone finally got used to the blinding light and the deafening cheers, they lifted their heads and saw where they were.


    It was arge za!


    No, more urately, this was a filled arena. And the candidates were like pigs andmbs to be ughtered for the entertainment of the audience.


    The light from above was far too intense. The re made it impossible for them to see the faces of the audience. Still, all the candidates already knew that those weren¡¯t actual people, but images projected through the use of magic!


    Although no one knew what was going to happen next, the intense feeling of danger in their hearts sent a clear signal to them: death was inevitable if they stayed here!


    "I am not going to wait around in this ce!" A witch took out a flying broom from her storage tool and took to the skies as she shouted.


    Not all adepts knew flying or teleportation spells. If there was no such spell in their innate elementium talent, flying brooms and magic carpets were the next best alternative.


    The other witches also had simr tricks up their sleeves. However, most of them were extremely cautious. Now that someone was testing the waters, the witches suppressed their desire to escape and watched the reckless witch that flew further and further into the sky.


    There was no chance the enemy would let them escape so easily after transporting them here.


    Everyone was smart enough to know this. However, only a few were able to bear the intense pressure and act ording to logic in this moment of danger! Most witches would act like this witch, controlled by their fear and moving without hesitation.


    As expected, a blinding electrical st came from the skies under everyone¡¯s watchful gaze. The witch fell like a stone, smashing a tiny crater into the ground.


    Her body had been thoroughly charred ck. Even her robe had shredded into ribbons under the force of the electric currents.


    "Let¡¯s drag her back and treat her! We might need her helpter." A witch with a sinister appearance gave out an order like that.


    Most of the people gathered here were apprentices. Two of them immediately went out and grabbed the witch. They then had her drink potions and healed her with nt-attribute healing spells. In the end, they managed to save the witch.


    As the apprentices were busy doing this, the eleven other witches had gathered together and silently looked at the stands. They were not sure, but they all had a feeling. The wicked person behind all this was hiding within these projections, quietly enjoying everyone¡¯s struggle and agony.


    "I have tried. We can¡¯t teleport out of here." A witch said resentfully.


    "We can¡¯t leave through the ground either!" Another witch added.


    "It seems the only way out is through force," The witch with the sinister appearance grit her teeth and spoke, "But before we act, all of us here must swear with the cruelest of curses! We are not to fight among ourselves until we get out of this goddamned ce!"


    "Naturally!"


    "I agree!"


    "Agreed!"


    The gates of the arena in the distance suddenly opened as they discussed the issue at hand.


    Metallic nging rang out throughout the field, and row after row of metal animated statues marched out of the gates with uniform steps. They pressed on like a wallposed of metal.


    Ten steel statues stood in a row. There were ten rows in total. That meant that their enemies were a total of a hundred steel statues.


    All of the witches and apprentices paled with fear!

 Chapter 364 Gruesome Battle

    Chapter 364 Gruesome Battle


    Steel statues.


    As the name implied, these were humanoid constructs of steel.


    These steel statues were often three and a half meters tall and around 2,200 kilograms in weight.


    They had humanoid forms forged from steel. The surface of their bodies was smooth and reflected the lights from above. Complex runic circuits and patterns were engraved on their metallic shells. The chest of the statues appeared to be extremely wide, a design feature to better protect the control and energy cores within their bodies.


    Their attack and defense relied upon the giant tower shield in their left hand and the giant sword in their right hand. That said, these monsters were still shocking fighters with their bare fists.


    Creating a statue golem was unquestionably a difficult task. The cost of the materials was expensive. The process was strict and required high precision. It took a lengthy period of time, money, and resources. Sometimes it would even take several dozen adepts and apprentices working together to create these steel statues. Moreover, the final stage of animating these golems also required the existence of a high-grade adept to awaken the constructs.


    These strict conditions caused the steel statues to be expensive products that onlyrge adept organizations could afford. An army of steel statues like this one could note into being without the support of a massive energy pool reserve as well as plenty of money.


    Today, this ragtag group of witches and apprentices would have to fight this frightening army. They were falling apart at the very thought of it!


    The weak magical attacks of the apprentices were not even going to be able to pierce through the golem¡¯s thick, magic resistant shells. Moreover, their fragile bodies would not be able to endure the opponent¡¯s heavy des, regardless of the defensive spells they cast on themselves.


    This... how was a battle like this supposed to go on?!


    The witches and apprentices had lost all confidence even before the fight!


    However, there was no surrender or escape in this fight. The group forcefully gathered together and prepared for a cooperative battle to the death.


    They could see that none of the three favored ones were amongst them. It meant that there were still reinforcements outside of this unique battlefield. Those people might not want to save them, but if they tried to stop the person behind this, they would have to interfere with her n to ughter all these witches.


    This thought was the only thing keeping the party together!


    The entire arena was two hundred meters wide and five hundred meters long. It had more than enough space for the statues and the witches. However, the wall of steel that pressed towards them greatly restricted the witches¡¯ space. They could only move around one-third of the arena¡¯s space.


    Moreover, this space gradually shrank as the army of steel continued to march forward.


    "Hold them back. Hold the army back. We cannot let them continue to walk forward," A witch shouted, "Everyone who knows Swamp and Quicksand, throw it at their feet now."


    The chaotic and scattered group finally organized when someone tookmand.


    Intense elementium flux radiated in the air. One after another, the spells and halosnded in front of the steel statues.


    The ground of the arena was rough and hard ck dirt. That said, it wasn¡¯t enhanced with any magical protection. The first wave of attacks from the witches immediately took effect. The ck soil spontaneously turned into soft quicksand and dirty swamps filled with mud and acid.


    The first row of steel statues was still attempting to walk forward, but their thick metal legs had stuck into the swamps. In fact, their weight also forced them to sink deeper and deeper into the ground.


    However, the statues appeared to be controlled by someone.


    The second row of statues stopped at the edge of the swamps and quicksand. They sheathed their metal swords and took out short metal spears from their backs.


    "Prepare to dodge."


    "Be careful of their thrown spears."


    The witches began shouting when they saw what wasing.


    Their voices were overwhelmed by the ear-piercing whistle of the spears as they sailed through the air.


    Phew, phew, phew.


    Ten long, metal throwing spears, a meter long and thick as an egg, whizzed through the air. They pierced into the witches¡¯ formation with piercing dynamic force.


    Their battle n was crude, and their attack was simple. However, it was very effective.


    The metal spears pierced two apprentices that hadn¡¯t managed to dodge in time and pinned them to the ground. Although they missed the vitals and didn¡¯t cause instant death, the apprentices were still immobilized when the spears pierced through their legs or shoulders.


    They endured the intense pain and called for help, but the reinforcing apprentices were unable to remove the deeply embedded spears even with all their strength.


    The scream of yet another apprentice caused everyone¡¯s heart to wither, even as panic and chaos still engulfed them.


    "Be careful. The statues are still throwing spears."


    This time, it wasn¡¯t just the statues in the second row.


    The third row of steel statues had arrived. They too switched to their metal throwing spears, and twenty fearsome projectilesunched at the witches.


    Phew, phew, phew.


    The slightly panicked formation ultimately fell into chaos after this wave of attacks.


    The powers of the witches meant that their defensive spells were unlikely to be breached by such simple physical attacks. However, the apprentices didn¡¯t have such power. They became the most significant victims in this storm of steel and metal.


    Aside from one unfortunate apprentice who was hit directly in the head, seven apprentices had been pinned to the ground.


    The arena swelled with their pleading and agonizing cries for help!


    This scene was a massive, torturous blow for the apprentices that had yet to be hurt. They ran around, not knowing what to do as they took out all sorts of magical tools. They took out everything and anything they had and used them in hopes of increasing their defense. They cast every single spell they knew of that could protect them from physical attacks.


    "We can¡¯t just be sitting targets like this," The sinister-looking witch shouted, "Attack. Quick, attack; use every means at your disposal. Counterattack now..."


    The witches and apprentice seem to have broken out of their panic with her yelling. They immediately started chanting spells or taking out seeds, bones, and other casting materials from their storage tools.


    The witches¡¯ counterattacknded on the steel statues after a few seconds.


    Several seeds dug into the ground once theynded. A short momentter, the earth split apart, and dust was sent flying into the sky. Vines as thick as a child¡¯s arm reached out from underground andshed at the statues like giant serpents.


    Hiss.


    The rapidly growing buds on the roots of the nts quickly amassed together amid a weird hissing sound. The roots and vines turned into odd mouths that started biting and gnawing away at the bodies of the steel statues. Pungent acid dripped out of their green mouths as they bit the figures. Smoke rose to the skies when the acidnded on the metallic shells of the golems.


    A dense rain of bone spikes fell upon the statues as the nt creatures entangled them.


    ng. ng. ng.


    The sharp bone spikes exploded on the sturdy bodies of the statues and splintered into pieces of bone. Sadly, they did no visible damage to the figures, other than leaving white spots on their armor.


    The magical alloy used in forging steel statues had exceptional physical and magical defense. Ordinary spells and attacks were unlikely to damage them at all. Only powerful spells or physical damage far above the limits of their guards could destroy them.


    However, the witches had none of these!


    That said, the twisting vines did indeed sessfully throw the army¡¯s formation into disarray. The intensity of the fight between the nt monsters and the metallic golems was breathtaking.


    Three steel statues had already fallen in a shroud of ck smoke with the harassment of the vines and thebined attacks of several witches.


    The emboldened witches immediately summoned more elementium creatures to fight against the statues. It didn¡¯t matter if they couldn¡¯t hurt their enemies; they could still cause chaos to the enemy ranks.


    While the first three rows of statues were dragged into a chaotic fight, the two rows of figures behind them had been smart enough to nk to the left and right. It appeared they intended to wrap around the swamp and continue their assault. Metal spears continued to shower down against the witches.


    The two parties fought with all they had with a small swamp of twenty meters to keep them apart.


    The witches ran around and panted as they chanted their spells with trembling voices. They hurled acid balls at the joints of the statues and tried their very best to dodge the thrown spears.


    Fifty witches dodged spears and counterattacked within a small space of less than a hundred and thirty square meters. Everyone was busy fighting. At the same time, the apprentices fell all around them, pinned to the ground by the thick, heavy spears.


    A frail and mysterious girl wrapped in a ck cloak walked through the bloody battlefield amidst the chaos.


    It was strange. Extremely strange!


    The chaos of the battle was a stark contrast to her calmness. It felt so out of ce. However, she still walked at her own pace, passing by the frantic apprentices one by one.


    All of a sudden, she stopped and squatted beside an apprentice that had been pinned to the ground by a spear in her right shoulder. The apprentice¡¯s voice had gone entirely hoarse from crying in agony. Blood stained her entire body. She no longer had the strength to call for help.


    It was only when the mysterious girl¡¯s form obscured the bright light from above that the dying apprentice noticed her.


    She had a slim figure and a pretty face. However, the bright lighting behind her obscured her exact looks. The girl¡¯s gentle smile had a natural charm to it. The apprentice extended her trembling hands and spoke herst call for help.


    "Sa... save me. I... do not want... to die."


    A single sentence, and yet she stuttered so much. It was apparent that her life force was running out.


    She was on the verge of death!


    The mysterious girl extended a white, sacred hand and covered the apprentice¡¯s eyes. She whispered into her ears, "Don¡¯t worry, I¡¯m here!"


    The body of the dying apprentice trembled. Her weak and powerless eyes immediately opened wide. Hatred, resentment, anger, and confusion reflected in her pupils.


    However, with thest drop of her life force draining away, all the light in her eyes faded away.


    The mysterious girl gently removed the dagger from the apprentice¡¯s chest and slowly got up, walking towards her next target!

 Chapter 365 The Girl Hidden By Fate

    Chapter 365 The Girl Hidden By Fate


    The battle raged on.


    Meanwhile, the mysterious girl continued to drift through the chaotic battlefield like an invisible god of death.


    She wasn¡¯t actually invisible. Nor did she have any defensive spells cast on herself. A misfired throwing spear would have killed her in an instant if it had struck her frail body. Even the apprentices frantically running around would have severely wounded her if they crashed into the girl.


    However...


    It was almost like everything was within her design, and that a spell of Mass Hypnotic Suggestion had been cast upon all the witches here. No one seemed to have noticed the strange irregrity that was this girl. It was like she was only the background; like she was just thin air that was not worth seeing.


    And everywhere she went, there was a severely wounded apprentice hanging by a thread of their life.


    A delicate body, in robes, and an unenchanted dagger. Yet she still managed to steal away the lives of five apprentice witches. The other surviving witches and apprentices only thought of them as natural deaths from blood loss.


    They were utterly unaware of the terrifying presence of a death god amongst them. She was an existence that silently paid a visit to all who were at the brink of death.


    The steel statue army had the ability to crush the group of witches. However, they appeared to be a clumsy bunch of metal tin cans under the directed control of the mysterious girl. The statues either chose to throw spears across the stretch of swamp, or they formed groups and slowly walked around the swamp.


    Their strategy might have seemed foolish, but it was, in fact, a fantastic maneuver. All the witches and apprentices that were hit by the spears or knocked away by the nking statues were always wounded but never killed. This arrangement made it very convenient for the mysterious girl to go about on her harvest.


    The mighty army of statues was like a noose around the necks of the witches. It slowly tightened and strangled the witches, but it wouldn¡¯t kill them directly. After all, the steel statues were only obeying the mysterious girl¡¯s orders due to the authority of the Tower. They weren¡¯t contracted beings under hermand. Thus, deaths at the hands of the statues were not considered kills of the mysterious girl.


    The Tower absorbed the powers of Fate within the bodies of those who had died to the statues and gathered the energy at its core. The mysterious girl was not going to get even a sliver of fate from their deaths.


    This was why she intentionally created such an odd situation, continuously bleeding out the witches and creating opportunities for her to ughter them personally!


    Sadly, the witches were much more powerful than the apprentices, and a great deal more powerful than she was. Consequently, not a single one of the eleven witches were critically wounded. Of course, this meant that the mysterious girl hadn¡¯t been able to reap the life of even one witch. She also didn¡¯t dare get too close to any one of the witches.


    After all, if any of them had raised their power of Fate above ten points, they would be able to sense her existence. She was too frail and weak. There was no way she could endure even one magical attack.


    Even if there was a dying witch on the battlefield, the mysterious girl wasn¡¯t sure she could survive a spell cast by the witch before her death.


    Thus, the girl could only choose to wander around the perimeter of the group of witches and subtly harvest the fruits of war!


    The mysterious girl once again walked to the side of an exhausted apprentice cowering on the ground. However, this time, the girl stopped and turned to look somewhere in the distance.


    A new enemy had arrived!


    The strange girl turned and quickly left the arena without any hesitation. The exhausted and utterly inattentive apprentice that had just brushed past death suddenly turned and looked behind her in confusion.


    Just then, she had felt a sinister aura around her, but that aura had suddenly vanished as quickly as it came. If it weren¡¯t because of the immediate difference between the presence and absence of the ufortable feeling, she wouldn¡¯t even have been able to sense the aura! Especially with the battle still raging around her!


    Dammit! Could somebody have snuck beside her side earlier?


    The apprentice witch felt a chill run down her spine when the thought popped up in her head. The terror and fear of realization were enough to petrify herpletely.


    ............


    Inside a vast and magnificent hall.


    Over fifty witches and apprentices were lying around or running around the center of the empty hall. There were no enemies or monsters around them, but they continued to attack and defend with all they had. It was as if they were fighting with an invisible creature.


    asionally, there were even some apprentices who would fall to the ground.


    There were no wounds on their bodies, but they continued to cry out in pain. Their mental flux and life force also continuously dropped.


    That wasn¡¯t the only thing odd about the whole situation!


    There were absolutely no magical facilities or runic tools in this massive space. The only things here were theplex runic circuits and the profound magical symbols spread all over the walls, ceiling, and the floor.


    Strange blue light filled the entire room, showering the witches in a sea of blue radiance. Everyone was fighting with all their might in the illusion. In reality, not a single one of them was casting a spell. In fact, not one of them was moving. They just stood still on the spot.


    As for the army of steel statues?


    After a thousand years of aging, only about three dozen golem guards remained functional. The steel statues might have been animated lifeforms and didn¡¯t possess the limitations of life that humans had. However, thousands of years of corrosion was more than enough to immobilize them.


    Their steel bodies might not decay, but the runic circuits and energy centers in their bodies couldn¡¯t possibly remain undamaged after so many years! The animating souls within their control centers had already vanished and dispersed without proper treatment and maintenance over the past thousand years.


    The construct golems might have been imed to be undying, but they did indeed still have a lifespan of their own!


    The mysterious girl quickly left the illusion and turned to leave the hall.


    The moment she appeared at the stone door and entered the corridor, she heard a massive rumblinging from the distance.


    Judging by themotion, it seemed like a strong group of individuals were rushing to this ce, disassembling everything in their way as they hurried over!


    I can¡¯t let those powerfulpetitors interrupt my harvesting. Mm, let¡¯s find them some enemies to deal with!


    The mysterious girl mused and drew out a card from the stack of exquisite tarot cards floating beside her.


    The other tarot cards suddenly dimmed and faded away as this card activated.


    The tarot card that the girl had chosen slowly flipped over before the girl¡¯s eyes. Its picture was revealed.


    It was a Minor Arcana. The picture drawn on the card was that of a hideous dark skeleton construct. Two small runes glowed in the corner of the card. The mysterious girl recognized these two magical runes that contained profound arcane knowledge. The runes meant ¡¯Shadesteel.¡¯


    The mysterious girl chanted the name of the card under her breath. The card then lit up when she touched with her fingers. This special tarot card disappeared without a trace.


    The next second, four strange ck silhouettes emerged from the shadows beneath the mysterious girl.


    Shadesteel animated statues. These were a type of powerful construct creatures with power rivaling that of an elite adept. They were made of a metal that could only be found and forged in shadow nes, and were sturdy and stealthy guards.


    Shadesteel statues were easily mistaken for undead creatures. They had the appearance of skeletons and moved about silently like ghosts and spirits. Unlike other constructs, shadesteel statues were extremely good at concealing themselves. They could freely blend into the shadows.


    A Shadesteel statue was approximately two meters in height. Despite their appearance of hovering in the air, they were seven hundred kilograms in weight.


    Judging from their looks, the metal used to create the Shadesteel statues seemed to absorb almost all light. They appeared to bepletely and utterly ck. Mist filled the insides of their skeletal ribs, while sharp metal ws hung at the ends of their arms. A sinister skull-like head was fixed right above their bodies. These constructs didn¡¯t seem to possess necks. They moved slowly but silently, circling above the ground without making a sound.


    "Go! Stop them and kill them all!" The mysterious girl spoke for the first time.


    Her voice was chilly, exquisite, and even ethereal. However, there was an odd trace of depth and maturity to it. There was a sense of time that didn¡¯t fit her young age.


    The four Shadesteel statues calmly blended into their surroundings after receiving their orders. They vanished without a trace.


    ............


    Alice frowned at the same time the girl had summoned one of the rare few trump cards left in the tower. She stopped moving.


    Snowlotus, who had been traveling with her but keeping a certain distance, also stopped. She asked coldly, "Why are you stopping? I can sense that ce. It isn¡¯t far away!"


    Sofia, who had been leading the way, smashed apart the stone wall in front of them and turned back in disdain, "Why else? She must be afraid! Of the five of us, she¡¯s the one with the weakest body. Who else would be afraid if it wasn¡¯t her.¡±


    Two other witches followed behind the three favored candidates. They appeared to be Amanda and Doris, the two witches that had shed with Alice earlier.


    The five of them had formed a temporary team and seemed like they wouldn¡¯t stop before they managed to split the mastermind into pieces. However, their faces betrayed their wandering thoughts. All of them had sinister ns of their own.


    The muscr and unrefined Sofia was about to insult Alice further. However, just then, some of the more sensitive witches put on an expression of surprise and fear. Someone yelled, "Watch out..."


    Four strange shadows emerged from the darkness around Sofia as she tensed her muscles in preparation.


    Eight dark ws stabbed towards her body from every direction.

 Chapter 366 Enemy Assault

    Chapter 366 Enemy Assault


    Today was most likely Alice¡¯s lucky day.


    If those four shadesteel statues had picked her as the first target, she would have been a cold and unmoving corpse right now.


    No. Alice¡¯s soul and body would likely have been transformed into an undead creature from the intense negative energy shockwaves from the statues¡¯ attacks. For her, this was an oue even more horrifying than death!


    Luckily, they had chosen to attack Sofia first!


    Perhaps it was because she was too far ahead, or maybe it was because herrge size was too eye-catching. No matter the reason, when the four shadesteel statues emerged from the shadows, all eight of their sharp ws shed towards Sofia.


    The Berserk Witch¡¯s response was immediate.


    She had instantly picked up on the irregrity around her, even without the others¡¯ warnings.


    The shadesteel statues were able to appear everywhere without any prior indication thanks to this ability of theirs. Their bodies could freely travel between this ne and the shadow ne. As long as there were shadows, their dense bodies would be weightless, and they would be able to swim like a fish within the shadow substance freely.


    No noise, no obstructions, and no significant energy fluctuations. The only indication of their approach was the sudden increase in density of shadow particles around their victim. It was hard to even pick up on the slight increase in shadow particles if one wasn¡¯t explicitly sensing for it.


    However, Sofia was a candidate with thirteen points of the power of Fate. Her Spiritual senses didn¡¯t rely so much on her Spirit itself but the warnings from Fate.


    Thus, Sofia instantly went berserk the moment danger fell upon her.


    Sofia¡¯s body was already muscr and healthy before her transformation. She looked more like a warrior than an adept. Right now, her body swelled up in size, and her muscles became even thicker and more robust. Veins popped up across her arms and her body. She looked just like a mighty god standing above mortals in her current state.


    Her thick wooden staff also appeared to be a Soul Equipment. The staff also started increasing in size when she did. Sofia waved the weapon as if it weighed nothing and instantly blew away two of the shadesteel statues that hade too close.


    However, she was injured at the same time. Blood started to flow from her left shoulder, left ribs, her hip, and her right leg.


    The berserk Sofia ignored all the wounds on her body. The staff in her hands fell like a thunderstorm, beating down on every shadesteel statue that tried to escape. She didn¡¯t even allow the shadesteel statue near her the time to meld into the shadows. Sofia violently smashed its head apart and crushed its body to pieces.


    The shadesteel statues were a particr kind of statue specializing in assassination. They weren¡¯t known for their toughness, but for their phantom-like ability to vanish and reappear without a sound. This weakness was why a single hit from the ferocious Sofia destroyed the shadesteel statue.


    It was only now that Snowlotus¡¯ Frost Shield and Amanda¡¯s Energy Barriernded on Sofia¡¯s body. Unfortunately, Sofia¡¯s body had powerful magic resistance upon turning into her berserk witch form.


    Her magic-resistant body helped her endure the harmful energy shockwave from the shadesteel statues¡¯ attacks, as well as the shadow damage from their ws. However, her resistance also reduced the effects of her teammates¡¯ healing and enhancement abilities.


    Sofia had always traveled and fought alone after she had advanced to a berserk witch. She rarely ever formed groups with others. The main reason for that was her inability to benefit from the buffs and enhancements from her teammates!


    That said, there was always an upside to everything. Sofia¡¯s berserk form might have caused her to lose the ability to benefit from enhancement spells, but she had unexpectedly also gained powerful regenerative abilities.


    The three remaining shadesteel statues had just vanished, and already the gashes on Sofia¡¯s body was healing at a visible rate. The wounds on her body, which would have been considered grievous and critical on any other witch, would heal within three to five minutes at the speed they were closing up.


    "Goddamned cowards. Only know how to hide in those shadows. This bad bitch will beat you to scraps if any of youe out again." Sofia stomped on the broken body of the shadesteel statue and cursed out loud. Her wild and ferocious attitude was on full disy.


    Everyone present knew that she was the only one that could taunt these phantom assassins. The other witches had to start cing defensive spells on themselves immediately.


    "Mass Bull¡¯s Strength!" (Strength +2)


    "Mass Cat¡¯s Agility!" (Agility +2)


    "Mass Bear¡¯s Endurance!" (Physique +2)


    "Mass Fox¡¯s Cunning!" (Intelligence +2)


    "Negative Energy Protection!"


    "Shadow Protection!"


    "Prediction!"


    "Haste!"


    ......


    Given their normal rtionships, the witches never would have cast beneficial spells on each other. However, amon enemy that wanted to kill all of them had appeared before them.


    Thus, the former enemies had no choice but to turn into allies. None of them dared hide any of their abilities. All of them took out the magic scrolls they had been saving to enhance their powers.


    All these spells and enhancement halos caused the witches¡¯ attributes to increase exponentially. Everyone wrapped themselves inyers of energy barriers and defensive spells. In doing so, not one of them could be killed in a single hit by the shadesteel creatures, even if they didn¡¯t have Sofia¡¯s monstrous Physique.


    Alice¡¯s actions were even more extreme. She immediately summoned a tank-like spider golem and dove into its abdomen without another word. Her body waspletely hidden within the golem.


    The Berserk Witch grunted, then continued to walk forward with the staff on her shoulder.


    An ice barrier also enveloped Snowlotus¡¯ body. She quickly kept up with Sofia.


    Amanda threw out two vials of potions and summoned two humanoid storm elementals, and walked in the middle of the group with Doris beside her. Alice controlled the spider golem and moved with the Infernal Tyrant at the rear of the group.


    This formation took into consideration the profession traits of Snowlotus, Amanda, and Doris. The path they chose to walk down focused more on support and elementium spells. Their chance of survival was far lower than Sofia and Alice if the shadesteel statues ever attacked them.


    However, an ear-grinding metallic noise came from the distance, right when they had justpleted their formation.


    Twenty stumbling, animated armors, and a hundred modified voodoo beasts formed a massive army that closed in on them.


    It was only when the army stepped into range of the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s light that the witches saw their actual faces.


    Terrible! Incredibly terrible!


    The twenty-seven armored guards were Animated Armors. One could see the shroud of ck smoke within their bodies through the gaps in their rusty armor. These armored guards had already eroded over a thousand years. A trail of rusted metal parts followed behind them, falling off every so often as they dragged their stiff metallic bodies toward the enemy.


    A lot of the armored guards had severely corroded knee guards and legs. The lower half of their bodies couldn¡¯t even support the weight of armor anymore. Their legs crumbled into pieces and left the upper half of their body crawling on the ground.


    Guards like these were so weak that not even a powerful warrior was needed to defeat them. The frail Amanda could probably smash them to pieces with the Bull¡¯s Strength she had applied to herself!


    It was the same for the other voodoo beasts.


    The voodoo beasts with any sort of life were all dead. The only ones left were the undead beasts.


    Bodaks, banshees, wraiths, mummies...


    These voodoo beasts were bound to the Tower by their contracts. Yet, none of them had been nourished with soul or flesh in a thousand years. They were all thirsty and hungry for food. They immediately flew into a riot when they sensed the aura of life in this ce. They had ignored the order given by the mysterious girl and left the army¡¯s formation. They surged forward and lunged at the witches.


    There were five Mummy Elders and three Revenant Banshees in the group. All of them had once been Third Grade undead creatures. However, the extended period of soul deterioration had caused their abilities to fall to the elementary stage of Second Grade. They could scarcely be considered as weakened Second Grade creatures.


    Still, their sudden assault put tremendous pressure on the group of witches.


    Alice controlled the spider golem and used its four pairs of sharp limbs to leap over the witches. The golem appeared beside Sofia at the front of the formation.


    The key to surviving this wave of enemies was whether they could endure their violent blows!


    Putting aside the slow and immobile armored guards, mummies, and bodaks, the first to reach them were the spirit undead.


    The three revenant banshees led the charge. They let out wailing screams as they lunged towards the center of the group.


    The screams of the revenant banshees had the terrifying ability to tear apart the souls of living creatures. Individuals without soul protection weren¡¯t able to do anything against their attacks. Physical defenses and energy barriers counted for nothing. The screams of the banshees were considered soul-attribute magic. They could ignore all defenses that were not of the soul-attribute!


    The means by which revenant banshees killed was not through direct attacks, but by uttering their deste wails right their enemy¡¯s ears! All souls were as fragile as ss before this unbelievably ear-piercing screech. People would shatter into pieces!


    If a soul was tough enough, it might be able to endure the damage. However, the constant tearing from the howls and screeches would cause tremendous impact to the soul. A person would lose all ability to resist and could only watch as the banshees turned into shadows and dived into their body.


    Indeed. The other innate ability that the banshees held was Possession!


    They could temporarily take control of a body and achieve the effect of ¡¯betrayal.¡¯


    During that time frame, while the banshee possessed a body, it would be a ¡¯traitor¡¯ in the group.

 Chapter 367 Battle

    Chapter 367 Battle


    Three Second Grade Banshees assaulted the group and attempted to let out their Death Screeches!


    That was a disaster that could not be allowed to happen.


    The Banshees would most definitely exterminate the group if the monsters managed to use their spell.


    Almost at the same time that the revenant banshees charged towards the group, a Halo of Repulsion emerged from the Infernal Tyrant. Waves of fire continuously spread outwards, forcing everything except the witches away. The three banshees froze in the air like a raft trying to row upstream. The me shockwave had obstructed them. Their spirit bodies sizzled, and they cried in agony. Still, they couldn¡¯t make it to the witches.


    Just then, the five mummy elders dragged their stiff bodies and lurched at the witches. The mummy shrouds on them were covered with runes that could freely switch between various attributes.


    The runes on their shrouds shed when they saw the might of the Tyrant¡¯s fire. The shroud attributes had been modified to maximize fire resistance. Their ck hands stretched towards the witches.


    "You hold back the banshees, and I¡¯ll deal with these big monsters."


    Sofia waved her staff and charged forward after saying that.


    The banshees had breakneck flight speed and were extremely good at gueri warfare. They were not the kinds of enemies that Sofia liked to fight. Inparison, these mummy elders were slow but strong. Corpse Rot Poison and Hysteresis Halos apanied each of their attacks. These attacks happened to be ineffective against the Berserk Witch¡¯s magic resistance. That was why Sofia was so eager to fight with them.


    Both of them were meat-shield professions.


    The mummy elders might have fallen to Second Grade, but their impressive Strength and Physique were still above that of Sofia¡¯s. If it weren¡¯t because of their low agility, which limited their movement speed and attack speed, Sofia would have no ability to hold her own against these monsters.


    Usually, the mummy elders were able to rely on their Hysteresis Halos to drag the opponent¡¯s speed down to their level. They would then use their unreasonable physical defense and theirck of critical weakness as undead to slowly grind the enemy to death.


    Sadly, they met Sofia today.


    Berserk witches sacrificed all of their casting ability in exchange for astounding magic-resistant physiques and exceptional closebat skills.


    The mummies shambled around when Sofia charged into their ranks and started smashing them. They waved their ck ws, but the only thing they grabbed were the afterimages left behind by Sofia.


    Snowlotus blew an Arctic Frostbreath in their way and further slowed down the movements of the mummy elders. Doris used her illusions to make another copy of Sofia, also confusing the mummies and slowing them down. The mummy elders often spent too much time surrounding one of the Sofias, only to find her to be an illusion.


    Amanda, on the other hand, continuously threw out her vials of potions. She summoned all sorts of energy golems from them. Their powers were only equal to advanced apprentices, but there were just too many of them. Moreover, these golems didn¡¯t require too manymands and control on her part. To some extent, this managed to fill in for theck of manpower in the group.


    However, the three shadesteel statues appeared once again while Sofia was busy dealing with the mummy elders. The Infernal Tyrant was upied in holding back the banshees.


    The statues instantly killed a dozen energy golems when they appeared. If Alice hadn¡¯t protected Amanda with the spider golem, she too might have died in the wave of attacks by the shadow assassins.


    Amanda¡¯s and Doris¡¯ abilities were barely enough to deal with one shadesteel statue. Three of them together made it impossible for the witches to survive, even if the two of them worked together.


    The two of them were an urate representation of the average power of a witch.


    Monsters like Alice and Sofia, who could challenge several Second Grade creatures while they were still at the First Grade, were the minority. Even the genius Snowlotus was overshadowed by the remarkable performance of the Berserk Witch and the Infernal Tyrant.


    Amanda and Doris decided to hide underneath the spider golem and rely on its four pairs of sharp limbs and the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s horrifying mes to fend off the shadesteel statues.


    Snowlotus seemed to have been provoked by her twopetitors. Layers of ice barriers surrounded her entire body as she hovered in the sky. She unleashed a flurry of spells upon the enemies outside the perimeter formed by the Tyrant and Sofia.


    Ice Shards!


    Ring of Frost!


    Ice Lance Barrage!


    Blizzard!


    Most ice spells were area-of-effect spells that specialized in freezing and slowing the enemy.


    The azure Rings of Frost exploded amidst the enemies. Every crystalline ring generated light blue energies that dispersed into the air. Ayer of frost would cover all substance in the area of effect. The flesh bodies of the voodoo beasts also froze to the spot.


    Above in the air, on the ceiling, a continuous rain of hailstones and ice des fell upon the monsters. The attacks were drawn in by a terrifying tornado that surrounded the witches. Any being that stepped into this ce had to suffer the cuts and shes from an endless storm of ice des.


    She didn¡¯t need to say anything. Snowlotus, the Dancer of Ice and Frost, had used her actions to demonstrate the terror of an ice witch perfectly. With Snowlotus controlling the crowd of enemies, Sofia felt much less pressured in her fight against the mummy elders.


    The three revenant banshees had just broken free of the me shockwaves. Yet, they were instantly engulfed by Snowlotus¡¯ Ice Vortex before they could even gather themselves together. Thick frost hung onto their semi-translucent bodies as they were blown about in the vortex of wind.


    The Infernal Tyrant stopped summoning the waves of fire and instead started to gather fire elementium around itself. It seemed like it was channeling a powerful attack.


    That was the best course of action.


    After all, the banshees were Second Grade undead. Ordinary First Grade spells weren¡¯t able to damage the malice cores in their bodies. However, with the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s powerful abilities, which could reach one hundred and seventy-five points of fire damage at their peak, there was a chance. Especially when one took into consideration the fact that spirit beings took double the damage from elementium attacks into ount, the Infernal Tyrant could kill them in a single shot!


    Alice, as the temporary master of the Infernal Tyrant, naturally had to support its actions.


    The spider golem that had been fighting the mummies with its sharp ws halted suddenly. Its four metallic limbs dug deep into the ground. Two cannons appeared on the top of the spider golem and started to fire loads of purple sma bubbles at the immobilized banshees.


    The initial speed of the sma bubbles was notably slow. However, the pull of the elementium particles in the air caused them to gradually elerate and m into one of the struggling revenant banshees.


    The massive sma bubble spontaneously exploded when it came into contact with the opponent¡¯s spirit body. A sea of bright purple sma scattered from within and caused a small thunderstorm in the area.


    Greem had estimated that the thunderstorms caused by these sma bubbles delt as much as a hundred and thirty points of damage. Only the Fel Cannon, created through the merging of magical machinery with magic spells, could create such a devastating effect.


    A shot like this would cost a hundred magical crystals at the very minimum.


    Ordinary magical crystals couldn¡¯t even support the output of the Fel Cannon. Only the purer, denser crystal cores had that much power. Thus, using the Fel Cannon to fire at an enemy was no different from crushing the enemy under the weight of a mountain of magical crystals.


    Even Alice didn¡¯t dare to waste magical crystals like that if it wasn¡¯t a moment of emergency!


    Of course, the results obtained by paying the hefty price of a hundred magical crystal was a brilliant one as well. The lightning storm had mostly devoured that unfortunate banshee¡¯s body. When she finally broke free of the attack, several holes and wounds riddled her body. Nearly half of her spiritual existence had been damaged.


    Before the revenant banshee had a chance to escape, the Infernal Tyrant raised its zing hands. A Fire Core Explosion instantly engulfed the banshee.


    This time, the banshee did not escape!


    A resentful and sorrowful wail resonated in the ce. A wholly weakened Second Grade revenant banshee had finally be the first victim at Alice¡¯s hands.


    The other two revenant banshees were terrified out of their spirits. They couldn¡¯t care less about attacking the witches. Both of the creatures struggled and broke free of the Blizzard before disappearing into the darkness.


    Meanwhile, the three shadesteel statues took advantage of the spider golem¡¯s shift in attention and epassed it. They used their sharp ws to strike at the golem¡¯s tough shell. Sparks went flying as steel shed against steel.


    The spider golem¡¯s head also swiveled. Energy beams of various colors shot forth from itspound eyes.


    The red beam was a Scalding Ray from a red gemstone!


    The blue beam was a Freezing Ray from a blue gemstone!


    The earthen-yellow beam was a Petrification Beam from the Eyes of Petrification!


    The purple beam was a Paralyzing Beam from Drac¡¯s Gemstone!


    The green beam was a Disintegration Ray from a poison orb!


    ......


    These energy beams only dealt between fifteen to thirty points of damage. Most people considered these weak spells, but there were simply too many of them. Not to mention the fact that each one of them carried a special magical effect.


    If all these beams had hit an ordinary adept, he might still live through it. However, all the umted adverse effects were more than enough to make it a tough fight for them!

 Chapter 368 Forward Charge

    Chapter 368 Forward Charge


    A revenant banshee had instantly died, and the other two had been frightened away.


    Alice immediately turned her attention towards the mummy elders and ordered the spider golem to assault the monsters.


    The Infernal Tyrant and Snowlotus acted as two terrifying cannons, recklesslyunching their ice and fire spells at every inch of space around them. Inparison, Amanda and Doris were not doing much. They exerted all their effort just to defend themselves. They followed closely behind the Tyrant and cautiously looked out for any sneak attacks from the shadesteel statues.


    Sofia unleashed all her power and all the strength of a berserk witch with Alice¡¯s reinforcement. She waved her staff fluidly and quickly struck the mummy elders all across their rotting bodies. The decayed flesh scattered everywhere.


    Fighting a Second Grade enemy with the prowess of a First Grade wasn¡¯t that odd of a situation!


    Firstly, it was important not to categorize Second Grade magical creatures with Second Grade adepts.


    A Second Grade adept had to endure unimaginable difficulties to reach their level. It was only with great wisdom and a massive library of knowledge that an adept could advance to Second Grade. A Second Grade adept like this was never unarmed.


    They were powerful and always had magical equipment custom built for their purposes. Not to mention the many casting materials, arge number of magical gemstones, unending potions, scrolls, wands, alchemical tools, enhanced equipment, and a perfectly constructed system of ult knowledge and spells at their disposal.


    The reason human adepts were able to obtain the absolute advantage in their battles against magical creatures, despite their poorer attributes, was thanks to these external tools and their effective means ofbat.


    What did the magical creatures have in their favor?


    A million years ago, they were able to rely on their powerful bodies and peculiar innate talents to rule various worlds. However, the intelligent races of every ne had started to develop and grow stronger. They had learned from the magical creatures and gained a deep understanding of the monsters¡¯ abilities and techniques.


    What improvement did the magical creatures produce over this period of time?


    Powerful individuals continued to fight with their strong bodies and talents, while the tribes of magical creatures stubbornly continued on their path of relying on their innate abilities! While some of the more intelligent beings in the ck Forest had also started to learn from the human adepts, they weren¡¯t performing nearly enough of a change.


    Their selfish natures andck of a systematic means of passing down legacies were a massive obstacle that they could never ovee!


    A Second Grade Mummy Elder needed a thousand, or even two thousand, years to evolve out of a horde of a million undead. Meanwhile, a Second Grade human adept only required four or five hundred years toe into existence. Moreover, this time was even shorter for the geniuses among the adepts.


    Apart from the time difference required to advance, the difference in power between the adepts and the magical creatures also became even wider after they progressed to Second Grade.


    Even if some undead had been lucky enough to evolve to Second Grade after ages of umtion, their powers were still miles away from the level of Second Grade adepts. An unintelligent creature that relied on its base instincts was only good enough to be the prey and ve of human adepts.


    Only highly intelligent magical creatures that had awakened self-consciousness were equals to the human adepts.


    Sadly, the undead here weren¡¯t intelligent monsters. Otherwise, they would never have been reduced to the ¡¯watchdogs¡¯ of an adept¡¯s tower!


    What did the mummy elders possess to fight back with against Sofia when she waved her thick Soul Equipment around with her berserk strength? Only their tough, steel-like bodies and their funeral shrouds.


    They had nothing other than those!


    Consequently, their Grade advantage waspletely wiped away when the better equipped Alice joined the fight.


    Their undead bodies had undergone multiple instances of strengthening and were stronger than steel. However, it was still weak whenpared to the magical alloy that the adepts had painstakingly refined and improved over the years. Their funeral shrouds had impressive and wondrous effects that could boost any attribute ording to the will of the mummies. Still, this ability appeared clumsy and inflexible whenpared to the host of tricks up the adepts¡¯ sleeves.


    Furthermore, the Corpse Rot Poison and Hysteresis Halos they relied so much upon could do nothing to Sofia and Alice. The battle was utterly one-sided at this point.


    Alice drove the spider golem forward and started to fight all five of the mummy elders at once. It deflected and held back all of their attacks. It didn¡¯t matter how much the mummy elders punched the golem¡¯s body, creating small indentations in the metal; the spider golem continued to fight and use its sharp limbs and frightening ws to slice the mummies.


    The Fel Cannon also continuously fired at the mummy elders and bombarded their bodies with sma bubbles. If it wasn¡¯t for their sturdy bodies and the magical resistance from their funeral shrouds, Alice might have been able to ughter Second Grade creatures once more sessfully!


    Even so, the mummy elders were still at a disadvantage when faced with a monstrous metallic golem that could split the ground apart. They could only retreat under the heavy blows of the two violent witches. They had none of their earlier bloodlust or recklessness.


    However, an ill feeling gradually crept up the hearts of the three favored ones in the group as time passed.


    Even though the undead beasts were strong, the mysterious person still had no intention of showing up to further help them. It seemed like she wanted to leave the undead here for them to ughter. That meant she was nning a massive conspiracy behind their backs!


    The three witches sensed the rm bells going off from their fate senses.


    "We can¡¯t be bogged down by this trash! We need to find a way to break through!" Alice¡¯s voice rang out from within the giant body of the spider golem.


    "Hmph! Easy to say! Each one of these monsters is harder to kill than the next. Not to mention that they are all more powerful than us. Do you think every one of us has a metal can to hide inside and ughter the monsters with?" A mummy had just punched Sofia in the back. She was naturally upset, and thus, her words were mean and hostile.


    Of course, Sofia didn¡¯t let it go that easily. She had also smashed that mummy on its shroud-covered face. Judging by the crack on impact, the mummy¡¯s nose bone and skull were utterly shattered.


    That said, the mummies were practically meat shields after all. Even with part of their body destroyed, they still managed to fight on with as much vigor as before. However, they did protect the soul fire in their skulls and the core in their hearts very well. They would even sacrifice all the flesh on their arms to protect these critical parts.


    That was why Sofia, the Tyrant, and the spider golem were unable to kill even a single one of the mummy elders, despite working together.


    On the other hand, they had no time to waste!


    "This can¡¯t drag on any longer!" The warnings from Alice¡¯s heart was getting more and more urgent,"I¡¯ll lead the charge. You lot remember to keep up."


    The Infernal Tyrant let out a massive roar and started to charge ahead with massive steps. At the same time, a ferocious Scarlet Firestorm erupted in the middle of the group of enemies.


    The low-grade undead were helpless to resist this powerful spell. They scattered and tried to escape from the sea of mes. Meanwhile, the spider golem took this opportunity of the horde dispersing to start to propel its limbs. It knocked aside two of the mummy elders and continuously shot out beams from itspound eyes as itunched its unstoppable charge.


    The two banshees that had fled earlier descended from above. However, a couple of purple sma bubbles rapidly greeted them. If these revenant banshees had any long range abilities, they would have easily been able to detonate the bubbles before they reached them.


    Sadly, the banshees had no such ability.


    The banshees had already experienced this earlier. They were immediately frightened away by the attack and quickly hid in the ceiling, barely managing to avoid the sma bubbles.


    The spider golem Greem had spent six months on lived up to its name. It crashed through the horde of powerful monsters as if it trampled on the t ground. Itpletely ignored all the scratches and blows directed at its metal shell. Whenever it swung one of its sharp limbs, some of the foolish undead would instantly split into two.


    Alice ignored these low-grade undead and drove the spider golem onward as fast as it could go. Its metal limbs nged as it smashed against the ground. Alice only fired the sma bubbles to chase away the Second Grade undead when they advanced too close.


    With the spider golem¡¯s charge, the Infernal Tyrant¡¯s dispersion of the crowd, Sofia¡¯s violent blows, and Snowlotus¡¯rge-scale Blizzards to slow the enemy down, the group of witches instantly sped up. They rushed through the army and knocked aside all the monsters in the way, heading straight for the magical facility in the distance.


    The sudden charge of the three favored ones immediately exposed Amanda and Doris.


    They had been able to obtain shelter by following alongside the Infernal Tyrant or the spider golem. However, now that their teammates had started to charge forward, the two of them were exposed at the rear of the formation. They became the most essible pieces of meat to tear off from the group.


    The three phantom shadesteel statues, the two revenant banshees wandering the walls, and the few mummy elders Alice had blown away; all of these monsters turned their attention towards the two of them and gradually surrounded them.


    "Don¡¯t leave us behind... bring us with you... "


    The two witches screamed as they used every ability they possessed to stumble after the party.


    The entire group was like a chariot gone out of control, wildly smashing their way towards the target in the distance.

 Chapter 369 The Illusion is Shattered

    Chapter 369 The Illusion is Shattered


    The mes of battle continued to burn within the Tower.


    Meanwhile, outside the Tower, the waiting witches were bored out of their minds!


    It had only been four hours since the Tower of Fate¡¯s activation and the closing of its gates. There hadn¡¯t been anymotion since.


    That said, the sky wasn¡¯t all that peaceful either.


    Every once in a while, a brilliant beam of light cut through the sky and sank into the walls of the Tower.


    This phenomenon had caught Greem¡¯s attention as well.


    He had performed a few subtle experiments of his own earlier. Neither Spirit nor elementium spells could pass through that mysterious force enveloping the Tower of Fate. Even the Infernal Tyrant that had his soul aura branded in its core had beenpletely disconnected from him. Contacting Alice was going to be impossible.


    Greem had also secretly passed one of the ck Qiraji Resonating Crystals to Alice. He had wanted to rely on this to maintainmunications. Sadly, even the Resonating Crystals that imed to be able to ovee nar barriers wouldn¡¯t work!


    Despite all these defenses, those colorful lights in the sky still managed to enter the Tower. Of course, Greem was shocked and surprised!


    "Those fools. Still dreaming of resisting their fates when they have already turned into the mediums of fate itself. Did they think they could avoid the Battle of Fate by hiding as far away as possible? Kehkehkeh. In the end, they lost their only opportunity to survive! Hmph! Fools." An old witch with a hooked nose and sunken eyes looked up at the bright lights above her head and mocked.


    Greem heard what she said, and his body trembled. He had a whole different feeling when he once again looked at these rainbow lights.


    These weren¡¯t spells, but the lives of candidates!


    There had only been one hundred and fifty candidates that entered the Tower of Fate when the Battle of Fate started. Were there so few people who had awakened to their talent for fate across the entire Continent?


    Of course not!


    Greem had talked with the Death Witches before this, and he knew that at least three or four hundred candidates would appear every time a lost witch legacy surfaced. That meant that only a third of the total candidates had reached the Tower of Fate.


    Were the ones that went into hiding able to ensure their survival?


    Greem fell silent as he looked at the rainbow lights streaking through the sky.


    It didn¡¯t matter where you were or how powerful you were. Once the Tower of Fate closed, all absent candidates received the bacsh from the narws. The talent of fate that had brought them unlimited glory was now a lethal poison that stole their lives.


    At this moment, across many hidden locations on the Continent, countless fate candidates were wailing and crying in agony. They prayed and begged.


    But it was useless.


    An unknown fire of thews ignited in the depths of their souls. Their bodies, flesh, bones, organs; everything they had burned to ashes. The essence of all their body and soul was concentrated and refined into a mysterious substance and attached to a trace of the power of fate. Then the material, along with the sliver of fate, was sent all the way to the Tower.


    This scene repeated all over the world. No one could stop it, and no one dared to.


    These individuals that had given up on the Battle of Fate forfeited theirst chance to fight for survival. The moment the gates of the Tower of Fate closed, all the candidates that remained outside were doomed to suffer the bacsh from thews of fate. They were transformed into the most concentrated and purest nutrition, waiting within the core of the Tower for the birth of the new Witch of Fate.


    Why was it that every Witch of Fate that came to power was so suddenly able to gain influence and authority? Why was the new Witch of Fate so important as to be noticed by every single witch branch?


    This event was the reason!


    With the nutrition to empower them, any newborn Witch of Fate was able to climb to the ranks of Second Grade, and even Third Grade, powerhouses within a short period. Of course, whether they could reach the levels of the Fourth Grade witch leaders depended on the talent of the individual.


    Still, would a person that managed to be the Witch of Fateck in talent?


    What a joke of a question!


    That was why the new Witch of Fate was destined to be a Fourth Grade powerhouse. The only question was how long it would take for her to reach that level. Naturally, the Witch Council would have to provide this future Fourth Grade witch with the necessary respect and authority.


    It meant that if Alice won the Battle of Fate, she was very likely to rapidly rise to a level where Greem could only look up towards. At that time, the dynamics of their rtionship were likely to reverse.


    It wouldn¡¯t be Alice needing Greem¡¯s power anymore. Instead, it would be Greem who would have to rely upon Alice!


    Greem possessed a rather sharp eye.


    Ever since he had heard about the Battle of Fate from Endor, he had been searching through ancient records and learning all he could about the Battle of Fate and the Witches of Fate. It was at that moment that he came up with this n to hasten the development of his powers and his future influence.


    A one-time investment for a return that wouldst him his whole life!


    If he bet correctly, he would have a high-grade witch covering his back. His life would be a breeze afterward!


    Even if he did lose the bet, all he would suffer was the loss of some materials and objects that didn¡¯t impact his own body. He was a registered adept of the Sarubo n within the Zhentarim area. The Northern Witches were unreasonable, but they stillcked sufficient reason to kill him. As long as he didn¡¯t resist, nothing would happen to him. The worst was that being caught by the Witch Council meant being shut in jail for a couple of years.


    After all, he had only killed the adept due to the enemies¡¯ provocation. He hadn¡¯t initiated the fight. Not to mention, the adept wasn¡¯t part of the Northern Witches. Looking beyond the Witches of Deceit¡¯s malicious intent, the Witch Council had absolutely no reason to put him to death over this!


    Moreover, Greem already had a n.


    Even if he did fail and was captured, he would use hisst spacestone to negotiate for his freedom. If Alice died here, there would be a massive hole in his n to invade another ne. That wasn¡¯t something that he could easily ount for. Thus, there would not be much meaning in keeping the spacestone any longer.


    It was due to his ns that Greem had never ordered Alice around as a ¡¯master¡¯ would. Instead, he had always thought about things for Alice¡¯s benefit and treated her as an equal. All this because he didn¡¯t want to ruin their rtionship!


    Their fragile master-ve contract would probably vanish the moment Alice seeded to the Witch of Fate title!


    After all, how could the powerful Witch of Fate ever be subordinate to a First Grade male adept? Keeping such thoughts to oneself was fine. But if Greem ever tried to make it a reality, the entirety of the Witch Council would tear him apart.


    Greem had always treated Alice as a friend in all of their previous interactions. Such a rtionship might have seemed fake and insincere, but it was a deception that carried with it a trace of honesty and sincerity.


    Would Alice be a Second Grade or Third Grade Witch of Fate? The first thing she did when she met him wouldn¡¯t be to turn him into meat paste, would it? How much of his previous emotional investment would remain after she became the Witch of Fate?


    All sorts of factors that were out of his control ran through Greem¡¯s mind. The wait became even more arduous and intolerable.


    ............


    Crash. The spider golem knocked down the walls of the mystical hall and charged into an odd ce filled with strange runes.


    The sea of radiance suddenly disappeared. All of the runes on the walls, ceilings, and the floorboard exploded, one after another. The destruction finally allowed the witches who were still trapped in that illusory world to break free.


    Nearly half of the apprentices, and two of the witches, copsed to the ground when the illusion vanished. They had lost their lives. The remaining people, on the other hand, started screaming and crying out loud in pain. They frantically threw spells and attacks in every direction. It was apparent that the side-effects from the illusion were not going to be undone so easily.


    An ordinary-looking girl knelt beside a young witch. She closed the witch¡¯s mouth and used an extremely in dagger to slit the throat of the witch slowly.


    Oddly enough, the young witch¡¯s body surged with elementium aura while the mysterious girl was utterly harmless. Still, the young witch appeared to have entirely given up on resisting. She just lied there and allowed the girl to kill her.


    The other witches had just broken free from the illusion. The impacts and tremors to their Spirits hadn¡¯t calmed down yet. The looked on as this unexpected urrence happened before them, but they were still confused as to what was happening.


    "That¡¯s her! Kill her!" Alice¡¯s sharp voice rang out from within the spider golem.


    The next moment, the gigantic machine lunged at the girl in the crowd with unstoppable momentum.


    The spider golem raised the front of its body while thepound eyes shot out energy beams of various colors. It stabbed forward at the girl with its massive ws.


    Sofia and Snowlotus passed through the hole in the wall at this time. Their eyes also immediately fell upon the mysterious girl.


    The girl was an invisible existence to those with less than ten points of the power of fate. Even if their eyes saw her, their minds automatically ignored her due to fate obscuring the fact.


    However, for anyone with ten points and above, the girl was like a brilliant moon in the night. They couldn¡¯t ignore her even if they wanted to. The three favored onespletely disregarded everything else once they entered the hall. Their attention was drawn towards the strange and mysterious girl.


    "Kill her!" The mysterious girl lifted her head. A brilliant light of intelligence glowed in the depths of her pitch-ck eyes. She pointed at the spider golem and shouted, "She¡¯s the one behind the illusion. Let¡¯s work together and kill her first!"


    Strangely enough, her voice was dull and emotionless. Even though there were no strange powers in her words, they still managed to affect all the witches around her.


    The eight confused witches that had just broken out of the illusion immediately raised their staffs and wands. A torrent of spells sted towards the spider golem.

 Chapter 370 Sever Fate

    Chapter 370 Sever Fate


    Damn!


    If Alice had the time, she would have started insulting her enemies¡¯ moms; she would have gone all the way up to their ancestors right now. The mastermind behind all the pain they had suffered was right behind them, yet they shifted their attention towards Alice.


    If it were merely a group of apprentice witches in front of her, Alice would not have worried about them dealing any damage to the golem. However, the group in front of her had nine witches and seventeen apprentices.


    Any single one of them alone would be utterly useless. Alice wouldugh before ordering the spider golem to roll over them. However, even Alice started sweating when she saw the torrent of spells raining down on her. Despite hiding inside the spider golem, her hands went cold.


    The colorful elementium spells merged to form a raging flood of elementium. They shed together and surged towards the spider golem.


    Alice screamed as she ordered the spider golem to dodge to the side. At the same time, the golem¡¯spound eyes shed asyers of force barriers were erected around the massive machine.


    Force barriers like these were the most effective of all the defensive spells.


    Most other shielding spells had some sort of elementium inclination. It was a bonus when defending against magical spells of the same attribute, but this also meant that specific other attributes could counter the spell. On the other hand, force barriers were made with pure magical energy and were not of any elementium type. That was why they were the most suited forrge-scale brawls.


    Despite this, the force barrier the spider golem had summoned didn¡¯t even manage tost for three seconds. The elementium spells had stacked together and produced almost three hundred points of power. They smashed through the transparent force barrier and engulfed the spider golem in a tide of elementium.


    Snowlotus and Sofia, who had been following closely behind the spider golem, quickly dodged. The Berserk Witch might have magic resistance, but there was still a limit to it. If anything rose above that limit, then even she couldn¡¯t deal with the consequences.


    An attack of over two hundred or three hundred points. This number was already at the level of Second Grade adepts. Even Sofia didn¡¯t risk taking an attack like that head-on.


    While Alice and her allies were busy dealing with the other witches¡¯ ¡¯betrayal,¡¯ the mysterious girl slowly released the corpse of a witch in her arms. She closed her eyes and lifted her head to savor the pleasant feeling of fate gathering in her body.


    The mysterious girl¡¯s aura seemed to be vaguely different now, as if she had passed an invisible threshold. It was like the quality of her soul had been elevated to an unimaginable level.


    Twenty points.


    Killing the witch had allowed the girl¡¯s fate to reach a total of twenty points. This number was a threshold with great significance.


    All sorts of subtle yet mysterious changes had started urring in the arcane hall.


    The floor and walls started to grow brighter and brighter. Countless cerulean,vender, and crimson-colored magical lines appeared on the walls. They extended all over the area and the various lines of different colors even stacked and crossed over each other. One after another, radiant magical nodes formed.


    The many magical lines that appeared like veins of a human body extended and reached in every direction without order. Despite their chaotic pattern, there was a sense of profundity and mysteriousness to them. They started to connect with each other or wrapped around to form three-dimensional runic structures of all shapes and sizes. Specks of small runes continuously appeared and slowlybined to form iprehensible runic chains.


    The entire arcane hall had vanished from everyone¡¯s eyes. The floor, ceiling, and the walls had all faded into the darkness. Only a mysterious arcane array woven from innumerable magical lines remained in ce.


    Powerful magical energies surged through the runic chains.


    They intertwined with each other,yer afteryer, and umted perfectly upon each other. The lines connected and supported each other. All the mystic lines connected to form one single entity. A massive and mysterious magical array.


    At the center of the array was the mysterious girl that no one could name.


    The girl¡¯s body slowly floated into the air.


    It was like a small sun had infused her body. A stunning and blinding light burst forth from within, illuminating all of her body.


    A circle of fate formed by two snakes biting each other¡¯s tail appeared at the center of the zing sun.


    "This...this is the totem of the Witch of Fate... " A witch that was well-versed in magical patterns and totems cried out loud.


    Her words were like an explosion that instantly tore everyone out of their confused states.


    For what reason were they here?


    Of course, it was to fight for that one ten-thousandth of a chance to be the Witch of Fate!


    The witch in front of them had already obtained the Witch of Fate ahead of everyone else. Didn¡¯t this mean she had earned the acknowledgment of thews of fate? And didn¡¯t her victory mean that everyone had lost the fight? Didn¡¯t it indicate that they had been reduced to someone else¡¯s stepping stone?


    Everyone¡¯s hearts plunged into a cold and chilling pond in an instant. So cold that their teeth started chattering in fear.


    However, just when everyone had lost their will to fight, Snowlotus gritted her teeth and stood forward.


    "What are you lot panicking for? She will only be considered the true Witch of Fate once the ceremony isplete. We all still have a chance as long as we kill her before the ceremony ends."


    Snowlotus waved her hands, and a barrage of ice shards shot towards the girl suspended in the air.


    The ice spell crashed against the barrier of the mysterious array and instantly provoked a powerful bacsh.


    Several dozen ice spears, more powerful than the ice shards Snowlotus had fired, materialized in the air and raced towards her.


    Snowlotus¡¯ face turned pale as fear surfaced in her eyes.


    These ice spears were far more potent than her ice shards. Could her armor of ice deflect this attack?


    Arge silhouette appeared in front of her as she debated whether to run or to stand and deflect the spears. The massive body helped her block most of the icences.


    ng. ng. ng.


    The gigantic shape moved its metallic body after blocking the icences. Alice¡¯s angry voice came from within, "Sisters, what are you hesitating for? For our lives, for one shot at survival, kill her!"


    She roared as the tattered and beat down spider golem lunged forward. The Fel Cannon on top of its metallic torso fired continuously with everything it had.


    A rain of purple sma bubbles floated towards the girl in the array.


    "I hate sneaky people like you the most! Die you stinking backstabbing rat." Sofia instantly went berserk and brandished her thick wooden staff as she marched towards the array.


    "Indeed, my sisters! Our efforts cannot be ruined and wasted by this person that came out of nowhere! It doesn¡¯t matter who it is that tries to affect our fate! All of them will have to die!" The first witch to wake up from her hesitation yelled, and the light of a magical spell appeared in her hand.


    With these people taking the lead, all the hesitating witches and apprentices found the courage to act. There was no need to organize anything. The girl closest to the Witch of Fate¡¯s throne became everyone¡¯s target. Magic spells of every color and varying strength crashed down upon the array like an incessant storm.


    The mysterious girl gently opened her eyes and looked at the attacking candidates. The intimidating aura and disdain unique to a person of authority colored her pitch-ck eyes. She opened her mouth and spoke without emotion, "Hmph! You rude witches that step beyond your own boundaries. You are only pathetic worms struggling within the vast river of fate. ept your lot obediently! Otherwise, all of you will have to endure the bacsh from fate. Sever Fate!"


    The girl chanted softly. Everyone¡¯s body trembled, and expressions of pain and agony appeared on their faces. A mysterious light started to be brighter and brighter within the depths of their spiritual consciousness. In fact, the light was slowly being separated from their souls.


    Everyone let out pitiful cries of agony!


    Ever since the talent of fate had awakened in them, it had be the most important thing in their lives. Their abilities, their glory, their everything revolved around their talents for fate.


    At this moment, with two words by the mysterious girl, this talent that was so deeply rted to who they were and what they had achieved was being ripped from them.


    The more effort and resources they had invested in their talent for fate, the more intense the pain they had to endure.


    It was a more painful way to die than having them skinned and their muscles stripped from their bodies! Tens and even hundreds of times more!


    The apprentice-level candidates could not endure such agony. They rolled on the ground as every inch of their skin started to break. Their red flesh and muscles were exposed for all to see. An endless stream of blood trickled and flowed out of their bodies, instantly turning them into bloody humans that no one could bear to look at.


    The mysterious lights slowly separated from their bodies. Every inch that the light separated from them would cause several strands of their soul to snap apart mysteriously.


    After so many years of hard work, their talent for fate had already turned into part of their lives. It had an unseen but deep connection with every inch of their skin and each piece of their flesh. Now that the talent was being forcefully severed from their bodies, the pain involved was not something that outsiders couldprehend!


    All of the apprentice witches died from pure pain!


    Once they had died, all of their body, flesh, and soul was burned by an unknown me and turned into the purest of energy essence. The mysterious light then dragged that substance along with it as it dove and disappeared into the array.


    The mysterious girl in the core of the array couldn¡¯t help but raise her head and let out moans of pleasure!

 Chapter 371 Curse Prophecies

    Chapter 371 Curse Prophecies


    The frightening ¡¯Sever Fate¡¯ had been fatal to the apprentices. However, it was still within a tolerable range for the witches, whose Spirits had already reached a level where a change in quality had urred.


    The surviving witches had all absorbed a portion of the wandering powers of Fate from all the deaths that had urred. They still had a buffer before they crumbled before the opponent¡¯s Fate Severance.


    Everyone had a vague idea of who this mysterious girl was by now!


    She might not have be the Witch of Fate yet, but she was the most potent candidate, and the one infinitely close to being the Witch of Fate!


    Moreover, she had mysterious methods that she could use to control the powers of Fate. This ability was not something that an ordinary witch could ever hope to master and use. As such, she was most likely part of a soul projection left behind by the previous Witch of Fate.


    As everyone understood it, the previous Witch of Fate hadn¡¯t died. Instead, she had gone above Fourth Grade and thus exceeded the power limit that the World of Adepts allowed. Consequently, she had been expelled into the gxy. It was not beyond expectation that she would have meddled with the selection of the future Witch of Fate before she left. It would make sense for her to have set her soul projection up to be the victor of the Battle of Fate.


    This soul was part of the previous Witch of Fate. The Witch of Fate possessed the Physique and soul mostpatible with the powers of Fate after all. It gave her an insurmountable advantage when it came topeting for the role of Witch of Fate!


    However, the selection of the Witch of Fate was under the direct control of thews of fate.


    If she wanted to sessfully advance to be the Witch of Fate, she would have to y ording to the rules set forth by thews of fate. The most important part of these was raising her powers of Fate to twenty-one points. And this was something she could only achieve if she killed everyone present.


    What would humans do at the veryst moment of their lives?


    Some would cry out in pain and close their eyes to wait for death, thinking that this was their fortune, a destiny that they could not fight against.


    Some would fight with all they had, struggling to theirst breath regardless of how faint hope appeared to be.


    Two of the weakest witches were unable to endure the pressure of the situation before them. They fell to the ground, crying as theyughed. It was clear that their spirits were on the verge of entirely breaking down. The mes of fate had also ignited on their bodies. It slowly burned away their flesh and soul, turning it into that pure and mysterious energy.


    The twelve other witches, including Alice, and the Infernal Tyrant were thest band of resistance. They formed a small group and frantically attacked the array.


    However, the array appeared to be imprable. None of their attacks did anything to it!


    The witches turned their attention to the floor and the walls. All magical arrays required magical facilities to support them. If they destroyed the foundation of the array, then it would disappear.


    Their actions had an effect. The ground trembled as their destruction grew. The array in the air also started to destabilize.


    "Goddamned ants! Can¡¯t you just ept your fate? It seems I¡¯ll have to rob you of everything you have personally!" The mysterious girl within the array opened her eyes in anger. She floated out of the array with her arms stretched outwards, "Come at me together! Let me see if there are any delightfully surprising desserts amongst this batch of candidates!"


    "Ants? Arrogant kid. In my eyes, you are the ant!" The one-eyed Sofia raised her staff above her head and rushed the mysterious girl.


    "Sever Sight!"


    Her voice dripped with the energy of mysterious magic. Sofia¡¯s vision went pitch-ck. Her only remaining eye had turned into a bloody hole. The blood streaked down her face like a crimson snake.


    A massive boom that shook the ground reverberated in the room.


    Sofia¡¯s staff had missed the girl with only inches to spare. It smashed a deep crater into the ground. She lifted her staff with all her strength and tilted her head to try and capture the girl¡¯s position. It was evident that she hadpletely lost her sight.


    "We can¡¯t let her cast her spells as she wishes! Everyone, forward!" Alice hid within the spider golem, but she could see everything clearly through the Detection Crystal. She immediately ordered the Infernal Tyrant to rush ahead.


    The Tyrant had returned to his full five-meter height in the room. The giant me humanoid was shrouded in mes. It ran towards the mysterious girl and continuously hurled massive Explosive Fireballs in her direction.


    The girl used Fly to dash about in the air and dodge all the fireballs. However, she couldn¡¯t avoid the shockwaves from the explosions.


    The girl¡¯s soul might have been several grades above everyone present. However, her body was far inferior to the level of her soul. Rage and fury started to boil within her heart when the mes managed to burn the robes on her body.


    "Souls that don¡¯t belong to this world are fated to be abandoned by it!" The girl pointed at the Infernal Tyrant as she dodged the other iing attacks. She cast her unique curse upon the golem.


    Her words had just left her mouth, and overwhelming, mysterious energy immediately enveloped the Tyrant.


    Its giant body vanished without a trace in the middle of an intense space distortion.


    Alice¡¯s face paled.


    She could sense that the Tyrant was still alive. It had only been banished from this world. Given enough time, the effect of the spell would fade, and the Tyrant would return unharmed.


    However, it was clear that it was not going to be of any help in the battle before them!


    Alice finally recognized the ability the girl used. It was simr to the Power Words of the Imperative Series. Every word she said possessed tremendous power. The words could turn into reality as long as they were within the limits of the spell.


    However, the caster had to choose their words carefully when using spells like Power Word. If fate could not fulfill the prophecy she gave, she would have to endure double the bacsh from her spell.


    This effect was why such spells were considered double-edged swords. A misstep could wound you severely!


    Berserk Witch Sofia was the first powerhouse of the witches to be crippled. Without her eyes, she could only rely on her Spiritual senses to discover the girl¡¯s position. However, the most significant trait of the mysterious girl was herck of substantial existence. It was virtually impossible to lock on to her with the use of only Spirit.


    Sofia was practically a big, blind ck bear. She was never able to hit the agile girl, no matter how much she lunged. If it weren¡¯t for the other witches¡¯ help in giving her instructions, she probably wouldn¡¯t even have been able to help in the fight.


    The witches surrounded the mysterious girl and continuously bombarded her with spells. The one that attracted the most attention was Snowlotus.


    Right now, six or seven pieces of ice shields orbiting around her and protected her. There were all sorts of energy barriers and defensive fields around her. She hovered three meters above the ground and continuously showered the girl with a torrent of ice spells.


    The damage of her ice spell was fairly average. They dealt around seventy to a hundred points of damage. However, the freezing and slowing effects of the spells annoyed the mysterious girl to no ends.


    A mysterious aura protected the girl and deflected most of the attacks from the witches. Whenever this mysterious energy was almost exhausted, the girl would wave at the array, and another surge of power would supplement the shield around her body.


    Snowlotus¡¯ slowing powers were causing the mysterious girl to drain energy at two or three times the usual rate. This undoubtedly infuriated her!


    Her next target was set to be Snowlotus.


    "Headache!"


    "Stomachache!"


    "Weak Legs!"


    The girl spat three words at Snowlotus, words that appeared to both be prophecies and curses. The Dancer of Ice and Frost immediately stopped her barrage of spells.


    An intense headache swelled in her head. Snowlotus grabbed her head and fell to the ground in agony. She had justnded on the ground, and her legs went weak. She stumbled to the ground. That wasn¡¯t the scariest bit. Snowlotus suddenly grabbed her stomach. Intense grumbling rang out from that part of her body.


    Dammit, what was this!


    Honestly, the means of attack avable to the mysterious girl had utterly exceeded everyone¡¯s imagination. She wandered around the witches and used her athletic body to dodge everyone¡¯s attacks. She would only choose to deflect those that she could not avoid.


    And her means of attack were her extraordinary curses that resulted in what she said!


    Of course, you could think of it as a sort of prophecy.


    The girl continuously pointed at the witches and said individual words out loud as she dodged their attacks. Every one of the things she said would turn into reality in an instant, throwing the witches into disorder or agony.


    She didn¡¯t dareunch any fatal or lethal ¡¯prophecies¡¯ at the spiritually resilient witches. However, she was not concerned at all when it came to the weaker ones.


    The first to die was a young witch with a doll-like face and freckles on her nose.


    When the girl passed by her, a single ¡¯Death¡¯ was spoken. The witch then copsed to the ground without any sound. She had lost all life.


    The second unfortunate victim was Amanda.


    As a potions master, herbat ability was insufficient. Most of her attacks came from the energy servants summoned from her potions. Thus, after a single prophecy of ¡¯Betrayal,¡¯ Amanda died horribly at the hands of her own summoned creatures.


    Witches continuously fell to the curses of the mysterious girl. Everyone started to have to worry about their own lives. At this point, Alice had no choice but to expose the powerful offensive abilities of the spider golem, even if she wanted to hide it from the other witches.


    As such, the mysterious girl finally turned her sights to Alice¡¯s spider golem.

 Chapter 372 An Uphill Battle

    Chapter 372 An Uphill Battle


    "Everything that defies nature is fated to be abandoned by nature!"


    The girl¡¯s voice was crisp and clear. The prophecy she had cast was direct and straightforward.


    The array trembled when she spoke the prophecy. Large amounts of rainbow light separated from the array and dispersed into the air. As the host of this prophecy, the mysterious girl also seemed to have been affected by this spell that had exceeded the limits of fate. She couldn¡¯t help but cough out blood.


    Still, the prophecy took effect. The spider golem that had been chasing after the mysterious girl and bombarding her with sma was suddenly restrained by the strange lights spreading out in the air. The very next moment, the five-meter-tall, nine-meter-long, three hundred ton heavy spider golem and itsrge body forged from physical and magical resistant alloy instantly deconstructed!


    In the blink of an eye, the powerful and mighty beast had exploded and disassembled into scraps and bits of scattered metallic parts. The metallic constructs and elements remained suspended in the air for two seconds before ttering as they hit the ground.


    Alice, who had been safe in her metal cabin, suddenly sat on a pile of metal. She covered her head and screamed as the rain of metal parts pelted her.


    Goblin-make pistons, Z-50 magic replenishing devices, stic cushions, neuron springs, thought ergement discs, agile deflector discs, force barrier generators, and all sorts of magical gemstones and strangeponents of various shapes and purposes fell.


    Alice even saw the Eyes of Petrification, the red gemstones and parts of the Fel Cannon, in the rain of parts.


    These things might have been able to threaten the mysterious girl whenbined. However, now that they had beenpletely disassembled, they were just useless ¡¯trash.¡¯


    Fortunately, Alice¡¯s energy flux was faint. One look and the girl could tell that Alice was not abatant that could threaten her life. The mysterious girl flew over her head and didn¡¯t stop to waste another of her frightening prophecies on the harmless witch.


    The group of witches fighting the mysterious girl started to falter in their cooperation now that the powerhouses among them had been crippled. Their firepower had copsed, and everyone was at risk of death. They all wanted to try their best and use all they had to kill this annoying person, but they were also fearful of their powerful attacks drawing the attention of the girl.


    Judging from the way the battle had gone so far, none of the people here were the match of the mysterious girl. If she seriously wanted someone dead, there was nothing anyone could do to stop her!


    In a matter of fifteen minutes, the girl has reduced the passionate group of witches to two or three people. Apart from Alice, Sofia, and Snowlotus, everyone else had died at the hands of the mysterious girl. Their bodies burned to ashes, and rainbow light emerged from their bodies for the array to absorb.


    A massive ball of light two meters in diameter had gathered at the core of the magical array. It spun around and glowed brilliantly. Dense, deep aura of fate radiated from the ball. Everyone saw it very clearly. Some clusters of prismatic light asionally floated towards the array and were silently absorbed into the ball through several magical lines.


    This was the advancement ceremony of the Witch of Fate!


    Anyone who managed to step into the array and absorb the powers of fate gathered within would be the next Witch of Fate.


    However, the witch that was hosting the ceremony would enter a vulnerable state where her soul would leave her body. It was effortless for otherpetitors to interrupt the ritual. The safest method to deal with this was to kill off all the otherpetitors and exterminate all possible danger.


    And that was what the mysterious girl was nning!


    The Tower of Fate was sealed shut right now. Thews of fate crushed all thepetitors that had not managed to make it to the Tower of Fate in time and turned them into pure energy. This substance was then brought back to the array by the powers of Fate. Of course, their spiritual consciousness and souls were also disintegrated into nutrition to strengthen the new Witch of Fate further!


    There were no more candidates left in the outside world. All of them had turned into the energy in the ball of light. On the other hand, the only surviving candidates in the Tower were the four witches here.


    The mysterious girl, Sofia, Snowlotus and Alice were thest ones.


    The mysterious girl was undoubtedly the most powerful amongst them. All the other witches were dead; dead, and part of the clump of light floating in the array. All because of this girl¡¯s bloody and cruel prophecies.


    Sofia waspletely blinded. She could still fight, but she had to chase after the mysterious girl like a clumsy bear. She had smashed the floor to pieces, yet she hadn¡¯t even managed to touch the girl.


    The mysterious girl had severely suppressed Snowlotus¡¯ ferocious firepower. Any spell that required chants and hand signs were impossible to cast. Every time she tried to channel arge scale spell, she would be interrupted by a simple spell from the girl. ¡¯Headache,¡¯ ¡¯stomachache,¡¯ ¡¯Mute,¡¯ and all sorts of other curses.


    If it weren¡¯t for Snowlotus¡¯ resilient Spirit and the various spiritual defense tools she had on her, she would probably have been tortured and reduced to a terrible state! Pissing herself would have been the least of her troubles.


    Inparison, Alice hadn¡¯t received any attacks at all.


    She had been the most powerful among the three favored ones. She had the Infernal Tyrant for offense and the spider golem as her bodyguard. Together, they were enough to even hold off both Snowlotus and Sofia at once.


    But what now?


    The Infernal Tyrant had been banished from the World of Adepts. It was going to be a long time before he returned. The spider golem had also been dismantled into a pile ofponents and spare parts by a single terrifying prophecy from the mysterious girl. The only price she had paid for this was a cough of blood.


    Without these two guards, Alice was reduced to her original state. The witch candidate with nobat ability apart from ¡¯Divination Arts.¡¯ If it weren¡¯t because of a few offensive magic scrolls she had prepared, she would be a harmless baby sitting on the sidelines.


    The power demonstrated by the girl had been more than enough to crush the entire group of witches. Unless a miracle happened, every single one of the three remaining candidates was going to die!


    Holding anything back at this moment of life and death was a foolish decision!


    The three witches quicklymunicated in secret.


    "Quick! Use whatever means you still have in hiding! Do you guys intend to take your tricks to your graves?" Alice roared in her panic, "My Infernal Tyrant will be able to break free from the banishment in another ten minutes, but I definitely can¡¯t hang on until then. Left, left. Ten meters away from you."


    Alice didn¡¯t forget to give the coordinates of the enemy to Sofia even as she grumbled.


    "This goddamned bitch only knows how to dodge. I can¡¯t catch up to her at all. Sofia hadn¡¯t managed to even brush an inch of the girl¡¯s skin ever since the start of the fight. It was undoubtedly a tremendous humiliation for a berserk witch that excelled at closebat. She was furious, "Think of a way, quick! Even if you make me die along with that bastard, I¡¯ll do it!"


    "I have an organ transnt scroll over here. I can give you one of my eyes. It is an external insertion spell and won¡¯t be affected by your magic resistance." Snowlotus trembled as she floated in the sky. She used all her powers to discharge ice shards and frost breaths at the girl. She yelled even as she fought.


    Her personality might have been cold and reserved, but that girl had also incited a rage within her. She was willing to risk everything just to bring the girl down.


    "No! You can¡¯t afford to lose any more of yourbat ability!" Alice interrupted, "I¡¯m the most useless one right now. Pass the scroll to me. I¡¯ll give Sofia my eye. She¡¯s the only one who can help us take revenge!"


    "Hurry up! I can tell she¡¯s heading your way." Sofia furiously roared as she chased after the girl.


    The three mortal enemies had now given up all their hostilities under the pressure of amon enemy. They were wholeheartedly thinking of the team and the team only.


    Snowlotus took out a scroll filled with ancient patterns and threw it to Alice. She then gritted her teeth and flew even higher into the air. The barrage of ice shards intensified and turned into a storm of hail. For the moment, Snowlotus had managed to stall the enemy in ce.


    Sofia also waved her staff and forced the girl away as she ran towards Alice.


    The abnormality of the three witches had drawn the suspicion of the mysterious girl. She immediately became alert when she saw Snowlotus throw an unknown scroll to Alice, while Sofia also mobilized towards Alice¡¯s location.


    The girl applied a barrier of ice immunity upon herself using her prophecies and quickly lunged towards Alice.


    It didn¡¯t matter what they were nning. These three couldn¡¯t be allowed to seed!


    Alice looked at the two people hurrying towards her and snapped the scroll in half without any hesitation. She had a determined expression on her face. The moment the magical energies surged through her body, Alice clenched her teeth and used her fingers to pluck her right eye out of its socket. She threw it to Sofia.


    The intense pain was unbearable for Alice, but at this moment, pain counted for nothing!


    The swiftly approaching girl instantly understood their n. A sinister smile appeared on her face. She lifted her hand and pointed it at the eyeball flying through the air.


    "Burst!"


    A slim shape appeared right in the direction she was pointing when she spoke her prophecy aloud.


    The next second, Snowlotus was sent flying through the air. A gaping hole had been sted through her abdomen. A fountain of blood sshed everywhere.


    Sofia could clearly ¡¯see¡¯ everything happening around her using her Spiritual senses.


    She caught Alice¡¯s eyeball and stuffed it into her empty eye socket. Thousands of flesh tendrils as thin as hairs immediately grew forth and attached themselves to the eye once it entered Sofia¡¯s eye socket.


    A short momentter.


    Like a brilliant sun shing through the curtain of night, the darkness was swept away, and the long-awaited light once again filled Sofia¡¯s vision.

 Chapter 373 A Bloody Battle

    Chapter 373 A Bloody Battle


    Sofia looked at Alice.


    A gaping, bloody hole had appeared on the small face of the little girl. Blood continuously flowed out from Alice¡¯s eye socket. Half of her face and body had been stained red.


    From a distance, Alice looked just like a doll that had broken from excessive y.


    She was still smiling sweetly at Sofia!


    Sofia spun around with her massive body, and the first thing she saw was a falling shape.


    A massive hole had been sted into the person¡¯s snow white skin. An ice shield orbiting her had shattered into ice powder. kes of ice mixed with the blood that had sshed everywhere and bloody snow fell from the sky like blossoming flowers.


    All the damage from her previous encounters, along with this grievous wound, was too much for Snowlotus to endure with her frail body.


    The aura of life started to fade from her delicate and wless body. A flicker of the fire of fate appeared above her heart and quickly spread throughout her body.


    When Snowlotus fell from the sky, the mysterious girl was exposed to Sofia¡¯s sight.


    The Berserk Witch raised her head and let out a heartbreaking roar. She threw the wooden staff in her hand with all her strength and then lunged towards the girl.


    The mysterious girl was utterly indifferent about Snowlotus¡¯ death. She directed her attention towards the berserk Sofia. A mocking smile appeared on her emotionless face when she saw the berserk witchunch an attack from such distance.


    She ignored the hatred and anger of the few ants crawling before her.


    After all, she was the spiritual projection of a high-grade witch. She couldn¡¯t care less about the feelings of such low-ss creatures. So what if they were performing above their limits? If it weren¡¯t because of this pathetic body, she would have been able to crush these witches with the flip of her palm. She was just too powerful and understood too much about using the power of Fate.


    A berserk ant was still an ant. What could happen? Should she worry about the ant turning into a beast to bite her?


    The mysterious girl floated to one side and avoided the wooden staff. She lifted a finger and pointed it at the charging Sofia.


    It was just a warrior that only knew how to use her raw strength to knock things around. She could kill her in one go!


    However, before she could start speaking her prophecies, the wooden staff that had passed by her suddenly morphed into a serpent covered in dark green scales. It extended its body and quickly wrapped itself around the girl.


    This sudden change shocked the mysterious girl!


    Everyone present was a candidate of fate. It was nearly impossible for them to predict each other¡¯s actions using their premonitions. This blind spot was why this sudden turn of events had caught the scheming girl by surprise.


    The serpent that had transformed from the staff was a strange magical creature. It started to strangle and bite the girl after its thick body had coiled around her. Sadly, the mysterious aura around the girl was tougher than any shields and barriers. The snake¡¯s venomous fangs could not even reach the girl¡¯s soft skin.


    The amount of time bought by the barrier was more than enough for the girl to chant three words. ¡¯Burn To Ashes.¡¯


    These were three simple words, but there was an astounding amount of power in them. The serpent hissed in pain as a fire kindled on and within its body. ck smoke was evening out from the gaps between its scales.


    The wounded serpent frantically twisted its body. The girl took the opportunity to break free of its hold.


    The first thing she saw was an iron fist rapidly expanding before her eyes.


    "Block!"


    The prophecy that she cast on the spot hadn¡¯t managed to gather enough power. Still, it perfectly blocked Sofia¡¯s furious punch.


    Dong.


    A translucent light barrier appeared between Sofia¡¯s fist and the girl¡¯s nose. It was as thin as a cicada¡¯s wing, yet it was as resilient as the hardest metal in the world. Sofia¡¯s iron fist was bleeding and tearing from the tremendous impact of her punch, but the barrier remained undamaged. Apart from a slight indentation, it waspletely intact.


    However, the indentation of the barrier had allowed the girl¡¯s nose to be lightly hit. The girl felt a slight pain on her nose.


    Goddamned ant...


    The girl took one step backward and rubbed her nose. She cursed Sofia in her heart with the most malicious insults she could muster.


    The Spiritual Projection¡¯s consciousness might have juste into existence and was not all that intelligent. However, the immense pride in her heart caused the mysterious girl to feel a genuine hatred and disgust for these ants that had tarnished her dignity.


    Perhaps it was okay to exhaust a little of the powers of Fate in the array to crush these ants as soon as possible. However, the powers of Fate were the foundation to her climb to dominance once more. She honestly felt a little upset at wasting them on these ants.


    The light barrier surrounding her trembled as the mysterious girl hesitated.


    The Berserk Witch had no intention of giving up. She continued to pummel the barrier with all she had.


    If fists weren¡¯t enough, then I¡¯ll use my legs. If my legs aren¡¯t enough, then I¡¯ll use my head!


    Sofia bashed the barrier repeatedly as if she had gonepletely mad. Blood sshed everywhere every time she hit the shield.


    The flesh on her fists had utterly torn apart. Her white finger bones were visible beneath the bloody pulp. Her forehead had also been bashed against the barrier so much that it was bruised ck and green. In fact, the skin on her forehead had started to tear as well. Yet, it was almost as if Sofia didn¡¯t feel any of this happening. She continued to punch, kick, and headbutt the barrier without hesitation.


    Every attack sheunched caused mysterious energy to surge across the barrier. The sharper and more ferocious her attacks, the quicker the mysterious energy was exhausted.


    A visible crack started to appear on the previously imprable barrier.


    The speed at which the energy repaired the barrier clearlygged behind the pace at which Sofia caused damage.


    Aaaaaaaaah!


    Alice screamed and ran towards the girl with a dagger in her hand. At this point in the battle, she had used up all her scrolls, potions, and magical tools. The only thing she could do was use her blood, flesh, and life to exhaust this ursed barrier!


    Alice waved her dagger and started to stab the transparent barrier with all her might.


    Dammit! These two ants have gone insane...


    The mysterious girl had no time to think about the potential consequences of her actions. She immediately raised her hand and prepared to draw power from the array to protect herself.


    A loud and resounding crack echoed through the room. The barrier had shattered!


    The next second, Sofia¡¯s utterly broken and bleeding fistsnded on the girl¡¯s jaw.


    An even louder crack rang out.


    The mysterious girl¡¯s eyes opened wide. Shock, anger, and disbelief were painted on her face as she was blown away with a detached jaw. Sofia¡¯s other hand grabbed onto the girl¡¯s right leg before her body could fly away. Sofia pulled with her hand.


    Her bloody forehead increased in size before the frightened gaze of the mysterious girl.


    Dong.


    Another muffled boom.


    At the same time, the scary bone cracking sound rang out.


    The girl felt like she had just been thrown into a mountain. A frightening crack rang out from her head. A small indentation had been knocked into her head. The intense pain from her jaw and forehead quickly spread throughout her soul. The girl raised her head and yelled out in agony.


    Three bloody teeth fell out from her mouth as she screamed!


    Dammit! I can¡¯t get into a messy fight like this with these ants! How could I and my noble body be...


    Sofia¡¯s massive body once again expanded in her vision while thoughts were still hurling through her mind.


    Sofia stretched out her arms as if she wanted to hug the girl, but what did that open mouth and those gleaming teeth mean?


    The girl had no time to think; Sofia had already crashed into her. The Berserk Witch¡¯s thick arms kept a tight grasp on the girl¡¯s body as the berserker witch¡¯s teeth sunk into the girl¡¯s flesh.


    What kind of goddamned battle technique was this?!


    The immobilized girl was furious beyond belief.


    Her arms were pinned down. It was hard for her to use hand signs to draw upon more powers of Fate. Every time she wanted to open her mouth to utter her prophetic verdicts of fate, that lowly barbarian¡¯s head would smash into hers.


    Sofia¡¯s entire body had be her weapon!


    Again and again, Sofia¡¯s head smashed into the girl. The girl¡¯s nose snapped, her eye sockets fractured, her face had sunken in, and blood covered her entire face. No one could still recognize the girl. The damage Sofia had sustained and was receiving from her attacks was still far more the girl, but she seemed ustomed to this method of fighting. She continued to hit the girl without hesitation despite the severe wounds that she had to endure with every blow.


    Alice had also gotten up from the ground and was lunging towards the girl with the dagger in hand.


    Ahhhhhhhhhhh!


    A deste scream dripping with power reverberated throughout the entire Tower.


    A terrifying power beyondpare exploded from within the girl¡¯s body, easily blowing Alice away. Sofia, who had been restricting her at zero distance was even more critically wounded. The sudden explosion of power had caused her already injured body to shatter. Her arms were utterly broken and then sted into meat paste.


    Her muscr body flew into the distance. The powers of Fate in her body had started burning even before shended on the ground.


    Even though all three of them had brought out all the power they held, their struggles had remained futile before an impossibly powerful enemy.


    The opponent¡¯s strength was just not something they could have fought against!


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    Sofia¡¯s body crashed to the ground and fell even further away, like a skipping stone thrown across a pond. It was only after a while that she stopped moving.


    Her body was in tatters. There were absolutely no signs of life in that broken body.


    "Even if I were to die, this bad bitch will bust your face ck and blue... "


    Berserk Witch Sofia spat out herst words while facing the ceiling. It was only then that she closed her eyes with a huge smile on her face.

 Chapter 374 Everyone Has Their Own Way

    Chapter 374 Everyone Has Their Own Way


    Sofia was dead!


    Following after Snowlotus, the ferocious and wild Sofia had died.


    Only Alice and the mysterious girl were left in the hall now.


    It was when the mysterious girl slowly turned towards her that Alice was able to see her distorted and caved-in skull, as well as that bloody and ruined face. Her face looked like a stampede of elephants had brutally ravaged it. A very angry and violent herd of elephants.


    Her nose had beenpletely shattered, and her mouth was badly swollen. Most of her teeth had also fallen out of her mouth. Her eye socket had fractured, with purple-ck blood covering her left eye. Hatred and viciousness gleamed in the right eye that remained.


    As the spiritual projection of the previous Witch of Fate, her actions had brought shame upon all high-grade witches. She had a thousand years more experience than the otherpetitors, and part of the control authority of the Tower. However, she had been beaten up by a low-grade witch with one of the crudest methods possible.


    Just the thought of this drove her recently awakened consciousness mad!


    She was angry and impatient. She needed someone to take it out on.


    But the person responsible for her terrible state was already dead.


    Would a future Witch of Fate like herself beat a corpse? This action was even worse of a humiliation!


    All of her rage and fury cast upon the only survivor left. Alice.


    Perhaps because she saw a little of what the mysterious girl was thinking, Alice remained standing tall and proud despite missing an eye. There were small cuts and scrapes all over her petite body. Thick blood stains also covered half of her face, but she still smiled sweetly and happily.


    "I won¡¯t give you a chance for revenge!"


    Alice plunged the dagger in her right hand straight into her heart. Her tiny body froze for a second before slowly copsing to the ground.


    A pool of crimson blood soon appeared on the ground beneath Alice¡¯s body.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! What is wrong with this batch of candidates?! Why is each and every one of them so infuriating and hard to deal with? Goddamit.


    The mysterious girl¡¯s rage had nowhere to go. It bubbled within her as she sensed Alice¡¯s lifeforce gradually weaken until itpletely vanished. The anger turned into a zing fire in her heart. She was so furious that her chest could have exploded.


    The girl scanned the hall and the Tower one more time. Having confirmed that no more life forces remained in the Tower, the girl forcefully suppressed her emotions and walked towards the mysterious array.


    Now that everything was over, the most important thing was toplete the ceremony and be the Witch of Fate. The powers of Fate gathered here were, at the very least, enough to push her to Third Grade. Even Fourth Grade wasn¡¯t impossible if she was fortunate enough. Perhaps in less than a thousand years, she would be able to step out of the World of Adepts and merge with her original self!


    A feeling of unease prompted her to stop, just when she was about to step into the array.


    Danger!


    She sensed a terrifying danger that could spell doom for her!


    The girl spun around and took yet another careful look at the battlefield. The fires of rage in her heart had beenpletely extinguished by the cold and chilling premonition from fate.


    What did face and humiliation count for before her own life?


    She had to quench all signs of danger and anything that could threaten her before she entered the array and absorbed the powers of Fate. This cautiousness was a character trait that a person of authority had to have!


    What had gone wrong?


    All thepetitors inside the Tower were dead. Where could a potentially threatening enemy have hidden?


    The girl mused to herself as she used her only eye left to scan the remains of the battlefield.


    The floor had been shattered. One could see stones and debris everywhere. There were also plenty of odd objects. The fires of fate had burned the witches¡¯ bodies. The only things left were their magic staffs, wands, the scraps of their scrolls, and used potion vials.


    Of course, there was also a giant pile of gleaming metal parts andponents in the middle of the hall. There was also a bunch of magical gemstones with some energy remaining in the collection of metal.


    Apart from that, there were the three corpses of the witches that had just died and...


    Corpses?


    It was only now that the girl realized something.


    How could there be corpses?


    Once the three girls died, Fate would have burned their bodies and turned them into pure energy essence to be absorbed by the array. It wasn¡¯t just their bodies. Even their souls couldn¡¯t escape. Everything they had would be the nutrition and foundation of the new Witch of Fate.


    Then why was it that their corpses remained?


    Unless...


    They weren¡¯t dead and were still using their will to resist the powers of Fate in their bodies!


    The mysterious girl¡¯s face dropped. She raised her hands and started chanting.


    "By the name of the greatws of fate, bless me with the Eye of Truth to see through lies and deception!"


    The mysterious array tremored, and a surge of power of fate flew towards the girl.


    The hall before her disappeared.


    Every detail in her vision had lost their outlines. Instead, they appeared as spots of color with lines of magic in the air. A new sense had reced her original sight. Everything appeared in a whole new manner before the girl.


    Through her Eye of Deception, she could see that Snowlotus¡¯ broken body had lost all aura of life. However, a strange tiny person that looked just like her had been sealed into a crystal ne on her neck.


    The tiny person sat within the crystal. Vast swathes of white mist gathered around her. It was this mist that blocked the effects of ordinary detection and sensing spells and allowed Snowlotus to remain concealed.


    At this moment, the mysterious girl¡¯s eyes passed through the white mist and the crystal wall, shing with the eyes of the little Snowlotus. The little Snowlotus¡¯ face went white in an instant!


    Crack.


    The crystal exploded, and the dense white mist engulfed Snowlotus¡¯ body.


    A short momentter, the perfectly safe Snowlotus, protected byyers of spells, walked out of the mist. A grave expression appeared on her snow-white face. She clearly resented and despaired at the opponent seeing through her tricks.


    "As expected of worms! All you use are despicable and underhanded tricks!" A cold ¡¯smile¡¯ appeared on the girl¡¯s face, "The two of you bastards! Are you waiting for me to drag you out of hiding!"


    The mysterious girl¡¯s gaze fell upon Sofia¡¯s broken body. More specifically, she looked towards the right pinky finger. The ferocious punching Sofia hadunched at the barrier had caused the bone of her fingers to be exposed. A strange jade green pattern was visible on the bone of her pinky finger.


    Life Concealment!


    That was a unique technique exclusive to the Death Witches!


    Life Concealment. A technique that allowed the user to transfer, iste, and conceal part of their life force in a portion of their bodies. When their original self received a fatal blow, they could use the hidden life force to revive.


    However, Sofia¡¯s Life Concealment was inferior to Snowlotus¡¯ magical tool. When Sofia allowed the life force to flow back to her broken body, she still had to put up with her damage and wounds.


    Everyone¡¯s gaze then fell upon Alice¡¯s frail and petite body.


    A sigh rang out in the room, and the dagger in Alice¡¯s heart mysteriously started to remove itself from her chest. Alice then spat out the slice of fruit that she had been hiding in her mouth.


    The Golden Apple!


    Everyone nodded. They finally understood how Alice had faked her death!


    The Golden Apple was an item used in a revival ceremony. Furthermore, if the user bit off a piece from the Golden Apple before their death and held it in their mouth, they would not die, regardless of any grievous wounds they received afterward. Of course, this was limited to any attacks that didn¡¯t destroy her body.


    "Good... very good." The mysterious girl looked around the room and fumed as the three candidates who should have died at her hands slowly stood up. A feeling of anger at having been cheated rose in her, "Since all of you want to die another time, I¡¯ll fulfill your wish!"


    Arge cluster of light surged out of the array and entered her damaged body.


    "Recuperate!"


    With a single word, a strange spatial flux enveloped the girl¡¯s body. All her wounds had vanished when the spatial flux finally disappeared.


    A fully regenerated enemy stood before Alice and the other two witches!


    The three witches frowned when they saw this. A trace of despair appeared on their faces.


    Compared to therge cluster of light in the array, the girl had only drawn upon one or two-tenths of its power. Yet, this amount of energy was more than enough for her to crush the three of them.


    An enemy like this, a battle like this, was there any meaning to the bloody fight they were putting up?


    There was no answer, and there was no need for one!


    At this moment, the first to step forward was still Sofia.


    "I don¡¯t care whether you guys still have any trump cards in reserve, but I¡¯ll be fighting to my death!" Sofia¡¯s body was also rapidly regenerating. However, her regenerative powers were trivial whenpared to therge gashes on her body, "We Berserk Witches never wait for our deaths!"


    Sofia then dragged her broken body along and stormed towards the mysterious girl.


    Alice and Snowlotus exchanged looks. A frightening determination rose in their hearts. They too followed behind Sofia andunched their final wave of attacks at the mysterious girl.


    Sadly, the girl¡¯s overwhelming power devoured every trick they had.


    The girl spat out a single word, ¡¯Imprable,¡¯ and an indestructible barrier formed in front of the three of them. It didn¡¯t matter how much they sted it with spells or bashed it with their fists; the wall didn¡¯t budge an inch.


    Rot! Enhanced Pain! Decrepify!


    Snowlotus was the first to fall victim to the girl¡¯s prophecies.


    Her face seemed to have experienced hundreds of years in an instant. The girl of ice and snow with smooth, snow-white skin had turned into an old hag with a wrinkled face and spotted skin. Moreover, there weren¡¯t screams of agony that came out of her mouth when she rolled around the ground in pain. The only thing that came out of her mouth was a ck cloud of dust.


    Snowlotus¡¯ organs had rotted!

 Chapter 375 The Victor

    Chapter 375 The Victor


    How could the mysterious girl ever give them a second chance after what had just happened?


    The girl had constantly limited her use of the powers of Fate. That was because all of that energy was the nutrition she needed for her future rise to dominance!


    If everything had gone as nned and she had been able to exterminate all the candidates without a problem, the reserves of power would have been enough to help her break through the threshold of Fourth Grade. However, if she used too much of the power now, she might miss the chance of entering Fourth Grade by just a little bit. Falling short would be a massive blow to her.


    The difference between a Third Grade and Fourth Grade in the World of Adepts was like a vast chasm! As far apart as the earth and the sky!


    If this happened to her, she would be distraught.


    These three cockroaches had managed to force her to draw upon the powers of Fate to defend herself. Her heart bled, even as she overwhelmed them with her abilities.


    However, as upset as she was, she didn¡¯t want to taste that humiliation of being beaten up without being able to retaliate!


    A stream of power flowed out of her hands and turned into horrifying effects that gued the three witches. The girl once again brought them to their knees with minimal effort.


    And this time, she killed Sofia without any hesitation.


    Alice looked at Sofia¡¯s intensely burning body, then dragged herself to the weakened Snowlotus. She gently ced Snowlotus¡¯ head on her legs. Even this gentle action caused Snowlotus to cough up even more blood.


    "Say your final farewells!" Rainbow lights shed around the mysterious girl. She slowly floated towards the two girls as she spoke, "I¡¯ll take utmost care in killing you. You three bastards caused me to exhaust so much of my power of Fate. I¡¯ll take my time to squeeze out everyst drop of fate from your bodies."


    Faced with the girl¡¯s threats, Alice bent her body and brought her head to Snowlotus¡¯ ears. She sent a mental message tomunicate with her ally, "Can you still put up an ice barrier?"


    Snowlotus¡¯ voice was weak but determined, "Of course. But do we still have a chance of victory?"


    "Don¡¯t worry about that. Just do as I say. When I give you the order, you must erect a defensive barrier with all you have!"


    The private exchange between the two witches drew the girl¡¯s attention. For some reason, even though these low-grade witches were weak and fragile, they gave her a sense of jeopardy.


    The mysterious girl made up her mind. It didn¡¯t matter if she had to use even more of the powers of Fate; she needed to exterminate these two people as quickly as possible.


    The girl hovered in the sky as the powers of Fate surged around her and disappeared. She opened her mouth, and a single word that had been umting power was about to be spoken.


    A weak but gentle voice counted down between Alice and Snowlotus.


    Three.


    Two.


    One.


    An unexpected change happened in the hall when Alice counted to one.


    Space started to tremble as a massive and mighty me giant stepped out of nowhere.


    The Infernal Tyrant!


    It had finally been freed of its banishment and had returned from the external dimension!


    The girl instantly realized her negligence when she saw the Tyrant¡¯s giant body!


    The Tyrant had only been banished, not destroyed. Of course, it would return here once the duration of banishment was over. That said, as long as she was able to kill the summoner, the summoned creature would have disappeared as well. All witches knew this fact by heart.


    It was the excessive confidence of the mysterious girl that caused her to ignore this fact. She had never believed Alice could survive until the time the Tyrant returned from the other ne. Consequently, she had never thought of this scenario as a possibility.


    Her heart skipped a beat when she saw the Infernal Tyrant and the unnatural swells of me energies all over its body.


    This isn¡¯t good. The brat is intending to...


    The sudden turn of events left no time for the girl to think. The Infernal Tyrant had been ordered to self-destruct at the very same moment it emerged in the hall. A miniature sun blew up under the girl¡¯s furious and shocked gaze.


    There were no shockwaves sts of wind. The entire room merely filled with a frightening and blinding crimson light. The temperature of the air continued to rise rapidly. It soon reached an unbearable level of heat.


    Violent and ruthless fire elementium permeated the room. The zing mes had ignited everything that could burn.


    The sky was burning, the earth was burning; even space was burning brightly.


    The intensely radiating heat caused the floor of the arcane hall to melt. Thick smoke rose into the air. Even the magic resistant bricks couldn¡¯t stand the terrifying radiation from the zing fires, not to mention flesh and blood. The blood stains and gore left behind from the bloody battle started to carbonize and disintegrate until nothing was left.


    Red mes had started eating away at the mysterious girl¡¯s hair and the edges of her robe, despite her protection by the powers of Fate. The air was scalding hot. Just the single act of inhaling would even cause the alveolus of your respiratory system to catch fire.


    Raging fires surged out of the center of the Tyrant¡¯s self-destruction and quickly ravaged everything around it. Neither Alice nor the mysterious girl was spared from the destruction.


    A thick block of ice kept Alice and Snowlotus frozen and protected from the fire. Snowlotus¡¯ ice powers were continuously reinforcing it. However, a short momentter, the radiation reached the ice block. The terrifying crackling of ice and fire shing rang out in the room!


    ............


    Outside the Tower.


    Greem raised his head in surprise.


    The other witches of the various branches also looked up in horror.


    The peaceful and silent Tower of Fate had abruptly started quaking. Two massive cracks that went all the way along the walls of the Tower had appeared. Savage fire elementium leaked out from within. Even the skies were burning red from the mes.


    The Infernal Tyrant!


    Greem gasped.


    The others might not have known what had happened in the Tower, but Greem knew very well what was going on.


    The Infernal Tyrant had self-destructed!


    Some extraordinary trouble must have cropped up in the Tower of Fate. Otherwise, Alice would never have chosen to have the Tyrant destroy itself. Greem couldn¡¯t even care for the loss of his most powerful golem. A feeling of endless concern and worry arose in his heart.


    The situation must have gone out of control!


    ............


    Within the arcane hall.


    The messy battlefield had now been reduced to a field of zing mes.


    Any substance without magical protection had been incinerated and transformed into viscousva. There were only a few piles of rocks that remained untouched. Alice and Snowlotus barely found a ce of shelter upon one such group of stones. They were still enduring the heat and the streams of fire with all they had.


    If it weren¡¯t for the remnants of the ice block keeping them cool, they would have died from just the heat in the air.


    They looked around for any signs of the mysterious girl. Just then, theva in front of them split apart, and an utterly charred figure walked towards them with determined steps.


    Dammit! I knew this wouldn¡¯t be enough!


    Fueled by her hatred and anger, Snowlotus forced herself to get up. She still wanted to resist. However, with the single word ¡¯Death¡¯ from the opponent¡¯s mouth, she copsed to the ground and slipped into the pool of magma.


    Alice straightened her body amidst the strange sounds of sizzling meat and the pungent smell of burning flesh. A charred hand grabbed her throat right as she stood up.


    Alice¡¯s body was tiny. The girl picked Alice up and suspended her in the air. Her hands and feet iled in an attempt to free herself from the enemy¡¯s grasp.


    "Well done... very well done. All that¡¯s left is the two of us," A scalding breath of air came out of the charred girl¡¯s mouth, "I won¡¯t let you die. I will burn your body and preserve your soul. I will turn you into a doll of fate and make you suffer endless lifetimes of cruel torture. I won¡¯t let you die just like this."


    Alice could only let out gasps and chokes with her throat being gripped by the enemy.


    "What is it? Is there something you want to say before you part with this body of yours?" The mysterious girl was enraged. She might die of the bottled-up rage if she wasn¡¯t able to take out her resentment and hatred on her enemy.


    The girl loosened her grip to listen to Alice¡¯s final cries before her death.


    Alice swiftly grabbed the girl¡¯s wrists. A smile shed on her face of utter fear and despair.


    "Thanks for letting me touch your body. Goodbye!"


    A mysterious surge of spatial energy coursed through the defenseless Alice. It instantly enveloped the mysterious girl before she could do anything.


    She still had the power to resist?


    The mysterious girl, disfigured from the explosion, was startled. The remaining powers of Fate in her body rapidly turned into an imprable defense. The girl was relieved when the defensive barrier finally formed.


    This barrier hadn¡¯t copsed, even when all three of them had attacked her. How could this little brat harm her through the protection of this barrier?


    Even before she could finish the thought, her vision blurred. Everything before her eyes changed.


    The skies that had been burnt bright red, the endless stretch of destend, the tall Tower of Fate behind her, and the Northern Witches looking curiously at her...


    Dammit, this was outside the Tower!


    The mysterious girl let out an ear-piercing screech when she understood what had happened. She immediately turned and lurched towards the Tower.


    But it was toote.


    A vast and omnipotent will filled with a sense of antiquity locked onto her position. The next moment, all the powers of Fate in her body converted into a frightening me that engulfed her body.


    The gentle power of Fate that had been her servant and soldier was now the cause of her death. It rapidly turned into the most unforgiving bandit in the world, burning every piece of flesh on her body. She broke down into a cluster of pure energy essence while consumed with fear and regret. The energy then slowly floated back into the Tower of Fate.


    Greem and the other witches looked at each other, confused. None of them understood what had just happened.


    The Witch of Fate selection this time was weird!

 Chapter 376 Witch of Fate

    Chapter 376 Witch of Fate


    Inside the arcane hall.


    Alice was shivering!


    Her petite body was already at its limit after such an arduous battle. She had lost one of her eyes and endured so many spells. From a distance, Alice looked just like a broken doll abandoned by her young owner. Not a single spot of her body remained uninjured.


    Alice shivered on the spot for a long time before finally being confident that the mysterious girl would nevere back. Her beating heart could finally rx!


    That mysterious girl was an undefeatable existence. She was not someone that low-grade witches like themselves could have dealt with.


    Alice hugged her shoulders with her badly wounded hands and sat on the pile of rocks silently. Just then, an exceptionally bright cluster of light floated into the hall under the guidance of a magical line and slowly merged with therge glow at the center of the array.


    There was a strange object in the middle of the lights. Bizarrely enough, the powers of Fate hadn¡¯t disintegrated it. Instead, it continued to float stubbornly around the lights. It was a remarkable sight to behold.


    Alice finally broke free of her fear after momentarily adjusting her psychological state. She stood up and looked obsessively at the massive ball of light in the array.


    The mysterious girl¡¯s soul and consciousness had already been wiped away by the narws and reduced to pure energy essence. Any entity no longer manipted the array, and for the first time, it opened its weing embrace to the only victor of the Battle of Fate¨C Alice.


    The mysterious array was closely rted to the Tower of Fate. The array¡¯s eptance of Alice¡¯s identity as the Witch of Fate also meant approval from the Tower of Fate. Alice would be the new Witch of Fate once she absorbed the powers in this array!


    Having obtained authority over the Tower of Fate, Alice was able to gain an understanding of the whole story through the data stored in the Tower¡¯s core.


    The mastermind behind the massive chaos in the selection of the Witch of Fate this time was the First Witch of Fate.


    When she had been forced to depart for the gxy due to her power exceeding the limits of the World of Adepts, she, like the other Northern Witches, had agreed to an equal exchange with the world consciousness. In exchange for her departure from the World of Adepts, the World had to allow her to imprint part of her legacy into the narws. It was a legacy that would pass on for generations and eternity, never to be extinguished!


    But these were only her actions on the surface!


    Out of her desire and greed for the powers of Fate within the World of Adepts, the first Witch of Fate intentionally created the Tower of Fate and established the Battle of Fate. She then hid part of her soul within the Tower.


    Every so often, when it came to the time of selection, the shards of her soul hidden within the Tower of Fate would try its best to possess and take over the body of a candidate. The soul then took part in the Battle of Fate with the stolen identity.


    That way, it didn¡¯t matter if that soul shard lost or won the battle. Since everything would be distilled into the power of Fate that fed back into the final victor of the Battle of Fate, every single Witch of Fate that came to be would have a piece of her soul hidden within them.


    Every Witch of Fate was like a seed nted by the Witch of Fate. They slowly budded, grew, and became stronger in the World of Adepts. When they finally had enough power to depart from the World of Adepts, the piece of soul would guide them towards the first Witch of Fate, who would then assimte them and their powers.


    The world consciousness forbade such actions.


    However, with the dense powers of Fate within the Tower shrouding and obscuring the truth, the mechanical and inorganic system of narws was not able to discover anything. That was how the secret of the First Witch of Fate managed to endure for so long!


    However, Alice had managed to crack the Tower of Fate with the Tyrant¡¯s self-destruction. The subsequent use of her spacestone then allowed her to teleport the girl outside of the Tower. That action exposed the truth and secret of the First Witch of Fate under the ever-watching eye of the narws.


    The most severe of nar bacshes had immediately punished the opponent. The bacsh was in addition to the great punishment she had to face for being outside of the Tower during the Battle of Fate.


    For the first time in history, with the purification by the narws, the advancement of the Witch of Fate was no longer being meddled with by the First Witch of Fate.


    Two mysterious options appeared in her mind when she finally stumbled into the array and stood before the ball of light.


    The first option¨C power infusion.


    It would directly infuse the powers of Fate into her to increase her strength. The energy in the cluster of light was estimated to be enough to push her to be a Third Grade Witch of Fate.


    The second option¨C potential increase.


    She could give up on increasing her powers and use it to enhance and elevate her talents and potential instead. This option was estimated to produce a vast and all-rounded increase to her current potential.


    Alice fell silent.


    She sank deep into thought when confronted with these two options.


    She could sense that this choice was nar feedback from the world consciousness, presented to her as a reward of sorts for having ¡¯killed¡¯ the mysterious girl. If it hadn¡¯t been for her part in exposing the secret, she would only have the first option. The second option would never have been presented to her.


    Judging from this point of view, raising her potential was undoubtedly the wisest course of action!


    However, if Alice indeed did that, she would be the first person to ever advance to Witch of Fate while remaining at First Grade. A First Grade leader of witches. The situation would undoubtedly throw chaos into the politics of the Northern Witches. Everything would be messy and troublesome!


    If Alice stepped out of the Tower of Fate as a Third or Fourth-Grade Witch of Fate, then there would have been no question as to her authority. She would be guaranteed a seat on the Witch Council, and all the former territories and resources of the Witches of Fate would be returned to her.


    But a First Grade leader of the Witches of Fate...


    What awaited her might be an arduous and painful journey to climb to the top once more!


    The best option would cause her to walk down a path of thorns. Inparison, the first option could bring her immediate convenience and benefits. Even though the mysterious girl had wasted too much of the power of Fate, bing a Third Grade Witch of Fate still gave Alice plenty of authority within the internal affairs of the Northern Witches. Her days would be morefortable if that were the case.


    The differences between her treatment would be massive!


    After an extended period of consideration, Alice took out the ck Qiraji Resonating Crystal and tried to contact Greem.


    The Infernal Tyrant¡¯s self-destruction had dealt quite an extensive blow to the Tower of Fate. If this had been any other Battle of Fate,munication with the outside would have been impossible.


    Greem quickly understood what had happened after listening to Alice¡¯s story.


    Even the outsider Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel shocked and concerned at all the twists and turns in this Battle of Fate!


    The scheme of one of the ancient witches was involved in this matter. It wasn¡¯t even Greem or Alice¡¯s turn to think about issues at that level. Their biggest problem right now was what option Alice should pick.


    Greem instantly understood this as well; Alice had already made her decision. She only asked his opinion out of respect for their rtionship and in consideration of their future cooperation.


    This attitude was undoubtedly beneficial for Greem¡¯s long-term gain!


    Thus, without hesitation, he chose to support Alice¡¯s decision to increase her potential.


    Alice was finally able to make her decision with Greem¡¯s support.


    However, before she selected the second option, she secretly borrowed part of the powers of Fate to do something.


    ............


    Outside the Tower of Fate.


    The skies had undergone a mysterious change.


    The fire elementium that had covered the entire sky disappeared. A massive funneling vortex appeared in the air. The end of the funnel extended all the way to the Tower and connected with the peak of the building.


    An immense power of repulsion emitted from within the Tower. Greem and the witches had no choice but to retreat one and a half kilometers away and watch the Tower from afar.


    They didn¡¯t need anyone to remind them. All the witches knew that this was the new Witch of Fate savoring the fruits of her victory. Perhaps, in a few more hours, the Northern Witches would wee a new witch leader. As the representatives of the various witch branches, they had to offer their gifts and greetings to this new sister of theirs.


    The neighboring branches, in particr, wanted to meet this new witch leader as soon as possible. They wanted to start discussing the issues of territory ownership. After all, the past thousand years had seen thends of the Witches of Fate being divided and split between the other branches.


    Now that the Witch of Fate had returned, everything they had eaten and swallowed into their stomachs had to be brought back up. Massive changes would unavoidably happen in the Northern Lands. One misstep and the politics within the Witch Council could be significantly affected!


    Several high-grade witches gathered together when they saw the increasingmotion urring in the sky. They began discussing who the new Witch of Fate might be, and what powers she would possess.


    If the new Witch of Fate were only Third Grade, then the Second and Third Grade gathering of witches here were qualified to negotiate with her on equal standing. They might even have the influence to push back on issues of specific territories and poptions.


    After all, the new Witch of Fate would be alone and without any subordinates. If she wanted to establish the dominance of the Fate branch, she had to rely on the support of the other groups. here was still plenty of room for negotiations.


    However, if the new Witch of Fate were Fourth Grade, the witches would only suffice as ambassadors to offer gifts and wees. Only their witch leaders qualified to negotiate with the Witch of Fate then.


    Greem¡¯s existence among these cackling witches was incredibly awkward.


    Even though he already knew the oue of the Battle, he couldn¡¯t reveal any of it before Alice became the Witch of Fate. Greem quickly started looking for solutions to deal with these witches when he felt the cold gaze of a Witch of Deceit on him.


    That witch was Rena, the mother of Snowlotus, the Dancer of Ice and Frost. Even Greem wasn¡¯t sure what the enraged Rena would do if the person who walked out of the Tower of Fate weren¡¯t Snowlotus.


    Four hours quickly passed as everyone waited anxiously.


    The doors of the Tower once again opened.


    This time, it truly opened. There was no longer a barrier of light like thest time.


    Everyone held their breath as they silently waited for the final results.


    A silhouette shed behind the doors. A beautiful figure wearing a long royal dress appeared before everyone.


    Her! It¡¯s her!


    Everyone was stunned.

 Chapter 377 Congratulatory Gifts

    Chapter 377 Congrattory Gifts


    It was a beautiful woman draped in a purple celestial robe.


    Her silky silver hair fell upon her shoulders. Her face was gentle and tranquil, but her two bright blue eyes whose, corners inclined upwards, gave her a sense of mystery and charm.


    "Alice, why is it you? What about Snowlotus?"


    Rena faltered. Her voice trembled as she asked.


    Even though Alice had transformed from her eight-year-old appearance, her familiar mental flux was the best proof of her identity for these witches.


    The other Witches of Deceit all betrayed expressions of dejectedness.


    They all knew very well.


    Only one witch could walk out alive from the Tower. As for what happened to those that didn¡¯t walk out? The rainbow lights that had streaked towards the Tower were the best exnation.


    "You... why are you only First Grade?" Compared to the Witches of Deceit¡¯s concern for Snowlotus, the witches of the other branches were more concerned about the power of the new Witch of Fate. Third Grade and Fourth Grade also meant different approaches they had to take with regards to their negotiations.


    However, all the witches were shocked to find Alice at First Grade.


    The Alice that walked out of the Tower of Fate... was only First Grade!


    "Are you here to celebrate my advancement to Witch of Fate, or are you here to doubt me?" The appearance Alice showed off right now was likely her real form. She didn¡¯t possess the facade of maturity that she used to put up as a girl. However, she didn¡¯t cower before the Second and Third Grade witches in front of her. Instead, her every action and word conveyed the pride and dominance unique to a person of authority.


    Hesitation appeared on everyone¡¯s faces.


    Such a thing had never happened before in the history of the Northern Witches.


    The witches of the various branches had always tried to help each other, but they never interfered with the internal affairs of another branch. Whether Alice was First or Fourth Grade upon advancement was an internal matter of the Witches of Fate. It shouldn¡¯t matter to the other witch branches.


    Thus, faced with Alice¡¯s harsh words, the high-grade witches only hesitated for a moment before bowing and paying their respects.


    Even if there were something inappropriate to this situation and Alice¡¯s power, only their respective leaders had the right to doubt Alice¡¯s legitimacy. In the end, they were nothing more than messengers meant to establish initial contact with the new Witch of Fate.


    The first ones to step forward were the Dark Witches that had always maintained friendly rtions with the Witches of Fate.


    A Third Grade witch named Kylie stepped forth and bowed her head slightly in respect.


    "Congrattions on bing the new Witch of Fate of our Northern Witches, Lady Alice. I represent Leader Circe of the Dark Witches and present to you seven apprentice witches, two resource sites, three human manors, and seven hundred apanying servants and ves."


    A parchment filled with a list of the gifts flew to Alice as Witch Kylie read its contents.


    Of course, Alice epted everything with a broad smile on her face.


    The next to step forward was the other allied branch of the Witches of Fate. The Death Witches.


    A middle-aged Second Grade witch strode forward and also nodded respectfully towards Alice.


    "Congrattions, Lady Alice. As the representative of our Death Witch Leader Khesuna, I bring you her most sincere congrattions. Furthermore, we of the Death Witches have brought you congrattory gifts of our own. Six apprentice witches, three resources sites, two human cities, one orchard, and six hundred apanying servants and ves."


    Alice epted the gifts from the Death Witches with satisfaction.


    With the two witch branches having taken the initiative, the other witch branches also took turns expressing their congrattions and presenting their gifts, after some slight hesitation. It was also true for the Witches of Deceit.


    However, the situation of their group leader Rena was taken into consideration, and another witch was sent in her ce to announce their gifts. Rena stood among the crowd, her face shing green and white. Her emotions were clearly vtile.


    Rena was a Second Grade witch, while the Alice who had killed her daughter was only First Grade. Yet, right now, this unqualified First Grade witch arrogantly stood near her and epted the congrattions and gifts of all these witches. All of this should have belonged to her daughter Snowlotus!


    "No... I¡¯ll never acknowledge your identity." Rena roared in anger, having reached her limits, "You murderer. You killed my daughter. I¡¯ll... "


    Rena¡¯s eruption immediately caused chaos at the scene.


    Alice might only have been First Grade, but she still represented the branch of Fate. If Rena¡¯s attitude reflected the intention of all the Witches of Deceit, then it meant that the cooperation and peace that the Northern Witches had maintained between them would shatter.


    The various branches were very likely to fall into a long andsting civil war!


    The other Witches of Deceit hurriedly restrained the enraged Rena and prevented her from harming or doing anything to the newly advanced Witch of Fate.


    Alice took a slight step back when she sensed Rena¡¯s hostility. Prismatic lights glowed around her body. One after another, delicate tarot cards with the scales of fate printed on the back appeared in a blinding sh. They slowly revolved around Alice.


    At the same time, the Tower of Fate looming over them started to rumble. A strong surge of magical energy weighed down and crashed upon the witches. Their hearts skipped a beat when they felt the pressure on their shoulders.


    All of the previous assessments and judgments of the Witch of Fate had onlye from tomes and ancient records. It was just now that the witches truly understood what being a witch leader meant.


    Even though Alice was only First Grade, she was still the absolute sovereign within any area covered by the Tower of Fate, while she was also the Witch of Fate.


    If anyone wanted to harm her here, they would first have to bring down the Tower of Fate.


    The older senior witches were all excited to see the tarot cards floating around Alice. It reminded them of the legends of the previous Witches of Fate.


    Witch of Fate. Witch of Fate. It was an overwhelming witch that had mastered Fate!


    Theirbat abilities might be aplete mess, but no one was willing to be their enemies!


    They were a strange existence that had leaped out of the system of worldws through their control over fate. They could swim in the river of destiny and use their powers to see the path that fate would take. Divination and predicting fortune and misfortune were child¡¯s y for the Witches of Fate. Their greatest strength was their ability to change fate!


    Change other people¡¯s fate!


    They didn¡¯t need to craft and carve out a new fate for someone else. All they had to do was lightly push you from your nodes of fate, and you would fall from a safe, paved, and known path to a dangerous trail filled with thorns.


    Everyone who offended the Witches of Fate would forever be cursed to a fate of misfortune, misfortune, and even more misfortune!


    From then onwards, luck would never be in their grasp.


    Because every time fortune approached them, they would find themselves subtly shifted onto a divergent path without even knowing what had changed.


    The Witches of Fate¡¯s strength might be weak, but they could shift the river of fate¡¯s trajectory without your knowledge.


    Thus, the powers of Fate represented by Alice immediately sensed the hostility Rena gave off. An oppressive aura of fate directly caused shivers to run down the spines of every witch present.


    No wonder no one dared to invade the Tower of Fate, even a thousand years after the extinction of their legacy. There was such a profound force hidden within the Tower.


    The witches silently nodded as if they had understood something.


    Alice abruptly smiled when she looked at the angry and sorrowful Rena.


    "Do you still want to see your beloved Snowlotus?" Alice casually tossed an image-recording crystal towards Rena, "Why don¡¯t you take a look at this first!"


    Rena¡¯s body trembled when she heard Alice¡¯s words. She immediately caught the crystal and used her Spirit to examine the contents.


    A short momentter, she lifted her head in joy and surprise and asked, "Are... are the contents of this crystal real?"


    "You can stay backter and verify it for yourself." Aplex expression appeared on Alice¡¯s face.


    She then turned towards the other witches and calmly spoke, "The Tower of Fate has only just activated. Too many things inside require my immediate attention and cleaning up, so I won¡¯t be inviting you inside for a tour. The gifts presented by the various representatives can be slowly handed over to us, but the promised apprentices have to be sent over as soon as possible. I thank you for your efforts!"


    The witches could hear Alice¡¯s intention to send them away. They looked at each other and turned to leave.


    The Witches of Deceit debated for a moment and decided to leave Rena behind when they departed.


    Soon, only Alice, Rena, Greem, and a Death Witch remained.


    Rena¡¯s confused gaze fell upon the Death Witch that had stayed behind.


    "I am H, Sofia¡¯s aunt. I know that asking about the Battle of Fate is an offense to the new Witch of Fate. But...but I still wish to know what happened to Sofia. If she is truly dead, then I can forget about it." The Second Grade Death Witch¡¯s face hid underneath her hood. She looked at Alice as she slowly exined her intentions.


    As expected, Sofia was rted to the Death Witches!


    Alice exchanged looks with Greem before silently nodding.


    "Since the two of you wish to know about your rtives, follow me! Sir Greem, please follow me as well!" Alice smiled at everyone present and turned to walk into the Tower of Fate.


    The three adepts followed her into the Tower.


    Rena was anxious and impatient. She marched right in front of everyone but Alice.


    The Death Witch was leaning on a magic staff with a strange design. The staff clonked against the floor as she walked into the Tower.


    Greem was the weakest of them all. He could only rub his nose in helplessness and walk behind them.


    A sense of antiquity was the first thing that greeted the three guests when they entered the Tower.


    Thick dust covered the floor, the pirs, the bookshelves, and the walls. Copsed shelves and boxes littered every ce they walked. Heavy crops of magical vines grew all over the ce haphazardly. They had forcefully turned the arcane hall of the ground floor into a sinister and frightening garden.


    And here, the marks of the Battle of Fate could still be seen!

 Chapter 378 The Two Revived

    Chapter 378 The Two Revived


    Even though it had almost been a whole day after the battle, the scars left behind were still visible.


    No corpses or blood stains remained, but there were shattered and severed vines all over the ce. The remaining bloodsucking vines and magical thorns crawled away from the adepts when they sensed the magical aura around the adept¡¯s bodies.


    The apprentices¡¯ skirmish had been the first battleground of the Battle of Fate.


    You could see the marks left behind on the walls and floor by all the various spells when you walked through the halls, libraries, arcane halls, rooms, and corridors. Not a single door stood untouched. Not one location had been left unexplored by the candidates.


    Along the way, the adepts also saw the fragmented remains of armored guards. They had been disassembled, reduced to pieces, and were scattered all over the floor like trash. The surface of these living armors had lost all their shine. Even their exposed joints looked to be rusted and corroded.


    Theck of maintenance and upkeep had significantly impacted theirbat ability. It was no wonder the guards had been so quickly put down by a group of apprentice witches.


    They walked through dark corridors and passed by several ruined battlefields. After a long walk, they finally left the apprentice living area and arrived at the upper floors of the adept¡¯s tower.


    The situation there appeared to be even worsepared to downstairs.


    The traces of battle on the lower floors had been extremely obvious, but at least most of the magical facilities and architecture remained undamaged. But here, broken pirs and copsed walls were everywhere. Rubble covered the entire ce. It was hard to tell what all the facilities and rooms had originally been.


    This ce was an extremely run-down tower!


    How powerful of a defense could an adept¡¯s tower like this still possess? Could it still be used without undergoingrge-scale renovations, repairs, and the instation of a new magical system?


    Questions arose in the guests¡¯ minds when they saw the state of the Tower.


    However, everyone knew better than to ask these questions that concerned the secrets of the Tower!


    Alice didn¡¯t continue to take them up the structure. Instead, she wound through the piles of rubble and finally arrived at a secret stone room that had survived all the damage.


    Two stone tforms had been ced in the room, side by side. Two naked women were lying atop the tforms. Apart from that, there were no other objects in the room.


    It was a gorgeous young witch that was lying on the tform to the left. Her skin was smooth and white, and her figure was very well-defined. Her breasts weren¡¯trge, but they were firm and supple. Even though she was only lying down on the tform, it gave everyone who saw the sight a feeling of crystalline beauty. It was the unique feeling of tranquillity when looking at a refined work of art.


    On the other hand, a strong woman no less muscr than a manid atop the tform on the right. The reason ¡¯she¡¯ was described as a woman was because of the undeniable female traits of her body. If it hadn¡¯t been for those traits, Greem would have thought of her as a man.


    Well-defined lines of muscle, pieces of flesh as sturdy as iron ingots, thick veins that ran through her body like tiny serpents, and healthy, firm arms and legs. Greem swallowed his saliva with a little difficulty. He thought his body had been sufficiently muscr already. When faced with the woman before him, he couldn¡¯t help but feelpletely outssed!


    The two witches were Snowlotus and Sofia, who had be candidates alongside Alice. Theyid upon the stone tform without a single movement. Not a trace of life remained in their bodies. A cluster of light the size of an egg floated above each of their heads. The adepts vaguely saw two small soul human figures that looked like Snowlotus and Sofia within those clusters of lights.


    "Snowlotus!"


    Witch Rena rushed forward and cried out in anguish.


    She might have been a materialistic and pragmatic person in most circumstances, but she still had a trace of genuine attachment to her daughter. It was clear how upset she was upon seeing Snowlotus¡¯ soul separated from her body.


    Sofia¡¯s aunt, H, also stepped forward. A semi-translucent girl in a red dress suddenly floated out from within her body. The girl wandered around Sofia¡¯s body and the cluster of light like a phantom. She finally returned to Witch H¡¯s body afterpleting her examination.


    Witch H closed her eyes as if she wasmunicating with the spirit. She then sighed and turned to ask, "Lady Alice, what price do I have to pay to revive Sofia?"


    Witch Rena was concerned about this as well. She turned and stared at Alice, waiting for an answer.


    They were all veteran Northern Witches. They knew very well the course of events that had taken ce during the Battle of Fate. Alice hadn¡¯t absorbed Snowlotus¡¯ and Sofia¡¯s powers of Fate. In fact, she had exhausted her own powers of Fate to reform their bodies and gather their shattered soul pieces back together. This action would have undoubtedly drastically reduced her powers.


    No one would have performed such a foolish act as harming their own benefit for the sake of someone else!


    At this moment, Witch H had to understand Alice¡¯s intentions. It didn¡¯t matter if she had to lower her pride a little. It was for the sake of her rtive. After all, the two girls remained suspended in this unique state of body-soul separation. That cluster of the power of fate was forcefully maintaining their life. Even the Second Grade Death Witch had no guarantee that she could revive the two girls without Alice¡¯s help.


    The Death Witches were only good at turning live humans into ¡¯dead¡¯ humans, not the other way around!


    "The two of you know very well what a severe loss it would be to me if I allow Snowlotus and Sofia to live! I will be direct in speaking my thoughts here. I need your sincerity, and I need them to serve me for a hundred years!" Alice, who had reverted to her adult appearance, was unusually calm and decisive at this moment. There was a sense of maturity in every one of her actions.


    The two Second Grade witches fell silent immediately.


    They thought for a long time and finally exchanged looks. Both of them saw the trace of helplessness in each other¡¯s eyes.


    They might have been Second Grade witches, but it was impossible to fight against a witch leader approved by thews of fate within the Tower of Fate.


    Even if she was only First Grade, it was impossible!


    A witch leader was a witch leader. Her noble status remained! If they tried anything against Alice, they would not have any advantage against her. Fate¡¯s powers supported the Witch of Fate, as did the abilities of the Tower. Perhaps this was why Alice allowed them into the Tower without a second thought!


    Every witch branch had their own towers of origin. These towers served unique functions different from those in an ordinary tower. There, the innate talents of the respective witch branches were significantly amplified. These towers also served as essential legacy sites.


    And the Tower of Fate was undoubtedly Alice¡¯s home ground!


    Here, in this tower, the Witches of Fate would have their abilities amplified by magnitudes of hundreds and thousands of times. The powers of the other witches, on the other hand, would be suppressed to their weakest. Trying to snatch Snowlotus and Sofia away from this ce was a fantasy.


    "I can agree to all your conditions as long as Sofia is revived!" Witch H finally spoke.


    "I can agree as well! I will agree to anything if you can bring back Snowlotus!" Rena replied hastily.


    "I have faith in your promises!" Alice nodded, "I¡¯ll treat them like true sisters!"


    Alice then waved her hand, and the two clusters of light with Snowlotus¡¯ and Sofia¡¯s souls in them slowly dropped and entered their heads.


    Alice walked forward and used her sharp nails to cut their skin. She started carving the mark of fate upon their foreheads. It was a symbol of two snakes biting each other¡¯s tails. The brand started glowing once she finished drawing the totem. The light disappeared in the blink of an eye. The two girl¡¯s foreheads became as smooth as they were before they had been cut. Not a trace of the brand could be seen.


    "From now on, the two of them will be the deputy leaders of our Witches of Fate. Do you find this a suitable arrangement?" Alice asked the two witches in a gentle voice.


    H and Rena bitterly smiled when they heard this.


    Even though this oue didn¡¯t match their original expectations for the Battle of Fate, it was still a happy ending whenpared to the worst possible oue. Supporting Sofia had mostly been H¡¯s personal decision. Most of the other Death Witches had been standing on Alice¡¯s side before the Battle.


    What else could she ask for with a result like this?


    Snowlotus and Sofia¡¯s bodies abruptly started moving while everyone was still deep in thought.


    Snowlotus¡¯ long eyshes fluttered, and a soft groan escaped her mouth. The rough and uncouth Sofia had already sat up. She looked around her surroundings in wide-eyed confusion. Her eyes slowly started to focus as she examined everything around her.


    "Sofia, it¡¯s me!" Witch H stepped forward, removed her hood and revealing her face to Sofia.


    Greem instantly felt a shiver run down his spine.


    What a hideous face!


    If one ignored the numerous stitches that ran across her face like centipede legs, and the face that had split into four or five pieces, she could still be considered pretty. However, the numerous cuts and stitches on her small face had utterly wrecked any beauty she had. Ignoring the wounds scarring her face was impossible!


    For the first time in his life, Greem hated his excessively powerful vision.


    The chip¡¯s atomic-level visual capturing abilities had perfectly projected the face in his mind. It had magnified every detail of H¡¯s hideous face. Greem could even see wriggling maggots and strange creatures moving under her face through the cracks of the stitches.


    If Greem hadn¡¯t suppressed the turmoil in his stomach with his powerful Spirit, he would probably have embarrassed himself by throwing up on the spot!


    "Aunt H, you? Didn¡¯t I die?" Sofia leaped off of the stone tform. Her substantial body caused the ground to tremor and rumble when shended.


    The Physiques of berserk witches were unbelievably strong. They couldpare to body-refining adepts. She was able to move about freely so soon after her soul had re-entered her body.


    Still, her uncouth and unrefined behavior was intolerable. She just stood there with her legs wide apart. She didn¡¯t seem to care about her nudity with a male adept standing right before her.


    At this moment, Snowlotus also sat up on the stone tform. She scanned her surroundings in confusion.


    "Where is this? Didn¡¯t I... die?"

 Chapter 379 Magical Crystal Mountain

    Chapter 379 Magical Crystal Mountain


    The process of convincing the two witches to join Alice¡¯s side was straightforward.


    After all, the two of them had been powerfulpetitors during the Battle of Fate. They had already prepared for all the possible oues. No one would choose to die after being revived over some insignificant limitations.


    This fact was evident from their performance during the Battle of Fate


    Even an uncouth, violent witch like Sofia knew how to keep a trick hidden up her sleeve and cast Life Concealment on herself. It was incredibly obvious how much the witches valued their own lives.


    A hundred year contract and the brand of fate were not a problem at all. In fact, Snowlotus and Sofia were more curious and unknowing as to why Alice hadn¡¯t just assimted their powers of Fate.


    Alice couldn¡¯t have brought the two of them back to life with her meager First Grade powers. The fact that she had managed to do so was only usible if she had split part of the energy used for her advancement before the ceremony.


    She had reduced her powers to save two individuals who didn¡¯t have clear allegiances towards her. Even though there was a ¡¯friendship¡¯ forged from their cooperation in the battle, it wasn¡¯t sufficient reason to save them. Thus, Snowlotus and Sofia, in their confusion, became Alice¡¯s deputies, and the deputy leaders of the Witches of Fate. They were leaders without anyone to lead, though.


    As for the subordinates...


    The apprentice witches promised by the various witch branches would arrive in one or two days. It was unfortunate, but before the apprentices came, there would only be the three of them within the tower. Not even a ghost could be found here.


    Well, that wasn¡¯t entirely true.


    After inspecting the Tower of Fate, Alice had found the few surviving guards. Two armored guards, three shadesteel statues, two revenant banshees, and four mummy elders. The other guards and voodoo beasts had all been destroyed and turned into useless piles of metal or destroyed during the Battle of Fate. It was hard to find any other creatures that could even move.


    Rena and H had already left the Tower of Fate to report to their respective witch leaders. The Death Witches had always been allies of the Witches of Fate; there was no need to worry about any trouble from their side. Instead, it was the Witches of Deceit that could pose a slight issue. No one knew how Rena¡¯s return to the Witches of Deceit might affect Alice.


    Sofia and Snowlotus set off to find their rooms within the Tower. Meanwhile, Alice brought Greem to the core area of the Tower.


    The intense battle had turned this ce into ruins. The tremendous explosion of the Infernal Tyrant had devastated the entire area. Most of the magical facilities on the floors, walls, and the ceiling had been utterly destroyed. The Tower of Fate was not going to have its usualbat prowess until they performed arge-scale renovation.


    "The Tower of Fate was crippled after this battle," Alice took the initiative and took Greem¡¯s hand. She took him on tour around the tower, "The Infernal Tyrant you lent to me is gone. The spider golem you spent so much time on has also turned into useless scrap metal. Tell me, how do you want me topensate you for all your investments?"


    An expression that was neither happy nor sad crossed Greem¡¯s face. He looked at the mess around them and frowned, "The whole Tower of Fate can¡¯t be this poor, can it? Did all the previous Witches of Fate need to slowly build up over a hundred years to regain the wealth and power they previously had?"


    "There, it¡¯s all here!" Alice took out a thick stack of parchments and pushed them into Greem¡¯s hands, "These are some of the territories and assets the other branches have returned under the guise of congrattory gifts. I already read through the list. They probably ount for around one-eighth of the territories and assets that we had in the past. These are just the appetizer they are serving. Not a single one of the important assets have been returned. We will probably have to rely on our strength and our fists to get back all the other assets!"


    "Isn¡¯t it always said that the Northern Witches are an extremely harmonious group?!" Greem¡¯s frown grew even deeper as he flipped through the list of gifts, "Why do they also love to fight andpete like everyone else?"


    "Hmph," Alice snorted coldly, "Don¡¯t you forget. The legacy of the Witches of Fate has been extinct for one thousand seven hundred years. Any of the rtionships established in the past have already faded after such a long time. Do you think those Death Witches will give back all the resources they¡¯ve taken just because of some flimsy rtionship of the past? To have actively supported me earlier was already thergest gift they could have given me."


    "Then what are your ns? Just struggle in the middle of these ruins? No subordinates and no resources? You probably won¡¯t have the ability to fix the Tower of Fate even if you wanted to!"


    "Let¡¯s take a look around first!" Alice frowned as well. It was the first time she felt the pain of being a faction leader, "There are several hidden spots in the Tower that I haven¡¯t checked! Maybe we¡¯ll find some surprises there."


    "I can only hope so!" Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh.


    As the tower of origin for the Witches of Fate, the damaged Tower of Fate was going to cost a tremendous number of resources to repair. The cost alone would be a massive and miserable sum. Both Alice and Greem, leaders of their own groups of individuals now, couldn¡¯t help but sigh when they thought about the expensive repair costs.


    Greem believed himself to be a reasonably wealthy adept, even within the Sarubo n. Yet, that amount of wealth would make absolutely no sound when thrown against the monstrous beast that was the Tower of Fate. It was, after all, one of the most powerful adept towers throughout the entire continent.


    The Tower had neen levels in total. Fifteen of them were above ground, and four were underground. The ce they were walking towards was the energy room on the second level of the basement. The energy room was always the most important ce for any adept¡¯s tower. It was the energy source and the energy reserves for the entire tower.


    They had to pass through twenty-oneyers of magical defenses and arcane doors. Even Alice, with the highest level of authority over the tower, only made it past the final barrier after an hour and a half.


    A transparent crystal shing with strange magical runes floated in front of Alice. This crystal was what allowed Alice to maintain a connection with the core of the tower. She chanted aplex, arcane password that consisted of three hundred and seventeen sybles, as well as ny-seven magical handsigns that had to be employed at different intervals.


    Once she hadpleted this, the thick, rune-enhanced door trembled. Dust fell everywhere as the door slowly opened to the side and revealed the energy room that had been sealed for a thousand years.


    A thick, almost solid wave of elementium aura surged out at them the moment the doors opened.


    Alice wasn¡¯t quite affected. She was a Witch of Fate, and her talent didn¡¯t nt towards any particr element. However, Greem was a pure fire adept. The thick elementium aura that enveloped his body instantly turned into a crimson sea of fire.


    From a distance, it looked as if Greem had been sealed in a massive ruby. The bright red color was a beautiful sight from afar.


    Alice¡¯s act of opening the energy room had also drawn Sofia and Snowlotus to this ce. The thick elementium aura immediately engulfed their bodies the moment they got close. They two looked like they had been encased in a giant gemstone.


    Snowlotus¡¯ appeared to be a sapphire, while Sofia¡¯s looked like a diamond!


    The two greedily inhaled the flowing magical particles around them. Almost every pore of their skin had opened to the fullest and was trying their best to absorb these nearly liquid-state elementium particles. Their bodies had just reconstructed after death. There were almost no magical energies within their bodies at this point. Of course, they couldn¡¯t wait to replenish themselves with such a great opportunity before them. They wanted to rid themselves of this unbearable state of energy starvation.


    The four of them were utterly shocked by the scene in front of them when they walked into the hall of the energy room!


    Magical crystals, magical crystals. So many magical crystals!


    As one of the best adept¡¯s tower on the Continent, its energy room was one of thergest as well. It probably had twenty thousand square meters of area in total. The chamber also reached a surprising forty-three meters in height.


    A towering tform upied the center of the hall, and the top of the tform was a three meter long, five meters wide, and two-meter high altar. It was this magic altar that allowed the Tower to continuously absorb wandering magical particles and add it to the elementium pool below.


    A stone terrace with many differentyers was below the altar. Each segment of the terrace contained a massive magic energy pool. Once the pool at the top filled with magical energy, it would flow into the pool below it.


    The entire structure was like a brilliant flower. The altar was the center of the flower, and theyers of magic energy pools were like the many differentyers of the flower¡¯s petal. The pools were dug in an iprehensible manner around the terraces in a specific profound order.


    The four adepts present were all knowledgeable individuals. The all knew that liquid, magical energy perpetually filled the energy pools at the top of the terraces. The pools on the bottom, on the other hand, would be split into elementium pools of their respective elements.


    If the owner of the tower were a fire adept, the number of fire elementium pools would greatly outnumber those of other elements. If the owner were a Death Witch, the negative energy pools would take up the most space.


    It was only through such a method that the entire tower could create an environment that was most suited for its owner. Still, modifying such an ample space to convert this state of elementium equilibrium into one with only a single dominant attribute would exhaust tremendous amounts of elementium energy.


    Why was it that so many adepts loved to choose geographical environments that suited their attributes when constructing their adept¡¯s tower?


    Fire adepts liked to build their towers in volcanic areas, while ice adepts preferred to construct theirs in frozen wastnds. All of this was to reduce the waste of elementium energy while modifying the environment!


    Saving all this energy allowed it to be converted into tangible economic benefits¨C magical crystals!


    The first thing the four adepts saw when they entered the energy hall was the hill made of magical crystals.


    A magical crystal cluster asrge as a mountain!

 Chapter 380 Magic Fairies

    Chapter 380 Magic Fairies


    What would your reaction be if a cluster of magical crystals asrge as a mountain appeared before you?


    Greem, at least, waspletely tongue-tied. His eyes opened wide as he stuttered for several minutes, trying to find the words to express his feelings.


    The entire block of crystals was like a massive cactus growing without a particr pattern. The gigantic clusters of crystal started from the energy pools and gradually extended outwards, with numerous smaller, derivative crystals growing out of the giant block. Their crystalline structures shined with a magical light.


    It looked like most of the energy room¡¯s space had been taken up by these crystal clusters. If one looked throughout the room, they would find crystals everywhere, along with the prismatic light they reflected. There were even giggling magic fairies flying all around the room.


    Magic fairies were not creatures born of nature; they weren¡¯t magical creatures in the ordinary sense. Instead, they were elementium spirits that manifested once the magic elementium in the air reached a certain density. They looked no different from regr elementium fairies, but the level of their existence origins was far superior to elementium fairies.


    If elementium fairies were analogous to the beasts of the wild, then magic fairies would be the powerful magical creatures that ruled over them all. They were few in numbers, but their soul origin was several levels above your ordinary magical being.


    When the four adepts walked into the hall, they saw a total of six or seven magic fairies.


    A slightlyrger magic fairy pped her wings and flew to the four of them while they were still mesmerized by the sight of the crystal mountain.


    "You outsiders, why are you trespassing in our home? Get out, or we will attack you!"


    The one who was speaking to them was a beautiful magic fairy. She was only the size of a palm, but she had a slim figure and looked just like a tiny elf. She had a pair of transparent wings on her back and waved a magic wand in her hand. The wand was so thin that it looked like a matchstick. Glimmering magic dust would remain in the air wherever she went, painting bright starry paths in the air.


    The other magic fairies also surrounded the adepts after the first one had threatened them. They beat their wings and scattered stardust in the air as they flew. All of them pointed their magic wands at Alice and the rest.


    "Big guys, get out of our home."


    "Leave quickly, or I¡¯ll turn you into honking pigs."


    "No, it¡¯s better to turn them into little snakes."


    These magic fairies were quite talkative. They surrounded the adepts, but after issuing one or two threats, they started arguing among themselves over the smallest of matters. Greem was amazed at the sight of these magic fairies, even as they waved their fists and tried to look intimidating. Hemunicated with the chip.


    "Chip, can you scan for the base model of these lifeforms?"


    "Beep. Project has been constructed. Scanningmencing. Beep. Beep. Beep. Warning. Target lifeform has an unknown forcefield around their body. Ordinary detection rays are unable to prate said forcefield. Rmending use of elementium analysis rays. However, this will be active probing. There is a certain probability that the target will detect the probing. Requesting instructions from host. Commence operation?"


    "Can¡¯t their race be deduced from their appearance and their behavioral traits?"


    "Beep. No simrities found within the 1,397,941 lifeform traits within the data library. Initial estimates suggest lifeform to be a legendary lifeform. Passive probing abilities have indicated that the target is most likely a nature spirit that manifested once magic elementium density passed a certain threshold. Lifeform does not belong within the category of natural lifeforms and magical creatures."


    "Nature spirits?" Greem brooded in silence.


    Meanwhile, Sofia, who only believed in absolute strength, marched forward.


    "You uninvited midgets, this is ournd. How dare you be so arrogant in our ce. Do you want me to punch you?" Sofia raised her massive fist and waved it at the fairies while she spoke.


    With how big her fists were, it was probably more than enough to crush two fairies in a single grasp.


    However, her threats didn¡¯t work. In fact, the fairies treated her reckless actions as an attack against them.


    The next moment, four magic wands pointed at her.


    Crisp and sweet yells rang out in the air as four green beams shot towards Sofia and hit her on her broad chest.


    The beams were very thin, and the magical energy they radiated was pitiful. Yet, strangely enough, they ultimately passed through Sofia¡¯s defensive forcefield without any resistance and made contact with her body.


    Pu. A soft sound echoed in the room.


    The green mist dispersed and Sofia vanished. A cute pink pig with a red bowtie and a curly tail stood in her ce.


    Alice, Greem, and Snowlotus felt ufortable shivers run through their bodies when they saw what happened to Sofia. The pink pig even raised her snout at the three of them, sneezed, and wagged her little tail.


    "Dammit! It¡¯s magic pration!"


    The three of them immediately understood the nature of the magic fairies¡¯ powers.


    If spells were an ability the adepts had gained through the umtion of knowledge, then magic fairies would be natural spellcasters.


    They were nature spirits born of magical energies. Their control over magical energies wasn¡¯t like an adept¡¯s. It wasn¡¯t a means of manipting and borrowing the strength of magical power. Instead, it was second nature and intuition carved right into their soul. They needed absolutely no chants or handsigns when they used magic. The fairies only had to will it to happen, and magic would move as they wanted it.


    Moreover, what was even more terrifying about them was the fact that each one of their spells possessed magic pration. Magic like this was too much to endure, even for Sofia, who had a basic magic resistance. Their spells had instantly struck her.


    Sofia, who had as much muscle as the most muscr of human men, had been turned into a pink honking pig without any ability to resist. The humiliation of being reduced to livestock made the three other adepts gulp. They couldn¡¯t help but slowly back away.


    If even Sofia couldn¡¯t defend against the spell, the rest of them probably couldn¡¯t as well. No amount of magical defenses could block that frightening magic pration effect. It was better to y it safe to avoid being reduced to a joke!


    "Scared now?" A magic fairy proudly beat her wings and flew about in the air. She waved her hands in delight, "It was me. Me. It was my magic that worked!"


    The other three fairies immediately became dejected. Even their wings started drooping.


    All four magic beams had hit Sofia at the same time. Yet, in the end, the spell that took effect was this fairy¡¯s who had cast Polymorph: Pig.


    In truth, the magic fairies looked almost identical to each other. When they flew in unison, even Greem couldn¡¯t distinguish them with his mundane sight alone.


    "Okay, outsiders. We won¡¯t be pursuing your offense of trespassing into our home any longer," The slightly more mature magic fairy once again flew before them, "Now please leave and return peace to our home!"


    Greem and Alice looked at each other. Alice then smiled and walked forward.


    "As mypanion said, this is our ce, not your home. As the outsiders, shouldn¡¯t you people be the ones to leave?"


    "Liar."


    "This big one is lying."


    "Big guy is so mean. Let¡¯s turn her into a green frog."


    The magic fairies immediately started scolding Alice. They pouted and put their hands on their hips. Some even raised their wands and charged at her.


    "Hmph! Little people still want to be stubborn even after taking advantage of my tower for such a long time. Let me show you who¡¯s the real owner of this ce!" Alice might have returned to her original body, but her habits from her child-form were hard to change quickly. She also ced her hand on her hips like the fairies were doing and snapped her fingers.


    A rune shed on the control crystal floating in front of her. The unique flux of a magical array change came from deep within the crystal cluster.


    A short momentter, a magic fairy anxiously flew out from within it. She yelled as she flew, "This isn¡¯t good... it¡¯s bad. The magic fountain source has been cut."


    The magic fairies immediately started panicking. They couldn¡¯t care less about Alice and the rest. All of them dashed back into the depths of the crystal mountain.


    "Talk to them!" Greem nodded at Alice, "They seem innocent. If discussions go well, you might find yourself with some useful helpers!"


    Alice smiled sweetly back at Greem.


    Snowlotus looked at the two of them in confusion. She really couldn¡¯t quite understand their real rtionship.


    A short whileter, the magic fairies once again flew out in a rage. They surrounded Alice.


    "Speak, evil bad guy!" The leader of the magic fairies waved her fist and threatened, "What evil magic did you use to cut off the magic fountain source. Quick, cancel it."


    "Little fellows, you stay here, and you don¡¯t know where this is? This ce is the energy room of my adept¡¯s tower. It¡¯s my home and my territory. If you want to stay here, you will have to get my permission. And if you don¡¯t agree, don¡¯t me me for forcefully evicting you!" Alice seemed to be even better than them at being an unreasonable kid.


    The magic fairies gathered together and started a discussion.


    As powerful nature spirits, their intelligence wasn¡¯t low. It was only the istionist lifestyle they had led that caused them to be a little too innocent. They could tell the truth behind Alice¡¯s words.


    Thus, an intense debate happened before the eyes of the three adepts. Meanwhile, Sofia was still sadly walking in circles on the ground. Even though she was trying her best to roar and intimidate the fairies, it just wasn¡¯t working. Greem had to force himself to stay calm to notugh at the pig¡¯s small body and its cute face.


    The magic fairies were pragmatic beings as well. They soon pushed their dejected leader forward and started a careful negotiation with Alice.

 Chapter 381 Putting Things Back into Order

    Chapter 381 Putting Things Back into Order


    The magic fairies were at a distinct disadvantage in this negotiation!


    It was unavoidable. These magical energies were merely one of the ways by which the adepts maintained the daily functions of the tower. Even if the magic altar was shut down and the adept¡¯s tower deactivated, the adepts wouldn¡¯t suffer. The only real harm to the adepts was theck of an energy reserve that they could draw upon in times of crisis.


    However, the magic fairies had no other choice.


    After all, they were nature spirits that had been born in environments of high magical energy concentration. The magical energy was extremely crucial to fairies like the air was for humans. It was not an element that they could do without. They would be severely affected if the magical energies in the energy hall fell below critical levels.


    An ordinary energy room didn¡¯t produce the conditions to allow for magic fairies toe into existence.


    That was because of the nature of energy pools and their function within an adept¡¯s tower. Every so often, the crystals formed from the dense concentration of magical energy would be drawn from the pools and used to fill the treasuries of the adepts. It was an important economic source for an adept¡¯s tower!


    It was rare for an adept¡¯s tower to be abandoned and sealed for 1,700 years like the Tower of Fate.


    The closed environment and the extended period of time allowed magical energy to umte and reach dense concentrations. It was this unique environment that allowed the energies topress into not just crystals, but crystal clusters that continuously grew to this enormous size.


    Even with the unique conditions of this room, it took a thousand years for the first magic fairy to be born. From then onwards, a new magic fairy was born every hundred years.


    That was why there were only seven magic fairies in this energy hall at the moment.


    Alice received excellent news from her discussions with the leader of the magic fairies.


    The magical crystals stored in this ce had reached an astounding total of nine million!


    Before they could even start rejoicing, the magic fairy put forth their conditions for serving Alice.


    First, the total amount of magical crystals in the hall was never to go below nine million.


    After all, the magic fairies relied on the magical energies to live. If the magic concentration in the room were too low, it would be hard for any new magic fairies to be born. However, this meant that Alice could only use a small number of magical crystals. A total of approximately three hundred thousand.


    Second, Alice could only take half of the magical crystals that formed in this room from now on.


    Of course, Alice couldn¡¯t agree to this condition. It was way too harsh.


    Thus, after arduous negotiations, the magic fairies had no choice but to lower their standards. They would only take one-third of the total amount of crystals formed each day.


    The number of crystals that formed on a daily basis numbered around twenty-three. Once the Tower of Fate was fully activated, a significant amount of energy would be drawn away to maintain its daily functions. This diverted power meant that only a total of twelve magical crystals would form every day. Eight of them would be taken away by Alice, and four would be left behind for the magic fairies.


    Third, the terms of service.


    Alice and Snowlotus were each allowed to conscript one of the magic fairies as their magicalpanion. The fairies would be responsible for the managing of the witch¡¯s rooms as well as theirbs. However, their service was limited to the Tower of Fate. The magic fairies refused to ever step out of the tower.


    On the other hand, the fairies didn¡¯t very much like Greem or Sofia, so they were excluded from the list of potential masters.


    They came to an agreement. Alice and Snowlotus then picked one of the magic fairies each as theirpanions and signed a contract of equal treatment. With the contract in ce, the two of them had to pay the fairies two crystals per day as their wage. Moreover, they couldn¡¯t force the fairies to do anything without their consent.


    A cute and petite magic fairy crouched upon Alice¡¯s shoulder after they signed the contract. The fairy leaned on Alice¡¯s shoulder and started talking with her.


    Greem also managed to get some basic understanding of the magic fairies from the information Alice provided him.


    Magic Fairies. Magic spirits that had been born of nature. They were sexless and possessed a body of pure elementium. Their primary powers were approximately equal to that of a First Grade adept. They possessed many innate magics, including Magic-Interference Barrier, Enhance Magic Regeneration, Deep Meditation, and Replenish Stamina. Most of their spells were support spells.


    These spells could be used on themselves, but they could also cast them on others. They had strong abilities like being able to double magic regeneration rates, replenishing stamina, and allowing their allies to enter profound meditations. The magic fairies were, undoubtedly, an exceptional servant for experienced adepts.


    Not to mention that their racial trait of extreme longevity made them the perfect servants. They could serve an entire n for thousands of years. For these reasons, they were considered one of the best magicalpanions.


    However, the requirements for their birth were too strict. Their discrimination when picking partners also made it difficult for adepts to turn them intopanions of their own. They were proud creatures. They would rather kill themselves than be bound by outsiders if they couldn¡¯t reach an agreement.


    Uncouth witches like Sofia fell way out of their beauty standards. The fairies also rejected Greem on ount of him being a male. No one knew how the fairies made up their minds when deciding on these arbitrary factors!


    Alice had essentially rented the energy room from these magic fairies upon signing the contract. If she wanted to visit the hall in the future, she would first have to gain the fairies¡¯ consent.


    These conditions were still a little harsh on someone as seemingly powerful as the Witch of Fate, but Alice had no choice but to ept them. After all, these fairies could be a great help to the Fate branch in the future!


    The magic fairies were sexless and alsocked a concept of identity. That was why they often didn¡¯t have names of their own.


    However, Alice still gave the magic fairy she had recruited a name to distinguish her from the others. She named her Helen. Snowlotus, on the other hand, name her fairy Hannah.


    The two fairies were like little girls that had just gotten a new favorite toy. They quickly ran to theirpanions and started bragging about their new names. All the magic fairies soon went into a frenzy. They all flew towards Alice and harassed her for a name of their own.


    Alice was utterly overwhelmed by the passionate fairies. She had no choice but to start randomly calling out names. Anna. Allie. Eve. There was no rest until she had satisfied all of the fairies.


    Surprisingly, this won her the approval of a favor by the magic fairies. They all volunteered to help Alice clean up this tower that had been neglected for an entire millennium.


    The moment Alice nodded, all the magic fairies formed a group and flew into the tower as if it was their own home. Only one fairy was left behind to watch over the reactivated magic altar.


    Six magic fairies weaved and zipped across the air like six sweet angels that had descended from heaven. They left behind trails of stardust as they dashed through the dark corridors.


    They casually waved their wands at anything they didn¡¯t like while they flew.


    With a wave of the wand, illuminating crystals that had lost their lights once again lit up.


    With a ripple of stardust, the dust on the floor was blown away, swept into a corner with all the magical vines and cobwebs that had grown all over the ce.


    The magic fairies even miraculously repaired the damaged doors and structures when they flew past them.


    Alice and the other three left the energy room and found their way back above.


    All the corridors were brightly lit now. The floors were as clean as if they were new, and all the doors and facilities were in perfect working condition. These little fairies seemed to have the magical ability to transmute even stone to gold. A thousand years of dust and waste were all blown out of the tower wherever they went. Even the areas covered in magical vines and thorns were cleared up and returned to how they had looked before.


    Even the shelves and racks copsing from old age reverted to their original state under the effect of the fairies¡¯ mysterious and wonderful powers. A library open to all apprentice witches had been restored in the blink of an eye.


    The squad of magic fairies quickly flew out of the library once they had finished there. They immediately flew towards the magicalbs next.


    Alice and the others looked on in shock.


    The most skilled at their work were specialists after all!


    The magic fairies were famed as the greatest magical butlers andpanions in the entire universe. This skill was thoroughly demonstrated by all they had done in the mere minutes since they had left the energy room. Even though the fairies had locked up nine million magical crystals worth of assets for their services, all four adepts believed this to be a good trade!


    At least three of them were smiling. As for Sofia? Her face was turning even darker by the second. The fires of anger in her heart were stoked whenever she saw these midgets dashing all around her!


    Her! A berserker witch with a magic-resistant Physique, reduced to a... Sofia wanted to go berserk every time she thought of the events that had transpired in the energy room. She wished to smash everything to pieces.


    Alice pulled Snowlotus and Sofia to a side and had a heart-to-heart talk while the fairies were busy cleaning up the tower.


    "You have ns and rtives behind you. I can understand that!" Alice patiently started, "However, right now, you are part of our Witches of Fate. As sisters, I won¡¯t ever force you into an awkward position or make you do things you are unwilling to. However, you two must also manage your rtions with the various ns well."


    Snowlotus and Sofia naturally knew what to do now that Alice had brought the matter before them.


    As vice leaders of the Witches of Fate, they shared the burden and mission of restoring the glory of the Witches of Fate.


    Alice gave them part of the tower¡¯s control authority, and the three gathered together to discuss their future ns. Soon, the three witches had already divided the most pressing tasks between them.


    Alice was going to focus on understanding the structure and secrets of the Tower. She was also going to do a count of all the damaged and destroyed facilities, and check if she could recover them. Snowlotus was responsible for clearing out the storeroom and the treasuries in search of any materials and resources that they could still use. The probability was low, but the stones and metals used for repairing the tower might not have been wholly corroded away by time.


    These resources were all things that they desperately and urgently required!


    Naturally, as an ¡¯ally¡¯ of Alice, Greem had to help however he could.


    The knowledge of statue constructs that he had mastered over the past few years immediately came into use. The magic fairies ced the shattered pieces of the statue constructs they had collected from all over the tower in arge hall. Greem worked there day and night as he tried to put together some functional golems to help with the work.


    The magic fairies were only clearing up and tidying the tower after all. Their magical tricks might be useful for fixing up some of the more ordinary objects, but they weren¡¯t very useful when applied to the magical objects and facilities.


    Each golem that Greem managed to repair was additional freebor. The clearing up of the massive ruins upstairs couldn¡¯t be aplished without their help.


    Sofia, on the other hand, collected a hundred thousand magical crystals from the energy room and rapidly left the Tower.


    Arge group of apprentices would arrive at the Tower of Fate in two days. Their arrival meant that the Tower needed to be in working condition. It needed to be able to fulfill the daily activities and needs of a hundred people. Their meals, studies, training, and their lives.


    The adepts could directly consume elementium water drawn from the water elementium ne, but the apprentice witches had no such ability. Drinking elementium water on a regr basis was very likely to upset the bnce of elementium in their bodies.


    The Tower of Fate badly needed replenishment of food, water, magical materials, and all sorts of other resources.


    As the only leaders of the Witches of Fate, the three of them were incredibly busy!

 Chapter 382 On the Way

    Chapter 382 On the Way


    Erika was extremely anxious.


    The hired carriage slowly made itsborious way through Dragonblight. Apanying her were six other apprentices and one witch responsible for escorting them. There were about four dozen guards in ck armor scattered around the line of a dozen carriages.


    These guards had been sent by the n to escort them to the Tower of Fate.


    Erika became even more upset when the thought of leaving herpanions behind entered her head. She had to abandon the familiar surroundings of the n and travel long distances to the Tower of Fate located in this deste ce.


    She was born in the small town of Mostow, Moline. It was an area governed by the Dark Witches.


    Erika had been discovered to possess talent as a witch and was sent to the tower of the Dark Witches by her family to study magic. She had only barely managed to reach intermediate level after twelve difficult years of study.


    At the rate at which she was improving, it was doubtful she would advance to be a witch!


    Her talent was considered as inferior among the other apprentices. Otherwise, she wouldn¡¯t have been selected as one of those to be sent to the Witch of Fate. She had secretly cried three times during this trip over this fact. It was Freya who had kepting to console her during these breakdowns.


    Freya was a kind and pretty girl. She was already at the level of advanced apprentice, even though she was only fifteen years old. Just a little longer and she would raise her Spirit to twenty points and advance to be an actual witch. The n would most definitely shift their resources in her favor then!


    Erika truly couldn¡¯t understand why they had picked Freya for this.


    If the Dark Witches had abandoned Erika due to her incapability, why was a hopeful apprentice like Freya included in the list of apprentices sent to the Tower of Fate?


    Amotion came from outside while Erika was still bothered by her thoughts.


    "Windwolves... "


    "These are windwolves!"


    Shouting and yelling came from outside the carriages, along with mournful wolf howls.


    Dammit! More magical creatures!


    These assaults hadn¡¯t stopped since they had left the Death Witches¡¯ territory and entered Dragonblight. There were far too many monsters wandering around Dragonblight. Every one of them was savage and ferocious. Arge target like the caravan line was never going to escape the sensitive noses of these magical creatures.


    All sorts of creatures had attacked them on the way here. Otyughs, umber hulks, ankhegs, gray renders, ironhide rhinoceroses, breathdrinkers, and even manticores. Eleven of the guards had died fending off these attacks. They would have lost even more men if it hadn¡¯t been for the Dark Witch escorting the party.


    Envy would rise in Erika¡¯s heart every time she saw the Dark Witch floating in the sky and chasing away the packs of magical creatures with her ck halos and shadow spells. She was so envious of the witch¡¯s ability that she wanted to cry.


    She too wanted to be a true Dark Witch after so many years of study in the adept¡¯s tower. If she became a witch, she would possess the enviable Body of Shadows. She would gain control of numerous shadow spells, and most importantly, she would be able to leave her soul brand within the soul energy pool of the tower.


    That way, even if she died in battle, she only needed to exhaust some resources to be revived in the energy pool. This ability was the main reason why most Dark Witches had such fierce and boldbat styles!


    However, not all n adepts could be Dark Witches. The selected candidates had to undergo a Dark Baptism before they could be Dark Witches. It was rumored that a tested adept would be sent into a lesser ne known as the Realm of Darkness. They had toplete a certain number of kills before they had a chance of undergoing the Dark Baptism.


    These had all been part of Erika¡¯s ns. However, all these ambitions and designs of hers had faded into dust when she was sent on this journey to the Tower of Fate!


    The howls in the distance had grown even more frequent while Erika bemoaned her fate.


    It sounded like they weren¡¯t too far away from the carriages now!


    "All apprentices get out of the carriages and help the guards in defending against the windwolves! Hurry. Get moving." The Dark Witch finally spoke when she saw the crumbling line of defense.


    The thirty-two guards covered each other as they retreated while fighting. They soon re-established their formation around the carriages. A pack of windwolves had trapped four of theirpanions and were striking at the humans.


    Windwolves. They were a type of magical creature that lived in packs. Individually, they were as powerful as a beginner apprentice, and they only knew how to use a single spell. It was a spell that called upon wind particles to envelop their bodies and increase their agility, much like the wind-attribute spell Windrun. However, once the pack reached over a hundred in number, elite windwolves who knew Windde would develop. Windde was a long-range spell that ordinary humans were incapable of defending against.


    The reason the guards had been unable to turn away the pack of windwolves earlier was due to three such elites firing winddes at them. The green translucent des shed through the shields of the guards and split their bodies apart when the elite wolves focused their firepower on a single target.


    The three elite windwolves made it impossible for the guards to keep the wolves at bay with just their shields and armor.


    The guards that retreated to the carriages gathered into a simple formation that protected the witch and the apprentices behind them. The apprentices all started to chant their spells while the windwolves charged towards them. The two nt-attribute apprentices even threw thorn seeds to the outsides of the perimeter.


    Soon, over a hundred and thirty windwolves leaped upon the guards. They raised their snouts and howled into the night as they attacked.


    The first things that made contact with the wolf pack were the thorn seeds whose growth had been elerated.


    Roots emerged from the magic seeds and nted themselves in the earth. The seeds then started to swell and expand in size. A massive thorn vine grew out of a seed. It then split into four or five more, slightly thinner, vines. All of the vines had purple-ck thorns and fang-like barbs on them.


    The vines that had instantly grown out of the seeds waved about like the arms of a living creature. A mouth filled with sharp and delicate teeth would open at the ends of the vines every time they entangled or hit a windwolf. The vines then dug into the bodies of the wolves.


    If they seeded in digging their way into the flesh, the thin vine would instantly start to swell. A chilling grumbling sound would then ring out.


    In the blink of an eye, the seven windwolves in the lead had turned into the magical vines¡¯ victims. They struggled furiously and tore at the vines with their ws and fangs.


    A powerful nt hadn¡¯t been used to create these apprentice-level vines. Consequently, they were rtively weak. The vines were continuously being torn apart even as they continued to assault the wolves. All the acid and indigested flesh in the vines scattered across the ce.


    Even though the magic vines tried their best to resist, their quality and numbers were still insufficient to deal with the windwolves.


    Soon, the wolves broke through the first line of defense and neared the wall of guards.


    Seven apprentice witches had managed toplete their spells in the time the wolves had taken to break through the nts.


    Acid Spray!


    Acid Pool!


    Fireball!


    Sonic Hunt!


    ......


    Erika stood at the edge of the formation and also fired a spell of her own. Shadow Assassin.


    It was a low-grade shadow spell. It summoned a humanoid assassin in the shadows near the enemy that dealt eight shadow damage to all creatures around it. As long as the assassin¡¯s shadow core remained intact, it could continue to damage enemies for as long as three hundred and eighty seconds.


    It was the only area-of-effect spell that Erika knew!


    Inparison, Freya used Sonic Hunt.


    She stuffed a bunch of Screech Herbs in her mouth and cupped her mouth. She then let out a terrifying soundwave.


    All the windwolves in a cone before Freya howled in agony and fell to the ground. They had lost all control over their bodies. The guards seized the opportunity to move forward and y these incapacitated windwolves.


    The Dark Witch immediately noticed the three elite windwolves when they came close to the group.


    She didn¡¯t do much. The witch extended her hand and made a grabbing motion at the location where the wolves were, and the beasts instantly plunged into a situation of life and death.


    Vast swathes of shadow erupted from underneath the three windwolves. The ck mist quickly enveloped their bodies and dragged them into the shadows beneath them. It was like a tunnel had opened into the Shadow World. It didn¡¯t matter how much the wolves struggled. They couldn¡¯t break free of the ck haze. Bit by bit, they disappeared into the shadow.


    The ck mist dispersed once the wolves were gone.


    Only brown dirt and pebbles remained on the ground.


    The three wolves had vanished entirely!


    The loss of their leaders quickly threw the wolves into chaos. After suffering the loss of almost one-fourth of their entire pack, the wolves chose to retreat!


    Another seven guards had died in this battle, and the rest were also injured.


    Fortunately, the apprentices were unharmed. The Dark Witch was relieved at this oue.


    These seven apprentices might not have had much potential and talent, but the n had still exhausted a lot of their resources to train and raise them. The decision to give them away to the Witches of Fate undoubtedly caused dissatisfaction among the n witches!


    However, the escorting Dark Witch couldn¡¯t help but feel a little d that the Witches of Fate had to waste their resources on these ¡¯trash¡¯!


    If she were the leader of the Witches of Fate, she would have a significant headache figuring out what to do with these apprentices.


    Waste resources on them? But every one of them was an untalented apprentice that wasn¡¯t worth the effort. Even the asional apprentice with decent potential was likely a spy from another branch.


    With no options left to her, what would the Witch of Fate known as Alice do?

 Chapter 383 Looming Shadow

    Chapter 383 Looming Shadow


    It was already sundown when the carriages reached the Tower of Fate.


    Lonely rocks and shattered bones littered the deste Dragonblight. The Tower of Fate stood alone in the heart of this deste ce, where one could hear the magical creatures howl in the night.


    The apprentices got down from the carriages under the orders of the Dark Witch. They stood in a row before the gates of the Tower and waited for the owner of the Tower to arrive.


    Erika was undoubtedly one of many anxious apprentices. Erika shivered when she thought of living in a bleak tower like this. The only ones apanying her were those crazy magical creatures in the wild and these potentially maliciouspanions.


    "Don¡¯t worry. Things will get better!" Freya whispered to Erika. Freya stood beside her and lightly sped her hand.


    Erika returned a forced smile.


    Erika could tell that Freya¡¯s hands were cold.


    It seemed she wasn¡¯t as calm as she appeared to be on the outside!


    The gates of the Tower finally opened.


    A gentle, bright light shone from inside and showered the apprentices with a warm radiance.


    A slim figure appeared in front of them. She silently assessed the apprentices.


    "Now that you have arrived,e in and take a rest! Sorry to have troubled you in escorting these apprentices!"


    Her voice was sweet and gentle, and she seemed young.


    The Dark Witch stood in the darkness and replied coldly, "Lady Alice, the seven apprentices promised by us Dark Witches have been sent to you. I won¡¯t be staying. Farewell!"


    The witch turned and disappeared into the darkness, along with the guards, without even entering the gates.


    Dragonblight at night was not peaceful nor calm. The group would certainly sustain heavy losses while trying to break through the hordes of monsters. However, the Dark Witches¡¯ attitude was firm and decisive. It appeared that they didn¡¯t want to have much to do with Alice.


    Alice gazed at the carriages disappearing into the distance. An iprehensible smile surfaced on her face as she turned and spoke with the seven apprentices, "Come in!"


    The apprentices bowed in respect. They knew very well in their hearts who this was. The master of their futures¨C Alice, the leader of the Witches of Fate.


    The apprentices lifted their heavy chests with all their strength and carefully walked past Witch Alice into this warm, bright tower.


    Erika was thest of the apprentices to enter the tower.


    She couldn¡¯t help but sneak a look at the legendary Witch of Fate when she walked by her.


    This woman was a young and beautiful witch. Her figure was even more delicate and perfect than any other witch Erika had seen in her life. Her head was full of smooth silver hair that shined in the dark. Her skin was so white it almost appeared crystalline. Her eyes were sharp and filled with power, and her pupils were a translucent blue color. She wore a long purple robe decorated with magical rune and patterns of suns, moons, and stars.


    The Witch of Fate also silently looked at Erika with gentle eyes.


    Their gazes collided, and Erika immediately shrunk her neck out of fear. She gripped the handles of her old and worn case tightly and soberly followed behind herpanions. She no longer dared to look around randomly.


    Alice sighed when she saw the apprentice¡¯s cowardly and fearful behavior.


    She had known Erika back when she was an apprentice.


    A dozen years ago, they were apprentices that had entered the Dark Witches¡¯ tower at the same time. They had spent two years together. Alice was only sent away to a mid-sized adept organization in the center of the Continent due to Granny Endor¡¯s assignment to the Zhentarim area. Alice had been put under the care of a female adept known as Debra in the organization Fanny¡¯s Cottage.


    Twenty years had passed just like that. Who would have expected Erika to have only reached intermediate level while Alice had be the leader of the Witches of Fate?


    The word miraculous didn¡¯t even begin to describe the difference in how their lives had yed!


    Alice frowned when she looked at the seven apprentices walking into the tower.


    Most of them had poor potential, while the one or two redeemable apprentices had such incredible talent that she started doubting her own eyes.


    Judging from the attitude of the Dark Witch earlier, the Dark Witches no longer treated her as an ally. Alice had initially expected the escort of the apprentices to be Granny Endor.


    Instead of Granny Endor, they had sent an unfamiliar and unfriendly witch her way. There was clearly a story behind this that she didn¡¯t know!


    The apprentices were immediately shocked by the scene before them when they walked past the gates!


    Fresh and bright arcane halls, clean floors, illuminating crystals glowing with gentle lights and...


    A long table was in the middle of the hall. All sorts of dishes and drinks had upied on the table. There were fried ox kidneys, quails stuffed with spices and fruits, meat pies made withrk and partridge meat, steak seared with wine and onions, and dormice pickled in honey. The fragrant food wafted steam into the air. The menu had aroused everyone¡¯s appetites.


    The hungry apprentices couldn¡¯t help but swallow their saliva.


    They looked at each other in confusion. Hadn¡¯t this ce just been activated for two days? How had it recovered so quickly? They were the first apprentices to reach the Tower! Could Witch Alice have personally tidied up the hall in the past two days?


    "Have a meal first!" Alice¡¯s voice was still as gentle and calm as before, "Your lodgings have also been prepared. You only need to eat and rest today. Your tasks and duties will be assigned to you tomorrow. Just follow this guard once you are done eating. It will bring you to your rooms."


    Alice referred to the armored guard standing in the corner of the hall.


    It stood there without moving, like those sets of armor that nobles liked to use to decorate their rooms. However, the apprentices knew very well what this armor was. It was a living armor forged with magic-resistant alloys and was as powerful as they were. Crushing a group of intermediate and advanced apprentices like themselves was an easy feat for a golem like this one.


    Alice walked away to tend to her own business.


    Only the apprentices, the food on the table, and the unmoving armored guard remained in this massive arcane hall.


    Everybody hesitated for a moment as they looked at each other. Freya and another advanced apprentice stood forward and spoke, "Everyone¡¯s exhausted from such a long trip. Let¡¯s do as Lady Alice has told us to, and take a rest after we eat. We can leave anything else that needs to be said to tomorrow!"


    Everyone had been waiting for this!


    They immediately rushed forward and started feasting after hearing Freya¡¯s words.


    In truth, everyone had already prepared themselves for a difficult time here in the Tower.


    After all, the Tower of Fate had been sealed for a thousand years. Most of the magical facilities would not be functional, and the entire ce was likelycking in resources and materials. Don¡¯t even mention snacks and food. All the apprentices had also stuffed sleeping tents into their chests that they had brought along.


    Yet, the initial impression that the Tower of Fate and its owner gave them waspletely different from their expectations. In fact, it was the exact opposite!


    Consequently, the apprentices wanted to know more about this mysterious Tower of Fate!


    ............


    The Tower of Fate¡¯s twelfth floor.


    Alice and Snowlotus stood in front of a massive water mirror and silently observed the feasting apprentices.


    "This one... and this one." Snowlotus pointed with her thin, white finger. She pointed out two distinctive apprentices in the mirror, "They are different from the others! Their talent is a little too good. Are you sure this isn¡¯t the goodwill of the Dark Witches?"


    "I am sure!" Alice lifted her eyelids and the fine eyshes on them. She revealed her beautiful blue eyes. Only this time, there was none of the warmth and cheekiness she usually disyed. There were only cold apathy and thinly-veiled anger, "If the Dark Witches wanted to express their goodwill, they only needed to send Granny Endor to our ce. No need for suchplicated tricks!"


    "Theyunched a spy over to us and went about it in such an obvious manner. So what will it be, do we bite?" Snowlotus nodded her head in agreement.


    She was also a second generation witch that came from arge n. Naturally, she was acquainted with theplicated politics ofrge ns. Therger the n, the better they were at putting up facades and hiding their true intentions.


    Alice might once have had much to do with the Dark Witches, but their past ties were poisoned by schemes and concerns now that she had be the leader of the Witch of Fate.


    Alice¡¯s grandmother Endor was, at best, a First Grade witch. She had absolutely no authority or influence within the Moya n, the most prominent n within the Dark Witches. Thus, Endor could not affect any of the crucial decisions the Moya n made. The only reason why this ufortable situation had developed was due to some significant but unknown shift in the Moya n¡¯s attitudes towards Alice!


    If one were to assume the worst, Alice¡¯s grandmother would have been put under house arrest if she didn¡¯t respect the decision of the Dark Witches.


    It was precisely because Alice thought of this that her mood soured!


    "Snowlotus, are the resources left in the tower enough to host one divination ceremony? I want the answer tonight!" Alice turned to look at Snowlotus.


    The ounting of the treasuries and storerooms had all been done by Snowlotus over the past few days.


    "Of course the resources are enough," Snowlotus took out an inventory list, "A thousand years might have caused most of the materials to lose their effects, but the remaining materials are more than enough to host tworge-scale divinations."


    "Good!" Alice nodded and said, "Helen, please help me clear out the astrology tform at the top level. I¡¯ll be using it in a moment! Take any materials you need from Snowlotus!"


    The magic fairy Helen, who had been crouching on Alice¡¯s shoulders, immediately took to the air. She beat her wings as she shouted her reply, "Got it. I¡¯m going now."


    The magic fairy then disappeared in a trail of stardust.

 Chapter 384 Astrology

    Chapter 384 Astrology


    The astrology ceremonies were usually held at the top of the tower.


    One¡¯s vision was unobscured by anything when they looked out from atop of the Tower of Fate. That was because the walls of the tower would turn transparent during astrology ceremonies. This ce would be exceptionally calming and vast when night fell, and the curtain of stars settled over the sky. It made the astrologer feel as if they had dropped into the infinite gxy.


    Surprisingly, there were no magical facilities or astrology tools in this massive space. The only things here were theplex runic circuits and celestial symbols drawn all over the walls, ceiling, and the floor.


    Astrology has always been regarded as the most urate and useful divination spell in the eyes of diviners. However, astrology ceremonies required the use of an astrology tform and had to be conducted in a specific, fixed manner. These restrictions meant that the resources exhausted in these ceremonies were far more than usual. No one willingly used astrology ceremonies if it wasn¡¯t necessary. Instead, they preferred to use the simpler and moremon ways such as shell-reading and tarot cards.


    Astrology was akin to sketching out a map of the long river of fate.


    It was only a short stretch of fate, but it was clear and epassing. No detail would escape the eyes of the caster.


    The map of fate could tell the diviner where their potential lied, where problems would arise, and the path forward. However, the choice remained in the hands of the diviner. It was up to them to decide what was best.


    On the other hand, other means such as tarot cards and the like could only provide the diviner with mere glimpses and pieces of the future. It allowed them to see through the fortunes and misfortunes of one particr moment, but that was all. These visions of the futurecked any exnation for the cause and effect of all the events happening in them. It was extremely easy to misinterpret them and, consequently, walk away from the correct path and against the tide of fate.


    Naturally, Alice had to use astrology. She needed to get aplete picture of what was happening behind the scenes with the Dark Witches to ensure that her reckless actions wouldn¡¯t bring disaster upon Granny Endor.


    Fifteen minutester, Alice had taken a bath and changed into her ceremonial clothes. She hurried towards the astrology tform.


    Once inside, she stood at the center of the massive andplex magic array, directly below the dome-shaped ceiling. This ce was the core of the mysterious array. Alice then raised her palms into the air. Cerulean light suddenly shone forth from the array beneath her, dyeing the entire hall blue.


    Alice cleared her mind and performed a short meditation to affix her mind and spirit to the vast and boundless space. A few of the brightest major stars suddenly started to sh in the skies above. Traces of thin yet pure star energy began to feedback to Alice. They passed through the seemingly non-existent roof and entered her body.


    The formation beneath Alice¡¯s feet slowly started to rise. The bright blue light colored the entire hall and turned it into a giant glowing sapphire. Alice immersed herself in this ocean of blue. She drew upon the power of the major stars of the Deer¡¯s Bane constetion to conduct her divination. The bloodline of fate within her body guided her mind and slowly extended it into the infinite gxy.


    It was almost as if her soul had suddenly been freed from the shackles of her physical flesh. Alice had never felt so rxed and free than at this moment. Her soul was no longer bound to anything. The star energies immediately enveloped it, and, guided by that trace of bloodline, ventured deep into the star of seas. Suddenly, she had arrived in a mysterious ce.


    ............


    Neo Valley.


    This area was located to the east of Kesari River, near R¨¦lien Mountain.


    A tall, ck adept¡¯s tower quietly stood within this quiet valley surrounded by mountain ranges.


    Even if you had looked all over the entire continent, this would be the only adept¡¯s tower colored a pure ck!


    Its appearance wasn¡¯t all that bizarre, apart from its color, but ayer of shadow surrounded the structure. Even though it was daytime, you would only see ck and white when you looked at the tower in this valley. Its shape also appeared to be distorted at times.


    It was almost as if this ck tower didn¡¯t exist within the World of Adepts, but lived as a projection from the shadow ne.


    All flora and fauna in this valley also appeared tock any liveliness, not to mention the fact that they were all gray. There weren¡¯t any other bright colors on their bodies. Only ck, white, and that ubiquitous gray stained the entire valley.


    This was the origin tower of the Dark Witches¨C the ck Mystery.


    Under the protection of the star energies, Alice¡¯s spirit consciousness crashed into the ck Mystery. All of a sudden, she found herself in prison in the third underground level of the tower.


    It was called a prison, but it was no more than a stone room three square meters in size.


    Countless chains enhanced with runes were attached to the walls. They kept an old and frail witch bound right to the tiny room. An oldntern sat on a wooden rack affixed to the moss-filled stone wall. The small glint of me was not even sufficient to illuminate the room. In fact, it caused the shadows to flicker and dance about.


    All the runic lights and the color of the fires in this strange dark tower were gray. It was a thick and dense shade of gray that struck despair into the hearts of all that looked at it!


    ¡¯Alice¡¯ opened her eyes and looked upon this world of gray. She couldn¡¯t help but extend her shivering, intangible hands to caress Granny Endor¡¯s bone-thin face. She couldn¡¯t suppress the rage within her heart. It surged out like an apocalyptic flood.


    Several sparks came from thentern as if it had detected an unusual flux that didn¡¯t belong here.


    The next second, two strange silhouettes emerged from the shadows of the stone room.


    The shadows moved about, and the mist-like substance formed into two witches made of darkness.


    Their entire bodies were obscured and hidden behind the thick gloom. Only slight differences in the shades of their body parts allowed Alice to distinguish the outlines of their bodies. Their faces appeared to have been hidden by a thick ck veil. Everything was unclear and blurred. Alice couldn¡¯t see any of their facial features.


    "What¡¯s going on?" The leading Dark Witch stopped to inspect the stone room, but didn¡¯t find anything out of the usual, "Why is there the aura of an unfamiliar soul? Did someone actually sneak in here earlier?"


    "I think you¡¯re acting overly sensitive!" The other Dark Witch dismissed her ims and spoke, "Something might have happened in the Realm of Shadows and caused a change over here in this world. This was the period where the ck Mystery ovepped with the Realm of Shadows. It was not out of the ordinary for some issues to crop up."


    "Best to be a little careful! Leader Circe personally ordered the arrest of Endor. I don¡¯t know what crime shemitted, but it is a fact that the arrest of a First Grade witch warranted a directmand from the leader, and it is a fact that this witch was specified to be locked up in the ck Mystery. We have to be careful going about this!"


    "Fine, fine, fine! I¡¯ll contact our sisters over at the Realm of Shadows to check for any anomalies. We should be able to find out where the problem urred!"


    "Mm, go! I¡¯ll keep guard here and ensure no one sneaks into this ce."


    One of the Dark Witches¡¯ bodies disassembled and mysteriously vanished from the room.


    Circe?


    It was a direct order from Circe?!


    Alice was like a phantom without a body. She wandered around the stone room and observed everything that had just transpired. Her spirit consciousness had finally settled from the sudden shift in location. She now went utterly unnoticed with the star energies hiding her existence. The Dark Witch didn¡¯t notice even when Alice moved right through her.


    When Circe¡¯s name, soaked in the powers of Fate, rumbled through Alice¡¯s mind, her body trembled. A mysterious force once again guided her body through the ck tower. The next instant, she found herself hovering in a strange secret room.


    This was a magical altar!


    A tall ck figure and a strange mirrorposed of mes stood atop the gray altar.


    In the darkness, one could only vaguely make out the existence of delicate patterns that extended out of the smooth me mirror. These patterns formed a massive andplicated magical array. It wasn¡¯t amon pentagon or hexagon. Instead, it was a ring-shaped array made of borate pictures and runes that oveyed and connected with each other in various ways. They held up a cluster of dark shadow in the middle of the array.


    The shadow cluster circled in the array as if it was alive. A rhombus-shaped crystal had developed in the middle of the formation. It appeared to be crimson, with a single purple line running through the center of the crystal. When the lights pulsed, the shadow cluster looked like arge eye scanning everything in the room.


    Alice had appeared right at the moment when the ck figure wasmunicating with the giant eyes!


    ck shadows enveloped the tall figure. Striking ck stripes crawled across their body. Alice couldn¡¯t make out the face. Still, judging by their slim figure, the person appeared to be a woman. When her vision fell upon the unknown woman, a pair of bright eyes immediately cast their gaze upon Alice¡¯s location. A rumble that sent tremors through the tower rang out.


    "Who is it? Who¡¯s there?"


    Alice¡¯s head was knocked back as if a heavy hammer had hit her. Blood started to drip out of her eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. Her spirit consciousness hummed and the vision before her shattered.


    At that moment, Alice felt like she had run into an unmoving wall while running at extreme speeds. Her spirit consciousness throbbed from the pain. She could hardly even control her Spirit now. What was even more terrifying was the unbelievable speed at which theyer of starlight shielding her spirit consciousness was being stripped away.


    Everything in front of her started to fade. Everything turned into indistinguishable blends of colors and lines. Her vision began to spin frantically, causing her to feel nausea and sickness.


    A distant but familiar voice called to her.


    Alice sat up on the floor all of a sudden. Her unfocused gaze slowly started to gather.


    "You finally woke up," Helen¡¯s voice rang out beside her ear, "What exactly did you see during your astrology ceremony? Why did you suddenly copse?"


    Alice wiped away the blood from the corners of her mouth. She held her aching head, throbbing from the severe exhaustion of her Spirit, and put on a smile.


    "I¡¯m fine! Very fine! This astrology has been extremely sessful!"


    "It seeded? Then why did bacsh still hit you?" The fairy clearly didn¡¯t understand.


    "Because I didn¡¯t act within the limit of my powers and tried to interfere in the plotting games of some high-grade existences!"


    "How high are we talking?"


    "At least Fourth Grade!"


    "Gasp!"


    Alice held her head in her hands and stood up with some difficulty. She then sent the curious fairy away and slowly made her way towards the exit of the hall.


    She suddenly turned her head when she came close to the doors. She silently looked at the blue radiance that had yet to disperse entirely.


    I won¡¯t let you get away with your schemes! Hmph! Let¡¯s see how this ys out, shall we?

 Chapter 385 Teleporting Away

    Chapter 385 Teleporting Away


    "You¡¯re making me leave the Tower of Fate?!" Greem shouted in disbelief.


    "I am not making you leave. I am asking you to leave!" Alice let out a helpless sigh.


    "Is there a difference between the two?"


    "Of course there is!" Aliceughed bitterly, "The former would be the action of the owner of the Tower of Fate, while thetter is the request of an ally!"


    "If you treat me as an ally, then why, at this moment where you most need help, would you... "


    "Because you are a male adept, and this is the territory of the Northern Witches!" Alice gave a direct and straightforward answer.


    "You mean, my existence has brought you trouble?" Greem narrowed his eyes. It was the first time he hade into contact with this group of individuals that hailed witches as their absolute leaders. He hadn¡¯t gotten used to it.


    "Yes!" Alice once again sighed resentfully, "If this had been an ordinary advancement, and I possessed Third Grade or even Fourth Grade strength, no one would ever dare to trouble me over this minor issue. But now... "


    "What happened?"


    "I have already told you everything about my advancement. As you would know, the First Witch of Fate should have been able to sense it when I destroyed her soul projection. Even though she can¡¯t enter the World of Adepts, she can apply pressure on me through more discreet means."


    "For instance?"


    "For example, raising doubts about my legitimacy in the Witch Council through one of the witch leaders. I passed the Battle of Fate to be the Witch of Fate. I have also obtained the approval of thews of fate. They cannot deny this. However, they can use me of having betrayed the traditions of the Northern Witches and bowed before a male adept!"


    "What kind of shitty tradition is this? Aren¡¯t there plenty of male adepts in the adept¡¯s towers of the Northern Lands?"


    "Those are all male adepts that are subordinate to witches!" Alice held her forehead with her hand as her seductive eyes looked straight at Greem, "Or would you rather I go before the Witch Council and tell them that you are my concubine?!"


    Greem¡¯s towering figure couldn¡¯t help but tremble at the suggestion.


    He felt a shiver run down his spine when he thought of the sight of that happening. He could see Alice pointing her finger at him before hundreds and thousands of witches while shouting, "He¡¯s my concubine!"


    "Can¡¯t we just say that we are allies?" Greem feebly suggested.


    "What do you think?" Alice rolled her eyes and said, "The tradition of the Northern Witches maintains that females possess the ultimate authority. In fact, some of the more extreme witches even insist that their subordinates managing the humannds have to be female. They deeply hate those that try to go against the traditions!"


    "This is what you saw in your astrology ceremony yesterday?"


    "This is just a part of it. Not everything," Alice expression turned solemn, "I cannot tell you the specifics due to thews of fate. This information involves the secrets of the leaders of the Northern Witches. Thews will be triggered if I ever speak of them, and unforeseen changes will ur. So... "


    "I understand!" Greem also let out a deep sigh, "Then, I¡¯ll be taking my leave."


    "Come with me!"


    The two of them quickly entered a secret room on the fifteenth floor under Alice¡¯s lead.


    There was nothing in the room except for a sizeable, mysterious array carved into the ground.


    "A teleportation array?" Greem gasped.


    He had seen arrays like this before. The Sarubo n had used simr arrays in their ultra-long range teleportations. The one before him was a teleportation array as well.


    "This is a teleportation array within the Tower of Fate. It can send you directly to the Zhentarim area and spare you from the pain of having to walk through the ck Forest. I¡¯ll give you the activation authority and coordinates of the array. That way, you cane here at any time if the need arises."


    Having said that, Alice split out a cluster of light from the control crystal. Greem grabbed the ball of light and allowed it to enter his body.


    "Beep. Detecting spirit data requesting ess to the body. Requesting instructions from host. Authorize request?"


    "Authorized!"


    Soon, a set of nar spatial coordinates flowed into Greem¡¯s mind and were quickly stored by the chip. At the same time, an even moreplex and extensive flow of data entered his mind. If it weren¡¯t for the chip, Greem could only have used his powerful Spirit to memorize the contents forcefully. He would never have been able to conduct a more bnced analysis of the chunk of information.


    Greem could feel every trace of change that urred in the teleportation array once the cluster of light entered his body. Greem even had a vague feeling that he could do more. If the chip had enough time, it would have been able to decipher the contents of the control authoritypletely. Then, he would have had even more control and influence over the teleportation than Alice, who owned the tower.


    Greem entered the array and smiled at Alice, "Keep that Qiraji crystal. That way, you can find me if any problem crops up. You must be careful, regardless of what is it you will be doing from now on."


    Before he could finish speaking, a warm and youthful body fell into his arms. Then, his lips were sealed by a pair of burning red lips.


    Alice finally pushed Greem away after a lengthy embrace. She stepped backwards and took a good look at his handsome face.


    "Thank you for everything you have done for me!" Alice started mumbling, "I only hope you understand that I will always be on your side no matter what you choose to do."


    Greem extended his tongue and licked the part of his lips that had been torn by Alice¡¯s fiery kiss. A zing warmth spread through his heart as he looked at the blushing beauty.


    "These are some of the things I found in the warehouse. You will most definitely need them. Take them along with you! Remember toe back and see me when I finally manage to cement my authority here. Don¡¯t forget to bring Sis Mary along."


    Alice gently ced a storage bag into Greem¡¯s arms, then stepped away.


    A milky-white light rose from the teleportation array and gradually consumed Greem¡¯s shape.


    A short momentter, the array vibrated as the spatial flux started to intensify. Blinding white light filled the whole room. When everything settled down, and the light faded away, the interior of the array was empty. Greem¡¯s tall figure was nowhere to be seen.


    For some reason, two trails of tears streaked down Alice¡¯s face.


    ............


    An intense humming surrounded Greem as white lights shed.


    He felt his mind turn heavy, and only managed to regain control over his body once the spatial fluctuation had settled down.


    Greem had to support his head with his hands and stand still for a moment before opening his eyes and examining his surroundings.


    "Wee to Ibis City! Judging from the spatial coordinates, you were transported from the Northern Lands. That said, I have never seen these coordinates before. May I ask what array is this and which of the Lady Witches built it?" A white-robed adept stood in front of Greem with a quill and a parchment book in his hands. He had a silver executor¡¯s badge pinned on his chest. It seemed he was an adept stationed here by the Zhentarim Association.


    "The Tower of Fate!" Greem nodded at the adept and prepared to leave the teleportation room.


    "The Tower of Fate?" The white-robed manager bit his quill and tilted his head, "That adept¡¯s tower hasn¡¯t been connected to the teleportationwork for over a thousand years. Could it have been reactivated? Hey, you haven¡¯t paid your teleportation fees."


    "Wait, I still have to pay? Isn¡¯t all the energy required for the teleportation gathered on the array on the other side? Why do I still have to pay over here on this?" Greem was instantly confused.


    "Hmph! I bet this is the first time you got to enjoy such long-range teleportation!" The white-robed adept snorted, "Even though the teleporting party provides most of the energy, the receiving array still needs to endure a certain amount of spatial shockwave damage from the process. Thus, to ensure maintenance of the teleportation array and supplying our services to everyone, we have to collect a small maintenance fee over here on our side."


    "How much is it?"


    "Three hundred magical crystals!"


    Greem was speechless.


    It had only cost two hundred magical crystals to go through the ck Forest with the merchant groupst time, and it required three hundred for teleporting? Then, if it had been under usual circumstances, how much would he have had to pay Alice for using her array?


    The white-robed adept quickly gave him his answer.


    Four Thousand!


    And this was only because Ibis City was the closest to the Northern Lands. That was why the price was so ¡¯low¡¯. If Greem wanted to teleport from the center of the Zhentarim area to the Tower of Fate, it would have cost him as much as five thousand magical crystals. If he wanted to teleport from the Silver Union¡¯snds to the Northern Lands, it would cost him an enormous ten thousand magical crystals.


    Greem had to control himself and stop his facial muscles from twitching when he heard the price.


    No wonder so many low-grade adepts preferred to ride on flying ships or trudge through the ck Forest with caravan lines than use teleportation arrays, even though there were so many adept¡¯s towers and arrays all over the ce. The principal reason was the unbelievable price.


    ording to the white-robed adept, the cost of using teleportation arrays was expensive because of the massive drain on the tower¡¯s energy reserves. Consequently, they had to collect a fee from the users topensate their losses.


    Greem could feel a fervent passion burn in his heart when he heard this.


    He still had a spacestone in his storage belt. If he used it to build a teleportation array, the stone would automatically collect the spatial energies required for the process. Didn¡¯t this mean that he had a treasure trove that could continuously provide him with magical crystals?


    Still, the greater value of the spacestone was its ability to conduct ultra-long-range teleportation. That was where its real value lied. Using it as an ordinary array to earn some magical crystals was a waste of such excellent material. Only paupers desperate for money would ever do such a thing!

 Chapter 386 Alices Goodwill

    Chapter 386 Alice¡¯s Goodwill


    News of the me Demon¡¯s return spread throughout Feidnan City within half an hour of his arrival in the city.


    A couple of hourster, half of the Zhentarim area had received news of this as well.


    Greem should never have received this much attention with his status and power. However, it was a known fact that his acquaintance, Alice, had be one of the Northern Witch leaders.


    It was important to note how powerful the witches were. Most of the witch leaders were Fourth Grade witches. Only the Coldwinter Witch leader was a Third Grade witch.


    It was undoubtedly immensely advantageous for the Sarubo n to be able to be allies with an influential witch leader like those. Thus, everyone treated Greem¡¯s return as that of a messenger sent back by the Witch of Fate.


    If these two forces joined hands, it would bring about enormous trouble for all the enemies of the Sarubo n!


    These things tended to be less public news hidden from the people. No more than fifteen days had passed since the Battle of Fate, not to mention how istionist the Zhentarim area was. Reports of the Northern Witches couldn¡¯t possibly have spread to this ce so rapidly. However, under the intentional efforts of the Sarubo, this information disseminated through the center of the continent like a gue. Consequently, many looked well upon the future development of the Sarubo n.


    The Sarubo n was only a mid-sized n right now. It had always wanted to break into the ranks of therge-sized groups.


    However, they needed to fulfill two necessary prerequisites before that dream of theirs coulde to fruition.


    The first was the existence of a Fourth Grade adept within the n.


    The previous n leader, Lord Sarubo, had possessed the power of a Sixth Grade. However, the cultivation of the n adepts hadn¡¯t been sufficient to produce a new Fourth Grade adept.


    Consequently, while they had an influential leader outside the World of Adepts, they were hard-pressed to obtain a decisive advantage within their homeworld.


    Currently, the most powerful individuals below Lord Sarubo were the two Third Grade adepts¨C Lady Sanazar and Lord Violeteye. It was impossible for them to advance within the next one hundred or two hundred years. It would considerably benefit the n if they were able to entice a Fourth Grade powerhouse to join them.


    The second condition was, naturally, the overall strength and influence of the n.


    This condition included two portions. The overall power of the n adepts, and the number of resources that the n could draw upon. These factors influenced each other. Together, they decided the n¡¯s potential for development.


    The Sarubo n wascking in this regard as well. It had been far too short a time since the establishment of their organization.


    That is why they prioritized external help so much.


    Once he returned, Lady Sanazar dragged Greem into a private room to have a secret discussion.


    Lady Sanazar was excited over the news of Alice¡¯s advancement to Witch of Fate. However, her passion quickly cooled when she heard the whole situation from Greem.


    "You said Alicepleted her advancement as a First Grade Witch of Fate?" Sanazar couldn¡¯t help but ask again. She emphasized the word ¡¯First Grade¡¯ in her question.


    Even the reckless and ruthless Sanazar fell into a period of contemtion when she saw Greem¡¯s solemn nod.


    "So be it!" Sanazar sighed, "It doesn¡¯t matter how you put it, you still managed to draw a new and reliable ally for the n. This matter has greatly increased our influence in the north. Being able to have connections with a witch leader means that we have some degree of influence in the Witch Council, no matter how little. The n will definitely reward your efforts!"


    "All for the n "Of course, Greem knew how to put up an appearance of basic courtesy.


    "Mm... " Sanazar nodded, "A banquet will be held in the tower tonight in celebration of the n¡¯s alliance with the Witches of Fate. A few of the neighboring ns and organizations will be attending the feast. You had best prepare a little! Keep the fact that Alice is only First Grade a secret for now. Don¡¯t let the public know of this yet. Everything will have to wait until my representative meets Alice."


    Greem nodded his head obediently before taking his leave.


    All the apprentices and disciples of his faction were already waiting for him at the door to his room. They all congratted this mentor of theirs. Meryl was not behaving as an adept should at all. She was in the crowd with her apprentices and congratting Greem in the same fashion.


    Snox, on the other hand, had also hurried over here as fast as he could. He was a striking sight in the crowd.


    Greem smiled as he nodded and acknowledged everyone. He then extended a hand and invited Meryl to enter his room together with him.


    As Alice had always been an influential and popr witch among the apprentices, everyone wanted to listen to the story of her advancement. Greem gave a simple description of everything that had urred in the trip to the Northern Lands.


    Of course, Greem hid the part about the First Witch of Fate¡¯s soul projection when he talked to Lady Sanazar, but he did tell her everything else. This time, hepletely skipped the Battle of Fate, using his position outside of the tower as an excuse to gloss over the details.


    Greem only smiled when the apprentices excitedly asked about Alice¡¯s current Grade. He didn¡¯t give them an answer.


    After satisfying everyone¡¯s curiosity, Greem brought up the banquet that Sanazar had mentioned. He left the matters rted to this in the hands of Kodar, Am, and the others.


    The disciples and apprentices were more than d to do such tasks for an adept.


    After all, Greem¡¯s increasing influence within the n had caused apprentices like them, who served under Greem, to receive better treatment. They had far better mission options, more resources, and superior welfarepared to apprentices of the other factions. Even though Greem didn¡¯t have any time to train his apprentices with all the tasks he was busy with, his apprentices were still a very harmonious and united group.


    Of course, there was the factor of Meryl¡¯s help in all this!


    Once Greem¡¯s disciples left with the other apprentices, only Meryl and Snox were left. It was only now that Greem leaked a limited amount of the critical information that he knew.


    Meryl¡¯s face turned a pale white when she heard about Alice¡¯s situation. Her First Grade powers, and the scheming high-grade witches that surrounded her. All the plots and conspiracies. Just the thought of it was frightening.


    Meryl recalled her time as an apprentice. Even the malicious infighting between the apprentices back then had been enough to strike fear into her. There were far too many unpleasant memories that she preferred not to think about. Who knew? All these troubles still existed, even after one advanced to adept. In fact, they had gotten more numerous andplicated. Meryl felt fearful and worried for Alice.


    By now, Greem could tell that Meryl genuinely disliked conflicts. She only wanted toplete her obligations and tasks, then use the remaining time to perform experiments and research on topics that she liked. Meryl just wanted to walk through her long and modest life in peace.


    She was also wholly untalented when it came tobat. That said, she was a decent managerial adept.


    There were quite a lot of female adepts like her. Most of them needed to find shelter under stronger male adept to ensure that their safety was guaranteed. Otherwise, they were likely to be the prey of other adepts with their gentle personalities and weakbat prowess.


    Green quicklymunicated with Snox while Meryl was worrying over Alice. The majority of their conversation concerned Snox¡¯s trade with the goblin Grand Duke. Greem only barely asked about the management and ie of the arcane shop.


    After all, it wasn¡¯t much of a problem. With the help of Feidnan and the others, as well as Greem¡¯s influence, Snox¡¯s business was bing bigger and bigger each day. At this point, it was already able to sustain the daily expenses of Greem¡¯s faction.


    Greem bitterly smiled when he saw Meryl still fussing and worrying about Alice¡¯s situation. He had no choice but to take out the ck Qiraji Resonating Crystal and pass it to Meryl. Meryl immediately went back to her room while holding the Crystal as if it was the greatest treasure in the world. It seemed she couldn¡¯t wait to talk to Alice.


    Greem activated the room¡¯s magical defenses once everyone had left. He then took out a storage bag.


    It was the item Alice had gifted him before his departure. He had suppressed his curiosity and not opened the bag all this while. Greem now had the time to assess the contents slowly.


    "Tormanta, by the name of the winds."


    The red string on the dimensional bag unraveled on its own after a short magic chant. Intense elementium light shone from within the container.


    Greem sent his Spirit into the bag in curiosity as he took the items out one by one.


    Three Ioun Stones: one red, one purple, and one blue.


    The red one provided two additional Spirit when activated. The blue one could forcefully absorb an elementium attack below eighty points of power. The purple Ioun Stone was even more precious. It shielded the soul with a barrier of a hundred and twenty points of power. If the enemy¡¯s attack didn¡¯t exceed this limit, Greem would bepletely immune to its effects.


    ze of Destruction. A reasonably famous elementium scepter among adepts. It was two meters in length andpletely ck. It appeared to have been forged from a unique magical alloy. Fitted into a groove at the top of the scepter was a fist-sized crimson crystal.


    Greem knew this crystal. The Star of Destruction. It was a mutated crystal that had been taken from the edge of the World of Destruction. It could turn any fire energy and convert it into mes of Destruction. These were mes that naturally possessed a trace of the powers of destruction.


    These mes of Destruction were exceptionally effective at destroying elementium defenses, and were an immensely offensive power!


    For an apprentice, the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter had been a mighty scepter. However, the power of the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter became irrelevant once Greem had advanced to an adept. The pseudo-adept level Fire Deity that it summoned was also incapable of helping him deal with adept-level opponents. Greem very rarely used the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter these days.


    Acquiring this new adept-level ze of Destruction unquestionably helped Greem with his awkwardck of a useable scepter!


    Apart from that, Greem also found a strange crystal in the dimensional bag, along with a small note.


    The crystal was about the size of a fist. It was a dark green color, with purple liquid flowing about within it. A surge of magical flux immediately pressed against Greem when he held the crystal in his hands. There was even the uniquely ferocious aura of ancient beasts mixed within.


    Dragon Crystal!


    This item was the crystal core of a Second Grade dragon!


    Judging from the color and magical attribute of the crystal core, this was a wind-attribute dragon crystal.


    Greem sighed.


    He had invested far too many resources into Alice, most of which had been lost in the Battle of Fate. He could tell that this was Alice¡¯s way ofpensating him for his losses. Even though all these items moved Greem, the one gift that touched him the most was still... Alice¡¯s kiss.


    He slowly opened the note as he recalled that private moment with Alice.


    It was Alice¡¯s handwriting, but only a few words were written on the paper.


    Volcano Vesuvius!

 Chapter 387 Passionate Banquet

    Chapter 387 Passionate Banquet


    The banquet was set to be held on the fifth floor¡¯s arcane hall.


    It was the first time that Greem had attended a formalrge-scale adept¡¯s banquet since his advancement.


    As the protagonist of the show, Greem had been put to work by Sir F¨¹gen before the banquet had started. The two of them were to greet their guests at the doors of the hall.


    Fanny¡¯s Cottage.


    Mandasor Academy.


    Sunflower Garden.


    The Arthur n.


    The Buschmann n.


    The Clovis n.


    One by one, they announced ns and names that Greem had never heard of. And one by one, both familiar and unfamiliar adepts walked through the doors of the hall, cing their arms on their chests to congratte Greem.


    What were they congratting? That Greem¡¯s investment in the little witch had paid off? Or the Sarubo¡¯s sess in establishing a connection with the Northern Witches?


    Greem grumbled in his heart as he smiled and stood by the door. He ced his hand on his chest and acknowledged the goodwill of the guests.


    The Second Grade adepts were naturally being received by Sir F¨¹gen himself, while Keoghan, Meryl, and the others dealt with the ordinary adepts. The five or six pseudo-adepts in the n were only waiters at this grand event. They stood by and attended upon the adepts.


    The banquet hall was vast and bright. All sorts of delicacies and drinks had been arranged on the long circr table. Pseudo-adepts dressed in waiter uniforms weaved through the adepts, continuously serving them fine wine and fragrant tea.


    As this was an adepts¡¯ banquet, there were no bands or dance performances. These were the crude customs of human nobles. Instead, the adepts entertained themselves by gathering in groups and conversing while sipping their drinks. Most of the time, they weren¡¯t even talking out loud. They mostlymunicated through mental messages and voice transmissions.


    Greem soon realized the abnormality of today¡¯s banquet after walking through the feast.


    The banquet seemed to belong to the young adepts!


    Almost all the adepts appeared to be below a hundred years old. Many of them hadn¡¯t even advanced for more than ten years.


    In the words of veteran adepts, these would be adepts who were still ¡¯stinking with the smell of milk.¡¯ These adepts were the ones full of passion and dreams. Their conversational topics never fell far off from adventure, fights, and sensual pleasure.


    Unlike veteran adepts, newly advanced adepts did not have any resource reserves. Most of what they had saved up had likely been exhausted during their advancement ceremony. Thus, this was the time where they were the most full of passion yet also when they were the poorest.


    The more profound research always required knowledge they didn¡¯t have. The more prominentbs always needed more resources for better facilities that they didn¡¯t possess. Consequently, the young adepts would rush to go on adventures and exploration after stabilizing their Spirit.


    They had no ability or right to participate in the faction conflicts within the n or to benefit from such disputes. The nar wars of the nes beyond were far too dangerous. The best option left for the newly advanced adepts was to form exploration parties and head into the nearest stretches of the ck Forest.


    As long as they were cautious and kept out of the genuinely hazardous areas, the ck Forest was a treasure trove waiting for them to find. It was rich with resources. Magical creatures, mutated monsters, corruptors, woond beasts. These living beings existed in abundance within the ck Forest. Many of the sentient lifeforms even possessed intelligence that could rival adepts. If they could catch them, they would be able to sell them to high-grade adepts forrge sums of money, or they could use it for their research. Both were good options.


    And this was the true path of ascension and rigorous training that a newly advanced adept had to tread upon!


    Newly advanced adepts that were thrown into nar wars, like Greem, were the first to die. Greem would have followed in their footsteps if it hadn¡¯t been for all the trump cards and aces he had hidden up his sleeve.


    Naturally, his tremendous feats brought him a lot of attention from the guests. Both male and female adepts raised their wine sses and approached him to engage in passionate conversation. Some of the hastier female adepts even took the initiative to invite Greem to their party to go venturing in ruins they had discovered.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare to look down upon the ruins that they mentioned.


    It was true that most of the ces were ruins left from ancient times and had no real value. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine why. Countless generations of past adepts would have looted anything that was worthwhile. Why would there even be a speck of dust left?


    That said, an exception existed for everything!


    Following the exile of the Great Adepts a few tens of thousands of years ago, plenty of their secretbs and personal rooms had surfaced to the view of the public.


    These Great Adepts had been powerful individuals and often ced their homes andboratories deep in the ck Forest or the Underground World. Odd ruins were even discovered in some of the inds of the Boundless Sea.


    Exploring such ruins was a real test of an adept¡¯s luck!


    The fortunate ones would be able to find hidden ruins that had already been explored by high-grade adepts. They would then be able to make a profit off of the resources and materials that the high-grade adepts hadn¡¯t deemed worthy enough to loot. These explored ruins were often safe. On the other hand, the unfortunate ones might find themselves in an ancient Great Adept¡¯s ruins that were still functional. That was not fortune. It was most definitely a curse.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was defensive arrays left over from ancient times, voodoo beasts that survived the test of time, or even cursesden traps. Not a single one of them was within the ability of an ordinary adept to survive!


    Any exploration into an ancient ruin warranted extreme caution. The number of annual adept deaths in such ruins was very high. That said, a single sess and a profitable harvest from some ruins could immediately propel an adept to sess and afortable life.


    Apart from adventures and fighting, the favorite topic of the young adepts was sex!


    The first hundred years of time was a period where the newly advanced adepts were significantly limited in what they could do. Without resources and power, they could only return to the endless grind of collecting and gathering resources, materials, and knowledge. Thus, they spent the rest of their time on sensual pleasure. Sex, in particr, was their preferred outlet.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether the adept was male or female. The adepts would get together and sleep together as long as they found their partners pleasing to the eyes. Even if they got sick of their more respectable, higher-ss adeptpanions, they still had plenty of choices around them.


    The pseudo-adepts and advanced apprentices desperate for resources and attention were their best targets. Some of the adepts with heavier tastes would even set their sights on handsome humanoid creatures after they finished toying with all their apprentices.


    Good-looking male and female ves always cost the most in auctions held for low-grade adepts. The price would be further pushed to even more absurd levels if it was an exotic race with unique skills!


    As far as Greem knew, elves, centaurs, subi, lust demons, child giants, forest spirits, and mermaids were considered the most desirable products. Most of the time, you wouldn¡¯t even be able to purchase one with magical crystals. You had to trade with something of equal value.


    The subus that Greem had seen in the World of Deep Red, back in the Underground Cave of Dagon, had been the shared ything of the adepts stationed in that tower.


    Greem had alreadye up with a conclusion about the nature of the adepts before this¨C all adepts were selfish, arrogant, narcissistic beings thatcked restraints from an external force. Consequently, all their actions were reckless and dangerous.


    However, now that he saw the passionate looks that all the young female adepts were giving him, he added an addendum to that conclusion of his! The adepts were wild!


    All the young adepts were exceptionally beautiful. The way they dressed also exposed a great deal of skin.


    The carefully tailored adept¡¯s robes didn¡¯t obscure their perfect curves. In fact, they further emphasized their full bosoms. The cut in their skirts that ran almost all the way to their stomachspletely put their thighs on disy.


    With all these sexy and seductive female adepts teasing him and rubbing their bodies against his, even the apathetic and uninterested Greem had to tug at his cor a little and down a couple of sses of chilled wine.


    Greem might im to be one of those with ¡¯plenty of experiences,¡¯ but most of his experience remained in the memories of his past life. Compared to him, any one of these female adepts could easily be considered a true veteran of lust and desire. A few of their tricks were all they needed to silence a rookie like Greem.


    Fortunately, just as Greem was about to crack under the teasing of the passionate adepts and run away awkwardly, someone came to his rescue. Meryl. She had been wandering around the hall with no real aim.


    Greem nodded apologetically at the female adepts out of courtesy and grabbed Meryl¡¯s arm. He then pretended to have an intimate conversation with her as he dragged her to a corner of the hall.


    "Hehe," Meryl couldn¡¯t help but cover her mouth and giggle, "Who would have known? Sir Greem isn¡¯t all that good at dealing with these passionate witches. ...I wasn¡¯t talking to you just now. I was talking to Sir Greem. You should have seen that. Sir Greem was so awkward when he was chased around by a group of female adepts earlier."


    Thetter half of Meryl¡¯s words weren¡¯t directed at Greem. She was pressing her right ear and talking with someone else under her breath.


    Greem looked over to her ears and was shocked to find the Qiraji Crystal that Meryl had put by her ears and cleverly concealed with some spells.


    "You... you¡¯ve been talking with Alice all this while?" Greem was tongue-tied.


    "Yea, I know... " Meryl balled her hands into fists as she excitedly said, "Lady Alice is way too cool. She¡¯s got her own enormous adept¡¯s tower. She even made me describe everything happening in the banquet earlier. We were having so much fun."


    Greem felt himself sweat at the mere thought of what was happening. As expected, the gossipy nature of girls was the same no matter which world you happened to stumble into!


    Forty or fifty thousand miles away, and they still tried to perform instantmunications. Women were the scariest when they wasted resources like this.


    "Sir Greem, do you want to talk to Lady Alice?" Meryl lifted her head and looked towards Greem.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and firmly rejected the offer.


    Meryl whispered into the crystal and started chuckling. Greem could vaguely hear Alice¡¯s crisp and entertainedugh from the other end.


    He tugged his cor again.


    For some reason, the room felt even warmer now!

 Chapter 388 Pinecone Town

    Chapter 388 Pinecone Town


    Pinecone Town.


    As thest human settlement east of the Ailovis area, Pinecone Town was a necessary stop for all who wanted to enter and exit the ck Forest. It was also one of the regionsbeled as extremely unsafe by the Zhentarim Association, due to the frequent magical creature attacks.


    The skies slowly turned gray as evening arrived.


    A ck carriage rode towards the small town of Pinecone. Greem pushed aside the curtains of the carriage and carefully assessed everything around him.


    Vast stretches of mountains took up his entire vision, with tall, ancient trees growing all over the unevenndscape. A single winding path snaked through the green scenery.


    The carriage he had hired was traveling upon this mountain path.


    The middle-aged man who handled the horses at the front leaned back to remind Greem, "Sir Adept, you must sit properly. We are going to have to speed up now. This path is still safe during the day, but it bes hazardous once night falls. We must get to Pinecone Town before that happens!"


    Greem nodded and didn¡¯t say anything else.


    He also saw what was happening. All the carriages journeying along this path were also increasing their speed as the skies slowly turned dark. The coachmen were in no mood to talk, even when they passed by each other. They were trying their best to hurry to their destinations.


    The carriages continued to speed along the mountain road. The further they went, they more uneven the path and the rockier the ride. However, before night arrived, the carriage arrived at its destination¨C Pinecone Town.


    Pinecone Town was said to be a human settlement, but it was more like a military outpost.


    It was a military outpost that was fenced in by tall, thick wooden fences!


    Greem had visited countless viges and cities, but he had never seen a ce so securely guarded.


    The thick and tall wooden fence was constructed with solid lumber from ancient trees in the nearby forests. The wall itself was three meters tall, with its tips sharpened into an edge, threatening to spear anyone that dared to breach its defenses. A thick metal te hung from the outside of the wooden door. Massive copper nails kept the metal te in ce.


    Battlements had been built on the fences. Watchtowers and sentry towers had been constructed all around the perimeter. Guards could be seen patrolling along the top of the wooden walls.


    The true face of Pinecone Town was slowly revealed to Greem as his carriage drove into town.


    This ce was a rural and sparsely popted town.


    There was only a single main street that cut through the town, while almost a hundred wooden buildings stood along each side of the road. This area was the majority of the city. Some of therge buildings disyed wooden signs that informed the people of their uses.


    There was an inn, a bar, an ironsmith¡¯s, a grocery store and arcane shops.


    To think that he would find arcane shops in such a rural ce! Greem couldn¡¯t help but be amazed by the ubiquity of magic in this world.


    The ck carriage soon stopped in front of a crude two-level wooden building. It was also the only inn within the town.


    Greem got off the carriage, and the first thing he saw was the innkeeper. He was a middle-aged man with short brown hair, rough gray linen clothes, and a smile stered on his face.


    The smile on his face became even wider when he saw the telltale adept¡¯s robe Greem wore. His expression was respectful, but there wasn¡¯t fear in his eyes. It was clear that this innkeeper was someone that frequently worked with adepts.


    "I need a clean andfortable room!" Greem stood before the innkeeper with his staff in his hands. His two-meter body cast a shadow so long that it almostpletely covered the innkeeper, "Also, I wish to recruit a small group of adventurers. I want you to help me spread the news."


    "As you wish!" The innkeeper nodded and bowed, "Pleasee with me!"


    The arrival of an official adept had caused a visiblemotion in the small town. All the mercenaries, adventurers, and apprentice adepts became even more agitated when Innkeeper Jack announced the news of the adept¡¯s recruitment.


    Pinecone Town might not have looked like much, but it was a famous town around the Ailovis area.


    The entrance to the ck Forest was less than five kilometers northeast of the city. If you Walked into the forest, you would find plenty of strange nts, beasts, and creatures that you would never see in an ordinary forest.


    As thest stop for supplies before the ck Forest, everyone who wanted to venture into the ck Forest had to stop and rest in Pinecone Town.


    The ck Forest was dangerous, but it was still possible to make a profit while keeping your life as long as you made sure not to go in too deep. Valuable magical nts and beasts could be found at the edges of the forest. An experienced team of adventurers with a proper bnce of professions had a significant chance of obtaining these spoils of war.


    The arcane shop in the town was specially built to amodate these adventurers. The shop provided them with much needed magical items, while the store also bought magical goods from the adventurers.


    ............


    Apart from a bed, a wooden desk, and a chair, Greem¡¯s room was bare. The furniture seemed to have been crafted from the lumber obtained nearby. The furniture hadn¡¯t been specially processed or refined, but still retained the unique fragrance of wood.


    The living conditions here were incredibly crude.


    That said, considering where this was, Greem couldn¡¯tin.


    Inparison, the inn served pretty decent food.


    Soft bread, thick vegetable soup, and the ribs of an unknown beast that the cook had roasted to golden perfection were on the menu. Greem tasted the food and was satisfied. There was a wild vor to the cuisine, and the ribs were extremely filling as well.


    Greem had never discussed the price of all this with Innkeeper Jack. Naturally, the shrewd innkeeper made sure to serve the best of his wares to Greem.


    Price?


    Adepts had never cared about gold and silver. Pleasure was all that they pursued.


    It was one of the reasons Jack had been so excited about weing Greem!


    Compared to the calcting adventurers and stingy apprentices that liked to put on facades of generosity, adepts were the best guests. Gold coins were never a problem for them.


    Greem finally finished his meal. He pushed his tes aside and slowly wiped his mouth with the napkin. Just then, Jack gave a signal to have a servant take away the dishes. He then respectfully went up to Greem and said, "Sir Adept, everyone you need has been assembled downstairs. Should we...?"


    "Bring me downstairs!" Greem reached for the ze of Destruction that had been ced by the table. He then walked out of the room ahead of the innkeeper.


    Adventurers that had answered Greem¡¯s call of recruitment filled the first-floor lobby. There were about fifty or sixty of them, and even some apprentice-adept¡¯s were mixed in among their ranks. These were individuals that were hardy enough to have made a living in the ck Forest. Every one of them was arge and muscr man. Their every action had a murderous aura to it.


    Greem didn¡¯t walk down the stairs. Instead, he stood at the railings of the second floor and looked down upon the crowd. His eyes had a terrifying and intimidating quality to them.


    "I need a small adventurer¡¯s group of around five to seven men. It would be best if it¡¯s made up of veterans with experience in the woods." Greem slowly exined his requirements, "You won¡¯t need to capture any ferocious creature on this trip. All you need to do is apany me in exploring an area. You will deal with the ordinary beasts, and I¡¯ll deal with the powerful magical creatures. Everything that we get along the journey will belong to you, provided my exploration mission proves sessful. That is all!"


    Murmuring started to spread through the hall.


    Everyone seemed exceptionally excited and agitated. No one expected this adept to promise such rich rewards. However, Greem still noticed a few abnormalities in the room. Some of the more powerful adventurers were not rejoicing like the rest. Instead, they seemed to be rooted in thought.


    "Sir, could you perhaps tell us a bit of where we are supposed to explore?" A veteran adept who was much more experienced ced his hand on his chest and bowed respectfully, "I have no intention of peering into your secrets, Sir. I only wish to assess the risk involved in this mission!"


    The murmuring crowd silenced all of a sudden. Their gazes fell upon the mysterious adept once again.


    "The area I wish to explore is near guewood!" Greem calmly answered the question.


    Gasps rang out from the crowd when Greem uttered the name guewood.


    Shock and fear betrayed most people¡¯s faces.


    As expected, an adept¡¯s money wasn¡¯t that easily earned.


    Adepts were generous in giving out money, often paying out five to ten times more than the usual rate. However, the tasks they assigned were often ten to a hundred times more dangerous.


    guewood?


    As adventurers that made their living in the ck Forest, they had all heard of this ce. It was located one hundred and fifty kilometers to the northeast of Pinecone Town. That meant that the adventurers had to make their way a hundred and forty-five kilometers into the ck Forest.


    This...this was already a deadly territory!


    Perhaps because he saw the fear in their eyes, Greem immediately announced more news.


    "I understand the difficulty of this mission. For that reason, I¡¯ll be offering two hundred magical crystals as part of the payment as well!"


    Greem¡¯s words started yet another storm in the crowd. All the adventurers began discussing it in loud voices and passionate gestures. Chaos fell upon the hall once again.


    Greem could see very clearly what was happening from his vantage point. Some of the younger and less experienced rookie mercenaries shook their heads and left the hall. The veteran mercenaries also went after a period of deliberation.


    Soon, less than ten people remained in the hall.


    "Sir, I am Love, a Second ss shield-bearing swordsmen. I am willing to join your party," Love was a tall and young swordsman. He pointed at the two people behind him, "This is my sister, F. She is a Third ss archer. And this is Rhodes, a Third ss rogue."


    As Greem took a look at them, the chip instantly projected their attributes into his mind.


    In a world dominated by adepts, all other professions were severely limited in their abilities and potential.


    The Second ss and Third ss that Love spoke of was only a standard title used by fighters in the human world. They corresponded to the different levels of an adept apprentice.


    First ss was equal to a pseudo-adept, Second ss was equivalent to an advanced apprentice. Third ss was simr to an intermediate apprentice, and Fourth ss was like a Beginner Apprentice. Almost all of the fighter professions were divided in this manner.


    What about fighters that couldpare to adepts? Sincerest apologies, but such a person had never appeared in the Continent of Adepts!


    Love was approximately twenty-eight years of age. The fact that he was able to reach Second ss without any elementium talent ced him in the ranks of geniuses. After all, he was a person that had to rely solely on the training of his body and hisbat skills to reach a levelparable to an advanced apprentice.


    The other two people behind him also had exceptional Physique. Greem couldn¡¯t help but nod in approval.


    They were obviously a mature group of adventurers. It would be very convenient to rely on a group like this!


    The other apprentices that dared to stay here were extremely confident as well. They also reported their professions and abilities to Greem. In the end, Greem only picked a Fourth ss hunter known as Neil, and an intermediate potions apprentice called Anthony from the remaining candidates to add to the team.


    The reason he picked a Fourth ss hunter was purely due to Jack¡¯s rmendation.


    Neil wasn¡¯t all that good atbat, but he was a decent cook. His skill at roasting meat was widely known and praised in town.


    Love and the other two shrugged at Sir Adept¡¯s choice.


    As they expected of the noble and spoiled Sir Adept; even when they went adventuring in the ck Forest, his priority was still his stomach!


    Apart from the five adventurers that Greem had chosen, there was still a mysterious figure sitting in the corner of the hall. Their face was hidden underneath their cloak.


    When Greem¡¯s eyes looked towards this mysterious person, they stood up and took off their hood. The person bowed respectfully and spoke, "Sir Adept, we meet again!"


    It was her!

 Chapter 389 Trouble

    Chapter 389 Trouble


    A silver half-mask obscured the left side of her face. The left eye beneath the mask glowed with a bright red light. When her eyes turned, it emitted an odd mechanical sound.


    Greem¡¯s elementium sight allowed him to see into her body. He was shocked to find that she had reced one-third of her organs with special mechanical constructs.


    "So it¡¯s you! Sabrina," Greem was quickly able to match the person in front of him with a face from the past, "I recall that you¡¯re from the Tracy n in the Woodrow region. Why are you here in Ailovis?"


    This pseudo-adept level mechanical girl bitterly smiled. It seemed she didn¡¯t want to go into detail. She said, "Sir, I wish to join your party!"


    Sabrina didn¡¯t mention Greem¡¯s name, as she wasn¡¯t sure whether he intended to hide his identity.


    A pseudo-adept wanted to join?


    Greem took out a small pouch and tossed it to Love, the swordsman.


    "This is a fifty magical crystal deposit. Buy everything you need tonight. We will be setting off tomorrow!" Greem turned to look at Sabrina, "Come with me!"


    The adventurers smiled and quickly left the inn.


    Greem had just sat down on a chair in his room when Sabrina walked in, still wrapped in her traveler¡¯s cloak.


    Her body weighed a lot. The wooden floorboards creaked when she stepped on them.


    "Tell me! Did you get into some serious trouble? Why else would you have such wounds on your body that you would leave untreated!?" Greem casuallyid the ze of Destruction by the table and stretched his body.


    "Since you¡¯ve already seen through me, I won¡¯t be hiding it any longer." Compared to Sabrina¡¯s dominance and confidence in the Underground Cave, she appeared to be extremely dejected now.


    In Greem¡¯s elementium sight, Sabrina¡¯s life force appeared to be weak and in disorder. Her Spirit also seemed to be wilting. It was clear that she had been grievously injured.


    "Sir Greem, I am now being hunted by the people from my n!"


    "Hunted by the people of your own n?" An amused expression appeared on Greem¡¯s face, "Now, that is something I want to listen more about!"


    The right side of Sabrina¡¯s face was beautiful, but the smile on her face right now was just so bitter.


    "The Tracy n specializes in training mechanical adepts. Those who want to advance have to grow and construct a mechanical heart that only belongs to themselves. Four years ago, after much difficulty, I managed to modify and create a mechanical heart of Excellent quality. I had intended to use it toplete my advancement ceremony. However, someone took it from me."


    "Excellent?"


    "That¡¯s our n¡¯s internal quality ssification of mechanical hearts. You have Inferior, Low-Grade, Medium-Grade, High-Grade, Excellent, and Perfect hearts. The Inferiors are the worst, while a mechanical heart of Perfect quality has only appeared once. Excellent quality is already the best we can achieve."


    "Didn¡¯t you say that the mechanical heart was supposed to belong to you alone? How did it get taken away by someone else?" Greem asked, confused.


    Even he didn¡¯t know much about the mysterious profession of mechanical adepts. He was quite curious.


    "We have to activate the mechanical heart and connect it to our artificial organs to sessfully advance to a mechanical adept. However, before our advancement isplete, the unactivated mechanical heart can still be stolen away from us."


    "Who took away your mechanical heart?" Greem asked curiously.


    "Locard, the blood descendant of Second Grade Adept Franco of our Tracy n!" Sabrina gritted her teeth as she spat out loud.


    "Why¡¯s that Locard person still pursuing you? He¡¯s already got your mechanical heart after all."


    "That¡¯s because he¡¯s afraid that I have some hidden means by which I can control that mechanical heart. That¡¯s why."


    Greem understood the basics of what was happening even without any additional exnation from Sabrina. It seemed this was one of the internal struggles that often happened within adept ns!


    Sabrina was talented, but she didn¡¯t have any status within her n. She was likely just a member of a side branch of the n. If someone like her managed to develop their powers, they were very likely to threaten the ruling position of the main branch. These sort of incidents were likely to happen, especially when her abilities overshadowed even those of the main branch¡¯s pseudo-adepts.


    However, the fact that things had grown so dangerous only pointed to the shady and unfair nature of the Tracy n! Taking away someone¡¯s mechanical heart, then exiling and pursuing them? That was far too bold and obvious of an internal struggle!


    "Did you think I would ept you with all the mess and trouble you are in?" Greem coldlyughed.


    This matter was one of the things that Greem was confused about!


    Sabrina would never obtain help from any adepts with the situation she was in. Helping her meant provoking a small adept n. Moreover, it was the Tracy n, who were well-known as decent fighters. The fact that they were able to establish themselves as a small n meant that they had a Third Grade adept acting as the backbone of their organization.


    No adept would ever be foolish enough to offend a Third Grade adept for the sake of one pseudo-adept!


    "Don¡¯t worry. The Third Grade adept of the n doesn¡¯t know of this incident at all. Neither will they act because of this. I would never havended in such a terrible situation if it wasn¡¯t because of Franco¡¯s interference and his abuse of his status," Sabrina exined worriedly.


    Greem still shook his head in silence.


    Even if there wasn¡¯t a Third Grade adept mixed in the equation, a Second Grade adept was still someone beyond his abilities to deal with! What difference were a Second Grade and Third Grade to him? The oue was the same! He would experience death in a single strike.


    "Sir Greem, If you are willing to shelter me, I...I¡¯ll be willing to provide you with information about an ancient ruin!" Finally, Sabrina steeled her resolve and put out the only leverage she had.


    "Ancient ruins?" Greem straightened his body.


    "Aren¡¯t you curious?" Sabrina didn¡¯t intend to hide anything now that she had already revealed her secret, "I was only a branch n member. I didn¡¯t have ess to any rare resources. Why was I able to obtain an Excellent mechanical heart?"


    "You mean to say that you tapped into power from the ancient ruins?" Greem narrowed his eyes.


    "Yes!" Sabrina said confidently, "I only explored the outer rim of the ruins, and yet I managed to get such bountiful yields. If you went there, with your ability, you would be able to get much more than I was able to!"


    Greem looked at Sabrina¡¯s pale face. Blue light shed in the depths of his eyes.


    "Chip, can you determine if she is lying?"


    "Beep. Judging by the electrocardiographic feedback, there is a 98% chance of the ancient ruins existing, and a 2% chance of her lying.


    "Addendum. Based on the opponent¡¯s brain waves, her words contain false or misleadingponents."


    "Which is to say that the news about the ancient ruins is true, but the fact that she found the mechanical heart inside is false?"


    "Beep. Agree with the host¡¯s perspective!"


    Greem subtly and quicklymunicated with the chip. They exchanged countless pieces of information in the blink of an eye. It was unfortunate that Alice wasn¡¯t here with him. Otherwise, it would have been an easy matter to determine the truth of Sabrina¡¯s words!


    Greem narrowed his eyes and brooded in silence as he tapped the table with his right hand. That was the only sound in the entire room.


    Sabrina held her breath and anxiously watched every change of Greem¡¯s expression.


    Until she saw the cold smile that crossed Greem¡¯s face.


    "I can temporarily allow you to follow by my side!" Greem said slowly, "But if I find any part of what you have said to be a lie, I won¡¯t send you back to the Tracy n. I¡¯ll kill you on the spot!"


    Sabrina was relieved. A joyful smile finally appeared on her face as she hastily bowed towards Greem.


    "Go and rest first! Remember to treat your wounds as much as possible. We will be leaving tomorrow."


    "Understood!"


    Sabrina raised her head to take another look at Greem. She quickly lowered her head when her eyes shed with his intimidating gaze. She then slowly exited the room and closed the door.


    The room regained its peace. Just then, Greem tilted his head and said calmly, "Sir, sneaking into my room in this manner isn¡¯t quite friendly, is it?"


    A blurred silhouette slowly emerged from thin air in the corner of the room. It was the corner Greem was staring at.


    "I had heard that an adept arrived in town, so I hurried to take a look. Who would have known? You, sir, aren¡¯t just powerful. You are extremely bold as well! I, Gargamel, am impressed."


    It was an adept with a sinister face. All of Gargamel¡¯s hair had fallen out of his head, except for a few patches of white hair. He wore a gray adept¡¯s robe and held a glowing staff in his left hand. The hand holding onto the staff was thin and withered. Greem practically saw the outlines of his bones. It was more like the w of a ghost than the hand of a human.


    "Gargamel. An unfamiliar name. I have never heard of it! Are you here to catch that little girl?" Greem looked at the other adept in confusion.


    Greem would have prepared his magical defenses if it wasn¡¯t for the absoluteck of hostility that he was picking up from the opponent. After all, an adept hiding themselves and sneaking around another adept didn¡¯t seem like a friendly act no matter how you looked at it!


    "There¡¯s no need for wild guesses, good sir!" Yellowed and ckened teeth showed when Adept Gargamel spoke, "I have nothing to do with the girl. I am only a wandering adept that happened to be staying in Pinecone Town for the past six months. For the moment, I¡¯m here to do my magical experiments, as well as to purchase some of the materials thate from the ck Forest."


    "Then you are here to...?"


    "I heard you wanted to go to guewood? Are you interested in joining me on a big venture?" Gargamel¡¯s eyes shone when he exined his purpose here. He appeared almost impatient to start on this venture of his.


    "A big venture?" Greem asked doubtfully.


    "Indeed. Indeed. I want you to help me kill an adept-level magical creature."

 Chapter 390 Magic Forest

    Chapter 390 Magic Forest


    The ck Forest.


    It was a terrifying name on the Continent of Adepts, feared by many and dreaded by most.


    To the ordinary man, the ck Forest was a name that represented death and chaos. If you flipped through the history pages of the Continent of Adepts, you would find countless bloody examples of why this was the case.


    Year 13179 of the Era of Adepts. All one hundred and twenty-three individuals in a human vige by the western border of the Zhentarim area vanished without a trace. Investigations conducted by adepts discovered the tracks of Mind yers.


    Year 17281 of the Era of Adepts. A stampede of magical beasts ravaged a newly constructed human settlement in the Nn region of the Northern Lands. In a matter of three days, the number of deaths reached twenty thousand, while the missing and the wounded were too many to count.


    Year 22765 of the Era of Adepts. After the formation of the Seventeenth Construct Army, the Silver Union started to expand their territory into the depths of the ck Forest. The magical creatures initiated a horrifying bacsh, and countless casualties ensued.


    ......


    ......


    Just a single look through history told you that all of humanity had a naturally instinctive fear and respect for the ck Forest.


    The forest was both a treasury full of resources and the source of chaos where monsters gathered.


    Living next to these magical creatures was walking on a knife¡¯s edge. Every day and every night people worried about a sudden stampede or an unexpected attack by wandering monsters. Those who had never experienced it for themselves would never understand what it meant to lead such a life.


    The people of Pinecone Town huddled within their walls. No one dared to take a step beyond the only thing that kept them safe. The townsmen even formed groups when they went to gather firewood during the day. Not a single one of them had stayed in Pinecone Town for more than five years.


    The pioneers of Pinecone Town, those that had first arrived here, had all been devoured by the ck Forest, one after another.


    Thergest poption among the outsiders gathered in Pinecone Town were the mercenaries and adventurers seeking a living. Of course, there were also the apprentice adepts that were here to search for materials.


    These people epted requests to earn gold coins and magical crystals, and they spent most of their time in the forest nearby. They either looked for unique magical nts, captured magical beasts with delicious meat, or investigated and explored certain areas. It didn¡¯t matter what they did. Everything they obtained by risking their lives and spilling their blood appeared in thebs of the adepts or on their dining tables eventually. All of it was in exchange for money.


    ............


    The party set off early in the morning.


    They cut through the thin mists of dawn, wrapped in thick cloaks and mantles, passing through the narrow gates of Pinecone Town and disappearing into the woods.


    The initial stretch of the forest was like any other woods.


    A big brown cliff towered in the middle of the sea of green trees. The cliff stood alone amid the trees like a proud king looking down upon his subjects. White clouds and mists wandered around the cliff.


    The top of the cliff was t and covered with ck and brown moss.


    A breeze blew across the forest and caused the trees to wave in the wind. Twitters and chirps rang out in the air as a flock of bluebirds chased each other through the woods and flew into the distance.


    Green was all you could see when walking through a forest like this. Green flowers, green grass, green vines, and ancient tree trunks that had grayed from age.


    Life! The ce pulsated with life!


    It wasn¡¯t too bright in this silent forest. Overgrown branches, vines, and roots were everywhere. It was almost impossible to make progress through a forest like this without the help of a guide that was familiar with the geography.


    Love the Swordsman was now in charge of opening a path for the party. He carried a round shield on his back as he swung a sharp hatchet. He cut through all the obstructing vines and thorns and barely managed to create a path. It allowed a person to walk through if they positioned their body sideways. The party slowly moved forward.


    The soft and delicate clothes that adepts liked to wear the most were unsuited for traveling through primeval forests such as this. The branches and thorns that crossed their way could easily tear their clothes. Thus, even adepts and apprentices had no choice but to wear a thick cloak over their robes to avoid tripping from their clothes catching on a stray branch.


    These adepts that always hid in their tall towers and secretbs had none of their usual arrogance and mystery when they ventured into the woods. Even an ordinary slope was a huge obstacle in their path.


    They had to have someone pulling with a rope from above, while another person pushed from below to get the weak and frail Gargamel up a small cliff of three meters.


    On the other hand, Greem exhibited a sturdy body that was no weaker than Love. Not only was he able to walk through the uneven paths as if it was t, but he was also able to maneuver his way through cliffs and rocks swiftly. He was almost as agile as Rhodes, the Third ss Rogue.


    Gargamel couldn¡¯t help but be envious of Greem¡¯s muscr body. More than once, Greem caught Gargamel salivating while staring at him!


    In truth, any newly advanced adept possessed a body with a strength that could rival a fighter, agility that could beat a rogue, and swift reactions like those of an archer. However, extended periods neglecting their bodies, along with the corrosion of harmful magical materials, caused their bodies to deteriorate from peak condition quickly. There were very few adepts who managed to stay fit.


    That was why Gargamel wasn¡¯t surprised by Greem¡¯s extraordinary Physique. In fact, he revealed an expression of contemtion and reminiscence.


    Once upon a time, he had also possessed an exceptional body like that!


    Back then, he was able to push through the night, fighting and working tirelessly without stopping. Sadly, the passage of time and the corrosion of magical energies had turned all this into an immutable past. Now, he was only an old man that looked no better than a starving ghost!


    That said, his powerful magical energy still made him a respectable adept feared by mere mortals. If he decided to go all out, ughtering Pinecone Town would be no difficult task.


    Unfortunately, his impressive powers didn¡¯t count for much in the ck Forest!


    It wasn¡¯t difficult for adepts to summon flying servants and spare themselves from the arduous and tiring task of trekking through the woods, especially with all the tricks they had at theirmand.


    However, it was best to keep such thoughts in their mind and never attempt to carry them out in practice. Otherwise, a gruesome death awaited them!


    Flying over the ck Forest might seem like a good idea, but even determining your location was nearly impossible.


    Those who had never taken to the skies would never understand the pain of being lost in the ck Forest.


    When flying in the blue skies with an endless stretch of mountains and forest beneath, you might have been able to determine the direction, but you would never be able to find your destination. The ck Forest was easily hundreds of thousands of kilometers wide. Trying to calcte your position with something like andmark was a mere joke when the only thing that existed was an endless sea of trees.


    The high-magic environment of the ck Forest also caused most detection and divination spells to be ineffective. Even the Wand of Prophecy was a liability in this ce. Most of the time, it would bring you straight into a monster¡¯s den instead of a ce of safety.


    Moreover, flying in the sky was great, but it also made you an easy target for some powerful magical creatures.


    The creatures of the ck Forest were remarkably territorial. It was okay if you managed to sneak past the edges of their territory without them finding out. But if you were foolish enough to fly above their heads...


    The only oue would be them using your bones to decorate their dens!


    This five-kilometer stretch of woods was only a small trialpared to what was about toe.


    The green of the forest slowly turned darker and darker as they walked deeper into the ck Forest. Once they passed the five-kilometer mark, everything in front of their eyes appeared to bepletely different. It was almost as if they had entered an entirely different world.


    Looking above, they found the skies to have been obscured by the darkened canopy, like the night sky filled with specks of stars.


    The ck leavesyered upon each other and hid the sky from view. It managed to create a curtain of darkness deeper than night. The shining stars were spots of faint blue light that glowed everywhere in the forest like fireflies. These lights were what gave the ¡¯night sky¡¯ its strange and beautiful appearance.


    Apart from the beautiful ¡¯night sky,¡¯ the atmosphere of the ck Forest also appeared to be exceptionally elegant.


    The fragrance of flowers filled the forest. Young green grass that went all the way up to the ankle covered the ground. Stepping on the grass felt like stepping on the most delicate of velvet carpets. It was so soft that it made you want to lie down on the ground and roll around.


    Every stretch of the ck Forest had a unique style and atmosphere.


    If the ck Forest reaching towards the Northern Lands was filled with darkness, malevolence, and chaos, then this stretch of the ck Forest contained fantasy, elegance, and wonder.


    It was almost as if Greem and his party had stumbled into a magic forest. An aura of magic saturated the area around them. The whole ce was unbelievably beautiful.


    For most of the people in the party, this was the first time they had seen something so fantastical and pretty. For a moment, all of them were stunned by the brilliance of it all. Even Love and the adventurers who spent their days in the ck Forest couldn¡¯t help but straighten their bodies, rx, and take in this wondrous scene before their eyes.


    Greem silently looked at everything in front of his eyes. His elementium sight presented him with apletely different world from what the others saw.


    Traces and strands of magical energies flowed through the dark forest.


    It was nutrition that never ran out. A nutrient that continuously fed and nurtured the world before Greem¡¯s eyes.


    In Greem¡¯s vision, every de of grass, every flower petal, and every tiny creature in this magical ce brimmed with magic. Elementium particles soaked their bodies.


    In his sight, red represented fire, cyan was wind, brown was earth, green was wood, blue was water, and purple was soul and spirit. Layer afteryer, patch after patch, pile after pile; the dense magical energies had practically submerged the entire forest in a sea of elementium.


    In an environment like this, anything could happen. As long as it wasn¡¯t a rock, anything would be able to develop a consciousness of its own. Even intelligent lifeforms that could rival adepts weren¡¯t out of the question.


    The ck Forest. In truth, it should have been known as the Magic Forest!

 Chapter 391 Forest Spirit

    Chapter 391 Forest Spirit


    Magic energies existed all over the world, but they still had unique traits of their own.


    The energy in different ces would exist in various forms and possess different traits.


    Greem wasn¡¯t quite sure how magical energy looked in other ces, but here, the energy was gentle and tame.


    However, even docile energies were far too dangerous for an ordinary mortal.


    Greem¡¯s elementium sight allowed him to see the forest for what it was. There were still plenty of dangers and hazards hiding underneath this strange and wondrous disy.


    Terrifying spotted tarants stalked the bushes of colorful flowers, waiting to strike the unsuspecting wanderer. Green toads sat in the middle of grass bushes. Anyone who stepped on them was bound to be greeted by a massive spray of acid. Bamboo snakes coiled around tall tree branches. Their bodies hung down from the trees as if they were harmless vines.


    These hidden dangers were almost impossible to see with the naked eye. Even Greem had only realized their existence due to the unnatural concentration of magical energy in those areas. Love and the others had been able to survive in such a dangerous forest due to the experience and skills they had umted through the sacrifices of theirpanions¡¯ lives.


    One by one, they lit up torches and held them in their hands. An odd smell spread throughout the woods.


    It was a strange sight to behold.


    All of the hidden creatures started to scurry out of the way when Love raised his torch and cut a path through the bushes.


    For a moment, many critters crawled and slithered away from the nearby grass and branches.


    Soon, an entirely ¡¯clean¡¯ path appeared before the travelers.


    "Repent Powder!" Gargamel shed his yellow teeth as he looked at Greem and tapped at a small pouch by his waist. It had the same odd smell that wafted from the torches.


    Greem looked down at his waist. There was also a pouch like Gargamel¡¯s there. Love had explicitly requested that Greem wear it on the outside. He didn¡¯t expect it to have the ability to drive away small magical insects.


    These pouches saved the party from plenty of unnecessary trouble!


    Thepany continued to walk into the ck Forest.


    Rhodes the Third ss rogue, despite his seemingly weak abilities, was having an easy time here. He moved about like a fish in water.


    He gave Love a simple heads up, then dove headfirst into the thick forest. Love would only start walking forward once Rhodes gave him the all clear.


    All the vines and thorns were cut down to ensure that the adepts and apprentices wouldn¡¯t be affected. Even so, every step forward was still an agonizing struggle for everyone.


    Their clothes would catch on thorns, branches would hit their faces, and thick roots tripped their feet. The primal forest was a torturous ce for spellcasters thatcked training.


    That said, adepts and apprentices were not weaklings either!


    Their bodies had been nurtured with magic and potions. Their Physique was still far beyond the ordinary person, even if it wasn¡¯t all that strong. Not to mention the fact that they could enhance themselves with magic. For example, summoning some wind elementium to surround their bodies would instantly grant them agility equal to rogues. The defensive forcefields around their bodies also kept them safe from sneak attacks.


    Repent Powder wasn¡¯t omnipotent.


    There were always some strange creatures that were immune to its effects. These beings were able to hide from explorers and struck when they were finally in range.


    F the Archer put away her longbow and drew two daggers instead. She used her sharp des to split apart any poisonous snakes and bloodsucking leeches that dared to lunge at them. Neil the Fourth ss Hunter and the apprentice adepts were unharmed thanks to her.


    Of course, the two adepts didn¡¯t need their help.


    The decrepit Adept Gargamel was like a horrid source of poison himself. Any creature that came close to him instantly died of poison before melting into a puddle of acid.


    Greem, who was walking at the rear of the formation, was even weirder of a sight to see.


    A faint red barrier enveloped his body. It would reduce any creature that entered the field to ashes. Only a small pile of gray dust remained on the ground.


    Ring of Fire!


    The apprentices recognized the barrier. They couldn¡¯t help but cast gazes of envy at it.


    If they had chosen to master fire spells, they might also have been able to possess this brilliant and powerful me barrier after several years of rigorous study. While it might take a long time¨Csometimes as long as a dozen years¨Cthe Ring of Fire was a spell that possessed both offensive and defensive capabilities. It was well worth the effort. However, this required them to have exceptional talent with regards to their affinity for fire. Otherwise, they would have to prepare themselves to spend an eternity trying to master the secret of the Ring of Fire!


    Sabrina turned back and took a look at Greem¡¯s ease in the situation. The envy in her heart was enough to drown her.


    Greem had only been an intermediate apprentice back when they had gone on a mission in the Underground Cave together. Most of Sabrina¡¯s attention had been on the more eye-catching of the duo¨C Mary.


    She had never expected this to happen in a matter of just ten years. Greem had turned into a terrifying adept that everyone had to fear and respect. Meanwhile, she was still stuck at the pseudo-adept level. Moreover, she was even involved in a conspiracy against her that might very well spell the end of her life.


    The bizarre ways that things turned out were well worthmenting!


    Heavens. What was it that caused two individuals of different standings to have their fates, identities, and social status to bepletely flipped on their heads? Was it because she wasn¡¯t stubborn enough in her pursuit of magic? Or was it a joke that fate was ying on her?


    The bubbling thoughts upset Sabrina, and her wounds started to ache again.


    Sabrina gloomily sighed as she pulled out a ck water pouch and took a drink.


    It wasn¡¯t water she drank, but a pungent and viscous organ reconciling agent!


    Strange mechanical constructs had already reced most of her human organs. Without a mechanical heart to synchronize and reconcile these mechanical parts with her original biological systems, they were bound to contradict and sh with each other.


    Consequently, she had to drink this ¡¯motor oil¡¯ that acted as a regting agent on a daily basis. It was the only way to dy the conflict befalling her body.


    That was also part of the pain of being an apprentice who walked on a mechanical adept¡¯s path!


    After four tiring hours of trekking, the party stopped on a small cliff fifteen kilometers deep in the ck Forest. They started preparing a camp for tonight.


    It was still two hours until nightfall, but it wasn¡¯t easy to find a sheltered ce like this. To avoid the awkward situation of being unable to find shelter, Love decided to stop here. He asked for permission from Greem and proceeded to set up a tent.


    After all, this was the first day of the expedition. Before the team could get familiar with each other and learn how to cooperate, it was best to save some energy to deal with any unforeseen circumstances.


    The diversity of animal species in the ck Forest and the hordes of magical creatures was an eye-opening experience for Greem as well! This expedition was the first time he had ventured so deep into the ck Forest.


    Hopping bunnies and guinea pigs were the favorite prey of hunters outside of the ck Forest. They were easy targets. However, here, it was almost as if a Berserking Spell had been cast upon these harmless creatures. They had dug out of holes in the ground and recklessly charged at the party.


    Greem had personally seen how frightening they could be. The ¡¯gentle¡¯ rabbits had been able to leave distinct w marks on Love¡¯s metal shield with their every strike. The sharp fangs of the guinea pigs even left teeth marks on Love¡¯s longsword.


    Greem had seen what was happening in their bodies. Their Spirits were chaotic and berserk, while a roiling mess of magical energy raged on within their bodies.


    Once in a while, they even came across small critters that could release wind des, fireballs, and earth spikes. It wasn¡¯t out of the question for them to evolve and grow into magical creatures with powerful magical powers if given enough time.


    Still, most of these creatures would probably die from thebustion of chaotic energies within their bodies!


    It was evident that the dense and ubiquitous magical energy of the ck Forest was influencing their behavior!


    The ck Forest was like an extensive magical experimentationb. Any creature that refused or was unable to be transformed by the magical energy would die from the excessive power. Only those magical creatures that had survived the surge of magic had the right to survive in this ce.


    The ¡¯Speciology¡¯ and ¡¯Magical Creature Handbook¡¯ stored in Greem¡¯s chip was in need of severe corrections and addendums. At every moment, there were more and more unique magical creatures unknown to the world being born in the vast and boundless ck Forest. They too were also returning to the embrace of the earth through their constant struggles and fights for survival.


    It was through such a process that all those sudden and unstable factors, as well as the unknown variables, were absorbed and eliminated. Only the most dominant and stable mutations could survive and be a new species as part of the ck Forest.


    And the cause of this cycle was this eternally iprehensible forest! The ck Forest!


    While everyone was busy gathering firewood, setting up tents, finding water, and hunting for dinner at the base of the cliff, Gargamel dragged Greem to the top of the cliff. He then took out a magical tool that resembled apass and silently started measuring something.


    "Are you certain that the forest spirit you mentioned is nearby? We¡¯re fairly close to the edge of the ck Forest. If it did possess intelligence, it would never choose such a ce for its territory!" Greem asked doubtfully.


    Forest Spirits.


    What kind of magical creatures were these beings?


    The question had just popped up in Greem¡¯s mind, and the data stored in the chip instantly flowed into his mind.


    Forest spirits. Nature-attribute magical creatures that possessed intelligence. A sort of magical nt that came into existence when an ordinary magical creature¡¯s soul consciousness, upon death, blended with a tree spirit. This form of life was simr to that of the Demon Flower that Greem had met in the Underground Cave. However, one was the coincidental creation of nature, while the other was a magical creation of a wicked adept.


    Still, their evil natures were the same!

 Chapter 392 The First Day

    Chapter 392 The First Day


    In truth, forest spirits were simr to undead spirits.


    They came into existence through the merging of a magical creature¡¯s soul and the essence of magical nts. Depending on what soul and what essence they sprang from, the forest spirit would possess different magical abilities.


    The prowess of an adept-level magical creature had much to do with the abilities they possessed. The difference between strong and weak skills could be massive!


    For example, some forest spirits that possessed revival abilities were considered invincible within the domain of the woods. Any damage they sustained would be able to be restored by absorbing the magical energies of nearby nts. It was a powerful ability when you considered the dense reserves of magical energy present in the ck Forest.


    It was virtually impossible to capture a forest spirit like this one if you weren¡¯t able to cripple it in a single strike!


    The peculiar calls of magical creatures came from the distant horizon.


    "Magical creatures areing this way! We had better hide for now!" Gargamel opened a pouch and took out a handful of yellow powder, sprinkling it all over the two of them.


    The outlines of the two adepts quickly vanished as they turned transparent. They had disappeared entirely by the time the magical creature in the distance flew past their heads. Not a single trace of their aura was left.


    The other people beneath the cliff didn¡¯t have such amazing tricks up their sleeves, but they still had something as simple as Scent-Elimination Powder. The cover of the trees also kept them from being discovered by the gigantic monster in the sky.


    Greem raised his head for a better look.


    It was a wyvern with green and gray scales all over its body!


    Based on the crown on its skull, and its short tail, this dragon¡¯s innate magic was likely of the acid attribute. It also appeared to be one of the moremonly seen flying magical creatures in the ck Forest.


    "Beep. Detecting high-energy magic being. Green-Footed Wyvern. Acid-attribute hybrid dragon. It is rumored to possess the bloodline of dragons and griffins in its body. It possesses leather wings and can fly. Bodily attributes have been detected to be as follows: Strength 7 | Agility 4 | Physique 5 | Spirit 2. Overall evaluation: Adept-level."


    The wyvern¡¯s Strength and Agility were two times his own. The creature¡¯s Physique was also slightly higher than his. The only department that Greem was superior in was his Spirit. He had seven points of Spirit, but the wyvern only had two. It was perhaps his only constion.


    Greem tried to calcte the real prowess of the wyvern while he looked at the statistics the chip provided him. After all, the chip¡¯s scan only gave him theoretical data. This data was not an urate representation of an entity¡¯s real skill inbat.


    If one were to single out the traits of the wyvern, they would find that it had no specialties apart from its tough hide and resilient life force. It was one of the hybrid dragons, but the bloodline of the dragons in its body was far too thin. Even the griffins of its ancestral lineage had thicker dragon blood.


    That was why most adept ns that possessed dragon bloodlines were prone to exclude wyverns from the likes of hybrid dragons. They might look like dragons, but the dragon bloodline in them was so thin that any random creature might be better. They were useless monsters with only looks and no power to back their appearance!


    One wouldn¡¯t consider them fearsome creatures. They might have the ability to fly and technically have a strength that could rival adepts. However, in an actual fight between the two, an adept would have way too many tricks they could employ to crush a wyvern such as this one.


    These creatures were deserving of the contempt of adepts! Their intelligence was just far too low!


    For a hybrid dragon creature to only possess the instinct to fight and eat was humiliating. They didn¡¯t even possess elementary intelligence. It was easy for an adept to kill them by setting out traps and luring the idiotic monsters into them.


    That said, wyverns lived in groups andmunities. Usually, they survived in flocks of a dozen. That was also why adepts tended to be reluctant when it came to provoking these idiotic yet rash and vengeful beasts.


    This wyvern had apparentlye out here to hunt for food.


    It unfurled its wings covered with thin scales and soared above the canopy with its massive body. Gusts of wind blew across the forest as it passed by.


    The unique stench of hybrid dragons filled the entire area!


    The continuous sound of snapping tree branches and rustling leaves echoed out in the woods. All the animals in the area were frantically evacuating. For one moment, the creatures of the forest fell into a frenzy, panicking as if the end of the world had arrived.


    The wyvern circled above the forest with its wings extended before suddenly diving headfirst into the trees.


    The forest trembled. All sorts of animal cried and howled. Even the tall and ancient trees shook from themotion stirred up by the wyvern.


    A short momentter, a mighty gale sted into the air as the wyvern returned to the sky. It held a boar asrge as a bull in its powerful hind legs.


    It let out an excited screech and quickly flew away, disappearing into the depths of the forest.


    "Are magical creatures of this levelmon in the ck Forest?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    "Not justmon. The beasts are literally everywhere!" A sinister smile appeared on Gargamel¡¯s face, "We are only at the edge of the ck Forest right now. You will know how many magical creatures there are in this ce once we go past the fifty-kilometer mark! It won¡¯t matter how powerful you are in this ce. The endless horde of magical creatures will be enough to send you to your grave just by throwing body after body at you. Do you want to survive in this ce? Subtlety and silence is the best way to go about it!"


    "No wonder those adepts like to form groups when they venture into the ck Forest. Traveling alone would be unwise."


    "Kehkehkeh. It¡¯s suicidal to try venturing into here alone! Those Second Grade magical creatures have territories and very rarely walk beyond them. But still, who knows what might happen!? Nothing¡¯s for certain here in the ck Forest. A lone adept wouldn¡¯t even have a chance to escape if they ran into a wandering Second Grade creature here!"


    "It isn¡¯t that easy to run into one, is it?"


    "Kehkehkh. The chance of running into a Second Grade magical creature around the two hundred and fifty-kilometer edge line of the forest is minuscule. Only those who have lost their territories to new challengers would travel this far out of the forest. But once you make it five hundred kilometers into the ck Forest, you will see nothing but Second Grade magical creatures. Every piece of territory there belongs to one of those monsters."


    "How intelligent are they?"


    "Hmph! Don¡¯t underestimate them. Those magical creatures won¡¯t lose to us adepts when ites to smarts. Their only disadvantage is theirck of knowledge and legacy systems. That¡¯s the only reason we have managed to keep them locked up here in this ck Forest."


    "Why can¡¯t the magical creatures gather together and form a massive organization to fight back against us? They should be able to aplish that with their intelligence!"


    "Kehkehkeh. Of course, they could aplish something like that with their intelligence. However, when you add their ambition and desires into the equation, things be far moreplicated. After all, there are far too many different races of magical creatures. They don¡¯t have the same ancestral roots as we humans do. Moreover, magical creatures have always respected power. The only way to get someone to obey your orders would be to make them submit through raw strength. Even if there were one or two powerful magical creatures with the thought of forming a united front, they wouldn¡¯t possess the power needed to make everyone else kneel before them."


    The two adepts started a conversation on the cliff while the mercenaries were busy preparing dinner.


    Greem might have collected a lot of data through the chip, but he still needed to talk andmunicate with other adepts to turn this knowledge into experience. It was the only way that academic knowledge could be turned into primary sources of information to increase his understanding of the World of Adepts.


    Dinner was roasted rabbit.


    The meat probably came from those ferocious rabbits that had attacked them earlier. Those things were asrge as hound dogs.


    These ordinary magic-infused beasts had absorbed plenty of magical energy. Not only was their meat soft and sweet, but a warm feeling would also surge through your body when you ate it. The faint traces of magical energy emanating from the pieces of meat could nourish those who ate it. It had beneficial properties for the body.


    Greem¡¯s Physique had already reached four points. He also had three points in Strength. These attributes were superior even to the swordsman Love, who had dedicated his life to training his body. Why was this the case? Precisely because of the nourishment from Greem¡¯s daily magical energy meals.


    With how powerful his Physique was at the moment, the meat of such low-level magical lifeforms was no longer capable of bringing him any improvements. The best it could do was help replenish the energy he had exhausted on the trip here.


    If he wanted to continue strengthening his body through food, he would have to find ways to capture higher-grade magical beings such as wyverns. Otherwise, he would have no other option. The price of the magical energy meals served within the adept¡¯s tower back in Feidnan City was exorbitant, even for an ¡¯elite¡¯ adept like himself.


    Setting up his future adept¡¯s tower near the ck Forest would make it very convenient to hunt magical creatures!


    After they had settled dinner, the two adepts entered their tents and sealed them with simple spells. It was only then that they started their daily required meditations.


    As they were still out in the wild, neither of them dared to go into a state of deep meditation. Naturally, this meant that the effects of their meditation were minimal. Still, however minuscule the improvement was, it was still an improvement. This constant and arduous grind was necessary precisely because of how hard it was for them to improve their Spirits any further at this point. Thus, meditation would always be an essential and fundamental daily activity for all adepts.


    An adept¡¯s meditation required absolute silence. Thus, everyone else stopped all other activities that could disturb the two adepts. They silently moved around and packed their bags.


    Rhodes the Rogue slipped out of camp without a word and started to ce traps around the ce. Rogues like himself might not be much in a fight, but they were very good at setting traps and hiding.


    Sabrina sat by the campfire and stared into the mes after dinner. Anthony, the intermediate apprentice, could only shrug and hurry to the perimeter of the camp to set up rm arrays.


    He might be a potions apprentice, but he was at the intermediate level. Ordinary arrays like this were no big problem. At the moment, he was the weakest person in the camp. Naturally, he had to be the one to do all the dirty and tiresome chores!


    Three hourster, when the darkness of night had utterly swallowed thend, Greem and Gargamel ended their meditation sessions and emerged from their tents.


    "Sir Greem and I have some business to attend to. The few of you stay here and keep guard. Don¡¯t go wandering anywhere." Gargamel tossed a small pouch to Anthony, "Scatter some powder into the campfire every other hour. This will keep the low-Grade magical creatures away. You,e with us!"


    Gargamel pointed at Sabrina.


    A pseudo-adept might not be much help in capturing an adept-level magical creature, but she could still qualify as a meat shield!


    Sabrina¡¯s body trembled, but she obediently stood up and followed the two adepts into the pitch-ck woods.

 Chapter 393 Tracking Down

    Chapter 393 Tracking Down


    The ck Forest was still a wondrous ce of magic, even at night.


    The silver moonlight from therge, brilliant moon shined down through the leaves of the trees, forming mesmerizing pirs of light in the pitch-ck forest. nts shimmering with magical energy started to glow with iridescent colors under the moonlight.


    In the eyes of an ordinary person, the ck Forest appeared to be submerged in eternal darkness. However, for adepts who had mastered elementium powers, this ce was as bright as day. Strange glowing lights floated everywhere in the air.


    Greem was amazed by the wonders of the World of Adepts as he walked past the ancient trees.


    Every one of them was nearly a hundred meters tall, and so wide they needed three men to embrace thempletely. Scattered on the ground beneath the massive trees were mushrooms of all kinds. Ther were matsutakes, ck fungi, bright shrooms, whitehead shrooms, fluorescent moss. All the fungi and moss glowed in the dark. Red, green, purple, blue, gray¨C their lights came in a variety of colors.


    Layers of vines coiled around the branches like stalking snakes. The ends of the vines disappeared into the canopy, preventing anyone from seeing where they led.


    It was indeed a bright, fantastical world filled with life!


    Sabrina cautiously walked behind the two adepts. She tried her best to maintain a certain distance between them. One that was neither too far nor too close. Too far away, and they wouldn¡¯t be able to save her if something unexpected happened. Too close, and...


    A subtle forcefield that was virtually invisible to the naked eye surrounded the two adepts¡¯ bodies. The forcefields weren¡¯t usually visible, but if any creature dared toe to close, they would trigger all sorts of magical effects.


    The effect of Gargamel¡¯s forcefield was poison. Both nts and animals instantly died when they came into contact with it. Sabrina had already witnessed several glowing bugs get too close to the sinister adept. Their lights immediately extinguished as they crashed to the ground.


    Sir Greem¡¯s forcefield was the Ring of Fire.


    Any substance, both organic and inorganic, would suddenlybust when it entered the Ring of Fire. They were then reduced to ashes in a sh and fell to the ground.


    A path of ash trailed behind him wherever he went!


    Sabrina didn¡¯t dare take even one step too close to these adepts. Even with her pseudo-adept level abilities, she would note out unharmed if she identally entered their forcefields.


    Adept Gargamel held a magical tool in his hands that resembled apass. He led the group forward into the forest. Once in a while, he would lower his head to check the tool before correcting his trajectory. It appeared that he was tracking something.


    Danger lurked everywhere in the ck Forest of the night!


    The three of them had already run into strange magical creatures several times.


    These creatures were like phantoms in the night. They passed through the bushes and vines without so much as a sound. They would immediately hide in the shadows and observe the party of three when they found them.


    The smarter creatures quickly left after sensing the power of the three humans. Only bloodthirsty or unintelligent ones failed to resist the allure of flesh and blood, charging at the adepts.


    These foolish beings were all done in by Sabrina alone.


    The power of a pseudo-adept might not be much to an adept, but it was more than enough to crush these creatures. They were usually no stronger than an advanced apprentice.


    Greem stood silently in the darkness and observed the way Sabrina fought every time monsters ambushed them.


    Having reced part of her limbs and organs with robotics, Sabrina possessed an extraordinarily unique and efficientbat style.


    The robotic eye covered by her silver mask also seemed to have some unusual ability that granted her superhuman vision. She waspletely unaffected by the darkness of the forest. The robotic left hand hidden underneath her cloak wasn¡¯t just her weapon; it was also her shield.


    A nightsaber leopard lunged at her from a tree branch ten meters above by using Shadowstalker Stealth, but Sabrina¡¯s left hand, hard as steel, immediately struck it. The leopard¡¯s heavy body was blown away, snapping countless vines as it crashed through the vegetation. Itnded on the ground with a massive rumble. Greem couldn¡¯t help but raise an eyebrow.


    Three points of Strength!


    Sabrina might have been an apprentice, but she was already as strong as him when it came to Strength. In fact, Greem was reasonably sure that he was not her match in terms of Strength if he didn¡¯t transform into the me Fiend.


    The nightsaber leopard, its ck body covered in magical patterns, slowly walked out of the ravaged bushes. Pieces of grass and moss stuck to its beautiful ck fur.


    That violent blow had obviously damaged it!


    It slowly circled the three of them and let out intimidating growls from its throat.


    Gargamel let out an impatient snort.


    Sabrina had no choice but to end this quickly. She didn¡¯t want to displease the adept. She swiftly strode towards the magical creature.


    The human¡¯s active provocation and actions had angered the nightsaber leopard. It crouched and pounced. Four deep w marks left behind by its powerful legs scarred the ground. Its lithe body turned into a shing silhouette and rushed towards Sabrina.


    This time, Sabrina didn¡¯t choose to blow the opponent away. Instead, her robotic left hand abruptly shot forward and grabbed the nightsaber leopard in midair. Seven or eight crescent des shot out from her body and instantly dug into the cat¡¯s flesh.


    The nightsaber leopard was a creature known for its agility. Most of its prowess came from its two abilities¨C Shadowstalker Stealth and sh w. Its body¡¯s defense waspletely ineffective at stopping these strange robotic attacks.


    Pupupu.


    Seven or eight clusters of blood sshed from its body. It opened its mouth to roar in agony, but a drill-like robotic extension was shoved into its throat immediately.


    Pu.


    A bloody drill came out of the back of the leopard¡¯s head. The drill itself was still spinning away, sending purple beads of blood flying in every direction.


    Crash.


    Sabrina threw the nightsaber leopard¡¯s corpse aside, and she panted from exhaustion.


    The nightsaber leopard had not been able toy a finger on her body in the few seconds of conflict earlier. However, the violent shockwave from forcefully punching into the hardened body of a magical creature still caused her pain. Several of her internal organs started to ache once more.


    "Let¡¯s go!" Gargamel seemed to have be restless from all the waiting. He took the lead and hurried even deeper into the forest.


    That damned forest spirit. He had already crossed paths with it countless times. A sudden ident always cropped up at a crucial moment and allowed the monster to get away. He had wanted to invite a few adepts to help him take down this sly forest spirit. However, he was also worried that the greedy adepts would take advantage of him being alone.


    That was why he had been so impatient to invite someone like Greem, an adept intent on exploring the ck Forest solo.


    And the price he had to pay for this forest spirit was...


    ............


    Forest spirits weren¡¯t powerful magical creatures at all. It was the unusualness of their powers that made them hard to deal with.


    Thisck of power meant that forest spirits oftencked the privilege of owning a territory of their own. Most of them wandered around the territories of other creatures in search of souls they could consume.


    The forest spirit that Gargamel was tracking also possessed extreme intelligence. It had even managed to catch Gargamel in traps it had set up beforehand. Those had not been pleasant times.


    Last time, the spirit had lured Gargamel into the hunting grounds of arge group of ankhegs. If it weren¡¯t for a little fortune that had allowed him to fight his way through the horde of monsters, he would have been the one to die on that day. However, he had also been severely injured in that incident. It took him six months topletely recover.


    Gargamel looked down and inspected the magical tool in his hand. The needle on thepass was wildly spinning.


    "Dammit... " Gargamel cursed under his breath, "That bastard is doing it again. It intentionally left its aura all over the woods to prevent us from detecting its location. Once we get impatient, it will lead us into the territory of magical creatures and leave us to die. Hmph! I won¡¯t fall for it again."


    Gargamel angrily stashed the magical tool and stomped his feet. A mysterious ck cat with shiny ck fur suddenly emerged from his shadows.


    A magical pet?


    Greem was surprised for a moment.


    Magical pets were creatures that had signedpanionship contracts with adepts. Not only were they able to expand the arsenal of abilities that an adept possessed, they were also convenient and useful assistants. However, from Greem¡¯s perspective, the slight benefit of owning a magical pet was offset by their ws.


    The death of a magical pet didn¡¯t just mean the loss of a useful helper for the adept. The pet would also drag to their grave that portion of Spirit that the adept had given the pet to establish the contract. Greem only had seven points of Spirit right now. The instant evaporation of two to three points of his Spirit was more than enough to cripple his mental space.


    That was why Greem was entirely unwilling to create another massive w in himself before he found a suitable target to turn into his pet. After all, not every adept could arm their magical pet to the teeth as they did for themselves!


    However, for a wandering adept like Gargamel, a ck cat pet made things much more convenient.


    The ck leaped onto his shoulders and started to talk with him.


    "Speak, Gargamel. What do you intend to do this time in summoning this great and mighty one?" Thezy ck cat stretched its body and yawned before asking in an unamused tone.


    "Help me find that forest spirit, and I¡¯ll give you two Spellfire Fish!"


    "Chh! You haven¡¯t even given me the mulberries you promisedst time! Trying to trick this great one once again won¡¯t... "


    "Just go, quickly, and I guarantee I¡¯ll fulfill my promise this time! Be careful. Don¡¯t tip that forest spirit off."


    "I understand, I understand, my stingy master. It¡¯s this great one¡¯s misfortune to have met a stingy guy like you!" The mysterious ck cat with human-like expressions grumbled as it jumped off of Gargamel¡¯s shoulders. It quickly shed several times and disappeared from everyone¡¯s vision.

 Chapter 394 Conspiracy and Forest Spirit

    Chapter 394 Conspiracy and Forest Spirit


    Greem betrayed an expression of surprise when he saw the cat move.


    It hadn¡¯t used any spatial magic, but its body disappeared and reappeared here and there as if it was passing through different dimensions. When Greem closed his eyes to sense the cat¡¯s existence, he heard no trace of its footsteps. In fact, he couldn¡¯t even detect the essential aura of soul and blood that every lifeform should possess. The cat was like a realistic illusion that had been created through the use of magic. There was absolutely no magical information that Greem could lock onto to keep track of the creature.


    No energy flux, no magical flux, no body heat, no soul aura.


    This ck cat was quite the extraordinary one!


    ............


    Starting a ughter in the ck Forest was not a wise decision.


    The best course of action when running into a magical creature was to avoid them. The blood stench of killing a magical being would attract all predators within a radius of several dozen kilometers. A peaceful venture into the forest would then turn into an endless butchering of magical creatures.


    Greem and the others followed behind the ck cat and quickly crossed thend. On their journey, they met several jungle beasts and magical creatures hiding in the darkness. Every time this happened, Gargamel raised the staff in his hand and shook it. A faint yellow light emanated from a small pouch attached to the top of his staff.


    All the beasts and creatures would immediately yelp in fear and run away as if they had seen the devil himself.


    Fear!


    The feedback from the chip informed Greem of the yellow light¡¯s magical effects. However, Greem still had no idea what materials Gargamel had put in that pouch.


    Greem already had a fundamental understanding of Gargamel¡¯s identity from their interactions along the way. Gargamel was likely a potions master, and Anthony the potions apprentice was probably his apprentice. It was far too unlikely for two spellcasters that had mastered potion studies to appear in the same small town!


    Most of Gargamel¡¯s magical abilities were probably focused on the use of potions. He presumably had poorbat skills. Otherwise, he would never have brought a pseudo-adept along just to serve as a meat shield.


    Still, Greem didn¡¯t dare underestimate a wandering adept like this.


    Adepts that were able to continue their research without the help of ns most definitely had trump cards hidden up their sleeves. Moreover, theck of being burdened by a n meant that these adepts were prone to breaking the rules set down by the Adept Association.


    Killing each other, stabbing others in the back, and luringpanions into traps was no foreign concept to these wandering adepts. As long as they were smart enough not to leave traces of their actions and continuously switched locations, they could easily prey on new adepts.


    Consequently, Greem didn¡¯t put too much trust in a person like this. He made sure always to keep the Ring of Fire around his body as they traveled through the forest.


    They crossed river after river and climbed mountain after mountain. Even Greem, with his great Physique, couldn¡¯t help but start panting. The even weaker Gargamel practically breathed his lungs out. His frail chest worked overtime like a restless bellow. He would likely have copsed to the ground if he hadn¡¯t leaned against Sabrina¡¯s shoulders.


    Sabrina was relying on her robotic arm to swing from branch to branch. Even so, she only barely kept up with the ck cat¡¯s swift form. Sabrina was sweating profusely and panting from exhaustion when the ck cat finally stopped in front of a ck cave.


    Forty kilometers.


    In an hour and a half, the three of them had traveled forty kilometers away from their camp. The surprising amount of energy needed for this effort was too much even for a robotic girl made of steel!


    "Silence!" Gargamel shouted under his breath, "My ck cat has managed to track down the forest spirit. It¡¯s right here, hiding in this cave."


    "What¡¯s your n of action?" Greem didn¡¯t attempt to probe into the cave with his Spirit, out of fear that he might tip off the forest spirit to their existence. He whispered his question.


    "I will go first! That goddamned monster definitely set up traps inside. That said, I have dealt with it several times. I know full well how to deal with anything it might have in store. Once the fight starts, you two immediately rush in. We will pincer it from two sides and capture it in a single go. Act quick! Make sure it doesn¡¯t get away!"


    Gargamel¡¯s suggestions caused Greem to pause for a second.


    Greem had always remained wary of Gargamel on the way here. He didn¡¯t expect the wandering adept toe up with a n this considerate of himself. Gargamel was practically taking on all the risks in doing so. He had reserved the safest position for Greem. Was he wrong in doubting Gargamel?


    Greem was still hesitating internally, but he calmly epted the offer on the outside.


    Gargamel quickly ran a check of all the magical equipment on his body. He then sprinkled a cloud of light blue powder all over himself, causing his outline to vanish into thin air.


    However, Greem¡¯s elementium sight still allowed him to see Gargamel. The wandering adept¡¯s body had only blurred slightly. He was currently sneaking his way into the cave at the bottom of the cliff.


    "Let¡¯s start preparing as well!" Greem calmly gave an order to Sabrina.


    He took out three strange stones engraved with mysterious runes. These stones started to float in the sky once his Spirit entered them. The rocks slowly circled ten centimeters above his head, as if there were an invisible orbit there.


    Then, Greem took out a long and pitch-ck staff. He paused for a moment, and a horrifying elementium flux sted out from the crimson crystal at the top of the staff. All sorts of strange and wondrous forcefields and magical defenses surged around his body.


    Ioun Stones! A scepter!


    An expression of envy appeared in Sabrina¡¯s eyes.


    These were all expensive products, even among magical equipment. Even the weakest of these items cost up to four or five hundred magical crystals. The quality products probably went for a thousand magical crystals.


    A pseudo-adept like her was considered filthy rich if she possessed an instant-cast magic wand that cost one or two hundred magical crystals. Magical equipment that required a thousand magical crystals was a luxury item that she could only dream of!


    Soon, a terrifying elementium explosion rang out from within the dark cave as the two waited in silence. The entire mountain trembled from the disturbance. Several rocks and boulders began to fall to the ground.


    "Come, let¡¯s go in!" Greem took the initiative and rushed into the cave.


    What the two didn¡¯t notice was the faint blue light that glowed beneath two inconspicuous stones on both sides of the cave when they entered.


    The cave wasn¡¯t too big on the inside. The ground was moist and safe, and it even had a stench to it, as if this had been the den of some other beast.


    Greem looked all over the ce and found a dark tunnel in the corner of the cave. Several tides of elementium surged out from the inside of the shaft.


    It seemed that the fight was pretty intense!


    Greem tapped his staff against the ground, and the crimson crystal red up like a torch. He led Sabrina into the tunnel without any hesitation.


    There wasn¡¯t much room in here. Water even dripped from the ceiling. However, the elementium particles in the air appeared to be excessively active and lively. There was something wrong.


    The tunnel continued to wind downwards as if it was leading straight into the belly of the mountain.


    The winds blowing in their faces were chilling. A musty smell mixed with them.


    The intense rumbling happened two more times. Dirt fell on them as they moved through the tunnels. Dust would have wholly covered Greem if it wasn¡¯t for his cloak and the Ring of Fire.


    The two of them awkwardly stumbled out of the tunnel into a massive natural karst cave. A towering stone pir stood before Greem and Sabrina¡¯s eyes, shielding them from the strong elementium tides in the distance.


    Shouts and intense elementium explosions came from the other end of the cave.


    "Come over quick!" The voice was slightly hoarse and distorted by the echoes of the cave, but Greem could still recognize it as Gargamel¡¯s ear-piercing voice, "I¡¯ve wounded it. Quick! Come here and stop it from running away."


    His voice seemed rather urgent. It looked like the battle was extremely close.


    Greem strode ahead and was shocked by the scene before his eyes when he walked past the stone pir.


    A frail and withered body stood alone in the middle of the cave. Tworge clusters of faint yellow light floated near Gargamel. The two balls of light emitted the sounds of elementium explosions and intense elementium flux.


    All the fighting sounds and elementium shockwaves he had heard and felt from the outside had all been fabricated!


    Greem stopped dead in his tracks. He tapped his staff against the ground and the Ring of Fire that had been hidden within his body immediately surfaced. Powerful fire elementium swiftly gathered towards him.


    "Gargamel, what are you doing?" Greem stared at the frail figure with cold eyes, "Was everything a lie you made up?"


    Sabrina stopped by the stone pir. She looked at every corner of the cave fearfully and slowly backed away.


    With how weak she was, Sabrina had no right to interfere in a battle between adepts.


    Regardless of whether this was a conspiracy, it would be best for her to hide in the distance!


    "Kehkehkeh. It isn¡¯t easy to wait for a lonesome adept like you to show up! The five years I have spent waiting here in Pinecone Town hasn¡¯t been in vain. Finally, I can reap the rewards." Gargamel couldn¡¯t help but let out a sinisterugh. His greedy eyes fell upon the magical equipment on Greem¡¯s body.


    Greem¡¯s face turned dark.


    "Gargamel, who gave you the courage to ambush an adept of the same Grade here? Get yourpanion toe out! I don¡¯t believe you would dare to pull something like this off with your weak powers and cowardice."


    "Hehehe... " A crisp, sweet voice rang out in the cave all of a sudden, "Gargamel, this guy knows you pretty well, doesn¡¯t he?! He even managed to figure out your cowardly personality."


    An invisible shape slowly revealed itself on the top of the cave as the voice rang out.


    It was a beautiful green phantom that appeared to be translucent. She had a perfect figure with perfect curves, as well as a body that seemed to have been made out of glowing green lights. She waspletely naked, but the magical patterns and flowers that grew all over her body were just enough to cover the important parts of her body.


    Her hair was soft flower branches flowing in the wind. Four or five intertwined vines formed her hands. Countless roots split off at the ends of her legs. These roots were even waving in the wind as they let out faint green lights.


    A forest spirit!


    Gargamel hadn¡¯t been lying when he said there was a forest spirit!


    Greem gasped in his heart when he looked up and saw this strange lifeform.

 Chapter 395 Eternal Sleep

    Chapter 395 Eternal Sleep


    Who would have known! Truly!


    Who would have expected a magical creature as strange as the forest spirits to exist in the world?!


    Greem clicked his tongue in amazement as he raised the ze of Destruction in his hand.


    "It seems this is a conspiracy of the two of you! What is it? A poor wandering adept, an even more pathetic magical creature, and you want to drag me to my grave? Isn¡¯t that just a little toocent?!"


    Greem tapped his staff against the ground, and a massive st of me a dozen meters long emerged from the top of the staff. The temperature in the cave instantly rose.


    "Hmph! Arrogant human, aren¡¯t you the smug one?!" The forest spirit floating down from above chuckled as she spoke, "Did you think we would trick you into this ce without prior preparations? Witness what I haveid out for you!"


    The forest spirit shouted, and faint blue light emerged from all around the room. The floor, walls, ceiling, and even the pirs of stone. A strange arrayrge enough to cover the entire space appeared.


    The mes from Greem¡¯s staff and his Ring of Fire quickly dimmed, before being reduced to sparks.


    "Beep. Detecting unknown forcefield interference. Initial estimates suggest..."


    The information projected in his mind caused him to pause for a second. He uttered the name of an array, one word at a time.


    "Magic... Interference... Barrier!"


    "Good to see that you know your magic!" The forest spirit¡¯s phantasmal body slowly hovered in the cave. She phased right through a stone pir and moved behind Greem, firmly sealing off his only path of escape.


    "This is a Magic-Interference Barrier specially prepared for you. I have adjusted it into a Fire-Interference Barrier. No fire spells can be sessfully cast while in this cave. What¡¯s left of a fire adept once you strip him of his innate magic? Hahaha."


    Sabrina¡¯s expression soured at this moment.


    One adept was more than enough trouble. To think that an adept was working with a magical creature. Her fortune must have been the absolute worst to run into a situation like this!


    Meanwhile, Greem smiled at his enemies, even as Sabrina plunged into despair. A strange smile appeared in his eyes.


    "Are you sure a Magic-Interference Barrier would be enough to make me surrender without any conditions? If that¡¯s the case, what are you hesitating for? Come at me!"


    Greem¡¯s calm demeanor was beyond the forest spirit¡¯s expectations. Her pretty eyes shifted from Greem and fell upon Gargamel.


    "Don¡¯t worry. Greem is merely pretending to stay calm!" Gargamel waved the staff in his hand, "We set up this magic array together. There shouldn¡¯t be anything wrong with it."


    Gargamel summoned an elementium fireball. The dense fire elementium gathered in his palm. It dispersed and turned into waves of fire before it could form into a fixed shape.


    "Then you go ahead and capture him!" The forest spirit calmly said.


    "This... " Gargamel took a look at his frail body, then nced at Greem¡¯s muscr figure. He shivered at the thought.


    A physical fight was out of the question!


    Gargamel chose to use his specialty without hesitation.


    He shook his staff rapidly. Every time he did so, a strange halo of light appeared around Greem. These halos contained various magical powders. They surged into Greem¡¯s body, carried along by the flow of magical energy.


    They were all reduced to ashes by a sudden explosion of mes from Greem¡¯s body.


    "Dammit! Didn¡¯t you say that he would no longer be able to cast any fire spells?" The forest spirit couldn¡¯t care less for her elegance when she saw this happen. She started cursing furiously.


    "No need to worry. It isn¡¯t a spell!" As expected of a veteran adept that had lived for two hundred years, Gargamel saw through the truth of the phenomenon in an instant, "He has already elementiumized his body. This is the innate ability of his body of fire. It isn¡¯t an active magic spell. The Interference Barrier cannot disperse this."


    "You are sure?" The forest spirit was doubtful.


    She might have been more powerful than Gargamel, but she was far less experienced than him when it came to magical knowledge.


    "Cough. Girl. Brat. Do you want to live or die?" Gargamel rolled his eyes and looked at Sabrina, "He can no longer use any spells at this moment. He¡¯s only a slightly fit man now. If you help me take him down, I¡¯ll help you treat your internal injuries."


    Greem snorted coldly and marched towards the forest spirit.


    "Stop him, Sabrina! Or I will make you die now!" Gargamel let out a hoarse yell and threw out two potion vials and two summoning stones.


    The potion vials smashed into the ground. Two storm elementals emerged from the viscous liquid. Two earth elementals, a hundred and fifty-centimeters tall, also climbed up from where the summoning stones had vanished.


    The forest spiritnded on the ground with a somber expression. Her legs turned into countless thorns and vines that dug into the ground, causing the ground to tremble. Earth and dirt overturned as thick vines dug underground like giant serpents. They quickly extended to the area beneath Greem.


    Sabrina stood right between Greem and the forest spirit as all this was happening. She gritted her teeth and hesitated for a moment before finallying to a decision. Five robotic arms that reached as far as three meters in length emerged from her body and struck towards the forest spirit.


    "You deal with the summoned beings behind me. I¡¯ll deal with the forest spirit!" Greem looked at Sabrina with a severe look in his eyes. He opened his mouth and gave his orders.


    Sabrina turned her head in surprise. She felt a trace of relief when she saw Greem¡¯s calm gaze. She immediately turned to deal with the four summoned beings. Each one of them had pseudo-adept level abilities and were supported by Gargamel¡¯s spells and potions. It was definitely a challenging task for Sabrina to hold them back.


    Greem stepped forward and gazed at the quickly approaching forest spirit with cold eyes. He waved his hand and threw two golem cores to the ground. The Decayer and the Roaring Monster appeared before him. Two adept-level golems.


    Dong!


    A muffled boom. The Roaring Monster stomped with its thick stone leg the moment it appeared. Fine cracks appeared on the ground beneath it. The powerful shockwave was just in time to greet the vines extending towards them.


    Ugh...


    The forest spirit grunted. All the roots and vines she had extended immediately shrunk back and retreated.


    Half of the roots had been shattered and ripped to pieces. Green sap dripped onto the ground. Soon, a small river formed beneath her feet.


    The forest spirit pped her hand in anger. Her left hand split into four vines and smashed apart the acid arrows that the Decayer had sent her way.


    "Haha! You guys are correct. I am a fire adept!" Greem chuckled, "Unfortunately, your information gathering wasn¡¯tplete. Apart from being a fire adept, I am also a golem summoner."


    This situation was only possible thanks to the two enemies. They had sealed away all fire spells but didn¡¯t entirely do away with the magic of other elements. It was unavoidable! If any basic wandering adept were able to set up a Magic-Interference Barrier that epassed every single elementium, then array masters would have be the strongest adepts in the world. The conditions and requirements were too harsh to create an all-epassing Interference Barrier.


    After all, most adepts only possessed long-ranged attacks. Once they lost their spellcasting abilities, they would die a terrible death when pit against a magical creature. Humans were far inferior when it came to a contest of their physical bodies. That was the main reason Gargamel and the forest spirit chose to set up this trap!


    Through the use of this Magic-Interference Barrier, that they could adjust to seal a single element, they had managed to kill three wandering adepts in ten years. Every time, Gargamel acted as the informant. He found out about the victim¡¯s innate magic, then employed the same excuse he had used to trick the enemy into the cave.


    Once the Magic-Interference Barrier tailored for the enemy was activated, the fight was practically over. Elementium adepts would have theirbat skills reduced by seventy to eighty percent. What remained of their powers was insufficient to deal with thebined force of an adept and a magical creature. Thisbination was how they had managed to pull this trick off three times in a row!


    However, their n had failed this time. Gargamel and the spirit had run headfirst into the tough steel wall that was Greem. It served them right!


    Still, the battle wasn¡¯t over. This forest spirit had the rare innate ability to drag people into their dreams. She had taken Greem by surprise when she cast this ability on him.


    A green nature-attribute halo emerged from her body and rapidly epassed the entire ce. Be it the elementium golems, the half-robotic Sabrina, or even the heavily defended Greem; they felt a wave of exhaustion take over their bodies. Their desire to sleep was overwhelming.


    Soon, they had all fell into their dreams!


    "Quick," The forest spirit yelled at the top of her lungs, "This fire adept¡¯s Spirit is way too potent. I can only restrain him for five seconds. Do it now."


    The forest spirit roared as she lunged at Greem. Thick vinesshed out at the fire adept. On the other side of the cave, Gargamel gritted his teeth and poured a vial of potion into his mouth. He then frantically charged towards Greem.


    Greem hadn¡¯t actually fallen asleep at this moment.


    On the one hand, the Ioun Stones that Alice had given him did their job. They raised his Spirit and neutralized part of the soul-controlling spell¡¯s effect. The forest spirit¡¯s spell was also a type of soul power. Otherwise, it wouldn¡¯t have been able to restrain the two elementium golems that never needed sleep!


    On the other hand, Greem¡¯s chip had managed to detect him sumbing to sleep. It emitted minor electric currents to stimte his spirit consciousness and allowed him to recover from the state of drowsiness quickly.


    He might be awake, but he still faced thebined attacks of both Gargamel and the forest spirit!


    "Chip, do you have a solution?"


    "Beep. This Magic-Interference Barrier is only an elementary-level runic array. Host only needs toplete the me Fiend Transformation. The sudden increase in attributes will be more than enough to neutralize the elementium interference."


    "Then what are we hesitating for? me Fiend Transformation!"


    Greem yelled in his heart, and his body started to swell.

 Chapter 396 Soap Opera

    Chapter 396 Soap Opera


    What did it feel like to witness a fire adept transform into a me Fiend right before your eyes?


    No one understood the feeling better than Sabrina!


    Just a moment earlier, a muscr young adept had stood beside her.


    The next instant, overbearing mes surged from within his powerful body as if there was portal to a fire elementium ne hidden within him. The wild elementium mes sted out of every orifice. His eyes, his ears, his mouths, his nose, and even every single pore on his body radiated heat. The scalding fires forced Sabrina to retreat. Otherwise, she would also have been swallowed and consumed by this explosion of burning waves.


    Red me shrouded Greem¡¯s body. A dominant will guided them and forced them into the shape of a delicate armor. Savage mes roared and roiled beneath this armor of fire. They mixed with ck and redva to forge a horrifying magma body.


    Greem¡¯s majestic figure continued to increase size as the fires billowed. Soon, he was twice the size of his human form. A smoldering magma hand grabbed at the forest spirit, bringing with it an endless cloud of fire as it whistled through the air.


    "Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!" The forest spirit cursed as she dug into the ground with her roots. She tried her best to stop her body¡¯s momentum while whipping her vine arms at the magma hand.


    The terrifying hand of magma shed with the hand of vines. The sizzling sound of burning echoed throughout the cave.


    The forest spirit screeched and frantically backed away from the giant cluster of fire.


    Her forearms had turned to charcoal in a matter of seconds. ck ashes fell to the ground as she retreated.


    The towering Roaring Monster had also intercepted Gargamel.


    Gargamel had turned invulnerable to all poisons after drinking the Aggressive Poison Potion. His every blow and strike also carried lethal toxins and venoms with them. The toxicity of these poisons and venoms were so potent that even elementium creatures fell prey to it!


    Gargamel turned into a cloud of ck smoke and hurriedly struck at the Roaring Monster from every direction. His ck ghost-like hands would leave a ck w mark every time it touched the monster¡¯s thick stone armor. Stone dust fell from its body, ckened from the corrosion of the poison.


    The slime-like Decayer barraged Gargamel with a storm of Acid Arrows and Poison Halos. However, none of these attacks had any effect on the incarnation of poison that was Gargamel at this moment. The golem could only try its best to help the Roaring Monster intercept the adept.


    Sabrina, who had been cautiously fighting with the summoned beings, was immensely d to see this turn of events, and it roused her spirit. Countless robotic arms and crescent des emerged from her body, sessfully slicing the two earth elementals into pieces.


    However, the two storm elementals still possessed pseudo-adept level abilities. Moreover, they had a fast flight speed and a fearless style ofbat. It took all Sabrina had to hold them back and prevent them from interfering with the adept¡¯s battle.


    "Goddammit, Gargamel! What kind of monster did you bring back for me?" The forest spirit tried her best to avoid the thrashing fire whip as she moved around Greem¡¯s massive body, "Didn¡¯t you say that he was only an ordinary adept? Why can his Spirit rise so sharply to allow him to break through the effects of the runic array?"


    Gargamel waved his hand and deflected an acid arrow from the Decayer. He then held up a ck shield and endured the heavy stone fists mming down from above.


    The savage strength was still enough to blow him away. If it weren¡¯t because of the Aggressive Poison Potion¡¯s effects, he would have broken several bones. The potion¡¯s stimting effects also caused his body¡¯s attributes to rise sharply. Even so, Gargamel had still taken damage. He coughed up ck blood and appeared to have weakened.


    "Hang on a little longer," Gargamel took this chance to shout out to the forest spirit, "This is a temporary power boosting spell of his. Hang on until it ends and he..."


    Greem let slip a coldugh. A human expression of disdain appeared on the face formed of fire.


    "Trying to drag it out until I revert from this form? Hahaha," Greemughed without restraint, "Well then, I¡¯ll let you guys witness my true form!"


    Greem had only activated the powers of his magical tattoos during the earlier Transformation. He had not unsealed the me Fiend¡¯s Heart yet. The flood of fire energy from the heart every thirteen seconds was enough to allow Greem to sustain the me Fiend¡¯s Transformation perpetually.


    To crush these adept-level opponents as soon as possible, Greem unsealed the me Fiend¡¯s Heart without any hesitation. Finally, he began his second me Fiend¡¯s Transformation.


    This time, the surging abyssal fires were not limited to three meters around his body. Instead, they rapidly enveloped the cave, along with the Ring of Fire that suddenly emerged from his body.


    The underground cave was a ce that Gargamel and the forest spirit had specially created to hunt down lone adepts. Consequently, it was natural that there wasn¡¯t too much space. Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire extended for a radius of a hundred and twenty meters. It enveloped everyone in the cave.


    Gargamel¡¯s violent poison body was immediately shrouded in mes. The terrifyingly hot fires ignited his long robes, showing that his magical defenses were no longer capable of keeping the mes at bay!


    The massive cave descended into a sea of fire. Even the forest spirit had no choice but to erect a green barrier and hurry towards the exit. The two storm elementals screamed as they were ripped into sma and burnt to ashes within a mere five seconds.


    Sabrina shrunk into a corner, her face pale white. The mes surrounded her and formed a dazzling prison of fire. Amazingly, these mes seemed to be capable of differentiating between friend and foe. The raging streams of fire split near her and circled the prison of me. They didn¡¯t harm her at all.


    Greem stood in the sea of mes like a mighty deity surveying his godly kingdom. Every spark of fire in this ce was his eyes, and every stream of me his body. Greem¡¯s form only stopped for a moment when he sensed the forest spirit fleeing the cave. His entire existence then teleported to the entrance of the cave.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether the forest spirit drew upon the souls she had assimted or her powers of nature. She was utterly incapable of enduring the continuous burning mes that reached a hundred points in strength.


    However, just as she was about to charge out of the sea of fire, a towering body of mes arose out of nowhere. The me giant stood in her way and grabbed at her neck with its zing magma hand.


    The forest spirit wanted to avoid the giant but suddenly felt her body tighten.


    Several chains of fire emerged from the sea of mes andpletely bound her translucent body. Therge magma hand grasped her torso as she tried to find a way to break free of her restraints.


    Sizzling sounds, thick ck smoke, and a burning smell emerged from her body when the ck and red hand touched her.


    This experience was no different from cruel torture by fire!


    After all, the forest spirit was ultimately a semi-tangible magical creature. Much of her translucent body evaporated in an instant. Her weak Strength didn¡¯t allow her to break free from Greem¡¯s grip. She howled in pain and anguish, but there was nothing she could do!


    "Let her go!"


    The sea of mes parted as Gargamel emerged from within, his face utterly ck from some magical effect. A weird ck smoke continuously billowed from his body, spontaneously extinguishing all the fires in a ten-meter radius around himself.


    He raised the prisoner in his hands and shouted at Greem, "You let Eva go, and I¡¯ll let this apprentice go!"


    Sabrina was limp in Gargamel¡¯s grasp. Her face had turnedpletely ck. It was clear that she had been poisoned.


    "You intend to use an apprentice to trade for the forest spirit in my hand?" Greemughed coldly and tightened his grip. The forest spirit once again started screaming in agony.


    A wicked and determined expression washed over Gargamel¡¯s sinister face when he saw his threats fail. He reached into the air and dragged the ck cat out of the space.


    "Don¡¯t. Don¡¯t. Please don¡¯t..." The ck cat seemed to have an idea of what Gargamel wanted to do. It struggled frantically in an attempt to escape, but, as Gargamel¡¯s apanying beast, it was at his mercy.


    "Sarikas, barter of equal value."


    ck light shed in Gargamel¡¯s hands as he quickly chanted the words of his spell. The ck cat disappeared, supnted with the poor forest spirit. A ck cat had reced the forest spirit in Greem¡¯s grasp!


    Greem was shocked, but he quickly balled his hand into a fist. The ck cat that was trying to turn incorporeal immediately cried out in pain. The magma hand squeezed slightly, and the sound of a cracking skull rang out.


    "Wait, please." The forest spirit that had just managed to escaped shouted from behind Gargamel.


    Greem stopped applying pressure with his fingers. Instead, several fire runes enclosed the ck cat and sealed away any chance of its escaping. Greem turned towards the two people twenty meters away from him after doing this.


    "Could you please not kill the ck cat? The two of us are willing to sign subordinate contracts with you. We will serve you in exchange for the ck cat¡¯s life. Would that be fine?" The forest spirit stuttered with fear stered to her face.


    "No, Eva. Leave me, run! You can turn your body incorporeal and escape from here. Quick! Go..." Gargamel¡¯s withered and wrinkled old face appeared to be unbelievably emotional at this moment. His expression when looking at the forest spirit contained an immensely pure love.


    "No, ck Cat is far too important to you!" The forest spirit rebutted furiously, "You sacrificed way too much of your Spirit to obtain it. You will turn mad if it dies! Do you intend to abandon me...and our child?"


    Greem waspletely stunned!


    If it weren¡¯t because of the tense face-off they faced right now, Greem would likely have taken out a wooden stool and enjoyed this sappy romance drama between an adept and a magical creature. It was particrly so when Eva mentioned the child. Greem felt like he had been struck by lightning. He almost went insane from theprehension of what was happening.


    His eyes floated towards the forest spirit¡¯s translucent abdomen.

 Chapter 397 Contract

    Chapter 397 Contract


    Greem vaguely sensed the abnormality in the forest spirit¡¯s abdomen with the help of the chip¡¯s three-dimensional projection.


    The forest spirit had behaved in a cowardly fashion in the fight earlier.


    Greem had thought of her performance as a reflection of her true nature. It was only now that he understood that she had just wanted to protect the child in her. That was why she didn¡¯t dare to fight as aggressively as she usually would.


    Greem looked at the ck cat in his hand, then looked at the anxious Eva and the dejected Gargamel. For a moment, he couldn¡¯te to a decision.


    Should he kill them all, or should he use the ck cat and force them to serve him for a period of time?


    Greem decided after three seconds of hesitation.


    "Serve me for thirty years, and I¡¯ll let you go!"


    The forest spirit¡¯s eyes gleamed. She was just about to agree when Gargamel stopped her.


    "How can we believe you won¡¯t go against your word?"


    Clearly, as an adept, Gargamel knew the greedy and sinister nature of adepts very well. He was such a person himself.


    "We can sign a fair contract of service. The power of the contract will enforce all the terms. That¡¯s fine, isn¡¯t it?" Greemughed coldly, "You had best make up your mind quick. If I find you trying to stall for time, hehe..."


    Gargamel¡¯s heart was heavy when he heard Greem¡¯s threatening words, but he insisted determinedly, "We can serve you for thirty years, but you cannot do anything to our child."


    Eva, the forest spirit, had just realized this problem. She stared at Greem with abject fear in her eyes.


    Greem clicked his tongue in pity.


    He was very curious about the ¡¯product¡¯ between an adept and a magical creature!


    However, Greem regretfully let it slide for the sake of his future.


    He didn¡¯t intend to stay in the Sarubo n forever. If the timing were ripe, he would raise his banner and leave the Sarubo n. To ensure that this became a possibility, Greem needed to have a hidden batch of subordinates that would serve him behind the back of the Sarubo.


    It was for this faraway ideal that Greem had made sure to befriend Mary and Alice. He needed them on his side. Even though Meryl also seemed to be close to him, she was still a Sarubo n adept. Whether she would be willing to follow him once he left the n, or not, was still an unknown variable.


    After all, on the one hand, you had a mid-sized adept n that was reasonably famous in the Zhentarim area. On the other, you had the mere makings of a group with little forces and limited resources. It was clear which side could provide her with more resources and influence.


    Consequently, Greem wasn¡¯t sure that Meryl woulde to his side.


    In fact, he didn¡¯t even haveplete confidence that Mary would side with him! The only one that had indicated willingness to join his future n so far was Alice.


    Greem¡¯s core faction was still too fragile when all these factors were taken into consideration. If Gargamel and the forest spirit joined him, it would greatly benefit his future strategic ns, even if they weren¡¯t loyal to his cause.


    That was the main reason Greem had to give up on that little life that was growing inside the forest spirit!


    Greem kept a tight hold on the ck cat and ensured that his hand still kept it imprisoned. Meanwhile, he started to draw in the air with his other hand. Soon, he constructed a fair, impartial, and open magical contract. The terms established by the deal didn¡¯t ce any discriminatory or oppressive conditions on Gargamel and Eva. It onlyid out the rights, obligations, and responsibilities of both parties. The terms were so generous that it was almost simr to a contract of equal treatment.


    It was undoubtedly a bizarre discovery for Gargamel and Eva. They looked at each other like they didn¡¯t believe what they were seeing.


    Gargamel and Eva perused the contract to ensure there were no hidden terms, trickeries, or misleading wording. Finally, the couple hesitantly ced their soul brands on the contract.


    The runes of fire slowly dissipated into the air once the contract was signed. The three of them all felt the vague change that had urred in their souls.


    No god was governing over contracts in the World of Adepts. The adepts would never pledge themselves to any deities either. Most contracts were witnessed and managed by the profound and fair World Consciousness. Anyone that dared to go against a magical contract in the World of Adepts was fated to be abandoned and punished by the World Consciousness.


    It was a punishment that no adept was willing to endure!


    Greem opened his hand and loosened his grip on the ck cat. His body also started shrinking amid an intense shockwave of fire elementium. There wasn¡¯t a need to maintain the me Fiend form now that they were no longer enemies. After all, the fire energy surging from the me Fiend Heart was a heavy burden on Greem as well!


    The ck cat shed and reappeared by Gargamel¡¯s feet the moment Greem freed it from its restraints. It dove headfirst into the shadows and didn¡¯t show himself again.


    Gargamel hesitated for a moment. An awkward expression appeared on his grim face. He bowed and spoke, "Master, may I know the purpose of your trip into the ck Forest?"


    Eva also betrayed an expression of curiosity.


    In truth, someone as powerful as Greem didn¡¯t seem like they would ever be so destitute as to go searching for materials himself. That was why Greem¡¯s two new subordinates were so curious about his real purpose here in the ck Forest.


    The existence of the magical contract meant that the two of them were now one of the few that he trusted the most. He didn¡¯t try to avoid the question.


    "Through some subtle means, I managed to discover the existence of an underground volcano that I can put to use here in this stretch of the ck Forest. Its approximate location is... do the two of you know anything about this?"


    Gargamel had absolutely no idea of such a geographical feature. The two adepts turned their heads to Eva.


    She was a magical creature that inhabited the woods. It had been over a hundred years since she had started wandering around the ck Forest. She knew the ce very well and was most qualified to be the guide.


    As expected, an expression of thought and hesitation appeared on Eva¡¯s face.


    "I am vaguely familiar with the coordinates you mentioned. If I¡¯m not mistaken, there is a family of manticores inhabiting the ce. There are seven young manticores in total, all of whom possess power rivaling an adept. There are also four pseudo-adept level cubs with them."


    Manticores?


    Greem paused for a moment, but with a single thought, the chip¡¯s data library immediately disyed all the data regarding manticores.


    Manticores were terrifying creatures thatbined the traits of bats, lions, and scorpions. They possessed the head of a lion, the sting of a scorpion, four legs, and the wings of a bat. They fought like a lion in most circumstances, while the bat wings on their back gave them the ability to glide and fly across short distances. However, their most frightening trait was the scorpion sting on their backs.


    The ws and fangs of the manticore were coated in a lethal venom, but its scorpion sting possessed unparalleled paralyzing effects in addition to its toxin. Most adepts were able to resist the venom by concocting antidotes on their own. However, their potions had little to no effect in neutralizing the paralyzing effects of the scorpion sting.


    If an adept ever found himself surrounded by an entire pack of manticores, their odds of surviving was extremely low. They would be continuously paralyzed and ripped to shreds before they had a chance to resist.


    However, the manticore venom and paralyzing poison were ineffective against golems. It was excellent news!


    Envy appeared on Eva¡¯s face when Greem slowly told them of what he knew about manticores.


    Here, he fully illustrated the overwhelming power of human adepts.


    What understanding Eva had of manticores had only been obtained through countless bloody fights and personal experience. Blood had to be shed, and tears had to drop for the sake of such valuable information. On the other hand, the adepts were able to rely on the generations of knowledge that had been passed down by their ancestors. A single mention of a name and they were able to quickly extract all the information they needed from their library of knowledge that had umted over the ages.


    They could n their fights and prepare for any situation, even before they met the opponent. This prior preparation was what gave the adepts an absolute advantage when they shed against magical creatures.


    Most of the time, the magical creatures were often more powerful and possessed greater numbers than the human adepts they were facing. Yet, even in those situations, they were the prey of adepts; prey that could be hunted at any time. The adept¡¯s preparedness was a significant reason why!


    Greem was in no mood to appreciate the turmoil in Eva¡¯s emotions right now. He only wanted to know more about the manticores and kept asking about the geography surrounding their den. After listening to Eva¡¯s answers, Greem was reasonably confident that the underground volcano he sought was located there.


    Still, this was a serious matter that he had to settle personally. Greem would have to make a trip there to confirm the existence of the volcano.


    It wasn¡¯t until Greem had gotten all the information he needed that he let Gargamel neutralize the poison in Sabrina¡¯s body. The mechanical girl gradually awakened from hera. Forest Spirit Eva had left the ce beforehand, so as not to expose her association with the adepts. Gargamel, on the other hand, stood obediently behind Greem.


    After a slight period of unconsciousness, the adepts hade to a truce while the magical creature had gone missing? Sabrina knew something was odd about this situation, but she swallowed her doubts. She didn¡¯t presume to ask any questions.


    Matters between adepts were not something a pseudo-adept like herself could seek to be a part of!


    The more she knew, the more danger she invited onto herself. That was why Sabrina chose, very wisely, to remain silent.


    ............


    It was almost daybreak when the three of them returned to the camp.


    Compared to Greem, Gargamel and Sabrina appeared to be somewhat worn out. They even had to wear their hoods to hide the burns on their faces.


    The other members of the exploration party were happy to see the adepts return. Only the potions apprentice called Anthony betrayed shock in his eyes.


    He was Gargamel¡¯s apprentice and undoubtedly knew of his mentor¡¯s n. It was natural that he would be surprised that all three of the adepts had returned together. Panic and unease were written all over his face.


    However, Greem couldn¡¯t care less about someone as unimportant as him. He left it to Gargamel to deal with his apprentice.


    Thus, after a quick rest and a breakfast prepared by Neil, they once again continued on their journey into the forest!

 Chapter 398 Plaguewood

    Chapter 398 guewood


    Gargamel wasn¡¯t able to be asid back as he had been during the first half of the trip, now that he was subordinate to Greem.


    He used his skills as a potions master to drive away small magical creatures. The smell emanating from the herb pouch dangling from his staff acted as a repent. It saved the exploration party from plenty of unnecessary fights!


    However, Gargamel¡¯s concoction was only effective against magical creatures. It had zero effect on the ordinary woond beasts. That was when the mercenaries shined.


    Love, Rhodes, F, and the amateur hunter Neil were more than enough to deal with these ordinary beasts. If a horde of such animals attacked them, the full destructive power of Sabrina the mechanical girl was brought to bear. It didn¡¯t matter how ferocious or terrifying these non-magical beasts were. They were still no more than pieces of flesh that Sabrina ughtered and disassembled at will.


    If they hadn¡¯t been concerned about drawing the attention of the more powerful magical creatures, Sabrina could have single-handedly exterminated an entire pack of two hundred wolves without taking a single scratch.


    Her magical defenses made her an impressive, god-like existence in the eyes of the adventurers. However, her power was next to nothing to the adepts. She didn¡¯t even dare breathe loudly when walking behind them, and obediently obeyed their every order. Even the frail and skinny Gargamel confidently ordered Sabrina about, despite how much it seemed like he could be blown away by a strong gust of wind.


    The party advanced at a much faster speed with Gargamel¡¯s help. Just three dayster, they approached their destination.


    It was the first time here for most of the party. They acted cautiously and chose to set up camp near a cliff before further exploration.


    Love the Swordsman brought Greem and Gargamel up a small hill. They surveyed this mysteriousnd through the gaps in the trees.


    guewood!


    That was the local¡¯s name for this twenty-five kilometer stretch of the ck Forest.


    The only reason why it was known as such was due to the strange state of the trees here. It was almost as if every single one of them had contracted an unknown disease. Their leaves had withered and yellowed, much like trees that were at the end of their lives.


    Honestly, guewood was no more than a small hill. Its highest point was only two hundred meters above the ground. The hill¡¯s slopes were gentle with no dangerous cliffs. Odd bony trees stood all over the mountain. What leaves they still had were a somewhat sickly color somewhere between yellow and green. It was an unusual sight to behold.


    The trees were not very tall, andrge clumps of metal existed underneath the earth. They gleamed and shone slightly beneath the sunlight. The ancient tree roots had a difficult time growing between the massive boulders in the ground, so many of the roots stuck out above the earth.


    There was a trace of yellow in the brown dirt of the hill, almost as if it had the color burned away from it. It was like there was a surge of heat continuously roasting the ce from underneath. The trees on the hill were like half-molten cheese in a boiling pan. If it weren¡¯t for the intermittent nature of the heat providing them with a slim chance at survival, there would be nothing left on the hill!


    Greem and Gargamel looked at each other and nodded.


    It was evident that there was a heat source beneath guewood. However, they would have to risk their lives and go into the hill to discover the exact reason for the heat.


    "There are caves there, there, and there. The caves are very narrow and tiny; an adult male would have to bend their backs to get in. There¡¯s a slightly bigger cave in that direction, but there are a lot of terrifying bats in there. It¡¯s virtually impossible to get inside without alerting them." As expected of an adventurer that lived by the ck Forest, Love even had a basic understanding of a dangerous ce like the guewood.


    However, it was apparent that his understanding was limited to the surface of guewood. The world hidden underneath the hill was not an area he could ever hope to ess!


    It was fortunate that Greem had found out about the manticores from the forest spirit. Otherwise, he would have had to find out on his own. Even Greem, with all his confidence, would have been sent scrambling awkwardly away from the cave if he dove headfirst into a pack of manticores that he hadn¡¯t known existed. He might not die, but he would have to pay a hefty price to get away!


    The adventurers had fulfilled Greem¡¯s request now that they had reached this ce. Going underground on a further discovery mission was not a task that ordinary adventurers could take on. It didn¡¯t matter how great of a reward Greem was willing to promise. Love wasn¡¯t foolish enough to lead his teammates right into a den of magical creatures.


    Magical crystals were sweet rewards, but being alive to spend them was even better!


    Greem didn¡¯t force them on any further missions either. He only asked the adventurers to stay at the surface camp. The team that would go exploring into the hill would be Greem, Gargamel, and Sabrina.


    The skies once again darkened when evening fell. Everyone gathered around the camp could hear a strange noiseing from the direction of the hill.


    A flood of bats rushed out of the massive cave at the foot of the hill. Their numbers were sorge that they even blotted out the sky. The entire colony of bats circled in the air and waited for more and more of their brethren to join their hunt. Once their numbers were enough, they turned into a buzzing cloud and swarmed towards the nearby forest.


    These nocturnal critters finally moved out!


    A massive gale blew out of the silent cave not long after the departure of the bats.


    Strange roars filled the air as several frightening creatures flew out of the cave. They were wicked-looking manticores as big as rhinoceroses. They glided in a circle in the sky before finally stopping on a tall stone pir near the entrance of the cave.


    They had the magnificent body and head of lions, with brown hair all over. A pair of crimson bat wings grew from their backs, and a terrifying scorpion¡¯s tail was where their tail should have been. The stinger was raised upright. The tip of the tail gleamed with a strange blue light. One look and you could tell that it was no ordinary venom.


    The manticores¡¯ wings almost appeared to be too slim and thinpared to their massive size. The size of their wings meant that they couldn¡¯t fly too high or too fast, but this was no problem for the manticores.


    After all, they were rare magical creatures that spent most of their days underground and in caves. Excessivelyrge wings were only a hindrance in ces with such narrow geography. They just needed their wings for short distance gliding. It was enough for them to lunge at prey from above.


    One, two, three, four...nine.


    The adepts hid in a crack between severalrge rocks. They had used magic powder to eliminate their smell and were observing these manticores close up.


    There were a total of nine manticores, a mix of adolescents and cubs. However, even the manticore cubs were almost fully mature. Every single one of these beasts was capable of hunting of its own. That meant that there were still two manticore cubs within their den in the cave.


    After a short moment of growling at each other, the nine manticores split into three groups and went off in separate directions. They might live underground, but the food was far toocking down there. Every so often, they had toe to the surface and conduct a great hunt to satiate the appetites of the newborn manticores of the pack!


    "Let¡¯s go! I can¡¯t wait to meet those baby manticores!" Once the manticores had vanished into the night, Greem waved his hand and led the other two people into the massive cave.


    It wasn¡¯t until they started moving that one could see therge sack on Sabrina¡¯s back. The bag was pulsing and wriggling. It seemed like there was some sort of creature in the sack.


    A pungent odor pressed against their faces the moment they entered the cave.


    Tens of thousands of bats lived in this ce, causing the air to stink tremendously. A thickyer of batshit hadpletely covered the ground and the stone pirs. There was no ce to set foot cleanly.


    Greem stood at the entrance. His eyes slowly swept across the dark cave and quickly locked onto a particr area.


    The damp, cold air was blowing out from that ce. There was sure to be a hidden passage behind those stgmites that led downwards.


    The darkness in the cave quickly faded away as Greem employed his elementium sight. His Spiritual senses were supported by infrared and night vision to give him near perfect visibility. The jagged stgmites, the stone pirs that reached all the way to the top of the cave, and the hidden cracks in the walls were slowly disyed in his mind.


    Multi-dimensional scene construction!


    It was an enhanced means of visual sensory input that Greem had obtained as his powers increased.


    Greem had only been able to see things in a straight line with his vision. Things that were obscured and hidden behind other objects weren¡¯t visible. However, the improvement of his abilities and the increasing strength of his Spiritual senses now allowed him to ¡¯see¡¯ anything he wanted, even if they were obscured by something else.


    Of course, this was only possible if there was no energy interference or walls that were too thick for his Spirit to prate!


    The existence of this new ability meant that he no longer had blind spots in battle. It didn¡¯t matter where the enemy struck from. Any angle, any direction. Greem would always be able to react to it with the most appropriate action. Either with a counter-attack, a guard, or simply dodging the attack.


    "Come closer; I¡¯ll bring you inside!"


    Greem whispered to his subordinates. Once Gargamel and Sabrina came close enough, he grabbed their shoulders, and all three of them vanished in a sudden explosion of fire.


    The next second, a pir of fire sted into the air of a dark corner where the bats didn¡¯t dare go. Greem and his subordinates reappeared in the darkness.


    Gargamel was fine. With his potent Spirit, he had been able to endure nausea caused by the sudden spatial shift. Meanwhile, this was the first time Sabrina had experienced a spell as strange as Fire Teleportation. She was only a pseudo-adept, after all. Sabrina felt her throat run dry and the scene in front of her eyes blur. She stumbled and had to lean against a pir to rest for a moment.


    "Come on. Two cute little babies are waiting for us up ahead!"


    Greem chuckled and took the lead in entering the pitch-ck tunnel.

 Chapter 399 Investigation and Planning

    Chapter 399 Investigation and nning


    There was a small cave one hundred and two meters below ground.


    Two exits led to different areas of the underground world.


    The walls on both sides glowed with a sinister light beneath the illumination of glowing moss. Drops of water fell from the ceiling of the tunnel, creating a constant dripping sound as they struck against the cold floor.


    The sound didn¡¯t stop, yet silence and quiet still ruled the dark world of the underground.


    Maintaining silence and hiding your body warmth was the best path to survival in this pitch-ck world. However, this rule was broken today!


    A goat that you would usually only find on the surface had been chained up to a rock in the center of the cave. The dark, cold environment caused the poor creature to shiver in fright. The massive wounds on its hind legs were still slowly bleeding.


    The pungent odor of blood filled the entire tunnel.


    Meeeeh.


    The goat¡¯s trembling bleat echoed in this deathly silent world.


    The goat anxiously cried as it rammed its horns against the pir it was bound to. It wasn¡¯t until it sensed themotion behind it that the goat stopped and looked around frantically.


    A terrifying silhouette slowly approached from the darkness!


    It was a Petrifying Lizard.


    Its humongous body spanned five meters from head to tail and made it the indisputable predator of this area. Its sharp fangs further ensured that no prey could escape its bite. Along with its Petrification Beam, that had a range of three meters, the Petrifying Lizard was the uncontested ¡¯janitor¡¯ of the underground!


    The goat started to panic as the pair of glowing yellow eyes closed in from the darkness. It leaped and kicked the pir with all its might. It was all in vain. In fact, its actions only caused the smell of its blood to spread even further and quicker through the tunnel.


    The lizard was stopped by a strange runic array when it neared the goat. The lizard bit at the formation that had surfaced from the ground and tackled it several times. However, the array didn¡¯t even budge. The lizard was helplessly circling the array when it suddenly tensed its muscles. It lifted its nostrils and started smelling the air flowing through the tunnel.


    Its sharp sense allowed it to pick up a familiar and terrifying scent mingled with the smell of blood.


    Without any hesitation, the petrifying lizard turned and crawled back into the darkness.


    A violent gust of wind blew across the tunnel not long after the disappearance of the lizard. A lithe ck form lunged out of the tunnel and started to circle the stctites hanging from the ceiling of the cave.


    Finally, the ck formnded on a t tform jutting out of the stone wall and looked down from above upon everything in the cave.


    The goat¡¯s legs had given way from fear of the strange atmosphere. The acrid smell of urine flowed from beneath its body.


    The cave seemed utterly dark, but the ck silhouette was able to see every single corner of the ce with its night vision.


    The cold ground, dark stone walls, and the flowing underground river; everything was all within its control.


    It stood in the darkness, a sh of suspicion and animosity gleaming in its emerald eyes.


    However, as a young manticore that had yet toe of age, it was still too immature.


    It took in all of the scenting from the goat. The smell of fresh blood unique to surface creatures stimted the creature¡¯s senses. Saliva dripped from its mouth and corroded tiny holes in the rock tform.


    The disy before the manticore looked like a crude trap, no matter how it looked at the scene, but where were the enemies that had set the trap?


    The young manticore suppressed its desire to feast and scanned around for any potential enemies nearby. However, it found no trace or smell of an outsider, even after taking aplete look at every corner of the cave.


    Finally, the young manticore was no longer able to suppress its natural desire for fresh meat. It roared and pounced downwards, ferociously pinning the goat to the ground.


    A short momentter, the cave resounded with the sound of the manticore savagely chewing the goat¡¯s flesh.


    As a member of the monstrous underground creatures, the young manticore had no regard for table manners. The wild and savage way it ate its food was too horrendous to watch. The entirety of the ground was covered in blood as if this was a ughterhouse.


    Meanwhile, while the young manticore was still engrossed in its meal, ripples appeared across a shallow pond in the corner of the cave. Three human silhouettes emerged from below the water.


    "Fall......fall......fall......"


    Gargamel mumbled under his breath.


    As he whispered, the feasting manticore stumbled. Its massive body suddenly copsed before it could unfold its wings and take off.


    "Move faster," Greem instructed in a soft voice, "There¡¯s still another manticore cub nearby. We don¡¯t have much time!"


    "Understood!" Gargamel let out a sinisterugh, "Extracting the venom from its tail won¡¯t take very long. I can assure you that he won¡¯t feel a thing afterward!"


    Gargamel silently made his way towards the unconscious manticore.


    ............


    There were still two hours before the sun rose. The adolescent manticores were slowly starting to return to the cave.


    It was evident from their bulging stomachs that they had already engaged in a filling feast.


    They held bloody prey in their sturdy hind legs as they dove into the cave. It was only when all the manticores had disappeared into the underground tunnel that the bats dared to return to the cave.


    Greem, Gargamel, and Sabrina observed the entire process from the side. They returned to the camp with satisfactory results when daylight broke.


    They hadn¡¯t killed anything on their first trip into the underground cave. Nor had the group kidnapped the manticore cub they had tricked either. All they had done was discreetly remove a bit of its flesh and venom. By the time the paralyzing drug wore off, and the manticore woke up from its deep sleep, Greem and the others had already erased all unnatural and abnormal signs around it.


    The manticore cub wasn¡¯t a fully intelligent creature yet. The effect of the drug also caused it to forget everything that had happened. It returned to its den with doubts in its heart but none the wiser.


    A potions master like Gargamel could use the venom taken from the manticore cub to concoct an anti-paralysis antidote that worked explicitly against their toxin. It might not be able topletely neutralize the paralyzing effects of an adolescent manticore¡¯s sting, but it was much better than having no antidote at all.


    For several days afterward, Greem and Gargamel spent their nights in the cave and its winding tunnels.


    They observed the manticore¡¯s habits and behaviors, and they even snuck into the manticores¡¯ den to get aplete picture of the geographical features there. All of this was to set the foundation for their n to get rid of the creatures.


    Finally, after much nning and spection on Greem¡¯s part, they decided on the perfect extermination n and the date it was to be carried out¨C the seventh day since their arrival at guewood.


    ording to Greem¡¯s observation, this was a day where the adolescent manticores were all going out to hunt. It was the perfect time to carry out their n.


    And the ones to execute the n were the members of the adventure party!


    Love and the others finally agreed to take on onest risk when Greem tempted them with three hundred magical crystals.


    ............


    Another beautiful night where the moon was bright and the stars were bright.


    The sky had just turned dark, and once again the colony of bats swarmed out of the cave, forming into a shadowy cloud and dispersing into the woods after circling a few times.


    The nine manticores showed up once again and went their way after splitting their duties amongst themselves!


    Greem and his party of eight showed themselves once the manticores had left. They hurried into the depths of the cave.


    Sabrina led the adventurers as they walked behind the adepts. In the meantime, Greem and Gargamel went ahead and rushed into the tunnel as fast as they could, heading straight for the manticore den.


    Time was precious. Every second counted. They needed to set their trap up before the manticores realized something had happened back at home. Otherwise, they were going to get trapped in the cave by the returning manticores.


    If they wanted to trick the pack of manticores and lure them into the trap, they first had to get the two manticore cubs under their control. That was why Greem and Gargamel were going ahead of the party. They used their magic and their spells to increase their movement speed and advanced towards the manticore den.


    Unlike their sneaking around for the past couple of days, this time they intended to charge right into the tunnel.


    Greem continuously threw out fireballs and sted away the small underground creatures in his way as he barreled through the tunnel.


    The massive fireball explosions quaked, andmotion spread throughout the cave. Greem was spared the trouble of finding the cubs. The two young manticores would follow the sting sounds and seek the intruder.


    The manticore cubs were only as powerful as pseudo-adepts. Still, while it might not be hard for Greem to beat them, it was going to be slightly tricky to capture them alive.


    Greem entered a small cave. Five tunnels led in different directions in the cave. This ce was one of the hubs of the undergroundbyrinth.


    An ominous wind had blown down on him when he reached here. Tworge silhouettes dived at him from above. They bared their white fangs as they bit at Greem¡¯s neck and shoulder.


    Greem had already expected the ambush from the two manticore cubs. His Multi-Dimensional Scene Construction allowed him to see everything clearly. Greem¡¯s body only paused for an instant before he transported to another part of the cave with the use of his Fire Teleportation. Meanwhile, a massive Magma Fireball he left behind exploded right at the position he had been!


    If Greem wanted to kill the two manticore cubs, he only needed to hit them directly with a Magma Fireball. That was more than sufficient to severely wound them. However, for the sake of capturing the beasts alive, Greem had to detonate the fireball before they were too close.


    A violent explosion and shockwave sted the two manticore cubs away. Wounds appeared all over their body. They cried in agony as they stumbled away from the fire.


    The first thing to greet the disoriented manticores were the iron fists of the Roaring Monster.


    Dong! Dong! Two muffled booms knocked the two manticore cubs neatly unconscious!

 Chapter 400 Invitation to a Trap

    Chapter 400 Invitation to a Trap


    The hardest part about dealing with the manticores was how to restrict their numerical advantage.


    Nine adolescent manticores: two of which were as powerful as elite adepts, three as powerful as veteran adepts, and four of which could bepared to newly advanced adepts.


    There was more than enough firepower to crush Greem¡¯s party. After all, there were only three adepts among them! Moreover, Gargamel and Eva were veteran adepts, while Greem could only maintain the power of an elite adept for a limited time!


    The other adventurers and apprentice adepts were useless in battle; they hardly even qualified as meatshields. Trying to get them to form a solid defensive line was no different from having a mantis stop a chariot. Their deaths would be gruesome.


    If they wanted to win despite this disadvantage in military force, they would have to resort to traps. They needed to bait the manticores into a narrow chokepoint and shave away at their numerical advantage. The only reason Greem was so confident and daring in his n was due to his understanding of the manticores.


    Manticores were fearsome beasts, even among magical creatures. However, they did not possess any long-ranged attacks. It was part of the reason most adepts didn¡¯t fear them! They might even be weaker than those pathetic wyverns if they hadn¡¯t been relying on their unique home ground advantage within the underground tunnels.


    It was about time for the sun to rise once more The pack of manticores that had gone out to hunt returned to their den.


    The two elite-level manticores were the first to be restless when they entered the tunnel.


    In their past efforts of prating into the tunnel, Greem and Gargamel had always eliminated their scent and all trace of their existence. However, this time, they hade in without any use of such means. In fact, they even brought the adventurers along with them, as well as torches to light up the pitch ck cave.


    The thick smell of humans and the smoke left by the burning torches were like a lighthouse in the dead of night; it couldn¡¯t be any more obvious!


    A group of humans had raided their den?!


    The manticore leader was enraged. But at the same time, it was anxious about the fates of the two young manticores they¡¯d left behind in their den.


    Under its orders, the other manticores threw their prey aside and followed the smell of the humans into the tunnel, flying as fast as they could. The further they went, the more concerned they became. The tracks of the humans seemed to be heading towards their hidden den!


    The manticores were extremely worried and concerned now!


    Finally, they picked up the scent of the young manticores at a major junction that led to their den.


    And mixed with the smell of the manticore cubs was the burning odor of fire elementium and a faint trace of blood!


    The former meant that human adepts were involved in this raid, and thetter caused the manticore to go into a furious rage.


    In less than five minutes they had scoured every corner of their den, Yet they had not found a single trace of the enemy. However, their sharp sense of smell told them that the enemy had not left the cave. Instead, they had taken the manticore cubs along with them and headed even deeper into the earth.


    The manticores were driven mad by anger. Under the leadership of the male and female elite manticores, they chased straight after the scent in the air. Eventually, they found the two manticore cubs in a dead end cave, where there was only one way in or out. The manticore cubs were bound tightly, and to their side was arge pile of clothes left behind by human adventurers.


    As the manticores furiously tore away the ropes on the young manticores, Greem and the rest of the party positioned themselves right behind the monsters. The humans firmly held the most critical area of this ce¨C the only entrance and exit of this dead end.


    This cave was a real dead end. One exit, with no other paths leading to other areas. Such caves and dead ends existed everywhere underground. They were a type of geographical feature that was both loved and hated by all adventurers.


    If you were an exploring adventurer that found such a spot when the party needed rest, this would be the perfect spot to set up camp. All you needed to do was seal the only entrance and set people on the lookout a little ahead, and you could rest without worry. There was no possibility of being ambushed by an enemy.


    However, if a horde of underground creatures were pursuing you, such dead ends spelled the doom of you and your teammates. It was why their existence was both a blessing and a curse for all adventurers!


    The cave that Greem had picked for the final battle had a funnel-like shape. They had investigated this ce countless times and were certain that there was only one entrance. The only opening in and out of the cave was four meters wide and three meters tall. It was barely enough for an adolescent manticore to fly through with its wings unfurled, or two manticores to walk through, shoulder to shoulder.


    When Greem saw that the manticores had entered his trap, he immediately blocked their only exit path. Greem summoned the Roaring Monster and the Decayer once he reached the entrance. The rocky Roaring Monster was responsible for sealing the opening, while he and the Decayer would attack the manticores from the side.


    The other members of the party were spread around the area to secure the perimeter and prevent any other underground creature from interfering in their n.


    Gargamel was in charge of setting off the various traps that they had hidden in the cave.


    They setrge amounts of wormwood, and some ghost shrooms, on fire. The burning caused thick, stinging, and pungent smoke to spread throughout the entire cave. Plenty of ghost shroom spores also wafted into the air.


    The burning of the grass and the smoke emitting from it rapidly exhausted the oxygen in the cave.


    Greem and Gargamel had sealed all cracks and holes in the cave. The smoke and the poison gas had nowhere to go, and quickly engulfed the manticores in a cloud of ck smoke.


    Rumbling coughs and the sound of beating wings came out from within the thick smoke. The manticore leader even let out a thunderous roar.


    The Roaring Monster was a massive stone humanoid four meters in height and thirty-five tons in weight. A thick stone armor covered its body. As the only tank in the party right now, it forfeited all means of attack. Instead, it gathered stone elementium together to form a massive rock that it held up as a shield; defense was its highest priority.


    The Monster had barely moved into position when the smoke parted. A ferocious manticore mmed into the Monster¡¯s shield, sending violent gales sting towards the adventurers as it did so.


    Crack.


    The one-meter-thick rock shattered!


    The impact knocked the Roaring Monster¡¯s massive body backward. Sparks were sent flying into the air as its stone feet ground against the hardened cave floor. The adolescent manticore had injured its head as well. It stumbled near the entrance in a dazed state.


    Greem immediately threw a magma fireball at the feet of the wounded manticore before either side managed to react. At the same time, the Decayer¡¯s acid ballnded on the manticore.


    It was almost as if arge bowl of sulfuric acid had been poured right onto the manticore. It cried out in agony, even as it was still stunned from the previous impact. Its magnificent mane vanished in an instant, and the sizzling sounds of corrosion came from its leathery brown skin.


    The next moment, the magma fireball exploded. The powerful shockwave sent the manticore flying into the air. The fire spell had severely bloodied its chest and abdomen. The ensuing magma ssh andva turned the ground into a sea of me.


    The wounded manticore had just been blown away, and already another manticore took its ce. It lunged at the humans with all the fury it could muster.


    This time, the Roaring Monster had no shield to guard itself with. It could only use its massive stone hands to block the manticore¡¯s assault.


    Dong.


    Another thunderous rumble.


    The Roaring Monster¡¯s hands smashed to pieces in the collision. If it weren¡¯t for the Monster nting its legs deep into the stone ground, it would have been sent flying from the force of that sh.


    What terrifying strength!


    The chip¡¯s scans indicated that the manticore¡¯s strikes had reached a shocking one hundred and thirty-five points. This was already far above any damage that an ordinary adept could aspire to deal out!


    This manticore possessed far superior Physique and Strengthpared to the first manticore. Apart from a couple of teeth falling out, and a bloodied head, it seemed utterly unfazed by the impact. That wasn¡¯t all. It took advantage of the Roaring Monster¡¯s imbnce from the blow andck of hands to strike again. Without anything to defend against the manticore, its scorpion stinger stabbed at the golem¡¯s stone armor, as fast as a sh of lightning.


    The thick stone armor was pierced right through like it was made of butter. The sharp stinger quickly injected its paralyzing venom into the body of the Roaring Monster. At the same time, the Monster lifted its right leg and mmed it into the ground.


    A tremendous shockwave rippled across the ground with the Roaring Monster at its center!


    Every entity that struck by the shockwave was thrown into the air. Their bones and flesh rattled and trembled from the shockwave. The spell had caused them to lose their ability to react flexibly to any other situation that might arise.


    This particr manticore was an elite-level creature. Both its Physique and Strength were equal to the Roaring Monster. Sadly, it had no choice but to take the Monster¡¯s Trembling Earth head-on. The manticore had never expected its paralyzing venom to bepletely ineffective!


    Any other manticore would have needed three to five seconds to break free of this detrimental effect. However, an elite-level manticore only required a single second.


    Unfortunately for the beast, one second was enough for Greem to cast his spell!


    Greem didn¡¯t intend to hold anything back. Without hesitation, he used the strongest single-target fire spell stored in the Scroll of Voodoo¨C Fire Core Explosion!


    Under the effects of the ze of Destruction, Greem¡¯s Fire Core Explosion had been further enhanced. It now dealt a monstrous one hundred and twenty-five points of damage; a whole ten points more than before.


    One shouldn¡¯t underestimate this difference of ten points. It was ten points of damage on a spell that already had powerful defense-pration properties!


    Most people tried to apply as many elementium and magical defenses as they could on themselves in a duel between adepts. Ordinary magical spells were not capable of prating these multipleyers of defense. They had no choice but to wear away at the durability of the spells slowly.


    The higher the strength of a single instance of a spell, the less it was affected and neutralized byyers of defense, and the more likely it would simply shatter the protective spells. The opponent would have to take on every single point of what remained of the elementium damage!


    An elite-level manticore like this one could only endure and ignore a maximum of ny points of spell damage.


    Anything below ny points might be able to damage part of its body, but it would never be able to break through the forcefield formed by its powerful life energies. Consequently, weak spells weren¡¯t able to damage any of the manticore¡¯s vital organs.


    And this was the foundation of its ability to continuously battle!


    However, it was different when it came to Greem¡¯s Fire Core Explosion. Even with the damage reduced, there was still thirty-five points of fire damage that directly affected the manticore¡¯s flesh.

 Chapter 401 Battle Against the Manticores

    Chapter 401 Battle Against the Manticores


    The elite-level manticore howled out in pain.


    Violent elementium mes ravaged its body, burning and roasting its flesh. All the hair on its skin vanished in an instant. Boils of all sizes rose on the exposed areas, exploding and sending blood sshing all over the ce.


    The elite manticore frantically retreated into the cave and deep into the smoke. No one could see the creature, but they still heard its pained cries and howls.


    It had been severely injured!


    Truly, severely injured!


    That blow might not have been lethal, but it had been excruciating. That elite manticore was not going to rejoin the battle any time soon.


    The Roaring Monster took this small window of opportunity to absorb as much earth elementium from the ground as possible. It thenpressed the elementium and formed it into tough rocks to repair the damage done to its body. Meanwhile, Greemunched a few more magma fireballs at the ground. He set the entire entry on fire and bought a little more time for the Roaring Monster to recover.


    However, the next wave of attacks from the enemy quickly descended upon them.


    The manticores no longer attempted a self-harming charge with their bodies. Instead, two adolescent manticores pped their wings, blew away the fires on the ground, and approached the Roaring Monster by climbing across the stone wall.


    The limited space in the tunnel made it impossible for them to use theirrge movements and attacks. Still, their sharp ws and piercing fangs remained a threat to the Monster.


    On the other hand, the manticores had no space to dodge the attacksing from Greem and the Decayer. They endured all the blows with their defensive forcefields and tenacious Physique.


    Every time the Roaring Monster managed to repair its stone armor, it would instantly be shredded and torn apart by the vicious attacks of the manticores. The Monster¡¯s stone body had been severely damaged. There were wide cracks and piercing w marks all over the front of its body.


    The elementium core used to create the Roaring Monster was still of slightly inferior quality. It was at an absolute disadvantage against these manticores that were just as strong and resilient as it was.


    The Roaring Monster still endured thanks to its powerful crowd control ability. Every so often, it was able tounch its Trembling Earth and disrupt the rhythm of the manticores. This bought it some time during the fight to regenerate. Its stone armor also increased the golem¡¯s defense tremendously. Without these abilities, it would not havested this long against the manticores.


    If it had been the Decayer in its position instead, the fight would have ended in a matter of a few minutes!


    Despite all its abilities, the Roaring Monster was at its limits. The two manticores retreated from the battle, having sustained wounds all over their bodies. Two fresh manticores promptly took their ce and started attacking the Monster.


    The rocks it had gathered around its body shattered, while its stone armor and body were shredded and in tatters. Soon its core would be exposed.


    It would be difficult to keep the enemy contained within the cave once they destroyed the Monster!


    Greem had no choice but to have the Roaring Monster retreat and regenerate its body. The fire adept strode forward to stop the manticores, his body swelling in size with every step.


    Greem had activated his me Fiend Transformation without hesitation. However, he had yet to unseal the me Fiend¡¯s Heart.


    The appearance of the powerful me Fiend was torturous to the two manticores crowding the chokepoint. Greem might not have the same Strength and Physique of the Roaring Monster, even after his transformation, but he did possess plenty of defensive magic to spare.


    The mes from his own body were a protection of sorts. Anyone that sought to attack him took fire damage when they came into contact with his body. Apart from that, there was also the Magma Shields, the energy shields from the Ioun Stones, and the burning Ring of Fire. Even a man made of stone would be baked into y if he stood before Greem. What were manticores of flesh and blood before such overwhelming might?


    The two manticores recklessly struck at the Magma Shields, gritting their teeth and enduring the barrage of Magma Fireballs as they did so. Their flesh had been scalded and burned. The mes,va, and streams of fire all came together like a giant oven, roasting and cooking them inside and out.


    The two manticores fled the battlefield as fast as they could once they had broken through Greem¡¯s Magma Shields and scratched his massive body a couple of times. The one to rece them was an intimidating manticore farrger than any one of them.


    An overbearing killing intent pressed against Greem¡¯s face. Even with all the might of his Transformation, he felt a chill in his heart. Greem¡¯s burning passion for fighting extinguished quickly.


    The manticore leader!


    An elite male manticore!


    Greem didn¡¯t dare hold anything back when dealing with such a strong being!


    The fires on the outside of his body started to roil and surge around chaotically. The me Fiend¡¯s Heart began to beat at a wild rhythm as wave after wave of pure fire energy coursed through his veins to every part of his body. The mes on Greem¡¯s body turned from crimson red to dark purple. Evil and twisted power of the utmost purity surged forth alongside the abyssal fires.


    This fire could destroy the soul even as it burned the flesh away. It was a wicked and sinister strength!


    The manticore leader stood proudly in the sea of mes. Its powerful life forcefield distorted the space around its body, preventing it from being harmed by the fire. Its magnificent and regal eyes trained on Greem. There was deep hatred in them, but there was also something more. Confusion and iprehension, and even more than that, the light of wisdom unique to intelligent life.


    "Human, why do you invade our home? We have never hunted or killed any adepts!"


    "Yournd!" Greem did not put on an adept¡¯s air of arrogance when faced with an enemy of equal power. He gave the answer the manticore sought, "I need thisnd! I need the volcanic energies in the depths of this underground cavern!"


    The light in the manticore¡¯s eyes flickered. He immediately knew that today¡¯s matter was not going to end well!


    As underground creatures, manticores couldn¡¯t divorce themselves from the unique environment here.


    Further down in the underground abyss they would only find more dangerous magical creatures to contest them. Many were creatures they didn¡¯t even dare to cross.


    If they went to the surface, they would lose to the magical creatures there. They had neither the power nor the rate of reproduction to contest with those monsters.


    In the end, only the uppermost levels of the underground world suited the manticores!


    If they left this familiarnd behind, they would fall from the middle ranks to the lower levels of the ck Forest¡¯s food chain. It wouldn¡¯t be them going out to hunt others. Instead, it would be their turn to run and hide from the pursuit of their predators.


    The significance of this den to the manticore pack was clear and distinct!


    The only way to have them surrender thend would be to step over their cold corpses.


    The manticore leader no longer entertained any thoughts of negotiation once he understood their position. With a furious roar, he leaped at the massive me Fiend.


    Greem lunged at the manticore with equal vigor and energy.


    However, he had already swallowed a potion before he stepped forward. It was the antidote that Gargamel had specially concocted to deal with the manticore¡¯s paralyzing venom.


    Greem pushed forward with both of his hands before he shed with the manticore leader. A massive torrent of fire sted towards the beast. The manticore took the mes head-on with its powerful forcefield, parting the mes and charged at Greem.


    Scritch. Scritch. Scritch.


    Frightening ws left deep marks on the Magma Shields floating in front of Greem. The fire singed the magnificent hair on the manticore leader¡¯s chest and instantly burned away.


    His long scorpion tail abruptly struck at the me Fiend as the two held each other at bay. The hook-shaped stinger had some kind of armor prating effect. It immediately broke through the Magma Shield and embedded itself in the body of the me Fiend.


    Aaaaaah!


    Aooooo!


    The two opponents let out screams of agony at the same time.


    Greem felt his shoulder hurt and slowly be numb. By the end of it, he couldn¡¯t feel anything from his shoulder. The manticore leader¡¯s potent paralyzing venom also possessed the ability to cripple the soul. Greem felt himself losing control over parts of his body.


    It was a slight and insignificant loss of control, but it did indeed exist!


    The Manticore, on the other hand, howled from the fire damage he took from his burnt stinger. He felt like he had just thrust his tail into molten magma. There were plenty of Spirit nodes located in his tail, and it felt like his tail had beenpletely cooked in a sh.


    Even though he was already injecting as much venom as he could into his enemy, it didn¡¯t appear to have much effect. While most prey would have copsed entirely, it only seemed to have slightly hindered and slowed the movement of this adept.


    Meanwhile, the Ring of Fire and the sea of magma beneath his feet were burning him.


    Even the manticore leader could not endure such monumental fire damage.


    After a dozen more seconds striking at each other, the manticore leader was the first to back away.


    The tremendous damage that both of them had suffered in the short skirmish was only noticeable now that they had separated from each other.


    All the Magma Shields that Greem had around him had shattered and a gaping wound had been torn in his chest. Crimsonva continuously flowed from the hole, transforming the ground into a small magmake.


    While he was the me Fiend, all thisva was his blood!


    The manticore hadn¡¯t fared much better either.


    It was almost as if he had been thrown into a volcano for ava bath. Not a single piece of his skin was unharmed by the mes andva. Every inch of skin had been burned and damaged; boils and blisters covered his entire body. The blood that flowed from his wounds turned to vapor before it could drip to the ground.


    If it weren¡¯t because his eleven points of Physique granted him the innate ability of Rapid Regeneration, he would have had to retire from this battle.


    The manticore leader put some distance between the two of them. He intended to catch a breath beforeunching an even more ferocious wave of attacks. On the other hand, Greem didn¡¯t even take a step backward. Instead, he gestured and grabbed the Scroll of Voodoo in his hands. The fire adept wanted tounch another wave of spells at the manticore without any pause.


    Scarlet Firestorm!


    Fire Core Explosion!


    Two destructive fire spells instantly locked onto the opponent and devoured the enemy like an unstoppable storm.

 Chapter 402 Recruitment

    Chapter 402 Recruitment


    If Greem¡¯s fire spells were what hurt the manticores the most, then Gargamel¡¯s poison mist potions were what exterminated any hopes of survival the beasts might have had.


    The battle today would have taken far more time if it wasn¡¯t for Gargamel. Gargamel was able to keep the manticores contained in the cave, but he had no means by which to kill them. In truth, the overall strength of the manticore pack was at least two or three times more than Greem and his party.


    However, there was no ¡¯if¡¯ in this world!


    The logicalbat strategy,bined with the appropriate men, along with a perfect execution allowed this victory of the few over the many.


    Even with the might of their powerful bodies and fearless wills, the adolescent manticores failed to blow away the ¡¯boulder¡¯ in their path. That was when their tragic fates were sealed!


    The manticore leader retreated deep into the depths of the cave. Two teenage manticores took his ce instead. The strongest manticores had already withdrawn due to their injuries. They had no choice but to send the slightly weaker ones to try and break through the siege.


    However, the ones they faced were true monsters. There was the wholly repaired Roaring Monster and the fierce fire adept. A meat shield and a force of pure destruction. Add to the equation the Decayer and Gargamel, and there was no way the teenage manticores could seed.


    They were hit and wounded by a chain of spells before they even reached the Roaring Monster. Even when they finally arrived in front of the stone giant, a single Trembling Earth sent them packing.


    Then, it was yet another storm of spells pelting against their hides!


    The two teenage manticores copsed almost immediately. They would have died right there in the tunnel if the manticores behind them hadn¡¯t dragged them by their tails and brought their unconscious bodies back into the cave.


    It was now that the full extent of Gargamel¡¯s sinister n revealed itself.


    If it weren¡¯t for the poison mist, the manticores would have had plenty of other options. At the very worst, they would have been able to defend their position and turn the fight into a protracted one with the adepts. However, Gargamel¡¯s existence made that impossible. Suffocating poison mist filled the entire cave, leaving the manticores with no other choice but to recklessly throw their bodies against the onught.


    Of course, the manticore leader could have had a better chance at breaking through if he had been a little more sly. For example, sending the teenage manticores to fight while they were still at their peak would have worn away at the Roaring Monster and Greem¡¯s strength. Then they could have sent the elite manticores to hack at them relentlessly. It would probably have increased their chances of breaking through.


    After all, the adepts barely had any meat shields on their side. There was only the Roaring Monster and the somewhat underqualified Greem. The situation would ultimately have turned against the adepts the moment the Roaring Monster was destroyed. There would be no turning the tides then!


    After all, Greem could notpare to his past self. Having lost the Infernal Tyrant, Greem¡¯s strength was barely at the level of a veteran adept. If he unsealed the me Fiend¡¯s Heart, he would temporarily possess the explosive power of an elite adept. Unfortunately, that onlysted for a mere fifteen minutes.


    With only that level of power, it was extremely believable that the elite-level magical creatures would defeat him!


    In the end, he still managed to pull off this n that he had simted with the use of the chip. Many things happened in the process, but they had managed to take down these manticores without much risk.


    Eleven manticores, yet not one of them had been blown to bits by Greem¡¯s violent spells. Instead, all eleven of them had copsed to Gargamel¡¯s poison; they were sprawled all across the cave, weakened and exhausted.


    Even the wounded elite manticore leader was no exception!


    All the hair on his body had fallen out. Blisters covered his skin, and sour pus trickled down his body.


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel some slightmentations when he dispersed the mist and set eyes on this scene. Such a powerful manticore family, yet they were still taken down by a few adepts. It was so bizarre that it was almost unbelievable.


    However, Greem¡¯s sympathy onlysted for a short moment as he looked at the crippled manticores. He then raised his voice and gave an order to Gargamel, "Hurry up and save them! We must not let them die, or we will be losing way too much!"


    There was no need for Greem¡¯s reminder. Gargamel was already on the task. He dove into the cave andughed without reservation when he saw the copsed manticores. His sharp, owl-like voice was chilling to hear.


    "Quick. Quick, quick," Gargamel gave a series ofmands, "Give them the antidotes and tie them up."


    The mercenaries that hadn¡¯t been able to help in the previous fight now rushed into the cave. They held a piece of wet cloth drenched in some sort of potion over their mouths.


    With their help, all eleven of the manticores were quickly restrained with ropes and fed the antidotes.


    Gargamel was not kind enough topletely remove the toxin in their bodies. If the poison hadn¡¯t weakened the manticores, then they could have easily broken free of these ironthread vine ropes with their natural strength. Thus, the antidotes that Gargamel fed them were modified remedies. It took away the lethal effects of the poison but kept the manticores in a weakened state. The medicines also caused the toxins to seep into their lungs to make it easier to force the beasts into submission.


    A family of manticore like this one was most suited to be recruited as the future guards of the adept¡¯s tower. Greem left the task of drafting the manticores to Gargamel, while he went deeper underground. There, he found a massive cavern and ava well.


    Greem sensed the dense fire elementium aura the moment he stepped into this ce. The entirework of caves spanned one full kilometer. A glowing red light enveloped it. The suffocating smell of sulfur was thick in the air. And the source of all this was theva well in the center of the cavern! A fiery well five meters in diameter!


    It was ava well that went straight down into the depths of the ground. Looking down from above, Greem saw roiling magma everywhere. The well was approximately fifty meters away from the surface of theva sea. The walls around theva were all volcanic rocks that could endure the unbearable heat of the molten rocks. These volcanic rocks were the perfect materials with which to construct a fire adept¡¯s tower.


    Greem gripped his staff and decisively leaped into the sea ofva. The partial immunity brought about by his body of mes allowed him to explore the surface of the sea ofva. The fire adept was promptly shocked.


    This ce was a natural Lung of the Earth!


    Much like humans need lungs to breathe, the world underground required passages by which energy could flow to and from the surface world. Volcanoes were one such formation. However, most of the other Lungs of the Earth existed in such a fashion, like the one in front of Greem.


    They were hidden all over the Continent, sometimes even found at the bottom of the Boundless Sea.


    These ¡¯Lungs¡¯ dispersed the heat underground to the surface with the use of winding passages, then absorbed the ubiquitous elementium energy back into the depths of the underground.


    And here was a natural Lung of the Earth that contained mostly fire elementium!


    Its existence was immensely valuable to a fire adept like himself!


    Greem left a magical emblem near theva well to serve as a coordinate marker. It was only then that he returned to the manticore den satisfied.


    Gargamel experienced a significant breakthrough in the three days Greem had left on his adventure.


    The two manticore cubs were the first to crumble before the threat of death and poison. They lowered their heads in humiliation, opening their souls and allowing Gargamel to ce a soul mark inside them. With the threat of the poison and the imntation of his soul mark, these two manticore cubs were entirely under Gargamel¡¯s control. A single word and they would kill themselves if that were Gargamel¡¯s wish.


    The other manticores soon surrendered after that. They were then freed. Only the two elite manticores refused to submit, even with the threat of death hanging above their heads. This undoubtedly exasperated Gargamel.


    However, after Greem returned, he went to have a heart-to-heart talk with the manticore leader and finally managed to have the beast submit! Two factors caused him to surrender:


    First, Greem promised that this would be a contract of service rather than a contract of servitude. That meant that Greem would have to pay the manticore family from now on. This amount was temporarily determined to be thirty magical crystals.


    Second, the descendants of the manticores would be free beasts. Any cubs born from now on were not to be bound by contract and were free to live, spawn, and migrate as they wish. The adepts would not be allowed to interfere!


    Greem happily agreed to these two points. It was only then that the manticore leader joined his faction along with his mate.


    Having dealt with the manticore issue, Greem left Gargamel, Sabrina, and Daniel in guewood and led the mercenaries back to Pinecone Town.


    Eva, on the other hand, was hiding somewhere obscure. The mercenaries had never met her, and naturally didn¡¯t know of her existence!


    This trip into the ck Forest had taken a total of twenty-seven days from start to finish. All of Pinecone Town was astonished when they sessfully returned unharmed.


    The mercenaries that stayed in the town rushed to the inn to listen to Love and the others talk about their adventure. However, all members of the party that Greem had hired kept their mouths shut. They didn¡¯t dare leak even a single detail about their employer.


    Greem only stayed in Pinecone Town for a single night. He hurried back to his n on the second day.


    The first thing he did upon returning was to pay a visit to Lady Sanazar. He then submitted his request to construct his personal adept¡¯s tower.


    This construction was something Great Adept Lord Sarubo had personally promised him after the conclusion of thest nar war. As such, he was extraordinarily straightforward and confident about his request.


    Lady Sanazar seemed to be in a good mood. She happily agreed to Greem¡¯s request and left the task to Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen.


    Greem asked around after the meeting and found out the reason for Lady Sanazar¡¯s joyful spirits; the n¡¯s ambassador in the Northern Lands had finally managed to establish contact with Alice. The two ns had established an extremely beneficial negotiation. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine Sanazar¡¯s joy at the situation.

 Chapter 403 Personal Adepts Tower

    Chapter 403 Personal Adept¡¯s Tower


    The Witches of Fate didn¡¯t have enough manpower to maintain and manage all the territory that the witch branches had returned to them. Thus, when the Sarubo n finally established contact with her, Alice happily gave away plenty of the spare resources she had on hand.


    The Sarubo n would use their human resources to help the Witch of Fate to operate and manage these territories and resource sites. All they had to do was hand over some of the resources that they collected every so often. This coboration was immensely beneficial for both the Sarubo n and Alice!


    While the resource sites andnds that the witch branches returned to Alice were the most insignificant portions of what they owned, it was still a massive amount of resources, especially in the eyes of a mid-sized adept n. It was even somewhat questionable whether they would be able to manage so many assets at once properly. The Sarubo n had no choice but toe to agreements with the local ns to start the development of these assets as soon as possible. Even so, they were barely maintaining operations across the board.


    The Sarubo n needed thesends and resource sites to expand their rtions and trade in the Northern Lands, while Alice needed a pre-existing source ofbor to help her manage the massive, sprawling assets of the Witches of Fate. Naturally, the two fit together like pieces of a puzzle and were quickly discussing the next stage of their coboration.


    For the past few days, Sanazar had been busymunicating with their ambassador in the Northern Lands. They wereying out the specifics of the agreement with the Witches of Fate as well as figuring out the assignment of manpower over the various assets.


    Alice was practically alone as a witch leader. She barely had two or three subordinates around her that could help with her work, and none of them were people she could entirely trust. This amount of power was not even sufficient for her to establish a small n in the Zhentarim Area.


    Still, a witch leader was a witch leader! The rights bestowed upon Alice by the ancient rules meant that she was entitled to resources andnds that were enough to put to shame even ancient ns with legacies spanning tens of thousands of years. Of course, that was in future. That was why the Sarubo n had much to gain if they were able to establish a friendly rtionship with her!


    It was these factors that caused Sanazar to view Greem in an extremely favorable light.


    Those who were not privy to the situation might think that Greem and Alice were only involved in an exchange of interests. Sanazar, having associated with both of them, knew better. Their rtionship was definitely something more profound. In fact, the dynamic and nature of their rtionship was likely the exact opposite of everyone else¡¯s expectations.


    Sanazar couldn¡¯t make things difficult given these circumstances. She didn¡¯t want to ruin their close working rtionship with the Witches of Fate. Not to mention, there was no real reason to deny Greem¡¯s request.


    ording to their promise, the Sarubo n was responsible for helping Greem construct an adept¡¯s tower in a suitable location. Based on Greem¡¯s understanding, even the lowest-tier three-level tower would cost a minimum of two hundred thousand magical crystals. This cost didn¡¯t even include all the facilities that a proper adept¡¯s tower needed!


    When Greem entered Sir F¨¹gen¡¯s room, the Second Grade Adept quickly activated a long distancemunication crystal.


    A short momentter, the crystal projected a middle-aged adept in elegant attire.


    "Wee to the Silver Union¡¯s Devinni Trade Company. Architect Hani is at your service! May I know how I may be of service, Sir F¨¹gen?"


    "Adept Hani, this is Adept Greem of our Sarubo n. He needs to construct a personal adept¡¯s tower. All the cost incurred will be shouldered by the n. As for the model, use the most basic andmon one. I¡¯ll leave the specifics for the two of you to discuss on your own." Having said that, F¨¹gen stepped away and left Greem alone in front of the screen of light.


    "Congrattions, Adept Greem!" Adept Hani sincerely eximed.


    "Thank you!" Greem nodded his head and acknowledged thepliment.


    Usually, the n only constructed an adept¡¯s tower at major n territories and resource sites. That was to increase their control over the region and to make it easier to manage and rule. Constructing personal towers for individual adepts was a substantial privilege only reserved for the few core adepts of the n.


    While this tower was only a fundamental tower of the lowest tier, Greem still possessedplete authority over the structure. He was not like those adepts stationed in the n¡¯s towers. They only had secondary control over the tower. The structure remained in the hands of the group itself.


    The benefit of owning a personal tower didn¡¯t need too much boration.


    A personal tower was a ce for an adept to rise to prominence and a ce for them to establish themselves. Most adepts would invest everything they had into their tower, and pass it on to their descendants or their beloved disciple upon death, treating it as if it was part of their bloodline.


    Naturally, Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen and Third Grade Adept Sanazar both had individual towers. They conducted the majority of their essential or secret research there. The Adept¡¯s Tower in Feidnan City was more of a public tower that belonged to the n. F¨¹gen and Sanazar only returned here once in a while to deal with the n¡¯s affairs. They preferred to spend most of their time in their own towers.


    The n would actively help high-grade adepts construct an adept¡¯s tower of their own, but this was not the case for First Grade adepts. Even someone as close to the inner circle of the n as Keoghan was not qualified to own a personal tower.


    Of course, if you could hand over the two hundred thousand crystal construction fee, you were free to build it of your own ord.


    However, an ordinary adept would take sixty to a hundred years just to save up that number of crystals.


    Someone like Keoghan had a steady crystal ie from the n¡¯s territory and resource sites. Moreover, his skill at voodoo beast creation was a respectable expertise that brought him quite a lot of additional ie frommissions throughout the years.


    Yet, Keoghan still didn¡¯t possess an adept¡¯s tower of his own!


    "Adept Greem, may I know if you have chosen the construction location for your adept¡¯s tower?" Hani continued politely.


    "It has been decided. The coordinates are as follows." Greem reported the coordinates of the guewood.


    Hani started flipping through and checking his maps on the other end of the light screen. He frowned when he finally found the location that Greem had given him.


    "Adept Greem, are you sure you want to construct your adept¡¯s tower there? You should know that this is an area within the ck Forest! Even though this is only the edge of the ck Forest, you are still taking an inestimable risk in doing so."


    "I am sure! I am a fire adept, and I found a small fire-attribute Lung of the Earth there. It is most suited for my future development!"


    Both F¨¹gen and Hani paused for a moment when they heard Greem¡¯s words. They couldn¡¯t help but envy the young adept for his fortune.


    If there was a Lung of the Earth near the adept¡¯s tower, the architects had methods to connect it with the tower¡¯s energy room. In doing so, the tower would possess a far greater supply of energypared to other towers. Furthermore, this particr tower would possess fire energy, the one element that was the mostpatible with its owner. Once the tower was built, Greem could maintain a meditation efficiency and energy regeneration rate that was several times that of his peers.


    "Congrattions, Adept Greem! Your luck is amazing!" Adept Hani couldn¡¯t help but sigh once again, "But there are some things that I have to tell you beforehand. A basic adept¡¯s tower like this one doesn¡¯t possess a teleportation array. If you want to construct one, you will have to pay an additional cost. Of course, if you are willing to offer up the teleportation array to be part of the Zhentarim public teleportationwork, the Zhentarim Association might be open to bearing this cost for you."


    "How much does it cost to add on a teleportation array?" Greem asked curiously.


    "The bare minimum will be a hundred thousand magical crystals!"


    "......"


    Greem fell silent.


    Although he already had some degree of understanding about the difficulty of constructing an adept¡¯s tower, he was stunned by that exorbitant pricing.


    Fortunately, the construction of this tower was mostly for the benefit of training and refining his Spirit. He didn¡¯t require such an intimate connection with the outside world. Temporarily giving up on the teleportation array wasn¡¯t too much of a loss.


    The two adepts talked over a bit more of the specifics, and eventually cut the connection on the crystal once they hade to an agreement.


    "It seems the most likely one to advance amongst the adepts of the n will be you." Adept F¨¹gen voiced his thoughts right as Greem was about to leave.


    In the end, F¨¹gen couldn¡¯t help but feel a strong sense of amazement at the speed that Greem had improved ever since he brought the young adept into the n.


    Greem expressed his thanks once more.


    He then promptly returned to Pinecone Town and silently waited as Adept Hani had asked him.


    The three adepts of the Devinni Trade Company reached the town two dayster.


    Greem still held great respect for this tradepany that the Silver Union had stationed in the Zhentarim area. The trip to the Castle in the Sky had allowed him to see, firsthand, the power and strength of the Silver Union. The army of war statues that could blot out the sky was so fearsome that seeing it almost made you feel despair.


    The Silver Union¡¯s monopoly over the esoteric adepts had indirectly allowed them to corner the market over all sorts of construction techniques. The craftsmen that were esoteric adepts were the only ones that could arrange things like adept¡¯s towers and teleportation arrays. While most ns did cultivate support adepts such as array masters, architects, potions masters, alchemists, and golem masters, they still had no choice but to rely on the schrs of the Silver Union for the core technology.


    On the other hand, those smaller ns that were not able to cultivate their own support adepts had to spend enormous amounts of money to purchase the services of the Silver Union.


    Devinni Trade Company was a unique organization that the Silver Union had stationed in othernds. They were singrly responsible for the construction of adept¡¯s towers.


    Greem had already made his preparations by the time the Devinni¡¯s array master, architect, and thebat adept that had been sent to protect them finally arrived in Pinecone Town.


    Five manticores waited outside of the town; their existence surprised the three visitors.


    It wasn¡¯t odd to see magical creatures retained as guards and transportation. However, most of these magical creatures were reared near the headquarters of the n itself. The fact that Adept Greem was so easily able to conjure up five adept-level manticores to transport them near the ck Forest spoke volumes about his influence and power in this region.


    Of course, the various wounds on the manticores that had yet to heal was a clear sign that Greem had only recently tamed them.


    That caused the Devinni adepts to be even more curious and expectant of the fire-attribute Lung of the Earth that Greem had described to them!

 Chapter 404 Wandering Adepts

    Chapter 404 Wandering Adepts


    A distance of a hundred and fifty kilometers was nothing to adepts.


    They would have crossed that distance in two or three hours if it wasn¡¯t for the ck Forest.


    There were rules when in the ck Forest. Even ten lives weren¡¯t enough if you wanted to fly through the skies recklessly.


    Most powerful magical creatures couldn¡¯t be bothered to deal with those bugs that snuck past the edges of their borders. However, if you were to boldly fly across their heads, that would be a direct provocation!


    The five manticores were native beasts of this ce. They had a perfect understanding of all the hunting areas of the various magical creatures along the way. They didn¡¯t fly high. Instead, they stuck to the forest canopy and wound through the ce, trying their best to avoid the territory of powerful magical creatures.


    Thus, the four adepts safely crossed this stretch of the forest and reached the conspicuous guewood.


    And here was the home of the manticore family!


    The five manticores folded their wings, and their magnificent bodies dove into the cave. Violent gusts of wind blew in every direction, shocking the bats in the cave and throwing them into a panic.


    Regardless of how frantic they were, not a single one of them dared toe within ten meters of a manticore. In this area, the manticores were the undisputed leaders!


    The manticores ignored this group of unpaid ¡¯watchdogs¡¯ and continued into the cave. They flew past stctites and stone pirs, avoiding every obstacle with ease as they entered a dark tunnel in the corner of the cave.


    They unfurled their wings and glided within the tunnel. It was only when the geography narrowed that they packed their wings and returned to the ground, running as an ordinary lion would. Once there was more space, they expanded their wings and quickly traveled further into the cave.


    This ce was their home.


    They were familiar with every passage and pir.


    WItrh their night vision, the dimness of the cave was no problem for these manticores. They were like fish swimming past the coral at the bottom of the ocean, freely weaving between stones, boulders, and stgmites as they made their way into the underground and reached the cavern with theva well that Greem had discovered.


    The space in the cavern was muchrger than the rest of the tunnels and caves they had passed through. In fact, it was sorge that it appeared empty. The three Silver Union adepts that had been sitting with their eyes closed couldn¡¯t help but open them. They started surveying the environment.


    In particr, theva well in the center of the cavern drew the attention of the two esoteric adepts. They excitedly walked towards theva well once they got off the manticores. They then took out a strange magical tool and started taking measurements of the conditions.


    The man named Eugene was abat adept. His only job was to protect these two esoteric adepts. He had no interest in this unique area. He nodded at Greem and started to walk around theva well aimlessly.


    Greem let out an awkward cough when he saw the two esoteric adepts scurrying as they took their measurements. However, his cough didn¡¯t seem to have caught the attention of the two passionately immersed esoteric adepts. Rather, he managed to draw the attention of the wandering Eugene.


    "What is it, what else do you need?" Adept Eugene¡¯s tone was cold and harsh; there was a sense of sternness and solemnity to the energy radiating from his body.


    "Er, I just wanted to ask if there was anything I needed to help with regarding the construction of the tower?"


    "We don¡¯t need any help from you!" Adept Eugene rebuked Greem with a single sentence, "If you had the ability, you wouldn¡¯t have needed to hire us for the job! This location is a decent one. It¡¯s quite suited for the construction of an adept¡¯s tower."


    "Then what do I need to do?"


    "Nothing. Just leave! It will only take nine days for a small basic tower like this one to be built. Once we¡¯ve finished everything, I will go and inform you. You willplete the sacrificial ceremony of the tower spirit. Very well, you can leave now."


    At this moment, Greem was so shocked by Eugene¡¯s arrogance and impoliteness that he couldn¡¯t even bother refuting.


    However, his shock quickly faded away once he remembered what kind of existence the Silver Union was.


    This type of construction was a monopoly of theirs after all.


    After they had obtained their monopoly over most of the techniques and knowledge rted to the esoteric adepts, the other adept ns and organizations had to rely on them if they wanted to construct an adept¡¯s tower quickly. The Sarubo had architects and array masters, but these strategic talents were all ced in the outer realms under the directmand of Great Adept Sarubo himself.


    Having them cross the ne barrier and return to the World of Adepts to build a crude tower for a mere First Grade adept was a little extreme. Even Third Grade Sanazar didn¡¯t have the authority to give them such an order. All the esoteric adepts that the Sarubo n had painstakingly cultivated had been trained and prepared for nar wars. No one would make thembor for an ordinary adept of the n.


    Thus...


    Something like constructing Greem¡¯s personal tower would have to fall on the shoulders of a specialized organization like the Devinni Trade Company!


    Less than fifteen minutes after bringing the adepts to theva well, Greem was ¡¯politely¡¯ booted out of the caverns by Adept Eugene.


    It was apparent that these adepts did an excellent job of protecting their knowledge and techniques.


    Greem could still feel himself being monitored with magic, even after he left the caverns. It wasn¡¯t until he reached the manticore den that the feelingpletely vanished.


    "No need to be dejected, master!" Gargamel, who had been holing up in the cave and putting the manticores to work for the past few days immediately hurried over when he heard the news. He consoled his master, "Every single adept from the three major forces is like that! You get used to it over time."


    "Oh? You know about all three of the major forces?" Greem asked curiously, "Could you tell me more about them?"


    "Kehkeh. Of course!" An expression of hatred appeared on Gargamel¡¯s shriveled old face, "Those who have never experienced the pain of being a wandering adept would never understand! We are like mice running in the streets, oppressed and beaten down by the n adepts wherever we go. We have no choice but to pinch our noses and tter the managers of the public adept¡¯s towers, all for the sake of gathering knowledge and purchasing cheaper materials.¡±


    "Then why don¡¯t you join a n? Your qualifications as a potions master guarantee you a ce in any mid-sized adept n, as long as you are willing to join them. Why the wandering about, and the tough life of being looked down upon?"


    "Master, the fact that you would say such a thing only proves that you have yet to understand the true nature of these adept ns. When you join a n as an esoteric adept, you will find that they truly regard your existence to be of great significance. They are more than willing to invest resources in you. However, from then onwards, you will have forever lost your freedom!"


    "Freedom?"


    "Yes, freedom!" Gargamel sighed, "The more they invest in you, the more they expect to get from you! A potions master like myself will have a quota imposed upon him upon joining a n. Every year, I will have to hand over a certain amount of potions to the n. A person like myself, who has neither influence or power, will most definitely be asked to create an abnormal number of potions. If I want toplete my task, I will have to spend my days trapped in an ufortableb, continuously repeating the same dull actions, day and night."


    Greem rubbed his chin as he listened in silence.


    "The consequence of this would be apleteck of time to meditate or improve my abilities. Since I became an adept, I have already spent most of my time on the pointless concoctions of numerous potions. And that was how my body has slowly deteriorated over the years."


    Gargamel was only eighty-nine years old. He wasn¡¯t even considered middle-aged among the adepts that often lived to two or even three hundred years. However, his body and his face were about as bad as those ancient adepts at the end of their lifespan!


    "Aren¡¯t there still plenty of high-grade adepts amongst the esoteric adepts? You..." Greem was somewhat confused.


    "Master, you are referring to the Silver Union adepts, aren¡¯t you?" Gargamel cackled coldly, "The adepts that arge organization like them would invest in and waste resources to allow advancement are all their own people! All of them are descendants of the higher-ups of the organization! They would never be willing to do so for outsiders. After all, the resources you sink into an untalented esoteric adept such that he may advance to Second Grade would be more than enough for you to make two or three Second Gradebat adepts. They would never part with so many resources if it wasn¡¯t one of their own."


    Greem had felt this disparity in improvement rate himself.


    Within the Sarubo n, Ferrier was a potions master, and Keoghan was a voodoo beast master. Both of them had a support specialty. However, theirbat abilities were so poor that Greem didn¡¯t even regard them as a threat. The speed at which their powers increased was like a tortoise¡¯s crawl whenpared to Greem.


    Greem had barely seen them three or four times a year ever since they returned from the knight¡¯s ne. Most of the time, they spent their days in theirbs. They would onlye out for a walk every few weeks. Sometimes, they even ignored their meals and relied on nutrition pills to sustain themselves.


    The extended periods without exercise, the exposure to harmful materials, and the failure to care for their Spirits had a significant impact on them. Their Spirits would even wither and waste away if they didn¡¯t properly care and maintain them.


    In fact, it would be a miracle if their powers didn¡¯t diminish in such an environment!


    However,pared to the deterioration of their powers, what was even more unbearable was the loss of their freedom.


    A specialized adept painstakingly trained by the n would never have the chance to go on adventures and explore on their own. No group would ever let their precious esoteric adepts wander with some strangers or journey on random adventures for the sake of some insignificantbat experience.


    Even when they had to go on explorations, the n would send arge group of strong escorts along with them. The esoteric adept would be well-guarded as they went to explore those low-risk ruins and hazard zones.


    It made it impossible for the esoteric adepts ever to get a chance to train and improve themselves!


    Greem finally understood why Gargamel would rather be a wandering adept than join a n.


    Adepts might look like a proud and glorious group on the outside, but if one were to delve deep into the workings of their organizations, they would find a despairing amount of internal oppression.

 Chapter 405 The Tower

    Chapter 405 The Tower


    The three major Adept powers.


    The Northern Witches of the North Coast, the Silver Union of the West Coast, and the Adept¡¯s Association of the East Coast!


    They each had their respective knowledge legacies, culture, and traditions. They were extremely private organizations.


    Whenever people mentioned the Northern Witches, the first thing that came to mind would be their ferocity!


    Tremendous ferocity!


    If it weren¡¯t for this bold and reckless nature of theirs, how would a group of witches have been able to expand and establish themselves in the resource-starvednds of the north? How were they able to ensure the continuing legacy of the witches for tens of thousands of years?


    It was this ferocity of theirs that allowed them to push back against the magical creatures of the ck Forest, fighting for every inch and foot of the preciousnd they now stood upon. The reason the citizens of the Northern Lands followed the witches so loyally was because of their contributions. The witches were the ones who stood at the forefront, resisting the tides of monsters with courage and might far greater than the male adepts.


    The witches were the true guardian goddesses of the North!


    Inparison, the Silver Union seemed to be a motley crew of talent.


    Their leaders were not as experienced at fighting as the Northern Witches, but they were skilled at managing and creating monopolies over certain magics and technologies. They had floating forts, transportation arrays, golem armies, and vast numbers of scrolls, potions, and magic wands. All of these were either necessary, rare resources or daily consumables.


    Gaining the monopoly over these items allowed them to profit tremendously. They umted a fathomless amount of resources and magic crystals through this trade monopoly.


    Most people looked upon the Silver Union as a massive, super trade organization instead of an adept organization, and they scorned them because of it.


    The Adept¡¯s Association on the East Coast, on the other hand, could be called a true primary adept organization.


    Their most significant distinguishing feature was theprehensiveness of their knowledge legacy, as well as their ability to make full use of their human resources.


    At the center of the continent, where the Zhentarim area lied, the various ns were the ones who invaded and excavated the lesser nes. Each group undertook the initial investment of manpower and resources. The excavation and harvest of resources then formed the foundation of the n¡¯s improvement.


    However, nar invasions were initiated by individual adepts in the Adept¡¯s Association.


    There were plenty of explorers in the Adept¡¯s Association. They were not powerful fighters, but they were very good at space exploration and ne tracking. They wandered through the depths of the boundless sea of stars, exploring one hazardous zone after another. And when they found a lesser ne that no one had conquered yet, they would put the nar coordinates on sale back in the Association.


    The powerful adepts of the Association then took turns to bid for the coordinates.


    The adept that sessfully obtained a set of coordinates recruited a team of suitable adepts and employed aggressive means to shatter the ne barrier and establish a forward base in the lesser ne. Once a teleportation array was constructed, the Adept¡¯s Association would take care of the rest!


    The invasion, domination, and removal of the resources were left to specialized expert adepts within the Association. The adepts that managed to establish a forward base only needed to wait and reap the rewards of their efforts!


    All the lesser nes owned by the Adept¡¯s Association were obtained through such means. The Association was only responsible for maintaining rule over the nes, while the adepts were the mercenaries they hired to do the dirty work. In doing so, the Association was able to free up some of their strongest adepts from the arduous process of nar domination. They no longer needed to go through invasion, domination, purging, and establishing their rule. The entire business became much more straightforward.


    The surplus workforce then invested in the conquering and domination of even more lesser nes. They strengthened themselves with the resources stolen from the other nes, continuing to use their overwhelming power to strike at even more worlds. This chain was the sustainable path of development that the Adept¡¯s Association had chosen for themselves!


    That was why they were the unchallenged champion amongst the three major adept powers. The Silver Union was second, and the Northern Witches were the weakest.


    However, if one judged their force based on their performance in small-scale skirmishes between their adepts, the Northern Witches would be the most powerful! The Adept¡¯s Association would be second, and the Silver Union would best.


    This ranking was the current political situation in the World of Adepts.


    On the other hand, the Zhentarim Association in the center of the Continent was only a loose alliance of adept ns. They appeared to have the most adepts, the most poption within theirnds, the most resources, and the mostnd, but their strength was meagerpared to the major powers.


    The reason the three dominant powers hadn¡¯t assimted the Zhentarim Association was due to the caution and unease between the influences. Each of the three powers feared that any reckless action might invite an alliance of the other two against themselves. Thus, the three major powers tried their best to expand their influence within the Zhentarim Association through trade and other means. However, the exclusive and xenophobic nature of the local adepts made it hard for them to gain any real progress.


    The old fogeys of the Zhentarim Association frequently fought over power and influence, but they became unusually united whenever it seemed the three major powers wanted to interfere in their affairs. They would rather kill wrongfully than let something past by their eyes. No adept n of Zhentarim was allowed to favor one of the three major forces!


    Every single n that had been infiltrated by the three major powers had been inexplicably defeated and exterminated in an unexpected n war. There were no exceptions!


    As there was still plenty of time, Greem continued his lengthy conversation with Gargamel.


    Greem did have some understanding of the three major powers through books and personal contacts. However, his conversation with Gargamel still helped him a lot. He learned plenty of open secrets many adepts widely discussed!


    Of course, during his free time, Greem couldn¡¯t help but wonder how the two Silver Union adepts were going to build an adept¡¯s tower so quickly. After all, back in the knight¡¯s ne, the Sarubo n had sent out two or three dozen n elites and barely managed to construct the foundation for a war tower within a month.


    The Silver Union had only sent two architects here on this errand. Greem couldn¡¯t believe this to be true, no matter how he thought about it. The number of stone materials, metals, and magical gemstones required in the construction of an adept¡¯s tower was terrifying. Could the two architects have brought everything with them?


    Of course, the location that Greem had picked was extremely convenient as well. The volcanic rock could be put to use and help save plenty of resources. Even so, this was still a massive undertaking. Shouldn¡¯t it be virtually impossible for two adepts to build something like this, even if they didn¡¯t rest for all nine days?!


    The more he thought about it, the more unbelievable it seemed to be!


    However, Greem did have some idea of how they could aplish this impossible mission. They must have brought along plenty of construction golems to solve theirck of human resources. But what about the carving of the runic arrays? For an adept¡¯s tower to be a magical facility that was entirely controlled by the adept, every single stone of the tower needed to be engraved with runic arrays with various functions.


    Reinforcement runes, magic-resistance runes, anti-divination runes; every one of these runes was necessary. Not to mention there was still the magical circuits and energy nodes that needed to be taken care of. These things covered the structure of the tower! The sheer amount of work was a headache to think about. How were they supposed to do this with just two adepts?!


    Could the Silver Union have invented some sort of golem construct that could carve energy circuits and runic arrays on its own? That made absolutely no sense! The task was far tooplicated and delicate for the likes of inanimate beings.


    Nine days quickly passed by while Greem mused and guessed.


    Finally, the adept known as Eugene stepped out of the cavern and sent a magical message to Greem.


    Greem hastily brought Gargamel and Sabrina along with him as he hurried into the cavern underneath.


    A crimson tower stood silently in the middle of the massive cave. The body of the tower was built with volcanic rocks, and the inside of the tower was filled with rich fire energy, causing the tower itself to radiate a faint red light.


    If Greem wasn¡¯t mistaken, theva well itself had likely been assimted into part of the tower¡¯s foundation. The energy room was also connected to the sea ofva beneath. That meant that this tower would never run out of energy.


    At least, not fire energy!


    A pair of adamantium doors slowly opened as they walked towards the tower. The three Silver Union adepts respectfully waited for Greem¡¯s arrival.


    The array master held a strange crystal glowing with rainbow lights in his hands.


    "This is the control crystal of the tower¡¯s core array. You need to use it to activate all the runic arrays in the adept¡¯s tower. It is only then that the tower will be considered to have activated. Very well, you should go in alone toplete your soul verification!"


    Excitement appeared on Greem¡¯s handsome face. He silently nodded and took the strange crystal into his hands.


    Hard and cool. Strange magical energies seemed to be swelling within the transparent crystal. Greem took a brief look at the gem and nodded at the three adepts to express his gratitude. He then slowly walked into the tower.


    There were five levels to the tower. The first thing Greem saw when he entered was a massive arcane hall. It would be the public area of activity for the apprentice adepts in the future. Perhaps this ce might be crowded and filled with magical facilities in the future, but for now, it was no more than an empty hall.


    Greem saw a small library to the left of the hall. The apprentice dwellings were on the right. They consisted of a row of small stone rooms. Naturally, there was no furniture in there either.


    The spiral staircase that led upwards was in the corner of the hall. The stairs hadn¡¯t undergone borate treatment and polishing. The carved stairs and walls appeared to be somewhat crude and rough.


    The entireyout of the tower had been projected into his mind when he held the control crystal in his hands. However, the elementium altar in the energy room had yet to be activated, and the core array had not connected to all the various runic arrays spread across the tower. Thus, the tower remained silent and incapable of responding to hismands.


    Greem stepped onto the spiral staircase, and some unique runic passwords and handsigns appeared before his eyes. He needed to chant these words while making the proper handsigns to open the temporary passage to the warehouse and energy room in the basement.


    Otherwise, this spiral staircase only led upwards.


    It also meant that anyone without control authority would have no hope of intruding into the resource warehouse and the energy room!


    Greem hesitated for a moment. He suppressed the desire to rush into the energy room and followed the stairs upwards towards the fourth floor, where the core array was located.

 Chapter 406 Activating the Tower

    Chapter 406 Activating the Tower


    ording to the control crystal, the core array resided on the fourth level.


    There were five surface levels to the tower and two underground levels, making for a total of seven levels.


    The two underground levels were the energy room and the resource warehouse respectively. Thisyout was typical for most adept¡¯s towers.


    The first level functioned as the dwellings of the apprentices, the arcane hall, the library, the academic hall, and the dining area.


    The second level had a magical garden, a breeding room, an incubation chamber, a smallboratory, and a magic practice range.


    The third level contained the sealing room, the book storage, the golem factory, the alchemyb, and the scroll crafting chamber.


    The fourth level was where the adept¡¯s rooms, the study room, the meeting room, and the core array were.


    The fifth level had the teleportation room, privatebs, and the workshops.


    That was only a basicyout that Greem had requested. Most of the required magical facilities were still missing. He would have to invest a lot more before he could have the ce functioning as he wanted.


    In ordinary circumstances, the apprentice adepts only had ess to the first and second levels. The pseudo-adepts and the advanced apprentices would be able to borrow the use of certain facilities on the third level by submitting requests. Fourth level and above was restricted to only adepts. Moreover, they had to be a trusted adept that belonged to the tower itself; outsider adepts could only stay on the third level.


    As the tower had not undergone spatial expansion, there wasn¡¯t too much space to move around. Still, it would be no problem to sustain the lives of nearly a hundred adepts and apprentices.


    Greem swiftly walked into the bright central control hall. There were white marble floors and rich elementium energy faintly radiating from the walls. Embedded in the array at the center of the room was arge crystal. An odd rune was shing and wavering at the center of this massive cluster of crystal, continuously letting out magical energy.


    Greem bent his body to examine the crystal in detail. Soon, the chip hadpleted a quick scan of the crystal¡¯s internal structure and itsposition. Weirdly enough, even the chip didn¡¯t manage to glean any information!


    "Beep. Discovered unknown energy crystal substance. No matching substance type found in the data library. No signs of artificial synthesis either. Initial estimates suggest crystal to be a substance from beyond this world."


    Was it a substance from beyond this world?


    That meant that this crystal wasn¡¯t a product from the World of Adepts or a synthetic gem created by a high-grade adept. Instead, this was a unique crystal taken from another ne. Or even the depths of the sea of stars!


    Greem took out the control crystal that the silver-robed adept had given him and realized that it was made of the same material as therge crystal before him. Moreover, when the rune within the giant crystal pulsed, the small one in his hand vibrated at the same frequency. It was almost as if the two crystals were breathing in sync.


    Greem did as was instructed by the silver-robed adept. He ced the small crystal on the indentation above the big one. He then cut his palm and pressed his bleeding hand against the crystal.


    "Beep. Detecting data connection passage. Construct connection?"


    "Construct!"


    Greem felt his sensory world expand infinitely as his Spirit connected with the massive crystal. His Spirit had instantly extended to every single corner of the tower. An enormous screen of light suddenly appeared in his mental space. The screen listed a wide variety ofplicatedmands.


    And the first emergencymand to be listed at the top was:


    Activate the Tower!


    Activating the tower wasn¡¯t just starting up its functions. What it meant was that Greem would now possess the highest authority over the adept¡¯s tower. Unless he conducted a special magical ceremony and willingly wiped away the soul brand he had left in the crystal, he would forever possess the highest authority over this tower.


    "Chip, have you discovered any safety issues?"


    "Beep. Initial scans of control crystalplete. No backdoor programs or traps discovered. Moreprehensive scanning will begin once the tower has been activated. Rmend host immediately activate the tower!"


    Greem solemnly gave the order to activate the tower, and the entire structure trembled. An elementium brilliance with a trace of holiness and divinity suddenly lit up in the energy room.


    A ck hole the size of a fist slowly opened above the elementium altar. Traces of prismatic mist drifted out of the hole. They were immediately guided towards the elementium pool the moment they exited the ck hole. The fog then settled at the bottom of the pool. In less than seven minutes, the rich magical energy had be thick and heavy. More and more rainbow mist gathered at the bottom of the elementium pool, causing it to be moist and damp.


    Soon, a transparent yet viscousyer of water appeared at the bottom of the pool!


    It was not water extracted from the elementium world; it was liquid elementium that had been extracted from the air! Elementium energy usually existed in a gaseous state. However, the elementium poolpressed the elementium energies and caused their unit concentration to increase dramatically, causing them to exist in this liquid state.


    If the energy room continued to function for an even more extended period, this liquid elementium would be furtherpressed and forced into solid state magical crystals. And that would be the most stable currency in the World of Adepts!


    With the activation of the energy room, surge after surge of magical energy was drawn from the surroundings. These energies were slowly circted into the tower¡¯s systems. From the second underground level to the first underground level, and then across the entire tower, the radiance of energy started to glow wherever the runic arrays extended.


    Gargamel and the three Silver Union adepts silently watched as a trace of light shone at the bottom of the tower and slowly spread across every corner of the building.


    This tower that had been a dull crimson color now burned brightly like a beautiful fire coral, disying itself to the adepts in all its beauty and wonder!


    "Pleasee in, my guests. Wee to my adept¡¯s tower!"


    The air boomed with Greem¡¯s boisterous voice. The closed doors immediately opened at the sound of his voice.


    Greem once again met up with the three Silver Union adepts in a guest hall on the third level to discuss other matters. Gargamel, on the other hand, had been given partial authority by Greem. He was wandering the tower, eagerly exploring every bit of the building.


    "Sir Greem, if you have no other requests, we will be on our way!" The one responsible for coordination was still Adept Eugene.


    It was apparent that the three spoiled Silver Union adepts wanted to leave as soon as possible now that they hadpleted their task. This ce was unpopted and had none of the luxuries they were ustomed to. They didn¡¯t even want to extend their stay by a single second.


    "No need to rush!" Greem quickly spoke to persuade them to stay, "The foundation of this tower has been constructed, but there are far too many magical facilities that I still need to be built. May I ask about your price when ites to this?"


    Adept Eugene was incredibly straightforward. He handed a piece of parchment over to Greem.


    Teleportation Array: One hundred thousand magical crystals.


    Detection Room: Seventy thousand magical crystals.


    Greater Magic Practice Range: Eighty thousand magical crystals.


    Room of Bindings: (Small) Four thousand magical crystals | (Medium) Twenty thousand magical crystals | (Large) Fifty thousand magical crystals.


    Sealing Room: Thirty thousand magical crystals.


    Pool of Purification: Twenty thousand magical crystals.


    Large Omnipurpose Alchemy Lab: One hundred and thirty thousand magical crystals. (Includes aplete set of tools and facilities)


    Golem Factory: Forty thousand magical crystals. (Can only be used for the creation and repair of adept-level magical statue constructs)


    Scroll Crafting Chamber: Three thousand magical crystals. (Includes all tools)


    Enchantment Lab: Seven thousand magical crystals.


    Alchemical ve: (Adept-level) Twenty thousand magical crystals | (Apprentice-level) Eight hundred magical crystals.


    Voodoo Beast: (Adept-level) Sixteen thousand magical crystals | (Apprentice-level) Six hundred magical crystals.


    Magical Garden Servant: Flower Fairy (Two hundred magical crystals/creature) | Genie (One hundred and seventy magical crystals/creature).


    Tower ve (Strength-type): Minotaur (Twenty magical crystals/creature) | Quilboar (Eight magical crystals/creature) | Ogre (Twenty-five magical crystals/creature) | Dragonspawn (Forty magical crystals/creature).


    Tower ve (Specialized): Halfling Gourmet (Three hundred magical crystals/creature) | Dwarven Smith (One hundred and twenty magical crystals/creature) | Grass Fairy ([Female] Seven hundred magical crystals/creature | [Male] Six hundred magical crystals/creature) | Siren Apprentice (One thousand seven hundred magical crystals/creature).


    The parchment wasn¡¯trge, but its contents were plentiful. Most of the things listed here were necessary for the operation of an adept¡¯s tower. However, Greem felt his head ache when he read through the prices listed behind each item.


    If he were a veteran adept that had lived for a hundred years, he would at least have some capital on hand. Unfortunately, he was not. He was just an ordinary adept that had been fighting tooth and w to make his bucket of gold. In fact, it hadn¡¯t been that long since he had bid farewell to hisbel as a newly advanced adept.


    As for savings; He had spent most of the resources and magical crystals he had obtained during thest nar on Alice and her Battle of Fate. He could barely squeeze out thirty to forty thousand magical crystals if he counted everything he had. This amount was clearly insufficient if he wanted toplete the tower¡¯s functions. It was barely enough for Greem to get the tower running.


    It wasn¡¯t as if Greem had no valuable items on hand. As long as he was willing to part with hisst spacestone, every financial problem he had would be solved.


    The problem was that he just wasn¡¯t willing to!


    Thus, after a lengthy negotiation with Adept Eugene, Greem paid for a small fire altar in the hall on the first floor. He then bought some tools and facilities for the alchemyb, the golem factory, the scroll creation chamber, and several other ces. He also purchased some magical seeds for the garden.


    Apart from these basic amenities, Greem also bought two halfling gourmets, two dwarven smiths, and two fairies.


    He had no choice! He and Gargamel had to live here from now on. They couldn¡¯t possibly be expected to go out hunting on their own for every meal! That was why purchasing food and daily consumables and leaving them to these ves to manage was the best course of action!


    Meanwhile, the role of the tower guards fell upon the eleven manticores.


    Once the Silver Union adepts had swiftly constructed the fire altar, Greem immediately ced the Fire Lord¡¯s Scepter that he had no use for on the tform. This way, he could summon up to five fire elementals from the altar on a daily basis. These elementals could serve as his servants that helped in the operation of the tower.


    Over time, thisbyrinthine underground tunnelwork would be dominated by fire elementium. This development would substantially increase the security of the tower. Greem would also be able to summon even more fire elementals to serve as freebor. Of course he chose to construct a fire altar first!

 Chapter 407 The Tower is Complete

    Chapter 407 The Tower is Complete


    When Greem had seen Alice controlling a tower of her own back in the Northern Lands, he had thought of it as an easy matter.


    However, it was only now that he managed an adept¡¯s tower of his own that he understood the pain of owning a tower!


    He had always lived in the Sarubo n¡¯s tower in the past. There wasn¡¯t an urgent need for resources. He had also frequently been burdened with matters he had to attend. Consequently, he never quite had the time to go around umting funds. Now that he held a tower in his hands, the sheer consumption of magical crystals and resources was enough to make his head hurt.


    His situation was nothing like Alice¡¯s. The Witch of Fate was working alone as of now, but she was still supported by all the umted resources of the Witches of Fate! Her starting point was much further along than Greem¡¯s. The gap in their power would only grow wider as time passed.


    That was Greem¡¯s most significant concern!


    His first nar invasion experience and the abundant wealth to be harvested had captivated his imagination. Countless times, Greem had fantasized about conquering foreign nes with an army of adepts he had assembled himself. They would obtain vastnds and mountains of resources that would be used to strengthen themselves further.


    However, in every single one of his fantasies, he was the leader; only he could be the leader.


    But if Alice umted more influence and power than him, who would be the leader when they allied? Who was the subordinate?


    The question was a simple one, but it deeply troubled Greem.


    Once both of their forces had developed to that extent, they would not be able to avoid facing the issue, even with the vague feelings they had for each other. Moreover, adepts were pragmatic beings. Minor romantic feelings could not possibly subvert the difference in status between two individuals.


    Alice was the leader of the Witches of Fate, albeit with slightly insufficient power as of yet. Greem, on the other hand, was a mere fire adept with a handful of subordinates he could call upon. When the time came for them to join hands, what was Greem supposed to use to make Alice submit to him? How was he supposed to make Alice subordinate to him?


    Alice and Greem each had an adept¡¯s tower of their own now.


    Alice possessed the tower of origin for the Witches of Fate, one of the most potent adept¡¯s towers on the Continent. She didn¡¯t have much right now, but as long as she held onto her identity as the Witch of Fate, she would have no problem expanding her influence and might. In fact, it couldn¡¯t be said that Alice was starting from nothing. She was only expanding upon the foundation of the Witches of Fate, while slowly restoring the legendary witch branch to its former glory.


    She was practically a rich kid born with a silver spoon in her mouth. Greem was the pauper that had to start from scratch!


    Of course, Greem could contact Alice at any moment and ask for several tens or hundreds of thousands of magical crystals from her. If he did so, he could solve all the financial problems of his tiny tower!


    However, as an adept with wild ambition, Greem would never bring himself to lower his status to ask Alice for help. He knew very well the problems that Alice had to face as well.


    The Tower of Fate might have arge reserve of magical crystals, but most of those assets were frozen for the sake of recruiting the magic fairies. What remained was barely enough to support the operation of that massive tower.


    Greem was in a problematic position himself, but he wasn¡¯t in as dangerous situation as Alice was.


    The issue concerning the First Witch of Fate, the attitude of the other witch leaders towards her, and the internal affairs of the Witches of Fate that still lied in shambles; a single mistake in dealing with any one of them plunge her into doom and despair!


    The burden that Alice shouldered wasn¡¯t any lighter than Greem¡¯s. In fact, most of the time Greem was d that he wasn¡¯t involved in thoseplexyers of conspiracy, where it was hard to tell friend from foe.


    The three Silver Union adepts left that night. The ves and servants that Greem purchased would also reach his tower within fifteen days. Greem had half a month¡¯s time to get the tower in order. At the very least, he needed to start its essential functions and operations.


    Apart from the magical facilities, the adept¡¯s tower was also sorelycking in the daily necessities for the adepts and apprentices. Replenishing these supplies was an issue that had to be dealt with immediately as well.


    After all, Greem couldn¡¯t possibly be expected to sleep on a stone bed, gnaw on wild game hunted by the manticores, and drink water summoned from the water elementium ne. It was eptable if he had to lead a life like this for a few days, but even the most resilient adept wasn¡¯t able to endure this lifestyle for long periods of time.


    Greem was silently thinking over these problems when he received a message from Snox.


    Snox and his party of a dozen people had reached Pinecone Town. They were hiring mercenaries to escort them to the adept¡¯s tower.


    Greem paused for a moment. He considered for a moment and handed control of the tower over to Gargamel. He brought the eleven manticores out of the cave and hurried towards Pinecone Town.


    Half a dayter, Greem was able to meet up with Snox twenty kilometers away from the town. He had used his mental connection with Snox to locate the party. There were sixteen people in total. The ones leading the way were Love and the others who he had recruited during theirst trip.


    Greem¡¯s ck eyes swept over the party members as he leaped off the back of the majestic manticore leader. Apart from Snox and the apprentices of his faction, he also saw Meryl amongst them.


    "Meryl! Why did youe along?"


    An expression of idolization and envy shed in Meryl¡¯s eyes as she looked at the strange lion-like beast, "Teacher, you are amazing! It¡¯s only been a few days, and you¡¯ve already managed to tame such a powerful magical beast!"


    Greem wore a simple gray robe. He was tall in stature and possessed a handsome face. His flowing crimson hair fell upon his shoulders, and he held in his hand a mysterious ck staff with crimson patterns. He gave the party members a sense of stability and security when he stood before them like this.


    "Very well, we can talk about all this once we reach the tower! I¡¯ve specially brought the manticores to carry everyone over. Let¡¯s go!"


    Love and his two party members followed the road back to town, while the eleven manticores carried the fourteen adepts and apprentices on their backs. They unfurled their wings, roared, and flew towards the depth of the ck Forest.


    To save time, Greem made Snox ride along with him so that he could ask the goblin the reason for his visit.


    "Master, of course, it¡¯s to bring you some necessary goods!" Snox excitedly exined, "You¡¯ve only just constructed your tower; it¡¯s certain that you wouldck in daily necessities. I went to look for Lady Meryl, and we decided to bring these things to you along with your disciples and apprentices."


    A violent gust of wind swept across their heads. Snox¡¯srge ears fluttered behind his head, and his green hair blew into a quiff. Even so, there was no stopping the goblin¡¯s enthusiasm. He continued to wave his hands and eagerly spoke about his actions.


    However, near the end of his lengthy speech, Snox leaned against Greem¡¯s ear and whispered, "Master, apart from the necessities, I have also brought you some magical crystals. The business of the goblin shop has been phenomenal recently. This one took the opportunity to earn as much as he could, all for the sake of master."


    "Magical crystals? How much?" Greem asked doubtfully.


    "A hundred and twenty thousand magical crystals!" Snox yelped with a wide grin on his face.


    If Greem hadn¡¯t caught Snox by the cor, he would probably have fallen off the manticore¡¯s back out of sheer excitement.


    "A hundred and twenty thousand?" An expression of amusement appeared on Greem¡¯s face. He didn¡¯t say anything to Snox¡¯s words.


    He wasn¡¯t a rookie that had just emerged from some unknown rural ce. A small goblin shop relying on the protection of a n made a hundred and twenty thousand magical crystals in less than ten years? A legendary story like this might be good for the taverns, but it wasn¡¯t to be taken seriously.


    Greem shook his head andughed and chose to not think about the matter. Instead, he turned to join his apprentices in appreciating the beautiful scenery beneath them.


    Birds flitted through the trees as the manticores flew across the canopy of the vast forest. The entire ce was brimming with life.


    From high above the skies, all you could see was the endless stretch of leaves and canopy. ck. Perhaps this was the only color in this forest.


    The woods were dark and the trees towered above everything else.


    When looking up from within the dense forest, the thick branches and dense leaves cut up the sky into pieces of blue ribbons. Spots of light scattered across the ground, flickering and shing as the leaves swayed in the winds.


    The ck and boundless forest continued forever, from low bushes to tall trees. Thisnd was a paradise for flora. Ironoaks, firs, spruces, cedars, and all varieties of trees grew straight up to the sky. Thick, nameless vegetation and vines filled the gaps between the trees.


    Any outsider would find it difficult to traverse such an ancient and primal forest.


    Of course, there were all sorts of forest creatures in such an environment. However, they were not the true owners of the ck Forest. The only ones that could make that im were the tide of terrifying magical creatures and monsters that inhabited the forest.


    The apprentices that could follow Adept Meryl on this visit were all advanced apprentices or pseudo-adepts. They had all ventured into the edges of the ck Forest and fought with beasts, magical creatures, monsters, and corruptors in there. They might be victorious and return with resources and spoils of war, or they might not be, being forced to hide in the swamp or the decaying vegetation, praying to escape the notice of the monsters.


    If an apprentice wanted to be stronger, they had to experience such tragic and stressful situations several times. It was because they continued to grow from their victories and defeats that they were able to be stronger.


    In their eyes, the ck Forest was thend of the magical creatures and a paradise for monsters. It was also the battlefield from which they obtained resources. Yet, at this moment, they were riding upon the legendary manticore, flying far above all those frightening beasts below. They were freely weaving through the trees, flying acrosskes, and making their way past mountains and rivers.


    This rxed andfortable feeling was a refreshing one to experience!


    It was also the real might of an adept. Even a powerful magical creature could only beg for its life and be an obedient ve when ced before an omnipotent adept.


    This feeling was pretty goddamn good!

 Chapter 408 Bad News

    Chapter 408 Bad News


    The arrival of Meryl and the others certainly made the tower more lively than before.


    Moreover, they had brought plenty of daily necessities and supplies along with them, replenishing much of what the tower sorelycked.


    Greem gave the apprentices ess to the first and second levels and had them slowly develop the two floors. Meanwhile, he brought Snox and Meryl to the meeting hall on the fourth floor to discuss other matters.


    Snox took out his sack and handed it over to Greem in front of Meryl. The one hundred and twenty thousand magical crystals he mentioned were inside. However, this time Snox honestly admitted that Alice had sent them through a witch¡¯s tradingpany.


    "Alice would never send such a huge number of crystals without any reason. Did she say anything else?" An ominous feeling rose in Greem¡¯s heart.


    "The messenger she sent had a message. ¡¯Be careful of the assault of the magical creatures!¡¯" Meryl replied.


    Her words shocked Greem. The young fire adept lowered his head in contemtion.


    Assault of the magical creatures?


    Other people might not understand the implications of this sentence, but something shed through Greem¡¯s mind when he heard this reminder; an ¡¯interesting¡¯ story that he had read in ancient tomes arose in his mind.


    There were plenty of examples of magical creature attacks when adept powers had tried to encroach upon the ck Forest.


    It was almost as if the magical creatures had a stubborn belief that human expansion into the woods would profoundly affect and deteriorate their living environment. That was why they wouldunch reckless assaults on the humans whenever they tried to move into the ck Forest. Sometimes the magical creatures even gathered together to coordinate a siege effort against human settlements near the ck Forest.


    In the past, Greem had only thought of these as battles between human adepts and powerful magical creatures. He thought these were battles for territory. He felt that as long as he was cautious not to infringe upon thends of the powerful magical creatures, he would never be in serious trouble.


    However, Alice¡¯s reminder made it impossible for Greem to not reconsider the possibility of an assault by the magical creatures!


    He had rarely gone out from the underground since he arrived in guewood. Naturally, it was impossible for him to have trespassed into any creature¡¯s territory. Then what was it that made his existence intolerable to the magical creature lords?


    Others might not be able to answer this question, but Greem had a vague idea.


    The adept¡¯s tower!


    With the establishment of the tower, the wandering magical energies would unavoidably be extracted from the surroundings to maintain its daily functions. This function resulted in an artificial drain of magic!


    The distribution of magical elementium varied from ce to ce. The more energy the tower extracted from the air, the thinner the density of elementium in the surroundings. This minor change wasn¡¯t significant to the ordinary woond beasts, but it was as in as day to magical creatures who possessed supernatural abilities.


    Truthfully, the magical creatures were magical beings born from immersion in the dense concentration of elementium. They were very sensitive to the flow and change of elementium particles. How could they possibly allow an outsider to do as they wanted in theirnd? To rob them of the elementium that they relied upon to survive?


    That was why the tower had be the target of the magical creature lords¡¯ hostility the moment the elementium altar had activated!


    Greem promptly called upon Gargamel once he understood what was happening. He had Gargamel contact Eva the forest spirit. As expected, Eva sent back news of disturbances among the magical creatures. It seemed they were all gradually gathering towards guewood.


    It was only now that Greem understood why Alice had taken the effort to send a messenger and a hundred and twenty thousand magical crystals to him. It wasn¡¯t to help with his construction of the tower, but to help with the defense of the tower!


    The elementium altar had been functioning for a day and a night at this point, but the liquid magical energy in the pool wasn¡¯t even enough topletely cover the bottom of the pool. That also wasn¡¯t taking into ount the secondary elementium pools and tertiary magic pools. The magical energies in those pools still existed in the gaseous state. They weren¡¯t dense enough to be converted into liquid yet.


    Most of the wandering elementium that the tower absorbed on a daily basis was being used to maintain and modify the environment within the tower. Only a small portion of the energy was directed towards the elementium pool. If the magical creatures attacked, the tower would have to activate all of its defense systems. When that happened, the wandering elementium particles wouldn¡¯t be enough to sustain the consumption of energy.


    Greem had the chip do an elementary calction.


    If the tower shut down all unnecessary magical facilities and runic arrays, then the elementium altar would probably be able to generate twenty-seven to twenty-eight magical crystals every day. However, in doing so, it would expose the adepts and the apprentices to the harsh conditions of the environment around them.


    The underground world was a dry, warm, and deste ce to live in without environmental control. No one could tolerate living under such conditions!


    On the other hand, activating the tower¡¯s defenses would take twelve to fifteen magical crystals per day. If they wanted to run the necessary magical facilities, the consumption of magical crystals would go up to twenty to twenty-two magical crystals per day.


    After all, there were many magic doors, defensive arrays, rm arrays, and detection crystals within the tower. All these things consumed magical energy when they were activated. If one were to take into consideration the voodoo beasts, golem constructs, and the magical garden that were to be added afterward, the consumption of energy was going to increase further!


    Trying to rely on an adept¡¯s tower as the sole means to procure magical crystal was a childish and absurd line of thought.


    It was also why most adept¡¯s towers only activated the lowest degree of defenses during peaceful times!


    Once war erupted and all the defenses were activated, the tower instantly became a money pit. The rate at which it devoured magical crystals was enough to make any adept cry in anguish and grief.


    Greem was in a disastrous situation right now. Other adept¡¯s towers might have several decades and even a century¡¯s worth of magical energy reserves. However, his adept¡¯s tower had absolutely nothing. His warehouse and treasury were so empty a mouse would starve to death if it were trapped inside. More importantly, Greem didn¡¯t have anything resembling a magical crystal reserve. His entire tower was practically operating stark naked!


    Was he going to use a tower like this was for war?


    As he held them in his hands, Greem immediately understood the significance of the magical crystals that Snox had given him.


    These weren¡¯t magical crystals! These were the lifeline of the tower he was standing on right now!


    Greem would probably have grabbed his head and cried out loud if he were the only one in the room right now. However, at the moment, two of his subordinates were looking at him. Greem had no choice but to hide the feelings in his heart, regardless of how upset he was.


    Greem smiled. (Even though he really wanted to cry!)


    "Things aren¡¯t all that bad!" Greem rested his head against his hand as he thought, "First, this tower isn¡¯t up on the surface. It won¡¯t be easy to siege, even for a horde of magical creatures. Their numbers won¡¯t matter if they get lost in this dark and sprawlingbyrinth. That¡¯s the best and most convenient ce to set up the first line of defense!"


    "Second, this is only the edge of the ck Forest. The possibility of a Second Grade magical creature showing up isn¡¯trge. If it¡¯s only a group of First Grade magical creatures, we can rely on the tower¡¯s defenses to hold up against them. If things go well, we might even be able to counterattack and make a profit out of this."


    "Most importantly, we have a sea ofva beneath our feet. If anyone angers me, I can draw upon the tower¡¯s powers and extract theva from below to flood this cavern. What can those creatures do when that happens?"


    After a logical analysis of the situation, Greem slowly listed all the advantages and disadvantages they had on their side. To his surprise, he found that they weren¡¯t in an entirely passive position. It was only now that Greem realized the reason Alice had so strongly supported his construction of a tower here.


    This location was an excellent ce that was entirelypatible with his future development!


    There were norge adept ns nearby, and there were no terrifying magical creatures. It allowed Greem to avoid being harassed and troubled while he expanded his influence and power. Furthermore, there was a hidden sea of volcanicva beneath guewood. This resource had incredible significance to Greem¡¯s personal growth and development.


    He only needed to resist this attack by the magical creatures. When the light of his tower shone upon the nearby forest, this small stretch of the ck Forest would be his territory. If the magical creatures were unable to drive him away, then they would have no other option but to leave this ce, migrating to foreignnds to find a new home.


    However, there weren¡¯t that many safe territories for these creatures to migrate to in the ck Forest. For the sake of their tribe and their species, these magical creatures had to band together tounch a frenzied attack at Greem¡¯s adept tower.


    Soon, Greem would face a tough defensive battle!


    ............


    Stonehammer Ruins.


    A forest of stone pirs shaped by weathering throughout the ages, fifteen kilometers east of guewood.


    Eva the forest spirit stood alone atop a tall stone pir. The stones here had been shaved away and worn by wind and rain. Some were thick, while others were thin. Some were tall while some were short; not one of them looked alike.


    Looking from above the stone pir, Eva saw that everything around here was a dull world colored in only yellows and ck. Countless valleys, caves, and stone forests had been covered by the towering ck trees, forming theplex geography of this ce, as well as creating the perfect shelter for various magical creatures.


    Who knew how many dangerous fellows lurked in the shadows and the caves here, silently observing everything?


    All the adept-level magical creature leaders had gathered here today, answering the call of the most senior of them all¨C T, the Demon-Hunting Spider. They were aggressively discussing the presence of the human adepts that had appeared in the manticores¡¯ territory.


    They had all felt the change in magical energy around the guewood.


    The strange trembling and drain of magical elementium posed a dire threat to all the magical creatures present. Many of the oldest magical creatures instantly determined the existence of an adept¡¯s tower; there was no other way to exin the phenomenon.


    Adept¡¯s Tower!


    The expressions on the faces of all magical creatures changed when they heard this name.


    This...this was a name that all magical creatures hated and feared!


    Because hearing that name meant that a considerable price had to be paid.


    Theirnd, their hunting grounds, and even their lives!

 Chapter 409 Dance of Monsters

    Chapter 409 Dance of Monsters


    Several strange creatures of varying shapes and sizes took up the entire space of the stone forest. Amongst them was a Three-Headed Demon Hound, a Dark Tentacr, and a Giant Berserk Gda.


    Even though these creatures weren¡¯t on particrly friendly terms, they still managed to suppress their displeasure out of respect for Lord T¡¯s overwhelming power. They just exchanged hostile looks from a distance. Irrelevant characters such as forest spirits and two-headed ogres could only wait outside the stone forest, waiting upon themands of the magical creature lords.


    "Almost everyone is here. It is about time we start our operation!" The first to speak was an ettercap. It was one of the many aberrant descendants of the veteran lord T.


    It looked like a human standing upright, yet it was a monster with the ugly appearance of a bug.


    Its words usually conveyed the will of Lord T!


    The Three-Headed Demon Hound raised its three wicked heads covered with rough and thick fur. All six of its crimson eyes fell upon the ettercap as it spoke, "And the n? We can¡¯t recklessly rush at the human adept¡¯s tower like this. If the n fails, you spiders can still return underground, but we who live on the surface will have to flee. We need a n for this battle!"


    As the leader of the fiend hounds in the area sixty kilometers northwest of guewood, Unguja was the only three-headed demon hound in his pack. His three heads didn¡¯t just give him three separate attributes in the form of wind, fire, and poison. They also allowed him to possess superior intelligence.


    He might not be the most powerful lord in this stretch of the ck Forest, but he was undoubtedly one of the smartest and slyest of them all.


    Fiend Hounds were a type of wolf-like magical creature that could transform into either a wolf or a goblin. Their actual appearance was that of a wolf with goblin features. They had frightening jaws and sharp ws. They were no different from wolves while they were still cubs. Every single part of them was the same, except for their size and their nails. When a fiend hound reached adolescence, its skin color would turn darker and darker, first bing a shade of red and blue before finally turningpletely blue.


    There was a unique evolutionary form among the fiend hounds, and that was the elite-ss three-headed demon hound. The bloodline inherited from Cerberus awakened within their bodies. Apart from their strong and powerful jaws, each of the three heads possessed unique magical abilities. The green head on the left could instantly fire wind des, the red head on the right could shoot a chain of fireballs, while the main head in the middle possessed the poison breath skill.


    Compared to the power of his attacks, the three-headed demon hound had nothing much in the way of defense. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have been relegated to his current position as one of the weakest magical creature lords. The Demon Hound might have a thick hide, but his thin and long waist was his biggest weakness. He had no means of resisting or enduring the swift strikes of stronger beasts.


    Thus, even though the Demon Hound loved ughter, he had to resort to more underhanded means. Ambushes and sneak attacks were his favorite tactics; he rarely ever fought an enemy head-on.


    "I agree with Unguja¡¯s opinion. We need a n. Otherwise, I¡¯d have reason to suspect that this is a conspiracy to exhaust our strength!" The first to concur was a giant Dark Tentacr that looked like a squid.


    M¡¯uru, the only Dark Tentacr in this entire area. He had the muscr body of a teenage human, but everything from his waist downwards had been reced with thick and long tentacles. Furthermore, there were many fleshy extensions where his hands and fingers were supposed to be. The limbs continuously intertwined and pulsed; it was a disgusting sight to behold.


    M¡¯uru waspletely naked. There wasn¡¯t a piece of clothing or armor on his upper body. A strange cloud of ck mist perpetually shrouded his body. His pitch-ck eyes sent shivers down a person¡¯s spine, even when it was still bright outside.


    As a lonesome but powerful magical creature, M¡¯uru had no tribe members or evenpanions. However, his potent dark magic and capable closebat skills made him a challenging foe. Not many in this forest dared to provoke him.


    "T, if your goal is to expel these human adepts, we will willingly follow behind you. However, we must see your spider army during the fight. Otherwise..." This time it was a Medusa that spoke. It was Dana, a medusa that had justpleted her metamorphosis.


    As one of the known magical creature lords in this area, Dana the Medusa had seven or eight gorgons as subordinates, as well as a hundred underground creatures that acted as her servants. She was an elite-ss earth magical creature. She had the alluring body of a pretty human girl and the slender tail of a rattlesnake. However, her hair was what was truly terrifying. It wasposed of countless tiny, creeping serpents.


    Moreover, her beautiful eyes would asionally let out a frightening shine. Everyone looking into her eyes would find themselves consumed by Petrification magic.


    She was nude as well. However, a thinyer of purple and ck scales covered her proud bosom. Her exposed skin was soft, smooth, and white. Her slender arms looked weak and harmless, but they had the strength in them to tear a tiger apart.


    Apart from T the Demon-Hunting Spider and his countless descendants, Dana was the most powerful and influential of the magical creature lords in this area!


    The arrogant ettercap didn¡¯t dare take the words of the medusa lightly. He could only step aside and reveal his gigantic ancestor. Demon-Hunting Spider T.


    The spider took two steps forward. T¡¯s massive body took up Dana¡¯s entire vision. The medusa couldn¡¯t help but fall silent and leaned backward slightly. The sheer size of T was far too overwhelming. She continued to stare cautiously at this domineering magical creature lord.


    Every area of the ck Forest had one such magical creature lord; a being of imposing power. They used their strength to hold onto the most bountifulnds, and wielded the influence tomand the surrounding magical creatures.


    Anyone that went against their will would be exiled or eaten. There were no exceptions!


    That was why even Dana the Medusa, with all her power and influence, didn¡¯t dare to challenge T, who was eldest and most senior of all the magical creatures.


    Purple light glowed in the manypound eyes on the demon-hunting spider¡¯s head. However, his mouth didn¡¯t move. He spoke with his Spiritual Voice, allowing everyone present to understand his thoughts through telepathy.


    "The human adepts must die!" T¡¯s voice was exceptionally rough and coarse, as if there were hundreds and thousands of chittering voices speaking at once, "The adept¡¯s tower must fall! Otherwise, our ck Forest will devolve! It will degrade! I will not tolerate this oue!"


    Now that the magical creature lord had given the deration of war, there was no more that needed discussing.


    "Three days," T¡¯s voice continued to sound in the hearts of all the magical creature lords, "You have only three days! Three days from now, you must bring all your subordinates here. Then, we willunch our attack, destroy the tower, and kill the adepts! Anyone who isn¡¯t present will have to face punishment from me."


    As T threatened them, countless tiny spiders the size of fists emerged from underground, from the canopy, from the bushes, and from the cracks between the rocks. They shed their fangs menacingly at all the magical creatures present.


    These tiny spiders were extremely weak individually, but there were far too many of them. Even elite-ss magical creatures would have a hard time escaping without a scratch if so many spiders swarmed them at once.


    The faces of the magical creature lords turned green, but no one publicly opposed T¡¯s orders.


    As magical creatures, they very well aware of the consequences of allowing an adept¡¯s tower to secure itself in this spot. The opponent would eventually exterminate them like prey in the wild. Thus, T¡¯s orders sounded harsh to the ears, but they were the correct course of action. They had no reason to object!


    ............


    A short momentter, Greem received the image-recording crystal that Eva had sent back.


    Even Greem, with his calm demeanor, couldn¡¯t help but draw a cold breath when he saw all the magical creature lords in the crystal.


    T, the demon-hunting spider, was most likely a magical creature at the peak of elite-ss. It meant that he would very likely have a portion of a Second Grade magical creature¡¯s strength. Greem wasn¡¯t sure he could survive an ambush by a monster like this!


    The other magical creature lords, such as the Three-Headed Demon Hound, the Medusa, the Dark Tentacr, the Berserk Gda, and the Wyvern King were all powerful elite-level magical creatures. Any single one of them alone would have been a troublesome opponent. Greem had no guarantee he could beat any of them in a duel.


    Not to mention the numerous ordinary magical creatures. Minotaurs, Berserk Gdas, Houndfiends, Ettercaps. Even someone of Eva¡¯s caliber was only one against a horde of hundreds and thousands. She would barely be a deciding factor during the war.


    Compared to these mighty creatures, the more numerous critter-like magical creatures didn¡¯t even draw Greem¡¯s attention.


    Greem had already made up his mind. Once the monsters reached the caverns, he would pull out all the stops. He was going to flood them with fire!


    A bottomless sea ofva rested right beneath the tower. If he could draw out thisva and inject it into the caverns, he would inflict massive damage upon the magical creatures. He didn¡¯t know how many of the powerful ones would die, but the weaker ones were doomed!


    They were currently outnumbered, outmatched, and the tower had no magical energy reserves to speak. However, the conclusion of the battle was not as obvious as it seemed.


    These rural monsters that stayed cooped up in their homes would never be able to imagine the true extent of cruelty and savagery that an adept was capable of!


    Greem had decided. If those magical creatures dared toe, he would leave them asting impression that they would never forget.


    Trying to outwit a human adept?


    Heh! Greem still had plenty of tricks up his sleeves!

 Chapter 410 The Ferocious Horde

    Chapter 410 The Ferocious Horde


    Three dayster.


    The area surrounding guewood had turned into a sea of beasts.


    The ground trembled, and the woods howled.


    Countless iron rhinoceroses, razor boars, leopards, and pythons emerged from the depths of the forest. Their numbers swelled and flooded thend like an unstoppable tsunami. Behind them, packs of wolves, lions, and tigers roared and sprinted on the ground. Apes and baboons swung from tree to tree, letting out loud shouts as they did so.


    From the skies, one could see countless beasts trampling across the mountainous terrain roaring, and even fighting amongst themselves. Surging ck dots nketed the entire forest. Lions, tigers, oxen, bears, boars, leopards, giant lizards, serpents, and even bats and owls were in the mix. Every single one of them was hastening towards guewood with all they had.


    The magical creature lords had driven all the animals under their rule out of their dens. Every single beast headed towards the adepts. They picked up even more ordinary woond beasts along the way. By the time they reached guewood, their party had turned into a small-scale stampede.


    The manticores that used to rule guewood didn¡¯t show themselves. The rioting beasts quickly entered the cave and headed straight for the underground through the dark tunnels. The bats that lived in the cave were caught by surprise. They pped their wings and took to the skies, lingering there like an ominous ck cloud.


    However, with the arrival of powerful flying creatures, the reluctant bats promptly abandoned their home and dispersed into the surrounding woods.


    A Magic Eye created from concentrated fire elementium observed everything from high in the air. It was trying its best to focus on the few enormous magical creatures among the beasts.


    A dozen magical creature lords stood tall upon some boulders in front of the cave. They continuouslymanded and drove the beasts into the underground cavern.


    The stealthy Magic Eye slowly swept past the magical creature lords. Inside the adept¡¯s tower, Greem and Gargamel discreetly examined these invaders through a connected mirror.


    Unguja, the Three-Headed Demon Hound was standing atop a boulder. He let out a strange howl when he opened his fearsome maw. Fourteen drooling and sniffing fiend hounds stood before him; they acted as temporary supervisors for the horde, continually growling and driving the beasts forward.


    There was Dana, the terrifying Medusa who possessed the appearance of a beauty, a long snake¡¯s tail, and snakes for hair. Elegant purple and ck scales filled her lower half¡¯s snake body. She had the beautiful face of a human woman. A thinyer of green scales only covered her four-meter-long body and naked torso beneath her chest.


    Dana¡¯s bountiful bosom swayed with every action she took. It was an alluring sight. She carried a strange longbow on her back that seemed to be a powerful magical weapon.


    She tried to stand on her tail as upright as she could, making herself seem more massive and intimidating than the other magical creatures around her.


    Seven hissing gorgons holding shortbows in their hands gathered in front of her. They didn¡¯t look much different from a medusa other than the much duller color of their scales. Only two of the seven gorgons had reached adept-level. The other five were all somewhere between pseudo-adept and advanced apprentice-level.


    A dozen muscr minotaurs surrounded the gorgons.


    They looked like towering humans with the heads of bulls. The minotaurs were approximately two meters tall when they stood straight. They weighed over three hundred and twenty kilograms, with hair all over their bodies and a giant pair of horns on their heads. Their arms were the same as a human¡¯s; five fingers on a hand, opposable thumbs, with ws where their nails should be. Their feet had the same hooves as cows.


    The minotaurs wore metal rings in their noses. Their every breath caused their nose ring to vibrate and tter. Their angry, bloodshot eyes swept across the horde. Foot-long scars were not umon among these fearsome creatures. They heldrge axes in their hands as if they were ready to lunge at any moment.


    These minotaurs were clearly the low-level magical creatures serving under the Medusa. They were loyally standing guard around the gorgons, cautiously looking out for any ¡¯enemies¡¯ that mighte too close!


    Apart from these impressive magical creature lords, there was also the Giant Berserk Gda Cracklefang, the Wyvern King Rrakk, and the Ettercap Guri. These strange creatures gathered near the entrance of the cave like the Monster¡¯s Encyclopediae to life. They silently awaited the main character of today¡¯s battle.


    They didn¡¯t wait long. Once the vast horde of beasts had entered the cave, a flood of terrifying Spiderites emerged from the ck Forest. Their numbers were shocking as they swallowed the entire field of vision of anyone looking at the ce.


    The Spiderites were the size of a fist. The creatures had hairy bodies with purple stripes, four pairs of slim spider legs, and a rounded abdomen.


    T¡¯s gigantic body slowly appeared before everyone, escorted by his spiderites.


    "Now that everyone is here, let the battle begin!" T¡¯s mental voice rang out in the minds of the magical creature lords, "I cannot wait to taste the sweet flesh of human adepts. Wake up, my children."


    The number of spiders in the forest exponentially increased as T gave this order. Countless spiders of all species and sizes flooded out of nowhere, instantly drowning some more unfortunate beasts that had yet to enter the cave with their numbers.


    Chittering sounds and the strange sound of biting and tearing came out from within the sea of spiders.


    The silhouettes of the beasts disappeared. Only a small hill of spiders was visible. When the hill finally dispersed and the spiders left, a pile of white bones was all that remained.


    No magical creature lords dared raise any objections that they had to these incidents of friendly fire. They could only manage their subordinates and keep them out of the way of the spider army.


    T the Demon-Hunting Spider and veteran lord present did not seem to betray any expression on its ¡¯face.¡¯ It extended its sturdy legs and left deep marks on the rock walls of the cave.


    "Come, it is about time we enter!"


    The magical creature lords followed behind the spider army under T¡¯s lead and slowly entered the bat cave.


    ............


    The battle on the frontlines had turned into a bloody one long before the lords moved out.


    As the rulers of guewood, the manticores possessed unchallenged influence in the underground world.


    They had already gone deep underground and gathered all the underground creatures before the enemy had arrived. All these underground creatures had been directed towards the upper levels of the underground world. They were the first enemies the surface beasts had to face when they entered this dark and confusingbyrinth. These were cold-blooded assassins that hid in the shadows and in between the rocks.


    Stone Serpents, Petrifying Lizards, Hook Horrors, Dwarves, Beholders, Gnolls, Lizardmen, Birdmen...


    These creatures that lived underground were all experts at ambushes and sneak attacks. They hid in every corner of the tunnels. Whenever prey passed by them, they lunged and used their poisonous fang or unique talents to disable the victim instantly.


    Their ambushes caused severe losses to the first forest creatures that entered the tunnels. All those beasts had been turned into food.


    Yet there were too many of them.


    The silent and unassuming tunnels had transformed into a bustling market. Roars, howls, and calls echoed everywhere. The underground creatures didn¡¯t even have time to feast after their kills. Already they were faced with a new wave of enemies.


    These underground beasts had never before seen such a sight. They didn¡¯t have the will to continue their ughter. Every single one of them chose to avoid the stampede. This unstoppable force trampled all the unfortunate ones who were unable to evade it into the ground.


    It was still alright if they were being stepped on by the likes of wolves and leopards. However, there were manyrge ck bears and ferocious razor boars in the horde of animals. Even the Petrifying Lizards, with their thick scales, could not survive such torture.


    The sounds of biting jaws and tearing fangs filled every corner of the winding tunnels. Tragic howls and angered roars mixed in with the sounds of fighting and killing. One by one, lives were snuffed out in these dark and unseen corners of the underground!


    From the entrance of the cave, all the way to the caverns where the adept¡¯s tower was located, the corpses of the underground creatures littered the ground, and their blood stained the tunnels. The weaker animals didn¡¯t even have corpses remaining by the time the savage beasts trampled past them. They had been reduced to an unrecognizable pile of blood and flesh.


    The underground creatures had defended the tunnels to the best of their abilities, but they were still unable to resist the overwhelming numbers of the surface creatures. In less than thirty minutes, this army of underground creatures had been exterminated. The unrestrained stampede continued to charge towards the depth of the underground!


    Over three thousand surface creatures had died in the undergroundbyrinth in these mere thirty minutes. The underground creatures had killed only four hundred enemies. The remainder had all died to the chaotic rush of their own allies.


    These surface creatures that had been driven into this cave were not used to the pitch-ck environment of the underground. Here, they could not see anything or determine direction at all.


    The beasts charging at the very front had all run into the walls of the cave. And if they stalled for a single moment, they would immediately be trampled to death by theirpanions pushing forward from the back. If they didn¡¯t want to die, they could only charge ahead without any regard for direction. As long as there was a path forward, they continued to run down that direction.


    It was through such barbaric means that the monsters were able to use their overwhelming numbers to fill thebyrinth tunnels and slowly approach the tower.

 Chapter 411 Prelude

    Chapter 411 Prelude


    Inside the tower.


    Most of the detection crystals and Magic Eyes ced along the tunnel had been discovered and destroyed by the enemy. Only a few of them continued to transmit the situation outside to the water mirror in the hall.


    The apprentices stationed in the tower gulped in fear when they saw the horrifying sight before them. Thousands and thousands of beasts charging through the cave. They were silently reassessing their decision to stay here.


    The tunnels in the underground cave extended in every direction. Cracks and valleys led somewhere in almost every single part of the cave. As long as they escaped the tower, ran far away, and found somece to hide, they might still be able to survive this disaster that they had never asked for.


    The difference in power was so disproportionate that even Greem¡¯s pseudo-adept level disciples had lost their confidence in victory. Most of them secretly hoped Greem would give the order to run. A few of them still had a chance at surviving if he did so.


    Once the horde surrounded the tower, what were they supposed to use to escape? There was no teleportation array in here!


    The apprentices were painstakingly thinking up a method of escape, even as they continued to work hard on the duties assigned to them. None of them knew what was going to happen. In fact, none of them dared to think about what was about to happen!


    Even though their teacher¡¯s title as the me Demon was known throughout the Feidnan area, how many could he kill when faced against this endless sea of opponents? Did his strength even matter? There were at least five elite-level magical creatures among the magical creature lords, and seventeen adept-level magical creatures. Even the ordinary magical creatures numbered in the triple digits.


    On their side, only Greem could barely be considered an elite adept. Gargamel was a veteran adept, and Meryl was nothing more than a newly advanced adept. Apart from them, the most powerful of the tower¡¯s defense forces were the eleven manticores and Sabrina the robotic girl.


    Of the twelve apanying apprentices, five were pseudo-adepts, and seven were advanced apprentices.


    This number of people might have a chance against the army of beasts if they owned a fully functional adept¡¯s tower. However, this particr adept¡¯s tower was destitute. Even after a desperate attempt to save up energy over the past four days the elementium pool still wasn¡¯t filled to the brim. If war erupted, they would have trouble holding the line for more than an hour.


    In fact, their time would be even shorter if the battle was too intense!


    The apprentices didn¡¯t have a chance to see the energy room for themselves, but even an idiot that was thinking with their toe would know that the tower had no energy reserves.


    Still, for some reason, Greem¡¯s attitude was unusually determined!


    Hemanded the manticores to drive the underground creatures towards the invaders to buy time, but he didn¡¯t send any of his apprentices to fill up the bottomless pit that was the battlefield. It was impossible for the apprentices to stall the assault of the beasts at their level, especially when they had no significant cover or defense.


    That was why Greem didn¡¯t even bother to give such an order. Instead, he gathered all of them within the tower and assigned each of them to an offensive array. He, Gargamel, and Meryl would be responsible for defending the doors of the tower; that would undoubtedly be the most heavily contested area once the battle started! It would be where the most ferocious battle would break out!


    ............


    On the third hour since the start of the beast invasion, the monsters finally managed to make their way out of thebyrinth. One by one they continuously entered the caverns where the tower was.


    It was almost like a massive octopus hade to life in the caverns as the army of beasts continued to pour into the area. Their immense numbers soon took up every visible inch of space.


    On the ground, there were countless predators such as lions, tigers, and leopards. Of course, you also had terrifying magical creatures like forest trolls, forest spirits, berserk apes, razor boars, forest sloths, and lightning leopards. In the air, you had crows, pigeons, woodpeckers and other birds, along with true predators of the skies such as thunder rocs, wyverns, and griffins.


    In fact, there were many more harmless creatures within this tide of monsters, such as normal animals like deer, owls, and flower snakes. All these creatures packed into the caverns. They howled, roared, chirped, and called out in unison at the shining adept¡¯s tower in the middle of the cave.


    The moment they set foot in the caverns, a tremendous magical energy fluctuation emerged from the tower. A barrage of Magma Fireballs crashed into the ranks of the animals, trailing ck smoke in the air as they did so.


    Dong. Dong. Dong.


    It was like numerous grenades had exploded at the same time. The horde had barely made it into the caverns, and already beasts were being blown to pieces. The attacks inflicted severe injuries and death upon the unfortunate creatures. The violent me shockwaves sted everywhere, instantly exterminating all of the weaker animals. The sshing rain ofva swiftly killed offrge groups of animals.


    Ordinary woond beasts didn¡¯t stand a chance. Even ordinary magical creatures with basic magic resistance couldn¡¯t possibly survive against such powerful fireballs!


    The vanguard of the horde had been crushed the moment they entered the caverns!


    The more frightening aspect of the tower¡¯s attacks was the rain of fire and magma. The ground had already ignited from the zing heat. The hot temperature and the savage mes vaporized all the small critters that ventured too close.


    Those predators and birds with no magical resistance didn¡¯t even dare toe close to these magical fires. It didn¡¯t matter how many of them there were; only death awaited them if they continued forward!


    It wasn¡¯t your natural and ordinary fire. It was challenging to extinguish it by throwing bodies at it.


    That was why the ordinary beasts struggled and paused before the cavern when the magical mes sealed the entrance. However, theirpanions pushing from behind were not having any of it. They continued to advance, forcing the despairing animals at the front towards their doom.


    After his initial investigation of the species involved in the assault, Greem had calibrated most of the offensive arrays to release magma fireballs. The apprentice adepts didn¡¯t need to fight themselves. All they had to do wasfortably wait within the tower and hurl the magma fireballs in the direction that Greem pointed them at.


    To save the tower¡¯s energy, Greem did not erect a dome-shaped defensive forcefield. Instead, he invested almost every single bit of power into the offensive arrays.


    It was with these dozens of fireballs that Greem sessfully sealed the entrance of the caves. The horde of beasts would have to pay a hefty price if they wanted to enter.


    After the first wave of fireballs, the apprentices stopped their attacks and silently waited for Greem¡¯s next instructions.


    This assault was a clear demonstration of the destructiveness of fire spells!


    Most spells dissipated shortly after they took effect. However, the magma fireballs were able to create tiny seas of fire andva at the entrance to the caverns. As long as theva didn¡¯t solidify and cool, the sea of me would never vanish.


    That was why the mes were able to be sustained for such long periods of time, and why they were so hard to extinguish.


    The apprentices in the tower started cheering when they saw the effectiveness of their attacks.


    However, there was no time for Greem to rejoice. Amotion quickly stirred amid the beasts at the forefront.


    A thick cloud of birds flew over the beasts and screeched as they charged into the cavern. They quickly got into formation and dove towards the tower.


    Greem quickly scanned the birds with his Spirit from within the control hall and promptly dismissed their threat.


    He didn¡¯t think too highly of them merely because of their numbers and their intimidating looks. If one were to look closely at the birds, they would see that most of them weremon animals. Magical creatures like wyverns, thunder rocs, and griffins were a minority after all!


    A red light shed in Greem¡¯s hand. He mumbled under his breath, and an order immediately transmitted to the manticore leader.


    A window on the third level of the tower abruptly opened, and nine adept-level manticores stormed out into the cavern. They didn¡¯t engage the flock of birds. Instead, they started circling the adept¡¯s tower.


    Greem then gave the order, and the second wave of magma fireballs crashed towards the birds.


    Much like the first wave of attacks, the potent spells brought about utter devastation to the birds. It didn¡¯t matter how savage a bird it was. As long as they got a single speck ofva on their body, they instantly burst into a cluster of mes and burned to ashes.


    Only a few stragglers had been left alive fluttering in the air when the second wave of fireballs had settled.


    The manticore leader took this chance and led the adolescent manticores to strike at the exposed flying magical creatures. The two teenage manticores beat their wings and started a ughter among the ranks of the ordinary birds.


    For a moment, the sharp calls of all sorts of birds mixed with the furious roars of the manticores!


    Both parties shed in the air near the tower, ferociously crashing and tearing at each other. A rain of bird corpses and blood fell towards the ground.


    The manticores didn¡¯t dare travel more than a hundred meters away from the tower, regardless of how intense the fight became. This limit was a strict order that Greem had given them. Every time they were surrounded by too many magical creatures, they swiftly retreated into the defensive line of the tower. They would then use their ws to hang upon the walls as they rested for a moment.


    If the magical creatures dared to pursue them, they would be greeted with a red-hot fiery magma fireball. Within a hundred meter radius of the tower, only the small and agile flying magical creatures could sessfully dodge the fireballs. Massive beasts like wyverns were forced to use their wings to swat the fireballs away.


    Naturally, in doing so, they had to use their tough bodies to endure the exploding rain ofva and the ensuing me shockwave.


    When the first wyvern and the first griffin finally fell from the air, the magical flying creatures no longer dared to get close to the tower.


    Consequently, the manticores possessed far inferior numbers, but they were still able to wreak havoc with the protection of the tower. The number of flying creatures in the air was quickly plummeting.


    Yet, the pestering of the birds had their intended effect. They had bought enough time for the horde to break through the wall of me. Once again, they surged into the cavern like an unstoppable tide.

 Chapter 412 The Dagger is Revealed

    Chapter 412 The Dagger is Revealed


    Theck of effective leadership during the early stages caused the beast assault to be chaotic and messy.


    However, the arrival of the magical creature lords quickly brought organization to this unrestrained horde.


    The wild gdas were thrown into the formation and assigned to dealing with the viscousva. They broke off stgmites from the ground and threw them into theva pools to fill it up. They created a makeshift bridge of sorts, and the ravenous horde was finally able to rush into the hall.


    This time, they immediately spread throughout the cavern, preventing the tower from once again sealing their path. The animals filled up the entire ce like a terrifying tide.


    A dozen magical creature lords slowly moved into the hall, escorted by their most trusted subordinates. They each took up an area in the caverns and started assessing the adept¡¯s tower that stood before them.


    This structure was a mysterious tower made of volcanic rock.


    It wasn¡¯t all that tall. In fact, if the lords were to judge the building by its size only, then it was nothing more than a small tower. Moreover, there didn¡¯t seem to be any elementium light emitted by the tower. There wasn¡¯t a defensive forcefield in sight either. Based on all these signs, the tower was likely an iplete one that wasn¡¯t at its most powerful!


    The magical creature lords couldn¡¯t help but rejoice at the sight of this. All their concerns were wiped away.


    Human adepts were all frail, weak creatures. Theirbat ability was several times weaker than magical creatures of the same grade. However, they were still able to snatch away piece after piece of the ck Forest from the hundreds of thousands of magical creatures that lived there and turn those pieces into a prosperousnd that humans could live on.


    Why was that the case?


    Precisely because they had those ursed adept towers!


    It didn¡¯t matter how many mortals that the magical creatures ughtered. A human settlement would not cease to exist until they razed the adept¡¯s tower that protected to the ground. Hundreds and thousands of ordinary humans could die, and the adepts would simply move in more people from another area.


    ughtering humans would never be an effective means of hindering the advances of the adepts. After all, the humans reproduced at a rate that no magical creature could oppose. They had to destroy the adept¡¯s tower if they wanted to sever the greedy hands extended by the adepts. That was the only way to truly exile the adepts from their territory.


    However, to this day, examples of adept¡¯s towers falling to magical creatures were scarce throughout history.


    There was a simple reason for this; adept¡¯s towers were too powerful!


    They were like a tough tortoise¡¯s shell. The magical creatures had to endure a painful storm of spells and magic if they wanted to use their bodies to break the doors of the tower open. In such circumstances, the frailty and weakness of the human adept¡¯s body were hidden and irrelevant. In fact, remaining in their towers further amplified the strength and power of their magical abilities.


    Thus, the morale of the magical creature lords significantly rose when they saw the weak elementium defenses radiating from the tower.


    T pushed his thick and hairy legs as he slowly marched onto the battlefield. Every one of his limbs was like a sharp knife. His limbs stabbed right into the ground, regardless of how tough and hard it was, supporting his dense, massive body.


    With the entrance of T, innumerable spiderites of all sizes surged out from everywhere. From beneath the ground, cracks in the walls, and even from the tall ceiling in the hall ofva.


    Unfortunately, the adepts had sent out far too few guards. What forces they had were also fighting within a hundred meter radius of the tower. The vast army of spiders had no enemy to fight, and could only surge towards the looming tower.


    More and more magma fireballs fired from the tower.


    Every barrage of fireballs created a sea of fire across the entire cavern and sessfully exterminated any enemy that it struck. Theva and the mes wouldn¡¯t extinguish even after the impact, stubbornly burning on. Every time the towerunched a new wave of attacks, another stretch of the cavern was turned into a sea of fire that no being could step foot in.


    If the tower were allowed to continue its attacks, the entire cavern would ze with fire in less than fifteen minutes.


    While the beasts still ran around in an attempt to avoid the fires, twenty fire spiritsposed of pure elementium charged out of the tower. They surrounded the tower and recklessly spit elementium mes at the enemy.


    For a moment, manticores guarded the skies and fire spirits defended the tower on the ground. Ordinary beasts were ughtered to death before they could even get near. The more powerful magical creatures, on the other hand, would be focused on by magma fireballs if they came too near.


    Even creatures as strong as wyverns could only limp away in agony if one or two magma fireball hit them. Three magma fireballs hitting them at once would burn them to a crisp.


    The magical creature lords personally witnessed a bold iron rhinoceros charge towards the tower and rip two fire spirits to shreds. Yet the very next moment, three or four fireballs crashed towards it. A massive hole instantly blew through its mighty and ferocious body. It struggled as it took a few more steps before falling to the ground with a cry of pain.


    One side of its humongous body had been sted away. The aggressive fire elementium had vaporized all the flesh, organs, and bones. Only a ck mess of ash and burnt flesh remained on that half of its body.


    "We won¡¯t get anywhere with these small fries!" Dana the Medusa frowned, "Wild beasts are scared of fire. As long as they keep up a ring of fire around the tower, they will be able to ward off most of the beasts. If they do so, we cannot exert the advantage of our numbers!"


    "Let my children forge a path for you!" The one who spoke was the giant berserk gda who had thick ck fur all over its body.


    It charged forward and started beating its chest, letting out a deafening roar as it did so.


    Under his prompting, several dozen agile figures leaped out from the crowd and quickly closed in on the tower. Every time a magma fireball shot out of the tower, they would pick up a piece of rock from the ground and throw it at the fireball.


    The sshingva epassed arge area after the fireball had detonated before hitting its target, but it was far less lethal to the beasts now. Several iron rhinoceros hurriedly formed a cleaning crew and crushed all the elementium fire spirits under cover of the gdas.


    These Berserk Gdas that excelled at throwing projectiles had intercepted all the magma fireballs flying out of the tower!


    Without the tower¡¯s support, the manticores in the air were slowly being pushed back.


    A terrible and long howl came from the skies; two wyverns had surrounded an adolescent manticore. It plummeted from the air as it continued to bite at its enemies.


    This was only the start!


    TThe flock of flying creatures surrounded the manticores now that they had lost their earlier advantage. Both parties fought and bit and tore at each other ferociously. The wounds on the manticores gradually grew more and more severe. They had no choice but to return to the adept¡¯s tower.


    Finally, without the manticores and the fire spirits holding the line, the horde could finally advance on this tall tower!


    A thick, muffled boom rang out in the cavern.


    All the adepts and apprentices within the tower could feel it trembling.


    The tide of monsters surrounded the tower and squeezed out every single drop of ferocity and savagery they had within them. They crashed against the tower with their bodies and struck at its tough walls with all they had.


    If this had been under normal circumstances, a dome-shaped defensive forcefield would have protected the tower. All invaders would first have had to break through this shield before they could touch the tower itself. However, this tower could not do so due to itsck of energy reserves. The best it could do was send all its elementium energy to all of the offensive arrays spread across the tower.


    That was why this tower was utterly exposed and used the durability of the tower itself to resist the attacks of the horde!


    Phew, phew, phew.


    Several magma fireballs sted and shattered the ground around the tower. Theva and fire devoured all life within a ten-meter radius of the impact.


    Every wave of attack from the tower reaped the lives of over a hundred forest beats. However, the density of the beasts around the tower was only bing greater after a dozen fireball barrages. If it weren¡¯t for the broad areas ofva and fire clearing out some space in the caverns, there would not be a single ce for anyone to stand!


    Greem stood within his tower. His spirit consciousness connected deeply with the entirety of the tower.


    He looked from high in the sky and saw tens of thousands of beasts attacking the tower all at once. They dealt significant injury to the tower¡¯s structural integrity. Greem could sense cracks appearing on the outeryer of the stone wall. rms and sirens continuously went off in his mind.


    Yet despite the danger and urgency of the situation, Greem remained as calm as ever!


    His attention was not on these foot soldiers at all. He silently observed the magical creature lords. Only their actions concerned Greem.


    The reason he had been so patient in waiting out and enduring the storm was so that he could bait these monsters onto the battlefield. It would be a shame if those guys weren¡¯t at the frontlines when he finally revealed his trump card!


    Outside the tower, the horde¡¯s attack continued.


    Countless beasts and magical creatures frantically dug away at the unyielding rock floor and the reinforced walls. They were trying to undermine the tower¡¯s foundation. A dozen iron rhinoceros, berserk gdas, and razors boars had gotten into a formation in front of the doors of the adept¡¯s tower. They wildly charged and threw themselves at the adamantium doors.


    The dull hammering reverberated throughout the caverns. One could hear the savage and wild roars of the savage beasts every time they crashed against the doors.


    Their morale and passion had infected the magical creature lords as well. The lords slowly moved forward and soon ventured within two hundred meters of the tower.


    And this range was the best distance for Greem to trigger his trap! It was a distance he had already calcted beforehand!


    Greem sensed themotion outside the tower. He gritted his teeth and raised his right arm. A transparent magical crystal rested in his palm, shing with strange lights.


    Greem crushed the crystal!

 Chapter 413 Unavoidable Battle

    Chapter 413 Unavoidable Battle


    Adept¡¯s Tower, Energy Room.


    Gargamel sulked as he dutifully performed his task.


    It wasn¡¯t anythingplicated. All Gargamel had to do was toss the mountain of beautiful magical crystals into the pool and watch as they turned into pure magical energy to be drained away by the tower¡¯s defense system.


    His continuous efforts poured one hundred and forty thousand magical crystals into the elementium pool, but these crystals were quickly vanishing as the battle raged on.


    It was fortunate that Greem hadn¡¯t activated the defensive forcefield. Otherwise, the thousands of instances of attacks per second would have been a fatal blow to the tower. The magical crystals here would never have been able to hold on for very long.


    In light of this, Greem had decisively given up on the forcefield and relied on the tower¡¯s durability to endure the attacks from outside. Most of the energy was redirected to the offensive arrays instead. Magma fireballs were being shot out of the tower at every second, relentlessly clearing out the horde of beasts.


    And every time Meryl and the apprentices concluded one round of a barrage, ayer of the magical crystals vanished from the elementium pool.


    Even though Gargamel had already mentally prepared himself for the task, he still felt like a stray cat was scratching away at his heart when he saw the mountain of crystals slowly disappear. The feeling of pity and loathing at watching such wasteful use of money was unimaginable.


    As a wandering adept, Gargamel had no fixed source of crystal ie. He had always traded away his potions in exchange for what he needed. Moreover, he had to be extremely cautious in his dealings to avoid the attention and greed of n adepts and other opportunistic ¡¯wolves.¡¯


    That was why poverty was the mostmon trait of all wandering adepts!


    This was the first time Gargamel had ever seen so many crystals. He felt the impulse to just run into the mountain of magical crystals and roll around. Naturally, his heart bled when he saw the magical crystals vanishing at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    Gargamel gritted his teeth and was about to pour even more crystals in the pool when the tower started trembling intensely. Half of the remaining crystals immediately vanished from the pool.


    Operation All Will Burn has started?


    Gargamel jerked his head up and tried to get a sense for what was happening outside through his control authority over the tower.


    The tower continued to shake, but it was a whole different sight outside.


    ............


    This stampede that T had initiated included almost every single creature in a three hundred and fifty-kilometer radius of guewood.


    Their numbers were immense, but it was far from being inexhaustible.


    At this moment, most of those animals had already been herded into the underground tunnels and caverns. Every single inch of space had been taken up.


    Yet, just as the beasts were continuing to assault the tower, the sound of a tremendous explosion rang out from underneath guewood. A massive fissure abruptly appeared on the earthen hill where guewood stood. A thick pir of dust and dirt was expelled a hundred meters into the air.


    The sudden change in geography caused violent earthquakes, dislocation in the rockyers, and a destructive volcanic eruption.


    Much of the intricate undergroundbyrinth started copsing, and many more areas distorted and dislocated, sealed off by falling rocks and crumbling walls.


    At the same time, the adept¡¯s tower started glowing brilliantly.


    The crimson walls of the tower began to emit blinding scarlet light under the effects of an unbelievably dense concentration of fire elementium. A bright red light illuminated the entire cavern.


    The floors around the tower¡¯s foundation turned crimson as they heated up. Countless cracks appeared on the ground. Terrifying me streams of shocking temperature surged out from underneath, immediately sting many beasts towards the ceiling of the caverns. By the time they fell back to the ground, they had already been turned into charred bones.


    The heat had instantly vaporized their flesh!


    The previously excited beasts started panicking. They frantically ran as they avoided the pirs of me and hot air from under their feet. The entire hall plunged into chaos.


    "The enemy is activating some kind of powerful spell. We have to stop him!" As expected of a veteran lord that had lived for a thousand years, T wasn¡¯t fazed by the sudden turn of events. In fact, he braved the harsh environment and unpredictable spouts of fire as he lunged towards the source of all this abnormality¨C the adept¡¯s tower.


    The other magical creature lords that had only been spectating up until now hastily followed after him.


    However, the fissures in the ground were no longer limited to the immediate surroundings of the tower. Instead, they were quickly spreading throughout the entire cavern. The explosions of hot air and fire promptly subsided as a pungent sulfuric odor filled the whole cave. Red and viscousva followed after. It swelled up from underground and quickly started to flow down the volcanic floor.


    The magical creature lords would not be afraid if this were only a littleva that had been brought up to the surface by the hot air currents. However,va continued to surge out from below. Ayer of red and boilingva covered the entire ground. It was a lethal disaster for all the beasts packed into the hall.


    They were merely predators and wild beasts that reigned in their small stretch of the forest. They had no magically resistant skin, nor did they possess excellent escape abilities. How were they supposed to survive this wave of magma with their bodies of flesh and blood?


    Numerous beasts frantically hurried towards higher ground, climbing onto stone pirs and stgmites. They desperately stepped upon the corpses of theirpanions as they tried to dy their deaths.


    However, all their efforts were in vain!


    The tunnels connecting to the outside had already been broken up during great earthquake.


    All the beasts still trapped in the tunnels were instantly buried alive by the avnche of sand and rocks. On the other hand, most of the other monsters were stuck in the caverns.


    Of course, no good news awaited them!


    The sea ofva still rose in height. It had barely covered the ground of the cavern earlier, but now it was over fifty centimeters high. Theva had covered the entire cavern by now. Tens and hundreds of thousands of beasts had died.


    Even if someone had tied all these animals up and left them to be ughtered by humans, it would still take more than two days to get the job done. Moreover, it would be a bloody and disgusting scene. However, when the murderer was a sea ofva, everything appeared calm and peaceful.


    It didn¡¯t matter how strong of a beast or magical creature you were. No one possessed the ability to endure in pureva. They still howled and called for help as they hung onto the stone walls, but if their grip slipped and they fell, only a single ssh would ur. Their life then vanished without a trace!


    Iron Rhinoceroses, berserk gdas, razor boars...


    All of these fellows were extreme meat shields with tough hides and resilient life force. However, if they fell into the flowing magma, they wouldn¡¯t even have a chance to struggle. Within minutes, they would burn until only their bones were left, and a littleter, there wouldn¡¯t even be bones.


    The flying creatures were still able to use their wings to remain in the sky and survive the flood ofva. However, hot air and mes swiftly consumed all the oxygen in the cavern. There was also no ce for the birds tond. Soon, exhaustion overcame them and one by one, they fell into theva, where they burned until nothing remained.


    Fifteen minutester, less than a hundred magical creatures still survived. It was a significant difference from the tens of thousands that had crowded the hall earlier. All the survivors hung onto thick stone pirs, panicked and looking around for a ce they could escape to. This continuously rising sea ofva had already devoured all their subordinates and tribe members.


    Of the dozen magical creature lords, only a few could fly.


    Even the minotaur that had been following right behind the Medusa had fallen into theva when fighting with the Giant Berserk Gda over a stone pir.


    T shot out a white spider web and pulled himself to the ceiling of the cavern. For the moment, he was safe from the looming threat of theva. However, the other magical creatures had no such ability. They could only cling to the walls or stone pirs with their sharp ws and try their best to climb as high as they could.


    However, in their moment of worry and anger, another threat appeared. A gigantic humanoid rose from the roilingva. The body formed of redva solidified, and a human¡¯s face developed on the uneven head.


    "I am honored to be able to meet the lords of the ck Forest here," Greem smiled and took a look at the terrible state the lords were in, "This war you started has failed! I wonder what ns you lot have for the future?"


    "Human." Demon-Hunting Spider T hung from the ceiling as he bared his fangs. Aplicated glint of light glowed within hispound eyes, "Do you think you can own this territory simply because you have won this time?! Wishful thinking! The ck Forest belongs to us magical creatures. You humans, get out of ournd."


    T let out a ferocious roar and loosened his limbs from the ceiling. He then lunged towards the giant me humanoid.


    The demon-hunting spider¡¯s body was like a metallic spider-shaped monster. Not only did T wield immeasurable strength, but had also fought with a unique style ofbat.


    The armor of the me humanoid cracked and dissipated into the air as sparks of fire.


    A human adept appeared within. The adept raised his head and stared at the lunging spider.


    He had crimson hair, ck eyes, and a clear gaze. An unnatural calmness and coolness existed between his brows.


    The gray robe he wore was nothing special, but a silver chain kept a grimoire tied to his waist. Three Ioun Stones shing red, purple, and blue floated above his head. He held a great ck staff with red patterns in his hand.


    Greem moved somewhat and drifted twenty meters away. He then shook his staff slightly, and a fire arrow shot towards T¡¯s wide-open mouth.


    T struck at the arrow with a massive limb and instantly shattered it.


    A hot breeze blew against his face, but that kind of temperature couldn¡¯t possibly do anything to a powerful demon-hunting spider like himself.


    T¡¯s sharp limbs almost appeared to be as light as a feather at this moment. They pressed against the sea ofva and even stabbed into the viscous liquid, yet the surface tension didn¡¯t break. His four pairs of limbs allowed him to stand upon theva as he quickly lurched towards Greem again.


    No wonder he didn¡¯t feel threatened by me. To have such a fantastic ability...


    Greem thought to himself as hepleted his me Fiend Transformation.


    The next moment, a five-meter tall demon of mes emerged from the sea ofva.


    A massive battle was about to ur!

 Chapter 414 A Burning Battle

    Chapter 414 A Burning Battle


    How terrifying was a magical creature at the peak of elite-level when it fought with all its strength?


    If Greem had not known before this, he now knew it all too well!


    The battle against T was agonizing.


    His metallic body had excellent magic resistance. Even though it wasn¡¯t all that good at defending against physical attacks, it was more than enough to deal with Greem¡¯s pathetic strikes.


    The battle that ensued upon this slowly rising sea ofva could be said to be brutal and savage. If Greem hadn¡¯t had the foresight to unseal the me Fiend¡¯s Heart, then T¡¯s flurry of sharp limbs would have skewered him. Moreover, the pair of fangs at the opening of T¡¯s mouth was extremely frightening.


    The Ring of Fire sizzled as it burned T¡¯s body, but it would be virtually impossible to rely on it to cripple the monster.


    Surprisingly enough, T¡¯s massive body was extremely agile on the surface of theva sea. It moved around with as much ease as a water strider. T¡¯s four pairs of legs moved about quickly and allowed him to circle Greem despite his massive body.


    Every time he found an opportunity, he sprung at Greem. His sharp limbs whistled as they cut through the air, shing at Greem¡¯s head and shoulders like two metallic spears.


    The Fire Shield was powerless before T¡¯s attacks. Even the sturdier Lava Shield could only take on a single blow from these sharp attacks. Every time the sharp limbs struck the thick Lava Shield, they would carve deep grooves.


    Greem could only retaliate with instant-cast magma fireballs or the me whip he held in his hand. There was no need for the other fire spells that required chanting and handsigns. Even if he took the time to prepare these spells, the opponent would already have escaped from his range by the time he was ready.


    The demon-hunting spider was swift and agile. The uracy of Greem¡¯s spells would plummet if the two of them were over twenty-meters apart. Rather than wasting time on a massive attack that wouldn¡¯tnd, it was much wiser to rely on instant-cast spells to wear away at the opponent¡¯s defensive forcefield.


    The rain ofva formed by the explosion of magma fireballs was an area-of-effect spell on its own. They dealt decent burning damage to T when they managed tond on his body. The me whip also left deep burn marks on the spider¡¯s body whenever it hit. T had no means of doing away with the continuous burn damage if he wasn¡¯t given a dozen seconds to recuperate.


    The two parties circled each other on the surface of theva, furiously attacking each other whenever they saw an opening. Yet as they struck, they were also trying their best to avoid the opponent¡¯s attacks.


    It hadn¡¯t been more than two minutes, and already the Fire Shields and Lava Shields orbiting Greem had been exhausted. He would have been entirely exposed if it wasn¡¯t for one of the Ioun Stone¡¯s energy shield.


    T soon changed his strategy upon realizing this fact. He switched from his gueri tactics and started to lunge at Greem without any regard for his life, wildly striking at Greem with all he had. T didn¡¯t give Greem a chance to replenish his defenses.


    Beneath the demon-hunting spider¡¯s fast and furious attacks, terrifying sh marks started appearing on Greem¡¯s magma armor. Once the protection broke, T¡¯s attacks would be able to threaten Greem directly.


    But a price had to be paid for everything!


    When T charged towards Greem and engaged close-range, he was also exposing himself to the firepower of a mighty fire adept.


    Fire Core Explosion!


    Chain of Fireballs!


    Scarlet Firestorm!


    Lava Pir!


    Several monstrous fire spells exploded between the two fighters. The violent me shockwaves washed against T¡¯s body, and the terrifying and corrosiveva quickly burned every inch of T¡¯s body.


    T¡¯s magic resistance had a limit, regardless of how powerful it was. Greem¡¯s second phase transformation into the me Fiend allowed his spells to break through the threshold and deal plenty of fire damage to the spider. That wasn¡¯t the end of it, however. T was extremely annoyed by Greem¡¯s spells. Every single one of his fire spells seemed to possess a trace of the powers of destruction.


    This trace allowed the most minor of Greem¡¯s spells to break through T¡¯s defenses and inflict tremendous pain and terrible fire damage upon T.


    The source of this was the strange staff he held in his hand!


    Perhaps because Greem had injected too much fire elementium into the staff, it had turned into a literal rod of me. Destructive and savage elementium mes shrouded the weapon. A purple ze burned at the center of it.


    For some reason, every time Greem swung the staff and hit the spider with it, the mes would disperse, and the shattered purple mes wouldnd on T¡¯s body. This tiny bit of fire would always cause T to howl in pain. The spider could not suppress the immense fear from the bottom of his soul and had to temporarily retreat every time he was hit.


    It seemed like that purple me possessed the unusual ability to burn the soul!


    Greem relied on this to break T¡¯s continuous attacks several times. This opening allowed him enough time to fix his magma armor. The materials used for this repair job were all over the ce. He only needed to kneel and scoop up a handful ofva to fill the cracks in his armor; it would instantly repair within a matter of moments.


    After all, the sea ofva was Greem¡¯s home ground!


    He held the advantage while they fought here. It was what lessened thebat ability gap between himself and T.


    Even though Greem didn¡¯t want to admit it, he had to ept the immense difference in their power.


    It was as if a barefooted farmer was fighting against an experienced soldier. If the farmer hadn¡¯t possessed a legendary weapon in his hand, this uneven battle would have ended a long time ago.


    Greem had already stored six powerful single-target spells into the Scroll of Voodoo at his waist in preparation for today¡¯s battle. He only needed to lock onto T¡¯s position, and he would use this trump card to turn the spider into charcoal-roasted meat.


    However, the experienced T seemed to have a vague sense of the threat that the Scroll of Voodoo posed to him. He would immediately retreat to a distance of twenty meters if he discovered Greem picking up the Scroll of Voodoo. He would then use poison balls and spiderwebs to slow Greem down.


    Honestly, the environment here was extremely disadvantageous to demon-hunting spiders.


    The reason demon-hunting spiders were feared across the continent was due to their ability to constrict opponents with their spider web, as well as their ability to tackle and squeeze the enemy. Their spiderwebs would limit the opponent¡¯s freedom of movement. On the other hand, their embrace, coupled with their sharp limbs and fangs, would instantly slice the opponent into pieces.


    Even a man of steel would be cut to ribbons if a demon-hunting spider wrapped around him.


    Unfortunately, all these abilities were meaningless on the sea ofva. A dedicated fire adept like Greem could unleash twice his usual power when he fought in an environment like this.


    You couldn¡¯t determine the situation of the battle just by T¡¯sposure. He knew how much burning and fire damage he had to endure every second he spent here.


    A magma fireball might only leave scorch marks when it crashed against its body, but the viscousva that sshed on his body would still flow all over. There was no avoiding the fire damage and the unbearable pain he had to endure during this experience.


    Greem continued to move around in the sea ofva as he exchanged blows with the demon-hunting spider. Meanwhile, he calmly connected with the tower. Every so often, a wave of magma fireballs would shoot out of the adept¡¯s tower towards the giant spider.


    The other magical creature lords quickly joined the fray after their initial panic. They could see that the sea ofva was still rising.


    The Medusa relied on her long tail to swing between stone pirs and stone walls with the agility of a gecko. Sometimes, she would even be able to whirl across the ceiling. The strange longbow in her hands also demonstrated terrifying ability.


    The arrows she shot out were, in fact, her hair of snakes.


    Every time she drew the longbow back, a single silver snake would climb onto the bowstring from her head. When an arrow like this one reached the enemy, it would immediately loosen its body and turn into a venomous snake that savagely bit at the enemy.


    If Greem didn¡¯t have a powerful Ring of Fire to roast all the snake arrows that made it near him, he would have been put in an awkward position by the numerous venomous snakes he would have had to deal with.


    Unguja, the three-headed demon hound, didn¡¯t have Dana¡¯s agility. He could only grab onto a stone pir as tight as he could and slowly climb upwards, away from the sea ofva. He didn¡¯t have any ability to attack Greem. In fact, sometimes he had to defend against the magma fireballsunched from the adept¡¯s tower.


    His three massive heads looked in every direction. Whenever something got close, he would fire a chain of wind des, fireballs, and poison balls to intercept it.


    The giant berserk gda was clearly more suited to guerri warfare like this.


    Its arms grabbed onto the stone walls like steel ws and moved around withplete ease. It asionally grabbed a piece of the wall and threw it at Greem. Every time his projectiles connected with Greem, the adept stumbled, creating an opportunity for T to strike.


    The more sinister dark tentacr climbed onto the ceiling like an octopus. It then leaped onto the tower and started searching for an entrance. The wyvern king aided him in his exploration.


    The wyvern king possessed a robust body and sharp ws. Its attacks would always deal some damage to the tower. Stone dust fell from the damaged walls as it tore distressing cracks into the volcanic rock.


    If it wasn¡¯t for their wariness of the magma fireball barrages, they would probably already have broken through the walls of the tower and started a ughter within!


    That was only because the towercked enough energy to support a forcefield and an elementium barrier. Otherwise, there was no way they could have so easily touched the structure tower itself.


    The battle raged on. If any one side were no longer able to keep up the intensity, they would instantly be overpowered by the other and be defeated.


    The tensions were high!

 Chapter 415 A Fight of Life and Death

    Chapter 415 A Fight of Life and Death


    Inside the tower.


    All the apprentices watched the battle outside the tower with a mix of feverish passion and fear.


    Most of the time they wished they could be like Sir Greem, proudly standing in the middle of several magical creatures and fighting off every single one. On the other hand, they couldn¡¯t help but be worried about the oue of the battle itself. They were frightened about the possibility of the tower¡¯s defenses failing and one of those hideous creatures making their way inside.


    For the sake of the tower and their own lives, all the apprentices were controlling the offensive arrays to the best of their abilities. Every time a magma fireball formed, they would hurl it towards the ugly tentacled creature climbing on the walls as well as at the wyvern king that fought with the manticore leader.


    Fireballs exploded in the skies and mes spread in every direction!


    The two monsters fought in the harsh environment just like this, circling above the tower, asionally shing while tearing and biting at each other.


    Of course, Greem wasn¡¯t in a good position! Even his manticore subordinate was fighting with all his might!


    The me Fiend retreated again and again under thebined attacks of T, the Demon-Hunting Spider, Dana the Medusa, and the Giant Berserk Gda. He had no choice but to keep his back against the tower and remain on the defensive.


    Fortunately, the sea ofva was still rising. It had already sealed off all exits in the cavern and had submerged the first level of the tower.


    Greem stood tall above the sea ofva. His legs had already turned into half-molten flowing magma. Viscousva was continuously being drawn from the sea ofva to his body to repair the damage he sustained.


    The time for his transformation was up. Greem had to withdraw from his second phase transformation. He sealed the me Fiend¡¯s Heart once again and relied on his first phase transformation to hold the magical creature lords at bay. Greem silently waited for the moment the sea ofvapletely flooded the cavern.


    The magical creatures that were counting on theva to subside quickly realized that the situation would only get worse. Defending themselves in this harsh environment was already a problem, and only a few of them could have any chance of helping in the attack against Greem.


    Seeing that the magical creatures were starting to stir, Eva had no choice but to expose herself.


    She left the stone pir she was standing on and floated to the middle of the magical creatures. An odd but intense mental flux immediately engulfed the entire ce.


    Eternal Sleep!


    It was an ordinary and straightforward Spiritual spell that was able to guide living beings into sweet slumber!


    An ordinary magical creature might have fallen asleep within seconds. However, all the beings that had managed to survive until this moment were strong magical creatures with exceptional strength. If it weren¡¯t for the fact that the sea ofva limited their freedom of movement, Greem would be in an even more challenging situation.


    All the creatures affected by Eva¡¯s Eternal Sleep felt their minds waver for a second. If this had been any ordinary circumstances, it would be no more than a quick nap for them. However, right now, they were all clinging to stone pirs and stone walls due to theva.


    They had nowhere to stand. Instead, the creatures barely hung onto the walls in all sorts of weird and twisted positions. This slight flicker in their consciousness caused two of the four remaining magical creatures to slip up and fall into the sea ofva.


    And among them was Unguja the Three-Headed Demon Hound!


    The boilingva scorched their skin and there was no ce for the monsters¡¯ feet to settle on in the flowing magma. They roared wildly but were still powerless to resist the terrifying heat and mes that prated through their bodies and roasted their flesh a bright red.


    The sizzling sound when flesh met magma was torturous.


    A thick burning smell filled the entire ce!


    Only one of the two magical creatures that fell into the sea managed to escape. It was Unguja!


    He was, after all, a magical creature lord and had a far more resilient bodypared to the other ordinary magical creature. Even so, Unguja was not in good condition at all.


    A muffled boom.


    A massive fire bubble popped in the middle of theva and Unguja scrambled out from within, howling in pain as he did so. His charred limbs hugged a stone pir tightly as he once again climbed up.


    The other magical creatures couldn¡¯t help but look at him.


    Tssss.


    The magical creatures drew in a cold breath of air.


    The previously mighty Unguja had be a hideous and mangy mongrel.


    His hair and skin had all burned away; only ck and purple burns remained on the surface. A mere seven or eight seconds in theva and already his thick hide had ckened into charcoal.


    As he moved around, his carbonized skin peeled off and revealed the vivid red flesh and muscles beneath. Blisters of all sizes covered his body, while blood and pus continued to flow out from his exposed muscle structure. Purple and ck blood would ssh every time one of his blisters popped.


    It was almost as if Unguja had been skinned and roasted over a campfire. Not a single piece of untouched flesh was visible across his body. He was bright red and bleeding.


    The magical creatures sympathized with Unguja¡¯s fate. They all cast hateful gazes at the cause of this incident¨C Eva. Almost instantly, a chain of purple-ck lightning and a cloud of acid immediately ravaged the spot where Eva was standing on.


    Eva screamed in pain and immediately fled. She desperately flew towards the tower which, at this point, had been half-submerged inva.


    Greem and the others had discovered the disturbance in the distance as well. T¡¯s spider webs, Medusa¡¯s snake arrows, and the giant berserk gda¡¯s stone projectiles formed an imprable line of defense. It seemed like they wanted to exterminate the traitor in one fell swoop.


    Gargamel was frightened out of his wits. He quickly flew out of the tower and shouted at Greem, "Saver her!"


    At the same time that Gargamel shouted, Greem¡¯s gigantic body of mes disappeared. He emerged from the sea ofva beneath Eva.


    "Get down!" Greem waved the staff in his hand as a terrifying suction pulled Eva down from the air. A raging wave of fire rose to the sky and formed a wall that protected against all iing attacks.


    By the time the gda¡¯s projectiles were able to force apart the wave of fire, both individuals had vanished once again.


    Greem¡¯s towering silhouette emerged from the sea ofva again, and he quickly sent the unharmed Eva back into the tower. It was only now that Greem had the time to raise his hand and remove the snake arrow biting into his shoulder.


    With its head in Greem¡¯s grasp, the snake could not bite his hand no matter how much it struggled. A me ignited in his hands and instantly reduced the poison snake to ashes. Greem rubbed his fingers together, and all the dust slowly fell.


    "What is it? Do you still not admit your loss today?" Greem¡¯s ck eyes stared at Dana the Medusa without any emotion. He spoke coldly, "Run now, and you still have a chance to escape. Continue fighting, and all you can do is wait for your death byva!"


    Meryl and Gargamel flew out of the tower as Greem threatened them. They levitated in the air and stared coldly at the magical creature lords.


    By this point, all of their subordinates and servants had died to the sea ofva beneath them. If they continued to fight instead of retreating, they would be forcing Greem to pull out all the stops.


    "Human, are you not at your limits as well!" Demon-Hunting Spider T hung from the ceiling as its wicked mouth ttered. A furious mental voice boomed out in the air, "You still intend to scare us away after ughtering so many of our tribe members? Tsk, tsk, tsk. I can¡¯t wait to conquer your tower and taste the fresh meat inside!"


    The eyes of the magical creature lords turned blood red when they heard T¡¯s words.


    This trick of theirs was too cruel and wicked. To have flooded this ce with subterraneanva! All of their tribe members and servants had been exterminated. Even if they managed to escape this ce today, they would be reduced to nothing but lone lords with no vassals to serve them. They couldn¡¯t suppress their rage when they thought of this. They once again prepared themselves for a fight as they surrounded the adepts.


    Seeing that the negotiations had fallen apart, Greem immediately projected his Spirit into the tower¡¯s control center. He chose a redmand from the list of items without hesitation.


    In next second the tower trembled as hundreds and thousands of streams ofva sted out from within the structure. It was a beautiful sight. From afar, it looked just like a flowering tree of fire.


    The face of the magical creatures flushed white the moment this happened.


    This attack enveloped the entire caverns. It was a terrifying rain of fire that fell from above. This...how were they supposed to dodge an attack like this, or even escape?


    The magical creatures quickly split into two parties.


    One party followed behind T and recklessly charged at the adept¡¯s tower. They wanted to smash open a path to survival by doing so. The Dark Tentacr led the other party. They turned tail without any doubt and rushed towards the other end of the caverns.


    As long as it was able to find a crack that allowed passage, the Dark Tentacr had absolute confidence in escaping.


    Dana the Medusa, as well as the Giant Berserk Gda, chose to charge with T. However, the Wyvern King was not as courageous as his previous performance suggested. He decided to leave with the Dark Tentacr.


    He had no choice. The fight with the manticores had inflicted severe injuries on him. He no longer had the confidence to attempt a breach on that unpredictable tower.


    The fight of life and death erupted in front of the adept¡¯s tower, just like that!

 Chapter 416 Abnormal Transformation

    Chapter 416 Abnormal Transformation


    Unlike in the battle earlier, everyone gave their full effort from the very start this time.


    The invading magical creature leaders had no way out now.


    The first earthquake had destroyed all the underground tunnels. If they wanted to run, they would have to use their own bodies to carve out a path through theyers of shattered rock.


    Moreover, they would undoubtedly be pursued by the human adepts, even as they tried to make their difficult escape.


    That was why the other magical creature leaders didn¡¯t follow after the Dark Tentacr and the Wyvern King. Instead, they chose to charge towards the tower.


    In their eyes, the adept¡¯s tower was their only chance of survival.


    Anyone could tell that the tower had been severely damaged by the forceful extraction ofva from underground. As long as they were able to push inside and ughter all the adepts and apprentices within, they would be able to take over the entire ce.


    They would have a ce of shelter from the flood ofva.


    Yet, at this moment, three human adepts stood in their way.


    Three ursed adepts who stood in the way of their survival!


    That was why it turned into a battle of life and death immediately.


    Greem endured the difort and unsealed his me Fiend¡¯s Heart once more.


    A tall and impressive figure emerged under a rain ofva and fire. Magma and meposed its wicked and resilient body. Strange runes floated around it, and sharp magma spikes covered the monster¡¯s shoulders, elbows, knees, and back. The ends of the spikes were glowing red from heat. It was frightening to look at, even from a distance.


    When the burning figure finally stood up, theva beneath its feet all flowed up towards its body as if the substance had sentience. A thickyer of magma armor formed wherever theva flowed.


    Several shields made of fire materialized around the me Fiend¡¯s body and started orbiting him. An even denser and broader magma shield appeared at the same time. The fifty-centimeter thick magma still dripped withva.


    Let alone touching these shields, just getting close to them would make one feel parched and dried out from the heat.


    Behind the shield, a pair of glowing red eyes shone in the me Fiend¡¯s crimson head. Greem held the ze of Destruction in his left hand and a me whip in his right. He opened hisrge mouth, and white steam came surging out as he let out a warning roar at the magical creatures.


    All the magical creature leaders who locked eyes with Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel fear creep up their hearts.


    This...this bastard turned into a terrifying abyssal me fiend?!


    At this moment, Greem was not doing well either. The red alerts from the chip had filled his consciousness.


    "Second phase transformationplete.


    "Signs of assimtion of the body of mes detected. Source of foreign energy has been identified as the me Fiend¡¯s Heart!


    "Current assimtion progress: 3%......


    "Host transformationplete! Physical strength significantly increased! Bodily attributes significantly increased! Elementary immunity to electricity, acid, fire, and poison obtained. Magical resistance increased! Physical damage taken reduced by 15%. Obtained part of a me Fiend¡¯s innate abilities.


    "Abnormal changes to host¡¯s attributes observed. Strength +3 | Agility +1 | Physique +3 | Spirit +2.


    "Host¡¯s current attributes are as follows: Strength 11 | Agility 7 | Physique 12 | Spirit 16.


    "Chaotic flux patterns have emerged in host¡¯s Spirit. Effects manifest as bloodthirst and battle hunger. Initial estimates suggest abyssal corruption as the cause. Requestion instructions from the host. Expel abnormal spirit aura?


    "Host¡¯s Spirit is being suppressed by the world consciousness. If the host is unable to expel abyssal aura within fifteen minutes, host will be judged to be an otherworld creature by the world consciousness. nar bacsh will be incurred by the host. Requesting instructions from host."


    A series of warnings and rms filled Greem¡¯s mind. At the same time, a surge of power ran through his body. He had never felt so much power as he did now.


    This strength was extremely overwhelming!


    Greem¡¯s rationality had been affected by the immense power coursing through his body. The desires he had buried deep in his heart were being uncovered by the mysterious power, like rotten mud that had settled at the bottom of a pond for a thousand years. Even Greem couldn¡¯t tell if those were his own delusions and fantasies, or strange thoughts that the mysterious power was feeding into his mind. His spirit consciousness wavered.


    However, when three magical creature leaders finally shattered the Magma Shield, Greem¡¯s survival instinct quickly brought him to his senses.


    He opened his eyes and realized that he had charged all the way into the middle of the three magical creature leaders; they had surrounded him. Greem had been using his robust body and savage battle fever to exchange blows with the enemy, trading wound for wound.


    Dammit! As expected, the abyssal aura was not a good thing at all. To have driven him to fight in such a reckless manner without any reason!


    Greem immediately contacted the chip in his brief moment of rity and once again regained control of his body.


    Without any hesitation, Greem activated the purple Ioun Stone circling his head. He erected a tough defensive barrier around his soul and kept that primal blood-red constriction in his mind at bay. Even though Greem had the presence of mind to exterminate this abyssal aura right now, it would severely affect the bonuses brought on by the me Fiend Transformation.


    Why were abyssal demons so powerful? It was because of this trace of violence, cruelty, and chaos.


    If he cut away these traits, his physical attributes would suffer. Thus, Greem had no choice but to allow the abyssal aura to continue ravaging his mental world. He needed this additional piece of strength. With the mental barrier¡¯s protection, he was not going to lose his mind in the short term.


    Time was limited!


    Greem took advantage of his considerably boosted attributes and changed hisbat style without pause.


    His innate talent was for fire spells, yet in that moment of chaos, Greem had been foolish enough to start a melee with the enemy. He had to correct this idiotic behavior of waving a staff like it was a wooden bat!


    The very next moment, Greem cast Fire Teleportation and shed away from the enemies¡¯ surrounding him. He appeared behind the agile figure of the giant berserk gda.


    Bind!


    Ignite!


    Greem pointed with his staff the moment he appeared, and two demonic fire spells immediately took effect upon the gda.


    Greem¡¯s me whip split into eight chains of fire the moment he used Bind. Theyshed towards the gda and wrapped themselves around the gda¡¯s legs. The chains quickly extended up the gda¡¯s hairy body, winding around various parts of its body. Soon, the chains had utterly constricted the monster.


    The red and burning fire chains sizzled and burned away the hair wherever they touched. They scalded the skin and pressed into the gda¡¯s flesh.


    A pungent odor of burning flesh filled the air!


    The berserk gda howled in pain. It grabbed the chains of fire with its hands that were as ck as steel. It used every single fiber of strength in its body in an attempt to tear them apart.


    However, Greem¡¯s second fire spell, Ignite, had arrived.


    The giant gda¡¯s body spontaneouslybusted.


    It wasn¡¯t just its hair and its skin. Even its organs and flesh had ignited under the effect of this strange spell.


    The berserk gda immediately turned into a ming primate!


    Greem wouldn¡¯t have been able to do this so smoothly if they hadn¡¯t been fighting in this environment. However, while they were here, Greem could instantly turn an elite-level monster into a sacrifice to the sea ofva.


    The caverns had halfway submerged into the slowly rising sea ofva. The concentration of fire elementium in the remaining space had reached shocking degrees. Every one of Greem¡¯s spells was twice as effective. The strength of the spells and the damage they inflicted had reached a horrifying peak of one hundred and seventy points.


    It was said that only Second Grade adepts could cast spells with two hundred points of power. Greem¡¯s attack was undoubtedly remarkably close to that of a Second Grade adept.


    The berserk gda was an earth-attribute magical creature. If there had been sufficient earth elementium here, it might have been able to draw upon the earth elementium to suppress the raging fire elementium within its body. However, that was an impossible feat in this environment!


    It struggled for a dozen seconds before falling from the ceiling with an excruciating howl. A muffled ssh rippled on the surface of theva, sending fire flying in every direction.


    The gda¡¯s body quickly sunk into theva and was never seen again!


    While Greem had been dealing with the gda, T and Dana were throwing everything they had at him, as if they had gone mad.


    Spiderwebs?


    They were all burned to ashes by the Burning Domain before they could reach Greem.


    Indeed, with the exponential increase in all of Greem¡¯s abilities, his Ring of Fire had been temporarily reced by the me Fiend¡¯s unique Burning Domain. All opponents that stood within his Domain would have to endure a maddening eighty points of fire damage per second.


    That was the highest amount of damage that a newly advanced adept could hope to muster!


    Even Meryl, who was three or four years deep into her advancement, had to go all out if she wanted to deal that much damage. However, at this moment, it was passive damage being dealt to everything within a hundred meters of Greem.


    Poison balls?


    They were instantly vaporized by the heat the moment they formed.


    Snake arrows?


    The Medusa¡¯s snake arrows were already broiled red when they reached within a hundred meters of Greem. When they came within fifty meters of Greem, they sizzled and turned into ck ash before falling into theva beneath him and vanishing without a trace.


    As for the Medusa¡¯s unique Petrifying Gaze? Apologies, but an innate ability with only a five-meter attack range was utterly useless when pitted against Greem¡¯s Burning Domain. Unless Dana wanted to take the risk of moving in close to Greem¡¯s side, she could do nothing but swear.

 Chapter 417 Truce

    Chapter 417 Truce


    Greem already possessed the home field advantage. The scales of the battle quickly tipped in his favor now that he hadpleted his second phase transformation. He was ferociously beating up T and Dana.


    It hurt them all the way to the bone whenever Greem struck them with his violent attacks that typically went up to one hundred and fifty points. When taking into consideration the Ring of Fire that covered a hundred meter radius, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how painful of a chore it was to fight with Greem in this sea ofva.


    Even the Medusa, with her magical resistance, could only skim along the edges of the Ring of Fire. She instantly felt as if her entire body had set ame if she ventured too far in and entered the Burning Domain. Even a monster like herself couldn¡¯t endure more than ten seconds in the Burning Domain. Otherwise, her defensive forcefield would fall apart.


    What awaited her then would be indescribably horrifying torture!


    On the other hand, T was doing pretty well, as one would expect of the true sovereign of thesends. Hisbat ability was at the absolute peak of elite-level. If the environment here hadn¡¯t wholly tipped in Greem¡¯s favor, T would have been able to put up a vicious fight against the adept.


    Thus, T was responsible for engaging Greem, while the Medusa was tasked with harassing Greem from a distance. Both parties fought above the tower, battling until the caverns trembled from their might.


    Despite all his strength and power, even T couldn¡¯t take much more after such an extended fight with the me Fiend.


    The elementium fire burned continuously at his body. The resilient, steel-like hair on his body had withered and fallen off from the heat. his smooth spider legs with high metalposition had roasted a bright red.


    Most of a demon-hunting spider¡¯s body was as hard as steel. Only the sizeable abdominal sac at the back of its body was particrly soft.


    In past battles, any enemy that tried to strike at that weak spot would have had to face the many spider webs that T shot out from there. If they were ever bound in ce by the sticky white webbing, they would be rendered harmless prey with their lives at T¡¯s behest.


    However, the relentless eighty points of me damage were truly hurting T! Extremely so!


    T¡¯s purple abdominal sac was already covered in ck scorch marks. Many ces had already been burned through. Every time T moved around with his quick speed, he left behind a trail of sour ck spots.


    That was what the spiderweb liquid looked like after being carbonized!


    It didn¡¯t matter whether Greem was still able to hang on at this point. T was most definitely faltering.


    With his power at the height of elite-level, T was a terrifying existence wherever he went. He ruled over a stretch of the ck Forest with his strength. He had ordered this war against the tower for the sake of hisnd and resources.


    A powerful being like T would be a massive threat to other magical creature lords wherever he went. That was why it would be virtually impossible for him to find a suitable territory to live in if he ever left this ce. Lords might be willing to take in magical creatures like Dana the Medusa, but no one would ever take in an ¡¯ex-lord¡¯ like T.


    Thus, be it for his own interests or those of all the magical creatures, T had given his all in the siege of this adept¡¯s tower.


    Unfortunately, he had still underestimated an adept¡¯s tower stationed with an adept!


    Moreover, he had never expected the terrifying ace that Greem had hidden up his sleeve¨C the sea ofva!


    Most of the tower had already submerged intova at this point. From a distance, the tower looked like a piece of broken rock floating in theva. The magma and fire continued to burn the tower¡¯s walls. The entirety of the outer walls glowed scarlet as if they were about to melt and copse at any moment.


    If the tower had been built with ordinary steel, it would have melted into the magma even if it had heat resistance. It couldn¡¯tpare to the volcanic rock with which the tower was built. The terrifying heat was immediately absorbed by strange runes the moment it made contact with the tower¡¯s walls. The heat was then transferred to the elementium in the energy room where it was stored for future use.


    Theva wasn¡¯t damaging the tower. Instead, the tower was absorbing fire elementium energy at an even faster rate. The lower levels of the elementium pool had been filled even before the pools at the highest level had been filled.


    When ayer of bright red elementium forcefield covered the tower, Tpletely broke down! Thest bit of his hopes had vanished into ashes.


    It was already an uphill battle without the elementium forcefield, and now...


    T promptly chose to give up without any hesitation!


    "I¡¯ll hold him back for now. You try and find an escape route!" T¡¯s mental voice silently rang out in Dana¡¯s mind.


    T moved the moment Dana agreed and turned. His tattered abdominal sac suddenly swelled, and a white sticky liquid sprayed all over the Medusa.


    The liquid dried the moment it was exposed to the air. It was both adhesive and stic now.


    "You..." Dana waspletely taken by surprise. It took her a while before she remembered to struggle and break free of the web.


    However, in a matter of seconds, her body had already been tied up into a cocoon by the multipleyers of webbing. She could hardly move a finger. T lunged over and grabbed the cocoon with his mouth, escaping with it towards the distance.


    His wounds might have looked deep, but his sharp limbs still rapidly moved when he needed to escape. He clung to the wall and vanished within seconds.


    Even Greem was surprised by the scene before him. He had let T escape before he knew it.


    He wanted to chase after T, but he paused and thought for a bit.


    Greem then slowly turned around and cast his gaze upon the few surviving magical creatures.


    Three-Headed Demon Hound Unguja!


    A bird demon!


    A snake fiend!


    They were an elite-level magical creature and two ordinary magical creatures!


    They didn¡¯t have the strength to run away, but they didn¡¯t dare to attack Greem either. That was why they hid on stone pirs or within cracks in the walls, anxiously awaiting the oue of the battle.


    The magical creaturesmented their fate when they saw the towering me Fiend look over with his blood-red eyes.


    "Sir, I surrender!"


    No one expected that the first to surrender would be Unguja! He was a magical creature leader after all!


    His hair and skin had all burned away. He looked just like a mongrel in the streets that had been skinned by a butcher. His three heads pressed against the stone wall as he desperately wagged his red tail at Greem.


    If he weren¡¯t clinging to a stone pir, Unguja would probably prostrate himself before Greem to demonstrate his submission and goodwill.


    The other two magical creatures looked at each other and saw profound helplessness in each other¡¯s eyes.


    They both lowered their heads dejectedly and expressed their desire to surrender.


    Greem snorted coldly. He pointed with his finger, and the dense fire elementium around the creatures materialized into red chains that immediately bound them.


    Of course, the three monsters could break free of this low-level fire spell. However, none of them could even find the courage to resist when Greem red at them. They were taken down just like that.


    Greem ran into a smiling Gargamel when he dragged the three creatures back into the tower. Gargamel was holding a massive body that had been charred beyond recognition.


    "The giant berserk gda?" Greem was stunned for a moment.


    There weren¡¯t many creatures of that size, which made it easy for Greem to guess its identity.


    Before Gargamel could answer, Greem shook his body and the tall me Fiend form quickly disintegrated. Greem¡¯s frail body was exposed as the magma and fire peeled away.


    He crouched on the ground and spat out several mouthfuls of ck blood before he got onto his feet.


    "Master... "


    "Teacher... "


    Gargamel and Meryl hurried forward and helped Greem onto their shoulders from both sides.


    Just then, Eva the forest spirit floated down from the top of the tower and slowly approached Greem.


    "Are you alright, Master?" Gargamel couldn¡¯t help but ask out of concern.


    Even though he was a wandering adept, and had a strong distaste for most n adepts, he felt very different about his master. That was why Gargamel¡¯s concern did have a certain sincerity to it.


    "Teacher, should I help you to your room to get some rest?" Meryl frowned as she asked, worried.


    "There¡¯s no need! A couple of shockwaves only hit me in the fight earlier. I¡¯ll be fine once I get the blood out of my system," Greem didn¡¯t want to reveal too much about his actual situation. He quickly turned his attention towards the four magical creatures they had captured, "Make some arrangements and bring them to the Room of Bindings. I need a conclusion to this as soon as possible!"


    "Leave it to me!" Gargamel couldn¡¯t hide the excitement on his face when torture and interrogation were mentioned. His eyes glowed with a brilliant light when he looked at the magical creatures, "Hey, you lot,e over here and bring these beasts to the Room of Bindings. This adept wants to tend to them personally."


    The apprentices that had just raced over from various spots in the tower respectfully greeted Greem. They then excitedly lifted up the four magical creatures and ran towards the Room of Bindings upstairs.


    Three locations in the tower could be used to confine enemies.


    One was a prison used to imprison ordinary creatures.


    The second was a Sealing Room, typically used to imprison magical beings with powerful abilities. The Sealing Room was essentially a small foreign dimension that could effectively cut off all connection to the outside world.


    Many proud creatures would have to be isted in the Sealing Room for several decades, or even centuries before their edge wore away, and they became more willing to submit to the adepts.


    Thest one was the Room of Bindings. It resembled the Sealing Room.


    A powerful confinement array existed in the Room of Bindings. All magical creatures locked up there needed to be dealt with as soon as possible. Those that were willing to serve were branded with a ve¡¯s mark. They would then be part of the tower. If they refused to serve, they would be tossed into the Sealing Room and isted for a couple of decades before they were reconsidered for service.


    Once things had settled for a bit, Greem quickly made his way to the energy room.


    Even though the chip¡¯s connection with the core array allowed him to know the number of magical crystals exhausted, he still felt like he needed to see for himself.

 Chapter 418 Post-Battle Accounts

    Chapter 418 Post-Battle ounts


    One hundred and ten thousand magical crystals!


    This regional battle for territory had exhausted one hundred and ten thousand magical crystals.


    And this was already the optimal oue that Greem had achieved by taking advantage of the geography and the sea ofva. If he hadn¡¯t had this trick in reserve, Greem would have had to lead his men in a desperate fight against tens of thousands of beasts.


    Their defeat would have been set in stone!


    He did a little calction himself. One hundred and ten thousand of the one hundred and twenty thousand magical crystals Alice had sent him had been exhausted. The remaining ten thousand were just enough to patch up the tower. That was a clear demonstration of Alice¡¯s powers as the Witch of Fate. The extent of her help was just sufficient enough; not too much, not too little.


    The situation in the energy room came as a shock to Greem as well. The activation of the defense system and the offensive array had depleted the small reserve of energy in the elementium pool. However, the existence of the sea ofva had filled up the lower levels of the elementium pool. It was now pure fire energy that sustained the functions of the tower.


    The enormous fire energies coursed through the tower¡¯s structure. The wall¡¯s volcanic rocks glowed a faint red from the heat. From a distance, the tower looked like a zing tree stuck in the sea ofva. It was an odd sight to behold.


    The chip had connected with the core array and generated a list of the battle¡¯s casualties while Greem was taking a look at the energy room. The record projected into Greem¡¯s mind.


    "Battle of the Magma Hall, ally casualties: two manticores. Enemy casualties: Approximately one hundred and seventy-three thousand low-level forest beasts, three hundred beginner-level magical creatures (apprentice-level), eighty intermediate-level magical creatures (adept-level), thirty high-level magical creatures, and two magical creature leaders. Magical Creature Lord T and Magical Creature Leader Dana remain on the run. The Dark Tentacr and the Wyvern King remain trapped somewhere underground.


    "One hundred and twelve thousand magical crystals were consumed during the battle. Thirty-one locations of damage detected in the structure of the walls. One hundred and twenty-seven malfunction areas detected within the internal energy conduction system. Thirty-four arrays have been damaged.


    "Spoils of war: two magical creature leaders confined in the Room of Bindings. They are the Three-Headed Demon Hound and the Giant Berserk Gda. (Gda has received critical physical damage. It is unlikely for it to regainbat ability. Voodoo beast modification is rmended). Two high-level magical creatures confined. They are the Bird Demon and the Snake Fiend. The bird demon is the unevolved form of the harpy. It is a close-range agility magical creature. The snake fiend is a mutated beast created by magical corruption. It possesses traces of a demonic bloodline and is a close-range offensive magical creature.


    "Fire spirits can be sent out to salvage more spoils of war. Magical creature corpses or items that can survive the continuous heat ofva will have immense value."


    ............


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel a shiver run down his spine when he saw the numerous rows of statistics listed in his mind!


    If he hadn¡¯t drawn the sea ofva into the cavern, he would never have been able to resist this stampede of beasts with only the tower. That wasn¡¯t even considering the magical creatures that had been mixed in!


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how things were for other adepts. Imagine that a n built an adept¡¯s tower in the ck Forest and stationed one of their adepts within. That tower would have to face the attacks of all magical creatures and beasts within an area of three to four hundred kilometers. The price they would have to pay to seed was immense.


    If the tower fell, the resources and manpower lost would be incalcble. Even if they managed to repel the stampede, it would still be hard to develop the area rapidly. They would still have to fight with the upset beasts again and again before they could turn it into a safe zone.


    These border areas were the zones of contention between adepts and magical creatures. They were extraordinarily hazardous and unsafe to live in. No n attempted to start a mass migration of their poption into such a dangerous ce. They had to slowly rely on their adepts, apprentices, and mercenaries to repeatedly exterminate the magical creatures and clear out their dens.


    This game of tug of war would typicallyst for ten years before they could develop a vige suited for humans to live in!


    In this process, any small mistake by the leader could bring about disaster for the entire human settlement. It could easily cause the n¡¯s decades worth of effort to go to waste.


    That was why every n that wanted to develop newnd and expand their territory had to be extremely cautious.


    They not only had to take into consideration their strength, but also the number and quality of the magical creatures surrounding their new territory. In particr, they needed a powerful team of adepts that could promptly react to any emergency that cropped up around theirnd.


    When considering this standard and cumbersome procedure, it wasn¡¯t hard to see how fortunate Greem was!


    This risky and dangerous defense of his tower didn¡¯t just fend off the magical creatures. More importantly, it killed off most of their numbers. It meant that the amount of wildlife and magical creatures around guewood would plummet tremendously.


    Moreover, the tower itself was hidden two hundred meters underground. It possessed a geographical advantage. Anyone that sought to destroy it had to face the wrath of a sea ofva. Greem only needed to remain in the tower, and he could strike when he wanted and defended as required. Even if the surface was once again taken over by magical creatures, he did not need to worry about his safety.


    As for developing the surface? Greem had never considered that part of his ns, at least not within the short term.


    He hadn¡¯t spent so much effort constructing and defending the tower just to expand territory for the Sarubo n. This endeavor was all for his future development. Based on information he had collected and gathered from various sources, spirit elementiumization was an unavoidable stage for Greem if he wanted to advance to Second Grade.


    If he wanted to refine his Spirit and make itpatible with his future path of development, he needed an excellent environment to train in. The guewood adept¡¯s tower was the most suitable ce for his cultivation!


    Gargamel sent a magical message to Greem¡¯s mind as he was contemting his future.


    Greem paused for a moment before walking to the Room of Bindings on the third level.


    The moment he walked in, Greem narrowed his eyes and looked at the shivering figures suspended in midair.


    The magical flowing lights on the walls illuminated everything in the room. One could vaguely make out the elegant patterns and lines glowing beneath the smooth surface of the stone wall. Everything connected to form a vast yetplex runic array.


    It wasn¡¯t a regr pentagon or hexagon array. All sorts ofplicated symbols and runesid upon each other and connected to form the borate spread of stars that you would usually see on a halo array. The various magical creatures were all bound in different silver halos; none of them could move a single finger.


    "How is it? Are these fellows willing to surrender?" Greem asked.


    "Of course, of course, of course." Surprisingly, the first to reply wasn¡¯t Gargamel. Rather, it was the three-headed demon hound crouching in the circle of light. Unguja spoke with a fawning smile on his face, "Sir, please heal me quick! If I¡¯m not healed soon, I might even regress, and my grade will fall. My injuries are so severe that even my spirit origin has been damaged."


    Greem looked at Gargamel, who nodded silently. It was only then that he believed Unguja¡¯s words.


    Once they nted a maniption rune in the demon hound, the beast would be one their own. It wouldn¡¯t be beneficial for either of them if his strength regressed.


    "If that¡¯s the case, then open up your mental space to me!" Greem extended a hand and started to draw in the air. Soon, a soul brand containing his magical aura materialized, "As long as you obey me properly, I will immediately have Gargamel treat all your injuries."


    Unguja gritted his teeth and growled in agony. A soul projection emerged from the leading head in the middle. It bowed respectfully before Greem.


    Greem was just about to send the maniption rune into the silver halo when a voice called out.


    "Teacher, don¡¯t be tricked by it!" Meryl quickly walked into the room from outside, "Sister Alice just told me something earlier. There¡¯s no point in gaining control over the main head of a three-headed demon hound like this one. You need to control all three heads at once. Otherwise, it can break free of the soul brand by forcefully devouring its own main head!"


    Greem eyes sharpened, and a crimson light glowed in the depths of his ck eyes.


    "I forgot... I really did just forget earlier," The three-headed demon hound was terrified out of its wits. It had no choice but to grimace and force out the soul projections of the other two heads, "Master, I won¡¯t dare to do it again!"


    Greem blew out. The maniption shook within the hot air current and split into three. They whizzed through the air and quickly sank into Unguja¡¯s three soul projections.


    The sudden change to his soul and the terrifying heat Greem had intentionally attached to the rune caused intense pain to Unguja. His whole body crouched against the ground. Hundreds of wounds and scars cracked and split apart as he coped from the pain in his soul. Purple and ck blood flowed all over its body. It wasn¡¯t a pretty sight to see.


    "Very well, you can treat it now!"


    Greem closed his eyes and confirmed that the maniption runes had safely merged with the demon hound¡¯s soul. He then waved his arm and dispersed the binding array to allow Gargamel to treat the demon hound.


    Simple external wounds would not kill Unguja; however, they would have to extract the horrifying fire poison deep within his body as soon as possible. Otherwise, it might affect Ungaja¡¯s spirit origin.


    "What about the two of you?" Greem turned his eyes towards the bird demon and the snake fiend.


    These two spineless creatures naturally chose to surrender, just like Unguja.


    They were also released after Greem carefully nted a maniption rune within them.


    Having dealt with the three cowards, Greem moved on to thest silver halo. Therge and mighty Giant Berserk Gda was confined within. However, its spirit seemed to have withered.


    "Are you willing to surrender?"


    Greem had just spoken when the gda opened its mouth and roared as it punched at the transparent halo of light. Apart from some muffled banging, the silver circle of light didn¡¯t even tremble. Electricity suddenly shed within the array.


    Electricity flickered across the gda¡¯s body amidst the sound of crackling and sizzling. Its massive body started trembling uncontrobly.


    However, even in its disabled state, the gda bared its fangs and roared at Greem.


    "It seems it¡¯s a tough nut to crack!" Greem shook his head in pity. He turned and ordered Meryl, "No need to break in a fellow like this. Invite Adept Keoghan from the headquarters and have him wipe away the gda¡¯s spirit and turn it into a voodoo beast!"


    "Yes, teacher!" Meryl nodded.


    "You shouted for me toe over earlier and said there were other spoils. What is it?" Greem turned to look at Gargamel.


    Gargamel, who had been rubbing his hands together all this while, couldn¡¯t help but betray a look full of greed, "Master, all these fellows have their own dens!"


    "Oh, so you mean...?"


    "Of course we will want to take a visit to the dens of the three-headed demon hound and the other two. More importantly, they know the exact locations of the other survivors¡¯ dens! Master, you should know that all those creatures were alone when they escaped." Gargamel couldn¡¯t hide the greedy glint in his eyes when he spoke. He licked his lips and waited for a reply.


    Greem¡¯s eyes brightened when he heard this.

 Chapter 419 Spider Forest

    Chapter 419 Spider Forest


    The forest around guewood appeared to be unnaturally quiet under the faint light of the stars.


    There were no signs ofrge carnivores. Even the chirping of birds and the calls of cicadas had vanished. The entire ck Forest was like a graveyard, so deathly silent it was eerie.


    The hill upon which guewood stood had disappeared. Therge crater from the copsed ground had swallowed the hundreds of tons of dirt and trees. This ce was no more than a messy pile of rocks now.


    A strange scratching sound wasing out from a corner of this pile of rubble. The noise was as soft as a mole digging through the ground at first. However, it gradually became louder and louder.


    Boom.


    There was a massive explosion as a strange magical creature with a short neck and tail emerged from underground. It was a peculiar beast that looked like both a dragon and a griffin. It had a muscr body, immense strength, and sharp teeth and ws. However, despite its apparent power, it had some horrifying wounds on its tough gray hide.


    It shook off the dirt on its body when it emerged from the hole it had dug. It then raised its neck and screeched. Its massive hind legs kicked against the ground and it took to the skies.


    The Wyvern King let out a sorrowful cry as it circled above the pile of rocks. It then turned and flew east towards the cliff it lived on.


    Not long after it disappeared, a ck silhouette appeared beside the hole.


    The Dark Tentacr¡¯s soft and flexible body couldn¡¯t easily be seen under the curtain of night. One could barely make out a mass of ck shadow.


    The Dark Tentacr hesitated for a moment before taking advantage of the cover of night and escaping into the distance.


    It had been a solitary being from the very start. The death and extermination of the horde had little to no impact on it. However, considering the potential revenge by the human adepts, the Dark Tentacr knew that this ce was no longer safe.


    It was time to consider moving!


    The Dark Tentacr wove through the vast darkness as it contemted its options. Its outline quickly shrunk as it went further and further.


    Soon after the two magical creature leaders had left, a st tore through another spot of the pile of rocks. Demon-Hunting Spider T climbed out from beneath with a massive cocoon on his back. He vanished into the forest without looking back.


    Nothing happened until a whole hourter.


    Rumbling sounded out from below and ayer of dirt suddenly copsed to reveal a winding tunnel. Several figures walked out from within and lined up at the entrance of the cave like they were waiting for an important individual.


    Thest to emerge was naturally Greem.


    Greem was exhausted from the bloody battle earlier, but the desire for even more spoils fueled his body and provided him with the will to continue fighting.


    Greem¡¯s two-meters of height might not have been the tallest in the group, but everyone bowed to him in respect the moment he appeared.


    Greem¡¯s eyes slowly swept across this group of individuals. There were no more than twenty of them: a party that included his disciples, his subordinates, and his ves.


    "Meryl, you bring Kodar, the bird demon, the manticore leader, and two manticores to the Giant Berserk Gda¡¯s den in the Twin Tower Mountain. If things go well, you can go pay a visit to the bird demon¡¯s home along the way back."


    "Understood! Leave it to me, teacher!"


    "Gargamel, you bring Sabrina and the snake fiend, as well as three manticores to the Medusa¡¯s den at Crimson Rock. Remember to bring back as much as you can from the snake fiend¡¯s den on the way back."


    "Leave it to me, master!" Gargamel once again uttered his signature sinisterugh.


    "Very well. The rest of you follow me to T¡¯s spider cave. I want to see if that fellow has returned to his old den!"


    "Understood!" The Three-Headed Demon Hound replied without much enthusiasm.


    It had just been enved, and its wounds hadn¡¯tpletely healed. Yet they already had to go on a march to Magical Creature Lord T¡¯s den. Of course, he wasn¡¯t happy. Still, he had no choice; his very life was in the hands of that human adept!


    It was a simple organization of manpower. The three human adepts were each apanied by three pseudo-adepts, a magical creature, and a couple of manticores. In doing so, they would at least be able to hold their own if they ran into the escapees. It wouldn¡¯t be easy to beat any one of the adepts. After all, those magical creature leaders knew each other very well. They probably had a much better idea of what theirpanions had left behind in their death. It wasn¡¯t unlikely for them to go searching around in the dens left behind.


    Thus, after considering the risks and benefits, Greem decisively split up the members of the tower to maximize their efficiency at scouring for useful resources.


    Of course, the tower itself could not be left unguarded. That was why Greem had left Eva the Forest Spirit behind. When aided by Am and the other apprentice adepts, they could defend the tower against any survivors as long as they stayed inside.


    After saying his farewells, Greem hopped onto an adolescent manticore and brought Unguja along as they hurried towards T¡¯s spider den.


    ............


    T¡¯s spider den was a massive cave.


    It was located in a valley a hundred kilometers to the north of guewood.


    Greem sat on the manticore¡¯s back and looked down at the forest along the way. The number of life signatures within the radius of his spiritual senses had drastically decreased.


    The battle of guewood had killed hundreds of thousands of woond creatures. It would bring about a massive and unprecedented impact to this stretch of the ck Forest. Even though the movement of poption in the ck Forest was extraordinarily high, and this vacuum of life would quickly be filled in by creatures from nearby areas, the number and quality of the animals were going to be inferior.


    The density of the woond creatures also determined the number of magical creatures that thisnd could sustain.


    While the adept¡¯s tower would be much more secure if there were less magical creatures, there would also be fewer resources harvested from them.


    Unguja, who had been running on the ground, finally stopped in front of a cave while Greem was thinking about various issues.


    The manticore circled in the sky once, then blew up a gale as it dove down andnded beside Unguja.


    Greem leaped off the manticore and took a good look at this menacing forest before him.


    Compared to the ck Forest, this ce should have been called the ¡¯White Forest.¡¯


    Towering, ancient trees filled this mountain valley that T had picked for his home. However, one couldn¡¯t see the green canopy, the undergrowth, or the vines and bushes. All of these had been reced with one thing¨C haunting white webs.


    They covered the canopy, were between the branches, between the trees...


    White and sticky webs were everywhere. There were small white cocoons littered here and there as well.


    These cocoons hung between the branches. Some hid in the hollows of trees, and others hung on either side of the path. They swayed in midair as the night breeze blew past.


    Greem could sense weak life auras from within some of the white cocoons. Most others already had all the liquid extracted from their bodies. Only mummies remained in those cocoons.


    Strangely enough, Greem and Unguja didn¡¯t find any spiders, even after walking for several hundred of meters!


    Did they all die in the sea ofva?


    Greem immediately dismissed the idea the moment it crossed his mind.


    T was a sly magical creature lord. There was no way he would evermit to such a resolute act of war. There had to be enough spider subordinates to defend his home hidden in this den. T had most likely run back home to treat his wound right after he escaped.


    If Greem wasn¡¯t mistaken, abducting the medusa was probably part of T¡¯s n to hasten his recovery. The only thing Greem wasn¡¯t sure about was how T was going to consume the medusa. Would he eat her alive? Steam her, or even fry her?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel a sense of pity when he thought of the medusa¡¯s pretty face and slender body. Eating a ¡¯beauty¡¯ like that was such a waste!


    Blue light shed in Greem¡¯s eyes as he slowly scanned the spider forest before him. A solemn expression quickly overtook his face.


    His elementium sight was picking up slight flows of energy in the webs every time he scanned them. Warnings continually popped up in his mind.


    "Warning. Warning. Detecting unknown defensive forcefield. Said forcefield can absorb Spirit and obscure spiritual senses."


    Hmm? A spiderweb that could obstruct spiritual senses?


    Greem promptly walked towards a tall tree. He extended a hand and grabbed the thick cobwebs that enveloped and covered the branches. He pulled and tore at the webs.


    It was sticky, tough, and had a trace of numbness to it. A numbness that could paralyze a person¡¯s spirit.


    If Greem were an ordinary animal, all his spirit would have been quickly drained away from him when he bumped into a web like this. He would then find himself in one of the many cocoons.


    Greem used all his strength, yet even his three points of Strength couldn¡¯t rip this ordinary-looking web. It was important to note how much three points was. A grown ck bear in the ck Forest had no more than three points of Strength. Three points of Strength would allow Greem to be a human monster in these woods. He wouldn¡¯t need to use any magic. His bare hands would let him defeat most carnivores.


    Of course, that was not taking into consideration magical beasts like Earth Maulers and Iron Rhinoceroses!


    Greem snapped his finger, and his right hand that gripped the web quickly burned with fire. The stic webbing immediately sizzled and vanished under the application of magic.


    It seemed fire was the weakness of these webs!


    Greem put his zing palms forward, and theyers of webs on the tree melted like snow sshed with boiling water.


    Soon, the ck and wrinkled bark of the tree was revealed.


    Greem punched ahead without any hesitation. His ming iron fists instantly smashed the bark and went right into the tree.


    The tree was hollow!


    When Greem pulled out his fist from the tree, purple and ck blood oozed out from within the hole. Countless spiderites surged outwards. Greem could see the pile of bones and fur left in the hollow of the tree.


    His discovery seemed to have triggered the entire spider forest. Those mummies that were hanging in between the branches suddenly started moving strangely. They started tearing away the webs on their bodies with dull and stiff motions.


    Yet the moment they broke free of their constraints, they were able to leap along the tall trees with the agility of leopards. They howled as they lunged at Greem and the three-headed demon hound.


    The entire spider forest erupted into a riot!

 Chapter 420 Spider Cave

    Chapter 420 Spider Cave


    Whoosh.


    Wicked winds blew wildly.


    A skinny and withered figure jumped down from the canopy, only to have its head grabbed by Greem¡¯s burning hand.


    Greem took a look at the creature by the light from the flickering mes. He instantly understood the nature of the being.


    It was a semi-undead!


    It was a mummy that had been lying dormant within a cocoon for numerous years. Its body was desated and withered, its abdomen caved inwards and what hair it had left was the color of straw. Spiders climbed in and out of its empty eye sockets, nose, and mouth.


    Aoooooo.


    The undead mummy was more like a monster that had been brought back to life from hell. Blinding red light suddenly shone out of its eye sockets, and its unnaturally twisted and wide open jaw caused its entire face to look wrong.


    However, it didn¡¯t matter how much the mummy tried to struggle. It would never be able to escape Greem¡¯s zing fingers.


    "Beep. Lifeform information collected.


    "Withered Corpse: Spiderified Undead (Low Grade). Advanced Apprentice Level. Fearless and possesses corpse poison. Strength: 1.4 | Agility 1.1 | Physique 2.1 | Spirit 0.4"


    Greem no longer needed to hold back now that he received the chip¡¯s notification. The mes on his hand swelled and instantly reduced this howling corpse to ashes.


    The mes didn¡¯t die out immediately. Instead, they spread to the tree behind the corpse.


    Layer afteryer of spider webs had wrapped around the tree. However, at this moment, all that had turned into the best fuel for the fire. Six seconds after Greem¡¯s zing hand made contact, and the sixty-meter tall tree transformed into a giant torch.


    mes licked everything around the tree as the fires danced and caused the dry tree to crackle in the ze. Innumerable spiderites of all sizes fled from the tree. The Spider Forest lived up to its name.


    While Greem hadn¡¯t seen a single lifeform when he entered, Spider Forest did have spiders. All those spiders were hiding within the trees and underground. With that bizarreyer of webbing obscuring spiritual senses, it was almost impossible for outsiders to detect their existence.


    Soon, almost four hundred frightening corpses howled and hurried towards Greem from every corner of Spider Forest. They were treating Greem as the only enemy here, lunging at him from every angle.


    Unguja leaped to pounce on a withered corpse, pinning the body to the ground. He then used his sharp ws to smash the corpse¡¯s chest and head instantly. Unguja¡¯s three heads weren¡¯t idle either; a chain of wind des, fireballs, and acid balls shot out in session, blowing corpses to bits.


    For a moment, not a single withered corpse could get near Greem!


    Unguja¡¯s power was not to be underestimated. He was a magical creature leader as well. Even though he hadn¡¯t disyed excellent performance in the Battle of the Magma Hall, it was because Greem had never given him the chance to do anything.


    Now that Unguja faced a bunch of Spiderified Undead that were far inferior to him, he demonstrated the full extent of his agility and the ferocity of his triple-elementium attacks. With Unguja opening a path in the front, Greem could focus all his attention on manipting fires. He tossed fireballs here and there, lighting up all the ancient trees along his way and turning them into torches that scraped the sky.


    As a safety measure, Greem had left the manticore outside the valley to keep watch. He had stormed into Spider Forest with Unguja alone. With nobody to contest him, Greem became increasingly ferocious and reckless with his spells.


    The so-called Spider Forest was only a stretch of the ck Forest that had been slightly twisted and modified by spiders. It was only about two to three kilometers deep. An entrance to a cave revealed itself to Greem and Unguja as they fought against the endless horde of withered corpses and spiders.


    This ce was the entrance to Spider Cave; Spider Forest was no more than a hunting area that T had developed.


    Greem could see no other color but white in this ce.


    White webs wrapped the trees, and severalyers of webbing covered the ground as well. It was almost as if the two of them were walking in an baster sea. The sickly white color was everywhere.


    Even the Three-Headed Demon Hound Unguja couldn¡¯t do anything about this home territory of the spiders.


    He could refuse to enter, or he could endure these torturous webs.


    Even Unguja would identally run into a sticky web if he fought in an environment like this. And if that happened, T would probably be able to slice him into several pieces before he could even remove himself from the web!


    Hmph.


    Greem snorted coldly. He snapped his fingers as a fire rune immediately entered Unguja¡¯s body. He then activated his Ring of Fire without any hesitation.


    This environment slightly suppressed the hundred-meter-radius Ring of Fire, but it had an excellent ignition effect. All spiderwebs within twenty steps of Greem suddenly burst into mes. The sticky webs on the ground slowly vanished to reveal the ck dirt beneath.


    "Come on. I can sense T inside the cave."


    Greem strode forward without any hesitation and entered the cave ahead of Unguja. A shiver ran down Unguja¡¯s spine, and he quickly shouted, "Wait for me, master!" He then chased after Greem with all he had.


    A zing sea of fire slowly spread towards the depths of Spider Cave!


    ............


    Spider Cave.


    This pitch-ck underground cave didn¡¯t show a single ray of light.


    Several strange green lights shone in this deathly silence.


    It was only when these strange lights shed that one would, to their surprise, discover that they were thepound eyes of some massive creature.


    Demon-Hunting Spider T moved its body anxiously. It silently sensed for the intense vibrations transmitted through the web underneath it.


    An enemy had arrived!


    T didn¡¯t even need to see for itself. Already, the terrifying silhouette of the me Fiend appeared in its mind.


    These ursed adepts! They wouldn¡¯t even give it a chance to take a breath. How dare they recklessly break into this Spider Cave that it had managed for hundreds of years.


    Hmph! The Magma Hall was your home field. You burned all the cannon fodder I threw at you there. However, this Spider Cave is my territory. Since you dared to approach this ce, I will let you die here!


    T¡¯s eight hairy spider legs shook the spiderweb beneath it with a certain rhythm as it cursed internally. Several messages were sent in every direction without any sound. The various strange creatures hiding in obscure corners of the spider den started moving.


    A small tear appeared in the giant white cocoon in the corner of this hidden cave. Dana¡¯s pretty face was visible as she let out a sorrowful and angered scream.


    However, the tear on the cocoon was quickly sealed by T the next second.


    T dragged its severely wounded body and walked over to the cocoon. It produced fine threads from its abdominal sac, then used its eight legs to slowly turn the cocoon and wrapped anotheryer of webbing on the outside of the cocoon.


    "Stop resisting. The eggs have been imnted in your body. In just another seventeen hours, my newest children will hatch inside you. It is a great honor to be the food and host of my children. Then, they will simultaneously possess the innate talents of magical spiders and medusas. They will be my most reliable subordinates."


    The distinctughter of spider-like creatures rang throughout the sinister cave. Mixed within theughter was Dana¡¯s muffled howls of agony.


    ............


    The dark shadows extended all the way forward. The narrow roads wound about here and there, and not a single trace of light shone in this ce.


    However, as Greem continued forward, the darkness was dispelled. The zing fires illuminated everything.


    Greem had thrown out two golem summoning cores after he entered the spider den, summoning the Roaring Monster and the Decayer. The Roaring Monster stood at the forefront; its tall stone body made it the perfect meat shield to lead the way. The Decayer followed in the rear. Its silent movement hid its presence from most other creatures.


    The golems were protecting Greem and Unguja in the middle. They swiftly and unhesitatingly ventured their way toward the depths of the underground.


    There were winding paths and forked roads everywhere. Without an experienced guide, a neer would never be able to find the correct way in thisbyrinth.


    Strangely enough, Greem seemed to know everything about this spider den. He made his way towards T¡¯sir picking the shortest routes without any mistakes.


    This ability undoubtedly frightened T, who was hiding deep underground. It could only send out the mutated army of spiders it had been hiding in reserve.


    "Enemies have arrived." Greem reminded softly.


    The Roaring Monster held its footsteps. It plunged both of its hands into the dirt below and quickly created a colossal stone sword for itself. The sword wasrge, heavy, and filled with rough and uneven stone spikes! It was the perfect weapon for an overbearing monster like itself.


    The chittering sound from the other end of the tunnel hadn¡¯t ceased. Greem threw a fireball in that direction and immediately illuminated the flood of odd spider magical creatures.


    The next second, a storm of shadow arrows, acid balls, bone spikes, and spiderwebs shot at the party.


    The Roaring Monster used its massive body to block over eighty percent of the attacks. It then swung itsrge sword and charged forward, roaring as it did so. There was no space for it to rampage in this narrow tunnel. That was why the Roaring Monster injected a significant amount of earth elementium into the stone sword in its hands every so often.


    The stone sword would split apart to shoot out hundreds of stone spikes, surrounding everything in front in a barrage of stone spikes.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether the stone spikes impaled the enemies¡¯ heads or abdomens; these attacks were lethal to all the creatures within the radius of the stone spikes. Most of the time, these mutated spider creatures weren¡¯t even as big as the stone spikes being fired at them!

 Chapter 421 Spider Hall

    Chapter 421 Spider Hall


    The battle in the tunnel was vicious!


    Neither party had room to dodge. Everything was a matter of raw firepower.


    Greem had the Roaring Monster on his side as a shield. The continuous supply of earth elementium ensured that the Roaring Monster could fight on endlessly. Even if the number of spiders was a little overwhelming, they could do nothing about the three-headed demon hound attacking from behind.


    Greem followed behind Unguja and the Monster, casually lighting up everything in the tunnel that got in his way. It was only when the chip deemed a specific spider corpse of research value that Greem would take the effort to bend down and pick it up.


    Meanwhile, all the opportunistic magical creatures that had secretly trailed behind Greem¡¯s party and followed him into the cave had been devoured by a mysterious enemy in the pitch-ck darkness.


    At first, the only ones standing in Greem¡¯s way were small andrge spiders of various types. There were tarants the size of Tibetan mastiffs that walked along the walls of the cave as if they were on t ground. You had small and stout jumping spiders with thick and powerful legs designed for leaping. You even had evarcha spiders that spit poison and hunted from a distance.


    These monsters looked odd and had hideous faces, but they were still spiders. It wasn¡¯t just spiders that came swarming out of the darkness when Greem made it a hundred meters deep though. More and more spiderified creatures were appearing.


    They were the same as the withered corpses back in Spider Forest. Even though they were of different species, they became part of the spider army once the spiderites infested them.


    Spiderified wolves, apes, kangaroos, ogres.


    There were only limits to your imagination, not to the types of spiderified creatures!


    Even Greem¡¯s confidence and calmness had slowly turned into concern as he slowly fought his way deeper. Unguja, on the other hand, was furious. He hadn¡¯t stopped cursing at T for a single second.


    It was only now that Unguja understood why, every so often, a significant number of magical creatures went missing from the ck Forest. It seemed they had all been caught by T and turned into these sacrificial pawns.


    The magical creatures that T caught couldn¡¯t possibly be all that strong. Not to mention, their powers would further deteriorate when they were turned into spiderified creatures. However, just their recklessness and fearlessness made them a most annoying soldier.


    Other magical creatures had senses and intelligence. They knew how to avoid harm and pursue pleasure. They would have known whether to fight the Roaring Monster head-on or retreat if they couldn¡¯t resist it. They would have known how to leverage the geography to better stall the enemy¡¯s attack. However, these spiderified creatures knew nothing of death. They insisted on charging at the Monster and Unguja, even when faced with a fierce barrage of attacks.


    In doing so, these creatures had nowhere to run.


    The Roaring Monster¡¯s stone spikes and Unguja¡¯s chain of tri-elementium spells riddled them with holes the moment they entered their attack radius. However, these spiderified creatures would always fire onest shot before they were sted to bits.


    If it was only one or two of these wild creatures, the Roaring Monster might have been able to endure the attacks. However, when it was hundreds or thousands of spiderified creatures surging at the Monster, it was a whole different story. The storm of spells was enough to severely damage the Roaring Monster, no matter how weak the individual spells were.


    Even Unguja was howling in pain from the barrage of enemy spells. He continued to fire off wind des, fireballs, and acid balls with all his strength.


    Finally, after enduring this painful journey, and once they had exterminated most of the spiderified creatures, a new enemy appeared.


    These were strange magical spiders as big as bulls. They had the ck bodies of spiders and eight hairy legs, yet the torso was a humanoid one. Thick ck hair grew all over their upper bodies. These creatures each held a pair of sharp knives in their hands. They climbed on the walls and the ceilings, quickly jumping out from the darkness like fierce tigers.


    The Roaring Monster¡¯s stone sword shattered several times in a row. The rain of stone spikes gouged plenty of holes into the torsos and abdominal sacs of these strange spiders. Yet they continued their fearless charge and vicious attacks.


    The damaged Roaring Monster was finally unable to take it anymore. Its stone armor shattered into debris, and its elementium body became exposed.


    However, it was not the time for the Roaring Monster to bow out; they hadn¡¯t even seen T yet.


    Greem grunted and advanced. A bright red fire halo sted outward, and all the strange spider creatures that came into contact with it stumbled backward clumsily.


    me Halo of Repulsion!


    Greem took advantage of the spiders gathering together in one spot. He raised the ze of Destruction in his left hand as a precise Scarlet Firestorm exploded in the middle of the monstrosities.


    Even though Greem hadn¡¯t transformed, the unanticipated energy merging process from thest battle had significantly improved his fire spells. They now dealt a shocking one hundred and thirty points of damage.


    Attacks of this degree were no longer something that ordinary magical creatures could hope to take on with their basic magic resistance!


    At the same time that the me waves devoured these spider creatures, they came stumbling out of the fire, yelling in pain. While they did make it out of the ze, they were unable to extinguish the elementium mes on their bodies.


    Some magical spiders rolled around on the ground, hoping to use the wet mud to suppress the mes. Others rushed towards Greem, trying to drag the adept to his death along with them.


    The ones trying to smother the mes were never able to extinguish the stubborn mes no matter what they did. In fact, the fire had even spread into the insides of their bodies. Their muscles, tissues, and organs slowly burned away. The ones that rushed Greem had barely charged into his Ring of Fire before the multipleyers of fire reduced them to ashes without reaching him.


    Greem slowly walked ahead, using his magma fireballs to open a path by sting away the spiders, then roasting them to death with the Ring of Fire. The tunnel filled with violent me shockwaves and the screams of spiders wherever he went.


    Of course, there was the unique acrid smell of burned flesh!


    Finally, after sting away thest strange humanoid spider, Greem¡¯s party set foot in the sinister cave hidden in the depths of the underground.


    "You have finally arrived!" A massive ck form crouched inside the darkness. Its ghostly green eyes shed and blinked, casting hateful gazes at Greem.


    Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire acted like a giganttern in this ce. It immediately illuminated this vast hall.


    This big hall wasposed of gray and brownyers of stone. Stgmites and stone pirs littered the ground, while stone spikes and stctites hung ominously from the ceiling above.


    This ce was the same as outside. Sticky white spiderwebs covered every single spot. Stuck in these webs were several white cocoons of various sizes. Judging from how they were pulsating, all of these cocoons had living beings trapped in them.


    A dense field of eggs covered the floor in the corner of the spider hall. Every time an egg broke, a weird fist-sized spider crawled out from within before disappearing into the web below.


    The king of this domain, Demon-Hunting Spider T, crouched upon a massive spider web. Its mountainous body was riddled with holes of various sizes. Countless spiderites crawled in and out of these wounds as if they were trying to mend broken armor.


    Its abdominal sac had shriveled up, and a disgusting and sour liquid continuously dripped out of what seemed like its anus.


    The monumental battle earlier had been tough on T. Its injuries would not have recovered that quickly if it hadn¡¯t devoured the three or four of its descendants that possessed adept-level powers.


    Its pride as a magical creature lord didn¡¯t allow it to run when it saw Greem arrive in pursuit. It could only sit here and stare at the cruel bastards that had broken into its pce with hate in its eyes.


    "Nice. Very nice," T¡¯s wicked mandibles sent sparks flying everywhere when they shed together as it spoke, "I am very curious. This should be the first time you are visiting my spider cave. What method did you use to make it through thebyrinth that I created without any mistake? How did you find this ce?"


    These questions disturbed it deeply. ording to its estimations, even if Greem and his party had managed to make it here, it should have at least taken seven or eight hours to do so. This buffer of time would have been enough for it to hatch its ideal mutated spiders sessfully.


    After all, this was the first time it had managed to obtain a magical creature leader as prey!


    However, Greem had seeded in navigating the safest and shortest route to rush straight into his quarters. Of course, this came as a shock to T!


    "I don¡¯t seem to have any obligation to answer your doubts, do I?!" Greem¡¯s mouth twisted in disdain before coldly speaking, "Everyone knows the viins die by monologue. You had best die with your doubts still in your heart."


    Greem¡¯s mental flux seemed to act as a signal. The Roaring Monster¡¯s stone spikes, Unguja¡¯s tri-elementium spells, the Decayer¡¯s acid balls, and his own Fire Core Explosion allunched at the same instant. The fierce magic thundered across the hall like a typhoon, crashing towards T.


    The entire party prepared the second wave of spells in tandem right after they had released the first one.


    At the same moment the spells consumed T¡¯s body, many spiderites climbed out from everywhere. The webs, the stgmites, the pirs, the cracks in the walls. These spiderites swarmed towards the party from every direction.


    At the same time, a shadow loomed from above. Arge form crashed down toward the group from the ceiling overhead. Eight sharp limbs were like eight horrifying spears, whistling through the air as they stabbed at the party.


    Enemy assault...

 Chapter 422 Unexpected Ambush

    Chapter 422 Unexpected Ambush


    How terrifying was an elite-level magical creature with the territorial advantage?


    Greem might not have known the answer to this question before this moment, but now he no longer needed one!


    The massive demon-hunting spider skittered about the hall with the agility of a monkey. It easily avoided the spells hurled at it by taking cover behind the pirs. It then scaled the walls and hung from the ceiling with the use of its webbing and spider legs. T remained as speedy as ever even when it walked on the roof of the cave.


    Every time T struck at Greem, its sharp limbs threw the adept into a panic as he scrambled to avoid the attacks. However, any misstep in this environment would cause Greem tond in a spider web trap! What came next was the horrible fate of being consumed by tens of thousands of spiders.


    Fortunately, Greem was a destructive fire adept that brought his territorial advantage along with him wherever he went. Once he transformed into the me Fiend, every ce enveloped by his Ring of Fire would turn into his home field.


    The Ring of Fire sizzled when it came into contact with the spiderwebs, like water poured onto boiling magma.


    The mes burned intensely, scorching the webs until they turned ck and charred before finally turning into dust. And T¡¯s method of countering the Ring of Fire was to have the magical spiders detonate themselves!


    Tens of thousands of fist-sized spiders climbed out of every shadowy corner, leaping and jumping towards the Ring of Fire where they ferociously detonated themselves before they wholly burned.


    These spiderites were small magical creatures that had magical energy. Their self-detonation wasn¡¯t all that powerful, but it was at least as strong as a magical fireball with twenty points of power. Once their numbers reached a certain threshold, there would be several spiders simultaneously detonating themselves within the Ring of Fire. The stacked energy shockwaves from the explosions caused some of the energy to dissipate. Still, thebined force of their explosions had also reached a threatening extent.


    Ten small spiders grouped could deal a hundred and thirty points of damage. That was as much as Greem¡¯s all-out attacks!


    Not to mention there were far more than ten spiderites standing in front of them. Spiderites covered the ceiling, floor, walls, pirs, and every other open space. Their numbers had likely exceeded the thousands.


    The shockwave vortex created by the lurching magical energies severely damaged the Ring of Fire¡¯s stability, causing its radius to shrink quickly. Once the Ring of Firepletely fell apart, Greem and his party would have to face the full force of those spiderites.


    The Roaring Monster, the Decayer, and Unguja all retreated to Greem¡¯s side, where they used their concentrated firepower to weaken T¡¯s relentless strikes. Greem then freed himself from the battle for a moment and immediately drew upon four of the massive fire spells he had stored in the Scroll of Voodoo.


    Scarlet Firestorm!


    Meteor Shower!


    Doomsday Volcano!


    World Scorching Firecloud!


    In all honesty, the simultaneous detonation of several spiderites was quite destructive. However, T wasn¡¯t able to leverage this ability to reign over the ck Forestpletely. The main reason for that was the excessively weak magical resistance and physical defenses of the spiderites!


    Perhaps because they had undergone mutations and modifications, most of the spiderites¡¯ internal organs were used to store magical energy; it caused their magic and physical defenses to be far inferior to small magical creatures of simr strength.


    Consequently, a singlerge-area fire spell from Greem instantly annihted most of the spiderites that had yet to charge into the Ring of Fire. Moreover, their passive ability to self-detonate had also triggered a chain reaction of sts. Their frail defenses and substantial numbers were the primary causes of the chain explosions!


    The explosive bang of a Scarlet Firestorm with ny points of power reverberated throughout the hall the moment it was released. Even T was effected, along with the spiderites near it. T was sted at least twice, even as it hid in a dark corner of the cave.


    This series of explosions had caused irreversible destruction to the spider hall!


    Most of the pirs supporting the hall had been sted to fragments. Many cracks had also appeared in the walls around them. Finally, the overburdened ceiling copsed amid ear-piercing grinding.


    If the Roaring Monster hadn¡¯t stood foremost to use its massive stone body to prop up a small barrier, Greem and his group would have be victims of this disaster.


    Yet, by saving the party, the Monster had also exhausted all the elementium energy it had stored within itself. All the stones on its body disintegrated and fell off until it was nothing but a pile of rocks. The Roaring Monster might not have been dead, but there was no chance it could participate in this battle any longer!


    Greem and the others eventually climbed out from the debris with great difficulty when a massive silhouette lunged at them from under the rocks. Its piercing spider legs shed out as it whistled through the air.


    Greem didn¡¯t say anything. He immediately leaped away from the spot through the use of his Fire Teleportation.


    The more massive Unguja was the first to be hit. One of his heads was severed, and a purple-ck fountain of blood sputtered out from the wound. Two spider legs had also impaled his body. T held the Demon Hound up in the air, causing Ung to scream in agony.


    The Decayer was also a victim as its defense was the weakest of them all. It had been split in half by T¡¯s ferocious fangs and had copsed into a pile of thick acid goo. The beetle shells and broken limbs of corpses that the Decayer had yet to digest scattered everywhere. It was incredibly disgusting to look at.


    With a sh of crimson light, Greem reappeared next to a stgmite thirty meters away. He then turned and silently looked at T, who raised Unguja¡¯s body in a show of might.


    A strange creak.


    T¡¯s two limbs moved slightly and the sharp des twisted in Unguja¡¯s flesh. The pitch of the three-headed demon hound¡¯s cries shot up sharply.


    "How dare you break into my den! Now you know my power!" Even though T was viciously punishing Unguja, its severalpound eyes stared at Greem without so much as a single blink; the adept seemed to be up to something.


    The other enemies in the room were not his opponent. Only this human adept, whose power varied from battle to battle, gave T a vague sense of danger; it was a threat of death that frightened the massive spider.


    Greem¡¯s massive body was zing with fire. He remained in the first phase transformation and didn¡¯t attempt to unseal the me Fiend¡¯s Heart. Even though his eyes, shing with a blue light, fixated on the cautious T, Greem was rapidlymunicating with someone in his mind.


    A moment ago, an unexpected mental consciousness came out of nowhere and gently poked at his senses, right when T was about to attack him. The first message he received was a warning about T¡¯s sneak attack.


    Without the warning, Greem would not have been able to sense T¡¯s existence immediately after they had just survived being crushed by falling rocks. If T had gotten its way, it would have severely injured Greem!


    "Now you believe me, don¡¯t you?" The mysterious consciousness continued tomunicate with him, "I helped you, and now you must help me. I don¡¯t need you to do much. Just force that damned old spider thirty meters back, and I will do my best to help you kill it."


    Greem was speechless.


    However, this mysterious mental consciousness matched a specific individual in the chip¡¯s data library. If it was indeed that person, everything that was happening could very well be exined.


    Greem acted without hesitation after quickly establishing an agreement with the other person.


    The Decayer had fallen apart near T. Suddenly, a green halo shed above the Decayer, and two slightly smaller Decayers emerged on the spot. They frantically started spitting acid at T.


    Greem held his staff in his left hand and the Scroll of Voodoo in his right. A radiant red light appeared amid the sound of flipping pages as a violent Chain of Fireballs crashed towards T. This Chain of Fireballs was a spell stored in the Scroll of Voodoo. With staff in hand, Greem simultaneously conjured an explosive fireball that he hurled at T.


    None of these attacks seemed to have considered Unguja¡¯s wellbeing!


    Even if T intended to use Unguja to block this wave of spells, he would still be damaged by the ensuing shockwave and explosion.


    It already knew that adepts were cold and unfeeling people. Trying to threaten them with their ¡¯subordinates¡¯ was a purely suicidal act. That was why T¡¯s six other limbs swiftly moved and carried its body back away from the spells. At the same time that it retreated, T raised its legs and threw the badly wounded Unguja at the explosive fireball flying towards them.


    Usually, T would have charged ahead and braved the attacks to engage Greem in a close range fight. That was its terrifyingbat style that it had honed after hundreds of years. Suffering a small wound for a chance to murder the enemy was worth the trade.


    However, T was deathly afraid of the powerful grimoire Greem had in his hand.


    A grimoire that could instantly discharge so many potent spells was likely a magical item. Before T figured out how many spells remained in that book, it would never risk its life!


    Moreover, the sudden active stance that the human adept was taking gave T a sense of danger. It had a vague feeling that there was a plot hidden behind the adept¡¯s actions.


    As expected, the human adept immediately disappeared in a sh of fire right after he fired that series of attacks.


    Fire Teleportation!


    Dammit, where did he intend to teleport to?


    Would he go to support that elementium golem¡¯s attacks, or would he rush over for a melee?


    T raised its four front limbs high up as unease and confusion filled its heart. It then shed at every inch of space around it with the four sharp limbs. At the same time, it used its other legs to retreat and quickly distance itself from its original position.


    At the same moment its massive body was retreating, a pile of rocks at the edge of the cave blew apart. A slender figure dashed out and lunged towards T¡¯s thick shell.


    More enemies?


    The sudden appearance of this enemy scared T out of its wits.


    It shook its body frantically and tried to shake the enemy away. However, the opponent didn¡¯t seem to care about the injury. They got all the way up to its back and jumped at T¡¯s head while ignoring the damage T¡¯s thick hair was dealing to their tender skin.


    Demon-Hunting Spider T was shocked!


    It barely managed to turn its head sideways, yet the first thing it saw was a pair of eyes shining with a frightening glow.

 Chapter 423 Having Medusa Yield

    Chapter 423 Having Medusa Yield


    How terrifying was a Medusa¡¯s Petrifying Gaze?


    Most people who had experienced it themselves never had the chance to speak of it.


    However, Greem had the luck to witness the petrification of an elite-ss magical creature lord personally.


    T only felt the intensity of the light shining into its eyes when it turned its head. It was blinding! Its vision went ck, and then it could no longer see anything.


    A quick momentter, T started to feel numbness throughout its body. It had lost the senses in its limbs and body. The feeling of numbness even spread toward the inside of its body at a shocking rate!


    However, Dana¡¯s Petrification Gaze wasn¡¯t going to go all that well. An earth yellow color shed around T¡¯s body. The old spider¡¯s head was the first to turn into hard stone. The light flickered as it spread through T¡¯s body, petrifying the upper half of its body to stone.


    However, the spider¡¯s counterattack had also descended at this moment.


    Several colorful spiderites climbed out of T¡¯s fat abdominal sac. These creatures quickly leaped onto the Medusa¡¯s body and started biting savagely. Several white pulses of light shed from within T¡¯s body, and it swiftly began absorbing the petrification power that Dana had injected into its body.


    The earth-yellow powers of petrification shed with the milky white healing radiance in the middle of T¡¯s body; neither side seemed to have the advantage.


    Dana, who had wanted to assassinate T in a single blow, was not in good condition either. Her slender snake tail whipped about frantically and sessfully killed many spiderites, but there were still plenty of them biting her body.


    The intense pain in her flesh and her already weakened spirit pushed Dana to her limits.


    "Kill it quick..." Dana screeched at the top of her lungs.


    That explosive attack had obviously been thest bit of her remaining strength.


    When thest traces of petrification energy entered T¡¯spound eyes, Dana let go of her grip on the old spider in exhaustion. Her wounded body fell off from T¡¯s shell.


    Even at this moment, thepletely worn out Medusa continued to shout at Greem.


    "Kill it. Help me kill it..."


    The old spider¡¯s paralyzed limbs suddenly twitched, and an unstoppable force shook off the shell of stone that had formed over the surface of its body.


    T was just about to double its efforts and use its freed limbs to break free of the petrification effect. Yet, at that moment, Greem and the Decayer¡¯s violent blows once againnded on T. This time, even the severely wounded demon hound standing at death¡¯s door forced himself to get up. His two remaining heads spit fireballs and wind des at the ancient spider with all they had.


    It was the first time Greem had hit T square on the body with his Fire Core Explosion!


    The old spider had always used its agility, quick reflexes, and counterattacks to dodge the center of his fire spells¡¯ area of effect. T easily ignored the remaining magical shockwaves thanks to its excellent magic resistance.


    This time, T was hit by Greem¡¯s spell while half of its body was petrified and its spirit was corrupted and crippled.


    A Fire Core Explosion of a hundred and thirty points of power... that was a horrifying attack that even magical creatures at the peak of elite-ss couldn¡¯t endure!


    The Fire Core Explosion generated an elementium vacuum one-meter in diameter. This vacuum carved out a small chunk of T¡¯s body. This one-meter diameter hole at the center of T¡¯s body was a grievous wound, despite the monster¡¯s humongous size.


    All the flesh and organs touched by the mes had been reduced to ashes. However, the intense heat also cauterized the gaping wound. That was why not a single drop of blood was visible. As the pressure on the wounds gradually built up within the body, purple-ck blood burst out of T¡¯s flesh like a volcanic eruption.


    T howled and fell to the ground, even as it managed to break free from the petrification!


    At the same time, Unguja and Dana also copsed.


    The two of them had been supporting their bodies through sheer force of will. Now that they had witnessed their greatest enemy mortally wounded, they too finally copsed.


    Greem walked up to Unguja and took out five vials of healing potion that he poured right into the beast¡¯s mouth. The massive amount of medicine did their work and managed to help the demon hound cling to life.


    Greem then slowly walked towards the copsed Medusa and waved a vial of healing potion before her.


    "Do you need me to heal you?" The green potion swished and swooshed about as he shook it, "I can ensure you survive as long as you yield to me!"


    Who knew? The Medusa hadn¡¯t even spoken when a mental cry for help came from the dying old spider.


    "Save me. Save me...you save me, and I¡¯ll listen to everything you say..."


    Hmm, one would suppose that even a magical creature lord could beg like that. Still, this was definitely beyond Greem¡¯s expectations!


    However, Dana the Medusa didn¡¯t want the old spider to be saved just like that. She opened her pretty eyes and stared unblinkingly at Greem.


    "That bastard T has already nted eggs in my body. They will hatch and emerge in half an hour. You don¡¯t need to set your sights on me." Dana was the silent type that valued every word she said. Even though she could have pretended to yield to Greem in exchange for the life of T, she still spoke the truth.


    Greem smiled and ignored the begging T. He sincerely spoke to the Medusa, "Don¡¯t worry about that! Just a parasite egg. I have absolute confidence I can extract them from your body! Now, it¡¯s just a matter of whether you are willing to yield to me."


    Dana painstakingly propped herself up with her arms and took a look at her surroundings. She then gazed at Greem: "As long as you kill T andpletely cure me, I swear by the name of the Earth Mother to forever serve you!"


    Dana¡¯s words shocked the dying old spider. But before it could even muster thest vestiges of its strength to fight back, a ck staff stabbed into its head. The impact squashed thest traces of life from the spider.


    Even though the old spider was much more powerful than Dana, from a theoretical standpoint, Greem decided to recruit the Medusa after he gave it some thought. That was because he didn¡¯t have the confidence topletely manipte a magical creature leader at the peak of elite-ss and keep it under his thumb. After all, he had to undergo his second phase transformation just to possess the power to engage T in a fight. The disproportionate difference in Spirit alsopromised any maniption spells and contracts he could establish.


    As opposed to recruiting a ticking time bomb, it was much better to take in a loyal Medusa.


    The dust settled, and the battle was won. Greem sent the Decayer and Unguja to sweep the Spider Cave while he stayed behind to help the Medusa solve the problem festering within her body.


    If it were any other adept, even those specialists who were well-versed in the arts of dissection and magical creature biology, they would not perform as well as Greem in this situation. With his scanning ability, Greem had the most perfect and unobstructed view of everything happening in Dana¡¯s body.


    Now that the Medusa had deactivated her life forcefield, Greem¡¯s elementium sight was as powerful as an x-ray machine. He had managed a detailed scan of her body with a single glimpse. He then sessfully found a parasite the size of a palm in her abdomen.


    It was a strange creature that resembled both a spider and a scorpion!


    Its head was pinned deep below Dana¡¯s ribs, while its four pairs of sharp limbs gripped her spine. Its tail had stabbed into the spine and seemed to be slowly absorbing Dana¡¯s bone marrow.


    Dana¡¯s current exhaustion had evidently been caused by this parasite absorbing most of her strength.


    Such aplicated scenario and such a strange parasite; any other adept would have been hard-pressed to get rid of this pest without harming the Medusa¡¯s origin powers.


    However, this was not a problem for Greem and his powerful eyes. He had Dana lie on the ground as he took out a dozen surgical tools from his pouch. All of them had various purposes and shapes. He then cut open the Medusa¡¯s abdomen.


    The surgical scalpel nimbly danced about Greem¡¯s slender fingers. It was almost as if surgery had be an art in and of itself.


    Greem opened Dana¡¯s chest and exposed the unique biologicalposition of a Medusa to his eyes. Thick crimson body tissue existed beneath the tough ribs. A thin but tough membrane covered those muscles. Dana¡¯s three-lobed heart was beating beneath all that, slow yet powerful.


    A dark red insect with a hard shell crouched on her spine. Seven or eight tiny vessels extended from its body and connected with the Medusa¡¯s organs.


    The strange insect reared its semi-translucent head that had yet to harden and let out a weak but determined screech at Greem. It was almost as if it could sense the outside threat. Its attempts to absorb Dana¡¯s power became even more hurried and rushed!


    Greem smiled coldly.


    Anyone else might not have known how to deal with a strange creature like this one. They could easily hurt the Medusa as they killed this parasite. However, Greem was different. He had the best surgical guidance right in his brain.


    The chip directly scanned all the contact points between the insect and the Medusa. It then projected every single one of them onto Greem¡¯s retina.


    Seventeen contact points!


    Eight of those were blood vessels, five were conduits of some kind, one was its head capsule, two were its body nodes, and thest one was its stinger.


    Greem had to remove all these things from Dana¡¯s body in the shortest amount of time to prevent the insect from dealing more damage to her. And to do all this, Greem only needed a single instant!


    Greem tossed the surgical scalpel aside. A strand of fire that resembled a de burned at the tips of all ten of his slender fingers. He then rapidly sliced across the body of the insect like a delicate and careful pianist. His ck eyes also shone as two tiny heat rays shot out from within.


    The perfect coordination of his hands and eyes allowed him to sever the seventeen contacts points in a single second. Even the insect¡¯s four pairs of limbs had been cleanly cut off by Greem.


    Greem felt the impulse to research a strange creature like this, and therefore spared its life. He carefully extracted it from Dana¡¯s body then threw it into a jar after sealing it with magic. Greem then cautiously took out the severed limbs and stinger and stashed them somewhere safe.

 Chapter 424 Bountiful Spoils

    Chapter 424 Bountiful Spoils


    How significant were the benefits of robbing a magical creature lord?


    Greem didn¡¯t want to answer this question, because he was practically having a stroke fromughing.


    T had excavated many independent caves in the deepest parts of its spider cave. Assorted valuable metal ores and precious resources were split up in hidden caches within these small caves.


    It was T¡¯s hundreds of years of toiling collection. The value of all the resources added together was enough to shock Greem!


    Of course, the magical creaturescked a detailed and perfected system of refining metals. That meant that most of the stuff they collected were natural metal crystals and magical gemstones of the highest quality.


    Greem also discoveredrge amounts of natural Magic Iron in T¡¯s warehouse. This metal was one of the fundamental materials that adepts used to make magic alloy. Apart from Magic Iron, Greem also found thorium, mithril, khorium, wrought gold, eternium, shadow stones, opals, unrefined emeralds, topaz, and many other magical gemstones.


    Naturally, T also had an entire warehouse of magical stones.


    Magical stones were simr to magical crystals; they were a product of arcane energies. However, magical stones were of inferior quality. Magical stones formed when rocks in nature absorbed excessive amounts of elementium. That was why magical stones shattered into pebbles and rock pieces once the magical energy within was extracted from them. Magical crystals, on the other hand, were crystals formed from concentrated elementium that was subjected to immense pressure. The amount of magical energy that a single magical crystal could store was far higher than that of a magical stone.


    In conclusion, magical stones had a more stable structure, but they absorbed and retained less magical energy. They also left behind impurities. Magical crystals were less stable, but they contained far more magical power and left nothing behind when consumed.


    That was why high-grade runic and magical arrays required magical crystals as a power source. Magical stones were only suited for use in inferior products. The exchange rate between the two types of resource was ten to one.


    The magical creatures of ck Forest could not extract and refine the stones into magical crystals. That was why they mostly stockpiled magical stones that they had dug out themselves. Greem performed a basic calction; T had amassed about seven to eight hundred thousand magical stones. Converted to magical crystals, this amounted to seventy to eighty thousand crystals.


    Even though it didn¡¯tpletely negate the cost of the war, it was still a great relief to the tower¡¯s finances.


    Moreover, Greem wasn¡¯t the only search party. If the other two parties were able to reap simr rewards, they might be able to make up for their losses. In fact, they might even have a little extra!


    However, of all the discoveries, there was one that excited Greem the most. A rare bottle of the Blood of Ley Lines.


    This substance was extremely beneficial for earth-attribute bloodline adepts. It could, at the very least, fetch thirty thousand magical crystals if put on the market.


    Furthermore, there were alsorge amounts of associated resources in metal ores. For example, there were the shadow crystals, smoky quartz, dark jade, elementium earth. There were even flora resources unique to the ck Forest, such as Thousand Year Tree Hearts, Giant Tree Roots, magic vine seeds, sunflowers...


    Greem had also found a smallboratory as he was searching through this extensive list of resources. All sorts of strange samples were inside. These were things like spiderified creature specimens and unformed fetuses. After a detailed search, Greem even found a knowledge crystal in a hidden box inside theb. Its contents seemed to be T¡¯s centuries of thoughts on its biological experimentations. T had also imparted some knowledge about the soul to the crystal.


    The magical creatures might not have had aprehensive and excellent legacy system as the adepts did. However, a magical creature with any ambition at all would research its own. That said, most of their research was isted and hidden away from the eyes of others. There was almost no exchange of knowledge between them.


    Every magical creature would have to start from scratch if they wanted to embark on a topic of research. There was no readily avable body of information or techniques they could draw inspiration from.


    Consequently, the results of the magical creatures¡¯ research were always fragmented and superficial. Even though they could sometimes be inspired and genuinely insightful, most of it was merely too shallow due to theck of understanding and technique. The research hardly even delved deep enough to reveal the hidden secrets of the world!


    One could tell what T¡¯s passion was just by looking at the sheer number of mutated spiders and spiderified creatures. The old spider loved breeding and modifying its own descendants. However, the descendants it had changed were all weak inbat. It meant that T wasn¡¯t all that talented and well-versed in the arts of biological modifications.


    Still, Greem wasn¡¯t a picky person.


    He pressed the crystal against his forehead. In less than five seconds, he had perfectly copied the massive amount of data stored within. Then, under the chip¡¯s careful filtering and selection, seventy-eight percent of the mistakes and irrelevant information were excluded. The rest was then carefully sorted and saved.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare touch the parts about utilizing spider eggs and powerful beings to birth spiderified creatures. However, there was plenty of exploration into the soul in T¡¯s research. This knowledge had great significance for Greem.


    In truth, Greem had been trying to purchase knowledge rted to the soul for a long time. However, he still hasn¡¯t managed to obtain any news of a seller. It seemed that all therge adept organizations were furiously trying to get ahead on research about the soul. Everything rted to this area of study, including the progress made in the area, had been sealed and was on lockdown.


    Ordinary adepts had no means of obtaining rted information, let alone conduct valuable and relevant experiments.


    That was why Greem had nearly no information about the soul in the chip¡¯s data library. T¡¯s research was mostly superficial and often mistaken, but it still had immeasurable significance in guiding Greem¡¯s own analysis!


    In particr, Greem loved the two or three minor soul spells stored inside the knowledge crystal; Greem was barely able to suppress his excitement. If it weren¡¯t for the timing and location, he would already be trying to get firsthand information about these spells.


    After all, only new knowledge and spells could interest an adept. These were the most significant factors that drove their improvement!.


    There was far too much wealth in the spider cave. Just Greem and Unguja alone couldn¡¯t possibly take away much of the treasure. That was why Greem left Unguja to keep watch over the ce while he brought Dana back to the tower on the manticore. He then had Am lead a group of disciples and a few manticores to the cave to perform the heavy lifting.


    The most powerful creatures in the area were already dead. There was no real need to be concerned for their safety. Thus, Greem left matters out of his hands once he passed the coordinates of the spider cave to the apprentices. He then holed up in his tower to slowly investigate the contents of the knowledge crystal.


    Dana the Medusa, as one of the severely wounded casualties, remained in the tower to regain her strength.


    Of course, Meryl and Gargamel also returned soon.


    There were upsets and difficulties along the way, but they also brought back abundant lists of resources and rare items.


    Much like T, the other magical creature leaders had secretly stashed plenty of resources in their private storerooms and warehouses. The two parties couldn¡¯t bring too many of the stores along with them, so they only picked the rarest of them all to bring back. The rest of the stuff had to be slowly moved back to the tower over the course of the next few days.


    The moremon resources were all left to Gargamel¡¯s discretion. They were to be stored in the warehouse as fundamental resources for the tower¡¯s day-to-day use. The more valuable and precious resources were also left to Gargamel to deal with after Greem got to pick from them. The most expensive and rarest of them all, Greem kept in his private quarters.


    Greem had left the Demon Hound¡¯s and the Medusa¡¯s dens untouched and left it for them to deal with themselves. This gesture was to strengthen their loyalties to him. Most of the housekeeping was centered around the dens of T, the Giant Berserk Gda, the bird demon, and the snake fiend.


    While the bird demon and snake fiend had also surrendered to Greem and pledged themselves to his cause, they were too weak. Therefore, Greem didn¡¯t see the need to provide them with better treatment. They had no choice but to suck it up and offer all their property to Greem. They were only allowed to keep some resources for themselves and their tribe members.


    The transportation took several weeks. When the Silver Union adepts hurriedly arrived with the construction team, they weren¡¯t sure if they had reached the right ce. guewood, no, the pile of rocks was too lively.


    guewood had utterly vanished, reced by a three-kilometer-wide field of rocks. ck dirt mixed with pebbles and rocks, as well as broken branches from fallen trees. These were thest signs of guewood.


    At the moment, a massive hole had been dug out in the center of the enormous pile of boulders. A new tunnel had also been dug out. Other than the manticores, who were carting things to and fro, there were also plenty of low-level magical creatures working at the entrance of the cave.


    They were the most hardworkingborers, continuously carrying stuff off of the manticore¡¯s back and grunting as they heaved them underground.


    A flock of bird demons took to the skies when the ¡¯outsiders¡¯ suddenly appeared. They held crude throwing spears in their hands as they formed a perimeter. Seven or eight snake fiends with male human torsos and snake tails slithered across the ground and surrounded the outsiders. They held long and gleaming spears in their hands.


    The silver-robed adepts had arrived here on a sort of floating disc unique to the Silver Union. The tform couldn¡¯t fly as high as a floating ship, but it was agiler and more suited for short distance flying of sixty kilometers or less.


    "Could the adept¡¯s tower have fallen to the magical creatures? Has this ce turned into a monster¡¯s yground?¡± A silver-robed adept couldn¡¯t help but exim.


    "No. I¡¯m afraid it¡¯s quite the opposite!" Adept Eugene was the one to speak, "Look at the cave entrance."


    The esoteric adepts turned to look, and indeed, they found two apprentices standing there. They weren¡¯t the ves or prisoners of these magical creatures. Instead, they seemed to be the overseers of the ce, arrogantlymanding the magical creatures.


    Kodar quickly called the bird demons and snake fiends back when he saw the silver robes on Eugene and the others. He personally rushed ahead to greet the adepts.


    "May I ask if you are the respected adepts from the Devinni Trading Company?"


    "That is right. We are indeed from the Devinni Trading Company."


    "That couldn¡¯t be better news. My teacher has been awaiting your arrival in the tower. Pleasee with me!"


    The adepts looked at each other in suspicion before silently following Kodar into the tunnel filled with the smell of fire and sulfur.

 Chapter 425 Construction Works

    Chapter 425 Construction Works


    The two parties met again in the tower.


    It had only been ten days, and yet it was almost as if this brand new tower had just experienced a hundred years of history. The scars of war remained on the tower¡¯s walls and the Magma Hall that it resided in.


    Thest time they had seen this ce, it had still been draped in pitch-ck darkness. There had only been illuminating rocks, nightlight crystals, phosphorescent moss, lichens, and fungi that glowed with dim lights.


    This time, what they saw was a Magma Hall that continually shone with a crimson light.


    All the stone pirs, dirt, and materials that had been immersed in the sea ofva and couldn¡¯t withstand it had been vaporized and washed away. Only the volcanic rock that could withstand the heat remained.


    That was why the geography looked so much differentpared tost time. It was barely recognizable.


    In particr, the stone walls of the Magma Hall were incredibly striking. They were red below and ck on top. The difference in the structures of the wall was pronounced. All the visiting adepts could sense the trials and difficulties that the tower had endured over the past few days.


    The three Silver Union adepts couldn¡¯t help but fall silent when they saw the tower¡¯s damaged walls and the severelypromised foundations. They knew very well what this meant. The fact that Greem could sit here talking to them at leisure meant that the magical creatures had lost.


    Those invading magical creatures were either hiding in some corner, licking their wounds, or starting to plot their next attacks. Still, either way, this ¡¯small-time adept¡¯ from the Sarubo n had won the first move in obtaining dominance over this stretch of the ck Forest.


    As long as he performed the follow-up support and replenishment well, this adept¡¯s tower would stick here like a stubborn nail. The magical creatures would hate its existence, but there would be nothing they could do.


    After all, an adept with an adept¡¯s tower possessed an overwhelming advantage in every aspect. These advantages were not something that could be overturned by sheer numbers!


    However, the three adepts shook their heads when they saw the number of adepts and apprentices inside the tower. The quality and quantity of workforce Greem owned were more than enough to defend, but they wouldn¡¯t be enough to go on the offensive. They would probably have a tough time exterminating the magical creatures.


    Those magical creature leaders coulde back and strike again at any time if they had escaped.


    The main reason the three silver-robed adepts hade to such a conclusion was that Greem had stationed his new recruits away from the tower. Dana, Unguja, Eva, the bird demon, and the snake fiend were all outside.


    Only Greem, Gargamel, and Meryl stayed inside the adept¡¯s tower, along with the three pseudo-adepts¨C Kodar, Am, and Sabrina. The other apprentices were not going to be of much use against an organized stampede! Therefore, they weren¡¯t taken into consideration by the Silver Union adepts.


    That was why the three adepts secretly guessed that Greem had used the sea ofva from theva well to flood the hall and force out the magical creatures.


    In doing so, neither side had obtained a real victory. Their hatred for each other would only continue to grow, just as the war would, with no end in sight! Even if this stretch of the ck Forest had any rare resources, they were not going to be able to excavate them under such circumstances properly.


    This failure caused the three adepts to lower their assessment of Greem by quite a bit!


    "Only three adepts and one of them is a newly-advanced adept. Is the Sarubo n incapable of assigning more manpower to help them?" One of the adepts silentlymunicated with the others using Password of the Mind.


    "Don¡¯t you forget, this is his personal tower. It¡¯s very likely that the n doesn¡¯t support his actions!"


    "Then the n sent him out to die? This is the ck Forest. Build a tower here, and you invite the magical creatures to attack. Could this guy not have known about this beforehand?"


    "Who cares?! Our mission is to build and construct an excellent adept¡¯s tower per the client¡¯s specifications. Don¡¯t overthink the other unrted matters."


    The three Silver Union adepts secretly talked amongst themselves as they discussed the maintenance and repair of the tower.


    The tower had suffered extensive internal and external damage during the battle. The cost of putting things back into order was not going to be cheap. Moreover, the magical facilities inside the tower were still iplete. Greem intended to take this opportunity to fill them in.


    Of course, he excluded the teleportation array!


    Both sides started a fierce negotiation over the cost of the operations. Finally, after the adepts consulted with their higher-ups, the final price was settled at one hundred and sixty-seven thousand magical crystals. The ves that Greem had purchased thest time had also arrived in Pinecone Town. They were hurrying towards the tower while escorted by mercenaries. It would take them approximately four days to arrive.


    One hundred and sixty-seven thousand magical crystals; this was a hefty fee that even some veteran adepts might not be able to pull out. Meryl and Gargamel¡¯s face flushed white the moment they heard of the news. They had solemn expressions on their faces the whole time as if their hearts were about to give out at any time.


    They had all participated in the process of the tower¡¯s construction from nothing.


    Building the tower had cost two hundred thousand magical crystals. Defending the assault of the magical creatures had cost one hundred and ten thousand. If they were to add all that to the cost of one hundred and sixty-seven thousand this time, it would mean that Greem had spent nearly five hundred thousand magical crystals in the span of a mouth! All for the sake of constructing his own personal adept¡¯s tower!


    This number gave Meryl, the newly advanced adept, and Gargamel the wandering adept an oppressively suffocating feeling.


    No wonder most adepts were willing to spend their entire lives managing their towers. In the end, it was because they had no choice. An adept¡¯s tower was practically a money-eating monstrosity. If left alone without any management, the sheer crystal cost was enough to reduce an adept to tears!


    Of course, Greem couldn¡¯t produce so many magical crystals at once. He only had thirty thousand on hand. He would pay the rest with 1,100,000 magical stones andrge numbers of magical gemstones.


    Just handing over the magical stones and the appraisal of the gemstones took a whole day.


    The Silver Union adepts couldn¡¯t help but change their impression of Greem when they saw the mountains of magical stones in the tower¡¯s warehouse. It didn¡¯t matter how they looked at it. To have obtained so many magical stones meant that this had been an overwhelming victory.


    Had this Adept Greem truly fought off and exterminated the core of the magical creatures¡¯ army with just three adepts? The truth was hard to swallow, but the magical gemstones in front of them were as real as they could be. If those magical creatures hadn¡¯t been crippled, how would they possibly have allowed the adepts to go in and out of the ck Forest in search of resources?


    It couldn¡¯t have been that all those magical creatures were dead, could it?!


    Little did they knew that their wild exaggerations of a guess were the most urate answer! However, this answer was just too unbelievable. Even they refuted it the moment they thought of it.


    With the help of the Silver Union adepts, the magical facilities of the tower were being filled in at a rapid pace. The numerous fine cracks in the body of the tower had also been easily patched up by the adepts.


    Specialists were the best at their work after all!


    One had to point out how amazing esoteric adepts were at the field they specialized in; they were gods of their craft. Impossible tasks in the eyes of outsiders were no harder than the flip of a palm for them.


    The tower waspletely restored in just three days under their ceaseless efforts. The six ves that Greem had purchased also arrived at the tower on this day.


    As the originalndmark of guewood was now gone, Greem decided to rename things. After some consideration, he named his adept¡¯s tower Fire Throne, and the new underground tunnel as Fire Cave. Once the surface was properly developed, he didn¡¯t mind building a city of humans known as Magma City!


    Once construction had beenpleted, Greem handed over the money, and the three Silver Union adepts left Fire Throne, apanied by a party of mercenaries. Greem threw the two halfling gourmets into the kitchen, the two dwarven smiths into the golem factory, and the two fairies in the magical garden.


    The halflings were approximately one meter in height and fifteen kilograms in weight. Their skin was a healthy red shade, while their hair was ck and straight while their eyes were brown.


    The Silver Union had sent male and female pairs for all the ves.


    The male halfling had longer sideburns, while the female was more slender than the male. Male or female, they possessed excellent cooking skills for preparing food so delicious that it would make you choke on your tongue. Everyone throughout the tower agreed on this!


    As for the dwarves... apologies, but Geem couldn¡¯t differentiate which was the male and which was the female, even after extensive visual inspection. Both of them were short, stout, with a coarse face and a big beard.


    Their bodies were tough like a mountain. Their muscles were hard as a rock, and their temper was just like their looks; stubborn and rough.


    That had exceeded Greem¡¯s expectations. Who would have known that even female dwarves sported a thick brown beard? It sounded like thunder when their gravely voices boomed out loud.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shiver in disgust when he imagined a dwarven couple like this climb into bed at night.


    The fairies were the exact opposite of the dwarves.


    They were only fifty centimeters in height, and both of them were female.


    They had frail and slender bodies, pretty faces, pale skin, green eyes, and sharp ears. If they were just a little smaller and had thin wings on their backs, they would look just like the elementium fairies Alice had in her Tower of Fate.


    However, the elementium fairies radiated with powerful magical energies. This pair of fairies were letting out a fragrant smell of grass and wood instead.


    They were considered nt-attribute magical creatures, and they were skilled at dealing with all sorts of magical nts. That was why they were irreceable gardeners that every magical garden needed.


    Greem seemed to recall reading something about these fairies in a book somewhere. These small fairies were actually a product of flower fairies and elves that the adepts had kidnapped from an ancient elven empire.


    They were a type of lifeform created by magic!

 Chapter 426 Change

    Chapter 426 Change


    The sudden appearance of Fire Throne had clearly affected the development of the ck Forest.


    Those who felt the greatest of impact were the townsfolk of Pinecone Town.


    As one of the border towns of the human settlements, they had always lived in the shadow of the terror of magical creatures. Every time arge-scale stampede broke out from the ck Forest, they would have to rush to request aid from the nearest ce: Baldan City. That was because there was an adept¡¯s tower located there.


    The adept ns that had stakes in Pinecone Town would also send some adepts and apprentices to help repel the stampede. Still, this sort of aid was always limited. These outsider adepts and apprentices would never give their lives for the town if the danger exceeded their expectations.


    There had already been two tragic cases of Pinecone Town falling to a stampede of beasts since its inception. And after every tragedy, the adepts would bring in a new batch of migrants to popte the town.


    This town was undoubtedly a terrifying ce that was both home and horror for the citizens!


    However, with the appearance of this mysterious adept¡¯s tower, the nearby woods had suddenly be serene like never before.


    The magical creatures ravaging the forest had all vanished. Even the number ofrge predators had drastically fallen. Several mercenary groups had found the courage to go venturing a hundred kilometers deep into the ck Forest, yet they had not seen a single sign of magical creatures.


    Some of the known dens of magical creatures had been abandoned. Past hazard zones and no man¡¯snds had turned into safe ces where people coulde and go. These mercenaries that thrived on adventure started to explore these abandoned caves and tunnels. They worked hard to find the dens of the magical creatures.


    For a moment, the mercenaries of Pinecone Town were extremely lively and active. Every single one of their expeditions yielded bountiful results. The apprentice adepts that had spatial belts soon became the most popr individuals in town. Their existence in a party meant that thepany could bring back even more spoils from their adventures into the abandoned dens.


    Initially, no one knew the cause of all this initially. However, as some mercenary parties slowly extended their expedition range into where guewood once stood, they had the luck of meeting the apprentices stationed nearby. It was only then that they knew that a great adept¡¯s tower had been erected at the bottom of guewood.


    Moreover, the ce was no longer called guewood. It was now the Fire Cave. And deep within Fire Cave was where the great Fire Throne stood!


    This news caused amotion when it reached back to the town.


    It wasn¡¯t just the townsfolk who were excited. Even the apprentices training near the town were ted to hear the news.


    Several of the apprentices stationed here by their ns hurried to the Fire Cave out of curiosity and visited the Fire Throne.


    ording to the courtesies of the Continent of Adepts, they had the good fortune to stay over at the tower for one night. Consequently, they managed to talk to the apprentice adepts within the tower. That was where they heard who the tower belonged to. The Fire Throne was the adept¡¯s tower of Adept Greem from the Sarubo n.


    Sarubo n? It sounded familiar. They seemed to be an inconspicuous middle-sized n in the central area of the continent.


    Adept Greem? This name was extremely unfamiliar to their ears!


    Greem¡¯s title as the me Demon had only spread in a small area around Feidnan City. Many adept ns just a little further away had never even heard of him.


    However, the speed at which news spread through the world of adepts was extremely shocking!


    When these apprentices sent news of what they had heard back to their ns, rumors of the me Demon quickly proliferated among the adepts.


    A newly advanced adept that, against all the odds, had in a veteran adept while outnumbered. He then went on to kill an elite bloodline adept during a n war.


    All of these rumors attracted the attention of many ns when they were dug up and revealed.


    It didn¡¯t matter how you looked at it! It seemed to be the triumphant rise of a powerful adept!


    Thus, more and more apprentices traveled to Pinecone Town before making their way to that mysterious adept¡¯s tower¨C Fire Throne.


    The culture of the Continent of Adepts dictated that most of the tower be open to the public, except for specific important areas. Every adept¡¯s tower had certain areas open to the public. These ces often provided replenishments for traveling adepts and apprentices, as well as a ce to take a short rest.


    That was one of the ways by which adept¡¯s towers made money!


    Of course, the only ones who could enter the tower to rest and stock up on supplies were adepts and apprentices. Ordinary adventurers and mercenaries had to ask for help from acquaintance apprentices if they wanted to purchase enchanted equipment. The prosperity of the tower also indirectly created a social circle of apprentices and adventurers, causing the formation of an external market around the tower.


    ............


    Billis was a wandering apprentice adept.


    Hecked talent and was still a beginner apprentice despite being thirty-five years old. Moreover, he only held a pathetic total of two spells¨C Probe and Faint Illumination.


    The first spell wasn¡¯t an unusual divining ability. It was a simple spell used to ascertain whether any food had been poisoned, or the purpose of an unidentified object. The second spell created an area of dim light around the caster and lowered the visibility of the field to disrupt enemies.


    Indeed, these two spells were not offensive spells. They weren¡¯t even defensive spells. They were only low-level auxiliary spells.


    Billis¡¯ family was also an ordinary noble family. They couldn¡¯t bear Billis¡¯ drain on the family¡¯s resources when he had nothing to offer in return. Consequently, three years ago, the n had cut off their provision of resources and money to him. Billis had no choice but to leave the adept¡¯s tower he had lived and studied in for twenty-seven years to be a wandering apprentice adept.


    Of course, if he were willing to return to his family, there was still a chance he could be a manager of a tradingpany or a small noble in a rural area. However, Billis had decided to dedicate his life to the work of an adept. He still dreamed of the day he could be a great and respected adept.


    He¡¯d rather wander and explore various areas than go home and be a puppet of the family.


    He had just happened to hear of this new adept¡¯s tower near Pinecone Town when he had been traveling through the Ailovis area. Hoping that this mysterious adept would recruit some foreign apprentices, Billis immediately changed course and hurried toward this rumored Fire Throne.


    Pinecone Town had now turned into a lively ce. Adventurers with bows on their backs and swords at their hips were everywhere. Mercenaries walked through the streets here and there. Everyone immediately rushed forward to recruit Billis when they saw the short apprentice¡¯s robe he wore.


    At this moment, Pinecone Town was bustling. It didn¡¯t matter how weak of an apprentice you were; you would be wee anywhere as long as you had a spatial storage belt. After all, the activation and storage of goods in a spatial belt required the exhaustion of Spirit. No regr non-caster ss could use the item by themselves. Only apprentice adepts could do so.


    That was why adventuring parties had to recruit apprentices if they wanted to haul more goods back with them.


    Unfortunately, Billis had other ns and rejected their invitations without hesitation. Billis sessfully passed through the hundred and fifty kilometers of the forest after hiring an experienced local guide. He arrived at the entrance of the rumored Fire Cave.


    In truth, Billis had already been surprised by the hustle and bustle of the ce long before he reached the messy pile of rocks where the Fire Cave was.


    Billis had already met several small parties hurrying to Fire Cave even while he was less than ten kilometers away. Their parties varied in size. Some were hunting parties with a dozen members, while others were exploration teams with three to four men. Parties of two individuals like Billis and his guide were non-existent.


    The further they went, the more parties they met. They were either draggingrge prey behind them or carrying huge blood-soaked bags on their shoulders as they excitedly walked through the ck Forest.


    Many parties would yell and greet each other when they crossed paths, asking questions here and there. "How¡¯re today¡¯s spoils?" "Did you find another hidden den somewhere?" And all sorts of other strange inquiries.


    Billis was utterly stunned when he finally made it through the forest and arrived at a vast space.


    Here was the ck Forest!


    This was a dangerous territory one hundred and fifty kilometers deep in the ck Forest!


    Yet, there was a row of crude wooden huts and tents in front of Billis¡¯ eyes. There were easily four hundred of these makeshift shelters. Adventurers and mercenaries wearing various costumes casually walked around this temporary camp. One could see people selling beast and animal hides in personal booths everywhere, as well as apprentices in short robes haggling with mercenaries.


    This ce had be a temporary base; a bridgehead and an outpost for the adventurers exploring the nearby area to get supplies. The overseers of this temporary base were the apprentice adepts from the Fire Throne.


    A dozen ferocious,rge predators had been confined in a massive wooden cage made of thick logs in the corner of the base. There were even monsters like iron rhinoceroses, razor boars, and berserk apes.


    Several mercenaries carried bound beasts on their shoulders and hurried over to that ce. Billis saw them hand over the animals to an apprentice in a green robe, who seemed to be in charge of managing the bestiary. Those mercenaries then received a heavy pouch from the apprentice.


    "Sir, we have arrived at the Fire Cave!" The guide was an honest viger from Pinecone Town. He looked at Billis with hopeful eyes.


    Billis took out a small pouch from his belt and tossed it to the man.


    Fifty gold coins!


    If this were in the past, Billis would never have been able to get these harmless vigers to venture into the ck Forest no matter how many gold coins he promised. In fact, not even if he had promised magical crystals! However, the appearance of Fire Throne had turned the ck Forest into a remarkably safe backyard. Most adventurers could walk about exploring and hunting without any fear for their safety.


    After dismissing the guide, Billis built up his courage and walked to the massive cave in the center of the base. He could feel the oppressive fire elementium pressing against his face from three hundred meters away.


    Fire Throne, here Ie!

 Chapter 427 Be Careful Who You Recruit

    Chapter 427 Be Careful Who You Recruit


    "You intend to join our tower?"


    The frail Gargamel evaluated the apprentice standing before him with suspicious eyes.


    "Yes, sir!" Billis begged anxiously, "Sir. If you allow me to continue my studies here, I promise to fulfill my duties as an apprentice obediently!"


    Gargamel narrowed his eyes and continued to look over the apprentice.


    Hmm, beginner apprentice. No troublesome family or n background, and a wandering apprentice. Judging from these factors, the chances of him being a spy from another n was reasonably low. If an adept n wanted to spy on Fire Throne, they would at least have to send an advanced apprentice over. Otherwise, there was no way Greem would assign the apprentice to any critical positions, and therefore there would be no value to spying.


    Sending such an untalented beginner apprentice here and hoping he could slowly w his way into the upper ranks to obtain the secrets of the tower; even Gargamel wouldn¡¯t do such a pointless thing, let alone those sly and sneaky ns.


    It was almost a certainty that this person was a poor apprentice with nowhere else left to go!


    An ugly smile finally appeared on Gargamel¡¯s face once he understood this.


    "The tower has just been constructed, and we do need manpower. We normally wouldn¡¯t ept a wandering apprentice like you with no letter of rmendation or guarantor..."


    A trace of nervousness appeared on Billis¡¯ hopeful face.


    Gargamel quickly spoke again.


    "However, given your sincerity, I can give you a chance."


    "Thank you...thank you." Billis couldn¡¯t help but betray an expression of immense joy as he gave his thanks.


    "Don¡¯t thank me yet. Everything still depends on your performance!" Gargamel made a grabbing motion in midair, and a metal talisman that didn¡¯t look metallic appeared in his hand, "Put your magic emblem in it and always have it on you. Go and find Advanced Apprentice Toril and have him assign you a room and a job. You are an apprentice of Fire Throne from now onwards!"


    "Yessir. I¡¯ll go now!" Billis obediently ced his personal emblem into the metal talisman and put it into his pocket. He then bowed respectfully before leaving.


    Eva¡¯s beautifully seductive figure only appeared beside Gargamel once Billis had left, "Why did you recruit this rookie apprentice? Aren¡¯t you afraid of creating potential trouble in the future?"


    The wicked Gargamel instantly turned into the most caring and kind husband when he saw Eva arrive. He carefully helped Eva sit down, then pressed his right hand against her t abdomen. Gargamel silently sensed for that unique pulse of life.


    Even though he couldn¡¯t sense any soul energy in it, the strength of the life force had be significantly stronger than before.


    Eva nced at Gargamel unamusedly, but the corners of her eyes filled with pride and love.


    "A kid like this might not be all that powerful, but they are the best candidates for trusted deputies!" The two of them flirted for a little bit before Gargamel suddenly exined, "The tower has finally established itself here. Whates next will definitely be an immense development phase. It doesn¡¯t matter whether it¡¯s from the master¡¯s n or another n, spies will be sent here. nting a few of our own before that happens will allow us better control of the situation in the future."


    "Hmph," Eva didn¡¯t care for all this, "You human adepts are just like that. You scheme too much. To plot and fight so much over a tiny adept¡¯s tower."


    Gargamel shook his head, "This isn¡¯t trivial at all. These are huge benefits we are dealing with! In all honesty, the entire stretch of ck Forest within a radius of two hundred kilometers became our property the moment the tower was constructed. As long as the tower doesn¡¯t fall, no one can take this away from us. ording to my estimations, the Kam n will be sending ambassadors over in a couple of days."


    "Kam?" Eva frowned as she asked, "You mean, the adept n located closest to Pinecone Town?"


    "Of course!" Gargamel had practically be the majordomo of the tower ever since Greem handed over most of the tower¡¯s control authority to him, "If they are too slow, the old fellows from the Zhentarim Association will hear of this toote. Then, all the benefits here will have nothing to do with them."


    Gargamel stroked his wispy goatee as he spoke. A fierce and proud light shone from his small eyes.


    "You mean the Zhentarim Association will be sending people over as well?"


    "Not only will theye, but they will alsoe very soon!" Gargamelughed coldly and gleefully, "Still, these guys have always been proud and arrogant. It will be up to me if we want to take advantage of them. Keh keh keh..."


    ............


    One had to mention Gargamel¡¯s excellent understanding of the adept ns. His experience of wandering for a hundred years had given him insight that most didn¡¯t possess.


    On the second day after Billis joined Fire Throne, the Kam n¡¯s ambassador and Adept Hatch of the Zhentarim Association arrived at the tower at the same time. They also brought their respective n¡¯s goodwill and contract.


    The Kam n brought a contract of equal cooperation. Both parties would be of equal status and coborate in the development and excavation of the resources andnd of the forest around Fire Throne. The Kam n would provide the workforce and create a small human settlement between Fire Throne and Pinecone Town. This settlement would have to be able to host a thousand men. On the other hand, the adept¡¯s tower would have to guarantee the safety of the workers and civilians involved.


    Once more and morend was cultivated, the Kam n will own seventy percent of the area and the citizens. The adept¡¯s tower would have the remaining thirty percent without paying any additional price.


    It was an excellent and purely beneficial proposition for Fire Throne from every aspect!


    After all, this was Greem¡¯s personal adept¡¯s tower. It would be hard for him to obtain the full-hearted support of the Sarubo n. Without the n to support him, Greem could only count on himself. Where was he to find a suitable poption for hisnds? Where was he to obtain the capital required to turn the wildnds of the ck Forest into a property suited to human settlement?


    If Greem wanted to own thisnd exclusively, he would have had to reject the Kam n¡¯s offer and develop it all by himself. That meant that the majority of he would have to spend the majority of the next hundred years on the trivialities that were construction and town management.


    All this was uneptable to the ambitious Greem!


    On the other hand, the Zhentarim Association gave far harsher conditions.


    As long as Greem agreed, the Association intended to build a public city with Fire Throne at its core. However, the old fogeys of the Association were unwilling to part with control over the city. They were only willing to split the mary benefits of the city with Greem.


    In doing so, all the ie from thend, citizens, resources, and mines would be converted into magical crystals and given to Greem. In exchange, Greem would not be allowed to interfere in any decisions of the public city.


    These were extremely harsh conditions!


    In truth, Greem didn¡¯t find anything attractive about either party¡¯s conditions.


    The Zhentarim Association¡¯s stiptions were far too harsh and practically deprived him of all influence. The Kam n, on the other hand, couldn¡¯te up with anything that Greem desperately needed.


    They were interested in thend and the resources, but Greem was only interested in thetter.


    Land and citizens? Could these things allow him to advance to Second Grade?


    At the moment, Greem was only thinking of how to improve his own abilities. He was indifferent to worldly power and wealth. The massivend and endless resources would only be useful if he had a mature and stable n system behind him. Thesends and its poption would then continuously churn out new talents and heirs for the n.


    However, right now, Greem was fighting on his own. Even if he had an endless stretch of territory, he didn¡¯t have the energy to slowly cultivate apprentices and train n adepts loyal to his cause!


    That was why Greem didn¡¯t want to ept the offers of either party.


    However, in doing so, he would offend the local powerhouse along with the elders of the Association. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how troublesome things might get for the Fire Throne!


    Just as Greem was hesitating, the well-prepared Gargamel leaned up to his ear and whispered. The fire adept immediately broke into a smile. Greem was reinvigorated.


    Sinister!


    Gargamel¡¯s n was utterly sinister!


    Thus, on the second day of negotiations, the magical creatures once again descended upon the tower.


    A party that had passed through the Fire Cave and gone adventuring in the northern side of the forest were suddenly attacked. From a party of five, only a single rogue had survived.


    Commotion immediately broke out when the rogue returned to the temporary base, covered in blood.


    Could the peace and silence of the ck Forest over the past month have only been an illusion? Could there still be magical creatures around this ce that hadn¡¯t been exterminated? Had new magical creatures entered these unguarded territories?


    A series of questions caused the mercenaries and adventurers to be increasingly anxious.


    They were already at significant risk when hunting those predators of the woods with their abilities. If they ran into those terrifying magical creatures, they would not be able to survive. Even if they had ten times the manpower and ten times superior equipment, they would still die to the strange and powerful spells of the magical creatures.


    The surviving rogue was promptly brought to the tower and questioned by Greem in front of the ambassadors.


    They had been attacked by a magical creature thirty-five kilometers northwest of the Fire Cave. It had been a terrifying demon hound with two heads. It had led a pack of twenty or thirty fiend hounds and ambushed their camp in the night.


    The rogue¡¯spanions were ughtered without resistance. Only the rogue had the good fortune to escape with his life. The rogue had also managed to overhear the demon hound¡¯s conversation with a terrifying Medusa.


    It seemed they were organizing another stampede to assault the tower once again.


    This information came as a surprise to all the adepts!

 Chapter 428 New Golem

    Chapter 428 New Golem


    A new assault of beasts?


    Didn¡¯t this mean that any investment in this area could end in disaster?!


    The ambassadors of both parties quickly retracted their offers without another word. They then produced a more conservative proposition after a secret meeting with their leaders.


    In the end, Greem decided to ept the Zhentarim Association¡¯s offer after several rounds of discussion and negotiation.


    The first phase of the n would span ten years. The Zhentarim Association would construct a mission site at Fire Throne to encourage and more adepts and apprentices to initiate their trial locations here. It would strengthen the tower¡¯s power.


    Greem¡¯s responsibility was to properly manage the adept¡¯s tower and try his best to ensure the safety of the surrounding area.


    Adept Hatch continuously emphasized to Greem that he had to protect the stretch of forest to the south of the tower with everything he had, even if he didn¡¯t have the power to expel the magical creatures invading from the north. That was because the Association would try and establish arge base in between the tower and Pinecone Town. This base would serve as the foundation for future human settlements.


    The Association would station adepts and apprentices at a post like that. However, if a horde of magical creatures assaulted them, Fire Throne would have to provide them with magical support.


    Gargamel represented Fire Throne and went through difficult negotiations with Adept Hatch. The two of them had even broken off talks several times until they sat down to resume discussions at the behest of their superiors.


    After a dozen rounds of haggling, the forests to the north of the tower had once again transformed into a ce fraught with danger. It was only then that they came to a basic agreement.


    Apart from the previous deal, the Zhentarim Association would also fund the construction of two teleportation arrays in Fire Throne. One would be a public-userge-scale teleportation array. They would construct it in the Magma Hall and Zhentarim adepts would maintain and run it. The tower would provide the energy consumed by the array. As payment, twenty percent of the fee collected from every teleportation would be given to the tower.


    Furthermore, the Association would also construct a small teleportation array on the fifth floor of Fire Throne. This array would be a facility of the tower itself, and the Association would have no right to interfere with its usage.


    Greem was happy about the results of this negotiation.


    Even though they had to hand over a hundred kilometers of forest to the south of the tower, along with all of its associated ie, they still held on to the sovereignty of Fire Throne, as well as the broader territories to the north of the tower.


    Greem had no choice. He was working all by himself here. It was too easy for other ns to harass him and interfere with his affairs. The Fire Throne would likely soon be facing the Kam n¡¯s blockade if he hadn¡¯t invited the Zhentarim Association into hisnds.


    The Sarubo n, on the other hand, had never been a possibility. Greem had never considered borrowing their strength in establishing himself.


    He might have faced significantly less pressure if he requested help from the Sarubo n. However, when he eventually decided to leave the n, it would be hard to distinguish what belonged to whom. The benefits and ownership over thends would be aplicated issue to resolve.


    The elders of the Sarubo n seemed to understand this clearly. They had never offered any help to Greem. Not only did Greem¡¯s private invitation to Adept Keoghan go without reply, but even Adept Meryl was also forcefully recalled by the n two days ago.


    Meryl also took nearly half of the apprentices along with her departure. This action undoubtedly weakened Fire Throne severely. Gargamel was a sly and smart person. He had expected this problem and recruited a bunch of wandering apprentices. However, these outsiders who were mostly of no more than intermediate-level were far weaker than the elite apprentices that the Sarubo n had cultivated.


    Thus, Fire Throne currently only had two adepts on the surface: Greem and Gargamel. The Forest Spirit Eva had to be kept under wraps still.


    There were three pseudo-adepts. Am, Toril, and Sabrina.


    As a veteran pseudo-adept, Kodar had already failed his advancement once and was now preparing for his second attempt. He had returned to Feidnan City with Meryl in search of better resources.


    The other veteran Pseudo-Adept Am was still a bitcking in the growth of his Spirit. He would probably have to wait another two or three years before he could attempt advancement.


    If Greem wanted to keep them within his grip, he would have to help them prepare the necessary resources. His usually gentle guidance would not be entirely enough. There was a limit to loyalty and emotion between an adept and apprentice. Resources and benefits still decided the majority of their rtionship!


    And then you had two advanced apprentices¨C Lena and Anthony.


    Anthony was a potions apprentice that Gargamel had taken under his wing during his travels. He had a reasonably outstanding talent at potions studies.


    The other apprentices were mostly of intermediate and beginner apprentice level. They had onlye here because they had nowhere else to go. The mostmon characteristic among them was theirck of innate talent, and there wasn¡¯t much value in cultivating and training them.


    Other than the humans, Fire Throne also had a group of magical creatures serving as its guardians.


    The nine manticores were the strength of the tower visible to the world. An additional thirteen bird demons and seven snake fiends hadter been added to the roster. In secret, the ¡¯Two-Headed Demon Hound¡¯ Unguja and Dana the Medusa, who were active in the forests to the north of the tower, were also chess pieces under Greem¡¯s direct control.


    It was because of them that Greem could put on a facade of danger and threat such that he could keep a tight hold on Fire Throne.


    Under Greem¡¯s instruction, Dana had positioned herself to be the new lord of the woods nearby. She was actively contacting the two other magical creature leaders that had escaped Magma Hall to ¡¯plot¡¯ the counter-attack against the humans.


    Dana¡¯s reports indicated that the Wyvern King had taken the bait. However, the Dark Tentacr was still nowhere to be found.


    After sending away many ambassadors and messengers from various ns, Greem once again ced the tower¡¯s matters in Gargamel¡¯s hands. He retired, exhausted, to the fifth floor of the tower.


    Greem had chosen to have his personalboratory expanded during thest series of renovations. This way, he could fit in even more experiment rooms.


    Here was a restricted area of the tower that only he could ess. Not even Gargamel could enter the fifth floor of the tower, even with all the authority that he held.


    ............


    A clean and bright tunnel unfolded before Greem.


    There were robust metallic doors on each side of the tunnel every dozen steps.


    Aplicated marking had been drawn on the middle of the doors with an unknown magical material. The markings wereposed of circles and chaotic patterns. Runes were carved in-between the spaces of the symbol.


    These magical doors connected to the core array of the tower. The tower¡¯s rms would be activated if anyone attempted to break in through with force. As the towercked guards, as well as defensive measures, Greem intended to purchase a couple of high-level tower guards from the Silver Union.


    After all, there was still a possibility that a magical creature would betray him or be negligent at its job, regardless of how loyal it was. However, a simple-minded mechanical golem would always defend this ce faithfully.


    Greem hurried ahead a few steps and stopped in front of a door scrawled full of golem runes.


    He gently put his hand into the ring in front of the door and silently chanted the password. Mitura, Door of Magic. The door finally opened after confirming the password and his soul aura.


    A small alchemicalboratory was inside the room. The alchemical tform in the middle of the room was small and delicate, but there was no doubt it was the best model for sale. Of course, it was also the most expensive.


    A brilliant, wind-attribute dragon crystal hovered above the alchemical tform, letting out an enchanting glow. Several parchments with mysterious pictures drawn on them littered the tform beneath the crystal. There were even more parchments on the floor. They were wasted parchments that had been crumpled and thrown aside.


    Greem¡¯s expression turned solemn when he arrived here.


    He had obtained the Second Grade dragon crystal for a long time now, but he still had no idea how to add it into his strength.


    A top-tier crystal like the dragon crystal naturally possessed a trace of narw within it. It was an excellent challenge for Greem to uncover and exploit every bit of potential hidden within a dragon crystal like this one!


    If he seeded, the crystal would instantly be a mighty golem that outmatched even the Infernal Tyrant; it would be an immeasurable improvement to his powers. Greem also had the confidence to fight back against a Second Grade adept if he joined forces with the new golem.


    However, the higher his expectations for the crystal, the more cautiously he would have to treat the new golem.


    That was why Greem needed to perfect and optimize the runic array designs of the new golem down to the most delicate detail before he could start carving. Of course, he required vast amounts of time for the hefty task of refinement.


    He had performed aplete scan of the dragon crystal long ago. Greem now perfectly knew the thickness and orientation of every cluster and line on the dragon crystal. The chip had also been working day and night to construct and refine the details of this three-dimensional runic array.


    Greem even had to use other elementium cores to verify certain parts of the array¡¯s design, as well as to confirm their actual functions.


    Greem nned for the new golem to possess both the ability to fight and the ability to fly.


    As a fire adept, Greem only possessed a single mobility spell in the form of Fire Teleportation. This single spell was insufficient when it came down to a fight between high-Grade adepts. His inability to fly was undoubtedly one of his major shortfalls.


    He could solve these inadequacies by auxiliary means such as a wand imbued with Fly, a Ring of Flight, or even a Flying Carpet.


    Still, these solutions didn¡¯t tackle the heart of the problem. In instances of emergency, Greem might not have the extra time to activate these auxiliary tools. That was why Greem intended to make the new golem his flyingbat pet. He had wanted to solve this problem that had troubled him for such a long time.


    The biggest issue he now faced was how to correctly merge the innate talents of the wind dragon with his fire adept powers!

 Chapter 429 The Accumulation of Power

    Chapter 429 The umtion of Power


    Greem spent six whole hours in the alchemicalb beforeing out of the room.


    His formerly plentiful Spirit was utterly exhausted when he stepped out. He was even swaying about on his feet when he walked.


    Greem started his daily meditation as soon as he reached his room on the fourth floor.


    The five hours of deep meditation quickly replenished his Spirit and also brought about a minor Spirit increase of 0.0005 points. It was an extremely slow increase, but his powers would still grow considerably if he kept it up.


    However, the development of Spirit through daily meditation wasn¡¯t always constant. The effect of meditation would gradually decrease once his Spirit grew to a certain extent. That was why adepts who wanted to advance to Second Grade through daily umtion were many, yet those who seeded were few.


    Why else were there so many First Grade adepts with lifespans of two to three hundred years, but only a few Second Grade adepts? The most important reason was the limits imposed by the narws!


    Every adept had to form their consciousness core when they advanced. Thepatibility of this core with the narws determined the upper limit that an adept¡¯s Spirit could reach.


    Meditation was a gradual process of assimting the consciousness core through the use of the narws.


    However, this process had its limits. It was significantly affected by the structure of thews within the consciousness core itself. If the adept themselves didn¡¯t further their understanding of thews that governed their powers, then the consciousness core would stop growing once it reached its limits. That was why working hard toprehend and master thews was the only way to improve the capacity of the consciousness core continuously. It was like digging a pond. The more profound andprehensive your understanding and mastery of thews, therger the pond.


    Daily meditation was the act of pouring water into this pool. One could see and feel the increase of the water level. However, if the pond remained untouched, there woulde a day when it became filled. That would be when the adepts had to deal with the stagnation of their powers.


    Still, theprehension and mastery of thews was no easy matter.


    Thews had always been, and will continue to be, intangible. Some might have been able to sense the presence of thews through the repeated use of magic, while others were able to verify the existence of thews through rigorous experimentation. Some might even be able to feel the existence of thews directly.


    Magical chants could be memorized and mastered through repetition. ult knowledge could be recorded with books and knowledge crystals to be passed on to others. However, only theprehension of the world¡¯swscked proper means by which to pass along to another individual.


    As of today, the only method that was capable of achieving this was the bloodline legacy of the bloodline adepts.


    Individuals with bloodline talent were incapable of receiving the world¡¯sws and passing it down within their bloodline legacy. However, they could pinpoint and insert vague fragments of their consciousness into their bloodline. For tens of thousands of years, many adepts of the same bloodline continued to contribute a piece of themselves in this manner. Their descendants were then able to be guided by their bloodline and quickly gained ess to this precious legacy of consciousness.


    It was natural that the bloodline adepts were able to improve so quickly when they had guidance and instruction from their ancestors.


    This ability was also what allowed the bloodline adepts to continuously remain the most influential individuals in the World of Adepts. If it weren¡¯t for their bloodline limits, the bloodline adepts might very well have be thergest faction in the World of Adepts.


    Sadly, they were unmade by their bloodline, just as it made them!


    The bloodline limit was like a noose hanging around the neck of every bloodline adept. It was a noose that slowly tightened as the adept¡¯s powers improved. One day, they would stagnate at a certain level, never progressing no matter how much they struggled and suffered!


    Compared to the bloodline adepts, elementium adepts ced far more importance on theprehension of the narws. While it was true that they had nothing to guide their journey, they also didn¡¯t have an unsurpassable threshold to deal with. That was why Greem had so eagerly joined the ranks of the elementium adepts back then.


    He needed to do two things now. First, he had to continue to meditate and umte magical knowledge. Second, he had to temper his Spirit regrly. The half-elementiumization of his body had allowed him to advance to First Grade easily. However, if he wanted to progress to Second Grade, he would first have to elementiumize his Spirit as well.


    And this feat could only be achieved by drawing upon the powers of the mysterious sea ofva below the tower!


    However, the conditions were not ripe yet. For the moment, Greem couldn¡¯t use the sea ofva to temper his Spirit. The main reason for the dy in his actions was the sudden change that had urred thest time he unsealed the me Fiend¡¯s Heart; foreign energies had assimted his body of me.


    He was still carefully assessing the effects of this change, and consequently, his n to elementiumize his Spirit had to be put aside for the moment.


    Greem raised his right hand and slowly called upon the energies within the me Fiend¡¯s Heart. He attempted to guide the power into his right hand. A short momentter, ayer of a ck substance with a metallic gleam covered his deft right hand. His hand now looked just like that of a demon.


    The mysterious substance was hard to the touch. It resisted the stabbing and shing of sharp-edged weapons. It even withstood elementium attacks below fifteen points of power. Greem¡¯s right hand started to swell like a continuously mutating monster as more and more energy was channeled into it. His fingers also became thicker and longer, crackling as they did so. The most apparent change happened to his fingernails. They started to transform during the rapid growth of his hand size. The tips of his nails turned sharp and curved as the most wicked of daggers.


    Greem took out a dagger with ck patterns and thrust it at his palm. Sparks went flying everywhere from the friction, but his ck palm remained unharmed. It wasn¡¯t until Greem stabbed his palm with an enchanted dagger that he could feel a mild pain from his hand.


    Judging by that test, his body would be entirely immune to attacks from conventional weapons once the mutation to his body of mes wasplete. Only enchanted weapons would hurt him.


    However, the foreign energy didn¡¯t just bring about benefits!


    Greem took out a mirror and opened his mouth wide to look into it.


    White and jagged fangs had reced his white and orderly teeth, and a thick smell of sulfur spread throughout the room when he opened his mouth.


    The strange mutation only went away a long time after Greem had dispersed the energies.


    "Chip, you recorded everything? Have you found any solutions?"


    "Beep. Mutation process recorded. Now analyzing the elementium change in the host¡¯s body during mutation. This mutation is beneficial and hasten¡¯s the host¡¯s adaptation to the pure fire energies from the me Fiend¡¯s Heart. It is rmended that the host not stop the mutation. That will lower thepatibility of the host¡¯s body with the fire energies."


    Greem was speechless when he heard the chip¡¯s rmendation.


    The chip wasn¡¯t him after all. It always prioritized optimal functionality in its decision-making process. For the first time, the chip had apletely different view than Greem. It didn¡¯t understand its host¡¯s insistence and attachment to his human body.


    Perhaps this was the frailty of humans!


    Greem mocked himself helplessly and left his room. He once again headed to theboratory area on the fifth floor.


    This time, he didn¡¯t go to the alchemicalb. Instead, he entered a small facility used for biological modification surgeries.


    Compared to the delicate and neat alchemicalb, the bio-modificationb appeared to be much more sinister and terrifying. All sorts of lifeforms of different species and sizes were spread across severalrge stone tforms. Most of them were missing parts, and their corpses showed visible signs of surgery.


    A tinum-colored, human-shaped golem standing one hundred and eighty centimeters in height walked in front of Greem when it sensed his arrival. It then respectfully stood as it awaited orders.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask a question when he saw the bloody knives and saws on the robotic arms of the auxiliary golem, "How is the treatment of Subjects One and Twoing along?"


    "Subject One has beenpletely cleaned up. Subject Two¡¯s life force is still decreasing. At the moment, only 87% of their body functions remain."


    The robot and its master walked as they talked. They soon arrived before a massive stone tform.


    A humongous magical spiderid across the tform. Its head was gone, and therge abdominal sac on its rear had also withered. However, its massive body and sharp limbs remained on the tform. It was an intimidating sight to anyone who saw them.


    T might be dead, but its body still held tremendous value!


    Its eight limbs were all sharp enough topare with magically-enhanced weapons. Their power could be further maximized if they were handed over to enchanters or alchemists and modified into proper magical armaments.


    The old spider¡¯s shell was also flexible, sturdy, and magic-resistant. Greem didn¡¯t know what material it wasposed of, but there was no doubt it was an excellent one. If the shell was crafted into a small shield, it would be light enough that even adepts would be able to hold it up.


    Greem also found arge poison nd, a poison sac, and a considerable silk nd within T¡¯s body.


    These items would have radically different effects in the hands of different adepts. However, Greem was not at all experienced in the treatment of magical materials. He had no choice but to give them all to Gargamel. After all, Gargamel was a potions master. The poison nd and poison sac would undoubtedly increase his reserve of poisons and further improve the efficacy of his poisonous potions.


    Gargamel didn¡¯t disappoint Greem either. He soaked the silk nd in a mysterious solution, and it started to produce the same silk and webbing that T used. Even though it barely produced one meter of silk over ten days, Gargamel confirmed that this silk was not only soft andfortable to the touch, but was also exceptionally tough and resilient as well. An ordinary magically-enhanced weapon couldn¡¯t sever it.


    Apart from that, this strange silk could also absorb elementium of fewer than ten points of power, as well as obscure mental probes.


    That meant that an undergarment woven from this silk would allow an adept to possess ten points of elementium resistance and enable them to be immune to an adept¡¯s passive spiritual senses.


    In doing so, the wearer no longer needed to worry about exposure of their mental state, even if they were standing near an adept with superior Spirit.


    After all, the passive probing would be obscured by the undergarment, and active mental probing was unlikely to happen; it was considered an extremely hostile act between adepts!

 Chapter 430 No Way Out

    Chapter 430 No Way Out


    The adepts always squeezed everyst bit of profit out of the magical creatures of the ck Forest. They knew how to maximize the use of their resources.


    Once the adepts killed a magical creature, they exploited every single organ and body part for everyst drop of value it had, turning the bloody body parts into an enviable pile of magical crystals.


    And this seemed to be a second nature unique to human adepts!


    Magical creatures often fought among themselves within the boundless expanse of the ck Forest. However, only the human adepts were capable of pushing the spoils of victory to such limits. Those wild magical creatures had no way of profiteering from the death of their opponent other than devouring them and taking over theirnds.


    After all, there was noprehensive and well-defined internal structure ofbor within the ck Forest.


    Greem hurried to Subject Two¡¯s tform once he had finished with the old spider¡¯s corpse.


    The dying body of the Giant Berserk Gda was there.


    Indeed, the gda wasn¡¯t dead yet. However, it had slipped into an unstoppable decline.


    Everyone was shocked when he was fished out of the sea ofva alive. How resilient and powerful was the gda¡¯s life force to have taken two zing spells from Greem and then survive being drowned in theva for half an hour?!


    The surface of its body had been wholly carbonized when it was dragged out of theva. With just a light touch, the thickyer of its skin fell to the ground as charred waste. However, its potent life force had stimted its body, allowing the now shrunken gda to regenerate flesh at speed equal to the damage dealt by theva. The carbonizedyer of its body had also effectively protected it from further fire damage.


    It was these multiple factors acting together that saved the life of the Giant Berserk Gda, allowing it¡¯s capture as one of the first prisoners of the adept¡¯s tower.


    Since the berserk gda was arrogant and prideful with no chance of yielding, Greem decided to modify it into a mighty voodoo beast. However, voodoo beast modification was a profound art that Greem did not know. Trying his hand at the task would only result in tremendous waste.


    That was why Greem had wanted to invite Keoghan over to his tower to help him modify the gda.


    However, after half a month, Adept Keoghan still had yet to arrive at Fire Throne. Greem couldn¡¯t help but start having suspicions. It seemed his rtionship with the Sarubo n was no longer as amicable as before.


    Of course, the main reason for this was Greem¡¯s ¡¯istionist¡¯ behavior!


    He chose the rural edges of the ck Forest as the location of his tower, instead of somewhere within the traditional territories of the Sarubo n. He hadn¡¯t even requested for help from the n when he faced the attack from the forest beasts.


    He still hadn¡¯t requested aid when the tower was in shambles after the difficult victory. Instead, he had actively sought the Zhentarim Association¡¯s cooperation.


    These were actions that provoked spection!


    These actions were attempts at ambition, at breaking free from the n to start a new force of their own.


    If the Sarubo n understood this, then it was a given that they couldn¡¯t treat Greem with the same goodwill that they had before. It was highly likely that they would remove him from the core of the n, and strip him of the associated privileges and conveniences.


    Meryl had already sent a message back from the tower in Feidnan City. A n mission directed at Greem was in the works. They had given Greem ten years of freedom before this; it was time for him to contribute to the n now!


    Greem had expected this to happen and was not surprised at all.


    The only thing he could do now was to make arrangements for all the tasks at hand, and ensure that he settled them before the mission arrived. In doing so, the Fire Throne would still be able to function without any trouble when he was forcefully called upon to aplish some dangerous n mission.


    ............


    The Knight¡¯s ne.


    The silent forest seemed tock even a single hint of life.


    A mysterious silhouette wrapped in a thick ck cloak silently walked through the dense foliage.


    The ck robe dragged along the ground, and the mysterious person walked with an awkward and shuffling gait. One could even see an extensive trail of purple blood and peculiar shell fragments where the person in their wake.


    The ck robe silently wove through the forest.


    He would stop and listen whenever he heard the sound of pping wings, and only continued if he was sure there was no danger.


    Finally, he stopped in front of a towering ancient tree.


    He dug out the thickyer of dirt at the feet of the ancient tree to reveal a purple ore glimmering with a star-like radiance.


    The ck robe nodded in satisfaction. He extended a dirty, bony right hand with sharp nails and started drawing in the air. A brilliant green rune appeared in midair, and a piece of the tree¡¯s withered bark fell off. A ck hole was unveiled behind it.


    A thick smell of blood and vague sounds of screeching bugs rose out of the hole.


    The ck robe stood still for a moment. He only climbed into the hole after confirming that there were no irregrities in the woods nearby.


    A cloud of ck smoke shrouded the tree once the person in ck had vanished, and the ancient tree once again reverted to its previous appearance.


    Half an hourter, a pair of abnormallyrge bats suddenly flew out of the forest. They circled the tree quickly as if they were searching for something. However, the ck robe¡¯s cave was well-hidden. The bats found nothing after a long search.


    The two bats squeaked at each other andmunicated for a bit. They had no choice. One stayed here and continued searching, while the other beat its wings and flew back into the woods.


    If one were to follow the ancient tree downwards and travel a distance of approximately twenty to thirty meters, they would arrive at a terrifying den of bugs. Two dozenrge worm nests stood in this tiny space of no more than thirty square meters. As theycked sufficient blood and flesh to nurture them, thervae in the nest couldn¡¯t mature into their juvenile forms. Consequently, not a single insect soldier could be found guarding the den.


    Acteon had nothing to hide once he had returned here.


    He tossed away the thick robe and revealed the severely wounded body beneath it. Acteon was unable to heal his wounds despite his powerful regenerative abilities! It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how severe his injuries were!


    Horrifying crimson spots spread across Acteon¡¯s ck bug body. These crimson patches acted like living things. They crawled on Acteon¡¯s gleaming bug body and were trying their best to expand to other ces.


    Some of the crimson patches had eaten through his thick shell and were starting to erode the softer internal organs and muscles within.


    Evil Bugs Acteon couldn¡¯t resist the urge to cough. He coughed so intensely that it was almost as if he was on his deathbed.


    As he was taking out several vials of potion to treat his body, the magical rms he had set up around the perimeter triggered. A water mirror appeared before him, allowing Acteon to see a red silhouette dashing through the nearby forest.


    Dammit! Those vampires managed to catch up so quickly!


    Acteon cursed as he looked up and stared at this nursery of his. A determined and savage expression shed on Acteon¡¯s wicked and hideous face.


    A ghostly green rune floated to the ceiling of the cave after a short password that sounded both like a chant and a bug¡¯s cry. The same strange rune appeared above all the worm nests.


    "Sona, Flesh Devouring."


    All twenty-two of the towering worm nests broke apart when Acteon¡¯s spell finished. All the semi-translucentrvae started to gather together and devour each other under the effects of the spell.


    They bit and snapped at each other; it was almost as if all thervae had gone mad in unison. They ferociously devoured everything around them, turning flesh and blood of theirpanions into nutrition for their growth.


    For a moment, blood sshed everywhere, and the screeching of bugs echoed throughout the room. The entire ce plunged into a bloody and cruel battle for survival!


    Even Acteon, with all his viciousness and sinisterness, couldn¡¯t help but betray a grim and horrified expression as he looked on.


    If he had enough time and enough lives to offer, this nursery room would have provided him with over two hundred soldiers. It didn¡¯t matter if they were juvenile or adolescent bugs; these carcass beetles would have turned into a terrifying flood of bugs. They would have be his most destructive force.


    He would have had absolute confidence to win, even if he faced off against four or five adepts at the same time.


    Unfortunately, his dream had been shattered at the hands of that wicked woman.


    Acteon¡¯s heart bled whenever he thought of that slender form shrouded in her mist of blood.


    At one point, Acteon had sessfully produced a terrifying nest of several hundred insects, with thirty-four mature carcass beetles that could each match an ordinary adept on their own.


    Yet, the encounter in the woods had dealt a crippling blow to him.


    The fearless beetles had shed with the vampires that could regenerate, and a savage battle erupted. They fought from one end of the forest to another, pursued each other from one mountain to the next. Both parties were like mad bulls that had seen red. They no longer cared for the remnants of the knights, and instead chose to tear at each other until one of them died.


    However, Mary the Bloody Sorceress always seemed to have an endless stream of reinforcements during this prolonged war of attrition. The wounded hid in the forest, draining blood to heal themselves. Fresh soldiers from Mary¡¯s reserves would rece the dead. It was with this wicked and ruthless method that Mary forcefully ground away Acteon¡¯s barely formed army.


    She had paid a hefty price for the results as well. Five of her eight blood knights had died. Only two Second Grade and one First Grade knight remained.


    The most unexpected turn of events came from Soros, Mary¡¯s newest addition to her blood knights. He had sessfully turned into a true Second Grade Blood Knight. He was a blood knight whose soul and intelligence was perfectly preserved.


    He was half of the reason that had Acteon lost!

 Chapter 431 Ticket

    Chapter 431 Ticket


    How terrifying was a Second Grade Blood Knight with intact memories and intelligence?


    The other blood knights only knew how to run headlong into the carcass beetles, shing at them with their most powerful techniques. They didn¡¯t know how to care for their wellbeing. They only thought of retreating when they were on the brink of death.


    These knights were quickly surrounded by the beetles as long as Acteon was willing toy down a little bait.


    Soros waspletely different. He was the perfect merger of a human¡¯s intelligence and a blood knight¡¯s savagery. Soros assigned most of the dangerous work to the other blood knights under hismand. In doing so, Soros created the space he needed to unleash the unparalleled offensive powers of a Second Grade Knight. He ughtered numerous carcass beetles with his longsword.


    Every time Acteon attempted to surround him, Soros would use tactics to foil the adept. He would send out two First Grade knights to bring up the rear while he led the rest to break out from the encirclement. In just a single fight between them, Soros had managed to trade the lives of two First Grade blood knights for those of fourteen mature carcass beetles.


    This tremendous loss caused Acteon to hate Soros with a passion!


    However, Evil Bugs Acteon had no choice but to suppress his emotions. He faced thebination of Second Grade Soros and First Grade Bloody Sorceress Mary.


    Still, it didn¡¯t do him much good to not act on his emotions. Mary seemed to have decided to take him down. An endless wave of bats cooperated with the powerful blood knights under hermand. The vampires stuck close to Acteon¡¯s bugs,unching a painful war of attrition against him.


    After two months of constant battles and escapes, Acteon had exhausted thest of his swarm. Blood spells severely corroded even his body of bugs.


    Acteon had no choice but to hide as he stealthily made his way to this nursery that he had set up a long time ago.


    He had created this ce in preparation for the future exponential increase in his powers. However, the winds no longer blew in his favor, and he had to activate it now.


    As the five hundredrvae continued to devour each other, the life in the cave slowly decreased. In exchange, the survivors were rapidly bing more powerful. All thervae were gone when the devouring ceremony had concluded. Only six elite-level carcass beetles with ck shells and green wings remained.


    The six elite beetles immediately lunged at Acteon when he let out a screech. They devoured all the crimson patches on Acteon¡¯s body with their sharp ws and jaws.


    As expected of elite-level carcass beetles, these patches created by blood spells did not affect their flesh and stomachs. The beetles absorbed every bit of the crimson spots.


    The process of having his flesh devoured was terrifying and painful. However, Acteon wore an expression of freedom and enjoyment on his hideous bug face. He was finally free from the sickness that had troubled him for seven whole days. It was worth it even if he had to hurt a little for it!


    However, during this short dy, a flock of two dozen vampires had arrived in the forest above the cave. They had gleaming ck fur, red eyes, white fangs, and bodies the size of wash basins. They circled the skies like vultures looking for their prey.


    Every time they found a clue, one of the bats would transform into a thin and pale human. That person would crouch on the ground and carefully check for further hints.


    The ancient tree and its enchanted door were finally found after their persistent pursuit.


    However, before they could even attempt to open the door, the roots of the trees exploded from within.


    A shockwave sent thousands of wood splinters and dirt sting through the air, instantly riddling the three vampire spawn standing near the tree with holes.


    Even a vampire, with all their regenerative powers, couldn¡¯t endure a massive injury like that. All three of the spawn died on the spot. The other vampire spawn immediately turned themselves into bloodsucking bats and dispersed into the surrounding woods.


    Even though they spread out in every direction, they didn¡¯t go too far. Many of the smarter bats also hid atop the trees and silently observed that tree.


    They quickly let out a long and strange ultrasound wave when they saw Acteon and the six intimidating beetles following behind him. These beetles were even more terrifying than the mature beetles Acteon previously had with him.


    Bloody Sorceress Mary¡¯s flying scouts were everywhere in the forest now. They used this sound wave that outsiders were unlikely to imitate or understand to swiftly ry information between them.


    Soon, on the top of a massive tree three and a half kilometers away, Mary turned her head. Her gaze cut through the sea of trees and fell upon the location where the news hade from.


    "They found Acteon¡¯s tracks. Go!" Mary¡¯s crimson battle armor perfectlyplemented and revealed her perfect figure, "Soros, you are still inmand. But be careful. Do not kill off all my knights."


    Mary was no longer the lonesome, reckless, and temperamental vampire she once was. She had taken great pains to manage this vampire army of hers in this ne, fighting tooth and nail for dominance against Acteon.


    These experiences had shaped her into more and more of a fitting leader!


    In front of these vampires, she was their rightful sovereign and absolute leader. Mary held in her hands the fates of every vampire in her army, even that of Second Grade Soros. The suggestion nted deep in their bloodlinepelled all the blood servants and vampire spawn to be unquestionably loyal to Mary.


    This ability was the real terror of a vampire!


    "I understand, master!" Soros gently bowed to Mary before leading the remaining three knights into the forest. They transformed into massive bats and beat their wings as they glided into the distance.


    "How are things proceeding. Has the perimeter been set up?" Mary didn¡¯t fight on the frontlines like she used to. Instead, she remained on the spot and gazed at the distant location.


    The first batch of vampires had already rushed forward.


    A battle to the death had started, and the previously silent woods had instantly bubbled into a riot. The towering ancient trees trembled, and Leaves and branches were blown into the air by violent shockwaves.


    In a matter of moments, all forty-five vampire spawn in the first wave had died. This result came as a surprise to Mary.


    "It has been arranged, master!" It was the old fox Vanlier who stood by Mary¡¯s side. He now looked handsome and charming, and his body was tall and slender. He looked nothing like the old man from before, "The army of vampire spawn have moved into position. They are only waiting for your orders, and they will die for you in battle!"


    "Then get them to move now!" Mary ordered in a cold and unfeeling tone, "I am sick of staying in this inferior world. We can leave once this war is over. The ticket to leave this ce is too expensive. I can¡¯t bring so many ipetent fools with me. However, if you serve me well this time, one of the tickets will have your name on it!"


    Mary¡¯s words were light and breezy, but they sounded like thunder when they fell upon Vanlier¡¯s ears. He already had premonitions and vague guesses about what was toe. However, he still couldn¡¯tpose himself in the face of this news. Vanlier was still shocked when Mary finally said it out loud.


    The vampire army had been built up by Vanlier himself. Their numbers had reached into a surprising excess of over two thousand. This mighty army had caused Vanlier to lose sleep in excitement.


    Yet, an army like this appeared to be insignificant in Mary¡¯s eyes. The way she spoke, it sounded like they could be brushed aside by a mere gust of wind.


    This monstrous army in a lower world was unimportant in Mary¡¯s heart. This...this was clearly beyond Vanlier¡¯s understanding.


    What did his master¡¯s world look like?


    Did his efforts here in this world mean nothing?


    What would happen to him if his master didn¡¯t choose him for his abilities?


    ......


    Vanlier started to panic the more he thought about it.


    For the first time, he felt as if the paradigm he lived in was far too small. It seemed he had never truly managed to keep up with his master. What would await a person like him? Someone with nobat ability or power? Someone whose only worth was his mind? What would happen if his master disregarded even his intelligence?


    "Master, I will go and check on the army. I will ensure that no unexpected incidents crop up! Evil Bugs Acteon; I definitely won¡¯t allow him to escape from us this time." Vanlier was practically grinding his teeth together as he swore.


    He quickly turned into a gray bat once he obtained Mary¡¯s acknowledgment. He then screeched as he flew towards his subordinates.


    Ticket! Ticket! I must get the ticket!


    Even though Mary never talked about the fates of those without tickets, Vanlier would swear on his life that it wasn¡¯t going to end simply.


    The roar of explosions came from the direction of the battlefield in the distance. Several ferocious gusts of wind ravaged the woods. Wood flew everywhere as the sea of trees shook in the winds. Flocks of bloodsucking bats fluttered through the trees, trying their best to avoid the energy fragments that shot everywhere.


    Mary sensed a subtle with a diameter of ten to fifteen kilometers being formed. The web was slowly tightening with the battlefield at its center.


    Soros and the blood knights she had sent out earlier were already lying in wait near the battlefield. The moment Acteon betrayed a weakness, the assault teamposed of Second Grade blood knights would leave him with a nightmare he would never forget!


    Hmph! It¡¯s finally time for me to make an appearance!


    Maryughed sinisterly as she unfurled her wings. She turned into a red meteor as she shot towards the savage battlefield.


    A battle to the death between bugs and vampires was about to break out!

 Chapter 432 Evil Bugs Exterminated

    Chapter 432 Evil Bugs Exterminated


    The six elite carcass beetles were an undefeatable existence within the woods!


    Their shells were hard and difficult to pierce. Their jaws could mince anything in their way. The waves of vampires wouldn¡¯t have been enough to fill their appetites if it weren¡¯t for their slow speed andck of ranged attacks.


    Acteon didn¡¯t need to worry about his safety with the beetles guarding him. He could recklessly rain his fury upon his enemies. Acteon alone solely caused most of the chaos and destruction in the woods.


    However, the vampires were slowly figuring out a strategy to deal with these troublesome and slow beetles after such a long and drawn-out fight. The n was to draw them out of the formation and iste them!


    Large flocks of bats scattered around Acteon. They threw their bodies at him repeatedly to continually goad Acteon into striking them. The more powerful vampires then assaulted the formation and crashed against the carcass beetles¡¯ defensive line.


    If they managed to bait any beetle away from the defensive line, a vampire lying in wait would immediately draw the beetle towards the perimeter. Of course, plenty of vampires died in this process.


    The pressure that Acteon endured hadn¡¯t been immense when the battle had just started. He was able to spare a bit of his concentration still to call back the beetles who had been baited away from the vanguard. However, once the real battle erupted, the pressure of the battlefield kept him from keeping track of his carcass beetles.


    Even though the carcass beetles had beenmanded to stay by his side to defend him, they would still act on their instincts at times. That was especially so when weak enemies they could kill in a single strike appeared in front of them. Again and again, the beetles the vampires tempted the beetles. Once a carcass beetle was drawn one or two dozen meters away from itspanions was when the blood knights led by Soros struck.


    The shell of an elite beetle was very tough indeed. The low-grade vampires couldn¡¯t even scratch them despite their sharp fangs. However, the beetles were not immune to the blood knights who equipped runic weapons.


    Four crimson arcs of light shed before the beetle. Its body that possessed the Physique and Strength of an elite adept instantly turned into a sacrifice under the crimson battle techniques. Its previously imprable shell was cut into four or five pieces. Purple and ck blood sttered across the ground.


    When Acteon furiously ughtered his way here with the other five carcass beetles, the four blood knights had already dived back into the swarm of bats. It was impossible to find them anymore.


    The disadvantage in speed made it impossible for the carcass beetles to catch high-grade vampires!


    The blood knight¡¯s savage crimson battle-techniques alsopensated for the weak attacks of the vampires. It gave them the ability to y isted elite beetles.


    With Soros as theirmander, the blood knights no longer charged headfirst at these carcass beetles. Instead, they borrowed the cover of the low-grade vampires, blood servants, and the vampire spawn, always moving about the perimeter and looking for a chance to strike. If things turned south, they immediately rejoined the outer edge and continued their harassment.


    The blood knights forcefully exterminated two elite beetles with this tactic. Acteon was so terrified that he no longer dared to let the four remaining beetles leave him.


    Acteon¡¯s weakness was exposed for all to see at this point!


    His slow movement speed was the most significant reason for his defeat.


    His principal means of defense were these resilient carcass beetles. Without them acting as meat shields, his own body of bugs was extremely frail. The reason his body was known to be an immortal body of bugs was due to the horrifying number of Evil Scorpions he had to reconstruct it with.


    However, all the evil scorpions he had hatched had died in the arduous battle against the vampires. Given that case, his immortal body of bugs was no longer true to its name!


    Any damage he now took would be reflected on his body. Without new scorpions to assimte, his wounded body would have nothing to recover with; his injuries would only be increasingly severe.


    Acteon had a mind to escape and run away, but this meant that he would have to abandon thesest four elite beetles he had.


    That was undoubtedly a painful choice for Acteon, who had not a single soldier left to his name.


    However, when Acteon sensed Mary¡¯s mental flux quickly closing in, he had to make a decision, regardless of how reluctant he was.


    He let out a sharp cry, and the four beetles quickly spread out. They rushed into the swarm of bats, instantly killing seven or eight unfortunate ones.


    Acteon grasped the opportunity his beetles had created for him. He transformed into a thick cloud of ck smoke and drilled underground without hesitation.


    "Trying to leave?" Mary yelled from the skies, "Not that easy!"


    With a crisp snap, a blood arrow glowing with a dark red light shot into the dark dirt. The bolt exploded, creating a crater in the ground that was one meter in diameter in fifty centimeters deep.


    Having received Mary¡¯s orders, Second Grade Blood Knight Soros¡¯ muscr body appeared near the crater in a sh. He gripped his sword with both hands and plunged it downwards with all his strength. Even the hilt of the sword was almost embedded in the ground. That wasn¡¯t the end of it. Soros let out a savage howl as the blood energies throughout his body surged into the longsword.


    An even more violent and destructive explosion erupted!


    A ck silhouette blew into the sky amid the rain of dirt, debris, grass, and storm of crimson energy. The figure was now exposed in front of everyone.


    "Forward, all of you. He must die here today."


    The old fox Vanlier roared from the sky. Hundreds of crimson figures lunged out from the forest and charged towards the shape in the air like moths to a me.


    Meanwhile, more and more vampires and bats surrounded the four elite beetles. They used their lives and bodies to stand between the beetles and Acteon.


    Two battles and twopletely different styles ofbat exploded simultaneously!


    At this point, Mary no longer cared about the casualties among her weak subordinates. She had her horde of underlings stall the beetles, while the elites among the vampires were all called upon to assault Acteon. They attacked him with the stubbornness and intensity of a tide, assaulting him with wave after wave.


    It was still tricky for the vampires to damage Acteon¡¯s body of bugs, despite their sharp fangs and ws. The only ones that could threaten the adept¡¯s life were the four blood knights. Of course, there was also the Bloody Sorceress hiding in the flock of bats¨C Mary!


    A cloud of acid mist rose from the body of any vampire that ventured too close to Acteon and came into contact with the ck smoke. Their bodies promptly turned into a pool of pungent liquid. Acteon¡¯s terrifying spells were cast with a wave of his hand and were like a fatal poison to the ordinary vampires. Fighting with Acteon was a suicidal act.


    However, several high-grade vampiresmanded those vampires and blood servants. Their souls and bodies were entirely under control. They were practically dying for the sake of wearing down Acteon¡¯s strength.


    When his magic powers were no longer capable of sustaining such an exhausting form, Acteon had no choice but to reform his body of smokes back into his body of bugs. He started relying on his tough shell and ferocious ws to bite and tear at any enemies that closed in on him.


    The blood knights struck whenever Acteon attacked.


    However, strangely enough, Acteon¡¯s body could split apart and join together at will. The only First Grade blood knight that remained passed by Acteon. He had barely finished his first attack when Acteon detached his right arm and threw it at the knight.


    This gigantic w transformed into a mass of creeping scorpions in midair. They fell onto the blood knight¡¯s body like a hive of bees and swiftly engulfed the knight. What came next was the terrifying sound of crunching and biting, as well as mad shouts of pain from the blood knight!


    Pu.


    The bowstring¡¯s snapping sound rang out in midair. A crimson rain shrouded arge area and swallowed the swarm of bugs.


    The needle-like rain pierced through the struggling knight, pinning the hundreds of scorpions on his body to the ground along with him.


    When the rain of crimson light had all fallen to the ground, the blood knight and scorpions had all been reduced to pools of blood.


    Acteon¡¯s pained screech came from within the swarm of vampires!


    Mary paid the price of a single blood knight, while Acteon had paid the cost of a hundred scorpions.


    This price was nothing to Mary, who had already steeled her resolve. However, this was literally as painful as severing an arm for Acteon, who sorelycked reinforcements.


    Even though Acteon tried his best to transform his body and grow a new w, his mass inevitably shrunk in the process.


    This scene was like a war horn blown in the heat of battle. It instantly caused the vampires to go berserk!


    Soros, Windsor, and Delin were the three Second Grade blood knights that were left. They were like three iparably sharp daggers as they melded into the crowd of vampires and continuously assaulted Acteon.


    Their runic des infused with dense crimson energies always cut a deep wound on Acteon¡¯s body. A shroud of blood energy would then linger on the injury, preventing Acteon from healing it.


    Acteon was like a wolf with its back against a wall as it fought in the encirclement. A pale green and savage light gleamed in his eyes as he furiously attempted to strike these blood knights that had wounded him.


    "Mary..e out and fight me. Youe out..."


    Acteon continued to taunt and shout as he waved hisrge ws inbat. More and more wounds appeared on his body.


    Finally, Acteon¡¯s body crumbled after yet another violent blow from Soros!


    Boom.


    The remaining magical energies in Acteon¡¯s body exploded into a massive cloud of smoke. Hundreds of ck insects shot in every direction from the ensuing shockwave, flying so fast it was almost as if they were bullets.


    Even though there were plenty of vampires surrounding Acteon, they couldn¡¯t intercept all of these bugs.


    However, as the vampires were flying around in an attempt to intercept every one of them, Mary¡¯s slender body suddenly appeared at the border. She extended her beautiful hand and caught an ordinary-looking insect with her bare hands.


    She put her hands together, and crimson energy started to together. The power turned into a strange rune and entered the insect.


    Tssss.


    The strange insect screeched in pain before finally turning into a ck beetle. Acteon¡¯s hideous bug face appeared on the shell and shouted at Mary.


    However, Acteon finally felt fear when he sensed the terrifying blood energies gathering in Mary¡¯s palm.


    "Let me go. Lady Mary, as long as you let me go, I will be willing to submit to you and obey your orders forever."


    For the first time, sorrow, fear, and despair appeared on Acteon¡¯s face. He desperately started fawning.


    "Hmph! I do not need an ugly subordinate like you." An expression of disdain appeared on Mary¡¯s pretty face. She sped her hands together, and powerful crimson energy devoured thest of Acteon¡¯s consciousness as he howled in agony.

 Chapter 433 Tempering Spirit

    Chapter 433 Tempering Spirit


    Fire Throne.


    Greem disappeared alongside the first floor¡¯s fire altar as energy surged through the tower.


    At the same time, a radiant Ring of Fire sprung up near the base of the tower where the sea ofva was. The viscous magma was repelled and pushed aside as Greem reappeared with the fire altar.


    Greem opened his eyes, and a blinding red light instantly filled his entire sight. Front, back, left, right, up, down; everywhere he looked was filled with boiling magma. This thick, semi-liquid substance seemed to be circting like some unknown force was pushing it. It rumbled as it slowly but stubbornly flowed around Greem.


    This spot was twenty meters deep in the sea ofva. The horrifying heat had vaporized every bit of moisture in this ce. The solid rocks had also been scorched into half-molten magma and dragged into this massive whirlpool ofva.


    Even Greem needed to erect his Ring of Fire to avoid being directly consumed by the magma. Greem¡¯s senses told him that this ce was 900 to 1,200 degrees Celcius. Every ten meters deeper into this ce would see a temperature increase of two to three hundred degrees.


    Even the immunity of Greem¡¯s me body had a limit. Currently, he could only barely survive the heat seventy or eighty meters down. Any further, and the red-hotva would burn even Greem.


    Of course, if Greem activated his first phase me Fiend Transformation, he could probably reach around a hundred and fifty meters. If he performed his second phase transformation, he could attempt to probe the bottom of this sea ofva. However, the second phase transformation onlysted for fifteen minutes. Trying to explore the chaotic and dangerous depths of theva sea in such a short time didn¡¯t seem like a good idea.


    Thus, Greem suppressed his desire to go exploring and focused on figuring out the optimal way to temper his Spirit.


    Spirit Elementiumization!


    The term sounded straightforward, but it was challenging to achieve this result.


    Inparison, body elementiumization appeared to be extremely easy to aplish.


    Body elementiumization only required the individual to be in an area rich with elementium. Then, they would draw upon an appropriate amount of elementium to continuously purify their body. The only problem with this particr process was the mastery of an ¡¯appropriate¡¯ amount.


    One controlled the elementium such that they were just beyond the limits of the body¡¯s tolerance and used it to break down the body continuously. At the same time, the flesh should still be able to recover and make slight adjustments to adapt to the stimtion from the elementium as it did so. The internal structure of the body, as well as the organs, would then slowly move towards a state where they could coexist with the elementium. Meanwhile, the adept had to make sure that the elementium¡¯s destructiveness wasn¡¯t too far beyond their limits, to ensure that inflicted no permanent,sting damage to their spirit origin.


    Thus, body elementiumization was the bncing of the body¡¯s regeneration rate with the destructiveness of the elementium. The purpose was to slowly and gradually improve the body¡¯s tolerance to fire elementium.


    In doing so, the body was able to contain a more significant amount of fire elementium, and therefore tolerate a higher amount of fire energy. The spells that were cast would naturally be much more powerful!


    The principle was the same for spirit elementiumization, but the techniques and methods were different.


    It wasn¡¯t going to be that easy for the elementiumization of Spirit!


    Greem crossed his legs and sat on the fire altar. He slowly gathered his Spirit and turned it into a thread. He then relied on the fire altar¡¯s subtle elementium connection with the surrounding sea ofva to slowly move the thread outside the Ring of Fire.


    Aaaaaah.


    Grem let out an intense howl of agony. His entire brain felt like it had been stabbed with a red-hot needle. It was so painful that his fingers had dug into his palms.


    His spirit was like the appendage extended by his soul consciousness. Extending it into theva of thousands of degrees while unprotected by elementium spells was like casting a zing spell right within Greem¡¯s soul.


    Greem grabbed his aching brain with both hands. The portion of his spirit that extended outside the Ring of Fire had vaporized in a sh of fire.


    Greem sat down for several minutes to collect himself and adjust his mental consciousness. Then, he once again split out a mental appendage and willed it out towards the sea ofva.


    The same intense pain, the same intolerable agony. Greem felt like he had just put his hand into a boiling pot of oil. He could even hear the strange sound of flesh being burned to char by the hot oil.


    No! This wouldn¡¯t work!


    The terrifying heat of theva was not something that his Spirit could currently tolerate. Without the protection of any elementium spells, his Spirit would instantly be burned to pieces the moment it left the Ring of Fire. There was no chance it could endure the heat.


    If his spirit couldn¡¯t even tolerate this heat, how was he supposed to temper it?


    It is me outside of the Ring of Fire, but my affinity is for me as well. Why is there such a vast disparity in the way my spirit reacts to them?


    Greem thought as he recalled the instant he had advanced to adept. He remembered that trace of thew¡¯s aura that had pierced through his soul.


    The fundamental technique of spirit elementiumization was the key to advancing to higher grades. That was why your ordinary books didn¡¯t contain rted knowledge. The Sarubo had information rted to this in their private collections. However, if Greem wanted to gain ess to this information, he would have to sign some ¡¯unnecessary¡¯ contracts with the elders.


    This scenario was what Greem was trying his best to avoid!


    Fortunately, Greem had managed to find some helpful information in the Tower of Fate. That was how he came up with the idea of using the fire altar as an auxiliary tool to temper his Spirit.


    Greem was moving in the right direction, but the specific path differed from person to person, depending on their physique and affinities. He still had to put in plenty of effort if he wanted to find the way that suited him!


    Greem tilted his head and thought for a while. He no longer tried to attempt anything with the same recklessness as before. Instead, he concentrated and started meditating.


    As his mental consciousness slowly descended into that intangible and fantastical state of meditation, everything around him vanished. Only the basic elementium that formed the underground world remained.


    The one thing that illuminated Greem¡¯s consciousness space was the consciousness core he had formed when he had advanced to adept.


    It floated like a miniature sun there, as the rich fire elementium in the surroundings continually flew towards it like birds returning to their nests. This phenomenon coated it with ayer of brilliant red light. From a distance, it looked both beautiful and magnificent.


    When Greem¡¯s mental consciousness appeared in this space, his consciousness core immediately became connected with him. In a split second, Greem felt like he had suddenly appeared in the inside of his consciousness core. He was looking over this boundless space from the perspective of the consciousness core. He experienced the ce from the angle of the core and with the senses that it used to feel.


    The surrounding fire elementium was so rich that it didn¡¯t even require Greem to guide it. The red spots of light ceaselessly surged into his mental consciousness like a downpour. Every speck of red light provided Greem¡¯s Spirit with a trace offort and warmth as they made contact with his mental consciousness.


    Greem ¡¯opened¡¯ his eyes and used his consciousness appendages to feel his surroundings slowly.


    Not far away, an overwhelming torrent of fire elementium slowly but surely flowed past him. The red and hot sensation felt the same as the sea ofva in reality.


    Greem hesitated for a moment before extending his mental appendage out of his consciousness core. He gradually reached towards that torrent of fire elementium.


    Weng.


    At the instant his mental appendage made contact with the fire elementium, Greem felt his mental consciousness gopletely numb. A hot swell of me split off from the torrent of elementium and flowed up the thread. It rushed towards his consciousness core with ferocious momentum as if it would crush anything in its way.


    Strangely enough, while Greem was shocked and feared that he was in great trouble, his consciousness core suddenly vibrated. A weird golden rune formed within the core.


    Golden light shone upon Greem¡¯s mental consciousness the moment the rune was born. He quickly, yet vaguely, felt as if something different and new had been added to his mind. The untouchable stream of mes turned into a warm summer¡¯s breeze, allowing his entire ¡¯body¡¯ to bask rxingly in that golden radiance. Greem was sofortable that he didn¡¯t want to move even a bit.


    At the same time, Greem¡¯s mental consciousness could sense gray and ck spots of light continuously spilling out from his Spirit. These spots of light slowly dispersed in this strange psychic space.


    Greem, in his usual state, might have been scared out of his wits at this point. He might have hurriedly broken out of this weird state. However, Greem was able to rely on the information he had gathered in the past. He was able to realize that this was the tempering process of his Spirit that he had been so painstakingly searching for.


    Those spots of light that were being expunged from his Spirit was the parts of his Spirit that weren¡¯t entirelypatible with fire elementium.


    While this meant that his total Spirit was slowly decreasing, the remaining Spirit was now undoubtedly more suited to supporting and absorbing fire elementium.


    His spirit consciousness sank into this strange state, silently enduring the pain of zing jets of pain enveloping his Spirit, and the difort of having it tempered. The golden rune emitted golden light every time Greem was at his limits. The radiance would merge into his mental consciousness and help him sooth the damage from the violent mes.


    This golden radiance possessed knowledge fragments that had a trace of the firews. It allowed his mind to suddenly gain missing knowledge that it previously hadn¡¯t understood.


    It was like a massive puzzle of knowledge suddenly had one or two inconspicuous spots illuminated and solved. This process of tempering his Spirit had allowed Greem to understand andprehend the existence of the firews finally.


    After four whole hours of meditation, Greem reluctantly retreated from his state of meditation. It wasn¡¯t that he didn¡¯t want to continue. Rather, his mental consciousness was at its limit.


    Greem received multiple notifications from the chip when he finally came out of the meditation space.


    It seemed these notifications had temporarily been blocked while he was in the meditation space. They were only flooding in now.


    "Detecting unique mental consciousness space."


    "Detecting unknown change happening to host¡¯s mental consciousness. Request instructions from host? Stop this process?"


    "Detecting unknown change happening to host¡¯s mental consciousness. Request instructions from host? Stop this process?"


    ......


    "Host¡¯s mental consciousness changing. Mental space shrunk by 11%. Mental strength increased by 4%. Elementium concentration within body increased by 1%.¡±


    "Host haspleted one instance of Spirit tempering."

 Chapter 434 Path of an Apprentice

    Chapter 434 Path of an Apprentice


    "Chip, disy the changes to my Spirit after tempering!"


    "Beep. Host¡¯s attributes are as follows: Strength 2.8 | Agility 1.3 | Physique 3.9 | Spirit 6.¡±


    Greem narrowed his eyes when he saw these numbers.


    He distinctly remembered that his Spirit used to be at seven points. Didn¡¯t this mean that his Spirit had decreased rather than increased after one instance of tempering? Not to mention, this was one entire point of reduction in his Spirit. This...


    The chip¡¯s notification continued while Greem considered.


    "Host¡¯s mental limits increased. Mental strength increased. Fire affinity increased. Disharmony between current psychological state and bodypatibility detected. This phenomenon is expected to end in 127 hours 36 minutes and 54 seconds. During this time, the host has to continuously release fire elementium to stimte change in the host¡¯s body.


    "It is estimated that Spirit will be increased by 1.17 points after mental state has reached the same frequency as bodypatibility."


    A reduction of 1 point and then an increase of 1.17 points? Didn¡¯t this mean that his Spirit would have a decent growth? The most significant change to Greem wasn¡¯t the increase to his Spirit. Rather, it was the improvement of his fire affinity.


    That was indirectly improving his innate potential! It was a massive development that would make Greem smile even in his sleep!


    After all, his Spirit only decided how many spells he could cast at the moment and the how fast his magical powers would recover. However, his potential determined how far he could go in the future. That was the determining factor in his attempt to advance to Second Grade.


    That was also what he prioritized the most!


    However, the change this time wasn¡¯t all that much. Greem had to continue his efforts to see a noticeable difference. What Greem needed to do now was properly manage Fire Throne. As long as he persevered, there woulde a day when he broke out of his cocoon.


    ............


    Greem received a request for an audience not long after he returned to the tower. The person who requested the audience was Kodar, who had just returned to Feidnan City not long ago.


    Greem met Kodar in his room on the fourth floor.


    Kodar¡¯s purpose on his trip here was to deliver a handwritten letter by Meryl. The letter pointed out that the Sarubo n had started bing vignt of Greem¡¯s faction. Not only was the allocation of resources vaguely biased against them, but even thepulsory missions assigned to them were also bing more and more dangerous.


    Moreover, the n had also started tense confrontations with a mid-sized group from the east over the death of a pseudo-adept. They were the Aki n, and several of the advanced apprentices in Greem¡¯s factions had been sent there. The friction between the two ns was incredibly intense, and it was very likely that it would escte into a n war.


    The information that Meryl had obtained through hidden means suggested that Greem was likely to be reassigned to the n resource site closest to the center of the conflict.


    When that happened, Greem would unavoidably be dragged into a n war!


    Greem pondered as he read the letter.


    After a long dy, Greem ced the letter on the wooden table. He tapped the table and turned to look at Kodar.


    "Is this all?" Greem asked doubtfully, "Meryl wouldn¡¯t ask you toe all the way here if this was everything. Is there something else you need to tell me?"


    The magical facilities within Fire Throne were now reasonablyplete. If something remarkable happened in Feidnan City, Meryl would most definitely use magical means to contact Greem. There was no need to send a pseudo-adept like Kodar all the way here just to deliver a letter.


    "Teacher, I intend to try again sometime soon." Kodar finally spoke hesitatingly.


    Greem¡¯s tapping finger paused.


    "Have youpleted your preparations?"


    "Yes, sir! My family has already prepared all the resources required for the ceremony. It is very likely that I will attempt to advance again next week."


    Greem fell silent for a moment. Blue light shed in his ck eyes as he instantly obtained all of Kodar¡¯s attributes.


    Kodar, Human Pseudo-Adept, Male.


    Innate affinity: dark elementium.


    Attributes: Strength 0.3 | Agility 0.4 | Physique 0.4 | Spirit 0.9.


    Kodar was the eldest of all of Greem¡¯s disciples. He was also the one who behaved the most like a noble. He had an impressive background. His family owned avish territory that spanned over fifty kilometers somewhere in the center of the continent. He was a royal noble of a small kingdom.


    The Sarubo n had picked up on the wealth of this family and recruited many apprentices with potential from Kodar¡¯s family back then. His family was considered one of the subordinate forces to the Sarubo n.


    However, his excellent background did not provide him with the same excellent fortune.


    It had been thirteen years since Kodar had be a pseudo-adept. During that time, he had already attempted the advancement ceremony once. Sadly, he failed!


    That was why his attributes appeared to have reached the necessary requirements to host the adept advancement ceremony, but Greem realized that his life aura was a dull gray color, reflected by the chip¡¯s scan. It meant that the life force lost from the previous ceremony hadn¡¯tpletely recovered. The chip estimated that Kodar would have no more than a 16% chance to seed if he attempted advancement in his current state.


    Greem knew very well what it meant to advance, having experienced it himself. Advancement was to gather a consciousness core within the consciousness space using thews one was most familiar with. This process would exhaust most of the body¡¯s energy reserves!


    The process of forming a consciousness core was notably long. Massive consumption of energy would ur throughout the duration. The initial consumption of energy drew upon the subject¡¯s energy reserves, and if the energy reserves were insufficient, then the ceremony would start drawing upon the subject¡¯s innate potential. If even the innate potential still weren¡¯t enough, then the life force was the next to be burned.


    That was why Kodar had lost tremendous potential during thest failure, along with a lot of his life force.


    If he exercised proper care and maintenance, he would have no problem living another seventy or eighty years. However, if he were to attempt advancement to adept in such a state, then the likeliest possibility was him exhausting all of his life force and dying during the ceremony.


    A 16% sess rate!


    That was the result that the chip had calcted after analyzing every single aspect. Even Kodar himself might not know his sess rate with such uracy. He would only have a vague idea that he was likely to fail. However, he wouldn¡¯t know how bad his chances were.


    Of course, the highest possibility was Kodar himself willing to attempt the advancement regardless of how bad his chances were.


    After all, in this world where adepts ruled the rest of the people, the pseudo-adepts were still far too inferior to real adepts!


    In truth, this was the only determination for all apprentices that stepped upon the path of an adept.


    They gritted their teeth and broke through barrier after barrier, or they died on the road, tragic and broken.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and didn¡¯t tell Kodar of his estimations.


    Kodar choosing to visit him before he held his advancement ceremony carried with it an intention to bid ¡¯farewell.¡¯ It didn¡¯t matter whether it was his choice or one that his family pressured him into making; this was a step that Kodar had to take.


    If that were the case, anything that Greem had to say would only weaken his will. Why not let him fight for that 16% with all he had?


    Greem lowered his head and thought for a moment before taking out a jade green potion from his pouch. He handed it over to Kodar.


    "Take it; this is a vial of high-quality Potion of Life. Drink it during the advancement ceremony if you feel like you cannot hold on any longer. It might help you!"


    High-quality potions like this were worth thousands of magical crystals each. They were healing potions exclusively used by adepts. In fact, they hardly ever surfaced on the market. Even an ordinary adept would preserve and keep a medicine like that if they came into possession of one. This item was something that could save their lives during a dangerous moment.


    If it weren¡¯t for Greem having a qualified potions master subordinate like Gargamel, even he would have trouble purchasing a life-saving potion like this one.


    Gratitude surfaced on Kodar¡¯s face. He silently epted the gift and bowed to Greem before slowly walking out of the room.


    Greem had a feeling as the doors of his room slowly closed. This moment was probably thest time he would see Kodar!


    ............


    The Tower of Fate.


    Therge doors slowly opened as Alice strode through the corridor in her long purple and starry robe. Magic Fairy Helen was like a nagging housewife, constantly flying around Alice¡¯s ears and reporting things.


    Clusters of starry radiance dragged behind Alice as she walked, forming a beautiful belt of stars.


    All the apprentices that met her on the way made way and bowed to her. They all held magical tomes in their hands. It was apparent that they were hurrying to a magical hall for lessons.


    "Who is giving the lecture today? Snowlotus or Katrina?" Alice suddenly pointed at a young apprentice and asked loudly.


    This apprentice was only nine-years-old. She had a young face, a short white robe, and she held a surprisingly thick tome in her hands. The words ¡¯Basic Discussions on Astrology¡¯ were written on the side of the hardcover book in beautiful andrge Aliduan characters.


    The apprentice was too young and too petite. That was why the sight of her walking through the corridor with a book half her size had been so eye-catching.


    "Lady Alice, Miss Katrina is the one giving the lecture today!" The little apprentice¡¯s face flushed red, perhaps because it was the first time she was speaking to someone as famous as the Witch of Fate herself. One could see tiny beads of sweat on her slightly freckled nose.


    Witch Katrina was a wandering witch that hade to join after the Tower of Fate had activated. Even though her abilities were pretty average, she still had rock-solid foundations for a First Grade witch. Alice didn¡¯t have the luxury of choosing at the moment either. She epted everyone who came to join her cause, regardless of who they were, and assigned them duties within the Tower of Fate.


    "What is your name?" Alice was suddenly interested in this nervous little witch apprentice.


    "I¡¯m called Tiffany!"

 Chapter 435 Battle in the Woods

    Chapter 435 Battle in the Woods


    Tiffany had been born in the Verne Region.


    Verne was one of the traditional territories of the Coldwinter Witches.


    As one of the first witch apprentices sent to the Tower of Fate, Tiffany was like all the other apprentices sent there. She possessed poor potential and was simply too young.


    In doing so, the Tower of Fate would require a much longer time to train these apprentices before they were could be sent out to manage resource sites and assets. In doing so, thosends and resource sites would remain within the hands of the various witch branches. That indirectly hindered the speed at which the Fate branch could expand.


    Of course, this was what was known as an open conspiracy.


    There was nothing Alice could do in response to this situation, even when she knew precisely what was happening.


    She had no influence or power, or even someone strong to back her. She only had her title as leader of the Witches of Fate. Apart from a single tower and twopanions that had gone through life and death along with her, Alice had nothing.


    Perhaps this was one of the main reasons thews of fate had chosen her!


    "Follow me, Tiffany!" Alice bent down and caressed the little girl¡¯s smooth face, "I might have a mission waiting for you here."


    Alice walked off on her own.


    The girl stared with wide-open eyes for a bit before starting as if just woken up from a dream. She grabbed the dense tome in her hand tightly as she shouted and chased after Alice¡¯s slowly shrinking silhouette.


    ............


    The ¡¯danger¡¯ surrounding Fire Throne continued to escte with each passing day.


    The mercenaries and adventurers had grown much more cautious ever since someone spotted signs of magical creatures gathering in the forests to the north.


    Even though Fire Throne had issued several high-bounty missions to investigate the activity of the magical creatures, few dared to venture deep into the north.


    More and more adepts and apprentices were also lured to Fire Throne by the numerous missions since it had be one of Zhentarim¡¯s mission sites. They formed apprentice parties of three to five men and were often active in the northern woods, where the activity of magical creatures was bing increasingly frequent. They would asionally bring back unsettling news.


    They had essentially confirmed that there were approximately seven magical creatures who were active near Fire Throne. In particr, the Three-Headed Demon Hound, Medusa, and the Wyvern King were veteran magical creatures that had lived in thisnd for over a hundred years. The ming Tigers, Gigant Brutelephants, Two-headed Ogres, and the Aba Beemen were new tribes that had migrated over from the depths of the ck Forest.


    ming Tigers were fire-attribute magical creatures that had tails zing with golden mes. Their ws and fangs possessed secondary fire damage when they attacked. Their powerful tails were also no different from a me whip. Their advantage was their speed, agility, and the ferocity of their attacks. Their only downfall was theirck of long-range attacks.


    The gigant brutelephants were terrifying creatures that were several times the size of an ordinary elephant. Mature brutelephants had tremendous Physique and horrifying Strength. However, they had no other magical means of attack. They were like the body refining adepts of the magical creature world. All of their magical powers were used to strengthen their bodies and strength.


    That was also why the brutelephants were considered an exceptionally savage and robust creature!


    They were always the vanguards of vicious charges against humans whenever a stampede urred near a human settlement. The human guards could do nothing about them. The human¡¯s defenses and walls were no match for their violent and brutal ramming.


    They only needed to create a single opening in the defensive line, and the ensuing stampede would be even harder to fend off!


    Two-Headed Ogres were mutants among ogres.


    Ordinary ogres were tall, mighty, and had superior strength. However, they were still considered ordinary woond creatures, and not a part of the magical creatures. However, once the number of ogres reached a hundred men, there was an extremely high likelihood of a mutant ogre with two heads being born.


    Ordinary ogres had no affinity for magic and were dumb as a brick. The average intelligence of an entire tribe would be approximately equal to a three-year-old human child. However, these two-headed ogres were naturally born with enviable supernatural powers. They were able to gain ess to the necessary knowledge and skill by tapping into their bloodline legacy. That was how they came into possession of their strange casting abilities.


    However, the magic powers that they wielded were elementary and limited in scope. They were either enhancement and auxiliary spells that boosted attributes, or violent and savage lightning spells.


    In truth, an isted two-headed ogre was an easy target. However, this was not the case for a two-headed ogre sorcerer with many subordinates. They only needed to cast a simple ¡¯Bloodthirsting Berserk¡¯ on their subordinates, and there would soon be over a hundred muscr monsters chasing you with stone hammers and stone sticks to the ends of the earth.


    If you ever wanted to cross a two-headed ogre sorcerer, you had best possess a sturdy body that could endure the beating that woulde!


    The Aba Beemen were even worse. You wouldn¡¯t want to make enemies out of them. Ever.


    They weren¡¯t challenging opponents because of their prowess. Instead, the Aba Beemen simply reproduced at an unnatural rate.


    As long as there were enough ordinary lifeforms in the ck Forest, the Aba Beemen would be able to produce offspring at a phenomenal rate. It was like they were operating on cheats. The numbers of the Aba Beemen were often proportional to the ¡¯food¡¯ in the ce they lived.


    If they ended up in a situation where there were more beemen than food, they would quickly split up and establish new nests. A split nest would often only start off with a single Aba Queen and twenty beemen foot-soldiers.


    However, once the Aba Beemen established themselves in their new homes, their numbers would explode at an exponential rate.


    The individual fighting prowess of an Aba Beeman was no more than a human beginner apprentice. They looked like a mix between an elf and a bee, and they had decent intelligence.


    Aba Beemen had four limbs in a humanoid fashion, but each of their appendages only had four digits. Harsh, steel-like hair covered their entire body, with ck or yellow spots at the edges. Their faces were as delicate and pretty as the elves, but with ckpound eyes and long antennae at the top of their heads.


    Of course, like bees, they possessed semi-translucent wings, but their flight speed and height were far inferior to the actual flying insects.


    Their mainbat tactic was flying in midair while bombarding the enemy with poison spears and arrows. If they got even closer, they shot out poisonous stingers from their tails. At a narrow range, the bombardment of their stingers was no weaker than enchanted weapons.


    Their most significant advantage was still their terrifying numbers.


    Even though individually they were only as powerful as a beginner apprentice, they still posed a threat to an adept if their numbers were high enough.


    These scary magical creature tribes were all problematic enemies. Consequently, the adepts training near the Fire Throne had to limit their activity range to a twenty-five-kilometer range.


    After all, this was the radius covered by the tower. The rate at which elementium was absorbed was also several times quicker than other ces. The magical creatures would never settle anywhere near this ce.


    That was how a rtively safe vacuum of space formed!


    The apprentices of the tower frequently went out hunting with this safe zone as their barrier. They dove deep into the hunting areas of the magical creatures to harass, or even stalk, isted beasts and magical creatures.


    Of course, the exchange of lives went both ways!


    The activity of the human apprentices attracted plenty of carnivorous beasts. Both parties fought with all their intelligence and strength in the depths of the ck Forest. One or two nned ambushes always happened within a single day, and both sides suffered tremendous losses during this process.


    However, the human apprentices still had the upper hand when all was said and done.


    After all, what stood behind them was a terrifying adept¡¯s tower that could fend off the attacks of tens of thousands of magical creatures¨C Fire Throne!


    Fire Throne had formed a group of tower guardiansposed of manticores, bird demons, and snake fiends to defend against the attacks of magical creatures from the north. This group continuously patrolled the surroundings of Fire Cave. The moment any apprentice faced danger, they only needed to send out a signal, and the nearest tower guard team would immediately head over to reinforce them.


    The cooperation of the guards and the apprentices caused the magical creatures gathering in the north to be ambushed and ughtered, bit by bit. The new tribes in the area had faced severe casualties over time. Meanwhile, the apprentices sessfully avoided many of the ambushes set up by the magical creatures, as if God himself was aiding them.


    Many apprentices gained the training they sought in these endless battles, all while obtaining plenty of rare resources. If this situation persisted, Fire Throne would be able to quickly obtain a mature and weathered group of apprentice in a short time.


    These apprentices would never suspect the hidden secrets behind the scenes of the battlefield they so busily fought on. The terrifying Gargamel, who was always smiling sinisterly on the second floor of the tower, was the real mastermind who orchestrated everything.


    Gargamel was the one who issued most of the assault and investigation missions to the apprentices, while he also obtained detailed information from the side of the magical creatures.


    He was like a strange old man ying chess with himself, trying his best to move about and assign the resources of the tower to the optimal positions. The dangerous missions fell upon the outsiders, while the bountiful and less risky missions would go to the apprentices of their tower.


    The target of the apprentice¡¯s attacks were almost always the new magical creature tribes. Unguja and Dana, who were secretly loyal to Greem, had be spies. Even though they feigned conflicts with the apprentices at times, they were quietly taking over thends of the new tribes.


    The numbers of their tribe members were also steadily rising and bing stronger as they relied on this sneaky strategy of exploitation on both ends.


    On the other hand, the true owner of Fire Throne, the almighty me Demon Greem, had entirely given up on the ¡¯games¡¯ of managing the tower¡¯s forces. He had left everything to Gargamel¡¯s discretion. He had fullymitted to the long and arduous journey of tempering his Spirit and improving his powers.


    That was because he saw the truth of the world as it was. The World of Adepts was a cruel world where individual power reigned supreme! The first and foremost factor that decided the position of an adept was his own strength; the influence of an adept only came after.


    If a rookie adept like himself that came from nothing wanted to establish himself, the only way was to crush anypetitors with a superior grade and power.


    Managing a force of his own was only to facilitate and make more essible the process of obtaining resources!

 Chapter 436 Slaughter

    Chapter 436 ughter


    The expected boot finally dropped after a month¡¯s long wait.


    Greem¡¯s contract of service with the Sarubo n was for a hundred years. He was now in his tenth year of service, and his protection period as a newly advanced adept had finally worn off. He was now an official adept of the n, and as such the n¡¯spulsory missions quickly arrived.


    Just like Meryl had leaked to him, Greem would be sent to Gilneas, the closest city to the area of conflict. There was a Sarubo mine there known as Iron Ring Mine, famous for producing high-quality azure moonstones and noble topaz.


    Of course, one of the n¡¯s Second ss resource sites was also nearby. That was one of the targets of protection for the stationed adept.


    ording to past conventions, Greem, as the stationed adept sent by the n, would have to ensure the safety of these two ces. Another specialized group of pseudo-adepts and advanced apprentices would be responsible for their daily production. Greem didn¡¯t need to stay on-site to guard those locations.


    However, if the resource site and mine faced a severe problem that the apprentices couldn¡¯t handle, Greem, as the stationed adept, would have toe out to expel or murder those adept-level opponents that had threatened the collection of resources.


    Therefore, Greem would usually be able to enjoy his days within the lively and bustling city of Gilneas. The everyday troubles would be dealt with by the apprentices in charge of security. They would only ask him over if they were dealing with adept-level opponents.


    That was why adepts often considered station missions like this an enjoyable errand, apart from the rtiveck of freedom.


    After all, the managers and local nobles near the resource sites would try their best to entertain a stationed adept like Greem. As long as he wanted, Greem could indulge in pools of wine and forests of carnal pleasure on a daily basis. Every so often, the supervisors of the resource sites and mines would also provide him with offerings of additional resources. These were unspoken rules and were considered part of the basic welfare of the stationed adept.


    However, all of these were what happened usually; the current circumstances were unusual.


    Not long ago, the apprentice captain of Iron Ring Mine, a pseudo-adept by the name of Sak, had a confrontation with a pseudo-adept of the Aki n when he went out collecting resources. Sak had ¡¯identally¡¯ killed his opponent.


    This incident set off all the umted grievances between the Sarubo and the Aki!


    Of course, the leaders of both ns would have started secretmunications away from the eyes of the public. They were probably discussing matters of ¡¯vengeance,¡¯ pensation,¡¯ and the like. However, given Sanazar¡¯s temper, how could she easily cave-in to the Aki¡¯s conditions to hand over Sak andpensate them with resources?


    This forward area of the n¡¯s turned into a powder keg while the two ns argued. It was likely going to be the target of the Aki¡¯s revenge.


    Even though the Zhentarim Association strictly forbade murder between adepts, the elders of the Association were willing to turn a blind eye if someone had a good excuse tomit murder. They wouldn¡¯t so readily interfere in the affairs between two adept ns.


    Given the tense situation near Gilneas City, they needed a greatbat adept for keeping control of things. Greem, the thorn in the n¡¯s side, was naturally assigned here.


    The Sarubo n only gave Greem twenty days to prepare.


    If Greem still hadn¡¯t arrived in Gilneas City after twenty days, the manager of the Sarubo n, Second Grade Sir F¨¹gen, would have toe looking for him for a ¡¯heart-to-heart talk.¡¯


    The subject of the safety of Greem¡¯s tower had never been brought up.


    The Sarubo n territory was so vast, yet Greem had still chosen a primal piece of the ck Forest as the site of his tower. This action had caused dissatisfaction among the higher-ups of the n. Thepulsory mission this time was clearly meant as a warning of sorts.


    An ordinary adept would usually have two to three options for theirpulsory mission. They could freely choose the task they preferred based on their liking and schedule.


    These station missions usually took two years toplete. After that, the adepts were free to arrange their own time for the remaining three years until the nextpulsory mission.


    Unfortunately, this was apulsory mission that Lady Sanazar had personally assigned to Greem. He didn¡¯t have the guts toin even if he was upset about the whole thing.


    After he received the mission orders from the n, Greem could only try his best to make arrangements for the internal matters of his tower.


    He would probably be leaving for a fairly extended period. He would have to discuss and settle the security and internal development of the tower beforehand. Moreover, he would have to clear out all the potential threats to the tower before he left!


    ............


    Gigant Brutelephants were extremely territorial magical creatures.


    They continuously patrolled their territory once they decided on it. Any dominant lifeforms that entered their area would have to face the mad and relentless attacks of the brutelephant horde.


    Inparison, weaker lifeforms did not even catch their attention.


    That was why it was nearly impossible to find other magical creatures within the living areas of the brutelephants!


    The ck Forest was shrouded by the curtain of night, its ancient and massive trees spread out through thend like a boundless sea.


    Every single tree was several dozen meters tall, their dense spread of leavespletely covering the ground. Anything flying from above would not be able to see what was happening below.


    Greem rapidly glided towards the brutelephant¡¯s territory under cover of night. He rode on the back of the manticore leader and made his way there based on the information provided by Unguja.


    As the canopy obscured the ground, even Greem had trouble seeing and sensing what was beneath the leaves. However, while above the ck sea of trees, Greem could still capture odd trembling motions in the treetops with his sharp eyesight.


    Night winds blew past his side.


    The manticore leader opened its wings wide and relied on the winds to glide above the trees.


    Greem looked around at his surroundings and quickly discovered some odd urrences in the mountainous forest. It seemed there was some massive beast running through the woods, knocking into trees and causing them to tremble and shake.


    Greem lightly patted the manticore leader. It immediately understood and turned around to fly towards that direction.


    When they were almost there, the manticore leader folded its wings and angled its body downwards. Its tough body crashed through the leaves and dove right into the pitch-ck forest.


    The manticore leader only unfurled its wings once again after it had entered the forest. It wove between the ancient trees with agile movements. Once in a while, it stopped on a thick tree branch and surveyed this mysterious forest with its sharp eyes.


    Dong.


    A massive hill-sized brutelephant slowly patrolled within their territory, and the ground quaked with every step it took.


    Suddenly, it raised its long trunk. Its enormous body turned with incredible agility as its bloodshot eyes fixated upon a spot in the darkness beyond.


    There, it could faintly sense a dangerous aura that it hated!


    Roar.


    The brutelephant lifted its thick front leg and stomped the earth beneath its feet. Its thick trunk swayed from left to right, smacking the trees nearby and causing them to shake and tremble. The brutelephant¡¯s two sharply curved tusks chafed on the ancient trees. Bark flew everywhere, and the white wood beneath was exposed.


    As a territorial creature, the brutelephant let out a threatening roar as it raised its trunk. It was trying to intimidate the enemy. If the creature in the darkness knew well enough to leave, it would pretend it hadn¡¯t seen anything and would continue to patrol the territory.


    After all, this terrifying sense of danger allowed it to understand that this was no ordinary enemy. However, the opponent cared not for its goodwill. Not only did the creature not leave, but it also even walked towards the brutelephant.


    Rumble.


    The angered brutelephantunched a death charge without hesitation. It lowered its head and pointed its tusks at the opponent before rumbling towards the humanoid creature walking out of the darkness.


    The opponent was a human in a ck robe. Intense elementium fluctuations surrounded him.


    These details allowed the brutelephant to recognize the intruder as a human adept!


    The brutelephant leader knew that an adept¡¯s tower had been erected in the vicinity when it migrated here. However, it clung on stubbornly to the idea that neither parties woulde into conflict as long as they didn¡¯t start one. As such, the brutelephant leader chose to set up his home here.


    Many of the surrounding magical creatures hade over to win it to their side during this time. However, the brutelephant leader had kept a strict hold on his subordinates and prevented them from stepping out of their territories for no reason. Sadly, all its efforts had been for nothing. It hadn¡¯t gone looking for trouble with the human adept, yet the adept hade looking for trouble with it!


    The brutelephant leader was like a moving mountain of flesh as it charged with anger and bloodthirst. It knocked over two or three massive trees that were in the way and advanced towards Greem with unstoppable momentum.


    Greem lifted his head under the ck robe. Two blinding red lights shone from under the shadow of his hood. He held a staff in his left hand and extended his right hand. A brilliant red stream of mes shot out of his palm. The fire cut through a distance of thirty meters and struck at the brutelephant leader¡¯s exposed skull.


    Szzzz.


    The sound of wildly burning flesh rang out in the forest.


    A thin force field appeared around the brutelephant leader, obstructing the stream of fire from Greem¡¯s hand. Its massive body then rushed right past where Greem had been like an out-of-control train.


    Arge cluster of me burst in the air.


    Greem¡¯s ¡¯frail¡¯ body vanished beneath the iron limbs of the brutelephant leader. When he once again reappeared, he was standing proudly upon the broad shoulders of the beast.


    A massive magma fireball was forming in his palm.


    When the fire elementium reached concentrations that were hard for even him to maintain control, he shook his wrists. He flung the fireball at the head of the brutelephant as Greem once again vanished in a st of fire.


    Boom.


    An explosion thundered and sent quakes reverberating throughout the area.


    A terrifying me shockwave ravaged the silent ck Forest as waves of fire licked the skies.


    The sea of fire had devoured an entire space almost thirty meters in diameter in an instant!

 Chapter 437 Pact

    Chapter 437 Pact


    Nightfall. The brutelephant¡¯s territory had been invaded by an adept.


    After a brutal battle, five deaths, and severe wounds on the brutelephant leader¡¯s part, they had finally managed to drive off the frightening fire adept.


    Yet, just as the numerous magical creatures of the ck Forest were going about their leisurely activities the next night, terror descended once more. Maulhill, upied by the tribe of a hundred ogres, was set on fire. The crackling sound of mes sounded throughout the woods.


    The bloody battle persisted throughout the night.


    When day once again graced the magical creatures, they were shocked to find Maulhill burned beyond recognition.


    The ogre leader, Two-Headed Ogre Zac was furious. If it weren¡¯t for the advice of Three-Headed Demon Hound Unguja, it would have led all of his subordinates towards that human¡¯s tower in a murderous rage.


    One couldn¡¯t me Zac for his anger. Last night, that shameless and sinister human adept had never even touched the ground. He relied on the manticore¡¯s ability to fly to remain perched thirty to forty meters in the night sky. The adept then took advantage of the high ground as he brazenly started to ravage the ogre¡¯s den withrge-scale fire spells as if he was a child pouring boiling water on an ant¡¯s nest for the fun of it.


    The adult ogres knew how to dig caves in the mountain and use them as shelter against the constantly changing weather. However, most ogres only knew how to set up makeshift tents and shacks as houses.


    They had no effective means of attacking an enemy who came from above, especially not a bold one that spread fire while flying in the night sky. The ogres could only cover their heads and scurry about or try and toss stones at the enemy.


    The only one with magic powers among the ogres was Zac, the two-headed ogre. However, it only knew Bloodthirsting Berserk and had no mastery over the lightning spells. Consequently, it also had no option but to curse and swear when faced with this challenging situation.


    An entire night of bombardment turned Maulhill into Dusthill.


    The already sparse trees were all set on fire. The violent mes turned Maulhill into a bald hill of stone, transforming into a tragic scene of smoldering ruins.


    That said, not many ogres had died. Instead, a lot of them were burned or had fainted from inhaling the smoke. With their frightening regenerative abilities, the ogres would be able to recover from such injuries in less than a day.


    Two tribes had been attacked two nights in a row by the human adepts. These events undoubtedly set the rest of the magical creatures on edge.


    As they had expected, the one assaulted on the third night was the Wyvern King.


    No one knew what trick the ursed adept used, but he was able to sneak below the cliff where the Wyvern King resided and nted plenty of alchemical explosives there. He then used a single fireball and toppled half the tall cliff.


    This sly and sinister action had caused many wyverns to lose their homes.


    And this had also wholly angered the magical creatures in this stretch of the ck Forest. They gathered together and cursed the adept¡¯s acts of aggression. Many wanted to once again attack the human¡¯s tower and exile the adepts from theirnd.


    However, the steady andposed three-headed demon hound Unguja shook his head repetitively. He described thest assault that the old lord had attempted on the tower with a face full of sorrow and tragedy.


    The brutelephants, who were basically massive hills of flesh, immediately changed their minds when they heard the tower resided underground. They might have been powerful and unrivaled in the ck Forest, but they couldn¡¯t possibly reach the enemy¡¯s base if it was underground!


    What were they supposed to do? Dig a tunnel to attack the adept¡¯s tower?


    The ming tigers and Aba beemen were small enough to make it underground. However, they too immediately changed their minds once Unguja described the sea ofva that had flooded their army back then.


    They didn¡¯t have the gigant brutelephants and ogres to act as their meatshields. These magical creatures would never be dumb enough to throw the lives of their tribe members at the tough adept¡¯s tower under these circumstances!


    However, if they didn¡¯t do away with the tower, then there was nothing they could do about the adept¡¯s reckless ambushes. The magical creature leaders gathered together and chattered, moaning and grumbling as they did so. Still, they couldn¡¯t find a reasonable solution to the issue.


    "Shut up, all of you!" Dana the Medusa¡¯s slender hips swayed as she slithered out of the darkness, "If we are going to fight, then do it. If we are going to kill, then do it. If you lot don¡¯t have the guts to go looking for vengeance at the human¡¯s tower, then at least send men to blockade the entrance and force them to negotiate with us!"


    "Negotiate?" Confusion appeared on the faces of the magical creature leaders.


    "Yes, negotiate!" Dana straightened her tail and made herself taller, "Since no one dares to fight, then we will negotiate with the adept! This forest is wide enough for the two of us. There is no need to exterminate each other!"


    "And what if the human adept doesn¡¯t agree to talk?" The Aba Queen was the only female of the beeman tribe. She had arrived here with several footsoldiers, but her tribe members had yet to exceed a hundred men. They were currently the weakest of all the magical creatures. Consequently, they didn¡¯t dare start any conflicts without good reason.


    "If he doesn¡¯t want to talk, then we will force him to!" Savagery unique to the magical creatures shed on Dana¡¯s pretty face, "We might not dare to attack the human adept¡¯s tower, but we can seal off their entrance. If the human adept rejects our request for negotiations, then we will take shifts to blockade his entrance. I don¡¯t believe they canst for long without supplies from the outside."


    Dana¡¯s suggestion was far more in everyone¡¯s favor. The magical creatures thought hard and long before agreeing with her judgment. However, when it came to the topic of who to send as their representative, fear once again appeared on their faces.


    Much like their rtionships with one another, not one of them would trust a human adept. The human adept was on a murderous spree. Wouldn¡¯t it just be sending amb into the mouth of a wolf if they sent someone there at this time?


    While the magical creatures were pushing the responsibility around, Dana once again stood forward.


    "I was the one that came up with this suggestion. Let me be the one to go!" Dana¡¯s beautiful eyes looked around the area, "However, it is far too dangerous for me to go alone. Who cane along with me?"


    Wyvern King Rrakk felt an unknown fear that caused a cold sweat to run all over its body when Medusa¡¯s eyes fell upon it. It had the feeling that its life would being to an end if it volunteered.


    Several of the magical creature leaders used all sorts of excuses to reject their obligation. In the end, the delicate matter fell upon the ¡¯unfortunate¡¯ Unguja.


    Thest war had caused Unguja to lose one of his heads. During this period of rest, a massive bulge had appeared in the location of his original head. It seemed he would regain his title as the three-headed demon hound in a couple of months!


    However, right now, it was the weakest magical creature leader apart from the Aba Queen. Thus, under the ¡¯persuasion¡¯ of the magical creature leaders, it had no choice but to ept this dangerous task. Of course, he had a bitter smile on his face throughout the whole thing.


    Nightfall.


    Dana and Unguja circled past the mercenaries¡¯ camp and stood by the only entrance to the Fire Cave.


    Finally, they managed to halt the human adept who was just about to leave. It was the owner of the tower, Greem.


    A dangerous and tense negotiation followed in front of the entrance of Fire Cave. Several scouts of the other magical creature leaders appeared in the forest nearby as well.


    The evil fire adept was finally forced to sign a temporary truce pact after Dana¡¯s intimidation and persuasion.


    The adept¡¯s tower was not to expand into the northern forest for the next two years. Any of the adepts belonging to the Fire Throne were also forbidden from entering the territories of the magical creatures.


    In exchange, the magical creature leaders would acknowledge the existence of Fire Throne and ce the surrounding ten-kilometer area under the tower¡¯s jurisdiction. All leader-level magical creatures were not allowed to cross the boundary and abduct the subsidiaries of the tower. They were also not allowed to attack any humans who were within the tower¡¯s safe zone.


    This pact was crude and simple, but it certainly expressed the reluctance of both sides to escte the conflict. The limitations and rules of the agreement only extended to leader-level magical creatures and the adepts of the tower. Not a single word mentioned the ordinary magical creatures or the apprentice adepts.


    This was also a preparation made for the conflict that was likely to resume in the future!


    This pact unexpectedly won the support of all the magical creatures once it was established.


    They all believed that this pact effectively restrained the reach of the humans and their adept¡¯s tower. They thought that this had practically chased the human adepts out of the ck Forest. As for the mercenaries and apprentices sent out by the humans? Just as they were trying to hunt the beasts and magical creatures, the magical creatures were also excitedly waiting for a chance to pursue them.


    Greem, on the other hand, was secretly relieved.


    The establishment of the safe zone would subtly increase the image and prestige of Fire Throne in the eyes of the mercenaries and outsider adepts. Aw that even magical creatures would have to follow was undoubtedly impressive news.


    Compared to magical creatures, the humans were the best at exploiting rules to their advantage!


    The safety of Fire Throne would increase by several-fold once this pact restricted the movements of the magical creature leaders. Greem put down his worries and could leave Fire Throne now that this was done.


    However, before he left, he still had to transfer most of the control authority over to Gargamel. After theplicated and strict process of transferring power, Gargamel essentially possessed control authority over the entire tower. Apart from Greem¡¯s room on the fourth floor and the entirety of the fifth floor, Gargamel could go in and out of anywhere else within the tower.


    Greem believed that Fire Throne was in good hands. He had the sharp Gargamel managing everything, with Eva secretly aiding him in the shadows, along with Unguja and Dana, their two spies.


    Not to mention, the small teleportation array on the fifth floor had also been constructed. If anything happened in Fire Throne, Greem could return here within minutes as long as he was willing to pay the expensive teleportation fee.


    Greem finally started on the journey towards Gilneas City after making all the necessary arrangements. He brought along Sabrina and Billis, a beginner apprentice that Gargamel had rmended to him.

 Chapter 438 Stone Tower

    Chapter 438 Stone Tower


    Gilneas City.


    This small city with a poption of under ten thousand people was nothing whenpared to cities in the center of the continent.


    As one of the Sarubo¡¯s territories on the outer rim, there wasn¡¯t a multipurpose adept¡¯s tower here. There was only a tower made of stone.


    The Sarubo n¡¯s adepts had been decreasing over the past few years. Most of their forces were gathered in their core territories. For example, the stone tower in Gilneas hadn¡¯t seen an adept stationed within it for thirty-seven years.


    Theck of maintenance had caused the outer walls to bepletely covered by vines and the like. The two-meter iron fence was also rusty and had holesrge enough for a man to crawl through.


    The garden had also been abandoned. Only a dried up pond and weeds remained in the flowerbed. Withered leaves and dirt covered the stone path from the entrance to the tower. It looked as if no one had walked through here in a very long time.


    This sight was the deste scene of ruin presented to Greem when his ck carriage stopped before the garden.


    "Sir, why don¡¯t we find an inn to stay in first while we hire some people to clean up this ce?" Sabrina¡¯s appearance was a little weird, so she always covered herself with a ck robe when she went out. She talked as she helped Greem down from the carriage.


    Billis, on the other hand, had acted as the groom along the way. He now stood beside Greem, respectfully bowing and waiting for orders.


    Greem wore a ck adept¡¯s robe. No powerful spells had been cast upon the cloth, but it did have an elementary energy shield. The three Ioun Stones were kept in Greem¡¯s pouch, now that he wasn¡¯t engaged inbat. Greem held the ze of Destruction in one hand as he walked into the garden in the front.


    Greem felt a weak probing flux scan his body when he walked past the garden gates.


    Hm? There were still magical facilities here that functioned?


    Greem doubtfully walked forward. Just then, a vine that had been intertwined with another vine suddenly came to life and moved away for Greem to pass.


    Deng. Deng. Deng.


    Greem tapped the stone path with his staff rhythmically as he quickly strolled through the way hidden by the weeds and vines. All the strange magical vines moved away as he stepped forward. White bones appeared on the exposed stone path every so often.


    Broken daggers and rotten ropes were visible beside the corpses.


    These had been robbers that had set their eyes on an adept¡¯s wealth. They had tried to get rich by breaking into the tower while no one was in it.


    These ignorant fellows didn¡¯t know the terror of an adept. Even if this tower was in disrepair, it was still not a ce that mortals like them could step foot on!


    nting magical vines and bloodsucking nts near their homes was a popr defensive measure employed by many adepts. These magical nts were not only bloodthirsty and cruel; they also had an enduring vitality and wouldn¡¯t easily die, even without regr care.


    For themon man, these carnivorous nts were as terrifying as magical creatures. For the adepts, they were the tamest and cutest ¡¯watchdogs¡¯ you would ever find.


    Greem arrived in front of the doors of the tower after passing through the winding garden.


    He knocked on the heavy door with his staff, and the face of an old man appeared on the door.


    "You have five seconds to speak the password or face the punishment of the adepts!"


    "Light of Yeru!"


    "Password correct! Wee, sir adept."


    The magical servant disappeared, and the long-sealed doors finally opened amid a lot of groaning and creaking.


    "Sabrina, take my identity token and go activate the core array beneath the tower!"


    "Billis, go and pay a visit to the manager of this ce. I want them to report thetest situation to me by tonight."


    Greem started surveying the tower after handing out tasks to his two subordinates.


    The stone tower had three floors. The first level was where the apprentices and servants lived. The second floor had a crude library and alchemicalb, and the third floor was the location of the adept¡¯s quarters. A spiral staircase connected the three levels in the corner of the tower.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to tell that this ce hadst been home to an adept several decades ago. The tower had some defensive measures. While apprentices asionally came over to replenish the supply of magical crystals, the energy pool remained in a state of depletion.


    Consequently, most of the temperature and environmental controls were no longer functioning. The years of dust and corrosion had rendered most of the facilities useless. Vines had even grown over some of the rooms. It seemed this ce needed a thorough tidying if he intended to live here.


    Greem pushed upon a wooden door and arrived in a room resembling a bedroom.


    A table, a chair, and a wooden bed.


    This room was about as crude and inly furnished it could get.


    Greem¡¯s sharp eyes quickly swept through the room. He walked to the wooden desk and wiped away the thickyer of dust on top of it. A line of strange words that resembled magical patterns was revealed.


    "Death be with me!"


    ............


    Gilneas¡¯ authorities immediately sent someone over to the tower upon hearing news of Greem¡¯s arrival. They arrived in less than half an hour.


    Inside a dim hall on the first floor.


    Most of the rotten and ancient furniture had been cleared out.


    A beautiful Geronggang dining table had been temporarily ced here. Greem casually leaned on his chair, enjoying the delicious foie gras as he assessed the smiling Viscount Alvar before him.


    Viscount Alvar was the manager appointed by the Sarubo n to oversee things here in Gilneas City. He was the lord of this city.


    The viscount currently held a thick stack of parchment in his hands as he reported the development of the city in recent years. Greem wasn¡¯t interested in this information at all, but he didn¡¯t interrupt the man.


    After all, they were both waiting for the actual ¡¯stars¡¯ of tonight!


    One hourter, when Viscount Alvar¡¯s voice was going sore from all the reading, the crisp sound of hooves against stone rang from outside the tower.


    Two dusty and exhausted apprentices walked in.


    They were the two apprentice captains that the Sarubo n had stationed in the mine and the resource site.


    The apprentice captain stationed at Iron Ring Mine was a pseudo-adept named Yuri. He had just filled the position of the troublemaker Sak from two months ago. The person posted in the Second ss resource site was a guy called Morse. He was also a pseudo-adept.


    The smiling Viscount Alvar immediately stepped aside when he saw the two apprentice captains arrive. He left the stage to them.


    The two pseudo-adepts might have been stationed away from the headquarters, but they had long heard of the me Demon. Thus, the two of them immediately bowed and greeted Greem when they saw him.


    Greem stifled the idea of intimidating the three people when he saw that they were all respectful towards him. He started asking the apprentice captains about the situations on their end.


    "Things are still fine on my side. There are twenty-three apprentices and seventeen servants at the resource site. I have already forbidden them from going out during this period, so nothing troublesome has happened!" Morse fawningly smiled as he spoke, "Sir Greem, your two apprentices reported inst month. I have already arranged for them to stay at the inner court. There should be no problem with their safety."


    Greem didn¡¯t speak and only nodded at the apprentice Captain.


    A few months prior, three out of four advanced apprentices under Greem had been sent here by the n. Thus, be it for official matters or the trouble he just caused for his men, Greem had toe here. He had to protect these unfortunate subordinates that had been caught up in the n¡¯s warning against him.


    "An advanced apprentice also arrived on my side. I have already arranged for him as a mine overseer. The job is a little heavy, but there¡¯s no problem with regards to safety," Yuri hurriedly exined the situation on his side as well. Hesitation then shed on his face, "Someone went missing from the mine a few days ago. Even though we didn¡¯t find any clues, I suspect..."


    "Viscount Alvar, you have lived here in Gilneas City for a dozen years. Have you discovered any shady characters in the past few days?" Greem had only just arrived and had known nothing about the circumstances here. All of his information currently came from the three people before him.


    "Sir, as you know, Gilneas City has no decent adept resources. Thus, it is rare for an adept to stay here. That said, a few apprentices are staying here. I have already sent people to spy on them, and nothing unusual has urred!" Viscount Alvar frowned and truthfully described everything he knew. It didn¡¯t seem like there were any problems on his side.


    "Mm, you people need to cooperate with all your effort in regards to local matters. Yuri, Morse, keep a tight hold on your territory. Make sure the enemy doesn¡¯t manage to sneak in. Alvar; put more effort into observing all movement in the area. Immediately send any information you get to me if something happens. I¡¯ll be staying in the stone tower for now."


    "Sir, this tower hasn¡¯t been cleaned in several decades. Would you like toe to my castle to rest for a few days while I get people to patch up this ce?" A fawning smile was stered across Alvar¡¯s face, "Gilneas City might be small, but the nobles here have already heard of your name. They are all waiting for you to grace them with your presence. Would you like to..."


    A suggestive smile that all men would know appeared on Alvar¡¯s face.


    "The likes of entertainment will be considered after things are a little more settled! The only thing we need to do now is to ensure that we fulfill our duties! We will see how things progress over time and act ordingly afterward." Greem calmly rejected the Viscount¡¯s offer.


    He could sense a mild flux in the apprentice captains¡¯ Spirits when he rejected the viscount¡¯s invitation to his banquet.


    It seemed they were a little disappointed.


    It appeared the two apprentice captains had quite the intimate rtionship with the casten.


    Greem called upon Sabrina and Billis once the three of them had left.


    "The two of you find a room on the first floor and stay there tonight. Sleep well and don¡¯te out if you have no business to deal with!" Greem raised an eyebrow once he was done speaking. He asked coldly, "Do you hear me?"


    "Yes, sir!"


    Sabrina and Billis hurriedly bowed and answered.


    For some reason, their hearts tightened. They felt as if something was about to happen in the tower tonight!

 Chapter 439 Spiritual Spell

    Chapter 439 Spiritual Spell


    As night fell, the tower gradually became shrouded by a cloak of darkness.


    Sabrina and Billis hid in their rooms after filling their stomachs, determined not toe out tonight.


    The dark tower was deathly silent, and only a trace of a dim light shone through the narrow windows. The shadow of a tall figure flickered, and it seemed the person was checking on all the rooms in the tower.


    Greem strolled through the empty, narrow, and dark corridor. He held a small candbra in his hand, the five candles radiating a faint and weak yellow light. The light from the candles wasn¡¯t even enough to illuminate the walls. In fact, it was barely enough to envelop Greempletely.


    Greem muttered silently under his breath as he slowly progressed through the corridor.


    "Come out. It¡¯s about time you came out; you can¡¯t keep hiding like this, can you?"


    Finally, a wooden door to a hidden room opened when Greem reached the corner of a corridor.


    Greem casually smiled and approached the door with the candbra in hand.


    The wooden door was half open. A ck footprint remained on the floorboard in front of the door. The size of the print was only half that of a human¡¯s. It looked as if it might have been left behind by a small humanoid creature.


    Greem tapped the ground with the staff in his left hand, and the wooden door swung wide open. The candlelight shone into the room and illuminated everything within.


    Dusty floorboards, rotting furniture, and a pile of red wooden boxes in a corner. A pale white silhouette with long hair stood in the darkness where the light couldn¡¯t reach. Their blood red eyes trained upon Greem, even through the curtain of their hair. A foul and chilling aura filled the entire space.


    Greem remained unfazed and strode into the hidden room. As he did so, more and more candlelight flooded into the room. Fewer and fewer shadows remained for one to hide in. The pale white shape could only crouch behind the shade of the wooden boxes, wailing in a bone-chilling manner.


    The wooden doors shut with a thump as Greem was preparing his next move. Greem couldn¡¯t help but turn his head to look. Yet, by the time he faced forward again, the ¡¯female ghost¡¯ had already disappeared.


    "Chip, were you able to record that? Did you find anything?" Greem was slightly spooked and startedmunicating with the chip.


    "Detecting unusual forcefield changes. The host is currently within the radius of an unknown forcefield. An unknown substance has polluted mental flux. Please evacuate from the source of the forcefield as soon as possible. Please evacuate from the source of the forcefield as soon as possible..." Even the chip¡¯s mechanical voice seemed to be wavering by the end of its notification.


    Greem had never doubted the reasonable judgment of the chip since it awakened.


    Thus, he waved his staff the moment he received the alert. A magical fireball the size of a fist sted the wooden doors open. His body then exploded into a cluster of mes and vanished from the spot.


    A burst of fire appeared in the abandoned garden near the tower of stone. A short momentter, the mes dispersed, and Greem¡¯s tall figure appeared on the spot.


    A strange ¡¯hmm¡¯ sound rang out from the darkness at the top of the tower the moment Greem left its radius.


    He followed the sound and looked upwards. His eyes were glowing red. It was then that he found the weird creature sitting cross-legged atop the tower.


    It was a pretty fox with bright yellow fur and a white scarf on its neck.


    It was staring at Greem with an expression of shock on its face. In its paw, a crimson rune shed and shone with aplicated flux.


    For some reason, Greem¡¯s vision would start blurring when his Spirit came into contact with this flux. He suddenly heard heavy breathing from behind him. Judging by the sound, it was getting closer and closer.


    A light biological electric impulse sent out by the chip immediately helped Greem break out from the illusion.


    Spiritual Magic?


    Greem didn¡¯t dare hesitate now that he understood what was happening. He drove the staff into the ground, and a thick Sr Ray beam shot out from the crystal at the top of the staff and sted towards the strange fox at the top of the tower.


    "As expected, there¡¯s something odd with you. To be able to resist the illusions that I have spent so long preparing. Hehe. It¡¯s good fortune for you today. Let¡¯s meet again next time." The fox waved its tail, and Greem¡¯s spell mysteriously went off course. The fireball missed its target, shooting into the sky after passing right by the fox.


    The fox didn¡¯t stay after all this. It immediately crushed the crimson rune in its paw and leaped into the curtain of night.


    Greem didn¡¯t try to pursue it.


    Strange and unconventional adepts like that loved to set up ambushes to lure their enemies into a trap. Recklessly pursuing them would not be wise. Greem shut his eyes to sense his surroundings. The chip still detected an unusual forcefield fluctuation within the tower. It seemed the source of the forcefield hadn¡¯t vanished with the departure of the enemy.


    Greem was stunned for a moment before quicklying to a realization.


    He then recalled something and immediately took out the three Ioun Stones, throwing them above his head. Greem braved the forcefield and went into the tower once more.


    A short whileter, mes exploded, and Greem once again reappeared outside the tower. He held a person in each of his hands¨C Sabrina and Billis, both deeply trapped in the illusion.


    The two of them were asleep, but their breathing grew increasingly heavy and rushed. Even Billis and Sabrina¡¯s bodies were trembling and shivering slightly.


    Greem squatted by their sides and tried calling their names, but neither one responded.


    He pushed open their eyelids to take a look. Billis¡¯ eyes had rolled back. His Spirit was on the verge of copse and insanity. Sabrina was doing a bit better than him, but she wasn¡¯t going tost much longer either.


    Greem frowned.


    Even though he had dragged the two of them away from the forcefield, their mental flux had been too severely polluted. Trying to break away from the pull of the mysterious forcefield with their own strength was likely an impossible task.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare dy any longer. He ced the two apprentices side by side, then stuck the ze of Destruction in between the two of them. Greem¡¯s hands quickly weaved and drew in the air, and one mysterious fire rune after another appeared. The staff started to tremble as well, as sparks of red light drifted out from the crimson crystal.


    These crimson lights fell onto the two apprentices under Greem¡¯s channeling.


    The two started to shiver intensely the moment the red light touched their bodies. The less tolerant Billis even started rolling around in agony.


    "Ouch...this hurts. What is this? This hurts too much."


    Billis scrambled up from the ground, squealing and crying in pain. He started batting away the mes on his body as if he had just woken from a dream. Yet, when Billis opened his eyes, he found his body perfectly untouched. It wasn¡¯t being burned to cinders as it had in his dream.


    While Billis looked around in confusion, the trembling Sabrina suddenly sat up. A fearful crimson light glowed in her mechanical eyes.


    She immediately stood up when her eyes fell upon Greem.


    "Sir, were you the one who saved me?" Sabrina couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    "Save?" Billis clearly still hadn¡¯t understood the situation, "Did an enemye by earlier?"


    "Mm. It was a strange adept that looked like a fox. They seemed to be particrly skilled at spiritual magic. Even I almost fell to his tricks." An angry light shed in Greem¡¯s ck eyes.


    "Aren¡¯t there magical defenses in the tower?" Sabrina asked fearfully, "How were we ambushed without any knowledge when we had the defenses?"


    Greemughed coldly.


    "Perhaps because the ones working against us were the magical arrays themselves?"


    "Ah..."


    "Ah!"


    An expression of horror appeared on Sabrina¡¯s and Billis¡¯ face at the same time.


    "If I¡¯m not wrong, that fellow has probably known for quite a while that we wereing." Greem narrowed his eyes and exined, "So they touched up the arrays in the stone tower before we arrived."


    "How did they have control authority over the tower?"


    "Control authority isn¡¯t required. Most of the defensive arrays had already shut down due to theck of energy. The guy just needed to add a little something extra to the array during that opportunity. This way, they would know when we arrive and activate the tower¡¯s core. Moreover..." Greem narrowed his eyes further when he reached this part.


    "Moreover what?" Billis didn¡¯t suppress his curiosity and asked.


    "Moreover, this enemy is extremely sly. They truly spent a lot of effort to take me down. They secretly carved a magical character in my room on the third floor and baited me into reading it. This way, they gained ess to my soul coordinates and could specifically target their attacks at my soul. The two of you weren¡¯t their target and just happened to have been in the tower and affected by the aftershocks of the spiritual magic."


    "Then... sir, how did you save us? Do you also happen to know some spiritual magic?" That was the most significant point of interest for Sabrina and Billis.


    "Hmph! I¡¯m a fire adept. Why would I ever dabble in the strange and mysterious spiritual magic?" Greem let out a coldugh, "Recall how you broke free from the illusions and you will know how I did it!"


    Billis scratched his head when he heard this. His gaze became unfocused, and he tried to remember what happened.


    "I remember running into a horde of terrifying zombies while I was adventuring in the ck Forest. There were too many of them, so many that it was impossible to kill all of them. In the end, I ran out of magic power and was dragged into their graves," A terrified expression appeared on Billis¡¯ face at this point of his story, "Just as I was about to be torn to pieces, a massive cluster of mes fell from the skies and ignited my entire body. Those fires burned my body. It was so painful, so agonizing; so much so that I woke up from my dream!"


    Sabrina listened to Billis¡¯ story,pared it to her own experiences, and had a vague idea of what Greem had done.


    Sir me Demon¡¯s fires had the strange characteristic of burning the soul. It was undoubtedly the most suited for pulling the two of them out of their slumber.


    However, she still clearly remembered how she had been reduced to ashes by the strange fire in her dreams. Her mind and consciousness were so sharp that she still remembered every detail of her body being incinerated. The painful experience might have saved her, but it was an unbearable memory to recall!

 Chapter 440 Maid

    Chapter 440 Maid


    Last night¡¯s incident had allowed Greem to understand his ws.


    As a fire adept, he possessed iparable dominance and lethality on the battlefield as long as he could fearlessly unleash his fury. However, the magics he knew were often clumsy and less tuned to small-scale duels with other adepts. He had a difficult time dealing with those extremely strange and mysterious spells.


    Of course, if he transformed into the me Fiend, the increase in his base resistance would help him negate most curses and maniptive spiritual spells. Still, trying to deal with such spells head-on through pure mental will wasn¡¯t without its limits. If he slipped up even once, he would end up in a terrible situation. It would be so awful that even Greem himself felt chills running down his spine just by imagining the conclusion!


    In the past, he would only activate the Ioun Stones duringbat to hide the full extent of his abilities. However, Greem no longer dared remain overconfident afterst night¡¯s lesson. He immediately took out the three Ioun Stones and allowed them to spin around his head like three twinkling little stars continuously.


    The red Ioun Stone might not have helped him defend against spiritual magic, but it did provide him with an additional two points of Spirit. This would increase his resistance just a touch.


    Inparison, the purple Ioun Stone was instrumental in this regard. It could provide Greem with a soul barrier of one hundred and twenty points. There was no chance of Greem being manipted and controlled as long as the enemy¡¯s attack didn¡¯t exceed this limit.


    Not to mention he was a fire adept with explosive powers. If Greem couldn¡¯t severely wound the opponent before they broke through his soul barrier, then he would have deserved the loss.


    Greem waited until daybreak and confirmed the absence of enemies before entering the tower to check on the core array. As expected, he found a very well-hidden auxiliary formation within. It remained in a hidden state when the core array was functioning. That was why it hadn¡¯t triggered any of the array rms. Greem, the owner of the tower, was the very person that had activated this hidden array.


    The phrase ¡¯Death be with me¡¯ had been the activation passcode for this array. The phrase had also simultaneously nted a soul coordinate within Greem without him even knowing. Thus, Greem¡¯s actions mostly caused the uninvited trouble fromst night.


    Greem was begrudgingly impressed by the ability of the enemy adept once he understood all this. They were indeed the best when it came to toying with a person¡¯s mind. If it weren¡¯t for the chip¡¯s ability to detect unusual forcefield fluctuations, Greem would probably still be trapped within the palms of his opponent.


    The abnormality at the stone tower had alerted the casten of Gilneas City as well. By the time Viscount Alvar reached the tower with a city guard army of almost two hundred men, everything had already returned to normal.


    They then scrubbed the hidden array and had the tower itself cleaned and tidied. Newer and better furniture reced all the old ones within. More importantly, the Viscount reassigned over two dozen servants, kitchen maids, housemaids, and guards to the tower, once again filling it with the liveliness of humans.


    Whether intentional or not, every one of the maids the Viscount Alvar sent over was young, pretty, and gentle. There was even a pair of young twin sisters barely fourteen years of age. Many of these young maids came from the noble families around Gilneas City. They were often branch members of the noble families, enjoying the status of a nobledy within their family.


    Here, however, they were willing to reduce themselves to being a lowly maid, all so they could spend just one additional minute beside Sir Adept.


    Viscount Alvar had even personally promised that whoever managed to find their way into the bedsheets of Sir Adept would be rewarded handsomely. The noble family they belonged to would be exempt from taxes for ten years. Furthermore, if anyone managed to conceive a child, their family would instantly be elevated to one of the fiverge families within Gilneas City. That maid would also be gifted a vi of her own to enjoy luxury and pleasure for the rest of her life.


    Initially, thesedies all believed they were dealing with an elderly adept old enough to be their grandfathers. One with a wrinkled face and hunched body. After all, the stories shared over tea and cakes often imed that the stronger the adept, the less human they became.


    Adepts that spent their years as hermits in their towers were often arrogant, cruel, and perverted evildoers. Their lengthy lifespan and the tedious way they passed their time caused them to have apletely different perspective towards enjoyment and pleasure. Ordinary intercourse and decadence were no longer enough to fulfill their twisted minds. Frightening torture and torment probably awaited those that tried to offer themselves up to an adept like this.


    Private rumors even imed that some evil adepts would transform into monsters and beasts during sexual intercourse and kill their partners in the process.


    That was why all the maids were fearful of their fate when they were first sent to the tower. They were afraid that they would also end up with such a horrible oue. After all, they were of an inferior statuspared to the adepts. They had never honestlye into contact with one.


    However, when the one dozen young girls wearing their neat maid uniforms saw the great Sir Adept for the first time, they were utterly shocked by what they saw.


    Greem wasn¡¯t a body-refining adept, yet he possessed a two-meter-tall muscr body, a handsome look on his face, well-defined muscles that even a loose ck robe couldn¡¯t hide, and long, intriguing crimson hair falling down his back.


    Not a single drop of excess fat could be found on the tall and fit body of this teenage adept. Greem¡¯s handsome appearance, along with that slight wickedness mixed with the wisdom of an adept, caused all the girls to be attracted to him at first sight.


    Of course, there were also the beautiful stones circling above his head, the magic tome radiating with elementium light, and the mysterious staff leaning against his seat; all of these added more mystery and profundity to his character. It instantly turned the girls into lost moths, desperately wanting to cast themselves into that zing me.


    Greem chose to ignore the small little tricks that Viscount Alvar was pulling under his eyes.


    After all, his title as the me Demon was fairly well-known throughout the Sarubo n. Not to mention he was abat adept known for his prowess. It was natural that the viscount would pull out all the stops to fall into his good graces.


    Someone like Viscount Alvar probably wasn¡¯t even qualified to know much about the situation and internal affairs of the Sarubo n. Thus, the viscount only saw Greem¡¯s power and his apparent rise like a zing star in the n. He didn¡¯t honestly know the brewing conflict and tensions between Greem and the elders.


    If he knew that Greem¡¯s assignment here was a form of punishment and warning by the n, he would probably regret his unnecessary actions.


    That was why Greem graciously epted all of Alvar¡¯s goodwill while secretly being amused by the situation. After all, he was going to be staying here for a quite a long time. It wasn¡¯t necessarily a bad thing to have a couple of maids tend to his daily activities during this time. On the other hand, he wasn¡¯t all that attracted by the prospect of carnal pleasure.


    Ever since he became an adept, Greem had improved his Spirit and his will at its origin. All kinds of inferior and worldly desires no longer controlled how he behaved. He would only consider them as a sort of entertainment in an otherwise dull and dry lifestyle.


    These young girls walked to his side, and all the information about their physical and mental states projected in front of him.


    With the help of the chip¡¯s scanning abilities, and his own spiritual senses, he could obtain all the information he needed.


    The heart rate of the girls, their blood flow, the thickness of their hair, their menstrual cycles, their sleep quality, their three sizes, even when they got their first period; Greem could get an approximate answer to all of these.


    In Greem¡¯s eyes, these girls might be young and pretty, but their life forces were dull and weak. Their Spirit activity was also rtively low. That meant that they had mostly led vapid lives within their families, with no proper education or meaningful experiences. They were only delicate ythings with a pretty appearance and no soul to match it!


    Trying to seduce Greem with women like this was like trying to lure a wealthy man with a beautiful doll; there was no chance of sess. For an adept, only those with a potent life force could draw their attention as potential mates.


    And these vases and dolls? No more than a decent option to while away the monotony of daily work. Of course, no adept would mind letting their bloodline spread on if they were fortunate enough to beget an offspring in this manner. All they needed to do was pay the price of a little time and some insignificant resources that they had never needed in the first ce.


    ............


    Night once again fell upon the tower after an entire day¡¯s affair.


    Greem drove all the maids into the lower level of the stone tower after dinner.


    Only he was left in the two upper levels of the tower.


    Greem sat at a wooden table by a window on the second level, diligently reading through the information he had gotten from Alvar. These books did not contain powerful magical knowledge. They were the basic intelligence reports regarding the Aki n.


    Greem glossed over their resources, assets, vis, and staffing situations and focused on the information about their adepts.


    The Aki n was also a mid-sized adept n. Their headquarters was located in the city of Rohr, a thousand kilometers away from this ce. Unlike the Sarubo n, the Aki n had yet to produce a Great Adept that had embarked on a journey beyond this realm. Their current n leader, Maecena Aki, was the founder of the n.


    A great Fourth Grade adept!


    That also meant that at the moment, the Sarubo n was surpassed regarding high-grade powerhouses. The Sarubo did not have a Fourth Grade adept of their own to deal with Maecena Aki himself.


    Even though Great Adept Sarubo was already a Sixth Grade adept, he couldn¡¯t help with the n¡¯s conflicts if he couldn¡¯t return to the World of Adepts. If it wasn¡¯t out of concern about being pursued by Great Adept Sarubo when he left the realm upon reaching Fifth Grade, Maecena Aki could entirely exterminate all the Sarubo adepts by himself.


    Consequently, the Sarubo n could not take the risk of engaging in a full-out war with the enemy!

 Chapter 441 The Annoying Adept

    Chapter 441 The Annoying Adept


    Understanding the nuances of this conflict was crucial for Greem!


    Such tensions between adept ns had to be handled with the proper measures.


    There were those Who could be offended and those who should never be offended. One had to know these clearly. Otherwise, if you ran into a powerful adept n, you would die without knowing why.


    This time, the Sarubo n was dealing with a pretty formidable enemy.


    If the culprit, Sak, hadn¡¯t been a descendant of Sir F¨¹gen¡¯s family, the n would likely have handed him over to resolve the matter. After all, the Sarubocked a Fourth Grade adept that could determine the oue of the battle. If war were to break out, they would be the ones suffering losses.


    Fortunately, the Aki pseudo-adept that died at Sak¡¯s hands wasn¡¯t a core member of the Aki n. Still, a pseudo-adept was still a valuable asset for any adept n. They weren¡¯t disposable objects that the group could afford to toss aside.


    That was why these ¡¯tensions¡¯ and ¡¯idents¡¯ happened behind the scenes while negotiations were still in the air. It was now a matter of who would be the first to break and bow their heads.


    That would be quite the blow to a n¡¯s reputation!


    Greem immediately knew what he had to do once he understood the situation. He was here more as a guardian and defender. They were using his title as the me Demon to intimidate the opponent and discourage any reckless behavior. Otherwise, if the opponent came over and massacred a resource site of theirs, the Sarubo n would be left with no choice but to dere war, regardless of how unwilling they were.


    Greem was here to deter any potential attacks by the enemy and buy time for the higher-ups to conclude their negotiations. If he tried to act on his own ord and beat up the enemy too much, it might not be a reward waiting for him. In fact, it might even be punishment.


    Greem quickly squashed the thought of actively seeking the enemy out now that he realized this. Instead, he started thinking about how he should deal with the strange and annoying tricks of the opponent.


    To better understand the enemy, Greem was diligently going through all the information they had on the Aki adepts. He wanted to find out more about the enemy from yesterday.


    He was in no mood to start anything with the maids during this time of danger.


    Greem chose his life over pleasure without question.


    Apart from the Fourth Grade founder, the Aki n also held two Second Grade adepts and neen First Grade adepts. There were enough adepts to possess an overwhelming advantage against the Sarubo n. They only needed to be a little harsher in their negotiations, and the Sarubo would eventually cave.


    After all, the Fourth Grade adept was too influential a deciding factor in a n war. As long as he decided not to worry about his future development beyond this realm, he alone would be enough to exterminate every single trace of the Sarubo in the World of Adepts.


    It didn¡¯t matter how furious and angry Sixth Grade Great Adept Sarubo would be. His only recourse then would be to wait until Maecena reached Fifth Grade, and proceed to hunt him down. Before that happened, Sarubo would have no ability to touch Maecena in the World of Adepts, regardless of how powerful he was.


    Of course, the Aki n¡¯s lesser nes would probably be targets of revenge for Sarubo. And Sarubo still had other tricks up his sleeves. As a Sixth Grade Great Adept, he had made allies and friends with other adepts that had left the realm. He could ask them for a favor and borrow the strength of their subordinate Fourth Grade forces to help repel the threat of the Aki n.


    That was why even the Aki¡¯s Fourth Grade Adept was reluctant to take things to the extreme unless necessary.


    Greem silently contemted the entire situation as well as possible future developments. Just then, the tower¡¯s defense system triggered.


    The next second, a zing pir of fire burst forth above a small tform at the top of the tower.


    The me pir was gone as fast as it hade, vanishing in a puff of smoke. Greem held the staff in one hand and the Scroll of Voodoo in the other. Bright mes burned in his eyes as he silently stood on the spot.


    A woodpecker was circling the night sky above. It was the one that had triggered the tower¡¯s rms by throwing a stone at it.


    "Heh, Sarubo brat, could you tell me how you saw through my spiritual magic yesterday?" This inconspicuous woodpecker actually knew how to speak. It started cawing at Greem, "If you tell me how you did it, then I¡¯ll let you in on a secret as well. You should know, it¡¯s rted to your safety!"


    Greem lifted his head and looked at his opponent. He was shocked to find that it wasn¡¯t a magical creature; it was just an ordinary woodpecker. However, Greem once again felt the existence of soul coordinates within the woodpecker.


    This bird wasn¡¯t the true form of the soul adept. It wasn¡¯t their contract creature either. It was just an ordinary bird that had been enchanted by the adept.


    Greem looked around in hopes of discovering where the soul adept was hiding. Sadly, pitch-ck darkness cloaked everything. Only darkness filled his vision, aside from the few strands of light spilling out of the tower.


    The tower itself was thirty-seven meters tall. Finding another tower of this height in Gilneas City was impossible. Only the important areas of Gilneas City and thends nearby were lit with bright fires on this night. The other areas of the city were dimly lit with the asional flickering of weak candlelight.


    Trying to find the hidden soul adept in this environment was impossible. Greem took a quick look at his surroundings and gave up on this absurd idea. He once again shifted his attention to the woodpecker.


    "Your abilities are impressive," Greem shook his head, "Yesterday, a fox. Today, a woodpecker. Your true body remains hidden behind the scenes, not leaving me even a single chance to pay you back for the other night."


    "Hey, I¡¯m not here to fight today. I already tried killing you yesterday, and since I didn¡¯t seed, I no longer have any reason to try again. Oh right. What do you think about my suggestion?"


    "That¡¯s my life-saving trick. You think I would tell you just like that?" Greem stamped his staff against the roof. A stream of fire sted out and reduced the woodpecker to ashes.


    Greem took another look around him after killing off this annoying messenger and prepared to head back into the tower.


    Just when he was about to leave, an owl screeched out from the darkness and lunged at him.


    "Seriously, brat? You are really mean, aren¡¯t you? Killing off my messenger before we... "


    A fireball rocketed into the sky. The violent me shockwaves turned the owl into cinders.


    No more than seven secondster, a green-headed parrot arrived on the scene.


    Judging from the broken silver chain tied to its feet, this was the pet of a noble from the city.


    "Hey, the dude ying with fire. You kill my messenger again and I¡¯ll... "


    A me arrow shot across the sky, turning the parrot into a stter of flesh and blood.


    "How is it, chip? Can you find their hiding spot?" Greem silentlymunicated with the chip in his mind.


    "Beep. Probe failed! Enemy¡¯s spell is strange and unusual; associated magical knowledge iscking. Impossible to identify and track."


    Greem was helpless when it came to this.


    Magic rted to the soul and the spirit was not fundamental knowledge that anyone could get their hands on. Only those with particr talents could draw out their full power. These adepts were often mysterious individuals who were skilled at hiding and disguise. Trying to get magical knowledge rted to their powers was virtually impossible.


    That was the type of person Greem was dealing with.


    They never showed their real form, only ever rying their intentions by enchanting and controlling animals. Greem would never believe a single word of such a shady fellow.


    Greem¡¯s zing eyes scanned the night sky after sniping the parrot. He didn¡¯t find any new flying creature closing in on his position. His spiritual senses picked up something in the garden while he was still considering the situation.


    The staff had entirely cleared away the withered vines and magical nts in one of the flower beds, and they had also plowed the dirt. The new seeds had yet to be sown. The ce was empty and without a single sign of life. Yet, Greem sensed a mouse digging out of the ground right now. It was trying its best to stand up on its paws as it squeaked at Greem.


    Ran out of flying creatures? Now they were turning to critters like these instead.


    Greem let out a helpless sigh.


    He wanted to fight it out with the enemy, but this sly fellow didn¡¯t want to show themselves! He couldn¡¯t do anything about this. What was he supposed to do? Was he supposed to watch out for this annoying person day and night?


    It wasn¡¯t just him in the stone tower. There was also Sabrina and Billis. They would not survive if the enemy adept got angry and turned their rage towards them. Greem couldn¡¯t possibly look after their safety at every moment.


    Greem shed with fire and appeared below the tower. He strode ahead and frowned as he asked, "What do you want, really?"


    "Still the answer to that one question. How did you discover my spiritual magic? I used an auxiliary array, nted a soul coordinate, and even used subtle psychological suggestions on you. You shouldn¡¯t be able to discover it." The red-eyed mouse waved its little paws furiously. The enemy was still obsessing over this problem.


    "Then what information do you intend it exchange for it?" Greem asked in return. He could sense a trace of sincerity in the opponent¡¯s words.


    "Your safety!" The mouse started squeaking again, "You don¡¯t think I¡¯m the only one that the n sent here, do you? Now that I have failed to kill you, there will be other adepts taking up this assignment. If you tell me how you managed to break free of my illusion, I will give you information on that adept."


    "Er... "


    Greem was speechless.


    The flipping heck was this?

 Chapter 442 Danger Everywhere

    Chapter 442 Danger Everywhere


    Night fell.


    Greem still hadn¡¯t gone to sleep yet. In fact, he had even dyed even his four hours of daily meditation.


    ced before him was a list of adepts that would soon arrive at Gilneas City.


    The list wasn¡¯t very long. There were only five names on it, but three of them were Aki n adepts.


    That was already a terrifying number!


    It was important to note that even the Sarubo headquarters in Feidnan City only usually had two or three stationed adepts. The Aki n had sent three adepts to Gilneas City, all for this measly matter. No matter how you looked at the situation, it seemed like they were nning something big!


    Greem¡¯s average power was only at the level of a veteran adept, now that he had lost the Infernal Tyrant. If he transformed into the me Fiend, his strength would further rise to the level of an elite adept. He would have to unseal the me Fiend¡¯s Heart and undergo the second phase transformation if he wanted to exterminate the opponent quickly. If he did so, he would possess the power of a peak elite.


    A strength of this level would allow Greem to take on adepts of the same Grade with rtive ease. In fact, he could even further improve his chances by summoning his two adept-level golems.


    However, this was only rtive to adepts below elite level. If Greem met an elite-levelbat adept and failed to finish the battle within fifteen minutes, he would be in a dangerous situation. That was notably the case if those enemy adepts came prepared and had fire-resistant magic equipment with them. Greem¡¯sbat effectiveness would be cut in half before the fight even started.


    Greem needed to finish processing the dragon crystal as soon as possible to deal with this problem. Otherwise, he might not be able to deal with all the challenges he would meet during this mission.


    Lamure. Female. Aki n. Soul Adept. Specialises in controlling the souls and minds of others.


    Sicha. Male. Aki n. Body Refining Adept. Possesses great strength and a tough, unbreakable body.


    ndre. Male. Aki n. Elementium Adept (Water). Great mastery over water spells. Is extremely destructive. It was said that his ¡¯Waterspout¡¯ spell held the terrifying record of crippling three adepts in one blow.


    Enon. Male. Zehnder n. Bloodline Adept (Transformation Type). Can turn into a Space Bat: a sort of spatial lifeform that transcends the material ne.


    Baroque. Male. Morrison n. Elementium Adept (nt). Specialises in hastening nt growth and modification of magical nts.


    ......


    For some unknown reason, these five adepts had appeared near Gilneas City. The three Aki n adepts were here for him, but the motives of the other two were less clear.


    They either had something essential to do nearby or...


    Greem¡¯s head hurt. There were too many possibilities.


    ording to Lamure¡¯s words, the Aki n intended to capture one or two Sarubo n members and use them to exchange for Sak, who was hiding in Feidnan City. The reason Lamure hade was to abduct those two apprentice captains.


    However, since Greem had arrived, the Aki n decided that the two pseudo-adepts weren¡¯t nearly influential enough as targets. That was why they shifted their attention towards Greem instead.


    Their original n was to send two more adepts to work together with Lamure and capture Greem. However, this Adept Lamure had been too confident in her powers. She had made the first move without waiting for reinforcements.


    The result was, naturally, a failure.


    Moreover, this Adept Lamure had even initiated a private deal with Greem to learn how he escaped her psychological suggestions. In exchange, she gave up the names of the two adept reinforcements.


    Of course, Greem couldn¡¯t possibly reveal the secret of the chip. Instead, he imed it to be an innate ability of his. Lamure wasn¡¯t entirely satisfied with the answer, but she didn¡¯t press the issue.


    Greem even had a feeling that Lamure would have found an excuse to hand over the information on the two adepts, even if he hadn¡¯t done anything.


    Greem felt a headachee on when he looked at the information in his hands!


    There was an elite level water elementium adept. That was an opponent that had been explicitly arranged for him. If one included the resilient body refining adept and a tricky soul adept on this team, Greem didn¡¯t seem to have any better option than to run.


    The opponent would not kill him.


    After all, the Sarubo n was much stronger than the Aki n. If the Fourth Grade Aki n leader truly angered Sarubo, his life would be hell, even if he didn¡¯t step out of the World of Adepts. That was why killing an adept was out of the question.


    The reason they sent three adepts in total was to ensure Greem was taken down. They desperately wanted to use him as a bargaining chip in the negotiations. On the other hand, if Greem lost and were detained by the Aki n, his reputation would suffer. It didn¡¯t matter if the Sarubo n managed to exchange for his release.


    Perhaps this was the actual threat by which Lady Sanazar wanted to take Greem down a notch!


    Greem came to an inevitable conclusion after running through all his thoughts. The one thing hecked most was still power. There was no other option but obtaining unimaginable power if he wanted to shatter this awkward and stressful situation.


    No wonder Lamure had so casually thrown the information his way. An elitebat adept aided by two veteran adepts made it a child¡¯s errand to capture Greem. Lamure wasn¡¯t worried about Greem going anywhere or achieving much with the information.


    Perhaps she also understood a lot more about the various intricacies of this conflict!


    Greem decided to lock himself within the stone tower for the next few days; he was not going out anymore.


    He put his other research projects on hold and allowed all of the chip¡¯s calction time and effort to be spent on designing, constructing, and optimizing the prototype of the Second Grade dragon crystal golem.


    The chip estimated apletion time of nine days.


    Greem left the chip to run on its own. Meanwhile, he went about gathering all the necessary magical materials for the task. With the constant increase in golem core grades, conventional magical materials were no longer able to satisfy their requirements. They were unable to deal with the potent and high-efficiency elementium energy output.


    Greem employed his authority as a stationed adept to transfer all the resources and materials he needed to his tower from the resource sites and the mine warehouse. These materials were all to craft the Wind Dragon Golem that he had ced all his hopes on.


    Billis and Sabrina were busy tending to all the errands he had sent them on. For the moment, they had both turned into Greem¡¯s little assistants, constantly helping him process these magical materials.


    Even though his actions were not exactly by the rules, no one quite dared say anything at this particr moment.


    The two Aki n adepts arrived while Greem was silently preparing all this.


    Greem didn¡¯t see them with his own eyes, and Viscount Alvar didn¡¯t send him any rted information either. However, he knew without a doubt that the enemy had arrived.


    That was because, since the fourth day, incidents were urring all over Gilneas City and its surroundings.


    The first incident urred at the Iron Ring Mine.


    The mine had be haunted.


    Over twenty miners went missing in a single night.


    There was a small town near the mine, and most people had family members working in the mines. They dug in the tunnels during the day and returned to the vige at night to rest. Their lives were reasonably peaceful.


    However, on the fourth night after Greem arrived in Gilneas City, twenty mine workers suddenly vanished from the town. They had all disappeared while they were still resting in their homes. Even their family members didn¡¯t know where they went. They only knew that the miners had disappeared entirely!


    Everyone talked and chatted about the incident. Then, on the next night, another twenty mine workers disappeared.


    This time, the apprentice adepts at the mine could no longer stand by. They sent people to the homes of the missing workers but didn¡¯t find any signs of magic.


    Thus, not knowing what to do, Yuri ran to the stone tower and asked for instructions from Greem.


    "Sir, how do you think we should deal with this situation?"


    "Deal with it like how you would usually deal with it!" Greem slowly and casually replied while holding a piece of parchment in his hand.


    "But..." Yuri stuttered in reply.


    Right now, he had hoped Greem would hurry to the mine to stabilize the situation. The hidden enemies would not dare be so arrogant if there was an adept guarding the ce.


    Judging from how clean and neat the whole matter was, it was impossible for the culprits to be mere apprentices. It meant that the ones silently watching the mine were likely adepts of the Aki n.


    Yuri¡¯s heart trembled whenever reminded of the idea that a mighty adept might be scheming against the mine.


    "Go back!" Greem appeared to be unfazed by the events, "They only killed some workers. Give the family members more gold coins aspensation and make sure to appease them. I will deal with the rest!"


    Greem was already straightforward in his meaning. Pseudo-Adept Yuri might still want more action from the adept, but he could only bow and leave at this point.


    If it weren¡¯t for his duties and obligation, Yuri would have moved right into the stone tower. He didn¡¯t want to stay a second longer in the mines.


    However, with Greem¡¯s orders above him, Yuri could only grit his teeth and return to the mines.


    Greem lifted his head once Yuri had left. He coldlyughed as he looked out of the tower, "Trying to trick me into leaving the tower? Hmph! Come and assault my tower if you have the guts! We will see who¡¯s the first to fall."


    The fact that they were trying to lure Greem out meant that they had absolute confidence in taking him down. Consequently, Greem was able to deduce that the two adept reinforcements that Lamure mentioned had already arrived. They were hurling out a web and waiting for him to walk into it.


    "Try your best. Wreak havoc," Greem mumbled, "It won¡¯t matter how much destruction you unleash. You won¡¯t get me to leave until I¡¯vepleted the Wind Dragon. Hmph."


    For the next four days, several of the Sarubo n¡¯s resource sites near Gilneas City were attacked. Their warehouses were set on fire, their magical herbs started to wither en masse, and even staff members started going missing.


    Initially, most of the people who vanished were only ordinary people. However, after a while, even some of the stationed apprentices had started going missing.


    Chaos spread throughout Gilneas City. Everyone was fearful of what was happening. Some of the smarter nobles and tradepanies even left the city as fast as they could to avoid being dragged into this terrifying storm.


    Meanwhile, more and more pressure fell upon Greem¡¯s shoulders!

 Chapter 443 Closing In

    Chapter 443 Closing In


    Mineur Valley.


    Bright sunlight couldn¡¯t pierce the dense canopy, causing confusing darkness to swallow the forest. A thin mist covered the entire forest in a deathly silence. One couldn¡¯t even hear the cries of insects or the calls of birds.


    A ck shape suddenly emerged from the shadow of a tree during this silence. The shadow quickly formed into the shape of a human.


    The mist dispersed with a gushing sound, revealing a mysterious adept with a handsome and cool face; he wore a sky-blue robe.


    The strange adept looked around him after appearing. He stomped his feet on the ground lightly when he discovered no abnormalities. He sent a chilling gust of air into the earth, where it activated a particr array.


    A thick Snake-Necked Flower silently emerged from the earth. Itsyers of closed petals slowly opened up, and a muscr man wearing leather armor stepped out of the flower. He wore a golden circlet on his head, metal ws on his hands, and had a boorish look to him.


    "God, is there still no news?" The muscr man¡¯s temper rose when he saw hispanion¡¯s silent expression, "It has been four days! That bastard should havee to take a look, even if he¡¯s aplete coward! Did he catch word of something? Why else would he be so patient?"


    "You will have to ask Lamure about this!" The blue-robed adeptined while an upset expression showed on his face, "She ambushed him of her own ord. Not only did she fail, it is very likely that she also alerted the enemy to our existence."


    "Could that bitch Lamure have sold us out?" The thought shed through the rude man¡¯s mind. His eyes turned colder and sharper, "Lamure, get your ass out here. I know you are here. Come out now."


    The entire forest trembled and shook when the man roared. The blue-robed adept couldn¡¯t help but frown when this happened. He waved the short staff in his hand, and a colorful semi-translucent water barrier immediately sealed the ce.


    This position was far too close to the enemy¡¯s mine. If the rm arrays picked up on the irregrity here, it would be much harder to execute their ns.


    Screech, screech, screech.


    A wave of strange ape calls rang out from the depths of the forest. Five gibbons swung from tree to tree as if they had wings on their backs. They eventually stopped on a tree in front of the two adepts and stared at them.


    "Lamure, you still dare show up. Speak! Did you give out the information about us arriving? Why else would that brat be so smart? This ce is already in chaos, and he¡¯s still insisting on staying inside that tiny city."


    A trace of intelligence shed in the dull and lifeless eyes of one of the gibbons. The animal suddenly became a lot smarter and more spirited.


    "Sicha, you freaking barbarian. I couldn¡¯t be bothered to talk to you. I was also assigned to this mission. What do you think I get out of this if it fails?" The gibbon began to speak, and, surprisingly, the voice of a woman came out of its mouth.


    "Hmph! Who can know for sure? Everyone knows that you and ndre have an ongoing rivalry. Who knows what plot you might be cooking up behind our backs?" Sicha crossed his arms; his distrust painted clearly across his face for all to see.


    ¡°Alright, alright," ndre, who had silently been listening to the exchange with a cold expression, interrupted the two, "It doesn¡¯t matter whether our target has caught wind of us and our ns. We need to lure him out. Iron Ring is the best ce to set up an ambush. We don¡¯t need to worry about being interfered with either. This ce is still going to be where the fight takes ce."


    "Hmph! The environment here is pretty good indeed. It¡¯s well suited for an ambush. Still, if we know this, it¡¯s highly likely that the brat knows it as well. It¡¯s been a few days since things started happening at the mines. Yet, he isn¡¯t even willing toe here for a simple visit. I¡¯m afraid he¡¯s already given up on Iron Ring Mine." Sicha might have been a body-refining adept with remarkably developed muscles, but he was just as intelligent and wise as ndre.


    "There¡¯s one of his disciple apprentices in the mine. Should I lure that person out? We might be able to force that bastard to show himself that way!" The gibbon rolled its eyes and suggested.


    "Lure them out and imprison them. We can see how this ys out!" ndre started frowning as he considered the situation.


    Even though he knew Lamure¡¯s suggestions probably had some unspoken schemes hidden behind them, he couldn¡¯t discover anything wrong with it at the moment.


    "We will wait for a day. If that fellow still hasn¡¯t returned, then we will tear that Second ss resource site of his apart. I don¡¯t believe he can remain unmoving in his stone tower under such conditions. Sicha, you will have to do some extra work. Find a suitable spot for an ambush near the resource site,y out arrays there, and wait for me."


    "Then you...?"


    "I¡¯ll go to take a look at Gilneas City." ndre gritted his teeth, "If that brat truly intends to hole up in there, we might have to assault his tower. Fortunately, that tower only has a crude defensive array. Our mission might have been a difficult one if it were a war tower!"


    ndre clearly intended to scout the enemy¡¯s base.


    Sicha didn¡¯t ask for any more details. After all, Lamure was here as well. Regardless of whether she was the one who spilled the secret of their arrival or not, it was best to keep their whereabouts to themselves.


    The three adepts exchanged a few words before parting from each other and heading in different directions.


    This forest near the mines quickly fell back into its deathly silence.


    ............


    The Stone Tower.


    Greem was in an awful mood.


    He had just received a magical message sent by Meryl from Feidnan City. Kodar¡¯s funeral was to be held three dayster in a rural ce known as Molloy.


    That was the location of his family¡¯s graveyard!


    Kodar had died ten days ago when he failed his advancement ceremony.


    They said that his flesh and organs had all been drained away by the ceremony when his family members took him out of the secret room. His entire body was emaciated, so much so that he looked like a skeleton.


    Kodar¡¯s family was bound to face a period of decline after losing him. Even though there were other talented sprouts among the youth of that family, they still required time and resources before they could grow and mature.


    Meryl didn¡¯t know how to deal with the crying and sobbing elderly head of Kodar¡¯s family. She was still not used to such situations since it had only been a short time since she had be an adept. Consequently, she brought a young girl called Mona back with her when she returned to Feidnan City.


    Mona, eighteen years old, beginner apprentice.


    This short amount of information revealed absolutely nothing of merit!


    She was already eighteen years old and yet she was still a beginner apprentice. This information was more than enough to prove that her innate potential was terrible. The resources used to cultivate a beginner apprentice like this would be more than enough to develop three to five apprentices with exceptional talent.


    Meryl had picked up an unnecessary burden for herself!


    As a newly advanced adept herself, she didn¡¯t have many resources in her reserves. Not to mention the fact that she had a whole bunch of subordinate n apprentices that required cultivation and training. Now Kodar¡¯s sister from a different mother was added to the equation. This massive burden would most likely dy Meryl¡¯s own ns for improvement and development.


    Greem didn¡¯t approve of Meryl¡¯s actions. However, he thought for a while and still sent a message to Snox and Gargamel. He had them increase Meryl¡¯s resource allowance by a little bit.


    She was a member of Greem¡¯s faction, after all. If Greem wanted to maintain their rtionship, he needed to provide her with practical benefits like cheaper resources and free guidance. There had to be something more than their simple rtionship as teacher and disciple. This assistance would also help her save more resources and use them in strengthening and improving herself.


    It was the same for any other adept that Greem wanted to draw into his faction. Consequently, the costs of gathering a group of people were far higher than an outsider could ever imagine.


    Just a simple example: why were so many apprentices willing to ept harsh magical contracts so that they could join an adept n or organization?


    It was all so that they could obtain resource allowances and a free advancement ceremony when they reached pseudo-adept level. If one were to convert the price of an advancement ceremony and all its required materials to magical crystals, it would cost a minimum of ten thousand magical crystals.


    A wandering pseudo-adept would probably need more than seven or eight years to umte that many crystals on their own. Furthermore, most of the resources required for the ceremony were not sold on the market. The adept ns had monopolized all of them.


    Thisplication further increased the difficulty of preparing for an advancement ceremony!


    Many wandering adepts who were forced into a corner had no choice but to break into the resource sites of an established n, all so they could steal some rare resources they couldn¡¯t manage to find on the market. Many were killed during such reckless acts.


    That was also how the hatred between wandering adepts and ns came to be.


    Sabrina arrived to report something while Greem was spacing out over this issue.


    Yuri and Morse hade again!


    This was probably the twelfth time they had visited him in the past five days!


    Judging from their expressions every time they came, the situation at the front line was growing ever more desperate. The victims had only been servants and guards in the past. However, in thest two days, the list of victims had increased to include apprentices.


    In just two days, two intermediate apprentices had gone missing from the Iron Ring Mine, along with an advanced apprentice. The Second ss resource site had also lost an intermediate apprentice.


    The disappearance of these people was bizarre. No signs of fighting could be found at the scene. It was almost as if they had snuck out of their rooms, then walked out of the defensive array of their own ord.


    Greem had an idea about what was going on here, but he didn¡¯t reveal anything to these ¡¯subordinates¡¯ of his. After all, he had no means of ascertaining who he could trust in these dire circumstances. For the sake of secrecy, Greem decided not to see anyone. Instead, he had Sabrina make them leave every single time.


    The two apprentice captains sat anxiously in the hall on the first floor. They repeatedly raised their heads and looked at the door.


    Despair and anger appeared on their faces when they saw only Sabrina walk in with no trace of Adept Greem.


    Once, they had viewed the great and famous Sir me Demon as an idol of theirs. But now...


    "Sir Greem is busy with his experiments. He doesn¡¯t have the time to see you now," Sabrina paused for a moment, her red mechanical eye shing, "He wants me to tell you that this is only a harassment tactic employed by the enemy. As long as you... "


    "Harassment, harassment," Yuri, who was suffering the most pressure, was the first to snap, "All of the apprentices have already moved into the same room to prevent the enemy from attacking, yet we still can¡¯t stop apprentices from disappearing. Protecting the Iron Ring Mine might be my duty, but Sir Greem has to share part of the responsibility as well. If Sir still refuses toe out, we will have to ask for help from the n."


    Yuri turned and left without even looking at Sabrina¡¯s expression.


    Apprentice Captain Morse also sighed before silently walking out with his head hung low.


    Greem stood by the shadow of a narrow window in the higher levels of the tower, quietly watching the departing silhouettes of the two apprentices. He silently spoke to the chip.


    "Chip, how long until the data model is done?"


    "Beep. 36 hours, 49 minutes, 52 seconds."


    If Greem were to include the time required to craft the golem, this meant that he would need at least another forty-eight hours before he could take any action.


    Greem narrowed his eyes. The chilling gleam in the depths of his eyes became even sharper and resolute.

 Chapter 444 Surging Undercurrents

    Chapter 444 Surging Undercurrents


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    Meryl stormed out of Adept F¨¹gen¡¯sboratory with anger painted all over her face.


    Lessons started today. Groups of apprentices rushed to the arcane hall with books in their arms. They hastily moved aside and bowed when they saw Adept Meryl walking down the corridor.


    If this were any other time, Meryl would have returned their greetings with a warm smile. However, her mood today was horrible. She had no extra goodwill with which to maintain the smile on her face as she stomped and returned to her room.


    Meryl¡¯s unusual behavior caught the attention of the apprentices. They started chatting and gossiping about her once she had walked away.


    Most of the apprentice adepts knew nothing about the situation, but there were some smart and sly individuals among them. They might not have seen anything happen with their own eyes, or even heard of any rted news, but they are still able to piece together the whole matter based on clues and hints hidden all over the ce.


    You couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by how confidently and vividly they described an incident that they had only pieced together based on rumors. Sometimes, size and strength didn¡¯t matter when it came to schemers; plotting and conspiring against others was a craft of its own!


    Adept Keoghan, who was lecturing today, arrived at the end of the corridor as the apprentices chattered and talked.


    "It¡¯s almost time for the lecture. What are you lot still gathering here for? Go to your sses."


    The apprentices scattered when Keoghan reprimanded them with a mean look. They bowed and left.


    Once all the apprentices had left, Keoghan let out a sigh before slowly walking to the arcane hall.


    As a core adept of the n, he might not be the strongest adept, but he was undoubtedly one of the most loyal. He knew very well the tensions between Greem and the elders, but there was nothing he could do.


    Keoghan was one of the adepts who had the most contact with Greem. He was incredibly impressed by Greem¡¯s intelligence, strategies, andbat prowess. The other two adepts that had advanced along with him were talented individuals as well; Bloody Sorceress Mary and Evil Bugs Acteon. If those two hadn¡¯t chosen to stay in the other ne, they would probably enjoy as widespread a reputation as Greem.


    If the n could keep a tight rein on all three of these newly advanced adepts, the n¡¯s future expansion and strengthening would be a certainty. Furthermore, if Lady Sanazar could advance to Fourth Grade within the next hundred years during this, the Sarubo n would even have a chance to take the next step. They could rise to be one of the rare,rge-sized ns on the Continent.


    When that happened, the n would possess a permanent seat in the Zhentarim Association. They would no longer be pawns and subordinates of a more prominent organization.


    Unfortunately, powerful adepts often held lofty ambitions!


    All signs pointed towards the fact that Adept Greem was unwilling to remain bound to the Sarubo n. Even though he had signed a hundred-year contract with Lord Sarubo, his actions were clearly those of a man trying toy a path for himself.


    This insubordination would undoubtedly attract the dissatisfaction and oppression of the n¡¯s higher-ups.


    Keoghan received countless reports about everything happening in Gilneas City on a daily basis. He had a clear picture of the situation there. It was a nightmarish swamp that could devour anyone, regardless of how much of a genius they were. Moreover, it was a swamp that had been created by the elders, intentionally or otherwise.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether Greem took the bait and fell into the web of conspiracy. What awaited him would still be the reprimands and punishments that the elders had already prepared.


    If the Aki n caught him, the Sarubo n would take full advantage of the situation and have him ransomed publicly. In doing so, the image of power and might that Greem had so painstakingly created would fall apart.


    This embarrassment would be more than enough to extinguish his thoughts and ambitions about starting a force and faction of his own.


    If he didn¡¯t fall into the trap and became caught, then Gilneas City would fall intoplete chaos and disarray. When that happened, Greem would face the punishment of the n. A single usation of cowardice in battle would be enough grounds to pass harsh judgment upon him. So severe, in fact, that Greem would still be reeling from the consequences for decades toe.


    No one was willing to throw away a powerful subordinate like Greem. However, they couldn¡¯t let him do as he liked. That was why necessary suppression was required at times. Still, the degree of oppression and bullying had to be kept to an appropriate level. Otherwise, it was likely to exaggerate further any resentment that was present in the first ce.


    Keoghan didn¡¯t have to be present to figure out what Meryl had gone to Adept F¨¹gen for. He could also tell what F¨¹gen¡¯s reply was judging from Meryl¡¯s response. Still, he didn¡¯t agree with Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s rough and crass way of handling this situation.


    Since Meryl couldn¡¯t bear seeing her teacher in that situation, and had actively requested to join him in Gilneas City, there was no reason not to allow her to go. It would at least decrease any resentment that Greem might have about the n not sending any reinforcements!


    As a newly advanced adept, Meryl had little to nobat experience. She might even turn into a burden for Greem if she went there, rather than being any help. Why should they deny Meryl when it wouldn¡¯t turn the situation around?


    Sadly, Adept F¨¹gen was far too conservative and stubborn. He only knew how to execute Lady Sanazar¡¯s orders to the letter. He didn¡¯t know how to be more flexible in handling matters. In doing so, wouldn¡¯t they be reaffirming the rumors that the n was intentionally suppressing Greem and his faction?


    If that was the case, was it possible for Greem to stifle his ambitions, even if they did manage to teach him a lesson?


    No. Resentment would likely be his most dominant reaction!


    Cough.


    Adept Keoghan shook his head and walked away as he silently contemted.


    ............


    Gilneas City.


    If Feidnan City were said to have surging undercurrents, then Gilneas City would be submerged deep in boiling waters!


    The apprentices stationed at the Second ss resource site and the Iron Ring Mine had all retreated to the stone tower. However, this didn¡¯t include Greem¡¯s four disciples. Even the apprentice captains had suffered losses. Only Yuri had managed to return. Morse, who had been guarding the resource site, had gone missing along with the fall of the resource site.


    A small box returned to the tower with the apprentices. Within the box was a person¡¯s bloody severed hand. The apprentices confirmed that this likely belonged to one of Greem¡¯s apprentice disciples.


    These apprentice disciples didn¡¯t have close emotional ties with Greem. He wouldn¡¯t shed a tear if all them were killed. Still, this tant act of disrespect and disdain angered him deeply.


    Greem still didn¡¯t mention anything regarding ¡¯vengeance¡¯ or ¡¯payback,¡¯ despite all that had happened. He met the apprentices and assuaged their worries before returning to the second level of the stone tower.


    The apprentices stared at Greem¡¯s departing form and startedining as theyid in the hall, injured and wounded. Some with more fiery tempers even began mumbling beneath their breath, "me Demon, me Demon... heh...."


    Sabrina remained calm while she treated their wounds as if she hadn¡¯t realized what they were saying. However, the young Billis could not tolerate this any longer. He started refuting them furiously, "Sir Greem has his own difficulties. This is all a conspiracy and scheme of the enemy¡¯s. What good is there for all of you toin like this?"


    "Conspiracy? What conspiracy? From start to finish, only a single water adept crushed every single one of us. We never saw any other adepts," Pseudo-Adept Yuri was the one to reply. He was also to only one who had the rights and qualifications to talk down to Billis, "The enemy only sent one adept. If Sir Greem were willing to take a stand, we would never have lost the resource site and the mine."


    "You..."


    "You, you, you," Several of the apprentices that had lost limbs in the previous battles were going to have to spend a lot of crystals to regenerate them. Consequently, there were in no amicable mood either, "What have you done while we were fighting with the enemy on the frontline?"


    "Yea! We should just send him to the resource site, see what he can say about it."


    "You don¡¯t dare to fight with the enemy, and you stand here scolding us. Hmph!¡±


    Billis¡¯ face flushed red as he faced all the insults by the apprentices. He could only try and argue for his idol, "Sir Greem is not the kind of person you think he is. He will find a way. Just wait."


    "Wait, wait, and wait. We¡¯ve already lost the mine and the resource site! What are we waiting for?"


    Sabrina lightly set down the healing potions in her hands. She stood up and looked at everyone with her cold mechanical eye. Once everyone had shut up, she dragged Billis along with her and exited the hall.


    "Sabrina, don¡¯t tell me you believe their words? Do you think Sir Greem is that kind of person? Someone who would fear a fight?" Billis was still upset and couldn¡¯t help but raise the question.


    Sabrina didn¡¯t turn back to look at him. She let go of Billis and walked towards the spiral staircase.


    She stopped in front of the stone staircase and spoke, almost as if she was replying and telling herself at the same time, "They are adepts!" Having said that, Sabrina walked away without looking back.


    "Adepts? What about adepts?" Billis didn¡¯tprehend: "What is it? Do adepts think differently from us?"


    Unfortunately, no one could give his question a reply.


    ............


    Themotion downstairs couldn¡¯t escape Greem¡¯s spiritual senses.


    He could ignore the resentment and anger of the apprentices, but it wasn¡¯t like he felt none of it!


    The Aki adepts were too radical in their actions. They were even willing to forcefully take over resource sites to force him out of hiding. It was important to note that war hadn¡¯t been dered yet, even though tensions were high! Taking over property without dering war was a major taboo!


    If the Sarubo n were willing to lose face over the theft of their resource sites and report the incident to the Zhentarim Association, the Aki n would have to pay a hefty price. Of course, if the Sarubo did so, they would practically be announcing their weakness and frailty to the entire Zhentarim area; that they were so incapable of fighting off the enemy¡¯s advances that they had to ask for external intervention.


    It would undoubtedly be a massive blow to the Sarubo¡¯s reputation!


    That was why the enemy¡¯s reckless and fearless actions had forced Greem into a corner. Fury and hatred bubbled within him.


    "Chip, how much longer for the data model?" There was a harshness and severity to his tone this time.


    "Beep. 7 hours, 23 minutes, 15 seconds."


    Greem mmed his fist against the walls with all his strength and let out a wicked smile as he gritted his teeth, "I¡¯ll let you guys run wild for one more day."

 Chapter 445 Dominating Appearance

    Chapter 445 Dominating Appearance


    Second ss Resource Site.


    As a mysterious area controlled by the Sarubo n, this ce had plenty of magical nts.


    For the adepts, these adder¡¯s tongue, dog stinkhorns, bloodveils, ancient lichen, nightmare seeds, gueblooms, giant-eye flowers, human-faced mushrooms, bloodsucking vines, man-eating flowers, and more were no more than exotic nts with very few magical properties. Cultivating them was only an act to procure necessary enchanting materials.


    However, for the mortals near the resource sites, these magical nts were all monsters that ughtered without remorse. Apart from theirck of mobility, they were just as dangerous as the magical creatures in the ck Forest. Even the apprentice adepts in the resource site had to rely on the powerful arrays left behind by adepts to trap and contain these things before harvesting them.


    Anypse in concentration could spell death for them. That was why the lowest level of worker in a resource site had to be an apprentice adept. Ordinary mortals had no chance of survival.


    The reason most resource sites were located in rural areas was to ensure that disaster didn¡¯t happen. If something went wrong with the defensive arrays and individual magical nts managed to escape, it would spell catastrophe for the human settlements nearby.


    Extreme examples of this had urred in the history of the Continent of Adepts.


    A leakage crisis had happened in theboratory of an adept n. A specially cultivated magical nt took the opportunity of the defensive array being offline to turn its main body into a small spore, before proceeding to escape. It then polluted and took over a human town. The entire poption of one thousand people turned into terrifying sporeloks without any sense of self.


    This nt did an exceptional job of hiding and keeping things under cover. For a while, no one discovered the abnormality in the town poption. Surprisingly, for two months, these sporeloks were able to continue going about their lives with their human shells. If it weren¡¯t because the nt grew greedy and started seeking new victims in travelers and merchants, it would not have been discovered. In the end, it ran into an adept that happened to stay in the town.


    The adept n responsible for the incidents sent outrge groups of adepts and apprentices to participate in its extermination. It was only then that they discovered that the sporeloks had infected almost four thousand individuals, including some advanced apprentices.


    Only a few sporeloks managed to escape the purge and run away into the underground. The rest were all killed. Ever since then, all adept ns had be stricter and more rigid when overseeing theirboratories and resource sites. It was all for the sake of preventing the same thing from happening again.


    Here in Sarubo¡¯s Second ss resource site, all the magical nts were ofmon danger. Even if they managed to escape, they would not be able to cause a widespread disaster like the sporeloks. However, the site still posed a massive threat to nearby mortals.


    Now, with the destruction and damage done to the defensive arrays, some magical nts had managed to escape this ce. Adept ndre, who had taken over this ce, didn¡¯t seem to mind. Instead, he watched with interest as he forced a group of a dozen apprentices tomit destructive harvesting acts on these nts.


    Adept Sicha even broke into the warehouse and started robbing the ce of all its magical materials. On the other hand, Lamure never showed herself. Only a flock of red-eyed crows flying in the sky indicated her presence.


    Hill, whose right hand had been severed, slipped up. A bloodsucking vine wrapped around his leg and slowly dragged him into the woods. Hill struggled with all his might with his life on the line as he cursed and swore at ndre.


    "Goddamned sissy. You are a freaking pervert. Go and find my teacher in the tower if you are so capable. You don¡¯t dare deal with my teacher, so youe and deal with us apprentice subordinates. You are a..."


    Adept ndre had always been proud of his handsome face. His expression soured when he heard these words. He made drawing motions in midair, and soon a rune shot into the forest of magical vines. The wild bloodsucking vines immediately became even more savage.


    Several sprouts emerged from the tip of the vine that had entangled itself around Hill¡¯s leg. The shoots then twisted together and formed a humanoid mouth. The sharp edges of the leaves were like shing teeth, viciously tearing into Hill¡¯s flesh.


    The serpent-like vines even dug into his blood vessels. You could hear the gulping sound as the vines swallowed and absorbed his blood.


    The destructive actions of the vines brought immense pain and damage to Hill. The torturous throes of the apprentice adept were an appalling sight to behold. The other captive apprentices lowered their heads fearfully. They didn¡¯t dare watch this happen. If it weren¡¯t for fear of provoking this wicked adept, they would have even covered their eyes and ears to avoid the knowledge of what was to follow.


    A red-eyed crow pped its wings andnded on a tree beside ndre. It tilted its head andughed disdainfully, "Are you not afraid that the me Demon wille after you with all he has once you kill this disciple of his?"


    "Come after me?" A sinister smile surfaced on ndre¡¯s face, "Does he even dare step out of that stone tower? He still refuses toe out after all we have done. I say, most of his past ¡¯feats¡¯ were only flukes. Hmph! Just a coward."


    "Caw caw," The red-eyed crow cried, "Don¡¯t me me for not warning you. If our two ns establish a truce in the end, your actions will bring down a terrifying enemy upon yourself!"


    "Hmph! Since when did you care about my wellbeing?" ndreughed coldly, "Not to mention that I have nothing to fear from a cowardly adept that doesn¡¯t even dare to fight me head on. He..."


    Just as ndre nned to mock his opponent and boast a little bit more, something happened. He lifted his head abruptly and stared into the distance with unsure eyes. The feathers of the red-eyed crow bristled. It beat its wings and took the skies, its red eyes fixating on a ck dot on the distant horizon.


    Even Adept Sicha, who had been piging the warehouse, had detected the abnormality. He immediately ran out with hispanions and stared at the horizon.


    There, on the edges of that cloudy horizon, a tiny ck speck was quickly bingrger.


    A cluster of mes was also approaching rapidly behind that ck dot.


    Even though there was still a distance between them, that powerful aura caused even the elite ndre to frown. A brilliant light shed in his eyes.


    "It¡¯s... him?" ndre quickly recognized the approaching person.


    All this while, the three of them had been trying to force Greem out of his tower. It was natural that they would acquaint themselves with his aura. Yet, at that moment, the terrifying god-like individual that was storming towards them with that oppressive aura still caused them to gulp slightly.


    That was the enemy they wanted to deal with?


    Dammit! Why is he so powerful?


    A violent gale pushed against their faces like a crashing wave. The ck dot had reached within one kilometer of them in the blink of an eye. Its wildest and most savage side was disyed before everyone¡¯s eyes.


    That...that is a dragon?


    Even the three adepts couldn¡¯t help but stare in stunned silence, despite their cumtive knowledge and experience. They had no idea what to do when looking this creature in the eye; this strange dragon whose flesh, muscles, and bones were all formed from tempestuous wind vortices.


    The World of Adepts had not seen a live dragon in many, many years. There were rumors that the Adept¡¯s Association on the East Coast had once created mixed-blood ¡¯faux-dragons¡¯ bybining the bloodline of ancient dragons with the sea dragons in the Boundless Sea. However, here in the Zhentarim area, far from the sea, it was rare for anyone to witness anything that resembled a dragon.


    The three adepts had to look closely multiple times before they confirmed that this proud green dragon with the recklessly arrogant aura was no magical creature. It was only an elementium golem¨C a wind-attribute elementium golem!


    It was only when the wind dragon neared that the three of them noticed the towering silhouette riding on its back.


    This was a powerful and unforgettable adept!


    He wasn¡¯t old at all. In fact, there was even a trace of youthfulness that hadn¡¯t faded from his handsome face.


    He wasn¡¯t a body-refining adept, yet he had a perfect body with the ideal ratio. Tight muscles, radiant skin, and the strange long, crimson hair that rested on his shoulders and extended to his waist. With the crimson light glowing beneath his ck eyes, he radiated a strikingly seductive aura of destruction and unbridled power.


    This man was far too noticeable. It was almost easy to miss out on the three Ioun Stones circling above his head, the strange and powerful staff in his hand, and that even more unknown tome that dangled by his waist.


    What was even more shocking to the three adepts was the realization that the cluster of mes was no magical spell. Instead, it was a massive cape of me flowing behind his back due to the excessive speed at which the dragon was traveling.


    The faces of the three adepts became solemn when they made this discovery.


    Dammit! This me Demon only has the ability of a veteran adept. How was he able to impose such great psychological pressure on them?


    In particr, Soul Adept Lamure, who had once fought with Greem, couldn¡¯t suppress her shock and surprise. She had not sensed such astonishing power when she struggled with him before this!


    This neen-meter elementium dragon emanating a violent and savage aura suddenly stopped in the skies above them as the three adepts looked on. It remained a hundred meters above the ground.


    Greem lowered his head and looked down at the forest. A blinding red light shone from his eyes when his vision fell upon his still struggling disciple, Hill.


    "How bold!" A chilling smile appeared on his face, "You all deserve nothing less than death!"


    A crimson magma fireball shot out of his hands and crashed into the forest of magical vines.


    Boom.


    Resounding me shockwaves ravaged the entire garden. Half an acre of the magical vine forest was swallowed by a sea of fire that reached into the skies. All the magical vines curled and struggled in the shockwave, desperately twirling left and right.


    Sadly, nothing they did mattered!


    The elementium mes ended as quickly as they came.


    Once the sea of fire dispersed, a field of carbonized magical vine remnants was all that remained.

 Chapter 446 Melee

    Chapter 446 Melee


    The two adepts didn¡¯t intercept Greem¡¯s attack. Instead, they silently assessed the strength of the fireball.


    One hundred and thirty points!


    A casual attack by the me Demon could deal up to a hundred and thirty points of fire damage. This degree of power was shocking. Even ndre, who prided himself as an elite adept, would have trouble reaching such terrifying heights of power.


    He might be a water adept, but he didn¡¯t choose to specialize with it as his mastery. That would make him and his spells extremely susceptible to a counterattack.


    In usual circumstances, ndre¡¯s magical damage was only between eighty to a hundred points. If paired with the proper magical materials, chants, and handsigns, this amount could inte by another five to fifteen percent.


    ndre had once defeated three adepts with a single Water Dragon Wave, but that was only due to the waves of attacks from the spell itself, not to mention the fact that none of the enemies were elite adepts. After all, the core area of the Water Dragon Wave only reached one hundred and ten points. The edge of the spell dealt even less at seventy points.


    If it weren¡¯t because ndre had a unique method to shape the Water Dragon Wave into a dense vortex that couldst for an entire forty seconds, he would never have been able to aplish the magnificent feat that had propelled him to his fate.


    That was why the n elders immediately sent ndre to the frontlines when they heard who the enemy was to be. The me Demon, who had the power of a veteran adept and the ability to reach elite level temporarily. The n also assigned the veteran Sicha to go along with ndre to ensure the sess of the operation. The sole purpose of Sicha¡¯s inclusion was to aid ndre in capturing the famous me Demon in one fell swoop.


    On the other hand, there was Soul Adept Lamure. Her solo prowess was extremely limited. She probably couldn¡¯t even beat an ordinary adept in a straightforward fight. However, if she discovered a chink in your soul, she would be an even more lethal force than ndre himself.


    Greem set fire to the magical vine forest and saved Hill. Yet, it didn¡¯t seem he had any intention of leaping off of the wind dragon. He stood high up on the wind dragon and red coldly at the flock of red-eyed crows flying away into the distance. His eyes then moved on to the blue-robed ndre and the leather-armored Sicha.


    Without another word, Greem raised the ze of Destruction high above his head. Loud and resolute chants reverberated throughout thend as a massive fire spell formed in his hands.


    Judging from its shape, this was a Scarlet Firestorm!


    Dammit! The two adepts had already known that Greem chose to go down the path of me mastery. They knew he could cast spells at a much faster rate than an ordinary elementium adept. Still, watching arge-scale spell like this one form in under five seconds was a jarring experience.


    "I¡¯ll keep him upied. You give him a mean one." A ferocious light red in Sicha¡¯s eyes. He secretly transmitted a message to ndre before he took off. His body shed, and in just a single instant he appeared right beneath the wind dragon¡¯s gigantic body. His figure shed again with a golden armor on it as a golden afterimage drew across the sky. He appeared just two meters below the wind dragon¡¯s abdomen.


    Sicha was a true-blue body-refining adept. His control over his body had already reached levels far beyond ordinary men. The golden circlet gave him the ability to levitate. Sicha took a few steps as if he was walking on the firm ground and not stepping on the sky. The golden ws in his hands shed out several times, targeting the dragon¡¯s unprotected abdomen.


    Back on the ground, a ripple of water enveloped ndre. Blue light shed as severalyers of Wave Shields and Water Barriers emerged and protected him within. Once he had cast his defenses, ndre took out a blue gemstone the size of a fist. He used it as a medium to rapidly cast Ice Lance Barrage.


    Ice spells were a variation of water spells, and ndre had mastery over several of them!


    However, their attacks still couldn¡¯t reach the speed of Greem¡¯s fire spell.


    Almost at the same time the two had finishedmunicating, Greem hurled the Scarlet Firestorm towards them. Meanwhile, he also started to transform into the me Fiend.


    A zing fire pir exploded into the sky with ndre at its center. The roiling elementium mes were streaked with traces of purple as they sizzled and burned away at ndre¡¯s shields. The wind dragon that Greem was controlling wasn¡¯t as stiff and dull as your ordinary elementium golem. Instead, it was as agile and flexible as an actual dragon.


    Faced with the storm of golden ws swinging at it, the wind dragonshed out with its tail. Its pair of broad wings thrummed, and several transparentyers of wind vortices swiftly covered its entire body.


    The delicate elementium control of the wind dragon allowed it to shape the direction of the wind vortices, causing every one of them to pull in a slightly different direction. Stacked together, they were even sturdier than any magical defense an adept could muster.


    Even with his violent strength, Sicha¡¯s w was still almost diverted by the barrier of wind. If he had been an agility-focused body-refining adept instead, he likely wouldn¡¯t even have a chance to break through the wind dragon¡¯s defense.


    The golden w pierced through theyers of wind and finally came into contact with the wind dragon¡¯s thick hind leg.


    Sparks flew everywhere.


    Sicha and the wind dragon were both knocked back. A considerable distance quickly grew between the two of them.


    Meanwhile, Greem had transformed into a towering demon burning with mes. He pointed with his smoke-shrouded magma finger as a chain of Explosive Fireballs shot towards Sicha.


    Sicha didn¡¯t actually possess the ability to fly. The power of levitation granted by his golden circlet was also much less agile than if he was walking on the ground. He waved his golden w and smashed apart a dozen of the explosive fireballs. He quickly retreated and avoided most of the ensuing shockwaves.


    What remained of the impact couldn¡¯t deal any damage to him through his golden leather armor.


    While Sicha was tangling with Greem in the skies, ndre had finally finished preparing arge spell.


    Whirlpool Strangtion!


    An immense amount of water elementium gathered from every direction. It condensed to form several twisting currents that surged around Greem and the wind dragon. The moment the spellpleted, all the flows flooded in towards the center, and all the water merged together.


    The next second, a deafening dragon¡¯s roar rang out from within the sshing whirlpool. The gigantic green dragon, whose body was so concentrated it almost looked solid, broke out of the maelstrom under the protection of a wind barrier. Lava Shields surrounded the me Fiend standing on its back keeping the torrent of water at bay.


    Fire and water shed.


    Choking steam and heat enveloped the me Fiend.


    Amid the mist and steam, the gigantic me humanoid remained wreathed in mes. It threw magma fireballs andunched magma spears at ndre, creating a storm of fire of his own.


    As the chaos went on, one could sense the continuous shockwaves from within. Sicha¡¯s ferocious battle cry could be heard as well.


    Greem seemed to have gone mad. Hepletely ignored Sicha¡¯s attempt to draw him into a melee and enduringly avoided the body-refining adept with the agility and speed of the wind dragon. Instead, he focused most of his attention on the magic duel with ndre.


    The destructive magma fireballs and the rain of water arrows collided in midair. Some of them neutralized and intercepted each other, while others slipped past and wore away at the enemy¡¯s defenses.


    The three adepts circled each other, quickly moving around in the resource site. Everywhere they stopped was ravaged by the coteral damage from spells that had missed their targets.


    Those magical nts that existed as the nightmares and horrors of human society had now be delicate crystal flowers; they shattered into pieces with a single touch.


    Greem tossed a Scarlet Firestorm from above. ndre deftly dodged the attack. The wildfires spread in every direction and devoured the garden and all the magical nts in a zing congration.


    By the time they moved away from this location, thend had been scorched and burned until it cracked. A thickyer of dust piled above the earth.


    On the other hand, ndre¡¯s Blizzard was like a chilling current. It had instantly frozen all the magical nts into white and blue crystalline sculptures. The shockwaves passed by and shattered them all into ice shards.


    The magical nts bound to the gardens by powerful magical arrays gathered together and wailed as if they had foreseen the fate awaiting them ahead. Sadly, this couldn¡¯t save their lives!


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was a Magma Fireball cutting through the air or an enormous wave. Each of these magical attacks spelled their deaths.


    Of course, there were a few fortunate nts as well. The powerful spells had damaged the defensive arrays and created gaps in the formation that contained them. Thus, many surviving magical nts escaped outwards. Some turned into humanoid forms and crawled outwards with great difficulty. Others dug into the earth and fled through the ground.


    If these terrifying nts made their way to human settlements, they would cause a massacre. However, these three adepts were far too involved in their fights. No one could spare any effort to care about such an ¡¯insignificant¡¯ matter!


    The scales of battle were a little nted, but as a whole, it still maintained a delicate bnce.


    Adept Sicha undoubtedly had the most meleebat power of the three.


    Every one of his attacks was at least one hundred and ten points in power. Moreover, his movements were swift and agile. It would be challenging to get away if he managed to catch up.


    Still, Greem¡¯s me Fiend was the one doling out the most damage.


    Casually dishing out a hundred and thirty points of me damage was something that neither ndre and Sicha could deal with.


    ndre the Water Adept, on the other hand, was vastly inferior to Greem when it came to attack damage. However, he had the advantage of producing attacks that persisted and lingered, as opposed to the explosive destruction of fire spells. Moreover, water spells also had a bit of a slowing effect attached to them. That was why his primary purpose in this battle was to slow Greem down and give Sicha more openings to strike.


    Of course, Greem also had a clear idea of what was happening from his vantage point on the dragon.


    The reason he was engaging in this messy fight was all for the sake of buying time for the chip. It was currently gathering data on the two of them.

 Chapter 447 Bait

    Chapter 447 Bait


    Sicha. Human. Body Refining Adept (Assorted Poison Style).


    Bodily attributes: Strength 12 | Agility 8 | Physique 14 | Spirit 6.


    Melee battle techniques: Quick Strike, Barbaric Blow, Lacerating Touch.


    ndre. Human. Elementium Adept (Water).


    Bodily attributes: Strength 5 | Agility 3 | Physique 6 | Spirit 17.


    Commonly used spells: Ice Lance Barrage, Whirlpool Strangtion, Tidal Impact, Water Dragon Wave.


    An adept¡¯s potent life force and Spirit usually came together to form an intangible forcefield that could obscure probing abilities. Under normal circumstance, the chip¡¯s passive probing ability would not be able to identify the opponent¡¯s attributes clearly.


    However, in the heat of battle, Greem could determine the enemy¡¯s Spirit based on the effect of the magma fireball crashing against their defensive spells. He could evaluate the enemy¡¯s Spirit regeneration rate from the time gap between the spells they cast. He could figure out the enemy¡¯s Strength, Agility, and Physique based on their movement speed and endurance.


    Even though all of the enemy¡¯s external performance was a result of countless factors, Greem was still able to extract quite a lot of useful data through quantitative and qualitative analysis.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was Greem¡¯s attacks piercing through the enemy¡¯s defenses or the spells cast by them. The mental flux frequency, the effect of the spells, the strength of their defenses, the dy between each spell, the rate at which magic regenerated; all these minute details were things with which the chip could dynamically draw upon to construct a basic model of the two adepts.


    Then, Greem could attack them to repeatedly probe the strength of their defenses and draw more responses from them to verify the data collected. These were undoubtedly extraordinarily precise and inconsequential pieces of information. Most people would not have the additional presence of mind to care about such things during an intense battle. Consequently, the enemy would never even imagine a person collecting information on them while they fought.


    Initially, Greem knew nothing about ndre and Sicha¡¯s attributes. The battle had been tense, with dangers lurking at every corner and turn. However, the fog of war obscuring Greem¡¯s eyes cleared the moment the data models on the two enemies finished; everything seemed so clear now.


    Greem now had their bodily attributes. The chip had also captured and recorded their fighting patterns from the battle up till now. Greem might still find himself caught in a numerical disadvantage, but now it was as if he had a third eye. He was now able to predict the enemy¡¯s next actions to a certain degree.


    Now that Greem knew Sicha¡¯s Strength and Agility, he could estimate his base movement speed, as well as the limits to which his attacks could reach when he struck. In doing so, Greem could assign his magic defenses and reposition in the manner that was most appropriate. He could continuously keep Sicha in an awkward position where it was hard to unleash his strength fully.


    Sicha felt the difficulty of the situation!


    When he wanted to strike at Greem forcefully, the fire adept would be in just the right position where the force he exerted would be at its weakest. If he wanted to strike from the side, he had to take the risk of being bombarded by Greem¡¯s spells.


    On the other hand, if he wanted to run and drag it out into some form of guerri warfare, then Greem would chase him all the while and present him with a full fireball bombardment before ndre¡¯s attacks could connect.


    Trying to manage his advances against Greem, and his efforts to avoid attacks, was extremely difficult!


    It was important to note that Sicha¡¯s twelve points of Strength provided him with a frightening offensive ability. If one were to ignore the effects of defensive spells, every single one of Sicha¡¯s w strikes could deal a shocking seventy points of damage.


    This number might not sound like a lot. After all, it was one third less than his full-force attack of a hundred and ten points. However, Sicha¡¯s high Agility also allowed him to chain his melee battle techniques, striking the enemy with the relentlessness of an endless storm, keeping them engaged with him.


    He could strike five times in three seconds, with each attack dealing seventy points of damage. If all these attacksnded urately, what kind of defensive array could hold up against him?


    That was why most adepts couldn¡¯t cast spells if Sicha managed to close in on them. They had to rely on their defensive spells and quickly put some distance between them and the body-refining adept.


    Earlier, during Greem¡¯s duel of fire and water with ndre, Sicha had charged up from the side. He had smashed through the wind dragon¡¯s defenses, then took the mere two seconds of being close to Greem to shatter his Lava Shield into pieces.


    If the wind dragon¡¯s Vortex of Wind hadn¡¯t expelled him immediately, all of Greem¡¯s Lava Shields would have shattered.


    Of course, Sicha had also paid an equivalent price for his wild advance.


    The Burning Domain that incinerated everything near the me Fiend stacked with the Ring of Fire. Sicha had to endure an overwhelming eighty points of fire damage per second while he was next to Greem. The damage from the Lava Shield itself also caused him to take an additional twenty-five points of damage per second.


    His temporary withdrawal from the melee wasn¡¯t just to avoid the counter-attack from Greem. He also needed time for his body to regenerate. Fourteen points of Physique allowed him to restore any damaged part of his body through the consumption of Spirit, as long as it wasn¡¯t something as critical as a severed limb.


    Sicha only needed to gain a distance of twenty to thirty meters. He had absolute confidence in hisbat skills and means of dodging to avoid most of Greem¡¯s spells.


    His sacrifice was worth it!


    In the mere seconds that he had managed to draw Greem¡¯s attention to him, ndre had already finished channeling another Water Dragon Wave. It surged at Greem like a storm. It was quite tricky for Greem to endure this wave of attacks without any injuries now that he had lost some of his Lava Shields.


    If Greem had been caught in this situation a few minutes earlier, he would have had to expend the wind dragon¡¯s power. The dragon would have to erect a massive barrier of wind and allow him to escape from ndre¡¯s spell without taking any damage.


    What made it even worse was the possibility of Sicha reentering the fray and ambushing him while he was making his escape.


    However, Greem now had an incredible insight into this battle¡¯s situation. He immediately reversed his previous cautiousness and conservativeness. Instead, he started fighting in an almost unbelievable manner.


    Greem grunted as three Magma Fireballs shot towards ndre¡¯s Water Dragon Wave in a triangle formation. He didn¡¯t take the chance to escape with the wind dragon. Instead, he turned around and lunged towards Sicha, who was desperately making his escape.


    What is this? Is he trying to drag me down along with him?


    Sicha was bewildered for a moment as he ran away. However, that surprise quickly turned into joy as he casually started stepping left and right. He struck back at Greem, his two golden ws punching one after another. The overbearing force generated a st of wind pressure that smashed against Greem¡¯s Fire Shields from a distance of twenty-seven meters. The Fire Shields even trembled from the impact.


    Sicha had high confidence in dodging all of the enemy¡¯s attacks at this distance. He could then take the opportunity of Greem casting his next spell to rush forward andunch another flurry of strikes. Not to mention, ndre¡¯s Water Dragon Wave was still chasing behind Greem. Those three fireballs could never stop that savage wave of water. As long as Sicha was able to slow down the opponent, ndre would be able to brutally ravage the me Demon, who had practically lost all his shields.


    Countless calctions went through his mind. Sicha immediately decided to face Greem head on without any hesitation.


    Greem had already predicted Sicha¡¯s choice!


    In fact, one could say that Greem had influenced Sicha into making that choice.


    He hadn¡¯t repaired his missing Lava Shields as soon as he could, didn¡¯t pursue Sicha when arge spell was chasing him by the heels, nor disyed any means that could instantly cripple Sicha. From the start of the battle, Greem had been misdirecting Sicha. All these various clues caused the overconfident Sicha to make the wrong choice.


    The three Magma Fireballs that exploded behind them caused a chaotic me shockwave that dyed the Water Dragon Wave by a couple of seconds.


    In this short window of opportunity, Greem raised both of his hands, and a fearsome cloud of fire filled with me andva bubbles immediately appeared above him.


    Sicha had no intention of moving away when faced with the terrifying spell that Greem would be able to finish casting in three seconds. Instead, he was like a shark that had smelled blood. Sicha¡¯s silhouette shed as he quickly wove his way forward. In just a single second, he had managed to arrive in front of Greem.


    In Sicha¡¯s mind, he only needed another second to break through the wind dragon¡¯s wind barrier. He would then quickly make it to the me Fiend¡¯s side, where he could use his Barbaric Blow to interrupt the opponent¡¯s casting. When that happened, Greem would have to shed some blood to escape!


    Sadly, the moment he arrived before Greem, the wind dragon opened its jaws. A deafening roar that rang throughout the area filled his ears.


    And along with it came that majestic and unstoppable dragon¡¯s aura of might!


    Dragon¡¯s Aura of Might?


    Sicha felt his body tremble just as the name surfaced in his mind. His brain was also affected by the aura. He had actually fallen into a state of Mental Intimidation at this crucial moment!


    Sicha¡¯s heart filled with fear, despite only just recently having had a wickedly confident grin on his face!


    Dammit, why is it the dragon¡¯s aura of might?


    Isn¡¯t that something only a true dragon could use? Could it be...could it be that this brat had made the dragon golem from a real dragon crystal?


    Sicha almost immediately understood the reason for the phenomenon before him. Unfortunately, it was toote!


    Greem dispersed the pulsating and rumbling cloud of fire with a wave of his hand. Judging from how quickly he had canceled the spell, it had only been a feint. Otherwise, even Greem, with all his talent and abilities, would have to suffer a tremendous bacsh from dispelling arge scale spell of this size.


    While Sicha was temporarily disabled, the me Fiend opened its massive palm. A radiant red tome silently appeared above it.


    Flip, flip, flip, flip.


    The thick parchment paper flipped rapidly. Every time it reached a new page, a strange rune and numerous symbols would rise from the empty pages.


    As Greem¡¯s Spirit continued to ripple, several powerful single-target spells sted forward, one by one, forming at a rapid rate of one spell per second.


    The ferocious wave of fire devoured Sicha¡¯s body!

 Chapter 448 Surrender

    Chapter 448 Surrender


    How much did Greem¡¯s spells hurt?


    Three fire spells at one hundred and fifty-five points beat on the body like a downpour. Even a golem crafted from magical alloy would have melted and been reduced to liquid metal in that kind of heat, not to mention that Sicha only had a body of flesh and blood.


    Sicha had used various poisons to train and refine his body over the years. This training allowed him to form an invisibleyer of force on the surface of his skin when he drew upon his magical powers. This sort of barrier was generated by abination of life force and Spirit. It deflected all elemental, soul, poison, and curse-attribute magic damage. Of course, the person¡¯s ability determined the damage reduction effect of the barrier.


    Sicha was a veteran adept and could reduce about thirty to fifty percent of all iing elementium damage.


    Moreover, after all that refining, his body was as resilient as a top-grade magic resistant armor, even without the use of any other equipment. It was the most astounding trait of body-refining adepts!


    They could endure an elementium adept¡¯s barrage entirely and charge to the enemy¡¯s side. After that, a single strike for them would end the battle. If the enemy didn¡¯t have sufficient mobility spells, victory was guaranteed.


    However, this only held true for ordinary adepts.


    An ordinary First Grade adept could only cast spells with power between seventy to a hundred points. Those that could exceed the hundred point threshold could already be considered veteran adepts. One hundred and thirty points would put you at the elite-level.


    ndre¡¯s signature Water Dragon Wave might only have one hundred and ten points of power at the point of impact, but its persistent nature made it an effective spell. The spell couldst for forty seconds. Converted to total damage, the Water Dragon Wave could reach a shocking one hundred and forty points of power.


    An ordinary adept would not even be able to break through Sicha¡¯s defenses, regardless of whether they could instantly cast spells as Greem could.


    A hundred point elementium attack would be reduced by thirty to fifty percent, then further weakened by Sicha¡¯s golden armor, before finally affecting him. Sicha didn¡¯t even need to dodge. He could take these spells head on, and he would be fine as long as he could endure thirty to forty points of elementium damage.


    This little bit of damage was entirely tolerable for Sicha, who had already honed his body until it was as durable as magical equipment. He might feel some minor pain in the process, but it wouldn¡¯tpromise his ability to fight in any manner.


    However, a hundred and fifty-five point elementium attack like Greem¡¯s was far beyond the limit that his body could endure. The amount of damage that broke through his defenses was shocking!


    That was why Sicha¡¯s body started to melt the moment the three spells descended upon him!


    His previously steel-like muscles quickly disintegrated and fell apart when ravaged by the elementium mes. Sicha was engulfed by elementium mes of over three thousand degrees the moment his forcefield was ovee; he immediately ignited and started to burn.


    The fire zed, burning all his skin, hair, blood, flesh, and nerves.


    The intense pain from every piece of his body caused Sicha to break free of the wind dragon¡¯s intimidation instantly. He howled in agony and started running away. However, there was no use in running. That ferociousyer of mes still overwhelmed his body, sizzling and crackling as it burned away his flesh.


    It didn¡¯t matter how powerful Sicha¡¯s magic resistance was. His skin still withered, cracked, and turned to ashes under the effects of that horrifying fire. Without the protection of his skin, the flesh, nerves, and bones were exposed to the me.


    With his powerful Spirit, Sicha very clearly felt how the fires were burning every inch of his skin and every piece of his flesh.


    It was a nightmarish feeling that frightened him to the very core of his soul. His actions became even more desperate and mad.


    He waved his w frantically, striking at whichever direction he thought Greem could be in, all while crying out in pain and calling for ndre¡¯s help.


    He was now using all his strength and power to keep the elementium mes restricted to the outside of his body. They might be dealing tremendous damage to him, but at least they had yet to affect his spirit origin. As long as hispanion saved him in time, he still could recover from such wounds, despite how terrible they appeared to be.


    ndre frowned as he continued to control his Water Dragon Wave, and a chilling light shone in his eyes. He quickly wove signs with his hands, and the unstoppable wave chasing behind Greem immediately transformed into a dozen water dragons. They forcefully broke through the magma field created by the fireballs¡¯ explosions and lunged at the me Fiend¡¯s back.


    ndre still chose to strike at the enemy, even at this moment.


    Saving Sicha could be put on the back burner until they had captured Greem.


    Greem, on the other hand, had fixed all his attention on Sicha. He was no longer going to be able to escape or avoid the ferocious Water Dragon Wave crashing down upon him.


    Fire Teleportation was an excellent tool for escaping and moving around. However, casting the spell still required one second to channeling the mes and lock onto the target destination. The Water Dragon Wave would not provide him with that much time to escape.


    Most of his Lava and Fire Shields had already been torn apart by Sicha. What remained of his defenses couldn¡¯t possibly stop ndre¡¯s powerful spell. However, Greem remained fearless in this situation. His body started to sink, and amazingly enough, it began to merge with the form of the wind dragon below.


    All seventeen meters of the wind dragon¡¯s body, along with its wings with a wingspan of six meters, swung around. Its spindle-shaped tail whistled through the air and smacked Sicha across the body, sending the body-refining adept crashing down from the sky.


    However, the wind dragon was also quickly swallowed by a rumbling tsunami. The dragon tumbled and rolled about in the air from the impact, its green-scaled body creaking from the continuous strikes of the water dragons.


    If it weren¡¯t for the wind dragon¡¯s densely concentrated elementium body, it would have fallen apart from the repeated attacks of the water dragons.


    Adept ndre felt a considerable joy rise in his heart when he saw the Water Dragon Wave devour Greem and his wind dragon. Decades of bloody battles had instilled absolute confidence in ndre when it came to his Water Dragon Wave. As long as the opponent was still an adept of flesh and blood, and as long as they hadn¡¯t reached Second Grade, there was no way they could defend against the continuous attacks and strangtion of the water dragons.


    A terrifying dragon¡¯s roar that seemed to rend the skies apart emanated from the center of that humongous wave of water.


    It was almost as if a legendary monster hid within the waves. An egg-shaped ripple spread out from within, enveloping every inch of space around the mass of water. Every single wave, whirlpool, and vortex of water was ripped to shreds and reduced to mere mist wherever the wave spread. The fog was even further reduced to its most basic form¨C pure water elementium.


    The Water Dragon Wave that had once filled the entire sky transformed into a peaceful world of water in a single moment. The dense concentration of water elementium quickly dispersed after that.


    A green wind dragon roared as it flew out of that blue and rippling atmosphere of water. However, strong and surging mes had reced the transparent wind vortices within its body.


    This was a strange and unusual dragon that possessed both wind and fire attributes!


    The dragonnded on the ground with a heavy thump. Trace of fire energies radiated from within its body as Greem¡¯s towering body reformed on its back.


    ndre drew a cold breath.


    He hadn¡¯t thought much about this wind dragon¡¯s power at the start of the battle. He only felt that it looked majestic and magnificent. However, ndre finally had a vague understanding of this dragon¡¯s power after that Water Dragon Wave.


    It was definitely more powerful than him!


    That meant that the dragon was as powerful as a peak elite-adept!


    Even if Greem weren¡¯t involved in the battle, ndre alone would have no more than a twenty percent chance of winning against this wind dragon. Now that the wind dragon had synergized so well with that ursed Greem, ndre knew his chances were slim.


    No. This was no longer a matter of whether ndre could win; it was a matter of whether the enemy would let him escape!


    ndre¡¯s handsome face twisted into a wicked and distorted expression.


    Goddamned elders. What kind of information did you provide me with!? Didn¡¯t you say that I was only up against a fire adept that could temporarily possess the power of an elite adept! Where did this elite wind dragone from?


    ......


    ndre¡¯s expression shifted several times from theplex emotions he was feeling. Meanwhile, his desire to continue fighting was quickly falling.


    He could clearly sense that Sicha was gravely wounded. The body-refining adept was now suffering and crying for help in a deep crater somewhere. The flock of red-eyed crows looking on from a distance had all disappeared now.


    Was there still any meaning in continuing this fight now that both of hispanions were down for the count?


    Large beads of sweat emerged on ndre¡¯s forehead, and his expression was grim and painful.


    Greem ordered the wind dragon ahead. Just a single step and the struggling ndre promptly raised both of his arms.


    "Surrender. I surrender. ording to the Adept¡¯s Code of Conduct, you may take every resource or item I have on me, but you may not harm me. I wish to be conferred the treatment of a prisoner of war."


    Gah.


    That was a thing?


    Greem had been thrown into a nar war the moment he advanced. Then he was engrossed in all sorts of errands after he returned, including a small skirmish he had to settle for the n. He had never found the time to catch up on some of the less critical knowledge about adepts.


    Consequently, Greem was stunned for a few seconds when faced with ndre¡¯s surrender.


    He immediately gave the Chip an order to bring out the contents of the Adept¡¯s Handbook and quickly look for information rted to surrender and prisoners of war.


    The Adept¡¯s Handbook was a necessary item given out by the Zhentarim Association. Almost all adepts in the central area of the continent had to obey the rules written within. Even though much of the content could be ignored and disregarded in private settings, going against them in public was a bad idea. One would be pursued and hunted by the executors, who likely had too much time on their hands.


    If this ce was somewhere rural and far away, Greem only needed to be a little more, and he would have no problem, even if he killed an adept who surrendered. However, now Greem nced at the n apprentices who were huddled together and fearfully observing the battle from a distance. He then recalled the couple of hidden spiritual fluctuations he had sensed at the edge of the battlefield. In the end, Greem had no choice but to sigh and dispel his thoughts of killing the enemy and exacting his revenge.

 Chapter 449 Chaos and Commotion

    Chapter 449 Chaos and Commotion


    The Stone Tower.


    Adept Greem had already been gone for over ten hours. Everyone was concerned and anxious.


    Even though the wind dragon that Greem had summoned before he left was a boost in confidence, rumors still started to spread when he had yet to return after such a long time.


    "Adept Greem must have run away," A slightly fatter advanced apprentice started stirring the crowd, "He abandoned us here and ran away. We will all be done for once the Aki n adepts arrive."


    "Yeah! Yeah, Adept Greem hasn¡¯t returned even after so long. He must have run back to headquarters."


    "Well then, what do we do?"


    "Let us run too! I don¡¯t want to stick around to be cannon fodder."


    These people aggravating the situation shook the other apprentices¡¯ wills.


    Even Apprentice Captain Yuri seemed to be hesitant about the situation. His eyes gleamed with aplicated light.


    They had lost the resource site and the mines to the enemy this time. Even though it was not a factor that was within their control, it was still hard to predict what the n would do to them. It was extremely likely for people to assume to worst in this situation and, consequently,mit some actions they usually wouldn¡¯t do.


    "What are you people doing?" At this key time, the first to step up was still Beginner Apprentice Billis, "Sir Greem has already gone out to deal with the Aki n adepts. I believe in Sir Greem. He can bring victory back to us. Yet, at this moment, all of you are only thinking about running away? Can you still call yourselves humans?"


    "Indeed; we are not!" The one who spoke was still that fat advanced apprentice. He waved his fists and walked up to Billis. If it weren¡¯t for Sabrina standing in front of him and ring coldly at him, he probably would have been unable to suppress his urge to hit Billis, "It¡¯s been such a long time, and your Sir Greem hasn¡¯t returned yet. What evidence do you have that Adept Greem hasn¡¯t run away? What evidence do you have that he can beat those malicious enemies? Perhaps he has already lost now, and is..."


    "And is doing what?"


    A firm and dominating voice rang out from outside the tower.


    Wild winds blew, and the wind dragon¡¯s massive body descended from the skies. It spit out two worn-out and wounded figures from its mouth. Greem¡¯s tall silhouette then stepped off of the dragon¡¯s back with steady steps. Four stumbling people followed behind him.


    It was his apprentice disciples!


    "Bring the four of them down for treatment. Take special note of Hill. His injuries are quite bad!" Greem gave an order, and Sabrina bowed respectfully. She then stepped forward as several silver metallic appendages extended from her body, which she used to prop up the apprentices.


    Billis¡¯ eyes shone when he saw Greem. He quickly stepped forward, "Sir Greem, these people..."


    Greem raised a hand to interrupt him, "Go and help Sabrina. I¡¯ll deal with the situation here!"


    Greem walked towards the fat apprentice while tapping his staff on the ground. He lowered his head and looked down at the apprentice, "You were the one rousing the others just now? You said I already lost and was doing what?"


    Gegege...


    The crisp sound of ttering teeth was audible throughout the room.


    The pig-like apprentice¡¯s feet gave way. He crumbled to the ground, body trembling and shivering, as his teeth chattered in fear. He couldn¡¯t even muster a single word from his mouth.


    Dong!


    A dull thud.


    The staff in Greem¡¯s hand touched the ground, and a ze of fire ignited on the fat apprentice¡¯s left hand. A terrifying cry of pain that resembled pigs on the chopping block filled the hall!


    "You, you, and you," Greem turned to look elsewhere and quickly called out a few people, "Go and invite the two Aki n adepts in here."


    Adepts? Prisoners?


    It was only now that the apprentices realized that the two figures that spat out of the wind dragon¡¯s mouth were adepts. However, these two normally respectable adepts were in a lousy state. One was ck as charcoal, with the thick smell of burnt flesh and soot wafting off his body. The other one was reasonably unharmed, but his robe, staff, amulets, rings, and all other magical items had been confiscated. Strange fire runes had even been attached to his shoulders, hands, and feet.


    These fire runes looked to have the ability to seal magic power and limit movement. If this adept tried to move around or draw upon the magic powers within him, a burst of fire would emerge from the runes. It would sear his hands and feet and inflict immense pain on him.


    "Yuri, take a few people to the resource site and bring the other apprentices back." Greem gave another order.


    Once Yuri and the others had left, Greem looked down at the now unconscious fat apprentice. His left hand had burned to ashes. Just a single touch and it would crumble to dust.


    "Take him away!" Greem demanded, "Have him return to the n tomorrow. I don¡¯t wish to see him again! Hmph."


    ndre had been sent to Greem¡¯s side under the escort of the apprentices. He growled menacingly, "I have already handed over everything I have on me. You are not allowed to torture us any longer. You must give us the treatment we deserve as adepts."


    "I¡¯ll ensure you are treated properly, but you will have to pay for that. Yourpanion is severely wounded as well. Just the treatment cost would be exorbitant. Do you expect me to shoulder this cost?" Greem snorted with disdain, "You can rest safely here in my stone tower. I will provide you with the basic treatment you deserve. However, if your n doesn¡¯t hand over a reasonablepensation within ten days... hehe. We will need to talk about the matter of you lot destroying our mine and resource site."


    ndre let out a long sigh and lowered his head in helplessness.


    Ten days? Who knew how the elders would respond? If they couldn¡¯te to an agreement with the Sarubo...


    ndre looked at poor burnt Sicha beside him and sighed once again.


    ............


    The conclusion of the battle at the resource site was transmitted to both ns by midnight.


    The almost unbelievable news caused amotion in both ns.


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    Sanazar quickly hurried back from hernds after she got the news. She silently sat on her chair and listened to F¨¹gen¡¯s report. Adept Keoghan, who was a core member of the n, also stood quietly by the side. He closed his eyes and said nothing.


    A dozen apprentices had personally witnessed the battle at the resource site. Consequently, Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s report was incredibly detailed. He analyzed every single detail that urred during the fight. In particr, Adept F¨¹gen gave the wind dragon that had emerged out of nowhere an evaluation of peak elite-level.


    Disregarding everything else, Greem could count as an elite First Grade adept with just his wind dragon. Moreover, he still had plenty of room to grow. Once he finished tempering his body and soul, his fundamental attributes would skyrocket.


    This person was someone who had immense potential to be a mighty adept!


    It didn¡¯t matter what perspective you looked at it from. The rise of a powerful adept like this within the n was a good thing rather than a bad one. Still, everyone knew that the number of resources that Greem got from the n was even less than Keoghan!


    A non-core adept of the n disying such tremendous potential caused them to be both concerned and joyous.


    If they let a person like this continue growing within the n, who among the First Grade adepts couldpete with him? He would be like a ma, quickly attracting a group of loyal followers behind him. If he chose to split from the n to go his own way in the future, he would cause a division of power within the Sarubo n!


    "Mydy, do you think we should continue suppressing Greem?" F¨¹gen couldn¡¯t help but ask once he finished with his report.


    Adept Keoghan trembled when he heard this, but he said nothing.


    After all, everyone present was a high-grade adept of the n. A First Grade like himself could only listen without making anyments. He had no right to talk here.


    However, his unusual behavior still caught the attention of Adept Sanazar.


    "What is it, Keoghan? Do you have a different opinion on this matter?"


    Sanazar had been busy with the improvement of her own powers in recently. She had already lost her patience for these annoying internal affairs of the n. If it weren¡¯t for today¡¯s urrence being a little too shocking, Adept F¨¹gen might not have been able to summon her back from her territory.


    "Mydy. Sir. I believe that oppressing Greem from this point onward would no longer be appropriate." Adept Keoghan hesitated for a moment and finally decided to voice his thoughts.


    "Could you not have seen through Greem¡¯s ambitions?" Adept F¨¹gen snorted, "He chose to build his adept¡¯s tower in the ck Forest, far away from the n. Moreover, he didn¡¯t choose to work with the n, even after stabilizing the situation. Instead, he decided to work with the Zhentarim Association. What do you think he is trying to do?"


    "He is preparing for his future endeavor for independence!" Adept Keoghan pointed out the truth.


    "Hmph! And you still intend to favor him, knowing this? Do you know how massive a disaster it would be for the n if we allow him to go on as it is?" F¨¹gen¡¯s tone was bing even more solemn.


    "Then, sir, do you intend to drive him away before that happens?"


    "Drive him away? Where can he go? He¡¯s signed a hundred-year contract with our n leader!"


    "He isn¡¯t as alone or without help as you would like to think. If you push him around too much, he..." Adept Keoghan¡¯s voice turned softer and softer. He turned to look at Sanazar. Or more urately, the cloud of purple mist that shrouded her.


    "You mean he will choose to join Alice?" Sanazar¡¯s voice suddenly rang out from the purple mist.


    "I don¡¯t know for certain his rtionship with Alice. However, I can tell that Alice was a chess piece that Greem set down beforehand. If the n can no longer permit his existence, he need only bow his head, swallow his pride, and it wouldn¡¯t be hard to obtain the shelter of the Fate Witches. When that happens, would the n choose to break off our friendly rtions to the Fate Witches for a First Grade adept like him?"


    No sound came out of the purple mist.


    Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen also frowned. That was apparently the first time he had seen things in this particr light.


    "That Mary is about to return as well!" After a short break, Sanazar spoke.


    "Adept Mary? Isn¡¯t that the vampire that¡¯s on good terms with Greem? The Knight¡¯s ne still isn¡¯tpletely pacified as of yet. Why was she sent back here at this time?" Adept Keoghan was thoroughly shocked. He couldn¡¯t help but voice the question that had suddenly popped up in his mind. He immediately realized he had stepped out of line and quickly bowed.


    Sanazar didn¡¯t think anything of Keoghan¡¯s breach of conduct and gave a simple exnation.


    "That Mary girl is a troublemaker in her own right. She ended up killing Acteon back in the Knight¡¯s ne. She¡¯s being sent back to be reprimanded. The n is still discussing her punishment!"


    "How did that happen?" Even Adept Keoghan was interested in the situation.


    Why were all the people involved with Greem so much trouble? What was Mary thinking? Did she not want to live any longer?


    Everyone fell silent for a few moments.

 Chapter 450 Spoils of War

    Chapter 450 Spoils of War


    They were still dealing with post-battle matters.


    The apprentices remained in the tower to rest, while the others went back to the resource site to clear up the mess.


    The resource site had lost its value after they emptied the warehouse.


    The great battle between the three adepts had dealt destruction and permanent damage to the resource site. The broad stretch ofnd had either muddied into swamps ravaged by floods or burned to scorched earth. Most of the magical nts had died from the adepts¡¯ shockwaves. The survivors had also escaped from the damaged defensive arrays.


    To avoid a massacre happening to theirnds nearby, Yuri and the slightly wounded Morse ventured everywhere near Gilneas, trying their best to exterminate these lucky survivors. Even so, dozens of ¡¯strange urrences¡¯ still happened on a daily basis. Yuri and Morse were worked to the bone to solve these problems.


    The dozens of adepts that had witnessed the battle gave a detailed ount of what happened. Almost every single apprentice had heard of the might and power of Adept Greem and quickly began idolizing him.


    Three adepts?


    Based on apprentice Hill¡¯s description, the Aki n had sent a surprising number of adepts!


    Adept Greem had horribly burned one of them. Even now, he was still howling in agony on the second level of the tower, confined to bed. He had already received necessary treatment, but the process of recovering the burnt flesh was an arduously painful one.


    Adept Greem had captured another adept. Greem had imprisoned him in the tower under manyyers of magic and arrays, devoid of any freedom. It was rumored that this person was an elite-levelbat adept!


    The third one, on the other hand, didn¡¯t even show their face. They had been utterly scared away by Adept Greem¡¯s dominant show of force.


    The battle of the resource site was an instant morale boost for the n apprentices. It caused them to have unsurpassed respect and feelings of idolization for the me Demon. Even the doubtful ones looked shocked when they returned from the ruined resource site.


    ording to them, the entire ce was a horrifying zone of magma. Lava flowed everywhere, the earth was scorched, pungent sulfur filled the air, and ck and red magma remained on the surface of the ground alongside the damaged flowerbeds and gardens.


    If it weren¡¯t for the coordinates indicating they were right, these apprentices wouldn¡¯t even have believed that this was the resource site they knew; the resource site they had guarded for seven or eight years.


    The Sarubo n might have lost quite a lot of resources in this battle, but with the two enemy adepts in hand, the Aki n would have to pay a tremendous amount ofpensation to settle this matter!


    ............


    While the apprentices were busy with work, Greem casually appreciated his spoils of war in his room.


    He had captured two enemy adepts at once. ording to the Adept¡¯s Handbook, everything they had on them became spoils of war. Even if they were ransomed, he need not return the items. The enemy would have to offer a high price to repurchase their items.


    Greem took the golden circlet and golden ws off of the badly burnt Sicha. Sadly, Greem¡¯s fiery onught had severely damaged Sicha¡¯s golden armor and boots. They had lost all possibility of being repaired.


    Apart from this, Greem also found a charred storage belt and a cracked fire talisman on Sicha¡¯s person.


    It was clear that the opponent had performed a lot of preparations before seeking him out. However, Greem¡¯s exponential increase in power upon transforming into the me Fiend had exceeded Sicha¡¯s expectations. Consequently, the elementary-level fire talisman had shattered in the battle.


    The golden circlet was an intermediate magical item. Its owner would possess the ability to walk in the air freely.


    The golden ws were intermediate magical items as well. They were enchanted with three magical abilities: Blood¡¯s Bite, Haste, and Armor-Piercing.


    As for the rest of the items.


    Most of them had already been destroyed in the great elementium mes, causing Greem to lose many potential spoils of war! ndre, who had actively surrendered, had left behind a lot more prizes for Greempared to Sicha. Just the collection of magical items that ndre had on him was enough to make Greem¡¯s eyes grow wide.


    The short staff ndre had been holding during the fight wasn¡¯t worth much. However, the Empyrean Sapphire embedded atop the weapon was a high-quality product worth up to a thousand magical crystals.


    Ring of Freezing. Intermediate magical item. The owner¡¯s water spells would have a freezing effect.


    Empyrean Robe. Intermediate magical item. Enchanted with Wave Shield (Three uses/day). Enchanted with Summon Water Elementium Golem (Adept-level. One use/day). Enchanted with Mirror Image.


    Spirit Locket. Beginner magical item. Helped concentrate Spirit.


    Ring of Quickcast. Beginner magical item. Could save up to one-third of casting time for a specific spell (Three uses/day).


    Ring of Magic Detonation. Beginner magical item. Could enchant a specific spell with Mighty Spellpower (Two uses/day).


    Bloodsucker¡¯s Bracelet. Beginner magical item. Could enchant a melee weapon with Vampiric Touch.


    Magic Belt. Beginner magical item. Enchanted with an energy barrier that could reduce the damage of all elementium spells by 12%.


    Ripple Boots. Beginner magical item. Possessed the ability to allow one to walk on water and run on water. (An excellentbination with Acid Pool!)


    There was also a storage ring with tremendous space. A magical crystal card worth twenty thousand magical crystals was stored inside, along with four thousand physical crystals, several magic tomes, a notebook, and plenty of casting materials.


    The most valuable item within was a small vial of Ice Marrow; there were approximately twenty drops of the liquid within. This liquid was a type of unique substance created within the bodies of ice-attribute creatures. Consuming it inrge quantities could raise an individuals¡¯ magic resistance and innate affinity with water.


    It was probably something ndre had prepared for his future attempt to advance to Second Grade.


    The Chip quickly estimated the total value of all these items with its rapid processing abilities.


    They were worth approximately sixty to eighty thousand crystals in total!


    That meant Greem had practically obtained half an adept¡¯s tower through this battle.


    At least for the moment, Greem no longer needed to worry about the day-to-day functioning of Fire Throne!


    ............


    The Aki n¡¯s messenger arrived very quickly.


    To Greem¡¯s surprise, the messenger was Adept Lamure herself, who had fled without even fighting.


    In all honesty, Greem might have talked with Lamure twice, but this was his first time seeing her in person.


    Lamure was an ordinary-looking female adept with a head of brown hair. A gray adept¡¯s robe wrapped her slim figure. Lamure¡¯s most noticeable trait was her strange golden eyes.


    There were two pupils stacked upon each other in her golden eyes. Greem felt as if a powerful vortex was hidden in the depths of her eyes when he looked into them. His soul felt like it would sink into them at any time.


    Fortunately, Greem had the protection of Soul Barrier. He could withdraw his Spirit at any time to ensure Lamure didn¡¯t make any contact with his soul.


    "You are very cautious and surprising!" Lamure smiled at Greem the moment she met him, "I only thought you would have brought a little trouble upon ndre. Who knew you were that strong and had such a powerful elementium golem in your possession? Hehe, those old fogeys in the n must be pissed now."


    "I haven¡¯t thanked you for the information you provided, have I?" Greem returned a smile as well, "I would have had trouble taking down both Sicha and ndre without your information!"


    "Hehe," Lamure suddenly started giggling gleefully, "What is it? Do you think you¡¯ve got leverage over me now? Do you want to ckmail me into paying you?"


    "Do I not?"


    "Then I regret to tell you that you still don¡¯t understand the Aki n!" Lamure spoke disdainfully, "You could tell ndre about all this. See if they would care about what I did."


    "Fine. Let¡¯s skip the unnecessary words, shall we?" Greem interrupted her, "What does your Aki n n to offer as the ransom for the two adepts? I hope to hear a satisfying number."


    "With regards to the conflict between our ns, the elders are now holding negotiations. I still don¡¯t know the specifics of their agreements at the moment. However, I did bring some benefits for you alone!"


    "Oh?" Greem narrowed his eyes and thought for a while. He understood that that was how the situation was.


    He might have been the one to capture the adepts, as well as the person who had created the chance for this ¡¯agreement¡¯ toe about. However, he was not the one who possessed the right to negotiate. If the enemy wanted to talk, they would go straight to the Sarubo leaders instead of wasting time on a First Grade adept like himself!


    However, as the most prominent person in this conflict, his benefits were guaranteed, regardless of the final results of the negotiations!


    Now it was just a matter of how much sincerity the Aki were willing to disy to ¡¯improve¡¯ the treatment of the two prisoners!


    Half an hourter, Lamure left the stone tower with a smile on her face.


    Greem also received an additional fifty thousand magical crystal and some advanced healing potions.


    Sicha¡¯s wounds were extraordinarily grave and severe. His Physique was only enough to prevent the injuries from growing worse. It was difficult for him to regenerate and recover thoroughly. As such, these advanced healing potions were a kind of a bribe from the Aki n to make sure that Adept Sicha didn¡¯t end up with permanent injuries that affected him in the future.


    Greem did a rough calction. Three of these advanced healing potions were enough to help Adept Sicha recover from the burns. The remaining two vials were undoubtedly a bribe meant for him!


    For the next few days, Greem remained stationed in the tower, silently waiting for news from the n.


    His estimations suggested that the conflict between the Sarubo and the Aki would conclude in less than three days!

 Chapter 451 Relationship

    Chapter 451 Rtionship


    Feidnan City, Adept¡¯s Tower.


    The teleportation array continued to sh with a brilliant light.


    It was only after three minutes that the light started to stabilize and shine blindingly.


    After a while, the light faded, and five figures of varying height appeared in front of the others.


    "Wee back, Mary!"


    The first to step out and wee Mary was Adept Keoghan. The two of them had cooperated and worked together back in the knight¡¯s ne. Naturally, they had a much closer rtionshippared to the other adepts present.


    "Hmph! What is there to wee? I am here to ept my punishment. Oh right, have the elders decided on my punishment yet?" Mary still wore her crimson armor as she strolled out of the teleporter,ining as she did so. Three Blood Knights and the old fox Vanlier followed behind her. They immediately fell to the ground and grabbed their heads with their hands as they cried in agony.


    Mary seemed fine initially, but after a few steps, her whole body trembled and she also copsed to the ground. Clouds of red mist rose from her body, causing the entire room to smell of blood.


    "What an intense nar feedback! It seems you profited from your time in the knight¡¯s ne. The few of you; hurry up and help Lady Mary back to her quarters." Adept Keoghan ordered as he assessed the strange knights following behind Mary.


    He could sense that these knights were vampires. They all had Mary¡¯s unique magical aura on their bodies. They seemed to be a sort of soul-servant kind of existence. However, it was their power that shocked Keoghan. All three of these knights were almost as powerful as veteran adepts. Only the guy dressed like a noble was slightly weaker, with the strength of a pseudo-adept.


    Adept Keoghan¡¯s memory was exceptional. He instantly recognized the identities of the knights¨C they were all radiant knights from the other ne! All of them were famous Second Grade knights! However, traveling from a lesser ne to arge ne like the World of Adepts had a negative impact on them. Their souls had been suppressed by the world consciousness, causing various degrees of regression in their grade and powers.


    As long as they were provided with sufficient time and resources, it was possible for them to regain their former powers. Of course, they would first have to get used to the narws of this world. However, if you considered the difficulty of a Second Grade adept advancing, then you would understand how impractical it would be for Mary to help the Blood Knights to rise to Second Grade again.


    "Get a few more people over here and help those people get to Adept Mary¡¯s quarters as well!"


    The apprentices waiting at the side swarmed forward at Keoghan¡¯smand. They were about to help Mary and the knights up when the mist of blood seared them as they got near Mary. They cried in pain as they panicked and stumbled away.


    Mary moaned several times as she leaned against the wall and helped herself up.


    "What is with me? Why does my head hurt so much?" Mary¡¯s body was still trembling, but her bright red eyes gleamed and stared at Keoghan.


    "This is the usual reaction upon returning from a lesser ne. We call this phenomenon nar feedback! As long as you endure this period of pain, you will find your powers improving at an explosive rate." Adept Keoghan quickly exined.


    Rash people like Mary always acted before thinking. If she felt like something was off, she would most definitely fight before she talked.


    Making an elementium adept like Keoghan fight a wild and ferocious bloodline adept like Mary in a narrow space like the teleportation room was not a good idea!


    Consequently, to avoid Mary misinterpreting the situation, Keoghan exined all information regarding nar feedback as fast as possible.


    Mary held her head in her hands. She closed her eyes to sense for a moment. Mary only released her apprehension once she confirmed that this sudden headache was bringing beneficial to her. She then looked around the room and frowned as she asked, "Where¡¯s Greem? Did he not know that I was returning today?"


    Keoghan put on a bitter smile, "He actually didn¡¯t know, because he¡¯s stationed outside of the headquarters right now. It seems a n war might break out there!"


    "A n war?" Mary¡¯s eyes gleamed when she heard these two words, "Should we go to your ce or my ce? Tell me all about this thing."


    Keoghan couldn¡¯t help but show a bitter smile when he heard this.


    Anyone else would try his very best to avoid a n war for fear of bing the n¡¯s cannon fodder. But not Mary; she was excited.


    "What should we do with your subordinates?"


    "Them? Let theme along!"


    Mary extended a slender hand. A cloud of blood mist emerged around her four subordinates. The next second, they had all turned into small hairy bats. They dove into her armor and disappeared from sight.


    Mary was a vampire and a bloodline adept after all. Her Physique was far better than an ordinary adept. It had been no more than a short moment, yet the effects of her nar feedback had utterly vanished. The aura of power that she radiated had also increased by a significant degree.


    If Greem were here, he would be shocked to find that Mary¡¯s bodily attributes had far surpassed his own. In fact, she had already reached the level of an elite adept.


    Two hourster, Mary exited Keoghan¡¯s room and swiftly walked down the tower¡¯s corridor.


    She turned past two corners and was about to reach her room. Just then, Vanlier¡¯s high-pitched voice rang by her ear.


    "Master, that Adept Greem¡¯s position in the Sarubo n doesn¡¯t seem very stable!"


    "Hm? Why would you say so?" Mary seemed unfazed by the news.


    "I¡¯m not sure if you noticed earlier, but Adept Keoghan doesn¡¯t seem to want you to meet Adept Greem. He repeatedly emphasized that the situation over there wasplicated and it would be inappropriate for you to show up there at this time."


    "Oh."


    Mary had never really cared for these details. She was just about to ask Vanlier another question when she stopped.


    A young, beautiful, and gentle female adept stood in front of her room. The woman nodded at her and smiled.


    "You must be Lady Mary. Nice to meet you; I am Meryl, a disciple of Teacher Greem."


    Teacher Greem? It had only been eleven years, and that guy managed to cultivate an adept-level disciple?


    "You have met Adept Keoghan already, haven¡¯t you? A lot of things have urred in the n over these years. He might not have had the time to tell you about it all. That¡¯s why I¡¯m paying a special visit, in hopes that I can inform you of all the changes."


    Adept Meryl spoke with a casual tone, but Mary, having ughtered and fought for a dozen years in the other ne, could still pick up the trace of murderous intent in her voice.


    Mary let Meryl into her room and heard about all the various things that had happened to Greem over the past eleven years.


    Alice had also advanced to adept-level and was even the leader of the Witches of Fate within the Northern Witches.


    Greem had constructed an adept¡¯s tower known as Fire Throne at the edge of the ck Forest. He was now amassing strength and influence there.


    Tensions seemed to have built between Greem and the higher-ups. There were signs of conspiracy in the n war this time.


    Greem was stationed in Gilneas City alone, and the n refused to reinforce him. It seemed there was more to the situation than how it appeared to be.


    ......


    A thick, murderous intent spilled out of Mary¡¯s crimson eyes by the time Meryl finished speaking.


    "I¡¯ll hurry to Gilneas City right now. Don¡¯t worry; I am much more powerful than before. With me there, your teacher Greem will certainly be unharmed!"


    Mary was a person who believed in action and acted whenever she spoke. She asked for a map from Meryl and immediately flew out of the window of her room without bothering to exit through the doors of the tower. She transformed into her bat form and pped her wings as she disappeared into the distant horizon.


    Once Feidnan City had vanished from sight, Vanlier braved the whistling winds and climbed to Mary¡¯s shoulder with much difficulty.


    "Master, your actions are unwise! They are very likely to draw the suspicions of the n¡¯s leaders."


    "Vanlier, remember. Your duty is to plot and scheme for me, not to obstruct my decisions!"


    Vanlier shrunk his neck in fear after being scolded by his master.


    However, he quickly asked out of curiosity, "Master, what rtionship do you have with that Adept Greem fellow? Why would you take such a huge risk to help him?"


    "He¡¯s my partner!"


    The coldness of Mary¡¯s tone caused Vanlier to stop asking questions. Instead, he silently contemted the meaning of his master¡¯s words.


    This was an entirely new world!


    It hadpletely different rulespared to the world he originally came from. Before he understood and mastered everything about this world, its narws, and its rules, Vanlier didn¡¯t believe himself able to help his master n for everything that mighte at them.


    He couldn¡¯t help but start thinking of Adept Greem as they traveled.


    What kind of rtionship did this guy have with his master?


    Partner? Ally? Or...lover?


    The master might seem to be cruel and savage at all times, but she was still a human girl after all; no, a vampire girl. Perhaps it was possible that she still had a trace of a female¡¯s emotional dependency left in her heart!


    "Vanlier, what kind of stupid bullshit are you thinking about now?" Mary¡¯s angry shout almost caused Vanlier¡¯s soul to shatter and disperse.


    Due to the connection between their souls and the limited distance between the two of them, Mary could sense Vanlier¡¯s thoughts when he was too focused on thinking about something.


    "Spare me, master! I won¡¯t do it again." Vanlier hastily hid into Mary¡¯s armor again. He no longer dared to show his face.


    Mary, who was quickly flying through the skies, fell into contemtion after shouting at Vanlier.


    She had charged out here without hesitation after hearing about the trouble Greem was in. Yet, she still couldn¡¯t untangle her thoughts on this situation. She still didn¡¯t understand her own emotions.


    Lover?


    What an absurd and ridiculous word!


    Many male and female adepts dide together to be lovers, as well as what is known as husband and wife by others. However, the majority of adepts were often in a dependent rtionship.


    One of them would be a high-grade adept, and the other would get into the rtionship for resources, knowledge, or even influence within their n. They would live a life of being groomed and taken care of, much like a pet.


    Mary couldn¡¯t ept such a twisted rtionship, unless...


    Unless she was the dominant one!


    Mary¡¯s crimson eyes lit up when her thoughts wandered here.


    This might be a good idea!

 Chapter 452 Analyzing Runes

    Chapter 452 Analyzing Runes


    The Stone Tower.


    In the end, this tower was just a crude building made of stone. It didn¡¯t haveplete facilities like an actual adept¡¯s tower; it certainly didn¡¯t have a sea ofva, such as the one in Fire Throne, that Greem could use to continue tempering his Spirit.


    The efficiency of meditating in a ce like this was only one-fourth or even one-fifth of what it was in Fire Throne. Every day here was like endless torture for Greem.


    To ensure he didn¡¯t end up wasting his time, Greem dedicated most of his time here to the study and mastery of the otherworldly runes.


    After eleven years of processing, the Chip had finally managed to analyze and decipher the one hundred and seventy-three runes brought back from the Knight¡¯s ne. Apart from the one hundred and twenty-two primary runes that both worlds shared, thirty-five of the runes were variations of existing runes, and sixteen of them were new and rare runes.


    The shape of the runes had been confirmed and verified. What came next was a more detailed probing and analysis of each rune to figure out the hidden knowledge within them.


    One could say that the variation runes and rare runes were Greem¡¯s greatest harvest from his trip to the Knight¡¯s ne. That was because these runes were the essence of the higher arcane knowledge of a small ne!


    The Knight¡¯s ne might only have been a small ne, and its arcane knowledge was limited due to the knight¡¯s suppression, but the knights had also managed to push the power of every individual rune to their very limits.


    Things would have been very different if the green dragons manipting the kingdom from behind the scenes hadn¡¯t been such misers. Had they done away with the bloodline limitations on the runic powers, the Sarubo n could only have dreamt of taking down the Knight¡¯s ne with anything less than fifty First Grade adepts.


    However, there were no such things as ¡¯if¡¯ in this universe!


    It was the greedy nature of the green dragons that caused the strength of the natives to be so distorted and weak. The knights hadn¡¯t been able to gain a decisive advantage against the sinister adepts.


    That was why the loss of the Knight¡¯s ne had been an inevitability for the green dragons!


    Even if the adepts had never discovered this backyard haven of the green dragons, some other dominant race would have found it. The fate of the ne remained unchanged.


    These variant runes and rare runes that Greem obtained from the Knight¡¯s ne still retained some of the origin forms of the narws there. That was because they hadn¡¯t undergone the long process of evolution and change that the World of Adept¡¯s runes had.


    That was the part that Greem valued the most!


    ording to the Chip, the collected and created runes in the World of Adepts runic system numbered over a thousand. It was thebination of all these runes that forged the rich culture of magic in the World of Adepts.


    However, there were tradeoffs involved in this. The ancient adepts had once drawn upon the chaotic runes they saw and learned from nature. The continuous optimization, modification, and creation involved in the runic system over the years had caused these chaotic runes from ancient times to evolve and turn into the magical runes that adepts of today could utilize.


    The chaotic runes of ancient times were often the manifestation of narws on the bodies of powerful magical creatures. That was a time when the world consciousness had yet to be born. Consequently, these runes were not things that ordinary humans could master or understand. Only great adepts with exceptional talent and ingenuity could learn some of the chaotic runes. It was through these runes that they had gained ess to supernatural and mysterious powers.


    The nature of these chaotic runes caused them to be extremely close to the truth and origin power of the narws. That was why every single adept that mastered the ancient chaotic runes were powerful existences that could rend the skies and split the earth with a single thought!


    However, a small number of powerful individuals were hard-pressed to defend the massive entirety of the human race. As a result, many smart and intelligent sages had devoted their effort towards the research and analysis of the chaotic runes.


    Years of repetitive experiments and exploration had finally allowed an individual to be an adept by drawing upon the power of the new variant runes derived from the chaotic runes.


    These new adepts had undoubtedly possessed a far weaker mastery of the narwspared to the ancient adepts. Still, this progress had substantially lowered the difficulty of advancing to adept.


    Thus, generation after generation of umtion, and the efforts of countless adepts had transformed the chaotic runes into the many new runes of the current system. This change over time significantly weakened the powers of the runes themselves and made the forces of the narws even more inessible. However, it allowed humans to cultivate arge batch of new adepts quickly.


    As the narws slowly became more intricate and refined, fewer adepts were able to master the chaotic runes. On the other hand, the new adepts started to rise in numbers. Finally, the adepts became the dominant force in this world, and a brand new civilization was born!


    All the runes that the adepts of today researched, studied,prehended, and mastered were the new runes that had been created through the analysis of the chaotic runes. Those ancient runes that few could learn had now crumbled into the dust of history, never to be seen again.


    Still, all elementium adepts knew the power of these chaotic runes. The adepts would be able to quickly and more efficiently sense and experience the power of the narws if they used chaotic runes. It would be hundreds, if not thousands of times more effective to use the chaotic runes instead of the new runes. Of course, this only held true if the adept¡¯s abilities and knowledge had reached a certain threshold. Unfortunately, in the World of Adepts of the present, it was virtually impossible to get one¡¯s hands on an ancient chaotic rune.


    Therge adept organizations might still preserve some chaotic runes in their knowledge treasuries, but they would never be so generous as to offer them to the public for research. Instead, they hid them deep within their organization, treating them with the utmost importance and secrecy. Only the high-grade and core adepts of their organization were allowed to research them.


    Many powerful adepts had discussed these chaotic runes in their notes. The research and analysis of the chaotic runes were said to be extremely difficult and time-consuming. Even the same rune, when analyzed by two different adepts, could result in entirely different knowledge and experience for the researcher. Only the researcher themselves would be able to utilize the results they had discovered.


    That meant that no one would be able to refer to the research results, let alone use them, even if someone had been generous enough to publicize them.


    It was this unique situation of the chaotic runes that caused them to be undesirable to low-grade adepts.


    However, if an adept were able to decipher even a portion of a chaotic rune, they would be able to merge that knowledge into their abilities and createpletely different and unique spells.


    Even though many adepts were creating new spells on a daily basis, spells containing the power of chaotic runes were always known for their strength and effectiveness. In fact, many adepts had even managed to form new adept paths and styles due to a single powerful spell they discovered!


    Greem had been an adept for eleven years. However, he had only gathered a measly number of three hundred and twenty-seven magical runes. Every single one of them was a fundamental rune. The variant runes and rare runes found in the Knight¡¯s ne might not have undergone the countless evolutions and modifications of this world¡¯s runes.


    However, if Greem was able to decipher thempletely, he might be able to figure out a portion of the narw¡¯s pattern.


    The Chip organized and categorized these thirty-five variant runes and sixteen rare runes. The Chip split them into six major attributes¨C earth, fire, water, wind, light, and darkness. These attributes were then further divided and broken into branch attributes¨C acid, chaos, ice, shadow, death, lightning, evil, horror, me, forcefield,nguage, radiance, soul, sound, and many more.


    The Chip estimated an astoundingpletion time of sixty-seven years for the task of researching all of these runes. That means that Greem would have to focus on only these runes for sixty-seven years without doing anything else if he wanted to figure them out entirely. Moreover, he didn¡¯t even know how useful they would be.


    That was a heavy time investment. It would be a devastating blow to Greem if the deciphered runes could not be included and used in the improvement of his powers!


    Greem only hesitated for a moment before choosing to prioritize the deciphering of the runes rted to his affinity.


    There were three runes rted to fire. One was a variant rune, while two were rare runes.


    Analyzing the variant rune required forty-one days while examining the rare runes needed seventy-eight and eighty-two days respectively. In fact, this was a considerablypressed timeframe that Greem was only capable of thanks to his fire affinity and the powerful tool that was the Chip. Any other adept would likely have needed several years or even decades to figure the runes out slowly.


    Since he had nothing better to do in the tower, Greem put all of the Chip¡¯s processing power towards the analysis of the variant fire rune.


    He wanted to know if these runes he had risked his life for could actually help him!


    Greem gave an order, and a strange rune made of pure fire immediately surfaced in the depths of his mind. The rune slowly started spinning. When Greem cast his mental consciousness into the rune, a peculiar and obscure feeling would rise in his soul.


    Back on Earth, in his previous life, any word constructed with symbols could only carry meaning with it. However, here in this fantastical high-magic world, words had energy and power. They became much more valuable. Apart from being able to convey information throughplex symbols, the runes could also reveal hidden details about the world through the distribution and changes of energy within them.


    For example, there was the fire rune currently floating in Greem¡¯s mind. Even though he had only formed squiggly lines in the shape of the otherworldly rune, he had somehow touched upon the firews of the world. The lines that formed the rune were now glowing with a golden radiance and caused all who looked at it to feel a strange warmth.


    This feeling came from within the soul! It wasn¡¯t an external feeling.


    When Greem looked at this rune, a warm feeling would naturally rise in his heart. It wasn¡¯t a magical effect applied to him from the outside.


    This mysterious power enchanted him. His mental consciousness couldn¡¯t help but sink into the feeling, silently experiencing and trying to understand the fluctuation of the fire aura within the rune.


    While he was trying his best to feel the rune with his soul, the Chip emitted a brilliant blue light. The light shone upon the variant fire rune, conducting a detailed andprehensive analysis while it recorded every single change happening within.


    Just then, the tower¡¯s defensive arrays sent a warning to him through a unique frequency.


    An outsider had broken into the stone tower!

 Chapter 453 Approval

    Chapter 453 Approval


    Greem almost hadn¡¯t recognized Mary when he first saw her.


    The ten years of battle in the other ne had produced a tremendous change to Mary¡¯s appearance andposure.


    Her skin was still as white as ever, her face as delicate as before, and her eyes still glowed the crimson color of blood. However, this once iparably beautiful young girl had now be a cold, decisive, and capable leader. Her every action carried amanding aura of intimidation that silenced all doubts.


    The arcane hall was now filled with apprentices that had caught wind of the news!


    Even though they knew the intruder was a terrifying adept, they didn¡¯t seem scared at all. They held magic wands in their hands, holding their scrolls at their waist while downing several bottles of resistance potions. They worked together and took up all the advantageous positions in the room as they stared at this beautiful intruder with fierce looks.


    Sir me Demon was now within the tower. That undoubtedly filled the apprentices with boundless courage and bravery. If Sabrina hadn¡¯t suppressed their eagerness, apprentices would have already struck at the intruder.


    "May I know where you havee from, Lady? Why are you trespassing here in the property of the Sarubo n?" Sabrina was nervous, but she still acted as the chief of the apprentices and stepped in front of this mysterious female adept.


    Before the intruder could even speak, Greem¡¯s voice rang out in the room.


    "Everyone put your wands away," Greem arrived promptly by the spiral staircase, "Allow me to introduce our guest. This woman is the famous Adept Mary of our Sarubo n!"


    Adept Mary? The Bloody Sorceress?


    The apprentices opened their mouths wide in shock. They stared at Adept Mary withplicated feelings. She didn¡¯t seem as scary and terrifying as the rumors imed. She had an infamous reputation within the n for being violent. Almost all of the apprentices had already heard of her feats. She was abat adept that had risen to prominence alongside Adept Greem, and she possessed powerful vampiric talents.


    She had been sent to a nar battlefield right after she had advanced to adept. Consequently, not many apprentices within the n had seen her before. Why else would the apprentices do something as ridiculous as not recognize one of their n¡¯s adepts?


    "Mary, when did youe back? Let¡¯s go to my room and talk!" Greem clearly sensed the changes Mary had undergone after such a long time away.


    However, things didn¡¯t unfold the way he thought they would. Mary didn¡¯t seem too happy or excited to see him. Instead, she narrowed her crimson eyes and silently assessed Greem. After a long pause, she proudly spoke, "I killed Acteon!"


    Greem¡¯s face twitched. He couldn¡¯t help but ask a question in return, "Evil Bugs Acteon? You killed him?"


    The Bloody Sorceress killed Evil Bugs?


    This explosive news came as a massive surprise to all the apprentices. None of them could hide the shock that their faces betrayed.


    The one who was most affected by the news was Greem!


    Others might not have known difficult of an opponent Acteon was. However, he had personally fought against him multiple times. He knew just how annoying and powerful his magic was. Acteon¡¯s abilities might not be the most powerful, but they were certainly the hardest to deal with!


    Moreover, Acteon was also a powerful adept that could punch above his weight.


    If given a chance to raise his army of carcass beetles, he would have been able to crush any ordinary adept. The bugs would have devoured them before they even had a chance to get close. One couldn¡¯t measure Acteon based on his attributes as a newly advanced adept. With the numerical advantage of the carcass beetles and his own undying body, Acteon could wear away at an elite adept and drag them to their grave.


    "I officially challenge you now!" Mary was destined to surprise some of the apprentices into aa today. Another massive bomb hade out of her mouth when she spoke, "Come with me!"


    Bloody mist rose behind Mary. A pair ofrge leather wings with a clear outline opened up. She slowly levitated off the ground and charged out of the stone tower, flying towards an empty area to the west of the city.


    Dammit? What was this?


    An expression that was neither upset nor happy appeared on Greem¡¯s face. He waspletely baffled.


    Even he didn¡¯t always understand what Mary was thinking with her temperamental personality.


    "All of you listen to Sabrina¡¯s orders. Watch the tower and make sure nothing goes wrong before I return!" After leaving some simple instructions, Greem activated all of the defensive arrays using his authority as the stationed adept. He then quickly followed behind Mary and hurried towards the east of the city.


    ............


    Five kilometers from the eastern outskirts of Gilneas City.


    Mary had already been waiting for a while by the time Greem arrived.


    Mary beat her wings and floated fifty centimeters above a small mound of earth that resembled a grave. Her crimson eyes were fixated upon Greem.


    Her skintight armor covered the upper half of her body. Crimson patterns shed on the armor, asionally forming blood-red roses. Her exposed arms and feet were white and smooth, and her skin glistened with a certain radiance.


    Mary¡¯s small face was still as delicate and perfect as before. Her seductive red lips paired with her blood-red eyes to create an unforgettable sight.


    She carried a longbow on her back that glowed with the same crimson light.


    Greem couldn¡¯t be more familiar with this armor and longbow. In fact, Greem could even describe every marking, pattern, and rune on them. That was because he was the one who had personally modified the equipment for Mary.


    "What is it, Mary?" Upon arriving, Greem stopped in front of Mary and asked in confusion, "We haven¡¯t seen each other in so many years. Shouldn¡¯t we be catching up? What¡¯s with all this?"


    "What¡¯s our rtionship?" Mary suddenly asked.


    "Rtionship?" Greem tilted his head and thought for a while before answering withplete seriousness, "Friends!"


    "Adepts have no friends! There is only knowledge, benefit, and one¡¯s self in the eyes of adepts!"


    "Calling you a friend might be uneptable for you, so why don¡¯t we define our rtionship as apanionship!"


    "There is still the dominant and the submissive in a rtionship! What do you think about us? Who¡¯s the dominant one, and who¡¯s the submissive one?" Mary continued to stare at Greem,pletely emotionless. Her words surprised Greem.


    A battle for power?


    In the past, both Greem and Mary had always treated each other with sincerity when they had worked together. The enemies they had faced were almost always too powerful. The two of them had to treat each other as sincerely as possible to work together and deal with every difficulty that came their way. That was why they had never honestly figured out the pecking order between them.


    "I just returned from the Knight¡¯s ne five days ago. I heard some problems have happened between you and the n. Adept Meryl has also told me about everything that has happened in the n during this period. I can tell. You are not a person that would only live in the present. It doesn¡¯t matter whether it¡¯s your adept¡¯s tower or the investment you made in Alice. All of this is a clear disy of your ambition."


    Greem didn¡¯t speak. He silently listened.


    "You wish to go independent! You want to build a force and organization of your own!" Mary continued to press the issue and finally arrived at the most important question, "What position would I take up in the organization that you envision?


    "Your concubine? Or your subordinate?"


    The pitch of Mary¡¯s voice suddenly rose at the end.


    "If you want me to serve you, you will have to beat me first! Otherwise, you should be the one to kneel before me and call me Queen!"


    Mary let out an ear-piercing scream, and her bat wings unfurled to their fullest. Four bloodsucking bats suddenly flew out as crimson mist enveloped her body. The batsnded on the ground and transformed into three muscr knights wearing crimson armor, and one noble youth.


    Three radiant knights?


    Greem immediately recognized the identities of the three Blood Knights. He couldn¡¯t help but be surprised by the extent of Mary¡¯s power.


    If this conflict hadn¡¯te up, Greem would have been happier the stronger Mary was. However, Greem felt his head start to ache from how powerful Mary had be.


    Damn! Trying to subdue a proud female adept would have been a freaking daydream if he didn¡¯t have a little power! It was even more so when it came to someone aspetitive and headstrong as Mary. It would be impossible for her to willingly be his woman if he didn¡¯t convincingly overpower her.


    Greem knew it was no time to shrink back when he saw Mary reveal the full extent of her powers. Even though this fight came upon him in an extremely confusing manner, it would all be worth it as long as he could make Mary submit.


    Having understood all this, Greem cast away his hesitations. He too brought out everything he had.


    He casually took out a brilliant golem crystal core from his belt and tossed it into the air. Meanwhile, Greem himself started to swell in size as he let out a coldugh.


    The surging fire elementium poured out from within his body, instantly turning him into a zing me being. The earth beneath his feet scorched and melted under the extreme heat. The ground soon came together and formed a roiling pool of magma.


    The redva crawled up Greem¡¯s legs and extended towards his body. The substance covered the terrifying me humanoid with a thickyer of magma armor wherever it flowed.


    Crimson magma, redva, and frightening mes. The three manifestations of heat mixed and formed Greem¡¯s four-meter tall me Fiend body.


    Deng! Deng! Deng!


    Seven Fire Shields formed in midair. They started to spin around the me Fiend¡¯s body, each of them one meter wide and two meters tall. These shields wereposed of red and yellow mes.


    ng!


    A dull ringing sound.


    Two massive Lava Shields formed from magma and fire quickly sprang up and appeared in front of and behind the me Fiend.


    Finally, a light, red egg-shaped barrier shot out of Greem¡¯s body. It instantly engulfed an area of over a hundred meters around him.


    All the grass within the radius of the Ring of Fire burst into me.


    The whole ce became a sea of fire!

 Chapter 454 Battle of Two Monsters

    Chapter 454 Battle of Two Monsters


    Shocking!


    Extremely shocking!


    Watching Greem transform from a flesh and blood human to a monster of magma and fire from a close distance sent shocks right to the depths of the soul; it was a surprising sensation of awe that was hard to quell. However, the genuinely eye-catching bit wasn¡¯t the me Fiend itself, but the ferocious wind dragon that Greem had summoned from the golem core.


    It was a strange dragon that was neen meters long from head to tail! Its wingspan was ten meters wide!


    Its body was neither intangible nor tangible, but somewhere in between. Ayer of light green, semi-translucent scales covered the surface of its body. The somewhat empty-looking body appeared to be unexpectedly tough. Through the thick scales, one could see that the wind dragon¡¯s flesh and bones weren¡¯t actually physical constructs. Instead, they were masses of rapidly flowing wind vortices.


    It possessed protruding and well-defined bones across its body, where wicked bone spikes stuck out from head to tail. They gleamed with a chilling light. The green dragon lifted its sinister head pridefully. A light shone in its eyes as it moved around. When it opened its mouth, one could see a small thunderstorm forming in its throat.


    The wind dragon had a massive pair of wings on its back. It had slender front limbs and thick, muscr hind legs. Its ws were powerful with sharp, threatening nails.


    Unlike the me Fiend Greem had turned into, the wind dragon had formed entirely out of nowhere. The sudden imbnce of elementium when a massive amount of wind elementium surged and gathered into a small area was a horrifying feeling.


    Greem rose into the skies like a miniature sun on the back of the wind dragon. The endless mes caressed the ground as the temperature continued to rise without stopping, causing one to feel as if they had been plunged into a volcano.


    The three blood knights were fine. The blood energies within their bodies emerged and formed blood-red barriers on the surface of their bodies. This protection allowed them to resist the damage from the intense heat and mes. However, the weak and frail Vanlier couldn¡¯t do this. He screeched in pain as he transformed into his bat form and desperately escaped the reach of the Ring of Fire.


    His flight speed after transformation allowed him to move a hundred meters away in less than five seconds. Even such a short period was like torture for him. The hairs on the surface of his body had started to wither, and small clusters of mes had also ignited on his body.


    A blood-red mist exploded around him.


    Vanlier immediately returned to his human form once he was out of the Ring of Fire. He frantically beat his body and rolled about on the ground in an attempt to extinguish the fires.


    Sadly, all of this was in vain!


    These fires seemed to be burning wildly with his flesh and blood as the fuel. The pain went straight to his heart, causing him to yell and cry out.


    Szz!


    Vanlier endured the intense agony from his burning flesh and forced out the small amounts of blood energy within his body. He directed the power and covered the areas of his body that were on fire. Finally, after much difficulty, Vanlier was able to put out the mes.


    Once the final spark of me was gone, Vanlier let out a sigh of relief and crumbled to the ground, singed and burnt. A deep sense of respect rose in Vanlier¡¯s heart as he looked at the mighty me humanoid standing on the wind dragon. He once again felt the terror of a powerful adept!


    Greem didn¡¯t care about a small-fry like Vanlier.


    That said, since he was so weak, there had to be some exceptionally redeeming point to him.


    This fight wasn¡¯t a true deathmatch; there was no need to exterminate or kill anyone. Thus, Greem didn¡¯t deal the finishing blow to the now crippled Vanlier.


    At this moment, most of his attention was focused on Mary, who was licking her red lips.


    Mary didn¡¯t seem even a little shocked or fearful, despite seeing Greem¡¯s dramatic entrance. Instead, she appeared to be unusually excited and eager to fight.


    "Go!"


    Under hermand, the three blood knights maintained their strange half-human, half-bat forms and lunged at Greem with Soros in the lead.


    The fire damage they received increased at an exponential rate as they closed in on Greem. Szz! The crimson energies shed with the elementium mes and continuously destroyed each other. The dense cloud of blood mist that engulfed the knights quickly wore thin.


    Crescent Moon sh!


    Leaping Execution!


    Cross Impact!


    Three destructive knight battle-techniques cut through the air before they even got to Greem¡¯s side. They crashed against his Lava Shield with three dull thuds. Shattered rocks flew everywhere. Sparks scattered. Three deep sh marks appeared on the fifty-centimeter thick Lava Shield.


    Even Greem¡¯s brow twitched when facing the attacks of three blood knights.


    As expected of radiants knights that had once been known all across the Knight¡¯s ne. Their mid-range battle techniques were truly ferocious. The most profound sh mark had almost cut the Lava Shield clean in half. If that had happened, Greem¡¯s most potent defense would have been destroyed in the first round of attacks.


    Greem instantly retaliated with three Magma Fireballs.


    The sudden me shockwave and rain ofva threw the blood knights into chaos. It was only thanks to their high mobility that they were able to avoid the core of the explosion. Even so, the sshingva still burned their bodies and wings; holes appeared everywhere. They had no choice but to quickly retreat from Greem¡¯s range and draw upon their blood energies to regenerate their wounds.


    This ability was what troubled all of Greem¡¯s enemies!


    The existence of the Ring of Fire made a drawn-out fight with Greem a harrowing experience. The elementium mes that perpetually burned their bodies made it a futile effort to fight Greem at melee range.


    The enemies would always have to retreat after a single round of attacks to prevent the damage umtion from the high temperatures and fires. In doing so, their rhythm was interrupted. All their attacks would fail to exert their full effect due to the frantic retreat andck of follow-up.


    When faced with an elementium adept like Greem, the blood knights first had to crack theyers of energy defenses shielding him. Then, they would have to work through the thick magma armor before finally being able to harm the adept himself.


    It was the only way to harm Greem¡¯s well-protected body of elementium!


    Meanwhile, they would have to endure Greem¡¯s relentless barrage of fire spells. If they gave up half-way and backed off to heal their wounds, Greem would be able to replenish his damaged and destroyed defenses quickly.


    It was virtually impossible to harm Greem if they didn¡¯t crush all his defenses with a powerful single round of attacks!


    Moreover, Greem wasn¡¯t the only one fighting against them.


    The wind dragon he rode was practically a counter to all flying beings.


    Apart from some of the magical creatures who excelled at flight, any other being would pale inparison to the wind dragon; they seemed so much more clumsy and sluggish whenpared to it. They could only watch with dazed eyes as the enemy maneuvered around them with the agility of a fish in water.


    Compared to the blood knights, the wind dragon was like part of the air itself. They couldn¡¯t track its next movement when it flew in the air. It could perform all sorts of unthinkable actions in flight, despite its gigantic body. One couldn¡¯t even believe their own eyes.


    It was this agile and swift trait of the dragon that left Greem free to turn into the most overbearing cannon in the world. Magma Fireballs crashed towards the blood knights from several different directions, trailing ck smoke as they flew across the sky. The fireballs threw the knights into disarray, sending them flying everywhere in a desperate attempt to dodge the attacks. The blood knights were no longer able to repeat the savage attacks they had aplished during their initial charge.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The wind dragon¡¯s speed advantage was far too pronounced in the air. The wind dragon was utterly rolling over the three blood knights.


    It didn¡¯t matter how strong the attacks of the blood knights were, or how ferocious their advances were. It was all for nothing if they couldn¡¯t keep up with the wind dragon!


    Back in the Knight¡¯s ne, Greem had to be careful whenever he dealt with a radiant knight, fearful that a slight slip up would spell his death. However, now, Greem appeared to be calm and collected, even when facing three blood knights.


    Of course, there was the factor of the ne suppression¡¯s effect on the blood knights. But most of it was a demonstration of Greem¡¯s personal growth.


    Mary let out a crisp battle cry when she saw her subordinates being beaten around by Greem. Her wings shook, and an afterimage drew across the sky. She turned into a red silhouette and dashed onto the battlefield.


    Greem, who was casually chasing the blood knights on his wind dragon, was immediately alerted when he heard Mary¡¯s outcry. He hastilymanded the wind dragon to dodge. However, the wind dragon didn¡¯t have time to do so. It moved three meters away when Greem¡¯s Lava Shield shattered in a flurry of crimson strikes.


    Mary, having obtained her nar feedback, had improved by leaps and bounds. Her bodily attributes had far exceeded the range of a veteran adept and had entered the level of an elite adept.


    Her sixteen points of Agility made it almost impossible for an ordinary adept to catch sight of her. Her Strength, which had once been a weak point of hers, had now be enhanced by her high Agility. Her attacks were both fast and powerful. Mary sessfully destroyed Greem¡¯s Lava Shield by striking seven times as she passed by the wind dragon.


    Greem still had severalyers of Fire Shields around him, but those shields were meant for defense against elementium attacks. They possessed inferior physical defense whenpared to the Lava Shield. Greem was terrified. He immediately moved the Lava Shield at the back of his body forward to temporarily protect his critical spots.


    The me Fiend¡¯s elementium body didn¡¯t possess a vital spot that would cause death when hit. However, there were key nodes in his body that, when damaged, would significantly affect the efficiency of his elementium cirction.


    That would indirectly decrease Greem¡¯sbat ability!


    Mary opened her wings and flew away after her sessful attack, flicking away theva on her hand as she did so. Her smooth, white right hand had now turned ck as charcoal. The surfaceyer of the skin hadpletely carbonized.


    Mary let out a cold snort as blood energy gathered in her right hand. Her severely burnt skin that had lost all signs of life rapidly peeled off, revealing the quickly regenerating bright red flesh beneath.


    The two opponents passed by each other in the air. The gazes they cast at each other betrayed shock and cautiousness.


    Clearly, theirbat prowess had exceeded each other¡¯s expectations.


    The scales of the battle once again returned to equilibrium!

 Chapter 455 Melee

    Chapter 455 Melee


    The battle in the sky continued to intensify.


    The Explosive Fireballs, Magma Fireballs, and Meteor Showers fell like rain pouring down from above. Craters sted into the earth, and moltenva flowed everywhere.


    Soros carefully dodged through the Meteor Showers, asionally performing a frantic dodge to avoid an Explosive Fireballing from above. A single moment¡¯s carelessness could send him flying to the ground in such a harsh battle environment. An attack could quickly turn him into part of that scorchedndscape.


    Soros beat his wings and made a broad circling motion across the sky. Inside the area he circled was a blinding sea of fire.


    However, while most of the fields of fire were usually on the ground, this particr sea of fire was thirty meters in midair.


    The fire elementium within was far too dense and active. It severely affected Soros¡¯ field of vision and spiritual senses. Consequently, Soros had no idea what was happening inside the sea of fire.


    He would only grit his teeth and dive in once his wings had healed under the influence of blood energy. He would try tounch another wave of attacks at that monstrous me Fiend standing atop the wind dragon.


    He only had a short window of two to three seconds to attack. If Soros lingered too long within the fire, his bat wings would burn and be riddled with holes. If that happened, he would fall from the air and turn into a grounded blood knight.


    Only one of his two knightpanions was still flying in the air alongside him. The other blood knight had been hit in the wing by the me Fiend¡¯s me whip and was grounded entirely now.


    This was the battlefield of two powerful adepts. Without wings, one didn¡¯t even have the qualification to participate in it. Soros cautiously protected his wings as he weaved in and out of the battlefield,unching powerful midrange attacks at the me Fiend by throwing crimson spears at him.


    Inside the fiery battlefield, Greem remained towering on the back of the wind dragon. He was trying his best to maintain the Ring of Fire to continuously damage Mary while shooting out Scalding Rays from his eyes. Greem was closely chasing after the agile vampire.


    The thirty minutes of battle had inflicted rtively severe wounds on both Greem and Mary.


    The incredibly agile Mary dodged and weaved in a small area; she was an annoying assassin. There was no point in casting any spell that required more than three seconds of chanting.


    Trying to cast arge-scale spell was a suicidal act unless you were sure that your defenses could hold out that long!


    On the other hand, those powerful single-target spells weren¡¯t practical either. The chances of these spells hitting Mary were just too low. Even if Greem managed to lock on to her position using his Spirit, his spell would only manage to destroy the realistic afterimage she had left behind.


    When necessary, Mary even used her strange blood magic to swap positions with one of her knights. It might temporarily cripple one of her subordinates, but it ensured that her personal safety was guaranteed and that herbat ability was notpromised.


    Still, despite all her advantages, Mary had been injured.


    The most rming thing was still that ursed Ring of Fire. As long as she was in this zone of fire, her body had to endure the continuous burning of the destructive mes.


    Mary would not have taken much damage with her elite-level resistances if this weremon fire. However, what currently engulfed her was an elementium fire that was sixty points in power. Moreover, the mes themselves seemed to possess a trace of soul-burning effect.


    That forced Mary to continuously protect her wings with her blood energies as she flitted around within the sea of fire. However, the depths of her soul would asionally sting, regardless of how tight her defenses were. It was as if someone were constantly stabbing her soul with an invisible needle.


    It wasn¡¯t a very powerful or crippling attack, but it was extremely annoying!


    Mary¡¯s wings were in tatters now, covered with burn marks and punctures. Signs of being burned had also appeared all over her slim and slender body. There were gaping wounds on her shoulders and legs where the Scalding Rays had pierced through.


    It was no longer the start of the battle. Mary could no longer afford to use her blood energy to recover her wounds continuously. For the sake of better preserving her strength, Mary couldn¡¯t waste her blood energy on the recovery of these insignificant wounds.


    She would only indulge herself when struck in a crucial part of her body.


    After all, she couldn¡¯t find any blood treats here that could help her regenerate blood energy. Without the nourishment of blood, a vampire would not be able to employ their signature suicidalbat style.


    This substantially limited Mary¡¯s abilities in the fight!


    Of course, as her loyal servant, old fox Vanlier had already gone hunting in the surroundings. He had brought back a goat. Sadly, he couldn¡¯t even send these spoils into the sea of fire. The moment Vanlier returned, an Explosive Fireball shot out from within the battlefield and sted the goat into smithereens.


    Greem had perfectly controlled the strength of the fireball; it hadn¡¯t hurt Vanlier at all.


    Thus, the battle reached a stalemate!


    In truth, the pressure Greem had been facing was no less than Mary all this time.


    The extended period of maintaining the Ring of Fire had caused Greem¡¯s fire energy to continuously dwindling. If it weren¡¯t for the sporadic surges of fire energy sent out from the me Fiend¡¯s Heart, Greem would probably have had to shrink his defensive line and fullymit to defending.


    He was hiding deep in the sea of fire and relied on the wind dragon¡¯s Wind Barriers to defend against Mary¡¯s ambushes. His defenses had all been taken apart in the battle up until now. Currently, only a single battered Lava Shield and an energy barrier remained.


    Threerge and visible wounds were visible on Greem¡¯s massive body. Traces of blood energy could be observed fighting and shing with the fire energy inside these wounds. They would not heal before the blood energy was neutralized.


    Despite the difficulty of the battle, Greem didn¡¯t make the wind dragon unleash its aura of might. He didn¡¯tplete his second phase transformation either.


    Greem had a feeling that Mary was hiding some of her powers and trump cards while looking for a chance to flip the tables on him. To avoid being caught by surprise, Greem had to keep his own trump cards tightly in his grasp. He waited silently for the moment she would strike.


    Two of the three blood knights had been grounded. They weren¡¯t dead, but they had lost the ability to participate in the ensuing fight. The only remaining knight seemed to be reasonably intelligent. He wasn¡¯t as ¡¯straightforward¡¯ as the others. As a result, every time Greem tried to cripple him, Greem would fail.


    Moreover, this blood knight had a perfect grasp of the timing of his attacks. There were several times where his knight battle-techniques didn¡¯t connect, but they created the perfect opportunity for Mary to attack. One time, Greem even had to exhaust half of his Scroll of Voodoo¡¯s instant-cast spells to force Mary away.


    Powerful area-of-effect spells couldn¡¯t beunched against an agile and difficult to target assassin. Single target spells, on the other hand, were easily dodged. Consequently, Greem couldn¡¯t hurt Mary at all, apart from his Ring of Fire and the multitude of small instant-cast fire spells he had on hand.


    Not to mention there was still a blood knight looking in from the edges of the sea of fire, waiting for a chance to push. If Greem showed any weakness, this fearless and reckless man would definitely use his own life to tear open a path of attack for Mary.


    That was why Greem couldn¡¯t focus all of his Spirit on Mary.


    That said, while the battle was intense and unpredictable, the chances of Greem winning were still steadily rising.


    The main reason for that was the Chippleting its data collection on Bloody Mary. She was no longer a cloud of blood mist whose actions he couldn¡¯t predict. Her true form and abilities had been exposed to him.


    Mary.


    Vampire. First Grade Bloodline Adept.


    Bodily attributes: Strength 7 | Agility 16 | Physique 11 | Spirit 7.


    Combat magic: Blood Arrow, Rapid Advance, Shackles of Blood, Life Drain, Vampiric Touch, Blood Mist, Blood Frenzy, Rending Bloodw, Transfusion, Crimson Pact.


    Greem¡¯s head hurt when he saw all of Mary¡¯sbat magic projected in his mind. Mary had already repeatedly cast dozens of blood spells from the start of the battle until now. It was a clear demonstration of Mary¡¯s talent for battle. It was so impressive that Greem was at a loss for words.


    Melee adepts were not the same as elementium adepts.


    Elementium adepts often functioned as ss cannons, firing off powerful spells while remaining fixed on the same location. While they did have mobility spells, most of theirbat consisted of long-range elementium attacks. While melee adepts also possessed a lot of spells, most of these were auxiliary and enhancement spells meant to boost their strength at a close range. They were rarely intended to be long-ranged attacks.


    Therefore, Greem had to use quick and consecutive instant spells to force back an agile assassin like Mary, who was continuously striking from every direction. That was especially the case after he lost his Lava Shields that provided him with physical protection.


    When the battle finally reached a standstill, Mary gave up on her strategy of harassing and dodging. She finally revealed her ace, the Shackles of Blood.


    She let out a strange screech, and several shackles of blood immediately connected her with her four blood servants. She then stormed at Greem with no regard for her own body.


    Even though Greem had prepared himself for this, he was still shocked by Mary¡¯s ferociousness and determination.


    The next second, a storm of fire spells crashed towards Mary. The wind dragon started beating its wings as well. The dragon threw a massive tornado at Mary, obstructing her path forward.


    The climax of this battle for dominance had broken out just like that!

 Chapter 456 Who is Surrendering to Whom

    Chapter 456 Who is Surrendering to Whom


    Shackles of Blood!


    As the name implied, this was a spell that superior vampires used to control their direct blood kin and blood servants.


    It needed to be used in conjunction with Crimson Pact and would allow damage sharing and energy-siphoning. Mary, being the master of the Crimson Pact, would never die as long as she still had blood servants alive.


    The blood energy within her four subordinates surged towards Mary through the Shackles of Blood. It allowed her to sessfully break through the multiple walls of elementium fire and reach within ten meters of Greem.


    Under normal circumstances, the Scalding Ray and streams of fire would work together with the Ring of Fire to inflict tremendous fire damage on Mary; it could reach up to a hundred and forty points. Even with Mary¡¯s resistances, she couldn¡¯t linger for more than two seconds inside the center of such extreme attacks. Otherwise, her life forcefield would be damaged and her body would receive grievous wounds.


    That was why Mary had previously relied on her agility and speed to avoid all the attacks. Many times, she even had to give up on her advances. However, right now, Mary seemed like she had just been injected with a powerful stimnt. Not only did she not avoid the fire, she even folded her wings and dove right into the center of it like a moth to the me.


    The next second, a cloud of crimson mist exploded in front of Greem.


    The dense mist quickly engulfed Greem like a wild beast devouring its meal. Mary¡¯s aura vanished instantly as well. She melded into the mist itself.


    It was as if there was a savage and destructive storm brewing within the center of the crimson mist.


    The entire crimson cloud was caught in the storm and continued to expand outwards. The mist roiled, spun, and churned as it epassed an increasinglyrger area.


    The mist was thick and red as blood.


    It was impossible to see Greem and Mary¡¯s silhouettes from the outside now. One could only indirectly measure the intensity of the battle based on the shockwaves spreading out from the bloody mist.


    The explosions had never stopped since the mist spread out. Wave after wave of me shockwaves leaked out from within. However, it didn¡¯t matter how wild and brutal the battle was; the terrifying blood mist didn¡¯t seem like it would disperse any time soon.


    It wasn¡¯t possible to see what was happening within, but the changes outside were already surprising enough.


    Soros, Vanlier, and the other two knights suddenly let out cries of agony. Their skin started to peel off, and their flesh began to burn. Their entire bodies were withering at a rate visible to the naked eye. Vanlier was the weakest of them all. When the blood energy within his body started to surge towards his bloodline origin due to the power of the pact, he immediately crumbled to the ground. His life force became extremely weak.


    On the other hand, Soros was indeed Mary¡¯s strongest blood knight. Despite this sudden incident, he was still able to remain on one knee. He leaned against his longsword and tried his best to endure the bloodline origin drawing upon his strength.


    As strength left his body, waves of searing fire energy transferred into his body through the intangible Shackles of Blood. It made him feel as if a hot oven had been lit in inside him and was continuously spewing out terrifying streams of fire that ate away at his body.


    Wherever the streams of fire flowed, Soros¡¯ blood vessels burst apart. His nerves and bones burned and his flesh carbonized. Not a single drop of blood flowed from his body, even when his skin started peeling off.


    The overbearing heat vaporized the blood that the vampires relied on as their life-thread. If it weren¡¯t for the supernatural lifeforce granted them by their Physique, they would have turned to ashes the moment the fire energy entered their bodies.


    Even so, someone as powerful as Soros still had to grit his teeth and hang on, praying that his master would quickly obtain victory.


    However, at that moment, the berserk Bloody Mary was also dealing with an unexpectedly powerful ¡¯enemy¡¯!


    She severelycked information when it came to Greem.


    Thest time she had made contact with Greem, he could onlyplete the first phase me Fiend transformation. He was powerful then, but most of his dominance in battle was still thanks to his elementium golems.


    When Bloody Mary drew upon her subordinates¡¯ blood energy, she only needed to endure one-fourth of the damage from Greem¡¯s attacks (Vanlier¡¯s way too weak. He can¡¯t help Mary endure that much damage). This damage reduction allowed her to transform from a sinister assassin into a berserk warrior instantly.


    The blood energy was attached to her curved and sharp ws, allowing her hands to be terrifying magical gear of their own. Every scratch, stab, and strike was threatening and effective.


    Even the eighty-points of power that the Fire Shield had was not a match for Mary¡¯s terrifying ws. She would pierce straight through them with a single stab, reducing them into sparks of fire.


    However, piercing through the wind dragon¡¯syers of wind vortices wounded Mary severely.


    Tens of thousands of de-like whirlwindsbined into a solid barrier around the wind dragon¡¯s body. They protected Greem as well. Mary would have to take the risk of going through this barrier if she wanted to attack Greem.


    Consequently, Mary was in shambles by the time she appeared on the wind dragon. She slowly walked towards Greem, her entire body bloodied and wounded.


    It was like Mary had just been rescued from a shredder; not a single piece of unharmed flesh could be found on her body. Gashes and fine cuts covered her skin. Thick purplish blood continuously flowed down to the ground. Blood covered her entirely.


    However, the rapid regeneration of vampires was taking effect as blood energy continued to rush into her.


    It had just been two steps since Mary had started walking towards Greem, yet all her minor cuts had healed. The terrible gashes had also started closing up. The blood that had flowed out of her body didn¡¯t just go to waste. It dispersed into a mist of blood and slowly returned to Mary¡¯s body.


    Bloody Mary was truly an undefeatable existence when confronted with only physical damage.


    There was now less than three meters between her and Greem!


    That was an incredibly intimate distance for an agile assassin like herself! They could even hear each other¡¯s breath!


    The Wind Barrier had broken.


    The Lava Shield had shattered.


    Only a few of the Fire Shields remained.


    Large portions of the magma armor were also missing.


    The energy barrier was practically a piece of paper before an elite-level assassin.


    At this point, one could say that all of Greem¡¯s magical defenses had been exhausted. If he wanted to continue fighting, he would personally have to face this frenzied Bloody Mary.


    "Surrender, Greem!" Mary looked at Greem, who stood so close to her. Her blood-red eyes gleamed like a crimson sun, "You can¡¯t possibly be my opponent at this distance!"


    "Are you sure?" An odd smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face forged of fire, "You should know that I will never surrender!"


    "Why? For your so-called dignity as a man?" Mary pouted in disdain, "You know it as well. I¡¯ve always quite liked you. As long as you admit that I¡¯m stronger than you, then I can be your only lover. I can even help you fulfill that tiny dream of yours!"


    "Er..." Greem was stunned for a moment. He had never expected Mary to say these things when she thought she had the upper hand. However, he shook his head slightly and did away with this unexpected emotional disturbance, "I¡¯m not rejecting you because of some weird male dignity. Rather...


    "...it¡¯s because you haven¡¯t beaten me."


    Greem¡¯s massive me Fiend¡¯s body started to grow evenrger as he grunted out thatst sentence. His Ring of Fire began to turn from red to purple-ck. A strange unknown fire started to burn Mary.


    While Greem was unsealing his me Fiend¡¯s Heart andpleting his second phase transformation, the wind dragon let out a reverberating roar. An intimidating aura of might rushed towards Mary.


    The vampires were already considered to be higher magical creatures, but their bloodline tier was still below that of the dragons. The dragons were the real king of the food chain. Consequently, Bloody Mary was affected despite her excellent resistance; she was far too close to the dragon itself. Her mind started to haze and fog up. She couldn¡¯t move at all for the entire duration of three seconds.


    Greem seized this opportunity. His four-meter body exploded in size and instantly turned into a six-meter monster of mes. He then bent down, extended arge magma hand, and grabbed Mary in a single grip.


    The terrifying Burning Domain immediately scattered the blood mist around Mary. The hand of magma and fire kept a tight hold on her. It didn¡¯t tighten to crush her, and no energy mes were intentionally used to burn her.


    "It¡¯s my turn to ask you, Mary," An erged version of Greem¡¯s face formed on the head of the magma giant, "I have defeated you. Now it¡¯s you who should be surrendering to me!"


    Mary had now broken free of the dragon¡¯s aura of might and was furiously struggling.


    Unfortunately, her advantage lied in her high Agility. Her Strength was only a measly seven points. Greem, on the other hand, possessed twelve points of Strength uponpleting his second phase transformation. Even though he still couldn¡¯tpare to body-refining adepts who specialized in Strength, it was more than enough for him to restrain an Agility-focused assassin!


    "Dream on."


    The sudden swap in their dominant-subordinate positions angered Mary. Someone of her personality would never be willing to be a subordinate that another person could order around.


    Even with Greem¡¯s savage strength and raging mes around her body, Mary drew upon all her blood energy without any regards for her life.


    Greem sighed bitterly. He lifted a finger and formed an extremely concentrated cluster of mes at his fingertips. He then made drawing motions in the air around Mary.


    Zchwing! Zchwing! Zchwing! Zchwing!


    With the help of the Chip¡¯s elementium sight, Greem very cleanly shattered Mary¡¯s aid.


    The Shackles of Blood had been broken!


    Mary, who was already at her limits, let out a yelp in surprise.


    "They are all decent servants of yours. You should treasure them more and not throw them away in an inconsequential internal struggle. Er..." Greem had just finished lecturing and shifted his attention back to Mary. It was then that he realized the intense shockwave from breaking the Crimson Pact had caused Mary to lose consciousness. She was knocked out.


    Cough.


    Greem looked down upon the messy battlefield and the four unfortunate figures lying around it. He let out an exasperated sigh.


    "This battle waspletely unnecessary!"

 Chapter 457 Night of Intimacy

    Chapter 457 Night of Intimacy


    Her head was heavy.


    When Mary finally regained consciousness, she was inside a peaceful and quiet bedroom.


    The bed was soft, and the smooth bedsheets had a familiar scent to them.


    Mary opened her eyes, and the first thing she saw was the brightly lit ceiling.


    This was a stone tower. Naturally, the ceiling was made of stone as well.


    It was smooth, t, and had a gray-white color with tiny particles of metal mixed within. Its unique appearance allowed Mary to identify its material with a single look.


    It was steelrock, an ordinary stone mostmonly used for constructing tall buildings.


    While steelrock was a natural ore, it had the same hardness as magical alloy. If it weren¡¯t for itsck of elementium resistance, it would have been the perfect material to construct adept¡¯s towers with.


    At this moment, the elementium light in the room cast a tall shadow onto the ceiling.


    Mary tilted her head and immediately saw a familiar back at the side of the room.


    The sky outside the tower was already filled with stars.


    Greem sat by a narrow window.


    A ck adept¡¯s robe rested on his shoulders, and his long crimson hair cascaded down his back. He was silently hunched over the study table, quickly copying or writing something down.


    Mary closed her eyes to sense her condition. Her withered pool of blood energy had recovered a little, and most of her wounds had vanished. Her skin had be as smooth as before. She licked her red lips; the sweet smell of blood lingered in her mouth.


    Mary licked it carefully. She could almost taste the unique spiciness of fire energy!


    In the next second, Mary opened her blood-red eyes as she appeared behind the tall silhouette without a word. She pushed apart his long crimson hair, stared at his white, radiant neck, and let down a greedy gulp.


    His plentiful energy aura made him the perfect prey for the starving Mary. A ghostly green light shone in the depths of her crimson eyes as her instincts kicked in. Two fangs protruded from her upper jaw as if they were about to pierce the neck.


    "You are awake?" Greem remained hunched over the table, quickly writing down line after line of magical runes. He didn¡¯t turn back as he spoke, "Come, take a look. This is a set of magical tattoos I designed for you. It should be able to increase your Agility by another one or two points once it¡¯s activated."


    Greem didn¡¯t seem to have sensed Mary¡¯s abnormality, only her presence. He started to exin the benefits of these magical tattoos to her without pause. Weirdly enough, his deep and calm voice allowed Mary to break free from the restlessness of her blood as if the words had some strange magical power. She once again regained a clear mind.


    "You defeated me." Mary calmly said.


    Greem stopped his exnation and fell into absolute silence.


    He really wanted to console her, but he knew that she would construe anything he said as pity from a stronger person. Thus, Greem could only maintain his awkward silence.


    "My subordinates?" Now that Mary was past her fixation on victory, she was finally concerned about her underlings.


    Even though she hadn¡¯t drained everyst bit of blood energy out of them during the battle, that kind of exhaustion was still very likely to cause their bodies to disintegrate. In particr, the old fox Vanlier had wholly reverted to his aged and elderly appearance.


    "They are not doing very well, but they are vampires you created after all. As long as we give them enough blood treats, they can recover from any injury!"


    Mary¡¯s Spirit swept through the tower and saw everything.


    Her four subordinates were lying on top of several beautiful and naked girls in a room on the second level. They sank their fangs deep into the veins of the girls¡¯ necks. These pretty girls¡¯ eyes had all rolled into their heads. Their expressions were twisted and excited as if they were indulging in absolute pleasure.


    Several withered and wrinkled corpses were piled together in the corner of the room. Their blood had beenpletely sucked dry by the vampires; not a drop remained in them.


    Mary withdrew her Spirit in satisfaction and once again cast her attention towards Greem.


    "Tell me, what¡¯s with your powers? What happened to the Fire Lord? Why did it turn into the wind dragon you currently have? Also, what¡¯s with that wind dragon? Why did it have the aura of might unique to the dragons?"


    Mary felt like a stranger concerning all these things about Greem after such a long time apart. She couldn¡¯t wait to understand this mysterious man once again.


    Greem slowly started to describe everything he had experienced after he had left the Knight¡¯s ne. The quick and short n war. The mysterious and powerful Castle in the Sky. Alice¡¯s Battle of Fate. The Fire Throne he had constructed by himself.


    "Alice gave you that dragon crystal?" Mary abruptly asked.


    After so much storytelling, Greem thought that Mary¡¯s first concern would be about the n or Fire Throne. He didn¡¯t expect the first question to be about the dragon crystal.


    "Yes!"


    "Dammit, did that little girl foresee something! Why else would she have given you a dragon crystal that you just so needed?" A red light shed in Mary¡¯s eyes as she ground her teeth in slight annoyance.


    "Er," Greem was a little speechless, "I don¡¯t think even the Witches of Fate are that good, are they? This is like a whole year after. How could she have seen thising?"


    "Hmph, this had to be the case! Otherwise, there was no way I would have been hit with the dragon¡¯s aura of might and lose."


    "......"


    "Say, do you think Alice could predict the conversation we are having now?"


    "......"


    The more Mary contemted, the more she was convinced of her train of thought. A dangerous light shone in her crimson eyes.


    She immediately grabbed Greem by the cor and pulled him to her face. Their noses were practically touching, and their eyes stared into each other.


    "Hmph! I won¡¯t let that brat get ahead of me!"


    Mary¡¯s full, red lips sealed Greem¡¯s mouth.


    The candlelight continued glowing as Mary¡¯s slim and slender shadow slowly merged with Greem¡¯s.


    An odd and intimate sound started ringing out from within the room.


    ............


    The sun was high in the sky by the time Greem woke up from his sweet dream.


    He could no longer see Mary¡¯s form on the messy bed, but her scent still lingered on the bedsheets.


    Greem had sat up too quickly. He felt intense pain on his waist as if it was almost about to break. Apart from the pain, there was also lethargy and exhaustion there. However, when he recalled Mary¡¯s wildness from the night before, Greem immediately felt an itch in his heart. An unsuppressible impulse rushed to his head.


    Greem made himself get out of bed with much difficulty and made a quick scan of the tower. Strangely enough, he couldn¡¯t find Mary. Her subordinates on the second level had also vanished.


    However, it wasn¡¯t as if he didn¡¯t find anything with his Spirit.


    Greem stepped forward. Violent mes shed across his naked body, and the marks fromst night¡¯s entanglement immediately vanished. Greem removed a set of clothes from the rack beside him as he walked past it and came to the wooden table. Mary¡¯s handwriting was on the parchment at the very top of a pile of writing materials.


    ¡¯I¡¯ll go talk to Alice!¡¯


    Er... What was this? Was she going to assert her dominance, or to meet with an old friend?


    An expression of helplessness appeared on Greem¡¯s face as he held the parchment in his hands.


    Mary¡¯s straightforward and passionate personality deeply attracted him, but he honestly didn¡¯t know what to do with her recklessly indulgent actions. She had always been such a maverick, insisting on what she wanted to do. Most of the time, her actions came before reason. She had gone ahead and done such an important thing without first discussing it with him. Moreover, she had made it sound like it was the right thing to do.


    That caused Greem to be somewhat annoyed, but he immediately started fantasizing.


    His rtionship with Alice was both formal and informal, with a dash of intimacy involved. It was different from his candid passion with Mary. What would happen when Mary and Alice collided together? Greem didn¡¯t know, but he wanted to.


    ............


    Far away over an empty in, Mary was flying in the air. Vanlier, Soros, and the other two knights followed behind her.


    The traffic of travelers and merchants on the gray road beneath made Vanlier extremely thirsty; He desperately wanted to dive down and feast.


    However, what upied more of his mind was the unusual behavior of his master. He beat his wings harder and closed in on Mary¡¯s side. Vanlier asked softly, "Master, where are we going?"


    "The northernmost end of the Continent of Adepts. There, you have thends governed by the Northern Witches." Mary didn¡¯t know why, but her mood today was excellent. She didn¡¯t reprimand Vanlier for his chattiness and patiently answered his question.


    "Why are we going there? Master, didn¡¯t you just return to the n? Does the n allow you to run about as you like in this manner?" Vanlier mustered up the courage to ask.


    "Hmph! I just helped them win a ne war; I have ten years of vacation after returning. From now on, I ampletely free!"


    "Then why are we going to the base of the Northern Witches?"


    "Seeing a friend!" Mary suddenly shouted in irritation, "A friend that¡¯s too full of herself!"


    Mary didn¡¯t give Vanlier a chance to ask any further questions. She pped her bat wings, and her body dashed across the skies like a lightning bolt, leaving a red beam in the air. She soon disappeared from Vanlier¡¯s sight.


    "Master. Wait for me......"


    Vanlier rolled his eyeballs and quickly understood that his master didn¡¯t want him asking any more questions about that mysterious man from earlier.


    Thus, he shut his mouth, gritted his teeth, and tried his best to chase after his master.


    Five red lines drew across the sky and flew into the distance!

 Chapter 458 Mutated Queen Bug

    Chapter 458 Mutated Queen Bug


    Greem was silently examining a ck sphere inside the stone tower.


    It was the strange object that Mary had left behind along with her note, and Greem hadn¡¯t been able to figure out what it was after half a day.


    [Beep. Deep scanning processpleted. Report being produced....]


    After a moment, a stream of data surged into Greem¡¯s mind. The ck sphere¡¯s internal structure disyed in front of him. Greem couldn¡¯t help but shout when he saw the familiar cross-section diagram of the biological structure, "The Carrion Beetle Queen!"


    This ck sphere wasn¡¯t an item; it was a living being. Moreover, it was a strange creature that had left a deep impression on Greem¨C the Carrion Queen Bug!


    Acteon¡¯s original talent and potential were extremely ordinary. There was no way he would have advanced to adept. However, his luck was reasonably decent. He had seeded in assimting a Carrion Queen Bug when he was still an apprentice. It was this unexpected yield that allowed Acteon to break through the limits of his talent and sessfully ovee the threshold of bing an adept.


    In all honesty, Acteon was a top-tier adept even among other First Grade adepts.


    Even veteran adepts would have had to run away from him if he had managed to raise an army of carcass beetles. After all, not every adept could raise a thousand-man army like Mary. Not every adept could use that army to wear down his beetles, and not every adept could bypass the swarm of bugs to strike at him.


    Sometimes, there was no solution against an army of carcass beetles paired together with Acteon¡¯s immortal body of bugs!


    However, now that the Carrion Queen Bug hadnded in Greem¡¯s hands, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what had happened to Evil Bugs. To think that Mary had killed Acteon on her own in the Knight¡¯s ne without any support from himself. Just the thought of how difficult and dangerous that had been sent shivers down Greem¡¯s spine.


    Now that Mary had left the Queen Bug in his possession, she was hinting that Greem could do as he liked with it.


    Just as Greem stared at the ck sphere and started releasing a murderous intent, the ck sphere moved and slowly opened up.


    It wasn¡¯t actually a ck sphere. It was the Queen Bug curling it¡¯s body into a ball. The exposed ckyer was only the Queen Bug¡¯s tough shell!


    Perhaps because it sensed Greem¡¯s murderous intent, or maybe it knew it could no longer hide, the Queen Bug had opened up on its own. It once again turned into a ck beetle.


    It was a peculiar lifeform with a thick ck shell. It had a pair ofrge rainbow-colored eyes on its head. Multiple, smallerpound eyes surrounded those two eyes. A lotus-like mouthpart was at the front of its head, and one could see the pair of knife-shaped jaws on the front.


    A dark ck shell that gleamed with a particr brilliance was at the beetle¡¯s back. The chip¡¯s scans indicated that the shell was as tough as magical alloy. This kind of toughness was enough to endure a full-strength blow from a berserk swordsman. In fact, the swordsman wouldn¡¯t even be able to leave a scratch. Only blunt weapons could cause enough impact damage to the soft organs under the shell.


    Even though the beetle had multiple de-like limbs on each side, it¡¯s tiny size probably made it hard for it to defend itself.


    While Greem silently assessed this strange Queen Bug, it raised its head and let out a sharp screech at Greem.


    [Beep. Detecting foreign lifeform requesting mental connection. Requesting instructions from host. Connect?]


    "Connect!"


    Greem¡¯s mind filled with innumerable noisy and foreign bug screeches.


    The tone and pitch of the screeches slowly morphed and adjusted until a clear stream of consciousness finally made soft contact with Greem¡¯s mind. A set of slightly iprehensible mental projections were transmitted.


    "Protect......contract......live......"


    The Queen Bug wasn¡¯t human. Consequently, the way she thought andmunicated was remarkably different from how a human would. Still, both parties were able tomunicate via the use of keywords.


    "You want to obtain my protection by exchanging contracts?" Greem could only guess at the Queen Bug¡¯s meaning through the Chip¡¯s ¡¯trantion¡¯ of specific keywords.


    The Queen Bug nodded.


    "It¡¯s unfortunate. I really care about my human bloodline. I won¡¯t try and assimte some strange foreign bloodline." A sense of disgust rose in Greem¡¯s heart when he recalled Acteon¡¯s ugly appearance.


    The Queen Bug¡¯s lotus-like mouthpart started moving even more rapidly as if Greem¡¯s nonchnt attitude had terrified her. Her screeching voice wasplete pollution of noise. Although the Queen Bug continued to screech without stop, Greem only heard three words through the Chip. Understand. Powerful. Obey.


    "I only keep servants useful to me. Ones like you..." Greem tapped the table lightly, looking at the Queen Bug in dissatisfaction.


    Adolescent carcass beetles or carrion beetles were adept-level magical creatures that lived in groups. Their shells were sturdy and durable. More importantly, they were capable of flight. With some slight modifications, they would be decent magical servants. However, their greatest weakness was their slow flight speed, along with their severeck of long-ranged attacks.


    That caused them and theirrge numbers to be useless in a fight. It was easy for an awkward situation to arise, where the enemies couldn¡¯t beat them, but they also couldn¡¯t catch up to the enemy.


    The Queen Bug started shrieking even more frantically, like she was desperate to sell herself.


    Greem listened carefully for a while. He then closed his eyes and contemted. Finally, he spoke.


    "I don¡¯t desire the kind of inferior immortal body of bugs that Acteon had. That is why I will never consider assimting with you. However, I can refer you to a few other candidates. If you can assimte with one of my subordinates, then I can allow you to continue living. Otherwise, I would have to wipe away thest marks left behind by Acteon on this world."


    The Queen Bug screeched and wailed for a long time before ultimately lowering her head in helplessness.


    "Since you¡¯ve agreed, you should open up the defenses of your soul. I¡¯ll leave a soul contract with you." Greem struck while the iron was hot and tried to settle this potential aide in the shortest time possible.


    The Queen Bug might have been an intelligent lifeform, but she had no choice but to do asmanded in this situation. She cowered on the table and slowly opened up the defenses of her soul.


    Under the Chip¡¯s control, Greem¡¯s Spirit pierced into the core of the Queen Bug¡¯s consciousness like a hot needle. Greem¡¯s soul brand was left in there.


    In doing so, the Queen Bug could be considered one of Greem¡¯s magical servants. It didn¡¯t matter who it would assimte with in the future. This soul brand would always remain and would be a necessary method for Greem to control her life and death.


    The Chip took the opportunity to scan the Queen Bug¡¯s mental consciousness and the form of her soul. Soon, the Queen Bug¡¯s attributes projected into Greem¡¯s mind.


    Queen Bug. Assimtion-type mutated magical creature.


    Does not possess offensive abilities on its own, but can provide the host with the unique ability of hatchingbat bugs. Host¡¯s talents will decide traits of hatched beetles. However, the primary form of the bugs will always remain as beetles.


    Bodily attributes: Strength 1 | Agility 1 | Physique 3 | Spirit 2


    Hatchedbat bug count: Determined by Spirit. Every point of Spirit allows control of twentybat bugs. The current limit is forty bugs.


    Hatchedbat bug speed: When provided sufficient flesh and blood as nutrition, fivervae can be hatched each day with a growth cycle of twelve days.


    Greem slowly went over the Queen Bug¡¯s traits and silently estimated itsbat ability.


    The Queen Bug herself couldn¡¯t fight at all. She had to rely on the hatchedbat bugs to protect herself. With the speed at which she could hatch bugs, Greem could obtain five adept-level beetles daily after twelve days. Of course, this required feeding the beetles sufficient blood and flesh. The stronger the creature the meat came from, the better the effect. These bugs could be used as consumable and disposable soldiers, constantly thrown into the battlefield as cannon fodder.


    From a particr perspective, the Queen Bug could be a moving, living biological den of beetles if she were utilized correctly. She could perpetually churn out soldiers for Greem¡¯s faction.


    However, the Queen Bug couldn¡¯t do this by herself. She only gained this fantastic ability once she had assimted with another being. That was why choosing a proper host became an important factor after the Queen Bug submitted.


    Greem¡¯s scan confirmed that the Queen Bug still retained adept-level abilities, despite being severely wounded by Acteon¡¯s death. That meant that any apprentice adept would be able to be the new ¡¯Evil Bugs¡¯ in a very short time, as long as they were properly trained!


    Moreover, the existence of the soul brand in the Queen Bug¡¯s soul meant that Greem had a certain degree of control over the new Evil Bugs.


    Thus, Greem decided to share the tower¡¯s control authority with the Queen Bug and allow it to make contact with all the apprentices in the tower stealthily. The Queen Bug could then make a list of individuals who could assimte with her.


    Greem had expected every single apprentice to be included in the list. However, he was surprised when he saw the list provided by the Queen Bug.


    Weren¡¯t these too few names?!


    It was important to note that two dozen apprentice adepts were staying in the tower at the moment, including pseudo-adepts like Sabrina and Morse. However, there were just three names on the list provided by the Queen Bug. In fact, there wasn¡¯t a single pseudo-adept among them. None of Greem¡¯s four disciples were included in the list either.


    Greem only recognized one of the three names.


    Billis!


    Beginner Apprentice Billis!


    Greem couldn¡¯t understand this result. It wasn¡¯t until after hemunicated with the Queen Bug that he finally got it.


    It seemed the Queen Bug didn¡¯t choose her host based on power. Instead, she decided based on their talent.


    The Queen Bug was a dark-attribute magical creature. Thus, she especially favored lifeforms with simr talents. Billis might be the weakest, but his innate affinity was extremelypatible with the Queen Bug.


    In fact, his soulpatibility with the Queen Bug was far superior to that of the previous Evil Bugs, Acteon!


    Billis.


    Greem repeated this name as he narrowed his eyes.


    It was worth trying!

 Chapter 459 Shadow Adept

    Chapter 459 Shadow Adept


    Three dayster, the Aki n finally sent a messenger after a long wait.


    It was early in the morning. When Greem opened his eyes, he found a person in his room.


    A blurry silhouette stood in the shadows in the corner of his room.


    It was already bright outside. The bright sunlight scattered into the room through the narrow window, illuminating most of the space and painting it a golden yellow. However, the ce where the shape stood remained dark and gloomy. It was as if a portal to the Shadow World had opened in the shadows there.


    Greem was a little taken by surprise. He closed his eyes to sense, but neither his spiritual senses, the Chip¡¯s energy scans, nor even the tower¡¯s defense system could pick up any abnormality from that corner of the room. If one had to pick out any unusual phenomenon where the silhouette was standing, it would be the slightly more active nature of the shadow energy there.


    However, this so-called activity was only rtive.


    The entire World of Adepts was a high-magic world filled with plenty of elementium magic. Still, the distribution of elementium energy would be imbnced depending on geographical and environmental traits. Some ces would start to umte simr elementium materials that werepatible with their environment. That was amon phenomenon in the World of Adepts. Greem, when closing his eyes, was almost incapable of differentiating that blur from the background using his spiritual senses alone.


    Greem took a deep breath and climbed out of bed. He stared at the blurred silhouette and bowed to greet his guest, "It is my honor to meet you! Wee, Sir Colin!"


    "I was still wondering why ndre had lost. However, I¡¯ve suddenly understood everything after seeing you with my own eyes," A cold and chilling voice rang out from the blur of shadows. One couldn¡¯t tell whether it was a male or female speaking, "To think you had started tempering your Spirit before youpleted tempering your body. Hehehe. Brat, if I were you, I would take it slower and replenish the emptiness of your body first."


    Greem listened silently.


    Even though he didn¡¯t know why the opponent was suddenly giving him advice, he knew that their information was beneficial to him.


    Ever since Greem hadpleted the elementiumization of his body and turned it into a me body, his potential had improved by leaps and bounds. However, while he had dug a massive pool, he hadn¡¯t had the time to fill up that pool.


    It was important to note that Greem¡¯s attributes were supposed to be much higher than they currently were. With his power of a veteran adept, all of his attributes should at least be above five points. As long as he was willing to spend some magical crystals and find a suitable body tempering technique, he would be able to increase his Strength, Agility, and Physique twofold within twenty to thirty years.


    Unfortunately, he had been too busy running errands everywhere. That caused him tock the necessary umtion of knowledge. Even though his Spirit was at an extraordinary height of seven points, his other bodily attributes were severely hindering his improvement.


    Even though he had managed to cover up this situation through various means, this ¡¯internal emptiness¡¯ had be a serious concern of his!


    Even though he had managed to crush the two Aki adepts in a glorious disy of power, it had mostly been a result of the wind dragon¡¯s abilities. The enemy hadn¡¯t been able to attack him as they had liked with the wind dragon next to him. Thus, Greem was able to exploit his advantage to its fullest extent and steer the circumstances of the battle in whichever direction he pleased.


    If he hadn¡¯t possessed the wind dragon, Greem would have had to rely on his second phase Transformation to sh directly with Adept ndre. He would have been at the mercy of his enemies the moment his transformation time was over!


    ording to the Chip¡¯s calction, the dragon crystal that Alice gave Greem was worth a minimum of three hundred thousand magical crystals. After he converted it into the wind dragon golem, its price even ballooned to an exaggerated five hundred thousand magical crystals.


    Adept ndre and Sicha hadn¡¯t lost without reason. They had been forcefully buried under the weight of five hundred thousand magical crystals.


    "Sir Colin, the purpose of your visit this time..." Greem would be lying if he said he wasn¡¯t nervous when faced with a Second Grade Shadow Adept from the Aki n. After all, just the sheer extent of power that they had demonstrated so far made it extremely likely they could kill him with a single strike.


    The stone tower might have been Greem¡¯s base, but even now, he still hadn¡¯t managed to lock onto the opponent¡¯s location with his Spirit. In fact, Greem couldn¡¯t even tell if this blurred shadow in front of his eyes was Adept Colin¡¯s actual body.


    That meant Greem would have to rely on his instincts tond any of his single-target spells if a fight broke out. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how effective that would be!


    "Our Aki n and your Sarubo n havee to an opening agreement. The war will not continue any longer. Otherwise..." The adept in the shadows let out a chillingugh, causing fear to further grip Greem¡¯s heart, "I have taken away those two individuals. This is thepensation for you."


    A ck shadow shot towards Greem before exploding into a cloud of blindingly dark mist. When the fog slowly dispersed, a gray pouch was in Greem¡¯s hand. It was heavy as if it had been filled with plenty of things.


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled.


    Just then, if the opponent hadn¡¯t stopped the ck shadow and just allowed it to hit him instead, he would have been killed without the time to react.


    This opponent had used this move with the intent to intimidate!


    When Greem finally shifted his attention away from the gray pouch, he realized that the blurred silhouette had already vanished.


    The room suddenly became slightly brighter for no apparent reason.


    ............


    Gilneas City.


    One and a half kilometers away from the stone tower, there sat an ordinary house. Thick ck cloth covered all the windows and doors. The inside of the building was filled with a shadowy substance so thick that it was practically solid.


    A strange adept draped in ck robes was silently sitting within a small array in the house.


    Suddenly, the array shone with a ck light, and the roomful of shadow substance started to flow.


    The dense shadow substance gathered in two spots and formed two silhouettes. As more and more shadow substance flowed into the shapes, they started to be increasingly substantial.


    Finally, the surplus shadow substance dispersed, and two adepts with blood and flesh appeared on the spot.


    An instant ago, Sicha and ndre had been locked in their cells with bitter expressions. Who knew that the very next second, their Spirits would be fazed for a single moment, and they would find themselves in this pitch-ck space.


    The two of them were stunned. However, the two immediately understood everything when they saw the ck-robed adept sitting in the array. Sicha and ndre hurriedly bowed and paid their respects.


    Sicha¡¯s broken body had roughly healed after a dozen days of recovery. However, the regenerated flesh clearly couldn¡¯t reach the same degree of refinement as before. Consequently, his physical body appeared to be slightly weak and empty.


    "My greetings, Sir Colin!"


    "Sir Colin!"


    A hopeful light suddenly emerged from the dispirited eyes of the two adepts. They bowed to Adept Colin with happy surprise on their faces.


    "Your performance this time was terrible. The name of the n has been dragged through the mud because of you two," The ck-robed adept¡¯s face was still shrouded in shadows. Even their voice was somewhat phantom-like, "Prepare yourself for punishment after we return!"


    Sicha¡¯s and ndre¡¯s faces flushed white in an instant.


    "May I know how the n intends to deal with this matter?" ndre stuttered as he asked.


    "What is it. Do you intend to have two mid-sized ns engage in an actual war?" A cold voice rang out from within the shadows, "If you two had put up a better performance, we might have had a little advantage over the opponent during negotiations. And what now? You destroyed their resource site, and even worse, became prisoners yourself. The n has lost quite a lot of resources to put this issue to rest. Hmph!"


    The two of them had been shut in the tower for a long time. Sicha and ndre had plenty of time to guess what their n¡¯s reaction would be. Still, the hatred and disapproval in their hearts were still as intense as ever when they heard the news with their own ears.


    "Sir Colin, does the n not intend to hunt down that pseudo-adept Sak?" ndre couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    "The killing order remains effective, but we cannot continue issuing it with the name of our n. That Sak fellow has to die! Unless he never walks out of Feidnan City. Otherwise..." The voice from the shadows was sinister and ice-cold. It was almost as if they had forced their words out between their teeth. It was chilling to hear them speak.


    "Then, what about the me Demon?" Sicha was the one to ask this time.


    His had been the most significant casualty of this fight. Consequently, he was also the most furious and vengeful.


    "Conflicts between adepts are unavoidable. Naturally, the n will fully support the both of you if you intend to win back your reputation. However, all of this can only be conducted in your name. Think carefully about this. If you fail once again, he will have sufficient excuse to murder you!"


    Their faces turned even paler when they heard Adept Colin¡¯s words.


    "That me Demon has a powerful wind golem. His power is already equal to the peak of elite-level." Sicha spoke resentfully.


    "No First Grade adept within our n would be his opponent in a duel! Unless..." ndre started stuttering once again when he reached this point.


    "Unless it was Sir Ivan who took action!" Sicha gritted his teeth and blurted out the words that ndre had hesitated to speak.


    This Adept Ivan was referred to by Sicha and ndre as Sir, but he was, as a matter of fact, still a First Grade adept. However, he was a peak First Grade elite adept and was preparing his advancement to Second Grade.


    More importantly, Adept Ivan was the personal disciple of this Second Grade Adept Colin.


    "Hmph! Dream on!" The ck-robed adept¡¯s sinister Spirit swelled and immediately made it difficult for Sicha and ndre to breath, "Ivan already moved to the n¡¯s lesser nest month. There, he can attempt his advancement to Second Grade without any interference. That is why you two will have to win back your reputation on your own. Don¡¯t expect the n to help you with that. The n leader even warned me beforeing on this trip; I am not allowed to strike at someone below my grade. Otherwise, we are very likely to invite a strong retaliation from the Sarubo."


    Sicha and ndre knew this for a fact as well.


    It was an unspoken rule among the various adept organizations. No higher-grade adept would be allowed to murder lower-grade adepts without proper reason.


    Of course, it was an entirely different matter if the lower-grade adept initiated the provocation!


    This rule was all for the sake of maintaining the ruling order of the World of Adepts.


    Without this rule, the high-grade adepts of the ns would be able to ughter their enemy¡¯s low-grade adepts and mortal civilians. If they were allowed to murder as they liked, no one would remain in the ns except for the few high-grade adepts.


    Under normal circumstances, high-grade adepts would not intervene in the conflicts between low-grade adepts. Otherwise, the opponent could use this as an excuse to murder the low-grade adepts of their own n.


    A meaningless conflict like this would inflict an extensive and intolerable loss upon any adept organization!

 Chapter 460 Assimilation

    Chapter 460 Assimtion


    The third level of the stone tower.


    Greem slowly walked to a hidden room afterpleting his daily meditations.


    At the moment, Beginner Apprentice Billis was sitting inside arge wooden bucket in the room. His expression was twisted and wicked as if he was silently enduring intense pain. A pungent, unknown purple and ck liquid filled the wooden bucket.


    Billis struggled to get up and greet Greem when he saw the adept enter. However, Greem stopped him.


    "How is it; is the assimtion process going well?" Greem asked caringly.


    "Everything is going smoothly, Sir!" Billis endured the intense pain and replied with much difficulty, "I will definitely seed in this assimtion!"


    Billis pushed aside the long robe draped over his shoulders and revealed his bony chest and pulsating tumor there.


    As a wandering apprentice, Billis wasn¡¯t particrly fit. Still, it wasn¡¯t as if he was underweight and skinny either. However, in the span of two to three days, he had lost a shocking twenty kilograms. He looked as if his life was burning out. The culprit for his terrible state was that parasitical tumor in his chest.


    Embedded in Billis¡¯ chest was a tumor the size of a fist. One could vaguely see a strange bug squirming in there through his skin. The bug¡¯s head had firmly nted itself in Billis¡¯ chest. Only a small portion of its body and abdominal sac remained on the outside.


    Billis¡¯ pain became even more intense as the bug slowly edged closer to his heart.


    Greem bent down to examine the progress of their assimtion. He then straightened his body and advised Billis solemnly, "The Queen Bug hase into contact with your heart. Next, it will find a way to infest your heart and try its best to assimte with the organ. So, I ask you onest time; do you regret this? If you regret it, I can still interrupt this process. Otherwise, once this phase starts, obvious bug transformations will happen to your body in a short period of time. By then, even I can no longer do anything for you!"


    "I know that my talent will never allow me to be a true adept without Sir¡¯s help. That is why I do not regret this choice of mine. Aaaaaah!" An intense pain shot through Billis¡¯ heart the moment he finished speaking. He couldn¡¯t help but grip the sides of the wooden bucket and howl in agony.


    He didn¡¯t scream for much longer. Large mouthfuls of blood poured out of Billis¡¯ mouth like a fountain. Judging by the amount of blood, his internal organs must have been severely wounded.


    Inside the bucket, the bright red blood was immediately absorbed by the purple liquid when they came into contact. The blood was then directly sent into Billis¡¯ body through his skin. The purple and ck liquid started bubbling during this process, and an oddly fragrant smell filled the hidden room.


    A seductive and phantom-like singing started alongside the smell.


    The singing was like the voice of angels, sweet and refreshing. It was inspiring and moving at times, clear and crystalline at others, and even profound and reflective at certain moments. Several beautiful sirens the size of a palm floated above the purple liquid and sang in unison.


    However, as they continued to sing, all their flesh started to rot and fall apart, turning into pools of purple-ck fluid and joining the rest of the liquid in the bucket. Only lonely skeletons remained, their jaws moving up and down, letting out strange creaking noises.


    At the same time, the touching song suddenly turned into a hateful curse uttered with bloody tears. A mental flux filled with hatred and vengeance rippled through the air before surging into Billis¡¯ body.


    Billis¡¯ grip continued to tighten. Splinters started flying everywhere from the strength he exerted on the sides of the bucket. He gouged deep marks in the hardwood.


    Inside his body, the ursed Queen Bug was furiously devouring his heart. Outside, the curse of the sirens was continually surging into him, eroding his soul without stop.


    Billis dove into the purple-ck liquid when the pain reached its limit. He suppressed his disgust and started gulping down the revolting material.


    The liquid in that bucket was fresh blood taken from living sirens.


    Judging from the amount in the bucket, they had to have wholly drained ten sirens of their blood. The sirens were a type of magical sea creature that couldpare to human adepts. Ten advanced apprentice-level sirens had cost Greem a hundred and fifty thousand magical crystals.


    The assimtion process between Billis and the Queen Bug was a manner of mutual devouring. In this process, the Queen Bug¡¯s body needed to be Billis¡¯ new heart, and the Queen Bug¡¯s soul needed to reside in Billis¡¯ soul sessfully.


    The Queen Bug did not possess any ability to improve and grow on her own. However, when it infested Billis¡¯ body, it could be stronger along with Billis¡¯ personal growth. That was a unique method of growth that belonged to their species!


    However, the assimtion process itself was far too cruel and bloody. If the host failed to endure through the entire thing, both man and bug would die.


    That was why Greem had no choice but to purchase the siren¡¯s blood to increase the sess rate of the assimtion.


    Just like the Water of Life of the elves, siren¡¯s blood also possessed astounding regenerative properties. However, this blood was already soaked in the hatred and curses of the sirens at their deathbeds. That was why one had to endure the power of these curses when using the blood.


    The reason Greem chose Siren¡¯s Blood over the Water of Life was due to the sh of attributes. Both the Queen Bug and Billis had the unique twin attributes of darkness and earth. These were opposed to the Water of Life. Consequently, Greem had no choice but to choose the siren¡¯s blood, even if there were potentially severe side-effects.


    Fortunately, getting rid of these curses would be an easy matter as long as Billis sessfully merged with the Queen Bug.


    The intense torture of both soul and body brought Billis to the edge of life. He curled into a ball and soaked himself in the siren¡¯s blood, silently enduring the terrifying pain of having his heart eaten out.


    Red blood continued to pour out of his orifices before being transfused into his body with the siren¡¯s blood. It was this cycling of his life force that ensured Billis wouldn¡¯t die of exhaustion during the assimtion process.


    Greem silently stood by the side of the wooden bucket during the entire process, carefully watching over every step of the assimtion. With his subtle soul connection to the bug, along with the Chip¡¯s x-ray vision, Billis¡¯ body was like a transparent sack. Greem could see everything happening within.


    Greem didn¡¯t just examine him without doing anything. He asionally drew a small blood sample from the bucket to keep. After this, he could analyze the secrets of the Queen Bug¡¯s assimtion through theposition of Billis¡¯ blood.


    While Greem anxiously waited, the Queen Bug had managed to squeeze all the way into Billis¡¯ chest. She had also managed to devour all of his heart.


    Under ordinary circumstances, Billis would have been a dead man at this moment!


    After all, as a beginner apprentice, he was still incapable of using magical energies to sustain the cycle of life within his body.


    However, the siren¡¯s blood had provided Billis with additional life force. It allowed him to hang on to his life until the Queen Bug managed to rece the heart¡¯s function, even while he was missing a heart.


    Ssh! Water went everywhere.


    Billis emerged from within the blood. He grabbed onto the sides of the bucket and panted intensely.


    A pair of strange dirt-yellow pupils resided within his eyes!


    ............


    Three dayster.


    Sabrina walked into the hidden room with arge te of mutton steak. Traces of blood still clung to the meat.


    This ce was on the second level of the stone tower.


    Apart from the few pseudo-adepts, no apprentices were allowed on this level. Beginner Apprentice Billis not only had a room to himself, he even had the privilege of having five daily meals personally sent to his room by pseudo-adept Sabrina herself!


    This kind of treatment undoubtedly invited the fervent jealousy of the other apprentices.


    However, only Sabrina knew the truth. It was hard to tell if the person that had locked himself in that hidden room was still that Beginner Apprentice Billis!


    Under Greem¡¯s strict orders, Billis had moved from the first level to the second level of the tower. He had not left his room since. He only hid within that dark and enclosed space, spending most of his day eating and devouring food with an eager passion.


    At first, Billis only ate those well-roasted and juicy steaks. However, even with the two chefs sent over by the city lord cooking non-stop, they were still unable to appease Billis¡¯ bottomless appetite.


    Three meals a day turned into five meals a day, then continuous feasting. Sabrina was reduced to a busy worker. She was constantly bringingrge tters of meat to and from the hidden room and the kitchen.


    Afterward, Sabrina realized that Billis didn¡¯t seem to be picky about the taste of his food or even if it was fully cooked. She decided to have the chefs do away with the fine cooking and marinating process. All they had to do was cut the meat into appropriate portions before quickly cooking it and sending it to Billis.


    In the end, Sabrina even decided to throw the bloody corpses of cows into the room with her mechanical ws.


    Finally, Greem was no longer able to stand the sight of all this. He called Sabrina over for a few words.


    The next time Mechanical Girl Sabrina visited Billis¡¯ room, she brought a live cow with her!


    ............


    No one knew whether it was intentional or not, but most of the apprentices in the tower had been sent out on errands.


    Sabrina extended four or five mechanical appendages from her waist and lifted a three-hundred-kilogram cow, which she easily carried into Billis¡¯ room.


    The room was dark and without light.


    In truth, Sabrina should have been able to see everything within this room. She had a strong mechanical eye capable of infrared sight and low-light vision.


    However, this room was different. It seemed as if a magical effect had been imbued in the darkness of the room. It didn¡¯t matter how wide Sabrina opened her eyes; she couldn¡¯t see anything. She only had a vague feeling that a terrifying secret hid within the darkness.


    Sabrina didn¡¯t dare to take more than one step forward. She stood in front of the door and sent the struggling cow into the darkness with her mechanical arms.


    Every time this happened, she would feel a strong pulling force on her mechanical appendages. If she didn¡¯t let go of the cow promptly, she might have been dragged into the darkness with the unfortunate prey.


    When she retracted her mechanical limbs, the cow had vanished, and some pale, green, and stinky slime clung to the appendages.


    Then the terrifying sound of tens of thousands of biting bugs would echo from the darkness of the room!

 Chapter 461 Bug Transformation

    Chapter 461 Bug Transformation


    Deep in the night.


    The bustling city of Gilneas had once again fallen into an unusual silence.


    The ravenous Billis was wandering inside the stone tower, looking for his prey.


    The ck robe draped over his body continuously swelled up and deted, as if there were many living creatures squirming about under the cloth. A strange cracking or crunching sound seemed to ring out from under the robe as well.


    This was the second level of the tower. There was no one else apart from Sabrina and Morse here.


    That was why Billis hadn¡¯t managed to find a suitable target, even after making several rounds through the corridors.


    At this moment, the images of several dozen locations were moving about in Billis¡¯pound eyes. He was dizzy from the information overload. He had just obtained this Bug¡¯s Eye ability.


    Billis silently stopped somewhere in the corridor. He attempted to sense for any motion behind a thick stone door. Four or five strange bugs with ck shells fell out from his robe.


    They were only the size of a fingernail, but they crawled on the ground in an agile fashion. These bugs crept into the room through the tiny gap under the door.


    Once they had made it past the stone door, Billis was immediately able to see everything behind it. Hispound eyes could share their vision.


    It was extremely bright inside the room. Pseudo-Adept Sabrina was crouched over a wooden table, carefully and solemnly grinding several extremely sharp spiral cross-des. As a mechanical girl, these spiral cross-des were one of her few long-ranged attacks. That was why she had to take them out and conduct proper maintenance on them every so often.


    An indescribable sense of danger suddenly surged through her heart as she was concentrating on the task at hand.


    Sabrina turned her head abruptly. The red mechanical eye under her silver mask quickly scanned the entire room. She didn¡¯t find anything out of the ordinary. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the infrared sensors in her left eye or the low-light vision in her right eye. Neither had picked up on any unusual lifeforms, apart from the few tiny bugs crawling in the shadows of the walls.


    Tiny bugs!


    Sabrina¡¯s mechanical eye suddenly glowed brightly.


    This ce might notpare to an actual adept¡¯s tower, but it still had tight defensive arrays. How would it have let several bugs make their way into her room?!


    Having understood that, several narrow slits immediately opened up in Sabrina¡¯s body. Three spiral cross-des shot out and shed towards the shadows like shes of lightning.


    Those strange bugs clearly couldn¡¯t stand up to the spiral cross-des that had been enchanted with piercing and sharpening effects. The five dots in Sabrina¡¯s infrared sight immediately extinguished. At the same time as the bugs died, a muffled grunt rang out from outside the stone door.


    Sabrina didn¡¯t even hesitate. She opened the stone door and charged outwards with instant-cast wands in each hand and silver mechanical appendages all around her. Yet, she couldn¡¯t see a single form in the narrow corridor illuminated by the gentle light of illumination crystals.


    The enemy was quick to run!


    A savage light gleamed in Sabrina¡¯s eyes. She intended to immediately send a magical message to Sir Greem, who was on the third floor. Yet, just as the light of a magical message had gathered about her mouth, Sabrina changed her mind. She picked up the spiral cross-de that had just exterminated the strange bug.


    Some pungent slime seemed to have gotten onto the de. The ooze glowed with a ghostly green glow under the light.


    Could it be him?


    Sabrina hesitated for a little longer before finally dispersing the magical light with a wave of her hand. She turned and returned to her room. Nothing else happened after she shut the door.


    At the far end of the corridor, there was a ceiling that wasn¡¯t illuminated by the crystals on the walls. At the moment, strange ck beetles crowded this corner.


    A tide of beetles surged out once the corridor returned to its previous silence. The beetles climbed down the walls and onto the ground, once again reforming into a strange human figure wearing a ck robe.


    Bug¡¯s Eye, Bug Swarm Transformation, Shadow Tunneling, Earth Spike.


    These were the various abilities that Billis obtained after assimting the Queen Bug.


    However, his Spirit was still too weak. He was still incapable of supportingrge-scale swarm activities. He could only split out twelve beetle scouts at the moment.


    Billis¡¯ current Spirit was only at beginner apprentice level. However, hisbat ability had risen by several degrees. He was no longer the same pushover apprentice.


    Sir Greem had mentioned that the Queen Bug he assimted had once belonged to Evil Bugs Acteon. Evil Bugs Acteon was a powerful adept whose strength was acknowledged by all. That meant his path to advancement had already been established. All Billis had to do was train his Spirit, and he would steadily rise to adept-level.


    He might still have been a beginner apprentice now, but the speed at which he would advance was destined to be several dozens, or even a hundred times, faster than other apprentices.


    He was destined to be a powerful bloodline adept in the future!


    This prevailing belief stimted Billis. He was barely able to suppress his bubbling desire to head to the first level and start a massacre.


    Blood and flesh! He needed blood and flesh!


    For some reason, Billis¡¯ intense desire for blood and flesh had not disappeared since he sessfully assimted the Queen Bug.


    If it weren¡¯t for Sir Greem sternly warning him not to go hunting in the stone tower, Billis would have turned all those apprentices, maids, and servants into his prey.


    Billis stood up and looked at the stone door at the end of the corridor before turning and disappearing into the darkness around the corner.


    He wasn¡¯t the opponent of these pseudo-adepts as he was right now. In fact, he couldn¡¯t even sneak up close to them. Thus, if Billis wanted to hide the secrets he held, he would have to lower his standards and feast on those below advanced apprentice first.


    Billis hadn¡¯t taken two steps in the dimly lit corridor when he suddenly stopped.


    His master seemed only to have emphasized him not being allowed to hunt in the stone tower. He never mentioned anything about outside of the stone tower. If he snuck out of the tower under the curtain of night...No one would notice if a few people went missing from Gilneas City, would they? It had a poption of several tens of thousands after all.


    If this had been any usual circumstance, the kind and caring part of Billis¡¯ humanity would have rejected this sort of unreasonable ughter. However, the mes of starvation had lit a fever inside him. He no longer cared about what feelings he had about the situation. Instead, he bowed before his instincts to kill and hunt. Billis turned and dashed towards the closest window.


    ............


    Greem, who had been reading books on the third floor, shook his head and let out a soft sigh when he sensed Billis¡¯ aura vanishing from the stone tower.


    As the stationed adept, he was able to rely on the defensive array, along with his powerful Spirit, to sense everything within the tower. Nothing in here could escape his spiritual senses. That was why Greem knew everything that Billis had just done. In fact, he had merely allowed him to do so.


    If it weren¡¯t for Greem, Billis¡¯ weak attacks would never have been enough to allow him to escape this tower.


    Greem casually tossed out a magical golem core and summoned a wind critter. He had the wind critter levitate in midair and follow behind Billis. With this eye in the sky, Greem would have aplete grasp of Billis¡¯ every action in Gilneas City.


    Greem¡¯s impression of Billis the beginner apprentice was pretty good!


    He was loyal, resilient, hardworking, and even somewhat kind. Billis was an apprentice with a decent moralpass. Unfortunately, his elementium affinity had never been a dominant trait. That caused him to have inferior talent and cursed him to be stuck at beginner apprentice level.


    However, his twin attribute of earth and darkness had been activated after this sessful assimtion of the Queen Bug. They were finally dominant traits over his other attributes. This would clearly affect the future development of his bloodline path. Moreover, how a person¡¯s personality would develop after merging with another lifeform¡¯s differing character was also an extremely interesting subject of research!


    Greem immediately started collecting the necessary research materials after having the Chip construct a research project.


    It was as easy as flipping his wrist for Greem to hide from Billis¡¯ senses while he gathered essential data and behavior on him!


    The only thing Greem needed to be careful of was ensuring that Billis didn¡¯t cause too much trouble. Otherwise, if rumors started to spread, some unwanted problems would stille their way. It wouldn¡¯t even matter if Greem managed to get Alvar to put a lid on things.


    Unlike Meryl, Billis was like Gargamel back in Fire Throne. They were subordinates that Greem was secretly assembling for his future development. Thus, if it was possible, Greem didn¡¯t want him exposed to certain people too early.


    Having finished dealing with Billis¡¯ matter, Greem took out a knowledge crystal from his pouch. He tossed it about in his hand and fell into deep thought.


    This knowledge crystal hade from Adept ndre¡¯s storage space. All sorts of bits and pieces of knowledge were recorded in it. It was easy to tell that it was the iplete knowledge that ndre had somehow stumbled upon in his life as an adept. The water adept had recorded it all in this knowledge crystal to prevent himself from forgetting some crucial details.


    Just a while ago, the Chip had rearranged the bits and pieces of magical knowledge within. After filtering out the 87% useless knowledge, the remaining 13% significantly expanded Greem¡¯s library of knowledge.


    He unexpectedly obtained a vital detail from this 13% of iplete knowledge.


    Soul Equipment could further evolve!


    Greem had Soul Equipment of his own. It was the tome that he had obtained from the den of the Demon Flower. Ever since he had gotten his hands on it, the Scroll of Voodoo had always been by his side. It had been a great help in countless battles in the past.


    First, this trait of the Soul Equipment to stay by its owner¡¯s side was a fascinating subject of research for Greem.


    Sadly, his knowledge and information had always been quite limited. Greem didn¡¯t know where to start if he wanted to venture into research like this.


    That was why Greem had always treated the Scroll of Voodoo like an advanced-level magical tome meant for the sole purpose of storing six instant-cast spells. Greem had never really considered how to exploit and further utilize the functions of the Scroll.


    However, Greem had unexpectedly obtained this strange detail from ndre¡¯s knowledge crystal.


    If the power of the Scroll of Voodoo could be further improved...


    Greem narrowed his eyes and started to consider whether it was worth his time to go collect some knowledge rted to Soul Equipment!

 Chapter 462 Elementium Golems

    Chapter 462 Elementium Golems


    The tumultuous city of Gilneas had finally returned to peace.


    The Second ss resource site had been ruined beyond repair after this conflict.


    For the resource site to regain its functionality, they would first have to repair the severe damage done to the geography by the three adepts. Yet, if one had that many resources, they might as well reconstruct the resource site in another location.


    That was why the Sarubo n decisively gave up on this resource site after they received thepensation from the Aki n. They only performed some light repairs on the Iron Ring Mine and got it to resume functions.


    Apart from assigning some of the apprentices to the mine and Gilneas City, the rest were all recalled back to the n headquarters.


    As the Aki n members retreated from the surrounding areas of Gilneas City, the conflict between the Sarubo and the Aki finally reached a temporary conclusion with the Aki¡¯s loss of face.


    Even though everyone knew that things weren¡¯t truly over, both mid-sized ns managed to restrain themselves on the surface. Tensions hadn¡¯t escted to the level of a n war.


    Pseudo Adept Sak, who was the cause of all the conflicts and the person who murdered the Aki n¡¯s apprentice, was hiding in Feidnan City and managing to keep his life for the moment. On the other hand, the name of the me Demon started to spread once again.


    Greem had defeated two Aki adepts alone, and he had even managed to capture both of them as prisoners. Such a ridiculous urrence didn¡¯t frequently happen, even in the entire history of the Zhentarim area. Thus, Greem¡¯s title of the ¡¯me Demon¡¯ was once again mentioned by people, gradually bing known by all the adept ns.


    The Sarubo n itself had a pretty solid background in the first ce. Now they also had a new and rising star in Greem. For a while, many adept ns and organizations in the central area of the continent had optimistic predictions about the Sarubo n¡¯s future!


    However, all of this didn¡¯t concern Greem, who hid within the stone tower without taking a single step out.


    During the days while the dust settled, many adepts had made special trips to Gilneas City to visit Greem.


    There were those who specially came to congratte Greem, those who happened to pass by and decided to meet him, and those who heard of his reputation and began to invite him on adventures and explorations. Of course, the majority of them were still individuals who came over to see if they could purchase a top-ss golem.


    Indeed!


    As news of the battle slowly started to spread, the elementium golem that had allowed Greem¡¯s magnificent performance in the fight turned into the focus of everyone¡¯s attention.


    People once again took a look at Greem¡¯s rise to prominence. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the Fire Lord or the Infernal Tyrant or the Wind Dragon this time; powerful golems had always been Greem¡¯s greatest ace with which he used to turn the tables in a fight.


    It indirectly proved that Greem was a person capable of crafting golems!


    In a situation where the number of resources spent was the same, the elementium golems were inferior to metallic golems of the same grade, due to ack of a durable body. However, therge size and heavy weight of metallic golems made them impossible to carry around without the use of a golem talisman.


    In such situations, a high-quality elementium golem would be a precious and valuablemodity!


    Many adepts appeared after hearing news of Greem¡¯s feats. They were willing to spendrge numbers of magical crystals to have Greem build a custom-madebat elementium golem for them.


    Everyone knew that esoteric adepts had a fairly high failure rate when crafting magical items. Thus, every visiting adept would prepare two to three sets of magical materials and high-grade elementium cores, all for the sake of obtaining a magical golem that they would be satisfied with.


    Greem was initially extremely apprehensive of this idea.


    Just like everyone¡¯s investigations showed, high-quality elementium golems were undoubtedly Greem¡¯s most important insurance that had allowed him to survive until now. If his enemies also got their hands on simr golems, it would be unclear if he would still possess his dominance and advantage in a battle.


    Yet, when a rich and wealthy adept dumped three sets of resources in front of him and requested only one well-crafted elementium golem, Greem finally cracked. He couldn¡¯t suppress his greed and epted the adept¡¯s conditions.


    For the next three days, the adept stayed in his stone tower, vaguely revealing parts of his ability to Greem and providing more detailed and specific lists of requests.


    Greem couldn¡¯t directly scan the adept¡¯s body to obtain detailed information. Still, he could already formte a vague outline of their bodily attributes and casting habits through the information they had provided him.


    This preparation work took a total of three days. The Chip used this period toplete the model construction and data calction for the custom-made golem.


    The adept had provided Greem with three First Grade, peak-level wind elementium cores. He needed Greem to create a mount that coordinated spells and attacks with him.


    With the help and guidance of the Chip, Greem already had an 89% sess rate with this kind of golem design and creation. It was far higher than his 64% sess rate when it came to Second Grade golems.


    Thus, with no mishaps, Greem sessfully created a mighty Razorwind Hawk for his client in a single attempt. Of course, Greem kept the process of creating it under wraps!


    When the adept finally left in satisfaction, Greem managed to keep two First Grade, peak-level wind elementium cores and quite a lot of other materials.


    Inparison, the magical crystal fee that the adept had paid was no more than small change!


    Greem quickly epted three other requests after this sweet harvest. Apart from one instance of a mistake where he exhausted one set of materials, hepleted all of the orders in a single attempt.


    This efficiency caused him to be rich in an instant!


    Moreover, all of the elementium golems he created were excellent products. They only consumed 70% of the energy an ordinary golem would, yet they were also 30% more powerful. However, the truly outstanding factor about Greem¡¯s elementium golems was the fact that they only took about 50% of the Spirit that a regr golem would.


    That also meant that the same amount of Spirit consumed could allow for two elementium golems to summoned to the field at the same time, as opposed to just one.


    That was just a little too scary!


    In fights between adepts, summoned golems were often treated more as cannon fodder or meatshields. They were rarely used as the primary force inbat. The main reason for this was due to an elementium golem taking up an adept¡¯s Spirit when summoned.


    An adept only had so much Spirit. If too much of it were taken up by an elementium golem, there wouldn¡¯t be enough for them to cast spells with.


    Take for example the veteran adepts. A veteran adept would have between ten to fifteen points of Spirit. If they wanted to summon an elementium golem of simr strength, it would tie up six or seven points of their Spirit. While the elementium golem was still activated, this portion of their Spirit would perpetually be in use, continuously supplying and fueling the elementium golem.


    This missing portion of Spirit would cause quite a bit of disruption to a veteran adept, be it the regeneration of Spirit, or the casting ofrge-scale spells. That was why most adepts chose to believe in their own abilities over golems, especially when the golems¡¯ powers were not ideal.


    However, golems created by Greem, even those at elite-level, only took up three to four points of Spirit when summoned. That meant that a veteran adept just needed to exhaust six to eight points of their Spirit, and they would be able to support two magical golems of simr power by themselves simultaneously.


    It would be like three ¡¯adepts¡¯ attacking together. Even if two of those ¡¯adepts¡¯ were slightly weaker, they would still form a terrifying force to be reckoned with!


    In fact, one could go even further in their theorycrafting. A veteran adept could give up on the battlefield and choose to summon four elementium golems of simr power to themselves. An adept like this could rely on the golem¡¯s reckless bombardment to force back an enemy and keep them at a distance.


    That was far safer than the adept themselves fighting on the battlefield!


    As long as the enemy possessed no sneak attacks or skills that allowed them to bypass the elementium golems, this was a wless, brainless, and sufficiently savage way of fighting!


    It didn¡¯t matter how much of a genius you were, how much faster you could cast your spells, or how much more powerful they were. When faced with four or five fearless elementium golems, the continuous streams of attacks and suicidal assaults would be enough to make you back off.


    Once the secret of Greem¡¯s golems had spread out through various means, all adepts that heard of the news were moved. In particr, those adepts that mainly relied on summoned beings fell into a craze.


    While more and more adepts hurried to Gilneas City, Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen of the Sarubo n personally made it to the stone tower. He somewhat forcefully persuaded and dragged Greem back to Feidnan City.


    His excuse was a notably legitimate one as well!


    ording to the Sarubo¡¯s secret intelligencework, several Second Grade adepts had set their sights on Greem.


    Greem should have never revealed that First Grade peak-level Wind Dragon of his in the previous battle. The core he had used to create the Wind Dragon with was an actual Second Grade core.


    It meant that Greem¡¯s current golem crafting skills were sufficient to work on Second Grade cores.


    If the Sarubo n managed to gain one or two additional Second Grade magical golems out of nowhere, it would be devastating news for any rival ns!


    Even if Greem couldn¡¯t create Second Grade golems, just an army of twenty or thirty First Grade peak-level golems created for the n would allow them to perpetrate a bloody ughter against their enemies!


    It was due to these considerations that the Sarubo leaders had Greem forcefully brought back to the n headquarters. In fact, they had even alerted Lord Sarubo himself.


    Greem agreed without pause when he heard that the n wanted him to help them create a batch of elementium golems.


    Adept F¨¹gen brought him to a highly-secure resource warehouse on the sixteenth floor of the adept¡¯s tower.


    F¨¹gen had to use seven magical techniques and undergo sixteen different identity tests before the warehouse doors finally opened.


    "Work hard, Greem!" Adept F¨¹gen raised his arms in excitement, "You will be the hero responsible for the rise of the n."


    Behind him, in that somewhat small magical room, nearly a hundred crystalline gems radiating tremendous elementium power were grouped together. These were all Second Grade elementium cores!

 Chapter 463 Mutual Benefit

    Chapter 463 Mutual Benefit


    A problematic negotiation began with this abundance of resources.


    A stable sess rate was the most important consideration for a qualified esoteric adept.


    After a period of consideration, Greem reported his sess rate to Adept F¨¹gen as 17% for Second Grade elementium cores, and 36% for First Grade elementium cores.


    Due to unavoidable energy loss, all elementium golems and their cores would devalue by a certain degree during the crafting process. For example, it was already decent that Second Grade elementium cores could end up as First Grade peak-level after passing through Greem¡¯s hands.


    Greem himself hadn¡¯t even reached Second Grade. He had no concept or idea of the real power of a Second Grade adept. Apart from knowing that any attack from a Second Grade adept could reach a terrifying number of two hundred points, Greem knew nothing about them.


    That was why he couldn¡¯t possibly go beyond his grade and forge a true Second Grade golem, regardless of how talented he was!


    Of course, Adept F¨¹gen couldn¡¯t possibly be so trusting of the base sess rate that Greem gave him. However, he still had basic knowledge about the professions of golem masters and puppet masters. An ordinary esoteric adept¡¯s sess rate when crafting a First Grade elementium golem was roughly around 42%; that wasn¡¯t much higherpared to Greem. Not to mention that Greem¡¯s golems were all modified and improved golems. They took up less Spirit, consumed less magical power, and were more powerful!


    With these merits in mind, it was understandable for Greem¡¯s sess rate to be slightly lower than ordinary esoteric adepts.


    Since Greem dared to present a 36% sess rate for First Grade elementium cores, he had undoubtedly fiddled with the numbers a little. Still, with the baseline 42% of an ordinary esoteric adept, it wasn¡¯t too unbelievable an amount, even if he was lowering it by a little.


    In truth, Adept F¨¹gen had already mentally prepared to haggle for lower prices, even before talking to Greem. Right now, to F¨¹gen¡¯s surprise, the sess rate that Greem reported was still above his mental baseline. That undoubtedly caused Adept F¨¹gen to be extremely satisfied at Greem¡¯s obedience.


    As for Greem¡¯s im that he was unable to craft Second Grade magical golems, Adept F¨¹gen chose to believe it.


    After all, even the Wind Dragon golem that Greem had crafted for himself had only reached First Grade peak-level, despite using a Second Grade dragon crystal. The golem¡¯s most potent attack had also barely reached a hundred and fifty-five points. That was even inferior to the Infernal Tyrant.


    Of course, this had to do with the two golems¡¯ assigned positions on the battlefield.


    The Infernal Tyrant had been nned as a mighty me cannon at its inception. Add that to the fact that fire spells were known for their offensive power, and the Tyrant¡¯s most potent attacks could reach around one hundred and seventy-five points. The Wind Dragon possessed high-speed mobility, and wind spells were also known for being light and fast. Consequently, the Wind Dragon¡¯s best attack only reached a measly hundred and fifty-five points.


    After figuring out each other¡¯s baseline, F¨¹gen and Greem finally started to argue over the exchange rate of the golem crafting.


    ording to Adept F¨¹gen, Greem would have to provide an elementium golem with at least First Grade elite-level strength for every three Second Grade elementium cores and supporting materials that the n provided him with. The n would purchase these elementium golems at a price of twenty thousand magical crystals per golem.


    On the other hand, Greem leaned towards being paid with Second Grade elementium cores. He wanted the n to provide him with four Second Grade elementium cores in exchange for not taking any payment for the elementium golems.


    Both parties were unwilling to back down on this issue. After all, it concerned Second Grade elementium cores. Every single Second Grade elementium core had a base price of over fifty thousand magical crystals here on the Continent of Adepts. Moreover, they often couldn¡¯t be found on the market. Collecting these cores was troublesome.


    Even the Sarubo n could only take out so many Second Grade elementium cores, thanks to the two lesser nes that they had been running for a long time. A small n might not even be able toe up with more than ten Second Grade elementium cores.


    After some serious haggling, both parties finally reached an initial consensus. For every seven Second Grade elementium cores that the Sarubo n provided Greem with, Greem would have to produce two elite-level golems; the n would not pay a separate fee for the golems.


    They would set the time allowed for the crafting process at one year!


    However, Greem had also mentioned that he needed to return to Fire Throne for this job. After all, that was his territory. The undergroundva sea that helped his cultivation and energy regeneration was also there.


    Adept F¨¹gen reluctantly agreed to this condition after consulting Lady Sanazar.


    However, Adept F¨¹gen also attached a condition to it. Greem was not to leave Fire Throne without reason. If there were a need to go out, Greem would have to ask Adept F¨¹gen for permission and be escorted by him.


    This measure was actually for Greem¡¯s safety!


    After all, an esoteric adept of such strategic significance to a n was very likely to fall into the trap of a rival n if they went out. If Greem didn¡¯t want to die mysteriously, his best choice was to be a hermit and stay in his tower.


    As for his title as the me Demon? That counted for nothing in the eyes of enemy Second Grade adepts.


    Furthermore, Adept F¨¹gen also agreed to send Meryl over to Fire Throne to further reinforce the tower. It was synonymous with tacitly allowing Greem to build a faction of his own.


    This kind of privilege was usually only reserved for Second Grade adepts in an ordinary n.


    The fact that Greem could start a faction of his own while being at First Grade was more than enough proof the Sarubo n¡¯s sincerity!


    Greem had his own suspicions about why the Sarubo elders were so easygoing about this matter now. It was highly likely to be an open conspiracy of theirs.


    Greem had always walked on the path of a fire adept, trying his best as abat adept.


    Yet, there was a turn of events over the past few days. Greem had demonstrated tremendous potential as an esoteric adept. That aligned just right with the intentions of the Sarubo higher-ups.


    Crafting two elementium golems for the n in one year. Greem would spend most of his time during this one year on the treatment of the elementium cores and the crafting of the elementium golems. It would be a massive profit for him. If he were fortunate enough, he would even obtain an extra Second Grade elementium core. However, in exchange for this wealth, he would have to pay the price of his power stagnating for prolonged periods of time.


    That was torturous for a person whose ambition was to be abat adept!


    At the moment, the benefit given to Greem was just far too substantial. That was why he would passionately cast himself into the grueling grind of golem crafting. After three to five years of this tediousbor, and he would find his past ambition and passion worn away, despite obtaining plenty of resources and magical crystals.


    The Sarubo n had arge enough resource reserve to rely on this method and chain Greem to hisb. If three to five years weren¡¯t enough, then they would make it thirty to fifty years. On the one hand, the n would be able to convert inactive resources into activebat power. On the other, they would be able to wear away Greem¡¯s drive.


    Thus, the Sarubo n changed their strategy of suppression after discovering Greem¡¯s talent. Instead, they became much more acquiescent and protective of him.


    Greem couldn¡¯t care less about the n¡¯s schemes and conspiracy.


    With the help of the Chip, the speed and sess rate at which he crafted golems was unimaginable to outsiders. That was why their idea of chaining him to theb with this deal was an utterly mistaken one!


    That instead gave him the time and opportunity to temper his Spirit legitimately.


    Adept F¨¹gen nced at Greem with aplicated light in his eyes when they parted ways. He gave advice with certain hidden implications, "I saw something strange on the body of your subordinate apprentice. You should be more careful. Don¡¯t be deceived by a certain brat¡¯s superficial obedience."


    Greem was slightly shocked. He now knew that the change to Billis hadn¡¯t managed to escape Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s senses. He could only nod and acknowledge the advice.


    Once the negotiations with the n wereplete, they signed a magical contract thatsted for as long as twenty years. It was only then that Greem used Feidnan City¡¯s teleportation array to return to Fire Throne. Meryl and Billis returned with him in this manner. Sabrina and the other apprentices, on the other hand, would have to go back by themselves.


    The base price of a single person using the long-ranged teleportation array was two thousand magical crystals. Three people together would be six thousand. If it weren¡¯t because the n chose to exempt them from the fee, Greem would not have been willing to spend this much money to save four days journey.


    In truth, it wasn¡¯t that Adept F¨¹gen had be more generous this time. Instead, it was because he couldn¡¯t ept the possible risks that Greem would have to take on an ordinary trip back.


    Apart from being a powerfulbat adept, me Demon Greem was also an exceptional golem crafter. Such rumors had already spread throughout the central area of the continent. Letting Greem go back to Fire Throne on his own under such circumstances was an unforgivably dangerous act!


    To prevent anything from happening on the way, F¨¹gen could only consent to exempt Greem¡¯s teleportation fee!


    ............


    The brilliant light from the teleportation array faded away.


    Greem shook his dizzy head. When his vision finally settled down, he saw Gargamel holding a staff in one hand, a scroll in the other, and biting a potion vial between his teeth.


    Greem hadn¡¯t informed Gargamel before his return. Moreover, he had used the teleportation array within Fire Throne. That was why Gargamel immediately hurried to the array after sensing themotion in the teleportation room. He brought Eva along with him.


    The frail and skinny Gargamel, with his sharp features, opened his round mousy eyes wide as he carefully evaluated the three individuals that had teleported into the tower. He let out a sigh of relief when he saw Greem¡¯s familiar silhouette. He quickly put away his equipment and called over the forest spirit that had been hiding in the shadows. Both of them greeted their master.


    In all honesty, Gargamel might not have been much in terms of power, but as a butler, he did an excellent job.

 Chapter 464 Report

    Chapter 464 Report


    The meeting in the teleportation room was somewhat awkward.


    Eva seemed to be slightly oversensitive. She disyed quite a lot of hostility towards Billis, who cloaked himself under his robes.


    If it weren¡¯t for Greem and Gargamel being present, she would likely have failed at suppressing her instincts and struck at Billis. Even with Greem here, Eva was still openly hostile towards Billis, as if she didn¡¯t want to get close to him.


    When he saw Eva¡¯s response, Billis let out a sinisterugh while hidden under the thick ck robe. The pale greenpound eyes under his hood were a chilling sight to behold.


    Inparison, Meryl and Gargamel could also sense Billis¡¯ potential danger, but they weren¡¯t feeling the same intensity as Eva was. After all, Billis¡¯ intermediate apprentice-level of power was too deceptive!


    In less than half a month, Billis had managed to rise from beginner apprentice to intermediate apprentice. It was only because his regr presence was too weak that Gargamel and Meryl had rarely taken notice of him before this. That was why neither of them had realized the change in his power.


    Billis¡¯ actions had be increasingly inconspicuous ever since he assimted the Queen Bug. He had be more mysterious and never showed his face in public locations. Even today, he was wearing a ck robe and hiding in the corner furthest from the rest of the party. Meanwhile, he was silently looking at everyone from under the shadows of his hood.


    "Go and find a suitable room for yourself on the fourth floor. I have something to tell you tonight." Greem picked up on the awkward atmosphere in the room and turned to give Billis an order.


    Billis bowed and acknowledged the order with a harsh voice, before leaving ahead of everyone else.


    Meryl and Gargamel looked at each other. Their eyes filled with utter iprehension.


    The fourth level of the adept¡¯s tower was the rest area for the stationed adepts. Even the more favored pseudo-adepts were only allowed to stay on the third level. They were not to set foot on the fourth level unless otherwise permitted. Yet now, Greem had given this privilege that belonged to adepts to an intermediate apprentice. This...


    "Let¡¯s go to my ce!" Greem nodded at the other three people, "A lot has happened to the situation outside. We will need to rework a lot of our arrangements."


    Gargamel and Meryl nodded in silence.


    Eva was utterly disinterested in these trivial chores, but she didn¡¯t dare to go against the will of the tower¡¯s master. She could only follow along with the rest.


    Half an hourter, Gargamel finally understood everything that had happened in Gilneas City during this period, thanks to Greem¡¯s narration. However, an expression of pity appeared on Gargamel¡¯s mouse-like face when he heard that Greem had been chained with heavy shackles by the n due to his ability to craft golems.


    After all, he had be a wandering adept precisely because he despised the exploitative actions of ns!


    His wrinkled forehead scrunched up further when he heard that Greem had promised to hand over two elite-level elementium golems to the n every year.


    As a potions master, Gargamel had personal experience in crafting adept-level magical items.


    One could disregard apprentice-level potions. Three or four days were enough to brew a batch of those, especially those that they were already familiar with. On the other hand, adept-level potions often required ten to fifteen days to bepleted. That was due to the number of materials needed for the creation process. Every one of those materials had to undergoplex procedures of selection, filtering, treatment, extraction, refinement, and much more.


    Moreover, the failure rate was rtively higher!


    Gargamel, at his current level, couldn¡¯t craft potions of any higher quality than that.


    His Spirit was no more than seven points at this point. Such weak Spirit was incapable of sustaining the creation process of high-quality potions that took long periods of continuous and precise mental maniption.


    It was because of how well Gargamel understood this that he could understand the difficulty of crafting two elite-level golems in a single year.


    An elite-level golem would require two to three months toplete. If the crafting process failed, this time could multiply by several times. Even if Greem were hugely sessful in his efforts, he would need four to six months toplete the n¡¯s assignment. That left him with only half a year to improve his abilities.


    However, if Greem failed one of his attempts, he would only have three months of free time left. If he failed twice in a row, he would have to spend his entire year in theb!


    Day after day, year after year, perpetually staying in the cold and silentb, repeating the same monotonous work; that kind of life would be enough to crush the passion and ambition of most esoteric adepts!


    It also caused the esoteric adepts to be one of the slowest-improving groups among adepts.


    Gargamel hesitated for a moment and finally expressed his thoughts. He didn¡¯t understand. Greem had always been a brilliant and sharp individual. How could he have not seen through the trick that the Sarubo n was pulling on him? Why would he instead agree to these harsh conditions?


    Was he blinded by the reward of those Second Grade elementium cores?


    Meryl also looked at Greem with concern when she heard Gargamel¡¯s question.


    In finding the determination toe with Greem to Fire Throne, she had essentially severed her ties with those in the n. If Greem¡¯s power were suppressed at a certain level and never improved, then they, as his followers, would not end up much better. Thus, Meryl was also concerned with Greem¡¯s answer.


    "Don¡¯t worry!" Greem knew very well how the two of them felt, "I have my ns on this matter, as well as sufficient countermeasures. Also..."


    Greem paused for a moment when he reached her.


    "...I have already figured out the method and path to advance to Second Grade. I happen to need this period to umte and condense what I have learned. Thus, this thing is only beneficial for me. There is nothing bad about it!"


    Advancement to Second Grade?


    Expressions of shock appeared on Gargamel and Meryl¡¯s faces when they heard Greem¡¯s reply.


    Greem was their master (teacher), and he had power enough to impress and convince them. However, it had only been eleven years since he advanced to adept. Yet he was already thinking about progressing to Second Grade.


    How could this not cause them to feel as if lightning had struck them!


    In particr, Gargamel, who had advanced to adept seventy years ago, felt like his entire worldview was falling apart. Was the difference between one person and another thatrge? Had he been living a dog¡¯s life for all these years?


    "It¡¯s not as exaggerated as you think. I just understood where the path forward lies." Greem never expected a casual sentence from him would cause his two subordinates to put on such exaggerated expressions. He couldn¡¯t help but exin, "Even though the path is clear, it¡¯s still a long journey ahead. I estimate that I can¡¯t reach the threshold to attempt to advance to Second Grade without another eighty to ny years!"


    So that¡¯s how it was!


    However, thinking about it some more made Gargamel experience that terrible feeling of despair and being abandoned by fate. Greem had still managed to find his path so quickly.


    "Alright, alright. You¡¯ve asked your questions; it¡¯s time for mine," Eva was already impatient from waiting at the side: "Gre...master, what was with that ck-robed person earlier? Why..."


    Eva¡¯s questions immediately dragged Gargamel and Meryl out of their thoughts. They once again cast their eyes upon Greem.


    "His name is Billis. He used to be a beginner apprentice. Gargamel, you personally epted him into the tower." Greem slowly started speaking.


    "Billis..." Gargamel stroked his wispy goatee as he muttered to himself.


    This name sounded familiar to him, but He couldn¡¯t reconcile the person he saw today with the person from his memories.


    "Was he the first apprentice to want to join the tower? But his aura..." Gargamel had already recalled the person in question, but he couldn¡¯t be sure yet.


    Things like retentive memory and recollecting past things were child¡¯s y with an adept¡¯s Spirit. However, an adept typically relied more on the aura of a soul to recognize an individual apart from just the physical characteristics.


    Everyone¡¯s life force and soul mixed to form their own unique aura. This aura could be stronger or weaker, and it could even change with advances to the soul origin. Still, for a person¡¯s soul aura topletely change within such a short time was virtually impossible.


    At least, an apprentice adept shouldn¡¯t possess such a strange ability to do so!


    "Just a while ago, Mary came back from the other ne. She killed Evil Bugs Acteon and gave the Queen Bug he assimted with to me after wiping away his soul brand. Thus, I had Billis assimte with it!"


    They were just a few short sentences, yet they hid a shocking story behind them. The twists in the plot were many and unexpected. It would be hard to describe them all even if they were written in a book.


    Meryl had some idea of the tensions between Greem, Mary, and Acteon. She could only whisper to Gargamel and Eva what she knew when she saw their confused expressions.


    "Then, is Lady Mary our mistress?" Gargamel voiced what he thought since it was the first time he had heard of this.


    Greem¡¯s face froze.


    Meryl was giggling from aside, "This isn¡¯t certain, you know? Teacher still has Sister Alice. She isn¡¯t an easy one either. Lady Mary¡¯s paying a visit to her. Who knows whether the two of them will still have a vicious fight between them!"


    "Why¡¯s there still an Alice? " Gargamel was clearly a person who loved gossiping. He immediately asked with gleaming eyes, "Who is this Alice? Why haven¡¯t I heard Master mention her before? Quick, tell me, tell me..."


    Greem hastily interrupted his subordinates¡¯ gossiping and asked with an expression that was neither crying nor smiling, "Gargamel, you haven¡¯t given me a report about the situation near Fire Throne! Are the magical creature leaders still quiet? Did they bring any trouble to the tower?"


    Gargamel finally remembered something when Greem asked him.


    "This isn¡¯t good, Master. I almost forgot to tell you," Gargamel¡¯s expression turned solemn and grave, "Something huge has happened in the ck Forest."

 Chapter 465 The Battle in the Night

    Chapter 465 The Battle in the Night


    The ck Forest at night was never peaceful.


    Unpredictable hazards hid everywhere in the silent and ghostly darkness.


    There were forest beasts that went hunting under cover of night, bloodsucking vines that hid among ordinary vines, acid swamps that looked like grass but were actually the homes of Ghost Nannies, and ferocious predators that wandered in the depths of the forest like phantoms.


    Including all of the rumored corruptors, monsters, and magical beasts would give you a genuinely primal world with a variety of resources and species¨C the ck Forest.


    Sixty kilometers to the north of Fire Throne wasnd owned by the Aba Beemen.


    It was deep into the night, yet his ce was still bustling with activity and a particr sort of urgency.


    Squads of beeman soldiers holding poison-tipped spears and arrows beat their wings and moved between the trees. Many of them were also carrying in their hands the prey they had hunted. Most of them were ordinary forest creatures such as goats, wolves, and apes. Once in a while, one would also see berserk apes, Otyughs, and human mercenaries in their grasp.


    Under ordinary circumstances, each beeman squad would employ fifteen beeman soldiers.


    They would move through the fifteen kilometers of ck Forest around their den in a specific pattern, carefully and seriously searching for prey they could hunt. Every time they ran into a beast or other magical creature that hade out to hunt meant an inevitable battle.


    It was precisely the terrifying offensive abilities of these prey that often ensured casualties in these beeman squads; almost none of the beeman squads returned unscathed. The worst battle saw only four beeman soldiers return. However, without exception, all of them returned with varying sizes of spoils.


    The Aba Beemen¡¯s nest was constructed in a dense stretch of forest. It was a strange magical structure that resembled a bee¡¯s nest.


    This ce was also the Aba Queen¡¯s delivery room. It was the special ce where she gave birth to new beemen.


    Ordinary beemen had no right to enter the hive. Only specially selected servants could stay by the Queen¡¯s side, continually feeding her and taking care of the newly-spawned eggs.


    The hatching cycle of a beeman was extremely short. An egg only required a short seven days to hatch into a beeman soldier. That was why an Aba bee nest could produce beeman soldiers at a\ breakneck pace as long as there was enough food.


    ording to the method by which an adept¡¯s strength was calcted, an ordinary beeman soldier only had 0.7 points of Strength. However, they couldn¡¯t be underestimated because of their feeble power. The danger of these creatures exponentially increased if they managed to rally some of their allies.


    They had wings for flying and were skilled in the use of poisoned weapons. They could fire long ranged attacks with their bows and arrows while using their spears to dive down as a melee attack. These advantages stacked together and benefitted from their countless numbers. Once a tribe of Aba Beemen managed to gain a foothold in a territory, they would quickly rise to be the rulers of the nearby area.


    That was why almost all other creatures in the vast ck Forest were on the Aba Beemen¡¯s hunting lists. The only exceptions were the powerful magical creatures that had tough hides, such as the brutelephants and the wyverns.


    During the time Greem had been gone from Fire Throne, the uncontested Aba Beemen had increased their numbers at an explosive rate. Their unrestrained reproduction had undoubtedly threatened the forces around Fire Throne, which had barely just gathered together.


    In a mere seven or eight days, Gargamel had already received news about the deaths of two outsider apprentices and a dozen mercenaries. For a moment, the fifteen kilometers around the Aba Beemen¡¯s nest was categorized by Fire Throne as a zone of extreme danger. The tower even established a strict ban going near the ce.


    The rise of an excessively powerful magical tribe around Fire Throne was not a good thing, no matter how you looked at it. Consequently, the tower restricted mercenaries and low-grade apprentices from getting close to the Aba Beemen¡¯s hunting area. They also released an internal extermination mission to send high-grade apprentices out to exterminate the rampant Aba Beemen.


    ............


    An encounter had just reached its conclusion in a narrow mountain stream nearby.


    A three-meter-long and three-hundred-kilogram heavy ming Tiger that had strayed from the pack had be the prey of a beeman hunting squad.


    The dead ming tigery on the ground without moving. Many short ck arrows pinned its yellow body filled with red stripes. There were even two long spears embedded in its neck that had been snapped in half.


    The Aba Beeman soldiers¡¯ strength might not be enough to kill a berserk ming tiger, but the toxic poison on their weapons could. This unfortunate ming tiger had been poisoned to death!


    However, the ming tiger¡¯s strong fireballs had still tremendously damaged the beeman hunting squad. Four beeman soldiers had been blown to bits when they failed to avoid the fireballs. Another three had died to the ming tiger¡¯s jaws and tail when they had dived at it.


    The remaining eight beeman soldiers had all received varying degrees of fire damage. However, this didn¡¯t prevent them from happily cutting up the ming tiger¡¯s body to take its meat back with them.


    This kind of magical creature meat, filled with elementium aura, was an exceptionally nutritious food. It was the favorite food of the Aba Queen.


    Just as they gathered around the tiger¡¯s corpse and busy at work, a voice rang out from the forest nearby. A humanoid creature cloaked in thick ck robes appeared within the vision of the soldiers.


    Human!


    Not only was this neer a human, but they were also a human caster that the Queen most liked to feast on!


    That was because the only ones that dared to walk through this forest in ck robes were those so-called apprentice adepts.


    The beeman soldiers couldn¡¯t help but be happy.


    Weng, weng, weng!


    The buzzing sound of their wings began to spread out throughout the forest.


    The eight beeman soldiers tossed away the bloody flesh in their hands, picked up their spears, and instantly took to the skies. A few of them spread out to avoid possible magic attacks from the human apprentice. They took cover behind thick branches and vines and quickly closed in on the ck-robed individual.


    What puzzled them was the fact that the human hadn¡¯t tried to run. Instead, they raised their head. A pair of pale green eyes shone from beneath the shadows of the hood, staring coldly at the beemen.


    Even though they could tell something was off, the beeman soldiers still initiated their attack ording to their usual strategy.


    The first wave of attacks was naturally the mid-ranged poison arrows.


    Phew! Phew! Phew!


    Eight poisoned arrows shot through the space between the trees and barraged the human like a swarm of locusts.


    Surprisingly enough, the enemy had no intention of dodging. They didn¡¯t even try to cast any defensive spells. They just stood there and allowed the poison arrows to hit against their body. Judging from the dull sound of the poisoned arrows hitting their target, the human wasn¡¯t wearing any metallic armor beneath their robes.


    The eight beeman soldiers became even more excited. They quickly closed-in while firing even more arrows at the apprentice. When they were within ten steps of the hooded figure, they tossed aside their bows and charged at the enemy with forked spears in hand.


    The ck-robed human suddenly unleashed a strange bug¡¯s screech when all eight spears dug into their body. The human¡¯s body exploded into a sky full of ck beetles, instantly drowning the eight beeman soldiers in a terrifying tide of insects.


    It was the first time the beeman soldiers had ever faced such a terrifying retaliation. They screamed and tried to get back on their feet, but they were covered in ayer of ck beetles. Their faces, heads, bodies, feet, and even their semi-translucent wings were crawling with these strange insects.


    What frightened them more was that strange chattering sound of silkworms feasting on mulberry leaves, and the intense pain from every part of their body.


    A few stronger beemen barely managed to fly by pping their wings. However, their vision was obscured, causing them to fall to the ground after crashing into branches.


    The beeman soldiers struggled and frantically fought back. Many ck, bean-sized beetles were crushed into a paste or reduced to pools of ck liquid by poison. However, their remaining numbers were still enough to kill these eight unfortunate victims with no magical abilities.


    Soon, the forest regained its peace.


    Only chilling crunching sound remained in the silent ck Forest.


    A short momentter, the ck beetles gathered together after their feast. They once again reformed into the appearance of Billis.


    The apprentice adept that had just experienced glorious victory in his first battle stood in the pool of blood on the ground. He silently savored thefortable feeling of sweet blood coursing through his body.


    The Aba Beemen were a type of magical creatures, but their appearances were abination of elves and bees. They were humanoid magical creatures. In the past, Billis¡¯ personality would never have allowed him to conduct such a cruel act as devouring the enemy alive.


    However, after he had assimted the Queen Bug, all of this seemed to be a matter of fact for him. He was indifferent to it all!


    This ce is the world of my goals!


    Greem had always suppressed Billis¡¯ violent and bloodthirsty nature after his sessful assimtion. Even though Billis had enjoyed plenty of snacks in secret before this, those weak humans couldn¡¯t provide him with much energy needed for evolution.


    Inparison, the magical creatures soaked in elementium power were the most suitable food for him!


    Those sweet and delicious human apprentices were also walking delicacies. However, Master Greem had given him strict orders. He was not to eat adepts or apprentices without permission. That was why Billis had to suppress his impulse to hunt in the tower. He followed his master¡¯s guidance and came here to look for the Aba Beemen.


    Once he had finished eating, Billis pushed into the depths of the forest with heavy and shambling footsteps. A swarm of bugs followed closely behind him like loyal hunting hounds, sweeping the bits and pieces of flesh left on the ground along with them.


    Billis had only barelypleted the evolution of his body of bugs. He now possessed an immortal body of bugs, but he had yet to cultivate a singlebat beetle. His current self was undoubtedly frail. He could only turn around and run if he ran into those powerful magical creature leaders.


    That was why it was time for him to find a ce to create his bug¡¯s nest!

 Chapter 466 The Greem Faction

    Chapter 466 The Greem Faction


    Two beeman squads that had gone out hunting went missing in a single night.


    It immediately caused unease in the nest.


    The silent bee nest started bustling once again when the sun rose. Squads of fully armed beeman soldiers charged out of the nest and began a close and careful search of the area where the team had gone missing.


    They quickly discovered the battlefield, but the signs of conflict that remained at the location were shockingly few.


    Apart from some burn marks and snapped arrows, they could not find any corpses or even flesh or blood. That was extremely rare in a battle between magical creatures!


    One was able to deduce that the hunting squad had run into a ming tiger based on the clues left on the ground. However, the situation perplexed the beeman officer. If there had been too many ming tigers for the hunting squad to take down, they had only needed to p their wings and hide in the canopy to escape; there was no need for confrontation.


    Since the hunting squad had initiated a fight with the ming tigers, it meant the leader of the team was confident in being able to take them down. But where were they now?


    One could tell that the site of battle had been carefully cleaned up. It was so clean that it was hard to find even a shred of meat or a drop of blood. If it weren¡¯t for the unique body odor of the ming tiger that lingered in the ce, the beemanmander would have suspected that a human adept had broken into their territory.


    The signs left behind didn¡¯t seem like the actions of a human adept.


    Those greedy human adepts were not cruel and bloodthirsty magical creatures. They would only extract their prey¡¯s organs, which contained their life essence, after killing them. They wouldn¡¯t act like savage magical creatures and strip the victims of every piece of flesh.


    While the beemanmander was beating its wings and moving through the scene of battle in hopes of finding some clues, a beeman soldier came rushing to his side, panting.


    "There... there¡¯s a demon¡¯s nest..." The beeman soldier racing back from the distance to send this message was obviously in shock. He stuttered even as he spoke.


    That made themander¡¯s heart tighten with unease.


    A short momentter, the beemanmander hurried to that ¡¯demon¡¯s nest¡¯ with arge troop of beeman soldiers behind him.


    It used to be the den of a terrifying gray bear. However, this twenty square metersrge cave had forever lost its owner with the arrival of the Aba beeman.


    However, it was clear that this ce had been taken over by some horrible demon sincest night.


    This ce looked like an abandoned bug¡¯s nest. The floor, walls, and ceiling were all covered in ayer of strange moss. Erected in the middle of the cave were five or six dirt piles that resembled anthills. However, these piles of dirt had already been taken apart and pushed over. One could no longer see how it had looked when they were still intact.


    The beemanmander was immediately disgusted by the thick scent of blood when he stepped into the cave. He could no longer suppress his rage when his eyes fell upon the crumbled piles of dirt.


    These goddamned bastards!


    This damned anthill-like bug¡¯s nest was constructed with a mixture of beeman flesh, wood splinters, and mud. The beemanmander could see the remnants of wings and beeman stingers in the crumbled dirt pile.


    Judging by the scene before him, this ce was an ursed nursery for bugs to devour the corpses of the beeman soldiers!


    They had been one step toote. Those damned insects had already hatched and moved out from their nest.


    "Send out all patrol squads. I want them tob every inch of the forest nearby. We must drag out those evil bastards from hiding." The beemanmander¡¯s sharp roar rang out in the cave.


    Squads of beeman soldiers swarmed out of their nests at this order. They instantly turned the ck Forest into a riotous and chaotic swamp.


    ............


    All that was urring in the distant woods didn¡¯t affect the daily routine of Fire Throne.


    Greem had just finished an instance of tempering his Spirit. He received a magical message from Billis when he returned from the underground sea ofva.


    Billis had sessfully gained a foothold in the Aba beemen¡¯s territory and had seeded in hatching five Stinging Scorpionrvae.


    After assimting with the Queen Bug, the difference in Billis¡¯ elementium affinity and talent caused Billis not to hatch carcass beetles. Instead, they were the Stinging Scorpions that possessed the twin attributes of darkness and earth.


    Thanks to the message Billis sent to him, Greem was able to obtain an elementary understanding of the scorpionrva¡¯s basic abilities.


    Sadly, these scorpionrvae had lost the beetle¡¯s flying ability. In exchange, they obtained the ability to tunnel rapidly and the use of earth and dark attacks. Their central strategy was to tunnel below the enemy¡¯s feet beforeunching terrifying melee attacks. Their primary weapons were therge pincers and wicked jaws at the front of their body, and their poison stinger.


    They could cast a weakened version of Quagmire and trap the enemies around them in a thick, swamp-like pool of earth elementium. Their attacks also had strong shadow damaged attached to them.


    Of course, once theservae managed to mature into adolescence, they would be able to use Earth Spikes and Shadow Assault while hidden in the ground. As long as the enemy couldn¡¯t drive them out from under the ground, they would be undefeatable.


    If they went one step further and evolved into elite-level magical creatures, they would awaken to even more numerous and terrifying magical abilities. However, Greem could not predict the capabilities they would get without reliable data and information.


    The tough shells of scorpions would protect them from most physical damage, while Quagmire and their shadow attacks would allow them to keep arge group of enemies close by. From this perspective, Billis¡¯ future army of stinging scorpions would likely be an army of meat shields that specialized in chaotic up-close fights.


    That would significantly relieve the pressure of defending from the elementium golems, and allow them to disy the full extent of their power as long-ranged cannons!


    Greem had vaguely started forming his thoughts about warfare after thest nar war.


    The so-called nar war was no more than an embellishment of nar invasion. The invaders had to face both the suppression of the nar consciousness and the tides of natives. A lone invader would bemitting suicide in trying to start trench warfare against the enemy under these circumstances!


    That was why the key to victory was possessing a method to raise an army while maintaining mobility and stealth quickly. Greem¡¯s elementium golems, Mary¡¯s vampire army, and Billis¡¯ stinger scorpion army were all critical and irreceableponents of this strategy.


    Of course, trying to invade a mature ne with their current ability was immensely difficult. That was why Greem, after considerable thought, decided to set the operation date for after he became a Second Grade adept.


    Greem was sure that their servant army strategy would havee to fruition by then. It wouldn¡¯t be like now, where everything was only in the early stages with just bare bones to show; he couldn¡¯t even pick out amander or general that could hold his own.


    Greem quickly shifted his attention to himself after thinking about Billis¡¯ message. It was his second time tempering his Spirit!


    Thest Spirit tempering had caused his Spirit to fall from seven points to six points. Greem had only managed to return his Spirit to the limit of seven points after a period of rest and adjustment. He had also used multiple methods to hasten the recovery of his Spirit.


    However, his second time tempering had caused his Spirit to once again fall to 5.8 points. Intense and continuous quakes had appeared in his mental space as well.


    This trembling on the mental level had both benefits and drawbacks.


    The benefits were that these tremors could shake the already solidified mental space. They would detonate the hidden troubles that were detrimental to the growth of Greem¡¯s mental space and allow him to have a wider area for future development. The downsides were that these mental quakes involved Greem¡¯s body and mind. Greem would be unable to cast any spells before they resolved. He would need to be careful when drawing upon his Spirit, to not affect the adjustments happening in his mental space.


    Of course, the spells stored beforehand in the Scroll of Voodoo were a different matter!


    ording to Greem¡¯s estimates, he would require five to seven days to eliminate these mental quakes, even with sufficient potions and resources to waste. If he took into consideration the limits of his physical body and the need to nurture his Spirit, Greem felt like it was most suitable to determine a Spirit tempering period to be between ten to fifteen days.


    In this state, he would lose almost all of his casting abilities. He could only rely on the tower and its tight defensive arrays to protect himself. If the enemy discovered this weakness of his, Greem¡¯s life would be in danger!


    Two dayster, Adept Keoghan arrived at Fire Throne as nned, bringing with him plenty of materials. Snox and the many disciples under Greem had also tagged along with him. They were a lively party of over two dozen people.


    These were all the apprentices that the Sarubo n had assigned to Greem over the past ten years, and they had all been sent along on this trip.


    It was clear that the attitude of the Sarubo higher-ups towards Greem had changed drastically after the new contract was signed. Their previous suppression had turned into the current support. It was apparent that Lady Sanazar had plenty of confidence in being able to wear away Greem¡¯s ambition. So much so that she didn¡¯t mind giving Greem an advance of benefits.


    Greem knew very well what was happening.


    Under the management of Meryl and Gargamel, Fire Throne hosted a grand banquet to wee Adept Keoghan. They were also using this banquet to provide the apprentices that had been stationed in the tower a chance to interact and meet the neer apprentices.


    After all, for a long time hence, Fire Throne would be the ce where they lived, studied, and trained.


    The current members of Fire Throne included three adepts¨C Greem, Meryl, and Gargamel (Eva and Mary were yet to be included). There were also five pseudo-adepts, eleven advanced apprentices, thirty-four intermediate apprentices, and many more beginner apprentices.


    A tiny faction belonging to Greem had silently appeared in the center of the continent just like that!

 Chapter 467 Rune of Explosion

    Chapter 467 Rune of Explosion


    Adept Keoghan¡¯s arrival was an unexpected surprise to Greem.


    After such a long time here in the ck Forest, arge batch of magical beasts had started piling up in the warehouse. Some of them were even adept-level magical creatures.


    Killing them and harvesting their organs was the less profitable way to go about maximizing their value. Taming them would undoubtedly have been the method that would yield the most benefit. However, the Fire Throne hadn¡¯t been able to find a sufficiently powerful tamer despite a long time searching; they had no choice but to put the idea to rest.


    Consequently, after multiple estimates, turning these magical beasts into loyal voodoo beasts was best suited to benefit the tower.


    That was why Greem took the opportunity and persuaded Adept Keoghan after he arrived to stay and help him deal with the magical creatures in the Fire Throne.


    There was the corpse of an elite-level giant berserk gda, a wyvern king, a ming tiger, seven razor boars, and twenty-three berserk gdas.


    From this, one could see the importance of a leader-ss monster in a tribe!


    Once the giant berserk gda had died, all of its subordinate berserk gdas lost their only protection. They became easy targets for the magical creatures and tower apprentices to hunt down.


    It could honestly be said that nearly half of the berserk gda tribe had fallen into Greem¡¯s hands. The rest either fled far away or became the food of other magical creatures.


    There were no such things as firm friendship and alliance in the ck Forest!


    Even the Wyvern King had to pretend to be buddies with the giant berserk gda when it was still alive. However, the moment the giant berserk gda died, these strong wyverns were the first to descend upon the gdas.


    Adept Keoghan was wildly surprised by the fact that Greem could take out so many live magical creatures at once. Apart from sending that first batch of seven Second Grade elementium cores, Keoghan had alsoe here with the intention of helping the n mend their rtionship with Grem.


    That was why Keoghan agreed to Greem¡¯s tiny request without even thinking. However, Keoghan wished for Greem to pay him in elementium golems for the creation of these voodoo beasts.


    Naturally, Greem happily agreed to this condition.


    Greem had alsoe into contact with some voodoo beasts back in the Knight¡¯s ne.


    In simpler terms, a so-called voodoo beast was a wild beast that had been modified with magic.


    The adepts used unusual methods to wipe away the beast¡¯s memory and part of their intelligence. They then nted a control rune into the creature and made them bend to their every will and whim. An adept only needed to give a single order during a battle to trigger the native ferocity of the voodoo beasts, causing the animals to attack the enemy without any fear of death.


    A beginner voodoo-beast master could only handle ordinary woond creatures. Keoghan, on the other hand, was an intermediate voodoo-beast master. He was qualified to handle adept-level magical creatures. That was why Greem couldn¡¯t convert these magical creatures into activebat power despite having them in his possession for a long time. The main reason was that the process of wiping away a magical creature¡¯s memory and imnting a control rune was far tooplicated. A slight mistake would cause the voodoo beast¡¯s power to excessively degrade.


    In fact, if a voodoo beast master¡¯s technique were insufficient, the modified voodoo beast would even lose most of itsbat instinct. It would turn into an idiot that only knew how to rush forward. An excellent voodoo-beast master would be able to preserve a magical creature¡¯s originalbat techniques to the fullest extent. They were even sometimes able to allow the magical creature to regain its intelligence.


    Adept Keoghan cast a spell to check the magical creatures. The giant berserk gda had great bodily attributes from the start. It was a powerful elite-level magical creature itself. Consequently, there was a chance Keoghan could modify it into an adept-level voodoo beast. The other magical creatures, on the other hand, could probably only be turned into pseudo-adept-level voodoo beasts due to their inferior quality.


    Those razor boars were even worse. They would likely only retain advanced apprentice-level powers after modification.


    Greem had already predicted Keoghan¡¯s estimations and left the job to Keoghan¡¯s discretion. Greem finally narrowed his eyes and started thinking while Keoghan went into the voodoo beast modificationb with the magical creatures.


    It was only now that Greem truly understood the value of the elite-level golems he would provide the n.


    An elite-level magical creature leader would lose that muchbat prowess after voodoo beast modification. They would even fall from elite-level to the ranks of an ordinary adept. Other magical creatures would fall below adept-level.


    If Greem exchanged all of these magical creatures for elementium cores, he could guarantee that he could convert them into adept-levelbat forces. The reason behind this was the auxiliary effect of the Chip.


    With the detailed modifications and designs of the Chip, along with its auxiliary functions, Greem could exploit an elementium core¡¯s power to its fullest extent. He could transform them into perfect golem cores with the smallest rate of energy loss. Adept Keoghan didn¡¯t have the conveniences he had. Keoghan had to rely on his natural skills and unique techniques topensate.


    That exined why the n ced so much importance on his ability to produce elite-level golems.


    However, throughparison to Adept Keoghan, Greem instantly understood that he could not be as honest with his skills when he was creating these golems. He would have to tone down his skills most of the time. He couldn¡¯t develop golems that were too perfect, or it would be very likely that he¡¯d attract even more attention from the n.


    Greem opened the wooden box that Keoghan had given him once he returned to his room.


    Radiant elementium aura immediately started to gather towards the wooden box. The brilliant lights made it hard for Greem to open his eyes.


    Seven elementium coresy neatly inside the box.


    Without the restriction of the magical arrays on the box, the corresponding elementium particles surged and gathered around the elementium cores, continuously merging with the crystals. The elementium cores themselves possessed a trace of the aura of the narws, which was why the elementium particles were still attracted to them even after their owners were dead.


    That was why Greem could currently seeing the Second Grade elementium cores shing in the mist-like concentration of elementium as if they were taking deep and slow breaths. The rhythmic pulse of the elementium formed ripples around the elementium cores, causingyers of elementium halos to gather around the increasingly radiant crystals and making them appear all the more dazzling.


    The crystals resembled the nucleus of a star, radiating a celestial brilliance as they continued to release spots of light that dispersed into the air. All of this made the elementium cores look like something out of a dream while still containing fantastically profound truths within them.


    Greem extended a hand and lightly caressed an elementium core. When his slender fingers touched it, the fire elementium within him shed with the elementium aura inside the core. Ripples spread out throughout his mental space.


    Three wind elementium cores, two fire elementium cores, one dark elementium core, and one earth elementium core.


    Different elementium cores would provide Greem with entirely different experiences. An in-depth analysis of the elementiumposition of these cores would help Greem better understand the difference between Second Grade creatures and lower lifeforms.


    It was important to note that the consciousness core that adepts formed during their advancement wasrgely in reference to the tangible elementium cores residing in the bodies of magical creatures. Consequently, extended periods of contact with multiple Second Grade elementium cores would greatly help Greem over time.


    However, Greem¡¯s doubts increased the longer he came into contact with these Second Grade cores.


    The owners of these cores had already died. Their mental consciousness had also dispersed to the winds. What was it that the crystal cores were relying upon to maintain the power of the narws within them?


    Could the power ofws break free from the bounds of mental consciousness and solidify in the form of a material substance?


    What was the true nature ofws? Where did their powerse from?


    Greem¡¯s thoughts drifted as he caressed these beautiful crystal cores. His desire and expectations for the truths of the world hiding under all theseyers intensified.


    Magic, witchcraft; in the end, when taken apart, it was witchery and craft!


    At the simplest level of exnation, witchery was the practice of magic. It represented the supernatural, the chaotic, and the unknown. Craft, on the other hand, expressed the known techniques and the determinedws. Bothplemented each other and required the other. You couldn¡¯t be missing either one!


    Witchery represented the ancient adepts¡¯ desire to pursue truth in chaos. Witchery was also the incarnation totem by which they existed. The adepts of today mostly only pursued the craft. They were the kind of crafts and techniques that could provide them with power and strength.


    Greem, on the other hand, was trying to find a bnce between witchery and craft. In doing so, he would be able to see the truth of the world, while also possessing the ability to defend himself and not fall on the path of pursuing the truth.


    Of course, this might have been extremely greedy. However, if Greem was already this far down the road, what difference would a little greed make?!


    The Chip¡¯s voice suddenly rang out in Greem¡¯s mind as he was caressing the elementium cores and fantasizing about the future.


    [Beep. Sessfully deciphered variant fire elementium rune. Requesting instructions from host. Ry information?]


    What? The variant fire rune has been deciphered? Why did it take only take half the time estimated?


    All sorts of doubts popped up in his mind. Greem had the Chip send over the information.


    A slight stinging pain appeared in his mind. Greem then felt nearly half of all his Spirit evaporate in an instant. It was only then that he barely managed to take in that unimaginablyplex and terrifying stream of data.


    Strangely enough, even though Greem received a stream of data that had undergone severalyers of analysis and deciphering, it formed into a strange rune when it gathered in his mind. It was a rune in his mental space that was burning with a crimson fire.


    Crimson fire?


    What the flying heck was this?


    Why did it give him a feeling of extreme danger?


    Even though it was clearly fire, Greem felt like his brain would quickly explode whenever he extended his Spirit within.


    Strange, powerful, and dangerous.


    Greem tolerated the difort and contacted this strange variant fire rune with his Spirit. He finally understood its effect.


    Rune of Explosion!


    It was actually a Rune of Explosion!


    When Greem¡¯s Spirit sunk into the rune, he had a vague feeling. If he managed to master this rune fully, then all of his future fire spells would probably be able to... explode!

 Chapter 468 Renowned Signature

    Chapter 468 Renowned Signature


    Greem fell into the busiest period of his life over the following days.


    The Spirit that had withered from tempering required long periods of meditation to recover.


    His mental space required nurturing from the continuous quakes.


    The Chip might have thoroughly analyzed the variant fire elementium rune, but he still needed to continue experimenting to turn the rune into part of his strength.


    Therge numbers of Second Grade elementium cores also had to be assessed and have data models constructed on them.


    The strange changes happening to Billis also needed to be recorded and processed.


    The order of the Fire Throne¡¯s rule was in need of further specification.


    He couldn¡¯t ignore the training of the tower apprentices either.


    ......


    The always lonesome Greem had never thought it would be this troublesome to manage a fully functional faction. He had never expected the internal affairs to be so numerous and annoying. If it weren¡¯t for Meryl and Gargamel, then he alone would never have been able to get Fire Throne functioning properly.


    It was only now that he truly understood why so many high-grade adepts would rather stay within their ns thane out and establish a new organization of their own.


    It was this difficult and torturous to establish a new organization!


    The number of adepts in the adept¡¯s tower was not sufficient. That was why even Greem had to start taking on sses for advanced spell techniques under Meryl¡¯s strong insistence. Fortunately, he only needed to teach sses four days a month. Otherwise, Greem wouldn¡¯t have been able to resist the urge to chase the apprentices away.


    He was like a wound-up top, never having a moment¡¯s rest. He weaved between different magicalbs all day long, conducting seven or eight magical experiments simultaneously. Even during the asional instance where he had free time, he also needed to make preparations for the magical golem crafting process that was about to begin.


    The only time he might have been able to rx during a day was when he had utterly exhausted his Spirit and closed his eyes to meditate.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s calctions, his mental space hadn¡¯t settled down since he had started tempering his Spirit. It was in a perpetual riot. However, in exchange, his meditation efficiency had increased by arge margin aspared to before. It was clear evidence that the Spirit tempering process he had tailored to his needs honestly had the effect of improving his innate potential.


    The Goblin Snox had also sessfully transferred his goblin shop into Fire Throne. He was now thergest arcane merchant within the tower. The goblin machinery he sold had be fresh new products that the apprentices were willing to try out. That was because they were cheap, easy to use, and had strange new effects that were not often seen in regr spells.


    If you wanted to bait a foolish ogre into an ambush from a distance, the Mechanical Chicken was a decent choice. The apprentices often didn¡¯t have enough magic power, and an Alchemical Bomb allowed them to retain offensive strength even when they ran out of magic. When the party was escaping from a terrifying magical creature, Rocket Boots might be able to save your life. When prey hid in a dark cave and refused toe out, an Explosive Chicken might be able to change its mind.


    These mechanical creations from another world always have all sorts of problems. For example, the mechanical chickens could have faulty settings and lead the ogre to its user. Maybe only two alchemical bombs out of three that were thrown would explode, or the rocket boots would throw you into the embrace of a massive tree trunk. But still, it didn¡¯t matter how you put it; when you had an additional option, life would always have a bit more surprise and shock to it!


    Greem also took the opportunity of his golems¡¯ fame and started trying putting up golems for sale in Snox¡¯s goblin shop.


    The first batch of golems was almost all at the pseudo-adept level. There were golems of practically every attribute: earth, fire, water, and wind. There were only ten of them, and he set each of their prices at a stunning eleven-hundred magical crystals.


    Based on Greem¡¯s analysis beforehand, this price should be slightly too high.


    After all, an ordinary apprentice adept only got paid around twenty to thirty magical crystals for every mission theypleted. Even those dangerous missions often didn¡¯t reward more than a hundred magical crystals. On the other hand, adepts would not think anything of pseudo-adept level golems. Adepts wouldn¡¯t buy them, and apprentices couldn¡¯t afford them. That was why Greem expected sales to be a problematic issue.


    However, Greem still underestimated the passion of apprentices towards the strengthening of their abilities.


    If those advanced apprentices could bring a pseudo-adept level helper along with them when they went on errands, they would be able to go unchallenged as long as they didn¡¯t run into real adepts or the skilled individuals among the pseudo-adepts.


    That was like a blessing from heaven for mediocre advanced apprentices.


    An apprentice alone might not be able to afford a golem, but two to three apprentices taking out all of their money could put together the ¡¯unimaginable¡¯ sum of eleven-hundred magical crystals.


    Thus, many apprentice parties that hunted in the ck Forest started using magic golems in their fights. The favorites of the apprentices among all the elementium golems were undoubtedly the stone golems and the stone serpents. With these monsters in their team, those tough and ferocious beasts and magical creatures could no longer disperse their formation.


    Many borate ns and strategies could be executed to their fullest extent with such powerful meat shields!


    Those magical creatures that needed to be dyed by tanks with their lives could now easily be taken on by a single stone golem. The casualty rates in the parties fell tremendously and the downtime where new recruits were hired also shortened drastically. Party members were almost always a fixed roster and their synergy improved at an exponential rate.


    Moreover, carrying the heavy prey back to the tower after each victory was no longer a problem.


    Given the elementium golem¡¯s convenience and power, many apprentice parties even specially designed strategies around them. They would shape the party¡¯s strength with the golem at its center and form a unique and differentbat party.


    The elementium golems of the goblin shop quickly fell into short supply as more and more parties obtained perfect victories and came home with plenty of spoils.


    ording to the feedback of apprentices after multiple uses, Greem discovered that the most popr golems of all were the earth golems and the water golems. One of them was beefy and could take on magical creatures in a melee. The other had spells that could slow down the enemy. Both of them were elementium golems that were favored by the apprentice parties.


    Inparison, the fire, wind, poison golems and those of other attributes were not liked by the apprentices. In fact, some of them even actively disliked these golems. The reason for this was because the damage these golems dealt the prey was too severe, despite being extremely powerful.


    That would significantly reduce the spoils of war for the apprentices and reduce their magical crystal ie!


    Consequently, after taking in the lessons learned from the first batch of golems, the second batch of golems that Greem put on sale in the goblin shop had been changed to only earth and water attributes. Of course, for the fun of it, Greem intentionally added in an adept-level earth golem to the mix¨C The Roaring Monster!


    An adept-level golem!


    And even an earth-attribute brute that the apprentice parties liked the most!


    It immediately caused an insane fight for the golem between the apprentices of Fire Throne!


    The price of three thousand magical crystals might intimidate most apprentice adepts, but it couldn¡¯t stop the mad passion of the pseudo-adepts.


    The opportunistic goblin Snox decided to hold a small auction in the goblin shop and allowed the pseudo-adepts to bid for the Roaring Monster. After a heated round of bidding, the veteran pseudo-adept Sabrina finally managed to obtain the Roaring Monster at the price of five thousand, two hundred magical crystals.


    That night, Sabrina publicly challenged the other six pseudo-adepts in the tower to test the might of this Roaring Monster.


    Sabrina and the Roaring Monster would take on all six of them!


    It was an adept level golem. Could Sabrina sessfully control it with just her pseudo-adept level of Spirit?


    The six pseudo-adepts dly agreed to the challenge with doubts and questions in their minds. A ¡¯friendly contest¡¯ began in the Magma Hall in front of the adept¡¯s tower.


    The results were entirely beyond everyone¡¯s expectations. Thebination of Sabrina and the Roaring Monster crushed the united efforts of the six pseudo-adepts with absolute ease. The Roaring Monster that stomped around with heavy footsteps and possessed Trembling Earth, Stone Toss, and Rock Armor had dominated the battlefield.


    In truth, the Roaring Monster alone brought a Second ss Quake along with it everywhere it went thanks to its massive stone body. Ordinary apprentices couldn¡¯t even stand on their feet when it was around, not to mention fighting it. Moreover, its enormous stone fists and Stone Toss crushed all apprentice level defensive spells.


    Even the pseudo-adept who was known for his earth-attribute defenses coughed up blood continuously after being blown away by a single strike from the Roaring Monster. The other apprentices were even frailer and didn¡¯t even dare be brushed by the Roaring Monster¡¯s fists.


    However, against such a barbaric opponent, would it work to stand further away and attack with spells?


    The Roaring Monster would immediately concentrate a massive amount of earth elementium between its palms andunch long-range tossing attacks from a distance.


    Anyone would lose all intent to chant and cast spells if they saw a rockrger than a carriage hurtling towards them. They would run away with all their might while screaming and shrieking.


    All Sabrina had to do was have the Roaring Monster casually make one round through the six adepts. She managed to force the pseudo-adepts to throw their arms up and surrender.


    It was an absolute beatdown of a battle!


    The six pseudo-adept gathered together and settled after the battle.


    Unless they could use some method to restrict the barbaric charges of the Roaring Monster, they would not be able to free their hands up and focus their firepower on this giant brute. The Roaring Monster¡¯s thick stone body and continuously regenerating stone armor was not something that could be destroyed with just two to three spells.


    This strength indirectly demonstrated the absolute dominance of adept-level golems over apprentice adepts.


    Gargamel also started promoting internal contribution points within the Fire Throne in coordination with the golem frenzy that Greem had started. As long as the apprenticespleted missions put out by the tower, they would be able to obtain corresponding contribution points apart from the ordinary magical crystal reward.


    They could then use these contribution points to enter the internal book storage within the tower or purchase specialties of Fire Throne, such as custom-made golems, high-grade potions, or the private tutorship of an adept.


    Greem and Gargamel once again spread the name of Fire Throne throughout the nearbynds through such means.


    Thus, as time passed, Fire Throne¡¯s elementium golems became a renowned signature of the central area of the entire continent.

 Chapter 469 Knocking on the Doors

    Chapter 469 Knocking on the Doors


    The Tower of Fate.


    The daily morning prayer had just ended.


    Nearly a hundred witch apprentices slowly left the ceremony hall. Only Snowlotus was left behind, silently waiting for Alice¡¯s orders.


    After half a year together, the rtionship between Alice, Snowlotus, and Sofia had be much closer than before. In particr, Snowlotus¡¯ mediation had also led to a great improvement in Alice¡¯s rtionship with the Witches of Deceit. The leader of the Witches of Deceit had even invited Alice to be a guest of the Moya n at an appropriate time.


    That was good news for Alice regardless of how one looked at it!


    "Alice, is there anything you need in having me stay back?" Snowlotus couldn¡¯t help but ask out of curiosity. She had only seen Alice frowning in silence despite quite an extended period of bowing in anticipation of Alice¡¯s words.


    "Today," Alice suddenly shook as she muttered uncontrobly, "A guest from far away will be visiting. I hope you can help me receive her first!"


    Snowlotus raised her head and evaluated Alice¡¯splicated gaze. She asked softly, "Will there be a fight?"


    Alice first nodded then shook her head. She spoke in frustration, "I can¡¯t be sure either."


    Snowlotus couldn¡¯t help but be even more shocked.


    Ever since she had officially be the Witch of Fate, there were almost no questions regarding matters within Alice¡¯s grade that she couldn¡¯t be sure of. Was it a high-grade adept that was visiting this time?


    Alice had already seen through Snowlotus¡¯ thoughts while she was secretly guessing. Alice put on a bitter smile and said, "It¡¯s not an enemy that¡¯sing our way. Rather, it¡¯s... one of my... very close sisters from the past. My rtionship with her is extremelyplicated. Conflict is very likely to arise if I simply meet her like this. That is why, before I see her, I need to divine certain things!"


    "I understand!" Snowlotus nodded and said, "I will personally greet her and ensure that she doesn¡¯t cause a scene!"


    After Snowlotus had left the ceremony hall, Alice let out a silent sigh. She then turned and gave instructions to the fairy lying on her shoulder, "You go ahead and prepare the astrology tform on the top level. I will go there immediately after I take a bath and change my attire!"


    The fairy had been yawning out of boredom, but she immediately leaped up in excitement when she heard this, "Helen¡¯s going right now. I promise I¡¯ll have everything done properly!"


    Elementium fairies like her loved ces with thick elementium aura the most. The divination ceremonies that Alice held at the astrology tform would always gather a massive amount of powers of fate. Being able to smell and take in the aura of fate while standing at the side was one of the rare enjoyments in the drab lives of elementium fairies.


    Alice turned her head to the west after seeing Helen flutter her translucent wings and fly into the distance. She couldn¡¯t help but let out another soft sigh.


    ............


    Fifteen kilometers west of the Tower of Fate.


    Five strange bats beat their massive wings in the blue sky and cut across the air like arrows let loose from a bow. They quickly flew towards the tall tower on end of the horizon.


    The deste Dragonblight sprawled beneath them, with not a single inch of green visible across the vastnd. Apart from the yellow-brown dirt, one could only see the piles of massive bones buried in the earth.


    The wind caressed thend. Sobbing sounds that sounded like crying phantoms asionally rang out as the wind blew through the gaps between the massive bones.


    Every once in a while, one could also see packs of magical creatures in this destend.


    It was an ominousnd cursed by fate!


    Mary could smell the dense power of a dragonsoul curse even though she was only flying through Dragonblight.


    "Master, why do I feel a chill in my heart. This ce is a little sinister!" Vanlier, who was always extremely sensitive to his surroundings, asked as he flew.


    "Of course it is," Maryughed coldly in disdain, "The most powerful Witch of Fate in the past had sacrificed nine dragons in this ce for the sake of that Tower of Fate. That is why this ce is called Dragonblight."


    "Master, you mean to say that all those things that we saw earlier are dragon bones?" Vanlier was so shocked he almost fell out of the sky.


    "They might be, and they might also not be," Mary shook her head, "Don¡¯t have any ideas about those dragon bones anymore. Did you think they would have been able to remain here for almost ten thousand years if it was that easy to take them? The aura of the dragon¡¯s curse here is revolting. Let us leave as quickly as we can!"


    Their group increased speed immensely. They rapidly closed in on the tower without alerting the wandering magical creatures below.


    It was already dusk when Mary and her vampires arrived at the Tower of Fate.


    The dark and heavy curtain of night fell over Dragonblight as specks of stars started to appear in the distant horizon.


    A blinding, colorful light shone from the Tower of Fate¡¯s high peak. Beautiful elementium halos appeared around the tower, rippling outwards andplementing the pitch-ck night sky. It was a magnificent sight to behold.


    A divination ceremony? It couldn¡¯t have something to do with my arrival, could it?


    Marynded two hundred and fifty meters away from the Tower of Fate as she thought to herself.


    Thanks to the radiant lights from above, Mary could see a lonely and pretty figure silently standing before the doors of the tower, as if she was waiting for something.


    "Pleasee in now that you, the honored guest, has arrived! Snowlotus has been waiting here for a long time under the orders of the owner of this tower." Snowlotus might not have been able to see Mary, but her supernatural senses allowed her to know that the person she was waiting for had arrived.


    "You are not Alice?" Mary took firm and steady steps towards the tower in the darkness. Her crimson eyes fixated upon the opponent without blinking.


    This woman was a beautiful, overwhelmingly proud, and seductive female adept. She had a long and slender figure, curvaceous body, smooth white skin, perfect and delicate facial features, along with bright red lips that had a trace of a cold smile on them. Her most eye-catching feature was the pair of blood-red eyes that gleamed with a crimson light in the darkness. They were almost crystalline, like the two most wless rubies in the world, and were exceptionally breath-taking.


    "You must be Ms. Mary?" Snowlotus couldn¡¯t help but be slightly surprised after taking a look at Mary. She bowed and spoke as Alice had told her to, "Lady Alice is already waiting for you inside the tower. Pleasee with me!"


    Snowlotus turned and disappeared into the doors behind her.


    What an opening gambit!


    Mary smiled coldly.


    It was the Tower of Fate that stood before her. This ce was undoubtedly Alice¡¯s home field. If she didn¡¯t dare to go in, didn¡¯t that mean that she was afraid of her?! However, if Mary walked into that girl¡¯s base just like that, she might fall into a trap.


    Even though Mary was still hesitating internally, she strode into the barrier of light with no hesitation and entered the Tower of Fate.


    Behind the light barrier was the arcane hall on the Tower of Fate¡¯s first level.


    It was free time for the witch apprentices now. They were gathered together in groups of two and three, giggling as they gossiped, softly discussed problems, or set up stores to sell the trinkets they made themselves.


    The witch apprentices immediately made way when they saw Snowlotus and bowed to greet her.


    Snowlotus maintained her calm and distantposure as she led Mary to the upper levels of the tower.


    Mary followed behind, her crimson eyes sweeping across the hall. She instantly saw through the power of all the numerous witch apprentices.


    Out of nearly a hundred witch apprentices, not one of them were pseudo-adepts. The strongest of them were at no more than the advanced level. In fact, over sixty or seventy percent of them were actually beginner apprentices.


    This distribution of apprentice strength couldn¡¯t ever be considered appropriate for this Tower of Fate!


    As the leader of the Witches of Fate and one of the rulers of the Northern Witches, the strength of Alice¡¯s subordinates was inferior to the random group of individuals that Greem had gathered back in Fire Throne.


    Alice¡¯s situation seemed to be a lot worse than she thought!


    Snowlotus brought Mary all the way to a guest hall on the eighth level of the tower. She then sat down with Mary inplete silence.


    It was clear that Snowlotus wasn¡¯t someone who was good at conversation. Mary also wasn¡¯t a person who would make small talk when there was no need. Thus, the two of them sat facing each other, closing their eyes and waiting in silence.


    Soon, Snowlotus even started meditating without another word.


    Mary opened her crimson eyes and looked at the girl¡¯s crystalline skin that seemed carved from ice. She couldn¡¯t hide the shock in her eyes.


    Alice was quite bold to have sent a subordinate like this to receive her. Was she not afraid that I would start trouble? At this distance, Mary had absolute confidence she could kill Snowlotus before she could react.


    After another hour, the dazzling stream of fate on the Tower of Fate¡¯s top floor gradually faded. It seemed the divination ceremony had concluded.


    As expected, seven minutester, a sweet voice rang out in the guest hall.


    "Sister Mary. As I expected, you came!"


    A slender and prettydy wearing a purple starry robe walked into the hall.


    "Alice?" Mary stood up in confusion.


    She had heard news of Alice¡¯s figure and appearance changing tremendously after advancing to Witch of Fate, but the woman before her was just far too drastic a juxtaposition to the loli in her mind. It caused Mary to be in a bit of a denial for a moment!


    "Sis Mary, you came here to see me right after your return. I¡¯m just too happy!" Alice smiled and walked to Mary¡¯s side.


    Snowlotus stood up silently and moved behind Alice.


    "Happy? What¡¯s there to be happy about?" Mary spoke coldly, "Did your divination spell not tell you that I¡¯m here to fight you?"


    The smile on Alice¡¯s face just hung there in the air.


    Er... Mary¡¯s still as straightforward as before. She¡¯s still so insistent, even when I¡¯m being so friendly. Cough. I guess I can only resort to that trick!


    Alice dropped her smile and looked at the eager Mary with resentful eyes. She said calmly, "We are not enemies, but allies!"


    "I know we are allies!" Mary¡¯s reply was still straight to the point, "I¡¯ve already fought with Greem. I can¡¯t beat him, so I¡¯ll listen to him. Now I want to fight with you. It doesn¡¯t matter who wins; the other person will have to obey them."


    What amazing logic!


    Alice¡¯s mouth couldn¡¯t help but be agape. She was utterly in awe of this friend of hers.

 Chapter 470 You Help Me, I Help You

    Chapter 470 You Help Me, I Help You


    Sadly, the battle that Mary had been preparing for didn¡¯t break out.


    Alice crushed her bubbling will to fight with a single sentence.


    "Sister Mary, do you not want to break free of the bloodline shackles on your body? " Alice had no choice but to throw her trump card out into the open when she saw how eager Mary was to go.


    The phrase, bloodline shackles, was like a sharp awl, stabbing right into Mary¡¯s heart. Her crimson eyes opened wide, her hair started billowing, and her bat wings suddenly unfurled. Her bloodthirst had reached its limits.


    "What......did......you......say?" Mary¡¯s face suddenly became cruel and violent. She pressed in on Alice one step at a time as if about to strike at any moment.


    "I said, I can help you find the vampire that gave you your bloodline!" Alice was utterly unfazed by Mary¡¯s abnormality. She spoke without any change in her tone.


    However Snowlotus, who was standing right behind her, suddenly had her skin turn even more crystalline and radiant. A violent and savage storm of ice and snow started gathering within her body, about to be unleashed at any moment.


    Mary no longer pressed forward once she reached within five steps of Alice. She could sense that the ice-manipting person behind Alice would explode if she took even half a step more!


    Mary¡¯s overflowing aura fell upon Alice, and her crimson eyes fixed upon Alice¡¯s without blinking. Alice didn¡¯t try to avoid it either. She stared back at Mary¡¯s eyes full of strength and anger. Iparable confidence and determination filled her own eyes.


    Mary finally understood at this moment.


    The Alice that she had always thought would be a little girl, who would never grow up, had indeed grown up. Not only was Alice¡¯s will so resilient that it shocked her, but even Alice¡¯s experience seemed to be more vast and epassing than her own.


    The one currently standing before Mary was no longer the wicked little loli that liked to put on a cute facade; she was a true witch whose mind had matured so much it was hard to tell its limits.


    Mary had made up her mind while she was on the way here; she would fight Alice first regardless of what excuses she had prepared. However, the bloodline shackles that Alice mentioned had moved her.


    It could also be said to be the eternal agony of all offshoot vampires!


    As offshoot vampires, they were different from true vampires.


    True Vampires were mostly the bloodline descendants of vampire families. Their bloodline was passed on generation to generation. There were almost no limitations by bloodline shackles on them. On the other hand, offshoot vampires were often ordinary men that had been turned into vampires by the Embrace of true vampires.


    Mary was even more of a special case. She was a unique vampire that had been cultivated and modified by that ursed Adept Anderson with vampire blood that he had chanced upon. Thus, in all truthfulness, it was more appropriate to call Mary a bloodline corruptor!


    It was because of this factor that Mary had started feeling severe bloodline conflicts ever since she had be an elite adept. If she didn¡¯t find a way to deal with the trouble deep in her soul and bloodline, then elite adept might be the limit she could reach for the rest of her life.


    Even if she wanted to increase her powers, that strange and intangible bloodline shackle would turn all of her efforts into a pipe dream. If she wanted to change this, the only method was to drain that vampire of their blood, thereby allowing her to be a ¡¯true¡¯ vampire!


    These were the secrets that Mary hid deep in her heart. Who would have known that Alice would expose them here? It wasn¡¯t hard to see why she was so affected that she almost lost control of her strength.


    Mary took several deep breaths and suppressed her instincts to go berserk. Finally, she managed to regain her rationality.


    "Tell me then; I want to listen to your conditions!" Mary put away her threatening looks and started conversing with Alice on equal footing.


    "I know you are looking for the location of that vampire!" A trace of a smile finally appeared on Alice¡¯s tense face.


    "Where is he?" Mary asked impatiently.


    "Is there any use in asking this question?" Alice smiled as she answered with a question, "Why? Could you actually bring men and kill your way to him, even if you knew his location?"


    "Why can¡¯t I?"


    Alice ced her hand on her forehead in pain.


    "Vampires have absolute authority over their bloodline descendants. Do you think you could even stand and speak with the vampire once you arrive before them? The vampire wouldn¡¯t even need to fight you. They only need to order you to kill yourself through the bloodline connection, and you would probably strangle yourself to death."


    Mary¡¯s body trembled uncontrobly for a moment.


    She had recklessly created blood servants and vampire spawn in the other ne. Those fellows were no more than worthless ves and cannon fodder in her eyes. They had no personal rights or privacy. When she needed to leave the ne, she was even cruel enough to activate her Shackles of Blood and turn the hundreds of subordinates that she couldn¡¯t bring with her into nutrition for her growth.


    She had felt as if everything was just as it was supposed to be when she performed those actions!


    However, there was now a person above her that could impose the same things upon herself. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine Mary¡¯s anger and fear!


    The more she thought about it, the more apparent things became. Mary¡¯s mind was now calmer and more rational than ever before.


    She raised her head and stared at Alice, delicately asking, "Then what do you think I should do?"


    "You don¡¯t need to be too worried!" Alice exined slowly, "I have already found that arch-nemesis of yours. We are very fortunate. He¡¯s still a First Grade vampire. We can still exterminate him with our strength. However, you definitely can¡¯t exterminate him yourself. In fact, you shouldn¡¯t even get close to him. That¡¯s why I will need to arrange the personnel to take him down personally. These vampires are all cautious. If we try and fail, we will likely alert them, and it will be much harder to find them again."


    "I understand!" Mary sighed and once again spoke, "I owe you for this one. As an exchange of benefits, I will also help you do on one thing with all of my abilities. I will not retreat, regardless of how dangerous it might be!"


    Alice let out a sigh of relief and walked forward to take Mary¡¯s hand. She softlyughed as she said, "Since we have already reached an agreement, then naturally, we are the best of sisters now. Oh! That¡¯s right, Sister Mary, did you know? I used to have a grandmother that really loved me in the past, but she... she... "


    Alice¡¯s blue eyes abruptly turned red at this point. Tears flowed down her face continuously.


    "What happened to her?" Mary gritted her teeth and asked.


    "She¡¯s been detained by some bad guys. She¡¯s even imprisoned in a terrifying ce and constantly being tortured.¡±


    Mary looked at Alice, who looked like she was about to cry again. Even though Mary knew she was probably looking at a massive trap, she had no choice but tomit to it for the sake of the bloodline shackles.


    "Alright, stop crying!" Mary said frustratingly, "You just want me to help you save a person, don¡¯t you? Tell me the location and the person, and I¡¯ll go now."


    Alice, who had just been sobbing, immediately broke into a radiant smile. She grabbed Mary¡¯s hand and swung it about, "As expected, Sister Mary really loves Alice. Alice will also try her best to do help Sister Mary on her matter."


    Having said that, Alice leaned up to Mary¡¯s ears and whispered a few sentences.


    As expected, this was no easy task. The enemy was the Dark Witches!


    This Alice had indeed found a good opponent for herself.


    Mary sighed and left with tremendous resentment in her heart.


    ............


    Bee¡¯s Nest.


    As the den of the Aba Beemen, the security of the bee¡¯s nest was undoubtedly the strictest of all.


    However, the appearance of a mysterious phantom these days had plunged the ¡®powerful¡¯ Aba Beemen into endless horror.


    Over the past month, nearly a hundred beeman soldiers had gone missing. That was the gift that the mysterious phantom had bestowed upon the Aba Beemen. Moreover, as the mysterious ghost grew stronger with each passing day, he was no longer satisfied with waiting to ambush beemen hunting squads near the border. Instead, he actively invaded the territories of the beemen.


    Now, even patrolling in the forest near the bee¡¯s nest was no longer a safe errand.


    With no other choice left to him, the Beeman Commander had to shrink the defensive line and increase the number of men in the hunting squads from its initial fifteen men to the current thirty. Theck of food also halted the Aba Queen¡¯s act of quickly expanding the tribe.


    The number of beeman soldiers in the bee¡¯s nest had fallen from its peak of five hundred and sixty men to its current number of four hundred and thirty-six men. The number of hunting squads had also been reduced from twenty-five to ten. It was an incredible blow to the bee¡¯s nest!


    The beemen¡¯s detailed investigations finally allowed them to figure out the situation. The one attacking the beeman hunting squads was no magical creature, but a human apprentice adept.


    And this was precisely what confused and bewildered the Aba beemen.


    What means did an ordinary human apprentice adept possess to devour so many beeman soldiers?


    This question was finally answered by some beeman soldiers that had been fortunate enough to escape.


    That damned human apprentice had walked upon the terrifying path of a bloodline adept. He could transform into a frightening bug man and continuously strengthen himself by devouring the bodies of beeman soldiers. He was also capable of hatching strange scorpions to act as his soldiers.


    Moreover, the scorpions that he hatched could hide under the ground. This ability was why the bee¡¯s nest was incapable of finding the enemy, despite sending out so many search parties!


    The Aba Beemen even sent messengers to the human adept¡¯s tower to protest the enemy crossing over agreed upon borders.


    Sadly, the human adept, that was skinny enough that he looked like a giant mouse, took out the peace agreement that he had signed earlier and rebutted. Spit flew everywhere as he exined borately to the beeman messenger that all of the adepts had stayed within the tower. None of them had taken a single step into magical creature territory.


    On the other hand, the conditions of the peace agreement did not regte the actions of apprentice adepts.


    Thus...


    Fire Throne would not be responsible for any actions of the bug apprentice. If the Aba Beemen didn¡¯t like him, they were free to kill him and eat his body.


    Going to the human adept¡¯s tower had yielded no result. Yet, it was also impossible for them to go asking for help from the other magical creatures nearby.


    As such, the Aba Queen flew into a rage!

 Chapter 471 Everyone Busy With Their Own Matters

    Chapter 471 Everyone Busy With Their Own Matters


    The ck Forest in the afternoon was unusually and ufortably warm.


    Tall trunks supported the massive umbre-like canopy.


    The distance between each of the ancient trees wasn¡¯t much. Their branches, leaves, and vines intertwined together to form the boundless expanse of forest. A thin mist wandered in the woods, and sunlight filtered through the gaps of the leaves to form nted pirs of light, turning the forest into a dream-like fantasy.


    There wasn¡¯t a single trace of a bug¡¯s call or beast¡¯s roar in the forest.


    The dirt beneath a massive tree suddenly started moving, and a tiny earth hill the size of a human¡¯s head swelled on the spot. Countless ck beetles surged out of the ground and gathered together to form a crawling figure of a human.


    This bug man formed out of a pile of insects stood silently for a while, as if he wasmunicating with some subordinates of his in the distance. A short momentter, the man raised his crawling head of bugs and turned to stare in the direction of the Aba Beemen¡¯s nest. Profound confusion filled his heart.


    The Aba Beemen had abandoned their outer hunting area and inner living area; they had all retreated into their nest. That was beyond his expectations!


    However, after some quick thought, Billis managed to deduce the actions of the Aba Beemen based on the knowledge crystal that Greem had given him.


    The knowledge crystal that Greem had passed off to him was full of content. It epassed almost everything about the Aba Beemen. It detailed the origin of their species, the organization of their tribe, their governance system, the mode of operation of authority, the fundamental attributes of the different members of the tribe, theirbat strategy, and the traits of the beemen sses.


    With this information, Billis could beat down these low-level magical creatures that even outnumbered his bug army. In fact, most of the time, Billis couldy down all sorts of traps and wait for the beemen to walk into them.


    Billis still managed to find the answer he needed from the knowledge crystal in response to this unusual behavior of the Aba Beeman.


    The Bloodlocust Bee. That was probably the only trick up the sleeves of those Aba Beemen!


    The bloodlocust bee was a type of terrifying otherworldly creature. It possessed adept-level power and was one of the rare individuals among the Aba Beemen that had individual power beyond an adept level.


    Any Aba Beemen tribe had to sacrifice the lives of three to five beeman soldiers on a daily basis to sustain the existence of a bloodlocust bee. That was why the Aba Queen wouldn¡¯t so easily hatch this terrifying creature that feasted upon its brethren, as well as the enemy, if the tribe didn¡¯t at least number a thousand.


    Yet now, the Aba Beemen had almost gone mad from torture by the annoying bug man. That was why they could no longer care for these taboos and instead prepared to hatch a bloodlocust bee to deal with Billis quickly.


    Recorded in the knowledge crystal was the fact that bloodlocust bees possessed resilient bodies that could evenpare to beginner body-refining adepts. Their flight speed was swift, and their terrifying scythe-like mouthpart could shred steel.


    Fighting against a monster like this was impossible. Even Billis himself might be hunted down and killed, let alone his seven sting scorpions!


    Hmph! If I can¡¯t beat you, then I¡¯ll just hide from you!


    Billis wasn¡¯t a brainless, wild magical creature that only knew how to run against a wall until it died. In any case, the mission his master gave him was just to limit the expansion of the Aba Beemen. Now that he had mainly aplished his task, there was no need to continue fighting them to the death.


    Return to the tower?


    A deadly murderous intent raged in Billis¡¯ heart when he recalled the forest spirit¡¯s angry look when she had seen him. However, that forest spirit seemed to be the partner of that mouse, and that mouse was his master¡¯s assistant. It wouldn¡¯t be easy toy a finger on her.


    Since he wasn¡¯t going to return to the tower, then he might as well go and find trouble with the other magical creatures!


    Master said that the Three-Headed Fiend Hound and the Medusa were secret pawns that belonged to him. Billis couldn¡¯ty a finger on them either, so his options were limited.


    Wyverns?


    No. Wyverns could fly. Catching them would be aplicated matter!


    The brutelephants?


    Not possible either. The brutelephants¡¯ Strength and Physique were off the charts. His sting scorpionrvae couldn¡¯t even wound them with their current power.


    No matter how Billis thought about it, the ming tigers and the ogres were the most suitable target for him now.


    Billis¡¯ strength was improving at a significant rate. He would likely reach advanced apprentice after two or three more feasting sessions. At that time, his boosted Spirit would enable him to control even more subordinates, and hisbat prowess would increase even further.


    Mm! It will be the ogres then!


    There were plenty of them, and theycked magical abilities. They were just right for watering his army of bugs.


    After making up his mind, Billis no longer hesitated. His entire body suddenly fell apart and once again turned into a swarm of countless tiny bugs. The insects dug into the ground and headed northeast towards the ogre camps.


    Seven sting scorpionrvae the size of washbasins quickly tunneled behind him under the ground.


    Seven small swells in the earth quickly appeared and extended into the distance.


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    Boom! A massive explosion that shook the ground and the heavens.


    The entire tower trembled slightly.


    With just a tiny mistake, such as a small deviation in the runic lines being drawn onto a Second Grade elementium core, the rioting of the magical energies had resulted in a terrifying explosion.


    This explosion had exceeded the tolerance limits of the defensive arrays in the alchemicalb. The frightening shockwaves spilled out of the room and even affected the entirety of the tower.


    Greem opened the doors of theb and stumbled out of the room with a billowing cloud of ck smoke behind him. The entireboratory was already a mess with shards and pieces of the destroyed alchemical tform everywhere. A ringing sound came from the room.


    Keoghan, Gargamel, and Meryl hurriedly went to him after receiving news of the incident.


    "Are you okay?"


    "Are you alright, master?"


    "You didn¡¯t get hurt, did you, teacher?"


    Three people and three different expressions of concern, but the only reply they got was an intense wave of coughing from Greem.


    Greem¡¯s young and handsome face flushed white now. There was even a trace of blood at the corners of his mouth. Severalrge holes had been blown into that ck robe of his, and several small fires were also burning on the cloth.


    Judging by the situation at the scene, it was evident that the explosion of the elementium core had damaged both his mind and body. No defensive arrays protecting him would have been able to endure the chain explosions triggered by the elementium sts in that environment. The elementium shockwaves would easily hurt his mind and Spirit.


    "Cough! It¡¯s... such a shame," Greem continued intensely coughing as he spoke frustratedly, "Just a bit more and it would have seeded. It¡¯s still a matter of my Spirit being unable to keep up, after all."


    "Greem, you don¡¯t need to be in such a rush," Adept Keoghan felt pity over the loss of the Second Grade elementium crystal core, but he still needed to console Greem on the surface, "The time limit for the n¡¯s mission is still abundant, and you don¡¯t need to be so hasty in crafting the cores. It¡¯s better to take it slow and steady!"


    Gargamel and Meryl weren¡¯t in a position to speak about this situation. They could only surround Greem and help him treat the most obvious wounds on his body.


    Greem¡¯s Spirit recovered by a lot after during this short rest.


    "It¡¯s a shame this time! I would havepleted it with just a little bit more, and then I got impatient. In the end, I failed again."


    "There¡¯s no need to rush; there¡¯s really no need to. From my perspective, you need to be more steady when doing this. Also, I¡¯vepleted the voodoo beasts you asked me to modify. There are still many matters I need to tend to back at the headquarters so I won¡¯t be extending my stay here any longer." Greem had shut himself inside hisb for the past few days. Keoghan hadn¡¯t been able to see him at all. That was why Keoghan took this chance to say his farewells.


    Of course, Greem was extraordinarily gracious and thankful for his services. He went and had Gargamel retrieve the agreed-upon reward before personally handing it over to Adept Keoghan.


    Even though everyone belonged to the same n, these sorts of tasks that consumedrge amounts of Spirit and time couldn¡¯t be performed for free. That was why a reward was necessary.


    Once Gargamel had sent Keoghan away, the three of them once again gathered in a hidden room on the fourth floor to talk.


    "Teacher, is your body really alright? Do you need to meditate and self-examine your body?" Meryl was still asking concernedly.


    Greem¡¯s previously hunched-over body suddenly straightened up. His weak Spirit also became full of energy all of a sudden.


    "Master, how did the thing go?" Gargamel had obviously been involved in this matter. He was now rubbing his hands together anxiously while opening his wide, beady eyes and asking softly.


    Meryl was utterly confused by their actions. Her pretty eyes swept from one person¡¯s face to the other¡¯s.


    Greem didn¡¯t reply. Instead, he lightly swiped across his waist with his right hand, and a bright, crystalline golem core appeared before the two of his subordinates.


    "It worked... it worked. It really worked." Gargamel immediately leaped up in excitement. He rushed to Greem¡¯s side and stared at the golem core with his mousy eyes without even looking away. The goatee on his chin swayed and trembled without end.


    Sadly, a woman¡¯s sensitivity and agility when it came to shiny jewels were ten times that of a man¡¯s.


    Gargamel¡¯s trembling hands hadn¡¯t even reached outwards when the golem core had already fallen into Meryl¡¯s hands.


    Meryl joyously yed with the gem as she pouted in an unamused fashion at the other two guys, "This is the elite-level elementium golem you mentioned? Shouldn¡¯t it be destroyed already? Why is it still here? Could the two of you have been putting on a performance earlier?"


    Greem and Gargamel didn¡¯t reply. Instead, they started letting out sinisterughter in unison.


    "Teacher, even you¡¯ve been influenced by Gargamel¡¯s wickedness. It must be Gargamel¡¯s idea. It¡¯s really nasty indeed." Meryl rolled her eyes at Gargamel and continued ying with this exceptionally precious ¡¯gemstone.¡¯


    Er......


    Gargamel rolled his own eyes at Meryl¡¯s words. He almost couldn¡¯t help but exim that this was Greem¡¯s idea and that he was only a manager.


    Sadly, his words were stuffed back down his throat by an intimidating re from Greem. He had no choice but to bear this unfair usation on his back silently.


    "In all honesty, I didn¡¯t expect us to seed on the first try. That¡¯s why we made preparations to do it again. However, our luck was good enough, and it ended up working in the end. We even managed to trick Keoghan over this," Greem said, "Right. This thing should be kept between the two of you. You are not allowed to tell anyone else about this."


    "What about Eva then?" Gargamel rolled his mousy eyes.


    It was obvious that Gargamel was incredibly devoted to Eva. He was like a cute boy waiting for his mother¡¯s instructions.


    Greem paused for a moment. He had no choice but to change his words, "Only you two and Eva are allowed to know about this. No one else should know!"


    Gargamel and Meryl bowed together and acknowledged his orders.

 Chapter 472 Ogre Camp

    Chapter 472 Ogre Camp


    Neo Valley.


    Mary carefully walked through a stretch of shadowy woods.


    Everything around her was ck and gray. She could only see dark shadows of various shades around her. Furthermore, Mary could vaguely sense tiny life auras within many of the shadows.


    Mary needed to carefully avoid these shadows because every one of them was a twisted and evil shadow creature. They were spread across the entire valley, strictly guarding all the paths that led towards the ck adept¡¯s tower.


    These shadow creatures weren¡¯t all that powerful, and they were all weak lifeforms that Mary was confident of exterminating in a single blow. However, in order to avoid raising any rms, she had to hide all signs of her life as she carefully and cautiously made her way through the hordes of shadow scouts.


    As an offshoot vampire, Mary could easily control the temperature of her blood, thereby avoiding infrared and life searches. Moreover, her agility bonus when hidden made her impossible to detect by these shadow creatures that only averaged the strength of an intermediate apprentice.


    The reason Mary was so careful wasn¡¯t to evade them; she was trying to avoid the shadow mastiffs that were asionally moving through Neo Valley. Much like the hunting dogs of the material world, they had an exceptionally developed sense of smell and could detect the elementium flow of any non-shadow substance.


    Fortunately, Mary was wearing the Orb of Deception that Alice had gifted her.


    This ce was also known as the ck Mystery, and it was the location of the Dark Witches¡¯ origin tower.


    If she hadn¡¯t made a promise to Alice, Mary would never havee here looking for death, even if she had gone insane. It was important to note that there was always at least a Second Grade or even Third Grade Dark witch stationed in the tower. The Fourth Grade Dark Witch Leader Circe also spent most of the year within this tower.


    Even Mary, with her reckless and fearless personality, couldn¡¯t help but feel her heart tremble at the thought of so many high-grade adepts.


    Conspiring to sneak into the origin ce of the Dark Witches. That was a crime whose sentence no one could shoulder. That was why Mary had to conceal her identity if she didn¡¯t want to be pursued by the Dark Witches all over the world.


    A sense of warning suddenly grew in her heart while Mary walked through the gray tree-shaped shadows. Her body flew up as if it had no weight and silentlynded on arge gray tree. She then pressed herself against the trunk and merged with its shadows.


    Even though her actions were swift, and no aura had leaked out, she still unavoidably generated a small flow of wind elementium.


    The next second, five shadow mastiffs emerged from the shadows on the ground. They lifted their noses and sniffed all over the ce. There was a trace of wind elementium in the air separate from the thick smell of shadows.


    Even though this ce was buried in the valley of shadows, and the excessively dense shadow substance had expelled most other magical elementium of the material world, trace amounts of wind elementium could still get in through gaps in the darkness. The presence of wind elementium wasn¡¯t all that out of the ordinary.


    That was why the shadow mastiffs quickly rxed after searching anding up with nothing.


    With another slight wave of shadow ripples, the five shadow mastiffs instantly appeared in another shadow a hundred meters away. They continued their patrol.


    A few momentster, after confirming that there was absolutely no movement around her, Mary slowly emerged from the darkness of the massive tree.


    In all seriousness, this ce was no longer the World of Adepts.


    Those Dark Witches had relied on the power of their adept¡¯s tower and caused the nar conjunction of the World of Adepts and the legendary Shadow ne over this small area. The area of ovep was this forest of shadows in Neo Valley.


    In doing so, the Dark Witches could continuously organize parties to explore the Shadow ne, whosend was broad and boundless enough topare with the World of Adepts. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the benefits they had managed to obtain through this method.


    However, as the core axis that anchored both of theserge nes, the origin tower of the Dark Witches was also continuously caught in the sh between the two different ne origins. Consequently, periodic shadow explosions and even attacks by Shadow ne natives would cause quite a lot of adverse effects to the stability of Shadow Valley.


    Trying to break into a well-guarded Dark Witch origin tower with the power of a single First Grade vampire adept was crazy talk. However, with Alice by one¡¯s side, you find a crack to travel through in even the most well-built of walls.


    Mary took step after step, using almost three days to walk a distance of two kilometers. However, she was still nearly one and a half kilometers away from that looming dark tower.


    She no longer pushed forward upon reaching this location. Instead, she found a slightly quieter space in the forest and very slowly squeezed her body into the dirt, which was somewhere between tangible and intangible.


    She would have to stay here like a stubborn nail from now until the explosion of the Shadow Tide one monthter. Without the spatial disturbance caused by the Shadow Tide, Mary had no chance of breaking into the Dark Witches¡¯ origin tower. It was only when the Shadow Tide caused quakes in this area of conjunction that she would have an opportunity to attempt a break-in.


    Of course, Mary knew absolutely nothing about what the so-called Shadow Tide was, or when it would start.


    However, just because she didn¡¯t know, didn¡¯t mean that the Alice who had control over the Tower of Fate didn¡¯t know.


    Alice, who was constantly scrying on the Dark Tower, had long devised the rescue n. The only thing shecked was a powerful adept with assassin talents like Mary.


    Plotting against the ignorant, and pitting the prepared against the unprepared; Alice was determined to save her only rtive¨C Poison Witch Endor.


    She no longer cared about the consequences that woulde!


    ............


    Stonemaul Camp.


    It was arge ogre camp located in the depths of the ck Forest.


    Maulhill, where the ogres resided, had been burned to a crisp by Greem thest time. It was now no more than an empty and barren stone hill. Thus, the ogres decided to build a massive camp on the mountain. They used thick, sharpened wooden logs to create a wall around Maulhill.


    The powerful elite ogre soldiers, squad leaders, and the terrifying two-headed ogre magi naturally lived in the belly of the mountain. Meanwhile, the majority of the ordinary ogres set up simple tents on the waist of the mountain and lived there.


    Due to theck of nning and organization, each ogre walked wherever they wanted. The camps and tents they set up were all over the ce as well, with the tents being made of all sorts of materials. The entire area was chaotic and messy beyondpare.


    When the sun finally rose, the ogre squad leaders would emerge from the belly of the mountain. They would walk towards the tall camp gates at the foot of the mountain while using their ck and thick legs to kick awake the snoring ogres.


    "Wake up, wake up. All of you, wake up. Lazy bums. You don¡¯t do nothing but eat a lot. Uglyhead, ckface; all of you wake up. It¡¯s time to go hunting.¡±


    As the squad leader scolded the ogres, the ogres grumbled and rose up from the ground and out of their tents. Their hill-like bodies swayed as they followed the squad leader down the hill.


    For a moment, towering figures could be seen all over Stonemaul Camp. Shouting and grumbling could be heard everywhere. It was so lively that it was almost like a market.


    This ogre camp had a total of eighty-seven ogres of various ages. There were forty-three adolescent male ogres, twenty-two adolescent female ogres, fourteen ogre soldiers-in-waiting that had yet toe of age, and eight ogre children.


    One shouldn¡¯t look down on the ogres just because the adolescent males only took up half of their numbers. For a species as savage and barbaric as the ogres, not a single one of their members were useless individuals. Almost all of them were strong and mighty warriors. Even those female ogres and juvenile ogres, when they wielded wooden sticks as thick as a human¡¯s leg, could easily crush the skull of an elite human warrior.


    If an ogre in an ogre camp became elderly and had yet to die, the tribe would exile them and turn them into wandering ogres. The ogre camps never cared for useless individuals who had lost theirbat ability!


    Billis stood on a cliff two and a half kilometers away from Maulhill. He looked on as the mass of ogres rushed out of the camp gates and dispersed into the nearby ck Forest.


    Unlike the beeman squads, the ogres formed groups of three. The weapons they used were often thick wooden bats and stone sticks that they crafted themselves. Their hunting radius also spanned a vast area of nearly fifty kilometers. Those adolescent ogres could smoothly run thirty-five to forty kilometers in a single morning if they were to sprint at full speed.


    This speed fully demonstrated their extraordinary Strength and Physique!


    In all honesty, ogres were humanoid lifeforms.


    Their appearance was just like a human who had been erged several times. Their bodies were exceptionally muscr, and their Strength was incredible. They were a sort of magical creature that wasrge, ugly, and greedy. They might be strong, but their minds were simple. Even the adolescent ogres only possessed the intelligence of a five-year-old human child.


    Only the mutated ogre mages had the possibility of breaking through the limits of their intelligence and bing a terrifying magical creature that was cruel, bloody, and who believed in violence.


    Based on the system of the adepts, ordinary ogre soldiers possessed seven points of Strength and nine points of Physique. The two-headed ogre Zac, on the other hand, held eleven points of Strength, thirteen points of Physique, and as much as four points of Spirit.


    Four points of Spirit might only be considered to be the level of an ordinary adept amongst adepts, but they were already regarded as enviable geniuses in a tribe of ogres.


    Billis lowered his head in contemtion.


    Compared to the ogres, the Sting Scorpionrvae that he hatched possessed four points of Strength, five points of Physique, and two points of Spirit.


    The sting scorpions might even possess a sizeable advantage against the Aba Beemen with such attributes. However, if they were to sh with the ogres, they would probably be unable to deal with the violent attacks of the adolescent ogres.


    It seemed the only way was to orchestrate a strategic victory!


    Billis made up his mind. He whistled softly and immediately turned into a swarm of ck bugs that charged down the cliff.

 Chapter 473 Sting Scorpion Army

    Chapter 473 Sting Scorpion Army


    Tracking the ogres without sufficient stamina was challenging.


    The ogre warriors never stopped after they surged out of their camp. They started running towards the woods in the distance.


    Over the past six months of hunting, they were no longer find anyrge beings that could fill their bellies within a ten to fifteen-kilometer radius of Maulhill. That was why the ogres had no choice but to venture even further out if they wanted to bring back enough prey.


    Billis, who knew nothing of the daily habits of the ogres, hadn¡¯t expected this to happen. He brought the seven young sting scorpions with him as they sprinted for over twenty kilometers. It was only then that they found the messy remains of the ogres¡¯ battles.


    The first victims were a den of razor boars.


    Razor Boars could be considered one of the mostmon forest beasts in the ck Forest.


    They had no elementium powers. They only possessed bulky and muscr bodies and thoserge, razor-like fangs. Adolescent razor boars were at least a hundred kilograms heavy. The mixture of amber-like tree sap, sand, and stone on their bodies also made it as if they had a thickyer of armor around them.


    A berserk razor boar in the ck Forest could forcefully knock down a massive tree that would usually require two people to embrace its trunk fully.


    Sadly, they had run into an ogre hunting squad, who were both stronger and more well-versed in hunting. Thus, this den of two adolescent boars and three piglets became the prey of three ogres.


    The ogres also loved to eat cooked food. However, they didn¡¯t know how to start fires. The ogres would often just eat what they have on hand while they were out hunting.


    As the warriors who went out hunting, they naturally possessed the right to fill their bellies first.


    After the sessful hunt, the three ogres used vines to tie up the adolescent pigs that they had knocked out. They then sat down on the ground, and each one picked a piglet. They opened the bellies of the piglets, then dug out the intestines and other organs before taking out the hearts and biting into them.


    In the savage and straightforward minds of the ogres, the source of all life form¡¯s power sprang from the heart. That was why eating the heart first to strengthen themselves became a tradition of the ogres.


    While they were tearing at the flesh and sending blood sshing everywhere, a pair of pale greenpound-eyes had already trained upon them from the woods nearby.


    Under Billis¡¯ remotemand, the seven sting scorpions had tunneled through the ground with their unique talent. They bit through the tree roots, dug through the dirt, and silently snuck below the three ogres.


    As expected of magical creatures of this nature, the ogres managed to detect the strangeness in the ground through the slight trembling of the earth, even though they hadn¡¯t heard anything.


    As they halted their feeding session in suspicion, the dirt beneath them suddenly broke apart. A deste pir of dust swept through the air and quickly consumed the figures of the ogres.


    Enemy assault!


    The ogres instantly understood the situation. They cast aside the food in their hands and leaped away. They bent down and picked up the weapons they had set at their sides.


    Eh?


    What perplexed them was the fact that their hands came up empty.


    The target of the sting scorpion¡¯s assault actually wasn¡¯t the ogres. Instead, it was the crude weapons that had been ced against the tree by the side. Three sting scorpionrvae used their massive ws to grab the wooden bats and stone sticks before diving back underground.


    While the ogres were frantically searching for their weapons, the second group of three sting scorpions emerged from the ground and dug their sharp ws into the thick calves of the ogres.


    The ogres had lost their weapons and could only use their massive fists to repeatedly bash the shells on the heads of the sting scorpions. The ogres¡¯ seven points of Strength forcefully smashed through the solid earth elementium around the scorpions and beat the bugs so hard that blood went flying everywhere. However, the spikes on the shell of the scorpions also caused the ogres¡¯ fists to bleed without stopping. The ws that had cut into their calves also continued to inject earth elementium energies into the ogres.


    Several earth spikes shot towards the ogres under the magic of the sting scorpions. Even though most of the spikes were deflected by the ogres¡¯ tough and dense hides, some of them still managed to break through and inflict tremendous wounds on the bodies of the ogres.


    If one were to assess the ogres and the sting scorpions individually, the ogre warriors would be far stronger. In a one-on-one duel, a newborn sting scorpion would never be able to beat an ogre warrior. However, ogre warriors were only ordinary magic-infused creatures, while the young sting scorpions were pure-bred magical creatures.


    The ogre warriors were met with two sting scorpions each. The battle was intense, and the situation was chaotic. However, while both sides were enduring grievous wounds, the seventh sting scorpion that abruptly emerged from the ground became the straw that broke the camel¡¯s back.


    Half an hourter, the battlefield regained its peace.


    The three ogres had been injected with too much earth elementium; they finally lost control of their bodies and fell to the ground. They could no longer resist the scorpions.


    A strange wave of chittering and scratching sounds rang out.


    The three ogres, who had the nerves of their four limbs bitten off, had lost all ability to fight back. They were shocked to find a terrifying ck swarm of bugs surging towards them. Just as the ogres were about to scream out of fear, the poison stingers of the sting scorpions immediately stabbed their necks.


    The three ogres fell utterly unconscious.


    The bug swarm billowed forth and picked up the three ogres and two boars. The horde quickly vanished into the depths of the woods under the escort of the seven sting scorpions.


    ............


    Maulhill.


    The ogres that had gone out hunting didn¡¯t start returning to the camp until night had fallen.


    They brought back plenty of spoils with them.


    Therge ones included bulls and massive smanders, while the smaller catches included boars and rabbits. They had caught all sorts of prey.


    The ogres happily gathered together and started a campfire in the middle of the camp, using massive stone pots to cook the delicious meat.


    It was probably the only cooking technique that all the ogres in the universe knew.


    As the ogres were all muscr yet brainless individuals, they didn¡¯t discover the loss of six of theirpanions from the camp on the first night.


    The second day. The same hunt, the same departure from the camp.


    This time, they lost ninerades.


    At this point, even the ogres knew something was off, regardless of how dumb they were.


    Sometimes there were cases of ogres who went out hunting that only returned after two or three days due to traveling too far away. However, these were rare and unusual events.


    But now...


    There were about that many ogres who had never returned to camp. No matter how they looked at it, this seemed like a conspiracy and assault designed against them.


    The number of ogre warriors that had gone missing was far too many. They had exceeded the number of fingers and toes that an ogre squad leader had. That made it impossible for them to calcte how many had gone missing. That was why the ogre squad leaders could only use the term very very many to describe the loss of their numbers when reporting to Two-Headed Ogre Mage Zac.


    Zac was also furious at the disappearance of his subordinate warriors and was unusually violent and angry.


    The few ogre squad leaders quickly ¡¯came up with a brilliant n¡¯ in response to Zac¡¯s enraged shouting. They all pointed their fingers at the Aba Beemen.


    The mad expansion of the Aba Beemen had caused their hunting areas to start ovepping with those of the ogres. Conflicts had erupted between both parties numerous times over the contentious areas. They had already fought several battles. Consequently, the ogres first thought of the Aba Beemen after encountering this unknown wave of assaults.


    The Two-Headed Ogre Mage Zac also went berserk in a sh under the influence of those squad leaders.


    The moment the sun had gone up on the second day, arge group of ogres charged down Maulhill with Zac in the lead. They boisterously marched towards the territory of the Aba Beemen.


    ............


    In a damp and dark underground cave.


    A dozen bug¡¯s nests forged of blood, wooden splinters, and dirt had been erected in the middle of the cave. Holes the size of a fist could be seen everywhere in these holes. One could very clearly see the crawling sting scorpionrvae in these bug¡¯s nest through these openings. Of course, they could also see the pile of bloody corpses.


    Billis had returned to his human form and was standing in the middle of all the bug¡¯s nests. His eyes continually assessed theservae that were about to be his subordinates.


    As the blood in the air thickened, Billis¡¯ body hidden beneath his robe was also undergoing subtle changes.


    His human skin was now entirely reced by ayer of ck shell. His human hands had also be a pair of giant ws gleaming with a metallic shine. Three scythe-like limbs were curled up on his chest.


    What was even more shocking was Billis¡¯ head.


    The continuously swelling bug¡¯s head had split the original face apart. The nose, mouth, and eyes were all nted to a side, revealing the ck and wicked face beneath.


    Ghostly greenpound-eyes, wicked and frightening mouthparts, two external antennae...


    It was evident that Billis wasmitted and determined to his evolution into a bug person.


    There wasn¡¯t much more about his body that was still human!


    Moreover, with the increasing extent of his bug transformation, Billis had also silently progressed to an advanced apprentice. He had caught up to the height that Acteon spent sixty to seventy years to reach in a matter of two months.


    In fact, an advanced apprentice wasn¡¯t the endpoint of his evolution this time. As the sting scorpions in the bug¡¯s nests continued devouring copious amounts of flesh, Billis¡¯ aura started growing even further.


    Twelve bug¡¯s nests. Once the sting scorpionrvae within them had sessfully grown into young sting scorpions, they didn¡¯t choose to break out of the nest. Instead, they started tearing at each other.


    Young sting scorpions were still too frail for Billis. They were not suitable as a bug army that waged war alongside him. That was why Billis set the goal of this evolution of his bug swarm to be mature sting scorpions after wiping out the few nearby magical creature dens!


    The bloody and cruel devouring and evolution process started in each of the twelve nests under his mad and excited gaze.


    Each young sting scorpion possessed individual consciousnesses and instincts. Naturally, they were unwilling to allow their barely awakened being to be someone else¡¯s stepping stone to evolution just like that. Consequently, the fight in each of the nest was fierce and bloody. It had even reached a level of insanity.


    Under Billis¡¯ strict orders, only the strongest young scorpion that survived in each nest had the chance to grow and evolve. That was why the scorpions used each part of their bodies to attack every single thing around them that could move insanely.


    This battle for evolution that urred in an unseen corner of the world took two hours to conclude.


    As the bug¡¯s nests started copsing, twelve bloody adolescent sting scorpions with iplete and damaged shells climbed out of the dirt and gathered around Billis.


    Billis looked down upon these subordinates of his and finally let out a wild and sharp bug¡¯s screech towards the sky!

 Chapter 474 Mystical Bug

    Chapter 474 Mystical Bug


    Greem was busy working in hisb when an insignificantmotion broke out in the ck Forest once again.


    His mental space would experience a small-scale copse every time hepleted the tempering of his Spirit. During this period, he would have to gorge on energy substances to sustain the energy being exhausted while his body and mind tried to regenerate rapidly.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel lucky for his current situation.


    Magical resources would never be insufficient now that he was in the ck Forest.


    There was such a saying spread throughout the ranks ofbat adepts¨C only the adept who best knows how to feast can be the adept who best knows how to fight!


    One could understand the attitude of adepts towards food and drink from this saying.


    Adepts didn¡¯t feast because they were gluttons that enjoyed the debaucherous pleasures of eating and drinking. It because of the frailty of the human body.


    Both elementium adepts and body-refining adepts faced the same problem; the human body was not an aid to the adepts. Instead, it was an extremely limiting restraint.


    The higher the Grade of the adept, the more terrifying of an elementium torrent that their body needed to endure when casting their high-grade spells. If Greem hadn¡¯t elementiumized his body promptly after bing a fire adept, he would severely damage his body every time he cast a powerful fire spell.


    Just imagine; terrifyingva and streams of fire that measured up to several thousands of degrees coursing through the veins in your body. Without a resilient body, the adept¡¯s veins and flesh would be reduced to ashes before they could unleash the spell.


    And an elementiumized body had to be sustained with even more massive quantities of energy!


    That was why adepts had to rely on alternative meals to support the daily functions of their bodies. They were high-energy beings after all.


    The so-called ¡¯delicacies¡¯ of human society held no benefit for adepts apart from their taste. Magical energy meals prepared with the flesh of magical creatures were the necessary support that was crucial to an adept¡¯s improvement.


    Fire Throne naturally had a significant advantage when it came to their reserves of magical creature resources from the nearby ck Forest.


    In the mission hall on the first level, the mission that hung year-round at the top of the list was a long-term task purchasing magical creature meat.


    Ordinary magical creatures with delicious, quality flesh were also reared throughout the year in the nursery room. However, this magical creature meat would be only open to the higher-levels of the adept¡¯s tower. The apprentice adepts on the lowest level had almost no opportunity to taste that meat.


    As the reign of Fire Throne stabilized, the number of apprentice adepts residing in the tower started to swell. Apart from studies, experiments, and magic training, their daily activities began to include exploration and adventuring outdoors.


    With the expansion of the apprentices¡¯ field of activity, Fire Throne gained an additional understanding of the nearby geography.


    Not long ago, an advanced apprentice had identally stumbled upon the tracks of a pack of Underground Fire Dragons while exploring the depths of the underground. Once he sold this information to the adept¡¯s tower, a new main course known as ¡¯Fire Dragon Ribs¡¯ appeared on Greem¡¯s daily menu.


    Of course, this name was a little exaggerated!


    A crass creature like the underground fire dragon, which was dumb enough topare with the ogres, could at best be considered a hybrid dragon creature that possessed the blood of real dragons. No one knew for sure their true bloodline connection to the fire dragons, but it was true that there was a trace of fire dragon in their bloodline.


    As the underground fire dragons often remained near volcanoes, they especially liked devouring sulfur and fire energy cores. That was why their blood was also soaked in dense fire dragon aura.


    Back in the past, in the elite student camp of the Underground World, Greem had only eaten a single meal of underground fire dragon ribs. Yet, that was enough to boost his powers by several levels. However, now that he had be an adept, this auxiliary magical creature flesh could no longer bring about as much of an improvement to him as before.


    Still, if Greem continued to eat these ribs, their subtle effects would still be a formidable help to Greem¡¯s body.


    If all adepts could allow their body and Spirit to improve at a decent rate by just casually eating and drinking every day, no one would be able to resist the temptation to do so!


    An adult underground fire dragon weighed three thousand kilograms. After removing the unnecessary parts and organs, you would have around two thousand kilograms of meat on the ribs. The Chip performed aprehensive calction of the approximate energy substance within the fire dragon ribs as well as the needs of Greem¡¯s growing powers. It then set Greem up with a necessary amount of fifty kilograms per day.


    Fifty kilograms of ribs!


    If Greem had been an average person, he would be hard-pressed to eat that much, even if he ended up dying in the end.


    However, all this was nothing significant to Greem.


    The current Greem looked like he had the appearance and habits of a human. But if one dissected him, they would discover that his muscle structure was far different from an ordinary human¡¯s body.


    That was something that Greem could do nothing about!


    Any human would continuously walk further and further on the path of evolution and change once they be an adept. They would continue until they reached the point of no return. In fact, people like Billis had even discarded their most basic human rationality. He was now bent on the path of bug transformation, sworn never to turn back!


    Greem had also tried tasting the blood and flesh of the underground lizards beyond the fire dragon ribs.


    Sadly, that sour and pungent taste wasparable to potions that had been randomly mixed by an amateur potions apprentice. They caused Greem to cklist the dish after one taste immediately.


    The next mostmon thing that Greem did beyond stuffing himself was to soak himself in a tub of herbs.


    Currently, Greem¡¯s Spirit had steadily risen to eight points. He was almost at the same level as Adept Keoghan, who had progressed for a hundred years. He now belonged to the ranks of the experienced veteran adepts, but his other bodily attributes were allgging behind.


    This deficiency had much to do with the excessively short time since his advancement!


    He had been busy with errands ever since he had advanced to adept. He¡¯d found no time to consolidate the new things he learned and make them part of his foundation. If it weren¡¯t for all the kinds of auxiliary measures in a battle that he held, Greem would never have been able to reach the height he currently stood.


    Greem took advantage of this rare time tomit to his hermit lifestyle and immediately started tempering his body in every aspect. These so-called herb baths were a type of method that low-grade body refining adepts used to strengthen their bodies.


    They used herbs with dense energy auras or poison to continuously stimte their cells and allowed them to achieve a sort of bnce between the rapid death and regeneration of the cells. This process continuously stimted the body¡¯s potential and fully realized the effect of drawing out the physical body¡¯s power.


    Of course, the first problem to deal with when using this method was the prolonged weakness after tempering the body.


    That could be mitigated entirely by the consumption of magical energy meals.


    However, Greem was simultaneously tempering his Spirit while using herbs to refine his body. Consequently, the twoyers of weakness tortured him to no end at times.


    It was important to note that, as an adept, Greem was able to know everything happening within the tower through his powerful spiritual senses without ever lifting a finger. In fact, when necessary, he could even manipte and change the situation around the ck Forest as if it was part of his body.


    However, as his body and Spirit were at their worst state, his Spirit couldn¡¯t be projected, and his body was unbearably frail at this moment. This feeling of weakness that resembled being a mortal gave him the illusion of being knocked back to his powerless days!


    As the leader of a faction, he naturally couldn¡¯t allow his enemies or his subordinates to see this weak state of his. Otherwise, unpredictable events were likely to be triggered. That was why Greem hadn¡¯t left the fifth floor of the tower over the past few days. Even Gargamel, who personally prepared the herb baths for him, never saw Greem with his own eyes.


    Since his body and Spirit were so weak that he couldn¡¯t disy them in front of others, Greem decided just to shut the doors and carefully start research on some projects he had set aside for a long time.


    The project that Greem had been keeping up with for the past two days was the strange bug that he had obtained from Spider Cave!


    Unlike the mutated Bug Queen, this live bug still evidently possessed its survival abilities.


    If the Queen Bug were said to be pursuing parasitic and mutual sess with its host, this strange bug would be purely attempting to rob and strip everything of its host.


    Greem had removed this strange bug from Medusa¡¯s body. The old spider T was the one who had personally imnted it. The spider had hoped that this bug would break out of Medusa¡¯s body and be one of his strongest aides. The most powerful part of this bug was its capability to take the host¡¯s innate ability for its own and convert it into the nutrition it needed to grow.


    This robbing of innate abilities could not possibly allow the bug to reconstruct the host¡¯s talents with a 100% uracy, but it still genuinely shocked and surprised Greem.


    A person¡¯s innate talent had always been decided the day they were born; this was true since ancient times. One might be able to improve these talents atter stages with copious amounts of rare and unique resources, but trying to change one¡¯s innate skills entirely was something that was unimaginable.


    Greem had flipped through multiple books and historical records after obtaining the strange bug, but he had not managed to find anything on this insect. At least, all of the tomes and documents that Greem had read never mentioned any rted incident.


    It increasingly demonstrated the value of this strange bug¡¯s ability to rob other creature¡¯s of their abilities!


    That was why Greem had set up an independentb for this bug alone the moment he got it. He gave the Chip full authority to examine and cultivate this bug. Greem gained both good news and bad news after a series of magical experiments.


    The good news was that this strange bug could indeed rob a host creature of their innate abilities.


    The bad news was that the talents it robbed were shattered and non-sequential. There was absolutely no way of putting the talent back together in itsplete form through any experimental methods they could think of.


    Even T didn¡¯t know what kind of ability the strange adolescent bug would obtain once it broke out of Medusa. Gaining Medusa¡¯splete petrification abilities was impossible. However, there was a decent chance that a weakened version, in the form of a Paralyzing Gaze, could form.


    There probably wasn¡¯t an adept in this world who could clearly exin how a strange magical ability like this one hade into existence.


    That was perhaps the main reason why the World of Adepts had always been enveloped in a potent, mysterious force!

 Chapter 475 Biological Laboratory

    Chapter 475 Biological Laboratory


    A talent-stealing bug!


    The Chip¡¯s experimental data showed that these bugs could only perform one instance of talent-stealing through their entire lives. It triggered at the moment they transformed fromrvae into an actual insect.


    Moreover, the bug¡¯s talent-stealing ability had its limits.


    Seventeen percent of gic segments was the upper limit on the amount of talent that the bug could steal from its host. Any more than this limit and the excessive foreign gic segments would cause the bug¡¯s own genes to tilt towards instability and result in the chain copse of its gic structure.


    That obviously didn¡¯t reach Greem¡¯s goal of being able to obtain 100% of a lifeform¡¯s gic chain!


    The World of Adepts was sorge and prosperous. Even Greem himself would not believe it if you imed that no adept had ever discovered the unique ability of this strange bug. However, as the World of Adepts had yet to develop aplete microscopic system, even the most potent adept of this world could only extend their magical abilities to the level of molecules.


    Any further, where magical research reached the levels of the atom, and even the high-grade adepts could not do anything.


    It was an inevitability!


    On the Earth of Greem¡¯s previous life, the low-magic world and the non-existence of supernatural powers had given birth to precise and delicate scientific procedures. Even the most ordinary member of humanity could observe phenomenon at a level even more microscopic than a molecr one with the help of microscopes and other simr apparatus.


    On the other hand, in a high-magic society, even a mortal could heal their wounds with a simple Circle of Healing. If that didn¡¯t work, all they had to do was drink a vial of healing potion concocted with Water of Life. That would practically bring back the dead and even restore vitality and youth.


    It was because of this convenience and mystical nature of their supernatural powers that all adepts would treat their magical abilities as the only direction of thought when they confronted a problem. It indirectly caused a severeg in the development of other disciplines, such as the natural sciences, human sciences, social sciences, and the empirical sciences.


    A system of magic had unavoidably reced all of these!


    Earth had organ transnts. High-magic worlds also had magic transnts. Moreover, they were quicker, more convenient, and a lot more straightforward and brutal in their processes. The adept that participated in the surgery didn¡¯t even need to be well-versed in human organs and dissection. They only needed to know one single spell that was Organ Activation.


    You couldn¡¯t underestimate the adepts because of how messy their dissection and operations were. They were often so bloody that the operation tform looked like a ughterhouse. However, the lifeforms of high-magic worlds also possessed potent life forces, almost ten times that of life on Earth. Even the crudest of operation conditions and the roughest of operating procedures didn¡¯t matter. When the radiance of supernatural powers shone on the subject of the operation, they would still be full of life as they climbed down from the operating tform.


    Earth had artificial intelligence. You could find a simr thing in a high-magic world, such as the tower spirits that top-tier adept¡¯s towers possessed.


    In fact, while people on Earth were still concerned about the possibility of artificial intelligence turning against them, the adepts had already tamed the tower spirits into the most loyal and reliable servants one could find. Many adepts spent their entire lives in their adept¡¯s tower. Some extremely passionate adepts even merged their unfortunately deceased lover¡¯s soul with the tower¡¯s spirit to achieve their goal of forever being with their love.


    Separating the soul and merging the soul with a different substance was a level of technology that Earth could not be involved in even if they advanced by leaps and bounds.


    Thus, twopletely different civilizations were born in two different environments, where the material conditions were not all that different.


    A scientific civilization and a magical civilization!


    Greem was witness to both civilizations. He was an adept himself, yet the Chip in his mind was the crystallization of scientific culture. When he tried his best to reconcile both civilizations, he came into possession of a worldview and a soul that was far superior to those of an ordinary adept.


    When other adepts were in his position, they were still obsessed with all sorts of scheming, plotting, and fighting for power and authority. However, Greem only thought of tearing away the veil covering his eyes to allow him to gaze upon the truth of this world with his own eyes!


    It was this amazingly high perspective on life that allowed Greem to perceive the value and power of this mysterious bug instantly.


    Of course, an ordinary adept would be hard-pressed to ess such power. Only an individual like himself, who was well-versed in both civilizations, could forge an alternative path and discover a method to exceed the upper limit of the gic segment absorption.


    For the next few days, Greem spent most of his time and energy on researching the strange bugs. While he had yet to develop any breakthroughs, he had managed to test and verify all the various substitute ns that the Chip had suggested.


    Currently, Greem was working as hard as he could to try and extract that mysterious substance within the strange bug that allowed for the stealing of genes. It was a process that exhausted both time and energy!


    ............


    The biologicalb was filled with fantastical lights of all colors.


    The wall was radiating with a bright but soft white light that illuminated the entire room.


    A dozenrge, semi-translucent cocoons stood in the middle of theb. There was a thickyer of fleshy substance beneath the enormous cocoons. This substance had grown all across the floorboards of theb, like a carpet of moss. Some parts of it had even extended to the walls.


    The cocoons connected to the carpet of substance with several thick fleshy vessels. These vessels climbed around the surface of the cocoons, growing all over the ce like the blood vessels of a human heart. They were continuously pumping a light-yellow nutritious substance into the cocoon.


    Through the membrane, one could vaguely see embryos of various sizes floating within the cocoons. One could tell from the different sizes and traits of the embryos that they were the various development and maturity stages of the same lifeform after asexual reproduction.


    The mysterious bug that Greem had captured from Medusa¡¯s body was floating in the massive cocoon at the center of all the others. The stinger of the mysterious insect hung limply from its body as if suspended in a state of deep anesthesia.


    The owner of this biologicalb, Greem, was currently pacing between the cocoons. He silently observed the evolutionary development course of each and every embryo.


    As hecked the support of exact sciences, it was virtually impossible for Greem to reconstruct, from scratch, a biologicalb that resembled that of Earth¡¯s. That was why Greem leaned upon the thinking of Earth¡¯s biological sciences and used the techniques of the magical civilization to construct this unusual organicb in the end.


    The nutrient solution sustaining the lives of the bug and the embryos contained all the nutrients that a creature needed to evolve. It was a mysterious potion that Gargamel, the head potions-master of Fire Throne, had carefully synthesized per Greem¡¯s instructions and requirements.


    When submerged in the potion, any lifeform would be able to rapidly evolve from their infant forms to their adolescent forms under its stimtion. Moreover, this process was entirely manipble. The concentration of the potion being fed to the embryos was always in the hands of the owner of thisb, Greem.


    The strange bug was incredibly precious. Greem had carefully scoured T¡¯s nest after the whole incident and had not managed to find a second one like it. Thus, to avoid destroying such a valuable experimental sample due to his own mistakes, Greem had to cultivate recements for this strange bug en masse before he attempted to extract its gic sequence.


    Even though this bug was only arva itself, Greem had still managed to sessfully extract its gic material thanks to the Chip¡¯s profound scanning abilities.


    What followed was his earnest attempt to cultivate Strange Bug Two, Strange Bug Three, Strange Bug Four...


    The dissection and extraction of genes could finally begin once the strange bug sample was no longer unique.


    Greem quickly arrived in front of a cocoon. A misshapen piece of flesh the size of a palm floated in the yellow nutrient solution within. A dozen long, fleshy appendages hung limply around the portion of tissue. These appendages were waved about, allowing it to swim in the cocoon like a fish freely.


    There were no visible orifices or organs on it, and no hidden life systems could be detected within the piece of flesh either. However, when Greem¡¯s gaze fell upon the flesh through the membrane, it stopped all its activities like a frightened critter. It sank back to the bottom of the cocoon without moving again.


    ying dead?


    That should be a survival ability that only lifeforms of average intelligence should have ess to, shouldn¡¯t it?!


    Could this insignificant piece of flesh already possess intelligence that rivaled ordinary lifeforms?


    Greem sighed silently.


    The mysticality of the life systems in the World of Adepts was beyond the limits of his imagination. Any of his past understanding and rules were going to be in the way of his future research and exploration. Getting rid of his fixed mindset was the most important thing if he wanted to improve in this brand new system and study the arcane arts.


    Greem silently drew a rune in the air and shot it into the moss carpet below him.


    The vessels surrounding the membrane trembled slightly, and concentrated life potion injected into the membrane. Greem leaned on the cocoon and stared unblinkingly at the piece of flesh to look for a response.


    The piece of flesh that had been ying dead started to tremble tremendously under the stimtion of the powerful nutrient solution. The one dozen appendages shrunk back into its body as it began to swell and transform.


    In Greem¡¯s spiritual senses and the clear scans that the Chip was feeding to him, the piece of flesh continually absorbed the nutrient solution into its body, quickly turning the nutrients into tissue structures and internal organs. Some muscles and bones appeared out of nowhere. They were gradually growing and shaping up while being pulled to their appropriate positions by the attached muscles and fibers. These bones and muscles were being pieced together into the skeleton of a strange bug.


    This process was mystical and miraculous. It had both the rigidity of the biological sciences and the wonder of arcane arts. Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed as he watched.


    Yet, at the moment the strange bug¡¯s skeletal structure was about to bepleted, An unknown gic quake suddenly destroyed everything.


    Several chains snapped at the gic level, causing the evolving bug to explode into a bloody paste.


    The explosion was so uniform that not a single piece of the lifeform¡¯s flesh remained in the cocoon. All the tissue had been ground into a paste, coloring the membrane of the cocoon a blinding crimson color.


    Greem straightened his body in disappointment.


    Multiple notifications from the Chip popped up in his mind.


    [Beep. Sample cloning attempt 125 failed. Reason for failure: a fracture in gic chains. It is rmended to destroy the remains of the sample.]

 Chapter 476 The Witch Council

    Chapter 476 The Witch Council


    The entirety of the Northern Lands belonged to the witches.


    The once iparably powerful thirteen witch branches had split the Northern Lands into thirteen interconnected territories. These thirteen territories surrounded a neutralnd that spanned up to fifty kilometers.


    It was the location of the Witch Council¨C Werning!


    Werning was also a mega-city of its own. It possessed an impressive poption of nearly three hundred thousand individuals. The most famous building in the city was the Council Hall that sat in the center of the city. It was a sacred and holynd where only the witch leaders could gather to discuss their matters.


    Every witch branch had their territories and had to manage all of their own external affairs. The witch leaders would never waste their precious time arguing in the council of this rural area if it wasn¡¯t a matter of great importance that involved all the witch branches.


    Consequently, Werning had always been under the protection of the neutral witch n, n Sidonthiria. To ensure their absolute fairness and neutrality, the Sidonthiria n swore to defend Werning forever, and to never expand their influence even a single inch beyond the walls of Werning.


    It was the binding power of this ancient oath that allowed the unyielding gs of n Sidonthiria to continue waving above the skies of Werning, never changing through the years. Only seven of the thirteen witch branches remained, and thends had changed hands many times, but the Sidonthiria remained faithful to their post.


    It was a peaceful and casual afternoon.


    Uzzah was patrolling in the skies around Werning on her flying broom with five witch apprentices flying behind her when she suddenly saw a ck speck appear on the distant horizon.


    Had outsiderse to Werning?


    Uzzah frowned. She steered the flying broom with a push of her hand, and she flew towards the ck dot with her party in tow.


    Patrol Captain Witch Uzzah frowned when she reached a distance of almost two hundred meters from the opponents.


    There were three guests in total. They sat on top of a magical carpet, which was one of the mostmon transportation tools that the Northern Witches used for group activities and transportation.


    There were three people on the magical carpet.


    The one kneeling on the very front and carefully controlling the flight of the carpet was a witch apprentice. Judging from her appearance and size, she was no more than eight or nine years old. The short apprentice¡¯s robe she wore was of a bizarre style. A symbol of scales seemed to be carved on the badge she wore on her chest. It was the first time Witch Uzzah had seen such a marker in a hundred years.


    Two foreign-looking witches sat crossed-legged behind the witch apprentice.


    The one in the lead was wearing a delicate purple and starry robe. Her head of silky silver hair flowed down her shoulders, and her face was unusually gentle and quiet. She had a pair of unforgettable blue eyes that shone with a seductive and mysterious charm.


    The witch at the very back appeared to be much weirder.


    Her figure was so muscr that she no longer resembled a woman. She wore a pirate¡¯s eyepatch over one eye and green leather armor on her body. She also held a thick wooden staff in her hands that looked unusually heavy.


    Witch Uzzah had repeatedly evaluated the neers before she blocked their path with her flying broom. She hadn¡¯t managed to match them to any known witches in her head.


    Finally, she couldn¡¯t help but speak.


    "Sincerest apologies, but ahead of you is Werning City! If you wish to visit this ce, please go to the ground and go in through the proper procedures. Otherwise..."


    ording to the rules passed down from ancient times, no ordinary witch was allowed to fly within fifteen kilometers of Werning City. Moreover, all witches would have to undergo constant surveince by the witches of Sidonthiria. Only witch leaders and the witches of Sidonthiria, who acted as guardians, were exempt from this rule!


    As the Witch Council had gradually been reduced to a decorative organization over the past years, the enforcement of these rules had also started bing looser. A few thousand years ago, any ordinary witch that dared casually fly close to Werning City like this would probably have been immediately detained by the Sidonthirian Witches. They would never have been so pleasant as toe up and give a warning.


    "From what I know, some witches have the right to fly andnd at the Council Hall immediately!" The pretty purple-robed witch suddenly spoke. Her voice was deep but pleasant to the ears, yet it possessed a trace of might that tolerated no disrespect.


    "Of course, this is a rule of the Witch Council," A smile of disdain surfaced on Witch Uzzah¡¯s face, "However, that rule only applies to the witch leaders of the various branches. Ordinary witches can¡¯t..."


    Witch Uzzah¡¯s voice suddenly stopped before she could finish. That was because she saw a mysterious card glowing with prismatic light in the pretty girl¡¯s upraised hand.


    "The Card of Fate?" Uzzah¡¯s knowledge was much wider than an ordinary witch¡¯s, given her capacity as a patrol captain. She could feel the genuine mystical powers from the card and couldn¡¯t help but exim, "You... are you Witch of Fate Alice?"


    Even though the Sidonthiria n stayed in Werning City and never intervened in the various tensions between the witch branches, they had still heard of the reactivation of the Tower of Fate and the rise of the new Witch of Fate.


    The Sidonthirians had also sent one or two representatives to send gifts to Alice at the conclusion of the Battle of Fate back then. These representatives had all described the new Witch of Fate Alice as an individual so mysterious that it was hard to get a grasp on her.


    "I am Alice, leader of the Witches of Fate. I need to go to the Council Hall. What is it? Do you still intend to block my way?" Alice stared coldly at this witch of the Sidonthiria n.


    "I wouldn¡¯t dare. Uzzah is willing to show you the way!"


    Even though it was only a First Grade adept who stood in front of Uzzah, Alice possessed the halo of a witch leader on her head. Alice was not a person that Uzzah should provoke for no reason.


    Witch Uzzah could only make way for this dominant and pushy Witch of Fate Alice. She apanied Alice and her party as they flew into Werning City.


    Two hourster, the long ringing of the Witch Council Hall¡¯s bells echoed throughout the city.


    Many Werning civilians walked out of their rooms upon hearing the ringing bells. They gathered in the streets and gazed at the Council Hall, where the ringing hade.


    This sound of a ringing bell was incredibly foreign to most people. It caused them to be at a loss as to what to do!


    However, for some seniors, the ringing of these bells had instead awakened the distant memories that had been buried in their brains.


    "This ringing. I know now. This is the bell sound when the witch leaders dere a meeting. I remember, I remember; my old grandfather had once described this tone to me when I was really young."


    The audience couldn¡¯t help but be shocked when they heard the old man¡¯s excited shouts.


    Most people in this crowd had lived their entire lives in Werning City. Yet, this was the first time they had heard of such bell tolling. Could it be that the long-sealed Witch Council was about to be reactivated once again?


    "The meeting of the witches? Must all the witch leaderse when they heard this sound?" Someone confusedly asked.


    "They will definitelye. As long as they are Northern Witches, and can hear this bell ringing, they wille." The elderly man seemed to be yelling at the top of his lungs amidst the chattering, despite his weak breathing.


    As the center of authority in the Northern Lands of the past, Werning City had been silent and quiet for far too long!


    All the citizens felt a passionate joy that they couldn¡¯t hide swell in their hearts now that they once again heard the ringing of the bells that had been quiet for a hundred years. Excited and joyful expressions broke out on their faces.


    People cheered and danced, almost instantly turning Werning City into a sea of happiness!


    As the civilians were celebrating on their own, countless apprentice witches with Sidonthirian emblems hopped onto their brooms and rushed out of Werning City. They flew towards thends of the various witch branches.


    ............


    Alice, who had barely climbed onto her seat as the leader of the Witches of Fate, had exercised her rights as a leader and submitted a suggestion for all witch branches to convene for the Witch Council.


    For a moment, the effect of this matter rippled throughout thends, causing amotion everywhere. Everyone was discussing and gossiping, not knowing what the new leader of the Witches of Fate was nning.


    The various witch branches were even more confused. They had absolutely no idea how to deal with this troublemaker that didn¡¯t y by the rules.


    ording to the traditions left behind by the ancient witches, only witch leaders could actively propose and organize a Witch Council. A democratic vote would then decide the more difficult internal affairs of the witches.


    However, as time passed and the witch branches invested more and more efforts into the prosperity of their personalnds, the Witch Council that had once been the institution of absolute highest authority over the Northern Witches started to lose its significance. Even when conflicts broke out between the branches, the leaders only needed to get together to discuss a solution. They very rarely relied upon the great ¡¯weapon¡¯ that was the Witch Council.


    Thus, the Witch Council¡¯s authority was slowly stripped away and reduced to a shell of what it used to be. It became a ce where the various witch branches took turns to manage the neutral public cities.


    However, while the excellent reputation of the Witch Council could be sealed in the past, it could never truly wiped away.


    That was why the entire Northern Lands erupted into disorder when the bells of the Werning Council Hall rang once again.


    The witch leaders didn¡¯t like Alice, and they didn¡¯t wish for the Council to reign above their own rule. However, all of them could only cast aside their work with angry expressions and hurry to that familiar yet foreign City of Werning the moment the bells rang.


    For a moment, things started to intensify around Werning City. Many witches hurried to this ce by marching day and night. On the third day after the bell rang, the Pale Witch Leader, who resided furthest away, had also appeared in the Council Hall.


    All the Witch Leaders of the Northern Lands had now arrived in Werning City.


    After one hundred and thirty-two years, the next Witch Council had finally gathered.


    ............


    The so-called Council Hall was, in truth, no more than an ancient, fortress-style castle.


    The ce where they held the council was also no more than a dimly lit hall on the second level of the castle.


    Three long, narrow windows were nestled in the walls of the hall, and not much sunlight could get in. This ce required torches to illuminate everything, even during the daytime.


    A ubiquitous long table had been ced in the hall. Fourteen crude chairs made of wood sat alongside the table. Apart from the ck chair at one end of the table, all thirteen other chairs were ced on both sides of the table.


    The corresponding witch emblems were carved into the seats of the chairs.


    At this moment, only eight people sat in the thirteen chairs; five of them were missing. On the other hand, no one even dared to go close to the ck chair at the end of the table.


    It was said that the ck chair was the seat of the Witch Queen.


    No one dared to infringe the might of the Witch Queen in this holy ce!


    Even if she had traveled beyond the realm for more than ten thousand years.

 Chapter 477 Large-Sized Plane

    Chapter 477 Large-Sized ne


    "Alice, what exactly are you nning?"


    The first to start trouble was the leader of the Dark Witches, Circe.


    One couldn¡¯t me her for her rage. Now was the critical moment of the Shadow Tide that the Dark Tower was undergoing. Every time of the year when the Shadow Tide erupted, Circe had to be at the Dark Tower as the leader of the Dark Witches. She had to ensure that no incidents befell thend of their origin.


    But now...


    Circe was bound by the uses of the ancient contracts when the bells of the Council Hall rang. She had no choice but toe to this old and rotting ¡¯Hall¡¯ to listen to the story of this ignorant little brat.


    A child that dreamed of being their equal despite only being First Grade.


    Circe wasn¡¯t the only furious witch leader.


    The leader of the Agony Witches had even been called to this ce by her nsmen while fighting on the front lines of a nar battlefield.


    The leader of the Agony Witches couldn¡¯t hide the murderous intent on her face. It showed every time she thought of that intense battlefield that teetered on the precipice of victory and defeat, and of the three nights she had gone without sleep in order to hurry to Werning City.


    There were six Fourth-Grade witches and one Third Grade witch that sat in the massive Council Hall. When all of them stared at the lonesome Alice with hostile gazes, the overwhelming pressure from their Spirits was enough to paralyze any First Grade adept.


    Alice stood there with her face flushed white. She bit her lip tightly and had to use all her strength to ensure her body didn¡¯t start trembling.


    A First Grade witch like her was insignificant to this hall full of high-grade witches. If the old contracts hadn¡¯t bestowed upon her the rights she deserved as the leader of the witches, she wouldn¡¯t even have the right to listen in on this meeting, much less speak in it.


    Alice¡¯s blue eyes swept across everyone. The energy field and spiritual flux that spilled out of the witch leaders¡¯ bodies were so overpowering that tears started to flow. Every single person in this room was like a miniature sun in Alice¡¯s eyes. The magical light that they released was so intense that Alice risked blindness when staring at them for more than three seconds.


    In this situation, Alice would not be able to see the faces of the witches, even if she opened her eyes as wide as she could.


    Alice was worried that Dark Witch Leader Circe might start yelling. Just the shockwave from the sound might be enough to kill a mere First Grade witch like herself.


    Fortunately, these witch leaders still knew how to restrain their magical powers and Spiritual flux, despite their rage. They made sure not to hurt this witch leader sitting in front of them. Alice¡¯s abilities might have been insignificant, but ancient contracts protected her status and identity.


    Cases of public infighting had yet to happen among the Northern Witches. At least the leader-ss witches still knew how to maintain the good of the whole.


    "Alice, we are all waiting for your answer," Of all the witch leaders, only Death Witch Khesuna seemed to be calm. However, her words still caused Alice¡¯s heart to tremble in fear, " Convening the Witch Council is a right that all witch leaders share. However, the witch that asked for this meeting has to provide a sufficiently important topic. Otherwise, we witch leaders are entirely allowed to cast votes and strip you of your rights as the leader of the Witches of Fate."


    Alice remained silent in her seat. After a long while, her emotions had calmed down. After she had gotten used to the pressure from the other witches, Alice finally started speaking.


    "Witch leaders, I have gathered everyone here to restore the glory of all Northern Witches." Alice stuttered as she spoke.


    "Hmph! We are not here to listen to your empty words. Glory? What kind of glory? How are we doing it? You had better begin talking about something more practical!" Dark Witch Circe grunted unhappily.


    "Arge-sized ne... arge-sized ne that has advanced to that level for no more than a thousand years. This... will it be enough to restore the glory and prosperity of the Northern Witches?" Alice had to adjust her breathing to make her wordse out smoothly even while under the pressure of many Spirits.


    "Arge-sized ne?"


    "Arge-sized ne..."


    The witch leaders were shocked. For the first time, they started expressing a little interest in Alice¡¯s suggestion.


    "Be clearer. What does thisrge-sized ne have to do with the Northern Witches?" The one to speak this time was still the Death Witch Khesuna.


    Having said that, the Fourth Grade Death Witch waved her hand at Alice and cast an Undead¡¯s Protection of her. This way, Alice would be unaffected by the Spiritual pressure of the high-grade witches!


    "Thank you, sister Khesuna!" A trace of blood finally returned to Alice¡¯s face. She smiled and nodded to Khesuna, "I specially gathered everyone here for the sake of restoring the former might of the Northern Witches. To fulfill this goal, I intend to offer up the coordinates of arge-sized ne that has ascended to that level for no more than a thousand years. I wish to call upon all my sisters to fight our way into that world. If we Northern Witches can take down that ne with our abilities, will we ever need to worry about the issue of rising to prominence?"


    The various witch leaders were utterly shocked.


    The value of arge-sized ne was so significant that even the people in this hall were hard-pressed to give an approximation.


    The coordinates of a small-sized neworld were currently worth a million magical crystals in the World of Adepts.


    It wasn¡¯t even a ne that had been conquered. That was the price for an untouched neworld: one million magical crystals.


    Simrly, a mid-sized neworld¡¯s coordinates would be a hundred times that of a small-sized ne.


    Arge-sized ne?


    Its value could not be estimated!


    It was important to note that even the World of Adepts was no more than arge-sized ne.


    The only difference was that the World of Adepts had developed into arge-sized ne several tens of thousands of years ago. The strength of its natives had grown to their fullest. That gave them a chance to rise and be one of the most powerful nar conquerors in the multiverse.


    If what Alice imed turned out to be true, and the ne that she offered up was indeed an immature neworld, then there wouldn¡¯t be too many Fourth Grade powerhouses in that ne. In that case, while they might not be able to colonize the entire nepletely, the Northern Witches could still obtain a sizeable territory there with the full united force of every single branch. They could then scour the ce for resources. That was a feasible n!


    However, why was Alice so willing to offer up these coordinates, given how valuable they were? If the same situation had urred any other witch leader, they would have hidden the truth and profited from their discovery by themselves. They would lead their own ns to stir trouble in the foreign realm, and never offer to share it with the others.


    It was important to note that the final spoils of war were uncertain. No one knew who would profit the most once they shared the coordinates and a portal opened to the new world.


    If your luck was terrible, you might run into the armies of the nar natives the moment you broke into the ne. Don¡¯t even talk about scouring for resources then; even the army you brought there could be wiped out.


    Alice didn¡¯t seem to possess an advantage over the rest in this particr point!


    The more the witches considered, the more unimaginable the situation felt like to them.


    Yet, everyone started having a vague answer when they thought of Alice¡¯s current powers.


    It was arge-sized ne!


    Even if it had only advanced from a mid-sized ne not long ago, its fundamental power was still there. It didn¡¯t matter how weak the enemy was. They were not enemies that a bunch of First Grade adepts could knock over.


    If a First Grade adept like Alice burst into that world, the most likely oue for them would be being crushed to death by the enemy like a bedbug. There would be no room for resistance.


    As for keeping the coordinates in her hands and going there to find a chance once her powers had increased; this was such a simple thought that it was almost funny.


    By the time Alice had grown her fangs, the enemy would probably have developed into a real monster. Then the difference in power of both parties would not be shrinking. Instead, it would be widening at an increasing rate.


    That was why Alice offered up this item that she could noty her hands on. She would go after a more practical and obtainable benefit while doing a favor for the other witches.


    The witch leaders¡¯ expressions softened when they understood this. For the first time, they felt as if Alice the brat wasn¡¯t that bad. Even the cold leader of the Agony Witches had put on a much better expression.


    "Alice, if everything you said earlier was true., then how do you intend to prove it? Do you just intend to hand over the coordinates of that world right now?" Death Witch Khesuna was a calm and experienced individual. She was the first to voice her doubts.


    "I hope you all can pick two representatives to head to the Tower of Fate. I will hand over the world coordinates there. You can check the validity of the coordinates of said world. However, before everyone is done preparing for the invasion, I wish to keep the world coordinates in my hands alone. What about this n..." Alice immediately tossed out the idea that she had cooked up after long periods of thinking.


    The witch leaders looked at each other and gave it some thought. They found nothing wrong with the idea.


    "That is good," Khesuna nodded, "Then sisters, let us cast our votes. Who shall be responsible for the verification of these world coordinates?"


    There was no question that the representative had toe from one of the six Fourth-Grade witches. That was why Third Grade Coldwinter Witch Leader Morgana was automatically excluded.


    The six Fourth-Grade witches were of the same grade, but they still held different reputations and respect in the group. That was why everyone quickly chose Death Witch Khesuna and Dark Witch Circe without much fuss.


    The Pale Witch Sylvia was also a decent candidate. However, before she became the Witch of Fate, Alice had been a member of the Moya n, subordinate to the Pale Witches. Thus, to avoid any possibility of collusion, the witch leaders chose Circe, the witch who shed directly with Alice, as the judge.


    However, while everyone had just reached an agreement and were filled with satisfaction, Dark Witch Circe¡¯s body suddenly trembled. ck mist filled the space around her.


    "How bold of you, Alice! How dare you send someone into the ck Mystery to take a prisoner away from me. You are seeking your grave."


    Circe waved both of her hands and a surge of mysterious shadows immediately wrapped around Alice¡¯s body.

 Chapter 478 Poison Witch Endor

    Chapter 478 Poison Witch Endor


    The bright light of the teleportation array slowly faded away from the room.


    Six vague silhouettes slowly turned solid and appeared before Greem.


    "Wee... Lady Endor!"


    It was obvious that Greem had hesitated with his choice of title. That was why he was staring right down Mary¡¯s amused eyes when he straightened his body and looked up.


    Six people had teleported to Fire Throne. Poison Witch Endor, Bloody Mary, her three Blood Knights, and that old fox Vanlier. Even though they lookedpletely fine on the surface, Greem could see, through countless minor details, the grievous wounds that Mary and Endor had suffered through.


    Poison Witch Endor, in particr, was in a terrible state. Shadow substances had severely corrupted her body during her lengthy detainment in the half-shadow space that was the Dark Mirage. It seemed Endor would have to take a long time off to treat her body before she could regain her former strength.


    "Kid, it seems this old hag¡¯s gonna have to stay here at your ce for the moment." Poison Witch Endor¡¯s spirits were high despite the damage to her origin powers. A trace ofpassion surfaced on her hideous and sinister face.


    "Wee, wee, a warm wee. Please, treat this ce like your own home! I have already arranged everything." It was only a few words, but sweat had already started forming on Greem¡¯s forehead.


    The adepts were cold and unfeeling people by nature. They were selfish and prioritized profits in everything they did. Even the alwaysposed Greem felt kind of awkward with the sudden appearance of a rtive in Endor.


    "Mm. Then, I¡¯ll be going down ahead to rest!" One could see that Endor¡¯s Spirit had been exhausted after this long-range teleportation. Her Spirit was almost at its limit now that she had finally reached a safe haven.


    "Gargamel, please escort Lady Endor to her room!"


    Gargamel, who had been waiting by the side, immediately escorted the Poison Witch away with a fawning smile.


    Greem¡¯s demeanor became much more natural once only Mary and her subordinates remained in the room. He looked at the crimson-armored girl and put on a sincere smile.


    "What, don¡¯t you want to ask what¡¯s happened to Alice now?" Mary¡¯s skintight armor put her perfect figure on full disy. She raised one charming eyebrow, and a yful smile appeared on her face once again, "Don¡¯t worry. Alice was still perfectly fine when we left. She seemed to have reached an agreement with the witches. That is why the Dark Witch can¡¯t touch Alice as long as she doesn¡¯t get caught with any incriminating evidence."


    "I¡¯m not worried about her, but you," Greem smiled as he took a step forward, "It¡¯s not an easy thing to break into the Dark Mirage. I can see your internal wounds aren¡¯t light either. Why don¡¯t I take a look at them for you."


    Mary¡¯s body froze. She rolled her eyes at Greem unamusedly and waved her hand without turning her head.


    "Sir Greem and I still have something to deal. You guys go walk around the tower as you like! Remember, don¡¯t start any trouble for me!"


    "Yes!"


    The three Blood Knights bowed in unison. Soros and Vanlier¡¯s eyes quickly swept past Greem as they silently exited the teleportation room.


    "Come on; didn¡¯t you say you wanna take a look at my condition?" Mary smiled seductively, "Why don¡¯t you let me take a look at you in the meantime and see why your Spirit suddenly turned so weak?"


    ............


    Three hourster.


    After an intense tussle, the satisfied couple finally stopped. Their limbs intertwined together as theyid in each other¡¯s embrace on the bed. It was now that they started the actualmunication.


    In truth, even Mary only knew bits of Alice¡¯s n.


    She knew that Alice had no choice but to hurry to the location of the Witch Council and summon the rest of the witches to draw away Dark Witch Leader Circe. This n had been very effective. Alice had sessfully managed to get Circe out of the Dark Mirage.


    And it was thanks to the absence of Circe, the owner of the tower, that Mary was able to break into the tower by taking advantage of the SHadow Tide¡¯s surge. She had ughtered her way into the prison and sessfully brought Poison Witch Endor out with her.


    Even though Greem already knew Mary had seeded, listening to her first-hand ount of the whole thing still caused Greem¡¯s palms to sweat. He realized something through those simple descriptions.


    Foresight!


    Prediction!


    First, the Dark Witches always swept through Shadow Valley right before the Shadow Tide arrived. They would then temporarily cut off the connection between the origin tower and the World of Adepts. That would then eliminate all chance of enemies from the World of Adepts sneaking into the origin tower. In this manner, they would be able to deal with the challenge of the Shadow World without any distractions.


    However, Alice had predicted this. That was why she had instructed Mary to sneak into Shadow Valley one month beforehand and hide from the Dark Witches¡¯ searches.


    Consequently, when Fourth Grade Circe was gone, and the main forces of the Dark Witches were all assigned to the Shadow World, Mary was able to immediately kill her way through the weakest defense point of the origin tower. That was how she had made it to the underground prison.


    Under normal circumstances, breaking into the prison would have been the limit of Mary¡¯s powers. Taking someone out with her under those conditions was virtually impossible. After all, that ce had temporarily cut off its connection to the World of Adepts; ordinary teleportation spells would not have been able to get them out.


    However, this didn¡¯t stop Alice¡¯s incredible means.


    Alice had given Mary a round silver stone before she left. When Mary found Endor, she didn¡¯t need to bring her along and break out once again. All Mary had to do was take out the silver stone and chant the required words. The silver stone would then sessfully bring them back to the Tower of Fate.


    Naturally, Mary didn¡¯t know what that mysterious silver stone was, but Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a knowing smile when he heard all this.


    Alice had fully demonstrated the strong ability of foresight throughout this rescue mission. Every move of the enemy, along with everyyout, had been entirely within her control. She was able to utilize all resources and opportunities around her to their fullest extent and pave a path of sess for herself.


    The power of her talent for fate was evident from this!


    Of course, the strength of one blessed by fate never came from themselves. Instead, it manifested in their deep understanding of the world¡¯s rules, and in their ability to maximize the use of the resources at hand.


    Without someone like Mary, who would listen to all her instructions and wlessly execute them, Alice would have been hard-pressed to carry out her n, regardless of how good it might have been.


    It was like a fight to the death between two boxers. One boxer possessed the ability to sense fate and could foresee thending points and stances of his opponent¡¯s next three punches. He could perfectly avoid and counter-attack when the opponentunched his first punch.


    When that happened, a tiny alteration point would ur in the path of fate.


    After the oue of the first punch had been altered, would the opponent still stubbornlyunch the same second and third punch that had been determined by fate?


    No. At this moment, the ripples of fate would shift the development of the future out of the hands of Fate and into the hands of the fixed rules that hid beneath the world. It was only when Fate¡¯s ripple effect slowly calmed down that this small moment in the world would once again rejoin the tracks of Fate, rumbling forward at full force.


    It was Greem¡¯s respect and fear of the powers of Fate that made him care so much about Alice¡¯s identity as the Witch of Fate. And now, Alice had indeed demonstrated the talent and ability she should possess as the Witch of Fate.


    More importantly, their rtionship was still incredibly close!


    That was obvious from Alice¡¯s n.


    Poison Witch Endor could be considered Alice¡¯sst living rtive. Alice was even willing to sh with one or several Fourth Grade witches for her sake. Now that she had sent Endor to Fire Throne, and into Greem¡¯s hands, it was clear that she didn¡¯t believe Greem would use Endor as a hostage.


    This fact was what put Greem in such a good mood!


    However, even though he basically knew all of Alice¡¯s n now, he still didn¡¯t understand how she had managed to make Mary submit to her. Greem understood Mary far too well.


    Mary had speciallye over to his tower to fight him all for the sake of being the leader of their faction.


    Moreover, Greem believed that Mary would still leave all the administrative and leadership tasks to him, even if she had won. She just wanted to obtain the title of being the boss to fulfill her deeply ingrained mindset of might makes right.


    That was why conventional techniques of persuasion and offers of benefit were ineffective against Mary.


    The only way to win Mary¡¯s respect was to fight with her.


    She would only settle into the position that she should be in once you demonstrated the strength that a leader should possess. Otherwise, Mary would forever waiver between obedience and rebellion, making it hard to predict what she would do.


    Thus...


    Greem was extremely curious how Alice had managed to deal with Mary!


    After several influencing techniques of all sorts, Greem finally managed to pry out of Mary¡¯s mouth the trade that had transpired between her and Alice.


    Bloodline Imprisonment!


    Greem pped his leg hard when he heard how Alice had managed to make Mary yield.


    Dammit! Why didn¡¯t I think of that!?


    However, he knew very well that there was nothing he could do, even if he had thought of that weakness of Mary¡¯s. Did he have Alice¡¯s means to find that vampire sessfully?


    Those with strength used strength, and those without would have to rely on their minds!


    He had no such tricks up his sleeves, so he could only make Mary submit through pure force. Yet, Alice had managed to deal with Mary with just a couple of words.


    Perhaps this was how the Witch of Fate dealt with things on a daily basis!


    Greem couldn¡¯t even imagine what was happening while he was ¡¯enjoying time¡¯ with Mary. Far away, in the Tower of Fate, Alice was looking up at the sky full of stars as tears streaked down her cheeks.


    The beautiful light of the stars fell upon her and illuminated her delicate and pretty face, along with her long silky hair that was half-silver and half-white.


    Nobody knew when, but almost half of her long hair had turned white.

 Chapter 479 Dominant Descent

    Chapter 479 Dominant Descent


    The battle in the night raged on.


    Both parties were already fighting with all they had, and neither side refused to back down despite the heavy losses.


    From an overall perspective, the Aba Beemen still held the initiative on the battlefield. The wandering squads of beeman soldiers were continuously attacking stray ogres with their poisoned arrows and spears. On the other hand, the ogre soldiers relied on their tough skin and tremendous regeneration to bulldoze through the attacks. They didn¡¯t fear the poison arrows at all. Instead, they roared and picked uprge boulders to throw at the beemen.


    Whistling arrows and crashing stones flew across the woods. Beeman soldiers kept being hit and knocked down from the canopy. The already tough skin of the ogres started glowing with an intimidating red light under the effect of Mage Zac¡¯s Bloodthirst. They waved their sticks and charged towards the defensive lines of beeman soldiers while enduring a rain of poison arrows.


    The power gap between the individual troops was far too broad. Even two or three beman soldiers together couldn¡¯t fend off a single ogre. If it weren¡¯t for the beemen¡¯s absolute numerical advantage, Zac might have been able to break into the nest with the four dozen ogres behind him.


    These wild ogres were all at least three meters tall and built like true savages. They didn¡¯t wear any armor or clothing, and apart from a crude piece of hide wrapped around their waist, there was no protective gear anywhere on their body.


    Every time Mage Zac let out an angered roar from the back, these ogres shook their sticks and crashed against the battleline of beeman soldiers. They didn¡¯t even try to dodge the rain of poison arrows. Instead, they would charge forward with their simple weapons, using their thick left arms to cover their more vulnerable heads.


    The tough skin of the ogres mostly deflected the poisoned arrows. Only a select few managed to pierce through the skin and embed in the flesh of the ogres. The ogre warriors couldn¡¯t care less about these little arrows. They continued to advance as if they had wings on their back.


    Their muscr bodies gave them powerful physiques. These poisoned arrows that crippled ordinary woond creatures could only make an ogre warrior to feel slight dizziness. When Mage Zac¡¯s Bloodthirst engulfed their bodies, the exponential increase in their resistance and the enhancement of their bodies made them immune to that sliver of dizziness that they felt.


    All the ogre warriors advanced furiously. They attacked madly, crushing all of the beeman soldiers in front of them into meat paste.


    The only ones that could deal with the ogre warriors were two strange bugs.


    These strange bugs looked like a cross between locusts and bees. They were two meters long and had two pairs of semi-translucent wings on their backs. Their most distinctive trait was their lightning-quick speed in flight, as well as their frightening jaws.


    They were so fast when flying that they would leave behind a trail of red light and appear before an ogre warrior in an instant.


    Their sharp limbs could stab right into the ogre¡¯s muscr arms. The moment they managed to cling to an enemy, they would use their massive jaws to tear apart the throats of the enemy immediately.


    If the ogre continued to resist, the bug could even sever their neck in half with a single bite.


    The ogres might have powerful regenerative abilities, but that didn¡¯t help them against such horrifying destruction.


    One could see two trails of red light shing and blinking throughout the forest. Every ce the two bugs visited would shortly be followed by the death of an ogre warrior, howling and yelling as they copsed.


    The speed at which the ogres ughtered the beeman soldiers wasn¡¯t slow at all. Still, the bloodlocust bees were even faster at ying the ogres.


    It was as if both parties were engaged in a killingpetition. A storm of blood had descended upon the forest.


    The two bloodlocust bees had eleven points of Strength, eight points of Physique, and thirteen points of Agility. In a situation where their Strength was no less than the ogre¡¯s, their terrifying thirteen points of Agility allowed them to crush any ordinary ogrepletely.


    However, they were aware of Two-Headed Ogre Mage Zac¡¯s might as well. That was why they only attacked regr ogres and avoided where Zac was. Zac might be called a mage, but sadly, he was a mage that leaned towards strength as his primary form of power.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was Bloodthirst, Attack Speed Increase, or Brute Force. All of them were enhancement-type spells meant for physical fighters. In a situation where they couldn¡¯t catch up to the two bloodlocust bees, the ogres were helpless, despite their terrifying and savage strength.


    That was why one could asionally hear Zac¡¯s furious roar on the battlefield, loud as a drum.


    While the Aba beemen and the ogres were sending blood flying everywhere, a wretched and sinister form was crouching in the shadows, watching the carnage with inexplicable excitement.


    Billis¡¯ power had drastically increased after this period of bloody ughter. His current self had already reached the peak of an advanced apprentice. He was only one step away from bing a pseudo-adept. That was why he hade here despite knowing that there was a risk in doing so. However, his desire for more powerpelled him toe here without any regard for his personal safety. He was taking advantage of the ignorance of both parties and silently pilfering spoils from the ce.


    He watched the battlefield closely. The moment an ogre warrior fell, he would immediately instruct his sting scorpions to tunnel their way there underground. Then, Billis would find the right moment to have the sting scorpions burst out of the ground while no one was noticing. The scorpions would then grab the corpse and drag it back into their tunnel.


    Corpse stealing!


    Only someone like Billis, whose and personality werepletely twisted, could perform such an unscrupulous act. Any other apprentice would never havemitted to such a dangerous course of living on the edge of a knife.


    However, Billis suddenly shivered in the middle of his happy harvesting. He turned and looked towards the southwest.


    Just then, a bug scout he had ced at the perimeter had caught sight of a strange figure.


    Crimson armor, unfurled bat wings, a curvaceous figure, and an iparably arrogant expression.


    For some unknown reason, an inexplicable sense of fear and terror surged out from the depths of Billis¡¯ heart the moment heid eyes upon that red silhouette. It was almost as if he was facing his natural predator. Billis was trembling uncontrobly from his body all the way down to his soul.


    Who was this person?


    Why did this body of his fear her so much, even though he didn¡¯t know her?


    While Billis was shocked into paralysis, Mary had dominantly descended upon the battlefield with her four subordinates.


    Mary pped the big wings on her back and descended from the skies like a breathtaking goddess of war, apanied by ear-piercing screeches and falling leaves. She levitated five meters in the air.


    Three towering and fully armored knights silently stood behind her. Their bloodshot eyes swept past every single lifeform present on the battlefield as their red-lined ck robes fluttered behind them.


    The old fox Vanlier still dressed as a middle-aged noble. He stood on a thick branch atop a tree, excitedly looking down upon the battlefield. In his eyes, every life on the battlefield was a decent treat for him.


    "Human adept, you¡¯ve overstepped the boundaries!" The Two-Headed Ogre Mage Zac couldn¡¯t help but emerge from the crowd when faced with the intimidating neers. He roared in dissatisfaction at Mary.


    "Tsk! Since when did you magical creatures start ying by rules as humans do? Don¡¯t forget; this is the ck Forest! Whomever¡¯s fist is greatest is righteous!" Mary¡¯s crimson eyes turned increasingly brighter as dense blood mist seeped out of her body.


    "Tremble, magical creatures! Scream! I, Mary, will be the ruler of this ce from now onwards!"


    Having given her deration of war, Mary folded her wings. Her entire body turned into a beam of red light as she immediately lunged and appeared beside Zac.


    The fearless Zac roared. A red light appeared on his body, and the thick wooden club in his hand crashed towards the light, screaming through the air.


    With the help of Attack Speed Increase, Zac¡¯s movements were several times agilerpared to before. However, this speed was utterly insignificant when faced with Bloody Mary¡¯s high Agility.


    The red light swerved and passed by the bat with millimeters to spare. Mary passed straight by Zac¡¯s right ribs in a single sh.


    Scarlet light shed again, and Mary¡¯s seductive body appeared in an empty spot thirty meters away. Everyone only realized that Zac had been wounded when she raised her hand and started licking the blood on her sharp ws.


    Ten scratches of varying depths appeared on the right of Zac¡¯s torso. His tough skin couldn¡¯t deflect the ws that possessed blood energies. Ten mediocre wounds had been left on him.


    Such wounds weren¡¯t much against the powerful Physique of a two-headed ogre. Under normal circumstances, the wounds would close in three to five seconds, and all signs of injury would vanish with less than another three minutes.


    Yet strangely enough, traces of blood energy had now appeared around Zac¡¯s wounds. It didn¡¯t matter how much Zac tried to draw upon his powers; the wounds would split apart moments after they healed due to the corrosion of the blood energy.


    "Dammit! What is this?!" Zac shouted angrily. He waved the wooden bat in his hands with all his might, and one brilliant red aura after another red up around him.


    Bloodthirst!


    Attack Speed Increase!


    Brute Force!


    Two-Headed Ogre Mage Zac¡¯s strength was increasing exponentially under the effects of these enhancement spells. He once again roared and charged towards this enemy that angered him to no ends!


    However, the one to sh with him this time wasn¡¯t Mary. Instead, it was a Blood Knight d in full armor¨C Soros.


    His title of Second Grade Knight no longer held true whenpared to his actual power now, but his robust body was still there. That was why Zac was quickly defeated in the area he was most proficient in after a round of closebat.


    The three Second Grade knights from the other ne could only bring out the power of a First Grade elite-ss here in the World of Adepts. However, that was more than enough to deal with these wild magical creatures!


    Billis was hiding in the shadows, watching Mary and her Blood Knights sow discord in the battlefield like powerful whirlwinds. The terror in his heart grew even stronger as he witnessed one mighty ogre warrior after another fall to the ground like small fry.


    Perhaps it is time for me to leave!


    Billis secretly thought to himself.


    The moment he turned, Old Fox Vanlier¡¯s sly smile appeared before his eyes.

 Chapter 480 The Poor Billis

    Chapter 480 The Poor Billis


    It was apletely one-sided ughter.


    In terms of pure numbers, the Aba Beemen and the ogres were two of thergest tribes in this area. Their power also allowed them to crush the other magical creature tribes. Even great beings like wyverns couldn¡¯t easily break into their territories.


    Unfortunately for them, these two unchallenged magical creature tribes had now run into the overwhelming, crushing might of the Bloody Queen.


    Yes, it was indeed a crushing!


    The three blood knights that stood in a triangle formation were undefeated on the battlefield of carnage. The runic longswords in their hands could strike near and far. Every time their powerful blood-attribute sword techniques erupted, a corresponding number of ogres would suddenly copse to the ground.


    One could see that the main enemies of the blood knights were these muscr and towering ogres. That was why they threw most of their powerful sword techniques into the areas where the ogres were most concentrated. However, their attacks were remarkably measured; all the ogres were injured, but not dead. Even though the ogres¡¯ wounds were grievous and severe, they wouldn¡¯t threaten their lives yet.


    The Aba Beemen, on the other hand, didn¡¯t have such luck.


    Faced with the annoying poison arrows from the canopy and the waves of beemen that dove down at them with spears, the blood knights struck with merciless and savage blows.


    The beeman soldiers struck by the sword sts would instantly be corroded beyond recognition by the blood energies. They turned into shriveled corpses and fell from the skies. Most of the blood within their bodies was forced out and concentrated into a crimson ball of blood the size of a fist. These spheres of blood would orbit around the blood knights.


    Every time they were wounded, a portion of a blood sphere would split off and enter their body, replenishing their blood energy. When dealing with long-ranged attacks, the blood spheres could even transform into crimson shields of various shapes. These shields could help them deflect part of the attacks.


    The number of blood spheres gathered around them signified their strength as well. The two blood knights only had two blood spheres orbiting them, while the most powerful, Soros, had four around him.


    Ever since they had been modified into blood knights by Mary, Soros and the others were no longer afraid of ordinary poison. Apart from the rare one or two vital spots on their bodies, they were no longer as fearful of wounds like humans were. They took the fresh blood of the enemy to heal their own body. This strange talent provided the blood knights with unimaginable sustainability in fights.


    Faced with these wild magical creatures with weak attacks and power far inferior to theirs, the three blood knights were like iron chariots plowing through the battlefield. They madly ughtered the Aba Beemen with overwhelming prowess.


    In the meantime, they had also been the recipients of sneak attacks from the two bloodlocust bees.


    Sadly, the damage that the bloodlocust bees dealt the knights¡¯ bodies wasn¡¯t even enough to reduce theirbat ability. The counter-attacks of violent blood-attribute sword techniques forced the two bloodlocust bees to retreat while howling in pain.


    Compared to the blood knights, the two bloodlocust bees were like unarmed farmers. Their arrogant attacks couldn¡¯t particrly affect the enemy, while the enemy¡¯s attacks could wound them badly.


    There was already a decent disparity between the power of the bloodlocust bees and the blood knights. However, the blood knights also had a full set of runic equipment and a system of blood-attribute battle techniques. Inparison, the bloodlocust bees had nothing. They could only rely on their bodies and natural talents to fight.


    These push and pull factors caused a difference inbat prowess that prevented the adept-level bloodlocust bees from reproducing their previous victory against the ogres. Before the blood knights had arrived, the bloodlocust bees had been easily able to ughter the ogres. Yet, they werepletely beaten and driven away the moment they shed with the blood knights.


    By the time the three blood knights had sessfully taken down all the ogre warriors, the battle between Mary and Two-Headed Ogre Mage Zac had also reached its conclusion.


    Two-Headed Ogre Zac was now bathed in blood!


    The terrifying wounds all over his body were shrouded in sinister blood energies. They had reduced the powerful regenerative ability that he took pride in to nothing. If he even so much as moved a single muscle in his massive body, blood would flow and spray everywhere.


    His iparably savage strength had no use in front of a stealthy and agile assassin.


    It didn¡¯t matter how much he smashed and lunged. The red mist that Mary had turned into constantly lingered at his side. Mary had never even engaged in a direct confrontation with the ogre from the start of the battle to the very end.


    It wasn¡¯t until the end, when his throat had gone dry from roaring, and his blood had practically all flowed out, that Mage Zac was no longer able to keep up his effort.


    He put his hands on his head as he squatted on the ground. Zac didn¡¯t even dare to resist. He didn¡¯t dare to make the slightest of movements for fear of thest drop of blood in his body flowing away.


    The blood mist gathered, and Mary¡¯s tall and slender figure once again appeared by Zac¡¯s side.


    When her crystalline crimson shoes stepped upon Zac¡¯s head, the two-headed ogre only grunted softly. He no longer had the savagery and pride that he previously held.


    The three blood knights walked with steady steps and arrived at Mary¡¯s side. The ogre warriors were strewn across the battlefield behind them, howling and screaming in pain. As for those wounded Aba Beemen? Not a single one of them remained alive.


    "And Vanlier?" Mary took a look around her and couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    Vanlier was undoubtedly the weakest among her four subordinates. That was why Mary never made Vanlier participate in ordinary battles. After all, in Mary¡¯s eyes, Vanlier¡¯s most significant value was his mind. His ability to fight was secondary and unnecessary.


    "Master, I¡¯m here!" Vanlier¡¯s voice rang out from the forest nearby, "Take a look, master, at what I¡¯ve brought you."


    Soft footsteps sounded as Vanlier led a ck-robed individual and appeared before Mary in his middle-aged noble appearance.


    For some reason, the ck-robed person curled up when they saw Mary. Pieces of ck things were continuously falling off from their hidden body. These dark pieces seemed to be ck shell-shards. However, they quickly split into countless crawling ck beetles when they hit the ground. These beetles dispersed and made their way back into the robe.


    "You are terrified of me?" Mary tilted her head and looked at this strange ck-robed person.


    Before Mary had left toe here, Greem had only vaguely told her that Fire Throne had assigned an agent in this location to restrain the magical creatures. He hadn¡¯t told her any details. It was only when she started to recall the strange smile that Greem showed when talking about Billis that Mary sensed something was off.


    Mary could vaguely smell a trace of the familiar on this Apprentice Billis.


    That mutated Queen Bug...


    Mary¡¯s gaze froze. The spiritual pressure that fell upon Billis suddenly possessed killing intent.


    Back then, the annoying Evil Bugs Acteon had shed with Mary for an entire year before they drew it to a conclusion. The victor had lived, and the defeated had died!


    The brutal history of their fights had filled Mary with disgust for all bug-like lifeforms. Not to mention Billis, who possessed faints shadows of Evil Bugs himself. If it wasn¡¯t because Mary had thought of Greem at that moment, she might have been unable to help herself from tearing Billis into pieces and chop him into a paste.


    For Greem¡¯s sake, Mary suppressed the feelings of disgust that surged up in her heart. She coldly ordered, "You are Billis? I¡¯ve heard Greem talk about you. How is it? Have youpletely assimted with the Queen Bug? Take off your shirt to let me see..¡±


    Billis could clearly sense the cold killing intent spilling out of Mary. Of course, this wasn¡¯t because Billis¡¯ spiritual senses were sharp enough to use against an adept. Rather, it was because Mary had never tried to hide her disdain for Billis.


    However, the hostility that Adept Mary disyed wasn¡¯t what concerned Billis the most. What truly worried him was the mutated Queen Bug that had assimted with him. It was as if the Queen Bug feared Adept Mary from the depths of her soul.


    Through the assimted soul origin, the fear and nervousness that the Queen Bug felt had been etched into Billis¡¯ natural reactions as well. That was what caused him to appear too anxious and frantic near this female adept.


    Even though he had never seen this powerful and beautiful female adept in his life, and even though they both belonged to the same faction, his soul origin was continually warning him; a single mistake, and he would very likely be killed on the spot.


    Billis was reluctant to reveal his ¡¯true face¡¯ to anyone after he hadpletely transformed into a bug. Billis would treat any magical creature or human as an enemy if they expressed disdain when they saw his face. He would think of the cruelest ways to kill the opponent.


    Yet, at this moment, under Mary¡¯s chilling killing intent, Billis had no choice but to take off his ck robe and expose his ck and shiny bug body beneath the sunlight.


    One had to acknowledge that Billis was far moremitted and far deeper down the path of Bug Transformationpared to Acteon.


    Most of the time, Acteon had only treated his bug transformation as an auxiliary means to help him grow stronger. He had still wished to preserve a trace of humanity in the depths of his heart. Billis, on the other hand, had entirely given up on his human identity. He only weighed things in terms of pure power. That was why one could see absolutely no signs of a human on his exposed body.


    This... this was just a strange bug that stood straight and who knew how to speak like people!


    Mary was delighted with Billis¡¯ obedience.


    She had been hoping for Greem to increase the strength of his subordinates when she handed him the Queen Bug. Now that things were going perfectly, Mary had nothing toin about.


    Her killing intent from earlier was mostly just an instinctual reaction to difficult memories from her soul. Now that Mary had managed to adjust herself, the memories were no longer able to affect her emotions.


    "Two red bugs escaped from the battlefield. I need to know their current position." Marymanded coldly.


    "They fled there!" Billis quickly point towards a direction with his finger, "They have already escaped towards the bee¡¯s nest, along with the remaining Aba Beemen. If you would like to, Billis can help show the way!"


    Even Billis became unusually obedient and friendly under the pressure of death. He was trying to use every opportunity he had to get on equal terms with Adept Mary.


    "Call out all your entire army of bugs!" Mary instructed, "Watch over the ogres here. I¡¯lle back to deal with the prisoners once I have cleared out that bee¡¯s nest. Do it diligently, and you can get six of the corpses after the whole thing."


    "Understood! Billis will try his best toplete Lady Mary¡¯s orders!" Billis¡¯ body of bugs trembled slightly.


    This Adept Mary had a pretty clear grasp of his power. Billis only needed six more ogres to gather enough life energy to raise himself to pseudo-adept. When that happened, he would no longer be as weak as he was now.


    Vanlier leaned close to Mary and whispered after they had left the battlefield, "My Lady, are you that unconcerned about that bug man? What shall we do if he takes all the blood treats and takes off?"


    Mary continued flying forward without even looking back. She tossed out a sentence coldly.


    "Isn¡¯t that even better?! He had best not give me a reason to kill him. Otherwise..."


    Several red silhouettes quickly flew into the distance before she could finish speaking.

 Chapter 481 Growth of the Adepts Tower

    Chapter 481 Growth of the Adept¡¯s Tower


    Mary had already changed drastically after undergoing the bloody fights of the nar wars. She was no longer the insignificant and reckless vampire from the past.


    Compared to the vast scale of a nar war, the extermination of the native magical creatures in the ck Forest was utterly uneventful. It was nd and boring. Mary would never have found the motivation to take up this mundane job of sweeping away small fry had it not been for the sake of clearing a safe territory around Fire Throne.


    The treaty that Fire Throne signed with the native magical creatures could stillst for three months. Yet the human adepts had shown their wicked and greedy faces.


    Mary led her three great subordinate generals, and one military advisor, to embark on her quest. She dragged along the reluctant and helpless Billis, gathered together the two chess pieces Greem had nted in advance, and swept through a radius of five hundred kilometers to the north of the tower in a matter of a single month.


    Mary and her troops visited all magical creatures whose poption exceeded a certain level. They could either submit or die; there was no third way out. Those magical creatures that didn¡¯t yield to Fire Throne¡¯s rule would be dealt with, and those with value would be dragged back to the tower to be used as ves. Those who were worthless were cast aside and given to Billis. These creatures became the source of blood and flesh for Billis to hatchbat insects on a massive scale.


    The initially upset Billis immediately turned happy after receiving so many benefits consecutively. He started sincerely and honestly doing the work that Mary assigned to him. This much food would have taken him two to three years to gather slowly. He would never have been able to do it like Mary¨C crushing everything in her way in a month and slightly more.


    That undoubtedly made Billis grateful to Mary. He even started silently cursing the petty nature of the Queen Bug that had assimted with him. The Queen Bug fell into a period of prolonged silence. She couldn¡¯t be bothered to refute the thoughts of the ignorant Billis.


    Only the Queen Bug who had shed with Mary for an entire year knew the full extent of Mary¡¯s savagery and fearlessness. Others might be tricked by Mary¡¯s beautiful and seductive appearance, but matter when the Queen Bug thought about it, she was filled with deep agony and endless sorrow!


    The territories became far emptier after clearing away those obstructive and annoying individuals.


    Consequently, the magical creatures that were the quickest to surrender all received the biggest and bestnds. They also became the scouts and watchmen of Fire Throne, scattered around the adept¡¯s tower to watch for threats. The magical creatures that were neither willing to submit to Fire Throne or be exterminated had no choice but to migrate to distantnds under cover of night.


    For a moment, the name of Fire Throne spread far and wide. Even many adept ns in the center of the continent decided on this ce as and of trials for their apprentices.


    ording to the treaty between Fire Throne and the Zhentarim Association, a small human¡¯s settlement was quickly developed, with Pinecone Town at its center. Every day,rge amounts of resources surged into Pinecone Town. Many farmers were also gathered together to expand and build more living spaces.


    The shape of a small city had appeared in just a little over a month.


    The sudden boost in human activity undoubtedly created a substantial flow of human traffic for Fire Throne. With the original guewood at its center, another small townposed of only mercenaries, adventurers, and apprentices on trials started to form rapidly. It attracted many tanners, herbalists, arcane merchants, and other fringe professions.


    Gargamel, who managed the daily matters of Fire Throne, had been a wandering adept himself. That was why he deeply understood the pain and troubles of wandering adepts. As such, hepletely deviated from the oppression and disdain that most adept ns cast upon the wandering adepts. Fire Throne announced many policies that were generous to staying adepts.


    The so-called staying adepts were wandering adepts. When they walked to a ce, they would temporarily stay over in a tower open to the public. Their stay might be to gather knowledge, collecting nearby resources, or even to borrow the magical facilities of the adept¡¯s tower.


    Even though they didn¡¯t belong to the ranks of stationed adepts, they would be active around the tower in the short term.


    These ¡¯short terms¡¯ were often one to two years.


    Of course, there were also staying adepts who easily resided in a single ce for a dozen years.


    Gargamel provided living environments with the least regtion he could afford to these people who chased after resources and didn¡¯t wish to be restricted by the ns. He also allowed their descendants to stay within the tower.


    Wandering Adepts were adepts as well. Many times, they would form parties to go on adventures or to explore ancient ruins. In these cases, the descendants that always followed behind them became a tricky problem.


    Bringing them on the adventure was definitely out of the question.


    Leaving them in a random ce could easily affect and dy their improvement and development.


    That was why Gargamel helped them deal with their concerns while calling for more wandering adepts to adventure around Fire Throne. As long as they were staying adepts that had registered with Fire Throne, they would enjoy the fundamental rights of a stationed adept, and they would not need to take onpulsory adept missions.


    The apprentice adepts that came along with them could also enjoy the learning and trial opportunities within the tower.


    As massive quantities of quality resources flowed into Fire Throne from the surrounding ck Forest, a new market slowly formed. Purchasing raw magical creature resources and herbs here and processing them into valuable magical materials and potions was a lucrative affair. So much so that it attracted droves of merchants and wandering adepts.


    The policies that Fire Throne pushed out might not look like much on the surface to the ignorant. However, each and every single one of them would resonate and y to the hearts of the wandering adepts.


    It might not move them enough to make them change their resolve to continue wandering, but the abundant resources and loose rules would indirectly influence them to stay a little longer.


    One or two wandering adepts doing this wouldn¡¯t bring about much of a change. However, if seven or eight wandering adepts chose to be staying adepts, then it would be a massive revolution for Fire Throne.


    At any one point, Fire Throne could host a dozen staying adepts. In their free time, Gargamel would be able to use generous magical crystal rewards to get them to teach lessons to the apprentices of the tower. These wandering adepts were often masters and experts in various fields. Some of the less popr magical disciplines quickly found suitable teachers in this manner.


    For a moment, the magical fields and research topics that tower apprentices could take part in had gained much more variety and fullness. It indirectly increased the apprentices¡¯ reserves of knowledge, as well as their insight into magic. That allowed them to have a broader space for development!


    Of course, for the sake of spreading the name of Fire Throne even further, and to increase the passion with which stationed adepts and apprentices would work for contribution points, Gargamel and Greem came to a decision. After some discussion, they put in some rare resources that couldn¡¯t be found in a normal market into the mission and reward system of the tower in a purposeful and limited fashion.


    For example; advanced potions, adept-level magical creatures, elementium golems, etc.


    These things were rare resources that were hard to find, even in an adept¡¯s trading point. Adept ns and organizations monopolized most of them. When they did appear, everyone would fight for them. Ordinary adepts without plentiful savings would not be able to get these things even if they wanted to.


    However, now, Fire Throne introduced a set amount of such resources on a monthly basis into its mission system. These resources didn¡¯t cost magical crystals and didn¡¯t demand power. One could get them as long as they had enough contribution points.


    Moreover, when one stayed in Fire Throne, they didn¡¯t need to go out and conduct dangerous adept missions. The missions that allowed them to gain contribution points while staying in the tower were numerous.


    They were missions such as: holding some sses, bing the teacher for specific magic research topics, helping manage the magical garden, or treating some enchanting materials. There were far too many such missions. Most staying adepts could take out enough free time to do one or two tasks while they were exploring and adventuring on their own.


    That was why Fire Throne was able to prop up the functioning of the magical facilities and the mission system just through these staying adepts who had no contractual rtionship with the tower. The stationed adepts that belonged to Fire Throne could now gain more time to be ced into their research and experiments.


    This ingenious act, which brought about so many benefits, obtained the uncontested approval of all the stationed adepts.


    As praises were passed around, Gargamel¡¯s position as the head butler of Fire Throne was solidified!


    ............


    Inparison to Gargamel¡¯s exceptional talent for management, Greem, the actual owner of the tower, was doing poorly in this aspect.


    After handing over most of the authority to Gargamel and Meryl, Greem had hidden himself on the fifth level of the tower. He was entirely absorbed in all sorts of research and experiments.


    The cloning of the robber bug was still being tested, even after over a hundred failures. He had lost a lot of resources due to that. However, the beautiful future was right in front of him and waving its hands at Greem, and he was unwilling to give up.


    After he had sessfully deciphered the Explosion variant fire rune, Greem had also sessfully etched it into his core consciousness. That meant he could add on an explosive effect to any fire spells he cast from now on with just a thought. However, the changes to the runes at the core meant changes had to be made to the spiritual spell models and magical chants.


    It was an incredibly exhausting practice and a massive project that required changes to each spell!


    However, with the help of the Chip, anything rted torge data calction and data model construction could be left to the Chip to figure out in its free time slowly. As such, Greem could still utilize lots of time to deal with the current magical problem he was facing!


    Two more rare fire runes were waiting for him to decipher. They were listed in the Chip¡¯s idle missions. Judging by the magical characteristics that the variant fire rune had disyed so far, the two rare fire runes were clearly above it.


    The moment they were deciphered, the runes would be an immensely helpful increase to Greem¡¯sbat prowess.

 Chapter 482 Bloodline Origin

    Chapter 482 Bloodline Origin


    Fire Throne.


    In a secret room on the tower¡¯s fifth level.


    A cluster of ck mes lit up an array. It floated in the air steadily as the temperature in the room plummeted to the freezing point. Apparent signs of frost developed on both the ceilings and the walls.


    Greem wasn¡¯t concerned about these abnormalities. He only silently gazed at that ck fist-sized fire. Who knew what he was thinking.


    He didn¡¯t have to wait long. A short momentter, a strange spatial flux emanated from within the ck fire. It then turned into a clear wave of mental flux.


    "Tell me your request, adept!" The voice in the ck fire was dry, cold, and stiff. The mental flux also vibrated tremendously. It was evident that the mental flux and voice had both been disguised with magic.


    "I¡¯m looking for a person! It¡¯s best if you people can kill him. If you can¡¯t kill him, then give me his information and location!" Greem was just as straightforward.


    "There is no problem. Send over the basic information on that person!" The mental flux in the ck fire continued, "Remember, something like assassination costs money. A thousand magical crystals for an ordinary human, and a hundred thousand magical crystals for an adept. If the target belongs to a n or organization, the price will increase by two to five times, depending on the situation. Given your current clearance, we will not ept any mission on adepts of Second Grade and above."


    Greem¡¯s gaze sharpened.


    Since they mentioned Second Grade adepts, it meant that they possessed the means to kill a Second Grade adept without leaving behind any trace. It also meant that there had to be multiple Third Grade adepts in their organization!


    On the Continent of Adepts, Third Grade adepts were already the corebat strength of adepts. The grade above that was the Fourth Grade. Those people were mysterious characters that often shut themselves away in their rooms and spent all their days thinking about how they could make it past the threshold of Great Adept.


    It was almost impossible to run into a Fourth Grade adept under normal circumstances.


    "As expected, the hidden strength of these extreme organizations is definitely beyond the imagination of ordinary people." Greem¡¯s mind turned, but he sent over the necessary information he had on the target without hesitation.


    "The information has been received. A result will be provided after three days!" The adept on the other end of the ck fire cut the long-rangedmunications after its reply.


    The ck fire in front of Greem suddenly went out. The array of floating runes also started to disperse.


    Hopefully, they can provide us with good news!


    Greem silently contemted.


    Alice had only managed to divine a name and an image of the person rted to Mary¡¯s source of blood. However, shecked moreprehensive information on that person.


    Leicester. A three-hundred-year-old vampire. Given the thousand-year lifespan of ordinary vampires, he was still in his rebellious teenage years.


    He had mysteriously appeared in a vi near Feidnan City and lived a life of hermitage there for several decades. No one might have been able to discover his existence if it weren¡¯t for his victims including a person under the protection of the Sarubo n.


    The things that happened afterward were just as Adept Anderson had described in the past.


    The n had sent many adepts to exterminate this vampire with only beginner-adept-level prowess. However, they were unexpectedly ambushed byrge numbers of blood servants. During the chaos, Leicester had escaped while grievously wounded. The attacking n adepts returned empty-handed.


    Anderson had taken the opportunity of searching the mysteriousb beneath the vi to swipe a vial of essence blood from Leicester¡¯s body for himself. It was only then that he started his research on the ancient species that was the vampires.


    The reason Mary was corrupted into an offshoot vampire was due to those couple drops of essence blood.


    Mary had indirectly be the blood servant of Leicester!


    Now that Mary had be an elite-level adept, her power had almost caught up to that vampire. As the bloodline origin, the restrictions of the bloodline limit was extremely obvious.


    If that vampire Leicester didn¡¯t advance to Second Grade, then Mary would never have the chance to develop any further. Her power would be locked under her bloodline source¡¯s grade for her entire life.


    The only way to change that was to find the bloodline source and conduct a blood exchange transfusion ceremony. This way, Mary would be able to obtain the room for growth that belonged to the other person. Until she reached the next bloodline limit, she would be free!


    Trying to find someone with just their name and image in this massive world was a virtually impossible task for someone of Mary¡¯s strength and resources. Even Alice, as the Witch of Fate, couldn¡¯t directly obtain the location of the opponent. It meant that Leicester was currently within some kind of strange ce, or that he was being obscured by a high grade adept. Otherwise, there was no reason for Alice to fail.


    As the information Alice provided was far too crude, Greem had no choice but to contact a prominent underground organization on the Continent of Adepts through Gargamel. They were the Shadowhand, and Greem hoped to find Leicester through their channels and means.


    ............


    The Shadowhand was a famous underground organization of the Continent of Adepts, just as expected!


    In just three days, they had managed to find the vampire known as Leicester.


    However, they had turned down Greem¡¯s request to kill him. The reason was simple. The vampire was a member of a vampire family, and the family he belonged to had many Second Grade vampire adepts.


    For that reason, Greem had no choice but to take out fifty thousand magical crystals to purchase the detailed information on the vampire.


    Leicester Vik. Part of the Vik family. It was a vampire family that possessed ancient bloodlines. They had sixty-seven members, one of which was a Third Grade vampire, and three of which were Second Grade vampires. There was also twenty-five pureblood vampires and thirty-eight offshoot vampires.


    The vampires that had yet to reach adolescence wouldn¡¯t even be included in the family tree by the family.


    The Vik Family resided in the southwest area of the Zhentarim area. That was also a ce where adept ns of various races lived. Much like the Kingdom of Stormwind that the Storm Giants had established in the center of the continent, these adepts of other races had also created peace treaties with the human adepts. That was why they could possess the same status and rights as human adepts as long as they didn¡¯t go against the adept code of practice set down by the Zhentarim Association.


    The Leicester that Greem was looking for was already an elite adept now. He was also one of the more powerful pureblood vampires amongst the other purebloods of the Viks. That was why it was hard to avoid serious bacsh from the Viks if he wanted to kill Leicester.


    Greem¡¯s current clearance was not enough to get the Shadowhand to take the risk of offending high-grade adepts to kill Leicester. That was the truth, regardless of how many magical crystals Greem could take out from his pocket.


    Consequently, the Shadowhand promptly cut off allmunications with Greem after selling Leicester¡¯s information to him.


    Greem immediately fell into a dilemma after researching the information he had received.


    ording to Leicester¡¯s travel records over the past few years, he had rarely left the Bloodcastle, located in the Qatarselon area. It seemed the family was grounding him. This fact undoubtedly increased the difficulty of catching him. As for something like breaking into Bloodcastle? Maybe if someday Greem got sick of living!


    Moreover, Greem had also left behind tracks by checking on Leicester¡¯s information through the Shadowhand. Even if he managed to, with great fortune, kill Leicester, the Viks would be able to trace this clue and easily find Greem.


    Greem felt his scalp go numb at the thought of facing a terrifying Second Grade vampire. If he really did get himself an enemy like that, he would be in danger even if he turtled within the


    safety of Fire Throne.


    That was why Greem decided to temporarily let go of the issue of the vampire after a deep and intimate talk with Mary. After all, the most critical thing for Greem currently had to be his own advancement.


    Even though advancement to Second Grade was still a faraway goal, Greem had already found his path forward. The only thing left was the umtion of power and the passage of time. As long as he sessfully advanced to Second Grade, the difficulty of these problems would decrease significantly.


    After all, it was much harder to tell if that Third Grade vampire of the Vik family would choose to sh with a Second Grade Greem over a First Grade descendant. Not to mention that Greem was not going to be the kind of ordinary Second Grade adept that relied on time and luck after he advanced.


    When the time came, a Third Grade vampire might not be all that scary to him as the world would imagine!


    ............


    Bloodcastle.


    Five pitch-ck and heavy stone coffinsid in a damp and dark room underground.


    Creaaaaak!


    An ear-piercing creaking rang out as the lid of a coffin moved. Flickers of fire started burning on the torches ced on the walls. They illuminated this sinister room and its walls covered in ugly moss.


    The second coffin from the left suddenly opened during the creaking. Cold, ancient, and fetid air emerged from within as a ck silhouette suddenly sat up. Their crimson eyes glowed with a cold light in the dim room.


    The stone coffin beside that person suddenly opened as if its resident had sensed the movement beside them.


    "Brother, what has happened? Why did you suddenly wake up from your deep slumber?" The one asking was a beautiful teenage girl in a golden noble¡¯s dress. Her crimson eyes glowed brilliantly despite the darkness.


    Leicester was a handsome young man. His delicate and perfect mustache was neatlybed. He radiated the noble aura of a gentleman.


    After silently staring into the darkness, Leicester finally spoke, "I sense something unknown calling to my blood. As if... as if some of my essence blood has been leaked to the outside world and is slowly growing stronger."


    "What?" The beautiful female vampire couldn¡¯t help but exim, "Do you not know what it means to us for our origin blood to be leaked? Losing control over our blood descendants is the easiest way to cause a bloodline bacsh."


    Leicester understood the terror of bloodline bacsh. However, no matter how hard he thought about it, he couldn¡¯t recall when he had leaked his essence blood.


    After all, he had set up several bloodlineboratories back then, when he was secretly conducting his bloodline research. The process of his study hadn¡¯t gone entirely smoothly; he had been pursued by human adepts several times. However, he had always destroyed hisbs before he escaped, and there shouldn¡¯t be any of his essence blood leaked to the outside world.


    "Perhaps it¡¯s only a delusion of mine. Don¡¯t worry about me. I¡¯ll be careful!" Leicester¡¯s crimson eyes glowed twice before he sighed andid back into his coffin.


    As the two stone coffins once again creaked and closed shut, the fires on the torches extinguished.


    The room was plunged into deathly silence once more!

 Chapter 483 Soul Equipment

    Chapter 483 Soul Equipment


    Five monthster.


    The first elite-level elementium golem had been sent back to the Sarubo n.


    The feedback from Adept F¨¹gen stated that the higher-ups were extremely satisfied with Greem¡¯s obedience. They didn¡¯t at all suspect he had done something to the golem.


    After all, Greem couldn¡¯t hide the intense and periodic explosions from his alchemicalb from other people. That was why the n was still able to keep track of Greem¡¯s activities through the spies they had ced in Fire Throne, as well as Greem¡¯s basic sess rate at crafting golems.


    The intense explosions that happened once every two months, along with the asional pseudo-adept and adept-level golems that appeared as rewards within the mission system of the tower, all pointed towards one thing; this once powerfulbat fire adept had now invested all of his efforts into crafting elementium golems.


    That could be seen through the quantity and quality of the golems he was crafting.


    Even though it was a pity that some of the golems had fallen into the hands of wandering adepts and apprentices through the mission system, most of these golems would still end up in the hands of the Sarubo n through various means.


    Greem knew very well about this, yet he had the good sense not to interfere. He continued to insert a certain number of low-grade golems into the mission system on a monthly basis.


    Over the past six months of management, almost all of the apprentices within Fire Throne had managed to get their hands on one elementium golem. These cheap and powerful assistants were a massive boost to the power of the tower apprentices. They no longer needed to be as cautious as before when going in and out of the ck Forest.


    The two watchdogs that Fire Throne ced around Fire Throne¨CThree-Headed Demon Hound Unguja and Medusa Dana¨Cwere helping Greem keep a close watch on the perimeter of the ck Forest. All magical creatures that were permitted within three hundred kilometers of the adept¡¯s tower had all been carefully selected.


    Those excessively fierce magical creature tribes, or those that posed a threat, were all kept at a distance of five hundred kilometers. If any foolish enemies tried to force their way past the perimeter, Unguja and Dana would join forces and send troops to exterminate them. If the opponent was too strong, they could still call on Mary, who was constantly wandering around the ck Forest with her subordinates by her side.


    Three pseudo-Second-Grade blood knights, one powerful vampire adept, and a now pseudo-adept level Billis were enough to deal with any magical tribe that had yet to establish a foothold.


    If it weren¡¯t for Greem strictly restricting Mary from stepping out of the perimeter, she would probably have led her men and gone even deeper into the forest.


    Mary was fearless because she was ignorant. She didn¡¯t understand the true terror of the ck Forest!


    The five hundred kilometer perimeter to the north of Fire Throne that they now controlled was still at the edge of the ck Forest. The most plentiful creatures living here were all kinds of strange magical creatures. Their strength and grades were also at a level that Fire Throne could still deal with.


    If they went a little deeper inside, there was a high chance that they would run into those terrifying Second Grade magical creatures.


    Fire Throne¡¯s current power was still inadequate to deal with Second Grade magical creatures. If Mary recklessly drew a Second Grade magical creature to the surroundings of Fire Throne, they would probably have no choice but to hide within the tower. No one would dare to go out again.


    That wasn¡¯t an exaggeration; it was something that was very likely to happen.


    Much like how the human adepts liked to treat the magical creatures of the ck Forest as an endless supply of resources, why wouldn¡¯t the native magical creatures of the ck Forest treat the human adepts with hostility? If those high-grade creatures discovered that human adepts had snuck into the ck Forest, it was inevitable that they would pursue them at all costs! They would have to exterminate the adepts!


    Consequently, the severely restricted Mary became notably bored after having explored the area within the five hundred kilometer perimeter.


    To avoid Mary making trouble in her boredom, Greem quickly cooked up an idea. He tossed the tower apprentice Sabrina into Mary¡¯s care.


    He had heard Sabrina mention an ancient ruin when he took her under his wing. It seemed there were some valuable assets there. The only problem had been that Greem was too busy to find the time to go there. He decided to leave the issue to Mary and have her lead a team toplete Fire Throne¡¯s first adventure mission.


    After a round of selections, the core party members were decided to be Mary, Endor, and Meryl. Sabrina and Billis would also go along. This party seemed too small at first nce, but their hidden power was far more than an outsider could imagine.


    Mary had three pseudo-Second Grade blood knights under hermand while being a powerful vampire adept herself. She and her subordinates ounted for more than half of the party¡¯sbat strength. As adepts of the tower, Endor and Meryl naturally carried several elite golems with them.


    At this point, it wasn¡¯t just them. Even the pseudo-adept level Billis and Sabrina each held an adept-level golem in their hands.


    If the entire adventuring party was to go full out, they could even be equal to a ten-adeptbat party.


    Greem, on the other hand, was simply too busy. He was either in the midst of the ¡¯degradation¡¯ of his body or Spirit and having to gorge for his nutrition, or in the midst of the sudden boost of his body and Spirit, when he would have to make preparations for the crafting of the next golem.


    Greem had to temper his Spirit in the sea ofva beneath Fire Throne once every month. For the fifteen days following a tempering, his mental space would experience continuous quakes and contraction. Still, this was only a temporary effect. As long as he supplied proper treatment and nutrition, Greem¡¯s Spirit would increase by 0.04 points once the quakes had stopped.


    This number seemed insignificant, so much so that even Greem would not have been able to detect his improvement through self-assessment had it not been for the Chip¡¯s detailed scans. However, this sort of growth was real and absolute. As long as Greem kept up his efforts, the days would umte and eventually all of his Spirit would bepletely elementiumized.


    When that happened, the elementiumization of both his body and Spirit would reach a bnce. The necessary conditions for his advancement to Second Grade would then be fulfilled.


    To fully utilize every bit of time he had, Greem always used voodoo poison to temper his body during the period of weakness following Spirit tempering.


    His body had alreadypleted elementiumization. Greem¡¯s body of mes allowed him to be immune to nearly all damage from elementium fires. However, elementiumization had only increased his body¡¯spatibility with elementium fires. It didn¡¯t fully excavate the hidden strength in his body.


    That was why Greem would always use voodoo poison to stimte his body into releasing more of its potential. He would then follow it up with a carefully-prepared magical energy meal to solidify his body¡¯s foundation.


    His Spirit and body¡¯s attributes were slowly but surely improving under the precise help of the Chip.


    Thus, time slowly passed by under such a routine, day by day.


    The tower party that had gone to investigate the ruins had barely made it back to Fire Throne. The area they had gone to was the burial grounds of some ancient adept cult. After tens of thousands of years, that ce had turned into a dangerous ce rife with wandering souls, ghosts, and monsters.


    If it weren¡¯t for Poison Witch Endor¡¯s experience that allowed her to detect the abnormality, all of the party members might have been possessed by evil spirits. They would have spent the rest of their lives wandering in the dark caverns as that which was neither alive nor dead.


    The party had relied on their overwhelming firepower and used the elementium golems to forge a path out of that ce. It was only then that they barely managed to escape that dangerousnd. However, their reckless actions had also caused nearly half of the spirits in the burial grounds to escape. A decent-sized ghostly disaster had urred in the area nearby!


    To avoid being stopped by the Zhentarim Association adepts that hurried to the ce after the incident, the party immediately retreated the very night they escaped. They quickly headed back to the Fire Throne.


    The adventure this time had caused the female adepts to all receive varying degrees of spirit corruption, and much had to be done to help them dispel the effects.


    Still, the party hadn¡¯te back empty-handed. They had discovered some strange runic stones in the first few graves they searched. Greem sessfully extracted some ancient inscriptions and runes from those stones.


    Of course, most of the content was the personal biography left by some ancient adepts who were the owners of those graves. Naturally, the runes sang plenty of praises for these people. However, after removing all the useless trash, Greem managed to find some things that were beneficial to him.


    It was about Apanying-Type magical items, or, as the adepts now knew it, Soul Equipment. They used to be the standard equipment in ancient times. There had been so many more of them in the past than there were now.


    However, the creation of Soul Equipment required the bloody sacrifice of thousands or even tens of thousands of people. If the ancient adepts had been allowed to do as they had pleased, the fragile human race would never have been able to withstand their wrath. That was also tremendous damage to the World of Adepts!


    A severe shing of viewpoints passed between the ancient adepts and the world consciousness back then.


    The world consciousness had finally perfected the narw system and forbidden the adepts from being able to manipte thews of this world directly. That indirectly weakened the ancient adepts.


    The conflict between the ancient adepts and the world consciousness hadsted tens of thousands of years, causing colossal damage to the entire world.


    The strength of the ancient adepts had significantly weakened. To avoid further bacsh from the world consciousness, the most powerful of the adepts had no choice but to leave the World of Adepts. They stepped out of the realm and went to find new ces and new nes to establish themselves.


    From then on, an unspoken rule was created in the World of Adepts. All Great Adepts that had gone beyond Fourth Grade had to leave the World of Adepts and proceed beyond the realm. It was only then that Great Adepts could be prevented from hurting the World of Adepts through their overwhelming power.


    The departure of those Great Adepts had caused many magical systems and ancestries to fall or even vanish from the World of Adepts. Soul Equipment was undoubtedly one of these systems.


    The Soul Equipment that could be found in the World of Adepts now was almost all left behind from the ancient ages. The adepts of the present had lost the techniques to craft and strengthen their Soul Equipment.


    However, what made Greem feel extremely fortunate was the fact that he found a clue in these records; a hint to strengthen Soul Equipment.

 Chapter 484 Of Monster and Man

    Chapter 484 Of Monster and Man


    Time flew by in a sh.


    Sixty-seven years.


    Any ordinary human would have over half of their lives gone just like that. However, for adepts who had a fundamental lifespan up to two or three hundred years, this was no more than one-quarter of their lives, or even less.


    Those who had mutated their bodies, going down the path of bloodline mutations, or elementiumized bodies, even had lifespans up to four or five hundred years. Vampires like Mary could reach a thousand years easily.


    The same Fire Throne, the same adept¡¯s tower.


    However, the apprentices living within had undergone a massive change.


    ............


    Horus.


    An advanced apprentice belonging to Fire Throne.


    He had a pale and smoothplexion, a tall and muscr figure, and always wore a gray short apprentice¡¯s robe draped on his body.


    As an outsider, he had been rmended into the tower by a staying adept twenty years ago. That staying adept was also his only rtive in this world.


    Unfortunately, that adept hadn¡¯t seeded in returning from an invitation to a mysterious adventure. Thus, the Horus who had lost the only person he could rely on had no choice but to lead a lonely life in this strange, yet foreign, adept¡¯s tower.


    Fortunately for him, the owner of this tower was wise andpassionate. While he looked a little sinister, he had created an excellent and rxed living and learning environment for the apprentices of the tower. Perhaps it was due to him having been rmended by a staying adept, but Horus even managed to obtain an excellent job as a librarian.


    This way, Horus was able to easily obtain a monthly ie of thirty magical crystals and ten contribution points, without needing to take risks and go into the ck Forest with mercenaries. That was already more than enough for him to lead a peaceful life inside the tower!


    There were approximately seven or eight individuals in a simr position as him inside Fire Throne. Most of them were apprentice adepts with nowhere else to go who decided to treat this tower as their home.


    It was a pity, but their excessively peaceful lives also slowed down the speed at which they learned new spells and mastered incantations. Consequently, most of them were stuck at the advanced apprentice level; they hadn¡¯t improved in many years.


    There were many times when Horus couldn¡¯t help but wonder to himself if he should abandon this sort of tranquil life and follow in the footsteps of thosebat apprentices. Perhaps he should follow the mercenaries deep into the ck Forest and refine hisbat techniques under the ws and fangs of magical creatures.


    Only one pseudo-adept had sessfully advanced to adept in the past ten years, and that person had be the ninth stationed adept of Fire Throne. On the other hand, there were as many as three pseudo-adepts who died in their advancement ceremonies. Horus had only attended two of their funerals. The third one¡¯s family lived too far away from the tower. Horus also had duties in the tower. Consequently, he couldn¡¯t send off hispanion in person.


    That was also the main reason for Horus¡¯ depressed mood over the past six months.


    The sess rate of apprentices advancing to adepts had never been high. It was good enough for one out of every four or five to advance to adept.


    Fire Throne, on the other hand, had managed to maintain a rate of one adept advancement per every ten years. It would already be a shocking number if it were announced to the public!


    Currently, Fire Throne had nine stationed adepts and twelve staying adepts. This number was sufficient to overshadow more than half of the adept¡¯s towers in the center of the continent.


    The numerous adepts also drew many apprentices toe to the tower.


    The current Fire Throne had a total of two hundred and fifteen apprentice adepts, seventeen of which were pseudo-adepts, seventy-eight of which were advanced apprentices, and the rest who were beginner and intermediate apprentices.


    As the number of adepts was plentiful and all of them were well-versed in varied and strange fields of magic, most of the known basic magical courses had been set up in the tower. A master¡¯s lecture open to the public would be held every two or three days.


    These masters were all powerful adepts who had reached enviable achievements in a specific field. For example, the melee-expert female adept Mary talked about the offensive techniques of abat adept. Witch Endor, who specialized in synthesizing poisons, lectured about voodoo poison and toxin mixing. The strange Adept Billis gave lessons on entomology. The gentle and beautiful female adept Meryl taught techniques on instant-casting spells. The mostly modified robotic adept Sabrina taught magical mechanical constructs.


    Horus, on the other hand, was extremely lucky. He was able to have close contact with all of the tower adepts. He was indeed able to see the power of adepts.


    However, something had been deeply troubling Horus recently.


    Adept Eva, who had been responsible for teaching magical botany, had suddenly stopped all her lessons. She had called off several nned public lectures and vanished without a trace. That undoubtedly caused several students who were taking her sses to take note.


    Horus was one of them.


    Adept Gargamel has also been missing for a few days. Perhaps I should inquire about Adept Eva¡¯s situation the next time I run into him.


    Horus thought to himself as he diligently organized the library.


    He had no idea that something that had never before happened in the World of Adepts was currently underway on the fifth level of the tower.


    ............


    The fifth level of the tower.


    A small, secret room had been taken out for use as a temporary delivery room. Heart-rending screams were asionally let out, pulling on the heartstrings of everyone present.


    Gargamel, who was so skinny and frail that he looked like a giant mouse, was stroking his beard and pacing about outside the room like any other ordinary human husband. Several times, he lifted his leg with the intent to go in, but then hesitated and put it down.


    The one hidden inside the delivery room and giving birth was the forest spirit Eva, who had been carrying her baby for as long as sixty-nine years. She was also that mysterious, cold, and pretty Adept Eva that the apprentices knew.


    At the moment, the female adepts were the ones who were busy going in and out of the delivery room. They were Mary, Meryl, Endor, and Sabrina.


    Still, while they had magical knowledge that far surpassed the smartest of mortal schrs, as well as cruelty and savagery that trumped even a bloody butcher, none of them knew what to do with the strange baby inside Eva. In fact, they were often panicking more than Eva, who was screaming at the top of her lungs.


    The baby inside Eva had gone beyond the scope of an ordinary lifeform. Their traits as a semi-human and semi-monster had caused them to be a strange lifeform that was hard define by current standards. What delivery method to use had be the most significant issue that the ¡¯nurses¡¯ were fretting over!


    However, whatplicated things more was the fact that the strange and tiny life seemed to be in a stage where it was wildly growing. Just as it was about toe out, dozens of fleshy threads extended from its tiny body and dug into various spots on Eva¡¯s body. The baby was wildly absorbing Eva¡¯s life force.


    When Mary saw that Eva¡¯s life force was still falling continually and that Eva¡¯s life was at risk, she immediately suggested cutting apart Eva¡¯s stomach and taking out this naughty fellow. However, this suggestion was swiftly rejected by the agonizing Eva.


    As the mother of this strange being, she could sense that such an act would cause a life bacsh that would severely affect the child¡¯s future development. Interrupting or stopping this would create tremendous consequences in its future that could never bepensated for.


    Thus, out of her desire to nurture her child, Eva stopped everyone from interfering. She even shouted at Gargamel and got him to get out of the delivery room. It was only then that she started leaving behind her will.


    Faced with this sort of awkward situation where they couldn¡¯t help, fight, or me anyone, the girls could only retrieve bottle after bottle of life potion. They were trying their best to maintain Eva¡¯s life.


    However, the effects were minimal.


    Substitute Dolls, False Life Potions, Ring of Damage Reduction; they had put to use all of these magical items, yet they still couldn¡¯t stop Eva¡¯s life force from fading away.


    Gargamel was heartbroken at this, but he also understood Eva¡¯s feelings. That was why he no longer dared to bring up the idea of forcibly taking out the child. He could only strike his head while periodically taking out strange potions or herbs for Eva to consume.


    Watching your lover slowly die in front of your own eyes was the most horrifying torture in the entire world!


    The coldly observing Billis was also an elite adept now. As a bloodthirsty and cruel bug-man adept, he was extremely confused by everyone¡¯s unwise action.


    Was there any value in preserving a descendant that would bite the hand of its master?


    There was no second answer to this question in his mind!


    In his eyes, all lifeforms in the world were either targets to be hunted or servants to bemanded. Why would he ever sacrifice himself for someone else and use his own life to provide for a descendant that he had never been acquainted with?!


    That had already exceeded the limits of hisprehension as a bug-man adept!


    Adept Am and Adept Deserra, who had joined the tower after the others, could only stand by and wait for the results in silence. They had no right to intervene in the decisions of these more veteran adepts.


    Am had advanced to adept fifty years ago. He was the second pseudo-adept among Greem¡¯s disciples, after Meryl, to have progressed to adept. Thest batch of the other two pseudo-adepts under Greem¨CToril and Lena¨Chadn¡¯t met good ends. One had died due to failing the advancement ceremony, while the other had returned to their n after exhausting eighty percent of their life force after failing the ceremony.


    After Greem had utterly isted himself, he had never epted any apprentices after Am and the rest. That was why Adept Deserra, who had unexpectedly advanced, was actually a disciple of Adept Meryl.


    If one were to consider it in that manner, Adept Deserra could already be considered to be a third generation adept of Fire Throne!


    "No, this can¡¯t continue like this!" Meryl performed a simple calction of the speed at which Eva¡¯s life force was withering, and she couldn¡¯t help but speak worriedly, "Lady Mary, you had best contact Teacher Greem! Maybe... maybe he might have some idea of what to do."


    Gargamel, who was almost tearing out all of his wispy beard, suddenly lifted his head. The light of hope shone out of his beady eyes.


    Indeed! If he went to look for his master, maybe, perhaps, he could have a useable idea!


    Yet, just as Mary was about to speak, a deep and thick voice rang out in the room.


    "No need to shout for me. I¡¯m here."

 Chapter 485 Beautiful Baby Girl

    Chapter 485 Beautiful Baby Girl


    A sound rang out as a strange human figure of pure elementium fire appeared in the corner of the room.


    Sixty-seven years had been enough time for Greem to push his Spirit to the twenty point limit. It had been enough for him toplete his Spirit elementiumization, and to achieve an elementium bnce between his body and mind.


    In the past, Greem would merely have to turn into his me Fiend form, and this tiny room would have been so scalding hot that it would have been hard to even step on the floor. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the pure heat he radiated or the Ring of Fire. Everything about him would turn any environment into a world of magma, with seas of me and waves of heat.


    However, now that the fire elementium had reached a perfect bnce, all the fire and heat that used to radiate outwards had vanished. When the two-meter tall elementium human stood by everyone, no one felt any change in the temperature. They couldn¡¯t even sense any feelings of suffocation from the fire consuming the oxygen in the air.


    The silently burning fires remained within Greem¡¯s body like the most gentle of servants. They didn¡¯t possess any of the violence and ferocity that people expected. That caused all the adepts present to suspect that they only saw an illusion. They thought that there were no mes on Greem!


    However, that massive aura of energy was as deep as a bottomless sea, and everyone in the room could clearly feel it!


    One couldn¡¯t help but wonder what Greem had gone through in the past couple of decades. After the most difficult twenty years at the start, Greem had forced himself to constantly be in the me Fiend form to stimte the elementium in his mind and body to reach harmony and bnce.


    The Greem in the past had to rely on runic tattoos toplete his me Fiend Transformation and be an exceptional master of fire. However, right now, Greem was perpetually maintaining this me humanoid form of his. It didn¡¯t matter whether he was eating, sleeping, meditating, or performing magical experiments.


    Fire was no longer an ability of his. Instead, it had be an instinct of his, as natural as breathing and speaking.


    The old Greem had been an ordinary adept. The human was human, and the fire was fire. The one thing that allowed both tomunicate with each other was that intangible fire elementium affinity of his. Now, most of the time, Greem subconsciously recognized himself as a cluster of fire¨C a cluster of fire with self-consciousness and a humanoid appearance.


    The most significant benefit brought about by this change was the fact that all the fire spells that Greem cast no longer required any chants or handsigns. They would gather and disperse with a single wave of his hand.


    Therge-scale fire spells that Greem needed to spend a long time and a lot of mental energy to form had all nearly be instant-cast spells. Casting these spells was no longer a matter of whether there was enough time. It was only a matter of whether Greem was willing to spend the magic required to cast the spell.


    Consequently, for the current Greem, his me humanoid state had instead be his usual state. If it weren¡¯t for being affectionate with Mary, Greem would probably already have just abandoned his iparably ¡¯weak¡¯ human form.


    After silently appearing in the room, Greem didn¡¯t talk too much with the rest of the people. Instead, he immediately walked towards the agonizing Eva.


    A soft bed had been ced in the middle of the delivery room. Eva was lying on top of it, her pale face drenched with sweat.


    She sped the sides of the bed tightly with both her hands and raised her head to let out heart-rending and terrible screams.


    Greem didn¡¯t seem affected by the sight before him. He stood before the bed and bent his body. Blue light shined in the depths of Greem¡¯s pure red-me eyes. With his twenty points of Spirit, and the Chip¡¯s powerful elementium fluoroscopy, long-range sensors, and full-spectrum elementium senses, Eva was like an open book. Everything¨Cabsolutely everything¨Cwas disyed before Greem¡¯s eyes.


    Eva¡¯s stomach still didn¡¯t bulge like an ordinary pregnant woman¡¯s, even while she was delivering. Beads of sweat covered her smooth body under the delicate green robe. Instead of blood, a pool of green viscous liquid gathered between her legs.


    Even with theyer of clothes obstructing his view, Greem could still clearly see Eva¡¯s stomach twitching every so often. Her belly was being forced into all kinds of weird shapes by the little thing inside.


    As Greem¡¯s sight prated even deeper, the flesh on Eva¡¯s body started to be semi-translucent, revealing the strange spore-like lifeform inside her. The sporeloks recorded in adept history surfaced in Greem¡¯s mind when he saw the baby¡¯s peculiar appearance.


    It had a humanoid body, eyes, ears, mouth, nose, and four limbs. It had several pairs of protrusions on its back. When Greem looked even deeper into them, he could vaguely see dragonfly wings crumpled together inside these protrusions. The baby¡¯s appearance wasn¡¯t all that strange, but its flesh and blood were all as green as grass. They looked no different from the nt fibers of the natural world.


    One could also see the nt moss and sporangium unique to the sporeloks on the surface of its skin.


    Its hands and feet also ended in whip-shaped vine appendages.


    At the moment, the tiny spore-like lifeform seemed to have sensed that it was about to leave its mother. Sharp and thin needle-like vines had emerged from its body and pierced into Eva. The baby was currently wildly absorbing its mother¡¯s life energy through these vines.


    The life energy hadn¡¯t gone to waste either. It had all been converted into the massive energy required for the baby to readjust its bodily structure. In Greem¡¯s senses, the body of the little fellow was like a bustling construction site. All new muscle fibers and internal organs were rapidly forming. Even the bones used to support its body had appeared out of thin air.


    All of this was only realized by exhausting the massive amount of energy taken from its mother.


    "Go and retrieve all the blood crystals and green crystals. Also, get some flesh regeneration potions!" Greem tilted his head and thought for a moment before taking out an elementium core glowing with green light from his me stomach. He ced that elementium core on Eva¡¯s abdomen.


    When the green elementium core touched Eva¡¯s skin, Greem could almost hear the small lifeform in her stomach rejoicing.


    The blood crystals were used to replenish blood, while the green crystals were formed by concentrating green nt energy. This elementium core, on the other hand, was a Second Grade core. Moreover, it was of the extremely rare nt-attribute.


    With the help of his elementium sight, Greem could very clearly tell the direction of evolution and the elementium affinity of this little fellow. Greem could target the baby¡¯s needs and replenish Eva¡¯s energy in such a way that the little fellow could loosen up draining from its mother.


    Eva¡¯s life force slowly started to recover under the replenishment of many life potions. She had finally broken free of the risk of a life bacsh.


    Finally, after ten grueling hours, the soft sound of a baby¡¯s cry rang out. The strange lifeform made between Gargamel and Eva had been born.


    It was a beautiful and enchanting human girl. She looked like a human baby of two to three years of age despite just being born. She had a pink, chubby face, skin that was flushed red in a healthy manner, beautiful and long eyshes, and a head full of curly and somewhat damp gold hair.


    When Meryl wiped off the green viscous liquid on her body and passed her into Eva¡¯s embrace, the baby girl even let out a joyousugh. She still held on to that Second Grade elementium core in her tiny hands.


    All the adepts who gathered around might not have Greem¡¯s strange ability to see into someone else¡¯s body, but they still knew well the abnormality of this baby girl. The fact that this little newborn person already knew how to put on a show and make herself even more likable to everyone was odd enough as it is.


    Everyone pretended to be ignorant despite clearly understanding this fact. They smiled as they congratted Gargamel and Eva as if they hadn¡¯t observed the abnormality of the baby girl.


    The adepts took off one after another after leaving behind their gifts.


    Just as Greem intended to leave, the infinitely grateful Gargamel personally sent him to the door.


    "Master, there is no problem with my child, is there?" As they were bidding farewell, Gargamel secretly contacted Greem with his Spirit without showing any oddity on his face.


    "She has yours and Eva¡¯s life brand on her. That is more than enough!" Greem¡¯s answer was simple and straightforward. Yet, at the same time, there seemed to much more of a hidden implication behind it.


    Gargamel lowered his head and thought for a moment, before nodding and approving of his master¡¯s opinion.


    Judging from all the abnormality that had urred during the delivery process, this baby girl was genuinely suspicious. However, it was just as Greem had said. As long as the bloodline flowing through her belonged to him and Eva, why was there a need to care for such an insignificant ¡¯w¡¯?!


    Soon, only Gargamel and Eva remained in the secret room. Eva immediately pulled Gargamel towards her and looked into his eyes deeply.


    "This is our child!" Eva¡¯s voice was firm and serious.


    "This is our child!" Gargamel promised with the same severity.


    Having obtained Gargamel¡¯s promise, Eva was finally able to put the baby girl in Gargamel¡¯s arms without any concerns.


    The baby girl blinked with her beautiful green eyes and smiled sweetly at Gargamel.


    A smile just as sweet finally appeared on Gargamel¡¯s withered old face when he sensed the thick bloodline aura from the baby. He tightly embraced the baby girl.


    However, he immediately felt his chest hurt as something hard pressed against it.


    He lowered his head and saw that it was the Second Grade nt-elementium core that the baby girl was still holding on to.


    "Darling,e on, give that thing back to master. I¡¯ll find you so many more things just like this another day. Is that okay?" Gargamel couldn¡¯t help but want to take away the elementium core when he sensed the furious elementium energy inside the Second Grade core.


    Who expected his actions to cause the baby girl to start crying immediately? Even her cute little face was all scrunched up now.


    "It¡¯s ok, it¡¯s ok, it¡¯s ok. You keep this thing. You can give it back to me any time you are tired of ying with it." Gargamel hurriedly changed his words. Only then did the baby girl break into a smile once again.


    Gargamel could only helplessly put on a bitter smile.


    ............


    Greem finally returned to hisb. He took out a small vial and poured the green viscous liquid that he had silently acquired earlier into the vial.


    Even though he hadn¡¯t conducted any experiments or urate magical tests, Greem was confident that the baby girl that Gargamel and Eva had given birth to was the legendary Sporelok.


    After excluding the possibility of an invasion of foreign species, Greem now had reason to suspect Eva the forest spirit¡¯s true identity.


    If Eva hadn¡¯t been a victim of parasitism, then the only possibility was that her bloodline origin was from the sporeloks of the underground world.


    Furthermore, as a mutated native magical creature, Eva herself might not have that much of an understanding of her own roots!

 Chapter 486 Greems Improvements

    Chapter 486 Greem¡¯s Improvements


    Greem.


    Human (Elementiumized). Male.


    First Grade Elementium Adept.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 9 | Agility 7 | Physique 11 | Spirit 20.


    Condition: Healthy.


    Note: Bodily attributes have reached gic limits.


    After the grueling toil of the past sixty-seven years, Greem had finallypleted the elementiumization of his Spirit. Moreover, he had sessfully allowed his Spirit to reach perfectpatibility with his elementiumized body. However, this had also caused his body¡¯s potential to bepletely excavated. Greem had to find a way to advance to the next Grade and create a qualitative change in himself. Otherwise, in one or two hundred years, he would probably find it virtually impossible to improve, even if he ate the liver of dragons and the marrow of phoenixes for every single meal.


    The perfectpatibility between his body and mind had allowed him to reach a delicate bnce. He had constructed a life energy cirction system within himself.


    What made Greem even more relieved was the fact that he had managed to take advantage of the tempering of his body and Spirit, as well as include the me Fiend¡¯s Heart in this cirction system. The me Fiend¡¯s Heart had be the core of his body that continuously pushed him towards further evolution. This way, his body would be an eternal forge, even in areascking elementium energy. Greem would always be able to produce pure fire energy from within himself.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s calctions, Greem¡¯s fire core would be able to support magical attacks up to thirty points, even in areas utterly devoid of magic. Greem could continuously throw out fire spells of thirty points and below, even without absorbing energy from his surroundings or exhausting the elementium energy reserves he had within himself.


    If Greem increased the strength of the attacks to seventy points, he could still sustain his offense for two hours. A seventy point attack was already the line that distinguished between apprentices and adepts. Moreover, this two hour referred to continuous attacks, with only a bit of dy between each spell.


    If Greem switched to guerri tactics and moved around as he attacked, then it would provide the fire core with a buffer to regenerate. In doing so, Greem could even extend the duration ofbat to one day and one night.


    The ability to continuously fight was shocking. At least Greem himself hadn¡¯t observed such stamina in other First Grade adepts.


    Currently, in Fire Throne, the best atbat had to be Bloody Queen Mary. Her explosiveness in melee was shocking, not to mention her talent for sustained fights. However, her sustainability depended on the avability ofrge amounts of blood. If the enemy specifically targeted her blood treats, then her prolonged output in fights would fall tremendously.


    However, the fire core that Greem had constructed himself resided inside his body. It was like a miniature fire altar, continuously drawing energy from the fire elementium ne. It was challenging to disrupt such a connection through ordinary sealing spells or magic-interference arrays. That almost made it impossible for Greem to run out of fire energy!


    Apart from pushing his Spirit to its twenty-point limit, Greem¡¯s Strength and Physique had also reached their limits. Nine points of Strength made him capable of flipping over an Iron Rhinoceros with his bare fists. Unfortunately, he had no talent in melee and close conflict. That was why further investing resources and efforts into close quartersbat would only result in an even greater waste.


    It was the same for his eleven points of Physique.


    A Physique of this level had made him as tough as a wild magical creature. Thebination of his life energy and mental will had toughened his skin like the thick hide of a rhinoceros. His magic and physical resistances were just as exceptional. In particr, crossing over the ten point threshold of his Physique had allowed him to obtain the ability to regenerate limbs.


    As long as he was alive and had sufficient energy, he would be able to regenerate any lost limbs by consuming energy. This regeneration was a basic ability that all high-grade body refining adepts possessed.


    It was the same for his Spirit. When Greem¡¯s Spirit passed eleven points, he obtained the ability of Rapid Regeneration. It allowed his Spirit to regenerate at twice the usual rate when over half of it had been exhausted.


    After silentlypleting his self-assessment, Greem casually walked to his biologyb.


    He had modified this ce into a strange forest that resembled the ck Forest.


    The moment he entered, a strange bug that looked remarkably simr to a Rock Scorpion emerged from the thick grass. It climbed up Greem¡¯s shoulders and started to brush against his earlobe endearingly.


    Greem extended a fiery hand and softly caressed the strange bug¡¯s back. The skin was as durable as a cow¡¯s hide, yet smooth and oily, making it hard for an ordinary person to exert any force even if they managed to grab the bug. Limbs as sharp as knives grew on each side of the bug¡¯s body. There was a bony and segmented scorpion¡¯s tail at the rear of its body. The poison stinger at the end of the tail dispersed a ck mist that could be clearly seen.


    It was the first juvenile bug that Greem had managed to cultivate after several decades. It could rob all 100% of a target lifeform¡¯s gic sequence that rted to its innate ability. However, this bug¡¯s individual strength was minimal. Even with Greem¡¯s painstaking efforts to increase its powers, the bug¡¯sbat ability was only barely equal to a beginner apprentice.


    Relying on the bug alone to hunt down top-ss magical creatures was no more than a childish thought. Its innate ability to rob that of others was exceptionally unfair and genuinely terrifying, but the world was fair in its own way!


    The world had given it an unfair ability, yet it had also cursed the bug with a weak body.


    All top-ss magical creatures would possess terrifying elementium auras. Meager beings like this bug would be crushed to bits by the frightening spiritual aura of intimidation or the elementium vibrations before even getting close.


    That was why Greem would first have to capture a dragon andpletely restrict its movement before bringing it to the bug if he wanted to obtain the bloodline of dragons. Moreover, he would have to be wary of the dragon sneezing during this process; it might just identally kill the bug.


    Based on all these factors, the dream of having the bug extract powerful innate abilities was not going to be that easily realized, even if it could be mass-produced¨C which it currently couldn¡¯t be!


    The human body¡¯s capacity for gic sequences had a limit. Greem¡¯s talents as a fire adept had already taken up most of his capacity. Only a limited amount remained for foreign genes. If he didn¡¯t choose wisely, and randomly added lots of useless abilities to his gic sequence, then it was very likely to cause adverse side-effects. At the very least, his innate abilities would be corrupted. At worst, it might even cause the disintegration of his gic chain.


    That was why he had to avoid ¡¯trash¡¯ abilities. Greem needed to choose carefully for himself the most appropriate and perfect innate ability. And this undoubtedly required time and luck!


    Greem yed with the bug for a little longer until it was feeding time.


    Three holes the size of human heads suddenly opened in the ceiling above. A dozen snowrabbits unique to the ck Forest dropped from the openings.


    These were wild rabbits with short snow-white fur. Their eyes were ck, and their ability to escape with short-distance hops was great.


    The previously gentle and peaceful bug suddenly turned savage and cruel. Its sharp limbs pushed against Greem¡¯s body as it leaped into the air. Its body was still rolling in midair, but its stinger had already shot into the bushes, urately hitting a snowrabbit that had just hit the ground.


    The snowrabbit had justnded, and it had no time to adjust its position. Its body trembled and fell to the ground, wholly paralyzed and immobilized.


    The strange pitter-pattering of bug limbs scratching against the ground rang out. A dozen fellows just like the first bug, but slightly smaller, emerged from the grass. They headed towards the paralyzed snowrabbit. However Bug One managed to reach the snowrabbit before the others. It quickly climbed atop the rabbit and straightened its body, revealing its terrifying ws for all to see.


    The dozen other small bugs surrounded the snowrabbit and tried to probe forward. However, they were frightened away by Bug One¡¯s ferocious ws each and every time. With no choice left to them, the bugs hesitated for a moment before quickly turning and plunging into the forest to chase after the other snowrabbits.


    It was only now that Bug One started to feast in satisfaction!


    Greem, who had been silently observing from a distance, was overjoyed to discover that Bug One¡¯s strength and speed had increased slightly.


    That made him extremely d.


    As all these bugs had been imnted with control runes when they hatched and had been branded with Greem¡¯s consciousness, there was no need to worry about them biting back once they got stronger. This brand was the key reason why Greem dared to cultivate them with all he had!


    Greem observed the bugs for a little while longer and made sure that no idents urred. He then left the biologyb and arrived at his alchemicalb.


    Three golem cores and five blinding Second Grade elementium cores neatlyid upon the small tform in the middle of theb. These were all the elementium cores that he had managed to keep for himself after such a hard and long time working for the Sarubo n.


    The number of Second Grade elementium cores that Greem should have managed to keep should have been ten. Unfortunately, two of those had been destroyed when he attempted to turn them into golems. Thus, he only had threepleted golem cores in his hand, all of which were peak elite-level golem cores!


    The other five Second Grade elementium cores were all of the earth attribute. He had specially reserved them as materials for crafting a Second Grade golem.


    Before he ascended to Second Grade, his power would limit the attack of his golems to a maximum of one hundred and eighty-five points. It might seem like a sliver away from the two hundred point threshold of Second Grade lifeforms, but it was worlds away.


    That was because the two hundred point attack limit was virtually impossible for a First Grade lifeform to break through, be it a lifeform of blood and flesh or an elementium one. However, a two hundred point attack was only the fundamental attack power for a Second Grade lifeform. Inyman¡¯s terms, it would be the lower limit of their attacks.


    If they didn¡¯t intentionally weaken their attacks, any spell that a Second grade adept casually fired off would be above two hundred points! The legendary Third Grade adepts would easily be able to reach a thousand points, far above the level of a Second Grade adept.


    The grade difference between the creatures of the World of Adepts might appear to be a small one; just a single grade¡¯s difference. However, that single grade could mean a difference in power of five to ten times. That was why killing an individual beyond one¡¯s own grade was something that could only happen under extreme circumstances. In a normal situation, a low-grade being would never be able to beat a high-grade one.


    It was the real meaning in the way adept¡¯s distinguished between the grades of each lifeform!


    Consequently, the golems Greem created could never go beyond the threshold and be true Second Grade lifeforms, even with the help of the Chip. However, once Greem actually advanced, creating Second Grade golems would be something that he would definitely be able to do!

 Chapter 487 Rare Runes

    Chapter 487 Rare Runes


    After sixty-seven years of grinding, Greem was only one step away from Second Grade.


    However, this step felt like the difference between heaven and earth.


    If he didn¡¯t manage to get past this barrier, his Spirit origin would wither due to the ceremony¡¯s bacsh. This kind of damage was difficult to recover from when one¡¯s potential had beenpletely excavated.


    One could say that First Grade adepts in the World of Adepts were as plentiful as the hairs on a cow¡¯s hide. Just casually counting those in the central area of the continent would give you twenty to thirty thousand First Grade adepts. The strength of the three major adept organizations was even further above the center of the continent. If one were to count in this manner, the number of adepts in the World of Adepts exceeded a hundred thousand.


    However, among this hundred thousand adepts, no more than two thousand had sessfully advanced to Second Grade. And less than three hundred people of these two thousand Second Grade adepts were able to advance to Third Grade. The number of Fourth Grades was even lower, numbering less than fifty individuals.


    Why was it that the World of Adepts could still be a dominant yer among all the various ne worlds despite such harsh conditions for advancement? It was all because of their constant umtion over the years.


    As long as the adept¡¯s knowledge legacy system wasplete, and as long as there were sufficient adept resources, then there would always be Fourth Grade adepts. Great Adepts beyond Fourth Grade could also continuously appear. Moreover, with the increase of an adept¡¯s power, their lifespan also ballooned at an exponential rate.


    As each adept could be of a different race, study different magic, and evolve in different directions, there was no fixed measure of their lifespan. Still, over the years, a system had been created with the human adepts as a model. They had created an approximate range of lifespans.


    An ordinary human¡¯s lifespan in the World of Adepts was around a hundred and twenty years. A First Grade adept¡¯s lifespan was between two and three hundred years. A Second Grade adept¡¯s lifespan was between three hundred to five hundred years. A Third Grade adept¡¯s was seven to eight hundred years, and a Fourth Grade adept¡¯s beyond a thousand years.


    That was only a simple calction with fundamental numerical values. If differences in race and effects of magical energy were taken into ount, then the individual values might still undergo sizeable variations.


    Take, for example, Mary. She might only be a First Grade adept, but she walked the branch of bloodline adepts that was the Vampire. The vampires were known as a ssic race of longevity. They could easily live up to seven or eight hundred years with no problem.


    Greem¡¯s robotic adept subordinate, Sabrina, belonged to the mechanical lifeform branch of the bloodline adepts. As the corrosion of mechanical constructs on the human body requiredrge amounts of reconciling agent to maintain a bnce of bodily functions, robotic adepts often had one-fourth to one-third less lifespanpared to an ordinary adept.


    However, they also obtained powerful offensive abilities in exchange; it was a worthy trade!


    As for adepts like Greem that yed with elementium; they would have to find some way to increase their original body¡¯s elementium affinity after advancing to adept-level. Otherwise, long periods of using elementium would inevitably deteriorate their original life force. That was why elementiumizing their body was the only way to avoid elementium corrosion, and why it was a path they certainly had to walk upon.


    However, most adepts only took steps to elementiumize their body after advancing to adept. That was why their average lifespan clearly couldn¡¯tpare to Greem, who hadpleted that process when he was still an apprentice.


    The advancement from First Grade to Second Grade was truthfully more of a transition from a maniptor of elements to a controller ofws.


    A First Grade adept might still mostly be using their talents and magical energy to draw upon wandering elementium to amplify the effects of their spells. However, a Second Grade adept begins to borrow the strength of narws to incline the elementium in a target area towards themselves.


    The only problem was that a Second Grade adepts could onlye into contact with the most superficial of narws. They couldn¡¯t yet be considered true controllers ofws. Even Third Grade adepts were only slightly better than Second Grades. They too hadn¡¯t reached the goal of expert control.


    Within the Continent of Adepts, the Fourth Grade adepts were the only group of individuals who could be considered to have truly grasped control over the narws.


    Fifth Grade adepts, on the other hand, had already jumped out beyond the limits of nar worlds. They understood thews of the world at a profound level. That was why adepts were only qualified to call themselves principle adepts starting from the Fifth Grade. Below Fifth Grade, all First to Fourth Grade adepts could merely call themselves elementium adepts.


    However, with the gradual development and maturation of the World of Adepts, the baseline power of the current Fourth Grade adepts was also slowly increasing. Many adepts had already started to categorize them into the ranks of principle adepts, be it with some external motivations or not.


    It was because of the massive difference in strength between each grade that no adept had an absolute guarantee of seeding whenmencing their advancement ceremony. Failing an advancement would only bring about damage to an adept¡¯s Spirit origin, causing it to wither. While all of this could be treated and recovered through an extended period of rest, it would still be an unprecedented blow to an adept¡¯s psychological state.


    Moreover, an adept¡¯s lifespan was limited. Even if the road up till then had been entirely smooth, there might not be enough time for the adept to attempt an advance to the next grade repeatedly. The main reason adept ns favored those young adepts so much was that they had the capital to fail and try again!


    Consequently, even though Greem had already reached the threshold of advancing to Second Grade, he was still steadily and slowly gathering the necessary resources and knowledge, trying his best to increase the sess rate of his advancement. His greatest advantage now was the twenty-eight runes he had brought back from the Knight¡¯s ne. After such a long time of organization and deciphering, they had all been analyzed and cracked.


    Among them, the most useful ones to him were the three runes rted to fire elementium.


    Variant Fire Rune of Explosion!


    Rare Fire Rune of Coldme!


    Rare Fire Rune of Poisonfire!


    Just as the name implied, the Rune of Explosion could cause explosions. As long as it was an area rich in fire elementium, Greem would only need to sweep past with his Spirit, and all the elementium could explode like fireballs.


    On the other hand, the Coldme Rune was an incredibly ingenious use of fire energies. When the caster attempted to draw away the heat within the elementium fires, the internal temperature of the me would drop, even reaching levels of negative one to two hundred Celcius at times.


    In such situations, the fire was still fire, yet it could generate a strange effect of freezing and frost.


    After several tests, Greem discovered that cold fires had greater magical pration effectspared to zing fires. They were more suited for breaking through elementium defenses and energy shields.


    The Poisonfire Rune, on the other hand, mixed a trace of foreign energy into the elementium fire. That caused a burning effect in the enemy that resembled poisoning. This type of poison was different from the venom of ordinary creatures, nts, ores, and other natural toxins. It was a type of energy poison.


    As long as the target couldn¡¯t cut off the energy flow within their body, then they would not be able to stop the energy poison from rapidly spreading throughout them. For those without the means to deal with it, energy poison could be said to be without an antidote!


    Greem had etched all these runes into his consciousness core, one after another. This way, even with Greem¡¯s rudimentary and vague understanding of the runes, he could still draw upon their powers when he willed. The reason this was possible was all thanks to the Chip.


    In all seriousness, the one that hadpletely figured out the runes was not Greem, but the Chip. Greem was only a capitalist that had stolen the fruits of the Chip¡¯sbor.


    When it came to the runic knowledge within each and every stroke of these runes, Greem could only read out the information that the Chip had sent to his mind. The real meaning behind these things, and the spiritual inspiration obtained during the process of deciphering them, was intangible and abstract. It was hard to describe them using the crude medium of words.


    The inclusion of the three types of fire runes had allowed three different series of fires to appear before Greem: the explosive series, the coldme series, and the poisonfire series. Each of these mes had considerably expanded Greem¡¯s arsenal, both in the number of forms his fire spells could take and the effects they could possess.


    When he advanced to Second Grade, Greem even intended to take time out to construct aplete list of spells for each series. This way, it would be as if Greem had simultaneously built three different systems of ss advancement for fire adepts. The nar feedback he would obtain for such a feat would necessarily have to be amazing.


    Apart from fire runes, Greem also had twenty-five magical runes of other systems and series. It was all rare knowledge on the same tier as the fire runes. Given their massive auxiliary effects for adepts, Greem selectively shared some of those runes with adepts in his faction.


    Among them, Alice, far away in the Tower of Fate in the Northern Lands, obtained the Rune of Dreams. This rune gave her the unique ability to manipte other people¡¯s dreams as she liked.


    Poison Witch Endor obtained the Aggressive Poison Rune. It caused all her future poison spells to instantly erupt for all the damage they had been umting if it was being dispersed or healed. The effect of such a rune was most effective against enemies who weren¡¯t expecting it!


    Bloody Queen Mary was even more ferocious. She had actually received two runes¨C the Phantom Rune and the Shadowstrike Rune.


    The Phantom Rune allowed Mary to create two phantoms when she moved at high speeds. Each phantom could exist for three seconds and possessed 35% of Mary¡¯s offensive power. The cooldown for this ability was seven seconds.


    On the other hand, the Shadowstrike Rune allowed Mary¡¯s attacks to possess shadow damage when she struck.


    In that manner, every one of Mary¡¯s attacks would be enhanced with the twin-attributes of blood and shadow. If one were to include the physical effects, then it would be a triple-attribute attack.


    While the power of her attacks might not be that much higher, they would be far more annoying and difficult to deal with.


    After all, most of the time, shadow attacks ignored defense!


    Meryl was a ssic schr adept. She was not good atbat and could not find a rune that suited her, despite picking through all of them. Greem could only gift her a Rune of Wisdom.


    She then possessed an eidetic memory and greater ability to find clues when pursuing knowledge.


    This sort of ability was beneficial for assessing and evaluating unknown items!


    As long as her eyes focused on an item for more than five seconds, she would be able to obtain a faint trace of magical information about the object from the narws. That was basically an appraiser with cheat codes activated!


    Gargamel was adept at herbology and excelled at synthesizing potions. That was why Greem presented him with the Rune of Disintegration. This rune could dpose any magical material into even tinier and purer energy crystals.


    However, this ability required the use of an alchemicalb and the help of magicalbs; it could not be used in actualbat!


    Thest one to obtain a rune was Robotic Adept Sabrina. She gained the Rune of Hardening, allowing parts of her body to double their original hardness. As this rune could only take effect on metallic substances, she was the only one among all the adepts suited for this rune.

 Chapter 488 Snorlaxs Frustrations

    Chapter 488 Snox¡¯s Frustrations


    Snox¡¯s mood today was despondent.


    After sixty-seven years of never seeing each other, his master had finally called upon him once more.


    Their meeting was just as passionate as ever, but Snox suddenly became depressed and dejected upon returning to his goblin shop.


    He took a look around his shop and looked at the apprentice worker respectfully bowing before him. He looked at the three adepts who were already waiting in the shop. Snox suddenly lost all his past feelings of glory and glee.


    Snox sent his guests away after some small talk. He then returned to his secret room behind the shop, lied down upon that favorite massive deckchair of his, and silently stared at the ceiling.


    Master was still master! Even after sixty odd years, master looked the same as before. It was almost as if the passage of time had not left any traces upon his body.


    Yet I...


    Snox sat up all of a sudden. He ran to a mercury mirror ced in the corner of the room and seriously assessed his own looks.


    His rough green skin hung loosely upon his frame. His once bright green skin had now turned dark and dull. His ugly mug was just as disgusting as before, but one could now vaguely see the signs of aging and debilitation on him.


    Green goblins were too hideous. That was why the humans around them would never look at them in such detail. Even those staying adepts who wanted to make requests of Snox harbored disdain and disgust in their hearts, even as they put smiles on their faces.


    In their eyes, all goblins were the equivalent of words such as fools, ves, and experimental subjects. For them, goblins didn¡¯t deserve to be called intelligent life. If it weren¡¯t to more quickly obtain the adept-level golems that the shop asionally put on sale, these prideful adepts would not even be willing to get close to Snox, not to mention ttering him and asking him for favors.


    The Goblin Snox of the past had very much enjoyed being of equal standing with these adepts. He always loved to narrow his eyes, prop up his leg, and listen to the other person¡¯s forced and dry tterings while maintaining a poker face.


    For some reason, today, Snox had suddenly lost interest in all this!


    He leaned against that mercury mirror that perfectly reflected his appearance and looked carefully all over. In the end, he had no choice but to admit that he had indeed aged.


    As a lowly goblin, his lifespan was far shorter than a human¡¯s. At the very best, it was no more than sixty to eighty years. In the cruel environment of the natural world, most goblins would be considered long-lived if they could survive to thirty years of age!


    Most goblin tribes could not care for elderly goblins that had lost their ability to fight. That was why all goblins were not far away from being abandoned once they stepped into the middle ages of their thirties!


    Snox¡¯s excessively fulfilling life had almost made him forget that he was a goblin himself. However, after seeing his master today and witnessing that unchanging appearance of his, Snox was once again made aware of that fact.


    He was a different kind of goblin that had been modified with magic by an adept. Judging only from the level of lifeform, he was undoubtedly within the range of a First Grade magical creature. That would cause his lifespan to double. However, the lifespan of a goblin was just far too short. Even after it had increased, his lifespan was still no more than a hundred and forty or a hundred and fifty years.


    Yet he...


    To be brutally honest, half of his life had gone past in a single session of seclusion undertaken by his master. He would be one of those that was bordering on the edge of abandonment if he were in a goblin tribe.


    This trace of sorrow and fear that emerged from nowhere caused Snox to wander around his room in frustration.


    This was the high and mighty World of Adepts!


    This was the World of Adepts where nothing was impossible!


    Could a great goblin merchant like himself not find ways and methods to extend his own life?


    After frantically flipping through countless magical books and questioning the few apprentices under his service, Snox was pained to discover that extending lifespans was an incredibly extravagant and expensive act, even in the World of Adepts.


    The more popr lifespan extension ceremonies among adepts could be divided into three different tiers: elementary, intermediate, and advanced. The elementary tier could extend lifespans by fifty years, the intermediate tier by three hundred, and the advanced tier by a thousand years. The price was fit to the wondrous effects of the ceremony. It was enough to make someone agonize and hope that they could rob an adept¡¯s tower.


    Apart from the price, the lifespan extension ceremony also required plenty of rare resources. Most of these resources were already hard to find in the World of Adepts. Just the cost of gathering these resources would be yet another astronomical sum. Even if one was somehow lucky enough to gather all the ingredients, they would have to hire a high-grade adept to host the ceremony. That, again, was a massive number that an ordinary adept didn¡¯t even dare to imagine.


    That was why, ording to Snox¡¯s understanding, those elementary-tier ceremonies required seven to eight hundred thousand magical crystals. An intermediate ceremony would need five million crystals. As for an advanced ceremony? They were priceless.


    Snox had umted private funds while toiling and working for his master Greem. He had an approximate of a hundred and fifty or sixty thousand magical crystals.


    In the past, he was easily proud and boastful about his diligence and ability to make money. Now, Snox suddenly lost all his motivation to try hard whenparing the prices to his wealth. He felt that everything before him was like a bubble, and a single touch would make it vanish into nothingness.


    No one would quickly think of death while they were young.


    Snox had felt as if he could no longer be separated from glory and wealth after experiencing it for himself.


    He had patrolled his goblin shop, enjoy the ttering respect of the apprentices and listened to the nice pleasantries of the adepts. Those days were impossibly happy.


    But now...


    Snox had a suffocating feeling, as if he was slowly walking towards death, one step at a time.


    I must be someone useful to master!


    Snox swore to himself furiously.


    That night, Snox once again contacted the Goblin Grand Duke Gazlowe located in his faraway ne. Then he once again transported arge batch of magical ores to the goblin ne in a trade.


    Of course, he had mixed a single inconspicuous and tiny silver ore into this pile of ore. All the other magical minerals had covered its little silver glow.


    The goblins couldn¡¯t possibly sense its weak energy signature mixed in with the dense energy aura emanating from all the other stones either, especially with their pathetic magical senses.


    The bait had been cast; all that was left was to wait.


    ............


    Greem didn¡¯t think Snox¡¯s fervent and passionate proposal strange at all.


    He might be a goblin, just like Gazlowe of the other ne, and share the same race as each other. However, they had no ties of blood or family. That was why no feelings of psychological guilt would arise from betraying his kind.


    Not to mention, the goblins had selfish and uncaring personalities. Greem actually felt more surprised that Snox had onlymitted to his actions after such an extended period of thought.


    Regardless of what Snox¡¯s actual motivations were, the batch of contaminated ¡¯gifts¡¯ was what concerned Greem. Greem had readily agreed to the longevity that Snox dreamed and fantasized about.


    What hurry did they need to be in? Snox had at least seventy to eighty years to live. They could consider the matter after the Goblin¡¯s ne had fallen into his pocket. Lifespan extension ceremony? Too expensive. A simple ceremony would require rare items like dragon bones, Dragondrool Grass, and even the egg of a nine-headed serpent. Even Greem didn¡¯t have absolute confidence in obtaining these items.


    That was why it wasn¡¯t that bad of an option to instead turn Snox into a spirit or a voodoo beast when he was about to die. He could extend his lifespan that way. Of course, it could also work if Greem had Mary Embrace Snox and turn him into a vampire goblin. However, goblin blood was pungent stuff. It might be a problem of whether Mary was willing to bite into Snox.


    Greem casually strolled into a secret room after dealing with all the various matters at hand.


    The room was empty. Only a singleplicated and profound array was carved in the center of the room.


    When Greem stood in the array, the tower immediately redirected a significant amount of energy and poured it into the formation. A massive array enveloped the entire room as numerous magical runes and lines silently appeared.


    The room instantly became pitch-ck.


    ............


    At the same time, inside the Tower of Fate nestled in the Northern Lands far away.


    Dark and lightless mist seeped out of the astrology tform at the top of the tower. The fog devoured the entire space rapidly.


    An attractive figure stood silently in the darkness, gazing at the sky full of twinkling stars.


    The river of stars shone brightly as the countless suns shed.


    Alice¡¯s slim figure appeared to be lonely, even in this breathtaking sea of stars. It was sorrowful and deste, and her face was wet from tears.


    A tall figure embraced her from behind and gently wiped away the two streaks of tears that had just started falling down her cheeks.


    "What are you sad about again? If you miss Endor, you can teleport over to Fire Throne! Don¡¯t always hide here and cry alone." It was Greem¡¯s voice that sounded out from the tall figure. However, this figure clearly wasn¡¯t his actual body. Instead, it was a strange spell that projected his consciousness.


    Alice squeezed backward slightly and allowed ¡¯Greem¡¯ to embrace her tightly. Still, she didn¡¯t speak.


    Over all these past years, she had always been Alice¨C the cold, calm, future-seeing Witch of Fate to outsiders, wrapped in a veil of mystery! However, only she knew the truth. Every time she stood upon this astrology tform, she could sense the rumbling and endless torrent of fate.


    From an outsider¡¯s perspective, the Witch of Fate was a mighty existence that manipted the river of fate. Even she had once gotten lost in that mysterious and unpredictable power of fate when she first came into contact with it.


    However, the longer she bathed in the river of fate, the more she felt her powerlessness and frailty. Every probing into the stream of fate wasn¡¯t just an adventure. It was an adventure made with no preparations.


    The river of fate wasn¡¯t something that was unchanging.


    In this impossibly vast World of Adepts, there were plenty of powerful individuals who could extend their reach into the river of fate. Their existences were disasters for Alice!


    These people relied on their strength to recklessly stir violent torrent after torrent in the river of fate. They cut off the river of fate as they liked and redirected it in the direction they wished for it to go.


    Alive could sense the angered roar andmentations of the river of fate, even with who knew how many tens of thousands of billions of kilometers between her and the river of fate.

 Chapter 489 Lonely Alice

    Chapter 489 Lonely Alice


    Of course, the river of fate had no consciousness!


    That was why these roars of anger were actually the emotions that the world consciousness was sending through theyers ofws.


    Each world had its own functioningws and principles. It wasn¡¯t until everything ran ording to thesews that the world would beplete and healthy. Yet in the world right now, there were too many powerful existences who were using their strength to disrupt the functioning of the world. They were making the world consciousness bend to their whims.


    That was something the world consciousness would not allow!


    That was why there was always a massive battle perpetually being fought on a level imperceptible to most lifeforms of the World of Adepts.


    Alice, who spent her days in the river of fate in a strange state, was also dragged into this conflict. Countless unexpected dangers hade her way.


    Her powers were too weakpared to those existences, and she was insignificant before them. When they ravaged the river of fate and sent monstrous waves everywhere, they might have been able to get away easily. However, most of the time, their actions would result in tragedy for the First Grade Alice if she couldn¡¯t avoid them.


    Those who had never experienced the vastness of the river of fate could never imagine the tremendous pressure and sheer volume one would face when all the power of arge-sized ne world¡¯s fate crashed down upon you.


    No one besides Fourth Grade adepts could dream of wreaking havoc on this level of the world. If Alice weren¡¯t blessed with the talents of a Witch of Fate, then her meager First Grade powers wouldn¡¯t have been enough to protect her from the river of fate; she would have been swept away and absorbed the moment she came into contact with it.


    Unlike the Fourth Grade adepts that created storms and waves, Alice was like a tiny ship weaving between the massive swells. A small mistake would cause the boat to capsize, and its crew would die.


    One couldn¡¯t assume that the river of fate was a hidden intangible existence and a mere manifestation of all thews. If one died inside there, everything that represented you as an individual wouldpletely vanish.


    If you died in the external material world, your corpse would be left behind. At least your rtives, friends, and lovers would remember you. If you died in the river of fate, then the sincerest apologies to you. Your very person¨Cthe individual that your name refers to¨Cwould be entirely erased by the powers of thews.


    Your person would vanish from the World of Adepts, and no one will remember your name. Every mark you had made on the World of Adepts would disappear with you.


    From the beginning to the end, you would never have existed. You would be an existence that had never lived yet had indeed existed at the same time!


    One could imagine how it was to enter such a hazardous environment with insufficient power asionally. Surviving without a heart as steady as a stone was impossible. For the long sixty-seven years in the past, Greem had operated under constant hard work, but he was safe and sound. However, Alice...


    Greem tightly folded Alice into his embrace, hoping to use his soul to warm hers. Greem lowered her head and used his chin to caress Alice¡¯s silky silver hair lightly.


    She was not even a hundred years old, but half of her silver hair had gone white. If one were to look closely, they could see the slight wrinkles at the corners of her eyes.


    Witches of Fate pursued destiny on a daily basis. However, they had no means of mastering their own fate!


    It was impossible to bring any magical equipment into the river of fate, regardless of how powerful or well-crafted it was. The only thing that was useful in that level of the world was the origin strength that existed within her soul. This kind of strength exhausted as you used it, and there was almost no way to replenish it.


    That was why Alice had no choice but to exhaust her own life whenever she wanted to change the trajectory of a future she had seen. By burning her life, she created a series of fate nodes. She then used one ident after another to crash against that determined future.


    Back then, to save Endor, Alice had first needed to ce several fate nodes in the river of fate. She then returned to the World of Adepts and relied on the efforts of Greem, Mary, and the others to reverse the direction of fate around those nodes. One by one, they added together to finally provide the required strength to smash against the original ¡¯future.¡¯


    That was why urate maniption over the river of fate didn¡¯t just require Alice¡¯s powers of fate. It also needed a dominating force that would act ording to her will. It was only with thebination of these two internal and external factors that one could hope to steer fate in the direction that one wished it to go.


    And in this process, what Alice had to give up was her life force!


    Alice was an extremely young witch. Under ordinary circumstances, she had only gone through one-fourth of her life as an adept. Yet the signs of aging on her face clearly showed that she was nearing her middle ages.


    As high-energy lifeforms evolved from humans, the adepts might not be able to break free from the lowly organs, senses, and life systems of the humans. However, they could dy the aging of the body with magical energies. Many times, an adept could easily fix their appearance at a certain age of their long life, as long as they paid the price.


    As long as they had enough magical energy, and their life system didn¡¯t falter, they would never age!


    Visible signs of aging suddenly appearing on an adept was likely because their life had entered its final stages. Their magical energies were no longer enough to sustain aplete life system.


    Signs of aging had now appeared on Alice. Greem could fully imagine what she¡¯d had to endure during this period of time, and the pain of burning her own life!


    "How much longer?" Greem grabbed Alice by her shoulders and stared into her deep blue eyes. He asked softly, "How much longer is your life?"


    "Fifty-four years seven months and three days."


    "Why is it twenty years less thanst time? You..." Greem paused for a second and immediately understood.


    "This is your first time initiating a ne war. It is crucial to both you and me. That is why I must guarantee its sess!" Alice¡¯s words were firm and unmoving. She might be a frail woman, but her actions carried with them a pride and reservation unique to people in ruling positions.


    "You saw victory?" Greem held her face as his heart ached.


    "You are being an idiot again!" Alice rolled her eyes at him, "That¡¯s a foreign ne. My powers of fate can¡¯t extend all the way there. I only saw your existence in the future of the World of Adepts."


    She¡¯s right!


    If he still continued to exist in the future of the World of Adepts, that meant that he would not die in the other ne. That was good news!


    Greem mulled over it. Finally, he lowered his face and pressed his lips against Alice¡¯s.


    ............


    Boom. A light thump.


    The ck mist in the array dispersed.


    Greem lightly coughed as he walked out from the fog. A set of small and delicate teeth marks had clearly been left on his lower lips.


    Er, they had already been in a rtionship for so long, and she was still so bashful. To actually disperse Greem¡¯s body and send his consciousness projection hurtling all the way back. Ow, ow, ow. Why do these teeth marks hurt so much? Did that brat cast some special curse on me?


    Greem rolled his eyes as his body appeared five steps away with a sh. He had used the fire to reconstruct his body during this sh. He could almost cast aside all damage and curses on the surface of his body through this method.


    Strangely enough, Greem was stunned when he reappeared five steps away. He touched his lips and stopped on the spot.


    Dammit, those teeth marks were still there! That brat Alice had gotten him good this time!


    How was he supposed to meet people now?!


    Greem howled several times silently. He had no choice but to form a golden mask out of me and wear it on his face. It might look a little weird, but it was better than beingughed at by Mary.


    Once he returned to his room, Greem began examining all his magical equipment.


    The ze of Destruction could effectively amplify the power of fire spells. It even attached soul-burning effects to those spells. He could still use this staff after advancing to Second Grade, and there was no need to consider recing it yet.


    The three Ioun Stones, on the other hand, had to be retired. Once Greem became a Second-Grade adept the stones small enhancement would not affect Greem at all. There was no point in keeping them around other than to look cool.


    All the rest of his magical equipment had to be retired as well. Their prowess no longer matched Greem¡¯s current strength.


    The only one of all those that satisfied Greem¡¯s expectations was the Soul Equipment¨C the Scroll of Voodoo.


    As Soul Equipment that had followed Greem through his apprentice years, the Scroll of Voodoo was also an apanying-type magical equipment. It could absorb the power of the host¡¯s soul to strengthen itself continuously. Of course, the process of strengthening also cost plenty of rare resources and magical materials.


    The Greem of the past had no idea about this and had no concept of where to start improving the Scroll of Voodoo.


    However, he gained a clear and definite clue after deciphering the knowledge runes that Mary and the others had brought back from the burial grounds.


    Greem allowed a thought sh across his mind, and the magical tome hanging by his waist appeared in his hands. As he caressed the hard surface of the thick book, he could feel a vague sense of power coursing through it.


    This power was neither elementium energy nor magical energy. Rather, it was closer to the soul flux that all spirit consciousness possessed.


    Greem flipped open the cover. The pages inside were somehow all merged together, leaving only a single page. Drawn on the page was a strange and profound hexagram. Arge green jewel was embedded in each of the protruding edges, and a bizarre, doll-like lifeform was slowly crawling around in the middle of the hexagram. It was within the two-dimensional confines of the page, yet it gave people a feeling as if it was a living thing.


    Greem looked at the strange array and then at the unknown lifeform. He couldn¡¯t help but sigh.


    One had to use gemstonespatible with the Scroll of Voodoo¡¯s attributes to strengthen it. Six emeralds weren¡¯t much for Greem now. However, its six-emerald-per-month consumption rate was shocking, even for Greem.


    The Voodoo Doll inside the Scroll of Voodoo had finally formed its body after Greem had fed emeralds to the Scroll for as many as ten years. Moreover, if Greem wanted to turn it into a Spirit of Pestilence, he would have to provide it withrge amounts of flesh and life.


    Initial estimates by the Chip suggested that a sacrifice of at least, bare minimum, ten thousand lives were required!

 Chapter 490 Demons and Monsters

    Chapter 490 Demons and Monsters


    The possibility that the Scroll of Voodoo could evolve was both good news and bad news.


    The good news was that Greem could now obtain a magically contracted spirit that was as powerful as himself. The strength of both the Voodoo Doll and the Spirit of Pestilence was tightly linked to the power of his soul.


    The bad news was that the pages of the Scroll of Voodoo were merging into one. The original six spell slots had now all vanished, and Greem no longer had free instant-cast spells he could rely on in battle.


    On the other hand, the Scroll of Voodoo was even more tightly bound to Greem¡¯s soul. The tome could now help him resist maniption-type spells, as well as increase his resistance to mental spells.


    That was why one had no choice but to say that strengthening the Scroll of Voodoo brought on more benefits than downsides.


    Greem sensed the dense voodoo energies from the tome, and his heart started to sink.


    Everything was prepared, except for that one crucial element!


    He hadpleted all his preparations. Everything on hand was in an idle state as well. There were no urgent matters in front of him. All was for the sake of awaiting a single oue; a single result that would tie together all the lines and events.


    Advancing to Second Grade!


    Only if he advanced to Second Grade would Greem be able to most objectively demonstrate his power and potential to the adepts in his faction. That was how he could give them a reason and excuse to continue following him.


    Otherwise, he would never be able to break away from an outsider¡¯s perception of him being a conspirator that only relied on tricks to elevate his status!


    Greem wanted to be a ruler, a leader¨C not some random schemer.


    That was why he would first have to prove himself before he activated his faction¡¯s power and brought them along with him for the arduous journey ahead. He had to prove his power, his infinite potential, and his extraordinary and wise vision for the future.


    What else could be more convincing than the title of Second Grade? Not to mention, he was not even a hundred years old. He had plenty of time and power to attempt Third Grade advancement.


    Being the follower of a great rising star of an adept. Were there any choices wiser than this?


    As a result, this wasn¡¯t just something he had to do to instill confidence in his followers. It was to reaffirm his belief in himself. That was why it was time to prepare for advancement!


    ............


    Just as Greem was silently preparing for his advancement, a discussion regarding his fate was also taking ce in Feidnan City, several thousands of kilometers away.


    Feidnan City. The seventeenth floor of the Adept¡¯s Tower.


    This ce was still the personal dwelling of Third Grade Adept Lady Sanazar.


    Only three individuals could participate in the discussion this time: Sanazar, F¨¹gen, and Keoghan.


    The three core adepts represented the benefits of the three different groups of adepts. That was why they were also the core group of individuals that decided the future direction of the Sarubo n¡¯s development in the World of Adepts.


    Unfortunately, they had run into a troublesome problem today.


    "Has the information from before been verified?" Lady Sanazar was still shrouded in a cloud of purple mist. One could only hear her familiar voice through the thick mist, "Has that brat truly reach the threshold for attempting advancement to Second Grade?"


    Adept F¨¹gen nodded silently.


    As a veteran Second Grade adept himself, he knew very well the dangers of advancing to Second Grade. Even if that brat had actually reached the peak of First Grade, the chances of him sessfully promoting on his first try was no more than 27%.


    Moreover, that brat had been hiding in his tower for the past couple of decades, without taking a single step into the outside world. He had not experienced any opportunities to scour and search for those rare resources that could help with advancement. That stifled any chance of Greem making it to Second Grade through special tricks.


    If Greem had still insisted on forcefully attempting to advance under these circumstances, then F¨¹gen had no choice but to be impressed by Greem¡¯s decisiveness and determination.


    "He might get outside help!" Even though he mostly only had the right to listen and obey instructions in these situations, Adept Keoghan still spoke his mind after a slight moment¡¯s hesitation.


    Adept F¨¹gen lifted his head, looked at Keoghan, and asked, "You mean from the Witches of Fate?"


    "Yes!"


    Adept F¨¹gen thought for a while and couldn¡¯t help but nod, "Lady Sanazar, I also suspect that the brat has gotten help from the Witches of Fate. Otherwise, he shouldn¡¯t be trying the advancement in such a reckless manner. After all, with the basic lifespan of an adept, it would be impossible to attempt advancement more than three times. Everyone knows this to be the truth!"


    "Hmph! What we need to worry about isn¡¯t why he chose such a moment to advance. Rather, it¡¯s about what stance we should take towards this action of his!" As expected of a Third Grade adept that had lived for six hundred years; Lady Sanazar might not often involve herself in the affairs of the n, but she still managed to get to the core of the problem immediately.


    Indeed. Greem had hidden his progress and did not have any intention to request for advancement ceremony resources from the n. That was a clear indication of trouble!


    It seemed the sixty-odd years of hermitage still hadn¡¯t managed to dispel Greem¡¯s thoughts of leaving the n. Moreover, the brat had managed to push his Spirit to the twenty point advancement threshold at such a fast pace without the n discovering. It waspletely unbelievable!


    It was important to note that even Adept F¨¹gen, who had been known as a genius at cultivation, had spent one hundred and seventy-five years to get his Spirit to the twenty points limit. Greem had managed this aplishment in that rural area without any help from the n.


    If it weren¡¯t for the spies that the n had nted in Fire Throne sending the information back, they would probably only have gotten wind after Greem had sessfully advanced. When that happened, they would lose all initiative.


    Second Grade!


    A Second Grade adept!


    A person with such power could obtain high status no matter where they went.


    In fact, in extreme circumstances, a Second Grade adept could already create an independent n of his own!


    Moreover, wasn¡¯t that brat doing precisely that in the ce called Fire Throne?


    A small, low-grade adept¡¯s tower had gathered eight or nine core adepts, and almost two dozen peripheral members. Weren¡¯t these the makings of a small n?


    If Greem were allowed to sessfully advance and concentrate all his subordinates and resources with his identity as a Second Grade adept, it would be a simple matter to leave the Sarubo n.


    After all, the Sarubo n currently had no Fourth Grade adept on the World of Adepts. Relying on a single Third Grade Lady Sanazar to beat down a Second Grade adept with a tower of his own would probably result in a tremendous internal conflict within the n!


    If things got serious and they couldn¡¯t subdue the conflict quickly, then the Sarubo n would be one step away from decline!


    It was because they could foresee such a terrible scenario that the three core members of the Sarubo n remaining on the World of Adepts had gathered together to hold a serious discussion on all the possible oues.


    "Firstly, I believe that Greem¡¯s advancement to Second Grade has more downsides than benefits. It is very likely to cause a split in the n. That is why we have to find ways to stop him from sessfully advancing! At the very least, we have to find a way to stop this first attempt of his that¡¯s about toe," Sanazar thought for a moment before finallying to a decision, "F¨¹gen, did the information you receive state the exact time that he will hold that advancement ceremony?"


    "It should be three months from now!" F¨¹gen answered firmly, "ording to the information from that side, a batch of rare resources belonging to Fire Throne will arrive in three months. I have read through the list of resources. It contains many of the items required for the advancement ceremony."


    "That is good!" Sanazar spoke in relief, "This means that we still have time to intervene and do something. F¨¹gen; you immediately establish contact with Violeteye in Deepwater World. Have him put out a conscription order under the pretense of quelling a rebellion. Then have Greem bring people into Deepwater World to execute the n¡¯spulsory mission."


    Deepwater World?


    That was a mature lesser ne that the Sarubo n had been running for over three thousand years. It was also the source of most of the n¡¯s ie. Non-core adepts of the n would never be sent there under ordinary circumstances.


    While F¨¹gen and Keoghan were shocked by this decision, they couldn¡¯t help but marvel at the ingenuity of this idea after some quick considerations.


    Deepwater World was a strange ne filled with mostly water! Greem would never easily attempt advancement once he was sent there, due to the shing of attributes.


    This way, it would be easy to dy his ns for several years.


    Once they had removed the prick, the rest of the ants could easily be scattered and reassigned to other ces via other means. Greem¡¯s tiny little faction would be torn to pieces. That way, they couldn¡¯t stick together. Even if Greem sessfully advanced in the future, the impact to the n would be reduced significantly.


    The more they thought about it, the more they understood the brilliance of Lady Sanazar¡¯s n. The two adepts betrayed expressions of admiration on their faces.


    Before the three of them could further perfect the n, a strange frog¡¯s croak rang out from Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s body.


    F¨¹gen paused for a moment and took out a piece of magical equipment in the shape of a frog from under his robes.


    The magical equipment was blinking uniformly with a red light. It puffed its cheeks and let out croaks.


    "It¡¯s him! It¡¯s the spy I put in there!" F¨¹gen¡¯s expression changed. He couldn¡¯t help but blurt that fact out.


    As for who the spy that F¨¹gen had arranged to be in Fire Throne, Sanazar and Keoghan had absolutely no idea. The Third Grade adept couldn¡¯t care less, while the First Grade Keoghan had no right to know. The whole thing had been managed by Adept F¨¹gen alone!


    "Answer it!¡± Sanazar¡¯s voice suddenly turned cold and severe, "If he¡¯s so frantic as to use emergency magic to contact you, something unexpected must have happened. Let me hear what he has to say as well."


    Adept F¨¹gen nodded awkwardly. Magical energy surged through his hand and into the magical frog equipment. He answered the emergency message from far away.


    "It¡¯s bad. It¡¯s really bad! Sir F¨¹gen, Greem secretly snuck into the sea ofva today. He¡¯s already started attempting Second Grade advancement." The voice from the magical equipment sounded extremely flustered. It was clear that he had been caught off guard by this news as well.


    The three people in the hall instantly froze when they heard this. Light shed in their eyes.


    Dammit, they were tricked by Greem once again!


    All three of them started cursing wildly in their hearts.


    The atmosphere in the room quickly started heating up.

 Chapter 491 Second Grade Adept

    Chapter 491 Second Grade Adept


    Fire Throne Tower.


    No more than three adepts in the tower could have known about Greem¡¯s premature advancement today.


    Things were just like usual. Today was still an ordinary, average day with no anomalies.


    However, once it reached a specific hour, everyone suddenly received a message. They all exited theirbs, rooms, and lecture halls to hurry to the fourth level of the tower.


    Eight tower adepts and twelve staying adepts gathered in the arcane hall, instantly filling the ce to the brim.


    Most of the adepts still didn¡¯t understand what was happening. They were intimidated by the weighty atmosphere when they arrived at the scene, and they instantly figured out that something important was happening in the tower. These staying adepts were only guests. It was natural that they had no prior knowledge of the strange ongoings of the tower¡¯s leaders.


    The adepts gathered together and started talking, trying to ask about what might happen next. Some of the adepts who had been staying for a while, and who had established closer rtions with the tower adepts, secretly started tomunicate via magical messages.


    However, while many adepts had gathered here, only a few knew the inside truth.


    The few tower adepts looked at each other ignorantly before finally casting their gazes towards Adept Gargamel, who had gathered everyone here.


    Gargamel¡¯s wrinkled old face fell as he raised both of his hands.


    "Don¡¯t look at me. I only summoned everyone after receiving a message from Lady Mary!"


    Everyone¡¯s gaze then shifted to the crimson-armored Mary, who was casually picking at her fingernails in the corner of the hall.


    "Don¡¯t look at me either. I¡¯m also acting ording to Greem¡¯s orders to have Gargamel summon you at this time. I have absolutely no idea about anything else."


    Such irresponsible words immediately irritated the adepts present.


    However, a few people who knew some details vaguely managed to figure out a few things. They lowered their heads and hid their faces under the shadow of their hoods, preventing anyone else from seeing their expressions.


    Mary was apathetic, Gargamel was frowning, Meryl was restless, while Sabrina held her arms together and silently looked at everyone else. The rest of the adepts were either confused, betraying expressions of suddenprehension, or putting on a poker face; no one spoke. Everyone shut their mouths and silently waited for the oue of the meeting.


    Suddenly.


    For absolutely no reason, Fire Throne suddenly shook intensely. An unfamiliar mental flux appeared out of nowhere, rapidly and subtly sweeping past all the adepts.


    "There¡¯s an enemy."


    "The tower¡¯s under attack."


    "We must return to our stations, quick!"


    The bizarre turn of events instantly caused a riot in the ranks of the staying adepts. They all took out their staffs and gripped scrolls in their hands with faces filled with vignce, sensing the abnormality in the space.


    "Everyone rx! I have something to announce to everyone today." A loud voice that resembled exploding mes boomed in the air. The sound reverberated in the air, and though it was thick and dull, the volume was unexpectedly loud.


    Several unprepared adepts even had to sp their ears to endure that booming voice.


    A sharp explosion that sounded like the ripping of parchment echoed through the room. A two-meter long crack had been abruptly split open in the air in the middle of the hall. Blinding and intense red light shone out from within the break.


    An opening had torn open in the iparably tough space right before everyone¡¯s eyes. They could vaguely see the roiling sea ofva on the other side of the crack through a thinyer of an energy barrier. A gigantic me humanoid stood before the barrier of light, trying its best to enter the tower via the rift.


    The me giant extended two hands made of pure elementium fire and grabbed the uneven edges of the spatial rift. It exerted strength and pulled towards each side of the breach, instantly widening it enough for the being to pass through.


    The next second, the me humanoid¡¯s body turned into a surge of terrifying destructive mes. The mes burned through the barrier and appeared inside the tower.


    It was a frightening me giant that measured seven meters tall when it stood up straight.


    The arcane hall would never have been able to hold such a massive being if it hadn¡¯t been constructed to be unusually high.


    As the light barrier broke, tremendous heat surged through and caused the hall to be a massive forge. All the adepts could feel the suffocating heat wave pressing against their faces, and the corners of their clothes that were unprotected by magic immediately burned with golden sparks of fire. The streams of me even forced them to step back.


    However, the adepts no longer cared for these minor inconveniences. That was because a more horrifying and gigantic enemy had appeared before them.


    Contrary to their expectations, the me giant hadn¡¯t started its ughter after making it into the tower. Instead, it turned back and swiped the air with its hand of fire. It managed to use its terrifying strength to tten out the rift in space. The surging sea of me was once again sealed on the other side of the light barrier. As the tower¡¯s energies surged into the room, the damaged space was once again mended.


    Eh? Why did this me giant possess the authority to control this tower?


    Several smarter adepts immediately noticed this problem. On the other hand, the other staying adepts quickly retreated to a corner of the hall. Their hands, hidden under the sleeves, tightly held onto escape scrolls and pulling scrolls. They had already made up their minds to flee the moment things turned sour.


    The tower wasn¡¯t theirs. There was no reason to pay with their lives for a reward of some magical crystals. The invading me being was obviously no easy opponent. They could sense, just from the opponent¡¯s overwhelming mental flux, that this was definitely a terrifying Second Grade magical creature. If it started going on a rampage, even thebined strength of all the adepts present would not be able to suppress it.


    That was why it was best to flee as far as possible before the fight started.


    While the adepts were in a panicked frenzy, Mary casually walked up to the me giant. She walked around the giant twice.


    Mary had a tall and slim figure. However, she only reached up to the knees of the me giant. If the giant opened its palm, any one of its fingers would be as thick as Mary¡¯s waist. As the me giant stood there proudly, all the adepts couldn¡¯t help but feel the heat andck of moisture around them. They didn¡¯t even dare to stare into the brilliant sun-like eyes of the giant.


    After making two rounds around the giant, Mary could no longer suppress her curiosity. She extended a hand and touched the mes on the me giant¡¯s thick leg.


    Sizzle. Green smoke rose to the air. Mary¡¯s right hand had been singed ck by the fires protecting the me giant¡¯s body, and she eximed in pain.


    "What¡¯s the matter? You still can¡¯t control the fires inside your body?" Mary hurriedly retracted her right hand.


    As blood energy gathered there, the charcoal remnants of her palm fell to the ground, revealing red and smooth skin below.


    "I can¡¯t help it. The amount of fire I absorbed this time was too rich. It will take me a few days topletely digest it." The me giant replied with his echoing voice.


    "Teacher, is that you? You...you advanced to Second Grade?" Meryl stepped forward in excitement and stuttered as she asked.


    Teacher? Advanced?


    If the audience still couldn¡¯t understand the situation at this moment, then they would have no right to be known as an always wise and knowledgeable adept.


    The adepts present couldn¡¯t help but hold their breaths as they silently waited for the giant¡¯s reply.


    "Hurhur! Meryl. Very fortunately for me, I seeded in advancing this time!" The me giant raised its head and let out a joyousugh that resembled the roar of a tsunami. However, it then lowered its head and looked at its huge body. The giant sighed, "Still, the fire I absorbed during the advancement ceremony is a little too much. I¡¯ll probably need two weeks to digest it and return to my original formpletely."


    The me giant Greem had transformed into started muttering to himself. However, all the adepts had selectively ignored hisments. All their focus and attention was on the first sentence.


    He seeded!


    The owner of Fire Throne had be a Second Grade adept!


    This kind of explosive news blew everyone away. Their mouths were opened wide, and their arms hung ck at their sides. They could only stare at the towering giant in a daze.


    The path of an adept was so treacherous that most of the adepts present had never actually hoped to make it past that threshold of rising from a First Grade adept to a high-grade adept.


    They had dreamt of the moment they would achieve such glorious heights countless times, but their calm and collected adept minds would remind them that this would always remain only a dream!


    For these people, just being able to sense the aura of a Second Grade adept at close range was already an invaluable experience. However, they had now personally witnessed the rise of a powerful Second Grade adept!


    If they recalled correctly, the owner of the tower, the legendary me Demon, seemed to have advanced to adept less than a hundred years ago. Lord Greem had used iron proof to demonstrate that he possessed extraordinary talent and potential by advancing to Second Grade at such a shocking speed.


    If he continued at this rate, Third Grade and even Fourth Grade didn¡¯t seem to be that out of reach!


    The adepts grew more excited the more they thought about it. The eyes with which they nced at the me giant started to possess a trace of respect.


    They had be blessed individuals and spoiled children of the ne after they became adepts.


    However, only the adepts themselves knew that they were only minor characters in the massive group that was the adepts. No one would truly ce significance on them or care for them.


    It was this terrifying reality that bred the prideful, extreme, twisted, and resentful personalities of the adepts.


    With such emotions bottled in them, the only things that could make them submit, apart from absolute strength and profound knowledge, would be the respect and envy of powerful individuals!


    They might have been disdainful towards the idea of being a loyal dog following behind a Second Grade adept. But if it was following a future Great Adept rising to prominence, it was certain that everyone present would beg for the chance to do it.


    Unlike these staying adepts, Mary and the other eight tower adepts couldn¡¯t help but gather around Greem. They closed their eyes and silently felt the unique and powerful soul flux belonging to Second Grade adepts. Greem had only just advanced. His Spirit had yet to solidifypletely. That was why the phenomenon of his soul¡¯s aura leaking was happening.


    Such a rare experience was the experience of a lifetime. If Greem had another two weeks to settle down, the other adepts would have no chance to investigate the secrets of Second Grade adepts.


    The staying adepts had no choice but to watch enviously from afar. No one dared to try and get close to Greem like the tower adepts were doing.


    After all, no Second Grade adept would allow outsiders to investigate their secrets so freely!


    Not even if those people would not be of any threat to them.


    In truth, even from a distance, the staying adepts could still vaguely sense Greem¡¯s terrifying and bottomless mental flux, along with that indescribably strange aura.


    That was the taste of the narws!


    The aura of narws on a Second Grade adept was undoubtedly denser whenpared to them.


    In fact, one could even say that a Second Grade adept was no longer the same type of existence as a First Grade adept.

 Chapter 492 Good Luck

    Chapter 492 Good Luck


    me Demon Greem had sessfully advanced to Second Grade. This news was spreading as fast as a gue.


    Adept Sanazar went silent when she received this news. The light in Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s blinked his eyes, shocked and stunned. Adept Keoghan¡¯s jaw even dropped. He had no idea how to react.


    Second Grade. That was an actual Second Grade adept!


    Put them in any country or any adept organization, and they would still be core, foundational members.


    There was no need to look anywhere else. Just look at the Sarubo n.


    If Greem sincerely wished to stay in the Sarubo n, then apart from Third Grade Sanazar, he would likely be the one with the most authority in the n in the World of Adepts. Even the veteran Adept F¨¹gen might not have an absolute guarantee to stand above him.


    Over the past couple of years, the Sarubo n¡¯s influence had increased rtively quickly, thanks to the three lesser nes they held in their hands. Excluding the three adepts that had appeared in Fire Throne, seven new adepts had advanced within the Sarubo n. Feidnan City had be a lively and bustling ce once again.


    Yet, at this moment of peak prosperity, Greem had advanced to Second Grade without their knowledge. It was a massive impact for the core members of the n.


    However, the one that had felt most strongly about this incident was Adept Keoghan, who was only First Grade.


    He remained on the spot for a long time after hearing news of Greem¡¯s advancement. He couldn¡¯t shake off the shock he felt.


    Keoghan bent his fingers and counted. He had advanced to adept approximately a hundred and twenty-odd years ago, but his Spirit had only just reached fourteen points. It would take him another twenty to thirty years of grinding to achieve the sixteen point threshold of an elite adept. And if Keoghan wanted to reach the twenty point limit, initial estimates suggested he would need another hundred years of effort.


    Inparison, Greem, despite advancing fifty years after he did, had...


    A feeling of irritation gathered in Keoghan¡¯s heart when he thought about the matter. The frustration in his chest was so intense that he almost wanted to tear open his body to let it all out.


    Keoghan had diligently and dutifully helped the n manage all sorts of assets, vis, shops, and resource sites to obtain the full support of the n.


    While others were focusing on their experiments, he was patiently assigning apprentices to various locations.


    While others were going to and fro on their adventures, he was carefully rationing the n¡¯s resources.


    While others were working hard on meditationte at night, he was dealing with the n¡¯s multitude of internal affairs and problems.


    It was his massive contribution that allowed the tremendous amounts of resources and manpower to flow in a logical manner that allowed the Sarubo n to develop steadily and healthily. Naturally, after giving so much, Keoghan had obtained the whole-hearted cultivation and guidance of the n. It could be seen in the course of his development.


    However, there was a definite trade-off in this!


    He had used his efforts and loyalty to obtain the trust and regard of the n; resources were never a problem. The difficulties he faced in magic research were always aided with the guidance of higher-grade adepts. However, his excessive work on various matters had indirectly slowed down his progress.


    Keoghan had never thought of himself as making a mistake in the past. In fact, there were many times when he secretly rejoiced over his own ingenuity. But today...


    Adept Keoghan could no longer suppress the rage in his heart when he received news of Greem¡¯s advancement. He calmly returned to his room, activated the magical defenses, and started smashing the things in his room as he cursed and swore loudly.


    An expression of sympathy appeared on F¨¹gen¡¯s face as he watched the dejected Keoghan leave.


    In the World of Adepts, there were the two most direct manifestations of power.


    One was possessing overwhelming strength. That was the most direct way for an adept to acquire resources and respect. The second was to possess authority and influence.


    If you couldn¡¯t obtain absolute strength, then you had to think of a way to gather people who could control absolute power.


    That was why those possessing authority and status used their influence and resources to attract all sorts of talented individuals. They used those resources and talents at hand to gather even greater authority and influence. It was like rolling a snowball. As long as one was able to construct a healthy cycle and hierarchy using this method, then they could be an extraordinary individual in the World of Adepts.


    Judging from the current situation, Greem walked on the first path, running straight ahead on the pursuit of power. During his time as a First Grade adept, he had been able to rid himself of the various distractions of managing his territory. He gave away his authority to a wandering adept he had coincidentally encountered and endured nearly seventy years of loneliness and boredom.


    That was undoubtedly the real reason he could rise to prominence in such a dominating fashion!


    On the other hand, Keoghan had apparently forgotten that the World of Adepts was a top-tier world that revolved around the strongest individuals. The gravitational pull of power on authority was far more significant than the influence of authority on power. Under ordinary circumstances, authority and resources would naturally apany the strong. The same situation would hardly ever manifest for the other side.


    Still, after sympathizing with Keoghan, Adept F¨¹gen started to be concerned for himself.


    The same situation was fairly striking when it came to him as well.


    He wasn¡¯t the only Second Grade adept in the n. The rest had all requested stations in the lesser nes to use the harsh environments of a different world to train themselves. F¨¹gen had instead chosen to stay in the resource-rich homeworld. Even though he had far more authoritypared to them, it was evident that he nowgged behind them when it came to sheer strength.


    Perhaps it was time for him to make some appropriate choices?


    Adept F¨¹gen silently thought to himself.


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    The inside of the tower was currently a sea of joy!


    Under thebined efforts of the tower adepts and staying adepts to drum up anticipation, the mysterious owner of the tower that always hid at the top of the tower had finally appeared before the apprentices once more. Moreover, it was a dramatic entrance with him being a Second Grade adept.


    Even though Sir Greem still needed to stabilize his Spirit, and hadn¡¯t actually shown up at the celebration in the second floor¡¯s arcane hall, the atmosphere at the scene still ignited the emotions of every single adept.


    The World of Adepts was a world that chased after powerful individuals!


    What could be more exhrating than following a prominently rising adept?


    Every adept and apprentice that belonged to Fire Throne would receive two to three times more resources than they currently had in the foreseeable future. That was what they valued the most!


    While everyone was rejoicing and celebrating, Billis had been summoned by Greem to the fifth level of the tower and disappeared into a teleportation array.


    ............


    The Tower of Fate.


    When the brilliant white light dispersed from in front of him, Billis endured the immense pressure from the shift in space and opened his eyes to assess the strange tiny lifeform near the teleportation array.


    It was a teenage human girl the size of a palm. She had thin wings that resembled those of dragonflies behind her back. Specks of light would drop from her body as she danced in the air.


    An elementium fairy?


    Billis couldn¡¯t help but lick his lips. His pale-greenpound eyes lit up with a greedy green light from under the shadow of his hood.


    "Follow me, big bug!" Elementium Fairy Helen, who was holding her magic wand in her hand, obviously didn¡¯t like this strange fellow shrouded in his cloak. Her tone when speaking was exceptionally sharp.


    Helen beat her wings and flew away having said that.


    "Damned bastard. I will eat you one day!" Billis cursed wickedly before stumbling after that foul-mouthed fairy.


    A male and a female adept were already waiting inside the astrology tform at the top of the Tower of Fate.


    The male adept was a strange humanoid made of mes. Judging by its brow, the silhouette, and the mental flux radiating from it, it was Billis¡¯ master¨C Second Grade Fire Adept Greem.


    The female adept had a slender figure. She wore a purple starry robe as the ethereal radiance of stars shone down upon her, putting yet another intangible, mysterious, and beautiful coat on her shoulders.


    She was young, and her face was gentle and soft. Her bright blue eyes, paired with their inclined corners, gave her a mysterious and seductive look.


    Billis froze for an instant.


    His master Greem had just sent him into the teleportation array back in Fire Throne. How did he run into another Greem here? He could tell from Greem¡¯s aura that it didn¡¯t possess that terrifying spiritual pressure that Second Grade adepts possessed.


    "Come here, Billis!" The me human seemed to have seen through Billis¡¯ doubts, "This isn¡¯t my actual body; it is only a spiritual projection. The matter we need to perform today is far too important. My true body can¡¯t leave Fire Throne, so I had no choice but to use my spiritual projection to talk with you."


    After sensing the contract powers radiating from the depths of the me being¡¯s soul, Billis obediently walked up to the two of them and waited for orders.


    "My actual self has already exined to you what you need to know. I have something here. Keep it with you always!" The me humanoid opened his hand. Two strange objects rested in his scarlet, fiery palm.


    A ck orb the size of a pigeon¡¯s egg.


    A fist-sized metal ball radiating an intense spatial flux.


    "The ck orb is the Orb of Deception. Keep it with you once you reach the other side. It will hide your identity as an invader. The metal ball is a simplified teleportation array. It can only teleport two people at once and will take approximately five days for aplete charge of energy."


    "The spatial energy within it has been emptied to avoid the spatial flux from affecting its teleportation precision during the internar teleportation. That means that you will have to survive alone for five days once you reach the other side. You will have to find a safe spot to activate the metal ball once it charges up with energy. Then you will be able to receive reinforcements from us!"


    Billis listened respectfully to Greem¡¯s words, not daring to miss any critical information. Even though this was his first time experiencing a nar invasion, he knew very well the potential dangers in a different world.


    Billis kept the two objects in his spatial ring, then swallowed the ring. He made ast careful check of everything he had on him before nodding at the me being.


    "Stand in the ck circle!" The beautiful witch that had been bustling about the hall stopped everything she was doing and coldly spoke to Billis.


    Billis stood in the circle as he was ordered.


    The witch then started to perform an unusual dance around the array, chanting odd notes as she did so.


    Immense magical energies surged continuously into the array under Alice¡¯s guidance. Brilliant light enveloped the astrology tform.


    The light persisted for seven minutes or so.


    When the light finally started to dim, and it became possible to see on the tform, Billis¡¯ silhouette had vanished entirely.


    Only a solemn-looking me humanoid and an exhausted Alice remained.


    "Say, do you think we will seed this time?" Greem sighed softly.


    "There¡¯s only a twenty-three percent chance of this internar teleportation failing with my spacestone as a spatial anchor. If this fellow is truly that unfortunate, then we can try a second time one month from." Alice spoke in an unconcerned manner.


    Er...


    Greem¡¯s projection was speechless.


    Try a second time? Where am I supposed to find another piece of spacestone?!


    As for Billis¡¯ fate if he failed the teleportation... Greem hesitated for a moment and didn¡¯t ask.


    He was afraid some more terrifying words woulde out of Alice¡¯s mouth.


    So, Billis; good luck!

 Chapter 493 Goblin Plane

    Chapter 493 Goblin ne


    The endless road of stars extended in front of his eyes.


    Billis felt as if he had been turned into a clump of dirt; a clump that anyone could mold and press.


    The strange and unpredictable spatial energies assaulted him from every direction. Hundreds and thousands of gravitational pulls acted upon Billis¡¯ frail body of bugs, instantly tearing him into pieces. Billis¡¯ body disintegrated into tens of millions of tiny ck beetles and barely managed to gather together as ck smoke, preventing him from being dragged away by the gravitational forces.


    If it weren¡¯t for the protection of the teleportation array, Billis would probably have been torn to pieces by the distortion in space. All those different parts of him would have been dragged into different shattered regions of space.


    The reason Billis was under so much pressure was thanks to Alice, who had hosted the teleportation.


    If Alice were at Fourth Grade, she would naturally have been able to handle spatial energy in a skilled fashion. The person being teleported would have been able toplete his internar teleportation while only needing to endure a fraction of the spatial energy.


    Unfortunately, Alice was only First Grade. Moreover, she had intentionally weakened the defensive strength of the teleportation array to prevent severe spatial bacsh. Billis, who had been sent out as a scout, had no choice but to frantically use his immortal body of bugs to negate the tremendous pressure he was dealing with.


    His body was stretched thin, or crushed t, or twisted into knots as he swam through the continuously extending path of stars. Billis was like an undying cockroach, enduring all sorts of terrifying torture on his arduous journey to another ne.


    He had no means of resistance. Billis could only passively endure the pain.


    However, even the longest of journeys had a day when it ended.


    A small rift finally appeared on the path of stars as a strange rune exploded. Through the spatial membrane formed by the ne barrier, obscured by faint shimmering lights, Billis could vaguely see the scenery of the unknown continent on the other side of the rift.


    Before Billis could hesitate, the power of the stars that enveloped his body dragged him towards the rift and sent him all the way through.


    ............


    Green fields and blue skies.


    The skies of Karlmek were always that sunny.


    The gentle spring breeze blew through the wild grass. Red, blue, purple, yellow; flowers of various colors mixed in with the green and grassy field, presenting an exceptionally charming and beautiful view from a distance.


    A two-meter-long spatial rift had been torn open in the middle of this beautiful and moving painting. The grass seemed to have been cleaved by an invisible razor as spatial gusts blew out from the rift. Countless grasses, flowers, nts, and roots were diced into powder before being blown far away.


    Some strange ck creatures were crawling in the midst of the powder.


    The spatial rift onlysted for approximately three seconds before returning to its original state under the powerful regeneration ability of the nar space. However, just these mere three seconds of time had released such powerful spatial gusts and distortions that irreparable damage had been done to thend.


    The field had been ravaged, and the ground had split. The strange distortions of space had even left the spacetime in this location somewhat twisted and bizarre. The spatial distortions might assault any creature that identally came to this ce, dragging them into an interdimensional space.


    Ordinary creatures could not possibly endure the changes in space without protection from a strong force. The second they were dragged into those spatial distortions would be the moment their bodies disintegrated, as well as the moment their lives came to an end.


    Two and a half kilometers away from the point of teleportation, Billis was piecing together his consciousness with great difficulty. He sent out screeching bugmands to gather.


    Finally, after fifteen minutes, Billis climbed up from the bushes with only a small half of his body. Clouds of smoke gathered towards him from the dense greenery around him. The smoke was merging with his body.


    An unspeakable pressure and suppression filled Billis¡¯ heart. It made it hard for him to think. He could hardly use the magic within his body either. If it weren¡¯t for his immortal body of bugs that allowed him to depend less on oxygen for survival, even taking deep breaths might have been a problem.


    nar Suppression!


    Billis instantly understood what he was experiencing.


    He had arrived on another ne. That meant what he was currently experiencing had to be the constant nar suppression from the ne consciousness. Billis had already predicted this happening before he set off.


    He opened his hideous mouthpart and spat out an antique spatial ring. He then put it on his thick left pinky.


    Billis chanted the magic password and took five whole seconds before finally taking out the Orb of Deception and the metal ball from the ring. The same action would have taken him a single thought in the World of Adepts. However, it had taken five seconds of his time here.


    Moreover, at the instant the spell waspleted, Billis could feel the magic in his body diminishing significantly.


    Such an insignificant magical act consumed very little magic. In the World of Adepts, Billis would have been able to recover from this exhaustion in a minute amount of time by absorbing wandering elementium energy in the air.


    However, here he could only feel the loss of magic. He didn¡¯t sense any recovery of it.


    Billis¡¯ face dropped. He closed his eyes and sensed deeply.


    His adept-level Spirit still allowed him to sense the existence of ambient elementium energy in the air. However, his Spirit estimated that the concentration of elementium particles here was only sixteen percent that of the World of Adepts. In situations with such thin levels of elementium, an adept¡¯s passive absorption was no longer able to sustain their recovery.


    If Billis wanted to recover his magic powers, he would probably have to enter a deep meditation.


    Goddamned low-magic world.


    Billis cursed furiously and picked up the Orb of Deception. The moment he touched the Orb, he could feel the nar suppression reduce by nearly half. Even his breathing became much morefortable.


    Billis thought for a moment before opening his mouth and swallowing the Orb.


    In any case, this thing needed to be in contact with his body to take effect. Swallowing it both ensured its safety and allowed it full contact. Of course, it was the best measure to take!


    Billis also used his brown insect-like appendage to pick up and assess the metal ball. The five crystals embedded in it were all dull and without light. Only the first one was evenly blinking as if it was breathing like a human.


    He couldn¡¯t ce this thing within the spatial ring. Otherwise, it would never be able to absorb the spatial energy that it needed to perform its function.


    Billis hesitated for a moment. He then used his bug hands to tear apart the armor on his abdomen with much difficulty and buried the metal ball inside. Just then, the woods rustled with the strange sound of tunneling earth. Five sting scorpion, the size of mastiffs, broke out from the ground and crouched before Billis.


    "I have you, and so, I have the entire world!"


    Billis looked in satisfaction at this mighty army of bugs that belonged to him. He waved his arm and led them towards the depths of the forest.


    ............


    Half a dayter.


    The point of teleportation had just settled down when a strange noise broke the peace.


    A strange ck dot immediately flew towards this location, gliding right beneath the clouds.


    It became increasingly clearer as the ck dot got bigger. It was a strange flying device that was so crude and simple that it was almost terrifying.


    It was a crude goblin helicopter made of light and sturdy wood, with coreponents made of mechanical gears.


    The body of the helicopter was fashioned in the shape of a goblin¡¯s head and had been dyed yellow on the outside, and a rotor made of metal tes spun above the body of the helicopter. The terrifying noise heard earlier was the sound of this massive rotor rotating wildly in the air.


    The size of the helicopter wasn¡¯t thatrge. Only a single human could fit in it.


    However, when the helicopternded on the ravagednd, two tiny goblins jumped out of the cockpit. They wore leather armor, pants, boots, and wore goggles on their heads.


    Old Pa Tok lit up his pipe as he stepped upon the harsh, barren dirt. He took two rounds around the point of teleportation and cursed angrily, "Dammit, my eyelid has been jumping all day since yesterday. I knew something bad was going to happen today. Dammit, dammit, dammit. Mosaldin, go back to the vige and inform everyone that there might be some interdimensional monster nearby. Have everyone be on alert."


    The one speaking was an elderly goblin. Judging by his looks, Old Pa Tok was probably already forty years old. This age was about equal to an eighty-year-old human.


    On the other hand, Mosaldin, who had apanied him to this spot was only a young goblin seven to eight years of age. His face was full of youth and childishness, without a speck of fear on it.


    "Old Pa Tok, how can you tell there¡¯s a monster?"


    Mosaldin had circled by Old Pa Tok¡¯s side several times, but he didn¡¯t find anything unusual. The fields in a quarter kilometer radius around the point of teleportation had beenpletely overturned. Fine debris had blown several kilometers away. Any evidence or proof would have been shredded to pieces by the violent spatial storms.


    That was why Mosaldin was curious about Old Pa Tok¡¯s judgment.


    Old Pa Tok struck Mosaldin¡¯s forehead with a big pipe.


    "What other evidence do we need? Can¡¯t you tell that someone from the outside shattered the ne barrier? This isn¡¯t a weak space location. Natural spatial holes won¡¯t appear here. If that¡¯s the case, it has to be an intruder." The more he spoke, the more Old Tok got angry. He waved his pipe to strike again, but Mosaldin had already run away ahead of time.


    "Maybe that monster has already been destroyed by the spatial winds!" Mosaldin furiously rebutted as he climbed onto the goblin helicopter with some difficulty, "Didn¡¯t you say that very few creatures could survive through spatial storms?"


    Old Pa Tok hesitated for a moment. He ced his hand on his eyebrows and looked at the distant forest. He couldn¡¯t help but mumble, "It would be best if they actually did die in the spatial storm. What I¡¯m worried about is if they survived. Then whates next might be a disaster for us. Anyone that can enter our world through space is not going to be an easy enemy to deal with."


    The two of them returned to the helicopter, which took off amid loud noises and flew back in the direction they came from.

 Chapter 494 Beta Town

    Chapter 494 Beta Town


    Billis was still wandering through the depths of the forest.


    The existence of the nar suppression caused his fundamental abilities to weaken severely. It further caused the various side effects from the teleportation to persist until now.


    If Billis hadn¡¯t previously fully understood his master¡¯s choice of sending a pseudo-summoner bug adept like himself to be the scout, instead of a purebat adept like Mary or Sabrina, he did now.


    The terror of internar teleportation was so horrifying that he still shivered at the memory. Thoseyers afteryers of spatial distortions, and the shattered space around him. A slight misstep and he would have died, even with the guidance and protection of the magical array.


    Moreover, when that damned Alice irresponsibly tore apart the ne barrier of the Goblin ne and tossed him in like that, there wasn¡¯t even the shadow of a magical defense cast on him. If it weren¡¯t for Billis¡¯ immortal body of bugs that allowed him to negate part of the spatial force¡¯s corrosion of his soul origin and core, he might have been torn to pieces in that ferocious and violent spatial maelstrom.


    Even so, his immortal body of bugs had still fallen apart at thest moment. He had taken great pains after the matter to recollect the remaining parts of his body.


    It was only now that Billis fully understood his master¡¯s thoughts.


    It seemed he had been chosen as the vanguard because of his immortal body of bugs. If it had been Lady Mary instead, things would have been very different. Even though herbat prowess was several times that of his, her ability to adapt and survive when faced with such disastrously harsh environments fell short of Billis¡¯.


    Billis gloated over this fact for a short moment, before being distracted by his rumbling belly once again. His body was severely damaged, and his energy reserves werecking. It seemed it was time to go looking for some blood meals!


    Billis recklessly hunted in this tropical, Amazon-like forest with the aid of his fifteen sting scorpions. It didn¡¯t matter if they were rabbits, mice, wolves, tigers, or jaguars; as long as they were within range of Billis¡¯ life sensing ability, none could escape the earth-attribute attacks of the sting scorpions.


    The fifteen sting scorpions were like fifteen stealthy demons, weaving underground between the roots of nts. Every time they found a target, they would silently sneak to the spot beneath it before using a sudden earth spike to exterminate the enemy in one hit.


    If the sneak attack didn¡¯t manage to kill the enemy, the sting scorpions would emerge from underground and use their terrifying jaws to bite the enemy¡¯s throat, causing it to bleed to death. If the scorpions didn¡¯t want the prey¡¯s struggling to attract new enemies, they could even use their poison stingers to inject excessive amounts of earth elementium into the victim, forcing them to die in despair while utterly paralyzed.


    Naturally, Billis didn¡¯t have Greem¡¯s ability to analyze and decipher the narws rapidly. That was why his solution to the nar suppression was brutal and straightforward. That was... to eat!


    He would only have the strength to resist the nar suppression once his hunger was satiated. By the time he devoured sufficient native lifeforms, he would be able to obtain adequate gene factors from the lifeforms to change his external life traits. It was actually a camouging ability that most predators possessed!


    As a ssic carnivorous predator, Billis the Bug Adept was extremely proficient in this aspect.


    Billis shambled through the green sea of trees, a thick ck cloak on his shoulders. He looked like the god of deathe to life as he made his way through the vines, branches, and bushes, turning every ce he passed into and of death and decay.


    No living creatures detected by Billis¡¯ Spirit could escape the ughter of thebat sting scorpions. Behind him, the formerly lively woods had been reduced to a ce void of any life. Apart from some bugs the size of fingernails and other microscopic lifeforms, Billis had thoroughly cleansed all visible creatures from the sections of the forest that had been swept through by the sting scorpions.


    Billis could feel the nar suppression weakening thanks to his ughter. Without the support of these tens of thousands of lifeforms, the mediums and carriers that the nar consciousness could lean upon decreased. The strength that it used to suppress an external intruder like Billis unavoidably declined.


    Billis¡¯ magical knowledge was insufficient for him to see through the nar consciousness and its nature. However, his base instincts allowed him to sense that the nar suppression weighing upon his body weakened as he killed more native creatures and the faster he killed them.


    With this rudimentary knowledge in mind, the amoral Billis immediately began his ughter without holding anything back.


    Just as he wasmanding his sting scorpions to surround and blockade three windwolves in a nearby cave, a loud noise from the horizon drew his attention.


    Billis repeatedly adjusted hispound eye modes and finally managed to capture the silhouette of a strange object through the dense foliage.


    It was an odd alchemical flying device with two weak soul fluxes in it.


    Billis gave up on his directmand over the sting scorpions and allowed them to fight with the windwolves by themselves. He carefully examined the strangebination in the air through the leaves.


    His master Greem had specially bestowed him with plenty of knowledge and matters of caution regarding nar wars before he crossed over. Among them, the first thing he had to do was to hide and conceal his existence. The second was to quickly find out the racialposition of the ne and find a way to assimte into the local intelligent species. The third thing was toe into contact with the race that held the dominant position on the ne and to discover their weaknesses and strengths to exploit at ater time.


    Billis only had a vague impression and concept of this ne. It was the fact that this was a small ne where the goblins held the ne dominance!


    Goblins? These greedy, weak, and stupid creatures could dominate a ne?


    Billis almost hadn¡¯t believed his ears when he first heard of this.


    However, when he thought of the sly fellow that always apanied his master, Billis had no choice but to admit that green goblins still had wits of their own. At least, in the eyes of his master Greem, that green goblin Snox might have been of slightly higher status than himself.


    An actual terror of a bug adept like himself was of lesser status than a green goblin who was the natural equivalent of the words weak and stupid. Billis could not lie to himself, though he was extremely reluctant to admit this to be true. That was because this was the reality!


    Billis finally gained a vague understanding of something when he set his eyes on that strange flying device.


    If this ne was filled with those naked and weak goblins who fought with wooden bows and short spears, he alone would have been able to crush them all with his ever-growing army of bugs.


    However, now, two ¡¯stupid¡¯ goblins, who were so weak that they would lose to a beginner apprentice, were flying in the sky with the help of an odd alchemical construct. That was more than enough proof that these goblins werepletely different from the ones in Billis¡¯ mind.


    If he were foolish enough to attack them head-on, then the tragic scenario of a great bug adept being chased around by a bunch of ¡¯weak¡¯ goblins might actuallye to fruition.


    The flying device that the two goblins were driving in was remarkably swift. Billis¡¯ judged from his observations that its velocity was around fifteen to twenty meters per second. This speed was already equal to the speed of adepts flying with the use of Fly.


    On the one hand, you had normal goblins who couldn¡¯t sense any supernatural auras. On the other hand, you had adepts who had mastered powerful abilities. If the weak goblins were able to disy adept-level powers through some unknown means, then this invasion might be extremely difficult.


    While Billis silently contemted, the cruel and bloody ughter ended. Three sting scorpions had killed the three adolescent windwolves at the cost of some light wounds.


    As expected, the goblin ne was a low-magic ne. Even after scouring the entire forest, the number of magical creatures that Billis could find was few and far between. Ordinary beasts would not have been able to deal any visible physical damage to the scorpions, regardless of how numerous they were. However, these three windwolves were considered part of those rarely seen magical creatures. They possessed the ability to manipte wind elements.


    It was the violent wind des that they released as a final struggle that caused some slightly more obvious damage to the scorpions. The storm of wind des had severely cut the shell on the back of a sting scorpion. Some of the des had even cut through the shell and caused purple and ck blood to flow out.


    However, as the wounded scorpions feasted, their wounds healed at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    With a soft whistle, the scorpions scattered in the nearby woods hurried back to Billis.


    Still cloaked in his ck robe, he led them as he ran towards the direction the mysterious flying device had disappeared.


    Billis felt like there was a need to understand the opponent before he shed with them in a frontal conflict. And as a bug adept, the only way he could understand an opponent was... to eat!


    ............


    Beta Town was a goblin town that neighboured a vast forest.


    The ones that lived here were, naturally, a group of lively and cute green goblins.


    One could even see quite a number of individuals from various other races in the town. However, most of them were being ordered around by the goblins and used as ves.


    The buildings in Beta Town weren¡¯t all thatrge. That clearly had something to do with the height of the goblins themselves. The construction materials used manyrge metal parts, causing Beta Town to look shiny from afar. There was a taste of blood and steel to its image.


    There were round mushroom cottages, wrapped in ayer of metal on the outside. They possessed thick, heavy metal doors, disc-shaped roofs, and windows. White steam lingered in the air above the town.


    When Billis looked at the town from the edges of the forest, he saw a capital of iron and steel filled with a sense of strength.

 Chapter 495 Goblin Lumber Mill

    Chapter 495 Goblin Lumber Mill


    This was a rural town ruled by goblins.


    Billis hid at the edge of the town, continuously adjusting the scanning modes of hispound eyes, making a careful andprehensive analysis of the things that stood out.


    An earthen wall three meters tall surrounded the town, and small watchtowers were constructed in the corners of these walls. Several goblin warriors stood in these towers, holding strange cylinders in their hands as they looked out for any movement around the town.


    Quite a few peculiar races could be seen entering and exiting the town. Most of these races were much taller than the goblin guards. However, they all shared amon trait. That was the metal cors on their necks that were forged from a unique material.


    If they were disobedient or started conflicts with the goblin guards, the guards only needed to press a single button in their hands. Theserge individuals would immediately copse in a shroud of electricity before being subjected to plenty of whippings and beatings.


    Billis was shocked.


    Were these still the weak goblins from his previous impression? Since when were green goblins so cruel and savage? Were the electric-shock cors the reason they dominated the other races? Then what was it that they used to defeat their enemies and put the cor on them?


    Countless questions emerged in Billis¡¯ mind. However, another scene he witnessed quickly answered these questions.


    Loud rumbling and ear-piercing noise came from a different direction in the woods while Billis was secretly spying on the town. The ground slightly tremored as this happened.


    It was almost as if some giant creature was moving around in that ce.


    Billis hesitated for a moment before leading his bug army and carefully approaching that ce.


    It was a small camp that had been excavated in the forest.


    Thick logs that had just been cut down were scattered across the camp. Each of them was thick enough that it would take two people to embrace thempletely.


    Five human-shaped logging machines that were three meters tall and seven hundred kilograms heavy were working hard at the edge of the camp. The ones sitting at the controls of the logging robots and controlling them to cut down the trees were tiny goblins.


    Alchemical golems or magic-poweredbat golems?


    They had humanoid shells made of pure metal,rge chains, gears, axles, exaggerated metal saws, and hot steam that sted out from the backs of the robots.


    The loud rumbling Billis had heard earlier was the sound from these massive giants advancing through the forest. That ear-piercing sound, on the other hand, was the terrifying noise of rapidly-revolving chainsaws cutting down trees.


    One by one, the massive trees that rose up over twenty meters copsed with a thundering thud and the ear-piercing noise of chainsaws. The goblins then manipted the logging robots and cleared away the obstructing branches in a matter of moments. They used the massive robotic hands to carry the lumber back to camp.


    The five logging robots working in the forest had different roles as well. Two were in charge of logging, one was in charge of cutting down the branches, while the other two were responsible for carrying the logs around. The robots had an explicit assignment of duties and worked in an orderly fashion under the control of the goblins, putting on disy an unusual yet immense kind of power.


    The hulking ves that Billis had seen in town could be seen here as well. They lifted the lumber onto the cutting machines inside therge buildings under the supervision of the goblin guards. The logs would then be reduced to several smaller pieces of a more appropriate size before being hauled onto carts and taken away.


    After seeing the entire process, Billis finally understood that this ce was no more than a small lumber mill under the rule of the green goblins. The rumbling constructs weren¡¯t thebat machines of the goblins either. They were only auxiliary tools being used to log.


    The dark clouds over Billis¡¯ heart thickened when he saw this.


    In all honesty, the goblins before him were probably only the lowest of cannon fodder in the Goblin Empire. If even these cannon fodder were equipped with these terrifying ¡¯strongmen,¡¯ then the fundamental strength of the Goblin Empire could be easily deduced.


    It might be a small ne, and the ones that ruled the ne might only be a group of ¡¯weak¡¯ and ¡¯foolish¡¯ goblins. However, a bad omen suddenly rose in Billis¡¯ heart.


    This ne didn¡¯t seem to be as easy to deal with as he had previously predicted!


    However, as a bug adept from the World of Adepts, Billis couldn¡¯t possibly have been frightened into submission by this tiny difficulty. He made up his mind and hid in the depths of the forest. He started sending out bug scouts that he had specially cultivated to sneak into this goblin lumber mill secretly.


    ............


    The damp forest.


    Green, tall trees and annoying bushes were everywhere. Resilient vines and brambles filled the rest of the space between the trees.


    The humidity in the camp was extremely high. When paired with the noise, it was almost impossible to get a good night¡¯s sleep in this environment. That was why Uldum remained sleepless even after sticking cotton buds in his ears. The trembling from falling trees and the loud sounds of the chainsaws were too much.


    Uldum softly cursed as he rolled out of bed. He slid into his heavy metal boots before walking out of his tent.


    "Oh,mander, you¡¯re finally awake. That Old Pa Tok has alreadye by twice. It seems he has something especially important to report to you." The guard stationed by the entrance to the camp shouted into his ears with an almostical tone.


    Uldum was themander of this camp. The five goblin shredders were all under hismand. Consequently, his status was even higher than the green guy that was the mayor of Beta Town.


    Uldum shook his head several times before finally recalling that he was the one who sent Old Pa Tok out to investigate that strange urrence in the distance. That unique quake that shook the earth had been felt even from dozens of kilometers away.


    For some reason, Uldum had felt short of breath. Guided by some unknown train of thought, he had immediately sent his best goblin helicopter pilot to investigate. Now that they hade back with a report, there had to be some extraordinary discovery.


    With that in mind, Uldum immediately strode to a wooden hall in the middle of the camp. As expected, Old Pa Tok was anxiously circling the wooden table. Goblin Apprentice Mosaldin was sitting by his side with a face full of confusion. It seemed he hadn¡¯t fully understood the situation.


    "Speak, Old Pa Tok!" Commander Uldum entered the wooden hall and sat down in front of the table. He looked at the old goblin with a solemn expression, "What news do you bring back for me this time?"


    "O¡¯ respected lordmander, the news I bring to you might not be good!" Old Tok took off his goggles and gripped the leather cap in his hands. An expression of hesitation appeared on his face.


    "Go on; I am listening." Uldum¡¯s heart sank.


    "I believe... I suspect that some interdimensional monster has intruded upon our world!" Old Pa Tok¡¯s grip tightened as he finally voiced his thoughts.


    Themander abruptly stood up. Anxiety appeared on his green face filled with yellow freckles. He quickly asked, "What kind of creature? How powerful are they? Are their numbers many?"


    Old Tok stuttered awkwardly, "We didn¡¯t see anything when we went there. Only a forest destroyed by uncontrolled spatial forces."


    "You saw nothing? Then the monster you mentioned?"


    "Even though we saw nothing, my years of experience led me to sense a trace of evil that didn¡¯t belong to our world!"


    Commander Uldum once again sat down. An expression of uncertainty appeared on his face as well.


    As a veteran warrior that had followed him for a long time, Old Tok possessed a wealth of experience unmatched by most goblins. That was why Uldum had no reason not to take Tok¡¯s report seriously. Still, how was he supposed to report this to this superiors without any evidence!


    The shouts of ves came from the camp outside as he was mired in doubt.


    "What has happened?" Uldum roared in an unamused fashion.


    A soldier that had been guarding the entrance came in and reported, "Re...re...reporting. A monster has appeared in the camp and has already bitten two ves to death."


    Uldum¡¯s heart trembled when he heard the word ¡¯monster.¡¯ He instantly drew the short goblin pistol at his waist and marched outwards. Old Pa Tok and Mosaldin surged out of the wooden hall behind him.


    The southwest corner of the camp was in chaos right now.


    Two or three dozen trolls were frantically running around as a single strange scorpion the size of a mastiff pursued them. The corpses of three troll vesy on the ground even further towards the edge of the camp. Their throats had been gnashed into a bloody mess, and it was clear that they were dead.


    The sounds of guns were exploding out through the camp by the time Uldum and the goblins made it out of their tent. Seven or eight goblin guards stationed at various spots in the campground had already raised their guns and started firing at the strange insect.


    Uldum could very clearly see the metal bullets shoot and hit the body of the strange bug under the propulsion of an explosion. However, something happened that almost made him scream out loud. With no exception, all the metal bullets deflected when they hit the ck shell of the strange insect.


    Deep craters or marks might have remained in the spots where the scorpion had been hit, but not one of them had managed to pierce through its shell.


    The deflected bullets had even hit two troll ves that were escaping frantically.


    Ayer of yellow dust appeared around the increasingly enraged scorpion. Its body swiftly vanished in the cloud of smoke. By the time it reappeared, it was already at the side of a goblin guard twenty meters away.


    Kacha!


    A sickening crunch rang out. The frightening scorpion had used its front jaws to snap the goblin guard¡¯s right leg in half. Even the thick metal armor on the goblin guard couldn¡¯t defend against this sort of terrifying biting ability. The scorpion forcefully swallowed the armor piece after chewing it several times.


    Dammit! Goblin guns didn¡¯t work on it!


    "Quick, recall all the shredders."


    Commander Uldum¡¯s angry yell rang out in the camp immediately.

 Chapter 496 Inside and Outside the Camp

    Chapter 496 Inside and Outside the Camp


    Five shredders waved their chainsaws and metal fists under the control of the goblins. They charged towards the strange bugs with their heavy footsteps.


    This scorpion had acted reckless and fearless until this point. Yet, the moment it saw several metal freaks charging towards it with steam sting everywhere, it turned into a sly fox and started hiding throughout the lumber mill.


    The piles of lumber had now be its best cover.


    Compared to the shredders, the bug was no bigger than their rectangr feet. Regardless of how resilient its life force was, or how hard its shell, being stepped on by such a colossal being would mean an overwhelming weight of forty tons.


    That was why the insect relied on the logs scattered across the camp to rush everywhere. It asionallyunched rapid assaults at the troll ves and goblin guards who couldn¡¯t dodge in time.


    It quickly threw the lumber mill camp into disorder.


    All the troll ves were lowering their heads and scattering. Some didn¡¯t watch where they were going and ran straight into the insect. Naturally, it ughtered them. Some brought themselves into the path of a shredder¡¯s charge, where it would reduce them to meat paste in a short yet tragic scream.


    Uldum and the troop of guards by his side had their formation disrupted by the ves that were running everywhere. They could not keep up with the insect¡¯s agile and lithe body.


    "All goblins, do not panic," Uldum was the campmander after all. He was calmer than the other goblins, even at this moment. He climbed onto a tall log and shouted from above, "All goblin guards get on top of a log. You, you, and you; don¡¯t run about with your shredders. Guard the entrances of the camp. All ves gather in their rooms. Anyone else who runs about randomly will be beaten to death."


    The previously chaotic camp immediately found its backbone under Uldum¡¯smand. All the ves and goblin guards hurried to their posts ording to his instructions. The five shredders no longer chased futilely behind the insect. Instead, they retreated to the entrances between the logs and stared eagerly at the bug, as if they were waiting for it to fall into their trap.


    The sting scorpion stopped between two piles of lumber. It raised its head as if listening to something.


    Soon, it changed its strategy. It charged out of the pile of logs and moved atop the stacks of wooden boxes in the center of the camp.


    Baited by the scorpion, two goblin shredders charged into the pile and cut everything into pieces with their chainsaws. They cut the logs, splinters flying everywhere. The big wooden crates fell all over the ce. They crashed to the ground, and their contents scattered everywhere.


    They were strange crystal prisms about half a meter long. The insides of these crystals weren¡¯t solid. Instead, they were filled with an odd liquid that radiated a ghostly green light.


    For some reason, even though Billis couldn¡¯t sense any elementium aura from these crystals, he felt his heart tremble.


    He had a sudden feeling that the most significant objects in that camp for him might not be the five goblin shredders. It wasn¡¯t the fire-spitting sticks in the goblin¡¯s hands either. It was these mysterious crystal prisms.


    Under hismand, the sting scorpion conjured yet another obscuring cloud of dust. It then dove underground and emerged next to the scattered crate of crystal prisms.


    "Fire! Fire!" Uldum¡¯s sharp and severe roar rang out once again, "We can¡¯t let the monster get close to the magic energy batteries. Hurry up and fire."


    His shout prompted all the goblin guards standing atop the piles of lumber to raise their guns and fire at the sting scorpion. The rain of metal bullets crashed against the shell of the sting scorpion. However, most of them were deflected.


    Still, several columns of purple and ck blood leaked out of the scorpion. Many of thepound eyes at its head had been blinded.


    A sharp and sorrowful scream rang out in the camp. The goblins all sped their ears and rolled around in agony wherever the terrifying soundwave echoed. Even the goblin mechanics in the shredders were no exception!


    Billis, who had been watching from a distance, was slightly stunned. He then seemed to have understood something.


    In all honesty, Billis was utterly shaken when he first saw those five goblin shredders.


    The sensitivity of his Spirit allowed him to sense that each of these goblin shredders was as powerful as an advanced apprentice. However, this ce only seemed to be aparatively rural town of the Goblin Empire.


    The cylinder stick that fired metal bullets, in the hands of the goblin guards, had a basic damage that reached thirty points of power. Such strength might not be much to adepts, but if every single low-level goblin of the Empire had ess to such a convenient and rapid method of attack, Billis had no choice but to reevaluate the overall strength of the Goblin Empire.


    If even this ce could easily pull five advanced apprentices together, and if every single goblin had the offensive power of a beginner apprentice, this would be bad news for the uing invasion of the adepts.


    However, good news always apanied bad, regardless of the matter!


    Even though thebat training and offensive strength of these goblins surprised him, the sting scorpion¡¯s scream of agony had also exposed the weakness of these goblins.


    The goblins¡¯ strength and power all came from this strange equipment, and their inherent power was so insignificant that it wasn¡¯t even worth mentioning.


    The soundwave that the sting scorpion had let out in agony was no more than fifteen points in strength, but the goblins were already copsing left and right. It clearly demonstrated that the strength of their bodies was even weaker than a beginner apprentice. The basic statistics of their Physique and Spirit had to be extremely low.


    The injured scorpion conjured another cloud of dust while the goblins were dazed. It dove underground and didn¡¯t appear again.


    The dizzy goblins took a long while to recover. They immediately organized their manpower to search the entire camp. However, they found no tracks or signs of the insect. With no choice left to them, they gave up on their search and started to restore the order of the lumber mill camp.


    The entire camp had turned into a muddy mess. The charging shredders had broken many logs, and numerous crates had split into pieces. Consequently, as they were cleaning up everything, no goblin realized that two of the crystal prisms had gone missing.


    ............


    While the goblins were pouring out of the camp to search the forest, Billis had already returned to the depths of the woods, only leaving behind one or two insects to spy around the camp.


    Billis found a hidden cave in the forest and immediately started researching the two strange items he had just obtained.


    Magic energy batteries?


    These two odd little things were called magic energy batteries?


    Judging by their names, they seemed to be strange energy crystals that could provide certain facilities with mysterious non-elementium energy. Billis was already shocked beyond belief when he had seen a weak goblin easily manipting a metallic golem twenty times its size as if it was its own body.


    What shocked him the most at that moment was the energy that had been used to power those hulking monstrosities. After all, he hadn¡¯t sensed any elementium energy on those machines.


    But now, after obtaining the two magic energy batteries, and sensing the strange energy frequency within them, Billis had a vague feeling that these so-called magical energy batteries had powered those shredders.


    However, hecked an alchemicalb here. He also possessed minimal knowledge about alchemy as well. That was why trying to expose the unique system of the goblins through these two magic energy batteries was beyond the limits of Billis¡¯ abilities.


    Billis had no choice but to cast his attention to the goblin camp and attempt to find moreprehensive information there.


    However, what Billis didn¡¯t know was that a goblin helicopter had suddenly taken to the skies while he hid in the cave to research the batteries. The helicopter raced into the distance under cover of night.


    The battle during the day had caught Commander Uldum by total surprise and left him with no valuable information or clues. However, whenbined with the information brought back by Old Pa Tok, Uldum had more than enough reason to suspect that the insect that had attacked today was most likely the fangs of an otherworldly intruder.


    That was why Uldum personally wrote a letter requesting reinforcements after having more guards stationed at the lumber mill camp. He then had Old Pa Tok send the message to General Buzzek of the Seventh Goblin Land Corps.


    In the letter, Uldum used skin-crawlingnguage to describe in detail the horror of the otherworldly intruder. He once again mentioned how weak the defenses of Beta Town were.


    As Old Tok left the camp with Flying Apprentice Mosaldin, Commander Uldum stood by a wooden window of the second floor, gazing into the deathly silence of the nighttime forest. Indescribable terror and worry filled his heart.


    A forest like this one could not possibly be ordinary!


    Under normal circumstances,rge numbers of wild beasts and monsters would appear around the camp once night fell. Even after the goblin guards ced plenty of torches around the camp, they still couldn¡¯t stop these creatures from circling outside the camp.


    However, today, the forest in the night betrayed a silence like death.


    It was almost as if countless terrifying demons hid in the darkness where their vision couldn¡¯t reach, and these demons were the ones who ughtered or scared away the forest beasts.


    That meant the insect from earlier hadn¡¯t gone too far away. It was still spying on them from outside. If the goblin guards rxed, or an opening in the camp¡¯s perimeter appeared, then the insect was sure to visit again, wreaking havoc upon the camp.


    As for the opponent¡¯s goal? Commander Uldum had absolutely no idea, even after mulling over it for half a day.

 Chapter 497 Goblin Land Corps

    Chapter 497 Goblin Land Corps


    Reinforcements for the lumber mill camp arrived by dawn.


    Three hundred and seventy-eight goblin warriors sat on tamed mounts known as hawkstriders. They traversed a distance of fifty kilometers at surprising speed and quickly arrived at the lumber mill camp. What came with them was a Goblin Zeppelin, three Goblin Tanks, and twelve Magic Mechas that wererger and more powerful than the goblin shredders.


    The goblin zeppelin looked just like a wooden sailboat flying in the blue sky, only with copper tes ced all over the body of the ship itself. The reason the zeppelin could float wasn¡¯t due to some supernatural power. Rather, it was because of a giant leather balloon filled with some mysterious gas.


    The goblins had drawn a colorful shark on the floating balloon to make the zeppelin look cooler. They used metal chains to tie the balloon to the ship itself. This way, the goblin zeppelin was able to use the lift from the balloons to fly freely in the sky.


    Moreover, apart from transporting things, the blimp also had four or five powerful magic cannons. Consequently, it also possessed air-to-ground offense.


    Goblin tanks, on the other hand, were no more than metallic chariots that had been outfitted with magic cannons. The four wide metallic wheels were two meters tall, but the insides of the thick and heavy chariot had limited space. Only three goblins could fit in it at any one time.


    A goblin tank captain, a cannoneer, and a watchman.


    It might not have been able to fit many goblins in it, but its tough metal shell and powerful cannons still made it a terrifying magical construct that was not to be underestimated.


    However, the core power of the goblinnd corps was still the twelve magic mechas.


    The magic mechas looked like metallic golems that were six meters tall. They possessed a head, a torso, and four limbs, just like humans did. Unlike the goblin shredder, magic mechas wereplete-coverbat constructs. The goblin mechanics that operated them were hidden within the thick, wide bodies. The logging robots were only semi-cover construction machines. To make it easier for the goblins to see their surroundings, they did not have an upper body as the magic mechas did. Only an open operating tform remained atop the chest of the machine.


    That was why goblins that operated the logging robots were easily subjected to long-range enemy attacks, while no such problem existed for the magic mechas.


    Such arge goblinnd corps suddenly flooded the small lumber mill camp, instantly turning the ce into a lively and noisy ce.


    The incidents happening in this location naturally couldn¡¯t escape the eyes of Billis¡¯ flying scouts. That was why Billis once again snuck close to the goblin camp fifteen minutester. He spied on themotion from a distance.


    He didn¡¯t wait long. An hourter, a group of goblins with extremely recognizable outfits boarded the goblin zeppelin floating above the canopy. The camp that had gone quiet started to bustle once more.


    With the zeppelin at the center, the three tanks and twelve mechas arranged themselves in a line and charged into the forest like an unstoppable steel chariot.


    The goblin tanks continuously fired as they advanced. Magic fireballs consistently shot out of the mouths of the magic cannons. The magic fireballs caused tremendous explosions wherever theynded. A violent me shockwave would also follow.


    Even the massive trees couldn¡¯t endure the explosion of a magic fireball at close range.


    As the goblin tanks fired while advancing, the forest in front of thend corps was set aze. Splinters flew everywhere. One after another, the ancient trees toppled amid the sound of agonizing creaking. They were then shoved to a side by the logging robots.


    Squads of goblin warriors on hawkstriders followed behind the tanks, the shredders, and the mechas. They rode on the tall back of the hawkstriders and held goblin guns in their hands. If they discovered anymotion in the forest, they would immediately shower the location with a rain of bullets without a second word.


    The wild chickens, jaguars, and goats that lived in the bushes became the most tragic victims of their actions. They were shocked into running by the deafening report of the magic cannons. However, they were shredded to pieces by the metal bullets the moment they emerged from the forest.


    Their blood and flesh soaked the ck soil of the woods. Before the blood could even seep into the ground,rge metallic feet stomped into the earth. When the feet lifted up, pools of sticky and disgusting meat paste had appeared in between the field and the bottom of their feet.


    What were the goblins intending on doing?


    Could they... could they actually be thinking of razing the entire forest?


    Billis¡¯ gaze fell upon the army of steel through the trees. Even though they were just a group of weak goblins, the murderous aura they possessed when hidden inside those massive and hardy machines made even Billis concerned about the difficulty.


    The offensive power of the guns in the hands of the goblins was only thirty points, which was approximately the same as an attack from a beginner apprentice in the World of Adepts. On the other hand, those randomly bombarding magic cannons had energy attacks up to seventy points. This strength reached the levels of pseudo-adepts.


    Such attacks would usually not be able to threaten a bug adept like Billis. However, regardless of how minor the damage was, there was no resisting their sizeable numbers. If Billis appeared within range of thend corps¡¯ attacks, their focus fire could severely wound his immortal body of bugs.


    His immortal body of bugs didn¡¯t truly make him immortal. Billis was merely relying on the separation of his bug body to split the damage he would have to take indirectly. That was why every wound he suffered meant that part of his body of bugs would fall apart and disintegrate, taking the damage dealt along with it.


    As the vanguard chosen for the nar invasion, his master Greem had also granted him with a Rune of Berserk. That allowed the bug soldiers under hismand to wield a burst ofbat strength twice that of their original power for a short time. However, these bugs would only wildly attack the enemies around Billis during this berserk period. They would not listen to Billis¡¯ remotemands.


    That was a bit of a shame!


    That was why Billis¡¯ mission priority was to stay hidden, investigate, and wait for iing reinforcements, as opposed to foolishly storming up against the local natives.


    As a result, Billis could only lead his bug soldiers back into the depths of the forest when he discovered the actions of the goblins. He made his way towards Beta Town in a roundabout fashion.


    General Bezzek of the Seventh Goblin Land Corps stood high above on the goblin zeppelin, a hundred meters in the air. He led a group of officers as they leaned against the side of the ship, sweeping through the forest with telescopes in their hands.


    It was beating the grass to alert the snake. The violent and ferocious attacks had turned this forest into a sea of mes. They were trying to use this method to force the terrifying intruder out of hiding. What awaited the enemy that was exposed before the steel army of the goblins was a storm of magic fireballs.


    However, sadly, they couldn¡¯t find any traces of the strange bug, even after thoroughly ravaging the forest. Instead, they had delivered plenty of coteral damage in the form of woond beasts.


    Even those iparably savage ck bears and apes could not hope to pass through that dense rain of bullets.


    How the green goblins had managed to be the rulers of this ne was evident from their expert machine operation and their powerful machine weaponry.


    When the ne itselfcked sufficient magical elementium, the quantity and quality of the magical creatures could not threaten the goblin tribes. The green goblins were then able to lean on their excellent engineering and alchemical knowledge to use various magical machines in a variety of ways. That was how they had be the masters of the ne.


    Ordinary creatures thatcked supernatural powers had no means to fight back against them. It didn¡¯t matter whether they were barbarians, trolls, humans, or other intelligent lifeforms. They could only bow before the goblin warriors and their guns and obey their every whim. They became the lowest ves that helped the goblins dig their mines and manage their gardens.


    As for civilizations; in this ne, there was only the goblin civilization. The other cultures had all been shattered into shards of civilization amid the sounds of rumbling fireball explosions. They had all been buried in the flood of history that crashed forward.


    By relying on their powerful magical machines, the goblins that had always been known to be weak and foolish had turned the tables. They became the masters and ced the other races far below them to be humiliated as they wished.


    An indescribable pride and excitement filled the heart of General Bezzek as he looked upon the unchallenged advance of the goblinnd corps below. If he wasn¡¯t a hundred meters in the air, he might not have been able to resist the urge to pull out his copper handcannon and fire a few shots into the air.


    However, his reservedness as a goblin noble allowed him to suppress the bubbling emotions inside him. He turned and frowned at Uldum, who was beside him, "Hey, country brat. Where¡¯s that intruder you spoke of? Could they all have hidden underground out of fear? You confidently imed that they were near the camp. What about now? Where are they?"


    As the only goblin army in a five hundred kilometer radius, General Bezzek¡¯s status in the Karlmek area was uncontested. Moreover, this Seventh Goblin Land Corps led by General Bezzek had experienced over a hundred battles, culling several ve rebellion armies.


    That was why there were several rows of delicate badges of honor on his well-ironed military uniform.


    Each of these badges had all been dyed red with the fresh blood of hundreds and thousands of ves!


    Uldum had no choice but to put on an apologetic smile and bow when he heard General Bezzek¡¯s confrontational questioning, "Lord Bezzek, it must be because your army is simply too powerful, causing them to ru... "


    Uldum¡¯s voice stopped before he could finish. His pair of beady green eyes opened wide as he stared into the distance behind Bezzek.


    Arge could of ck smoke rose into the air from the distant horizon. One could vaguely make out the smoldering mes that reached the sky. The ce where the ck smoke rose from was Beta Town!


    "Beta Town. My Beta Town... " Uldummented in agony.

 Chapter 498 Distraction

    Chapter 498 Distraction


    The once bustling town of Beta had now turned into an asura¡¯s ughterhouse; blood stained the ground.


    The goblin zeppelin floated fifty meters in the air. It slowly reached the skies above Beta Town. The scene below was so horrifying that no goblin could bear to witness it.


    The town wasn¡¯t that big. All in all, there were only seven or eight streets. However, there were plenty of shops and stores on the streets. Most of them were weapon shops, cksmiths, and alchemy stores. Under normal circumstances, this would be the golden hour where the traffic was at its highest and the shops would be shouting for business.


    But now...


    Mutted goblins and ves were scattered all across the streets. The doors of the shops were wide open, their insides a mess as well. Dark red blood stains were everywhere, along with corpses that had been gnawed on and eaten beyond recognition.


    The cksmiths and the alchemy stores had been set on fire.


    Ferocious mes surged out of the shops, wildly licking away at every mmable object. The goblin constructions were mostly outfitted with metal tes to increase their defenses, and a lot of their coreponents were made with pure metal parts as well.


    Sadly, all these turned into dust under the sea of mes that devoured everything!


    "Master Beirut is still in the alchemy store." Uldum¡¯s pained cry rang out from the goblin zeppelin.


    Beirut was Beta Town¡¯s only advanced goblin engineer, and he was the only one that could repair the goblin shredders if they malfunctioned. As such, Uldum¡¯s heart was unbearably heavy when he saw the alchemy store engulfed by the raging sea of fire.


    The goblin zeppelin could only shift its direction and maneuver between the pirs of fire and smoke.


    Beta Town had only been under attack for half an hour, but the damage dealt to it was lethal.


    The damned enemy seemed to be extremely familiar with the town. They immediately ughtered their way down a street to the alchemy store after breaking through the entrance to the town. After wildly ying everyone in the alchemy stores and the smithies, they murdered their way out of town through the nearest street and escaped towards the northwest.


    A dense tropical forest lied to the northwest of the small town.


    The reason the goblins knew the path taken by the enemy so well was because of the clear view they got from above with the goblin zeppelin. They could see a clear, bloody path winding through town. The other streets and shops had received varying degrees of attacks, but the damage they suffered and the casualties were much lower. It was obvious where the main battlefield had been and where else had only been dragged into the conflict.


    The goblins in hiding came out once again when they saw the goblin zeppelin patrolling above the town. They cried and sobbed and waved their arms at the sky.


    Just as everyone thought the danger had passed, the cksmith that was still burning with mes exploded. The mushroom-shaped building instantly broke apart into many pieces. Countless splinters and twisted, shattered metal tes shot in every direction like heavy rain.


    Yet another terrifying rain of fire suddenly fell from above.


    The massive amounts of gunpowder stored in the basement of the cksmith had ignited!


    After the terrifying explosion, a massive crater appeared in the center of Beta Town. The hole was scorched ck, and a sea of fire continued to burn inside it. Debris and random objects fell and rolled away from the crater at the edges of the impact site. Some goblins and ves could be seen hanging onto the walls of the cavity, continuously calling for help.


    General Bezzek¡¯s face turned green. He gritted his teeth as he looked at the terrible state of things below. His gripped his fists tight.


    "Uldum, you immediately go down to help the mayor in his rescue efforts. I will lead men with me to track down that goddamned intruder. Quick, carry out my order!"


    "Yes!"


    Uldum saluted and took a parachute from the guard beside him. He reached the edge of the zeppelin, steeled his heart, and jumped off.


    The goblin zeppelin had no time to reach a lower attitude for him to get off; They needed to pursue the enemy as soon as possible. That was why Uldum had no choice but to carry out the orders of the general, even when he knew that the goblin parachutes weren¡¯t all that safe.


    As tiny mushroom explosions continued to bloom in the air, the goblin zeppelin made a sharp turn and sped towards the northwest of the town.


    "Get yourself together," General Bazzek tore apart the uppermost button of his uniform that suffocated him and waved the copper handcannon about as he roared, "All observers get into positions. You must find that damned bastard. All cannoneers, prepare everything. I want you to use all one hundred percent of your rage to drown the enemy once we find them.¡±


    Goblins with telescopes hanging at their necks ran towards both sides of the ship and filled every single observation spot. They raised their scopes to their eyes and swept through every suspicious location below them.


    Countless goblins ran and shouted under the deck. Magic cannons forged of copper were pushed into position. The metal tes on the hull of the ship were forced open to reveal the ck cannon holes.


    However, unlike Earth, there were norge piles of cannonballs and barrels of gunpowder. Those were all reced by crates of magic energy batteries. These magical cannons had all undergoneplete technical construction from the Goblin Empire¡¯s Institute of Engineering and Technology. They could convert the strange force in the magic energy batteries into clusters of unstable energy fireballs.


    Such fireballs would generate terrifying energy explosions with the slightest impact once fired.


    Each of these expensive magic energy batteries had to be swapped out after firing five energy fireballs. Consequently, the Goblin Empire mainly trained their cannoneers to be able to change batteries inbat rapidly.


    It was a massive waste if a magic energy battery was swapped out without being used up. And if the magic cannon had its battery swapped beforepletely cooling down, it would be prone to self-destruction. That was why being a goblin cannoneer was both an upation that tested technique and tested luck!


    The goblin zeppelin zipped through the air a mere thirty meters above the ground. Countless magnified eyeballs were anxiously sweeping thend, not letting anything slip past their sight.


    Finally, at the edge of the forest one kilometer away from Beta Town, the goblins discovered the signs of an insect crawling on the dirt.


    Judging from the numbers of the tracks, the insects numbered no less than ten!


    General Bezzek immediately flew into a rage when he saw the tracks disappear into the sprawling forest.


    "Contact Naaru, quickly. Have him get over here with hisnd corps immediately. I want him to raze this ce t in an instant."


    Naaru was the deputy general of the Seventh Land Corps.


    Bezzek had intentionally left the deputy general with the army tomand them. Under Bezzek¡¯s strict orders, the Seventh Land Corps that had been hurrying towards Beta Town promptly changed directions and quickly advanced on the general¡¯s position.


    With the goblin tanks and the hawkstriders as transports, the goblins could reach top speeds of twenty-five kilometers per hour. However, the slightly clumsy mechas and shredders clearly couldn¡¯t keep up with the army. Thus, the entire army was dragged into a line, like a snake with disjointed bones.


    Bug Adept Billis, who had been watching all this unfold while hiding nearby, couldn¡¯t help but lick his lips in pity.


    His army of bugs had yet to formpletely. They were functional in small brawls, but they were utterly insignificant in a sh between armies.


    The assault on the goblin town while taking advantage of the distraction allowed him to capture two or three goblins with advanced knowledge. It also allowed him to obtainrge numbers of magical energy batteries and other unknown materials. The goblin prisoners were relocated to a hidden cave, while he stowed the spoils in his spatial ring.


    Thus, Billis had retained extremely high mobility and agility even now.


    The tracks left at the edge of the forest were only a guise. Billis had sent out three sting scorpions to lure the enemy¡¯s leader away while he turned back with the remaining twelve sting scorpions. He once again reached for the lumber mill camp.


    He wouldn¡¯t do something like shing with the enemy directly. The mission his master gave him before the reinforcements arrived was to survive and expand his bug army as much as he could.


    Bug Adepts like himself were restrained by the Adept¡¯s Code of Conduct wherever they roamed in the World of Adepts. They were never able to hunt down intelligent life to expand their armies recklessly. Here, the entire ne was like a delicious cheese that had yet to be exploited. He could ruin the ce as he liked and no damned adept executor woulde to interfere.


    That was why he loved this ce!


    Even though there were unknown risks and dangers here, an indescribable feeling of rxation andfort rose in the depths of Billis¡¯ heart. He loved this ce; or rather, he belonged to this ce.


    An entire ne filled with delicious blood treats waiting for him to feast upon. What else could be more enticing and more rxing than this?


    An hourter, the furiously forest-razing General Bezzek once again received an alert form the distance. The lumber mill camp had been attacked!


    By the time he hurried back to the camp with the Seventh Land Corps, only scars and pools of blood remained on the ground. What was even more horrifying was the fact that all stationed guards and troll ves had vanished. Not a single corpse, mutted or otherwise, was left in the entire massive camp.


    The magic energy batteries stored in the camp warehouse had all disappeared as well. That was the worst news that impacted the Seventh Land Corps the most!


    All the magical machines that thend corps were equipped with required the batteries to properly function. Now that all the stored cells had been stolen, what was the army supposed to use to continue the battle?


    General Bezzek immediately calmed down after realizing this problem. After much consideration, he chose not to have anyone defend this camp with no advantageous terrain. Instead, he led all the goblin warriors into Beta Town and set up a new defensive system with the town at the center.


    After doing all this, General Bezzek finally set aside his face and reputation to send messengers to the empire¡¯s military headquarters. He also sent out emergency reinforcement request letters to the other nearby generals.


    The storms of war of an even greater scale silently brewed, beyond the senses of Bug Adept Billis.

 Chapter 499 New Intruders

    Chapter 499 New Intruders


    Five days wasn¡¯t a long time, but it wasn¡¯t short either.


    For Bug Adept Billis, it was only a small game that he yed with the goblins while leading his bug soldiers. However, for the poor goblins of Beta Town, that small game meant the deaths of over a thousand people. Of these victims, there were one hundred and twenty-five goblins and nine hundred ves of various other races.


    Billis had broken free of the goblin¡¯s pursuit the moment he sensed the brimming energy of his metal ball on the fifth day. He made his way deep into the forest under cover of night.


    When the metal ball opened up silently in an empty section of the forest, the stars in the skies turned dim and lightless. Several dazzling beams of light that couldpare with the radiance of the sun shot out of the metal ball¡¯s core. The beams illuminated the entire forest so brightly that it was hard to keep one¡¯s eyes open.


    The intense radiance even pierced through the denseyer of leaves above, casting several pirs of light towards the pitch-ck night sky. It was so bright it was practically daytime. This fantastic scenery could be easily seen from several dozens of kilometers away.


    Several terrifying spatial ripples that shook the nar barrier apanied the brilliant lights. As the spatial ripples intensified, the spatial flux became even more frequent. The entire forest started to be affected by the wormhole that was about to form.


    Almost twenty kilometers away in Beta Town, Bazzek and Naaru hurriedly scrambled onto the observation tform. They gazed at those terrifying pirs of light that shot into the skies,pletely stunned.


    They didn¡¯t have any talent or affinity for elementium and, naturally, couldn¡¯t sense the presence of the spatial ripples in the air. Still, the inexplicable sense of danger made their hearts beat quicker and quicker. If they hadn¡¯t been pressing against their chests with their hands, their rapidly beating hearts felt like they might break free of the constraints of their flesh and burst forth from their torsos.


    "This feeling; I seem... to be somewhat... familiar with it. That...that¡¯s... " Deputy General Naaru was a scrawny goblin. His iron-straight uniform, paired with his elegant golden-frame sses, gave him a distinguished look.


    At this moment, all the color had been shocked away from his face. He pointed at the pir in the distance and stuttered, struggling to form aplete sentence.


    "That¡¯s a long-range spatial teleportation, and it¡¯s even the internar kind." General Bazzek¡¯s face was just green. His beady eyes stared into the distance as he gritted his teeth and uttered the words that Naaru didn¡¯t dare utter.


    It hadn¡¯t even been five days, but two instances of such shocking abnormalities had already urred near Beta town. If they hadn¡¯t realized what was happening, then they were not fit to be the generals that led ten thousand goblins.


    Beta Town; no, this ne that they lived in was now in the sights of some terrifying enemy. The anomalyst time was much smallerpared to this one. It proved that the intruders fromst time were only small in number. However, this time it was a considerablemotion. The intruding enemies had to be far stronger than earlier.


    The entire Karlmek Area was under the garrison of Bazzek¡¯s Seventh Land Corps. ording to the flow of battles in the past, whenever enemies that the local defense force could not deal with popped up, only General Bazzek had the authority to gather up all the soldiers stationed in the various cities. Only he could organize them and send them into battle.


    The Seventh Land Corps only retained this mobile squad of four hundred goblins to make it easier to exterminate the ve rebellions that happened all over the ce. They alone were enough to squash those unorganized rebellions!


    However, at this moment, Bazzek¡¯s heart felt like it had fallen into a bottomless pool of icy water. It was cold and dark. More importantly, he could feel himself perpetually sinking, not able to find any way out of this predicament.


    "The goblin zeppelin? Where¡¯s our goblin zeppelin? Have them move out now. I want them to reach that location as soon as possible to get the first strike on the enemies." In this instant, Bazzek was like a gambler that had gone mad from all his losses. He anxiously roared and yelled from the observation tform.


    A goblin officer immediately ran to issue the orders.


    Seven minutester, that massive zeppelin took off from northeast of the town. It blew its horns and cut through the sky rapidly as it flew in the direction of the pirs of light.


    Fifteen to twenty kilometers of distance was only a matter of minutes for the balloon.


    As the thousands of goblins in town waited anxiously, the zeppelin closed in on the forest where the anomaly was proceeding. Just as it was descending to spy on the situation within the woods, a meteor shot out of nowhere and hit the massive balloon.


    The next moment, a huge fireball appeared in the skies above the forest. The frightening shockwaves from the explosion even sted away all the trees and nts in a quarter-kilometer radius.


    Even from that much of a distance, the goblins in the town could feel the oppressive heatwave. Under their wide-eyed and ck-jawed gazes, the goblin zeppelin that had always been thought of as an aerial chariot instantly exploded into a fireball and fell towards the ground in tens of thousands of sparks.


    All the goblins went silent at that moment!


    Even the furiously shouting Bazzek suddenly seemed as if he had lost his soul. His head that had always been held high tipped downwards.


    A powerful enemy had finally descended!


    ............


    Greem retracted his right hand.


    It was him that had cast a spell and shot down the goblin zeppelin that dared to parade before them. He had done that even before he¡¯d adjusted his Spirit, right after came through the wormhole.


    The price he paid for this was immense.


    A fireball of no more than two hundred and twenty points of power had caused his Spirit to decrease by one-third. It had even triggered the nar oppression that now entangled with his body and soul. He couldn¡¯t help but lean against his staff as he started coughing intensely.


    Mary, who hade here along with him, hadn¡¯t gotten used to the narws here either. She appeared to be in low spirits and had trouble fully controlling her body.


    The spatial wormhole created by the metal ball couldn¡¯t support even more manpowering across. Having exhausted the spatial energies, it quickly copsed.


    As the wormhole shrunk, the forest on this end of the wormhole rapidly experienced a reverse spatial tide. Dirt, branches, grass, rotting leaves, small insects, and other things were all dragged into space by the spatial wave due to theirck of magical protection.


    Then, with a light pop, the singr point vanished under the impressive regenerative powers of the ne.


    The entire forest regained its peace.


    However, if one stood here and looked around, they would find that the ce looked as if a horrifying meteor crash had just ravaged it. All the trees in a quarter kilometer radius had snapped and fallen down. The part of the forest in front of the wormhole had been neatly cleaned up. Not one speck of debris remained there. Even the loose surface soil of the ground had all been sucked into the singrity, revealing the dark earth below.


    As a bloodline adept, Mary¡¯s physical condition should have been far above Greem¡¯s. However, as Greem advanced to Second Grade, his Physique exceeded Mary¡¯s, making him stronger and quicker when regenerating.


    He thought back to the first time he had traveled through nes. Even with a Sixth Grade Great Adept protecting him, Greem had still almost suffocated from the power of the ne. Even walking had been a problem. This time, even without a Great Adept protecting them, Greem was able to shield himself and Mary from the spatial forces during the journey and enter the Goblin ne without any damage.


    Moreover, Greem managed to start moving freely after adjusting his breathing.


    While he still couldn¡¯t cast spells as freely as he liked, he was still in a much better condition than Mary¡¯splete exhaustion.


    "I hate this world!" Mary leaned powerlessly upon Greem as she cursed, "The damned narws here make me feel like a fish thrown into a desert. I¡¯m almostpletely suffocating."


    Greem put on a bitter smile, even as he felt the same.


    Adepts could be considered high-energy creatures with the bodies of humans. Their bodies perpetually called out to the environment andmunicated with it. The magical energy scattered throughout the ne constantly nourished their bodies, allowing them to maintain a state of high-magic.


    When they arrived on this low-magic Goblin ne, the concentration of magical energy in the space was so low that it was almost unbelievable. The magical power here was inert and a lot less lively than the energy back in their homeworld. It wasn¡¯t as fresh.


    That was why the adepts had this terrible feeling of needing to exert themselves just to get air into their lungs.


    Another dozen seconds passed by before Mary was able to get somewhat used to the ¡¯filthy¡¯ and ¡¯inferior¡¯ air of the Goblin ne. She left Greem¡¯s embrace and could finally move about freely.


    "Billis, you did extremely well!" Greem picked up the exhausted metal ball and turned to look at Bug Adept Billis, who was bowing to him, "Now, bring us to your hiding spot! I need moreprehensive first-hand information on the Goblin ne."


    "Sir, everything has been prepared!" BIllis¡¯ bug head under the shadow of his hood revealed the traces of a wicked smile, "Please follow me!"


    Billis turned and walked towards the forest.


    Greem and Mary also donned their cloaks and pulled the hoods over their heads. They then followed along without a word.


    They had no choice but to keep such a low profile to avoid being surrounded by the natives.


    They¡¯d had a Sixth Grade Great Adept helping them when they entered the Knight¡¯s ne in the past. That was why the spatial ripples hadn¡¯t spread out that far. However, this time, they were practically traveling without hiding their tracks. Without an adept¡¯s tower to conceal themotion, the intense spatial flux could spread as far as several thousands of kilometers away.


    Trying to hide this teleportation from the natives was only a pipe dream. It would only be possible if all the goblins in a radius of thousands of kilometers were blind and deaf. Therefore, Greem couldn¡¯t wait to relocate the moment they arrived and head to the hiding spot that Billis had prepared in advance.

 Chapter 500 Shooting Oneself In the Foot

    Chapter 500 Shooting Oneself In the Foot


    Billis¡¯ hiding spot was underground.


    It was awork of caves hidden ten meters beneath the ground. Some of the caves were used as holding cells for prisoners, and there was also a warehouse where spoils of war were held. However, most of them were still temporary bug nurseries.


    As the air vents were too well-hidden, air cirction in the cave wasn¡¯t great. Factor in the vast amounts of fresh blood needed to nurture the bugs and Greem could sense the pollution and stink in the air the moment he entered.


    Billis was a bug adept. His own body had turned into an immortal body of bugs. Consequently, things like air, water, and food were no longer as crucial to him as it had been when he was still human. That was why Billis didn¡¯t realize the harshness of his living environment.


    However, just because he didn¡¯t feel the effects of it didn¡¯t mean his goblin captives were immune to it.


    All goblins with slightly weaker Physiques would die in the shortest amount of time possible under such circumstances. Lacking food and being trapped in an environment with damp and stale air; it was only natural. The ones that were left were all extremely powerful individuals. Sadly, the numerous deaths of goblin prisoners couldn¡¯t attract any of Billis¡¯ concern.


    He tossed any goblin that died into the bug¡¯s nest as food for the evolution of thervae. Not a single piece of flesh was wasted. If the reserves of blood meals got too low, then he would go to the goblin settlements and abduct a few more people. At any rate, there were plenty of goblins there. Billis never needed to worry about the decrease in food supplies or about the living environment of the prisoners. There was absolutely no reason to be concerned about how long they lived.


    Of course, prisoners of different sses enjoyed different privileges. The few famous individuals among the goblins were singled out and imprisoned alone in more refined quarters. Billis had even picked a few female goblins to serve them, to avoid their premature deaths.


    Of these particr individuals, there was an advanced goblin engineer, two mechanics, and two lower-ranked officers of the Seventh Land Corps abducted from Beta Town.


    These goblins started to reveal some information under Billis¡¯ grueling torture. However, their knowledge was limited. The information they provided was also fragmented, making it hard for anyone toy their eyes upon the true ssified secrets within the Goblin Empire.


    Still, Billis didn¡¯t immediately get rid of them. He waited for his master to arrive before deciding their fates.


    Greem praised Billis greatly over his discretion and started to interrogate these goblins personally the moment he arrived at the hidden cave.


    It was evident that these goblins had received the greatest scare of their lives over the past few days of being imprisoned here. They saw and heard ves of various races dragged from their prisons and tossed into those piles of terrifying bug¡¯s nest on a daily basis.


    The death cries of the ves before they met their end, and the crunching sounds of bones and flesh being eaten, never stopped. The noises continuously rang in the ears of the goblins. Even though they couldn¡¯t see thervae feasting, they could hear and smell further affected them.


    Seeing theirpanions fail to return after being dragged away, always hearing that crunching and snapping sound, still smelling that dense odor of blood and rot; no goblin could tolerate such an environment.


    Many goblins hadn¡¯t, in fact, died of starvation or suffocation. They had been shocked to death by this horrifying atmosphere!


    As a result, Greem realized that the goblins he interrogated could scarcely form coherent sentences. Their expressions were almost insane. Greem could hardly understand what they were saying even after mastering themonnguage of this ne¡¯s goblins through magic.


    However, unlike Billis, he didn¡¯t really care about that so-called ssified information. He didn¡¯t ask about the origins of the magic energy batteries. He didn¡¯t ask about the secrets of the magic mechas. Instead, he repeatedly asked about the daily lives of the goblins, the ruling structure of the Goblin Empire, and the fundamental way that the military and the country functioned.


    These things were fragmented pieces of information, often too disconnected to be useful by themselves. However, they were beneficial for Greem as he pieced together how the Goblin ne was run. Greem wasn¡¯t concerned about how fragmented the information was. That was because he had the Chip. The Chip¡¯s aid allowed Greem to ask the necessary questions that helped him figure out the core node that maintained the systems and hierarchies of the Goblin ne.


    It was oftenmon knowledge and ideologies that the entire public would know. No goblins would ever treat such information as ssified secrets that would concern the survival of their ne.


    As more and more information poured into his brain in a stream of data, a basic outline of the strange Goblin Empire shrouded in clouds was slowly revealed.


    However, unfortunately, there were still too few goblins here. Most of the Goblin Empire remained shrouded in mist and fog. Greem could only slowly deduce possible hidden information through the vague and rtively irrelevant information he had obtained.


    Greem had also appraised the magic energy battery. It was indeed a system of energy usage that entirely differed from the World of Adepts. However, Greem still discovered a trace of something he recognized within¨C basic runology!


    Back in the Knight¡¯s ne, the natives were able to invent a type of runes that merged the energy of magical crystals with their own life forces. In doing so, they had managed to create the unique advancement system of the witcher knights. Of course, there were shadows of the dragon¡¯s interference behind the invention of these runes.


    Here on the Goblin ne, the individually weaky goblins had managed to rely on the umtion of knowledge and technique to invent some primitive firearms. That was what allowed them to break free of their identities as a weak race and be one of the top ten intelligent races of this ne.


    What made the goblins genuinely shine above the rest, rise above them, and be their rulers, was the creation of the magical machines!


    The early magical machines had all been crude golems mostly made of metal. They were driven by the limited numbers of magical stones in this ne and were able to release the energy contained within the stones by burning them. The power drove the steam systems, allowing the gears to turn and the massive robot to move.


    Of course, there were many problems with this way of doing things. The early magical machines were all slow and clumsy. The technology used in their creation was so crude that it was hard to take them seriously. Still, it was these first magical machines and a shocking number of firearms that allowed the goblins to establish themselves as the blessed of this ne.


    The Goblin ne might be a low-magic ne, but there could still be natural magical stones that existed in such environments. The goblins had used their powerful magical machine army to defeat one race after another. They had then forced the ves they had obtained to excavate mines and dig out metal ores and rare reserves of magical stones.


    The appearance of the magic energy batteries was something that had only developed in thest hundred years. A certain engineer of the Goblin Empire seemed to have obtained the guidance of some otherworldly individual. They had managed to incorporate the fragments of arcanology they learned with magical machines.


    The Goblin Empire then built a massive space furnace near the capital. The furnace could continuously draw magical energy from the endless space and seal it into some unique crystal prisms. That was how the magic energy batteries in Greem¡¯s hand came to be.


    The energy in these batteries was too violent and wild. It was several times more dangerous than magical stones. However, there was no limit to their quantity. That was why the invention of the magic energy batteries freed the Goblin Empire of their dependence on magical stones. It allowed the goblins to obtain an infinite source of energy.


    Moreover, with the appearance of the magic energy batteries, more and more advanced weaponry and equipment that employed these batteries started appearing in the Goblin Empire. The kingdom¡¯s strength rose at an unprecedented rate. However, the Seventh Land Corps that Greem hade into contact were considered a local defense force. They had yet to receive the newest magic-powered weapons.


    The more he heard about these goblins, the more ominous of a feeling Greem got.


    It was especially so when the advanced engineer known as Beirut drew the blueprints for the magic mecha for him. The ominous feeling reached its peak. Greem saw far too many magic runes or information rted to them in the process of the Goblin Empire¡¯s production of the batteries: the way they stored the magical energy, the way they drew the energy, the way the energy was utilized.


    All this caused Greem to start thinking.


    It was important to note that twopletely different worlds could hardly even produce the same magic runes without connected passages.


    Take, for example, the runes that Greem had obtained from the Knight¡¯s ne. Even though the runes that represented fire worked simrly, and had a simr function to the fire runes of the World of Adepts, they were written in apletely different manner. The runes of each world existed in a form that was mostpatible with their narws.


    That was why the runes manifested by the narws were different when the narws themselves differed!


    However, Greem saw far too many runes from the World of Adepts in the blueprints that Beirut had drawn. Even though they had all been artificially distorted and modified slightly, most of thendmark origin symbols were still there. They were clear as day.


    It was when Greem heard Beirut start talking about the ¡¯Father of Magic Energy¡¯ with a tone of utter admiration that his face began to contort. It was Prince Gazlowe of the Goblin Empire.


    Gazlowe...Gazlowe...Gazlowe...


    Who else could be more familiar with this name than Greem?


    The reason he could even bring Billis and Mary to this ce was thanks to that individual known as Grand Duke Gazlowe. No. He was no longer a Grand Duke. Instead, he was the most celebrated and respected goblin engineer, alchemist, and inventor of the Goblin Empire, as well as the only prince of the empire that was not rted to the royal lineage by blood.


    It was rumored that the goblin prince had relied entirely on the immensity of his genius to invent these mysterious runes that changed the fate of the Goblin Empire in a moment of ingenuity. If it wasn¡¯t for the traditions of the goblins that prevented those of royal bloodline from bing king, Gazlowe might have been able to be crowned as the rulers of the goblins.


    Dammit, dammit, dammit!


    Greem had Billis take the goblins back down to their cells. He started to pace anxiously within the small cave.


    It was at this moment that he vaguely understood why the Adept¡¯s Code of Conduct listed the exchange of knowledge with other nes as the most major taboo. His past self had been unlearned and inexperienced. He¡¯d only known that basic runology was a fundamental knowledge that everyone had ess to in the World of Adepts; it wasn¡¯t ssified information.


    That was why he had Snox conduct an equal trade with that person known as Gazlowe.


    These trades might have undoubtedly seemed like they were the ones that made off with a steal, but now that he reflected upon it, it was an iparably foolish decision!


    More importantly, he had actually created a massive problem for himself seventy yearster!


    An overwhelmingly massive problem!

 Chapter 501 A Massive Conspiracy

    Chapter 501 A Massive Conspiracy


    The results of the interrogation were so ridiculous and unbelievable that Greem didn¡¯t know whether tough or cry!


    It was only at this moment that he realized the true meaning of the saying ¡¯Runology was the origin of the power of the adepts.¡¯ The foundational stone of knowledge that propelled the adepts to the peak of power naturally possessed immense significance to other nes as well.


    Take, for example, the Goblin ne. After hundreds and thousands of years of umtion and development in the field of steam power and other primitive energy sources, the goblins had finally managed to form their own unique civilization system¨C a mechanical civilization. They had excavated every ounce of strength from mechanical constructs and were in an awkward situation where they could no longer improve.


    They then started digging out magical stones, allowing the Goblin Empire to walk down the path of magical machines. However, theck of magical stones in the ne was a tight restraint that severely limited their choices. It made things difficult for them to bring about the next round of explosive developments and leaps in technology.


    Yet, Gazlowe had coincidentally managed to obtain the basic runology of the World of Adepts, incontrovertibly changing the fate of the Goblin ne!


    As expected of a great inventor; Gazlowe had managed to create goblin runes suitable for the magical machines in the low-magic Goblin ne by modifying the magic runes. The merger of goblin runes and magical devices was like adding wings to the tiger that was the Goblin Empire.


    From a certain point of view, this ¡¯tiger¡¯ was one that Greem had personally groomed to adolescence.


    That was what upset Greem the most!


    However, at the moment the one who was most upset in the underground caverns wasn¡¯t Greem. It was Bug Adept Billis, who was weing his new batch ofbat bugs.


    Thebat bugs filled half the cave and sprawled across the ground like a thick rug. This scene should have made Billis overjoyed, but his face was steel green. He was furious.


    There was no other reason than because of this batch of newly-hatchedbat bugs.


    He had abducted so many prisoners and used their blood to water the bug nests, yet all the insects that crawled out of the nests were juvenile sting scorpions. There was no unusual reason for this; the energy aura within the flesh he had fed them was too thin. It was so weak that it wasn¡¯t sufficient to allow the sting scorpions to evolve into their adolescent forms.


    Billis had no other choice but to ept the cruel reality before him.


    In the uing ne war, he would only have fifteen sting scorpion soldiers he could use. The rest were juvenile bugs that could only act as cannon fodder.


    Facing the native army¨Ca gathering of the ne¡¯s elite¨Cwas undoubtedly an unwise move!


    ............


    While Greem and his party were silently resting and waiting for the nar suppression to wear off, a mysterious squad that exceeded their imagination slowly approached the lumber mill camp.


    The new enemies came from the sky.


    A terrifying ship that was a dozen timesrger than the goblin zeppelin slowly hovered in the air. Its massive hull cast an equally massive shadow on the ground.


    A dozen ck dots visible to the naked eye leaped off the ship. They quickly increased in size in the eyes of those looking on.


    Orange mes suddenly burst forth from below the ck dots when they were twenty meters from the ground. The speed of their descent quickly decreased. Following a series of dull thuds, thirteen strange magical machinesnded on the ground. They were four meters tall, but still several sizes smaller than the magic mechas.


    Even with the deceleration from the bursts of me, these magical machines still left massive craters in the ground; the holes were all at least fifty centimeters deep. As metal creaked and ground, several beast-type magical machines appeared on the scene.


    Wolf, bear, squid, ape, wyvern, giant...


    The thirteen strange magical machines each had a unique design of their own. Not only did these figures covernd, air, and sea, there were also some rare species among them.


    These magical machines were all around three to five meters tall and weren¡¯t as clumsy and heavy as the magic mechas. When they walked towards a three-meter tall metallic goblin, they disyed an unnatural grace and agility.


    Ka ka!


    An odd cracking rang out, and the magical machine that looked like a ck wolf abruptly opened its mouth wide. A small operating tform slid out of the mouth, and a green goblin in a strange uniform sat on it.


    "Boss, it¡¯s right here! ording to the report submitted by the local troops, the area that the intruders were active in is right here!"


    "Indeed, boss. Do we split up to search for them or do we stick together?" The one speaking this time was a female goblin. She had emerged from a bear-type magical machine. Out of all the designs, this bear-type magical machine was undoubtedly the one with the most defense. It was also the heaviest.


    This female goblin had a huge face, smooth green skin, and a petite body. If one were to judge by the beauty standards of a goblin, she would be a rare specimen of beauty in the Goblin Empire. Sadly, in the eyes of other races, she was just as stout and green as any other goblin, not to mention covered in green hair all over. A female goblin such as this was just as ugly as a male goblin.


    With these two individuals starting a conversation, the other magical machines also opened up their cockpits, revealing the goblin warriors within. They gathered together and began to chatter amongst themselves.


    "All of you, silence." He could no longer bear it. The chest of the metallic goblin opened up, revealing a short and muscr goblin warrior.


    Compared to the other goblin warriors, this goblin known as Boss by the others radiated a powerful aura of strength. It seemed he had a unique profession and that he had advanced.


    If one were to evaluate these goblins using the strength system of the World of Adepts, only this person from amongst the thirteen magic mecha pilots had adept-level powers. The rest were mostly at pseudo-adept level. One or two among them were even at the advanced apprentice level.


    That was a significant trait of the goblin ne!


    The goblins here were not too powerful themselves. In fact, most goblins were extremely frail and weak. After all, the goblin race as a whole was mostlyprised of engineers, mechanics, and alchemists. Being able to raise their body¡¯s attributes to adept-level in this low-magic world was already something that was beyond the imagination!


    That was why the strength of the goblins mostly came from their magical machines. Individually, regr goblins couldn¡¯t even stand a direct blow.


    One could even say that these specially selected goblin warriors would never have so adamantly and fervently trained their bodies if not to control the magical machines better and endure the tremendous impacts and pressure created when the magical devices were in the heat of the battle. Ordinary goblins could not possibly tolerate the excessive forces of magical machines moving at ultra-high speeds. Their blood vessels would explode, and they would simply die.


    The leader inside the metallic goblin spoke coldly, "Don¡¯t get too arrogant, you lot. The ones invading this time are the evil adepts, infamous even within the multiverse. Given that Lord Gazlowe has sent us here, it¡¯s clear that he wants us to capture those evil adepts sessfully. He didn¡¯t send us here for a vacation. So, all of you, get yourselves together! If we catch those adepts, I will treat all of you to a month of vacation at Winnie Beach."


    "Yoohoo, Boss, you¡¯re the best!"


    "Long live Tigule."


    "Boss, we will listen to everything you have to say."


    The pilots burst into enthusiastic cheers when they heard the promises of their leader Tigule. The goblin mechanics were so excited that they started dancing as if victory was already within grasp.


    The metallic grinding and cracking rang out once again. All the mechanics had returned to their magical machines and were driving them around in a detailed search of the lumber mill camp.


    This camp had beenpletely devastated beyond recognition after the several previous conflicts.


    The stacked piles of lumber had been scattered all over the ce. The workshops and huts in the camp had all copsed as well. They could no longer be used.


    What caught the attention of the goblins was the fact that while most of the buildings and items in the camp had been damaged, none of them had vanished. Only the goblins that had been stationed in the camp had disappeared alongside the ves. No corpses had been left behind either. It was almost as if the enemies had dragged them away as spoils of war.


    Of course, the magic energy batteries in the camp had also disappeared.


    The squid-type magical machine possessed tracking abilities. The one dozen metallic tentacles below its massive metallic head mmed against the ground as it pursued the enemy¡¯s vague trail into the forest.


    The other magical machines immediately followed after the squid machine and extended their search towards the depths of the forest in a fan formation.


    ............


    In the skies above.


    At the moment the magical machine squad entered the forest, an elderly goblin wearing extravagant noble robes was crouching before a concave mirror. He narrowed his eyes and carefully observed everything happening on the ground.


    As he turned a knob, the mirror also adjusted its angle. It was set to keep the magical machine squad fixed on-screen at all times.


    Under the goblin¡¯s orders, the floating ship started to advance into the forest under the propulsion of mystical energies.


    "Lord Prince Gazlowe, what do you think. Should we let the other machine squads go down as well?" The voice of Ship Captain Toltoy red out from a horn in front of the elderly goblin¡¯s mechanical operating tform.


    "No need!" The elderly goblin said coldly with a wicked smile on his face, "The first wave of adepts the enemy sent can¡¯t possibly be too strong. We must bait them out from their den as soon as possible. They are going to be scared away if we send too many magical machines. This time, no matter what, we must capture them alive. I must obtain the knowledge in their brains."


    A barrage of coughs and wheezing followed his words.


    It was apparent that this Gazlowe that had contacted Snox so many times in the past had entered the elderly stage of the goblin race. His body had be extremely frail.


    "I understand!" The voice of Toltoy, the captain of the Greatsword Warship, once again sounded from the horn, "Do not worry, Lord Prince. We will aplish our mission! For the Empire!"


    Intense passion and excitement could be heard in the goblin captain¡¯s tone during hisst sentence!


    "Empire? Kakaka," Gazlowe couldn¡¯t help but chillinglyugh oncemunications were cut off, "I am only out for the longevity techniques in their brains! The idiots of the Empire only know how to keep their ancient traditions, calling themselves kings and emperors in this tiny world! Hmph! All of you added together aren¡¯t worth as much as my life. Snox, you little shit. Did you really think I didn¡¯t know of the little tricks you pulled? Kakaka, I hope that your master is among the adepts that teleported here this time. That way, you will finally know that the great Gazlowe is the smartest goblin in the world."


    Sinisterughter filled the room.

 Chapter 502 First Battle of Another World

    Chapter 502 First Battle of Another World


    The arrival of the strange squad of magical machines naturally didn¡¯t avoid Billis¡¯ eye bugs.


    After quickly clearing up the underground cave, Greem, Billis, and Mary returned to the surface. They silently hid in the bushes for an ambush.


    It was obvious that this squad of magical machines that had tracked them here were the so-called ¡¯elites¡¯ of the Goblin Empire. Given that the nar war was going to happen regardless, it was best to figure out the strength of the enemy before the real thing started.


    That was why Greem and his party hadn¡¯t chosen to retreat. Instead, they set up an ambush and quietly waited for the peculiar team of machines to arrive.


    The fact that the Goblin Empire had managed to obtain the ruling position of this ne proved that they had their own exceptional talents. The goblins themselves were weak and frail. They were nothing in the eyes of the three adepts. If that was the case, then what gave the goblins power had to be the magicalbat machines that very much resembled metallic golems.


    Even if it was only to gather some necessary data, this fight was an unavoidable and inevitable one!


    After an entire night¡¯s worth of rest, Mary¡¯s strength hadn¡¯t returned to its peak level, but her fundamental ability to fight was no longer affected. On the other hand, while Greem was enduring an even more tremendous nar suppression due to his identity as a Second Grade fire adept, the Chip¡¯s assistance hastened the speed at which he deciphered the narws. Consequently, Greem also possessed some ability to engage inbat.


    Mary pped her wings and flew onto a branch, using the dense canopy to hide her silhouette. Billis only needed to tunnel into the earth with a sinisterugh before he was nowhere to be seen. However, Greem was able to sense Billis hiding underneath arge patch of bushes to the right through the existence of their soul contract. Billis¡¯ sting scorpions, on the other hand, had been scattered all across the nearby woods.


    Greem didn¡¯t hide; he did not need to conceal his presence. He stood alone before the entrance to the underground cave without a single word, silently and calmly observing the disturbance in the distance.


    A squad of thirteenbat magical machines slowly appeared in his vision apanied by odd metallic sounds.


    Greem¡¯s scorching, immensely powerful eyes slowly swept past all of the machines. As blue light shed deep within his eyes, he immediately figured out everything there was to know about the machines: their outward appearance, their behavioral patterns, joints, and possible modes of attack.


    Of course, all of these were only deductions. The actual details still needed to be verified inbat.


    Since you have arrived, let us do battle!


    Greem didn¡¯t utter a single word. He grabbed the air with his right hand, and brilliant fire elementium gathered frantically in his palm. A Magma Fireball the size of a human head quickly materialized and floated above his hand. As the fireball spun, terrifying heat and searing winds pressed against the squad of machines. They suddenly stopped when they felt this change.


    Right now, such a scene was disyed in front of the entire magical machine squad.


    A single person; a domineering adept two meters tall silently standing before them, and a horrifying fireball with increasingly powerful mes floating in his hand as he stared at them.


    The detection instruments in their machines allowed them to see the energy value rapidly rising very clearly.


    2300 degrees.


    2500 degrees.


    ............


    3000 degrees.


    3500 degrees.


    ......


    ......


    Goddammit, the enemy was this powerful? A fireball that he casually gathered in his palm could reach three to four thousand degrees? None of the magical machines present would be able to retreat unscathed if such a fireball hit them directly!


    The previously arrogant squad fell silent. They gulped audibly. Some of the squad members even subtly drove their magical machines a bit further away. Of course, this wasn¡¯t them being afraid or retreating. It was only them trying to put some distance between each other to prevent a collision when they tried to avoid the fireball.


    "Evil Adept, I am Tigule of the Magical Machine Squad. You... "


    The three-meter metallic goblin stood forward to give an opening speech, but the fireball in Greem¡¯s hand had already moved. It quickly flew towards the goblin machine in an elegant and beautiful arc.


    "Dammit." Tigule could no longer care for words. The two metallic arms of the goblin lifted, and its palms split apart to reveal two guns emerging from within.


    A torrent of leaden bullets was propelled outwards and crashed against the Magma Fireball.


    The other machines quickly followed suit and moved backward. Simr ck barrels emerged from all over their bodies as they moved while the goblins assisted their captain in intercepting the fireball.


    The Magma Fireball of four thousand degrees, and reaching two hundred and ten points of power, exploded in the center of the battlefield!


    Destructive me shockwaves and a shower of meteors that contained shards of magma rocketed in every direction. All the machines quickly dodged. Meanwhile, a light blue energy shield emerged from the machines, protecting them from damage.


    The energy barrier only seemed to work against magical elementium; it couldn¡¯t block purely physical attacks. Consequently, the magma shards managed to pierce through without any hindrance, nking as they struck against the metallic shells of the machines. However, the resulting me shockwave had beenpletely neutralized. It failed even to reach the machines.


    Elementary Energy Shields!


    The amount of energy damage it could shield against seemed to be between three hundred to five hundred points.


    Blue light shed in the depths of Greem¡¯s eyes. He had managed to figure out the nature of these energy barriers in a matter of seconds. He even calcted the amount of energy damage it could endure.


    Gazlowe¡¯s ingenuity marveled Greem at this point. He was indeed a genius of a goblin engineer. To think, he had been able to transfer a low-grade magic spell ontobat machines. Not to mention the fact that the shields themselves had a decent ability to protect against elementium damage.


    It was important to note that an elementary energy shield cast by an apprentice adept would only have a tolerance limit of approximately fifty points. But upon Gazlowe¡¯s modification to employ them on the magical machines, the strength of the shield had suddenly increased tenfold.


    This situation had urred because a human body had far less tolerancepared to a magical machine. The sudden energy output of up to fifty points was still barely within an apprentice body¡¯s range of tolerance. However, if they abruptly increased the strength of the shield tenfold, the apprentice in question would be utterly crippled, despite how much more potent of a defense that sounded like.


    However, this problem didn¡¯t exist for the magical machines. The amount of energy the devices could instantly put out was often several times that of the human body, as long as their metallic bodies could still withstand the intensity of the energy. If better and more appropriate magical metals were used to forge the energy conduction system, then the instantaneous energy output could easily be a hundred times that of a human body!


    That was why the magical machines had been able to achieve the effect of an advanced energy shield despite only using an elementary one. Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown at this.


    Five hundred points of energy defense. Even a Second Grade fire adept like himself would require three all-out attacks to get past the shield. An agility-type adept like Mary would then probably need seven to eight continuous attacks to get through.


    Greem was slightly shocked. He instantly sent the numbers that he had calcted to Mary and Billis.


    Now that they had tested the opponent¡¯s defense, it was time to check their offense.


    Greem strode forward. He only needed to grab and toss with a single hand to send a powerful Magma Fireball flying towards the magical machines. All these fireballs dealt damage above two hundred points, and it ced enormous psychological pressure on the squad of machines.


    To ensure the uracy of the test, Greem did not utilize his Lava Shields. Instead, he used the purer Fire Shields. The ferocious and savage fire elementium gathered to form several Fire Shields. They orbited Greem¡¯s body at high speed, helping him block all attacks that came his way.


    The storm of metal bullets crashed against the Fire Shield, where they were melted into liquid metal by the streams of fire beforepletely vaporizing in small explosions of me.


    Greem continued to advance. Crackling sounds proceeded to ring out from the three Fire Shields that spun around him. These pure-me shields constantly trembled as crimson cracks started to appear on their bright red surfaces.


    Fifteen to twenty-five points!


    Greem estimated the strength of the metal bullet attacks. He quickly provided an assessment to this attack.


    The good news was that the opponent¡¯s barrage was entirely physical damage. There was no elementium damage attached to them. The bad news was the frequency of the enemy¡¯s attacks. Assaults like these of the beginner-apprentice level could still cause moderate disturbance to an adept when stacked in this manner.


    The thirteen magical machines surrounded Greem, maintaining a distance of twenty to thirty meters between them and the adept. They barraged Greem and drowned him in a deluge of metal and fire.


    The opponent¡¯s strange fire shields had mostly destroyed the relentless stream of bullets. The shots that missed their marks had hit the ancient trees around them instead. Even these old, massive trees couldn¡¯t hold on for more than two seconds before being riddled with holes and copsing to the ground.


    Their unique observation lenses allowed the goblin mechanics that were hiding inside their machines to watch on with excitement as they beat down upon the human adept, who had been rendered incapable of fighting back. No; the opponent could still retaliate. It was those Magma Fireballs with shockingly high energy signatures.


    However, fireball counterattacks such as these were no problem for the elite magical machine squad. They either blocked them with their barrage of bullets or dodged them and avoided thending point of the fireball. At any rate, this evil adept was now surrounded and didn¡¯t seem to be as terrifying as rumored!


    Just as the members of the squad started to rx, Greem finallyshed out with all his strength. He believed he had performed all the necessary tests he required.


    Two Lava Shields forged from burning magma and pure fire quickly gathered in front of Greem, recing the battered Fire Shields.


    With these two Lava Shields that possessed excellent physical protection, Greem¡¯s previously shaky defense was now rock solid. Greem raised his right hand high into the air as a Scarlet Firestorm with a massive radius enveloped the area. All the magical machines were dragged into the Firestorm.


    The wild elementium mes turned into hundreds and thousands of randomly rampaging me streams. They wreaked havoc upon thend and also quickly obscured the vision of the mechanics.


    "All of you, be careful. Reposition yourselves as fast as you can." The captain of the squad, Tigule, had plenty of experienced. He sensed something wrong about the situation and immediately shouted to warn his team members.


    But it was toote!

 Chapter 503 A Brutal Battle

    Chapter 503 A Brutal Battle


    At almost the same time the mes obscured the vision of the goblin mechanics, Greem vanished.


    When he once again reappeared, he was near the side of the wolf-type machine.


    Three Magma Fireballs simultaneously exploded beneath the Wolf machine. The ferocious me shockwaves threw the robot into the sky. Its energy shield rapidly flickered inside the terrifying shockwave before finally shattering.


    The moment the energy shield shattered, Greem lifted his head, and two highly concentrated Sr Rays shot out from his zing eyes. The Sr Rays merged into a single ray midair, brutally burning away at the space between the forelegs of the wolf machine.


    And that ce was precisely where the goblin mechanic was hiding!


    The sudden burst of attacks from the evil adept struck fear deep into the heart of the mechanic. The machine was also in the air, rendering it incapable of executing mostbat maneuvers. The goblin¡¯s hand quickly worked across the seven control levers and fifteen crystal buttons when he sensed the terrifying rays sting at the metal tes in front of him. He was frantically trying to have the wolf machine perform a dodging maneuver.


    Sadly, it was all toote!


    The Krathor Alloy that was four fingers thick might have a hardness that far surpassed ordinary metals, but it was mediocre when it came to resisting magic. After all, magical creatures that wielded elementium attacks were rare in the Goblin ne. As such, magic resistance hadn¡¯t been the first priority of the goblin engineers when they created the magical machines.


    Theserbeam-like Sr Rays stacked together. Even though the resultant beam wasn¡¯t as thick as a little finger, it possessed an astounding cutting ability that was unimaginable to an ordinary human. It practically ate through that metal te in an instant. The goblin mechanic hiding within the narrow cockpit had absolutely no chance or space to dodge and was cut apart by the Sr Ray.


    As the strength of the Sr Ray continued to increase, the purple and crimson pir of light pierced through the body of the goblin and tore through the metal behind him. The beam stabbed through the back of the wolf machine and sted towards the sky.


    The torso of the wolf machine that was one meter thick had been thoroughly pierced through by the Sr Rays that Greem had shot out of his eyes. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what had happened to the goblin mechanic hidden inside the machine.


    "Billy!"


    "Billy... "


    ......


    Screams and gasps rang out in the forest.


    These goblin mechanics were obviously extremely close. Severalbat magical machines roared and charged forward when they saw Greem striking Billy.


    In particr, the Bear machine acted as a tank. It roared and stormed forward as it opened its massive bear mouth. A pir of fire that was a dozen meter long burst forth. The Squid machine waved its seven-meter long metallic tentacles and struck at Greem as if they were whips.


    ying with fire in front of a fire adept?


    A cold smile surfaced on Greem¡¯s handsome face. He paused for a moment before vanishing in a towering pir of elementium mes.


    Most of the magical machines here only had the strength of an elite adept. Only their captain, Tigule, could have some semnce of a Second Grade creature¡¯sbat ability. Even so, the battle was entirely one-sided. If it weren¡¯t for the ne suppression that Greem was enduring, the situation would have been much more unfavorable for the magical machine squad.


    Greem shed even further away with his Fire Teleportation. He appeared behind the Wyvern machine that was flying in the sky.


    Greem didn¡¯t give it any chances. Purple mes of a shocking temperature started to burn in Greem¡¯s right hand. He bent his back and thrust his hand towards the backside of the Wyvern with a single motion. The energy shield protecting the Wyvern machine only endured for less than three seconds before cracking with a crisp sound.


    The massive purple me hand immediately stabbed into the tough metallic shell.


    "Winny, he¡¯s on your back! Quick, cast him away!" Captain Tigule yelled furiously. He raised his arm as blinding fire instantly ignited at the end of the two goblin rockets attached to the arm. The rockets whistled as they sted towards Greem.


    The other machines quickly turned their guns, and a new barrage of bullets fired into the sky.


    Theirpanion was protected by the metallic tes of the machine and wouldn¡¯t perish to their bullet assault. That was why they were able to shoot away without any worries to force that damned evil adept away from Winny.


    Greem grunted. He didn¡¯t care about killing the creature beneath him. He leaped away from the machine with a single kick of his legs. Fire zed while he was still midair and he was gone again.


    "Dammit. All of you, dodge, quick!" The Metal Goblin that Tigule was piloting had just made it beneath the Wyvern machine. He had no choice but to stop his movements when he saw the evil adept vanish in a ze of fire once more. He shouted to remind hispanions while hastily searching for the next location the enemy would reappear.


    Boom! This time, Greem appeared behind the Squid machine. The Sr Rays forming in his eyes swept past and instantly severed three of its metallic tentacles.


    The Squid machine swiftly turned to run when it realized the situation. However, Greem extended a hand, and countless fire elementium particles gathered together to form a giant hand of fire. The hand grabbed the Squid machine¡¯s round metal body.


    The hand of fire tightened its grip, and the thick fingers caused the energy shield to creak under pressure.


    Seeing that it would take a while longer to break through the enemy¡¯s energy shield, Greem shouted under his breath, and the fiery hand threw the machine. The struggling Squid machine transformed into a massive bowling ball as it crashed towards the Metal Goblin.


    Tigule had no choice but to save his endangered subordinate. He piloted the Goblin and had it leap up into the air, catching the crashing Squid machine with itsrge metal hands. The tremendous momentum caused the two robots to fly another dozen meters before finally crashing to the ground.


    Tigule extended one leg and nted the other into the ground behind him. He sunk half a meter into the ground before that kic force was neutralized.


    Yet, it was this short dy that kept Tigule out of the battlefield. Greem smiled coldly and once again disappeared in a burst of fire.


    All the magical machines went on alert when they saw Greem vanish. Those that were close by each other gathered together, back to back, and watched their surroundings with caution. The ones that were too far away from each other were fearful and started to move as quickly as they could.


    Despite their superior numbers, the opponent¡¯s untraceable Fire Teleportation had turned them into the ones at a disadvantage; they didn¡¯t feel safe even with theirpanions by their side. When they sensed the slightest breeze at any location around them, they would instantly shower the ce with a curtain of bullets as they retreated.


    Even though they knew that their bullets couldn¡¯t harm the adept, they could still dy the enemy¡¯s attack motions. That would give them a few precious seconds to escape. It was why the cluster of mes would always be greeted by a barrage of bullets whenever it got close to a machine.


    Poof! This time, Greem didn¡¯t appear by any machine. Instead, he had teleported to a distance of a hundred meters away from them.


    When he stepped out of the raging pir of mes, he held the ze of Destruction in his left hand. His loud and clearly enunciated chants also echoed throughout the forest.


    Goddammit! The evil adept¡¯s spells were terrifying enough without the use of chants. If he were allowed toplete his chant, then even more casualties would ur.


    The goblins instantly understood this fact. The machines sprung towards the adept in a fan formation. They continued to barrage the enemy¡¯s Lava Shield as they ran towards him.


    Just as their attention was all concentrated on Greem, Mary and Billis finally emerged from hiding and struck.


    Mary chose the Wyvern machine.


    It was the only machine in the group that was flying at the height of twenty meters. More importantly, it had yet to regain its energy shield. Such a mistake should never ur on a battlefield, where life and death were determined in an instant.


    Just as the Wyvern machine prepared to dive at Greem, a massive silhouette with bat wings appeared on its back. An opening in the shape of an inverted triangle could be seen on the clearly-defined, aerodynamic metallic body of the Wyvern.


    That was the mark that Greem had left behind with his attack when it hadn¡¯t managed to burn through the metal due to theck of time.


    Mary walked towards the opening with her tall and slender figure. She immediately pulled the towering crimson bow in her hand into a full moon. Iparably violent blood energies gathered at Mary¡¯s fingertip and formed into a delicate, crimson arrow.


    Boom! The bowstring snapped loudly.


    The crimson arrow sped towards the opening and pierced through thest bit of the metal te, exploding inside the cockpit.


    The goblin mechanic known as Winny died instantly. All of her blood essence was corroded and turned into a dense mist of blood that returned to Mary¡¯s body.


    The Wyvern machine crashed down from the skies!


    Billis, on the other hand, picked a considerable Metal Giant as his target.


    As the machine was far toorge, its movements were slow. As a result, it naturally fell behind itspanions.


    While the Metal Giant was shooting as it ran, the earth beneath its feet suddenly copsed. The machine fell to the ground,pletely caught by surprise.


    A swarm of innumerable insects poured out of the split earth like a tide. They buried the Giant before it could even get up.


    The Metal Giant struggled with all it had, but it was pinned down and restricted by a dozen sting scorpions. The terrifying swarm of bugs crawled all over the Metal Giant, digging all over its surface in search of passage inside.


    And who¡¯d have known? They actually found one!


    The goblin mechanics still needed to breathe while enclosed in their cockpits. That was why every machine had venttion passages on the surface of the machine that connected to the cockpit. Under ordinary circumstances, these venttion passages were very well-hidden and quite small. Regr enemies were hard-pressed to attack the goblin mechanic through these holes.


    However, the scorpions that bug adept Billis controlled were no ordinary enemies.


    Once the terrifying scorpions finished their search and burrowed into the cockpit, the only thing left for the other goblins was the painful screams of theirpanion and the crunching sound of something being eaten.

 Chapter 504 Black Sun

    Chapter 504 ck Sun


    To be fair, the magical machine squad wasn¡¯t weak at all.


    The strength of each member could at least rival that of a veteran adept. Their leader, Tigule, even possessed the power of a Second Grade adept. However, while their strengths were visible, their weaknesses were even more apparent.


    The ones that piloted these machines were all goblin mechanics that had undergone arduous training. However, there were still far too many blind spots when they were cooped up in those narrow and tiny cockpits. There was a limit to the range of the lens¡¯ vision. Moreover, the goblins were far too weak. They were often incapable of enduring a casual blow by the adepts the moment their metallic shell was pried open.


    However, what limited the strength of the machines the most was theirck of alloys forged from magical metals.


    They had created the machines with the toughest substance on the Goblin ne¨C Krathor Alloy. This alloy was exceptional when it came to its toughness and flexibility. Unfortunately, it was far too weak when resisting magic!


    The Goblin necked magical creatures. As such, there was no reason for them to investrge amounts of resources into researching an exceptional magical metal alloy. That caused the magical machines to be easily prated by the adepts when dealt too many magical attacks.


    All these factors added together was what resulted in the utter defeat of the magical machine squad right now.


    Tigule was pretty powerful, but hecked the means to limit and restrain the adepts.


    The crimson-armored female adept with bat wings seemed to be weak, but her movement speed was so fast that Tigule paled at the sight of her dashing around; Tigule would have had no chance of killing her. Even if he raised his speed to its limits, he would only trail behind her dust.


    The evil adept that manipted the insects, on the other hand, was sly and very alert. He would explode into a mass of scorpions whenever Tigule tried to get close to him, escaping in every direction. Tigule might have been able to kill some of the bugs with his methrower, but that didn¡¯t seem to have any effect on the bug adept.


    Before long, the escaping scorpions would gather in another spot to form the likeness of the adept. The adept would thenmand his swarm to devour another magical machine.


    The leader of the evil adepts, that enemy shrouded in mes, was an extremely difficult opponent.


    The Fire Teleportation that urred at three-second intervals allowed him to appear anywhere on the battlefield at any time.


    He seemed to have given up on directly killing the members of the magical machine squad. Instead, he turned to using his rapid repositioning and immensely powerful fire attacks to break the energy shields around the machines. The magical machines that had lost their barriers were then thrown to the other two adepts with the use of his giant me hand. The fire adept solely concentrated on cracking the hardened shell of the nut.


    The members of the magical machine squad continuously decreased under the adepts¡¯ excellent teamwork.


    Tigule¡¯s eyes were opened so wide their corners were nearly splitting apart. There was nothing else he could do but rage as he frantically chased after the adepts.


    The means ofbat avable to the Metal Goblin that Tigule piloted was plentiful. It had goblin rockets and missiles for ultra-long range fights, boomshooters for long range, methrowers for midrange, and iron fists for melees. Such strength would have made him qualified to fight even a Second Grade magical creature.


    But using these tricks to deal with several evil adepts that had made their way across nes to get here?


    Their techniques were still too singr and straightforward. The goblins still had far too limited means with which to threaten the adepts.


    Just as Greem and his party were brutally ughtering the magical machine squad, the floating vessel in the sky slowly approached the battlefield.


    Numerous goblins were furiously watching the ¡¯live stream¡¯ of evil adepts murdering theirpanions through severalrge crystal lenses in thebat preparation hall.


    The atmosphere in the hall erupted as they watched the magical machines piloted by theirpanions being taken down by the adepts before the machines were pierced through and the goblin mechanics themselves killed!


    Several hundred goblins shouted furiously, begging theirmander to allow them to engage inbat. These goblins were all elite goblin mechanics that the Goblin Empire had trained.


    "Wait, wait, wait. What are we still waiting for?" A goblin mechanic that had died his hair blonde jumped onto a table. He roared angrily, "Ourpanions are being ughtered down there. We have several hundred of magical machines here. We might not be able to take them in a one-on-one fight, but all of us together could take them down just by sheer virtue of numbers. That being the case, what are we still waiting for?"


    "Yea... why won¡¯t you give us the order to engage?"


    "We request to engage inbat."


    Sharp voices shouted and yelled in thebat preparation hall. Their suppressed emotions from earlier red up once more.


    "These are the orders of Prince Lord Gazlowe!" Ship Captain Toltoy fixed his uniform and coldly spat out.


    It was almost as if a cold gale had blown past the hearts of the goblins. The riotous hall fell into a deathly silence once more. All the goblin mechanics sat down quietly, no longer daring to make amotion.


    At the moment, the name of Gazlowe was like a totem of the Goblin Empire. It was a symbol; a symbol that represented the future of all goblins, and the hope of the Goblin Empire rising to even greater heights. That was why the goblins had no choice but to sit down and await their orders in humiliation when they heard this name, even if they still didn¡¯tprehend the actions of their superiors.


    ............


    Inside a room at the heart of the flying ship.


    Old Prince Gazlowe was observing the battle below with a fervent passion.


    Gazlowe showed no signs of sympathy or sorrow despite the magical machines serving him being ravaged and bullied by the adepts. Instead, he disyed excitement and insanity as he watched the various fire spells, the destructive female adept, and the strange bug-manipting adept.


    He had cast aside his ugly white trenchcoat since bing a prince. However, the goblin multipurpose detection sses he wore on his right eye hadn¡¯t been taken off.


    At the moment, he was watching thebat styles of the adepts with immense interest, while using various instruments to measure the energy levels of the adept¡¯s attacks.


    The old goblin would gasp again and again when the shocking values were projected onto his monocle.


    In particr, when his monocle locked onto the fire adept, he found that every single spell that the opponent cast would always be at the limits of the instrument¡¯s measurement capabilities. The values that rolled across his monocle were a bloody crimson.


    "Toltoy, prepare the goblin artillery. I want to see how what heights of power these adepts can reach!" The old goblin picked up a golden horn and yelled into it.


    "Understood, Lord Prince!"


    As the order was given, the metal tes at the bow of the flying ship split apart. A ck cannon barrel one meter in diameter emerged. As the ship trembled, immense amounts of magical energy transferred from the engine room into the goblin artillery. A terrifying and blinding ck light lit up in the barrel of the cannon.


    The old goblin controlled the cannon from his room and slowly aimed the crosshairs at the fire adept. The old goblin could very clearly see the fire adept lift his head through therge lenses in his room. The adept¡¯s deep red and zing eyes shed with his own eyes over the one-kilometer distance.


    "Taste my goblin artillery, intruder!" The old goblin let out an orgasmic cry and furiously smashed the crystal button on his table.


    Weng! A muffled boom.


    The massive floating vessel rocked as a blinding ck pir of light shot towards Greem at the speed of lightning.


    Greem had detected the abnormality in the sky a long time ago.


    The powerful magical energy that gathered above him was like a rising ck sun. It was hard even to ignore its existence.


    Greem pushed away all his enemies with a me Halo of Repulsion before straightening his body and lifting his head to see what it was the enemy intended to do.


    It was a cluster of pure magical energy that still retained the violent and chaotic nature of magic from the space beyond the ne. It was probably the spatial energy extracted from a space furnace.


    Judging from this, the flying ship above them must have a steadily functioning space furnace at its core.


    The goblins had no affinity for elementium control. As such, it would be hard for them to convert the spatial energy into unusual spells of various forms. Consequently, they could only gather all this spatial energy and use it in this extremely crude fashion of firing it.


    However, spatial energy possessed destructive and chaotic traits. It caused tremendous amounts of damage to the stable elementium energy inside the adepts. The goblins¡¯ means of attack might seem simple and crude, but the might it possessed was by no means small.


    Greem looked on as the ck sun lit up in the barrel of the cannon. He watched as the ship shook intensely. He even watched as the ck pir of light shot towards him, targeting his chest.


    The ck light wasn¡¯t all that fast, but the spatial energy was clearly damaging the elementium bnce of the ne. The space of the ne started to tremble and ripple wherever the ck light went. The crackling sound of the chain explosion of elementium energy rang out in the air.


    The ck pir of light that initially had a diameter of no more than one meter had expanded into a massive column with a twenty-meter radius when it was halfway to its target. By the time it reached in front of Greem, the radius of the pir of light had reached as far as a hundred meters. The power of the attack per unit area within the pir of light reached upwards of a thousand points.


    Not temperature, but a thousand points in terms of energy damage!


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled, and he teleported to the maximum possible distance with a single Fire Teleportation. Mary, who was at the edge of the pir of ck light, extended her wings and escaped at a speed that the naked eye couldn¡¯t catch.


    That put Bug Adept Billis in a tight spot, with hisck of mobility spells.


    His body fell apart, and he turned into a swarm of bugs that burrowed into the ground. The one dozen sting scorpions frantically gathered on him and formed a multiyer bug shield above him.


    However, a spatial energy attack of over a thousand points was not that easy to take on.


    The next second, Billis paid a terrible price for his arrogance!

 Chapter 505 Fighting While Retreating

    Chapter 505 Fighting While Retreating


    Greem had experienced a nagging suspicion in the back of his mind since the fight started.


    He had kept feeling as if the Goblin ne didn¡¯t live up to its name. The strength they were disying was far too weak.


    As a small-sized ne, the power systems of the Goblin ne were several times weaker than the Knight¡¯s ne. There had at least still been a Fourth Grade Dragon Knight in the Knight¡¯s ne. Yet, Second Grade magical machines like Tigule¡¯s were already considered top-tierbatants in the Goblin ne.


    Greem didn¡¯t really understand the situation. He had intended to observe a little longer to obtain an exnation. And at that moment, when he saw that ck pir shoot towards him, Greem instantly understood the core strength of the Goblin ne.


    Dammit! The opponent had invested most of their efforts into the path of ¡¯magical energy¡¯!


    Greem possessed the ability to exit the battlefield quickly. Naturally, he had the leisure to think about all theseplexities. However, Bug Adept Billis, who had remained in the ck pir of light¡¯s area of effect, instantly became the most tragic victim of the battlefield.


    Two other magical machines had remained in the radius of the ck light, much like Billis. They had rapidly started melting the instant they came into contact with the ck light. The machines copsed like melted candles before being entirely vaporized.


    Billis was still tunneling downwards. Sadly, the speed at which he tunneled clearly couldn¡¯tpare to the speed of the ck light.


    The scorched earth that had remained after the fight was melted away by the ck light. It had managed to expose Billis, who was now five meters deep underground. The fifteen sting scorpions formed into a ck shieldyered over Billis¡¯ head, but they had barely managed to shield him from the direct st of the ck beam.


    However, the terrifying elementium chain reaction still unavoidably affected him!


    The spatial energy destroyed the delicate elementium bnce within Billis¡¯ body, turning the orderly elementium into chaotic and ferocious energy. The energy shield that Billis had erected immediately ignited and exploded like a barrel of oil lit by a spark.


    The adepts might pride themselves as evil beings that tended towards chaos, but at their core, they were still beings of order that originated from a ne. Chaotic and unbridled spatial energy was no different from poison to them. Only overwhelming strength of the soul could prevent spatial energy from interfering and destroying the elementium energy within an adept¡¯s body.


    However, Inner Light was something that only Fifth Grade adepts were capable of.


    Perhaps this was the main reason the World of Adepts had set Fifth Grade to be the prerequisite for stepping out beyond the ne!


    Billis could not possibly use the Inner Light that only Fifth Grade Great Adepts had ess to. He could only try to maintain his energy shield to the best of his abilities, while desperately attempting to tunnel himself out of the area of the ck light.


    Tragically, just half a meter away from the edge of the ck light, one sting scorpion above his head exploded. It could no longer endure the corrosion of the spatial energy. A thin ray of the light shone upon Billis¡¯ body.


    The very next second, Billis¡¯ immortal body of bugs boiled and fell apart.


    The tens of thousands of dispersed scorpions fought with each other to escape from the radius of the ck light, but they were all entangled by the scattered spatial energy at the very same instant, causing them to explode into a sttered mess of flesh and blood.


    It wasn¡¯t over yet.


    Before all the blood could evennd on the ground, it was vaporized by the ferocious energy and vanished without a trace.


    After Bug Adept Billis had suffered his tragic death, the fourteen sting scorpions that had formed the shield immediately scattered and started to run for their lives. They paid an unbelievable toll of five lives to make it across that short distance of half a meter.


    The remaining nine sting scorpions quickly gathered in an area a hundred meters away after escaping from the ck pir of light. The ground there split apart as the earth turned. A new swarm of bugs emerged from underground and reformed into Bug Adept Billis¡¯s likeness.


    Compared to earlier, the body that Billis had gathered this time possessed a much weaker energy aura.


    It seemed that the idental death from earlier had severely damaged Billis¡¯ soul origin.


    The ck pir of light persisted for another sixteen seconds before gradually dissipating.


    It had utterly ravaged the location. The geography had been destroyed, leaving only a shocking scene behind.


    The ck pir of light might have vanished, but it left behind a terrifying crater. The crater had a radius of nearly a hundred meters and was a dozen meters deep with walls as smooth as marble.


    For a moment, both parties involved in the battle¨Cthe goblins and the three adepts¨Cwere wholly mesmerized by the frightening power of the ck light. They stared at the crater with fear in their eyes, unsure of how to continue.


    The Metal Goblin that Tigule piloted kneeled by the crater, its massive metal hands digging deep into the earth. The sorrow and pain in his heart overwhelmed him.


    A mere half an hour ofbat, yet all one dozen of his closepanions had died, just like that. Moreover, even their corpses hadn¡¯t remained after death. Their bodies had vanished with the descent of the ck light.


    Yet, the one that wiped out everyst trace of their existence was actually the goblin cannon fired by their own people!


    Such an impact almost caused Tigule¡¯s spirit to copse. He could no longer muster the courage to battle.


    Greem lifted his head and once again cast his eyes upon that floating ship. Even though he was like a rabbit in front of an elephant whenpared to the ship, he remained fearless and unfazed. In fact, it almost seemed like he was eager to go up and investigate for himself.


    Before he could realize that thought, over a hundred small ck dots emerged from the floating ship. They quickly dived towards the battlefield.


    Greem¡¯s ultra-long ranged sight allowed him to see the true nature of the ck dots perfectly.


    Combat magical machines!


    Over a hundred magical machines!


    Moreover, judging from their external designs, they were all bird-type machines that could fly.


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled and finally dispelled the idea he previously had.


    This was not their world. It was the world of the goblins!


    As an intruding Second Grade adept, Greem still needed to maintain caution and respect for the enemy when facing a native armyposed of elites.


    That was why Greem was the first to run, without any hesitation.


    The three adepts demonstrated all sorts of tricks as they frantically escaped into the woods. The ck dots in the sky were like a swarm of bloodthirsty wasps. They buzzed as they pursued the adepts.


    The massive flying ship also rapidly turned around and trailed after the robots, but slowly disappeared into the horizon as it trailed behind.


    No one could care for the heartbroken Tigule right now. He opened his cockpit with grief painted across his face. He leaped onto the ground and stumbled across the battlefield in search of the corpses of hispanions.


    Regardless of how thoroughly he scoured every inch ofnd in a two and a half kilometer circumference, he could only find the broken machines of two of hispanions. Tigule personally dragged hispanion¡¯s deformed corpses from the machines and buried them with tears streaking down his face.


    The otherpanion¡¯s corpse had already exploded into bloody paste and chunks of flesh. Tigule didn¡¯t mind the filth. He gathered every drop of blood, every strand of flesh, and every piece of meat, before stuffing it all into his mouth, crying out loud as he swallowed everything in a single gulp.


    For some reason, Tigule¡¯s green eyes turned blood red after doing all this. A dense aura of bloodthirst radiated from his body.


    He unhesitatingly charged into his cockpit and closed it. The three-meter tall Metal Goblin raised its arms and let out a heart-rending roar. It then strode into the forest.


    ............


    The pursuit in the forest was still ongoing.


    Billis and Mary had already shaken off the enemypletely.


    Mary¡¯s speed was too much, even if the magical machines in the skies had two additional wings. Bug Adept Billis, on the other hand, was extremely proficient at stealth and hiding. He only needed to burrow into the ground, and the goblins would be incapable of finding him with their crude technology.


    That was why they had all vanished from sight a long time ago. Only Greem alone remained.


    Greem didn¡¯t mind this situation at all.


    Billis and Mary were only First Grade. Recovering their magic in this shitty low-magic ne was an arduous task. They needed to go into hiding after a fight to recover.


    On the other hand, Greem was utterly different.


    With the pounding core of fire in his chest, nothing could stop Greem from taking fire energy from the fire elementium ne, even if this ne was void of any elementium. Consequently, Greem would almost never run out of power as long as he limited the intensity of the battle to a certain level.


    As Greem strode through the forest, he asionally used fireballs to open a path ahead. Meanwhile, he kept a close eye on the magical machines circling the skies.


    These fearless fellows were like flies that had smelled the odor of rot; it was impossible to chase them away no matter what he tried. They maintained a tight tail on Greem, diving down and attacking him whenever they found a suitable opportunity.


    One could see a pile of smoking machine wreckage every three kilometers on this path that Greem had escaped through. The location of the crashes might be different, but all the machines shared the same trait. That was... none of the goblin mechanics in the magical machines had survived!


    Greem had already figured out thebat method and means of attack avable to the machines after the previous battle. When he struck, his counterattacks were always sharp and brutal.


    A chain of three exploding Magma Fireballs would shatter the energy defenses, and then only a single piercing ¡¯gaze of death¡¯ was needed.


    Greem was only firing Sr Rays. However, in the eyes of the goblins, they were undoubtedly terrifying ¡¯gazes of death¡¯!


    The moment the energy shield covering a machine broke, a thin beam of red light would shoot from the evil adept¡¯s zing eyes, piercing right through the location of the cockpit. The ray of light wasn¡¯t even as thick as the little finger of a goblin, but it possessed fearsome fire energy.


    The Sr Rays would release terrifying fire energy the moment they came into contact with the body of a goblin mechanic.


    Thus, if one investigated all the machines that had been struck with the gaze of death, they would not find any corpses within, only a pile of ashes.


    The goblin mechanics flying in the sky faced an enemy that could easily kill them while being almost impossible to kill himself. They all felt a deep chill from the depths of their hearts.


    Greem¡¯s frightening strength had intimidated them and sent their morale crashing down into a valley.


    Just then, a rumbling roar came from the woods behind.


    Greem stopped running and teleported onto a tall cliff. He looked back at the forest behind him.


    Ancient trees along a path were snapping and falling. Even the trees near them trembled and shook. From a distance, it seemed like a horrifying monster was making its way through the sea of threes.


    Crack! The two ancient trees nearest to Greem fell, and a somewhat familiar metallic silhouette appeared in Greem¡¯s vision.


    So it was him!

 Chapter 506 Berserk Tigule

    Chapter 506 Berserk Tigule


    Greem took this rampaging enemy seriously for the first time.


    Tigule, the captain of a magical machine squad.


    In Greem¡¯s eyes, Tigule had only been a First Grade goblin mechanic that had barely managed to disy Second Grade strength by piloting a machine. However, while his identity as a First Grade goblin mechanic was roughly equal to the status of a First Grade adept, he couldn¡¯t trante his body¡¯s attributes intobat abilities of the same level.


    He was at First Grade, but he had neither the closebat techniques of body refining adepts, the violent spells of elementium adepts, and especially not any innate talents he had been born with. Under such circumstances, the only thing he could rely on was the magical machine he was piloting.


    The Tigule of before had been an individual of his own. The mechanic was the mechanic, and the machine was the machine. The two things sometimes ovepped, but there was still a clear distinction between the pilot and the piloted. There was nothing extraordinary about his performance.


    Yet at this moment, for some reason, Greem could sense the trace of a threating from Tigule as he looked at him.


    Was it a perfect union of man and machine?


    A strange sentence suddenly appeared in Greem¡¯s mind, and he couldn¡¯t help butugh a little at the thought.


    However, reality left him no time to think anymore.


    Tigule¡¯s attack descended at almost the same moment he emerged from the forest.


    Phew, phew!


    Two goblin rockets sting with orange mes at their tails drew strange paths across the sky and circled towards Greem. They were instantly detonated by the invisible Ring of Fire when they reached within fifty meters of Greem.


    The rockets filled with excessive amounts of gunpowder exploded in midair, sending shrapnel shooting in every direction. Such an attack would undoubtedly be lethal for an ordinary creature, but it was as insignificant as a casual breeze for a well-protected adept.


    In the instant that the mes of the explosion and the smoke obscured Greem¡¯s vision, a metallic w smashed through theyers of defenses and appeared before Greem.


    Goblin rocket attack plus flying w?


    Very creative. Very creative indeed...


    The expression on Greem¡¯s face seemed like a smile but wasn¡¯t really one. He couldn¡¯t help but start givingments on the attack.


    Tricks like these might be useful against the low-grade creatures of this world that only relied on their eyes and noses to sense the world. However, adepts mostly used their spirits as a mode of observation. These little tricks that fooled the eye had no ce before the all-seeing spiritual senses.


    Greem¡¯s body paused for a moment as his entire person leaped fifty meters backward through the use of Fire Teleportation.


    What surprised him was Tigule¡¯s Metal Goblin pivoting the moment he stepped out of the fire. The machine lunged until it was only twenty meters away from him.


    The Metal Goblin extended its arm backward and expelled dense mes from its palms. This counterforce propelled its body towards Greem at three to five times its usual speed. It didn¡¯t retract its other hand. Instead, the goblin brandished a twelve-meter-long metal chain and smashed its hand towards Greem like a meteor hammer.


    At the instant the ¡¯meteor hammer¡¯ descended upon Greem, it had only been one second since hisst Fire Teleportation. He required at least another two seconds cooldown to teleport again.


    Damn! An explosion of power!


    Greem was frantically cursing internally. He raised his right hand, and an equally massive hand of me gathered in an instant.


    At the same time, the Metal Goblin opened its mouth to reveal a gun barrel emerging from within. A flurry of bullets tore the hand of fire into shreds. The dozen magical machines in the sky who were closest to the battle were encouraged by Tigule¡¯s performance. They dove downwards in a pincer attack.


    Dammit! If I don¡¯t show you a little color, you lot would really take a Second Grade adept for a herbivore!


    Greem, who had mostly been breezing through his encounters, was suddenly forced into a corner by the explosive performance of Tigule. His perpetually calm state of mind started to tremble.


    Killing intent surfaced within him. Greem extended his left hand and grasped; the ze of Destruction appeared in his grip. The next second, towering shrouds of fire surged out from his body, instantly arming him and turning him into a terrifying me humanoid.


    The three-meter-tall metal machine with the appearance of a goblin shed with a two-meter me humanoid spewing wild mes. They engaged each other like two fearsome demonic gods and smashed each other with all they had.


    The other magical machines could only circle the two of them, with no ability to join the fight.


    The two demonic beings circled as they entangled in a melee. Raging me streams and shrapnel continuously shot out, piercing holes clean through any object. The fires that clung to the pieces of metal would then turn it into unrecognizable charcoal in the shortest amount of time possible.


    For a while, the Second Grade Greem was tied with the Second Grade Metal Goblin.


    Indeed, at this moment, Greem was no longer fighting with First Grade Tigule, but the Second Grade Metal Goblin that he had wholly assimted with.


    Tigule¡¯s mastery and use of the attacks avable to the Metal Goblin had reached the absolute apex of the machine. The various attacking movements that he utilized had reached their absolute limits as well. Boxing out, rhythm, pressing against the opponent; it was abat style and tactic that was practically the same as gambling one¡¯s own life.


    Inside the Metal Goblin, blood was streaking down the corner of Tigule¡¯s mouth as he used all of his abilities to operate the metal goblin to avoid the adept¡¯s attacks. At the same time, he requested the floating vessel to fire its goblin cannon.


    Another seven minutes passed by, and the flying ship finally arrived at the most optimal location. The terrifying cannon at the bow of the vessel was once again revealed.


    The magical machines surrounding the battlefield silently retreated into the distance. They anxiously waited while engraving each and everybat maneuver of the Metal Goblin into their minds with feelings of admiration and respect.


    The goblin cannon started to charge.


    The ck sun once again appeared.


    Greem was being kept to the spot by Tigule, with no easy way to escape.


    Fire Teleportation looked like an instantaneous move, but it still required preparation of approximately half a second. Greem had to painfully admit that he couldn¡¯t even spare that half a second under Tigule¡¯s interference. He had no choice but to apany this suicidal Tigule in awaiting the descent of the ck pir of light.


    They didn¡¯t have to wait long. Forty-five secondster, the fully charged flying ship shook as ck light burst forth from the barrel of the goblin cannon. The ck column of light two meters in diameter shot towards the battlefield.


    The ck pir of light increased in size as it made its way downwards. It quickly swelled from two meters to ten meters. Twenty meters. Fifty meters. By the time the pir reached the ground, it had spread to a hundred meters in diameter.


    No being of flesh and blood could survive within the ck light. At least, not the low-grade creatures that lived in this ne.


    As the goblin mechanics opened their cockpits and silently mourned for the great Tigule, a burst of fire suddenly appeared outside of the ck pir. Greem walked out of the mes with the limp Metal Goblin his grasp.


    What was happening? Had they failed?


    Countless questions appeared in the minds of the goblin mechanics. They silently looked upon the two individuals in the distance, unsure of how to respond.


    Greem loosened his grip and threw the Metal Goblin onto the ground. He wiped away the cold sweat on his forehead before summoning the hand of fire and tearing away the metal te above the cockpit, revealing the limp goblin within.


    "Why did you save me?" ck blood flowed down Tigule¡¯s mouth as he yelled, "We are enemies! Why did you save me?"


    Greem put on a cold smile, "Because I wanted to!"


    Such a simple sentence instantly caused Tigule to choke on his words. It was a whileter before he could curse furiously, "Don¡¯t get too pleased with yourself! If my machine hadn¡¯t just run out of energy at that moment, do you think you could have escaped the ck light alive?"


    Greemughed coldly, "You have seven sets of magic energy batteries in your Metal Goblin. Each set of batteries can sustain five minutes of basicbat. The sudden burst of power you initiated earlier caused the batteries to exhaust at a rate that was 37% faster than usual, while also causing the machine to take an additional 25% damage. In total, the duration you would be able to fight for was reduced by 46% or more. Did you think I would y with you for so long if it weren¡¯t for having perfectly gotten all the timings down?"


    Tigule¡¯s fierce look disappeared. He was fearful of the calm calctions of his opponent.


    He had been relying entirely on his burst of adrenaline in the battle earlier. He never had, and would never be able to calcte such precise numbers in the midst of battle.


    Out of respect for an equal opponent, Tigule could sense that every number that the opponent gave him was the exact statistic. But if all these were true, didn¡¯t it mean that the entire battle had always been within the control of the enemy?!


    What else could be a more significant blow to his confidence and will to fight!


    The bloodthirsty aura around Tigule instantly dispersed. The goblin was once again dejected.


    The opponent hade from the terrifying World of Adepts. That was arge-sized ne that was famous across the multiverse, and a ce with plenty of evil and savage ne conquerors. The knowledge and strength that the opponent possessed were far superior to the goblins. Could the Goblin Empire truly seed at defeating enemies like these?


    While Tigule was shaken and lost in his thoughts, Greem took a look at the circle of magical machines that were approaching him. His body once again turned into a cluster of fire and vanished from the spot.


    The enemy left...


    The enemy didn¡¯t kill him.


    For some reason, Tigule felt none of the joy of having survived. Instead, only sorrow and depression filled his heart.


    Perhaps I should have died in that pir of ck light!


    Tigule thought to himself.


    ............


    Greem met up with Mary and Billis six kilometers away from the battlefield.


    Of course, Greem couldn¡¯t avoid a bunch of nagging andints from Mary, telling him about how he shouldn¡¯t have so easily put himself in danger.


    "Let¡¯s go. We must escape their pursuit before the flying ship arrives." Greem gave a few simple instructions before escaping into the distance with the other two adepts.


    "Master, who will being over in the next teleportation once we get through theing few days?" Bug adept Billis couldn¡¯t help but ask out of curiosity.


    "Sabrina and Endor! This is actually the ce most suited for them." Greem answered as he traveled, without even looking back.

 Chapter 507 Goblin Civilization

    Chapter 507 Goblin Civilization


    The adepts¡¯ strange spells made it impossible for the goblins to track them for extended periods of time.


    When Greem took out the Demon Alligator Hunter that he hadn¡¯t used in a long time and sank into the ground, the goblin mechanics were utterly dazed. Chasing an enemy that had burrowed underground? They hadn¡¯te up with a tool for that yet!


    The only thing they could do was assign even more local garrisons to the location and scatter them across every corner of the area in hopes of discovering the enemy¡¯s tracks.


    In truth, they didn¡¯t need to go on a search. At a particr moment five dayster, the goblins once again detected that strange spatial ripple. The origin of the spatial ripple was in another goblin province five hundred kilometers away.


    The Carai Area.


    Mechanical Girl Sabrina and Poison Hag Endor copsed to the ground in a well-hidden underground room the moment theypleted their internar travel. However, the nar suppression that Sabrina endured was inferior whenpared to Endor¡¯s. Perhaps this had something to do with the fact that she waspatible with the narws here!


    Due to the racial traits of the Goblin Empire, the ones that ruled over every single piece ofnd could only be goblins.


    On the way here, they had only seen goblins. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the goblin merchants who rode on huge Kodos, or the small viges and towns by the sides of the road; the ones that could be nobles and ownrge amounts ofnd, mansions, and mines were goblins. The other races could only take up lowly, dirty, and dangerous employment.


    They saw green goblins in luxurious clothing parading through the streets on pnquins while elven and human servants walked along in servitude. Massive trolls and minotaurs carried the pnquins on their shoulders one after another. The adepts couldn¡¯t help but feel their spirits grow confused!


    The trolls were resilient and possessed great strength. They had be the best miners and ves of the goblins. The native humans were weak, but their ability to learn and craft was fairly decent. As such, they turned into the goblins¡¯ butlers, tailors, and bakers. The wood elves were frail beings, but they possessed exceptional talent with nts and became the gardeners of goblin mansions.


    Countless native races had been beaten down by the firearms and artillery of the goblins. They had no choice but to obediently surrender and be ves and prisoners to ensure the survival of their races.


    The goblins had tamed the massive kodos as long-distance transportation tools. They had also tamed the hawkstriders asnd transportation, the hippogryphs as flying mounts, and tiger sharks as sea mounts, yet these were only auxiliary tools that were used to benefit the public.


    The real demonstration of the Empire¡¯s power was the construction andbat machines scattered across the continent.


    On their trips through viges and cities, Greem and his party could tell that the literacy rate of the goblins almost reached a hundred percent. Moreover, the goblin children were all tested for their innate talents at a very young age, before being cultivated in different disciplines tailored to their abilities.


    Currently, the most popr job in the Goblin Empire had to be the goblin mechanic!


    If one became a goblin mechanic, they would have taken a massive step forward and instantly turned into a noble among the goblins. They would then be able toe into contact with construction and engineering machines of various models. Only those who obtained excellent results while piloting engineering machines were qualified to go further and became the pilots ofbat machines.


    In the past hundred years, more and morebat machine models had been manufactured as the Goblin Empire¡¯s utilization of magic energy significantly improved. The power of the machines was also vastly superior to previous versions. Consequently, every single goblin in the Goblin Empire took pride in being able to be a pilot of abat machine!


    Apart from a goblin mechanic, there were many other branch professions in the Empire. For example, there was the goblin engineer, goblin alchemist, goblin cksmith, goblin forgemaster, goblin jeweler, goblin musketeer, goblin cannoneer, goblin tank driver, goblin aviators, goblin technicians, etc.


    One had to mention how short, small, and weak the goblins were. If it weren¡¯t for their mastery of engineering, machines, and alchemy that gave them what they needed to solidify their position, they would never have the strength to conquer an entire ne.


    If one wanted to understand the goblins, they had to talk about the most meritorious trait of the goblins¨C their adventurous spirit!


    This ne had plenty of powerful races. Why was it that they couldn¡¯t be the rulers of this ne, and were instead upstaged by these frail goblins? The main reason was that the goblins held a twisted passion for knowledge and technique that far surpassed the other races.


    The most luxurious building in every town and city had to be the goblin alchemicalboratory. Moreover, you would undoubtedly find row after row of sculptures depicting goblin predecessors erected in front of the doors of theb.


    Those that could be known as a predecessor in the Goblin Empire were great goblin inventors that had aplished groundbreaking feats in goblin engineering and alchemy.


    It was these generations of umtions that allowed the goblins to grow from their initial alchemical roots to an engineering civilization, before moving on to a steam-powered culture. Finally, they had arrived at their new energy system¨C Magic Energy.


    From his experience, Greem easily concluded that the Goblin ne would most definitely seed at bing a magic energy civilization if they had one or two hundred more years of time to develop. When that happened, it would be time for them to step out of their narrow Goblin ne and carefully start exploring other nes.


    Tragically for them, Greem and the adepts had arrived right when the goblins were undergoing the painful transition from a steam-powered civilization to a magic energy civilization.


    Perhaps this was the fate of the Goblin ne!


    It was because of Greem that the Goblin ne had an opportunity for a leap in power. However, it was also because of Greem that the Goblin ne faced the intrusion and coveting of the domineering World of Adepts.


    If the Goblin ne were a little more fortunate and seeded at exterminating Greem and hispanions, then they would receive a ¡¯present¡¯ from the distant adept civilization. If that happened, everything in the minds of Greem and hispanions would be the strength used to boost and propel the leaps in the development of the goblins¡¯ power.


    However, there were always tradeoffs. Benefits and drawbacks were two sides of the same coin!


    The goblins first had to pay the price if they wished to get what they wanted.


    The price they had to pay was the uncertain fate of the Goblin ne.


    Were they to kill the intruding the adepts and raise the strength of the ne to a whole new level, or were they to be defeated by the adepts and turned into a satellite ne of the World of Adepts? This was the fate that the Goblin Empire had to face!


    When Sabrina and Endor arrived at the Goblin ne, they brought with them Alice¡¯s message for Greem.


    "Be careful of Gazlowe!"


    A simple sentence, but it immediately gave Greem rity and understanding of the situation.


    It was only now that Greem was sure that this trip of theirs into the Goblin ne had been a trap set up by Duke Gazlowe.


    He didn¡¯t know what it was that forced Gazlowe to make this decision, but he was confident that the goblin had intentionally leaked the coordinates of the ne to Snox and agreed to ept the batch of problematic magical stones.


    If things had gone ording to n, Greem and the others would have teleported to the Goblin ne with the silver spacestone as the coordinates. What would have awaited them then was a cage trap with a sea ofbat machines that surrounded them like an iron wall.


    Perhaps it was because of the trace of unease that she felt that Alice gave up on the coordinates of the spacestone. Instead, she turned to random teleportation to toss Bug Adept Billis into the world ahead of everyone else.


    That choice had gone beyond Gazlowe¡¯s expectations!


    The moment Gazlowe realized that the adepts of the other ne hadn¡¯t appeared in the trap ording to his set script was also the moment news of a spatial intrusion reached him. It was then that he knew his n had fallen apart. He had led many of his subordinates right out of the capital in an attempt to hunt down the adepts before their strength got out of control.


    Yet, when they finally came into contact with the adepts, Gazlowe made a surprising discovery. The reason that the adepts had managed to be ve owners and intruders feared by the multiverse was truly due to their abilities and strange spells.


    The first three adepts were all difficult to deal with. Gazlowe could hardly get any advantage against the adepts, even after bringing the most elite magical machine squads of the Empire with him.


    Consequently, when Gazlowe once again picked up on the strange spatial ripple, he promptly assembled troops and charged towards the source of the spatial ripple. But this time, he brought with him two flying ships and over a thousand magical machines.


    ............


    In a cave by the edges of the Keza Mountains.


    They had started a campfire inside the ck cave. The dancing mes illuminated the tiny space and ced a red tint over the people by the fire.


    Large pieces of bear meat were being roasted on the fire after having been treated and skinned. As expected of a witch that spent her days outdoors, Poison Hag Endor was well-versed when it came to cooking and roasting meat. Golden oil seeped from the fat and thick flesh, sizzling as the fire continued to burn. Endor asionally took out colorful powder from a bag of spice, causing the bear meat to release even more fragrance.


    The individuals present here might all be adepts and possess entirely different bodily structures from ordinary humans, but most of their human nature had still been preserved.


    Take, for example, Mechanical Girl Sabrina. Alchemical machines had already reced the primary organs of her body and most of her limbs. Her stomach had also been turned into a miniature furnace that was capable of instantly disintegrating anything she ate into their most basic nutritionalponents and waste. This method of digestion efficiently utilized energy and generated very little waste.


    As such, cooking food was an entirely unnecessary process for Sabrina!


    Most of the time, directly eating the bloody meat might have given her more energy than roasting it beforehand.


    However, as a former human, Sabrina still retained many of the habits and instincts of a human.


    She sat elegantly by the campfire, gracefully putting the delicious sliced bear meat pieces into her mouth. The juicy, fresh taste of meat could still provide her with enjoyment. As for the minor reduction of energy gained? It was something of little concern to her!

 Chapter 508 Voodoo Doll

    Chapter 508 Voodoo Doll


    "Tell me, why did you drag me here ahead of time?"


    Endor casually asked as she used a small carving knife to cut the roasted bear meat into suitable and edible chunks.


    ording to the original n, the third batch of individuals who were supposed to transfer over was Sabrina and Snox. However, Greem had suddenly swapped the order, putting Endor into the third batch instead of the fourth. That was why she had appeared here five days ahead of time.


    The ck Qiraji Resonating Crystal allowed Greem to maintain close contact with Alice, despite them being in different nes.


    "Because this ce is more suited for you!" Greem praised Endor¡¯s culinary skills while smiling and answering, "After fighting with the goblins, I realized the most suited to dealing with the goblins had to be you."


    "Are you referring to the use of poison?" Poison Hag Endor couldn¡¯t help but pause for a moment.


    "Indeed! We are at a numerical disadvantage here. The massive difference between our races makes it impossible for us to disguise ourselves and hide amongst them. It isn¡¯t hard to imagine that long and grueling guerri warfare is what awaits us. They chase, we run. It¡¯s difficult to establish a base where we can gain a foothold."


    "And so you thought of using poison?"


    "Not poison, but gue!" Under the illumination of the fire, a cold light shed in Greem¡¯s ck eyes, "Poisoning several dozen goblins to death is not helpful in our current situation. What I need right now is a terrifying gue that can threaten the entire Goblin ne. It is only when the lives of most of the goblins are within our grasp that they will willingly give up their passion and obsession with magic energy, turning instead to kneel before us!"


    The people present were all pure adepts that had been raised in the World of Adepts. None of them expressed any shock or objection at Greem¡¯s casual mention of guing an entire ne of living creatures. Instead, they furrowed their bows and considered the feasibility of such a n.


    "I do have some decent gue viruses with me. It won¡¯t be a problem to kill several hundreds of thousands of goblins when I spread them out. However," Endor hesitated for a moment, "These little fellows aren¡¯t that easy to control. It¡¯s tough to control these viruses once they leave my palm. They might be useful at scaring the goblins, but we will need to increase our control over the source of the gue viruses if we want to use it as leverage in negotiations with the goblins!"


    "This is no problem!"


    Greem smiled and extended his hand. The Scroll of Voodoo that hung by his waist immediately flew to his palm. A marite etched with numerous magical runes appeared in front of the eyes of the adepts under the effect of Greem¡¯s magic.


    The marite creaked and moved its wooden mouth when it saw the adepts before it. It let out a strange voice that resembled a human baby. Its two wooden eyes were still somewhat stiff when they started moving, but they quickly became as agile and lively as those of a human¡¯s.


    "A voodoo doll!" A kind smile surfaced on Endor¡¯s ugly old face, "It seems you¡¯ve cultivated this little fellow very well. Its intelligence is veryplete. It will most definitely be a powerful helper of yours in the future!"


    "It should be no problem to use it to control the gue viruses, should it?" Greem humbly asked.


    He might be the one who had personally cultivated the voodoo doll, but many little problems needed to be dealt with before it matured. Greem could only be a humble disciple when cedpared to the proficient poison master Endor.


    "Mm!" Endor nodded, "Have your voodoo doll swallow my gue viruses; the gue will merge with the voodoo poison. This way, the reach of the gue and whether it bes activated will bepletely within our control. It will be time for you to negotiate with the ruler of the goblins once most of this ne¡¯s goblins have been infected with the virus."


    After a sinisterugh, Endor reached out with her slight, skinny hands. She cautiously took out a medicine jar from her waist pouch. The ck medicine jar wasn¡¯t veryrge¨Conly about the size of a fist¨Cand was sealed with magical runes on the lid.


    Greem tried several times, but even his Spirit had a hard time piercing through the runes to see the contents of the jar. Judging from that, the medicine jar itself was magical equipment.


    Something that had to be stored inside magical equipment...


    Greem¡¯s heart moved. He started to look forward even more to the gue virus that Endor had mentioned!


    Endor followed some sort of odd ritual. She first tapped the jar lightly in several spots before cing the jar before her mouth and softly chanting several passwords. The magical rune seals were finally dispelled.


    "Have your voodoo doll prepare," Poison Hag Endor¡¯s expression was deadly serious at this moment, "Even I have no means of taking back or eliminating the gue virus the moment it escapes!"


    All the other adepts present retreated into the distance to avoid interrupting the two of them. As adepts, their Physique would kill any ordinary gue, even if the viruses managed to make it into their body. However, would a gue virus that Poison Hag Endor treated with such caution be amon virus you would find on the streets?


    The adepts made a temporary retreat to ensure no idents urred.


    Light shed in Greem¡¯s ck eyes, and a crimson Ring of Fire silently enveloped him and Endor. That kept them safe from interruption while preventing the gue viruses from escaping.


    Endor took out a sky blue crystal leaf and ced it in her mouth. It was only then that she lightly opened the piece of cloth covering the jar.


    A green mist emerged.


    The green mist had initially been about to disperse into the surrounding air upon escaping its confines secretly. However, the Ring of Fire gave it no such opportunity. As some virus spores ignited in a crackle of me, the shapeless and colorless gue virus was forced into a cluster to resist the corrosion of the dense fire elementium in the air.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by this unstable floating cloud of mist that was gradually bing greener. The method by which lethal viruses spread was roughly the same across all worlds. The viruses could split out into numerous microscopic spores that scattered everywhere through currents in the air.


    It was precisely because the spores they split into were so tiny that they were invisible to the naked eye that gue viruses had such a fearsome reputation. Only adepts could detect their existence through the use of their Spirits.


    At the moment, the gue viruses in front of Greem could gather together when they were driven into a dead end. The viruses were relying on their numbers to resist the corrosion of the fire elementium temporarily. This... from a certain perspective, this gave them elementary group intelligence.


    A gue virus like this had probably cost a lot of effort and resources on Endor¡¯s part to cultivate.


    For some reason, the voodoo doll sitting on the Scroll of Voodoo became extremely excited when it saw this cloud of green mist. It kept sending requests to Greem with its baby-like cries.


    None of the adepts present could understand itsnguage. Even Greem was only able to understand its meaning through the central link that was the Scroll of Voodoo.


    Greem sped his right hand, and the Ring of Fire started to shrink with the green mist at its center. The green cloud had no choice but to shrink itself further to fight back against the fire elementium. It condensed into a green gumball the size of a thumb before it managed to reach a semnce of equilibrium with the Ring of Fire.


    Greem lifted the fist-sized Ring of Fire and ced it before the voodoo doll. The doll betrayed a joyous smile with its wooden eyebrows and immediately plunged its head inside and swallowed the bright green gumball.


    All the magical runes on the voodoo doll¡¯s body started shining after it swallowed the gue. Various strange runes lit up and dimmed, illuminating the doll¡¯s wooden body with a sickly green color.


    The voodoo doll burped in a human fashion before diving back into the Scroll of Voodoo and vanishing without a trace.


    Greem flipped open the Scroll of Voodoo. Only a single page remained in the tome. The voodoo doll was curled up within a magical silver circle, snoring as it slept.


    The Chip¡¯s notification rang out in Greem¡¯s mind.


    [Beep. 17 hours, 16 minutes, 54 seconds before the voodoo dollpletely digests the gue virus.


    [73 hours, 28 minutes, 13 seconds before the voodoo doll spits out poisonsoul seeds.]


    Greem nodded in satisfaction.


    "Everyone take a rest here for a while. Thirty-seven hours from now, we will obtain our first batch of poisonsoul seeds. Then we can go out for a big fight!"


    Everyone was firmly confident in Greem¡¯s words.


    One could say that the reason the adepts were willing to follow Greem into this ce of risk was that they believed in Greem¡¯s insight and power.


    In all honesty, Greem¡¯s faction was still too weak right now.


    If one were to count with their fingers, it would seem as if the number of adepts that Greem had gathered at Fire Throne had exceeded the number of adepts the Sarubo had stationed in the Feidnan City tower.


    Did that mean that the strength of Greem¡¯s faction was beyond the power of the Sarubo headquarters?


    No, of course not. If anyone honestly thought so, they would be an ignorant and foolish person!


    One couldn¡¯t assume the strength of Greem¡¯s factions by their current numbers. There might seem to be a wealth of talent, but how many would be left once the bloody and cruel nar war came to its conclusion?


    It was important to note that the Sarubo n had lost nine adepts before barely managing to conquer the Knight¡¯s ne, even with Sixth Grade Great Adept Sarubo backing them and two Third Grade adepts as the principal military force.


    The Goblin ne that Greem had picked might be far weaker than the Knight¡¯s ne on an overall scale, but they still had their ace¨Cmagic energy¨Chidden up their sleeves. If they engaged in a frontal confrontation with the Goblin Empire, the number of adept casualties would be absolutely terrifying!


    Could Greem¡¯s faction pay such a high price?


    To avoid his faction being worn down, Greem could only take on most of the risk himself, while thinking of alternative methods to wear away at the strength of the goblins.


    In such a situation, an inconspicuous gue undoubtedly became his best option!

 Chapter 509 Poison Halo

    Chapter 509 Poison Halo


    Two dayster, the first poisonsoul seed was finally born.


    Bug Adept Billis became the first adept to leave the group.


    The main party continued to advance towards the capital of the Goblin Empire, Anvilmar. Billis, on the other hand, brought the poisonsoul seed with him and went down south. The mission Greem had given to him was to soak the poisonsoul seed for fifteen minutes in the wells and water sources of every goblin town and city.


    This mission wasn¡¯t exactly difficult, but it wasn¡¯t easy either.


    The mission first required Billis to possess some means of remaining stealthed. After all, it required a non-goblin to walk into Empire territories and get close to vital water sources. That presented a challenge in and of itself!


    However, this difficulty was nothing before Billis¡¯ intangible body of bugs that could scatter and reform as he willed.


    Greem had already drawn up aplete map of the Goblin ne with the information he had gathered over the past few days. The capital Anvilmar was located right in the center of the entire ne. That ce was surrounded by mountains and possessed steep and punishing geography. It was a stronghold that was easily defended and challenging for a siege. Ordinary creatures would find it difficult even to make it into the city.


    The goblins had used their powerful engineering abilities and machines to construct a city of metal in the most precipitous area of the mountains¨C The Steel Capital.


    Over one hundred and twenty thousand elite goblins lived there. It was a city of miracles and the capital of technology where goblin engineers, inventors, and alchemists gathered in hordes.


    Over the past thousand years, the goblins had practically hollowed out the belly of the mountain beneath the Steel Capital to fuel the advancement of their mechanical civilization. The literal mountains of coal and the steam that they produced from the resources were used to support the operation of the Steel Capital.


    Now that magic energy had appeared, the goblins had constructed a massive, ten-story-tall space furnace inside the mountain. They were using the magic energy extracted by the furnace to propel the goblin civilization towards broad-scale magic energy use.


    The goblins didn¡¯t seem to have the awareness to keep such information confidential. Instead, they even went about spreading the merits and advantages of magic energy to the general public, openly calling for more goblin engineers and alchemists to take on the research of magic energy.


    Sadly, the Goblin Empire¡¯s research on goblin runes was still too superficial and crude. The progress of the study on miniaturizing the space furnace was developing sluggishly. Otherwise, if every magical machine were equipped with a miniaturized space furnace, they would be able to break free of the limitations of magic energy batteries and be perpetual ughter machines.


    The Goblin Empire had only sessfully installed space furnaces onrge machines like the flying warships at this point. These warships were used as power sources for smaller magical machines and supported the magical machine squads in their continued warfare and purges.


    However, there was still a matter of whether the goblin mechanics could keep up with the intensity of such frequent battles with their pseudo-adept level Physiques. After all, individuals who had gone past the limits of mortals were still a minority. Most goblin mechanics were still goblins with mortal flesh. They needed to eat, drink, excrete, and sleep.


    In fact, most goblin mechanics would face additional psychological burdens after an immensely bloody battle. That was something that even First Grade Goblin Mechanic Tigule couldn¡¯t avoid. What was there to say? He might have a supernatural body, but he didn¡¯t have a Spirit and soul to match.


    That was why the Second Grade Metal Goblin that First Grade Tigule piloted could just barely bring to bear the strength of a pseudo-Second Grade.


    Greem didn¡¯t look kindly upon the goblin capital that the Goblin Empire had spent so long and so much to construct. There was only one reason for that¨C these goddamned idiots had actually built the space furnace beneath the Steel Capital. Didn¡¯t this mean that the most elite goblins of the entire Empire were living right on top of a massive barrel of gunpowder?


    Moreover, they were continually stuffing even more gunpowder into the barrel!


    Of course, as a native goblin, they probably had hundreds and thousands of reasons to do so. The entire ne was trembling under the rule of goblin firearms and goblin cannons. You couldn¡¯t find a single enemy in the whole ne that could even vaguely threaten the order of the Goblin Empire.


    The massive Steel Capital also needed a clean and sustainable source of energy if it wanted to continue functioning for another thousand years. That was the primary way to ensure the legacy of the goblin civilization.


    That was why it wasn¡¯t surprising that the ruler of the Empire had chosen this course of action There were no enemies, and they desperately needed the energy. However, now that Greem and his crew had arrived, any weakness and w in the vast entity that was the Goblin Empire would be put to full use by the adepts. These ws would be the first domino that toppled the goblin civilization!


    At this moment, the one thing that Greem wanted to do most was to sneak into the Steel Capital and lob a fireball into that massive space furnace that the goblins had so delicately constructed. Surely, that would be a gigantic fireworks performance that would shake the entire ne to its core!


    However, there were still many difficult tasks they needed to aplish before they could achieve this goal.


    The only thing that Greem could do now was try his best to spread the gue¡¯s poisonsoul seed to every corner of the goblin empire. It would give their side even more leverage in future negotiations.


    There was no choice. Greem couldn¡¯t use destructive ways to obtain the Goblin ne. Less than one-tenth of the living beings in the ne would survive once the gue had spread out.


    When that happened, the ne might lose its ability to put up a resistance, but it would also lose all of its fundamental strength. Where was Greem supposed to find that much freebor when he decided to excavate the resources of the ne then?


    Buy cheap ves from the World of Adepts? Excavating a ne wasn¡¯t just a matter of several hundreds or thousands of workers. It demanded tens of thousands of strong adolescent ves and a functioning societal system within the ne to breed and produce even more poption.


    Greem needed to organize plenty ofbor to dig the ground, excavate the metal ores, and bring them to the surface if he wanted to obtain all the precious metals. That wasn¡¯t the end either. He still needed to filter and select the ores for inferior materials before choosing the superior ores for smelting and refining into metal ingots.


    This process was often apanied by the extraction and purification of precious metals.


    That was why a stable and existing societal system was a must for the mass excavation of metal ores and rare resources in a ne.


    If the natives of this ne were all exterminated by the gue and Greem was left to create a societal system from scratch, then it would be impossible to profit from the whole endeavor for another hundred years!


    It was because of this that Greem intended to create a tightly controlled gue in the Goblin ne. He wanted an epidemic that could deal a devastating blow to the Goblin Empire withoutpromising the strength of the entire ne.


    Such an idea was simple in thought butplicated in practice.


    However, Greem had no choice but to try his very best to realize his ideas and beliefs!


    Fortunately, the Goblin ne didn¡¯t properly belong to him yet. He could do as he wished with it right now. If the ruler of the Goblin Empire refused to capitte, even after he detonated the space furnace, Greem didn¡¯t mind reducing the goblin ne to a barrennd of death and decay.


    After all, only benefits that had been obtained were gains that belonged to yourself. If Greem couldn¡¯t get what he wanted, then he didn¡¯t mind smashing everything to pieces.


    Even if the meat rotted, it would rot in his pot!


    Another two days passed. The second poisonsoul seed appeared, and Mary left the party as well. She hurried to the west of the continent on her own.


    Yet, just two days after Mary had left, Greem, Sabrina, and Endor were tracked down by the swarming magical machine squads in a destend.


    However, the army of magical machines had retreated as fast as they had descended upon the adepts!


    The reason the goblins had so quickly given up on the enemies they had been pursuing for six days was due to the appearance of a new and terrifying adept that they couldn¡¯t deal with¨C Poison Witch Endor.


    After six days, the goblins had finally managed to catch up with Greem and the rest. The over one hundred magical machines immediately charged at them from every direction.


    The first thing that greeted them was Endor¡¯s Poison Halo!


    Endor had set up a small altar in the wild and used this altar to amplify the radius of her Poison Halo, allowing it to go from its original hundred meter radius to the current five hundred meters.


    The pilots of every magical machine that charged into the Poison Halo were unknowingly poisoned.


    When Endor finally activated the poison rune, the sudden rush of poison damage instantly exterminated a hundred magical machines that were present.


    For a moment, magical machines fell from the skies like pouring rain.


    They crashed into the ground headfirst, and never moved again.


    The permeating poison filtered into the air vents of the magical machines, where it poisoned and killed the goblin mechanics within. It didn¡¯t matter how reliable the magical machines were. They were nothing but cold lumps of metal without the control of a mechanic.


    That was why there was no hope of survival for the goblin mechanics as long as they still needed to breathe!


    Greem and the others understood all the principles behind this, but the attacking machine army was utterly ignorant of it.


    Themander that led the army was still getting more of his subordinates to enter the battlefield to avoid the evil adepts from escaping. Yet, who could have known? A single green light from the hands of the ugly and evil witch and nearly a hundred of theirbat machines fell to the ground as if they had lost their souls.


    It didn¡¯t matter how much themander yelled and screamed at the machines; he would not get any feedback or response from them. The few machines that he sent in afterward also copsed to the ground moments after they stepped onto the battlefield, without any signs whatsoever. They became unreachable as well.


    Themander almost went mad from the bizarre scene he was witnessing!


    He could understand dying in the midst of an intense battle. He could also understand perishing in a harsh natural environment.


    But a scene like the one before him, where everyone died with a single sh of green light from the enemy¡¯s hand... it was impossible for him to ept such a thing with his dull brain!


    The magical machinemander that had been paralyzed with fear of the unknown had no other choice left to him. He sounded the retreat!


    The over a hundred magical machines that had blotted out the sun earlier had almost all died here. Less than ten of them had managed to retreat sessfully. The disastrous losses caused the goblins to be utterly heartbroken. They only dared to return to the scene and take away a few of the magical machines after the adepts had left the ce.


    It was after the goblin doctors conducted an autopsy that they realized that all the goblin mechanics had died of poison.


    It was only now that the goblins realized that such a terrifying w existed in the magical machines!

 Chapter 510 Magic Energy Weapon

    Chapter 510 Magic Energy Weapon


    Losing nearly a hundred magical machines before the battle had even started was an immensely painful loss for the goblins.


    Of course, they weren¡¯t heartbroken over the magical machines, but the goblin mechanics within the machines.


    The one hundred magical machines that had fallen from the skies could be put back into use after a quick repair in the factory. However, the dead goblin mechanics would remain dead.


    While the goblins were frantically escaping, the most excited of the adepts wasn¡¯t Endor. Rather, it was Mechanical Girl Sabrina.


    She possessed the ability to assimte alchemical machines after she activated the mechanical core insider her body. The hundreds of magical devices crashed around them meant a hundred tiny treasure chests were waiting for her to open them.


    Sabrina was like a little girl that had unintentionally wandered into a mysterious treasury. She was so excited that she could barely speak. A colorful detection beam shot out of the mechanical eye underneath her silver mask. The beam wandered around the oddly-shaped magical machines while the eye itself scanned for the mechanical systems installed within the devices.


    One could tell that the Goblin Empire had no concept of streamlined mass production. All of their magical machines looked like delicate and well-crafted pieces of art. Each of the hundred magical machines had a unique style and sparks of creativity to them. With one look you could tell that different master artisans made each of them.


    It was because the Goblin Empire had the machines crafted by craftsmen that a single goblin engineer would be responsible for all the mechanical parts of a single magical machine. They would even be in charge of deciding the ratio of metal used in the alloys. Even something as tiny as a metal screw would be decided by the goblin engineer!


    The benefits of this meant that every machine was carefully managed by a single expert. All of them would qualify as great pieces of work.


    Mechanical Girl Sabrina walked between these handcrafted pieces of art, trying her best to find mechanical parts that would be beneficial to her.


    Sabrina immediately gave up on the goblin firearms.


    There was no other reason for her decision. Their offensive power was just too low!


    There was no changing the fact that the goblin firearms were the lowest grade of weapons, even if used in a barrage. Of course, if Greem were willing to put in some effort and etch Explosive Runes and Piercing Runes on every single one of the bullets, then they would have some worth as long-ranged auxiliary weapons.


    Goblin methrowers were a weapon that the goblin machines often used for mid to close-range area suppression. The mes they sted out didn¡¯t contain any elementiumponents. Instead, it was abustion reaction that urred from a kind of alchemical dusting into contact with the air.


    Alchemical fires like this often had temperature limits. They could only reach a maximum of 2500 degrees, even after stacking their effects. Converted to the energy strength system used by the adepts, the attack would be worth no more than a hundred and twenty points of power. An attack of this level might be enough to threaten a First Grade adept, but it would be a massive joke to expect to use it against a Second Grade adept. Especially a me immune fire-adept like Greem!


    That was why Sabrina regretfully gave up on the goblin methrowers after taking them off of the machines and ying with them for a while. However, she did keep the methrowing stones hidden inside them.


    Sabrina took apart seven or eight magical machines in a row and quickly became enamored by many of the delicateponents within.


    XD-57 Circr Rocket Guidance System.


    GG-117 Miniature Rocket Backpack.


    Magic Power Regional Bomb*.


    Magic Energy Beam Gun.


    Goblin Auto-Bnce Gyroscope.


    Goblin Energy Spectrometer.


    ......


    There were too many strange kinds of equipment, each with a unique purpose; Sabrina was utterly caught up in the sheer number of options. Greem had nothing to do, so he decided to run over and help her.


    First, diversifying Sabrina¡¯s means of attack was a necessary step in strengthening herbat ability.


    Given that case, the XD-57 Circr Rocket Guidance System was her best option for realizing ultra-long range attacks.


    The XD-57 stored five miniaturized goblin rockets. It had an attack radius of approximately 1200 to 2400 meters. This attack was almost four times beyond the range of an ordinary spell and was almost at the limit of enabling assaults beyond the scope of sight.


    Of course, the rocket¡¯s explosive damage could only reach seventy points. Moreover, most of the destruction relied on pure physical damage from the shrapnel. Adepts using their defensive spells would very easily defend against it.


    As the goblins had no such thing as proper long-ranged guidance or the ability to use Spirit to guide the rockets, the so-called Circr Guidance they came up with was mostly an estimation of sorts. The Circr Guidance had a deviation range of thirty meters within a firing distance of five hundred meters. This range would go up to a hundred meters when firing at a target a thousand meters away. If the enemy were two thousand meters away, you would probably be better off eyeballing it.


    That was due to the limitations of the goblin mechanic¡¯s bodily attributes. Even with the help of goblin enhanced goggles, the sight range of an ordinary goblin was only around fifteen-hundred meters. Any further past this distance and a goblin mechanic would be blind as a bat, even if their weapons could reach that far.


    Whether they could hit the enemy and whether they could strike them where they needed to had already be an impossible question that only the goblin god could answer!


    Naturally, Sabrina had no such problem.


    Even without the use of magic, Sabrina could easily sense everything happening in a one-kilometer radius with her Spirit and mechanical eye. If she used Magic Eye, then everything within five kilometers would be perfectly disyed before her.


    Sabrina could very likely perform ultra-long range attacks from beyond the range of the goblin¡¯s sight with vision like that. Of course, she would first have to perform some modifications to the goblin rockets. More importantly, attacks like these didn¡¯t exhaust her magic power at all.


    The ammo limit was a problem that the goblins hadn¡¯t solved. They could only bring with them as much as the machines could carry, and the machine would be a useless suit of armor once the ammo ran out. However, as a mechanical adept, Sabrina possessed plenty of spatial rings. That was why ammo would never be a concern for her.


    Sabrina couldn¡¯t wait to try the idea out once Greem had analyzed it for her.


    She couldn¡¯t help it. Even though she was in the Goblin ne, the first imaginary enemy that she defaulted to when she startedbat analysis was still an adept of the same Grade. Her mind would automatically abandon all weapons that couldn¡¯t be of lethal threat to adepts of the same Grade.


    However, she was currently in the Goblin ne. This equipment might not be that useful against adepts, but they were appropriate as weapons against the goblins.


    Apart from the XD-57 Circr Rocket Guidance System, the GG-117 Miniature Rocket Backpack was also extremely helpful for Sabrina.


    She only needed to make some small modifications before the GG-117 could be an excellent tool for partial evasion and repositioning. With the use of the rocket propeller, Sabrina would be able to move in any direction as she wished duringbat. Moreover, her movements would have no patterns to speak of. The device would make it challenging for the opponent to predict where she would be at the next moment.


    The Magic Power Regional Bomb was essentially a modification of a magic energy battery that turned it into a bomb. It could generate magic energy interference in a twenty-meter radius, effectively disrupting mechanical cores that had lost their energy shields. Of course, they were nifty equipment against adepts as well.


    If the wild magic energy disrupted an adept, it would be a tremendous burden on their elementium bnce. This adept would lose all ability to cast spells until they were able to neutralize the rampaging energy with their reserve elementium energy!


    The Magic Energy Beam Gun functioned in the same manner as the magic energy bomb. However, the means of attack was through an energy beam. Its range was only a mere twenty to thirty meters, and the strength of the attack only reached thirty-five points. Any further and the magic energy beam would have its bnce and stability destroyed by the elementium in the air; the beam would no longer deal any damage after that.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown when he figured out the principles behind the magic energy weapons.


    The enemy hadn¡¯t seemed to have such magic energy weapons in thest fight. Yet, just six dayster, they had alreadye up with such developed magic energy weapons. This terrifying research and development ability worried Greem.


    In all honesty, if Greem and the others had engaged the magical machines the same way they hadst time, without knowing of these changes, they would probably have been left with an unforgettable and painful memory.


    Fortunately for them, Endor was with them this time. A single Poison Halo had managed to decimate an entire army of magical machines. This turn of events had to be beyond the expectations of even Prince Gazlowe!


    Greem didn¡¯t even really need to think. He could imagine theedic tantrum that the mastermind Gazlowe would be throwing when he saw the wrecked and crashed magical machines that littered the entire ce. Anyone else would naturally be in a lousy mood if their undefeated army of magical machines, that cost mountains of gold and silver to make, were destroyed in a single move by a hideously ugly old witch.


    Even with the entire ne under their control, the Goblin Empire had no more than a thousand men in their magical machine army. Endor had exterminated one-tenth of that number in a single blow. Anyone would be coughing up blood at this point!


    Of course, now that they had discovered so many useful items, the three adepts were not going to hold back.


    With Sabrina in the lead, the three of them turned into a demolition team sweeping across the field, dismantling all theponents of the magical machines that they thought useful and stuffing the parts into their spatial rings.


    The three of them had never been properly trained in the disassembly ofbat magical machines. There was no way they could be gentle in the process of taking the robots apart. They tore the machines into pieces with brute force.


    By the time they hadpleted all their rounds, this ce had turned into a graveyard of magical machines. Metal tes, screw, copper gears, pipes, and metal shells were scattered all over the ce. All metallicponents and unique equipment that radiated magic energy became their spoils, packed together and stuffed in their rings.


    The few machines that had survived and looked on from a distance were furious about this. Yet, there was nothing they could do but clench their teeth and jump up and down.


    However, Greem had clearly underestimated the vengeful nature of the goblins. Just as he was happily stripping the machines, a series of spatial ripples suddenly appeared in the air above him.


    With the amount of knowledge he possessed, Greem easily figured out that this was something being teleported over from a different location.


    The goblins know how to teleport?


    This redundant question had only just surfaced in his mind when Greem remembered the internar teleportation device that Snox had received from Gazlowe.


    [Sensing unnatural spatial teleportation ripples. Rmending host remain vignt. Countdown beginning. 5... 4... 3... 2...1... ]


    As the Chip¡¯s notification rang out, a hole the size of a human¡¯s head opened at the center of the spatial ripples. An alchemical chicken forged purely from metal emerged from the hole.


    The chicken let out a strange cluck.


    "Self-destruction initiated."


    A terrifying explosion that had been amplified several times appeared no more than five meters above Greem¡¯s head as his expression turned sour.

 Chapter 511 Night Attack against the Flying Ship

    Chapter 511 Night Attack against the Flying Ship


    Targeted teleportation with explosive chicken?


    Greem had never even thought of such an amazingbo. The main reason for that was due to the difficulty of mastering targeted teleportation!


    In all the years he had lived, only Alice had possessed that ability. However, Alice relied on her spatial talent and didn¡¯t know much about spatial principles.


    Grem had never expected a bunch of foolish and noisy goblins to be able to use targeted teleportation with such uracy.


    Boom! A fiery explosion.


    Greem immediately used Fire Teleportation and moved away.


    A magic energy battery was clearly hidden inside the explosive chicken. The violent energy ripples triggered by the explosion had almost ravaged every inch of space within a radius of ten meters. If Greem had stayed on the spot, he wouldn¡¯t have died, but the magic energy that would have surged through him would have easily destroyed the elementium energy within his body.


    If one were to speak in more familiar terms used in his previous life, this sort of attack wouldn¡¯t have taken away any of his hit points, but it would have burned a lot of his mana.


    Before he could even get himself together, an evenrger spatial hole appeared in the air. A flood of explosive chickens poured down from within.


    It seemed like they were sent here by the goblins just to blow themselves up. All the chickens immediately activated their goblin rockets when they saw Greem and the others. Their bodies were propelled by a burst of fire and crashed towards the adepts as if they were flying.


    How many explosive chickens was this!?


    A hundred, or a thousand?


    Greem, Sabrina, and Endor were terrified. They swiftly used every trick they had to escape outwards. Behind them; Boom! Boom! Boom! A series of perpetual explosions. Moreover, the violent magic energy was still chasing them and keeping at their heels, not allowing them a single moment¡¯s rest.


    The explosive chickens were not living beings. Endor¡¯s Poison Halo did not affect them. On the other hand, Sabrina was a mechanical adept that focused on mid to close-range melee. However, even Sabrina had to run when faced with a swarm of fearless explosive chickens that self-destructed the moment they caught up with the enemy. She spent all her magical abilities in keeping herself alive.


    Only Greem seemed to have some energy to spare. After teleportation, he would always throw some fire spells back behind him to clear up the explosive chickens chasing behind them.


    However, the goblin raid boss mastermind behind this attack became infuriated after Greem repeated this two or three more times. Another batch of explosive chickens teleported over once again.


    Even Greem¡¯s scalp buzzed when he saw the sea of chickens behind him. He had no choice but to leap to Sabrina and Endor¡¯s side and bring them away with him.


    This pursuitsted a good fifteen minutes and only ended after Greem and the others had managed to exhaust the energy of the rockets inside the explosive chickens. Yet, at this moment, the massive hull of a flying ship once again emerged on the distant horizon.


    "Go!" Greem turned back and red at the flying ship. He coldly spat out, "If that¡¯s how they want to y, then we will go and meet them at their home tonight."


    Having said that, a ze of fire emerged, and Greem disappeared from the scene with Sabrina and Endor.


    ............


    As night fell, the riotous day on the Goblin Continent turned peaceful and silent once again.


    The massive body of the flying ship was like that of a colossal monster under the silver light of the moon. Its sharp metallic features seemed to have been draped in ayer of silvery radiance as it slowly glided in the skies a thousand meters above the ground.


    The enemies were still running.


    The magical machine squad in the distance asionally sent them the position of the enemy. It was sometimes in the west, and sometimes the coordinates would be in the east. The direction in which the enemy was heading was always changing. Based on this, it was evident that the explosive chickens from the day had been a massive problem for the enemies. They made it such that the adepts no longer dared to stay in a single ce for too long.


    From an outsider¡¯s point of view, the flying ship was too slow and cumbersome. However, it wasn¡¯t until when you stood upon the decks of the ship and looked down upon the hills, mountains, rivers, andkes zooming past you that you truly understood the speed of the vessel.


    One could see plenty of scattered sparks of light set against the pitch-ck backdrop of the ground from high up here. The dense gathering of lights were the goblin cities, while the scattered firefly-like lights were the goblin viges.


    Every light that lit up represented the continuation of the goblin civilization!


    Tigule stood high upon a small tform at the bow of the ship. He silently looked down upon everything below as he allowed the cold air at this altitude to pierce his leather jacket and through his chilled body. His tworge ears, unique to the green goblins, had blown to the back of his head. They shivered slightly in the wind.


    The heavy thumping of boots rang out just as Tigule was caught in his daze.


    "Sir Tigule, Commander Toltoy requests your presence at thebat meeting!" A goblin messenger wearing a thick windbreaker and goggles saluted and shouted loudly.


    There was no choice. It was hard to hear each other without shouting at this altitude.


    "Not interested!" Tigule coldly replied without turning his head, "Go back and tell Toltoy to erect the energy barrier and see through tonight if he doesn¡¯t want to kill everyone on the ship."


    The messenger had no choice but to go back and do as he was told.


    A short whileter, Toltoy, the captain of the flying ship, appeared where the messenger had been.


    "You¡¯re saying that those human adepts will attack the ship tonight? Where¡¯s your proof?"


    "I have no proof!"


    "......" Toltoy paused for a moment, "Then you¡¯ve got to give me at least a reason!"


    "Instincts!"


    "......"


    Toltoy finally left after a sigh.


    Even after another hour, the energy forcefield that could surround the ship still hadn¡¯t appeared. This time, it was Tigule¡¯s turn to sigh.


    In truth, Tigule could understand Toltoy to some extent. Toltoy might be themander of the flying ship, but he was entirely at the behest of Prince Gazlowe, who hid deep within the vessel. Activating the energy forcefield generator and sustaining aplete forcefield might keep the flying ship safe from all enemies, but it would also take up over forty percent of the space furnace¡¯s energy output.


    In doing so, the flight speed of the ship would be reduced by seventy percent. It would only be able to float through the skies at a rate of fifteen kilometers per hour.


    Trying to catch up to the escaping human adepts at that speed was an absolute joke. That was why it was impossible for Commander Toltoy to slow down the ship over the random ramblings and so-called ¡¯instincts¡¯ of a goblin that had failed at his task, especially when the frontline was continually sending back the vague locations of the human adepts!


    Even though he had already expected this, Tigule still felt his heart ache tremendously when he faced the cold reality in front of him. Vague spots of color appeared before his eyes.


    Tigule stumbled backward and crashed into a towering metallic machine.


    God of War!


    That was the name that Tigule had privately given to his magical machine. He¡¯d never had the guts to reveal this name he had been mulling over, as he had yet to obtain any decent aplishments.


    Yet, in that battle from earlier, all of his mechanicpanions had died at the hands of the evil adepts. He, on the other hand, could not avenge them. Even his life had only been spared by thepassion and mercy of the evil adept.


    All these things, all these urrences, bundled together and weighed upon him, pushing him further and further away from his dream!


    Tigule¡¯s heart felt like it had been sliced open by a knife when he thought of this. He could even smell that distinct odor of blood when he breathed.


    "Old friend. Tonight, let us wash the spots off of our bodies with our blood and the blood of the enemies!" Tigule gritted his teeth and entered the cockpit as he caressed the cool, hard surface of the massive Metal Goblin.


    As the magic energy battery connected, the various patterns on the surface of the Metal Goblin started to glow with a shining purple light. The light quickly dimmed down, and the Metal Goblin bent down and silently hid in the darkness where none of the ship¡¯s lights could reach.


    Even though Commander Toltoy didn¡¯t believe in Tigule¡¯s instinct, he still arranged double the usual scouts and patrols on the deck of the ship out of the caution of amanding officer. In fact, he even assigned a squad of seven magical machines at the only entrance to the interior of the ship.


    Midnight.


    The floating ship glided past a tall mountain. It continued to adjust its course, closely trailing behind the three evil adepts that were thirty-five kilometers away.


    What the goblins never imagined was two figures wrapped in thick ck robes raising their heads on the mountain below them. They were taking a good look at the flying ship moving past their heads.


    From beneath, one could perfectly see the white metal hull of the flying ship as well as the rows of windows and metal tes on its sides.


    "Let¡¯s go up! It¡¯s time to teach these goblins a good lesson." The voice of the taller figure on the left was deep and held within it an aura of might that wouldn¡¯t take no for an answer.


    Judging from the voice, it was Greem.


    The ck shadow to the right cast off their robe, revealing a strange body that was half-human and half-machine. It was Sabrina, who had just updated her weaponry systems.


    "Let¡¯s meet up there!"


    Sabrina nodded. Six clusters of red light simultaneously lit up beneath her feet, by her waist, and under her armpits. She shot into the sky like a rocket. She became as agile as a fish in water as the six propellers adjusted, and her speed also increased over time.


    Greem¡¯s body paused for a second. A cluster of fire burst forth as he appeared in the sky two hundred meters above. He casually strolled in the empty air with the Boots of Levitation that he wore on his feet. When the cooldown of Fire Teleportation had passed, yet another rumbling explosion rang out. He was now somewhat close to the flying ship.


    Greem did not intend to remain subtle. He had no means to hide themotion from his Fire Teleportation anyway. Instead, he continued to teleport just like this.


    Finally, with yet another explosion, Greem¡¯s massive body set foot upon the deck of the flying ship!

 Chapter 512 The Ship Crashes

    Chapter 512 The Ship Crashes


    Enemy assault!


    As the ear-piercing siren went off, Greem revealed his most potent form without any hesitation.


    Ferocious elementium mes surged out of his body and wrapped around him, instantly turning Greem into a massive and mighty elementium me humanoid. The sweltering heatwave pushed out in every direction. The temperature of the air in a twenty-meter radius around him shot up to a terrifying four thousand degrees in a matter of two or three seconds.


    This temperature was extremely high. Even the deck made of a ghostly blue alloy couldn¡¯t endure such heat, let alone an ordinary living being. The patterns of the metallic deck started to blur, and a set of clear footprints remained wherever Greem walked.


    The sound of goblin firearms crackled in every direction like popcorn.


    However, as two Lava Shields and five Fire Shields started orbiting Greem¡¯s body, the goblin guards could no longer freely fire as they had been before. Any attack on a Fire Shield triggered a corresponding bacsh burst of fire. The goblin guards dealt negligible damage to Greem, but the bacsh from the Fire Shields was too much for the goblin guards to deal with.


    Several goblin guards ran out from their hiding spots after firing their guns, their bodiespletely ame. The fire elementium was so stubborn and obstinate that it was hard for the goblins to put it out, no matter how much they rolled on the ground and beat it with their clothes.


    As Greem continued forward, the burning goblin guards ran out. After onest futile struggle, they burned into a heap of ashes and despair.


    These ordinary goblin guards might be considered strong and tough among the goblins, but they were as frail as paper-people before a Second Grade adept from a different ne.


    Without magical machines and magic resistant equipment, even the passive fifteen-point fire bacsh of the Fire Shield was too much for them to bear. There was no need to even mention Greem and his Ring of Fire¡¯s forty-five points of power.


    The Greem of the moment was like an overbearing demon that had climbed out of hell. mes surged, and fires flowed wherever he went.


    The entire flying ship was over five hundred meters in length. Greem had stepped on the first half of the vessel, approximately one hundred meters away from the entrance to the cabins that was right in the middle of the ship. Ordinary goblin guards were powerless to stop his advance. However, the seven magical machines guarding before the entrance could.


    Some of the more impulsive goblin mechanics wanted to charge forward immediately, but their captain stopped them.


    Their mission was to guard the cabin entrance and stop the evil adept from breaking through. If they went up to engage the enemy, there was a risk that a new enemy would slip into the cabin. That would directly threaten the safety of Prince Lord Gazlowe.


    The squad captain held back his squad members and had them stand out in a row before the entrance of the cabin. They got into defensive formation and silently waited for reinforcements.


    Commander Toltoy had already received a report when the enemy set foot on the flying ship. At the moment, people were scrambling inside the vessel. In another three to five minutes, arge group of magical machines would be able to swarm out and drown this evil adept with their terrifying numbers.


    Greem stopped advancing after reaching the middle of the front deck. Instead, he looked around him. An intimidating smile appeared on his me-shrouded face.


    "Gas masks? Your reaction speed is pretty fast, isn¡¯t it!?"


    Greem could see leather masks covering the faces of all the burned goblin corpses on the ground. He was smart enough to figure out their purpose without too much thought.


    It seemed the Poison Halo that Endor had cast during the day had utterly terrified the goblins. They only dared to teleport explosive chickens to bombard the adepts until they could equip all their soldiers with gas masks. Sending actualbatants to the adepts was entirely out of the question.


    After a little bit of banter, Greem waved the ze of Destruction in his hand. A massive Meteor Shower and Demonic Wall of Fire exploded with the cabin entrance at the center!


    Spells with such vast reach were impossible to intercept. Thus, the seven magical machines started burning. They screamed, yelled, and struggled to escape the radius of the spell, after which they finally managed to extinguish the mes on them.


    What they hadn¡¯t expected was the terrifying me Demon not taking advantage of the opportunity to rush into the cabin. Instead, the adept took a few steps backward and shouted at the skies, "Hold back that goblin for me!"


    The intensity of the mes around the me Demon increased even further. The crimson mes turned a golden yellow as extreme elementium mes gathered in the hands of the me Demon. He pressed his hands into the metal deck beneath his feet.


    Initially, ayer of colorful lights appeared on the surface of the metal deck, barely resisting the effects of the zing fire. However, as a surge of strange runic powers corroded the insides of the metal, the metal deck could no longer hold together. It shattered.


    The secondyer of the metallic deck was exposed after the firstyer had shattered. It was an alchemical alloy creation with entirely different traits and hardness.


    Unfortunately, much like the firstyer, the metallic deck had an exceptional performance in everything except magic resistance. Soon, the second metal deck eroded as well.


    The thirdyer was revealed.


    The magical machines guarding the cabin entrance flew into a frenzy when they saw the me demon attacking the metal deck with all he had. It seemed the monster wanted to burn an opening into the interior of the ship.


    A barrage of metal bullets crashed against Greem¡¯s Magma Shield like an unrelenting storm. Magma scattered andva sshed, but the rounds did absolutely nothing to the heavily-defended adept.


    Three of the magical machines stormed forward.


    Just as they were midway to the me Demon, three rockets zing with a trail of spiraling fire shot down from the skies and hit them on the backs.


    A small magic energy storm appeared, and the three magical machines immediately copsed to the ground without any warning. It was as if they were toys that had their batteries taken out of them.


    Magic Energy Bomb!


    The goblin mechanics in the four machines that had stayed by the entrance opened their mouths wide. They couldn¡¯t believe their own eyes. That...that was the newest magic energy weapon that the superiors had just handed over to them. How was it that the weapons had be aplices of the enemy before the goblins had gotten a chance to use them?


    The four machines quickly gathered together and raised their ck gun barrels. They looked around them cautiously for anymotion. Energy shield, gas mask, energy goggles, energy spectrometer; the goblins activated all their auxiliary equipment, ensuring they werepletely protected.


    After hiding so long in the darkness, Tigule could no longer hold back. Greem was almost about to break through the metallic decks. Tigule strode forward as his three-meter tall Metallic Goblin charged towards the me Demon like a valiant knight. The Metallic Goblin thrust the metal dagger in its hand towards Greem¡¯s throat.


    The oddughter of a girl rang out in the air.


    Two metallic appendages stabbed out of nowhere, their tips sharp as the finest of daggers.


    Mechanical Adept Sabrina finally showed herself entirely. Eight metallic appendages as thick as a thumb waved about her body like the tentacles of a squid. They formed a defensive line of metal and steel, obstructing Tigule¡¯s path.


    Sabrina couldn¡¯t help but grimace in pain after only two or three exchanges.


    A Metallic Goblin that had some semnce of Second Grade power was not something a First Grade mechanical adept like herself could stop. Two of her metallic appendages had been severed in a mere three seconds. Her own body might have been damaged if she hadn¡¯t activated a Goblin Rocket at close range to scare Tigule away.


    At this point, Greem had managed to use his terrifying hand of mes to break through the fiveyers of the metallic deck. He seeded in opening up a bowl-sized hole that prated straight into the inside of the ship.


    Greem didn¡¯t just enter the hole thoughtlessly. Instead, he first raised his head and took a deep breath.


    The breath he took was so deep and massive that it caused a small natural storm in the air.


    He waited until his body of mes had expanded to its limits before bending down and blowing all the fire energy in his body straight into the opening.


    Out of nowhere, a hot breeze filled with the smell of sulfur and fire blew across the interior of the ship. An unstoppable stream of fire ravaged every inch of space inside the flying ship.


    Such pure fire energy could hardly threaten the goblin mechanics hiding inside their magical machines, especially spread across the massive area inside the ship. However, apart from the almost four hundred goblin mechanics, there were still thousands of ordinary goblin engineers, alchemists, and other technicians aboard the vessel, along with many goblin soldiers.


    Those peoplecked the protection of a magical machine. What awaited them was death by magical fire if they failed to hide in an enclosed space before the stream of mes reached them.


    This move by Greem was savage and sinister!


    He had wholly avoided those pesky magical machines and targeted the unprotected ordinary goblins. Moreover, there were plenty of goblin technicians on this ship!


    The flying ship trembled slightly and a deafening explosion echoed inside the ship.


    It seemed Greem¡¯s attack had triggered some equipment at the core of the ship. The entire vessel started to go out of control.


    "Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!" Hidden in his secret room, Gazlowe smashed the monitoring lens in his hand and cursed over and over.


    Commander Toltoy¡¯s furious voice rang out from the horn in front of Gazlowe, "Lord Gazlowe, this isn¡¯t good. External energies have intruded on the space furnace we hastily installed. It¡¯s already... it¡¯s already gone out of control."


    Gazlowe had always treasured his own life. He couldn¡¯t help but feel a shiver run down his spine when he heard Toltoy¡¯s words. He calmed down and solemnly said, "Can the space furnace still be saved?"


    Toltoy¡¯s crying yell rang out from the horn, "We can¡¯t save it anymore. The great engineers are trying their best to salvage it right now. They say...they say that the space furnace will onlyst another three minutes before it explodes."


    Gazlowe shivered once more when he heard the word explode. He coldly answered, "Ignore those idiots. Youe to secret room B512 immediately. We will teleport and leave this ce as soon as possible. Remember, do not tell anyone else. Only five people can teleport away. I will wait two minutes for you. If you don¡¯t arrive in two minutes, then hmph! I will just take it that you¡¯ve died for your country."


    "Wait for me, please. I¡¯ll be there as soon as I can."


    Toltoy¡¯s desperate screech rang out from the other end of the horn.


    One could hear the shouts of confusion and frantic footsteps in the background.


    The flying ship shook once more and slowly fell from the skies!

 Chapter 513 Spatial Vortex

    Chapter 513 Spatial Vortex


    The flying ship was crashing!


    The massive ship was like a drunk, shaking and wavering from side to side. Blinding mes and debris asionally sted out from the side of the vessel, along with endless screaming figures.


    Mechanical Girl Sabrina dug her metallic appendages deep into the hull¡¯s metallic deck. At this point, the deck nted sixty degrees. It was only then that she could free up her hands to grab Greem, who had exhausted all the energy in his body. Her remaining appendages continuously fired magic energy beams to keep the Metallic Goblin from approaching them.


    The move from earlier had taken everything out of Greem; every drop of his fire energy had been used up. Even though his Heart of mes was continuously replenishing him with more power, it couldn¡¯tpare to the massive deficit he was experiencing. The meager amounts of new energy simply were not enough.


    Only Greem could dare to be so reckless and arrogant. If it had been Sabrina or Endor who had exhausted their energies, then what awaited them would be a long and endless journey of recovery. Even back in the World of Adepts, a Second Grade adept would require two to three days to recover after exhausting all of their strength. Here in the low-magic Goblin ne, it might take up to half a month.


    If one were to factor in the pursuit of the goblins, they wouldn¡¯t be able to recover all of their energy after an entire month.


    Only Greem could so recklessly and fearlessly waste his energy due to his Heart of mes perpetually providing him with pure fire energy. Otherwise, Greem wouldn¡¯t dare to take such massive risks and ce himself in such apromising position. He had lost all ability to threaten the enemy!


    The ringing sirens followed closely, one after another.


    Magical machines crashed through the hull and escaped from the cabin before frantically flying away from the ship. Greem could clearly see plenty of goblins clinging to all of the magical machines.


    This unnatural act of escape that the enemies were attempting was a clear hint to Greem.


    The flying ship had a space furnace hidden within it. If something happened to the space furnace, then things were troublesome!


    "Leave now. Don¡¯t dy any longer. I suspect the space furnace inside the ship has malfunctioned. Otherwise, the goblins wouldn¡¯t be in such a frenzy to escape." Greem quickly reminded Sabrina.


    His voice wasn¡¯t soft. It seemed he didn¡¯t mind letting that Metallic Goblin hear what he was saying.


    Unfortunately, the Metallic Goblin didn¡¯t seem to have heard what he said. It continued to rush forward while leaning against the nted deck.


    Sabrina shouted and braced her legs against the deck. She then flew away from the flying ship with Greem in her arms. As she flew outwards, she continued to fire a web of magic energy beams with the miniaturized magic energy guns at the tips of her metallic appendages to obstruct the Metallic Goblin.


    A magic energy beam identally hit the Metallic Goblin, causing brilliant sparks to burst all over its metallic shell. Sabrina took advantage of the metallic goblin being disabled and fired two goblin rockets at the machine. The magic energy storm that exploded at close distancepletely enveloped the Metallic Goblin.


    This time there was no way Tigule could turn the tables, regardless of how powerful he might be!


    The Metallic Goblin struggled slightly before crashing to the ground powerlessly.


    Sabrina saw that the metal goblin was a terrestrial magical machine; it had no flying device installed. If Tigule fell from this height of a thousand meters, he would be smashed into meat paste.


    Sabrina couldn¡¯t help but let out a joyful and chillingugh when she thought of the terrible fate that this annoying enemy was about to face. Yet, just as she was flying outwards with Greem in her arms, a pretty little white flower suddenly bloomed in the sky below her.


    Goblin Parachute!


    Dammit! That bastard Tigule actually had something like that with him!


    Anger bubbled in Sabrina¡¯s heart. She dove downward and intended to finish the job. Greem patted her back lightly and pointed at the flying ship that was now crashing while spinning in a spiral pattern.


    Sabrina instantly forgot any grudges when the thought of the space furnace came to mind. She hugged Greem even more tightly, and the booster rockets behind her sted with even more power. The two adepts rapidly glided towards the distance.


    A massive explosion that shook the heavens and earth rang from behind them when they were five kilometers away. Arge, blinding fireball appeared on the distant horizon.


    The entirend suddenly turned from night to day.


    The harsh light and heat were like golden spears, creating ferocious gales as they shot in every direction. The winds hadn¡¯t yet reached them, but already Sabrina and Greem could feel a stinging pain on their bodies.


    Greem didn¡¯t even need to remind her. Sabrina took out everything she had and frantically flew away. As she flew, she dove down and used her bright mechanical eye to scan for a suitable hiding spot below.


    "There." Greem was much superior to Sabrina when it came to elementium senses and detection. Greem pointed at a hill nearby and had her fly there.


    There was no point and no time to argue at this moment.


    Sabrina descended without any hesitation andnded behind the hill.


    They had justnded when a sharp howling rang out. The savagely violent shockwaves from the explosion blew past the hill. All the trees and nts exposed atop the slope instantly snapped in half before being blown far away by the subsequent shockwaves.


    The fierce gale uprooted everything that stood out. Even the dirt of the hill and the vine nts that rested upon them were not spared. After the strong winds blew away all the soil and nts, hard stone was revealed beneath the earth.


    Judging from the brilliant shine of the rock¡¯s surface, the metallicposition of the hill¡¯s stone had to be very high. Moreover, this hill seemed to be one solid entity of its own that went as deep as a hundred meters underground. This kind of hardness made it impossible for the explosion in the distance to harm it, even if it were ten times stronger than this.


    Greem and Sabrina finally survived that explosion without much trouble thanks to the shelter of what remained of the hill. When the shockwaves started to die down, Greem climbed to the top of the reduced mountain and stared at the center of the explosion in the distance. His eyebrows furrowed together.


    Even though it hadn¡¯t even been fifteen minutes, the fire energy from the Heart of mes had been enough to sustain Greem moving.


    "Are we not meeting up with Endor?" Sabrina arrived at Greem¡¯s side and watched the slowly dimming sun with him.


    "If I¡¯m not wrong, the flying ship had already snapped into two halves before the explosion."


    "So?"


    "So, there might be something left behind."


    Sabrina silently sighed.


    Perhaps this was the most significant difference between her and this mysterious Second Grade adept.


    Her thought process focused at every moment on how to stay safe. Yet Greem always seemed to ce the acquiring of benefits ahead of everything else!


    Sabrina hesitated for a moment before lunging towards the searing wind. She grabbed Greem and flew against the wind, quickly heading towards the ce they had just fled.


    The ground had beenpletely razed t. All the rivers, mountains, and creeks had vanished without a trace. Everything else had also disappeared. The dirt and earth had been blown away in many ces, revealing the hardyers of stone and dry riverbeds.


    From a distance, between the ck and white sky andnd, the entire ground appeared to be pitch-ck. You could sense the chaotic space energy and frightening spatial turbulence everywhere.


    Such a scene was usually only seen at the edges of a ruined ne. However, this ce was the main continent of the Goblin ne!


    Sabrina carefully adjusted the direction and strength of her booster rockets with Greem¡¯s help and avoided the multiple pockets of turbulence.


    It was ordinarily difficult for a being of a ne to make it through the nar barrier and into space. However, if one encountered spatial turbulence, the person only needed to close their eyes and jump in. It was highly likely that they would be brought to a different dimension.


    Of course, it was more likely that you would beunched into the vast space beyond the realm, where the space energy would corrode your body into unobservable tiny particles that would be spread to every corner of space.


    Sabrina spent half an hour to cross the five-kilometer distance.


    The space furnace had exploded in midair.


    A small spatial vortex slowly moved across the sky above the location of the explosion. Colorful and brilliant strips of lights wavered around the spatial vortex.


    One couldn¡¯t let the beautiful strips of lights deceive them. In the eyes of a knowledgeable adept, that ce was an extreme hazard. That was because that spot held the faults ofws that would only ur when the narws shed with space energy. It was a fearsome ce where a single misstep would mean death.


    All thews that had initially been suited to the ne became chaotic and disorderly in an area like this.


    Greem tried to use his elementium vision to look at the hazardous area, but only blinding red warning signs could be seen when he opened his eyes. If he hadn¡¯t closed his eyes in time and cut off his extended spiritual senses, then the massive stream of data might have consumed the Chip¡¯s insignificant data processing bandwidth in an instant.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare easily extend his Spirit into those rainbow strips of light, even if he had Spirit that far exceeded Sabrina¡¯s.


    The two of them slowlynded a quarter of a kilometer away from the center of the explosion. They felt their heads hurt when they looked at the rainbow lights floating in the space before them.


    They saw the remaining half of the flying ship entangled in many prismatic ribbons of light, suspended in the air. Much like the ship, masses of dirt, rocks, fallen trees, rotting leaves, and goblin corpses had be entangled in the wisps of light. They were floating in a mysterious and profound trajectory through the air, slowly being devoured by the spatial vortex.


    Greem¡¯s expression changed.


    If the spatial vortex devoured anything in front of them, then who knew which corner of the space they would have to travel to find them!

 Chapter 514 Goblin Traitor

    Chapter 514 Goblin Traitor


    Sabrina carefully made her way through the rainbow strips of light.


    Eight agile metallic appendages floated in front of her, helping her detect those invisible narw faults. These fault areas were often spots of chaotic gravity, turbulent spacetime, or even just areas of spatial storms. It didn¡¯t matter which they were; they were lethal to a mere First Grade adept.


    That was why the metallic appendages that Sabrina held in front of her became talismans of protection of sorts. She would immediately retract them if she sensed any change in the narws in front of the appendages. Of course, she couldn¡¯t avoid loss of parts andponents in this process. Still, it was much better than actually being caught in a fault.


    Greem, on the other hand, followed closely behind Sabrina. He precisely traced her path, not daring to make even a single misstep.


    Tens of thousands of pieces of debris slowly floated past their eyes like freeze frames from a roll of film. Among these were wooden casks filled with golden wine, goblin firearms snapped in half, shattered pieces of the metal deck, dirt, nts, and some goblin corpses with faces frozen in terror and shock.


    They gathered together and slowly moved towards a point in space as if being dragged by an invisible current. The spatial vortex was slowly devouring everything.


    The two adepts carefully avoided all the obvious narw faults and closed in on the massive remaining half of the ship. The ship had broken clean in half at the center, providing the adepts with a cross-sectional view of its contents. They could even clearly see the ces where the metallic deck had distorted and broken off.


    They saw the dark tunnels and wrecked cabins through the cross-section. The objects within the ship were still spilling outwards, providing the rainbow lights with even more spoils.


    "Let¡¯s go in!" Greem quickly took a look at everything, "We only have half an hour. We need to get out in time, regardless of whether we find anything. Otherwise, we will be dragged into the spatial vortex along with it."


    Sabrina nodded.


    The two adepts wished each other good luck before bending their bodies and diving into the light-filled area.


    There was no air inside the rainbow light strip. There was no gravity either. Everything levitated in an almost motionless state. When he had still been outside the piece of lights, Greem had been able to see the objects within floating at an extremely slow speed. However, the moment he entered the strip of light himself, time seemed to have stopped. He couldn¡¯t sense any passing of time.


    Of course, such a strange phenomenon was not going to be an issue for the adepts.


    Sabrina made her way into a corridor in the middle of the ship using the force from her me jets. Her metallic appendages grabbed onto the walls on the left and right as she disappeared into the darkness like an octopus.


    Meanwhile, Greem stepped on shattered pieces of wood and floating corpses to make his way into the belly of the ship.


    Their target was clear. They were aiming for the cabin rooms of the leaders.


    Sabrina chose the captain¡¯s room and the warehouse, while Greem was going for the office that Gazlowe had been hiding in.


    The ship was slowly spinning due to theck of gravity. As such, many of the paths they were taking and the arrangement of the rooms differed from usual.


    As a Second Grade adept, breathing and eating were no longer necessary for survival. Most of the time, these actions were only habits and a means by which to obtain energy from the external world. That was why Greem tried to ce his Ring of Fire just two meters away from him and use it as a sensory device as well as the first line of defense.


    Much of Greem¡¯s fire energy had recovered after his downtime. It was not sufficient for a proper fight, but it would be more than enough for him to defend himself.


    He was now in the fifthyer beneath the deck.


    While the ship wasn¡¯t big, it still took time tob through it. Greem very wisely decided to start searching from the third floor onwards. The first two floors alone had taken up fifteen minutes of his time.


    As he slowly floated past the rooms with his head down and his feet up, he couldn¡¯t help but be intrigued by the arrangement and decorations of the fifthyer.


    There were quite a lot of luxury items floating in the cabins here. In terms of beauty and delicateness, the furniture here far outssed any goblin furniture Greem had seen. More interestingly, Greem also found several highly-secure st doors. All these seemed to point towards the fact that the goblin who lived here was a vital individual used to a life of luxury.


    However, what Greem hadn¡¯t expected was the fact that all these st doors had been opened. Moreover, they had been opened forcefully.


    As there was no air in here, sound couldn¡¯t be transmitted. Consequently, Greem couldn¡¯t hear anything out of the ordinary. However, he could still sense the light tremors of the ship.


    Someone¡¯s in there!


    This strange thought caused a shiver to run down Greem¡¯s spine.


    Such an urrence would not be enough to scare a Second Grade adept like himself. Greem slowly floated towards the metal doors that had been tossed aside after being taken down. He seemed to understand something after observing the marks left on the doors.


    It was a messy and disorderlyb.


    The metallic experimental tform floated through the room, along with plenty of oddly-shaped tools and unfamiliar equipment. In front of a warehouse wall by the side of theb, there was a short figure with a massive chainsaw in their hands. The individual was using the huge chainsaw, that was usually equipped on the logging machines, to cut away at a mysteriously hidden drawer.


    It was apparent that the drawer and walls around it had undergone some kind of special treatment. The alloy used to forge them was imprable. The wall and the drawer remained unmoved, even as sparks and dust flew everywhere from the revolving chainsaw.


    Given the progress this person was making, they would probably be unable to get anything done even after another ten hours.


    "Tigule, we meet again!" Greem sent a mental message over when he saw that familiar form.


    Tigule, who had been focused on taking the drawer apart, seemed never to have expected seeing someone alive here. His wrist trembled, and the giant chainsaw slipped to his side. He turned its green triangr head frantically, revealing a gas mask on his face.


    Ah, so that¡¯s why!


    Greem had been somewhat curious about how Tigule had managed to survive in these conditions. He might be a First Grade goblin mechanic and have a body as tough as a First Grade adept, but there was no reason he should have been able to endure this unique environment that had no air. Greem immediately understood everything when he saw that gas mask!


    Still, why was Tigule here? Greem still had questions.


    If he was an honest goblin, then what he should have been doing right now was gathering the corpses of the dead goblins outside. If he was a greedy goblin, then the warehouse of the ship should be the best ce to go. But he was doing none of this. Instead, he had made his way to this secretb that belonged to Prince Gazlowe and was desperately trying to open that drawer.


    That was difficult for Greem to wrap his mind around!


    Cold light gleamed in Tigule¡¯s eyes when he turned back and saw the towering Greem shrouded in his fire. Hostile intent bubbled in his re. However, Tigule quickly realized that he was not in a magical machine as he waved his chainsaw and lunged at the enemy.


    Without his magical machine, he was only a First Grade goblin mechanic. He was as frail as a paper person in front of the terrifying Greem. There wasn¡¯t even a need for somerge-scale spell. The simplest magical fireball would reduce him to ashes and make him part of this silent graveyard.


    "I wish to make a trade with you!" Tigule quickly changed his attitude, seemingly understanding the situation he was in. He shouted at Greem.


    Even though his voice couldn¡¯t transmit in this vacuum, Greem still understood his intentions through his spiritual senses.


    "I have no interest in trading with weaklings!" Greem smiled coldly, "Moreover, I don¡¯t think you cane up with anything that¡¯s useful to me."


    "What about the coordinates to a ne world?" Tigule waved his hand. He was hiding a metal shining with an odd light in his left hand, "These are the world coordinates to another small-sized ne. Are you also not interested in this?"


    Greem¡¯s expression at this moment was fascinated!


    Who knew... who could have ever known that he would hear news of another world from a low-ss goblin of the Goblin ne? That was even more unbelievable than hearing of a rabbit raping a bear.


    However, he immediately started doubting the truth of this information.


    After all, Tigule¡¯s identity and history should never have and could never have gotten him involved with ssified information like that involving the coordinates of another ne world. Unless... this wasn¡¯t his property!


    Greem took a quick look around the room. He seemed to have understood something when he saw the messy quarters thaty at the end of theb.


    Greem silently drifted forward.


    "Stop!" Tigule opened his green eyes wide in anxiety, "You take a half a step forward, and I¡¯ll destroy these world coordinates!"


    He took two steps backward and ced the metal ball in front of the rumbling chainsaw.


    Judging from the appearance of the metal ball, it was no more than a delicate and well-crafted alchemical item. There was a strange energy aura radiating from within it, and it was not a solid metal ball.


    Dammit, it does not feel good to have the enemy¡¯s grip around your throat.


    Greem bared his hands and stopped on the spot. He smiled and looked at the opponent, "Then, what do you wish to get out of this?"


    "This hidden drawer," Tigule tilted his head, "I want the information inside this hidden drawer!"


    "Information?" Greem hesitated for a moment.


    "Don¡¯t worry. This information presents no benefit to you," Tigule hesitated for a moment before gritting his teeth andying it out, "This drawer contains proof of Gazlowe¡¯s collusion with members of the royal family, as well as detailed information about his subordinate forces. I need these things!"


    "Ooooh." A yful smile appeared across Greem¡¯s face.


    "Indeed, I belong to the Anderme Royal Family, pledged to her highness Princess Vanessa!" An expression of pride appeared on Tigule¡¯s ugly green face when he mentioned his true background.


    It was obvious that he was a passionate fanatic loyal to the goblin royalty!

 Chapter 515 Gazlowes Ambition

    Chapter 515 Gazlowe¡¯s Ambition


    Even though Greem wanted to engage in a more in-depth discussion of the goblin political intrigues with Tigule, the reality of the situation didn¡¯t allow for it.


    As the ship wreckage slowly drifted closer and closer to the spatial vortex, the entirety of its structure was affected by the area of chaotic gravity. The ship was being pulled in different directions by hundreds and thousands of gravitational forces. The wreckage would probably have disintegrated and split apart if not for the goblins sturdy craftsmanship.


    Even so, as more and more gravitational pulls started acting on the wreckage with increasing strength, the hull began to creak and tremble.


    There wasn¡¯t much time left for this remaining half of the ship!


    "Move away. We don¡¯t have much time left!" Greem didn¡¯t have time to engage in moreplex negotiations. He shouted under his breath and dove towards the hidden drawer.


    Tigule carefully dodged to the side and kept a tight grip on the metal ball in his hands.


    Greem arrived in front of the warehouse wall where the hidden drawer sat. He then smacked the wall hard with his hand and silently sensed the shape and size of the drawer using the vibrations in the wall.


    The things in the hidden drawer were obviously significant to Gazlowe. Yet, the process to open the drawer was also extremelyplicated and drawn-out. That was why Gazlowe himself hadn¡¯t been able to take it away with him when he escaped the ship using the teleportation device.


    This safe that Gazlowe had personally created employed some sort of new high-quality alloy in its creation. Not only was it incredibly resilient, but it also possessed the magical resistance that all other goblin alloyscked. It wasn¡¯t easy for Greem if he wanted to burn his way through. First, it would take time. Second, it would be hard for him to manage the intensity of the me.


    If the fire identally spilled into the drawer, all that information regarding ¡¯traitor of the crown¡¯ and ¡¯Gazlowe¡¯s subordinate forces¡¯ would be destroyed. The deal from earlier would be off the table.


    Greem no longer hesitated once he thought of this. Fire sted forth from his palms pressed against the walls and quickly spread out through the entire wall. The ravenous fire incinerated everything around the drawer, leaving behind an outline of the hidden drawer and a three-meter zone around it.


    The entire wall was about seven to eight meters wide, and the metallic base and the hidden drawer took up about half of that width. Under ordinary circumstances, it would have been pure fantasy for a thief to pry the secret drawer open. However, under this environment of zero gravity, taking the hidden drawer away along with its metallic base was undoubtedly the most convenient method.


    Tigule, who was coldly watching from aside, couldn¡¯t help but sigh. If he had thought of this method earlier, he wouldn¡¯t have needed to spend so much time trying to break this special alloy. He wouldn¡¯t have been caught by Greem then.


    After the fire illuminated the outline of the metallic base, he put in even more power. The mes crashed against the drawer and the bottom. Finally, Greem managed to pry the whole thing out of the wooden deck. It was a strange metallic box that was five meters long, three meters wide, and five meters deep. If it weren¡¯t for theck of gravity, Tigule might not have been able to bring it out of this ce, even if he was operating his magical machine.


    The size of the whole thing was more than enough to serve as a coffin for the goblins!


    "Go!"


    Greem conjured a ming hand to carry the metal ¡¯coffin¡¯ as he shouted at Tigule. He went ahead and rushed out of the ship. All the corridors and decks that stood in his way were sted apart by Greem¡¯s ferocious fireballs.


    One man, one goblin, and one coffin flew out of the ship in an odd turn of events. They lunged towards the edge of the column of rainbow lights.


    The three of them had just left the strip of lights when the metal coffin crushed the hand of fire under the force of gravity. It rolled and crashed into the ground below.


    "Why is this guy with you?" Even though the ce that Sabrina had headed for was even deeper into the ship, she had made it back quicker than Greem.


    "It¡¯s a long story!" Greem sighed and turned to speak to Tigule, "I have brought the thing out. However, before we make our exchange, I¡¯ll need to check if the thing inside the ball is what you im it is. Don¡¯t even think of leaving this ce if you lied to me!"


    "Sabrina, I¡¯ll leave this matter to you!"


    Tigule seemed to have expected this. He took a few steps backward nonchntly and bared his hands and let Sabrina do her work.


    Greem¡¯s mes were not suited for such delicate work. That was why he very wisely left the task to the mechanical girl. He also quickly gave her an exnation.


    Despite her calm and steady nature, even Sabrina couldn¡¯t help but get excited when she learned that the reward for opening the metal coffin would be the world coordinates to a ne.


    The spatial coordinates of a ne world. Those are spatial coordinates to a ne world!


    Even if they weren¡¯t going after the benefits that could be found in that ne, just auctioning off the spatial coordinates in the World of Adepts would allow them to gain a million magical crystals easily. That was an irresistible temptation for a First Grade adept.


    Sabrina charged towards the metal coffin without another word. Her seven or eight metallic appendages temporarily turned into drills and started whirring as they wildly took the box apart.


    The metal coffin might have beenposed of excellent alloy materials, but it still couldn¡¯t resist the wild destruction wreaked upon it by a mechanical adept. In just fifteen minutes, Sabrina had drilled arge hole into the surface of the hidden drawer. The objects within had also been retrieved.


    There were no gemstones or coins inside. Instead, there were only engineering blueprints and a thick register of names.


    Greem quickly flipped through the documents. On the engineering blueprints, he saw plenty of names that shocked him: Sky Patrol Ship, Goblin Golem Dragon, Goblin Mortar, Goblin Pacemaker, Goblin Dragonce, Dimensional Ripper, Thunder God Titan, and even more.


    These were, without a doubt, designs and ideas that Gazlowe had for moreplex uses of magic energy with his elementary grasp of magic energy.


    In all seriousness, the Sky Patrol Ship should be the strengthened version of the flying ship. They were also flying battleships explicitly designed for travel in space, beyond their realm. After all, regardless of how powerful the goblin ne became, the goblins themselves were still frail and weak creatures. Without suitable flying ships, they wouldn¡¯t even be qualified to step out of their own ne.


    Goblin Golem Dragons. One could tell from the designs and functions denominated on the blueprints that these were meant to be powerful magical machines designed forndbat. Their appearance seemed to be imitating those of hydras. The golems would be equipped with goblin mortars, goblin dragonnces, goblin cannons, and all sorts of terrifying magic energy weapons.


    Siege was undoubtedly its only strength!


    The two designs were still barely well-thought out enough for Greem to imagine their abilities. However, the Dimensional Ripper and Thunder God Titan were much closer to pointless fantasy.


    ording to Gazlowe¡¯s thoughts, the Dimensional Ripper would be a particr sort of anti-space furnace.


    It couldn¡¯t absorb energy for space, but it could use the energy stored within itself to rip apart the space in ne worlds and create terrifying spatial vortices.


    The spatial vortex created by the explosion of the space furnace this time was only about ten meters in diameter. However, its existence had already caused indescribable damage to the geography within a fifty-kilometer radius. The environment within a five hundred kilometer radius was also severely affected.


    However, the Dimensional Ripper that Gazlowe envisioned could easily create a spatial vortex that was a kilometer in diameter.


    If such a massive spatial vortex were allowed to appear inside a ne, the very foundation of that ne world would be shaken!


    That was why Gazlowe wouldn¡¯t even need to call his concept a Dimensional Ripper if it actually worked. It would be much more urate to call it the ne Ripper.


    Just think of it. Send a suicide soldier into the enemy¡¯s ne world and detonate a Dimensional Ripper- no, ¡¯ne Ripper,¡¯ right in there. The oue of it would be astounding.


    On the other hand, the Thunder God Titan was meant to be a mighty and terrifying magical machine that rivaled the Fourth Grade in Gazlowe¡¯s mind. It had a towering humanoid body and imprable metal shell. It would have a perpetual source of magical energy and wield ferocious and violent lightning storms.


    Of course, the greatest obstacle to Gazlowe having all this was the miniaturization and functionality of the space furnace. After all, all magical machines needed a perpetual source of magical energy if they wanted to engage in sustainedbat. The current version of the space furnace was too crude and rough for that purpose.


    That was why the foundation for allrge magical machines would have to be a magic energy furnace!


    Greem flipped to the end and looked at the halfplete blueprints of a magic energy furnace. Blue light shed in the depths of his eyes.


    The Chip could only store the data in its information library with such a short glimpse. It didn¡¯t have enough time to evaluate and make calctions based on the content. However, just by instinct, Greem could tell that Gazlowe was walking on the right path; as expected of the top goblin engineer and inventor of the Goblin Empire.


    If he just had one or two hundred more years, all of these wild delusions and fantasies might slowly be a reality.


    However, with the average lifespan of goblins, would Gazlowe have that much time on his hands?


    Even Greem felt moved by the blueprints. He couldn¡¯t help but start wondering if Gazlowe¡¯s recent activities were rted to the fact that he was about to die.


    "Human Adept. As per our agreement, I will take all of this information with me." Tigule could feel his heart rise to his throat when he saw Greem staring at the blueprints. He quickly reminded the adept of their deal.


    He might possess a deep hatred for the two adepts before him, but it was far more important for him toplete the task that her Highness the Princess had given to him.


    "Oh, you meant those registers." Greem came back to the present and started flipping through the registers by the blueprints. As expected, lots of goblin names were written on it, along with trade records that took ce in various ces and times.


    Greem intentionally kept count and found that the significantst name of Anderme showed up often.


    It seemed this was the critical information that the goblin royalty so badly wanted!


    The other register contained the records and staff roster of a goblin financial group known as Risk Investment Company. The names listed at the front all had impressive titles like Mayor, Commander, and General attached to them.


    Greem casually assessed the thickness of the register. All of the members of the Risk Investment Company were probably recorded in this book!


    "ording to our previous agreement, you can only take these registers away with you!" Greem smiled coldly as he said, "These blueprints will be my spoils!"

 Chapter 516 Goblin Royalty

    Chapter 516 Goblin Royalty


    Tigule¡¯s bargaining chips were insufficient in front of the forceful Greem.


    Even though the value of the ne world coordinates in his hands were worth way more than the list of some no-good rebels, Tigule had no room for negotiation.


    In fact, Tigule was thinking about whether he would be able to safely retreat after hepleted the trade,and how he should proceed with thepletion of the deal.


    While Greem and Tigule engaged in a period of silence, the ship wreckage floating in the strip of lights finally went to its eternal rest.


    The spatial vortex was only two meters in diameter, while the flying ship was a massive object that spanned three hundred meters. When the two came into contact with each other, the small hill of a vessel vanished instantly without a trace as if a giant, invisible beast had swallowed it.


    On the other hand, the spatial vortex remained as peaceful as before, even after devouring such a huge object. It was almost as if nothing had happened.


    The spots of narw faults were gradually shrinking under the effects of the ne¡¯s regenerative power. The area where the lights reached had been pushed back to less than two and a half kilometers around the vortex. Judging from what was happening, the speed at which space regenerated would only grow faster.


    "If you agree to this trade, then let us go through with it!" Tigule didn¡¯t wish to dy any longer. He had no choice but to put forth his request toplete the trade politely.


    At this moment, Tigule would rather have left with the metal ball in his hands. However, he had no means of resistance against the two opportunistic adepts before him, especially without his magical machine.


    "You don¡¯t need to worry about what happens after the trade. We are adepts. Proud and respectable adepts. We are the zealots of knowledge and the defenders of fair trade. We will uphold our deal as long as you didn¡¯t lie to me!" A strange smile surfaced on Greem¡¯s face, "Moreover, as a token of our friendship to that Princess Vanessa of yours, I can let you take with you one blueprint at no additional cost. This is a powerful magical machine that possesses the power of Fourth Grade!"


    "Fourth Grade? Magical machine?" Tigule almost shouted out loud.


    The Second Grade magical machine he piloted was already a rare existence in the current world of the goblins. If they could truly create a Fourth Grade magical machine, would the Goblin ne still be afraid of any opponents toe?


    Why would the adepts who were intruding on their ne be so nice?


    Countless questions and rms went off in Tigule¡¯s head. He stashed the register of rebels, the name list of Gazlowe¡¯s subordinate forces, and the engineering blueprint for Thunder God Titan before carefully passing the metal ball to Greem.


    Greem calmly assessed the ball as a notification from the Chip rang out in his mind.


    [Discovered one set of ne world coordinates. Direct into the data library?]


    "Yes!"


    As Greem gave his affirmation, a long beam of dataposed of many strange lines and goblin letters flowed into Greem¡¯s mind. It was evident that the way goblins stored world coordinates was different from how they did it in the World of Adepts. It involved some methods unique to the mechanical civilization.


    The Chip gave an initial estimate of 10 hours, 27 minutes, and 29 seconds to decipher the world coordinates. Even though Greem still knew nothing about this foreign ne, the information he had now allowed him to confirm the legitimacy and integrity of the world coordinates.


    "Very well, you may leave now." Greem looked at the anxious Tigule andughed softly, "Remember to pass my words to Princess Vanessa. I am very interested in meeting the goblin royal family. Since Gazlowe cut off his cooperation with us, baited us here, and tried to kill us, we naturally want to see him fall.¡±


    Tigule¡¯s face instantly flushed white!


    Ever since the leaping improvements in magic energy research, the goblin royal family had been reduced to the conservative and backward faction of the Goblin Empire. On the other hand, Gazlowe, who stood at the very forefront of magic energy research, became the well-liked representative of the progressive faction. He had be the ¡¯Father of Magic Energy.¡¯


    The Risk Investment Company that Gazlowe founded had also sessfully be an influential force in the Goblin Empire that could rival the goblin royalty themselves.


    With no choice left for them, the goblin royal family had to confer the title of Prince upon Gazlowe to appease his ambitious and forceful actions. It had been the first time such a im had been bestowed upon a person outside of the royal bloodline. Many goblins privately gossiped that the goblin royal family should give Princess Vanessa¡¯s hand in marriage to Gazlowe. She was the most popr of the heirs to the Empire and would be the most suited to tie the knot between the royal family and the most powerful goblin on the ne.


    As for the one tiny w of Gazlowe being a ny-six-year-old elderly man, and Princess Vanessa being an eleven-year-old young girl¨C it was not a problem at all in the eyes of the passionate goblins.


    Gossip like this was undoubtedly the greatest humiliation and challenge to the goblin royal family!


    After all, given the traditions of the royal family¡¯s heirs, Princess Vanessa possessed the most influence among the three heirs. Any schemes that targeted her would result in anger and bacsh from the defenders of the royal orthodoxy.


    The Goblin Empire was currently split between the Risk Investment Company, led by Gazlowe, and the goblin royal family. Their conflict had already bubbled to the surface and was quickly intensifying. If these reckless adepts also got involved in the internal conflicts of the goblins, the division of the Goblin Empire into two separate states would be a very likely oue!


    The pale Tigule nodded without a word and turned to leave with the vital information in his hands.


    Once the goblin was entirely out of sight, Sabrina asked quizzically, "We are letting him take the blueprints for the Thunder God Titan just like that? That¡¯s a terrifying magical machine with the power of Fourth Grade!"


    "It¡¯s just a blueprint," Sabrina might not understand, but Greem knew the truth, "The opponent might want to forge a Thunder God Titan, but the metal resources in the Goblin ne will not allow for that to happen. Even if they sent ves to dig up everyst bit of rare metal in this ne, it would not be enough. Also, the coreponent for creating the Thunder God Titan¨Cthe magic generator furnace¨Cis a problem that they have no solution for. That¡¯s why the blueprint is no more than a useless piece of paper in their hands."


    "Not to mention that if they foolishly try to invest all of the ne¡¯s resources into the construction of the Thunder God, the resistance against us will proportionally weaken. Am I right?" Sabrina quickly understood Greem¡¯s idea by following his train of thought.


    "The goblins aren¡¯t that stupid. They won¡¯t so easily put all their eggs in one basket in that manner. The blueprint is more of a lure. I want to use it to bait out the royal family standing behind that goblin princess."


    "Then you intend to walk the tightrope between Gazlowe and the goblin royal family?"


    "There¡¯s no choice. We can¡¯t forcibly crush the enemy with what military might we have now. That¡¯s why it¡¯s necessary for us to resort to more flexible tactics. We should try and contact both factions if we have the time. With this battle as a reference, I¡¯m sure no idiot will still be doubting our power. This way, we will have the chance to bnce the strength of the two factions and find an opportunity in it."


    ............


    Five dayster.


    Vanessa propped her head up with her hand after sending away the Minister of State and the Military Minister. She was exhausted. She leaned back behind the broad oak table and stared into the nk air.


    As a rare goblin beauty of the Anderme Royal Family, Vanessa¡¯s beauty and intelligence were unrivaled throughout the Goblin Empire. Otherwise, Gazlowe would never have taken such huge risks to have his subordinate forces prompt her into a marriage.


    The old king was elderly and confined to his bed; hecked the ability to manage the sprawling empire. Vanessa¡¯s two younger brothers were still growing and were not up to the arduous task of maintaining the empire. Thus, Princess Vanessa could only take up the scepter and run the kingdom in her father¡¯s ce while silently waiting for her brothers to grow up.


    ording to the traditions of the royal family, the highest ruler of the Goblin Empire had to be a male heir. It was only when all the male heirs were dead that Vanessa could inherit the throne as the eldest princess.


    That was why Prince Gazlowe¡¯s desire for Vanessa contained arger and more nefarious ambition.


    Once Vanessa married Gazlowe, and her two brothers died in idents, Gazlowe would share the right to rule over the Empire with Vanessa as her husband. That perfectly conformed to the traditions of the goblins and would not result in a bacsh from the conservative goblins and local plutocrats.


    It was because they realized this that the royal family had be even stricter with the limitations they ced on Gazlowe.


    The various shes and tensions between the two parties grew ever more severe than before. It was almost at the point where cold steel would be bared.


    The registries that Royal Scout Tigule had brought back at great risk made Vanessa¡¯s head hurt. She had thought that she would be able to get rid of the bad apples, and Gazlowe¡¯s subordinates forces within the royal family, when she got ahold of the list. However, she only received a more disappointing result after consulting with many of her ministers and officers.


    One couldn¡¯t help but acknowledge that the financial group that Gazlowe had personally raised to such heights was already so massive that it was impossible to deal with!


    If they eradicated the entirety of the group, the foundations of the royal family¡¯s rule would also be shaken.


    The continuous war that would follow would hasten the copse of the Empire. Such a thing would only benefit those evil intruding adepts.


    However, the news that Vanessa received from several subtle means made her feel uneasy.


    The evil adepts from that fearsome World of Adepts had been intentionally brought into the Goblin ne by Prince Gazlowe. Even though she didn¡¯t know what Gazlowe¡¯s motives were, such actions had already ced the Goblin ne in a perilous position.


    If the world coordinates of the Goblin ne were leaked, the swarm of adepts they would attract would cause the goblins to lose their grip over their own ne. They would fall from their proud identity as the owners of the world, to prisoners and ves.


    That was an oue that could not be epted!

 Chapter 517 The Plague Breaks Out

    Chapter 517 The gue Breaks Out


    Because Vanessa understood very well the strength of the adepts, she could never forgive the wicked enemy that had brought them to their ne!


    If not for the fact that the forces she had at hand were insufficient to eradicate the enemy faction, Vanessa had a mind to thrust a sword into that crook¡¯s heart personally. He was simply too wicked. He would drag the entire ne into such a terrifying and destructive storm just to fulfill his own desires.


    A person like this should be sliced into tens of thousands of pieces.


    Vanessa cursed as she pushed aside the wooden door. She arrived at a small balcony outside her room.


    This ce was a metallic castle in the style of the goblins.


    Theyout of the building was no different from a human castle, but the construction materials were utterly different. Human castles mostly used wood, earth, and stone in their construction. Goblin castles, on the other hand, usedrge numbers of metalponents, asionally supported by wood. Even wooden walls would have to be reinforced with ayer of hardened metal tes to increase their sturdiness.


    That was why the Royal Castle of the Anderme Royalty looked like an iron castle forged from pure metal from a distance. It reflected a light unique to alloy metals.


    As the goblins were diminutive in size, their buildings also tended to be short, small, and study. The goblin architects also fully utilized that creative, divergent thinking of theirs to create structures in all kinds of strange shapes.


    Look no further than the roofs of goblin buildings. There were thousands of different designs.


    There were round mushroom roofs, pointed rocket roofs, and slim thunder-rod-style roofs. There were even odd roofs in the shape of a goblin¡¯s face.


    That was why it was impossible to find twopletely identical structures inside the castle.


    As the goblins promoted frugality and thriftiness, the space left for pedestrians to walk between the buildings was extremely narrow. All sorts of wires, levers, and winches sprawled over and between the buildings. Metal doors, drawbridges, and carts running on tracks could be seen all over the ce.


    Most of the buildings were also still using steam power. As such, ck smoke continuously emerged from tall metal chimneys above them. On the streets, goblins arrogantly traveled on hawkstriders, golem beasts, and automated robots.


    Far in the distance, several goblin merchant groups had arrived at the edge of the castle. The green goblin managing the group was waving his whip andmanding the ves to move the merchandise down from therge bodies of the Kodo Beasts.


    Goblin helicopters hummed with the unique sound of mechanical constructs as they cut through the skies above the ancient castle. Arge goblin flying ship slowly approached the airport located at the edge of the castle. Goblins continuously walked up and down the deck of the ship.


    Princess Vanessa took a slow sweeping look at all the happy goblin citizens under her rule. A sense of endless pride filled her heart, along with an indescribable fear and unease.


    She loved her citizens. She loved this country. She loved the unique civilization of the goblins, but the sudden introduction of magic energy changed all of this.


    Magic energy meant a cleaner and more efficient source of power. It was also a sustainable source of energy that would never run out. That was why, when it was first introduced, no goblin had been able to reject this new energy source that represented a greater future.


    However, for some reason, the more they came into contact with magic energy, the more easily the weak hearts of the goblins were corrupted.


    The various tycoons and leaders of the financial groups led by Gazlowe had all be reckless and greedy. They fantasized about getting their hands on terrifying power that didn¡¯t belong to goblins.


    Vanessa had a vague idea as to why Gazlowe had contacted the World of Adepts and drawn the evil adepts to the Goblin ne. After all, once a ny-six-year-old overage goblin had obtained supreme power, the one thing he would want the most would be to make himself live longer.


    That was something that the goblin civilization would never be able to solve!


    It was why that jerk had drawn the evil adept into their home; for the sake of his own selfish and wicked ends. All of this was no more than the futile struggles of a dying old goblin.


    The Thunder God Titan blueprint that Tigule sent back had enchanted and enamored the royal engineers. The power of the Fourth Grade in that machine had perfectly assimted goblin mechanical engineering and alchemical technology. It would be the most powerful magical machine that would witness the rise of the Goblin Empire.


    If a thing like that were sessfully created, all the engineers and alchemists involved in the process would forever be carved into the annals of history. They would be sages to be worshipped by countless generations of goblins toe.


    No goblin could resist such temptation!


    Vanessa had received news that those elderly goblin engineers hadn¡¯t slept in the three days and nights since the blueprint had arrived at the Royal Engineering Academy. They had gathered all the engineers and invited a bunch of old fellows from the Alchemy Association to help them. All the goblins were now passionately discussing every detail and core technology involved in the Thunder God.


    Toplete their experiments, they had appealed for seventeen major engineering projects, twenty-one core material experiments, a hundred and seventy-five technique verification tests, and five technical feasibility projects on space furnace miniaturization, all at once.


    Based on their current actions, it would be impossible to sustain all of the projects that they were nning on doing, even if they emptied out the royal treasury. Moreover, if all the wealth and resources of the royal family were thrown into this intangible Thunder God project, then the n for the royal family to create their own magic energy army would have to be dyed.


    What was the goblin royal family supposed to use to fight against Gazlowe¡¯s mercenaries without a new magic energy army? What was the goblin royal family supposed to do against the invasion of the evil adepts without a new magic energy army?


    If the ones that defeated the adepts weren¡¯t the goblin royal army, but Gazlowe¡¯s mercenaries instead, then the goblin royalty would lose their sacred role as defenders of thend in the eyes of their citizens. When that happened, what else could the goblin royal family do but watch as Gazlowe slowly gained the favor of the poption?


    The more she thought about the situation, the more the dark clouds in Vanessa¡¯s mind swelled. There were many times when she felt like the burdens on her shoulders far outweighed thebined total of all goblins of her age.


    If it weren¡¯t for the royal bloodline that prevented her from stepping back andpromising, she would probably be just like any other eleven-year-old goblin princess¨C working on the engineering projects they loved, piloting their alchemical creations, and not ever worrying about problems and troubles that were yet toe!


    Sadly, she was Vanessa. She was the eldest princess of the Goblin Empire. She was the most influential goblin of the Anderme Royal Family. Under such circumstances, she had no choice but to cast away her skirts and don her armor, fighting to the best of her ability for the survival of the royal family!


    As Vanessa gripped the metal railing and looked down upon the citizens of her castle, a frantic goblin maid ran into her room.


    "This isn¡¯t good. This is bad. Princess, your Highness, the Minister of State just submitted a report. Large-scale gues have broken out all over the Empire."


    The scepter in the hands of the petite and pretty Princess Vanessa fell to the ground.


    ............


    A gue had broken out!


    It was almost as if the death god of gue had just taken a stroll through thends of the Empire. A horrifying epidemic of shocking scale broke out throughout the Empire, from south to north and from east to west.


    All infected goblins had the same symptoms. Their bodies festered as blood spots of various sizes appeared on their green skin. Even the strongest of goblins would instantly copse once the gue had infected them. They would then start scratching their bodies until they ravaged their skin. Pus would seep through their wounds, and they would cough up blood!


    It wasn¡¯t as ifrge-scale gues had never happened in the history of the Goblin ne. However, those gues always had an apparent source. The goblins only needed to quarantine that source, and the scale of the outbreak would be significantly limited.


    However, this gue was clearly unlike any before. Not only was the scale unprecedentedly broad, one specific symptom of the disease was so odd that it struck fear into the hearts of the goblins.


    That was the fact that the mortality rate of the gue was so miraculously low!


    It was almost as if a demon god was ying a wicked prank on the goblins. Even though the number of infected goblins increased at an exponential rate, not many of those goblins died.


    Among the infected goblins, only those who were exceptionally frail died from the gue virus. The other goblins suffered and agonized, but they remained at the edge of life and death. Thest remnants of their life force weren¡¯t stolen away by the virus.


    That indirectly proved the source of the gue to be the evil adepts!


    When the goblin doctors sent out by the royal family finally discovered the source of the gue to be the polluted water sources of the goblins, it was already toote. Therge-scale disease was quickly spreading from goblin to goblin. It spread from cities to towns to viges, before spreading from the towns and viges to even smaller settlements across the Empire.


    The weakening of the goblins caused rioting all over the ce. The ves that had been oppressed by the goblins for so long immediately initiated a wave of revolution all over the country. As the mainbatants¨Cthe goblin mechanics¨Chad all been infected with the gue, the various goblin cities and townscked the protection of magical machines. Many of these ces fell to the ves of other races.


    Those goblin cities that had yet to fall had no choice but to start massacring the ves inside their walls to protect themselves. That naturally led to intense resistance from the ves.


    For a moment, goblin garrisons, militia, and local armed forces engaged in massive wars with the other races. Casualties piled up on both sides.


    The fearsome gue that swept through the Goblin ne forced the Goblin Empire into a precarious position!

 Chapter 518 Meeting of Two Titans

    Chapter 518 Meeting of Two Titans


    As the pulsing spatial ripples vanished, the third batch of reinforcements arrived in the Goblin ne.


    This time was the same as thest. Only two people came as reinforcements. Alice and Berserk Witch Sofia.


    Their arrival was a significant boost to the strength of Greem¡¯s faction. The number of active adepts went from five to seven. Moreover, with Alice¡¯s unique Fate Divination, she would be able to obtain various amounts of information during her daily divinations, as long as that information was not something that the enemy was actively trying to hide.


    With her addition to the party, no significant movement of the enemy would pass unnoticed by Greem and his allies.


    It was precisely Alice¡¯s importance that made her a core member of Greem¡¯s faction. Greem would never let her be subjected to any risk under ordinary circumstances, not to mention having her step on the battlefield. Therefore, Greem quickly summoned Mary and Billis back from their tasks and had Mary stay by Alice¡¯s side.


    The seven adepts that had arrived on the Goblin ne met up in this manner. They started discussing their following battle ns against the Goblin Empire.


    Of the seven adepts, Mary and Billis leaned toward making contact with Gazlowe. As long as he was sufficiently greedy, Greem¡¯s faction could easily use an exchange of benefits to trade with him. If he could sell out the goblin ne once, he would sell it out a second time as long as the price was right.


    The neer Sofia was more inclined toward contacting Princess Vanessa. After all, she was the one who represented the true legitimate rulers of the Goblin ne. Even though the entire country had been upset by Greem and the others, her influence over the goblins was still far superior to that usurper, Gazlowe.


    Moreover, secondary information revealed that Princess Vanessa had always been known for being a benevolent and kind ruler. It seemed much better to negotiate with her using the infected goblins as bargaining chips as opposed to making a trade with that sinister and scheming Gazlowe.


    Mechanical Girl Sabrina and Poison Hag Endor were impartial!


    Both sides didn¡¯t reach a consensus, but the strategy they were using was the same¨C suppress one party while supporting the other. The best leverage that they currently held in their hands was the terrifying gue that had spread through a third of the Empire¡¯s territories and infected approximately 2,600,000 goblins.


    As long as the Voodoo Doll was still in Greem¡¯s hand, he could determine the life and death of these infected goblins. ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, the entire poption of the Goblin Empire was no more than 11,000,000. The infected 2,600,000 goblins were already one-fourth of the total poption.


    If such arge number of goblins died of a gue, it would shake the foundation of the Empire¡¯s rule.


    The development of the Goblin Empire had been somewhat deformed and iplete. It relied too heavily on alchemical machines and magic energy devices. They utilized these inventions in every facet of daily life. However, a highly advanced mechanical civilization could not help with the progress of the healthcare system. Consequently, the doctors raised by the Goblin Empire were only slightly better than the voodoo doctors of barbarian tribes. They were far from the heights that the goblin engineers and alchemists had reached.


    Just as Greem and the others silently plotted their next move in the shadows, shocking news came from the hearnd of the Goblin Empire.


    Something had happened to Princess Vanessa!


    ............


    This ce was a goblin town located sixty-five kilometers to the north of the royal castle.


    As a satellite town of the ancient imperial castle, it housed over two thousand outsider technicians and artisans, despite only having three hundred permanent residents. The cksmiths and forging factories that functioned as metallurgical facilities numbered twenty-five.


    Large numbers of specialized metal ingots were transported to this ce by goblin merchant groups and flying ships on a daily basis. They were then turned into metalponents based on the needs of the imperial castle. Theseponents were used to keep up with the demands of the royal engineers and alchemists.


    That was why ck smoke always churned out of this town. The liquid metal in the steelmaking furnaces flowed like rivers as many pipes channeled it to various forging factories. The nging of metallic molds, the sizzling sound of metal rapidly cooling in water, and the ear-piercing sound of metalponents being ground upon metalthes was everywhere.


    The entire town was like a massive manufactory. Any neer to this ce would be utterly annoyed and disturbed by the constant nging.


    However, at this moment, two groups of goblins were facing off at arge warehouse at the edge of the town. The atmosphere in the ce was taut.


    The dozen magical machines that gathered on the right side of the warehouse were branded with the insignia of the Royal Anderme Family on the front and the back. They were the royal magical machine squad. Over a hundred goblin soldiers in royalbat uniforms stood around the magical machines. They held arcanite rifles in their hands, taking up most of the high ground and advantageous positions in the warehouse. They steadily aimed their ck gun barrels at the enemies across them.


    The ones facing off against the royal guards were also goblins.


    They dressed in a variety of uniforms, but their skill and hostility were no weaker than the guards. The profile of a goblin wearing a monocle was branded onto the fronts of all their shirts.


    As the intruders, there wasn¡¯t a lot of them; there was only approximately two dozen. However, the four magical machines that stood at the very front were covered in a brilliant magic energy radiance. With one look, anyone could tell that they were Second Grade machines that had been forged with superior alloy.


    Inparison, only two of the thirteen magical machines in the royal magical machine squad were Second Grade.


    The great disparity in power undoubtedly hung over the heads of each royal mechanic. Their expressions were solemn, and they couldn¡¯t dispell the uneasiness in their hearts.


    After all the experimentations so far, the rtive power of a Second Grade magical machine, as opposed to a First Grade machine, was already a truth beyond all doubt.


    Typically, a single Second Grade machine could only fight off three to four First Grade machines. The moment two Second Grade machines joined forces, however, would be the moment they easily destroyed many dozens of First Grade machines.


    As such, it only appeared as if the royal magical machine squad had the advantage. The four Second Grade machines on the other side would easily demolish the two Second Grade machines and eleven First Grade machines that they owned the moment the battle started.


    The royal goblin soldiers could only act as auxiliary support and containment units in a battle like this. The power they could unleash against a rampaging magical machine was insignificant.


    Amon alchemical carriage stopped at the back of the warehouse. A petite goblin girl wearing a veil over her face stepped out of it.


    The person waiting in front of the carriage was Tigule, who was now piloting a spider-type Second Grade machine.


    "Princess, are you sure you want to go in?" Tigule¡¯s voice hung in the air as it transmitted through the air vents, "You should know that the bastard will turn hostile and assault us the moment negotiations fail."


    "Teacher Tigule, I will still do this!" The goblin girl under the veil was Vanessa in disguise. Worry, concern, anger, and annoyance were painted all over her face. However, all of that anxiety and distress vanished the moment she stepped through the back door of the warehouse with her head held high. She once again became that confident and lively goblin princess, Vanessa!


    Tigule sighed silently and operated his spider machine to follow after.


    A mighty-looking machine stepped forth from behind the goblins on the other side as if it had sensed Vanessa¡¯s arrival. The appearance of the device resembled a magical mecha. However, the thickness of the metal around it was shocking. One look and you could tell that it was a guardian-type magical machine meant mostly for defense.


    The number of special alloys and rare resources used to forge this machine had reached a stunning height. The inordinate amount of materials used in its creations would be more than enough to create three Second Grade machines!


    "Vanessa... o¡¯ beautiful Princess Vanessa. Since you were willing to give me the honor of meeting me, why don¡¯t you take off that veil and let me gaze upon your pretty face." An old and hoarse voice rang out from within the massive machine.


    "How dare you!" Tigule roared in anger. The spider-type machine moved its eight ttering metallic limbs and stood before the giant machine, "Gazlowe, you might be a prince, but even you cannot behave in such a rude manner before Her Highness the Princess!"


    "Kehkehkeh," The old goblin inside the giant machine couldn¡¯t help but break out in insaneughter, "Tigule, you are no more than an old dog of the Royal Family that has lost all of its teeth. Your master has yet to speak, and you jump out to bark? Are you not worried about messing up your master¡¯s ns?"


    Tigule¡¯s anger reached its boiling point. He was just about tounch a reckless attack at the enemy when Princess Vanessa walked to his side. She gently took off her veil and softly said, "Teacher Tigule, tolerate it for a bit. Let me have a few words with Gazlowe!"


    Vanessa¡¯s sweet and moving voice was like a cooling spring flowing into the middle of a desert. It immediately chilled the bubbling tensions in the warehouse.


    Tigule was reluctant, but he still suppressed his fury. The Spider Machine moved to a side and revealed Vanessa.


    "I havee! What about you?" Vanessa stared at the giant machine with determined eyes.


    The giant machine seemed to hesitate for a moment before steam sted out of the many exhaust pipes on its back. The metallic tes at the front of the device opened up,yer byyer. Finally, after sevenyers of protective tes, Gazlowe¡¯s face was exposed to everyone.


    The effects of his age seemed to weigh more heavily on Gazlowe nowpared to before.


    Distressing spots and blotches filled his green skin. The purple spots had almostpletely obscured his green skin color. His wrinkled, bark-like skin rolled up. The surface of the skin seemed to have absolutely no shine to it.


    With the average sixty to eighty years of lifespan of an ordinary goblin, Gazlowe was a genuinely elderly individual with his age of ny-six years. Unlike Tigule, who had his lifespan extended after his advancement, Gazlowe was still an ordinary goblin. His life should have ended ten or twenty years ago.


    Yet, the greatest engineer and inventor of the Goblin ne had used some method to extend his lifespan with the influence and resources at his disposal.


    That was obvious, given the thin transparent tubes connecting him with the giant machine!

 Chapter 519 Warehouse Battle

    Chapter 519 Warehouse Battle


    Even if Gazlowe was the most influential and wealthy goblin of the ne, he could only barely sustain his life with some medical facilities.


    That was why Tigule couldn¡¯t help but feel sincere sympathy for the pitiful and tragic appearance of the old goblin, despite the great hatred he harbored for him.


    If Gazlowe were willing to limit his ambition and use all of his intelligence and talent to contribute to the rise of the Goblin Empire, he would undoubtedly be an existence hailed as a sage and saint of the goblins.


    Sadly, greed had clouded his brilliant mind. The fear of death had made him lose his dignity as a goblin!


    The Goblin Empire of the present was betraying worrying signs of division, precisely because of this damned old fool. If the situation were allowed to continue as it was, the influence of the Royal Family would eventually be usurped by his financial groups.


    After a quick reveal of his face, the metallic shields of the giant machine closed up once more. The elderly Gazlowe was once again protected under its thick metal body.


    "Princess, your Highness; you must have something important to discuss to have sent your men to call me here secretly. I wonder... " Gazlowe paused for a moment when he reached this part.


    "Gazlowe, we are both nobility that wields the most influence in this country. There¡¯s no need to put on any facades here. Do you not know the reason I have called you here?" An expression of frustration and anger appeared on Vanessa¡¯s smooth, light-green face, "The invading adepts have unleashed such a fearsome gue in our country. Are we to sit by, watch, and let them do as they please?"


    "Then, Princess, what do you mean to do?"


    "I hope we can join forces and first get rid of these damned adepts. The internal conflict between us can be resolved through other means after we deal with this external problem."


    "......"


    Gazlowe fell silent.


    The atmosphere suddenly became tense.


    Goblins shouldn¡¯t be killing other goblins. This simple thought was shared by all of the goblins present here. However, the political ideals of their leaders were far too different. That was why they had no choice but to stand on opposing sides and bear hatred against each other.


    If Gazlowe epted Princess Vanessa¡¯s suggestion, then it would undoubtedly be a massive step toward mending the cracks that had emerged in the Goblin Empire.


    The weight of the matter caused every single goblin to hold their breath and wait silently for Gazlowe¡¯s reply.


    He spoke after a long silence.


    "Your suggestion is actually a n that I had thought of a long time ago. However, the distrust between us makes executing cooperation such as this to its fullest extent difficult. As such, to truly merge both of our power, I have a different suggestion."


    "What is it?" Princess Vanessa¡¯s jade-green eyes gleamed with the light of surprise when she saw her suggestion approved by Gazlowe.


    "I... suggest... "


    Gazlowe¡¯s old voice turned deeper and deeper as he spoke through the voice transmitter. By the time he reached the actual suggestion, it was too thick to hear what he was saying.


    As Princess Vanessa leaned forward to discern his words, the ground of the warehouse started rumbling intensely.


    The next moment, the ground beneath the royal magical machine squad split apart. A metal spiral drill dug out of the earth, still rapidly spinning. One of the First Grade magical machines didn¡¯t manage to avoid it in time and was impaled right through the center by the spinning drill.


    A goblin boring machine emerged from underground apanied by the ear-piercing rattling of metal, revealing the massive metallic sphere of a body behind the drill. The unfortunate magical machine had beenpletely pierced through.


    As purple blood trickled down the drill, the metal sphere opened up. A surprising number of goblin death squads rushed out of it.


    They wore motion-support exoskeleton armor on their bodies, with Biznicks 247x128 urascopes on their heads. They held Core Marksmen Rifles in their hands, wore foldable metal shields at their elbows, braced high-temperature methrowers on their shoulders, and had plenty of magic energy bombs hanging at their waists.


    They might not have magical machines, but their terrifying equipment still turned them into the key to throwing the royal guards into disorder.


    They threw magic energy bombs at the royal guards like pouring rain before they could even react. Intense mes and powerful metal bullets instantly drowned the battlefield in explosions.


    The royal guards had been taken by surprise. They lost over two or three dozen men during the first moments ofbat. However, their strict training and excellent equipment still allowed them to fight back against the attacks of the goblin death squads.


    Both parties started an intense battle in the corner of the warehouse.


    At this exact moment, four or five holes smashed through the thick metal roof above them. Several magical machines dropped down from above, suspended on metal wires. One could see the fleet of flying ships above the warehouse through the holes busted in the roof.


    The sudden turn of events infuriated Princess Vanessa to no ends. However, before she could even question Gazlowe, the giant machine suddenly bent down and swept its massive hand towards her.


    When the metal hand was only half a meter away from Vanessa, Tigule¡¯s spider machine had already crashed into the hand from a side. The Spider Machine extended a limb and pushed the goblin princess away as gently as it could at the moment of impact.


    Dong!


    A metallic ringing shook the entire warehouse.


    The metal hand was deflected and instead grabbed a goblin maid that had been staying at Vanessa¡¯s side. Gazlowe¡¯s furious grunted from within the magical machine. He tightened his grip and crushed the goblin maid to pieces!


    "Adjali!" Princess Vanessa let out a mournful cry and reached towards the blood paste falling from the sky.


    Vanessa stumbled as the royal guards quickly surrounded her and retreated towards the back door. She didn¡¯t even have time to mourn for the maid that had followed her for so many years.


    The royal magical machines couldn¡¯t help the soldiers clear up the death squads either. They immediately charged toward the princess and used their ferocious firepower to suppress all enemies lunging at her.


    It was soldiers against soldiers and magical machines against magical machines.


    The towering machines fired with all they had while rapidly closing in on each other. When two of them reached within a certain distance of each other, they would put aside their barrage of bullets and used massive metal chainsaws to attack the enemy¡¯s weak points.


    Their energy shields defended against the methrowers, while their metal shields and thick arms deflected close ranged weapon strikes. Two massive metal machines crashing into each other meant a cacophony of metallic nging and the ear-piercing sound of grinding metal.


    Metal dust flew everywhere as sparks flew here and there.


    The battles between the magical machines were equally as savage as the ones between the soldiers. Every punch struck hard on metal. Every strike of a de cut deep into a machine. The dangers of magical machinebat were not inferior to those of meleebat.


    In just a dozen seconds, five magical machines had copsed on the battlefield. Three of those belonged to the royal family, while two belonged to the old goblin. Over a hundred supporting goblin soldiers had already died.


    Large and small battles continuously erupted, with the stumbling princess as the center. The number of guards by her side was quickly dwindling.


    However, this ce was still the territory of the Royal Family after all. The number of guards hidden around the warehouse was no less than the number of goblins that had suddenly ambushed them. The rapport of guns and cannons, as well as the rumbling of the shing magical machines, rang out throughout the goblin town.


    Tigule had no choice but to pilot his Second Grade spider machine and throw himself at the ultra-Second Grade giant machine to cover for the princess.


    Gazlowe might have been the greatest engineer and inventor, but he was not proficient at piloting magical machines. The machine appeared to be extremely clumsy and slow under his control, and it unleashed almost none of itsbat prowess.


    However, Gazlowe had invested a heartbreaking amount of effort and resources into this giant machine to protect himself. The machine lived up to his expectations as well. It was so durable and sturdy that it was almost disheartening.


    At the very least, Tigule, who was fighting with it, felt the impulse to start vomiting blood!


    Most magical machines had to find a point of bnce between the toughness of their armor and the agility of the machine. It shouldn¡¯t be too heavy as to affect its movement, yet it shouldn¡¯t sacrifice the safety of the mechanic for the sake of agility.


    However, the giant machine before Tigule was an extreme counterexample of that!


    The machine had been designed withyer afteryer of alloy armor, with absolutely no consideration for its mobility or agility. It was like a rhinoceros covered with a dozenyers of armor when it stood there. It didn¡¯t move a single step, but it was so resilient that it made any enemies lose all desire to fight with it.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was close-ranged bombs, high radiation mes, or sharp limb strikes. Nothing could move thoseyers of alloy armor.


    Even if you spent all your efforts and smashed through oneyer, there would still be anotheryer waiting underneath.


    When trying your best to break through the secondyer, there was still the thirdyer down there.


    It wasplete torture, and it deeply frustrated Tigule, who prided himself on his prowess inbat.


    Even with his skill, the Spider Machine¡¯s weapons could not harm the old goblin inside the machine at all.


    The old goblin hiding inside the machine was like the colossal boss of a raid that just stood there. It endured Tigule¡¯s attacks while clumsily taking out all sorts of strange magic energy weapons from remote hidden parts of its body to counterattack.


    The battle quickly devolved into a stalemate!

 Chapter 520 Night Visit

    Chapter 520 Night Visit


    It was a ssic goblin civil war!


    The size of the battlefield limited the scale of the battle. However, the fight itself was exceptionally bloody and brutal.


    The leaders of both parties were trapped in a metal ore warehouse that was no more than seven hundred square meters in size. The reinforcements were still swarming into the warehouse. This tiny ce instantly turned into an asura¡¯s ughterhouse where both factions fought each other to the death.


    The royal guards that were escorting the princess were currently in an incredibly awkward position.


    Two or three dozen magical machines were fighting in front of them, while the goblin death squads stubbornly pursued them from behind. They were stuck in the middle, unsure of what to do. For a moment, they had no idea where they should go.


    The goblin town was still sovereign territory after all. The number of goblin soldiers stationed here undoubtedly outnumbered Gazlowe¡¯s private army that had traveled from far away. However, it was precisely this advantage in numbers that caused Princess Vanessa and the Military Minister to let down their guards.


    They had never imagined that this daring Gazlowe would attempt something as barbaric as abduction, especially while he was in the enemy¡¯s base.


    Not only did the old goblin ignore the Princess¡¯ offer while the evil adepts wreaked havoc inside the Goblin ne, but he was also even willing to risk civil war to get his hands on the princess. Such mindless actions were clearly beyond the range of an ordinary goblin¡¯s logic!


    Princess Vanessa agonizingly mumbled as she stumbled forward with her guards: "Mad...mad, he must have gone mad... "


    As intelligent as she was, even she couldn¡¯tprehend the insanity of an ancient goblin teetering on the brink of death. There was no way she could ever understand the intensity of Gazlowe¡¯s desire to live in the face of death, especially when he still thought of himself as the future hope of the Goblin Empire!


    If the Goblin Empire couldn¡¯t rise to prominence with him as its leader, then he would rather have all goblins fall along with him!


    The battle was still raging on.


    The army that Gazlowe had brought with him could notpare to the local military in terms of number. However, as the ones on the offense, their equipment quality and skill was far above the royal guards who hadn¡¯t seen a battle in a long time. Moreover, Gazlowe¡¯s army seemed to have already decided on their targets before their attack.


    That was why their attacks were always targeted and their strategies wellid out. The moment the fight had started, they assaulted and took over all the strategic areas around the warehouse via bothnd and air.


    The royal guards inside the warehouse were still trying their best to resist, but they were at a clear disadvantage. The number of royal guards had dwindled rapidly under the nking attacks of the enemy. They had been reduced to less than ten men from their initialplement of a hundred.


    The soldiers stationed around the warehouse by the Royal Family were being held back by a squad of magical machines. Magical machines were fighting both inside and outside the warehouse, along with the goblin soldiers supporting them.


    Magic energy weapons, alchemical weapons, and gunpowder weapons could be seen everywhere across the battlefield. All of these were lethal weapons of murder that had been created by the intelligent goblins. Dozens and hundreds of goblins fell to the ground at every moment, each turning into yet another sacrifice on this chaotic battlefield.


    When the final goblin guard was riddled with holes, only Princess Vanessa alone was left with Tigule¡¯s single magical machine. They faced a dozen magical machines and over a hundred goblin mercenaries.


    Among the enemies, three of them were First Grade goblin mechanics who could match Tigule¡¯s might, and all of them were piloting Second Grade magical machines as well.


    Tigule¡¯s Spider Machine had been badly damaged after that bloody battle, and itsbat ability had been severely reduced.


    Only five of the machine¡¯s eight limbs remained. The rapid-fire array of guns scattered around the spider¡¯s body had mostly been destroyed as well. Even the high radiation methrower on the back of the spider¡¯s metal body had vanished without a trace; only half of its metal base had remained there.


    If these were the only problems that Tigule faced, then the battlefield before him still couldn¡¯t prevent him from escaping. After all, he was daring and resolute in all of his maneuvers. However, he was the only thing standing between Princess Vanessa and the enemy. Thus, there was no chance of him using rapid movements and repositioning to dodge the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    Most of the time, he had to use his machine to shield Vanessa from stray bullets actively. Even the unstoppable Tigule couldn¡¯t help but feel a helpless dejectedness when the enemy slowly closed in on them.


    Kacha kak!


    Countless ck gun barrels forced them towards the center. Tigule hopelessly tossed away the First Grade machine he had torn into two pieces and gave up all resistance.


    So many enemies at such a close distance. There was no way he could still protect the Princess from harm, and if he continued to fight, any random stray bullet would cause lethal damage to Princess Vanessa. There would be no saving the Princess¡¯ life no matter how many enemies he killed after that.


    Losing the Princess would be an intolerable nightmare for the Goblin Empire!


    That was why the Princess had to live!


    The battles outside the warehouse slowly came to a rest after Princess Vanessa fell into the hands of Gazlowe.


    None of the royal goblinmanders had any idea what to do. They weren¡¯t sure if they were supposed to continue attacking or transition into negotiations. Their cautiousness led them to remain idle, even when Gazlowe boarded his flying ship with Princess Vanessa in his arms. They didn¡¯t dare to attack and could only watch as the enemy left the battlefield.


    ............


    The battle that urred near the castle ended just as abruptly as it had started.


    If it weren¡¯t for the spies that Mary had nted among the goblins, the adepts would never have known that the two leaders had met up.


    Greem and the others had only heard of the specifics three days after the incident due to the strict lockdown of information imposed by the goblins. By that time, Gazlowe had already retreated into the Steel Capital with his ¡¯spoils of war¡¯.


    That was the capital of the Goblin Empire and well within the Royal Family¡¯s sphere of influence. However, with the rise of the progressive faction, the Steel Capital had gradually be the meeting ce of various financial groups.


    In particr, as magic energy research had progressed over the past few decades,rge amounts of wealth and resources had quickly gathered in the hands of Gazlowe¡¯s Risk Investment Company. As such, the progressives were able to amass military might. They mass manufactured magic energy weapons and quickly became a militarized merchant union that grew with each passing day.


    The leaders of this goblin merchant union were both merchants, tycoons, and bandits that possessed significant military strength.


    Under the merchant union¡¯s coercion, the conservative traditionalists had no choice but to silently move out of the Goblin Empire¡¯s center of authority¨C the Steel Capital.


    That was why the Steel Capital was now the base of mad goblin Gazlowe instead!


    The information that Greem obtained about this battle between the traditionalists and the progressives was vague. It alsocked organization. Greem still had absolutely no idea what the mad old goblin was thinking.


    Wealth and resources? For a native of a small ne, Gazlowe was only one step away from being the supreme leader of the entire ne. All logic suggested that he shouldn¡¯t be using such a radical method to anger the traditionalists!


    Given that to be the case, the only thing that could exin his actions was a rumor circting throughout the Goblin ne. People said that the one thing the smartest goblin in the world was thinking about was eternal life. All the insane things he had done up till now were all rted to a project known as ¡¯Immortality¡¯.


    While Greem and the others gathered in a hidden mountain, their camp had a mysterious guest.


    Tigule!


    ............


    The curtain of night fell over thend.


    It was a peaceful stretch of forest that lied beneath the beautiful sky of stars.


    Tigule had run into the adept camp alone, before presenting the draft of a cooperation agreement to Greem in front of the zing campfire. That agreement had the seal of the Royal Family on it.


    As the leader of the adepts, Greem was naturally the first person to read through this strange agreement.


    Greem casually stuffed the parchment into Alice¡¯s hands after he was done reading through it. He had a strange look on his face. He then silently assessed the exhausted and pallid goblin warrior across the fire.


    Alice quickly passed the agreement over to Mary after she was done.


    Soon, every adept by the campfire had read through the agreement once.


    While Greem was assessing Tigule, this goblin god of war was also secretly taking a look at all the mysterious adepts in the camp.


    He couldn¡¯t help but admit that these otherworldly adepts truly lived up to their names as mysterious, strange, evil, and unexpectedly powerful individuals. At least, that was what they looked like on the surface.


    From what Tigule understood, only one adept had been present when they first arrived. That was the strange bug adept who waspletely covered in his thick ck cloak. His power was just as weird and unusual as his appearance. Not only could hemand terrifying bugs, but he could also turn his body into tens of thousands of ck beetles.


    This strange ability alone made it hard for the goblins to hurt him with the weapons they possessed. The terrifying bug adept had even taken on a st by the massive goblin cannon without dying during the battle against Prince Gazlowe.


    Moreover, the goblins couldn¡¯t even detect any signs of weakness or wounds on him the next time he appeared before them.


    It was an evil adept that couldn¡¯t be killed by any means!


    That was a fearsome opponent that Tigule would never wish to face. He knew too well the might of the goblin cannon!


    Yet, they relegated an evil adept like this to the fringe of the adept group. That was obvious from the order in which they read the agreement.


    Even though the adepts in this camp had such good rtionships with each other that they were willing to share such important and valuable information with each other, there still seemed to be an apparent disparity between their statuses.

 Chapter 521 Project Immortality

    Chapter 521 Project Immortality


    The worthy leader of the adept camp was that terrifying fire adept who had personally sted the flying ship out of the sky.


    Even now, Tigule felt dizzy and fearful the moment he thought of the power the adept possessed.


    He wouldn¡¯t have been able to fight off this fire adept, even if he had piloted the most powerful Second Grade magical machine on this ne, let alone as he was now. The difference between their strength and equipment was not small. Tigule estimated that the Second Grade fire adept at his peak could deal with two to three Second Grade machines simultaneously.


    That seemed nearly unbelievable, but it wasn¡¯t that hard to ept once Tigule remembered that they were adepts from the famous World of Adepts!


    The other adepts in the camp also seemed to possess fearsome power that scared him. Each of them radiated a strange and robust energy. More importantly, they were all female!


    No, the more appropriate term was female adept!


    The second one to read the agreement was a slender, long-haired beauty with a distinct aura. It was hard to rte her to the evil adepts from her pretty face and gentle aura.


    However, for some reason, Tigule felt his heart beating non-stop the moment he set eyes on her. Tigule almost couldn¡¯t hold back a gasp when the adept finally noticed his gaze and looked at him.


    He felt as if his entire being had been utterly seen through by that adept at that very moment!


    He hadn¡¯t seen this female adept during thest fight. Her sudden appearance meant that the adepts probably possessed the ability to summonpanions continuously.


    Tigule¡¯s round eyeballs continued to shift down the line toward the other adepts.


    The charming female adept in red armor with bat wings behind her back was a frightening and cold-blooded assassin. She also possessed the odd ability to heal herself by ingesting blood. However, the terrifying thing about her was that phantom-like speed.


    As someone who had personally witnessed Mary¡¯s terror on the battlefield, Tigule felt his heart shake the moment he saw her.


    Apart from these people, there were also three female adepts in the camp.


    The oldest one of them, with the wrinkled, sinister face and hunched back, was the powerful witch that had poisoned over a hundred mechanics with a single move.


    A hundred magical machine was a force strong enough to destroy any of the powerful races on the Goblin ne. Yet these machines were as frail as chickens before the old witch.


    A hundred magical machines had charged at the old witch, all falling to the ground with a single wave of her hand, poisoned to death. Tigule shivered uncontrobly when the memory surfaced in his mind. He didn¡¯t dare to continue thinking about it.


    Other than the poison witch, there was also a half-human, half-machine female adept, as well as a muscr female adept whose body couldpare to a man¡¯s.


    It was the first time he saw thetter as well; she was probably a female adept that had just arrived. He had crossed swords with the former on the flying ship. While she wasn¡¯t as powerful and brutal as the fire adept, her method of fighting and the direction she was developing was somewhat simr to the path the goblins had embarked upon.


    If it weren¡¯t for the hostilities between them, Tigule would have had a good mind to find a chance to sit down with the mechanical adept and exchange thoughts on the piloting of external machines. However, while the goblins were using exoskeleton-type magical machine mechas, she already seemed to have fused with those machines herself.


    Tigule¡¯s terrified gaze finally returned to the leader after sweeping through all the adepts in the camp. The opponent was also silently assessing him.


    Tigule also possessed thebat prowess of a Second Grade when he climbed into his magical machine. However, he was no more than a First Grade goblin mechanic once he left his vehicle. The difference in Spirit between him and Greem was so massive that it was impossible to make up for it with an external item.


    Tigule felt his eyes sting when he locked eyes with Greem. It was almost as if tiny needles were pricking them. It only got better once he turned his head slightly and looked away.


    However, tears were already streaking down his face.


    "Cooperation?" Greem¡¯s ck eyes appeared to be very ck and deep at the moment. His voice was even deeper and more resonant, with a trace of dominance behind it, "Gazlowe has just abducted your princess, and instead, youe here to discuss cooperation with us? I most definitely have a reason to suspect that this is a scheme that the two of your factions have privatelye up with."


    "Wepletely understand your suspicions!" Defeat and sorrow were written all over Tigule¡¯s green face, "However, since I dared toe here, I naturally brought with me the official promise and agreement of the Anderme Royal Family."


    The light in Greem¡¯s eyes shed. He fell silent for a moment before finally speaking.


    "Then why don¡¯t you first tell me; what exactly is that Project Immortality Gazlowe is working on in the Steel Capital?"


    Tigule hesitated for a moment before speaking, "As most of the authority over the Steel Capital has fallen into the hands of the radical progressives, they have already been secretly working on that Project Immortality for as long as twenty or thirty years. Even we only recently managed to get some inside information a few years ago."


    "This so-called ¡¯Project Immortality¡¯ is a research project that Gazlowe intends to use to extend his lifespan. He has spent a vast amount of resources and wealth to support the research of inventors, only to live a few more years. The study included many experiments on live samples and experiments on the assimtion of bloodlines. Unfortunately for him, they have all failed!"


    "However, Gazlowe has somehow managed to obtain a method of immortality from another ne through unknown means. He has constructed a massive space furnace under the Steel Capital. It is said that providing the Capital with an endless source of magic energy is only a front. The truth is that Gazlowe intends to build a nar door!"


    "A nar door?" Greem suddenly interrupted to ask. His words trembled with deep shock.


    nar Doors were ssified information among ssified information, even in the World of Adepts. It was a high-level adept knowledge that no ordinary adept could hear of. All the adepts that had mastered the method to construct nar doors were core adepts of major forces. Powerful seals and restrictions had also been ced in their minds by the Great Adepts of the organization they belonged to.


    If anyone set their sights on this knowledge, a seal bacsh would be triggered, and the adept¡¯s brain would be blown to bits while their soul was devoured.


    It was through such methods that the major organizations had always kept a tight hold on the secrets of nar doors. It was a privilege that only significant organizations could enjoy.


    Yet now, he heard news of a nar door in an insignificant small-sized ne. How could this not make Greem overwhelmingly surprised and excited!


    The level of the Goblin ne¡¯s civilization could never have possibly leaped all the way to develop technology like a nar door. That was why Greem had reason to suspect that this matter involved higher nes.


    As expected, Tigule¡¯s following descriptions caused Greem¡¯s expression to change slightly.


    "The technology used in the nar door has exceeded the scope of our goblin civilization. It is not something that Gazlowe himself invented. Ites from a higher dragonspawn ne."


    Greem¡¯s expression turned by just a little bit.


    He had obtained a strange set of world coordinates afterpleting the deciphering of the metal ball he had gotten from Tigule. The research and analysis of the Chip showed that the ne in question was a small ne that had matured to the pinnacle.


    That was why, given Tigule¡¯s perspective, it was valid to call it a higher ne.


    Dragonspawn ne, Project Immortality, Steel Capital, nar door...


    That Prince Gazlowe was working up a real mess. Greem wouldn¡¯t need to be worried about being lonely or bored with an opponent like this!


    He silently listened to Tigule¡¯s exposition, asionally interrupting when they reached a critical point. It was through this method that he finally gained a vague understanding of everything happening in the Goblin ne.


    In the eyes of the adepts from the powerful World of Adepts, it didn¡¯t matter how powerful or strong the natives of a lesser ne were. They were still no more than magical creatures that were slightly stronger or smarter than usual. Regardless of where and when it was, the adepts would never treat these goblins as intelligent lifeforms that could be their equals. Naturally, there was no way they would ever give them equal treatment!


    However, after listening to everything said about this goblin prince, even Greem couldn¡¯t help but acknowledge that Gazlowe was a unique goblinpared to his kin.


    At the very least, his ability to stir trouble was no less inferior to Greem¡¯s!


    The old goblin Gazlowe had been devoting all his efforts to working out that so-called immortality ever since he had sensed his impending death. If he had only been doing goblin experiments and dissections in his own ne, there was no way the Goblin Empire would find itself thrown into the chaos it was currently in.


    But Gazlowe had simultaneously maintained subtle and discontinuous connections with seven or eight powerful individuals from various nes. He had also obtained quite a lot of otherworldly knowledge and techniques through multiple instances of trade.


    Furthermore, after assimting all this knowledge from various nes, Gazlowe had managed to forge a path of his own ande up with the unique Project Immortality.


    He intended to dig out his brain and soak it in a particr life solution of sorts. He would then transfer that brain into an ultra-magical machine forged from all the special alloys and rare resources of the ne after the brain had been strengthened to a certain degree.


    The massive space furnace he had constructed under the Steel Capital was the heart he had prepared for himself. The entire Steel Capital, on the other hand, was very likely to be animated and turned into his new body.


    Doing so would requirerge amounts of life energy from a high-energy lifeform.


    Gazlowe had initially nned on tricking a batch of adepts into his trap and then imprisoning them. Sadly, Alice¡¯s rare instincts allowed her to sense something wrong ahead of time. She didn¡¯t create a nar passage to the silver spacestone. Instead, she had used randomized teleportation and threw Billis to some unknown corner of the Goblin ne.


    It was Alice¡¯s cautiousness that caused the old goblin to lose his grip on the situation in the Goblin ne!

 Chapter 522 Steel Capital Strategy

    Chapter 522 Steel Capital Strategy


    The old goblin didn¡¯t have many days left!


    Gazlowe¡¯s failure to catch the adepts caused a massive and irreparable hole to appear in his Project Immortality. For the sake of extending his lifespan, Gazlowe had no choice but topromise with a certain powerful individual from another ne.


    When the nar door was activated, the entire Goblin ne would be subordinate to the Dragonborn Empire of the other ne. The old goblin would then obtain the high-energy lifeform he had been waiting for, sessfullypleting his transition from a biological lifeform to a mechanical one.


    Initially, the goblin royal family had no idea about these secrets. However, as Galowe had stolen Princess Vanessa away to the Steel Capital, the Royal Family sent plenty of scouts and spies into the city. That was how they had managed to stumble onto Gazlowe¡¯s secret ns.


    Most of the citizens of the Steel Capital had been put to hardbor by Gazlowe. They were forced to work day and night toplete the nar door. The mercenaries and patrol squads of the Risk Investment Company surrounded the outside of the Steel Capital and sealed off all of the paths and harbors that led to the city.


    Gazlowe¡¯s private army had all retreated into the Steel Capital. They turned the ce into a well-defended magic energy city.


    The selfishness of the old goblin had also ced the goblin royal family into a predicament, faced with enemies on both sides. Inside the ne, the evil adepts wreaked havoc as they liked. Outside the ne, the Dragonborn Empire was waiting for an opportunity to pounce. Even if they gathered together all their strength and defeated the adepts, the Royal Family were still fated to be enved by the Dragonborn.


    The goblins finally lowered their heads in this moment of crisis. They had prepared to negotiate a truce and a treaty of agreement with the adepts, prioritizing the foiling of Gazlowe¡¯s scheme.


    The royal documents that Tigule had brought with him indicated that the Royal Family was willing to hand over part of their authority and share their resources with the adepts, as long as the adepts helped them defeat Gazlowe and repel the Dragonborn invasion.


    Greem naturally agreed to the Royal Family¡¯s terms.


    Now that he hade to the Goblin ne, everything here was fated to be hisnd and his wealth. Why would he ever allow an army from another ne to march into the Goblin ne and contest his rule here?


    That old goblin was indeed a scourge. Leaving Gazlowe alive would put a big dent in Greem¡¯s ns.


    Greem¡¯s understanding of that Dragonborn ne was far too iplete. Greem didn¡¯t have absolute confidence that his seven adepts could beat the Dragonborn¡¯s army if they shed in the Steel Capital.


    After a period of thought, Greem¡¯s eyes fell upon Alice¡¯s face.


    Alice smiled brilliantly as if she had sensed the fervor in Greem¡¯s eyes, "Since we have alreadye to this ce, then we have to get something to show for it. Go ahead and do what you will!"


    With Alice¡¯s affirmation, Greem¡¯s troubled mind finally settled into resolution and determination.


    "I agree to cooperation!" Greem nodded at Tigule and said, "Then, do you people have any specific battle n in mind?"


    "We sneak into the Steel Capital, destroy the nar door that¡¯s being constructed, save Princess Vanessa, and kill Gazlowe."


    As the representative of the royal family who had been charged with all decisions, Tigule quickly gave a detailed rundown of their ¡¯Steel Capital Strategy.¡¯ The adepts quietly listened to the n.


    ............


    Five dayster.


    Outside the Steel Capital.


    A sturdy mountain pass located at the opening of a mountain.


    A battle had just ended, and three dozen goblin mercenaries stationed here had all be corpses. The wolf feces above the mountain pass had been ignited. A thick plume of ck smoke rose to the sky, in clear view even from a dozen kilometer away.


    Squads of elite goblins were quickly clearing up the battlefield as Tigule apanied the seven cloaked adepts to the top of the pass. They gazed upon the Steel Capital that stood proudly at the top of the mountain a dozen kilometers away.


    It was a breathtaking city of steel.


    The entire city sat upon the highest point of the snowy Sulei Mountains, forged entirely of metal and massive Low Rocks. It had been built upon the mountain, with most of its buildings located within the belly of the mountain itself.


    The Steel Capital had two huge doors up to thirty meters tall. Several equallyrge sculptures of great goblin predecessors stood on the sides of the doors. Even the smallest of the statues was more than twenty feet tall. The details in the sculptures were delicate and refined, making the stonework almost life-like in appearance.


    For the sake of convenient entrance and exit, a t, but stable, stone road had been built inside the Steel Capital. It allowed for five goblin chariots to enter side-by-side.


    However, at this moment, eight temporary camps had been set up by the sides of the stone path. Over a thousand goblin mercenaries were stationed here. A bloody battle was unavoidable if anyone wanted to force their way through.


    ording to the Royal Family¡¯s n, a vast army of royal guards and local garrisons would cross through Minar Mountain Pass beforeunching a furious assault on the doors of the Steel Capital from the east and the west.


    While they were upying the majority of the mercenaries, an elite squadposed of the adepts, and a magical machine squad led by Tigule, would enter the Steel Capital via an underground passage.


    The gates of the Steel Capital had only been built for the convenience of goblin merchant groups entering and exiting the city. Therge number of goods that they brought with them would take too much time and energy to transport all the way up to the mountain slowly. As such, the goblins used their knowledge and skill in engineering to dig a sprawling underground tunnel in the belly of the mountain. They then set up tracks for steam-powered trains in there.


    Rumbling steam-powered trains passed through this web-likework of tunnels on a daily basis. They carried with them heaps of coal, wood, food, and fruits from the base of the mountain to the top, before transporting the daily garbage and engineering waste products down from the top of the mountain to the bottom.


    Without Tigule leading them, the adepts might not have been able to make it into the inner city area of the Steel Capital, even if they had ten days to do so. After all, each of the key nodes of these tunnels was guarded by Gazlowe¡¯s private army. They wouldn¡¯t be able to conceal news of their arrival the moment a fight broke out!


    That was why Greem had to listen to all of Tigule¡¯smands while they were here.


    They ambushed an entrance by the foot of the mountain and entered its belly on a steam-powered train.


    Some goblin spies that had been arranged ahead of time became the captains of the train. Greem and the others hid in boxes of oats and fruits and sessfully made it past the checkpoints.


    The train rapidly traveled through the extensive tunnels. An illumination crystal was embedded in the top of the shaft at regr intervals. When the train was about to reach the next checkpoint, Train Captain Terra would sound the whistles and shut the steam valve, slowly decelerating.


    They came to a temporary docking tform.


    Two massive goblin chariots took up the most advantageous offensive positions at each side of the tform. The magic energy cannons at the top of the machines pointed at the steam train that was slowly approaching. A goblin in a yellow uniform raised a red signal light to tell the train to stop.


    The train screeched as it ground against the iron tracks, still puffing thick ck smoke. It finally came to a halt between the tforms.


    "Routine inspection!" A captain that looked like a goblin officer grunted, "What do you have on this train?"


    "It¡¯s all oats and fruits." Goblin Spy Terra had been lying low here for a while. He reached his head out and replied loudly. ck dust from the smoke covered his face. He wasn¡¯t worried about being recognized.


    "Open up the carriages. We have to check all of them." The captain waved his arms and shouted rudely.


    "Another inspection? I have already been checked seven times since the entrance. Why do I have to go through inspection again?" Terra feigned annoyance and grumbled, "Any more of a dy and all these fruits are going to spoil. When that happens, you lot can have your rotten apples and bananas."


    "Open it quick, stop wasting words!" The captain gritted his teeth and yelled back, "You think we like to do this? These are instructions from above. All trains going into the Steel Capital have to be thoroughly inspected."


    The goblin guards rushed forward and pulled open the doors of the train. What greeted them was boxes upon boxes filled to the brim with fruits. The wooden containers by the doors had already been pried open. Golden peaches, dates, muchas, and ss were revealed within them.


    A few of the hungry goblins immediately grabbed a piece of fruit and stuffed it into their mouths. The sweet juices flowed down their throats, further tempting the goblins behind them.


    "What are you lot getting impatient for?" The captain raised his whip and flicked it at his subordinates, "Finish your work for me first. We can move two boxes of fruit to our tform once we finish our inspection; no need to worry about eating! Hurry up and get to work!"


    The goblins started inspecting the goods in each wooden box under themand of their captain.


    Yet, when a goblin guard pried open an unusuallyrge box, the fruits within suddenly spilled out.


    A massive metallic body stood up from the box!


    A magical machine! A magical machine had been hiding in the box!


    The goblin guards immediately ran about fearfully. The captain at the lead even leaped right back to the tform and shouted towards the goblin chariots with all he had, "Fire! Fire, there¡¯s an enemy in here!"


    To his surprise, the goblin chariots remained unmoving, regardless of how much he yelled and waved his arms. Instead, ck smoke emerged from within the chariots and gathered into the shape of a ck-robed individual.


    Ad...adepts...


    How could the captain still not understand the situation after seeing this? He immediately realized that they had run into those terrifying adepts!


    He no longer cared aboutmanding his group of grunts. The captain snuck away and quickly ran towards the nearest emergency exit.


    He was confident of throwing away any pursuers with his knowledge of the tunnels, as long as he could make it in there.


    Unfortunately, a red gleam of light shed, and his head went twirling into the air!

 Chapter 523 Planar Door

    Chapter 523 nar Door


    After casually exterminating an escaping goblin, Mary put down the crimson longbow in her hands.


    All thirty-one goblin guards by the tform had been murdered in the short time that had passed. Their bodies were piled up inside the carriage and buried underneath all the fruits.


    In truth, the strike team had no more need to hide their identities from this point on.


    The tunnels from here on sprawled in every direction. Gazlowe would be hard-pressed to stop them in all of the tunnels, even if he knew they wereing.


    On the other hand, a trace of seriousness appeared on Alice¡¯s pretty face as she smelled the strange and unique odor in the tunnel.


    "I smell a trace of an otherworldly aura here!"


    "Otherworldly aura? You mean?" Greem paused for a moment and asked softly.


    "I suspect the information the goblin royal family obtained is not urate. It¡¯s very likely that the nar door has already been constructed!" Alice replied softly.


    The two of them weremunicating using mental fluxes, but they weren¡¯t exactly hiding it from the other adepts. The goblins, on the other hand, had no idea about the conversation that was happening due to their ignorance of such a use for Spirit.


    "I understand!" Greem nodded and said, "It¡¯s very likely that Gazlowe¡¯s magical machine army won¡¯t be the only enemies we run into in the Steel Capital. There will be some soldiers from the other ne as well. Everyone be careful!"


    The adepts looked each other in the eyes and silently turned to enter the tunnels after mentally preparing themselves.


    The group immediately split into a dozen smaller parties, making their way toward different areas of the Steel Capital through the sprawlingwork of underground tunnels.


    Greem, Alice, Sofia, and Mary made their way to the belly of the mountain; that was where the old goblin should be hiding. Billis headed to the lower city area. He would then create massive chaos there to cover for the operations happening in the other ces. Sabrina and Endor went to the inner city area to see if they could find anything of value.


    The goblins, on the other hand, snuck into various areas of the city to look for Princess Vanessa. Tigule was an exception. He led ten magical machines and followed Greem to seek out Gazlowe.


    ............


    A massive cave deep in the belly of the mountain.


    The cave was artificially created and didn¡¯t possess the usual feature of natural caves. Its ground was t, and there were no pirs or stctites within.


    It was approximately one kilometer beneath the mountain range, yet there was absolutely no feeling of darkness or humidity. Small holes of various sizes had been dug into the walls of the cave, and white steam lingered in the air.


    A humongous capsule-shaped metal cylinder stood in the center of the empty cave. Ferocious and violent magic energy bubbled inside the metal can. A densework of metallic pipes was connected to the metal cylinder, directing filtering pure magic energy to various areas in an orderly fashion.


    With the continuous energy output of this massive space furnace, the Steel Capital had turned into arge soldier manufactory, working without stop. More than twenty-five magical machines, and a hundred goblin tanks and chariots walked off the assembly line on a daily basis.


    On the other hand, other goblin firearms and magic energy cannons were only limited by the production capacity of special alloys.


    As long as the outside could provide them with the metals and rare resources needed for the weapons, the Steel Capital would be entirely capable of turning them into offensive magic weaponry. They could then arm Gazlowe¡¯s private army that had been assembling in this ce.


    An arched door, forged of pure metal and mechanical parts, was radiating bright sky-blue energy in a newly excavated underground hall right beside the cave where the space furnace resided. More and more spatial fluctuations were appearing in the air.


    At the moment, several mysterious runes on the metallic arched door were lighting up in sequential order. A surge of strange energy would gather towards the spatial singrity in the center of the door every time one of the runes was lit up. As more and more magic energy gathered around the door, the spatial singrity started to expand outwards, turning into a massive portal of light that covered the arched metal door behind it.


    Several goblin engineers gathered around the door with eyes of wonder and amazement. They carefully controlled the input of magic energy while diligently recording each of those mysterious runes that had appeared.


    The barely conscious and frail Gazlowe slumped on a soft chair upon a tform across from the door of light. He wore a well-crafted dress suit, and many tubes stuck out of his body. All of these tubes connected to containers full of colorful nutrient solutions attached to the back of the chair.


    "Watch the stability of the Door of Light. Maintain the energy output threshold at 1.77 Hertos." Even though his internal organs showed signs of failing, Gazlowe still calmly directed everything that was happening.


    The goblin engineers and alchemists were utterly subservient to this dying old goblin. Here in the Steel Capital, Gazlowe possessed immense influence that even the Goblin Emperor couldn¡¯t hope to match.


    He could even have one of the goblins heremit suicide. Not only would they execute his order without hesitation, but they would also dly do so.


    These people would be extremely proud to be able to do anything for the spiritual leader of the goblins. Even death would be something honorable!


    The massive door of light maintained its stability for fifteen minutes under Gazlowe¡¯s guidance. Ripples suddenly appeared in the middle of the sky-blue door as arge, mighty figure emerged.


    It was a strange creature that was half human and half beast!


    It was three meters tall, two meters wide, and had a tail that was five meters long.


    It had a tough and muscr humanoid body, but its lower half was more like a beast. Four hooves and a t, long, and thick tail behind it. It had a blunt nose on its face, a hard forehead, andyers of wrinkles around its face and ears. Its hands and feet were those of a dragon¡¯s, with sharp, hard ws as well.


    Large, dark-green scales covered its body. Its muscles were clearly defined as well. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the arms, neck, or its four stubby legs; they all seemed muscr, intense, and packed with power.


    It was a pure half-dragon person, also known as a Dragonborn. They were strange beings that were created by the mixing of human and dragon bloodlines. They weren¡¯t that intelligent, but they had powerful bodies and equally powerful magical abilities. Their magic resistance was also excellent thanks to their dragon bloodline.


    If it weren¡¯t for their inability to fly, they could even be considered one of the most powerful branches of dragon descendants!


    The Dragonborn that stepped out of the nar door was an individual that possessed First Grade power.


    Even though the grade wasn¡¯t all that significant or excellent on his own ne, it was more than enough to crush these frail goblins.


    That was why all the goblin engineers frantically stumbled backward when the Dragonborn shook its massive body and stomped upon the metallic floor with its sturdy hooves. The goblins looked upon this terrifying demon with anxious and fearful eyes.


    The magical resistances and bodily strength of the Dragonborn were just as powerful as suggested by the books. He only shook his head slightly after stepping through the nar door, and he had recovered from the ill feelings of nar suppression. Of course, this also had something to do with the faint red light radiating through the nar door.


    The Dragonborn shook his head, and his unfocused eyes quickly returned to normal. His reptilian pupils contracted in his amber-like eyes and quickly shot towards Gazlowe.


    The old goblin was still sitting on the tform, but when the Dragonborn arrived in front of him, they were practically at the same eye level.


    "You are that tiny goblin?" The Dragonborn¡¯s voice was as loud as a bell. The other goblins on the tform couldn¡¯t help but cover their ears.


    "You¡¯ve done very well! We will greatly reward you once we have established a foothold here."


    The Dragonborn took a quick sweeping look at the nar door. It was evident that he was delighted with the work of the goblins. However, the tone he used to praise Gazlowe was stiff and forced. Its voice held the disdain and mockery used when rewarding a traitorous dog with a bone.


    "Lord Ashendrake, why is it only you? Didn¡¯t we agree on a squad of thirty individuals?" Gazlowe asked with a soft voice and an expression of iprehension.


    "Hmph. The nar door you built has cut out too many important materials. Too many things are missing. It is utterly incapable of sustaining the descent of the Third Grade Duke. Now that I have arrived have your men remove themselves from this ce. They are not to enter without being summoned. The matters of us dragonborn need not your interference."


    Perhaps because he sensed the frailty of the goblins present here, Dragonborn Ashendrake Thunderlight¡¯s tone turned impatient. From his point of view, these weaklings that couldn¡¯t even survive a single dragon¡¯s breath had no right to talk to him, a Dragonborn Marquis.


    He would have turned them all into ash and dust with his power of lightning if it weren¡¯t for the energy sustainment of the door still hinging upon this ¡¯trash.¡¯


    The goblins¡¯ faces turned various colors when they heard the caustic words of the Dragonborn.


    Some goblin engineers even secretly took out walkie-talkies and prepared to summon the magical machine army waiting outside the hall.


    "Very well, very well, it is understood." Who knew? Gazlowe didn¡¯t seem to be even the least bit frustrated by the Dragonborn¡¯s harsh words. Instead, he ordered his subordinates to lift his chair and bring him out of the hall, his face still wearing a fawning smile.


    "Lord Prince, you mean to... " Those goblin engineers swarmed around Gazlowe once they were sufficiently far away. They asked in soft voices.


    "Hmph! These dragonborn are all idiots that think in one dimension. We¡¯ll let them have their way for the moment. Once all of that dragonborn squad teleports over here, we will cut off the energy supply to the nar door and capture them all. Then, the life force of three dozen dragonborn will be more than enough for us toplete Project Immortality!" Gazlowe coughed intensely, maniacallyughing as he did so. His dark green skin and ck age spots shook as heughed. It was a hideous, wicked sight.

 Chapter 524 Conflict Erupts

    Chapter 524 Conflict Erupts


    "This truly is a lowly and filthy world. The whole ce reeks with a disgusting stench."


    Ashendrake Thunderlight shook his massive dragon-like head. The strange reptilian pupils in all four of his wild, beast-like eyes expanded and contracted as an amber light shed in them. His powerful spiritual senses were far superior to lifeforms of the same grade. The Dragonborn could hear every word of the goblins despite the distance between them.


    Once all the goblins had exited the hall, the Dragonborn wiped away all traces of arrogance and impatience on his face. Instead, the light of reason unique to intelligent lifeforms shone through his rolling eyes.


    Most Dragonborn were very much foolish creatures with excessive strength and no brains to match. However, the fact that Ashendrake Thunderlight was sent here by the Duke himself as the vanguard army¡¯s scout meant that he possessed his own unique abilities.


    Ashendrake Thunderlight raised his four thick limbs and walked around the hall, carefully examining everything of note. Finally, after ensuring that there were no major problems, he took out three thunderlight stones and tossed them towards the door of light.


    A terrifying surge of electricity sted out of the gray stones when they came into contact with the door of sky-blue light. When the three thunderlight stones embedded themselves into the metal door in a triangle formation, another triangr spatial passage formed in the middle of the portal.


    Once the spatial passage had stabilized, ripples spread across the ck screen of light. Almost three dozen mighty dragonborn of the same size as Ashendrake Thunderlight emerged from within.


    The vast hall appeared to be reasonably spacious. It could fit over a thousand goblins without being too crowded. However, just these thirty-five dragonborn already made the ce seem tight.


    The ck spatial passage started trembling intensely after all thirty-five members of the Dragonborn Vanguard had arrived. It was almost as if a humongous entity was stuck within the passage, unable to exit or retreat from it. Just like that, the spatial corridor slowly started to expand, and a strange sound rang out from the tremendous force being exerted upon space.


    Finally, a dragonbornrger and more muscr than Ashendrake Thunderlight broke free of the confines of space with a muffled boom. He finally started to appear in this world.


    "Praise thee, our leader, Lord Zacha."


    "We wee your arrival, Lord Zacha."


    The dragonborn scouts immediately bowed before their powerful leader the moment he stood straight. Their right arms, covered in green scales, pressed against their chests as they bowed in unison.


    The ones chosen as scouts for the Vanguard Army were all First Grade at the very minimum. On the other hand, thest one that had been teleported over as the Scout Leader was a Second Grade powerhouse. When he appeared in the hall, cloaked in blinding blue light, an intangible nar power surrounded his body and caused this Second Grade powerhouse to grunt involuntarily.


    As creatures from a different ne, the Second Grade lifeform needed to endure far harsher nar suppressionpared to First Grade lifeforms.


    Fortunately, apart from the innate dragon abilities inherited from their bloodline, Dragonborn also possessed the powerful and muscr bodies of the dragons. Even if their innate magic was temporarily unavable, their powerful bodies alone were more than enough to crush most of their enemies!


    "Brat of the Ashendrakes, what¡¯s the situation here like?" The Scout Leader still betrayed fearsome power even as he endured terrifying nar suppression.


    "Leader Zacha, that goblin is untrustworthy, just as we expected. The construction of the nar door used the most inferior of magical materials. It is entirely impossible for it to sustain long-term use. Moreover... "


    "Moreover what?"


    "The energy source of the nar door seems somewhat strange. It contains traces of superficial knowledge from the World of Adepts. As such, I am worried that our invasion this time might be met with some unexpected enemies!"


    "The World of Adepts... "


    The dragonborn scouts present couldn¡¯t help but frown when they heard this name. Scout Leader Zacha¡¯s expression soured slightly. A blinding electrical radiance shot out of his amber eyes.


    "What about the goblin that traded with us?" Leader Zacha¡¯s mood was utterly spoiled when he heard such unpleasant news. He couldn¡¯t help but roar in a chilling tone.


    "He has already been expelled from the hall. I am worried they will fiddle with the energy source of the nar door. They can cut our path of retreat just by cutting the energy source."


    Ashendrake Thunderlight was a rare intellectual amongst the Dragonborn. Even though he was young at the age of only a hundred and three years old, logic and reason lied behind every one of his judgments.


    As if rushing to prove his deduction, the lights in the hall suddenly extinguished. The energy surging into the nar door also rapidly subsided. Therge door of light inside the metal door was rapidly dimming. Only the triangr spatial passage supported by the thunderlight stones still radiated a faint glow.


    "Haha, these sly and shameless goblins. Do they really think they can cut off our retreat path by just cutting the power?" Leader Zacha roared, "Thunderlight, you take five men and guard the nar door. You must not let it shut or be destroyed. Here. These are the three hundred thunderlight stones I specially brought for this asion. It¡¯s enough to sustain the nar door for a month!"


    Zacha removed arge leather sack from his back.


    The sack fell on the ground, and the free opening came unwound. Hundreds of brilliant and blinding blue light shone out from the bag.


    "Understood, Leader!" Ashendrake Thunderlight waved his hand, and five members of his team swarmed towards the metal door. They pulled out electric spears from behind them and went on alert.


    Just then, a loud metallic nging came from the entrance of the hall. Rows of magical machines in formation, hordes of intimidating tanks, and squads of fully-armed goblin soldiers poured in like a tide.


    How could the dragonborn still not understand the intentions of the goblins with such a turn of events!


    "Dragonborn Warriors, charge!" Leader Zacha raised the three-meter-long electric spear in his hand and roared at the top of his lungs, "st these lying and shameless goblins to pieces!"


    Following Zacha¡¯s orders, several dragonborn scouts shook theirrge bodies and charged towards the goblin army with electric spears pointed forward.


    Even though the charging dragonborn scouts only numbered thirty men, it felt as if an entire army was throwing themselves at the enemy!


    Each dragonborn was approximately thirty tons in weight. Thirty dragonborn together would be over a thousand tons.


    Can you imagine a horrifying monster made of one thousand tons of solid flesh, tough bones, and hard scales charging towards you with thunderous steps?


    The loud rumbling echoed through the belly of the mountain, melding with various other sounds. It was almost deafening.


    Unlike the direct charge of the dragonborn scouts, the goblin army was very orderly.


    The ones standing at the very front were the undefeated magical machine squads. They took up three rows, with each rowprising of five three-meter-tall magical machines. Once the dragonborn came within shooting distance, these magical machines immediately fired their guns, attempting to use their terrifying barrage to stop the enemy¡¯s advance.


    Ordinary metal bullets didn¡¯t do much damage to Dragonborn.


    After all, the green scales around a Dragonborn¡¯s body was more than enough to resist any physical and magical attacks below twenty-five points. However, the force that each of the bullets carried with them was not so easily negated. Even the mightiest of the soldiers had to slow down when seven or eight streams of bullets crashed upon their scales. Advancing forward became a difficult task.


    asionally, one could even hear the grunting of dragon soldiers when their scales were prated!


    However, the fearless dragonborn warriors did not shy from the challenge. They raised their left arms and blocked their exposed faces while roaring and summoning a water-blue electric shield in front of themselves.


    With the electric shields to negate the force behind the bullets, the dragonborn once again started to pick up speed.


    Behind the magical machine squad, the goblin chariots and tanks quickly swerved to the side of the formation. They slowly unfolded their metallic supports before a ck gun barrel one meter in diameter emerged from within the machines. The fully metallic magic cannon wasposed of special alloy materials. The entire cannon itself glowed a deep crimson as magic energy filled the device.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Several fireballs containing violent magic energies fell in a graceful parabolic arc beforending at the frontlines. They then exploded and turned into sizeable clusters of fire.


    Any enemy would have to back down temporarily against such ferocious and concentrated energy attacks. However, the dragonborn warriors became even more fearless and courageous when faced with the storm of energy fireballs.


    They roared in the strange Dragontongue that outsiders could notprehend. Once they closed in on the first row of magical machines, terrifying white chain lightning shot out of the electric spears in their hands. The savage chain lightning would bounce between the magical machines, dealing incredible damage to the metallic machines with every jump.


    The ten magical machines in the two front rows of the formation turned into clusters of blinding fire without any resistance. The goblin mechanics within were also instantly reduced to cinders.


    The goblin army hadn¡¯t expected the Dragonborn to possess such overwhelming powers of lightning and electricity. It was the first time they were fighting the Dragonborn. The tragedy was in the materials used to construct the magical machines. All the devices were made with high-quality alloy materials, yet none of them had been subjected to non-conduction treatment.


    Consequently, as the best conductors of electricity, not only did the magical machines fail to protect the goblin mechanics, they were even the cause for the effectiveness of the chain of lightning.


    The magical machine squad of Gazlowe¡¯s goblin army was decimated at first contact!

 Chapter 525 The Underground Battle

    Chapter 525 The Underground Battle


    The first round of the battle.


    Minimal damage had been inflicted upon the dragonborn warriors, but the goblin¡¯s magical machine squad had been crippled!


    As dragonborn soldiers ughtered their way into the goblin army, the casualties among the magical machines rose exponentially! It was hard to even look at the numbers!


    The goblins had indeed covered their ws of weak strength and patheticbat ability with their tough metal shells. However, the destruction that they could wield while piloting the magical machines hinged upon the magic energy weapons and explosives that the machines carried with them.


    Even though these weapons could attack without stop, they also had obvious limitations regarding power.


    The best example would be the metal bullets that were propelled by gunpowder. Attacks like these could never go above an upper limit of thirty points of physical damage, regardless of how well-crafted and well-designed the weapons were.


    On the other hand, magic energy weapons mostly functioned by firing magical energy attacks through the activation of magic energy batteries. When violent magic energies umted to a certain degree, they were able to deal decent energy damage to nar creatures.


    However, the magic energy weapons that the goblins invented were primitive products. The energy damage they dealt was only somewhere between thirty-five to eighty points. While attacks of such power were enough to wound the dragonborn, they could only inflict flesh wounds and non-lethal damage.


    The dragonborn didn¡¯t retreat after being bombarded and scalded by the magic energy fireballs. Instead, they became even more aggressive and reckless. They waved the electric spears in their hands, stabbing and sweeping away the goblins in their path. Those that were not in melee range would use chain lightning to strike the goblins. Every close-ranged strike was apanied by a tide of lightning that crackled in every direction.


    The electricity that spread out clearly couldn¡¯t break through the excellent magical resistance of the dragonborn. They were all insted by the indigo scales of the Dragonborn, unable to affect them whatsoever. However, the magical machines they were fighting against couldn¡¯t do that.


    The magical machines couldn¡¯tpare in size, weight, or offensive power. Moreover, they were frequently being electrocuted. That was why the dragon soldiers almost wholly crushed the magical machines at the start of the fight.


    As the line of magical machines was broken, the goblin chariots behind them were also attacked by the dragonborn soldiers. The goblin soldiers who had spread around the chariots became the victims of the berserk dragonborn rampage.


    The weapons invented by the goblin engineers weren¡¯t useless; they just dealt too little single-target damage, making it hard for them to break through the Dragonborn¡¯s electric shields and the tough scales beneath. That was why the entirebat strength of the goblin army quickly plummeted the moment their formation was breached.


    The goblin soldiers frantically escaped from the dragonborn. They couldn¡¯t even hold the perimeter, much less attack the enemies in an organized manner!


    In less than fifteen minutes, the thirty dragonborn soldiers had routed this army of seven hundred goblins, and the goblins that died on the battlefield numbered over three hundred. No deaths had appeared on the side of the dragonborn. Even though most of the dragonborn had minor wounds and injuries, these injuries were healing and recovering at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    Just this alone was more than enough evidence of the tremendous regenerative abilities of the Dragonborn!


    As the goblins scattered, this vanguard formed of dragonborn scouts split into ten groups and started chasing after the goblins, ughtering them by the lot. Each group had three dragonborn.


    Given the usual style of the Dragonborn¡¯s rule, they would have to firstmit a bloody ughter before subduing the victims as their ves. On the one hand, this allowed them to vent their violent tendencies. On the other, they could establish their image as a powerful and undefeatable race!


    ............


    A game of hunting and escaping began in the sprawling underground tunnels as the dragonborn chased the goblins.


    A goblin chariot that had escaped from the battlefield creaked as it charged out. The metal wheels spun wildly against the stone floor, and two clearly defined swerve marks were left behind as sparks flew into the air.


    The goblin chariot crashed from side to side, sending sparks flying as it ground against the walls of the tunnel. Meanwhile, the magic energy cannon at the top of the vehicle was rapidly charging and firing at the massive form stubbornly pursuing behind them. The revolver rifles at the back of the chariot were wildly firing bullets, cracking against the enemy¡¯s blue electric shield.


    When enemy got too close, the chariot would shoot out a stream of fire, drowning the giant silhouette and everything around it in an intense nket of mes.


    Sadly, even if the goblin chariot had been operating at 200%bat capability, it still couldn¡¯t deal any effective damage to its pursuer. In fact, most of the time, the goblin chariot was creaking and drifting from side to side under the frantic control of the pilot. All this was to avoid the blinding electricity shooting from behind.


    While the goblin chariot could only deal meager quantities of damage to the dragonborn with each attack, it was a pretty decent amount when umted. Still, without the protection of the magical machines, the goblin chariot had no choice but to fight while running and trying its very best to trip up the enemy.


    The goblin chariot couldn¡¯t do anything to the dragonborn. On the other hand, the Dragonborn could easily pierce through the fifty-centimeter thick metallic te if his attacksnded. The leather-armored goblin inside the chariot would instantly be vaporized.


    Most goblin soldiers were only ordinary lifeforms. Their basic bodily attributes couldn¡¯t evenpare to these dragonborn. They were no more than dust before the dragonborn without their chariots. The enemy only needed to exert a little strength, and they would be wiped out of existence.


    The chariot sped away, the cannons fired, and roiling red mes filled the tunnel.


    The dragon soldier didn¡¯t seem to be affected at all. It was still dragging its heavy body along and closely chasing after the chariot. He had already split up with his twopanions due to theplexity and twists of the tunnel. However, the tiny rat that was frantically running from it had sessfully ignited his rage. He recklessly followed the chariot down tunnel after tunnel, making turn after turn.


    Just as they were about to run into a narrow tunnel, the furious and rampaging dragonborn scout stopped. His triangr dragon-like head quickly assessed his surroundings. Electricity climbed up the spear in his hands, asionally releasing terrifying arcs of lightning.


    Dong! Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Four continuous ngs and four magical machines akin to the earlier ones appeared in front of the dragonborn¡¯s vision from the front and back. Two came from the front and two approached from behind, perfectly sealing all escape paths avable to the dragonborn.


    It was a trap!


    The dragonborn scout figured out the truth without much guessing.


    He might have fallen into the enemy¡¯s trap, but he was not at all fearful. Instead, he slowly cracked his neck and wrists before brandishing the electric spear and striking at the two enemies before him.


    They were four Second Grade magical machines!


    On the surface, the goblins seemed to possess the absolute advantage. They should have been able to take down these dragonborn scouts with few losses.


    However, an embarrassing scene unfolded in front of them as the battle started.


    The four-man goblin crew only sent a single Second Grade magical machine to deal with this First Grade dragonborn scout because of their confidence. The oue of the battle exceeded their expectations. The First Grade dragonborn scout destroyed the Second Grade magical machine while only sustaining moderate wounds. Even the goblin mechanic hiding inside the magical machine had been torn out of the vehicle and crushed to paste.


    The lifeform grade system held by the goblins as standard criteria had a massive difference when it came to different species.


    The magical machines that the goblins hailed as Second Grade seemed to reach the standards of a Second Grade creature when every one of their specs were listed out. However, when put together, these machines still couldn¡¯t reach the level of a true Second Grade lifeform.


    In fact, in the eyes of some powerful First Grade beings, these Second Grade machines of the goblins were no more than slightly troublesome toys. The frail bodies of the goblin mechanics couldn¡¯t unleash all of the might of the Second Grade machines, resulting in a waste of excellent resources.


    That undoubtedly hurt the hearts of many goblin engineers, inventors, and alchemists who were hiding in a safe ce and secretly watching the battle through long-distance lenses. This brutal one-on-one allowed the goblins to once again recognize the difference in power between them and the invaders with perfect rity.


    Otherworldly invaders of a higher ne weren¡¯t just stronger than them in a single aspect. They were superior in every single aspect. While they secretly mocked the Dragonborn as foolish and brainless idiots, they failed to understand a fundamental truth. When a species was sufficiently powerful, they no longer needed to resort to those so-called schemes and strategies.


    It didn¡¯t matter who the enemies were and what they tried to do. The Dragonborn only needed to endure the enemies¡¯ bombardment and charge forward to smash them to pieces. Schemes had no ce at moments like these. Evenbat strategies were no longer as important!


    It wasn¡¯t as if the Dragonborn were absolute idiots. They simply did not need to employ such tricks against the frail goblins.


    The goblin leaders finally gave another order after the verification of the Dragonborn¡¯sbat abilities. The remaining three Second Grade magical machines swarmed forward and finally took down the dragonborn at a price. One machine was severely damaged, and the other two also suffered minor damage of varying degrees.


    Then, this specially modified goblin chariot hauled this dragonborn prisoner away at its highest speed.


    By the time the other two dragonborn arrived here by tracking the scent in the air, there was nothing left but scattered magical machine pieces and arge pool of blue blood.


    The dragonborn were no idiots. They quickly discovered oddities at the scene of the battle.


    The dragonborn scouts quickly reported the situation to all theirpanions through strange roars. Some long, some short, while others were high-pitched or low.


    That also caused the ambushes that Gazlowe had prepared in a few other areas to fail due to the caution of the dragonborn!

 Chapter 526 Mary and the Dragonborn

    Chapter 526 Mary and the Dragonborn


    The pitch-ck tunnel continued to extend before the eyes.


    The destruction in this ce had caused leakage in many of the energy pipes. That also forced most of the lights in the tunnel to shut off. Only individual areas were barely able to maintain their lights.


    The leaked chaotic magic energies ran loose in the tunnels, indirectly weakening and disrupting spiritual senses. The disruption made it hard for outsiders like the adepts and the dragonborn to get a proper grasp on the situation with their powerful Spirits.


    The tunnels of the Steel Capital were like a muddy pool of water that had been disturbed. All the powerful, weak, and mediocre actors scrambled inside the ce, taking advantage of the chaos to try and obtain the most substantial benefit. Since there were predators, there was naturally prey. Of course, most of the yers involved were only idiots that imagined themselves as predators despite being prey!


    ............


    Mary was shrouded in a crimson mist as she traveled in the darkness. Her bat wings shook lightly as she silently gilded with the tips brushing against the ceiling of the tunnel.


    Along the way, she put out everything that gave off light, causing eternal darkness to take over the entire tunnel. Below her, several panicking goblin soldiers were crying as they scurried in every direction. Without proper illumination, they bashed their heads into walls and metal pirs like blind men.


    Any wise predator would hide their position in such a dangerous environment. They would hide in the darkness, beside the panicking goblins, quietly waiting for their true prey to take the bait.


    The routed goblin army was undoubtedly a sacrificial pawn that Gazlowe had thrown to the wolves. Their haphazard escape into all the various tunnels was a ploy to split up the predators during this crisis. This way, the elite goblin squads he had prepared would have better ability to counterattack. They would be able to rely on their powerful and concentrated strength to put down these strong outsiders.


    The dragonborn scouts were beginning to expand outwards with the hall as the center, and they were looking to exterminate all goblin forces that could threaten their ns. The adepts, on the other hand, also advanced towards the core area without knowledge of the dragonborn.


    Both parties were like octopi, spreading all of their forces towards each corner of the battlefield. As they started to close in upon each other, and as their forces began to cross paths with other, conflict became inevitable!


    If one were described as an assassin in the dark, then Mary would be a monarch of the dark.


    Most of the frail goblins couldn¡¯t even sense her existence when she unfurled her wings and flew right past their heads. These lowly creatures didn¡¯t interest her either. Consequently, Mary continued to advance towards the core area of the undergroundbyrinth, never stopping even slightly for the ¡¯trash¡¯ beneath her.


    When she flew down a narrow corridor and arrived at a critical crossroad, a thick smell of blood pressed against her face. She felt her Spirit refreshed at the very scent of it. Mary silently stopped below the tall ceiling of the crossroads and took a look at the floor.


    An army of goblin soldiers that numbered around fifty individuals had once been stationed here. They had everything¨C magical machines, chariots, magic energy weapons, and they possessed decentbat strength. Yet, by now, all of these had been turned into relics; everything had been shattered and torn to pieces.


    The magical machines and chariots had been destroyed through violent means!


    The expensive magical machines had all been turned into metalponents scattered across the ground. A deep indentation had even been left in the ground. It looked as if it was the result of a forceful blow by a giant monster. Caught between the shards of metal were the twisted and sliced corpses of the goblins, along withrge pools of ck blood.


    Mary went in the direction of the blood trail and soon found herself looking down a dark tunnel.


    It seemed someone or something had already hunted here. The direction they were hiding in led right into that pitch-ck tunnel.


    Mary unfurled her bat wings and dove into the tunnel without any hesitation. She turned into a beam of red light as she rapidly glided down the shaft.


    The path was one of ughter!


    Destroyed magical machines and pieces of the goblin chariots were lying everywhere. None of the goblin mechanics¡¯ corpses wereplete either. They were like toys that had been spoiled by excessive y and werepletely torn apart.


    Mary finally managed to catch up with that group of enemies after flying for seven kilometers.


    Two remaining magical machines were fighting with three muscr monsters under cover of five goblin soldiers. In truth, this couldn¡¯t be called a fight. It was a game of death!


    Without a solid defensive line or focus fire of heavy weaponry, the magic energy weapons of the magical machines and the goblin soldiers dealt negligible damage to the enemy. Three creatures that were half-human and half-dragon used electric shields to defend against the goblin attacks before violently charging at them like berserk warriors.


    Blue electric shields, tough indigo scales, and muscr and mighty bodies.


    Their immense physical advantage allowed them to crush the barely established perimeter of the goblins instantly. The poor creatures were reduced to meat paste as the giant monsters stormed their way past them.


    A magical machine that had lost most of its limbs copsed to the ground, but it was still trying to barrage the dragonborn with bullets to stall their movements. The other goblins quickly scattered. They could no longer act in a group and decided to escape into the nearby tunnels on their own.


    "Sambe... ihamdar... guriat." The dragonborn scout in the lead shouted several sentences in Dragontongue and his twopanions quickly pursued the goblins into the tunnels with wicked smiles on their faces. The scout himself slowly walked up to the damaged magical machine.


    The ferocious bullets immediately stopped when they hit the blue electric shield. All of their kic energy was absorbed by the shield, causing them to be trapped in front of the of electricity. The dragonborn¡¯s indigo scales would deflect the asional bullet that made it through the. The round bullets would even tten from the impact.


    Bullet barrage, methrowers, iron fists.


    The magical machine had done everything it could, but it still couldn¡¯t leave any visible damage on the dragonborn. As as the goblin mechanic wasing to terms with his death and preparing to trigger a rocket to self-destruct, the dragonborn struck with his electric spear. The spear pierced through the thirty-centimeter thick metal te and ran all the way through the goblin.


    Electricity shed across the spear and sparks flew everywhere inside the machine. The entire machine then blew up into a rain of metalponents with a loud explosion.


    The dragonborn scout retracted his electric spear with a wicked smile hanging on his face. He was just about to leave when he paused. The dragonborn turned around, his four reptilian, amber eyes quicklytching onto a slender figure standing in the air. He quickly noticed therge wings behind her as well.


    "Vernarsuta (Who are you)?" The dragonborn scout roared in Dragontongue. For the first time, a profound sense of danger rose in his heart. However, the opponent seemed to be apathetic to his Dragontongue. She didn¡¯t respond. Instead, she just levitated in the air, staring at him with cold crimson eyes.


    The dragonborn scout ran through three or fournguages in a row. It was apparent that he didn¡¯t want to start a fight against the person before him recklessly. Sadly, the one he ran into was Mary¨C the woman of action who had a history of acting faster than she could think.


    Mary raised her pretty face and let out a battle cry as blood mist surged around her. She folded her wings and dove downward.


    The dragonborn scout didn¡¯t dare be as careless and casual with Mary as he had been with the goblins. He raised the electric spear in his hand as a forked lightning shot towards the enemy. The electric shield in front of him crackled and its powers of electricity tripled.


    However, Mary¡¯s speed was still clearly beyond his expectations. Her crimson silhouette made multiple sharp, quick turns in the air, leaving only afterimages. She had already flown past the edges of the electric shield before the dragonborn scout could even react.


    Beng! The loud snap of bowstring.


    A crimson arrow pierced through the thick neck of the dragonborn, leaving a bloody hole in its wake.


    A wound as terrifying as this would have been lethal to any ordinary person.


    However, the Dragonborn were terrifying creatures with tenacious vitality. He still didn¡¯t die, despite a hole being blown into his neck. Instead, the dragonborn cupped the wound on his neck and used his powers of electricity to cauterize the wound. He then raised his electric spear and chased after Mary, continuously using blue thunderstrikes to strike at her shadow.


    A trace of electricity had found its way onto Mary¡¯s body the moment she had passed by the dragonborn scout earlier.


    Even with the protection of the blood mist, the savage powers of electricity had still managed to shatter three crimson roses on the surface of her crimson armor. That meant that the opponent¡¯s electric attacks were powerful enough to hurt Mary if they struck true.


    However, Mary was still a fearsome First Grade elite adept that originated from the World of Adepts. The opponent was no more than an ordinary First Grade dragonborn from a small nar world. Both parties might seem to be at the same level, but their actual might inbat was the difference between heaven and hell.


    Mary didn¡¯t even need to use her real power. She was merely relying on her vastly superior agility to circle the opponent, waiting for a slip in the enemy¡¯s defenses to close-in shoot an arrow at a point-nk distance.


    The dragonborn scout could only roar in grief and indignation when faced with a vampire adept that remained so cautious against him, despite how much more powerful she was. Of course, he was also frantically hurling electricity at Mary¡¯s afterimages. Unfortunately, all of his attacks struck only air, while Mary¡¯s attacks allnded on his body.


    The neck, the heart, the stomach, the right eye, the tail.


    As long as it was the vital point of a living creature, her crimson arrows would pierce it. The existence of magic powers caused the dragonborn¡¯s scales and electric shields to be ineffective at protecting their owner.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the physical damage from the arrow, or the blood mist corrosion and shadow damage attached to the arrow; none of these were attacks that the dragonborn scout could endure. As his internal organs were destroyed and his life force drained, the dragonborn scout finally copsed to the ground with a painful howl. He was no longer able to stand up with his own strength.


    Mary lunged onto the dragonborn¡¯s massive body. Her cute canine teeth suddenly increased in size and stabbed into the dragonborn scout¡¯s neck like twin daggers. She then crouched upon the dragonborn and started sucking blood.


    The dragonborn¡¯s formerly healthy body quickly dried up. Even his scales turned dull and lightless.


    The slight bit of energy consumption from the battle earlier was immediately recovered. However, much of the dragonborn¡¯s life energy couldn¡¯t be directly digested, and Mary stored it as blood crystals in her stomach.


    "Vernasuta (Who are you)? Yabrihangustaso (You are the one that killed him)?" A strange exmation in Dragontongue rang out in the room. The other two dragonborn scouts sensed something was wrong and saw the scene before them when they returned.


    Mary lifted her head from the dragonborn¡¯s shriveled corpse. Her pretty face was smeared with blood, and her crimson eyes glowed with a dangerous and greedy light. Blood dripped from her sharp, protruding fangs.


    Powerful, pure, delicious.


    That was Mary¡¯s assessment of Dragonborn blood!


    However, what attracted Mary the most was the bloating sense of strength she received from the dragonborn¡¯s blood.


    It¡¯d been a long time since she¡¯d savored this feeling.


    Mary lifted her head and presented the two dragonborn scouts with a ¡¯sweet¡¯ smile!

 Chapter 527 Greems Resolve

    Chapter 527 Greem¡¯s Resolve


    Mary wasn¡¯t the only one who had gotten into a fight at this particr moment.


    The goals of both parties were the same. As such, the chances of them running into each other was immense.


    As the invaders, sweeping aside all obstacles was a task they had toplete. Thus, almost four or five of such battles had coincided in the ck underground tunnels.


    Of course, without exceptions, the adepts were the ones who emerged victoriously.


    The power difference between both parties was obvious!


    The dragonborn might all have possessed First Grade powers at the very minimum, but that was only their innate power manifested by their muscr bodies and powerful bloodline. As a result, the way they fought leaned more towards the basic instincts of a wild beast.


    The adepts were vastly superior to them in this particr aspect.


    Almost eighty percent of all adepts came from frail and lowly humans. They underwent untold suffering and wandered near the gates of death again and again. It was only after enduring a terrifying journey as an apprentice that they ascended to be a terrifying adept that stood above everyone else. Compared to the natural abilities of the Dragonborn, all of the adept¡¯s powers were won with their own two hands. Or rather, seized with their own two hands.


    Only a minority of people could sessfully go from apprentice to adept. Most of these sessful individuals had to step upon the bones and corpses of theirpanions to reach the peak of their life. Of course, there were a generous sprinkling of schemes and conspiracies mixed up in this journey of theirs.


    That was why every single adept would possess trump cards and an ace in the hole that outsiders were not privy to. These were secrets they would never easily expose unless it was a moment of life and death. Adepts nurtured in such a harsh and unforgiving environment naturally possessed a greater chance of winning against a bunch of dragonborn who relied on their innate talents and physical might.


    Not to mention the factor of equipment.


    If Mary¡¯s crimson longbow didn¡¯t have a piercing effect, it would have been hard for her to so easily murder a dragonborn scout, regardless of how fast she might be. Apart from Mary, Poison Witch Endor, Mechanical Adept Sabrina, and Berserk Witch Sofia also obtained victories of their own.


    Bug Adept Billis, on the other hand, wasn¡¯t so fortunate. His scorpions couldn¡¯t do much against a thirty-ton hulking monster wrapped in hard scales. That was why he had no choice but to give up on these mouth-watering blood treats after a couple of unsessful attempts. Instead, he turned to the goblins for his needs.


    Greem and Alice didn¡¯t encounter any enemies. They easily reached the core area as if they were merely strolling through a market.


    Things became a lot more difficult when they reached there.


    Both the goblins¡¯ important facilities and the hall guarded by the dragonborn were very well-defended. Trying to find another path without an enemy using Alice¡¯s abilities was impossible.


    Alice looked at the three paths that silently extended before them. She appeared just as unfazed and calm as she always was, even if she was deep in enemy territory.


    "Three roads going in three directions. Which one do you choose?" Alice fell silent for a short moment before turning to ask Greem.


    "You¡¯ve got to give me at least a hint!" Greem spread his palms open, "I don¡¯t have that divination ability of yours."


    "The path to the left is where Princess Vanessa has been hidden. Fate feedback suggests only moderate danger.


    "The path down the middle leads to the space furnace. There is where Gazlowe is conducting his immortality ritual. Fate feedback suggests extreme danger.


    "The path to the right leads to the nar hall. The nar door guarded by the dragonborn is located there. Fate feedback suggests... "


    "Extreme danger?"


    "No. Certain death! We are very likely to run into fearsome Third Grade dragonborn there."


    "Bingo, you are right! Let¡¯s go!" A joyful smile appeared on Alice¡¯s face. She skipped towards Greem and led him down the middle path.


    For some reason, the massive shadow that had been weighing on Alice¡¯s heart had suddenly vanished when she had left the World of Adepts. She no longer had that feeling as if her every action at every moment was under someone¡¯s scrutiny.


    Even though she knew this reaction was a ridiculous one, and very possibly an illusion, she couldn¡¯t get rid of the feeling. She had given herself up to Fate, but Fate didn¡¯t belong to her alone.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the top-tier powerhouses standing at the pinnacle of the ne, or even the previous Witch of Fate. They were all linked with a delicate and mysterious connection. Every pulse of the powers of Fate in the World of Adepts could affect their souls and Spirits. Any action that one of them took in the river of Fate could not be hidden from another master of thews of Fate.


    The Alice of the present was still too weak. She couldn¡¯t yet be called a master of thews of Fate. However, this didn¡¯t stop her from detecting the strange activities of the others blessed by Fate. She could still trace these phenomena through the movements of thews of Fate and other, more subtle hints.


    If one were to think of Fate as a poker table, then presently Alice only had the right to observe and spectate; she didn¡¯t have the power needed to y the game itself.


    She needed the time and space to allow herself to grow.


    As the Witch of Fate, the thing that Alice liked doing most was collecting powers of Fate. An ordinary life spent in an adept¡¯s tower umted powers of Fate at an excessively slow rate. It was only when she regrly threw herself into the tumultuous crossroads of Fate that she could rapidly gatherrge amounts of the power of Fate.


    Moreover, this was not the World of Adepts. She didn¡¯t need to be concerned about being scryed upon by the other individuals blessed by Fate.


    By following at Greem¡¯s side, she would always be able toe into contact with those blessed by Fate who could profoundly affect the Goblin ne. People like Gazlowe, Princess Vanessa, or even Tigule had all been dragged right into the Goblin ne¡¯s unstoppable vortex of history.


    At this moment where Fate intensely shed at every turn, an adept like herself that had learned divination abilities could veryprehensively sense the movements of Fate behind each battle and each conspiracy. To better experience the power of Fate, Alice had actively involved herself in the operation. She then used the powers of Fate she had gathered to exert weak yet delicate forces upon the general flow of events in order to adjust the trajectory that history was going in.


    Apart from obtainingrge amounts of power of Fate, Alice could also experience the movement patterns and methods of maniption of thews of Fate during this process.


    The powers of thews of Fate were too massive and subtle in the World of Adepts. It was hard for her not to be crushed and cut to pieces when she tried to intervene with her weak powers. However, here in the Goblin ne, most of the Fate bacsh would be shared by the so-called ¡¯blessed ones of Fate,¡¯ thanks to delicate means of redirecting the powers of Fate. She could swim between these events, relying on Greem to protect her and keep her safe.


    It held indescribably significant benefits for Alice¡¯s growth!


    Alice deeply understood all of this.


    What was breeding behind the battle today was a tremendous opportunity and an enormous danger for the Goblin ne!


    If the Goblin ne could sessfully digest the invading adepts and Dragonborn as gifts, then the goblins would be able to progress. There was a chance the ne itself could grow and be part of the 1%; the mid-sized nes. However, if the goblins failed, then the Goblin ne could turn into the backyard of the adepts and the Dragonborn. Their ne would be a ce exploited for its resources.


    Boon and bane came in pairs. Fate worked behind each of these possibilities!


    The immense danger that had appeared in the Goblin ne might seem to have been caused by Gazlowe¡¯s selfishness and recklessness. However, what truly directed and pushed things in this direction was still that intangible power of Fate.


    The appearance of magic energy. The debut of the space furnace. Even the conflict between that old goblin and the goblin royalty; traces of Fate could be vaguely seen in all of these events.


    An ordinary person would have no other option but to sigh in resignation andunch themselves into the turmoil, even if they saw the flow of Fate. It was their world, and this was their life. They couldn¡¯t possibly sit by and watch as their loved ones were swept away by the river of Fate. Involving themselves and throwing themselves into the flow became their only option.


    Only outsiders like Alice could ride the waves of Fate with a stance that was both detached and involved. People like her could recklessly change the direction the river of Fate flowed.


    Much like the three paths that Alice had pointed out to Greem, the choice of each distinct tunnel meant pushing the Fate of the Goblin ne on entirely different paths.


    Choosing to save Princess Vanessa would undoubtedly be choosing to support the conservatives of the Goblin ne. That would allow the conservatives to retain a bit of their former strength in the flood of Fate. This way, even if Gazlowe¡¯s ritual seeded, two separate goblin factions would still exist in the Goblin ne.


    However, Greem had no attachments to the Goblin Royal Family to speak of. He couldn¡¯t be bothered to help them.


    Choosing to attack the nar hall would undoubtedly incite an irreparable conflict between the adepts and the Dragonborn. When that happened, the only one to benefit would be old goblin Gazlowe. Not only would he gain the most significant chance of extending his lifespan, but he would also be able to devour the two intruding forces and allow him to be the true heir of the ne.


    However, the possibility of such a scenario was almost zero. Unless Greem experienced a stroke, there was no way he would be dumb and generous enough as to offer himself up as a sacrifice for that greedy goblin.


    After much consideration, the only thing that fit the adepts¡¯ benefit was to confront Gazlowe, the temporary ¡¯heir of the ne.¡¯ As long as Greem and his party were able to defeat Gazlowe and sessfully route the dragonborn army, they would be able to obtain rule over the Goblin ne through this battle.


    You pay the price for what you wish to obtain!


    There was no such thing as an unearned victory in this world.


    Even with Alice¡¯s help to choose the best path, what awaited him at the end was still a risky and bloody battle.


    Thus, when Greem walked down that path with Alice¡¯s hand in his, he had already resolved to fight to the death. Even if what awaited him there was a wall of steel and iron, he would smash a way through with his life and blood.


    That was because this was the path that he had chosen for himself!

 Chapter 528 Gazlowes Revival

    Chapter 528 Gazlowe¡¯s Revival


    The ritual hall.


    While a storm of blood raged outside, the ritual hall bustled with activity.


    Several goblin researchers in white robes were busy walking in and out. They were directing goblin engineers and ordering them to check all the metal pipes and control center stretched over the interior of the mountain.


    If the animation of the Steel Capital were sessful, then these metal pipes would be the blood vessels of the magical machine known as the Great Emperor. The giant space furnace would then be its heart. Old Goblin Gazlowe would be reincarnated within the Titan body of the Great Emperor, and he would be the true ruler that manipted this giant beast.


    Indeed, this was Gazlowe¡¯s true n!


    Whether it was the immortality ritual or the invasion of the adepts and the dragonborn, everything was only a part of Gazlowe¡¯s n to put into motion Project Titan.


    Gazlowe had only finally managed to gather all the staff and resources he needed inside the Steel Capital after so many tricks and schemes. Even though the adepts and the dragonborn were still freely moving about in the tunnels beyond his control, it only mattered that they were here.


    Everyone knew how expansive the Steel Capital was. Trying to animate such a massive city into a magical machine lifeform required life force and souls beyond the imagination.


    That was why Gazlowe designed this n to bait all of the elitebat forces of the Goblin ne into the city. When that happened, not only would the one hundred and twenty thousand goblins living in the Steel Capital be his sacrifice, but even his private army, the Royal Army, the adepts, and the dragonborn would be nutrition for the animation of the Demon God Titan.


    He, the smartest goblin in the universe, would use this massive wave of life force to assimte with the Steel Capital and be the undying Fourth Grade Demon God Titan.


    The Goblin ne would be the springboard for his ascension, allowing him to be a god that could rule over multiple nar worlds. He would be creating a new species for the multiverse¨C magical machine lifeforms!


    However, before this coulde to be, Gazlowe needed a massive surge of life force to allow his assimtion to seed.


    Gazlowe¡¯s elderly body lied upon a metal operation tform in the ritual hall. His skull had already been split apart like a blooming flower. His loyal subordinates had carefully extracted the brain inside and ced it in a massive ss vat that was five meters in diameter and fifty meters tall.


    The inside of the jar was filled with light green nutritional liquid. Gazlowe¡¯s fist-sized brain was swimming inside like a tadpole in a pond. A dozen tentacles floated beneath the trembling brain. It was these tentacles that allowed the gray brain necessary movement.


    As the battle progressed, several dragonborn scouts that had been murdered were sent into this ritual hall. Their corpses were then thrown into several small corpse dissolving pools by the side. Their bodies, souls, and everything about them was being dissolved and melted into a pure solution of life force. The solution was then injected into the ss jar, bing nutrition for Gazlowe¡¯s brain to grow and strengthen.


    One hour after the battle had started, Gazlowe¡¯s formerly tiny brain had grown into an Overmind three meters in diameter. The Overmind was happily swimming about in the nutrient solution.


    The growth and development of the brain allowed even the unfortunately magically challenged goblin to obtain some strange supernatural mental powers. Gazlowe didn¡¯t even need that technological equipment tomunicate with his subordinates now. He could directly speak to their minds.


    Moreover, this mental power was strengthening as the brain continued to develop and expand. It even started to create rted mental spells.


    Telepathy, Soul Stab, Soul Whip, Soul st, Mind Control, Hypnosis, Mental Illusion.


    Several mental and soul spells that had never been heard of before popped up one by one. They allowed Gazlowe to be extremely excited. He had never experienced supernatural powers before. The massive Overmind swam about in the ss vat, repeatedly using these strange magical abilities of his.


    In general, he was able to be proficient at the use of some of the more simple mental powers after a bit of practice. However, the moreplicated mental abilities such as Mind Control and Soul st were hard to master.


    After all, these abilities were not techniques he had obtained through hard work and practice. They were mysterious fragments of knowledge from a different world that Gazlowe seemed to be able to hear and see after his Spirit had strengthened to a certain degree.


    Most of the time, these mental powers were innate abilities that one would gain upon their Spirit reaching a certain level; one should be able to master the use of them without any practice or learning. However, Gazlowe¡¯s goblin origins undoubtedly had too lowly a spiritual origin. That made it hard for him to master a lot of these innate abilities sessfully.


    While Gazlowe was having fun with his newfound powers, the battle outside the hall had be incredibly intense.


    Old Goblin¨Cno, Overmind Gazlowe¡¯s¨Cperimeter could no longer hold back the adepts and the dragonborn. Many checkpoints had fallen, with soldiers and mercenaries dying en masse.


    However, Overmind Gazlowe didn¡¯t mind at all. Instead, he used his spiritual sense to send the cruelest order to his subordinates¨C massacre.


    As Greem and Alice set foot on the path toward the space furnace, a bloody ughter started in the Steel Capital a thousand feet above them.


    As a goblin city, the Steel Capital had plenty of gardens and zas.


    At the moment, all of these public areas were filled with ve goblins.


    They were all bound with ropes and made to kneel on the ground. The streets were sealed off by goblin chariots. Several fully-armed goblin mercenaries stood tall along the buildings nearby, their ck gun barrels pointed at the ves in the zas.


    With the order given to them, fire spat out of the ck gun barrels, and a storm of bullets shot into the crowd. The ve goblins cried and howled in agony, but it didn¡¯t help.


    zas of goblins were murdered on the spot at the hands of the goblin chariots and mercenaries. Scarlet blood flowed out of their tattered bodies and turned into a stream. This stream then gathered into a wave of blood as it trickled into the sewage, where it was directed straight into the core area of the underground tunnels.


    Jars in the ritual hall slowly filled to the brim asrge amounts of blood gathered there. Overmind Gazlowe¡¯s ss vat had turned a crimson red. The dense concentration of blood had covered his body.


    It was hard to see the changes happening within, but one could sense that a massive being was struggling inside the jar due to the tumbling blood waves within. asionally, one or two long and fearsome tentacles would crash against the transparent walls of the vat. The limbs would squirm about, the suction pads on them clear for all to see.


    Gazlowe¡¯s evolution hastened as if he could sense the approaching danger. The number of goblins being sacrificed in the city above also began to peak. The poption of the Steel Capital numbered a hundred and twenty thousand. If one were to include the citizens that Gazlowe¡¯s army had caught from the nearby areas, the number of goblin sacrifices had reached a record of a hundred and fifty thousand.


    Such a massive flow of life force directed into the underground became a catalyst for Gazlowe¡¯s assimtion with the Steel Capital. The entire undergroundwork also started to fill with a strange, sinister aura.


    Gazlowe¡¯s Spirit continued to strengthen and power up. It was even starting to radiate through the vat and spread outwards. Metalponents, alchemical machines, control tforms, magical machines and magic energy weapons, every inanimate object; as long as they were within reach of Gazlowe¡¯s Spirit, they would possess a trace of consciousness.


    Wherever Gazlowe¡¯s Spirit extended, the objects there would be enveloped in a coat of white light. They would then start to distort and twist ording to Gazlowe¡¯s consciousness.


    In just fifteen minutes, Gazlowe had managed to animate the ritual hall and turn it into part of its body. Moreover, as more life force surged into the room, his consciousness started to extend out to other areas of the undergroundwork via the energy pipes and control centers.


    Soon, the entirety of the undergroundwork had be part of his body!


    However,pared to the insentient metal machines and alchemical machines, Gazlowe¡¯s assimtion process of the space furnace was arduous. The violent and roiling magic energy in the space furnace was like scaldingva. He would be thrown into immense pain every time he touched the furnace.


    In the past, Gazlowe would have left the space furnace forst and chosen to expand his consciousness domain within the Steel Capital. Sadly, he had no time!


    His spiritual senses indicated that another round of vibrations had started in the nar door; it seemed something new was happening in the Dragonborn ne. If the opponent¡¯s reinforcements managed to arrive here, it would cause unpredictable impacts to Gazlowe¡¯s reincarnation project.


    That was why Gazlowe used all the power he wielded to cut off all of the energy pipes to the nar hall. However, the Dragonborn seemed to possess a different energy source. They were sustaining the nar door through their own means.


    With no choice left to him, Gazlowe assigned an enhanced group of magical machines from the outside to hurry to the nar hall and stop the Dragonborn from teleporting reinforcements.


    Apart from the Dragonborn, Gazlowe also discovered a dozen intruders inside his ¡¯body¡¯. What frightened him the most was the arrival of the fearsome fire adept. That man had brought a female adept with him and had made it extremely close to the space furnace without his knowledge.


    That undoubtedly put Gazlowe on guard!

 Chapter 529 An Uphill Battle

    Chapter 529 An Uphill Battle


    Gazlowe was at a critical moment in his evolution. He didn¡¯t want himself being interrupted at this moment.


    An elite group of goblin soldiers that had been guarding the surroundings of the ritual hall was immediately ordered to intercept these two adepts.


    What made him want to scream out loud was how long the soldierssted. They hadn¡¯t even stood three minutes before being annihted by that fire adept. The opponent had fully demonstrated the terror and power of an otherworldly adept.


    The fire adept had turned into a five-meter tall me fiend. Unbearably hot elementium fire surged out of his body as he casually strolled through the metal corridor. The floor, walls, and the ceiling started to melt under the ambient heat as he passed by. They melted like wax.


    The goblin soldiers that dared to attack him were all melted along with the walls; their equipment and flesh turned to liquid. Only the magical machines and goblin chariots couldst a bit longer due to the special alloy materials they wereposed of.


    However, these were not enough for them to harm the terrifying me fiend.


    The beautiful witch, on the other hand, was sitting on the me fiend¡¯s zing hand as they slowly advanced towards the ritual hall.


    The other adepts quickly started to gather toward the location of the fire adept as if they had sensed his aura. However, the fervent defense Gazlowe¡¯s subordinates were putting up was significantly dying their progress.


    After all, a barely animated magical machine lifeform like Gazlowe watched over the whole thing. The adepts and dragonborn were essentially moving within his body. That was why there was no possibility of remaining undetected. The adepts would have to utterly exterminate the goblin guards of whichever checkpoint they chose to walk past.


    These adepts also clearlycked the might of a Second Grade fire adept like Greem. As a result, they were being held back by the magical machine squads.


    When the me fiend that Greem had turned into finally descended upon the ritual hall with the heat of hell itself, a massive magical machine squad was already waiting there.


    They didn¡¯t rush forward to fight with Greem. Instead, they retreated to the front of arge ss vat, as if they were protecting its contents.


    Greem¡¯s scorching heat radiated to every inch of the room the moment he stepped inside. What surprised Greem was an invisible mental barrier that had sealed off the ritual hall. This barrier had forced his Ring of Fire out of his body.


    This barrier also seemed to be a unique mental consciousness domain.


    The scarlet Ring of Fire around Greem¡¯s body shed with the white mental barrier, neutralizing and attacking each other. The Ring of Fire was superior in terms of strength. Whenbined with the frightening heat around Greem, it was burning away the mental consciousness without any real resistance.


    However, the opponent¡¯s Spirit seemed to be incredibly resilient, and the mental consciousness continued to crash against the Ring of Fire with unrelenting waves. Even though it was weaker than the Ring of Fire, the mental consciousness was ahead when it came to a numerical advantage.


    The two individuals involved in the sh couldn¡¯t help but frown when their domains of different attributes shed. They developed a deep apprehension of each other.


    If it weren¡¯t for Gazlowe¡¯s mental barrier, Greem could use his Ring of Fire to turn the entire ritual hall into a world of magma and fire. When that happened, everything would be reduced to boilingva. Whatever ns Gazlowe had in mind would have failed.


    Sadly, while Gazlowe had yet to show himself, his familiar mental consciousness permeated the room.


    Greem lightly ced Alice at his side on the ground. He shared a deep look with her before striding towards the white mental barrier in front of him.


    The intensity of the mes that the mental barrier had to endure increased as Greem closed in.


    Gazlowe¡¯s furious grunt suddenly rang out in the undergroundwork.


    "It seems I can¡¯t fight against you without a true body," Gazlowe¡¯s mental flux flowed into Greem¡¯s mind clearly, "If that¡¯s the case, thene at me."


    As Gazlowe¡¯s mad mental consciousness trembled through the air, the magical machines, goblin chariots, and various magic energy weapons located in front of the ss vat were suddenly taken away from the control of the goblins. They quickly gathered in a single spot.


    Kacha, kacha!


    A series ofplicatedbinations urred, and the three dozen magical machines, eight goblin chariots, and many magic energy weapons started tobine in a sequence, not unlike the fictional ¡¯Transformers¡¯ back on Earth. They turned into an odd and bloated humanoid figure that slowly stood up.


    Countless ck gun barrels and cannon barrels emerged from the bloated body of the machine. All the magic energy weapons started charging at the same moment as blinding white light shone in the room.


    "Dammit."


    Greem could only curse a single time before a flood of energy fireballs and metal bullets devoured his body.


    The brutal energy attacksted for twenty-six seconds!


    This barbaric attack finally ended when the magic energy weapons on the giant metal monster started to fall apart due to excessive energy output.


    As the white light slowly dimmed, the mighty and terrifying me fiend appeared in a terrible state before the goblins.


    Greem had managed to summon two Lava Shields to defend himself before the attack had reached him. If one were to include the six Fire Shields and one energy shield that he already had on him, Greem¡¯s energy defenses reached a height of seven hundred and twenty-eight points.


    A defense of this level was enough to resist a whole round of attacks from ten First Grade adepts.


    As long as the enemy couldn¡¯t break through his defensive spells in a single round of attacks, Greem would be able to mend these defenses while the enemy prepared for the next attack.


    Sadly, this barrage of magic energy weapons had reached an energy intensity of over a thousand points. A single moment of carelessness and Greem¡¯s Lava Shields were sted to pieces. Lava flowed everywhere, and mes sshed all over the room.


    The Fire Shields also shattered into sparks after the destruction of the Lava Shield. Greem¡¯s me fiend¡¯s body was riddled with holes. If he hadn¡¯t used his fire energies to protect key parts of his body like his heart and head, he would have been reduced to dust by that one round of attacks alone.


    Gazlowe¡¯s attack had visibly angered Greem.


    The giant me fiend let out a furious roar. Theva and molten metal beneath his feet flowed upwards along his leg and mended all of his wounds in a matter of seconds. The me fiend roared again, and frightening elementium fires surged out of every crack of his body. These fires turned into red streams of mes that shrouded his body.


    When the streams of fire finally stopped, a finely-crafted armor of fire covered Greem¡¯s body.


    Magma for a body and ember for an armor!


    Greem roared again and again as a pir of fire surged outwards and sted against the body of the giant metal monster.


    The metal monster that had been cobbled together copsed to the ground under the terrifying stream of mes. It hadn¡¯t evensted seven seconds. The body that had been twisted and merged by an outside force shattered into tens of thousands ofponents that went rolling to every corner of the hall.


    "Come out, Gazlowe!" Greem strode forward, his zing face turned towards the ss vat of blood, "Let me see what you have be."


    The stream of fire in his hand swept forward without a single pause and crashed against the towering ss container.


    Even the twenty-centimeter thick tempered ss couldn¡¯t endure such terrifying mes. A crisp crack rang out and the entire container shattered.


    A terrifying deluge of blood spilled out from within and shed with the fire. The strange sight of blood contesting with fire was almost mesmerizing.


    A strange and gigantic lifeform appeared before Greem amidst the crimson mist in the air.


    It was the brain of a lifeform that had been magnified and erged a thousand times!


    From a close distance, the white lights running through its uneven and trembling main body that represented mental activity made the brain itself a work of art. A dozen thick and agile brain nerves dangled from the bottom of the brain.


    Greem would never have imagined that the short, sly, and dying goblin would have turned himself into a creature like this if it weren¡¯t for sensing Gazlowe¡¯s mental flux within.


    Gazlowe¡¯s evolution vaguely resembled the otherworldly Mind yers, though just in terms of appearance. If it weren¡¯t for meeting Gazlowe several times before this, Greem would have suspected that the goblin had wholly turned himself into a Mind yer.


    "Gazlowe, if you choose to submit to me, I can give you the right to continue living! Otherwise... " Greem took two steps forward and pressed his Ring of Fire towards the monster.


    However, the massive brain defeded against all of his attacks with a single white light.


    "Submit to you? Hahaha," Colorful light spilled out of the gigantic brain as if it was thinking, "You should be the one to submit to me!"


    The metal passage around Greem suddenly folded inwards under the guidance of some strange power as mental flux radiated out of the giant brain. Greem would have been crushed into meat paste had he not promptly braced the walls with his magma hands.


    Joyous and satisfiedughter rang out from the giant brain when it saw Greem trapped between the metal walls. It performed all of itsmunications psychically due to theck of a vocal organ.


    "Don¡¯t you forget, I havepletely assimted the Steel Capital; you are practically standing in my body right now. Do you want to fight with me while in my base? Hahaha!"


    Greem was in a dangerous situation, but there was no trace of fear on his zing face.


    "Is it done yet, Alice? It¡¯s tough trying to hold out here." Greem finally couldn¡¯t help butin.


    Alice?


    It was only now that the giant brain noticed that it hadn¡¯t kept track of the female adept during this entire fight.


    The location of the female adept now seemed to be at the space furnace.


    This thing that should never have happened with Gazlowe¡¯s evolved and impable brain had just happened before his eyes!

 Chapter 530 Operation Rat Extermination

    Chapter 530 Operation Rat Extermination


    Gazlowe¡¯s brain was operating at high speed.


    Everything that had happened in the past fifteen minutes reyed in his mind like a videotape.


    From the female adept being put on the ground by the fire adept, to her casual stroll past the barrage of energy beams. From her walking past him, making it past the heavily guarded steel door, to where the space furnace was; the entire process was clear and direct. There was nothing out of the ordinary or conspicuous about it.


    However, this was a battlefield where life and death were decided in a single instant!


    How could such a vast oversight ur with Gazlowe¡¯s strengthened brain and ubiquitous spiritual sense? How had he let a terrifying female adept walk by him just like that?


    That was something that absolutely should not have happened, yet it had happened just like that!


    Gazlowe still didn¡¯t understand why he had ignored an enemy adept in that manner, even after reviewing his memory. Why had he let her walk into such an important ce?


    It wasn¡¯t invisibility or vision avoidance or incorporeality. After all, any form of spell would cause an unavoidable magic flux, as small as it might be. With Gazlwoe¡¯s current Spirit, what kind of spell could be hidden from his spiritual senses?


    After much thought, Gazlowe could only regard it as an innate ability of the witch.


    This witch seemed to possess a strange power that allowed her to be an invisible person of sorts. She could cause both enemies and allies to ignore her existence subconsciously. Much like the natural charm of subi, and the elvish affinity with nature, it was a kind of innate ability; magic flux would not appear when it was used. Consequently, individuals who were unaware of her talent were very likely to fall prey to it.


    White light immediately surged around the giant brain once he understood the situation. He prepared to instantly teleport to the space furnace and murder this strange witch with the swiftest attack he had. However, just as the giant brain was about toplete his teleportation, a st of fire beneath his body interrupted him.


    Greem used his Fire Teleportation to break free of the metal corridor¡¯s restriction. He appeared near the giant brain and used arge cage of fire to imprison the monster. The Fire Prison onlysted for three seconds before being destroyed an explosion of mental powers. However, he had foiled the giant brain¡¯s n to teleport away.


    The anxious brain furiously brandished his nerves and sted several mental beams of various colors.


    These mental beams fired with a mere thought of the brain and were hard to avoid. Moreover, they also possessed strange effects, unlike most ordinary spells. Most people would be unable to determine the effects of each beam from their appearance alone without allowing the attack to hit them.


    Some of these mind beams would turn into curse effects much like Weaken. Others would cause direct damage by turning into Soul Whips. There were also some that would open up portals on the ground where theynded, instantly teleporting the enemy in front of them.


    Ever since he had turned into a giant brain, Gazlowe had be a mysterious monster that possessed Third Grade powers. If it weren¡¯t for Gazlowe¡¯sck of a powerful body and his unfamiliarity with his new state of existence, Greem would have been hard-pressed to deal with the array of mental powers and reinforcements, even if Greem used everyst bit of energy he had.


    More and more portals were opened under Gazlowe¡¯s will, and he instantly summoned a goblin army of two hundred individuals into the hall.


    Two hundred goblins might not sound like much. However, if every one of them was equipped with a magical machine or a goblin chariot, these weak goblins would be more than enough to threaten a Second Grade adept like Greem.


    Greem even saw two familiar silhouettes among these goblins.


    Mechanical Adept Sabrina and Goblin God of War Tigule.


    Both of them seemed to have lost control of their bodies. They moved along with the goblins,unching wave after wave of ferocious attacks at Greem. Sabrina, in particr, was not only firing all her weapons but had also summoned the adept-level golem that Greem had given her¨C the Roaring Monster.


    Greem could only rely on his Fire Teleportation to avoid the barrage from two such formidable opponents. Not to mention he also had to deal with the storm of magic energy weapon attacks from the other goblins. During the downtime between each Fire Teleportation, Greem would cast arge-area fire spell and try his best to whittle down the number of goblins.


    Gazlowe took the opportunity provided by his subordinates dying Greem and sessfully teleported. He transported himself into the underground cave where the space furnace resided.


    Countless researchers in white robes were bustling about the towering metal container inside that massive cave filled with thick metal pipes and wires. They continually checked on all sorts of equipment, adjusting the valves of the tubes and the switches of the cables, keeping a close eye on the energy and pressure bnce within the metal structure.


    It was not a battlefield, but the intensity with which they performed their job showed that this was no less of a battle!


    A single, tiny mistake on the frontlines could mean the loss of a soldier¡¯s life. Here, in this ce, any error by a goblin researcher could cause a pressure imbnce in the space furnace and result in an apocalyptic explosion.


    The explosion of the flying ship¡¯s space furnace had been able to result in a disaster that engulfed an area of several dozen kilometers; this space furnace was ten times the size of that one. The resulting catastrophe of this space furnace exploding was something that no one could imagine.


    A slender and pretty figure had mixed in amongst these busy researchers. She looked right and left, asionally moving toward a researcher to observe their work. She appeared to be quite excited and intrigued.


    The giant cylinder in the middle of the cave was not at all conspicuous regarding appearance. Plenty of pipes of various sizes had been attached to it. These pipes spread all over the ceiling and delved into the stone walls. Who knew where in the Steel Capital these pipes extended?


    The bottom of the cylinder was crudely patched. From a distance, one would only think of this structure as a crude goblin creation. It was hard to rte it to the astounding invention that was the Space Furnace.


    Yet this thing that looked like a broken toy cobbled together by goblin children represented the highest alchemical and engineering achievement of the Goblin ne. More importantly, it carried with it the hope of the Goblin ne to cast off their shell as a lower civilization and ascend to a higher level!


    The metal cylinder looked ordinary, but it was entirely forged from the extremely rare Queyras alloy. This alloy not only possessed surprising malleability and hardness, but it also possessed the magical resistance that the other alloys of the Goblin ne so dearlycked.


    It could even make a top ten list for magic resistance whenpared to the other magical materials in the World of Adepts. It was invaluable for a small ne!


    What made it even more valuable was its limited production.


    Even with Gazlowe¡¯s influence over the Goblin Empire, he had obtained no more than two hundred tons of Queyras ore after scouring the ne. The Queyras ore was the most important raw ingredient for creating Queyras alloy. Forging this space furnace had required a total of thirty tons of Queyras alloy.


    Even if the Goblin Empire dedicated all of their efforts and wealth to the construction of space furnaces of this scale, they could make no more than six or seven of them. If they were still unable to obtain new sources of ore upon exhausting all of their Queyras alloy, then the Goblin ne¡¯s journey of expansion woulde to an end.


    Within Gazlowe¡¯s faction, ssified information like this was privy to only a few goblins. However, Alice had perfectly grasped this information after a couple of rounds around these goblin researchers.


    Just as Alice was wondering how to best maximize their benefits via this space furnace, white light shed above the hall. A brain the size of a hill appeared out of nowhere.


    Gazlowe¡¯s one dozen brain nerves struck at Alice the moment he teleported over. These thick tentacles were one-meter in diameter and whistled through the air, seemingly apathetic to the fates of the goblins around Alice.


    Gazlowe no longer thought of himself as a goblin after his consciousness had wholly revived inside his brain. These familiar goblin researchers, engineers, alchemists, and technicians were no more than loyal ves in his eyes. If it weren¡¯t for the difficulty of finding new ves to rece them, Gazlowe wouldn¡¯t have minded wiping away all traces of these lowly creatures from his body.


    Alice¡¯s pretty eyebrows furrowed when she saw the tentacle striking at her. With a single sh of her body, she appeared next to the metal cylinder. The fleshy tendril appeared to be soft and non-threatening. However, it crashed into the metal control tform and smashed it into pieces, crushing the six researchers who had been standing by the tform.


    The giant brain¡¯s nerves quickly retracted when he saw that physical attacks were ineffective. Five or six mental abilities shot towards Alice in the form of beams.


    He was in a hurry to exterminate this rat that had entered his heart, but he was still extremely cautious with his actions. A dozen beams of lights all grazed the metal cylinder and went past it. None of them dealt any damage to the container.


    After Gazlowe had turned that mechanical adept known as Sabrina into his ve, the powers and information about each member of the adepts was no longer a secret to him.


    In Sabrina¡¯s memory, this witch known as Alice was skilled at manipting the powers of Fate but possessed nobat ability of her own. That was undoubtedly great news for the giant brain Gazlowe!


    If it had been that powerful Second Grade fire adept who had made it into this hall, then he would have incurred significant losses even if he managed to defeat the adept. That was why he was in such a hurry to use his two new ves to hold the fire adept back and take the opportunity to catch this ¡¯rat¡¯ that had snuck into his heart.


    Indeed, a First Grade witch with nobat abilities was only a rat to the Third Grade giant brain Gazlowe!


    Moreover, it was the kind of rat that was extremely harmless!

 Chapter 531 Damned Witch

    Chapter 531 Damned Witch


    Giant Brain Gazlowe still underestimated Alice.


    In all seriousness, the most powerful individual of Greem¡¯s faction wasn¡¯t Second Grade Greem. It was Alice, who only had the strength of a newly-advanced First Grade.


    It was something that outsiders were unlikely to understand. Even within Greem¡¯s faction, the only ones that understood this was Greem, Alice, and Mary.


    The terror of the Witch of Fate¡¯s innate abilities was something that could not beprehended by someone who had not experienced it. They weren¡¯t weak because the narws had robbed them of their ability to fight. Quite the contrary, it was because of how terrifying their innate ability was that the will of the world would not allow them to possessbat ability on top of their talent for Fate.


    A profession that even the will of the world felt a need to ce limitations on; did that still not make it terrifying enough?


    The Goblin ne had no simr profession, nor was the information that Gazlowe got from Sabrina¡¯s memory sufficientlyprehensive. As a result, he used the same methods as he would use against an ordinary enemy to deal with Alice.


    Alice casually avoided all of the enemy¡¯s attacks with her rapid shes of teleportation. Alice could only sigh and start working her magic when she saw the enemy wouldn¡¯t y along.


    She shed and appeared behind a group of researchers. She opened her hands, and a delicate alchemical bomb appeared in them.


    Alchemical bomb?


    Gazlowe¡¯s powerful Spirit quickly scanned and recognized the item in Alice¡¯s hand. It was a small alchemical explosive unique to the Goblin ne¨C an alchemical bomb!


    This sort of alchemical bomb had no magic energy effect and couldn¡¯t cause any elementium damage. The only things the weapon had going for it were shockwaves and shrapnel damage from its explosion. An initial estimation of its destructive power put it at five points; even lower than a spell from a beginner apprentice.


    If it weren¡¯t for theck of a vocal organ, Giant Brain Gazlowe would¡¯ve startedughing at the sight of the enemy taking out such a crude means of attack.


    He was currently Third Grade, and five points of physical damage wouldn¡¯t be enough even to scratch it. Disregarding himself, even the space furnace wouldn¡¯t be afraid of such pathetic damage.


    It was important to note that the Queyras alloy the space furnace was forged with had physical defenses that could tolerate attacks up to a thousand points. If one intended to use alchemical bombs to destroy the space furnace, they had best prepare a literal mountain of such explosives.


    Just as Giant Brain Gazlowe let down his guard and was prepared to drown the enemy in a storm of attacks, Alice put her hands together. A familiar white light shed as the alchemical bomb vanished.


    Giant Brain Gazlowe¡¯s control over the underground space had reached an almost perfect level after this buffer period. Thus, it managed to find the new location of the alchemical bomb in less than a tenth of a second.


    Dammit!


    Gazlowe¡¯s Spirit immediately shifted to the inside of the space furnace; a small explosion had just ended in there. The spatial turbulence caused by the st had resulted in the barely tamed magical energies going berserk once more.


    The area within the space furnace was considerable. Turbulence caused by the alchemical bomb was like a tiny wave sshing in a raging sea. It was devoured by the flood of magic the moment it appeared. However, this backflow turbulence had still disrupted the changes to the energy tides within the furnace. It caused the magic energy¡¯s regr impacts against the inner walls of the furnace to increase by just that much more.


    Gazlowe had already assimted most of the space furnace. Thisrge metal cylinder had now be a source of endless energy for himself. It was much like a human heart, where even a slight backflow of blood would cause difort to the owner.


    The explosion of an alchemical heart had to be somewhat stronger than a backflow of blood!


    Twenty or thirty neighboring neurons in Gazlowe¡¯s massive brain of a body were suddenly burned to ashes. He couldn¡¯t help but grunt in pain. However, this was a small numberpared to the millions of neurons in a brain. This much damage would be repaired in a matter of two or three seconds.


    However, Alice couldn¡¯t allow Gazlowe to call upon his life force and mend his brain so casually. She smiled coldly and waved both of her hands. She simultaneously threw five alchemical bombs into the space furnace.


    That also indirectly reflected her power!


    No other adept could do this even if they wanted to. Even Greem would first have to break that tough metal cylinder if he wished to attack the space furnace. Only Alice could so easily attack the space furnace through her strange spatial teleportation powers and her ability to use her Fate talents to lock on to a spatial coordinate within it.


    Both of these factorsbined was what allowed Alice to attack the magic energy inside the space furnace so easily. The magic energies were now equivalent to the ¡¯blood¡¯ in Gazlowe¡¯s body.


    Giant Brain Gazlowe was relying on his powerful mental consciousness and endless magic energy supply to sessfully control the Steel Capital. Otherwise, he would never be able to move this giant Steel Capital that weighed over a million tons with just his mental powers.


    He first needed to assimte the space furnace and mark all of the magic energy being put out with his unique soul brand. As the magical energy seeped into every corner of the Steel Capital, he would be able to control this mountainous ¡¯body¡¯ as if it were its own.


    Yet at this moment, something had happened to its most important heart. How could this not scare Gazlowe?


    The multiple alchemical bomb detonations were like sharp needles, causing stinging pain right in his heart. Even though this amount of damage was yet insufficient to threaten his life, who knew what else the witch would pull out with her hands.


    Just as Gazlowe was trembling with fear, Alice flipped her wrists. This time, it wasn¡¯t an alchemical bomb that appeared in her hand. It was a fearsome explosive chicken.


    If the alchemical bomb could only deal five points of damage, an explosive chicken could deal fifteen points of damage. If Alice were allowed to stuff this explosive chicken into the space furnace, it would no longer be needles stabbing at Gazlowe¡¯s heart. It would be a gleaming dagger.


    "Stop!"


    Giant Brain Gazlowe¡¯s released a loud and furious roar in the form of a mental fluctuation. Apart from Alice, everyone else in the underground hall was only a goblin researcher with beginner-apprentice level bodily attributes. They couldn¡¯t possibly endure a sonic attack of this intensity.


    Red streaks of blood crawled out of all of their orifices as they silently copsed to the ground.


    Gazlowe¡¯s roar hadn¡¯t been meant as an attack against the witch. He simply hadn¡¯t managed to control the strength of the shout. However, his Third Grade strength made even the aftershock of his emotions intolerable for ordinary creatures like goblins.


    "Are you talking to me?" Alice tilted her head and stared at the giant brain coldly, "I really dislike your attitude, so... "


    The explosive chicken disappeared in a sh of white light.


    The next second, Giant Brain Gazlowe grunted in pain. Deep inside his brain, away from the eyes of any other individual, nearly a hundred of the neurons that supported his massive mental consciousness exploded into blood paste.


    How could Gazlowe take this lying down, especially after he had just gotten his hands on such tremendous mental powers? A massive tide of Spirit that was almost solid radiated out of his enormous brain-body. As he was trying his best to adjust his mental frequency and turn this tide of Spirit into a storm of psychic spells, his one dozen brain nerves suddenly froze in midair.


    The mischievously smirking Alice stood in the distance and made multiple grabbing motions with her hand. Eight explosive chickens appeared all at once. These explosive chickens were all engulfed in a blinding nket of white light. Any slight movement and there was no doubt all of these explosive chickens would appear in Gazlowe¡¯s ¡¯heart.¡¯


    Shit, damn, ****...


    Gazlowe was choking in anger, but there was nothing he could do. He desperately wanted to curse at this witch with the most toxic and wicked swear words of the Goblin ne. More than that, he desired to st her into pieces with the mental spells in his ¡¯hands.¡¯ However, he had no choice but to slowly and carefully disperse the massive power he had gathered before mentallymunicating with the witch with his calmest, most gentle tone.


    No one knew how or what the two were negotiating, but even an outsider could tell that the discussion was going well. Sadly, there wasn¡¯t a single goblin left in this room who could see this happening.


    The brain and the witch seemed to be having an amicable discussion, but there was great danger lurking beneath.


    She might have used this method to force Gazlowe to bow before her, but the giant brain still had immense power that distressed her. If Alice showed a single w, there was no doubt that Gazlowe would take full advantage of the opportunity. He would kill her in the shortest time possible, even if he had to pay a hefty price for it.


    That was why Alice¡¯s heartstrings were still suspended tightly, even after countless affirmations and promises on Gazlowe¡¯s part. In fact, her guard against the giant brain had only grown even stricter.


    As their battle took a temporary pause, the struggle in the ritual hall had alsoe to a conclusion.


    Sabrina had died in front of Greem, the remaining flesh of her body burnt to ashes. Only some alchemical parts remained on the ground. The Second Grade magical machine that Tigule piloted had also been gged into metal putty. A giant hole had been burned through the metal te that protected the mechanic. Tigule lied upon the ground, charred ck and unconscious.


    The other goblins had also turned into minced bits and metalponents.


    On the other hand, even as a Second Grade adept, there was no way Greem could havee out unscathed in a battle against a fearless army of goblins. Not to mention the fact that a Second Grade magical machine and a powerful mechanical adept like Sabrina were mixed with the army.


    As such, Greem had also sustained fairly heavy wounds!

 Chapter 532 Three-Way Standoff

    Chapter 532 Three-Way Standoff


    The nar Hall.


    No more than seventeen of the three dozen dragonborn scout sessfully returned.


    At this moment, creaking came from the spatial passage sustained by the thunderlight stones. Arge human¡¯s face pressed against the semi-transparent ne membrane. It was as if a terrifying human from the other end of the passage was trying to squeeze his way into this lower ne.


    As the person continued to struggle, the ne membrane started to protrude further and further. It also became thinner as it stretched out.


    Vague cracks appeared in the spatial passage, and a terrifying sh of blue thunder sted from within.


    Finally, the ne membrane could no longer resist the pressure of the fearsome figure, shattering into tens of thousands of spatial shards. A tall human figure shrouded in the bright blue radiance of electricity charged out of the broken spatial passage with firm steps.


    An iparably ferocious spatial whirlwind surged out of the passage along with him.


    Every substance within the nar hall that wasn¡¯t protected by supernatural powers eroded, apanied by plenty of creaking and groaning. It was almost as if an invisible storm of energy had just erupted in the middle of the room. Even the metal floor, walls, and archway were reduced to nothingness in the ravaging storm.


    Apart from Second Grade Zacha, who calmly stood against the billowing of the spatial whirlwind, all seventeen dragonborn scouts were blown about by the wind. They crashed into the metal walls and bruised their bodies and faces.


    "Oh great Sir Arms, Dragonborn Zacha is at your behest!" Zacha ignored what had happened to the subordinates behind him. Instead, he bowed before the tall human figure that had just teleported over and paid his respects.


    "Hmph! What are you lot doing? Why are things taking so long?" The one that had teleported into this ne was a tall man wearing a fine blue set of armor. His head full of long blue hair crackled with lightning arcs. Anger brewed between his handsome brows the moment he appeared, "Our armies have alreadypleted their preparation. Why is the nar door here only able to sustain the lowest level of internar teleportation? Where¡¯s that damned goblin?"


    "Sir, that goblin has betrayed us. He cut off the energy source of the nar door the moment we teleported over. If I hadn¡¯t brought with me a batch of thunderlight stones... " Zacha fearfully exined when he sensed the rage in his superior.


    "I knew these rats that surrendered on their own couldn¡¯t be trusted!" The tall man roared at the top of his lungs, "Well then, what are you guys waiting for? Get out of here, all of you! ughter everyst goblin in this ce! Zacha, you are responsible for finding a new stable energy source for the nar door."


    "Understood!" Zacha had no choice but to bow and receive his orders.


    The First Grade dragonborn scouts shivered in the distance. They didn¡¯t dare toe close to this human male shrouded in blue lightning.


    It seemed the narws in this ne couldn¡¯t yet wholly suppress the tall man¡¯s immense and pulsing powers of electricity, as he had just arrived. Even Zacha was like an obedient sheep before this man, despite his Second Grade powers.


    Apart from his fearsome Third Grade prowess, this neer had a unique identity.


    He might possess the form of a human, but he was not, in fact, one. Instead, he was a pure-blooded Third Grade Thunder Dragon; dragonborn like Zacha were no more than servants of their Thunder Dragon n in the end.


    In their world, only pure-blooded descendants of the dragon were qualified to bendlords. Moreover, the pure-blooded dragons would often promote mixed-blood descendants of their bloodline to be their servant race. That was to better ease their rule over theirnds. Their mixed-blood descendants would help them manage their sprawling territories.


    They came from the ne of Rance. It was a small ne world ruled by various dragon lords. Even though it was a small ne much like the Goblin ne, Rance¡¯s overall power was enough to crush the Goblin ne.


    As one of the many Dragon Lords of Rance, Thunder Dragon Arms was still a young man. He was no more than four hundred and thirteen years old currently and was considered an active and healthy juvenile dragon. As such, his territories were extremely limited. They only covered an area of approximately three thousand square kilometers. This journey to the Goblin ne was also his first internar invasion ever since he became a dragon lord.


    The thirst and greed for wealth had caused Arms to forgot any traces of fear he might have had. He only thought of leading his dragonborn servant army to rob this lower ne and add anotheryer of gold coins to his hoard back in his pce.


    As a thunder dragon that had morphed into a human form, Thunder Dragon Arms absolutely hated everything about the environment in this ne.


    The low-magic Goblin ne made it virtually impossible for him to breath. The stench of the goblins that lingered in the air further infuriated Arms.


    "Hurry up... all of you, hurry up," Arms yelled angrily, "Hurry up and make the goblins in this ce hand over all of their wealth and gemstones. Otherwise, we will ughter all life on this ne. Remember, convey my will to the goblin ruler of this ce!"


    Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha led the remaining seventeen dragonborn scouts out of the nar hall amidst Arm¡¯s roars. He advanced towards the underground chamber where the space furnace was located by tracing the strange mental flux in the air.


    Compared to the cautious attitudes of the adepts, the dragonborn didn¡¯t seem to have any intention of staying here for too long. They seemed to be in a rush to rob all the wealth from this ne and leave.


    The adept faction had alreadye to an initial peace agreement with Giant Brain Gazlowe. The leaders of both parties had met. Greem also sent Sofia and Endor over to Alice¡¯s side to protect her.


    Alice didn¡¯t dare stray too far away from the space furnace, to keep her leverage over Gazlowe effectively. If she wandered too far away from the space furnace and lost her ability to detonate the space furnace at any time, there was no doubt that Gazlowe would immediately use all the power at hismand to exterminate her.


    As long as it managed to kill Alice, the other adepts would be hard-pressed to break through theyers of magical machines and the defenses of the Third Grade brain itself to attack the central space furnace.


    Every second Alice stayed within the nar hall meant that Gazlowe had to stay by her. The giant brain didn¡¯t dare to leave for a single second.


    When both of them sensed the intense spatial flux from the nar halls and the massive attack from the dragonborn, they immediately realized that the enemy¡¯s reinforcements had arrived.


    Giant Brain Gazlowe instantly drew out colossal amounts of magic energy from the space furnace and directed it into the underground tunnel without a second word. With the furious magic energy as a cover, the outsider¡¯s would not be able to extend their spiritual senses into the room.


    Moreover, the magic energy waspletely extracted from the space beyond the ne. It hadn¡¯t been adjusted or treated. Consequently, it was not suited for direct absorption by nar creatures; Gazlowe didn¡¯t need to worry about his actions indirectly benefitting the enemy!


    One hourter, Dragonborn Zacha arrived at the underground hall with his scouts in tow.


    The three parties involved in the conflict stood off in a triangle formation inside the hall.


    As the host and owner of this ce, Gazlowe the giant brain floated above the space furnace. The entire hall was filled with goblin magical machines. Over sixty percent of the space in the room had been taken up by the goblins.


    The six adepts of Greem¡¯s factions kept to a corner of the hall, protecting Alice at the center and always alert for a possible assault from the giant brain.


    Thete-arriving dragonborn party, on the other hand, had arrived at the hall after decisively crushing all goblin defenses.


    In all honesty, the adepts had been extraordinarily ruthless and heartless in their fights with the dragonborn. No survivors had been left to tell the tale in every one of their encounters. As such, the dragonborn had only just discovered the existence of the adepts upon arriving at the underground hall.


    The leading Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha couldn¡¯t help but feel anxious when he saw the adepts from the World of Adepts.


    The strength of the Goblin ne was apparent for all to see. They were no match for them, the invaders. However, it was hard to predict how things would turn out if they were made to deal with the infamous evil adepts at the same time as they were exterminating the local forces.


    The three factions gathered in the same ce. Their furious and wicked gazes swept from one camp to the other. For a moment, no one knew how to deal with the situation at hand.


    Zacha had initially nned to use pure martial strength to force the old goblin into supplying power to the nar door. However, he was shocked to findpetitors upon arriving here. The old goblin had also vanished, reced by this giant brain monster.


    Moreover, Zacha could sense from the radiating aura that the old goblin was no longer a weakling he could bully at will. Instead, the goblin had turned into an odd Third Grade lifeform.


    The dragonborn might have Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms as their trump card, but even Zacha couldn¡¯t be sure his lord would necessarily win against this mysterious Third Grade monster. Greem and Gazlowe¡¯s factions were also cautious of each other. At the same time, they couldn¡¯t find a point of agreement or cooperation.


    Consequently, all three parties simply stared at each other. No one dared to start the conflict for fear of being the first to be targeted. The atmosphere within the room quickly turned tense and heavy.


    At this awkward moment, a strange fourth party appeared in the hall. It was the magical machine army directly subordinate to the Royal Family. This army of a thousand magical machines immediately charged toward the adepts under the lead of the rescued Princess Vanessa.


    Their reckless actions caused the other two parties to stir as well.


    Greem was thoroughly infuriated. He had no choice but to send his subordinates forward to hold the enemy back.


    He had no choice. As the Second Grade fire adept of the party, he had to remain still before the other two factions struck. A three-way melee would probably break out immediately if he personally entered the battlefield.


    The Royal Family¡¯s army was nothing in the eyes of these three factions!

 Chapter 533 The Might of Adepts

    Chapter 533 The Might of Adepts


    There were only six adepts in Greem¡¯s faction.


    Apart from the nonbatant Alice, and Greem, who couldn¡¯t easily engage in the battle, only four adepts could participate in the fight.


    Bug Adept Billis, Vampire Adept Mary, Berserk Witch Sofia, Poison Witch Endor.


    Of these four people, the only one that could act as a meat shield was Berserk Witch Sofia.


    Sofia strode forward with her muscr body in the face of the cannon barrage. She carried her thick wooden staff on her shoulder, roaring and increasing in size as she advanced forward.


    As a berserk witch, Sofia had not learned many long-ranged spells. Even if she had mastery of such spells, all of her magic powers would automatically be converted into ferocious physical prowess upon transforming into a berserk witch. As such, what appeared before everyone after her transformation was a naked and muscr five-meter tall giantess.


    The transformed Sofia appeared to be muchrger than her transformed state from the past.


    The massive muscles all over her body were as hard as steel. Fearsome and explosive strength hid within them. The piece of animal hide that had been draped over her body had now fallen to her waist and was barely covering that onest part of her body that wasn¡¯t exposed.


    However, the two pieces of flesh in front of her chest were exposed for all to see. They quivered in an extremely eye-catching manner as she walked forward.


    Any other witch would probably have been incapable of tolerating this feeling of being nude. However, Sofia had always been much rougher when ites to these things. She didn¡¯t seem to care about her situation at all. Sofia had zero awareness of her identity as a female. She simply raised the thick, pir-like staff and smashed it upon the two magical machines in front of her.


    These magical machines were both First Grade. An explosive creak rang from the machines when Sofia¡¯s staff struck them in the waists. A terrifying dent immediately appeared in the metal tes before the goblin mechanics. One could vaguely hear the sound of the mechanics coughing up blood from inside the machines.


    The barrage of bullets from the goblins sent sparks flying everywhere when they crashed against Sofia¡¯s steel-like body. The projectiles even squashed into t pieces of metal under the powerful kic force and deflected to the side.


    Of course, there were asional bullets that managed to pierce through Sofia¡¯s skin and embed themselves in her muscles. However, Sofia would merely let out a furious roar and tense all of her muscles. The strength in her muscle fibers forced the bullets out of her wounds, and they clinked as they fell to the ground.


    Sofia only needed to raise her left hand to protect her face!


    Even the barrage of magic energy weapons could only wound Sofia on the surface; they failed to damage any of her internal organs. Sofia¡¯s ability to fight was not weakened or limited in any manner!


    The three adepts behind Sofia had an easy time with the excellent meat shield defending them at the front.


    They raised defensive spells to shield themselves from the barrage of bullets and started using their own tricks to ughter the magical machine army that was rushing at them.


    The first to charge at the goblins was naturally Bloody Queen Mary.


    Her slender figure was shrouded in a mist of blood as she beat her wings and dashed into the center of the army like a crimson phantom.


    The goblin magical machine army mostly consisted of magical machines and chariots, but there were still approximately seven hundred goblin soldiers among them. These soldiers weren¡¯t protected with the same thick metal tes as the mechanics in the magical machines were.


    Mary¡¯s attacks had always been known for their speed and flexibility. The power of her attacks, on the other hand, was often inferior to other adepts. As such, Mary avoided the magical machines and goblin chariots. She shed through the air, leaving afterimages behind her and causing all the goblin firearms to miss their mark.


    Mary took the opportunity to charge into the crowd of goblin soldiers, using her crimson longbow to barrage them with scarlet arrows. Every one of her attacks was apanied by shadow damage and the corrosion of blood energy.


    The grunts and howls of the goblin soldiers could be heard everywhere in the army. A fog of blood slowly gathered in the room. Their arcanite rifles continued to fire, sending white smoke into the air. However, the goblins were still unable to catch up with Mary¡¯s shadow. In fact, more often than not, the furious goblin soldiers¡¯ random attacks resulted in plenty of friendly fire.


    Mary continued to weave between the soldiers, intentionally baiting them into firing at her.


    In particr, when Mary passed by two goblins with methrowers, both of them wentpletely out of their mind. They tried to use their methrowers to burn Mary. As they turned to light the adept on fire, they instantly turned each other into goblin torches with their streams of alchemical fire.


    They ran about screaming in agony, trying to get theirpanions to help them extinguish the fires on their bodies. Sadly, the methrower on their backs exploded the moment they ran into the crowd.


    The nearby explosions immediately set two dozen goblins on fire, sending another group of goblin torches running through the hall.


    With the Berserk Witch dealing with the magical machines and Mary sowing chaos behind enemy lines, Bug Adept Billis couldn¡¯t suppress his bloodthirst any longer.


    His entire body dispersed and turned into a swarm of ck insects. These insects swarmed into the midst of the goblins and started to devour the defenseless creatures. Of course, he would intentionally avoid those goblins with methrowers and individually pick on the soldiers with only arcanite rifles to defend themselves.


    With his immortal body of bugs, the barrage of bullets couldn¡¯t deal too much damage to his scorpion clones anyway. That made Billis grow increasingly reckless.


    Princess Vanessa let out a battle cry and reassigned arge group of methrowing goblins to exterminate Billis. Just then, a dozenrge sting scorpions murdered their way into the goblins. Billis himself might have been vulnerable to extended periods of roasting, but his scorpions were not.


    With his sting scorpion squad keeping him safe, Bug Adept Billis turned into a ck god of death. A terrifying tide of destruction would appear wherever he descended!


    Poison Witch Endor hid behind Sofia but failed to obtain any kills even after several attempts.


    The lethal poisons transmitted via air could hardly threaten the lives of the goblins now that they all had gas masks. Endor could only throw shadow balls at the goblins. A one-meter long shadow snake would emerge from these shadow balls and slither towards the goblins.


    Sadly, all of the goblins were equipped with magic energy weapons. Arcanite rifles and magic energy cannons were both capable of killing the shadow snakes. Consequently, none of Endor¡¯s snakes could even get close to the goblins.


    The dragonborn scouts had arrived after the adepts, and they gathered around Zacha, watching the battle unfold from a distance.


    They goblin¡¯s power might not be worth mentioning, but they needed to be on guard against the evil adepts.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s strange amber eyes were fixated upon the battlefield, constantly calcting the difference in strength between them and the adepts


    None of the four adepts on the battlefield were his opponents in a duel.


    The witch that transformed into a giantess might possess a magical resistant body and invulnerability to low-level energy damage, but she wasn¡¯t a counter to the Dragonborn. The Dragonborn weren¡¯tposed solely of individuals who only knew how to rely on their innate magic. Their resounding physical strength wouldn¡¯t be that much weaker than the giantess.


    In fact, Zacha had the confidence to crush the giantess in less than eight minutes if they were to duel. As for the other adepts, the female adept with the bat wings would be the most trouble to deal with!


    The Dragonborn were all brute beasts withrge bodies. It was easy for them to be exhausted when fighting against an agile enemy like this.


    In contrast, the bug adept wasn¡¯t too much of a concern for Zacha.


    Strange fellows like that often possessed inferior offensive abilities. He might be able to resist the attacks of the dragonborn for a very long time, but if the dragonborn were to just ignore him, there wasn¡¯t much that Bug Adept Billis could do either.


    Finally, the hag that used poison didn¡¯t seem to have any particrly extraordinary toxins. There was no need to pay too much attention to her.


    A weak mental flux suddenly rang in Zacha¡¯s mind as he was silently assessing this group of adepts that had appeared out of nowhere.


    "Lord Zacha, why don¡¯t we join forces?"


    The voice sounded like that of the former old goblin Gazlowe.


    "Join forces? How so?" Zacha might look like a rough brute on the surface, but he was a sly fellow as well. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have been sent as the leader of the vanguards.


    "We work together to kill these adepts, and then we sit down to discuss the other matters."


    "Haha! Who knew you would still act like a lowly creature after advancing to a Third Grade lifeform!?" Zacha didn¡¯t betray any emotion on his face, but he wasughing out loud internally, "Those adepts are also here for the ne, aren¡¯t they? We Dragonborn only want to rob this ce. We have no intention of staying here for extended periods of time. That¡¯s why our conflict of interests might be resolved through cooperation. Why should I help you deal with them under such circumstances? I don¡¯t get anything extra out of it."


    Giant Brain Gazlowe fell silent for a moment before sneering coldly, "These lies of yours might work against some lowly lizards, but they¡¯re not at useful against a great brain like me. Since the master behind you has arrived, it is a certainty that he has ordered you to find an energy source! If you help me deal with the adepts, I will provide you with energy once more and allow your reinforcements to teleport over!"


    Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s eyes gleamed with a cold light.


    "Why do you keep provoking us to go deal with the adepts? Why don¡¯t you go yourself? Moreover, where are you supposed to go once we have taken over this ne? You would be foolish enough to give us a source of energy just like that?"


    Gazlowe sighed softly.


    "It¡¯s virtually impossible for me to stop the invasion of this ne now that both you and the adepts have set your sights upon it. It doesn¡¯t matter how strong I might be. That¡¯s why I have already made up my mind. I will leave the Goblin ne in the Steel Capital and find a new world to reside in once I have killed these adepts. How about that? Do you believe me now?"


    Zacha frowned. He lowered his head and fell into deep thought.

 Chapter 534 Clash of Words

    Chapter 534 sh of Words


    While Gazlowe and Zacha secretly negotiated, Alice and Greem also privately talked to each other in the corner of the hall.


    "Greem, you had best prepare yourself!" Alice¡¯s voice suddenly rang out in Greem¡¯s mind, "We might be facing the joint attack of the dragonborn and the goblins."


    Greem was slightly surprised. He immediately asked, "Haven¡¯t we already reach an agreement with that giant brain? What reason does he have to go against his word suddenly?"


    "Because I currently hold the means to threaten his life in my hands," Alice replied in a tone of helplessness, "A selfish lifeform like him would never allow his life to be held in the grasp of someone apart from itself."


    Greem lowered his head and thought for a moment before asking another question out of curiosity, "Alice, tell me the truth. Do we have a chance of winning this war?"


    If the dragonborn hadn¡¯t appeared, Greem would never lose hope for victory regardless of how savage the goblins were or how harsh the battle became. However, the appearance of the dragonborn had caused a delicate change to the nature of the war. The actions of the adepts in the past had always been a straightforward invasion of a foreign ne. All they had to deal with were merely a group ofughable monkeys that had put on the clothes of humans!


    The adepts had always regarded the natives of lower nes with disdain.


    Any ne that the adepts had set their sights upon could never escape the fate of being enved and conquered. Their struggling would only dy the eventuality and bring even more suffering for the native citizens. The conclusion would never change.


    That was due to the massive disparity of power between the two nes!


    However, the appearance of the dragonborn had turned the nar invasion into a contest of strength between two invaders. The World of Adepts that Greem and his subordinates represented might be infinitely stronger than the ne the dragonborn came from, but that didn¡¯t mean that Greem and the others could defeat them.


    "A Third Grade has appeared on the side of the enemy. It is currently guarding the nar door and slowly getting used to the narws here. Giant Brain Gazlowe¡¯s control over the Steel Capital is also slowly increasing. If his mental consciousness canpletely assimte with the Steel Capital, it is very likely that he will ascend to Fourth Grade, bing a unique and never-before-seen alchemical lifeform." Alice was still smiling as she revealed the information she had gotten through her powers of Fate as if this wouldn¡¯t terrify or shock Greem at all.


    Greem fell silent for a second and insisted, "I don¡¯t care how severe the situation has be. All I want to know is if we have a chance of victory! Sabrina¡¯s death has already caused us to lose an adept. I do not wish tounch me and my subordinates into a battle that we are destined to lose."


    It was now Alice¡¯s turn to fall silent.


    A short momentter, she spoke firmly.


    "There is. We do have a chance of victory! You can leave the rest to me as long as you can bait the giant brain away from the space furnace for a short moment!"


    Two clusters of fire ignited in Greem¡¯s calm eyes when he heard Alice¡¯s reply. He turned and cast his gaze upon the giant brain floating high above the space furnace.


    It was clear that Giant Brain Gazlowe was keeping a tight guard over the space furnace to ensure Alice didn¡¯t continue tossing unhealthy stuff into it. He was using his massive and strict mental consciousness to guard the area around the furnace firmly. Any external attacks were unlikely to reach the space furnace with this psychic barrier of his. Of course, this also included Alice¡¯s short-distance spatial teleportation.


    While Gazlowe might no longer need to worry about Alice¡¯s tricks through this method, his body was also rooted to the spot. He couldn¡¯t risk leaving the location for even a single moment. Otherwise, there was no reason that a Third Grade monster like himself needed to lower himself to negotiation with Second Grade Zacha just for the sake of killing a First Grade witch.


    As such, Alice required the constant apaniment of a bodyguard now. Giant Brain Gazlowe would always be on the lookout for an opportunity to strike and eliminate this damned witch that represented the biggest threat to him. As for the verbal agreement they had just established; cing faith upon an individual¡¯s integrity in a situation of power imbnce was aughable act in and of itself!


    Perhaps because he sensed the strength in Greem¡¯s eyes, the giant brain floating above the space furnace brandished his dozen brain nerves andid down a few more mental barriers around himself. He cut off all possibility of teleporting into the interior of the space furnace.


    As a new surge magic energy flowed into the nar hall via the pipes, Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha assembled his seventeen subordinates into a formation and led them in an assault towards Greem and his adepts. It seemed they were trying to rely on their overall strength to force the adepts out of the hall.


    The adepts who were ughtering the army of goblins promptly retreated in the face of these new enemies. They set up a simple perimeter in front of Greem. Greem also stepped forward and transformed into a giant me humanoid in an instant. From a distance, he stood off against Second Grade Zacha from Rance.


    If this were an ordinary enemy he was dealing with, Greem would have spared the small talk and immediately started the fight. However, the attitudes of adepts drastically changed when facing an individual that might be of a higher ne as well.


    At the very least, the adepts demonstrated absolute rationality and restraint before these dragonborn!


    "We are adepts of the Sarubo n of the Zhentarim Area of the World of Adepts. This world belongs to us. If you, sir, do not wish to start a nar conflict, then you had best remove yourself from this world immediately!" Greem didn¡¯t seem to have any intention to retreat, even though this was his first time dealing with a situation like this. He disyed the usual arrogance and forcefulness of the adepts in his words.


    Greem had intended to use the Greem n as their title, but in the end, he chose the Sarubo n for a better intimidation effect. After all, the Sarubo n still had a Sixth Grade Great Adept as their leader. Things would be much simpler if the enemy also recognized the Sarubo n.


    However, if he imed to be of the Greem n and allowed the enemy to immediately know that the ruler of the n was only a Second Grade adept, the enemies would be a lot less apprehensive. They might even think of utterly exterminating his party!


    Greem¡¯s arrogant promation immediately evoked the rage of the dragonborn. They raised their electric spears in anger and roared in the slow and heavy-sounding Dragontongue to express their fury at the adepts.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Scout Leader Zacha blinked with his four amber eyes of two different sizes; he carefully sized up the adept leader in front of him.


    This was an elementium adept with the same grade as himself.


    However, considering the low-magic environment of the Goblin ne, the effects of the nar suppression should be a lot harsher on him. After all, the Dragonborn preferred to use their muscr bodies to crush their enemies, aside from their use of elementium powers. The adept, on the other hand, used only elementium as his means of attack. His physical strength wasn¡¯t all that much and was much more affected by the environment they were in.


    Even though they were both Second Grade, Zacha was extremely confident he could beat the adept while they were in the Goblin ne.


    It was because of this factor that Zacha still possessed a tremendous psychological advantage when facing off with the domineering Greem.


    Zacha might be one of the smarter individuals among the Dragonborn, but his understanding of the mysterious adepts was still extremely limited due to his narrow world view. All he knew about the World of Adepts was that it was a terrifyingrge-sized ne popted with evil and viinous adepts.


    They knew not what was mercy and justice was.


    They would step out of their ne, endlessly going in search of weak lower nes before sending their evil and terrifying adepts to conquer those nes.


    They exploited and robbed resources from every ce they visited, taking thend for their own, scouring the civilizations for their knowledge.


    They proimed themselves as the servants of knowledge, wandering everywhere in search of the truth of the world.


    They were all knowledgeable and powerful individuals. However, the most fearsome factor about the adepts were their attitudes towards other races.


    In the eyes of the adepts, there was no such thing as friends orpanions.


    The only thing that could keep adepts together was the promise of benefit and amon goal.


    They could be wise sages debating with eyesses resting upon their noses. They could be butchers that ughtered an entire race of tens of millions without batting an eye. They could be hardworking schrs spending their lives in tedious research and experiments.


    Because there were so many mysterious facets to the adepts, Zacha couldn¡¯t help but be on his guard when he first came face to face with an adept from the World of Adepts.


    The Zhentarim Area? Sarubo n?


    What were these?


    He had only vaguely heard of three powerful adept organizations existing on the World of Adepts. The Zhentarim didn¡¯t seem to be one of them. And who was this Sarubo person? Was he a Third Grade adept or a Fourth Grade?


    However, these questions onlysted for a single second in Zacha¡¯s mind before being answered by a ¡¯Samaritan.¡¯ Gazlowe, having stolen all the information from Sabrina¡¯s mind, made the kind gesture of sending all information he had on Greem to Zacha. It was all to drive away Zacha¡¯s fear and doubts.


    A newly established adept n that had yet to determine their name. The strongest of their group was the young n Leader Greem that stood before them right now. He was only Second Grade.


    Dragonborn Scout Leader Zacha¡¯s attitude towards Greem immediately changed with the introduction of this information.


    "You want us to retreat and hand this world over to you? Kehkehkeh," Zacha let out an unrestrainedugh, "That will have to depend on whether you have the power to make us do so!"


    Greem¡¯s face forged of fire shone brilliantly. A terrifying and blinding red light spilled out of his eyes.


    "If that¡¯s the case, then let us battle to our heart¡¯s content!"

 Chapter 535 Life as Cheap as Grass

    Chapter 535 Life as Cheap as Grass


    A battle between Second Grade lifeforms was drastically different from a fight between First Grades.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the First Grade adepts or the First Grade dragonborn; all of them were merely rookies that had only just stepped into the ranks of supernatural beings. They might be superhuman in some aspects and be fundamentally different from ordinary lifeforms, but at their very core, there were still many aspects to them that were limited by their past racial identities.


    Take First Grade human adepts for example. They might already possess supernatural powers, but their energy output was still inferior to magical creatures of the same grade. The main reason for this was the tremendous amount of damage that magic power could deal to the caster if too much of it were flowing through their veins at a single instant.


    However, most human adepts would havepleted assimtion with some form of elementium magic upon advancing to Second Grade. When that happened, their mortal bodies would no longer be the limitation to the might of their magic. It is only then that an adept could fully unleash their strength.


    When Second Grade Greem transformed into the fearsome me fiend, his terrifying mes and immense heat surrounded everyone. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the mighty dragonborn or the goblins hiding in their magical machines. All of them could very clearly feel the terror of a Second Grade fire adept!


    The previously lukewarm underground hall instantly turned into a hell of magma and incinerating mes. Lava flowed everywhere, and streams of fire sted here and there.


    The metal floor and all the rocks in the room glowed red from the frightening heat. The thick hooves of the dragonborn sizzled from contact with the ground. The limited amount of clothes they had on them ignited with the rapid rise in the room¡¯s temperature.


    A deep breath in such an environment would introduce scorching winds to one¡¯s weak and unprotected lungs. Ordinary creatures would be turned into mummies within three seconds of exposure to Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire. Five seconds and they would be reduced to ashes due tobustion from concentrated fire elementium.


    As Greem expanded his Ring of Fire, the First Grade dragonborn had no choice but to step back and frantically retreat from the reach of the red barrier. The adepts standing in front of Greem also quickly fled to the side, leaving the battlefield to the two Second Grade leaders.


    Even the First Grade adepts who were extremely confident in their abilities didn¡¯t dare to test the might of the Second Grade dragonborn leader so easily. The Dragonborn was different from the Second Grade magical machines of the Goblin ne. The Second Grade machines of the Goblin ne might have all sorts of ws and weaknesses, but the Dragonborn was different. He was from a higher ne, and his strength couldn¡¯t bepared to the goblins.


    When Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire engulfed Zacha, a brilliant sh of cold blue electricity emerged from his body. The powers of electricity shed with the forces of fire, causing ayer of colorful lights to appear around Zacha.


    Zacha¡¯s hooves started to move with this coat of colors around him. He picked up speed andunched a ferocious assault at Greem. Zacha¡¯s muscr body provided him with iparably violent physical prowess. When he brandished his electric spear and stabbed at Greem, the electric spear forged from special materials created tens of thousands of silver, snake-like arcs from the friction with the air. These arcs of lightning lunged at the opponent.


    Greem would never dare to take on such a savage attack from a Second Grade powerhouse head-on, regardless of how confident he was in himself.


    His body paused for a moment and instantly vanished in a st of mes. He then appeared twenty meters to the side of Zacha, and a storm of magma fireballs arose along with Greem.


    Shu! Shu! Shu!


    A chain of five magma fireballs crashed toward Zacha simultaneously. However, all of them were destroyed by forked lightning that the dragonbornunched to the side. Red boilingva sshed everywhere when the crimson fireballs exploded. They became a rain ofva that covered an extensive area.


    Zacha¡¯s broad hooves stomped against the red floor. His lithe body quickly turned back and avoided the rain ofva with an agility that couldn¡¯t be reproduced by a human body. Zacha promptly switched directions and surged at Greem.


    Twenty meters of distance was far too close for Second Grade creatures!


    A quick lunge and his long arms, paired with the four-meter-long electric spear, allowed Zacha to reach Greem in a single breath.


    One had to mention the size of the hall in this fight. The underground area was wide and spacious, but that was only rtive to the goblins. This ce was undoubtedly too narrow for two Second Grade creatures fighting with all they had. It was a lousy ce for elementium adepts who relied on long-ranged spells.


    However, Greem was no ordinary Second Grade adept!


    After failing to catch Zacha by surprise, Greem ignored the electric spear that was about to stab him. Instead, he pointed downward with both of his hands as a powerful Doomsday Volcano erupted at the spot that Zacha was about to set foot.


    Doomsday Volcano was an area-of-effect fire spell.


    It would cause a small volcanic eruption in an area specified by the caster.


    When the Doomsday Volcano erupted, a frightening hot surge ofva sted out from underground, sending the enemy flying into the skies while bathing them in a shower ofva. The volcanic eruption onlysted for thirteen seconds, but the temperature of theva would reach more than three thousand degrees.


    Ordinary creatures would be vaporized from slight contact with the zing winds caused by theva, not to mention actually bathing in the stuff.


    Zacha didn¡¯t manage to dodge due to him not picking up on the spell in time. He happened to step right upon the core area of the Doomsday Volcano¡¯s eruption.


    Scorching air broke out of the earth and blew against the indigo scales of Zacha¡¯s lower body.


    Zacha immediately retracted his spear when he saw himself destabilized and about to be sted upwards by the air current. He thrust his spear into the rock beneath him with all his strength. The erupting Doomsday Volcano had its spell structure disrupted by a sudden flow of arcing electricity and was promptly canceled.


    Greem took the opportunity of the enemy shattering the spell to retreat further. His body exploded into mes and reformed in an area fifty meters away.


    There were nearly a hundred goblin soldiers in the ce where Greem had teleported. However, with Greem¡¯s appearance, the portion of me powers he wasn¡¯t controlling spread to his surroundings and quickly dragged the goblins into a zing hell.


    Greem hadn¡¯t intended to attack the goblins. It was merely the usual dispersion of energy from his Fire Teleportation.


    However, this insignificant amount of energy for a Second Grade adept was a disaster for the hundred goblin soldiers.


    The goblin soldiers didn¡¯t even have a chance to run. They were reduced to cinders in a wave of fire. Their bodies instantly turned to ashes; only parts of their armor and magic energy weapons remained. These metal pieces clinked as they hit the ground.


    Just then, Zacha pointed to the skies with his spear. A blinding sh of lightning swiftly crashed down upon Greem.


    The bloodline talent of the Dragonborn¨C Lightningfall!


    The Dragonborn weren¡¯t skilled at magic, but they still had the blood of Thunder Dragons running through their veins. They could easily cast some of the cruder lightning spells as they wished. Zacha had a n in mind when he called down this st of lightning. The thunderstrike possessed a unique paralyzing and restrictive effect.


    The blinding lightning smashed through two Fire Shields and one energy shield before exhausting all of its energy. The lightning¡¯s aftershock came in the form of tens of thousands of tiny snake-like arcs. These small arcs of electricity crackled around Greem, forcefully preventing him from using his Fire Teleportation.


    Zacha took this opportunity to close in on Greem rapidly.


    In less than two seconds, Zacha had made it a distance of forty meters and appeared beside Greem.


    Greem frowned slightly. He tapped the ground hard with the ze of Destruction, and a me Halo of Repulsion sted out of his body.


    The strength of the me Halo was extremely negligible. It was only twenty points in power. However, the most powerful part about the spell was its strong physical shockwave.


    Zacha had just reached Greem¡¯s side and had barely destroyed one Magma Shield when he was pushed away by a wave of fire that had enveloped his body. His subsequent attacks naturally missed!


    Greem, on the other hand, took this opportunity to reward the Dragonborn with a Scarlet Firestorm, then teleported away before he could be caught.


    The two Second Grade powerhouses from different nes started a ferocious battle to the death with the underground hall as their battlefield.


    All goblins, adepts, and dragonborn kept their heads low and maintained a distance from them wherever they went. Even so, some of the slower individuals still died to the devouring mes or the suddenly erged iron hooves.


    Half an hour ago, the furious Princess Vanessa had led her goblin army to find trouble with the adepts. Yet her army was now scrambling around the hall with no discipline to speak of. They were fearfully avoiding the aftershocks from the battle between those two monsters.


    Never had Princess Vanessa so clearly felt her own insignificance and weakness!


    The value of their existence might not evenpare to a shiny ore in the eyes of these foreign invaders. At least a metal ore could attract the attention and appraisal of these powerful individuals, while they, the goblins... their lives were as insignificant as dust on the ground, blown to the winds with a gust of hot wind.


    At this moment, at this critical moment for the Goblin ne, even Vanessa the Goblin Princess had no choice but to run around the hall with apany of her soldiers.


    They would run forward, and a wave of fire would brush past them. A dozen goblins burned to ashes!


    The panicking soldiers would then scream as they headed in the other direction.


    However, before they could even make it several dozen meters away, a terrifying st of lightning would crash to the ground. An apocalyptic tide of electricity would ravage them, and yet another dozen goblins were dust in the wind.


    Princess Vanessa¡¯s will utterly shattered. She stumbled about, running without any sense of direction.


    For the first time in her life, an irrepressible thought arose in her heart.


    Sometimes, living was more important and more valuable than dignity!


    Though she had clearly understood this far toote.

 Chapter 536 Change of Situation

    Chapter 536 Change of Situation


    The damage dealt to the underground hall by two Second Grade powerhouses fighting with all they had was incredibly obvious.


    The giant brain hovered high above the space furnace, his potent Spirit keeping full sight over every development of the events happening in the room. He might have advanced into a Third Grade monster, but his innate talents made him unsuited for direct conflict. He could only mostly use his massive Spirit for assimting alchemical and engineered magical machines.


    Mechanical Adept Sabrina hadn¡¯t been weak at all. She had only happened to be countered by the giant brain¡¯s innate ability due to her existence being an alternative kind of alchemical lifeform. That was why she had been assimted by Gazlowe without much resistance and turned into a pawn to be used against Greem.


    Inparison, the magical machine that Tigule piloted might have been assimted, but he had still possessed independent will. He had been able to escape from the control of the magical machine after it had been destroyed.


    At the moment, goblin soldiers were running all over the Steel Capital. The magical machines and goblin chariots that had fought by their sides a moment ago were now chasing behind them.


    In fact, in rural corners hidden from the eyes of the goblins, something even more sinister was going on inside one of the Steel Capital¡¯s goblin chariot factories. A massive surge of magic energy poured into the ce, causing all the engineering machines to start bustling about and working. Several metal ingots of various colors and traits were ced onto the conveyor belt. Over a hundred mechanical arms moved about and performed their work as these ingots moved down the belt. The arms were mysteriously piecing these pieces together and turning them into functional goblin chariots.


    These goblin chariots needed no driver or gunner. All of the magical machines were outfitted with a consciousness-amplifying module and an automated control module. They could constantly receive the unique consciousness flux sent from Giant Brain Gazlowe.


    Five magical machine factories were operating at full power in the core area of the Steel Capital. A functional magical machine would walk off the conveyor belt every fifteen minutes. They might only be First Grade, but they came inrge numbers. Moreover, they didn¡¯t require goblin mechanics as pilots. They were all controlled by Giant Brain Gazlowe alone.


    The giant brain might look like he was remaining curled up in a corner above the space furnace as if he wasn¡¯t going to involve himself in the conflict. However, the magical machine army under his control was secretly growing at a rapid pace. When their numbers reached a certain threshold, the giant brain would flip his patience on end and use the terrifying horde of magical machines to drown these detestable fellows.


    Meanwhile, a clear superiority had been established after so much fighting between Greem and Zacha.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha was powerful, but he was no match for a Second Grade fire adept. That was especially the case once Greem had thrown out two elite adept-level Infernal Tyrants onto the battlefield. As fearsome fire cannons themselves, they could relentlessly st Zacha into disorientation and make it hard for the Dragonborn to make his moves.


    Moreover, Greem¡¯s interference left no chance for Zacha to eliminate his two golems. The Dragonborn had no choice but to endure the waves of bombardment passively. Even with his electric shields, his fine scales, and the resistance afforded to him by his thunder dragon bloodline, Zacha still couldn¡¯t take on the explosions of the fire spells.


    The chain of exploding magma fireballs charred his chest and burned his body.


    The terrifying Fire Core Explosions prated his scales and corroded much of his flesh.


    The massive Scarlet Firestorms engulfed him entirely, roasting his outsides and burning them ck.


    The spectating dragonborn scouts could no longer sit still upon seeing their leader being beaten up. They quickly got into formation and charged forward. Their strength was not enough to deal with a Second Grade adept, but the storm of lightning they could call upon in their formation was still a decent threat to Greem.


    However, their participation in the battle also drew the adepts into the fight.


    A massive skirmish between the dragonborn and the adepts erupted in the underground hall!


    All the adepts participated in the battle. Only Endor stayed by Alice¡¯s side under Greem¡¯s instructions. She was carefully and cautiously paying attention to Gazlowe¡¯s actions. Alice, on the other hand, had shut her eyes and was calmly resting. She didn¡¯t seem to care for the battle before them.


    Her perspective and tolerance were utterly different from the past since she became the Witch of Fate.


    Right now, what she was concerned about wasn¡¯t the victory or loss of this insignificant battle. What she cared about was the core node of this nar invasion.


    The battle between the adepts and the dragonborn had no real meaning. Victory or loss, it would not change the trajectory of the ne¡¯s future. The only one that could genuinely decide the fate of the Goblin ne was still that Giant Brain Gazlowe¨C the one being who stood in the eye of the storm.


    If Gazlowe chose to remain outside of this fight, then the adepts would win!


    Even if Greem and the others managed to exert all their might and exterminate these dragonborn scouts, that would only draw out the more frightening individual who stood behind them¨C a true Third Grade dragon.


    Even though that fellow had used an unusual method to transform into a human appearance, Alice still undoubtedly recognized that unique dragon¡¯s stench from however far away.


    That was why Alice had specially told Greem to extend the battle with the dragonborn and not to be too ferocious with his attacks.


    Alice was waiting.


    She was waiting for a variable!


    Of the three factions involved in the battle, it was the unstoppable adepts who were at the most obvious disadvantage. If the Third Grade behind the dragonborn showed himself, or if Gazlowe decided to make a move, then the few adepts would have no choice but to step out of this conflict.


    If they didn¡¯t handle the situation well, not many of them would be able to escape the Steel Capital alive.


    The only hope of breaking this stalemate rested upon Giant Brain Gazlowe.


    The adepts would only have a chance to regain control of the situation if they found a way to spark conflict between Gazlowe and the Third Grade dragon.


    As Alice waited anxiously in silence, a turning point that could change the fate of the Goblin ne finally arrived!


    The adepts and the dragonborn had been fighting for a long time. Meanwhile, the magic energy that the giant brain supplied to the nar hall was at a constant low. That caused Arms, the Third Grade dragon staying by the nar door, to be increasingly restless.


    Without sufficient magic energy, the nar door had to exhaustrge numbers of thunderlight stones with every passing second to maintain its functions. It was important to note that Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms had juste of age. He had yet to rob enough wealth and resources to allow him to splurge in this manner.


    As of now, it was still uncertain as to what benefits the Goblin ne could provide him. However, the exhausted pile of thunderlight stones had definitivelye from his personal collection. If he won this war but ended up finding this ne to be poor and worthless, then he, a newly appointed Dragon Lord, would be the butt of the joke to the entire dragon race. He would getughed at over this by his thunder dragonpanions for at least a thousand years.


    That was why Arms finally couldn¡¯t wait any longer. When the first group of fifty dragonborn reinforcements arrived, he left thirty of them to guard the door while he led twenty dragonborn warriors toward the underground hall, following the marks left behind by the scouts.


    None of the adepts and dragonborn scouts fighting in the hall knew anything about Arm¡¯s actions. However, Gazlowe saw it as it happened.


    In truth, the giant brain had already initiated his n. The moment significant losses started piling up on the side of the adepts or the dragonborn, the magical machine army he had hidden would immediately swarm out and deal with the rest of the enemies.


    However, to his surprise, the battle between the two factions was taking an extremely long time. A group of fifty dragonborn had teleported over through the damned nar door.


    If this situation were allowed to continue, the bnce between the adepts and the dragonborn would sway. When that happened, Gazlowe would not be able to stop the enemy reinforcements regardless of how sizeable his magical machine army might be.


    At this moment, the threat of the dragonborn in Gazlowe¡¯s mind far outweighed the adepts. In particr, Gazlowe had reached his psychological bottom line when Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms advanced towards the hall with his subordinates.


    The only reason he had allowed the adepts and the dragonborn to continue their fight in the hall was that he believed that neither party was a genuine threat to him. All of the adepts and dragonborn added together could notpare to the threat that the evil witch posed to him.


    Now the Third Grade thunder dragon intended to march toward the underground hall. That was something that Giant Brain Gazlowe couldn¡¯t tolerate!


    It was a Third Grade dragon!


    If Arms managed to break into the hall, he would easily be able to defeat a newly advanced Third Grade weakling like Gazlowe with his dragon powers. When that happened, Gazlowe would not have any chance of escaping or defending himself. His enemy would truly hold his life in their hands!


    As such, Gazlowe had no choice but to send a killing order to all the magical machines in the Steel Capital, even if the conditions weren¡¯t ripe. The giant brain also connected with Greem¡¯s mind and started discussing their n to deal with the dragonborn.


    ............


    An exceptionally brutal battle erupted in the extensive underground tunnels!


    Third Grade Arms hadn¡¯t made it far out of the nar hall before being swarmed by a flood of goblin chariots, magical machines, and magic mechs.


    Only two magical machines could fight side-by-side in this tunnel that was no more than ten meters in height and seven meters in width. Moreover, both parties were only using melee attacks in the fight due to the limited space avable.


    The dragonborn still sustained unavoidable wounds, even though they were superior to the machines in both bodily strength andbat techniques.


    After all, the magic energy weapons equipped on the magical machines could be used at both close and mid range!


    Two dragonborn stood side by side and shed with two magical machines at melee distance. They were able to crush the machines into pieces with their raw power, but two more machines charged forth before they could even take a breath.

 Chapter 537 Shifting Alliances

    Chapter 537 Shifting Alliances


    The way these magical machines were fighting was brutal and reckless!


    The two magical machines at the back were firing methrowers and bullets, while the two at the front were waving their metal fists to punch at the dragonborn.


    When the two dragonborn destroyed these four magical machines at a small cost, four new magical machines stomped forward.


    It was tough for the dragonborn to escape the siege of the machines once they had been caught in an endless loop of battles.


    The siege of the magical machines naturally infuriated the arrogant and proud Third Grade thunder dragon.


    For the first time, he felt as if he had been toyed with by the natives of a lowly ne!


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms was no longer able to suppress his fury. He let out a reverberating dragon¡¯s roar as he began his dragon transformation against the might of the nar suppression.


    Arms was no mixed-blood descendant like Zacha. He was Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms, a pure-blooded noble thunder dragon. The reason he had transformed into human form when he came to the Goblin ne was only to make the passage here easier. It also helped weaken much of the nar suppression¡¯s effects.


    Now, faced with the provocation of the local natives, Arms could no longer suppress his mes of anger. He released his transfiguration effect in a sh of lightning and returned to his original appearance.


    It was a beautiful thunder dragon with a body full of fine blue scales. His neck was slender, yet muscr. His cheekbones were sharp, as were his superciliary bones and pointed snout. When Arms¡¯rge mouth opened, the sound of rumbling thunder could be heard within. One could also vaguely see a cluster of pulsing electric storms in his throat.


    Thunder Dragon Arms¡¯ body was seventeen meters from head to tail. His wingspan was twelve meters at its fullest.


    The tunnel before them might be a massive corridor for ordinary goblins, but it was a tightly constraining prison for the transformed thunder dragon. It was hard for him to turn his body in this tunnel.


    However, he did not need to bother with turning!


    Thunder Dragon Arms shoved his subordinates aside after he hadpleted his transformation. He lowered his head and used the two pairs of hard, spiral-shaped horns to open a path. He smashed his way through the magical machines in a matter of seconds.


    It didn¡¯t matter how tough and hard the alloy materials used to forge the magical machines were. They couldn¡¯t possibly defend against the barbaric charge of a Third Grade dragon.


    Moreover, if Thunder Dragon Arms made it into the midst of the magical machine army, he could easily summon lightning around him and use it to st away all magical machines around him.


    That would be a lightning storm conjured by a Third Grade thunder dragon. How could a group of First Grade magical machines hope to defend against it?


    It was just like plowing the ground. Thunder Dragon Arms pierced through the siege of magical machines without much effort. A floor full of machine debris and shards were left in his wake. However, the counterattacks and focus firing of magic energy weapons from the magical machines still dealt minor damage to the thunder dragon¡¯s body.


    Arms plowed through three tunnels and destroyed over a hundred magical machines. Yet the tunnels in front of him were still packed full of magical machines.


    Thunder Dragon Arms crouched on the ground and panted for a moment. For the first time, he started doubting whether this had been the right choice.


    The lightning speed of a thunder dragon had no room to be unleashed in this location. Even the endless power of electricity he always wielded in the past could not be replenished in this ce; this damned Goblin ne¡¯s magic aura was too thin. It was enough to make a dragon suffocate. The magic elementium obtained through breathing was not sufficient for Arms¡¯ use.


    That was why, after a bit of fighting, the Third Grade Arms didn¡¯t dare to use his powers of electricity in the same extravagant manner as he had in the past. Instead, he turned into a cold-blooded killer, pinning the machines with his horns and tearing their chests apart with his ws before spitting a ball of lightning into the machines.


    The explosion of lightning within the magical machines would instantly destroy all their delicateponents, causing them to cease all operations after a bit of creaking.


    Killing the magical machines in this manner was a little slower, but it saved a lot of Arms¡¯ lightning powers. After all, the wounds from close-rangedbat would quickly heal due to his robust Physique. On the other hand, his lightning powers would take a much longer time to recover.


    As Arms was having a fun time taking apart the magical machines, Giant Brain Gazlowe was almost crying from the heartbreak.


    The magical machine factories in the Steel Capital could indeed produce an endless stream of magical machines, but the process itself still consumed arge number of metal resources. The metal reserves in the Steel Capital were, at the very best, only enough to construct another 1,236 magical machines.


    Yet, just Thunder Dragon Arms alone had easily destroyed a hundred and eighteen machines.


    If Arms was allowed to continue his rampage, all of Gazlowe¡¯s machines would be destroyed, regardless of how many he could create.


    As such, Giant Brain Gazlowe could no longer sit still when the Third Grade dragon continued to advance towards the hall. It started to negotiate with Greem, the leader of the adepts.


    Nothing else in the world was more important to Gazlowe than his life!


    He had gone through so much trouble to assimte with the Steel Capital through the immortality ritual. However, these adepts and dragonborn that had broken into his ¡¯body¡¯ had be a major problem.


    Of course, he would try and capture both of these enemies in a single blow if he had the chance.


    However, his means of attack were restricted. He needed to rely upon those mediocre low-Grade magical machines forbat. Those magical machines had no advantage to speak of before the adepts and the dragonborn. In fact, they were so frail in front of the Third Grade thunder dragon that they were no different from simple toys.


    With no choice left to him, and the situation spiraling out of his control, Gazlowe could only choose to form an alliance with the adepts once again. He needed them to help fight against the dragonborn and weaken the amount of pressure that he needed to deal with.


    While Gazlowe believed his ns to be unnoticed by the others, he had no idea that Alice possessed a perfect sense of all his schemes.


    All the adepts that Greem led retreated from the underground hall without any hesitation upon establishing an alliance with Giant Brain Gazlowe. However, they didn¡¯t behave as they had agreed. Instead of going out to hunt the thunder dragon, they were trying to make their way out of the hall via the tunnels.


    The current situation was a result of there being three parties. No one dared to fight with their full strength out of caution for the third party. Thus, Greem chose to temporarily remove himself from the conflict and allow the giant brain to sh head-on with the thunder dragon.


    He didn¡¯t believe that Gazlowe would so easily bow before the dragon when it came to a choice of freedom and envement.


    As long as the dragon and the brain didn¡¯te to an agreement, then a big fight was unavoidable. The adepts would then have a chance and the space to thread the needle and determine the oue of this conflict!


    Giant Brain Gazlowe was naturally furious at the adepts retreat.


    However, he couldn¡¯t do anything about their betrayal. He had to deal with this problem by himself!


    Arge group of magical machines and goblin chariots swarmed out of various spots under hismand. They were to stop the adepts in the tunnels before they could make it too far away. Even more magical machines marched into the underground hall and started clearing up the remnants of the dragonborn squad.


    Less than ten dragonborn scouts remained after that brutal battle.


    The severely wounded Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha could only lead his remaining seven dragonborn scouts in a difficult retreat. They fought as they slowly stumbled backward and attempted to return to the nar hall to regroup with their master.


    Sadly, while the magical machines were mostly dying the enemies in the other two battlefields, Gazlowemanded the machines tomit to bloody and savage extermination when it came to Zacha and his soldiers. All the remaining dragonborn scouts fell to the endless horde of magical machines in less than fifteen minutes. Dragonborn Zacha was alsopletely exhausted. He couldn¡¯t possibly escape from the surrounding of the magical machines now.


    "Save him!"


    Endor was protecting Alice as they moved in the group. However, Alice suddenly opened her eyes and gravely spoke to Greem when Zacha had fallen into a situation of certain death.


    There wasn¡¯t time to exin anything in such an emergency. Greem immediately cast Fire Teleportation several times in a row without any hesitation whatsoever. He dove right into the fearsome battlefield filled with magical machines.


    Dragonborn Zacha was indeed a powerful individual as a Second Grade himself. If it weren¡¯t for the exhaustion from his battle with Greem, and the dyed recovery caused by the Goblin ne¡¯s environment, he would never have fallen into such an awkward position.


    The magical machines might be able to trap the Dragonborn, but they couldn¡¯t stop the agile and mobile Greem.


    Greem engulfed the battlefield with a Meteor Shower the moment he stepped foot inside. He sessfully reached Zacha while the magical machine army was thrown into disarray.


    "If you trust me, then do not resist," Greem gravely said as he fired a chain of fireballs to knock the magical machines away, "I can bring you out of here!"


    Zacha gripped the electric spear in his hand tightly. He cautiously assessed this terrifying fire adept who was engulfed in a ze of mes. He couldn¡¯t figure out what the adept¡¯s intentions were.


    After all, they had only just been wing at each other¡¯s throat. Now, the enemy wasing over in a friendly disy of help? That... was confusing Zacha, whose brain capacity had a limit.


    "You are an invader. I am an invader. Now, it seems both of us invaders have been tricked and toyed with by that bloody Gazlowe," Greem coldly said, "I will never allow such a formerly lowly creature to do as they will, not upon my dignity as an adept. So..."


    Who knows which of Greem¡¯s words was the one that moved Zacha, but the dragonborn immediately tightened his grip on the electric spear. The muscles on his right hand bulged, and his veins could be clearly seen. A thunderous roar erupted from his mouth as he stood up on his hooves. Suddenly, a dense lightning power radiated from his body.


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled slightly.


    The Second Grade Dragonborn was almost at his limits, but even a faltering tiger was still an intimidating one. If Zacha tried to attack him with all he had, Greem would not escape unscathed, even with all the defenses he possessed.


    He was an elementium adept after all, not a body-refining adept or a bloodline adept that fought with their physical bodies.


    While Greem was frowning, Zacha¡¯s ferocious attack that had been building for a while finally descended upon the hall.


    Suddenly, the entire battlefield was covered in blinding, brilliant clusters of terrifying lightning!

 Chapter 538 Adept and Dragon

    Chapter 538 Adept and Dragon


    Thunderclouds rumbled as lightning shed.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha was a soldier that mostly engaged in closebat, but the lightning power that he amassed with all his strength still reached a level that moved Greem.


    Two hundred and eighty-three points!


    That was a shocking number.


    An attack of this level could allow Zacha to instantly kill any individual weaker than himself within a radius of a hundred meters. That mostly referred to any being of First Grade and below. Even Greem could be severely wounded if his defensive spells weren¡¯t all prepared.


    As the rumbling lightning spread outwards, all of the magical machines copsed to the ground. Bright arcs of electricity still crackled over their metal bodies. The powerful lightning st had destroyed the control modules and energy cirction system within their bodies, resulting in multiple smaller explosions on the battlefield.


    All the magical machines in view exploded into scattered bits of metal and roboticponents. Only the machines at the edge of the lightning storm were barely able to stay in one piece. However, even they had lost their ability to fight.


    Seventy-eightbat magical machines.


    A full power attack from Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha had destroyed seventy-eight magical machines. That was a result that he could already be proud of.


    However, all of Zacha¡¯s energy was exhausted after the attack. His muscr hooves could no longer support his massive body, and he slowly started to fall as he leaned against his electric spear.


    Even a Second Grade like himself couldn¡¯t support such a brutal and reckless blow.


    Far away at the entrance of the tunnels, a new wave of magical machines was charging toward Greem and Zacha, stepping upon the debris of the destroyed machines as they did so. They had yet to arrive in front of Zacha, but their violent barrage of bullets had already engulfed the Dragonborn.


    Theplete exhaustion of his lightning powers and the inability to rapidly absorb new lightning elementium from the air caused Zacha¡¯s blue scales to lose their luster. His scales were now dull and lightless.


    Consequently, his defensive abilities also degraded. He was a genuine Second Grade dragonborn, yet grunted from being hit by ordinary metal bullets.


    The Thunderstrike from earlier had clearly avoided the area Greem was in. Even though the wildly crackling tide of lightning had destroyed one of Greem¡¯s Fire Shields, he¡¯d only had to endure a portion of the lightning aftershock. He was not hurt at all.


    Greem took a few steps forward and stood by Zacha¡¯s side. He bent over and ced his bright burning hand upon the Dragonborn. A mysterious scene urred!


    The brilliant mes slowly started to spread from Greem¡¯s magma hand and extended toward every part of Zacha¡¯s body. Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s four odd eyes of two different sizes opened wide in surprise. The bright red mes were burning on his body, but strangely enough, he couldn¡¯t feel any pain from the fire at all.


    It was almost as if...as if those mes didn¡¯t have any temperature!


    However, his sharp instincts as a Second Grade dragonborn told him that these mes did have heat. It was only that the powerful human fire adept seemed to be temporarily allowing him to possess a strange state of immunity against fire through contact. This way, elementium fires of any strength would not be able to damage him!


    The visible burning of the fire looked extremely slow, but in truth, the entire process took less than three seconds toplete.


    The Fire Shields and Lava Shields around Greem also hovered over and helped Zacha block the barrage of bullets and goblin rockets. As the bright mespletely engulfed Zacha, a brilliant red light erupted in his vision. He immediately felt as if he had been thrown into a sea of fire. His sense of space had fallen intoplete chaos.


    However, this sh of red light departed as fast as it hade!


    When the red light quickly faded away, Zacha was shocked to find himself moved from his original position. He had been teleported into the group of adepts along with the fire adept.


    He could see that speechlessly savage and violent witch at the perimeter, beating on the magical machines with her thick wooden club. Every swing of her club would cause a dent in a magical machine¡¯s head, and sometimes even destroy the machine. Only metalponents and alloy shards remained on the floor.


    Disregarding everything else, this berserk witch was a terrifying existence when it came to pure strength, even if thrown into the midst of First Grade Dragonborn. Even Second Grade Zacha would not be able to crush her in a matter of two to three seconds.


    The other side of the adepts¡¯ perimeter was being held up by Bug Adept Billis¡¯ swarm.


    A dozen sting scorpions the size of mastiffs roamed the battlefield, asionally letting out earth spikes at the magical machine. These sudden spikes would probably have impaled ordinary creatures. In fact, it was possible that they were simply lifted into the air from all the earth spikes.


    However, the heavy machines were entirelyposed of tough, hard metal. There was no apparent weak spot anywhere on their bodies. As such, the earth spikes of the sting scorpions couldn¡¯t deal much direct physical damage to them.


    However, these sting scorpions were disying power beyond their own grade under themand of Billis. If one earth spike wasn¡¯t enough, then he would use two, or ten.


    Focused fire from thirteen sting scorpions was enough to deal severe earth damage to all magical machines in a ten-meter radius. As the damaged magical machines struggled to escape from the forest of earth spikes, these sting scorpions would burrow and appear beneath them.


    Then the sting scorpions would bite and tear at the bodies of the machines in a mad frenzy.


    Once visible cracks started to appear in their bodies, the sting scorpions would dive inside. A magical machine would then copse in a crackling explosion, wholly crippled and incapable of movement.


    The ones fighting at the frontline were always these sting scorpions. Bug Adept Billis was hiding inside the defensive line formed by the sting scorpions, casually picking off the stray machine that had made it past.


    However, the sting scorpions were still somewhat weak individually whenpared to the magical machines. Their shells were also not as durable as the machines. As a result, all thirteen of them suffered wounds and injuries of various degrees after a long period of fighting. Their pungent purple blood had spilled everywhere.


    Still, this didn¡¯t make them any less reckless when they rushed at the next magical machine in the line!


    Mary and Endor had a much morefortable time behind the lines with these two meat shields in front of them. They stayed by Alice¡¯s side and guarded her while using powerful long-ranged spells to attack the magical machines.


    As a vampire adept, Mary was an agility-type assassin. Her expertise was not frontal attacks.


    That was why she had no choice but stay inside the perimeter and fire arrows with her crimson bow, despite her normally assertive personality. She couldn¡¯t do much against this endless horde of enemies.


    It was the same for Poison Witch Endor.


    Her poison techniques and spells were utterly useless against a bunch of remote-controlled machines with no flesh or blood to speak of. She no longer had the same might that she had disyed when she instantly murdered a hundred goblin mechanics on the day she entered the Goblin ne.


    However, Endor also knew pretty decent and sinister spells apart from deadly gues and poisons. Even the magical machines were not immune to her vast acid swamps and the corrosive arrows that she fired.


    Moreover, all of her attacks focused on the lower half of the magical machines. All the machines that had their legs corroded by acid would be stumbling blocks for the others. It dyed the speed at which the machine army pressed toward the adepts.


    In conclusion, the spells of the adepts were extremely varied. They coulde up with entirely different ns of action in response to different situations.


    The discipline and obedience of the adepts might be extremelycking, but they made up for it by having adaptability that surpassed that of Zacha¡¯s dragonborn squad by several times.


    That was also why the adepts had managed to hang on for so long despite having fewer numberspared to the dragonborn scouts. Their chances of survival were also much higher.


    As expected of a fierce and mighty Second Grade dragonborn, Zacha managed to recover in less than thirty seconds. He could now stand up and join the battle once more.


    The perimeter of the adepts became even more stable and more difficult to break with Zacha¡¯s addition!


    At this moment in the battle, the number of broken machines piling up outside the perimeter had reached a total of two hundred. It had gone far beyond Gazlowe¡¯s psychological bottom line.


    If all of his magical machine reserves were exhausted, he would have to retreat. That was the case even if he was a Third Grade monster facing off against a ragtag group of First Grade adepts led by two Second Grade beings.


    After all, who was it that made his reincarnated body that of a giant brain that only had the means to protect itself? It didn¡¯t have the uniquebat techniques and abilities that normal Third Grade monsters should possess.


    As the adepts gave their all to repel the attack of the machines, a thunderous roar echoed from a tunnel nearby.


    The next moment, a dozen magical machines guarding the tunnel were blown away by a massive force. They flew across the sky like petals in spring. The four directly hit machines disintegrated in midair.


    Shattered magical machine parts flew everywhere like a downpour of rain!


    A powerful dragon seventeen meters long and covered with fine blue scales emerged from the tunnel as the magical machine army was thrown into disarray. He took to the skies and caught up with the machines in the air before using his fangs and slender tail to smash them to pieces.


    The adepts present on the battlefield couldn¡¯t help but be mesmerized at the sight of the dragon¡¯s majestic movements inbat. Their hearts shrunk at the same moment.


    A Third Grade Dragon!


    And to make matters worse, a fearsome Thunder Dragon¨C dragons that were known even amongst the entire species!


    The few adepts belonging to Greem¡¯s faction couldn¡¯t help but gather closer together. They got into formation and resisted that terrifying dragon¡¯s aura of might that pressed against them.

 Chapter 539 Might of a Dragon

    Chapter 539 Might of a Dragon


    As natural rulers among magical creatures, the dragons were born with a unique and invible aura of might!


    The first impression the Thunder Dragon gave to the adepts upon entering was an extremely invasive pressure.


    Even the fearless Mary felt it harder to breath when standing near a dragon like this. After all, the dragon was a superior being higher up on the food chain. The vast mental aura of might and intimidation was not something that a puny vampire could endure.


    Zacha, on the other hand, was a direct subordinate of this Third Grade thunder dragon; the dragon¡¯s blessing of faith protected him. He was holding himself together much better in the face of the dragon¡¯s aura of mightpared to the adepts.


    Dragonborn Zacha immediately bowed when the Thunder Dragon appeared. His two scaled front limbs bent as he kneeled on the ground and paid his most sincere respects to his master.


    The other adepts gathered behind Zacha, their pale faces looking at this fearsome dragon shrouded in arcs of electricity. For a moment, none of them knew how to respond.


    Some adepts had already secretly made preparations to escape at any time.


    After all, they only had a loosepanionship with Greem. They weren¡¯t bound with intimate contracts or anything of the sort. They didn¡¯t mind contributing their strength to Greem¡¯s cause when their goals aligned. However, no adept would sacrifice themselves like a loyal knight or warrior in the face of a hopeless battle.


    Instead, they would scatter and fight for themselves! That was the response most appropriate to the nature of the adepts!


    Even Greem had to retract the energy flux he radiated when faced with a tyrannical Third Grade being of a top-tier species. He withdrew his Ring of Fire back into his body and bowed slightly to pay his respects to the Thunder Dragon.


    The proud and mighty Thunder Dragon reared on his hind legs as he tore the remaining magical machines to pieces with his sharp teeth and ws. The dragon let out a loud and resounding roar as it beat its wings and cocked its head. It was only then that hended on all fours. The Thunder Dragon strode toward Zacha with firm and steady steps.


    "What¡¯s happened, Zacha? Where is your dragonborn scout squad? Who are these people? Why do I smell a repulsive magical aura on them?" Thunder Dragon Arms asked way too many questions at once the second he met with his subordinate.


    He even lowered his body and sniffed Greem with his massive snout. He then let out a resounding sneeze. His huge amber eyes radiated a visible light that quickly scanned all of the people present.


    True Sight!


    That was an innate ability of higher-grade dragons. They could see through all illusions and deceptions of low-grade creatures and directly view the soul origin of these creatures.


    That was why it was extremely, extremely difficult to cheat a dragon!


    A lot of the stories spread throughout many nes about tricking dragons and fooling them were referring to unintelligent mixed-blood dragons or inexperienced whelps. Those self-proimed charismatic bards would probably be unable to utter even a single word if they were faced with a true adolescent dragon and its terrifying aura of might, not to mention being clever enough to lie and trick a thousand-year-old monster like that.


    "Adepts. You are adepts!" Thunder Dragon Arms didn¡¯t need any introduction. He saw the soul origins of all the adepts with a mere nce thanks to his True Sight.


    The adepts were powerful creatures that had long been infamous in the multiverse. They were almost as well-known as the dragons.


    If the dragons were individually mighty lions and tigers, the adepts would be sly, sinister, and evil wolves. They wandered the space beyond their realm in groups, invading lower nes everywhere. Countless conflicts and battles had erupted between them and the dragons in many different ces.


    As the natural rulers of all magical creatures, the dragons were walking treasure chests. Their scales, blood, tendons, marrow, bones, dragon crystals, skin, ws. Absolutely everything on the body of a dragon was a treasure of extreme collection value to an adept.


    The adepts would never let go of a lone dragon that appeared in their sights if the opportunity allowed for it!


    For the same reason, the dragons did not have a good impression of the adepts who possessed sufficient power to hunt theirpanions. That was why the sight of both parties pursuing the other to death was a ubiquitous sight outside of the realms. They would engage in a fight as long as time and space allowed for it.


    In all seriousness, adepts and dragons could be considered twopletely separate and opposing factions!


    When Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms detected that unique magic aura inside the adepts, he immediately opened his mouth wide. A lightning storm the size of a grindstone quickly formed in his throat. If nothing unexpected happened, that fearsome lightning st would explode in the midst of the adepts in the very next second. These lowly and despicable poachers would be exterminated before they could grow to be threats.


    Wiping out a small group of adepts like this one in a single blow wouldn¡¯t be a surprise with the innate abilities of a Third Grade thunder dragon. Of the six adepts, perhaps only Second Grade Greem couldst a few seconds longer. Arms might need another bite or scratch of the w to finish the job. The other First Grade adepts had absolutely no possibility of surviving!


    All the adepts present felt as if arge pot of glue had been poured into their minds in the face of the dragon¡¯s threat. Both their thought processes and bodily responses were more than ten times slower than usual. The few adepts could do nothing but stumble backward when they saw the sudden sh of lightning from the thunder dragon. The waited for the descent of the lightning st with fear and anxiety.


    "My lord, our enemy is not them!" The kneeling Dragonborn Zacha shouted loudly, "That native goblin has sessfully turned himself into a Third Grade monster. It is the magical machine army he¡¯s manipting that has caused us so much trouble."


    The Thunder Dragon¡¯s body froze.


    His long head tilted slightly as he scanned Zacha with his amber eyes. He confirmed that Zacha was neither lying nor under the charm effects of the enemy. It was only then that he hesitated, withdrew his battle stance, and dispersed the small lightning storm forming in his throat.


    To be able to disperse such ferocious energy flux with a mere thought!


    Greem secretly felt relieved and shocked at the same time. For the first time, he was envious of the excellent innate abilities of the dragons.


    Honestly, the dragons were much like the bloodline adepts.


    They didn¡¯t need to wander everywhere to test themselves and to collect knowledge and resources as the human adepts did. The two activities that the dragons engaged in most in their lives was going out to rob the wealth of nar worlds, and then feasting and going back to sleep in their dens.


    Their power was obtained through this continuous process of eating and sleeping and waking up and eating.


    One could honestly say that all the knowledge and strength that a dragon needed was engraved in their bloodline and their soul at the moment they were born. As long as they obtained an increase in physical strength through dragon meditation (sleeping), then the knowledge of dragons that corresponded to their power would naturally appear in their brains.


    They were able to obtain such a powerful physical might and magical ability without putting in any hard work. It wouldn¡¯t be wrong to say that no other natural creature in this universe had a better life than the dragons!


    However, at this moment, Greem had no thought to spare on the good life of the dragons. Instead, he centered all his attention upon the Chip¡¯s passive probing ability.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare use any active probing abilities in the face of a Third Grade Thunder Dragon that could go berserk at any time. He could only use his passive data collection abilities to observe the actions of the thunder dragon. If the enemy truly wanted to fight, he would have to make sure he escaped the range of the thunder dragon¡¯s attack before the lightning st could wipe out the party.


    Escaping should not be a problem for someone of his power, as long as he reacted promptly.


    If he was willing to risk death and stayed for another two seconds, he could also bring Alice and Mary along with him. However, if he did that, the risk of death would jump from 21% to 67%. If he were a little more greedy and tried to bring one more person with him, then his death rate would reach 89%.


    That was literally nine deaths out of every ten scenarios!


    Greem hated this feeling.


    His life was in the hands of the enemy. He could only rely on skill and luck for a sliver of a chance to live. This feeling was really...really unpleasant.


    "Zacha, are you sure about what you are saying?" The Thunder Dragon¡¯s rumbling voice reverberated throughout the hall, "You should know that you are speaking for these adepts now."


    "Indeed, master!" Zacha lowered his head. His attitude turned even humbler than before, "I wouldn¡¯t dare to lie to you. I am only saying what I have seen and what I have heard. Our greatest enemy of the present is in the underground hall behind us. It is controlling arge number of magical machines to assault us. My...my squad all died in there."


    It seemed all mentions of ¡¯magical machines¡¯ had infuriated the Thunder Dragon.


    Everyone could clearly see scratches and marks of varying depths upon the beautiful blue body of this formerly noble, elegant, and sacred great thunder dragon. Many parts of his scales were dented or missing. The pieces of his flesh that had lost the protection of his scales were charred ck.


    These seemed to be the work of the methrowers on the goblin magical machines!


    The two wings on the dragon¡¯s back were not bnced. The right side was curled behind his back and having a hard time extending, and it seemed there were countless tears and wounds on it. The Thunder Dragon¡¯s muscr left hind limb also appeared to be limping. He didn¡¯t dare ce too much weight on that leg.


    More obviously were the marks on the Thunder Dragon¡¯s spiral horns. Cuts of various depths could be found all over them. One of the horns had even snapped off. Purple dragon¡¯s blood was seeping out of the base of that horn. Mary couldn¡¯t help but lick her lips.


    "Speak! Those damned, annoying metal cans were sent out by that goblin?" The Thunder Dragon roared, and the deafening Dragontongue almost shattered everyone¡¯s eardrums.


    Anyone could hear the dripping hatred and unconcealed fury in that one short sentence of his!


    "Indeed, master!" Dragonborn Zacha turned and pointed at the underground hall in the distance, "The one manipting the machines is hiding there."


    There was no need to tell the dragon anything more. The next second, the berserk Thunder Dragon Arms flew past everyone¡¯s head. His massive body charged into the underground hall, bringing with it a pulsing aura of lightning power.


    For some reason, everyone started praying for that Giant Brain Gazlowe!


    Here was hoping he won¡¯t die too brutally.

 Chapter 540 Secret Passage

    Chapter 540 Secret Passage


    The atmosphere in the room quickly turned awkward once Thunder Dragon Arms had charged into the underground hall like a whirlwind.


    Less than eleven dragonborn warriors had managed to make it here with Arms. Naturally, they stayed with Zacha once Arms had left for the underground hall.


    Zacha¡¯s attitude toward the adepts had slightly changed now that he had more leverage than before.


    The dragonborn and the adepts were unquestionably opposing factions in the end!


    It wasn¡¯t a good thing to leave the adepts to do as they liked on the battlefield while the master of the dragonborn was fighting with the Third Grade monster. After Zacha obtained a new group of warriors, the first person he had to deal with was Greem.


    In the end, Greem had saved his life once.


    That was why Zacha chose not to fight with him. Instead, he had his subordinates keep a close eye on the adepts and seal off the entrance to the underground hall. It was as if they were trying to prevent the adepts from doing anything suspicious while their master was fighting.


    Greem didn¡¯t protest at all. Instead, he calmly gathered his subordinates and escaped into a tunnel.


    He might have saved Zacha once, but Zacha had also helped protect the entire group of adepts with his words. They had settled their debt. Greem could perfectly understand why Zacha was treating them in this manner.


    There were still quite a few magical machines around, but strangely enough, they ignored the adepts. They charged past the adepts and recklessly threw themselves at the dragonborn¡¯s line of defense.


    At this moment, a great rumbling came from the underground hall in the distance. The entire Steel Capital seemed to be quaking. Waves of mental fluctuations that appeared to belong to Giant Brain Gazlowe reverberated throughout the undergroundwork. There were pained howls and cries for mercy mixed within these mental fluxes.


    "Follow me!" Alice¡¯s morale seemed to be at its highest at this moment. She stepped up and led the party through the winding tunnels as if she was familiar with thebyrinth-likework.


    Their destination was a secret underground room!


    There, they found Goblin God of War Tigule, who was crying as he cradled the corpse of Princess Vanessa.


    Tigule couldn¡¯t be any more filled with hate and anger than he was at this moment. He immediately leaped up and lunged at the adepts when he saw them arrive.


    Sadly, Tigule was no more than an adept-level goblin without his magical machine. Any of the adepts in the party could easily kill him, let alone Greem.


    Endor especially disliked ignorant fools like these. She took out a green frog and was about to toss it at Tigule. However, Alice stopped her before she could do so.


    Sofia strode forward under Alice¡¯s instructions. The berserk witch grabbed Tigule¡¯s stubby neck and lifted him into the air. Tigule couldn¡¯t reach Sofia no matter how frantically he punched and kicked. Moreover, there was no chance he could break free of Sofia¡¯s grip with his meager strength. He started crying and wailing after a bit of resistance.


    "You love Prince Vanessa?" It was only now that Alice walked to the front of Tigule.


    "......" Tigule was dejected, but he lifted his head and stared at Alice with hateful bloodshot eyes.


    "If I help you resurrect Princess Vanessa... " Alice¡¯s narrowed her eyes and smiled at the goblin.


    "Gah," Tigule gasped. He then asked in disbelief, "You...you can really resurrect... the princess?"


    "Don¡¯t you forget, we are adepts from the World of Adepts! The means that we have our up sleeves are beyond the imagination of natives of lower nes like you."


    Tigule chose to ignore the disdain in Alice¡¯s words.


    He gritted his teeth and asked in a soft voice, "What...what do I have to do to get you to resurrect the princess?"


    "I need a secret passage that leads to the underground hall."


    Tigule¡¯s eyes froze for a moment. He lowered his head and thought for a moment before finally and reluctantly speaking, "As long...as long as you can prove that you have the ability to resurrect the princess, I can provide you with a secret passage that no one will even think of. Even that Gazlowe might not have realized the existence of this passage."


    Alice was relieved when she heard this, and a huge smile appeared on her face once more.


    "There are two ways to resurrect Princess Vanessa. The first is through the Spell of Life Transfer. We will transfer all of your life force to Vanessa and resurrect her. However, if we did that, you would die without a doubt!"


    "I¡¯m willing to do it!"


    "Don¡¯t get impatient. You should hear the second option first. The second option is the Spell of Soul Parasitization. We will extract Vanessa¡¯s soul and graft it into your soul. This way, she will form a parasitic rtionship with you. She will be an apanying spirit that outsiders cannot easily see, and only you can touch. Moreover, from then on, she will always be obedient to you and listen to only you."


    The same strange smile appeared on the faces of all the other adepts at the same time Alice said those words. However, Tigule failed to notice this in his cascade of emotions.


    "Now that you know of both options, why don¡¯t you tell me which resurrection option you wish to choose?"


    "I... " The previously resolute Tigule suddenly started stuttering. He didn¡¯t know what he was saying even after mumbling for several minutes.


    ............


    A small spark of light shed in the dark underground tunnel.


    Tigule held a magic energymp in his hand as he led the way, limping as he walked. Six adepts followed behind him, their footstepspletely silent as if they were phantoms. All of their elementium auras had withdrawn into their bodies.


    This ce was not an ordinary tunnel like the rest. It was a maintenance passage.


    Metal pipes and wires of various sizes spread all over the narrow corridor that was hardly even two meters in size. Half a meter of ck liquid had pooled beneath their feet. Its temperature was approximately negative fifteen degrees or so and should have been a mixture of underground water and condensate liquid leaked from the pipes.


    The adepts didn¡¯t seem affected by the harsh environment at all.


    After all, all of their Physique had undergone tremendous change when they became adepts. There was a fundamental improvement to their natural abilities. The weakest of the adepts here was Alice. However, even she had two points of Physique, and those two points were more than enough to allow her to tear a living tiger apart.


    Alice shouldn¡¯t be looked down on just because she was a frail young witch. An environment like this one was still no trouble for her!


    They walked in the pitch-ck maintenance passage for a long time until finally arriving in front of an open hall. A five-meter-thick metal pir rose from the ground all the way to the ceiling above.


    Everyone could hear the strange rumbling sound of a surging flood within the metal pipe when they got close.


    "This is the main pipe that connects the space furnace to the surfaceyer of the Steel Capital. Gazlowe intends to use the energy in the space furnace to power the entire Steel Capital. Here is the main vein of power. Gazlowe¡¯s magical machines have blockaded all the underground tunnels. This is the only way you can get close to the space furnace without him noticing!" Tigule put down his magic energymp when he reached this ce. He turned and stared at Alice, "I have already shown you the passage you wanted. What about your promise?"


    Alice raised her slender hand, and a golden birdcage appeared in it.


    Tigule moved closer. He could see a tiny corpse of Princess Vanessa lying peacefully within. Even more peculiar were the magical golden runes surrounding her body. An intangible and phantom-like Vanessa was slowly pulled out from the body. She stood on the spot with a nk expression.


    "What¡¯s happened to my Vanessa? You... don¡¯t you trick me!" Tigule shouted agitatedly.


    Alice smiled.


    "You need to trust us, now that you have decided to help us. I can only temporarily bind Vanessa¡¯s soul to this cage right now. It will take a lot more rare resources if I wish to graft her soul onto yours. These resources can only be found in the World of Adepts. So, if you want to obtain theplete soul of your lover, then you will have to go back to the World of Adepts with us!"


    Alice¡¯s words were like the murmurings of the devil in Tigule¡¯s mind. Even though he knew there was poison in them, even though he knew he was being led by the nose, there was no choice for him but to do as Alice said.


    "Fine, I will trust you!" Tigule could only submit helplessly, "This pipe is currently filled with magic energy; the energy storm will devour anyone that goes into it. Are you sure you want to sneak in from here?"


    Since he had already be an ¡¯aplice¡¯ of the adepts, Tigule had to start worrying for their safety, even if it was only for the sake of Vanessa¡¯s soul.


    "This is not a problem you will have to worry about!" Greem stepped forth at this moment, "The rest of you bring Tigule with you and leave at the fastest speed possible once Alice and I enter. The faster, the better. The further, the better."


    Alice put her lips together and smiled. She didn¡¯t oppose the n.


    "Why is it you and her? Why can¡¯t it be someone else?" Mary frowned and couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    "Adepts with weak defenses can¡¯t even make it to the end if we were to enter the space furnace through this pipe. The reason I¡¯m bringing Alice with me is because of her teleportation abilities. She can instantly bring us out at the most dangerous moment." Greem gave a quick exnation.


    Alice didn¡¯t seem nervous about the whole operation at all. She only handed over a silver-gray metal ball to Endor.


    Only Greem and Alice were left once the rest had departed.


    "How did you know I would be willing to take the risk along with you?" Alice spoke as she gentlyughed.


    "Because this is the path you pointed out to me. If it wasn¡¯t you apanying me, who else could it be?" Greem returned a gentle smile. He stepped forward and wrapped his arm around Alice¡¯s soft and slender waist.


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but shiver slightly. She rolled her eyes at him unamusedly.


    Greem didn¡¯t say anything else. He pressed her against his chest and crashed backward. Pure elementium fire instantly spread all across his back.


    The metal pipe quickly melted and softened under the intense heat, much like a red-hot piece of metal thrown into the snow.


    Greem instantly dove into the pipe with Alice in his arms.

 Chapter 541 The Disaster of the Space Furnace

    Chapter 541 The Disaster of the Space Furnace


    The underground hall.


    A terrifying battle had erupted between two Third Grade powerhouses!


    On one side, there was the Third Grade monster floating above the space furnace, Giant Brain Gazlowe, along with an army of countless magical machines under his control. On the other, you had the Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms, expanding his broad wings and shrouded in a cloak of terrifying blinding thunderlight.


    It was a fearsome battle that pitched one against a thousand. It was also a textbook example of brutal ughter.


    These magical machines that had just walked off the conveyor belt all possessed the strength of a First Grade creature. When they grouped up and formed aplete system ofbat, they were capable of disying surprising power.


    There were no chaotic attacks or charges. There was no disorderly stampede and stepping out of line. All the magical machines were lined up into a regr army. They formed arrays based on their attack patterns andunched a relentless tide of offense against Thunder Dragon Arms.


    The ones charging at the very front were naturally the specially modified meat shields¨C the Chain Hands.


    They were a group of magical machines with reinforced metal tes and all of their ranged weapons removed. The only weapons they had were the grappling chain hooks fixed onto their thick cylindrical arms.


    They braved the thunder dragon¡¯s lightning storm and charged to his side.


    Though one-third of the Chain Hand machines fell during the assault, the rest sessfully reached the thunder dragon.


    They formed a loose circle and raised their arms. A loud pop came from their arms as their big metal hands linked with fine metal chainsunched towards the body of the dragon.


    While most of these hands bounced off of the scales of the dragon, some of them seeded in catching the spikes on his back or some other parts of his body.


    These Chain Hands began frantically retracting their chains the moment they established a grip. They were struggling to drag the thunder dragon toward the ground.


    The other Chain Hands that had failed also retracted their chains and prepared for the next shot.


    It was through such crude and direct methods that Gazlowe kept Arms bound to the spot with only eighty machines. The Thunder Dragon couldn¡¯t push any further forward.


    The machines that had been specially modified with methrowers took this opportunity to step forward and attack. Several red pirs of fire crossed a distance of twenty meters and sted against Thunder Dragon Arms¡¯ body.


    Even further away, the magical machines outfitted with several Goblin Shredders were slowly advancing. As they marched forward, a barrage of bullets fired from eight ck gun barrels reaching out of their bodies. The flood of bullets clinked against the scales of the blue dragon before falling to the ground around the beast like a rain of metal.


    Some spider-type machines also clung to the walls and shot goblin rockets at the thunder dragon.


    Sadly, the suppression of the dragon by the machines was only an illusion!


    Once all of their means of attacks had been revealed, Arms unleashed a resounding roar, and a violent storm of lightning engulfed the entire battlefield.


    Intense powers of lightning ravaged the hall. sma even appeared in ces with the most concentrated lightning. Beautiful blue arcs of electricity crackled between machines if they were even a little bit too close to each other.


    The machines closest to the Thunder Dragon himself couldn¡¯t defend against such fearsome and pervasive lightning, regardless of how tough their metal tes were or how manyyers of magic resistant material they had painted on them. Moreover, most of the metal materials they wereposed of were excellent conductors of electricity. That made it harder for the machines to endure the damage from the lightning storm.


    All machines within a thirty-meter radius silently copsed. Only half of the machines in the fifty to hundred meter radius survived. On the other hand, most of the magical machines that were a hundred meters away were still fully-functional and at fullbat capacity. Only a select few machines were unfortunate enough to have been struck down.


    Thus, a new wave of machines stepped upon theirpanion¡¯s remains and surrounded Thunder Dragon Arms once more. And once more, a violent lightning storm engulfed the battlefield!


    An energy explosion of this size could be utilized five more times with a Third Grade thunder dragon¡¯s energy reserves. However, Arms stopped after three such eruptions of power. He was in the Goblin ne after all, where it was hard to recover magic.


    The rest of his lightning powers were required to defend himself; he couldn¡¯t afford to use his lightning powers in such an extravagant manner anymore. At any rate, the Thunder Dragon still had his muscr body and overwhelming strength, even without his destructive lightning powers.


    Thus, Arms folded his wings and dove down to the ground, engaging the machines in closebat.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the sharp ws or fearsome fangs, the ferocious tackles, wing sweeps, tail swipes, or the dragon breaths. Any of the techniques that the Thunder Dragon used would cause tremendous damage to the magical machines.


    The intelligent assistance module and control modules inside the chests of the machines were destroyed with lightning under the Thunder Dragon¡¯s voluntary control. These machines turned into lumps of metal that had lost their soul.


    The Thunder Dragonmitted a massacre in the midst of these magical machines, wrecking these frail constructs with various means of attack. However, it wasn¡¯t as if these machines were harmless rabbits. They used their durable bodies and frightening weapons of war, always managing to tear off a small scale from Arm¡¯s muscr body with each of their attacks.


    Even Arms started panting from exhaustion once these tiny wounds umted.


    However, at this moment, Second Grade Zaca led the eleven dragonborn warriors into the underground hall.


    Arms finally had a sliver of a chance to recover from his wounds with these subordinates as a shield.


    Destroying this endless horde of magical machines was only a matter of space and time with his power.


    Yet , at the moment where the battle had reached its peak intensity, both Third Grade creatures stopped all of their actions. They couldn¡¯t help but turn to look at the towering space furnace.


    Even they didn¡¯t dare to extend their mental consciousness into the space furnace with all the chaotic magic energy roiling within. However, for a moment back there, they seemed to have very vaguely sensed a strange explosion of energy inside the space furnace unlike the others before.


    This isn¡¯t good. The space furnace is about to go out of control.


    ............


    Greem pressed Alice against his chest as he quickly traveled through the flood of magic energy.


    The chaotic and disorderly magic energy was eroding the elementium mes that shrouded them with every passing second. Both of them would probably have been riddled with holes and turned into chaotic particles with no consciousness to speak of if Greem hadn¡¯t maintained a thin yet resilientyer of an energy barrier around them.


    Only Greem could have covered such a far distance and closed in on the space furnace while protecting another person. He was not just a Second Grade adept. He also possessed the support of endless energy from his Heart of mes.


    When he sensed the spatial ckhole rumbling in the center of the space furnace, he immediately gritted his teeth and projected thest surge of fire energy in his body toward the ck hole.


    Alice immediately wrapped her arms and legs around him when Greem¡¯s energy was exhausted. A profound and subtle surge of spatial energy enveloped the two of them.


    A silver sh of light appeared in the space furnace, and they disappeared from the spot.


    At the same time, the ck hole inside the space furnace let out a belch, as if it had swallowed something it couldn¡¯t digest. The space inside the furnace started to turn chaotic and violent, even more than before.


    The energy in the space furnace might have always been in a chaotic state, but there was an order to that chaos.


    Total Chaos only existed within a ten-meter radius around the ck hole. The strong spatial energies would suddenly be a great deal ¡¯gentler¡¯ once they had made it past this area. Once the energy had left the core area and arrived at the edge of the space furnace, the initially violent space energy would have turned into the less intense magic energy.


    Magic energy was still too chaotic and violent for magical creatures or adepts to absorb. However, it was the most suitable source of energy for the magical machines, which had no affinity to any specific element.


    At this moment, the space furnace¡¯s internal system of energy cirction had been severely damaged when a foreign elementium energy was introduced to the ck hole.


    The space energy that had gone out of control rushed out of the core and crashed against the metal walls of the space furnace. The metal walls were sheared off, little by little.


    As the destructive space energies thrashed about in the furnace and repeatedly crashed against the metal interior of the furnace, a terrifying disaster descended upon the Steel Capital.


    Gazlowe, who had assimted over ny percent of the space furnace, became the first victim!


    The out-of-control space energy ravaged the space furnace. However, this felt as if someone was stabbing Gazlowe¡¯s brain with a knife and wickedly twisting the embedded de.


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms also sensed something wrong with the situation. He immediately unfurled his wings and roared. He turned into a sh of lightning that bolted into the tunnels without even caring for the lives of his servants. He might not know what was in the furnace, but that didn¡¯t stop him from sensing the impending danger.


    That feeling of death was so clear in his mind that he was almost incapable of telling the difference between reality and illusion.


    Their master had suddenly run despite the fight leaning in their favor.


    Dragonborn Zacha might not have the same sense for danger as a Third Grade thunder dragon, but he had still sensed peril descending upon them. He also turned and ran without hesitation. He strode with all four of his muscr limbs, rapidly chasing after his master and heading away from the underground hall.


    An earthshaking rumble rang out from behind them not long after they started running.


    Then, a pulsing surge of spatial energy that struck fear into everyone¡¯s hearts spread out from the underground hall. It poured into thebyrinth of tunnels like a flood of energy.


    The entire Steel Capital was quaking at this moment!

 Chapter 542 Explosion Aftermath

    Chapter 542 Explosion Aftermath


    A flock of ck shadows rapidly moved down a snowy mountain range.


    One of the members of the group suddenly stopped after they had made it beyond one of the shorter mountains. She shouted excitedly.


    "Something¡¯s happened!"


    A silvery gray metal ball was shing in her old and wrinkled right hand.


    "Protect!"


    One of therger silhouettes took off her ck cloak, revealing Sofia¡¯s thick and muscr body beneath. She held a thick, ck wooden staff in her hand and stood by Endor like an evil god of cmity.


    Mary unfurled herrge bat wings and hovered in the air, quickly taking everything around them into view. Bug Adept Billis tossed Tigule away and allowed the goblin to drop headfirst into half a meter of snow. Billis turned into a buzzing cluster of ck mist and circled Sofia and Endor.


    The thirteen sting scorpions started roaming about underground, looking out for potential enemies.


    While the adepts were making their preparations, the metal started glowing intensely. A stinging red light was mixed with the brilliant white, making it hard for any of them to stare directly at the ball.


    Spatial flux rippled in the air, and two adepts emerged from nowhere in each other¡¯s embrace, one male and one female. A tide of energy so massive that it was indescribable had also transported through at the same moment they appeared.


    Boom!


    A terrifying explosion. Everyone around Endor was blown away by the explosion¡¯s shockwaves. Bug Adept Billis was caught off-guard, and he was thrown over a hundred meters away, crashing into the snow.


    As the adepts got up from the ground to ask how the n had gone, an even louder and more fearsome explosion echoed throughout the world.


    It felt as if the sky was copsing, the earth was splitting, and everything was flipping over!


    This world was about to be destroyed.


    Simr thoughts arose in the minds of every adept.


    Pirs of smoke and dirt suddenly rose from the towering Steel Capital ten kilometers away from them. The violent spatial energy seeped into every corner of the Steel Capital and every inch of space. It shed severely with the narws there, both of them wildly neutralizing each other.


    The sh between the space energy and the narws directly affected the structures on the surface of the Steel Capital. Even the main body of the city, hidden within the belly of the mountain, was caught in the destruction.


    The struggle between the two energies urred almost simultaneously in every corner of the Steel Capital. The chain of explosions caused the mountain itself to tremble, shake, and fall apart.


    Large boulders tumbled down the slopes as mountain peaks crumbled and fell.


    The towering statues of goblin predecessors that stood in front of the gates of the Steel Capital weren¡¯t much different from the copsing world around them. They too shattered and fell, sending massive stone blocks rolling down the mountain.


    The hundreds of thousands of goblins living inside the Steel Capital had all been ughtered during the preceding immortality ritual. Thus, they no longer needed to endure another painful death in this disaster.


    As such, there were no pained cries and tragic howls of weaklings in this apocalyptic explosion!


    The vast stretch of mountains that extended for several dozen kilometers seemed to have its inner structure taken out from beneath it. It started to copse to the ground. The scattering dust and snow couldn¡¯t even make it to the skies. They were broken down into unrecognizably tiny particles by the intense spatial energy from the mountain¡¯s core.


    Then another massive explosion sent all these radioactive particles spreading out in every direction through sheer kic force.


    For a moment, the entire sky turned crimson as blood.


    Mixed within this strange light were tens of thousands of unknown belts of light that cut the horizon into pieces.


    The Steel Capital was now history. The once tall and majestic metal structures had sunken into the belly of the mountain as the mountains themselves copsed. When the thousand meter cliffs slowly fell to the ground,yer byyer, thest traces of the Capital were buried in the thick pile of rubble and dirt. It was a massive pile of destruction that stood a hundred meters tall.


    All the snow on the mountain had already been turned into vapor by the savage energies. In fact, the humidity in the air was so high that it started raining in some areas around the copsed mountains.


    The adepts were still within the radius of the energy explosion when it happened. They instantly used their best abilities to escape outward.


    Greem had exhausted all of his energy in the underground. It was only thanks to Mary that he was able to fly across the canopy of the forest. Alice had also been shaken unconscious by the shockwaves. She leaned limply upon Endor as they flew across the sky on a broom. Berserk Witch Sofia was sprinting on the ground barefoot. Surprisingly, she was no slower than the rest of the adepts in the air when she ran at full speed.


    Tigule had no such ability. He could only be transported through the ground with Bug Adept Billis wrapping around him in mist form. However, the ck mist had to emerge from the ground every thirty seconds to give Tigule a chance to breathe.


    Otherwise, Tigule would have already suffocated during the fifty-kilometer trip.


    The mountain continued to copse as they ran.


    They had personally witnessed a towering mountain crumble into a bottomless abyss behind them. A gigantic pir of dust chased after the adepts like a tsunami from the ocean, bringing with it tons of debris and dirt.


    That terrifying tide of energy only exhausted itself after fifty kilometers, and its speed finally started to slow down.


    The adepts took the chance to find an unupied mountain to rest on. They silently watched the gray tide devour the earth and forest beneath them and continue surging forward.


    In the blink of an eye, the mountain that they were on had be an isted ind in the midst of a gray sea. A thickyer of energy dust had engulfed everything around them.


    It was no ordinary dust. It was energy dust that formed from thebination of space energy and the material substance of this ne. It possessed fearsome radiation, and ordinary creatures would die to the intense radiation when exposed to the dust, even if they hadn¡¯t suffocated in the first tide of destruction.


    No living creature could still exist within thisnd of gray dust that stretched as far as they could see. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the powerful jungle predators or some fearsome flying hunters; none of them could escape from the damage of energy radiation.


    Several birds that had escaped from the nearby mountains were flying in the distant skies, tragically crying as they did so.


    Sadly, there was gray dust all beneath them. They couldn¡¯t afford toe into the slightest contact with this stuff.


    Some of the birds with weaker Physiques could no longer hang on after a short flight. They started to fly lower and lower. When their bodies finally touched thatyer of radioactive dust that hovered in the air, they let out a bloodcurdling cry.


    The fearsome radiation caused their flesh to wither and their bones to melt. Their previously beautiful feathers lost their color at a visible rate. Sloughs of fat and skin fell from their body as if they were being shed off. The red muscles and organs within were exposed.


    The birds that had been caught by the radiation could no longer struggle.


    They drifted lower and lower, eventually crashing into the gray sea, tragically crying as they sank until everything fell silent.


    The adepts couldn¡¯t help but betray solemn expressions when they saw this happen.


    The outside was already this bad. The radiation in the core area of the explosion would only be stronger and even more terrifying!


    This massive explosion at the Steel Capital had probably significantly affected the entire Goblin ne.


    It was no longer a paradise for goblins!


    ............


    News of the tragedy that had urred in the Steel Capital quickly spread throughout the ne.


    Everything within five hundred kilometers of the ce had been enveloped in a dense cloud of radiation. Any person that walked into it couldn¡¯t walk out alive. The goblin reinforcements could only gather in the cities nearby, anxiously waiting for the radiation clouds to subside.


    How did this tragedy happen?


    Several different answers to this question spread amongst the goblins.


    The most popr amongst them was the Adept Invasion Theory.


    Some goblins described in a lifelike manner how the otherworldly evil adepts had invaded the Goblin ne and how the great Prince Lord Gazlowe had been forced to detonate the space furnace and die alongside the invaders to save the world.


    Of course, there were far more chaotic versions of the story out there.


    For example, some goblins gossiped that the evil adepts had been invited into the ne by Gazlowe. The purpose of this was so that the Prince Lord could borrow the strength of the adepts to deal with the Royal Family. The three parties had fought in the Steel Capital, and the space furnace had exploded due to idental shockwaves from the fight itself.


    Apart from this version of the story, about twenty or thirty other stories were being spread out there. Almost all of them were described in such vivid detail, almost as if the goblins had witnessed it themselves. However, it didn¡¯t matter which version of the story it was. The evil adepts were always the antagonists, and the goblins would always have obtained the final victory by the end. That was the same conclusion of every version of the story.


    One couldn¡¯t help but point out that the Goblin ne of the present was truly in a bizarre situation with no leadership to speak of.


    The Risk Investment Company that Gazlowe had established might im to be the most significant force within the Goblin ne, but all of their higher-ups and elite fighting forces had been brought into the Steel Capital to fight against the adepts and the dragonborn.


    All of them had turned into dust with that tremendous explosion. The Risk Investment Company was now no more than a headless snake. Even though they still had massive influence and decent military presence in other areas, all of their leaders were dead. Thus, these ces were unavoidably caught up in struggles for superiority fought between the localndlords.


    The most influential person of the Royal Family¨CPrincess Vanessa¨Chad also ¡¯died¡¯ in the Steel Capital. Her brothers had yet toe of age either. They were still goblin kids sucking on lollipops and riding on toy horses.


    Having them step up to lead the chaotic Goblin Empire was a huge joke.


    Thus, the wounded goblin God of War who brought Vanessa¡¯s corpse back to the Royal Family became the saving grace of the Goblin Empire. The six otherworldly adepts that Tigule brought back with him also rapidly caused the Empire to fall into internal disagreements.


    Some goblins were shouting and calling for war against the adepts, believing that they were the ones who brought this cmity upon the Goblin ne. Some goblins were already utterly terrified by the tragedy of the Steel Capital. They asked to negotiate with the adepts. These goblins were willing to treat the adepts as their superiors and allow the adepts take what they wanted as long as they themselves retained their status and positions.


    For a moment, none of the goblins could agree with each other and fell into an intense round of disagreement and arguments!

 Chapter 543 Rule of the Plane

    Chapter 543 Rule of the ne


    Snox sessfully arrived at the Goblin ne during this chaotic situation.


    Perhaps because of his identity as a goblin, Snox didn¡¯t receive too much nar suppression. He shook his head once upon arriving and instantly got limated to the narws here.


    Adept Meryl had also apanied him in traveling to the Goblin ne.


    As a strong supporter of Greem, Meryl couldn¡¯t wait to participate in the first nar invasion her teacher hadunched. Sadly, she was genuinely unsuited forbat. That was why Greem only decided to teleport her here after the battle had been mostly decided.


    The first thing that Meryl and Snox saw upon arriving was the boundless fields, the blue skies, and the white clouds.


    The location of the teleportation was set at the balcony of the goblin castle. As such, the both of them saw a group of individuals casually chatting with wine sses in their hands the moment they turned around.


    Two deck chairs had already been prepared for Meryl and Snox.


    Meryl fell limply to the ground the moment she arrived. She couldn¡¯t even greet the other adepts. It took her a long time resting on the soft deck chair to get used to that intolerable nar suppression.


    In stark contrast to Meryl was Snox.


    He had held his head for a short while, and the daze quickly passed. In fact, he could start chatting with the other people while drinking wine in less than seven minutes.


    The servants who were passing wine and desserts to the adepts were all goblins. It was apparent that they had all undergone strict etiquette training and lessons on service. Every one of their actions and movements was elegant and uniform.


    There were even five goblin musicians in the corner of the balcony, performing a pleasant tune for the adepts. The instruments they yed were entirely different from those of the World of the Adepts. They possessed the style of the goblins.


    Snox¡¯s heart was relieved when he saw the scene before him.


    The adepts must have been doing well, given how publicly they were showing themselves before these adepts. At the very least, they were in no danger!


    The first thing to be done with the arrival of the neers was the exchange of information.


    Meryl and Snox heard about the fearsome battles that had happened in the Goblin ne through Greem. Greem had already tried his best to be brief. There were no embellishments or exaggerations in his story, yet the story he told was still enough to shock and awe Snox and Meryl.


    The goblin magical machine army, flying ships, the Steel Capital, the immortality ritual, a Third Grade dragon, giant brain, space furnace...


    Such mysterious and wondrous things had all appeared in the span of a single month. Moreover, all of these things were closely rted to the adepts themselves. Such bizarre and unimaginable stories would only have appeared in the stories of the mortal world in the past. But now, they had be part of the legend of the adepts present here.


    For the first time, Meryl had also be interested in nar invasions.


    Sneaking alone into an unvisited ne. Hiding from the search of powerful native creatures in damp swamps and dark forests. Fighting the natives to the death in harsh environments when they ran into each other.


    Win, continue to run and proceed to write your own legend. Lose, and you would fall into a world that was not your own. Even your head and body might be part of a personal collection for the natives to brag about.


    Collect sufficient knowledge about the other world as you escape, and in doing so, discover the weakness of the enemies and learn to exploit it. Even a weak adept could kill an otherworldly lifeform far stronger than them through such means.


    When the strongest lifeforms or organizations of the ne had been defeated, the invading adepts could naturally be the rulers, doing as they pleased with the resources and wealth within it.


    Meryl fantasized as she listened to her teacher¡¯s stories.


    In her childlike mind, she had entered numerous foreign nes and crushed them all beneath her foot. She imagined titles and emblems of ¡¯ne Conqueror¡¯ being bestowed upon her, allowing her to be the spotlight at every adept banquet, bing the target of envy and jealousy of all other adepts.


    Even a calm and discreet adept like Meryl couldn¡¯t help but feel herself getting excited when she thought of such a scene.


    She knew her limits, and her ws made such a dream impossible to be realized. But, she was still an adept after all!


    The desire to seed, the desire to be recognized, the desire to obtain victory after victory; this had almost be second nature etched into the bones of every adept. It had nothing to do with one¡¯s ability.


    Snox¡¯s mind had also gone into the clouds while Adept Meryl¡¯s mind was wandering in her dreams.


    The goblin maids surrounding him now were all so pretty and beautiful. Their bodies were so curvaceous and slim. It caused Snox¡¯s hormones that had been thirsting for several decades to go straight through the roof, reaching all the way into the clouds. It hovered high up there and didn¡¯t seem like it would being down any time soon.


    Most human adepts would not be able to differentiate which of these goblins were male and which were female. That was why it was even more of a futile effort to expect them to make a judgment of their beauty.


    With a human¡¯s standards, these goblin maids that were sending Snox into paradise were all extremely ugly. Stout bodies, round waists, green skin, mouths asrge as melons, and those big yellow teeth...


    In particr, these goblin maids had thick ck hair growing on their heads, beneath their armpits, and on their feet. It utterly disgusted the few human adepts present here. If it wasn¡¯t because they knew these maids were a form of ¡¯goodwill¡¯ sent by Tigule to appeal to them, the adepts might have suspected Tigule had done so to disgust them intentionally.


    The adepts might be disgusted with these maids, but Snox was not.


    Truthfully, in Snox¡¯s eyes, these goblin maids were much prettier than the few female adepts. He had never understood why his master could tolerate being intimate with such ugly female adepts.


    Fortunately for Snox, Mary didn¡¯t possess any mind-reading abilities. Otherwise, today would be his funeral!


    Greem also received information about the situation in Fire Throne from Snox and Meryl.


    Greem had kept a very tight hold on the flow of information. As such, the disappearance of the adepts here had been attributed to an expedition to somewhere in the World of Adepts.


    One or two adepts missing was not a problem. However, if arge group of the core adepts in Greem¡¯s faction vanished from the tower, it would attract the suspicions of his enemies. If Greem managed his time well enough, his enemies couldn¡¯t do much even if the tower¡¯s strength was temporarily emptied.


    However, things were bound to change, and incidences were likely to happen if things dragged on for too long.


    The invasion had already gone on for one month and three days if they had started counting since Billis¡¯ teleportation to the Goblin ne. Greem estimated he still had ten to fifteen days worth of time to maneuver around. The chances of something happening to Fire Throne would increase exponentially if he couldn¡¯t settle the matter of the Goblin ne by then.


    Meryl woke up from her daze after a while and realized that someone was missing from the adepts present in the room.


    "Where¡¯s Sabrina? Is she out on a mission?" Meryl asked in surprise.


    Greem didn¡¯t answer. He only shook his head dejectedly.


    Meryl instantly understood what he meant.


    Mechanical Adept Sabrina had died!


    This unexpected news shocked Meryl beyond words.


    Even though Sabrina had been a few decadester than her in advancing to adept, a single Sabrina was strong enough of a mechanical adept to fight off three to four of herself.


    Such a powerful adept in her eyes had silently fallen in this insignificant Goblin ne. This...how...how could this not make someone sigh in exasperation?!


    ............


    The war of the Goblin ne had already concluded.


    The ancient Royal Family lost all confidence and ability to continue fighting with the adepts once news of Gazlowe¡¯s loss reached them.


    Moreover, the gue seeds that Greem had nted all over the ne had also started reproducing en masse. The number of infected goblins had reached 4.7 million. That was more than two-fifths of the total goblin poption.


    Few of these infected goblins would survive if a fight broke out between the goblins and the adepts.


    Moreover, Tigule had personally described the strength of the adepts upon returning. That made the stale and decaying Royal Family incapable of finding the will to fight back.


    After all, these adepts could even defeat a Third Grade thunder dragon from another ne. What were they, with their weak powers and abilities, supposed to fight the adepts with?


    If Gazlowe were still alive, if the metal ore reserves they had in the Steel Capital still existed, these goblins would not hesitate to fight the invaders to the death, even if it meant the copse of their world. However, now the thousands of years of ores reserves of the Goblin Empire and all their special alloy materials were buried deep under the copsed mountain along with the Steel Capital itself.


    Even if they wanted to resist the adepts, what were they supposed to use to do so?


    Without noticing it, all the goblins had lost their previous courage and bravery. Plenty of voices requesting cooperation with the adepts and starting a joint excavation of the Goblin ne began to emerge among the citizens.


    Of course, this was no more than a fig leaf that the goblins were using to hide thest bit of face they still had.


    The positions between the adepts and the goblins had unknowingly changed when the Goblin Empire lowered their heads to the adepts for the first time.


    The Goblin Empire still retained theirnds and their legitimate rule, but their crown had been branded with the mark of the adepts.


    The rule of the ne naturally fell into the hands of the adepts!


    Or more urately, into the hands of Greem.

 Chapter 544 Sage Snorlax

    Chapter 544 Sage Snox


    Five dayster.


    An ultra-long-ranged teleportation device thatbined the technology of the goblins and the knowledge of the adepts was finally created.


    This device was connected with Greem¡¯s teleportation array back in Fire Throne. It also symbolized that the Goblin ne had officially turned into the first lesser ne under Greem¡¯s control.


    The process of conquering the Goblin ne had been met by obstacle after obstacle. If it weren¡¯t for their luck, many of Greem¡¯s party wouldn¡¯t have sessfully made it back to the World of Adepts.


    Still, Greem had ultimately managed to gain control over the Goblin ne despite having lost Mechanical Adept Sabrina. Apart from the goblinborers, the ne provided Greem with plenty of unimaginable goblin technology.


    An army of workers that brought with them their own technology tree. Could there be any ne invasion that yielded more benefits than this?


    With his personality, Greem wouldn¡¯t do anything like killing the goose thatid the golden eggs. He had no interest in turning all the goblins into ves and waiting for them to initiate wave after wave of rebellion and resistance. The goblins of the Goblin ne were all decent technicians in Greem¡¯s eyes.


    Turning them into ves would be a waste of their real value. They didn¡¯t have the muscr bodies of the ogres or the resilient life force of the trolls. Mining and digging for ores underground was just not an appropriate line of work for these delicate creatures.


    In contrast, if he utilized these goblins as ve masters and technicians, their true value would be fully realized.


    Greem¡¯s impression was that the machine technology of the Goblin ne was already extremely mature, and its universalization rate was very high. It had permeated almost every social ss of the Goblin Empire, from the very bottom to the top. Even the lowest socialmunities¨Cthe viges¨Cpossessed highly efficient Goblin Shredders and drilling machines.


    At the very least, the degree to which knowledge was shared in the Goblin ne far exceeded even therge-sized ne of the World of Adepts.


    The World of Adepts was arge-sized ne and terrifying world whose name would incite fear and panic in multiple worlds just from the sheer mention of it. However, the universalization of adept civilization was not aplete one. The adepts still insisted on the development and cultivation of elites.


    The status of the adepts could not be shaken. The magic civilization only extended to the First Grade adepts and the local nobles that were familiar with them. The ordinary citizens at the lowest rung of society had no right to enjoy the benefits that the developed civilization brought to the world.


    That was why the middle and upper ss of the World of Adepts were powerful enough to cross nar barriers to conquer other worlds, while the lower ss still struggled in poverty, starving and getting by without any dignity to speak of. The situation greatly resembled Europe in the medieval centuries back on Earth. It was the knowledge that Greem had from his previous life.


    The main reason this disparity between the Goblin ne and the World of Adepts existed was due to the difference in their civilization¡¯s model.


    The world that the goblins lived incked magical energies. As such, it was difficult for the world to give birth to individually powerful heroic characters. Even the famous God of War Tigule was no more than a First Grade goblin mechanic.


    Such a situation made it impossible for the world to continue progressing and evolving with the help of only individuals. The world had to rely on the strength of the masses.


    The goblins had no choice but to share their knowledge, skills, and civilization to strengthen the entire race. That was the only way to create a snowball effect and keep themselves perpetually moving forward.


    Correspondingly, the strength of the World of Adepts didn¡¯t rely on the tens of thousands of low-grade adepts. Instead, they were feared because of the three Ninth Grade Supreme Adepts that terrorized the multiverse.


    In the eyes of these three Supreme Adepts, the low-grade adepts of their world were no more than ants. Cultivating them was only for the purpose of having soldiers and cannon fodder they could throw at the frontlines of nar wars. As for the ordinary citizens that had no magical talents whatsoever? They were of absolutely no use to the Supreme Adepts. Naturally, no one would be bored enough to tilt resources toward them.


    Improving the lives of the citizens? Improving the living conditions of the lowest ss of society?


    These were fated to be dreams!


    Even a thousand unarmed farmers couldn¡¯tpare to the usefulness of a steel statue.


    The purpose of low-ss humans in the World of Adepts was for the sake of serving the great Adepts and the nobles themselves. Apart from that, their only contribution was for breeding, more breeding, and absolutely more breeding. If they were fortunate enough to give birth to a descendant that had the potential to be an adept, they would see a dramatic turn in their lives.


    Such a situation made it easy to create a human society that revolved around the adepts. That was why the current state of life in the World of Adepts had been decided by the few Supreme Adepts out there. Creating an adept society in this manner was only for the sake of providing the Great Adepts who had ventured beyond the realm with an endless stream of logistical support.


    The more Greem understood the World of Adepts, the harder it was for him to judge the correctness and logic of this societal model. However, there was no doubt that it was this social model that had forged the strength of the adepts and the prosperous development of a magical civilization.


    Greem, himself, was honestly also a beneficiary of such a civilization.


    The individuals with adept talents had rights and the space to continue growing, while those without could only remain trapped at the bottom of society, destined to always live at the whim and will of the adepts.


    It was the most authentic side of the World of Adepts!


    ............


    Now that the Goblin ne had turned into his property, destroying the lifeforms and resources within it would be destroying his own wealth.


    As such, Greem decisively reimed all of the poisonsoul seeds he had spread out with the use of the Scroll of Voodoo.


    However, he couldn¡¯t do something so charitable for nothing. He needed to get something out of this.


    Greem appropriately timed this to introduce the savior of the Goblin ne, a great goblin that possesses the grace of a sage¨C Snox.


    With the cooperation of Tigule and the Royal Family, Snox was built up as a great goblin that possessed mysterious powers of magic. He fearlessly stood forth to negotiate with the invaders of their world¨Cthe evil adepts¨Cand won generous terms for the goblins.


    He was also the only goblin in the entire race to possess magic powers!


    Snox used his intelligent mind and merged goblin technology with his magic powers to invent a magical box known as the ¡¯gue Terminator.¡¯


    Snox carried this mysterious box with him and visited all the goblin viges ravaged by the gue. The moment he entered the viges, strange lights that resembled fireflies would fly out of the bodies of infected goblins. These lights would enter the metal box, never to be seen again.


    Once the poisonsoul seeds of the gue had left their bodies, the infected goblins were healed. All of them returned to normal in an extremely short time.


    This miraculous scene made it hard for any goblin to believe their eyes. Those who had been tortured by the gue were immensely surprised and happy to have survived.


    All the goblins started to prostrate themselves before Snox wherever he went. They began to treat Snox as an actual living sage that walked among them.


    The number of goblins that Snox saved in each ce he went meant that many new followers for him.


    Moreover, there were plenty of fanatics and zealots among these followers!


    The walk through the gued areas wasn¡¯t even halfwayplete, yet Sage Snox had already be a household name. No goblin didn¡¯t know of his name. In fact, Snox¡¯s reputation had already outshone that of the recently deceased Father of Magic Energy, Gazlowe. He was now the only hope and savior of the Goblin Empire as they struggled in the deep and dark abyss.


    Only 4.2 million goblins had been infected, which was only two-fifths of the entire poption. However, who didn¡¯t have friends and families, parents and lovers? Saving one goblin was putting a whole group of them into one¡¯s debt.


    For the first time ever, a living goblin had be a sage and a saint, the hope for all goblins to break free of their current nightmare.


    Those who had been savedid themselves down at his feet, and those who had yet to be visited waited in anticipation and excitement.


    The excited Snox decided to get into his role even further. He took off his extravagant robes and changed into old rags. He walked barefoot while holding the mysterious metal box in his hands, refusing to rely on any transportation. He walked upon the vige paths of the Goblin ne with his own strength.


    The devout goblins would crouch over and kiss the footprints he left behind. The goblins who waited in anticipation of his arrival would send their vige chiefs and nobles out of the vige to wee him so that they might have him arrive that much quicker.


    Moreover, these usually pampered elders and nobles would even bend down and have Snox sit upon their backs, just so they could run back to theirnds and have the Sage reach a little earlier.


    In fact, some neighboring goblin viges even fought among themselves over the right to wee the Sage.


    For a moment, the entire Goblin ne was preupied with the colossal raising of a new figure of worship.


    As Greem¡¯s proxy in this world, the tiny green goblin that had been looked down upon in the World of Adepts had now be a goblin sage revered and prayed to by all goblins.


    It might sound ridiculous, but there was a vague hint of inevitability to how things had turned out.


    Sage Snox then took advantage of his considerable influence to call for a new movement¨C the Non-Violent Non-Cooperation Movement. He called upon the goblins to give up on violence and use pacifist means and soft resistance to fight against the ruling adepts for the legitimate interests and legal status of the goblins.


    After the ¡¯difficult and painful¡¯ resistance and disagreement from Sage Snox, the adept rulers finally lowered their heads and agreed to restore the Goblin Empire¡¯s rule over the Goblin ne.


    However, while thend still belonged to the goblins, the ore resources belonged to the adepts. The goblins would have to payrge sums of money and advanced technicians, engineers, and alchemists if they wanted to mine.


    It was through such a method that Greem easily negated all possible resistances that could arise in the future of the Goblin ne. He had tied all of the goblins to his rumbling war chariot that he had just set into motion.

 Chapter 545 Goblin Plane Excavation Plan

    Chapter 545 Goblin ne Excavation n


    The two-man act with Snox was all for the sake of stabilizing the atmosphere within the Goblin ne.


    There was no need to worry about the act falling t with Tigule¡¯s help and the Royal Family¡¯spromise. More importantly, the goblins themselves were also leaning toward peace after enduring so much pain and suffering.


    Snox called for the lower ss goblins to actively cooperate with the invaders and avoid more suffering for their brethren under the name of the Non-Cooperation Movement.


    Thus, the spark of resistance had been doused before it had even started. Not a single inch ofnd continued to rage on with the fires of war.


    The goblins were forgetful creatures as well.


    They had quickly forgotten the great trouble and hurt that the evil adepts had created for the Goblin ne. Instead, they obediently presented themselves before their invaders, bing the butlers and aplices of the adepts in the management and ruling of the Goblin ne.


    Greem had undoubtedly obtained a well-developed world upon receiving thisrge group of freebor, though it was also a low-magic worldcking in resources.


    The resources in the Goblin ne definitely couldn¡¯t be said to be rich whenpared to the World of Adepts. The thin concentration of magical energies in the ne resulted in ack of magical creature resources, magic gemstones, and magical materials. Comparatively, the Goblin ne was rich in metal reserves.


    These metal reserves were mostly hidden deep underground and were often apanied by minute amounts of magical gemstones. The ne as a whole could only be considered a resource-poornd for most adepts. However, Greem didn¡¯t think it such.


    In fact, Greem very much approved of much of Gazlowe¡¯s development strategies on several differentyers.


    There were limits to the development of a mechanical civilization. A mechanical culture would have a hard time moving even one step forward once they hit the ceiling.


    The greatest limiter that held back mechanical civilizations would be the energy crisis.


    A mechanical civilization that wished to expand required some form of energy source that could sustain the entire engineering system. The use of the rare magic gemstones in the ne with highbustion-rate Anthracite was what allowed the goblins to prop up their steam-powered civilization.


    The reason the goblin shredders and magic mecha of that time were sorge was not to boast of the goblins¡¯ craftsmanship. Instead, it was so that the goblins could store more coal and magic gemstones inside the machines. If the magical machines were too small, they wouldn¡¯t be able to carry sufficient fuel with them to work for extended periods of time.


    Things like coal and magic gemstones were a non-renewable energy. Moreover, the energy conversion rate was so low that it was frustrating.


    These lowly forms of energy were barely enough for the goblins to defend their ne, let alone crossing nes and going to new worlds in search of new forms of energy.


    In all honesty, Gazlowe was truly the one person amongst all the goblin engineers who had the vision and spirit to venture in pursuit of it!


    It was because he saw the limits of the goblin mechanical civilization that he had made contact with so many higher nes in search of a way out of their predicament. He had hoped to obtain a path forward for the goblins through these foreign nes.


    One had to mention that the space furnace Gazlowe had invented bybining the technology of various nes was unquestionably an epochal invention. It was the one invention throughout the history of the Goblin ne that most deserved apud and celebration.


    The appearance of the space furnace was what propelled the goblin civilization into the age of magic energy.


    From then on, the non-magical goblins could harness and use magic power as they liked!


    Sadly, if Gazlowe hadn¡¯t been so ambitious and had instead dedicated himself to his people, things would never have devolved to this point.


    It was the age of magic energy that he had personally forged. Yet his own life hade to an end at this crucial moment in the Goblin Empire¡¯s transformation.


    Gazlowe could not resign himself to this ending. He had refused to give up just like this. He had wanted to personally drive the revolution, to witness firsthand the rise of the goblin civilization, and to see it grow to be a dominant force feared within the multiverse.


    To extend his own life, Gazlowe had secretly put into motion that Project Immortality of his.


    The reason he had invited foreign forces into the ne was all for the sake of turning them into sacrifices for Project Immortality. Sadly, the strength of the invaders far exceeded his imagination. The power he held was not enough for him to casually do as he wanted with the invaders.


    As such, the conclusion to his story was the adepts biting back. He was buried in the destroyed Steel Capital along with the Third Grade thunder dragon and his group of dragonborn warriors.


    The manner in which Gazlowe chose to execute his choice was too impatient and forceful. However, the direction he had decided to go in was not incorrect. In fact, one could frankly im that he was the wisest and most visionary goblin leader and sage of the entire Goblin ne!


    However, the losers were still the losers in the end. With tremendous explosions, Gazlowe had been cast to the wind, and the world he had left behind became the stage upon which Greem could perform to the best of his abilities.


    Greem was not a wastrel who would let something valuable go to waste.


    Now that the goblins were as good as his, it was his priority to propel them into the age of magic energy.


    Would it be all that difficult for him to invade another nar world if he had a sizeable magical machine army under hismand?


    The creation of a qualifiedbat adept in the World of Adepts took a long time, apart from the tremendous amount of resources required. Adepts had to undergo the arduous trial of being apprentices. On the other hand, a Goblin Empire that had entered the magic energy age would only require fifteen minutes and sufficient metal resources to build a magical machine with adept-level powers.


    As long as the metal didn¡¯t run out and the space furnace was still functioning, the magical machines would continue walking off the conveyor belts. They would be a terrifying magical machine army that fought Greem¡¯s wars for him in foreign nes!


    Greem, one by one, would realize the dreams that Gazlowe had put to pen. However, the appearance of these things had to be in service of Greem¡¯s vision. That was the only precondition!


    Sky Patrol Ship, Goblin Golem Dragon, Goblin Mortar, Goblin Pacemaker, Goblin Dragonce, Dimensional Ripper, Thunder God Titan; these things would not be dreams for much longer.


    The goblin magical machine army would be a terrifying force that swept through the multiverse under Greem¡¯s lead!


    As such, Greem worked hard on two things after stabilizing the situation in the Goblin ne.


    The first was creating a stable teleportation system to tie the Goblin ne to his cause more securely.


    The second was to start a reparative excavation in the destroyed Steel Capital.


    That was a crucialponent of Greem¡¯s n.


    He had no choice. Almost eighty percent of all excavated Queyras ore had been transported to the Steel Capital under Gazlowe¡¯s orders. Greem needed to dig up the Queyras metal buried underground if he wanted to build the space furnaces inrge numbers.


    Moreover, Gazlowe had also helped the dragonborn construct a nar door. That, too, was buried underneath the rubble.


    These things couldn¡¯t possibly be untouched after experiencing such a terrifying explosion. However, even if it were only a small fragment, Greem would still be able to obtain unexpected knowledge from another world if he dug them out soon.


    In particr, there was a nar door that could be used even with the lowly civilization of the goblins. It was a ¡¯great-quality product¡¯ that Greem had been dreaming of. Greem would be able to strengthen the connection between his headquarters and the Goblin ne with this, and it would make it easier for him to control the goblins.


    Moreover, it was still unknown as to whether that explosion had actually managed to kill Third Grade Giant Brain Gazlowe and Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms. That was why it was best to explore as soon as possible and excavate the rubble as early as they could. Greem could only rest easy once they had confirmed the situation at the site of the explosion!


    A radiation cloud a hundred meters in height, spanning five hundred kilometers, hung around the mountains after the explosion. Ordinary goblins would wither and die as their flesh melted off their bones within a matter of thirty seconds. As such, clearing away the radiation cloud was a must if they wanted to investigate the situation underground.


    The goblins might be unfamiliar with this substance that was rted to spatial energy, but this was no problem for the adepts, who had plenty of experience surviving in the space beyond the realms.


    Greem returned to the World of Adepts and purchased Julu Grass from the Silver Union. He then squeezed the juice out of the grass and created a shower of rain above the Steel Capital with the use of magic.


    The lingering radiation cloud finally started to fade under the strange scouring rain. Finally, a clean area of fifty meters was carved out within the dense grey sea.


    The goblins used the onerge flying ship they had remaining to transport supplies and machines to the cleansed area and began to set up a temporary excavation camp there.


    Then, the goblins started a tireless dig downward in hopes of digging a hole that connected to the insides of the ruined Steel Capital. The adept representative that Greem had stationed here was Bug Adept Billis. Apart from Endor and Meryl, who had been kept behind to protect the teleportation device, all the other adepts had returned to the World of Adepts.


    Greem would never have known the massive costs of ultra-long-range internar teleportation without personally experiencing it. Teleporting a single adept cost twelve thousand magical crystals on the part of Fire Throne. A Second Grade adept like Greem even required thirty thousand magical crystals per teleportation.


    If he couldn¡¯t find a free and powerful source of energy for the teleportation device on the side of the Goblin ne, the costs of teleportation alone would be enough to make Greem go broke! And he had only just started amassing a decent amount of wealth!


    Of course, Alice¡¯s Tower of Fate could help share part of these costs for Greem. However, Greem¡¯s machismo got the better of him. He gritted his teeth and decided to reject the help.


    In truth, Greem also had a clear idea of the difficulties that Alice faced.


    She might seem to possess plenty of assets and was supported by the umted wealth of the Tower of Fate from the past thousand years, but she did not have it easy either. After all, she had arge group of apprentice witches under her that required her to support, not to mention the one dozen magic fairies who kept a tight hold on the mountain of money that she should have.


    A little bit of money here and a little bit there; despite being the leader of the Witches of Fate, Alice¡¯s days were not much morefortable than Greem¡¯s.


    That was why, after some thought. Greem decided to shoulder everything by himself!

 Chapter 546 Underground Enemy

    Chapter 546 Underground Enemy


    The excavation was going smoothly.


    The supplies and resources in the camp had been well-prepared due to the full support of the Goblin Royal Family. Over a hundred boxes of magic energy batteries had been moved to the site to power the machines. It was more than enough to keep the more than two hundred machines functioning for over a month.


    Three dozen boring machines had drilled a massive hole in the ground with their rapidly-spinning drills. The machines then disappeared from sight. If they were fortunate enough, they could dig a hundred meters downward before needing to stop. It was likely that they would run into the wall of a building or a massive boulder from that depth onward.


    Neither of these possibilities was good news for the frail boring machines.


    If the machines did run into such obstacles, they would either be destroyed by the impact or stop functioning and require aid from above.


    Of course, there were also those individual machines which were fortunate enough to find a winding path downward amidst all the rubble and debris.


    The excavation crew quickly revealed the approximate situation of the underground space as they delved deeper and further down.


    The original Steel Capital had been constructed on the towering peak of the mountain. Nearly sixty percent of the heart of the mountain had been emptied and turned into a sprawling undergroundwork. The goblins hadid out plenty of metal beams and constructed unique rooms made wholly from metal during this process. It was to strengthen the integrity of the entire undergroundwork.


    All of the tunnels had shattered into numerous stretches with the explosion. Those metal rooms had also been distorted and shifted around.


    Then the mountain itself had copsed, burying the Steel Capital under hundreds of millions of tons of dirt and rock.


    In all honesty, it was impossiblyplicated to attempt to find the Steel Capital and the things contained within it from deep underground. The difficulty of the task was no lower than digging out this entire fifty kilometer stretch of mountains. The work that would need to be put in was tremendous, so much so that it would render one speechless.


    However, given that this was a n that Greem had pushed forth, the Goblin Royal Family had no choice but to grit their teeth and try their best. They invested most of the manpower and resources they possessed in this task.


    The sheer number of goblins stationed in the goblin camp situated within the purified area reached seventy thousand. Several hundred machines were working day and night tirelessly to clear up the surface, pushing the debris and waste away from the camp. In just five days, they had managed to dig a hundred and fifty meters downwards. The weight of the stone and metal pieces that they had dug up totaled ten thousand tons.


    In the center of this bustling goblin camp was a small and lonely tent. No goblin dared walk within a hundred meters of this tent. It was only when the excavation team found some mysterious objects that they had never seen before that they would send a messenger to inform Lord Billis, who was the overseer of this operation.


    The man constantly hid himself beneath a thick ck cloak even when he went outside. He never showed even a bit of skin.


    Apart from a few goblinmanders in the camp, no other goblin knew the true identity of this overseer.


    Billis once again returned from the goblin construction headquarters. He sat cross-legged onto his carpet. A red spot of light vaguely glowed at the center of the fist-sized crystal ball in front of him.


    Billis extended a strange right hand covered in a ck shell and pressed it against the crystal ball.


    A familiar mental consciousness flowed into his mind.


    "Billis, how are things going on the side of the goblins?" It was Greem, who was far away in the World of Adepts.


    With the connection of the teleportation device to Fire Throne, magical connections between the two nes was no longer a problem.


    "Master, they¡¯ve dug another seventeen meters downward today. However, they¡¯ve run into the remains of a massive statue and are now finding a way to blow it apart and remove it. They¡¯ve also found the roof of a metal structure that stretches for one and a half kilometers. They should be able to find the remains of the ruins of the Steel Capital soon. It¡¯s possible that we will make some meaningful discoveries then."


    Greem paused for a moment after he had heard Billis¡¯ report. He then continued with a question, "Then, have you found anything on your side?"


    The adepts were sly and skeptical by nature. They would never have ced their hopes solely on the shoulders of the goblins. That was why Greem had stationed Billis here. On the one hand, he wanted Billis to oversee the progress of the goblins. On the other, he wanted Billis to use his unique abilities as a bug adept to search for treasure underground.


    "My little babies are about to reach five hundred meters underground. They found one or two structures that resembled broken-off stretches of metal tunnels yesterday. They also found an underground warehouse today, though the warehouse was only filled withmon resources. Given their current progress, it will probably take them another three or four days to reach the one-kilometer depth."


    Greem finally nodded in satisfaction with this reply. He then spoke again, "The closer you get to the site of the explosion, the more careful you will have to be. You need to watch out for the existence of enemies in addition to the shattered space hidden in the earth; I have a feeling that the enemies haven¡¯t all died. Immediately inform me if you find signs of life. I will get there as soon as possible."


    The two exchanged a few more words silently, cutting off the expensive long-rangemunication only after making sure that there were no ws in their n.


    Bug Adept Billis retracted his right hand once the red light in the ball had faded entirely. He sat on the spot and didn¡¯t make another move. Of course, he wasn¡¯t sleeping or even meditating. Instead, he was focusing his mind on the sting scorpions deep beneath the earth.


    ............


    Five hundred and seventy-three meters below Billis, a sting scorpion pushed apart the dirt with its unique innate ability. It was trying its best to dig downward.


    The earth before its eyes wasn¡¯t all dark and ck. Its many strangepound eyes allowed it to see several odd substances mixed with the soil. It saw green branches and leaves that had yet to rot fully, metal shards glowing with the light of energy, part of a goblin¡¯s corpse, rocks of odd shapes, and countless tattered substances whose original form could not be discerned.


    The thirteen sting scorpions didn¡¯t gather together. Instead, they spread out and looked in the loose dirt for any hidden passages that could lead downward.


    The original tunnels might have been mostly destroyed, but there were still pieces of them left. If the sting scorpions were able to find them, it wouldn¡¯t just help them determine where they were. They could follow the tunnels in directions where objects of values were likely to be.


    This sting scorpion suddenly stopped as it was digging through the earth. It started to sense closely for a strange tremor that wasing from deep below.


    The source of the tremor wasn¡¯t far away. It only seemed to be several dozen meters away.


    Moreover, given the frequency and extent of the tremor, it seemed that there was something secretly digging upward. The speed of that object wasn¡¯t slow either.


    This unexpected discovery instantly caught Billis¡¯ attention. All thirteen sting scorpions started to covertly close in on the source of the tremor under hismand. He felt as if he needed to find out the truth behind the quake before he reported to Greem!


    The stong scorpions¡¯ digging speed increased tremendously now that they had a clear target.


    With only ten meters between them and the source of the tremor, Billismanded the sting scorpions to stop their digging. He then had them go into stealth mode and wait for orders. Only a single sting scorpion continued crawling forward carefully.


    When the scorpion was just one meter away from the source of the tremor, a strange ck w pierced through the thickyers of dirt and grabbed the creature.


    The earth then split apart, and a light shed under the ground.


    Tworge silhouettes, onerge and one skinny, squeezed in the narrow tunnel. The one who had grabbed the sting scorpion was the more muscr figure of the two.


    The being shook the sting scorpion in their hand and cast off the dirt on it before opening their mouth and swallowing the creature with no hesitation. It started chewing.


    The sting scorpion¡¯s shell that was supposed to be as tough as alloy seemed to be ineffective against the teeth of this towering figure. A crunching sound rang out, and the scorpion¡¯s shell cracked as blood sshed everywhere. The sting scorpion had actually been eaten alive.


    Bug Adept Billis let out a pained screech. He felt an immense pain from his head.


    He had a feeling that the being hadn¡¯t just eaten his sting scorpion. That thing had also devoured the sliver of Spirit that he had attached to the scorpion.


    Dammit! It¡¯s him!


    Billis endured the intense pain as he activated themunication crystal.


    ............


    Greem was dealing with a matter at hand when he received the news from Billis.


    There was finally progress on that massive project of his that he had been plotting for a long time. It had taken plenty of preparation, but it finally worked.


    The fish had taken the bait!


    Leicester Vik. The person that had left their essence blood in the outside world and had indirectly caused Mary to be corrupted into an offshoot vampire had finally shown himself once more, after a long period of seventy years in hiding.


    He had started to involve himself in the local affairs of the Vik Family after leaving Bloodcastle in Qatarselon. He was enjoying himself in the banquets of the nobles and reveling in the more physical pleasures.


    That sounded like good news on the surface. However, what apanied this news was colossally lousy news.


    Unfortunately, Leicester Vik had also sessfully advanced to be a Second Grade vampire.


    That undoubtedly raised his position in the Vik Family to a level that was equal to several of the family elders!


    It wouldn¡¯t be an easy job to capture him, even if Greem had advanced to a Second Grade fire adept a few years earlier than him. With a single misstep, even Greem could fall at his hands.


    After all, everyone knew how troublesome and challenging vampire adepts could be!


    However, getting Mary to conduct a blood exchange and bing reborn as soon as possible was extremely crucial for her future development.


    While Greem was silentlying up with a n to capture a Second Grade vampire adept, Bug Adept Billis suddenly sent him explosive news.


    The enemy had appeared!

 Chapter 547 Negotiation Breakdown

    Chapter 547 Negotiation Breakdown


    Greem was eighty percent certain that the tall figure in the crystal image Billis sent back was Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms, who had gone missing after the massive explosion.


    It seemed he had turned into a human form once more to ease his escape from underground. Moreover, Greem could vaguely make out something else through the faint image. Arms seemed to be bringing with him his field rations.


    The skinny figure obscured by Arm¡¯s body was a familiar sight to Greem. They seemed to be someone Greem knew. However, ording to Greem¡¯s memory, that person shouldn¡¯t be as skinny as he currently was.


    Still, Greem had already started understanding something when he saw that person¡¯s limbs. The white bones beneath them had already been exposed.


    It had been over twenty days since the explosion. Even a Third Grade thunder dragon would have an impossible time surviving underground where there was no food or water. Not to mention the fact that the Thunder Dragon had been in such close proximity to the space furnace when the explosion had happened. Escaping unharmed was no more than fantasy.


    If it weren¡¯t for his Dragonblood Barrier protecting him from the terrifying space storm, Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms would already be dead. He might have survived until this moment, but he was covered in wounds andpletely drained of all energy.


    That was why Arms had no choice but to drag along his Second Grade dragonborn subordinate Zacha, who had, fortunately, survived the explosion as well. After all, he was buried a thousand meters underground beneath endless tons of dirt and stone. Arms had only managed to sustain himself up to this moment with Zacha¡¯s blood and flesh.


    Still, while the blood and flesh gave him some stamina and life force with which to continue digging upwards, it couldn¡¯t help him recover from his grievous wounds. The injuries should have been no problem for Arms. As long as there were sufficient magical energies, the dragons would be able to recover from any physical damage with their exceptional Physique.


    Sadly, the Goblin ne was indeed a small-sized ne thatcked resources and magical energies. The immensely thin concentration of magic in the ne was so unbearable that it had almost caused Arms to break out in tears. It had been over twenty days, yet his magic energy hadn¡¯t recovered. In fact, his supply of magic energy was even steadily falling due to the hard work and nd diet he was on.


    The loss of his lightning powers caused Thunder Dragon Arm¡¯s wounds to worsen each the day. His body was in such frail condition that it was almost about to fall apart.


    Even so, Thunder Dragon Arms did not give up hope for survival. He dragged his ¡¯food supply¡¯ along as he slowly shuffled towards the surface. All living beings in his path could not escape his ws. Lizards, ants, snakes and all sorts of creatures were turned into the nutrition he needed to continue going.


    Unfortunately, that was why the thunder dragon had devoured Bug Adept Billis¡¯ sting scorpion.


    The dragon was only six hundred and twelve meters away from the surface. That meant that he had forcefully dug his way up a distance of four hundred meters with his steel-like ws, despite the harsh environment he was in.


    This distance might not sound like a lot, but it was referring to a vertical distance down into the earth!


    Plenty of metal tunnels and copsed structures stacked upon each other down there at a depth of one thousand meters. Trying to dig a way out through these mountains of metal was unbelievably difficult. Even the ordinarily loose dirt would turn as hard as steel when packed so densely under the weight of hundreds of millions of tons of debris.


    In all honesty, Arms being able to make it this far had already far exceeded Greem¡¯s expectations.


    Greem had expected these annoying enemies to survive with the help of some unique geography underground and that they would be waiting for death while trapped in there. He had never thought any creature would be strong enough to dig their way out with pure, brute force.


    If Greem hadn¡¯t stumbled upon this discovery, Arms might have been able to escape after seven or eight more days. Of course, that was assuming that the wounds on his body didn¡¯t worsen.


    However, Thunder Dragon Arms¡¯ n to escape was fated to fail now that Greem had found out about it!


    Greem had no choice but send Mary to track down Leicester while he personally hurried back to the Goblin ne with Poison Witch Endor.


    In the two days¡¯ time he took to get to the goblin camp, Arms had managed to dig another one hundred and seventy meters upwards.


    Perhaps because he sensed the intense tremors from above, Arms stopped digging upwards after a short time. Instead, he started to dig in a horizontal direction, as if he intended to avoid the unknown forces waiting above.


    Bug Adept Billis grew a lot more cautious after losing one of his sting scorpions. He sent two sting scorpions to follow behind the thunder dragon, quickly traveling through the earth by following the tunnels that the dragon had dug. The other ten scorpions were scattered around the thunder dragon, remotely judging his position based on themotion from his digging. They didn¡¯t dare to get too close this time.


    These sting scorpions would never have been able to escape Arms¡¯ spiritual senses if he had been in his usual condition. It wouldn¡¯t matter how much dirt and debris stood between them; thirty or forty meters of distance was nothing for Arms¡¯ powerful Spirit.


    However, the thunder dragon was now barely limping by with his wounded body. His Spirit was almostpletely exhausted. As such, he had failed to notice the fact that the enemy was monitoring him.


    Until a sinister silhouette piped up beside him.


    "O¡¯ respected Lord Dragon, Greem pays his respects!"


    The sudden appearance of a voice in the dark tunnel shocked the Thunder Dragon. He stopped digging and turned back to look. His amber reptilian eyes immediately locked on to a small silhouette standing in the distant darkness.


    An earth elemental!


    It was a low-grade earth elemental that was only as powerful as an apprentice adept!


    The body made of rough y wasn¡¯t sturdy at all, but a pair of intimidating red eyes glowed in its round head as it stared at the dragon.


    Dammit! Those adepts still got to me in the end!


    Even though Arms actually wanted reinforcements, he knew the situation he was in and was ultimately hoping he would run into goblins. Those short and weak goblins could never be his match, regardless of their numbers and magical machines.


    However, the brief appearance of the adepts before the showdown made Arms anxious!


    He wouldn¡¯t have needed to worry about these low-grade adepts if he had all of hisbat power. It would have been a simple matter of devouring the adepts if he ran into them. He didn¡¯t need to think about the non-existent threat they posed to him. But now...


    A grave expression appeared on Arms¡¯ face as he lowered his head to look at his tattered body, covered with wounds, oozing with pus, and with scales falling off here and there. He steadily walked up to the earth elemental.


    "That explosion was your doing?" Arms asked, but the expression on his face made it clear that he already had his answer.


    "My deepest apologies, Lord Dragon. The original intent of detonating the space furnace wasn¡¯t to inflict any harm upon you. We only wanted to st that damned brain to pieces. We never even expected your appearance in our original n." A scarlet light shed in the eyes of the earth elemental. A strange mental consciousness flux could be sensed within the elemental.


    Arms couldn¡¯t help but betray a dejected expression.


    He too had never nned to enter this lowly and inferior Goblin ne personally. If it hadn¡¯t been for his infuriation by the dy in the charging of the nar door, he would never have relied on his powerful Physique to force his way through the spatial vortex ande to this ursed ce.


    It was toote to say anything!


    Arms would never have been able to imagine himself running into such a terrifying space storm inside a lowly, small-sized ne. A space furnace explosion of this intensity was equivalent to throwing him into the energy storms in space.


    The fact that Arms had been able to survive in that massive explosion was already a testament to the power of his dragon bloodline and the strength of his Physique.


    Power, luck, and experience; Arms would have been sted into pieces in the explosion if he hadcked any one of these factors.


    "Adept, I am Third Grade Dragon Lord Arms of the ne of Rance. If you save me from this ce and let me leave safely, I swear by the name of the Dragon God to rpensate yourpassion with five... no, ten times my wealth." The typically arrogant and wild Thunder Dragon Arms suddenly behaved in an extremely friendly fashion.


    "Oh? You mean... you will repay me with wealth ten times that of the value of a Third Grade Dragon?" The earth elemental was still speaking with its unique booming voice.


    Arms face had already turned ashen from the continuous loss of blood. However, it still managed to be even paler upon hearing the opponent¡¯s words.


    The value of a Third Grade Dragon, and ten times that?!


    Would he be able to gather such a terrifying sum of payment even if he skinned his own body, took apart his bones, drained his blood, and collected all his flesh?


    His words earlier were only meant to be rpensation for the opponent¡¯s ¡¯kind¡¯ gesture of saving him. Yet, they seem to be implicitly categorizing him as their property with what they had just said.


    It seemed that things were unlikely to be resolved through negotiations, given the vast differences between their perspectives.


    Rage filled Arms¡¯ heart. Heshed out with his now dirtied and muddied right hand at lightning speed and plunged it deep into the chest of the earth elemental. He then crushed the elementium core within the golem.


    Thunder Dragons were variants of the wind element. They were ipatible with earth elementium. As such, Arms didn¡¯t choose to devour the creature and instead destroyed it immediately.


    This one-meter tall elemental quickly copsed with the destruction of its elementium core. It returned to dust.


    However, this seemed to have sounded the horns of battle. Arms immediately sensed over a hundred elementium fluctuations unique to earth elementals in the soil around him.


    Several adept-level earth elementals started to appear in the tunnel he had dug through the ground. They immediately lunged at Arms with rumbling footsteps after they had formed.


    Arms was unfazed by such small fry.


    He shook his dirt-covered right hand, miraculously turning it into a well-defined dragon w. He then made grabbing motions in the air, smashing through the chest of an earth elemental with every thrust and retrieving the elementium core within.


    Those earth elementals had their cores shattered before they could even get close to Arms. Their bodies disintegrated and fell apart.


    Arms suddenly turned back and let out an angered roar, despite how well the battle was going for him.


    The skinny body that had been lying in the corner of the tunnel had mysteriously sunk into the earth and vanished before his eyes.


    His ¡¯rations¡¯¨CDragonborn Zacha¨Chad been abducted by the adepts!

 Chapter 548 Magic Spring

    Chapter 548 Magic Spring


    Seven minutester.


    Greem met with Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha, who was in terrible state.


    It was obvious that the Dragonborn had incredible luck. He had not been too badly polluted by the space energy from the massive explosion. However, that luck of his was also his misfortune. It was what caused him to be Thunder Dragon Arm¡¯s rations for survival.


    Greem had originally though Zacha to be dead. However, he was surprised to find the dragonborn hanging by hisst breath when he fetched him to the surface with the earth elemental.


    Greem immediately took out a Potion of Life and poured it into the dragonborn¡¯s mouth without any hesitation.


    Sadly, while this might be enough to save Zacha¡¯s life, it couldn¡¯t help the dragonborn regenerate his four limbs and body that had been eaten by the thunder dragon. Further recovery would have to wait until he was brought back to Fire Throne.


    Such terrifying wounds would require several months to heal, at the very least.


    While there were spells that could hasten the regeneration of flesh, most of those spells took effect by inciting the subject¡¯s life force in a moment of crisis. The missing parts of the body still required proper treatment and healing to regenerate once the effect of the spell was over.


    Still, a Second Grade dragonborn¡¯s exceptional Physique should allow him to regenerate flesh at a much higher rate than an adept with weak Physique, as long as he was fed enough food and energy.


    Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s life might be hanging by a thread, but he had always maintained consciousness. He even sent a hint of gratitude to Greem with his weak Spirit when Greem saved him from the hands of the thunder dragon.


    Even though Greem didn¡¯t know how sincere this gratitude was, he still saw the chance of recruiting the dragonborn as a subordinate!


    Greem had no time to deal with Zacha right now. He quickly passed the dragonborn to Endor and let her deal with the matter. He, on the other hand, focused all his attention back on the silent battle that was happening underground.


    In less than fifteen minutes, nearly two-tenths of the earth elemental army that Greem had gone to great lengths to create had been destroyed. Twenty adept-level earth elementals cost fifty thousand magical crystals each at the very minimum. If they were all put on sale, they could probably fetch around three hundred thousand magical crystals.


    Yet, the only result that Greem had gained from the loss of twenty earth elementals was further worsening the exhaustion of the thunder dragon. Arms had finally used up all the lightning power he had been saving over the past month.


    The image feeding back from the earth elementals indicated that the Third Grade thunder dragon was about to fall. It seemed just a little bit more effort would cause the titan to copse. However, Greem didn¡¯t dare be careless. He didn¡¯t dare to enter the fight personally either. Hemanded the earth elementium golems to circle the thunder dragon and attempt sneak attacks when the opportunities presented themselves.


    The thunder dragon could not possibly escape with the earth elementals there.


    Moreover, under Greem¡¯smand, the earth elementals had even copsed the tunnel behind the thunder dragon. This way they had sealed off Arms¡¯ path of retreat.


    Greem started to send an endless wave of earth elementals to shout at the dragon now that he had him cornered. He wanted to take this opportunity to bring this terrifying Third Grade thunder dragon into his fold. Sadly, every one of his golem messengers was shredded with a single swipe, and the battle continued.


    Greem finally steeled his heart once his multiple attempts had failed. He no longer tried to send messengers to call for the dragon to surrender. Instead, he started to use all his strength to exterminate the isted Third Grade thunder dragon.


    Greem would never have even dared to think such a thought if this had been in the past. However, multiple coincidences and twists of fate had allowed him to run into this massive fish. Greem would never forgive himself if he let an opportunity like this slide past him!


    The excavation work on the surface had stopped. All the goblins had dropped the work at hand and silently waited for news.


    As the protagonists of the battle, Greem and Billis were hiding in their respective shelters. Greem hid in a small wooden hut while Billis stayed in his tent. Both of them were remotelymanding their subordinates,unching a constant wave of harassment and attacks at the Third Grade thunder dragon stuck in the small space underground.


    It didn¡¯t matter how strong a thunder dragon was. In the end, it was the sky that was their stage. The underground was fated to be a nightmare for a thunder dragon!


    The earth elementals would immediately dive into the small ditch and harass him if Arms attempted to dig his way out. Meanwhile, they would use their affinity with earth elementium to strengthen the hardness of the ground around the ditch. They might not be able to turn the earth to stone, but it would increase the difficulty of digging through it tenfold.


    If Arms gave up on digging and turned to attack the golems, then the golems would escape into the earth and asionally fire earth spikes and create quagmires to entangle the thunder dragon.


    The one hundred golems and scorpions circled the thunder dragon while employing this strategy. They took turns to harass the dragon, significantly lowering the elementium consumption of the golems. After all, much like the thunder dragon, the golems also couldn¡¯t replenish their elementium supply in the low-magic Goblin ne.


    One side was stronger, while the other was more numerous. Both parties were giving their all in the underground, and the battle would be decided by who was the first to copse in exhaustion.


    It was clear that the thunder dragon was disadvantaged in this aspect!


    The hidden battle that followed undergroundsted for half a month. Finally, the exhausted Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms copsed and became a prisoner of the earth elementium golems.


    The joy of capturing a Second Grade Dragonborn and a Third Grade Thunder Dragon almost overwhelmed Greem.


    However, there was an even greater surprise waiting for him.


    Two of Billis¡¯ sting scorpions had actually managed to arrive at the scene of the space furnace explosion by following the tunnels that the thunder dragon had dug into the earth. That ce had already turned into a strange energy space. All substance that drifted in there would be disintegrated into unrecognizably fine dust before being expelled again.


    The expelled dust was all coated with extremely intense energy radiation. One of Billis¡¯ sting scorpion had fallen apart just from being sted by a pir of the dust.


    From a distance, the energy space looked like arge ck stone with a diameter of ten meters. A fineyer of energy dust shrouded the exterior of the energy space. The center of the energy space continuously spewed out a rainbow energy flow, rumbling and crackling as it did so.


    This energy flow wasn¡¯t as violent and chaotic as when it had just appeared after theyer of dust had filtered it. The energy shed with thews of the Goblin ne, turning into waves of extremely pure magic elementium that merely dispersed into the surroundings.


    Billis clearly didn¡¯t understand this strange phenomenon, but Greem immediately recognized it for what it was. After all, he practically had an adept encyclopedia in his mind.


    [Beep. Discovered a naturally-urring magic spring. After examination, magic concentration has been determined to be 78.25%. Attributes of said magic are slightly wild and are unsuitable for direct consumption by adepts.]


    "Magic spring!" Greem¡¯s eyes lit up.


    In all seriousness, this was an entirely naturally-urring magic spring that had not been treated or subjected to any taming.


    Even though the cause of its formation was a strange explosion, it perfectly matched all of the descriptions of magic springs in Greem¡¯s memory.


    The so-called magic spring was only a name that the adepts attached to the phenomenon. In truth, it was a point of energy intersection of outer space and nar space. Here, the wild energies of the outer space woulde into contact with the nar space and a strange phenomenon of a rainbow energy flow would appear.


    It was the existence of magic springs that allowed the ne to be replenished with energy from outer space, and thus maintain a stable magic index within the ne. It was precisely theck of wild magic springs in the Goblin ne that caused the thin concentration of magic elementium within the ne. That was why it had ended up as a notorious low-magic ne.


    At this moment, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be amazed by the bizarreness of fate!


    If the Third Grade thunder dragon knew that a magic spring had been born in the core area of the explosion, he would never have dug upward. He could have stayed within the radius of the magic spring and replenished his lightning power. When that happened, who in the entire Goblin ne could stop a Third Grade thunder dragon at full might?


    Yet it had apparently been utterly terrified by the massive explosion. Arms had only been thinking of fleeing as far away as he could, not knowing that he had walked past an opportunity to turn the tables! An opportunity that fate had arranged for him!


    Magic springs were an absolute blessing for powerful magical creatures. On the other hand, they were hazardous and lethal ces for people who were too weak.


    Even First Grade adepts were too frail for magic springs. It was very likely that they would be assimted and turned into demon spirits without bodies and only fragments of consciousness if they ventured too close to magic springs. Meanwhile, as a Second Grade adept that hadpleted the elementiumization of both his body and mind, Greem would not be harmed by the magic spring. Instead, he would be able to feel the immense concentration of magic constantly.


    Even if he had exhausted all of his elementium energies inbat, he would only need to stay near the magic spring for five minutes to replenish all of his elementium.


    The significance of a treasure like this for an adept was equivalent to an origin relic!


    Moreover, Greem remembered a record in a book that stated that such magic springs could be transported through magical means. If he could add this magic spring to the magic generator furnace, whose initial designs had already beenpleted, then it could potentially boost the efficiency of the magic generator furnace by more than ten times.


    Greem stood approximately twenty meters away from the ck ball, remotely sensing the internal structure of the magic spring. However, it didn¡¯t matter how he tried to sense for it. The cluster of energy space at the center of the magic spring remained a pure ck in his mind.


    Neither magic probing nor spiritual senses could receive any feedback or reaction from that energy space.


    His spirit would be mysteriously devoured the moment it entered the space.


    Indeed, devoured; not just gone missing!


    Greem stood on the spot for a long time before sighing helplessly.


    Magic springs were genuinely mysterious and wondrous constructs. He was still not qualified to discover its secrets with his current power.


    He set up a spatial coordinate in the area where the magic spring was located and thought of a way to seal it.


    Now, it was Greem¡¯s time to wander underground freely!


    Greem could navigate the underground world with extreme ease in a way that the Third Grade thunder dragon hadn¡¯t been able to. And the one aid he was relying on was his signature helper¨C the elementium golems.


    He had initially intended to pass the task of excavating the Steel Capital to Bug Adept Billis. However, given what he had seen, he had underestimated the value to be found here. Disregarding the nar door that had yet to be found, just what he had discovered here had already exceeded his expectations.


    If he could scour this ce thoroughly, he might find even greater yields!

 Chapter 549 Fleeing Mary

    Chapter 549 Fleeing Mary


    A ck shadow rapidly dashed across the night-cloaked Ad ins, sticking close to the ground as it did so.


    The ck silhouette was slender and tall, brimming with a seductive charm under the illumination of the round moon in the sky. rmingly enough, the seductive figure didn¡¯t belong to a human. She had a pair ofrge and wide gray wings on her back, silent as a phantom as she glided above the ground.


    There were no pursuers or oddities behind her, but the owner of this ck silhouette seemed to be fleeing in a panic. Much like an anxious bird, she dashed across fields and viges and rivers, never daring to stop for a break.


    Even someone of her power would eventually be exhausted after a continuous flight at full speed for several hours.


    Whenever she reached this peak of exhaustion, she would dive down into somece within the forest. There would immediately bemotion fromrge-sized forest beasts from that area.


    However, these growls and howls disappeared as fast as they appeared!


    A short momentter, when the ck silhouette unfurled her wings and took to the skies once more, two shriveled corpses had been left behind in the forest. The blood within the bodies of theserge beasts had beenpletely drained within a matter of minutes.


    At the instant the ck form took to the sky, the moon illuminated the face of its owner¨C a pretty, concerned, and anxious face.


    Mary. She was the Vampire Adept Mary whom Greem had sent to monitor Leicester!


    Perhaps the odd atmosphere of the night had scared away all nearby beasts, or maybe Mary had been remarkably silent and clean in her hunt. Regardless, the forest quickly turned silent once she had vanished into the darkness in the distance.


    Until another strange ck shadow descended upon the spot!


    There were absolutely no signs of living beings in the forest. Only those with the most delicate of senses could vaguely sense the light in the forest dimming slightly.


    A cluster of thin ck mist spread throughout the forest as the bright moonlight shone down upon the trees. The fog quickly enveloped the two beast corpses that had been hidden in the bushes.


    Two crimson eyes suddenly shone in the ck mist, as if its owner had discovered something of interest. This unknown individual immediately turned and stared in the direction that Mary had fled.


    A sinister male voice rang out from the mist.


    "She actually possesses the smell of my bloodline within her... strange. Could it be an experimental subject that I didn¡¯t properly dispose of? No. I must try bloodline summoning once."


    An intense red light burst forth from within the red mist. A strange and intangible flux started to ripple into the distance under the guidance of some odd bloodline connection.


    Mary had already fled twenty-five kilometers away at this point.


    An indescribable mental summons entered her mind, even as she beat her wings and continued gliding across the canopy.


    Like a speeding train suddenly braking, Mary¡¯s elegant flying posture came to an abrupt pause. Her whole body folded together as she crashed down into the forest, snapping countless branches and vines as she fell.


    This sudden twist of events had been so abrupt that the fall itself almost threw her into a daze.


    However, before she could even regain consciousness, a strong bodily instinct forcefully manipted her body and made her leap onto her feet. That same instinct then drove her flying back in the direction she hade from.


    Before even making it five meters, Mary swiftly came to her wits after. She instantly regained control over her own body and stopped walking.


    Two different consciousness were still intensely fighting over control of her body.


    Mary wanted to get away from that terrifying demon as fast as she could. However, her instinctual consciousness was driving her to return to the side of her bloodline origin. The two minds shed on multipleyers of the body, unwilling to give up on even the slightest control of the most minor body parts.


    Mary couldn¡¯t even stand still. One foot stepped forward while the other stepped backward. One hand turned right while the other turned left. Even the muscles on her face were twitching intensely.


    Her entire body had beenpletely messed up by the two struggling consciousness!


    The vampire blood flowing in her body still retained the bloodline mark of Leicester the Vampire, making her unable to resist any orders from him. However, she was not a bloodkin that Leicester had created through the Embrace. As such, her soul wasn¡¯t under his control.


    When her soul started shing with her bloodline instincts, neither side could fully control her body and became mired in a stalemate.


    An expression of surprise finally surfaced on the face of Second Grade Vampire Leicester when the bloodkin had yet to arrive despite a long time after his bloodline summoning.


    What a strange bloodline descendant! To be able to reject the summons of their bloodline origin. This...this was almost unbelievable!


    Leicester undoubtedly became even more interested in such a strange bloodline descendant.


    He stopped his bloodline summoning ritual and retracted the ck mist. The cloud gathered and formed into arge pair of bat wings that could almost blot out the stretch of forest he was in. The vampire vanished with a slight beat of his wings. He quickly flew in the direction where the odd bloodline flux wasing from.


    The enemy was closing in.


    That strange instinctual consciousness in Mary¡¯s body had just died down. Yet, she didn¡¯t even get to rest for a moment when she sensed her bloodline origin getting closer.


    Mary hadn¡¯t felt afraid, even when she was fighting with her body¡¯s instinctual consciousness earlier. However, her face paled the moment she sensed her bloodline origin. She took to the skies without any hesitation and escaped on her wings at her highest speed.


    Mary had even used the spells Energy Explosion and elerated Flight to get away from this fearsome enemy.


    The opponent was able to use a single thought from dozens of kilometers away to make her body obediently walk back to surrender. Mary would probably have a difficult time stirring up even a rebellious thought if he managed to get to her.


    That was why Mary gave her very all. She used everything she had on her¨C magical items, scrolls, wands, potions, anything that could increase the speed of her flight, all for the sake of putting that much more distance between her and that demon.


    With her resilient mental consciousness, Leicester should be incapable of sensing her exact location once there were more than fifty kilometers between them!


    Mary dashed across the skies with this single thought in mind. A game of tag upon the Ad ins started between her and that terrifying Second Grade Vampire Leicester.


    ............


    Zhentarim area, Feidnan City.


    Sanazar, F¨¹gen, and Keoghan were gathered in a secret room at the higher levels of the tower for a meeting.


    As the core adepts of the Sarubo n, they had such a regr meeting on an annual basis. Things had been much busier this year, and correspondingly, more meetings had been held.


    During the regr meeting, Adept Keoghan gave a standard report on all matters that had happened within the n, the distribution of the n¡¯s resources, the assignment and adjustment of internal staff, the record of apprentice advancements, and so on. Once he hadpleted this, Keoghan took out yet another, tinier piece of paper from inside his sleeve and started to give a summary on everything that had happened in Fire Throne recently.


    Greem had been hiding in the adept¡¯s tower,pletely hidden from the public. It had been six months since anyone saw him.


    The tower had recruited another two staying adepts.


    A few core adepts of the tower had also simultaneously vanished for a period a month ago.


    Goblin Snox had gone missing, though Majordomo Gargamel was still present in the tower.


    Half a monthter, Meryl and Mary had returned to the tower. However, Bug Adept Billis, Poison Witch Endor, and Mechanical Adept Sabrina were still unounted for.


    Seven days ago, Mary set forth for the southwest of Zhentarim. Her goal remained unclear.


    Large amounts of resource imports and exports had been recorded recently. It seemed Greem¡¯s faction was up to something big.


    ......


    ......


    One by one, sentence by sentence, almost everything in the report was about the recent movements of Fire Throne¡¯s principal characters, as well as the details of essential matters. One would gain a perfect understanding of Fire Throne from all this information!


    Adept F¨¹gen patiently waited for Keoghan to finished his report. Finally, he couldn¡¯t help but bow and ask, "Lady Sanazar, should we... "


    "Is there any question about this?" The sharp voice of Third Grade Adept Sanazar rang out from the purple mist, "That brat has some real skills. To think he would dare to attempt a nar invasion just a few days after his advancement. Kehkehkeh, how bold!"


    Even though he already had his suspicions, F¨¹gen clearly wasn¡¯t as sure as Sanazar was. He asked doubtfully, "Mdy, is he able to do that with his current power? That... we are talking about invading a ne, after all!"


    "Hmph! F¨¹gen, you are too conservative!" Sanazar couldn¡¯t stop herself from mocking, "If I were you, I wouldn¡¯t be wondering if he would dare to invade a ne. Instead, I would be wondering where he obtained the nar coordinates for an invasion. Greem¡¯s financial situation is clearly insufficient for him to buy any nar coordinates, even that of a small-sized ne from the Silver Union."


    "Could it have been provided by that girl in the north?" Adept Keoghan threw in his opinion.


    Sanazar thought for a moment when she heard this. She agreed with this idea.


    A fire adept that had only advanced to Second Grade for no more than a hundred days having enough money to buy world coordinates from the three major forces? This line of thought was just too ridiculous! The highest probability was that he had obtained external aid.


    And with Greem¡¯s social circle, the only one that could provide him with such aid could only be that Alice from Dragonblight.


    If that was the case, then had the adepts missing from Fire Throne died in the other ne? Or were they stationed there?


    Sanazar and F¨¹gen¡¯s consensus was that it was likely to be the former.


    After all, the strength of Greem¡¯s faction was too weak. Even at their peak, they could only call upon six to seven adepts. Moreover, most of these adepts were newly advanced adepts. There was no way they could conquer a ne with a force that small unless the opponent were a microne with extremely limited resources.


    Even if they could take on the ne, five or six adepts in a small ne were like a handful of pepper cast into a creek. They would be swept away before they could make any substantial difference. Ruling a ne was even further out of the question!


    Ack of adepts made it difficult to form any effective ruling structure. Without that ruling structure, it was difficult to properly excavate the resources and wealth hidden within that other ne. Moreover, low-magic nes had extremely thin magic concentration. It was unsuitable for adept practices and cultivation. That would undoubtedly be an incredibly torturous exercise for the adepts stationed in the ne!


    It was certain that Greem would be unwilling to station himself in a low-magic ne that wascking in both resources and magic. He would never ept his power improving at a crawling pace while being forced to deal with worldly management matters!


    It seemed Greem had already swallowed his first loss!


    The three core adepts of the Sarubo n couldn¡¯t help but sinisterlyugh when they thought of such a disaster befalling Greem.

 Chapter 550 Giant Metal Monster

    Chapter 550 Giant Metal Monster


    One had to mention how the victors of a brutal battle were always guaranteed the most valuable of spoils!


    After a month of work, the goblin excavation team had cleared away millions of tons of dirt and all sorts of other debris. They had ovee several difficulties and pierced through the hardyers of rock and stone. The Steel Capital, buried nearly a thousand meter underground, finally saw the day of light once more.


    In all honesty, it shouldn¡¯t have exactly been considered underground. After all, the Steel Capital had been built high atop the peak of a mountain. It had only been buried as the mountain itself copsed.


    After all the debris had been cleared away, the ruins of the uncovered Steel Capital revealed to everyone the ferocity and violence of the explosion on that day. Most of the metal buildings had been distorted beyond recognition. In fact, many of the metallicponents had their original attributes altered by the corrosion of the energy storm. They had been fused and turned into substances that were more akin to magical alloys.


    As the hundreds of construction machines operated at full power and endeavored to cut these metal parts into suitable sizes before lifting them out of the ¡¯pit,¡¯ an unexpected event urred.


    A mysterious force suddenly guided arge pile of broken and distorted metal parts to transform into an eight-meter metal giant within full view of all the goblins, clicking and nging as the metal parts collided with each other.


    It had a rough and crude metal body, broken wires spouting sparks and electricity, a tilted metal head, and metal fists withrge cracks in them.


    Even though this metal giant was unbearably crude, itsrge size and massive fists still caused devastating damage to the nearby construction machines.


    A single punch would tten a construction machine to half its size. With a kick, the machine would be sted to the sky, falling apart as it fell.


    This strange metal giant was like a tiger that had made its way into the middle of a pack of wolves. It beat back all the machines around it without any contest. Soon, five construction machines had fallen by its hands. The goblin mechanics within the machines had also been turned into unrecognizable crimson splotches on the earth.


    After all, this was an excavation site. Most of the machines that were active here were construction machines. They were not consideredbat magical machines. All of them were built in a bulky fashion and had slow reaction speeds. They weren¡¯t outfitted with any weapons either.


    Expecting them to wave their saws meant for cutting and drills meant for digging to charge at a killing machine was truly unfair.


    The fewbat magical machines that were present at the site quickly shifted to full power and rushed at the monster. They used a barrage of goblin rockets and rapid-fire guns to riddle the enemy with holes. Shards of metal went flying everywhere as their bullets found their mark.


    Just as the magical machines were about to obtain their victory, the metal giant iled its arms ferociously and forced the magical machines away from it. It then strode towards the damaged construction machines. The giant let out a roar as its suddenly liquified arms plunged into the remains of the machines.


    A bizarre phenomenon that no goblin understood urred!


    The previously smoking, damaged, and immobilized construction machine came back to life once more. Its sundered body split into tens of thousands of tinyponents and surged towards the metal giant¡¯s body like a flock of birds returning to their nests.


    The originally eight-meter tall metal giant suddenly devoured a damaged construction machine; its alreadyrge body once again grew amidst ear-piercing grinding sounds. It was now ten meters in height. Many attachments that once belonged to the construction machine had sessfully moved to its body in an orderly and logical fashion.


    The expanded metal chainsaw let out a terrifying rumble as it started to spin. This previously unarmed giant now had a metal chainsaw in its left hand and a drill in its right. There was also a shiny metal armor covering its back and its breast. It... it had actually armed itself!


    Almost as if it had just discovered this strange metal ability, the metal giant shielded itself from the attacks of the magical machines while lunging at the other damaged machines on the site.


    It was through this method that the metal giant endured the attacks of six magical machines and slowly absorbed each construction machine into its body.


    In the blink of an eye, it had turned into a giant metal monster that stood fifteen meters tall, equipped with all sorts of strange attachments.


    At this point, the umtion of metal parts had made it an unstoppable force.


    The magical machines that had previously managed to overwhelm it didn¡¯t even dare to get close to it now. They could only harass it from afar. Finally, a magical machine failed to get out of the way of the giant metal monster. The metal giant¡¯s fist crashed into the chest of the magical machine. It severely dented the machine¡¯s metal tes, and the sound of the goblin mechanic coughing up blood could be heard from within.


    A pool of blood flowed out from the inside of the machine.


    After unhesitatingly ¡¯devouring¡¯ this magical machine, this giant metal monster armed with primitive mechanical weapons instantly transformed. The metal attachments on the surface of its body were all refitted into goblin rapid-fire guns with surprising offensive prowess.


    Countless ck cannon barrels also extended from its massive body. Fist-sized bullets instantly riddled the remaining five magical machines with holes.


    The goblins immediately descended into chaos upon this happening!


    The goblin mechanics frantically climbed out of their construction machines and gathered with the other goblins. They swarmed toward the elevators and slopes that had been dug into the side of the pit in hopes of escaping this nightmare.


    Goblins pushed and shoved each other, howling and screaming as they vied for a way out. The excavation site at the bottom of the pit instantly turned into a chaotic mess.


    Just as the goblins were fighting to escape from this unkible and fearsome metal monster, a blindingly bright red sun suddenly rose at the bottom of the pit. A beam of pure white light then shot across their heads and crashed into the chest of the giant metal monster.


    This pir of light was one meter in diameter. It didn¡¯t look extraordinary, but it possessed a jaw-droppingly high temperature.


    The metal parts engulfed by the pir of light immediately started to melt and soften, flowing down the body of the metal giant like hot wax.


    The metal monster seemed to sense the danger it was in. It thrashed left and right, hoping to escape from the entanglement of the light pir. However, the column of light appeared to have a mind of its own. It closely followed the metal monster, regardless of which direction it went in, always keeping itself focused upon the metal giant¡¯s chest.


    The giant metal monster stopped moving as if it knew it would be a futile attempt to escape from the white pir of light. It roared ferociously, and over a hundred ck cannon barrels emerged as its body ground and creaked. The cannons promptly began to fire a barrage at the source of the pir of light.


    The giant metal bullets crossed paths with the zing Light, turning the excavation site into a fearsome battlefield!


    However, the battle onlysted for seven seconds before it ended with the loss of the metal monster.


    zing Light possessed an iparable destructiveness and lethality in the hands of Second Grade Fire Adept Greem.


    The three-meter thick body of the giant metal monster had been forcefully pierced through by the pir of pure white light. In fact, the white beam had even sted the earth wall behind the metal giant and had melted a giant crater into the dirt.


    The chest seemed to be the vital point of the giant metal monster, and it lost itsbat capabilities once that point had been pierced. The metal giant shuddered before copsing to the ground with a heavy thud.


    Greem arrived in front of the metal giant¡¯s towering body with steady footsteps. Even though his height of two meters made him a giant amongst humans, he still appeared as tiny as a bean beside a wheel of cheese whenpared to this strange metal monster.


    A crack appeared in the earth beside the giant metal monster, and tens of thousands of ck beetles surged out from beneath. Soon, they reformed into the Bug Adept Billis, cloaked in his ck robe.


    "Master, why does this guy look so familiar."


    "Of course he looks familiar!" A disdainful smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face, "He¡¯s an old friend of ours after all."


    "You mean to say that it...it¡¯s that guy?" Bug Adept Billis asked hesitatingly.


    "Hmph! I knew Third Grades wouldn¡¯t die so easily. Even that thunder dragon managed to live. What¡¯s so surprising about Giant Brain Gazlowe surviving the explosion?"


    Having said that, Greem¡¯s body exploded into a cluster of mes and reappeared on the broad chest of the metal monster.


    Hisrge hand zed with a golden me and reached inside the chest of the monster to extracted a strange brain from within it. This brain had a dozen fleshy tentacles beneath it and was the size of a human head.


    Gazlowe had once been as big as a hill. Now, it wasn¡¯t much bigger than a human¡¯s brain. Greem¡¯s zing Light from earlier had pierced through the upper left side of its brain, burning away nearly one-third of what was left in the first ce.


    Greem flicked at the tentacles dangling beneath the broken brain. They seemed utterly limp and void of any life. After all, no one would be able to live any longer if a third of their brain had been burned away!


    "Master, is it still alive? Why can¡¯t I feel the presence of any life force? Could it have been beaten to death by you already?" Bug Adept Billis also turned into a cluster of ck mist and flew onto the metal monster. He reformed himself beside Greem.


    "Dead? Well, isn¡¯t that good." The smile on Greem¡¯s face became even wider, "Well, if that¡¯s the case, then I guess I¡¯ll just burn the rest as well!"


    The fire on Greem¡¯s hand immediately started zing after he said that.


    "Not dead... not dead. I¡¯m not dead."


    Small Brain Gazlowe had wanted to y dead. However, he now had no choice but to dispel his pretense and regain his aura of life.


    The miniaturized Gazlowe seemed to understand that its strength was insufficient to deal with this leader of the adepts. Thus, he quietly stayed in Greem¡¯s hands, enduring the burning of the red mes.


    "Tell me! How did you survive that massive explosion!" Greem stared at the little fellow in his hands and asked in a calm tone.


    Even though his tone was calm and peaceful, Gazlowe felt a real threat of death in it.


    "I... I... seem to possess the ability to regenerate from even a drop of blood!"

 Chapter 551 Strange Brain

    Chapter 551 Strange Brain


    Regeneration from a drop of blood was undoubtedly an exaggerated description.


    Strange brain Gazlowe¡¯s current abilities were somewhat simr to Bug Adept Billis¡¯. Even if most of his brain was destroyed, the remaining bits would be able to regenerate.


    Unfortunately, Gazlowe¡¯s size corresponded with his abilities.


    He had barely managed to grow from scraps of the brain to a functional one that was capable of thought when he found himself in that situation of severe energy and nutritional deprivation. His current size only allowed him to manipted some metal substances and mechanical constructs that had been polluted by magical energies.


    He could no longer use the mental powers that he had previously mastered due to the severe decrease in his Spirit!


    Moreover, one-third of his newly grown brain had just been burned to ashes by his old opponent¨C Greem. It was difficult for Gazlowe to maintainplete consciousness. Otherwise, he would never have tried something as crude as ying dead in front of a Second Grade fire adept!


    For some reason, the memories and emotions that belonged to Gazlowe had faded substantially after being reduced to his current size. Even though the brain itself retained all of Gazlowe¡¯s memories, they were only memories. The newly grown brain possessed a dominant consciousness and position that was distinct from Gazlowe¡¯s.


    Otherwise, he would never have appealed to his old enemy just because he was afraid of death.


    Greem ignored the show of friendliness and subordination. Scarlet light shed in his eyes as a series of fire runes were pieced together to form a strange spell. The runes entered into the body of the brain.


    A sharp re emerged in Greem¡¯s eyes as he coldlymanded, "Let down your mental defenses!"


    The fist-sized brain paused for a moment. His gray brain matter couldn¡¯t help but start trembling.


    He knew too clearly what Greem intended to do.


    Soul Brand!


    It was a soul brand that was etched directly upon the soul. The brain¡¯s soul would no longer be able to hide any secrets from Greem the moment the brand was engraved upon it. As long as Greem wished for it, he would be able to see the current state of the brain¡¯s soul, as well as the thoughts that were running through the brain.


    Greem would be able to sense any hostile thoughts or intentions that arose in the mind of the brain. When that happened, he only needed to send the thought of ¡¯suicide¡¯ to the brain, and its soul instincts would drive the mind to execute his order without error.


    If he were still that lowly and humble goblin, Gazlowe would probably bend the knee and surrender; he couldn¡¯t have resisted after all. But now, he was, at the very least, a powerful Third Grade monster. How could he...


    Before the brain could think of a perfect strategy, Greem closed his palms. His five zing crimson fingers instantly sunk into it. The gray brain matter was torched and roasted ck by the mes, and pungent fumes rose from the brain.


    The brain felt Greem dripping with cold killing intent.


    Greem would probably exterminate him in the next second if he couldn¡¯t assure Greem of his loyalty and obedience.


    Allowing a monster like him to escape was not a wise decision. He could reform into that terrifying giant brain if he had ten to fifteen days to recover. When that happened, all metallic substances on the Goblin ne would be his body. All magical machines would be his ves. Who could stop him from once again gaining control of this world when that happened?


    If Greem didn¡¯t want his newly obtained lesser ne snatched from his hands, then he had to either turn the brain into one of his own or one of the dead.


    The brain ultimately recognized the situation he was in when threatened with death. He dejectedly let down of all his mental defenses.


    In all honesty, as a Second Grade fire adept, leaving his soul brand in the soul of a Third Grade monster was an arduous task for Greem as well.


    The brain was in agony throughout the process, while Greem was teetering on the brink of exhaustion the whole time.


    It took a total of fifteen minutes for the two of them toplete the soul branding. The weakened Third Grade brain had also be Greem¡¯s soul ve.


    Greem let out a grunt once hepleted the soul brand. He immediately threw the brain away while falling to the ground, sping his head between his hands. He had no choice. The soul information transmitted from the Third Grade brain at the moment the contract waspleted had flooded his rtively frail mental consciousness.


    [Beep. Detecting strange soul connection. Requestion instructions from host. Maintain connection?]


    "No... cut it off first!"


    A short momentter, Greem temporarily managed to cut off his soul connection to the brain with the Chip¡¯s help. He finally broke free from the vast sea of soul information.


    Greem stood up with Billis¡¯ help. He wiped away the ck blood streaking down his nostril and returned to normal.


    As expected of a Third Grade brain, he was a Third Grade monster after all. The memories and information in his mind were sorge and numerous that it was hard even to count. If Greem had attempted to absorb all that information with no regard to their significance, his brain might have exploded.


    However, with the help of the Chip, Greem didn¡¯t need to care about anything that had to do with the brain. He let the Chip silently arrange and sort all the information that had been sent through the soul contract in that brief instant. He only needed to browse through the data once the Chip was done sorting it.


    Now that Greem had the soul contract, the brain would not be able to escape his control, even if he was one grade higher than himself. That meant that the brain had ironically turned into the most trustworthy and reliable member of all of his subordinates!


    "What do you need to recover?" Greem impatiently asked the brain that had returned to his side once he got onto his feet.


    The brain did not have a body, or any other organ for that matter. However, it was able to freely hover in the sky due to its powerful mental powers.


    The brain was now like a tame cat. It sat upon Greem¡¯s left shoulder and startedmunicating with him using telepathy.


    Large amounts of energy and nutritional solution!


    The brain had no digestive organs. It could only rely on its brain matter to slowly absorb liquid nutritional substances and magic energy. It had been able to rapidly swell to its massive size back in the past due to the space furnace serving as its energy source.


    Now that the super space-furnace had been destroyed, it had lost a stable source of energy. Thus, it had to rely on Greem finding a new source of energy for itself.


    Greem didn¡¯t say anything else. He pointed toward the sky, and the brain was immediately invigorated.


    A massive flying ship currently floated above the pit at the construction site. It was the existence of this ship that allowed the goblins to transport so many construction machines and resources into this purified area. The vessel was also responsible for carrying the useful waste that they had dug of the pit, allowing the goblins to sort and filter the debris at another site.


    This flying ship instantly became the most delicious cake in the brain¡¯s eye now that Greem had given his permission.


    The brain waved its tentacles and quickly cast a few mental powers on itself.


    Masquerade!


    Invisibility!


    Haste!


    The fist-sized brain turned into a sh of lightning under the umted effects of all those mental skills. It instantly flew into the sky, found a crack in the ship, and entered it.


    The first fifteen minutes was incredibly peaceful, so much so that one might even nod off.


    However, fifteen minutester, the flying ship broke out into a riot.


    The many goblins inside the ship started to escape in a panic. They got onto various flying vessels and started leaving the ship.


    That was only because the brain didn¡¯t dare to devour their sweet flesh without Greem¡¯s permission. Otherwise, none of these goblin technicians would have been able to leave the flying ship alive.


    Once the goblins had all been driven away, the flying ship started to contort slightly, creaking and grinding as it did so. The other goblins were terrified by what had happened in the ship and didn¡¯t notice this happening. However, Greem could detect all this happening due to the Chip¡¯s detailed spiritual scans.


    It was apparent that the brain wasn¡¯t satisfied with its new ride upon taking control of the space furnace within the ship. It started using its magical energy to change the structure and appearance of the ship slightly.


    It was important to note that the flying ships had always been one of the old goblin Gazlowe¡¯s proudest works. The structure of its hull and the aerodynamic design had been one of the few things that the old goblin had taken great pride in. No goblin in the Empire could suggest any improvement or change to these designs, even a dozen years since the invention of the ship.


    However, the brain that had grown through Gazlowe¡¯s memories instantly discovered plenty of illogical and unscientific parts to the ship¡¯s design, despite only just gaining control of it. That was more than enough to demonstrate how much more powerful the brain waspared to the Gazlowe of the past!


    The modified flying ship made an elegant arc through the air and rapidly descended into the pit, hovering twenty meters above the ground.


    Slowly, the flying ship no longer waved in the air as it had in the past. Controlled by the brain¡¯s magic energy, it stopped right in the middle of the sky without any slight movements. It was almost as if it had been fixed to space with nails.


    Greem¡¯s mental consciousness silentlymunicated with the brain hiding in the flying ship. A short whileter, a small opening appeared in the bottom of the ship. A powerful energy storm sted out, sucking in all the dirt and oddly-shaped debris on the ground like a tornado.


    A visibleyer of the dirt had been removed from the pit.


    At the same time, windows opened on the side of the massive ship, ejecting all the useless stuff, while keeping the useful and filtered materials within its hull.


    This efficiency was much higher than the continued and simultaneous efforts of a hundred construction machines.


    Greem had personally witnessed the efficacy of the flying ship under the brain¡¯s control and was greatly pleased. After a few words of instruction to the brain, Greem hurried away from the dig site and rushed back to where the teleportation device was.


    He couldn¡¯t help it. It seemed something had happened in the World of Adepts that demanded his attention!

 Chapter 552 Rose Manor

    Chapter 552 Rose Manor


    There was arge manor situated fifteen kilometers to the west suburbs of Sturk? City.


    Night had just taken over the sky.


    Rose Manor was already brightly lit and filled with guests.


    The manor¡¯s front za with a fountain was filled with noble¡¯s carriages from the surrounding cities. Several well-dressed nobledies in expensive fur emerged from the carriages, delicately stepping upon the ground before proudly walking into the manor under the apaniment of equally well-dressed gentlemen.


    Several rows of servants in formal dress stood straight before the manor. They held still politely as they awaited the arrival of the guests, asionally loudly announcing the long string of titles that each guest possessed.


    Leicester Vik stood silently on the open balcony of the manor¡¯s third floor. He held a ss of Pinedew Wine in his hands, cradling the ss and allowing the crimson liquid to swirl inside to release its sweet, alluring, and bloody fragrance.


    This particr type of truffle wine had been personally distilled by the famous Master Ritfink of the Vik Family. The sweetest virgin¡¯s heart blood and pine dew harvested from the edge of the Great Silent Forest had been used to make the wine, along with a dozen types of jasmine and rose pollen.


    Pinedew wine distilled in this manner was the utmost extravagant luxury for a vampire family. That was why it was not something that an ordinary vampire could afford. Only a top-tier vampire like Leicester could enjoy it as if it was a dailymodity.


    Leicester was extraordinarily tall, handsome, and he looked to be only about thirty years old.


    He had a pronounced nose and sunken eyes. His eyes were red, but his pupils were golden. A headful of long, dark, and curly brown hair rested upon his shoulders. The lines on his face were sharp and firm. His mustache was fine and extremely well-maintained, while his exposed skin was a pristine baster envied by all nobles.


    He wore a tailored ck dress suit, the material of which was smooth, elegant, and pleasant to the touch. One look and anyone could tell it cost a fortune. A metal chain also hung outside the inner pocket of his suit. It seemed there was a pocketwatch within.


    While he emotionlessly assessed the gathering of guests below him, a clear voice rang out from behind.


    "Count Leicester, the guests are all here. They are waiting on you."


    The one who had approached Leicester was the host of the Rose Manor¨C Viscount Entia, who had been stationed here by the Vik family.


    As an ancient vampire family, the Viks had split the vampires within the family into five sses, ording to ancestral etiquette. These five sses were the Duke, Marquis, Count, Viscount, and Baron. Duke represented Fourth Grade, Marquis represented Third Grade, Count represented Second, Viscount represented First, and Baron represented pseudo-adepts.


    Any vampire who was pseudo-adept and below would not be recorded into the Vik¡¯s family tree. Not even their name would remain after they died.


    The evolutionary traits of the vampires destined them to go down a different path of cultivationpared to ordinary adepts. Pursuing the blood of powerful individuals was an instinct of theirs, as well as the only way they could strengthen themselves.


    The blood of ordinary individuals could only sustain them. Only by sucking the blood of powerful lifeforms could they grow in power. That was why they were also one of the rare few adept groups who held the most contact with the ordinary people of their territories.


    Allrge manors within the hereditarynds of the Viks would asionally holdrge-scale parties of debauchery. The nobles of nearby cities were often invited to such banquets and feasts. In particr, these were the best opportunities for nobledies to get close to their rulers.


    The ordinary and ignorantmon folk might harbor great fears of vampires, believing them to be monsters that feasted on human blood and demons that spread death wherever they went. However, the local nobles in the Vik territory didn¡¯t think so.


    They had no choice but to offer their talents and abilities to these gentle and elegant adepts, as they lived within thends of vampires.


    Naturally, after spending a long time with the vampires, they realized they weren¡¯t as terrifying as the peasants often imed them to be.


    The vampires were just like them. They needed to eat and drink. They had a life of their own. They required plenty of servants to serve them.


    Moreover, the vampires had a unique trait¨C their eternal youth. Just turning into a blood ve, or even a lowly vampire spawn, would dy aging and make a young man or woman grow even more handsome and pretty, let alone turning into an actual vampire.


    If vampires were demons, then they were demons who spread beauty and eternal youth wherever they went!


    Demons of this nature would be alluring and attractive figures once one learned to get over the disgust and fear of blood.


    All the vain nobledies fantasizing about eternal youth fell in love with these debaucherous banquets. If ady were fortunate enough to be looked upon by a member of the Vik family during the feast, and was bitten just once because of that, she would instantly be the envy of all nobledies in the surrounding cities.


    She might turn into a blood ve that had to obey all orders given to her because of this, but who would fuss over such a small detail? What was the loss of a little freedom if one could get their hands on youth and status?


    That was why nearly all nobles with any influence within a hundred kilometer radius immediately hurried to the Rose Manor upon hearing the arrival of the new rising star of the Vik family¨C Leicester.


    They brought along all the females of their families: voluptuousdies, slender girls, even specially trained beauties. Every single one of them was so graceful, so pretty, so seductive.


    The male guests also tried to lean into the preferences of the vampires. They dressed in nice dress suits and behaved as elegantly as possible, as if their family had a long history in nobility. Pale faces, auras of elegance, slightly showing canine teeth and deep, mysterious smiles...


    They couldn¡¯t help it. After all, it was said that a high-grade Viscountess of the vampire castle would also be present at tonight¡¯s banquet. That was a decent motivation and stimtion for the numerous male guests as well!


    Leicester calmly assessed the heaps of flesh moving about the banquet. Those people put on facades of calmness and confidence, exuding absolutely no real energy from their well-fed bodies. Not only could these people incite no desire within him, but they also weren¡¯t even interesting enough to make him want to interact with them.


    "Has Rose arrived?" Leicester brushed his two delicate mustaches as he coldly asked.


    "Lady Rose has already gone down there! She seems to like tonight¡¯s banquet." As a lower vampire of the Vik family, Viscount Entia could only remind Leicester in such a cordial manner.


    Leicester quickly found Viscountess Rose in the banquet upon Entia¡¯s reminder. The Viscountess had be the eye of the storm that was the banquet.


    She was a stunningly beautifuldy dressed in a full ck formal dress.


    She had a face as radiant as ivory, a tall nose, rose-colored lips, and cute crimson eyes. Her dark brown hair ran down her back, all the way down to her waist. The stretch of snow-white upon her bosom appeared to be that much more substantial under the illumination of the magical lights.


    As the entire banquet¡¯s center of attention, a dozen handsome and well-built young nobles gathered around her. No one knew what joke they had just cracked, but it made the Viscountess bend forward as sheughed, further entuating her unnatural beauty.


    The crimson eyes of theughing Viscountess Rose shed as if she sensed Leicester¡¯s eyes upon her. She turned around and locked eyes with the Count across the dense crowd and the hundred meters between the two of them.


    Viscountess Rose lifted the winess in her hand delicately and put on a brazen smile on her pretty face, greeting Leicester from afar. However, the young nobles around her obviously didn¡¯t understand her intentions. They though the beautiful Viscountess was responding to their invitations to drink. Thus, all of the nobles excitedly lifted their sses and drained their contents in a single gulp.


    The reason for this banquet wasn¡¯t to have the vampire nobles indulge in pleasure. Rather, there was a hint of a marriage arrangement in the entire affair.


    Leicester¡¯s status in the family had been on the rise ever since he had advanced to Second Grade. He had slowly be someone with actual influence within the family. In such a situation, the family elders were impatiently attempting to find a suitable vampire bride for him.


    Naturally, the prime candidates were among high-grade vampires!


    After much selection, Viscountess Rose from another vampire family three hundred and sixty-five kilometers southwest of the Viks¡¯ Bloodcastle was chosen.


    Rose might only have the power of an elite First Grade, but she was only one hundred and three years old. She was a favored pick for advancement to Second Grade vampire, even within her own n.


    Bringing together the Second Grade Leicester and the elite First Grade Rose could significantly strengthen the ties between the two vampire families. When that happened, they might be able to merge their families. That act would certainly bring the n¡¯s power to a whole new level and elevate them to the most famous vampire family in the entire southwest of Zhentarim!


    Today¡¯s banquet was meant as a meeting arranged by the two vampire families. The invited nobles were only meant as background andpliment to the dinner.


    In all honesty, Leicester wasn¡¯t pleased by the idea of the banquet himself.


    He kept feeling as if the whole idea was the scheme of some rival elder within the family.


    He had only just advanced to Second Grade. It was a time where he needed to make vast improvements and grow further. Forcing him to copte with a female vampire and give birth to a pureblood descendant at this time would undoubtedly hurt his potential significantly.


    Over two or three hundred guests had gathered in the banquet hall by now. They clustered in small groups and held passionate discussions, adding even more liveliness to the scene.


    It was about time for Leicester, the main character of tonight¡¯s banquet, to show himself as well.


    Leicester stood straight and carefully smoothed out his attire. He suddenly thought of something when he was about to leave.


    "Where¡¯s that female vampire I brought back?"


    "She¡¯s imprisoned in the blood prison beneath the manor. I have sent a lot more guards to watch over her. No problem will ensue!" Viscount Enti replied with a smile.


    "Mm. Keep a good eye on her. I will drag the mastermind behind her back tomorrow. Hmph!"


    Leicester snorted coldly. He then elegantly walked towards the hall, winess still in hand.

 Chapter 553 Inside the Banquet

    Chapter 553 Inside the Banquet


    The banquet at Rose Manor was well underway by the time Greem stepped out of the ck carriage.


    His hasty travel here hadn¡¯t allowed for any other arrangements. He had no choice but to rent a carriage from a nearby city to arrive at Rose Manor.


    He wasn¡¯t wearing that conspicuous adept¡¯s robe of his. Instead, he had changed into a ck frock coat with gold spectacles and a wig on his head. When paired with his ck eyes, he possessed a muted trace of nobility and pride to him, even as he carried himself with elegance and grace.


    Things had happened too quickly!


    He had already warned Mary not to get too close to Leicester, and he had reminded her only to collect necessary information on the vampire from afar. However, Mary didn¡¯t do as she was told.


    The existence of the bloodline limit had caused Mary to stagnate at elite First Grade level for far too long. Greem¡¯s advancement to Second Grade, in particr, had greatly provoked thepetitive vampire.


    Even though they were already officially intimate lovers, thepetitiveness etched in Mary¡¯s bones hadn¡¯t faded away. That was why she held an intense passion and motivation when it came to hunting and capturing Leicester.


    Sadly, just as Greem¡¯s abduction n was slowly unfolding, terrifying news reached their ears.


    Leicester had also advanced to Second Grade, bing a fearsome Vampire Count.


    That had far exceeded the limits of what the original abduction n had ounted for!


    A Second Grade vampire would be able to pull together a ve army formed from blood ves and vampire spawn within less than a month if theymitted reckless massacres. If an entire vampire family gave their all, they would be able to transform the whole center of the continent into a paradise for vampires in only six months.


    That said, no vampire family was crazed enough to attempt something like that while under the jurisdiction of the Zhentarim Association. No adepts would intervene if they made descendants or blood ves within their own territory, but they would be met with the full united force of every single adept if they ever extended their reach to someone else¡¯s property.


    The vampires also sustained themselves on the blood of intelligent creatures. If they turned all the citizens of theirnds into blood ves and vampire spawn, they would end up in an awkward situation with no food.


    It was these two reasons that caused all vampire families of the World of Adepts to lead a life of extreme self-control. In fact, they kept a very tight rein on the number of blood ves and vampire spawn within their territory. The lives of their citizens were no different from those of other regions. That was why no situations of mass immigration of fugitives had urred due to fear of the vampire lords.


    However, the low profile of the vampires did not signify weakness!


    If one ranked all adepts by their overall power, the vampire adepts would probably be somewhere in the middle-upper tier among adepts of the same grade.


    They might not be the strongest inbat, or the fastest at running, or the ones with the strongest defense, but they were the most cunning!


    These were weaknesses and strengths that all vampire adepts shared.


    They were fast, could transform into bats, excelled at remaining stealthed, and chief amongst them all¨C they had shocking regeneration speed when able to consume blood.


    Their weakness, on the other hand, was their universally acknowledgedck of offensive abilities.


    The attacks of vampires were often weak whenpared to opponents of the same grade. They could only rely on their regeneration to slowly wear away at the enemy¡¯s defensive spells.


    It was precisely because she knew how difficult a Second Grade vampire would be to deal with that Mary had been driven by her boiling vampire instincts to sneak closer to Leicester. And as expected, her movements were sensed by the opponent!


    After a grueling five days of pursuit, Mary could no longer use any of her abilities due to the effects of her bloodline instincts. Leicester had caught her. He couldn¡¯t help but be stunned upon checking the bloodline in Mary¡¯s body.


    In all honesty, the origin bloodline of this mysterious descendant of his had developed shockingly well. If one were to be entirely frank, the degree of development of her origin bloodline had already exceeded Leicester¡¯s own origin bloodline before he advanced.


    Which is to say, this captured offshoot female vampire held a surprisingly high chance of advancing to Second Grade.


    The reason she hadn¡¯t advanced yet was mostly due to the bloodline limit. Now that Leicester had advanced to Second Grade, the bloodline limit had shifted upwards. This mysterious female vampire would only need to take a little to adjust herself, and she could consider advancement.


    Bloodline bacsh was a terrifying prospect. However, as a vampire family, they had plenty of means to control such bloodline offshoots of impure descent.


    It was because he didn¡¯t wish to squander such an excellent potential subordinate like Mary that Leicester didn¡¯t kill her on the spot. At any rate, nothing would go wrong with bringing her to Rose Manor. Once he was done with the affairs here, he could bring Mary back to Bloodcastle and deal with her at his leisure.


    The urgency of the situation left Greem no time to n. He had hurried to Rose Manor immediately upon receiving news of the banquet.


    Greem¡¯s arrival instantly caught the attention of the servants waiting at the gates.


    Truthfully, Greem wasn¡¯t dressed too extravagantly. The carriage he came in was also unremarkable. One could even say it appeared crude and shabbypared to all those luxurious carriages out there.


    However, when Greem stood in front of the gates of the manor with his hand brushing the buttons on his coat, an overwhelming aura of intimidation and might alerted the servants to the truth; an important figure had arrived.


    Greem had already tried to retract his spiritual pressure, but there was still an unconceble intimidation to the way he walked and to his appearance.


    "Sir, may I know who you might be?" The ones that could greet the guests at the gate as the head servant was also a peripheral blood ve of the Vik family. This identity was equal to a middle-ss noble among the local territories. He would be an apprentice adept, even within an ordinary adept n.


    "Greem!" Greem didn¡¯t speak much. He merely gave his name.


    It was a lone word, without even the name of a n attached to it. Yet, not only did the head servant no look down upon this unknown man, he became even more respectful and cautious around him.


    This was the World of Adepts. It had always revolved around the adepts.


    The adepts who had established themselves through their own efforts went by their first names only, without the n surname attached to it. That was in stark contrast to the adepts that had been trained by the adept ns themselves. However, no one dared to look down upon these adepts.


    Anyone could tell that this guest was no ordinary figure. Moreover, he had no n surname. The learned head servant immediately realized that this was an adept who was hiding his identity.


    Any manor and castle in the World of Adepts were unconditionally weing to visiting adepts!


    Greem passed through the broad, towering gates and entered the banquet, followed by the loud promation of his arrival.


    As the band currently yed a lively tune, and the young noblemen and nobledies were dancing their hearts out, no one noticed Greem¡¯s arrival.


    Only the head servant waved for an attendant and leaned into his ear to whisper a few words. The attendant then hurried towards the main building of the manor.


    ............


    Greem had attended all sorts of banquets since he had arrived in the strange and mysterious World of Adepts. However, most of these were half-business, half-socializing events hosted by apprentices or private dinners held by adepts.


    The guests invited to those banquets were of the same nature. The intent of the feasts was often straightforward and simple as well. So much so that the dinners were a little dull and uninteresting.


    Greem had never attended a banquet like the one before his eyes, where countless handsome men and beautiful women dressed in eye-catching colors while flirting andughing among themselves. It was perhaps the kind of lifestyle favored by those adepts that had given up on the path of magic in pursuit of worldly power and desires.


    Even though it was the same banquet, there were distinct inner and outer circles.


    The inner banquet revolved around the banquet hall on the first floor of the three-level building in the center of the manor. The ones that were allowed in there were mostly great nobles and the wealthiest merchants of the nearby cities. Of course, there were also plenty of beautiful, noble women and young girls that had been specially selected to be allowed in there.


    The middle and lower ss nobles could only gather in the fields, greenhouses, gardens, and corridors around the main building. Here they could still meet plenty of important figures, who would sneak out of the main hall in search of a romantic encounter. As such, the outer banquet was no less lively than the one inside.


    Greem was not a body-refining adept and had no unnatural, tough as steel muscles. However, his two-meter body height still gave him a muscr and nearly perfectly proportioned body. His tailored attire further added a hint of elegance and grace to him.


    He didn¡¯t even need to go out of his way to seduce women as he walked towards the main banquet. Plenty of pretty nobledies were already winking at him. Some of the wilder women even personally stopped him and tried to draw him into a passionate conversation.


    These vulgar women might not have the ability to see through Greem¡¯s identity, but they naturally knew how to pursue the strong and powerful. Even though Greem had already limited his overflowing Spirit, that massive and pulsating life force was like a massive maic field drawing these women toward him.


    Greem¡¯s vision swept through the scene and quickly understood something.


    Half of all the women gathered around him were peripheral blood ves of the Vik family. They spent their days at the sides of high-grade vampires, diligently serving them and selling their youth and bodies to obtain the favor of the vampires.


    Individuals with powerful life forces like Greem were their best prey. The moment a victim was seduced into bed, the women would be able to absorb their life force during intercourse secretly. That was also the only way for them to umte power and grow stronger.


    Once their power exceeded a certain threshold and they became baronesses in their own right, they would be pseudo-adepts and would break free of their identities as blood ves. It was then that they would be officially recognized by the family and epted as an internal member of the Viks.


    That was why nearly half of all the female blood ves were attracted when they saw such delicious prey appear at the banquet. They gathered around Greem, trying their best to show off their appeal.


    Of course, this was in part due to Greem concealing his identity as a Second Grade adept.


    Otherwise, these women would never have dared to so directly tease a terrifying Second Grade adept, even if they had a hundred times the courage than they currently possessed!

 Chapter 554 Meeting of Two Titans

    Chapter 554 Meeting of Two Titans


    Truthfully, Greem was not good at dealing with situations like this.


    Perhaps slightly releasing some of his Second Grade spiritual pressure might be a good idea. That said, if he did that, there would probably be a dozen bawling women at the banquet. After all, there were still some ordinary nobledies surrounding him, apart from those blood ves.


    With their empty and hollow Spirits, any slight pressure from him might cause them to break down!


    Thus, Greem furrowed his eyebrows and put a cold and harsh expression on his handsome face.


    If the women surrounding him were the greater nobles of the inner banquet, they would probably have known well enough to leave at this moment in search of easier prey. However, the women before Greem were far too charmed by his muscr body and unusual aura. Seeing their target get upset not only failed to dismiss their desires, it even caused them to be even more enamored with him.


    These maturedies who fancied themselves as beauties started to use more and more explicitnguage to tease Greem. The more daring ones even pressed against Greem, trying to touch his firm chest while flirting with him.


    Greem¡¯s face turned utterly cold. Two small clusters of fire burned deep in his ck eyes.


    He had already made up his mind. Anyone who dared to put their dirty hand on him would be burned to ashes!


    "What are you lot doing? Go away now."


    The crisp and authoritative voice of a woman rang out as Greem was just about to lose his temper.


    The women turned their heads back in shock, and their faces flushed white when they saw who it was.


    "Lady Rose."


    "My greetings, Lady Rose."


    ......


    The women quickly left after clumsily, but uniformly, bowing and paying their respects, leaving Greem and Lady Rose alone.


    Greem was d to see the women leave and turned his attention towards the approaching person.


    White and smooth skin, a tall nose, bright red lips, and those crimson eyes unique to the vampires. Honestly, there might have been some kind of beauty gene hidden in the bloodline of the vampires. That was perhaps what caused all vampires, both male and female, to be extremely attractive and charming.


    When paired with the ck dress she was wearing, the woman¡¯s skin appeared all the more white and her figure all the more attractive.


    First Grade elite-level female vampire!


    Greem figured out her power in less than half a second with the Chip¡¯s help. The difference in grade made it impossible for her to hide her real strength.


    A vampire of this level could still harm Greem when he was defenseless and within three meters. Of course, if the enemy attempted something like that, they would not be able to escape Greem¡¯s counterattack, even if he was wounded.


    It wouldn¡¯t be weird for Greem to instantly kill the vampire with his current power if she didn¡¯t have any powerful protective magical equipment on her.


    Consequently, Greem hesitated for a moment before choosing not to stop the vampire from approaching him.


    Other women might not be able to see through Greem for his true identity, but as an elite of her family¡¯s First Grade vampires, Rose could sense the enormous fire energy within him even with her eyes closed.


    Rose could tell that the guest was a terrifying fire adept, but she couldn¡¯t be sure of his grade. If he was only a First Grade adept, he shouldn¡¯t be able to repel her spiritual senses and prevent her from figuring out his power. However, it made no sense for him to be a Second Grade adept either.


    The banquet today was no more than an internal meeting for an arranged couple from two vampire families in the end. They had not invited any outsider adepts. The arrival of this powerful adept was confusing.


    "Wee to Rose Manor, sir!" As expected of someone who was well-versed in worldly etiquette, Rose immediately stepped forward with a brilliant smile, "Now that you have arrived, why don¡¯t youe in with me and have a seat?"


    The young nobles who had gathered behind Viscountess Rose immediately betrayed expressions of jealousy and anger on their faces. There was hostility in the gazes they cast at Greem.


    This might have been the first time Viscountess Rose hade to Rose Manor, but in a mere two hours, she had already used her irresistible charm to capture the heart of every young noble in the banquet. If this had been any normal situation, these nobles would never have acted out of jealousy, especially with their rationality and education.


    But today, Viscountess Rose¡¯s powerful personal charm had caused the heat to go to the heads of every one of the young nobles. They swarmed forward and stepped in front of Greem, all moring and challenging Greem to a duel.


    Viscountess Rose softly reprimanded them with mild anger on her face, but there was a hint of pride at the edges of her eyes.


    It was clear that these charmed nobles had be her instruments with which to test Greem¡¯s true powers!


    Greem was as outstanding as ever with his height of two meters, even when surrounded by a horde of noblemen. His eyes never fell upon these mortal men. Neither did they fall upon the secretly d vampire. Instead, he raised his head slightly. His focused eyes pierced straight through the wooden door on the third floor of the building and shed with a pair of eyes hidden in the darkness.


    The two gazes shed mid-air. Both parties felt their hearts tremble.


    It seemed this was the person of interest!


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered dealing with a bunch of small fries now that he had found the person of interest. He released his massive spiritual pressure for a brief instant before immediately retracted it. He parted the crowd before him and confidently walked towards the stunned Rose.


    "O¡¯ beautiful Lady Rose, I will leave myself in your care then! Hopefully, you can show me around this beautiful manor." Greem¡¯srge hand wrapped around Rose¡¯s soft and slender waist as he talked, bringing her along as he walked towards the main building.


    A Second Grade Adept!


    He was actually a Second Grade adept!


    Rose felt her limbs go cold at the idea of this terrifying reality. She was stunned.


    She had always been a flirtatious person with high confidence in her own power. However, when faced with a true Second Grade adept, she felt her whole body shivering from just that focused gaze of his. She even felt an intolerable burning sensation on the surface of her skin when he looked at her.


    Of course, this burning sensation did not inflict any real damage. Rather, it was a magical effect caused by the powers ofw contained within his concentrated mental consciousness. Her opponent had an extraordinary understanding of thews of fire. He only needed to strengthen his mental consciousness slightly when looking upon Rose, and he would be able to allow thews of fire to manifest upon her body.


    That was the greatest demonstration of Greem havingpleted his spirit elementiumization!


    Rose wanted to push away the hand that the Second Grade adept extended toward her, but her vision briefly went ck under that intimidating concentration of Spirit. By the time she came to, the adept had already wrapped his arm around her and was dragging her along to the building.


    A wicked smile suddenly appeared on Rose¡¯s face as she attempted to use the agility of the vampires to escape Greem¡¯s grasp.


    However, the blood energies within her body had only just been mobilized when a warm stream of energy entered her body through the Second Grade adept¡¯s palm. That heated stream shattered the surge of blood energy that she had just gathered into oblivion.


    The warm, overwhelming fire energy quickly circted through her body, illuminating many strange runes as they did so. These runes rapidly and tightly sealed all of Rose¡¯s energy nodes: those in her heart, her brain, and the rest of her body.


    The previously rebellious Rose turned aspliant as water. Half of her body clung on to Greem¡¯s, and there was aziness to her posture. Her eyes were closed, and it seemed as if she hadn¡¯t the energy to even move a single finger. Rose, whose blood energy had been disrupted, would have copsed into the arms of the opponent if it weren¡¯t for his strange power propping her up.


    The noblemen that had surrounded Greem earlier only woke up from the most terrifying of spiritual nightmares once he had entered the main building with Rose. The ones with more resilient Spirits were sweating all over while shivering and teetering on the verge of copse. The weaker ones immediately broke down upon waking up from the nightmare. They ran everywhere in their panic, waving their arms and screaming in terror.


    Leicester personally witnessed everything unfold from the third floor of the main building. Naturally, he had also personally experienced the vastness and terror of the opponent¡¯s Spirit. That was why he immediately lifted his head to give orders to his subordinates.


    By the time Greem had made it up the stairs and arrived at the third floor, the few mad noblemen had already been escorted to a different ce. The banquet had returned to normal.


    Anyone who was qualified to attend this banquet knew how to improvise. That was why they continuedughing and enjoying themselves when they had seen no reaction from the host of the dinner yet. It was almost as if the scene from earlier hadn¡¯t happened.


    However, their eyes couldn¡¯t help but shift towards the third floor, even as they danced and chatted among themselves.


    Perhaps, maybe, it was possible that a significant event unbeknownst to them was slowly brewing in that room!


    ............


    Second Grade Vampire Count Leicester Vik was already waiting with a face full of smiles when Greem was escorted into the guest hall by a polite noble youth.


    "Wee. Wee, sir, to my family¡¯s humble Rose Manor! I wonder if I could be graced with your name?" Leicester was still brimming with smiles. His eyes were full of sincerity. He didn¡¯t seem to care for the unusual condition of the female vampire hanging onto Greem.


    At this moment, only Leicester, Greem, and Rose remained in the guest hall. The vampire that had escorted Greem here had known well enough to shut the door and leave.


    "Greem!"


    Greem sat down upon the sofa with the beautiful female vampire still in his embrace. He simply gave his name.

 Chapter 555 Battle of Two Titans

    Chapter 555 Battle of Two Titans


    Greem?


    Leicester quickly searched through his mind for mentions of this name as he sat down with the unfamiliar adept.


    Almost all adepts possessed eidetic memory with their powerful Spirits. In particr, it wasn¡¯t easy to forget unique individuals like Greem, especially if they have already met once before.


    However, despite all of his efforts, Leicester could not recall anything about his uninvited guest.


    Which meant this should be the first time they have met each other!


    The smile on Leicester¡¯s face only froze for a slight instant before returning to normal.


    "Sir Greem, I wonder what matter brings you so suddenly to our family¡¯s Rose Manor?"


    Even the arrogant Leicester didn¡¯t dare be disrespectful in front of an adept of the same grade as himself.


    A Second Grade adept was an important figure regardless of where they went. Even the Vik Family wouldn¡¯t aggravate a Second Grade adept, despite all the resources and power they held!


    "I¡¯m sure you already know what brings me here." Greem smiled as he let go of Rose¡¯s waist, "Haven¡¯t you been waiting for me to arrive?"


    The energy restrictions in Rose¡¯s body vanished once Greem¡¯s hand left her body. Still, despite being freed, Rose didn¡¯t dare to make any moves. She was utterly intimidated by this adept.


    She could sense that this mysterious Second Grade adept was not a well-intentioned guest. He seemed to have some particr conflict with Leicester. If she was foolish enough to make any sort of movement, it was likely to start a fight between the two Second Grade adepts.


    Rose might think highly of herself, but she would not go unharmed if caught in a battle between two such terrifying Second Grade adepts.


    Leicester¡¯s face froze. The ominous feeling at the bottom of his heart surged to the surface all at once.


    "You mean to say... that female vampire?"


    Leicester¡¯s eyes couldn¡¯t help but sharpen but when he saw Greem nod lightly.


    The origins of the female vampire were aplete mystery. She had refused to talk after being captured. She wouldn¡¯t even divulge her name. That was why Leicester was trying to find her through the means of his family.


    What he hadn¡¯t ever imagined was the mastermind behind the female vampire showing up before he had managed to find information on her.


    "Rose, I have some things to discuss with this Adept Greem. Leave this room for the moment!" Leicester narrowed his eyes as he instructed her.


    The female vampire¡¯s body trembled, and her crimson eyes shifted their gaze toward Greem; she didn¡¯t dare move yet.


    "Sir Leicester is right! We do have some things we need to discuss. Sweetheart, you had best leave the room!" Greem suddenly broke into a smile and patted the female vampire¡¯s voluptuous bottom.


    Rose let out a sigh of relief. She then rolled her eyes seductively at Greem before swaying her hips and exiting the guest hall.


    Leicester¡¯s pointed gaze finally loosened once Rose had left.


    At least the opponent wouldn¡¯t stoop as low as to take Rose hostage. That won a bit of Leicester¡¯s goodwill. Though Greem wouldn¡¯t have been able to threaten him in the slightest, even if he had taken Rose hostage, the willing surrender of this advantage still eased the tense atmosphere slightly.


    "Sir Greem, you should know; looking into someone¡¯s familial bloodline without permission is a great taboo!" Though his face was not as tense now, Leicester¡¯s tone was still as firm as before, "I don¡¯t care what methods you used to steal my bloodline, I must take it all back now!"


    That female vampire actually possessed his bloodline. If she were allowed to grow freely, a bloodline bacsh would be something that was bound to happen. That was why Leicester suppressed his bubbling anger and coldly rejected Greem¡¯s unreasonable request.


    "Sir Leicester, don¡¯t forget what you yourself did at the Sarubo n ny years ago!" Greem immediately replied with a hostile tone.


    Ny years ago? Sarubo n?


    Leicester eyes shone when he obtained this information. He promptly understood the cause and effect of the whole incident.


    Ny years ago, Leicester was only a First Grade vampire that hadn¡¯t advanced for long. He had no choice but to choose a secretive location outside of the family to research his vampire bloodline in hopes of further purifying it.


    He had hidden his identity and made his way into the Sarubo¡¯s territory. There, he had bought an ancient castle and secretly conducted research that he did not wish his family to hear of.


    Sadly, he was caught by the Sarubo for abducting apprentices as experimental subjects just as he was starting to get results from his research. Leicester sessfully escaped after a bloody battle, but theb he left beneath the castle was also destroyed in the fight.


    He had initially thought that all the blood samples he had left there were destroyed. Now, it seemed that they had clearly fallen into the hands of the Sarubo n. Given that case, it was apparent where the female vampire¡¯s blood hade from.


    The Sarubo were pretty ingenious as well. To have sessfully created a female vampire and raised her so excellently, despite only using a portion of his origin blood, marveled and shocked Leicester!


    However, the revtion of the situation made it awkward for both parties.


    Leicester had set up aboratory in another n¡¯s territory and abducted the apprentice adepts of said n. News of this would bring him trouble if heard by the Zhentarim Association. However, with his current status as a Second Grade vampire, the old geezers of Zhentarim would probably only have him paypensation, even if they were to intervene.


    He could still bear the burden of such a ¡¯wrongdoing.¡¯


    Of course, this was only because he was Second Grade. If he were First Grade, it wouldn¡¯t be wrongdoing. It would be a crime!


    Simrly, the opponent¡¯s n had used his origin blood to create a female vampire. That action couldn¡¯t escape the crime of trying to look into the bloodline secrets of the Vik Family. If both parties were to start an argument and bring it to trial, neither side would be able to put the other down. They were both guilty.


    However, given that Leicester still had the female vampire in his grasp, it could be said that he held the overall advantage.


    Both adepts frowned after rifying the cause of the event.


    Greem calcted the chances of Leicester letting go of Mary, while Leicester was trying to figure out the reason Greem wanted to set the female vampire free.


    That female vampire had exceptional potential, and even the chance to advance to Second Grade. However, the potential was only a possibility. This Greem would take the risk of aggravating a Second Grade like himself for that slight chance?


    Greem finally put it out in the open, as if he sensed Leicester¡¯s doubts.


    "Sir Leicester, to be honest with you, that Mary you have in your custody is my lover. I cannot possibly give her up for any benefit you may offer me!"


    Leicester understood the seriousness of the issue once he heard Greem¡¯s confession.


    Much like Greem couldn¡¯t give up on Mary, Leicester also had his reasons not to let Mary go. It seemed that there was no room for any negotiation between the two of them.


    Both of them seemed to sense the other¡¯s determination in their eyes. Their expressions turned more and more solemn, and soon a dense and sinister killing intent started to surface.


    The atmosphere in the hall only hung there for half a second.


    No one knew which of the two was the first to let their killing intent surface, but both Second Grade adepts erupted almost simultaneously!


    The guest hall wasn¡¯t all thatrge.


    Both adepts were only five or six meters away from each other. There was also a sturdy and thick square oak table between them. Yet, in the matter of a single instant, the oak table split into several pieces and shot towards Greem. Meanwhile, Leicester¡¯s phantom-like silhouette closed in on the fire adept.


    Leicester¡¯s hands raced as his sharp nails shrouded in dense, sizzling blood energies pierced into Greem¡¯s body like des.


    The attack had just started when Leicester sensed an overwhelming surge of fire rushing toward him. His instincts for danger caused his face to nch. He didn¡¯t even have time to check the damage done by his attack.


    His nails had prated half an inch into Greem¡¯s body. If he had just one-tenth of a second more to spare, he would have been able to pierce through Greem¡¯s bodypletely. However, that pressing sense of danger made him give up this opportunity. Leicester shed and left Greem¡¯s side.


    The next second, a ferocious storm of fire erupted from Greem¡¯s body, instantly enveloping the guest hall in a sea of mes.


    Szzzzzz!


    Greem¡¯s ck suit immediately split apart when the fearsome streams of me appeared. A fountain of blood also shot out of eight deep wounds on Greem¡¯s body at the same time. The heat vaporized the blood before it could even reach the ground.


    At the same instant, the ze of Destruction appeared in Greem¡¯s left hand. His body stalled for a moment, and an evenrge and more terrifying Ring of Fire shot out of his body and enveloped the entirety of the building.


    The scorching mes and heat enveloped the banquet in an instant. Those ordinary humans who were not protected by any magic were burned to ashes before they could even howl in pain. The members of the Vik Family quickly summoned a dense cloud of blood mist from their bodies to protect themselves as the fled from the Ring of Fire.


    The vampires and blood ves below Viscount level (First Grade) were also burned to ashes before they could escape due to the exhaustion of their blood energy.


    There had been three or four hundred peopleughing and talking in the banquet below. In the blink of an eye, only three or four people were left. These people had barely managed to escape from Rose Manor. The rest had all been turned to ashes in that terrifying sea of fire.


    The three-story building built of brick and wood also copsed from the fire, leaving two tall figures standing at odds against each other in the zing field of fire.

 Chapter 556 Battle Between the Powerful.

    Chapter 556 Battle Between the Powerful.


    [Beep. Wounds detected on surface of body. The wounded area has reached 43%. Rmend immediate treatment.]


    [Beep. Blood energy remnants detected in wounds. Energy neutralization required before treatment can proceed.]


    [Beep. Continuous blood loss from wounds has resulted in a blood loss of 1.72% and energy loss of 2.15%.]


    [Beep. Host¡¯s Ring of Fire has been activated. Domain of Heat has been activated. Burning Domain is forming.]


    [Beep. Host¡¯s energy strength is continuing to increase... abnormal distortions have formed in surrounding forcefield. Calcting distortion rate.]


    A series of notifications from the Chip shed in Greem¡¯s mind. He quickly browsed through most of the statistics, not bothering to act on any of them. At the same time, he patiently waited for the Chip toplete its calction on the degree of distortion in the forcefield around him.


    Any casual strike by Second Grade adepts like themselves could reach energy levels of two to three hundred points. That was a terrifying height that was forever unachievable for First Grade adepts.


    The elementium powers contained within the body were so overly vast that thebination of mental consciousness and magic power constantly distorted the forcefield space around the adept.


    In an environment like this, any sensory information obtained by the naked eye or the Spiritual senses would contain some slight deviation. The degree of this deviation depended on the power of these two adepts. If any adept relied too much on their vision and attacked or moved ording to what they saw, they would be shocked to find their moves never hitting their target.


    Their target would never be where they thought them to be.


    And this was the result of spatial distortions in the forcefield!


    Under ordinary circumstances, such spatial distortions would not be too exaggerated and would not be able to affectbat between high-grade adepts. However, when two equally-matched adepts were engaged in such a battle, any tiny change or variable could be utilized by the opponent to turn the tables.


    Leicester had already used his agility to obtain the first strike before Greem could conjure his powers. This much damage was not severe for a Second Grade fire adept, but losing 1.72% of his blood and 2.15% of his energy right when the battle had just started was not a good sign.


    Greem hovered in midair, his entire form shrouded in elementium mes that had surged out from his body. The wild elementium fires roiled and wrapped around him. Greem¡¯s body turned red, white, and almost transparent. He had wholly transformed into a terrifying me humanoid.


    The minor wound on the surface of his body quickly healed with the help of the fire energies. However, the blood he had lost would take a while to recover.


    Across from Greem, sizeable gray bat wings had extended from Leicester¡¯s back, and fearsome spikes grew at the ends of his wicked bone wings. Leicester hovered above the sea of mes with his wings. He extended a long red tongue, gently licking the boiling blood that remained between his fingers.


    Indeed, as Greem¡¯s fire energy erupted, the blood that had left his body would also be boiling hot. Licking it with the tongue felt like lickingva itself.


    Even though the drops of blood had already reached temperatures of over seven hundred degrees, Leicester still narrowed his eyes and licked the liquid. He even raised his head and let out a blissful yet tortured moan when he ingested the crimson blood.


    [Beep. Detecting abnormal loss of energy from host¡¯s body. Initial estimates of 1.16% energy loss rate.]


    The Chip¡¯s notification that had popped up in Greem¡¯s mind caused him to change color.


    The vampire before him could actually absorb the elementium energy within his body through the blood that had already left his body. It was unimaginable, but it wasn¡¯t all that surprising once he considered the great bloodline talents that the vampires possessed.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Several explosions of fire erupted. A vast amount of fire energy gathered in front of Greem and formed into Fire Shields glowing with numerous fire runes. Solidified mes mixed with shrouds of fire and quickly started spinning around Greem¡¯s body.


    Tworger and more robust Lava Shields were also quickly forming in front of the Fire Shields. With magma as the base, fire as its adhesives, and paired with shing fire runes, the two Lava Shields brimmed withva and burned with mes. They had a sturdy and heavy quality that gave a sense of weight to anyone who looked upon them.


    Theyers of defensive fire spells werepleted, and Greem was well within their protection. It would no longer be easy for Leicester to get close as he had before.


    Even Leicester, for all his pride, felt his scalp buzz when he saw Greem putting up all those personal defenses of his. Any single one of Greem¡¯s shields were nothing if taken individually. Leicester¡¯s sharp fangs could tear them apart with a single swipe.


    However, there were so many of them. If these shields obstructed Leicester for even a moment, the fire adept would have the time to chant his spells and cast them. Leicester might be Second Grade, but he could not endure too many violent blows from a fire adept of the same grade, especially if he were slowed down by a shield.


    It was important to note that elementium adepts had always been known as ss cannons among the multitudes of different adepts. No adept of the same grade could endure their onught if they were allowed to unleash all of their strength without interruption.


    The elementium adepts had powerful attacks and weak defenses!


    Still, that weakness was rtive.


    A fellow like Leicester, who had speed butcked in offensive ability, would have trouble breaking through all of Greem¡¯s shields and getting to him. A body refining adept with high elementium resistance would probably fare much better.


    There was no need for reservations now that things had turned ugly.


    Still floating in midair, Greem turned into a frightening humanoid artillery. One by one, fire spells of terrifying strength and power ravaged towards Leicester like a violent storm. Leicester beat his big wings, using his agile figure to weave between the gaps in the wave of mes, asionally closing in on Greem to rip apart one of his Fire Shields.


    Even though Greem had put in all his effort to locking onto Leicester, the vampire adept¡¯s high agility and flexible figure caused nine out of ten of Greem¡¯s spells to miss. Even the asional spell that made contact with Leicester would have its damage minimized. The vampire adept used some special technique to avoid the core area of the explosions and was only affected by the energy at the edges of the spell.


    However, the me bacsh from the Fire Shields and the burning effect of the Ring of Fire made it impossible for Leicester to attack while remaining unharmed. Every second he spent near Greem meant another second of enduring burning damage.


    Still, the blood mist that protected his body could easily deal with fire damage of this intensity.


    If one were to think of Greem as a ferocious cannon, then Leicester would be a gray bat flying around the barrel of that cannon.


    He logically exploited the gaps between the enemy¡¯s attacks and used all he had to break theyers of Fire Shields that surrounded this enemy. Yet, at the same time, he needed to be extremely careful to avoid being burned by violent mes because he couldn¡¯t dodge in time.


    A Magma Fireball of two hundred and twenty points of power might not be enough to wound him severely.


    However, it wouldn¡¯t be easy to escape the shower of fire that would descend upon him the moment the Magma Fireball stalled him.


    Leicester had initially intended to use his speed to trick Greem into going all out. He would then counterattack once Greem had exhausted most of his energy. As the two of them continued to fight in the skies above Rose Manor, and the manor slowly turned into a sea of fire, Leicester was shocked by his discovery. Greem¡¯s firepower was just as strong as when they started; there were no signs of him faltering.


    It was as if... as if Greem wasn¡¯t concerned about running out of energy!


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    This was an adept that hadpleted both body and Spirit elementiumization!


    He must have formed a corresponding elementium core within his body.


    Ordinary battles of attrition were useless against such elementium adepts who carried a miniaturized energy pool with them. Unless Leicester could find a way to increase the intensity of the fight by another two levels, exhausting the opponent¡¯s elementium energy was naught but a joke.


    While Leicester was worried about Greem, Greem was also deep in thought.


    Leicester could not hit him through theyers of elementium shields he held. Simrly, his powerful fire spells had no way of keeping up with Leicester¡¯s rapid movements.


    Over the course of thirty minutes, Greem¡¯s fire spells had already thoroughly plowed the earth beneath them once. However, the amount of damage that he had applied to the vampire was minuscule. Trying to get the vampire to submit with just this much damage was fantasy.


    Even though Greem possessed over ny-nine percent of the initiative in the all-out fight between the two Second Grade adepts, he didn¡¯t actually have muchbat advantage. He needed tomit all of his efforts to tracking that vampire. Any moment of carelessness could cause him to be the victim of a relentless assault.


    Every time this happened would mean the loss of two or three of his FIre Shields!


    Inparison, the Lava Shields had better defensive powers, but their slow orbiting speed made them less agile than the Fire Shields. The two sluggish Lava Shields were incapable of stopping the vampire¡¯s sudden attacks if all the Fire Shields vanished.


    The two Second Grade adepts continued their stalemate in this manner. The powerful fire spells continued to wreak havoc on the ground below, severely changing the geography.


    The once beautiful, quiet Rose Manor had crumbled into ruins. All the buildings had copsed in the sea of fire. All the nts and flowerbeds had been reduced to ashes by the mes, leaving only ck marks in the earth.


    While the two adepts were fighting, a secret battle had also broken out beneath the manor!

 Chapter 557 Blood Prison Counterstrike

    Chapter 557 Blood Prison Counterstrike


    As a separate asset of the Vik Family, the Rose Manor couldn¡¯tpare to Bloodcastle when it came to functionality and defenses.


    As the two Second Grade adepts recklessly ravaged the manor, all the buildings were utterly destroyed. While the buildings on the surface copsed and vanished in the fire, the more secretive constructions beneath the manor were also unavoidably affected.


    Blood Prison!


    It was one of the mostmon facilities in a vampire family.


    The purpose of its existence was to imprison low-level vampires that hadmitted wrongdoings.


    As vampires themselves, they inevitably knew the ws and strengths of vampires. As such, all the facilities in a blood prison were tailored for use against vampires. At the same time, they were also more bloody and cruel than an ordinary prison!


    The vampires relied on blood as a carrier of their power and required it for energy. Their abilities would be heavily discounted once they had lost more than half of their blood.


    That was why blood prisons were also terrifying torture rooms, apart from their ability to imprison vampires.


    The captured Mary was currently hanging on arge wooden barrel. Eight silver chains the thickness of a thumb had pierced through her shoulder des, corbone, ribs, wrists, and her ankles, keeping her firmly suspended in midair. As magical silver had indescribable destructiveness toward a vampire¡¯s body, the wounds created by the silver chains would not heal on their own.


    The thick and rough chains caused Mary¡¯s wounds to be exceptionally bloody and severe. Fresh blood continued to flow from the holes in her body, dripping into the big wooden bucket below her.


    The wooden bucket wasrge enough to fit three people of Mary¡¯s size. Yet, it seemed like it was almost filling up to the brim as the blood continued to drop.


    The ones in charge of watching over Mary in the blood prison were two Vampire Barons.


    As lower vampires, they were enjoying the experience of seeing a higher ss Viscountess being tortured before their eyes. They weren¡¯t shy to express their joy with words and actions either.


    Still, Mary was a spoil of war that the Second Grade Count had personally put in the prison. As such, neither of them dared take so much as a sip from the blood in the bucket, even though it was almost about to spill. Mary had on her crimson armor, red boots, and her head full of long crimson hair. Even as the silver chains tortured her into a ghastly state, her impressive figure and breathtaking beauty still stunned any who looked upon her.


    She was an offshoot vampire that threatened the Count; she could not avoid the fate of extermination, regardless of how talented she might be. Leaving the blood prison alive was nigh impossible now that she had fallen into the hands of Lord Leicester.


    That was why these two pseudo-adept level vampire barons regrly walked about Mary, cursing and swearing at her with the most obscene of vulgarities, while boldly gazing upon her body with their lustful eyes.


    Their greatest pleasure was pulling upon those silver chains and causing them to tug on Mary¡¯s flesh, inflicting further damage upon her and hastening the flow of blood.


    Mary gritted her teeth and remained silent regardless of how they tortured her.


    She had even red at them with her crimson eyes for the first two days. However, over the past few days, the blood in her body had almost entirely dried up. Her body had weakened to the point where it was hard even to open her eyes.


    Yet today, severalrge tremors had spread into the prison from the manor above.


    The entire Rose Manor seemed to have been thrown into a grinder. The trembling houses copsed, and the earth itself split apart. The underground blood prison was necessarily affected by this.


    Several magical halos lit up on the augite walls filled with green moss and blood stains. These halos formed into a tight defensive forcefield and repelled the spells descending from above.


    If it weren¡¯t for the magical protections of the blood prison, the two vampire barons hiding within it would have already been turned to ash by Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire.


    The two vampires keeping guard over Mary didn¡¯t know what was happening. They hastily took out theirmunications wand to attempt to contact theirpanions on the outside. Unfortunately, they got no response after multiple tries with different individuals. Even Viscount Entia, who managed the entire Rose Manor, couldn¡¯t be reached.


    Of course, they didn¡¯t even dare consider the idea of opening the defenses of the blood prison to go out and look.


    If the mysterious force could so severely damage even an advanced magical facility like the blood prison, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what had happened to the buildings outside.


    For the sake of their own lives, it was best to hide in here until the coast was clear.


    While the two vampire barons panicked, Mary opened her crimson eyes. A murderous and sinister killing intent vaguely shone through her weak gaze.


    While most of the tremors from themotion above had been absorbed and repelled by the blood prison, the energy that had managed to get through was not a small amount of force either. At the very least, it was sufficient to loosen the wall around the chains that suspended her in the air.


    Mary was extremely weak now. Her strength was inferior to a five-year-old toddler. However, an intense feeling from the bottom of her heart drove her actions. It might be her only chance of escaping!


    The loosening of the silver chains allowed her body, which had been spread out, some degree of movement.


    Mary endured the intense pain from the silver chains chafing her flesh and dragged her left hand toward herself. She opened her mouth and used her sharp teeth to bite off half of her wrist. That allowed her to free her left hand from the silver chains.


    She then turned to bite her right hand. Once both hands had been freed, she only needed to rest for a while and her badly damaged hands, hanging by a thread of a skin and some tendons, would return to normal.


    The vampire¡¯s powerful regenerative powers were on full disy now that the silver chains no longer bound her hands and she was no longer losing blood.


    Then, Mary used both her hands to break her shoulder des, break her corbone, and slowly extract the silver chains from within her body.


    This process was undoubtedly no less painful than the cruelest and most bloody of tortures in the world. Mary gritted her teeth and pulled through it without a single sound.


    Once she had pulled thest silver chain out of her body, Mary¡¯s disrupted and severed flow of blood energy immediately began to circte once more. The energy flowed through her entire body; thefortable and pleasing feeling caused her to moan slightly in bliss.


    The two vampire barons turned their heads upon hearing this sound, only to see a free female vampire that had broken free from the bounds of her silver chains.


    "Quick, get at her... she¡¯s just broken free. She hasn¡¯t recovered any of her strength yet; we still have a chance..." The more veteran of the two vampires couldn¡¯t help but exim.


    Two agile figures immediately lunged at Mary.


    Mary raised her pretty face andughed sinisterly. Her whole body suddenly dropped as she plunged herself into the bucket of blood beneath.


    Ripples spread through the bucket as Mary instantly submerged herself beneath the blood.


    The next second, an overwhelming surge of blood energy erupted in the blood prison!


    The two vampires were caught mid-lunge, and blood sshed fully across their entire bodies.


    If this had been any normal circumstance in the past, blood that contained the victim¡¯s life force would be a sacred healing item that would be most beneficial to the adepts. Today, the blood seemed to have taken on a life of its own. Not only were the vampires incapable of absorbing the blood, but the blood was also even destroying their bodies. There was a stinging pain from where they had been sshed.


    The two low-grade vampires stopped in their tracks. They lowered their heads to look at their bodies and were shocked to find the blood to be alive.


    The blood on them seemed to have a mind of its own. It gathered into clusters of blood and then started transforming,shing out with fine thorns and piercing their skin.


    The clusters of blood were like tiny blood monsters, continually creating new wounds on the vampire barons. These clusters of blood could even dig into their skin and start ravaging the insides of their bodies, destroying everything that it came across.


    The bucket of blood exploded with a resounding boom while the two vampire barons howled in agony.


    A tall, slender figure withrge wings behind her back rose from the blood mist in the room. She reared her head and let out a battle cry.


    Once Mary had let out all the umted rage with that unrestrained shout, she folded her wings, and the mist of blood in the blood prison immediately went back into her body like birds returning to their nest.


    Not only had all the blood in the bucket been absorbed back into her body, but the blood of the two vampire barons poured out of their bodies like a copsed dam and were absorbed by Mary.


    Soon, the two utterly withered corpses fell to the ground. Their skin was wrinkled, like tree bark from an ancient tree; not one bit of moisture remained in them. Their life force had also flowed into Mary¡¯s body as theirst drop of blood was taken from them.


    Having dealt with these two small fry, Mary extended her wings. Her body turned into aet shrouded in a mist of blood and sted through the ceiling above the prison. She beat her wings and slowly took to the skies amidst the sea of fire around her.


    Her sudden appearance instantly attracted the attention of the two battling Second Grades.


    Vampire Adept Count Leicester and Fire Adept Greem betrayed utterly different expressions upon seeing Mary.


    Shock and surprise!


    Count Leicester¡¯s expression turned quickly. His silhouette shed, and he lunged towards Mary. He shouted as he charged at the female vampire.


    "Come here!"


    A crimson rune appeared on Leicester¡¯s forehead, and Mary felt her consciousness go dim. Her body started flying toward the vampire against her will.


    However, at that second, a massive halo of fire broke out between Mary and Leicester.


    Greem perfectly timed his Fire Teleportation and stopped Mary while obstructing Leicester with his own body.


    Mary had to grit her teeth and use all her strength to restrain herself from attacking Greem.


    An irresistible strength within the vampire bloodline that coursed through her body was calling toward her, seducing her. It Wanted her to submit beneath the feet of the great Master Leicester and use all of her body and mind to serve her master.


    However, this bloodline instinct came into severe conflict with her own will. She let out a moan and copsed limply into Greem¡¯s embrace.


    Mary might have recovered most of her powers from absorbing her blood, but there were still traces of torture left on her body.


    Greem scanned with his Spirit and instantly got aprehensive idea of her condition. Sympathy and pain swelled inside him.


    "Well done. Very well done," Greem stared at Leicester, his eyes cold and chilling, "I will leave things here for today. We can discuss the rest at ater date."


    Leicester stepped forward in midair and replied with the same chilling tone, "Do you think you can escape punishment because you saved her? Hmph! Don¡¯t look down upon the power of the Vik Family. Next time, it might be you begging me to forgive the crimes you havemitted today."


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to exchange another word. He stepped back and vanished with Mary in a zing pir of fire.

 Chapter 558 Feast of Dragon Blood

    Chapter 558 Feast of Dragon Blood


    Fire Throne.


    Greem and Mary¡¯s return did not attract anyone¡¯s attention.


    In fact, most adepts of the tower didn¡¯t even know when they had left. Some of the people with more limited information even stubbornly believed that Greem had locked himself up in his room and was quietly settling down after the massive boost in Spirit from his advancement!


    How could they ever suspect what Greem had done? Completing a nar invasion and then going on to battle with a vampire adept of the same grade.


    Of course, the ramifications and impacts of this battle had yet to fade.


    The consequences of that destructive battle between the two Second Grade adepts had only just started rippling outward. The severe oues resulting from their actions would only get increasingly worse over the next few months.


    In the end, Rose Manor was still the personal property of the Vik Family. The ce had now been razed to the ground, and the number of dead nobles and ves added up to over four or five hundred people. Adepts might not care for the lives of their worldly proxies, but it was a different matter when the n¡¯s reputation and honor were involved.


    Things would not be peaceful for Greem regardless of whether the Vik Family decided to exact their revenge personally or bring the matter to the Zhentarim Association. It was very likely that Greem was going to be subjected to criticism and pressure from various factions. Greem¡¯s newly formed faction was very likely to fracture and copse if he didn¡¯t properly deal with the matter. He also might not be able to find a ce within the Zhentarim area any longer.


    Of course, how this issue would unfold still depended on the attitude of the Sarubo n.


    If the Sarubo n was willing to step forth and take on the matter, then the Vik Family couldn¡¯t go too far out of respect for the Sixth Grade Great Adept. When that happened, Greem would be able to safely tide over this crisis, be it by paying magical crystals or resources aspensation.


    However, there was no possibility of the Sarubo n standing up for him with their current rtionship. Greem even had to be cautious of the n using this incident as an opportunity to strip him of his influence.


    As such, the first thing on Greem¡¯s mind upon returning to Fire Throne with Mary was how to strengthen his faction.


    ............


    The third level of Fire Throne.


    The magical facilities here wereplete after the many years of running this tower.


    The sealing room, book storage, golem factory, alchemyb, and the scroll crafting chamber; every facility that an adept might need was present here.


    These magical facilities had initially been open to the public. Some of them were being managed and used by the stationed and staying adepts of the tower. However, for the past fifteen days the majordomo of Fire Throne, Adept Gargamel, had suddenly retracted all management rights over the sealing room. He had also rejected all requests from non-core adepts to use the room.


    Fortunately, there were very few fields that required the use of the sealing room. It was rare to see an adept use the sealing room even once in a decade. This small inconvenience didn¡¯t bring too much trouble for the staying adepts.


    However, some adepts could still guess the reason behind the hasty retraction of the sealing room management rights. It was very likely that the authorities of Fire Throne were trying to seal and imprison some sensitive or powerful otherworldly creature. Otherwise, they wouldn¡¯t have behaved with such a sense of urgency.


    The higher-ups of Fire Throne behaved nonchntly in the face of such rumors and gossip, choosing to ignore the opinions of the public.


    No more than six core adepts knew what sort of otherworldly creature had been imprisoned in the sealing room on the third level of Fire Throne. Moreover, two of them were still in the Goblin ne, while another two were far away in the Northern Lands. The only ones within Fire Throne who knew the truth were Greem and Gargamel.


    The information had even been kept exclusive from Eva. Gargamel didn¡¯t dare to inform her without Greem¡¯s permission.


    The first ce Greem visited upon returning from Rose Manor with Mary was the sealing room on the third level of the tower.


    Greem passed through multipleyers of strict magical doors and defenses. He even had to use his authority as the owner of the tower to fully open the doors to the sealing room. He then brought Mary with him and entered this mysterious ce.


    The sealing room was an extremely mysterious ce. However, its true nature was no more than an ordinary room with walls of graphite lines etched with numerous defensive runes and protected by many mysterious barriers.


    There were many differentyers of seals in the sealing room. The price varied depending on the level of the seals.


    The unique design of magical geometry allowed the sealing room to obstruct the scrying of any divination spells effectively. Any individual that tried to scry on this ce through magic or magical items would have to possess the authority of the tower owner. Otherwise, they would first have to deal with the countless anti-scrying arrays in here.


    Moreover, the inside of the sealing room was iid withplete sealing and binding arrays. The arrays could draw upon the strength of the tower to seal fearsome magical creatures or powerful otherworldly lifeforms that couldn¡¯t yet be dealt with.


    Thus, the sealing room became the prison that Grem temporarily used to lock up Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms and Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha.


    The first thing Greem and Mary saw when they stepped into this mysterious sealing room was two beams of lights. They were of different colors, and one was big while the other was small. A seventeen-meter long thunder dragon with fine blue scales was sealed within therger pir of light. Several nearly tangible runic chains extended out of the air and wrapped around the body of the dragon,yer afteryer.


    Thepounded suppression effect of the narws and runic chains made it virtually impossible for this Third Grade thunder dragon to make any movement at all. He could only close his eyes and rest, using his powerful will to resist the narws on this ne.


    A glowing magical dagger was embedded right in between his chest and stomach. The thick dragon blood containing densews of electricity flowed down the de, slowly dripping into a y jar beneath the dragon.


    Several of such y jars were stacked outside the pir of light, measuring up to two meters tall in total. About seven or eight of them had been filled with dragon blood and had been sealed.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha stood up straight at the other end of the sealing room, in the smaller pir of light. He could hardly move either, with all the runic chains wrapped around his body. Zacha silently looked at Greem with aplicated expression.


    Greem would never hand over his authority of entry to such an important ce to anyone. Not even Majordomo Gargamel of Fire Throne could freely enter and exit this ce. To ensure the thunder dragon was taken care of, Greem had transferred the construction support golem from hisboratory here. The golem was in charge of collecting the dragon¡¯s blood.


    Mary¡¯s crimson eyes immediately locked onto Arm¡¯s body, even without Greem¡¯s introduction. No, more urately, theytched onto the flowing dragon blood umting beneath the thunder dragon.


    "Go, feast to your heart¡¯s content! I¡¯m sure this dragon blood feast will be more than enough to make up for the exhaustion of thest couple of days."


    Mary instantly transformed into a hungry ghost that had been starving for a thousand years upon obtaining Greem¡¯s permission. She leaped into the pir of light and simply crouch on the wound of the thunder dragon, gulping down the thick dragon blood directly flowing from the source.


    Mary¡¯s brash action incited the anger of Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms. However, many profound and strange runes instantly surfaced on those runic chains the moment he started mobilizing the powers of electricity within himself. The forces of electricity were immediately drained from his body, like a bottle of wine with a cracked bottom.


    The runic chains guided all the electrical power into an unknown and mysterious space!


    The Third Grade thunder dragon had wanted to let out a menacing roar. However, the emptying of his electricity powers sapped the energy out of his limbs, forcing him to his knees once more and reducing him to being incapable of any further resistance.


    Still, though he was not able to resist directly, he still had some small, subtle tricks he could pull.


    The viscous purple dragon blood exploded in Mary¡¯s stomach the moment she devoured the liquid. She didn¡¯t have time to digest the powerful life force contained within.


    The electrical powers within the dragon blood might have left his body, but they still maintained a vague connection with the thunder dragon. The electric powers within the blood suddenly erupted under the orders of the thunder dragon. They instantly blew Mary¡¯s internal organs into bits.


    Many of her organs instantly turned into an unrecognizable mess of blood and flesh.


    These would have been terrifying and lethal wounds on any other person. However, they were only mediocre wounds for vampires.


    As Mary¡¯s body absorbed the powerful life force of the dragon blood, her shattered organs started to regenerate under the effect of some strangews. As the overbearing life force surged into her body, these newly grown organs became even stronger and more robust than before.


    However, not long after, these organs were once again ravaged by the powers of electricity that had burst forth once more. This time, only a portion of the organs were destroyed. Organs at the edges of the explosion were spared.


    Thus, shes of lightning would asionally ring within Mary¡¯s body as she continued to devour the dragon blood. Each explosion would cause tremendous damage to her. However, Mary had already made up her mind to feast. She wouldn¡¯t budge at all. She gritted her teeth and continued to drink the blood from the thunder dragon¡¯s wounds with no regard for her life.


    The organs within her body were shattered upon regenerating, before regenerating again and being shattered again.


    It was an endless loop. The powers of electricity within the dragon blood that Mary couldn¡¯t endure continued to be released and she used this process of constant destruction and regeneration to slowly transform the life force within the dragon blood into her own blood energy.


    She had experienced a cruel torture like never before in Rose Manor. She might have reabsorbed most of her origin blood, but she had still lost a lot of her strength. Now that she had gotten her hands on potent Third Grade thunder dragon blood, Mary was like a mouse that had fallen into arder. The only she could do was eat and eat and eat.


    Eating until her stomach was round, eating until the bloodline powers within her body were brimming full, eating until the blood energy within her was close to blowing her body up. It was only then that Mary reluctantly loosened her bite and stopped her reckless meal.


    An overwhelming sense of exhaustion washed over Mary before she knew it. Mary tilted her head and fell into a deep sleep before she could even speak another word.

 Chapter 559 Negotiations

    Chapter 559 Negotiations


    The drained Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms could no longer keep hisposure upon seeing Greem picking up Mary and turning to leave.


    "Human Adept, what is it that you want?" Arms roared lethargically.


    This wicked human adept had transported him to a higher ne using a special goblin teleportation device after capturing him. Even though the Third Grade thunder dragon had never been in this ne before, his powerful sense of smell and for nes allowed him to smell the reeking stench of the adepts through the narws of the world.


    Chaotic, evil, strange and powerful.


    Though the adepts preferred to be known for their knowledge, their so-called culture was little more than a joke before the dragons that easily lived up to thousands of years.


    The legacy knowledge that the dragons obtained from their bloodline was some of the most advanced knowledge in the entire multiverse. Ordinary nar lifeforms wouldn¡¯t even have the chance toe into contact with or learn such knowledge!


    Ever since he became imprisoned in this lowly and narrow space, Thunder Dragon Arms had thought countless times about how to respond to the human adept¡¯s interrogation and torture. His rational being had even considered all the appropriate strategies to use in all the various situations.


    Yet, what caught him by surprise was the stark indifference he was being treated with. The human adept only showed up once when sealing him and then quietly left him with that wicked elementium golem that kept draining him of his blood.


    There was no repetitive attempt to convince him, or wicked and brutal pressuring. The human adept seemed to be treating him like a powerful resource site, not doing anything else apart from draining his blood.


    That undoubtedly made the Third Grade thunder dragon suspicious!


    The dragons were so powerful that human adepts would never be willing to simply dissect them upon capturing them. They would only get some ¡¯insignificant¡¯ dragon resources in doing so: dragon blood, dragon tendons, dragon meat, dragon bones, dragon crystals. These things were valuable, but how could theypare to a living Third Grade dragon?


    That was why Arms was confident that the adept was only taking up this attitude to break down his psychological defenses. Once he sumbed to the torture, the adept would take the opportunity to put forth some intolerable conditions.


    He would ask for things such as panionship contracts,¡¯ dragon secrets, dragon knowledge...


    As a pureblooded dragon and the pride of the thunder dragons, Arms would never ept any such conditions!


    Not even in the face of death!


    However, having the enemy unconditionally let him go; the difficulty of those negotiations was no less than if he had been presented with those conditions.


    After much thought, the thunder dragon, who fancied himself collected and calm, finally opened his mouth when he saw Greem turning to leave.


    Greem stopped upon hearing the thunder dragon speak.


    "You can¡¯t give me what I want!"


    "How do you know that before telling me what it is."


    "I want you." Greem looked at Arms and gave a direct reply.


    "Do not delude yourself into thinking that one of the great thunder dragon bloodline would bow his head to a human weaker than himself. This remains the same, even if you are an adept." The thunder dragon replied with a firm tone.


    "Then what is there to talk about?" Greem twitched his mouth coldly before turning to leave again.


    "Wait..." Thunder Dragon Arms couldn¡¯t help but shout.


    In his hurry, he identally exerted force. A series of magic runes immediately lit up on the runic chains, and Arms instantly felt the pain of searing flesh.


    Thunder Dragon Arms hissed in agony a couple of times, but he didn¡¯t dare move his body. It was only when the runes on the chains had been extinguished that he slowly climbed out of the abyss of pain.


    "I......might not be able......to submit to you, but......I can have......my servant......take my ce." It seemed the bacsh from the magic earlier had caused pretty severe damage. Arms was exhausted even when speaking.


    Greem raised an eyebrow when he heard this. He turned his head and took a look at Dragonborn Zacha, contained within the other pir.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha had been in a terrible state when he brought into the sealing room.


    The multiple weeks of starvation had turned him into rations for his thunder dragon master. Almost all of the flesh on the lower half of his body had been devoured, and even the upper half of his body had been badly mutted.


    Even Greem hadn¡¯t been sure he could save the Dragonborn when he brought him back. After all, such wounds were far too unimaginable terrifying!


    In all honesty, the Dragonborn truly did possess one half of a dragon¡¯s bloodline. Despite the severe wounds, Gargamel and his shoddy potion master¡¯s treatment had managed to save the dragonborn. Zacha had almost fully recovered.


    Greem had thought that Zacha would be filled with burning hatred for Arms and would be easily convinced to his cause.


    But who knew? This Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha was a blockhead. It didn¡¯t matter how much Greem and Gargamel tried to incite and stir his emotions, he would never speak. Zacha still seemed to remain obedient toward Thunder Dragon Arms.


    At this point, Greem had no choice but to admit the binding power that bloodline had over most lifeforms. It was beyond his imagination!


    Greem had initially given up on Zacha and all thoughts of turning the dragonborn into his subordinate. Yet today, Arms¡¯ words had caused a sliver of hope to rise once again.


    Though he was overjoyed, Greem kept a tight hold on his cold expression. He put on a sinister smile of disdain instead.


    "You are a Third Grade dragon. Right now, you are trying to use a Second Grade dragonborn as a recement for yourself. Do you take adepts for brainless idiots?" Greem¡¯s tone even started to turn severe at the end of his sentence.


    "Of course not, of course not." A great dragon lord, reduced to being scolded and reprimanded by a tiny human adept. If this were in the past, Thunder Dragon Arms would have merely let out a dragon¡¯s breath and sted the opponent into oblivion. However, he could only cautiously and gently exin himself now.


    "I will use wealth satisfactory to you to exchange for my freedom!"


    "A dragon¡¯s wealth?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but brood silently upon hearing this.


    The dragons loved hoarding wealth. That was something known universally throughout the multiverse.


    Every dragon would live together with their parents when they were still a whelp. However, they would be chased away by their parents the moment they came of age and forced to lead an independent life. The most direct cause for this wasn¡¯t their parent¡¯s hope for them to grow into independence, but because their parents would fear them lusting for the wealth they had worked so hard for.


    That was why every dragon would build their own dragon¡¯s den and go out robbing the wealth of other intelligent lifeforms upon adolescence. Human cities, elven tree fortresses, dwarven castles, and even powerful magical creatures would be looted by the dragons as long as they were weaker than them.


    Gold, jewels, rare ores, legendary weapons, magical gemstones, items containing powerful elementium energy; all of these were targets that the dragons loved to collect and rob for their possession.


    When the wealth of a dragon reached their psychological bottom line, they would be increasinglyzy and cautious. They would hide in their dens, crouching atop their mountainous pile of treasures, snoring as they slept.


    Dragons during this period of their life were the most reluctant to leave their dens, as well as the most powerful.


    That was why Greem¡¯s heart throbbed intensely for a moment when he heard Arms¡¯ suggestion. He then looked at the thunder dragon with suspicious eyes.


    "Arms, ording to my knowledge, you seem to be a juvenile dragon. Moreover, this invasion into the Goblin ne seems to be your first attempt at robbing away from your den. Do you have any wealth in your den?"


    Thunder Dragon Arms¡¯ face fell apart when he heard this.


    He hadn¡¯t expected this human adept to have gathered suchprehensive information about him. He looked so young. It was going to be difficult to trick the opponent now!


    "I... have... some wealth in my den." It was the first time he was lying to a lower lifeform. Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms felt as if he had dragged his name through the mud.


    "And that wealth is enough to buy the freedom of a Third Grade dragon?" Greem pursued the matter.


    "Enough...enough... it¡¯s definitely not enough. But... as long as you let me go, I will definitely go borrow some from my tribemates. It will be enough wealth to buy my freedom." For some reason, Arms was stuttering when he said this. There was none of his usual arrogance and self-importance.


    "I have never heard of dragons lending their wealth to tribemates. Not even dragon partners would do so, would they?!" Greem was no longer suspecting. Instead, he red at Arms with hostile eyes.


    For the first time in his life, Thunder Dragon Arms cursed the vast knowledge of the adepts.


    However, what he hated, even more, were those dragon bastards that went about spreading the secrets of the dragons!


    Even the prideful Thunder Dragon Arms could no longer stay calm before the pressing eyes of the adept.


    "I can help you rob... help you borrow..." The thunder dragon¡¯s voice finally relented.


    "You mean you are finally willing to work for me?" Greem felt a slight joy at this.


    "Impossible!" Who knew? The relenting thunder dragon suddenly turned stubborn when it came back to this question, "ording to the traditions of us dragons, pure-blooded dragons are not allowed to be thepanions, servants, or mounts of other races. Anyone who goes against this tradition will be spit upon by all dragons and lose the blessing of the Dragon God!"


    "You mean... you can serve me, but you can¡¯t sign any servitude or very contracts?" Greem mulled over Arms¡¯ words and asked probingly.


    This time, the thunder dragon didn¡¯t refute him. He didn¡¯t affirm the question either. Instead, he looked at Greem with aplicated expression and chose to remain silent.


    Greem vaguely understood something.


    The faith and soul of the dragons would always belong to the great and holy Dragon God.


    That was a line that was never to be crossed!


    As long as this red line wasn¡¯t stepped upon, Thunder Dragon Arms was more than willing to make some concessions for his own life!


    Greem was d that he now understood the cards that Arms held in his hand.

 Chapter 560 A Powerful Enemy Descends

    Chapter 560 A Powerful Enemy Descends


    The sun was shining high up in the sky.


    The formerly peaceful market around Fire Cave suddenly turned loud and lively.


    A group of adventurers returning from their hunt in the ck Forest had fortunately brought back with them five Featherwing Serpent eggs. A riotous auction broke out in the market and the camp.


    Four or five adventurers with bloodstains still on their faces waited happily by the side of the auction tform. Every bid from the crowd around them caused them to cheer softly. The few merchant representatives from various ces across Zhentarim were red in the face with all the arguments and hollering. They continued to wave the bidding cards in their hands even as they tugged at their cors to vent the heat.


    The host sent by Fire Throne was an apprentice adept. He might only be an advanced apprentice, but he had rich life experience that surpassed his physical age. However, today¡¯s atmosphere was too intense. Even the apprentice adept couldn¡¯t help but be affected by the auction.


    Just as he was about to shout andnd the gavel for the final time, a shocking scene unfolded before his eyes.


    A dark cloud of human forms pressed toward Fire Cave from the distant horizon.


    They were still far out at the horizon a moment ago, but the next second they had all appeared above the skies of the market.


    All the people inside the market and the camp quickly hurried into their tents or wooden huts, silently assessing these uninvited guests from the side. Their faces turned when they saw the appearances and clothes of the neers. Anxiety filled their hearts.


    The Vik Family!


    These were all high-grade vampire adepts of the Vik Family!


    There were veteran adventurers in the camp who had traveled far and wide. They quickly recognized the neers with a single nce.


    In all honesty, it wasn¡¯t hard to recognize these people, with their noble clothes and giant bat wings on their back. There were only so many vampire families after all.


    Moreover, the vampire in the lead had a long and sharp face, a tall nose, thin lips, and a pair of strange silver eyes that shone like stars. He wore fitted pants, a red shirt, and a ck high-cor coat. A ck red-lined silk cape billowed behind his back. He was a person who left an impression.


    The family head of the Viks, Third Grade Vampire Adept Haines Vik.


    Someone quickly recognized this famous and powerful Third Grade vampire. They gasped in surprise and hurriedly pressed their hands against their mouth before sneaking out of the camp.


    A total of thirteen vampires had arrived. There was one Third Grade vampire amongst them, and that was the current family head of the Viks, Haines Vik. There were two Second Grade vampires, Leicester, who had just advanced, and the more veteran vampire Toril. The other vampires were also core members of the Vik Family and publicly known as First Grade adepts.


    A Second Grade adept in ck robes walked along with them. It looked like Adept F¨¹gen of the Sarubo n.


    This domineering descent of intimidating vampires upon Fire Throne didn¡¯t seem like they were here as guests. The smart adventurers who had gathered around the market and camp started to slowly back off, exposing the small auction tform and host within the crowd.


    "You are from the tower below?" The cold Haines narrowed his eyes and stared at this apprentice adept with his strange silver eyes.


    "S-...sir, greetings to you. I am... Wa..."


    Skra! A strange red sh of light.


    Haines made a grabbing motion with his right hand while hovering in the air. Five deep w marks instantly appeared on the apprentice¡¯s face.


    "I have no interest in your name. I asked you whether you are from the tower below? One more useless word out of your mouth and I will crush you to death." A wicked expression surfaced on Haines sharp face.


    The apprentice adept sped his face and screamed, but quickly stopped himself when he heard Haines¡¯ threat. He trembled as he nodded and said: "Yes... I am."


    A satisfied smile appeared on Haines¡¯ face.


    "You have five minutes to go inform Greem of our arrival. Tell him to hand over that bitch ande out to kowtow before us. Otherwise, I will wash his tower with blood today!"


    The apprentice adept was shocked by the loud roaring of the Third Grade vampire. Hepletely forgot the pain on his face. He opened his eyes wide, unable to believe what he had just heard.


    "You¡¯ve been poisoned by my blood poison through the wound on your face. You only have five minutes left to live. Better hurry up, or else, kehkehkeh..."


    It was only upon the vampire¡¯s reminder that the apprentice sensed the abnormality of the wound.


    Five minutes!


    Passing through Fire Cave to reach Magma Hall, and then entering Fire Throne? Five minutes? How was that enough? However, the apprentice adept couldn¡¯t think about this any longer. His life was at stake. He activated the Hasten spell in his pinky finger ring and desperately poured antidotes into his mouth.


    In the blink of an eye, he had passed through the market and dove into Fire Cave.


    "He can¡¯t possibly live until he reaches the tower!" Adept F¨¹gen coldlymented.


    The calmness and coldness in his tone made it impossible for anyone to realize that he was talking about a life at stake.


    "A small fry like that isn¡¯t qualified to be a messenger. He might have lived for five minutes if he wasn¡¯t running so fast, but now, he should turn into a pool of blood within two minutes." Hainesughed sinisterly.


    "There seems to be movement under the ground!" Leicester, who had been folding his hands and standing respectfully behind Haines, couldn¡¯t help but give a reminder.


    The cluster of elementium fire two hundred meters under the ground had started roiling ever since they arrived. It seemed like Fire Throne had sensed their aura and was drawing upon the energy of the elementium pool to increase the defenses of the tower.


    The people in the camp who had still been observing the situation scattered upon seeing that the adepts were here for trouble. They quickly escaped into the woods.


    The vampires had no interest in ughtering these ordinary mortals that lived by the tower either. Instead, it was Vik Family head, Haines, who couldn¡¯t help but be intrigued when he saw the five adventurers trying to leave with their Featherwing Serpent eggs.


    The eggs being held in their hands magically flew into the sky, as if they had grown wings, and fell into Haines¡¯ hands.


    "Eggs of Featherwing Serpents?"


    Haines lifted the eggs and sniffed them. He then casually cracked one of the eggs and sucked all the egg white into his mouth.


    "The energy aura isn¡¯t too dense, but it tastes fairly fresh. Mm, take this magical crystal and leave. I¡¯ll be keeping these eggs."


    The next second, a single shiny magical crystal fell from the sky andnded before the five adventurers.


    Five eggsid by a First Grade Featherwing Serpent was only worth one magical crystal?


    The muscr warrior of the group turned red in frustration. He wanted to step forward to argue, but his teammate quickly dragged him away, picking up the magical crystal as they left and never looked back.


    This temporary camp and market that could fit four to five hundred people became a barrennd within a matter of moments.


    The thirteen vampires beat their wings and slowlynded on the ground. Haines, on the other hand,nded atop a crimson carpet that the other vampires hadid on the ground. A ck chair then appeared behind him, and Haines elegantly sat down.


    A ss filled with red wine was ced into his right hand the moment he opened it.


    Haines elegantly crossed one leg over the other and brought the wine ss before him. He sniffed the fragrance from the crimson liquid and narrowed his eyes, silently waiting for the arrival of the enemy.


    No more than a Second Grade adept. He couldn¡¯t possibly be a worthy opponent.


    The speed of a Third Grade vampire when flying at their fastest was not something that an ordinary mortal could even imagine. Killing that Second Grade fire adept wouldn¡¯t take more than three seconds. In fact, Haines wondered if the fire adept would see his movements before he died.


    Perhaps this would cause the adept to die too quickly, and there would be no pain!


    Mm. Then he would just slowly crush him with the slowest of movements, allowing him to experience how death descended upon him fully.


    A door of fire slowly opened in a space in front of Fire Cave while the vampires were patiently waiting.


    Two adepts of entirely different stature walked out from the door.


    "Greem!"


    Leicester immediately recognized the adept and couldn¡¯t help but call out his name in resentment. However, he didn¡¯t dare make any movements without the orders of the family head. He could only stare at Greem with his crimson eyes.


    The ones that had arrived were naturally the two people in charge of Fire Throne¨C Greem and Gargamel.


    Gargamel raised his wrinkled old face once the door of fire had dispersed and carefully assessed the group of individuals in front of him. Even though Gargamel had already known the identities and purpose of the enemy before he came out, he still felt his heart tremble when faced with such a powerful group of individuals.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the mental protection that Fire Throne remotely cast on him, Gargamel might have started trembling from the unsuppressible fear.


    On the other hand, Second Grade Greem was faring much better.


    Ayer of light me-red light radiated from Greem¡¯s body due to the protection of Fire Throne. While he was within five kilometers of Fire Throne, any enemy that wanted to attack him would first have to break this me barrier.


    That was Greem¡¯s special privilege as the owner of the adept¡¯s tower!


    Greem betrayed no fear when faced with these powerful uninvited vampires. Instead, he raised his head and greeted the old face in the sky.


    "Long time no see, Adept F¨¹gen! Why don¡¯t youe in for a seat, now that you havee to my tower?"

 Chapter 561 The Ship Has Yet to Sink, But the Rats Have Already Fled

    Chapter 561 The Ship Has Yet to Sink, But the Rats Have Already Fled


    Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s expression turned awkward yet solemn when faced with Greem¡¯s friendly invitation.


    After a moment of hesitation, F¨¹gen finally spoke.


    "Adept Greem, given the fact that you have yet to sign a new contract of service with the n after you advanced to Second Grade, I am here to give you special notice. You and your subordinates no longer belong to our Sarubo n!"


    Adept F¨¹gen had used some sort of magic in hisst sentence. It wasn¡¯t just the adepts present who could hear him speak. Even the adventurers and mercenaries who had fled to the woods and the apprentices and adepts within the tower could clearly hear his words.


    For a moment, numerous adepts and apprentices within Fire Throne gasped and drew in breaths of cold air.


    Amotion started to break out.


    Arge group of vampires came to seek trouble, and the Sarubo n was kicking Greem out of their door. This time, a disaster had fallen upon Fire Throne! Could they, as members of Fire Throne, survive this cmity?


    No one wouldpromise when it came to the matter of their own lives.


    Greem could sense Fire Throne turning into a bubbling volcano. All sorts of angered and pessimistic emotions erupted and were directed at him, the owner of the tower.


    Of course, the greatest bacsh came from the staying adepts.


    They were not core adepts of Fire Throne in the first ce. They had only chosen to stay here as staying adepts for the welfare benefits they could get here. Naturally, they were the ones with the most unstable emotions when faced with the cmity descending upon the tower.


    There was no way they would agree to fight with the Vik vampires for the sake of Fire Throne.


    Greem immediately received countless resignation requests from inside the tower through the control crystal. There were adepts, as well as apprentices, potions masters, herbalists, tamers, skinners, and tanners.


    Some of the more impatient fellows didn¡¯t even wait for Greem¡¯s reply and quickly left after packing their belongings.


    A short momentter, a horde of people swarmed out of Fire Cave. They bowed before Greem, Gargamel, and all the other vampires, shouting ¡¯I am not a member of the tower,¡¯ before scattering and taking to the woods.


    Gargamel saw plenty of familiar faces in the crowd.


    These staying adepts had never stopped fawning before him, the deputy owner of the tower, all for the sake of resources and benefits. Yet now, when Fire Throne faced a crisis, they were the fastest to run.


    Gargamel paid particr attention to the staying adepts, but Greem¡¯s focus was on a strange figure mixed amongst the crowd.


    That person didn¡¯t run into the woods nearby like the rest after exiting Fire Cave. Instead, he took to the skies and slowly flew to F¨¹gen¡¯s side.


    He might have been cloaked in ck robes and had his hood pulled down, but Greem could still recognize him by his familiar soul flux.


    Am!


    A stationed adept of Fire Throne.


    One of Greem¡¯s oldest disciples.


    His behavior right now indicated his true identity.


    It seemed the Sarubo n¡¯s precautions and monitoring against Greem had already started when he had returned from the Knight¡¯s ne. Am was a patient person as well to have stayed undercover by Greem¡¯s side for so long.


    Given that to be the case, it was evident that Adept Am was the one responsible for the Sarubo n having such a clear grasp of the happenings within Fire Throne!


    For a moment, Greem and Gargamel were like two stubborn rocks in a river, standing still as many adepts, apprentices, and craftsmen swarmed out of Fire Cave and escaped into the woods.


    Their proud figures appeared to be so lonely and deste!


    Haines, who remained casually seated in his ck chair, lightly shook the winess in his hand. A cold and disdainful smile appeared on his pale and sharp face.


    It was an atmosphere he had intentionally manufactured, the sole purpose of which was to make Greem feel the pain of betrayal and the agony of defeat before he died.


    That was the only way he could pay Greem back for the great shame of destroying a manor within Vik territory!


    Leicester, who was involved in the matter as well, also let out a sinisterugh.


    The excellent talent of that female vampire had kept him up at night ever since the incident at Rose Manor half a month ago. If she were allowed to continue growing at this rate, a bloodline bacsh would be a definite reality in the future.


    That was why Leicester had to use the family¡¯s strength to exterminate this threat, even at the cost of his reputation.


    Consequently, Leicester had undoubtedly been the most anxious amidst the vampires when the horde of people left Fire Throne. He opened his crimson eyes wide, continually scanning the crowd out of fear that the female vampire would escape along with them.


    Adept F¨¹gen, who silently hovered in the air, was undoubtedly the most awkward person here.


    He might not disagree with Lady Sanazar¡¯s decision, but he thought it too rash and heartless.


    Indeed, it hadn¡¯t been easy to deal with Haines and his horde of subordinates when they came knocking at the door of Feidnan tower, but they shouldn¡¯t be abandoning a Second Grade adept just because of this!


    The Sarubo leaders might have many conflicts with Greem that had been brewing since long ago, but these were unknown to the outside world. It didn¡¯t matter how official and legitimate of a reason F¨¹gen was giving for their decision, this looked like the Sarubo n mercilessly abandoning a high-grade adept of their own.


    It was a severe blow to the reputation of the Sarubo n!


    Moreover, F¨¹gen¡¯s understanding of Greem gave him a feeling that he wasn¡¯t a brainless idiot who would orchestrate his own death. Greem must have some way of dealing with the crisis, given the fact that he dared provoke a vampire family headed by a Third Grade vampire in the first ce.


    Honestly, even if the Sarubos cut off all possibility of help and severed their ties with Greem, just the Fire Throne tower beneath them made it impossible for the vampires to exterminate Greem and his forces in a single attack.


    The might of a powerful adept supported by his adept¡¯s tower was far beyond the limits of everyone¡¯s imaginations. Greem himself might not be able to fight the Third Grade Haines, but it was difficult for the vampires to conquer the tower if he chose to turtle within it.


    The most likely scenario was a stalemate after a bloody battle.


    The vampires would probably blockade Fire Throne and cut off all means of help and reinforcement. Greem, and what few adepts he had left, would be trapped in an isted tower. The vampires might not be able to make their way in, but they would also be caught in a rut with no resources or food to speak of.


    When that happened, and Greem and the others had nowhere to go, they would have to turn to Lady Sanazar and sign even harsher terms of servitude in exchange for help.


    Then the Sarubo n would enter the conflict once more as intermediaries. They might need to pay some resources to resolve the issue, but they would be able to fold a Second Grade adept and his subordinate forces under their wing once more.


    A Second Grade adept whose ambition had been whittled away, and became an obedient subordinate. Even Lady Sanazar wouldugh in her sleep if she managed to get her hands on such a person!


    "You... are Greem, that fire adept?" Haines finally opened his mouth to ask after taking a long sip of the blood wine in his hands.


    His dominant aura pressed against Greem like a massive wave, affecting the fire adept on multiple levels, including the mind, soul, and reality itself.


    The prideful Greem took a step forward and used his broad shoulders to cover for Gargamel.


    Theyer of light around him shone brightly and shed with the invading spiritual pressure.


    The spiritual pressure was intangible, but Haines powerful Spirit caused it to manifest itself in reality as if it had physical weight and substance. Greem might have been able to resist this pressure with the me barrier cast on him by the tower, but the earth around him couldn¡¯t endure the force of a Third Grade vampire adept. The ground sank over half an inch downward.


    From an outsider¡¯s perspective, it looked as if Greem had suddenly shortened by half an inch!


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled slightly.


    The vampires were not creatures known for their Spirit. If even Haines had such fearsome spiritual pressure, how powerful would the Spirits of elementium adepts and other more spiritual adepts be?


    This frightened Greem. Things had gone too well for him recently.


    The grade differentiation in the World of Adepts was the real deal. The power difference between each Grade was often a difference of more than ten times, and his power was still a far way off from a Third Grade adept.


    "I am sincerely sorry about the tragedy that urred in Rose Manor half a month ago. If you, sir, would allow for it, I hope topensate for the loss of your family at an appropriate price." Greem calmly expressed his suggestion, even when faced with a Third Grade adept.


    "Compensate? Kehkehekh." Third Grade Adept Haines was the first tough, followed by all the other adepts, as if they had just heard the funniest joke in the world.


    "Then pay with your lives."


    Third Grade Haines let out a scream, and all the vampires took to the skies, lunging at Greem and Gargamel like a crimson cloud.


    The two Second Grade vampires, Toril and Leicester, led the charge, flying at the forefront of the many First Grade vampires.


    "You go back and direct the tower. I will take care of the rest here!"


    As expected of the leader of his own faction, Greem remained calm and steady in this critical situation. He turned one hand and pushed Gargamel into a door of fire that opened behind them while opening his other palm and summoning a strange staff into his hand.


    Wall of Demonic me!


    me Halo of Repulsion!


    Two defensive fire spells exploded in front of Greem as he let out a grunt. All the attacking vampires were engulfed in the spells.


    The battle had finally broken out!

 Chapter 562 Might of a Third Grade

    Chapter 562 Might of a Third Grade


    My base. My initiative!


    Elementium adepts excelled at violent elementium attacks, while vampires were more akin to phantoms roaming a battlefield.


    It might appear as if the two Second Grade vampires had an overwhelming advantage when simultaneously challenging a single Second Grade fire adept. However, the truth was exactly the opposite. It was the lonesome Greem who used his rapid and ferocious fire spells to st the Second Grade vampires and forced them to move around him, not daring to stop for a single second.


    The reason a situation like this had urred was mostly due to the blessing of Fire Throne.


    Fire Throne was an adept¡¯s tower that belonged only to Greem; he had absolute authority over the tower. Fire Throne¡¯s me barrier could be projected to any spot within five kilometers of the tower. That meant that Greem practically didn¡¯t need to worry about defense duringbat.


    The two Second Grade vampires could only sit on their hands and run from his attacks if they were unable to break through the me barrier. Even if they braved Greem¡¯s fierce bombardment and closed in for an attack, it would only be negated by the me barrier that projected from Greem¡¯s body.


    The two vampries would need to increase their instantaneous offensive power beyond the defensive limits of the me barrier if they wanted to hurt Greem himself. Otherwise, their periodic attacks would never be able to match the regeneration of the me barrier. They would never be able to harm Greem, even if they attacked in this manner for a hundred thousand years.


    That is, unless the tower¡¯s elementium energy reserves were exhausted!


    The reason the adepts of the World of Adepts loved to construct adept¡¯s towers was this powerfulbat-support ability of the towers. Trying to conquer an adept¡¯s tower without offensive power ten times that of the tower¡¯s defense was no more than a fantasy.


    Think about it. How were the first adepts in the ancient past that had yet to mature to their fullest strength able to survive the endless tide of monsters and demons? They had relied on these imprable adept¡¯s towers and thebined might of all the stationed adepts.


    And today, Greem relied on the support of the tower and forcefully endured the attacks of two vampires of his grade. It was an indirect disy of the power of adept¡¯s towers!


    The fight between Second Grade adepts was genuinely frightening. There was no room for those First Grade vampire Viscounts to intervene.


    The other eleven vampire Viscounts took to the skies, whistling through the air as they turned and dashed toward Fire Cave like bolts of lightning.


    The defensive strength of the tower was sure to weaken now that its owner was being kept here by the two Counts. They might not be able to make much progress in attacking the adept¡¯s tower, but it might create more trouble for the fire adept and distract him with crises happening on both ends.


    The eleven vampires dove into Fire Cave. Before they had even gotten a grasp of the situation, a ferocious tide of lightning drove them out again.


    Nine crimson silhouettes shot out of the cave, turning into red bats and circling in the air above Fire Cave.


    The other two shadows that had fallen behind were shrouded in blinding blue electricity. They turned into ashes amidst pained cries and howls before they could even escape the web of electricity. A tall, mighty creature that resembled a centaur charged out of the cave, waving his crackling electric spear as he blocked the way into the cave.


    It had bright blue scales the size of bowls, thick and powerful dragon ws, unmatched draconic strength, and that pulsating power of electricity around him.


    Haines, who was casually watching the battle from behind, frowned. The blood wine in his ss trembled slightly.


    Not a centaur. A dragonborn.


    Moreover, it was a Second Grade lightning-attribute dragonborn with a fairly pure bloodline.


    Where did Greem pick up such a high-ss specimen of another race?


    Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s expression also froze. He couldn¡¯t help but turn and look at Adept Am.


    "Sir, I have never before seen this dragonborn in the tower! He...he probably showed up a few days ago." Am could perfectly sense the rage in F¨¹gen¡¯s re.


    A mysterious Second Grade powerhouse. Such important information, yet he had failed even to obtain any knowledge about it. It was an intolerable mistake for any spy.


    If Lady Sanazar had known ahead of time Greem¡¯s ability to call for such a powerful ally, she would most definitely have reconsidered her decision to abandon Greem.


    While the adepts were engulfed in their own thoughts, the nine First Grade vampires shrieked and charged into the nearby woods. They returned a short momentter, holding one or two unconscious human mercenaries in their hands.


    They quickly gathered together and formed a circle before simultaneously tearing the human mercenaries in their hands into two halves. They then started chanting a strange spell while the blood sshed everywhere.


    A red halo shed through the air, and the two carbonized vampires mysteriously emerged from the blood mist in the air. They appeared to be no different from before, apart from theirplexions being a little paler and their auras being slightly weaker.


    That was probably an alternative sort of secret revival technique of the vampire family!


    The adepts present couldn¡¯t help but shake their heads and sigh when they saw this happen.


    No wonder these vampire families could pass down their legacies for thousands upon thousands of years. Disregarding everything else, this secret revival technique was not something that an ordinary adept n would be able to aplish. It was hardly surprising why the vampires fought with such recklessness and ferocity inbat when they had such a revival technique in their hands.


    The vampires sent out abination of eleven vampire Viscounts (First Grade) and two vampire Counts (Second Grade), while the opponent had also revealed two Second Grade powerhouses. If one were topare them in terms of raw power, the vampires no longer possessed any sort of advantage over Greem and his faction. If one were to take into consideration the support and help of the tower, the Vik Family was very likely to be the one to lose out in the fight.


    The appearance of the Second Grade Dragonborn was undoubtedly the most critical turn of events on the battlefield. His appearance directly changed the disparity between the strength of both parties, as well as everyone¡¯s prediction for the oue of the battle.


    The Vik Family had brought out more than half of all their active military force. Their reputation over the past few thousand years would be besmirched if they, an ancient vampire family whose legacy stretched as far back as several thousand years, failed to defeat a fire adept that had just advanced six months ago under such circumstances.


    When that happened, all adept ns within the Zhentarim area would see them as weaklings. They would pounce upon the Viks in hopes of tearing a piece of flesh from their body.


    That was why Marquis Haines could no longer sit still upon seeing the turn of tides!


    He let out no battle cry or warning. A beam of crimson light stretched out across the battlefield and Haines instantly appeared beside Greem; he waved his ws in session. The few weightless strikes immediately caused the me barrier to tremble intensely.


    The Chip¡¯s rms red and went off in Greem¡¯s mind.


    [Beep. me Barrier has been attacked by an external force. Defensive power reduced by 13%.]


    [Beep. me Barrier has been attacked by an external force. Defensive power reduced by 11%.]


    [Beep. me Barrier has been attacked by an external force. Defensive power reduced by 15%.]


    ......


    The chain of warnings constantly rang out. The me barrier being projected by Fire Throne was also weakening rapidly. An endless stream of fire energy was still being sent over by the tower, but it couldn¡¯t keep up with the speed and ferocity of the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    [Beep. me Barrier has been attacked by an external force. Defensive power below 30%. Shattering imminent.]


    Greem¡¯s face flushed white the very next second.


    It was important to note that this me barrier projected by Fire Throne possessed a minimum of a thousand points of defensive power. It was an estimated number provided by the Chip. When paired with the constant stream of fire energy from the tower, it could easily hold against a barrage of attacks from dozens of First Grade elementium adepts with absolutely no problem.


    Yet, for a Third Grade adept, a defense of this level was no more than an eggshell that could be cracked with the flick of a finger. Moreover, this adept was a vampire adept, known amongst all adepts for their weak offensive strength!


    Greem had imagined the power of a Third Grade adept countless times. However, the statistics and data he had drawn out in his mind still weren¡¯t as terrifying as a Third Grade adept in the flesh.


    Greem was worried, but he wasn¡¯t panicking. He quickly shed backward and retreated while waving the ze of Destruction. He summoned a massive Meteor Shower that instantly engulfed every inch of space around him.


    Greem knew very well the situation of the battle. Single-target spells would never be able to hit the Third Grade Haines. Only area-of-effect fire spells could affect the vampire adept. Greem wasn¡¯t counting on these spells wounding Haines. He just hoped they could limit or dy Haines¡¯ attacks and provide him with the space to dodge.


    A few stepster, Greem¡¯s me barrier vanished in the clear and crisp sound of its shattering. He hadn¡¯t managed to even rally with Dragonborn Zacha.


    Third Grade Haines¡¯ ws possessed intense corrosive properties and fearsome blood poison. The me barrier of a thousand points of power turned to pieces in less than five seconds.


    Greem had no me barrier left to protect him. His Lava Shields of four or five hundred points and his Fire Shields of two hundred points were even more fragile and couldn¡¯t do much either. Fortunately, they managed to help Greem win half a second worth of time. Greem barely managed to teleport away just as Haines¡¯ bloody ws were about to rip his throat apart.


    That was the most dangerous and closest Fire Teleportation for him since he had advanced to adept!


    Greem felt intense pain at his throat when he stumbled out at Zacha¡¯s side. It was difficult to even swallow. It seemed the edge of Haines¡¯ ws had barely scratched his throat at the instant he teleported away.


    "Quick... retreat back into the tower..." Greem mumbled out as he escaped into Fire Cave under Zacha¡¯s support and protection.


    Perhaps because he feared that terrifying speed of Third Grade Haines, Zacha made sure to use his most violent lightning storm to drown the entrance of the cave and halt any attempts at pursuit.


    Zacha supported Greem as they quickly ran along the winding magma tunnels of Fire Cave toward the adept¡¯s tower, just two hundred meters away from them.


    Haines appeared at the edge of the lightning storm like a ghostly phantom.


    He bent slightly forward, his tall nose no more than ten centimeters away from the storm. He locked onto the two fleeing silhouettes through the ravaging storm with his strange silver eyes.


    Two Second-Grades.


    In his eyes, the Second Grade figures that terrorized most of the world were no more than targets of a hunt that could suffice as a pastime and diversion.


    They couldn¡¯t be called ¡¯opponents.¡¯


    If it weren¡¯t for the fact that he didn¡¯t want the Second Grade dragonborn¡¯s all-out strike to damage the clothes he had on him, he would have caught both of them before they made it ten meters out.


    Still, it was no big deal.


    They have only extended their lives for a few dozen seconds. The conclusion was predetermined.


    Haines¡¯ silver eyes grew even brighter when he sensed the energy levels of the lightning storm rapidly receding.


    He turned into a crimson shadow the moment thest lightning aftershock vanished, disappearing into the dark cave that was Fire Throne.


    Naturally, the other vampires shrieked and followed after their leader.

 Chapter 563 Unmatched Dragon

    Chapter 563 Unmatched Dragon


    The area outside grew silent once more as the vampires zoomed into the depths of the cave.


    Adept F¨¹gen hesitated for a moment before bringing Am along andnding on the ground.


    The appearance of the Second Grade dragonborn clearly disturbed him. He couldn¡¯t help but stare into the ck cave as he fell into deep thought.


    "Sir, Greem might be aided by a dragonborn, but that dragonborn is no more than Second Grade. They still have no chance of victory when faced with Third Grade Lord Haines. What are you worried about now that the oue has been decided?" Am gathered his courage to offer a few words of constion.


    "Hmph. What do you know!" A big frown appeared on F¨¹gen¡¯s wrinkled old face, "Why did that Greeme out for if he didn¡¯t have any chance of winning? He wouldn¡¯t have had anything to lose if he just hid within the tower and ignored the provocations of the enemy. He chose toe out for a frontal fight. There¡¯s something in this... I keep smelling a conspiracy behind this."


    "You mean..." Adept Am opened his eyes wide in disbelief.


    He had lived in Fire Throne for several decades now. In the end, it was no more than an elementary adept¡¯s tower. It wouldn¡¯t have been so popr if not for its location right near the ck Forest, which granted it rich magical creature resources.


    As one of Greem¡¯s disciple adepts, Am was very well-acquainted with this adept¡¯s tower. He had investigated all the magical facilities apart from the few restricted areas. He hadn¡¯t found anything abnormal or noteworthy.


    It had been rumored a while ago that his teacher had organized an invasion of another ne. He had no specific information as he was not involved in the affair. However, it was true that a few of the tower¡¯s core adepts had gone missing.


    Meryl, Sabrina, Billis, Endor.


    Those people hadn¡¯t shown up again since vanishing from the tower. Greem and Mary, on the other hand, appeared two months after their disappearance. Am didn¡¯t pick up on any abnormalities from their behavior either.


    The only event of note would be the sudden incident that urred in the sealing room half a month ago. All adepts had been temporarily banned from using the sealing room. The event hadn¡¯t drawn much attention from the stationed and staying adepts, as the uses for the sealing room was extremely narrow.


    Even Am might not have noticed this tiny detail that did not affect his life if he wasn¡¯t a cautious person.


    Now, it seemed the ¡¯incident¡¯ of the sealing room was only a facade. The truth was probably the presence of something new in the room!


    Dragonborn?


    Did Greem break into a kingdom of dragons?


    Am¡¯s body quaked while he was fantasizing. He was almost thrown off bnce.


    Am quickly snapped out of his daze and realized that it wasn¡¯t him having lousy footing; the earth itself was rumbling and shaking intensely.


    The formerly t ground suddenly started swelling before his eyes, as if an earth dragon was tunneling beneath them.


    It was almost as if a giant beast had dug into the ground as was furiously struggling and digging. The earth started to crease and crack beforepletely breaking apart. Numerous bottomless pits and hills of dirt surfaced before crumbling and falling apart.


    A pir of dust that stood at a hundred meters tall erupted from the fine cracks, instantly devouring the market and camp around Fire Cave.


    Am could vaguely hear a resounding dragon¡¯s roar from underground.


    He must have heard wrong. There were no dragons near Fire Throne!


    Just as Am was doubtfully looking about, Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s eyes widened. It was like he had seen a ghost.


    Am might not be able toe to a definite judgment, but a Second Grade adept like F¨¹gen couldn¡¯t possibly be mistaken.


    The eruption from underground wasn¡¯t arge scale spell being cast by Fire Throne. Instead...


    Another ear-splitting crack rang out at the entrance of Fire Cave while F¨¹gen was still caught up in shock.


    Tons of magma rocks and endless dirt and sand were blown into the air by a surge of resounding force. Two creatures of massively different sizes shot into the sky amidst the obscuring dust, battling as they flew.


    The gray cloud of dust couldn¡¯t hide the crimson marks from Third Grade Marquis Haines activating his Hellsblood Ghostws. The extremely dense blood energy was enough proof of Haines fighting with all he had.


    Even so, Haines¡¯ Ghostws still couldn¡¯t break through his opponent¡¯syers of blue dragon scales. The blinding and fearsome lightning on the surface of his opponent¡¯s body simply dispersed the corrosion and blood poison effects that came with his Ghostws.


    Haines beat his wings and flew while rapidly dashing and weaving with irregr movements to avoid the terrifying strikes from the enemy. Bites, lunges, wing attacks, tailshes, and horrifyingly quick dragon¡¯s breath.


    A loud, clear, and intimidating dragon¡¯s roar reverberated through the skies. The fearsome dragon¡¯s aura of might hit Haines right in the face. His body froze for a slight moment and was instantly devoured by an overwhelming tide of lightning.


    Half a secondter, Haines let out a tragic shriek. He dragged his charred body out of the lightning and escaped into the distance. Haines no longer dared to stay for even a moment longer. The blood energy in his body erupted as he turned into a crimson shadow, instantly vanishing from the spot.


    Haines¡¯ terrifying opponent reared his neck and let out another loud roar in the direction he had fled. Only then did he beat hisrge dragon wings in satisfaction and freely circle the skies.


    Those wicked dragon¡¯s horns, gleaming fangs, the clearly defined body. Powerful ws, a pair of full dragon¡¯s wings, and that eight-meter long spiked tail. The prideful Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms proudly flew among the blue skies and white clouds, showing to this mysterious world his intimidating and majestic body.


    It was only after he had happily made three rounds in the sky and dispelled his low spirits that Arms noticed the two human adepts below him. They had their heads raised and mouths agape, watching him inplete shock.


    Hm? Why are there still two insects here that haven¡¯t been chased away?


    It seemed as if the two adepts wanted to say something, but Arms couldn¡¯t care less. He absolutely hated adepts anyway. The next second, a terrifying thunderstorm engulfed the two human adepts and threw them a couple of kilometers away.


    Hmph! I can¡¯t kill you, but it won¡¯t be a problem if I give you a bad time, will it?!


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms slowlynded as he wickedly thought to himself.


    Stones ttered and rolled around as Arms gracefullynded on the ground.


    The battle underground had been a brief one, but Fire Cave had already been utterly destroyed by the battle between the two Third Grades. The ground was scarred and marred everywhere by the signs of their struggle. The heat from underground continued to rise in the form of steam, mixing with the dust in the air and making it hard for anyone to breath.


    The hole created by the fight between the vampire and the dragon had already been covered by the stones and dirt that had fallen back down. Arms would have to dig with his ws or wait for the fire adept if he wanted to return underground.


    Arms sat upon the ruins, continually raising his neck to look around at thend around him.


    That wicked fire adept even made him cut off the path of retreat of the other vampires, apart from just chasing away their leader.


    Having a great Third Grade thunder dragon such as himself act as a lowly assistant? This was an insult to the great thunder dragons! However, he had no choice but to endure the treatment in the face of that precious Dragon Pledge Gemstone.


    Arms grumbled furiously while using his vast Spirit to scan for all abnormalities within five kilometers.


    All of a sudden, he straightened his body. His amber eyes stared at a pile of stones a thousand meters away from him.


    Arms tilted his head slightly, and as if he had heard something, he took to the skies with his lithe and muscr body. Arms then dove downwards with an unstoppable aura.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    The pile of debris was crushed into dust under the w of the dragon. The vampire that had just dug his way out of the ground was instantly stomped into meat paste.


    Oops. That was a little too much power!


    Arms couldn¡¯t help but be shocked for a moment. He remembered that the fire adept wanted them alive.


    The dragon raised his ws and licked the pieces of meat stuck on it.


    Seems really weak. Must be a First Grade vampire. That¡¯s not my target!


    Arms sighed in relief and casually returned to his original spot, continuing to keep watch.


    Where could the vampires escape with a Third Grade thunder dragon sealing their only way out?!


    The vampires invading this time were all core members of the Vik Family. They were all powerful and possessed plenty of experience and battle techniques. As such, Greem didn¡¯t send his subordinates to deal with them. Instead, he cooperated with Dragonborn Zacha and searched for the vampires in the disconnected magma tunnels of the cave.


    It was the home base of Fire Throne, after all. He sent a horde of magical Fire Eyes out, slowly finding the escaping vampires one by one.


    Pitting the Second Grades against First Grades made things extremely easy, not to mention the fact that there were two of them. No vampire could escape from them the moment they were discovered. They were all beaten within an inch of their life before being bound with anti-magic chains and thrown back into Fire Throne.


    After a thorough search, Greem finally managed to corner his most important target, Second Grade Vampire Leicester, in a tunnel a mere ten meters away from the surface.


    After a casual and bloody battle, Leicester¡¯s leg was stabbed by Zacha¡¯s electric spear. The vampire was utterly shocked, with even his hair turning into an afro. It was then that Greem dragged him back to Fire Throne.


    With Leicester in hand, Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered with capturing the other Second Grade vampire. He immediately used a megate to bring Arms back to the tower and proceeded to cut off all connection to the surface.


    With the cover of the copsed Fire Cave, it was time to have Fire Throne go dark for a while!

 Chapter 564 Battle Aftermath

    Chapter 564 Battle Aftermath


    Fire Throne, dragons, vampires.


    These words that usually had nothing to do with each other instantly became the hottest buzzwords in the region, immediately attracting the attention of countless people.


    Head of a vampire family to the southwest of Zhentarim, Third Grade Haines Vik had raised the gs of revenge and led his family in a determined invasion against Greem¡¯s Fire Throne. The Zhentarim Association had consented to this attack due to the incident in Rose Manor and the silent consent of the Sarubo leaders.


    A Third Grade vampire led the group, with two more Second Grade vampires and dozens of First Grades in the group. Power of this level was more than enough to raze an ordinary small-sized n. It was a powerful army that couldn¡¯t be underestimated, even for some mid-sized ns with insufficient umtion.


    Yet it was an army like this that broke their heads upon the adept¡¯s tower of a lesser known Second Grade adept.


    A mighty Second Grade dragonborn, and a terrifying Third Grade thunder dragon.


    These wholly unexpected and strange creatures had all appeared in that rural adept¡¯s tower. The psychological impact was immense.


    In particr, all the staying adepts who had impatiently dered their departure from Fire Throne before the battle had started were green with regret.


    The name of me Demon might have been widely spread for a period in the past, but that was mostly temporary fame in the areas around the Sarubo n¡¯s territory. The decades of silence when Greem hid in Fire Throne to work toward Second Grade had caused the title of me Demon to fade from the minds of the people.


    With this ¡¯n war,¡¯ and the frantic escape of the Third Grade vampire, the title of me Demon became a widespread name once again. For a moment, Greem had be an influential figure that no one didn¡¯t know of.


    As arge number of ex-members of the tower fled from the scene, the process and oue of the battle between Greem and the vampires, as well as some of the insider information and intricacies leading to the conflict, started to be passed around the entire Zhentarim area.


    Since the Sarubo higher-ups had dered that Greem was no longer a part of their n before the battle, a new adept n had now been born in the center of the Continent of Adepts with their victory.


    Hordes of wandering adepts would rally to Greem¡¯s call as long as he was willing to step forth in this moment of might and glory to recruit followers.


    After all, the resources and benefits that one would get from following a quickly rising adept powerhouse were immense.


    However, what truly unnerved the adept ns was the appearance of the dragon. How did Greem, a mere Second Grade adept, manage to summon a Third Grade thunder dragon to do his bidding? This event had utterly subverted all their previous understanding of dragons as greedy and prideful creatures!


    Of course, a small rumor had been spreading among the adepts¨C Greem had most likely discovered a small dragon¡¯s ne. The allies that he had found for his cause were his coborators back in the dragon¡¯s ne.


    This particr rumor appeared to be baseless and a lot more ridiculouspared to other ones. Unexpectedly, it was the one that most adepts endorsed. It was the only reasonable ¡¯reality¡¯ that could exin away their doubts and questions.


    For a moment, Fire Throne, me Demon, Greem, Dragon¨C these words were bundled together and became the hottest topic of the Zhentarim area.


    Ordinary nobles and wealthy merchants naturally turned these into teatime conversational topics and passionately discussed the details amongst themselves. However, for the adepts who possessed power and knowledge, the entire incident oozed with a great deal of interesting information.


    The dragons had been extinct in the World of Adepts for over ten thousand years!


    Therge-sized ns and organizations all held world coordinates of some dragon nes in their hands, but they chose to keep the wealth to themselves and would never easily let the resources reach the public. The other adepts could do nothing but watch, even if they wanted a so-called ¡¯dragon pet.¡¯


    Many adepts whocked strong magical pets or mounts were immediately intrigued when they caught wind of clues leading to dragons in the hands of a Second Grade adept.


    Many powerful adepts turned their eyes toward the rural ck Forest after the conclusion of the battle at Fire Throne. However, the fight from earlier had already destroyed all paths leading to Fire Throne. The adepts had no choice but to suppress their impatient emotions and silently wait for the moment Greem showed himself once again.


    They would purchase with magical crystals and throw mountains of resources at Greem. They didn¡¯t believe he would be able to remain unmoved in the face of such benefits.


    Many adepts didn¡¯t mind using up their hundreds of years of savings if they could obtain a satisfactory dragon pet.


    Power. In the World of Adepts, power was the fundamental force that decided everything else!


    A mighty dragon pet would undoubtedly be a part of an adept¡¯s power.


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    The tower itself was extremely lively, even as they ignored themotion of the public outside.


    Those that had been able to muster the determination to stay in the tower and face the challenge of fate alongside Greem when the vampires descended were going to be the future backbone of Greem¡¯s faction.


    Gargamel did a count after the battle. No more than fifty-four people remained in the tower after the fight. Of these fifty-four, there were five adepts, twenty-nine apprentices, and twenty servants.


    However, what moved Greem the most weren¡¯t the adepts or the apprentices. Instead, it was Medusa Dana, who he had recruited in the ck Forest.


    Dana had led her snakefiend subordinates to reinforce Fire Throne without any hesitation when she had heard of the tower being attacked by another powerful force of adepts. Moreover, she had no prior knowledge of the existence of the dragonborn and the thunder dragon.


    On the other hand, the other two subordinate forces of Fire Throne¨Cthe manticore family and the fiendhound tribe¨Cwere slow to act and behaved dubiously.


    Fortunately, the manticore leader had done his duty in the battle within Fire Cave. He significantly dyed the assault of the First Grade vampires, and thus was considered by Greem as a hero who had contributed to the sess of the battle. Three-headed Demonhound Unguja of the fiendhound tribe appeared to be a lot more indecisive.


    He had already received his orders before the battle, yet he dragged his feet and only barely arrived at Fire Throne once the battle was well underway. It was only when the wind started to shift in Greem¡¯s favor, and sess tilted toward them, that Unguja had hastily jumped out to clean up the battlefield.


    Of course, Greem saw all of this as it happened.


    Greem didn¡¯t say much on the surface, but he had already sentenced Unguja to a death sentence in his mind. The next time an opportunity presented itself, the risky and suicidal jobs of scouting and the like would certainly fall upon Unguja¡¯s shoulders.


    The tower was a lot quieter after the victorious battle, but it was still lively and filled with a triumphant atmosphere.


    Gargamel waved his hands, and the doors of the warehouse were turned wide open. Many wines and delicacies were taken out of the storage and used to reward these future backbone members of the n that had resolutely stood on their side.


    Gargamel was already utterly loyal to Greem now.


    Gargamel had thought the lives of all within Fire Throne to be foregone when faced with this tremendous crisis. He had already prepared himself for the death of his body and the extermination of his soul. Yet, who had expected his fantastic master Greem to convince the dragonborn and the thunder dragon? Greem¡¯s actions turned them into the shock troops and powerful reinforcements of the tower at the most pivotal moment.


    A Third Grade vampire couldn¡¯t possibly beat a Third Grade thunder dragon, no matter how strong he was.


    Casually dispatching multiple human adepts of the same grade was no problem for a dragon, with the renowned individual strength of their species. In fact, the more powerful dragons could even challenge individuals of superior grades. It seemed to be an unbelievable feat that only powerful creatures like the dragons were capable of, even throughout the entire high-magic multiverse.


    The crisis today had helped Fire Throne get rid of a spy among their ranks. That was unquestionably beneficial for the development of Greem¡¯s faction from here on out.


    Rewards were naturally due after a victory. During the banquet, Greem personally dered that he would form a new adept n and that everyone present was going to be core members of this new n. That included Medusa Dana and the manticore leader.


    They would cast away their identities as magical creatures and be official members of an adept n. As long as the Zhentarim Association acknowledged this adept n, they would also be granted the status of adepts.


    Greem announced the name of this new n before the eager and anticipative crowd¨C Crimson!


    Greem was a fire adept and excelled at fire spells. Crimson was a fitting name.


    Thus, Greem¡¯s name would be updated to the new Greem Crimson.


    And he would be the powerful Crimson Adept!


    ............


    A secret room on the fifth floor of Fire Throne.


    Greem had arranged the room into a proper scene for a mysterious ritual.


    While the happy adepts and apprentices were still celebrating in the hall on the second level, Greem brought Mary and Leicester here. Waiting inside for awhile were Alice and her fairy Helen, who had specially teleported over from the Tower of Fate.


    "It¡¯s you again, you heart robber. Can¡¯t you be satisfied with having Alice? To think you went and seduced another female vampire. Do you not know that all vampires are twisted and sick?" Helen immediately flew up to Greem when she saw him, drawing a ribbon light across the air as she did so. The fairy put her hands on her hips, pointed at Greem¡¯s nose, and started reprimanding him.


    This sudden usation caught Greem byplete surprise.


    Right now, he was cradling the unconscious Mary in one hand, while dragging the bound Leicester in the other. He opened his mouth several times and had no idea how to defend himself against this righteous fairy.


    "Helen, don¡¯t go unting your unreasonable theories! It¡¯s not your ce to intervene in our rtionship," The smiling Alice slowly stepped forward and took Mary from Greem¡¯s arm. She asked curiously, "What¡¯s happened to her?"


    "She drank too much blood from the thunder dragon half a month ago. She¡¯s been sleeping like this ever since. I can¡¯t get her to wake up no matter how I shout at her." Greem awkwardly exined.


    "The bloodline of the vampires courses through her body, and we still need some magical facilities unique to the vampires. Fortunately, I brought a Blood Coffin with me. Otherwise, most of the power would simply disperse. It would have been a great loss for her." In public, Alice still appeared to be as domineering as before she advanced to Witch of Fate. However, her behavior in private interactions was far more gentle and thoughtful than before.


    Blood coffins were magical items unique to the vampires. They could help vampires concentrate and purify their bloodline. The only drawback was their high price, making it such that only high-grade vampires had the privilege of using them.


    As the leader of the Witches of Fate, there was no doubt that the Blood Coffin she brought with her was of the highest quality!

 Chapter 565 The Little Girl and the Blood Moon Prayer Ceremony

    Chapter 565 The Little Girl and the Blood Moon Prayer Ceremony


    Mary couldn¡¯t be considered a pureblood vampire.


    She wasn¡¯t created through a superior vampire¡¯s Embrace. Instead, she was born in the biologyb of an adept. As such, she more obviously suffered from the limitations of bloodline shacklespared to true vampires.


    Under ordinary circumstances, her advancement to Second Grade should havee way before Greem, considering her frenzied ughter in the Knight¡¯s ne.


    It was the existence of the bloodline shackles that caused her power to remain stagnant for such a long time.


    This time, they had sessfully captured the source of her blood¨C Leicester. The shackles that bound Mary to the ground would no longer exist once shepleted this blood transfusion and purifying ceremony. Advancing to Second Grade was a certainty with her talent!


    Greem had initially intended to personally host the blood transfusion ceremony for Mary and witness her rebirth into a path without bloodline limitations. However, Alice was a far better choicepared to him when it came down to both experience or qualifications. Thus, Greem had no choice but to step down and hand over the hosting of the ceremony to Alice.


    Greem retreated to a corner of the secret room and silently watched as the fairy waved her magic wand. Light shone in the room as Mary¡¯s armor was removed, and her naked body slowly floated into a semi-translucent casket.


    The casket appeared to be carved out of a massive piece of emerald crystal. It shone with unmatched crystalline beauty.


    Leicester, on the other hand, was ced above the cover of the casket. The four copper dragon heads on each corner of the coffin extended forward and took a deep bite into the vampire¡¯s body. The fresh blood flowed through the hollow pipes within the dragon heads and slowly filled the casket beneath.


    The blood level in the casket rose slowly at a pace visible to the naked eye. It flowed over Mary¡¯s arms, stomach, breasts, and face. Soon, the peacefully sleeping Mary waspletely submerged in blood.


    Alice, who usually took great care of her appearance, untied her hair at this moment. She went barefoot and started dancing a strange and sinister dance around the blood casket with an odd soulmp in hand.


    This... why was this so different from the blood transfusion ceremony he read from the books?


    Greem kept his doubts to himself while opening his eyes wide and enjoying this entirely different side of Alice. Of course, he didn¡¯t forget to turn on the Chip¡¯s scene memorization function so that he could refer to it in the future.


    However, the small fairy Helen once again flew into his face with her hands on her hips the moment the ceremony started.


    "Hey, shameless guy, what are still doing here?" The fairy seemed to be in this sour mood perpetually, "You want to watch two girls naked and dancing around in the room? Get out quick and don¡¯t disturb Alice¡¯s Blood Moon Prayer ceremony."


    "Blood Moon Prayer ceremony? Isn¡¯t it a blood transfusion ceremony? Why did it turn into a Blood Moon Prayer ceremony? Are there blood moons in the World of Adepts?" There were a million things that Greem didn¡¯t understand right now.


    "Hmph! If it was just an ordinary blood transfusion ceremony, even an idiot like you could do it. Why would Alice need to specially teleport here? This is a promotion ceremony that Alice specifically prepared for that female vampire. Also, isn¡¯t it a just simple thing if you wanted a blood moon? Alice is the Witch of Fate. If she says there¡¯s a blood moon now, then there¡¯s a blood moon now. What¡¯s strange about that?" A certain question seemed to have picked at Helen¡¯s wounds when the conversation reached this point. The fairy was still scolding Greem, but tears had welled up in her pretty little eyes.


    Greem¡¯s expression dimmed. He nodded his head silently and quietly removed himself from the room.


    Greem had heard of the Blood Moon Prayer ceremony before. It was a grand ceremony usually only held for high-grade dark creatures when they were advancing. Dark creatures that sessfully passed this ceremony could possibly obtain special skills in addition to purifying their bloodline and advancing.


    Moonstalking Stealth, Moonshade Messenger, Shadowde, Moon¡¯s Illusory Wings, Moonlight Recovery.


    These were all abilities that someone was most likely to obtain through the Blood Moon Prayer ceremony. They weren¡¯t iparably powerful, but they were practical abilities that could be used in anybat situation. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the ability to remain invisible in the night, the critical damage of Moonshade Messenger, the hard-to-defend nature of Shadowde, the high-speed escape afforded by the Illusory Wings, or even the tremendous healing of Moonlight Recovery. Any one of these skills would significantly increase Mary¡¯sbat prowess in the night.


    However, everything came at a cost!


    A hefty price had to be paid to obtain these additional powers.


    Apart from the massive amounts of rare resources that it required, the ceremony would ce a considerable strain on the host. The World of Adepts had no blood moon. Alice needed to exhaust her powers of fate to make her prophesy a reality if she wanted to allow Mary to sessfullyplete the ceremony.


    As the Witch of Fate, the only thing Alice could afford to pay were the powers of fate that she had gathered after so much difficulty, along with her life force.


    The price was indeed a tremendous one!


    While Greem was anxiously waiting outside the room, he suddenly stopped his footsteps and looked up. He cast his gaze through the solid walls of the tower and the two hundred meteryer of earth above to the sky in the distance.


    It was supposed to be the dead of night right now. The moon should be high up in the sky, crowded with stars.


    A thinyer of blood mist had somehow enveloped half the horizon, causing the silvery-white moonlight to turn into a dizzying and sinister crimson color when it shone down upon the ground.


    The mountains were the color of blood, as was the earth, the trees, and even the giant moon in the sky.


    The entire world had been turned into a blood-colored ce.


    This unique scenery only existed within five kilometers of Fire Throne. The ck forest and the silver moonlight; everything was normal beyond this range.


    While the people in the tower were celebrating, only Eva, Dana, and a few high-grade dark creatures vaguely sensed a trace of abnormality in the air. It felt as if their bodies were lighter, the flow of the energy within them smoother, and as if there was an indescribable fragrance of blood spread in throughout the air.


    Apart from the few of them, someone else in a room on the third level of the tower sensed the change in the surroundings. A cute-looking girl climbed up a narrow stone window with much difficulty. She remotely sensed the brilliance of the moon shining down from the blood moon, even through theyers of the earth.


    All the blood moon brilliance was being guided by a strange force and poured into the top level of the adept¡¯s tower. It seemed some sort of special ceremony was being held up there.


    The girl looked to be only three or four years old, but she had a mind and intelligence that far surpassed her age.


    The little girl tilted her face as she felt the pure inviting energy in the brilliance of the blood moon. She bit her white thumb as she thought to herself. Finally, the girl could no longer suppress her desire for the blood moon energy and waved with her hand.


    The next moment, the blood moon energy that had been continually pouring into the top level of the tower like a beautiful ribbon suddenly split off into a much smaller stream. This smaller stream directed the energy toward the body of the little girl.


    The girl immediately jumped up in joy with a huge smile on her face when the crimson light entered her body.


    "The big sister on the floor above has such a good physique. I¡¯m sure she won¡¯t mind if I take a bit of her stuff. If she really does, I still have dumb-dumb dad and silly-silly mom to help me gloss over the matter. Mm. I¡¯m sure nothing bad will happen."


    One couldn¡¯t be sure if the little girl was scheming or merely speaking aloud to herself, but she immediately started to absorb the energy with no restraint after some thought.


    The change in the blood moon stream couldn¡¯t possibly have escaped the attention of Greem and Alice.


    Alice was the host of the ceremony. Naturally, she had the clearest sense of the changes happening to the blood moon energy she was guiding. Alice raised her head and looked doubtfully into the horizon the moment the little girl started stealing the blood moon radiance. She then turned and looked toward the location of the girl.


    After some thought, Alice chose not to take any direct action!


    The other one to sense the changes besides Alice was Greem. As the owner of the tower, he was the most sensitive to all energy flows within it.


    Greem immediately discovered the abnormality when the blood moon energy split off. He flew into a rage.


    To think that someone dared to intervene in a magic ceremony that he was protecting!


    Greem would be furious beyond belief if this interrupted the ceremony and caused Mary to fail!


    Greem suppressed his emotions and had his Spirit follow the energy flow. He passed through the walls of the tower, made it past magical defenses, and quickly locked onto the strange little girl.


    Who was she? Why hadn¡¯t he seen her before?


    The question had just arisen in Greem¡¯s mind when he immediately understood the situation thanks to the Chip¡¯s reminder.


    It was Eva¡¯s room, and Greem knew this girl as well, for he was the one who helped her deliver the child. However, ordinarily, the baby girl that Eva gave birth to should only be four to five months old. Yet this girl was clearly four to five years old.


    If it weren¡¯t for the soul flux and mental consciousness information recorded by the Chip matching with the girl, Greem would have suspected the baby girl being swapped with another person while he was away from the tower.


    What shocked Greem even more was the fact that the girl already possessed the Spirit of a pseudo-adept.


    To possess pseudo-adept level Spirit a mere four to five months after birth! How shocking was this girl¡¯s talent!


    Though the girl was odd, she was still Gargamel and Eva¡¯s daughter.


    Greem understood this and had no choice but to suppress his anger. He used his authority as the tower¡¯s owner to cut off the blood moon energy that the girl had redirected toward herself.


    "Little person, did your parents not tell you it¡¯s bad to take someone else¡¯s stuff?" Greem¡¯s cold spiritual pressure was remotely projected into the soul of the girl, "It¡¯s only a warning this time! If there¡¯s a next time, you can be sure I will punish you."


    A Second Grade adept¡¯s spiritual pressure couldn¡¯t possibly be something that a five-year-old girl could endure! Even as talented as she was, there was no way she could square off against a powerful Second Grade. Just the aftershock of Greem¡¯s Spirit was too much for her.


    The little girl was jolted into tears. She immediately fell to the ground on her butt.


    Eva sensed the disturbance in her room and quickly hurried back from the banquet hall on the second level. She hugged her child the moment she entered the room.


    "Emelia, my sweetheart, my baby, what happened? Did some jerk bully you?" The anxious and protective Eva didn¡¯t mind her words at all. Greem felt speechless as he watched with his mental consciousness in the room.


    "Eva, keep a close eye on your kid! She already interrupted Mary¡¯s Blood Moon Prayer ceremony earlier... Hm? It seems the ceremony¡¯s concluded. We will talk about this matter at ater time." Greem¡¯s mental consciousness hurriedly left halfway through the conversation.


    The frightened little girl Emelia pouted and mumbled to herself as shey in her mother¡¯s embrace, "I just took a little bit, and he came chasing over. What a scrooge."


    However, the little girl¡¯s expression had been changed into a terrified one when Eva lifted her up to look at her.


    Eva had wanted to scold her a little, but she could only shake her head, sigh and start consoling her baby.

 Chapter 566 Clan Prospect

    Chapter 566 n Prospect


    Mary had advanced!


    Greem returned to the banquet before it ended and delivered such good news to everyone.


    Thus, the already lively hall erupted into even more celebration.


    A newly established rising n now simultaneously possessed two Second Grade adepts, with another Second Grade dragonborn and Third Grade thunder dragon that could be deployed with themand of the n Leader, Greem. What did it mean for a new n? It meant that the Crimson n was already at the top of the many small-sized adept ns located in the Zhentarim area upon its establishment. The fundamental power of the Crimson n was almost enough to catch up with mid-sized ns.


    However, every single one of those mid-sized ns had undergone hundreds of years of turmoil and risked the extermination of their organization to possess the stable status that they currently held. Yet, now, a new n that had appeared suddenly possessed power that was not much behind theirs. How were they supposed to feel about this?!


    However, Greem¡¯s Crimson n was clearly still inferior to established ns when it came to umted resources.


    Most of these ns had already rooted themselves in their territories. They possessed ancestralnds and plenty of resources. Even the asional failure wouldn¡¯t matter too much. These ns could still reestablish themselves and return to their position as institutions of power as long as they were given enough time.


    On the other hand, Greem¡¯s Crimson n had no n assets to speak of. They had no vast hereditarynds or resource sites scattered across their territory either. The Crimson n had no other properties or resources in Zhentarim apart from Fire Throne itself.


    It was like a massive but rootless tree. It might look tall, mighty and sturdy, but it couldn¡¯t endure any sort of disaster or turmoil. It would be virtually impossible for the n to turn the table around if they were beaten down by wind or wave!


    There was no other choice but tounch n wars if the Crimson wanted to expand their territory and umte resources within the Zhentarim area where many adept ns established themselves. How many wars could the Crimson n afford to fight with its current wealth?


    All these questions that didn¡¯t require consideration had all be questions that Greem, the n leader, needed to think about and solve.


    It wasn¡¯t much of a problem for the Crimson n¡¯s current forces to stay within Fire Throne for the moment. However, expanding outward was unavoidable if they wanted to continue developing and growing.


    In the future, apprentices would have trial locations for apprentices and adepts would have trial locations for adepts. All of this required the support of vast n territories. Moreover, once the n had grown in scale, the provision of essential resources had to follow suit as well. It was unrealistic to buy every single resource that the n needed from outside. Greem wouldn¡¯t be able to afford such extravagance even if he had a mountain of magical crystals to spare.


    The magical experiments of both adepts and apprentices alike requiredrge quantities of resources on a regr basis.


    The rare resources could be purchased from outside, but they couldn¡¯t go so far as to buyrge amounts of essential supplies, could they? As such, finding suitable locations for the construction of resource sites and using them to cultivaterge quantities ofmon resources and materials was the mostmonly seen model of development for an ordinary adept n.


    Greem felt a genuine joy fill his heart as he looked upon the flushed red faces of the wildly celebrating adepts and apprentices. Yet, his heart suddenly felt a lot heavier as well.


    The Zhentarim area wasrge and had abundant resources. Furthermore, there was no fearsomelyrge organization like the three major adept forces located here. That was why it was the first choice for all adepts who wanted to found their own n.


    The number of adepts that passed through Zhentarim each year was as numerous as carp in rivers; it was uncountable. There was nock of talent or ingenuity among this crowd, and small ns and organizations were as plentiful as there were stars in the sky. However, only a select few could genuinely nt their roots in Zhentarim and continue to grow and develop.


    Zhentarim was arge ce with vastnds. However, after tens of thousands of years of history, every single mountain and hill in Zhentarim had an owner. On the surface, they all appeared to belong to certain human nobles or wealthy merchants. However, if one unraveled all the middlemen, they would find the real owners to be some established adept n.


    Touching any piece ofnd would provoke the full might of an established n, causing them to strike back in retaliation. If one sought peace, they would have no choice but to establish themselves in unupied areas at the edge of Zhentarim, much like Greem had.


    However, in doing so, another problem was created. There might no longer be any established ns that merited concern, but the bacsh from the ck Forest was no mere matter than any ordinary n could deal with.


    No new n could endure the perpetual exhaustion of resources of a drawn-out battle with the wild magical creatures if they failed to properly excavate the ores and biological resources promptly. Once the n was weakened to a certain degree, there were certain ¡¯vulturous creatures¡¯ that would show up and devour the n in a single bite.


    The established adept ns also relied on such methods to continue growing!


    If Greem wanted to grow the n ording to the usual flow of development, he needed to spend a hundred years time at this stage to cross paths with those established ns, using pure military might to im thends the n required from their hands slowly.


    This process couldn¡¯t be rushed. It needed to be done slowly and procedurally. It was very easy to provoke intervention from the Zhentarim Association or allied counterattacks from the established ns if too many unnecessary wars were waged.


    Consequently, a hundred years was already considered a short frame of time!


    Greem would need at least two to three hundred years of political grinding if he didn¡¯t want to take any risks.


    Once they possessed n territories, they would own the space needed to set up resource sites.


    The territories of most ns were obtained through n wars. As such, it was unlikely for the territories to be well-connected, making it difficult for a secure and defensible defensive line to be constructed along all theirnds.


    Every territory and resource site had to be defended by sufficient adepts, separate from the necessary staff and apprentices. Otherwise, any wandering adept that walked by could cause devastating damage to the n¡¯s assets.


    Insufficient adepts and apprentices would make it difficult to sustain operations, even if the n possessed vastnds and numerous assets.


    Greem was riding on the waves of his intimidating victory over the Viks and with Fire Throne sealed deep underground, he didn¡¯t need to worry about intervention from a foreign force.


    It was the perfect time to establish the Crimson n!


    Greem estimated he couldy low for another six months. Any more time beyond that and the outside world would no longer be able to suppress their curiosity. People would start probing the Crimson n to figure out their real strength.


    Greem had to smooth out the internal hierarchy and confirm the future direction of the n within these six months. More importantly, he needed to squeeze out sufficient resources and benefits from the Goblin ne he now owned. He had to turn it into one of the cornerstones that supported the rise of the Crimson n.


    Thunder Dragon Arms had already left Fire Throne and returned to Lance. When he left, he transferred Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s soul contract to Greem, as he had promised.


    Thus, Greem now held in his hands the soul contracts of a Second Grade dragonborn and a Third Grade brain monster.


    Greem had confidence in fending off a siege for extended periods of time with the help of these two hidden subordinates, even if it was a Fourth Grade adept that he was dealing with. The strength and stability of Fire Throne meant that the Crimson n had a root that no one could remove from the earth.


    As long as this root remained, the Crimson n would see a day where they rose to prominence once again, regardless of what great cmities they faced on the outside.


    Thunder Dragon Arms had already be a strategic ally of Greem. It was the Dragon Pledge Stone he got from the knight¡¯s ne that allowed for the establishment of this rtionship.


    It was the Dragon¡¯s Pact that the Fourth Grade green dragon had signed with the human king to obtain his trust.


    To avoid the green dragons being bound to the cause of the humans, the green dragon leader had yed a little trick when signing the contract. Naturally, the green dragons were one party involved in the agreement. However, the other party involved in the contract was not the human royal bloodline, but the owner of the gemstone.


    The human king back then was entirely under the surveince of the green dragons. If anything too troublesome urred, the green dragon leader needed only give an order, and his subordinates would immediately snatch the gemstone. The pledge stone would then no longer possess any binding power over the green dragons.


    However, no one had expected Greem to forcibly take the Dragon Pledge Stone for himself under the eyes of so many dragons.


    It became arge matter of concern for the green dragons.


    If Greem found any green dragon tribe with the gemstone in hand, he would have the right to request that the dragons help him in his battles.


    Fortunately, there were thousands of millions of nar worlds out there, and the green dragons were only a tiny branch of the emerald dragons. The chances of Greem running into any green dragons upon leaving the Knight¡¯s ne were close to zero. That was why the green dragon leader hadn¡¯t impatiently tried to go looking for Greem.


    This Dragon Pledge Stone didn¡¯t hold much significance to Greem. At the very best, it could allow him to learn some arcane knowledge rted to the green dragons. However, this gemstone had far more significance in the hands of Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms.


    Greem might not be able to find the green dragons, but this didn¡¯t mean Arms couldn¡¯t.


    If Arms could offer this Dragon Pledge Stone to the great Dragon God, he was sure to be blessed with rewards. If Arms went to visit the green dragons with this gemstone, he might be able to ckmail them into giving him some treasure and precious items.


    In the best case scenario, Arms could run into green dragon branches living in abject conditions and use this gemstone to take them under his wing, instantly turning them into his subordinates and dragon soldiers.


    After all, such dragon pledges were exceptionally valuable to any higher dragons. It shouldn¡¯t be easily leaked to the outside world. More importantly, the dragons could not go against the pledges they had made.


    Consequently, the Dragon Pledge Stone that meant nothing to Greem was like a free dragon summoning tool for Third Grade Arms. As long as Arms was able to catch wind of the locations of any green dragon tribes, he could run over with his gemstone and would most likely be greeted with a pleasant surprise!


    That was why the Third Grade thunder dragon agreed to be Greem¡¯s ally without a second thought the moment he was shown the pledge gemstone. The two of them signed an agreement of mutual battle aid.

 Chapter 567 Plane Benefit

    Chapter 567 ne Benefit


    An agreement of mutual battle aid wasn¡¯t the same as a contract of very and servitude.


    The former only promised aid in ordinary battles, while thetter was a magical contract bound by thews of the world itself.


    The difference between the two was vast!


    ording to the pledge, Greem would have to pay Armsrge sums of magical crystals and resources every time he summoned him to his aid. Moreover, as a higher dragon, Arms had the right to refuse to participate in battles that were too dangerous.


    Of course, given his identity as a prisoner during the signing of the agreement, Arms very generously offered Greem a friendship price of only a hundred thousand magical crystals per summon!


    That meant Greem would lose a hundred thousand magical crystals from his purse every time he summoned the Third Grade thunder dragon.


    That wasn¡¯t even expensive!


    If one went out to listen around, being able to summon a thunder dragon that could defeat most Third Grade human adepts at the price of a hundred thousand magical crystals was a dirt cheap price to pay!


    If Marquis Haines of the Vik Family could also summon a Third Grade thunder dragon at the price of a hundred thousand magical crystals, there was no doubt he would generously summon four or five such dragons and use their sheer barbaric force to raze Greem¡¯s tower.


    However, Haines had no such ability. As such, his family was hit with a catastrophic disaster. Only one other Second Grade vampire, Toril, had managed to return to the family, apart from Haines himself. The other eleven First Grade vampires had all fallen in Fire Cave.


    It was almost a lethal blow to the Vik family!


    In fact, it had even caused the Viks to fall from one of the top small-sized families to the bottom of the ranks. They had now be a sweet piece of fresh meat in the eyes of other adept ns.


    Haines would have to pull back his defensive line if he wanted to protect the Vik Family. The family members stationed across the territories would have to be recalled back to Bloodcastle, and what remained of their power had to be consolidated. It was the only way to stop the enemies who had set their eyes upon the family.


    However, in doing so, the five or six hundred years the Vik family had spent to obtain thend they currently had would have been for nothing.


    Of course, it was also possible that the Viks had been secretly cultivating some taboo forces in the shadows. These means were very likely to be prematurely forced to the surface now.


    Greem paid no heed to these matters from the safety of being underground.


    He was using this rare period away from the public eye to boldly decide upon the future structure of the Crimson n.


    The most rudimentary step was already present. The members of the Crimson n could be divided into core members, official members, and peripheral members.


    Core members were yed by those veteran adepts who had followed Greem for a long time and whose loyalty had been verified to some extent. As of now, this list only consisted of five people¨C Greem, Mary, Alice, Gargamel, and Meryl. Official members would include adepts that had signed individual contracts of service with the n. For example, Billis, Zacha, Forest Spirit Eva, Deserra, Medusa Dana, Manticore Leader Charon, Brain Monster Gazlowe, and Tigule.


    The peripheral members, on the other hand, were talented individuals who chose to serve the Crimson n in some aspects but didn¡¯t fully belong to the n itself. For instance, Poison Witch Endor, Goblin Snox, Alice¡¯s subordinates Sofia and Snowlotus, Thunder Dragon Arms, Three-Headed Demonhound Unguja, etc.


    All future adepts who came to join the Crimson n as it grew in influence would be ssified as peripheral members. Only those with exceptional performance or those with verified loyalty could be promoted to be official members.


    Naturally, since Greem went to great lengths to ssify the n members and sort out their respective roles, the resources and treatment that each received would differ ordingly.


    That was something that Greem had aplished by referring to the basic structure andmonly-used techniques employed by most adept ns. Finally, he had managed to create the rudimentary hierarchy for the Crimson n.


    As the Crimson n didn¡¯t have any n assets to speak of yet, most adepts were busy with their training or magic research. There weren¡¯t too many n missions that could be assigned to them.


    Moreover, the Goblin ne they had just conquered had yet to bepletely excavated. Thus, the only mission for the Crimson n at this point was to invest most of their adept resources into the Goblin ne and strive to squeeze their first bucket of gold from the nar war.


    Mary had just advanced to Second Grade. She badly needed to stay in Fire Throne to stabilize her Spirit. As such, Greem handed the defensive authority of the tower over to Mary and proceeded to travel to the Goblin ne with most of the other adepts.


    In all honesty, this the first time most of the adepts of the tower had heard of this lesser ne owned by the n. That was why almost all of them were teleported to the Goblin ne in a shocked and stunned state.


    Their first impression of the Goblin ne was terrible!


    The rtively weaker Deserra was practically choking when he came out of the teleportation array. The ¡¯powerful¡¯ ne suppression and almost suffocating low-magic environment left him half-dead. In contrast, Dana and Charon were magical creatures and had excellent Physique. Their ability to adapt to the environment of another world was far superior to the human adepts.


    Bug Adept Billis, who Greem had left here as a representative, had been stationed at the excavation site. He ¡¯cooperated¡¯ with brain monster Gazlowe to dig out the remains of the Capital of Steel.


    The information Billis sent back showed that dozens of tons of metal products andponents were being dug out of the thousand meter pit on a daily basis. So far, two of the smaller warehouses of the Capital of Steel have been excavated, and plenty of rare ores and resources had been retrieved.


    These were all being transported out of the pit. At the moment, they badly needed manpower to sort and organize these resources and turn them into supplies that the n required.


    Greem thought for a moment and decided to leave this tedious work to Deserra and Dana.


    Both of them hadn¡¯t participated in the ne war; they had no contributions. Thus, they could only rece that with hard work. That was the only way that they would be qualified for a share of the Goblin ne¡¯s resources and benefits in the future.


    Apart from the excavation site, Greem had also left Adept Meryl behind on the Goblin ne with a task of her own.


    With Snox and Tigule¡¯s help over the past month, Meryl had practically scoured the entire Goblin ne. She did a rough count of all the resources, materials, and wealth in the Goblin ne, sorting them by their categories¨C nts, animals, ores, and many more.


    Amongst them, over three thousand and seven hundred types of the precious ore resources had been counted, with two hundred and fifty thousand different types of flora, a hundred an ten thousand types of fauna, fifty-eight types of edible crops, over one thousand and two hundred of various fruits...


    The Goblin Empire had never undertaken a massive ne resource census of this scale.


    Meryl had no choice but to have the goblin governors of each massive province report the situation of the resources in their territories. Meryl then filtered through the information and presented to Greem this list of resources.


    Even Greem and his Chip, with its rapid scans, took seven days to record this massive list of resources that took up an entire room.


    Greem then performed aparison of the resources of the Goblin ne and the World of Adepts with his remaining time, picking those resources with the highest price difference.


    Most of the ores and living beings in the Goblin ne had no elementium traits due to the ne¡¯s nature as a low-magic world. However, the unique environment also gave birth to some novel products.


    The metals refined in the Goblin ne were often much tougher and harder than those in the World of Adepts. Moreover, they had some unique physical traits of their own. It was certain that these metals would sell for a decent price in the World of Adepts.


    Moreover, the goblin alchemists were exceptionally adept at bncing the various physical traits of the different metals, forging them into unique alloys. These were resources that the World of Adepts sorelycked, and their prices on the market were very attractive.


    The cost of teleporting between the nes was still as high as before. Exporting basic resources was still an impractical business. However, there was revenue to be sought in the sale of such rare resources. In fact, there were plenty of benefits to be gained.


    Thus, Greem made up his mind and gathered together all the adepts. He had them find the most precious and most valuable items out of this vast list of resources.


    Once the resources were selected, he needed to send adepts to investigate the ce of origin of these resources with the goblins as guides. They would then have to ascertain the reserves of these resources and the possibility of increasing the scale of nting or excavating them.


    Those that were too rare or too difficult to cultivate were scratched off, leaving only those that were easily grown or nted. When it was necessary, the adepts would even use magical means to find out new ways to cultivate these resources on arger scale.


    This tremendous amount of work made every adept of the Crimson n extremely busy.


    Still, everyone worked with vigor and all they had, attracted by the bright and brilliant future before them.


    In all honesty, one would be able to obtain ten times and even a hundred times the return as long as they were willing to put in the effort!


    By the time good news came from the excavation site, the resource census of the adepts had concluded. An initial list of twenty-five valuable metals, seventeen precious nts, and one hundred and three rare resources not found in the World of Adepts had been drawn up.


    The goblin royalty sent out experts to various areas under Greem¡¯s insistence. They were to discuss therge-scale cultivation and excavation of these resources with the goblin governors and merchant leaders throughout the continent.


    Greem had sent n adepts to almost every single goblin province to prevent the goblins from cking off on their job. The adepts were to monitor the follow-up performance of the goblins.


    Greem hastily rushed to the excavation site after handing all the work to his subordinates.


    There had finally been news of the nar door that Greem had been expecting!

 Chapter 568 Eve of the Planar Invasion

    Chapter 568 Eve of the nar Invasion


    Greem saw the remains of the excavated nar Door inside arge leather tent.


    One could vaguely see the silhouette of the metal arch¡¯s door standing in the center of the tent. It gave all visitors an oppressive feeling of might.


    Scaffolds and metal tforms had already been constructed in front of and behind the metal door. Countless goblin technicians and engineers were busy working on the thing, climbing up and down. Arge pile of ¡¯garbage¡¯ had also umted in the corner of the tent. Several goblins were working on top of the pile with bamboo baskets on their backs. They were carefully picking out all the metal pieces in the debris that seemed like they could belong to the metal arch.


    These metal shards came in all sizes. Therge ones were asrge as a goblin, while the smaller ones could be as tiny as a fingernail. Once these pieces had been carefully picked out of the pile, they would be sent to the goblin engineers, who would use their experience to determine whether the shard belonged to the nar Door and where it originally belonged.


    Greem stood at the edge of the busy work site. Blue light shed in his eyes, and he instantly understood the condition of the nar Door.


    The upper half of the metal arch door was where the damage was most significant. Over 78% of theponents there were visibly missing. Inparison, the two foundations of the arch door were still basically intact. However, the surface of the metal was cracked and dented all over the ce. Its formerly strange patterns were now unrecognizable.


    The fearsome spatial storm created by the explosion of the massive space furnace had also ravaged the area the nar Door resided. Fortunately, the nar Door was protected by a forcefield, allowing it to weather the initial period of the storm where it was the most ferocious. It was the massive faults in the ground and the copse of the underground space that had caused the nar Door to malfunction and its structure to be crushed and damaged.


    Now that it was being cautiously excavated and restored by the goblins, the metal arch door was once again showing to the world its proud, mighty, and mysterious appearance.


    Excavation site overseer Bug Adept Billis had arrived here with Greem. The few goblins responsible for the other workers in the excavation site hesitated and didn¡¯t dare to walk near the adepts. It seemed they were terrified of Billis.


    It wasn¡¯t until Greem extended a hand and called for them that a goblin in a delicate military uniform loudly reported the progress of the nar Door¡¯s restoration.


    Fortunately, the nar Door wasn¡¯t too severely damaged. It was missing approximately 64% of its metalponents, along with 57% of its goblin runes. This goblin estimated that the metal door could be restored to 84% of its previous state if they scoured the entire underground space and filtered out all the metalponents that could be found.


    The other 17% had either been dragged into a different ne by the space storm or simply vaporized; it was impossible to retrieve these pieces. They would have to reforge these missing parts if they wanted toplete the reconstruction of the door.


    This task would only take twelve to fifteen days for the goblins and their exceptional skill at engineering and metallurgy.


    With Brain Monster Gazlowe on their side, the goblin runes on the door were no problem either. After all, Gazlowe was the one who had personally created this door. Itbined the knowledge of the dragons, magic runes, and goblin technology. All of this information was saved in Gazowe¡¯s sizeable mind.


    The Third Grade thunder dragon had still refused to reveal the secret knowledge of the dragons and any information about the Lance ne he grew up in, even when faced with Greem¡¯s threat on his life and promises of wealth.


    Arms also took the effort to wipe away all memories of the coordinates of the Lance ne in Zacha¡¯s soul when he transferred the soul contract to Greem.


    Thus, Greem had no choice but to ce his hopes on this nar Door and brain monster Gazlowe himself.


    In all honesty, even Thunder Dragon Arms didn¡¯t expect the nar Door to survive through that terrifying explosion. More importantly, Brain Monster Gazlowe was still alive.


    Greem could do anything he wanted with the presence of Gazlowe at his side. Even if the nar Door had been utterly destroyed without a trace, Gazlowe could help them recreate a nar Door within six or seven months. However, now that they had ready-made remains of the metal arch, the entire timeline of the project could be shortened to a single month. That would also be the day upon which Greem and Gazlowe were toplete their joint construction of the first magic generator furnace.


    Gazlowe had invested all his efforts to create the Queyras Alloy in the past, especially in light of the severeck of magical metals in the Goblin ne. Now that he had Greem¡¯s support, tens of tons of magical alloys andrge amounts of special metals with excellent magical resistance were transported over from the World of Adepts.


    It was such backing that allowed Brain Monster Gazlowe to optimize and improve the design of the magic generator furnace with his thousand-time amplified calcting abilities.


    When you added to the consideration the creation of the magic spring by the explosion, there was no doubt that the efficiency of this new magic generator furnace would be increased by more than ten times.


    A more powerful magic generator furnace doubtlessly warranted support from a stronger magical alloy. These days, Gazlowe spent his days in a small alchemicalb in the flying vessel he controlled. He was constantly experimenting with new magical alloy materials.


    Gazlowe¡¯s estimated time for thepletion of the magic generator furnace forged with the newest materials coincided with thepletion of the restoration of the nar Door.


    Gazlowe, after weaponizing himself with the magic generator furnace, could immediately use the nar Door tounch an invasion on the Lance ne where Arms lived.


    And this was going to be Greem¡¯s third nar invasion!


    ............


    One monthter.


    Arge group of goblin engineers had been transported to the excavation site. This ce once again turned into a bustling city of machines.


    All sorts of metal of various shapes were dug out of the ground and piled up by the side. The more brilliant metal ingots, on the other hand, had been sent here from therge provinces of the goblins. Apart from this, the engineers and the magical machines formed a neat line and rows, creating a mechanical army that numbered over several tens of thousands of individuals.


    All sorts of factories unique to the goblins such as the smelter, the construction machine factory, and thebat magical machine assembling factory could be seen even further away in the distance.


    All resources and equipment had been prepared. Everyone was only waiting for thepletion of the towering, ten-meter tall giant metal arch door.


    This initially battered door seemed to have been turned into a new one after a month¡¯s worth of restoration and polishing. Countless strange runes hovered about the surface of the metal door that shed with a ghostly blue metallic shine.


    These strange patterns were not meaningless cosmetic decorations. They were goblin rune technology that the Brain Monster Gazlowe had created through merging the essence of the three civilizations¡¯ knowledge.


    However, the protagonist of today was not the cold metal door, but the flying vessel hovering high above in the air.


    The adepts of the Crimson n were all gathered in the center of the field, assessing the bottom of the flying vessel as it slowly lowered its height.


    The floating vessel finally stopped once it was a mere hundred meters away from the ground. Instead, a hole silently opened in the bottom of the ship. A five-meter long, three-meter wide, and three-meter tall irregr metallic product slowly drifted out from the ship and slowly fell downward.


    The magic generator furnace!


    All the adepts felt their hearts pound when they saw the increasingly close metal product. The excitement in their hearts was indescribable.


    Don¡¯t look down on the furnace simply because of its mediocre size. It had terrifying energy capacity and endurancepared to the elementium altars of the adept towers.


    The current numbers showed that the magic generator furnace was continually absorbing magic energy from space at a hundred times the rate of Fire Throne. That made the furnace almost equal in efficiency to Alice¡¯s Tower of Fate. The magic energy power that the furnace could output would instantly be the sum total of the output of all the origin towers of the witches put together if it as paired with that legendary magic spring.


    When that happened, one only had to attach sufficiently powerful magical facilities and magic energy weapons to the furnace. Who could defend against a reckless bombardment then from the furnace then?


    All adept¡¯s towers were fixed upon specific leyline nodes. Moving the towers by even an inch was difficult. However, the magic generator furnace could be liberally transnted to any war machine, including the giant flying vessel flying in the ship right now.


    A flying vessel that could travel throughout the world. This was the true reason why Greem was willing to do everything in his power to help Gazlowe construct an uber-magic generator furnace.


    "Where¡¯s the brain monster?" Meryl couldn¡¯t help but curiously ask her teacher. She couldn¡¯t find Gazlowe¡¯s figure no matter how she looked around.


    Greem didn¡¯t reply. Instead, he pointed at the magic generator furnace with his finger.


    Meryl once again closed her eyes to sense her surroundings. It was now that she vaguely sensed Gazlowe¡¯s mental consciousness flux within the iparably violent magic energies inside the magic generator furnace.


    "He fitted himself into the magic generator furnace." Meryl¡¯s pretty eyes openedrger andrger. She didn¡¯t dare believe her own senses.


    The brain monster had been asrge as a hill thest time she saw it. How did it manage topress itself into a tiny ball and squeeze its way into the furnace?


    Meryl couldn¡¯t help but start fantasizing, and bloody scenes of carnage were quickly conjured up in her mind.


    "It¡¯s not as terrifying as you think," A trace of a smile appeared on Greem¡¯s youthful and handsome face as if he had already seen through Meryl¡¯s thoughts, "Gazlowe created a clone for himself and transferred most of his actual consciousness into that clone. The clone¡¯s only the size of an ordinary human¡¯s brain. It¡¯s a perfect fit to be installed within the magic generator furnace."


    Greem then changed the subject, his eyes moving to the flying vessel above.


    "Gazlowe had put his main brain in the furnace three days ago. The secondary brain he left outside started growing and swelling without restraint ever since. Currently," Greem paused for a moment, "Its new brain has almost taken up all the remaining space in the flying vessel."


    "It¡¯s that big already?" Meryl raised her head to look at the giant ship that was taking up most of her vision. She betrayed an expression of disgust.


    "I have already discussed with him. The massive underground space left behind from the excavation won¡¯t be backfilled. Rather, it will be protected as the secondary brain¡¯s depositary. At any rate, the outside is enveloped in radiation dust that won¡¯t be dispersing any time soon. Ordinary creatures have no chance of making it here. It is the most suitable ce for the brain to grow!"


    Meryl looked around her.


    A massive underground space that measured twenty to thirty kilometers in diameter and several thousands of meters in depth had been formed here after the excavation had concluded. The brain monster intended to use this ce as the shelter for its secondary brain. How big did it mean to grow exactly?


    Meryl felt goosebumps rise all over her body.


    As expected, none of these fellows were normal!

 Chapter 569 Freedom and Death

    Chapter 569 Freedom and Death


    Greem nodded at the adepts around him when the magic generator furnace finallynded on the ground.


    The next second, all the adepts started chanting. The channeling array that had been carved beneath their feet ahead of time began to light up,yer byyer, as they connected and synchronized with another mysterious array a thousand meters underground.


    Greem floated above the channeling arrays and made a waving motion with his hand. The massive and heavy magic generator furnace slowly floated before him.


    "Let¡¯s go in!"


    Greem ced his hand below the magic generator furnace and kept it suspended in the air as he brought it with him into the channeling array.


    The next second, they appeared a thousand meters underground.


    What floated before them was the magic spring that had now almost concentrated into a stone ball.


    After two months of ¡¯nourishment,¡¯ the magic energy within the magic spring had reached such density that it was almost solid. A light magic mist lingered around the stone ball, allowing all nearby magical lifeforms to feel the plentiful aura of energy that pressed against their faces.


    Brain Monster Gazlowe no longer hid his existence once they reached here.


    The magic generator furnace trembled slightly as Gazlowe¡¯s Spirit poured out from within like a tsunami. His Spirit quickly scattered the stone ball like a whale swallowing the world itself. It then extended into the slowly spinning space vortex of the magic spring.


    Brain Monster Gazlowe was a mysterious lifeform that had undergone mutation, after all. It had nobat ability apart from some simple mental powers. The magic generator furnace and the space vortex started trembling intensely at the same time when his Spirit started to tangle with the energy.


    "It¡¯s done. You can start now." Gazlow had projected most of his mental powers into resisting the energy space. He barely managed to split off a trace of his mind to maintain a mental connection with Greem.


    Gazlowe would never have been able to move this energy space a single inch with only his own knowledge and ability. One could even say that most native creatures of the various nar worlds could not move these wild magic springs. Only the powerful World of Adepts possessed the necessary magical knowledge and technique from their countless invasions and conquering of lower nes.


    That was why Brain Monster Gazlowe had to ask for help from Second Grade Greem when he wanted to transfer the magic spring into his new body, even though he possessed Third Grade power himself.


    As such, Brain Monster Greem tried his best to seep his Spirit into the energy space while silently waiting for Greem to make his move.


    As the strange mumbling of chantspleted, a massive and mysterious array appeared on the ground beneath the magic spring. Countless magical lines and magical runes appeared one after another. In almost a single instant, they had turned this massive pit into a sea of light and radiance.


    The singrity fixed at the core of the energy space suddenly spurted out numerous energy particles under the effects of the runic array. These particles turned into a violent stream that corroded everything in their path, causing the alreadyrge cave to be even broader.


    Gazlowe was hiding within the magic generator furnace. He was protected on the outside by a special magical alloy with tremendous toughness and magical malleability. Naturally, he wouldn¡¯t be damaged at all. Greem had also propped upyers of Fire Shields. It was like a fireworks performance when the energy particles crashed against his shields.


    Singrities had no substance. They were only a mysterious spatial node that connected the ne space with the outer space. Ordinary creatures couldn¡¯t even touch them, much less pluck them away as if they were gemstones.


    However, as an adept, Greem was able to purchase an expensively priced mysterious array rted to magic springs from the Silver Union. The magic principles and techniques within the array were too difficult to properly analyze, even with Greem¡¯s current reserve of knowledge. He could only act ording to the instructions and use his Spirit to push the mysterious array into functioning.


    Still, this expensive array had an effect.


    The unmoving singrity started to slowly float toward the magic generator furnace under the guidance of the array, as the energy particles continued to spew out of it.


    As expected! It worked!


    Both Greem and Gazlowe let out a silent sigh of relief.


    Greem¡¯s Spirit suddenly spiked when he saw the singrity close in on the furnace. He instantly transformed into the me Fiend.


    A fearsome me Fiend seven meters in height and forged of fire and magma appeared in the cave.


    The next second, a fire rune that concentrated part of Greem¡¯s soul brand suddenly appeared. It floated toward Gazlowe¡¯s central brain along with the singrity.


    "What...what are you doing?"


    Gazlowe couldn¡¯t help but start shouting when he saw Greem do this at this crucial moment of the assimtion of the furnace and the singrity.


    "You are Third Grade. I am Second Grade. You will have assimted both the magic generator furnace and the singrity by the time this is over. Your power is sure to rise exponentially. I can¡¯t guarantee that the soul contract I¡¯ve ced within you before this can still bind you. So," The transformed Greem bent his body and put on a ¡¯gentle¡¯ smile on his zing face, "Either you ept this new soul brand, or you die here; you choose!"


    Brain Monster Gazlowe fell silent.


    The Second Grade fire adept wasn¡¯t just threatening him here. Gazlowe could sense a few ¡¯guests¡¯ forcibly boarding the flying vessel above. Included among them was that Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha.


    Given the circumstances, it was obvious that both sides would start attacking him if he didn¡¯t agree to Greem¡¯s request. The adepts would try to exterminate him.


    He might have a be a high grade when he turned into the Third Grade brain monster. However, he possessed nobat ability. He needed to rely on an assimted metal body and magical machines to fight with anyone.


    The fire adept had instilled continuously within him the various benefits of possessing the magic generator furnace before this. He had even advised Gazlowe to maintain his mental powers at their peak state before assimting the magic generator furnace and the singrity, and avoid owning too many magical machine bodies.


    It was only at this moment that Gazlow understood the opponent¡¯s intentions.


    Even if he wanted to resist at this moment, he didn¡¯t pose much of a threat with that flying ship outside. That ship had been stripped of most of its magic energy weapons.


    Moreso, the opponent had wholly understood all of his weakness and strengths during this period of interaction. They would exterminate him with a blitzing strike if they ever needed to. They wouldn¡¯t leave him with any chance of splitting his brain and escaping.


    Gazlowe felt even more furious and humiliated when he understood all this.


    He was a Third Grade lifeform, yet he had so utterly fallen into the scheme of a group of small Second Grade adepts. He could only close his eyes and wait to be enved now. This...this upsetting feeling made him want to go berserk!


    Gazlowe¡¯s feelings became even moreplicated as he saw the quickly approaching singrity and fire rune.


    One was something that he couldn¡¯t wait to possess, and another was something he couldn¡¯t want even more to destroy.


    He could instantly destroy a magic rune like this that imprinted directly upon the soul. All he needed was a beam of mental power. Yet, he could only watch as the rune slowly floated toward him and merged with the soul consciousness of his central brain.


    Every time Gazlowe mustered the courage to resist his fate of envement and started to gather his mental powers, the thought of his own body being torn to pieces by the violent spells of the adept would appear in his mind.


    He might be a true Third Grade brain monster now, but in the end, he still inherited the origin of his soul from a cowardly and weak goblin.


    Neither of the two choices of extreme power and the loss of freedom couldpete with Gazlowe¡¯s fear of death, even when they had arrived before him.


    He had tried countless times to gather the courage and had imagined many ns of escape. However, the 93% death rate made Gazlowe only capable of watching time pass by until the fire rune and the singritypletely merged with himself.


    When the singrity merged with his mental consciousness, and the core area of the magic generator furnace finally started to stabilize, a surge of space energy more violent and more powerful than thest sted outward, repeatedly eroding the rock walls of the underground cave.


    Countless specks of energy particles corrupted and turned everything around the cave into glowing energy crystals. The thickness and density of these energy crystalyers were quickly increasing as the particle stream intensified.


    Greem scanned with his Spirit, and the notifications from the Chip shocked him.


    The massive cave had only been affected by the magic generator furnace for a single minute, yet the rockyers and earth around it had started to show signs of turning into magical stones. ording to the Chip¡¯s calctions, this magic generator furnace could produce three hundred magical crystals on a daily basis, even if it wasn¡¯t used for any other purpose.


    That meant three thousand magical stones!


    Inparison, Greem¡¯s Fire Throne could only manage eight magical crystals or fifteen fire crystals a day, even if most of the magical facilities had been shut down. The elementium altar in the energy room of Fire Throne was disposable trash whenpared to the magic generator furnace. Its returns were so meager they were hardly worth mentioning.


    Gazlow could feel the boundless energy coursing through his ¡¯body¡¯. However, he couldn¡¯t feel happy when he sensed the contract of very that had utterly assimted with his soul.


    "Go up!" Greem¡¯s attitude toward Gazlowe improved tremendously when he saw how obedient the brain monster was being, "There¡¯s still plenty of food left up there for you."


    Perhaps because Gazlowe wanted to vent the anger growing within him with a violent and forceful act, the magic generator furnace trembled and shot upward without Greem¡¯s help.


    It continued to shoot out energy as it floated up.


    After all, Gazlowe only had a magic generator furnace heart right now. He didn¡¯t have a body that belonged to him yet. As such, 99% of the energy had nowhere to go and could only shoot outward in a disorderly fashion in the form of energy particle streams.


    Finally, Brain Monster Gazlowe descended upon the crowd with his own unique way as the adepts and goblins on the surface looked on!

 Chapter 570 Metal Giant

    Chapter 570 Metal Giant


    A terrifying cluster of energy storms rose from underground before the eyes of everyone.


    Even though the adepts already knew Gazlowe was hiding within that storm, they couldn¡¯t sense his exact position through thatyer of chaotic and violent energy, even after using all the means at their disposal.


    While the adepts were silently marveling at the wonder of Gazlowe after assimting with the magic generator furnace, the goblins on the outside were watching this former greatest goblin of the world with a zealous fervor.


    He was the smartest goblin in the world and the ¡¯god¡¯ of the goblins!


    He had stepped past the grade threshold that no goblin had ever seeded oveing, bing the first Third Grade ¡¯goblin¡¯ of the multiverse. It was true that Gazlowe looked far too different from a goblin now, but he had still been a goblin once upon a time, hadn¡¯t he?


    All the goblins kneeled on the ground withplicated emotions in their hearts. They kowtowed and paid their respects to this God of the Goblins that had brought them both endless suffering and endless hope!


    The power of ¡¯god¡¯ continued to increase, and the god¡¯s will was starting to move.


    Hopefully, the strengthened Goblin God coulde back and protect the poor goblins from the cruel envement of the adepts.


    Gazlowe could urately sense the spiritual and emotional change in every lifeform present with his enhanced mental powers, except for the adepts, who were shielded by their life forcefield.


    The anger in Gazlowe¡¯s heart started burning intensely when he remembered that his power had been obtained at the price of forever losing his freedom.


    His mental consciousness was attached to the stream of energy particles and started to corrupt every inch of space and every piece ofnd in this world along with it. His mental consciousness could practically pierce through all substance, both tangible and intangible, thanks to the highly prative effect of the energy particles.


    Neither dirt, stone, wood, or metal could stop Gazlowe¡¯s mental consciousness from infiltrating and sensing.


    At this moment, everything in this world was transparent before his eyes. No secret in the world could hide from his spiritual senses.


    The violent energy that the magic generator furnace continually extracted from outer space became his greatest weapon, as well as the best carrier for his mental consciousness.


    A blindingly bright light shone in the eye of the energy storm that was continuing to spread outwards. The next moment, tens of thousands of energy particles with Gazlowe¡¯s will attached to them shot out in every direction like gusts of violent winds.


    They pierced through earth, stone, metal, and wood; no substance could stop their furious advance, and no lifeform could stop the particles from prating through their body.


    Even the Crimson adepts felt an unknown pressure on their souls. They had no choice but to gather together and prop upyers of strange spells that defended against soul and mental attacks.


    The spirit was supposed to be intangible, and the soul had no fixed shape.


    Yet individuals like Gazlowe, who could merge their intangible mental consciousness with the tangible energy particles, could create their own unique Spirit Light.


    The Spirit Lights were like beams of pure white radiance. They freely turned and twisted about in the air, constantly seeping into every metal ingot and every machine in the excavation site. Gazlowe¡¯s mental consciousness started to be omnipresent and omnipotent as the energy particle streams continued to bombard and infiltrate into various substances.


    These formerly dead and inorganic metal ingots became as soft and moldable as y when controlled by a powerful force. The giant hills of metal by the side of the camp were mostly bits of the Steel Capital that had been dug out from underground. Some of them were also metal ingots that had been transported here from the outside.


    It didn¡¯t matter where the metal came from now. All of it started to distort and twist into a metal dough. The pieces twisted into each other and blended, forming into multiplerger and heavier pieces of shapeable metal. Strangeponents that resembled tentacles and robotic legs started to extend from within the masses of metal. These metal pieces slowly closed in and became stuck to each other.


    Like a drop of liquid merging into a more substantial drop of liquid, these balls of metal started to meet with each other, joining together to form an even more humongous and fearsome metallic creation.


    It wasn¡¯t just the mountain of metal that was being affected. Even the construction machines and magical machines of the excavation site were starting to activate under the control of Gazlowe¡¯s mental consciousness. Plenty of goblin technicians also suddenly ran out of the alchemy factories, the engineering factories, and the magical machine assembly lines at the edge of the camp.


    Those massive metal factories abruptly grew robotic legs and climbed towards the pit like giant beasts.


    For a moment, the twisted and morphing bodies of metallic creations could be seen all over the camp.


    They twisted and morphed as they slowly gathered together using all sorts of strange means. They pieced together to form even more bizarre and unique metal creations.


    Metal spiders, metal beetles, metal wolves, metal slimes, and many other strange creations whose actual forms couldn¡¯t be identified.


    The lifeless metal pieces would bend and shift into odd objects that no one recognized. However, the construction machines andbat machines, as well as therge factories, all had fixed shapes already. They couldn¡¯t be wasted in such a manner. They kept their original form as, bit by bit, the other metal creations started to merge with them.


    A small drop of water became arge drop of water, which turned into a stream, and the stream ultimately became a towering metal giant. It had a head, a body, and four limbs. The surface of its body was uneven, and one could see the signs of the metal spliced into its body.


    Still, this two hundred and seventeen-meter tall metal giant finally appeared before everyone.


    Once the metal giant had formed, Gazlowe drove the magic generator furnace toward its broad chest. As the furnace got closer, a ck hole appeared in the chest that drew the furnace into the metal giant.


    A short momentter, the magic generator furnace had been connected to the internal energy cirction system of the metal giant. The dead colossus promptly sprang to life.


    Violent magic energy coursed through the body of the metal giant, activating one goblin factory after another located within it. COnstruction andbat machines repeatedly lit up. The entire surface of the giant gleamed with a ghostly light unique to magical metals and an intangible soul forcefield formed around it.


    As that immense energy flowed through the metal giant, its rough body that had been cobbled together from pieces of metal started to turn even finer. Bumps began to appear on its rough round head. Distinct facial features could now be seen on it.


    Even though these things were only appearances and had no impact on the metal giant¡¯s functions or powers, it made it looked a lot better on the eyes.


    One couldn¡¯t be certain if it were an intentional or unintentional act, but the face of the metal giant was fairly simr to Greem¡¯s.


    However, the metal giant was just too big. Even Greem was no taller than its lips if the two werepared.


    The Crimson adepts gathered together and started talking amongst themselves.


    The giant before them wasrge enough. The question was¨C how were its defense and offense?


    Greem had also flown out of the ground now. He slowlynded by the other adepts.


    "Deserra, you try attacking it!" Greem gave an order.


    As the disciple of Meryl and the grand-disciple of Greem, Deserra was an elementium adept with wind affinity. It had been no more than seven years since he had advanced to adept level.


    Deserra was a quiet person that didn¡¯t enjoy too much social interaction. As such, he didn¡¯t stand out amongst Greem¡¯s faction and didn¡¯t have too much of a presence. However, his existence represented the legacy of the Crimson n. That was why Greem had also started paying attention to him recently.


    "Understood, n Leader."


    Deserra was a conservative adept that liked to do things by the rules. He always wore a formic smile on his pale face, and his body revealed a trace of sickliness. His behavior was elegant, but not superficial. One look and anyone could tell he was the ssic noble adept that came from a noble family.


    Deserra¡¯s entire body glowed with light when Greem looked at him with his elementium sight. Not a single equipment slot where Deserra could equip something was empty. It was apparent that he was a reasonably wealthy adept.


    Deserra took off of the ground after being called by Greem. He hovered in midair, the magical equipment on his body lighting up in order, providing him with plenty of enhancing and amplifying status effects.


    He extended both of his hands, and several wind vortices started to gather between his palms before forming into a single sharp wind de.


    Theck of elementium in the Goblin ne caused Deserra to require seven entire seconds to bring the wind de to its strongest level.


    Deserra then let out a battle cry as the sharp wind vortex shot out of his hand. It traversed a hundred meters in an instant and crashed upon the soul forcefield of the metal giant.


    Some slight ripples appeared on the intangible soul forcefield, and Deserra¡¯s attack was quickly neutralized.


    Eighty-five points!


    The Chip immediately provided Greem with the strength of that attack.


    Considering this was the Goblin ne, and Deserra was a newly-advanced adept, an attack of this strength was alreadymendable. If this were the World of Adepts, that attack would probably have reached over a hundred points of damage!


    Even back in the past, with all the optimization from the Chip and the explosiveness of his fire spells, Greem¡¯s spells had only reached a peak of one hundred and five points.


    As such, Deserra¡¯s research into wind spells was still fairly decent in contrast!


    Deserra¡¯s attack might not have broken through the metal giant¡¯s soul forcefield, but it had attracted Gazlowe¡¯s attention.


    The metal giant bent its body slightly and turned its head toward Deserra. The pair of eyes that gleamed like searchlights shone toward Deserra.


    A First Grade adept could hardly break through the defense of the metal giant controlled by Gazlowe, but what about a Second Grade?


    Greem waved his hand, and a Magma Fireball the size of a human head instantly appeared in his palm. It continued to increase in strength as it absorbed the fire elementium around them.


    The fireball immediately drew the metal giant¡¯s gaze.


    "Gazlowe, don¡¯t move. I want to try this out."


    Greemmunicated with Gazlowe and then proceeded to push with his hand. The Magma Fireball in his palm cut across the sky like a streaking meteor and crashed against the soul forcefield.


    Sparks flew everywhere, andva sshed across the ce!


    One half of the metal giant was engulfed in that massive st of fire.

 Chapter 571 Otherworldly Metal Base

    Chapter 571 Otherworldly Metal Base


    Two hundred and eighty-six points!


    The Chip revealed that the power at the core of the Magma Fireball¡¯s explosion reached two hundred and eighty-six points!


    The elementium might of any casual spell from Greem had been wildly increasing ever since he had advanced to Second Grade, despite the fact that he hadn¡¯t particrly taken any time to research and strengthen his fire spells.


    The same Magma Fireball differed by two to three times when cast by a First Grade and a Second Grade.


    Greem¡¯s current magic power was so powerful that a direct hit with his Magma Fireball would instantly exterminate a newly advanced adept that had all their defensive spells activated.


    Take Adept Deserra for example. He had advanced to adept for seven years already, spending all his time between then and now doing magical experiments or spell practice. Yet, he had only mastered two defensive spells¨C Wind Barrier and Wildwinds Bulwark.


    The former was focused on defense and could provide the caster with one hundred and fifty points of wind elemental protection, along with forty points of physical defense. Thetter possessed both offensive and defensive properties. It could provide the caster with one hundred and twenty points of wind elemental protection and ny points of physical defense. Moreover, the spell could also direct the enemy¡¯s motions and offset their melee attacks.


    Both spells could only defend against an instance of a two hundred and seventy point attack, even when added together. Moreover, it leaned more toward wind-attribute defense.


    If the enemy¡¯s instantaneous damage couldn¡¯t reach this level, then both defenses covering for each other could allow the adept to be untouched by the enemy¡¯s attack. Moreover, the adept could take advantage of the interval between attacks to allow their defenses to somewhat recover by injecting more magic power into the spells.


    That was the main reason why individual magical defenses could keep adepts safely out of harm, despite how low their protection often was!


    However, when faced with someone like Greem, whose explosive damage was above the limits of bothyers of defenses, there could only be one oue. The magical defenses would shatter, and the adept would have to endure the remaining magic attack damage.


    That spillover damage would be nothing if it were someone like Medusa Dana or Manticore Leader Charon, as they had their powerful magical creature Physique. They could easily endure that little bit of damage and wouldn¡¯t be too badly wounded. However, the weak bodies of human adepts were greatly known as their most significant w.


    Without their magical protections, even an elementium attack of twenty points could cause lethal and devastating damage.


    Moreover, all this estimation had to consider the traits of the elementium in question.


    Deserra¡¯s two defensive spells were of the wind attribute. As such, they could only have the best opposing effect against wind-attribute attacks. If the opponent used assaults of other elements, then the Wind Barrier and the Wildwinds Bulwark¡¯s defenses would be significantly discounted.


    With all these factors present, Greem¡¯s two hundred and eighty-six point Magma Fireball could exterminate Deserra in a single shot!


    However, such a fireball only caused the metal giant¡¯s soul forcefield to tremble intensely. It couldn¡¯t make it break. Also, once the me shockwaves disappeared, Gazlowe directed his mental force into the shield, and the fragile forcefield turned stable once again.


    [Beep. Detecting spiritual-type defensive forcefield. Elementium defensive strength: three hundred and twenty points. No physical defense ability.]


    The numbers from the Chip rang out in Greem¡¯s mind.


    The existence of the defensive forcefield rendered it impossible for Greem to see into the metal giant¡¯s construction and its basic defensive abilities. However, the Chip could still estimate the opponent¡¯s approximate defense through the destruction caused by the attack earlier.


    A forcefield defense of three hundred and twenty points was honestly a little too low for a Third Grade monster.


    However, considering the fact that Gazlowe had just gained control of this body, and that this forcefield was an omnidirectional, domain-type defense, this was an eptable defensive power.


    "Gazlow, how many points can your attacks go up to?"


    Greem still needed to understand the opponent¡¯s offensive powers, now that the defenses had been tested.


    The metal giant¡¯s five-meter-thick right arm reached outward when it heard Greem ask this question. A ck cannon barrel, three meters in diameter, abruptly appeared at its palm. The next second, energy pulsed forth from the magic generator furnace, sending fearsome power into the right arm through special pipes.


    A blindingly intense blue light instantly shrouded the ck barrel.


    !


    A terrifying blue lightning chain shot out of the barrel amid the crackling of electricity. The lightning arc sted a steep mountain¡¯s peak two and a half kilometers away from here.


    The destructive elementium lightning erupted, instantly shattering the mountain peak into pebbles. Everything within the core area enveloped by the lightning st was instantly vaporized, be it stone or rock. Only parts of the mountain peak that remained at the edge of the st radius managed to survive the explosion.


    Electric attacks were the fastest amongst all elementium attacks. Furthermore, they often brought with them lightning shockwaves that caused paralysis. However, the shockwaves didn¡¯t have much of an effect on the non-conductive mountain peak, apart from sending more rocks flying down the mountain.


    The mountain peak had been like a cake towering high in the air. It now looked as if someone had bitten off the middle portion of the cake. The summit could hardly support the weight from above any longer. Finally, after a dozen seconds, the remaining bits of the mountain peak slowly copsed before everyone¡¯s eyes.


    Even though there was a distance of two and a half kilometers between here and there, the intense quake from the copsing peak and the massive pir of dust created by it still stunned the goblins and the adepts.


    They might not be able to estimate the strength of that attack from the metal giant, but the Chip in Greem¡¯s mind could urately calcte its power.


    Eight hundred and fifty-three points!


    That was a terrifying degree of power that made even Greem speechless!


    In the World of Adepts, the power of a First Grade adept was ordinarily below two hundred points. If one were to be brutally honest, most adepts couldn¡¯t even go past one hundred and fifty points with their spells. Only those at the peak of First Grade and who were prepared to advance to Second Grade at any time had a possibility of going above one hundred and fifty points.


    The strength of a Second Grade adept¡¯s attacks were often between two hundred to four hundred points. Only those exceptionally powerful Second Grade adepts could possibly reach beyond the threshold of four hundred.


    Third Grade adepts, on the other hand, had offensive power of between three hundred to a thousand points. The difference in development direction and the difference in the degree of development would cause shocking disparity inbat ability. Powerful individuals at this level were often two to three times more powerful than their peers of the same grade.


    As for attacks above a thousand points? That was overbearing might reserved only for Fourth Grade adepts!


    However, statistics like these didn¡¯t take into consideration plenty of other factors. For instance, thebat techniques that the adepts possessed, the environment of the battle, their condition, and the matter of the intangible Fate. That was why statistics could only be statistics. There was no determined oue for two adepts of simr statistics engaging inbat. Who would win, who would lose, who would live, and who would die. All of these things were affected by the unique circumstances and environmental factors. There was no absolute certainty of victory or defeat.


    However, even the most potentbat technique and means of murder were useless before absolute statistical advantage.


    It didn¡¯t matter how much more experienced Greem was atbat; there was no chance of survival if he was hit by that metal giant¡¯s eight hundred and fifty-three point electric st.


    Fortunately, some information that the Chip sent to Greem allowed him to let out a sigh of relief.


    The metal giant that Gazlowe was controlling required at least three to five seconds to gather energy to fire a thunderst like the one before. Moreover, the pose and light from preparing the shot were extremely obvious.


    Greem would only need to avoid the barrel of the cannon if and when he found the metal giant charging up, and he would be able to escape the st of death. However, even Greem, with all the defenses he possessed, would not escape from death if he were restrained to the spot for some reason.


    Eight hundred and fifty-three points!


    This amount of power was enough to pierce through all of Greem¡¯s magical defenses and utterly vaporize him.


    Greem wouldn¡¯t be able to endure such a horrifying electric st even if he transformed into the me Fiend.


    The metal giant slowly lowered its right arm after that thunderous attack. The metal arm was glowing red after all that intense energy had passed through it. Smoke could be seening out of the arm.


    It was clear that the metal giant couldn¡¯t fire such a violent attack consecutively. Moreover, it needed to perform some extent of repair and maintenance to parts of its body before it could fire the next shot.


    This discovery caused Greem to lower his head in contemtion.


    "Gazlowe, I remember you attacking me from the flying shipst time. That attack was far more terrifying than this one. It had reached one thousand points of power. Why is it this weak this time?" Greem startedmunicating with Gazlowe using Password of the Mind.


    "Master, I need to obtain stronger magical alloy if I want to fire a stronger attack. The materials used in creating this body were far too ordinary. If I charge for more than five seconds, the magic energy cannon within me will disintegrate before I could attack." Brain Monster Gazlowe seemed to have understood his status and his identity. He became honest like never before.


    "Apart from energy attacks, what other powers do you have?"


    "Master, apart from the two massive magic energy cannons within my body, there are also a hundred ordinary magic energy cannons, one thousand arcanite rifles, one hundred high-radiation methrowers, one thousand goblin rockets. These are the most basic weapon units.


    "Apart from those, I also have one hundred and thirty-six construction machines and six hundred and seventy-twobat magical machines within my body. These are the most basicbat units.


    "Furthermore, I carry within my body two simple goblin factories that can create simple goblin weapons, two metal ore smelting factories that can smelt metal ores into required metalponents, and one magical machine construction factory that can produce magical machines as long as there is a supply of magical alloys. Currently, fifteen basic magical machines can be produced on a daily basis.


    "However, it is difficult to maintain the functions of these metal factories while inbat mode. I need to find a suitable area to transform myself into defense mode before I can obtain the required energy and space to put the factories into motion."


    Combat mode, defense mode.


    Greem, who had traveled here from Earth, was instantly reminded of something back from long ago. The strange image of the Mobile Construction Vehicles of Red Alert surfaced in his mind.


    Fold it together, and it turns into a towering metal giant. Spread it out, and it turns into an extremely well-defended metal fortress. It was the mobile base that he had always dreamed of!

 Chapter 572 A Difficult Journey

    Chapter 572 A Difficult Journey


    The Lance ne.


    It was an exceedingly beautiful small ne.


    The entire ne wasposed of stretches of swamps, hills, ins, forests, volcanoes, and vast seas.


    In terms of area alone, Lance was two times the size of the Goblin ne.


    The biological resources here were plentiful, and the reserves of metal and ores were shockingly high.


    Moreover, the reserves of magical crystals and resources of Lance were many times that of the Goblin ne due to its nature as a high-magic ne.


    The most populous and widely found tribe across the vast ne were the trolls, who had all sorts of various tribal branches.


    Trolls were a fearsomebative species who averaged seven feet tall (approximately two meters) and two hundred pounds (approximately ny kilograms) in weight. They possessedrge skeletal structures and had remarkably developed muscr strength. They were skilled at using poisoned javelins and spears and possessed all sorts of desirable racial abilities such as berserking, regeneration, beast ying abilities, and proficiency in throwing weapons.


    Voodoo doctors with strange voodoo abilities would even be born in somerge troll tribes. They wielded some of the more primal arts of herbalism and voodoo magic.


    The trolls had been the rightful rulers of Lance before they were faced with a terrifying invasion. In fact, at the peak of their history, the trolls had even established an utterly vast Troll Empire.


    Unfortunately, all of this came to a screeching halt in the 1207th Year of the Voodoo Calendar.


    The history of the trolls¡¯ rule had ended when a massive flight of dragons arrived, soaring in the blue skies.


    The dragon allied army quickly destroyed the capital of the trolls and ughtered their army.


    The massive Troll Empire instantly fell apart and was split into hundreds of territories of various sizes. The dragons obtained differentnds depending on their grade and power. Fourth Grade dragons could imnds over a million kilometers in size as their territory, while Third Grade dragons could only takends of a hundred thousand kilometers.


    Dragons of even lower grades could only own one or two viges or arge troll tribe as theirnd, living the life of a lord served by a horde of servants.


    The Dragon Lords intentionally cultivated a group of dragon descendants with a native bloodline upon conquering the ne¨C the Dragonborn. It was to suppress the resistance of the trolls.


    The dragonborn hid within the pces and dragon dens they had created with all their hoarded wealth and gemstones, while the order within their territory was maintained by the dragonborn servants who possessed their bloodline.


    These dragonborn were the loyal servants of their dragon lords. They were usually responsible for taking care of the daily lives of the dragon lords within the pces and the dens, but they would asionally leave thends to retrieve the offerings and contributions of the troll tribes.


    Small-scale troll resistance and riots wouldn¡¯t even need to alert the dragon lords. The dragonborn had an immense individual strength and possessed elementium powers granted by their dragon bloodline. These disturbances were often settled by a small number of dragonborn warriors and scouts.


    As such, the hierarchy in Lance had turned into a food chain where the dragon lords ruled from high above, the dragonborn were the middle ss, and the trolls were the ones being exploited by the upper levels. As for the other tribes that were even weaker than the trolls? They became the target of exploitation and robbery by the trolls themselves.


    The dragon lords only ever ventured out to y, or just chose to stay at home to sleep. They never thought about the spreading of the dragon civilization. That was why the local natives were still living lives as rough, uneducated, starving, and freezing primitive people, even after a thousand years of the dragons¡¯ rule.


    Not a single ce in Lance could feel the warmth of civilization!


    The Year 1723, Month 4, Day 11 of the Draconic Calendar.


    It was a mysterious day that was fated never to be forgotten by people.


    Arge light door of teleportation slowly opened in a vast swamp that stretched for tens of thousands of kilometers.


    Silhouettes shed in front of the door, and the faint figure of a tall person slowly became clear.


    The man was half-man and half-dragon. His upper body looked like an adult male in golden bronze armor. The man held an electric spear in his hand. His lower half had four thick limbs covered with bright blue scales, and terrifying dragon ws rested at the end of each leg.


    The dragonborn dragged a thick, slightly t dragon¡¯s tail along the ground behind it. Beautiful and tough scales covered the tail as well.


    Here in Lance, the Dragonborn practically represented rulers who murdered and robbed as they wished.


    A First Grade dragonborn could easily use his powerful body and fearsome elementium powers to ughter a primitive tribe of over a few hundred trolls. A Second Grade dragonborn like Zacha could be worshipped as a messenger of the dragons, even if he went torge troll tribes of over tens of thousands in poption.


    As such, the vulturous beasts and hunters hiding in the nearby waters quickly fled in fear when they saw Zacha¡¯s easily recognizable dragonborn body.


    The one thing that native tribes like these feared the most was the sight of a dragon messenger.


    The arrival of a dragon messenger meant that the wealth of the tribe that had been umted over the past year, and even the past few years, would all go to waste. These dragonborn messengers were often excessively muscr but mentally simplistic creatures. They had no objective concept of numbers.


    They would randomly walk about the territory, forcing any tribe they met to give up all their resources: food, metal ores, magic gemstones, mysterious treasures. The amount they had to hand over? It would just be any random number that the dragonborn came up with.


    If it was only something like five hundred kilograms of various jerkies, then the tribe being extorted might still be able to cough it up if they tightened their belts. However, if the messenger simply said something like five hundred kilograms of magic gemstones, the tribe would be in deep trouble. They would never be able to amass such a terrifying sum, even if they smashed their pots and sold them as scrap metal.


    As such, appealing to the dragon messengers became the only way for a tribe to continue living. Killing a dragon messenger and rebelling against the tyranny of the dragons was a thought that had best remain only in their minds. If someone couldn¡¯t suppress their emotions and struck a messenger, then what awaited them would be the full force extermination and genocide of the dragonborn army.


    Zacha quickly scouted the area as he moved through the humid swamp with his heavy footsteps.


    Zacha¡¯s every step in the silt where rotting matter resided would cause dirt and pungent ck water to ssh in every direction. ck puddles and a persistent fog was visible everywhere.


    Everything slightly further away in the distance was all cloaked in a thin veil of mist, making it hard to see clearly.


    The genuinely rxing feeling of returning to the ne he came from made Zacha incredibly happy. However, he felt his heart weigh heavy when he remembered the task he bore upon his shoulders. It felt as if walking became that much harder.


    No traitors had ever appeared amongst the dragonborn, who saw loyalty as the only creed in their lives. They would sooner lose their lives than lose their pride and glory as dragonborn.


    Yet, as a dragonborn ve subordinate to Thunder Dragon Lord Arms, he had been given away by his master to a human adept. This unprecedented event made Zacha remarkably lost and confused.


    Who was it that he was supposed to be loyal to?


    The dragon lord that had bestowed upon him his bloodline? Or the human adept that possessed his soul contract?


    Zacha¡¯s soul was lost!


    He was thinking, searching for an answer.


    Before he coulde to an answer, his new master had sent him back to his home that he had been thinking of, even in his dreams.


    Zacha felt a sense of rxation and ease as he took in the pungent air of the swamp, even though it was apletely different environment from Lord Arms¡¯nds.


    Zacha allowed his feelings to run free for a moment before finally returning to the teleportation door with heavy footsteps. He sent out an ¡¯all clear¡¯ signal to the door ording to the n.


    Fifteen minutester, ripples appeared on the door of light, so much so that it seemed almost like the sea itself. An iparably massive metal monster huddled up and squeezed itself out of the narrow teleportation space.


    The size of the metal monster was still far, far, far too big for the ten-meter tall teleportation door.


    It had already tried its best topress its body, even going as far as to distort its metal body into a metal monster that resembled a soft squid. It was still this difficult and painful to go through the door of light.


    Its massive body would split apart the nar space if he used just a bit too much strength, causing violent spatial gusts to appear.


    Several shing spatial shards gathered around the metal monster, continually devouring its metal body. Some of the more substantial spatial rifts roamed about, dicing the thick metal shell of the metal monster to pieces wherever it went. The metal didn¡¯t evenst a single second.


    However, despite the difficulty of the journey, the metal monster was still squeezing its way into Lance without any hesitation.


    The metal monster took an entire three hours before finally emerging from that cracking teleportation door. Zacha had been keeping guard and making sure no enemies would interrupt the process.


    This barbaric action had also caused indescribable damage to the metal monster.


    Just the parts sliced up and devoured by the spatial rifts took up over 31% of its body.


    The teleportation door finally shattered into bright spots of light and vanished the moment the metal monster dragged its damaged body out of the gate.


    The next second, Gazlowe, Greem, Endor, Billis, Deserra, Dana, and the other adepts all grunted in unison, even as they remained hidden within the metal monster. They all felt the endless hostility from this world.


    The nar suppression descended upon them without another word!


    Lance was small in terms of area. It was a ssic small-sized ne among the tens of thousands of nar worlds. However, the magic aura here was extremely lively. It was apparent that it had a high-magic environment.


    The dragons had probably taken much care to change the narws of this world upon conquering it. They had created a nearly perfect backyard for the dragons. Otherwise, Lance would never have had such a powerful magical aura with its world level.


    As the main offense sent by the Crimson n to Lance, all the adepts including Gazlowe were severely weakened. They were almost incapable of providing anybat support before they slowly adapted to the narws here.


    However, the metal body that Brain Monster Gazlowe controlled was not amongst the list of those affected by nar suppression.


    After quickly retrieving some metal shards that could still be used, the metal monster walked into the mist and toward the southwest with Zacha in the lead.

 Chapter 573 Stonetalon Mountains

    Chapter 573 Stalon Mountains


    "This should be the legendary Swamp of Sorrows!"


    "If we go north from here, we should arrive at the Dragon Mountains in five day¡¯s time. That¡¯s where the den of Third Grade Dragon Lord Ugern is located."


    "If we go east, we will arrive in Fourth Grade Dragon Lord Ihuarraquax¡¯snd in eleven days."


    "If we go south, we will reach Third Grade Dragon Lord Cozarta¡¯snd in eight days."


    "The reason we have been walking southwest is that the Dragon Lords to the west and south of the Swamp of Sorrows are all either Second Grade or Third Grade. Their overall strength is much weaker than those of the other directions."


    At this moment, the metal monster had already transformed into the appearance of a spider golem under Gazlowe¡¯s control. The spider golem dashed toward the southwest of the Swamp of Sorrows with its heavy footsteps, creating a pond with every single step it made.


    The massive metal spider had provoked countless swamp species and native magical creatures along the way.


    They were all chasing behind the metal spider or lunging and biting at its three-meter-thick metal limbs.


    Under Greem¡¯s strict orders, Gazlowe did not retaliate against these foolish lower lifeforms. He merely continued to walk down the path, passing through the dens and shelters of countless swamp creatures.


    With the help of Zacha, thends that the metal spider passed through were all unowned wildnds. That prevented the adept vanguards from prematurely provoking enemies that were too powerful for them to deal with.


    The metal spider didn¡¯t start a ughter, and in doing so, avoided inciting panic among the various intelligent lifeforms they had passed by.


    Those lifeforms might be utterly confused at this massive metal monster passing by their tribes, but they wouldn¡¯t go reporting to their Dragon Lords in a wild panic if it didn¡¯t show any hostility toward them.


    This, too, was clearly a means to buy more time for the vanguard!


    The adepts and Zacha could naturally hide on the high metal back of the metal spider as it transported them across the swamp. They rested and waited for their powers to recover while passionately discussing their following ns.


    Lance was an infinitely stronger higher-ne whenpared to the Goblin ne. Greem and the others mighte from an even more terrifying World of Adepts, but the Crimson n were only a small-sized adept n established no more than thirteen days ago, after all. It was delusional to dream of devouring Lance in a single bite.


    Disregarding everything else, any single Third Grade Dragon Lord within Lance could easily exterminate this small Crimson adept squad of Greem¡¯s. That was why Greem¡¯s boldness to break into Lance didn¡¯te from his adept subordinates but from Brain Monster Gazlowe.


    No. More specifically, it came from the metal fortress and the magical machine army under Gazlowe¡¯s control!


    Dering war against the dragons the moment they arrived was a suicidal act that couldn¡¯t be any more idiotic. Greem would never do such a thing. Instead, he was trying to keep as low a profile as possible.


    As the vanguard of the Crimson n, their mission this time wasn¡¯t to conquer any territory or capture any dragons. Rather, it was to live!


    Greem would never have stepped foot upon Lance if it were a unified ne with a strict and effective hierarchy. It was an honest talk with Zacha that revealed to Greem the structure of authority. That was what made him decide to take the risk of venturing into the den of the dragons.


    Lance was a feudal ne with loose hierarchy. Dragon Lords of various power and strength were scattered all across the ce. Every Dragon Lord only cared for the resources and wealth within their personal territories, paying no mind to the matters outside of their borders.


    As such, the tremendous abnormality caused by the entrance of Greem¡¯s party into Lance wouldn¡¯t draw much attention. At the very worst, it would only cause a few nearby messengers of the Dragon Lords to investigate the situation. The dragons would go back to sleep the moment they discovered the ne intruders had left their territory for someone else¡¯s ce.


    As for whether the intruders would cause disasters and catastrophes in the territories of other Dragon Lords? Sincerest apologies, but that had nothing to do with them!


    The dragons would onlyugh if they saw a weakpanion of theirs fall on harsh times ande toin to them. There was no way they would leave their dens or pces to avenge theirrades. Unless the dragons possessed close blood ties or belonged to the same tribe, they would sooner hide in their dens and sleep than go out and fight when there was nothing to be gained.


    It was because he understood this strange nature of the dragons that Greem gritted his teeth and came up with this invasion n. Of course, what made hime to the final decision was still the existence of Zacha, a native of this ne.


    Without the guidance of a ne native, Greem and his party could only wander around the ce. They were done for if they ran into thends of a Fourth Grade Dragon Lord. There was no way a dragon would choose to ignore such a massive threat, regardless of howzy they were.


    Surrounded and beaten down by a Fourth Grade dragon and their horde of dragonborn; that imagery alone sent shivers down Greem¡¯s spine!


    Gazlowe¡¯s metal fortress could hold back a Fourth Grade dragon with no problem, while the massive magic energy cannons hidden within his body could pose a fairly decent threat. As such, Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe was an undefeatable existence within any ne, as long as logistics support was guaranteed!


    What kind of logistics support did Brain Monster Gazlowe require?


    First and foremost was arge amount of metal. An endless supply of magical metal.


    Consequently, the first thing Greem was trying to do upon his arrival wasn¡¯t to rob a dragon or to find a spot to hide. Instead, it was to rush straight toward the closest mountain with rich metal reserves with Zacha leading the way.


    Stalon Mountains.


    It was a vast stretch of mountains located thirty-six thousand kilometers southwest of the Swamp of Sorrows. This ce was famed for the richness of its metal ore reserves, even in the entire western area of Lance.


    It was only a Second Grade Dragon Lord that lived here in Stalon Mountains.


    Greem and his adepts wouldn¡¯t fear such a small fry, even if they didn¡¯t have the metal monster with them.


    nning before acting, and Greem¡¯s intense desire for increasing his powers, was what drove him to this trip!


    ............


    Stalon Mountains.


    This area was a massive stretch of mountains that reached as far as five hundred kilometers.


    As the geography here was steep, and the mountains dangerous, it was rare to see anyone here.


    If one stood at the top of a twin-peaked mountain and looked into the distance, they would only see the tremendous Stalon Mountains extending ever further into the horizon. Amazingly sharp cliffs could be seen everywhere. Vast coniferous forests covered the entire ce, and all sorts of strange birds flew between the valleys. The location was pulsing with life.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes sat upon a broad tform in front of his den, looking down upon the beautiful scene below him and waiting for news toe back from a distance.


    Two days ago, his subordinates at the edge of his territory had sent back news about an unsettlinglyrge metal monster. The monster was charging toward the Stalon Mountains with an unstoppable speed.


    They had tried to stop or force the monster to change its trajectory, but they had aplished nothing despite heavy losses.


    The dragonborn servants serving Cherkes had no option left but to muster their courage and wake up the sleeping Cherkes.


    Cherkes was infuriated when he was woken up from his sweet dreams. He devoured the First Grade dragonborn that had woken him up before being appeased and willing to listen to what the others had to say. Of course, what awaited him was impossibly lousy news!


    For the past two days, Cherkes had mustered all the native tribes within his territory. These tribes threw themselves at the metal monster, one after another, in hopes of stopping the progress of the metal monster. Sadly, apart from defeat after defeat, not a single good news came back to Cherkes.


    The severity of the situation made it hard for even Cherkes to stay within his den peacefully. He had no choice but to pretend to remain calm while waiting here for more information.


    ording to the reports from his underlings at the borders, this metal monster had emerged from the Swamp of Sorrows. The Swamp of Sorrows was ancestralnd that belonged to another Dragon Lord. As such, Cherkes could only send his most trusted subordinate to the pce of that Dragon Lord to inquire about the origins of this monster.


    However, considering the slow andzy nature of the dragons, it wouldn¡¯t be surprising if the messenger had to wait one to two years for the Dragon Lord to wake up.


    Consequently, Cherkes couldn¡¯t ce any hope in his neighbor. He once again sent arge group of subordinates to trace the metal monster¡¯s tracks back into the Swamp of Sorrows, hoping to find out something from the natives of the swamp along the way.


    Amotion came from the edge of the mountains in the distance while Second Grade Dragon Lord Cherkes was bending his head in contemtion. Large flocks of birds took to the sky, and pained shrieks rang out from the horizon.


    Ooh... what has happened?


    A group of harpies arrived by gliding above the canopy in Cherkes¡¯ moment of uncertainty.


    Theynded at the foot of Twin Peaks and entered the dragonborn army camp situated there.


    A short momentter, the strongest warrior of the dragonborn army¨CSecond Grade Bino¨Crushed up the Twin Peaks with a few subordinates tailing behind.


    "My lord, this isn¡¯t good...this isn¡¯t good. That metal monster has already... arrived."


    Bino couldn¡¯t remain unfazed after dashing up the thousand-meter-tall peak. He panted intensely as he quickly reported the information he had received to Wind Dragon Cherkes.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes¡¯ olive eyes blinked rapidly. He turned and stared into the distance as he asked, "Is the enemy heading toward us?"


    "No, it¡¯s not," Dragonborn Bino scratched his head in frustration, "ording to the harpies, the metal monster changed direction upon entering the mountains. It¡¯s heading straight...straight for..."


    "Straight for where?"


    "Straight for Azurelode."


    Wind Dragon Cherkes was shocked!

 Chapter 574 Azurelode

    Chapter 574 Azurelode


    Azurelode.


    It was arge metal mine at the edge of Stalon Mountains.


    The cave spiders and the hill dwarfs were the ones toiling hard within the mine. They had obtained ownership of the mine from Dragon Lord Cherkes in exchange for offering a certain amount of metal ores on a consistent basis.


    It was such a rich metal reserve rested right beneath the eyes of Dragon Lord Cherkes, yet he seemed blind to its wealth. Cherkes didn¡¯t do much else with it apart from some light excavation of the metal ores to forge metal armor for his subordinate dragonborn.


    As for creating an empire of steel and exporting the valuable metal resources to other nes? Such mercantile thoughts had never appeared in the minds of the Dragon Lords.


    Back then, the reason Cherkes had agreed to the joint excavation of Azurelode by the dwarfs and the spiders was that he had his eyes set on the apanying resources of the metal reserves¨C the magical gemstones. Cherkes couldn¡¯t care less for those ck and heavy metal ores that took up so much space.


    Yet, it was these metal ores that Cherkes was never concerned about that drew him such terrifying and undefeatable enemies.


    Second Grade Wind Dragon Lord Cherkes stood proudly upon the peak of the mountain. Upon hearing the report, he gripped the edge of the stone tform with his sharp talons, bent his body, looked down upon the forest beneath, and let out a reverberating dragon¡¯s roar.


    The entire forest flew into chaos wherever the dragon¡¯s echoed.


    Countless birds and beasts emerged from their homes and fled away from the Twin Peaks without looking back. On the other hand, loud dragon roars rang out in response from the dragonborn camp at the feet of the mountain. Squads ofrge and mighty dragonborn wearing metal armor and wielding poleaxes charged out of the camp in strict formation.


    There were a hundred and two berserk dragonborn with First Grade power. These dragon warriors were already all of the strength that Wind Dragon Cherkes could assemble, disregarding the dragon messengers he had sent out to collect ¡¯taxes.¡¯


    The dragon warriors¡¯ ferocious will to battle deeply motivated this wind dragon lord.


    Cherkes might have chosen to ignore the transgression out of fear of the enemy if they were only passing through hisnds. However, there was no way he could sit still when it looked like the enemy wanted to set up camp at the edge of his home.


    Thus, Wind Dragon Cherkes looked at the ferocity of his dragonborn army and let out yet another powerful dragon¡¯s roar that shook the forests. He beat his green and gray wings hard and took to the skies with a powerful kick to the ground.


    The wind dragons were naturally the masters of the sky.


    Cherkes¡¯ ten-ton-heavy body looked idle and clumsy when he moved on the ground. However, when he took to the air,yers of semi-translucent wind barriers enveloped his body, and the terror and agility of a wind dragon were put on disy for all to see!


    Other dragons had a trace of disharmony when they turned and twisted in flight, but the wind dragons flew in the air with the agility and flexibility of a fish in water.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes dove downward before abruptly pulling up right as his massive body approached the ground. He couldn¡¯t help but let out another roar when he flew past the dragonborn army.


    The army immediately broke out into cheers.


    They raised theirrge and wicked poleaxes to pay their respects to their lord, even as they started sprinting to follow behind the wind dragon and charge toward Azurelode.


    ............


    At this moment, the metal spider had already arrived at Azurelode. It transformed into an oddly-shaped monster and entered the mine without any difficulties, even as it was showered with the throwing axes of the hill dwarfs and the poison of the cave spiders.


    The small two-meter entrance of Azurelode was clearly notrge enough for something its size to easily enter. Thus, the metal monster extended a thick metallic limb to seal the entrance. Dong! Dong! Dong! As many as thirtybat magical machines were instantly shot out into the mine.


    Countless cracks then opened up on the body of the metal monster. A barrage of bullets shot out and dealt with the trash and small fry hiding outside the cave.


    The arcanite rifles had been reforged and were now all powered by magic energy. They possessed terrifying lethality that surpassed what they had in the past.


    The fearsome metal bullets shattered and pierced everything in their way. Wood splintered and rocks split. In fact, the bullets could even cause a massive pir of dirt to rise whenever they hit the ground, leaving only deep ck holes in the ground.


    The short hill dwarfs were not wearing any decent armor. Their bodies of flesh and blood were instantly riddled with holes by the brutal gunfire, draining the life from them. The cave spiders, on the other hand, were agile leapers and ran about quickly. Ordinary rifles had a hard time killing them.


    Thus, a few more holes opened up beneath the metal monster¡¯s giant body, and several spider golems rolled out from within.


    Spiders against spiders!


    Two different spider-like creatures broke out into an intense fight in front of Azurelode.


    The cave spiders¡¯ main weapons were their sharp fangs, pointed limbs, and their acid spit. However, none of these were threatening against the spider golems made of pure metal.


    The metal spiders walked with heavy and nging footsteps, rapidly closing the distance between them and their enemies. Several metal barrels extended out of the disc-shaped protrusion on their elliptical backs. Then, beams of intense me would st toward the cave spiders.


    Charcoal spiders!


    In almost a single instance, the cave spiders defending their nests outside Azurelode had already sustained heavy losses. Most of them had been burned into ck charcoal by the hot mes.


    Gazlowe¡¯s mental voice rang out in the minds of all the adepts once he had dealt with all these pesky ¡¯trash.¡¯


    "Sit tight. I¡¯m going in."


    A dozen robotic arms with rapidly spinning drills attached to their tips emerged from the metal monster¡¯s body. A fearsome disaster befell the mountain where Azurelode was located.


    A massive hole was drilled into the mountain amidst an ear-piercing nging and the forceful pressure of the metal monster. The metal monster slowly vanished in a cloud of dust.


    A long dragon¡¯s roar suddenly rang out from the depths of Stalon mountains as the metal monster was trying its best to dig into the depths of the mine.


    A slight quake in the earth and a rumbling sound apanied the dragon¡¯s roar.


    The wind dragon and his dragonborn army had arrived!


    "You deal with them!" Greem fell silent for a moment before givingbat orders to Gazlowe, "Try not to expose the existence of us adepts if possible!"


    "I understand!" Gazlowe was much more obedient than before, "It¡¯s just a tiny Second Grade dragon anyway. I¡¯ll send it packing."


    As a Third Grade brain monster, it wasn¡¯t an exaggeration when he said such a thing.


    With the metal monster and all its hidden magic energy weapons, it was no trouble dealing with a barely adolescent Second Grade wind dragon. In fact, Gazlowe could even capture the dragon alive if the geography was suitable.


    Thus, not only did the metal monster not stop digging upon Greem¡¯s orders, it even increased its pace, as if it couldn¡¯t wait to get underground.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes flew high above Azurelode, looking down upon the mess beneath him with eyes widened in anger.


    It wasn¡¯t that he cared for these worthless mine workers. Instead, he was stunned by the absolute hostility of the enemy. It seemed the enemy had no intention of making peace with him, the Dragon Lord of thisnd. They had wrought immense destruction on the mountain the moment they arrived.


    It seemed the enemy was trying to dig into the ore veins beneath the mountain.


    A massive hole a hundred meters in diameter had already been dug out of the mountain. Over half of the metal monster itself had entered the mountain.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    Cherkes cursed furiously.


    The enemy¡¯s actions signaled one thing; they were ignoring him.


    It was undoubtedly an offense against the Dragon Lord¡¯s reputation!


    Cherkes could no longer hold back. He let out a roar, folded his wings, and dove straight down from five hundred meters in the air, his whole angr dragon body stabbing down like a sharp sword.


    The dragon hade!


    Naturally, there was no way any single one of Cherkes¡¯ actions could have escaped Gazlowe¡¯s spiritual senses.


    Gazlowe only stopped his digging when he saw the dragon dive towards him. Hemanded hisrge liquid metal body to prepare forbat.


    The production facilities carried within the metal monster were all sent into the mountain, while all the magic energy weapons were transferred to the side facing outward.


    The initially uneven metal body had now be as smooth as a mirror, melding to be one with the mountain, as if it was a metal city wall. Countless holes opened up in the wall as ck gun barrels emerged from every one of them. All the cannons and guns locked on to the approaching dragon.


    What...what was this?


    Fierce winds blew through the air.


    Cherkes¡¯ massive eyes opened wide while his body was still mid-dive. He watched the enemy¡¯s strange actions with utter confusion.


    He might not have understood what the enemy was up to, but the sharp senses of a dragon caused an indescribable feeling of death to rise from the depths of his dragon soul.


    He would most definitely die if he kept diving down like this!


    This feeling hade so suddenly that Cherkes couldn¡¯t help but doubt it for a second.


    While he was debating whether to pull up or continue descending for a dragon¡¯s breath, his sharp sight caught sight of a hundred magic-gathering points suddenly lighting up. The speed at which the magical energy was gathering, and the level of the power, left Cherkes speechless.


    The wind dragon was utterly terrified, so much so that he fell into aplete panic. The dragon beat his wings desperately, trying to change the angle of his flight.


    Dammit!


    Cherkes couldn¡¯t even finish his roar before being drowned in a blinding sea of light by the one hundred energy pirs sting into the sky.

 Chapter 575 Dragonborn Routed

    Chapter 575 Dragonborn Routed


    Cherkes felt like he was at the brink of death!


    His flexible body was covered withyers of wind barriers that helped dissipate the damage of the energy beams as he dodged and retaliated with short bursts of dragon¡¯s breaths.


    Even so, his lean body still had to endure the corrosion of the powerful energy ripples.


    A rain of one hundred energy attacks, each above a hundred points in power.


    The collision and refraction of the energy pirs in mid-air made it increasingly harder for Cherkes to dodge. There were many times when such chaotic ricochets and refractions hit him.


    The wind barrier around his body could effectively disrupt the trajectory of most of the attacks. If there were only two or three such energy attacks, the wind dragon¡¯s swift figure would allow him to escape the line of fire with a single beat of his wings.


    Sadly, Cherkes now faced the barrage of a hundred energy light pirs. The opponent clearly intended to use this area bombardment to leave him with no space to dodge or run.


    The wind barrier refracted part of the attack, and his scales defended against another part of it. However, the remaining energy shockwaves were still far beyond the limits of what a Second Grade dragon could endure.


    The flesh beneath his scales was severely corroded, and the scales themselves started to shed, revealing the charred flesh underneath. His veins had been burned, his flesh decayed, his bones embrittled, and his blood sshed everywhere.


    When Wind Dragon Cherkes emerged from the sea of light, shrieking and howling, his lithe body had already been riddled with holes. Blood and wounds were everywhere while his scales scattered across the ground. Dragon blood rained down from above, filling the air with a pungent odor.


    Large holes had also appeared on his unfurled dragon wings, making him incapable ofmanding the winds in flight as he had before.


    The simultaneous firing of a hundred magic energy cannons was no weaker than the simultaneous casting of spells by a hundred First Grade adepts.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes was Second Grade, with a dragon¡¯s body and Physique that possessed exceptional magic resistance. However, he was still reduced to this terrible state after being caught unaware by the enemy¡¯s barrage.


    He had only escaped the death trap because of the powerful abilities of the dragons. Any creature with slightly weaker magic resistance would probably have been torn apart and left without aplete corpse.


    Cherkes dragged his broken body, howling as he flew even higher upward, trying his best to escape the area engulfed by the energy beams. However, he rose a little too fast, and his slightly withered tail smashed against the wall of the cliff, sending boulders tumbling down.


    A single round!


    In just a single round, Gazlowe had used his fantastic disy of fireworks to almost cripple the wind dragon lord, forcing the dragon to escape into the distance while crying and screaming.


    Cherkes¡¯ dragonborn army had only made it through the forest at this moment. They appeared within Gazlowe¡¯s vision.


    Even though their dragon lord had already been defeated, the dragonborn army still charged toward that massive metal wall under the lead of the Second Grade dragonborn. The earth trembled under their heavy footsteps.


    The loud st of arcanite rifles rang out in the battlefield. A storm of metal bullets cut through the two hundred meter distance and crashed against the metal armor and fine scales of the dragonborn.


    Metal bullets the size of thumbs crashed against the bodies of the dragonborn, sending sparks flying into the air. Blood sshed from the unprotected arms, face, and waists of the dragonborn. The grunting of agonizing dragonborn never ceased!


    Gazlowe stopped the dragonborn warriors from pushing another inch forward with just the barrage of bullets. By the time the dragonborn took out their metal shields and prepared for their second charge, Gazlowe¡¯s magic energy cannons had already cooled down.


    A hundred fearsome cannons adjusted their angle slightly. The next second, one hundred horrifying energy beams enveloped the dragonborn army.


    The dragonborn warriors did indeed possess the strong bodies and exceptional magic resistance of the dragons. However, the level of their resistances couldn¡¯tpare to pureblooded dragons.


    Cherkes had managed to endure over a hundred of those energy beams without dying, but these dragonborn warriors weren¡¯t capable of such a feat.


    Only one barrage of the magic energy cannons, and already half of the one hundred and two First Grade dragonborn warriors, and the one Second Grade dragonmander, had died. It was a tragedy.


    However, the determination and loyalty within their nature drove them forward. The dragonborn continued their assault under the lead of their heavily woundedmander.


    The sessive firing of the magic energy cannons had caused severe damage to the energy circuits within the body of the metal monster. It quickly repaired these conduits as it opened walls to send out two hundred magical machines in a single go.


    Two hundred magical machines shed with the remnants of the dragonborn army under cover of a barrage of bullets.


    There was no need for cheering or battle cries. Both sides engaged in a battle of life and death upon contact.


    The dragonborn were individually much stronger than the magical machines. However, they weighed almost about the same.


    On the one hand, you had muscr monsters. On the other, you had robust steel creations. Both sides were fearless and were not afraid of death.


    That was why the battle immediately reached its climax the moment they shed.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Commander Bino had already gone berserk from the fighting, and his eyes were bloody red. He waved his heavy war axe, splitting apart two magical machines at the start of the battle while ignoring the multiple bleeding wounds on his body.


    The strong robotic bodies of the magical machines exploded into countlessponents and sparking parts, but there were no signs of flesh or bone.


    This discovery caused Bino¡¯s heart to sank.


    No intelligent lifeforms piloted the metal monsters they were fighting with; it was no wonder that they were so fearless in battle.


    As themander, Bino couldn¡¯t help but hesitate in this situation. He couldn¡¯t, in good conscience, allow hispanions to trade their lives for the destruction of these insentient metal monsters.


    These dragonborn were all the mixed-blood descendant of wind dragons. They could all cast Windwalk and Tornado Vortex. The battle was well underway now. One could asionally see the speed of the dragonborn suddenly increasing with a sh of white light before they split apart yet another magical machine and sentponents flying everywhere.


    However, these magical machines were allplicated to deal with. They would drag their smoldering and sparking bodies to fight the enemy as long as their remains weren¡¯tpletely disintegrated or rendered incapable ofbat. In fact, the damaged machines would even lunge at the dragonborn, slowing them down or distracting them with what remained of their arms and feet and creating opportunities for the other magical devices to attack.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the arcanite rifles firing from a distance, the zing methrowers, or even the buzzing chainsaws. All of these weapons could deal severe damage to the dragonborn, who were equipped with only rudimentary metal armor.


    There weren¡¯t that many dragonborn in the first ce, and most of them were already wounded. Even the dragonborn army, known for their ferocity in battle, could no longer hold on for much longer against the superior numbers of the magical machines.


    Dragonborn Commander Bino let out a furious roar, and thest surviving thirty dragonborn roared along with him as they let out their most powerful attack¨C Tornado Vortex. Several small vortices merged and stopped the enemy from advancing. It was only now that the dragonborn dragged their battered bodies off of the battlefield, quickly vanishing into the distant forest.


    When thest dragonborn¡¯s deste silhouette disappeared, the bloody battlefield instantly fell silent again. Only the moans of dying dragonborn remained.


    The magical machines quickly changed roles as well, turning into an army of servants and janitors as they cleaned up the battlefield.


    They were incredibly detailed and serious in their work. The machines not only sent their damagedpanions back into the body of the metal monster, but they also retrieved lost parts andponents. Gazlowe even sent out construction machines to shovel up the blood, flesh, and corpses of the dragonborn in the end.


    Apart from the basic magical machine factory, Gazlowe had also brought with him the smelting factory this time. The severely damaged magical machines could all be sent into the furnace and reforged. At the very least, he would be able to recyclerge amounts of metal and some rare resources.


    Gazlowe also made sure to retrieve all of the dragonborn, dead or alive.


    He had unexpectedly obtained some techniques from Billis with which to create flesh golems. If Gazlowe cooperated with the bug adept inbining the corpses of the dragonborn with the robotic bodies of the magical machines, there was a high possibility they could create a unique flesh magical machine.


    Even though thebat power of a flesh magical-machine couldn¡¯t possiblypare to a magical machine made of pure metal, it could significantly alleviate theck of metal ores that they were currently dealing with.


    The dragonborn had been routed after fifteen minutes of battle, leaving behind seventy of theirpanions as they did so. Over a hundred magical machines had been destroyed in exchange.


    The ratio of casualties was fair evidence that the dragonborn were still individually much more powerful than the magical machines.


    However, it took a lot to cultivate the dragonborn, from birth to their growth into eligible warriors. On the other hand, magical machines could walk off the assembly line as long as there were sufficient metal resources.


    If one were to look at it from this perspective, the magical machines were far more cost-effectivepared to the dragonborn.


    Still, it was probably time to put some thought into the weapons used by the magical machines!


    With the dragon lord and his dragonborn army expelled, there was no longer anything stopping the metal monster from obtaining the metal veins it sought.


    The metal monster continued digging downward, only stopping once it was two hundred meters away from the veins of ore.


    It then used its own unique methods to dig out an underground space of one square kilometer.


    The metal monster could finally spread out its body with this space. It transformed into the foundations, walls, and ceilings of the new metal base, turning into a vague framework for what was toe.


    Then it formed the ore crushing workshop, the ore filtering workshop, smelting workshop, the construction and repairs workshop, and the magical machine factory. All sorts of individual factories and workshops were haphazardly ced all over the new fortress, taking up every corner of the underground area.


    Several construction machines charged out of the fortress, like busy bees. They immediately started mining. Large amounts of unscreened metal ores were removed from the mineral deposits with the use of the drills and alchemical explosives before being transported into the factories.


    The magic generator furnace that Gazlowe lived in also turned into the power core of the new metal fortress. It continually sent magic energy to every facility and supported their constant activity through a thick energy pipe.


    The loud nging of the work echoed throughout every corner of this underground world.

 Chapter 576 Magical Machine Modification.

    Chapter 576 Magical Machine Modification.


    With just a single day¡¯s work, the bottom of the mountain had been constructed into a massive metal fortress.


    Rumbling mining machines weaved through the area, transporting tons of high-quality ores to the inside of the fortress. Several belts ran across the entirety of the metal fortress, first sending the rough metal ores to the ore crushing workshop.


    There, the ores of various sizes would be thrown into the rumbling ore crusher. By the time they emerged on the next belt, they would have been turned into a fine powder of the same fineness and size.


    Then, the product would undergo heavy selections and screening, filtering away all the dirt and nt remains within. What remained of the stuff would then be ore with extremely high metal content. These ores would then be assessed and checked by several robotic arms along the conveyor belt before they were sent for smelting. That was to pick out the rare metal ores and magic gemstones and ce them onto separate conveyor belts.


    The entire process of crushing, screening, picking, and transporting the ores was done by machines alone. Complete automation had already been realized.


    At the doors of the final step in the process, a magical machine would step off the assembly line every fifteen minutes, joining the ranks of Gazlowe¡¯s magical machine army.


    After so many battles, Greem and the other adepts were already utterly disinterested in these low-grade magical machines that relied on their numbers to grind away the opponent. The machines might be considered as possessing First Grade power, but they needed three to four times the numbers to best a single First Grade dragonborn in actualbat.


    Under ordinary circumstances, there would need to be at least five to ten dragonborn to pose an actual threat to a First Grade adept.


    Theseyers of disparity in power demonstrated how questionable the grade of lifeforms in lower nes could be!


    As such, the bored adepts with nothing to do naturally came together to start researching the matter of upgrading and modifying the magical machines.


    Deserra was a faithful supporter of the school of violence.


    He believed the lower magical machines to only be useless due to theirck of heavy weaponry that could threaten higher lifeforms. There was no doubt that the magical machines would be much more powerful if they could be outfitted with magic energy cannons.


    However, the amount of magic energy that a magical machine could carry was limited due to their size. If outfitted with something as consumption-heavy as magic energy cannons, they would be useless heaps of metal in a matter of two to three shots. Such magical machines couldn¡¯t stray too far from the metal fortress, regardless of how many of them could be produced. Having them was equivalent to not having any machines at all. They were impractical for actualbat scenarios.


    Endor had been spending the past few days with the voodoo doll that Greem had cultivated. She hid in her secret room and concocted all sorts of strange gues and poisons for the voodoo doll to consume. Unbelievably, just a while ago, she had managed to cause the voodoo doll to evolve and possess a strange voodoo halo of its own.


    It turned the voodoo doll into a true poison doll!


    All ordinary humans unprotected by magic would die of poison whenever they stepped into the voodoo doll¡¯s voodoo halo. They would then evolve into fearsome zombies containing gues and poisons under the effects of the strange voodoo poison.


    These zombies had unmatched strength, sharp ws, and were fearless. They also contained all sorts of gues and poisons within their bodies. In general, each of these zombies was as powerful as a beginner apprentice. They weren¡¯t all that strong, but they sufficed as cannon fodder.


    Of course, there was also a sess rate when it came to the evolution of the corpses into these zombies.


    In general, the higher the intelligence and more powerful the lifeform before its death, the higher the chances of it evolving into a zombie. With humans as an example, the basic conversion rate was around 30%, while the conversion rate for goblins was only approximately 15%.


    When Greem invaded a ne alone, just the voodoo doll itself would help him create a fearless army of zombies.


    The voodoo doll also possessed the power of a pseudo-adept after all of Endor¡¯s cultivation and experimentation. If the voodoo doll could sessfully evolve to adept-level, then the zombies it created would also increase in strength.


    However, the evolution of the voodoo doll still wasn¡¯t too stable yet. It could only maintain a close soul connection with Greem within several dozen kilometers. Only a vague sense of Greem¡¯s soul could be maintained if they went beyond fifty kilometers of each other. Consequently, Greem had no choice but to keep the voodoo doll by his side. He still couldn¡¯t use the voodoo doll as an independent entity itself.


    Going back to the modification of the magical machines, Endor came up with a far more radical suggestion.


    She had suggested that she create an even more infectious and lethal super-virus to be spread out by these low-grade magical machines to weaken the strength of the Lance natives further.


    Greem could only treat such a suggestion as empty words. He didn¡¯t dare turn them into reality.


    They were currently hiding within a mountain. The only enemy they had to deal with directly was still a single Second Grade wind dragon. If he acted ording to Endor¡¯s suggestions, there was no doubt that he would instantly offend all of the dragon lords of Lance.


    When that happened, the whole sky would be blotted out with Third and Fourth Grade dragons. The entire mountain would be flooded with fearsome dragonborn. Gazlowe would never be able to repel the massive army made by consolidating all the strength of the ne, even if he had an endless supply of metal and magic energy.


    Endor¡¯s suggestion was immediately rejected!


    Inparison, Bug Adept Billis¡¯ idea of flesh golems was far more practical.


    Flesh golems were thebination of the flesh of powerful magical lifeforms (dragonborn, in this case) with specially selected alloys. A unique magical alloy could be created from thisbination of meat and metal. This magical alloy would simultaneously possess the strong physical traits of special metals, as well as the elementium attributes of magical creatures.


    For instance, the merging of the flesh of wind dragonborn with eternium could create an entirely different magical alloy¨C Wind Indurium.


    Wind indurium was a sort of magical alloy that contained a harsh wind-elementium aura. Armor forged of wind indurium would automatically create a wind barrier when attacked, misdirecting 37% of melee attacks and 65% of long-ranged attacks.


    Magical longswords forged of wind indurium would be apanied by a Tornado Vortex with every full-power swing. Larger enemies would be trapped for three seconds by the vortex, while lighter enemies would just be blown away and stripped of the control of their body.


    Staffs made of wind indurium could also hasten the gathering of wind elementium and increase the power of wind adepts¡¯ spells. Deserra, the only wind adept of the n, couldn¡¯t stop praising this particr trait of wind indurium. He constantly talked about the wonders of wind indurium by evoking his personal experiences.


    Forging magical machines with such wind indurium was undoubtedly wasteful. It was much more cost-effective to transport it back to the World of Adepts to be sold back there.


    The Chip performed a basic estimation. This first battle in Lance, and the flesh of the wind dragonborn, could bring a direct profit of around two hundred to three hundred thousand magical crystals for the Crimson n.


    It was clear why the adepts had always thought of nar wars as a means of profiteering!


    However, wealth of this nature wasn¡¯t so easily obtained by everyone who pined for it.


    If it weren¡¯t for the endless magic energy provided by the magic generator furnace and the metal walls created by the metal fortress, a Second Grade wind dragon and his one hundred First Grade dragonborn would have been enough to raze any small-sized adept n.


    The Crimson n that Greem had established wouldn¡¯t even stand a chance. They would have been drowned in the ferocious assault of the dragonborn army.


    Greem¡¯s idea for the low-grade magical machines was tobine them with the elementium golems that he created and give birth to a sort of elemental metal golem. The energy source of the metal golems woulde from the magic generator furnace, as well as the elementium cores. That would solve the problem of there being only a single energy source.


    Elementium attacks were also much more potent than those shy, but weak, rifles. Moreover, the protection of those metal shells meant that the ws of elementium golems having weak bodies would vanish.


    However, thepatibility of metal with the golems of different elements still required plenty of magical experiments to be verified and confirmed. As such, Greem spent most of the following days hiding within the metal fortress as well. Almost every single hour of his day was dedicated to the magicalboratory he had set up here.


    Billis was busy with the refining of the wind indurium, while Greem was busy with thebination of the magical machines with the elementium golems. Deserra and Endor had nothing else to do. As such, they silently snuck out of the metal fortress and ran back to the Swamp of Sorrows to capture some rare otherworldly creatures.


    Hunting otherworldly lifeforms, dissecting them, and analyzing the origin of their bloodlines was a necessary research project for all adepts.


    It was only possible to indirectly understand the mechanisms behind the formation of the ne and the way in which the narws of this world functioned if one had sufficient insight and understanding of the ne¡¯s natives.


    Understanding the narws could often achieve a significant effect in nar wars!


    ............


    It was a steaming, scorchednd.


    Countless rifts and valleys split the earth. One could see these features from high up in the sky, along with the boiling magma slowly flowing beneath the ground, within these rifts.


    Thick yellow smoke spread across the air, filling it with the choking smell of sulfur.


    Volcanoes of various sizes littered thend. asionally, a giant pir of magma would st out of these volcanoes, adding ashes and smoldering meteors to the already polluted air.


    Here in the middle of this scorched earth floating amidst a sea of magma, there stood an exceptionally tall volcano. Arge castle carved out of pure obsidian floated upon the magmake at the top of this volcano.


    This was a magnificent pce floating above a sea of magma!


    This ce was peaceful. No other sounds could be heard apart from the rumbling flow ofva and magma.


    All of a sudden, a crisp and loud dragon¡¯s roar rang out from a distance.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes¡¯ lithe and athletic body appeared above the magma castle.


    He dove downwards and took a look at the pce shrouded in red mes and gritted his teeth before finally folding his wings and descending.

 Chapter 577 Wind Dragons Luck With Women

    Chapter 577 Wind Dragon¡¯s Luck With Women


    Wind Dragon Cherkes¡¯ visit caught the dragonborn of Doomsday Castle by surprise.


    Doomsday Castle belonged to the Star of Disaster, Philippa Eilhart, Third Grade Fire Dragon.


    Philippa Eilhart was a sexually voracious female dragon and loved to keep male consorts of her own in the pce. She had collected beauties and handsome men of various races from all over Lance inside her Doomsday Castle. The dragonborn army she had created was also undoubtedly thergest and most diverse of all the dragon lords.


    Philippa Eilhart would not have had such a bad name if she was simply sexually active; that wasn¡¯t a w in the eyes of the dragons.


    The true reason for her notorious reputation was her unsavory preferences in bed that frightened all the other male dragons.


    It was rumored that it would be a miracle for any male that had slept with her to live. Her greatest habit was to transform back into a fire dragon during the height of the act and use her intense me breath to warm the hearts and bodies of her and her lover.


    It was important to note that, as a Third Grade female fire dragon, Philippa Eilhart¡¯s true form was at least two to three timesrger than an ordinary male dragon. She was at least several dozens of tons heavy.


    Such a terrifying act wouldn¡¯t matter if her lover were a male dragon. At the very worst, it would only mean a couple of bone fractures. However, any other species would be squashed into unrecognizable meat paste.


    Still, even if the strong male dragons could endure Philippa¡¯s weight, they couldn¡¯t deal with her great me breath that reached up to five thousand degrees. mes of this intensity were already as hot as the core area of a volcano.


    Not all dragons loved to bathe in surgingva, and not all male dragons could endure Philippa¡¯s reckless moves.


    That was why every single young male dragon in Lance had avoided Philippa once her reputation got out. Otherwise, if she abducted them into her Doomsday Castle... having a bit of their dragon essence squeezed out of them was secondary. More importantly, it was the utter trampling of their body and mind that terrified them!


    Philippa had been setting her sights on Wind Dragon Cherkes for more than several years now, especially with the close proximity of their territories. However, while Cherkes couldn¡¯t beat Philippa, who was known for her fierce temperament and prowess inbat, he could easily outrun her.


    That was how the two of them managed to live the past hundred years in rtive ¡¯peace¡¯ as neighbors.


    Cherkes let out a short dragon¡¯s roar which counted as a greeting of sorts. He then beat his tattered wings and slowlynded on the stone square in front of Doomsday Castle. The boiling stone was enough to cook any flesh, but it couldn¡¯t do much to a Second Grade dragon.


    Seven or eight muscr dragonborn with red scales emerged from the stone houses around the square. They approached from every direction, cautiously looking at this uninvited wind dragon. The two dragonborn in the lead were also very obviously at Second Grade.


    Even though Cherkes had a much nobler statuspared to all these dragonbornbined, wounding Philippa¡¯s subordinates in her base would make it a lot harder for him to make his requestter.


    As such, Cherkes only hesitated for a moment before transforming. An odd silver light engulfed his body as he instantly transformed into a young man in a silver shirt.


    "Isn¡¯t this Lord Cherkes, known as the most handsome man in Lance! Why would you have time to visit Sister Philippa today? Sister wants you toe in." A fragrant breeze of wind blew toward Cherkes as a seductive and charming subus walked out of the castle.


    That blushing expression, those arousing curves, that pair of fire red lips, and those full breasts and bottom, as well as the bat wings and the agile bone tail behind her back...


    The natural seductiveness of subi didn¡¯t discriminate by race or sex. All intelligent lifeform that looked upon a subus¡¯ body would feel an irrepressible desire rise within their hearts.


    That was why the subi were one of the few demon races that survived by entertaining and pleasing powerful individuals, even amongst the multiverse. Their birthce was in the lower realms known as the Bowels of the World, but their footprints could be found in every corner of the multiverse.


    Be it within the private tower of some powerful adept, or the den of a powerful otherworldly creature, or even amongst the harem of a human king; these powerful and sly demonic creatures could be found in almost all areas with dense male auras.


    Of course, Cherkes¡¯ powerful Spirit made it virtually impossible for him to be seduced by a little First Grade subus. However, the dragons were sexual in nature, not to mention that Cherkes was a young wind dragon that thought the world of himself. Thus, the previously cold and arrogant Cherkes immediately betrayed a lecherous expression and hugged the subus¡¯ smooth waist with his thick arm. He then followed the subus back into the magnificent and towering Doomsday Castle.


    ............


    It was two days and three entire nightster when Cherkes finally stumbled out of Doomsday Castle.


    He painfully transformed back into his wind dragon form and panted on the ground for a long while before finally taking to the air. There were several times where he almost fell straight into the boilingva beneath due to exhaustion.


    If something like that had actually happened, Cherkes would undergo plenty of pain and agony, even with the exceptional magic resistance of a Second Grade dragon.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes roared furiously at the bottom of his heart as he struggled to keep himself in the air.


    "Just you wait. Once I advance to Third Grade... no, Fourth Grade, I will definitely kill all of you bastards. All of you that have humiliated me, bullied me... I will kill all of you. Ow..."


    Cherkes had been just a bit too emotional and pped his wings with a little too much strength and immediately stirred the wounds on his body.


    His body had already been tattered and riddled with holes by the otherworldly metal monster in Azurelode. After recovering in his den, he had immediatelye here to ask for help from that damned female fire dragon and had been wickedly treated to some love for two days and three nights straight.


    Cherkes might look alright and unharmed right now.


    However, he knew very well how bad his injuries were. There were bone fractures on at least five parts of his body, and two of those wereminuted fractures that looked like a tree branch after being repeatedly crushed by a raging chariot. The fact that he could still fly with these wounds was a testament to the exceptional talent of the wind dragons in the air.


    "Damned monster, just you wait! Once the dragonborn army that fat hag lent me arrives, I will let you experience a thousand times the pain I am currently feeling. I will tear you into shreds and pieces... ow."


    Cherkes could no longer endure the eruption of pain this time. The pride of the wind dragons let out a shriek as he crashed from the skies. Fortunately, he had already flown out of the area of thevake during this short time. Apart from a massive dragon-shaped crater being imprinted upon the scorched earth, Cherkes¡¯ life wasn¡¯t in much danger.


    The wind dragon had to wait another thirty minutes before finally finding the strength to take off once more. Slowly, Cherkes flew toward the Twin Peaks, shaking and swerving as he cut across the sky.


    Twin Peaks, as the name suggested, were a pair of oddly steep peaks that stood across from each other.


    Cherkes had turned one of these peaks into hisir, and the other had been turned into the chambers where he kept beauties of various races.


    Whenever he was in a bad mood, he would visit the chambers and enjoy the weing of those beauties, asionally using them to breed some mixed-blood descendants for himself.


    It was challenging for two pureblooded dragons to breed a descendant of their own, but it was effortless for them to give birth to mixed-blood descendants. Thus, the lustful dragons often used breeding offsprings as a reason to spread their seed across the world, spawning countless descendants of various types across countless ne worlds.


    Some busybody adept had even verified that the dragon bloodline had even been found in a certain tribe of the numerous and vile kobolds.


    The adepts couldn¡¯t help but shiver in disgust when they imagined a lusty dragon transforming into a kobold to mess with another kobold over tens of thousands of years ago.


    Kobolds, underground fire dragons, nine-headed lizards, dragonborn, dragonblood goblins, human dragon disciples.


    One could find some dragon bloodline in the offshoot branches of almost all intelligent lifeforms the adepts had ever heard of. It was apparent how potent the dragons were in this regard! It would make any adept speechless to learn of all this!


    Cherkes was practically squeezed dry at this moment. Where was he supposed to find the energy to enjoy himself amongst his beauties? Thus, he beat his wings and carefullynded upon the tform in front of hisir.


    Cherkes shivered intensely the moment he entered the winding corridors of hisir.


    He could vaguely smell something out of the ordinary in the air.


    Almost...almost as if it was an indescribable stench of blood.


    Enemies!


    The wind dragon instantlypleted a short chant, and an Eye of Truth shining with bright silver light floated above his head. The Eye illuminated the corridor before him and the mountain of gold coins at the end of the passage.


    A slender silhouette was curled up amidst the pile of mountains and jewels as if they were preparing to ambush Cherkes.


    Sadly, while the opponent was very well-hidden, they werepletely exposed before the wind dragon¡¯s Eye of Truth.


    How the enemy had gotten past all the dragonborn scouts, how they had managed to break through all his magical traps; Cherkes couldn¡¯t care less about these things anymore. He was only concerned about whether he could escape from this death trap today.


    That was because he vaguely heard the grunting of dragonborn scouts and the thud of them falling to the ground from the tform outside, even at the same moment he had discovered the female assassin.


    Enemies both behind and in front of him!


    Wind Dragon Cherkes opened his eyes wide, and his aura increased tremendously. He then let out a reverberating roar and courageously took the initiative to strike at the enemy.

 Chapter 578 Wind Dragon Captured

    Chapter 578 Wind Dragon Captured


    "You don¡¯t need to call for help from the dragonborn!"


    A young man¡¯s voice rang out from outside the cave.


    "We have already dealt with the remnants of your dragonborn guards during the time you were out. Even if you broke your throat shouting, no one woulde to your help."


    The man¡¯s voice was crisp, clear, and firm. Anyone could tell this was an extremely confident person based on his voice alone.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes¡¯ massive body continuously shifted about as he tried to best move into a position to deal with the enemies on both sides.


    The enemy hiding within the pile of gold coins and jewels had shown herself as well. She beat her bat wings and slowly hovered into the air above the dragon¡¯sir. She looked like a beautiful female girl. However, Cherkes could tell based on the strange aura casually radiating out of her body that this was a vampire, and a Second Grade vampire to boot!


    Heavy footsteps rang out at the entrance to their behind him.


    One fat and one skinny, one tall and one short. Two mysterious enemies withpletely different statures walked into their.


    The one in front looked to be half-human and half-dragon. He wore blue metal armor on the upper body, while his lower dragonborn body was covered in blue scales. The dragonborn also held an electric spear shing with blue lightning in his thick humanoid arm.


    Dammit, it¡¯s a Second Grade dragonborn!


    Walking behind the dragonborn was a mysterious human cloaked in ck robes.


    Even though much of his body was obscured by the ck robes, the hand that gripped the strange stuff still betrayed his identity.


    Cherkes smelled the powerful, evil, and chaotic stench of the adepts on him!


    The one who had been speaking was also this human male adept.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes immediately connected all the dots of the past few days without needing much thought.


    "Adepts, you have overstepped your boundaries!" Cherkes slowly turned his body toward the ck-robed man and the dragonborn. These two were more of a threat, "Here is the kingdom of dragons. ording to the peace treaty signed by your Great Adepts and our Lord Dragon God, neither of us are to invade the origin ne of the other party. You are overstepping boundaries!"


    The ck-robed Greem chuckled.


    He knew of this ¡¯peace treaty¡¯ that the wind dragon spoke of. The fact that the wind dragon was talking about it right now was even more proof that he was only putting up a tough front.


    "Overstepping? Lord Cherkes, I suggest you take a good look at that peace treaty! We agreed to not casually invade each other¡¯s origin ne. But can Lance be considered to be the origin ne of your dragons? ording to what I know, this was a ne originally ruled by trolls. You dragons are, at the very best, outsiders, much like we are. Two outsiders fighting over contentious territory cannot be considered an infringement of that peace treaty. So...


    "You had best just surrender!"


    The battle immediately broke out as Greem¡¯s voice suddenly rose.


    Dragonborn Zacha, the meat shield of the group, didn¡¯t like to waste words. He said nothing and lunged at the wind dragon with his electric spear after receiving Greem¡¯s orders.


    As a servant of the dragons, Zacha¡¯s status was a world apart from the wind dragon, even if he was of the same Grade. However, he was a servant that had formerly belonged to Thunder Dragon Arms. He had no affiliation with this wind dragon. As such, Zacha didn¡¯t intend to hold back when he attacked.


    As Zacha charged at the wind dragon with heavy steps, Mary also let out a crisp battle cry. She folded her wings and turned into a red beam of light, lunging at the dragon from behind.


    Greem, on the other hand, didn¡¯t advance. He even took a few steps backward, secured the exit of their, and started loudly chanting a mysterious spell.


    This battle was the first cooperation between the three Second Grade adepts of the Crimson n. Whether they could sessfully suppress this Second Grade dragon would depend on whether they had synergy.


    In the past, Greem¡¯s favorite move in a fight was just to toss his magma fireballs. They were powerful and could also create vast fields of fire. However, now that he was cooperating with other people, he could no longer use area-of-effect spells like these as haphazardly as he used to.


    After all, the fire spells that could affect the wind dragons could affect the performance of Zacha and Mary just as easily. For the first time, Greem treated himself as an orthodox spellcaster and conscientiously stood away from the battlefield and acted as the cannon that he was meant to be.


    The wind dragon let out a short hiss when faced with the attacks from the front and behind. He reared his body and shed at Dragonborn Zacha with his mighty ws. At the same time, he flicked with his body as his eight-meter-long tailshed at Mary. Wicked winds cut through the air.


    A sky blue wind de was rapidly concentrating in his wide-open throat. Cherkes was only waiting for Zacha to be fazed by his strikes before sting the wind de at him to disrupt any further attacks.


    In all seriousness, therge size of the dragons gave them a unique advantage in battle and made them an immense threat.


    Cherkes and Zacha were both Second Grade. Their Strength shouldn¡¯t be that much different. However, the additional Strength from his size allowed him to beat Zacha in a battle of might.


    The sharp dragon ws shed with the electric spear. The charging Zacha was pped and thrown into the stone wall nearby like a chariot sent out of control.


    A dull thud shook the heavens.


    Zacha¡¯s entire person was embedded into the stone wall. The ferocious strength in that strike had caused even their to tremble slightly.


    The wind dragon took full use of this opportunity. He opened his mouth wide and prepared to use the Wind de he had been brewing to break through Zacha¡¯s protective scales. All of a sudden, he felt an intense pain on his back. The wind de turned into a st of white light and hit the stone wall beside Zacha, missing the dragonborn by millimeters.


    A strange tearing sound rang in the air, and a deep, one-meter long scratch mark appeared beside the human-shaped crater where Zacha was.


    The wind dragon turned back furiously and caught sight of a sneakily escaping red silhouette with his olive eyes.


    A sky blue vortex immediately wrapped around the wind dragon and made him as fast as the wind.


    Cherkes performed a lightning-quick lunge and bit wickedly at Mary with his vicious fangs. The vampire had seeded in her sneak attack.


    Mary¡¯s agility had greatly increased since she had advanced. She was actually teasing the wind dragon within hisir with every beat of her wings. She dodged left and right, avoiding the ferocious bite of the dragon by mere inches every single time.


    One big and one small; the two fast silhouettes chased after each other within the narrow space. They dodged each other¡¯s attack while regrly retaliating. The two outlines, one red and one white, had exceeded the limits of Greem¡¯s vision when they reached their top speed.


    Dragonborn Zacha broke free of the stone wall after some extraneous effort. He spat out a mouthful of purple blood and could move like usual once more. He roared and charged forward again with his electric spear raised high.


    Just then, Greem¡¯s channeling of his fire spell that hadsted for thirty-seven seconds finally came to an end. Greem tried his best to capture the silhouette of the wind dragon, eyes shing as he did so, all while he carefully maintained the strongest fire spell currently held in his hands.


    Meteor Swarm!


    It was a powerful fire spell that he had derived from the Fire Core Explosion and the Meteor Shower upon advancing to Second Grade.


    It was the unchallenged champion of all of Greem¡¯s spell when it came to pure power.


    It was a single-target spell, and its power reached a shocking three hundred and forty points after all that channeling. It was already the most powerful attack that Greem could muster!


    After a deathly pursuit, the wind dragon finally caught up to Mary with his superior speed.


    The wind dragon let out a powerful wind breath. Mary couldn¡¯t escape the area-of-effect before the wind breath reached her and was instantly sted away by the tens of thousands of vortex des.


    Greem¡¯s face turned grim when he saw Mary scream and be pressed against the wall by the wind breath that was now cutting up her body. He stepped forward, and the blindingly scarlet Meteor Swarm finally shot out.


    At this moment, it wasn¡¯t a Magma Fireball that shot out of Greem¡¯s hand. It was a miniature rain of meteors.


    The intense heat waves roasted the air and the earth around them, distorting the air and making everything seem odd and surreal. Greempleted thest chant of the spell; the meteors he held in his hand cut across the wide space within the belly of the mountain and hit the wind dragon before anyone could react.


    The next second, a sun exploded beside the wind dragon!


    The explosion¡¯s shockwaves ravaged the entireir. The mountainous pile of gold coins and jewels were thrown into the air, as if they had been met with a ninth level hurricane, before rapidly melting in the hot me streams.


    The me streams were also destroying the rough stone walls around the dragon¡¯sir, and all the metal armor and swords that were hidden within the pile of treasure melted like wax.


    The wind dragon had been hit from the side by the Meteor Swarm. The wind barrier that protected his body popped like a bubble in less than a single second. The heat pierced through his scales and magical resistance, instantly boiling the blood beneath his chest and vaporizing his muscles.


    A massive scar appeared there, and a short momentter, the flesh beneath the injury exploded with a resounding boom. Large scales flew everywhere as a thick fountain of blood poured to the ground.


    The wind dragon reared its head and let out an agonizing roar before powerlessly copsing to the ground.


    Even a defeated dragon should not be underestimated.


    Dragonborn Zacha worked together with Mary, who had now broken free of the wind breath. Both of them together had to fight the dying wind dragon for almost another forty rounds before finally suppressing him.


    By the time Greem casually walked into the battlefield with both hands behind his back, Zacha and Mary were already covered in blood and wounds.


    That battle had once again verified the popr rumor of the multiverse.


    Apart from the Titans, the starbeasts, and the rare few species of war, the dragons were truly undefeatable among those of the same grade!


    If it weren¡¯t for Zacha¡¯s fearless tanking of the wind dragon¡¯s attacks, Greem and Mary alone would have a hard time restricting Cherkes. If it weren¡¯t for Mary drawing part of the firepower, Zacha would have had a hard time surviving at the hands of the wind dragon in a direct melee.


    Then, the most crucial blow had been fired by Greem.


    Without Greem, Zacha and Mary would have only been able to upy the wind dragon and would have had no means to defeat it.


    In the end, all three of them had been needed to capture the wind dragon.


    Losing any one of them would have made it virtually impossible to defeat the wind dragon lord here today.


    Even so, Greem still had his questions.


    "Strange... so strange. Why does this wind dragon seem so weak?"

 Chapter 579 Dragon Devourer

    Chapter 579 Dragon Devourer


    Greem¡¯s doubts were quickly answered.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes wasn¡¯t some tough, unrelenting warrior either. Mary only needed to suck a little of his blood threateningly, and he spilled all the beans.


    Third Grade female fire dragon, an organized dragonborn army...


    Greem¡¯s head swelled when he heard about it. He once again frowned at his lousy luck.


    Second Grade dragons were small fry even in Lance. One of two of them going missing wouldn¡¯t draw the attention of any dragon. However, it was a whole different matter if it was a Third Grade dragon!


    A Second Grade dragon in Lance was like the vige chief of some rural ce; it wouldn¡¯t matter if he died. There would be nomotion or chaos. A Third Grade dragon, on the other hand, was like the lord of a city. These dragons often had many connections andplicated social ties.


    A slight misstep would very likely lead to the premature drawing of a Fourth Grade dragon¡¯s attention.


    The strength of the metal fortress that Gazlowe currently controlled was insufficient. It was still far too difficult for them to fight off a Fourth Grade dragon. In all seriousness, they could only be considered as illegal stowaways now. The best course of action was not to attract the attention of the dragons.


    Once they had rooted themselves here for a couple of years, the resource cirction within the metal fortress will have been smoothed out, and the enhanced new magical machines would walk off the assembly line endlessly. Only then would be the golden period for the Crimson n to excavate Lance on arger scale.


    They could attack if they wished to, with therge group of magical machines as cannon fodder. Decimating the natives would not be a problem.


    They could also defend if things turned south. It didn¡¯t matter how many magical machines they lost. As long as the adepts could get back to the metal fortress in time, the Crimson n would not need to worry about this foothold of theirs being uprooted.


    When that happened, Greem, as the n leader of the Crimson n, would only need to worry about the size of the benefit that they would get out of Lance. He would no longer need to be concerned about the possibility of being expelled from the ne by the dragons.


    Just as the three of them were discussing their next n of action around therge body of the wind dragon, a low and hoarse female voice rang out from behind.


    "Er, this is a little sudden, but I still want to ask¨C do you people mind giving me this wind dragon?"


    The neer¡¯s voice wasn¡¯t loud, but the three adepts reacted as if thunder had just crashed down beside them. Cold sweat ran down their bodies.


    Greem glided backward and tapped the air with his staff. Six Fire Shields instantly surfaced out of nowhere and rapidly spun around his body. Dragonborn Zacha was indeed the most loyal servant of the world. He roared and stepped in front of Greem while brandishing his electric spear.


    Mary, on the other hand, let out a battle cry. Blood mist surged around her body, and only a crimson silhouette remained on the spot. Her true body was nowhere to be seen.


    Ambushing Cherkes in hisir was an operation that Greem had nned after obtaining precise information. Dragonborn Zacha had already relied on his identity as a dragonborn to scout the surroundings before the operation. They had only started the battle after ensuring that there was no possibility of intervention or interruption.


    Who knew this would happen? While they were still giddy with joy from capturing a dragon, their behind them had already been blocked off by an opponent.


    After hastily establishing his personal defenses, Greem finally started to solemnly assess this mysterious neer.


    She was a woman.


    Her face was obscured with a ck veil, obscuring part of her looks. However, it was apparent that she was a human, given her exposed eyes and skin color. Moreover, she was an extremely powerful female assassin.


    One also had to admit that she had a good figure.


    The ck bodytight leather suit hugged around her exquisite body. The curves were all in the right ces as well. It was a pleasing sight from afar. That said, the weapons that the woman carried with her didn¡¯t suit her figure. She carried a massive kpinga that far outsized her on her back and two mysterious machetes sheathed on her waist.


    She also wore a pair of ck ws on her hands. The gleaming ck ws shone as if they had been polished. Greem could even vaguely hear the death throes of dragons when a breeze passed through the gaps between her ws.


    A human female assassin?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be intrigued.


    The opponent clearly wasn¡¯t a native of Lance. Then what was her purpose in blocking their way here?


    With the Chip¡¯s help, Greem¡¯s vision roamed about every part of the woman¡¯s body, lingering for a long time on each piece.


    It wasn¡¯t Greem being a lecher. Rather, there were far too many things about this woman that confused him.


    Dragon tooth ne, dragonbone ring, dragoneye pendant, dragonhorn dagger; in fact, with the scanning function of the Chip, Greem had plenty of reason to suspect that the woman¡¯s very clothes were made of dragon hide. Greem could vaguely sense the curse of dragon souls upon the giant kpinga and machetes that she carried with her. Even her ws were stained with the curse.


    If these were all made of dragon materials, then the opponent honestly held fearsome power!


    Greem had initially determined the opponent to be of Second Grade from the feedback of the Chip. However, if his observations were not incorrect, then she would have to be a lot more powerful. Unless she was not afraid of death, she had to be that powerful to brazenly walk within the dragon-ruled Lance with a full suit of ¡¯dragon¡¯ equipment.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and mentally adjust this mysterious woman¡¯s power to Third Grade (to be verified).


    The formerly solemn Zacha and Mary felt their hairs go on end when they heard from Greem that the opponent could be Third Grade.


    Damn! As expected of a dragon ne that was many times more powerful than the Goblin ne. Even a random person they ran into could be Third Grade.


    The three adepts quickly turned tense once again.


    The woman dressed like an assassin stepped forward as if she saw the anxiety and solemnness of the adepts. She spoke softly. "You don¡¯t need to worry. We are not enemies!"


    The three adepts took a step back in unison.


    Greem paused for a moment before replying, "May I know who you are,dy? Why have you appeared here?"


    "The reason I¡¯m here is naturally because of that fellow behind you people." The mysterious woman smiled coldly as her eyes fell upon the immobilized Wind Dragon Cherkes.


    Cherkes also clearly recognized this mysterious woman. He immediately started roaring in a frenzy when he saw her arrive.


    "Take me away...take me away, quick. Adept...adept, didn¡¯t you want to take me away and make me a ve? Hurry up and take me away; let¡¯s leave now. Please don¡¯t ever hand me over to this woman. I...I can give you all the wealth here..."


    A ¡¯frail¡¯ human woman so utterly terrified a Second Grade adolescent dragon. He looked so frightened he would be willing to obey Greem unconditionally as long as Greem took him away from this woman.


    That caused Greem to start thinking about the broader implications.


    "Hmph! Aren¡¯t you fast? Slipping away from me two times only because you are a wind dragon. Even going so far as to bring the Azure Wings to exterminate me. Hmph. I will treat you well once I get my hands on you." The female assassin obviously had a grudge on the wind dragon. She wasughing coldly while staring at Cherkes with sinister eyes. It made the wind dragon tremble in fear.


    Something wasn¡¯t right. This female assassin didn¡¯t seem to be Third Grade.


    If she was Third Grade, she might as well have just stood out and demanded Greem hand over the wind dragon. Greem and the others wouldn¡¯t even have dared to say another word.


    However, if she was only Second Grade, then there was no reason Cherkes should be so terrified of her. After all, even Greem, Mary, and Zacha had to work together to beat the wind dragon, trapping it within itsir and sealing off the exit. A little Second Grade assassin shouldn¡¯t be strong enough to make Cherkes so scared!


    Greem then thought of the various dragon equipment the woman had on her, along with that dense dragonsoul curse upon her entire being. The Chip instantly found an extremely rare and unorthodox profession within the data library that rted to these traits.


    "Dragon Devourer!" Greem couldn¡¯t help but exim.


    "Hm," The female assassin raised her head in surprise and reassessed Greem, "You, sir, are truly from the World of Adepts. To think you were able to discover my identity so quickly. Indeed, I am a dragon devourer. A Second Grade dragon devourer!"


    Greem nodded silently. He finally understood why the wind dragon was so afraid of her.


    The stealthed Mary started to ask a bunch of questions through a mental connection with Greem. It was evident that she knew nothing about dragon devourers, given how she spent all of her time on improving her battle techniques.


    Greem had no choice but to send what he knew to Mary and Zacha via mental links.


    Dragon Devourers weren¡¯t members of the dragon species. Instead, they were a strange hybrid dragon species.


    It was hard to verify which specific dragon tribe their bloodline originated from at this point, but they were undoubtedly the greatest mistake that the dragons wished to rectify.


    Dragon blood might course through their bodies, but they felt no kinship with the dragons.


    They had no exceptional intelligence either and behaved like ordinary humans until their bloodline awakened. They didn¡¯t know any of the mysterious Dragontongue magic, but they were the nightmare of the dragons.


    The moment they came of age and awakened to their bloodline as dragon devourers, they would instantly possess elementium affinity that outshone even the faerie dragons. They would also gain the same fearsome Physique and Strength of the dragons. They could recklessly hunt down dragons of even higher grades than themselves and absorb the elementium energy within those dragons to patch the ws in their bloodline.


    They were the dragon devourers!


    People slew dragons for a myriad of reasons¨C wealth, fame, glory, resources, and much more. However, they slew dragons only for the sake of devouring the bloodline of the dragons. The increase of their strength came solely from consuming dragons. As such, they became the greatest prick in the eyes of all dragons.


    Every single dragon would summon all of theirpanions the moment they caught wind of a dragon devourer. They would swear upon their lives to exterminate the dragon devourer, even if they had to rely on their numbers.


    That was how the dragon devourers had almost gone extinct from being hunted down by the dragons. The surviving devourers had no choice but to hide here and there.


    Greem and the others being able to meet a dragon devourer in Lance was nothing short of a miracle!

 Chapter 580 Civilization and Conflict

    Chapter 580 Civilization and Conflict


    It took a Herculean effort to bring the massive dragon back to the metal fortress, even for Gazlowe¡¯s construction machines.


    That dragon devourer had also returned to the adept¡¯s base under Greem¡¯s warm invitation.


    In just seven days, Gazlowe¡¯s construction machines had dug up the mountain and turned it into a hidden base. The massive hole that had been carved into the mountain had also been sealed with a metal wall. Countless secret doors had been created at the bottom of the wall, allowing the construction machines to stream in and out constantly.


    Logging parties, scouting parties, hunting parties, geo-exploration robots, geological soil inspectors, biodistribution statisticians; ordinary tasks were left to the unquestionably loyal and steel-headed construction machines, but the sampling and investigation of the environment, life forms, and geological resources couldn¡¯t be left to them.


    Arge-sized goblin teleportation device was quickly constructed within the base, allowing the metal fortress to possess a stable and uninterrupted means ofmunication with the Goblin ne. The first batch of individuals to teleport over was the goblin technicians and engineers that the metal fortress desperately needed.


    Just as expected, all the goblins were struck with ¡¯magic-drunkenness¡¯ from suddenly moving from a low-magic world to a high-magic world. All sorts of abnormal conditions started to afflict the one hundred goblins. They came down with fevers, threw up, and even their moods turned sour. The goblins finally barely managed to adapt to the environment of Lance after the death of over four dozen of their number.


    With the arrival of these helpers, the various construction and magical machines that Gazlowe built now hadmanders. A goblin technician wouldmand four or five magical machines, perfectly executing the various tasks that Gazlowe assigned to them¨C scouting, investigations, sampling, logging, hunting, and many more. Moreover, these goblin officers could provide Gazlowe with a detailed andprehensive mission report after each mission.


    It increased the work efficiency tremendously. It was much easier than having Gazlowe forcibly keep a trace of his mental consciousness around the machines to control them remotely.


    Moreover, Gazlowe¡¯s soul origin still came from that old goblin. As such, his personal preference and hobbies still leaned toward invention and the creation of new technology. He couldn¡¯t be bothered to take on the lowly and inefficient task of overseeing operations under ordinary circumstances.


    To ensure that he could be free of this repetitive, inefficient, and exhausting task of an officer, Gazlowe specially built a hidden room within the core area of the metal fortress. He converted the ce into a mysterious brain pool and started to cultivate a new secondary brain.


    The secondary brain would be able to take his ce in dealing with these menial daily tasks once it had grown and matured. That would allow Gazlowe to retake his preferred office as an inventor, scientist, and engineer.


    Everything in the metal fortress was already running in an orderly fashion by the time Greem returned. Along with him came his two subordinates, an unexpected guest, the wind dragon, and the team responsible for transporting the wind dragon.


    It was almost as if this was the first time the female assassin had seen such a strangely metallic civilization. She carefully assessed these nging metal machines with bodies forged of steel and iron. She couldn¡¯t sense any life or flesh within them.


    Yet, mere metal lumps like these possessed behavioral awareness akin to humans. They were able to gather together, carry a massive wooden log, form groups to lift a metal cage filled with howling beasts, or even form neat lines under themand of a technician.


    The metal path leading to the various areas of the metal fortress might be broad, but they were still narrow rtive to these giant steel machines. Even so, these machines knew how to wait and let others by when they streamed past each other within the narrow corridors. No such thing as collisions or idents happened.


    This extremely orderly scene naturally drew the shock and respect of the dragon devourer.


    Civilization!


    Though they were only a bunch of metal lumps with no soul consciousness, she sensed the existence of an otherworldly civilization through these machines.


    Only civilization could make every member within society disy such order and discipline. Only culture could allow a group to rise beyond their primal state and be a unique existence respected by others.


    Most species that possessed their own civilizations were scattered and small. They required the pooling together of the majority to ignite the mes of civilization. However, the civilization in front of the dragon devourer¡¯s eyes seemed to be concentrated and unified. The radiance of intelligence and the light of culture seemed to have gathered around a single powerful individual. This one individual was allowed to direct and assign the power of the entire species.


    Civilizations like these were rare, but they weren¡¯t unique!


    However, what surprised this female assassin was the fact that the lower ss of this civilization were all metal machines. She couldn¡¯t help but want to meet the master of this civilization.


    "Master, you brought back an outsider? Do you need me to make special preparations?"


    Gazlowe¡¯s mental consciousness silently connected with Greem while he gave the female assassin a tour while walking toward the central hall.


    "No need! This is a dragon devourer. She is very likely to be our ally in the future. I¡¯m confident she won¡¯t betray us to the dragons because those dragons are more likely to exterminate her first!" Greem replied confidently.


    "Dragon Devourer?"


    Gazlowe had no rted data or information within his memory. As such, Greem had to sent over sets of information he had organized on the matter.


    Gazlowe only paused for a second or two beforepletely digesting the knowledge. He couldn¡¯t help but raise a suggestion for Greem, "It¡¯s true that this dragon devourer has the power, the motive, and the right to be our ally here on Lance. However, master, you must be careful. Prematurely having our rtionship with this dragon devourer be exposed to the dragons before we establish a foothold is very likely to draw trouble."


    "Mm, I know! That¡¯s why you¡¯ll send another group of magical machines to Twin Peaks. Clean up that ce one more time. Either capture all living things there or kill them. No witnessed can be allowed to escape!"


    "Understood. I will do as you say!"


    Their mentalmunication was swift and silent. The entire process took no more than a brief eight seconds.


    By the time Greem reached the central hall with the female assassin, a squad of fifty magical machines had already rushed out of the metal fortress under the lead of a goblin officer. They were heading straight for Twin Peaks.


    "May I know..." Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask a question once they had all sat down.


    "I am Oliven. I am a Second Grade dragon devourer, and Ie from the World of Disasters. The members of my family have all been devoured by those damned Scourge Lords. I was the only one who escaped and ended up wandering here on Lance. So, if you guys set your sights on those dragons, you can count me in. I can be a decent help to you people!" The female assassin was a pretty straightforward person. She immediately gave all of her background without further questions from Greem.


    There was no way of verifying the truth of her words, but for some reason, Greem chose to believe her. Greem also noticed some extremely interesting things in the assassin¡¯s narration.


    World of Disasters. Scourge Lords.


    It was important to note that there were only a fewrge-sized nes in the multiverse that couldpare to the World of Adepts. The World of Disasters was one such world. In fact, it was a ne that was even more powerful than the World of Adepts.


    It was said that that ce was far more evil, chaotic, and powerful than the World of Adepts.


    Monsters walked freely there, and magical creatures existed in hordes. Thews of time and space were entirely different from most other nes as well. It was almost impossible for ordinary life forms to live there. They could barely survive by hiding between the gaps of the powerful and fearsome magical creatures and monsters.


    There were almost no countries or cities there¨C only one absurdly powerful monster after another.


    These monsters called themselves Scourge Lords. Each and every one of them was a dominating and evil individual. Even the weakest of the Scourge Lords was no weaker than Sixth Grade. They had already devoured most of the resources in the World of Disasters that they resided in. As such, the resources of the world had dried up, and the worldws were chaotic and strange.


    They spent most of their time sleeping within the ne, only waking up once every thousand years to invade other nes in search of food; their food was the ne origin that all nes relied upon to survive! As such, no fate other than destruction awaited the unfortunate ne targeted by the Scourge Lords.


    The adepts might be very evil already, continually expanding theirnds outside of their ne, robbing resources, and enving entire species. However, these ne worlds could all recover part of their resources if they had the time to rest and recuperate. On the other hand, the Scourge Lords would directly devour the origin power that sustained the functions of the ne, causing an entire world to head toward extermination and destruction.


    The adepts might be evil, but they were still a group of individuals that pursued order, even if it was an order that they ruled over.


    Their path of development waspletely different from the Scourge Lords that sought to destroy everything. That was why the adepts often fought the Scourge Lords in several ces, starting bloody and intense battles all over the multiverse.


    Still, there was no topping the rivalry between the Scourge Lords and the Titans. The battles that broke out between them were the most severe and brutal ones in the entire multiverse.


    Both factions fought with all they had in numerous outer nes, destroying countless ne worlds in the process.


    That was why Greem defined the Scourge Lords and the Titans as the most significant source of chaos in the multiverse upon reading through all the rted literature.

 Chapter 581 Wind Dragons Treasure

    Chapter 581 Wind Dragon¡¯s Treasure


    The conversation with Oliven was pleasant and rxed.


    Both parties had no conflict of interest. They had bothe to Lance in hopes of gaining something out of it. They were all looking to obtain as much as they could from the dragons.


    The nar wars in the past were all-in situations. The conflicts revolved around the ruling position of the ne and the winner would take all. However, Lance was different. If all the dragon lords came together, they would have enough power to crush Greem¡¯s tiny faction a hundred times over.


    Force wasn¡¯t a solution. A softer, more peaceful n had to be put into action.


    A firmly established base for logistics would first be constructed with the Stalon Mountains as the center of it all. They would then slowly project their power outward. First, they would deal with the Second Grade dragons. One by one, they would take care of these ¡¯shut-in¡¯ dragons that kept to themselves.


    However, the strength of the dragons wasn¡¯t uniform. It was still difficult to assure the capture of all the dragons, even if Greem¡¯s faction had three Second Grades. That was why it was good to have Oliven join them. She was the bane of the dragons and could achieve a tremendous effect at crucial moments.


    However, she was a far too conspicuous dragon-ying de. If news of her got out to the dragons, Greem would be implicated. Thus, how to best use Oliven became the greatest test of Greem¡¯sbat intelligence.


    Oliven wanted nothing of all the spoils. She only wanted aplete dragon. She wouldn¡¯t change her mind even after Greem promised her hundreds of thousands of magical crystals. That gave him an immense headache!


    It was true that they would be able to obtain a literal hill of wealth every time they conquered a dragon¡¯sir. However, if one were to count the numbers seriously, they would find that a dragon¡¯s wealth wasn¡¯t as exaggerated as the legends.


    At their current power level, Greem and his party were only able to beat those young dragons that had barelye of age. These dragons were either busy sleeping at home to grow their bodies or indulging in their lives as lords.


    There wasn¡¯t much wealth to go around for these dragons. The native tribes in their territories all led primal and uncivilized lives. They offered plenty of ck jerkies and foodstuffs, but very few gold coins or magic gemstones to speak of. What could they hope to get from robbing these poor fools?


    If they didn¡¯t rob these natives, then the only way to obtain wealth would be to go robbing in other small-sized nes.


    Such a n of action carried far too much risk.


    If their path of retreat were cut off, then it would no longer be a matter of them being the robbers. Instead, they would turn into kind messengers delivering dragon goods to foreign nes! Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms had taken great care to choose the immensely weak Goblin ne, yet even he almost lost his life there. Second Grade dragons like them would only face more danger if they invaded other nes.


    Of course, it was not as if they had no means of making money.


    Much like the humans and their societies, the dragons also had their own social circles.


    If a prominent figure of the dragons set their sights upon a wealthy and resourceden ne, they would often summon a couple ofckeys from among their social circles. When this happened, those younger and weaker dragons that had neither the strength nor courage to go invading on their own would rise to the call and ce themselves under themand of the more powerful dragons.


    That was how it was. A Fourth Grade dragon would go out to deal with the ne¡¯s powerhouses, while the Second and Third Grade dragons would go about piging. They would only need to hand over half of all their spoils to the Fourth Grade dragon, and the rest would be enough to keep them happy for a while.


    Why was it that the dragons didn¡¯t just conquer the ne and take all the resources if they had that kind of power? Oliven immediately rebutted this question of Greem¡¯s the moment it left his mouth. She spoke with contempt.


    The dragons only liked gold coins, jewels, and all manner of valuable treasure that shone brightly. However, they didn¡¯t like management and construction. If they ran into something you enjoyed, they just took it for themselves. Why go through the trouble to help those foolish native ants develop and create a system for it all?


    Why not just hug their wealth and sleep upon the mountainous pile of gold coins if they had that kind of time? That way, their powers could continue growing as they slept. By the time they woke up, the resources in the ne would have recovered again, just in time for them to go robbing once more.


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head in exasperation when he thought about things that way.


    In all seriousness, thiszy and rough shepherding style of the dragons indeed suited them best. Other races would not be able to imitate them even if they wanted to.


    Naturally, Greem had no intention of holding back with the wind dragon. He moved everything out of hisir.


    Gazlowe also sent an organized inventory to Greem while he was talking with Oliven.


    There were1,307,633 gold coins of various mint, 428 magic gemstones, 129,000 magical crystals, 350,000 magical stones, 37 magical longswords, 142 enchanted armors, 11 otherworldly staffs and wands, 115 magical beast crystal cores, 54 elementary magic scrolls (First Grade), 14 intermediate magic scrolls (Second Grade), 2 advanced magic scrolls (Third Grade), 21 magic tomes, and 1 otherworldly knowledge crystal.


    Gazlowe performed a rough calction. If these treasure were properly processed, they could, at the very least, bring about a direct profit of approximately 650,000 magical crystals to Greem and the Crimson n.


    There were even items among the treasure that really attracted Greem.


    Most of those fourteen intermediate magic scrolls were ordinary spells like Explosive Fireball, Waterfall Tornado, or Vampiric Touch. They weren¡¯t all too useful for Greem. However, there were still some scrolls that were useful to him.


    Dimensional Anchor. An intermediate magic scroll, its origin unknown. When cast on a spellcaster, it could prevent them from casting any teleportation spells for twenty-five seconds.


    Of course, the spell could also interrupt any teleportation gates or portals that had already been sessfully conjured.


    Mirror Image. Intermediate magic scroll. Able to create three to five mirror images of the caster within thirty meters of the caster to confuse the enemy.


    This magic belonged to water-attribute magic in the adept system. Adepts with fire mastery like Greem could never cast it under ordinary circumstances. Thus, it was a good idea to bring one with him at all times.


    The ones that were the most useful to Greem were the two advanced magic scrolls¨C ne Shift and Finger of Death.


    If one were to go by the levels in which magic power was divided, these two scrolls possessed the might of Third Grade spells.


    ne Shift would teleport the owner of the scroll to a random ne world. The chance of reaching a material ne was only 13%. It was more likely that the user would be teleported to the fearsome lower realms. After all, all material nes declined otherworldly visitors. Only the lower realms took them as they came. In fact, they dly weed those of the material nes toe down to their filthy world to die.


    On the other hand, Finger of Death could be ssified as death magic. It could directly apply a shattering effect to the target being¡¯s soul. The intensity of the spell was approximately around three hundred and twenty points and ignored all physical defenses.


    Of course, the Finger of Death could still be partially negated by magical defenses and the target¡¯s Physique, but the three hundred and twenty points of armor-prating soul damage were still horrifying. With this scroll in hand, Greem could even exterminate a Second Grade like Dragonborn Zacha with a single hit.


    Zacha wouldn¡¯t even have the time to retaliate if he cast it at an appropriate time.


    However, it was a bit difficult when used on a dragon.


    After all, the souls of the dragons were all unnaturally tough. Their magic resistances were also exceptionally outstanding. It was still uncertain if a Third Grade Finger of Death could instantly kill a Second Grade dragon. Still, Greem wouldn¡¯t waste the scroll in that manner even if it could seed.


    After all, a live dragon was the most valuable!


    Take Second Grade Wind Dragon Cherkes for example. If he were brought back to the World of Adepts, he could sell for eight hundred thousand magical crystals at the very least. The price could even go much, much higher. However, if Cherkes were dead, he would probably only fetch about three hundred thousand crystals.


    Apart from the scrolls, there were also plenty of magical beast crystal cores in the wind dragon¡¯s treasure. There were as many as five Second Grade crystal cores. Regrettably, there were no dragon crystals mixed within.


    It was actually a reasonably normal observation. No dragon would collect the remains of their own species unless they were some perverted and twisted dragon. In fact, the dragons would actively attack those other species that owned weapons or equipment created from dragon materials.


    If one were to include the crystal cores that Greem had been collecting over the past few decades, the number of Second Grade crystal cores that Greem possessed now numbered in the double digits. There were a total of twenty-one cores now.


    The past him might have been unable to suppress the desire to turn all these crystal cores into suitable elementium golems. However, he had continuously been busy ever since he had advanced to Second Grade. He had almost no time to research and improve upon his elementium golem creation technique.


    The First Grade elementium golems of the past were of little help to him now.


    Much like the battle against the wind dragon earlier, Greem hadn¡¯t summoned any of his elementium golems. Even if he had ced them on the battlefield, they wouldn¡¯t have been of much obvious use in a battle against Second Grade creatures. Unless he could simultaneously put out double digits worth of First Grade elite golems, he was better off using his time to chant a Second Grade spell.


    The correct way of doing things at this juncture was to custom-make some suitable Second Grade golems for himself. That was a project that would consume a lot of his time and energy.


    The magical tomes they found in the wind dragon¡¯s treasure were mostly magical notes and observations of otherworldly spellcasters. Though it wasn¡¯t possible to thoroughly understand their magic systems through those notes, they still provided Greem with plenty of knowledge and experience.


    In particr, a certain Gulliver¡¯s Travels described several strange worlds that Greem had never even heard of. The details between the lines made Greem confident that the author had been a powerful spellcaster at or above Fourth Grade. That was because details about travels in the space beyond the realms had been recorded at the end of all the other stories.


    In the World of Adepts, only the Great Adepts were capable of venturing out into space alone. Fourth Grade adepts could barely achieve this as well, but they were very prone to death if they ran into star beasts or starbound species. The chances of their demise were over 70% when that happened.


    Greem unexpectedly discovered a mysterious alchemy spell within the knowledge crystal after looking through all the treasure.

 Chapter 582 Dragonborn Scout

    Chapter 582 Dragonborn Scout


    Stitch Ghost Golem.


    The Stitch Ghost Golem looked like a cloth doll the size of a palm. The left half was in the form of a man, while the right half was the form of a woman. Its entire body was filled with stitches and the signs of thread. Its body was ck, and bloodstains were everywhere. Its face wasposed of a single eye drawn in blood.


    Three convict ghost guards would follow the Stitch Ghost Golem the moment it was sessfully created. It was the golem¡¯s only means of attack.


    The three convict ghost guards were incorporeal existences; they couldn¡¯t be affected by physical attacks. Moreover, they would take away with them a shard of the target¡¯s soul every time they passed through the target¡¯s body. They could then seal that soul shard within the body of the Stitch Ghost Golem.


    Once the number of soul shards reached a certain amount, the Stitch Ghost Golem could activate Soul Attachment once. It would be able to take control of the target¡¯s body for a short period. The sess rate of Soul Attachment depended on the difference of Spirit between the Stitch Ghost Golem and the target creature. The stronger the Spirit of the target, the lower the sess rate. If the target¡¯s Spirit were twice that of the Stitch Ghost Golem, then the Soul Attachment would fail!


    Greem put down the knowledge crystal and gave the golem a thought. He couldn¡¯t help but be amazed by the vastness and strangeness of the world of magic. A Stitch Ghost Golem such as this wasn¡¯t strong, but it was exceptionally odd and unpredictable. An opponent could very easily be taken down if they had no means of dealing with it.


    This knowledge crystal should havee from the hands of a profession known as a Soul Master.


    Soul Masters were not a species. They were a unique profession.


    They could be of any race or lifeform, and the specialty of their profession was the ability to dissect and cut up souls to use in the creation of all sorts of soul servants. These soul shards that they cut off of their own soul possessed a tight connection that no magic could cut off; they never needed to worry about their soul servants turning on themselves.


    The servants created by these soul shards were ethereal. They could ignore all physical defenses and directly attack the enemy¡¯s soul and mental consciousness. Moreover, the soul servants were one with their master, making the act of controlling them extraordinarily natural andfortable. There would be no dy in thought and action even when controlled remotely.


    However, the weaknesses of these soul servants were just as apparent as their strengths. If they were ever destroyed, it would cause damage to the soul master¡¯s soul. Such an injury would require a long time to recover from. The soul master would even face the risk of having his soul disperse and his mental consciousness being exterminated, especially if too many of his soul servants were destroyed all at once.


    The soul servants were double-edged swords. Risk and power came hand-in-hand!


    Greem now possessed knowledge of the method to create the Stitch Ghost Golem and the soul attachment ceremony after reading the knowledge crystal. It was entirely possible for him to create this golem with his current ability and power. After a moment¡¯s hesitation, Greem put the knowledge crystal away and silently started assessing the cost-benefit ratio of the Stitch Ghost Golem.


    ............


    The Swamp of Sorrows.


    Dirty swamps and filthy puddles were everywhere.


    Looking from a distance, the only thing that filled one¡¯s vision would be the dark-colored mud and the ck water pooled on the ground. Anything further away was all obscured by a thickyer of mist. It was hard to see far in this environment.


    The mist was thick, and the earth was silent.


    However, unimaginable dangers and death brewed within this silence.


    Sly and sinister hunters could be hiding under every single pool in the Swamp of Sorrows. They silently hid under the murky and pungent waters, waiting for their prey to arrive.


    These pools were often connected to each other by narrow tunnels at the bottom. It allowed them to change positions or retreat without alerting anyone. The prey would only sense danger approaching at the moment the hunters lunged at them with their bloody jaws open.


    A loud ssh shattered the silence in this world.


    A thick and scaly dragon¡¯s leg stepped into a puddle, sending water and mud sshing everywhere.


    "Dammit."


    Dragonborn Asa loudly cursed as he pulled out his front leg with much difficulty.


    His loud voice traveled far in the silent swamps, but Asa couldn¡¯t care less.


    For he was a dragonborn!


    If the dragon lords were the noble rulers of Lance, then they, the servants of these dragons, would be the nobles of various statuses. The dragonborn were the uncontested strongest warriors in anynd, and before any species, in Lance. They were the strictest tax collectors and the justest executors of thew.


    No native dared to offend a noble dragonborn, even if they were only an ordinary dragonborn warrior or dragonborn scout. As for attacking a dragonborn? That was an unforgivable crime that would result in the extermination of the entire tribe!


    Thus, dragonborn scout Asa did not need to worry, even as he trudged along the unfamiliar Swamp of Sorrows. He even went against the principles of being a scout in letting out such noise.


    Strangely enough, Dragonborn Asa wasn¡¯t attacked by the swamp creatures hiding in the surroundings, even after he made such amotion. Instead, it caused the animals to dive underwater in a panic and escape into the distance through the winding tunnels.


    A wicked smile appeared on Asa¡¯s sharp, long face when he saw the bubbles rise from the murky pools.


    He dragged hisrge and heavy body and started to walk through the more solid dirt road rapidly.


    Here in the Swamp of Sorrows, one needed to be able to recognize which patch of dirt could be stepped upon and which contained a pool underneath. Otherwise, it was easy to get trapped in all the mud. That would have been a massive insult to Asa as well since he was a scout.


    Arge dragonborn army was brazenly marching just thirty-five kilometers behind him.


    As the dragonborn scout they had sent out, Asa needed to clear away all possible ambushes in the path of the army. On the other hand, he also needed to chase away those pesky swamp creatures in case they interrupted the progress of the dragonborn army.


    In truth, there was no creature on Lance that dared to ambush the dragonborn army. Asa still remembered thest ambush. It had been over thirty years ago.


    A lizardman had attacked a dragonborn tax collector, having been driven mad by the heavy taxes. The lizardman threw mud at the dragonborn. Thus, that entire area was cleansed. Be it the lizardman tribe or the kobold tribe, everything that could stand on two legs was ughtered by the dragonborn.


    Ever since then, all the native tribes of Lance would frantically hide from the dragonborn, fearful of identally offending them.


    Dragonborn scouts didn¡¯t need to be concerned about those terrified native tribes when they went on expeditions. Instead, they had to be careful of the many wild magical creatures in the wilderness.


    They were all powerful primal beings without the intelligence to differentiate between those that they could afford to provoke and those they couldn¡¯t. Asa¡¯s main job was to chase away these creatures!


    Asa walked another one and a half kilometers in the humid and dim swamp before stopping.


    This wasn¡¯t right. Something wasn¡¯t right about this ce!


    Quiet. Unprecedentedly quiet. Even the small sounds of pythons slithering on rotting leaves and leeches bubbling in the murky waters couldn¡¯t be heard.


    The massive swamp area had be umonly quiet, almost as if the living beings here had all suddenly died.


    Death...


    Asa felt something wrong with his body when this word appeared in his mind.


    He quickly took two steps to the side, bent his body, and lowered his head. It was only now that he realized he had been hit.


    An almost intangible shroud of gray mist rose from the puddle below, polluting Asa¡¯s scales and turning them a gray color. As the fog grew denser and thicker, the rate at which the gray corroded Asa¡¯s body increased. It quickly spread toward the upper half of his body.


    What was this?


    Poison? A living creature? Or the strange ability of some magical creature?


    Asa¡¯s brain was rapidly spinning. His constant training as a dragonborn scout was already driving him to flee from the gray mist. Asa let out a muffled roar upon escaping to a nearby dirt road. Blinding firelight sted out of his scales.


    The robust Physique of the dragonborn gave Asa exceptional magic resistance. Ordinary biological poison would not be able to cause lethal damage to him. He was already gathering his strength and nning his counterattack upon escaping the enemy¡¯s trap.


    Yet, an intense daze engulfed his mind while he was ferociously stimting the blood within his body,


    Asa stumbled for a few steps and almost copsed to the ground.


    His previously rock-sturdy dragon legs were trembling and shivering. They could no longer support his massive weight.


    Dammit! What poison is this? Why is it so strong?


    Asa once again roared furiously. He raised the heavy metal axe high above his head and intended to fire a ferocious fireball into the air to warn the dragonborn army behind him.


    Sadly, while he erected his body with serious effort, a skinny and withered ck silhouette suddenly appeared within his blurry vision.


    "Take a nap! Take a good nap! You should just take a nap now that you¡¯ve run into me, Poison Hag Endor."


    The next second, an intense pain coursed through every single part of his body and gathered together to shatter Asa¡¯s consciousness as if the figure before him had sessfully cursed him.


    ng!


    The metal axe fell to the ground, and the dragonborn scout¡¯srge body slowly copsed, sshing even more dirty water into the surroundings.


    Poison Witch Endor¡¯s withered body approached the dragonborn scout after she had brought him down. She casually made a grabbing motion, and most of the poison was extracted from his body. However, she kept part of the poison lingering in the dragonborn¡¯s skull. This way, the dragonborn would not be able to wake up easily.


    "Come, take him back to the base!"


    Endor¡¯s voice wasn¡¯t too loud, but it immediately caused amotion in the surroundings.


    Dirt went flying and water sshed in a fewrge pools nearby. A dozenrge construction machines climbed out of the pools to gather towards the witch with heavy footsteps.


    The construction machines surged forward, lifted the unconscious dragonborn, and ran into the depths of the mist, all under themand of a goblin technician sitting high above an open-top machine.


    Endor lifted her old and sinister face to look in the direction that the dragonborn scout hade from.


    "The subordinates of that female fire dragon came quick! It seems we will have to fight with them here in the Swamp of Sorrows."


    Poison Witch Endor pulled her hood over her head once more after mumbling to herself and silently disappeared from the scene.

 Chapter 583 Glaring

    Chapter 583 ring


    The squads of dragonborn walked through the filthy swamp with no particr organization or order.


    All the swamp creatures fled wherever they went, and none of them dared toe within a hundred meters of these dragonborn.


    Arge swamp alligator was a little too slow in running and entered the dragonborn¡¯s alert zone. Four to five violent elementium fireballs instantly greeted it, blowing it into scattered pieces of meat on the spot.


    A native tribe hid in the darkness within the depths of the mist, silently watching this massive army of dragonborn from the shadows. An indescribable hatred filled their eyes, but they could only look on wordlessly. They didn¡¯t dare to get close.


    Here was a massive dragonborn army that numbered three hundred. No ordinary dragon lord coulde up with such a powerful force, even in Lance.


    Thus, when Second Grade Dragon Army Commander Will charged into the Swamp of Sorrows with his ferocious soldiers, everything in their path scattered. No living creature had the courage to appear within their vision, much less stand before their way.


    "Sir, we have already lost contact with three groups of scouts. We have not found anymunication marks left behind by them along the way. The search parties we sent out have not found them either." A particrly muscr dragonborn captain jogged toward Commander Will and beat his chest firmly with his fist.


    The metal gauntlet shed with the metal armor, emitting a t metallic ring.


    No traces of the dragonborn meant no corpses.


    However, no native tribes within the Swamp of Sorrows had the ability to silently murder a dragonborn scout. The powerful magical creatures might be able to do so, but they shouldn¡¯t have the courage to do so.


    Moreover, the three different groups of scouts had gone in three different directions. All of them disappearing at the same time was already extremely suspicious!


    "Have the other scouts withdraw!"


    Commander Will was a tall and ferocious dragonborn. His body under the metal armor was covered in a fineyer of red dragon scales. That meant that apart from his exceptional strength, he also possessed immense fire elementium powers.


    "Since the enemy has started removing our eyes and our ears, it means that their den isn¡¯t far away now. We will find a suitable spot to make campter. Then we need to hurry up and send someone to establish contact with Lord Cherkes. Melman,ter you will be bringing Squad Seven to go collect food from the nearby viges. Be careful and watch out!"


    "Understood!" A dragonborn captain at his side also beat his chest and epted his orders. The dragonborn then strode away to gather his subordinates.


    "Falka, you bring your subordinates with you and go figure out who it was that attacked out scouts. I hope to hear good news from you before dinner is made." This time, Will gave his order to a troll in a ck ceremonial robe.


    Indeed, there was a squad of two hundred trolls mixed in with this dragonborn army. Moreover, they were all zealous followers of the Cult of the Dragons.


    All sorts of traitors would appear when a species was being conquered by another foreign race. In fact, there were sometimes traitors who made afortable life for themselves through their acts of betrayal.


    The Cult of the Dragons was one such bizarre organization!


    The trolls had no chance of turning the tables once the dragon lords had destroyed their Empire.


    Many troll powerhouses had been hiding in the shadows during these thousands of years of dragon rule. They invariably started waves of rebellion against the dragons. Yet there was also an alternate group of trolls that had gotten sick of the bloody and endless cycle of resistance, suppression, and rebellion. They raised the g of revering the dragons and called for their tribesmen to stop their unnecessary revolutions.


    Trolls like this naturally fell into the good favors of the dragon lords.


    Under the intentional aid of the dragons, a portion of the trolls established the Cult of the Dragons. The Cult called for natives of all species toe into the fold and be the devout followers of the dragons.


    The dragons even bestowed upon the Dragon Cultists a status only inferior to the dragonborn to further rope them in. The Cultists became the servants of the dragons¡¯ servants!


    The dragons would even bestow part of their dragon bloodline upon those who were the most devout and had the most contributions. Thus, these cultists came to possess strange spellcasting abilities reminiscent of warlocks.


    Outsiders also knew these cultists as Dragon Cult Priests.


    Falka, who Commander Will had called for, was one such Second Grade Dragon Cult Priest.


    Even though Falka knew that this was a difficult task with nothing to gain, there was no room for discussion with Commander Will. Priest Falka had no choice but to ept the order helplessly.


    Falka shouted, and arge group of ck-robed Dragon Cultists quickly left the dragonborn army. They disappeared into the distant mist in the blink of an eye.


    "Hmph! Leave this dirty work to that Dragon Cultist bunch! Cohen, inform the soldiers to turn northwest. I remember arge kobold camp located in that direction. We will set up camp there tonight." Will couldn¡¯t help but coldly snort once he saw the Dragon Cultists had left.


    "Kobold camp?" The few trusted captains around Commander Will looked at each other and hesitantly spoke up, "Sir, those kobolds stink too much. It will affect the rest and appetite of our soldiers."


    "Hmph! Who¡¯s scared of a little stench? Kill all those kobolds and litter the camp with their blood. We won¡¯t smell their stench anymore that way."


    The dragonborn captains had no choice but to nod obediently now that their leader had already spoken. They disbanded and went to organize their own squads.


    Soon, only Deputy Commander Eden was left. He was an old friend of Commander Will, and both of them went back over a hundred years. It was only now that a trace of solemnness appeared on Will¡¯smanding face.


    "What is it? Are you still worried about our enemy this time?" Eden asked softly.


    "I can¡¯t help but be worried!" Will¡¯s voice was filled with fury, "I have already heard about the situation. We might be facing off against a bunch of mysterious individuals that broke into our ne from the outside."


    "What about it then?" Eden consoled his friend nonchntly, "Other nar invasions happen a few times almost every year. Most of them are wanderers with nowhere to go or some idiotic spellcaster that chanted the wrong word. It has nothing to do with us once we expel them from this territory."


    "No, old friend, this time might not be all the same as all the previous times."


    "How so?"


    "I already checked before we left on this expedition. Those intruders appeared in the Swamp of Sorrows nine days ago. They then made a beeline straight for Lord Cherkes¡¯ territory. Cherkes, on the other hand, hade to ask for help from our master three days ago. If we were to exclude the time spent on the journey, it means that the enemy had defeated Lord Cherkes¡¯ soldiers within a single day."


    "One day." Eden¡¯s eyes couldn¡¯t help but be opened wide in shock.


    He knew the Wind Dragon Lord Cherkes. The dragonmanded over a hundred dragonborn, and hismander was a powerful Second Grade as well. If the enemies could route an army like that in a single day, the risk of this mission was extraordinarily high!


    "I expected these people to hide within Stalon Mountains and defend that ce to the death. Who would¡¯ve known that they would extend their ws into the Swamp of Sorrows? Let us first make camp! We will decide on the next course of action once we figure out the situation at Stalon Mountains." As expected of Fire Dragon Philippa¡¯s most trusted aide, Commander Will was not only an exceptional fighter but possessed a calm and collected mind as well.


    Eden sighed silently. He supposed that was all they could do for now.


    ............


    The Swamp of Sorrows, inside a hidden camp.


    Several adepts of the Crimson n had already gathered inside one of the tents and were quietly waiting for news from a distance.


    A dozen images with different angles were being projected upon a metal strategic tform in the middle of the tent. The movements of the dragonborn army werepletely disyed before the adepts.


    The adepts might have all sorts of magical means to spy on the dragonborn, such as Adept¡¯s Eye, Invisible Servant, and Life Sense, but these means all unavoidably released magical flux. That could very easily draw the attention of the dragonborn.


    Thus, all the scouting this time was done by Gazlowe¡¯s machines.


    Vibration sensors fitted at the bottom of puddles, hidden mechanical eyes embedded in the trees, multi-band sound recorders buried in the mud, and life sensors flying above the mists of the Swamp of Sorrows.


    These mechanical constructs all carried a bit of magical aura with them, but it was far weaker than actual spells. If one were to take Lance¡¯s high-magic environment into consideration, even adepts would have a hard time discovering these mechanical constructs if they weren¡¯t very carefully searching with their Spirit.


    As such, there was no way the dragonborn could discover these strange objects hidden around them, regardless of how careful and cautious they were being.


    Now, it was almost as if a one-way mirror separated both sides of the conflict. The adepts had a perfect grasp of the opponent¡¯s movements, while the dragonborn were still moving about like they were blind, unknowingly walking into a death trap.


    "I didn¡¯t think these dragonborn would bring a bunch of Dragon Cultists with them. How about it? Who wants to go draw these Cultists away?" As the temporary leader of the group, Mary had taken on the role ofmander.


    Standing beside her were the three Blood Knights she had taken into her fold in the Knight¡¯s ne, along with the old fox Vanlier They had sessfully arrived in Lance after transferring from the Goblin ne.


    The battle was nearing, and Greem had stayed in the metal fortress to think of ways to modify the new metal golems. Thus, the only Second Grade adepts that had arrived at this battlefield were Mary and Zacha.


    The outsider Dragon Devourer Oliven might havee along, but she remained silent. Under Greem¡¯s suggestion, she had found a thick ck robe to cloak herself inpletely.


    There was no choice. Oliven¡¯s appearance and life aura were too unique. The dragonborn would effortlessly recognize her if she didn¡¯t put on a little disguise.


    The ones waiting for orders within the tent were the few First Grade adepts that the Crimson n had only recently cultivated: Bug Adept Billis, Deserra, Medusa Dana, and Manticore Charon. Poison Witch Endor, on the other hand, was a representative sent over by Alice¡¯s faction; she couldn¡¯t be considered a core member of the Crimson n.

 Chapter 584 Mission Assignment

    Chapter 584 Mission Assignment


    The Dragon Cultists came in great numbers, and even the Dragon Cultist Priest leader seemed to be a First Grade elite.


    After a short moment¡¯s silence, Bug Adept Billis stood forward.


    "I will go, Lady Mary! My little fellows are just in need of some meat and nutrition. Their numbers are just enough."


    "Very well, do as you will! But you must draw them away from this ce and wait for us to start before you do. You may take fifteen Archers and fifteen Loggers with you when you go." There was no surprise on Mary¡¯s delicate and pretty face when she heard the brutality and bloodiness in Billis¡¯ words.


    Archer and Logger were the codenames that the adepts gave the different models of magical machines.


    The former was equipped with a tremendous number of arcanite rifles and goblin rockets. They were swift and agile on their feet and were the long-ranged attackers of the magical machine army. Thetter had most of their long-range means of attack removed. They were outfitted with heavier armor as well asrge chainsaws and drills, turning them into fearsome closebat machines.


    The force that had been chosen to intercept the fire dragon¡¯s dragonborn army here in the Swamp of Sorrows didn¡¯t consist only of the adepts. Mary had also brought along two hundred magical machines of various models. Adepts that went on a mission were apanied by a certain number of magical machines. They were meant to be used as cannon fodder.


    That was the only way to minimize the risk to the adepts as much as possible!


    "A squad of fifteen dragonborn scouts have gone to collect food from the swamp murlocs one kilometer away from here. Who wants to go and deal with them?" Mary¡¯s crimson eyes were still fixed upon the one dozen shifting screens of light as she loudly asked without even lifting her head.


    A dragonborn squad was usually formed of First Grade dragonborn and led by a First Grade elite captain. The adept that took on this mission would have to single-handedly take on fifteen powerful First Grade warriors who also possessed some elementium powers.


    Adept Deserra looked around him and realized he was the only human adept left in the tent. He had no choice but to step forward with a bitter smile on his face.


    "Lady Mary, I can give it a try!"


    With his ability, he should have no problem killing two to three dragonborn warriors in a head-on challenge as long as he had sufficient preparation. If the numbers were too many, and Deserracked a meat shield, then the risk he undertook would increase exponentially.


    Even though the apanying magical machines would protect him, no one knew how effective they would be; it was the first time the adepts were working with the magical machines. Even Deserra didn¡¯t haveplete confidence in exterminating the enemy under such circumstances. He was facing off against fifteen dragonborn and an elite-level dragonborn captain after all.


    Deserra alone seemed too weak to deal with this.


    Medusa Dana slithered forward with her slender waist while Mary was still contemting what she should do.


    "Lady Mary, I can go with Adept Deserra!"


    Two adepts and some magical machines. Mm, this much firepower should guarantee sess!


    Mary was pleased. She turned and looked at the medusa, who was wearing a wind indurium armor and nodded.


    Of the three magical creatures that had submitted to the Crimson n, Dana was the only one that had disyed sufficient loyalty and intelligence. The Manticore Leader Charon was also a loyal subordinate, but he was too stupid and was only suited as an assistant.


    In contrast, there was great value in cultivating and training Dana!


    Perhaps because her gaze had lingered a little too long upon Dana¡¯s hair of snakes, Mary could feel a wave of strange energy surge into her body through her eyes. The flesh and organs near Mary¡¯s eyes started to show signs of paralysis.


    Mary smiled brilliantly and silently used her blood powers to neutralize this foreign energy. She then cast her eyes back upon the screens of light as if nothing had happened.


    "I¡¯ll give you ten Archers and ten Loggers. Remember, make sure no dragonborn escapes alive. The time of attack will be set at..."


    Adept Deserra couldn¡¯t help but be amazed at the sight of Mary calmly neutralizing a medusa¡¯s petrification powers.


    In all seriousness, Deserra had never taken a good look at Dana, despite being her colleague for such a long time. The books always described the Medusa¡¯s as lovely and seductive creatures, but Deserra never dared to cast his gaze upon Dana.


    Otherwise, those natural powers of petrification might turn him into stone. He would then need other adepts of the n to help him, and then his reputation would be utterly ruined.


    As such, Deserra had never dared to look directly at Dana despite his curiosity about her beauty. He merely bowed along with her before leaving the tent to pick out the magical machines they were assigned for the mission.


    Mary lifted her head and looked around once the two groups of adepts had left the tent.


    Currently, she and Zacha were the only Second Grades in the tent. The three blood knights were pseudo-Second Grade, while Charon and Endor were First Grade. (Second Grade Oliven had beenpletely ignored!) An army like this should have no issue defeating that dragonborn army, especially with the cooperation of a hundred and fifty magical machines.


    However, it was going to be difficult to exterminate the opponent entirely.


    At least, it would be difficult unless she put some particr means into motion!


    Mary¡¯s ruby-like eyes couldn¡¯t help but fall upon Poison Hag Endor.


    The old witch put on a bitter smile and stepped forward to bow.


    "Lady Mary, simplymand if there¡¯s something this old hag can help you with!"


    Endor didn¡¯t wholly belong to the Crimson n after all. She was a rtive of Witch of Fate Alice. That was why even Greem had to be extremely polite and courteous with her. He treated her with plenty of respect.


    "Adept Endor, I need you to spread a type of poison near the camp where the dragonborn will be resting. It should effectively reduce theirbat power. However, they cannot discover the effects of the poison ahead of time. The symptoms need to manifest only right before we start our attack."


    The old and sinister Poison Hag let out a broad smile when she heard Mary¡¯s difficult request, revealing her missing and yellowed teeth.


    "No problem! Leave this mission to me, Lady Mary! You don¡¯t need to worry about it."


    Endor left the tent after promising toplete the task. The ground thudded as she walked out while leaning upon her staff, which was almost twice her height.


    "Charon, the opponent seems to have sent two dragonborn scouts to Twin Peaks. You go and kill them! Remember, you must hurry back before the offensive on our end here begins."


    "Understood, Lady Mary!"


    The tall and muscr manticore leader beat his wind-indurium armor with one of his paws and loudly responded to Mary¡¯s orders. He then turned and left the tent.


    He hadn¡¯te here to Lance alone. He had brought with him his partner, the First Grade elite female manticore, and two manticore subordinates.


    They weren¡¯t apanied by magical machines this time. The four manticores pped their leathery wings and took to the skies. They hid their bodies within the dense mist and quickly flew in the direction of the two dragonborn scouts.


    As one of the first official members of the Crimson n, Charon and the others had received tremendous privileges on several aspects.


    The new wind-indurium armors, the evil Vampiric Knuckles, and all the various magical equipment, scrolls, and potions had thoroughly weaponized them and turned them into powerful ughter machines.


    If one were only topare basicbat power, the odds of four First Grade manticores against two First Grade dragonborn were only sixty-forty.


    Sixty for the manticores and forty for the dragonborn.


    It wouldn¡¯t be weird for losses to ur on the side of the manticores if they slipped up on their cooperation.


    After all, the dragonborn were fearsome monsters that possessed dragon bloodline. Theirbat power was unexpectedly high. Moreover, the manticores were underground creatures. Their strength could only be fully disyed if they were within the unique geography of the underground world.


    Consequently, the chances of four manticores fighting two dragonborn on the surface wasn¡¯t that high.


    However, the four manticores were utterly different from before after being equipped with so much magical equipment. Their power had doubled. That was the main reason why Charon was so confident inpleting this mission!


    "Miss Mary, what about me?" Oliven, who had been hiding in a corner cloaked in her robe, couldn¡¯t help but move forward and ask.


    Dragonborn Zacha huddled and betrayed a trace of fear when the dragon devourer walked near them. However, he quickly suppressed this instinctual reaction with his powerful will. Instead, he opened his tworge eyes and his two small eyes and stared at Oliven, almost as if he was facing off with a fearsome enemy.


    Mary sighed helplessly, pointed at Zacha and replied with a question, "You see this as well. The dragonsoul curse on you is far too conspicuous. The whole dragonborn army will know we have a dragon devourer in our ranks the moment you appear. We can¡¯t guarantee one or two of them won¡¯t escape from today¡¯s battle. If that happens, rumors of you will be spreading throughout Lance in less than a month."


    Oliven frowned when she heard this.


    "That leader of yours made a promise with me. The spoils will be split ording to contributions inbat. Where am I supposed to obtain these contributions if you won¡¯t let me participate in the fight?"


    Mary smiled when she heard this. She then flipped her wrist and took out a strange orb from her robe.


    "Have you heard of the Orb of Deception? I happen to have one here with me. You might not ever need to worry about your aura leaking if you keep this Orb of Deception with you at all times."


    "Orb of Deception?" Oliven opened her eyes wide. It seemed this was her first time hearing of such a fantastic thing.


    Mary didn¡¯t say anything. She turned with the jewel and smiled at Dragonborn Zacha.


    An awkward expression appeared on Zacha¡¯s face. He hesitated for a moment before extending one of his right fingers, its nails curved and sharp as a dagger. He then lightly cut his left palm. The sharp knife-life fingernail easily sliced apart the unprotected palm, leaving a shallow cut on the flesh. A single purple drop of blood seeped out to the surface.


    Zacha wiped the blood upon the Orb of Deception, his wound disappearing almost instantly after.


    The next second, Mary¡¯s aura abruptly changed. It actually became the same as Zacha¡¯s aura.


    This fantastical scene caused Oliven to open her eyes wide in shock. She almost couldn¡¯t believe her own eyes, and even more so, her spiritual senses.


    It was important to note that multiple factors decided a being¡¯s life aura. It merged the being¡¯s soul flux, mental consciousness, magical aura, as well as natural odor. In most cases, life aura could be suppressed and even hidden, but it was difficult to disguise it.


    After all, no magic could perfectly replicate the aura of another living being. It would all be exposed in the face of powerful spiritual senses.


    Yet, at this moment, Mary and Zacha were standing side-by-side before Oliven. When Oliven closed her eyes and felt with her spiritual sense alone, she was shocked to find that two Dragonborn Zachas were standing in front of her.


    "I want this Orb!" Oliven eximed.


    Oliven clearly had no idea how to hide her desires and thoughts. She had always been a lone wolf.


    Mary lightly tossed the Orb of Deception in her hand, causing Oliven¡¯s eyeballs to flick up and down along with the Orb.


    Mary smiled and betrayed a little joy from her n going as well as she had thought.


    "This Orb is really expensive. Did you intend to get it just like that?"


    "I¡¯ll buy it. I can buy it with the equipment on me; why don¡¯t you offer a price?"


    The smile on Mary¡¯s face grew even wider.

 Chapter 585 Fires of War

    Chapter 585 Fires of War


    At the edge of a murky and filthy pool.


    An old witch with turbid eyes, yellowed teeth, wrinkled skin, and a hooked nose was squatting by the pool. She wore a gray adept¡¯s robe and a gray witch¡¯s hat on her head, silently chanting some strange, indiscernible spell.


    As light magical fluctuations spread throughout the pungent pool, the surface of the sickly green water started to bubble like boiling water.


    Soon, all sorts of creatures had gathered around the old witch: toads covered with warts, inconspicuous gray poison water snakes, muskrats, slow alligator snapping turtles, and all sorts of other strange, unrecognizable swamp creatures.


    Judging from their size, the old witch had only summoned smaller swamp creatures.


    These swamp creatures would not havee out of their hidden nests if not for the bindings of magic, nor would they be peacefully standing near all these other swamp creatures without fighting each other.


    "My little babies. Look at you, all so cute..." Poison Hag Endor smiled as she bent over and caressed the toad that had leaped to the side of her leg.


    Those massive warts, that sticky mucus on its body, that ugly appearance and size; it was likely that only a mad old witch like her would call a poisonous toad like this one her cute baby!


    "My cute babies, I need you to bring a gift to the big meatheads over at the camp. Won¡¯t you make a trip there for me?"


    Endor took out a jar as she mumbled to herself. She then carefully dripped its ck and viscous liquid contents upon these swamp creatures.


    The ck liquid rapidly seeped into the swamp creatures the moment it made contact with their skin.


    Those small critters carrying the ck liquid within them quickly turned and vanished into the pool. They started to move toward the crowded dragonborn camp with their own unique methods. The other critters who had yet to receive a drop of the liquid surged toward Endor, piling up into a bunch as they fought impatiently for the next drop of the ck liquid.


    The misty Swamp of Sorrows suddenly turned a lot more sinister and horrifying!


    ............


    The Murloc Camp.


    The one-sided ughter was still going on.


    Murlocs were a type of bipedal, amphibious life form that resembled fish and lived by the shore, theke, or the riverbed. They all possessed round and fat bodies, mouths withrge sharp teeth, and bodies covered in slimy liquid.


    Murlocs came in many colors, from green to dark gray. You could probably find a murloc in any color. Their average height was between 1.3 meters to 1.5 meters.


    Murlocs liked to stay in groups. From a few dozen to a hundred murlocs would get together and form a tiny vige.


    Their viges were all made of tattered branches and mud and were not at all nned or organized. There were no campfires in murloc viges, nor clean roads or any defensive structures. Murloc huts were crude and natural. They were all small shacks supported by round logs.


    The murloc vige that the dragonborn requisitioning squad had gone after were swamp murlocs.


    Swamp murlocs were the mostmon and numerous low-grade magical creatures in the Swamp of the Sorrows. In all honesty, they brought shame upon their identity as swamp creatures.


    Their unbelievably weak Frostbolts, crude spears shaved from wooden sticks, and fishings made of nt fiber were useless against the tall and mighty dragonborn warriors.


    The few murloc priests within the vige couldn¡¯t do much either. Their Frostbolts were surprisingly weak and would only explode into snowkes when they hit the chests of the towering dragonborn. Don¡¯t even talk about freezing the enemy; Those Frostbolts could hardly wound the dragonborn.


    The dragonborn that were hit by the Frostbolts would usuallyugh and scratch off theyer of ice on their chest before bashing the murloc priest¡¯s head into their chests with a light punch.


    The dragonborn weren¡¯t here to requisite the pathetic animal bones and ck jerkies left over from the murlocs¡¯ meals. What they wanted were the swamp murlocs themselves.


    Swamp murlocs were basically a bunch of fish with limbs. Tossing a couple of murlocs into a pot could make pretty good fish stew!


    The dragonborn all had huge appetites. An army of two hundred dragonborn wouldn¡¯t have enough to eat even if they wiped out the entire murloc vige.


    Thus, the dragonborn requisitioning squad that charged into the vige didn¡¯t even bother with the frantic yelling of the old murloc vige head. They immediately got to killing once they arrived. They quickly ughtered the murlocs and brought their bodies to the center of the vige, where they tied them up with vines and prepared to haul them back to the army.


    The Frostbolts of the murloc priests could only cool the body temperature of the dragonborn by a little bit, and the spears of their warriors often broke upon the scales of the dragonborn. Thes that they cast couldn¡¯t endure the powerful tearing of the dragonborn warriors and the slicing edge of their metal axes.


    If it weren¡¯t for the dragonborn¡¯s size that made their movements slower, not a single survivor would have escaped this vige of one hundred and thirty murlocs.


    The dragonborn warrior under the fire dragon naturally possessed fire affinity. The more talented ones among them couldunch powerful fireballs. On the other hand, the ordinary dragonborn warrior could only channel the mes onto their weapons and enhance them with some fire damage.


    To better hunt their ¡¯rations,¡¯ many of the dragonborn had sheathed their metal weapons. They were using their bare hands to crush or smash these harmless murlocs.


    They scattered throughout the vige, chasing after the terrified and screaming murlocs. They would smash a murloc to the ground whenever they caught one before going on to grab the next one.


    It was like an eagle descending upon a flock of chicks. The entire murloc vige descended into ear-piercing screams. The dragonborn captain even started a fire around the town to cut off all paths of escape avable to the murlocs.


    This deste scene of utter chaos and tragedy was what appeared before Deserra and Dana when they arrived at the edge of the battlefield with the magical machines in tow.


    Twelve dragonborn warriors had split up. They were chasing after the groups of murlocs and busy trying to hunt them down.


    Only the dragonborn captain had gathered with two of his subordinates. They sealed off the most significant exit of the vige and were gleefully ughtering the unfortunate murlocs that ran into them.


    "What¡¯s the n?" Medusa Dana shook her slender waist and propped up her body on her long snake¡¯s tail. She took a serious and careful look at the battlefield.


    She might be smart and capable, but she was still born as a magical creature. Shecked the sly and sinister nature of the humans when it came to tricks and techniques. That was why she was willing to listen to Deserra¡¯s opinion, even though she was more powerful than the human adept.


    As expected, Deserra¡¯s suggestion was truly sinister.


    "We can¡¯t go in all at once!" Deserra was a wind adept. Spells like Levitate and Fly were par for the course for him. He hovered three meters above the ground and looked at the battlefield from a distance. Heughed sinisterly as he gave his suggestion, "The geography here is wide and unobstructed. We don¡¯t have the power to stop all the dragonborn if they are bent on running.


    "So...


    "We should hide the magical machines for the moment. The two of us and the two snakefiends you brought with you should go and ambush the dragonborn captain first."


    Dana tilted her head and thought for a moment. She still didn¡¯t quite understand.


    Shouldn¡¯t one always charge forward with all the force they had inbat? Whoever had the most numbers and thergest fist would be the one to obtain the final victory. Could they win this battle by leaving half of their forces outside?


    Deserra seemed to have seen through Dana¡¯s doubts and exined in a little, self-satisfied manner, "Lady Mary didn¡¯t send us here just to beat these dragonborn. She wants us to capture or kill everyst one of them. As such, it¡¯s not difficult to win this battle. It¡¯s difficult to keep them all within this battlefield."


    "We can take down all the dragonborn if we leave the magical machines behind?"


    "We will only appear as four people at first. Moreover, we will be striking at their captain. The dragonborn will assume themselves to have the numerical advantage and won¡¯t think of running anymore. Have them stay on the battlefield, slowly grind away their strength and have the magical machines form a perimeter on the outside and prepare to enter the battle at any time. This way, we have a far greater chance to take down all the dragonborn!"


    "I have no problem fighting with the dragonborn, but my subordinates..." Medusa Dana wasn¡¯t a cold-blooded individual, after all. She took great care of the younger generation of her species.


    The two subordinates she had brought with her were excellent individuals amongst the younger generation of the tribe. They had already grown four arms and could simultaneouslymand multiple weapons. When paired with their fast, wind-like movements, they rained down a storm of des when they fought with knives.


    They could easily bully those unequipped low to mid-grade magical creatures with such strength. However, it was insufficient against powerful beings like the dragonborn.


    Four-armed snakefiends were still too weak regarding Strength. Cutting through the thick metal armor and fine scales of the dragonborn was nearly impossible. An awkward situation of being unable to harm the enemy would happen if they were to actually engage in the fight.


    That was why Dana was already worried about them before the battle had even started.


    Deserra was already muddle-headed when he heard Dana¡¯s soft voice and request.


    Deserra had been extremely strict with himself ever since he had been an apprentice, all for the sake of his future as an adept. Though it wasn¡¯t quite at the level ofpletely abstaining from women, Deserra was honestly far more disciplinedpared to his peers.


    He might have acted upon his desires sometimes after bing an adept, but he was still a resolute and matured individualpared to adepts of the same grade.


    Yet, for some reason, Deserra found himself infatuated with Dana after they started to interact more with each other.


    That delicate and perfect face and that hot and explosive figure. Though the hair of snakes and Dana¡¯s Eyes of Petrification were a little harsh to deal with, didn¡¯t that make it all the more exotic?


    It was rare that the beauty would ask something of him, so it was natural that he would try and amodate her.


    "Then we will bring along another two Loggers! They will be much safer with two of those meat shields at the front."


    A sweet smile immediately appeared on Dana¡¯s face. The snakes on her head all started to let out weird hissings as well.


    "Well, prepare yourself. We will be going now!"


    A simple shout, and the two Crimson adepts, the two snakefiends, and the two rumbling Loggers descended like a whistling whirlwind, swiftly and fiercely lunging towards the dragonborn captain.

 Chapter 586 Deadly Battle at the Murloc Village

    Chapter 586 Deadly Battle at the Murloc Vige


    Thick smoke lingered above the skies of the Murloc vige.


    If this were anywhere else, the smoke would have been visible from dozens of kilometers away.


    Sadly, this was the Swamp of Sorrows!


    The excessively dense fog was like a massive barrier of water that trapped the swamp beneath it and cloaked it in dim daylight.


    The battle in the murloc vige was still underway, and the ughtering was only getting more brutal.


    Adept Deserra flew twenty meters high in the air, his body radiating intense wind elementium aura. He was also loudly chanting spells and using wind des to sh at the dragonborn warriors beneath him, wounding them while throwing them into disarray.


    However, being in the air didn¡¯t mean absolute safety. Severalrge and ferocious whirling metal axes were hurled into the air. Deserra would be severely wounded if he couldn¡¯t dodge these axes. Usually, he could use Tornado Vortex to redirect ranged physical attacks like these.


    However, the metal axes of the dragonborn were far toorge. They were far beyond the likes of small long-ranged weapons. No wind barriers or Tornado Vortexes couldpletely shield Deserra against these ferociously spinning weapons.


    If Deserra was already in such danger in the skies, it was only natural that Dana and her two snakefiends were having more trouble on the ground.


    Two massive Loggers stood in the front, enduring attacks and strikes from multiple dragonborn. Therge chainsaws in their arms would rumble and shriek every time they shed with the axes of the dragonborn, and blinding sparks flew everywhere.


    The reinforced metal bodies of the Loggers were heavily dented and scratched. Many of the violent strikes had already broken through their outer metal shells, revealing the interconnected and spinning metalponents within.


    Dana and her two four-armed snakefiend subordinates were taking turns attacking the dragonborn with the Loggers holding the line at the front. They were continually wounding the dragonborn around them.


    The snakefiends were like rattlesnakes in front of honey badgers when they fought with the fully-armored dragonborn. The thin knives in their hands sent sparks flying when they struck the armor and scales of dragonborn.


    Dana was shouldering all the pressure of the battle alone.


    She slithered with her long snake¡¯s tail and rapidly weaved between the thick limbs of the dragonborn, dodging their axes while having her snake arrows pierce into the gaps between their scales.


    Dana even climbed up some of the particrly ferocious dragonborn. She would use the tiny instant where they locked eyes with her to open her snake eyes and inject her petrification powers into the enemy. In that short instant when Dana paused to look, all the snakes on her head immediately erupted into action. Theyshed out their forked tongue and hissed in unison.


    A Halo of Fear radiated outward, affecting all enemies within a dozen meters.


    Any ordinary creature would have been utterly terrified when engulfed in the Halo of Fear. They would have dropped their weapons and started running. However, the dragonborn were powerful life forms with the bloodline of dragons. They were only scared a few steps backward before breaking out of the fear.


    The dragonborn were also all equipped with armor and didn¡¯t need to worry about friendly fire.


    Thus, the surrounding dragonborn warriors instantly threw their weapons at Medusa Dana while she was wrapped around one of theirpanions.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Dana frantically dodged left and right amidst the metallic ngings. She weaved rapidly but was still unavoidably hit by the axes that were flying everywhere.


    Dana might be wearing a wind-indurium armor on the upper half of her body that helped her mitigate much of the damage, but her lower half was only covered with scales.


    A brilliant light shone from her dusty-yellow eyes as she moaned in pain. Several nearby dragonborn were instantly petrified and turned into statues with wicked and ferocious expressions. Dana then dragged her bloody tail and made a wild attempt to escape. One could even see the bone of her tail exposed.


    Four of the six dragonborn around her were petrified. The remaining two were still relentlessly pursuing after Dana, waving their glowing red metal axes and shing at the medusa.


    Petrifying Gaze!


    Halo of Fear!


    Poison Snake Arrow!


    A chain of spells and powers sted the dragonborn and wounded them so badly that they were coughing up blood. Yet, Dana still couldn¡¯t defend against all of their brutal attacks. The wind barrier around her was on the verge of breaking. She could be severely wounded by the death throes of the dragonborn warriors at any time. Just then, a violent Tornado Vortex descended from the skies, crashing at the feet of the dragonborn like a speeding meteor.


    The ferocious hurricane instantly exploded and turned into hundreds and thousands of thin and powerful wind des. These wind des quickly engulfed the two dragonborn warriors.


    The storm faded as quickly as it had appeared.


    When the violent whirlwind finally disappeared, the two dragonborn looked as if they had been thrown into a meat grinder. Their whole bodies were covered in painful wounds of various sizes. The blood that flowed from their cutspletely stained their bodies.


    They stumbled two more steps toward Dana before crashing with a loud thud. The metal axes in their hands even left deep craters in the ground when theynded.


    The explosion of such power had exhausted all the wind elementium left in Deserra¡¯s body. His body trembled as he slowly floated down from the sky.


    Just then, the sound of cracking stone came from the four dragonborn statues that Dana had forcibly petrified. The dragonborn warriors had used their powerful Physique to resist the powers of petrification and were quickly breaking free of their petrified state.


    Dana¡¯s face turned. She let out a battle cry, and the short bow in her hands snapped several times in session. Two snake hair arrows urately found their way to the throats of two of the dragonborn warriors who had broken free.


    That was the only ce on the dragonborn¡¯s body that was not protected by scales!


    The snake arrows entered their bodies, and the poison took effect.


    The faces of the dragonborn warriors immediately turned purple and ck as they were poisoned to death.


    The two snakefiends that Dana had brought with her took the opportunity and rushed forward. They waved the four knives in their hands and wildly shed at the two half-petrified dragonborn warriors. The strength of the snakefiends was very much inferior to the dragonborn. They had to cut their enemies¡¯ exposed throats and necks to be able to behead them.


    The knives shed and danced about as sparks flew here and there.


    Finally, a firm sh from the knives caused two dragonborn heads to roll to the ground just as they had almost broken free from their petrification. A fountain of blood poured out of their necks.


    Twelve of the fifteen dragonborn warriors had been executed. Only the dragonborn captain and two ordinary warriors were left.


    Deserra and Dana had already ambushed and wounded the captain severely when the battle started. They then intentionally let hispanions save him.


    They then took the chance of the dragonborn being split up to protect their captain to wear away at their numbers.


    Now that all the other dragonborn warriors had fallen, the other two survivors could no longer remain calm. They picked up their captain upon their shoulders and attempted to flee. Sadly, the moment they turned their bodies, they found themselves staring at another nightmare. Eight towering and mighty magical machines were slowly walking toward them with steady steps from the distant fog. The three machines that stood at the very front were the same model as those terrifying machines they had just fought. Five more slender machines stood in a row behind them. ck gun barrels extended from the front of their bodies, their shoulders, and even their arms.


    The five Archers at the back immediately let out a blinding red light when they reached the optimum fifty-meter attacking distance. Metal bullets the size of pigeon¡¯s eggs were propelled by violent magic energy and ravaged the two surviving dragonborn warriors like a ferocious storm.


    Most of the metal bullets were deflected by the metal armor or simply crushed to pieces. Only white spots were left upon the armor. Yet, when the metal bullets hit the scales of the dragonborn, they managed to leave shallow dents in them.


    Only individual bullets managed to pass through the gap between the scales and dug into the flesh of the dragonborn warriors. The dragonborn felt the pain in their bodies and grunted in agony.


    The two dragonborn could only endure the beating without any hope of retaliation. It infuriated them, and they roared in anger.


    Their requisitioning party was about to be captured entirely now that they had been nked. They needed to think of a way to break through the enemy¡¯s perimeter. The two dragonborn warriors could only prop up their captain and continue running ahead while braving the barrage of the Archers.


    The captain saw how desperate the situation was and summoned thest surge of strength within his body. He pushed away from the two dragonborn, picked up a war axe, and immediately charged at the three Loggers.


    "The two of you, run out the nks. Hurry up and report the situation here to Lord Will..."


    The dragonborn captain let out a primal roar and used his charging momentum to drive the axe into the ck earth beneath him furiously.


    The massive and wild blow shook the earth, sending tremendous shockwaves toward the three Loggers.


    The magical machines couldn¡¯t stand still. They stumbled about and lost the best timing to intercept the enemy.


    The captain then leaped high into the air and smashed the massive axe in his hand into the metal chainsaw of one of the Loggers. The unbridled strength was unmatched by the Logger, and the machine went stumbling backward. The chainsaw in its arm had been badly deformed and had even been forcefully driven into its own body.


    The Logger tried its best to pull out the metal chainsaw while using the drill on the other hand to stab the dragonborn. Unfortunately, the dragonborn captain¡¯s second axe had already cut down upon the massive gash created by the chainsaw.


    A muffled but loud boom rang out.


    The Logger¡¯s mechanical body split apart. Countless metal shards,ponents, and magic energy parts scattered in every direction like snowkes in winter.


    This unfortunate magical machine struggled for a bit longer before powerlessly copsing to the ground. It no longer moved after that.


    This series of violent attacks had also taken thest wind out of the dragonborn captain.


    He leaned against his axe and panted in exhaustion. He looked around, but all he saw were the tragic, hacked corpses of his dragonborn subordinates. The two dragonborn warriors trying to escape were also intercepted by the flying Deserra and the slithering Medusa Dana.


    It was over. His party waspletely done for.


    The dragonborn captain felt his vision go ck as his will to battle faded from him. He fell unconscious.

 Chapter 587 A Brewing Battle

    Chapter 587 A Brewing Battle


    Dragonborn Camp.


    The pesky kobolds had beenpletely dealt with.


    The kobold blood had been scattered all across the camp, and the stinging smell of blood had obscured the stench of the ce.


    The smell of blood wasn¡¯t unpleasant to the dragonborn who had always lived on the edge of battle. In fact, it made them feel at ease and rxed.


    The dragonborn had traveled far to get here and had indeed prepared food of their own. However, given the unpredictability of war, it wasn¡¯t a bad idea to prep more food ahead of time. That was why Commander Will had sent out the food requisitioning party to find trouble with the local natives.


    The dragonborn warriors gathered into their squads to start campfires and put on their pots. Soon, the pleasant fragrance of cooked ribs started to fill the camp.


    Several dragonborn warriors had even taken off their armor and were wrestling bare-handed with the free time they had before dinner.


    Dragonborn were warlike people. Fair matches like these were the best stages to demonstrate their valor and might.


    As such, the dragonborn captain did not stop them from doing so. They joined the spectating warriors and started cheering for theirpanions and jeering at the opponents.


    The atmosphere of the camp turned lively and fun, yet there was also a certain peace to the scene that most outsiders wouldn¡¯tprehend!


    "Those overactive little brats." Deputy Commander Edenughed when he turned back and saw this scene unfold. He was standing on a slope within the camp and looking into the distance.


    Even though he was scolding the soldiers, there was a trace of indulgence in his tone.


    Commander Will also turned to look at the camp, but he frowned and shook his head before looking into the distance once again. If this had been in the past, he would probably haveughed off the situation much like Eden. He might even have roared and charged into the camp to throw a couple of those rascals to the ground.


    However, an indescribable feeling of uneasiness lingered in his heart right now. He couldn¡¯t free himself from that feeling no matter what he did.


    "What are you still worried about?" Eden caringly asked when he saw his old friend frown so hard, "The requisitioning party, or the Twin Peaks party?"


    Eden never even mentioned the Dragon Cultists.


    Those lowly trolls had relied on their humble, fancy words and useless praise to win the favor of Lady Philippa. Dragonborn looked down upon such behavior and, by association, scorned these Dragon Cultists.


    Two hundred Dragon Cultists sounded like a reasonablyrge army. However, Eden was confident he could ughter the enemy in half an hour if he had a squad of dragonborn warriors with him.


    It was this vast disparity inbat prowess that caused the dragonborn to look down upon the Dragon Cultists, who only knew how to grovel and pray. The dragonborn would even be d to hear of the Dragon Cultists sustaining massive losses against some powerful magical creature.


    Commander Will didn¡¯t answer his old friend¡¯s question. His gaze was still roaming across the distant fog.


    "How long has it been since the requisitioning party left?" Will narrowed his eyes and asked sombrely, "If we were to go by my calctions, they should already have returned seven minutes ago!"


    Eden was a veteran of war and quickly realized the abnormality upon being reminded by Will.


    "The murloc camp they were heading to is no more than two and a half kilometer away from us. Unless they ran into some real trouble, they should already have returned. Should I bring someone to go check?"


    "No need to go! They might nevere back," The fires of anger burst forth in Commander Will¡¯s four amber eyes, "I have been feeling uneasy ever since we entered the Swamp of Sorrows. Now, it seems, we have underestimated the enemy this time! We have stepped into their trap without even noticing. The enemy never intended to hold the line at Stalon Mountains. Instead, they¡¯vee all the way here to intercept us."


    Deputy Commander Eden shivered at those words. A trace of anger appeared in his eyes when he once again looked at the fog around them.


    Fear was the one word that had never appeared in the dictionaries of dragonborn warriors.


    They would only feel hate and anger for those despicable fellows that hid in the shadows. They would never fear them!


    "I will go and gather up the group and have them be on alert!" Deputy Commander Eden quickly came to a decision.


    Eden beat his chest and saluted Will before crushing a ck scorpion by his foot and sprinting down the slope with two of his subordinates.


    Will continued to look at the surroundings of the camp, utterly ignorant of the sliver of gray smoke that rose from the remains of the ck scorpion that Eden had stomped into the ground. The gray smoke silently merged into the damp mist around them.


    In truth, the entire camp was enveloped by this strange gray smoke. The only reason no one had realized this was due to the presence of the mist around them.


    While Will was silently guessing at the intentions of their hidden enemy, a modified magic-energy flying ship slowly cruised above the skies of the camp. It started to circle there.


    If this had been the goblin flying ships of the past, its old and clumsy steam engine would have been roaring loud enough for everyone within four kilometers to hear it clearly. Moreover, there were also the nging and creaking sounds of mechanicalponents and turning gears. That loud noise would have made any form of subterfuge impossible. The dragonborn would have discovered the ship before it appeared unless they had all turned deaf.


    The sound released by the flying ship was minimal now that the energy source had been swapped out for magic energy. The chances of them being discovered by the dragonborn were even lower with the cover of the fog.


    Several goblin technicians in leather clothes and advanced goggles with green lenses were crouching at the edge of the flying ship. They were using the enhanced vision of the goggles to observe the dragonborn camp beneath them silently.


    One of the advanced goblin engineers was softlymanding a construction machine to carefully ce a three-meter-long, cigar-shaped bomb into the drop hatch.


    Once they had prepared everything, the advanced engineer pressed themunication device in his headset and softly made his report, "Hummingbird One calling Eagle Nest. Hummingbird One calling Eagle Nest. Destroyer is in ce. Hummingbird One awaiting orders."


    An invisible electric wave rapidly spread out towards the distance and sent the message to the heavily guarded base.


    Mary took off her headset and lightly tossed them upon the metal tform. She then casually ced her slender and beautiful legs on the floor. The three blood knights stood in a row behind her while old fox Vanlier mumbled something into her ear with a huge grin on his face.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha was sitting in the corner of the camp, using a cloth to carefully wipe the electric spear that had apanied him for all these years.


    Deserra, Dana, Endor, and Charon had all returned from their missions. Almost every one of them carried wounds on their bodies, except for Endor. In particr, Medusa Dana¡¯s injuries were the most severe.


    However, with the treatment of plenty of healing potions and life potions, Dana¡¯s wound healed at a rate visible to the naked eye. She only needed another fifteen minutes of rest to regain her essentialbat ability.


    Only Bug Adept Billis, who had gone out to kill the Dragon Cultists had yet to return. News from the battlefield was that Billis¡¯ bug army, paired with the magical machines, had managed to obtain the advantage in that battle. However, there were some tough nuts among the Cultists that could use potent fire powers as well. It caused the losses of the magical machines to be rtively higher than expected.


    It seemed Billis would not be able to make it back in time for the main offensive against the dragonborn camp!


    Another fifteen minutester, Dana pulled her head from within a massive barrel of herbs without a scratch on her body. Mary put down her legs and stood up confidently to shout, "Prepare to attack!" She then led the way and strode out of the tent.


    This single order seemed to have put a high-speed motor upon the entire camp. The whole establishment started to move about at an extremely high pace.


    One hundred and sixty-three magical machines split up into different squads based on their models. They sorted into neat formations and marched into the mist with heavy and rumbling footsteps.


    The adept squad that Mary led hid within the magical machines and silently proceeded toward the battlefield.


    Mary continued to give orders as they moved. The eyes and spies they had set up around the dragonborn camp ahead of time started to close in as well. They were like a tight fishing being cast over the dragonborn.


    Therge-scale movement of the magical machine army couldn¡¯t avoid the senses of the dragonborn, even with the fog as cover.


    The dragonborn camp was filled with the shoutings and moring of the dragonborn captain. The squads of dragonborn had been summoned and were being assigned to different areas based on their habits in battle.


    The so-called dragonborn camp had actually been stolen from the native kobolds.


    There were no durable walls or fortresses around the camp that they could fortify themselves in. However, three sides of the camp were blocked off by massive pools of mud and water. There was only a single ten-meter-wide dirt road that led straight into the camp.


    Thus, the dragonborn adapted their strategy to the geography andid most of their troops upon the road that led to the camp, forming several defensive lines along it.


    The dragonborn army had always been known for their ferocity and violence inbat; they had rarely ever been on the defense. However, the enemies had appeared far too abruptly this time. They also seemed to be out for blood. That left Commander Will with no choice but to alter their original n and to decide on their next course of action after figuring out the strength of the enemy.


    However, Commander Will¡¯s little scheme was well within Mary¡¯s ns.


    Mary might not be all that good at scheming, but toying with a dragonbornmander was still a breeze with the aid of Old Fox Vanlier.


    The organized formation of magical machines parted the fog and pressed toward the dragonborn camp with rumbling steps under the hostile gaze of two hundred dragonborn. The intimidating aura of bloodthirst and killing intent unnerved even the veteran dragonborn.


    Both sides slowly closed in on each other.


    A massive fight would break out at any time!


    Chapter Notes:


    Editor Ryu: For those who don¡¯t normally read posts, I implore you to read this Major Update that affects the future of Age of Adepts. It contains some serious changes that go into effect today, November 1st, 2018.


    | Patreon | Discord | Previous Posts | Vote | Leave a Review (NovelUpdates) |

 Chapter 588 Battle Upon the Mud Road

    Chapter 588 Battle Upon the Mud Road


    Therge-scale use of magical machines was a big problem that gued the higher-ups of the Crimson n.


    If they created all the magical machines with top-ss alloy purified and extracted in advanced alchemicalbs, then the cost of production of each magical machine would be higher than the magical statues and constructs of the World of Adepts.


    Thus, to limit the production costs, most of the magical machines were made of an ordinary alloy that had undergone a simple smelting process. Only their energy core, energy cirction systems, and magic-energy weapon parts were made with the newest magical alloys.


    A new magical machine factory had been in the works within Gazlowe¡¯s massive metal body to alleviate this problem, even as the low-grade magical machine assembly lines were still producing magical machines. This new factory would no longer produce assembly line, low-grade magical machines. Instead, it wouldbine the various new technologies, new materials, and new ideas to create elite magical machine warriors.


    The metal golems that Greem was researching was no more than a part of this Project Magical Machine Warrior!


    A total of one hundred and sixty-three magical machines had been assigned to Mary for the battle this time. Of these magical machines, one hundred and sixty were ordinary machines, while three of them were special models¨C the Elementary Magical Machine Warrior.


    These three Elementary Magical Machine Warriors were prototypes that had just walked out of the goblinboratories. They had been sent here after production to test their limits in actualbat. This data would be used to evaluate their practicality and the feasibility of the project¡¯s concept.


    One could also hear from the few mad goblin engineers that these three Elementary Magical Machine Warriors each had their own badass nicknames, apart from their individual model names. They were, respectively, Goblin Tinker, Goblin Shredder, and Goblin Bomberman.


    Mary couldn¡¯t help but be exasperated when she heard these names for the first time. There were truly no sane goblins among these scientists that spent their days shut in theirboratories and factories. Expecting these mad scientists toe up with anything resembling an elegant name was no more than a daydream.


    Still, while the names were crude, they indeed did fit the magical machine warriors.


    Mary naturally kept these elite-level machines around her as bodyguards, while she treated the other magical machines as sacrificial pawns.


    Several paths led to the dragonborn camp. However, apart from the ten-meter wide mud road, all the other trails were winding little roads with uneven geography filled with mud and water. It was not suitable terrain for therge magical machines to traverse.


    Thus, the focus of the conflict would be upon that one exit and entrance of the camp.


    Seeing that the enemy was adamant in holding their positions and were unlikely toe out of the camp, the magical machines started to lock down the exit under the orders of the goblin technicians. The army of machines then stood off against the dragonborn across a vast stretch of murky swamp. Twelve magical machines that had been specially selected formed four rows of three and slowly pressed on down the mud road.


    They had no choice. The mud road was only ten meters wide, while all the magical machines wererge in size. It was possible to fit four magical machines across if they wanted to, but that would make it impossible for them to fight. As such, each row could amodate three machines, for a total of four rows. This squad of machines marched toward at the enemy.


    Upon reaching the middle point of the mud road, the first two rows of Loggers nted the massive metal shields in their hands into the ground. They stopped pushing forward. The two rows of Archers behind them then took up crossfire positions and extended all the long-ranged weapons within their bodies.


    What were the opponents trying to do?


    The dragonborn warriors standing guard at the end of the mud road looked at each other with their axes still in hand. None of them knew what these lumps of metal were up to. Were they not here to attack them? Why did they stop moving halfway?


    The dragonborn were still indecisive about whether to charge forward and route the magical machines or remain in their positions. Meanwhile, the six Archers that had taken up position in the middle of the mud road started to fire.


    They were now approximately seventy meters away from the dragonborn warriors at the end of the mud road. It was well within the effective range of the magic energy rifles. The proud and towering dragonborn were instantly beaten into a daze when the first wave of bullets came at them like a storm.


    As warriors that had undergone a hundred fights, they had experienced all sorts of physical and magical attacks. However, this was the first time they had ever seen such a dense and concentrated rain of ¡¯thrown¡¯ weapon attacks.


    It was like a rain of iron and steel!


    The pained grunts of the dragonborn mixed with the ttering of colliding metal.


    For a moment, the dragonborn squad that guarded the mud roads were running from the rain of bullets. They could hardly stand still in their original positions.


    They couldn¡¯t do anything about it. Even though the fine scales and metal armors of the dragonborn warriors protected over ny percent of their bodies, there was still a portion of their bodies that were exposed. For instance: the eyes, the throat, the ears, the armpits, the stomach.


    Under ordinary circumstances, the enemies were very unlikely to hit these parts with their attacks, especially if they did a good job of hiding them. That was why the dragonborn hadn¡¯t bothered to design special equipment to shield these areas.


    At this moment, the six Archers were wildly firing their rifles. The randomly flying bullets could deal plenty of stray damage to the dragonborn. Either their eyes were blinded, or a bullet went into their ear, or their scales were pierced.


    The dragonborn had stood too close to each other. It was true that their armor and scales had deflected most of the bullets and didn¡¯t cause too much damage to them. However, the bullets would ricochet off their bodies and hit theirpanions instead. It was easy for the shots to deal damage in such a situation.


    Substantial casualties had urred in the first line of defense of the dragonborn in a matter of moments.


    The small metal bullets were less than toothpickspared to therge bodies of the dragonborn. At the very worst, they were like the bite of a mosquito. However, anyone would fall into a panic if hundreds of mosquitos were swarming them and all they could hear was strange explosions and clinking noises.


    The experienced dragonborn warriors quickly covered their faces with their scaled arms and used their massive axes to protect their other weak spots. But how were they supposed to fight now?


    The dragonborn captain of the squad reared its limbs and mes spontaneously burned upon the massive axe he held in his hand. The captain let out a stunning warcry and stormed toward the magical machines while waving the ming axe and stomping with his heavy steps.


    The berserk dragonborn captain covered a distance of seventy meters in a matter of six seconds. The ming axe then solidly cut at the metal shields of the magical machines in the first row.


    A loud explosion could be heard as a metal shield split into pieces. The arms of the Logger holding the shield also exploded into shrapnel and countless metal parts.


    The Logger stumbled backward from the residual force and crashed upon the metal shields in the second row.


    Behind it was an immovable steel wall, while in front of it was the force of a raging dragonborn. The unfortunate Logger was crushed in between and exploded like a watermelon.


    As expected of a powerful First Grade elite warrior, the dragonborn captain had instantly exterminated this enhanced Logger magical machine with a single furious blow.


    The Logger¡¯s metal shell was riddled with cracks and holes. Its body shed with electric sparks, and nearly half of its body was gone. The machine took two steps sideways before falling right into the swamp.


    The sessful dragonborn captain felt his will to battle rise to a peak. He once again reared his limbs and tried to knock the remaining metal lumps into the swamp.


    Yet, he had never expected his reckless charge to expose himself to the full force of the Archers.


    After the next second, the rapid and concentrated sounds of firing guns didn¡¯t cease.


    The barrage came from everywhere within a one hundred and forty degree fan-shaped area in front of him. All the bullets impacted against his towering body.


    The dragonborn¡¯s armor might have exceptional defensive capabilities, and their scales might be tough, but they all had their limits. When a concentrated attack exceeded this limit, it would deal unimaginable damage to the dragonborn.


    The dragonborn warriors hiding in the back had exploded into cheers for the heroic feat of their captain. The very next second, they saw blood erupt from their captain¡¯s body. The dragonborn had been riddled with holes by the fearsome barrage of bullets.


    It was only now that the dragonborn captain¡¯s reared front hoovesnded on the ground.


    The captain had used too much strength in doing so. Over a hundred streams of blood shot out of his body,pletely staining the earth around him a crimson red.


    The blood-soaked dragonborn captain trembled slightly, but he failed to squeeze out a single word from his dry throat. Three of his four eyes had been blinded, and the light of life was quickly fading from thest.


    A dull thud rang as the dragonborn captain¡¯s body copsed limply to the ground before sliding into the swamp like the magical machine before him. Only bubbles appeared on the surface of the pool of water, along with bright red threads of blood.


    The cheering dragonborn instantly fell silent!


    A powerful dragonborn captain had actually been instantly torn into pieces by the enemy; such a thing had never happened in the long military history of the dragonborn.


    The dragonborn were the strongestnd warriors of Lance apart from the superior dragon lords. They were loyal. They were brave. They were capable of fighting off enemies a hundred times their numbers. They were unmatched.


    At this moment, this gilded standard of theirs that had been established by countless bloody battles had been crushed to pieces by a group of cold, unfeeling metal lumps.


    The image of dragonborn as invincible and undefeatable was quickly crumbling.


    It was a massive shock to the dragonborn, as well as a tremendous humiliation.


    The eyes of all the dragonborn in the camp turned bloodshot. They all roared and brandished their axes and charged toward the mud road.


    Fight. Fight. Fight.


    Wash their bodies with the blood of the enemy, honor their dead tribesmen with the flesh of the enemy.


    All the dragonborn had gone berserk!


    However, at this very moment, Mary calmly gave a series of orders while still hidden among the army of magical machines.


    "Endor, immediately activate the poison gue you¡¯ve spread."


    "Hummingbird One, drop the Destroyer now."


    "All Archers, fire at full power now."


    A blood battle instantly broke out upon the narrow mud road!

 Chapter 589 Clash of Flesh and Steel

    Chapter 589 sh of Flesh and Steel


    The terror of the dragonborn unleashing their full strength could be clearly witnessed through this battle.


    The dragonborn army wasn¡¯tposed of only warriors. There were some ¡¯spellcasters¡¯ with rtively more powerful elementium powers hidden among them!


    They were just as physically capable as ordinary dragonborn warriors, but their elementium powers were even stronger than their physical prowess, though there were very few of them. Only one out of twenty or thirty dragonborn was one such spellcaster.


    Moreover, cultivating and equipping them also cost a lot of money. Ordinary dragon lords were incapable of raising such soldiers. That was why even Fire Dragon Philippa had no more than seventeen dragonborn spellcasters serving under her.


    Six of those spellcasters had apanied this dragonborn army.


    These six talented dragonborn spellcasters charged to the front and waved the me staffs in their hands. Several massive fireballs crashed into the ranks of the magical machines like meteors from the sky.


    The sessive explosions of the elementium fireballs sted five or six of the magical machines into pieces. Sparks flew everywhere. Over a dozen magical machines were also blown away by the ensuing me shockwaves.


    The dragonborn spellcasters frowned at the mediocre results.


    However, something even more troublesome happened next.


    The dozen magical machines that had been sent flying back by the explosive shockwave quickly got onto their feet. They shook off the dirt on their bodies and started to fire bullets again as they moved back to their previous positions. Two of the six magical machines that had been caught in the center of the explosion also stood up with much difficulty.


    Most of the gun barrels on their bodies had been melted or snapped by the fireballs, and thick ck smoke came from within their tattered bodies. Electric sparks shed every so often. Yet they continued to fire a barrage of bullets at the dragonborn with what weapons they had left.


    That one wave of fireballs had only managed to destroy four of the metal lumps. This...this was clearly far below the bottom line of the dragonborn spellcasters.


    In every past battle, their fireballs would have reaped the lives of countless creatures each time they exploded. Moreover, the loud explosion of the fireball, the cluster of fire, and the fearsome shockwaves had always intimidated the enemy. They were far more fearsome to behold than the warriors cutting down enemies with their axes.


    Sadly, this was meaningless before the cold and unfeeling machines.


    The six dragonborn spellcasters bombarded the magical machines with fireballs from a distance of two hundred meters away. They had no idea that right above them, a terrifying and wickedly grinning God of Death was lunging toward them.


    The magic energy flying ship hurriedly increased its altitude after dropping the Destroyer. It frantically fled toward the distance.


    The cigar-shaped bomb that was three meters long and one meter in diameter cut through the mist and the fog, whistling as it dove toward the ground.


    All the dragonborn in the battle couldn¡¯t help but raise their head when they heard the sound. They looked on fearfully as a strange and tiny object descended from the skies andnded in their camp.


    A massive fireball ten meters in diameter rose in the center of the camp the very next second. It exploded and sted outward, sending out scalding heat waves and hot air currents.


    A dragonborn warrior happened to be caught within the st wave and was thrown twenty meters away. He was bruised and scratched all over when he finally stopped. However, he was only relieved upon getting up from the ground. He patted himself all over and realized that he hadn¡¯t lost any limbs or body parts.


    The dragonborn who watched the whole scene unfold were shocked!


    That was all?


    That was all that thing that made them feel dread was capable of?


    The power of that weapon was truly seven or eight times that of the fireballs of the dragonborn spellcasters, but these things were still too weak to be used against the dragonborn. It couldn¡¯t even kill an ordinary dragonborn warrior.


    However, something started to happen to that lucky dragonborn before the others could even cast that thought away from their minds.


    The dragonborn abruptly started to scream and yell. His voice was hoarse and pained.


    Warts and blisters of all sizes started to swell upon his rough and slightly reddened skin. The surface of his skin began to swell, and burn marks began to appear. Large patches of the warrior¡¯s scales started to shed, almost as if an invisible fire had scorched him. The bloody blisters beneath were revealed for all to see.


    The dragonborn didn¡¯t have much hair to speak of, but they still had tough, dark red hairs growing on their heads. At this moment, these hairs started to fall off in patches, as if the scalp had been burned with boiling water. The red, new flesh beneath was now exposed.


    However, soon, even the skin there started to rot and turn bad, as if it had caught necrosis. The dragonborn was also constantly coughing and spitting out ck blood and shattered organs. It was apparent that the inside of his body was also undergoing the same rotting process as the outside.


    The intense pain felt as if tens of thousands of bugs were eating the dragonborn from within. He couldn¡¯t help but start scratching at his own body. Scales began to fall as he scratched with all he had. His skin continued to rot as his flesh withered and shrunk. The w marks he inflicted upon himself were so deep that one could even see the bone underneath.


    This dragonborn was dissolving!


    Indeed, all the dragonborn could see what was happening. The dragonborn was dissolving, both from the inside and outside. All of his flesh was disintegrating from the effects of that strange ¡¯dirty bomb.¡¯ Skin, veins, blood, muscles; everything and absolutely everything was dissolving and melting into each other, turning into a disgusting pool of liquid.


    When everything on the dragonborn that could be dissolved had liquified into a puddle of pungent fluid, the remaining insolubles fell to the ground with a tter. That included a perfectly clean skeleton, dark red dragon scales, some hair, and a few short, curved horns.


    That was all that remained of the mighty and towering dragonborn warrior in a mere blink of an eye!


    Waves of intense coughing starting to appear in the camp while the dragonborn watched this horrifying scene y out before their terrified gazes.


    It was almost as if a gue god had silently passed through the camp. Nearly one-third of the dragonborn started to cough and throw up for no reason. The blood they coughed up was also ck in color. Organ bits and crawling bugs floated inside their blood.


    It instantly threw the dragonborn into chaos.


    They ignored orders, regardless of how much their captains shouted and roared at them. They ran about in a panic avoiding those panions¡¯ of theirs that were spitting up blood.


    The dragonborn camp had utterly fallen into disorder!


    ............


    The adepts were clearly prepared for this chaotic scene.


    However, the unexpected effectiveness of the magic still surprised them.


    The effect of the magic was way too good, wasn¡¯t it?!


    Was it Endor¡¯s poison being too powerful, or was it the Destroyer being too terrifying? For a moment, even Mary couldn¡¯t be sure which it was.


    Mary had an excellent idea of Endor¡¯s power.


    If she had sufficient time to nt her poisons, they could achieve horrifying effects. Killing multiple adepts of the same grade wouldn¡¯t be out of the question. But being able to so severely poison these dragonborn, whose Physique couldpare to those of Second Grade body refining adepts; it seemed as if she shouldn¡¯t be able to do that, should she?


    Then was it the work of that Destroyer?


    Mary knew nothing of the effects of the Destroyer. Greem had only faintly mentioned something about ¡¯intense radiation¡¯ when he passed the bomb to her. It appeared to be some new experimental weapon he had concocted in coboration with Gazlowe.


    From a certain perspective, the destructiveness of this weapon was truly stunning!


    At the very least, it had instantly crippled one-third of the dragonborn. The other dragonborn had also been affected to some extent.


    However, the bomb had also forced the dragonborn army into a corner. The soldiers were wildly assaulting the defensive lines of the magical machine army under the instructions of their superiors.


    Finally, after so many schemes and plots, the dragonborn warriors were shing with the magical machines with real steel and fire.


    The dragonborn seemed to have realized the firepower of the magical machines¡¯ ranged weapons. Thus, all the charging dragonborn wavedrge tree trunks around or held up massive boulders as they approached the enemy. They sessfully breached the fire suppression line with these objects as their shields. The dragonborn were finally able to engage the magical machines in a close-range fight.


    On one side, you had berserk warriors forged of flesh and blood, while on the other, you had magical machines with steel for veins and iron for bones. The intense violence and brutality from the meeting of these two unstoppable forces were exhrating.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Several Loggers were blown into the air amid a series of dull thuds of metal against flesh. They were instantly shattered intoponents and broken pieces. The metal axes in the hands of the ferocious dragonborn had also been broken and bent during the impact. Every inch of their bodies had turned bloody as their scales shattered from the exchange of blows.


    A rain of metal bullets then came from every direction in the one moment they had paused after striking the Loggers. The bullets embedded themselves into the bodies of the dragonborn, aggravating their injuries. Finally, the dragonborn copsed to the ground, roaring in agony as they did so.


    Waves of dragonborn warriors charged forward, and waves of dragonborn warriors copsed to the ground. The Logger defensive line was also thinning out at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    The previously tight defensive line couldn¡¯t deal with the relentless assaults and charges of the dragonborn warriors. The line had been moved back again and again. Finally, the dragonborn managed to break through the mud roads and expanded the battlefield to arger and wider in.


    The magical machine army had also made considerable adjustments to their formation while the defensive line moved backward. The formerly tight square formation had now turned into a looser pocket formation.


    Archers were roaming the edge of the battlefield, continually using their long-ranged firepower to wear away at the defenses of the dragonborn. The only remaining thirty Loggers formed several small defensive circles inside of the battlefield. They used theirrge and robust bodies to divide the formation of the dragonborn army.


    Meanwhile, the adepts hid themselves and waited like ferocious alligators hunting beneath the water. They slowly closed in on their prey.


    The bloody battle raged on.

 Chapter 590 Display of Powers

    Chapter 590 Disy of Powers


    The rhythm of the battle had always been in the hands of the adepts.


    Be it the poisoning or the radiation bomb from above, the strategies of the adepts had sessfully weakened the power of the dragonborn. One-third of the dragonborn warriors had already been taken down before they could even enter the battle. The remaining dragonborn had been deeply provoked and had charged out of the camp with no regard for their own lives.


    Unavoidably, they were greeted by the long-ranged firearms of the Archer magical machines during this process.


    The dragon scales that had been polluted with radiation could no longer effectively neutralize the bullets as before. The dragonborn warriors were squeezed into the narrow mud road, enduring the storm of bullets as they swung their massive battleaxes and fought with the Loggers.


    It didn¡¯t matter who fell in the battle. Their remains would be shoved into the pool beside them to make the necessary space for the fight to continue.


    The ear-piercing rumbling of chainsaws, the furious roars of dragonborn warriors, the dull thud of flesh against steel; all the strange sounds merged into an annoying noise that reverberated throughout the skies of the dark and murky Swamp of Sorrows, lingering in the air.


    The mud road sealed off by the wall of metal had finally been opened up once more through the bravery of the dragonborn warriors and the desperate fighting of their superiors. As they disposed of the final row of Loggers, the magical machine army had no choice but to retreat into the distance. They formed a loose defensive line around the exit. All of the magical machines on the perimeter were Archer models.


    The remaining two or three dozen Loggers moved into a formation near the exit of the mud road. They used their strong bodies to segment the dragonborn warriors into disconnected and disorderly groups.


    The adepts hidden within the army took this opportunity to enter the battlefield. They quickly started to assassinate the stragglers amongst the dragonborn warriors.


    Everyone from the Crimson n apart from Mary and Zacha had already entered the battle. Even the three experimental magical machine warriors had been thrown into the fray.


    The Goblin Tinker was only three meters in height. It looked like a mix of various alchemical parts on the outside. One could see the spinning and interconnected gears andponents on the surface of its body. The Tinker had no dome-shaped metal body. Its fragile internal constructions were exposed to the enemy.


    A little fellow like this appeared to have nobat ability at all. It would probably fall apart the moment a dragonborn¡¯s axe struck it. Yet, the Goblin Tinker¡¯s performance was genuinely eye-catching once it had been put into the battle.


    It usually shook as it moved around on its two robotic legs, puffing out smoke and not being all that fast. However, the moment a dragonborn charged at it with axe in hand, a robotic flying w would shoot out of any position of the Tinker¡¯s body. The w would grapple onto a distant target and pull the Tinker away from danger with the rope attached to it.


    It was this bizarre movement ability of the Tinker that gave it exceptional mobility and agility in constrained battlefields. The few dragonborn warriors that tried to pursue it could only eat dust. They were never able to catch up with the mysterious repositioning powers of the Tinker that made it fast as a mouse.


    The Tinker¡¯s offensive powers mainly came from the miniature magic energy cannon and the enhanced goblin rockets it possessed.


    The miniature magic energy cannon installed within the Goblin Tinker could fire an Energy Laser with an energy rating of one hundred and thirty points. Theser could deal attributeless overload energy damage. However, due to the limitations of the energy source, the Tinker could only fire this attack once every one hundred and fifty seconds.


    The enhanced goblin rockets were the improved versions of the conventional goblin rockets. The explosion of the missile no longer relied on shrapnel for damage, but the violent space energy contained within it. Multiple technicians had assessed the primary offensive power of the enhanced rocket. It was confirmed to be around eighty to one hundred and ten points.


    It didn¡¯t sound very high, but if anyone saw the mass of rocketunchers around the Tinker, they could easily foresee the fearsome oue of going against it.


    However, the Tinker could only simultaneously guide two of these enhanced goblin rockets at any one time with the intelligence module currently loaded into it. The destination of the other missiles was up to luck!


    The Goblin Shredder was a five-meter giant. It had a robust andrge metal body simr to the Loggers. Its lower body wasposed of four spider-like robotic limbs, while its torso had two powerful and strong robotic arms. The ends of the arms were not humanoid hands, but two spinning discs that let out ear-piercing grinding sounds.


    The two gigantic discs were one meter in diameter and could cut through almost anything when they started spinning rapidly. Anything that they cut would be split cleanly in half!


    The Goblin Shredder relied upon these two giant disc-shaped saws to be an unstoppable force within the ranks of the dragonborn. It thrashed about with no contest whatsoever. The wildly spinning discs would badly slice all the dragonborn warriors that tried to face it head-on. Even their three-finger-thick metal armor couldn¡¯tpletely stop the spinning des, let alone the light scales of the dragonborn themselves!


    However, theck of mobility was still the biggest w of the Goblin Shredder.


    A dragonborn captain grabbed a thick tree trunk and used it to fend off the Goblin Shredder¡¯s wild shes. His two subordinate dragonborn warriors used all they had to smash their waraxes into the back of the Shredder. Finally, they were able to take out the Shredder before it managed to dissect their captain.


    The experimental Goblin Shredder had been knocked out by the dragonborn in less than seven minutes since the start of the battle.


    If the Tinker was frustrating to deal with, and the Shredder was extraordinarily wild and reckless, then the remaining Goblin Bomberman was entirely and utterly despicable!


    It had inherited the cowardly yet sinister nature of the goblins, bringing great trouble to the dragonborn at the very start of the battle.


    The Goblin Bomberman was extremely small. It was only approximately one meter in size.


    It had no obvious lower body either. It looked just like a round metal sphere torso with an equally round metal sphere for a head. It rolled on the ground with surprising speed.


    Its only weapons were fist-sized alchemical bombs.


    Two robotic arms extended out of its round body as it sped along the ground like a marble. It used its petite frame and rapid speed to dart beneath the dragonborn warriors and weave between their legs. It didn¡¯t even need to be concerned about the heavy stomps of the dragonborn or the ferocious strikes of their axes.


    It was way too small, while the dragonborn warriors were far too tall.


    The dragonborn warriors had to bend down to attack the Bomberman. They would have to try and use their axes or their hands to grab at this annoying fellow rapidly winding around their legs.


    It would have been fine if the Bomberman was only quick, but...but this jerk of a robot even stuck alchemical bombs where the dragonborn couldn¡¯t reach. For instance, their crotch, their asses, or their heels.


    What made things worse was that these ces were often where they had minimal scales to protect them!


    The dragonborn warriors were treated to one hell of a nightmare as these bombs went off one after another. Their lower bodies bled non-stop, and their agonized shrieks were so tragic that it would cause a bystander cry to hear them.


    The divided dragonborn army fell into more chaos as the three magical machine warriors stirred trouble and roamed through their ranks. The Crimson adepts hidden in the mess were like terrifying alligators, asionally emerging from beneath the water to drag a prey back into the swamp.


    The most awkward fighters in the battlefield today had to be Mary¡¯s three blood knights.


    The power of the three blood knights had increased with Mary¡¯s advancement to Second Grade. They could now unleash even more tremendous blood powers aspared to before. However, their limited primary power caused their attacks to be weak and their defenses to be negligible. Their only strength was their regenerative powers and superb mobility.


    However, such a trait was not a useful or beneficial one in a violent battlefield such as this one!


    To think a pseudo-Second Grade Blood Knight would have trouble dealing with even a single dragonborn warrior.


    They had all been humans. Even though Mary had Embraced them and turned them into vampires, their basic Strength values still couldn¡¯tpare to these First Grade dragonborn warriors. Add to the equation the armor and scales of the dragonborn, and anyone whocked in Strength would have trouble wounding the dragonborn.


    On the other hand, the fancy runic armors of the blood knight were invincible against the attacks of ordinary humans, but it was fantasy to expect them to endure the monster metal axes in the hands of the dragonborn. Those axes were seventy-two kilograms in weight, and the des alone measured one-meter in length.


    The blood knights would be in danger even if they were literal pirs of metal!


    Any regeneration would be no more than a joke if such heavy axes hit them. Even the blood knights would have troublepletely recovering if they were turned to meat paste. Moreover, where were they to find cattle to act as ¡¯food¡¯ for them in this chaotic and brutal battlefield?


    The three blood knights had no choice. They formed a group and circled the battlefield in their bat forms. They would instantly swarm any dragonborn warrior that got separated alone from its group.


    They no longer had the bearings of Second Grade powerhouses. Instead, they were like a bunch of street thugs with an elegant appearance, catching an enemy in a disadvantageous position and beating them to death through such a dishonorable tactic. And who would have known? This tactic suited them exceptionally well. It allowed them to exterminate six dragonborn warriors and one dragonborn captain in the span of fifteen minutes.


    Still, if one were to talk about battlefield dominance, they would have to mention the adepts!


    As a First Grade wind adept, Deserra¡¯s wind elementium attacks had trouble quickly killing these mighty dragonborn. However, that didn¡¯t stop him from effectively dominating the battlefield with his magic.


    Deserra flew high into the air and avoided the bloody battle on the ground.


    Large Tornado Vortices surrounded his body, making him seem like a great deity surveying the ants beneath him with disdain as he strolled across the sky.


    Deserra looked upon the battlefield from a distance.


    Whenever he saw dragonborn possessing the upper hand and pushing back against his allies, he would drive his massive tornado and descend upon that battle.


    Deserra would merely wave with his hand, and a massive Tornado Vortex would appear from above, enveloping the dominating dragonborn warriors. The wind couldn¡¯t possibly blow the dragonborn into the air with their excessive weight, but the ravaging winds could still throw them into disarray and cause them to lose their sense of direction temporarily.


    This short pause in the conflict could allow the magical machines to either escape or get back into formation. By the time the dragonborn escaped from the gale, the situation of the battle would have changed drastically.


    It was through such amazing means that Adept Deserra effectively turned the winds to the side of the adepts without killing any dragonborn.

 Chapter 591 A Heroic Duel

    Adepts like Endor and Dana had almost no independentbat ability in such a bloody and intense battle.


    Theirbat ability wasn¡¯t weak at all. However, theirck of defensive skills and techniques made it hard for them to endure in such a terrifying battlefield. Being unable to persist in the battle meant that they had no chance to unleash their fearsome magical powers.


    Thus, the two of them had been staying within the protective circle formed by the Loggers, along with the two snakefiends since the start of the battle. They were using their poison and petrification powers to help the magical machines stabilize the thin defensive line. Meanwhile, Manticore Charon followed after Mary and took to the skies. He was keeping a close eye on the few dragonborn leaders who looked very distinct.


    At this point of the battle, no more than eighty dragonborn remained of the original two hundred. Moreover, each of them were wounded and had been separated into small groups of their own. The magical machines had also suffered losses, with their numbers cut down from one hundred and sixty-three to only fifty-seven. Their ability to kill dragonborn was starting to plummet.


    However, the magical machines had always been seen as cannon fodder by the adepts, meant to be exhausted in battle and war. As such, the adepts couldn¡¯t care less about their losses. Things were different on the other end. The higher-ups of the dragonborn army were agonizing over the deaths of their soldiers.


    Themander and his two deputies tried their best to storm out of the dragonborn camp under the protection of a squad of two dozen dragonborn warriors and five dragonborn spellcasters.


    Mary stood upon Charon¡¯s back in the dark skies. They circled above the survivors of the battle. Her crimson eyes fixated upon Commander Will.


    The dragonborn¡¯s gaze shed with the vampire¡¯s across the hundred-meter distance. An intangible soul flux rippled across the air.


    An otherworldly Second Grade!


    Will recognized the enemy¡¯s identity with a single nce.


    He took in that strange magical aura and frowned. He felt as if he had smelled this aura in the past, but things were just too far back into the past. It was somewhat difficult for him to recall the memory.


    To dare to challenge him just because she was Second Grade; what incredible confidence this Second Grade had in herself!


    Before he could even finish that thought, amotion rang out amongst the dragonborn warriors in front of him. An intimidating roar rang out, and three dragonborn warriors were blown into the air by a powerful and unstoppable force. A towering and mighty figure revealed itself to everyone.


    A humanoid upper body, a dragon¡¯s head, dragon-like limbs, and a tail.


    This new enemy was a Second Grade dragonborn?


    Commander Will felt his world spin uncontrobly at the sight. He couldn¡¯t believe his own eyes.


    The dragonborn had always been utterly loyal to their rulers; to think there would be one who would join another world and turn upon their own.


    If Mary was making Will feel hatred and anger, then the only thing left within Will¡¯s heart at the sight of Dragonborn Zacha was endless indignation as well as indescribable heartache and sorrow.


    "Why...why?"


    Commander Will waved his thick arms and shoved the dragonborn warriors at his side that were in his way. He roared at Zacha as he charged toward the dragonborn.


    "I have no obligation to answer your question," Zacha waved his electric spear about and easily swatted away two dragonborn warriors, "However, I can swear by the bloodline of the dragonborn that I still abide by the pledge of the dragonborn, protecting the master I am supposed to protect."


    What did that mean?


    Was he intercepting Lady Philippa¡¯s dragonborn army under the orders of a dragon lord?


    Could it be that other dragon lords aside from Wind Dragon Lord Cherkes were involved in this?


    For a moment, many thoughts streaked past the minds of Commander Will and the higher-ups. Sadly, they were fated to not get a proper answer in a battlefield like this.


    "Who would¡¯ve known that you served such a despicable lord. I am speechless. Well then,e! Let me see what kind of great dragonborn warrior a despicable dragon lord could hope to cultivate. Do you dare to fight with me?"


    "Fight if you want to. Spare me the words!"


    A wicked smile appeared on Zacha¡¯s sharp face. Viscuous blood dripped from the electric spear in his hands.


    An intense killing intent filled the entire battlefield the moment the two Second Grade dragonborn made up their minds. The surrounding dragonborn warriors stopped fighting and gathered around them with their weapons raised, the des all pointed toward the center of the battlefield.


    The dragonborn warriors slowly started retreating amid a solemn silence, giving the two Second Grade sufficient space to fight. Deputy Commander Eden opened his mouth multiple times in an attempt to stop this unfair duel. However, he knew his words would have no effect when he saw his old friend¡¯s solemn and determined expression.


    As such, Eden had no choice but to step back with the other dragonborn warriors dejectedly.


    Dragonborn Zacha raised his head and looked to the sky. He sent a mental message to Mary¡¯s mind.


    "A duel between dragonborn warriors is sacred. I hope you do not interrupt this fight!"


    Mary rolled her eyes and pouted when she received the message from Zacha.


    What was this? Why did they suddenly break into a duel? Wasn¡¯t it supposed to be two of their Second Grades beating down on one enemy Second Grade? Why did the script suddenly go a different way?


    Even though Mary wasn¡¯t happy about the situation, she knew how much Greem valued Dragonborn Zacha. That was obvious from how much expensive magical equipment Greem had equipped Zacha with. As such, even the usually arrogant Mary couldn¡¯t refuse such a serious request from Zacha.


    Mary nodded reluctantly and rose higher into the sky on Charon¡¯s back, leaving the battlefield behind them.


    However, Mary had privately contacted the hidden Oliven and requested that she find a way to save Zacha¡¯s life if he were to lose the duel. And this request would be considered part of her battle contributions, regardless of whether she had to help or otherwise!


    They ignored themotion around them.


    By the time the two Second Grade dragonborn made up their minds for a duel to the death, their attention and aura were already deeply tangled with each other.


    They brandished the weapons in their hands and slowly circled each other around the battlefield. Both their eyes and attention were fixed upon each other. Any change in their Spirits or aura would invite a storm of an assault from the opponent.


    Thus, they kept their Spirits to themselves, concentrating it and retracted into their consciousness, not giving the enemy any opportunity in this tense and stalemated standoff.


    No one knew who it was that first revealed their killing intent, but both dragonborn raised the weapons in their hands at the same time. They charged ferociously at each other and shed in the middle of the battlefield.


    There was the dull thud of metal against metal.


    The electric spear collided with the metal axe. A violent lightning storm shed with a ravaging volcano. An elementium explosion detonated in the center of the battlefield.


    Four hundred and sixty-seven points!


    The violent attacks of the two dragonborn warriorsbined and let off an explosion of no less than four hundred and sixty points. An attack of this strength would have been enough to instantly exterminate Mary if it hadnded on her.


    What use was the powerful regeneration of the vampires if their entire body was instantly minced to pieces?


    Explosive-style warriors were truly powerful!


    Theycked mobility and could be easily kited to death by spellcasters, but their instantaneous explosion of power at melee range was even stronger than elementium adepts.


    Even Greem couldn¡¯tpare to Zacha in this aspect!


    The two dragonborn didn¡¯t separate after the fight started.


    They fought at melee range, their weapons charged with unbridled elementium power, regrly applying heavy pressure upon the enemy. Dragonborn Zacha was rapidly moving about as his weapons collided and clinked with Will¡¯s. Zacha circled Will using the agility provided to him by the wind elementium, asionally lunging at Will and resuming the fight once again.


    Will, on the other hand, had inherited the powers of fire.


    Every blow and counterattack of his was apanied by blinding magical fires that shrouded his body and axe. The mes would either burn or cause a magical bacsh to Zacha, constantly interrupting Zacha¡¯s movements and attacks.


    However, the lightning powers shrouding Dragonborn Zacha were not simple either. They caused a quick instant of paralysis every time they spread to Will¡¯s body.


    Dragonborn Zacha was younger inparison and possessed stronger Physique and will. Dragonborn Will might be older, but he clearly had more skill inbat and experience in fighting.


    Both fighters had their advantages and disadvantages. They were both physically intimidating, causing the fight between them to be subdued yet wild and primitive. Their wounds increased with the passage of time, slowly covering the entirety of their bodies.


    If these were only ordinary wounds, their Physique would have allowed them to quickly heal within two minutes, even if they were fifty-centimeter gashes. Sadly, both of their weapons possessed strong elementium powers. Consequently, their wounds would split apart in a sudden explosion of energy the moment they healed.


    The only difference was that Zacha¡¯s wounds were erupting with shes of red light, while Will¡¯s injuries were erupting with blue arcs of electricity.


    These minor wounds would never be able to truly heal until the foreign energy attached to them were neutralized.


    However, who could take the time to take care of such an ¡¯insignificant¡¯ matter in the heat of such an intense and bloody battle?!


    Blood flowed, and warriors roared. Both dragonborn were drenched in blood, yet they continued to circle and hack at each other.


    The duel between the leaders of both parties quickly attracted the attention of all the dragonborn. They slowly stopped their own battles and gathered around the site of the duel to cheer for theirmander.


    It was at this moment that Mary found Poison Witch Endor. A secret conversation happened between the two.


    "Is that dragonborn infected with poison?"


    "He is... but it seems he used his bloodline powers to suppress the poison."


    "Then do you have any way to trigger the poison? Remember, you have to make it seem as if the poison activated on its own, and not by an external influence."


    "Don¡¯t worry, Lady Mary! Lord Greem once passed me a unique Aggressive Poison rune. It will not be suspicious at all.¡±


    "Very good. Find the best possible opportunity to do itter. We cannot leave the hope of victory in the hands of uncertain fate. Go ahead..."

 Chapter 592 Dominant Submission

    In all honesty, a battle between strength-reliant warriors was not as exciting as one would think.


    The two Second Grade dragonborn were of fairly high grades and were having a genuinely bloody battle. Every punch and strike would draw blood. Anyone would feel their blood boil and their emotions soar at the scene alone. However, the variety and strangeness of their battle techniques were far inferior to the Second Grade body refining adepts of the World of Adepts.


    Though the dragonborn were Second Grade as well, the body refining adepts of the World of Adepts were all ordinary humans who had slowly climbed up the from the very bottom as beginner apprentices. They had made their ways past intermediate apprentice, advanced apprentice, pseudo-adept, and First Grade with great difficulty to be the Second Grade adepts that they currently were. These various levels were all testament to the process of change and metamorphosis that these human adepts had undergone.


    A human adept could notpare to a bloodline creature like a dragonborn in terms of Physique, Strength, or regeneration even after bing Second Grade. However, if the two were to fight in a duel, then the one to die would most definitely be the dragonborn. The final survivor would undoubtedly be the human adept.


    The main reason for this was that the dragonborn had far too powerful innate talents!


    A dragonborn would possess powerful physical abilityparable to a First Grade body refining adept even if it did nothing and naturally grew up into adolescence. In fact, a First Grade body refining adept was very likely to lose to a First Grade dragonborn if they took off all magical equipment andpared physical strength alone.


    Yet, it was this extremely high starting point and powerful bloodline talent that caused the dragonborn tock the refined and concentrated power of the human adepts, that had onlye about through training and countless trials. The human body-refining adepts knew they had poor bodily foundations, and thus, sought every way possible to increase their power. They relied on all sorts of strange techniques and evil abilities to enhance their capabilities.


    That was why even a mere First Grade human adept like Deserra could easily defeat multiple First Grade dragonborn warriors. The profound logic within this phenomenon couldn¡¯t be clearly expressed, but it could be demonstrated through practical action.


    Take for example the intense duel currently happening between the two Second Grade dragonborn. The dragonborn warriors around them were exhrated and excited by the fight, but the adepts were all frowning. They couldn¡¯t help but be exasperated by how these muscle monsters were wasting their exceptional talents.


    They had potent bloodline talents. All they needed to do was direct their strength slightly, and they could easily be capable of many new tricks and techniques. Those two dragonborn, however, were like two cksmiths. Trading axe blows for spear strikes, apanied by the ringing of metal.


    Physical strength was physical strength. Elementium power was elementium power. These two powers of theirs had not been perfectly merged together. Dust was dust and dirt was dirt; so clearly separated with such poor coordination!


    They never tried to consciously direct the elementium powers in their bodies when they struck, and they only relied upon the elementium powers within their bodies to instinctually amplify their attacks. That caused their attack patterns to be overly uniform, and their techniques to be extremelycking. There weren¡¯t many fundamental differences between a First Grade and Second Grade dragonborn apart from being tougher, stronger, and having faster regeneration.


    That was telling of the attitude of the dragon lords. They had no intention of turning the dragonborn into an extraordinarily powerful species. Instead, they only treated them as loyal and useful ves.


    It also caused the adepts to be utterly disinterested in this intense battle that all the dragonborn warriors couldn¡¯t tear their eyes away from. Deserra and the other First Grade adepts were only amazed at the rising energy intensity of the explosions between the two dragonborn warriors. They held a profound contempt for the dragonborn¡¯s battle technique and skills.


    The Second Grade Dragonborn of Lance were vastly inferior to the Second Grade adepts of the World of Adepts.


    If Lord Greem went all out, he would have no problem exterminating two of these dragonborn with a single barrage. The only ones that could match Lord Greem had to be the Second Grade Dragon Lords of Lance. Moreover, even the Second Grade dragon lords with ordinary talent couldn¡¯t make it. They had to be Second Grade dragon lords with exceptional abilities and bloodline powers!


    The impression of Greem as an invincible Second Grade fire adept had unknowingly embedded itself deep within the soul consciousness of the Crimson adepts. The process of this had been gradual and slow, causing them to ept Greem¡¯s extraordinary power as an absolute truth unknowingly!


    Of course, many of the n adepts held such feelings of admiration. It was merely a matter of intensity. Meryl was undoubtedly the most fervent and unyielding believer in her master. Deserra, as her disciple, had almost been affected by these feelings to some extent.


    In contrast, adepts like Endor, Gargamel, Dana, Charon, and Billis had much moreplicated feelings about Greem and his power. Regardless of what they thought, they still held a certain recognition of Greem¡¯s power deep within their hearts, along with the confidence that Greem would continue growing in power and strength.


    These feelings all came from the battlefield that they were currently fighting upon!


    They were only a group of ordinary adepts with First Grade power, yet they were able to stand tall upon thends of another world, fighting for the future of the n and expanding its territories. It seemed like something they had never heard before in other adept ns!


    nar wars had always been a matter of concern left to high-grade adepts.


    First and Second Grade adepts like them seemed never to have been of much use in such scenarios, apart from being cannon fodder and foot soldiers.


    Yet here in this other ne, where dragons gathered, and dragonborn roamed the earth, they were able to be the main force of the invasion. How could this not impress them?!


    The Crimson adepts couldn¡¯t help but feel their spirits rise as they watched the battle in the distance. Their minds wandered into fancies about their future glory. However, as the mastermind behind this battle, Mary didn¡¯t dare let down her guard at all.


    Her unexpected capture in the World of Adepts had already left a mark of humiliation upon her mind that couldn¡¯t be easily erased. Though Greem had sessfully turned the tables in the end, that had also been the first crisis of life and death that Greem¡¯s faction had ever needed to face.


    It was a crisis that had been created by her own recklessness.


    That was what bothered Mary so terribly!


    The choice of intercepting the dragonborn army in the Swamp of Sorrows this time had been a decision Mary decided upon after a long and patient discussion with Old Fox Vanlier. Naturally, Greem gave his full approval to this idea.


    The Goblin ne was only a start, while Lance was just meant as practice.


    The Crimson adepts would be able to get training from Lance, giving birth to powerful adepts or evenmanders that could lead entire armies. It would be a fortune for the Crimson n.


    After all, the Crimson n had the metal fortress as their final shield. It was virtually impossible for them to losepletely, regardless of how many battles they lost. That was why the most critical objective during this rare period of development was to have the younger generations of the n experience war and battle!


    The duel at the center of the battlefield was starting to reach its conclusion while everyone watched on with anticipation.


    The unknown poison that Commander Will had been desperately suppressing suddenly activated after parrying a ferocious strike from Zacha. Themander¡¯s organs were abruptly upset. In the blink of an eye, several of Will¡¯s vital organs had deteriorated under the corrosion of the fearsome poison.


    Yet, a change like this wasn¡¯t easily detected or sensed on the surface.


    The already exhausted Zacha immediately erupted with a newfound strength upon sensing the rapid deterioration of his opponent¡¯s physical and elementium powers. Heunched yet another ferocious and violent session of attacks.


    Will, who had previously been holding his own, seemed to have turned into a toy deprived of its batteries. Not only was he incapable of countering with his own attacks, but he also wasn¡¯t even able to parry and defend himself.


    Will quickly retreated under Zacha¡¯s quick and fierce strikes. His four thick dragon limbs trembled uncontrobly. It was clear that he was no longer able to deal with Zacha¡¯s immense strength.


    Finally, Will¡¯s axe shattered from a charging strike by Zacha. The metal armor in front of his chest broke apart as a deep wound was made in his chest, piercing straight into his heart. The destructive powers of lightning upon the electric spear roamed through Will¡¯s body, directly setting off all the hundreds of other wounds on his body.


    Pupupu!


    Countless streams of crimson and purple blood sshed from Will¡¯s body like a water pouch that had been abruptly punctured. The blood quickly stained the earth around him a bright scarlet.


    Commander Will copsed to the ground, his heart blown away, his organs rotting, and his front limbs broken. Commander Will finally managed to stand up once again after a long struggle, but the light was slowly fading from his dark red scales and skin.


    "You win. This...this axe, and... my head. You, take... them both. These... are... what... you deserve."


    Will bowed and lifted the heavy metal axe above his head with much difficulty in ordance with the most ancient dueling rites, and offered it to Zacha.


    Zacha stepped forward and took the axe with a difficult expression on his face. He loudly eximed, "You are a powerful individual worthy of my respect. I will not rob you of your honor as a warrior. I will cut off your head andy it upon the highest peak of the Stalon Mountains, allowing your soul to return to Dragonheaven."


    A trace of gratitude appeared in Will¡¯s eyes when he received Zacha¡¯s acknowledgment and promise. Finally, the dragonborn that had been barely holding on closed his eyes limply.


    No one knew when, but someone among the surrounding dragonborn warriors started humming and singing a strange song of the dragonborn. It was a tune that all dragonborn would hum when burying their dead. As the sorrowful and tragic melody echoed throughout the battlefield, an indescribable emotion grew in the hearts of the surviving dragonborn.


    Their leader had already died in battle. An unmatched fear of Zacha had risen in the hearts of the dragonborn warrior. The crimson-armored adept that had temporarily vanished appeared above them once more. The magical machines had formed into a circle around them and were slowly pressing forward.


    Even more powerful adepts had started showing up and were sealing off all paths of escape.


    While the remaining sixty-seven red dragonborn were stuck in confusion, Zacha raised the battleaxe and severed Will¡¯s head in one swift blow. He held the head up high in his hand.


    "Submit or die!"


    His voice was loud and clear, rumbling across the entire battlefield.


    "We will not surrender. However, we are willing to listen to your orders until our master Lady Philippaes to ransom us." Deputy Commander Eden shouted in an equally loud but sorrowful voice as tears of blood streaked down his face.


    Zacha raised his head and looked toward Mary.


    This turn of events didn¡¯t fit with her original ns, but she had no choice but to nod her head reluctantly!

 Chapter 593 Marys Fury

    Chapter 593 Mary¡¯s Fury


    War between dragon lords wasn¡¯t rare, even in Lance.


    The eternal theme of wars between human kingdoms wasnd, resources, and poption. Here on Lance, the causes of war were all sorts of trivialities¨C things like not liking the look of another dragon, having been made fun of by a particr dragon, and the like.


    With wares victories and defeats!


    As the direct subordinates of the dragon lords, the dragonborn were often the main forces fighting at the very front line. That meant that they often faced the difficult choice of being captured or being killed!


    The dragonborn were ves created by the dragon lords and were imnted with soul brands that made them forever loyal to their masters at the moment of their birth. Dragonborn like Zacha, who had their soul contractpletely transferred, were extremely rare.


    Dragonborn lords like him only usually became the servants of a new dragon lord once their own lord had lost the war. However, the first and foremost recipient of their loyalty would still be their old master, as long as their old master was still alive. That was why their new masters wouldn¡¯t trust them either, instead choosing to use them to procure ransom from their original masters.


    If the master of the defeated dragonborn refused to pay the ransom, then the new master would have the absolute right to do whatever they wished with the dragonborn. To kill them or sell them off; the new master decided everything.


    The lives of the sixty-seven surviving dragonborn were entirely within the hands of their old and new masters the moment they put down their weapons and chose to be prisoners.


    These dragonborn would never have so easily surrendered if it weren¡¯t for the presence of Dragonborn Zacha, even if they were to bleed everyst drop of their blood. Now that Zacha had defeated them with his own might, they dejectedly chose to be Zacha¡¯s prisoners.


    They chose to be Zacha¡¯s prisoners! They did not surrender to the adepts!


    Thus, Mary discovered upon descending from the sky that these dragonborn would always follow Zacha but refused to bow their heads to the adepts.


    Damn! Half a day¡¯s work and it was just recruiting an entourage of guards for Zacha!


    Dragonborn Zacha had already respectfully appeared in front of Mary before she could unleash her anger.


    "Lady Mary, though I know this might displease you, I still insist upon this. I wish to keep these dragonborn prisoners by my side and have them contribute their strength to Master¡¯s cause!"


    Mary stood on the spot, silently looking upon this bloodied and bowing dragonborn.


    The battle earlier had done tremendous damage to the dragonborn.


    His left arm was bent at an impossible angle and was clearly broken. The wind-indurium armor he was wearing had failed to endure the sessive violent blows from the enemy as well. It had be scrap metal and was barely hanging onto Zacha¡¯s body. His lower body, covered in fine blue scales, had also been repeatedly targeted by the enemy. Fifty-centimeter long gashes could be seen everywhere. Even the white bones underneath were exposed.


    He might have won, but the wounds he suffered were no less than the dead and defeated Will.


    Still, he had dragged along this broken body of his to appear before Mary. He held Will¡¯s head tightly in his right hand as he respectfully bowed before Mary and requested mercy for these dragonborn prisoners!


    A dragonborn striking this pose was equivalent to a human taking a knee.


    Mary might not understand the etiquette of dragonborn, but she could sense Zacha¡¯s sincerity through his actions.


    Since Greem ced so much importance upon Zacha, she didn¡¯t mind affording him this respect. It would be an excellent move to obtain his loyalty better as well.


    A trace of gentleness and a smile appeared on Mary¡¯s cold, beautiful face after some quick thought.


    "Well, if that¡¯s the case, then..."


    Mary was just about to agree to Zacha¡¯s ¡¯request¡¯ when a few disapproving voices rang out from amongst the ranks of the dragonborn prisoners.


    "No way, we cannot ce our fates in the hands of a dragonborn traitor. Look at him¨C your so-called great warrior is bowing before a weak human. This is humiliation. We cannot ept this."


    Zacha¡¯s face went ashen.


    Mary¡¯s slightly smiling face instantly turned as cold as ice. Her eyes gleamed with a blood-red light.


    Her eyes quickly swept through the crowd and instantly picked up on the owners of those voices.


    Three dragonborn spellcasters!


    Apart from the two deputymanders and the dragonborn captains, there were also five spellcasters in the ranks of the surrendered soldiers. The ones that were stirring trouble now were three of those five dragonborn spellcasters.


    Perhaps they had led lives that were too sessful and easy, but they didn¡¯t have the necessary wisdom to understand the situation they were in. They very foolishly chose to provoke Mary to fight for better treatment conditions for themselves.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. As the leader of the adepts, Mary hadn¡¯t fought even once since the start of the battle. Her slender, explosive figure and her delicate, pretty face caused other species to mistake her as a concubine of sorts easily.


    That was why the three foolish dragonborn spellcasters had so recklessly started trouble!


    The anger that had been umting in Mary¡¯s heart over the past month finally erupted.


    A nauseating and dense cloud of blood mist spread out around the crimson-armored Mary as Zacha and Eden¡¯s faces turned pale. The previously clear figure transformed into a sh of red lightning. It instantly appeared in the middle of the three dragonborn spellcaster at speed indistinguishable to the naked eye.


    A blood mist engulfed the entire area, blotting out the skies and covering the ground beneath.


    All nearby dragonborn warriors were blown away by the blood mist except for the three dragonborn spellcasters. The three dragonborn spellcasters were by Mary¡¯s side, but no one could see what was happening within the dense cloud of blood mist.


    The panicked shouts and angered roars of the dragonborn spellcasters could be heard from outside, but even louder were the horrifying crunching sounds.


    The three dragonborn spellcasters might have surrendered their weapons, but they weren¡¯t weaklings that had lost allbat ability. They might be called spellcasters, but their physical strength wasn¡¯t too far behind an ordinary dragonborn warrior. They could easily kill jaguars and boars with a single punch when they waved their scaled fists.


    Unfortunately, the one they had provoked was the newly advanced Second Grade Vampire Adept Mary.


    After the strengthening from the Blood Moon Prayer ceremony, the racial trait that Mary had obtained upon advancement into a pure-blood vampire was Blood Resonance!


    Mary could perfectly sense all flowing blood within a hundred meters and could achieve a certain level of resonance with that blood. If the target creature was not protected by magic, then Mary could even cause their blood to boil.


    It couldn¡¯t actually be considered magic anymore. It was simply and purely a racial power.


    All weak lifeforms would lose all ability to resist before Mary. She didn¡¯t even need to lift a single finger. All she had to do was activate her racial power, and the opponent would die to their own boiling blood.


    These three dragonborn spellcasters were taken down before they even had a chance to strike back!


    Everything started to clear up as the dense blood mist slowly returned into Mary¡¯s body.


    The three dragonborn spellcasters had turned into three withered corpses. Theyy upon the ground with not a trace of observable life within them. Mary lightly licked her bright red and seductive lips as she walked out of the mist with a look of satisfaction.


    She was even softly wiping away the blood stains on her face with a pure white handkerchief as she walked.


    The handkerchief had turned crimson red by the time she arrived before Zacha.


    She turned around with the speed and force of a whirlwind and coldly asked with a harsh expression on her face,


    "Does anyone else have an opinion?"


    Her voice wasn¡¯t very loud, but all the dragonborn prisoners shrunk backward out of fear.


    Who would¡¯ve thought, and who would¡¯ve known that this seductive and beautiful human female adept was also a terrifying Second Grade. Moreover, the power she possessed was more than enough to obtain the respect of the dragonborn!


    No wonder even a great dragonborn like Zacha would bow before her.


    The dragonborn prisoners all lowered their heads. No one dared to look directly at this female adept.


    "Bring them back!"


    "The rest of you, clean up the battlefield."


    The remaining adepts and magical machines started to carefully andpletely clean up the battlefield, while Zacha propped himself up and led the dragonborn back to the metal fortress.


    The Crimson n had paid quite a considerable price for the victory in this battle. They would have to regain their losses through the spoils of war.


    All destroyed magical machines had to be retrieved, regardless of the extent of the damage. Those that had sunken into the swamp had to be fished out as well. They might have lost theirbat ability and were mostly left with only their empty shells, but they could be melted down and reforged if they were sent back to the metal fortress.


    The fully functioning smelting factories, alloy workshops, and assembly lines of the metal fortress were also in great need of raw materials. Returning the damaged magical machines to the forges would undoubtedly help save plenty of metal ores.


    The dragonborn corpses were also biological resources of great value.


    The flesh of the wind dragonbornst time had produced decent wind indurium upon beingbined with magical alloys. The indurium had provided the Crimson n with fairlyrge returns upon being transported back to the World of Adepts. There were even more fire dragonborn corpses this time. The Crimson n would be able to reap even more returns as long as they were able to create a suitable magical metal material with the corpses.


    The Crimson n might appear to have suffered high losses in this battle, but these wastes could all be recuperated in a short amount of time. The metal fortress only needed around ten days at full operational capacity to rece the lost magical machines. All they had to do was clear up the battlefield and take all the spoils with them.


    The only thing that the Crimson n had lost was some metal ores they had dug up from the depths of Azurelode.


    Would they everck magical machines with such a rich mine right behind their backs?


    The Crimson n had solidly established themselves upon Lance with this minor victory.

 Chapter 594 Sanazars Attitude

    Chapter 594 Sanazar¡¯s Attitude


    World of Adepts, Fire Throne.


    With the opening up of Fire Cave, Fire Throne was once again presented before the public after a being shut away for over a month.


    The teleportation device inside the metal fortress had also been connected to the teleportation arrays in the Goblin ne and Fire Throne, with Gazlowe¡¯s magic energy furnace as the energy source. This way, the Crimson n had managed to break through two ne barriers in a matter of six months.


    In particr, the Goblin ne had be a lesser ne of the Crimson n, and the numerous goblins within had be a satellite force of the n. Lance, on the other hand, only had a nail hammered into it. Further attempts at the excavation of its resources required a constant investment of power.


    That was why Greem could only list Lance as a contested territory.


    A ne like this was not within the ability of the Crimson n to devour. The only choice left was to spend over a hundred years to chip away at its power slowly!


    Now that the Goblin ne had be the property of the Crimson n and the forward base in Lance was secure, Greem could finally take the time out to deal with the hidden concerns of the n.


    The Crimson n¡¯s roots were still in the World of Adepts, after all. It would be exceedingly difficult for the n to grow in size and power if they didn¡¯t properly deal with the interpersonal rtions in the World of Adepts. The first problem that required attention concerning the establishment of the Crimson n was, naturally, the Sarubo n.


    On the third day after Fire Cave was fully excavated, Greem¡¯s messenger arrived in Feidnan City. The messenger delivered a delicate handmade invitation to the hands of Third Grade female adept Lady Sanazar. Along with the invitation came a whole batch of valuable magical gemstones, magical materials, and rare treasures of other worlds. An initial estimate of the gift put it at three hundred thousand magical crystals worth.


    Adept Keoghan hurriedly arrived at Lady Sanazar¡¯s quarters after settling the messenger within the adept¡¯s tower. To his surprise, he found Adept F¨¹gen there. The Second Grade adept had been gone for quite a while.


    F¨¹gen had hidden within his room after the battle of Fire Throne and refused to see anyone. It seemed he had been affected by the whole event. The fact that he had appeared here meant that he had heard news of the arrival of the messenger.


    "Have you helped the messenger settle down?" Lady Sanazar was still cloaked in a strange cloud of purple mist.


    "He has been settled!" Keoghan bowed and paid his respects.


    In the time that Adept F¨¹gen had been in hiding, Keoghan had been responsible for the various matters of the n.


    "That fellow has been hiding for an entire month. Now he¡¯se up with some damned banquet the moment he shows himself. He even sent someone here with such valuable gifts. What is he nning?" Lady Sanazar¡¯s voice floated out from within the purple mist, seeminglyzy and disdainful.


    Adept F¨¹gen remained silent but cast his gaze upon Adept Keoghan.


    Keoghan wasn¡¯t young anymore. All these years of experience had turned him into a calm and collected man who knew how topose himself and hide his thoughts. Thus, he hesitated for a moment before finally speaking, "Mydy, if I am not mistaken... Greem probably intends to establish his own n!"


    The room suddenly fell silent.


    A short momentter, Sanazar finally asked with a chilling tone, "You mean to say that Greem will directly announce the establishment of his n at this banquet? What incredible guts he has."


    Adept Keoghan had a solemn expression on his face. He smiled bitterly and said, "This is only my guess! However, judging from how valuable the gifts he has sent us are, there is a very real possibility that my guess is correct."


    "Kehkehkeh," Sanazar suddenly let out a piercing and coldugh, "Gifts worth three hundred thousand magical crystals; how generous of Greem. He intends to use these as his ransom?"


    The nearly middle-aged Keoghan could only lower his head when he sensed that overwhelming killing intent. He didn¡¯t dare to meet the chilling gaze within the purple mist.


    The adepts might be wise and knowledgeable individuals, but the strengths and weaknesses of one¡¯s personality would also be magnified tens of thousands of times as their power reached a certain height.


    As the leader stationed within the World of Adepts by Lord Sarubo himself, Lady Sanazar could have avoided the intensification of conflict between the Sarubo n and Greem if she had been gentler in her approach and softer in her method of dealing with things.


    Perhaps a First Grade adept was no different from a Second Grade adept in Lady Sanazar¡¯s eyes. These adepts were always insignificant ants before a Third Grade adept. A simple p would crush and kill them. It didn¡¯t matter how much stronger Greem was. There was no chance of him threatening her, a superior Third Grade adept.


    However, her arrogance and pride might have caused her to forget an important fact. Greem had taken no more than a hundred years to climb from his lowly position as an apprentice adept to his current Second Grade. That was indirect proof of his astounding potential and talent!


    In all seriousness, the Sarubo had already lost their best chance and timing to suppress Greem¡¯s growth.


    Now, if they failed to acknowledge Greem¡¯s growth and give him the recognition he deserved, then the conflict and tension between them could never be resolved again!


    The fact that he had sent an invitation and such valuable gifts to his old n when he intended to establish his own n was already extremely benevolent and kind of him. If Sanazar didn¡¯t take back the initiative with this kind act of Greem¡¯s, their rtionship would only get worse.


    It meant that Greem¡¯s new adept n was very likely to be a rival n to the Sarubo. That was not a wise decision for the Sarubo n!


    If Greem was someone that was easily dealt with, then the pressure from the n and the mass invasion of the vampire n should have been enough to topple him.


    Sadly, the development of events waspletely different from everyone¡¯s expectations!


    Not only did Greem not copse under such pressure, but he had also sessfully crushed the Vik family led by a Third Grade vampire. In doing so, he had left a heavy p upon Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s face.


    Second Grade Adept F¨¹gen had slowly phased himself out of the management matters of the n ever since the battle at Fire Throne. One had to acknowledge that this was the effect of that battle.


    Greem was now impatiently stirring up trouble immediately after his wounds from the previous battle had healed. After all, Greem was an adept raised in the Sarubo n. His standing forward in public to establish his own n would mean a separation of the Sarubo n.


    It would have an entirely negative impact upon the reputation of the Sarubo n!


    Adept Keoghan could understand Lady Sanazar¡¯s anger, but he had always been a practical man and believed that worsening tensions was not a solution to the problem.


    Firstly, the Sarubo n had to acknowledge a single truth¨C they had let the time and ability to suppress Greem¡¯s continual growth slip away.


    If Lady Sanazar had the ability to rewind time and could return to before Greem had advanced to Second Grade, simply killing him would be the cleanest and most direct solution. It might have some adverse effects within the n, but the n could still endure such insignificant shockwaves.


    However, with the point things had now developed to, Greem had sessfully advanced to Second Grade. Even a veteran Third Grade adept like Sanazar couldn¡¯t do anything to him as long as he was cautious and hid within his adept¡¯s tower.


    Perhaps this was the main reason why Greem dared to provoke Lady Sanazar¡¯s fury and chose to sh with a Third Grade vampire!


    Secondly, Keoghan himself had to acknowledge that Greem had made it to where he was all through his personal efforts and hard work. The help of the Sarubo n was much more minimal than what outsiders thought.


    For a new adept that had barely advanced for six months, Greem¡¯s debut performance in the nar war of the Knight¡¯s ne had been nothing short of ster. It could have been described as stunning.


    Heartless ughtering, ferocious and efficient battles, appropriate strategic moves, bold yet careful.


    Even a veteran adept like Keoghan, who had advanced over a hundred years ago, couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by Greem. His decisions were always correct and efficient. He seemed to have ovee the various ws of human nature and allowed himself to always remain in his calmest and wisest state of mind.


    Fear, doubt, confusion¨C these emotions seemed to have never appeared in Greem.


    He was like a cold golem, unaffected by these human emotions, always cing himself in the most advantageous position.


    However, if you thought of Greem as a cold and purely rational adept that ced his own benefit before everything else, you would also be mistaken. He¡¯d possessed reasonably good rtionships with the various adepts around him during the battles in the Knight¡¯s ne, especially with Adept Mary. In fact, there were many times where he disyed a sort of courage and generosity in action.


    That was what truly confused Adept Keoghan!


    Greem was simply too excellent. He disyed all the necessary traits of a an adept leader. Yet, he had only been a newly advanced First Grade adept back then!


    Could Greem already have thought of developing independently and establishing his own adept n even back in the Knight¡¯s ne?


    The thought was almost absurd, but for some reason, Keoghan felt like his conjecture had stumbled upon a terrifying reality.


    If one were to be brutally honest, Greem had pretty much advanced from an apprentice to a First Grade before pulling ahead of Keoghan and advancing to Second Grade, all under Keoghan¡¯s eyes.


    That might not be much to Greem, but it was a heavy psychological burden for the proud Keoghan. Every night before he slept, Adept Keoghan always doubted whether the path he chose was the right one.


    That was why Adept Keoghan felt a certain sense of pleasure at Lady Sanazar¡¯s hostility toward Greem, even as he worried deeply for the n.


    Perhaps taking this opportunity and reconciling with Greem was the best choice?


    Adept Keoghan silently thought to himself.

 Chapter 595 Dragon Auction

    Chapter 595 Dragon Auction


    Greem, who had sent the entire Ailovis region into turmoil, had appeared once again.


    This short message spread throughout the Zhentarim in a single day, as if it was an infectious gue.


    The name of a Second Grade adept shouldn¡¯t be able to create such massive waves in the center of the continent. After all, there were over five hundred ns of various sizes scattered across Zhentarim. It wasn¡¯t as if Second Grade adepts were everywhere, but there were at least a thousand of them.


    However, he was the first and only Second Grade adept to crush a decent ranked vampire family with the power of his own n.


    The defeated Vik Family had lost over half of their family members. Even family head Haines had suffered fairly severe wounds. That wasn¡¯t the worst of it all. The weakening of the family had also provoked several neighboring vampire families into action.


    The newest information revealed that the Aimer, Snowden, and Moen Families had already started conspiring together. They were preparing to split up the Vik Family between them during this period of weakness that the Vik was experiencing.


    These vampires had already shut the doors on the southwest of Zhentarim and started their own bloody battle. Plenty of rumors about the deaths of human nobles and changes in territory ownership could be heard from the southwest.


    However, the Viks still had a single Third Grade and two Second Grades. As long as they gave up their outer territories, they should have no problem defending Bloodcastle. However, the Vik would probably need several decades of rest and recuperation to rise back up from such a disaster and return to their original ranking.


    There was no doubt about it. The Vik Family had most definitely ced Greem and Mary upon their list for revenge. The Third Grade Vampire Haines Vik would undoubtedly use his most cruel methods to y the two of them alive and mince them to pieces as long as he had the chance to.


    When Haines heard of Greem showing himself once more and inviting the nearby adept ns to participate in a banquet hosted at Fire Throne¨Cwhile he himself was struggling to survive his crisis¨Che flew into a rage. Haines snuck out of Bloodcastle in the night after some careful arrangements and preparations.


    The two Second Grade vampires of the family remained in Bloodcastle.


    They had no choice. The Vik Family had now be the most substantial cut of brisket in the eyes of their rivals. If the strength of the n werepletely put to use, Bloodcastle would only have traps and magical defenses to rely on. That was not nearly enough to defend against thebined forces of the other families.


    ............


    It was only three days until the day of the banquet, yet the surroundings of Fire Throne had already turned lively.


    Arge group of human adventurers, mercenaries, and wandering adepts and apprentices had gathered around the ce, with Fire Throne and Fire Cave at the center. They had their backs against Fire Throne and did not need to worry about their safety. They could boldly enter the ck Forest to explore itsnds and harvest its near endless flora and fauna resources.


    Fire Throne had discarded its previous istionist stance ever since Fire Cave was made open to the public. They had also started requiring strict identity checks of all people wishing to stay in Fire Throne. The adepts and apprentices that had left in the previous battle had all been ced on a cklist. These people were no longer allowed to appear anywhere near Fire Throne.


    The new wandering adepts and apprentices that came because of Greem¡¯s reputation were only allowed to stay in the tower after having their identities verified. That made it very difficult to recruit enough manpower, but it also suppressed unstable elements to the lowest possible level.


    Given Dana and Charon¡¯s performance in Lance, Greem signed an official n directive upon returning to Fire Throne including their tribesmen and subordinates as members of the tower.


    From now on, the snakefiends and the manticores would be able to enjoy the welfare and privileges of official Crimson n members. They were no longer wild magical creatures that would be chased and hunted by the humans.


    Greem brought several of the most powerful n members with him when he returned from Lance, along with plenty of spoils of war.


    Greem even boldly ced the captured Second Grade dragon in Magma Hall to further spread the name of the uing n establishing banquet. Of course, Greem made sure toplete all the necessary preparations.


    With a fire prison cast by Fire Throne itself, several dozens of anti-magic chains binding the wind dragon, and the constant surveince of Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha, there was no chance of this wind dragon escaping.


    This way, the first thing that all guests would see upon passing through the long winding tunnels of Fire Cave would be the massive dragon chained to a corner of Magma Hall.


    One had to admit that the eye-catching effect of this tactic was exceptional!


    The wandering adepts that traveled far and wide to join Greem¡¯s cause would instantly sense the power and extravagance behind Greem the moment they saw the mighty and wicked wind dragon.


    That was a freaking dragon!


    Moreover, it wasn¡¯t a whelp or a drake, but a true adolescent Second Grade Dragon!


    It was important to note that no dragons had existed on the World of Adepts for over a thousand years. The glimpse of a Third Grade dragon during the battle at Fire Throne had made all adept ns take note of Greem¡¯s existence.


    Now it was even more so the case. Greem had directly ced a Second Grade dragon before the doors of the tower. The implication behind this was something that only experienced veterans could truly understand.


    Disregarding everything else, just the presence of the dragon alone could draw enough attention and marvel toward Greem!


    When news of Fire Throne auctioning a dragon got out, the number of adepts in Ailovis increased exponentially over the next few days.


    The adepts had plenty of tricks and cards up their sleeves. They quickly figured out the intent of Greem in so hastily hosting an adept¡¯s banquet.


    The Crimson n!


    Greem, who had made such a name for himself, could finally no longer suppress his ambitions. He intended to establish his adept n.


    Many adepts across Zhentarim were both surprised¨Cyet not surprised¨Cat this news.


    They weren¡¯t surprised that Greem wanted to establish his own n.


    With his strength and reputation, leaving his original n to establish his own n was well within everyone¡¯s expectations.


    What surprised people was the timing Greem chose to establish the Crimson n.


    Most people estimated that Greem would need at least another thirty years to umte sufficient resources and power to establish a n.


    After all, the so-called adept n was made of a group of adepts, not a single adept.


    It didn¡¯t matter how strong or amazing Greem was. An organizationposed of him alone could never be called an adept n.


    He needed to first gradually umte sufficient power, recruit enough subordinates, and then construct a n structure that could positively develop. Only a force like this could be acknowledged as an adept n.


    That was why most neighboring adept ns were not optimistic about Greem¡¯s odds with how hastily and hurriedly he wasmitting to this. Still, with the eye-catching auction of the dragon, Greem had sessfully attracted enough attendees to his ceremony.


    ............


    The location of the banquet was set within Magma Hall.


    Long wooden tables had been neatly ced together and filled with all sorts of delicacies and wines. Delicate desserts, drinks, and fruits had all been prepared¨C a perfect show of the host¡¯s goodwill and generosity.


    The ones who substituted for maids were snakefiend girls that had been specially selected.


    They had perfect faces and explosive upper-body figures. If one had no inhibitions to their snake hair and bodies, then the snakefiend girls were a very attractive race as well.


    They stood by the side of each table, using the table and the tablecloth to obscure sight of their snake body as they helped every adept to get the food they wanted with a sweet smile on their faces.


    However, the adepts who had an interest in the food and the beauties were still a minority. Most adepts were gathered around the fire prison, holding their wine sses in hand as they talked about the imprisoned wind dragon with their friends.


    It had been too long since thest appearance of a dragon in the World of Adepts!


    Therge adept organizations had enved dragons in their hands, but never before had anyone so publicly disyed and auctioned a dragon as Greem had.


    It was a valuable chance, especially for the adepts who were searching for dragon blood, dragon bones, or dragon tendons. In fact, this could be their only chance.


    The Wagenhagen, the Congreve, the Juniper, the ntag, the Bahrain; all of the reputable mid-sized ns and small-sized ns of Zhentarim had sent envoys to observe the ceremony.


    Of course, their real purpose was still the auction that was to happen after the banquet.


    Adept Greem had promised to sell off this Second Grade wind dragon at that auction.


    In all honesty, nothing could satisfy these n envoys as much as this promise alone!


    If they brought back a Second Grade wind dragon back with them and adequately broke it in, they would instantly have a powerfulbat force within their n. What quicker way was there to increase the power of the n.


    As for why Greem didn¡¯t take this dragon for himself and chose to put it out for auction instead? Everyone had their guesses. The most reliable rumor was that Greem¡¯s newly established Crimson ncked the necessary experts in this field. He had trouble taming such a mighty dragon and could only convert it into other useful resources.


    Of course, while this theory wasn¡¯tplete, it still got half the reason right.


    The other reason why Greem had so easily sold the wind dragon away was that there was just too many Second Grade minor dragons in Lance. Even if there weren¡¯t a hundred Second Grades like Wind Dragon Cherkes, there would at least be eighty or ny of them.


    The Crimson n had established their foothold in Lance. Their Second Grade adept squad had also been formed. They might not be able to provoke a Third Grade dragon, but was it not a simple matter to deal with a Second Grade dragon?


    There were three Second Grade dragon lords living within a ten thousand kilometer radius of the metal fortress alone. Cherkes was no more than the first prey to fall in the Crimson n¡¯s, and he would not be thest.


    Finding a way to sell the wind dragon and making a profit was the best course of action.


    This way, the Crimson n would obtain a new path to strengthen themselves rapidly, would they not?

 Chapter 596 Clan Member

    Chapter 596 n Member


    The Crimson n¡¯s banquet appeared shabby inparison to the establishment banquet of other ns.


    However, the visiting adepts were not shallow individuals either. What they truly wanted to see was the future power of the Crimson n. As long as you had a sufficiently hard fist and a powerful adept squad, things like resources would eventually fall into your hands.


    Thus, when the banquet started, and all the core members of the Crimson n gathered together and appeared before the guests, the guests were utterly shocked.


    The first to walk out of the doors of Fire Throne was naturally the founder of the Crimson n, Greem.


    As a Second Grade adept, he had especially worn a crimson adept¡¯s robe on this asion, with the ze of Destruction in hand. When he silently stood alone in front of the door, the fire energy he radiated shed with the fire elementium within Magma Hall, causing clusters of magical mes to ignite around him.


    He had tough and well-defined muscles, crimson yet radiant skin, as well as all the strange tattoos covering his chest and his back. Greem might be an elementium adept, but his two-meter height and golden ratio body still gave him a nearly perfect appearance.


    A head full of long crimson hair flowed down behind his back, reaching all the way to his waist. When paired with the crimson light in his ck eyes, Greem radiated a wicked aura of mystery and wisdom.


    Disregarding everything else, Greem¡¯s appearance alone had moved the hearts of countless female adepts. mes of desire suddenly burned in the hearts of these female adepts.


    Approximately two to three hundred adepts hade here today from various ns. There were thirty to forty Second Grade adepts among them. They were scattered all across Magma Hall, with every one of them surrounded by arge group of First Grade adepts.


    About seven or eight of these Second Grade adepts were female. Most of them had beautiful faces and dynamite figures. Of course, there were one or two odd individuals with unique appearances and bodies asrge as a pig. The bodies of those who could make it to Second Grades would have undergone extensive modification and reconstruction. There wasn¡¯t much left about them that was human.


    The First Grade female adepts might not dare to express any desire or lust toward Greem, but this wasn¡¯t the case for the Second Grade adepts; their eyes burned like torches. They were filled with greed and lust. Many young and handsome male adepts stood by their sides. They lowered their heads at the sight of Greem, but their eyes shed with a mad and envious light.


    However, they still knew very well the difference between themselves and Greem. They wouldn¡¯t ever dare to cast gazes of enmity upon him. Otherwise, they might invite the anger of the fire adept. When that happened, even their lover would not be able to stop the punishment of a Second Grade adept, no matter how much they were cherished and loved.


    While a slightmotion spread through the crowd of adepts, a red burst of light shed before the doors of Fire Throne. The crimson-armored and slender Mary walked out of the entrance with elegant steps.


    Those crimson eyes, as crystal clear as rubies themselves. That vague and fearsome cloud of bloody mist that shrouded her body. That deep and massive Spirit that was so concentrated it almost seemed solid.


    Second Grade. This female vampire had also advanced to Second Grade!


    Several adepts who had insider information couldn¡¯t help but sigh silently at the sight.


    The Crimson n had crippled the Vik Family, and in doing so, had benefited this female vampire. Why else would she have been able to advance to Second Grade so quickly? It was evident that she had climbed up there by stepping upon the mountainous pile of Vik corpses.


    An adept within the crowd with ordinary looks and ck robes raised his head wordlessly. The eyes that looked upon Mary and Greem were soaked in an indescribable hatred as if the emotion had been carved into the adept¡¯s very bones. However, the adept disguised his feelings very well. Not a single trace of killing intent had radiated beyond his body. Naturally, he would not rm the two Second Grade adepts on the stage.


    The light door of the tower shed once more while the adepts were silently evaluating this terrifying female vampire. Dragonborn Zacha walked out of the tower with firm and heavy steps.


    A third Second Grade.


    The expressions of many n representatives turned solemn.


    A newly established adept n having three Second Grades was more than enough proof of the unimaginable power that they had umted. This much power already ced them above seventy percent of all small-sized ns.


    There was no doubt that the Crimson n would be able to rank very highly among the small-sized n.


    Yet it was no more than a newly established n right now!


    Before the adepts could continue contemting the situation, the light door of the adept¡¯s tower shed in session. Several mysterious witches with unique appearances walked out of the door.


    The one in the lead was a beautiful witch cloaked in purple starry robes.


    Her silky silver hair rested upon her shoulders. Her face was exceptionally gentle and tranquil, while her sharp, bright blue eyes shone like stars, giving off a sense of charm and mystery.


    Behind her stood two unique and powerful witches.


    One was built like the most muscr of men, with a ck eyepatch over one eye and a thick wooden staff on her shoulder. It was Sofia. The other was a cold beauty dressed in an ice blue dress and enveloped in a chilling air¨C Snowlotus.


    Five more witches of various ages followed behind Sofia and Snowlotus. All of them wore solemn expressions and determined looks on their faces. Anyone could tell that they were elites cultivated by a big n.


    "Alice, it¡¯s Alice."


    "The leader of the Witches of the Fate from the Northern Lands."


    "Mm, I¡¯ve long heard that she has an extremely close rtionship with Greem. Who knew she would publicly bring her people along with her to support his cause."


    Cautious chattering rang out amidst the crowd.


    Many adepts with inside information started to tell the others what they knew in vivid detail as if they had seen it all happen, taking the opportunity to show off all the ¡¯secrets¡¯ they knew. The majority of the adepts were looking at two adepts in the crowd with expressions of amusement.


    As a representative of the Sarubo n, Adept F¨¹gen felt iparably awkward at this moment.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was Greem, Mary, or even the current Witch of Fate Alice. These three adepts had all been members of the Sarubo n. They might have left the Sarubo n, but Adept F¨¹gen felt uncontroble anger bubbling in his heart when he felt the looks of scorn and ridicule around him.


    If the people that dared to look at him this way were First Grade adepts, Adept F¨¹gen would have no qualms about using his magic to make them regret their decision. However, the only ones that dared to make fun of him in this manner here were all Second Grades. As such, F¨¹gen could do nothing about the intense fury he was feeling.


    Inparison, Adept Keoghan, who hade along with him, was betraying an excellent attitude.


    Keoghan smiled and nodded at everyone who looked at him, as if he hadn¡¯t picked up on the contempt in the eyes of the crowd.


    This attitude of turning the other cheek did indeed win him the admiration of several adepts.


    Alice¡¯s arrival was clearly beyond everyone¡¯s expectations.


    As an important branch of the Northern Witches, the branch of Fate undoubtedly had much nobler status than most other adept ns. To think that Alice was willing to lower her position ande here in support of Greem; the various implications behind her actions invited further consideration and thought.


    Mary rolled her eyes upon seeing Alice arrive. She immediately revealed a broad smile and quickly walked over. She put her hand around Alice¡¯s slender waist and pulled the Witch of Fate to her side. It caused Greem to be stunned. He had intended to invite Alice to stand by his side. His right arm hung loosely in the air now.


    This seemingly innocuous act also clearly incited the anger of several of Alice¡¯s subordinates.


    The fact that Alice was willing to lower herself ande to celebrate the establishment of the Crimson n had already upset several of the Witches of Fate. Now this female vampire actually whisked their leader to her side, as if the Witches of Fate were subordinate to the Crimson n! How could this not infuriate the witches?


    However, Alice¡¯s image in the hearts of the witches had be more significant and sacred after all these years of management and leadership. That was why the witches didn¡¯t dare throw a tantrum and ruin this banquet without her permission. They could only stifle and suppress their rage.


    Alice was stunning, with an air of nobility and etherealness to her being. When she stood beside the wickedly charming and explosively seductive Mary, it was like two exquisitely blooming flowers ofpletely different beauty. The sight of their faces alone would shake one¡¯s heart and give a sense of immense perfection.


    "Greem lucked out."


    The same thought sprang up in the minds of countless male adept at the same instant.


    Alice might only be First Grade, but her identity made her nobler and more influential than most of the Second Grade adepts present here. The title of Witch of Fate alone was enough topare with the n leaders of some of the most powerful ns in the center of the continent.


    Even the n leaders of the five prominent adept ns of Zhentarim would have to wee her with the greatest respect and honor if she were to visit the area. Not just any adept n could endure the fury of the Northern Witches after all!


    Plenty of thoughts were racing through the minds of the crowd, but Alice didn¡¯t seem to take note of the situation. She held Mary¡¯s arms in one hand and politely yet proudly nodded at the Second Grade adepts beneath the stage in acknowledgment.


    A strange feeling of being wholly seen through suddenly rose in the hearts of all the adepts when Alice¡¯s eyes swept through the hall. Even the Second Grade adepts were no exception.


    The expressionless adept in ck robes within the cloud felt his heart tremble. He had a feeling that there was something special about the look Alice had cast at him from a distance.


    Could she have seen through his disguise?!


    The expressionless adept shuddered uneasily.


    This ce was well within the defensive radius of the tower. A problematic battle was unavoidable if his identity was exposed. Greem, Mary, and the other core members of the Crimson n were extremely close to the tower¡¯s door of light. They would instantly retreat within the tower if he failed to kill them with the first strike.


    Any attempt to hurt the opponent through killing theirpanions would be fruitless.


    When that happened, revenge was no longer a matter of concern. There was a high possibility he might even die here.


    The expressionless adept shivered when he thought of that fearsome Third Grade thunder dragon fromst time. The chilling killing intent in his heart finally started to subside.


    The adept silently exited the Magma Hall and disappeared into the winding tunnels of Fire Cave.

 Chapter 597 The Auction

    Chapter 597 The Auction


    The Crimson n then featured their First Grade adepts.


    Apart from Meryl, who had to watch over things in the Goblin ne, and Billis, who needed to stay at the metal fortress, all the other n adepts had hurried back to Fire Throne to participate in this grand establishment banquet.


    Gargamel, Eva, Deserra, Endor, Dana, Charon, the three blood knights, Old Fox Vanlier, Goblin Mechanic Tigule, Goblin Snox.


    Their numbers were plenty, but nearly half of them were magical creatures that had joined the Crimson n. Consequently, it wasn¡¯t too striking of a scene and wouldn¡¯t invite the fear of the surrounding adept ns.


    The auction that came after the introduction of the Crimson adepts was, naturally, handed over to Snox for him to host.


    Snox had managed to break free of the mor of authority and status after enjoying those several months of emperor-like treatment and rejoined the ranks of the n adepts. In all honesty, this was beyond Greem¡¯s expectations.


    It was important to note how good a life that Snox was leading in the Goblin ne. As the ¡¯sage¡¯ and ¡¯saint¡¯ of the goblins, Snox had practically uncontested authority. He could do whatever he wished. Over the past few months, he had always lived under the adoration of his many believers. He was weed wherever he went and greeted by masses that swarmed the streets. Tens of thousands of people followed him like shadows. He had immense influence, and countless goblins would have responded to his call.


    Anyone else who had never tasted such power would probably have been lost in the mor of the poisoned wine that was authority. Yet, strangely enough, Snox was able to break free of this bewitchment within a matter of weeks. He had cast away all his followers and believers without another word after hearing about the Crimson n¡¯s establishment today. He had eagerly hurried back to Fire Throne.


    It was because of Snox¡¯s shocking performance that Greem decided to hand him the reins of the auction today. Snox didn¡¯t disappoint either. He showed no signs of fear or intimidation before such a crowd of powerful individuals.


    The goblin moved a tall stool in ce and stood upon it. Snox waved the gavel in his hand and shouted with all his strength at the adepts below.


    "Noble lord anddy adepts, wee to Fire Throne of the Crimson n. I am Lord Greem¡¯s loyal ve, Snox. I will be the one hosting this grand auction today."


    Snox was a little fellow that knew how to read between the lines and observe people¡¯s expressions. He quickly picked up on the impatience on some of the adepts¡¯ faces after his series of introductory remarks and promotion of the Crimson n. He immediately changed topics to address the central issue today.


    "Today, the first auction item that we of the Crimson n have prepared for you people is... Wind Dragonborn!"


    As Snox¡¯s inciting shouts spread throughout the cave, ten muscr dragonborn were brought up the stage under the escort of snakefiend warriors. They were bound by runic chains and shuffled up the side.


    It was apparent that these dragonborn had not been tamed in any manner. They might be suffering from the fearsome nar suppression of the World of Adepts, but they were still ring at everything around them with fourrge and furious eyes.


    Their tall and muscr bodies, the humanoid torsos, and the powerful dragonlike lower bodies caused them to radiate a sense of overwhelming strength. Experienced adepts could easily tell that they possessed elementium affinity through their light green scales.


    They were truly wind-attribute dragonborn warriors!


    The adepts, many of whom thought that the Crimson n couldn¡¯t present any decent products, were immediately excited. They swarmed toward the stage and used their Spirits to ascertain the quality of these dragonborn silently.


    First Grade dragonborn warriors. In fact, they were first-generation dragonborn guards that possessed dragon bloodline.


    They were personal bodyguards that the dragons had personally cultivated, not mixed-blood dragonborn that had been born from several generations of interbreeding between dragonborn.


    Dragonborn might not be actual dragons, but their value increased significantly given their size and identity as first generation ves. Their blood could achieve seventy to eighty percent of the effect of actual dragon blood if they were wholly extracted, properly refined, and purified.


    If these dragonborn were bred on arge-scale, then they could be an endless source of ¡¯faux-dragon blood.¡¯ It was an extremely cost-effective solution for adepts that were in desperate need ofrge quantities of high-quality magical creature blood!


    Moreover, young dragonborn were all qualified First Grade warriors. If they could be made to submit, then the adepts would instantly gain a group of loyal subordinates.


    The adepts couldn¡¯t help but start offering their bids after some quick assessments.


    The price of ten wind dragonborn warriors rose all the way, quickly rising from the original bid of three thousand magical crystals to seventy thousand magical crystals. At this point, most wandering adepts no longer had any ability to keep up with the bids. The focus of the auction shifted to the n representatives.


    Ten dragonborn were still insufficient to attract the interest of those Second Grade adepts. The ones that participated in the current auction were mostly the representatives of those small-sized ns. They might be more interested in the Second Grade dragon, but they knew that was not an auction their n could hope topete in. It wasn¡¯t a bad choice to obtain some of the leftovers before the real star of the show was put on stage.


    In the end, the Faten representative obtained these ten dragonborn with a bid of eighty-three thousand magical crystals.


    Once the dragonborn had been escorted off stage, Snox excitedly rubbed his hands together. He hadpleted his first deal. The goblin shouted for the tower guards to haul the second batch of auction items onto the stage.


    Three magic energy robots stamped with a visible goblin logo lifted arge metal box onto the stage. Neatly arranged metal armor and magical longswords were revealed within the box when they opened up its cover on the side.


    A dense aura of wind elementium pressed against the faces of the adepts when the dull crimson light of the Magma Hall shone upon this equipment.


    Snox, who had been yelling on the podium, suddenly turned into a weapon master. He took out a longsword and a set of armor from the metal box and started showing them to the adepts.


    These magic weapons and armor were all made of wind indurium. They were unique alchemical creations and could not be found anywhere else.


    A quick wind de shot out of the light green de when Snox waved the magic longsword like a clown. The sword was half a head taller than he was. The wind de cut through the air, crossed a distance of seventy meters, and left a deep mark upon a rock pir.


    Wind de¨C its power could only reach forty-five points.


    This was not a powerful magical equipment for most adepts. However, if they were used to equip a private noble¡¯s army, it would make it easy for the army to decimate and conquer all nearby territories.


    Goblin Snox shifted his attention to the wind indurium armor after showing off the longsword.


    When he raised the wind indurium longsword and stabbed at the armor, a familiar aura of wind surged out of the armor and formed into a small Tornado Vortex. Thus, the longsword in Snox¡¯s hand was blown to a side by the rapidly spinning Tornado Vortex.


    If this were a battle of life and death where every second counted, the redirection of an attack like this would have been enough to decide a victor between two equally matched soldiers.


    Tornado Vortex¨C sixty points.


    A spell of this power was enough to defend against ten arrow shots or five powerful strikes from a human warrior.


    Goods like these were not suited for adepts, but they were a decent choice for equipping the guards of adepts!


    Thus, some of the interested adepts started to offer bids, and Auctioneer Snox once again started shouting and yelling excitedly.


    Seven minutester, this box of wind indurium weapons and armor (a total of seventy sets), were sold for a price of seventeen thousand magical crystals.


    The auction continued with enthusiasm. One by one, the auction items were hauled on-stage before being taken off and put into the hands of the adepts below. The magical crystals obtained by the Crimson n were also rising without stop. All the Crimson adepts present at the banquet couldn¡¯t stop smiling.


    The prosperity of the n meant that their welfare would also improve in turn.


    Lord Greem had never been a stingy man when it came to such matters.


    Wind dragonborn warriors, wind indurium armor and longswords, magic energy construction robots, dragontooth amulets, arcanite rifles, plenty of magical gemstones, and many rare materials from other worlds were auctioned.


    These auction items were part of the resources that Greem had scoured from the Goblin ne and Lance. They were ordinary items that had all their secrets and knowledge scrubbed from them. Even so, these items had brought a profit of 1.4 million magical crystals to the Crimson n.


    Once this opening act had concluded, Snox finally shouted out the finale of the performance under the eager gaze of all the adepts¨C the Second Grade Wind Dragon.


    Fire Throne rumbled, and the rattling sounds rang out from the fire prison in the corner of the Magma Hall. The magnificent body of the wind dragon that had been seen before the auction was revealed before everyone once again. Dragonborn Zacha held a shing electric spear in his hand, watchfully guarding over the fire prison.


    "This is a Second Grade wind dragon our n captured in a certain other ne. It is a dragon lord that possesses a pure bloodline and is immensely powerful. If any lord ordy adept here can tame it and turn it into their mount, then their power would instantly skyrocket by thirty to forty percent. Its starting bid is one million two hundred thousand magical crystals. Highest bid wins. Any offers..." Seeing that it was the climax of the auction, Snox rose his voice one octave higher to a surprising level of excitement. His voice could be clearly heard throughout every corner of Magma Hall, even without the use of any voice amplification spells.


    The adepts immediately flew into a riot.


    Even the Second Grade adepts opened their eyes wide and cast their Spirits toward where the wind dragon was.


    It seemed the goblin¡¯s loud yelling had provoked Second Grade Wind Dragon Cherkes. He started to struggle against all the denseyers of runic bindings that he was ced under once more. The invisible sacrificial mes immediately spread to his body through the runic chains. These scary mes that could directly contact the soul burned and scorched the Second Grade wind dragon terribly. He let out a pitiful and drawn-out cry, and a fearsome dragon¡¯s aura of might erupted from his body.


    The low-grade adepts in the front were caught unprepared. They frantically retreated backward. Even the spirit appendages they had extended toward the wind dragon were torn to pieces. Some of the adepts with weaker Spirits even grunted as ck streaks of blood flowed down their nose.


    The violence of the wind dragon didn¡¯t invite anyints from the Second Grade adepts. In fact, it caused their eyes to shine even brighter. They wanted this enraged dragon even more now.

 Chapter 598 Power of Fate

    Chapter 598 Power of Fate


    As the finale, the auctioning of the wind dragon was exceptionally lively.


    Adepts from various ns started bidding, causing the price of the wind dragon to rise exponentially. It very quickly rose from one million two hundred thousand magical crystals to one million nine hundred thousand magical crystals. A terrifying number like this not only kept the wandering adepts out of the ranks ofpetitors, it even dissuaded the adepts of the small-sized ns. Those adepts had no choice but to shake their heads, sigh, and watch on silently from the side as the Second Grade adeptspeted over the dragon.


    In terms of purebat ability, a Second Grade wind dragon could easily defeat three to four magical creatures of the same Grade. Consequently, its price was also several times that of an ordinary Second Grade magical creature.


    However, a price like that was still not enough to deter these prepared n adepts. Their faces flushed red as they shouted out one heart-stopping number after another. The spectators around them felt their hearts ache just hearing them throw out such incredible sums of money.


    The price of the wind dragon was increasing rapidly by the tens of thousands during these bids.


    The Crimson n adepts had already left before the auction concluded. Some of them hurried back to their posts in the Goblin ne while others went to Lance for further training. In the blink of an eye, only Greem, Mary, Alice, and Dragon Devourer Oliven remained in the tower.


    The ck-robed Oliven couldn¡¯t possibly be in a good mood, seeing that the wind dragon she¡¯d had her eye on had turned into prey that other people were fighting over. However, this wind dragon was the spoils of the Crimson n. She had contributed absolutely nothing to its capture and thus had no grounds to request anything of Greem.


    Moreover, Oliven had recently rejected Greem¡¯s invitation to join the Crimson n. She had even less reason to make such unreasonable requests.


    After the past half a month of time together, Oliven had no choice but to admit that this young and handsome Second Grade male adept was indeed a fairly charming person. Not only did he possess vast power, but even his subordinates had plenty of tricks up their sleeves.


    Disregarding everything else, just the Second Grade female vampire and the Second Grade dragonborn were exceptional talents and geniuses. Still, despite their overwhelming power, Oliven didn¡¯t think much of them. Instead, it was another First Grade ¡¯small fry¡¯ that frightened her.


    What the heck was a Witch of Fate?


    Could they be the legendary Great Prophets?


    Oliven felt her heart tremble every time her eyes crossed paths with Alice, even though the witch was only First Grade. She felt a strange feeling as if she had beenpletely seen through.


    It was a very odd feeling that Oliven had never felt in the face of other powerful creatures.


    Alice¡¯s bright blue eyes seemed to be able to see into a person¡¯s heart and directly look upon the most secret memories hidden in the depths of Oliven¡¯s soul. The idea sounded ridiculous, but it unsettled the dragon devourer.


    The anxiety that the mysterious witch had brought upon her sessfully drove out the dissatisfaction of having lost the wind dragon. Oliven might appear to be hiding in the corner of an arcane hall and looking at the scene of the auction projected on the light screen, but most of her attention was spent wondering about the oddity of the witch.


    She had gotten closer with a few of the Crimson adepts over these past few days. She might be able to find a chance to discover more about the witch through them.


    While Oliven was trying to sort out her uneasiness, Greem and Alice were discussing even more ssified secrets.


    "...you mean the Third Grade vampire, Haines, hase here before."


    "Mm. I sensed his aura the moment I arrived. However, I had to project a sense of danger into his soul and scare him away to prevent him from interrupting tonight¡¯s banquet."


    "Why are you using your powers of Fate so frequently? Are you no longer worried about the bacsh of Fate?"


    "..." Alice sighed pensively upon hearing these words, "All who attempt to control the powers of Fate will ultimately fall before the bacsh of Fate. It is a sort of destiny and certainty! Why should I struggle against it if there¡¯s no escaping it?"


    "Isn¡¯t the first Witch of Fate still alive? She must possess some means to escape Fate¡¯s bacsh if she¡¯s managed to live for such a long time. We..." Greem was still frowning in contemtion.


    "It¡¯s no use!" Alice sighed once again, "I have some idea of what means she used to escape Fate¡¯s bacsh. That, too, is a perilous path. The risk she will face when danger descends won¡¯t be much lower than Fate¡¯s bacsh itself. So..."


    "Don¡¯t waste too much of your powers of Fate on inconsequential matters anymore. Don¡¯t forget, the powers of Fate are now deeply intertwined with your life. Wasting your powers of Fate is akin to wasting your life! That reminds me. You mentionedst time that participating in major events that decided the future of a ne could allow you to collectrge amounts of powers of Fate. How did that experiment go? Did you get anything out of the nar war in the Goblin nest time?"


    Alice revealed a sweet smile when she heard this.


    "I didn¡¯t think you¡¯d still care about me! Hmph! Mary turned me into your subordinate tonight. What about it? Do you feel anything special about that?"


    "What can I feel about it? Aren¡¯t you my ve from the very start? Don¡¯t you forget, we signed a soul contract between the two of us." Greem smiled wickedly, his eyes filled with intimacy and nostalgia.


    "You..." Alice couldn¡¯t help but get angry.


    She had been ignorant when she was a young apprentice and was tricked into signing the soul contract. The soul contract had already turned vague and useless now that she had advanced to be the Witch of Fate. In fact, Alice could have cut off her soul connection with this bad, bad person at any time with her current power. She had only preserved it to makemunication more convenient.


    Now, this shameless person was using it to make fun of her. Alice¡¯s face had unknowingly turned red when she remembered her capriciousness and mischief as an apprentice. She was embarrassed.


    "Don¡¯t just be shy, you haven¡¯t answered my question yet! Was the war in the Goblin ne of any help?" Greem clearly had something nned in his mind. He pressed the question.


    "Of course it was. It was a great help!" Alice¡¯s mind turned. She quickly discarded her childish embarrassment, bing that wise, intelligent, and visionary branch leader once again, "I did some estimations after the whole thing. The battle at the Steel Capital allowed me to collect three thousand seven hundred units of the power of Fate."


    "Three thousand seven hundred units of the power of Fate? That doesn¡¯t sound like a lot." Grem couldn¡¯t help but curl his lips.


    Alice rolled her eyes at him unamusedly.


    "Ignorant kid, let me teach you a lesson!" Alice had no choice but to exin, "Do you know how much power of Fate my daily Fate ceremonies in the Tower of Fate can bring me? Two units! Do you know how much power of Fate I consume every time I host a Fate divination ceremony? Thirty units! Moreover, the power of Fate required will shift drastically depending on the power of the item or person being divined. Under ordinary circumstances, the amount of power of Fate required will double with each increase of grade in the item or person."


    Greem gulped ufortably.


    "You mean to say that divining the location of a First Grade adept might only take thirty units of Fate. But divining a Second Grade will require sixty units, and Third Grade, one hundred and twenty units."


    "These are only the base numbers!" A sad expression surfaced in Alice¡¯s eyes, "I can cut down this cost by half within the Tower of Fate through the use of the astrology tform and the other support facilities. However, if the target of the divination is protected by some abilities or means to disrupt Fate¡¯s senses, then the consumption of the power of Fate could go further beyond my control. If the amount of stored power isn¡¯t enough to sustain the Fate spell, then the remainder can only bepensated for with my life force. Perhaps this is the main reason why Witches of Fate face so many cmities!"


    Greem took a deep breath.


    He had always held a vague understanding of Alice¡¯s situation in the past, but he never had the full picture. Greem finally understood the meaning of the profession of the Witch of Fate upon hearing Alice¡¯s confession today.


    It was a potent profession that used their own lives to move the lever of Fate!


    However, Fate had its own unique rules andws as well. It pushed the torrent of Fate in the determined path with these sons and daughters of Fate as its manifestations. In all seriousness, Alice and all the previous Witches of Fate were the janitors and guardians selected by the rules of Fate. They were chosen to protect and defend the normal functioning and operation of thews of Fate.


    The world consciousness even blessed them with some skill to manipte Fate to allow them to have the ability to push back against those who could walk above thews of Fate. However, the world consciousness also ced heavy shackles upon them to prevent them from abusing this immense power.


    The power of Fate might indeed be mighty!


    However, the cost of using this power was also hefty. There were times where the weight alone could cause them to sink into situations of irredeemable doom.


    Greem took a few deep breaths and tried his best to calm down.


    "We have now established a foothold in Lance. We will soon be startingrge-scale exploration and excavation. Would you also be able to gain powers of Fate if you participated in this?"


    Alice smiled bitterly.


    "Greem, don¡¯t ever think of toying with Fate! Your small skirmishes in Lance can¡¯t possibly affect the future direction of the ne. It can¡¯t possibly cause powerful and unknown effects to the dragons in there. That¡¯s why I can¡¯t gain much power of Fate there.


    "The reason why I got so much out of the Goblin ne was that we were deeply involved in a significant event that could have affected the entire ne or an entire species. Moreover, we were the main catalyst for the development. That was why it was such a harvest for me.


    "A great ne like Lance and your Crimson n is like a cow with a tiny flea sucking blood on its back. Your actions are not yet at a level sufficient to upset the fate of Lance."


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but smile when she saw Greem¡¯s dejected expression. She caressed his face softly with her hand.


    "Don¡¯t worry! My body can still hang in there. We have plenty of time to think about this problem. There¡¯s no need to worry about me."


    Before Alice could say anything more, a sudden incident in the auction drew both people¡¯s attention.


    Greem and Alice couldn¡¯t help but turn their eyes toward the auction at the same time.

 Chapter 599 Unreasonable Third Grade

    Chapter 599 Unreasonable Third Grade


    "I want this wind dragon. I bid one million and five hundred thousand magical crystals!"


    An unexpected character had suddenly appeared in the auction at its most intense stage.


    An overwhelmingly ferocious aura enveloped the entire ce with her descent. All the adepts couldn¡¯t help but be shocked and terrified by her appearance.


    It was a strange cloud of purple mist that appeared before everyone.


    A tall and intimidating female adept was vaguely visible in the swirling mist.


    The adepts could not clearly see her appearance and figure, but many of them immediately gasped and muttered.


    "Sanazar."


    "Poison Dragon Adept."


    The figure in the mist stood in midair. Her pair of eyes that glowed as brightly as the sun immediately fell upon these disrespectful adepts. Some of them were even Second Grade.


    The faces of these adepts turned pale when the Third Grade female adept¡¯s Spirit locked onto them. Their bodies shivered. Several First Grade adepts with weaker Physique couldn¡¯t endure the spiritual pressure and copsed to the ground, unconscious.


    Snox, who had been hosting the auction, was scared out of his wits. He squealed in terror and dove under the stool, hugging his head and trembling in fear.


    The snakefiends maintaining order around the stage couldn¡¯t keep their fear in check and fell limply to the ground from the terror. They couldn¡¯t even stand up straight in front of a Third Grade adept.


    In an instant, the previously lively auction turned into a frantic riot. All the adepts scattered to both sides and opened up the way to the fire prison. The Second Grade adepts might be upset at the situation, but this was a dominant Third Grade female adept that they were dealing with. Even they could not bear the cost of enraging her.


    It immediately exposed dragonborn Zacha, who was standing guard in front of the fire prison.


    Everyone else could step away, but he alone could not yield a single step!


    He bore upon his shoulders the heavy duty imparted to him by his master. He had to defend his responsibility and keep his word, even if he was facing a Third Grade powerhouse.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Zacha stepped forward and mmed his electric spear heavily upon the ground. A small crater had been created in the tough crimson volcanic rock floor. Everything within one meter of the crater shattered, and cracks covered a radius of five meters.


    Violent powers of lightning instantly gathered upon the electric spear, further emphasizing his towering and mighty body.


    Dragonborn Zacha might not have said a single word, but his appearance of readiness was more than enough to express his determination and will to not back down, even in the face of death.


    The adepts in the hall couldn¡¯t help but be amazed when they saw this happen.


    Who knew what fortunate luck Greem had run into that allowed him to obtain such a loyal and powerful Second Grade ve. The safety of one¡¯s life would be very much guaranteed if they had a strong guard like this standing before them in the field of battle!


    It made them green with envy!


    Still, challenging a Third Grade bloodline adept to frontalbat was not rational behavior. The life of this dragonborn warrior hung on the precipice!


    "Good, very good. Who knew that Greem would be able to gain a dragonborn ve from another world? Hehehe. Truly a fearless warrior." Sanazar chillinglyughed as she strode toward the fire prison.


    The spiritual pressure and aura of intimidation that Dragonborn Zacha had to endure increased with every step Sanazar took. Any other human adept¡¯s frail Physique would not have allowed them to withstand such intense pressure from a Third Grade adept. They would have been crippled from the fear.


    Zacha managed tost through it all with the exceptional talent and robust Physique of the dragonborn.


    The brightly shining gaze from within the purple mist intensified as an overwhelming killing intent crept up in Zacha¡¯s heart.


    Sanazar could no longer hold back and was about to strike. Just then, a tall figure appeared between her and Zacha. An immense surge of fire energy apanied this man.


    "Lady Sanazar, Greem is extremely honored that you were able to visit Fire Throne personally. Wee, wee."


    Sanazar stopped walking without another sound.


    The timing of Greem¡¯s appearance was perfect. He was entirely in Sanazar¡¯s way. It caused her to have no proper angle of attack even if she wanted to punish the dragonborn, Zacha. That was because there were no spells that could bypass Greem, the owner of the adept¡¯s tower, and immediately take effect upon the dragonborn behind.


    He was the owner of the tower. Apart from the glory and nobility, this title also meant iparable authority. No energy flux within two and a half kilometers of the tower could escape the spiritual senses of the tower owner. Any enemy that wanted to attack the tower owner within five hundred meters of the structure would unavoidably have to endure the suppression and attack of the tower.


    Greem might seem to be veryfortable standing before Sanazar, but that was because he was cloaked in an extraordinarily dense and nearly substantial quantity of fire energy. It wasn¡¯t Greem¡¯s power, but the power that Fire Throne had projected upon him.


    Any enemy that wanted to deal with Greem would first have to deal with this seemingly thin yet incredibly powerful elementium enhancement. It was this augmentation from the tower that allowed a Second Grade adept like Greem to speak on equal footing with a Third Grade adept.


    It was true that Greem couldn¡¯t wound the Third Grade Sanazar even with the adept¡¯s tower at his back. Conversely, the Third Grade Sanazar would also have an incredibly difficult time defeating and capturing the ¡¯pseudo-Third Grade¡¯ Greem.


    If Greem didn¡¯t mind being a cowardly turtle, Sanazar wouldn¡¯t even be able to touch a single hair on his head while he was hiding in the tower.


    Sanazar had no choice but to stop walking at the sight of this courteous Second Grade fire adept, even as anger filled her heart. She narrowed her eyes and assessed the opponent.


    "You¡¯re good; very bold. I like it very much."


    Sanazar¡¯s practically squeezed her praise out of the gaps between her chilling teeth. It was incredibly unsettling and incredibly fearsome.


    Adept F¨¹gen and Adept Keoghan, who were standing in the crowd, looked at each other. They were both surprised by Lady Sanazar¡¯s sudden arrival. A deeply ominous feeling arose from the depths of their hearts after the initial shock.


    They might have wanted to oppress Greem and force him to serve the Sarubo n in the past obediently. However, they had already cast that impractical thought away from their minds after seeing the umted power of the Crimson n today. The only thing left were considerations about maintaining their rtionship, and setting up further cooperation.


    Yet Lady Sanazar had suddenly shown up just as they had discarded their hostile intents. It seemed she wanted to bring the hostilities to a level of direct conflict. That undoubtedly robbed the initiative from the hands of the two adepts.


    Greem¡¯s smile didn¡¯t falter in the face of Sanazar¡¯s pressing attitude. In fact, his tone turned firmer than ever before.


    "Who would have known that you, my Lady, would be interested in this wind dragon as well."


    "I want to take this wind dragon away with me!" Sanazar spoke without hesitation.


    "That is no problem! However, it seems that before you arrived, the bid for the wind dragon has already risen to two million two hundred thousand magical crystals."


    "I will only pay one million five hundred thousand magical crystals!" Sanazar¡¯s words were firm and final. There was no room for negotiation in her tone.


    "That is no problem either. I have received much care from Lady Sanazar in the past. I can afford that many magical crystals," Greem stepped aside and opened a path forward. He extended his hand invitingly, "Please, mydy."


    Dragonborn Zacha grunted and reluctantly moved aside at Greem¡¯s instruction. He walked to Greem¡¯s side and red at the cloud of purple mist. The crimson-armored Mary had also appeared beside Greem sometime earlier. She waited in silence for the next move.


    Three blood knights simultaneously stepped out of the light door of the tower. They pressed their hands against their runic longswords, as if in preparation of battle.


    The atmosphere in the Magma Hall suddenly froze and turned to a standstill!


    Sanazar, still enveloped in her purple mist, seemed oblivious to this. She snorted coldly and rushed toward the fire prison with an overwhelming and intense aura.


    "Break!"


    A strange w filled with indigo scales emerged from the purple mist with that battle cry. It made a light scratching motion at the fire prison.


    A massive, semi-translucent w appeared twenty meters away, above the fire prison that restrained the wind dragon, and ferociously crashed upon the pir of fire.


    The fire prison let out creaking noises and was forcibly crushed to pieces like a child ying with mud.


    Six hundred and seventy-three points!


    That one remote grip from Sanazar had an offensive power of six hundred and seventy-three points.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes.


    Greem¡¯s mood was extremely solemn as he silently evaluated the crimson numbers in his mind.


    To think that a simple attack from Third Grade Sanazar could reach such dizzying power. No wonder she was so arrogant and unreasonable when she held such power in her hands. Even if he used all his strength and abilities, Greem would have trouble defending against any of her attacks if he weren¡¯t enhanced by the tower¡¯s power.


    The difference in power between a Second and Third Grade was just too wide. It was well beyond Greem¡¯s expectations.


    Greem quicklypared the difference in power between them and the enemy, as well as all the other hidden factors in y. He had no choice but to grit his teeth and give up on his intent to escte the conflict into a fight. The adepts who were waiting on guard returned to the tower under his orders, relieving the tension in the room to some extent.


    The runic chains could no longer control the wind dragon now that the fire prison¡¯s restrictions had been shattered. The wind dragon struggled frantically in the face of the mysterious approaching adept. He had already destroyed a dozen runic chains.


    The tower had also intentionally lowered its limitations over the wind dragon under Greem¡¯s control. That allowed the wind dragon to break free of its restraints sessfully.


    "Aoooo!"


    The wind dragon raised its head and let out a loud and reverberating dragon¡¯s roar. It turned into a sh of green lightning and frantically escaped toward the other end of the Magma Hall.

 Chapter 600 Fire Dragon Blockade

    Chapter 600 Fire Dragon Blockade


    Just when Wind Dragon Cherkes thought he could escape thisnd of terror, another roar rang out in the hall; Third Grade Sanazar had transformed.


    Flying Venom Dragon!


    It was a sort of strange dragon species that existedpletely independent outside of the ordinary dragon family tree.


    They didn¡¯t have the majestic appearance of normal dragons or their ferocious and well-defined looks. The Flying Venom Dragon that Sanazar transformed into looked like a green dragon that had been skinned, and its body was covered in disgusting and fearsome pus and slime.


    Compared to the wind dragon, the only impression that the flying venom dragon gave the adepts was ugliness. Extraordinary ugliness. Perhaps this was why Sanazar usually used the purple mist to hide her body.


    Pu! A sticky ball of green liquid shot out of Sanazar¡¯s mouth, striking the flying wind dragon right on his side.


    The violent impact of the shot threw the wind dragon sideways, causing him to lose his bnce and crash against a wall of the Magma Hall. The dragon tumbled downward and lost all sense of direction.


    The transformed flying venom dragon unfurled her ugly, wicked poison wings and took to the skies. She then pressed the wind dragon beneath her with her stronger body.


    The cyan and green dragons lunged and bit at each other just like that.


    The battle between the two monsters was far more brutal, bloody, and more straightforward than battles between adepts.


    The Second Grade wind dragon was not exceptionally gifted when it came to Physique. Now that he was pressed to the ground by the flying venom dragon, he couldn¡¯t even put to use his only gift¨C his speed. The only choice the dragon had was to engage the flying venom dragon in closebat, biting each other like wild beasts.


    Fights between dragons were not much more exciting or elegant than fights between forest creatures when they resorted to more primitive means.


    Theirrge bodies were tangled together as they scratched and bit at each other with their teeth, ws, wings, limbs, horns; everything and anything that could be used to wound the opponent was put to use tearing and scratching the opponent.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes was at a disadvantage because he was being pinned to the ground. He couldn¡¯t take advantage of his superior speed. On the other hand, Flying Venom Dragon Sanazar was disadvantaged due to herck of tough scales for protection. However, the advantage in Grade and her terrifying poison that corroded everything allowed her to maintain the initiative and advantage in this bloody battle.


    Wind Dragon Cherkes was wildly creating as many wounds as he could upon the body of the flying venom dragon. However, it wasn¡¯t warm blood that came spilling out of the injuries. Instead, it was a viscous and pungent poison instead.


    The two dragons were too deeply intertwined, causing all the poison and acid to fall upon Cherkes¡¯ body. Despite the scales that protected Cherkes, the fearsome acid and poison still burned through them and corroded his body, dealing tremendous damage to him.


    Cherkes opened his jaws and took a deep and wicked bite on Sanazar¡¯s thick front legs. However, the acid that came sshing out from the bite marks sizzled when they corroded his mouth. The intense and terrifying pain caused the wind dragon to howl and shriek. He had no choice but to loosen his jaw¡¯s grip.


    The flying venom dragon that Sanazar had turned to might not be a pure-blooded dragon, but her Grade advantage made her possess a Physique that was equally as powerful as the wind dragon. Both parties continued fighting. Though Sanazar¡¯s surface wounds seemed to be more severe, the wind dragon was the more badly wounded one.


    It had been no more than fifteen minutes since the start of the fight, and the wind dragon already looked like he had been soaked in a pool of acid. Most of his scales had burned ck, while parts of his flesh and muscles seemed to have turned to some strange, slime-like liquid and were falling off his body.


    The powerful nar suppression of the World of Adepts further weakened the wind dragon. He endured the fight for a few more rounds before finally faltering from the flying venom dragon¡¯s attacks. The wind dragon crashed into a stone wall and was no longer able to get up.


    The flying venom dragon reared her vile and vicious body and pressed the howling wind dragon to the ground with a single limb. She then turned and let out an intimidating roar at all the adepts in the Magma Hall.


    Sanazar might be covered with wounds after the battle with the wind dragon, but she had perfectly demonstrated the strength of a Third Grade bloodline adept.


    The flying venom dragon picked up the dying wind dragon with her thick back legs after her roar. She then beat her massive poison wings and flew into Fire Cave.


    This was intimidation!


    This was raw intimidation!


    Snatching away the final auction item in front of all these Second Grade adepts and Greem, the n leader of the Crimson n; only those who had seen this event unfold could genuinely understand the arrogance and unreasonable forcefulness disyed in this action.


    Adept F¨¹gen sighed internally. He knew that the Sarubo n would no longer have a chance to negotiate with Greem after this. Even maintaining a superficial peace would be exceedingly difficult.


    He silently stepped forward and took out two or three storage rings to amass the one million and five hundred thousand magical crystals that Adept Sanazar had promised.


    F¨¹gen didn¡¯t stay after handing over the magical crystals. Instead, he immediately turned to leave with a solemn expression with Adept Keoghan by his side.


    The various n adepts gathered in the Magma Hall looked at each other. They were all upset about Third Grade Sanazar forcefully taking away the wind dragon. However, no one present dared to say another word after seeing the tremendous power and wild ferocity that she had disyed in battle.


    The adepts could only shake their heads and sigh as they left Fire Cave.


    The Crimson n establishment banquet that Greem had gone to great lengths to prepare concluded on such a discordant note!


    ............


    The Lance ne.


    An intense battle was urring right outside the metal fortress.


    There were two sides to the battle. On the one hand, you had hundreds of metallicbat magical machines. On the other, you had a single ¡¯person¡¯. No; more urately, a single dragon.


    An exceptionally fat female fire dragon.


    Compared to the usually aerodynamic and lithe body of the dragons, not only did this female fire dragon possess a belly, her size alone was several times that of an ordinary dragon. One couldn¡¯t help but feel as if it was a pig that flew in the air when they saw her beat her me wings with difficulty to stay in the sky.


    Though the fire dragon didn¡¯t look good, her power definitely matched her grade.


    A pure-blooded Third Grade female fire dragon would be an uncontested tyrant over arge area, even in Lance where dragons gathered inrge numbers!


    The female fire dragon had heard about her dragonborn army being defeated. Most of them had been captured and were being used to ask for ransom for her. This ludicrous event immediately caused the Third Grade Fire Dragon Philippa to explode into a rage.


    Without another word, this female fire dragon charged straight to Stalon Mountains all by herself. She forcefully blockaded the gates of the metal fortress.


    The massive fire dragon beat her wings in the sky, with the metal fortress right below. Every time the fire dragon lowered her body slightly, several dozens to a hundred energy beams would shoot up from the ground.


    Most of these energy beams would be refracted when they hit upon the bright red scales of the dragon. Only a small number of these beams could pass through the gaps between the scales and cause some minor damage to her. The female fire dragon grunted repeatedly and endured the stinging pain from her body. She bent her body and retaliated with a thick and continuous me breath.


    A path of mes seven to eight meters wide instantly appeared on the ground in front of the metal fortress, stretching for a distance of nearly two hundred and fifty meters.


    The magical machines that were wildly firing toward the sky were caught in the fire. The sticky dragon¡¯s me breath stuck to their bodies, burning them red-hot before they could even escape from the fire¡¯s path. Their bodies then melted and fell apart. However, the remaining magical machines didn¡¯t seem fazed by the intensity of the attack. They kept their arms held high as even more ferocious and dense barrages of bullets shot out of their ck gun barrels.


    These metal bullets, propelled by magic energy, couldn¡¯t all do damage to the fire dragon, but they still caused some minor wounds. At the very least, they were able to shatter in seconds the me barrier and Fire Shields that the fire dragon summoned.


    The fire dragon would have to endure the focused fire of a hundred magical machines if she wanted to attack the gates of the metal fortress. Yet, when she lowered her altitude to exterminate these pesky metal lumps, two magic energy cannons extended from within the metal fortress. These magic energy cannons firedpressed energy shots with an energy level of three hundred and twenty points.


    Philippa would be in extreme pain if she were hit by one of these shots, even with the magic resistance of a Third Grade fire dragon.


    If she wasn¡¯t careful enough and became caught by the hooks of the defensive magical machines below, then she would face a lot more than just pain. Even the fire dragon, with all her prowess, would need to pay a price in blood if she wished to break free of thebination of cannons and ants.


    Fire Dragon Philippa became furious after failing to achieve anything despite several attacks.


    Dragon Transfiguration!


    It was a transformation ability that all pure-blooded dragons possessed.


    The previously mountain-like female fire dragon instantly started shrinking and transforming. She turned into a two-meter tall young human girl with an extraordinary, dynamite figure. The elegant, bright red scales of the fire dragon also turned into a set of red armor that rested upon her body. Philippa then took out two massive fire hammers from somewhere, waved them about, and charged into the middle of the magical machines.


    Her dragon¡¯s breath swept across the battlefield as her hammers swung around.


    In a single second, five or six magical machines had been blown away by the violent force. Countless metal shards and roboticponents flew into the distance like rain.


    The Archers¡¯ bodies were far too thin and weak. They couldn¡¯t endure a violent blow from the Third Grade female fire dragon. All the long-ranged Archers fled from the fire dragon under Gazlowe¡¯s hidden control, while the meat shields¨Cthe defensive magical machines¨Csurrounded the dragon and prepared for meleebat.


    This simple tactical move of retreating and advancing perfectly demonstrated the order and efficiency of the magical machines.

 Chapter 601 The Violent Fire Dragon Girl

    Chapter 601 The Violent Fire Dragon Girl


    One had to admit that the fire dragon still possessed uncontested strength even after turning into her human form.


    The twenty-seven points of physical Strength made her a human-shaped monster. There was nothing that could stop her in her tracks when she swung her massive fire hammers among the magical machines.


    If one were to look from high above in the sky, they would clearly see shattered metal bodies andponents flying everywhere that the me-red silhouette went. A winding path extended behind that form.


    The broken bodies of the magical machines, twisted beyond recognition, could be found all along that path.


    Even more magical machines were wildly lunging at the red shape before being dealt an unbearably heavy blow two to three secondster.


    Even so, the magical machines still rushed at the fire dragon without stopping.


    Two magic energy cannons extended out of the thick metal walls of the fortress. They would fire twopressed energy shots every fifteen seconds. Without exception, the fire dragon, with her agile and lithe body, dodged all of them. Even when the magical machines managed to drag her down and prevented her from avoiding in time, she was able to use the massive fire hammers in her hands to block thepressed energy shots.


    These two fire hammers were no ordinary items. They burned with magical purple mes. A ripple of me shockwave would erupt from the hammers every time the fire dragon girl swung or blocked with them. Even thepressed energy shots had their effectiveness halved when they ran into these me ripples.


    The remaining strength of the shot had no chance of dealing any damage to the fire dragon girl!


    The fire dragon girl¡¯s actions had be increasingly agile due to the shrinking of her body and the fact that she was now on the ground. It became increasingly difficult for the heavy and clumsy magic energy cannons to lock on to her figure.


    In fact, the friendly fire caused by thepressed energy shots had almost caught up to the number of magical machines that the fire dragon girl had destroyed herself.


    Gazlowe had no choice left but to recall most of the remaining magical machines and arrange a circle of Archers hundred meters away from the fire dragon girl. These Archers were to apply pressure upon the enemy continuously. Every time the fire dragon girl wanted to get close and attack them, these magical machines would scatter and run in every direction. The ones at the front were to run while the ones at the back were to continue kiting and firing at the fire dragon girl.


    For a moment, sparks flew from her armor, crackling and snapping from all the attacks.


    Moreover, with no more friendlies around the fire dragon girl, the magic energy cannons could increase the frequency of their attacks. Several powerfulpressed energy shotsnded near the fire dragon girl¡¯s side like a torrent. They sted several deep craters into the ground and sent pirs of dirt into the air.


    Even though the fire dragon girl neutralized most of these attacks with her agility and her fire hammers, the asional shot that struck would still cause her to wince in pain.


    Fire Dragon Philippa finally realized what to do after being dragged by the Archers like a dog being taken out for a walk. She gave up on the annoying magical machines and charged toward the metal fortress with the fire hammers in hand.


    The moment she stepped within a hundred meters of the metal fortress, the sturdy walls of the structure suddenly split open. Over a hundred openings appeared in the walls. A hundred menacing ck cannon barrels extended from within.


    Violent magic energy gathered within the cannon barrels, making it seem as if a hundred miniature suns had lit up on the wall of the metal fortress.


    This sudden change shocked Philippa tremendously. She immediately stopped in her tracks.


    She had used too much strength in her assault, causing her powerful legs to sink into the dirt below.


    The next second, a hundredpressed energy beams shot out, sting toward her like raindrops in a storm.


    Philippa was so terrified that even her hairs were standing on their ends.


    An aura of death so dense that one could smell it enveloped her. Philippa felt scared out of her wits.


    She let out a roar, and a massive projection of a fire dragon¡¯s head appeared above her. The dragon head projection let out a fan-shaped fire breath as her own fire dragon armor glowed with a brilliant red light. Arge projection of a fire dragon¡¯s silhouette appeared and used its massive fire wings to protect her.


    Philippa then ced the two fire hammers in front of her body after activating all these necessary protections.


    The one hundred energy beams had reached her just as shepleted these actions.


    me Breath versus the energy pirs!


    The me breath vanished without a trace after merely neutralizing one-fifth of the energy pirs.


    The secondyer, the me barrier, was then exposed.


    This secret dragon technique that the fire dragon girl activated with her origin power possessed power unparalleled by ordinary magic. However, that tiny bit of magic power from the fire dragon girl still couldn¡¯tpare to the magic energy that the magic energy furnace had been umting for half a month.


    The me barrier onlysted a mere five seconds in front of the energy pirs before shattering into bits of fluttering light.


    There was only one-third of the energy pirs left after the filtering of these two protectiveyers. However, these remaining energy pirs still brought the fire dragon girl an unforgettable lesson.


    The barrage of energy pirs immediately neutralized and destroyed the zing mes on the fire hammers upon impact. It caused the hammers to return to their original state¨C metal hammers forged from pure volcanic copper,pletely etched with mysterious runes.


    Thest remaining energy pirsnded upon the surface of the copper hammers, instantly punching tiny holes into the weapons. A series of minor explosions appeared within the hammers.


    These two magical weapons of exceptional quality had been obviously damaged.


    The energy pirs that hit the fire dragon girl pierced bloody holes into her body. The intense pain caused Philippa to howl and hiss in agony.


    The fire dragon girl heartbrokenly looked upon her almost destroyed hammers. She then endured the pain of the almost thirty piercing wounds in her body and tried onest time to charge into the metal fortress.


    The very next second, something fearsome that caused her to scream in terror happened.


    The one hundred magic energy cannons retracted into the metal walls, and one hundred new magic energy cannons emerged from the ck openings.


    Fire Dragon Girl Philippa turned and ran without another word upon seeing the hundred magic energy cannons glow with blinding energy radiance. She wickedly cursed the controller of this metal fortress as she ran.


    These intruders were too despicable and shameless!


    They didn¡¯t dare to fight her, the great Fire Dragon Warrior Philippa, head on. They only knew how to send some lifeless metal lumps to harass and disturb her. They were even more extreme now. To think that they would turtle up and arm the metal fortress like a hedgehog, making her unable to even get close.


    Still, the battle from earlier had destroyed over forty or fifty of the enemy¡¯s magical machines. If she had a bit more patience, she might have been able to grind away all of the enemy¡¯s metal guards slowly!


    Philippa cursed as she thought to herself. A crimson light glowed around her, and she quickly transformed back into her dragon form. The female fire dragon kicked against the ground with her powerful hind legs and took to the skies once more with herrge fiery wings.


    She circled the ravaged surroundings of the metal fortress and let out a few intimidating roars. Philippa then turned and left, flying into the depths of Stalon Mountains.


    Her stamina had been greatly exhausted after such a long battle. It was time to find food and feast!


    Philippa had already made up her mind when she flew away. She had to find a way to break into that metal fortress and exterminate all the otherworldly intruders hiding within with her murderous fire dragon¡¯s breath. Otherwise, letting such a dangerous force remain at the edge of her territory would eventually invite a cmity of extermination upon her ownnds.


    Speaking of which, where had that Wind Dragon Cherkes gone? Why was his dragon nest empty now?


    The female fire dragon was exceptionally disappointed. She had suffered some losses and was looking to recuperate them.


    Hopefully, he hadn¡¯t been abducted by the otherworldly intruders. If that were the case, then she would have to reassess the power of these mysterious invaders.


    The female fire dragon unfurled her wings and flew into the depths of the Stalon Mountains as she thought to herself.


    ............


    Several wary yet greedy eyes on the ground fixated upon the fat body of the fire dragon.


    They had witnessed the entire process of the battle that happened at the metal fortress and had thus obtained aprehensive understanding of the power of the female fire dragon.


    They had no choice but to admit that this female fire dragon was superior to most Third Grade adepts in terms of purebat ability. If one were to be brutally honest, the female fire dragon even had the power to confront some Fourth Grade adepts. Of course, the final victory would definitely belong to the Fourth Grade adept. However, the manner of the battle would not be entirely one-sided.


    Most of the time, Fourth Grade adepts could even be wounded at the hands of the female fire dragon if they were careless.


    She could fight at close quarters and at long-range. She could fly, and she could transform.


    They were heavy bombers while in the skies. Though a bit clumsy and slow, there was no doubt that they were undefeated in the skies. Moreover, their terrifying dragon breath made any air to ground battles absolutely crushing. Even the magical machines that had undergone several modifications and enhancements couldn¡¯t fight against a dragon that flew in the skies.


    If they weren¡¯t happy with how slow and inefficient they were in air battles, then the dragons could even transform into human form and sacrifice Strength and Physique to significantly increase their Agility and Spirit. Dragons in their human forms were even more challenging to deal with and even more of a terror, especially when they started using their dragon breath and equipped magical weapons.


    Any human adept would be terrified if they were to go against an opponent like this. They could hardly perform at their very best.


    After all, adepts and dragons of the same grade couldn¡¯t bepared in the food chain!

 Chapter 602 Clan Welfare

    Chapter 602 n Welfare


    The Crimson adepts led by Greem had perfectly witnessed the battle from the side.


    They had seen the massive body of the Third Grade dragon. They saw its powerful and thick dragon breath. They saw her transform into a human and ughter with her lithe figure. All the Crimson adepts felt their hearts tense up as they watched the events unfold.


    Fortunately, Gazlowe wasn¡¯t weak either. Moreover, this was his home ground. He had managed to repel the fire dragon¡¯s attacks and drove her away into the depths of Stalon Mountains.


    It seemed like the female fire dragon had now established hostilities with the metal fortress. She wouldn¡¯t be leaving Stalon Mountains in the short term. Simr battles would also continuously happen. Given that case, it would be a lot more dangerous for the Crimson adepts to continue activities near the metal fortress.


    After all, First Grade adepts would simply be exterminated if they ran into the fire dragon in the wild. They won¡¯t even be able to keep their lives if they didn¡¯t have some special tricks up their sleeves. On the other hand, of the few Second Grade adepts in the n, Mary would be able to escape without a scratch with her exceptional Agility. Greem, on the other hand, would also barely be able to survive if he paid a certain price. Only Dragonborn Zacha would have no different fate than death if he ran into the fire dragon.


    Even though there was also Second Grade Dragon Devourer Oliven hidden inside the fortress, it wasn¡¯t practical to count on her to defeat the dragon. She might have a high chance of ambushing and killing a Second Grade dragon, but it was still quite impossible for her to attempt to attack a fire dragon, who were known for their powerfulbat abilities. Especially one that was Third Grade.


    If she failed to kill Philippa, then the fire dragon would spread news of the existence of the dragon devourer. The ordinarilyzy and selfish dragons would then immediately gather together ande to raid Greem¡¯s metal fortress. When that happened, they could only run but not hide. The metal fortress might have insanely powerful defensive capabilities, but how many dragons could it fend off?


    Disregarding everything else, just the five Third Grade dragons alone would cause the massive energy of the magic energy furnace to run out slowly. They would no longer be able to amassrge amounts of magic energy as they were currently doing.


    The dragons would only need to be slightly smarter to make it past the metal fortress. They could merely take turns and bait the metal fortress into constantly firing those powerful waves of cannon shots. The metal fortress couldn¡¯t possibly support such extended periods of firepower with its current magic energy reserves.


    Without the support of the massive surge of magic energy, the metal fortress was no more than arge lump of metal. The walls of the metal fortress couldn¡¯t handle the powerful dragon breaths and sharp ws of the dragons, regardless of how tough they were.


    That was why the Crimson n were still unable to excavate Lance on arger scale with their own name, even now. All operations had to be hidden within the metal fortress to avoid attracting fearsome enemies that they couldn¡¯t deal with.


    The Crimson n was like a ferocious beast that had hidden their fangs and ws. They didn¡¯t dare show their ferocious side to the world. Greem hesitated several times in the face of this powerful fire dragon lord. In the end, he could only choose to allow her to continue her rampage.


    He had no choice. The Crimson n didn¡¯t have absolute certainty in killing the female fire dragon with its current power, even with the full cooperation of Dragon Devourer Oliven. To avoid startling the enemy, Gazlowe controlled the metal fortress and made it seem as if it only had the power to defend themselves, without the capacity tounch any offensive strikes. It was to trick that arrogant and wild fire dragon.


    The auction that had been held in Fire Throne earlier might have ended on a sour note due to Adept Sanazar¡¯s actions, but the name of the Crimson n had still spread far and wide. The dragonborn and dragon that Greem sold away already had the coordinates of Lance wiped from their minds. They would not result in any potential negative influences on his attempt to conquer Lance alone.


    The Crimson n also took this opportunity to turn some of the resources they had robbed from the Goblin ne and Lance into more practical magical crystals. For the first time, the usually thrifty Greem felt like he was rich.


    In all honesty, Greem had held his breath for a very long time when he saw the mountain of two million magical crystals pour out of his spatial ring. The magnificent and shining scene stunned even him.


    That was actually a pretty decent reaction.


    After all, he had seen an even more massive mountain of magical crystal back in the Tower of Fate. Moreover, that ce had been a closed environment that gave birth to nature spirits.


    However, the other Crimson adepts all turned into idiots with magical crystals for eyes. They rushed up to the magical crystals, touching the jewels, caressing them andughing madly. The only thing they had yet to do was start rolling in all that wealth. That precious baby girl of Gargamel and Eva even dived right into the magical crystal mountain and couldn¡¯t be dragged out of it when Eva pulled on her ankles.


    However, Greem could see what was happening. The little girl known as Emelia was furiously stuffing the magical crystals in her mouth and feasting without stop. That crunching sound...


    Greem was utterly speechless at the sight of this.


    Magical crystals might not be as durable as magical equipment, but they were not something that ordinary mortals could simply break.


    Yet, they had been chewed and crunched by a six-year-old girl as if they were little candies. There was no way Greem could get past that strange and bizarre scene. The girl was most definitely not human. She might look no different from a human girl, but her behavior and actions were very simr to that of a magical creature.


    Human adepts usually held the magical crystals in their hands and slowly absorbed them. Only powerful magical creatures would absorb the pure energy within the magical crystals through direct consumption.


    After all, humans were not magical creatures. They needed a gentler and slower way to absorb this energy to weaken the impact and magic-infusion effects from the foreign magic energy. These magical creatures were also closer to the ne origin and had stronger bodies than humans. Consequently, they had a far higher tolerance for magicpared to humans.


    Emelia¡¯s behavior was solid proof of the nature of her soul¨C a magical creature.


    Maybe because they had already epted this reality, Gargamel and Eva didn¡¯t seem to be fazed by Emelia¡¯s actions at all. In fact, they pampered her and showered her with just as much love as before. Greem couldn¡¯t help but be rendered speechless by this. Still, the growth potential of Emelia was shocking. It had only been a short time since he hadst seen her, yet Greem could tell that her Spirit had improved considerably.


    Given the rate at which she was improving, the Crimson n could look forward to the addition of a new adept in a few more years.


    For a few more days, the Crimson n continued to recruit wandering adepts to maintain the day-to-day functions of Fire Throne. The tower was being managed and guarded by Gargamel and Eva. The addition of Charon the manticore, Unguja the three-headed demonhound, and fifty new magical machines ensured the safety of the tower.


    This way, the Crimson adepts would be freed up from their duties and could be ced in Lance and the Goblin ne to expand the n¡¯s assets in these locations further.


    First Grade adepts mostly stayed within the Goblin ne. On the one hand, they could intimidate the goblin royalty, and on the other, they could trade with the goblin merchant groups from all across the continent.


    The adepts could provide them with magical items and all sorts of mysterious products that were not avable in the Goblin ne. Though these items would experience slight magic loss in the Goblin ne and have their effects reduced, they could still function to some extent.


    Meanwhile, the goblins could provide all sorts of strange metals andmon metallic ores that the goblins used. They could also trade with unusual nts and animals found on the Goblin ne.


    The rate of exchange was fairly casual due to theck of amon currency as a point of reference. For example, the blood sacks and blood crystals that the adepts brought back from the World of Adepts were hailed as amazing products that could save lives due to their ability to infuse a lifeform withrge amounts of blood energy instantly.


    Every single blood sack could be traded for several kilograms of special metals, or even a hundred tons of ordinary metal ores. Every high-quality blood crystal could be traded for several dozens and even a hundred ogres. These rare resources could be exchanged for over a thousand magical crystals for the Crimson n if brought back to the World of Adepts. These one thousand magical crystals could then be used to purchase even more cheap blood sacks and blood crystals.


    As long as the core of the nar trades remained in the hands of the Crimson n, arge amount of magical crystal would flow endlessly into the wallets of the adepts. That was why being stationed in another ne could cause the stationed adepts to be wealthy while being a boring and dull task at the same time.


    The Crimson n had even specifically pushed out a life-extending potion within the Goblin Empire with the help of Goblin Sage Snox and Goblin God of War Tigule. This potion immediately caused a massivemotion within the Empire.


    The Life Extension Potion was only an intermediate potion in the World of Adepts. Any potions master could easily concoct this potion. Its main ingredient was a strange nt that came from the elves¨C the Fruit of Nature.


    This Life Extension Potion could only extend one¡¯s natural lifespan by three to six years. Moreover, it couldn¡¯t be consumed repeatedly. As such, it wasn¡¯t a cost-effective product and wasn¡¯t viewed too importantly by the adepts. Even in the World of Adepts, this potion only had a market amongst the social circles of the more impoverished local nobles.


    However, in the Goblin ne, these ¡¯cheap¡¯ Life Extension Potions had be miracle potions fought over by all the goblin nobles. The price had increased to a height that rendered even the adepts speechless.


    It was bound to happen. Most human adepts in the World of Adepts already lived for two to three hundred years. Another three to five years were of no significance to them. However, the goblins of the Goblin ne usually only lived for fifty to sixty years. That was less than half of a human¡¯s lifespan.


    The cost-effectiveness of five years of lifespan was naturally much higher under such circumstances.


    In particr, the leaders of thoserge merchant groups and corporations all over the Goblin ne were all dying old men. If one told them at this moment that they could live for another five years, and that they would be as strong and spirited as they were in their younger years...


    Pray tell, which powerful goblin could resist such intense temptation?


    That was why the Life Extension Potion instantly created massive waves in the Goblin ne upon being introduced!

 Chapter 603 Dalkas Troubles

    Chapter 603 Dalka¡¯s Troubles


    Dalka had been feeling a little uneasy the past few days.


    As the dragonborn servant of the young Frost Dragon Aruntini, his most important duty was to properly look over his master¡¯snds while his master slept. Over the past three hundred years, Dalka had done a good job. An exceptional job, even. His dragon lord had often praised him for his performance.


    Yet today, this dutiful Second Grade dragonborn felt extremely troubled.


    What troubled him was some bigmotion that had happened in the Stalon Mountains several thousands of kilometers away from here. Wind Dragon Lord Cherkes had also disappeared mysteriously. A foreign magical machine army had now taken ce within hisnds.


    The reason these enemies were called an army instead of a tribe was that they were not lifeforms. They were no more than magical golem machines being controlled by another group of people. However, one could tell from the way the machines fought that a powerfulmander stood behind them. Thismander was able to control every single individual machine as if it was their own body.


    Dalka had heard plenty of rumors. Most of them described these magical machines as metallic lifeforms that were able to continuously grow in numbers by devouring the metal ore veins beneath Stalon Mountains. Of course, there were also some rumors that described the enemy as otherworldly intruders, with the metal golems as no more than their external forces.


    Dalka¡¯s limited brain capacity had slowed after listening to too many of such simr rumors. He hesitated countless times, but could never muster the courage to run to Dragon Lord Aruntini¡¯s quarters and wake the dragon up.


    Firstly, everything he had heard was only a rumor.


    Waking the frost dragon lord simply because of such unverified rumors would not end well for him.


    Secondly, Dalka had no actual proof that the metal monsters would invade the frost dragon¡¯s territory.


    The dragons all took up their territories and didn¡¯t care about the affairs that happened in thends of other dragons. Dragon Lord Aruntini wouldn¡¯t even bat an eysh if the metal monsterspletely ravaged Wind Dragon Cherkes¡¯ territory. In fact, Aruntini would smile and wait for the next dragon gathering to make fun of Cherkes.


    As long as the metal monsters stayed within Stalon Mountains, Wind Dragon Cherkes would be the only one affected. What did that have to do with them? If Wind Dragon Cherkes had the ability to do so, he could summon his friends or go back to his family and call for help from his seniors.


    If he couldn¡¯t even gather allies, then he deserved to be a lower dragon that was the first to lose his territories to a bunch of otherworldly invaders. When that happened, he would be the subject of mockery of all dragons at the dragon gatherings.


    If Frost Dragon Aruntini could defeat the metal monsters and take back thends that Cherkes lost, then all thatnd would belong to the frost dragon.


    However, given the usualziness and slow pace of the dragons, one would probably have to wait until Aruntini had enjoyed enough sleep and after Aruntini ate a good meal for anything to happen. It was only then that Aruntini would be in the mood and have the time to deal with these insignificant matters. Before that happened, any interruption to the frost dragon¡¯s sweet dreams would invite her fury and rage.


    The fury of a Second Grade frost dragon lord was extremely fearsome.


    At the very least, the several dozens of lifelike ice statues at the doors of Aruntini¡¯s bedroom were the best evidence of this. They were not the painstaking efforts of craftsmen, but living beings who had been sealed in ice after enraging the frost dragon.


    Of course, included amongst them were Dalka¡¯s predecessor, his predecessor, and the predecessor of that predecessor.


    Without exception, the one foolish act they hadmitted was to wake the dragon lord when they shouldn¡¯t have.


    Second Grade Frost Dragon Aruntini¡¯s quarters were located upon a towering peak.


    Pristine white snow had been cut andid together to form a brilliant and shining pce. The cold and dry air of these heights flowed and swirled around the za in front of the pce, asionally letting out sharp and scary whistles as they blew across the mountains.


    White clouds floated at the waist of the mountain, preventing all mortals from looking upon the frost dragon¡¯s pce and sating their curiosity. There were only a few days in a year where the violent winds at this high altitude would tear apart the clouds. The bright sunlight would then shine upon the towering peak. The bright golden walls of the frost dragon¡¯s pce would temporarily appear before everyone¡¯s eyes, allowing them to marvel at its magnificence.


    Most of the time, the frost dragon¡¯s pce was hidden within dense mist and ice crystals. It was constantly protected by as many as a hundred ice dragonborn. The other dragonborn warriors and scouts were sent to various areas of the frost dragon¡¯snds to requisition food, collect taxes, or to recruit soldiers.


    Plenty of resources were transported to this ce every year. They became the private wealth of the dragon lord. The dragonborn, on the other hand, were the personal ves and warriors of the dragon lords, as well as the defenders of their wealth.


    The two tall dragonborn warriors standing before the gates of the pce held frost longswords in their hands. They had frostbows on their backs and stood straight with their muscr bodies and thick limbs. They opened their four pure white dragon eyes, two big and two small, and continually surveyed the surrounding forest of mountains. However, they never dared to set their eyes upon their dragonborn leader, Second Grade Dalka, who had been circling in front of the door for half the day.


    It had been so long since Dalka arrived, yet he didn¡¯t dare take a single step into the ice pce. That was proof os his hesitation and anxiety. However, despite their sympathy for their leader, the two dragonborn warriors didn¡¯t dare step forward to offer any constion or advice. They kept their eyes straight and looked ahead.


    Their duty was to protect. No outsiders were to interrupt the sleep of their frost dragon lord. They had no obligation to wake her up. The only one upon the mountain that had the authority to enter the ice pce was Dragonborn Leader Dalka.


    It was both an authority granted to him, as well as a tormenting experience!


    At the very least, Dalka felt tormented right now.


    Cold air currents breezed through the jagged peaks of the ice mountain, letting out bone-chilling and shrill whistling. For some reason, a strange smell was mixed in with this air current. It was a smell that shouldn¡¯t appear here.


    Dalka, who had his lowered and was pacing about in front of the pce suddenly stopped moving. He lifted his nose and started sniffing about.


    It was a floral smell. An odd floral scent.


    Waves of weird dizziness and strange powerlessness apanied the floral smell.


    There was poison in the smell!


    Dalka raised his head in surprise, only to find the entire front of the pce enveloped in a semi-translucent light barrier. He was trapped right in the middle.


    A Silencing Barrier.


    Dalka was a dragonborn leader, after all. He instantly recognized the true nature of this strange elementium barrier. It was a Silencing Barrier that could hide all the noise within. Everything within the light barrier could not be heard by the outside world, regardless of how much of a ruckus was created.


    While Dalka realized their predicament, the two dragonborn warriors standing before the ice pce started to sway unsteadily upon their feet. Their powerful dragonborn Physique had allowed them to endure this unknown floral poison, but it had weakened them and made it hard for them to disy any of their strength.


    At the same time, a red silhouette that was as fast as lightning descended from the skies. The crimson longbow in their hands immediately fired several dozen crimson arrows that darted toward the various critical spots on Dalka¡¯s body. The towering and ferocious Dragonborn Zacha dispelled the invisibility cast upon him. He charged toward the stunned Dalka with rumbling steps, as if he was a chariot forged of steel.


    The attack came from the skies and the ground. Moreover, the enemies were both Second Grade, just like he was. That caused the shocked Dalka to fail to react appropriately. He didn¡¯t even have time to draw the frost longsword at his waist. He immediately started brawling with the two attackers at melee range with his bare fists.


    While the three individuals were fighting, an extermination squad formed of Poison Witch Endor, Bug Adept Billis, Wind Adept Deserra, and Medusa Dana struck at the two dragonborn warriors at the doors of the ice pce.


    These two dragonborn warriors were undoubtedly elites among the army, for they had been selected to guard the quarters of the frost dragon lord herself. Sadly, with Endor¡¯s poison and the pincer attack of the two Second Grade adepts, they were now left alone. The Crimson adepts had also made all sorts of preparations for this attack. They were all equipped with Ice Amulets and rings of resistance.


    These dragonborn might have powerful abilities and greatbat instincts, but all these advantages and disadvantages piled up. They could only, very regrettably, fall at the hands of the Crimson adepts.


    One of the dragonborn warriors had died from Endor¡¯s poison after being pierced multiple times by Billis¡¯ sting scorpion army. The other dragonborn warrior was shredded into countless pieces by Deserra after being petrified by Dana at close range.


    The battle of the Second Grades had also concluded by the time this battle ended.


    Second Grade Dragonborn Dalka died!


    Mary was severely wounded, while Zacha was only slightly hurt.


    However, these wounds were nothing for Zacha, especially with his powerful regeneration ability and the healing potions that he had consumed. On the other hand, Bloody Queen Mary had been the leading force in this battle. As such, she had also received the most grievous of wounds. However, when she crouched upon Dalka¡¯s bloody body and sucked the blood from the corpse, the horrifying wounds on her body healed at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    It was only now that Greem appeared with Oliven.


    One reason the two had not helped in the battle was that Mary and Zacha alone were enough to take down this Second Grade dragonborn. The main reason they hadn¡¯t done so, however, was because Greem¡¯s attacks always came with tremendous sound and light effects. The Silencing Barrier could only cut off noise, but not tremors and light.


    That was why Greem could only dy his appearance so as not to alert the dragonborn in the camp at the foot of the mountain.


    Oliven, on the other hand, was not a direct subordinate of Greem¡¯s; she was only a strategic ally, and having her participate in the battle cost too much. That was why this dragon-ying de would only be used in the most appropriate ce.


    The path to Second Grade Frost Dragon Aruntini¡¯s quarters had be unobstructed after killing these dragonborn!

 Chapter 604

    Chapter 604 Breaking into the Ice Pce


    One had to say that Second Grade Frost Dragon Aruntini truly did an excellent job of decorating her pce.


    It was a tall and magnificent pce. It had full and brightly lit halls, beautiful murals, and brilliantly golden decorations. However, all these were encased under ayer of thick ice, creating a strange sense of chilliness amid the magnificence.


    The party finally entered Aruntini¡¯s world of ice and snow after passing through a long, straight corridor. The first thing they saw was a magnificent hall. A tall tform sat above the hall. It appeared to be the seat that the frost dragon had prepared for herself.


    She would spend most of her time lounging upon the tall tform when she wasn¡¯t asleep, silently enjoying the service of the dragonborn and either feasting or summoning some singers and dancers to entertain her. As for the matters of her territory, the dragons would never spend any effort upon those trivial matters.


    At any rate, they had their loyal dragonborn ve to help them manage such issues. The dragon lords only needed to enjoy their lives while asionally visiting theirnds to reinforce their might in front of the foolish and ignorant natives.


    Of course, as a female Second Grade frost dragon, Aruntini was not as sexually active and open as the female fire dragon. She wasn¡¯t as busy at work as Cherkes was, either. She was merely an ordinary dragon that yed her part. That was why her territory wasn¡¯t all thatrge. It was only about two to three hundred kilometers wide.


    With her speed as a Second Grade frost dragon, she would be able to make a trip within her territory in less than half a day.


    Various ice-attribute magical creatures lived within hernd. For instance, there were ice banshees, raging snowmen, iceworms, and blue demons. The dragons around the area were all more powerful than Aruntini, but they couldn¡¯t be bothered to deal with her since hernds were ones of only ice and snow.


    That was why Aruntini was able to enjoy hundreds of peaceful years in this kingdom of ice and snow.


    Sadly, the peace of the icy world was about to be shattered by a group of intruders today.


    All the adepts held excited and nervous feeling as they walked within this world of ice and snow wholly formed of ice crystals and icicles.


    Dragonying!


    What an exciting word!


    Countless human warriors were willing to sacrifice their lives in pursuit of this intangible glory. They dared to take the fearsome dragons head-on, all so that they might add the prefix title of ¡¯Dragonyer¡¯ before their surnames. This way, their title of Dragonyer would pass down for tens of thousands of years, even if they were to die of old age upon their beds.


    While dragon ying wasn¡¯t as simple as killing cats or dogs for Greem, it was not the impossible feat that was presented before ordinary humans. It was a tiny chance of sess that regr humans would have to attempt to obtain with one hundred thousand percent of their effort.


    The sessful capture of Wind Dragon Cherkes already meant that the Crimson n¡¯s Second Grade squad already had a basic chance at ying a dragon. Though there had been much luck involved in their first sess, it was still evidence that they now possessed the fundamental power required to engage a Second Grade dragon in frontalbat.


    That was why Greem immediately made the decision to y this dragon six days after the public founding of the Crimson n. They had conducted an in-depth analysis and investigation of the locations and strengths of the three Second Grade dragon lords around them beforehand.


    Greem and the others had made plenty of preparations to capture this Second Grade frost dragon.


    The magical equipment that increased their frost resistance alone cost seventy to eighty thousand magical crystals. Everyone had also been provided with three Potions of Cold Resistance that could temporarily neutralize frost damage. This cost another fifty thousand magical crystals. The other misceneous items such as anti-scrying wands, Scrolls of Invisibility, Potions of Melting, Potions of Spirit Protection, and many others had also cost Greem another forty thousand magical crystals.


    Not included in this were the frost armor and two enchanted shields that Greem had purchased for Zacha, the tank. That was to help him best resist most of the frost damage.


    All these various costs added together totaled up to three hundred thousand magical crystals. The Crimson n had ced a massive investment upon this venture for Aruntini. Not only were they at risk of wasting these three hundred thousand magical crystals if they failed to y the dragon, but they were also risking the loss of the participating members.


    Thetter was what concerned all adept ns. It was the one thing that they most hoped would not happen!


    The adepts passed through the halls and walked toward the sleeping quarters of the frost dragon. All the First Grade adepts stayed behind and started setting up various arrays. These arrays would cut off all possible reinforcements the frost dragon possessed once the battle started. After all, this was a fight between multiple Second Grades. Themotion created by a battle like this couldn¡¯t possibly be small.


    If the dragonborn camp picked up on the abnormality and sent arge army of warriors as reinforcements, then the four of them would be responsible for holding the enemy off for quite a while.


    They might not need to face that fearsome Second Grade dragon, but they very likely needed to meet a massive horde of raging dragonborn. The danger they faced was not much less, and thus, they still had to treat the situation with utmost caution.


    A vague sound of freezing winds rang out in the icy passage as they closed in on the frost dragon¡¯s quarters. The unique smell of draconic creatures was mixed with the chilling winds. Its aroma was dense and pungent. Anyone who picked up on the scent would feel like throwing up.


    As an experienced Second Grade adept, Greem knew very well that this wind was not a natural wind. Rather, it was a freezing current created by the breath of the powerful frost dragon as she slept.


    The frost dragon seemed to have yet to realize the enemy was closing in on her. She was still having a sweet nap.


    Yet, a crisp sound of cracking ice came from beneath Zacha¡¯s feet when he turned to walk into a straight corridor. He had been walking at the very front. This sound wasn¡¯t significant, but it was pronounced in the silent ice pce, where the only sound was the wailing winds.


    The adepts also sensed a nearly imperceptible magical flux with the cracking of the ice crystal.


    "Dammit! It¡¯s a magical trap!" Greem instantly came up with a decision, "Don¡¯t hesitate, charge."


    At Greem¡¯smand, Dragonborn Zacha reached backward and took out a massive tower shield that could cover most of his body from his back. He raised his head and let out a long roar before rushing into the corridor with the shield held up high.


    This corridor encased a thinyer of ice suddenly shed with a series of magical lights. Countless white sts of cold air shot out of the ceilings, the floor, and the walls as more and more hidden traps were activated.


    Severalpleted ice spells surged outward and sted toward the advancing dragonborn like a cial tide.


    A milky-white Frost Aura still clung to Zacha even with his shield up. He had to drink two Potions of Melting to prevent from being frozen on the spot by the tide of chillingly cold air. His muscles red, and he had to draw upon all his power twice before he managed to continue forward in the face of this freezing tide.


    Greem, Mary, and Oliven hid behind Zacha¡¯s back and avoided being directly sted by the cold wave. They would be frozen to the spot in such a cold space if their Strength and Physique were slightly weaker. The three of them grabbed onto Zacha¡¯s tail and borrowed his ferocious strength to conserve stamina. It was only then that they managed to make it through the corridor.


    The cold winds within the ice pce suddenly turned erratic and fierce.


    "The frost dragon is awakening. It won¡¯t be easy for us to ambush her once she¡¯spletely awake." Oliven, who was petite but extremely experienced in matters of dragon ying, shouted under her breath.


    Zacha once again drew upon all his strength when hearing her words. Hisrge body elerated as he charged into the frost dragon¡¯s room like a chariot gone out of control.


    The magical traps that the frost dragon set up in the passage might be able to kill ordinary thieves, but they weren¡¯t much trouble to Greem and the others who had already prepared for the asion. However, if Greem and his party spent too much time dealing with the traps, they would be dealing with a well-prepared dragon by the time they arrived in her room.


    Now that they had taken a risk and charged all the way through this dangerous path, things were much more rxed. When they finally arrived in front of the frost dragon, the white-scaled dragon had just opened her eyes. Her intimidating eyes were still filled with confusion.


    She might have sensed the activation of the magical traps outside, but it took some time to break free of such a deep sleep.


    Thus, the first thing that Frost Dragon Aruntini saw upon opening her sleepy eyes was a wild silhouette that was asrge as a steel chariot. A massive tower shield increased in size before her fearful gaze. It took up most of her vision and smashed upon her nose.


    "Aooo!"


    Nose blood sshed everywhere, and an intense pain descended upon her. Aruntini let out a tragic roar and utterly broke free of theziness and exhaustion that usually apanied a long sleep; she instantly woke up.


    By the time she straightened her elegant and slender body, three more tiny ants had appeared behind her. These ants simultaneously let out their most terrifying attacks upon the beautiful shape of the frost dragon.


    Torrent of mes + Rune of Explosion!


    Bloodshade Strikes + Shadowstrike!


    Hamstring + Eviscerate + Sinister Strike!


    The three terrifying enemies immediately offered up three different types of attacks.


    The spell that Greem used was still the most potent and most skilled Second Grade fire spell in his arsenal¨C Torrent of mes. It was a torrent of elementium mes that had been bound together into a single concentrated st. However, this ordinary Second Grade fire spell had turned into an extremely fearsome attack with the enhancement of the Rune of Explosion.


    The roiling pir of fire was obstructed by the chilling air around the frost dragon and could only spread out and burn the air around her elegant body. Ice and fire intertwined with each other before being detonated by the strange Rune of Explosion.


    It was almost as if many fireworks had gone off on the surface of the frost dragon¡¯s body. Everything exploded at that one instant.


    The areas with dense frost and thick scales would not be affected by these me explosions, but there had to be weak areas to the surface of the frost dragon¡¯s body. Those areas became the suffered the most from the explosion.


    The white mist around the ice dragon was suddenly colored with ayer of crimson. A dozenrge, bowl-sized dragon scales were blown away, revealing the bloody muscles beneath.

 Chapter 605

    Chapter 605 Freezing Breath


    There were only a mere six or seven seconds between the activation of the first magical trap and the awakening of the frost dragon.


    Yet, in these insignificant six or seven seconds, Greem and the others had managed to make it through the hundred-meter long trapped corridor with Zacha¡¯s reckless charge, then rushed to the frost dragon¡¯s side and unleashed their first wave of attacks upon her body.


    [Beep. Target creature¡¯s life energy drastically falling. Currently at 78%...77%...]


    [Beep. Target creature has been temporarily stunned. Duration of stun is 2.37 seconds.]


    [Beep. Defensive effect of target creature¡¯s shields lowered by 46%. Defensive elementium shields willpletely vanish in 1.18 seconds.]


    [Beep. Target creature¡¯s right hind leg has received devastating damage. The hamstring has been severed. Target creature¡¯s ground movement speed is estimated to be reduced by 56%.]


    [Beep. Target creature¡¯s left wing root has received multiple attacks. Obvious damage is showing. Target creature¡¯s flight speed is estimated to be reduced by21%.]


    The series of Chip notifications rang out in Greem¡¯s mind, providing him with the most objective view of the situation in battle.


    Greem, Mary, and Oliven were like three annoying mosquitoes. They circled Frost Dragon Aruntini¡¯s massive body, using their mobility to move around as they put out tons of damage upon her with every passing second.


    Greem¡¯s fire spells intended to harm asrge an area of Aruntini¡¯s body as possible. Both the Magma Fireballs and the Explosive Fireballs could instantly cover half of the frost dragon¡¯s body. However, he never unleashed a single one of his sizeable area-of-effect fire spells. That was because these spells would disrupt the melee attacks of hispanions, even as they would hurt the frost dragon.


    Mary¡¯s attacks had fundamentally improved after her advancement to Second Grade.


    Her attacks were no longer negligible, even in the face of a terrifying frost dragon that stood near the upper middle ranks of the food chain.


    Mary turned into a crimson silhouette and circled the frost dragon. She relied on thebo of Bloodshade Strikes and Shadowstrike to rapidlyunch crimson arrows at the enemy. Every single one of her attacks could simultaneously trigger Bloodshade Strikes and Shadowstrike, dealing increased blood damage to the frost dragon while also inflicting shadow damage.


    Both of these attacks ignored defense!


    That meant the frost dragon¡¯s tough ice armor and fine dragon scales were like paper before Mary. They broke with a single attack.


    On the other hand, there was Oliven who held the title of Dragon Devourer. She was truly one of the dragon killers, infamous even throughout the multiverse. Her racial powers and closebat techniques were mostly targeted at creatures of the draconic bloodline. Her Strength, Speed, Agility, and explosiveness would increase several times when fighting with dragons.


    It allowed her to possess unparalleled lethality when facing off against a dragon of the same grade, even though she didn¡¯t have the advantage in size. Moreover, some unique racial powers of the dragons would have no effect on Oliven.


    Disregarding everything else, just the annoying dragon¡¯s aura of might that all dragonyers had to deal with did not affect Oliven.


    All the individuals within the ice pce could feel an indescribable feeling of oppression when the frost dragon let out a furious and deste roar. Those with weaker Spirits would give up on attacking and defending when within the radius of the aura of might, almost as if a Fear spell had hit them. They would toss away their weapons and run across the battlefield fearfully with their hands above their heads.


    Even an elementium adept like Greem that specialized in Spirit felt his brain faze for a second during the battle, despite already drinking the Potion of Spirit Protection. A single moment of interruption like this could cause arge spell that had been channeled for a long time to fail or cause initially smooth movements to stall for an instant.


    Such a phenomenon could not be seen upon Oliven.


    Olivenpletely ignored the frost dragon¡¯s aura of might. Her petite body leaned against the dragon¡¯s, avoiding the wings and dodging the ws and bites. She was like a stubborn ster stuck to the frost dragon¡¯s body, continually using the Slicer and Cruel ws in her hands to attack the weak spots of the dragon¡¯s body.


    Dragon eyes, nose, throat, belly, the root of the wings, anus, back of the head...


    As long as it was a part of the body where the frost dragon could not defend, you could be sure that this fearsome dragon killer had already taken care of that spot. It left Aruntini with the helpless feeling of being unable to retaliate and an unforgettable pain!


    Frost Dragon Aruntini had just woken up from her sweet nap and was already beaten half to death by a dragon ying squad of four before she could understand what was happening.


    The intense pain from her entire body. The resentment of being attacked by unknown enemies. The fearsome feeling of death that rose from the depths of her soul. All this caused the anger in Aruntini¡¯s heart to explode like a fireball.


    [Beep. Detecting high-intensity frost energy gathering within the target creature¡¯s body. Initial estimates suggest this to be a dragon¡¯s breath. Ice attribute. Energy level is estimated at three hundred to five hundred points. Host is advised to quickly retreat. Safe distance: two hundred meters.]


    The abrupt notification from the Chip caused Greem to jump up in shock.


    Between three hundred to five hundred points?


    Even he couldn¡¯t escape death if he were to be sted directly by an attack of this intensity.


    "Retreat two hundred meters away. Zacha, you go forward."


    Greem gave out a series of orders while an expression of shock still hung upon his face. Mary and Oliven, who were having a great time attacking the frost dragon while sticking to the creature, paused for a moment upon hearing this.


    Mary would never doubt the uracy of Greem¡¯smands. She immediately retreated upon receiving her orders. Oliven hesitated for a short moment. She only needed three more shes before the frost dragon¡¯s left wing waspletely cut off at the root. Wouldn¡¯t her earlier efforts be for nothing if she retreated now?


    However, they were allies after all. Greem must have discovered something for him to give out such an order. Moreover, that female vampire had been so resolute in her retreat. It seemed they weren¡¯t lying to her to cheat her of her contributions.


    Oliven¡¯s ck silhouette shed after a momentary pause. She quickly escaped back after Mary.


    Just then, Frost Dragon Aruntini let out a reverberating dragon¡¯s roar. She opened her mouth wide, and a Freezing Breath that covered the entire space sted out of her throat. It surged in every direction like a relentless tide.


    For a moment, the massive room was filled with white and swirling dragon¡¯s breath.


    The temperature of this Freezing Breath was exceptionally low. It had the terrifying power to freeze all things.


    Everything within the room was frozen in a thick block of ice as the white mist dispersed. Even the frost dragon herself and Zacha, who was surrounded by an Ice Barrier, was frozen within.


    Greem and Mary hadn¡¯t been caught in the ice due to their timely retreat. Oliven, on the other hand, had been a littlete. The ice mist had caught up to her body. Fortunately, she drew upon her strength quickly and managed to break free of the ice mist and escape, especially with her on the edge of the breath radius already.


    However, Zacha, who had been ordered to intercept the frost dragon, could only be frozen five steps away from the frost dragon.


    Oliven cast a subtle look at the Second Grade Fire Adept Greem upon escaping the ice mist. She couldn¡¯t help but secretly wonder how he had managed to discover the actions of the frost dragon before the explosion of power. She had been closer to the frost dragon at the time. Yet, Greem had been able to discover the gathering of the frost dragon¡¯s ice energies before she had even realized anything.


    Could he have any precognition abilities?


    While Oliven was sorting out her doubts, Greem had already walked forward. He continuously used his fireballs to bombard the massive ice crystal before them.


    One could imagine that this was an ultimate skill that the frost dragon had only used to save her life and buy some time.


    Once the Freezing Breath surged out of her mouth, all the enemies within the room would be sealed in a thick block of crystalline ice along with herself. This way, she would be able to save her life in a moment of crisis, as well as buy some time and wait for her dragonborn servants toe as support her.


    Greem had already tried to ce as high an estimation as possible to the effect of the Freezing Breath. However, he still realized that he had underestimated the Second Grade frost dragon by the time all the mist had dispersed and the ice crystal was perfectly exposed before him.


    The ice crystal was durable enough to match even diamond. While it had frozen both the frost dragon and Zacha, it didn¡¯t affect the frost dragon¡¯s movements and attacks within at all.


    While dragonborn Zacha was frozen to the spot, Aruntini was casually extending her body and using ice mists to perform essential treatment upon her most serious wounds. She then swam like a fish in water within the ice, as if the substance wasn¡¯t solid, and took steady steps toward dragonborn Zacha.


    Frost dragon Aruntini wanted to walk more elegantly and disy her nobility, but the severely wounded left leg and right wing made her wince with every step. One could even see the broken bones within the massive wound on the right leg.


    It made the frost dragon skip and hop when she walked. Aruntini didn¡¯t dare set her foot upon the ground for fear of touching the wound.


    Frost Dragon Aruntini couldn¡¯t express any elegance or beauty when she walked in such a manner, regardless of how pretty her appearance was.


    The enraged Aruntini¡¯s eyes had already turned milky-white, and a fearsome tide of frost was gathering within. She slowly arrived in front of Zacha and opened her mouth filled with sharp teeth. She used her slowest possible speed to bite down upon the dragonborn¡¯s head.


    Aruntini was filled with hatred at this moment.


    She wanted to use the slowest possible speed to torture and kill this wicked enemy and use the death of this dragonborn to warn the enemies outside the ice crystal. She could only relieve the anger and fury inside her chest through such a method. She still had no idea where these enemies came from, why they broke into her room, or why they had hurt her elegant and noble body.


    Just as she was intentionally putting on a show of elegance, the two Potions of Melting that Zacha had drunk before the start of the battle finally took effect.


    Something finally changed about Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s formerly restrained body as the frost dragon¡¯s teeth closed in upon him.


    His thick fingers that held on to the two shields suddenly sprang to life. He could finally move.

 Chapter 606

    Chapter 606 Splitting the Frost Dragon


    Dragonborn Zacha defrosted himself just in time.


    The two shields brought together sessfully blocked the cruel fangs of the frost dragon.


    The price Zacha paid in exchange was only a mouthful of blood.


    A muffled boom...


    A massive dent instantly appeared in the Queyras shield enchanted with frost resistance. All the magical runes drawn upon the shield detonated in session, causing it to lose all of its basic resistances.


    Frost Dragon Aruntini was caught unaware. She had used too much force and was now wincing and hissing in pain. A single massive dragon tooth flew out with traces of blood still attached to it.


    At this moment, the ferocious roars of dragon warriors reached the room through the winding tunnels from outside the pce.


    A trace of hope suddenly appeared in Aruntini¡¯s eyes!


    We can¡¯t let the frost dragon do as she wants to in the ice crystal.


    Greem made up his mind. He crushed tworge rubies with a single hand and used the ze of Destruction to cast therge-scale fire spell Doomsday Volcano. The magical volcano¡¯s point of explosion was right beneath the frost dragon.


    Ice and fire were always in opposition to each other!


    The ice mist in the room dispersed rapidly asrge clusters ofva and fire surged out of the magical volcano. The massive ice crystal also started melting and shrinking at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    Seeing that her shell was about to be broken, the slightly recovered frost dragon once againunched a brutal attack at Dragonborn Zacha. Sadly, Dragonborn Zacha was remarkably resilient against attacks now that he had given up on any sort of offense. All the high-quality magical equipment he was wearing on his body turned him into a steel statue, especially when paired with the many elementium protections revolving around him.


    Frost Dragon Aruntini¡¯s consecutive lunges and strikes all ended in vain apanied by dull and muffled thuds.


    Just then, a sweltering heat wave pressed against her face. The ice crystal had finally shattered!


    The conclusion of the dragon ying was incredibly smooth.


    The four First Grade adepts of the Crimson n could not hold off the continuous charges of the ferocious dragonborn. They could only retreat as they fought, quickly arriving at the frost dragon¡¯s quarters.


    They formed a new defensive line here. The few Second Grade adepts that had sessfully captured the frost dragon took this opportunity to ughter their way out, dealing tremendous damage to the dragonborn that had swarmed into the room.


    At the same time, the one hundred and forty magical machines that had marched all the way from the metal fortress also charged up the single and snowy peak, sessfully surrounding the enemy.


    Second Grade adepts stood in their way at the front while fearless metal machines assaulted their ranks from the back. The hundred dragonborn were caught in the middle, unsure of whether to advance or retreat. Soon, all of them had fallen within the snowy ice pce.


    The riotous battlefield was finally silenced when day turned into night; the curtain of darkness fell upon thend.


    Over half of the one hundred and forty magical machines had been destroyed. Only thirty of those were still in perfect working condition. The rest of the surviving machines were all missing arms or legs. They would need to be sent back to the metal fortress¡¯ repair shop to regain their fullbat abilities.


    These thirty magical machines were also being used as construction machines right now. They piled the corpses of the dead dragonborn together and sent them up to the goblin flying ship to be transported back to the metal fortress. The severely wounded dragonborn who still had breath left in them were all made to drink healing potions before being locked up in their own camp.


    A newly assembled flying ship appeared above the snowy peak at midnight. It slowlynded in front of the ice pce.


    Once some wide metallic nks had beenid out, squads of construction machines marched out of the ship with heavy footsteps.


    It was challenging to bring the massive flying ships of the Goblin ne to Lance through the teleportation device. Large groups of engineers and technicians had gathered in the metal fortress, and after an entire month, they had finally seeded in using the rudimentary construction tools to build a flying ship.


    Gazlowe hadn¡¯t even dared to let this new flying ship out of the metal fortress while the fire dragon girl was still ravaging its surroundings. Such flying ships thatcked powerful defensive measures were invincible when bullying magical creatures without the ability to fly. However, it was no more than a moving dummy for arge and ferocious being like the fire dragon.


    That was why Gazlowe had to dy the operation of the flying ship and only let it out once the fire dragon girl had gone hunting in the depths of Stalon Mountains.


    The metal fortress was nearly seven hundred kilometers away from the snowy mountain. Trying to bring this badly wounded frost dragon back across such a long distance would take eight to ten days on the ground. Such a long time on such a long road. Any ident that happened in between could cause Greem¡¯s efforts to have been in vain.


    Greem had no choice but to call for the flying ship and transport the frost dragon, along with all of the wealth in herir, back via air.


    One had to admit that each and every dragon were items with plenty of potential.


    This Second Grade frost dragon might still be a young teenage dragon and had not participated in too many of the dragon raids, but the golden coins, jewels, and treasures gathered in her pce still managed to take up most of the room.


    Greem did a quick survey and shook his head in disappointment.


    Robbing a teenage dragon was just not the same as robbing an old dragon!


    The frost dragon¡¯s wealth might seem plentiful, but most of these were worldly items that had been stolen from human kingdoms such as gold coins, antiques, agates, and crowns. They might cause somemotion if taken to a human realm, but they were useless in the eyes of adepts.


    For the adepts, tens of thousands of gold coins were no more practical than a single magical gemstone.


    The former was only an ornamental product, while thetter could be used as materials to support spellcasting, allowing theunched spells to be faster and more powerful.


    shy but without value!


    That was Greem¡¯s assessment of the frost dragon¡¯s hoard after looking through it.


    However, even a rotting ship had three pounds of nails in it. Greem still managed to find some useful stuff in the hoard after sifting through and organizing all of it.


    Spellsaving Gemstone!


    It was a type of magical gemstone that could contain a singleplete spell.


    Duringbat, adepts needed to chant words, perform handsigns, and use their staff and casting materials to cast spells. It was the only way they could use any of their most potent and fearsome magic. Now that Greem had a Spellsaving Gemstone, he could save aplete spell within it ahead of time. When needed, all he had to do was chant a short activating keyword to release the spell rapidly.


    That was undoubtedly extremely beneficial to an adept inbat!


    Sadly, upon inspecting the quality of this Spellsaving Gemstone, Greem disappointedly realized that it could only contain a First Grade spell. It was utterly useless for him.


    Still, it was a convenient item for a First Grade adept.


    After some hesitation, Greem awarded it to Bug Adept Billis, who had fought the hardest during today¡¯s battle.


    The construction machines also found a high-quality Frozen Mallet within the pile of jewels.


    It was a one-handed warhammer with a strange design. One end of the mallet was t, while the other tapered off into a sharp edge. Brilliant kes of frost and icicles covered the entire hammer. A strange surge of frost power would radiate from the mallet when the user held it in their hand. This frost power would cause seventy points of freezing damage to nearby enemies while slowing their speed by 40%.


    A powerful weapon like this clearly shouldn¡¯t fall into the hands of outsiders. It had to be awarded to the most significant contributor to today¡¯s sessful dragon ying¨C Dragonborn Zacha.


    In all honesty, the head of the Frozen Mallet was the size of two to three human heads put together, while the whole thing weighed about one hundred to one hundred and fifty kilograms. The only one within the Crimson n that was capable of using such a heavy weapon seemed to be Dragonborn Zacha.


    Dragonborn Zacha fell silent when he saw the powerful magical weapon ced before him.


    After a long period of hesitation, he finally bent over to pick up the warhammer.


    A milky-white Frost Aura appeared around him the moment the warhammer fell into his hands. It was like a beautiful ribbon of light. It froze the water molecules in the air into ice shards, causing them to hang upon Zacha¡¯s body and armor.


    "Thank you...master." Dragonborn Zacha finally faced Greem and said these words after waving the weapon about and testing it out.


    Even though he had been following Greem for over half a year and had always put all of his efforts into the missions Greem assigned him, this was the first time he had such sincere gratitude for his master. That was why it was particrly difficult for him to articte this gratitude.


    Still, his usually stern and solemn expression seemed a bit more rxed after saying that.


    Greem didn¡¯t say anything else, only responding with a smile and a nod.


    An extremely untimely voice suddenly interrupted this moment of warmth.


    "Alright, alright. Let¡¯s stop wasting time. Shouldn¡¯t we start considering how to split up the frost dragon?"


    There was only one person among the crowd who could so boldly disrupt the atmosphere. That was the extraordinarily eager and thirsty Dragon Devourer Oliven.


    Oliven circled again and again around the panting frost dragon syed upon the ground with a bump on her head as if she couldn¡¯t wait to leap upon the dragon and start feasting.


    The frost dragon had all her limbs dislocated and was bound with countless restraining runes. Despite her immobility, her eyes were wide open and was staring at this enemy of the dragons with hateful eyes.


    "Indeed, we finally won this battle! It¡¯s time to split up the spoils." Greem turned his head and smiled. His crystal clear eyes fell upon Oliven, "Miss Oliven severely wounded the frost dragon during this battle and limited the dragon¡¯s mobility. Truly a great achievement."


    A proud smile appeared on the half of Oliven¡¯s face that was not obscured by her veil when she heard Greem¡¯s praise.


    However, Greem¡¯s words took a quick turn next.


    "Given the exceptional contributions of Miss Oliven, she naturally has priority of choice over the frost dragon."


    Oliven¡¯s eyes instantly lit up.


    "Well then, Miss Oliven, please choose! Do you want the left half of the frost dragon or the right half? Do you want the upper half or the lower half?"


    "Half?"


    Oliven was instantly boggled. She used her hand and gestured right and left in the air over the frost dragon¡¯s body. She waspletely confused for a moment.


    "Miss Oliven, your contributions are huge, but it isn¡¯trge enough for you to im an entire dragon for yourself. There were four Second Grades that participated in this battle. Your contribution is no more than one-fourth. Still, given all the effort you have put in, I can speak for the others and give you the priority of choice. Tell me, how do you want to cut this dragon up into four pieces? You can pick the first piece..." Greem smiled as he spoke.


    Oliven¡¯s expression immediately soured!

 Chapter 607

    Chapter 607 A Visiting Guest


    One-fourth of a dragon?


    Dragon Devourers needed topletely devour an entire dragon to effectively improve and obtain the dragon¡¯s bloodline, physique, magic resistance, and soul.


    Would the dragon still be whole if it were split into four pieces?


    Oliven was extremely frustrated and upset right now.


    Yet, when she tried to give the matter some serious thought, she couldn¡¯t find anything wrong with Greem¡¯s words.


    It was only natural that she got a quarter of the dragon when all four of them had worked together to defeat the dragon, mainly when there wasn¡¯t much difference between their contributions and power in battle. Still, this was too far beyond the expectations she had been holding onto this whole time!


    "You don¡¯t intend to give me a dragon leg or a dragon wing every time we y a dragon, do you?" Oliven furiously squeezed this query out through her teeth. Two dangerous clusters of fire lit up in the depths of her jade green eyes.


    "Of course not!" Greem was still smiling brilliantly, "From what I know, only dragons with whole bodies and souls can allow you to strengthen your powers. Why would I ever do something so mean to you?!"


    "Then what¡¯s your n?"


    "There are only two options currently. One, I give you your spoils after every battle ording to your contributions. However, this way you will only be able to get one-fourth of a dragon every time."


    "Just talk about the second option."


    "Two, you give up on your choice this time and umte your contributions. Then, the next time we sessfully y a dragon, you will be able to get an entire dragon; one-half of it at least!"


    Oliven¡¯s face fell apart once more.


    "You mean to say that I have to help you capture four dragons to obtain oneplete dragon?"


    "That¡¯s how the situation is! After all, we are only allies. I can¡¯t possibly give you advance payment just to please you when we are only engaged in such a temporary alliance ofmon interest. So..."


    "So I¡¯ve turned into your freebor and cheap assistant, answering to your every beck and call, all just for the sake of a damned dragon that I might get in the future." Oliven turned increasingly furious as she spoke. An unconceble rage filled her jade green eyes.


    Greem spread his palms and shrugged.


    "If you had the ability to hunt a Second Grade dragon alone, you wouldn¡¯t need to be bound to me in this manner. Sadly, wind dragons run fast, fire dragons live too far, frost dragons are too annoying, water dragons aren¡¯t easy to find, lightning dragons can teleport; you really need to put in some effort if you want to catch them."


    Oliven¡¯s anger quickly subsided when she heard Greem list out the terrifying aspects of the various pure-blooded dragons. Her eyes were filled with helplessness instead.


    She might possess the title of dragon devourer and would always hold the advantage in a fight against a dragon of the same grade.


    However, being able to defeat a dragon wasn¡¯t the same as being able to capture one!


    The dragons might all have different attributes and different fighting styles, but they all had onemonality¨C that was, they all knew how to fly.


    It didn¡¯t sound like much, but the ability of flight, when bestowed upon the dragons, was incredibly hard to deal with.


    The dragons had robust Physique and Strength that they prided themselves over. They also had sharp fangs, lethal wings, and a long tail in closebat, while also simultaneously having Dragontongue magic and dragon breath for long rangedbat. All these factors already made them incredibly powerful and troublesome to deal with. Throw into the equation their ability to fly, and the dragons now also possessed the right to choose where and when they wanted to fight!


    They could dive downward and engage in a ferocious fight if they could win the battle. If they couldn¡¯t win, then they could simply turn around, take to the skies, and leave.


    What amongst ordinary magical creatures could deal with such a harsh and annoying piece of meat?


    Oliven might be known as a dragon killer and possess the dragon-ying abilities, but even she couldn¡¯t force the dragons to stay if they fled the moment they saw her.


    That was the main reason why she had actively sought out Greem!


    Greem knot only possessed tremendous power, but also the manpower required to realize his ns. Only someone like him could carry out a well-nned operation and trap a dragon lord in a situation with no escape.


    That was why Oliven was no more than extra help and an extrayer of insurance for Greem when it came to ying dragons. However, Greem was an irreceable and extremely significant factor for Oliven and her ambitions.


    Their standing had never been equal from the very start!


    Every time she remembered that she needed to help Greem defeat another three Second Grade dragons to obtain an entire dragon, Oliven felt herself getting frustrated again. She couldn¡¯t calm down.


    Still, someone who could wander the multiverse alone was no angel either. Oliven rolled her eyes and immediately swapped out her expression with a smiling face.


    "Sir Greem, could you truly bear seeing ady get caught in such suffering?"


    Oliven had changed her strategy. She instantly turned into a sad, mourning, and dejecteddy, slinking toward Greem with graceful steps as she held her hands over her chest as if she was heartbroken.


    In all honesty, there weren¡¯t too many people who could resist such seduction, especially when it was a beautifuldy with a dynamite figure who was trying to charm you. Still; this was a matter of a dragon, every one of which was worth over a million magical crystals. There was no room for negotiation even if God himself came down to speak.


    Greem immediately betrayed a lewd expression. He extended an arm and wrapped it around Oliven¡¯s soft and slender waist before bending down to her ear and whispering, "If Lady Oliven¡¯s willing to visit my adept¡¯s tower tonight, I can pass you my portion of the dragon. How about it? That¡¯s one-half of a dragon in total, you know."


    Mary¡¯s cold snort came from not far away.


    Oliven couldn¡¯t help but feel chills run down her spine when Greem ced his hand on her.


    She couldn¡¯t wait to use her ws to add a few more holes in this wicked adept¡¯s body if it weren¡¯t for the alliance. Even though Oliven had been the one to attempt seduction, she was the first to fall apart when Greem responded with a perverted expression.


    Oliven twisted her waist and quickly got herself out of Greem¡¯s grasp with her skills as an assassin. She walked away without looking back.


    "Keep my portion of a dragon for me. However, you won¡¯t hear the end of it if even one gold coin is missing from my portion of the hoard." Having said that, Oliven quickly vanished from the scene.


    The very next second, the tender flesh on Greem¡¯s waist was pinched and twisted by a pair of snow white hands.


    Three times to the left and three times to the right. There wasn¡¯t much force in the pinch, but that intense pain still went straight to Greem¡¯s heart.


    "You¡¯re not allowed to hook up with that girl!" Mary wickedly left this sentence behind and went without looking back, much as Oliven had. Her slender waist swayed like a willow in the wind as she walked. Every step tempted and plucked at Greem¡¯s heartstrings, causing lust to rise in him. He couldn¡¯t help but lick his lips.


    He had been too engrossed in the organization of the Crimson n and the excavation of Lance over these past few days. It seemed to have been a long time since hest had some ¡¯propermunication¡¯ with Mary. He had also unlocked a couple of interesting movestely. He could probably consider letting loose for just a bit.


    Sadly, before Greem could put the thoughts in his mind to action, a goblin engineer swiftly ran out of the flying ship while waving both of his hands. The goblin had a piece of note in his hand.


    A guest has arrived. Return ASAP!


    This was the brief message that Gazlowe had sent over via themunication device aboard the flying ship. It was vague and inconclusive, as if Gazlowe was intentionally leaving the matter a mystery.


    It shouldn¡¯t be an enemy. Otherwise, the cowardly and fearful Gazlowe would take a much more urgent tone.


    But a guest?


    Greem was slightly surprised.


    He didn¡¯t seem to have any acquaintances here in Lance. It couldn¡¯t be that some adept that had wandered here from the World of Adepts was visiting him, could it? No, wait. It seemed it was possible, probable even, that he had an acquaintance here in Lance.


    A sh went off in Greem¡¯s mind. He had a vague idea of who the visitor was.


    Good. It was about time to have a proper talk with him.


    After hastily cleaning up the snowy mountain, Greem boarded the flying ship with all his subordinates. The vessel then slowly took to the skies and started on its way back to the metal fortress.


    Lonepeak Snowmountain had to hold something special about it, given that Frost Dragon Aruntini had chosen it as herir. Abandoning the mountain this way was a bit of a waste. Still, the Crimson n had to keep their fist held tight if they wanted to expand their forces in Lance while remaining hidden. They absolutely couldn¡¯t spread out their strength and have the enemy slowly snap each one of their fingers.


    All the adepts retreated to the metal fortress after the battle to avoid any unfortunate incidents from happening. Yet, they couldn¡¯t easily forsake an excellent base like this either. Greem left one goblin engineer, two goblin technicians, five construction machines, and tenbat magical machines in the ice pce.


    The task Greem gave them was to do aprehensive and detailed survey of all the creatures, minerals, and nt resources within the frost dragon¡¯s territory, with Lonepeak Snowmountain as their temporary base. They were not to start any conflicts with therge-scale native tribes unless absolutely necessary. They were to do their best to figure out the distribution of resources within the frost dragon¡¯s territory.


    The goblin engineer that acted as the temporary captain had to maintain long-distancemunications with the metal fortress every three days to report their findings. The metal fortress would also send out resources, logistics, and reinforcements at important times using the flying ship.


    Once everything had been arranged, the flying ship rose into the clouds and quickly flew toward the Stalon Mountains under cover of night. Due to theck of special alloys, the engine room of the flying ship was still the old space furnace; the newest magic generator furnace hadn¡¯t been installed.


    Greem had already exhausted a third of the Queyras alloy dug out of the ruins of the Steel Capital to construct a powerful magic generator furnace that could sustain the entire metal fortress. The remaining Queyras alloy could, at best, be used for three to five miniature magic generator furnaces.


    However, the blueprints of the miniaturized magic generator furnace were still being calcted and optimized. They couldn¡¯t be used to sustain the explosive growth of the magical machine army in the short term.


    Ordinary magical machines could get by with improved versions of the magic energy batteries. The ones that genuinely needed miniature magic generator furnaces were the elite magical machine warriors. The performance of the Goblin Shredder and the Goblin Bomberman during the battle of the Swamp of Sorrows were the most eye-catching of them all. They were also undergoing improvements and optimization.


    Once the newest Second Grade magical machine warrior waspleted, it could be paired with Tigule, who was known as the Goblin God of War. When that happened, it was very likely that anotherbat unit with Second Grade power would emerge within the Crimson n.

 Chapter 608 Metal City

    Chapter 608 Metal City


    The one waiting at the gates of the metal fortress was indeed Greem¡¯s old friend¨C Thunder Dragon Arms.


    It was evident that Arms had disguised his identity for this trip. Not only had he transformed into his human form, but he had also masked his appearance by covering himself with a long, thick robe.


    Arms stood alone before the towering metallic walls of the metal fortress. He silently lifted his head and watched as a massive hundred-meter long metallic creation emerged from the distant horizon and rapidly arrived before his head.


    The flying ship stopped for a quick moment above the metal fortress embedded within the mountain. The creaking sounds of gears rang out as an opening quickly appeared in the metal fortress that perfectly blended into the mountain.


    The flying ship slowly sank into the fortress under Arms¡¯ surprised gaze.


    From a distance, it looked as if the metal monster within the mountain had devoured the flying ship with a single bite. It was an intimidating and shocking sight.


    The goblins had already moved past the steam power era. All of the energy consumed within the metal fortress came from the magic energy furnace. Without thoserge pots and steam engines of the past, there were none of those huge clouds of steam.


    It was almost as if the metal monster had emptied the insides of this massive mountain. It had been turned into a base that was half mountain and half a metal fortress. Arms was speechless at the thickness of the metal wall that had reced this half of the mountain.


    More importantly, this metal wall seemed perfectly clean and smooth. Arms couldn¡¯t find any entrances or exits along the entire thing. That left Arms with no other choice to enter other than breaking down the wall.


    A loud and reverberating dragon¡¯s roar rang out from the depths of the Stalon Mountains while Arms was still silently considering his options.


    The calm and collected Arms instantly turned anxious upon hearing this roar.


    "Lord Arms, wee to my territory! Please."


    Arms didn¡¯t know when, but Greem was already standing graciously in front of the metal wall. The metal gates before him slid to the sides, revealing a massive entrance five meters tall and ten meters wide. Two rows of tall and ferocious metal golems were lined up along the two sides of the opening. They numbered approximately three dozen.


    Arms turned back for a fleeting look. He could see the ck dot that had suddenly appeared on the distant horizon due to his excellent dragon eyesight. Even though the figure was over fifteen kilometers away from here, Arms could already vaguely sense the immense aura of fire elementium.


    It was a fire dragon.


    ording to Arms¡¯ memory, there seemed only to be one fire dragon living near the Stalon Mountains and the Swamp of Sorrows. It was the powerful Fire Dragon Girl Philippa, who stayed in Doomsday Castle.


    Dammit! That¡¯s a powerful Third Grade fire dragon. Moreover, she¡¯s a dragon with a nasty temperament that particrly likes fighting. Who would have expected these human adepts to make enemies with such a terrifying individual the moment they got here? Dammit, dammit, dammit!


    Arms was furiously cursing to himself.


    Even he, for a brief moment, didn¡¯t know if he was cursing the female fire dragon or Greem.


    Arms didn¡¯t bother with any etiquette for Greem and quickly strode into this wondrous fortress forged entirely of metal. It seemed he didn¡¯t want to deal with that fire dragon either.


    Arms was stunned by the sight in front of him the moment he entered!


    How was this a fortress?! It was definitely a terrifying, wide, and fully functional metal city!


    The silver-colored metal floor extended endlessly under his eyes, as towering metal warehouses and buildings filled both sides of the road. The intersecting and interconnected metal roads could reach any corner of this metal city, while the ones who walked upon them were fearsome magical machines trudging about with heavy steps.


    As many as twenty security magical machines gathered at every traffic hub. Their appearance gave away the fact that they wereposed of several magical machines of different models and functions. Some of them looked like spiders. Their disc-shaped metal bodies were filled with lots of strange, honebpound-eyes.


    They stood on each side of the road, continually scanning every magical machine that walked past them. A spectrum of strange lights shed from theirpound eyes, and it seemed there wasn¡¯t just one type of scan that they were conducting.


    Apart from these fixed sentries, a type of metal eyeball the size of a human head was also circling in the skies of the metal city. It had no wings, but it could fly with just as much freedom with a few jet ports sting out a light-blue light.


    They would asionally and very abruptly stop above a building or magical machine before projecting a wide green beam from their mechanical abdomen. All metal in contact with the beam of light would instantly turn transparent, exposing everything inside to the metal eyeballs.


    The city might berge, busy, and filled with plenty of giant machines, but strangely enough, there weren¡¯t too many grating noises. Moreover, the construction machines traveling through the city were all carrying something of value in their hands. They were eitherrge metal boxes, arge pile of metal ingots, or some type of rare resource.


    Arms looked all across the city, but couldn¡¯t find a single magical machine among the hundreds and thousands of machines that was cking off or simply walking around. They seemed to be constantly working without end as if the concept of exhaustion was foreign to them.


    More importantly, Arms felt a powerful mental force from these machines.


    Indeed, ever since he had stepped into this metal city, Arms could very clearly feel the air, pieces of steel, and all the metal was permeated by this indescribable mental power. It was as if they were all being controlled and ruled by a single powerful consciousness and will.


    It was that strange Third Grade brain!


    Arms didn¡¯t need any exnation. He had been fully involved in the great battle at the Steel Capital in the Goblin¡¯s ne. He instantly thought of that strange lifeform. That fellow had almost no physicalbat ability, but its control of magic energy and mental powers was far beyond Arms abilities.


    Who knew the brain would also survive that massive explosion?


    While Arms was getting frustrated over his failure to exterminate the brain, the loud rumbling sound of a collision rang out from the thick metal wall behind him. A piercing rm sted throughout the metal city immediately after.


    It seemed that irritable fire dragon girl hade back to siege the city!


    This formerly peaceful metal city immediately transformed after the sounding of the rms.


    The construction machines that had been walking on the metal roads in an orderly fashion promptly stepped to each side. The few giant warehouses and forts near the metal walls immediately opened up. Squads ofbat magical machines marched out of these buildings, apanied by several goblin chariots of exaggerated size.


    These magical machines and chariots quickly gathered near the metal wall and got into a formation as they silently waited for orders.


    The blows being dealt to the metal gradually got more substantial and more frequent.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    The muffled thuds echoed above the metal city, and some loose rocks and stone started to fall from its tall ceiling. However, this didn¡¯t deal too much damage to the city.


    Many strange metal constructions were embedded on the inside of the metal wall, hundred meters above the ground. When the metal wall was being attacked from the outside, countless tiny cannon openings would open up on the metal wall. These constructions would then move forward and extend their ck cannon barrels outward.


    An immenselyrge surge of magic energy would thene up from under the metal city and extend toward the position of these strange metal structures along the metal wall. The magic energy cannons would vibrate silently as the amount of magic energy gathered increased in size. Terrifying energy beams with shocking intensity would then fire out of the barrels.


    Arms had no means of knowing what the situation was on the outside.


    However, the attacks on the metal had suddenly stopped with the continuous firing of the magic energy cannons. It was as if the enemy no longer had the energy to spare to keep up their attack. Instead, they had to turn their attention toward those fearsome energy attacks.


    The short battle ended after no more than fifteen minutes.


    Another brief momentter, several dozen metal gates opened in unison. Squads of magical machines and construction machines swarmed outside andunched a final charge at the remaining enemies in the distance.


    Soon, the construction machines lifted, grabbed, and raised the bloodied and crippled dragonborn back into the city before locking them up in some unique prison cells.


    Arms might not care for the strength of these magical machines, but he still watched the whole thing unfold with a pale expression.


    This was Lance, the backyard of low and mid-grade dragon lords!


    Arms heart was utterly shaken and in turmoil upon seeing all this happen.


    Once upon a time, the dragons were the true masters of this ne, while the dragonborn were the worthy rulers of thend.


    Now, much like how the dragonborn had easily ughtered the native tribes, the metal city was also easily ughtering the dragonborn in a nned and purposeful manner.


    The hunter of the past had be the prey!


    Such a turn of fates and upset of roles was truly too much for Arms to swallow.


    While Arms was mourning for the dragonborn, a short yet sorrowful dragon¡¯s roar rang out within the metal city.


    Arms turned to look and happened to see arge group of metal golems upon the tall metal tform. They were working together to move an utterly white dragon covered in semi-translucent white scales down from the flying ship.


    The brief roar from earlier hade from this dragon, who had suddenly regained her consciousness.


    Frost Dragon Aruntini!


    Arms didn¡¯t need a closer look. He could tell who this frost dragon was just from seeing her beautiful and crystalline frost scales.


    Second Grade Frost Dragon Aruntini was also a rare dragon beauty in Lance.


    Sadly, given the circumstance, it seemed she had already fallen into the hands of the adepts.


    Arms expression turned increasingly solemn!

 Chapter 609 Faen Plane

    Chapter 609 Faen ne


    "What is it? Lord Arms, you know this frost dragon?"


    Greem, who was taking Arms on tour through the metal city asked curiously.


    Arms hesitated for a moment before nodding his head reluctantly.


    "Speaking of which, Lord Arms, how did you know we were here?"


    Arms was now a tall man in beautiful blue armor after transforming into a human. He had a handsome face, good posture, and an indescribable aura of might apanied his every move and action.


    Arms rolled his eyes upon hearing Greem¡¯s questions. He put on an expression that seemed to be asking Greem ¡¯how dare you even ask me that question?¡¯


    "Mmhmm. A good question! Since I¡¯ve already given Zacha to you, you should know where my territory is located, don¡¯t you?"


    "If we were to walk seventy thousand kilometers northeast of Stalon Mountains and pass through the territories of twelve dragon lords, we would be able to reach Lord Arms¡¯ Thunderbolt Cliff!" Greem replied without any hesitation as if he had put research into this matter a long time ago.


    Arms expression froze on his face.


    "I thought I could stop your footsteps after wiping away the ne coordinates from Zacha¡¯s mind. Sadly, I sensed a ne coordinate I had set up being triggered one month ago. That¡¯s when I knew something was wrong. In the end, you people still managed to get the specific coordinates of Lance from the Goblin ne."


    Arms¡¯ face was full of regret when he said this.


    Invading the Goblin ne was the first activity he had nned independently after bing a Third Grade dragon lord. However, something as incredibly wrong as this had happened on his very first expedition. Of course he was going to be frustrated!


    In all seriousness, it was the significant mistakes hemitted that allowed these adepts to invade Lance. If it weren¡¯t for his reckless actions, the young dragons of Lance would not need to be subjected to such cmity. They could still enjoy theirfortable and luxurious lives as dragon lords without any worries.


    Greem was slightly relieved upon hearing Arms¡¯ exnation.


    Thunder Dragon Arms had personally set the nar coordinate they had teleported to in the very first ce. It was entirely normal for him to have left something behind in the coordinates. In all honesty, Greem was d that this was the case.


    If Arms had discovered Greem and his adepts through other means, didn¡¯t that mean that the actions of the adepts werepletely exposed to higher dragons? Now that he had confirmed that Arms had only found them via the nar coordinates, it meant that the Crimson n¡¯s invasion had yet to be discovered by the higher dragons.


    It was perfectly understandable!


    The dragons had always been a long-lived species. Their understanding and attitude toward time werepletely different from humans.


    It had, at the very most, only been a month since the Crimson n had invaded Lance. This much time wasn¡¯t even enough for most dragon lords to take a brief nap. The existence of the metal fortress was also only slowly spreading through the few dragon lord territories near Stalon Mountains and the Swamp of Sorrows. Dragon lords who were slightly further away had no knowledge of their presence and had no interest in the matter either.


    Much like their seven hundred kilometer trip to ambush Frost Dragon Aruntini, the dragons would not be prepared at all. At the very least, they were not prepared for these outsiders. That was why Greem and the others were able to capture the frost dragon alive in a mere fifteen minutes. They were pitting unprepared against prepared, and unaware against aware.


    If the frost dragon had possessed even a slight idea of what was about to happen, she wouldn¡¯t have lost so decisively and so terribly.


    Now she had fallen from a superior dragon lord to a future product to be evaluated and assessed on a stage by various adepts!


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms had signed an agreement of mutual battle aid with Greem, after all. Strictly speaking, the two of them should still be considered allies. Unfortunately, now that the fires of war had spread to Arms own home, their positions and rtionship had also turned exceptionally awkward.


    "Lord Arms, now that we have arrived here, we won¡¯t easily be leaving either. To better coordinate the rtionship between the two of us, I feel like there¡¯s a need to understand your attitude," Greem went straight at the heart of the issue, "How do you intend to deal with our entrance into Lance?"


    Greem¡¯s question was straightforward. He was basically forcing Arms to exin whether he was friend or foe.


    After all, this Third Grade thunder dragon knew the true identities and strength of Greem and the Crimson n. Greem and the others would have to pay an rming price to take him down if he chose to be the enemy of the n.


    Greem wasn¡¯t that stupid either.


    The parts he had brought Arms on a tour of were only the uppermost buildings of the metal fortress. The coreponents and areas of the metal fortress were actually hidden in the mines over several hundred meters below. Moreover, there was Gazlowe the Third Grade brain monster. With the sustenance of the enhanced magic energy furnace and the home field advantage, Gazlowe would not be much inferior to Thunder Dragon Arms in a fight.


    Furthermore, Greem also had the hidden chesspiece that was Dragon Devourer Oliven. It might not be a simple thing¨Ceven if he tossed her into the fray at a critical moment¨Cbut at the very least, it could intimidate this proud thunder dragon lord.


    That was why Greem was able to face off against Arms the Third Grade dragon lord so calmly despite only being a Second Grade adept. He had cards in his hands.


    Frustration; infinite frustration.


    If Arms could, at this moment, trade half of his wealth in exchange for the adepts¡¯ retreat from Lance, he would agree without any hesitation. Sadly, it was virtually impossible to have the enemy retreat for such minor benefit after they had experienced their first taste of profit from Lance.


    That was why even Thunder Dragon Arms himself, after much consideration, didn¡¯t know what to do!


    The Arms of the past might have resorted to martial force if he failed in his negotiations. However, after the battle in the Goblin ne, he already had a broad and cutting experience of the sinister, wicked, and cunning nature of these adepts. If he were to resort to force... Arms took a look at this ¡¯meeting hall¡¯ with walls thick enough to contest a metal prison and once again sensed the great mental flux that was always around him.


    In the end, Arms utterly gave up on the very idea of solving the issue with violence!


    Since there was no way he could chase the adepts out of Lance, then he would have topromise and strive for the next best option. Arms would try to ensure that the thunder dragons, at least, were not affected in any way by the adepts¡¯ actions.


    Both parties engaged in a sincere and in-depth discussion over the following period.


    Half a dayter, Arms finally left the metal fortress in secrecy upon obtaining a satisfactory result.


    ............


    The World of Adepts, the Tower of Fate.


    Alice¡¯s tall and slender figure was slowly revealed as the brilliant starlight radiating from the astrology tform gradually dispersed.


    As she walked out of the magical array with a solemn expression, Helen, who had been watching over from aside, flew over as she spread pixie dust everywhere.


    "How is it? How is it? Did you get any results this time?" Little Helen floated above Alice¡¯s shoulders, leaned by her ear, and softly asked.


    "So what if I did? So what if I didn¡¯t?" Alice seemed dejected.


    "There needs to be a result!" Little Helen anxiously flew about near Alice as she said, "You¡¯ve already exhausted so much of your life. If you don¡¯t get a result still, you..."


    Little Helen suddenly stopped speaking.


    She could clearly see from her angle that her master, who was not even a hundred years old yet, was already experiencing the effects of aging. Her originally silky silver hair had now turnedpletely snow white. That made Alice¡¯s face seem all the paler. Her frail and weak body seemed even weaker as if a single gust of wind would blow her away.


    Alice gave it some thought before shaking her head and putting on an ugly smile, "I¡¯m very sorry, but it seems there are no results this time either!"


    Little Helen flew in front of Alice. She ced her hands on her waist, pouted, and stared angrily at her master.


    "Do you think we magic fairies are all idiots that you can fool as you like? I saw it very clearly. The past few times you divined, the magic array has responded to the powers of the star, and pronounced abnormalities have urred. These are the telltale signs of sessful divination. How long do you intend to lie to me?"


    Alice straightened her body and sighed distantly, "So what if it seeded, so what if it didn¡¯t? If Fate pointed out a path to you that cannot be passed through, then isn¡¯t it the same as having no path before you?"


    "What exactly was Fate¡¯s hint to you? Weren¡¯t you asking about the direction of your Second Grade advancement? Why would Fate point you toward a dead end?" Little Helen asked curiously.


    Alice stared at the starlight on the astrology tform that had yet to dispersepletely, "I have divined three times in a row. Fate keeps hinting to me that my only chance at advancing to Second Grade will be the nar expedition three monthster. That¡¯s the invasion of a mighty mid-sized ne. Do you think we of the Tower of Fate have the right to participate in such a massive invasion with our current prowess?"


    Little Helen was also shocked upon hearing this.


    She had also never expected her master Alice¡¯s opportunity of advancement to fall upon a different ne, much less one that possessed a powerful native civilization.


    Alternate nes like that often had terrifying otherworldly deities guarding them. They were not like those small-sized nes, where people could enter and exit as they wished. Completely devouring such a ne would easily allow any adept organization to expand at a rapid rate.


    However, inparison, the difficulty of invasion would also increase by several dozen times or even several hundreds of times!


    One could responsibly say that the invading adept organization would be very likely to be exterminated on these terrifying nes if they didn¡¯t have the necessary power. It wouldn¡¯t even be a matter of profits and benefits then, but a question of survival.


    Alice had once offered up the nar coordinates of arge-sized ne during the Witch Council. ording to tradition, the other Northern Witch branches had to offer up nes of equal quality that they held in their hands if they wanted to participate in any invasion activities rted to that ne.


    After some hesitation, all the leaders of the various witch branches could only announce the coordinates of a mid-sized ne that they held in their hands. They couldn¡¯t possibly be as powerful as therge-sized ne that Alice offered to the Council, but they also possessed many nts, animals, magical creatures, and all sorts of other resources.


    The three consecutive divinations that Alice conducted this time pointed toward the mid-sized ne that the Pale Witches had shared with the rest¨C the ne of Faen.


    ording to the rules, the Pale Witches would be opening a portal to Faen in three months.


    When that happened, all the witch branches could freely send troops and forces to participate in the robbing of Faen. Moreover, everyone would be able to keep the spoils that they reaped in the war.


    It sounded like a perfect and just operation for everyone, but an opportunity like this might as well be non-existent for the weak Witches of Fate.


    The Witches of Fate would be seeking their own death if they were to go robbing a mid-sized ne with their current strength.


    Thus, Alice hesitated. She was lost, and she was uncertain.

 Chapter 610

    Chapter 610 Directing Forces


    "Don¡¯t you have that Greem person?"


    Little Helen¡¯s eyes suddenly shone brightly during Alice¡¯s moment of confusion and doubt. The fairy excitedly flew up and down.


    "His force seemed to have been developing fairly well thest time we went to Fire Throne. Maybe..."


    Alice thought for a moment before shaking her head and saying, "They¡¯ve just found a decent small-sized ne on their end. The local forces there are pretty tough to deal with as well. The enemies aren¡¯t much weaker than the Faen ne of the Pale Witches. I fear they would have difficulty sparing any manpower on their end at this moment. Moreover, this is an internal matter of the Northern Witches. He is an outsider."


    "Hmph! What outsider," Little Helen pouted in disdain, "Last time he asked you to go and support his cause, he treated you as if you were his subordinate. If he dares not help you in your moment of difficulty now, I will scold him to death."


    Alice pretty face turned into a frown. She reprimanded the fairy unhappily, "Helen; I won¡¯t allow you to do anything unnecessary! The reason I could be the Witch of Fate was all his help. That is why I am obligated to help him. The trip to Faen this time is far too dangerous. I don¡¯t want his n that is only just starting to shape up to disappear just like that. That¡¯s why..."


    Alice had justpleted arge-scale divination. She had greatly exhausted her Spirit and stamina. Alice felt dizzy and nauseous just from trying to argue with Helen, and her eyes went ck as she copsed to the ground.


    That frightened Helen half to death. She waved her tiny magic wand and cast Levitate on Alice before using the wind powers to move the girl out of the astrology tform.


    Greem only heard news of this at a slightlyter time.


    He had to first teleport from Lance to the Goblin ne, then teleport from the Goblin ne to Fire Throne before finally making his way to the Witch of Fate.


    Even he, a Second Grade adept, felt his head ache after so many teleportations. He couldn¡¯t walk straight by the time he reached the Tower of Fate.


    He hurriedly arrived at her room and saw the unconscious Alice lying on a bed.


    All seven witches of the Witches of Fate were gathered here, including Berserk Witch Sofia and Icdy Snowlotus. Their expressions were solemn and severe, and they seemed slightly upset at Greem¡¯s appearance.


    Greem walked forward and bent to scan Alice¡¯s body. The Chip¡¯s scans revealed that she was deficient in blood energy, her Spirit was in a state of severe withering, and the light spectrum that represented her life maic field was incredibly dull. He couldn¡¯t help but ask in shock, "What¡¯s happened to Alice?"


    "What else could happen? It¡¯s because she conducted too many divination ceremonies and lost too much life energy. That¡¯s how this..." The palm-sized Helen ced her hands on her waist as if she was fuming with anger.


    Snowlotus grabbed the fairy before she could finish her sentence. The ice witch lightly touched the fairy on the head with a finger before turning and coldly speaking to Greem, "Since you, sir, have already seen the tower owner, would you please go home!"


    Greem fell silent. It was only now that he lifted his head and took a look at the witches in the room.


    "I might not be a member of the Witches of Fate, but I have an unbreakable rtionship with Alice. Thus, I hope you people had best not hide anything from me!"


    Snowlotus was slightly stunned. Even she was speechless for a second. Instead, it was Helen that broke free of Snowlotus¡¯ grip with a quick teleport. She appeared before Greem once again and floated toward his face. The fairy stared into his eyes and asked, "Do you mean what you say? You would be willing to save Alice if she was in danger?"


    "Of course!" Greem spoke with utter certainty, "Alice¡¯s problems are my problems! I will involve myself in all of her matters!"


    "Good."


    Helen¡¯s expression turned into one of joy. She was just about to spill the beans when a crisp and cold voice interrupted her.


    "Helen, you¡¯ve acted out of turn!" No one knew when, but Alice had already woken up. She sat up with much difficulty and scolded Helen angrily. "This is the matter of us witches, why did you summon him here?"


    Greem took a look around him and vaguely understood something.


    He decided to sit by the bedside and grab Alice¡¯s white and somewhat thin right hand in his own.


    "Alice, do you now know my feelings for you? If you doubt the authenticity of my feelings, you can verify it with your divination spells."


    Before he could even finish his sentence, seven radiant beams of divination simultaneously fell upon him.


    "Seventy percent truth and thirty percent non-truths."


    "The non-truths don¡¯t seem like lies, however."


    "Hmph, just as expected. Not a hundred percent truthful."


    "Men are all like this."


    "Eh, this is pretty good inparison to most men."


    "Guess we will trust him this one time."


    "He got lucky this time!"


    These people.


    Greem¡¯s body instantly froze. His forehead immediately filled with plenty of ck lines.


    It was clear that Alice was dealing with some doubts concerning him right now, but it was so difficult to make any confessions with so many ¡¯ducks¡¯ around them.


    While Greem was unsure of what to do next, the blushing Alice had already embarrassedly started chasing away the witches.


    For some reason, after tossing their divination spells at Greem, they no longer looked upon him with the same sense of estrangement and distance. Theyughed amongst themselves as they left the room.


    Once they were the only two left in the room, along with sneaky little Helen, Greem brought Alice into his embrace. He pressed his face against her smooth and silky white hair, taking in the faint scent of her body.


    Alice might look slender and tall, but it was obvious her body was far too frail. Greem could tell that she was too skinny when he had her in his arms. The girl even seemed bony to the touch.


    Alice was like a shy littlemb right now. She leaned her head upon Greem¡¯s shoulder and trembled slightly. It was hard for her to organize her words.


    Greemughed out loud and pulled Alice deeper into his chest. He didn¡¯t care for her slight gasp and instead lifted his head and smiled at Helen.


    "Well, I¡¯ve dealt with your master! Now, you can tell me the matter as it is."


    "Ayayaye. Bad man, terrible man. As expected, all they think of is doing bad things."


    Helen covered her eyes with both hands as she flew around Greem and Alice like a headless fly. It wasn¡¯t until she peeked through her fingers and saw Greem waiting for her that she carefully leaned toward his ear. She then told him everything about Alice¡¯s advancement and the matter of Faen.


    "You can already advance?" Greem was first happy to hear this, but then couldn¡¯t help but grumble, "Alice, what¡¯s with you this time? This isn¡¯t like you! There¡¯s no point to hiding anything. You should have told me this matter earlier. Then, everyone can gather together to discuss. We can surelye up with a n."


    Alice pulled out her small hands and tried her best to catch Greem¡¯srge hands, which were taking the opportunity to roam and do evil everywhere. Still very much embarrassed but happy, she pouted and said, "It¡¯s only because I¡¯m worried that you¡¯ve only just entered Lance. The situation still isn¡¯t clear yet. It¡¯s very easy for your efforts to bepletely wasted if you have to withdraw your forces prematurely! Moreover, this operation is an internal matter of the Northern Witches. Outsiders are not allowed to participate."


    Greem smiled, "I¡¯m not an outsider; I¡¯m your lover and partner! No one can oppose my participation if I do so under this identity, can they?"


    The Northern Witches¡¯nds might beposed mainly of witches, but every branch had male adepts as well. These male adepts held awkward positions among the Northern Witches. They were either the lovers of certain witches or the subordinates of others. Almost all male adepts were at the periphery of the system of authority.


    Greem, on the other hand, was still a Second Grade adept in the end. Moreover, he was the n head of the newly established Crimson n. It was possible for him to put himself beneath the witches like the other male adepts and participate in this otherworld invasion as a subordinate force. While very much possible, it would deal tremendous damage to Greem¡¯s reputation.


    However, Greem didn¡¯t care about that!


    He was a ssic pragmatist. He didn¡¯t care as much about his reputation as some male adepts with too much machismo. He epted this condition with almost no difficulty.


    Still, a proper excuse to participate in the war wasn¡¯t enough. Greem also needed sufficient power to protect his people and to engage in the battle. As such, the choice of participants was also an important decision.


    The Tower of Fate had to send everyone to war. Even with Alice the tower owner included, it was still no more than eight witches. Moreover, they were all First Grade.


    Greem¡¯s side could probably only afford to spare Greem (Second Grade Fire Adept), Mary (Second Grade Vampire), Zacha (Second Grade Thunder Dragonborn), Goblin Shredder (Second Grade Magical Machine, piloted by First Grade Tigule), Deserra (First Grade Wind Adept), Billis (First Grade Bug Adept), Endor (First Grade Poison Witch), Dana (First Grade Medusa), Unguja (First Grade Demonhound), three Blood Knights (Pseudo-Second Grade Vampires) and Vanlier (First Grade Vampire).


    As for the remaining adepts, Gargamel and Eva were responsible for guarding Fire Throne and would be assisted by Charon the manticore.


    The Goblin ne would be left under Meryl¡¯s authority.


    The matters on Lance, on the other hand, would have to be left to Gazlowe, the Third Grade brain monster. He had to use the metal fortress to defend whatnds they currently held.


    The greatest fear of going to a different world was being surrounded by the native forces and forced into a war of attrition.


    Even an extremely powerful adept could be forcibly ground to death by a bunch of ant-like natives in this manner. Thus, after selecting a group of powerful underlings, Greem went about on a mission to put together an elite force of soldiers.


    Apart from the one hundred magical machines he would bring over, Greem also intended to expand his elementium golem army to act as more cannon fodder.


    Most of the battles these days relied on the endless army of magical machines. However, without Gazlowe and the logistics soldier factory that was the metal fortress, Greem would have to think of his own method to produce countless disposable soldiers.


    As such, Greem could only ce his hopes on his elementium golems, Billis¡¯ bug army, and Mary¡¯s vampire squad.

 Chapter 611

    Chapter 611 ne Opening Day


    Greem returned to the metal fortress once more after deciding on an initial list ofbatants.


    The newly captured frost dragon had already been sent to Fire Throne. She would be sold away via special means once the time was ripe. The name of the Crimson n had been founded after the n establishment banquetst time. They had left a deep andsting impression in the minds of many adept ns.


    Snox was now using his private social circle and trying to spread the name of his own brand using the high-quality dragons that Fire Throne could asionally provide. It made plenty of adepts who went home empty-handed extremely excited. They would visit Fire Throne every day, constantly looking out for specific news of the next dragon.


    Some of the wealthier adept ns even provided Snox with the gender, attribute, and all sorts of data for the dragon they needed. They imed, very boldly, that they would be willing to ept any price as long as the Crimson n could provide them with a dragon that suited their specifications.


    Snox was an extremely smart goblin as well. He decisively put on disy a dragon scale taken off of Frost Dragon Aruntini¡¯s body at the goblin shop he had opened at the hall on the first floor of Fire Throne. This way, visiting adepts would only need to examine the milky-white dragon scale to be able to figure out the bloodline purity and innate attributes of the frost dragon.


    For a moment, word of a new dragon in Fire Throne spread everywhere.


    Many high-grade adepts sent their own representatives to hurry to Fire Throne and negotiate the purchase of this frost dragon with Gargamel and Snox. For a short time, the Crimson n based at Fire Throne was at the center of attention, presiding above even the five great ns of Zhentarim. They had be the most popr and well-received, newly established n of Zhentarim.


    Yet, behind this poprity, all of the Crimson adepts had vanished one after another. They had started a new wave of seclusion.


    They were about to step on a journey to a new ne in three month¡¯s time. There was far, far, far too much preparation to be done before then.


    Firstly, they needed to finish the newest batch of miniaturized magic energy furnaces as soon as possible.


    Not only did the Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder require the furnace as its energy source, but some of therger construction machines also demanded the use of the magic energy furnaces. Greem needed first to ensure the safety of the n adepts before they made it into Faen.


    Secondly, Greem had been busy with nar invasions ever since he advanced to Second Grade. He had unknowingly let up on his fundamentals¨C the research and crafting of elementium golems.


    Now that they were about to enter a mature mid-sized ne governed by a host of deities, high-quality elementium golems were an irreceable support force. Greem needed to use thisst period of free time to convert all the high-grade elementium crystals he had been umting into suitable and indispensable elementium golems.


    That was the fastest way to increase his personal power!


    Furthermore, apart from these usual tricks of his, Greem also worked out the Spirit of Pestilence and the Stitch Ghost Golem. They gave him two new ways to deal with enemies.


    However, these two alchemical creations had independent soul consciousness. Greem needed to cultivate and train them for a long time if he wanted them to unleash their full potential. As such, these two beings could only act as Greem¡¯s assistants for the moment. He couldn¡¯t use them as the main fighting force.


    On the other hand, three of the talent-stealing bugs being bred in Fire Throne¡¯s secret room had entered maturity. They would soon be able to undergo the second phase of the bloodline experiment.


    Greem¡¯s heart raced when the prospect of being able to steal the bloodline talent of a mighty race perfectly crossed his mind.


    Ever since he had advanced to Second Grade, the daily meditations had been incredibly ineffective at raising his Spirit. In the end, the original owner of this body of his was no more than an ordinary human apprentice adept. The body¡¯s potential was minimal.


    Greem had relied on his tenacity and the Chip¡¯s help to rapidly climb to his current grade. However, the increase of his Spirit had suddenly slowed down tremendously at this stage. It even showed signs ofpletely stagnating. Without the use of special means, Second Grade might be the limit of this body.


    Greem had to do something about his soul origin or bloodline source if he wanted to improve further.


    However, soul experiments and bloodline research of this nature were always hazardous and risky. Any mistake could lead to devastating and irrecoverable consequences. So many Second Grade adepts turned themselves into monsters and abominations precisely because of a slight error in the process of modifying themselves.


    Moreover, when such mistakes involved the soul origin and bloodline source, it was virtually impossible to undo the damage. The more that was changed, the further the soul and bloodline would deviate from an ordinary human until the adept finally turned himself into a strange monster that no one could recognize.


    The main reason the Second Grade dragons the Crimson n provided were so popr was because the dragons were ubiquitously known for their robust Physique and bloodline powers. Being able to uncover the secrets within the dragon¡¯s bloodline was equivalent to excavating a new bloodline development path for any high-grade adept.


    Disregarding the dragon¡¯s bloodline legacy, just the immense lifespan and great elementium talents of the dragons alone were things that the human adepts were extremely envious of. If they were able to turn themselves into dragon bloodline adepts, they would be undefeated amongst adepts of the same grade.


    Moreover, the longer they were able to live, the more time they would have to improve themselves and advance. The powerful elementium strength from the dragons¡¯ bloodline would also make it a breeze to destroy adepts of the same grade.


    Bloodline adepts emphasized their bloodline powers, elementium adepts prioritized their elementium skills, and body-refining adepts focused on their physical strength.


    That was why living dragons became the most sought-after bloodline creature in the World of Adepts!


    Though Titans, Phoenixes, Hydras, and Behemoths were all bloodline creatures that were even more powerful than the dragons, they were few in number, hard to find, and extremely difficult to capture. Moving one step backward, it was only natural that the dragons became so sought-after by all high-grade adepts.


    ............


    The World of Adepts.


    Land of the Northern Witches, Werning.


    As the location of the Witch Council, Werning was a neutral territory that existed independent of the various witch branches. In particr, during these past years, the witch branches had set up the entrances to all the shared lesser nes at Werning, making the ce livelier than ever before.


    Today was the day the Pale Witches were opening up their ne. Arge group of individuals had gathered upon the road to Werning at the break of dawn.


    Those ordinary merchant groups had already retreated to both sides of the road upon seeing the forces of the witches arrive. Coachmen, ves, guards, and all manner of small fry crouched on the ground. Their heads were lowered, and none dared even look up to sneak a peek at the witches. Only merchant group leaders with titles could stand before the witches and bow to wee their arrival.


    A group of ck carriages that was extremely well-covered rolled past their respectful gazes. The handsome horses pulling the carriages all whinnied and pressed forward with all their strength. It seemed as if they were having a tough time.


    Knight Ed Kinsville was the manager of the Edie Chamber of Commerce. He often traveled upon this road and was used to such a scene. However, this was the first time his youngest son Finney was apanying him on a trip; he had never seen such a view before. He secretly looked at the legendary group of witches while hiding behind his father, also tugging at his father¡¯s sleeve as he did so.


    "Father, which branch are these witches from?"


    Finney¡¯s voice was extremely soft, but it still shocked Ed tremendously. The man quickly turned back and scolded.


    "Silence! Put your head down low and look at the earth at your feet. Do not stare at the carriages directly."


    Just then, ck-armored guards by each side of the witch carriages walked past the father and son while looking straight forward.


    Ed hurriedly used his hands to cover his son¡¯s mouth. He then turned and frantically bowed before the ck-armored guards.


    However, the guardspletely ignored Knight Ed. They continued to advance while guarding the ck carriages.


    At this moment, one of the carriages hit a rock on the road before Ed and his son. The tightly covered curtains flew upward, revealing the horrifying monsters packed within.


    They looked like humans who had been skinned and soaked in a filthy gutter for several days. Their bodies had a sickly pale color to them that resembled victims of drowning. Their skin was also slimy, wet, and let out a pungent smell.


    They had no eyelids either. Only milky-white eyeballs could be seen in their deeply sunken eye sockets. They were so white that not a spot of ck could be seen.


    They were like a group of dead creatures, unmoving even as they were packed within the small and narrow carriage. However, they immediately sensed the trace of a living human when little Finney¡¯s gaze fell upon them. Their slimy bodies trembled and started writhing about, wildly sniffing for the scent in the air. They became restless.


    Themotion in this carriage caused a chain reaction.


    Soon, all the nearby carriages also trembled intensely. One could even asionally hear the ¡¯howls¡¯ of these terrifying monsters.


    "What happened? Who alerted these ghouls?"


    Two young witches appeared in the sky on flying brooms. They silently hovered above the carriages.


    The restless carriages once again fell silent as they sang a strange and drawn-out song. The monsters within calmed down once more.


    It was the Death Witches!


    The knowledgeable Knight Ed immediately recognized the identities of the witches by the styles of their witch robes and the emblems they wore. He immediately fell onto the damp dirt in surprise. Little Finney, who had crossed eyes with the ghouls, had already fainted.


    "Hmph! Useless fellow. If you had alerted the big guys in the other carriages, they would not have stopped until they devoured you. You¨C go and tell the people in front to have all unwanted personnel retreat thirty meters away from the road." The witch in charge of guarding the carriages cursed unamusedly. She then whistled and took to the skies on her strange broom again.


    The ck-armored guard that the witch had pointed at immediately bowed in acknowledgment. He dismounted from his horse and rushed toward the front of the formation.

 Chapter 612

    Chapter 612 Magical Machines Take the Stage


    The portal to Faen was in an underground hall behind the Witch Council. It was under the joint protection of the Sidonthiria n and the Pale Witches.


    The witches of the various branches had all sent their representatives to Werning as the date of the ne¡¯s opening approached. What surprised people the most was the fact that the Witches of Fate had also sent people to participate in this nar invasion.


    It was the first time this had happened since the witch branches had shared their private lesser nes with the others.


    Thus, the arrival of the Witches of Fate drew a lot of attention!


    While the other witches were driving their heavy chariots on the uneven roads toward Werning City, a massive shadow flew past their heads.


    The witches in the rear of the formation lifted their heads in surprise. They were shocked to find an iparablyrge flying ship storming toward Werning City with unstoppable momentum, shredding the clouds in their way as if it was a metal fortress floating in the skies.


    Several dozen witches rose from Werning at the same moment. They stood off against the flying ship from a distance.


    "Who is it that has arrived? Do you not know that this is the Northern Witches¡¯..." Of the many Sidonthirian witches, the leader was a terrifying Third Grade.


    The massive flying ship suddenly stopped when she appeared in front of it in the air.


    A familiar shape appeared at the bow of the ship before she could finish her sentence.


    "Lady I, it is me!"


    The voice was deep yet gentle. It wasn¡¯t loud, but there was a strange charm to the sound. Even Third Grade I couldn¡¯t help but open her eyes wide in disbelief as she gasped, "Alice, it¡¯s you?"


    The several dozen apprentice witches surrounding the Third Grade witch opened their mouths wide in shock. They silently stared at the pretty figure that had emerged from the ship and was smiling at them.


    There was that familiar robe of stars, those pretty eyes, that head of silky smooth ¡¯white¡¯ hair, and that gentle yet determined look in her eyes.


    It was Alice. It was truly Alice, leader of the Witches of Fate!


    "Lady Alice, this is..." Witch I couldn¡¯t help but ask questions.


    Alice¡¯s presence on the ship meant that they weren¡¯t dealing with an enemy. Still, a massive metal battleship like this didn¡¯t seem to have ever appeared in any of the witch branches. In fact, the design and style of the ship somewhat resembled those fellows from the Silver Union.


    While the witch responsible for the security of Werning City was caught up in the confusion, a hint of a smile appeared on Alice¡¯s pale face.


    "I, this ship is our ride. We are here to participate in the ne opening day of the Pale Witches."


    "What? Participate in the ne opening day?"


    For a moment, I couldn¡¯t believe her ears.


    In the past seven decades since Witch of Fate Alice had handed over the ne coordinates of thatrge-sized ne, the witches of the other branches had also started to publicly open the portals one or two of their private mid-sized nes. They encouraged witches of other branches to form groups to explore and excavate these nes.


    These mid-sized nes might have been excavated and developed by them for several hundreds of years now, but there were still some potent and terrifying local native forces existing within. These n witches were only barely able to survive as a foreign faction within the nar world.


    The territory they had excavated was often isted beyond the main continent or situated in some perilous and hazardous ce.


    They had only managed to avoid the persecution and expulsion by the native forces and hold on to their strongholds through such methods.


    They still hadn¡¯t managed to fully excavate these private nes even after a thousand years. Instead, they had slowly assimted with the ne, bing a ¡¯local¡¯ force that was half native and half hostile!


    Most of the witch branches took this opportunity to offer up these nes that they couldn¡¯t do much with. They would provide the portal and the temporary foothold for all adventuring witches. The witches of the other branches could keep all spoils they found on their adventures.


    This way, they could indirectly draw upon the strength of the other witch branches to help their own n develop and expand theirnds. The time of the ne opening usually onlysted for six months to a year. All witches of other branches that failed to leave within that timeframe would no longer receive reinforcements via the portal. Naturally, they would also no longer be able to get any supplies from the witches¡¯ stronghold.


    Lone witch parties like these would eventually be exterminated by the fierce persecution of the local native forces. Thus, no witch party would ever dare to go against this rule!


    It was precisely the cruelty and bloodiness of internar warfare that made the affair a suicidal one for weaker witches. That was why the Witches of the Fate were the only ones out of the eight current branches that had yet to send anyone to participate in these ne opening days. After all, it had not even been a hundred years since Alice brought the Fate branch back to life.


    Consequently, I, who very well knew what the situation was like, was shocked upon hearing Alice¡¯s words!


    "Since Lady Alice is here to participate in the Pale Witches¡¯ ne opening day, then please stop your ride at Fifteenth Street Square!"


    Alice was clearly intimately acquainted with this Werning City. She turned back to give a give a simple order, and the flying ship immediately turned like a giant whale. It slowly flew toward somewhere one and a half kilometers away under the apaniment of many Sidonthirian apprentice adepts.


    ............


    The citizens and merchants of Werning were all terrified when they saw the hundred and twenty-meter-long and forty-meter-wide massive flying ship slowly descend from the skies. They hid at a distance and silently judged this fearsome metal beast.


    A thick, muffled boom rang out.


    The gigantic hull of the flying ship sessfullynded on the t and stable Fifteenth Street Square, crushing the tough stone bs beneath into dust.


    Several Sidonthirian apprentice adepts rode upon flying brooms and floated in the skies around the flying ship. They all held glowing elementium wands in their hands.


    Strangely enough, the first to appear on the full metal deck of the flying ship was not a human. Instead, it was a group of short and stout green-skinned goblins wearing leather suits with goggles upon their heads. They started to shout and wave excitedly at the witches in the air once they appeared upon the deck. No one could figure out what it was that they were saying.


    The cabin door opened once again while the apprentice adepts were mired deep in confusion. This time, it was the actual Northern Witches.


    Seven Witches of Fate followed closely behind their leader, Alice. They walked onto the deck in an orderly fashion and arrived at the bow of the ship.


    The goblins no longer dared to make amotion when they saw the witchese out. They hurriedly ran to each side of the tform and started giving orders while waving strange glowsticks in their hands.


    The next second, a hatch opened at the side of the hull. Squads of ferocious and towering metal golems of strange design walked out from within the ship with heavy footsteps. The entire square tremored slightly with their march.


    It was a group of exceptionally fierce-looking metal monsters!


    The armor on their bodies was at least a dozen centimeter thick and glowed with a ghostly blue sheen. That was an appearance unique to magical metals. They came in various shapes and appearances. With a quick nce, one could approximately split the machines into three categories with.


    The first ones were defensive magical machines with incredibly thick and heavy armor. They held arge metal tower shield in one hand and a thick, massive il in the other. As they walked in neat rows, the dust and debris on the stone bs of the square were sent flying into the air. Even the stone buildings around the square started to tremble slightly.


    The second type of machines wasparatively slender and agile. However, their bodies were covered with all sorts of strange gun barrels of various sizes. For some reason, the apprentice witches could vaguely feel a suffocating killing intent when they looked at these ck gun barrels.


    The first two types of magical machines took up ny percent of the army. Three even stranger and even more fearsome magical machines slowly walked out of the ship behind them. These three machines were all enveloped by a forcefield of semi-translucent energy.


    The machine in the lead was the first proper magical machine warrior that Greem had created after exhausting a great deal of energy and effort¨C the Mechanical Pioneer, Second Grade.


    It was a new magical machine warrior model that used the miniature magic energy furnace as its power source. Installed on it were the Blitz Apperception System, magic energy guns, gravity interferometers, and energy artillery cannons. Greem didn¡¯t wholly put this mighty magical machine warrior under Gazlowe¡¯s control. Instead, he decided to have the machine fight using the traditional method of the goblins¨C being operated by a pilot.


    However, the magical machines of the past were difficult to control, yet they were still only capable of simple body movements. They could not qualify as proper magical machine warriors. However, the Mechanical Pioneer had been equipped with the Blitz Apperception System. When hidden within, First Grade Goblin Mechanic Tigule didn¡¯t need to use any levers or control panels. He could wlessly operate this powerful machine using his mental consciousness alone.


    The other two magical machine warriors were the improved Goblin Tinker and the Goblin Bomberman.


    The magic energy weapons installed on them were not as powerful as those outfitted on the Mechanical Pioneer. Their core energy sources were also miniature space furnaces, rather than the miniaturized magic energy furnace. They were far inferiorpared to the Mechanical Pioneer, especially with the addition of the goblin mechanic.


    If one were to evaluate these two machines from various aspects, they could barely make the cut as Pseudo-Second Grades.


    All who witnessed these one hundred towering metal constructs form up neatly in the square couldn¡¯t help but hold their breath and dte their pupils.


    This...this was a frightening army of steel!

 Chapter 613

    Chapter 613 Entering Faen


    Bringing a bunch of metal golems to fight in another world?


    The witches present were first stunned at first but quickly began to snicker secretly.


    These witches had some idea of these metal golems¡¯ power, seeing how they were encased in their dozens of centimeters of armor. These one hundred golems alone could raze a sizeable human city of several hundred thousand people with no difficulty.


    However; what about it?


    The number of magical crystals needed to raise so many metal golems was astounding.


    It was true that they were undefeated and unchallenged when pit against human armies. But what happened after that? Could the losses incurred in powering the golems be covered by the damaged armor and weapons captured from the opponent? Where was the value in conquering other nes if every battle only incurred further losses like that?


    Every single adept¡¯s tower of the Northern Witches contained many different steel statues, metal golems, voodoo beasts, and construct lifeforms. However, they could only remain within the tower as part of its defense system. It was very rare for a golem or a statue to be transported and ced on a faraway battlefield.


    Otherwise, just the amount of magical crystals spent on activating them would be a headache.


    Organizing them into an army of steel and having them be the cannon fodder of war was an act of excessive waste and extravagance! That was why the Sidonthirian apprentice witches betrayed such an odd expression upon seeing Alice bringing such arge group of metal golems to Werning City.


    Before the sneer from their faces could be wiped away, a few tall silhouettes emerged from the ship and caught their attention.


    It was a group of foreign adepts and their followers. There were both men and women in the group, numbering a total of twelve individuals.


    The Sidonthirian witches were surprised by the high number of Second Grade adepts in this group. It was important to note that Second Grade adepts were the backbone of most adept ns. It was very rare to catch even a glimpse of them if something big hadn¡¯t happened.


    Yet, despite only having six adepts in this group, half of them were Second Grade.


    All the apprentice witches were secretly terrified when they saw the ferocious bodies and intimidating auras of these adepts. They quickly flew back on their flying brooms.


    "What¡¯s the matter, Alice? Why are there so many foreign adepts?"


    I once again flew toward Alice and demandingly questioned with a frown.


    Werning was the headquarters of the Witch Council, after all. It was the ce where the witch leaders held their sacred meetings. Ordinarily, no adepts other than Northern Witches were allowed in here.


    It was also currently a gathering of witches, which made it even more impermissible for unrted adepts toe ¡¯strolling¡¯ through Werning!


    "They are peripheral adepts of the Tower of Fate. They will be following us into Faen this time." Alice pursed her lips and smiled as she casually exined.


    I swept across with a nce. As expected, she saw the unique bnce emblem of the Witches of Fate pinned to the chests of these adepts.


    "This..."


    I fell silent for a moment. She knew this wasn¡¯t appropriate, but after a moment of thought, she realized she couldn¡¯t find any w in Alice¡¯s words.


    Almost all witch towers had some number of male adepts. Their positions were always inferior to witches of the same grade, and they were often at the fringe of any form of power or influence. That was why it was ordinary to find male adepts amid the ranks of witches!


    However, in this particr party, it was apparent that these ¡¯peripheral adepts¡¯ were the ones who held the dominant position. Inparison, the Witches of Fate appeared to be supporting characters.


    That was why this scene felt peculiar and upsetting for I, who had always been ustomed to witches holding the superior position!


    However, this much wasn¡¯t enough to say that Alice was in the wrong either.


    I had a bizarre andplicated expression for a while. She had no choice but to lead Alice and her group of people to the teleportation hall located underground.


    ............


    Faen ne.


    It was an exceedingly beautiful mid-sized ne.


    Thendmass of the ne took up more than forty percent of its total area. Plenty of small inds and smaller continents were also scattered across the vast and boundless ocean.


    Among them, the tworgest continents were governed by humans and elves, respectively. A vast ocean also separated the two continents. Onlyrge ships meant for long-distance travel could make the journey. It had been 1,100 years since the Pale Witches had invaded this ne. Sadly, they had been incapable of establishing a stable foothold on either of these two main continents.


    Faen was a top-tier mid-sized ne. With the tworge continents and the vast oceans as its foundation, powerful native deities had been born to the ne. Naturally, three pantheons were born- the oceanic, the humans, and the elves.


    All ocean creatures among them, including the maritime empire that ruled over a vast territory, worshipped the same powerful deities- the God of the Sea, Dions!


    Sea God Dions was estimated by the Pale Witches to be a fearsome Sixth Grade. He had under him God of the Sea Beasts, Atri (Fourth Grade) and God of the Shallow Bay, Sintra (Third Grade). Apart from these two, there were also several minor deities no higher than Second Grade.


    The Garan Continent that the elven empire ruled over had a poption of thirty-four million forest elves. They worshipped a powerful nature deity- the God of the Elves, Saoirse. She was yet another terrifying Sixth Grade deity. She had as her subordinates: the God of Archery, Marco (Fourth Grade), the God of Rangers, Eisner (Fourth Grade), the God of Luck, Visenna (Third Grade), the Heart of the Forest, Yurga (Third Grade), the God of Moonlight, Meve (Third Grade), as well as a host of demi-gods and sacred creatures.


    Inparison, the Faen Continent upon which the humans lived had more substantialnds, higher poption, and more abundant resources. Unfortunately, they had yet to give birth to a sufficiently powerful human deity. Instead, many, many minor deities had been born. For example: God of War Kael, God of Strategy Bourecq, God of Assassination Keira, God of Wealth Bining, and God of Justice Dornfelder.


    Their followers and believers wandered the continent, working hard to spread their faith. It gave rise to a strange andplicated situation where the deities and their followers lived in coexistence.


    Almost every city-state and vige popted by humans on the Faen Continent were home to a multitude of religions. They fought and contested with each other, yet mysteriously enough formed a parasitic rtionship of coexistence and shared prosperity.


    The survival of native forces in this strange and great world was already difficult. As invaders, the lives of the Pale Witches were even harsher!


    The Pale Witches had locked onto Faen 1,100 years ago. They had broken into this world under the guidance and help of Great Adepts in the outer realms.


    The point of invasion back then had been the elven continent.


    Unfortunately, the elven gods had already turned the ce into a mighty empire. The Pale Witches had faced a brutal retaliation from the elven pantheon and the elven empire during their very first invasion.


    The two parties had broken out into a bloody battle upon the elven continent.


    The Pale Witches had killed as many as five elven gods. Though these were all minor deities of only Second and Third Grade, they had still dealt a heavy, severe blow to the elven pantheon. Even the Sixth Grade Goddess of Elves Saoirse had been forced into a deep sleep of a thousand years.


    The Pale Witches had also suffered horrifying losses.


    Two of their Great Adepts from the ounds had participated in the war. One died, and the other had been severely wounded. Still, they had barely managed to stave off the attacks from the elven pantheon.


    The Pale Witches had also lost n adepts counting up to double digits. In the end, they had no choice but to retreat from the elves¡¯ continent and escape on theirst legs to a ce known as Shadow Ind.


    The Pale Witches erected a tall adept¡¯s tower upon Shadow Ind and constructed an internar teleportation array. They then obtained some reinforcements from the World of Adepts. It was only then that they barely managed to hold a forward camp in Faen.


    Over the next thousand years, the Pale Witches wouldunch an invasion at the Garan or Faen continent every time they umted sufficient strength. They would use war to rob and ruin the viges and cities of these two continents such that they might obtain the resources they required.


    Faen was a top-tier mid-sized ne after all. The Pale Witches alone would have a hard time expanding theirnds and obtaining more resources when Faen had sufficient power to defend itself. That was why the Pale Witches took the opportunity of the Witch Council¡¯s suggestion of sharing resources to offer up Faen.


    At any rate, the teleportation coordinates of Faen were in their hands. Why wouldn¡¯t they do something as convenient as using the strength of the other branches to expand their territories? The small share of resources they would have to give up on couldn¡¯tpare to thend and poption that they would be able to own forever.


    Thus, on this day, an intense magical radiance shone upon the adept¡¯s tower on the isted Shadow Ind.


    Several magical halos stirred the air around the ind like an unrelenting tide, causing the wind to ripple outward. The dense mist that always hung around Shadow Ind was pushed into the distance by this strange force. The bright sunlight finally fell upon the jagged and uneven Shadow Ind along with all of the protective arraysid upon it.


    A massive portal slowly opened up in the center of Shadow Ind when the magical aura radiating from the tower reached its peak.


    At this moment, no one knew how many pairs of strange eyes around Shadow Ind were silently witnessing this phenomenon happen.


    They didn¡¯t dare go too far into Shadow Ind due to the existence of the protective arrays and the tower. They could only wait silently on the small inds nearby.


    "Cough! Go back and tell the priest. The witches are moving again. It seems yet another ughter is about to befall our ne of Faen."


    A strange merfolk watched the happenings in the distance. They couldn¡¯t help but sigh as they gave the order when they sensed the intense spatial aura in the air.


    Thus, everything that had happened on Shadow Ind was subtly spread to all the major forces of Faen!

 Chapter 614 Shadow Island

    Chapter 614 Shadow Ind


    The isted Shadow Ind was like the ne¡¯s tumor to the rest of the major forces in Faen.


    These evil witches from another ne were entrenched upon Shadow Ind, using the geographical advantage and their terrifyingly powerful adept¡¯s tower to resist the repeated attacks of the seafolk, the elves, and the humans for over two hundred years.


    Finally, the elves and the humans had no choice but to give up on this fearsome war that had almost run their races into the ground. Instead, they chose to trap the witches and iste them from the main continents.


    After a few hundred years of conflict, even the seafolk had no choice but to acknowledge the existence of the witches. They gave Shadow Ind and the surrounding hundreds of kilometers of territorial waters to these foreign witches but strictly forbade them from stepping out from the ind.


    For the next six hundred years, Shadow Ind became the most horrifyingnd of evil in Faen. Every year, countless evildoers who could no longer survive in the Faen and Garan Continents would travel far and wide to Shadow Ind to join the Pale Witches.


    That indirectly increased the influence and strength of the witches!


    The Pale Witches were able to make connections with many underground dark forces within Faen with the help of the ties brought to them by these local natives. The Pale Witches provided them with powerful and evil magical equipment, and these dark forces became the eyes and ws of the witches, helping them scour the continents for rare resources.


    Both sides took full advantage of each other and slowly extended their influence into each other¡¯s factions. The Pale Witches had now be the strongest underground force of darkness in Faen!


    Over the past hundred years, the Pale Witches always chose to open the way to Faen every ten years.


    This way, the Northern Witches that entered Faen would be the allies and vanguards of the Pale Witches. They would hastily charge toward Garan and Faen, stealing wealth, plundering resources, and abducting higher elves and seafolk. In doing so, they inflicted tremendous suffering and cmities on the civilians of the two continents.


    Thus, the natives of Faen painfully named these disasters as the Cmity of Witches!


    After such a long time in conflict, the sages and wise men among the humans and elves had slowly managed to figure out the pattern of the Cmity of Witches. The event would happen once every ten years. It wouldst approximately six months, sometimes stretching out to as long as a year.


    As long as they secured the necessary defenses and preparations, they could minimize the losses and damage brought about by the invading witches during the Cmity of Witches. The native forces near Shadow Ind would also form the Anti-Evil Alliance in the event of the Cmity of Witches. They would send their armies out to fight with the witches.


    It had been ten years since thest Cmity of Witches this year!


    The surrounding forces were all on high alert. They used all the tricks they had up their sleeves to ce sentries around Shadow Ind. All of it was for the sake of figuring out the day of the Cmity at the very moment it happened.


    The most apparent prelude to the eruption of the Cmity of Witches was the opening of the portals on Shadow Ind.


    ............


    After a thousand years of management by the Pale Witches, Shadow Ind was like an iron barrel.


    As the tower¡¯s energies wildly gathered at the teleportation square, a massive portal measuring ten meters in height and five meters in width slowly opened up in the middle of the square.


    Fifteen minutester, the first batch of witches gradually appeared as the energy from the tower slowly started to stabilize. They hadn¡¯te alone. Instead, they drove many ck carriages across the portal, quickly passing through the nar portal as if they were passing through castle gates. They arrived on Shadow Ind from Werning City.


    The ones pulling the carriages were not ordinary horses. They were all voodoo beasts that radiated a magical aura.


    The nar suppression on Shadow Ind had been reduced to the very minimum due to the magical barrier of the tower. The witches that arrived atop the carriages didn¡¯t betray any excessive biological symptoms of unease. Even the beasts appeared unfazed. They continued to pull the carriages with plenty of vigor, transporting the goods and resources within to the ind.


    Six Death Witches hade. They were led by a Third Grade witch, with one Second Grade follower and four First Grades. Apart from the adepts, the Death Witches had also brought along with them two hundred undead of intermediate and advanced levels. Amongst them were one hundred and forty elite ghouls, twenty advanced mummy elders, five shadow dwarven assassins, fifteen specters, five evil corpse dragons, five toughbone dragons, ten death knights...


    They were the cannon fodder the witches had specially prepared for this nar war!


    The Coldwinter Witches sent five people. One Second Grade and four First Grades. They brought with them as many as a hundred Frost Guardians. These were a particr type of voodoo beast made by modifying ice and snow lifeforms.


    The witches of the other branches also sentrge voodoo beast armies. These armies quickly took up the massive teleportation square as the portal continued to spit up more people.


    The Death Witches.


    The Coldwinter Witches.


    The Agony Witches.


    The Pale Witches.


    The Dark Witches.


    The False Witches.


    The Deceit Witches.


    A brilliant light burst forth from the portal once the voodoo beast armies of the seven major witch branches had arrived.


    It was as if this nar portal made from countless runes and chains ofws had swallowed a piece of meat that wasrger than its throat could swallow. It could neither devour it or spit it out. The previously stable portal started to ripple and tremble.


    "Dammit, what¡¯s happening? Haven¡¯t all the witch parties teleported over? Why¡¯s there a big fellow in there? Quick, hurry; have the tower expand the spatial rift a bit more. If the bastards on that side blow up the portal, the entire teleportation array will be destroyed."


    The tower trembled slightly, and the supply of energy was increased once more with the strict orders of the stationed witch. The portal started to expand, and finally, with a light pop, a massive metallic creation appeared before the witches.


    "This...what¡¯s this?"


    It was the first time she had seen such a massive metal creation. The stationed witch stuttered from the shock.


    "No need to be concerned, it¡¯s a giant floating ship! It¡¯s probably something from the Silver Union. Still, Faen is only open to the Northern Witches. Why¡¯s there a Silver Union floating ship here?" This time, it was a Third Grade Pale Witch who spoke up. She had a pale face, silver-gray hai,r and was leaning against a mysterious staff of a unique design.


    The Third Grade witch that led the Death Witches was evidently acquainted with this Pale Witch. She shook her head and exined, "Wurzer, you¡¯ve spent too much time in Faen. I¡¯m afraid you probably don¡¯t know about the return of the Fate Witches. This floating ship was brought along by them!"


    "Don¡¯t think of me as such an ignorant fool. You are speaking of that brat known as Alice, aren¡¯t you!? To think a First Grade brat could climb her way to be the leader of the Witches of Fate. Kehkehkeh. The Fate Witches are truly an existence that outsiders can never hope to figure out." Witch Wurzer couldn¡¯t help but start cackling when the topic shifted to an interesting one.


    The massive door of light trembled intensely andpletely shattered once the flying ship had made it past the portal. The violent and chaotic magic energy turbulence thrashed about in the teleportation square, but it was kept out by the defensive arrays that rose from the ground.


    The violent turbulence only calmed down after several minutes, allowing the people in the square to let out a breath of relief.


    "All witches leading their parties must follow me to the seventh floor for a meeting." Witch Wurzer called out softly.


    At this moment, Greem and Alice had only just stepped out of the metal hatch of their ship. They looked at each other upon hearing this and left the matters of logistics to their subordinates. They then followed the other witches and slowly walked toward the great tower looming at the center of Shadow Ind.


    Shadow Ind was an ind out in the sea and was isted from the other continents. One couldn¡¯t find a better volcanic ind for a base within a radius of five hundred kilometers. The adept¡¯s tower stood above the massive volcanic crater, using the mighty underground powers of fire here to provide the tower with an enormous source of free energy.


    Shadow Ind wasn¡¯t particrlyrge in size. It was only approximately seventy square kilometers.


    Apart from the abiding pirs of volcanic dust, the witches had also used a vast amount of mist on the outskirts to hide Shadow Ind. That was why the ind was mostly gray and shielded from the sun. Its skies were always the same dull gray color.


    Naturally, the Pale Witches all stayed within the tall tower. They never needed to worry about the harsh outside environment. However, the fellows that came to Shadow Ind to join the evil witches could only set up crude shacks and huts at the edge of the ind, leading ¡¯peaceful¡¯ and ¡¯needless¡¯ lives as fishermen there.


    The Pale Witches were not kindhearted enough to provide them with food and clean water. They needed to find their own water sources and food if they wanted to live in such a harsh environment. Or, they could take it from the hands of others.


    Supply ships from far away only came every two or three months. That was why blood and murder weremon themes in the walled city that was Shadow Ind.


    The brief meeting was held on the seventh floor of the tower.


    When Greem and Alice arrived here with the other witches, they immediately saw a massive projection of Faen in the center of the hall.


    The geography of the massive Faen Continent stretched and wound about. There were vast and sprawling mountains everywhere, with some extending for as far as five thousand kilometers, while others had steep and unforgiving slopes upon which towering forests stood. Human cities, towns, and viges of all sizes were scattered along the continent. When paired together with the winding rivers and massivekes, it was a perfect picture of a human world.


    On the other hand, the massive Garan Continent was filled with a sea of trees. From a distance, the ce looked like a gigantic forestpletely covered in towering, ancient trees and numerous green nts.


    Greem immediately, with absolutely no reservations, scanned the three-dimensional projection of Faen into his Chip using a unique method. He then quickly reconstructed a model forparison.


    Just then, a group of witches in strange clothes walked into the hall.

 Chapter 615 Staff of Divination

    Chapter 615 Staff of Divination


    The ones who had arrived were a group of spirits.


    More specifically, they were a group of powerful spirits that apanied the Pale Witches.


    The reason the Pale Witches were so powerful was due to these fearsome spirits whose souls existed in symbiosis with their own.


    Any enemy that sought to fight with a Pale Witch would have to simultaneously deal with two strong opponents whose souls and minds were united. One possessed a physical body and excelled at elementium and curse-type spells, while the other was a full spirit and immune to most physical damage.


    When you put the two together, you had aplete Pale Witch!


    It was the power of the apanying spirits and their independent consciousness that made the Pale Witches to view theirpanions¡¯ apanying spirits as theirrades themselves. The apanying spirits would receive the very same treatment and benefits as their host wherever they went.


    The ones that walked into the mission hall right now were a group of apanying spirits.


    It seemed as though the witches themselves were busy with other matters. Thus, they had left the issue of receiving the ¡¯allied army¡¯ to these apanying spirits.


    Five spirits walked into the hall. One was Fourth Grade, two were Third Grades, and the other two were Second Grades.


    Naturally, the one who spoke was the Fourth Grade spirit.


    It was a beautiful young woman in a magnificent court dress. She could easily be the heroine of any noble human banquet she appeared in. Her bountiful chest was visible underneath the thin, low-cut tube dress. Her skin was as white and smooth as ivory, and a red blush could vaguely be seen on her delicate and perfect face.


    In truth, if it weren¡¯t for the data that the Chip had projected in his mind that so clearly pointed toward her being a spirit, Greem would have unknowingly treated her as a real human.


    "I am Lilit, the highest witch stationed in Faen by the Pale Witches. Firstly, please allow me to wee my sisters to Shadow Ind of the Faen ne."


    An enthusiastic round of apuse rang out in the hall.


    "We Pale Witches have specifically decided upon a new battle n to coordinate the excavation of Faen. Seven days from now, all forces on Shadow Ind will be split into two parties. These two parties will respectively invade the Garan Continent and the Faen Continent. Though I know my sisters came here to search the ne for resources, it is best to work with our forces. This way, it will be safer, and we can ensure that all of our operations go smoothly."


    "If sisters of any branch wish to join us, why don¡¯t you report your targets and goals to me. I will arrange for a suitable invasion path at my discretion."


    A few of the witch representatives present in the hall couldn¡¯t help but lower their heads in contemtion when they heard Witch Lilit¡¯s request.


    "The Garan Continent." The first to speak was the representative of the Dark Witches.


    Since someone had already spoken up, there was no reason for the other representatives to hold back.


    "Faen Continent."


    "Faen Continent."


    "Faen Continent."


    ......


    "The Oceanic Empire."


    As many as five of the witch branches had expressed interest in going to the weaker Faen Continent, governed by the humans. On the other hand, only the Fate and Dark Witches wanted to go to the Garan Continent ruled by the elves. The most peculiar ones of them all were the False Witches. They actually chose the Oceanic Empire as their target.


    Lilit frowned and fell silent for a moment. Finally, she spoke.


    "Since more of our sisters chose the Faen Continent, then we Pale Witches will treat Faen as our main battlefield during this invasion. Those who go to Garan will only be responsible for a feint attack. All sisters who choose to go to Garan will have to take on a portion of risk on their own. Also, on the matter of the Oceanic Empire, we have only recently signed some cooperative agreements with them. If you False Witches start any trouble after entering theirnds, you will not receive any help or reinforcements from our part."


    All the witches had already expected such an attitude from the Pale Witches. None of them raised any objections.


    "Very well. Since everyone has epted this n of action, then we can spend the rest of the time on Shadow Ind to rest and prepare ourselves for the uing battle. You should try your best to eliminate the effects of nar suppression as soon as possible. Seven days from now will be the time of our coordinated operation! Also, if any of you require detailed information and maps of a specific territory in Faen, you can visit Miss Rita. If you want to craft some special spirit equipment, you can visit Witch Wurzer. Very well, that¡¯s all I need to say for now."


    Having said that, the pretty Miss Lilit turned and left the mission hall without looking back.


    After some discussion with Greem, Alice decided that she would look for that Miss Rita and purchase detailed information about the Elven Empire and the Garan Continent.


    The price was thirty thousand magical crystals!


    The target that Alice had set her sights upon this time was a powerful artifact in the hands of the elves. To avoid revealing her main objective of this trip, Alice had no choice but to purchase all the information.


    The Staff of Divination!


    It was a low-grade artifact that possessed the immense power to see through the fate of the world.


    Anyone who possessed this staff would constantly sense a whisper murmuring in their ear as if secretly spilling to them the secrets behind the world. However, this sound was the voice of the devil for ordinary individuals with no talent for divination; it could drive them mad. You couldn¡¯t hear what it said even if you wanted to hear, yet there was no way to silence the voice if you didn¡¯t wish to listen to it.


    Constantly, continually, perpetually murmuring!


    However, when this Staff of Divination fell in the hands of sages and wise men, it would be able to expose the true face of the world hidden by thews of the ne.


    Alice needed to obtain this Staff of Divination and seal it into her Cards of Fate if she wanted to advance to Second Grade. It was the only path forward that she had obtained after three consecutive fate divinations.


    Of course, there also existed other paths of advancement. However, Alice would never be able to walk down those paths with her current life force. That was why Alice had no choice but to grit her teeth and walk down this path of advancement, even if it was filled with rigor and countless possibilities of death!


    Before she arrived, Alice had only managed to divine that the Staff of Divination was located in Garan. She had absolutely no idea who possessed the staff. As such, Greem and Alice were both stunned when they pieced together and analyzed the information they had purchased.


    If there was no problem with the information that Miss Rita had sold to them, then it was very likely that the Staff of Divination had fallen into the hands of a mighty dragon demi-god. Here in Faen, a powerful dragon demi-god often meant an opponent of Second Grade.


    There were dragons in the elven-ruled Garan. There was no mistake with this information.


    It was said that approximately two dozen dragons lived in Garan. Most of them were low-grade green dragons, but there were also a few extremely strong Emerald Dragons in their midst. The Staff of Divination that Alice wanted to get her hands on was an item within Second Grade Green Dragon Ohgu¡¯s collection.


    The dragons might be prideful creatures that disliked living with other species, but they still had very close ties with certain individual kinds.


    The forest elves were nature creatures. The emerald dragons and the green dragons also favored nature and were dragons that enjoyed living in vast forests. That was why these two species were, naturally, often on good terms across many different nes.


    The forest elves had even carved out arge stretch of forest that belonged solely to the emerald and green dragons within the Great Fantasy Forest. Moreover, the elves had specially constructed a tall dragon cliff for the dragons to gain their favor. They had used countless jewels and mountains of gold coins to decorate the pces of the dragons.


    After enjoying so many offerings from the forest elves, the dragons were willing to battle on behalf of the elves conditionally. In fact, some dragons even became remarkably closepanions and friends of influential individuals among the forest elves. It strengthened the ties and bonds between the two groups.


    Alice, to her distress, realized that she would have to take the forest elves into all of her considerations to deal with the green dragon known as Ohgu. Otherwise, any battle n that they came up with would be utterly disrupted by the intrusion of the forest elves.


    Still, what troubled Greem and Alice the most wasn¡¯t how to fight their battles. Instead, it was theirck of a local native who was familiar with Garan.


    Greem¡¯s thoughts fell upon the evildoers staying on Shadow Ind.


    ............


    Saltfish Tavern.


    The day had just turned dark, and already the tavern was filled to the brim.


    Greem had just pushed past the two rundown doors of the tavern and taken his first step into the establishment when he frowned at the raucous sounds and voices. What bothered him more was the heat and the smell of cheap, pungent perfume, sweat, and the stench of salted fish having been stored for far too long.


    The living environments the Pale Witches provided these foreign followers was not good at all. There were no sturdy, safe, orfortable rooms. There were no delicious and fragrant meals. There was no warm water to shower with.


    They all ate bread made of stale and rotting wheat, drank coarse beer, and the only meat they ate was fish. That was why all outsiders living on Shadow Ind reeked of fish.


    When they all gathered in the only tavern on Shadow Ind, their sweaty smell gathered together and was amplified by the heat. This horrifying smell could probably kill an ordinary person who walked into this ce for the first time.


    Of course, Greem was no ordinary man!


    With his Second Grade elementiumized body, he couldn¡¯t be killed even if he were thrown into the deadliest volcano in this world. Naturally, there was no way he would copse from this mere stench.


    Greem decided just to hold his breath as he scanned the crowd by the door side.


    All sorts of vagrants, murderers, and criminals in ragged clothes with unkempt faces gathered here. They were of various races as well: humans, barbarians, dwarves, sethraks, and even half-elves.


    The reason Greem was certain that they were half-elves was that he had already ¡¯seen¡¯ with his spiritual senses the pair of long, slender ears they were hiding under their tattered trilbies.


    Greem¡¯s appearance had also clearly attracted the attention of all the guests of the tavern.


    They all held the same poses from the moment before, looking at this outsider that didn¡¯t belong to their group with nk faces. No one knew how to respond for a moment.


    Greem might have put on a thick cloak over his adept¡¯s robe that hid all the rich threads and magical runes, but his cleanliness and neat appearance still betrayed him. It made him appear tantly outstanding.


    "We intend to go to Garan soon. We need to hire some guides who are familiar with the local geography there. Are there any amongst you who are suitable candidates?" Greem made no attempts to hide his intentions either. He directly stated his requirements.


    Tssss!


    The sound of people inhaling in surprise instantly echoed in the tavern.

 Chapter 616 Secret History of the Elves

    Chapter 616 Secret History of the Elves


    In the end, the one that managed to stand nervously before Greem was the male half-elf that he had first spotted.


    Tymo was his name.


    ording to Tymo, he was born in Garan.


    His father was a high elf, while his mother was an ordinary human maid.


    In the Great Fantasy Forest of Garan where the elven court resided, the high elves led a life much like human nobles, indulging in wine and luxuries. Tymo¡¯s birth was no more than an ident; one caused by a high elf toying with a human maid while drunk.


    Racial chauvinism for pure-blooded elves was the norm in the elven court.


    Thus, Tymo¡¯s father, the high elf, had been cold-hearted enough to n Tymo¡¯s murder right after his birth, all for the sake of keeping the family bloodline pure. However, Tymo¡¯s mother, the human maid, was unwilling to let her son die like that. She had escaped the Great Fantasy Forest under cover of night.


    The mother and son wandered Garan for many years until the year Tymo turned fourteen. They were once again found by the subordinate sent out by the high elf. After some fighting and brawling, Tymo finally found a chance to jump off a cliff when his mother had desperately clung on to the assassin¡¯s leg.


    Tymo¡¯s mother died under the sword of the elven assassin, while Tymo himself escaped Garan while covered in wounds. He became a sailor aboard a long-distance ship.


    For the next hundred years, Tymo wandered around the human-led Faen. In the end, he was forced to escape Faen after killing an important noble that had attempted to abduct him and turn him into his sex ve.


    As a mixed half-elf, Tymo possessed agility and bnce that no ordinary human could match. His potent racial talents allowed him to advance his profession into a rogue sessfully. In fact, he became an exceptionally famous rogue and thief.


    In truth, Greem was not at all interested in Tymo¡¯s tragedy. The only thing he was interested in was Tymo¡¯s hatred for the elven empire and his understanding of it.


    Tymo might have lived in the Great Fantasy Forest for as many as a dozen years, but the only memories that remained in his mind were the scornful gazes and the endless hatred he held.


    The Elven Empire was an extremely xenophobic country!


    The entire empire, all the way from the royalty and nobility to the lowest sses of elves, hated alien races with an extreme passion. They even held an intense hatred for the humans, carved into their very bones.


    The humans chopped down forests and destroyed vegetation. The size of the woods would decrease rapidly wherever humans went. There was great tension between the human¡¯s method of production and developmentpared to the beliefs of most elves, resulting in all sorts of conflicts and disagreements.


    Greem brought the half-elf back to his ce. After an entire day and night, he finally managed to obtain the obtain the other piece of information about the Elven Empire that was even more detailed and realistic than what they already possessed. Tymo had visited most areas of the Great Fantasy Forest, after all. The information he provided was the best addition and correction to what they already knew.


    Garan was split into many differentmunities by the forest elves. Those who could live in the core area of Garan were, naturally, the noblest and most influential elven families. The weaker tribes and ns could only stay at the fringe of the Great Fantasy Forest.


    The edge of the forest neighboured the shore. vers from Faen would often stop here in secret and ambush the weak elven tribes to capture forest elves and transport them back to human society to be sold at a high price. The forest elves were all handsome and pretty individuals. Their figures were attractive, and there was an exotic element to them. That was why prices for elves were always high in the upper echelons of human society.


    An ordinary elven girl could sell for the shocking price of three to five thousand gold coins in human society. High elves withbat and magic professions could even go for as high as several hundreds of thousands of gold coins.


    It was a dangerous thing to be living at the edge of the Great Fantasy Forest. Every year, hundreds of ver ships would secretly sneak into Garan, where they would attack an elven vige before quickly retreating.


    While most of the vers would fall to the arrows of the elven patrol, there were always fortunate men who could make it through the defensive lines of the Elven Empire. They could then swipe everything within an elven vige and take with them every single forest elf, be they old or young.


    The hatred between humans and elves only umted under such a background. At this point, their rtionship had deteriorated so much that members of each race would bear arms at first sight of the other!


    Tymo obediently told Greem everything he knew before respectfully asking the adept, "Lord adept, I have been wondering. The target of your attack this time is..."


    "The Dragon Cliffs!"


    Greem sat by the wooden table and gave a straightforward answer to the half-elf¡¯s question. He didn¡¯t seem to care for the half-elf¡¯s widening eyes.


    Two strange, palm-sized dolls were happily climbing all over Greem¡¯s body.


    One appeared to be put together from coarse and crude pieces of wood and radiated a fearsome green light from within its body. The other was a ck ragdoll that was haphazardly sewn together. Half of its body was male while the other half was female. The only thing on the doll¡¯s face was a single eye drawn in blood, making it seem all the more sinister and odd.


    The two strange dolls didn¡¯t seem to get along with each other. They rarely came together, preferring to y by themselves; one crouching upon Greem¡¯s left shoulder while the other floated above the right shoulder.


    Their choice of y was extremely bizarre as well.


    The wooden body of the Spirit of Pestilence didn¡¯t seem to be a physical body. Whenever it saw something interesting, it would wave with its hand. The wooden hand would then instantly transform into countless tiny poison bugs that were indistinguishable to the naked eye and bring the item to the doll. The Spirit of Pestilence¡¯s method of assessing the quality of the item was to bite it.


    Ordinary items would instantly melt under the Spirit¡¯s horrifying powers of poison. Even inferior magical equipment couldn¡¯t endure corrosion of this level.


    The newly crafted Stitch Ghost Golem also only possessed a newborn soul consciousness. It appeared somewhat slow and stiff. However, Tymo instantly froze and fell into a daze when the doll turned its eye and locked eyes with him. His soul had almost been ripped out of his body.


    In the end, it was Greem putting his hand in between them and cutting off their eye contact that pulled Tymo back to consciousness.


    The half-elf shivered frightfully and no longer dared to lift his head to look around.


    Yet, the adept¡¯s answer reverberated inside his mind.


    The Dragon Cliffs...Dragon Cliffs. To think the target was the Dragon Cliffs!


    Outsiders might not understand what the Dragon Cliffs represented. However, as a half-elf that had spent over a dozen years in the Great Fantasy Forest, Tymo was well aware of the importance of the cliffs to the forest elves.


    That was because the Dragon Cliffs represented the ultimate force of the Elven Empire!


    The half-elf immediately kneeled in front of Greem out of his loathing for his elven father and his hatred for all forest elves. He swore to do everything within his power to help the adepts aplish this tall task of attacking the Dragon Cliffs.


    Greem, satisfied, recruited him into the party.


    ............


    Seven days quickly passed.


    After sufficient recuperation and replenishment of supplies, the expedition ships hoisted their sails and made for the two distant continents ording to n.


    This time, Alice¡¯s Witches of Fate became the center of attention once again!


    The flying ships, filled with resources, goods, and magical machines quickly rose into the skies in front of everyone¡¯s eyes. It silently hid in the denseyer of clouds.


    The Dark Witches, whose rtionship with the Fate Witches wasn¡¯t all that harmonious, had no choice but to take the ships provided by Shadow Ind. They hurried toward Garan along with the Pale Witches.


    Tremendous magical energy surged and coursed through the insides of the flying ship before being converted into intense wind power to levitate the ten-thousand-ton metal ship and allow it to glide across the air soundlessly. Powerful elementium currents shredded the nearby clouds, leaving behind them a strange path of torn up clouds.


    One could see the pristine blue seas zoom past beneath their feet through the gaps in the clouds. The passengers atop the ship could also asionally see green inds, along with merry seagulls circling thendmasses.


    Sadly, such scenes were quickly left behind before anyone could get a better look.


    Grem closed his eyes to feel the magical elementium aura of this mysterious world, as well as the strange narws of this different ne. He had never felt as calm and rxed before this moment.


    They had stepped upon a dangerous path of ne conquest. What awaited them would be bloody battle after bloody battle. Yet, for some reason, Greem had overwhelming confidence and assurance of their victory on this trip!


    It wasn¡¯t arrogance or some sort of prediction. Instead, it was his faith and confidence in himself and this group of people he was with.


    The magical machine army had shaped up now after the events and training in Lance. The golem army he had painstakingly created was also ready to break into action at any time. Moreover, he also held several mysterious trump cards in his hand. The trip to Garan this time might be dangerous, but Greem had confidence he could fulfill Alice¡¯s wish.


    Isn¡¯t it just a Staff of Divination artifact. Isn¡¯t it just a Second Grade green dragon. Isn¡¯t it just a bunch of frail elves protected by powerful deities. What could these things count for?


    At this moment, all enemies were no more than paper tigers in Greem¡¯s mind!


    All he needed to do was find that one crucial weakness of the enemy.


    Greem was confident in himself!

 Chapter 617 Legend of the Blood Moon

    Chapter 617 Legend of the Blood Moon


    The Garan Continent.


    As one of the only tworge continents of Faen, Garan was a rich, lively, and beautiful world.


    When one looked into the distance, they could see that Garan was covered in a dense, verdant sea of forest.


    The ancient trees in the forest were tall and mighty. Each one measured up to several dozen meters in height, while their treetops easily stretched for hundreds of square meters. Leaves grew in abundance upon the trees, while vines wrapped everywhere. All sorts of strange unknown birds of a variety of colors perched on the branches and chirped delightfully. The dense foliage of nts and trees filled the dark and silent space of the forest; it was hard to find any ce to stand.


    It was almost impossible for an ordinary person to travel through this forest!


    This ce was a rural, fringe area of Garan close to the shore.


    The tall, ancient trees appeared much less dense here. Even their height seemed to be considerably less impressive. Sharp cliffs and treacherous reefs were everywhere along the shore. The sound of waves beating against the rocks and the beach was almost deafening. It was an intense and exciting sight.


    The tumultuous surface of the sea shone and sparkled brilliantly. Jade seas, blue skies, green waters, and a vast forest. Roars and bestial cries rang out from the woods every so often, a sign of the pulsating life and hope in this breathtakingly beautiful scenery of nature.


    Just then, several ck dots appeared in the depths of the forest. They hovered right above the canopy of the forest, rapidly approaching the beach.


    It was a squad of the Elven Empire¡¯s special Silver Pegasus Knights.


    Lithe elven knights rode upon tall and handsome horses who had arge pair of wings and were covered in ayer of soft silver armor.


    The silver pegasi were as their name implied. Their bodies were brilliant silver from the armor, clear for all to see even with dozens of kilometers of forests obscuring their silhouettes. Wide and t hooves, long manes dyed silver, fast and agile bodies, and those broad wings that allowed them to ride the wind and freely traverse the blue skies.


    These pegasi were wondrous magical beasts born near a particr magical spring in the depths of the Great Fantasy Forest. They had the appearance of horses, the speed of eagles, and the elegance of unicorns. Thus, the forest elves specially tamed these magical beasts and turned them into the mounts of some high-grade knights. In doing so, they formed the most eye-catching flying squad of the elven empire¨C the Silver Lightning.


    They might not be as ferocious as griffins or as strong as hippogryphs, but they possessed the fastest flight speed in Garan, as well as the shiest appearance.


    Showy appearances might not be of much help inbat, but the Silver Pegasus Knights were still voted¨Cwith a massive lead¨Cas thebat profession most beloved by the girls of the Elven Empire. Almost no elven girl could reject a Silver Pegasus Knight inviting them to a romantic glide above the canopy to witness the beautiful sights of nature.


    As such, from every aspect, the Silver Pegasus Knights were the most elite and popr iconic armed force of the elven court!


    The Silver Pegasus Knights and their reserve, the Pegasus Knights, usually only patrolled near the elven court; they rarely came so far out to the shore to do their work. However, their appearance here today meant that an important member of the royalty was somewhere nearby.


    Two Silver Pegasus Knights and three reserve Pegasus Knights formed this particr party.


    As the Silver Pegasi reached the edge of the forest, the leading Silver Pegasus Knight pushed against the saddle and leaped from three meters above the canopy.


    Silver Pegasus Knights usually only wore light silver mail and wielded light weapons to reduce the burden upon the pegasus. They also carried some throwing spears and plenty of arrows in the horse¡¯s saddlebags.


    The Silver Pegasus didn¡¯t pause for a single moment. It extended its wings and quickly galloped back into the sky while the knight lightly fell to the ground.


    This Silver Pegasus Knight possessed the lightest and most agile movements in the world. His lithe body immediately leaped backward after a brief step upon a tree branch. He somersaulted several times through the air andnded firmly upon a cliff at the edge of the shoreline.


    "Hegus, wait for me."


    The other Silver Pegasus Knight that came with him apparently didn¡¯t have such agile movements and limber body parts. He could only pat his pegasus, have it circle the sky, and finally decelerate and stop above the cliff.


    It was only now that the Silver Pegasus Knight carefully jumped onto the cliff.


    Hended slightly heavily, and his silver boots stepped on the edge of the cliff. Countless pebbles and rocks instantly fell off the cliff andnded in the waves, the bubbles, and the reef.


    Cold sweat ran down Cidaris¡¯ brow as he patted himself on the chest and stabilized his breathing. It was the first time he had gone out on a mission. The elf then strode to Hegus¡¯ side.


    The first Silver Pegasus Knight that had jumped off his mount had already taken out a telescope reflecting silver light and was silently scanning the horizon of the sea.


    "Hegus, you are really brave. It¡¯s so high, yet you jump. Are you not afraid of falling into the ocean and feeding the fishes?" Cidaris teased hispanion as he ducked his head out to look at the dark rocks and tumultuous waves beneath. He patted himself upon the chest once more.


    With this height and dense concentration of rocks, anyone would die if they fell from here!


    The two Silver Pegasi joyfully chased each other above the nearby canopy now that their knights had gotten off their backs. The other three Pegasus Knights drove their newly-tamed pegasi downward andnded on an empty spot. They quietly waited for further orders from the two knights.


    As noble Silver Pegasus Knights of the elves, both Cidaris and Hegus were handsome men. Their bodies were tall yet lithe. They had firm muscles, goodplexions, heads of grassy green hair, soft, sharp ears, and blue eyes.


    They wore light silver mail upon their bodies, silver faulds of the same color on the bottom, silver leather boots on their feet, and carried two silver scimitars at their waists.


    Cidaris¡¯ skin was somewhat white, and his delicate face had a certain youth and childishness to it. His eyes were bright and shing, with a memorably bright and warm feeling to them. Hegus was equally handsome, but the shape of his face was sharper and harder. His every move and action carried with it a trace of sternness and experience unique to military men.


    Cidaris mumbled a few more words softly but didn¡¯t get any response from hispanions. He couldn¡¯t help but ask curiously, "What is it, Hegus? There is no mist at sea today; you can see everything at a nce. What are you looking so hard for? Are you worried about the human ver ships?"


    Hegus silently put down the telescope and replied with a solemn tone, "I¡¯m not worried about humans. I¡¯m worried about... those witches."


    Cidaris batted his eyes as if he didn¡¯t quite understand.


    "I¡¯ve also heard. It¡¯s finally reached the time of the Cmity of Witches! The witches will probably be making the long trip to harass us once again, but the past few times have been a lot better. The witches seemed to have figured out how powerful we are. They¡¯ve been putting most of their strength on the side of the humans. Our losses thesest couple of times haven¡¯t been too big."


    Compared to Cidaris¡¯ indifference, Hegus appeared to be extremely anxious.


    "Cidaris, you don¡¯t know," Hegus hesitated for a moment before finally gritting his teeth and speaking, "I visited Priest Tia a few days ago."


    Cidaris immediately turned concerned upon hearing the name Tia. He yelled without raising his volume, "You¡¯ve gone mad. How¡¯d you dare to make contact with that madwoman? Don¡¯t you know that people have been calling Tia the ck Witch behind her back? It¡¯s said that the elder¡¯s council are already preparing to vote to expel Tia from the Great Fantasy Forest. Do you intend to have the elder¡¯s council set their eyes upon you by talking to her at this point?"


    "Rx, Cidaris, rx; let me finish," Hegus sighed and said, "Personally, I don¡¯t think there was anything wrong with Priest Tia¡¯s actions."


    "Nothing wrong? To research the powers of those otherworldly witches as a follower of the Great Saoirse. Is this not a sin?"


    "It¡¯s been a thousand years since those wicked witches broke into our world. Have we been able to expel them? No! We¡¯ve never managed to do it in the past, we can¡¯t do it right now, and we will probably not be able to do it in the future. Why? Isn¡¯t it because they possess magical powers that are far superior to ours? That which they call magic."


    Hegus sighed.


    "If...if things could truly go as Priest Tia envisions it to be and the followers of the Great Saoirse can all learn that powerful magic, then we forest elves might actually be able to be the rulers of the Faen ne."


    Cidaris couldn¡¯t help but shake his head after hearing Hegus¡¯ exnation.


    "Hegus, I think you¡¯ve been deluded by that Priest Tia. Don¡¯t believe what she has to say. What ¡¯power is neither good or evil,¡¯ what ¡¯it only depends on who wields it.¡¯ Don¡¯t believe her, Hegus. In my opinion, all powers in the world are divided by good and evil. The power of the witches might be immense, but that power must be able to bewitch minds and corrupt souls. Why else are they capable of such evil and horrifying things?!"


    Hegus was silent for a long while. Finally, he spoke again.


    "Do you not wish to know what Priest Tia obtained after researching the books left behind by dead witches?"


    An ominous feeling rose in Cidaris¡¯ heart when he heard hispanion¡¯s heavy tone.


    "What did she tell you?"


    "She said that the witches that invaded our world are only a branch of a major force in that fearsome World of Adepts. The increasingly frequent Cmity of Witches is a likely indication that something has changed with the witch forces there. More and more witches are entering our world!"


    Cidaris couldn¡¯t help but gulp. He asked nervously, "Then what does that mean?"


    "It means that our world has be the main target of the opponent. It is very likely that even more terrifying and evil enemies will appear during this year¡¯s Cmity! A blood moon... Tia said she saw a blood moon." Hegus was practically shouting at hispanion while gripping him by the cor when he reached the end.


    "Blood moon..."


    Cidaris¡¯ face instantly became flushed white.

 Chapter 618 Finding Veins

    Chapter 618 Finding Veins


    Garan Continent, somewhere near the west coast.


    The flying ship slowly flew above the clouds at an extremely slow speed.


    The few adepts belonging to the Crimson n had alreadye on deck. They leaned against the bow and silently observed the mysterious continent below as it peeked in and out between the clouds.


    With their strength and the enhancement of the Eagle Eye Spell, they could easily see through the thinyer of clouds and directly observe the amazing scenery of Garan¡¯s nature and its plentiful nt life.


    Sadly, the elves that they were trying to find were not as easy to discover as humans. Humans liked to cut down the trees near their settlements and use them to construct high, sturdy camps and buildings. That was why it was easy to find human viges. All one needed to do was wait for night time and follow the light from fires.


    However, the elves were known for their adoration of nature. They were a race that loved and cared for forests. They almost never cut down trees, preferring to ce their viges and cities right up on those extraordinarily tall and thick ancient trees.


    Treehouses. Those were the homes of all elves.


    Elves also very rarely lit fires once night fell. Add to the equation the fact that they often lived in the dense forest and it was nearly impossible to find them with the use of a torch.


    It was especially the case for Greem and the adepts. They were flying above in the blue sky and looking down upon the stretch of uneven, green sea of forests. It was hard to even find a color other than green. Trying to spot an elven vige under such circumstances was no more than a dream.


    As such, the only way to find elves here was to dive into the forest and traverse the terrain as the elves did. It was still searching for a needle in a haystack!


    "Tymo, might you be able to recognize the geography here? I hope to hide this flying ship before starting a war with the elven court. You rmend a ce!" Greem took a quick look at the lush green forest and turned to ask the half-elven guide.


    Of course, Greem couldn¡¯t possibly ce all his trust in this person that had joined them halfway. He silently brought out the map of Garan in his mind as he waited for Tymo¡¯s answer, andpared it to the long shoreline beneath them.


    Half-Elf Tymo couldn¡¯t suppress his agitation, as if it had been far too long since he smelled the magical aura of the Great Fantasy Forest. He crouched upon the bow of the ship and silently evaluated the forest under them.


    "If I didn¡¯t remember wrong, this ce should be Whitecliff, slightly to the south of the west coast. The most obviousndmark should be a tall white stone cliff standing at the edge of the shore."


    Greem followed Tymo¡¯s descriptions and found a speck of white on the distant shore.


    "This is the area of the west coast where the currents are the mostplicated and the reefs are the densest. It¡¯s the ce least suited forrge ships. Thus, the chances of us running into an elven empire patrol here is extremely small," Tymo pointed his finger in a certain direction of the forest, "Proceed forward in that direction from here, and we should be able to find an elven vige after approximately seven days. Sorry, I was speaking about the time needed to walk through this sea of a forest. As for this...this big guy, we probably only need half a day to reach the vige."


    "An elven vige," Greem contemted for a moment before shaking his head, "It¡¯s not ideal for us toe into contact with the elves prematurely. We first need to find a suitablending spot. Tymo, are there anyrge metal veins or mines in this west coast area?"


    "Metal mines?" Tymo opened his mouth wide in shock, "There seem to be quite a few in the center of Fantasy Forest, but here on the west coast..."


    The half-elf lowered his head to think for a moment before gesturing uncertainly, "There should be a ratmen mine sixteen days north of here. As for whether there are metal veins in there, I have no idea!"


    "Then we will go there first!" Greem decisively gave his order.


    A short momentter, the flying ship once again pulled up and disappeared into the cloudyer above. They quickly flew toward the north of the coast based on the directions given by the half-elf.


    Once the gigantic flying ship had disappeared entirely, two elves drapedpletely in clothes made of green vines emerged from the top of a tall tree.


    Two elves¨Cone male and one female¨Clooked in the direction that the metal monster had disappeared. Their eyes were still filled with immense and unconcealed shock.


    "What is that? Is it another fearsome monster the witches created?" The female elf¡¯s voice was shaking. It was clear that she had yet to break free from her earlier horror.


    "There¡¯s no time to think about what it is. We need to bring the news of the metal monster back to the vige as soon as possible. Perhaps Grandpa Wenger can give us the answer we want." The male elf quickly made up his mind.


    "Mm, let¡¯s go."


    The two elves disappeared into the treetops behind them in the blink of an eye.


    Strangely enough, their silhouettes merged into the forest in a single instant, making it difficult to track them.


    One dayter, news of the appearance of a terrifying metal monster spread throughout all of the elven viges on the west coast.


    ............


    Ratmen Mine.


    The sixteen-day journey that Tymo spoke of was no more than a day and a night for the flying ship.


    If it weren¡¯t for the uncertainty of the location to the entrance of the mine, Greem and his crew would have arrived here four hours earlier.


    As the name Ratmen Mine implied, arge ratman tribe lived in this ck mine that was hidden within the forest. Only its nted entrance was revealed for outsiders to see.


    The elves were a race of individuals who ced tremendous importance upon their personal image and hygiene. They would sooner die than work in dark and damp mines. That was why the forest elves hade to an agreement with the ratmen inside the mine. The ratmen were to offer up a certain amount of ores on an annual basis to the forest elves in exchange for the right to live within the mine.


    Consequently, one couldn¡¯t find a single elf within Ratmen Mine. The only ones living inside it were intelligent ratmen of one meter in height that walked about like humans and used all sorts of delicate tools in their work.


    The frail bodies of the ratmen didn¡¯t allow for heavy armor. They usually only put a metal helmet on their heads and lit a thick candle above that for illumination. This dim light was what they relied upon to freely move through the dark, dank mine.


    The weapons of the ratmen miners were usually shovels of some sorts. Stronger ratmen warriors could also equip iron swords, spears, and other powerful weapons.


    Judging from Tymo¡¯s description, Greem figured that the strongest ratman here, their leader, was merely at First Grade. The other ratmen warriors and miners were either advanced apprentices or pseudo-adepts. Moreover, they were of the trash variety that had no elementium powers, with only small schemes and tricks to fall back on.


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to send out the valuable adepts against such trash. He merely ordered a goblin technician to charge in with five Archers.


    Greem and the others found a tter spot outside the mine and set up a table and chairs. The battle inside the shaft ended before they had even taken three sips of the hot tea.


    All two hundred ratmen, including the rat king, had been dealt with and turned into sieves by the metal bullets of the magical machines. As for the metal crossbow bolts that the ratmen shot out from the dark ditches? Neither their strength nor power was enough to deal with the thick metal armor of the magical machines.


    Thus, the Archers very easily massacred the entire ratmen tribe.


    The goblin technician also brought back four or five ores that had been excavated from the depths of the mine.


    Greem casually picked up one of the ores and weighed it in his hand for a bit. He then brought it closer to his eye for a more detailed inspection.


    [Beep. Inspectionplete. This is an ordinary ore. It contains 11% mineralponents. The rest is scrap with no utilization value. Upon estimation, the mineralponents of the ore are as follows:


    [Chromite 1.42%.


    [Olivine 3.27%.


    [Pyroxene 2.86%.


    [......


    [Metal content ratio lower than(unspecified)XXX%. No excavation or smelting value.]


    The Chip gave a final assessment after providing a long list of mineralponents.


    The quality of the Ratmen Mine wasn¡¯t very high. Most of the minerals they offered to the elves were only low-grade magical materials that apanied the ores, such as topaz, peridots, and agates. These things still had some value to the elves, but they were utterly useless to Greem, who only wanted to establish a foothold as soon as possible.


    He inspected all of the ores that the goblin technician brought out of the mine and then waved his hand in disappointment. All of the crew boarded the ship once again, and the flying vessel turned and sped away toward yet another mysterious mine in the distance.


    It could honestly be said that Greem was ignoring all other precautions for the sake of finding a suitable metal ore vein as fast as he could. At any rate, this was only the fringe of the Great Fantasy Forest. The military force that the Elven Empire could extend here was limited and insufficient to dissuade their operations.


    The allied army of the Dark and Pale Witches would be arriving at Garan by boat in another five or six days. They would be an even more conspicuous target then, who would also be easier to catch.


    It was inevitable that the Elven Empire would be more willing to surround and exterminate them with their elite armies instead of futilely chasing after a flying ship.


    In truth, Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered with worldly mortal armies with his tough ship and massive cannons. The only things that would make him slightly concerned were the elementium users and fearsome powerhouses amongst the elves.


    However, Greem was currently only circling the edge of Garan. He hadn¡¯t ughtered or harmed any elves. They were also continually turning back into the broad stretch of forest. Even Greem himself wouldn¡¯t know what to do with this mysterious metal monster if he were ced in the shoes of the elvenmander dealing with it!

 Chapter 619 Enemy Assault

    Chapter 619 Enemy Assault


    Spear Valley was exceedingly calm and peaceful in the afternoon.


    Birds and bugs constantly chirped in the dim forest as flocks of colorful birds extended their beautiful wings and wove through the branches joyfully.


    Dappled sunlight projected through the fine gaps between the leaves and the branches, leaving strands of brilliant light in the middle of the air. Sadly, these pirs of light couldn¡¯t illuminate the forest. In fact, they made Spear Valley seem all the more quiet andplex.


    The Spear Valley was a long, deep and narrow valley, known as such because its geography resembled a spear. An underground mine excavated by kobolds could be found in the deepest point of Spear Valley. The mine was famed for its abundant production of high-quality metal ores.


    In all honesty, this ce was a restricted military area carved out by the Elven Empire. No other individuals apart from elven convoys and kobold miners were allowed anywhere near it.


    Kobold mines would often copse easily due to excessive excavation and theck of light. Other creatures and beasts were very reluctant to enter kobold mines. As such, the defense of kobolds unknowingly turnedx under such circumstances.


    One could see that the only two kobold warriors guarding the dark entrance to the mines were nodding off while leaning against the rock wall and cradling their spears.


    Towering trees still covered the cliffs on either side of Spear Valley, their full canopies blocking out the bright sunlight and leaving only tiny rays of light in the valley.


    Yet, amidst this peacefulnd, a female elf in delicate armor cast off her robe. She appeared out of her disguise from the shadows of a tall tree¡¯s canopy.


    "Aizac, will that metal monster reallye all the way to this rural ce for a robbery? There¡¯s nothing in the kobold mine down there besides metal ores. What would the witches want with these lumps of metal?" The female elf flung her head of short green hair and turned to look at the tree beside her.


    A human figure strangely started to emerge from the dry and wrinkled bark on the tree that the female elf was looking at. The human figure then turned into a male elf who was draped in grassy green vine clothes, wore a stag helm upon his head, and had a wooden staff in his hands.


    The man had thick eyebrows,rge eyes, a straight nose, and a full mouth. His headful of green had been tied into wild braids that scattered and rested upon his shoulders. He wasn¡¯t exactly handsome, but he had a kind of wild and whimsical charm to him.


    One could tell from his appearance that this elf was an individual with the special ss of the forest elves¨C a Druid.


    If one were to go by a profession¡¯s traits, the druids were like abination of warriors and spellcasters. They had powerful nature magic and could not only cast spells but also use Wild Transformation at any time. In doing so, they could transform into a true magical beast, capable of using powerful racial traits and their physical strength to engage the enemy.


    However, the targets of druidic transformations were mostly wild, natural magical beasts. They couldn¡¯t transform freely into any being they wished.


    This druid known as Aizac was also a Second Grade individual. He had especially hurried over from the central mountains to intercept the metal monster. However, the urgency of the situation left him no time to gather his forces. The druid conve he had brought with him was not theplete one. They were only a third of the total number.


    Even so, this group of forty druids was a significant and influential force, regardless of where they went.


    "Commander Merina has already given me instructions before I came here. We must figure out the strength and intentions of these enemies this time. The General Staff Division has already researched the movements of these enemies, and it seems they are here for the mines of Garan. They have already robbed four wild mines on their way here. Given their flight path and the location theyst appeared in, this kobold mine is very likely to be their target."


    "If the General Staff Division is so certain of this, why did they only send you people here? What about the des of Glory war band? What about the Fury of Nature deadshot squad? What about the Silver Lightning flight patrol? Where are they?"


    One couldn¡¯t fault the female elf for being so angered.


    In the end, she was no more than the guard captain (Second Grade) of a nearby elven city. She had approximately a hundred warriors under her, with the majority of them being fairies and de dancers. Less than half of them could advance to elites (First Grade).


    Even if all the druids that Aizac brought with him were elites, that would make for no more than fifty or sixty elite warriors. The female elf captain was genuinely anxious about ambushing the metal monster and the witches aboard it with such a meager force.


    "It can¡¯t be helped! "Druid Aizac shook his head and said, "We are in an emergency right now. We have already received credible news that arge fleet of witch warships are closing in on the east coast. The elite forces within the empire have all been assigned to Silver Moon City to the east. Themander is worried that this metal monster is only bait that the enemy is using to split up our forces. Why else have they yet to attack any elven town until now? Thus, before we figure out the basic strength of these group of enemies, we are the only ones who could make it here in this short amount of time."


    "Then at least send us the Silver Lightning or the hippogryphs! The enemies are flying in the sky. How else am I supposed to fight with them if not with flying units?" The female elf captain was still upset.


    "The forces you mentioned have all been directed to the east coast to scout the enemy¡¯s movements. It is impossible for them to cross great distances and hurry over here for the moment. If the enemy enters our ambush andnds the metal ship, then we will find a way to barge our way inside and take over the ship. The druids I have brought with me have all advanced, so they can transform into windhawks and wield some level of airbat ability. Leave it to us if the enemy has any sort of air unit! However, when necessary, we might need your long-ranged attacks as support fire.¡±


    The female elf captain nodded silently upon hearing this.


    There were twenty elven archers in the guards she brought with her. They weren¡¯t as powerful as the deadshots, who had already advanced, but they had no problem with support fire at mid to close distances.


    The only problem now was that the elves had absolutely no idea what kind of enemies were hiding within the ship. Whatplicated matters was the ability of the enemy to choose their targets from the height that they were at. The elves could only passively defend and guard against the enemy before they could confirm their target. They had no way of efficiently gathering troops tobat the metal ship.


    For example, the female elf captain had to silently wait here for an enemy that might show up while also worrying about Moonshade Vige located forty kilometers away from here. That ce was her hometown and thend upon which she had lived her entire life. She had brought the whole garrison of the vige here with her.


    If, by chance...


    The female elf captain shook her head and cast away the terrifying thoughts from her mind. She then pulled aside the dense foliage of leaves before her and started to scan the blue skies to the west.


    Suddenly, the captain¡¯s body trembled. She let go of the branches and squeezed even deeper into the canopy. Her blue eyes were still fixated upon the ck dot that was slowly increasing in size on the western horizon.


    The female elf captain didn¡¯t dare to dy. She cupped her mouth and shouted at the nearby forest at a high frequency. High frequency shouts like these would only be ignored by outsiders as background noise, especially in the woods, where leaves were constantly rustling. Only creatures of nature such as forest elves, druids, and fairies could decipher that drawn-out call.


    The enemy had truly arrived!


    Moreover, they were heading straight for the kobold mine.


    All the elven warriors hiding in the forest by Spear Valley hid themselves after receiving the orders of the captain. They perked their ears and silently waited for the nextbat order.


    The female elf captain took one step backward and shook the elven cape on her,pletely concealing her armor and body. Her silhouettepletely melded into the surrounding environment after a series of strange shifting lights and shadows; it was impossible to distinguish her from the surroundings anymore.


    The Second Grade druid known as Aizac also used a concealing spell to merge himself with the trees. Unless the enemy happened toe into contact with his body, there was no way they would find him, regardless of how many times they looked at his current position.


    ............


    The flying ship swiftly glided above the skies.


    Tymo discovered the unique Spear Valley from a distance.


    With his guidance, the flying ship sted out dense wind elementium particles and slowly stopped above the kobold mines.


    The geography of Spear Valley was too narrow. It didn¡¯t allow for the flying ship tond within.


    That was why Greem leaned over the front of the ship to judge the distance. He then waved his hand and had the vessel lower its altitude as much as possible.


    The flying ship slowly started to descend while aligning with the center line of Spear Valley. Soon, it was level with the two cliffs beside it. Just then, the canopy of the trees scratched against the flying ship, letting out ear-piercing sounds of grinding metal and snapping branches.


    The two kobold warriors guarding the entrance of the mine were already shocked awake. They dropped their spears when they saw the gigantic object crushing toward them and escaped into the tunnels while yelling and hollering.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    The bottom of the flying ship had touched the cliff, and The entire ship trembled before finally stopping.


    At this moment, the ancient trees of the stone cliffs surrounded the ship, tightly wrapping around it as if they were the swaddling clothes of a baby.


    A ten-man squad emerged from the inside of the ship.


    It wasposed of two goblin technicians leading eight Archers.


    Apart from half-elf Tymo, only Greem, Billis, and two other Fate Witches were on the deck.


    It was the two young witches¡¯ first timeing to such a beautiful and different world. They were excited, joyful, and had already made ns to go touring through the nearby forest.


    Who knew? They might be able to find some rare nt specimen that didn¡¯t exist in the World of Adepts in these strangends. Such things were worth quite a lot of magical crystals back in the World of Adepts.


    Just as Greemmanded the ten-man exploration squad to dive downward, the two witches at the bow of the ship suddenly shouted ¡¯enemy assault.¡¯


    The whistling of arrows came from the skies above.


    Arge cluster of enchanted arrows glowing with magical light shot toward Greem and the others.

 Chapter 620 The Fight on the Deck

    Chapter 620 The Fight on the Deck


    An enemy assault.


    Loud shouts filled the skies.


    Greem¡¯s expression instantly changed.


    The first wave of attacks from the enemy wasn¡¯t very dense. At the most, there were only a hundred or so arrows.


    However, the terrifying thing about the attack was that every single arrow was an enchanted arrow.


    Szzzzzz!


    The ear-piercing noise of arrows cutting through the sky rang out. All one hundred enchanted arrowsnded upon the flying ship.


    The elves hiding in the darkness were sly as well. They actively gave up on the ten metallic magical machines and aimed their arrows at the adepts in cloth robes.


    Unexpected. Truly unexpected!


    They had never run into any trouble since they had entered Garan. Moreover, they had traveled in seemingly random directions and never started any direct conflicts with the elves. All these factors caused Greem to unknowingly let down his guard.


    He had sincerely never expected them to receive an attack of such scale in a rural ce where no elves could be seen, and especially not an attack with enchanted arrows.


    Pupupu!


    The sound of arrows piercing flesh rang out continuously.


    Greem and the other three adepts were turned into pincushions stabbed full of arrows. The violent nature powers instantly shredded the robes that they wore, and the adepts coughed up blood. The pain was unbearable. The two witches even cried out in pain and copsed to the ground.


    Greem raised his head and roared out loud. Searingva immediately surged out of his body, along with vaporizing streams of fire. The enchanted arrows embedded in his body were instantly roasted red before softening, melting, and flowing down his body in the form of liquid metal.


    Greem had alreadypleted the elementiumization of his body and his Spirit. Physical attacks like this were ufortable, but they weren¡¯t enough to kill him.


    Bug Adept Billis, on the other hand, was a monster that was very hard to kill through physical damage.


    If it weren¡¯t for the trace of strange nature power attached to the arrows of the elves, they probably wouldn¡¯t even have been able to cause minor wounds to Billis.


    Bug Adept Billis stood up straight again after enduring the impact of the natural power. He couldn¡¯t care less about the arrows on his body. Instead, he opened his wickedpound eyes wide and locked his gaze upon the lithe forms that had revealed themselves and were advancing toward the flying ship by stepping from branch to branch.


    Greem and Billis were not severely wounded, but it was a different matter for the two witches.


    They were rookies that hadn¡¯t advanced too long ago. Naturally, they had no great life-saving skills simr to what Billis had. One had died in the dense barrage of arrows earlier, while the other was severely wounded. It was truly tragic.


    The surviving witch might have been turned into a porcupine, but none of the arrows had hit a vital spot. That was why she was only severely wounded instead of dead. The other witch was not as fortunate. Apart from the arrows all across her body, the most lethal shot was the one that had found its way right into the middle of her forehead.


    "Dammit, dammit, dammit..."


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but roar in anger when he sensed the quickly draining life force of the witch.


    Just then, the second wave of enemy arrows descended upon them!


    "Kill them...kill them for me!" Greem roared furiously.


    Bug Adept Billis cackled chillingly and exploded during Greem¡¯s roar. He turned into a wave of countless ck bugs and charged toward the closest enemies.


    Greem also wanted to rush forward and crush a few enemies to sate his fury. However, he had no choice but to force himself to calm down. He pointed at the dying witch and cast a Fire Shield around her.


    One had already died. This one couldn¡¯t die, or the losses today would be too heavy to bear!


    To be honest, the tremendous damage from the first wave of the elves¡¯ arrows was caused mainly by theck of preparation on the part of the adepts.


    At their very core, the adepts were no more than humans who had obtained powerful abilities!


    An arrow that hit a vital spot could instantly rob the life of an adept without their magical protection.


    However, now that the adepts were on guard and had wrapped themselves within numerousyers of defensive spells, it wouldn¡¯t be an easy matter for the elves to hurt them with long-ranged attacks. At the very least, these elves didn¡¯t possess the strength to kill an actual adept with a single arrow.


    The second wave of arrows finally arrived.


    This time, they were fated to achieve nothing.


    The three Fire Shields revolving about the severely wounded witch trembled against the arrows imbued with nature power, but they didn¡¯t shatter. On the other hand, the bolts that shot toward Greem rapidly softened upon entering the Ring of Fire. They then crashed against his suddenly expanded body and broke into pieces.


    The raging Greem instantly transformed into the me Fiend. He strode to the witch¡¯s side and covered her with his body.


    The transformed Billis had already shed with the first wave of enemies now. They were engaged in a furious and brutal battle.


    These enemies were elven warriors with naked torsos and skin-tight leather shorts, their bodies covered in strange magical runes¨C de Dancers.


    de Dancer was a special profession of the elven warriors.


    They could not wear metal armor¨C only leather or cloth armor. Thus, they were warriors who wore light armor or none at all. They held two long and sharp elven longswords in their hands. Their bodies were drawn full of the battle tattoos unique to de dancers. Some of these tattoos could enhance their agility, while others could increase their reaction speed. Still, the majority of the symbols possessed a strange ability to confuse the enemy¡¯s senses.


    When the de dancers charged into the ranks of enemies, their rapidly moving bodies worked together with the elven tattoos to deceive the enemy¡¯s vision. It would cause the enemies to be incapable of figuring out the specific locations and movements of the de dancers.


    de dancers had almost no defensive abilities. They relied purely on their high agility and graceful movements to avoid the enemy¡¯s assault while raining down a storm of attack within inches of hostile des.


    The lowest requirement for advancing to de dancer was to stay within a dark room with ten swinging spiked pendulums for fifteen minutes.


    As such, the most potent ability of the de dancers was their ability to dodge and avoid attacks!


    Sadly, this ability was utterly useless against Bug Adept Billis. Their unprotected bodies had absolutely no way of stopping the jaws of tens of thousands of bugs.


    The swarms of bugs were like wolves in a herd of sheep. They ignored the rapidly dancing swords in the hands of the de dancers and quicklytched upon their bodies. In less than three seconds, when the swarm of bugs red their wings and flew over, only a green corpse chewed up beyond recognition was left on the spot.


    Billis¡¯ efficiency at murder wasn¡¯t very high, but it still did the job. In the blink of an eye, he had felled seven of the three dozen de dancers that had boarded the ship. The tragic de dancers couldn¡¯t stop the advance of the ck bugs no matter how quickly they waved their des.


    "These damned adepts. de dancers; spread out. Leave this fellow to the druids. You guys go kill the me human and the witch."


    An agile female elf leaped onto the bow of the ship. She took a look at the entire battlefield and called out orders. At the same time, she quickly took out her bow and notched an arrow. Two arrows snapped in the direction of the bugs.


    Unlike the previous ones, these two arrows were fast as shooting stars and exploded into giant fireballs the moment they came into contact with the ck beetles.


    The explosion instantly scorched arge number of the ck bugs. The ground rustled with the sound of bug corpses crashing to the ground, and a sharp screech rang out from the swarm of bugs. They instantly escaped a dozen meters away and reformed into Billis¡¯ appearance.


    Unlike before, his body appeared one size smaller and was no longer as round as before.


    Billis hissed and roared furiously at the female elf. Fourteen strange sting scorpions then emerged from his body. These sting scorpions were only the size of a fingernail at first, but they quickly swelled to the size of a bull when they left Billis¡¯ body. They swiftly crawled toward the female elf on the metal deck.


    Before Billis could exact his revenge upon the elf, a few dozen elves in strange clothes jumped aboard the ship. They yelled and stormed toward the bug adept.


    The oaken staves in the hands of these strange elves shed with a green light as they charged. Their bodies transformed into Earth Maulers and Fire Wolves within a mist explosion. The beasts then attacked Billis in a pincer formation.


    The fourteen sting scorpions immediately shed with therge group of druids upon therge metal deck.


    The de dancers and the druids had already taken the stage. The most numerous members of the elves¨Cthe flower fairies¨Cwere naturally not going to fall behind.


    They were a group of creatures only the size of two palms, with thin cicada-like wings upon their backs. They looked like miniature elves, but their petite and curvaceous bodies were not dressed in any clothes. Only some tangling vines helped cover their most private spots.


    Their skin was green, as was their hair, but their eyes were an odd ck color.


    These flower fairies were a type of nature monster. Their method of attack was their rapid flight speed paired with their sharp and fearsome ws. Moreover, their nails undoubtedly contained poison!


    The bug adept that could transform into insects didn¡¯t seem too easy to deal with. Thus, these cautious fairies set their sights on the dying witch on the ground. Sadly, a towering me Fiend spewing hot mes stood right there. All flower fairies that came within fifty meters of him wouldbust in a series of agonizing cries.


    That immediately frightened the fairies, causing them to scatter like a nest of hos that had their home disturbed. They circled the giant me Fiend but never dared to charge into the thin Ring of Fire.


    "That me Fiend is a Second Grade adept! I will deal with him! You think of a way to kill this giant bug." Aizac shouted at the female elf captain and charged at Greem with seven or eight druids in tow.


    The female elf captain looked at the giant me Fiend that Greem had transformed into. Her heart was exceptionally heavy.


    They had killed a witch and badly wounded the other. The results of this battle appeared to be quite glorious, but the surviving adepts were each more difficult to deal with than the previous. If a few more individuals of the same level stepped out of the cabin, today¡¯s battle would probably...


    While she was reflecting on the state of the battle, the ten magical machines had already moved into formation. They started to charge at the elves.


    For a moment, the barrage of metal bullets covered the air and shot toward the elves!

 Chapter 621 Oppressive Power

    Chapter 621 Oppressive Power


    One had to admit that certain military forces countered others.


    Strange nature creatures like the flower fairies might not berge in size, but they had speed beyond what a human eye could follow and sharp poison ws.


    Even dozens of human warriors would only be worn away if they met such an enemy in the woods, let alone an entire group of them.


    Yet, when the flower fairies and the de dancers ran into the Archer magical machines, they faced off against their greatest counter ever.


    Who cared if they were fast? Who cared if they had maximum levels in their evasion skill? The Archers simply got into formation and gave them a thorough scrubbing with their storm of metal.


    If it were human heavy-swordsmen who were dealing with the Archers, they might be able to block some of the damage with their massive armor. However, the majority of the elves were agility-focused warriors. Moreover, they were often unarmored or only wearing leather armor to not affect the agility of their limbs and the speed of their movements.


    It was practically suicide to fight against the Archers with a defense like that.


    The dense cluster of metal bullets shot toward them at speed faster than the eye could tell, instantly causing horrific damage to the ranks of the de dancers and flower fairies. Their slender bodies were shredded into pieces in the violent storm of metal, and green flowers of blood bloomed in the skies.


    "Dammit. What weapon is this?" The female elf captain had almost been driven mad by anger. It was the first time she had seen magic energy rifles. In a mere dozen seconds, almost all the melee forces of the garrison she had brought with her had been decimated.


    The machines immediately turned the barrels of their rifles after exterminating the fairies and de dancers. The firepower shifted upon the druids.


    As expected of elites that had gone through many trials, the few druids at the front of the ranks immediately roared and swelled up like a balloon at the very first sign of trouble. Short, thick, and heavy ck fur quickly grew out of their bodies as they crouched on the ground. Their jaw muscles started to tear and increase in size as they let out agonizing roars. Their bone structure distorted and snapped forward, turning into t and broad snouts.


    These druids had transformed into fearsome Earth Maulers in less than three seconds.


    They mmed the ground with their thick limbs and roared as they charged toward the Archers against the bullet barrage.


    Meanwhile, the other druids behind them transformed into all sorts of beasts. Some transformed into fire cats, while others transformed into Nightsabers or berserk apes or razor boars. For a moment, the druid squad had turned into a troop of beasts. They utilized the cover of the Earth Maulers and quickly charged toward the magical machines.


    At this moment, the Second Grade druid was already in front of the me Fiend and was standing off against the adept from a distance.


    They were both Second Grade, but the druid was clearly inferior to Greem when it came to their aura andposure.


    One was a mediocre and unambitious individual living his life out peacefully while trapped in a mid-sized ne. The other was a killer whose mind had been forged into steel after multiple nar invasions. While the two stood off against each other, it was clear that the me Fiend¡¯s forcefulness and strong aura was the one that stood out. On the other hand, the light in the druid¡¯s eye was flickering, almost as if he was suffocating from the opponent¡¯s dominating atmosphere.


    The spirit consciousness of the two individuals was very much linked to personal changes in their mentality.


    Greem had already sensed the disorder and fear in the heart of the Second Grade druid when it arose. Heughed maniacally and vanished in a st of fire.


    Not good.


    Aizac¡¯s heart shook. He could no longer care for using his Spirit to scan and track the enemy¡¯s movements. He took two steps backward frantically as his body started to distort and shift wildly.


    Sadly, before he couldplete his Wild Transformation, a strong gust of wind swept toward his back. A ten-meter-long fire whipshed at his back, bringing with it furious winds as it cut through the air.


    Aooooo!


    Aizac reared his head and let out a half-human, half-bestial howl of pain. He rolled to the side and dodged the followup strikes from the me whip. Aizac had no time to deal with the whip sear that was causing him to wince. He held his oaken staff with both hands and mmed it into the ground.


    The next second, a violent st of lightning as thick as a stone pir descended from the skies. It struck right upon the fearsome towering body of the me Fiend.


    After the dissipation of the lightning st, the two Second Grades were back to a tense standoff, though their positions had changed slightly. This time, the left hand that Greem had used to block the lightning had been seared ck, while Aizac¡¯s vine clothes had been shredded, exposing his bloodied back.


    Two hundred and seventy points.


    Greem shook his charred left hand slightly and allowed the carbonized rockyer to fall off, revealing the steaming ck and redva beneath.


    The enemy¡¯s destructive attack earlier was truly powerful. Still, an attack of this level was insufficient to take down Greem. Three to five secondster, once his shielding mes had extended back to his left hand, Greem smiled chillingly and cast Fire Teleportation once more.


    Aizac, who had traded blows with Greem, didn¡¯t have his opponent¡¯s amazing regeneration. The whip mark on his back might have scarred and stopped bleeding, but the intense pain was not so easily mitigated.


    Aizac frantically motioned with his staff when he saw the enemy disappear once again. A Natural Ward appeared around him, and it was only then that he cautiously started searching for the enemy¡¯s new location.


    Sadly, Greem was no longer nning to deal with him with this Fire Teleportation!


    A resounding boom rang out, and Greem appeared amidst the druids who had surrounded Billis as an elementium halo exploded beneath his feet.


    Dammit. The enemy went to find trouble with my subordinates.


    Aizac only seemed to realize what was happening at this moment. He yelled and rapidly transformed into a windhawk. His entire body turned into a ferocious tornado and sped toward the battlefield.


    Unfortunately, it was toote!


    The exploding elementium halo from Greem¡¯s appearance rippled outward. All ¡¯magical beasts¡¯ caught in its impact were turned into zing torches amid agonizing screams. The more powerful ones were still able to use their own nature power to shield themselves and run out of the area enveloped by the elementium halo. They were then barely able to extinguish the fires burning on their bodies. On the other hand, the weaker druids were immediately incinerated in the elementium halo that washed across them.


    The giant me Fiend that Greem had transformed into moved its thick magma legs and casually strolled inside the burning mes. It asionally gathered a fireball ofva in its hand and threw it into the area where the druids were most concentrated.


    These one dozen First Grade druids that had surrounded Billis were instantly met with a deathly cmity. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the Resist Energy Damage shrouding their bodies or the defensive Stoneskin, or even the usually great Nature¡¯s Vigil; nothing could defend against the Magma Fireballs that Greem was haphazardly flinging at them¨C fireballs with power up to three hundred and twelve points.


    At the moment of the fireballs¡¯ explosion, all druids that had been targeted by Greem could only re up into human-shaped torches as they shrieked in pain. They would then turn into piles of ashes in less than five seconds.


    First Grade druids were far too frail before a Second Grade fire adept from another world.


    Greem had quickly ughtered seven druids. The remaining druids frantically transformed into different magical beasts and escaped toward the surroundings. It caused the poor Bug Adept Billis to be revealed once again.


    Billis¡¯ ability was extraordinary and powerful. Still, he was a First Grade adept after all. Even his superior powers wouldn¡¯t allow him to hold off a dozen druids of the same grade as him.


    In less than fifteen minutes, five of Billis¡¯ fourteen scorpions had been crushed and ttened. Even the surviving ones carried all sorts of wounds on their bodies. Their appearance was terrible. However, it was these sting scorpions that had allowed Billis to not die at the bear paws of the druids.


    Greem turned back to look at the fleeing Second Grade druids after dispersing the crowd. He grabbed Billis¡¯ skinny body of bugs and then vanished in a rising plume of fire.


    Greem stumbled out of the zing fire pir after escaping from the siege of the druids with Billis in tow.


    He let go of Billis before turning to pull out the elven arrow that had been deeply embedded in his right shoulder. Greem stood straight and grasped the shaft tightly in his hand. His burning eyes were fixed upon the slender silhouette standing at the bow of the ship.


    The female elf captain!


    It was the female elf that had taken advantage of his momentary pause before the teleportation to shoot him. If it weren¡¯t for Greem¡¯s alertness that allowed him to lower his head and brace his shoulders in time, this arrow would probably have passed through his brain, inflicting tremendous damage to him.


    The red mes in his hand surged intensely. The heat rose exponentially and quickly reached a white-hot color.


    The decorative feathers of the elven arrow had turned to ashes the moment the arrow entered the Ring of Fire. Even the remaining metal shaft had liquefied under the heat of the mes. It seeped through the knuckles of Greem¡¯s magma hand and dripped on the ground, burning tiny holes into the metal deck.


    The female elf captain silently endured the spiritual pressure that Greem was remotely projecting upon her. She showed no intention of retreating even though her body was trembling uncontrobly.


    Greem¡¯srge and fearsome body took a step forward, and a horrifying smile appeared on the burning face of fire.


    "Since you have alreadye, then don¡¯t leave. All of you will stay!"


    Greem shouted, and several doors of the ship opened simultaneously. Hordes of Archers swarmed out from within. A ferocious storm of metal bullets immediately covered everyone¡¯s vision in the very next second.


    "Retreat, quick! Retreat!"


    "Retreat into the forest!"


    Seeing that the battle had gone far beyond the limits of their control, both the Second Grade Aizac and the female elf captain shouted out at the same time. Sadly, the druids that had surrounded the magical machine squad were too deep inside the ship. It was toote for them to retreat now.


    Several druids that had transformed into magical beasts stumbled rapidly outward with the barrage of bullets exploding behind them. Blood constantly sttered out of their bodies, soaking the deck in crimson.


    Aizac watched on with wide-open eyes as all this happened. He let out a furious cry and was about to charge forth once again. However, the female captain pulled him back.


    "We need to go. The kingdom needs the information we have."


    Aizac¡¯s body shook. It was only now that a trace of coolheadedness returned to his anger-filled eyes.


    "Let¡¯s go!"


    Aizac roared reluctantly before turning and rushing off the flying ship.

 Chapter 622 Continuous Fight

    Chapter 622 Continuous Fight


    Witch Airuilian¡¯s funeral was being held above a cliff to the side of Spear Valley.


    A zing fire burned upon the piled-up logs, licking at the young witch¡¯s body bit by bit until, finally, everything had turned to ashes.


    The witches were not members of this world. Their soul would never rest in peace here.


    To avoid Airuilian¡¯s soul being lost in other worlds, Alice personally hosted the funeral and tried her best to collect shards of Airuilian¡¯s soul from within the ashes.


    Once they returned to the World of Adepts, Alice only needed to shatter the soul crystal, and Airuilian¡¯s fractured soul would be allowed to return to the soul mother river. It was the greatest courtesy a dead adept could receive.


    During the funeral, Greem and the others only stepped forward to give their blessing. However, the Witches of Fate who hade along with Airuilian were shedding sorrowful tears. It was clear that the rtionship of these Witches of Fate had been extraordinarily close-knit after nearly a hundred years of being together.


    That was in stark contrast to the rtionship of the witches in the other branches!


    The majority of the elves that had ambushed the flying ship had been left behind. The remainder that had managed to scatter into the surrounding forest was too hard to track. Even Greem would find it difficult to lock on to their positions in the woods with his spiritual senses.


    Thus, after an entire kilometer of pursuit and five dead elven archers, the surviving elves had vanished without a trace. The Second Grade druid and female elf captain had particrly extraordinary stealth abilities. Greem had burnt nearly a quarter kilometer¡¯s worth of forest and still failed to find any trace of them.


    It seemed that the hardest part about future battles with the elves in the forests would be detecting their ambushes!


    Greem could have called for all of hispanions during thest battle. That would have slightly increased their chances of capturing the Second Grade druid. However, taking into consideration the fights that were to happen in the future, Greem had stillmanded Mary, Zacha, Alice and the rest to stay inside the ship. He only sent out some magical machines to surround the elves.


    They might have allowed more elves to escape, but it also guaranteed that the adept forces on the ship were notpletely exposed.


    The attacking elves hadn¡¯t been exterminated. In fact, some of them had been left alive.


    These elf warriors then became the best experimental specimens and subjects for the adepts.


    Those intended for dissection were dissected, and those who were to be fed to the bugs were fed to the bugs. Soon, all of the elves had been ¡¯exhausted.¡¯


    The few Crimson n leaders sat together for a discussion. They unanimously agreed that the reason for the uracy of the elves¡¯ ambush was the excessive straightforwardness of their operations. They had entered the depths of Fantasy Forest five times, all of which was only to investigate mines. Hell; it would be weird if the elven kingdom hadn¡¯t done anything when this information fell into their hands!


    After some discussion, the adepts came to a decision. They wouldmence guerri warfare. They would change locations after every attack and try their best to exterminate the opponent with every strike while also making feints to throw the enemy off of their next target.


    The flying ship immediately took to the skies after they decided upon a strategy. It then sped toward the sea.


    Tymo had initially suggested that they attack the nearest elven vige or town, but Greem abandoned the idea after some contemtion.


    From now on, he no longer ever wanted his thoughts to be figured out by the enemy. That was why they should avoid such vengeful, anger-venting, actions as much as possible. At any rate, Garan was incredibly enormous. They had plenty of targets to choose from. There was no need to worry about elves to ughter.


    This was the elven kingdom. Those who lived here were all citizens of the elven kingdom. As long as they ughtered enough people, their ambush today would have been repaid in full.


    With the speed of the flying ship, the crew managed to return to the shore in a mere two days. The vessel didn¡¯t stop once. It flew straight to the sea and headed fifty kilometers out before finally stopping.


    Having reached this ce, they would be impossible to track, even if there had been elven scouts following behind them all this time. After dropping all possible tails, the flying ship turned around and headed south. It flew toward the southern shoreline of Garan.


    It was a strategic n that Greem and the others hade up with.


    Their objective this trip was to obtain the Staff of Divination. Yet, the Staff of Divination was in a collection of the Second Grade Green Dragon Ohgu. If they wanted to steal the staff, they most crucial thing to do was to draw Ohgu out from the Dragon Cliff. Even if they couldn¡¯t draw away the dragons, they would have to find a way to draw out the main forces and powerhouses of the elven kingdom.


    Otherwise, trying to steal the Staff of Divination was practically suicide.


    Trying to tug upon the whiskers of a Second Grade green dragon deep inside the elven kingdom made it very likely that they would run into those fearsome elven god messengers. ording to the records of the adepts, the gods that relied on the faith of their followers faced the same awkward situation as the Great Adepts. It was the fact that they would be kept outside of the ne barrier by the powers of the ne. They could only attach themselves to the ne barrier and forge their own holy kingdoms in the ounds.


    The gods of Fifth or even Sixth Grade had absolutely no way to pass through the ne barrier and enter the world. Thus, to allow themselves to project their power into the world, they would find various ways to raise messengers or priests of their own pantheon inside the ne.


    This way, the gods would be able to project part of their strength into the world through their priests or messengers when their denomination was in danger.


    The Elven Empire constantly eulogized that the avatars of the gods walked upon the earth and spread the voices and wills of the gods. In truth, these avatars weren¡¯t the gods truly descending upon the world. Instead, it was merely the gods borrowing the bodies of the priests and the messengers to exact their will.


    Those who could ascend to godhood were existences above Fifth Grade, while central deities of the pantheons were often powerful Sixth Grades. However, the limitations of their divine power and grades caused there to be a difference in the amount of energy they could project back into their origin ne.


    For example, chief Elven God Saoirse was a Sixth Grade god. The amount of power she projected back into the ne was enough to create a peak Fourth Grade god messenger to exact her authority. On the other hand, the Fifth Grade God of Archery, Marco, could project power enough to create a newly advanced Fourth Grade. The weakest Fifth Grade God of Moonlight, Meve, could only project a Third Grade god messenger.


    That was why it was virtually impossible to kill a deity, for their actual bodies weren¡¯t even within the ne!


    If one wanted to y a god, they had to break out of the nar barrier and fight their way into the holy kingdoms of the gods. That was the only way to kill a god once and for all.


    If one only exterminated their messengers within the ne, they would quickly be able to find a way to create yet another god messenger. There would never be ack of proxies for the gods as long as they themselves didn¡¯t die!


    Greemmanded the flying ship to weave along the edges of Garan constantly. They never ventured deep into the continent, precisely because they were afraid of running into a powerful elven god messenger. With the faith of the elven kingdom, even the lowest god messenger would probably possess the approximate strength of a Third Grade.


    The flying ship might be carrying the strongest group of individuals that Greem could put together, but even they would have no choice but to flee if they ran into a Third Grade god messenger. After all, Greem had already seen the power of a Third Grade. It was indeed as domineering as he had expected.


    That was obvious from the stunning might of the Third Grade thunder dragon!


    Even if Greem gathered all the Second Grade adepts of the n and invited Dragon Devourer Oliven to help him, they would have a tough time dealing with a Third Grade thunder dragon. Even put all together, they might not withstand more than seven minutes under the destructive lightning of the thunder dragon.


    Combat techniques and fighting methods did not so easilypensate for the absolute dominance of the grade difference and racial superiority. That was why, at this current phase, Greem had to try his best to avoid battles with Third Grade enemies.


    Greem couldn¡¯t afford to pay the price needed to defeat the enemy!


    ............


    Moonshade Vige.


    This once peaceful and calm vige was now in a riot.


    Less than one-tenths of the defeated garrison had sessfully made it back to Moonshade Vige. The female elf captain that had led the group also brought back terrifying news to everyone.


    The fearsome adept¡¯s flying ship was near Moonshade Vige. They could descend upon them at any moment to take vengeance for the elves¡¯ ambush.


    Aizac, who had left the captain halfway, was already on his way back to the central mountains. He would try to report the information about the flying ship to an elvenmander as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the female elf captain hurried back to Moonshade Vige to organize the migration of the vigers.


    Most elves would only go adventuring in their youths. They usually returned to their ce of birth once they reached middle age to live out the rest of their lives in peace.


    For the vigers of Moonshade Vige, this was the home that they had lived in for their entire lives. No one would be willing to leave this familiarnd and forest if it weren¡¯t for the continuous urging of the captain. Even if they needed to depart, every elf brought with them plenty of baggage. They hesitated with every step, turning to look at their home at each turn. The reluctance in their eyes was heartbreaking.


    Though the female elf captain couldn¡¯t bear to leave this ce either, she steeled her heart and forced the elves to pick up the pace; it was for everyone¡¯s safety.


    At this moment, the elven scout that she had left near Spear Valley ran back, panting and gasping.


    "What? The enemy has already left? They flew in the direction of the shoreline?" The female elf captain grabbed the shoulders of the elf. She almost couldn¡¯t believe her ears.


    "Wooo. The evil adepts have left. We no longer need to leave our home anymore."


    The elves who couldn¡¯t bear to leave their home behind immediately started cheering upon receiving the news. Some of them even began to sing and dance.


    However, the frown on the elf captain¡¯s face only deepened. Her gaze into the distance turned deeper and darker.


    Could the adepts really tolerate this slight to them? Were they not going to avenge theirpanions?


    Far away, where the female elf captain couldn¡¯t see, the curtains were only rising on a storm of blood and murder orchestrated by Greem!

 Chapter 623 Greems Vengeance

    Chapter 623 Greem¡¯s Vengeance


    The flying ship slowly glided above the cloudyers.


    Several dozen metal eyeballs the size of human heads floated above the forest beneath, spouting faint blue light behind them. They wove between the dense canopy and winding vines, constantly shooting out faint redsers to scan for every suspicious shadow in the woods.


    Any opponents with life signs would have a hard time escaping the scans and senses of these metal eyeballs with the inspection runes and infrared rays embedded within them. With them as assistants, the adepts would have a perfect grasp of the situation on the ground, even if they were high in the sky.


    The giant, magic-energy mechanical body of the metal eyeballs did not appear to be outfitted with any offensive weapons. However, if enemies ever attacked them, all they had to do was increase the energy level of the infrared ray, and the scan would rapidly turn into a heat ray.


    The heat ray, possessing less than thirty points of power, might not be enough to deal with those high-grade magical beasts. However, it was more than enough to deal with ordinary forest creatures.


    Thus, the red heat ray sizzled and repeatedly hissed throughout the journey. Every single red sh meant an insignificant life had crossed into death: lizards, goats, wolves, owls, pigeons. These harmless forest creatures had met a true cmity of extermination this time. The passing metal eyeballs instantly killed the animals, though they had barely understood the situation.


    The metal eyeballs were like the bloodiest, cold-hearted, and despicable of assassins. They didn¡¯t spare any lifeform that had body heat or life signs. They advanced in groups of three, forming a wide yet strict of ughter, clearing the way along a fixed path and murdering all lifeforms they sensed along the journey.


    Under the bloody ughter of the metal eyeballs, the more alert forest creatures had no choice but to run out of their hiding spots in the caves, tree trunks, and tunnels to flee into the depths of the forest. Those who were slightly too slow all lost their lives to the fearsome heat rays.


    It was an area near the shoreline. ording to the information that Greem had obtained, there should be a small elven vige nearby.


    However, as outsiders, it was still challenging to find a well-hidden elven vige in the forest, even with Tymo¡¯s guidance. Greem had no choice but to use such a startling method to force out the elves.


    They had suffered a tremendous loss on the west coast. The adepts had lost a witch, while the other severely wounded witch would need time to recover herbat ability, even though they had finally saved her after extensive care. As such, Greem was brimming with anger. He couldn¡¯t wait to find these elves and massacre the lot of them.


    He stood within the flying ship, high above the clouds. The several dozen light screens before his eyes constantly shed with different scenes, disying everything happening within the forest below in its entirety.


    Every time the metal eyeballs discovered a magical beast or nt that was too difficult to deal with, Greem would immediately use themunication device at his side to contact Tigule, who was trailing behind the eyeballs. Three magical machine warriors would move out to deal with these troubles that had suddenly appeared.


    It didn¡¯t matter how strange or powerful these magical forest beasts and nts were. None of them could withstand the barrage of metal bullets and the heat of magical fires. They quickly fell to the guns of these magical machine warriors.


    Finally, with the appearance of a small stampede, Greem realized something was wrong.


    An antelope and a brown bear had been mixed within the stampede and were frantically escaping into the distance. Strangely enough, despite how they ran and fled, the two animals never seemed to scatter or leave each other.


    "Hmph! Those transforming druids again!" Greemughed coldly before giving out a series of orders.


    The of metal eyeballs made a slight turn and silently missed the position of the antelope and the brown bear as they turned toward another direction. Yet, in the shadows where the enemy had no eyes, a sting scorpion hiding in the ground and a red-eyed bat had secretly reached behind them.


    Once the antelope and brown bear had left the danger area, they gathered together and muttered to each other. The antelope then continued chasing behind the metal eyeballs, observing the situation from a distance. On the other hand, the brown bear turned and rushed into the forest, hurrying somewhere in the distance without looking back.


    When evening fell, the sting scorpion and the old fox Vanlier simultaneously sent out messages from the distance.


    They had finally found elven cottages!


    Without hesitation, the flying ship descended from the cloudyer. It retrieved the metal eyeballs and magical machine warriors, rose into the clouds once more, and vanished without a trace under cover of night.


    The cautious antelope seemed to have sensed something was wrong. It immediately turned and ran in the direction of the elven cottages.


    ............


    The elven cottages.


    It was an elven vige neighboring the shoreline.


    The vige wasn¡¯trge. Only a hundred or so elves lived here.


    There were no wooden or stone buildings of ornate design here. There were only small wooden huts and tforms constructed upon the branches of the tall ancient trees. The treehouses were extremely crude and simple. However, suspension bridges made of vines and wooden nks connected each and every treehouse.


    When breezes blew across the forest and the vine bridges swayed in the air, the flowers and grass upon them would wave about in a breathtaking disy of beauty.


    Due to the low poption of the vige, they had no ability to rearrge magical beasts or savage magical nts. Consequently, the town¡¯s garrison was made up of flower fairies, de dancers, and elven archers. Even the only two beginner druids had only chosen to stay here because they were born here.


    Night had fallen. Female Elf Captain Lyfaea stood upon the wooden tform the elves used for archery training, situated upon the highest ancient tree in the vige. She silently looked to the horizon.


    Lyfaea slowly walked toward the edge of the tform. She shut her eyes and used all of her mind¡¯s power to sense for the message from afar.


    It was the home of the elves.


    Every de of grass, every twig, every flower, every fruit, and even very tree, vine, and animal were known to Lyfaea. She could call their names and engage them in friendly conversation. No one could catch the elves in the forest, for all nts and animals in the woods were theirpanions. They would help the elves destroy all traces of their existence and be the ubiquitous eyes of the elves.


    For example, Lyfaea was standing in the wind right now with her eyes shut. However, she could still vaguely sense everything happening within a radius of several kilometers.


    The woods would warn her if danger ever descended. The animals would let out strange calls, and even the rustling of ancient trees¡¯ leaves would tell her the information she needed.


    For some reason, today, a feeling of danger lingered in her heart. Still, she was utterly unable to sense where the threat wasing from.


    A violent and terrifying aura hade from the forest in the south during the day.


    Out of security concerns, Lyfaea had sent the only two druids in the vige there to scout. ording to Syd Sharpfang, who had returned from his mission, a horde of strange and evil monsters seemed to have appeared there. The monsters were madly ughtering their animal friends in the forest.


    Their numbers were many, and they were reasonably powerful as well. That was why the two druids could only hide in the shadows, silently observing and tracking, but never daring to appear before the monsters to chase them away.


    As night fell, Lyfaea sent another two flower fairies to reinforce the other druid out of concern. Still, no news had returned.


    That was what Lyfaea was most worried about.


    "Sister Lyfaea, Sister Lyfaea."


    Two young elven teenagers¨Cone boy and one girl¨Cran to Lyfaea¡¯s side while she was at her most concerned.


    "Sister Lyfaea,e and take a look at this! I finally managed to hit two willow leaves earlier."


    The teenage elven girl pulled at Lyfaea¡¯s arm and shook it. She raised an elven arrow that she was holding in her hand. Two thin willow leaves were impaled upon the elven arrow.


    "So what if you just hit two willow leaves. Sis Lyfaea, look at me, I hit three leaves." The other elven teenager also raised an arrow happily. Three leaves were impaled upon this one.


    The elvish girl immediately pouted and red at the boy.


    For the elves who were naturally adept at archery, shooting stationary targets was something that only children did. The most essential condition for anyone who sought to be an elven archer was to pierce through five light willow leaves with a single arrow.


    The fact that these two little kids could shoot through two and three leaves was already quite impressive!


    Lyfaea put on a wry smile and extended her hands to rub their silky smooth, short green hair. She was just about to say something encouraging when she realized her eyes had gone dark. It was almost as if the entire world had turned dim.


    The female elf captain raised her head in surprise.


    It was only now that she realized the bright and brilliant disc of the moon hanging in the skies seemed to have been obscured by something, causing the entire vige to lose the brilliant shine of the moonlight.


    Naturally, with her eagle-like vision, Lyfaea could see everything clearly.


    It wasn¡¯t because of clouds. Instead, it was a massive metal ship descending from the skies; its target was the elven cottages beneath.


    The appearance and models of the enemy were just like the fearsome and evil monsters that Syd Sharpfang had described!


    It was an enemy assault.


    Multiple four-meter tall magical machines encased in strange metallic shells descending from the skies by metal ropes amidst panicked cries. Theynded all over the elven vige with dull thuds.


    The next second, whistling barrages of bullets shot toward every moving lifeform in the ce. Goblin rockets howled as they flew toward every treehouse, dragging behind them foot-long trails of fire as they went on a rampage.


    A series of explosions and ringing sounds echoed throughout the elven vige. A storm of blood and fury instantly engulfed this peaceful paradise!

 Chapter 624 Moonwater and Follower

    Chapter 624 Moonwater and Follower


    They onlysted fifteen minutes before ending!


    The organized attacks of the elves were feeble and ineffective against the fully-armed magical machines descending from the skies.


    Their fast and urate arrows were utterly useless before the imprable metal machines.


    Meanwhile, the flower fairies and de dancers, who only had closebat skills, had nowhere to run during the area barrage of the magical machines. It didn¡¯t matter how fast they flew; they weren¡¯t faster than the speeding bullets. It didn¡¯t matter how rapidly they swung their elven swords; they couldn¡¯t deflect the storming barrage.


    One after another, fairies and de dancers charged out of their hiding spots. Their sharp ws and des sent sparks flying and rang out against the metal bodies of the magical machines, but nothing they did could harm the opponent. The other machines that stood in the distance turned their guns without hesitation and drowned this ce in a savage barrage of bullets.


    They didn¡¯t seem to worry about whether their attacks would harm their own allies.


    In truth, there was no need to worry either!


    There was only one ¡¯living thing¡¯ that could still stand within the center of the attack once the barrage had stopped¨C the magical machines that had been surrounded by the elves. All the flower fairies and de dancers had been riddled full with holes. They littered the battlefield like abandoned rags.


    The magical machines moved their forms, paying no attention to the bullet dents on their bodies, advancing toward where the elves were with their heavy and steady steps.


    How powerful a military force could a tiny vige at the very edge of the elven kingdom possess? That was why they could not retaliate against the magical machine army, who were far stronger and more prepared. They were all razed by the gunfire and turned into prisoners of the adepts.


    The only ones that put up some degree of an outstanding performance were probably the female elf captain Lyfaea and the druid Syd Sharpfang. One of them was a First Grade elven archer, while the other was a junior First Grade druid. They could still threaten and damage the magical machines when going all out.


    The junior druid held an oaken staff in one hand and cast out iron thorn seeds with the other, summoning clusters of fast iron thorns from underground to trap an Archer on the spot. Meanwhile, Lyfaea let out a battle cry and shot out two elven arrows glowing with a green light.


    The two arrows instantly embedded themselves in the chest te of the Archer.


    For the magical machines supported by magic energy batteries, that was sadly not where their energy core was located. As such, the damage dealt by these two arrows were insufficient to cripple the magical machine or force it to self-destruct. The very next second, the Archer raised both of its arms, and eight mounted magic-energy guns immediately drowned Lyfaea¡¯s location in a violent torrent of metal.


    There was none of the usual deafening roar of ordinary goblin rifles, or therge plume of smoke from the explosion of gunpowder. The metal bullets continually fired out of the magic energy rifles andrge clusters of blood burst out of Lyfaea¡¯s slender body, along with the sound of snapping bones.


    By the time the wildly spinning mounted rifles had stopped their shooting, the only thing left of this once beautiful female elf captain was a terrifying and bloody corpse that quietly copsed to the ground.


    "Lyfaea..." Druid Syd Sharpfang let out a pitiful cry. His green eyes instantly turned blood red. The druid let out a howl and quickly transformed into a fearsome Earth Mauler. He then charged at the Archer.


    The mounted rifles on the magical machine¡¯s arms once again spat out a chain of bullets, bloodying the ferocious Earth Mauler all over its body and causing it to wince in pain.


    However, Syd Sharpfang still managed to arrive in front of the Archer thanks to the robust physique of the Earth Mauler.


    The Earth Mauler stood on its hind legs with a furious roar. It raised both of its paws high up and savagely smashed them upon the body of the Archer. The humanoid Archer magical machines were vastly inferior to the spider machines when it came to bnce. The Archer was actually thrown onto the ground by the druid.


    The Earth Mauler immediately leaped forward and started rolling about on the ground with the Archer.


    There were bestial roars, unsettling dull thuds, and the crisp, continuous sound of gunfire. All these sounds mixed, slowly descending from a loudmotion to muffled noises, then from muffled noises to subdued sounds. Gradually, all sounds vanished without a trace!


    By the time the other magical machines had cleared up the elven vige and arrive at this battlefield, they only saw one bloody and one metallic corpse entangled together.


    The earth mauler that the druid had transformed into had its stomach entirely shot into ribbons. The shattered internal organs slowly flowed out from within, soaking the ground beneath with blood. The Archer had also fallen apart. It appeared to have been badly ravaged by the earth mauler. Its metal body had been twisted beyond recognition, and it was totally non-functional.


    When all the battles had ended, the magical machines started to search outward with the help of the metal eyeballs. This broken elven vige was left to the adepts for research.


    The surviving elves and flower fairies were sent to the flying ship to be interrogated by Poison Hag Endor. She had to figure out the approximate locations of all surrounding elven settlements, as well as the nearest elven city.


    Half-Elf Tymo might be able to remember the locations of all elven cities, but he couldn¡¯t urately pinpoint the areas of all elven viges. After all, it had been nearly a hundred years since he had left this ce. A hundred years of experience was enough to cause everything familiar to fade from memory.


    Trying to assault an elven city with the current strength of Greem and the other adepts was suicide. However, raiding the elven cities and clearing up all of their surrounding towns and outposts was still within their ability.


    As qualified adepts, Greem and the others all personally retrieved the hair, flesh, and internal organs of the flower fairies and the elves. In particr, with the Spirit of Pestilence, Greem could now very easily use these materials to extract gue seeds with specific targets.


    However, both elves and flower fairies were creatures of nature and had exceptional resistance to gues and poisons. Trying to deal with them through disease alone was no more than a pipe dream. Still, Greem was more than happy to stir up more trouble for the elves!


    The ones who were the happiest about the spoils from the big battle had to be the vampires and Bug Adept Billis.


    One had to mention that the elves naturally possessed dense nature auras within their bodies as children of the forest. Their blood full of magical energy was undoubtedly the favorite food of vampires. That was why Mary had personally selected a few quality fairies and elves from the prisoners to be blood treats for herself.


    Billis then collected the corpses of elves that had been dismembered in the attack.


    Billis had just constructed a new bug¡¯s nest in a secret room within the ship, and he happened to needrge amounts of blood and flesh. These elf corpses hade at the right moment.


    Apart from these, the adepts also found many elven items within the ravaged treehouses. Most of them were different nt seeds and fruits that didn¡¯t mean much to the adepts. However, there were some fairly significant items within the pile.


    For example, there were the Fruits of Nature taken from a thousand-year-old oak. Ordinary humans could extend their lifespan by eating the fruit. However, in the hands of adepts, it could only be used as a nt-attribute material to concoct nature resistance potions.


    These nature resistance potion seemed to be necessary support potions in the fight against the elves!


    Of course, apart from the Fruits of Nature, the adepts also found some exotic wood used for crafting magical staffs, along with the corresponding nature magical gemstones to be embedded within them.


    However, Greem gave no mind to these things. The only thing that could move him was an unexpected discovery there.


    Deserra found a very well-hidden hollow in the top of the tallest tree of the elven vige. When Greem passed through the narrow hollow and pushed aside the green vines hanging down from above, what appeared before him was a small nature altar.


    The so-called ¡¯small altar¡¯ was no more than a tree stump one-meter wide in diameter. A pool-like groove had been dug into the stump. When Greem arrived here, he could very clearly see the bright moonlight passing through a hole at the top of the hollow, projecting straight into the groove.


    A thinyer of green spring water rippled within the groove.


    Greem had just moved toward the tree stump when he sensed the overwhelming life aura. He also detected a trace of holy and sacred aura.


    Moonwater!


    It should be the rumored treasure of the elves¨C Moonwater.


    Greem took a deep breath and turned to give an order, "Go and fetch Alice, quick."


    Deserra had only just acknowledged the order when Alice¡¯s soft and graceful voice rang out.


    "No need to call for me, I havee myself!"


    Greemughed out loud, "Eh, what a dog¡¯s nose you have. To think you smelled the air and came here before I even called for you." Having said that, he startedughing without any restraint or care for his image.


    Alice rolled her eyes at him unamusedly.


    However, her eyes were drawn toward and fixed upon theyer of green water once she got close to the tree stump.


    "Moonwater. It¡¯s Moonwater..."


    "What? There¡¯s actually Moonwater here?"


    The few witches that had followed along gasped in disbelief.


    Alice tilted her head and thought for a moment. She then seemed to have understood something.


    She walked to the tree stump and hit it a few times on several spots. She then pulled out a hidden drawer and took out a palm-sized wooden carving.


    For some reason, a surge of a profound and strange flux radiated from the wooden carving, causing all living beings that saw it to have the impulse prostrate themselves before it!


    "As I expected! Greem, we can¡¯t stay here for too long. This is a vige blessed by a deity."


    "Oh! Oh?" Greem was confused, "What is this wooden figure?"


    "A treasure like Moonwater shouldn¡¯t appear in a vige of this size and poption. Yet, it has still appeared here. It can only mean that this ce is under the protection of the God of Moonlight. This wooden figure is an idol of the God of Moonlight. The elves of the vige are very likely all followers of the God of Moonlight. We might attract great trouble if we stay here for too long!"


    "Understood. I will go and arrange our retreat now. I¡¯ll leave everything here to you!" Greem decisively agreed and immediately walked out of the hollow.


    "Don¡¯t just look around anymore, people. Work together and move everything here away." Alice also immediately gave her orders.


    The witches dly moved forward to get working.


    Soon, the hollow had beenpletely emptied of its contents!

 Chapter 625 Spoils and Investigations

    Chapter 625 Spoils and Investigations


    The spoils after exterminating a border vige of the elves were reasonably plentiful.


    The resources and supplies obtained were secondary; the greatest spoil was actually the small nature altar they had obtained.


    Moonwater, also known as Water of the Moonwells, was a sort of special spring water produced within the elven territory.


    It was rumored that moonwater was an entirely new energy created by elves bybining magic elementium with the power of faith. This energy manifested in the form of well water.


    For ordinary mortals, moonwater could bring the dead back to life, even if all that was left was bones. It was practically a miracle medicine. For spellcasters, moonwater was the most potent and safest healing potion in the world.


    Even if a spellcaster was utterly exhausted, without Spirit or stamina, all they had to do was drink a bottle of moonwater to revitalize themselves instantly. Their Spirit would be so full that they would be on the verge of exploding. That was why any high-grade adept that could bring a bottle of such moonwater with them was essentially providing themselves with a second life.


    One could easily imagine an adept using the moonwater to regain his strength after exhausting themselves in a battle with an equal. The sudden rejuvenation and pleasure that came from torturing and beating down the opponent with their newfound power couldn¡¯tpare to ordinary entertainment!


    The World of Adepts might be superior to Faen, but the magical potions they created were still the sort that stimted the body and Spirit to hasten regeneration speed. It was entirely unlike moonwater, which could allow anyone to turn the tables after consumption instantly: bursting full magical power, stuffed Spirit, maximum stamina. It would be just that easy to crush the opponent.


    Moreover, the magical medicines of the World of Adepts caused serious potion resistances. Drinking multiple vials of the same potions wouldn¡¯t have stacked effects either. Their regenerative performance was utterly inferior to moonwater in every aspect. They were like heaven and earth with absolutely no points ofparison.


    That was why moonwater was a high-ss potion that high-grade adepts fought over, even in the World of Adepts. Moonwater of the same quantity was often eight to ten times the price of magical potions. Still, it was a valuable good with no market among the social circles of high-grade adepts.


    The sole cause for this phenomenon was thebination ofrge amounts of power of faith in the process of creating genuine moonwater. The adepts had almost no faith. Thus, they had no control over the power of faith and could not replicate moonwater in their magicalboratories.


    Since they couldn¡¯t replicate the substance through magical means, the only method left for adepts to obtain moonwater was to rob the elves. However, those amongst the elves who could own Moonwells and producerge quantities of moonwater were usuallyrge elven settlements.


    Deities often protected these settlements!


    It didn¡¯t matter how powerful of an adept they were. If an adept were to stir up trouble at an elven home ground and invite the fury of the deity behind them, they could easily exterminate the adept and shred their soul to pieces by sending down an avatar through a god messenger. The avatar they sent down might have a considerable power differencepared to the deity themselves depending on the tier level of the faith channel and the individual power of the deity.


    Still, a Sixth Grade deity projecting his consciousness upon a Third Grade god messenger could easily butcher multiple Third Grade opponents. It was a simple matter, really. The superior understanding and utilization of energy and technique were more than enough to allow them to fight off numerous enemies and ughter all who opposed them!


    That was why elven settlements protected by deities were all forbidden ces for adepts. No one could defend against the god messengers and the fearsome divine magic they could cast.


    Divine power was considered a force more potent and superior than magical strength in the power system of the adepts. The only thing that could oppose divine power was the power ofws that the Great Adepts possessed.


    That was why Greem and the others were already satisfied at having unexpectedly obtained some moonwater from a small border elven vige.


    They had managed to fill five whole standard vials with moonwater. Every one of these vials would sell for, at least, the sky-high price of twenty to thirty thousand magical crystals in the World of Adepts. Moreover, even with such a high rate, moonwater could hardly be found on the market. No one would sell off the moonwater they had taken such great pains to obtain.


    After all, in moments of crises, a bottle of moonwater like this could save their lives!


    No one wouldin about their lives being too long!


    That was why high-grade adepts would instead stockpile them rather than sell them.


    Of course, the value of moonwater was undoubtedly immense to Deserra and the rest. However, for Alice and Greem, the value of that wooden idol seemed to be even greater than the moonwater!


    Since they were fortunate enough toe to a ne of faith ruled by gods, it would be a disgrace to their identities as adepts if they didn¡¯t do some proper research on this ¡¯power of faith¡¯ that was even more powerful than magical power.


    Of course, if Greem could go to the holy kingdoms of the elven gods, beg for some divine power crystals, and have them open up their domains for him to have a thorough tour, his research progress would most definitely skyrocket.


    Unfortunately, otherworldly non-believers like himself had no fate other than destruction if they were locked onto by the native deities here. That was why Alice and Greem¡¯s paths to make contact with divine power were very, very narrow. If one were to be honest, there was almost no way they coulde into contact with it.


    The wooden idol they had obtained from the nature altar of the elven vige might not have sufficient divine power to form a divine halo, but it was nheless a treasure in itself.


    One could imagine what had happened in the past. The leader of this elven vige must have knelt before this idol and prayed religiously, day after day, year after year,municating with and contacting the God of Moonlight that they believed in through this wooden idol.


    This way, after much time had passed spent soaked in the faith toward the God of Moonlight, the wooden idol would transcend its worldly roots and be a genuine divine item, regardless of how ordinary its material and how crude its workmanship.


    In-depth research on the idol would not only yield traits of the God of Moonlight¡¯s divine power. It would also indirectly reveal thew domains the deity was involved in, along with the strength of their divinity.


    That was why Alice immediately sealed the wooden idol with tremendous fate powers upon finding it.


    She wasn¡¯t foolish enough to research such terrifying subjects in such a dangerous and simple environment.


    If the God of Moonlight was to discover a non-believer spying on her authority and powers through a node of faith, she might hurl a divine punishment this way. It was rumored that the God of Moonlight was a Fifth Grade deity. Even though the limits of her power¨Cwhen projected into the ne¨Ccould only go up to Third Grade, that much power was already too much for the First Grade Alice.


    All members immediately boarded the flying ship after scouring the vige. They then escaped into the distance without hesitation.


    Two hours after the ship had left, a squad of elf huntresses riding upon nightsaber leopards charged into the elven vige.


    What awaited them, apart from the zing mes, was the shattered remains of the elven treehouses. The elves that lived in the vige had been ughtered, abducted, or had escaped into the surrounding woods. Not a single survivor could be found here.


    "Find them. Spread out and find them. We must find a survivor and find out what exactly happened here." The leading huntress let out a pained shout. All the other huntresses immediately spurred their nightsabers and charged into the surrounding forests. They started to search and call with the unique Whispering Wind of the elves.


    Soon, some survivors had been gathered before the huntress leader. Amongst them was the junior female druid who knew how to turn into an antelope.


    "Cassan, what exactly happened here? Who were you attacked by? Humans or witches? Why are the losses so tremendous? Did you not have scouts around the perimeter?" The huntress leader asked a long chain of questions; she simply had too many of them. The junior druid known as Cassan had no choice but to reply to each and every one of them dejectedly.


    In truth, even at this point, Cassan still hadn¡¯t figured out how today¡¯s events had happened.


    She had only followed orders and went to investigate the odd movements in the southern forests with Syd. After running into a group of strange metallic lifeforms that were wildly ughtering the animals, she stayed behind to keep an eye while Syd went back to the vige to report the situation. Then, the strange metallic lifeforms flew away.


    By the time she had realized something was off and ran back to the vige, the ce had been reduced to ruins. Apart from some smoldering piles of mes, she could no longer find a single surviving elf.


    The huntress leader questioned another two or three elves, but all of them were dazed and confused. No one had any idea how the enemy had appeared. They had been stunned by the enemy¡¯s ferocious firepower at the very start of the battle. They had then scattered and escaped into the surroundings after receiving the female elf captain¡¯s order to run.


    Sadly, most of the elves had been beaten and abducted. Only a few of them were fortunate enough to remain hidden and escape cmity.


    The huntress leader couldn¡¯t help but get upset after failing to obtain any urate information after questioning several of the survivors.


    "Madam, I know how those bad guys arrived."


    Just then, a deep and hoarse voice rang out from a side.


    The elves turned to look with befuddled expressions, only to find the speaker to be a young girl covered in dust. Her body still had burn marks on it.


    The huntress leader had questioned so many of the elves besides her precisely because of her young age. There was no way she would know too much about the situation. However, it was this young girl that brought them their most pleasant surprise.


    "I¡¯m Vena. I was talking with Sister Lyfaea in the tree hall when the enemy arrived. Little Mott was still alive then." The little girl remembered her dead friend as she spoke and couldn¡¯t help but start crying.


    The huntress leader was impatient and anxious, but she didn¡¯t press the issue. Instead, she took the girl into her arms and calmed the girl down with gentle words.


    "They came from the skies.


    "They suddenly crashed down from the clouds. The metal shippletely covered the moon.


    "All the metal men jumped off of the ship. They used foreign weapons and killed many of the elves the moment theynded.


    "Both Sister Lyfaea and Brother Syd were killed by the metal men. Their metal armors were way too thick, and ordinary elven arrows couldn¡¯t pierce them at all. Only Sister Lyfaea¡¯s Double Shot could pierce their shells.


    "Brother Syd turned into a bear and died along with a metal man. He died a terrible death.


    "Before she died, Sister Lyfaea had shouted for everyone to run. I...I turned into a pigeon and escaped. A hole even got shot through my arm by their weapon; this is the weapon they attacked us with."


    As she said that, Vena raised her hand. A round, shiny metal bullet the size of a pigeon¡¯s eggy in the middle of her dusty, bloody, and burnt palm.

 Chapter 626 Analysis

    Chapter 626 Analysis


    Just as the elves were sending the information from the vige up theirmand chain, Greem and Alice were facing the wooden idol and discussing their strategy.


    The floating ship was now parked above an isted ind one hundred and ten nautical miles away from Garan.


    The ind wasn¡¯trge. It was only one or two square kilometers in size and was filled with ck stone. There was barely any soft dirt, let alone nts or animals.


    The geography of the ind was extremely uneven, and there was really no ce where the flying ship could steadilynd. Thus, Greem could only have it stop ten meters above the ground, silently resting and making preparations.


    They had just fought a battle and captured some elven prisoners, and they had to find a ce to put them as soon as possible. After all, they couldn¡¯t possibly go around fighting while lugging their prisoners about, could they?


    A group of construction machines was sent down from the flying ship. They dug out a small underground prison in a hidden location on the ind and then stuffed all the elven prisoners in there.


    After offloading their burdens, Greem decided to just go with the flow and announced three days of rest on the ind.


    There couldn¡¯t possibly be any entertainment in such a rural ce. Greem was only giving the n adepts a buffer of time before the next battle so that they could prepare themselves for the multiple fights that were toe. Through the information that Endor had obtained from her interrogations, Greem had gotten a preliminary understanding of all elven viges, towns, and cities in a five hundred kilometer radius of the south shore, as well as the approximate assignment of their military forces.


    Once Greem had digested the gains from this raid, the Crimson n wouldunch arge-scale assault against the elven garrison of the south shore in the following one to two months. The targets of the attacks were always chosen randomly. As long as the adepts were not stalled on the battlefield by an elven powerhouse, the elves would have no means to stop them with the high altitude of the flying ship.


    With the fifteen thousand kilometers long winding shoreline of the south shore, the elves would have trouble stopping the flying ship from entering at a high altitude in any spot, even if they ced scouts everywhere in the Great Fantasy Forest. The elves wouldn¡¯t be able to entirely defend the massive Great Fantasy Forest, even if they sent all of the garrisons from the central mountains out there.


    Even Greem would have no ability to deal with such an untraceable enemy if he were themander of the elves. The only appropriate response was to shrink the line of defense and move most of the citizens of the viges and towns to the well-defended cities.


    The only way to minimize unnecessary deaths was by using the mighty wings of the elven army to shield the weak, ordinary elves.


    However, if they did so, the people in a few elven cities would endure tremendous stress. Moreover, they would also be giving up the vast Fantasy Forest to these mysterious enemies.


    Also, if the elvenmander of the south shore could honestly steel their hearts to do so, Greem would simply pat his bottom and run off to another area to cause trouble. When that happened, the other garrisoned locations would be facing the same difficulty and reluctance that the south shore garrison was facing.


    Of course, the elves were not rookies like the goblins; they weren¡¯t so easily pushed around by the adepts.


    If one were to take a look at the internalposition of the elven army, they would realize that there were quite a few military units that posed a significant threat to the flying ship. Looking closely from top to bottom, the most terrifying had to be the Green Dragon Corps.


    The flying ship might have serious firepower, but it would be in trouble if it ran into the Green Dragon Corps. It wouldn¡¯t take too many dragons. Just three to four Second Grade green dragons would be able to ground the ship.


    After all, dragons were the universally acknowledged emperors of aerial battle!


    However, with the arrogance and sloth of the dragons, it would cost far too much to have them travel tens of thousands of kilometers from the central mountains to a rural area just to deal with some ¡¯bandits.¡¯ The price was so heavy that any elvenmander would have to weigh their options carefully.


    That was why the odds of running into a legion of dragons were unlikely as long as the flying ship didn¡¯t get close to thoserge elven cities. In fact, if one were to be brutally honest, Greem wouldn¡¯t mind mobilizing the n¡¯s immediate dragonying squad to achieve the aplishment of dragonying once again if those green dragons dared to stray from their groups.


    Disregarding the dragon legions, the greatest threat to the flying ship had to be the aerial units of the elven army.


    The aerial units of the elves consisted of the Pegasus Knights, the hippogryph riders, and therge magical beasts, the Chimeras.


    Amongst them, the Pegasus Knights were specially selected elves who were good at meleebat riding upon pegasi. They used their rapid speed to charge to the enemy¡¯s side and engage in a battle. They used longbows at long-range, throwing spears at mid-range, and elven sabers at melee-range. They were offensive units that excelled in every aspect.


    Pegasus Knights with exceptional performance would be selected to ride the rare species of the pegasi¨C the Silver Pegasus. In doing so, they would advance to be Silver Pegasus Knights. These silver pegasi all possessed some strange racial abilities. Once they established enough rapport with the elven knights, such that their thoughts could be shared, they could even help the knights develop several powerful knight battle techniques.


    Sadly, as the pegasi and silver pegasi were only a unique species created by the magical modification ofnd horses, they were not good at bearing loads. Thus, the knights that rode them couldn¡¯t wear excessively heavy metal armor. Otherwise, they would severely drag down the flight speed of the pegasi.


    Consequently, the pegasus knights and silver pegasus knights of the elves mostly wore leather armor. However, many elves that came from noble backgrounds still liked delicate and fancy metal armor. To reduce the weight, they had no choice but to grind the metal armors thin and make hollow some of the parts.


    Such an aerial cavalry was truly powerful when used against human armies. It couldpletely direct the flow of battle. However, they weren¡¯t enough against the flying ship!


    The mounted firearms all over the Archers might not be powerful individually, but what made them stand out was their sheer number. Once it turned into a barrage of bullets, the elven knights would have trouble charging into the ranks of the magical machines, even if they were each individually much stronger than the Archers.


    Moreover, with the thickness of the magical machine¡¯s body, ordinary elven sabers, throwing spears, and arrows could hardly damage them. Only those knight battle techniques or archer battle techniques with incredible explosive power had a possibility of actually damaging the magical machines.


    That was why individual Archers would have great difficulty defeating an elven knight of the same grade. Most of the time, they would be taken down with precise and targeted maneuvers. However, if ten Archers were pit against ten elven knights, the victors would most definitely be the Archers. In fact, it might even be a one-sided ughter.


    Furthermore, the flying ship still had the even more powerful magic energy cannons on it.


    The dense barrage of energysers that could reach up to hundreds of points of power was fearsome. No elven knight could endure such a terrifying magical attack.


    With the magic energy cannons as the core and the Archers as support, the flying ship would be able to tear a path through the pegasus knights through sheer firepower, even if they were surrounded. If those pegasus knights dared to brave the field of fire and board the ship, then what awaited them would be the defensive magical machines with even thicker shells and the three immensely powerful magical machine warriors.


    The situation was simr for the hippogryph riders. Individuals with excellent archery were selected from amongst the elven archers and allowed to ride upon the hippogryphs that the elves had painstakingly bred. These riders could remain high above the skies and conduct ultra-long-range, air-to-ground attacks against enemies on the surface.


    They faced the same problem as the pegasus knights¨C ack of heavy armor protection. Naturally, they were uncontested when facing against the humans, who had no aerial units or anti-air military forces. However, this single weakness of theirs was lethal when dealing with the metal hedgehog that was the flying ship.


    First, they couldn¡¯t fly as high as the ship.


    That made them incapable of unleashing their precise archery skills and long-range parabolic shots.


    Second, they couldn¡¯t get close to the flying ship.


    With the defense that they possessed, two to three metal bullets were enough to cripple an excellent hippogryph rider. If anything happened to the hippogryph at all, the elven archer that fell from the sky would most certainly die!


    Third, their arrows couldn¡¯t do anything to the thick hull of the flying ship.


    ording to the measurements of the goblin engineers, the outer hull of the flying ship was already half a meter thick. Attacking a half-meter thick metal board with bow and arrow, and a special alloy that had been created in the goblin alchemicalbs at that. Only fools and maniacs would do such aughable thing!


    It was because of his clear understanding of the enemy and of his troops that Greem wasn¡¯t concerned about the enemy¡¯s aerial units.


    Of course, the elven aerial army wasn¡¯t made up of only ¡¯useless¡¯ troops. The specially bred chimeras not only had thick hides; they were also skilled in the magic of three elements. If the elves could gather enough chimeras to lead the charge, there was still a possibility of them breaking through the field of fire and boarding the ship.


    However, when that happened, it would be time for the adepts to act!


    Every elementium adept was a fearsome elementium volcano. When they unleashed all of their powers and recklessly poured their magical tide upon the enemy, the fearsome scene that would ensue was chilling and terrifying to even think about!


    In the end, the only one that could truly threaten the flying ship was actually a ¡¯faux-aerial army¡¯!


    The Druid Conve.


    As a select group of individuals within the elven kingdom, the Druid Conve possessed transcendent status and immense power within the nation.


    Even the most junior of druids possessed miraculous nature powers.


    They could cast spells, transform, and even summon forestpanions to fight by their side. They were practically thebination of elementium adepts, bloodline adepts, and summoners. They might not be sufficiently focused in any of those aspects, but their overallbat strength was formidable.


    If one had to pick the army within the elven kingdom that was the most likely threat to the flying ship, it would have to be the Druid Conve formed byrge amounts of druids.


    They could transform into wind eagles or Socrates Condors, take to the winds and catch up to the flying ship. Once they boarded the vessel, they could instantly shift intorge creatures such as earth maulers, berserk apes, razor boars, and brutelephants.


    This way, they wouldn¡¯t lose much ground, even against the defensive magical machines.


    Furthermore, they possessed the ability to rapidly cast spells, summoning rooting nature magic and unleashing powerful offensive nature spells. It was not good news for the magical machines, whose magical resistances were on the weaker side!


    Therefore, if the flying ship were to ever engage in an all-out battle with the elves, the one they most had to prepare against were these annoying druids.

 Chapter 627 Their Respective Ambitions

    Chapter 627 Their Respective Ambitions


    The isted ind.


    Massive living spaces existed within therge flying ship. As the owners of this vessel, the adepts naturally took up the best and mostfortable rooms.


    Inside Mary¡¯s living area, a unique banquet of blood was merrily carrying on.


    The shimmering blood rippled in the pool at the center of the room as Maryzilyid against the side of it. Apart from her delicate and pretty face, her long and slender neck, and her perfect cor bones exposed outside of the blood, her white and smooth body waspletely submerged under the liquid.


    Strangely enough, the blood in the blood pool was also roiling and churning about, as if there was a fearsome beast stirring up waves within it.


    Mary casually stretched her body and absorbed the pulsating blood energy within the blood to her heart¡¯s content. asionally, she extended a blindingly white arm and sshed the blood toward herself, allowing the red and sweet blood to slowly drip from her body in the form of beads.


    The plentiful, pure blood energy washed her body, causing her to close her eyes and moan in pleasure every so often. That seductive moan instantly caused the few males within the room to betray awkward expressions.


    The three blood knights each took up a spot of the room of their own. They all had a beautiful elf in their embrace, her clothes half-removed. Their powerful and strong hands were overbearingly wandering all over the elves¡¯ slender and frail bodies, but their exposed fangs pierced into the elves¡¯ aortas without any hesitation.


    The sound of sucking blood and the unconscious grunt of the weak elves blended together, adding yet anotheryer of wicked allure to this blood banquet!


    Meanwhile, the old fox Vanlier still kept his appearance as a middle-aged noble. He was crouching by Mary¡¯s ear attentively, mumbling as if he was analyzing something.


    "Lead an army independently? Are you mad," Mary suddenly opened her crimson eyes at some point in the conversation. She red at Vanlier coldly, "This is the Faen ne. There are only the followers of those hacks out there. What could we possibly aplish with the few of us?"


    "Lady Mary, how has this period of rest and recuperation caused you to be so fearful and cautious," Old fox Vanlier was not afraid at all. Instead, he started to patiently give advice, "Have you forgotten how dominant and glorious you were back in the Knight¡¯s ne? Have you forgotten your recklessness in the bloody fight against Evil Bugs Acteon? We vampires cannot grow through peaceful cultivation. If we want to be stronger, we need to use all the tricks avable to us. We need to be reckless."


    ¡¯"There seem to be too many gods and god messengers here in Garan. Will we suffer losses if we go for a walk out there?" Mary was someone with an overbearing and forceful personality as well. She couldn¡¯t help but be moved when she heard Vanlier mention her glories in the past.


    "Why should we be afraid of losses? The only crucial ones in this room are the five of us. As long as we don¡¯t lose any of the five of us, anything else that we get will be pure profit. We couldn¡¯t do it on the Goblin¡¯s ne. Those natives all had detestably pungent blood and were utterly unworthy of being food. The dragonborn on Lance, on the other hand, were too powerful. Turning them into blood ves was challenging. Inparison, the elves of this Garan Continent are the most suitable food for us vampires."


    "Then, if we go out and act independently, will we throw that person¡¯s ns into disorder?" Mary still appeared to be somewhat hesitant.


    "Mydy, what are you worried about? Can¡¯t you see? Lord Greem hase to the southern shore this time because he wants to stir up trouble and draw the elves of the central mountains out. Us going out to start a ughter will not only not affect Lord Greem, but we would also even be actively taking on a portion of his burden. Lord Greem will certainly be d!"


    "Really?" Mary¡¯s crimson eyes suddenly glowed.


    During this period of time, she had always been by Greem¡¯s side. Their rtionship had thus unknowingly improved. Her mind instantly started spinning when she heard that she could help her ¡¯lover.¡¯


    "Moreover; Lady Mary, this subordinate will say something he shouldn¡¯t be saying," The old fox Vanlier analyzed while hinting at certain hidden implications, "The n had proactively entered Faen to help Lady Alice obtain that Staff of Divination. If this goal is aplished, Lady Alice might have a chance to rise and be a Second Grade Witch of Fate. When that happens, my Lady, your grade superiority will no longer be an advantage on the side of Lord Greem."


    Mary¡¯s crimson pupils suddenly shrunk.


    "If, my Lady, you agree, this loyal subject of yours might be able to find a way to have Alice killed in the central mountains."


    "No!"


    Mary¡¯s voice suddenly turned cold and chilly. She abruptly stood up in the blood pool and hovered in the air with a single beat of herrge bat wings. Large sshes of blood reverberated and rose into the air. Not only did they not fall back to the pool, they even curled and wrapped around Mary¡¯s curvaceous body, strangely forming into a crimson armor.


    The old fox Vanlier was blown away by the violent blood powers. He spat out blood in midair and mmed down upon the ground ten steps away, almostpletely incapacitated.


    "Vanlier, do not challenge my patience. I might not like that Alice, but I still know what can be done and what should never be done. If Alice enters the central mountains, then Greem is sure to follow. You trying to n Alice¡¯s death would be including Greem within your calctions. Oh, I see. You don¡¯t want to live any longer!"


    When the Bloody Queen raged, those within the room were stunned and panicked!


    The three blood knights cast away the beauties in their embrace and kneeled upon the ground, silently waiting for their master¡¯s orders. Old Fox Vanlier also forced himself to get up, but he didn¡¯t try to defend himself. Instead, he crouched wordlessly upon the ground and waited for his master¡¯s judgment.


    Mary¡¯s crimson eyes shed with a glint of anger. They were fixed upon Vanlier. Through the Shackles of Blood and her blood essence, she could clearly sense that Vanlier¡¯s suggestion was only in consideration of her. There was no malice in them.


    If it weren¡¯t for that, the one blood pulse from earlier would have robbed Vanlier of his life.


    As her subordinate blood ves, the lives of Vanlier and the three blood knights werepletely within Mary¡¯s control. Life and death depended on a single thought of hers.


    She swept across the room with chilling eyes. Her sudden anger only started to subside when she saw how obedient and docile Vanlier was being.


    "Rise, all of you!" The coldness in Mary¡¯s voice gradually faded, "Remember; from now onwards, apart from my orders, you all have to obey Greem¡¯s orders to your death. That is my request and my order as well! With blood as the contract, so it is established!"


    "Understood, all will be as my Ladymands!"


    With the full responses of the blood ves, a faint crimson halo rippled out from their bodies.


    It was clearly the origin blood contract taking effect!


    "Very good," Mary nodded her head in satisfaction, "You go out and prepare. We will be setting out in an hour. Our target is the Garan Continent!"


    "Understood!"


    ............


    Inside another sinister and terrifying secret room onboard the flying ship.


    Erected within the room was a massive bug¡¯s nest. Countless corpses and bones were piled up around the blood-sttered, sticky bug¡¯s nest.


    If one were to be brutally honest, apart from some of the higher quality elves being picked out and imprisoned, Bug Adept Billis had requested most of the prisoners from thest battle at the vige. They had be the blood ritual sacrifice for this massive bug¡¯s nest.


    Sadly, the numbers of these elves were still insufficient. They were incapable of satisfying the needs of the newrvae to continue growing and strengthening. With no other choice left to him, Billis could only pull back the sleeves of his robe and extend his left arm into the bug¡¯s nest to be devoured by thervae.


    Finally, with the loud and wicked hissings of bugs, thervae were hatched!


    The bug¡¯s nest split apart, and several juvenile bugs of a new species emerged from within.


    There were twenty-one of them in total. They were only the size of a wash basin and had t, long bodies. Their appearance greatly resembled mantises. However, their size was several times that of the mantises in nature. They were also countless times more terrifying than ordinary mantises.


    These were a new species of bug that Bug Adept Billis had sessfully modified after much research¨C the Rippers. They looked like mantises and fought like them as well. However,pared to mantises, their speed and the effect of their shes were exceptional!


    They were utterly ck. The mantis shells appeared to be an onyx color, faintly shing with a unique metallic sheen. They had two pairs of thin, semi-translucent wings on their backs, one set big and the other small. These gave them iparably swift speeds. Three pairs of exceedingly sharp arthropod limbs existed beneath their stomachs, allowing them to climb on the ground at very high speeds.


    The terrifying aspect of the Rippers was the pair of scythe-shaped forelimbs at the front of their bodies. These limbs were densely lined with sharp sawtooth edges. When they waved these limbs about in the air, they could even create a series of afterimages, along with the fearsome sound of the air being shed apart.


    The moment they appeared, these Rippers immediately swarmed toward the only surviving seven sting scorpions and started to attack.


    The two swarms of bugs started a deathly battle in front of Bug Adept Billis.


    Finally, the newly hatched Rippers sessfully exterminated the sting scorpions with their absolute numerical advantage and the strange Execute effect of their sharp front limbs. What came next was a banquet and feast to be fought over. The scene was bloody and cruel, but there was a sense that this was merely a matter of course!


    The new bug generals had been born, but sharpening their fangs and jaws would still require more flesh and blood.


    Billis rubbed his bug-like chin with his remaining right arm. He finally made up his mind. It was time to go out into the Garan to make a living of his own!


    His lord was already a powerful Second Grade fire adept. Yet Billis, as his subordinate, was not only incapable of being his right or left arm, but he was even falling behind. At this point, he had even been forced out of the ranks of the first tier fighters.


    Such a reality infuriated and upset Billis and caused him to feel an immense sense of danger.


    If things continued at this rate, he would eventually end up as a bug summoner used exclusively to exhaust the enemy. That was not in line with his original intentions to continue growing stronger.


    Billis made his decision at the moment the new bug army was formed!

 Chapter 628 Might of Moonshade

    Chapter 628 Might of Moonshade


    The flying ship.


    Inside a secret cabin room.


    Greem and Alice sat across from each other. A palm-sized wooden idol was the only thing ced upon the crude wooden table. At this moment, several red ropes were wrapped around the wooden idol haphazardly, going in every direction.


    These red ropes looked normal as if they were just everyday objects, but the strange magical flux radiating from them hadpletely sealed the mysterious aura of the wooden idol within it.


    This appeared to be a sort of strange sealing spell!


    However, given that its material was an ordinary red rope, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be amazed at the wonders of magic.


    "What¡¯s there to be curious about?!" Alice seemed to have picked up on Greem¡¯s surprise. She naughtily pursed her lips and smiled, "The materials that ancient adepts used were all trash that they simply picked up from the ground¨C things like stones and dirt, or even bones and tree sap. The spells they cast could all move the narws with the power ofws. They had no need to rely on powerful magical materials to enhance and supplement the effect of their magic like the rookie adepts these days."


    "Er," Greem was speechless, "Why does it feel like I¡¯m also included in those rookie adepts you just mentioned!"


    "You are much better than them!" Alice giggled and spoke softly, "I still remember back then. If I hadn¡¯t been knocked silly by your strange instant-cast spells, I would never have been so unfortunate as tond in your hands."


    Her eyes were full of nostalgia as she spoke!


    Greem rolled his eyes helplessly and grumbled, "Didn¡¯t you call me here today to investigate the secrets within the wooden idol? How did things get dragged to the stuff of the past?"


    In truth, the process by which he had defeated Alice back then didn¡¯t seem to be all that merry of a thing. There were plenty of tragic memories of being chased around by Alice. Greem felt his whole body shiver and itch at the mention of these events. He wanted nothing more than to scrub these scenes from his memories.


    Alice had be much more mature and reliable after enduring so many trials and such heavy pressure. However, that trace of slyness and mischief engraved within her bones was still there. She couldn¡¯t help but go over the old record books with Greem whenever the opportunity presented itself.


    Alice finally let the issue go when she saw Greem¡¯s awkward expression. She put on a serious expression and gave a warning.


    "I will be unsealing this idol in a bit. If I make any mistake during this process, I could alert that legendary God of Moonlight."


    Even Greem¡¯s face turned solemn upon hearing this.


    Deities. This word was a huge taboo for the adepts.


    There were no deities in the World of Adepts, and no gods were allowed to appear.


    What the adepts worshipped were knowledge, power, and a perpetually calm and wise mind!


    Once a follower knelt before a god, they were actively handing over dominance of their consciousness. From then own, all of their actions and thoughts would have to be measured against the will of the god.


    They would be the extension of the god¡¯s will; a carrier, or more simply, a puppet!


    Adepts were not suited to have faith!


    If they had to have one, then it could only be in knowledge!


    Once they lost this foundation by which to establish themselves, the adepts would have lost their independence and the meaning to their own existence.


    That was why personal idolization and faith had always been differentiated in the World of Adepts. Any adept that crossed this boundary would instantly be the public enemy of all adept organizations.


    Still, rejecting faith was rejecting faith. Many adepts still conducted deep and extensive research on this entirely different and mysterious force known as the power of faith out of curiosity. They had gained a basic understanding of the attributes and traits of the power of faith.


    First, the formation of the power of faith relied on intense psychological suggestions.


    The gods would think of all sorts of way to nt the coremandments of their clergy into the minds of their followers. They would then have their followers repeatedly strengthen their psychological suggestions through specific actions, speech, or rituals, thus forming a sort of psychological reliance upon them. It caused the followers to treat the coremandments of the gods as the set of highest goals meant to realize the meaning of their lives.


    During this process of interaction between minds, the pure and stubborn soul consciousness would then stimte a strange soul power that would turn into the power of faith. If one were to analyze the power of faith from the perspective of the magic origin, it belonged to the category of supernatural powers of the mind attribute.


    If one were to look at things from the aspect of the narrow mind attribute, these gods were practically no different from the infamous mind yers of the multiverse. There was only one slight difference. One brazenly devoured the brains of other creatures to strengthen themselves. The other was just extending this process over an extremely long period of time, taking their followers as their sheep and the source of their powers. The only real change was them beautifying and polishing the process of their devouring, making them appear to be all the more noble and moral.


    However, what difference was there between the two if one were to peel away the facade?


    What truly made the adepts despise the gods was their attitudes and method of treating their followers.


    All sorts of research had demonstrated that weak and foolish intelligent species were the best source of power of faith. To maintain the purity of their followers¡¯ mindsets, the kingdoms and territories controlled by the gods always rejected the development of technology and civilization.


    Over the course of hundreds and thousands of years, the gods took full advantage of the tension and conflict between the king and the nobles, the greater nobles, and the lesser nobles. It was also between the nobles and the peasants in order to create all sorts of disorder and military shes. It was only then that these beings living within this hell of perpetual conflict and suffering would entrust all they possessed in the vague and intangible idea of faith.


    The vast and endless stream of faith became the source of power that allowed the gods to grow stronger continuously. However, in doing so, both the gods who resided at the top of the food chain and the lowest of peasants had be two grasshoppers on the same chain of faith. One was terrifyingly powerful, while the other was horrifyingly weak.


    Sadly, it didn¡¯t matter how significant the power difference was. Both of these groups of individuals had been reduced to parasites of the narws.


    The gods gathered the power of faith and used the portion of narws they had control over to turn this faith into purer and more condensed divine power. Thus, they became the powerful shepherds standing at the peak of the ne.


    The ne was like the ranch of the deities, while the intelligent followers were their cattle and sheep. On the other hand, this wooden idol on the wooden table was the device the foolish livestock used tomunicate with their masters!


    Greem and Alice might be fearsomely powerful characterspared to the ¡¯cattle¡¯ and ¡¯sheep,¡¯ but they were no more than two slightly stronger livestock or in the eyes of gods.


    As such, they had to undertake all actions against the gods with the utmost caution.


    Some magic tomes had revealed that mentioning the name of a powerful god within a ne would stir the narws, causing this deity to receive some faint impressions. If these gods also possessed holy divination professions, they might even be able to use this vague sense they had obtained to calcte all the elements behind it, along with the countless possibilities that it would bring about in the future.


    That said, the Goddes of Moonlight Meve that they were dealing with this time wasn¡¯t skilled at divination. Otherwise, Alice would never have dared to attempt deciphering and analyzing an idol soaked in her aura of faith while still in Faen.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but scratch his head upon seeing how eager Alice was, "What did you call me over here for? I know absolutely nothing about the power of faith. I¡¯m afraid I won¡¯t be of much help!"


    Alice smiled slightly, "I didn¡¯t call you here for anything. I just wanted you to sit by my side and watch as I do it."


    "Then?"


    "You are the calmest and smartest adept I have ever seen. You can judge for yourself. If anything goes wrong during my unsealing ritual or my process of investigation, you must instantly destroy the idol without any hesitation. I¡¯m worried... I will no longer have the power to destroy this idol at that time."


    Greem nodded his head inprehension.


    It seemed Alice had called him here to be a supervisor. If Alice¡¯s actions stirred the Goddess of Moonlight, she would have plenty of means to crush this First Grade shrimp to death. When that happened, it would be Greem¡¯s time to find a way to save her!


    Of course, this was only out of the cautious nature of adepts.


    The Goddess of Moonlight was a goddess¨C a high and aloof deity. If it wasn¡¯t a particr reason or a unique motivation, it was hard even to attract her attention. That was why the two of them never really expected something like that to arise when Alice gently told Greem about his purpose here. Their moods were still very rxed.


    Greem smiled when he saw Alice¡¯s white and slender fingers lightly touch the red ropes upon the idol and remove them in a specific order. He startedmunicating with the Chip in his mind.


    Chip; note, observe, and record all of Alice¡¯s actions. Immediately take intervention measures upon detecting any oddities.


    [Beep. Order received. Scanning and recording in process.]


    With an agile movement of Alice¡¯s slender fingers, the red ropes sealing the wooden idol finally snapped cleanly apart!


    The next second, a sinister, unfathomable, and strange power emanated from within the idol. This crude idol that had originally been carved of oak had, oddly enough,e to life.


    The formerly coarse and crude face that only possessed simple eyes and a nose started to stretch and transform. The wooden patterns turned smooth and clean. The protruding wooden nose also turned straight and pretty. Even more terrifying were the pair of shut eyes and the eyshes upon them quivering, as they were about to open wide.


    [Beep. Detecting the appearance of a mysterious power. The source is the inside of the divine object. Detecting the appearance of a miniature spatial cave-in. A mysterious spatial passage is forming.]


    A series of red alerts quickly rang out in Greem¡¯s mind. Greem looked around the room and immediately realized that Alice was staring at the wooden idol and her eyes were out of focus. She didn¡¯t seem to be aware of the impending danger.


    Spatial passage?


    What exactly was that damned Goddess of Moonlight trying to send over?


    Even if it was only a small spatial cave-in, the power being transferred over was probably not something that Greem and Alice could endure.


    That was why Greem raised his right hand without hesitation and furiously punched the wooden idol.


    The ferocious power of fire exploded in an instant. The wooden idol that had barely started opening its eyes immediately split into thousands of pieces. That strange power also vanished at the same time.


    The next second, Greem and Alice spat out blood and copsed limply to the ground. An odd projection of a moon surfaced upon their foreheads.

 Chapter 629 Messenger of the Moon Goddess

    Chapter 629 Messenger of the Moon Goddess


    Greem and Alice looked at each other speechlessly.


    The two wiped away the bloodstains on their mouths and remained dazed for a moment before recovering from the shock earlier.


    Alice moved toward Greem and carefully assessed the crescent moon projection on his head. She then tried to wipe it away with her hand gently. Strangely, enough, she didn¡¯te into contact with any material substance. It was almost as if the moon was just an image being projected from the crescent moon in the sky.


    However, when scanning with her Spirit, Alice could very clearly feel the existence of that crescent moon.


    Moreover, the projection seemed to be changing alongside the waxing and waning of the moon above.


    Greem also used the Chip to sense the moon projections on both of their foreheads. He vaguely detected a trace of spatial flux within them.


    "What is this?" Greem asked solemnly


    "I¡¯m not too sure, but it seems a lot like some kind of divine magic beacon," Alice replied hesitatingly.


    "Divine magic beacon? What is its purpose?"


    "If I¡¯m not wrong, it should function as a spatial coordinate. However, this is a spatial spell powered by divine power. I can¡¯t neutralize it with the magic I currently possess."


    "Spatial coordinates?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but start brooding in silence.


    If the enemy had obtained the spatial coordinates to their whereabouts, didn¡¯t that allow them to pinpoint where they were? When that happened, Greem and Alice would probably be locked onto by the Goddess of Moonlight if they ever came close to Garan once more.


    "Don¡¯t worry. This divine magic doesn¡¯t seem to beplete either. As long as the two of us are not exposed to the moonlight, this divine rune will not be able to obtain sufficient power to send our spatial coordinates outward."


    "Damn."


    Greem had nned to go on a ughtering rampage in the uing time. How could he not feel upset when he ran into such a strange moonshade rune at this points of time?


    "Could you get rid of them?" Greem couldn¡¯t even touch the crescent moon projection after several times. It was almost as if the image didn¡¯t even actually exist. He had no choice but to ask Alice.


    "This divine rune is constructed with the divine power of the Goddess of Moonlight. There is a huge difference in that and our own magical powers. It¡¯s virtually impossible to find a way to remove it without sufficient time for research."


    Greem was utterly frustrated now!


    Could he no longer show up for any of the following battles?


    It was important to note that the flying ship was just too big. Even though it could hide in the cloudyers during the day, it would still tear apart the cloud formations when traveling at high speeds, leaving behind a clear path to be followed. That was why things such as ambushes against the elves were best done at night.


    Now that Greem had be entangled in the crescent moon projection, any appearance at night would cause the moonshade rune to produce spatial ripples constantly. That would most definitely attract the attention of the Goddess of Moonlight.


    After all, Greem had killed the elven believers of the Goddess of Moonlight. If she was able to track down the location of these invaders, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how many powerful elves would be chasing after them.


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, the Goddess of Moonlight Meve had a Third Grade elven god messenger as her subordinate. Even Greem didn¡¯t have absolute certainty of escaping unharmed if this god messenger came to intercept the ship.


    An elven god messenger that could temporarily borrow the divine power of the gods was a fearsome individual, even if they were only Third Grade!


    Greem felt his head hurt at the very thought of pitting his n adepts against a god¡¯s messenger.


    The solemn Greem continued to rub his smooth chin with his hand as his eyebrows furrowed. He couldn¡¯t seem toe to a decision. Alice was watching all this from a side. She couldn¡¯t help but poke him lightly.


    "Feeling distressed over your subordinates¡¯ wellbeing? If you don¡¯t want to fight with the enemy head-on, then why not find our allies?"


    "Allies?" Greem paused for a moment before his eyes gleamed, "The allied army of the Dark and Pale Witches?" He chuckled, "You are so nasty."


    Alice rolled her eyes at him unamusedly, "Hurry up and get someone to make two circlets to hide the moonshade rune temporarily. I will be off to contact the Dark Witches."


    Greem left with a smile on his face.


    ............


    Garan Continent, the central mountains.


    Several towering nature temples loomed over this mountainous stretch of forest.


    No brick or stone had been used in any of these temples. Instead, divine power had been directly applied to stimte the growth of the ancient trees, causing theirrge and dense branches to twist and weave into the basic shape of a temple. Jade green vines and pretty roses climbed to every corner of these temples, turning the ce into the most beautiful human paradise in this world.


    These temples didn¡¯t all belong to the great Goddess of the elves¨C Saoirse. They also included the holy temples of the other deities of the elven pantheon, and naturally, a temple for the Goddess of Moonlight Meve as well.


    The fact that these nature-attribute gods could build their temples together represented the organic and harmonious nature of their rtionship. The pantheon of sea gods and the human¡¯s pantheon of gods far outnumbered the elven pantheon, but these two pantheons were vastly inferior to the elven pantheon when it came to teamwork and unity.


    These were the main reasons the two other two pantheons didn¡¯t dare to provoke the elven gods easily!


    A deep and silent sacred hall stood in an area at the edge of the multitude of massive temples.


    Unlike the constant flow of followers, high priests walking among believers, and the constant hymns for the elven gods of the other nature temples, this nature temple appeared to be exceedingly quiet.


    Apart from a few temple priests gathered in the main hall for a discussion, it was hard to see any followersing to thisrge temple for prayers or offerings.


    Third Grade Elven God Messenger Xenia, who held the title of Moonshade Messenger, was kneeling at a tall statue of a goddess and silently praying. Apanying her sides were Temple Officiate Aurora and two female priests. They had their eyes closed and were focusing as if listening carefully to the words of their goddess.


    Even though it was bright daylight outside, the inside of this temple was perpetually shrouded in ayer of dark, deep, and faint moonlight. No outsiders or gods would be able to see through the secrets within without stepping into the radius of the temple.


    Any individual that was not a follower of the Goddess of Moonlight would trigger the divine barrier set up by Meve if they stepped within a quarter of a kilometer of the temple. Meve¡¯s consciousness would then be sent over from the distant world of gods and judge if the guest was an enemy or a friend.


    After this prayer andmunion that hadsted for the greater half of the day, Third Grade Elven God Messenger Xenia finally stood up. The light of faith surrounding the tall statue that possessed a pretty figure whose face was obscured by faint moonlight also started to fade gradually.


    Soon, this statue, which had previously been soaked in a dense sacred aura, turned into a perfect wooden carving once again. The woman of the icon might look beautiful, with a dignified and scared expression, but it no longer had the same feeling of holiness thatpelled one to kneel and prostrate themselves.


    "You have heard the holy words of the Goddess as well. Why don¡¯t we all talk about how we canplete the mission assigned by the Goddess?" Even though they were all servants of the gods, this Third Grade God Messenger Xenia possessed much higher statuspared to the temple officiate. That was why this conversation was being held with her at the very core.


    Xenia was a tall, slender, and pretty female elf. She wore delicate elven armor decorated with plenty of beautiful patterns that resembled rose branches and jade green vines upon her body.


    Moonshade Messenger was both her title and her advancement profession.


    It was a unique profession that was somewhere in between a magical knight and a spellcaster. It also simultaneously possessed some offensive techniques of shadow assassins. As such, in terms of justbat strength, it could be categorized as a fearsome spiritualist ss with tremendous dueling abilities and limited brawling abilities.


    "Evil is breeding in the distance; the Goddess has already warned us. Those evil witches have once again invaded our home. In particr, a troop of especially wicked fellows have ughtered the followers of our Moonlight Temple. They even destroyed a nature altar that the Goddess herself had personally established. A crime like this needs to be punished. I will summon and gather the followers of the Goddess of Moonlight and strike back with maximum force." Temple Officiate Aurora¡¯s words might suggest fury, but her tone and expression appeared rtively calm.


    That was a ssic trait of all elven followers that believed in the Goddess of Moonlight.


    Elegant, noble, calm; these were the core beliefs that the Goddess of Moonlight most appreciated and encourage. That was why, as a follower of the Goddess, Aurora maintained an expression ofposure while harboring intense feelings of rage.


    The other two priests and the Third Grade elven god messenger were behaving in the same way.


    "This doesn¡¯t seem like enough!" Xenia confidently added, "The Goddess has already used her divine powers and left a moonshade coordinate upon their bodies. I will be able to clearly sense their location if they ever bask in the moonlight. That¡¯s why I will need you to gather some individuals who are skilled at fighting. The moment the enemy betrays their position, I will use divine power to teleport the group over instantly."


    "Understood, Lady Xenia!" Temple Officiate Aurora nodded her head slightly, "I will gather the people you need in the shortest time possible. I will not hinder this great vengeance that we will be undertaking!"


    The two priests nodded and epted their orders. They then slowly exited the hall.


    Seven minutester, an aura of intense nature magic radiated from within the hall. Several emergency magical messages had rapidly spread throughout the divine powerwork that the elven kingdom had set up.


    For a moment, all the high-grade followers of the Goddess of Moonlight left their homes within Garan and gathered toward the main temple in the central mountains.


    Due to the exceptional size and width of the Fantasy Forest, followers of further areas would take days to get to the main temple. That was why the temporary group of vengeance-seekers was only made of elven followers near the central mountains. Among their number were over a dozen high-grade profession holders (Second Grade) and almost two hundred elite profession holders (First Grade).


    Such a powerful force would inflict unforgettable scars upon the enemy if they stormed out of the central mountains.

 Chapter 630 Unexpected Assault

    Chapter 630 Unexpected Assault


    South shore of Garan, the Echo Isles.


    The Isles were arge formation of reef inds that neighbored the shoreline.


    These isles were ordinarily below sea level for most of the year due to the effect of the tides. They would only surface during the ninth or tenth month of the year when monsoon season wasing. This ce would then be a forbidden area that no sea explorer would ever dare to approach.


    That was why the Pale Witches made use of the Echo Isles, constructing a secure forward base from which tounch a constant attack on Garan.


    It wasn¡¯t as if the elves didn¡¯t know of the danger the Echo Isles posed to them; they simply couldn¡¯t do anything about it.


    The witches had set up a denseyer of various defensive and offensive arrays upon the only main ind of the Echo Isles that remained above water throughout the year. With a Third Grade witch stationed upon the ind, the elves would have to pay an unimaginable price to rid the ind of the witches.


    Moreover, there were about thirty to thirty-five kilometers of distance between the Echo Isles and Garan. The elves could only mobilize theirrge navy and aerial units if they wanted to attack that ind. However, the haphazard formation of reefs around the Echo Isles would be the nightmare of the elven navy if they were ever mobilized.


    On the other hand, the elven aerial units would have to travel a long distance to join the battle. Most pegasi and hippogryphs would not have the stamina to fly dozens of kilometers and then proceed to attack the well-defended stronghold of the witches. That was how the Echo Isles vanguard witch base had existed for over two hundred years without being destroyed by the elves.


    The only thing the elves could do was construct a new elven city near the closest shore to the Echo Isles. That was Greenwater City. A powerful elven army had been stationed there to repel the attacks of the witches. They were the Windrunners.


    This Windrunner unit contained almost all aerial units of the elven kingdom that could fly, from low-grade flower fairies to high-grade green spirits, low-grade pegasus knights to high-grade silver pegasus knights, and even groups of hippogryph riders, chimera hordes, and wind eagle strike units.


    As long as it was a flying beast that could be found in Garan, it could be found in Greenwater City.


    In addition to therge number of low-Grade druids and the forestpanions they could summon, the witches would face a sky full of flying magical beasts if they ever dared to invade Greenwater City.


    With Greenwater City and therge Windrunner unit keeping them in check, the witches¡¯ attacks on the south shore became extremelyckluster.


    Upon moving into the Echo Isles, the allied army of the Pale and Dark Witches could only send some small witch squads to harass the enemy. These witch squads had to avoid Greenwater City and create trouble in other areas nearby. The existence of the Windrunner unit and the migration of the elven viges by the shore made it difficult for the witch squads to make any profit. In fact, they even had to endure the tremendous risk of death during these operations.


    That undoubtedly lowered thebat profits of the witches, triggering the dissatisfaction of the Dark Witches that hade from the World of Adepts!


    In particr, Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah, who led this party, almost broke into arguments with the Pale Witches over this issue.


    Uzzah bore a significant burden upon her shoulders entrusted to her by the witch leader on this mission. Apart from a small elven tribe to be brought back for the Dark Witches, she also needed to find a way to obtain the ultimate sacred relic of the pegasi¨C Magic Spring Water.


    The expansion activities of the Dark Witches in the Shadow ne were going very well. They badly needed a group from a high-grade intelligent species who could reproduce to migrate to that world. After several selections, they realized that the forest elves of Faen provided by the Pale Witches were the best choices.


    However, the elves that the Pale Witches caught from Faen on a periodic basis were either elven warriors or archers. Almost all of them werebat-fit individuals with powerful bodies that were best suited to be trained asbat ves. However, this didn¡¯t fit entirely with the expectations of the Dark Witches.


    The Dark Witches wanted an entire tribe of elves that included both the elderly, the young, and the women. There should be at least four hundred of them. That would greatly ease the witches¡¯ observation and testing of the Shadow ne¡¯s corruption process on foreign intelligent species.


    On the other hand, the pegasus magic spring was the key to why the Fantasy Forest of Garan could continuously give birth to pegasi. It was said that pregnant pegasi or silver pegasi only gave birth to a pegasus if they went back to the magic spring of their holynd and drew upon the magic spring water. Otherwise, they could only give birth an ordinary horse.


    This strange phenomenon had apparently attracted the curiosity of the witches.


    Recently, the Dark Witches had been thinking of cultivating some suitable flying voodoo beasts. For that reason, they wanted to obtain some magic spring water for research.


    However, the pegasus magic spring was located deep in the central mountains. It was an area heavily guarded by the elves. As such, the Dark Witches didn¡¯t dare to act boldly, despite being in quite the hurry. They could only find some way to get their hands on it.


    That was why Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah could no longer tolerate the Pale Witches¡¯ck of any significant movements. She couldn¡¯t wait for the day they could split off from their group.


    Yet, at this moment, she very unexpectedly received an attractivebat invitation.


    The invitation came from Alice.


    Ever since the start of the Cmity of Witches, the leader of the Fate Witches, Alice, had left the fleet of the Pale Witches. She had relied on her powerful flying ship and entered Garan on her own. The other witch branches very much envied such a massive metal fortress that could advance and retreat as it wished.


    However, powering such a massive flying ship and keeping it in the air for such extended periods of time cost a shocking amount of magical crystals every second. It wasn¡¯t as if the other witch branches didn¡¯t possess simr methods and tools. They just didn¡¯t have the capacity to sustain such extravagant magical crystal consumption.


    The Fate Witches, on the other hand, owned a Tower that had sealed itself for up to a thousand years. The amount of stockpiled magical crystals had to be stunning. Consequently, they could make up for theirck ofbat power in the short term through such luxurious exhaustion of magical crystals. The witches of the other branches envied Alice¡¯s ability to fly so deep into enemy territory, but they weren¡¯t too surprised.


    The Fate Witches that Alice led had already been in Garan for over two weeks. They must have obtained some substantial spoils of war. However, their squad didn¡¯t even have a Third Grade witch that could keep them safe. Surely, they had to have suffered losses from the brutal retaliation of the elves!


    Now that Alice had actively invited the Dark Witches to move along with them, it was certain that they had been inflicted with tremendous damage.


    Dark Witch Uzzah epted Alice¡¯sbat invitation without any hesitation, even as she harbored traces of secret glee and disdain for the Fate Witch.


    ............


    Year 10471, Month 10, Day 12 of the Faen Calendar.


    Two light elven ships were patrolling around the Echo Isles.


    Compared to the massive sea ships of the humans, the elven battleships were smaller and narrower. The upper decks were tter and wider, often equipped with plenty of the unique magical machinery of the elves¨C the Birdwing ivethrowers.


    These elven battleships were clearly unsuited for deep sea, where the winds and waves were enormous. Consequently, the elven ships couldn¡¯t travel too far out. However, they were the mostmon battleships of the elven navy in the shallow seas due to their speed and agility.


    It was a sunny afternoon.


    The cyan sky was clean and without a trace of a cloud, and the sea winds continued to breeze.


    Two elven battleships wereckadaisically patrolling around the Echo Isles. The soldiers onboard were appreciating the beautiful scenery at sea while keeping an eye on every movement of the witches on the Echo Isles.


    Winged pegasi would asionally take to the skies from their ships. The elven knights equipped with telescopes would silently observe the surroundings from high above.


    The white steeds¨Ctheirrge, pure white wings and elegant flight posture that made flying look as simple as walking¨Ccaused these pegasus knights to attract the attention of everyone. Elven warriors on all sides of the elven battleships were waving at the pegasus knights and paying their respects, shouting their greetings out loud.


    These magical beast pegasi might look handsome, but their stamina was inferior to other flying magical beasts. That was why they were usually only responsible for the airspace security of a two-kilometer radius around an elven battleship. rms and warnings for more distant airspace would be dealt with by the more durable hippogryphs, who had more endurance.


    The sea was extremely fair today. There was plenty of wonder to be found in the blue skies and seas. That was why the flying knights in charge of alerts were feeling yful and started to charge downward from above and ride the waves around the flying ship. Several lithe pegasi carried their knights on their backs and dove from two to three hundred meters high. They then abruptly pulled up at the very moment they approached the surface of the sea. The handsome baster pegasi would then step upon the waves and walk above the foam.


    This exciting scene immediately drew the cheers of the elves. Several ck dots even emerged from therge castle in the distant Echo Isles and looked in this direction.


    Cidaris wiped away the sea foam on his face and climbed up toward the skies once more amidst the cheers and hand-waving of the other elves. The silver pegasus beneath him continued to rise until, finally, they were at the side of Knight Hegus, who was up a hundred meters high.


    "You¡¯re not going down to y for a bit? It¡¯s rare for us toe to the Echo Isles. The witches won¡¯t dare toe out so easily. It¡¯s the perfect time to have our oldpanions stretch their muscles and loosen their bones. Their bones are practically rusted after all that time spent in the cabins." Cidaris asked with an upbeat tone. His eyes were filled with a profound iprehension.


    Most of the elven air units had been sent to Greenwater City. Several powerful elven god messengers were also stationed there. The eruption of the Cmity of Witches this year had been stopped by the elves at the very source. Even now, the attacking witches hadn¡¯t been able to set their foot upon the homnd of the elves.


    Furthermore, the scattered witch squads that snuck onto Garan under cover of night would never be able to escape the pursuit of the Windrunners and other elven powerhouses if they showed themselves.


    That was why Cidaris had never been concerned about this group of witches.


    It was said that the focus of the witches¡¯ attack this year was still the Faen Continent, where the humans dominated. The attack on Garan was only a feint. As long as they could make it through four more months of low tides, the ferocious winds would start blowing in the depths of the ocean, and the witches would have no choice but to retreat to that evil Shadow Ind of theirs.


    When that happened, the Echo Isles would also be devoured by the rising sea level and be submerged underwater once again.


    Without this powerful forward base, the witches would have a much harder time trying to harass Garan.


    Just as Cidaris was asionally piping up and ¡¯harassing¡¯ Hegus, this somewhat stubborn loner of a silver pegasus knight suddenly trembled. He took out a shiny telescope from his waist and raised it to look at the sea in the distance.


    "Sound the rms...sound the rms. Enemy assault!"


    The very next instant, Silver Pegasus Knight Hegus suddenly rang the ear-piercing enemy siren he wore upon him.

 Chapter 631 Frail as Rotten Leaves

    Chapter 631 Frail as Rotten Leaves


    On the distant horizon, three hippogryphs were desperately fleeing.


    They flew up and down, turning, tossing, and performing all sorts of evasive maneuvers.


    The elven archers on their backs were also fruitlessly drawing their bows and loosing arrows at the massive metal ship chasing behind them.


    Sadly, the metal ship continued to fly above the cloudyers. The arrows of the elven archers were whisked to the side by the powerful wind vortices outside the ship before they could hit their target. The tes at the bottom of the vessel opened up, revealing several ck cannon barrels. Over twenty to thirty purple energysers the width of bowls fired in a single volley.


    Energysers of this level could envelop a space of over a hundred square meters with every volley. No aerial unit within the area could rely on their agility to avoid such a dense concentration of an energy barrage.


    Two of the three hippogryphs failed to escape in time and were riddled with holes before the horrified gazes of Hegus and Cidaris, the bodies of the beasts exploding into flesh and blood. The elven archers on their backs didn¡¯t escape their ill fate either; they died along with their steeds.


    "It¡¯s that metal demon!" Cidaris roared furiously and pulled out an elven saber from his waist.


    "Cidaris, don¡¯t be reckless. You go and notify the battleships to leave as soon as possible. I will hold the enemy back." Hegus gave orders to hispanions at the fastest possible speed. He then patted his silver pegasus, and the steed that had apanied him for a dozen years beat its wings quickly and soared up toward the metal ship with dancing hooves.


    The terrifying cannons seemed to be everywhere on the sides and bottom of the metal ship. Trying to charge up to the enemy¡¯s deck while enduring the cannon fire was a pipe dream. That was why Hegus gave up on directly attacking the enemy from the very start. Instead, he chose to rise as high as he could and find a suitable breaching point from the firing blind spot above the enemy.


    However, the metal ship¡¯s altitude was shocking. It was practically flying parallel to the cloudyers. The towering hull of the ship would crush and shred the white clouds wherever it went, leaving a choppy path of clouds in its wake.


    Hegus had to fly higher than the ship if he wanted to find a point of entrance from above. That was far, far, far too difficult for a silver pegasus that ordinarily lived within the Great Fantasy Forest and usually only needed to patrol for long periods at an altitude of one to two hundred meters.


    Still, no one could factor this into consideration anymore at this point. Even Hegus crouched down by the side of the silver pegasus¡¯ ears to encourage it, while rapidly tossing all the satchels of throwing spears and arrows on the silver pegasus off into the air.


    Hegus even removed his metal armor to lighten the load for the silver pegasus, allowing it to freefall from his body. Apart from the throwing spears, Hegus tossed away two of the three quivers of arrows used for long-ranged attacks. There were still thirty arrows in the remaining quiver. These were enough for him to attack freely upon boarding the metal ship.


    As the silver pegasus continued to climb upward, their altitude slowly pulled equal with the metal ship. Hegus could now clearly see the towering figures moving around on the deck.


    Dammit! The deck was filled with fearsome metal golems. Their tall and ferocious bodies shed with blinding metallic gleams under the shine of the proud sun.


    The enemy seemed to have discovered his actions. Metal golems had their arms raised on the side of the ship he was close to. ck gun barrels extended out of those arms.


    What was this they were preparing to do? Could they be preparing for long-ranged attacks? Didn¡¯t most metal golems only possess meleebat abilities?


    A series of strange thoughts arose within Hegus¡¯ heart.


    Before he could find his answers to those questions, small ck dots shot out of the outstretched gun barrels of those metal golems. These ck dots raged toward Hegus and his silver pegasus like an unrelenting storm.


    As a high-grade elven warrior, Hegus naturally possessed enviably sharp vision. Despite the fired ck dots being tiny and concentrated, Hegus still managed to use his superhuman dynamic vision to see the real face of these ck dots.


    They were metal bullets the size of a small finger bone. They were shooting toward him with an unstoppable momentum under the propulsion of a surge of powerful magical energy.


    An intense sense of imminent danger and death instantly crept through Hegus¡¯ heart.


    He abruptly flipped backward, his entire body leaving the back of the horse. He rapidly waved the saber in his hand as he crashed downward.


    The silver pegasus that had previously been trying to climb upward was instantly turned into swiss cheese by the dense barrage of bullets. The fountain of blood that sshed everywhere formed a rain of blood on the very spot.


    Most of the bullets had been blocked by therge body of the silver pegasus. Hegus¡¯ shing saber had also parried more than half of the remaining shots. However, there were still plenty of bullets that had made it past the shing glimpses of the de. They embedded themselves in his body.


    Hegus¡¯ lithe and fit body trembled wildly in the air. He was kept suspended in the air for a moment asrge clusters of blood exploded into a bloody mist in the air alongside shards of flesh and skin.


    The metal bullets might not berge, but the kic energy contained within them was extraordinarily great. These bullets the size of finger bones would even pierce straight through the body of a mortal, leaving arge gaping wound in the part of the body that had been hit.


    Hegus was indeed an elite elven knight. His Physique and Strength were far above an ordinary person, allowing him to be a hundred times more resilient.


    Four bullets passed through his left shoulder, leaving a massive wound there. One pierced his right leg, practically sting away the majority of the flesh on his calf. Another shed past the left of his stomach, leaving a deep gash behind, while another embedded itself somewhere slightly beneath his right chest, snapping and shattering most of the surrounding bones.


    A mortal would have already died from such horrendous wounds. Yet, Hegus was still alive and quickly plummeting from high up in the skies. With his current injuries and his current altitude, he would die to the tremendous impact ofnding, even if it was sea water beneath him.


    A light whinny.


    The familiar sound of hooves clopping in air rang out by his ear.


    Hegus felt his body tighten. Cidaris had sessfully caught him and help avoid the fate of falling to his death.


    Cidaris¡¯ eyes swelled with tears as he held his bloodypanion in one hand and drove the silver pegasus to the best of his abilities with the other. He dodged left and right, barely avoiding a dozensers shooting down from the metal ship above.


    The metal ship high in the sky didn¡¯t seem to be bothered by these two silver pegasus knights. They didn¡¯t change their course to continue pursuing the knights, despite seeing that their two rounds of barraging had failed to kill them. Instead, the boat turned slightly and pushed toward the two elven battleships in the distance.


    The elven battleships were already in disarray at this point. They turned around with much difficulty under the loudmands of the elvenmanders and were desperately escaping toward Garan. A swarm of flying creatures rose from the battleships and charged in the direction of the metal battleship.


    These were the two hundred odd flower fairies that came to sea alongside the elven battleships.


    They weren¡¯trge, but they numbered many and had ws coated in nt poison. Moreover, their flight speed was remarkably swift. These fairies were perfectly qualified to be the short-ranged flying squad of the battleships.


    Sadly, their wings were too thin. They had plenty of speed, but insufficient strength.


    Consequently, they started to falter when they rose to a height of about a hundred meters.


    Over half of the previously intimidating swarm of flower fairies was instantly shot down by the metal ship¡¯s bombardment. The remaining fairies let out screeches and quickly scattered.


    Those flower fairies that turned around and tried in vain to return to the battleships were quickly caught up by the metal ship and easily exterminated. Only the slightly smarter flower fairies turned and flew toward the sea. That was the only way they managed to avoid the next round of energy attacks.


    After all, those who cruised along the sea couldn¡¯t possibly outrun that which flew in the sky!


    Seven minutester, the flying ship caught up with the two battleships. Both ships were sunk amidst much creaking and groaning from three rounds of concentrated fire.


    For a moment,rge amounts of debris and countless struggling elven warriors floated in the sea.


    The flying ship didn¡¯t seem to be concerned about these weak elves. Itsrge hull adjusted itself once again, giving up on exterminating these capsized elves, and turned around to fly toward the Echo Isles.


    There, the Dark Witches and Pale Witches had emerged from their stronghold and were standing before the main fortress of the main ind. They were looking upon this massacre above the sea from a distance!


    "Disregarding the magical crystal exhaustion and cost, such metal fortresses that can fly in the skies would truly be undefeatable and powerful existences within all lesser nes." The Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah couldn¡¯t help but nod and give her praise.


    Alice might only be of First Grade, but if she could offer up this flying ship, then she just barely had the right to cooperate with her.


    Uzzah, who had still been holding some doubts about this partnership, immediately became all smiles.


    The Fate Witches might have plenty of magical crystals and were extravagantly using the flying ship. However, in the end, they couldn¡¯t produce someone who could hold down the fort. Thus, Uzzah just might be able to obtain the dominant position in this operation and make Alice bow to her every whim and fancy!


    On the other hand, the Third Grade Pale Witch in charge of guarding this ind didn¡¯t directly show herself. Instead, she hid within the strong fortress and used her Spirit to assess this strange flying ship silently.


    Even she couldn¡¯t help but treat it as the flying ships of the Silver Union when she first saw it¨C transportation vehicles that could only ferry passengers and goods. However, her Spirit was immediately arrested outside the ship by a peculiar energy fieldyer when she extended it toward the ship.


    Hmm? An energy field?


    The Third Grade Pale Witch was surprised once again.


    Could the Fate Witches be so wasteful as to put on an energy field for such a massive battleship?! How many magical crystals had this cost them!


    These unpredictable Fate Witches.


    The Third Grade Pale Witch sighed helplessly.

 Chapter 632 Their Respective Schemes

    Chapter 632 Their Respective Schemes


    A small weing party was held in therge guest hall on the flying ship.


    As the hosts, the adepts of the Fate Witches were surprisingly not too far behind the guests in terms of number and quality. There was a single Third Grade, one Second Grade, and nine First Grade among the eleven Dark Witches. Meanwhile, the Fate Witches had Greem and Zacha as their Second Grade attendees for this banquet. They had plenty of First Grade adepts as well.


    In general, disregarding the higher-grade adepts, the Fate Witches were more powerfulpared to the Dark Witches.


    Of course, the main reason such an exciting situation hade to rise was that the Dark Witches sent to Faen were only a fraction of the branch¡¯s strength. On the other hand, the Fate Witches were already putting out all of their avable manpower!


    Almost all of the Northern Witches already knew of the young Second Grade fire adept¡¯s rtionship with Alice.


    Due to their usually low profile and distance from each other, no odd rumors had been spread about them. However, for this journey to Faen, an undeniablebination of powers had appeared between these two forces from the central region and the north.


    It had caused dissatisfaction among some of the Northern Witch leaders!


    Of course, these worrisome matters were things that concerned the higher-ups. It didn¡¯t affect the coboration of the Dark Witches and the Fate WItches here in this other world.


    Still, with the usual pride and arrogance of the Northern Witches, they didn¡¯t assign too much importance to Greem, despite his identity as a Second Grade fire adept. The Second Grade Dark Witch prefer to talk to Snowlotus rather than exchange a single word with Greem.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh internally at this sort of arrogance.


    At the same time, the ¡¯guilt¡¯ he felt over his deception and maniption of them immediately faded!


    The flying ship turned back and flew off without any pause after fetching these Dark Witches from the Echo Isles.


    The three leaders of their respective forces met up in a secret room for a discussion while the witches were gathered in the hall socializing.


    Uzzah, Alice, and Greem.


    Uzzah was upset with Greem¡¯s presence here. Her first words upon seeing Greem were an innuendo, "You are truly fit!" Having said that, she turned toward Alice and teased, "You truly know how to choose."


    For a moment, both Alice and Greem¡¯s face turned gray.


    Uzzah was a ck-robed, middle-aged witch. She had a sinister face, a hooked nose, and thick, dark-colored lips; she looked somewhat insane. Still, the dense aura of darkness around her was unforgettable.


    As a Third Grade Witch, Uzzah had no need for reservations in front of the two of them. That was why Alice and Greem could only chuckle forcibly in response to her crazyments. They could not break into conflict with Uzzah.


    Moreover, those two seemingly innocuous sentences had quite obviously ced the Second Grade Greem in the position of Alice¡¯s male concubine. She was obviously trying to force Greem out of the room before negotiations had even started!


    Fortunately, Greem and Alice had already established an understanding. Greem kept his mouth shut and sat silently to the side, leaving Alice to deal with Uzzah alone.


    Alice might only be of First Grade, but she had the wondrous magical and metaphorical halo of a witch leader over her head. That was why Uzzah wouldn¡¯t dare to push her too far, even if she was two entire grades above Alice.


    At the very least, Uzzah had to wait for Alice to sit before she could.


    The negotiations were direct and efficient!


    They were both Northern Witches, and because of that, they knew very well what they should do when fighting a third party.


    Working together against amon enemy was the best way to cooperate.


    Both of their factions had traveled to this distant ne from the World of Adepts, all for the sake of raiding and robbing enough resources to drive the further development of their ns. The only thing that currently stood in their way were the elves of Garan. They only had a chance at obtaining the richest prize if they could move this massive mountain away.


    However, with the information they currently possessed, it was only a pipe dream for the witches current numbers to be able to beat the elves, who had plenty of powerful fighters. Even the Pale Witches couldn¡¯t defeat the elves after mobilizing much of their avable strength. It was even more impossible for them with their tiny bit of military force now.


    Furthermore, even if they could defeat the elves, the ones that benefitted the most would only be the Pale Witches. Their allied army would, at the very best, only gain some leftovers. Consequently, neither party had any interest in directly going against the elves.


    They easily settled the remaining issues now that they had agreed upon this important principle.


    Their entrance and exit from Garan would be much smoother than before with the flying ship. As long as they always had a clear target, urate information, and maintained the basic principle of quick fights and running after the first strike, those dull elves with their stubborn mindsets would never have a simple time catching them.


    The several assaults from the Dark Witches before had always been able to deal decent damage to the elves. However, given theck of a massive battle tform and logistical base like the flying ship, they could not maximize their profits from each fight.


    Not all the prisoners could be brought back. They could only pick the high-quality elves to bring along with them. The war resources were also far too much for them to take away and the remainder could only be put to the torch. Now that they had the flying ship, all these obstacles were no longer problems. The only difficult question now was how to choose the targets of their assaults!


    If they could sessfully surround an elven town or city and abduct all the elves within, then the first mission of Uzzah and the Dark Witches would be immediatelypleted. That was why Uzzan instantly objected when Alice suggested that they assault the unprepared elven viges on the west coast.


    "We have the flying ship. Our greatest advantage is the unannounced and sudden nature of our attacks. The elven kingdom is sure to slip up without any preparations. Thus, the first strike will always be the one with the greatest chance of sess. Rather than waste the first blow on those tiny elven viges that have neither resources nor elites, why don¡¯t we go for something bigger and try and swallow an entire elven town with a single bite?" Uzzah got increasingly excited as she spoke. By the end, her voice had practically turned into a scream.


    "But the defensive strength of elven towns is far higher than normal elven viges. From what I know, most elven towns have squads of treant warriors and are protected by powerful unicorns. These are all nature creatures that canpare to First Grade elite adepts. Moreover, there are sure to be plenty of Second Grade elven powerhouses in such towns. If..." Alice raised plenty of objections, but her tone didn¡¯t seem to be all that firm.


    Uzzahughed coldly upon hearing this. She quickly concluded, "I have already seen it. You have quite a few metal golems upon this ship. With them, ordinary elves will no longer be a threat. Even the treants and unicorns would have trouble disposing of them quickly. With the metal golems as meat shields and the number of witches we have, we are more than equipped to sweep away what little defenses they have."


    Having said that and still seeing hesitation upon Alice¡¯s face, Uzzah couldn¡¯t help but roar, "If someone beyond Second Grade actually appears, you don¡¯t need to worry. Just leave them to me. However, I will first take away two-thirds of the prisoners that we gain after the battle."


    She was genuinely demanding a lot by requiring two-thirds of the elven prisoners. She treated her identity of a Third Grade Witch as a golden signature.


    Greem furiously grumbled internally, but he remained unfazed on the surface. He didn¡¯t seem to mind at all.


    Uzzah was in a hurry toplete her mission, while Greem and Alice were in a rush to push things into motion as well. They wanted to hitch this Third Grade Dark Witch to their metaphorical wagon as well. Sadly, any impatience and desperation before these sly old witches would draw their suspicion. That was why Greem decided to remain silent and leave everything to Alice¡¯s performance.


    Alice was more than agreeable to Uzzah¡¯s idea. However, to avoid the opponent¡¯s suspicion, she could only suppress her joy and slowly skirt around the issue.


    Finally, after much haggling, both parties agreed upon the target of their assault.


    Jintha¡¯Alor!


    It was a small elven town located where the west and south shore met. It was one thousand seven hundred kilometers deep into Garan. It had a poption of seven hundred citizens, with a garrison of as many as two hundred individuals. These two hundred soldiers were all proper elite warriors and nature creatures. They were not like the elven viges that used the flower fairies to pad their numbers.


    Apart from the one hundred and twenty de dancers in their ranks, they also had twenty druids and fifty elven archers.


    Apart from that, the ce also had seven treant warriors and three unicorns.


    ording to the informationpiled by the Dark Witches and the Fate Witches, the high-endbat force of the enemy consisted of seven Second Grade powerhouses. In particr, the captain of the garrison was a Second Grade weapons master, while the deputy was an elven Deadshot. Two of the druids were also Second Grade master shapeshifters.


    One of the seven treant warriors was also a Second Grade Deadwood Guard. Those were famous tank units among the elves. The three unicorns were a family formed by a male and a female and a foal. The couple was a pair of Second Grade creatures.


    If one were to make the calctions, the allied army of the Dark Witches and Fate Witches would have to formte a n if they wished to swallow this tough bone!


    For the next five days, the flying ship continued on its path silently, flying high above the cloudyer. They slowly approached their prey from beyond the senses of the elves.


    The witches hadn¡¯t been idle for the past ten days either.


    Those skilled in poison brewed poisons while other witches prepared their curse staffs. Everyone appeared to be extremely busy.


    Finally, on the sixth day since the Dark Witches boarded the flying ship, they finally appeared near this small town known as Jintha¡¯Alor.

 Chapter 633 JinthaAlor

    This ce was a peaceful and harmonious elven town.


    Unlike the human towns, which thrived on trade, elven towns were locations meant to provide warriors of nearby viges with opportunities for interaction and training.


    Unlike the humans, even a young elf would possess exceptional archery skills and decent closebat skills with a sword. However, most elves preferred the arts, favoring music, dance, flower arrangment and the like. As such, most refused to bebat professionals.


    As free and easygoing forest elves, they could develop in whichever direction they so chose. No one could interfere with their free will.


    However, the leaders of the elven kingdom wanted to avoid the elves being excessively self-absorbed. That would cause the military reserves of the entire elven race to be too rxed. As such, they founded town-scale training facilities such as Jintha¡¯Alor outside of the verymon elven viges.


    Elven viges located around Jintha¡¯Alor had to send their most excellent warriors and all elves that hade of age to this town for training on a yearly basis. The former would all advance tobat professions and be drafted into the armies of the elven kingdom. Thetter was more of a militia training so as not to let these young elvespletely abandon and waste the traditional archery skills with which the elves had established themselves.


    That was why Jintha¡¯Alor was ten to a hundred times more powerful than the surrounding viges when it came to the elites they possessed.


    Some of the elites that finished their training would join the proud elven army, while some who couldn¡¯t give up on their hometowns would return and join their local garrisons. Both options strengthened and increased the pwoer of the elven kingdom.


    Jintha¡¯Alor was built upon a gentle hill. Training facilities could be seen everywhere on the hill from the base to the very top, from the very inside to the outside. The contents of the training covered most possible job advancements.


    Of course, a small elven tribe of three to four hundred elves also lived in Jintha¡¯Alor. They were notbat professions and were simply elf civilians. Their main reason for staying in Jintha¡¯Alor was to provide logistics for the elven warriors who came to train.


    Jintha¡¯Alor was only a training facility in the border areas of the elven kingdom, after all. There usually wouldn¡¯t be more than two hundred elites training here at a time. A simr training facility in the central mountains would easily see over ten thousand elites gather together to train and socialize.


    As a standard training facility, Jintha¡¯Alor also possessed a set amount of pegasi, hippogryphs, and chimeras. However, they were mostly used as training mounts. Usually, Jintha¡¯Alor¡¯s defenses and security wholly relied upon the flower fairies and the more powerful green spirits, both of whom were skilled at stealth.


    Nature creatures that were allied with the elves were abundant in the forest surrounding Jintha¡¯Alor. The flower fairies would pick up on anymotion from them, even if it were the slightest blow of the wind. These palm-sized flower fairies that could hide within blooming flowers or behindrge tree leaves were the best scouts of the elves.


    No enemy could silently sneak into an elven settlement while they were there.


    It was because of all these advantages that the elves believed themselves to bepletely safe as long as they hid within the forest!


    The elves didn¡¯t believe anyone could cross hundreds of kilometers of the forest to assault them as long as they were on their home ground within the Great Fantasy Forest upon which they grew and lived. Consequently, the security of Jintha¡¯Alor was even looser and more rxed than the elven viges by the shore.


    It was currently the afternoon when the sun was at its brightest.


    The hardworking silhouettes of the elven elites could be seen everywhere upon the rugged hill of Jintha¡¯Alor.


    Down on the de dancer fields, surrounded by battle cries and the shing of weapons, elven warriors bared their chests covered in confusing elven tattoos and swung their shining elven sabers around with both hands. They formed pairs and were engaging in duels.


    Further up on a different tform was the archery range for the elven archers. The enthusiastic cheers of young elves would break out asionally. ps and cheers would arise whenever one of theirpanions stuck an arrow in the bullseye of the target with a fancy archery technique.


    There was also a pegasus and hippogryph training ground on the slope of the hill. All of the youths who wanted to be elven knights would cautiously climb up the backs of the pegasi and hippogryphs before being taken into the skies as they screamed out their lungs.


    Behind the hill was where the Druid Conve gathered.


    Young druid gathered there to listen to the teachings of the druid elders, trying their best to learn the heart of nature. However, most of the time, they would leave the camp and enter the wondrous Great Fantasy Forest. There they would eat and stay with those nature magical creatures, learning their behavior and personalities through such a method.


    They druids learned their Wild Transformation through such observations and copying.


    Most druids would even sessfully recruit a powerful magical creature as their animalpanion after a great deal of interaction and living alongside them. This way, when they stepped upon the battlefield once again, a strong and reliable partner would be at their side, charging and fighting with them.


    ............


    High in the cloudyers where the flying ship was cruising.


    The weather today was simply too excellent. Most of the clouds were too light and thin. The flying ship had to be extremely careful not to expose its massive metallic body.


    The various witches were standing by the sides of the ship, using their different methods to spy on everything happening in Jintha¡¯Alor beneath them.


    Sinister and chilling smiles appeared on their faces as they watched the energetic and youthful bodies move. Truly, they were a bunch of unsuspecting and fearless fools! They didn¡¯t seem to have realized that their kingdom, their very home, was on the brink of war and that they had be prey in someone¡¯s eyes.


    While they arrogantly absorbed themselves in the fictional happiness and safety they had created for themselves, the beast of war had already opened its fanged jaw and was preparing to swallow them in one fell swoop.


    "Deserra, you bring five Archers with you and set up an ambush to the south of Jintha¡¯Alor. Dana, you bring your tribesmen and seal off the west. Unguja, guard the east properly with your fiendhounds. Snowlotus, take two Fate Witches with you and watch over the north. Everyone else; attack Jintha¡¯Alor at the same time. We will try and throw the ranks of the elves into disorder at the very start of the fight.


    "The main force of the battle will be thebat machines. Tigule, you bring fifty magical machines with you and lead the charge at the very front. Scatter all elves that try to form up. You don¡¯t need to worry about the extermination and capturing thates after. Just charge to the hilltop with all you have.


    "Sofia, you lead the remaining Fate Witches and follow after Tigule. You guys are responsible for the second charge.


    "Zacha and I will be responsible for clearing away the Second Grade creatures and powerhouses.


    "Endor, you need toplete the poisoning before the fight starts.


    "As for you noble Dark Witches, you can kill and ughter as you like. There¡¯s no need to be bound by any of our ns.


    "How about it? Lady Uzzah, are you satisfied with these arrangements?"


    Greem quickly gave out all thebat orders to the participants of the battle.


    Even though they were slightly dissatisfied that a male adept was so proudly arranging all thebat matters in front of their faces, the Dark Witches still betrayed satisfied smiles upon hearing these ns. Witch Uzzah replied with a chillingugh, "Don¡¯t worry, male adept. Once the battle starts, we Dark Witches will definitely not be dragging you down.


    "Sisters, it seems someone still doesn¡¯t believe in our power. Bring out your ferocity and powerter. Let these foolish male adepts all go to hell."


    Uzzah¡¯s arrogant speech immediately drew coldughter out of all the Dark Witches. These sinister-looking witches in ck robes all took out their staffs and scrolls and started equipping themselves.


    The flying ship was now slowly drifting toward the skies above Jintha¡¯Alor. With a single order from Greem, magical energy surged around the massive metal ship, and several energy fields and defensive forcefields were erected around it. The vessel then quickly descended toward the town.


    It was hard to ignore it when such arge object pushed past the clouds and abruptly appear before your eyes while reflecting the blinding sunlight with its metallic structure.


    From the uneven training grounds and tforms of Jintha¡¯Alor, many elves noticed the abnormality in the sky. They raised their hands to block out the light and get a better look.


    Just as they were murmuring and wondering about the identity of this suddenly appearing object, countless ck dots emerged around the quickly descending ship. These dots flew toward the surroundings of Jintha¡¯Alor.


    The outer blockade squads had set off!


    "Endor, the poison!" Greem solemnly spoke.


    Endor was currently sitting crossed-legged upon an empty spot of the deck. Twisting and winding magical runes covered the floor around her. Pale green halos would asionally rise from the ring of magical runes as Dense, almost solid-state green smoke was trapped within the array.


    "Lord Greem, I need to borrow your Spirit of Pestilence for a moment!" Poison Hag Endor took out a ck poison capsule from somewhere, crushed it, and threw it into the array. Meanwhile, she smiled and looked at Greem.


    Greem didn¡¯t reply. He merely patted his waist, and the magical tome suspended there with a silver chain shed with a green light. A strange, green, and palm-sized puppet floated out into the air.


    This doll had eyes, ears, a mouth, and a nose. It also had limbs. Its wooden body was also carved full of odd runes.


    Apassionate smile appeared on the usually sinister face of Endor when she saw the Spirit of Pestilence. The Spirit of Pestilence also shed and appeared in her hands, constantly calling out ¡¯Grandma,¡¯ ¡¯Grandma.¡¯


    "Poison attribute magical golem?" Uzzah also saw this happen. She turned and looked at Greem, "Brat, I didn¡¯t think you knew something about poison as well. Guess you can go and seduce a Death Witch once we return."


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered with this person who had never liked male adepts. He simply ordered with a serious tone, "Do it, Endor!"


    Poison Hag Endor acknowledged the order and sent the Spirit of Pestilence into the magical ring with a wicked smile on her face.


    The next second, a horrifying scene instantly appeared in the skies above Jintha¡¯Alor.

 Chapter 634 The Attack Begins

    A fearsome human face slowly appeared in the air above the massive Jintha¡¯Alor camp.


    "Death, gue, Ruin, Ation; In the name of the Spirit of Pestilence, I curse you all."


    The scary human face screamed in the mostmonly usednguage of the ancient adepts¨C Gubaillestin. Supposedly, no elves should be able to understand the face. Yet, strangely enough, all the elves were able toprehend those terrifying words as the loud and frustrating curses entered their ears.


    The next second, the face crumbled and turned into motes of green light, lightly falling downward.


    Up in the flying ship, Poison Hag Endor suddenly started coughing intensely. Her already hunched body shrunk even more. She lifted her head after a long while and disyed a ¡¯tragic¡¯ smile in Greem¡¯s direction.


    "The gue has been cast down through the curse. If you want to send someone in, it¡¯s best you have theme here and take an immunity rune first!"


    Having said that, Endor nodded to the Spirit of Pestilence. The voodoo doll-like fellow stomped his feet while standing within the magical ring as three dozen yellow brooches shot out from within. These brooches all flew toward one of the adepts present.


    The Crimson adepts and the Fate Witches grabbed the brooches and stuck them on their chests without any hesitation. The Dark Witches hesitated for a moment and put them on after finding no issues with their spiritual scans.


    "Let¡¯s go; it is time for us to take the stage!"


    Greem turned his head. Tigule, who had been standing on the side of the ship, chuckled, turned, and jumped into the Second Grade magical machine warrior Goblin Shredder that had been custom-made to his specifications. He roared and jumped down unhesitantly by grabbing onto a rope.


    Zeng, zeng, zeng!


    Much like dumplings thrown into the water, forty Archers and ten Shield Swordsmen magical machines followed tightly behind Tigule and jumped down along with him.


    "Sisters, today is a good day for harvest. It¡¯s time we set out."


    Dark Witch Uzzah cackled chillingly and rode on her flying broom along with her flock of dark witches. They quickly charged out of the flying ship.


    "Let us go as well!" Alice¡¯s face was a little pale, but her expression was just as calm as ever, "This is also the first time you all will be stepping upon a nar battlefield. Be careful, and let¡¯s go!"


    Even though Alice was concerned for the Fate Witches under her, she knew very well that they would never grow up if they didn¡¯t experience the trials of nar battlefields. Compared to the veteran Dark Witches, they were like rookie soldiers that had never touched a spear or seen the shade of blood.


    Perhaps one or two of the Fate Witches would bid an eternal farewell to theirpanions after this battle, resting forever in these foreignnds. However, the remaining witches would be able to absorb nutrients from the blood of their enemy and theirpanions, bing even stronger and more cautious.


    As such, Alice looked upon the faces of every one of herpanions with gentle yet determined eyes but said absolutely nothing in the end. She was the first to flip over the side of the ship and fly down.


    Jintha¡¯Alor was currently in chaos.


    The ultrarge scale witch poison spell had brought about indescribable agony to the elves of Jintha¡¯Alor.


    All of the elves that had heard the roar and curse started shivering when the green sparks entered their bodies. Their spirits, stamina, resistances, endurance, and will were all corroded to varying degrees. Thebat professionals that hadpleted advancement only felt some slight difort in their bodies. They could easily suppress this abnormality by raising their spirits.


    However, the ordinary elves that lived in Jintha¡¯Alor all copsed the moment the green light entered their bodies. They started to twitch and convulse as if they had lost consciousness and control.


    For a moment, all elven civilians across the Jintha¡¯Alor camp were showing severe reactions to the poison curse!


    The elves were thrown into disarray. They weren¡¯t sure whether to first save their tribesmen or to fight off the terrifying silhouettes that were quickly descending from the skies.


    A few druids that had nature magic started to chant the Heal and Remove Disease spells loudly. Once their chant ended, beams of green light covered the tumbling tribesmen. The mighty powers of nature instantly expelled the gue viruses within their bodies, allowing them to recover.


    Sadly, new green sparks entered their bodies the moment they stood up in their confusion. The people who had just recovered copsed to the ground in agony once more and started howling in pain.


    The druids raised their heads in shock. Expressions of hatred and resentment appeared on their faces when they saw the rain of green motes that continued to float down from the flying ship above.


    Before they could roar and transform into birds and take to the skies, a druid elder stopped them.


    "Don¡¯t be reckless. The enemy ising on strong. We cannot split up and let them defeat us one by one. Go and meet up with Utas and the others."


    From inside a giant tree hall at the waist of the hill where Jintha¡¯Alor resided, Second Grade Weapons Master Utas stormed out of the door. He looked at the sky full of green lights and those rapidly falling shapes with a face full of surprise.


    He turned, grabbed a young female elf mage, and shouted, "Hurry...hurry and contact Seradane City. The metal monster is here. Have them hurry and reinforce..."


    The young mage hurriedly took out amunication wand. Yet, despite how much magical power she inserted into the wand, all she received as feedback was a bunch of ear-piercing sounds.


    "We¡¯ve been disrupted. The magical message can¡¯t be sent." The young female mage seemed never to have experienced such an urgent and dangerous situation. She was almost crying from the pressure.


    "These damned enemies. It seems they are nning to bag all of us here. Gather and immediately send my message; have all the camp guards gather toward me."


    Several flower fairy dispatch troops pped their wings and charged out of the tree hall as Utas shouted.


    Sadly, these frail flower fairies were mostly at the advanced-apprentice level. Most of them crashed to the ground in pain the moment they came into contact with the green lights. Only a few barely managed to keep flying, stumbling into the distance as they hung in there.


    After all, the adepts wanted to capture all of these elves. Otherwise, if Endor¡¯srge-area poison spells had been changed to focus on weakening and lethality, these elves and flower fairies infected by the gue viruses would long be dead!


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Severalrge, heavy metal golems descended from the skies. Even though the ropes had reduced their falling speed, they still smashed up all the grass, flowers, and trees along the way, creating deep craters in the solid ground.


    These magical machines plunged their hands into the dirt and climbed out of the craters to the unique sound of creaking and grinding mechanical parts.


    They had been prepared for this. The first assault squad that Tigule led ¡¯crashed¡¯ right at the entrance of Jintha¡¯Alor camp. Consequently, when they gathered together, what stood before them was a winding road that extended toward the top of the hill.


    Even though there were plenty of trees here as well, it was a considerably thinner concentrationpared to the surroundings. Bright sunlight shone down from between the gaps of the waving leaves, leaving spotty patches of light on the hill road.


    "Charge!"


    Tigule¡¯s ear-piercing shout rang out from within the Goblin Shredder¡¯s body. This massive magical machine warrior led the way and stepped on the road.


    The lowest level of Jintha¡¯Alor was mostlyposed of de dancer training grounds.


    These agile and strong elven warriors leaped out of their camps, brandishing their narrow, long elven sabers as they rushed at Tigule.


    Szzzzzz!


    There was no need for Tigule to lift a finger. The Archers in formation behind him raised their arms, and a torrent of metal bullets whizzed past both sides of the Goblin Shredder, pouring at the enemy.


    It was apparent that these magical machines had been controlled by the goblin technicians to lower the targets of their guns when fighting. That was why the one dozen de dancers only copsed to the ground after the barrage. Their legs had been shot and broken, but they weren¡¯t dead.


    Greem, who was still in midair, looked over from a distance. He frowned and twisted the snake-eye ring he wore on his right little finger, softly sending a magical message to Tigule.


    "Have the technicians change the attack pattern of all Archers from barrage to sniping. If they were to shoot up all these elves, just the cost of healing would be a massive sum. Remember, under situations where you can guarantee your safety, your people are only allowed to snipe non-vital spots of the enemies. Do not kill them all."


    Tigule casually continued his march forward and quickly transmitted Greem¡¯s message to the goblin technicians hiding within the Archers. The storm of bullets stopped, reced by the crisp and clear crack of sniping shots.


    The elven de dancers whose legs had been riddled with holes were truly admirable warriors. When they saw the magical machines close in on them and were about to simply stride past them, they grit their teeth, endured the pain, and picked up their sabers once again. They tried to climb up from the ground and strike at the enemy.


    Tigule casually continued forward, freely allowing the enemy to strike at the thick, pir-like metal legs of the Goblin Shredder. Sparks were the only things sent flying. The mechanical leg of the Goblin Shredder that he controlled lightly lifted and kicked these crippled elves to the side of the road before continuing forward with his squad.


    Seeing that a frontal assault wouldn¡¯t work, these alert de dancers immediately dashed into the woods, relying on the trees for cover to close in on the magical machines.


    Weng! Weng! Weng!


    Several explosive sounds rang out. Bark and sap went flying from ancient trees that would take two to three men to encirclepletely. A clean bowl-sized hole that prated all the way through would appear from every ferocious metal bullet that was shot. Even the dense ancient trees could not endure such continuous firing.


    Many ancient trees groaned and copsed amidst trembling leaves and flying fragments.


    Still, the de dancers had managed to rush within a distance of the magical machines with the ancient trees as cover.


    Tigule smiled wickedly and controlled the Goblin Shredder to move forward. eleration mes sted out from behind the machine as itsrge metal body charged at the enemy.

 Chapter 635 The Dark Witches

    The newest version of the Goblin Shredder was a mighty magical machine warrior.


    Its lower half still used the extremely stable spider-model mechanical legs, while its upper half was a massive humanoid body of metal. Four strange mechanical arms were attached to that torso.


    Two of those four mechanical arms were fitted with a metal drill and a spinning disc respectively; these were weapons meant for meleebat. Equipped on the other two limbs were miniature energy cannons that could reach a stable output of energy shots reaching one hundred and forty points every five seconds.


    The individual strength of each energy shot didn¡¯t seem to match the Goblin Shredder¡¯s identity as a Second Grade magical machine. However, even a Second Grade adept¡¯s magical defenses couldn¡¯t endure for more than a few seconds once the Shredder closed the distance and rained down relentlessly upon the enemy.


    Moreover, the various energy restrictions that prevented the instation of excessively powerful magic energy weapons had vanished with the activation of the miniaturized magic generator furnace in the Goblin Shredder¡¯s chest. With the stacking of multiple magic energy weapons, the Goblin Shredder had been forged into a fearsome war machine by the goblin technicians.


    The Goblin Shredder charged forward at the elven de dancers, whirling its four mechanical arms as violent energy shots sted out of the guns. These de dancers who were only pseudo-adept level were either knocked aside, hit by the energy shockwaves, or even simply blown away by the Shredder¡¯s massive body.


    In a single instant, eight de dancers had been taken down by Tigule. They all had broken bones and torn muscles.


    Dong. Dong. Dong.


    The magical machines strode over these elves with neat and orderly footsteps and continued to advance toward the top of the mountain. The construction machines following behind them surged forward and quickly put manacles on these elves. They then tossed them into the goblin chariots.


    Two dozen metal eyeballs continuously circled them, preventing them from missing any elves while also keeping an eye out for any ambushes or assaults from other elves.


    Striking the unprepared with preparation and throwing metal against flesh; the orderly magical machine army was practically a tightly-held iron fist. It smashed right through the groups of elves that had gathered together hastily without any resistance.


    The Goblin Shredder that Tigule piloted was fitted with a magic generator furnace. It would almost never have an issue with insufficient energy. As such, Tigule led the charge as the vanguard. Meanwhile, the magical machines would retreat to the backlines every fifteen minutes to recharge their magic energy batteries.


    At any rate, they had plenty of magical machines. They could take turns on the battlefield with no worries about faltering!


    The Dark Witches floating in the skies upon their flying brooms couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by the unstoppable magical machine army.


    Truly, the Fate Witches were the rich ones. Bringing such an army of metal golems from the World of Adepts over to fight the local natives had shown incredible results, just as they had expected. If one were to be brutally honest, these magical machines alone would have been enough to raze Jintha¡¯Alor if the male adept had been willing to spend more magical crystals.


    These magical machines still worked against low-grade elves. However, the price needed for them to win against high-grade elves with advancedbat professions was just too high!


    The first losses among the magical machines happened as the Dark Witches watched.


    The ones whounched the assault on the machines were a group of elven archers in light leather armor. They had scimitars at their waists and quivers on their backs. There were both male and female elves in their ranks, and every one of them had extraordinary archery skills as well as swift, agile movements.


    They climbed up the tall trees and shot arrows at the machines as they leaped from tree to tree as if they were merely walking upon the t ground. As elven archers that had already advanced, every one of them could draw forth a remarkable strength that resembled an inner power of some sort. This power could be attached to the arrows to increase their lethality.


    Ordinary arrows, even those with triple-edge arrowheads that were most useful for piercing armor, had a difficult time prating the thick metal armor of thebat magical machines. However, these arrows glowing with the mysterious power reduced the solid bodies of the machines into butter. They shot right through.


    The destructive power of the arrows exploded within the magical machines, triggering the self-destruction of the energy system. The three Archers standing at the front of the formation were destroyed by the elven archers, one by one!


    This time, there was no need for Greem¡¯s orders. The goblin technicians hiding within the squad quickly gave their orders. The next second, the long-awaited barrage appeared once again. The bullets stormed into the trees where the elven archers were hiding.


    The trees trembled, branches snapped, and splinters flew everywhere.


    Mixed within were the pitiful cries of elven archers being struck by the bullets.


    It couldn¡¯t have been avoided. Elven archers, be they male or female, were just too frail and slender. None of them could endure the force of the bullets, even if they had tough leather armor protecting them. The condition of their bodies meant a single bullet was enough to cripple them. Two rounds might even snap their bodies in half!


    Once the Archers put their full might on disy, the opposing elven archers couldn¡¯t even find stable footholds. They could only grit their teeth and move between the ancient trees. The arrows that they shot while on the run were still powerful, but they could no longer pierce the armor as effectively as before.


    It was a batch of excellent ves. It would be far too much of a shame for them to be killed off by the magical machines like this.


    As such, Uzzah nodded her head slightly as three First Grade dark witches pressed down on their flying brooms and zoomed into the forest.


    Since the Dark Witches had started moving out, Tigule naturally wouldn¡¯t try and fight with them over the enemy. The Archers immediately stopped firing and continued up the hill road in formation. The magical machine remains that had been reduced to scatteredponents were then carefully retrieved by the construction machines.


    The three dark witches rode upon their flying brooms and arrogantly wove through the dense woods. They cackled incessantly as if without a single fear in this world.


    A female elven archer with short green hair couldn¡¯t stand the arrogance of the witches. She hid in a dense canopy and took the opportunity of a dark witch passing by her side to fire her arrow. The arrow struck the witch right upon her in the center of her head, between her exposed brows.


    The elven archer¡¯s heart was filled with the pleasure of exacting revenge when she saw the witch¡¯s broken body fall from the sky. Just as she was savoring the feeling, the anxious call of herpanion rang out from a nearby tree.


    "Verna, run!"


    Run? Why do I need to run?


    Before the green-haired elf could understand what was happening, a vague silhouette slowly appeared out of the tree¡¯s shadow behind her.


    Snap! A beam of ck light hit the green-haired elf, paralyzing her in an instant and making it hard for her to move even a finger. In the next second, a sinister, slimy, and dark form wrapped around her body. The unknown enemy leaned against her ear andughed wickedly, "Kehkehkeh. Poor brat, how did it feel to kill me just now? Do you want to have a taste of being killed as well?"


    She had no time to reply. Arge cluster of shadows surged forward and instantly dragged this green-haired elven archer into a bottomless pit of darkness.


    A brief momentter, the darkness dispersed, yet no sign of the female elf remained.


    Most of the so-called dark witches had transformed their bodies into shadow substance; they no longer had vital spots within their bodies. Without substantial magic damage, normal physical damage was practically ineffective against a dark witch.


    That was why the three Dark Witches were utterly fearless in the face of two dozen advanced elven archers (First Grade), even though they were only at First Grade. In fact, they could use their odd physical damage immunity and potent shadow movement powers to crush the enemy and leave them with no means of defending themselves.


    If it weren¡¯t for the powerful elven archery techniques that they possessed, the dark witches would have ughtered them a lot faster. These archery techniques allowed them to draw out some form of energy attack that resembled magic. If the witches pressed the elves too hard, they might use some kind of suicidal attack to drag the witches along with them.


    Right now, the three dark witches were shing about, disappearing and reappearing at will while using their ability to jump between shadows to dance around the elven archers. They used their shadow powers to paralyze their enemy the moment they found the chance to do so. They would then drag the enemy into the Realm of Shadows.


    The dark witches were slowly, yet efficiently, eating away at the numbers of the elven archers through this method.


    The elven archers had gathered together, but despite multiple attempts to fight back, they had achieved nothing.


    Even their powerful elven archery techniques were ineffective if they couldn¡¯t use a single saturated attack to kill a witch in a single blow. Any damage that the dark witches received could be negated by regenerating from the shadows that were everywhere.


    After losing eightpanions, the remaining elven archers could no longer endure the pressure. They whistled and rushed to Jintha¡¯Alor along the winding paths.


    At this point, a strong force of elves had already gathered before the giant tree hall at the waist of Jintha¡¯Alor¡¯s hill. Judging from where the fleeing archers were running, they intended to group up with that force of elves.


    "Hmph! The enemy has appeared! You lot, don¡¯t be standing around anymore. All of you go down. Leave all the archers behind." Uzzah watched the whole situation unfold from above and finally gave the order to her subordinates.


    "Understood!" The dark witches bowed in unison.


    Apart from the Second Grade dark witch, who stayed by Uzzah¡¯s side, the other Dark Witchesughed sinisterly at the same time and dove down from the skies. They lunged straight at the elven archers who were jumping between the ancient trees.


    Greem turned into a massive me humanoid and stood in the air, silently assessing the formation that the enemy had arranged themselves into in front of the tree hall.


    The most eye-catching member of the enemy¡¯s ranks were those three unbelievably tall and ancient treants.


    Their bodies were seven meters from top to bottom. Even the three to four-meter tall magical machines looked like dwarves before them.


    Their formerly withered and wrinkled bark turned intoyers of tough wooden armor. The green canopy turned into flowing long hair. Several cracks appeared on their bodies. From afar, they looked like the facial features that humans possessed.


    Moreover, these towering treants all had firm and solid muscles. Circles of wooden patterns filled their bodies. Their lower bodies were covered with thick roots, while their arms were formed by tens of thousands of branches and vines twisted together.


    In particr, the ten-meter-tall Deadwood Guard even held a massive tree in his thick humanoid hand as a makeshift weapon. That tree alone would have taken two men to embrace fully.


    That intimidating aura of might was fearsome! So fearsome that it made one want to avert their sight!

 Chapter 636 Relentless Advance

    The seven treants stood in a row, instantly erecting a wooden wall in front of the elven ranks.


    Three sacred unicorns, two big and one small, stood behind them.


    They were handsome white horses. Apart from their ck hooves, the rest of their body was white. Their surroundings were rich with a powerful sacred aura, and milky-white light glowed from the jade-white horn upon their heads.


    It was almost as if the unicorns all possessed an individual, sacred halo of their own. The green lights carrying the gue viruses would automatically fade away wherever they went. None of the green lights could get within twenty meters of them. Moreover, many of the elven civilians had sessfully taken shelter within the tree hall thanks to their blessings. None of these civilians had been affected by the gue curse.


    The witches couldn¡¯t help but feel their hearts burn with excitement when witnessing this miraculous feat of neutralizing the poison. The eyes that gazed upon the three unicorns were all filled with some trace of greed and passion.


    The young unicorn seemed to have been affected by the heavy atmosphere. It constantly dug at the ground with its front hooves, as if it was extremely anxious. The female unicorn walked to the young unicorn¡¯s side and rubbed her child with her snout. She then shielded her child behind her own body.


    The Second Grade weapons master stood upon the tree hall. He wore only simple leather armor as he lightly brandished a strange weapon with both of his hands¨C Moon des. It was a type of peculiar weapon that resembled a crescent moon. Sharp ded teeth filled the curved sword, except for a small handle on its back.


    The moon des would inflict horrifying slicing and cutting damage to enemies when it flickered and spun rapidly. It was also particrly suitable for piercing armor. However, due to the difficulty of controlling the weapon, most elven warriors that had yet to reach the level of a weapons master didn¡¯t dare to use this weapon.


    A beautiful female elf with a slender figure also stood at the weapons master¡¯s side. She held arge bow in her hands with an arrow nocked upon it. The edge of the arrowhead shimmered with the light of dense magic.


    She was probably the Second Grade elven deadshot who was the deputy captain of the garrison!


    Greem¡¯s vision was excellent. He even saw a group of druids in green leaf robes and wolf, eagle, or deer helms behind the ranks of the elves. They heldrge oaken staffs in their hands. The green light of natural power shrouded these staffs as the druids gazed upon the battlefield with eager and determined expressions.


    Perhaps they were the only ones among the elves who felt no fear!


    ording to the information that Greem had obtained, the way in which Grades were defined in the Faen ne was very simr to the World of Adepts. The only difference was that the strength of each Grade was slightly watered down whenpared to the World of Adepts.


    At least among the elven fighters that Greem hade into contact with, their basic grade levels were as follows:


    Flower Fairies (Intermediate Apprentice)¡ª¡ª Green Fairies (First Grade).


    Creatures like flower fairies were still pretty good options as scouts and messengers. Sadly, their bodies were far too frail, making the appearance of First and Second Grade fairies a rare thing. It was apparent that their maximum development potential was basically First Grade.


    de Dancers (Advanced Apprentice)¡ª¡ªWar Dancers (First Grade)¡ª¡ªWeapons Master (Second Grade)¡ª¡ªWeapons Grandmaster (Third Grade)¡ª¡ªStorm Sword Saint (Fourth Grade).


    It was an assassin or warrior-type profession that possessed great mobility. They were good at using rapid attacks to defeat the opponent while using their quick movements to avoid most of the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    Of course, there was a significant w in this profession; they couldn¡¯t wear heavy armor. That also caused their overall defense to be shallow. To make up for this weakness, the low-grade de dancers would often carve confusing war tattoos upon their exposed bodies to achieve the effect of obscuring the human eye and redirecting the enemy¡¯s line of sight.


    Elven Bowmen (Intermediate Apprentice)¡ª¡ªElven Archer (First Grade)¡ª¡ªElven Deadshot (Second Grade)¡ª¡ªMagic Marksmen (Third Grade)¡ª¡ªPhantom Ranger (Fourth Grade).


    In all honesty, the elven archers were probably the only long-ranged units of the elves.


    However, considering the elven racial talent for archery, almost all elves possessed superior skills at firing an arrow. That was why the elves were a fearsome race in the event of an all-out war. They were a race where every single civilian could pick up a bow and be an archer.


    If the elven archers werepared with the adepts, the archers woulde off superior whenparing explosive power. However, thebat techniques of the elven archers were far too simplistic and repetitive. It was easy for them to die to the countless strange skills that the adepts possessed if an elven archer were to ever engage an adept in a duel.


    Then again, if the location of the fight was set in the Great Fantasy Forest, the results would be a lot more unpredictable!


    Apprentice Druid (Advanced Apprentice)¡ª¡ªDruid (First Grade)¡ª¡ªDruid Master (Second Grade)¡ª¡ªDruid Elder (Third Grade)¡ª¡ªShapeshifters (Fourth Grade).


    If one were to be honest, the druids were the unique jack-of-all-trades profession of the elves.


    They wielded nature magic and could be considered casters of some sort; they could summon animalpanions and could, therefore, be seen as summoners of some kind. Druids possessed Wild Transformation and could change into all sorts of ferocious beasts to take on the role of tanks at the frontlines. They could even use swords, staffs, and various melee weapons while also being capable of simple healing.


    In all seriousness, the druids were more than qualified to fill in any vacant role that appeared on the battlefield!


    Tiny Treants (Advanced Apprentice)¡ª¡ªTreant Warriors (First Grade)¡ª¡ªDeadwood Guard (Second Grade)¡ª¡ªAncient Treant (Third Grade)¡ª¡ªNature¡¯s Herdskeeper (Fourth Grade).


    Nature creatures like treants were practically the greatest treasure that the Great Fantasy Forest had bestowed upon the elves. The elves had always been a race of frail and weak individuals. Their society often consisted of only casters or agile warriors and archers. There was no tank or meat shield to be found among their ranks to hold their own at the frontlines.


    It was then that the closest ally of the elves, the treants, became especially important!


    The treants had extremely long lives and exceptional defensive abilities. They even possessed fearsome regeneration while in the forest. These creatures were more than qualified as frontline tanks. Moreover, the treants also had a potent defensive skill¨C Entangling Roots.


    Any enemy that stepped into a treant¡¯s defensive area would be bound to the spot by strong roots that broke out of the earth. Without great strength or the ability to teleport, the entangled enemy would have no path to escape other than shutting their eyes and waiting for a merciful death.


    One couldn¡¯t look down upon ordinary treant warriors because they were only First Grade. Even many Second Grade magical beasts would not hold a candle to them if they were to apply themselves. These Second Grade beasts could only run as far as they could away from the treants.


    Young Unicorn (First Grade)¡ª¡ªAdolescent Unicorn (Second Grade)¡ª¡ªHoly Unicorn (Third Grade)¡ª¡ªProtector of the Woods (Fourth Grade).


    Compared to the treants, the unicorns were stronger magical beasts that were even harder to deal with.


    The fearsome spiral horn on its head possessed a powerful halo of purification and dispersion. It could even inflict a terrifying blinding effect upon being stabbed into an enemy¡¯s body. The unicorns also possessed robust magic-resistant skin, causing most elementium spells to deal minimal damage to them.


    That was why the unicorns were even tougher opponentspared to the treants!


    If Greem had the choice, he would rather fight two Deadwood Guards alone then deal with a single adolescent unicorn. Magic would not do much to it, while it could easily blind you before kicking and knocking you around. Greem felt himself shiver at the very thought of such a horrible situation.


    Greem assessed the enemy¡¯s forces while silently waiting for his own magical machine army to enter the fray.


    This troop of fifty-one magical machines had bulldozed their way to the tree hall, leaving a trail of ughter behind them. The price they had paid in exchange was no more than five magical machines.


    Tigule led his magical machine army slowly into therge square before the tree hall against the elven ranks defending ahead of them. They assembled into a neat formation and squared off against the opponent.


    The Fate Witches that arrived shortly after gathered behind the magical machines and silently prepared their spells.


    The dance between the dark witches and the elven archers had ended with the defeat of the elven archers.


    The final number of the elven archers that had made it back to the army could be counted with a single hand. In addition to the archer squad that had been standing guard by the hall, they were just barely able to put together a team of twenty-five archers. However, they also brought with them a bunch of ordinary elves to serve as their reserves. That caused the number of long-ranged attackers on the side of the elves to instantly be a hundred men strong.


    The dark witches circled the skies upon their flying brooms as they whistled and screeched. They asionally dove down and threw clusters of shadows into the ranks of the elves. Sadly, these Shadow Eclipses were dispersed by the unicorns¡¯ purification halos before they could take effect.


    The dark witches had no choice but to return to the sky after several failed attacks, cursing as they did so.


    They didn¡¯t dare to get too close to those two adolescent unicorns with their power. Otherwise, a single Cleansing Light thrown their way would spell immense trouble. Their First Grade shadow bodies couldn¡¯t possibly endure the wondrous powers of Second Grade unicorns.


    It wasn¡¯t much of a problem if their forms were purified. At the very worst, they could simply return to the shadows and reform their bodies. However, if their Spirit and consciousness brand that was assimted into the shadows were purified alongside their bodies, then these dark witches would truly be dead.


    "Devils of the other world, retreat from our home." The Weapons Master fixed his hateful gaze upon Dark Witch Uzzah. After all, she was the most powerful person here, "Otherwise, leave your lives behind upon this battlefield!"


    With the loud cry of this elvenmander, the elven archers pulled their bows and nocked their arrows; they were prepared for battle at any time. The other elven soldiers also started cheering and letting out battle cries.


    Sadly, their disy of intimidation couldn¡¯t scare off these otherworldly adepts who came prepared.


    Disdainful and chilling smiles appeared on the faces of all the adepts as they drove the magical machines to press forward.


    The massive flying ship also started to descend slowly, extending several dozen cannon barrels from its hull.


    It was clearly taking advantage of the elven army having no powerful flying units. They were ready to use their powerful arsenal to crush the enemy.


    The evil witches had traversed worlds for the very sake of abducting the elves, taking theirnds, and exploiting their resources. There were no grounds for negotiation between the two parties.


    Thus, with a deafening roar from the elvenmander, the tense string of battle finally snapped in two!

 Chapter 637 Standoff Between The Two Armies

    The battle erupted just as expected!


    Naturally, the first ones to fire were the long-ranged units of both parties.


    Both sides of the conflict proceeded like it was one of the ancient noble battles, pouring their firepower at the enemy from a distance of a hundred and fifty meters. The adepts undoubtedly held over ny percent of the upper hand in this regard.


    The violent metal bullets and the elven arrows shing with magical lights flew past each other in the center of the battlefield, scratching and slicing. Still, most of the projectiles found their way to the enemy frontlines.


    On the side of the elves, the seven towering treant warriors shambled forward. They waved their hands woven together with tens of thousands of vines, brambles, and branches and stood shoulder to shoulder in front of the frail elves.


    The dense storm of metal bullets crashed against their withered and skinny wooden bodies, sending splinters flying everywhere and sap sshing here and there. Even so, the treant warriors simply grunted in pain while keeping their body upright to block even more of the metal bullets.


    The elven archers hiding behind the treant warriors returned fire with all they had, even as they dodged the bullets that slipped by. The arrows of fury screeched through the air and sped toward the continuously advancing magical machine army.


    The druids at the back of the formation raised their oaken staffs high and loudly sang praises to the great spirits of nature. As they waved their hands, green halos of Rejuvenation, Heal, and Nature¡¯s Recovery covered the bodies of the treant warriors.


    This ce was, after all, the paradise of nature creatures¨C the Great Fantasy Forest!


    Under the influence of the druids, surges of green nature power visible to the naked eye seeped out of the surrounding woods and greenery. These surges of natural energy then gathered around the bodies of the treant warriors, healing and consoling their badly wounded bodies.


    A Druid Master of the Talon in an eagle helm raised his staff and used his mighty spellcasting power to apply ayer of Bramblethorn Armor upon the seven treant warriors. It was a defensive nature spell; not only could it increase the treant¡¯s defenses, but it could also reflect some melee damage.


    Meanwhile, the other Druid Master of the w in a wolf helm cast ayer of Barkskin on the treants. That caused the nature power that had gathered around the treants to turn into tough bark that covered their bodies and helped block some of the damage for them.


    It was through such help and support that this seemingly insignificant troop of elves were able to endure the furious barrage of forty Archers. No signs of the expected crumbling had surfaced.


    In fact, it was the adepts who were suffering obvious losses!


    Ten defensive magical machines with swords in one hand and shields in the other stood at the very front of the battle. They raised their alloy shields and blocked the magical arrows flying toward them. Indeed, they weren¡¯t dealing with ordinary arrows, but enchanted bolts that had been imbued with magical energy.


    These arrows were either enchanted with sharpening or piercing effects. However, the majority of them were still explosive arrows that burst upon impact.


    These hundred or so elven archers put on full disy their powers: Double Shot, Triple Shot, Penta Shot, Raging Storm. They put all those fancy archery techniques to use. When paired together with those powerful enchanted arrows, it ced unprecedented pressure on the magical machine army.


    To cut costs and increase the speed of their production, only the core and critical parts of these low-grade magical machines were built with high-strength alloy materials. The rest of the body was only made with ordinary magical metal that had been refined. These defenses were more than enough against most physical and magical defenses that they usually encountered.


    However, when faced with such a dense storm of enchanted arrows fired with such power, they were no longer as imprable as before!


    In particr, the arrows shot out from the hands of the high-grade elven archers and the elven deadshot were especially deadly. Not only were they exceedingly powerful, every one of their shots was urate and came flying in at sharp angles. Even though the Archers had already tried their best to cover the weak spots on their bodies, the enchanted arrows still managed to urately pierce through the mess of metal limbs and embed themselves within the joints of the magical machines, despite having traveled hundreds of meters.


    Boom!


    A thick metal arm flew into the sky with the explosion of an arrow.


    All the witches couldn¡¯t help but frown at the sight of that miraculous archery. They, somewhat unknowingly, put even more of a distance between themselves and that elven deadshot.


    That Second Grade elven deadshot was practically a god on this battlefield now!


    Shemanded over a hundred elven archers to bombard the magical machine army with explosive arrows continuously. The shells of some magical machines would eventually crack under the shockwave of magical energy from the waves of exploding magical fires.


    That would be the moment for her to strike!


    She stood high up in the tree hall, two hundred meters away, and used parabolic shots to have her arrows nail the magical machines where a crack had appeared. Through such a method, she had forcefully dealt with six magical machines in a short period of two to three minutes.


    Suchbat results undoubtedly turned the eyes of everyone present!


    As Greem¡¯s heart silently ached over these losses, the Fate Witches that were clustered behind the magical machines stood forth.


    With the predictivemands of Alice that almost seemed to be guided by a god, the Fate Witches used instant-cast magic wands to either intercept the arrows or shield the magical machines. They became able to block the attacks of that elven deadshot constantly.


    After all, the magical machines were built entirely from metal on the outside; they weren¡¯t made of paper. As long as the Fate Witches could find a way to prematurely set off the enchanted arrows or intercept them to make them miss the magical machines¡¯ cracks, then they wouldn¡¯t be able to deal such severe damage.


    In doing so, the Fate Witches sessfully stopped the elven deadshot from further expanding herbat results.


    Now that these witches had chosen to follow after Alice and advance to be Fate Witches, their own casting ability naturally devolved to some degree. Though this gave them potent prediction and anticipation abilities, it also meant that the Fate Witches¡¯bat abilities were the weakest among all the witch branches.


    That was why Greem led Dragonborn Zacha down from the skies upon seeing their magical machines being incapable of wrecking the treant frontlines. As he descended from above, he quickly started preparing arge scale fire spell.


    One had to say that even though the battlefield wasplete chaos, with powerhouses of every race gathered, a fire adept was still unquestionably the most dominant individual on the field!


    It had only been less than three minutes of spell preparation, yet a massive Meteor Shower had rapidly formed above the heads of the elves.


    The fiery red clouds quickly gathered in the skies above, rolling and quaking without stop. Severalrgeva bubbles faded in and out of sight within the clouds. As the fire elementium gathered, the mes within the clouds started to be increasingly restless and frantic.


    The entire world turned dark red under the illumination of the odd and sinister crimson light. The heat waves singed and scalded the people below.


    "Dammit. This is the enemy adept¡¯srge-scale offensive spell. We can¡¯t let the me clusters within fall on us. Quick; all druids attack with me."


    All the First Grade druids raised their staffs under themand of that eagle-helmed druid master. They threw the nature spells in their hands that they had carefully prepared at the turbulent cloud of fire.


    The Meteor Shower that had already brewed to its peak was disrupted by the spells of the druids at the veryst moment.


    Bang!


    A loud boom that seemed to split the heavens and earth rang out. The violent cloud of mes was finally incapable of maintaining its form and utterly exploded!


    The next second, a terrifyingly massive and immense me shockwave ravaged in every direction.


    This me shockwave was so vast that it almost engulfed both the elves and adepts within it.


    The two adolescent unicorns at the side of the elves stood upon their hind legs, and the spiral horns on their heads let out a blinding white light. They had worked together and erected a Natural Ward in this moment of crisis, protecting the frail ordinary elves among their ranks.


    The violent fire elementium that had gone out of control also had the entirety of the druids¡¯ powers mixed within. Thus, the surging energy and the ferocity of the elementium alsoid incredible pressure on the two adolescent unicorns.


    Pure white hair started to rapidly wither and fall off the unicorns¡¯ bodies at a visible rate. Large burn marks began to appear on their baster skin. However, while the wounds generated quickly, they were healed just as fast.


    As waves of purification halos washed across their bodies, these wounds started to vanish at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    However, at the edge of the Natural Ward, five elven archers were caught in the fire. Sparks of me ignited upon their bodies, clothes, and hair, quickly spreading across the rest of their bodies. It didn¡¯t matter how they beat the mes or cried; the magical mes couldn¡¯t be extinguished.


    They rapidly burned to ashes within a matter of seconds.


    Fortunately, with thebined efforts of the treant warriors and the two unicorns, the majority of the elves were finally able to survive the explosion of fire.


    The same burst of fire didn¡¯t cause nearly as much trouble on the side of the adepts as it did for the elves.


    The magical machines on the frontline didn¡¯t require any special protection from the adepts. As such, the adepts only needed to erect ayer of elementium protection for themselves so they could allst through this riot of burning. The only reason the elves were having such a hard time was that they had far too many ordinary elves in their ranks that couldn¡¯t protect themselves.


    The exhaustion of power from erecting a hundred-meter-wide Natural Ward was utterly different from a two-meter Natural Ward. Otherwise, it didn¡¯t matter how weak the two adolescent unicorns were; they wouldn¡¯t have been so troubled by an ¡¯ordinary¡¯ Second Grade spell.


    The eyes of all the adepts gleamed at this sight.


    The weak, ordinary elves seemed to be a soft spot of the enemy. Targeting their attacks at these elves would impose substantial pressure on the enemy forces.


    The very next instant, almost all the witches started chantingrge-scale spells at the same time. Moreover, they positioned the center of their attacks right upon the group of weak elven archers and ordinary bowmen.


    The faces of the leaders among the elves instantly flushed white!


    These damned adepts...

 Chapter 638 Pawn Against Pawn, General Against General

    Threerge-scale spells erupted almost simultaneously inside the ranks of the elves.


    Icy Frost Ring!


    Shadow Army!


    Meteor Crash!


    A massive tide of frost exploded in the very center of the elven lines. The churning cold of dangerously low temperatures raged in every direction, sealing most of the ordinary elves in a thick casing of ice. Only the individuals who had elementary magic resistance could avoid the fate of being sealed in ice.


    The Shadow Army that the dark witches had worked together to summon was a horde of ferocious shadow creatures that came from the Shadow ne.


    Shadows were not equivalent to darkness. Shadow was a sort of energy that had no material substance to it, but also naturally possessed spatial traits. There were countless types of shadow creatures. Most of them hid within the Shadow ne, for there were no suns or moons there. There was only the infinite darkness.


    Of course, some powerful shadow creatures would choose to wander between the nes. The chaos energy between the nes was their natural sustenance. These shadow creatures were sly, dangerous, and powerful. Consequently, they were a species of beings that summoner casters both loved and feared tremendously.


    Shadow Summoning was a mature magic and could be strengthened all the way from First Grade to Fourth Grade.


    First Grade Shadow Summoning could only randomly summon some ordinary shadow creatures, such as shadow mastiffs, shadow snakes, or shadow warriors.


    On the other hand, Second Grade Shadow Summoning could summon a whole squad of shadow warriors. Though they were not nar creatures, they were still intelligent lifeforms with elementary intelligence.


    As for what the dark witches had just worked together to summon? That belonged to the level of a Third Grade Shadow Summon and could conjure a massive shadow army that numbered as many as a hundred shadow creatures. A hundred-man shadow army like this could easily ughter a mortal army of a thousand soldiers with their immunity to physical damage and their ability to bypass defenses.


    Of course, the shadow energy that formed the creatures was a sort of negative energy. This negative energy was naturally countered by the unicorns, who had positive energy. Thus, as the darkness spread and the ughter extended its reach, three blinding suns lit up within the boundless shadows, two big and one small.


    Of course, these weren¡¯t actual suns, but nature¡¯s light glowing at the tip of the three unicorns¡¯ spiral horns!


    With the origin suppression from the three unicorns, the previously unchallenged shadow army immediately started fleeing in every direction. They shrieked as they dove back to hiding within the shadows. There was no longer a single trace of their previous fearlessness and recklessness.


    At this moment, a massive fireball that measured a whole five meters in diameter crashed from the skies. It brought with it a zing sea of fire and horrifying temperature as it went straight for the towering tree hall.


    The fireball had yet to arrive, but the heat wave had already swept the ground.


    Everything on the ground heated up and became scorched. The green quickly faded as fiery red was the only thing left within the massive space, along with the suffocating heat.


    "Dammit, dammit, dammit. You will kill all of the elves this way." Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah, who had been watching all this unfold without lifting a finger, started to curse repeatedly.


    She lifted a hand, and a thick Spear of Darkness crossed several hundreds of meters to strike the plummeting meteor. The meteor instantly shattered, exploding into four or five smaller meteor shards. These pieces continued to fall from the skies like a rain of fire that sought to burn the air to ashes.


    The shattering of the meteor meant the destructive impact of its descent was negated. Still, the rain of fire from above forced the elves to scurry about to avoid being killed. Their formation was thrown intoplete disarray. Even the tall and fearsome treant warriors seemed to feel unspeakable fear toward the rain of fire. Much like the elves, they frantically fled.


    The formation of the elves had beenpletely disrupted.


    Almost as if someone had blown the horn for a charge, all the magical machines started their advance at the direction of the goblin technicians. They unleashed a storm of metal toward where the treants, elves, and unicorns were as they marched.


    The witches roaming along the perimeter also seemed to have spotted the opportunity. They all used their various techniques to cut into the battlefield quickly. They charged onto the battlefield in groups of three to five, targeting the elven powerhouses that had been isted due to their frantic running from therge-scale spells.


    Tigule piloted his Goblin Shredder and kept his eye on that Second Grade Deadwood Guard.


    The Deadwood Guard was covered in wooden tendrils and sharp thorns. It waved the massive tree in its hand freely, sweeping away the rain of fire descending upon his head. It was trying its very best, but sparks of fire still ignited upon its dry and withered body.


    The Deadwood Guard was approximately ten meters tall. The Goblin Shredder was reasonably big on its own, but it was still no more than five meters in height. Tigule piloted the Goblin Shredder and rushed at the enemy, the five pairs of spider-like metallic limbs nging loudly as he advanced.


    As the Goblin Shredder advanced, it waved the four metal arms on its torso.


    A metal saw and an alloy drill spun rapidly, emitting a loud grinding noise. Meanwhile, the two magic energy cannons fired continuously without any restraint, instantly flooding the Deadwood Guard¡¯s massive body with fearsome energy shots.


    If he had the choice, Tigule would definitely not have wanted to pick a fight with this ten-meter giant. However, when he took a look at the forces on their side, the only one that couldpare to the Deadwood Guard in terms of size and strength seemed to be him.


    That was why Tigule had no choice but to roar and sh with the Deadwood Guard despite how reluctant he was.


    They were two massive giants. One wasrger but was created from the animation of a withered and ancient tree, while the other¨Cdespite being half the size¨Cwas a magical construct and a true metal golem.


    An apocalyptic melee erupted when these two individuals crashed into each other.


    One hadrge wooden fists, while the other possessed joints of steel and fists of iron. The two humanoids shed together and rolled around. Whenever they raised their fists, they would be thrown straight into the head of the other. Mountainous sounds rang out as they punched each other, almost as if the very earth was being pounded into gravel.


    However, splinters were flying everywhere from one of them; visible cracks had appeared all over the body of the Deadwood Guard. The other continued to dig and slice with its saw and drill, as its energy shots ceaselessly bombarded the enemy at practically zero distance.


    The two of them were both of the same grade, but the power that they disyed inbat against each other was vastly different.


    The basic attributes of both creatures slowly appeared before Greem¡¯s eyes like a book as he scanned with the Chip.


    [Goblin Shredder.


    Second Grade Magical Machine Warrior.


    Five meters tall, seventeen tons.


    Core energy source: Magic Generator Furnace (Miniature Version).


    Magic energy weapons: Two magic energy cannons, one metal saw, one alloy drill, twenty-four goblin rockets, one energy field generator, and one anti-gravity levitation system.


    Basic attributes are as follows upon conversion:


    Strength 27 | Physique 34 | Agility 18 | Spirit 11


    [Deadwood Guard.


    Second Grade Treant.


    Ten meters tall, eight tons.


    Basic attributes are as follows upon conversion:


    Strength 24 | Physique 27 | Agility 9 | Spirit 13]


    Greem had a sudden revtion when looking upon the attributes of both parties.


    The Deadwood Guard might not be too far off of the Goblin Shredder regarding Strength, but it was inferior when it came to Physique and Agility. A Second Grade creature like itself was mostly determined as Second Grade based on its primary attributes rather than its overallbat prowess.


    Thus, the Deadwood Guard only had the form of a Second Grade creature without the essence of one. It was a Second Grade creature that had an innately powerful body, but a weak soul consciousness.


    On the other hand, the Goblin Shredder both had primary attributes thatpared to Second Grade creatures, as well as the piloting of a top-grade goblin mechanic like Tigule, the God of War. The power it could unleash inbat, and its use of its own capabilities and attributes, was vastly superior to the opponent.


    If it weren¡¯t for the green vines and thorns on the Deadwood Guard¡¯s body that constantly entangled the Goblin Shredder¡¯s arms like serpents, things would be a lot different. These entangling vines were preventing the Goblin Shredder from making any significant movements, especially when thick roots were also emerging from the ground to further tie it down. With the difference in theirbat power, the Goblin Shredder would have only needed fifteen minutes to utterly destroy the body of the Deadwood Guard!


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, the Deadwood Guard, regardless of how powerful it became, was no more than a slightly stronger Pawn. However, the Goblin Shredder was a true General. It was a hero on the battlefield.


    The two individuals couldn¡¯t even bepared to each other!


    Now that the battlefield was quickly turning into utter chaos, Greem spent no more energy trying tomand the situation.


    At any rate, the more chaotic the battlefield, the greater their advantage. After all, the magical machinespletely rolled over the opposing elves when it came to individual strength.


    Thus, Greem transformed into a four-meter-tall giant me humanoid and casually strolled across the battlefield. He swept across the field with his bright yellow eyes of mes, continually looking for his opponent.


    Such an eye-catching target naturally drew some overreaching opponents.


    Ci. Ci. Ci.


    Three consecutive arrows pierced into the Lava Shield in front of Greem, sting it into a rain of fire andva that fell from the skies.


    Greem looked around with his zing eyes.


    It was that Second Grade female elven deadshot!


    She stepped upon the tall ancient trees and leaped off of the soft and slender branches to advance on Greem. As she did so, she continued to pull her bowstring rapidly.


    After that Triple Shot, she unleashed yet another Double Shot.


    This time, the strength behind the arrows was even more intense and its piercing power was a lot more ferocious than before as well.


    "Hahaha," Greemughed arrogantly, "You alone can¡¯t possibly be my opponent. Why don¡¯t you call him over as well!"


    As Greem spoke, he raised a hand to shield his face.


    The two enchanted arrows that were so fast as to avoid being seen by the naked eye dug deep into the back of his hand. They then exploded abruptly.


    A massive wound was sted into Greem¡¯s left hand made of onlyva and fire. The magma shards and boilingva instantly sshed in every direction.


    Greem couldn¡¯t care less for such a minor injury. He continued tough as he made a waving motion towards a lithe silhouette in the distance. Arge pir of crimson fire quickly sted out from under that person¡¯s feet.


    With Greem¡¯s current power, this crimson fire pir only required half a second to form and erupt. Even so, it still failed to wound the enemy.


    The agile form shed and turned into a rapid beam of light. It then dashed past Greem¡¯s side.


    At the same time, a fountain of fire sted out of Greem¡¯s side. A deep sh mark appeared on his dense waist.

 Chapter 639 Equally Matched

    Chapter 639 Equally Matched


    "A weapons master and a deadshot; two Second Grades. Now, this is fun!"


    Greem raised his head andughed. Several new Fire Shields and Lava Shields popped out of his party and enveloped him tightly within their defenses.


    "Come, all of you. Let me see what you Second Grades of Faen are made of."


    The faces of the two Second Grade elves turned around as the faint red Ring of Fire engulfed a hundred-meter space around Greem. Both of them retreated at the same time, barely making it out of the radius of the spell.


    However, while they had managed to escape, other smaller creatures were in for a disaster.


    The one hundred flower fairies and green fairies buzzing around the battlefield were still weaving through the crowd, screaming as they ran. The very next moment, they were howling in agony and frantically trying to leave this strange Ring of Fire, panicking like dragonflies that had fallen into the water.


    Sadly, before they could make it too far,rge bursts of me started to burn on their bodies.


    Within a matter of seconds, the mes spread throughout their bodies and turned them into zing birds of me.


    As creatures of grass and wood, flower fairies and green fairies had practically negative resistance to fire. That was why they were burned to ashes without a chance to escape when they faced a master of pyromancy. Sparks and mes of various sizes also ignited all over the bodies of the elves and treant warriors.


    The twomanders were naturally worried to see so many of theirpanions cast to the mes. They had no choice but to return and stall the otherworldly adept that had transformed into a fearsome me Fiend.


    If Greem were only an ordinary Second Grade adept, he would already have been minced to bits by the enemy. However, after opting for me mastery, Greem''s control over elementium fires had reached an incredible extent of power far beyond the reach of ordinary adepts.


    It was particrly true once Greem had merged so many otherworldly fire runes into his magic. The ways and techniques in which he utilized fire magic had be increasingly strange and profound.


    Explosion! Coldme! Poisonfire!


    Greem looked at the weapons master that was circling him and regrly using moon des to destroy his Fire Shields. He smiled chillingly, lifted a finger, and pointed at the elf, "Coldme!"


    The next second, the mes that shrouded the weapons master suddenly halted. They then suddenly turned into terrifying Coldmes with frigid temperatures. Ayer of cyan and white frost quickly covered the body of the weapons master, causing his limbs to go numb and cold. He was almost frozen to the spot.


    Greem then lifted his hand and pointed at the female deadshot that was closing in under cover of the ancient trees, "Poisonfire!"


    The female deadshot''s athletic body suddenly paused. She almost fell from the twenty-meter tall tree due to the abrupt change in her actions. A surge of green suddenly surged up her red and flushed face, almost as if poison had entered her body.


    Once he had hit both of the elves with his ability, Greem solemnly shouted, "Explosion!"


    A mysterious magical rune surfaced in front of Greem''s eyebrows. The frozen weapons master and the poisoned deadshot grunted simultaneously.


    A miniature upheaval of fire had erupted within their bodies and around them!


    Just as they were about to be wounded, a milky-white magical halo descended upon their bodies, forcefully dispersing the elementium mes that were just about to go rogue.


    Dammit! It''s those two unicorns!


    Greem roared and extended his zing hand of magma at the weapons master. However, the elf had already broken free of the Coldme''s control at this point. His silhouette shed as he moved away from the spot. The two moon des in his hands spun like windmills and sliced through Greem''s fist in a cross. The speed at which they moved was too fast to be seen with the naked eye.


    Haooo!


    A pained cry that was neither human nor beast rang out. Greem retracted his hand with all his strength. The enemy had already severed the front half of his magma hand.


    Boiling redva spurted forth from the wound like a fountain. Theva gathered in front of him, turning into a small pool.


    Greem stomped his feet furiously. A massive me Halo of Repulsion sted out in every direction.


    The weapons master that had intended to take this opportunity to close in on Greem was pushed away by the me Halo, screaming as he was knocked back. His body sizzled when burned by the elementium mes.


    The unicorns had only dispersed the abnormal condition of being frozen that Greem had imposed upon him. However, the elementium mes were now directly burning the weapons master. It was not a negative status, and thus, could not be purged or dispersed.


    Greem intended to take advantage of this opening to strike at the weapons master. Just then, the sound of a snapping bowstring came from the distance. Two enchanted arrows whistled across the air and pierced toward his chest.


    Dammit, that female elf broke free as well!


    Greem opened his mouth and spat out a massive cluster of fire. The fire formed into a nearly solid Fire Shield, just barely making it in time to block the damage from the explosive arrows. Greem took this chance to draw upon his Heart of mes. A surge of pure fire energy flowed to the cut upon his left palm and turned into a new magma hand within three seconds.


    However, at this moment, two milky-white Halo of Purificationsnded upon Greem''s massive me Fiend body. These halos crackled and caused many of his Fire Shields to explode.


    Dammit¡­dammit!


    Greem shouted at the skies in anger, "Zacha, kill those two damned unicorns for me!"


    Dragonborn Zacha roared upon receiving his orders. He bent his body andunched a ferocious charge at the three unicorns. Any object that stood in his path would shatter beneath his iparably brutal strength.


    He knocked down two ancient trees in a row, trampled three elven archers, and blew away a treant warrior. Dragonborn Zacha brandished his lightning spear and his Frozen Mallet as he appeared in front of the three unicorns.


    The male unicorn in the lead stepped forth and used its spiral horn to block the Frozen Mallet smashing toward them. Surging nature power shed intensely with violent ice power between the horn and the mallet.


    In the end, the two distinct elementium forces exploded, sting away both of the fighters.


    However, Dragonborn Zacha''s Strength was far superior to the male unicorn''s. He managed to regain his footing after stumbling two steps away. Meanwhile, the unicorn had been knocked ten meters away. Purple blood was even oozing out of the root of the horn upon its head.


    "How dare you stand before my master. Die."


    The physically superior Dragonborn Zacha was the first to recover from the impact. He waved his lightning spear as a thick and winding lightning chain shot forth. Its target was that male unicorn.


    A whinny rang out. The female unicorn that was protecting her foal raised her horn when it saw the situation turning against them. A st of Blinding Lightnded upon Zacha. Even Zacha''s exceptional resistance couldn''t help him against this racial ability that possessed a trace of narws.


    The next second, Zacha was utterly blinded by the enemy!


    Just as he rushed forward furiously with spear and mallet in hand, the male unicorn rolled and climbed up from the ground. The unicorn charged forward and stabbed his horn deep into Zacha''s chest.


    The unique purification ability of the unicorns caused the wind indurium armor Zacha wore to bepletely ineffective. Even the tough and beautiful dragon scales underneath the armor couldn''t stop the horn from piercing into Zacha''s body.


    The dragonborn let out a furious roar that stunned the entire battlefield. Zacha tossed aside his lightning spear and freed a hand to grab the unicorn''s horn. He then smashed downward with the Frozen Mallet in his other hand with such force that it stirred up a gale of its own.


    Dong! A muffled thud. The male unicorn started to see stars. Its limbs went limp, and it almost knelt before the dragonborn.


    Seeing that the enemy still intended to continue his hammering, the unicorn summoned all his strength to stir his horn while also calling upon more nature power to surge into the enemy''s body.


    The female unicorn could no longer stand by at this point. It feared for its mate and quickly charged over with the foal.


    Three big and one small. These four non-humanoid figures engaged each other in a deadly close-ranged fight in the center of the battlefield, fighting tooth and nail for every advantage. It was a bloody and horrible scene to behold.


    Without the unicorns interrupting, Greem could finally unleash his full power in a showdown against the two Second Grades.


    Seeing theirpanions dragged into the battle one after another, the two druid masters with long flowing braids of green hair let out battle cries of their own. They fully intended to join the fray now.


    At that moment, both of them heard sinister and scaryughter closing in on them. A Second Grade dark witch was charging at them upon her flying broom.


    The countering of her attribute caused the dark witch to be fearful of the two young unicorns. That was why she had been circling the skies instead of joining the battle. Otherwise, an unfortunate purification from the unicorns could easily wipe out a body of shadows like her own.


    She had waited until this moment when the dragonborn was stalling the unicorns. It was now that the Second Grade dark witch cackled and charged at the two Second Grade druid masters.


    The dark witch might be afraid of the unicorns'' racial abilities, but as a Second Grade being, she had nothing to fear about the druids'' nature magic. After all, in terms of magic technique and means of murder, a dark witch from the World of Adepts was just far too superiorpared to two druid masters.


    That was why she was utterly fearless, even when fighting against two enemies at once!


    The Second Grade individuals had shed with the other Second Grades. The rest that remained were naturally irrelevant small fry. These First Grade people might not have the ability to intervene in the battle between the Second Grades, but if they gained the advantage in battle and got into formation, they could still apply decent pressure on the Second Grades.


    That said, the magical machine army was clearly stronger when it came to aparison of First Grade units.


    One could put it this way; on the side of the elves, only the six treant warriors and the dozen low-grade druids could deal any degree of damage to the magical machines. The other elves were basically harmless.


    Their weak arrows and slender des could not break through the machines'' thick armor. Apart from being one-sidedly ughtered and beaten, they had no other options.


    Thus, once the witches went to deal with the treant warriors and druids, the defensive line that the elves had barely been keeping up finally shattered!

 Chapter 640 Conclusion of the Battle

    The battle at Jintha¡¯Alorsted for two hours.


    As the curtain of night slowly fell upon thend, the voices and sounds of battles started to fade from the woods, first growing soft before turning into a deathly silence.


    The adepts had employed the appropriate strategies and came prepared. Thus, it took no more than an hour for the elves to go from stubborn resistance toplete defeat. The remaining one hour had purely been for dealing with the tougher Second Grade creatures.


    Despite being the n leader of the Crimson n and themander-in-chief of this operation, Greem had also personally participated in the battle and gotten a full taste of the pleasure of beating down upon powerhouses of the same grade.


    The sinister and dangerous environment of the World of Adepts raised a bunch of fearsome adepts who were learned in the ways of murder. These people that came from another world had almost no apparent weaknesses to be exploited. Inparison, the forest elves living on the Faen ne¡¯s Garan Continent had weaknesses just as obvious as their strengths.


    If this battle had only been an internal ne struggle, then they might still be able to use their understanding of the enemy and their home field to gain some advantage. However, when their opponents were elite adepts that came from another world, what little leverage they would usually have vanished instantly without a trace.


    The weapons master had an agile body, expert weapons technique, pinpoint attacks, and astounding skill inbat. Sadly, his body was far too frail. His magical resistance was also not up to par. He couldn¡¯t even establish himself within Greem¡¯s stunningly powerful Ring of Fire, much less disy his power.


    The female deadshot faced the same problem.


    Her archery skills were genuinely miraculous. She could casually bully the slow and clumsy me Fiend in all sorts of ways. Unfortunately, she also had the problem of an insufficiently powerful Physique. Moreover,pared to the weapons master, her body was even weaker and frailer, so much so that even strong winds could blow her to the ground.


    The Magma Fireballs and me Pirs that Greem casually cast could all easily cover an area of ten to twenty meters in radius. These fire spells that reached power levels of over two hundred points were a disaster for the elven deadshot. Even slight contact with them would mean death for her.


    Consequently, her athletic figure and movements were entirely spent on dodging the ferocious bombardment from the me Fiend. As for stopping to deal some damage? Sadly, such an opportunity would never present itself to her.


    Moreover, the me Fiend that Greem transformed into might be somewhat slow, but it had no problem fighting two elves simultaneously with its unpredictable Fire Teleportation.


    The weapons master asionally charged to Greem¡¯s side and unleashed abo on him, and the deadshot would also unleash her full power and use fearsome explosive arrows to create cracks all over the me Fiend¡¯s body. Sadly, the pressure from the Ring of Fire and the fire spells made it impossible for them to stay near Greem¡¯s side and continuously attack. They could only rush in, let loose a series of attacks, and quickly flee.


    Otherwise, just the umted fire damage from the fires shrouding Greem would be too much for them to deal with!


    In truth, the two elves had already lost the moment they failed to suppress Greem¡¯s ferocious fire output.


    Fire spells were a talent most suited for war in most nes!


    A fire adepts like Greem would turn the entire battlefield into a stage for his unrestraint performance if he were able to pour down elementium fires around him unconditionally.


    The only ones present on the battlefield that could limit Greem¡¯s wild output were the two young unicorns.


    Unfortunately, they were being stalled by the intrepid Dragonborn Zacha; they were no longer able to support the two elves. If one were honest, even the two of them together didn¡¯t face optimistic odds against a Second Grade dragonborn with powerful Strength, extraordinary Physique, and excellent magical resistance.


    If the adolescent unicorns had to be categorized into some form of abat unit, they would be support magical beasts that fought at melee range.


    They had far too few offensive abilities. Most of their skills were support abilities that purified or dispersed conditions. Their primary means of attacks were Horn Attack, Blinding Light, and Trample. That was why they usually used their blinding attacks in tandem with their melee attacks inbat.


    This kind of power allowed them to quickly deal with most of the foolish magical beasts in the woods. However, they appeared very crude when used against such a barbaric and mighty dragonborn.


    Ignoring their support abilities, the Strength and Physique of the dragonbornpletely crushed those of the unicorns. If they were allowed to engage in meleebat with no holds barred, the unicorns, with their simplistic and unchanging means of attack, would undoubtedly be the ones to have the worse hand. If it wasn¡¯t for the attacks that caused Zacha to turn blind asionally, these two unicorns would already have been thrown to the ground by the dragonborn and bashed to paste.


    That alone was more than enough proof of the difference in the quality of the creature grades of two different nes!


    Second Grade adepts from the World of Adepts had no problem wrecking two Second Grade individuals from Faen simultaneously. Against these slightly weaker Second Grades, they would have no problem overwhelming three opponents at the same time.


    The battle between the Second Grade dark witch and the two Second Grade druid masters was going much the same way as all the other fights. The dark witch very obviously held the advantage. It didn¡¯t matter how the druid masters turned into a wolf and an eagle respectively. Their attacks were sharp and fierce, but they were still suppressed by the dark witch¡¯s many strange shadow powers. It was such that they couldn¡¯t even catch their breath.


    Once the small fries of the elves had been knocked down and captured by the magical machines, these Second Grade nature creatures started to panic.


    Some wanted to break out of the siege, and some wanted to continue fighting, while others wanted to capture witches as hostages to trade for theirpanions. The utter loss of morale led to the barely maintained stalematepletely crumbling!


    The first to break through was still Greem.


    As the n leader of the Crimson n, the power and resources he had umted were far beyond the reach of his opponents.


    When he saw the sky quickly approaching the agreed upon time, Greem unhesitatingly shed his first trump card.


    Second Grade Elementium Golem!


    Ever since advancing to Second Grade, he had been running all over on various errands. He¡¯d had practically no time to calm down and focus on the research of his fundamentals¨C golem creation. It was only thanks to the Chip¡¯s lengthy calctions and optimization prior to this otherworldly trip that he had managed to put to use some functional Second Grade golem creation methods.


    He had hoarded a batch of Second Grade elementium crystal cores during his time in the Sarubo n. Add to that number the cores that Snox had purchased, and the total number of Second Grade elementium crystal cores reached a peak of twenty-three pieces.


    After many sleepless nights and constant failures, the first elementium golem that reached Second Grade was born.


    The me Fiend of Terror!


    Indeed, the first Second Grade elementium golem that Greem created was a me Fiend of Terror that copied his own abilities and post-transformation form. When Greem released the me Fiend of Terror, two horrifying me fiends of nearly the same appearance stood at each other¡¯s side upon the battlefield.


    They gushed out nearly solid elementium mes from all over their bodies. They strode forth with their thick magma legs forged ofva and fire and shook their five-meter tall bodies, casually strolling across the battlefield like deities.


    Everywhere they walked would turn into a zing sea of fire under the intense heat and scorching of the elementium mes; they didn¡¯t even need to lift a single finger. The ground upon which they stood would crack and split from being burned, andrge clusters of undergroundva would surge out from underground.


    Greem¡¯s power instantly doubled with the help of this Second Grade me Fiend of Terror.


    The situation thrust the two elves that had barely managed to hold him at bay into a difficult position.


    The two me Fiends patrolled the battlefield and started fires in unison. The terrifying scene and pressing waves of heat caused the faces of the two elves to sour instantly.


    They no longer held any hope of defeating this male adept. All they wanted now was to protect their survivingpanions and help them break out of the siege. Unfortunately, this thought had appeared far toote in their minds!


    Before this, the two elves had always been able to help each other escape Greem¡¯s pursuit when he used his Fire Teleportation. However, now that two me Fiends were charging at them upon waves of fire, the frail female elven deadshot no longer had the opportunity or angle to escape.


    Her clothes and armor ignited, and half of her long hair burned away. Greem threw a violent Magma Fireball close to the deadshot. The explosion shockwave alone knocked the girl unconscious.


    The furious weapons master wanted to charge forth and save hispanion, but the me Fiend of Terror saw an opportunity and brought him to the ground with a quick sh of its fire whip. The me Fiend then bound the elf.


    The two me Fiends were mentally connected, allowing them to work together with no dys or mishaps. It was clean and neat.


    Moreover, Greem¡¯s soul aura had been left within the Terror me Fiend¡¯s core, making it easier for him to control. Thus, when they stood side by side, anyone would have trouble determining which was Greem¡¯s transformation and which was the golem based solely on appearance and aura.


    When victory had been decided on the central battlefield, the battles at the edges of the fight gradually concluded.


    The first to return victorious was naturally the Goblin Shredder that Tigule piloted.


    The Goblin Shredder was in tatters at this point, covered all over with cracks, scratches, and dents of all sizes. The metal saw on one of its four arms had also been crushed t. Even the alloy drill seemed somewhat bent. One of its four pairs of metal limbs had snapped. Electric sparks could be seen shing where the arm was broken.


    The Goblin Shredder might be in a terrible state, but its opponent, the Second Grade deadwood guard, hadpletely turned into a withered log. Its dry and cracked wooden body rested on the ground. A gaping hole had been drilled into its brow, and the thousand-year treeheart within it had been dug out. It was beating in the hand of the Goblin Shredder.


    It was a thousand-year treeheart soaked with powerful nature energy. It was a valuable magical material that many casters sought.


    ording to past rules, the spoils obtained in the battles of adepts belonged to themselves. As such, Greem cast a nce and paid it no more heed. Yet, who knew that Tigule would wave his hand and toss the thousand-year treeheart toward him.


    "Master, this magical machine warrior has many parts that still require improvement and optimization. I will be counting on master from now on!" Tigule¡¯s sharp voice rang out from within the machine as if he was trying to get on Greem¡¯s good side.


    Greem smiled and didn¡¯t say anything more.


    He turned and tossed the treeheart to n Adept Deserra, who had just arrived by his side; he had Deserra properly store the item. Greem himself lifted his head and silently looked at the night sky that was about to turn dark.


    The moon was about toe out......

 Chapter 641 Eager to Star

    t


    The other two battles ended swiftly as well.


    Apart from the Druid Master of Talon that had seeded in fighting their way out of the siege with some of the druids, the remaining elves had all fallen into the hands of the adepts.


    That included the three unicorns.


    After all, they had no wings. They couldn¡¯t transform into birds and fly away as the druids could. Their only option was to break through the siege onnd.


    However, the defensive lines that Greem hadid down were dense and concentrated. He even actively sacrificed three of the sword and shield magical machines to push back against the furious charge of the unicorns. He then gathered the firepower of the Fate Witches and knocked down the unicorns.


    The battlefield statistics quickly surfaced with the dispersion of the smoke and mes of war.


    The battle at Jintha¡¯Alor had yielded the adepts two hundred and forty-one ordinary elves, six elves withbat professions (First Grade), a Druid Master of the w (Male, Second Grade), two adolescent unicorns¨Cone male and one female (Second Grade)¨Cand one unicorn foal (First Grade), a weapons master (Male, Second Grade) and an elven deadshot (Female, Second Grade), and so on.


    The number of murdered forest elves totaled two hundred.


    There had been no choice. The elven warriors and archers would not easily give up their weapons as long as they could still fight back. Moreover, their bodies were far too frail. Even a stray bullet scratching past them would inflict severe wounds.


    When the wounded ones were elves withbat professions, the witches didn¡¯t mind healing them to ensure that they maintained their highest value. As for the ordinary elves? They were left to die a painful and agonizing death.


    After all, the price of internar teleportation was far too high. The lives and cost of these elves might not even be worth the healing potion used to save them. Thus, out of consideration of their profits, the witches would only save the more profitable ¡¯spoils of war¡¯!


    As a training camp set up by the elves near the southwest shore, Jintha¡¯Alor also had plenty of high-quality elven weapons in its storage apart from these elves. In particr, those enchanted explosive arrows that detonated upon contact were exceedingly numerous.


    The adepts would not need such an item, but they were decent lethal weapons when distributed among their followers and guards. Amongst the elven weapons, the one that most surprised Greem was a sort of elven longbow. The bow had been enchanted with two magical effects¨C Gale and Pierce.


    The former allowed the arrows shot from the bow to fly faster and further, while thetter allowed the bolts to break through thick and heavy armor.


    There were as many as twenty of these longbows!


    It was clear evidence that the elves of Garan had exceptional talent and unique insight on the subject of enchanting items.


    Of course, apart from the weapons, the Crimson adepts also found a unique nt seed inside the warehouses of the elves. Upon appraisal, several witches agreed that this was a legendary moonwell seed.


    Moonwells were both nts and buildings!


    They could gather the pure moonlight during the night of Garan andbine it with the aura of its environment to condense and produce the miraculous moonwater.


    Here in Garan, a magical reservoir as wondrous as the moonwell would typically only appear in elven cities. It would serve as apanion nt to towering Trees of Life.


    Jintha¡¯Alor was only a training camp and not an elven city. Usually, a nt-type elven building like a moonwell shouldn¡¯t appear here. The appearance of this moonwell seed was most likely a strategic logistical reserve that the elves had prepared in advance.


    Once the southwest shore broke out into war, Jintha¡¯Alor, as a forward base, could immediately nt the seed and cultivate it into a true moonwell. That would provide wounded elves with a method to quickly recover from their injuries!


    However, what the elves would never expect was a fearsome adept squad crossing five hundred kilometers of sprawling woods skipping seven or eight elven viges, all for the sake of assaulting Jintha¡¯Alor. Otherwise, the forest elves would never have left such a valuable vital resource here for the adepts to get their hands on!


    Obtaining so many elves and spoils in a single battle instantly caused the witches to erupt with excitement. In particr, that moonwell seed held within it mysterious and profound secrets of the forest elves that outsiders didn¡¯t know of. If they could thoroughly analyze the seed, part of the forest elves¡¯ secrets¨Cthough not all of it¨Cwould be exposed to the eyes of the witches.


    Still, the Dark Witches would never dare to break off their friendly rtionship with the Fate Witches for the sake of this elven treasure, regardless of how much they wanted it. After all, they still needed the help of the Fate Witches and their flying ship to transport so many elven prisoners back to their safe zone.


    The Dark Witches had no problem taking out an elven vige on their own with their overwhelming strength. The only problem was their inability to digest the spoils even if they could devour an entire town.


    They couldn¡¯t transport several dozen or even hundreds of elves across the vast Fantasy Forest, filled with the ears and eyes of the elves. That...that was an impossible task!


    That was why, for the past month or so, the Dark Witches had no choice but to take piecemeal bites at the elves and receive bits of spoils at any given time.


    It was difficult enough to find the elves in this vast forest of trees. It was even more improbable to take all the elves when they discovered them. It was a problem that had gued the dark witches for a long time. However, all those problems were no longer problems now.


    Rare smiles finally appeared on the faces of the Dark Witches when they saw the rows of elves escorted onto the flying ship by the magical machines.


    Apart from the prisoners and the items, the search party also brought back two pegasi and one hippogryph used for training.


    These were the mostmonly seen support units in the elven army; figuring out their racial traits and biological construction as soon as possible would be a great help in future battles.


    It was only natural that Greem happily took all these spoils for himself.


    Of course, Greem had even let out the Spirit of Pestilence and the Stitch Ghost Golem near the end of the battle earlier.


    They were only at the pseudo-adept level currently and were of no help to him in battle. However, they were both magical creations with the potential to grow that Greem had painstakingly raised. As long as he was willing to put in the effort and invest resources in them, their power would eventually rise.


    That was why Greem released them into the nearby woods to search for those elven survivors in hiding. They could only improve and develop further through sacrifices of blood, flesh, and ughter.


    By the time all this work concluded, therge and brilliant disc of the moon had risen into the sky, casting its crisp moonlight to every corner of the Fantasy Forest.


    Alice had already retreated into the flying ship under the excuse of inviting Uzzah to tea. At this moment, only one out of the two of them who had been struck with the Moonshade Curse¨CGreem¨Cstood upon Jintha¡¯Alor. He was silently waiting for any changes toe.


    The brilliant and chilly moonlight fell upon the forest. Mysterious shifts started urring when the gentle moonlight flowed past Greem¡¯s body.


    Layers of moonlight enveloped Greem. It looked like the shimmering surface of the water as the light rippled and trembled.


    Greem stood proudly under the moonlight, using the Chip to monitor all changes within himself. He could very clearly sense faint surges of magical energy entering the mysterious rune upon his forehead alongside the moonlight.


    With the nourishment of the moonlight¡¯s essence, the divine rune suddenly activated!


    Indeed, it suddenly came alive!


    The divine rune that had remained motionless for so many days without so much as a movement was now burning like a red-hot brand. It protruded from under Greem¡¯s forehead, appearing as scarlet as it was striking. Along with the divine rune came a subtle, obscure, and strange divine flux.


    [Beep. Detecting strange energy flux.


    [Source of energy flux is identified as the divine rune. The method of energy dissemination is unknown. The method of energy resonance is unknown. The nature of the energy is unknown.


    [Further reminder: this energy flux has reached the level ofws. It belongs to the category of advanced nar knowledge. No matching data can be found in the database....]


    Greem listened to the series of notifications from the Chip. He had no intention of interrupting these strange energy changes.


    In truth, this was the first time he had personally experienced how divine power functioned. As such, the research value of this experience was unprecedentedly significant for Greem!


    Greem knew what was happening due to his understanding of the primary functions of the divine rune obtained from Alice. He had let go of all irrelevant concerns. At this moment, he was working in full cooperation with the Chip and extending detailed monitoring of this process of the divine rune from silence to activation.


    Divine power was a potent strength that couldpare with the forces ofw in the World of Adepts.


    At its very core and essence, the traits of its power were far superior to the elementium skills that Greem currentlymanded.


    Even though divine power had always been at odds with magic, and Greem couldn¡¯t possibly change professions and turn into a spiritualist, divine power still had irreceable research and reference value as a higher form of energy.


    That was why Greem remained unmoved even as he was ced in danger by the divine rune as it slowly pushed him into a death trap. He focused all of his attention to the calm feeling and monitoring of every change in the rune.


    A strange energy flux stirred the narws and rippled outward on the level of thews.


    Law movements like these were utterly unnoticeable to ordinary beings. Only talented individuals and certain spiritualists could sessfully decipher these movements through the narws by borrowing the strength of the gods.


    ............


    Garan Continent. Central Mountains.


    The Goddess of Moonlight¡¯s main temple.


    Intense golden radiance suddenly emanated from the statue of the goddess standing on the moon-white tform within the spacious hall.


    Temple Officiate Aurora and the two female priests who had been kneeling before the statue raised their heads in surprise.


    "There¡¯s activity from the divine rune." One of the female priests couldn¡¯t help but blurt out. Her face beamed with joy.


    "Hurry up and inform God Messenger Xenia," Officiate Aurora turned her head and ordered without any hesitation, "Also, gather all the temple guards in the main temple here. Prepare for arge-scale prayer ceremony. The goddess will be personally using her divine power to open a spatial corridor to the sphemers. It will be our time to serve the goddess then!"


    With thest sentence, a trace of fervent passion attached itself to the tone of this usually cold elven officiate.


    A short momentter, the surroundings of the Goddess of Moonlight¡¯s temple turned lively!

 Chapter 642 Punish You in the Name of the Moon

    Jintha¡¯Alor Camp.


    Therge, bright moon was already hanging high in the sky. The beautiful faint silver moonlight turned the Fantasy Forest even more silent and mysterious than it already was.


    The adepts scattered around the perimeter of the battlefield had returned. The work of cleaning up Jintha¡¯Alor was also about to conclude. All the captured forest elves were escorted into the flying ship. Only thirty construction robots were left on the hill, diligently moving therge number of resources in the warehouses onto the ship.


    It had been four hours since the start of the battle. Even if the surrounding viges hade to reinforce their allies after receiving news of the fight, they would be scattered and divided forces. They would have no chance of fighting back against such powerful witches.


    To be brutally honest, Jintha¡¯Alor was already thergest elven training camp within a radius of five hundred kilometers. Now that even they had been defeated, the only way to deal with these witches was to run to Astranaar City for help six hundred kilometers away from here.


    The elves of Astrannar would require a minimum of fourteen hours to traverse such a tremendous distance, even if Jintha¡¯Alor had managed to send word for help at the very first moment they were attacked. Moreover, this was a speed that was only possible if all the elven reinforcements were flying units.


    If they werend units, it would be impossible for them to reach Jintha¡¯Alor without at least two days and three nights of marching!


    It was this sort of extreme control of the enemy¡¯s information that allowed the witches to so casually scour Jintha¡¯Alor and its surroundings for resources after a significant victory like this. By the time the elven reinforcements arrived, the only thing they would see would be an empty ruin of a battlefield.


    By that time, the witches would have gone to who-knows-where to celebrate their victory.


    This battle of Jintha¡¯Alor had greatly boosted everyone¡¯s morale. It was an exhrating experience.


    Apart from some metal golem casualties on the side of the Crimson n and the dragonborn warrior being severely wounded, the losses of the witches were practically negligible. It was a glorious victory that far surpassed everyone¡¯s expectations!


    The witches could already foresee the interesting expressions on the faces of the Pale Witches if they could sessfully transport these elven ves and resources back to the Echo Isles.


    Perhaps because they had obtained many spoils without losing anything, or maybe because she wanted to improve their rtionship with Greem and the others, Uzzah, the leader of these Dark Witches, took the initiative to approach Alice. She wished to give away some of the elven ves to the Crimson n aspensation for the losses they had suffered in this battle.


    Witch Uzzah had only one request. She hoped the Fate Witches could help the Dark Witchesunch an assault on the pegasus magic spring in the central mountains of Garan when the opportunity presented itself.


    Of course, this operation was a personal mission of the Dark Witches. That was why Uzzah was willing to engage in full coboration with the Fate Witches for the remaining six months in Faen as long as they were willing to help her. They would be firm and unbreakable allies.


    Of course, the trustworthiness of Uzzah¡¯s words would require more time and coboration to verify. Still, being able to make a Third Grade witch lower herself to say offer such a proposal was already proof of Alice and Greem¡¯s power. They had demonstrated sufficientpetence to win the right to speak for themselves.


    Just as Alice and Witch Uzzah were discussing the issue within the flying ship, a subtle abnormality appeared in the round moon above Jintha¡¯Alor.


    A Dark Witch dashed across the sky upon her flying broom. She incidentally raised her head and immediately stopped her flight in shock.


    Chilling yet beautiful moonlight projected from the moon like gentle water, draping a silver cloak over the woods where the fires of war had just been extinguished. The forest, trees, rivers, the grass, and the bushes; everything within sight had been enveloped in a cluster of fantastical starry radiance.


    The Dark Witch lowered her head and was shocked to find her own body dusted with plenty of this strange radiance as well. This starry light blinked soundlessly, almost breathing as if it had a life of its own.


    The Dark Witch was no ignorant and ordinary mortal. She wouldn¡¯t be deceived by such pretty and dreamlike scenery.


    Her powerful and sensitive senses informed her that this breathing radiance flowed.


    It circted with a strange energy that was utterly foreign to her. Moreover, the longer she spent bathing in the moonlight, the thicker and more intense the energy aura within the light.


    Dammit, something¡¯s wrong. This isn¡¯t the power of adepts.


    The suddenly enlightened First Grade Dark Witch immediately turned and flew toward the flying ship. As she darted back to the vessel, she used Thundersound to let out a deafening roar.


    "Careful! Enemy assault!"


    Unfortunately, this tiny spell that she casually cast was like a spark thrown into a sealed oil barrel. It instantly triggered a bacsh from the moonlight.


    !


    A strange explosive sound rang out. The initially calm, peaceful, and mysterious starry radiance suddenly transformed into horrifying Starfire, igniting the entirety of the witch¡¯s body from top to bottom and inside out.


    The next second, all lifeforms and substances that were not of nature within the forest, the skies, and the earth started to burn furiously under the caress of the moonlight. This zing wave of starfire seemed to have a strange life of its own. Even though it covered the entire area, it did nothing to the forest, trees, vegetation, flowers, or the streams. It only enveloped and burned the witches, the flying ship, and the magical machines.


    When Uzzah and Alice rushed out of the flying ship in their shock, all they saw was a silver sea of starfire!


    If you disregarded their identities, being able to silently sit down and observe this beautiful starfire sea would undoubtedly be a treat. It was a remarkable scene that one could hardlye across in a hundred years. However, Uzzah¡¯s mood was agitated when she discovered her witches trapped within the sea of starfire, howling and crying in agony.


    "Something¡¯s wrong with the moonlight. Everyone, prepare your defenses." Alice was undoubtedly the most alert of them all. She was the first to discover the source of the problem.


    As she shouted, all the witches that emerged from the flying ship erected their defensive spells and elementium protections.


    The witches stood upon the deck of the flying ship and looked around them. They saw absolutely no signs of the enemy. They only saw the sky full of silver starfire and theirpanions writhing within the mes.


    Down in the Jintha¡¯Alor camp, the two dozen engineering machines that had been busy transporting the resources had also started burning. They were quickly reduced to smoldering piles of metal.


    Uzzah furiously stepped forward. She made a grabbing motion with her withered, talon-like hand at a struggling witch two hundred meters away from her.


    The empty air sizzled, and a massive ck and ghostly hand appeared. The hand reached for the dark witch.


    Sadly, before the hand of darkness could shield the dark witch, she turned into a cloud of ashes, incapable of withstanding the burning of the starfire any longer.


    A gale blew across the air. The hand of darkness swiped past the air, but only managed to catch flying ashes in its grasp.


    Uzzah frowned and turned to re at the Second Grade dark witch following behind her.


    "How is it? Has Ganna returned?"


    The Second Grade dark witch took out a strange ck geomanticpass and looked at it. She then nodded happily.


    "It returned...it returned. Ganna¡¯s soul has already returned to the soul energy pool. Her soul has been badly wounded. It will take approximately two months for her to revivepletely."


    The faces of all the dark witches present lightened up slightly upon hearing this.


    The soul energy pool was a rare building unique to the Dark Witches.


    The first thing that the Dark Witches had to do upon arriving in a new ne was to construct a special soul energy pool in a safe ce of their choice. They would then leave the soul brands of all the Dark Witches in that pool.


    This way, even if they died in battle¨Cand as long as the opponent had no means of restricting or destroying souls¨Ctheir souls would automatically return to the soul energy pool. Their souls could then use the energy in the pool to revive once again.


    For the trip to Faen this time, the Dark Witches had already left the soul energy pool in the safest ce, Shadow Ind, on the very first week. This way they would no longer need to worry about dying on the battlefield.


    The Fate Witches were truly dead if they were to die. The Dark Witches, on the other hand, had plenty of lives.


    That was the main reason why all Dark Witches were such recklessly ferocious fighters!


    The witches stood at the bow of the ship. It hadn¡¯t been long since the fire started, but sparks of me had also begun appearing on the defensive spells around them. Their elementium shields crackled and sizzled from the fire.


    Of all the witches present, Uzzah was the strongest. As such, everyone else cast their gaze at her.


    "This isn¡¯t magic; this is divine magic. Dammit, how did we attract the attention of an elven spiritualist? Move. We can¡¯t think of the resources below anymore. Leave now. Otherwise, once the spiritualist arrives, we..."


    Before Uzzah¡¯s orders could be executed, a blinding beam of silver light shot out from the holy and bright moon in the sky. A massive portal had opened in the skies of Jintha¡¯Alor.


    The next moment, a hundred or so silhouettes of various sizes emerged from the portal and appeared before the witches.


    The portal vanished.


    The moonlight faded.


    The ce had returned to how it was before.


    However, a hundred furious elven powerhouses had appeared in the skies above Jintha¡¯Alor.


    The leader was a beautiful female elf. She wore delicate elven armor, with scimitars at her waist and a longbow on her back. Her facial features were as delicate and elegant as a painting, while her ears were sharp and cute. However, a bright full-moon brand could be seen on her forehead.


    She stood in the air while the cascading moonlight behind her gathered into a mysterious cape that constantly let out beautiful, celestial radiance.


    She opened her pretty, starry eyes and swept them across the ruined Jintha¡¯Alor. It was only then that she looked at the witches standing on the flying ship and furiously eximed, "sphemers. Today, this will be your final resting ground!"


    "In the name of the moon, I will punish you!"

 Chapter 643 Invading the Deck

    A Third Grade elven god messenger?


    Having ovee her initial panic, Uzzah finally regained her calm in the face of these new enemies. The unique arrogance and overbearing aura of a Third Grade dark witch finally started to show.


    Even though all elven god messengers were backed by a powerful deity, the disy of their power was still entirely reliant on the skills of the messengers themselves as long as the god couldn¡¯t personally enter this ne. If the elven god messenger were well-trained, then the power that the deity could exert using their body would be that much stronger. However, if the god messenger had poor foundations, then there were strict limits on the power that the god could unleash, even if they were to descend as an avatar.


    On the other hand, the witches had never seen thebat professions of Faen as their equals.


    The essential power of the fighters of Faen was substantial. Many of them also possessed fairly powerful innate abilities. However, they were too inferior to the otherworldly witches when it came to battle will and means of murder.


    The witches of the World of Adepts were like veteran soldiers that had traversed hundreds of corpse mountains and oceans of blood, while thebat professions of Faen were so pure that they were like rookies that had just set foot on the battlefield. Their courage wasmendable, and their spirits were high, but this was merely foolishness and ignorance in the eyes of the witches.


    The elven army before them seemed powerful and intimidating. However, upon close inspection, one would find that the only one in the army that could threaten Uzzah was that Third Grade elven god messenger. The other elves were either First Grade or Second Grade. This army could hardly be called an elite corps of the elven kingdom.


    With this understanding in mind, the previously concerned Uzzah immediately calmed down.


    The elves had just arrived here. They saw the wrecked battlefield beneath them and immediately let out deafening roars and battle cries. They then swarmed toward the flying ship.


    Greem and Alice, who were within the crowd, immediately exchanged looks. They stomped their feet, and the flying ship trembled slightly; a semi-translucent energy forcefield activated around the vessel. The forcefield blocked the first wave of attacks fired by the elves.


    The one hundred elves had also been stalled a hundred meters away from the flying ship by the sudden barrage that had engulfed them.


    Even though this energy forcefield wasrge and resilient, it still appeared to be somewhat frail under the attacks of so many elven powerhouses.


    Violent and ferocious elementium explosions continuously shed upon the energy forcefield, causing the semi-translucent barrier to tremble and shudder violently. If one were to pay attention, they would hear the cracking sounds of the energy barrier at its limits from the immense pressure.


    "Everyone strike in unison. Stop these elves and buy time for the energy barrier to recover." Uzzah lifted her head and shouted. Dense smoke that was ck as ink surged out from within her ck robe and condensed into a massive red-eye crow beneath her feet.


    Ga! Ga! Ga!


    Uzzah was lifted into the skies by the red-eye crow as the bird cried. She charged out of the energy barrier like a sh of lightning.


    Three elven arrows shing with magical light greeted her the moment she exited the barrier. Three nature magics of different colors followed closely behind the bolts. Even further away was an overwhelming wave of spells that was as ferocious as a storm of elementium.


    None of those who could follow the god messenger here to purge the heretics could be weaklings. Even the weakest one among the one hundred elves had the power of a First Grade. When they gathered together, they turned from frail strings into a firm rope. That ferocious momentum of their attacks upset even Uzzah, the Third Grade Dark Witch. She felt like her heart skipped a beat.


    Uzzah stomped her feat wickedly, and the humongous red-eye crow opened its sharp beak. Arge slit opened in the bird¡¯s mouth as it released a terrifying soundwave that was visible to the naked eye into the world.


    Ga!


    This fearsome soundwave spread out rapidly in the air, like ripples in the water. It instantly engulfed most of the space within a distance of a hundred meters in front of it. The front half of the elven army couldn¡¯t help but sp their ears when this sharp and ear-piercing cry reached them. Purple-ck blood streaked down their eyes, ears, mouths, and noses.


    The attacks shooting toward Uzzah also mysteriously dissolved, like boiling water thrown at snow!


    Pupupu!


    Much like dumplings dropped into a pot, almost three dozen of the high-spirited elves immediately fell out of the skies, temporarily robbed of theirbat ability.


    "Third Grade witch."


    "Careful, she¡¯s a Third Grade witch."


    "Everyone avoid her."


    For a moment, the elven army ran about in a panic,pletely devoid of their initial momentum and recklessness.


    "What¡¯s there to panic over? Leave this Third Grade witch to me; you people, deal with the rest of them." The Third Grade Elven God Messenger Xenia stood firmly behind her troops and roared furiously. She stepped upon the empty air and strode toward the scary-looking Third Grade witch.


    Almost as if they knew the colossal effects of the aftershocks of their battle upon the battlefield, the two Third Grades rapidly increased their altitude as they closed in on one another.


    Soon, the two powerhouses had vanished in the skies above. The only indicator of the danger and intensity of their battle was through the constant vibrations of elementium and energy from the air above.


    The remaining elves looked at each other and let out a battle cry, gathering together and once again charging at the flying ship.


    There were one hundred and twelve elves, eleven of which were Second Grades, and one hundred and one who were First Grade.


    In a mere three seconds, Greem had obtained the numbers of the enemy with the Chip¡¯s scans. In the face of such a powerful elven army, the witches would probably be utterly crushed without the flying fortress that was the flying ship.


    However, even with the flying ship, the enemy forces and theirbined power would not need more than two to three minutes to break through that thin energy forcefield. As such, the flying ship had to retreat quickly into the distance when ced in such a dangerous situation. As it withdrew, the cabin doors opened. All the Archers were thrown onto the deck such that they could use their firepower to force away any enemy that tried to get close.


    Of course, the flying ship¡¯s most effective weapons were still those terrifying magic energy cannons.


    However, as this flying ship still utilized a conventional space furnace as its core energy source, its energy output was limited. If energy were drawn and invested into the magic energy cannons, then the mobility and energy defenses of the ship would be significantly reduced.


    Given the dangerous situation they were in, the flying ship¡¯s energy forcefield would probably be breached by the elves before the magic energy cannons couldplete charging. That was why the only thing that the flying ship could do was send all the magical machines to the deck and have them stall the enemy¡¯s attacks with their hail of bullets.


    The witches weren¡¯t idling while the ship was being pushed to its limits. They gathered in small temporary groups of two or three and took up various corners in the deck, using their cruel and wicked spells to attack the pursuing elves.


    Dragonborn Zacha might have been badly wounded during the battle of Jintha¡¯Alor, but he couldn¡¯t continue treating his wounds when things were so dire. He endured the pain and rushed onto the deck.


    "You stay and protect Alice!" Greem immediately gave Zacha this slightly easier order.


    Zacha might be unquestionably loyal, but he was far too brave and honest in battle.


    He hadn¡¯t needed to try so hard during the battle in Jintha¡¯Alor. All he needed to do was stall the two young unicorns, and hispanions would naturally havee and reinforced him once the other fights had resolved. Yet, he had very honestly given it his all and relied on his power alone to beat the two unicorns within an inch of their lives.


    In exchange, he ended up terribly wounded and on the edge of death as well!


    If it wasn¡¯t for the stockpile of rare magical herbs and potions that Greem owned, his wounds might have been challenging to treat.


    It was precisely because of how straightforward and honest Zacha was that Greem didn¡¯t dare to let him out any longer for this fight. He could only have him stay by Alice¡¯s side. This way, he could ensure Alice¡¯s safety while also making sure that Zacha didn¡¯t get injured any further due to his straightforward nature!


    Having given his orders to Zacha, Greem looked around the deck. He silently used his authority to send the magical machines closer to the Crimson adepts and the Fate Witches. It was only once he had arranged everything that he roared and transformed into a towering and wicked me Fiend. The me Fiend of Terror also appeared by his side at the same time.


    The two five-meter tall me Fiends emerged simultaneously upon the deck, instantly drawing the attention of the elves chasing behind the flying ship.


    The two me humanoids walked toward the stern with heavy steps under the horrified gazes of the elves. They raised their arms upon stopping and worked together to cast a fearsome me Pir that engulfed the entire area.


    A thick pir of fire that connected the heaven and earth appeared, with the flying ship at its very center. Frightening me shockwaves then sted outward in every direction.


    These me shockwaves had reached a basic attack power of one hundred and ny points.


    TIt was already severe damage beyond the limitations of most First Grade elves!


    The pitiful cries and painful grunts of the elves rang out in the skies.


    Some of the weaker elves even caught fire.


    "Dammit, we can¡¯t let these two me beings continue their reckless attacks." A few Second Grade elves in the elven army mumbled and quickly responded.


    Three elven deadshots stood tall upon the back of their hippogryphs. Their bodies were as still as a mountain while they drew the elven longbows in their hands into a full moon. They uttered low grunts as a tide of arrows spilled out from the fingertips of these three elven deadshots. These arrows shot toward the energy forcefield like shes of lightning.


    Even though there were only three elven deadshots, they had used their terrifying attack speed to replicate the might of a hundred-men archer squad forcibly.


    The dense explosion of enchanted arrows concentrated incredible force in a small arrow of no more than one meter. It instantly shattered the thin energy forcefield.


    The next second, the elves that had been lying in wait braved the impact of the energy storm and charged up onto the deck of the flying ship!

 Chapter 644 Melee on the Deck

    A melee.


    Yet another unprecedentedly terrifying fight.


    The initially wide and spacious flying deck became frighteningly chaotic the moment it turned into a battlefield of ughter. Over two hundred individuals were simultaneously bathing in blood and fighting upon the bridge.


    The only conclusion to so many fighters of two opposing factions was a bloody massacre.


    The moment the elven army charged through the energy forcefield, runes of every color, shape, and size shone everywhere across the deck. Yellow, red, blue, green, faint golden, faint silver; arge patch of colorful lights filled every corner of the deck, brilliant and blinding.


    The most eye-catching individuals on the deck were still the magical machines scattered around the sides of the ship and the entrance to the cabins.


    They were all each four to five meters tall, and their towering bodies gleamed with a cold and chilling metallic light. Their thick torsos let out the grinding sound of gears unique to metallic constructs every time they turned. Their appearances were not uniform, but they were very clearly split into two different types of machines¨C ranged and melee fighters.


    Groups of ten magical machines would be found guarding the sides of the ship with a distance of twenty to thirty steps between each group, and the ratio of ranged golems to melee golems was 8 to 2. That meant that every magical machine squad wasposed of eight Archers and two Shield Swordsmen.


    They each took up a corner and attacked the elves that approached them with a dense barrage of bullets. If any elf were not sufficiently quick on their feet, they would be trapped by thebined firepower of two to three magical machine squads.


    The magical machines had turned themselves into affixed cannons under Greem¡¯smand, restricting and tearing apart the formation of the elven army to the best of their abilities. The elves had no choice but to scatter before these dispersed yet organized magical machines. They formed small groups of two to three and attempted to charge and dispose of these magical machines.


    At this moment, the witches werepletely spared any attention and were free to attack as they wished.


    They gathered up in small groups and freely moved about the decks.


    The moment they faced any difficult opponents among the elven ranks, they would instantly hide within the closest magical machine squad. In doing so, they neutralized the ferocious attacks from the enemy. On the other hand, any elves or summoned beasts that were isted from theirpanions were beaten down by the witches the moment they were caught.


    It was this tactic that allowed the severely outnumbered witches to fight off the savage attack of an enemy five times their number. They had finally started stabilizing the battle situation.


    If there were anyone who could casually stroll upon the flying deck, they would be very honored to experience all sorts of attacks and mysterious spells personally.


    In such a battlefield, even a dragon would have to hide, and even a tiger would have to crouch. If your ego got the better of you while you had yet to attain true invulnerability, then tragedy might greet you at the very next moment.


    Take for example the powerful bird druid that was at First Grade peak level. He suddenly transformed into a terrifying Socrates Condor and wrapped himself in ayer of semi-translucent wind vortex. The druid then used his astounding speed and sharp wind des to move through the air above the deck, almost as if there was nothing to stop his advance. He would asionally toss a fearsome tornado down into the battlefield and flee after throwing the enemies there into chaos.


    It was his arrogance and recklessness that drew the attention of many magical machine squads and witches.


    When he once again red his wings and dove down from above to drive away a Fate Witch with a sharp wind de, something happened. His life froze at this very moment.


    Three Spears of Darkness shot out from different angles, shooting straight for his massive eagle form.


    This bird druid was indeed an elite-level druid. He pped his wings rapidly in session and just barely avoided thebined attacks of the dark witches. However, when he flew past a magical machine squad, a grey halo that seemed to have predicted his trajectorynded upon him.


    Hold Monster!


    If he was still in his human form, he would never have been affected by this oddly niche spell. Yet, he was the one who made himself a magical beast at this moment. The weak effects of Hold Monster caused his gliding body to stall for a brief instant.


    This instant was no more than one-third of a second. It was only enough time for an ordinary person to blink. However, this was more than enough time for enemies that had been lying in wait.


    The three closest magical machine squads turned their guns at the same time. The concentrated firepower shattered the wind vortex shields around the druid in that short time he was stunned. The very next second, the bird druid let out a cry of agony. Plenty of red spots spurted from his frail body just as he intended to move away from his current position.


    When he finally struggled out of the ambush area, his blood-soaked body was hit by Poison Hag Endor¡¯s Poison Cloud and Icdy Snowlotus¡¯ Ice st.


    This Socrates Condor with a wingspan of seven meters wobbled and crashed to the ground before it could fly much further. Soon, the area upon which he crashed rang out with the rumbling footsteps of razor boars, berserk apes, and Shield Swordsmen magical machines.


    Naturally, his crippled body was turned into unrecognizable blood paste!


    The sinister nature of the witches merged with the ferocity of the magical machines, turning the flying deck into a swamp of war filled with death traps at every corner. This horrendous flood engulfed all elves that charged up the deck. They stormed left and right and were knocked forward and backward, the confrontations bloodying them and cing them at death¡¯s door.


    Of course, the elves still had the advantage in numbers!


    That was why the magical machine squads were slowly being exterminated one by one under the elves¡¯ powerful and ferocious charge. The witches were sent packing and running across the deck. The battlefield was bloody and brutal!


    Overall, the elves were far superior to the witches, be it in terms of number or quality. In particr, the number of Second Grade powerhouses they possessed crushed those of the adepts entirely.


    Without anyone to restrain them, the Second Grade elves would only need to gather together to annihte the magical machine squads on the flying deck easily.


    The two terrifying Second Grade Druids of the w instantly transformed into a frightening Giant Raging Ape and an Iron Rhinoceros, respectively. They relied on their strong bodies to brave the barrage of bullets and charged into the magical machine groups to stampede them. The two Shield Swordsmen in one of the groups were smashed to pieces by the brute force of the druids before they could even do anything.


    The remaining Second Grade elven deadshots then swarm forward and drew their bows to fire at the machines from a point-nk distance. They used their powerful elven archery skills to exterminate the Archers rapidly.


    Meanwhile, the weapons master cut down the magical machines like chopping vegetables when they let their inner power erupt. However, they would enter a temporarily weakened state every time they allowed their inner power to flow in that manner. They wouldn¡¯t typically use such this powerful battle technique when they were fighting alone. Now that they had the protection and shielding from theirpanions, the weapons masters that were only good at melee turned into ferocious fighters.


    In less than thirty minutes since the start of the battle, the elves had lost a dozen of their number, while over half of the witches¡¯ magical machines had been destroyed.


    If the enemy was allowed to clear up the rest of the flying deck, then the witches were very likely to be forced into a direct confrontation next!


    When that happened, it would be the real time for the weapons master and elven deadshots to put their powers on disy fully. The witches, desperately in need ofrger battlefields, would have their power severely limited.


    At this moment, the only four Second Grades on the witches¡¯ side had no choice but to step onto the battlefield.


    Greem had sent the severely wounded Dragonborn Zacha to Alice¡¯s side. He guarded the entrance to the ship¡¯s interior along with Alice. Greem had Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder stand by his side and act as his bodyguard.


    Greem had no authority tomand the Second Grade dark witch and could only let her do as she wished.


    Once everything had been arranged, the two me Fiends pressed toward the elven army with heavy and slow steps, their fearsome and zing bodies swinging as they moved.


    The two me Fiends raised their magma hands and instantly erected a massive Ring of Fire on the deck. All elves caught in the Ring of Fire fled outward frantically. Those who were slightly slower to react or move found burn marks and sparks upon their bodies.


    Thebined blockade of two Second Grade me Fiends was apparently not something that First Grade elves like themselves could easily withstand.


    All the elves were forced to retreat to the edges of the deck. There, they reorganized themselves into abat formation. The magical machines that had suffered tremendous casualties took this chance to retreat. They gave up on the part of controlling the deck and restricted all of their forces to the vicinity of the ship¡¯s entrance.


    In all seriousness, the appearance of Greem and the me Fiend had, to some extent, cleared the battlefield.


    The center of the flying deck turned into a hazardous zone where only Second Grade powerhouses could set foot. As for First Grades? If they didn¡¯t want to die, then they had best stand by the sidelines!


    Thus, eleven powerful elves of various shape and size emerged from the elven army, firmly taking up position on one side of the battlefield. Meanwhile, on the witch¡¯s side, there were only two extremely intimidating me Fiends and one iparably powerful magical machine warrior.


    The Dark Witch had utterly hidden herself in the darkness on the battlefield. There was no way of sensing her exact location.


    It was eleven versus three!


    It didn¡¯t matter how you looked at the situation. Greem¡¯s side was most definitely at a disadvantage.


    Still, one had to admit that even though the elves had the superior numbers, the group of beasts and frail elves could hardly catch their breaths when pitted against these two towering me Fiends shrouded entirely in mes. That barbaric and dominant aura of destructiveness that sought to reduce everything to ashes was far too oppressive.


    When a powerful fire adept that chose pure fire mastery and specialization stood upon the battlefield, his aura and manner were simply too imposing and dominant!


    All the elves that stood before the two me Fiends felt their hearts tremble.


    These were the sphemers. These were the enemies they needed to exterminate this time.


    What was the price they needed to pay to obtain victory?

 Chapter 645 Battle of the Second Grades.

    The powerful shed with each other.


    Weaklings had no choice but to stand aside and provide enough space for these terrifying Second Grade powerhouses.


    This battle was also the first time Greem was going all out since advancing to Second Grade. It was also the moment to judge the fruits of all his efforts up until now.


    The two me Fiends strode forward, continually expanding their Ring of Fire to im even more ¡¯territory.¡¯ Even though the nd¡¯ here was an imprable alloy deck, it still quickly softened under the steps of the me Fiends before melting into semi-liquid magma.


    A denseyer of Fire Shields floated around the me Fiends, but it was the heavier and tougher Lava Shields that caught the enemy¡¯s attention.


    The two utterly simr me Fiends roared loudly and threw out a chain of Magma Fireballs.


    The Magma Fireballs had just flown out and had yet even to cross the halfway point, yet they had already been shot down by the arrows of the elven deadshots. Red-hotva rained down from the skies, burning the metallic deck and turning it crimson, sizzling as it did so.


    All the elves couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    They couldn¡¯t allow these two me Fiends to continue spreading their sea of fire as they wished. Otherwise, the elves would have trouble even finding a foothold. They were only forest elves, not flower fairies; most of them couldn¡¯t fly. If it weren¡¯t for the group enhancement, Winged, that the Goddess of Moonlight cast upon them prior to them setting off on their expedition, many of the elves here would have difficulty even boarding the ship.


    That was why the Second Grade elves could no longer sit still upon seeing the two me Fiends intentionally molding the battlefield to their advantage.


    Of the eleven Second Grade elves, two were Weapons Masters, six were elven Deadshots, two were Druid Masters of the w, and one was a Silver Pegasus Knight.


    The only ones in such a group that qualified as meat shields were the two Druid Masters of the w.


    Thus, the two Druids of the w in beast hides and a wolf and bear helm respectively immediately roared. They then underwent a bizarre process of distortion and transformation. Even the staff and equipment on them were assimted into their continuously swelling body.


    In the blink of an eye, a Giant Raging Ape and an Earth Mauler appeared before everyone, roaring and howling.


    The Giant Raging Ape was a whole four meters tall. Its size wasn¡¯t that much smallerpared to the me Fiend. Moreover, it had a mouthful of sharp and wicked teeth, along with a muscr body. It was naturally born as a wild magical beast that specialized at melee fights.


    The Giant Raging Ape lifted both of its arms bulging with muscles the moment its transformationpleted. It instantly formed a heavy rock in its palm that was two meters in diameter and half a ton in weight. The ape then roared furiously as it threw the rock toward one of the me Fiends. It mmed its fists against the ground and charged at the enemy.


    Behind the Giant Raging Ape, the evenrger Earth Mauler opened its wide jaws and stomped forward with its earth-shaking steps.


    Greem motioned with hisrge magma hand, and two Lava Shields automatically floated in front of him to block the giant rock flying toward him.


    A muffled yet loud thud apanied one of the two Lava Shields shattering. The other also had cracks all over and was clearly not going tost for much longer.


    Dong!


    The next second, the Giant Raging Ape smashed through this one remaining Lava Shield and charged toward the me Fiend that Greem had transformed into.


    However, its ferocity and violence could only bring it so far!


    It had only just stepped foot into the continually expandingva pool around Greem when the two me Fiendsshed out in unison.


    Inferno Wall!


    Doomsday Volcano!


    A zing wall of fire forged purely of fire and magma rose from the ground and stood in the way of the ape. This Inferno Wall might not be able to halt the Giant Raging Ape for long and was quickly smashed to pieces, but it still managed to stop its ferocious advance for a moment.


    The terrifying Doomsday Volcano directly erupted beneath the feet of the Giant Raging Ape!


    The terrifying fire poison, corrosiveva, sweltering streams of mes, and the intense heat that was everywhere; the spilling streams of fire andvanded upon the hardened body of the Giant Raging Ape, instantly singing its thick ck hair. Even the reasonably resistant skin beneath the hair had started sporting blisters from the heat. Blood flowed all over its body.


    The Giant Raging Ape raised its neck and howled in agony. It lifted its hands, formed yet another massive rock, and threw it at Greem. The Earth Mauler also roared and rushed past the remnants of the Inferno Wall. It took the ce of the ape and continued lunging at the two me Fiends.


    Twenty meters.


    Ten meters.


    Seeing that the Earth Mauler had stepped across theva and was about to arrive at the me Fiend¡¯s side, Greem let out a soft cry. Two Halos of Repulsion shot out of their bodies and engulfed the enemy within their effect.


    The Halo of Repulsion might be a magical attack, but it also carried with it a knockback effect.


    However, the Earth Mauler had an immensely heavy and massive body. Trying to st the bear far away with two Halos of Repulsion was no more than a fantasy. The Earth Mauler might have been caught in the center of the two halos and was stumbling to move one step closer, but it wasn¡¯t being forced away from the me Fiends either.


    The me Fiends had tough bodies, but they weren¡¯t creatures meant for melee. Most of theirbat power was concentrated on mid and long-ranged elementium fires. Melee battles were not, in fact, part of their strength.


    That was why a hint of savagery shed across Greem¡¯s zing face when he saw the two wild magical beasts refuse to retreat.


    "Coldme!"


    Greem shouted out. The elementium fires that had been burning the Giant Raging Ape and the Earth Mauler suddenly changed. Their traits abruptly transformed into those of the strange Coldme, capable of freezing and burning everything in the world.


    The two beasts were caught unaware and were instantly frozen within ayer of silently burning, pure-white mes.


    Ao, ao, ao!


    The two magical beasts yelled wildly and continuously drew upon the savage strength within their bodies to break out of the damned restrictions.


    Before they couldpletely break free of the Coldme, Greem shouted once again.


    "Explode!"


    The very next second, all the fire elementium clinging to the beasts¡¯ bodies as well as those that had seeped into their wounds instantly exploded.


    The terrifying explosion of fire continued to erupt on the surface of the beasts¡¯ bodies. This explosion ravaged the barely wounded flesh of the enemy. Their blood instantly vaporized before it could even hit the pool ofva below.


    This one attack had turned the light wounds of the two Druids Masters into severe injuries!


    The battle might have been aplicated series of actions, but it was no more than thirteen seconds in reality.


    Just as the elves in the back were preparing to help the druid masters, the druids had already been incapacitated. Yet, their enemy, the two terrifying me Fiends, were practically unharmed apart from the loss of some of their fire powers.


    Such a conclusion undoubtedly shocked the elves to their very core!


    They were all Second Grade creatures! Why was it that the difference between their actualbat power was so vast?


    They had no time to think any further. The six elven deadshots drew their bows and fired furiously. Rapid arrows shot at the me Fiends one after another so fast that they couldn¡¯t be seen with the naked eye.


    This sudden attack also threw the two me Fiends into chaos.


    One had to acknowledge that high-grade archers, if equipped with powerful arrows, were more lethal than casters of the same level regarding mid to long-range firepower. After all, spellcasters needed handsigns, chants, and the aid of materials to cast their spells. They couldn¡¯t perform like high-grade archers, firing their arrows with the simple lifting of their hands. The bolts would explode at the very first contact and contained plenty of power behind the st.


    That was why, in the face of such a storm of explosive arrows, Greem and the me Fiend of Terror¡¯s Fire Shields werepletely sted away in less than three seconds. If it weren¡¯t for the two Lava Shields that they had erected promptly, this rain of explosive arrows would have sted them into pieces and badly wounded them.


    Even so, Greem and the me Fiend had lost their opportunity to continue attacking the wounded druids!


    The two Druid Masters of the w were heavy tanks with tough skins. They escaped the me Fiends¡¯va pool with a single lunge. They rolled upon the ground and immediately reverted into their human forms. The next second, two Cure Serious Wounds quicklynded upon their bodies.


    Tong tong tong tong tong!


    Multiple green healing waves weaved between their bodies in session, instantly relieving the two Druid Masters of their profoundly wounded and weakened states. Their badly blistered and torn up bodies were also quickly regenerating from the umtion of healing spells.


    The elven priests were the best at healing effects among the elves.


    Sadly, these elven priests had historically served only the great gods. Consequently, they very rarely left theforts and shelter of the temples or shrines.


    Druids were known as the jack-of-all-trades profession that had decent ability and skill when it came to healing as well. That was why the two Druid Masters only needed to quickly cure themselves of their serious wounds upon leaving the battlefield. They could then shut their eyes and enjoy the constant stream of healing spells from the First Grade druids around them.


    They had to conserve their magic power in a battlefield as cruel and bloody as this one. After all, the duration of their Wild Transformation hinged upon the amount of magic power they still held. If they were to exhaust their magic power to treat their wounds, then they would have lost their most significant asset as druids!


    The me Fiends that had justpletely crushed the two druids were now being forced into a furious reaction by the barrage of these six elven deadshots. Greem had to regrly inject his fire energy into the Lava Shield in front of him to quickly repair the damage done by the rain of explosive arrows.


    If thisyer of defense were to break, the elves would be able to torture them to death with explosive arrows alone.


    Greem, in his frustration, increased the size of his own Lava Shield to cover the me Fiend beside him. That was to allow the me Fiend to conjure a mighty rain of meteors over the heads of the elven deadshots.


    Unfortunately, these meteors were deflected by the weapons masters and Silver Pegasus Knight guarding the deadshots¡¯ side. This way, the elven deadshots could devote all of their concentration toward their attack. They instantly let loose with all of their might.


    For a moment they employed fearsome Twin Dragon Pearl Shots, Triple Shots, Meteor Moon Chases, Pear Flowers in a Storm, and all sorts of elven archery skills, forcefully driving Greem and the me Fiend to step back. Their bodies were riddled with holes and in terrible condition!

 Chapter 646 Key to the Battle

    High-grade archers were the bane of all casters!


    Many experienced adepts have repeatedly emphasized this point in their notes on magic, yet Greem had always treated these recorded cases as examples of ¡¯once bitten, twice shy¡¯ and had never taken the warnings seriously.


    After all, a powerful high-grade archer had never appeared in the World of Adepts.


    That was why Greem¡¯s scalp buzzed as he was sted all over when the six elven deadshots turned into ferocious cannons and rained down a storm of explosive magic arrows at him and the me Fiend.


    The magical explosive arrows only had an average power of forty to fifty points, but with the aid of such impressive attack speed, their damage easily umted to two or three hundred points. Moreover, this kind of terrifying and continuous damage was all focused in a small area of no more than one square meter.


    It caused the Lava Shield that Greem and the me Fiend were maintaining to be destroyed by the enemy in less than three seconds!


    Fortunately, Greem had a powerful bodyguard at his side that didn¡¯t fear low-intensity physical damage.


    Seeing the danger of the situation, Tigule drove his Goblin Shredder in front of Greem with a Mechanical Charge and used hisrge, robust body to block the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    All of the Goblin Shredder¡¯s attacks were instant-cast and wouldn¡¯t be interrupted by the intense explosions. When the Goblin Shredder brandished its four metal mechanical arms and wildly fired energy shots at its surroundings, the rain of magical explosive arrows were all detonated by the energy shockwaves before they couldnd.


    Meanwhile, the metal shell behind the Goblin Shredder¡¯s back split apart. From within, as many as twelve goblin rockets took to the skies. Ci, ci, ci! These cigar-long goblin rockets shot out orange energy mes from their rear and lunged at the six elven deadshots like fish in water.


    Long-ranged attacks like these were child¡¯s y to elven deadshots. It wasn¡¯t that much harder than shooting fixed targets at the range. The six elven deadshots waved their slender hands. Their bowstrings trembled, the explosive arrows shooting down all of the goblin rockets whistling toward them.


    However, in doing so, their firepower suppression against the two me Fiends had be minimal.


    Greem and the me Fiend were finally able to turn their efforts away from defense. They roared and once again worked in unison to summon arge-scale Firestorm to engulf the area where the elves were.


    They had learned their lesson. They no longer cast those spells that required continuous channeling or that were easily intercepted, instead choosing to use fire spells that covered arge area. A Firestorm like this that only had one hundred and eighty points of power might not be sufficient to deal with the druids, but it was more than enough to deal with the frail and weak elven deadshots!


    The elves couldn¡¯t do anything about a massive fire spell like this that couldn¡¯t be intercepted or destroyed. They had no choice but to dodge out of its way to avoid the area where the Firestorm¡¯s power was most concentrated.


    The formation of the elven deadshots had unknowingly be much looser.


    Greem looked for the perfect opportunity and waved hisrge hand without hesitation. A dozen or so magma hounds with red mes spilling out of their bodies climbed out from the pool ofva below. They were all the size of lions and tigers, and their bodies were forged entirely of hardened magma and half-moltenva.


    One couldn¡¯t judge them for the fact that most of their body was made of sturdy and hard magma. They didn¡¯t seem slow or clumsy at all. The magma hounds stepped upon the metal deck and rapidly pounced from the top of one cabin to another. They quickly closed in on the scattered elves.


    Under ordinary circumstances, summoned magma hounds would only have the strength of pseudo-adepts. However, since Greem had opted for me specialization, he possessed overwhelming power that far surpassed any ordinary adept when it came to fire spells.


    These magma hounds, surprisingly, all had the power level of an adept!


    Unfortunately, even adept-level creatures couldn¡¯t change anything on the battlefield today. They could only be used as cannon fodder to restrain the enemy¡¯s attack.


    The fifteen magma hounds were cut to pieces and exterminated by the elves within a mere forty-nine seconds.


    Yet, at this moment, the otherrge-scale fire spell that Greem and the me Fiend had been preparing had formed.


    megate!


    As a megate formed from pure zing fires assembled in front of the two me Fiends, a horde of fire elementium creatures emerged from the scarlet door of light. These creatures then charged at the elves.


    Fire boys, fire birds, fire crows, fire snakes, fire lizards, and fire spirits.


    All sorts of strange fire creatures swarmed out of the gate with no end in sight. However, the most numerous of them all was the two-meter tall, vaguely humanoid low-grade fire elemental. Their numbers were plentiful, but their basic power was at or below intermediate apprentice level. Only a few of them were at the advanced apprentice level.


    To stop the advance of the elves, Greem had used a fire talisman to open a small passage to the fire elementium ne directly. He then summoned arge number of fire elementium creatures from the ne.


    After some rapid healing, the two Druid Masters had essentially regained theirbat ability. Most of the wounds on their bodies had also healed. When they saw the swarm of attacking fire elementals, they let out a furious roar and once again transformed. They turned into terrifying and ferocious magical beasts, charging into the horde as they roared.


    The two Second Grade magical beasts went against a horde of fire elementals whose average power level didn¡¯t even exceed intermediate level. It was like bulls charging into a field of watermelons. The reckless stomping, ferocious charges, and destructive and unstoppable momentum; low-grade fire elementals couldn¡¯t pose any threat to them whatsoever. Instead, many elementals had been stomped to pieces by the magical beasts they had transformed into.


    If it weren¡¯t for the megate swelling and spitting out a hundred more fire elementals as reinforcements every dozen seconds, these small fellows wouldn¡¯t even be enough for the two magical beasts to crush.


    Once the battle hadpletely blown up, the elves behind the druids also started stirring.


    The two weapons mastersughed chillingly. They pulled out their elven sabers and charged into the ranks of the magical machines that had just gotten into formation once more. Their formerly amazingly sharp sabers became unstoppable under the support of their impressive inner power. Even the thick, pir-like arms of the magical machines couldn¡¯t take a single casual strike from the weapons masters.


    It didn¡¯t matter how hard the magical machines fought back. They simply couldn¡¯t push back against the reckless ughter of the two weapons masters.


    Meanwhile, the Silver Pegasus Knight was even more terrifying. He turned into the incarnation of a swift god of death. He rode upon his silver pegasus and circled high above the deck. The moment any witch showed a sign of weakness, he would instantly turn into a beam of silver light and dive down from above.


    Witches that had he had locked onto would not be able to escape the sword of the Silver Pegasus Knight if they didn¡¯t have a powerful means of saving themselves. It hadn¡¯t been thirty minutes since the start of the battle, yet already two Dark Witches had fallen at his hands; one was dead, and the other was badly injured. It angered the Second Grade Dark Witch hiding in the shadows.


    The moonlight dimmed, and the whole flying deck turned dark and sinister.


    When the Silver Pegasus Knight dove down once again to execute yet another Dark Witch, the shadow the pegasus projected upon the deck abruptly swelled in size. A dozen ck tentacles the width of bowls reached out from within the shadow.


    All of these ck tentacles had terrifying suction cups on them. They easily swept around the silver pegasus¡¯ hooves and wings and entangled the beast. They then tightened and shrunk, seemingly intending to drag the pegasus and its rider into the shadow.


    For the Dark Witches, the Shadow World was their true home field!


    Fortunately, the Shadow ne was a neworld utterly open to all creatures. It never denied foreign beings that sought to enter, and it didn¡¯t reject most material nes. That was why the Dark Witches were able to open entrances to the Shadow ne from Faen so easily.


    However, the Second Grade Silver Pegasus Knight wasn¡¯t a weakling either. He had been ambushed, but he showed no signs of panic. The elven longsword in his hand shed brilliantly as it severed the tentacles binding the silver pegasus.


    The severed tentacles fell to the deck and started to twist and contort like living creatures.


    Without the support of shadow substance, they were soon incapable of maintaining their stable form. As the severed tentacles quickly dissolved, the dispersed, dense shadow substance corroded the alloy deck beneath it. Arge crater appeared on the bridge.


    Having broken free of the restraints of the ck tentacles, the silver pegasus whinnied and beat its wings in an attempt to return to the skies.


    The Dark Witch hiding in the shadows could no longer stand by. She revealed herself from within the shadows and gestured at the silver pegasus that was pping its wings.


    "Get down here."


    With her shout, a strange ebony chain ttered and once again wrapped around the silver pegasus. It tightened and started pulling it down from the skies, along with the elven knight on its back.


    Arge cluster of ck mist spread out and engulfed the elven knight and silver pegasus within it. The next moment, the angered grunt of the elven knight rang out from within the mist, along with a loud explosion of inner power. Even though the mist still obscured the battle, there was no hiding the brilliant elementium light of exploding inner power.


    Two silhouettes of different sizes revolved around within the darkness, charging left and right and often mixing into an indistinguishable mess as they tangled with each other.


    Fearing something might befall the silver pegasus knight, a weapons master waved his saber and charged into the ck mist.


    The energy pulses in the depths of the ck mist turned increasingly wild!


    Second Grade powerhouses could be seen fighting everywhere at the center of the deck. The energy aftershocks that they released into the environment reached above one or two hundred points. It was already a hazardous level for those First Grade witches and elves!


    If the energy aftershocks of the battle even scratched their shields or defenses, they would lose all of those defenses even if they managed to survive. If they also happened to be targeted by an opponent of the same grade at that moment, then they would most certainly face death.


    That was why the First Grade witches and elves avoided the center of the deck, choosing to fight at the edges of the flying ship.


    Poison, curses, arrows, longswords, sabers, nature magic, wind magic...


    They utilized every skill that could be of use. Everything was for the sole purpose of rapid ughter. Both sides hadmitted all their efforts, swearing to defeat and crush their opponent.


    As all this unfolded within the chaotic tide of battle, Greem was putting his all into the struggle against his opponent while also silently observing the skies above.


    After all, there were still two Third Grade powerhouses there.


    Their victory or defeat was the real and only determining factor of this battle¡¯s oue of this battle!


    As for the efforts and deaths on the deck? Those were no more than the irrelevant frills and background to the actual conflict.

 Chapter 647 Otherworld Summoning

    There were no signs of battle in the skies, and it was hard to see anything happening either.


    However, every dozen seconds, a deafening explosion or roar would ring out from the cloudyers high above. It was also quickly followed by a strange climate phenomenon in the form of swirling clouds or shifting winds.


    Nobody knew when, but the moon in the sky also started turning a sinister crimson red. Billowing, inky clouds gathered around the moon, almost as if trying to devour it in a single bite.


    Greem furrowed his brows and took a closer look. All sorts of feelings of impending danger arose in his heart.


    Inside his mind, the Chip was also working at full capacity to keep close surveince on any abnormality from the skies. Two pirs of light, one green and one ck, steadily ebbed and flowed. They represented the abnormal concentration and activity of magical elementium in the skies.


    The two pirs of light were maintaining some semnce of bnce, but they would asionally change and tilt in favor of one or the other significantly. Every time the green pir of light obtained an overwhelming advantage, the moon in the sky would turn chilling and austere, its light radiating for tens of thousands of meters. Every time the ck light obtained the advantage, the round moon would grow dim and turn hazy.


    However, what concerned Greem was the fact that the green light was slowly crushing the ck light after thirty minutes of conflict and battle. It showed signs of growing stronger and stronger.


    At this moment, Greem lifted his gaze and looked into the distance. Therge round disc of the moon was right before his eyes, the traces and threads of brilliant moonlight falling upon him, causing the cirction of his Spirit and magic power to stall and slow down.


    An unusual feeling of hatred entered his mind from the moon. That instantly caused him to understand what was happening.


    Thend, the skies, and the entire world seemed to loathe and reject him!


    It wasn¡¯t just him. All Dark Witches, Fate Witches, and Crimson adepts were despised and rejected by thend and skies. This sort of rejection gradually turned from a faint and vague feeling to a strangely clear spiritual brand. It firmly locked onto the adepts, making it hard for them to focus on the battle at hand.


    It seemed the Goddess of Moonlight had already projected part of her spiritual consciousness into this world, and in doing so, triggered the narw¡¯s bacsh and rejection of the foreign invaders.


    That would further shatter the power bnce between the elves and the witch factions!


    It seemed that today¡¯s n of baiting the enemy would turn into suicide if he still refused to use that ace he had hidden up his sleeve.


    Greem turned back without any hesitation and fled the frontlines of the battle.


    "You guys cover for me. I want to..." Greem whispered some instructions to Alice before taking out a strange blue scale the size of a palm. He gripped it in his magma hand and started to chant aplicated, profound and drawn-out incantation loudly.


    The strange sybles of the chant were insignificant on the battlefield where explosions were continually going off. Yet, for some reason, from the very first word of the chant that came out of Greem¡¯s mouth, all the Second Grade elves turned their heads to look at his position. A trace of shock appeared on their faces.


    It didn¡¯t seem like a potent offensive spell. Instead, it appeared to be a type of otherworld summoning spell.


    Only otherworld summoning spells of this nature could trigger the nar powers of Faen, causing all the elves present to sense the rage and tremors from the nar consciousness.


    "Interrupt him."


    "We can¡¯t let him continue."


    "Let¡¯s attack together."


    Eleven consciousnesses quicklymunicated in their minds and promptly came to a unanimous decision.


    The next second, the six elven deadshots gave up on dodging and intercepting the goblin rockets that the Goblin Shredder was constantly firing at them. Instead, they stood on the spot, exhaled, and sent out a raging flood of explosive arrows toward the me Fiend that Greem had turned into.


    The Giant Raging Ape and Earth Mauler that the two Druid Masters of the w had turned into once again roared and charged forward. One of them went after the me Fiend of Terror and desperately stalled it with his very life on the line. The other crashed ahead with rumbling steps and lunged at the Goblin Shredder.


    The Silver Pegasus Knight and one of the weapons masters were trapped in the shadows and mist by the Second Grade Dark Witch and couldn¡¯t free themselves. The only remaining weapons master stepped forth with agile and lithe steps. He dodged past one magical machine after another that roared and stepped forward to stop him. He pressed onward toward Greem at a tremendously fast pace that only appeared slow to the untrained eye.


    Tigule piloted his Goblin Shredder and desperately intercepted the explosive arrows shot out by the elven deadshots. At the same time, he had to try his best to deal with that annoying Giant Raging Ape; he had no time or attention to spare for the weapons master.


    Greem, on the other hand, was silently standing still, utterly focused on chanting the profound magical spell. A string of sybles of the chant rang out and rippled through the air, forming into a strange rippling wormhole in front of the me Fiend.


    The spatial tremors created by the wormhole became increasingly frequent and indirectly started tearing at the protection of the ne barrier. One could already vaguely see the obscure and bizarre scene of another ne through the slowly opening wormhole.


    However, the otherworldly creature that Greem wanted to summon was clearly arge monster. This tiny wormhole was entirely insufficient for it to pass through sessfully. That was why it was squeezing its way into Faen through the wormhole while loudly and angrily roaring at Greem in Dragontongue.


    Dragontongue? Dragon?


    All the elves present in the ce couldn¡¯t help but be dumbfounded.


    The massive form in the wormhole couldn¡¯t be clearly seen, as it had yet to descend upon this ne. However, the loud dragon roars and the overwhelming dragon¡¯s aura of might had more than exposed its identity.


    A dragon.


    The one that wanted to enter this world through the wormhole was a dragon!


    Moreover, judging from the strength of the spiritual pressure of the dragon¡¯s aura, this was a horrifying dragon of Third Grade and above!


    The high-grade elves could no longer neglect the situation. They increased the intensity of their attacks, swearing to y Greem before he couldplete this otherworld summon.


    Without the summoner, the dragon would quickly be bounced back to his original ne by the nar suppression the moment he appeared. It was the fundamental principle with which material nes functioned. All the elves present here knew very well how it worked.


    The unchecked weapons master destroyed the two magical machines with five consecutive shes. With a single sh, he charged toward Greem, who was mere feet away from him.


    Sadly, at this moment, an indescribably charged web of electricity silently appeared before him. A ferocious and towering figure then stepped in front of the weapons master.


    Dragonborn. It was that grievously injured Second Grade dragonborn!


    Even at this moment, the weapons master could very clearly see the wound-covered body of the towering dragonborn, as well as that distressing injury on his abdomen.


    It was almost as if someone had stabbed the dragonborn with a dagger and then proceeded to twist and turn the de. The massive injury could hardly be healed with healing potions. It could only be barely close together such as to not expose the frail internal organs behind it.


    This severely injured dragonborn helped Greem block the speeding enchanted arrows while wickedly ring at the weapons master reaching near him. Purple and ck blood once again flowed out of his wounds from the agitation of his movements.


    "Zacha, don¡¯t feel pity for those potions any more! Do you want to die on the battlefield?" Alice loudly reprimanded from a distance.


    An expression of pity appeared in Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s four amber eyes upon hearing Alice¡¯s words. He took out a small vial of potion, crushed the mouth of the container and started gulping down its contents.


    A refreshing and dense surge of nature power filled the ce upon the vial shattering. All the elves couldn¡¯t help but turn to look, their eyes filling up with extreme fury.


    "Moonwater."


    "It¡¯s moonwater!"


    "These damned sphemers, they actually have moonwater on them."


    After downing a vial of moonwater, a surge of vast and vigorous life force burst forth from within Zacha¡¯s body. In the blink of an eye, the green light of life flowed all over Zacha¡¯s body, causing his body to appear as good as new. It was no longer as battered and weak as before.


    The massive wound on his abdomen also silently closed after the green light rolled past. Blue dragon scales rapidly grew out of his rough skin, once again covering his exposed body.


    Dammit, dammit, dammit!


    All the elves cursed continuously in the depths of their hearts.


    This legendary healing potion that should belong to the elves had instead appeared in the hands of the enemy now. This...how was this supposed to make them feel?!


    In that brief moment of shock, the weapons master had engaged with the fully recovered Dragonborn Zacha.


    Meanwhile, Wind Adept Deserra, Medusa Dana, Three-Headed Demonhound Unguja, and Poison Hag Endor had gathered around Greem, using all their various abilities to help him intercept that locust storm of magical explosive arrows.


    At this moment, a horrifyingly powerful green aura suddenly erupted in the skies above. The Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah then fell from the sky, screeching as she did so.


    However, Uzzah managed to stop herself halfway down.


    Uzzah turned and fled without another word as dense ck smoke shrouded her body. She vanished from sight in the blink of an eye.


    At the same time, the Third Grade God Messenger Xenia slowly descended from the skies like a mighty god, wholly shrouded in halos of light.


    Even the corner of Xenia¡¯s eyes brimmed with joy and happiness at seeing the Third Grade Dark Witch flee in defeat. Yet, when her gaze fell upon the summoning wormhole in front of Greem that was constantly radiating intense spatial flux, her previous joy was utterly swept away, reced instead with an indescribable frustration and shock.


    "What have you people been doing all this while? We can¡¯t let him summon that otherworldly creature. All of you, charge!"


    All the elves betrayed an expression of shame at being reprimanded by the god messenger. Their faces then filled with wild passion as they yelled and threw themselves at Greem.


    The remaining magical machines, witches, and adepts on the deck surrounded Greem, forming a tight perimeter and desperately stopping the advance of the elves.


    Sadly, the only ones who could stop the Second Grades of the elves were Second Grades of their own.


    However, there were clearly fewer Second Grades on Greem¡¯s sidepared to the enemy.


    The adepts and magical machines of Greem¡¯s side paid a terrible price to stop the Second Grade elves from getting any closer.

 Chapter 648 Dragons Migh

    t


    Otherworld Summoning.


    It was a type of powerful casting ability.


    Many professional summoners would establish friendly rtions or contracts with powerful otherworldly beings. This way, they could easily summon a familiar ally to their side with an Otherworld Summon just by following a fixed procedure.


    Of course, this ¡¯ease¡¯ was only rtive!


    Take, for example, the Otherworld Summoning that Greem was currently attempting. Even though he already held a magical contract with the Thunder Dragon Arms as a medium ofmunication, it was still aplicated matter to break through the two nar barriers of Lance and Faen to summon the dragon to his side.


    On the one hand, the difficulty was due to the thunder dragon¡¯s immense power as a Third Grade. On the other, it was due to Faen¡¯s acute rejection of alien creatures.


    Fortunately, with Thunder Dragon Arm¡¯s full cooperation and Alice¡¯s own mysterious space powers, Greem finally managed toplete the summoning before the enemy broke through the defensive line.


    The summoning wormhole was like a long and deep ck hole, continually radiating intense spatial flux outward. Thunder Dragon Arms¡¯ initially great body stretched and distorted within the ck hole, asionally stretching into all sorts of odd shapes.


    When Greem¡¯s chant finally concluded with thest magical rune, the summoning wormholepletely stabilized and its form settled. It was then that Arms struggled with all his strength and squeezed out of the continually shifting wormhole.


    With the appearance of Arms in this world, the strange wormhole finally copsed and crumbled, leaving only wandering singrities in the spot.


    His body was massive and supple. His bones were angr and fearsome. Thunder Dragon Arms raised his head and released a long dragon¡¯s roar at the sky. The overflowing dragon¡¯s aura of might spread outward, instantly intimidating everyone upon the battlefield.


    "Tell me, human adept, who is it that you intend to have me fight this time?" Thunder Dragon Arms lifted hisrge snout and took a deep sniff. His sleepy eyes instantly opened round and wide, "Dammit, I smell the smell of divine magic here. Human adept, you couldn¡¯t have started a fight against those religious hacks, could you?"


    Having said that, Thunder Dragon Arms sneezed angrily. He then bent down and pressed his massive head toward Greem.


    "I¡¯ve already told you before; I hate fighting against religious hacks. Those fellows are too difficult to deal with. Not to mention an older one always pops up after beating the smaller guy. It¡¯s too easy to provoke the shitty gods behind their backs into action."


    As if to let out all of his dissatisfaction for Greem, Arms continued toin and grumble. Even though Arms himself felt as if he was softly ¡¯gossiping¡¯ with Greem, Greem¡¯s ears were buzzing painfully. He felt as if he had almost lost his hearing.


    Greem¡¯s expression became very weird upon hearing Arms disrespectful words for the gods here. He didn¡¯t answer his ally¡¯s question, choosing instead to point at the skies.


    The thunder dragon lifted his head as if he had suddenly been enlightened.


    It was only now that he first discovered the god messenger, who was trembling in anger and betraying an agitated expression.


    "A Third Grade god messenger? Oh, and a high-grade god messenger that receives attention from the gods!" Arms turned and looked at Greem, "Human adept, I may have signed a contract of cooperation with you, but today¡¯s enemy isn¡¯t included in our agreement."


    Seeing that Arms was showing an inclination to avoid this battle with his sneaky words, Greem smiled, as he had already prepared, "Arms, help me fight this battle. I won¡¯t let you go unrewarded for your effort!"


    Greem took out a strange seed cloaked in green light. He tossed it up and down in his palm.


    "A moonwell seed?" The thunder dragon had a good eye and instantly recognized the item.


    However, he promptly shot a look of disdain at Greem with hisrge and wicked dragon face.


    "What use is there with just the moonwell seed alone? Only elves can cultivate them into true moonwells. Other races wouldn¡¯t be able to grow moonwells even if they got the seed."


    Greem returned a disdainful expression of ¡¯you¡¯re the real idiot here¡¯ to Arms.


    "Lord Arms, could you please turn back and look before you reject this offer. There¡¯s a whole group of high-grade forest elves behind you. If you catch a few of them, would you still need to worry about being unable to grow the moonwell?"


    Arms brooded for a second. A thoughtful expression appeared on hisrge face.


    "But moonwells require thebination of the power of faith to be able to produce the precious moonwater every so often. These elves couldn¡¯t possibly worship me."


    This time, his tone was no longer as absolute as before!


    "You are absolutely right. These elves couldn¡¯t possibly ever worship you. However, don¡¯t forget; you have a whole horde of dragonborn in your territory that fervently worships you."


    Arms¡¯ expression seemed to loosen, but he was still a bit hesitant.


    "The benefit you speak of has a possibility of existing, but it is only a possibility in the end. The one you want me to help you deal with is a high-grade god messenger that¡¯s being closely watched over by her god. Yet what you are giving me in return is a benefit that I can¡¯t immediately get my hands on. Hehehe..."


    Greem rolled his eyes and immediately changed the topic of conversation.


    "Lord Arms, have you managed to recruit some green dragon followers after obtaining that Dragon¡¯s Pact?"


    Arms furiously spat out a surge of wild electricity, causing the metal deck to crackle loudly.


    "Hmph! Don¡¯t talk to me about this matter anymore! I have looked into several ces in Lance and still have yet to find a trace of those lordless green dragons. Aooo! It is so infuriating. What use have I for this damned Dragon¡¯s Pact if I can¡¯t even find where they live?"


    Greem smiled.


    "My lord, why fret over this issue?! There are green dragons in this very ne. In vast numbers as well, I might add."


    "What did you say?" Arms suddenly let out a loud roar.


    He suddenly stood up upon his hind legs and lifted his snout to sniff for the smell of this strange world carefully.


    It was a massive continent with nature creatures being its most dominant and populous creatures. The ones that held dominance over this continent were these forest elves before him. With Arms¡¯ sensitive sense of smell, he could very clearly smell traces of a dragon¡¯s scent on the leading group of elves.


    These elves did not possess the bloodline of dragons. The only possible reason for them carrying the scent of dragons was them havinge into contact with dragons. Moreover, it had to be close contact over a long period of time.


    As a dragon himself, Arms knew very well that among the different types of dragons were a few branches that liked to maintain close ties with elves. That included the green dragons and their progenitors¨C the Emerald Dragons and the Golden Dragons.


    Judging from this, Greem wasn¡¯t exactly lying when he said that there were green dragons here.


    An expression of hesitation and doubt appeared on Arms¡¯ face.


    Greem let out a silent sigh.


    All dragons were immensely greedy. He had promised so many benefits, yet the dragon still refused to agree without first seeing actual material benefits.


    "A hundred kilograms of magical gemstones and...fifty elven maids."


    Greem had no choice but to bite the bullet and lean into Arms preferences after taking into consideration the dragon¡¯s usual personality.


    "Deal!" The thunder dragon¡¯s eyes lit up. He roared, "Leave this god messenger to me. I guarantee I¡¯ll chase her far, far away. She won¡¯t ever appear upon this battlefield again."


    As he let out the roar, Arms beat his blue dragon wings flowing with blinding lightning and rose to the skies with his athletic body.


    The two individuals involved might only have had a short and rapid conversation, but this had utterly stunned the elves and witches that were watching.


    They...they were actually negotiating prices on the battlefield. This...was this still the mighty and noble dragon in their hearts?


    The thunder dragon took to the sky. Hisrge dragon eyes red at all the terrified First and Second Grade elves below him. He opened his mouth and roared once more, "Human adept, seeing how generous you are being, I will help you deal with these as well!"


    Arms opened his mouth and spat out chain lightning as thick as a stone pir. It was only then that he beat his wings and lunged at the elven God Messenger Xenia, who was proudly standing in the skies.


    Dammit, this scary Third Grade dragon was truly an ally of those adepts.


    Before this thought of theirs could even fully finish, that terrifying chain lightning had already reached the elves.


    The first to be hit was naturally the weapons master that was too far ahead.


    His body was swift and agile. His swordsmanship was truly legendary as well. Sadly, none of this was of any help before absolute power!


    It didn¡¯t matter how fast the weapons master was; he couldn¡¯t possibly be faster than actual lightning!


    The lightning st instantly filled the vision of the weapons master at almost the same instant he thought of dodging.


    The weapons master pointed his des forward. Wild inner power erupted all around his body. A green ring of light just barely protected his body when the lightning struck the tip of his elven saber.


    The next instant, the weapons master¡¯s body was paralyzed and hurting tremendously. He had been wholly fried and scorched.


    The wild and ferocious lightning chain traveled all over his body and quickly snapped toward the closest elf to him.


    That was the Druid Master that had turned into a bear!


    He ferociously stood upon his hind legs and roared. He intended to use his iparably tough body to endure the lightning.


    Sadly, when the wild flow of electricity surged through his muscr body, he crumbled to the ground before he could even finish his roar. His entire body started to release thick ck smoke. One could vaguely smell the stinging and scorching burnt flesh.


    The chain lightning still didn¡¯t stop. It snapped once again and lunged at an elven deadshot that was drawing her bow.


    The female deadshot did not have as robust a body as the previous two targets with which to endure the lightning. She frantically dodged, but, sadly, a small part of her body was still struck by the lightning chain.


    Aaaaaah!


    There was a painful cry as the female elven deadshot crashed upon the ground. The parts of her body that had not been hit by the electricity were still fine. However, the parts that had been hit were burnt to ashes and were on the brink of simply disintegrating.


    The energy contained within the lightning chain had erupted three times in session. Most of the lightning power within it had been exhausted. However, it didn¡¯t disappear yet. It once again carved out a strange, winding path and turned toward another female elven deadshot.


    The elven deadshots, which had previously grouped up, panicked and fled in every direction.


    By the time the chain lightning exhausted its energy and dispersed into the air, five Second Grade elves had already fallen on the battlefield.

 Chapter 649 Blazing Guardian

    Five Second Grade elves!


    That Third Grade Arms¡¯ ferocious st had instantly knocked down five elven fighters of Second Grade. This terrifying reality caused the scalp of every elf present to buzz. The entirety of their souls numbed. None of them knew how to respond.


    Almost as if it sensed the crumbling will of its followers, therge brilliant moon in the sky suddenly glowed with an intensely bright and chilling light.


    A strange and profound aura suddenly rose from the body of the god messenger standing in the sky. Her demeanor and atmosphere had changed entirely.


    God Messenger Xenia¡¯s face was ice-cold. She looked down upon Thunder Dragon Arms who was roaring and charging at her; her face disyed no sign of panic.


    "Dragon brat. This is Faen, not the home of you dragons. Did your seniors not tell you to respect the gods?"


    As she spoke, a mysterious and holy aura radiated from her body, causing all living beings in the area to feel a trembling in their heart and an urge to kneel.


    The Goddess of Moonlight!


    No; the Xenia before them couldn¡¯t yet be called the Goddess of Moonlight. At the very best, she could only be seen as a god messenger carrying a trace of the Moonlight Goddesses¡¯ will. Of course, the divine power that ¡¯she¡¯ wielded would necessarily be limited by the power of Xenia herself.


    If she wanted to use excessively powerful divine strength, then before she could even hurt the enemy, Xenia¨Cas the host¨Cwould be the first to break. That was why the most significantbat power that the Goddess of Moonlight could unleash did not exceed Xenia¡¯s limit, regardless of how powerful she was.


    At her very best, the Goddess could only unleash the power of a peak Third Grade. Yet, as a Third Grade thunder dragon, Arms could even fight off some of the slightly weaker Fourth Grades. That was why Arms wasn¡¯t too inferior to the opponent when it came to aparison of power.


    It was precisely because he knew the nature and methods of descent that the gods used that Arms felt no fear or respect for this ¡¯descended¡¯ goddess.


    "Haha. You gods of other nes always think of yourself as the rulers of the entire universe. How much power can you even unleash once you leave this ne and this world?! How can youpare to us dragons? No matter where we go, our power will always be our power. It will never wither, and it will never be taken from us. What is such a god supposed to use to make me respect them? If you want me to retreat, you should first summon a Fourth Grade god messenger."


    The arrogant words of the Third Grade thunder dragon instantly caused the Moonlight Goddess¡¯ expression to turn.


    As a revered god of Faen, there had never been a mortal that dared to be so rude in front of the gods!


    Meve, the Goddess of Moonlight,ughed coldly and pointed lightly with her pretty and slender hands.


    "In the name of the moon, let darkness forever obscure the vision of this creature before me."


    As these words that sounded like a curse left her mouth, Third Grade Arms let out a wild roar. His vision had gone dark, his eyes shrouded by a cluster of darkness.


    "Dammit, to think it was a god that has mastered control over the narws; go and die!" Thunder Dragon Arms instantly roared and let out a storm of lightning that ravaged toward the position where the Goddess had been standing.


    He was only an ordinary Third Grade dragon. It was naturally impossible for him to defeat a powerful deity in their own world. Still, it wasn¡¯t as difficult to ovee a Third Grade god messenger. As long as he exterminated the body of this Third Grade elf, the trace of the Goddess¡¯ will would naturally fade, having lost its host.


    Arms tried several times with various methods to remove the mist of darkness shrouding his eyes, but he couldn¡¯t do anything about it. He had no choice but to bravely lunge forward, intent on defeating this Third Grade elf in the shortest time possible.


    The thunder dragon¡¯s counterattack fell well within the expectations of the god messenger.


    Her perfect and slender body simply shed in the moonlight and escaped from the area engulfed by the dragon¡¯s ferocious lightning. She raised her slender hand, and a cold beam of moonlight fell from the skies. She turned her hand slightly as it reflected upon the massive body of the thunder dragon.


    A thick beam of light the size of a bowl silently pierced through the dragon¡¯s rib. Itpletely ignored the Thundercloud Barrier around Arms, as well as his scales, and wholly shot through his body.


    Aooo! A long and pained dragon¡¯s cry. Thunder Dragon Arms beat his wings furiously and quickly retreated to his original position. He then turned and shot out a rapid st of lightning at the enemy. A mist of blood slowly descended from the sky.


    Sadly, this lightning attack was still avoided by the enemy using her strange teleportation technique!


    Arms roared furiously and promptly activated his True Sight. It was only now that he saw the enemy¡¯s source of power.


    "Dammit, you are the Goddess of Moonlight! Right now, this is your home field."


    Thunder Dragon Arms raised his head and roared angrily at the round moon hanging in the sky. For the first time, he felt a trace of regret at infuriating a Goddess of Moonlight.


    I shouldn¡¯t have fought her in the night. I shouldn¡¯t have fought her in the forest.


    With all these situational advantages on her side, this terrifying Goddess of Moonlight could disy the power of a pseudo-Fourth Grade. This...this wasn¡¯t easy to deal with!


    While the blind thunder dragon lunged at the Goddess of Moonlight in the sky, Alice was watching it all unfold from above the floating ship. She hesitated for a moment and took out a potion vial.


    She dabbed her fingers in the moonwater within and started drawing in the air. A strange rune formed. As she raised her slender hand, the mysterious rune vanished. The next moment it appeared, it was by Thunder Dragon Arm¡¯s side.


    The mysterious runended toward the dragon¡¯s body, carrying with it traces of nature power.


    Arms smelled the foreign power and opened his mouth, preparing to destroy it with a st of lightning. Yet, at this moment, Greem¡¯s mental message had been sent to his mind.


    "Don¡¯t resist, this is beneficial for you."


    The thunder dragon was stunned for a moment, but the lightning st gathering in his throat didn¡¯t st forward.


    As the rune entered his body, Arms felt an indescribable feeling offort and relief throughout his body. The mist gathered around his eyes dispersed without a sound, restoring his vision. The few terrible piercing wounds on his body also healed at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    In the blink of an eye, he hadpletely recovered!


    Arms¡¯bat power skyrocketed after regaining his vision.


    God Messenger Xenia shed and dodged several of the dragon¡¯s lightning in session. She then moved above the flying ship. She looked down upon Alice, whose face was turning white, and raised her hands. The chilling moonlight in the sky turned and poured down upon Alice¡¯s position.


    With her unique prediction abilities as the leader of the Fate Witches, Alice could very clearly sense what awaited her next. When she tried to teleport out of the enemy¡¯s attack range, her always effective spatial teleportation suddenly stalled and no longer worked.


    Dammit, this starlight even had the ability to lock down space.


    This angry thought had only just rolled past Alice¡¯s mind when the cold and deep moonlight had already crashed down upon her.


    If she had the strength of a Second Grade, she would be able to forcibly teleport away even if the moonlight engulfed her. In the end, she was only First Grade. She was about to be exterminated when facing a pseudo-Fourth Grade without even the chance to retaliate or dodge!


    The light before her eyes dimmed and moonlight crashed down upon her.


    The only thing Alice could do now was close her eyes tightly and wait for the arrival of death.


    Even as the strange sizzling sound of corrosion filled her ears, she felt no pain.


    Alice opened her eyes and was shocked to find a towering me humanoid extending both of its arms and reaching forward to protect her beneath itself like a loyal guardian.


    When the moonlightnded upon his body, everyone¡¯s impression of the moonlight as calm and quiet waspletely overturned. The light was like a powerful acid, instantly eating at the me Fiend¡¯s body and creating massive craters upon his body. The corrosion of this powerful moonlight had almost fully extinguished the zing mes and flowingva.


    "Greem..." Alice let out a pained cry. The tears that hadn¡¯t flowed even in the face of death finally fell down her cheeks.


    Greem might no longer have any vital spots on his body after transforming into the me Fiend, but that didn¡¯t mean he would not be damaged.


    Once he transformed into the me Fiend, the body of magma was his muscles, and the flowing and burningva was his blood. Even if the me Fiend didn¡¯t die from such tremendous damage, there was no avoiding the intense pain that came with it!


    If the me Fiend¡¯s body waspletely dissolved, and the moonlight corroded the mental consciousness hidden within, then Greem could still die.


    Greem arched his back and used his thick magma spine to endure the endless corrosion of the moonlight. His face, hidden beneath his body, twisted from the tremendous agony. Large clusters of corrodedva dripped from his back, turning into mud on the ground beside him.


    Alice stood upon the tips of her toes and grabbed Greem¡¯s zing face with both of her hands, warm tears still streaking down her face. Her heart filled with endless pain.


    With his power as a Second Grade fire adept, and the moonlight not being locked onto him, Greem¡¯s chances of escaping the pir of moonlight were extremely high. However, without his protection, Alice, at her current power level, would not even endure a single second in the light.


    That was why Greem unhesitatingly propped up an unyielding sky of fire for Alice with his own body, even though the Chip continued to re out warnings.


    Yet, at this moment, a horrifying tide of lightning and thunder rumbled across the skies.


    The endless moonlight finally came to a stop and vanished in front of everyone¡¯s eyes!

 Chapter 650 Divine Shield

    Raging Thundertides!


    It was the broadest and most potent Dragontongue magic that Thunder Dragon Arms could unleash.


    God Messenger Xenia was focused on unleashing her fury and was caught unaware. She turned a little too slow and was struck by the rolling st of lightning.


    Though she swiftly canceled her onught against Greem and Alice to rapidly turn, the raging lightning still shredded the magical protections on her and seared a good half of her body.


    Such severe damage would have crippled Xenia if she was still that Third Grade elf. However, after taking into herself the will of the Moonlight Goddess, these minor physical wounds could no longer faze her.


    After dashing out of the rolling thunder that took up nearly half the sky, ¡®Xenia¡¯ stood proudly in the air and extended a hand toward the bright moon above. She waved with her fingers as a cold beam of moonlight gathered around her broken body. The light was miraculously healing the burned parts of her body at an extraordinary pace.


    The green light that represented the power of nature continued to sh on her body. Every spark of light was apanied by a small, fingernail-sized piece of scorched flesh peeling off. New tissue was quickly growing underneath, turning into a newyer of tender and white skin.


    The damage caused by the thunder dragon¡¯s Raging Thundertides was healing at a rate visible to the naked eye when nourished by moonlight.


    Dammit, she was truly the Goddess of Moonlight! Her use of moonlight had already reached an extreme: attacking enemies, self-healing, and crowd control. How was the battle still supposed to go on?


    Regarding individualbat ability, the Third Grade God Messenger Xenia had inherited all of the strengths and weaknesses of the forest elves. While her body was agile and quick, it was also excessively frail. There was no doubt that the physically gifted thunder dragon would easily crush her when she was using such a ¡¯frail¡¯ body.


    However, with the unique traits of divine moonlight power, Xenia could easily dodge within the area covered by the moonlight. Moreover, the light she harnessed also possessed the magical quality of negating defenses. Combined, these two factors limited the power of the dragon, causing the Third Grade thunder dragon to be like a bull trying to catch a cat¨C incapable of even touching her despite all his strength.


    The only thing that could threaten her was the thunder dragon¡¯srge-area lightning magic.


    However, activating lightning magic of this intensity and scale was a deeply exhausting task for the thunder dragon as well!


    That was why both parties continued to circle each other in a game of cat and mouse above the flying ship. Cold moonlight and wild lightning entwined and shed with each other in the sky, creating an oddly beautiful scene.


    In general, the areas that the Moonlight Goddess was proficient in leaned more toward mystique and support. She shouldn¡¯t have too many skills in the realm ofbat.


    However, when her opponent was only a Third Grade thunder dragon, the god messenger could easily weave between the gaps of the lightning sts and asionally use the moonlight as a weapon to stab one or two horrifying holes in the dragon¡¯s body. She was immensely powerful, even though she was only currently possessed by a trace of the Moonlight Goddess¡¯ will.


    Thunder Dragon Arms was trying his best, but he kept missing the opponent¡¯s frail body by inches. It caused him to be increasingly furious and impatient. The apocalyptic sts of lightning increased in frequency and ferocity.


    It was a battle between two Third Grades. No; one was a ¡®pseudo-Fourth Grade,¡¯ and the other was only a higher Third Grade!


    Thunder Dragon Arms might not be able to win, but he wielded enough power to leave whenever he wished. God Messenger Xenia might possess the absolute initiative in this battle, but she still couldn¡¯t stop the dragon from escaping.


    After all, the Goddess of Moonlight¡¯s divine power leaned more toward the various uses of moonlight. A frontal confrontation was not her forte. That was why¨Cgiven his life was not under any threat¨CArms wanted to try even harder for a taste of a goddess¡¯ flesh and blood.


    Greem took this opportunity to drink a vial of moonwater and regained his strength once again.


    Not counting the losses of his magical machines and subordinates, three vials of moonwater had been consumed since the start of the battle. These could have easily sold for fifty to sixty thousand magical crystals if he had brought them back to the World of Adepts! Moreover, they were products that were so highly demanded that there wasn¡¯t even a market for them.


    These losses were all caused by the damned god messenger shing about above his head. That was why Greem stared at the ferocious battle of the two Third Grades in the sky with clenched teeth. All sorts of ideas ran through his head.


    The flying ship had slowly stopped flying under Greem¡¯s secret order. Even the shattered energy forcefield on the outside had been wordlessly removed. Silently and soundlessly, wild magic energy gathered and condensed within the interior of the flying ship.


    Suddenly, an opening appeared upon the flying ship¡¯s deck under Greem¡¯s order. A horrifying cannon barrel five meters in diameter extended out from within the vessel.


    Dong! A muffled explosion.


    The next second, an energy beam as thick as a pir shot out of the cannon, sting straight at the God Messenger Xenia that had just reappeared somewhere in the sky.


    Xenia had justpleted a Lunar Teleportation to dodge Arms¡¯ Thunderstorm. She had just emerged from the fantastical astral world when she was greeted by this energy pir that reached eight-hundred and ny points of power.


    Even the usuallyposed and cold Xenia was frightened out of her wits at this moment.


    The purity and concentration of this energy pir were well within the middle-upper ranks, even amongst Third Grade powerhouses. Moreover, this attack hade out of the blue. It was fast and sudden without any warning.


    That further increased the power of the attack!


    Without any hesitation, Xenia immediately yed the ace that she had been keeping a tight grip on.


    Divine Shield!


    Divine Shield. Just as the name implied, it is a powerful shield sustained by divine power.


    Divine power was something that only divine beings could possess. That was why divine magic of this kind had always been the exclusive skill of the gods and demigods.


    Xenia might be a god messenger, but she wasn¡¯t a so-called ¡¯divine being.¡¯ As such, her weak body could only tolerate a limited amount of divine power. During the battle earlier, she had to use her identity as a god messenger and take on a trace of the Moonlight Goddess¡¯ will just to borrow a portion of divine moonlight power.


    Thebination magic that she cast by manipting elementium energy through the use of divine power was also known as Apotheosized Magic. The strength was two to three times that of pure elementium magic.


    Yet, in the face of this powerful energy pir that took up all of her vision, Xenia had no other choice but to unleash her only trump card¨C Divine Shield.


    It was notbination magic formed from both divine and elementium power. Instead, it was real divine magic constructed purely from divine power. Its defensive strength was over ten times that of an ordinary elementium magical defense. It would be difficult for her to defend against such a strong energy attack if the Divine Shield wasn¡¯t this powerful.


    Like a silent film that had been slowed down countless times, the energy pir crossed a distance of two to three hundred meters the instant it appeared in front of Xenia¡¯s eyes, silently arriving right in front of her.


    Just as everyone waited with bated breath the moment the attack connected, Xenia raised her head and screamed. A brilliantly colorful Divine Shield appeared around her andpletely encased her within.


    The wild energy flow savagely attacked the Divine Shield, causing countless energy explosions to appear on the colorful shield. Yet, regardless of how the energy pir rushed at the protection, this eggshell-thin, transparent shield of light remained unmoving.


    Any ordinary defensive spell subjected to such circumstances would have exploded in less than a second. However, this Divine Shield was able to safely endure the most powerful attack of the flying ship with its immensely strong defensive powers.


    Everyone was stunned after the cannon shot ended!


    The elves honestly didn¡¯t imagine this flying ship to have such an offensive ability hidden within it. Greem¡¯s faction, on the other hand, never expected the Third Grade god messenger to block such a terrifying charged attack in her hurry.


    The spots from the blinding light of the energy pir piercing the skies took a long time to fade from the eyes. God Messenger Xenia hid within the Divine Shield, and her face was ashen. It was clear that she had to recover from her earlier shock.


    She was only Third Grade; the amount of power that she could borrow from her Goddess was limited. The Divine Shield alone had nearly exhausted all of the divine magic stored within her body. If she continued fighting with the Third Grade dragon, then the amount of power that she could use would drop from Pseudo-Fourth Grade to Third Grade. It would be exceedingly difficult for her to continue suppressing the enemy.


    What caused her even more anxiety was doubt as to the flying ship¡¯s ability to continue firing attacks of that intensity. If the enemy still had one more shot left in their ship, then today¡¯s battle was going to be truly dangerous!


    Thunder Dragon Arms, who had been failing to touch the god messenger despite his repeated efforts, immediately roared out in excitement at the sight of this scene.


    ¡°One more shot. One more shot. Her Divine Shield can¡¯t endure another shot.¡±


    Greem had no other choice but to roll his eyes intensely at the dragon¡¯s yelping.


    After all, the flying ship only carried an ordinary space furnace within its hull. It wasn¡¯t the magic generator furnace maintained by the Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe himself. That was why the core area of the flying ship had already suffered several elementium explosions after firing a charged attack of this intensity. There were plenty of leaks in the energy pipes already.


    All the goblin engineers and technicians were ordering the construction machines about and working tirelessly to fix the internal damage to the ship. There was no way the magic energy cannon could fire a second shot under such circumstances!


    Thus, Greem, who knew the truth, had no choice but to shake his head with a bitter smile upon his face in the face of Arms¡¯ shouts.


    ¡°Lord Arms, that god messenger seems to have exhausted her divine power?¡± Greem asked probingly.


    ¡°You don¡¯t say! Of course, I can see that as well!¡± Arms replied unamusedly, ¡°However, who knows if god messengers like them can still activate another divine magic if they get pressed into a corner. If she unleashes another offensive divine magic, even I don¡¯t haveplete confidence in escaping unscathed.¡±

 Chapter 651 Perfect Trap

    On the other side of the battlefield, the god messenger was frantically and frightfully looking away from the thunder dragon to the flying ship below.


    The flying ship was releasing ck smoke, and sounds of explosions seemed to ring out from within continuously. It appeared the earlier charged attack had also caused tremendous damage to the ship¡¯s integrity.


    However, there was no telling whether these signs were real or fake. She could only make her own guesses. That said, if she were to make a wrong assumption and be crushed once again between the ship and the dragon¡¯s attacks, she would not be able to escape unscathed¨C even if the Divine Shield had yet to vanish.


    The Goddess was immortal, but a god messenger like her was not!


    That was why Xenia couldn¡¯t help but start hesitating between retreating and fighting.


    Almost as if she sensed the doubt and hesitation in her follower¡¯s heart, the will of the Moonlight Goddess hosted within Xenia¡¯s soul suddenly grew extraordinarily furious. The sphemers were right in front of her, yet her own follower hesitated to go forward. It was an unbelievable humiliation to the Moonlight Goddess.


    Xenia silently sensed the chilling will sent by the Goddess behind her, and her heart trembled. She no longer dared to have even a trace of doubt in her heart. The god messenger put her hands together, and instant-cast nature magic suddenly struck at Greem, who was standing upon the ship¡¯s deck


    She finally saw the situation for what it was. This seemingly insignificant Second Grade male adept was the real mastermind behind the enemy today. Be it those evil witches with their strange magic or this Third Grade thunder dragon from another world, the Second Grade male adept manipted all of them behind their backs.


    Moreover, Xenia also vaguely sensed the remnants of divine moonlight magic upon this male adept¡¯s body and soul. That clearly meant that he was the sphemer that had enraged the Goddess as well as the person she was meant to capture!


    As a god messenger, she had a noble status and could even talk to the elven queen as an equal.


    Still, it was a fact that she had no real freedom.


    Take for example the situation before her. Even though victory was not certain, Xenia had no choice but to abandon her safety when the Goddess was enraged; she unhesitatinglymitted herself to the execution of the Goddess¡¯ will.


    Thus, a new round of the battle immediately erupted!


    Due to the tremendous pressure of thebat, most First Grade witches and Crimson adepts had retreated into the cabins. Only Greem, Zacha, Tigule, and two dozen magical machines remained on the deck.


    The flying ship dragged a long trail of thick ck smoke behind it as it escaped into the distance with much difficulty.


    Thunder Dragon Arms and God Messenger Xenia were fighting furiously in the skies. Every time she found some space, Xenia would suddenly fire a chilling beam of moonlight at Greem. These beams of moonlight seemed light, weightless, andpletely harmless, but they would always leave a terrifying ditch in the deck every time they swept past.


    Therge metal deck was scarred all over with crisscrossing marks after several attacks. The bridge was almost filled with ditches and notches of varying depths. It was a terrifying sight to behold.


    After getting themselves back in order, the elven army started saving the few critically injured Second Grades. The relied on the remaining troops to continue assaulting the adepts¡¯ defensive line. As long as they could charge inside of the flying ship and wreck its ability to fly, this metal monster would have to forever stay in thisnd.


    When the ship crashed, the reinforcements from the neighboring elven cities would sessfully obtain this war beast of immense strategic importance. One could easily foresee the value of the vessel. If the elven kingdom could construct an entire fleet of such powerful ships, they could load them with armies of elven archers and swarms of flying units. It would be an easy matter to fend off any attacks from the witches.


    If they nned ahead, even crossing the seas and taking the Faen Continent for themselves wouldn¡¯t be a dream!


    Thus, after sensing the Goddess¡¯ will, her followers that had teleported over immediately erupted with their fiercest attacks, instantly beating back the adepts¡¯ defensive line and forcing the enemy to barely be able to defend the cabin entrance to the interior of the flying ship.


    Xenia and Greem¡¯sbat power might not beparable to each other.


    Still, when it came to this moment when one was trying her very best, and the other was being sly and slippery, the bnce between the two started to tip in odd and unusual ways. From the thunder dragon desperately chasing after the god messenger, to the god messenger desperately maintaining her Divine Shield and chasing after the dodging Third Grade thunder dragon.


    Of course, Xenia would still asionally secretly use Lunar Teleportation to get to Greem¡¯s position to attack him.


    It was a Third Grade hunting after a Second Grade. Green could not retaliate apart from using his Fire Teleportation to dodge the iing attacks repeatedly.


    ¡°Arms, what are you doing?¡± Greem, who was frantically stumbling here and there, shouted with a mental message, ¡°I hired you here to deal with the god messenger. If you let her kill me, you won¡¯t be able to get even a single penny.¡±


    ¡°Hmph, deal with the god messenger? That¡¯s easy for you to say. She is possessed by a petty goddess. Do you think I could endure it if the goddess suddenly decided to reward me with a st of offensive divine magic?¡± Arms roared, dissatisfied.


    As a Third Grade thunder dragon, he was also furious at being backed into such a corner by a weak Third Grade elf. However, it didn¡¯t matter how angry he was; there was no way he would risk his life to test the enemy¡¯s limits. If that damned person still had another ace up her sleeve, he would be the unfortunate victim to be brutalized!


    ¡°Lord Arms, if I create a chance for you to deal with the god messenger, would you be willing to try?¡± Greem¡¯s mind turned rapidly as he asked with a solemn tone.


    ¡°Little adept, you aren¡¯t lying to me and trying to trick me, are you? A Second Grade adept like you dares speak such boastful words?¡± The thunder dragon¡¯s expression shifted slightly, and he replied in disdain.


    ¡°Hmph! Lord Arms, it¡¯s not as if you do not know what I am capable of. If I can truly create a chance to force the god messenger into a corner, will you be willing to try and exterminate her?¡± Green didn¡¯t give up and continued to press the issue.


    The thunder dragon paused for a moment. For the first time, he started to consider the problem seriously.


    This kid seemed like he was serious.


    Could he actually have some means to force a Third Grade god messenger into a corner and create an environment for him to kill her? It was a little hard to believe, but given the kids¡¯ results in the past, he just might...


    In the end, he had been forced to sign a cooperation agreement with this Second Grade adept precisely because he fell into his hands! He might be upset every time he remembered that incident, but it was more than enough to prove the ability of this male adept!


    ¡°Very well!¡± Arms gritted his teeth and spoke, ¡°As long as you can trap the god messenger or force her into a corner, I will take the risk and try and kill her!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡± Greem was thrilled to hear this, ¡°Wait for my signal. Once I give my signal, use your most powerful Raging Thundertides to attack her. Failure or sess will all depend on this.¡±


    The conversation between the two parties might seem like it took a long time, but given their mental connection, all those words took no more than a moment or two. That was why both of them stoppedmunicating afterpleting their scheme. They both waited for the best opportunity and stored their strength for the opportune time to strike.


    Thunder Dragon Arms only needed to dodge Xenia¡¯s attacks while charging his strength, but Greem was instantly upied with all sorts of jobs.


    Greem constantly shed about the battlefield while turning the snake-eye ring on his right pinky to send orders to his many subordinates.


    Dragonborn Zacha was still standing guard in front of the cabin door, while Tigule had driven his Goblin Shredder into the cabins and gone somewhere. Greem, on the other hand, was still murmuring. His snake-eye ring continued to sh with a brilliant magical light. It seemed he wasmunicating with some mysterious figure.


    A thick feeling of a plot being put into action rose in the battlefield!


    The adepts seemed to be plotting something. Even the ordinary First Grade elves could sense something awry, let alone the god messenger.


    However, they couldn¡¯t find danger anywhere they looked.


    That was why the elves had no better option to relieve their stress but to increase the pace of their attack.


    Greek¡¯s confidence was bolstered after the conversation with that mysterious figure ended. He shed and appeared at the me Fiend¡¯s side, once again using his ferocious fire magic to throw the elven ranks into chaos.


    Greem¡¯s powerful outburst drew the attention of the god messenger once more.


    She gritted her teeth and forced the thunder dragon away with three chilling beams of moonlight. She then raised her head and gestured with her hand as a beautiful rain of starlightnded upon her body. She vanished without a trace the very next second.


    That Lunar Teleportation again! Still, where would she choose to appear this time?


    Those on the adepts¡¯ side couldn¡¯t help but be anxious when seeing the god messenger vanish. Even the Second Grade dark witch frantically dove into the shadows to avoid being the enemy¡¯s first target.


    Only Greem was sure that God Messenger Xenia would definitely try and attack him.


    That was because the only shortcut to ending today¡¯s battle was killing Greem.


    Thus, Greem¡¯s ck eyes glowed with a chilling, cold light the very instant the god messenger vanished. His mind was strung like a drawn bow as he silently awaited instructions from Alice.


    He had no ability to track or scan the high-grade magic of a Third Grade god messenger. He had to rely on Alice¡¯s urate predictions to do so. That said, the price that Alice needed to pay to divine the location of a Third Grade god messenger protected by a Goddess was immense!


    ¡°Fifteen steps to your right and back. Her position is at XXX.¡±


    Finally, Alice¡¯s anxious voice rang out through the mental connection.


    Her voice was hoarse and carried with it a trace of fatigue.


    Green didn¡¯t dare to hesitate even a bit. He used his fastest speed and sent out a series of orders to different positions and various people. He himself leaped away with even higher speed.


    As he jumped away, aserbeam-like moonlight shed past his previous position, leaving a deep cut upon the deck.


    The me Fiend of Terror that had stayed on the spot roared; it didn¡¯t even have time to cast any spells. He merely pushed both of his hands forward and used all his strength to pour the violent flood of fire onto Xenia¡¯s shield.


    ¡°Hmph, you are looking to die!¡± Xenia¡¯s vision cleared as she instantly realized the male adept had already taken the chance to escape.


    Just as she wanted to strike out and exterminate this elementium golem that the adept had left behind, a perfect murder trap with her at the center had already been sprung.

 Chapter 652 The God Messenger Falls

    The first to strike was naturally the me Fiend of Terror, who was the closest one to Xenia.


    With the Second Grade power of the me Fiend, it was no more than a pipe dream to attempt to kill the Third Grade Xenia. However, it was still possible for it to temporarily limit and interrupt the enemy¡¯s movements.


    zing hot mes surged out of the me Fiend¡¯s magma hands and ceaselessly assaulted Xenia¡¯s Divine Shield. The fire quickly turned into a prison ofva and trapped the god messenger within. At the same time, the magic energy cannon that had remained silent all this time started charging up again. Overwhelming magic energy of shocking intensity began to gather within the barrel. It was clear that a new round of attacks was forming.


    If the me Fiend¡¯s attacks were said to only cause Xenia to frown, then the charging of the magic energy cannon utterly terrified her.


    She had yet to recover from the fear of the horrifying shot earlier.


    She had relied entirely on the Moonlight Goddess¡¯ Divine Shield to endure that st. Now that the divine power within the Divine Shield was almost exhausted, she had no guarantee of survival when being hit by the same attack, even with her ability as a Third Grade god messenger.


    It was a trap.


    It was a death trap that the enemy had set up and waited for her to enter willingly.


    Xenia instantly went mad after understanding what had happened.


    The Divine Shield she had cast earlier had already drawn out all of the divine power stored within her body. She was now entirely depending on the small stream of divine power being sent to her via the channels of faith to sustain herbat efforts. After all, this was not the central mountains. It was just way too far from the main temple. Moreover, there were norge moonprayer altars nearby. Trying to use this structure to recharge the faith channels was impossible.


    That was why it was challenging to send divine power from the holy kingdom to the main temple and then send it to Xenia via the channels of faith, even with the Moonlight Goddess¡¯ full support and generous exhaustion of divine power.


    Even sending divine power was an arduous task, let alone transmitting an entirely formed divine magic!


    That was why the individualbat power of the god messenger would often vary tremendously based on her location.


    Jintha¡¯Alor Camp was far away from the central mountains. It was situated at the edges of Garan Continent. This severely limited Xenia¡¯s ability to fight. If the battlefield could be shifted to somece near the central mountains and the main temple, then Xenia¡¯sbat power would easily rise by three to five times.


    At this moment, Xenia did not have such conditions. As such, the Third Grade god messenger immediately erupted with all her power when seeing the meticulous trap that the enemy had prepared for her!


    The next second, hundreds and thousands of blinding beams of rainbow light burst out of theva prison forged of steaming mes and red-hotva. These light beamsposed of divine power mixed with moonlight and suddenly spun intensely, instantly cut theva prison into pieces with their terrifying shing power.


    As the me Fiend of Terror was too close, it was also pierced by the rainbow lights and cut up into pieces.


    Xenia strode out of the rising sea of fire and shards of magma, staring murderously at the magic energy cannon that was rapidly charging.


    She let out a sky-shattering screech as a chilling beam of moonlight, more concentrated than any before, projected down from the round moon in the sky. It struck square upon the most focused spot of the cannon energy.


    Xenia instantly teleported away from the ship afterpleting this resentful strike of hers. She slowly reappeared somewhere in the skies a quarter of a kilometer away.


    Behind her, the magic energy cannon that had been destroyed by the moonlight suddenly lit up with a blindingly intense light. A chain reaction of explosions was quickly triggered. If one were to calcte the power of the magic energy cannon based on the previous shot, the destruction of the gun this time would blow the flying ship into a massive firework of steel.


    Xenia had just escaped the flying ship and was confidently waiting to enjoy the sight of rare and beautiful fireworks. However, the next moment she turned back in shock and realized that the flying ship was still floating two hundred meters above the canopy, perfectly unharmed.


    Though the chain of magic energy explosions urring on its deck was shy and loud, the intensity of the energy was hundreds and thousands of times less than what Xenia had estimated it to be.


    This...what was happening?


    Just as she was stuck in her deep confusion, Xenia¡¯s body trembled. She lifted her head and looked toward the round moon hanging in the sky. She didn¡¯t know when, but arge cluster of shadow as ck as ink had already obscured the moon.


    The intimate channel of faith that she had always been maintaining with the Moonlight Goddess had also been severed!


    The face of an olddy, so excited that it was distorted, formed from the cluster of shadows in the sky. She yelled with her sinister and hoarse voice, "Kehkehkeh. Damned religious hack, you didn¡¯t think that I would secretly sneak back, did you?! Now that I have obscured the moon and cut off your connection with that shitty goddess, let¡¯s see what¡¯s left of your abilities! Weren¡¯t you sending me packing earlier? Come,e; let me see if you are still as powerful as before. Kehkehkeh."


    The voice seemed to be that of Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah!


    A ferocious round of attacks had just been unleashed. The divine power sent over by the goddess had beenpletely exhausted. Now that the only faith channel had been severed, Xenia could no longer replenish her divine power.


    There was no way she could continue this fight against same-grade powerhouses of another world with her energy reserves!


    Having quickly understood this, Xenia immediately knew things were going south. However, before she could even try and escape the area, a violent tide of thunder and lightning that engulfed the skies had already exploded.


    ............


    Jintha¡¯Alor was utterly ravaged after the great battle.


    The adepts had only been robbing in the earlier battle and weren¡¯t setting fires or razing any structures. That was why most of the elven structures in Jintha¡¯Alor camp werepletely untouched, though their contents had been emptied. Now, after the more intense battle against the god messenger, the camp naturally had to endure the destruction from the shockwaves of the battle.


    Disregarding the elven structures, even the mountain upon which Jintha¡¯Alor resided had started copsing from the intense attacks. With the massive changes to the structure of the mountain itself, this ce had be tattered and wrecked; it looked nothing like it used to.


    Henceforth, the name of Jintha¡¯Alor would no longer exist!


    After the intense battle, the flying ship dragged its broken body and escaped toward the sea, having done some basic maintenance and repairs on its internal damage.


    The damage to the flying ship in the battle this time was undoubtedly extremely severe. The vessel was no longer able to fly high above the clouds to avoid the eyes of the elves. Moreover, with the thick ck smoke trailing for several kilometers behind them, it was difficult to remain in hiding.


    Still, they were fortunate enough to have taken down Jintha¡¯Alor and defeat the temple guards sent by the Moonlight Goddess. There was no longer a military force that could pose a threat to the flying ship within several thousand kilometers of Jintha¡¯Alor.


    As for the elven viges and towns hidden all across Fantasy Forest? Their meager garrisons were no more than trash before the joint forces of the Dark and Fate Witches. There was no need to even speak of those who were foolish enough to attempt to intercept the ship. If the position of their viges were exposed, the witches would only need to send out a single squad that could easily exterminate them.


    That was why the flying ship was not harassed or attacked by any elven squads, even as it dragged its broken body into the distance with a long tail of smoke behind it.


    Countless resentful eyes peeked out from between the trees, silently staring at this giant metal ship arrogantly passing through theirnds. The hate they had for these evil invaders undoubtedly ran deep into their very bones. Still, to avoid drawing trouble to their vige andpanions, they couldn¡¯t do anything but stare furiously at the enemy as they passed.


    When their side was clearly weaker than the opponent, there was nothing they could do about the situation!


    ............


    Garan Continent, Central Mountains.


    Main Temple of the Goddess of Moonlight.


    At this moment, the main temple had been thrown intoplete chaos.


    News of the defeat at the frontlines had blown up amongst the followers of the Goddess the instant it got back.


    The tide of furious and angry requests for battle alerted both the priests of the temple and even the Goddess¡¯ kingdom in between theyers of the ne.


    The fury of the Goddess naturally terrified the elven priests serving her. They all gathered in the main temple and silently listened for the newest word of their Goddess.


    The Moonlight Goddess wasn¡¯t the chief deity of the elven pantheon, nor the one that held absolute authority.


    In the end, the one that held the most widespread faith in Garan and amongst the forest elves was still the chief elven god, Saoirse. If one were to be brutally honest, almost all forest elves were faithful followers of Saoirse.


    It was only the elves that wanted special holy blessings from the gods that would choose to believe in the other elven gods as well.


    For example, most elven archers would choose to follow Marco, the God of Archery, in addition to Saoirse. This way, they would be able to obtain his blessings and enhancement in the field of archery. Elves who didn¡¯t like to be bound to rules and didn¡¯t join the army¨Cchoosing instead to roam the continent¨Cwould prefer to follow the God of Rangers, Eisner. This way, they would be able to obtain improvements in agility and gain exceptionally graceful movements.


    The druids, on the other hand, all believed in Yurga, the Heart of the Forest.


    Some female elves who enjoyed beauty and desired romance might choose to believe in the God of Luck, Visenna.


    Given all this, the Moonlight Goddess could only provide her followers with some stealth ability during the night as well as some improvements inbat power at night. That was why the Moonlight Goddess was not considered a powerful deity in the elven pantheon.


    The elves who chose to follow the Moonlight Goddess were numerous, but very, very few were fanatics that would be able to select the Moonlight Goddess as their only belief.


    That was why the loss of the only God Messenger Xenia was an unbearable loss for the Moonlight Goddess¡¯ temple!


    In this way, even the Moonlight Goddess herself could not continue sitting peacefully within her god kingdom.

 Chapter 653 Moonlight Temple

    Garan Continent. Central Mountains.


    The main temple of the Goddess of Moonlight.


    As an extraordinarily massive Goddess¡¯ will descended upon the towering idol in the center of the temple, the entire ce was bathed in a cluster of faint and silent moonshade.


    The Temple Officiate Aurora fearfully kneeled in front of the idol, silently enduring the chilling re her Goddess was giving her. Even though the Goddess hadn¡¯t opened her mouth, Aurora could feel the intense dissatisfaction and wordless me in her eyes.


    "O¡¯ Revered Goddess, has news of Lady Xenia¡¯s fall been confirmed?" Aurora mustered up her courage and asked in a soft voice.


    The authority and rank of the god messenger were far above a temple officiate like herself. That was why she needed to confirm the news about Xenia with the Goddess personally.


    After a long period of silence, the sweet and cold voice of the Moonlight Goddess finally echoed in the minds of all the temple priests.


    "Xenia is utterly dead! Her soul did not return to the god-kingdom. Instead, it has been wholly captured by the enemy."


    The Goddess¡¯ reply stunned everyone.


    They had conceived of many terrible scenarios, but they still didn¡¯t imagine the situation to be as severe as it was. This...this was the absolute worst scenario that they didn¡¯t even dare to think of!


    The Moonlight Temple was only a small faction in the entire elven pantheon. A Third Grade god messenger was already the most potent force that they could put together. If Xenia really had died at Jintha¡¯Alor, the impact on the Moonlight Temple was undoubtedly going to be horrifying. It was so terrible that a ¡¯mere¡¯ temple officiate like herself would not dare to imagine it happening!


    The Moonlight Temple had long figured out the details about this Cmity of Witches.


    The only Fourth Grade powerhouse that the evil witches had sent was stationed upon Shadow Ind. She had not entered Garan at all. The various temples had already stationed their elite guards and powerful god messengers at the frontlines to keep a close eye on the enemy¡¯s movements and deal with this Fourth Grade Pale Witch.


    Under such circumstances, the number of witch squads that the enemy could send into Garan to wreak havoc and raid was limited in not only quantity but also quality.


    It was because of their perfect grasp of the situation that Temple Officiate Aurora hastily reported the destruction of one of their followers¡¯ settlements to the Moonlight Goddess. She had intended to use this operation of exterminating the witches to demonstrate the might of the Moonlight Goddess to all her followers across the continent, as well as the Goddess¡¯ love and concern for her followers.


    ording to Aurora¡¯s original calctions, an army of a hundredbat professionals was already a powerful army. Add to that a Third Grade god messenger that possessed the divine power of the Goddess, and you had a group that was already enough to deal with any evil witches that snuck onto Garan.


    Sadly, regardless of how she calcted and estimated, she would never have guessed that a god messenger army of this level would be defeated in the Fantasy Forest. What made things even worse were the facts that they had not only lost, but they hadnded themselves a nearplete defeat.


    The news of the loss had been brought back by some fortunate survivors. They all imed to have personally witnessed the fall of God Messenger Xenia.


    The only Third Grade God Messenger Xenia had died to thebined attacks of a Third Grade evil witch and a Third Grade thunder dragon. Her broken body had even be the enemy¡¯s spoils, with the elves failing to get it back.


    This terrifying news immediately threw the entire temple into a state of shock and panic!


    Even though Aurora knew that the Goddess would punish her, she still pressed on and contacted the Moonlight Goddess far away in her god-kingdom. Thetter had personally chosen to descend to the temple¡¯s idol upon obtaining the news.


    The descent of the Goddess!


    Such an event had never happened in the seven thousand years since the construction of the Moonlight Temple.


    If one were to find a full ount, thest time the Goddess had personally descended upon the world was during the ancient wars between the elven and human pantheons. Yet today the Moonlight Goddess, high above in her god-kingdom, had chosen to descend once again for a Third Grade god messenger. The circumstances and implications behind her actions were evident to all even without a single word of hers!


    The impact to the Moonlight Temple this time was severe and overwhelming.


    The loss of manpower and military force was secondary. More crucial was the severe shaking of the faith and trust that the elves put in the Moonlight Goddess. Thetter was undoubtedly the foundation and basis for the former!


    Losing over a hundred believers withbat professions was nothing to arge organization like the temple of an elven god. However, a loss like that was akin to a broken spine for a small group like the Moonlight Temple. It was a pain that could be felt all the way in the bones. The fall of the high-grade god messenger also meant that the Moonlight Temple would henceforth lose any influence amongst the forest elves.


    Before the new god messenger was cultivated, the strongest force that the Moonlight Temple had in the outside would have to be taken on by a group of Second Grade elves! And what kind of status would a Second Grade god messenger have before Third Grade or even Fourth Grade god messengers? Who would take her words seriously!?


    Moreover, Xenia¡¯s soul had not returned. It meant that the witches might obtain inner secrets of the Moonlight Temple that she was privy to. When that happened, the evil witches would use this information to stir trouble and cause chaos. That would undoubtedly be an even more significant loss and greater concern to the Moonlight Temple and the Moonlight Goddess.


    It was because she realized the severity of the situation that the Moonlight Goddess chose to descend upon her main temple personally.


    This way, she could quickly affirm the shaken faith of her believers, while also making it convenient for her to arrange for the follow-up attack against the evil witches.


    Indeed, she wanted to arrange for another battle immediately and use a glorious victory to wash away the shadow that this defeat had cast upon them. However, before that, she needed to borrow some things from a ¡¯friend.¡¯


    There¡¯s no need to be surprised. Even in the realm of the gods, there were all sorts of strange rtionships and different degrees of intimacy between the gods. Much like the mortals, the superior gods would have inexplicable allies and enemies depending on their profession and personality.


    Within the elven pantheon, Meve the Moonlight Goddess had an especially close rtionship with Yurga, the Heart of the Forest; they were almost like siblings. Yurga was the elder brother, and Meve was the younger sister. The two gods might not have worldly blood ties, but the intimacy of their domain of authority caused the two to be drawn to each other naturally.


    Yurga, the Heart of the Forest was an elven god that all druids within the elven kingdom would worship. That was why he was a true Fifth Grade god with a stable group of believers. His domain of divine authority also included the ¡¯forest,¡¯ apart from ¡¯nature, druids, and flora and fauna affinity.¡¯


    Meve, on the other hand, also had ¡¯forest¡¯ under her own divine authority.


    If this had been the realm of the evil gods instead, a sh of domains in this manner would have triggered a terrifying and bloody battle of the gods. It would be a battle that would only end when one party hadplete control over that particr domain of the world. However, within the peace-loving elven pantheon, the ovepping of divine realms not only didn¡¯t result in conflict between Yurga the Heart of the Forest and Meve the Goddess of Moonlight, but it had even caused the two gods to develop an inexplicably intimate rtionship.


    ording to some legends of old, Yurga, the Heart of the Forest¡¯s previous incarnation was the first Fourth Grade Great Druid born in the Faen ne. To allow himself to continue protecting and contributing to the Fantasy Forest after death, he had his juniors bury his corpse under thergest oak of the woods.


    His deeds, while he was alive, had deeply moved many people who came after him and he became the idol of worship of the new druids toe.


    Finally, after thousands of years had passed, the immense amount of faith collected beneath that towering oak, giving birth to Yurga, the Heart of the Forest.


    Meve, the Moonlight Goddess, on the other hand, had appeared two to three thousand yearster than Yurga.


    It seemed as if her appearance had been actively guided to some extent by Yurga. That was why Meve naturally treated Yurga as her brother after her will and consciousness formed. Their rtionship was even closer and purer than the other elven gods.


    Their true forms necessarily rested high up in their god-kingdoms. Their normal interactions andmunication were through mental connections or a visit paid by a clone. It was extremely rare for them to visit with their actual forms. No god would ever enter the god-kingdom of another true god with their true body unless they had absolute trust between them.


    That was because the god-kingdom of a true god was equivalent to an extension of the domain of their divine power. Even a true god, several grades higher than the god in question, would not be able topromise the authority and might of that god while in their domain. That was why a Sixth Grade chief god, when entering the god-kingdom of a Fifth Grade true god, was practically handing their life and soul to the opponent.


    The massive risk involved in this was not something that any god dared to attempt!


    The Moonlight Goddess, upon descending on her Moonlight Temple, only needed to will her mind slightly and was already connected with another sacred druidnd in the central mountains¨C the Emerald Dream.


    It was a mysterious and peaceful stretch of greenery.


    Arge, tall oak stood in the middle of the field.


    The height and size of this ancient tree were beyond the imagination of mortals. Just the old and aged trunk of the tree was several dozens of meters thick. The massive umbre-like canopy was jade and emerald-green, full and plentiful with leaves. One look and the only thing that you could feel was the overwhelming aura of life.


    As the ce where Yurga, the Heart of the Forest was born, this tall oak tree naturally became the area where the druids most liked to congregate and live. Several hundred druids of various ages and grades were scattered in the forest around the oak.


    When a trace of Meve¡¯s godly will arrived here and transformed into a beautiful elven girl, the ancient tree trembled slightly. An old man draped in clothes woven from vines and grass walked out of the tree.


    "Wee, esteemed Lady Meve!"


    The old man held an oaken cane in his hands. His face was withered, his skin was bronze in tone, and his head was full of braids. A seed or an animal tooth¨Ceven something simple like a small rock¨Cwas tied to the end of each braid.


    "Lord Yurga¡¯s most devout follower, Fandral, pays his respects!"

 Chapter 654 Looming Seafolk

    Fandral was the oldest, most senior, and most powerful high-grade druid of the Emerald Dream.


    Of course, he was also an undisputed Fourth Grade Great Druid.


    There were only two Fourth Grade Great Druids among all the druids of the elven kingdom. One was Fandral, the great elder of the elder¡¯s council. The other was Dizenn, also a Great Druid of high acim and with many admirers and followers.


    Inparison, the druid god messenger blessed by Yurga himself, strangely enough, only had the power of a Third Grade. The god messenger wasn¡¯t the strongest individual among the druids.


    On the one hand, this had to do with the fact that it wasn¡¯t easy to find and cultivate a god messenger that waspatible with a god¡¯s origin power. On the other, it was also due to the loose, free, and natural way of doing things that the druids believed in.


    If it were the human pantheon, they would most definitely pave the path for their god messengers and have themplete their journey and training at the fastest speed. This way, they would reach the peak of their lives as soon as possible and be Fourth Grade powerhouses.


    That would allow them to be of much more help to the gods.


    However, the druids believed in the way of nature. They didn¡¯t like to hasten growth by pulling things by their stalks. They preferred to slowly grind and learn their own nature¡¯s way through the trivialities of everyday life and their time spent in nature. The previous druid god messenger died of natural causes four hundred years ago, and his soul had returned to the oak tree. The newly promoted druid favored by Yurga only then slowly rose to the level of a Third Grade.


    It would probably take a minimum of another two to three hundred years of experience before he could turn into a Fourth Grade Great Druid.


    "Fandral, I wish to see Lord Yurga!" Even though she was already a true god, the Moonlight Goddess was still as respectful as an ordinary elven girl looking for guidance before Yurga¡¯s servant.


    "My greatest apologies, Lady Meve!" Fandral shook his head apologetically, "Lord Yurga has fallen into a deep sleep. He is unlikely to respond to any calls from the outside world within the next three to four hundred years."


    It was a massive side-effect left behind by Yurga¡¯s path to godhood.


    In truth, Yurga, the Heart of the Forest was a divine creation formed by the life force of the boundless Fantasy Forest and the soul of that legendary Great Druid. Even though the faith of the druids sustained him, most of his faith still came from the vast Fantasy Forest.


    If Yurga behaved too actively and moved around too frequently, he would exhaust the life force and liveliness of Fantasy Forest itself. If he chose to go into a deep sleep, then he could reduce his massive god-kingdom¡¯s demand and the toll upon the great forest. It was beneficial to the development and strengthening of the Fantasy Forest.


    Thus, Yurga developed this habit of asionally hiding somewhere in the Fantasy Forest and falling into a deep, deep sleep. In this state, he would no longer respond to the prayers and wishes of his druid followers as well as all other natural creatures.


    As such, this favored druid indirectly became the most tragic god messenger.


    Not only were they often incapable of finding their own god, most of the wishes and prayers they sent out would also vanish like a stone sinking to the bottom of the ocean. There would be no reply at all. However, fortunately, druids were known as the Fantasy Forests¡¯ children of nature. They could passively receive nourishment of the soul and replenishment of their magic from the woods itself.


    Moreover, the Fantasy Forest itself seemed to be able to respond to the divine power needs of the druid god messenger. While the god messenger couldn¡¯t squander their power like the other god messengers, the forest seemed to respond to every call for power. The effectiveness and might of the divine power provided by the forest were also very highly-ranked, even among all god messengers.


    Even the Moonlight Goddess couldn¡¯t help but betray a weak and bitter smile upon hearing that the Heart of the Forest had fallen into his habitual slumber.


    Just as the Moonlight Goddess expected herself to return empty-handed, the seemingly dull Great Druid Fandral replied with a smile, "Lady Meve, there is no need to be worried! Lord Yurga might be asleep, but he gave a direct order before his slumber. We, of the Druid Conve, are to assist you with all our power. If you have any trouble, the Druid Conve will be willing to share that burden!"


    "Really?" At this moment, even the Moonlight Goddess was exceptionally overjoyed.


    Nearly forty to fifty percent of druids within the kingdom chose to join the elven army. They made up the mainstay of the casters in the various elite elven armies. Apart from these druids, another ten to twenty percent of druids chose to roam and wander freely across the continent. They led the lives of hermits and rarely participated in worldly matters. As for the remaining thirty to forty percent of druids, they tightly gathered around the druid elder¡¯s council. They formed the Druid Conve, an odd religious armed force.


    And who would have known? These druids that were willing to join the Druid Conve were all experts in some of their specific specializations; often the cream of the crop. Even the elven kingdom had to asionally invite masters from the Druid Conve to serve as instructors for the druids in the army.


    That was why the Druid Conve of the Emerald Dream was packed full of talented individuals and why it was held in such esteem across Garan.


    After obtaining the affirmation of the Great Druid, the Moonlight Goddess Meve¡¯s incarnation became increasingly excited. She immediately dragged Fandral to a side to discuss the matter of exterminating that group of evil adepts.


    Soon, a conve of druids that numbered as many as two hundred men joined the side of the Moonlight Temple. They started to work in cooperation with the Goddess¡¯ believers to look all over for traces of that group of evil witches.


    ............


    At this moment, the ones responsible for all the evil and their badly damaged flying ship had already reached their isted ind, having dragged its wrecked hull all the way across the ocean.


    This ce had also just experienced a war and was undergoing the lengthy and challenging process of recovery.


    When Greem brought the witches off of the flying ship, the first thing they saw was a bloody battlefield, ravaged and littered with corpses. The oddly-shaped bodies of the seafolk could be seen everywhere between the jagged ck rocks.


    Indeed, they were the corpses of seafolk warriors!


    Disgusting wrinkled skin and fine scales grew all over the bodies of these dead seafolk warriors. The surfaces of their bodies were also covered in ayer of slippery slime.


    They had long, narrow heads and humanoid bodies, but the ends of their four limbs, as well as much of their bodies, were still covered in fish scales. The legs beneath their torsos also seemed to have evolved from some sort of fins. Their legs were limp and soft, without any of the strength and agility of actualnd creatures. However, they still managed to prop up their ugly and disgusting bodies.


    Their appearance shared some simrities with the swamp murlocs that Greem had seen in Lance. However, the murlocs had evolved to be a lot more like humans, while these sea warriors still very clearly carried signs of sea creatures upon their bodies.


    Greem flipped over the bodies of a few seafolk warriors and discovered that most of them had died to metal bullets that had pierced their bodies. The bodies of the seafolk were extraordinarily flexible and were protected by the defensive liquid slime. These were the prerequisites that allowed them to take tond.


    Correspondingly, their bodies were excessively soft, and the scales protecting their bodies were overly thin. There was no way they could resist attacks from hard weapons. Ignoring the metal bullets of the magical machines with all the kic power behind them, even some small rocks thrown their way could deal decent physical damage to their bodies.


    Greem shook his head and sighed as he regrly investigated the internal structures of the seafolk bodies with the scanning and x-ray vision of the Chip.


    These seafolk were qualified to be warriors with such bodily conditions?


    Their legs were limp, weak, and couldn¡¯t run fast. They weren¡¯t equipped with any tough armor or weapons. Greem only saw some crude spears made of sharpened coral at the sides of the dead seafolk warriors. Such seafolk warriors could probably only obtain victory through numbers!


    As expected, when Greem stood up and took a look at the seas around the ind, he saw plenty of floating corpses and wild sea creatures swimming about to devour the rotting bodies.


    It seemed as if the creatures had been shocked by the massive metallic structure of the flying ship. The chirping and calling from the seas had suddenly stopped. Greem sharp eyes even saw the silhouettes of many seafolk warriors secretly sneaking back to deeper waters.


    For the humans, the skies were a mysterious ce that they could not hope to reach. For the Oceanic Empire and the sea creatures, thend was the ¡¯sky¡¯ that they could not hope to reach! As for the true sky? It was just like the space beyond the realm. It was a terrifying domain that they didn¡¯t even dare to think of.


    The sea nobles or casters might have some tiny trace of greed or desire fornd. However, most intelligent sea lifeforms didn¡¯t dare have a shred of malicious thought toward the sky! They only had respect for it.


    Thus, there was nothing other than fear and respect that the sea creatures felt for a massive metal mountain that could freely traverse the skies.


    Greem had arranged another magical machine warrior to be stationed upon the ind¨C the Goblin Bomberman. It was also in charge of a small squad of magical machines.


    Greem immediately listened to a moreprehensive situation report from the Goblin Bomberman upon returning to the ind.


    After the in-depth description from the Goblin Bomberman, Greem finally found out that the ind had been attacked over a dozen times by the seafolk army in the two dozen days they had been away. Their most massive scale assault had even possessed as many as twenty First Grade seafolk powerhouses joining them.


    Of course, these odd yet grotesque seafolk powerhouses were all defeated singlehandedly by the Goblin Bomberman, who had the power of a pseudo-Second Grade. After killing five seafolk powerhouses (including two Second Grades), the remaining seafolk had immediately dispersed and fled. They no longer dared to fight with the Goblin Bomberman onnd.


    When the Goblin Bomberman reported to Greem, it also emphasized its evaluation of these seafolk powerhouses. There was only one word it had for them¨C weak.


    Despite apanying Greem across two to three nes, the newly promoted Goblin Bomberman might have the fundamental strength of Second Grade, but it was still very muchcking in the soft skills that fully qualified it as a Second Grade. In its eyes though, these Second Grade powerhouses of Faen couldn¡¯t evenpare to the First Grade elite adepts of the World of Adepts in terms of individual might.


    The natural frailty of the seafolk turned them into rotten meat that could be easily thrown about and ravaged when they were faced with the terrifying murder machine that was the Goblin Bomberman. Their rusted metal spears and knives shattered beneath the Bomberman¡¯s unbreakable metal body. Their weak and powerless water arrows burst into drops of water on the chest of the Bomberman.


    A single Goblin Bomberman had utterly defeated the two dozen seafolk powerhouses. In the end, they had no choice but to turn tail and run after suffering such tremendous losses!

 Chapter 655 Sea Nagas

    Were the seafolk truly that weak?


    Greem was at first confused, but he slowly found the reason behind their weakness after reading through the analysis data from the Chip.


    Seafolk, also known as intelligent marine lifeforms, were a strange but guaranteed urrence in high-magic worlds.


    If animals and nts that had adapted to the aura of magic coulde into existence in an area where magic gathered upon thend, then the number of magical creatures born in the depths of the ocean¨Cbroader than any stretch ofnd¨Cwould be even greater.


    Much like what happened onnd, governmental systems and ruling hierarchies simr to human societies also developed among magical sea creatures after hundreds of thousands of years of history andpetition. Those who could be the rulers of the seafolk had to be an intelligent race with powerful military might and magical power.


    And deep in the depths of Faen¡¯s boundless sea, the rulers of the seafolk were a race of powerful Sea Naga.


    In general, the sea nagas were a race of magical humanoid creatures with lower bodies that resembled serpents. Their bodies were also covered in fine fish scales. Female nagas were tall and slender. Their scales were also even more elegant than their male counterparts. They had looks as delicate and perfect as human women, only with a slightly darker skin tone.


    Male nagas hadrger frames, stronger bodies, and rough personalities that weren¡¯t much unlike wild beasts.


    Female nagas were superior and morepatible than male nagas when it came to intelligence and magical aura. That was why the sea nagas were a ssic matriarchal society. Sea priests and casters were roles that were often undertaken by female nagas. Male nagas, on the other hand, filled in as warriors of the lower ss.


    As natural rulers of the seafolk, the sea nagas chose to believe in the great God of the Sea¨C Dions. The nagas built a thousand-meter tall idol of the Sea God in the depths of the Gem Sea. They then built massive sea temples around the icon and constructed a gigantic ocean city, the likes of whichnd creatures could not imagine.


    The power of the seafolk was universally known.


    However, sadly, their strength was limited to the boundless Gem Sea. All of their various racial weaknesses were thoroughly exposed the moment they stepped onnd.


    Most seafolk warriors might have strange gills that allowed them to breathe even after leaving the water, but their unique bodies still required the constant nourishment of seawater. If they were away from water for too long, their muscles would start to shrivel, and their strength would begin to fade. They could then only lie upon the ground and wait silently for death to descend upon them.


    It was this massive w that caused the Oceanic Empire, that had over a hundred times more intelligent creatures than the empires onnd, to be incapable of charging out of the sea and setting foot upon thend. That was the reason they couldn¡¯t wholly conquer this rich and beautiful ne of Faen that was bountiful in resources, poption, and territory.


    The seafolk couldn¡¯t set foot onnd and thus held no goodwill toward thend species¡¯. Under usual circumstances, they wouldn¡¯t easily permit human and elven ships to travel across their sacred and beautiful sky.


    The maritime business of Faen had always struggled to be prosperous. The main reason was the seafolkying im over the entirety of the Gem Sea, raiding and sinking anyrge ships that dared to travel within their territory. It didn¡¯t matter whether they were warships or merchant ships; everything was sunk!


    That was why both human and elven ships would only travel near the coast, and every one of these ships had to be apanied by sufficient military force. The ver ships that moved between the two continents, on the other hand, could only choose to travel via special sea channels where seafolk rarely appeared.


    Even so, one in five human ver ships still perished at the hands of seafolk patrols on a yearly basis.


    After all, even a frail First Grade sea priest could raise massive waves measuring up to five or six meters when they were at sea. The weak and brittle ships of the humans would be devoured without a trace, without even a chance to retaliate, when they ran into seafolk spellcasters.


    Moreover, due to the limits of their particr environment, almost all seafolk casters were hydromancers.


    Compared to therge variety of element affinities of thend creatures, this was clearly far too uniform and inflexible!


    Of course, there was also one more factor that limited the strength of seafolk powerhouses, which was the severeck of hard metal armor and weapons.


    Rich metal veins might exist under the sea, but due to theck of any way to smelt the metal, the seafolk could only opt for the closest alternative. They used crude and rough stone spears, as well as sharpened coral spears. Theck of high-grade defensive equipment also caused the seafolk powerhouses and the agile bodies they were so proud of to be substantially exposed in front ofnd fighters!


    It was perhaps the root reason why the Goblin Bomberman could ughter the entire group of seafolk!


    Greem waved away the Goblin Bomberman, shut his eyes, and sat silently in the underground hall that had been dug into the ce. He wordlessly contemted the motive and reason for the sudden attack of the seafolk.


    Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah, who sat beside him, spoke first after seeing him remain silent for so long.


    "What is there to be worried about?! The seafolk have always been bullies that went after the weak and averted the strong. They love to take everything they can, be it in the World of Adepts or here."


    It was fairly obvious what had happened after the battle in Jintha¡¯Alor, especially after Greem summoned that Third Grade thunder dragon. This snobbish Third Grade Dark Witch had finally started cing Greem in a position where he could talk to her as an equal.


    The most obvious demonstration of this was the position in which everyone was currently sitting in the underground hall.


    Two rows of stone chairs facing each other were currently upied by male and female adepts of various sizes in the damp and dim stone hall. On the right were the Dark Witches. However, after this brutal battle, the number of Dark Witches had fallen from their initial eleven to the current six.


    Of course, of the five casualties, only one had their soul and body wholly exterminated by the divine moonlight magic. The other four just had their bodies destroyed. Their souls had already returned to the soul energy pool previously set up upon Shadow Ind.


    Their revival was estimated to take about a month. Moreover, their revived souls and new shadow bodies needed some time to be broken in. That was why it was very likely that they won¡¯t be seen for the first half of the invasion against Garan this time.


    Compared to the Dark Witches, the Fate Witches appeared much frailer!


    They were almost all witches that had only just advanced in the past couple of decades. They might have a limited sense of the veins of Fate and the arrival of danger after mastering the powers of Fate, but their power wasn¡¯t enough for them to altogether avoid harm and danger.


    That was why their losses were undoubtedly the most severe of the lot!


    Following the death of one Fate Witch, two more casualties had urred in the midst of the Fate Witches during the battle of Jintha¡¯Alor. It caused the initially weak Fate branch, whose numbers were already few, to be knocked down to where it started. It was a tragic and sad sight to behold.


    Of the ranks of the Fate Witches, there were only two newly advanced witches left, apart from Alice¨Cthe leader¨Cand the deputies, Berserk Witch Sofia and Icdy Snowlotus.


    Inparison, the Crimson adepts were rtively untouched.


    After all, all the magical machines prioritized protecting the closest Crimson adept during the fight. That was perhaps the main reason why there were practically no casualties among the Crimson adepts.


    However, while there were no casualties on the surface, the losses calcted by the Chip caused Greem to frown hard.


    When the adepts counted casualties, they would only count theirpanions who also shared the same status as adepts. They wouldn¡¯t include the losses of their followers, golems, voodoo beasts, or summons. The highest price the Crimson n had to pay was in the form of such things.


    Medusa Dana had lost one four-armed snakefiend bodyguard and two ordinary tribesmen.


    Over half of the fiendhounds that Three-Headed Demonhound Unguja had brought with him had died.


    Forty-two Archers were destroyed. Thirty-seven of those were utterly wrecked and could not be repaired. They had to be recycled and processed once again.


    Sixteen Shield Swordsmen were destroyed; all of them were ruined.


    Visible structural damage had been done to the flying ship¡¯s space furnace. Repairs were estimated to take a week.


    Eleven of the construction machines working upon the ship had been destroyed and their numbers needed to be replenished as soon as possible.


    Multiple energy leaks had appeared in the energy pipes of the ship. Arge batch of construction machines was badly needed for maintenance.


    Large areas of the metal deck were also damaged, and a massive amount of special alloy was needed for repairs.


    ......


    This long list of various losses caused Greem¡¯s scalp to buzz. It drained him just to muster the patience to read through the entire list.


    The warehouse of the flying ship still had some metal ingots and alloy materials. Even if all of them were used to repair the ship¡¯s damage, there would still be an estimated shortage of around a dozen tons of metal materials. It seemed Greem needed to find arge metal mine that he could directly dig from if he wanted to repair the shippletely.


    Otherwise, if he were to exhaust all his metal materials here, the flying ship would very likely not be able to continue in operation if they ran into any more significant battles from now on.


    If the Crimson adepts and Fate Witches were forced to the ground, they would no longer have the same tactical advantage they had always held! They could no longer casually move around and choose their battles as they liked. They were simply too weak for that.


    With the overall strength of Greem¡¯s faction, one or two battles against the elves without the ship would be enough to wear away all their remaining forces.


    As such, Greem took the opportunity of a victory and their retreat to the isted ind to gather the adepts to discuss follow-up arrangements.


    Such an open meeting was a fresh feeling for the First Grade Dark Witches.


    After all, in the World of Adepts, power was everything. One¡¯s grade was hard logic!


    That was why all decisions and operations undertaken by the Dark Witches were given out to them in the form of orders after high-grade witches had discussed them in private. Uzzah¡¯s personality would never have allowed her to patiently sit together and talk things over with these First Grade Dark Witches.


    All First Grade Dark Witches shut their mouth tight at the start of the meeting. They cast their gaze toward their leader¨C Witch Uzzah. On the other hand, on Greem¡¯s side were the First Grade adepts who were behaving extremely active. They constantly gave their opinions and perspectives on the various matters. It was an amiable and lively atmosphere.


    Cold and warm, ice and fire. These two adept factions ofpletely different standpoints were gathered together in such an awkward manner!

 Chapter 656 A Beautiful Village

    The Dark Witches wouldn¡¯t usually be bothered with participating in such a meeting given their usual arrogance.


    However, considering that they still needed to borrow the power of the flying ship for their future venture into enemy territory, they had no choice but to patiently lower themselves and take part in the meeting. Moreover, there was a topic that very much attracted them during this conference. It was a topic that they couldn¡¯t wait for.


    That was the splitting of the loot!


    After two consecutive battles, they had killed and captured countless elves. Now that they had moved to a rtively safe ce, it was time to make clear the ownership of the spoils.


    A Dark Witch apanied Snowlotus to collect a proper count of all the elven prisoners. They performed aprehensive and detailed record of the elves based on their grade, gender, profession, age, and appearance.


    This long list quickly reached the hands of Greem, Alice, and Uzzah.


    Remembering simple numbers like these was no problem for the adepts and their supernatural Spirit. The list was quickly read through by everyone present, and the discussion promptly shifted to the splitting of the loot.


    ording to their prior agreement, the Dark Witches were to take a majority of the elven prisoners. They also had priority in choosing the prisoners. Greem politely invited Witch Uzzah to pick first.


    Greem¡¯s humility ttered Uzzah. A rare trace of a smile appeared on her ugly and sinister face.


    There were plenty of elven prisoners this time, and the quality of the ¡¯goods¡¯ was extraordinarily high.


    That was only natural. Be it the Jintha¡¯Alor camp or the army of the Moonlight Goddess that came after, the ratio ofbat professions was far higher than an ordinary elven vige. That was why one hundred and sixty-two of these four hundred and twenty-seven elven prisoners were First Grade fighters. There were even twelve Second Grade fighters among them.


    Of course, there was also one half-scorched corpse of a Third Grade god messenger and herplete soul.


    The Dark Witches were indeed representatives of the sinister and evil witches. They had quickly pressed a high-quality soul diamond into the forehead of the god messenger Xenia right after she died horribly to Arms¡¯ lightning sts.


    Under the pull of the soul diamond, Xenia¡¯s soul that was supposed to return to the Moonlight Goddess¡¯ holy kingdom through the channels of faith was imprisoned.


    The Dark Witches might be skilled at dark magic, but they weren¡¯t as well-versed in the arts of processing souls and modifying bodies as the Death Witches were.


    If Xenia¡¯s broken corpse and soul were to fall in the hands of the Death Witches, they would, at the very least, be able to create a Revenant Banshee of elementary Third Grade power level. If they were slightly luckier, an intermediate Third Grade lich would be pretty good as well. Considering Xenia¡¯s former identity as a god messenger, an advanced Third Grade lich was not impossible, though somewhat unlikely.


    If Xenia¡¯s soul were sold to the Pale Witches, they would be able to wipe away her soul¡¯s memory and assimte her into an apanying spirit.


    A high-quality Third Grade soul would most definitely sell for plenty!


    This ne wasn¡¯t the World of Adepts, where the trade of souls was forbidden. Those Third Grade Pale Witches were sure to go mad over such a high-quality soul if they could get their hands on it here.


    However, Xenia¡¯s soul wouldn¡¯t be wasted in the hands of Uzzah either. It would be an easy matter for Uzzah to turn her into a Third Grade Shadow Assasin. Dark shadow golems like these that had no sense of self and only listened to orders were the best aides to high-grade Dark Witches.


    Uzzah picked all of the ordinary elves, including the elderly and the young.


    She had no choice. The elves withbat professions were most definitely the ones who were worth the most. However, the order that Uzzah had received upon venturing on this mission was to bring back an elven tribe that could continue thriving. For that to be the case, the elderly and youths were necessary!


    A tribeposed of only adolescent male and female elves could not be called a whole tribe.


    After taking all the ordinary elves, Uzzah took one-third of the First Grade elves and three of the Second Grade elves.


    It wasn¡¯t as if she didn¡¯t want to pick more of the elves, but the subordinates of that male adept had captured most of these fighters during the battle. Given the situation, they could no longer be ssified as shared loot for Uzzah to take. Instead, they were private spoils belonging to the male adept¡¯s faction.


    The numbers of the Dark Witches was still a little on the lower side. Moreover, the chaotic skirmish had further caused them to be suppressed by the elves and incapable of unleashing their full strength. That was why the private spoils of the Dark Witches were far fewer than those of the male adept¡¯s faction.


    Even the broken corpse and soul of this Third Grade god messenger belonged to the male adept.


    After all, the one who contributed the most in the battle was that Third Grade thunder dragon, which in essence was a contract creature summoned by that male adept. Furthermore, the male adept had paid the price of three vials of moonwater to capture this god messenger while also sustaining tremendous damage to his flying ship along the way.


    That was why Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah was behind the male adept known as Greem when it came to his rights over the god messenger¡¯s remains and soul, even though she had also contributed quite a lot.


    No one would ever say no to high-grade loot as attractive as this, and certainly, no one would be willing to part with it.


    That was why Greem ecstatically put Xenia¡¯s corpse into the warehouse under Witch Uzzah¡¯s passionate eyes and put the soul diamond into his pouch.


    Of course, Uzzah¡¯s contributions in the final fight could not be denied. Thus, Greem gave her two Second Grade elven prisoners aspensation.


    After splitting the prisoners, the only things left were the elven resources and materials obtained from Jintha¡¯Alor¡¯s warehouses.


    These things all belonged to the Fate Witches, as agreed upon before the battle. That very meant that they were the spoils of the Crimson n as well.


    After dividing the loot, the elven prisoners were escorted off the flying ship and sent into the dark and damp underground cells. Considering the truly horrible environment and the frail bodies of the elves, many tragic nonbat losses were bound to happen if they weren¡¯t transported away as soon as possible.


    Thus, the Dark Witches and Greem¡¯s forces stayed on the isted ind and silently waited for the flying ship to be repaired!


    ............


    Garan Continent, West Coast.


    Rut¡¯theran Vige.


    There was a small elven vige hidden within a quiet valley.


    There were no more than two or three dozen treehouses in the entire vige, scattered across three massive ancient trees that pierced the clouds. Entwined passages of various heights had been constructed between the treehouses with elven nature magic,bined with vine bridges woven from vines and tree bridges crafted from thick, t branches.


    All the construction material here came from nature and the Great Forest. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the tforms built upon the branches of the ancient tree, the stairs wrapped around the trunks, or even the materials used for the vine bridges. Everything was provided by the green nts here.


    The bright and cheerful sunlight couldn¡¯t pass through the dense green sky above their heads, but the shredded shards of sunlight projected the greenery to every corner of this peaceful valley.


    The lighting here wasn¡¯t great. One would even call it dim.


    Yet, the fantastical scenery and the slender vine bridges that rocked in the wind were just so beautiful and amazing to behold!


    Elves weren¡¯t a particrly hard working race.


    Their longevity, casual and easygoing living environment, and their art-loving peaceful personalities were all factors that caused the elves to be extremely leisurely andzy!


    There were only around sixty elves in Rut¡¯theran Vige. Almost eighty percent of these elves were ordinary people that had not chosenbat professions. They either decided to be florists, artists, or organists; their pursuits were varied, and thus their choices were very different. Still, all their jobs did not differ from their essence as elves¨C a great love for nature and passion for life.


    All the elves of Rut¡¯theran would leave their treehouses in the evenings and gather upon thergest tform behind the vige hall.


    It was a ce that the vige had specially created to provide the elves with a ce to practice archery.


    If the elven kingdom were said to have imposed any requirements upon its citizens, then it would be the practice of archery!


    All elven viges, towns, and cities had to build such a public archery range for elves in the area to practice. Every single citizen of the elven kingdom was also obligated to spend a minimum of one hour per day to practice their archery skills.


    To better guide these ordinary elves living in peace andfort, and to ensure that they didn¡¯t abandon the racial proficiency of the forest elves, archery instructors and war dancers were stationed in every elven settlement. They were to provide the elves with proper training.


    Elves that performed well from a young age would be selected and sent to nearby training camps.


    There they would be able to fight with talented youths from the dozens of nearby viges, train with them, and grow to be qualified warriors or archers. Those who possess spellcasting talents were sent to even further ces to receive more systematic training from more professional druids and elven spellcasters.


    If the central mountains of the elven kingdom were said to be a massive ancient tree with winding branches, then a small ce like Rut¡¯theran Vige was like an insignificant whisker of the extended branches of this tree.


    It was the existence of many such whiskers that allowed for sand to gather into a tower and for a droplet to collect into an ocean, forming the massive elven kingdom. It wasrge enough to rule over the entirety of Garan!


    Evening time was the period that Rut¡¯theran vige used to practice archery.


    Apart from some elves who were out on errands, all the elves in the vige put down the tasks at hand. They left the flowerbeds they were tending to, emerged from their treehouses, and walked across the haphazard vine bridges to gradually assemble on the tform.


    What they never expected was for each and every one of their actions to fall under the eyes of a terrifying and evil adept.


    Countless beetles as tiny and light as flies beat their wings and flew between the green leaves. They kept a close watch on every elf in the vige.


    As the elves unknowingly gathered on the tform, a strange swell appeared in the earth near the roots of one massive, ancient tree; it was in a dim corner where no one could see.


    As the ck dirt broke apart, numerous fearsome bugs swarmed out from within.

 Chapter 657 Black Bug Sea

    The ck tide of bugs continuously spewed forward.


    These tiny yet strange ck bugs swarmed together and wildly climbed atop of each other. The pile of ck insects slowly increased in height, quickly swelling into an odd, writhing humanoid shape.


    The face of this odd humanoid was an ugly bug¡¯s face made of tens of thousands of squirming ck insects. The bug man lifted his head and looked around him. His baleful gaze cut through the dense green sea andnded on the towering tree tform.


    Sixty-seven elves.


    One war dancer and three sword dancers.


    Three elven archers.


    One pegasus knight in the reserve corps.


    Two treants that weren¡¯t even a thousand years old.


    Billis¡¯ lotus-like mouthpart split apart, and a strange screeching unique to insects came out from within.


    He had kept a close eye on Rut¡¯theran Vige for three entire days. He knew perfectly the number of elves and the strength of the garrison here. This tiny elven vige wasn¡¯t qualified to fend off an attack by a fully developed bug army.


    However, the two tiny treants in Rut¡¯theran made Billis somewhat hesitant!


    The lowest level of animated magical nts in the elven kingdom¡¯s army was the treant warrior. Tiny Treants were the younger forms of the treant warriors.


    If they were fortunate enough to live past a thousand years and make their bodies even sturdier, then they would gloriously advance to the long-living and sturdy treant warriors, whose defense and crowd control abilities were unparalleled.


    These two tiny treants rooted in Rut¡¯theran had yet to reach the lowest threshold to advance to treant warriors, but they were still very much lethal if they were to fight all out. That was why Bug Adept Billis had spent three days circling the vige. He was waiting for the most appropriate opportunity to attack.


    The timing that Billis chose to strike was the only time of the day in which the elves of Rut¡¯theran were gathered together.


    When all the elves gathered upon the tree tform, Billis let out a silent and wide grin. He waved his hand formed of countless bugs; the assaults had started!


    The beautiful elven vige that had been peaceful and magical the previous second suddenly changed the very next moment, turning into a bone-chillingly horrifying hellscape.


    The earth of the green and grassy ground started to swell like the surface of the sea. As the field began to split and the dirt fell apart, a tide of fearsome ck bugs swarmed out from within.


    The ck insects weren¡¯trge individually, but their numbers had reached a shocking size.


    They crowded together into a terrifying sea of insects after breaking out of the earth and surged toward the few ancient trees at the heart of the vige.


    The ck tide of insects was still running upon the ground, but even more insects had engulfed the surrounding trees. They crawled along anything that could be climbed and anything that could be scaled as they advanced toward their target. Along the way, the ground, branches, the vines that they walked past, and all the green leaves were utterly devoured.


    From a distance, it looked as if several massive clusters of ink had erupted inside Rut¡¯theran, staining and devouring all the green at an astonishing rate.


    The sounds of an insect munching might be minimal, but when the sounds of tens of millions, hundreds of millions of insects devouring food gathered together, it formed a deafening and nauseating noise. The sound reverberated throughout Rut¡¯theran Vige.


    Some elves quickly discovered the abnormality in the vige.


    As pained screams rang out in session, the elves who were training in the tree hall rushed out. They watched this horrifying scene unfold before their wide open eyes.


    What...what was this?


    Countless elves cried wildly in their minds.


    However, the ck sea of insects firmly and stubbornly advanced, devouring everything in their way. The three ancient trees in the heart of the vige were soon surrounded. Even more insects started to climb up the trees¡¯ trunks, the tree bridges, and the vines.


    "Don¡¯t panic, everyone. This is a terrifying insect tide summoned by the evil witches. Everyone pick up your weapons. We must use our lives to defend our home."


    The ordinary elves already felt their limbs go limp at the sight of this dense tide of insects, let alone being able to fight. At this moment, the only ones that could remain calm were probably the war dancer and the archery instructor assigned to Rut¡¯theran.


    The terrified elves helped each other up the tform above as the instructors shouted andmanded. The few de dancers and elven archers gathered by their sides and formed a thin defensive line to keep the insect sea from continuing forward.


    Countless insects climbed upward along the trees¡¯ trunks. A boundless sea of insects was still rushing over from a distance. Underneath the trees, the insects had already piled up to a meter tall. They were continuing the wind and climb upward.


    All the elves couldn¡¯t help but feel a chill from the depths of their hearts when they looked down from high up.


    How many insects were there here?


    Ci! Ci! Ci!


    Several enchanted explosive arrows flew in beautiful arcs andnded in the areas where the insects were most concentrated.


    Boom! Boom! Boom! The sound of consecutive explosions rang out, sting the swarm of insects and blowing ck smoke and insect corpses into the air.


    However, the area cleared out by the explosives were once again covered in insects within a mere two or three seconds. From a distance, it was almost hard to tell if the swarm of bugs was bing fewer in numbers. In fact, there was an odd feeling that the sea of insects was only growing denser and thicker.


    A chain of elven arrows rained into the sea of insects. Most of them were ordinary arrows, and only a few were enchanted explosive arrows. These arrows that best disyed the uracy and agility of the elves were practically useless at this moment.


    Apart from the explosive arrows that could deal ¡¯some¡¯ damage to the bugs, the ordinary bolts were like pebbles thrown into a roaring river¨C quickly drowned out and washed away without a trace.


    As for the damage they were doing?


    How many magical arrows could a rural elven vige possibly have in their stocks!?


    After the twelve explosive arrows had been let loose, desperation and helplessness appeared on the determined and firm face of the female archery instructor. Her pretty and slender fingers held on tightly to thest explosive arrow, yet she hesitated on the final shot.


    Where to shoot? What to shoot at?


    It was an ocean of squirming insects everywhere below the trees. She wouldn¡¯t miss even if she were to close her eyes. However, was it worth it to use such a valuable explosive arrow to dy the advance of the insects by just that bit of time?


    The instructor had never doubted her power and ability before today. She had always believed that she could defeat any enemy and any opponent with the elven longbow and explosive arrow in her hand.


    This confidence of hers was also a conviction that the elves had gained over so many years.


    But now, she hesitated. She was confused. She was lost!


    For the first time, she drew her bow and nocked the arrow, but she had no idea where she was to shoot and whether she was supposed to shoot.


    "Quick, sound the tree whistle."


    At this crucial moment, the war dancer was still the moreposed and calm of the two.


    Tree whistle? The tree whistle!


    The eyes of the archery instructor immediately lit up upon hearing the shout. She tossed the bow in her hand to the assistant at her side and rushed to the edge of the tree tform. She took out an odd green tree whistle and ced it at her lips to blow it.


    "Careful!"


    "Dodge!"


    A few hurried shouts rang out from behind her.


    As expected of a fighter that had undergone a strict training regiment, the archery instructor nced from the corner of her eye and instantly discovered several odd ck silhouettes lunging at her.


    The archery instructor leaped upward and dodged two strange green scythes that shed down in a cross. Her nimble feet quickly stepped upon the side of another pair of scythes and used this tiny point of contact to dodge aside agilely.


    She drew her dagger in the air and went by the third ck silhouette pursuing her.


    The archery instructor let out an agonized scream as her right arm was severed along the shoulder. Blood sshed into the air. She barely managed to hang on and parry the enemy¡¯s attack before somersaulting onto the center of the tform. She crouched upon the ground and used her only remaining arm to brandish the dagger and protect herself.


    Ci! Ci! Ci!


    A series of elven arrows fired in a barrage. Crisp ringing sounds echoed out as they were shed down by the terrifying scythe-shaped limbs of the strange creatures before them.


    Mantis!


    The ones that had secretly struck at the archery instructor were three odd mantises.


    The reason these mantises were described as ¡¯odd¡¯ was that they were far too big.


    If these mantises were to stand up straight, they would each measure up to one and a half meters tall.


    Such a massive mantis was a rare sight, even in the Fantasy Forest with its dense poption of magical creatures!


    These mantises were pitch-ck in color, and the surface of their bodies was a weird shell that carried with it a metallic gleam. They had two semi-translucent pairs of wings on their backs¨C onerge and one small. They also had three pairs of exceedingly sharp jointed legs beneath their abdomen. A pair of horrifying scythe-like appendages filled with sharp teeth were brandished in the upright front half of their bodies.


    Earlier, these three odd mantises had relied on their quick speed and fearsome scythe limbs to ambush the archery instructor and defend themselves against the barrage of arrows.


    "Who are yourmanders? They dare attack us, and they don¡¯t have the courage to show their faces and fight us? Have hime out." The war dancer waved his two des and stood in front of his injuredpanions, shouting furiously at the approaching mantises as he did so.


    Sadly, his taunting did not affect these magical mantises.


    The three magical mantises beat their thin wings rapidly as their t and sharp bodies dashed forward swiftly while leaning close against the ground. Their scary scythe-like limbs even caused odd afterimages to appear and leave behind the sound of air being shed apart.


    ng! ng! ng!


    A series of metallic impacts rang out in quick session. The war dancer barely managed to use his agile movements and tight defense to fend off the attacks from the three mantises. However, the difference in strength caused his entire body to tremble every time he parried.


    With no option left to him, the war dancer was slowly forced backward. The area between his thumb and forefinger on the hands in which he held his sabers had already started bleeding.


    Blood dripped upon the floor. It was a frightening sight.


    With his cover, the injured archery instructor was finally able to find the time to blow that jade-green tree whistle.


    A strange soundwave undetectable by ordinary people started to echo in the woods and ripple outward into the distance.

 Chapter 658 The Fall of Ruttheran

    There was a strange soundwave that was undetectable to ordinary people.


    As it echoed around the surrounding forest, two ancient trees at the edge of Rut¡¯theran Vige trembled.


    Aaaaaah...


    An odd and aged voice reverberated throughout the forest. Those two massive trees measuring up to seven or eight meters suddenly shook their bodies, and a humanoid face appeared on their wrinkled and dry trunk.


    "Who is it...who...woke me...from...slumber...again? You elves, can¡¯t you let me sleep just a little longer?" An ancient tree shook his body and uprooted himself with much difficulty as it grumbled.


    The speed of his speech was extremely slow. It seemed he had not wholly awakened from his deep slumber. However, once he straightened his body, he started to speak normally.


    "Hmm, where did these tiny insectse from? Why are there so many of them?"


    The faces that appeared in the trunks looked around for a bit, and the two tiny treants finally realized something was off.


    These weren¡¯t just some pesky bugs. It was a terrifying gue of insects!


    The two towering tiny treants shook their forms and cast the ck insects climbing all over their bodies to the ground. They then lifted their wooden legs made of countless branches and roots and stomped the ground forcefully.


    Dong! Dong! Dong! Dong!


    The sound of four muffled wooden pirs smashing the ground rang out. These thick legs filled with the patterns of wood had forcefully crushed numerous insects to death. When the two tiny treants once again lifted their legs, theirrge t feet had been stained with purple-ck blood and pungent yellow insect juice.


    "Enemy. Enemy, exterminate the enemy!"


    The two tiny treants roared furiously. They attacked the swarm with all their strength as they strode forward.


    The direction they were moving toward was precisely where the tree whistle had been blown!


    Bug Adept Billis hid silently in a corner of the battlefield and used his strangepound eyes to observe everything happening from a distance. Take into consideration those eye bugs circling the forest, everything within two and a half kilometers of Rut¡¯theran was under his close monitoring.


    As a bug adept, he had none of the poor taste of other adepts to personally descend upon the battlefield and experience the crude pleasure of exchanging blows. For Billis, everything before him was no more than the final struggle of prey before they were served on the dining table.


    He was enjoying a sumptuous feast, and these were only his blood treats!


    He did not need to match strength against a bunch of food destined to be devoured just to show his courage and bravery. All he needed to do was wait. Once the food had been roasted to perfection, he would swallow it all in a single bite.


    No trace of concern or heartbreak was on Billis¡¯ face, hidden in the shadows of the trees, even as he watched the two towering treants stomp a path of blood and carnage through the swarm of bugs. His purplepound eyes were glowing and shing in the darkness as he used the unique methods of an insect person to control andmand the tide of bugs.


    He had destroyed two elven viges as well as countless animals and magical creatures of Fantasy Forest on the way here. It was through the nourishment of their flesh that Billis had managed to raise this shockinglyrge army of insects.


    Even at this moment, with a terrifying army of bugs numbering one hundred and fifty thousand, he had yet to reach his limit. With his current power, he would be able to perfectly control the bug army even if it was to be increased to twice its current size.


    Where did the path of evolution lie for a bug adept?


    No one knew.


    Strengthening the self might be one of them. It could transform Billis into a fearsome and ferocious insect of war, having the ability to dominate the battlefield and enjoy the pleasure of the ughter. However, if he were to do so, he would continuously ce himself in the most dangerous scenarios. Billis didn¡¯t like showing himself in public. He didn¡¯t care for personal glory either.


    Thus, he unhesitatingly chose the evolutionary path of strengthening the insect swarm!


    This way, he would be able to control more insects and imbue some insects with strangebat abilities. With the ughter and evolution of the swarm, he, the leader of the hive, would unknowingly be even stronger. More importantly, due to the countless clones he would have, he would be practically immortal.


    He would never die as long as the swarm still existed.


    This particr factor was what attracted Billis the most!


    An evolution path like this undoubtedly suited his personality the most.


    As the lord of the swarm, these low-grade insects could never cause him to frown, regardless of how heavy their losses. The only things that could concern him were thosebat insects that possessed uniquebat power.


    Thebat insects evolved from their initial form as ck beetles, to sting scorpions, and finally developed from the sting scorpions to the current magical mantises. Their offensive power was increasing by leaps and bounds. The three magical mantises on the tree tform in the distance had formed a fighting squad. It was only the three of them, but they were already chasing the two high-grade elves around and beating them within an inch of their lives.


    Seeing that the two tiny treants intended to enter the fray to save the elves, Billis secretly sent an order.


    High up in the canopy, several shes of ck lightning surrounded the two tiny treants at various angles, leaving a trail of afterimages behind them.


    The vast tide of insects was indeed a massive threat for the frail elves. However, when faced with the tall, towering, and sturdy treants, the wild biting of the swarm could not deal lethal damage in the short term.


    As the two tiny treants made it toward the elves with great difficulty and heavy, bloody footsteps, their bodies chattered from the sound of countless insects gnawing at their tough bark.


    However, the losses of the swarm at the hands of the treants were also extremely severe!


    The two treants that had been striding forward abruptly stopped. They raised their beardy faces and looked anxiously at the quickly approaching silhouettes.


    Unlike the tide of insects around them, these strangebat insects were creatures that could truly damage them. Of course, they were anxious!


    ording to the Grade system of the World of Adepts, the treant warriors of the elven kingdom should have the power of advanced First Grades, while the Deadwood Guards had the power of a beginner Second Grade. The tiny treants that had yet to advance would be considered pseudo-adepts.


    However, such absolute distinctions of grade failed to truly reflect thebat power of the strange creatures of a high-magic world.


    Take these tiny treants for example. They were still in their youth and had not crossed the first advancement threshold of their lives. However, if one were to weigh their overall strength, they would realize the treants could easily defeat an entire squad of First Grade war dancers or elven archers.


    That was why Bug Adept Billis did not look down upon these two tiny treants at all. He immediately sent a wave of sixteen magical mantises to deal with them.


    The one and a half meter long bodies of the magical mantises looked like bean sprouts beside potatoes when put by the side of the eight-meter tall treants. They looked minuscule. However, these sixteen bean sprouts had an entire mouth full of sharp teeth and their terrifying scythes.


    The sixteen magical mantises turned into sixteen bolts of ck lightning constantly circling the two treants. The moment they found the opportunity, they would lunge at the treants¡¯ backs where they had trouble defending, and used their sawtooth scythe limbs to hack at the treants¡¯ bark. Tree sap sshed everywhere.


    The two tiny treants grunted. They turned about on the spot and waved the tough vines wrapped around their bodies in an attempt tosh at the ck silhouettes.


    Unfortunately, with their slow and clumsy movements, they could not touch the mantises at all, even though these attacks were still crushing the insects in the tide. Their careless attacks only exposed even more of their weaknesses.


    The sixteen magical mantises spun around the two treants like a revolvingntern and asionally lunged forward to sh. They would then quickly re their wings and leave the treants¡¯ attack range when they saw them lift their vine whips.


    In less than seven minutes, the tough bark armor of the two treants was covered in wounds. Crisscrossing sh marks could be seen everywhere. Many of them had even pierced the bark and damaged the insides of the treants.


    A look of determination appeared on the wrinkled and cracked face of one of the treants. It lifted its thick right leg and stomped it into the ground.


    A muffled boom. The entire ground trembled slightly.


    This treant roared at the sky and its right leg formed of countless roots was embedded into the earth once more. They once again turned into the form of snake-like roots under the power of the treant¡¯s tremendous life force andshed upward in every direction.


    The next second, in a twenty-meter area around the treant, the earth split, and the dirt rumbled. Countless roots emerged from underground and tightly bound all moving creatures above.


    These included countless insects and three magical mantises that couldn¡¯t fly away in time.


    "Gar¡¯lua, go, take the elves away; leave this ce to me!" The treant roared furiously and urged itspanion to leave.


    The other treant nced sorrowfully at itspanion that had chosen to sacrifice himself and finally turned to walk toward the elven treehouse.


    Its size was exceedinglyrge. It only needed to extend its arms and ce it upon the tree, and the elves would be able to jump onto its leafy body.


    At this moment, the ck swarm of insects had already forced the elves onto the very top of the only remaining ancient tree. They were barely defending thisst sanctuary of theirs.


    It had yet to be half an hour since the start of the battle, and only two dozen elves of their original number of six or seven dozen remained.


    The other had either been taken down by the magical mantises and dragged into the tide of insects or had slipped and fallen off the tree to be devoured by the wave. At any rate, their odds were slim!


    Thus, the elves hurriedly jumped into the canopy of the treant when they saw ite to their aid. It was only then that they had escaped this ancient tree that was about to be devoured by the swarm.


    This only surviving treant waved its vine whips to chase away the circling mantises after saving the elves. It then strode away into the depths of the forest, wading through the swarm of bugs.


    Behind his lonely back, the treant that had chosen to stay behind had already fallen wordlessly.


    A path full of shouting and a road full of deadly pursuers gradually extended into the distance.

 Chapter 659 Blood Elf

    The battle was slowly being extinguished.


    The once peaceful Rut¡¯theran vige had be a horrifying ce of death.


    Not a single living beingrger than five centimeters could be found in the entire vige or an area of several kilometers around it. In particr, where the battle had been the most intense, it wasn¡¯t just the animals that had gone missing. Even the nts had been devoured. The scars of battle left behind were a horrifying sight to behold.


    No one knew when it had appeared, but an eagle had been circling in the blue skies above.


    It circled the area around Rut¡¯theran many times before finally diving down, unable to suppress the feeling of frustration in its heart.


    The male eagle beat its powerful wings and quickly weaved between the trees, asionally pulling up or diving down to avoid the ancient branches and dense vinesing at its face. Finally, the light appeared before its eyes, and it passed through the dense forest that led to the quiet valley where Rut¡¯theran resided.


    The first sight that entered the eagle¡¯s eyes came as such a tremendous shock that it almost ran into one of the withered ancient trees. The eagle quickly flew in a circle andnded steadily upon the ground. It then returned to its human form amidst a series of strange contortions and transformations.


    Sov was a First Grade Druid from Skywater City.


    His daily mission was to patrol the one dozen elven viges around Irontree Forest. Rut¡¯theran Vige was undoubtedly one of those viges.


    Rut¡¯theran Vige might have a small poption, but due to the neighboring Irontree forest, the Ironwood produced here was also a rtively important strategic resource of the elven kingdom. Ironwood was one of the main ingredients in crafting high-quality elven longbows. Its value was immense to the elven kingdom and its many archers!


    Sov woulde here on patrol every four or five days, also taking the opportunity to visit some old friends for tea. Moreover, he had a crush on the archery instructor of Rut¡¯theran¨C Faelin. He was in the midst of a mad pursuit, which prompted him toe here even more frequently.


    Yet today, when he arrived, all he saw was the sight of a ravagednd after a great battle.


    Almost all greenery within the valley had vanished.


    The ground seemed to have been utterly punished as well. Cracks and upturned dirt were everywhere.


    The towering ancient trees had all withered and died. Their roots were exposed, and not one bit of life force or energy could be sensed in them.


    An unusually tall tree had copsed at the center of the vige. Its broken body seemed to have been devoured by some sort of creature. The soft insides of the tree had beenpletely emptied, turning the tree into an empty husk.


    Azali; it was Azali, one of the two tiny treants of Rut¡¯theran!


    Sov¡¯s heart trembled upon seeing the terrible state of Azali¡¯s death.


    If even Azali could die inbat, then the other elves would probably have an even lower chance of surviving!


    Then...then, Faelin...


    Sov, who knew the surroundings of Irontree Forest like the back of his hand, immediately identified that this wasn¡¯t an attack by some sort of ferocious magical beast. Instead, it was an attack by an outside force. Combined with the recent news from the elven military, Sov was confident that the culprits of this disaster were those savage and evil otherworldly witches.


    Under ordinary circumstances, Sov should immediately retreat from this vige and return to Skywater City to report the situation. It was to have the elvenmander assign more reinforcements, including more powerful Druid Masters, to investigate and track the location of the enemy.


    However, with Faelin¡¯s whereabouts in mind, Sov hesitated. In the end, he gritted his teeth and walked onto this terrifying battlefield.


    The enemy might have left quite a while ago!


    The signs of an intense battle could be seen everywhere upon the ground and on the trees, but it was hard to see any survivors at all. Not even a slightlyrger animal could be found. That caused his Animal Speech ss ability to be useless.


    Though he couldmunicate with the remaining grass and trees, these nts only had simple minds. Apart from the two simple words of "enemy...bug," they could not provide any finer details.


    Sov also picked up plenty of crushed ck insect shells on the ground.


    He carefully kept these few ¡¯clues¡¯ that the enemy had left behind and prepared to submit them to the higher-ups.


    Suddenly, movement came from the tree hall tform, high up in the trees.


    It couldn¡¯t help but make Sov nervous.


    He gripped the oaken staff in his hands tightly and cast ayer of Barkskin upon himself. It was only now that he mustered the courage to rush onto the tform.


    However, the sight on the tform caused his eyes to go wide open!


    This ce seemed to have been the main battlefield of the battle. Blood and sh marks littered the wooden tform. In the corner of the tform, close to the tree hall, a female elf with one arm had had her clothes removed and had been pinned to the tree trunk with an arrow through her chest.


    She was youthful, and her skin was white and smooth, but her head hung limply downward, and her scattered hair had covered her face. The blood that flowed from her naked body pooled beneath her feet, forming a crimson puddle. Too much time had passed, and the blood had dried into a dark red blood stain, making a shocking sight for all who saw it.


    Apart from her, no other elven corpses could be seen on the tform.


    It was Faelin!


    Sov almost instantly identified this female elf!


    He rushed over agitatedly, but before he could even touch Faelin¡¯s corpse, two malicious gusts of winds came from above and beside him. Four or five ck silhouettes lunged out from their hiding spots, striking right at the distraught young druid.


    Sov relied on the Nature Protection covering him as well as his oaken staff to defend the strikes quickly. Finally, he managed to struggle out of the magical mantises¡¯ ambush.


    He rushed to the edge of the tform and pressed his oaken staff against the ground while simultaneously tossing out a handful of strange nt seeds. As a beam of magic green light shed by, the nt seeds scattered through the air and instantly swelled into fearsome thorned vines, binding all four pursuing magical mantises to the spot without exception.


    Of course, such a Thorn Binding could not trap the magical mantises for long.


    The magical mantises waved their scythe-like limbs and almost instantly cut the thorned vines into shreds.


    Sov relied on the short amount of time he had bought with the thorned vines to transform quickly. He intended to turn into an eagle and take to the skies once again.


    Just as his transformation was about toplete, a pungent gale came from behind him. An extremely sharp mantis limb pierced his right chest and pinned him to the tform.


    Then a powerful strike hit his head, and Soc fainted without another word.


    ............


    A broad, spacious tree hall tform was filled with all sorts of strange forms.


    Mary, who hadn¡¯t shown herself in quite a while, stood at the front of the formation in her crimson armor. Standing in a row behind her were the three Blood Knights with Soros in the lead. Old Fox Vanlier looked just like the middle-aged noble he had always been and waited by Mary¡¯s side with a big smile on his face.


    Nearly thirteen to fourteen elves were standing even further behind them. There were both males and females amongst these elves, and all of them handsome and charming. However, at this moment, their eyes were blood-red and filled with malice. Two sharp bloodsucking fangs protruded from their upper lips, giving them a wild look.


    This batch of forest elves that Mary had converted into blood ves had been hand-picked. The weakest of them was First Grade, and two were Second Grades.


    Having undergone vampiric reconstruction, these elves¡¯ nature power within their bodies had now all been converted into blood energy. They were no longer the former forest elves. Instead, they had be a strange species never before seen in Faen¨C Blood Elves.


    The direct consequence of such a bloodline reconstruction didn¡¯t cause the de dancers and elven archers to weaken. In fact, because of their new regeneration and bloodsucking abilities, their might in battle had increased exponentially.


    It was the casters, druids, or elven mages who lost all of their nature magic upon reconstruction into blood elves. They were only left with a pathetic Blood Bullet spell.


    It seemed Mary would have to give these fellows a bit more time to discover new blood magic if she wanted to have more spellcasters among her subordinates.


    Fortunately, Mary had converted herself into a pure-blood vampire when advancing to Second Grade in the World of Adepts. The bloodline shackles upon her had beenrgely removed. At least, she wouldn¡¯t have to worry about this problem before she advanced to Third Grade!


    The most significant benefit she obtained from converting into a pure-blood vampire was her soul origin being able to tolerate two times as many bloodline descendants as before. The number of blood ves she could create were as many as thirty, and the number of lower vampire spawn she could have was two hundred.


    If she let go of some of her authority and allowed her blood ves to create vampire spawn of their own, then she could be the Blood Queen at the top of the pyramid, directly and indirectly controlling one to two thousand blood creatures.


    A single pure-blood vampire could control a terrifying bloodsucking army, while a family of vampires could even manage a medium-sized human kingdom.


    However, such behavior rarely urred in the World of Adepts. The main reason for that was the difficulty of finding so many high-quality, intelligent species. Even if the vampires lowered their expectations and found ways to Embrace those frail humans, the massive army that they would be able to raise would not endure a single,rge offensive magic spell from the enemy.


    Moreover, the Embrace consumed the origin blood of the vampire!


    Wasting precious origin blood on some inferior lifeforms would not only fail to help the vampire rise to power, but it would also even indirectly drag down the umtion of their power.


    That was why one could lower expectations when creating vampire spawn meant for cannon fodder, but when choosing blood ves to build bloodline connections with, one had to be extremely careful. The Embrace should not be used so casually.

 Chapter 660 Working Together

    At this moment, the tiny Rut¡¯theran Vige had already be a gathering ce for vampires and ck insects.


    A ck sea squirmed on the ground while swarms of vampires wove between the tall canopy.


    The leaders of their respective factions were quietly discussing something upon the tree tform as they stood guard.


    Even though Bug Adept Billis had raised an army of tens of thousands of insects and had twenty-five magical mantises guarding at his side, he remained as respectful as ever before Bloody Queen Mary. He didn¡¯t betray even a trace of arrogance or pride.


    With this bug army and thesebat insects that listened to his everymand, Billis would have no problem challenging all of the First Grade Crimson adepts alone. Despite having such power, he still didn¡¯t dare to be disrespectful to Mary.


    That was because apart from being a Second Grade vampire, Mary¡¯s actions while Billis was still an apprentice had left a deep impression on his soul. Even now, when Billis saw Mary, he felt his limbs go soft and his hands sweat. He forced a smile on his face and appeared even more obedient than even Vanlier.


    After the past couple of weeks, the nearby elven viges had almost all been visited by the two of them.


    As their power increased exponentially, they were no longer satisfied with such small battles and having to sneak around. They had specially chosen to meet here to gather their troops and umte enough strength to assault Skywater City¡¯s outpost.


    It was a small elven town southwest of Skywater¨C Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge.


    That ce was nearly a hundred kilometers away from Skywater City and had a poption of four hundred elves. It was one of the satellite towns of Skywater City and was responsible for providing the city withrge amounts of fresh fruit on a daily basis.


    Most elves were vegetarians and never touch bloody meat their entire lives. That was why the fruits provided by Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge could be considered the primary source of food for the citizens of Skywater City.


    It was in consideration of this factor that Old Fox Vanlier had been suggesting Mary and Billis work together and conquer this elven town of great significance. Once they captured Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge, not only would their military force increase tremendously, they would also be able to interrupt the order of daily life in Skywater.


    It was a necessary step that had to be taken for two ambitious adepts that sought to achieve something on the west coast.


    Moreover, the strongest person in Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge¡¯s garrison was only Second Grade; there were no Third Grade powerhouses present. Assaulting a ce like this wouldn¡¯t put them in too much risk at all. Mary and Billis couldn¡¯t help but be moved after listening to Vanlier¡¯s analysis and presentation.


    It was the benefit of both parties working together. They could immediately put to action any of their ns once they hade to a decision.


    The moment they made their promises, Billis took to the whistling winds and vanished into the forest with his rumbling insect army. The sound of beating wings came from Mary¡¯s side as a swarm of a thousand vampires gathered into a massive crimson cloud and flew into the distance, hovering right above the canopy.


    A short momentter, this ravaged valley finally regained its peace, with only deathly silence left behind.


    ............


    The isted ind.


    The flying ship was still floating above the ind. The tinkering sounds of hammering and the sizzling of welding continued to echo, along with metallic ringing all the while.


    The massive battle fromst time had left far, far too many wounds upon the flying ship both hidden and not. For the sake of all future campaigns, Greem had to honestly stay upon this tiny ind, regardless of how impatient he was. He had to wait for the moment the flying ship¡¯s repairs werepleted.


    At this moment, all sorts of construction machines were working inside the flying ship under the instructions of goblin technicians and engineers. They ceaselessly repaired the space furnace and all internal damage suffered by the vessel, as well as patching up the horrifying marks of battle marring the deck.


    The scale of the project was so stunninglyrge!


    It was fortunate that sufficient metal ingots and alloy materials had been stored inside the flying ship before they invaded the Faen ne. It was only then that they had a way of fixing all these damages. Otherwise, they would have had no choice but to return dejectedly to Shadow Ind and ask for help from the Pale Witches!


    All of the adepts clearly couldn¡¯t bear such a noisy environment. All of them chose to move down to the isted ind. There, they could use this temporary break between battles to continue experiments and research they were interested in.


    Greem also ordered people to dig out a small stone room beneath the prison within the ind. He then excavated a temporaryboratory there.


    What he badly needed to research now were those forest elves!


    Humans, elves, dwarves, beastmen, halflings, gnomes, kobolds, goblins;rge deviations would happen to the same species when they appeared in different ces. As an adept, Greem believed himself to be plenty knowledgeable about the elves already. However, all that knowledge hade from the books of the World of Adepts.


    Just the elven races that Greem had heard of through the books included the wood elves, gold elves, sun elves, moon elves, gray elves, wild elves, ins elves, and forest elves. Whenever an elven race was ced in an extreme environment, they would even evolve into entirely unrecognizable new appearances.


    For example, the dark elves that lived underground (also known as drow), the sea elves that lived deep in the sea (also known as naga), or the fallen elves that lived in areas of demonic magic (also known as satyrs).


    These elves that lived in Garan called themselves forest elves due to them taking up home in the Fantasy Forest. They fundamentally still held the legacy and tradition of the elves, establishing themselves through their exceptional archery skills. All forest elves, be they male or female, had slender bodies, intelligent minds, pretty appearances, graceful movements, and sharp eyes.


    Their favorite activities were poetry, literature, and music.


    They often lived deep in the forest, and theirrgest tribes rarely exceeded two hundred elves.


    The hidden viges of the elves blended miraculously with the forest without ever harming the wood itself.


    Almost all forest elves were vegetarians and only relied on harvested natural fruits as their diet, rarely killing or hunting the creatures in the woods. Thus, they also wouldn¡¯t fell trees or burn grass to farm as the humans would.


    It was because they assimted themselves perfectly to the Fantasy Forest that they won praise and titles of ¡¯Children of Nature¡¯ and ¡¯Friend of the Forest.¡¯ They relied on their unique racial talents to travel in the thorn-filled, tree-dense, and magical Fantasy Forest without leaving behind any traces.


    The massive forest that was difficult to traverse for an outsider was no problem for them at all.


    They could even converse intimately with every flower, every de of grass, and every tree in the forest. That was why trying to track an elf in the Fantasy Forest was a nearly impossible task!


    That was basically all that Greem knew of the forest elves. Apart from this, he only knew the basic sses of the elven army and their respective specialties.


    In general, Faen ne was only a mid-sized ne with decent development. It didn¡¯t have the qualifications to bepared to the World of Adepts. The grade ssification of the lifeforms here might be very simr to the World of Adepts, but the quality of each grade was simply too different!


    After the several battles he had gone through, Greem had obtained a fundamental estimation of the situation. The grades of the lifeforms here were about half a grade lowerpared to the World of Adepts. Which is to say, a beginner First Gradebat profession of Faen would only be slightly stronger than the advanced apprentices of the World of Adepts. They were barely equal to pseudo-adepts.


    Most of the time, the First Grades of Faen couldn¡¯t evenpare to the more powerful pseudo-adepts of the World of Adepts!


    That was why it wasn¡¯t hard to see how Greem could fight multiple Faen Second Grades as a beginner Second Grade fire adept and absolutely crush them in battle.


    However, the forest elves of Faen weren¡¯t only full of weaknesses. They also had their advantages and strengths.


    It was that all of their citizens could fight!


    Almost every single forest elf, even those tiny children who were barely taller than a longbow, would be Deadshots in the human world. It was this unique racial trait of having all their poption being archers that allowed the forest elves to maintain a steady hold over Garan, repeatedly repelling multiple invasions of Faen.


    Moreover, the forest elves were also a strong race that was protected by gods. They had quite a number of spiritualists within their kingdom. These temple priests and god messengers could all borrow the divine power of their gods andbine it with the nature magic in which they were skilled. It gave them considerable might.


    In the previous battle of Jintha¡¯Alor, God Messenger Xenia had sent Dark Witch Uzzah packing, despite both of them being the same grade. If it wasn¡¯t for Greem summoning the Third Grade thunder dragon in time as well as the use of the magic energy cannon on the flying ship, that might have been the final battle of the Crimson n.


    Greem might have been able to escape with his power, but most of the adepts following him would not have eluded the pursuit of the elves.


    That was why Greem, having seen the terrifying might of an elven god messenger, had chosen to run to the seas and take the opportunity of going into hiding to find the weaknesses of the forest elves.


    What he most wanted to do now was utterly and ultimately figure out the body structure of the forest elves, as well as the functions of their magical organs. He would then find the most straightforward and practical means to wound and kill them.


    Of course, his first choice was still a gue!


    After all, this wasn¡¯t a private ne that he possessed. Even if he wrecked the entirety of Garan and drastically reduced the poption of the forest elves, he wouldn¡¯t be the one toment the loss.


    Thus, Greem invited Poison Hag Endor into hisboratory and worked together with her to research and invent a particr gue meant explicitly for the forest elves.

 Chapter 661 Faith Node

    Inside the sinister and damp underground stone room.


    ced in the middle of the stone room was a stone autopsy table with a young and beautiful female elf lying on top of it.


    The clothes and equipment on her body had been removed and thrown to the side.


    She was almost naked at this moment, her perfect body not covered by any piece of fabric at all. A strange rune had been drawn on her forehead with paint as scarlet as blood itself. It was the effect and influence of this rune that rendered the female elf incapable of controlling her body despite having full consciousness.


    It was as if her body was out of sync with her mental consciousness. She could feel every part of her body, even the chill of the cold air breezing past her naked skin. Strangely enough, she couldn¡¯t control any part of her body.


    She couldn¡¯t even close her eyes, let alone move her pinky finger!


    The female elf¡¯s eyes were wide open, her pretty and clear eyes betraying unconcealed fear and unease.


    Fear of this environment, fear of the atmosphere, and fear of the two emotionless ck silhouettes assessing her body.


    All this frightened the elf so much that she wanted to scream.


    However, when the female elf was about to shout in horror, she realized that her mouth couldn¡¯t open at all, almost as if it had been glued shut with powerful tree sap. Even her throat didn¡¯t seem to be at hermand, making it impossible for her even to grunt.


    "This is excellent material. Aren¡¯t we just doing some simple dissection? Is there a need to waste a First Grade elf?" Endor, who stood at Greem¡¯s side, hunched her body and grumbled softly through her mouth.


    A vibrant green, palm-sized doll was grabbing onto herpel and ying around there. A ck doll with a strange form also floated by her shoulder.


    From a distance, the ck doll looked like a tiny human that had been cobbled together with ck cloth. The surface of its body was filled with crooked sewing lines and dark, unrecognizable runes. There were no facial features on its tiny head¨C only a single terrifying eye drawn with blood.


    The ck doll had no hands or limbs and just floated eerily above Endor¡¯s shoulder. Three green lights also orbited around its petite body.


    If one could get close enough to look, they would be horrified to find out that those green lights were three frightening miniature ghosts. These ghosts did not have bodies and were terrifying beings made of pure negative energy. They endlessly screamed and screeched in agony while trying to escape the Stitch Ghost Golem¡¯s body.


    However, it was all in vain.


    They could only hate, howl, and madly curse every living thing and being in the world.


    One could feel the overwhelmingly sinister aura from them if they were even slightly close to the golem.


    After this period of cultivation, the Spirit of Pestilence and the Stitch Ghost Golem that Greem had personally created had both barely managed to reach beginner First Grade. Moreover, they had both gained some especially terrifying abilities. Sadly, they still couldn¡¯t help Greem at all with their current strength; they still needed to be further cultivated.


    Perhaps they would need to reach advanced First Grade before they could even be of any help in a fight between Second Grade powerhouses!


    No one knew why, but these two helpers that Greem cultivated liked Endor very much. They would stick by the old witch¡¯s side every time Greem let them out, almost as if she was their true master.


    Greem couldn¡¯t do anything about this!


    After all, Poison Hag Endor also had a unique shadow Physique. Her origin power was remarkably simr to the two little fellows. Greem, on the other hand, was purely a body of fire and belonged to the ranks of positive energy. It was no wonder that the two little fellows weren¡¯t attached to him.


    After all these years of living as an adept, Greem had utterly gotten used to the rhythm of an adept¡¯s life.


    He draped a nd gray robe around himself and stood emotionlessly before the stone tform. Fearsome blue light subtly glowed in his eyes. Even though there was a naked and attractive beauty in front of his eyes, there were no signs of excitement or stimtion in his expression. In fact, he seemed to be more interested at flipping the female elf¡¯s fingers and arms about.


    "The muscles aren¡¯t sufficiently developed. There¡¯s probably quite a bit of loss in terms of robustness and strength."


    "That said, the tone of the muscle is extremely smooth. They must be wellpensated in flexibility and body coordination."


    "The bones are far too slender. The calcium content is only 76% of human bones. The weight is also 33% less than a human¡¯s. Impact resistance is estimated to be 21% weaker, while flexibility is increased by 48% and body coordination by 52%."


    Greem was like the most professional appraiser, extending the female elf¡¯s white and slender fingers and brushing past her joints, waist, and abdomen. He even lifted the female elf¡¯s hand and took a close look at the position and thickness of the calluses on her hands.


    "This is a fairly excellent elven archer. The extent of calluses forming is simr on the right and left hand, which means she is equally agile with both hands. However, given the difference of the calluses, she still prefers to hold the bow in the right hand and wield a de in the left."


    Greem slowly investigated the elf¡¯s body and spoke his insights.


    Poison Hag Endor was whispering to the two little fellows by herself, not paying attention to what he was saying. Only the female elf¡¯s blue eyes were continuously expanding and contracting. It was clear that she was utterly terrified, but her body still restedfortably upon the tform, incapable of any biological reaction.


    "You are probably very curious why we have obscured your control over your body, yet not robbed you of your consciousness." Greem carefully examined every inch of the female elf¡¯s body before meeting her gaze in satisfaction.


    A questioning expression came from the female elf¡¯s eyes, but she still couldn¡¯t move whatsoever.


    "It¡¯s for a very simple reason!" Greem calmly spoke, "Because in a moment, when we start dissecting you, we need to know the connections and the way in which your mental consciousnessmunicates with the magical organs in your body. During this process, I do not wish for your emotions to interrupt the surgery. Nor do I want you to bepletely unconscious and thereby make it difficult to examine how the magical organs function under the control of the consciousness.


    "So, let¡¯s start the surgery."


    Having said that, Greem lifted his hand, and a sparkling silver knife immediately stabbed deep into the female elf¡¯s chest.


    As Greem lightly pulled downward, a blood-curdling ripping sound rang out as the female elf¡¯s chest was opened like a book.


    What came next was an exceedingly cruel and bloody dissection.


    To clearly figure out the internal construction of the elves¡¯ bodies and what part their mental consciousness yed in it, Greem had used a restraining rune to restrict the female elf¡¯s mental consciousness within her own mind. This way, the biological reactions of her body could still act upon her mental consciousness, but she couldn¡¯t control her body as usual.


    The tremendous pain from her body assaulted the female elf¡¯s mental consciousness. She was in extreme agony, but her face remained emotionless.


    Greem reached into the elf¡¯s chest and lightly began reaching around the inside, asionally taking out a bloody living organ from within. He very carefully ced all the organs inside ss containers of various colors and sizes.


    The insides of these containers were filled with light-yellow nutrient solutions that had been specially concocted to maintain the short-term liveliness of these removed organs.


    Heart, liver, spleen, lung, kidney, stomach, intestine...


    Greem¡¯s hands cut with amazing agility.


    Every time he severed a blood vessel, he would flick his fingers and a tiny and spontaneous me would burn and seal the wound. This way, the female elf wouldn¡¯t die of excessive blood loss. Moreover, under the effect of some strange magic, the female elf remained alive despite having almost all of her internal organs taken out.


    Instead, it was the wave after wave of torturous agony that assaulted her consciousness that exceeded the cruelty of anything else!


    Greem shook his head regrettably after examining all of the female elf¡¯s internal organs.


    It seemed this was an ordinary elven archer that had absolutely no talent for magic. He had found no visible signs of magic assimtion in her body.


    Greem hesitated for a moment.


    It seemed he could only dissect the druids if he wanted to research the forest elves¡¯ rtionship with nature magic!


    Still, if the elf before his eyes was going to die eventually, why not fully use up every bit of utility she had to offer?


    Greem immediately and unhesitatingly took up some small knives, hammers, picks, and other surgery tools. He then carefully split open the female elf¡¯s skull.


    After so much torture at his hands, the life of the female elf naturally slipped unstoppably toward the abyss of death, even with the stimtion of magic and the sustenance of life potions.


    Greem waved his hand and activated multiple monitoring arrays that had been temporarily set up in the room. He then started aprehensive and detailed examination of every inch of the female elf¡¯s brain.


    Greem wiped away the restraining rune on the female elf¡¯s head and softly and temptingly whispered by her ear, "Pray to your god with all your strength in the final moment before thest of your life drains away, won¡¯t you?"


    The female elf¡¯s mind had already fallen into chaos and was starting to copse. At that moment, it seemed as if a trace of energy had returned to her. Her mouth began to tremble as she whispered a full-hearted and sincere prayer to her god.


    A sort of unfamiliar energy¨Cimperceptible to the ordinary person¨Cemanated from the elf¡¯s consciousness. This energy started to construct a hidden and profound channel of faith with some location in the distance through unique mental nodes in her brain.


    The moment the channel of faith opened, Greem¡¯s heart trembled. He sensed an indescribably strong mental will extending rapidly toward this ce.


    The monitoring array around the female elf¡¯s brain immediately turned from yellow to dark red as it let out a ring rm.


    Apart from the monitoring array, Greem also narrowed his eyes and used the Chip¡¯s scanning function and x-ray vision to their fullest.


    The two worked together, and Greem quickly managed to lock onto the channel of faith¡¯s location.


    Pa!


    A tiny fireball exploded at the location he had locked onto,pletely exterminating thest weak scrap of mental consciousness that the female elf still had. With the scattering of the elf¡¯s mental consciousness, the channel of faith also abruptly vanished.


    Somewhere in the void, Greem seemed to have heard an earth-shattering roar of fury and anger.

 Chapter 662 Secret Meeting of the Goddesses

    Garan Continent. The central mountains.


    The main temple of the Goddess of the Elves.


    It was a beautiful morning as peaceful as always.


    The bright red sun had just started peeking over the horizon, and the light mist over the forest had yet to fade.


    Some devoted elven believers were walking barefoot in the forest, their hair let down, plucking a leaf from the trees, rolling it into a cup, and using it to catch the sweet dew dropping from the branches.


    It was to be their first gift to the great Goddess of the Elves today.


    Yet, just as they were dly performing this ritual of theirs, an overwhelmingly powerful consciousness fluctuation erupted from the position of the main temple of the Goddess of the Elves. At the very instant this will overbearingly descended upon the main temple, all temples in the central mountains erupted with a blindingly intense golden light.


    Under the illumination of the golden light, a thousand-meter high projection of a beautiful female elf appeared above the main temple of the Elf Goddess. The image let out a furious cry as she red toward the southwest.


    It...it was the Goddess of the Elves, Saoirse!


    The great chief god of the elves, Saoirse, had descended!


    After a stunned moment, all forest elves who witnessed this sight immediately realized that the holy and beautiful projection of the elf that stood in the air before them was precisely the great Goddess of the Elves that they had faithfully prayed to time and time again.


    In the forests, between the bushes, upon the branches of the ancient trees, and inside their tree houses, all forest elves everywhere put aside whatever they were doing and knelt before the holy will that Saoirse had impressed upon the world.


    In a single instance, elven hymns of varying styles and tones, but of the same intent of praise and prayer, filled the skies of the boundless Fantasy Forest. The songs quickly gathered into an extraordinarily powerful force that surged toward the towering projection of the goddess above the temple.


    Elven Goddess Saoirse collected herself and retracted her anger. She then looked down at the tens of thousands of faith nodes that had lit up in the central mountains and thought for a moment. Her projection dispersed into sparks of golden light and merged with the tall idol inside her temple.


    The next second, beneath the prayers of the various temple priests, the five-meter tall giant idol forged entirely of the rarest magical metals opened its eyes; it hade to life.


    "Lile, what¡¯s the situation on the west coast of Garan recently?" The Goddess¡¯ idol swept with her eyes as her gaze quicklynded on the officiate L, kneeling at the very front.


    "Great Elven Goddess Saoirse, a new Cmity of the Witches has begun!"


    "Oh? We already taught those evil witches a harsh lessonst time. They still dare to invade Garan en masse again?" The Goddess asked doubtfully.


    The thundering of a brewing storm vaguely shed inside her pretty and wide open eyes.


    "No," Officiate L hesitated for a moment. She didn¡¯t quite know how to exin what she knew to the Goddess, "The scale of the Cmity of Witches this time is much smaller than before. Those evil witches seemed to have ced their main forces on Faen Continent. It¡¯s said that they have broken into the ck River Basin and exterminated the Guztanians living there. They are currently battling with the human alliance near Thunder Ridge. The specifics of the battle have yet to reach us."


    "Then who is it that is active near our coast?"


    "The intelligence we have received indicates that it is a witch alliance that has arrived upon Garan. The main forces are still those evil Pale Witches. However, it seems like the ones assisting the Pale Witches this time are the Dark Witches and Fate Witches. Their main forces are still stationed on the Echo Isles and facing off against our allied army. No excessively intense battle has broken out yet."


    "The Echo Isles are off the southeast coast. What I want to know now is what has happened off the southwest coast? Why are my followers there experiencing shameless torture and ughter?"


    The southwest coast? Followers being tortured and ughtered?


    This tremendous news blew up like silent explosives in the minds of L and the other temple priests. They were utterly stunned and speechless to the situation.


    Herding the sheep of the Goddess as her proxy in the mortal realm was the fundamental duty of these temple priests. The elven queen might have great authority, but even she had to be humble in front of the noble temple priests.


    After all, the word of the gods could only be passed down through the mouths of the priests!


    It was precisely this noble status that allowed the temple priests to question every single issue and matter in the elven kingdom, as long as it involved faith and believers.


    Their chief goddess was infuriated, so much so that she had cast down a manifestation of her godly will. Yet, these temple priests were utterly ignorant of the matter that had provoked her so. No matter what, it was a dereliction of their duty!


    Just as the temple priests were looking at each other in confusion and wondering about the situation off the southwest coast of Garan, a young elven girl kneeling in a corner of the temple lifted her head and softly spoke, "Great Chief Goddess Saoirse, I might know something of the situation on the southwest coast."


    The Goddess¡¯ gaze immediately swept toward her.


    Judging by her clothes, it was clear she was a trainee priest that had been selected from a local temple to practice in the main temple.


    "What¡¯s your name?" A gentle smile appeared on the Goddess¡¯ face, "Tell me, what do you know?"


    "My Goddess; I am Milissa, from Skywater City. It neighbors the west coast. One of my friends is a silver pegasus knight. He just returned to the central mountains recently after being severely wounded on the frontlines. I have heard of some things about the situation o the southwest coast from him."


    "What did he say?"


    "He said that the most dangerous part of the Cmity of Witches this time is not from the Pale Witches. Rather, it is a strange unit that has split off of them. They have a giant metal ship that can fly high above the clouds and can appear in any corner of Garan as they like. Their numbers and strength aren¡¯t great, but they are incredibly mobile and agile. Recently, many elven viges near the west and south coast have been assaulted by them. The numbers of our brothers and sisters that have been abducted cannot be counted."


    Metal ships? Witch unit?


    The Goddess brooded for a moment and finally opened her mouth once again.


    "Summon your friend to the temple. I wish to hear the situation from him in more detail. Very well; leave now, all of you!"


    All the priests promptly left the temple in fear at Saoirse¡¯s order.


    Once the goddess was alone in the broad and empty temple, she turned and looked at a corner of the temple district. A trace of confusion appeared in her eyes.


    "Why did Meve cast down a clone? Could something have happened on her end as well?"


    Her mind turned merely, and the trace of godly will attached to the idol directly arrived in the Moonlight Goddess¡¯ main temple.


    Inside the Moonlight Temple, Goddess Meve¡¯s clone had shut her eyes in contemtion. She suddenly opened them and looked in the direction of the Elven Goddess¡¯ temple in confusion. A short momentter, Goddess Meve suddenly bowed respectfully and said her wees in her sweet voice: "Wee, great Lady Saoirse!"


    The next instant, a blurred projection appeared in her temple, quickly revealed to be Saoirse¡¯s holy and beautiful face and body.


    "Sister Meve, you are too courteous!"


    It was only a manifestation of Saoirse¡¯s godly will that had arrived. Still, given the continuous attention, this manifestation was no different from her true self. That was why Meve had to treat her with the utmost respect, even though they were in Meve¡¯s main temple.


    Saoirse took one step forward and helped up Goddess Meve. Two flower seats silently appeared in the center of the temple, and they both sat down.


    "Sister Meve, I have projected my will this time because of some matters near the southwest coast. Why is it that you have also cast down a clone?" They were both of the elven pantheon and naturally, there was no need to be scrupulous between each other. That was why Saoirse went straight to the topic.


    Goddess Meve betrayed a bitter smile upon her face.


    "I had no choice but to cast down a clone. My only messenger was exterminated by a group of outsiders a few days ago!"


    As members of the elven pantheon, these elven gods were both intimate partners while also often having public and private rivalries.


    Saoirse was the main elven god and naturally had nothing to worry about. Almost all forest elves were her believers. Even the devout followers of other elven gods were her followers to some extent as well.


    However, while she didn¡¯t need to worry about the amount of faith power that she received, the other elven gods clearly could not be so carefree as she was.


    Even though these elven gods often seemed to have great rtionships, both in public and in private, they would not ever budge on the issue of believers.


    After all, the number of believers and the strength of their faith was directly rted to the level of their divine power!


    Niche deities like Meve already held few believers, and those that could be considered devout followers were even fewer. Under such circumstances, the cultivation of a fanatical god messenger would often take upwards of a thousand years of hard work.


    It wasn¡¯t like Saoirse at all. She easily had three or four god messengers under hermand. The loss of a single one would hardly affect the development of her temple.


    That was why Goddess Meve had no choice but to cast down a clone after the ¡¯death¡¯ of the Moonlight Temple¡¯s only god messenger, Xenia. She had to avoid losing the confidence of her followers, even at the cost of exhausting her divine power.


    However, in doing so, most of the daily powers of faith gathered in the temple would have to be supplied to the clone to sustain her existence in Faen. Given that case, the power that could be provided to her true self in the god-kingdom above was minimal.


    If such a situation was drawn out, there was no doubt that the god-kingdom would be destabilized and affect the divine power that the Moonlight Goddess granted to her believers.


    That was why the unpopr Moonlight Goddess would never have cast down her clone unless absolutely necessary!


    "Your god messenger was killed?" Saoirse¡¯s gazed turned sharp, "Where?"


    "Near the west coast?" Goddess Meve couldn¡¯t help but narrow her eyes upon hearing Saoirse¡¯s words.


    She seemed to have realized something at this moment as well.


    "It seems we had best exchange information. If it is the same group of sphemers that have done this, I will make sure to make them regret their actions." Goddess Saoirse said grudgingly.


    The whisperings of the two goddesses echoed within the god temple.

 Chapter 663 The Town is Attacked

    Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge.


    Compared to an ordinary elven vige, this ce was a lot more lively.


    Due to its neighboring Skywater City, elves of the west coast couldn¡¯t avoid passing by Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge on their way to the famous Skywater City.


    This ce became a beautiful town where every passing traveler couldn¡¯t help but stop by.


    Inside the elven kingdom, it was rare to findrge merchant unions like those in human kingdoms. The exchange and trade of goods and resources mostly took ce on a local barter basis. Most elves had long lives and enjoyed artistic pursuits such as music, drawing, gardening, and the like. Their desire for material enjoyment was minimal, and they usually pursued a ¡¯perfect¡¯ life of self-sufficiency.


    While humansmented the brevity of their lives and busily chased after money and power, the elves spent their adolescence roaming as they liked on Garan. They drank dew when they were thirsty, picked wild fruits when they were hungry, and climbed onto any branch to sleep.


    Things like influence, wealth, and power had instead be useless things that wasted their lives. Most elves chose to reject these concerns from their lives.


    It was such a life of enjoyment and an atmosphere that promoted the pursuit of elegance that caused the pace of the elves¡¯ lives to be soid-back and rxed.


    The west coast might have sent several warnings, but most of the ces that had been assaulted were situated upon the shore. That was why the elves of Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge remained as rxed as always, even as Skywater City sent out squads of pegasus knights and hippogryph riders to scout the coast. They were still enjoying every day of their lives to the fullest.


    As night fell, the pedestrians walking to and from Quel¡¯Lithien started to thin out.


    The Fantasy Forest might be the home of the elves, but when night fell, the ferocious magical beasts would alsoe out to roam. The elves didn¡¯t enjoy walking in the forest during the night unless it was necessary either.


    Under a short cliff one and a half kilometers away from Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge, the ck-robed Billis was softly discussing something with Mary.


    After five days of hiding by day and traveling at night, Bug Adept Billis had finally managed to arrive near Quel¡¯Lithien along with his bug army. Now that they hade, the next steps of the operation would have to go ording to Bloody Queen Mary¡¯s instructions.


    That was why everyone remained silent after meeting here. They silently listened to the words from Old Fox Vanlier.


    "This is already a core elven area close to Skywater City. We would be daydreaming if we thought we could calmly surround and exterminate the elves as we have before. If we stay here for too long, a hundred kilometers of distance is nothing for the garrison of Skywater. That is why, regardless of whether we win or we lose, we need to be fast. The time we spend on attacking Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge cannot exceed five hours."


    "Isn¡¯t five hours far too short?! With that much time, even if we sessfully managed to invade the town, we won¡¯t have enough time to clear out the resources inside." Billis said, his face dark as the clouds in the sky.


    "Lord Billis, don¡¯t you forget, we are still in a precarious position here. If our locations are exposed to the elves and their mobile forces catch up, it would be tough for us to lose them and make it to the coast. That is why we definitely cannot stay here for too long. Five hours is enough for us to route the elven garrison in town and take a huge bite out of the cake."


    Mary¡¯s face remained emotionless as she stood to the side. She wasn¡¯t paying too much attention to the conversation going on between Vanlier and Billis. She looked toward the northeast and frowned intensely. She had a constant feeling of tremendous weight pulling upon her heart, making it difficult to breathe.


    Could the operation this time have been exposed? Or was something going to happen during the mission? Or was it that there were some powerhouses nearby?


    For a moment, the countless possibilities swarmed toward her, disturbing her thoughts and making it difficult for her to stay calm!


    "No need to argue anymore!" Mary decisively ordered, "We only have four hours. Once the four hours are up, immediately scatter, regardless of what the oue of the battle is. If you are not afraid of dying, you can stay behind and take the loot; everything you get will be yours. I won¡¯t be asking for any of it as my share!"


    Billis naturally didn¡¯t dare to disagree in front of Mary and nodded his head in agreement.


    Since time was of the essence, there was no longer a need to set up a siege before the attack slowly!


    Aftering to a consensus, everyone immediately split up and began the operation.


    Billis¡¯ bug army was always at his side. He raised his hand slightly as he walked into the woods and softly called out, "Come out, my people!"


    Billis¡¯ had just spoken his words when a hundred-meter area around the woods immediately boiled with activity.


    The ck earth swelled up into tiny hills like waves in an ocean. As the top of these hills broke apart,rge swarms of ck beetles surged outward and turned the area into a horrifying sea of insects.


    Billis¡¯ ck body immediately fell apart and scattered into hundreds and thousands of ck bugs that joined the swarm. They turned into a terrifying flood and rushed toward the nearby Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge.


    Behind the swarm, arge flock of bloodsucking bats borrowed the cover of the canopy and pressed forward as well.


    A frightful scene was urring within the woods beneath the faint dim moonlight!


    ............


    Warren was only an ordinary elven bowman!


    He was very fortunate to be selected as part of Quel¡¯Lithien¡¯s garrison and became a trainee soldier.


    HIs daily mission was to guard the lookout located at the edge of town and prevent the wild and magical beasts from breaking in.


    The job of a guard was incredibly dull.


    If it weren¡¯t for the smart and cute Owie keeping himpany by his side and talking to him, Warren would not have been able to endure the long and silent nights.


    Owie was an owl that had grown up alongside him. He could be considered an animalpanion of his.


    Yet, today, something was clearly off!


    Owie appeared flustered and anxious once night fell. It asionally flew into the forest and circled the ce as if looking for something. However, the night was dark, and the woods were dense. It always came back without any findings.


    Just as the bright moon in the sky had reached its peak, this usuallyposed animalpanion of his continued to circle high in the air as if it had been possessed. Owie then quicklynded on Warren¡¯s shoulder and shrieked.


    "Enemy; danger."


    Warren could only get some simple information from the owl after some quickmunication.


    He wasn¡¯t a druid and couldn¡¯t use nature magic to converse with the animals directly. Warren had only been able to figure this much out thanks to his familiarity and understanding of Owie.


    Enemies were closing in on the lookout?


    Warren quickly shouldered his longbow and picked up a quiver. He tied his shortsword to his waist and pulled on a vine, scampering up the tree near him as quick as an ape.


    Warren found a hidden spot and hid his body with the dense foliage. He then pulled upon his bow and nocked his arrow before hiding his breath and scanning the forest in the night.


    As a trainee member of the garrison, unwarranted rms without finding any enemies would cause hismanders to reprimand him. As such, Warren could only observe his surroundings silently.


    As he calmed himself down and ced his attention upon the night winds, he faintly heard some strange noises aside from the rustling of the leaves.


    Chi chi, cha cha!


    It sounded like insects biting on dead wood, but also like the sound of insects rubbing their shells against each other.


    Such a dense wave of noise. Could all the bugs nearby have gone berserk?


    Warren finally realized something was off as he was still stunned.


    The ground was moving.


    When he looked intently upon the ground, the ck earth itself seemed to be creeping forward, surging toward him soundlessly like a wave.


    The chittering sound was growing increasingly louder!


    The ck curtain of the night could no longer stop Warren¡¯s sharp eyes. His expression finally turned!


    This...this wasn¡¯t the ground moving. It...it was an uncountable number of ck beetles crawling forward.


    They were like a ck sea, surging across the forest, climbing over hills, traversing rivers, and advancing toward Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge at an insane speed.


    Beeeep!


    An ear-piercing whistle finally rang out.


    The arrow in Warren¡¯s hand shot out and instantly sunk into the ck sea of insects.


    Who knew if he even managed to kill any of them? Warren quickly drew his bow again and prepared for another attack.


    Just then, a strange sound of beating wings also arrived by his ear.


    Warren lifted his head in shock; what came into view was a quickly expanding mouth.


    ............


    At the instant the whistle was blown, a lithe and agile female elf emerged from a tree hall in the center of the animated Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge. She looked into the distance where the whistle hade from.


    Almost at the same moment, Deputy Garrison Captain n arrived before the female elf, panting as he pressed his quiver against himself.


    "It seems to be a siren from the southwest! Have you sent someone to investigate?" This capable female elf was the captain of the town¡¯s garrison. She quickly asked the deputy captain this question when she saw him arrive.


    As the military leader of the town, she was not as ignorant as the ordinary elf.


    The west coast had not been peaceful recently!


    If this siren was indeed from the southwest, then the problem might be very, very serious.


    "I have. It¡¯s Warren who¡¯s keeping a lookout on the west tonight. Judging from the sound, it seems to be a siren from the west lookout. What do you think? Do we need to inform the garrison to gather?"


    "Gather!" The female elf captain was still looking into the distance, "I keep having a feeling then something bad might happen tonight."


    Before the deputy captain could ring the bronze bell in the center of town, the southwest direction had already been thrown into chaos.


    The chaos didn¡¯t happen in a single ce. It was confusion everywhere.


    One could see with the naked eye what was happening. The southwest border of Quel¡¯Lithien appeared to have been visited by a foul wind. Everything was snapping and blowing about where it passed. Many elves were screaming at the top of their lungs while quickly fleeing and climbing up tall trees.


    It seemed as if some terrifying beasts had charged into town.


    "Immediately gather the troops. I will go ahead and look."


    The female elf had no time to think. She left her instructions and leaped onto a tall tree, quickly running toward the source of themotion.

 Chapter 664 Fight in the Town

    Outside of the town was chaos by now.


    The surging sea of ck insects was like a fearsome beast that devoured everything in its path. The insects immediately crawled all over any elf that fell into their midst before drowning the elf and turning them into a struggling pile of insects.


    What was even more terrifying was the utterck of any defensive structures around the elven viges and towns. Those loose fences were of absolutely no defensive use apart from defining the range of the elves¡¯ activity.


    If the elves could build tall and durable walls like the humans could, they might have been able to slow down the speed of the insects¡¯ advance temporarily. However, an exposed elven town like the one right now would be the victim of the ck insects¡¯ reckless, devouring expansion.


    Many elves living on the edge of the town were forced into the trees by the swarming insects.


    Before they could calm down and regain their breath, several lightning-fast ck silhouettes and a cluster of crimson clouds engulfed them.


    There were somebat professions with decent strength amongst these elves. They had no room to dodge or run in the face of the magical mantises and the bloodsucking bats. Their only option was to put their lives on the line and trade blows with the enemy. Sadly, be it the magical mantises or the bloodsucking bats, they were never the type toment their losses.


    That was why the elven warriors with excellent sword skills, and the elven bowmen with perfect uracy, were knocked down from the trees by the magical mantises in this chaotic battle before they could even unleash a hundredth of their real power.


    The only thing that could be seen from a distance was a ck flood surging into the border of the elven town. All elven warriors that stood in their way erupted with inner-power aura of different colors, but they were all quickly engulfed by the swarm. Only the elven bowmen could bounce and roam about between the trees and asionally fire one or two powerful shots into the sea of insects.


    Sadly, these stragglers couldn¡¯t survive for much longer either. They were quickly caught up by the groups of magical mantises and exterminated one by one.


    The edge of the town had been thrown intoplete disorder.


    As the female elf captain made it halfway there, she happened to run into the elves that were fleeing and retreating.


    It had only been less than five minutes of battle, but it seemed as if these elves had experienced years and years of trauma. Their faces were pale, and their spirits were clearly shaken. There was nothing in their eyes except for fear.


    The female elf captain was a beginner Second Grade. Upon seeing the urgency of the situation, she immediately grabbed onto a vine and leaped onto a tall tree. She then took out three elven arrows carved with strange magical patterns from her quiver. Beng! Beng! Beng! With three consecutive snaps of her bowstring, three enchanted explosive arrows flew into the ck insect sea in a triangle.


    The next moment, violent explosive shockwaves spread out, again and again, quickly engulfing the front of the ck insect sea into its carnage.


    It immediately reduced the speed of the swarm¡¯s advance.


    Three visible openings had appeared at the front of the swarm!


    Ordinary elven arrows had lost all their previous effectiveness against such a dense swarm of insects. Instead, it was the violent but straightforward explosive arrows that could better deliver area damage. However, when the female elf captain reached into her quiver once again, she frowned at the number of arrows that she could feel.


    There were still thirty of those ordinary elven arrows, but there were only two enchanted explosive arrows left!


    These enchanted arrows with tremendous power could only be crafted by a small number of elven casters in the elven kingdom. That was why even a garrison captain like herself only carried with her five enchanted arrows. If she were to use all of them here, she would not have time to go back to the tree hall to replenish her ammunition.


    At any rate, Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge was a small elven town and had no more than thirty enchanted arrows stored in its warehouses. That was not even close to enough to deal with the situation before them.


    While the captain hesitated, a ck human silhouette quickly swelled into shape from the sea of insects in a street corner. After forming his body with the swarm, Bug Adept Billis looked through the trees and branches at the Second Grade elven deadshot.


    The opponent was a Second Grade. It was already far beyond the limits of what he could hunt.


    As per their previous agreement, Billis¡¯ mission was to drive the swarm forward, smash through all of the town¡¯s defenses, and trap the elves inside the sea of insects. Meanwhile, those elves of Second Grade and above would all be left to Mary and her bloodsucking bats.


    That was why Billis did not show himself after spotting the Second Grade elf, choosing instead to wait in silence.


    Under his wordless instructions, the ck sea of insects ignored the damage from the explosive arrows and continued to surge forward after a momentary pause. His magical mantises also left behind ck afterimages as they slipped past the Second Grade elven deadshot and bounded toward the center of town.


    The captain, who could see everything happening on the battlefield, was infuriated at this.


    Her body shot out like lightning as she quickly shed from tree to tree. The elven arrows in her hands were like beams of magical electricity, quickly striking at the backs of the mantises.


    One of the magical mantises didn¡¯t manage to dodge in time and was pierced through its chest by an elven arrow and pinned to a thick branch.


    With their tremendous life force, such a small wound would not be able to kill them!


    This magical mantis struggled with all it had and slowly pulled the arrow out of its body.


    Just then, the female elf captain had managed to catch up. The elven arrows spilled out of her bow like a torrent. In an instant, the triangr head of the mantis, along with its chest and abdominal sac had all been punctured by the arrows.


    It struggled desperately for a moment more before finally dying of its grievous wounds!


    In the window of these few seconds, the other magical mantises had charged even further toward the tree hall at the center of the town, utterly unfazed by the death of theirpanion.


    The female captain¡¯s expression turned. Her body bent down slightly as she prepared to give chase.


    However, at that very moment, several shrieks rang out from behind her. Enemies that could genuinely threaten her had finally arrived!


    The captain stood atop the towering tree. A single look around her under the illumination of the chilling moonlight allowed her to identify the few unique silhouettes that had enveloped her.


    The ones that had appeared from her north, south, and east were three human knights in strange crimson armor.


    Their bodies were all supple and muscr. Their gazes were cold and wicked. A crimson cape with ck underneath billowed behind all of their backs in the night winds.


    They might look the same as humans on the outside, but the female elf captain knew very well that they were nowhere close to humans. That was because she had a very clear view of what had urred earlier. These adversaries had all transformed from some strange giant bats.


    The captain slowly turned around and faced the beautiful and seductive woman. The woman was slowly descending from the skies, taking small steps as a pair of gray bat wings softly pped behind her back.


    The captain¡¯s spirits went adrift for a moment.


    She never knew a woman could look so wickedly seductive.


    Her perfect and delicate face, her explosive figure, her human-like yet unhuman-like features, her passionate, blood-crimson eyes; the female captain had no choice but to admit that this woman was just as terrifyingly beautiful in her eyes; so beautiful that it broke her heart.


    Charming magic?


    The female elf captain quickly woke up after her momentary daze.


    This time, she finally saw through the opponent¡¯s pretty appearance for her true nature!


    Second Grade...the opponent was a Second Grade as well!


    No; the female captain looked all around her and was shocked to find that all these subordinates of the witch that had surrounded her were Second Grade!


    There was nothing to be discussed between elf and witch.


    The two merely paused for a moment before breaking out into a battle without hesitation.


    Perhaps because she realized that Mary was the leader of this group of individuals, the female elf captain ignored all the attacksunched at her from the three Blood Knights while choosing to focus all her firepower on this pretty witch with a natural ability to charm people.


    Both sides were fighting fire with fire, exchanging blows as quick as they could, and turning and moving under the moonlight above the canopy like a set of revolving doors.


    As their silhouettes were moving too fast, their afterimages were being drawn all across the canopy, especially when seen from afar. The crisp sh of metal upon metal also rang out far into the woods.


    As a Second Grade elven deadshot, the captain also knew all sorts of archery techniques aside from using enchanted explosive arrows. She knew how to infuse arrows with magic, how to guide her shots, and how to fire volleys of arrows. In the mere millimeters of space when dodging attacks, the longbow¡¯s string in the captain¡¯s hand would tremble in session, sending several bolts into parts of the Blood Knights¡¯ armor that left them exposed.


    Sadly, it was only after wasting nearly half of her arrows that the female captain discovered that her opponents were undying monsters. These fiends were still fighting with all their strength even with an arrow through the brain or throat.


    They would casually pull out the arrow, snap it in half, and toss it aside.


    The horrifying wounds left behind by the arrows would heal asyers of crimson halos spread across them, repairing them to their original state.


    Dammit, these monsters had absolutely no weaknesses! This...how was she supposed to kill them?


    Just then, massive magical fireworks shot into the air above the central tree hall of the town. It exploded into pretty lights high up in the sky. From a distance, two hippogryphs could be seen howling as they took to the skies and carried the elven bowmen on their backs rapidly toward Skywater City.


    A call for help had finally been sent out from Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge!


    Yet at this point, it had only been no more than seven minutes since Quel¡¯Lithien was attacked.


    Still, these mere seven minutes already felt like torturous decades to the elves!


    Mary took the opportunity of her three Blood Knights stalling the female captain to transform into a bloody red mist. She then charged to the captain¡¯s side and engulfed her in the mist.


    Both parties fought all-out inside the dense mist of blood. Two massive fireballs exploded in the cloud of blood, following several furious warcries and the explosive snap of a bowstring.


    A short momentter, Mary beat her bat wings and slowly ascended into the skies. She had one hand on the captain¡¯s waist, while her other rested upon the captain¡¯s head as she greedily leaned against her neck and sucked her blood.


    The two massive wounds on Mary¡¯s shoulder and right leg were quickly healing under the shing crimson halos.


    Flooding the enemy with numbers and striking her with their fastest speed. It would be no issue taking down the female elf without any damage as long as Mary was patient.


    However, they were in enemy territory and every extra second in this ce increased the chance of variables popping up. That was why Mary intentionally betrayed a weakness and baited the enemy into using thest two enchanted explosive arrows against her. This way, Mary was able to capture the brief instant where the enemy let loose her shot to break through her defenses, arrive at her side, and capture her.


    Mary forcefully sucked the sweet blood from the captain¡¯s body, while also silently feeding back into the elf a trace of her blood essence. Under Mary¡¯s powerful control, this sliver of blood essence flowed along the captain¡¯s circtory system and slowly seeped into her brain.


    There, the blood essence gradually morphed into an undetectable microscopic blood cocoon and trapped part of the mind in there.


    As this area of her brain became locked away, the female elf captain fell into aa, but her body still trembled uncontrobly. A strange crimson rune slowly appeared on her forehead between her eyes.

 Chapter 665 Fury of the Goddess

    The process of creating the powers of faith was extremely wondrous. In fact, the very existence of faith was such an intangible concept.


    Due to their constant conflict against deities of all sorts, there were quite a few among the adepts who had interest in the research of deities. Through theirprehensive and detailed experiments, they had already started to figure out the methods in which the godsmunicated with their followers. They had uncovered the fact that all this seemed to be rted to brain nodes known as Channels of Faith.


    Ordinary beings upon converting to a god¡¯s believer would be left with a strange brand upon their soul by that god. This brand was like a mystical, magical switch. As long as the believer was in a state of devout prayer, it would be able to construct a narrow yet stable channel of faith between the believer and their god, thus allowing for the transfer of faith power.


    Of course, this channel of faith went both ways.


    When the believer devotedly opened up his mind and soul, his entire being and soul would be bared before the gods. However, the gods simply had no interest in understanding or researching the thoughts and secrets of an ordinary creature!


    Throughrge numbers of experiments and amounts of research, the adepts realized that all they had to do was find a way to shut off part of a believer¡¯s brain to cut off their connection node with their god. That way, a simple Bewitch spell would be all it took to trick a believer into changing their faith.


    However, this method of shutting off and sealing part of the brain was a real test of an adept¡¯s skill.


    If the area of the brain being sealed was off by even a little bit, tremendous damage would be inflicted upon the victim¡¯s intelligence and capacity for rational thought; if the seal ended up working, the victim would be rendered an idiot. The location in the brain of the area to be sealed, and how big the area was supposed to be, were all factors that varied from person to person and from god to god. Thus, everything had to be slowly tested and calcted out.


    Mary herself naturally couldn¡¯t master such high-grade magical knowledge, nor did she possess such refined magical techniques. That was why her attempt to Embrace a Second Grade female elf was mostly relying upon the racial abilities of a vampire.


    In her dozens of experiments before, some high-grade elves had been coincidentally modified by her into blood elves. Sadly, this female elf captain was destined to cause her efforts to be in vain.


    Who knew if it was because of her extraordinarily resilient Spirit, or because of her devotion to her faith. At any rate, a series of waves erupted from within the elf¡¯s soul flux just as the blood cocoon was about to engulf that faith node perfectly.


    These waves were light and powerless and were instantly sealed off by the entangling blood cocoon. However, it indirectly alerted a strange existence tens of thousands of kilometers away.


    Saoirse¡¯s divine manifestation, who was whispering with Goddess Meve in the Moonlight Temple, suddenly had a change in expression. She merely stopped speaking and turned to look in a direction southwest, silently sensing for something.


    "Sister Saoirse, what is it?" Goddess Meve asked confusedly.


    Saoirse hesitated for a moment and then betrayed a trace of anger upon her perfect and delicate face.


    "At this moment, a high-grade believer cut off her faith connection with me."


    Saoirse said in a very casual and vague manner. An ordinary mortal might not even be able to understand the meaning behind those words. However, the one in front of Saoirse was no other person than Moonlight Goddess Meve, a deity much like herself. Meve instantly picked up on the multiple critical points in Saoirse¡¯s words.


    A high-grade believer...node of faith cut off.


    An elf only needed to choose to believe in a particr god, and through some holy prayer ceremonies, the god would be able to leave a special brand within their souls sessfully. Many believers who were favored and cherished by the gods could even materialize this brand and turn it into an extremely striking stigma.


    Those who possessed stigmata were always watched over by a god!


    Even within the system of spiritualists, many god messengers couldn¡¯t materialize stigmata. Only some believers who were notably favored by the gods could possess one.


    Moreover, such a holy brand could only be wiped away with two methods once imnted.


    One was through the death of the believer, and the other was the conversion of their faith.


    However, both of these possibilities rarely happened upon Garan.


    First, conversion.


    A forest elf utterly abandoning their faith for Elven God Saoirse to believe in another god. This...this was practically impossible on Garan. Even Moonlight Goddess Meve¡¯s god messenger had to be a shallow believer of Saoirse, the chief goddess, even as she fanatically believed in Meve.


    It was almost an unfalteringw of the elven pantheon!


    No human or god dared to infringe upon thisw.


    That was why something like conversion couldn¡¯t ever possibly happen.


    Then, the only possibility left was the believer dying.


    However, if the high-grade believer had indeed died, then their holy brand should also have crumbled instantly, rather than being ¡¯cut off¡¯ as Saoirse had mentioned! Didn¡¯t that mean that the faith node still existed, but Saoirse was no longer able to use that faith node tomunicate with the believer?


    No god would tolerate such a matter!


    That was why Saoirse¡¯s face was already filled with unconceble emotion, even as she shut her eyes to sense for what had happened.


    No one knew when, but twenty-seven such urrences had already happened one after the other.


    The only difference was that Saoirse¡¯s true form had been residing high in her god kingdom when it happened before. It had been hard for her to sense this abnormality through the ne barrier clearly.


    Gods might be omnipotent, but they weren¡¯t omniscient!


    Gods might naturally be able to instantly pick up on everything happening to the believers that they were paying attention to. However, when dealing with tens of thousands of ordinary believers, the gods could only afford momentary awareness when they went to temples or altars to pray to them.


    Of course, this also required the believer to do something that could attract the god¡¯s attention! Otherwise, even the most diligent deity had no interest in paying attention to the thoughts of an ant; no, a sheep.


    Yet, it was precisely this phenomenon that caused it to be the darkest under themp itself. Saoirse was shocked to find that twenty-seven¨Cno, twenty-eight¨Cof her followers had mysteriously lost their faith connection with her. However, Saoirse was exceedingly sure that they had not died.


    It was fortunate that she had cast down a holy will because of the matter of her believer being tortured. Otherwise, this matter of her believer being ¡¯stolen¡¯ from her would probably have taken far longer before being uncovered.


    Saoirse nodded at Meve and then moved to return to her main temple without any hesitation.


    Here, with the massive amounts of faith power that had been gathered upon the idol over thousands of years, Saoirse could more efficiently utilize her godly senses and power.


    Saoirse instantly flew into a rage upon feeling out!


    An incident involving many deaths of her believers had urred near an elven city known as Skywater City near the west coast of Garan. Goddess Saoirse went berserk upon sensing the faith nodes disappearing and copsing one after another!


    There was no need for any gestures. A simple thought from her, and the entire main temple lit up with blinding holy radiance. From a distance, it looked as if the main temple had been coated in ayer of golden light. It was shining, pure and holy.


    All elves within the temple district, be they near or far, immediately knelt upon witnessing this sight and began religiously chanting words of praise for the chief elven god, Saoirse.


    Saoirse¡¯s temple priests were the only ones to move upon sensing the abnormality of this golden light, hurrying to the temple and kneeling before the towering idol of their goddess.


    Skywater City...elven believers being massacred.


    The few temple priests looked at each other in the face of Saoirse¡¯s divine decree.


    Elven God Saoirse had never given such a clear holy decree for the defense of one specific location in all of history. The priests could also vaguely sense the fury of the goddess through Saoirse¡¯s cold and chilling tone.


    They didn¡¯t dare hesitate. The priests quickly hurried out of the temple and went to contact the high-grade believers of Skywater City.


    They might have powerful and vast divine power, but they were helpless in stopping a ughter urring tens of thousands of kilometers away. All they could do was pass this news to the elven garrison of Skywater, inform the nearby high-grade believers, and have them be the avengers of the Goddess, killing all evildoers that dared enrage the gods!


    Sadly, the four god messengers of Elven God Saoirse were all upied. Two were stationed upon the frontlines of the south coast, one was stationed on Faen Continent, and thest was guarding the elven goddess; none of them could be easily mobilized. Thus, the priests could onlymunicate with the local priests through the temples and altars, hoping to find a way to mobilize high-grade believers with immense power.


    And who¡¯d have known? After a series of intense arguments and shouting, they managed to find the most appropriate person for the job.


    Eijae, the Spear of Vengeance!


    She was a female elven warrior that had been able to advance to be the rare Spear of Vengeance profession within the kingdom.


    Female elves had always been weak and frail in everyone¡¯s opinion. They weren¡¯t precisely unbearably fragile, butpared to the females of other races, they were somewhat slender and delicate and gave off the feeling that they might shatter upon touch.


    This Spear of Vengeance Eijae might be a female elf, but she had none of the usual frailty of an ordinary female elf. Instead, she gave off an impression of masculine toughness and fearlessness.


    Her appearance wasn¡¯t ugly. It couldn¡¯t possibly be ugly.


    However, the way she dressed was utterly different from an ordinary female elf. She went for a brutal and savage aura, not unlike the Amazons. She wore carved ck leather armor along with a girdle soaked in sweat on her waist. That was all that she wore.


    No earrings or pendants, no nes or headbands, no bracelets or flowers; in conclusion, she didn¡¯t like anything that ordinary female elves fancied, dressing like an Amazon warrior and bringing her favorite throwing spears everywhere she went.


    Indeed, her preferred weapon wasn¡¯t an elven longbow, nor was it an elven longsword or saber. They were throwing spears filled with murderous aura.

 Chapter 666 Conclusion of the Battle

    The Spear of Vengeance was a path of development that went utterly against the mainstream of the elves that allowed such a fearless elf, who was as muscr as a male elf, to jaw-droppingly advance to Third Grade.


    At that time, it had caused a noteworthymotion within the elven kingdom!


    The unhealthy custom of the elves to judge people on their appearances was hard to shake off. Even though Spear of Vengeance Eijae had the power of a Third Grade, most elves still found it difficult to acknowledge her ¡¯chivalry¡¯ and ¡¯valor.¡¯ After all, elegant speech, noble aura, and pretty looks were what determined nobility and status in the tradition of the forest elves.


    As for bloodshed and means of murder? These were not necessities required for a peaceful life in the eyes of the forest elves!


    Thus, even with Spear of Vengeance Eijae¡¯s power and reputation, she was still rejected from mainstream society by the higher elves of the kingdom.


    Still, the priests under Saoirse were immediately overjoyed to hear that Eijae was currently living near Skywater City. Under their insistent orders, a mission delegation was quickly signed and sent out in the name of the Elven God¡¯s main temple.


    ............


    The battle at Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge was still ongoing.


    Whenpared to the savagery of the insect sea, the elves¡¯ resistance was weak and powerless.


    Theirck of strong fortresses and untraversable terrain caused the wide and t forest roads, tree bridges, and winding vines to be paths upon which the swarm could freely travel.


    The living space of the elves was being pushed back, bing smaller and smaller.


    Most of the elves had even been forced up the canopy, relying on the winding vines and tree bridges to quickly move from tree to tree. Yet, it was at this moment that the fast magical mantises became even more terrifying.


    They were like wicked wolves hiding outside the herd, relying on the cover of the trees to quickly close in on the resisting elves. Once the magical mantises found the opportunity to rush forward, their lightning-fast speed and extremely sharp scythe-limbs were an absolute counter to the elven de dancers and bowmen.


    While the forest elves were still running and escaping via the canopy, the magical mantises would catch up with unbelievable speed and cut them down or knock them off the tree one by one.


    The elves that fell from the treetops had no chance to get up again; they were instantly pinned to the ground by the swarm. It didn¡¯t matter how hard they fought. They could not escape the tragic end of being eaten alive by tens of thousands of bugs!


    Billis, still hiding within the sea of insects, didn¡¯t care for the deaths of these elves. He took advantage of the insects¡¯ cover to devour plenty of elvenbat professions. The ordinary elves, on the other hand, would be dragged underground after being bitten to death. There, white eggs would be stuffed into their bodies.


    Many elf corpses were already bloated like balloons!


    With the nourishment of the elven meat, dozens and hundreds of ck bugs would climb out of every hatched egg. These young ck insects feasted on flesh and matured at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    When their slimy bodies hardened into tough shells that could resist des and swords, they would surge to the surface and join the rumbling swarm.


    It was through such a technique of instant hatching and maturation that the boundless sea of ck insects had not only not shrunk since the start of the battle, but had even started growing in size.


    The swarms of the past didn¡¯t have too many abilities apart from sharp fangs and limbs. However, with the increase of Bug Adept Billis¡¯ power, the swarm had also evolved and gained some strange abilities.


    Billis was only First Grade now. The only ability he could grant the swarm was the ability to tunnel.


    The reason why such a massive bug army had been able to hide from the elven patrol and their flying scouts to sneak all the way to Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge was due to the swarm¡¯s ability to tunnel.


    One could easily forsee the swarm gaining new abilities with Billis¡¯ continued growth.


    If the swarm was said to be the warriorsmanded and controlled by Billis, then the magical mantises were generals and heroes of the hive. Their numbers were few, but every one of them had powerfulbat ability that far surpassed ordinary insects.


    Even in their current form, the magical mantises possessed all sorts of strange abilities: Submerge, Rapid Flight, Looming Presence, Rabid Execution, Entrap, and many more. They were like assassins hiding within the swarm. It would be exceedingly difficult for the enemy to escape unscathed once they reached the enemy¡¯s side.


    The unique Entrap ability was like an invisible shackle. As long as the magical mantises¡¯ scythe-like limbs came into contact with the enemy¡¯s blood, the enemy would no longer be able to escape from them. The only way to survive was to kill these magical mantises!


    In truth, if one were topare the numbers of the swarm and the First Grade warriors in the elven garrison, the garrison of Quel¡¯Lithien would easily crush these magical mantises that barely numbered thirty. However, the elves possessed no ability to defend against the endless assault of the swarm, let alone being able to assemble formations to deal with the magical mantises.


    The de dancers and elven archers had their formations scattered by the swarm, and could only escape in groups of two or three using the cover of the trees.


    Loose groups like these had no chance to retaliate or resist the squads of magical mantises. As long as they were forced off the trees by the mantises, the surging swarm would be able to devour any of the enemies.


    During such a one-sided battle, the magical mantises also encountered brave resistance from the elves. Three magical mantises had already died on the battlefield since the start of the fight. However, the elves had already lost over a hundred First Grade fighters.


    The elven powerhouses with eye-catching performance were immediately be swarmed by Mary and her Blood Knights the moment they showed themselves.


    Regardless of how individually strong these elven powerhouses were, they would not be able to fend off attacks from multiple Second Grade vampires unless they were of the undefeatable Third Grade.


    In this crimson cloud of vampires floating above the canopy, there were a group of blood elves with strange abilities apart from Mary and her three Blood Knights. The blood elves numbered only seventeen, three of them being Second Grade. The newly added Second Grade blood elf was the female captain that Mary had just embraced.


    The captain didn¡¯t look much different. She was still using the same weapons as well.


    The only obvious difference was her eyes¨C they were crimson red.


    The female elf that had just been fighting selflessly for the forest elves had now turned into a cold and bloodthirsty blood elf marksman. Her arrows filled with crimson energy cut across the sky. Every shot was apanied by the sound of an elf howling as they fell from a tree.


    There were two deadshots in the three Second Grade blood elves that Blood Queen Mary had Embraced. Thest remaining Second Grade blood elf was a weapons master. Now that they had the ability to drain blood, they became far more fearless and reckless with their attacks.


    If their techniques were said to be suited forbat while they were forest elves, then now that they had be blood elves, they had been modified to be ideally suited for ughter!


    Combat and ughter sounded simr; the difference didn¡¯t seem huge. However, when ced on a bloody battlefield where death and life were decided in the matter of an instant, then the difference betweenbat and ughter was what determined the oue!


    Every single elven ability was crafted too much in pursuit of beauty and elegance. The elves could never use vicious moves such as having an ally take a hit for them, trading blow for blow, or even simply rolling upon the ground. However, these modified blood elves did not hesitate to charge up to the enemy¡¯s side and trade wounds with the enemy, even if it meant them being more greviously wounded.


    In fact, they didn¡¯t even care if the enemy¡¯s des shed apart their delicate and pretty faces.


    These were all things that the forest elves could never do!


    ............


    At this moment of the battle, the forest elves were already starting to show signs of copse.


    By the time the ck sea of insects devoured the elven town, the garrison had lost all its home-field advantage. They had no choice but to blow the horn of retreat.


    The ck forms of the swarm were everywhere across the deep woods.


    The elves could only jump upon the tall trees, desperately fleeing toward Skywater City.


    At first, they still gathered in groups of two and tree, covering for each other as they retreated.


    However, when the squads of magical mantises struck, these loose groups immediately fell apart. The elves could only give up on all hopes of retaliation and turned to escape as fast as they could.


    Up in the towering ancient trees, the ck outlines of the magical mantises were like the silhouettes of roaming reapers. Apart from slightly wounding them, all elves that were caught by the magical mantises had no chance of escaping.


    One slender and tall silhouette after another was caught up to by the magical mantises and quickly fell to the ground. What was left was the constant repeat of the same unspeakably horrific scene.


    With the presence of the magical mantises, few elves were fortunate enough to escape Quel¡¯Lithien!


    However, the three treant warriors that served as guardians of the town also delivered tremendous casualties to the army of insects. Be it the swarm or the vampires, none of them had powerful long-ranged attacks. Apart from swarming the treants with sheer numbers, they had no other way of dealing with the tough and sturdy treant warriors.


    In the end, Billis¡¯ bug army paid a price of fifty thousand insects to fell these three ¡¯sacrificial pawns¡¯ that had stayed behind as the rear guard.


    In only one and a half hours, the insect-vampire alliance led by Mary and Billis had routed the elven garrison.


    They then spent another hour to pursue the elves and deal with the three treant warriors. By the time they returned to Quel¡¯Lithien, it had been three hours already. This way, there was only one hour left for them to gather the spoils and scour the town for elven resources.


    As such, the horrifying insect army that had just been fighting promptly broke out into bustling work in a race against time.

 Chapter 667 Pursuit in the Nigh

    t


    Eijae sprinted under the bright and crisp moonlight.


    Ancient trees that were several dozen meters tall were like t ground beneath her feet. Cliffs and rivers were left behind in a matter of moments.


    The damp winds of the night pressed against Eijae¡¯s face, soaking her armor and her face, yet they were incapable of extinguishing the burning fires of rage in her heart.


    Eijae had set off on the journey alone upon hearing news of Quel¡¯Lithien¡¯s invasion from the mouth of a hippogryph rider, even before the envoy from the main temple had arrived.


    The garrison of Skywater City was still trying its best to assemble when she set off.


    Since the enemy had so daringly invaded Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge, a mere one hundred kilometers away from Skywater, it either meant that they were immensely powerful and unafraid of a counterattack from the garrison of SKywater City, or that this was a conspiracy intended to draw the garrison away.


    The elvenmanders and high elves of Skywater City broke out into an argument in the meeting hall, bickering non-stop over the scale of the incursion.


    Much like the corrupt and indulgent nobles of human society, the elven kingdom also had certain special sses¨C the high elves. The so-called high elves were still forest elves, and the only difference was their bloodline going even further back into history, into ancient times.


    They prided themselves over this, believing that only high elves were the purest and noblest of all forest elves. They refused to intermarry with peasants, trying their best to safeguard their bloodline from external contamination. They had exceptional authority within the kingdom. The positions of elder and council member in the elven kingdom could mostly only be taken on by high elves.


    Though the elvenmanders of Skywater City had absolute military authority, they couldn¡¯tpletely ignore the protests of these high elf nobles.


    The elvenmander had intended to send all of their aerial forces to first hurry over as reinforcements the moment they received news of Quel¡¯Lithien¡¯s invasion. An ordinary-sized ground force also had to be mobilized. Sadly, the variety of units and the number of soldiers continued to be cut down due to the protests of the high elves.


    The irritable Eijae furiously chose to move out alone, unable to tolerate such heartless and cold-blooded administrative dy!


    About five or six elven powerhouses made the same decision as Eijae. These were all Second Grade ¡¯rogues¡¯ that refused to be bound by the military.


    Sadly, their speed and stamina could hardlypare with the powerful Eijae. Thus, they were quickly left behind by the Spear of Vengeance after the first fifty kilometers.


    How free and fun was it to travel through the sea of trees under the sacred and beautiful moonlight!


    If it weren¡¯t for the concern for her tribesmen that filled Eijae¡¯s heart, she would have shouted out in excitement at this moment. In fact, she would have even sought out a powerful magical beast for a showdown.


    The fearsome name of Eijae, the Spear of Vengeance might not be all that widespread amongst the elves, but she had an infamous title as the ¡¯Madwoman¡¯ among the magical beasts of the central mountains!


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the immensely powerful Wyvern King, the iparably strong Giant Raging Ape, or even the cunning and sly Silver-Tailed Fox; all of them would be endlessly harassed by Eijae, crying until they had no tears left and with no one toin to. All other magical beasts with any fame or power would immediately be visited and challenged by Eijae.


    One could say that Eijae¡¯s terrifyingbat techniques had all been honed in the thousands of life and death challenges she had initiated. The many scars of various sizes that covered her body were the best proof of her insane drive andbat will!


    The forest elves might be the owners of Garan, but traveling through Fantasy Forest during the night was still a perilous thing to do.


    The wild beasts that ordinarily hid within their caves during the day would all pour out of their dense nightfall, roaming the dark forest for fresh meat. Most wild beasts were affected by the power of nature and would not actively attack the forest elves. However, there was no preventing wild animals under the effects of starvation or malice to suddenlysh out at the elves.


    That was why, under ordinary circumstances, the forest elves would also keep to some unspoke rules, such as never going near or passing through the territories of wild beasts during the night.


    However, these rules were seemingly non-existent for Eijae. She even let out a long roar as she ran, actively challenging the kings among magical beasts.


    Sadly, her voice and aura were well-known among the magical beasts. Consequently, not only were the forests she passed absent of any responses from the magical beasts, they even became absurdly quiet. All magical beasts temporarily halted their hunts and hid in the bushes, praying that this demon of a female would leave their territory as soon as possible.


    One hundred kilometers of winding forest roads tired even Eijae after running all that distance in one go. She was soaked in sweat.


    By the time she gradually approached Quel¡¯Lithien, she started to meet elves that had escaped from that ce. Eijae was heartbroken to hear the worst of news from their mouths.


    A roaring ze had turned this former elven town into a sweltering sea of fire.


    The overwhelming waves of heat and licking tongues of mes forced anyone away before they could even enter Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge.


    Several elves that had escaped from the town knelt at the edge of the fire in agony, crying, wailing, and drowning in their sorrow.


    Beside them, Eijae¡¯s body started to give off purple waves of air. She walked into the field of fire one step at a time with all her determination.


    Quel¡¯Lithien Lodge was a mid-sized elven town. Almost three dozen giant ancient trees that reached up to a hundred meters tall formed its core area.


    Unlike the broad, straight roads of human settlements, no such structures were ever seen in the elven towns and cities. The homes and buildings of the elves were all constructed upon the base of the ancient treetops where all the branches converged. Tree bridges and vines were what were used to connect these structures.


    Today, this prosperous and beautiful elven town had been put to the torch by the evil enemy. Every single tree in a radius of one and a half kilometers had been devoured by the sea of fire, twisting and struggling painfully in the unrelenting ze.


    Eijae walked through the mes solemnly as the fire lit up her face.


    She used her violent sacrificial inner power to force back the mes shrouding her sides and quickly scanned the ce with her eyes, trying to find the enemy¡¯s location.


    The enemy clearly hadn¡¯t gone far!


    The mes might be ferocious, but Eijae could still seerge patches of ck blood stains on the branches, grounds, and the leaves. Eijae also saw plenty of ck beetle corpses covering the ground around the few treant warriors at the center of the town.


    The treant warriors had obviously fought until thest moment of their lives.


    A thick pile of insect corpses buried their copsed bodies. Numerous wounds of various sizes could be seen all over their bodies.


    Even more strange was Eijae¡¯s discovery of a small handful of ashes at the edge of this tragic battlefield.


    Eijae squatted by the ashes and picked up some of them with her right hand. She rubbed the ashes in her hand.


    They took to the air, so light it was like they were weightless.


    It was a small handful of ashes that was the product of something wholly burned.


    Eijae couldn¡¯t help but narrow her eyes.


    It wasn¡¯t umon for ashes to appear in such a ferocious field of fire. However, it was odd to burn anything so thoroughly that no bone shards or minerals remained.


    In Eijae¡¯s impression, only unique spirits or undead could produce such a strange phenomenon upon death. If her deduction was correct, it was proof that some powerful undead creatures had appeared in the ranks of these witches.


    Undead creatures were evil, and the witches were evil as well.


    It wasn¡¯t all that surprising for them to coborate!


    The only thing that confused Eijae was how the evil witches had managed to create such a dizzying number of insects. If the scale of the insect army was sorge, then what method was it that they had used to avoid the elven patrol and the aerial scouts that were everywhere?


    Eijae¡¯s face turned while she was still wondering. Her eagle-like eyes quickly focused upon a spot on the forest ground. There was a small pile of dirt and what seemed to be an insect cave there. That ce seemed to have experienced the most concentrated zes of fire.


    It seemed as if the departing witches were trying to use the fire to hide something.


    Eijae¡¯s feet tapped the ground, and she quickly arrived at that empty space.


    Her expression shifted slightly when her feet stepped on the ground.


    There was a cave underneath. The sound of her step was slightly different from solid ground.


    Eijae didn¡¯t hesitate. She jumped into the air as a throwing spear from the leather sack behind her back immediately appeared in her hand. She inhaled in midair and started drawing upon her power. Violent purple sacrificial inner-power rapidly gathered upon the throwing spear.


    The next second, a purple afterimage that could hardly be captured by the naked eye sted across a distance of a dozen meters and exploded in the center of the space.


    The savage and ferocious shockwave momentarily extinguished the fires around the area, and the scorched earth copsed into a massive pit. Once the ashes had dispersed, a horrifying scene appeared within the hole. Spear of Vengeance Eijae almost spontaneously flew into a mad rage.


    The bottom of the pit was filled with arge pile of flesh and withered bones, along with a pungent slime. Plenty of white cocoon shards and dyingrvae that had yet to mature could be seen amidst all this ¡¯waste.¡¯


    When EIjae looked upon these twisted corpses, she could almost imagine how they looked while they were still alive; she could envision the immense suffering that they¡¯d had to endure at that moment.


    Eijae let out a furious roar into the sky and kicked against the ground with a single leg. She leaped into the air, and the Spear of Vengeance in her hand quickly shed. A circr ring of explosions blew up around the pit. Under her intentional control, the shockwaves of the st were all spread outward, instantly clearing out the center of the fire in the town.


    The witches had set fire to this ce because they didn¡¯t want the elves discovering their deeds. They just hadn¡¯t ounted for Eijae appearing as fast as she did.


    The Spear of Vengeance¡¯s destructive strength forcefully extinguished the fires around the pit. She then turned with lightning speed and sprinted toward the southwest of the town.


    The enemy hadn¡¯t gone far!


    If they were still carrying their spoils with them, she would definitely be able to catch up!

 Chapter 668 Secret Battle in the Woods

    The dark forest was deathly silent. Only an odd chattering sound remained.


    A vast army of insects traveled within the Fantasy Forest. The roars of ferocious magical beasts fighting with magical mantises rang out every so often from the darkness in the distance.


    The weak beasts were smart enough to run far away the moment they sensed the arrival of the swarm. Only those brainless magical beasts thatcked sharp instincts would ignore the strength of the swarm and charge out of their dens to ¡¯defend¡¯ their homes.


    Sadly, they were fated never to return!


    It seemed Lady Mary was not optimistic about this hunt. She had quickly cleared the battlefield once the fighting had ended and left with all her vampires. Bug Adept Billis was left behind and despite all of his efforts, clearing out the elven town still took up one and a half hours of his time.


    Now, as hemanded the swarm to take away the three dozen elves he had specially selected, along with the troves of previous resources, it was difficult for him to move as stealthily as he had arrived. Thus, Billis had no choice but to march above ground, spreading the magical mantises around the perimeter to chase away and exterminate any idiotic magical beasts that couldn¡¯t recognize the threat that he posed.


    As the insect army quickly traversed a clear and shallow stream, Billis suddenly turned his head and looked back at the zing battlefield in the distance.


    Fifteen kilometers of obstructing forests made it impossible for him to see what was happening there directly, but the explosion of energy caused him to frown deeply.


    So fast?


    Amotion had started in the sea of fire less than half an hour since he had led the insect army away from Quel¡¯Lithien. That could never be considered a good thing!


    Billis had traveled fifteen kilometers in half an hour. Taking into consideration how dangerous the forest was in the night, there was no way an ordinary person could track down the insect army. However, Billis wasn¡¯t so sure about this when they were dealing with elves.


    The bug adept sensed the traces of energy fluctuations from a distance, and his face turned solemn.


    To think he could sense the shockwave of the energy explosion from fifteen kilometers of forest away! It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how much fury was contained in that one attack of the enemy! Judging from the energy intensity, the chance of it being a peak Second Grade was seventy percent. There was even a thirty percent chance of it being a Third Grade.


    It didn¡¯t matter which it was. Neither were enemies that Billis could defeat at his current strength!


    Billis wordlessly gave up a series of orders to every corner of the swarm.


    Upon crossing the stream, therge swarm continued marching while a cluster of several thousand ck beetles stopped. These beetles then started to prepare for an ambush on this side of the shore.


    Billis even left behind a magical mantis for good measure.


    The swarm hadn¡¯t even made it seven kilometers away from the stream when the ambush found their prey.


    Sadly, this prey was practically a berserk beast. She exterminated the ¡¯tail¡¯ that Billis had left behind almost instantly.


    The other ck beetles had died far too quickly. They were greeted with a shower of energy throwing spears before they could even charge out of their hiding spots.


    Indeed, they were energy spears, not actual physical throwing spears!


    These energy throwing spears were soaked with iparably savage purple inner-power and would turn into terrifying energy explosions upon contact. The lithe and muscr female elf simply jumped into the air. The Spear of Vengeance that she held tightly in her grip merely trembled slightly as several projections of purple throwing spears shot into the swarm.


    These beetles that Billis had hatched all possessed tough shells and could endure quite a lot of physical damage. However, they appeared inadequate before such savage and ferocious inner-power energy attacks.


    The exploding energy spears hadpletely exterminated the over one thousand ck insects before they couldpletely swarm out of their hiding spots.


    Meanwhile, Billis also managed to rely on the eyes of the magical mantis hiding in the canopy to see the true face of the enemy, even from six kilometers away.


    A female elf; a muscr female elf whose body would not lose to any male.


    In particr, the dominant aura of that ferocious form as she leaped through the sky, tossed her throwing spear, and roared frightened even Billis.


    Just as Billis was secretly spying on the enemy, the strong female elf¡¯s eyes quickly swept across the area. An incredibly sharp, piercing, and furious gazended upon the magical mantis through the dense foliage.


    Not good.


    Billis immediately knew things were turning south. He quickly controlled the magical mantis and had it dodge.


    But it was toote!


    A wooden spear shrouded in violent purple inner-power cut through a hundred meters of woods under his terrified gaze and pierced right through the magical mantis, pinning it to a tree trunk. The savage inner-power attached to the spear instantly erupted, engulfing everything within three meters in a tide of purple.


    Nothing remained of the magical mantis! Not even a corpse or a bone!


    Billis¡¯ body stumbled. He was almost directly affected by the purple tide that almost managed to reach him through the mental connection.


    The enemy had actually killed an intermediate First Grade magical mantis in a single hit!


    This terrifying reality caused Billis¡¯ hairs to stand on end.


    Third Grade; absolutely a Third Grade. In fact, it was even possible for her to be a Fourth Grade.


    The insect army that was hauling the elven prisoners and resources immediately started stirring. Twenty-three magical mantises charged into the midst of the elven prisoners, quickly stabbing with their sharp scythe-limbs, piercing holes into the thighs and stomachs of the elves.


    All the prisoners fell to the ground, grunting and screaming in pain.


    For a moment, the entire forest was filld with their moans of agony!


    Still, while the magical mantises had been extremely vicious with their attacks, none of them seemed to have caused the elves to die directly.


    The magical mantises and the swarm abandoned all prisoners and resources after inflicting sufficient injuries upon them. They then charged into the dark forest without turning back.


    Five minutester, Spear of Vengeance Eijae charged into this part of the woods, still shrouded in ayer of purple light.


    The scene that came into her sight caused her to pause for a moment before stomping her feet in absolute fury.


    What cunning and sly and enemies!


    The enemy would definitely not be able to flee too far if they brought the prisoners and the spoils along with them.


    If the enemy had chosen to kill all of the elves, Eijae would only have increased the intensity of her pursuit, even as she boiled with even more rage.


    Wasn¡¯t it just perfect now? The enemy had left her with a ground sprawled full of critically injured elves. If she didn¡¯t quickly attempt to save them, several of these elves might bleed to death here. However, if she were to stay here and rescue the injured, then the enemy would be able to escape her grasp at leisure.


    Eijae angrily gritted her teeth. She wanted nothing more than to eat the enemy alive at this moment. Just then, a crisp and loud call came from the distant horizon.


    As a veteran elven powerhouse, Eijae immediately broke into a smile upon hearing this call.


    It was a hippogryph!


    Eijae¡¯s wrist waved, and a blinding purple light pierced through the canopy and shot straight up into the skies.


    The bird calls quickly converged upon the spot with this clear signal as a guide.


    A short momentter, the ancient tree above her shook as several lithe silhouettes descended from above.


    "It¡¯s Lady Eijae."


    "We found Lady Eijae."


    "The prisoners that were taken away are here as well! Everyonee down!"


    Rustling noises rang out, and more forest elves leaped down from the trees.


    These elves were clearly from Skywater City. They might not be very powerful, but their speed when riding upon the hippogryphs wasn¡¯t much slowerpared to Eijae.


    Their arrival had helped Eijae deal with this tremendous trouble. At least she, the ¡¯butcher,¡¯ no longer needed to tend to a chore like saving the wounded.


    "Leave some people behind to save the injured. The rest follow me to chase after those bastards!" Eijae roared furiously and immediately leaped up the canopy.


    There, upon the canopy, several four-meter-long hippogryphs with bodies full of tough feathers were peacefully resting upon the branches. All these hippogryphs shifted ufortably upon seeing Eijae close in on them. Their eagle-like gazes focused sharply on this crass intruder.


    The hippogryphs might be the tamed mounts of the elves, but they weren¡¯t creatures that ordinary people could hope to ride. Hippogryphs were plenty hostile toward strangers that they weren¡¯t familiar with.


    Still, due to the urgency of the situation, Eijae had no time to stare down this bunch of ¡¯livestock.¡¯ She grunted, and her entire body was shrouded in purple inner power. The powerful aura of a Third Grade powerhouse was instantly invoked to suppress this rowdy bunch of beasts.


    Her outline shed as she leaped onto thergest and most muscr hippogryph of the flock.


    "Go."


    The hippogryph was extremely unwilling, but under her cold and unyielding coercion, it had no choice but to kick off with its legs and beat its massive wings. It took the bird all it had to ascend to the skies, barely.


    Those who were selected as hippogryph riders were typically light and slender elven girls. They also usually only wore light leather armor and carried bows and arrows. That was the only way to limit their weight to a range tolerable for hippogryphs. Meanwhile, the Spear of Vengeance was a barbaric person whose body could put to shame even the most muscr of males. Her body was also covered in all sorts of belts, shoulder knives, shortswords, throwing spears, daggers, and other melee weapons.


    This particr hippogryph was in for a lousy time when such a severely overweight giantess with so many weapons rode upon it!


    It pped its wings painfully and tried to maintain its height, desperately gliding in the night sky.


    Eijae seemed to be utterly ignorant of the calls of protests from the hippogryph beneath her; she just scanned the dark Fantasy Forest below with her sharp eyes.


    All of a sudden she turned her head as if she had heard something strange in the forest.


    She tugged at the hippogryph¡¯s head with her throwing spear and the beast intelligently changed directions.


    Eijae raised her throwing spear as they closed in on the position where the chattering sound wasing from. Blinding purple light instantly gathered on the spear. She roared furiously, and the spear shot downward at lightning speed, disappearing into the dark, dark forest.


    "Die!"


    The next second, a purple energy storm enveloped the entire forest.

 Chapter 669 Game of Cat and Mouse

    A game of cat and mouse was being yed out in the depths of Fantasy Forest.


    The ck dirt in a spot of dark bushes suddenly broke apart. Arge swarm of ck beetles surged out from within and gradually swelled into an odd human silhouette.


    Bug Adept Billis remotely sensed for the ¡¯bait¡¯ in the other spots after forming his insect body. An ugly expression immediately took over his face.


    He had already sent out four squads of decoys to avoid the pursuit of that powerful elf, with each of the teams heading toward a different area. Yet now, there seemed to be only two remaining squads that he could sense.


    That meant two insect armies with over ten thousand bugs had been consecutively exterminated in the time he had been running. What died along with these two insect armies were six of his magical mantises.


    After all, the magical mantises were essentially his bodyguards. It would have been hard to trick the forest elves, who call the Fantasy Forest their home, had he not sent the magical mantises along with the decoy squads.


    Billis didn¡¯t dare show himself in the face of such a powerful elf. He could only repeatedly sever his own tail in hopes of drawing the enemy away. Sadly, the speed at which the insect army traveled underground was far too slow. Even though the elves would asionally be drawn away, they were quickly able to exterminate the decoys and then continue looking for the actual army.


    Those hippogryphs riders were riding the coattails of a ferocious tiger. They would never have dared appear in front of the magical mantises under ordinary circumstances. Yet now, they were brazenly traveling above the sea of trees, using their Whispering Winds, nt Speech, Animal Speech, and all sorts of strange skills to search for the news and location of thergest insect army.


    In the end, Fantasy Forest was the home of the forest elves!


    They had far too many methods and ways in which to investigate the tracks of outsiders here.


    That was why Billis immediately steeled his heart and made up his mind after being forced above ground once more. He split the eighteen magical mantises and one hundred and twenty thousand insects he controlled into four troops and had them escape in four different directions, not even bothering with traveling underground.


    This way, the trail of the swarm recklessly running and eating their way through the forest could be clearly seen. Meanwhile, the apanying magical mantises relied on their Grass Stalking ability to hide in the canopy, waiting for the elven archers to fly low past the canopy to suddenly strike.


    A devastating scenario quickly unfolded due to the use of this tactic. For a moment, situations of elven archers being ambushed and murdered happened all over a fifty-kilometer radius of the Fantasy Forest. Meanwhile, Spear of Vengeance Eijae was bringing along an elite squad of archers to extinguish the fires where they popped up.


    Wherever a vast army of insects or magical mantises appeared, they would rely on the hippogryphs to quickly show up.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the dense swarm of insects or the savage and cunning mantises; all of them were insignificant ants before Eijae, the Spear of Vengeance. Even if Billis gathered all the magical mantises together and had them charge at Eijae, he would only be making things easier for her. It was difficult for him to inflict even a slight bit of damage to the elf with such low numbers.


    It was because he recognized this to be the truth that Billis had decisively split up the magical mantises and had them fight on their own, avoiding the groups of elves and powerhouses to pick off the isted soldiers. It might not stop the death of the magical mantises, but in the end, it could still tug at the enemy¡¯s attention and energy, dying their inevitable demise.


    After paying such a tremendous price, Billis led an army of thirty thousand insects and six magical mantises away, escaping toward the southeast.


    The insect army had been desperately moving toward the west coast the whole time they had been on the run. Billis was worried that the elves had grasped his movements. He could only choose to send two decoy squads in that direction, while he personally led his army toward the southeast.


    Perhaps his decoy strategy had worked, for many of the hippogryph riders had truly been confused by theplex movements of the enemy. Their main forces were all chasing after the decoys.


    It gave Billis plenty of chances to escape. After running while fending off some elven pursuers, he immediately retaliated with all his strength upon reaching a safe zone. With his six magical mantises and thirty thousand insects, Billis instantly shredded to pieces the one dozen hippogryphs riders that had chased him all this way. It was only now that he unwillingly fled into the woods.


    By the time Spear of Vengeance Eijae heard of the news and arrived at the scene of carnage, the odd army of insects had already disappeared without a trace.


    The furious Eijae immediately ordered the apanying elves to return to Skywater City and report the situation so that they could deploy the garrison of nearby elven cities to blockade the enemy. Meanwhile, she once again took to the roads alone, chasing after some faint tracks left by the insect army into the woods.


    ............


    There was an area of scattered rocks near the coastline.


    On one side were the raging and swirling tides, and on the other some somewhat bare bushes and trees.


    The Fantasy Forest only started to thin out at this point. It was hard to see any of those tall and straight ancient trees. The only greenery here in this stony area were low bushes and slippery moss.


    A massive horde of bloodsucking bats was hanging upside down from the ceiling of a damp and extremely well-hidden cave at the edge of the coast. They were huddled together in a group. Six young men and women sat silently by a campfire dug into the ground below, their backs straight as a de.


    Three of them had muscr bodies, wore crimson armor, and had crimson longswords at their waist. It was the three blood knights that had followed after Mary all this while¨C Soros, Windsor, and Jos¨¦. The ones sitting opposite them were the three Second Grade blood elves that Mary had just recruited¨C Bonnie (female, archer), Candice (female, archer), and Leo (male, weapons master).


    Those First Grade fellows? They could only shiver on the outside. They were not even qualified to get near these Second Grade powerhouses.


    Meanwhile, the master of all these vampires, Bloody Queen Mary, was leaning against a stone tform, resting with her eyes closed as her old fox Vanlier waited loyally by her side.


    The soft sound of beating wings rang out.


    A single bloodsucking batnded in the field of rocks. It looked around with its beady little eyes and made sure no one had followed it before pushing aside a pile of stones and squeezing into the cave.


    The bat transformed into a young man after some rapid contortions and transformations. He tiptoed his way to Vanlier¡¯s side and whispered some words into his ear.


    Afterpleting his report, this young man transformed into a bat once more near the entrance of the cave, flew out, and headed toward the forest once again.


    "What¡¯s the matter?" Mary asked without even opening her eyes. She had propped her head up with her hand and was lying upon the stone tform by her side.


    "Master, the scouts we have arranged around the perimeter came back to report the elves patrolling half as frequently as they did yesterday. What do you think?" Vanlier hurriedly bowed and replied.


    Mary hesitated for a moment before opening her eyes and asking, "How are things on Billis¡¯ side?"


    "Lord Billis has already sent you three requests for aid." Vanlier smiled bitterly, "That Spear of Vengeance is hot on his heels. I heard that Lord Billis¡¯ insect army numbers less than twenty thousand now!"


    After all these days of investigation, the vampires had already figured out information regarding that powerful elf!


    "Do you think we should go and save him?" Mary narrowed her eyes as her ruby-like pupils shed with a chilling light.


    "Lord Bug Adept is abat adept that Lord n Leader has invested plenty in. If we were to allow him to die so simply in the Fantasy Forest, it would be quite a loss to the future development of the Crimson n." Vanlier kept a gentle smile on his face all this while.


    "You mean to say...we should save him?" Mary returned with a faint smile.


    "Saving him is a given!" Vanlier smiled obsequiously as he spoke, "However, rushing over to save him in this manner would probably not be of any help. In fact, it¡¯s very likely that we may even draw the attention of the Spear of Vengeance to ourselves."


    "Then why don¡¯t you tell me what we should do?"


    "Why don¡¯t we change the battlefield? The surroundings of Skywater City have now be a dangerous ce. The elves have ced plenty of traps in that area and are simply waiting for us to run into them. Rather than proceed with our ns, why not turn around, head north, and further spread the fires of war?"


    Mary listened attentively with narrowed eyes but did notment. Old Fox Vanlier could only continue with his analysis.


    "Firstly, we need to figure out our objective here?"


    "Our main mission ining to Garan this time is to help that Lady Alice obtain the Staff of Divination. And if we want to aplish that, we have to draw away the powerhouses and elite armies of the elven kingdom in the central mountains."


    "Up until now, the elven kingdom has only gathered their elite forces and powerhouses near the south coast to prevent the Fourth Grade Pale Witch from leading her forces into Garan. That is why they will never dare to reassign forces from the south coast, regardless of how big of a storm we stir up over here."


    "Lord n Leader has been ughtering some elves on the southwest coast. That is all for the sake of baiting the elves into deploying their troops. His n of infiltration can only be put to motion once there are openings in the central mountains¡¯ military force. Mydy, where will you choose to go when that happens?"


    Mary couldn¡¯t help but grunt coldly. She straightened her body upon the stone tform.


    "Hmph, of course, I¡¯m going as well. The central mountains are full of powerhouses. Even god messengers number as many as wild dogs in the streets. If I don¡¯t go and help, how are they supposed to aplish anything with just their few numbers?!¡±


    Old Fox Vanlier sighed silently in the bottom of his heart, but the smile on his face was unchanging.


    "Then we should stir up even more of a storm. It will be best if we can provoke the elves on the south coast to start fighting with the Pale Witches. When that happens, Lord n Leader will probably be facing a lot less pressure."


    He could finally see that this seemingly ferocious mistress of his truly cared for the Lord n Leader. To think she was unfazed by the danger of the central mountains and not at all hesitant about putting the vampires she had so painstakingly gathered together in jeopardy. In fact, she seemed utterly willing to lose out for the benefit of someone else.


    Vanlier couldn¡¯t help but curse to himself over this.


    However, the bloodline shackles made it impossible for him to have any other thoughts. He could only pinch his nose and make ns for Mary ording to her will. At any rate, he was the one that nned all the schemes and plots. Regardless of how the future was to unfold, he would never allow himself to fall into a situation of certain death.


    As such, the old fox¡¯s heart was remarkably calm!

 Chapter 670 Battle of the Fourth Grades

    .


    Garan Continent, Greenwater City.


    As thergest city of the elven kingdom near the south coast, this ce had practically gathered all of the most powerfulbat subordinate races and flying forces of the elves.


    They had one unified name and title here¨C the Windrunners!


    The Windrunners consisted of almost all of the elven kingdom¡¯s flying units, from the beginner-ss flower fairies to the high-grade green spirits, and from the beginner pegasus knights to the high-grade silver pegasus knights. Add to that the squads of hippogryph riders, chimera hordes, and wind eagle strike units.


    The reason why the witch alliance had been stationed at the Echo Isles for so long and yet still failed to take a single step upon Garan was due to the existence of these Windrunners.


    However, the Windrunners were still First and Second Grade fighters after all. Keeping the high-grade witches at bay was still left to the god messengers sent over by the great temples of the central mountains, as well as elven powerhouses recruited from all over.


    There were as many as five Fourth Grade powerhouses in Greenwater City alone, while the number of Third Grades exceeded two dozen.


    It was the tremendous force that they represented that kept the Fourth Grade Pale Witch stationed on Echo Isles in check. Otherwise, the casualties brought to Garan by the Witch Cmity would not be as minor as it currently was!


    In the past, every instance of the Cmity of Witches had inflicted uncalcble and horrifying damage to the forest elves of Garan. It waspletely different from the current situation, where the main forces of the Witch Alliance were kept beyond the coastline and having trouble even setting foot upon Garan.


    Even as the Greenwater City Coalition maintained a water-tight defense, disturbing reports repeatedly came from the regions behind them.


    It seemed a squad of evil witches had snuck into Fantasy Forest via the west coast and had taken the opportunity to ambush an elven town near Skywater City. The elven forces sent out by Skywater City had chased this evil force over thousands of kilometers across the west coast, running straight into the outer boundary of Greenwater City.


    Large groups of elves had banded together deep in the dark Fantasy Forest,bing the nearby woods inch by inch in hopes of finding those forces of evil. Upon hearing this news, Greenwater City also sent a squad of Windrunners to join the search team.


    Thus, the battle situation off the south coast mysteriously escted once again!


    ............


    The Echo Isles.


    As many as three or four dozen elven battleships were roaming outside of the reef formations asrge groups of Windrunners circled the skies, using their weapons to attack the structures upon the main ind.


    The witches had used the local geography to construct many magical buildings with strong defenses.


    Standing tall at the edges of the main ind were the defensive turrets. The bases of the turrets were connected with the main building of the ind¨Ca small adept¡¯s tower¨Cand could draw upon the magical energies of the tower to erect energy barriers and fire offensive spells.


    Thus, before they razed the defensive turrets, the Windrunners could only circle about in the skies; they had no way of dropping anynd units onto the ind. Their each and every attempt to dive and attack would be met with barrages of fireballs, energy sts, wind des, frost arrows, and acid balls. They had to risk their very lives just to use their explosive arrows or throwing spears to wear at the energy barriers.


    This small adept¡¯s tower alone had allowed the Pale Witches to hold off anyrge-scale invasions from the Windrunners. The casualties of the witches remained at zero, but the losses of the elves had gone well over a hundred.


    Remember, all one hundred of these casualties were elven elites who representedbat sses. Under ordinary circumstances, such tremendous losses would have been enough to cause the elvenmanders leading the operation to agonizingly toss and turn in their sleep.


    However, at this moment, they had be a necessary price to pay to suppress the arrogance of the witches!


    Every time the losses of the elves reached a certain degree, the elven powerhouses hiding in the battleships would swarm out and use their immense individual ability to attack everything upon the ind.


    When that happened, it was time for the sh of the top-grade powerhouses of both factions!


    Perhaps because of news about an enemy behind the frontlines, the sh of the powerhouses erupted ahead of time today.


    Two Fourth Grade elven god messengers appeared above the main ind, radiating intense magical auras. The Windrunners in charge of the assault immediately retreated at the sight of this. A Fourth Grade Pale Witch cackled and floated toward them from the massive reef ind.


    "Ursol, Zyvere, you two still daree at me? What is it? Was the beating you receivedst time not enough for you?"


    "Don¡¯t start gloating, Rimura. You didn¡¯t have that good of a time during thest battle either. Weren¡¯t you injured at my hands anyway? Hmph! There wille a day where we smash that tortoise shell of yours."


    It was clear that this wasn¡¯t the first time both parties had engaged one another.


    Over the past few days, the elven powerhouses had repeatedly attacked to end this Cmity of Witches as soon as they could. They wanted to destroy this obtrusive reef ind. However, the enemy was supported by an adept¡¯s tower, which allowed the Fourth Grade Pale Witch to repel multiple Fourth Grade elven powerhouses alone.


    That caused both parties to resort to such meaningless verbal sparring to pass the time.


    There was nomon ground to be found between the two parties, and a fight quickly broke out after a couple of words.


    Ursol (male) of the elves was a Fourth Grade God Messenger of Marco, the God of Archery, while Zyvere (female) was a Fourth Grade God Messenger of elven chief god Saoirse. One of them was responsible for the offense, while the other supported them. Even so, they could only force a stalemate with the Fourth Grade Pale Witch Rimura.


    The elves gathered around the Fourth Grade quickly turned to flee upon seeing a fight about to break out. They didn¡¯t even dare to stay and watch.


    Ursol was a muscr middle-aged male elf with a rugged and determined face.


    He wore dirt-yellow leather armor on his body and had short green hair, his long and slender ears pointing outward from his temples. He carried a quiver full of strange magical arrows upon his back and held in his left hand a magic longbow inscribed full of rose branches and carved with plenty of delicate patterns.


    A curved elven scimitar hung by his waist.


    He made no poses or battlecries. He merely raised his left hand and pulled on that iparably tough bowstring with his right hand. As sizzling magical energy gathered along his bow, a magical arrow forged purely of nature power gathered upon his fingertips.


    Haa!


    Ursol let out a low battlecry as the magical arrow instantly turned into a sh of green lightning, crossing a thousand meters in an instant, and appearing before Rimura.


    A thousand meters of distance was no obstruction for individuals of their power. As long as they wanted to, any attack that they unleashed would appear where they wanted it to be within their line of sight or where their Spirit had locked onto.


    The elven longbow in Ursol¡¯s hand was nomon artifact either. It was a famous Fourth Grade treasure even in Faen ne¨C Thoda¡¯rial, the Stars¡¯ Fury.


    It was a pseudo-artifact!


    It simultaneously possessed three magical effects: critical damage, artifact power, and pierce. Moreover, Thoda¡¯rial, the Stars¡¯ Fury had been personally blessed by God of Archery Marco. Consequently, the bow automatically generated magical arrows when drawn, with no need for any arrows to go with the bow.


    Even Rimura didn¡¯t dare face such a magical arrow glowing with countless magical sparks, despite having an energy shield from the adept¡¯s tower on her person.


    She quickly shed and appeared a hundred meters away.


    Rimura wasn¡¯t to be outdone either. She waved her hand after dodging Ursol¡¯s attack, and a sinister, semi-translucent ghost¡¯s wshed outward, whistling and howling toward the enemy.


    The ghost¡¯s w was only the size of a sink basin when it flew out, but with the continuous injection of magic energy from the tower below, the w continued to grow in size as it flew toward the enemy. It was half an acrerge by the time it reached Ursol and Zyvere.


    The cold winds surged around them, filling the air with a ghostly presence.


    The negative energy aura instantly corrupted the space into andscape of pure gray.


    Ursol didn¡¯t dodge against an attack with such arge area. Instead, he calmly started preparing his next attack. Meanwhile, Zyvere, who was standing beside him, let out a battlecry and waved the short and delicate nature¡¯s staff in her hand. A Purification Halo with an immense area immediately enveloped the both of them.


    Magic soaked in negative energy was perfectly countered by such powers of purification.


    The previously overwhelming ghost¡¯s w crumbled and shattered the moment it came into contact with the purification halo, turning into tufts of gray mist before slowly dispersing into the air.


    At this point, the Stars¡¯ Fury in Ursol¡¯s hands had been drawn into a full moon.


    Even more horrifying was the fact that three magical arrows containing explosive nature power had been simultaneously formed on the bowstring this time.


    Boom!


    As the snap of the bowstring rang out in the air, the three magical arrows shot forward. One of the magical arrows erupted with a powerful nature aura and transformed into a fearsome nature magic as it flew outward¨C Nature¡¯s Fury!


    It was nature magic that reached Fourth Grade. It could bring out the nature power inside in the instant it detonated, dealing terrifying spell damage to the enemy.


    As this happened, the other two magical arrows had silently vanished into thin air. No one could sense where they had gone.


    Evanescent Arrow!


    It was also a secret archery technique that God of Archery Marco had granted to the elves.


    The previously rxed-looking Rimura couldn¡¯t help but tense up when seeing the all-out explosion of Fourth Grade Ursol.


    In truth, she wasn¡¯t afraid of that Fourth Grade Nature¡¯s Fury, but rather those two magical arrows that had turned invisible.


    It didn¡¯t matter how powerful of a spell it was; it had to hit the enemy to unleash its might.


    Nature¡¯s Fury might be powerful, but it could not break through the defensive magic of this Fourth Grade Pale Witch.


    Rimura raised her head and let out a shrill, ear-piercing screech. The terrifying soundwave rippled in every direction like a wave. This Wail of the Banshee repeatedly weakened the Nature¡¯s Fury. It was at its limits by the time it hit the Deadsoul Barrier surrounding Rimura. It vanished before even making a ssh.


    The rippling soundwave¡¯s range was vast, so much so that it even forced one of the Evanescent Arrows hiding three hundred meters away to appear.


    The sound of piercing winds immediately erupted from the Evanescent Arrow upon being revealed, as it shot toward Rimura¡¯s forehead.


    The magical defensive strength of the Deadsoul Barrier was decent, but it was insufficient against physical attacks.


    Rimura¡¯s silhouette shed as she once again used Flicker to dodge this attack.


    Just as she flickered and appeared in her new position, the air three meters away from her trembled. An Evanescent Arrow appeared out of thin air, elerating and piercing toward her forehead.

 Chapter 671 Troublesome Enemy

    One revealed, and one hidden.


    The Evanescent Arrows were truly annoying to deal with!


    There was no more dodging this time. Rimura paused for a moment, and the arrow instantly pierced her forehead.


    A crisp st rang out in the air and the witch¡¯s skull shattered. Red blood and white brain matter sttered in every direction like raindrops.


    A pungent rain of blood suddenly fell from the skies as a headless corpse twitched and dropped from above.


    The Fourth Grade witch had been killed?


    The elves who were watching the battle from a distance were about to break out into cheers, but the two elven god messengers standing in the air didn¡¯t seem to be showing any joy. They looked at each other with solemn faces and closed the distance between them. Then they started to look at the empty air around them.


    If these evil witches from the World of Adepts were truly this easy to kill, then they wouldn¡¯t have be the terrifying tumors of Faen that they were today. That was why the two god messengers didn¡¯t let down their guard, despite the scene they had just witnessed. In fact, they became a lot more alert.


    Ursol nocked his arrow and drew his bow, keeping guard at Zyvere¡¯s side. Meanwhile, this god messenger of Saoirse started waving her nature¡¯s staff about, softly chanting a magical spell. Judging from the intonations and sybles of the chant, it seemed she intended to cast True Sight to verify what was happening.


    Just then, Ursol abruptly shouted, "Watch out!"


    His bowstring immediately snapped. Two magical arrows cut across the skies in a strange and mysterious path,nding on an empty spot a hundred meters away. Boom! The bolts exploded and instantly transformed into two nature spells¨C Nature Imprisonment and Wrapping Vines.


    Several magical vines that manifested out of thin air quickly wrapped around an odd humanoid silhouette like agile snakes in the wild. A small prison formed out of rose branches and green vines also rapidly grew on the outside.


    However, Ursol¡¯s sharp eyes instantly saw through the dense branches and vines and identified that the victim of the spells wasn¡¯t the body of the Fourth Grade Pale Witch. Instead, it was a terrifying corpse with blood and pus all over its body.


    The bloody corpse had no skin to speak of. Its entire body was naked, and the surface of it was covered in fresh blood and abscess of all sizes. The corpse didn¡¯t seem to care for the tough vines and thorned branches biting into its flesh, and it continued to struggle and thrash about violently.


    The fearsome blood from its body sshed onto the vines and branches and sizzled as it corroded the nt material. Acrid white smoke rose into the air. This corpse was immensely powerful and utterly fearless in the face of death. Moreover, its blood was no different from a strong acid and had powerful corrosive capabilities.


    Seeing that the two binding spells could no longer restrain the enemy, Ursol once again drew his bow. This time he was no longer using magic arrows, but an actual physical enchanted explosive arrow.


    Powerful physical attacks could more easily kill wicked magical creations like this bloody corpse!


    Just as the explosive arrow was about to leave the bow, the air behind the two god messengers rippled. A nearly invisible humanoid shape emerged out of nowhere.


    It was a powerful spirit with the abilities of a Fourth Grade. Her phantasmal face vaguely resembled that of Rimura¡¯s. This horrifying spirit opened her mouth the instant she emerged in the air before the god messengers could react. A sharp and ear-piercing wail burst forth into the surroundings.


    Wail of the Banshee!


    It was a true Wail of the Banshee in every sense of its name. Its effect was several times that of the Wail that Rimura had released earlier.


    The terrifying wailing soundwave beat against the air like waves in the sea. There was no need even to mention the frail flesh of the elves. Even the typically untouchable space started to crumble before the wail, inch by inch, piece by piece.


    The violent and ferocious soundwave quickly spread into the surroundings, catching up to the escaping Windrunners at the speed of a thunderst. The Windrunners then became like dolls and toys being wildly and roughly handled by a massive and invisible hand. They were instantly squashed and folded into the thickness of paper before exploding into a crimson rain of smashed innards and blood.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether they were First or Second Grade; none survived in front of such a terrifying Banshee¡¯s Wail. They were like helpless mortals at this moment, freely and indifferently toyed with in the palms of powerful gods without even the slightest trace of the ability to resist.


    Only those elves with Third Grade powers managed to rely on the eruption of their own energy fields to hold off the soundwave attack for a brief moment as they desperately escaped into the distance. Even so, they had paid a terrible price to live!


    The Wail of the Banshee wasn¡¯t just a sound attack. It also carried with it a fearsome soul attack. It was able to shatter the enemy¡¯s soul and kill them simultaneously. That was why all individuals murdered by the Wail of the Banshee could not be resurrected by revival magic or divine miracle.


    The situation was dire even in the distance. Necessarily, the god messengers who were in closest proximity to the spirit had to directly endure nearly eighty percent of the Wail¡¯s offensive power. The damage they had to receive was far beyond that of the ordinary elf.


    Fortunately, both of them had experience fighting with the Pale Witches. At that moment, the two god messengers promptly activated the life-saving divine magic that their respective patron deities had bestowed upon them¨C Divine Shield.


    An egg-shaped golden shield appeared around them, helping them to block all of the soundwave attacks safely.


    The two god messengers turned around furiously while still under the protection of the Divine Shield. They instantly took out their most potent abilities to deal with this spirit that had appeared out of nowhere.


    This apanying spirit belonging to Rimura wailed as she hovered to dodge the attacks of the god messengers. Meanwhile, she continued to activate all sorts of soul abilities that broke apart against the Divine Shields.


    Divine power was truly a mysterious power purer and more advanced than magic power and energy!


    The shields constructed from divine power could defend against all known magics and spells, including many spell branches that were so niche that hardly anyone dabbled in them.


    Upon seeing that her attacks werepletely ineffective against the Divine Shields, the apanying spirit had no choice but to give up. She started to flee from the god messengers¡¯ attack range with all her strength.


    And how could the enraged god messengers let her escape so easily?


    Zyvere¡¯s face was flushed red from frustration. She raised the nature¡¯s staff in her hand, and a brilliant beam of Nature¡¯s Light shone out of the top of her staff, firmly locking onto the spirit¡¯s body.


    Apanying spirits might be ethereal beings immune to all physical damage, but the cost of that immunity was having to endure double the damage from all magical attacks.


    That was why this beam of Nature¡¯s Light acted like a strong acid when itnded upon the spirit¡¯s body. It was almost as if the spirit had been soaked in an entire barrel of corrosive acid, her phantasmal body steaming and letting out pungent white smoke.


    The apanying spirit lifted her head and let out a painful cry of agony. She started to quickly and rapidly flicker and sh through the sky. Sadly, regardless of how she ran, that fearsome beam of Nature¡¯s Light remained tightly focused on her body, grinding away at her existence with the powers of purification.


    Perhaps because she sensed the agony of her apanying spirit, the Fourth Grade Pale Witch Rimura finally came out of her hiding.


    This time, she rapidly transformed into a horrifying shadow tentacled monster upon her reappearance. Her entire body was enveloped by ck smoke as dark as ink. She waved a dozen dark tentacles, as thick as stone pirs and several dozens of meters long, smashing them toward the god messengers from every direction.


    Ursol, who was responsible for protecting the both of them, let his bowstring snap again and again. Several magical arrows that fired from his bow blew up the shadow tentacles in midair. However, these dark tentacles were not so easily destroyed. The scattered dark matter moved under the control of Rimura¡¯s chants, once again forming into new dark tentacles that extended toward the two god messengers.


    Through their endless regeneration, the dark tentacles were finally able to break through Ursol¡¯s rain of arrows, shing at Zyvere¡¯s Divine Shield. Zyvere was unable to stabilize her body and flew almost three hundred meters away, like a rubber ball that had just been struck with extreme force.


    Though her Divine Shield had helped her mitigate all of the damage, the unstoppable shock from the impact still interrupted her Nature¡¯s Light.


    Nearly half of the apanying spirit¡¯s body had been burned away. She howled sorrowfully and used dense negative energy to extinguish the nature energy remaining upon her body. She then stared resentfully at Zyvere, with eyes that burned with ghostly green mes, and hatefully concealed herself once again.


    The two god messengers swept the skies with True Sight but failed to find any signs of the spirit. They had no choice but to set their sights on Rimura herself, resuming their battle above the skies of Echo Isles.


    Two Fourth Grade elves were fighting against a single Fourth Grade Pale Witch. It looked as if they held the advantage due to their numbers, but the god messengers were still incapable of obtaining any absolute advantage during the fight. After all, every Pale Witch had an apanying spirit that they cultivated from their youth. The spirit¡¯s power was proportional to their own, and their minds were linked as one, allowing for seamless acts of cooperation.


    That was why a Fourth Grade Pale Witch was equivalent to thebination of two Fourth Grade witches. The only caveat was that one had a physical body while the other was merely a spirit!


    Witch Rimura herself was skilled at a variety of powerful dark magic, while her apanying spirit was a master of soul abilities. The two of themplemented each other, and the sum of theirbined force was far stronger than the teamwork of the two god messengers!


    However, the god messengers were backed by gods and could obtain the support of some powerful divine magic. Meanwhile, the Pale Witch had her back against the adept¡¯s tower and could easily slip into the tower¡¯s defensive barrier whenever the winds turned south.


    Both sides had their advantages and trump cards. It was hard to utterly defeat the enemy before they could muster an absolute numerical advantage.


    There might be five Fourth Grade god messengers in Greenwater City, but if they were to all swarm out at once, Rimura would turtle within the tower, refusing to show herself. With a Fourth Grade witch hosting the tower, the elves would not be able to break into it, even if theymitted all of their forces.


    Moreover, even if they were willing to raze the tower at great cost, they had no way of stopping the Fourth Grade witch from escaping. With the witches¡¯ abilities, they could easily build a new base even if the Echo Isles were to fall out of their control. When that happened, the elves would be the ones faced with more problems.


    That was why, after a few attempts, the elves gave up on the idea of utterly exterminating the enemy. They chose instead to use a massive garrison and number of defending troops to wait out the Cmity of Witches.


    At any rate, these foreign witches couldn¡¯t stay in Faen forever. Once they all started to leave, the wicked Pale Witches would have to settle down again!

 Chapter 672 The Might of Fourth Grade

    The battle between Fourth Grade powerhouses was a shocking experience for the ordinary elves!


    The two dozen elven vessels quickly weighed their anchors and ran far from the Echo Isles.


    In fact, they could still sense the intensity of the energy explosions through the chaotic winds blowing across the hull of the ships, even when they had sailed four to five nautical miles away.


    There was no longer a single cloud in the blue skies.


    Thick, dark clouds gathered from every direction, forming into a dense and roiling cloud of mist over Echo Isles and firmly trapping the isles within. The elves all ran up to the deck and nced in the direction of the Echo Isles, waiting with hope for their god messengers to return victorious.


    The waves gradually became more tumultuous and treacherous, and their ships started bob even more furiously.


    Some elves who had never experienced such conditions immediately exhibited signs of severe seasickness and started vomiting. Meanwhile, the elven leaders gathered at the bow of the ship, anxiously awaiting the conclusion of the battle.


    Even Third Grade powerhouses didn¡¯t dare to get involved in a battle between Fourth Grades, much less ordinary elves. The terrifying Wail of the Banshee at the start of the fight had easily covered an area of one and a half kilometers. All First and Second Grade elves within this territory had already died, their souls having been ripped to pieces.


    Even the Third Grade elf that had barely managed to escape had been inflicted with great soul injuries. He had to be sent back to Greenwater City to recover immediately.


    That was why themander of the fleet and the leader of the Windrunners pulled the fleet six nautical miles away from Echo Isles due to safety concerns. They would silently wait here for news from the frontlines.


    Yet, while no news arrived, a horrifying natural disaster did!


    No one knew if it was a phenomenon caused by the witches¡¯ magic or the intensity of the fight itself, but the Echo Isles in the distance had been tightly locked down with a dense ck mist. Violent lightning sts and fearsome elementium tremors erupted inside the opaque fog, stunning every elf to their very core.


    While the elves anxiously waited, a piercing voice, due to its owner¡¯s nervousness, rang out from the bow of the ship.


    "Quickly erect a shield. Hurry up and have them erect a Natural Ward."


    The elves all turned back in surprise and were shocked to find the owner of the scream to be a Second Grade elven diviner. This diviner belonged to the Temple of Luck and was a female elf with pretty looks and elegant movements.


    At this moment, all the color had faded from her face, seemingly because of some vision from the future. Two thin streaks of bloody tears were crawling down from her tightly shut eyes. Still, she seemed ignorant of this fact and continued to yell and scream wildly.


    Even though the profession of a diviner didn¡¯t have anybat power, no one in the elven kingdom dared gloss over their opinions.


    The fleetmander immediately had the signal troops order all ships to activate their Natural Wards.


    As standard ships of the navy, all these vessels had been specially carved with an elven array in a secret room at the bottom of the boat. This array could activate a massive Natural Ward. To save energy, these barriers weren¡¯t usually opened. Now, though themander sensed no iing danger, he still decided to lean on the side of caution and listen to the warnings of the elven diviner.


    As expected, just as the elven ships erected the green Natural Wards that shielded their hulls, a massive wave of water several meters tall silently surged toward them from the horizon.


    Even before the wave had arrived, a suddenly advancing hurricane stormed through the area above the sea.


    The ships protected by the Natural Wards were rtively untouched. They had not sustained any damage other than being tossed around a little too intensely. However, the aerial forces responsible for scouting the seas and the skies met an unfortunate fate.


    The savage hurricane was like a wall of wind that smashed at them, instantly dragging the hippogryphs, chimeras, and silver pegasi into its vortex. The poor flying creatures were like tops being wickedly whipped by children, tumbling and falling from the sky without any chance to resist. The elven archers and knights upon their backs also fell into the sea like dumplings being dropped into a pot.


    The wall of wind had just passed by, and the wave arrived soon after!


    The two dozen ships were dragged along by the rising wave and smashed into one another. If it wasn¡¯t for the Natural Wards, this single wave alone could have capsized nearly half of the elven ships.


    For a moment, the elves were thrown intoplete disarray.


    Yet this still wasn¡¯t the end of it.


    Once the wind wall and the wave had passed, a pattering ck rain poured down from above.


    This ck rain carried with it a thick and pungent odor of corrosion andnded on the Natural Wards. Wisps of ck smoke rose into the air as the rain neutralized the nature power.


    The entire elven fleet was in a state of chaos.


    All of the First Grade elves were hurriedly hiding in the cabins to prevent the hostile environment from wounding them. The only ones that could move around on the deck had to be Second Grade at least.


    The Third Grades gathered at the bow of the ships. They didn¡¯t seem to care about the damage of this phenomenon to the fleet, choosing instead to focus on the ck mist in the distance.


    These were, after all, only the shockwaves of the Fourth Grades¡¯ fight. The true ¡¯disaster¡¯ was still locked within thatyer of mist.


    There, the Echo Isles that had been preserved for over a thousand years was facing an unprecedented cmity!


    Outside the Isles, the reef formations that had endured hundreds of years of tidal corrosion were slowly being chipped away by the violent gales, inch by inch. Apart from the parts covered by the adept tower¡¯s energy shields, all of the Echo Isles¡¯ reefs that were exposed above water were non-existent now!


    Be it the nature magic of the god messengers that was mixed with divine power, or the immensely powerful spells that the Pale Witches were unleashing through the tower¡¯s strength; everything was dealing tremendous and irreparable damage to the environment.


    Compared to the child¡¯s y of Second and Third Grade powerhouses, every single ability of Fourth Grade fighters was a cmitous finishing move that could destroy the world around them. The area covered by their spells and magic was also exceedinglyrge, often extending up to ranges of two kilometers.


    There was no apparent disparity of energy intensity in the area enveloped by their spells either. That fully demonstrated the fact that the understanding and mastery that Fourth Grade fighters had of their magical powers were at a shockingly unbelievable level!


    The fight between the Pale Witches and god messengers had also finally provoked anotherrge faction.


    The surface of the sea around the Echo Isles started to bubble as if the water itself was boiling. A gigantic sea monster that measured six meters in height rose from the water.


    It had arge and muscr body as well as humanoid arms and a torso covered in dark, green-gray scales. A spindle-shaped head grew above its neck, and a wicked face sat upon it. Two especially sharp and long fangs protruded out of its lower lips as two fleshy extensions hung from its chin.


    The lower half of the sea monster¡¯s body was a t, long snake¡¯s tail covered in fine indigo scales.


    This siren that had emerged from the sea was also a Fourth Grade powerhouse.


    Its green webbed hand held a rusty trident as it floated above the surface of the water. The siren raised its trident and shot a towering pir of water at the few individuals engaged in their messy fight.


    The Pale Witch and the god messengers immediately split up after witnessing the intervention of a foreign force. They each took up a spot and nced coldly at this new challenger.


    "Elves, witches; I don¡¯t care what reason you have. None of you are allowed to fight within the territory of us seafolk!" The siren roared.


    The seafolk of Faen used a unique mariner creaturenguage. Fortunately, all the individuals present were important characters of their respective factions, and all had a particr understanding of the seafolk¡¯snguage. Thus, there was no concern about iprehension.


    The arrogant and proud seafolk had always been at odds with thend species, even since the ancient times.


    Even the elven kingdom, with all their might, had to offerrge numbers of offerings to these seafolk if they wanted their elven ships to sail across the boundless deep sea freely. Otherwise, bing wreckage was the only fate that awaited them!


    That was why the two god messengers had no choice but to suppress their fury and argue in the face of this unreasonable Fourth Grade siren, "We didn¡¯t start this fight. As a member of Faen, I trust you, sir, to also have an obligation and responsibility to keep the peace of the ne! Why don¡¯t you join us and help us exile these otherworldly invaders from our world?"


    ¡°Kehkehkeh...you lot might not like these witches, but we have taken quite the liking to them. They have offered us quite a lot of good things."


    Rage appeared on the faces of both god messengers when they heard the siren¡¯s words. Zyvere evenshed out furiously, "How could you trade with a bunch of otherworldly invaders? Can you still call yourselves a member of Faen now?"


    The wicked siren simply betrayed a mocking expression in response to the elf¡¯s reprimand.


    "No more than a group of witches. You fear them, but I don¡¯t. If they truly found the courage to find trouble with us seafolk, we would crush them to bits and mince them to pieces. Not a single shred of their corpses would be left." The siren narrowed his murderous eyes and looked up and down Zyvere¡¯s curvaceous and bountiful body. He then revealed a lecherous look.


    "Girl, if you are willing toe shag at my coral sea for a few days, I can decide to chase this witch away from the ind for you. How about that?!"


    The two elves¡¯ expression changed utterly upon hearing this.


    Zyvere¡¯s body was even trembling from anger. Her eyes were practically spitting fire.


    "Mind your words, seafolk. You are insulting a god messenger of a great deity! You...do you intend to provoke a war between two great pantheons?" Ursol hastily stood in front of the berserking Zyvere and coldly spat out his words.


    "Pantheon war?" This siren seemed to be a brazen thug as well. He simply curled his lips in disdain and said, "Those weak beansprout gods of yours? You think they even qualify as a challenge to the great Atri? Hmph."


    The two elven god messengers almost went insane from the provocation, but instantly realized something from the siren¡¯s words.


    "You...you are the god messenger of Atri?"


    It was only at this moment that the two god messengers could sense a vaguely familiar aura from the siren¡¯s sinister and obscure energy flux. The opponent was actually also a god messenger. In fact, he was the messenger of the most brutal and savage god of the sea¨C Atri, God of the Sea Beasts.


    The discovery was both shocking and enlightening!

 Chapter 673 Siege of the Underground Prison

    As natives of Faen, the god messengers naturally knew who Atri, the God of Sea Beasts was.


    If the majority of gods were higher lifeforms that transcended worldly creatures and possessed superior power and intelligence, then Atri, the God of Sea Beasts would be a special exception!


    It was slow, and its mind was little more than chaos embodied. Even its mind and intelligence couldn¡¯t be considered asplete.


    However, there was no denying that Atri possessed overbearing strength and physical power that far surpassed an ordinary god. Even without fancy techniques or skills, Atri could easily defeat half of the elven pantheon with its physical strength alone.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. After all, over half of the gods in the elven pantheon were not proficient inbat!


    Moreover, Atri possessed the divine authorities of savagery, cruelty, and regeneration. It was especially worshipped and respected by all the powerful sea beasts in Faen. If one were to weigh the size of the Faen ne¡¯s oceans and the number of lifeforms within them, there was no doubt that the number of powerful sea beasts outnumbered even the total number of forest elves.


    With such incredible faith power backing it, the God of Sea Beasts forcefully pushed itself upon the ranks of the most powerful gods of Faen, even if it was highly unqualified. It became the second most powerful god of Faen, only second to the God of the Sea¨C Dions.


    If the battlefield were set in the sea, Atri alone would be enough to destroy the entire elven pantheon. Of course, if Atri was able to do this, then so could the Sea God Dions, who held the title of ¡¯Lord of the Berserk¡¯!


    All seafolk powerhouses that followed Atri, the Sea Beast God became mindless savages under its teachings. Still, a Fourth Grade ¡¯fool¡¯ was still not an existence that an ordinary person could afford to anger!


    Ursol and Zyvere had no choice but to swallow their pride and retreat from the battle.


    Once the two god messengers vanished into the horizon, the Fourth Grade siren turned to look at Pale Witch Rimura.


    "Hey, ugly hag from the World of Adepts, when can you send over the Blood of the Sea you promised? If I find out you were lying to me, I will bring my men with me and smash that garbage Shadow Ind of yours."


    Blood of the Sea was merely a euphemism. The substance was no more than the blood of powerful sea beasts from the World of Adepts. The blood of sea beasts of a higher world was undoubtedly an extremely rare and invigorating substance for the seafolk of Faen.


    The Blood of the Sea that this siren needed was naturally origin blood of a siren that it shared an ancestor with.


    Rare resources like these weren¡¯t kept in stock by the Northern Witches, even with their great might and influence. They had no choice but to send men into the depths of the World of Adepts¡¯ oceans to search for it. Moreover, they had to organize manpower to surround and hunt the target upon finding it. The difficulty of obtaining this Blood of the Sea was truly enormous!


    Pale Witch Rimura was surprised by this Fourth Grade siren¡¯s wild and rude words, but she didn¡¯t resort to hostilities over this. Here in Faen, the Pale Witches dared to provoke the elven pantheon and could hold their own against the human pantheon. Still, the only thing they didn¡¯t dare do was provoke these savage seafolk.


    The total volume of the ocean in Faen was nearly a hundred timesrger than the total area of thendmass. Resources were also bountiful and readily avable. Naturally, the number of seafolk powerhouses was shockingly high!


    This seafolk messenger casually spoke of destroying Shadow Ind. These weren¡¯t wholly lies and threats.


    If she genuinely forced this siren¡¯s hand, it wouldn¡¯t be hard for it to gather dozens of Fourth Grade sea beasts from the depths of the sea to break into Shadow Ind. Shadow Ind might have turned into an imprable fortress over the past thousand years of effort by the Pale Witches, but all its defensive towers and energy barriers were little more than a joke before dozens of Fourth Grade creatures. Moreover, these were massive and gigantic sea beasts that were almost always asrge as hills.


    "Lord Bestal, the dy can¡¯t bepletely attributed to us, can it?!" Even Witch Rimura had no choice but to exin with a bitter smile when dealing with an unreasonable siren, "If you could provide us with some of your own blood, we could naturally match it with our knowledge and find suitable prey for you. However, you refuse to provide any of your blood. That is why all three samples we previously provided you with were notpatible with your essence. Trying to find the sirens that match your specifications in the vast and boundless depths of the ocean is a daunting challenge, even for us!"


    "Hmph! I don¡¯t care! Don¡¯t even think about getting your hands on my blood. You witches love dealing in weird things the best. Who knows what you will do once you get my blood!" This Fourth Grade siren might seem crass, but he had street smarts of his own. He waved the trident in his hand angrily, "I will only give you ten more years. If I don¡¯t get the Blood of the Sea you promised me in ten years, then prepare to get kicked out of Faen."


    The Fourth Grade siren turned and disappeared into the sea after roaring these words, vanishing without a trace.


    After letting out a silent sigh, Witch Rimura also silently returned to the ind¡¯s tower with her apanying spirit.


    The Echo Isles¡¯ reef formation had been utterly shattered after this disaster, turning it into hidden reefs beneath the surface of the sea. That caused the waters around the Isles to be increasinglyplicated and difficult to navigate.


    However, Rimura couldn¡¯t find any interest in dealing with this matter. Instead, she hid in her room and silently contacted the Fourth Grade Witch stationed on Shadow Ind.


    Let the matter of the so-called Blood of the Sea be left to the leaders and elders of the n headquarters!


    ............


    Garan Continent, Aerie Peak.


    As a notorious den of magical beasts near the south coast, a flock of Windhawks lived here.


    As wind magical beasts unique to Garan Continent, these windhawks possessed exceptional flight speed and powerful wind magic. Adolescent windhawks had the strength of a beginner First Grade. That didn¡¯t sound very impressive, but one had to take into consideration the fact that they were an entire flock of magical beasts.


    A hundred windhawks had built their nests on the sunny side of a tall cliff, resting and reproducing here. As time slowly passed, the number of windhawks here grew in number, and they became tamed magical beasts of the elves. It became a ce where druids woulde to summon an animalpanion.


    Thus, this ce became the famous Aerie Peak!


    As flying magical beasts with shocking intelligence, the windhawks had always maintained friendly rtions with the elves.


    Furthermore, they had an extreme sense of territory and would unleash the most ferocious of attacks upon any birds or beasts that trespassed in their homes. That was why there were no dangerous creatures that could threaten young windhawks anywhere within two and a half kilometers of Aerie Peak!


    However, these days, Aerie Peak had lost its past serenity, turning into a chaotic and tumultuous ce.


    The cause of all this was a swarm of ursed insects!


    Seven days ago, a massive swarm of odd beetles swarmed out of the depths of the forest and rooted themselves underground Aerie Peak, never to show themselves again.


    A sky full of adolescent windhawks immediately stopped therge group of elves led by Spear of Vengeance Eijae after she reached within one and a half kilometers of Aerie Peak. This time of the year happened to be a crucial moment where many young windhawks hatched from their shells. The windhawks would never allow the elves to turn the den into a battlefield, even with their historical rtionship.


    Spear of Vengeance Eijae instantly flew into a rage against this flock of short-sighted cawing featherbrains who did not allow for any negotiations. If it weren¡¯t for the elven captain leading the troops finding the courage to stop her, Eijae would probably have started a fight with these windhawks before they could even exterminate the swarm.


    This flock of ¡¯puny¡¯ First and Second Grade windhawks would probably have had half their numbers annihted by Eijae in a single move. However, if Eijae were actually to do so, then the good rtions between the forest elves and the windhawks woulde to an end.


    The elves had no choice. The hippogryph riders that had been pursuing the enemy could only stop outside Aerie Peak, monitoring the surroundings and ensuring the insects would not escape. The elven captain led some men and flew to Greenwater City, a mere three hundred and fifty kilometers away from Aerie Peak, to request for aid from the elvenmander there.


    Half a dayter, a squad of Windrunners numbering less than a thousand men hurried to Aerie Peak.


    One had to admit that the elves could not do anything about this problematic situation, regardless of how much military force they mustered. That was because the enemy was dead-set on hiding underground!


    The elven kingdom had twenty to thirty million forest elves and, naturally, had all sorts of talented individuals. Some had precision archery skills while others possessed sharp movements; some even had the ability to channel powerful nature magic. There were also those that could transform into all sorts of magical beasts.


    However, oddly enough, not a single one of them could engage in underground battle.


    Forest elves were strange beings that liked nature, freedom, and art after all. How was it possible for there to be an oddity among them that excelled at subterranean battle? Thus, when the one thousand elves had managed to surround Aerie Peak, the topic of smoking out the enemy became the most significant concern that troubled them!


    Smoke, water, and fire.


    They tried all these strange methods at least once but failed to force out Bug Adept Billis. Instead, they had made things insufferable for the young hawks hatching in Aerie Peak.


    The elvenmander of Greenwater City could only use his connections and all sorts of negotiations to deal with the windhawks. In the end, he managed to persuade this sizeable flock of windhawks to relocate to another area temporarily. Once the battlefield had been cleared, the elves started to relentlessly dig at the foot of Aerie Peak, trying to excavate the insects that had killed so many of their brethren and exterminate them.


    Sadly, under Billis¡¯mand, the swarm were more sly and cunning than most magical beasts.


    The tunnels they dug underground were not even a meter thick and did not allow for any elves to move around within. The main areas of activity for the swarm were also concentrated right beneath Aerie Peak, where the rockyers were dense and thick. That indirectly increased the difficulty of excavation for the elves.


    With no choice left to them, the elvenmander could only gatherrge groups of druids that could transform into rock serpents and blindworms to have them change into earth magical beasts to smoke out these wretched insects.


    As such, a battle between the swarm and the druid-transformed magical beasts erupted in the narrow and lightless underground space!

 Chapter 674 Secret Battle Underground

    In a hidden tunnel a hundred meters under the ground, a new bug¡¯s nest was slowlying to life.


    Billis had sent out the remaining twenty-three thousand insects of the insect army in waves to scavenge and hunt for food, even at the risk of being exterminated by the elves. Though they did bring back plenty of woond creatures, their casualties were no small number either. As many as one to two thousand insects were killed on a daily basis.


    At the rate this was going, Billis would be in a desperate position with no insects at hismand within ten days!


    The remaining six magical mantises were made to stay by his side at all times, leaving him with a base of some high-gradebat insects. Far, far away at the edge of the west coast some of the insects and magical mantises that had been separated from the main army had managed to survive. They wandered into various corners of Fantasy Forest and hid themselves.


    If Billis¡¯ current location waspromised and his actual body was to be destroyed by the elves, he could still rely on the insect kings hiding in the other insect armies to revive himself. However, the price of such a revival was too immense. It was very likely to cause his power to decrease to the level of a beginner First Grade.


    That was why Billis would never willingly use such a method to escape the enemy¡¯s siege unless necessary!


    After the attempts on the first few days, Billis had given up on the fantasy of requesting help from Lady Mary. It was his reckless act of seeking help that had allowed the Spear of Vengeance to track him down through the weak elementium flux he emitted.


    He had been forced to abandon a ten thousand strong insect army during that battle to bait the enemy and draw them away.


    Sadly, Fantasy Forest was the home of the forest elves.


    Here, the elves would note any bit of movement in the grass or wind immediately. That was why Billis¡¯ journey of escaping was fated to be so difficult and arduous. In fact, there were several times where the Third Grade elf almost trapped him in his temporary dwellings.


    It had been over three thousand kilometers of cat and mouse between him and Spear of Vengeance Eijae. Up until now, Billis had never met her face to face. Even so, his insect army had fallen from its peak of one hundred and seventy thousand to its now pathetic state of twenty thousand. The number of intermedate First Grade magical mantises had also been reduced from twenty-seven to six.


    The blood and tears behind this were hard to understand unless you were in Billis¡¯ shoes!


    Here, beneath the strange Aerie Peak, Bug Adept Billis was able to figure out the situation above through hidden eye bugs, even though he didn¡¯t take a step above ground.


    It was clear that his reckless and rampant actions had utterly angered the elves. The elven sky patrol circling Aerie Peak didn¡¯t cease throughout the day. The woods were also being tightly guarded by the flying scouts of the elves and druids that had transformed into critters, practically turning the ce into a fortified stockade of its own.


    Without sufficient meat, it was hard to hatch an endless army of insects. Without flesh of high quality, it was hard to breed powerfulbat insects. At this moment, Billis¡¯ enemiespletely surrounded him. Any swarms he sent to the surface would never return. Still, the bug adept had not given up hope of escaping.


    Billis took advantage of the slight gap before the elven encirclement wasplete, sent outrge amounts of insects, and fortunately seeded in obtaining some flesh. With these blood treats and the sacrifice of some of the ordinary insects, Billis finally seeded at breeding some odd worms with a unique ability¨C Burrowers.


    They were a type of strange creature that resembled massive earthworms. Their bodies were twelve meters long, and at their fronts were many sharp teeth arranged in a dense concentric formation. These saw-like teeth that resembled an array of des extended all the way into their deep ck insides and were the tools with which they devoured and shredded everything.


    Burrowers were not picky eaters. Their fearsome stomachs would shred and digest anything as long as it was an organic substance that they could absorb.


    The swarm might have some ability to burrow and tunnel while under Billis¡¯mand, but the structure that they had developed was still primarily meant for rending and tearing flesh for food. Burrowing through the ground with them not only created tremendousmotion, but was also an incredibly slow process in and of itself.


    To dig his way to survival, Billis had no choice but to make some sacrifices and use the flesh and shells of part of the swarm to raise these special Burrowers.


    When the first Burrower broke through its nest and appeared before Billis, the excitement within his heart was no less than that of the very moment he had advanced to a bug adept. Yet, before he could take a closer look at this Burrower, a dozen insects in a tunnel two hundred and fifty meters away were exterminated in a single strike.


    Billis sighed helplessly then gritted his teeth and revealed a wicked smile.


    These druids had be more and more daring over the past few days. Again and again, they entered the undergroundbyrinth, navigating the winding bug tunnels and cracks to search for Billis.


    Some of the searching druids werebat squadsposed of First Grade druids. If Billis were to send out his only remaining six magical mantises, he would be able to teach these druids an unforgettable lesson, especially in such narrow and small spaces.


    However, some Second Grade druids were hidden within many of these druids squads.


    If the magical mantises were to run into them, their chances of escaping alive were no more than thirty percent.


    Thus, every time Billis¡¯ lookout insects were killed, he would hesitate, unsure of whether to send his mantises to retaliate.


    This torment tortured him day and night, consistently and continuously!


    In the previous battles, Billis had no choice but to resentfully relinquish the idea of a counter attack due to hisck of information. The most important reason for that was his multitude of priorities; he needed a group of soldiers that could protect him at his side constantly.


    Now that he had the Burrowers, escape was a very real possibility. Consequently, Billis¡¯ thoughts and attitude shifted drastically. The desperate and deadly flight had now turned into a situation of tremendous flexibility. As such, Billis had the idea of holding a fun game with his enemies.


    The insect army that had been on the defensive over the past few days once again swarmed into the ditches and tunnels en masse, charging and assaulting these druids squads from every direction.


    As the intensity of the battles increased, some previously unclear information started to gather in Billis¡¯ brain like a downpour of raindrops. As the conditions of the fight in the entirebyrinth appeared before him without reserve, Bills quickly decided upon his opponents.


    It was abat squad formed of three First Grade druids.


    One of them had transformed into a massive serpent a dozen meters long and was responsible for exploring and being the group¡¯s vanguard. The two druids behind him had turned into different animals. One was a massive gopher, sniffling with his long and slender snout for smells in the tunnel, while the other was a rough and bumpy toad that stood upon the serpent and looked around with its bulbous eyes.


    The stench of rot in the tunnel frustrated the three druids to no end during their trip in thebyrinth. They might have turned into magical beasts and possessed the might of magical beasts, but their minds were still those of humans.


    That was why they could tolerate such a dirty and filthy environment, instead of actually taking a liking to it!


    The three of them formed a group. The Giant Serpent was good at picking up tremors in the ground, the shing Gopher was good at smelling odd scents, and the Poison Arrow Toad had great dynamic perception. Theyplemented each other and possessed fairly synergistic teamwork.


    They were silently exploring the tunnels and forks before them while using nature magic to leave special marks along the way. It was their slow and gradual progress that had lit up arge half of this undergroundbyrinth.


    Perhaps they would have been able to fully explore thisplicated and windingbyrinth if they¡¯d had another two more days. By then, the maze would be littered with magical marks, and the insects would have a much harder time scampering about under cover of darkness and chaos.


    As long as they could find the bug adept, the few Second Grade druid masters would ensure that the wicked fellow would never escape again!


    ............


    The dark and narrow tunnel sprawled out before them.


    It was pitch-ck. Surface creatures would not be able to see anything here without darkvision.


    The tunnels here were no more than one meter tall or wide. If those elven archers were toe down here, they would probably have to crawl forward ufortabely. If it were those elven soldiers with their des, they probably wouldn¡¯t even be able to draw their sabers, much less fight.


    That was why a jack-of-all-trades profession like a druid was the most suited for battlefields that required adaptation.


    "This isn¡¯t right; we seemed to have been surrounded by the enemy!"


    The serpent leading in front stopped slithering. He used his sensitive feel for physical movement to pick up on the familiar chattering and vibrations in all tunnels around them.


    It was possible, perhaps, thatrge numbers of insects were swarming toward them through winding tunnels all around them. Insect assaults of this scale were sporadic since the swarm had been severely crippled.


    "Why don¡¯t we retreat first and report this abnormality to the higher-ups?" The gopher raised its body and betrayed a humanoid expression of hesitation upon its furry face.


    There were, at this moment, eleven druid squads searching for that bug adept. Only five of those squads had Second Grade druid masters within their ranks. Sadly, they weren¡¯t one of those squads!


    That was why the gopher immediately cowered in fear upon sensing the movement of the swarm in the distance.


    After all, their strength was limited in this narrow and enclosed space. They couldn¡¯t cast their powerful nature magic at all. Otherwise, the resulting copse of dirt and stone would be enough to kill them.


    "Those insects would definitely destroy the marks we left behind if we were to retreat just like that. Our whole day¡¯s worth of work would have been for nothing. Let¡¯s not retreat or advance. Tor, take the fork to the right; there should be a stone hall thirty meters away from us. It¡¯s not much room, but it should allow us to fight inside it. I have already sent a signal for help. We only need to hold our own for a while, and the surrounding groups wille and reinforce us." In the end, the most senior Poison Arrow Toad croaked and decided on the strategy.


    The three-person team didn¡¯t hesitate at all.


    The gopher and the toad leaped onto the serpent¡¯s back and quickly pushed into the pitch-ck tunnel. They then dove straight into the right tunnel at the three-way fork that appeared in front of them.


    Mere moments after they left, the chattering sound closed in as a swarm of insects charged out of the tunnels and passages. They also unhesitatingly followed the serpent down the right path.


    For a moment, the sounds of shells rubbing against each other filled the underground tunnel!

 Chapter 675 Before the Escape

    A terrifying and bloody ughter was still ongoing in the dark and narrow tunnel!


    The druid that had transformed into a serpent opened his fanged mouth, biting and spitting poison at the swarm and dealing decent damage with every attack. The long tail dragging behind him was also frantically sweeping and waving about, pping and smashing the pursuing horde into patches of meat paste.


    Sadly, these insects didn¡¯t seem to understand death and continued to surge recklessly toward the druids from both sides of the tunnel. Even if they were crushed to death by the serpent the very next second, their only thought in the present was to lunge at the serpent and tear a piece of flesh out of its body.


    Under the fearless assault of the swarm, the snake was soon covered in wounds, despite its sturdy body and fine scales. Countless fine cuts had appeared on its body.


    The shing Gopher and Poison Arrow Toad sitting upon the serpent¡¯s body were also trying their best to exterminate the swarm assaulting them. Burning Fire spells and poison arrows caused countless casualties among the ck beetles, burning the insects into charcoal and melting them into pungent slime.


    An indescribably pungent odor filled the entire tunnel!


    Finally, after cutting his way through the swarm and knocking down a wall of insects, the serpent seeded in bringing itspanions into that wide stone hall.


    It was called a stone hall, but it was no more than a ten-meter-wide cave formed by erosion by underground water.


    The changing of the underground stream¡¯s path left behind this damp and sinister stone hall.


    This ce was just as narrow as everywhere else underground, but it was much taller than the one-meter-tall worm tunnels.


    The three druids quickly transformed into their human forms after rushing into the stone hall. They then raised their oaken staves and hurriedly cast Rejuvenation and Rapid Regeneration upon their bodies. Sadly, before they could treat the wounds on their bodies, the pursuing swarm dig their way into the cave through the tunnels and the cracks in the wall, once again throwing their insect bodies at the druids.


    Aooooo!


    After a massive roar shook the entire undergroundbyrinth, one of the druids quickly transformed into a gigantic Earth Mauler. He unhesitatingly charged at the dense and terrifying swarm.


    Of the two other druids, one transformed into a mighty Giant Raging Ape and turned to attack the swarm as well. The other quickly turned into a treant form and used arge area of thorns to trap the iing insects. He then unleashed several green halos and enhanced hispanions with all sorts of support nature magic.


    Bramblethorn Armor!


    Nature¡¯s Blessing!


    Barkskin!


    Revitalization!


    ......


    Barkskin allowed the target¡¯s skin to be as tough as hundred-year-old bark and resisted weak piercing and shing attacks.


    Bramblethorn Armor formed a magical shieldyer over the target¡¯s bodyposed of green vines and thorns. The shield could not only resist physical and elementium damage but could even reflect parts of the melee damage it took.


    Nature¡¯s Blessing was a type of support nature magic that was mostmonly used by the elves. It could raise all aspects of the target¡¯s attributes¨C Strength, Agility, Physique, and elementium resistance.


    Revitalization provided the target with Stamina and Spirit regeneration,sting for approximately one hundred and twenty seconds.


    One couldn¡¯t look down upon the elves because of their slender and weak build, nor because their Strength and Physique were inferior to tough and muscr magical beasts. Even an ordinarily harmless rabbit could instantly be a ferocious lion when reinforced with all theseyers of magic spells.


    Thus, the three druids started a bloody battle to the death with the invading swarm in this crude stone hall that was no more than ten square meters.


    The excessively narrow terrain gave neither side too much room to dodge or move. The only thing they could do was use their bodies of flesh and blood to endure the enemies¡¯ assault and retaliate with their most wicked attacks. Battle techniques and means of murder were inconsequential in such a scenario. The only useful things were strong physical defenses and ferocious offenses.


    At first, the two tanking druids could still hold off against the wild strikes of the swarm with the protection of Barkskin and Bramblethorn Armor. However, when the green shield was scratched into shattered sparks by the hive, the Earth Mauler had no choice but to roar and cover himself with ayer of stone armor. The Giant Raging Ape also did something simr and covered his body with a yellow armor.


    They had both chosen to transform into earth magical beasts that were known for their toughness. As such, they could still hold off the enemy for a bit longer through their abilities, even after losing their elementium protections.


    The treant being protected by them in the middle was also now surrounded by hordes of beetles. He could only lift his wooden legs and stomp about as much as he could. His thick arms had also turned into long tree whips, violentlyshing at the dense swarm.


    Insect blood sshed everywhere as shells cracked and splintered.


    The entire hall tremored and shook.


    Hoarse battlecries filled the air, along with the sound of pounding fists and the deafening chittering and chattering.


    The ck tide of insects gradually covered the three towering silhouettes in the stone hall; it was difficult even to see them now. One only knew that they were still alive and stubbornly fighting by the asional insect corpse that got flung across the room.


    Just as the three druids were slipping up against the ferocious swarm, a few ck silhouettes climbed up above them along the walls. The next second, an order was given as the six magical mantises split into three groups. They all lunged down from above and stabbed or shed with their exceedingly sharp limbs at the bodies of the druids.


    Aaaaaaah!


    A pained, loud cry reverberated throughout the stone hall, spreading in every direction through the tunnels and the cracks between the rockyers.


    ............


    A group of three druids was fighting its way forward in another underground tunnel.


    Suddenly, they heard that low, gravelly roar of agony from the depths of the underground. A druid that had transformed into a jaguar lifted his head and betrayed an expression of immense shock and fury.


    "It¡¯s Tor! Something¡¯s happened to his squad."


    This druid had an extremely close rtionship with Tor. His heart felt like it was boiling in oil when he heard the agonized cry of his friend, and tremendous anxiety and anger overtook him.


    Despite how much he increased the speed at which he struck with his Shadow w, he was incapable of finishing off this group of several hundreds of insects. He was helpless in the face of this emergency.


    The druid in the group that had transformed into a woodpecker calmly arranging its feathers had a sudden shift in expression. A dangerous and murderous light gleamed in the woodpecker¡¯s eyes. The bird leaped forward as its body rapidly started to swell and distort.


    In the blink of an eye, he had transformed from a harmless woodpecker into a Firelion shrouded in magical mes.


    His lithe and powerful body had just formed, and the surging fires had already burned the remaining beetles in the tunnel to a crisp. His intimidating lion¡¯s head turned back and shouted out, "Follow closely!" He then turned and charged into the distant darkness without looking back.


    Along the way, the raging fires on his body asionally stretched and shrunk, scorching the beetles that were continuously squeezing out of the cracks in the walls. The druid quickly leaped into the depths underground.


    These scattered swarms of insects could not possibly stop the advance of such a powerful Second Grade firelion!


    The two First Grade druids immediately followed after that scorching path of me in joyful surprise, closely following behind the Second Grade druid master.


    Just as the druid master quickly entered a new tunnel after a fork, the path he was previously in mysteriously copsed.


    The two First Grade druids stopped their feet in shock!


    Before they could even figure out what it was that had happened, the chattering sound in the tunnel grew louder and louder. The dark, ck swarm emerged from various tunnels, ditches, and cracks, trapping the druids in here. Behind the squirming swarm, four ck shapes were also silently approaching.


    A dozen secondster, the death throes of two druids also rang out of this ce¨C sorrowful and tragic cries!


    ............


    Bug Adept Billis had to send out two intermediate First Grade magical mantises with every group as insurance for dealing with those beginner First Grade druids. Moreover, with the tide-like swarm, the druids that had their escape path cut off had no chance of fleeing!


    Billis, who had found his ticket out of this sticky entrapment, would have trouble bringing such a tremendous number of insects with him.


    To thoroughly squeeze every bit of utility out of the remaining twenty thousand insects, Billis didn¡¯t mindmitting to such an extravagant and wild strategy!


    The bug adept utilized his familiarity with thebyrinth and hisprehensive grasp of the battlefield at all times to toy with the enemy, working expertly with strategies such as isting, cutting reinforcements, interventions, and fixed ambushes. Billis trapped all the druids in a sea of insects at the price of exhausting his swarm, then proceeded toy traps and bait as he liked.


    Once a First Grade druid was isted, Billis would unhesitatingly strike out, even if he had to lose thousands of insects to aplish his goal of killing the druid. He would either copse the tunnel and separate the enemy or simply send out the swarm to stall the Second Grade druid. At any rate, those trapped First Grade druids couldn¡¯t dream of escaping unscathed once Billis found an opportunity to strike!


    With the masterful use of thebyrinth¡¯s advantage and the rapid exhaustion of the swarm, the casualties to the druids underground started to rise exponentially.


    The hidden Second Grade druids didn¡¯t seem to realize the severity of the issue at first. By the time they started to sense life auras vanishing quickly in session, they could no longer hold back. All of them burst out with their full force!


    At this point, the number of insects had also been drastically reduced from its initial twenty-one thousand to its currently meager four thousand.


    Billis sensed the constant explosions of energy flux in thebyrinth and finally gave the order to retreat.


    All surviving insects seemed to have gone mad at that instant, wildly throwing themselves at what remained of the druids. Bug Adept Billis used a secret tunnel to gather with five of his magical mantises as well as a thousand insects carefully picked out from the swarm in a spot underground.


    The Burrower that had just hatched wasying here, takingrge bites out of the druid corpses sent over by the insect army. It had only been half an hour, but its powers had improved tremendously. It had evolved from a young worm to a grown worm!


    "Let¡¯s go!"


    Billis hissed under his breath while cloaked in his ck robes.


    The Burrower¨Cnow thicker¨Cstarted to crawl toward one side of the wall like a massive snail. The speed at which it moved was almost infuriatingly slow.


    However, the moment its fat intestinal body touched the stone wall, its concentric formation of sharp teeth pierced the earth, and the Burrower started to suck. The rockyer that was meant to be even tougher than steel had a one and a half meter long tunnel dug out of it.


    Don¡¯t judge the Burrower based solely on the fact that its entire body was made of flesh and fiber. It was important to note that Burrowers were the best option when dealing with earth and rockyers.


    Much like a swimming fish tossed into the water, the initially fat and slow body of the Burrower suddenly turned agile. A smooth and wide tunnel appeared before Billis¡¯ eyes at a rate visible to the naked eye. The shaft was still quickly spreading forward.


    Billis nodded in satisfaction as he lifted his leg and jumped onto a magical mantis. The mantis then dove into the tunnel with him upon it.


    The other magical mantises quickly followed after, as the one thousand insects following at the very rear marched forward along with him while also trying their best to destroy the tunnels behind them.


    Asrge clouds of dirt and sand copsed from above, this tunnel that had just appeared was quickly covered and buried under thick sand and dirt.

 Chapter 676 Player and Chess

    "Someone¡¯s got their eye on us now!" Alice casually said.


    She was currently, elegantly, sitting in front of a wooden table, slowly spreading the tarot cards in her hand.


    The back of every single tarot card was carved with delicate and mysterious patterns.


    Apart from some eye-catching colors in the patterns, the cards only had meaningless magical lines on them, especially to the eyes of outsiders. However, in the eyes of the Fate Witches, every wave and turn in these patterns were soaked with an indescribable aura of mystery.


    These patterns were formed from twisted letters and symbols that only diviners could urately decipher!


    It was clearly a damp and dark underground stone hall.


    Yet, if one were to look at Alice¡¯s elegant and casual appearance, her delicate and extravagant silk robe, the expensive velvet tablecloth upon the table, and the shing crystal ball at a corner of the table...


    Greem had a mysterious feeling in his heart. He felt as if he were inside a breezy hall of paradise, holding a crystalline winess in his hand, swirling its contents, and enjoying the fragrant scent within as he silently listened to the sweet words of a beautiful diviner.


    Perhaps this was a unique aura of Fate Witches!


    They could always take someone¡¯s mind beyond reality and ce them in an enchanting and fantastical scene.


    Greem rubbed his right fingers together and confirmed that there was no such crystal goblet in his hand. He then awkwardly sat straight and pursued a question with a frown on his face, "Can you confirm who it is that has their eye on us?"


    "Well, there¡¯s definitely one clone of a Moonlight Goddess among them (advanced Third Grade)!" Alice was still slowly flipping the tarot cards over, "We have already offended her thoroughly. Do you believe me? The moment our positions are exposed, a portal will instantly open before us, and swarms of Second and Third Grade powerhouses will emerge from within."


    "Second and Third Grade powerhouses..." Greem sucked at his teeth. His head ached.


    The Crimson n was only a newly-established adept n right now. Most of its n members were no more than beginner or intermediate First Grade. If they were to run into the clone of the Moonlight Goddess with their current strength, the enemy would crush them as easily as she would crush ants.


    The reason they could still live on sofortably at the moment was due to their stealthy and constant movements. If the enemy intercepted them in Garan, hehehe; the terrifying consequence was one that Greem didn¡¯t even want to imagine.


    "Moreover, that Moonlight Goddess¡¯ clone isn¡¯t the most troublesome of them all." It almost seemed like Alice wasn¡¯t aware of what she was saying. She was still talking as slowly and casually as before.


    "You mean, we have even more troublesome enemies to deal with?" Greem¡¯s frown deepened.


    "Of course!" Alice pursed her lips and smiled. The damp and dark stone room was instantly lit up by her smile, "That pretty girlfriend of yours did a good job. She even managed to catch the attention of the main elven god, Saoirse! Fortunately, Saoirse only cast down a manifestation of her holy will. Herbat power isn¡¯t that strong."


    Greemughed awkwardly and intentionally ignored how Alice referred to Mary. Instead, he carefully asked, "How strong is your ¡®isn¡¯t that strong¡¯?"


    "Probably just beginner Fourth Grade!" Alice¡¯s smile became even brighter.


    Holy crap, beginner Fourth Grade.


    Greem¡¯s feelings were practically falling apart!


    The Fourth Grade divine manifestation of the elven chief god¡¯s will was probably nothing to the Fourth Grade Pale Witch. It would be like a meat bun challenging a dog; that clone would be done for. However, if she were to deal with them, then even Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah would not be able to escape with absolute certainty! As for the remaining adepts? They would most certainly be condemned to death. There was no chance of survival.


    Greem then frowned as he spoke.


    "This is the main reason you have been forbidding the flying ship from mobilizing?"


    "Of course! Over the past few days, the two goddesses have been keeping their eyes fixated on the southwest coast. If we dare to show ourselves, the next group of people to intercept us would be arge group of high-grade spiritualists."


    "Then, are we safe here? There has to be at least one or two gods amongst the elven pantheon that specializes in divination and prophecies, aren¡¯t there?" Greem was suddenly tense again.


    "Hmph! The elves would already have made their way here by the time you thought of that!" Alice rolled her eyes at him unamusedly, "Isn¡¯t that why I had my witches carve so many anti-divination arrays on the ind over the past few days? It¡¯s all to obscure the scrying and senses of the elven gods."


    Alice seemed to have been reminded of the Fate Witches that died during thest battle upon saying this. Her eyes silently turned red.


    If they wanted to master the powers of fate, the Fate Witches had no choice but to sacrifice the magical powers they had formerly possessed. However, without the protection of their magical powers, every single Fate Witch was as frail as paper.


    These witches who imed to have control over the powers of fate could onlytch onto certain powerful factions if they wanted to establish themselves in the tumultuous and dangerous world that was the World of Adepts. The Fate Witches might have a pair of eyes that could see through theplex world of possibilities, but they did not have sufficient strength to alter or obtain anything.


    For example, Alice herself had severely exhausted her life due to the excessively frequent use of the powers of fate. Her remaining life force was not sufficient to sustain her until her advancement to Second Grade.


    Thus, if she wanted to take the risk and undergo advancement prematurely, she had no choice but to steel herself and enter this Faen ne popted by pantheons of gods.


    The practically powerless Alice had only managed to establish herself in Garan with the dedicated support of Greem and his subordinate Crimson n. The current situation might still be shrouded in mist and clouds without a clue as to the best step to take next, but at least she had sessfully secured a seat at the table.


    The entirety of Garan was like a massive chessboard. The only ones who were qualified to make moves upon it were either gods or Fourth Grade witches like Rimura. Even Third Grade witches like Uzzah could only be used as chess pieces that charged forward mindlessly. They had no ability to influence the oue and direction of the game.


    Alice was only First Grade now and was even less qualified to y against the gods.


    However, the powers of fate were truly mystical. There were plenty of times where they didn¡¯t rely on face-to-face confrontations against the enemy to acquire victory.


    What she needed to do now was to secure her position as a yer and silently observe the changes and state of the chessboard. Then all she had to do was wait until the time was ripe to use all her power to snatch away the most insignificant chess piece from the enemy¡¯s board!


    One could say that Alice¡¯s most significant advantage was, in fact, her immense weakness!


    It was because of how weak she was that no chess piece or yer would treat her as a noteworthy character alongside the gods and the Fourth Grade witches. That then gave her the possibility ofying out the board and influencing certain oues in a calm andposed manner!


    However, it was still far too risky to attempt to shift the direction of the chess match, even with thebination of Fate Witches, Dark Witches, and the Crimson n. Over the past few days, Alice had been hesitating between advancing and retreating. She had been even more frustrated over the chaos of the chess match.


    However, Alice couldn¡¯t help but acknowledge the power of Greem¡¯s subordinates. Forget the fact that this mysterious fire adept was such a powerful individual himself; even the few subordinates he had somehow recruited were all so unorthodox and weird.


    Mary was a Second Grade vampire after all. She led her vicious blood knights and blood elves, running from the west coast to the north and extending the fires of war to the north-central section of the Fantasy Forest.


    That Bug Adept Billis was even stranger. He was only an advanced First Grade adept, yet he was jumping about with all the liveliness in the world despite being surrounded by Second and Third Grade elves near Greenwater City itself.


    It was important to note that Greenwater City was currently a military stronghold! Even the number of Fourth Grade powerhouses and god messengers probably exceeded five, not to mention the Second and Third Gradebat professions that likely numbered in the double digits! An insignificant and tiny bug adept was digging through their very beds and had yet to be exterminated.


    This...


    Alice tilted her head and thought for a moment. She couldn¡¯t find the appropriate words to praise this cute bug adept!


    In truth, it was the multi-pronged distractions of Bug Adept Billis and Bloody Queen Mary that allowed the central mountains that had always been shrouded in the dense mist of fate to be ever so slightly exposed.


    Even though Alice could not yet divine anything concrete about the area, this was an excellent omen!


    At the very least, she had already managed to divine some of the information rted to the Staff of Divination.


    A massive stretch of mountains oddly stood out in the center of the boundless forest of Garan. These mountains stretched from the west to the east, covering a distance of tens of thousands of kilometers.


    The center of the mountains hadkes, rivers, gorges, and valleys.


    Of course, most of the terrain was still mountainous forest.


    The central mountains could be said to be the absolute core of the entire elven kingdom.


    The massive temple district was located at the northeast part of the central mountains. There was an exceptionally wide and silent valley of ins there. Tall and steep mountains surrounded the ins, and thus, the ce had been excavated by the gods and turned into an extensive temple district.


    As the rulers of the forest elves, the elven court were also loyal ves of the gods. They didn¡¯t dare to stand on the same pedestal as the temples of the gods. Consequently, the entire court was built upon a neighboring stretch of forest in the central mountains.


    A massive and ancient Tree of Life towered there, having lived for thirty thousand years.


    The entire elven court was built around this Tree of Life!


    It was said that the chief elven god, Saoirse, personally nted this Tree of Life, and that this was one manifestation of her true form and that this was where the pulse of the fate of the entire race of forest elvesid!


    Meanwhile, the Staff of Divination that Alice was determined to acquire on this trip belonged to a Second Grade green dragon¨C Ohgu. The dragoncliff upon which this Second Grade green dragon resided was located at the foot of the central mountains to the west. It could be considered one of the more rural areas already.


    Alice originally had no idea as to how to obtain the Staff of Divination.


    However, in the past few days following the chaos sowed by Mary and Billis, some strange movements had been incited within the central mountains. At the same time, it allowed Alice to vaguely peek at a chance to obtain the Staff of Divination!

 Chapter 677 Movements of the Dragons

    There was a serene and deep forest valley.


    The geography of thend suddenly swelled deep in the woods. Tall and uneven mountains were everywhere. Among them, there was one particrly eye-catching and lonely mountain that pierced the clouds.


    This eighteen-kilometer-tall mountain stood proudly at the western edge of the central mountains. The upper half of the peak was even hidden above the shifting clouds. On the west side of this steep precipice, caves of various sizes had been dug into its rugged cliff.


    The only ones that could move around here were therge and ferocious dragons!


    Noon.


    A loud and drawn-out dragon¡¯s roar suddenly rang from the distant horizon. A single tiny ck dot slowly increased in size and descended on the Green Dragon Dragoncliff that was famous in the entirety of the Faen ne.


    The wild winds swept everywhere as a massive silhouette wove through the clouds. They flew across the sky with their wings spread out, putting their proud and magnificent body on disy for everyone to see.


    It was a terrifying being a whole twelve meters tall.


    Dark green, bowl-sized scales covered their entire body and caused the dragon to shine blindingly under the bright sunlight. The giant dragon¡¯s head was two meters long, and light-green smoke shrouded their snout, adding a hint of mystery to their identity. One could vaguely see the terrifyingly green acid ball behind the dragon¡¯s throat between shes into their colossal mouth.


    The massive and wicked spikes extended from the back of their necks and all the way down their spine. As the dragon beat their broad and scaled wings, a powerful gale flowed around their elegant and perfect body.


    Green Dragon.


    A forest-green dragon that had entered adolescence.


    Green dragons were one of the five chromatic dragons, the mostmonly seen dragons in the world. They possessed acid breath and were rtively weak inbat. Of the five chromatic dragons, their strength was only just slightly more powerful than the water dragons. As such, they were often seen as inferior lower-dragons by the higher dragon races.


    This green dragon soared in the air with their wings spread apart for a moment, then looked down at the towering dragoncliff below. Finally, the dragon decided on a spot, folded their wings, and dove downward at an extreme speed.


    The appearance of a dragon was always eye-catching, regardless of the location and time!


    Inside the dragoncliff, several dozen green dragons extended their heads from their own caves and let out deafening dragon roars at this unexpected visitor.


    For a moment, the surroundings of the dragoncliff were filled with continuous dragon roars, utterly terrifying the nearby birds and beasts of the woods.


    Amongst the many roars, there was one particrly hoarse and loud voice that stood out!


    "Ohgu, you brat! Why have youe to the Dragoncliff again? We do not wee you here."


    The one speaking was a high-grade green dragon whose size and seniority was far superior to the visiting dragon. Judging by itsrge dragon¡¯s head and thick, slender horns, he was a Third Grade green dragon.


    "Yeah, yeah, you disgrace of the dragons. We don¡¯t wee you here."


    Almost as if the Third Grade green dragon had incited them, the many green dragons residing in the dragoncliff erupted with all sorts of roars. Outsiders might have a hard time understanding anything from those deafening roars. Only dragons could fullyprehend this uniquenguage¨C Dragontongue.


    "Chase this thief away."


    "We can¡¯t let him get close to our Dragoncliff."


    The powerful and prideful dragons were synonymous with nobility and sanctity wherever they went. They were higher lifeforms that all low-grade creatures could only worship and look up to. Yet today, when a conflict broke out among their ranks, they were behaving no different from shrews shouting at each other in a wet market!


    The green dragon known as Ohgu was only Second Grade. He wordlessly pped his wings and floated in front of the dragoncliff in the face of these riled crowd. It seemed he was waiting for something.


    As expected, a short momentter themotion and noise in the dragoncliff were disturbed as a beautiful dragon covered in emerald dragon scales dove down from the upper half of the cliff and elegantly appeared on the scene.


    Unlike the muscr and rough bodies of the average green dragon, this higher emerald dragon had not only a more slender and aerodynamic body, but also finer and more delicate scales. What stood out even more about her was that noble and elegant aura of hers, along with a perfect body!


    The appearance of this emerald dragon immediately silenced the ce. Rough and ragged breaths could be heard.


    Iritina!


    It was Iritina!


    As the youngest and prettiest female emerald dragon of Garan, Iritina¡¯s beauty was iparable and acknowledged by all forest dragons.


    Ignoring everything else, just the number of individuals among the green dragons that treated Iritina as their idol would be enough to form an entire regiment. Unfortunately, Iritina was not only a beautiful dragon but also an extremely prideful one.


    Don¡¯t even bring up the mixed-blood green dragons; she couldn¡¯t even bring herself to fancy a single one of those young emerald dragons that barely managed to make it into the ranks of higher dragons!


    As a result, the matter of Iritina¡¯s partner had always been something that troubled the elders of the emerald dragons.


    However, apart from her pride, the dragon beauty Iritina was exceptional, be it regarding her personality or her bloodline. Consequently, she became the object of pursuit and desire of all these green dragon subordinates.


    Iritina beat her slender and delicate dragon wings lightly and let out a crisp and sweet roar at this young green dragon that had drawn the ire of the crowd, "Ohgu, you have already been exiled from the Dragoncliff for taking the personal property of your nsmen as your own. Why have youe back?"


    The other green dragons immediately started making noise at the outsider after hearing Iritina¡¯s query.


    Many green dragons even flew out of their dens, ring their wings and puffing their chests, hoping to leave a good impression in front of Iritina.


    In the state of the dragons, the personal wealth of every dragon was holy and untouchable. Even the closest of rtives or the greatest Dragon God himself had no right to take that which belonged to another dragon. Thus, acts of theft and robbery against dragons were the greatest sins that would enrage all dragons!


    It was no wonder that Green Dragon Ohgu was exiled from the safe andfortable dragoncliff for infringing upon thisw, even if he was an adolescent Second Grade dragon.


    "O¡¯ beautiful Iritina, I heard you have yet to choose your mate. Thus, I wish..."


    Green Dragon Ohgu¡¯s words were interrupted by thunderous dragon roars before he could even finish.


    Every single green dragon that sought Iritina¡¯s fancy flew out of their dens and circled Ohgu, loudly cursing and shouting at him. Some fellows who thought themselves courageous even started to ¡¯roll up their sleeves¡¯ and prepare to beat up Ohgu!


    A traitorous and abandoned green dragon such as himself dared to chase after Iritina? The green dragons were infuriated. It seemed they were prepared to start a fight at any moment.


    The pretty andposed emerald dragon beauty couldn¡¯t help but roar in embarrassment at the sight of this nonsensical disy.


    "All of you, stop! Don¡¯t you forget, this is Dragoncliff! All dragons are forbidden from fighting in here!"


    Those eager teenage dragons finally backed down sheepishly when they heard Iritina¡¯s reprimanding words.


    "You want to chase me?" Iritina finallynded her beautiful eyes upon Green Dragon Ohgu, cold as the morning star.


    "Yes, beautiful Iritina! Someone as pretty as you will not find your match in this nest of useless fools," The muscr and ferocious Green Dragon Ohgu roared loudly, "This trash! Not a single one of them is my match in singlebat! Even amongst those emerald dragons, you can¡¯t find many as strong as I am. So, beautiful Iritina, choose me! I will use all my wealth to decorate your beautiful room."


    All the green dragons couldn¡¯t help but draw in a cold breath of air.


    This Ohgu was actually willing to take out all his personal collection to pursue Iritina. This...this was simply too shocking!


    For a moment, all the green dragons cursed angrily, but their voices unavoidably turned softer.


    "I will find for myself the wealth that I require. I do not need your offerings." The beautiful Emerald Dragon Iritina raised her head proudly, and that pretty dragon¡¯s horn upon her head glistened with blinding light.


    "Then what do I need to do to win your heart?" Green Dragon Ohgu shook his head in frustration.


    "I might not have known what in the past, but I do now!"Iritina said in a soft voice, "A few days ago, the elven court extended a request of aid toward us. Those evil witches are wildly massacring the viges of the elves near the edges of Fantasy Forest and desecrating theirnd. That is why Fantasy Forest needs us; the elves need us. That is why I wish to gather a group of volunteers to follow me and expel those evil witches."


    The previously gossiping dragon flight immediately fell silent upon hearing Iritina¡¯s resolute deration of war.


    Expressions of hesitation and avoidance appeared in the eyes of all the green dragons.


    Many green dragons even let out subdued cries, "What? Has a new round of the Cmity of Witches broken out again?"


    They couldn¡¯t help it. There weren¡¯t very many beings that could harm creatures as powerful as green dragons in the Faen ne! Sadly, the witches were one such powerful and evil group of beings!


    These terrifying witches came from the legendary World of Adepts. They all possessed evil and strange magic. Above all, they had fearsome magical equipment. There weren¡¯t many weapons in Faen that could directly harm the body of a dragon, but there were far too many individuals among the witches who had dragonying weapons and techniques.


    That was why even the lofty dragons had a very high rate of mortality when fighting the witches.


    The green dragons had practically no natural predators with their status in the Great Fantasy Forest. That was why the green dragons were reluctant to risk their own lives to help those elves.


    However, the green dragons were forest dragons as well. They naturally had greatpatibility and intimacy with forest elves, the children of nature themselves. Moreover, the construction of the dragoncliff and the excellent offerings that they enjoyed on a daily basis couldn¡¯t be separated from the help of the elves. Thus, those green dragons who were friendly with certain elves couldn¡¯t help but start deliberating on the elves¡¯ request for help.


    "I will go!" For some reason, Green Dragon Ohgu was the first to volunteer himself.


    With him taking the lead, many green dragons started to offer themselves as well.


    A satisfied smile finally appeared on Iritina¡¯s pretty face.

 Chapter 678 Woodland Pursui

    t


    "How long do you intend to hide before you move?"


    Uzzah stopped Alice in the dark underground corridor andined with dissatisfaction in her voice.


    "That flying ship has already been repaired for a long time now, yet we are not taking the chance to move. Instead, we are hiding on this godforsaken ind. How long are we supposed to hide?"


    One could easily tell that the twenty days of idle activity upon the isted ind had left the Third Grade dark witch anxious and frustrated.


    All the witches carried on their shoulders the mission of their ns and the hopes of their people when they came to this other world. It had been almost two months since the activation of the nar gate. That meant that this trip to Faen was already a third of the way over. Yet, the progress of their mission was still minimal.


    The mission of abducting a small-scale tribe of elves was practically finished for Uzzah. All she needed to do from now on was to visit a few more scattered viges, and she would be done.


    However, the other mission of robbing the pegasus magic springs was still shrouded in mystery. No clues or ns were yet in sight.


    Before she came to Garan, Uzzah had intended to rely on the power of the Pale Witches to snatch the pegasus magic spring from the hands of the elves. However, when she arrived at Garan, she had been disappointed to find that the elves hadplete control and dominance over Garan. They had put together an Anti-Evil Alliance formed purely of Fourth Grade fighters and god messengers that were keeping the Pale Witches utterly locked out of the continent.


    It had been so long since the eruption of the Witch Cmity, but Fourth Grade Pale Witch Rimura had yet to take a single step upon Garan. This...this was far beyond Uzzah¡¯s expectations!


    To prevent Rimura having her apanying spirit sneak past Greenwater City and enter Garan, those otherwise unupied god messengers and Fourth Grade powerhouses would asionally go and attack the Echo Isles.


    Without her apanying spirit by her side, Rimura herself didn¡¯t have sufficient power to fend off thebined strength of multiple Fourth Grade powerhouses. Thus, through such a stupid method, the elves had forcefully managed to tie down Rimura and her apanying spirit to the Echo Isles.


    As long as the Pale Witches still wanted to hold possession of this ideal foothold off the coast of Garan, Rimura would have no choice but to remain stationed at the Echo Isles, bitterly waiting for those bastards to challenge her patience.


    In all honesty, if the elves truly intended to raze the adept¡¯s tower on Echo Isles, all they needed to do was set all five Fourth Grades of Greenwater City on the attack. Rimura wouldn¡¯t be able to deal with such a massive power differential, even with the tower at her back and the tremendous teamwork between her and her apanying spirit.


    However, the elves didn¡¯t do so out of their own considerations.


    If they destroyed the Echo Isles and routed the Pale Witches, this particr Fourth Grade Witch would no longer have any obligations or concerns weighing her down. Provoking and infuriating the Pale Witches didn¡¯t seem like a good idea when the elves didn¡¯t have an absolute guarantee to exterminate them yet.


    Fourth Grade strength was the limit of power within most nes!


    Even if the gods themselves were to descend, they would not be able to exert more power beyond peak Fourth Grade. The gods didn¡¯t have any dominating advantage over Fourth Grade powerhouses apart from more significant knowledge and technique.


    As such, destroying the den of the Pale Witches and enabling them to break into Garan to murder and seek revenge as they wanted would only inflict even more severe and massive losses on the elven kingdom.


    It was precisely out of this consideration that the kingdom chose to take the strategy of sieging the high-grade witch and continuously challenging her.


    The result of this strategy meant that the Echo Isles of the Pale Witches had virtually turned into a training grounds. A fearsome battle between Fourth Grade powerhouses would break out over the inds every so often. Without exception, every fight would end with casualties, but never severe enough to cripple either side.


    The frequency of these events and the passage of time quickly caused Uzzah to lose interest in these almost scheduled fights. What worried her more was the loss of time!


    Alice returned Uzzah¡¯s questions with a sweet smile.


    "Witch Uzzah, you should know as well that our previous activities have already drawn the attention of the elven goddesses. Before they shift their gazes away, any reckless actions on our behalf will only spell doom for the entire group."


    Uzzah fell silent for a moment before finally speaking again.


    "There¡¯s no need for us to lie to each other anymore. Was the descent of the Moonlight Goddessst time your doing? Why else would it have been such a coincidence? Those spiritualists descended upon us right after our battle concluded!"


    Alice smiled again.


    "We are already allies? Why would we ever try and trap our allies? Not to mention, we fought till the very end during thatst incident. The price we paid was even more severe than that of you Dark Witches. Or do you think I would push my own subordinate Fate Witches to their death?"


    Uzzah was speechless in front of Alice¡¯s questions.


    The Dark Witches had suffered a lot of casualties and deaths during thest battle. Still, apart from two of those casualties that had been directly exterminated by the god messenger along with their souls, the others had all revived on Shadow Ind.


    Inparison, the Fate Witches were far more tragic. Their numbers had been cut down to half the original!


    That male adept had spent a great deal of wealth to summon a Third Grade dragon. Even the flying ship had been functioning at maximum capacity.


    It was all these factors that caused Uzzah to be unsure of their motives, even as she had her suspicions. Moreover, she was currently asking for a favor from them. Uzzah had no choice but to gloss over the issue and not pursue it any further.


    "Alice, you are the leader of the Fate Witches. I wish to borrow your power of divination to investigate some things." She was bowing her head and asking for a favor from a tiny First Grade witch. It was only natural that Uzzah was hesitant in her speech.


    Alice¡¯s heart moved slightly. The smile on her face grew even brighter.


    She had been curious about the goal of the Dark Witches in leaving therger party for Garan all this while. Understanding this would be advantageous for her grasp of the situation¡¯s future developments. Sadly, these Dark Witches kept a tight lip and didn¡¯t allow Alice to get any information out of them.


    Now, the leader of these Dark Witches personally intended to tell her.


    No matter how you liked at it, this was good news!


    That said, the more that this was the case, the more important it was for Alice not to betray her enthusiasm.


    "You want me to divine? This is an otherworldly ne, you know? I am not being supported by an astrology tform either. The price I would have to pay for a divination would be far toorge!" Hesitation appeared on Alice¡¯s face.


    "Don¡¯t worry about that. I understand the rules of Fate Witches. I will definitely be able to afford a reward that will satisfy you."


    "That is good! Then why don¡¯t we go to my room?"


    The two witches walked as they talked, their voices gradually vanishing down the dark and damp corridor.


    ............


    The pursuit and ughter in the woods were still ongoing.


    Both sides were giving it their all, but the battle still seemed bloody and worrisome.


    Squads of elves leaped through the dense trees of Fantasy Forest as if they were flying, weaving between the top of the ancient trees as agile as monkeys and apes. Several de dancers with long sabers and naked upper bodies fully covered in elvenbat tattoos ran beneath them, sprinting past the bushes below like shes of lightning.


    They were giving chase, and they were fighting.


    The targets of their pursuit were those flocks of crimson bats flying and swerving between the trees at extreme speeds.


    These bats were blood red, be it their bodies or their hair.


    A single look at these creatures would fill people with a strange, sinister feeling of dread!


    These odd bats were not creaturesmonly found in Fantasy Forest. Every one of them seemed to have extreme intelligence, asionally splitting up and escaping while also gathering together to retaliate. Every one of their movements and attacks was so surgical and trained that it was impressive.


    The pursuing elves knew very well that these bats were not forest creatures or magical beasts. Instead, they were a sort of unique witch creation that had never before appeared in Faen ne.


    Indeed, they were not natural magical creatures, but magical creations produced by those evil witches through the use of their fearsome magic.


    Their name was...vampire!


    Each crimson bat was a vampire of its own.


    They had twopletely different forms, one being their current bat state that allowed them to easily fly, escape, and hide. The other was their human form.


    Their human forms were so ordinary that most elves had trouble picking up on their abnormalities, at least until they revealed their bloody fangs and crimson eyes.


    Much like ordinary humans, they did not have scaled skin and very rarely wore metal armor. That caused their physical defense to be extraordinarily low, so much so that they were incapable of defending against any physical or magical damage. Yet the strange and terrifying thing about them was their ability to regenerate through sucking blood.


    It didn¡¯t matter how severe the wound was. All sorts of injuries would healpletely in a matter of seconds as long as they could get a few mouthfuls of blood. Even those vampires that had been reduced to ashes would be able to revive in a surge of brilliant crimson light as long as there were vampires wildly ingesting blood nearby.


    It was these two racial traits that allowed the weak vampires thatcked any ranged spells to be able to hold their own against the pursuing elven army. It was more than enough to illustrate the terror of vampires!


    Even more horrifying was the fact that a group of Second Grades hid amidst these vampires.


    These Second Grade vampires were like the rulers and controllers of the flock. They hid in the shadows,manding the vampires to strike and retreat as they yed a game of guerri warfare in the vast Fantasy Forest.


    As an elven army sent out by Skywater City, these elves were not weaklings either.


    Be it the melee warriors that were the de dancers, or the long-ranged attackers that were the elven archers, the elves came in numbers of hundreds and thousands. There were plenty of specialized professions like druids, casters, and tamers within their ranks as well.


    With all these advantages on their side, the elven army kept a close pursuit on these identally exposed vampires, ying a game of cat and mouse in the boundless andplicated Fantasy Forest.

 Chapter 679 Bloody Pursui

    t


    There were no easy opponents among those that dared to travel to a different world and freely roam about in enemy territory!


    Mary¡¯s vampire army had swollen like a rolling snowball after she took advantage of Billis drawing away the attention of the Skywater City elves.


    However, the ravaging of the vampire army incited Skywater City¡¯s response¨C a standard elven army of three thousand soldiers. From chimera squads to druid squads to green fairy squads; in all seriousness, the elves were treating Mary and her vampires as an actual army.


    After a sloppy battle at Morgan Valley, Mary had unhesitatingly led all her vampires away in an attempt to escape!


    She had no choice. The vampires¡¯ survivability was truly powerful, but they were still far from being able to fight with a proper elven army.


    Without qualified defenders and ranged units for cover, the vampires were exterminated by an urate barrage of elven arrows before they could even get close to the elves. The vampires that, luckily, managed to approach the elves due to the cover of trees and terrains were surrounded by war dancers the moment they showed themselves.


    This batch of newly converted vampire spawn experienced a tremendous loss of Physique, Strength, Agility, and intelligencepared to actual vampires. The blood elves who endured the intense change of blood and did not regress into wild beasts were a minority after all. Ordinary elves could only be modified into these inferior vampires that just knew how to obey orders.


    Moreover, they had only justpleted the alteration of their blood and were yet unused to this half-elf, half-vampire form of theirs.


    They might still be as quick and agile as before and possess ferocious attacks, but there was a hint of numbness and clumsiness when they switched between their bat and elven forms. In truth, this weakness wasn¡¯t all that serious, but it was magnified when they were dealing with extremely agile war dancers!


    The movements of these vampire spawn were slow, dull, clumsy, and unresponsive in front of these war dancers and their two narrow elven sabers. They were practically the ideal training dummy.


    When both parties passed by each other in the woods, snow-white shes of des would shine in the night, and the heads and limbs of vampire spawn would go tumbling in the air.


    It was only the first sh of the battle, yet three hundred and seventeen of Mary¡¯s four hundred vampire spawn had been pinned to the ground by sharp arrows. The other eighty-three were also experiencing an agonizing death by a thousand cuts beneath the des of the elven war dancers.


    The vampire spawn army had utterly fallen apart a mere three minutes into the start of the battle!


    Having run into an iron wall, Mary unhesitatingly brought the remaining vampires with her and went on the run.


    To avoid the vampires from escaping, the elvenmanders hastened the elven army forward in full pursuit. In doing so, they became incapable of maintaining their previously sturdy and well-defined dynamic defense.


    Squads of elven archers rode hippogryphs above the towering canopy, trailing behind a shocking number of bats. They made sure to fly at least a hundred meters in the sky out of concern of an ambush from the vampires. They could only asionally see the rampaging crimson cloud of bats through the gaps in the canopy.


    Their job wasn¡¯t to attack the flock of bats but to point the elven strike team below in the right direction every so often. As such, their safety was pretty much guaranteed. At the very least, they had not let these vampires escape, even after several dozens of kilometers.


    Yet, just as they reached a dense stretch of the forest, the cloud of bats vanished without a trace.


    The excessively dense leaves and full canopy made it exceedingly difficult for them to figure out the enemy¡¯s tracks. With no choice left to them, the leader of the archers could only lower the height of her hippogryph and circle above the canopy in hopes of finding something.


    At the very moment the hippogryph riders descended, the forest beneath them trembled as six crimson silhouettes shot out from within.


    These shapes had gray, demon-like bat wings behind their backs. The distance between them and the riders rapidly closed as they beat their wings and soared into the skies.


    "Enemy assault!"


    "Attack!"


    All the hippogryphs started fluttering amidst panicked cries and calls. They quickly drifted outward to avoid the enemy¡¯s charge. While the hippogryphs repositioned themselves, the riders on their backs stabilized themselves with their extraordinary sense of bnce. They then drew their bows, nocked their arrows, and quickly intercepted the enemy with their bolts.


    Zeng, zeng, zeng!


    The countless snapping bowstrings rang out as numerous arrows shot toward these crimson silhouettes at speed faster than the eye.


    Strangely enough, these crimson shapes had no intention of dodging in the face of this rain of arrows. Instead, they endured the arrows and charged into the skies.


    These figures then let out battlecries, and crimson arcs of light, soaked in savage blood energy, cut across the sky in every direction. The hippogryphs that failed to dodge in time red their wings and cried out loud. The next second, their corpses split in half and fell from the sky in a rain of blood.


    As for the riders on the hippogryphs back? Some had keen senses and left the area covered by the crimson light arcs just in time and were saved by other nearby hippogryphs. Some elves couldn¡¯t respond in time and were cut by the crimson arcs of light along with their hippogryphs. These elves were diced to pieces before they could even shout out in agony, falling from the sky in bits and chunks.


    For a moment, the hippogryph squad had been thrown into utter chaos!


    These crimson silhouettes took advantage of their panic and pped their wings once again,unching a fierce charge at the elves as if they were knights of the skies.


    Three blood knights and three blood elves. All of them were powerhouses that possessed ¡¯pseudo-Second Grade¡¯ power. Moreover, they did not fear the attacks of these elves, allowing them to charge fearlessly like a tiger let loose upon a herd of sheep. They ughtered the hippogryph squad, letting broken corpses fall from the sky like raindrops.


    Qiu, qiu!


    A series of magical beasts calls rang from the distant horizon.


    Realizing that the scouts had been attacked, arge group of chimeras and silver pegasuses was rapidly approaching the battlefield, carrying many more elves on their backs.


    A sound rang out in the forest below before the reinforcements could enter the fight. The six crimson silhouettes turned and quickly vanished into the woods, disappearing without a trace.


    By the time the elves arrived, only a flock of continuously rising hippogryphs were left, along with broken and severed bodies hanging from the branches below. The pungent odor of blood forced its way up the nostrils of the elves, choking them and almost making them vomit in disgust!


    The high-grade druid that had hurried to the scene stomped his feet in anger. At the same time, he couldn¡¯t help but be shocked at the ferocity of these vampires!


    "There is a group of Second Grade people in the enemy¡¯s ranks. The scouts will have a hard time if no powerhouses are escorting them!" A high elf standing upon the back of a muscr chimera frowned and said, "Lord Antoril, it seems we can only leave the task of tracking the enemy to you!"


    This person named Antoril was a Third Grade druid elder. He belonged to the congregation of the Talon and could transform into two types of ferocious Third Grade avians. That was why the elvenmander kept him at his side.


    Third Grade fighters often had extremely high status and positions in regr elven armies. Even the leadingmander could not enforce any tasks upon them. You would have to discuss any matters of necessity that required their attention with an amicable tone.


    Moreover, this particr Third Grade druid elder wasn¡¯t even in the army; he belonged to the congregation of the Talon. Themander would have to rely on their personal rtionship to issue any orders to the druid.


    It was important to note that no druid elder would ever act alone!


    A dozen high-grade druids draped in green leaves and vines stood behind Elder Antoril¡¯s back. Amongst them were as many as four Second Grade druid masters. Even the remaining druids were elite druids with individual specializations of their own.


    Such a powerful druid squad would be a treasured elite unit in any elven army. They wouldn¡¯t hastily be sent into battle out of fear of suffering casualties. However, they had no choice today. To avoid letting the vampires escape, these druids would have to serve as vanguards and scouts!


    "Leave it to us!" The druid elder was clearly a close friend of themander. He very generously spoke, "These evil fellows! They have already ravaged the elven viges near the west coast. I was just thinking of settling that debt with them! Let¡¯s go and show them a little color, shall we?"


    The druid elder roared, and eighteen druids in eagle helms raised the staffs in their hands in unison. They quickly transformed into giant eagles and featherwing serpents amidst a blinding green light. They then dove forward into the forest.


    The druid elder, on the other hand, rapidly turned into a massive thunder roc, spreading his wings and soaring ahead.


    The size of this thunder roc and the intensity of the electricity that d its body was shocking!


    With such a group of druids leading the way, the safety of the elven archers was finally ensured to some extent. The routed hippogryph squad gathered together once more. Their numbers had been cut in half, but the remaining riders were still in good spirits. They all requested permission from themander to continue their pursuit.


    With the consent of themander, this squad of only twenty hippogryph riders quickly followed after the giant thunder roc and pursued in the direction of the enemy.


    Several kilometers behind them, arge group of war dancers, archers, and green fairies were traversing the forest in a loose formation, trying their best to keep up with the flying scouts.


    One had to acknowledge that the vampires were not the match of this elven army when it came to frontal warfare. However, when it came to a battle of mobility, this elven army wouldn¡¯t be able to touch the soles of the vampires¡¯ feet, even if their numbers increased tenfold.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The vampires had unique Physiques. They only needed to suck some blood from forest creatures to maintain their stamina and energy. Meanwhile, while these elves were all elites, they were still made of flesh and blood. They were far from being capable ofpeting with monsters like vampires in terms of stamina!

 Chapter 680 Invisible Enemy

    The woods were dark and the trees towered above everything else.


    From inside the dense forest, the branches and leaves seemed to have cut up the sky into fragments of light.


    Spots of radiance scattered from the skies, flickering as the leaves swayed in the winds. The vast and seemingly boundless greenery of the forest extended without end, from stout bushes to towering trees. This ce was like a paradise of nts and nature¡¯s treasury itself.


    Ironoaks, firs, spruces, cedars, and all sorts of arbor trees grew straight towards the sky, their magnificent and towering bodies an impressive sight to all. Meanwhile, all types of nameless vegetation and vines filled the gaps between the trees, leaving no spaces at all.


    Any outsider would find it difficult to walk in such an ancient and primal forest.


    At this moment, two odd groups of people were recklessly engaged in pursuit through the Great Fantasy Forest, fighting ferociously with all they had.


    Fleeing at the forefront was the vampire army led by Mary.


    Though this group was described as an army, their actual number was no more than two hundred, while those that could be considered elite vampires numbered only three dozen.


    Despite it being such a motley crew, they were able to transform into palm-sized crimson bats and weave between the branches, wildly escaping the mad pursuit of the enemies behind them.


    The ones chasing after the vampire army were a group of only a dozen strange birds with excessively ferocious appearances.


    Most of them wererge hawks with golden talons and silver wings. These birds could reach up to two meters tall when standing upright, while their wingspan easily measured four meters long. The rest of the flying creatures were odd flying serpents with wings upon their backs. Blinding electricity rumbled across their bodies as they flew.


    Asrge flying beasts, their bodies weren¡¯t suited for such high-speed flights in the woods. However, they were oddly able to traverse the harsh terrain, asionally ring their wings and riding upon the winds while sometimes folding them to maneuver between the branches and leaves.


    A terrifying wind de or lightning st would shoot forth whenever their green eyes locked onto a flying bat. It was just too hard for a vampire spawn to dodge instant-cast magic like this with their power!


    That was why several crimson bats had been exterminated in the skies along the way.


    On the other hand, the hastily organized retaliation of the bat had absolutely no effect upon the pursuers. The rumbling lightning would exterminate a vast majority of the bats before they could even get close.


    As vampire spawn with only the strength of an advanced apprentice, their bodiescked magic resistance and were as thin as paper beneath the eyes of elite druids. As for their ability to regenerate by consuming blood? That was utterly useless before a tidal storm of lightning.


    The only ones who could hold their own against these pursuers were the blood knights and the blood elves. Even the First Grade vampires had trouble guaranteeing their own safety.


    However, due to the threat of the giant thunder roc above, Mary didn¡¯t dare to send her elite squad to execute the pursuers, even after a great deal of hesitation.


    Both parties quickly traveled the forest during this pursuit, traversing a distance of a hundred kilometers within a single day. At this point, the power of the vampires¡¯ unique Physique was slowly starting to show.


    The vampires still had energy to spare, but the druid squad was at their limits!


    Finally, the pursuers were gradually left behind, and the vampires screeched as they continued into the depths of the forest.


    They flew on for another two hours in the forest and eventually stopped near a short cliff when there was no longer any trace of the druids.


    Though the vampires had unique Physiques, an entire day of continuous exhaustion had still caused the blood energy stored within their bodies to fall to extremely low levels.


    Night had already fallen by now. The entire forest was engulfed in heavy darkness.


    After they had set camp,rge swarms of vampires scattered into the surrounding woods to find blood treats. Meanwhile, Mary gathered a group of her subordinates and silently started to discuss their ns for the uing days.


    It was undeniable that they would never dare to set foot anywhere near Skywater City anymore!


    Their reckless actions before this had infuriated the upper echelons of the elves. The fact that this elite elven army had managed to intercept them near the west coast was no coincidence. Rather, it was a nned operation of extermination on the elves¡¯ part.


    Mary summoned a few of the blood elves and quickly gained an understanding of the situation after some questions.


    Within the ranks of the elven army, the elvenmanders were often apanied by elven diviners. Apart from their immense knowledge that allowed them to understand the geography of the entire continent and recognize all sorts of flora and fauna, these individuals were also prophets.


    Prophets. They were undoubtedly the most difficult opponents amongst casters, as well as the type that Mary was most reluctant to deal with!


    As a Second Grade vampire adept, her confidence in ughtering elves inside the elven kingdom¡¯s sphere of influence with a ragged crew all came from the agility and stealthiness of the group. She wouldn¡¯t even consider touching excessively strong elven cities and groups.


    The ones she chose to deal with had always been delicious food that had been specially selected and that she could easily swallow.


    However, if an elven diviner came looking for them and provided guidance, the advantage of the vampires would no longer exist. This group that Mary had spent so much effort into raising would instantly be cast to the winds if elves surrounded them on all sides.


    In fact, if one were to be brutally honest, even a Second Grade vampire adept like Mary would have plenty of trouble escaping unscathed!


    While Mary and the rest were softly discussing the problems with frustrations in their hearts, the angered and anxious roar of vampires came from the woods in the distance.


    "What¡¯s the matter? What¡¯s happened there?"


    Mary suddenly stood up. Her crimson eyes glimmered in the darkness.


    At that moment, her spiritual senses picked up on four spiritual nodes that had their connections severed with her origin power. It seemed the enemy had exterminated them.


    The forest in the distance suddenly buzzed as several dozens of crimson bats swarmed out from within. They cried and circled around as if avoiding something.


    While Mary was still lost in confusion, the sound of snapping bowstrings rang out without stop. Several odd arrows shot out from the forest and pinned a dozen of those bats to an ancient tree.


    "It¡¯s the elves!"


    Mary and the rest realized the enemy¡¯s identity almost immediately.


    Even though Mary was very confused as to how the elves had been able to catch up so quickly, she still led her Second Grade subordinates into the forest.


    The Fantasy Forest at night was just as mysterious and unpredictable as it was during the day.


    The Fantasy Forest in daytime was dark and dim. Ironically, the Fantasy Forest of nighttime glowed with a faint light due to arge amount of microscopic moss and magical nts.


    This bit of faint light wasn¡¯t enough to illuminate anything for an ordinary person, but it was more than enough for Mary and her vampires to see as perfectly as if it were daytime!


    Everything inside the vast and deep Fantasy Forest seemed so serene and obscure, so peaceful yet quiet.


    Mary looked around her and couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    The enemy? Where was the enemy?


    She couldn¡¯t see any living beings in her crimson field of vision, much less elven archers.


    Those arrows had been shot out from right here. How could they have escaped so quickly?


    While Mary was thinking to herself, the sound of ferocious winds broke out from the shadows of Fantasy Forest. Massive barrages of wicked and urate arrows came out of nowhere, forcefully engulfing the vampires in their range.


    Several of the vampires and Old Fox Vanlier were hit due to theirck of experience. The sound of arrows piercing flesh rang out in session, and the vampires let out muffled grunts. Three of the blood knights drew their swords and swung them around, deflecting most of the arrows. They then endured the few unfortunate arrows that pierced their bodies without even flinching.


    As this was happening, Mary extended a slender, white hand, the fingernails painted with daffodil juice. She flicked her fingers several times and managed to flick away the arrows directed at her. The casualness of her actions terrified the fellows that were hiding in the darkness.


    Lights sh, and her silhouette trembled.


    The area where the arrows hade from flickered and the horrifying silhouettes vanished once again.


    Three blood knights had charged to the spot and hacked the rose bushes to pieces. Strangely enough, they found no enemies.


    Hidden enemies?


    As they were still caught up in shock, a few dozen more arrows shot out toward them at extremely close distances.


    This time, they did not have the fortune of shielding themselves with their swords; they were instantly pincushioned with a rain of arrows.


    Mary¡¯s eyes froze.


    She saw it clearly this time. These arrows had practically shot out right by the side of these three blood knights. It was almost as if they were standing in an encirclement of hidden elves while being utterly oblivious of that fact!


    The crossbow arrows were forged of refined steel. Delicate magical patterns had even been carved on them, seemingly imbuing them with the effects of Pierce and Windwing. The former was to increase effectiveness against individuals with heavy armor or tough skin, while thetter was to eliminate the sound of the shattered wind as the arrow shot across the sky.


    That was why the arrows that had pierced the bodies of the three blood knights were all enchanted arrows.


    Moreover, those who could afford to use such expensive enchanted arrows couldn¡¯t possibly be ordinary people either!


    Even with seven or eight arrows through their bodies, the three blood knights were still vigorously waving their longswords. Large crimson sword sts were being fired from their des, slicing the surrounding trees and bushes to pieces.


    An ancient tree where an enemy was hiding seemed to have been cut down during this chaos because a slender shadow jumped down from a falling tree. The silhouette rolled on the ground and quickly vanished as they leaped into the shadow of another tree.


    The next second, Mary had already appeared at the position where the enemy had vanished. She looked around her with crimson eyes as they flickered with a strange light.


    In the shadows behind her back, where her eyes could not reach, a dark and lightless dagger extended from the shadows, silently stabbing toward the back of Mary¡¯s head.


    A spotty shadow was cast down through the leaves and branches due to the moonlight, entirely concealing the magical aura gathering upon the de of the dagger.


    Ci!


    The energy at the tip of the de only erupted at the moment the dagger was about to make contact with the skin.


    A tremendous and overwhelming aura of energy spilled forth.

 Chapter 681 Complete Crushing

    It was like a performance with perfect teamwork.


    Mary, who had been looking coldly elsewhere, suddenly twisted her body. She perfectly dodged the sudden strike from the mysterious dagger and appeared within that stretch of shadow.


    Her fingers moved like des as she flicked them, gently piercing into a living body.


    A pained grunt rang out as warm, red blood started bleeding out of the cracked bark. At the same time, there was a light peeling sound as a slender figure peeled off of the bark. As the elven cape split apart, the trademark and delicate face of a female elf was revealed.


    Even though this face was extremely contorted due to agony, it was still as pretty as ever. In fact, the elf¡¯s current expression could invoke sympathy in most people.


    Mary¡¯s right hand, still infused with incredible amounts of blood energy, had prated the elf¡¯s chest. She had a gentle grasp over the still-beating heart of the pretty elf.


    "Ignore me; kill...kill this...demon!" Blood streaked down the corner of the injured elf¡¯s mouth as she screamed with all her might.


    The hidden snap of bowstrings rained down in the shadows of the surrounding woods.


    Several enchanted arrows shot toward Mary from every direction.


    However, regardless of how fast the arrows were, they could not catch up with Mary¡¯s extreme agility.


    After advancing to Second Grade, Mary¡¯s Agility had already reached a shocking twenty-six points. That was an entire two times more than the Agility of these strange elves. The high Agility not only gave Mary surprising jumping ability and lightning speed, but also a stunning reflex.


    One could genuinely say that everything within Mary¡¯s vision was moving at a slower pace, so much so that they were even at a standstill! As long as she wanted to, she could stab a dagger into an elf¡¯s heart while they were still drawing their bow at her, then casually returned to her original spot and wait for the arrow to fly over.


    Mary had seldom used her crimson longbow since advancing to Second Grade. It wasn¡¯t because the might of the bow was too insignificant. It was because the speed of her arrow was simply far too slow. Rather than wait for the bolt to reach the enemy, why not just stab into the opponent¡¯s heart or throat with her hands? That was far more exhrating and simple.


    That was why Mary could spare the effort to crush the elf¡¯s heart and walk through the rain of arrows in the face of the barrage. Mary reached out with her hand and plucked away some of the more annoying arrows before shing ten meters away to a patch of dense brambles, gently shing the throat of an invisible person, and then blinking away once again.


    Mary¡¯s movements looked as strange as those of a phantom¡¯s in the eyes of those elves.


    One moment Mary had been twenty meters away, the next she was wiping at the throat of apanion beside her, then the next she appeared in a different area, flicking a crimson arrow at another elf¡¯s eye.


    shing, disappearing, flickering, disappearing, and flickering again.


    The process and actions in-between could not be captured at all. The only thing that the slow dynamic vision of the elves could catch was the 0.01 seconds where Mary paused before killing.


    As the dense barrage of arrows smacked against the ancient trees and embedded themselves into their trunks, six fountains of blood simultaneously burst forth into the empty air graced by the moonlight. Six elves whose wide-open eyes, filled with utter disbelief and horror, copsed without a sound. Their soft bodies rolled on the emerald-green grass of the forest.


    With the death of the elves, the elven capes they draped around them lost their Moonstalking Stealth ability as well; their true faces were finally exposed to the vampires.


    Uniform leather armor and dark-green capes. Pretty faces and slender ears. The short green hair and delicate crossbows, along with daggers, flying ws, and throwing knives at the waist was the appearance of an assassin.


    The elves also had assassins?


    A loud gale sped through the forest in Mary¡¯s moment of thought.


    A fast and cold wind struck toward Mary¡¯s back.


    The cold wind was sharp and chilling; it appeared to be a small, sharp weapon.


    The forest was once again filled with flickering silhouettes as multiple afterimages rapidly shed all over the ce. The sounds of shing metal rang out continuously and in session.


    The new opponent was a Second Grade fighter among these odd elves. She also specialized as a high-agility assassin. The phantasmal silhouette the Moonlight Goddess bestowed upon her ensured that the only thing that ordinary people saw would be her afterimages.


    Outsiders would die to her iparably sharp daggers without ever touching her sleeves when she used such a practical and straightforward ability, particrly with her exceptional Agility.


    It was a shame; truly a shame!


    The twenty-one agility points of this odd elf were utterly put to shame by Mary¡¯s twenty-six points. Her footsteps could not even keep up with Mary¡¯s shadows. Mary also seemed to possess the ability to distinguish between the elf¡¯s real form and afterimages. That caused all of the elf¡¯s prided abilities to be no more than bubbles before her.


    The two assassins quickly jumped through the forest, switching between twenty to thirty battlefields in a mere matter of ten seconds.


    The conclusion of the battle was seven w marks on the elf¡¯s body and not a scratch on Mary. One of the w marks even viciously tore apart the right side of her delicate, beautiful face.


    As the two separated from each other after their ferocious bout, three more stealthed elves copsed in the forest without a sound. A bloody hole existed where their throats and hearts were, without any exception. Crimson blood stained the grass beneath them.


    The odd elf flickered and moved into a shade in the forest, her eyes burning with the fires of fury. She red murderously at the female vampire casually standing upon a soft branch.


    Resentment and anger filled her heart, but she knew very well that the difference between them was far toorge. It was so massive that it was impossible topensate for it with numbers!


    The enemy was Second Grade. She was Second Grade as well.


    However, there was a tremendous difference, even between Second Grades!


    After all, the opponent was a Second Grade witch from the World of Adepts, while she was only a Second Grade experimental task force created through thebined efforts of the elven kingdom and the Moonlight Temple. Both parties were not even on the same technical level when it came to bodily attributes or the skill of utilizing those individual abilities.


    If the enemy was said to be a ferocious lone wolf filled with scars and memories of countless bloody battles, then she was a little bunny armed to the teeth.


    Even armed with a full set of armor and sharp weapons, the victor of a sh between them had to be the wolf.


    There was noplicated reason for it. One was a natural predator, while the other was only a herbivore that wanted to scare away the enemy. Their status was determined the moment they were born. No outside factors could change that fact.


    The fires of anger in the elven leader¡¯s eyes slowly faded after a momentary stand-off. She reluctantly epted her defeat and silently gave the order to retreat.


    As a whistle rang out in the woods, the odd elves hiding in various corners of the forest promptly escaped in every direction. The enemy, whose leader also had frightening movement speed, had already seen through their invisibility. Fighting any longer would only cause them to be wiped out.


    The previously serene forest immediately became popted by moving shadows as countless phantasmal silhouettes floated through the woods, confusing the eyes of any witnesses.


    The three blood knights gripped their runic longswords and prepared to give chase. However, they were momentarily stunned by the scene before them and had no idea in which direction they should pursue. They could only remain on the spot and listen carefully to the pitiful cries that rang out one after another in the forest until, finally, there was only deathly silence.


    As they froze on the spot in confusion, Mary casually stepped out of the shadows of the trees, herx hands still dripping with sweet and viscous blood.


    Mary had trouble stopping the leader of those elves from escaping when she was only focused on that, even when she went all out. As such, Mary wasted no time on the leader and chose to ughter the other elves rapidly.


    Clearly, her harvest was plentiful as well!


    "Go collect the corpses of those elves. I want to examine them again."


    Having said that, Mary proudly returned to her temporary base.


    The aura and dominance of the Bloody Queen were no more obvious than at this very moment!


    A short momentter, twenty-three elf corpses were spread out in a row on the empty field where the base was located. A few of the vampire higher-ups were moving around and examining them.


    Finally, after hearing the feedback of some of the blood elves, Old Fox Vanlier returned to Mary¡¯s side and delivered his report by her ear.


    The Undermoon Assassins.


    What the heck is that?


    Mary waved the blood elves over and delved into more thorough questioning. It was only now that she figured out what this strange elven force was.


    Of course, this was a force belonging to the Moonlight Temple.


    The elven kingdom chose elven rangers with exceptional abilities and sent them to the Moonlight Temple. They then became loyal believers of the Moonlight Goddess and were blessed with powers, thus giving birth to this very different elvenbat force¨C the Undermoon Assassins!


    This operationpensated for the elven kingdom¡¯s awkwardck of powerful assassins!


    The Undermoon Assassins possessed exceptional individual technique. Every single elf was the very best at traditional archery techniques and close range fighting. Add to that the abilities bestowed upon them by the Moonlight Goddess, such as Moonstalking Stealth, Moonshade Clone, and many others, and the Undermoon Assassins possessed the fundamentals to be top assassins of the Faen ne.


    The only thing theycked was likely practicalbat experience and the grinding of their fighting will!


    The debut of the Undermoon Assassins this time had undoubtedly been a disaster.


    That was because they chose for themselves a hellish opponent for their very first operation¨C Bloody Queen Mary.


    Though the Second Grade leader of the Undermoon Assassins was of the same grade as Mary, she was utterly inferior to the vampire, be it in terms of personal technique or god-given abilities.


    Mary had practically crushed this proud Second Grade elf without any resistance!

 Chapter 682 Crimson Assaul

    t


    In the end, the World of Adepts was one of the fewrge-sized nes in the multiverse.


    Adepts that came out of the World of Adepts were that much strongerpared to powerhouses of the same grade in terms of fundamental ability andbat techniques.


    Mary and the Undermoon Assassin leader were both Second Grade. Yet, when they started fighting, Mary was able to obtain an overwhelming advantage. If the leader had chosen to fight to the death, Mary would only have needed to pay the price of some light wounds to murder her easily.


    After this battle, the leaders behind the scene would probably understand that an entire squad of Second Grades was needed to suppress Mary. Perhaps they even needed to send a Third Grade powerhouse.


    The elven kingdom at present only had a handful of Fourth Grade powers. These individuals were the pirs of the kingdom and were to be kept safe at all costs. They wouldn¡¯t easily be alerted unless it was an emergency.


    The Third Grade elves that moved around Garan were the actual core and fundamental strength of the elven kingdom. If any random witch that popped up required the mobilization of a Third Grade, then given the current Third Grade reserves of the elven kingdom, they would not be capable of dealing with this drawn out Cmity of the Witches!


    Disregarding everything else, even Skywater City, the closest one to Mary, had no Fourth Grades. The strongestbat forces were five Third Grade elves. Spear of Vengeance Eijae had also been drawn away to Greenwater City¡¯s surroundings by Bug Adept Billis.


    That meant the number of Third Grade elves inside Skywater had been reduced to four individuals!


    The fact that they were willing tomit a Third Grade druid elder to hunt Mary was proof of the elven higher-up¡¯s resolution against these vampires. They could no longer tolerate them and were determined to exterminate everyst one of them.


    As for the unexpected appearance of the Undermoon Assassins, that might just have been the personal and impulsive decision of their leader. Of course, it was more likely that this was the leader¡¯s test of the Undermoon Assassins¡¯ ability.


    In truth, the Undermoon Assassins would probably have put on an excellent performance had their opponent not been Mary.


    Even the blood knights were at a disadvantage against them, despite their power. That was more than enough to demonstrate the immense hiding abilities of their Moonstalking Stealth.


    At this point, Old Fox Vanlier couldn¡¯t help but ask out of curiosity, "Master, how exactly did you manage to find those Undermoon Assassins?"


    Mary¡¯s expressions turned cold upon hearing this, "Hmph! Despite having followed me for so long, you people are still unable to cast away your human habits. We are now bloodkin, a noble and long-living species. We clearly have such excellent blood sensing capabilities. Why is it that you people do not know how to utilize them?


    "The cape that these elves wear can only provide them with basic environmental disguising abilities, while their innate talent of Moonstalking Stealth relies most on the refraction of Moonlight to hide. These two abilities might be able to cheat the eye and hide their body heat, but it cannot cut away the smell and aura of blood.


    "You people have put too much focus upon the blood energy¡¯s effects onbat strength all this while. You have ignored the power of blood energy itself. Who amongst you here has specially researched and tried to improve upon the niche ability of Blood Sense? The present you might not think much of the insignificant utility effect of Blood Sense. However, you must know that improved Blood Sense leads to a racial ability that all high-grade bloodkin must master¨C Blood Maniption.


    "With the enemy¡¯s blood, break the enemy¡¯s body. You lot will never be high-grade bloodkin without mastery of Blood Maniption!"


    As the Bloody Queen, Mary very rarely admonished her subordinates in such a solemn manner.


    This thoughtful advice of hers was the most crucial understanding she had obtained upon advancing to Second Grade.


    Bloodkin. Bloodkin; what was most important?


    In the end, the most important thing was the vampires¡¯ control over blood!


    Without such control, then they would be a bunch of monsters and beasts that lusted blindly after blood. They would no longer be the noble bloodkin that reigned supreme over all beings!


    The surrounding vampire spawn could only nod mindlessly at Mary¡¯s stern admonishment. Only high-grade vampires like the blood knights and the blood elves could think with their own minds and carve this lesson into their hearts.


    "Go! Enjoy your banquet of blood! You have only fifteen minutes. We will be setting out after that. Our trajectory is the north!"


    Having advised her subordinates, Mary raised both of her arms and gave her vampires the deration to feast.


    The entire swarm of vampires erupted withmotion!


    All the First Grade vampires charged toward the elf corpses at the center of the camp and crouched over their bodies, wildly sucking the blood that had yet to solidify. Meanwhile, the low-grade vampire spawn had no right to enjoy such privilege. They could only take to the skies, turn into crimson bats, and fly into the surrounding forest as a crimson cloud.


    There were countless forest creatures in there for them to chase and hunt. Though the blood of beasts was inferior and more pungentpared to that of intelligent life, it was more than enough to replenish their exhausted stamina and energy.


    Meanwhile, the three blood knights, three blood elves, and Old Fox Vanlier were naturally presented with warm, fresh blood extracted from the bodies by their servants. They didn¡¯t need to feed like wild creatures as the ordinary vampires did.


    As for Bloody Queen Mary herself? She couldn¡¯t even be bothered with sweet-tasting blood. Now she only enjoyed blood crystals, a sort of strange crystal that formed from the extraction and purification ofrge quantities of blood.


    These blood crystals weren¡¯t veryrge; they were typically the size of a thumb.


    However, even a thumb-sized blood crystal required theplete extraction of three young elves¡¯ blood to be produced. Moreover, to improve the taste and energy saturation level of the crystals, Mary would try her best to choose fighters as targets of her consumption.


    Twelve clear and crystalline blood crystals sat in Mary¡¯s pouch after her sweeping raid across the west coast.


    If her power was greatly exhausted on the battlefield at any moment, and she was left with no way of regenerating her strength, then any single one of these blood crystals would allow her to recover to her best state rapidly.


    It was the most important strategic resource that she had prepared for herself!


    ............


    As the forest was humid and heavy with moisture, daylight often arrivedte in the Fantasy Forest.


    When the sun in the distance cast down its first strand of light through the hazy mist, arge group of druids and elves had descended upon this vampire camp.


    Of course, they found the corpses of theirpanions thrown into a pile.


    The equipment and clothes of every single elf had all been taken away, leaving not a single shred of cloth on their bodies. Moreover, their twisted bodies were syed in all sorts of odd poses, with bloody bite marks all over them.


    Teeth marks of various sizes covered their withered, shriveled, and naked bodies!


    Aside from the corpses of the elves, plenty ofrge animal corpses had been abandoned around the camp. All of them also had their blood sucked dry without exception. The dry and wrinkled skin was a horrifying sight to behold.


    "These damned evildoers."


    "We must exterminate these witches."


    "We have to avenge them."


    All the elves turned their gazes, unwilling to look at the tragic sight of theirpanions any longer. The sounds of cursing and swearing intertwined with choked weeping that echoed out in the forest.


    "That¡¯s enough. The evil of the witches has always been known to us. We will mourn our unfortunate countrymenter. The most important matter now is to continue tracking the enemy. Master Kimbell, we will have to trouble you!" The elvenmander walked out with a mournful expression and gave a simple constion to his subordinates. He then invited the respected elven diviner behind him to step forth.


    One had to admit that the profession of elven diviner was the most difficult to advance to, even in Faen ne.


    This female diviner was Master Kimbell. Even though she was only at First Grade, her body was hunched so severely that it was almost at a right angle. The wrinkles on her face were so dense that even mosquitoes had trouble finding a spot to stand on.


    In all honesty, the marks of age and ugliness on this elven diviner were utterly horrendous in this group of young and handsome elves!


    Meanwhile, the Second Grade female elf standing at the elven diviner¡¯s side was wearing a delicate magical beast leather armor with a dark green elven cape upon her back. Several gleaming short daggers and throwing knives hung by the belt on her left, while a delicate dagger of ornate design hung by the right.


    Her body was extraordinarily tall and slender, but a terrifying w mark on the right side of her pretty face had nearly wholly ruined her looks. Fortunately, with the help of life potions and nature magic, this w mark was already started to close, scab, and heal.


    It would probably be healed entirely within another thirty minutes!


    As the leader of the Undermoon Assassins, Natasha¡¯s sorrow and agony could not be understood by outsiders. She was looking at her formerpanions and friends who had now been reduced to such a horrifying and tragic state.


    Due to the reckless assaultst night that inflicted tremendous casualties to the Undermoon Assassins, Natasha had now been relieved of her duty as the leader of the Assassins. She could only temporarily fill in as the bodyguard of Elven Diviner Master Kimbell.


    Though Master Kimbell was an elven diviner, she couldn¡¯t predict the location of the vampires out of thin air. As such, she needed to rely upon these ¡¯leftovers¡¯of the vampires!


    The hunchback Master Kimbell leaned against a nature staff twice her height and slowly walked in front of the terrifying corpse pile in view of the eyes of the elves and druids.


    Just as she softly started chanting a strange spell that outsiders were not capable of understanding, a surge of violently savage blood energy erupted from within the corpse pile.


    The next second, limbs flew everywhere and a blood mist engulfed the area.


    A crimson and phantom-like silhouette rushed to the side of the elven diviner and unleashed a ferocious attack upon her.

 Chapter 683 Bloody Battle in the Woods

    One had to admit that when it came to the techniques of murder and scheming, these elves were as pure as rabbits that had never seen the true face of the world.


    Despite how wicked and sly they had already imagined the enemy to be, they were still continually falling into the many tricks and traps of the otherworldly witches when they fought them.


    Of the two parties engaged in the pursuit, the elves undoubtedly had the advantage in numbers and power; there was no question that they were the hunters. Meanwhile, the vampires numbered only one to two hundred. They should be the prey. They should be thinking about how to escape the elves. They couldn¡¯t and shouldn¡¯t have the courage to turn back and bite at the elves.


    However, these vampires insisted on going against that logic. They hid most of their elites within the pile of elf corpses and waited for the fish to bite the hook.


    This ¡¯fish¡¯ was the ¡¯loudmouth¡¯ that could bring disaster to the vampire horde¨C the Second Grade Elven Diviner Master Kimbell.


    As the corpse pile exploded, arge cloud of blood mist instantly enveloped the ce, engulfing an area of several dozens of meters in utter darkness. The screeching bats flew about like headless flies, madly attacking every elf around them.


    Strangely enough, not one bat tried to get near the elven diviner!


    If the enemy had nned this attack, how could they possibly have forgotten about a character as important as the elven diviner?


    Master Kimbell knew she was in danger. She quickly retreated, shaking the nature¡¯s staff in her hand as she did so.


    Several brilliant green halos shone around her body as denseyers of Bramblethorn Armor, Natural Ward, Bark Skin, Nature¡¯s Vigil, and other defensive spells quickly shrouded her body. The eye-catching radiance of magic was so bright that it made it difficult for others to even look at her.


    As an elven diviner, Master Kimbell might have lost most of her casting abilities. However, with the use of an instant-casting staff, magical items, magic scrolls, and magic potions, Master Kimbell was still able to enhance herself with the maximum number of magical defenses in the shortest amount of time.


    Master Kimbell was slightly more relieved once such a tightyer of defenses protected her. She reached toward her waist and took out a seemingly ancient magic scroll of immense power. She then narrowed her eyes and carefully awaited the enemy¡¯s assault.


    She knew very well her own abilities. There was no way she could escape the range of the enemy¡¯s attacks with her six points of Agility. As such, she decided to keep a tight defense and await the aid of her allies.


    There were as many as twenty-seven Second Grade fighters among the elves here and even one Third Grade druid elder. All she needed to do...


    Master Kimbell¡¯s mind was still turning when a phantom-like silhouette inside the crimson mist pressed against the outermost Bramblethorn Armor. Green waves rippled across the defenses, and both the assant and the diviner grunted in unison.


    As a Second Grade vampire adept, Mary¡¯s basic attacksbined the power of blood energy and shadow energy. With her ability tounch five strikes in a single second, she could deal a terrifying amount of damage in the shortest time possible.


    In particr, blood energy possessed extreme corrosive power and excelled at destroying magical defenses. On the other hand, shadow energy possessed the magic trait of ignoring defenses and was one of the fundamental abilities that magical assassins had to master.


    Consequently, Mary managed to break through sixty percent of Master Kimbell¡¯s magical defenses with herpound attack in a matter of two to three seconds. At the same time, the shadow energy that pierced through impacted the elven diviner and caused her to cough up blood.


    However, the Bramblethorn Armor that Kimbell had cast on herself also possessed the ability to reflect thirty percent of all physical damage. As a result, Mary¡¯s body also received damage, even as she rapidly attacked the enemy.


    These few short seconds were enough for those elves and druid to react.


    Shua! Shua! Shua!


    Large areas of Nature¡¯s Light erupted within the field.


    These elves and druids were creatures of nature and naturally wouldn¡¯t be damaged by such a spell. The only things here that were not of the nature attribute were Mary and her bloodsucking bats. Thus, the transformed vampire spawn all let out agonized screams as the green auras that erupted in such density instantly purified them.


    The elves were still near the perimeter and couldn¡¯t get over there just yet.


    However, their Rejuvenation, Protection from Evil, Cure Damage, and other healing spells quickly washed over Master Kimbell¡¯s body, immediately negating the tiny bit of damage she had previously endured. Her status recovered to her peak.


    Several druids roared and charged forward. Some turned into ferocious bears and rumbled across the ground, while others transformed into massive hawks, calling as they soared into the skies. There were even some that turned into lithe jaguars and disappeared into the air with a single leap.


    Even the Third Grade druid elder never thought that a mere Second Grade witch had the guts to attempt to assassinate the elven diviner in front of him. At the moment, he was so frustrated that his dark green face had turned a bright red. He furiously waved the oaken staff in his hand as he strode forward.


    A mass of thunderstorm was rapidly forming over the empty field. Several thick pirs of lightning were sting down from the thunderclouds and pointing right at the crimson silhouette that was wildly chasing and hacking away at the elven diviner.


    The Undermoon Assassin leader that hadpleted her preparations reappeared at the edge of the thundercloud, resentful and upset. She had wanted to rely on her speed to stall the vampire witch, but this Third Grade thunderstorm was keeping her outside.


    These falling sts of lightning could not distinguish between ally and foe. If she went in, she would be attacked by the thundercloud as well!


    Natasha had no other choice. She turned and dashed at the other vampires that were stopping the elves from reinforcing the diviner. Dealing with these advanced apprentice level vampire spawn was child¡¯s y for a Second Grade like herself. It was pretty much a single sh for every enemy.


    Anyone would expect the vampire witch to retreat in such dire circumstances. At the very least, she should avoid this wave of nature spells before continuing with her assassination.


    However, to their surprise, the vampire witch gave absolutely no ground. She endured the savage thundercloud above her and the nature spells that burned her body, keeping close to the diviner¡¯s shields, attacking, attacking, and attacking again with her life on the line.


    The destructive lightning sts descended from the sky, blowing away most of the blood mist around her. The remaining magical energies were still enough to electrify half of Mary¡¯s body and turn it into char. Though Mary was already trying her best to use minimal movements to dodge the Rain of Thorns, Faerie Fire, Poison, Starfire, and more, the space she had was limited. She was still beaten within an inch of her life, coughing up blood as her broken body teetered on the edge of utter disintegration.


    The elven diviner within theyers of defenses was still unharmed, but she, the hunter, was already on herst breaths!


    Still, only a thinyer of barriers remained around the elven diviner!


    While the elves rxed and prepared for one more round of attacks to exterminate the wicked vampire witch, that woman took out a shiny crimson crystal and stuffed it into her mouth.


    The next second, blood energy surged out of her body and instantly created a horrifying mist as thick as blood around her. Her life aura soared once again.


    Dammit. Dammit!


    It was at this moment that the striding Third Grade druid elder realized that hisrge-scale thunderstorm¨Cdespite having dealt tremendous damage to the vampire witch¨Chad also indirectly hindered their own rescue efforts.


    He let out a resounding roar, and the rolling thunderclouds vanished without a trace. The druids that were gathered near the edge of the thunderstorm swarmed forward, lunging into the blinding mist of blood.


    The quickest of them all was Natasha. She rapidly freed herself of the vampire spawn and charged into the mist.


    The imperceptible sound of a cracking shield surrounded by battlecries and roars was horrifying.


    The mist trembled. Elven Diviner Master Kimbell let loose with her feet with no regard as to her old age. Her body had just charged past the area of the mist and was reaching at Natasha when an unbearably sharp blood arrow pierced her head and spun out of the middle of her forehead.


    The blood energy within the arrow had dissolved the brain of the diviner, leaving her headpletely empty.


    A loud explosion rang out as the diviner¡¯s head exploded. The fountain of blood spurted three meters high andpletely soaked the elves and druids around them.


    Natasha let out a furious growl and threw herself into the blood mist.


    Currently, there were as many as eleven Second Grade elves within the mist, while the other Second Grades were keeping a vignt watch on the outside and continuously casting Nature¡¯s Light to purify the blood energies. However, what they never expected was how the dense blood mist seemed to be endlessly replenished. Even with so many elves casting at the same time, they could not rapidly purify the fog.


    Natasha and the druids that had broken into the blood mist seemed to be trapped in a fearsome swamp of blood. It didn¡¯t matter how they struggled and ran. Their speed had been suppressed tremendously.


    The ferocious vampire witch even seemed to have created countless clones of herself, fighting everyone at the same time.


    Pained grunts, the sound of nails piercing flesh, the noise of sshing blood, and everyone¡¯s angered roars and growls could be heard.


    "Open."


    Druid Elder Toril reached the blood mist and let out a savage roar. A massive green halo immediately crashed down on the blood mist.


    The elves and druids within and outside the blood mist felt nothing. However, as the core of the blood mist itself, Mary felt as if she had been struck by lightning. Her barely recovered body was instantly covered with hundreds and thousands of fine cuts. The flowing fountains of blood soaked her and turned her a crimson color.

 Chapter 684 Rescue Operation

    This single blow had severely wounded Mary.


    If it weren¡¯t for the blood crystals she had consumed earlier rapidly turning into blood energy to sustain her body, she would have died at the very moment she was struck!


    The vengeful strike of a Third Grade druid elder was not something that a Second Grade vampire adept like herself could easily endure.


    Natasha and the other druids took advantage of Mary¡¯s momentary pause and stall in strength to swarm forward. They used their daggers, paws, and ws to inflict a horrifying amount of damage to Mary¡¯s body.


    Mary let out a painful cry. The blood mist retracted, and her tattered and broken body quickly flickered through the shing des and escaped the enemy¡¯s reach. However, Mary didn¡¯t dare to attempt to flee while that furious Third Grade druid elder was still standing at the perimeter.


    That old fellow would certainly deal yet another cruel blow to her if she were to leave the battlefield at this moment.


    There was no way she could endure another attack with her current Physique and Spirit, even with the sustenance of the blood crystals!


    "Quick; do it and pull me away." Mary focused on avoiding the attacks from multiple enemies while wildly roaring within her mind.


    Fifty kilometers away in a silent de, three blood knights and three blood elves sat cross-legged within a strange hexagram runic array. They each took up a runic node and were feeding blood energy into the mysterious blood pool at the center of the array.


    Meanwhile, Old Fox Vanlier could only rub his hands anxiously and pace about the outside.


    "It¡¯s been so long. Why hasn¡¯t master sent us the signal?"


    "It¡¯s been so long; she should already have given the signal."


    Vanlier suddenly stopped in the middle of his frustration and hastily shouted at the vampires within the array, "Activate it now, hurry! The situation on master¡¯s side is not good.¡±


    The six Second Grade bloodkin redoubled their effort of feeding blood energy, and the one-meter-wide blood pool suddenly expanded at a rapid speed. It instantly devoured the six vampires along with the array itself.


    Blood energy filled the space, the bloody mist so dense that it was impossible to see through it.


    The expansion of the blood pool was only maintained for a mere half second before shrinking back to its original size. Meanwhile, Mary¡¯s wounded body mysteriously appeared within the hazy blood mist.


    Mary¡¯s right leg exploded into a rain of blood the moment she appeared, affected by some unknown force. Yet, the Bloody Queen seemed utterly unaware of the injury. Her tightly shut eyelids abruptly opened, revealing a pair of blood-red eyes underneath.


    "Let¡¯s make full use of our time and leave. We can¡¯t wait here for too long. Those elves will be making their way here by following the energy flux soon."


    Mary calmly sat down in the blood pool and absorbed the energy within it to repair her body while giving out orders.


    The old fox diligently rushed to her side and supported her body.


    In a matter of seconds, Mary¡¯s broken leg regenerated under the sustenance of the blood mist.


    The newly grown skin was pink and juicy, and so bouncy that it seemed as if water would drip right out of it. However, as the color drained, the slender leg quickly became white and smooth again. The lines were breathtakingly perfect.


    That said, everyone present was a trusted subordinate of Mary. Their hearts were only filled with a deep respect for their willful master. As such, no one would attempt to makements about her body.


    Once her limb had regenerated, those rose-like crimson runes also started to extend toward the leg. Mary shook her hand and broke free of Vanlier¡¯s grasp once the crimson armor covered her entire body once again. She took the lead, transforming into a massive crimson bat and dashing into the depths of the forest.


    Behind her, three blood knights, three blood elves, Old Fox Vanlier, and fewer than three dozen vampires took to the skies and flew north.


    ............


    Mary had casually retreated from the battle, but the elves had been thrown into chaos.


    A Third Grade druid elder had personally backed the army, with two dozen Second Grade fighters for support, and they still let that wicked vampire witch assassinate the noble elven diviner and get away unharmed.


    The opponent¡¯s method of departure was genuinely bizarre and wondrous!


    During the bloody battle, mysterious and profound crimson patterns had suddenly covered the witch¡¯s body. She had then vanished in a surge of blood. The entire process took no more than three seconds. It was a technique that they had never seen nor heard of before and seemed to be a skill unique to the otherworldly adepts.


    When the elves failed to find Mary¡¯s tracks in their surroundings, they couldn¡¯t help but fall silent around Master Kimbell¡¯s headless corpse.


    Even though they already knew that these invading adepts of mysterious origins all possessed peculiar supernatural abilities, they couldn¡¯t have expected this to happen. Hearing of it was not the same as witnessing it. Now that they had experienced firsthand the powers of an adept, they were terrified to discover the massive gulf in ability between both parties.


    A chill wind blew through the hearts of the elves when they remembered that this was no more than an ordinary Second Grade witch; there were still Third Grade and Fourth Grade witches above this. For the first time, they felt the immense weight of the burden upon their shoulders, and for the first time, they felt that they were unqualified to bear such a burden.


    The Cmity of Witches this time seemed torturous!


    This odd thought couldn¡¯t help but surface in the minds of all the elves.


    The performance of the elves also infuriated and embarrassed Antoril. He strode forward, his voice as loud as booming thunder.


    "You people lead the rest back to Skywater City. I will pursue these evildoers alone."


    Antoril shook his body and transformed into the giant thunder roc, not even waiting for the elvenmander¡¯s reply. He beat his wings as violent electricity crackled across his body. Lightning crackled, and the thunder roc vanished from the spot before appeared at the edge of the horizon.


    Before the elves¡¯ eyes could catch up with the silhouette of the thunder roc, another st of thunder rang in the skies. The roc had utterly vanished from sight.


    The only thing left in the sky was thesting sound of rumbling thunder!


    It seemed Elder Antoril had beenpletely thrown into a rage by that vampire witch. He had cast aside all the other elves and went in pursuit of the witch alone. With his speed after transforming into a thunder roc, those vampires would not be able to escape him, even if they had an additional pair of wings.


    That said, the vast Fantasy Forest was arge ce. The forest was also popted with dense greenery. It was not an easy matter to track the vampires under such conditions.


    The elvenmander hesitated for a moment. He knew very well that it was no more than a dream to have the elves chase after the vampires on foot. As such, he left behind a squad of thirty-five flying units to continue tracking the enemy. She then brought the rest of the elves and the corpses of their deadpanions to begin the sorrowful journey home.


    ............


    Greem only received news about Billis and Mary muchter in the evening.


    Bug Adept Billis had been forced to scurry about the surroundings of Greenwater City by Spear of Vengeance Eijae. He was not in any immediate danger, but who knew what idents might arise if things were to drag out.


    On the other hand, Mary was madly fleeing toward the north of Fantasy Forest with what remained of her bloodkin elites.


    Behind them, the fearsome Third Grade druid elder was keeping a tight chase. There were several times where he had almost discovered Mary¡¯s tracks. If it weren¡¯t for crucial decisions from Mary to send out various baits, the druid elder would have intercepted their entire party.


    As the n leader of the Crimson n, Greem had no choice but to consider a rescue operation when two of his most important subordinates had fallen into such a predicament.


    When Greem brought these two pieces of news to Alice, who had always told him to proceed with caution, she actually nodded and agreed wholeheartedly.


    Greem stared at the eager Alice with a weird look on his face. He couldn¡¯t help but ask out of curiosity, "Weren¡¯t you always saying that the two elven goddesses had their eyes on us? Why aren¡¯t you stopping me this time?"


    Alice replied unamusedly, "Could I stop you even if I tried?"


    Greem hesitated for a moment and shook his head: "It¡¯s different from usual this time! Mary seems to have poked the nest of some nasty hos this time. If I don¡¯t go to her aid, her small crew of vampires will probably not be able to escape the pursuit of a Third Grade druid elder. That is why I have to go!"


    "Since this rescue operation has to be carried out, why should I waste the effort to try and stop you. This time, we are moving out with all our forces and might. At any rate, this should be much safer than having you sneak into Garan alone." Alice exined with a smile on her face.


    Even though Alice was making perfect sense, Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel like she wasn¡¯t speaking theplete truth when he looked at the smiling face she disyed now.


    Still, having been together with her for such a long time, Greem had an excellent understanding of Alice.


    If she chose not to tell him the truth, then there had to be sufficient reason for why she didn¡¯t justy it out for him. Perhaps the timing was not ripe, or maybe the powers of fate were at work. Regardless, all Greem needed to know was that Alice would never harm him.


    Greem decided not to pursue the question with this understanding in mind. He exchanged a couple more ideas with Alice and hurriedly went to arrange for the departure of the flying ship.


    Alice could finally let out a breath of relief after Greem had left.


    "Do you really not intend to tell him that the dragons have also intervened in this war. If you follow him into Garan, your chance of dying will be as high as eighty percent!"


    A cold and crisp voice rang out resentfully from the darkness but was quickly drowned out by a wild and deep voice.


    "What¡¯s there to be afraid of? We just need to send the enemy packing back to where they came from. Are we supposed to wait until we have absolute certainty before wemit to an action, just because we have be Fate Witches?"


    As the voices rang out, their owners appeared¨C Alice¡¯s only two deputies, Berserk Witch Sofia and Icdy Snowlotus. The only other remaining Fate Witch had only just advanced seven years ago. She was as yet unqualified to participate in these secret discussions.


    "Hmph! Fight, fight, fight; all you know is to fight! Do you know what we will run into during our trip into Garan this time?"


    "Isn¡¯t it just a group of bloody lizards that can fly and a group of annoying children of nature?"


    Icdy Snowlotus couldn¡¯t help but sigh again when she saw the coarse and seemingly indifferent face of Berserk Witch Sofia.


    "That is a flight of terrifying dragons that reach up to Second and Third Grade. Even the weakest green dragon among them could easily eat you alive. Moreover, the most powerful Third Grade emerald dragon in the flight would be enough to exterminate our entire group."


    "And what about it? Are we to give up because the enemy is strong? Don¡¯t forget, our only mission here is to help Alice obtain the Staff of Divination and advance to Second Grade. As long as we canplete this task, we can sacrifice all irrelevant individuals and matters. We can cast that all aside." Sofia called out loudly without a care for the circumstances.


    She put it very crudely, but her words rang true.


    With no rebuttal avable to her, even the brilliant Snowlotus had no choice but to shut her mouth!

 Chapter 685 Outsider

    Alice shook her head helplessly and sighed at the sight of her bickering deputies.


    "This is the true portrayal of the life of a Witch of Fate!


    "Pursuing Fate! Gathering the powers of Fate!


    "And where would powers of Fate be produced? Naturally, where the nar conflicts were most intense and where the disagreements were most heated!


    "Yet, we Witches of Fate are all weak and frail believers of Fate without even the ability to kill a chicken. We have to pass through the tumultuous abyss and the edge of the waves without any protection. Any single wave of water would crush our bodies in pieces.


    "What is the only thing we can rely upon at this moment?


    "Of course, the powers of Fate that we so devotedly believe in!


    "Since Fate has brought us here, it will not let us run into our own deaths. A path that we can walk down alive must have been left here amidst the uncertain future and the threatening powerhouses.


    "The only guide that leads us to that path will be our faith in Fate!


    "When Fate tells us to walk forward, we will have to take that step without hesitation and without question, even if its a mountain of des, a sea of fire, or a bottomless abyss. After we take that step, the mountain of des might turn into steps, the sea of fire into flowers, and the bottomless abyss into a proper road.


    "However, if we were to falter and miss that fleeting Fate, everything might bepletely different by the time we make up our minds!"


    Sofia and Snowlotus listened to Alice¡¯s words with solemn expressions. The fact that Alice had been able to defeat the two of them during the Fate¡¯s selection must have meant that she had iparable understanding and knowledge of Fate.


    The two deputies of the Fate Witches couldn¡¯t help but betray bitter expressions after listening to Alice¡¯s teachings and reflecting upon their circumstances.


    The Battle of the Tower of Fate, in the end, hadn¡¯t been a matter of them having less favorable conditionspared to Alice. In fact, they had been vastly superior to Alice in many aspects. However, they were still defeated and killed!


    Why?


    The reason for their defeat was them preparing too many things for themselves to rely on!


    They were believers of Fate. The only thing they needed in their lives was faith in Fate. Even in abject poverty, even in utter helplessness, and even surrounded by hyenas and coyotes, as long as they believed in Fate within their hearts then fate would not cast them aside. Fate would guide them toward a path of escape and survival!


    They hadn¡¯t believed sufficiently in Fate. Instead, they had superstitiously clung to their power and the magical equipment, scrolls, and potions they had prepared for themselves. When danger finally descended upon them and fate guided them upon a seemingly dangerous path that would actually turn into a safe one at the most crucial moment, they had chosen not to believe in fate. Instead, they had chosen their fists and believed in their own magic.


    And what was the result?


    Berserk Witch Sofia, who possessed powerful physical strength, died. Snowlotus, who possessed incredible frost magic, was defeated. Even the clone of the previous Witch of Fate, who then held in her hand all the advantages, had dispersed. Only the weakest one of them all, Alice, had be the victor and the new leader of the Witches of Fate.


    The feeling behind this was not known to outsiders, but as Witches of Fate themselves, Sofia and Snowlotus immediately understood the meaning behind Alice¡¯s words. They had finally obtained some semnce of enlightenment!


    The reason Alice had been improving so drastically upon the path of Fate had much to do with her determination and resolution!


    She had given up all her powers and abandoned all things that she could rely upon, cing everything she held within the grasp of Fate. Perhaps that was why Fate had chosen to favor her over everyone else!


    As for themselves...


    Sofia lowered her head and looked at her strong, massive fist. She sensed the unending savage strength within her body and shook her head helplessly. Her powerful Physique and natural strength had long since taken over her soul. She could only feel at peace and in control while she had these things.


    If she was made to exchange such practical powers for the intangible favor of fate, in all honesty...she couldn¡¯t do it!


    Icdy Snowlotus was the same.


    The powers of ice and snow coursing through her body and vessels were her life. To abandon all this in pursuit of Fate¡¯s pity; she couldn¡¯t bear to part with it!


    It was their hesitation and doubt that caused their progress down the path of fate to be so slow and dyed.


    Alice looked at the somewhat enlightened expressions of her twopanions and smiled, "Fate told me that my hope for advancement is here and that is why we havee! Fate tells me that this rescue operation might not allow me to obtain the Staff of Divination directly, but it will create an excellent chance for our future operations. That is why we have no choice but to participate, regardless of how dangerous the situation might be!"


    "If you believe so much in Fate, why do you still borrow the strength of that male adept?" Sofia was a straightforward person and spoke her mind, bringing to light the question that had stuck in her heart for so long.


    Snowlotus intended to stop Sofia from running her mouth, but she hesitated for a moment. In the end, her eyesnded upon Alice as well. In truth, this was a question whose answer she had also been seeking!


    The smile on Alice¡¯s face grew even wider.


    "We believe in Fate, but we cannot wholly rely on fate." Alice saw the confused expressions on the girls¡¯ faces and sighed sadly, "What is Fate? It is a type of rule that subtly formed from the movements and trajectories of worlds! It has no mind of its own, no emotions and certainly no pity for others!


    "As believers of Fate, we are often privileged by its powers in many matters and moments. This can easily give us the illusion that Fate favors us, that we can always divine the future before it happens, and that we hold the very pulse of Fate¡¯s development within our grasps.


    "This is, in fact, no more than an illusion!


    "We are not the masters of Fate, and certainly not its rulers! In the end, we are simply diligent servants prostrating before Fate. Our duty is to protect the world and allow it to move ording to a fixed trajectory of Fate. We are to think of ways to deal with those powerful individuals who attempt to alter its direction."


    "In this process, the blessings of the powers of Fate might make you temporarily uncontested, so much so that you could even toy with the most powerful of supremacies within your palm. However, as servants of Fate, we must know perfectly our own identity. We are still weak and humble individuals. Without the blessings of Fate, we are weak and powerless!


    "When Fate needs us, we bask in glory, able topete and stand side by side along those who stand at the peak of the ne. Yet, when Fate no longer requires us, do you think it will arrange for us a chance to retire and live out our lives in peace?


    Both the rough and muscr Sofia and the intelligent and pretty Snowlotus werepletely befuddled upon hearing Alice¡¯s words.


    This was this something that a believer of Fate should say?


    As a believer of Fate, shouldn¡¯t every word that came out of Alice¡¯s mouth be ¡¯I love Fate¡¯ or ¡¯I will always believe in Fate¡¯? Shouldn¡¯t she be a zealot of Fate? How could such sphemous words of doubt in Fatee out of her mouth?


    Alice started chuckling when she saw the stunned expressions of the two girls.


    "I already said earlier; Fate has no mind of its own and no emotion. It won¡¯t push you toward death simply because you curse it, and it won¡¯t arrange a life of luxury and sess simply because of your praises. That is why Fate is a type of power¨C an unfeeling, world-ss power!


    "And we are the servants that fate has chosen to protect its body and functions.


    "Under ordinary circumstances, fate wouldn¡¯t mind us using our identities to strengthen ourselves. After all, the more powerful we are, the better job we can do to protect the functioning of the world! However, once we grow to a certain level, our existences alone would be obstructions and tumors to the day-to-day functions and trajectory of the world.


    "When that happens, it would be time for a new champion of Fate to appear!


    "If we were to ce all of our strength in Fate, we would not have a single shred of power to defend ourselves with when Fate finally abandons us."


    Snowlotus couldn¡¯t help but pursue the issue, "What does this have to do with that male adept?"


    Alice betrayed a grim smile.


    "If that day befalls us, he might be my only hope of living. Because he, to all of us and to this world, might be the only outsider!"


    "Outsider?" Sofia and Snowlotus frowned at the same time. They were clearly unfamiliar with this term.


    However, despite how much they asked, Alice simply smiled without another word.


    ............


    Greem was utterly ignorant of the three witches¡¯ discussion of Fate. He was currently focused on arranging the expedition of the flying ship.


    Large amounts of resources were slowly transferred onto the now repaired flying ship.


    After the many witches had boarded the ship, it once again took the skies and flew toward Garan under cover of night.


    Garan at night was so peaceful and quiet.


    The dark shadows rose and fell along the mountainous geography, stretching into the distance with no end in sight.


    Sharp cries of apes and roars of wild beasts could asionally be heard from within the dense forest, but it was all pitch-ck when one leaned against the deck and looked down.


    The flying ship had been heading north along the coastline since it had entered Garan.


    Alice had a thin robe draped over her body as she wordlessly stood in the shadows of the deck. Her brilliant blue eyes were silently observing the weightless clouds crashing against the ship¡¯s forcefield.


    "Don¡¯t forget that on this trip I must find out the location of that pegasus magic spring. Otherwise, the cooperation between my Dark Witches and you wille to an end!" An intangible voice softly reverberated by Alice¡¯s ear.


    The owner of the voice only left after an imperceptible nod from Alice.


    It was only now that Alice could genuinely enjoy the beautiful scenery before her.


    The flying ship was like a metal vessel breaking the waves under the curtain of night, sailing above all else while carrying the adepts within itself!

 Chapter 686 The Death Scar

    Mary¡¯s situation was perilous!


    She had taken a significant risk to dispose of that elven diviner. This decision had undoubtedly allowed the vampires to shake off the pursuit of the elven army. Unfortunately, it didn¡¯t help them get rid of the Third Grade Druid Elder Antoril!


    The might of an enraged Third Grade powerhouse was something that the vampires could describe to you in detail with their personal experience.


    Mary had as many as twenty-seven vampires with her when she left the previous day. Today, that total had been sharply reduced to a mere sixteen. With that other wave of lightning from the depths of the forest, the number once again fell to thirteen.


    Mary stared into the distance and cursed as she saw the green smoke rising from the silent valley in the distance. She could only dive into a gorge within the forest with her remaining subordinates.


    This gorge was a seemingly bottomless fissure that led underground. The widest spot in the crack measured one and a half kilometers, while its narrowest location could barely fit a person. The fissure was one kilometer deep and was always filled with a cloud of acrid yellow smoke. It was the thick smell of sulfur.


    Below the fissure was a massive underground cavern that connected multiple caves for a total of several hundred hectares. Big caves engulfed smaller caves, and every cave connected to another within the cavern. It was a small underground world of its own.


    The things that lived here were odd magical beasts and magical nts that were rarely found on the surface of the earth. Hundreds and thousands of strange species and mysterious creatures even formed a unique ecosystem of their own in this underground world.


    The harsh environment beneath the fissure, and the ferocity of the magical beasts here, caused the ce to be an infamousnd of hazard and death in Garan. Only elves and druids that specifically wanted to hone their abilities would enter this ce in an attempt to find rare resources not avable elsewhere.


    Now the desperate vampires had no choice but to enter this underground world under Mary¡¯s lead. It was the only way to avoid that berserk Third Grade druid elder.


    Fifteen minutes after Mary and her vampires dove into the fissure, a crackle of thunder burst out in the air. That bearded druid elder, Antoril, appeared from a door of thunderlight, draped in clothes woven from leaves and wearing an eagle helm upon his head.


    The thick smell of sulfur caused the druid to frown. The wrinkles on his forehead increased when he looked upon this vast gulf that spanned for fifty kilometers.


    The Death Scar; to think it would be the Death Scar!


    Fweet!


    Elder Antoril let out a soft cry that resembled the call of a small beast. An odd rodent emerged from his leafy clothes and leaped to the ground. The rodent stood upon its hind legs and used its slender snout to sniff its surroundings.


    The mouse changed directions several times and finally turned toward the fissure before letting out a sharp call.


    Antoril tilted his head and listened for a second before exchanging a few more words with the rat. It was then that he waved his hand and pulled the rat back into his clothes.


    With the help of this fantastic Larkrat, he was able to confirm that those vampires had indeed taken refuge underground.


    That meant that he would have no choice but to risk venturing into the Death Scar if he wanted to continue his pursuit.


    He might be both Third Grade and a child of nature, but he still maintained indescribable respect for the underground world beneath his feet. It didn¡¯t matter whether they were powerful magical beasts or unusual magical nts; all living beings inside that world were extraordinarily savage and ferocious.


    It was difficult for druids to converse with them, even with their affinity for nature.


    There were many times where a druid couldn¡¯t get away without a fight, especially when they ran into the more unreasonable creatures.


    There once was an elven diviner who hade here to explore. That diviner had said that a mysterious, sinister feeling clung to the air of the ce, apart from the heat and sulfur itself. It was almost as if some oddly powerful being of evil hid within the depths of the underground!


    For this reason, several elven deities had even specially sent elite squads to uncover its secrets.


    Sadly, the three elven powerhouses that traveled together had all died mysteriously within the depths of the fissure. Their ranks had included a Fourth Grade elven messenger, a Third Grade elven messenger, and a Fourth Grade Storm Sword Saint. The reason for their deaths had never been discovered. Even the God of Luck, Visenna, had been unable to divine the truth.


    Such a secret was naturally unknown to people outside of the elves. Only the higher-ups had the opportunity to hear of this incident.


    As a druid elder, Antoril naturally possessed the power and qualification to know of this matter. That was why the fury and anger in his heart finally erupted as he stood before this infamous and threatening Death Scar.


    "Damned evil witches! You could have gone anywhere else, yet you still chose the Death Scar."


    Though the Death Scar had an infamous reputation on the surface, its insides were extremely wide and spacious, with plenty of tunnels leading in every direction. The chances of running into danger were still slim as long as he didn¡¯t venture too deep underground.


    Antoril hesitated for a moment. In the end, he gritted his teeth and stomped his feet before leaping down into that bottomless rift. A nature¡¯s mark had been left behind upon the spot where he had just been standing.


    The drifting smoke stirred and quickly devoured Antoril¡¯s body, causing him to vanish without a trace.


    Half a dayter, the trees around the fissure swayed as a dozen elven warriors in green armor arrived on the scene. They quickly discovered the nature¡¯s mark left near the gorge. After a simple examination of the mark, they split up their forces. One group guarded the mark while the rest split up and headed toward different areas.


    Another half a dayter, arge group of elves arrived from the central mountains riding flying magical beasts. They set up a basic camp around the nature¡¯s mark and sent groups of elves to break into the underground to search for the locations of Elder Antoril and the witches.


    This once unpopted and deste Death Scar turned lively once more!


    ............


    Greem and the rest only arrived at that location five dayster.


    Along the way, the flying ship had to travel by night and make multiple detours to sneak into the vicinity without catching the eyes of the elves spread around the ce.


    Mary¡¯s aura had disappeared around this area.


    After hiding his flying ship, Greem led Alice and Witch Uzzah out of the vessel. The three adepts hid in the forest and slowly approached the Death Scar under the guidance of their spells.


    The Death Scar spanned several hundreds of kilometers. There was no way the elves could keep a close guard on every single part of the rift. Thus, after finding an unguarded spot, the three of them silently snuck into the fissure.


    Unlike what they had expected, the underground world was not a ce of death where all life was void.


    The dark ck soil, twisted nts, and the countless nameless beasts; for some reason, here in the Death Scar, the three of them felt as if they were back in the ck Forest of the World of Adepts.


    Crimson Demon Tree, Manhunter Vines, Three-Headed Hulks, Greenfeather Snakes, Twin-headed Lizards, Man-eating Lashers...


    The geography of this ce and its ecology possessed a surprising simrity to the ck Forest.


    Still, the density of magical aura here couldn¡¯tpare to the World of Adepts. As a result, the magic-affected nts and beasts here were allparatively weaker. They were not as ferocious or sinister as the magical creatures and nts of the World of Adepts.


    More importantly, the nar consciousness that had been suppressing them all this while weakened the moment they set foot in the caverns. It allowed them better control over their powers.


    An interdimensional space?


    The feeling that this ce gave the three adepts was that of a miniature interdimensional space. Its aura was utterly different from the nar consciousness of Faen. In fact, it was directly contradictory to the natural powers of the forest elves. Themon sense surrounding the development of a ne dictated that such an odd interdimensional location should not have been born in a nar space where such powerful deities resided.


    If this ce hadn¡¯t formed naturally, it meant that an extraordinarily powerful source of foreign energy existed within the depths of the fissure. It was the constant corruption of this energy that had allowed the area to escape the grasp of the nar consciousness, turning it into an interdimensional space where the elves didn¡¯t dare enter.


    The forest elves living upon Faencked sufficient knowledge and theory of the nes and were thus incapable of recognizing this ce and its true nature. However, Uzzah, Alice, and Greem were all individuals of vast knowledge and experience. They had already picked up on the abnormal structure of the space after mere kilometers of exploring the Death Scar.


    They could no longer sense much of the Faen ne¡¯s aura and consciousness here in this underground world. Instead, there was a trace of an extremely thick smell of death.


    The further they progressed in the tunnels, the more they could see magical creatures and nts of the death attribute.


    Ghost Trees, Withervines, Bloodsucking Vines, Poison Moss, Human-Faced Flowers, Magical Konjacs, Snakehead Fungi, and countless odd undead.


    Indeed, this ce had be a lost paradise of the undead!


    These undead might all have been disguised as magical creatures and nts, but that pungent and assaulting origin of death within them could not escape the senses of the three adepts. Greem and the others detected undeniable signs of artificial modifications on their bodies.


    That meant that these undead had not been born of natural causes, but instead were created through the mysterious means of some great existence.


    All along the way, these undead had been lunging wildly at Greem and the two witches. They were almost like loyal dogs trying to stop the intruders¡¯ progress into the depths of the underground world.


    Trying to get past the obstruction of these undead unharmed was merely a dream. The only choice left to them was to fight their way through!


    Naturally, Uzzah couldn¡¯t be bothered to lift a finger against these beings that were only approximately at First Grade. Meanwhile, Alice had already lost all of her magical powers. Thus, Greem became the onlyborer of the group. He could only silently open a road forward.


    To avoid the loud explosions of his powerful fire spells from alerting potential enemies, Greem chose to use his most silent and reliable method of murder¨C the Ring of Fire.

 Chapter 687 Ghost Swarm

    A deep and lightless underground cavern.


    The ground was covered in damp, ck, and muddy earth. Odd magical nts with strange shapes grew sparsely in this ce.


    The rock walls of the cavern had been eroded by rainwater over the years. The loose sand and dirt had already peeled off the walls, leaving only the tough rock behind, along with the glowing moss.


    The lighting was dim in the first ce. Even the spots of green light emitting from the moss couldn¡¯t possibly illuminate such a vast underground space. In fact, the dim light further lent the cavern an air of mystery and immensity, making the ce solemn and menacing.


    Thin mist wandered inside the caves of various sizes, cloaking everything in a blurry haze.


    Greem took the initiative and walked at the very front. The dark red Ring of Fire around his body shed with the water vapor, constantly sizzling and crackling. The initially damp earth beneath their feet quickly turned into dry and soft sand after being roasted by the Ring of Fire. It was a quiet and gentle feeling to step upon the sand with leather boots, almost as if one was riding upon clouds.


    The crimson Ring of Fire was like a sharp, red-hot knife slicing through the mist and expelling the thick vapors to either side of their path. The magical nts that grew thinly along the way waved their spiked tendrils about in the depths of the fog, their odd poses resembling terrifying demons that had climbed of hell itself.


    Several ugly and twisted creatures were also howling and shuffling between the magical nts.


    Perhaps because they smelled life, the cry of monsters suddenly rang out from the mist to their right. The fog split apart, and a massive horde of rotting zombies appeared within Greem¡¯s field of vision. They raised their ugly and filthy hands, dragged their bare feet, and wildly charged at the three adepts.


    These were rotting zombies that had been sleeping underground for many years. Their formerly full bodies were nowpletely shriveled, their abdomens were t and caved-in, and what hair they still had on their heads was dry and withered. Countless maggots wriggled in their empty eye sockets, nostrils, and mouths.


    These rotting zombies that served as the guard dogs of the underground world went berserk upon sensing the intrusion of outsiders. Chilling red lights lit up within their empty eyes, further exaggerating their inhuman looks beyond what their wide-open mouths had already done to distort their faces.


    Aoooooo!


    This squad of nearly a hundred rotting zombies couldn¡¯t care less about the difference between their power and the enemies¡¯. They screeched and swarmed forward. When they entered the area enveloped by the Ring of Fire, crackling steam immediately started rising from their rotting and slimy bodies. Countless tiny fires began to burn on them.


    The quickly rising mes devoured their ugly and sinister bodies before they could even get close; the zing fires consumed everything.


    The three adepts were already holding their breath. They moved between the human-shaped torches with faces of disgust. Greem would simply flick a tiny orange me at any of the zombies that got too close. One couldn¡¯t look down upon the size of the mes. They were capable of instantly igniting the tough, leather-like skin of the zombies and setting everything mmable aze.


    These low-grade undead creatures that were, at best, at the apprentice level could not resist thebined effects of the Ring of Fire and Ignite. They howled in agony, one by one, before being scorched into unrecognizable piles of charcoal during their agonizing struggles.


    The magical nts might have sensed the strength of the three enemies, for they retracted their ws and eagerness before returning to their previous inert states. In the depths of the mist, where the three adepts couldn¡¯t see, a crimson magical nt retracted its thick roots that were tunneling across the ground. It allowed its slender branches go limp, pretending to be a dead tree.


    The bloodsucking vines wrapped around the magical trees also retracted their withered appendages, clinging to the trunk without any movement or energy.


    The giant Man-Eating Lashers that stood in the adepts¡¯ way also uprooted themselves and crawled to either side of the road. The massive nts that resembled sunflowers even folded their petals and hid the protruding human faces beneath.


    The previously murmuring yground of death quickly turned into a destene as the adepts approached. Several chilling and greedy eyes in the darkness shifted their line of vision. They no longer dared to infuriate these terrifying magic spellcasters.


    Greem turned to look at Alice.


    Alice shook her head and said, "I didn¡¯t sense Mary¡¯s aura! This is the yground of the undead. It is also very suited for vampires to hide here. I imagine, if I were Mary, I would definitely go deeper and use the native undead here to deal with that druid."


    Uzzah, who had been watching everything with cold eyes couldn¡¯t help but interrupt, "We had best not venture too deep. You two should have been able to see it as well. Most of the undead here were not manifested by nature but were created through artificial means. That means there has to be a powerful master hiding behind them."


    "Are you worried about a Fourth Grade hermit? " Greem spected.


    "Hm, it¡¯s not as if you can¡¯t see the situation here. There¡¯s no way a Third Grade adept could ount for such a huge abnormality, could they? I am certain that it is a powerful Fourth Grade undead that has linked this underground world to a different dimension. The low-grade undead here are simply the scouts he stationed on the outside. It is very likely that we will anger the opponent if we go too deep. Unpredictable risks may arise from that!" Uzzah was very cautious and guarded about this ce.


    "Do you sense any danger?" Greem tossed the question to Alice once again.


    This time, even Uzzah turned her eyes toward Alice.


    The Witches of Fate were all individuals who knew how to pursue fortune and avoid misfortune. They should have premonitions if the future were perilous.


    Alice took out a clear crystal ball and rubbed it with her hand for a short moment before shaking her head, "There is risk, but no danger! In fact...in fact..."


    Alice hesitated for a long time, uncertain of how she should describe the feeling that she just had.


    "I have a feeling that this underground trip will bring us immense benefits!"


    Both Uzzah and Greem let out a deep sigh of relief.


    "If that¡¯s the case, then let us proceed! I do want to see what the true owner of this area looks like." As a Third Grade witch, Uzzah¡¯s opinion was undoubtedly critical.


    After all, Uzzah was the main force of battle if they wanted to deal with that druid elder.


    Greem might have the ability to summon a Third Grade thunder dragon, but the price of doing so was far too high. Moreover, there was no way the Third Grade druid elder would allow him enough time toplete his summoning.


    However, as the party continued forward, they were quickly met with attacks by new undead creatures.


    Wraiths, ghosts, and souls crowded together and hid within the mists, releasing chilling cries. Compared to the spirits in the World of Adepts, these wraiths made of the souls of other creatures seemed more savage but were less sinister.


    They let out haunting cackles and circled outside the crimson Ring of Fire. Some wraiths who couldn¡¯t suppress their ferocity tried to charge into the ring and instantly let out horrifying screams as they turned to escape.


    Sadly, without the cover of a physical body, the core of their resentment was exposed to the Ring of Fire. In less than three seconds, a wraith of advanced apprentice level had been turned into a handful of ash.


    What befell the first wraith allowed the rest to understand the terror of this crimson barrier. They circled even more hastily around it andughed even more sinisterly, but none of them dared to take a single step into the Ring of Fire.


    Still, it wasn¡¯t just low-grade wraiths that had appeared here. Seductive giggling rang out as several beautiful girls with explosive figures and revealing clothes emerged from the mist.


    Theyughed and giggled as they chased each other, even disappearing from sight asionally. The figures left only a brief glimpse of their beauty behind as they hid in the depths of the mist again.


    Those seductive faces, thoserge round breasts, that enchanting and dissoluteugh, and those bodies shrouded in the fog.


    Cold and disdainful smiles simultaneously appeared upon the faces of the three individuals inside the Ring of Fire.


    Several wondrous magical lights were surging around them. Judging by the appearance, it was a phenomenon triggered by the constant activation of the Charm spell.


    These Charm Banshees could also be considered as high-grade spirits. Their powers could reach First Grade. However, the process of their creation had caused a severe impact on their intelligence, making them vastly inferior to First Grade adepts. If it had been a First Grade adept that ran into Greem¡¯s party, they would have run as far away as they could. Why would they ever try something as suicidal as attempting to seduce a high-Grade adept?


    The Charm that they held so much pride in obviously couldn¡¯t affect the three adepts at all. Thus, after a bit of harassment, the banshee leader behind them finally appeared.


    A First Grade Charm Banshee!


    Compared to her subordinates, this banshee¡¯s spirit body was more solid and focused. There was none of that phantasmal and intangible look to it. She was draped in a light green evening gown and wore delicate, translucent crystal heels. She walked across the air and emerged from the thick darkness, swaying her hips with every step.


    "Handsome boy, your body seems so strong and mighty," The banshee leader spoke with a maddeningly sweet voice as she gently caressed her own body with her jade-white hands. She licked her lips lightly and betrayed an intense desire on her enchanting face, "Hurry. Hurry up and use your boiling warmth to fill my lonely body."


    In all honesty, if Greem were only an ordinary traveler, he would have lost his soul and foolishly walked into the banshee leader¡¯s embrace like a puppet on strings.


    Sadly, he was not!


    In fact, with the two witches behind him, he could hardly even feign attraction.


    "Should we go somewhere else for the moment and leave some time for you lovebirds?" Alice chuckled. She clearly thought that this scene was hrious.

 Chapter 688 Undead Army

    The humans inside the crimson barrier hadn¡¯t been seduced and were insteadughing without a care in the world. That undoubtedly provoked the leader of the banshees.


    Lights flickered as that seductive beauty transformed into a muscr and handsome young man.


    "Beautifuldy, why note out and have a heart-to-heart talk about our future?!"


    Seeing that Greem hadn¡¯t been affected, the banshee leader actually picked Alice as her new target.


    Alice¡¯sugh instantly froze into ice when she saw this androgynous monster unting her charms in front of her. She waved her slender hand, and a glowing Card of Fate slid into her palm.


    "You don¡¯t need to lift a finger. Leave this interesting fellow to me. It just might be a decent ve if we bring it back and give it some training." Uzzah cackled sinisterly and extended one of her hands. Arge shroud of shadow instantly engulfed the banshee leader.


    The banshee didn¡¯t even have a chance to resist.


    The massive shadow dispersed with a boom and the banshee vanished from the spot without a single trace.


    The other banshees screamed and charged at the crimson barrier when they saw their leader abducted by the enemy.


    Sadly, every single banshee that entered the Ring of Fire was exterminated. In the blink of an eye, the sky full of dancing wraiths and banshees had been reduced to fewer than half of their original numbers. The remaining banshees screeched and scattered into the mists when they recognized their defeat.


    At that moment, the crunching sound of grinding bones echoed out from a distance. Arge squad of skeleton warriors marched out of the mists in an orderly formation. Sparks of red light lit up with the empty eyes sockets of these skeletons as they let out a silent roar. They raised the crude bone shields and bone swords in their hands and rushed at the adepts.


    Under the enhancement of the Chip, Greem could very clearly ¡¯see¡¯ skeleton armies, ghouls, and horrifying stitched abominations endlessly swarm out of the caves.


    Their individual strength might not amount to much, but their impressive numbers caused even a Second Grade adept like Greem to frown intensely.


    "An undead army!" Greem fell into silent contemtion.


    Most death magic casters were capable of modifying and creating powerful undead creatures, but only a select few would be able to controlrge numbers of undead to form an undead army.


    A Fourth Grade necromancer that specialized in undead modification and summoning might be capable of such a feat.


    Apart from that, the only ones capable of raising an undead army would have to be high-grade liches or undead overlords.


    That said, what were the chances of an undead overlord suddenly appearing in a mid-sized ne that had been under siege by the Pale Witches for over a thousand years? The chances of this couldn¡¯t be much higher than that of an ordinary human being struck by lightning. After all, ording to the power system of the adepts, the starting grade of a magical creature like a lich was Third Grade at the very minimum.


    The undead overlords, on the other hand, often ruled over tens of thousands of undead creatures and lived within small-sized nes of their own. They enjoyed a life of decadence and freedom without any shackles there.


    Even the weakest of undead emperors was Fifth Grade. Unless a ne was at the verge of ruin and copse, and its nar consciousness had shattered, amon material ne couldn¡¯t possibly amodate the existence of an undead king at such a powerful grade.


    However, the situation in front of Greem left him no time to think. He took a step forward and flipped both of his hands. Two red and zing mes hovered over his palms. As the fire elementium in the underground world sizzled and gathered toward the core of the fire, the two fist-sized zes grew to an incredible size within a matter of seconds. The fire elementium within the mes was immensely concentrated and wildly ferocious.


    Greem let out a grunt as he threw the two destructive fireballs. They cut through the air in elegant arcs andnded in the center of the skeleton armies in the distance.


    Dong! Dong!


    A muffled explosion rang out. Two ming pirs surged toward the ceiling of the caves, before turning into waves of fire and incinerating everything in the surrounding area into ash.


    These skeleton warriors might have undergone simple magical treatment, but their fundamental strength was barely better than that of ordinary mortals. Their bodies of bones might allow them to resist some shing damage, but there wasn¡¯t much magic resistance to them. As the waves of fire rolled across the cave, the hordes of skeleton warriors melted into ashes like hot wax. Their remains blew across the skies from the heat waves.


    Greem could no longer hide his power at this moment. The Ring of Fire that had initially covered a distance of ten steps around him suddenly expanded outward, enveloping everything within a hundred meters. Yet, even this couldn¡¯t stop the skeleton warriors from lunging headfirst into Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire.


    These skeleton warriors that were only as strong as beginner apprentices could onlyst a maximum of three seconds within the Ring of Fire. The soul fire hidden deep within their ferocious skulls could onlyst a single second, while their robust bones couldst for two.


    It was only a slight time dy before the soul fires of the first batch of skeleton warriors were shattered almost instantly upon entering the Ring of Fire. Yet, before their hollow bodies could fall apart, theirrades would charge past them from behind. By the time the frail bodies of the first skeletons had turned into dust, the second group of skeletons had made it six or seven meters into the Ring of Fire.


    It was their terrifying numbers that allowed the wall formed from white bones skeletons to rapidly approach Greem.


    A group of low-grade skeletons with no soul or consciousness wanted to bury a Second Grade fire adept to his death with their sheer number?


    A hint of coldness appeared on Greem¡¯s face.


    He grabbed the air several times in quick session and threw several magma fireballs into the air. These fireballs were like guided missiles, whistling through the air and crashing into the areas where the skeleton army was most concentrated. The violent me shockwaves and rain of magma turned this tiny cave into an unbearable hell ofva.


    Despite such a tremendous setback, the skeleton army continued to charge into Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire. Hordes of white ghouls were also starting to join the battlefield from the depths of the mist.


    Unlike the First Grade ghouls created by adepts, these mass manufactured ghouls were clearly much weaker. They were like a group of humans that had been skinned and left soaking in a gutter for several days and nights. Their entire bodies reeked with a pungent stench and betrayed a pale white resembling that of drowned humans.


    Their tendons and bones had been pulled and contorted beyond recognition; there was nothing human about their appearance. A slimy bodily fluid covered their bodies, and they hunched their bodies and crawled about like wild beasts. They possessed sharp ws and fangs along with unnaturally long tongues.


    These ghouls all had the strength of advanced apprentices and came in shocking numbers.


    At least from the scans of the Chip and Greem¡¯s own spiritual senses, there seemed to be no end to the ghouls that were swarming out of the caves. They stepped on the bodies of the skeleton warriors and quickly advanced toward the adepts. Some of them even climbed onto the wet and slippery walls of the caves, wildly lunging into Greem¡¯s crimson barrier from every angle.


    Greem¡¯s expression gradually turned solemn.


    Damn. There seemed to be a bit too many undead here.


    The strength of the undead before him still had no chance of killing a Second Grade adept. After all, their basic power was still merely that. Their attacks had absolutely no possibility of breaking a Second Grade adept¡¯s defensive spells.


    However, the situation in front of his eyes did not match his expectations!


    These undead had no morale, will, or emotions to speak of. They just charged into the Ring of Fire from every direction like an unrelenting tide. They were like a swarm of ants advancing through a ball of fire by gathering into a ball. They continued pushing forward even as the outeryer burned and scorched into ashes.


    However, with the addition of these agile ghouls, the assault of the undead army against the Ring of Fire became unstoppable.


    The white ghouls had covered the entirety of the ck stone walls and were jumping down without any care for their own wellbeing.


    Even as their exposed bodies were scorched ck from the fires, their withered bodies continued lunging at Greem.


    Beng! Beng! Beng!


    Several dull thuds rang out in session.


    The Fire Shields and Lava Shields that popped out of Greem¡¯s body stopped the burnt corpses of the ghouls. However, the consecutive impacts had also stopped Greem in his tracks.


    Greem looked at the lunging white shapes around him, and his frown deepened.


    These fellows didn¡¯t seem so easy to deal with!


    Greem had no choice left. He raised his hand and released the five-meter tall me Fiend of Terror. The golem shielded him and waved its me whip to drive away the ghouls that lunged at its master. Even if the asional ghoul managed tond on the me Fiend, the mes that surged out of the golem¡¯s body would reduce the ghoul to ashes when it bit the golem.


    With the me Fiend forging the way forward, the swarming undead no longer posed a threat to the three adepts. The army could only try wildly and in vain to assault the towering me humanoid.


    The me Fiend of Terror was utterly fearless despite being swarmed by enemies. It moved forward with its thick magma legs and charged into the area where the undead were most numerous. It then raised both of its arms, and arge-area Meteor Shower upended the undead army, obliterating their ranks and formations.


    The white ghouls swarmed forward and climbed all over the me Fiend¡¯s giant body.


    The me Fiend let out a ferocious roar as fearsome streams of fire that reached two to three thousand degrees sted out of its strong magma body. Even the resistant bodies of the corpses couldn¡¯t deal with such intense magical damage. They were like wolves that had fallen into a volcano, instantly vaporizing and leaving behind not a single speck of ash.


    Still, even this terrible oue couldn¡¯t stop the ghouls from hurling themselves at the enemy.


    Visible cracks and damage had already appeared on the massive magma body of the me Fiend.


    Meanwhile, the enemies didn¡¯t seem to be running out any time soon.

 Chapter 689 Undead Powerhouse

    Even ants could bring down an elephant!


    Greem had scorned this old saying in the past, but now it was ying out right before his eyes; he couldn¡¯t quite ept it as the truth yet.


    If it were humans that were facing off against the me Fiend now, they would probably have scattered and fallen apart the moment the golem had appeared. How could they possibly be like these undead, fearlessly using their horrifying numbers to push back against the enemy?


    It hadn¡¯t even been eight minutes since the me Fiend had appeared, yet the number of exterminated undead had already reached the ten thousand. However, the tide of undead showed no signs of reducing in number. In fact, with the surging of undead from the various caves, the dense crowd had almost taken up every inch of space within this massive cavern. They were trying their hardest to strike at the adepts and the me Fiend with their ferocious attacks from every angle and every direction.


    Of the three adepts, Alice alone had nobat ability to speak of!


    She might still wield some sealed Cards of Fate in her hand that she could use to let out some voodoo beasts or servants, but any summoned creature below Second Grade would not be of any use in a situation like this. Even a Second Grade summoned beast with slightly weaker Physique and Strength would be torn apart.


    That was why Greem¡¯s only reaction to their predicament was to fire off ultrarge fire spells at an increased frequency.


    Firestorm!


    Meteor Shower!


    Doomsday Volcano!


    ......


    These undead creatures had weak Physique and Strength; their only redeeming factor was their fearsome numbers. That was why the fire spells that Greem cast were lower in power, but possessed extreme area-of-effects and duration.


    Again and again, he cleared away the massive cavern. Again and again, the fires would eventually die out before being taken up by new undead in a matter of seconds; another explosion, another me that died out, and another wave of undead that surged forward.


    Even with his me core to sustain him and enable his extraordinarybat endurance, firingrge-scale spells at such a frequency still put Greem¡¯s body under tremendous stress.


    Fortunately, he had the me Fiend of Terror as his assistant. The two me giants alternated their spells and alleviated much of the pressure on Greem.


    Meanwhile, Uzzah, who stood at the rear of the formation, continued to watch on with a cold and silent gaze.


    As Greem continued tosh out with all his ferocity, a trace of surprise finally appeared on the cloaked face of this Third Grade Dark Witch.


    This male adept¡¯s power of fire was genuinely pure. Moreover, the limit of Greem¡¯s endurance was far beyond her expectations!


    Given the size of the undead army in front of them, Uzzah had expected the male adept to beg for her help a long time ago. Yet, despite how dangerous the situation was bing, this fellow called Greem was still hanging on. Moreover, the RIng of Fire that he had erected was still firmly protecting the two witches behind him, even as it held off tens of thousands of undead.


    His rtionship with Alice was intimate, so it wasn¡¯t surprising that he would keep an eye out for her. However, that crimson Ring of Fire of his also epassed Third Grade Uzzah perfectly within. He had no intention of leaving her out just because of her strength, nor did he intend to force her to engage in the fighting.


    While shocking Uzzah, it also frustrated her as someone who took pride in her identity as a witch!


    Could he think that all witches were as frail and helpless as Alice? One should know that the ones supporting the pirs of the sky in the Northern Lands were all immensely powerful Northern Witches. The so-called male adepts were little more than ornaments and tools for pleasure before the presence of true Northern Witches.


    Consequently, the tighter Greem¡¯s defense over Uzzah was, the deeper the shadows in her eyes grew.


    Anyone familiar with the Dark Witches knew that this was a sign that this Third Grade Dark Witch was so furious that she was almost beyond control!


    However, there was no one near Uzzah that she could get mad at. As a result, the anger in Witch Uzzah¡¯s heart could only umte and pile on, zing furiously in her emaciated frame.


    Perhaps because it sensed that the price of burying these adepts under the corpses of low-grade undead was simply too high, an undead knight wholly covered in metal armor emerged from the mists. He wore a full-face helmet and rode out upon a towering skeletal steed, the steed¡¯s bone hoofs clicking crisply against the ground.


    As a high-grade undead, every single action of this undead knight carried with it an oppressive and menacing feeling of dominance.


    All the skeleton warriors and ghouls beside it naturally retreated. No undead dared to approach within five meters of the undead knight.


    Judging by the ck mists boiling around the Second Grade undead knight, it was clear that this was a dark knight that had mastered the powers of darkness.


    The grinding sounds of bone rang out from behind this dark knight. Arge group of skeletal beings walked with casual steps and appeared before the adepts.


    These skeletons had skeletal armor on, a short bone de sheathed at their waists, a bone tiara upon their heads, and held short bone staffs in their skeletal hands; Greem¡¯s heart sank.


    Undead casters!


    The aura that they gave us wasn¡¯t too powerful. At their very best, they were only First Grade bone mages. However, casters were still casters in the end. He couldn¡¯t deal with these bone mages as casually as he had dealt with ordinary undead.


    Undead were essentially reanimated creatures formed from shattered souls that had been attached to broken bones.


    If such a shattered soul had been a powerful caster in their past lives, then there was a possibility that a portion of it¡¯s casting abilities and knowledge could be preserved. When a soul like this fell upon a pile of broken bones, it would be able to be the simplest of skeleton mages. If it fell upon a zombie, it could be a zombie mage.


    It was only possible for a skeleton mage to turn into a bone mage after hundreds and thousands of years of settling and evolution, while a zombie mage would turn into a terrifying lich.


    Regardless of what the soul¡¯s innate talents were in its past life, those skills would all turn into abilities of the death attribute after they were reanimated as undead casters. The most proficient magic of the bone mages was naturally bone magic.


    With the arrival of these bone mages, a rain of bone spears shot down at the adepts.


    [Bone Spear.


    First Grade Bone Magic.


    Offensive power: 35¡ª50 points: The tip of the bone spears will explode upon hitting the target and deal sshing damage equal to approximately 3 points of power. Furthermore, these bone spears also possess approximately 5 points of negative energy damage (Note: negative energy creatures are immune to this effect)]


    The various attributes as scanned by the Chip were be projected into Greem¡¯s mind the moment the bone spear appeared within his field of vision.


    In all honesty, the strength of each bone spear was unimpressive. So much so that the spear didn¡¯t deserve to be regarded as First Grade. At their very best, these bone spears were only as powerful as the attacks of advanced apprentices in the World of Adepts.


    However, there was no dealing with the fact that they were being fired in a barrage!


    The simultaneous barrage of bone spears from over a hundred bone mages pierced through the Ring of Fire without stop. The negative energy attached to the bone spears shed with the fire elementium, igniting microscopic elementium explosions in the air. However, the bone spears, tougher than steel, managed to endure the extreme heat and embed themselves within the magma body of the me Fiend.


    With the gigantic golem shielding him, Greem managed to block all of the remaining bone spears with his Lava Shields.


    This first wave of attacks had not dealt any damage to the three of them!


    Yet, as the master of the me Fiend of Terror, Greem had a clear grasp of the situation.


    The elementium reserves inside the me Fiend¡¯s magical core had fallen by six percent just enduring this wave of bone spears. If they didn¡¯t find a way to exterminate these bone mages, the powerful me Fiend would be beaten down by the relentless attacks of the enemy.


    Greem¡¯s eyes flickered, and a series of orders had already been sent out.


    The me Fiend of Terror that had initially stood in front of him let out a resounding roar. Its body then abruptly vanished in a massive halo of fire that reached toward the sky.


    Fire Teleportation!


    Under Greem¡¯s instructions, the me Fiend had used Fire Teleportation and instantly appeared within the tight formation of the bone mages. It didn¡¯t even need to use any spells. Just the Lava Shields protecting its body and the zing streams of fire that shrouded its form had dealt horrible area damage to these bone mages.


    Just as the me Fiend raised its arms and prepared to use arge-scale fire spell to cremate all these bone mages, ck lightning flew out from nearby. The st of lightning pierced through the me Fiend¡¯s Lava Shield and three Inferno Shields, going straight into its chest.


    This sudden attack caused Greem¡¯s eyebrow to jump. He couldn¡¯t help but turn his stern gaze toward that Second Grade dark knight.


    Just now, it was this monster that had thrown its four-meter longnce and pierced the magma body of the me Fiend.


    Moreover, through the scans and senses of the Chip, Greem had very clearly ¡¯seen¡¯ the might of that charged attack from the knight.


    Five hundred and neen points!


    That was already a shocking number for a Second Grade dark knight!


    The Chip had also managed to estimate the basic attributes of this dark knight through this attack.


    [Dark Knight.


    Second Grade Undead Creature.


    Possesses mastery over dark magical energies.


    Bodily attributes: Strength 21-23 | Physique >20 | Agility >15 | Spirit >13 ]


    An undead creature like this had attributes far superior to even Greem after his Second Grade advancement.


    After all, Greem walked the path of an elementium adept. He had not invested too many resources in his Physique and Strength. It wasn¡¯t until he transformed into a me Fiend that his Strength and Physique could reach beyond fifteen points and prove somewhat of a match against these Second Grade creatures.


    However, as a Second Grade elementium adept with me specialization, Greem¡¯s Spirit was as high as twenty-seven points. That was already a decent start for most Second Grade adepts.


    If Greem wanted to defeat this Second Grade dark knight, his best option was to maintain a certain distance with it and rely on his powerful fire spells to drown out the undead.


    Just as Greem gritted his teeth and stood forward, Uzzah¡¯s cold and stern voice suddenly rang out from behind him.


    "You stay here. Leave that dark knight to me!"


    A sinister and chillingugh rang out, and Uzzah had already vanished from the spot.

 Chapter 690 Unstoppable Advance

    As themander of the undead army, this dark knight did not charge forward to battle with the me Fiend.


    Instead, it stood at the rear of the battlefield, using a wound-up throw of its dark spear to interrupt the me Fiend¡¯s spell channeling. The dark knight didn¡¯t make any more moves beyond that and instead assessed the battlefield from upon its skeletal steed.


    As an intermediate-grade undead, it had sufficient intelligence to determine the individual that posed the greatest threat to the undead army.


    The terrifying me giant charging at the forefront was not the strongest enemy in front of the sensitive and sharp senses of its soul fire. Instead, the few human adepts hiding behind the me giant gave it the most significant and direct sense of threat.


    Thus, the dark knight shifted most of its attention upon the three odd casters after interrupting the me Fiend¡¯s spell.


    As expected, not long after the dark knight¡¯s attack, the ck-robed caster at the very rear of the enemy¡¯s formation vanished without a trace.


    The dark knight tugged at the reins of its steed. This skeletal steed covered in ck barding and outfitted with a spiral horn upon its skull immediately stood upon its hind legs and let out a terrifying whinny. Its eyes and hooves burned with an eternal ck me of death and sparks of fire came out of its nostrils.


    The dark knight drew the longsword hanging by the skeletal horse¡¯s neck and swung it about as if it was an extension of its very body. The knight scanned its surroundings with the utmost caution.


    Even the dark knight was deeply wary of these foreign casters!


    These outsiders might not be that much stronger than the local natives when it came to the power of their spells, but the diversity and strangeness of their abilities and magic was extraordinary. Even two or three casters on this ne put together could notpare to the flexibility of these evil witches.


    While the dark knight was utterly focused, his steed was starting to writhe about in difort and anxiety.


    Arge mass of shadow appeared beneath the skeletal horse without a single sound. As dark substance gathered around the shadow, thick and massive tentacles extended from within the shadows, twisting and winding around the limbs and torso of the skeletal beast.


    Dammit.


    The dark knight cursed and patted the horse on its head. It intended to have its steed leap away instantly.


    However, this magic was cast by a Third Grade Dark Witch. How could it possibly allow a mere Second Grade undead knight escape?


    As the shadowy substance abruptly expanded, a few dozen additional tentacles wrapped around the skeletal steed and its rider like the appendages of an octopus. The tentacles continued to tighten their grip despite the hacking and struggling of the dark knight, and its skeletal steed and slowly dragged them into that immense mass of shadow.


    A short momentter, once they hadpletely vanished into the shadows, the shadow let out a burp much like a beast that had just finished its meal. It was only then that the darkness started to shrink and disperse.


    Finally, the shadow vanished without a trace along with the dark knight and its steed!


    Uzzah once again appeared at the rear of the formation, without a single sound.


    Greem watched this entire process unfold from a distance. His heart was filled with shock.


    The dark knight was a Second Grade undead creature. Greem would have had to pay a price to murder it, even if he was going all out. Yet, in the hands of a Third Grade Dark Witch, the knight had been...had been...


    Greem hesitated for a moment, clueless as to how he should describe the battle he had just witnessed.


    He had very clearly ¡¯seen,¡¯ with the senses of the Chip, Uzzah hiding her presence and arriving beneath the enemy before opening a tiny passage leading straight into the shadow ne. In all honesty, the dark knight hadn¡¯t died. He had simply been dragged into the shadow ne by the techniques of a Dark Witch.


    That said, the shadow ne was practically the second home of the Dark Witches. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the fate of the dark knight after arriving in that realm.


    Uzzah might not be so arrogant as to waste her energy to connect two distinct worlds if she were faced with an enemy of the same grade. However, the enemy was only a dark knight that had nothing other than brute strength. A crude technique like the one she had just unleashed was even more effective against such opponents. An inconsequential and cheap battle was avoided by crushing the enemy with her superior grade and instantly knocking out the monster without expending much energy.


    The undead army quickly fell into chaos when they lost themand of the dark knight.


    Greem immediately transformed into a towering me Fiend and started to sweep the battlefield alongside the me Fiend of Terror.


    The first to be exterminated were those bone mages.


    Two five-meter-tall me Fiends simultaneously teleported into the ranks of the bone mages. They then boldly spread fire and destruction across thend, turning the space into a terrifying hell of fire and brimstone.


    The bone mages might have shocking power when attacking in unison, but their individual defensive power was even weaker than those Ironhide Zombies. Naturally, they were destroyed and routed when ravaged by two me Fiends.


    Greem and his golem had obliterated these bone mages in no more than five minutes. He then cast his attention toward the dark cavern that was continually spitting out these undead.


    First, Greem used a Demonic Wall of Fire to seal the entrance of the cave and cut off the reinforcements of undead. He and the me Fiend of Terror then turned into master pyromancers, igniting the entirety of the battlefield.


    Burning, scalding, and therge-scale Scarlet Firestorm that raged in the cave ughtered all the undead within the giant cavern. Only a ground full of scorched bones and burnt corpses remained when they were done.


    At the very same time, the mindless undead had sacrificed their cold bodies to suppress the zing wall of fire at the cavern¡¯s entrance. More reanimated monsters were once again surging into this tattered battlefield.


    What should he do now? Was he to continue squaring off against these undead here?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but turn and look at Alice.


    Alice instantly understood his intentions. She lifted a finger and pointed at a cave where undead were surging out of, "Over here!"


    Greem charged toward that cave without hesitation.


    He first manipted the fires and sealed the other entrances, leaving only this particr passage. The me Fiend then stomped his way across and charged straight into the passage, wading through the tide of undead.


    Meanwhile, Greem cleared away the undead remnants that had survived the me Fiend of Terror and followed the golem into the tunnel.


    The entire process was clean and surgical, without any hint of hesitation. It was a demonstration of Greem¡¯splete trust in Alice!


    An odd glint lit up in the eyes of Dark Witch Uzzah as she observed this scene wordlessly.


    The rtionship between Alice and this adept didn¡¯t seem quite like what the outside world imed it to be.


    For the first time, curiosity toward them sprouted in Uzzah¡¯s mind!


    Affection. Such a thing was practically non-existent amongst adepts.


    Most Northern Witches believed that affection would only weaken oneself. They thought that love could be a fatal weakness to a witch. There were plenty of powerful Northern Witches in history that ended with a tragic fate due to their lovers or family being captured by the enemy!


    That was why affection had always been regarded with disdain and fear amongst the circles of the Northern Witches.


    The male adepts that belonged to the Northern Lands were either in positions of servitude or were the representatives or concubines of powerful Northern Witches. Their statuses and identities were incredibly awkward.


    Yet, there existed a trace of tacit understanding and trust between Alice and this male adept known as Greem. It was an assurance that went beyond an ordinary rtionship.


    It infuriated Uzzah tremendously!


    Most Northern Witches might not have acknowledged Alice¡¯s identity due to her grade, but she was still the leader of the Fate Witches to the outside world! Even the Third Grade Uzzah had to treat her as an equal when talking to her.


    This woman that stood side by side alongside other powerful witches as one of the eight witch leaders was actually weak enough to develop affection with a male adept. That undoubtedly challenged the sacred witch¡¯s creed that existed within Uzzah¡¯s heart!


    How could a weak witch such as herself be qualified to lead the Witches of Fate? How could she be qualified to lead the branch of Fate on the path toward their past glory?


    Uzzah thought silently to herself.


    Her thoughts werepletely shrouded by a dense barrier of shadows. Alice couldn¡¯t pick up on any shred of her fury, even though she was mere inches away from the witch.


    Moreover, at this moment, all of Alice¡¯s attention was focused upon the guiding instructions from Fate as she continued to steer Greem toward the correct path.


    Many sizeable caverns could be seen along the way. As they walked against the tide of undead and went deeper underground, the caves and tunnels started to shrink in size, bing ever more narrow.


    A massive cavern that served as a crossroad would appear every hundred steps they took. Greem and the others would then have to choose between a series of different paths. Every cave was constantly spitting out shambling zombies and creaking skeleton warriors.


    In truth, these zombies and warriors had already set out from the depths of the underground when the battle started. However, their slow movement speed had allowed the ghouls to take up the battlefield before they had even arrived.


    Now that the three adepts had intruded into this underground space, they found themselves stuck in a horrifying sea of undead once again. Even if they managed to reach Mary and her vampires, they would have a hard fight escaping to the surface.


    Just as the party passed through the caves under Alice¡¯s instructions, vanquishing countless undead as they moved, a strangemotion seemed to stir in the distant depths of the earth.


    All the tunnels trembled slightly. The adepts could vaguely hear loud, consecutive roars through the winding tunnels, quickly followed by an earth-shattering sound.


    It seemed that there was yet another unknown battlefield!


    Greem¡¯s eyes couldn¡¯t help but light up.


    The Third Grade druid had pursued Mary into this underground world. If there were any other outsiders in this yground for the dead, it would have to be them. Moreover, Mary had no powerful casters in her group. As such...


    "Prepare for battle. Lady Uzzah, if it¡¯s actually that fellow, then you will probably have to fight!" Greem¡¯s emotions started to soar at the very thought of having to face off against a Third Grade druid. That said, as the leader of the group, he calmly started assigning the duties ofbat.


    Uzzah did not respond, but the shadows shrouding her body silently started to grow in size and power.


    The adepts stopped advancing. Their eyes turned toward the cave where the sound wasing from, and they waited in silence.


    Finally, arge group of undead was swept away by a thick chain-lightning as a ferocious and towering figure strode out of the tunnel.

 Chapter 691 Battle of the Powerhouses

    Antoril felt like his luck was in the dumps!


    He believed himself to be able to sessfully traverse every single forest in Garan with his nature affinity as a druid. Unfortunately, this underground world didn¡¯t show as much affinity toward him as he had imagined.


    Ever since Antoril had followed the vampires into the Death Scar, he had been shocked to find this ce to be and of death. Ghost trees, withered vines, disgusting mutated nts, and countless undead creatures were everywhere.


    Confident in his overwhelming strength, Antoril had charged right into the winding maze of the underground world without any consideration.


    In truth, there was practically no existence within thebyrinth that could trap or even stall Antoril, especially with his immense power. When he transformed into the thunder roc that possessed the power of lightning and electricity, the slow zombies and skeletons would be sted into pieces by lightning from above before they could even get close.


    Thunder rocs were lightning attribute creatures. They would naturally trigger Thunderfall wherever they went, be it when flying or when they were attacking. This First Grade spell could deal forty to sixty lightning damage and inflict paralysis on the enemy.


    That was why the first thing that greeted the hordes of zombies and skeletons that stood in the thunder roc¡¯s way was thousands of bright and shy silver lightning chains. It didn¡¯t matter how many zombies or skeletons there were; they couldn¡¯t possiblypare to the speed of tens of thousands of lightning sts sweeping across the cave.


    The swarm of ghouls that had given Greem so much trouble were sted into scorched corpses before they could even so much as touch the roc¡¯s feathers.


    The thunder roc that Antoril had transformed into rushed aimlessly in the underground world. Blinding forests of thunder and lightning erupted everywhere he went. These undead that roamed the underground realm had indeed run into misfortune. They had be sacrifices to the fury of the Third Grade druid. One by one, the shattered soul fires were extinguished, and their ugly bodies were destroyed, returning to the earth of this unique underground space.


    In all honesty, Antoril had still been preupied with finding the vampires when he first entered this strange space. Yet, as he ventured even deeper into the caverns and witnessing the horrifying amount of twisted nts and countless undead, his heart filled with anger.


    All druids were children of nature. Their love for the forest and nature was even above their concern for their own lives. That was why it was so hard for Antoril to tolerate the actions of foreign creatures destroying the forest and upsetting the order of nature.


    Everything he had seen since he entered the Death Scar¨Cbe they nt, animal, or environment¨Chad been twisted and strange. Here, he sensed an exceedingly powerful aura of death; an evil aura that went directly against thews of nature. It was a sinister atmosphere that shouldn¡¯t exist in this world.


    Consequently, Antoril quickly forgot about his original mission and turned his attention to the research and investigation of this evil aura of death.


    He broke through multiple tunnels and caves, witnessing even more varieties of horrifying undead creatures. Finally, he was stopped by an undead caster with the power of a Third Grade¨C a Lich.


    Within this underground world, where the undead piled as high as mountains and as deep as oceans, he began a ferocious battle to the death against this Third Grade lich.


    There was no doubt that Antoril would be able to obtain the final victory if this battle was a fair duel between the two of them. Sadly, this was the territory and domain of the undead!


    Antoril had plenty of reason to suspect that a certain powerful undead had already modified this underground world and that a nar rift connecting to the Skeletal ne had already been opened. Otherwise, there was no chance that a Third Grade lich could so easily summon dozens of Second Grade death knights and hundreds of bone mages.


    The powerful thunder roc that Antoril had transformed into had been bogged down by a series of disgusting curses. He was, after all, facing off against the attacks of a tide of intermediate to high-grade undead, along with asional sneak attacks from a lich of the same grade. Antoril also had to fend off thebined forces of an entire squad of fearless Second Grade death knights.


    It was important to note that these death knights were all unique existences even amongst undead knights. They possessed all sorts of offensive knight techniques, such as Revenant sh and Double Strike. In particr, Revenant sh allowed ordinary physical attacks to be enhanced by negative energy damage that could ignore all defenses.


    This particr attack was what concerned Antoril the most!


    As a Third Grade druid, Antoril was an entire grade above these death knights. It was extremely difficult for the undead to pierce through his physical and magical defenses under such circumstances. However, Revenant sh allowed these death knights to activate negative energy attacks every one out of five strikes.


    Consequently, when Antoril unleashed his might and crushed six of the death knights to pieces, his own body had been badly wounded. Injuries covered the thunder roc, with sh marks littering its torso along with rotting wounds!


    Antoril had no choice but to turn back and run. He could not allow himself to die in such a humiliating and filthy ce.


    It was then that he ran into Greem, Uzzah, and Alice, who had been lying in wait!


    Almost at the same time that Antoril exited the tunnel, the Doomsday Volcano that Greem and the me Fiend cast in unison exploded beneath the druid¡¯s feet.


    The ground crumbled to the rumbling surge ofva. A blinding red pir of magma burst out of the broken earth, sending heat waves into the air and precisely engulfing Antoril within its most potent strike zone. Horrifying fire poison, me streams, and elementium zes wreaked havoc in that location. The highest temperature of that core area even went up to four or five thousand degrees.


    Antoril was caught by surprise and hit directly by this pir of magma. His body was sted into the air and bathed in the roiling mes andva.


    If it weren¡¯t for his shocking magical resistance as a Third Grade druid, this one attack would have been enough to roast the upper half of Antoril¡¯s body, turning him into scattering ashes.


    Antoril cried out in agony and started to escape from the sshing magma.


    By the time he erected a Natural Ward and emerged from the sea of fire, his wounded body had been badly scalded. Blisters and festering wounds had formed all over, bleeding purple and ck blood.


    Antoril raised his head and looked at the two giant me Fiends in the distance upon escaping. He immediately understood that he had run into a different group of adepts.


    He barely managed to open his bloodshot and hate-filled eyes to re at the Second Grade adept that had ambushed him. Antoril roared, "A Second Grade adept like you dares to ambush me? I¡¯ll let you..."


    Before he could finish his sentence, the cave turned dark. The ce had been plunged into a mysterious and fearsome darkness.


    Greem tried his best to keep his eyes open.


    Unfortunately, despite how much he attempted to see or feel, he couldn¡¯t extend his senses beyond ten steps of his own body.


    The mad notifications from the Chip in his mind also frightened him slightly.


    [Warning, warning. Shadow space detected...shadow space detected. Host¡¯s Spiritpletely suppressed, physical vision reduced to eight meters, spiritual senses reduced to ten meters. Host has lost all control over the battlefield.]


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled. He hadn¡¯t expected a Third Grade Dark Witch to demonstrate such terrifying might when she went all out. How long could he survive under such utter suppression if Uzzah¡¯s target had been him?


    Ten seconds? Or five?


    Still, Greem felt a little safer with the me Fiend of Terror by his side.


    Would anything happen to Alice under such fearsome power?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be flustered when his thoughts wandered to this matter.


    Just then, a soft, small, and smooth hand silently gripped his right hand. Greem turned his head and saw Alice¡¯s gentle and quiet smile.


    "Don¡¯t worry about me. I can take care of myself on the battlefield!" Almost as if she had sensed Greem¡¯s concern, Alice¡¯s smile was charming, "What is it? Don¡¯t you want to watch a battle between two Third Grade powerhouses?"


    Greem¡¯s handsome brow rose upward.


    "You can break through Uzzah¡¯s Dark Incursion?"


    Alice smiled, gently pulled Greem¡¯s head toward her, stood on her toes and nted a light kiss on his forehead.


    "This is the blessing of Fate that I, Alice, gift to you! You should be able to see through the darkness now."


    An odd and refreshing feeling surged into Greem¡¯s eyes. In his surprise, he looked around him and realized that the ink-ck darkness that had surrounded him was gradually turning translucent.


    The Third Grade druid was battling against the evil and sinister Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah with all his strength at the other end of the cavern.


    Their battle was intense and dangerous!


    Both sides were already going all out. They had no attention to spare for their surroundings.


    It was very rare to see a situation where one fighter stopped during the fight to channel a major spell, much like Greem often did. They only used rapid, instant-cast spells.


    The thunder roc turned into a giant st of lightning and constantly chased and pecked at the teleporting Dark Witch. Thunder rumbled across the caves as it moved. Those massive sts of electricity continued to fall, going straight for the skinny silhouette shrouded in darkness.


    At this moment, a mysterious ck cloud hovered over Uzzah¡¯s head.


    The terrifying sts of lightning had their blinding electricitypletely absorbed by the ck cloud whenever they came into contact with it, losing all of their might.


    Meanwhile, Dark Witch Uzzah was quickly roaming from shadow to shadow, flicking her hands and firing concentrated dark balls at the thunder roc.


    These dark balls that had concentrated shadow substance to its very limits caused plenty of pain for the thunder roc.


    Even the Thundercloud Barrier that had as much as five hundred points of magical defensive strength could not stop the dark balls from piercing through. Moreover, these dark balls rapidly expanded from their original size¨Cthat of a phnx of a finger¨Cthe moment they touched the thunder roc. The shadow substance within these dark balls was like the most horrifying gue virus in the world. It would rapidly invade the body of the roc.


    A fist-sized spot appeared on the ce hit by the dark ball. Pungent ck slime would then seep out of the injury. Even the magic resistance of a Third Grade druid and the powerful regeneration of a thunder roc could not stop the spread of these shadow substances.

 Chapter 692 The Outcome Decided

    A lich radiating a sinister and malicious aura was silently observing the battle between the two outsiders from a dark tunnel nearby.


    The lich¡¯s Abyssal Darkness ability made it hard for the outsiders to notice its existence through the pitch-ck darkness, even when they walked past it. The lich opened and shut its lower jaw as it observed the battle in the cavern as if it was silentlymunicating with some powerful existence that wasn¡¯t present at the scene.


    As a lich raised from an elf, most of the flesh on its body had already dried and rotted away. Only a thin and wrinkledyer of skin clung to its bony skeleton; all of its past beauty and youth had vanished. No one could deduce its original race based on its wicked and horrifying appearance.


    A ck magician¡¯s robe sewn from human skin draped over its body, vaguely radiating a light Halo of Fear into the surroundings. All sorts of magical rings of various sizes sat upon its bony fingers. That said, there was only one piece of equipment that satisfied the lich¡¯s standards¨C the bonewa staff resting at his waist.


    Its master had mentioned that this bonewa staff had been taken from the spine of a high-grade adept. Moreover, the spine had been extracted while the adept was alive. As such, the item possessed not only immense powers of death but also the intense aura of resentment from that necromancer.


    Any offensive spells cast with this bonewa staff would carry with them their own curses and would be able to ignore the opponent¡¯s magical resistance and defenses. It was this staff¡¯s rare trait that allowed Lich Anders to carve a name for itself under its master¡¯s rule.


    This bonewa staff had, thus, became one of its favorite possessions!


    Lich Anders had been the one guarding this underground space over the past hundred years.


    Sadly, after several hundred years of peace, these ursed intruders had still disrupted the silence and order in this ce.


    The first group of intruders was a group of vampires from the World of Adepts. After Lich Anders sent troops and captured them, the scouts and spies he stationed on the outer rim of the underground world alerted him once more, before he could figure out what to do to the vampires.


    The ones that had broken into the underground space this time were two different groups of individuals.


    The first group consisted of only a single individual, and that was the fearsome thunder roc that the Third Grade druid had transformed into. The other group included three otherworld adepts. In particr, a Third Grade witch was hiding among their ranks.


    Lich Anders had no choice but to summon the undead legions from the depths of the underground to deal with such powerful intruders. The lich itself led its personal guards to ambush and exterminate the isted Third Grade druid.


    Unfortunately, a druid that had mastered multiple Wild Transformation forms was still too tough to be brought down. He endured the charge of the death knights and escaped under Anders¡¯ eyes. Nearly one-third of the Second Grade death knights that Lich Anders had spent almost five hundred years to raise had been destroyed at the hands of the druid.


    This pained Anders¡¯ heart immensely!


    Of course, that was if he still had one.


    In its fury, Lich Anders had led its subordinates and pursued the druid all the way here, where it had been surprised to find the two intruders engaged inbat within its territory.


    While the lich hid in the shadows and prepared for the best opportunity to ambush the two Third Grades, its murky eyeballs coincidentally swept across two other mid and low-grade adepts in the cave¨C one male, and one female.


    For some reason, its evil and sinister gaze managed to cause the puny First Grade witch to raise her head in surprise and look over.


    Indeed, the opponent was assiduously assessing Anders¡¯ existence.


    Lich Anders couldn¡¯t help but be astounded!


    Disregarding the fact that she was no more than a First Grade witch, how was she even able to sense its faint and well-hidden spiritual scans? Just the Abyssal Darkness that it had applied on itself alone wasn¡¯t something that ordinary inspection spells should be capable of bypassing.


    Moreover, she hadn¡¯t been able to sense it until its own gaze had fallen upon her!


    Even the two Third Grades hadn¡¯t been able to sense his gaze, let alone the Second Grade male adept beside the little witch. How was it possible that its spell had been seen through by a First Grade witch?!


    Perhaps because she had been disturbed by Lich Anders¡¯ odd spiritual flux, a subtle yet immensely power spiritual consciousness descended upon the lich¡¯s body.


    "Hm? To think I could run into one blessed by Fate here. Hehehe, it seems like my luck today is pretty decent," The master of Third Grade Lich Anders saw Alice through its ¡¯eyes¡¯ and couldn¡¯t help but chuckle, "Anders, I need that little witch; bring her to me. As for herpanions, imprison them and don¡¯t let any of them get away."


    "Master, there are two Second Grades present here. I...I¡¯m afraid I can¡¯t take down both of them." Lich Anders couldn¡¯t help but stutter.


    "Hmph, useless fool! You¡¯ve been with me for so long, yet you still can¡¯t beat two individuals of the same grade. You are truly useless!" The consciousness possessing Anders¡¯ body cursed furiously. Still, it seemed to be genuinely concerned that the lich would let these amusing toys escape and ordered chillingly, "Keep an eye on them. I will send Luke over immediately!"


    Lich Anders felt a sense of relief upon hearing Luke¡¯s name.


    As one of its master¡¯s many Third Grade servants, Anders knew very well that Luke was one of its master¡¯s trusted subordinates. He was also a terrifying undead lich of the Fourth Grade!


    ............


    While Lich Anders was silently zoning out in the dark tunnel, Alice couldn¡¯t help but betray a frown on her beautiful forehead.


    "What¡¯s the matter?" Greem looked into the distance and observed the battle between the two Third Grades with much fascination.


    In all honesty, the battle between the two Third Grades wasn¡¯t nearly as shy as when Greem and the me Fiend fought.


    Every move by Greem would either be a downpour of meteors, earthshaking pirs of magma or roiling and bubbling pools ofva. Setting aside the lethality of these attacks, just the visual effects alone were immensely enjoyable and astounding.


    Yet, when these Third Grade powerhouses fought, it was rare to see them unleash suchrge-area spells with shy effects. They were rapidly teleporting and leaping from ce to ce as they silently exchanged instant-cast spells.


    The visuals were nd, but the feedback from the Chip revealed that every single instant-cast spell had over five hundred points of power.


    Spells of this intensity could most definitely pierce through Greem¡¯s Lava Shield andyers of Inferno Shield with a single blow.


    It also meant that if Greem were to fight with any of the two Third Grades, he might as well be running about naked. Even if he were to keep up his defensive spells and magical protections, the enemy would instantly destroy these constructs.


    There had never been a time where the difference between Second Grade and Third Grade was so clear and direct! It was nearly impossible topensate for this difference in power throughbat techniques and casting methods!


    Even though Greem couldn¡¯t enter the battle to inspect and scan thebat statistics of both parties directly, the Chip¡¯s long-range sensors and recordings still allowed Greem to do an approximate organization and categorization of the fighting style and methods of Third Grade powerhouses.


    That had indescribably immense benefits for his research toward Third Grade!


    That said, even with all his attention focused on the battlefield, he still kept an eye on Alice. He immediately asked her the question upon noticing her abnormality.


    "There¡¯s a Third Grade lich spying on us." Alice hesitated, unsure of how she should describe what she had felt through her Fate senses.


    A Third Grade lich?


    Greem¡¯s attention was instantly drawn back to Alice.


    "Is there any danger? If there is, I can retreat with you first!" Greem silently asked Alice through a mental connection.


    "I don¡¯t know!" Alice was confused by something she had sensed, "I can see an immensely overwhelming darkness behind the lich, but I can¡¯t sense what it is. My divining magic tells me that we will run into tremendous risk, but...but my Fate sense hasn¡¯t sent me any warnings!"


    "Could it be the abnormal spatial structure here distorting your ability to sense Fate?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but offer a conjecture.


    "The power of Fate is one of the most mysterious powers in the world! No power could possibly distort or omit it!" Alice shook her head and said.


    "Or could it be a powerful existence that stands behind the lich whose power is beyond the range of your Fate senses?"


    Alice hesitated for a moment and replied uncertainly, "I might only be First Grade, but I am the leader of the Fate Witches after all. I am blessed by the powers of Fate. If the enemy wants to obstruct my Fate senses, they would have to be an ultra-powerhouse that has ascended beyond the nar threshold of Fourth Grade!"


    "An ultra-powerhouse!" Greem was speechless.


    In truth, Fourth Grade powerhouses were already terrifying existences in his eyes. Those ultra-powerhouses that had ascended beyond the nar threshold and could freely traverse between the void of the nes were just too far beyond his reality.


    They were so distant that Greem didn¡¯t even want to imagine their power!


    Greem wondered wide-mouthed about such ultra-powerhouses for quite a while after Alice mentioned them, but he still had no idea what one of them would look like. Perhaps, maybe, possibly, they would be the same as the Sixth Grade Great Adept Sarubo!


    Just as Greem used all his focus to imagine what an ultra-powerhouse would be like, the superiority in the battle had finally been decided.


    The Dark Witch had won, and the druid had lost!


    As Third Grade creatures that were only second to the strongest individuals of the ne, both parties possessed severely destructive powers. That was why Dark Witch Uzzah would have a difficult time trying to detain Antoril, even with his grievous injuries and weakened Spirit.


    After being repeatedly snubbed at the hands of the Third Grade lich and the Third Grade Dark Witch, Antoril had finally quenched his desire for revenge and started thinking of a way to escape.

 Chapter 693 Captured One By One

    While Antoril and Uzzah were engaged in their battle of pursuit and escape, a new enemy had appeared on the battlefield.


    In all seriousness, it wasn¡¯t aplete ¡¯enemy¡¯ that had appeared. Rather, it was a single strange head!


    It was the head of a lich carved out of semi-translucent magical crystal.


    This crystal head wasn¡¯t veryrge, but it was extremely clear and crystalline.


    Prismatic lines shone from a delicate and gorgeous magical crown upon the head, while two odd rubies were iid within its empty eye sockets, hiding the glow of its crimson soulfire.


    When the jaw of this head started moving up and down to speak, Greem could very clearly see its teeth were not actual teeth. Instead, they were teeth that had been individually carved out of magical gemstones with ferocious might.


    It was through the use of these powerful magical gemstones that the lich¡¯s head was capable of fighting its enemies without the use of any chants. It only needed to click its jaws, and the magical gemstones that had been set into a magical sequencer would rapidly activate,unching a ferocious barrage of spells to exterminate the enemy.


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, even the weakest liches of the multiverse were Third Grade creatures.


    Once they had umted enough resources and magical equipment to forge an immortal body, they would instantly advance to Fourth Grade. The lich before him seemed to have been able to produce an immortal head, barely. As such, its fundamental strength should only be around beginner Fourth Grade.


    Of course, if it was capable of forging its body within a thousand years, it still had the chance of rising to advanced Fourth Grade.


    However, a beginner Fourth Grade lich was already more than terrifying for this battlefield!


    Greem spared no words upon seeing the crystal head sealing off the exit of the two Third Grades. He grabbed Alice¡¯s waist and turned to leave with his Fire Teleportation.


    Yet, his entire body stalled the moment he turned.


    A sinister lich had already sealed off the exit behind him and was tapping its left hand with the bonewa staff in its right. A crisp and frightening knock rang out when the white bone staff hit against the lich¡¯s bony hand.


    Greem¡¯s heart instantly sank to the depths when he saw the lich¡¯s strange ck robe and that blinding magical radiance on its body.


    He narrowed his eyes slightly to cover the blue light given off when the Chip was running at full capacity. Greem started to analyze the battlefield with all his strength in hopes of finding an opportunity to escape.


    The Chip quickly provided Greem with five methods of escape after a series of intense calctions. However, three of these methods required Greem to abandon Alice in order to execute them perfectly. Thus, Greem had no choice but to give up on them. The remaining two escape operations were gradually merged into one after rapid analysis and organization from the Chip. They were put together to form a n of action that allowed for the highest chance of escape.


    27%.


    No matter how much the Chip calcted and analyzed, the chances of Greem and Alice sessfully escaping were no more than twenty-seven percent. Acting with such a low probability of sess was undoubtedly taking an immense risk.


    That said, and given the circumstances, Greem had no choice but to go ahead with it. Otherwise, if he were to wait until the Fourth Grade lich had dealt with Uzzah and Antoril, he would probably lose even thisst twenty-seven percent of his.


    The self-destruction of the me Fiend of Terror!


    It didn¡¯t matter which n he chose; the best method of interrupting the enemy was to order the Second Grade me Fiend to self-destruct.


    That beginner Fourth Grade lich was currently focused on the two Third Grades. That made it such that Greem¡¯s only opponent was this Third Grade lich. Despite being a Second Grade fire adept, however, there were hardly any spells amongst Greem¡¯s repertoire that could directly threaten the Third Grade lich.


    The self-destruction of the me Fiend of Terror was perhaps his only method to stall the Third Grade lich!


    As Greem gritted his teeth and prepared to execute his n, Alice, who had been leaning against his shoulder, tugged at his sleeve and shook her head.


    This one instance of hesitation passed by, and the entire situation on the battlefield had been entirely upset.


    The two Third Grades had been defeated!


    The already injured Druid Antoril had been beaten within an inch of death at the very moment he attempted to strike. The barrage of spells from the lich¡¯s head had been too much, and the druid waspletely unconscious now. Meanwhile, the rtively unharmed Dark Witch Uzzah chose to escape alone at the very first instance.


    Sadly, Uzzah was incapable of escaping against a Fourth Grade lich, even with all her abilities unleashed to their fullest potential.


    Shadow Movement?


    Uzzah¡¯s frail and skinny body was struck by a soulfire the moment she turned into her shadow form. She didn¡¯t even have the chance to dive into the shadows. That brilliant silver soulfire that burned on her head illuminated everything around Uzzah and dispersed the gathering shadows and darkness.


    With the short-distance Shadow Movement being obstructed, Uzzah could only open up a spatial rift and attempt to flee into the shadow ne through it. With the unobstructed movements of the shadow ne, she could rapidly put distance between herself and this lich¡¯s head to allow her to get away easily.


    Sadly, while her n was ideal in theory, the reality was much harsher.


    A strange spell was shot out toward the spatial rift from the giant rubies iid within the lich¡¯s head which actually caused the rift to heal at a visible rate. Uzzah, who was halfway inside it, was ejected from the space. The other half of her body that had been stuck in the shadow ne vanished abruptly.


    Uzzah let out a tragic howl!


    Anyone would be in immense pain like herself if half of their body had been devoured.


    If it weren¡¯t for her transforming into her shadow form, this injury would have been enough to ce her at death¡¯s door.


    The increasing pressure from the lich¡¯s head drove Uzzah insane. She raised her head and let out a deste howl. Several shadow spears appeared from thin air and shot toward the hovering crystal head.


    The lich¡¯s head didn¡¯t even respond to the retaliation of a fearsome Third Grade Dark Witch. It didn¡¯t fortify itself with the most basic of magical shields or elementium defenses, allowing its head to simply be consumed by the tide of shadow spears.


    Haha, that Fourth Grade lich slipped up.


    Such thoughts had just surface in Uzzah¡¯s mind when the lich¡¯s head casually emerged from the explosive zone of the shadow spears. Not a single scratch was on its crystalline head. It was just as smooth and shiny as before; in perfect condition.


    Dammit, dammit, dammit!


    It was only at this moment that Uzzah experienced the terror of a lich¡¯s immortal body!


    Did undead like liches have any weaknesses?


    They did¨C their soulfires!


    One could even say that all undead had only one fatal weakness and that was the soulfire hidden deep within their skulls. Many undead had evolved durable skulls that rivaled even the finest of steel to protect this soulfire and avoid themselves being killed with a single strike.


    The liches that stood at the very top of undead creatures undoubtedly went the furthest on this route.


    They used the most precious and sturdy magical crystals in the world to create a perfect home for their soulfires. This crystal skull might seem like it was forged from thin crystal ss and was immensely frail, but its magic and physical resistance was shockingly high.


    Take the beginner Fourth Grade Lich Luke for instance. The crystal skull it had crafted for itself was immune to all magical and physical attacks below Third Grade. Even attacks above Third Grade had to be concentrated to a single point and repeated multiple times to have any hopes of breaking through its head.


    The lich did not fearrge-scale elementium attacks such as the one Uzzah had just unleashed upon him!


    Lich Luke drove its crystal skull toward Uzzah¡¯s side, enduring her mad retaliations as it did so, before using an instant-cast Horrid Wilting to render the Dark Witch unconscious.


    It was then that rows of death knights stomped out of the few tunnels behind Third Grade Lich Anders. Judging from their intimidating presence, they were all Second Grade undead.


    Greem had utterly given up now!


    Even without Alice stopping him, he would have run into this army of death knights after he forced the Third Grade lich away from him with his me Fiend of Terror.


    Greem had great confidence in exterminating a single death knight in under fifteen minutes if it was a duel. After all, casters could use teleportation spells in a fight against enemies with brute strength, then proceed to wear away at their defenses with offensive spells.


    Even if he was dealing two death knights, Greem had a reasonably high chance of winning with all his aces put into y. If there were three death knights, Greem would have no choice but to turn and flee.


    However, judging by the situation before him and the squads of death knights that continued to march out of the tunnels, they numbered a total of twenty-one.


    An army like this wasn¡¯t something that a mere Second Grade fire adept like Greem could deal with!


    Under Alice¡¯s hinting, Greem had no choice but to unsummon the me Fiend and surrender.


    After they were caught, these undead slowly marched Alice and Greem them toward the depths of the underground after they had been caught.


    Greem could sense that, for some reason, these undead treated Alice with more priority and emphasis than they did Uzzah and Antoril. The Fourth Grade lich grabbed Alice after binding her with Hold Person, then flew ahead of the rest of the undead into the underground.


    Meanwhile, Greem, Uzzah, and Antoril were personally brought to a temporary camp by Lich Anders and its undead army. Greem saw countless intermediate and high-grade undead there, along with massive undead armies.


    If these undead were allowed to swarm to the surface, the forest elves might not be able to keep their positions as the masters of Garan!

 Chapter 694 The Deal Behind the Scenes

    It was a sinister and frightening magical hall.


    The Fourth Grade turned and left after tossing Alice into this hall.


    Alice struggled up from the cold floor and started to sort out her messy hair and clothes. She then casually began assessing this magical hall.


    Her first impression upon seeing this hall was¨C big and tall!


    It was clearly underground Garan, but these odd undead had managed to forcefully excavate a massive cavern and furnished such a gigantic and magnificent magical hall out of it.


    Alice looked around her from the middle of the hall and realized that she couldn¡¯t see the surrounding walls. This massive space might be enveloped in darkness, but it shouldn¡¯t have been able to obscure or weaken Alice¡¯s sight.


    The only possibility remaining was that she was over a thousand meters away from the walls and the edges of the hall.


    That was the only possible scenario in this situation!


    Alice lifted her head and looked at the ceiling. The towering ceiling gave her a feeling of distance and vastness. A chilling white light shone upon her body, making her feel even more cold and lonely than she already was.


    Even though everything here was so strange, Alice still casually looked around unfazed. That was because Alice had felt an odd gaze looking at her ever since she woke up. The gaze was silently observing her from all sorts of angles.


    She was like an ant that had been trapped in a tiny ss bottle by a human, incapable of foreseeing her future. Meanwhile, the opponent was crouched in front of the container, using a different angle to observe and investigate her existence.


    "You should know why I have brought you here, don¡¯t you?"


    Suddenly, an abnormally loud and chilling voice boomed in this massive hall.


    It was hard to determine the speaker¡¯s gender from the voice.


    Alice nodded her head lightly.


    "Of course. You want me to help you divine the location of a certain item! You probably wouldn¡¯t waste your time on me if I couldn¡¯t even predict this!"


    "Hehehe. The only good thing about dealing with those blessed with Fate like yourself is being spared from all the useless dribble," The loud voice continued, "Very well, state your request! As long as you give me a satisfactory answer, I won¡¯t hold back on the payment for the divination."


    "I came here for a Staff of Divination."


    "Staff of Divination. Do you mean this one?"


    As the loud voice echoed, a magical water mirror appeared before Alice¡¯s eyes. Reflected within that mirror was a crude and straightforward dragon¡¯s den. Shiny gold coins and magical gemstones, armor, and equipment of all sorts were arranged in a massive pile in the center of the cave.


    A magical staff glowing with prismatic radiance was nted at a nted angle at the very top of the pile. Judging by its design and magical flux, it was the Staff of Divination that Alice had been dreaming of!


    A light of intense desire instantly gleamed within Alice¡¯s eyes. She had to use all of her strength and control to stop herself from reaching toward the projection in the mirror.


    "Indeed, Your Excellency. This Staff of Divination is what I need!" Alice wiped away her expression and turned all her attention to the conversation with the opponent.


    "No problem!" The loud voice chuckled and said, "As long as you help me divine the location of one item, this Staff of Divination will be yours!"


    So simple, so easy.


    The Staff of Divination she had risked and exhausted so much to obtain was within her grasp, just like that?


    Alice calmed down and immediately sensed that something was not right.


    If the opponent was willing to give her a pseudo-artifact as herpensation, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the price she would have to pay to divine the requested object. Alice knew very well that the cost she needed to pay for every divination was proportionate to the value of the object being divined.


    The more precious the object, the more difficult the divination, and naturally the more horrifying the price she had to pay!


    That said,pared to the price of divination, there was another question that bothered Alice even more.


    "Your Excellency, do you mean that as long as I can provide you with sufficient detail of this object¡¯s location, you will allow me and mypanions to leave with the Staff of Divination?" Alice asked probingly.


    "That is basically what I mean. That said, the only ones involved in this deal are you and me. That is why you may leave with the Staff of Divination once you have seeded with your divination. As for the rest; they are not included in this deal!"


    Alice¡¯s smile froze on her face. Her expression turned solemn once again.


    "Your Excellency, they are mypanions! I wish to bring them along with me."


    "Hehehe. Brat; don¡¯t raise any presumptuous requests. This is only fair trade between us this time! You give me information, and I give you the staff. You are not qualified to haggle with me!"


    "Your Excellency..."


    "Brat, don¡¯t think you can use this request of mine to threaten me! There are plenty of individuals in this world that possess divination abilities. I am free to send people to bring them to me. Why do you think I chose you? The only reason I chose you is that of your identity as an adept. You adepts have always been selfish and egotistical creatures. You are flexible when doing business and have none of those disgusting rules and limitations when you negotiate. That is why, brat. Don¡¯t you test my patience!"


    "Your Excellency, what if I give up on the Staff of Divination as mypensation then?"


    The loud voice fell silent for a moment and finally replied, "If you give up on your Staff of Divination, then you may take away with you your adeptpanions. Moreover, I can agree to one other ¡¯tiny¡¯ request of yours."


    The corners of Alice¡¯s mouth curved upward slightly as a trace of loss and regret appeared upon her face.


    ............


    Three dayster.


    Greem, Alice, Uzzah, and Mary sessfully left the Death Scar and returned to the flying ship.


    Alice fainted the moment she set foot upon the flying ship.


    After thebined inspection of multiple Fate Witches, they came to a terrifying conclusion¨C Alice¡¯s life force had been almostpletely exhausted.


    This trip to the underground seemed to have drained away a massive amount of Alice¡¯s life force, leaving all of her bodily functions on the verge ofplete copse. Judging from the current condition of her body, Alice only had approximately two months of life left in her!


    Alice¡¯s life force should have been enough to sustain her for another forty years before this.


    ............


    It was already night by the time Alice woke up once again.


    The flying ship was slowly cruising above the clouds. One could see the fragments of shredded clouds passing by the vessel through the cabin windows.


    No lights had been lit in the cabin.


    Only flickering moonlight shone through the window, faintly illuminating the tall and muscr figure by the bed.


    Greem¡¯s chiseled facial features were extremely defined, causing deep shadows to fall upon his face when the dim light shone across it. The first thing that Alice saw when she opened her eyes was the pair of glowing eyes hidden in the shadows.


    "You lost forty years of life!" Greem sighed helplessly.


    Alice¡¯s pale face was still leaning against the pillow, paler and whiter than the white cloth itself!


    "Don¡¯t worry about me!" Alice put on a forced smile. Her originally silky-smooth hair was alreadypletely white, "At least I can still live for a period of time. This amount of time should be enough for us to do something!"


    "Two months!" Greem replied, pausing and grating each individual word as if he was biting metal itself.


    "Two months time is already plenty. Do you have no faith in me?"


    Greem hesitated for a moment and finally asked questioningly.


    "What exactly did you go through after we were caught in the underground world?"


    Alice sat up and leaned against her pillow, before softly narrating everything that had happened in the magical hall.


    "Then...then what exactly was it that that mysterious powerhouse made you divine for them?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask out of curiosity.


    Alice pointed at her forehead lightly and shook her head with a bitter smile, "That person wiped away parts of my memory using magic after the divination seeded. That is why even I can¡¯t remember what exactly it was that I divined."


    "That damned fellow, to even touch your memories. If that person has so much power, why doesn¡¯t he just learn divination himself? Why would he rely on a small witch like yourself?" Greem grumbled resentfully.


    Alice simply smiled.


    "Perhaps this has to do with his origin attribute! The powers of Fate have always shunned dark energies. That¡¯s why, if his true form is that of a high-grade undead, then his luck will always be locked in the negatives. Any divination spells will forever have nothing to do with him."


    "Cough. I know about that as well. Still, I¡¯m upset that you lost so much of your life force for nothing. Such a great loss..."


    "We didn¡¯t really lose out!" Alice let out a clearugh, "Don¡¯t you forget, that mysterious person agreed to one ¡¯tiny¡¯ request of mine!"


    "Oh? What did you request?"


    "I asked him to send troops to harass the forest elves just a little bit."


    Greem was speechless upon hearing this.


    After his trip to the underground world, he knew very well the terror of those undead.


    If tens of thousands of undead were to surge to the surface, it would be a cmity for the forest elves that exceeded even that of the Cmity of Witches!


    ............


    The Death Scar.


    The elves stationed around the Death Scar were still sending troops down to search for the location of Lord Antoril.


    Just as they were busy with their search, strange mists started to rise from the depths of the underground, engulfing the Death Scar and the surrounding forest.


    There were hoarse howling and the noisy sounds of shifting feet in the mists.


    A fetid odor of rot filled the air as the night winds blew across thend.


    Hordes of zombies and skeletons climbed out of the depths of the underground, shambling toward the nearest elven fortifications. Behind them, a massive horde of white ghouls dug tunnels and swarmed toward the closest elven city under the orders of intermediate-grade undead.


    Bodaks, Ironhide zombies, wraiths, skeleton mages, and liches could be seen amongst their ranks.


    Without exception, all of them had been given a single order by their master¨C to ughter everyst elf!


    Their eyes gleamed blood red as they set off on their journey.

 Chapter 695 Blightcaller

    Disaster!


    A major disaster!


    A major disaster had befallen the forest elves¨C the pacifists and protectors of nature!


    For some reason, a horde of hundreds of thousands of fearsome undead had swarmed out of Death Scar, the heart of the forbiddennd of Garan. These undead had ughtered everything in their warpath to the closest elven city¨C Rhames.


    Life withered wherever they went, and all creatures and magical beasts of the woods were subjected to extermination.


    Some powerful magical beasts fought back against the undead to defend their home and territory. However, even the lords of the magical beasts fell before this tide of undead creatures and evil undead casters hidden within, their bodies shredded to pieces and their souls scattered to the winds.


    Naturally, as masters of Garan, the forest elves would never allow a group of foreign evildoers to step all over their beloved home. The elven court that had not stirred in awhile immediately ordered a sizeable elite army to march to Rhames without stop. They were to intercept the vanguards of the undead tide at the city.


    The local elven viges started to arrange for a mass evacuation of the vigers to the city upon hearing this news. At the same time, they began gathering men to ambush and hunt down the undead creatures that had scattered all across the Fantasy Forest.


    For a moment, the fires of war raged all over the Fantasy Forest. It was on the brink of a massive outbreak of chaos!


    Just as the undead disaster was about to erupt, an odd silhouette abruptly appeared above the Death Scar.


    It was a phantasmal soul projection.


    A brilliantyer of golden light enveloped the entire soul projection, the radiance so bright that it was hard to see what was within. One could only vaguely sense that it was a woman.


    That said, the state of existence of this soul projection was obviously far from the norm. The projection radiated a strange aura of divinity that gave it mysterious and supernatural powers. At the very least, these rotten corpses and shambling skeletons did not possess the ability to see her true form.


    This soul projection casually strolled through the crowded throng, not a single undead capable of sensing her existence even as they shuffled across thend.


    That was the case even for the First and Second Grade undead!


    Within the projection, ¡¯she¡¯ first looked down at the scale and movement of the undead tide from high above the Death Scar before furiously diving down into the fearsome gorge festering with the aura of death.


    She zoomed past the swarming undead as if they didn¡¯t exist, passing straight through the corridors and caverns filled with foul-smelling zombies, skeletons, and ghouls, before heading directly for a mysterious area a thousand meters deep in the underground world.


    If the outside world was described as being cloaked in a thinyer of an aura of death, then this ce was pitch-ck. Even with her divine vision, the projection was incapable of seeing through this space of death and the secrets around her.


    "Please stop there, Lady Saoirse!" A strange crystalline skeletal head floated out from within and stood in the way of the soul projection.


    It was the beginner Fourth Grade Lich Luke that had taken down Antoril and Uzzah. Yet, at this moment, it was respectfully greeting this soul projection whose looks could not be clearly discerned.


    There was no need to hide anything now that she was here.


    The golden light burst apart, revealing the perfect body of the chief elven god, Saoirse, within.


    As the chief elven god, Saoirse naturally possessed all the good looks and beauty of the forest elves.


    Short green hair, long, slender, and soft ears, a straight nose, emerald eyes, and an impressively wless figure. This projection was only a manifestation of her godly will and thus had no weapons or armor manifested upon her. She was just draped in a light, elegant, and delicate robe.


    Lich Luke carefully erected a Deadsoul Barrier and shielded himself from the aftershocks of the dispersing golden light.


    He might be a Fourth Grade lich and existed as one of the most powerful forces on a material ne, but he was still facing a true goddess. Even as sinister and calcting as he was, the lich did not dare to behave disrespectfully before a powerful goddess.


    Not even if it was only a godly manifestation of that goddess!


    "Lich, tell your master toe out. I have something to tell him personally!" Saoirse frowned and said with a disgusted tone.


    Her manifestation had no more than one ten-thousandth of her actual power. It was difficult for her to even deal with a ¡¯mere¡¯ lich such as this one. That said, the disgust of undead creatures that came from her very soul origin made it impossible for her to speak with a cordial tone.


    "Please wait for a moment." Lich Luke calmly replied and then shut his eyes without another word.


    Judging from the looks, he was conversing with an individual in the distance.


    A short momentter, an immense consciousness descended upon the lich, lighting up his eyes.


    Two zes of fire ten thousand times more intense than before suddenly burned in the lich¡¯s empty eye sockets. The intensity of the red light was so immense that even Saoirse¡¯s divine power appeared to strain from the pressure.


    "Blightcaller, you have gone beyond your bounds!"


    "Kehkehkehe. I was wondering who was calling for me? So it was you! Saoirse, little girl, why have you suddenlye to my territory?" Lich Luke, who had been nothing but respectful to the elven goddess, had aplete change of attitude. Not only had he turn iparably arrogant, but even his title for Saoirse had also changed.


    "Blightcaller, don¡¯t even think of changing the topic. The contract we signedst time still exists. Are you trying to tear apart the contract and start a war again?" Even Main Elven Goddess Saoirse had a headache when dealing with this otherworldly powerhouse that had brought such a cmity upon Garan.


    "Kehkehkehe. How could that be possible?! You lot gathered the main gods of all three major pantheons to force me to sign that agreement of peace. Do you think my soul consciousness could still appear here if I went against the contract?" Lukeughed chillingly in a voice filled with resentment and hatred.


    "Then what are your actions right now?" Saoirse was also starting to fly into a fury, "Your subordinates have charged out of the Death Scar. They are harassing and assaulting my constituents right now. This...is this not you going against the agreement?"


    "Haha... little Saoirse, are you wondering why I haven¡¯t been punished by that contract, even though my subordinates have ventured out of the Death Scar?"


    "You must have used some sort of sinister scheme to bypass the Agreement of the Gods. Now! Recall your subordinates immediately! Or I willunch a war of the gods against you once again!"


    "It won¡¯t work, Saoirse!" Luke started to cackle without any restraint, "It won¡¯t work again even if you were to summon the main god of the seas and the main god of the humans. Because this time, I am not the one to go against the contract¨C you are."


    "You... nonsense! I have always been keeping my subordinates in check. I have never sent a single high elf in here to disturb you. You..."


    Saoirse¡¯s cheeks were flushed red from frustration. Just then, Lich Luke clicked his upper and lower jaws, and a portal opened. An incapacitated figure shrouded inyers of death energy floated out from the gateway.


    Saoirse looked at the figure¡¯s beard, his clothes, that nature¡¯s radiance that permeated his entire soul, and her heart sank.


    It was a Third Grade druid!


    Among the forest elves, the only ones that could advance the Third Grade druids were often elves that came from famed elven families and were considered high elves.


    "What is it, Saoirse? Do you dare not acknowledge this individual as your follower? He was very daring indeed. He charged all the way into my territory and exterminated countless servants of mine that I had gone to great lengths to raise. Thus, since you forest elves have initiated an attack against me, my sending of servants in retaliation is perfectly within the bounds of our agreement back then."


    Saoirse¡¯s expression turned cold and solemn.


    Even though she knew that the opponent was keeping something from her and the truth was much moreplicated than that, there was nothing she could do. She had used divine magic to verify the authenticity of his statement, and the nar consciousness itself had acknowledged his words.


    Despite the nar consciousness¡¯ hatred for this evil intruder, it was bound by the narws and the Agreement of the Gods. It could not step beyond its bound to side with the elves.


    Without the suppression of the ne, even Saoirse would have trouble dealing with this evil Blightcaller.


    "Blightcaller, I will investigate the situation based on what you have told me. However, before the investigation results are out, you must return my follower to me and recall your undead army. If we are truly the ones who vited the contract, then I guarantee, with my name as the main elven goddess, to provide you with satisfactorypensation!"


    Even Main Elven Goddess Saoirse didn¡¯t dare to ignore the ¡¯witness¡¯ that the Blightcaller currently held in his hands.


    "Kehkehkehe. Investigate as you will. However, don¡¯t even think of taking away the ¡¯evidence¡¯ from my hands! Since you have promised to providepensation, I will not increase the number of forces on the surface. As for the undead I have sent out, I won¡¯t be recalling them for now. I¡¯ll just let them take a tour around your territory for the meanwhile! When you havee up with satisfactorypensation, you cane to look for me to talk about the matter of recalling my troops. Kehkehkehe."


    Having said that, the flux of the oddly powerful consciousness retracted and vanished from the spot.


    Lich Luke¡¯s originally zing eyes immediately dimmed.


    If one were to observe more carefully, they would find that Luke¡¯s soulfire was weaker and dimmer than before the great consciousness had descended on him. It was proof that the simple task of hosting the soul consciousness of that great existence was more than enough to exhaust a beginner Fourth Grade lich!


    That said, Saoirse couldn¡¯t possibly be in the mood to pay any attention to a mere lich. Her eyes swept across the Third Grade Druid Antoril with aplicated look before finally leaving, shaking her head as she did so.


    Even though the powerful existence¡¯s consciousness had already left, and an exhausted Fourth Grade lich was the only one guarding the ce, this Sixth Grade elven goddess still didn¡¯t dare to retrieve her follower by force.


    And this indirectly demonstrated the power and terror of this ¡¯Blightcaller¡¯!

 Chapter 696 Raid Against the Pegasus Magic Spring

    Naturally, the worldly mortals had no knowledge of these secret dealings behind the scenes!


    Even a great goddess that stood at the very peak of the world could only bow her head before a greater face, silently enduring all the humiliation and suffering.


    If even the goddess herself was in such a predicament, the fates of the worldly beings could only be more tragic and deste!


    No more undead were swarming out of the Death Scar after Saoirse¡¯s interference.


    However, the tide of undead that had swarmed into Fantasy Forest had already reached a shocking number of one million. The undead had no intention of retreating or remaining where they were. They gathered into an intimidating tide of undead under themand of intermediate and high-grade undead hiding among their ranks and charged straight for the city of Rhames.


    Over eighty percent of the undead horde wasposed of slow-moving zombies and skeletons. Their slow movement speed gave most of the forest creatures, magical beasts, and elven civilians time to evacuate.


    However, the undead army didn¡¯t justprise of these lowly creatures. There were several fast ghouls within their ranks as well, along with all sorts of higher-grade undead.


    They had set out from the empty underground space and found themselves in this iparably bountiful forest, where both botanical and animal resources were plentiful. They could not suppress their desire for fresh meat that came right from their soul. These undead immediately broke free of the horde and started wandering the Fantasy Forest, ughtering everything in their path.


    The undead army was like a hydra whose body was continually expanding and whose head was continuously multiplying. It was a hydra that bared its fangs against the surrounding woods as it continued to close it on Rhames.


    Dozens and hundreds of battles were constantly breaking out in the forest around the undead tide. The elves started some of these skirmishes, some by the undead casters, and some were merely random encounters.


    It didn¡¯t matter who it was that started the battle; there was no path of retreat for the participants. The only option they had was to fight to the death!


    These one million cannon fodders were nothing to the undead powerhouse hiding behind the scenes. It would all be worth it if he were able to exchange them for the slight improvement of some of the elite undead!


    The see-sawing negotiations were still ongoing behind the scenes for the elves. If the elves were able to put on a greater show of force and push back against the undead, Saoirse would have much more leverage in thepromise.


    One side enjoyed exchanging quantity for quality, while the other simply had no choice.


    It was all these reasons, hidden or publicly known, that caused it to be a death match whenever undead ran into elves and elves ran into the undead.


    The bloody scene of the battle between these two forces could be seen throughout all five hundred kilometers of forest from Rhames to the Death Scar. The number of individuals that died in this conflict was so immense that it was impossible to keep count.


    It was the first time the peaceful Fantasy Forest had ever been subjected to such painful torture and devastation!


    ............


    Even as they hid high above the clouds, Greem and the adepts had sensed the happenings in the woods below.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel nervous at the gigantic game of chess that the powerhouses yed when he saw the ferocity of the undead horde, despite not being one of thebatants himself.


    It might only be a boring game for those ultra-grade powerhouses.


    However, a military movement like this on a mid-sized ne would already be a significant event that could send tremors through the ne!


    Due to Alice¡¯s exnation, Greem had, more than anyone else, a crystal clear view of the causes that had led to this situation, as well as potential future developments. In all seriousness, the fact that the elves had been struck by such a disaster could very much be attributed to Greem and the adepts!


    If the elven chief god Saoirse could spare the effort, she definitely wouldn¡¯t mind personally ¡¯purifying¡¯ this group of evil adepts. As such, now was undoubtedly the best time to put into action any operations they had nned.


    Blessed with this ¡¯good fortune,¡¯ the flying ship carrying the adepts circled outside the area of conflict for quite a while. It was only when they saw therge flight of dragons breaking through the skies that they chose to raise their sails and escape into the distance. They were to wrap around and enter the central mountains from a different direction.


    With the introduction of such a massive undead horde, Garan had now been stirred into a bursting pot of conflict. The elven alliance on the south coast was still keeping up their intense stand-off against the Pale Witches. They might have redirected part of their manpower, but the elves were still having a hard time stopping the undead tide from stretching its tendrils into their hearnds.


    The elves had no other choice. The elite army that typically guarded the central mountains and watched over the elven court, the elven temples, and the mysterious restricted areas were drawn upon, again and again, cutting their numbers by more than half. All of these elite troops had hurried day and night to reach Rhames.


    For a moment, the military force of the central mountains was unprecedentedly weak!


    However, even this weakness was rtive.


    After all, be they elves or magical beasts, those that could stand in the central mountains were no weaklings.


    The Pegasus Magic Spring that could give rise to the mysterious pegasus, the Moonde that gave birth to the sacred unicorns, the Deadwood Arch that allowed adolescent treants to transform into treant warriors, and the home specially excavated for the forest dragons¡ª the Dragoncliff.


    These mysterious restricted areas wouldn¡¯t easilye under any danger, even without an elite army sent by the elven court. That was because every restricted area was always guarded by specified powerhouses of the race that inhabited the ce. That was an unchanging fact.


    Take for example the Pegasus Magic Spring that the Dark Witches had been coveting. It was the most sacred line of the pegasi.


    The Pegasus Magic Spring was located in the southern area of the central mountains. A fifty-kilometer stretch of grassy green ins could be found there. It was the careful maintenance of the elves that kept this hignd ins away from the ever-expanding influence of the Fantasy Forest, ensuring that the fields weren¡¯t drowned under the dense and dark shadows of a canopy.


    Thousands of herds of wild horses of various sizes lived on this vast in. Dozens of mutated white horses would be born here on a yearly basis. Only these mutated white horses had the right to walk into the center of the ins to bathe and drink from the Pegasus Magic Spring to evolve into the mysterious winged pegasus.


    ording to the agreement between the pegasi and the forest elves, the elves were only allowed to send in a certain number of knights on the day where pegasi were born to search for their steed.


    There was to be no coercion or abduction. All elven knights had to rely on their Spirit and conviction to attract and move a pegasus that had just been born. That was the only way that they could qualify as Pegasus Knights that soared across the blue skies!


    The elven army sent by the elven court could only be stationed around the border of the in, keeping the peace of the wild herds. Inside the ins, a pack of powerful Skysteeds guarded the magic spring.


    The so-called Skysteeds were just the evolved forms of the silver pegasi. Their appearance somewhat resembled thebination of a pegasus and a unicorn.


    The grade ssification of the pegasi was pretty simple. Ordinary pegasi were at the level of advanced apprentices or pseudo-adepts in the World of Adepts, while silver pegasi were considered First Grade creatures. Skysteeds, on the other hand, had entered the level of Second Grade magical beasts.


    Meanwhile, the one and only Skysteed King of the pegasi was the only Third Grade creature of the herd.


    The adepts might have ssified the adept grades into nine different levels based on the power they wielded. However, not every species could reach such terrifying heights!


    The pegasi were an example of this. Third Grade was the highest level that these magical creatures could possibly achieve!


    Even if they wanted to advance further, their ¡¯frail¡¯ bodies would not allow them to host even higher and stronger powers.


    Consequently, the ones guarding the Pegasus Magic Spring were one Third Grade Skysteed King, seventeen Second Grade Skysteeds, and as many as a hundred First Grade silver pegasi.


    If they were the only forces guarding the spring, then the joint forces of the Dark and Fate Witches, along with the Crimson n and their flying ship, would be enough to take control of the spring. However, the moment the witches would start attacking the magic spring and disying offensive power beyond the limits of pegasi, the Skysteed King would summon the nearby elven armies without any hesitation.


    There were no more than fifty kilometers of distance between the spring and the perimeter. It would take no more than thirty minutes for the elite elven army to arrive at the battlefield.


    As such, the Dark Witches had to be determined in their actions if they wanted to obtain yields from the Pegasus Magic Spring. Moreover, the battle couldn¡¯t drag on for too long.


    That would be a challenging problem for most other creatures. However, for the adepts that had masted all sorts of knowledge, this was extremely simple!


    Forcefully breaking in, fighting their way through the ins to reach the spring, enduring yet another battle and finally escaping with a tragic victory; the adepts would never do such a thing.


    Thousands of nes regarded adepts as the evilest and selfish intelligent lifeforms of the multiverse. They had not achieved that reputation by sheer strength. Instead, it was the use of their brains and the evil application of their knowledge.


    The witches in the cabin immediately started getting to work when the flying ship approached the magic spring. They weren¡¯t preparing for battle, but for an unprecedentedly evil ceremony of witchcraft.


    After the past three months of preparation, the adepts had already managed to uncover the secrets of the pegasi through them and the silver pegasi they had managed to capture. With the use of the ckwinged Beetles raised by the Dark Witches and the Voodoo Doll that Greem and Endor had cultivated together, the might of this witchcraft ceremony was elevated to unimaginable heights.


    They had no intention of lowering the aircraft. The entire ceremony was held five thousand meters above the Pegasus Magic Spring.


    In consideration of the fierce winds and their negative impact on the spreading of the witchcraft, Greem ordered the flying ship to slowly descend as the witchcraft ceremony reached its final notes.


    By the time the flying ship was a thousand meters above ground, it had already been exposed to the eyes of plenty of pegasi.


    Large clouds of ck smoke surged out of the cabin as the ship slowly descended.


    These ck clouds of smoke appeared to have a mind of their own. They were not scattered by the fierce winds and instead gathered together and buzzed toward the magic spring below. From above, the spring looked asrge as ake.


    All this undoubtedly caught the attention of the pegasi garrison!

 Chapter 697 Above the Magic Spring

    As members of an isted holynd, the pegasi were utterly ignorant as to the recent happenings in Garan.


    Perhaps in another three to five years, when the ordinary and silver pegasi serving in the elven army came back to procreate, the news of the outside world might have a chance of spreading through the herd for a moment.


    Massive events that shook the state of the entire continent like the Cmity of Witches or the Cmity of the Undead were no more than teatime conversation topics for these istionist subordinate races to the elves.


    As such, when this flying ship feared by all elves descended in a shroud of ck smoke, the pegasi guarding the magic spring had no intention of fleeing. Instead, they furiously got into formation and took to the skies to fend off the enemy.


    Truly, these pegasi were far too ignorant and foolish!


    As flying creatures unique to Garan, the high-grade individuals among their herd had decent intelligence. That said, as a whole, their species was still far from being an intelligent race.


    Their lives under the protection of the elves had been too peaceful and quiet. They had lost their instinct for danger, the one trait that all magical beasts must possess.


    The pegasi guarding the magic spring gathered together and took to the skies as a group in the face of this gigantic monstrosity that had recklessly invaded their holynd. They continually circled above the magic spring, preparing themselves to attack at any moment.


    Just as theypleted their preparations and reared to defend theirnd, something happened to the pegasi that had taken to the skies.


    An odd floral scent drifted out of the ck smoke. The smell was strangely thick and quickly diffused into the surroundings.


    The intermediate and high-grade pegasi in the herd recovered after a brief moment of dizziness when they smelled this scent. However, the ordinary pegasi that made up the majority of the group were wobbling about and seemed to be incapable ofsting any longer.


    Ssh!


    After the first pegasus crashed headfirst into theke of magic spring water, the entire herd started to fall like dumpling poured into water. One after another, the pegasi plummeted from the skies in session.


    The entire herd was thrown into utter chaos!


    The pegasus might be known as a magical beast, butpared to your ordinary magical creature, it had no long-ranged abilities. Apart from their broad wings and rapid speed, the pegasi had no other specialties. If they wanted to attack the enemy, they still had to rely on tackling or lunging.


    One had to admit, the threat of the pegasi to the adepts was severely reduced without their riders!


    Poison Hag Endor descended from the sky with an old and tatteredmp resting upon her palm. A single white, lit candle had been ced in themp. The thick scent that lingered in the air hade from this candle.


    The many Dark and Fate Witches, along with the Crimson adepts crowded around Endor, carefully protected and guarded her. Meanwhile, Greem, Mary, Tigule, and Zacha, the Second Grades of the group, each found a target of their own and charged at the enemy.


    Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah also turned into a cloud of inky smoke and charged at the exceedingly handsome Skysteed King.


    After a long time preparing and nning, the adepts had alreadye up with this odd witchcraft that was extremely effective against the pegasi. It was based on their understanding of the creatures¡¯ biological construction; all pegasi within range of the witchcraft would be severely affected.


    The high-grade pegasi might be able to endure the effects for a moment with their Physiques, but the low-grade pegasi instantly fell unconscious when they inhaled the anesthetizing floral scent.


    This way, the adepts had sessfully avoided the scenario where arge herd of pegasi surrounded them.


    As the adepts¡¯ ranks rushed down from the flying ship, all the pegasi in their path fell from the sky. They crashed into the quarter-kilometer wide magic spring, never to be seen again. Meanwhile, the high-grade pegasi wobbled, beat their wings, and shed with the adepts.


    Theck of time didn¡¯t allow the adepts room to advance slowly on the pegasi.


    Consequently, the adepts went all-out the very first moment they engaged the pegasi.


    Shadow snakes formed from shadow substance, raging mes in the form of zing birds, bright green acid balls, three-meter tall humanoid wind elementals, and unending sonic sts.


    Violent spells of various forms rained down upon the pegasus herd under the conjurations of the adepts. Apart from the silver pegasi, who could erect ayer of strange energy barrier to shield themselves from the magic attacks, the other pegasi could only endure the damage with their powerful bodies.


    A wave of spells passed by.


    A dozen pegasi neighed in pain as they fell from the skies. Not a single spot on their bodies had been spared from the barrage of ferocious spells. Clouds of red blood drifted across the air. It was a terrible and unbearable scene to behold!


    Even so, the pegasi did not retreat in the face of the enemies that had intruded into their holynd.


    They raised their heads and whinnied as they beat their wings and trampled across the skies. Once they had gathered enough strength, they neighed and charged at the adepts.


    The adepts quickly erected brilliant magical defenses in response.


    However, the pegasi didn¡¯t seem to care. They ran headfirst into the semi-translucent barriers.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    A few dull thudster, the adepts¡¯ defenses were still standing, but the pegasi themselves were reeling with blood streaking down their long faces. Yet, before the adepts could adjust themselves and harvest these staggered animals, the second charge from the pegasi had arrived.


    It was through these many charges and tackles that the defensive barriers of the adepts went from translucent, to bright yellow, to light red, before finally turning into a bleeding red. Finally, the Dark Barrier of a Dark Witch shattered amidst the continuous thuds.


    The crack of the barrier was like the sound of a battle horn. Even more pegasi swarmed toward the Dark Witch and separated her from the other adepts with their ferocious tackles. It was at this moment that the Skysteeds, having waited since the start of the battle, dove down upon the adepts. They used their tough iron hoofs to stomp the enemy.


    It had to be acknowledged that there were too few Second Grade Dark Witches in their ranks for this trip!


    Third Grade Uzzah had already engaged in intensebat with the Skysteed King high above in the sky. She had no attention to spare for these low-grade Dark Witches. The only Second Grade Dark Witch rushed into the battlefield and protected the isted Dark Witch, but not far away, another Dark Witch had been surrounded by the pegasus herd.


    Though the use of the witchcraft scent had gotten rid of many of the low-grade pegasi, the remaining ones still had an absolute numerical advantage over these attacking adepts.


    The adepts were exhausting the magic power within themselves in each of these shes, while the pegasi were exhausting their very lives.


    The adepts had an overwhelming advantage against the pegasi in all respects. However, this advantage still wasn¡¯t enough to let the adepts go unharmed!


    The first casualty was a Dark Witch.


    After all, the faction of the Fate Witches and Crimson adepts had plenty of Second Grades, along with many pseudo-Second Grades. They could promptly rescue any one of their own whenever they were surrounded. However, the Dark Witches only had a single Second Grade in the end. There were limits to her ability- save one, and another would be neglected.


    That was why, even as she tried to put out all the fires, a Dark Witch¡¯s shield finally shattered and was stomped to death by two Skyteeds as she attempted to escape.


    Of course, this Dark Witch wasn¡¯t genuinely dead either!


    Due to their unique ability, her soul would automatically return to the soul energy pool located in the Shadow Ind¡¯s adept¡¯s tower. She only needed a matter of one or two months to reforge a body of shadows and be revived.


    However, given the time they had left, the Dark Witch would not have the opportunity to rejoin the expedition and battles in this ne!


    Moreover, while the soul energy pool could recall the soul, it could not recall her magical equipment. That was why even Dark Witches wouldn¡¯t want to die on the battlefield and leave their prized possessions behind unless absolutely necessary.


    The second victim was the three-headed demonhound, Unguja, who stood before Wind Adept Deserra.


    As a peripheral member of the Crimson adepts, Unguja had also been forced to participate in this internar war along with a couple of his subordinates. After a few rounds of battles, the five fiendhounds he had brought with him had all died in battle. It was finally his turn.


    A bad positioning caused a Second Grade Skysteed to target the three-headed Unguja.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. After all, all the official Crimson adepts had gathered around Poison Hag Endor to protect her.


    The lonely Unguja had also be the ideal target of an attack!


    The terrified Unguja immediately started running around in the air in the face of the Skysteed¡¯s charge. He let out a pathetic yelp as he ran, hoping that his allies coulde to his rescue.


    Sadly, another Skysteed had intercepted the Blood Knight that Mary had sent out. Dragonborn Zacha, on the other hand, couldn¡¯t fly under his own power and was entirely relying on a Wand of Flying to wobble across the sky like a drunken fighter.


    Naturally, the dragonborn wouldn¡¯t make it in time with that speed!


    As expected, the cornered Unguja had his bones smashed to pieces by an angry Skysteed before having his dog heads crushed to pieces, one by one.


    This disloyal dog that followed Greem had very regrettably been turned into unrecognizable meat paste in an otherworldly war.


    The next to fall prey were a few First Grade vampires that Mary had newly acquired.


    They were barely qualified to participate in a battle like this with their current strength. They couldn¡¯t evenst that long against the pegasi before being stomped to pieces by the surging herd.


    However, that was the extent of the pegasi¡¯s rampage!


    In just fifteen minutes, the unrelenting barrage of firepower from the adepts hadid low most of the pegasi. The proud figures that covered the skies and blotted out the sun above the Pegasus Magic Spring now remained in loose and tattered groups.

 Chapter 698 Pseudo-Artifact Longbow

    Neeeiiigh!


    A tragic and drawn out neigh rang out as the handsome Skysteed King fell from the skies, shrouded in a cloak of ck smoke.


    The sizzling sound of corroding flesh could be heard from its body as it crashed.


    Everyone on the battlefield was smart enough to see that the Skysteed King¡¯s odds were slim!


    Even though defeat was inevitable and meaningless ughter was the only thing that awaited them, the remaining pegasi refused to retreat.


    They were not fighting right now; they were stalling for time.


    As long as they could drag out the battle until the elven army arrived, these enemies would immediately retreat.


    They had to protect the irreceable magic spring, even if they all had to sacrifice themselves for that cause.


    Their thoughts were pure and noble.


    However, trying to deal with the adepts using such a mindset was overestimating their abilities.


    Now that the Skysteed King had been eliminated, Third Grade Dark Witch Uzzah had be an unstoppable de on the battlefield!


    Uzzah had also been slightly injured in her fight against the Skysteed King, but the morale of victory allowed her to regather her spirit and lead the other Second Grade adepts in exterminating the remaining Second Grade Skysteeds.


    With a Third Grade Dark Witch watching the lines and restraining their movements, no Skysteed was able to escape, even with their terrifying speed of flight. A single Prison of Darkness from Uzzah would bind a Skysteed to the spot. Greem would then order Dragonborn Zacha and Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder to surround and beat the Skysteed.


    A Second Grade Skysteed couldn¡¯t possibly deal with the brutal melee attacks of these two giants, even with their decent Physique.


    One after another, the Second Grade Skysteeds were knocked unconscious and captured alive. They were all transported onto the flying ship.


    It had only been twenty minutes since the start of the battle!


    When the number of pegasi left in the sky numbered in the single digits, Uzzah finally hurried out of the air along with a few of her subordinates. They lunged straight at the center of the magic springke.


    The statue of a pegasus rearing as if it was about to take flight silently stood at the heart of theke.


    The eternal spring water came from the mouth of that statue.


    The magic spring water wasn¡¯t crucial to the Dark Witches. What was important to them was this pegasus statue.


    Simply smashing away its base and taking it away was a wasteful act. It was very likely that doing so would instead destroy the mysterious powers of this statue.


    Thus, the witches had to cast aplete sealing spell to take the statue away with them.


    Uzzah could not be interrupted while she was sealing the statue. After she started channeling the spell, she would also lose all of her ability to sense the external world. Greem and the others would have to protect her if it came down to it!


    Dark Witch Uzzah nodded slightly at Greem before diving into the magic spring with three of her Dark Witches. They needed to uncover the mystery of the stone statue as soon as possible and then proceed to seal itpletely.


    Meanwhile, a Second Grade Dark Witchnded atop the statue and shut her eyes to focus on protecting her superior.


    Greem and Mary left some instructions and had Zacha, Tigule, the vampires, and the adepts remain on the spot. The two of them then hurried in the direction of the elven garrison without any hesitation.


    Mary and Greem were both Second Grade now, but their styles ofbat were utterly distinct from each other.


    Even the way they traveled had very distinctive traits.


    Mary¡¯s bat wings were not fully opened behind her back, and her body glided rapidly three meters above the ground like a speedy dragonfly. A light crimson trail followed her wherever she went, only dispersing after a long time.


    Meanwhile, Greem didn¡¯t choose to fly!


    He was a ssic fire adept. His mastery over Fly could neverpare to other adepts.


    Thus, he forged a new path of his own, researching and inventing this new way of travel using his Fire Teleportation and me Transformation as the basis of the spell.


    His body turned into a formless ze of fire whenever Fire Teleportation was on cooldown. This ze of fire floated half a meter above the ground and used the propulsion of hot me streams to move forward quickly. Once Fire Teleportation was ready, this ball of fire would abruptly explode into a fire halo, before reappearing in a specific position in front. The ball of fire would then continue sting forward.


    That was how Greem traveled: propulsion, Fire Teleportation, propulsion again, then Fire Teleportation again.


    When used in a constant cycle, his speed was not much slower than Mary¡¯s!


    However, this method of travel also left behind marks that were far too obvious.


    Anyone that looked down from high above the skies would clearly see a chain of ck pearls along Greem¡¯s trail. The pearls were the circr burn marks caused by the st of fire when using Fire Teleportation, while the streams of me he used to propel himself left shocking trails of ash upon the green ins.


    The two adepts ran into the elven army reinforcements fifteen kilometers away from the magic spring.


    It seemed the elves had left behind the slow infantry to increase their marching speed. As such, all the soldiers that the two of them had run into were air cavalry. Surprisingly, the one leading them at the very front was a beautiful elf riding upon a Second Grade green dragon.


    Greem revealed himself in a ferocious pir of mes. The ze of fire quickly formed into a five-meter tall me humanoid, subtly sealing off the path forward for the elves.


    Greem used his unique vision to look around him before nodding in satisfaction.


    Very good, no Third Grades.


    They had already investigated the elven army before they attacked the magic spring. There were no Third Grade powerhouses around here. That said, he had been worried that the elven kingdom would have been alert enough to increase the number of high-grade personnel during such a time of crisis. That was why Greem¡¯s priority upon appearing was to search for the existence of a Third Grade powerhouse.


    Now that there were none, the battle today couldmence.


    If there had been a Third Grade, Greem would not have been as foolish as to risk his life for the sake of the Dark Witches. He would have hightailed it and ran as far as he could. He wouldn¡¯t ever use his own life to test the strength of a Third Grade elf.


    A Third Grade elf might be weak, but that was only rtive to a Third Grade adept.


    An elf of that level would have no problem dealing with a Second Grade adept!


    As such, Greem instantly found the courage within himself when he sealed the path and found no Third Grades amongst the enemy¡¯s ranks.


    "Leave the green dragon and that elven brat to me. The rest is yours!"


    Greem spared no words or time and quickly divided the enemy between Mary and himself.


    Mary might have shocking short-distance flight speed, but her w of weak offensive power would be on clear disy against a tough and sturdy opponent like the green dragon. It seemed like Greem was being unfair by iming only two enemies for himself while leaving nearly a hundred aerial knights to Mary.


    However, in truth, he had only made a decision based on their respective strengths!


    Mary knew this very well and chuckled as she turned into a crimson cloud and threw herself into the midst of her enemies.


    "Ah!"


    "Careful!"


    "There..."


    "Dodge, quick!"


    For a moment, grunts of pain rang out amidst the elven knights. It was only now that the elves realized that these two mysterious adepts had appeared to ambush them.


    "You two are mine."


    The me humanoid Greem had turned into possessed a loud and resounding voice due to its size.


    Both the green dragon and the beautiful female elf on its back changed expressions upon hearing this. An expression of intense humiliation and anger appeared on their faces.


    "You are courting death!" The beautiful female elf extended her slender hand and grabbed the strange elven longbow on her back, "Orid, we will teach him a lesson!"


    The ferocious green dragon reared its head and roared. It then beat its mighty green wings and dove toward Greem.


    It was thebination of an elven deadshot and a green dragon!


    Greem¡¯srge eyes froze for a second as they fell upon the longbow in the elf¡¯s hands.


    The green dragon and the female elf were already putting immense pressure upon him. However, if he were honest, even the spiritual pressure of these two enemiesbined could notpare to the pressure from the longbow!


    Greem felt a chill in his heart when the female elf nocked an arrow and drew the bow. Even from two hundred meters away, he could sense that dreadful pressure from the longbow.


    The Chip quickly identified the bow through a trace of energy flux that it had leaked. A report soon appeared in his mind.


    [Beep. Warning. Warning. Detecting high-energy convergent weapon.


    Form: Bow.


    Means of attack: energy-shaping, energypression, energy enhancement.


    Attacked offensive effect: out-of-order conveyance strike.


    Basic offensive power: 200-300points.


    Note: ording to thews of the Faen ne, this weapon might be ssified as a pseudo-artifact.]


    Pseudo-Artifact?


    Even Greem¡¯s heart couldn¡¯t help but tremble when he heard these words.


    The Staff of Divination that Alice was always dreaming about also seemed to be a pseudo-artifact. The Second Grade elf that had appeared before him was also holding a pseudo-artifact in her hands.


    Dammit! Aren¡¯t there too many pseudo-artifacts on this ne?


    In the World of Adepts, the adepts had ssified magical equipment into four grades based on theirpatibility with the adepts of those grades: First Grade, Second Grade, Third Grade, and Fourth Grade. The so-called pseudo-artifact of Faen ne was of the same tier as Fourth Grade magical equipment.


    However, in the World of Adepts, a Fourth Grade magical equipment would never fall into the hands of a low-grade adept!


    Even if a low-grade adept had been fortunate enough to obtain high-grade magical equipment, they would not be able to hold it for long. In fact, the gear would easily draw death toward them.


    Meanwhile, the existence of gods on Faen caused the chances of mortals obtaining high-grade weapons to be significantly higher. Followers who were favored by the gods could easily be rewarded by the gods for all sorts of reasons.


    Thus, several low-end pseudo-artifacts were created in this manner!

 Chapter 699 Damned Surestrike

    Even Greem¡¯s situation regarding magical equipment was inadequate and shabby.


    The only thing on him that could be considered of decent quality was his Soul Equipment¨C the Scroll of Voodoo.


    However, the Scroll of Voodoo had already evolved and turned into the body of the voodoo doll. Over the past few years of nurturing and growing, the strength of the voodoo doll had already risen to advanced First Grade. It could finally be of some help to Greem.


    Meanwhile, the Stitch Ghost Golem, despite having undergone multiple massacres and devoured several souls, was still at intermediate First Grade. It had almost no chance of being fielded inbat against these Second Grade opponents!


    Apart from these helpers, the only equipment on Greem that could be considered Second Grade magical equipment was the ze of Destruction. The rest were basically still First Grade magical equipment. These magical items were severelygging behind his power and status. They couldn¡¯t provide him with much support inbat.


    If it weren¡¯t for his powerful elementium golems, Greem would not possess such immense advantage against opponents of the same grade.


    That was why Greem, despite his usual cool-headedness, couldn¡¯t help but be ovee by greed when he saw a pseudo-artifact in the hands of such a young Second Grade elf.


    The green dragon opened its mouth wide as it dove downwards, and a two-meter-wide acid breath swept toward Greem in a fan. The beautiful female elf riding on the dragon also flicked her slender fingers. Two transparent wind arrows caught up with the acid breath at an unbelievable speed and stabbed toward Greem¡¯s chest.


    [Beep. Warning.


    [Second Grade Green Dragon¡¯s Acid Breath. Initial power estimated to be one hundred and seventy points. Also possesses one hundred points of acid corrosion effect. Excels at corroding magical shields. Initial threat assessment is high. It is suggested that the host dodges the attack.


    [Wind Arrow elementium attack. Initial power estimated to be one hundred and fifty points. Threat level is lower......]


    Greem quickly understood the power of the enemy¡¯s attacks through the Chip¡¯s instantaneous scans.


    The fact that the green dragon, as a Second Grade magical being, could so casuallyunch an acid attack of two hundred and seventy points was fairly surprising. Meanwhile, the long-ranged attack of the elven deadshot was only one hundred and fifty points. That was clearly beyond Greem¡¯s expectations.


    The exchange of information was swift. Suchplicatedbat assessments flowed through Greem¡¯s mind instantaneously.


    When the two attacks were about tond on his body, the me humanoid that Greem turned into let out a grin and exploded into a halo of fire. He then took the opportunity to leap away.


    Yet, when he emerged at another spot, a ring rm filled his ears before he could even figure out what was happening.


    [Beep. Warning.


    [Detecting narw flux. Source of flux: the wind arrows.]


    Sadly, such an rm was far toote!


    There were two dull thuds as two wind arrows pierced through Greem¡¯s elementiumized me body. Twoplete holes had been left in his body.


    The me giant let out an agonized roar.


    He did not have the critical weakness and flesh of a human while transformed into his body of mes, and he was immune to most physical attacks. However, the powers of fire that the wind arrows had annihted when they pierced his body were part of Greem¡¯s current strength. Although he could rapidly replenish this portion of his strength with his me core, the sense of losing that power was as real as it could be.


    "Why? Why," The me humanoid turned and roared at the female elf standing on the green dragon, "Why is it that I still took damage, despite having clearly dodged your attack?"


    The elven deadshot proudly raised the longbow glowing with magical light as she looked at the berserk me giant and said, "Foolish brute, have you never heard of the name of Sinthavee Heartpiercer?"


    "So you are Sinthavee!" The previously berserk me giant was suddenly calm as water. He chuckled and spoke, "I was wondering what was special about the longbow. So it has the ¡¯Surestrike¡¯ attribute."


    In the past, Greem would have definitely scoffed at such a Surestrike effect.


    How could there possibly be something as ridiculous as absolute certainty in this world!


    It was called Surestrike and it would definitely hit? Then what was the purpose of technique and dodging?


    However, with his increasing umtion and research of magical knowledge, Greem was shocked to find that the so-called Surestrike had a certain logic and reason to it as well!


    Firstly, such weapons could not be forged by mortals; the participation of the gods was a necessity.


    Secondly, the god would have to imbue the weapon with a suitable trace of their understanding and authority over the narws when they set its form. That would bestow the weapons with specific supernatural magical abilities.


    For instance: ¡¯Surestrike,¡¯ ¡¯Indestructible,¡¯ or ¡¯Unstoppable Force.¡¯


    As long as it possessed the power of the narws, even a leaf enchanted with the power of Unstoppable Force would easily break apart the most sturdy magical shields of the world. That was because the sh of the leaf and the magical shield wasn¡¯t a sh between the hardness of their materials, but their respective narws.


    As long as the narws overwhelmed the opponent, even a leaf would be enough to slice a magical shield to pieces.


    Of course, in reality, it was also a matter of whether it was possible to find a leaf that could bear such sublime narw powers!


    That was why any magical weapon that the forest elves crafted from a random branch taken from the great Tree of Life would easily beat conventional magical metal weapons. They were relying on the strength of the Tree of Life¡¯sws that had seeped into every one of its branches and leaves.


    The elven longbow in the hands of this young elf clearly possessed thew attribute of Surestrike.


    Any arrow shot with the longbow would mysteriously appear at any position on Greem¡¯s body under the influence of Surestrike, even if Greem were to dodge or defend against it.


    The process might sound ridiculous and without reason, but its threat toward Greem was genuine!


    Just as Greem finally figured out the reason for his injury, the young female archer that seemed no more than thirteen years old once again dove forward with her green dragon.


    This time; zeng, zeng, zeng! The opponent fired seven wind arrows in a single breath.


    Damn damn damn damn damn!


    For the first time, Greem couldn¡¯t help but start cursing wildly duringbat!


    Dammit, how should I dodge? Dammit, they were going to hit anyway. Is there any point in wasting time avoiding them?


    For a moment, even the experienced veteran Greem had been thrown into a panic by the enemy¡¯s brainless attacks. He had no idea how to respond.


    Greem randomly threw a magma fireball when he saw the seven transparent wind arrows whistling with force. He intended to use the detonation of his fireball to jar the wind arrows and disperse them.


    His own body leaped away with a Fire Teleportation.


    A dull explosion rang out as the magma fireball exploded into a massive ball of mes. The violent me shockwaves and rain ofva turned everything in a radius of twenty meters into a sea of magma.


    Just as Greempleted his teleportation, seven wind arrows silently appeared around his newly-formed body. They once again shot toward him.


    This time, Greem was prepared!


    He opened his hands wide and caught three of the seven arrows.


    Unfortunately, he let out a furious roar the very next second. Seven visible holes had once again pierced into his body of fire.


    He opened his hand, and nothing remained in the zing palm.


    He hadn¡¯t managed to catch any of the arrows!


    Dammit...dammit...dammit!


    Those gods were all motherf***ing assholes! Were the powers of thews supposed to be an ability that a Second Grade elf should possess?


    Greem furiously cursed as he incited the me core to send out another surge of me energy to repair his body.


    Dammit! I can¡¯t be defending passively! Otherwise, even this brat of a girl alone would easily kill me.


    Greem had initially intended to hold back a little bit, but this time he no longer dared hide anything.


    He threw out a massive golem crystal which quickly transformed into a zing me Fiend of Terror.


    A clumsy doll covered in strange runes climbed out of his clothes, a sinister green light emanating from within its body.


    A doll sewn of cloth with a single eye drawn with blood upon its head floated out of nowhere as three spots of lights revolved around it, continually letting out a bleak and chillingugh.


    One had to admit that the golems and creations of adepts all naturally possessed a sinister and evil aura upon them. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the Voodoo Doll or the Stitch Ghost Golem. Both of them had the stereotypical appearances of evil constructs. Anyone could tell that they were ominous creatures of evil with a single look.


    The forest elves all worshipped nature. They could easily sense the overwhelming aura of bloodshed and murder upon these sinister dolls. To think that the evil adept across from her had managed to create these golems! Who knew how many poor elves he had ughtered on Garan to give them such an overwhelmingly evil aura!


    The female elf known as Sinthavee was driven into a fury. She immediately pushed the green dragon forward at the me humanoid.


    Both parties retreated as they fought, slowly moving the battlefield to the depths of the ins.


    Meanwhile, Mary had turned into a sh of red lightning, boldly and fearlessly weaving between the ranks of the elven knights. The low-grade elves fell like dumplings wherever she went, crashing toward the ground.


    Their lives had been lost before they evennded.


    The most direct reason for their deaths was Mary piercing their brains or hearts with her bloody hands. Only shocking and horrifying holes remained in their vital spots!


    There were quite a few Second Grade elven deadshots among the ranks of the knights. Naturally, they couldn¡¯t allow Mary to ughter theirpanions so simply.


    Pupupu!


    The sound of arrows piercing into flesh rang out in session. Mary, who had been ravaging the ranks of the elven knights as she pleased, had also been hit by the enemy¡¯s urate sniping. Several explosive arrows blew up inside her body, sending blood and flesh into the air.


    Sadly, the slender and pretty Mary was like a demon in human form without any sense of pain. Not only did she not show any signs of toning down her violence, but she also started ughtering the elves at an increasing pace with increasing brutality.


    The crimson silhouette would jump and flicker wildly among the aerial knight order. Each sh was apanied by an elf dying and falling to the ground. Meanwhile, the explosive arrow attacks she had endured had reached a shocking amount.


    Mary was still ughtering and killing with wild abandon.


    All the damage she took could be recovered through killing elves.


    The more ferocious the enemy¡¯s attacks, the quicker she ughtered the elves. An odd and delicate bnce of death mysteriously started to form between the two enemies!

 Chapter 700 Mission Accomplished

    [Beep. Dodge ten meters to the left.]


    A zing stream of fire shot out of the right side of Greem¡¯s giant body, propelling him a short distance to the right.


    The me humanoid had just vacated his original spot when a massive ball of acidnded on the grass below, dissolving all grass within a ten-meter radius and turning it into a slimy ck liquid.


    Greem lifted his head and looked at the diving green dragon and the female elf, who was still firing arrows at him. He wasted no energy in dodging those Surestrike shots and instead fired out innumerable magical fireballs in session, drowning his enemy in a storm of magic.


    Aooooo!


    A loud, pained roarter, the great green dragon managed to break through the explosive zone of the fireballs with its tough Physique. With a single swipe of his powerful ws, it shattered the afterimage that Greem had left behind. The green dragon then red its wings and took the female elf into the skies again, kicking dust and debris into the air.


    Meanwhile, the me humanoid appeared a hundred meters away. Greem calmly removed the magical wind arrows embedded in his body and crushed them between his magma hands. One by one, the wind arrows cracked and fell into pieces.


    The green dragon was once again in the sky and had just locked onto the me giant¡¯s position when three fist-sized phantom golems appeared nearby. They grinned sinisterly and charged toward the female elf.


    Sinvathee had just used her Ring of Grasswood to rid herself of the fire poison in her body when she immediately entangled with these annoying ghost golems. She couldn¡¯t continue her attacks on the me humanoid adept.


    With no choice left to her, Sinvathee could only snap her bow and shoot down each of the three ghost golems that attempted to dive into her body and snatch pieces of her soul. The giant me humanoid took this opportunity to join hands with the me Fiend of Terror, casting arge-scale Meteor Shower in unison. This area-of-effect spell easily enveloped the elf within its radius.


    The green dragon used its trained flying techniques to weave between the meteors falling from above. It was only when there was no avoiding it that Green Dragon Orid used a short acid breath to neutralize a meteor.


    The young female elf Sinvathee did not need to concern herself with external distractions when she had such a powerful flying mount. She turned all of her attention to the evil fire adept that was flickering about the battlefield.


    Both of them were the same grade, while Sinvathee herself had the help of a mighty Second Grade green dragon. Based on her understanding, it should have been a simple enough matter to deal with this evil fire adept.


    Yet, when they exchanged blows, Sinvathee was shocked to find that the elders¡¯ fear of the adepts was not without reason. The difference between their understanding ofbat and experience of ughter was as vast as the earth and sky!


    Most elves believed thatbat techniques were the same as murderous techniques. Excessive pursuit ofbat techniques meant deviating from the nature of elves as pacifists and protectors of nature; it meant losing their soul to the way of bloodbath and ughter.


    That was why most elves, despite possessing excellent skill in archery, were not willing to spend too much time on refining theirbat skills. That also caused the lethality of their superb archery skills to be far less practical and brutalpared to the spells of the adepts, forged in blood and battle!


    She was a ¡¯chosen one¡¯ favored by God of Archery Marco, and she owned a pseudo-artifact longbow envied by all of her tribespeople. However, she could only fight this evil fire adept to a standstill.


    This...this fact annoyed and frustrated the proud Sinvathee to no end!


    Both parties had been fighting for a dozen rounds upon this in!


    Greem still had not found an effective way to kill the opponent.


    Fire poison. That elf was wearing a Ring of Grasswood. She could utilize the power of nature to neutralize most poison.


    Coldme. With the green dragon¡¯s protection, the brief instances of freezing that Greem could inflict upon the elf wouldn¡¯t be of much use. He would have trouble making it past the green dragon to kill the elf.


    Fire. In all honesty, this was the ability that Greem had put the most research into and the talent that best manifested his might. Unfortunately, with the selfless defense of the green dragon, few fire spells could even threaten the female elf.


    As for the Stitch Ghost Golem and the Voodoo Doll, they were barely capable of distracting and limiting the female elf¡¯s power. If they were to act as the primary offensive force, they would probably be torn apart by the green dragon in a matter of minutes.


    It seemed the aid that they could provide Greem with was ultimately minimal, at least before they advanced to Second Grade!


    After a series of confrontations, the female elf was still unharmed, but visible wounds had already started to appear on Greem and the green dragon. That said, the ones who suffered the most significant losses were the herds of wild horse across the ins!


    They had no natural predator, no harsh environments, no drought, and no famine. These wild horses had always lived a peaceful life of leisure upon the ins where they had seeded for generations.


    However, on this day, all of that was shattered by a group of outsiders!


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was Greem¡¯s fire spells or the green dragon¡¯s acid breath; these were all terrifying attacks with immense might and radius. Any wild horses swept up in the shockwaves of their battle had no hope of surviving.


    For a moment, the ins were scorched and turned into dead earth. ck and withered bones covered in acid were littered all over the ce, leaving only a tragic sight to behold.


    Without the existence of the green dragon, Greem would have only required fifteen minutes to deal with this prideful young elf. He¡¯d have ensured that she was crisp on the outside and raw on the inside!


    Sadly, in his current circumstances, he could only run across the ins and endure the pain of arrows piercing his body without any end in sight.


    Greem was having a fierce battle, but Mary¡¯s fight wasn¡¯t much easier either.


    In the face of multiple powerful enemies, Mary was still being turned into a pincushion, even with her speed and agility. If it weren¡¯t for her exceptional regeneration abilities, her flesh would have been thoroughly picked apart by the arrows.


    Fortunately, both of them had aplished their goal. They had mostly intercepted the first reinforcements from the elven army. The reinforcements that made it into the magic spring area were no more than one-third of their original number.


    Greem and Mary were relieved when they finally received news of the sealing¡¯spletion. They no longer bothered with the enemy and turned to flee back to where they came from.


    Naturally, the infuriated elves couldn¡¯t just let this slide. They pursued the adepts and sent a barrage at them all the way back.


    When Greem and Mary ¡¯sessfully¡¯ returned to the Pegasus Magic Spring, they realized that the entire magic spring had turned blood red. The corpses of countless elves and pegasi floated in the average-sizedke.


    The adepts guarding the spring had all retreated onto the flying ship. The vessel immediately climbed up into the sky once Greem teleported onto the deck with Mary by his side.


    At the same time, several dozen cannon barrels extended out of the bottom of the ship as a horrifying assault stopped the army of elves from pursuing any further.


    Even as strong as Sinvathee and her green dragon were, they could only dodge in the face of the explosive magical sts.


    The elven aerial knights behind them that failed to dodge were sted into pieces by the magical purple sts, their broken limbs falling to the ground like a bloody rain.


    Countless aerial knights drove their pegasi and hippogryphs upward in their fit of fury, intending toy down their lives to y these evildoers. Sadly, flying magical beasts were only magical beasts after all. They couldfortably cruise at an altitude of a thousand meters, but anything above that and their wings would not be able to catch up to the flying ship.


    In the end, this trivial pursuit ended with the elves¡¯ loss as the flying ship hid within the cloudyer!


    The elves arrived at the Pegasus Magic Spring and silently looked upon the missing stone statue. Their faces were filled with downcast expressions. The surviving pegasi were furious, but there was nothing they could do.


    The loss of the stone pegasus statue meant the loss of the endless magic spring water.


    What this meant to the pegasi was evident and certain!


    Perhaps it wouldn¡¯t even take a hundred years for the once famous pegasi to go extinct from the Continent of Garan.


    ............


    In contrast to the anguish of the elves, the flying ship was filled with an atmosphere of joy and celebration.


    Dark Witch Uzzah¡¯s was in a pleased mood afterpleting all the missions her leader had assigned to her. Even when she once again saw Greem, it was a gentle smile that appeared on her usually cold and sinister face.


    "Kid, you did well this time! Regardless of what grudges or disagreements we Dark Witches might have with you and your people, from today onward, I can speak for the Dark Witches and let all that be bygones. If you are willing toe to develop in the Northern Lands, I can speak for our leader and extend a very warm wee!"


    The fact that Uzzah was able to publicly utter such words despite her typical disdain for male adepts was more than enough proof that Greem had won the respects of this Third Grade Dark Witch. These words from her was also an acknowledgment and praise for his power and the faction he led.


    The unexpected release from captivity after the underground trip and the fullymitted help with the magic spring this time had indirectly caused Dark Witch Uzzah to owe two major favors to Greem and Alice.


    If they had been so willing to help, then they had an excellent reason to do so!


    Uzzah pondered the mystery and decided that the keyy within the mysterious actions of the Fate Witches this time.


    The Fate Witch branch had only been revived for less than a hundred years. Rationality dictated that any training of their witches should merely involve the less dangerous small-sized nes. Yet, this time, they hadmitted all their forces to venture to this dangerous ne of Faen.


    Dark Witch Uzzah would never believe it if someone told her that there was no secret lying behind this!


    Perhaps something that they desperately needed resided on Faen, or maybe the Fate Witches wanted to gather the powers of Fate in Faen. Neither option was something that the Fate Witches could aplish alone with their currently meager strength.


    A request always followed immense courtesy. Now, it was just a matter of seeing what the Fate Witches would ask of her.

 Chapter 701 Negotiations

    When Greem brought Mary inside the metal hall, Uzzah was sitting alone inside and carefully fiddling with a palm-sized pegasus statue in her hands.


    It was probably the form of the Pegasus Magic Spring after having been sealed!


    Even though it had beenpletely sealed, Greem could still sense the stone statue¡¯s vast magical aura through the sparks of light emanating from it.


    The Pegasus Magic Spring could transform ordinary wild horses into flying magical beasts. It was inevitable that there was some research value to it. If it were wholly dissected and understood, it would have incredible benefits for the Dark Witches¡¯ taming and rearing of flying magical beasts.


    As such, it was only natural that Uzzah¡¯s mood had be unprecedentedly pleasant after sessfully obtaining the stone statue!


    "Tell me," A rare smile appeared on Uzzah¡¯s cold and sinister face, "What exactly is it that you people want me to do for you? Let me say this beforehand; I won¡¯t participate in anything that¡¯s excessively dangerous. At the very worst, I willpensate you for your contributions after we return to the World of Adepts."


    Greem slightly smiled when he heard this.


    "Don¡¯t you worry, Lady Uzzah. What we want you to do will in no way exceed the limits of your abilities!"


    "That is not a certainty!" Uzzah couldn¡¯t help but grunt, "Now that the entirety you¡¯ve thrown the entirety of Garan into chaos, the old fogeys hiding behind the scenes should be stirring soon. Trying to start up even more trouble in the hearnd of the elven kingdom at this time is far too risky. The chance of running into Fourth Grade powerhouses is too high."


    Now that both of her missions had been aplished, Uzzah wasn¡¯t too keen on taking up any new adventures. After all, Garan was currently swarming with elven god messengers and elites. Even with her powers, Uzzah had no confidence in sessfully escaping, especially if she ran into those Fourth Grade powerhouses with abilities that countered her own.


    In all honesty, the Dark Witches might not be afraid of those greatbat professions, but they were fearful of high-grade god messengers. Even if they were to fall inbat against strongbat profession users, the Dark Witches would be able to revive on Shadow Ind with the soul energy pool. That was why they behaved in such a fearless manner, recklessly charging into enemy ranks and fighting in such a barbaric way.


    However, if they were to die at the hands of high-grade god messengers, their chances of being revived were no more than forty-five percent. That also caused the Dark Witches to be extremely careful and cautious wherever there was a god messenger, losing all of their usual barbaric streaks.


    Moreover, now that the hearnd of Garan itself had been thrown into chaos by a horde of undead, the various gods of the elven pantheon would no longer be able to stand by silently. They had all started sending their god messengers, or even their personal clones, to aid the elven army in battle.


    Revealing themselves at the center of the continent under such circumstances was very likely to invite the retaliation of the most powerful elven forces!


    Not to mention the fact that they had just poked at a massive ho¡¯s nest and tore the entirety of the Pegasus Magic Spring from the elven kingdom. For the forest elves¨Cwho alreadycked flying mounts¨Cthis was like hacking away one of their limbs.


    It would have been weird if the elves hadn¡¯tpletely taken up arms!


    That was why even Uzzah couldn¡¯t help but be somewhat cowardlypared to before.


    That said, fear was fear, and Uzzah still had a bit of curiosity about Greem and Alice¡¯s real target.


    What was it that Alice so desperately needed that she would be willing personally travel and risk the lives of her Fate Witches?


    "The target of our attack this time is a Second Grade green dragon. That is because he has in his hoard a pseudo-artifact that we desperately need." Greem slowly exined, clearly enunciating each and every word.


    "Pseudo-artifact?" Uzzah¡¯s eyes suddenly lit up.


    In the World of Adepts, only adepts of Fourth Grade and above had a chance of mastering the narws. The high-grade magical equipment that they forged also often possessed tremendousw powers. However, creating magical equipment like this not only demanded a shocking number of resources, but also exhausted thew powers that the adepts had personally understood.


    That was why high-grade adepts would never forge excessively powerful magical equipment for outsiders under ordinary circumstances.


    It had been a long time since Uzzah became a Third Grade Dark Witch, yet she only had a piece of Third Grade support magical equipment on her¨C the Orb of Darkness. It allowed her to maintain a connection with the shadow ne regardless of what nar space she was in.


    It was the difficulty of finding and crafting powerful magical equipment that forced most adepts to continue using conventional gear that was one grade beneath themselves, almost as if they were paupers. Any adept that came to possess powerful magical equipmentpatible with their origin power would instantly rise to be an elite among their peers. They would be the targets of envy of all adepts.


    However, in the Faen ne, the existence of the gods allowed for the presence of many magical items. These individuals that had mastery over immense divine power and divine authorities could easily forge mysterious objects that possessed divine attributes of their own. Moreover, these strange items all possessed powerful strength that did not match their grade.


    Some adepts that hade into contact with divine items had found, upon research, that the so-called divine attributes of the weapons were the narws that the adepts obsessed over. The creation of artifacts and pseudo-artifacts wasn¡¯t as difficult for the gods as it was for high-grade adepts.


    That was why even mortals in worlds ruled by gods could own weapons, armor, essories, and other pseudo-artifacts that possessed the powers ofws. The adepts were ustomed to referring to these items as divine items.


    Unfortunately, the Faen ne had no dark gods. Otherwise, the Dark Witches would have formed raid parties to ughter the followers of the dark gods in hopes of obtaining these wondrous divine items.


    "Of the divination attribute, of course!" Greem reminded Uzzah with a smile in case the Dark Witch had any thoughts of greed in her mind.


    "Of course it¡¯s of the divination attribute. Why else would Alice be able to put herself at so much risk," Uzzah said disdainfully, before shooting a nce at Greem, "What price, exactly, did Alice pay to make you work so diligently for her? If you were willing to ally with us Dark Witches with your talent and power, I could guarantee you even higher status than you currently have. Of course, if you want women, I have some pretty good collections back home."


    Mary, who was listening at the side, couldn¡¯t help but start chuckling when she heard the offer.


    "Since you two are bringing up this topic, I had best shy away for the moment! Otherwise, it may be awkward for you to make your choice."


    Maryughed and left.


    Even Uzzah couldn¡¯t help but lick her lips when she saw Mary¡¯s seductive figure.


    "This femalepanion of yours is an excellent good, but her identity is a little awkward!" Uzzah stared lustfully at Mary¡¯s back for a few seconds before turning and speaking to Greem with a serious tone, "I¡¯m warning you; you had best have your femalepanion rein herself in a little. No one cares what she does in another world, but if she were to infect other adepts in the World of Adepts, the Punishers woulde for her. You won¡¯t be able to save her if she catches the eyes of the Punishers, even if you were a Fourth Grade adept!"


    "The Punishers?"


    "Don¡¯t think too highly of yourself because you are a Second Grade adept and a famous figure even amongst the adept ns of Central. As long as you are not a member of the three major adept organizations, you will nevere into contact with the true higher sses of the World of Adepts.


    "The three major adept organizations are located at the three edges of the World of Adepts, without any joining borders between them. As such, the Zhentarim area in the central area became the best buffer.


    "The reason Zhentarim can remain outside of the three adept organizations andy im to the widest and richest piece ofnd of the continent isn¡¯t due to their own power. It is because of a silent agreement between the three major organizations.


    "It has already been ten thousand years, yet not a single major adept n that canpare to the three major forces has risen from the central area, rich in both resource and talent. Don¡¯t you find that odd?"


    "You mean to say that the three major forces are secretly suppressing the central adept ns?" Even Greem didn¡¯t expect Uzzah to secretly reveal so many of the secrets of the World of Adepts to him today.


    "This was no secret to begin with!" Uzzah cackled coldly, "All three major forces have raised proxies of their own in Zhentarim, but no one family can gain the absolute upper hand due to their conflicts and disagreements. You think the old fogeys of Central can¡¯t tell, but it¡¯s just them not wanting things icing over between them and the three major forces."


    "The Punishers you mentioned?"


    "The Punishers do not belong to any one of the three adept organizations. Instead, they are a secret organizationprised of elite adepts from the central area. The purpose of their existence is to punish the scum amongst the adepts that refuse to abide by the Adept¡¯s Code of Conduct along with the ck adepts that havemitted atrocious sins."


    "An independent body that doesn¡¯t belong to any of the three major adept organizations?" Greem asked, confused, "Could they be an underground organization the old folks came up with to deal with you guys?"


    Uzzah¡¯s expression froze on her face for a second. She couldn¡¯t help but take another look at Greem, "You¡¯re pretty fast. You are right. The Punishers are an underground organization those Fourth Grade old men of Zhentarim created. The purpose of the Punishers is to go beyond the boundaries of n and family to gather the high-tier forces of the central adepts. Their public motto is to punish the ¡¯ck adepts¡¯ that do not obey the Code. In actuality, their real targets are still the proxies of the three primary forces that have been stationed in Zhentarim. They will not hesitate to strike at anyone that crosses the line!"


    "We are not of the three major forces."


    "But you are small fry. If that femalepanion of yours were toy her hands on an adept of the same grade, then those old folks in the Punishers wouldn¡¯t let her off the hook, even if it was just for their appearances!"


    "Very well, I understand!" Greem scratched his head in frustration, "Lady Uzzah, let¡¯s get back on topic! Will you be willing to apany us for this trip?"


    "You think I¡¯m mad? Do you think I¡¯d send myself to die in the den of the dragons?"


    "This green dragon¡¯s den isn¡¯t located alongside the others. It seems to be a traitor or rebel of the green dragons and has been expelled from the dragons¡¯ den by the green and emerald dragons. It now lives in an extremely rural branch mountain of the central mountains."


    "The news is getting better, so much so that I almost can¡¯t help but agree! Any more good news?"


    "The green dragon isn¡¯t in its den right now. It has hurried off to the Death Scar!"


    "The divination pseudo-artifact is yours. However, I want half of the remaining treasure, and I get first rights in choosing."


    "Deal!"

 Chapter 702 To Each Their Own Scheme

    Seven dayster.


    The flying ship slowly descended from the skies into a stretch of continuous mountains near the Central Mountains.


    This ce was covered with sharp and dangerous peaks. Even the unbroken sea of the forest had been split into patches of green and scattered around the perilous ridges.


    The green dragons were forest dragons. They liked warm and humid environments, and thus they would never ce their dens on the cold and dry mountain peaks. That was why Green Dragon Ohgu¡¯s den resided in a silent valley at the foot of these mountains.


    The extended presence of the green dragon had driven away all of therge beasts within a radius of several hundreds of kilometers of the mountain. Even the previous magical wolf lord had no choice but to lead his descendants to another territory following the arrival of the green dragon.


    Green Dragon Ohgu¡¯s violent personality and unbearably horrible temper made it such that even the elves didn¡¯t dare to enter his territory for no reason.


    That was why this valley had be an unguarded treasury after Ohgu left for the frontlines.


    No. It wasn¡¯t wholly unguarded.


    Green Dragon Ohgu had chased a nearby group of kobolds to his den to protect his wealth, recruiting them as his ves. This way, the group of ves would care for his dragon den.


    One had to admit, these kobolds weren¡¯t much good inbat but they were very proficient at pleasing and serving the dragons.


    That was how Green Dragon Ohgu had lived his carefree life within this silent and isted valley for as long as a hundred years!


    It was because he had figured out all of the information about this ce that Greem had been bold enough to drive the flying ship straight into the valley.


    It was only when the giant hull of the flying ship descended above the valley and blotted out the sun that the kobold guardszily lying around realized something was off.


    As a piercing rm rang out, along with a mess of barking and yelping, the enter den was thrown into chaos.


    These cowardly kobolds immediately turned when they saw the intimidating aura of the enemy and hid within the dragon den. They shut the door made of wood and twigs with a resounding m. Yet, with the size of the entrance to the cave, the two wooden doors weren¡¯t even capable of closing it off. They had absolutely no defensive utility apart from making the enemy speechless when looking from afar.


    The magical forest beasts that the green dragon had enved to be his guard dogs poked their heads out of the cave to peek and immediately shrunk back when they sensed the ominous aura.


    The enemies this time seemed quite fierce. It was best they didn¡¯t go out to die.


    As for the punishment of the green dragon? No penalty could be more terrifying than death, could it?


    Greem saw all this happen as he scanned the surroundings of the den with his powerful Spirit. A light smile appeared on his cold face.


    As he nodded his head lightly, the two dozen magical metal golems waiting by the edge of the ship slid down on ropes with Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder in the lead.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Several dull thudster, they pulled out their thick robotic legs from the dirt as ck gun barrels emerged from their metallic bodies. These machines then walked toward the dragon den¡¯s door with earth-shaking steps.


    For a moment, the nging metallic sound of the giant golems filled the entire valley!


    Greem stood on the flying ship and coldly looked at the sea of forests. The corners of his mouth turned upward slightly; he couldn¡¯t help but betray the traces of a disdainful smile.


    Greem abruptly started chanting a profound magical spell at the top of his lungs.


    As his voice rolled across thendscape, strands of magical power from the forest below started to react. Wisps and traces of invisible magical elementium began to rapidly gather toward him in the air, forming into a summoning portal filled with mysterious runes.


    Soon, with the intense trembling of magical energy, a spatial wormhole appeared at the center of the summoning portal. Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms once again disyed its lithe, muscr, and bright blue body in front of the adepts.


    Arms struggled within the wormhole and finally broke free of it after three minutes.


    "Brat, you owe me forst time."


    The Third Grade thunder dragon impatiently started grumbling at Greem the moment he emerged from the wormhole. However, he suddenly stopped before he finished. The Third Grade thunder dragon turned his body toward the northeast and lifted his snout to sniff the air, almost as if there was something that interested him.


    "Lord Arms,st time I promised to introduce you to a flight of green dragons. How is it now? Can you smell the scent of the Dragoncliff?" Greem asked politely.


    "Not bad, not bad," Arms couldn¡¯t help but sniff the air. There was no hiding the excitement in hisrge, intimidating eyes, "I looked it up when I went back. This Faen ne isn¡¯t listed in the sacred texts of the dragons, so the dragons here are still considered wild dragons. If I can lead them toward the glory of the Great Dragon God, I will most definitely be rewarded by the Dragon God himself."


    Thunder Dragon Arms became increasingly excited the more he spoke. His bright blue wings started beating intensely.


    "Little adept, if I seed here I will reward you greatly. I can void the summoning fee for the past two times. Just call me anytime you run into an enemy you can¡¯t deal with. As long as it¡¯s not one of those Fourth Grade old men, I can send the rest of them packing."


    Having said that, Thunder Dragon Arms couldn¡¯t be bothered with exchanging any more words with Greem. His giant body quickly rose to the skies and flew toward the location of the Central Mountains¡¯ Dragoncliff.


    Once the storm stirred by the Third Grade thunder dragon¡¯s flight had calmed down, Greem once again cast his gaze toward a snowy mountain peak in the distance.


    "Hmph! You are a patient lot!"


    ............


    Upon the snowy peak where Greem was gazing at, a group of elves was hiding inside a cave of ice. They were monitoring the movements near the dragon¡¯s den through a magical water mirror.


    The number of elves in the group wasn¡¯t many, but the power of each member was shockingly high.


    There were Weapons Grandmasters, Magic Marksmen, Druid Elders, and even an elegant dragon with emerald scales among their ranks as well as a fearsome green dragon of colossal size and stature. However, the most conspicuous one among them was a young male elf with a cold and stern expression.


    This elf wasn¡¯t precisely tall or broad, but his limbs and body had extraordinary senses of flexibility and coordination to them. He was only wearing light elven armor on his body with two long and narrow des sheathed on his back. A single golden braid trailed down his back all the way to his waist.


    No blinding magical light could be seen on his body, nor any bulging muscles. Yet when he stood there in silence, all of the elves present couldn¡¯t help but turn their eyes towards him in admiration and respect.


    Even the two proud dragons couldn¡¯t help but hold their breath in his presence, fearing that their heavy breathing might offend this noble Fourth Grade.


    Indeed, the one leading this Witchying operation was the Fourth Grade Storm Sword Saint¨C Agassi!


    The attention of the elven kingdom had been tied to the Pale Witches on the Echo Isles all this while. They had stationed nearly forty percent of the kingdom¡¯s military strength, and most of their powerhouses, at Greenwater City. It was the only way they had managed to keep the Pale Witches out of Garan.


    Unfortunately, what they hadn¡¯t expected was the squad of no more than thirty witches, of which none were above Second Grade, utterly throwing the hearnd of Garan into chaos by reaping more lives than they could count.


    Even putting aside the ughtered coastal viges, the witches had also baited a Third Grade druid elder into the Death Scar and caused the riot of the undead. This bloody debt was one that would be etched into the soul of each and every elf. Even the rivers and waters of heaven could not cleanse them of their sins!


    Moreover, they had even taken advantage of the elves being tied up by the horde of undead to ambush the sacrednd of the pegasi in the Central Mountains. They had utterly ruined the ce. This wicked punch felt like a de cutting all the way to the bone for the elves!


    With almost no hesitation, the elven higher-ups consulted their gods and sent out this powerful squad to ambush and hunt down these evil adepts.


    The God of Luck Visenna had specially conducted several divination ceremonies to get ahold of their locations. Finally, the elves figured out the ultimate goal of these evil adepts and the purpose of their trip to Garan.


    To think...to think it was all for a low-grade pseudo-artifact crafted by the fallen human God of Divination, Pantheon¨C the Staff of Divination.


    Pantheon originally crafted this Staff of Divination for his descendants. To amodate the strength of his descendants, the materials of this Staff of Divination had been downgraded, again and again, until it was at the level where even a Second Grade child of a god could use it.


    Unfortunately, this Pantheon had fallen during thest invasion of the continent.


    His son had also died tragically upon Garan.


    This Staff of Divination came into the possession of the fighters of Garan.


    Of course, God of Luck Visenna couldn¡¯t possibly desire a pseudo-artifact as weak as this. Meanwhile, the other elven diviners couldn¡¯t beat a Second Grade green dragon to im it for themselves.


    After many twists and turns, the Staff of Divination finally became part of Ohgu¡¯s extensive collection.


    The elven leaders immediately set up this trap after realizing the goal of these witches.


    On the one hand, they pretended to send Green Dragon Ohgu to the frontlines. On the other, they gathered a group of elven powerhouses around his den, preparing to cut off and trap the enemy once they had entered deep into the cave.


    To avoid rming the witches, the higher-ups did not move the elven armies at all. Moreover, a divine emblem of Visenna¡¯s was hung up within this cave.


    They did not need to worry that the Fate Witches would be able to sense the abnormality surrounding the dragon den this way!

 Chapter 703 Mysterious Fourth Grade

    Green Dragon Ohgu was exceedingly furious!


    These wicked evildoers were boldly marching into his den, ughtering the kobolds, and wrecking every single magical trap. Green Dragon Ohgus¡¯ heart burned in agony even as he watched the event unfold through the mirror.


    For the sake of realism, and to avoid the Fate Witch from even sensing the tiniest of shifts in the river of Fate, the elvenmander had requested Ohgu not to move away any bit of his wealth. The Staff of Divination was one of the most valuable and precious items of his ¡¯tiny¡¯ collection.


    However, to avoid alerting the enemy, Ohgu had no choice but to leave the Staff back in his den and wait for the robbers to raid his home. Though the elves had promised to double thepensation for all of his losses...that was a pseudo-artifact! Were the elves capable ofpensating him twice over if it were to go missing?


    The more he thought, and the deeper he considered, the more frustrated Ohgu became!


    He thrashed his dragon tail against the ground again and again. The long tail covered in beautiful green scales smashed against the crystalline ice, sending shards of ice into the air and causing cracks to appear in the ground.


    The dragon¡¯s hoard was the most invible right of every dragon!


    Even the Great Dragon God had no right to make a dragon surrender his hoard. That was why Ohgu had left so many magical traps in his den to protect this wealth. Yet, they were merely traps in the end. It wouldn¡¯t have mattered against these prepared thieves even if there were ten times as many traps.


    Ohgu watched as magical mes and frost sted out of the den, aware that the wicked enemies were furiously wrecking his snares. Even an ordinary group of thieves would have retreated in the face of so many magical traps of such quality.


    These people had no such reservations!


    They had no time to disable every one of these annoying traps. As such, they were all using the most foolish and violent of ways to destroy the traps: having the magical golems go ¡¯minesweeping.¡¯


    All of the metallic golems wererge and sturdy cans of iron. They had outstanding physical defenses and decent magical resistance. These golems only needed to run across the winding corridors to trigger most of the magical traps.


    me Shockwave: capable of unleashing three waves of fire in session.


    Magical Barrage: capable of firing eight magical arrows in every single direction.


    Acid Ssh: capable of firing a powerful acid ball (the acid of which was provided directly by Ohgu himself. Even a First Grade adept and his shield would be turned into mush if the acid was tond squarely upon him).


    Frost Breath: capable of sealing the entire corridor in a two-meter-thick ice crystal. Any enemy hit by the frost would most definitely suffer death.


    Finger of Death: capable of firing the Finger of Death spell. Living beings with insufficient soul toughness would instantly die. All defenses were ignored.


    ......


    ......


    One had to admit that Green Dragon Ohgu had expended arge amount of effort and resources to protect his home and his hoard. Ignoring the treasure itself, just these magical traps alone would cost upward of several tens of thousands of magical crystals when put together.


    Yet now, they were only wasted upon these cheap iron lumps.


    One metal golem fell over, but a second metal golem instantly took its ce.


    The second metal golem fell over, and the third took its ce.


    It was through such barbaric and violent methods that the magical golem squad continued to advance into the den. Meanwhile, the ring magical rms kept going off in Ohgu¡¯s mind.


    For a dragon, magical traps did not represent all of the defenses of their dragon den.


    The only one that could genuinely defend a dragon den was naturally the owner of the cave itself¨C the dragon!


    That was why so many magical traps and magical rms filled the inside of the den. As long as an outsider broke into the cave, the dragon would be alerted by the magical rm the very first instant, regardless of where they were. When that happened, the dragon would rush back to their den to trap the damned thieves, even if they were hundreds of kilometers away.


    Now, Ohgu had no choice but to allow the magical rms to re wildly in his mind. He could not do anything about the situation.


    Ohgu couldn¡¯t help but start turning restless!


    "Ohgu, tolerate it!" The slender and elegant Third Grade Emerald Dragon Iritina turned to console him, "Those evil adepts have yet to enter the den. If we were to attack them now, we would very likely scare them away. It will be hard to catch them all in a single strike then! Just tolerate it for a little bit more!"


    Ohgu was finally slightly calmer after being consoled by his crush.


    Before he could approach Iritina to flirt with her, she gasped from a scene in the magical mirror.


    That...that damned male adept had summoned a mighty Third Grade thunder dragon. Moreover, that thunder dragon had risen and left in the direction of the Dragoncliff shortly after appearing.


    What was it nning? What was the Third Grade thunder dragon going to Dragoncliff for?


    The more she thought about it, the more she panicked. Even Iritina couldn¡¯t stay calm any longer!


    An ominous feeling rose in the heart of both dragons out of nowhere.


    "Don¡¯t worry, Iritina!" The Fourth Grade Storm Sword Saint Agassi seemed to understand the dragon¡¯s concern. He consoled her with gentle words, "Several Fourth Grade emerald dragons are guarding Dragoncliff. A mere Third Grade thunder dragon can¡¯t do any damage!"


    It was the truth, but both dragons still could not suppress their concern and worry.


    They had an intuitive feeling that an unpredictable turn in Fate would happen to the forest dragons if the Third Grade thunder dragon were allowed to reach Dragoncliff.


    "Lord Agassi, we must immediately expel that thunder dragon from this ne. If you are unwilling to lend us a hand and intercept him, then I will have no choice but to hurry back to Dragoncliff and rally the elders of the n," The pretty female dragon roared anxiously, "Ohgu, we are leaving for the dragoncliff, now!"


    Iritina could no longer care about alerting the adepts. She quickly climbed to the entrance of the ice cave and used a ferocious soundwave breath to shatter the clear crystal barrier before taking to the skies.


    Grene Dragon Ohgu hesitated for a moment and finally followed Iritina into the air, unfurling his wings and flying toward Dragoncliff.


    Dammit!


    At this moment, all the elves in the cave were cursing the reckless actions of the dragons. However, they had no choice but to follow them out of the cave.


    The crystal sealing the cave had been carved with God of Luck Visenna¡¯s divine emblem that could prevent them from being discovered by the witches¡¯ divinations. Now that their ice crystal had shattered, their location had been exposed, and there was no longer any value in remaining hidden.


    "I will go ahead and stall them. You people hurry over as soon as possible!" The Fourth Grade Storm Sword Saint was decisive and immediately gave the order to attack.


    He turned into a speeding tornado and charged down, hurrying toward the cave fifteen kilometers away with a speed that was unrecognizable to the eye.


    The other elves either started running, transforming, or jumping onto their flying magical beasts and charged out of the cave with a series of battlecries.


    ............


    Fifteen kilometers away at the green dragon¡¯s den.


    Greem and Uzzah stood upon the flying ship and could very clearly see everything that had happened on the peak of the snow mountain.


    Seeing that everything was moving forward as prophecized by Alice, their anxieties and doubts were mildly calmed.


    "Don¡¯t worry. Now that you have paid me, I will be certain to help you until the very end," A wicked smile shed across Uzzah¡¯s sinister face, "As long as this flying ship is as effective as you described, I will help you stall that Fourth Grade Sword Saint. Hmph! A barbarian that only knows how to swing a de. How could he possibly be a match for us noble adepts?"


    "Then I¡¯ll leave it to Lady Uzzah!" Greem smiled when he heard this. He then lifted his leg and lightly stomped on the flying ship.


    Several magical messages were transmitted into the flying ship, and this giant metallic monster floating in the sky started to descend rapidly. It crushed the surrounding trees and smashed pieces of rock off the tall mountains.


    The flying ship did not flee but instead started to descend and seal off the entrance to the den with its massive hull.


    The Fourth Grade Sword Saint who was using Windwalking to hurry to the den was shocked. A solemn expression appeared in his calm and intimidating eyes.


    That wasn¡¯t right. Something had to be off when things were going against their usual expectations!


    The strongest one amongst these adepts was no more than an intermediate Third Grade. Why were they not trying to escape when they saw the elves running at them? Why were they fortifying themselves on the spot instead? Could there be something wrong with the situation?


    Before he could put in more thought, a massive tide of ck mist suddenly surged out of the half-exposed hull of the metallic ship and quickly formed into the shape of a middle-aged witch with a sinister look and a ck staff in her hand.


    The Fourth Grade Storm Sword Saint Agassi slowly stopped as he sensed the sinister and chilling aura. He looked at this six-meter-tall Dark Witch with an expression of shock and terror, even as he hovered in the air on an oak branch.


    With his sensitive instincts, Agassi could clearly feel that this odd witch¡¯s grade was also Fourth Grade! Though the enemy¡¯s power was far too chaotic for him to determine if she was a beginner or intermediate, there was no denying that she was Fourth Grade.


    Agassi couldn¡¯t believe this.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was all the battles at the start or the holy decrees given to them by their gods. All these pointed to the fact that the enemy¡¯s most potent force was no more than a Third Grade Dark Witch.


    If that was the case, then where had this Fourth Grade Dark Witch appear from?


    Agassi couldn¡¯t help but howl from the bottom of his heart.

 Chapter 704 The Might of Fourth Grades

    The appearance of the mysterious Fourth Grades terrified the charging elves so much that they stopped dead in their tracks.


    A Fourth Grade; there was actually a Fourth Grade among their enemies?


    Before they could find the answer to this question, a new problem appeared in their minds.


    If a battle broke out between the two Fourth Grades while they were standing here, wouldn¡¯t that be dangerous!?


    The previously courageous elves turned back and started running without any hesitation. Many of the elves even activated the precious consumable speed-boosting items they had on them so that they could get away faster.


    It was the first time Uzzah had experienced such ferocious and immense magical energy surging around her. Her gaseous form smiled wickedly at the fleeing elves as the arrogance in her heart caused her blood to boil with excitement.


    It was important to note that many of these fleeing ants were individuals of the same grade as herself! Yet now, they had no choice but to flee at the very sight of her.


    This...this intense joy of grasping the lives of enemies within her hands was intoxicating!


    Uzzah let out an unrestrainedugh and immediately fell silent. A chilling and cruel smile appeared on her face formed of ck smoke as she extended her right hand at the escaping elves.


    At that moment, the faster elves were already a kilometer away, while the slowest still had seven to eight hundred meters of distance between themselves and Uzzah. However, this distance was no obstacle in the eyes of Fourth Grade adepts!


    An odd sizzling sound rang out in the air.


    A massive ck phantom hand suddenly appeared behind the fleeing elves and caught five of them in a single swipe.


    Four of these elves were Second Grade, while one of them was Third Grade!


    The elves that were usually known as top-tier powerhouses on Garan had now be sheep to the ughter. It didn¡¯t matter how they struggled or resisted; they could not break free of the phantom hand or its tremendous pressure.


    As the ghostly ck hand clenched tight, a shocking blood mist spurted out from its palm. All the elves had been crushed into meat paste, and their bones snapped and cracked from the pressure.


    Blood, limbs, and pieces of flesh rained down from the sky.


    The mad Uzzah opened her ghostly right hand and revealed the unrecognizable mess of flesh.


    Blood, bones, limbs, and weapons had all been forcefully crushed by her terrifying strength and squashed into one entity.


    At this moment, the five elves had utterly assimted with each other. There was no longer any distinction!


    The other elves watched this tragedy unfold with wide open eyes, but only a surge of helplessness rose from the depths of their hearts.


    Low-grade creatures could not fend off a Fourth Grade powerhouse that stood at the very peak of the ne. Even the Third Grade elves could only flee helplessly.


    The difference between the strong and the weak, and the living and the dead, was simply thisrge. It was so vast that it was difficult topensate for the difference with numbers or technique!


    "This is not your power!" Even though the Fourth Grade Sword Saint had just witnessed a terrifying scene ur before him, he had managed to see the truth because of it, "You borrowed this power."


    The towering Uzzah made of ck smoke let out a wildugh.


    "I couldn¡¯t fool you in the end, but so what if you saw through my power? The power of a Fourth Grade is still the power of a Fourth Grade, even if it is a borrowed power!"


    As Uzzah cackled wildly, she waved the staff in her left hand, and thousands of dark spears manifested in the air before firing toward the Fourth Grade Storm Saint. Meanwhile, she unclenched her right fist and controlled the giant ghost hand to m toward the remaining elves.


    All those elves were a kilometer away from her by now. Sadly, when the ghost hand descended their usually light and agile bodies became iparably burdened and heavy. Their movements were as slow as statues carved from mud, rendering them only capable of crawling forward withically slow movements.


    All the elves lifted their heads in terror and looked at the terrifying ghost hand that had enveloped the entire sky.


    Despair and fear filled their faces. Unfortunately for them, they couldn¡¯t evenplete such a simple act of changing expressions.


    Yet, at this moment of life and death, a blinding gold light that transcended time and space erupted at the center of the ghost hand, instantly slicing it into five distinct pieces.


    That overwhelming aura crumbled with the destruction of the hand.


    The unexpected joy of surviving appeared on the faces of the elves that had escaped the grasp of the hand. However, they couldn¡¯t even muster the courage to turn back and look. The elves could only continue fleeing into the distance


    Aaaaaah!


    A thousand meters away, Uzzah abruptly clutched her right hand and let out a scream of agony.


    No one knew when, but crisscrossing golden lines had appeared on her hand of smoke and mist, stirring and disturbing the form of her right hand into chaotic ck smoke.


    The Fourth Grade Sword Saint across her nonchntly sheathed his sword and stared at Uzzah chillingly.


    "Only a mere fake Fourth Grade only. Did you think you could fight with a true Fourth Grade with borrowed power? Today, let me show you how true Fourth Grades fight!"


    The next second, the elven Sword Saint vanished from his original spot three hundred meters away.


    The wounded Uzzah felt rms go off in her mind. She couldn¡¯t care about treating her wounded right hand and quickly drew a line around herself with the staff in her left hand. A thin Dark Barrier silently rose around her.


    This Dark Barrier appeared at just the right time!


    Almost at the same moment that the barrier arose, hundreds of deep de marks had been imprinted upon it.


    Without the protection of the Dark Barrier, Uzzah would probably have been sliced into pieces by the elven Sword Saint at this moment!


    It had been 1300 points!


    It was hard to capture every single attack of the Fourth Grade Elven Sword Saint Agassi, but the might of each attack was not insignificant. One thousand, three hundred points; an attack of this level was enough to split a Second Grade adept in half even if they had defenses activated.


    The adept probably wouldn¡¯t even have the chance to react or dodge.


    Agassi silently appeared opposite Uzzah and the two locked eyes through this thin barrier.


    Agassi coldly regarded Uzzah, then assessed this barrier made of highly concentrated shadow substance before shifting his gaze to the flying ship beneath the witch.


    His sensitive instincts were giving him a very clear feeling!


    This mysterious power of darkness did not belong to this Dark Witch but came from the metal ship below. The metal ship that had wobbled as itnded in front of the dragon¡¯s den was like a furnace of magical energy, constantly pumping power into the witch¡¯s body.


    It was the sustenance from the flying ship¡¯s energy that allowed this Dark Witch to maintain astounding strength that reached the level of a Fourth Grade.


    That said, this was borrowed power after all; it did not belong to her. That was why Uzzah¡¯s actions seemed so stiff and dyed when she struck. Otherwise, a single strike from a Fourth Grade should have exterminated the majority of the two dozen Second and Third Grade elves. The situation would never have been as challenging to deal with as she made it seem.


    Could there be an adept¡¯s tower hidden within this metal ship?


    Agassi couldn¡¯t help but make guesses of his own.


    It wasn¡¯t the first or second time the elves had shed with the witches. Naturally, after such a long period of fighting with each other, they had gained some understanding of their opponent¡¯s battle methods.


    The strongest trick that the witches used to protect themselves was probably the adept¡¯s tower!


    There weren¡¯t very many Fourth Grade powerhouses in Faen ne, but they would have no problem gathering a group of ten. Meanwhile, the Fourth Grade witches that the Pale Witches sent over were only two or three individuals. The difference between the highest level ofbat force was so immense, yet the natives of Faen had not been able to expel the witches from the ne. The main reason for this was the effect of the adept¡¯s tower.


    The protection and enhancement provided by the adept¡¯s towers allowed every single witch to disy superhuman strength two to three times more than their original. That was why the continuous assault of numerous Faen powerhouses had failed to remove the witches from Shadow Ind which was guarded by an adept¡¯s tower.


    That was why the powerhouses had decided to defend their ownnds instead, preferring to endure the constant harassment of the witches instead of assaulting that impregnable ind.


    However, through the enhancement of a mysterious power, a Dark Witch that clearly only had Third Grade powers had nowe into possession of strength resembling a Fourth Grade. Could the adepts achieve this effect with any other ability apart from an adept¡¯s tower?


    Uzzah took advantage of the barrier¡¯s protection and quickly mended her wound. She couldn¡¯t help but coldly cackle when she saw the Sword Saint looking at the flying ship below, "So what if you figured it out? You will have to get past me if you want to wreck the ship!"


    Having said that, Uzzah waved her staff as yet another thousand dark spears sted at the Sword Saint.


    Agassi used Windwalking and rapidly weaved around Uzzah, dodging her storm of dark spells while gathering strength and shing at the barrier.


    Due to his exceedingly fast moves, the second de mark would be imprinted on the barrier before the first had even faded. The Dark Barrier couldn¡¯t possibly endure such concentrated and pointed attacks, regardless of how tough it was. With a crisp cracking sound, the barrier protecting Uzzah finally copsed!


    Naturally, Agassi would not give up such an opportunity inbat. He stepped back and instantly appeared at Uzzah¡¯s side.


    Just as he prepared to use his rapid array of des to slice and dice the enemy, an instinct for death that emerged from the depths of his soul silently crept across his body.


    Agassi had always valued his instincts and didn¡¯t dare to hesitate. He quickly turned and dodged a hundred meters away in a single instant. It wasn¡¯t the teleportation or flickering abilities of the spellcasters. It was merely an illusion created when an individual moved at extreme speeds.


    The next second, arge cloud of shadow substance that emerged from Uzzah¡¯s bodypletely enveloped an area of a hundred meters around her. Agassi would not have escaped the corruption and assimtion of this shadow substance if he had been caught in the attack.


    The Sword Saint turned back in terror, for he felt a despairing lethality from these shadows.


    Seven thousand, five hundred and twenty-eight points!

 Chapter 705 Fighting Against Fate

    The battle between the two Fourth Grades was still ongoing.


    Meanwhile, everyone inside the flying ship below Uzzah was wholly upied.


    All the metal cabins in the ship had their walls taken down so that their rooms could be joined together. All unnecessary facilities had also been removed. The inside of the cabin was carved and inscribed full of profound runes that glowed with blinding light when magical energy coursed through them.


    Several thick metal pipes filled the cabin, guiding the magical energy from the space furnace to every part of the massive ship.


    Due to the crude workmanship caused by the impromptu modifications, magical energy of shocking intensity would asionally leak out of where the pipes connected. Every time this happened, the goblin engineers would start yelling andmanding the repair robots to go weld the pipes again.


    Even though there were a dozen goblin engineers, three dozen goblin technicians, and over a hundred construction robots constantly maintaining the system, the magical energy leaking from the pipes had still reached a terrifying degree.


    The excessively concentrated magical energy had formed horrifying death zones in some regions of the ship. Any ordinary goblin that got close to these zones could be instantly killed.


    As such, these areas could only be left to the adepts who had extremely high magical resistance and powerful defensive magic!


    The flying ship had already lost its ability to take to the skies. All ¡¯unnecessary¡¯ and ¡¯ineffective¡¯ facilities had been taken apart and transformed into metal pipes used to transport the magical energy from the furnace. The flying ship had also turned, in the blink of an eye, from the flying transport of the adepts to a temporary adept¡¯s tower.


    What was an adept¡¯s tower?


    It was no more than a unique magical facility used to aid the day-to-day activities of the adepts along with bolstering theirbat power!


    The most important part about constructing an adept¡¯s tower was creating the source of magical energy.


    Most of the power in ordinary adept towers came from the elemental altars taking in energy from the outside world.


    The flying ship had no such altar, but the space furnace fitted in its core could be the power source of an adept¡¯s tower with the simplest of modifications. Moreover, the power from the furnace was more ferocious and violent than that from an altar.


    The flying ship had been undergoing this structural modification during the extended downtime they had spent on the isted ind. It would not be able to fly under its own power once itnded at the dragon¡¯s den.


    However, the immense source of energy, paired together with the variety of arrays carved onto the walls of the cabin, had sessfully turned the flying ship into a temporary adept¡¯s tower.


    It didn¡¯t have durable walls made of excellent materials as its medium. As such, it used the thick metal hull of the ship. It had no runic circuits across the body of the tower to function as paths of energy transfer, so it used the crude metal pipes as a substitute. It had no mysterious tower spirit to organize and manage the chaos; Greem unhesitatingly stood forth and took the ce of one, taking on the role of a central control crystal.


    With the addition of defensive and offensive arrays all over the ship, they had constructed an adept¡¯s tower system that was immensely wed but barely functional.


    Moreover, under Greem¡¯s careful and detailedmands, the entirety of the ship¡¯s resources and workforce were being utilized in the most logical fashion possible, turning into the most powerful support for Uzzah as she fought!


    However, as the battle between Uzzah and the Fourth Grade elven Sword Saint intensified, this simplified tower system was starting to endure increasingly frightening energy bacsh.


    Every single mighty sh between the two Fourth Grades could trigger partial energy countercurrents in the pipes. These ordinary metals couldn¡¯t endure the corrosion and impact of such fearsome magical energies. Large numbers of leaks were starting to appear all over the ship.


    Continuous energy explosions rang out from the insides of the ship. The harsh environments instantly killed nearly half of the goblins within the vessel. The remaining goblin engineers and technicians could only hide within the magical golems to survive within these areas.


    Greem had to split his attention to direct the construction machines, welding and sealing the increasing leaks on the metal pipes even as he carefully managed the energy system of the ¡¯adept¡¯s tower¡¯ to provide Uzzah with the maximum support he was capable of.


    The metal pipes that had been distorted by the explosion, and that had lost their reparation value, could only be substituted with another temporary pipe that had been constructed on the spot.


    As the battle continued, such improvisations and modified pipes started to increase in number, and the efficiency of the energy system in conducting magical energy began to decrease. In the end, some areas with severe leaks had be so terrifying that even low-grade adepts didn¡¯t dare enter them.


    Even they would have a pretty high chance of dying if they were to enter these areas.


    ............


    The explosions outside asionally spread into the corridors of the dragon¡¯s den.


    The mountain where the den was located would also tremble every so often, sending dust and pebbles down from above. The corridors were filled with the musty smell of earth and stone.


    All the magical traps had been swept away already.


    The weakened Alice had barely managed to enter the den while leaning upon the shoulders of the other Fate Witches.


    In all honesty, the hall in which the dragons slept and rested would have been as crude and ugly as the dens of ogres were they not decorated with shiny coins and gemstones.


    Broken stgmites and ck stone walls could be seen everywhere in the abnormallyrge and spacious hall. But strangely enough, no bugs, moss, or lichen could be found. The floor of the room was piled full of shining gold coins, along with assorted gemstones, weapons, armor, and magical equipment.


    All the witches and adepts that entered the den were stunned by this brilliant sight. Their breaths halted for a moment as they were overwhelmed with excitement. As noble adepts that stood above all worldly power, every single one of them had no doubt once gathered a shocking amount of wealth and resources. However, all that wealth was nothingpared to the scene before their eyes.


    That pile of gold coins that rested several meters tall, enough to bury a strong adolescent male beneath.


    Therge magical gemstones that were hidden within the gold coins that steadily glowed with magical light.


    The shining magical longswords and fancy armor, each with their own unique designs and borate worksmanship.


    Even though dragons could not equip most of the magical items and weapons here due to their the size, this did not stop the passion of a dragon to hoard all the wealth and treasures in the world.


    nted at the top of this eye-catching and blinding pile of treasure was a magical staff of unique design glowing with prismatic light. The elementium rainbows created by the waves of magical aura were visible to the naked eye.


    Even with her usualposure, Alice could not help but start breathing in short bursts at this moment.


    Alice appeared to be so weak and old at this moment. Not only had all her hair turned silver-white, but her formerly smooth face and skin had also be wrinkled. Alice, who wasn¡¯t even a hundred yet, should be at the peak of her life; her appearance was that of an olddy at the end of her life.


    If she were to stand at Endor¡¯s side, outsiders would only treat them as a pair of old sisters. Who could know that they were blood rtives separated by five generations?


    With the methods avable to the adepts, they could modify their body and looks through the use of magic, keeping themselves at their peak appearance as long as they weren¡¯t in thest vestiges of their life. It was only when their lives reached their end that their bodies would start to betray signs of old age due to the weakening of the soul and the fading of their magical powers.


    A Fate Witch like Alice was a strange case. The magical power in her body pulsed with the strength of unrelenting waves, and her soul was potent and vigorous, yet only the life force within her flickered like an evening candlelight at risk of being extinguished at any moment.


    It was this massiveck of life force that caused her soul to be incapable of getting the nutrition it required, thereby causing her soul to shrivel and dim.


    The adepts might have thousands and hundreds of ways to obtain life force, but they would not help someone like Alice who had her life force devoured by Fate¡¯s bacsh.


    Fate was always fair!


    It would take from you the most precious pieces of your life depending on how much you took from it.


    During thest trip to the underground world, Alice¡¯s life force had decreased by forty years just to divine the mysterious item for that otherworldly existence. If she couldn¡¯t advance sessfully this time, she would only have a month left to live!


    Thus, Alice¡¯s excitement in seeing the Staff of Divination that could keep her alive was not something that outsiders could easily hope toprehend.


    "All of you, exit the hall now!" Alice barely stabilized herself in front of the pile of gemstones and nonchntly spoke without turning her head, "Tell Greem to give me another two hours! If I don¡¯te out in two hours...have him escape on his own!"


    The Fate Witches beside her nodded in unison before bowing and exiting the hall. Endor sighed before retreating along with the rest.


    Berserk Witch Sofia and Icdy Snowlotus looked at each other at the entrance to the hall. They chose to guard the spot without another word.


    The only remaining newly advanced witch turned to leave with a sorrowful expression. She ran to pass on thest message from her leader.


    Poison Hag Endor paced about the entrance worriedly. Just then, the mountain trembled once more. The ceiling of the corridor they were in dropped even more dust and stone to the ground.


    "No, I cannot just wait here. The two of you guard this ce well. Don¡¯t let anyone interrupt Alice. I will go back up to help!" After leaving behind some simple instructions, Endor left the dragon¡¯s den. Her entire being boiled with a murderous aura.


    Sofia and Snowlotus had both been revived by Alice through the powers of Fate after she had advanced to be the Witch of Fate. As such, their souls were bound tightly with Alice¡¯s own.


    If Alice died, they died!


    If Alice advanced, then their powers would improve significantly as well. It would greatly benefit their own strength!


    That was why they couldn¡¯t help but be frustrated during this crucial moment in Fate.


    "Snowlotus, do you think Alice can advance?" The uncouth Sofia couldn¡¯t help but lower her voice and ask in her frustration.


    "A chance is always a chance!" Snowlotus calmly replied, "The powers of Fate can only point out the thread to allow one to escape death. However, whether one can grasp that thread and escape from the predicament depends entirely on their strength and luck. That is why there is nothing we can do to help her now. The only thing we can do is to pray for her and hope that she has good fortune."


    Then, a deste sigh echoed within this spacious and silent space.

 Chapter 706 A Falling Out In The Dragonfligh

    t


    Garan Continent. The Central Mountains.


    Dragoncliff.


    As the center of the entirety of Garan, the Dragoncliff was undoubtedly isted from the rest of the world!


    Even when curious elves wanted to find the Dragoncliff, they would first have to traverse countless mountains and hills and pass through the territories and dens of many powerful magical beasts. That was why the existence of the Dragoncliff was only a beautiful legend in the hearts of most elves. Most of them had no chance ofying eyes upon it.


    Naturally, the powerful military might of the Dragoncliff meant that they did not require the protection of the elves. A such, when Thunder Dragon Arms red his broad wings and soared toward the Dragoncliff, he immediately incitedmotion and chaos among the dragon flight.


    The so-called Dragoncliff was just the massive caves that had been excavated into the towering cliffs.


    As gregarious forest dragons, the green dragons liked to ce their den in towering cliffs located in the center of vast forests. This way, they could prevent thieves and burrs from setting their sights on their hoard while also providing the flight with plenty of quality food.


    The forest dragonsprising the green and emerald dragons could be considered the only dragon tribes in the entirety of the Faen ne. Apart from that, multi-headed lizards and serpents also lived within some damp and dark swamps. These creatures also possessed some degree of dragon bloodline.


    Sadly, serpents like these, with their inferior intelligence and beast-like behavior, would never be acknowledged by the dragons as their kind!


    That was why the dragons, so used to seeing green and emerald scales, could not suppress their excitement when they saw a different Third Grade dragon covered in blue scales. The dragons all emerged from their dens.


    For a moment, ferocious soaring dragons filled the surroundings of the towering Dragoncliff!


    Themotion at the Dragoncliff quickly alerted the emerald dragons staying in the upper half of the cliff.


    Several long dragon roars rang out as five mighty and muscr emerald dragons dove down from the cloudyer. They spread out their wings and firmlynded in front of Thunder Dragon Arms.


    Two Fourth Grades, a Third Grade, two Second Grades...


    Arms looked around and immediately figured out the strength of the opponent.


    The few emerald dragons were shocked to see a dragon of a different kind, but they also put on an expression of caution.


    "Tell us your name, friend from foreignnds!"


    The leading Fourth Grade emerald dragon might have a higher grade than Thunder Dragon Arms, but it rarely saw a dragon of a different kind on this isted ne. Even it couldn¡¯t help but be curious.


    "I, Thunder Dragon Arms, am a Third Grade Dragon Lord from the Lance ne! A while ago I heard that there werepanions of ours in this rural ce that had been lost beyond the glorious light of our great Dragon God. As such, I have particrly hurried here to guide you back to His embrace."


    No one knew whether it was intentional, but Thunder Dragon Arms¡¯ voice had been raised to a deafening volume.


    Moreover, his reply echoed and lingered in the air under the effect of sound magnification magic.


    The faces of the two Fourth Grade emerald dragons tremendously changed when they heard the thunder dragon¡¯s words. They betrayed an expression of shock and solemnness in theirrge amber eyes.


    Dragon God.


    Every dragon felt a different way toward this mystery-filled word.


    From the standpoint of their origins, all nar dragons were the citizens and descendants of the Great Dragon God.


    However, the ability to bask in the glory of the Great Dragon God wasn¡¯t all that important for some dragon tribes that could live a life of leisure and luxury within isted nes! In fact, some odd and alternative dragon tribes actively turned their backs on the Great Dragon God for all sorts of reasons. They chose to join the ranks of other powerful evil dragons or otherworldly powerhouses.


    For example, the forest dragons of the Faen ne enjoyed their carefree life in Garan where they had no natural predators. They chose to ally themselves with the forest elves and enjoy their offerings and care. These quiet days brought them much happiness!


    In truth, under such circumstances, the emerald dragons were not that interested in the distant and mysterious Dragon God.


    The forest dragons had lived in peace all these years.


    Now, a messenger of the Dragon God had suddenly appeared. It was clearly beyond the expectations of the emerald and green dragons; they were stunned. They had no idea how to deal with this uncouth and uninvited guest.


    Just then, wild winds blew as two dragons also descended upon the cliff, one after the other.


    It was Third Grade Emerald Dragon Iritina and Second Grade Green Dragon Ohgu.


    In all honesty, the sudden sight of a young dragon of a different kind was a shocking experience, be it for Thunder Dragon Arms or Emerald Dragon Iritina.


    Iritina was surprised because she hadn¡¯t thought that there were dragons in the world apart from the emerald and green dragons. Meanwhile, Thunder Dragon Arms was purely surprised that such a pretty and seductive female dragon could exist amongst such a ¡¯backwater¡¯ dragon tribe.


    Both dragons locked eyes upon first sight and never broke eye contact. Their eyes were filled with not only shock and admiration but also a rare trace of wild amazement.


    It was apparent that both dragons were extremely impressed with each other.


    If there hadn¡¯t been so many dragons on the scene, then the two of them would probably have gotten together and started flirting!


    For the remaining half of the day, the emerald dragons tried their best to invite Arms up to the upperyer of the cliff to be their guest in hopes of keeping him away from the younger dragons of the tribe.


    However, the experienced Thunder Dragon Arms would never fall for such a trick. Instead, he patted his chest and started boasting about his exploits and adventures before Iritina, exaggerating every detail and blowing them up to ten times their original numbers. Arms even began to praise the beautiful and vast ne of Lance in order to conquer this cute female dragon.


    A ne ruled entirely by dragons.


    And where every dragon was a lord of the ne, where every dragon ruled over vastnds, and where every dragon could do whatever they wished with anything they wanted in their territories.


    Such amazing things could happen to dragons as well?


    From now on, they would no longer need to toil and hunt in the Fantasy Forest. From now on, they no longer had to run around and work to collect wealth and gemstones.


    All of these tasks would be delegated to the dragonborn servants. All they needed to do was snore and sleep. They would be able to feast as they wished when they woke upter, then take the time to enjoy the ¡¯exotic beauties¡¯ offered up by their subjects.


    Such a leisurely life might have appeared in the dreams of the Faen dragons countless times, but in reality, they were only ordinary members of the forest dragons. They still needed to sharpen their fangs continually and hone their hunting techniques, then use their hard work to exchange for ¡¯meager¡¯ rewards from the forest elves.


    Comparison only served to infuriate!


    All the young emerald and green dragons couldn¡¯t help but start dreaming of life in Lance when they heard Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms proudly describe each and every scene of his daily life.


    The older dragons might have some desires for such a world, but they had experienced all sorts of things throughout their lives. They were somewhat doubtful of the words that came out of the mouth of this fellow that had appeared out of nowhere.


    If Lance was truly as amazing as he described, wouldn¡¯t it be alright for him to hole up in there and enjoy his life? For what purpose had he traveled tens of thousands of kilometers and passed through a nar barrier just toe here to Faen?


    As for the glorious light of the Great Dragon God that Arms kept mentioning? The elder dragons didn¡¯t believe a single word of it.


    The Dragon God was indeed a great existence!


    It was the existence of the Dragon God that had allowed the dragons to be a dominant species that no one dared to trifle with.


    Yet, as small dragons of a rural ne, the absence or presence of the Dragon God¡¯s light represented no difference to their lives. Why should they trouble themselves under such circumstances to pursue some radiance of the Dragon God?


    Still, such narrow and limited thinking was fated never to be openly expressed to the rest of the tribe.


    That was why the two Fourth Grade emerald dragons could not publicly expel the Third Grade thunder dragon, despite their overwhelming superiority in strength.


    It had been only a brief moment, but the Third Grade thunder dragon had already roused the spirits and ambitions of many of the young green dragons. His proposition also moved several of the young emerald dragons.


    In the end, Arms took out his trump card¨C the Dragon¡¯s Pact written full of the cursed vows of the dragons.


    Though these green dragons weren¡¯t of the same line as the green dragons that had written the Dragon¡¯s Pact, the green dragon¡¯s aura within the pact was the same. With this pact¨Cthat could well be said to be an ace in the hole¨Crevealed, the Third Grade thunder dragon decided to just publicly recruit volunteers and mercenaries that were willing to return to Lance along with him.


    The price of recruitment that Arms offered was so generous that several of the emerald dragons were eager to go as well.


    At this point, the Fourth Grade emerald dragons had no choice but to furiously expel the thunder dragon, even at risk of ruining their friendly rtions. What the tribe leader of the emerald dragons never expected was the immense falling out that this Third Grade thunder dragon would cause.


    With Third Grade Emerald Dragon Iritina in the lead, eleven other dragons requested permission to leave for the wondrous ne of Lance along with the thunder dragon. Included among them was the Second Grade Green Dragon Ohgu.


    Eleven dragons. This...this included almost one-third of all of the forest dragons on Faen.


    The Fourth Grade emerald dragon tribe leader immediately flew into a rage. He was prepared to use martial prowess to chase away the thunder dragon and suppress the disagreement within the tribe. However, incited dragon hearts were not that easy to soothe.


    After a brief sh, Third Grade thunder dragon escaped the dragoncliff, wounded and injured. A sizeable flight of young dragons packed their belongings and took their hoards with them as they left after the thunder dragon.


    An unbelievable split had appeared within the forest dragons of Faen!

 Chapter 707 The Decisive Battle

    The battle above the dragon¡¯s den was still ongoing.


    Magic power, life force, stamina: these prior limitations that held back low-grade fighters were no longer of any concern to Fourth Grade powerhouses.


    A Fourth Grade Elven Sword Saint had essentially two avenues of development for their ss.


    One was to sacrifice all of their magic power, life, stamina, and Spirit to pursue the path of iparable damage and lethality¨C the way of the Boundless Sword Emperor. The other was to convert all of one¡¯s power into extreme speed¨C the path of the Storm Sword Saint.


    Agassi was undoubtedly walking upon thetter path!


    The offensive power of Agassi¡¯s every individual attack was not very impressive. It barely passed the threshold of a thousand points. However, the terror of Agassi was in his extreme speed and phantasmal Windwalking.


    The sh of lightning when he struck with his sword was usually only an afterimage in the eyes of the enemy. In truth, any single attack of his was abination of dozens or even hundreds of attacks. It didn¡¯t matter how tough the armor or the defensive magic was; everything would silently shatter beneath such insane umtion of the critical damage.


    His movements were as light and agile as a dancer, allowing him to casually advance and retreat in the face of ferocious attacks and exterminating an enemy with a flick of his finger.


    No amount of exquisite poetry could describe the strength of a Fourth Grade Storm Sword Saint. That said, he possessed no way to execute this clumsy and slow fake Fourth Grade caster!


    This evil witchposed of ck smoke was like an undying cockroach. Not only were her evil spellsplicated to deal with, but even that ck smoke body of hers also seemed impervious to any attacks.


    The energy-state shadow body had no lethal spots or weakness like typical living creatures!


    Dark Witch Uzzah took advantage of her vastly superior offensive magic power and demonstrated to this speedy Sword Saint the overwhelming might of a caster.


    With the constant injection of magical energy from below her, Uzzah didn¡¯t need to be concerned about her magical power being exhausted. As such, she frequently fired ultrarge-radius dark magic in hopes of stalling the enemy¡¯s movements.


    Storm Sword Saint Agassi¡¯s movements were swift as the wind, allowing him to weave between gaps as thin as paper freely. Yet, when faced with such a tide of assaulting darkness that spread out in every direction, he had no choice but to retreat reluctantly.


    It was the chance for Uzzah to frantically repair her body or replenish her defensive spells whenever the Sword Saint was forced away. At any rate, Uzzah had plenty of magical energy to spare. As they say, the son feels no heartache selling his father¡¯s fields, and Uzzah was using magic as often as she could.


    Her unrestrained and wild attacks had rained down disaster on the Fantasy Forest around the dragon¡¯s den!


    Tides of shadow substance converted the green and leafy forest into a region of phantoms and ghosts. Even though it was a sunny afternoon, all light within three kilometers of the den had vanished. Everything was cloaked in a gray mist.


    The sky was gray, thend was gray, everything was gray.


    If one were to look into the distance in this odd and terrifying gray mist, they would find that the shape of the world still existed. The only difference was that all solid objects had turned from their original vibrant color into uneven patches of gray. It was almost as if a powerful god had suddenly taken away tone from this world, leaving only the most fundamental...gray!


    Ordinary individuals might not understand what this scenery meant.


    However, Agassi knew!


    The dark witch that was recklessly unleashing evil power onto thend had used her own body as a medium to open a rift that led to the Shadow ne. The three kilometers of strange meteorological phenomenon around her was an odd urrence caused by the power of the Shadow ne being projected onto Faen.


    The Shadow ne was a particr ne formed entirely out of shadow substance, and a ce that had connections to almost every single material ne.


    As apletely openrge-sized ne, the Shadow ne had never rejected visits from outsiders. It wasn¡¯t like ordinary material nes and did not have imprable nar barriers that rejected the visiting and connection of all non-natives. It didn¡¯t use such a method to protect its own nar consciousness.


    The Shadow World was like a free territory that connected all nes. Any individual that mastered the powers of the shadows could rely on the Shadow ne to freely travel between two different nes. Of course, the prerequisite to that was that the two nes would not block the individuals from entering.


    The Shadow World was extremely generous to maniptors of shadow. As such, the ne itself became a massive weapon in the hands of such practitioners. They only needed to open up a rift that led straight to the Shadow ne during battle, and they would be able to continually use the power projected by the Shadow World to corrupt the surrounding nar space.


    The corrupted nar space would be rapidly assimted into nd space that consisted only of shadow energy.


    This way, the enemy would have no choice but to fight within the shadow home field!


    In the end, Uzzah herself was only a Third Grade Dark Witch. She also only had Third Grade magical equipment in her possession¨C the Orb of Darkness. The limit of the shadow space that she could erect was no more than three kilometers. She couldn¡¯t expand her zone of darkness beyond this.


    Still, this was more than enough already!


    The Storm Sword Saint Agassi would have to enter this dark and lightless shadow space if he wanted to attack Uzzah¡¯s shadow body. Uzzah could rely on her affinity with shadow energy to correctly grasp Agassi¡¯s real-time physical location.


    That way she would be able to use ultra-long-range energy attacks to force the enemy to move around and dodge, even when he wasn¡¯t within her range of vision. Uzzah was like a horrifying poison spider hiding underyers of spider webs. She quietly and patiently waited for the enemy to fall into her webs.


    Uzzah had never felt as rxed and free as at this moment!


    It was an overbearing might that only Fourth Grade elites could manipte and control. It was also a feeling of extreme strength that only Fourth Grade powerhouses could experience. Yet, as a Third Grade Dark Witch, she had managed to experience this feeling in a different world with the help of a crude energy funneling system.


    Such a rare experience and feeling hadpletely intoxicated Uzzah. She wanted nothing more than to make this power truly hers.


    She was like a madman, utterly lost in that extreme experience of wielding ultimate destructive power and savagely attacking that damned gnat leaping about within her shadow space. She fantasized about using her shockingly powerful shadow energy sts to wipe the enemy out of existence entirely.


    Sadly, her control over this extreme power beyond her abilities was not that familiar or natural. The way she was using the force was so unbearably clumsy that proper Fourth Grades wouldn¡¯t be able to stand seeing her fight. If it weren¡¯t for the power injected into her being so suffocatingly immense, she would have had trouble dealing with Agassi¡¯s violent and rapid strikes, even with the support of a tower system.


    After multiple tries, Agassi realized that he could not execute this fake Fourth Grade witch. He turned his attention to the flying ship below.


    Several sharp strikes continued tond upon the thick metal shell of the ship, leaving behind horrifying de marks.


    Uzzah¡¯s defenses could not protect such a massive ship after all. She had to quicken the rate of her attacks, trying to force Agassi to dodge and reduce his attack speed by responding with aggression.


    The shell of the ship was several meters thick and was empowered by an energy forcefield. That might make it an imprable wall for most people, but it was nothing to a Fourth Grade Sword Saint.


    If it weren¡¯t for Uzzah¡¯s interruption, Agassi would have only needed three consecutive strikes to break the ship!


    After an hour of fighting, the battlefield slowly shifted from the vast space outside to the narrow and winding metal corridors within the ship.


    Here, Agassi started to make full use of his phantasmal movements and speed, initiating a deathly battle against the pursuing Uzzah within this narrow space.


    Every single time, Uzzah¡¯s body of shadows would be sliced and diced into tens of thousands of strands of thin shadow energy. A terrifying energy storm would then erupt that was so powerful it could kill an ordinary Fourth Grade.


    Agassi was forced out of the flying ship to avoid these energy storms.


    By the time he changed locations and broke into the ship from another angle, Uzzah would arrive hastily with a new shadow body for another round of blows.


    This tactic was reasonably effective!


    Extending the battlefield to the enemy¡¯s core area was causing a lot of trouble for them. The awkwardly fleeing Agassi wasn¡¯t the one to suffer the most with every energy storm¨C it was the crumbling ship.


    After all, it wasn¡¯t the metal beast that Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe was personally controlling; it couldn¡¯t transform or repair itself at will. Instead, it was an inferior metal fortress that was being supported by the modified energy cirction system and Greem¡¯s Chip. The damage to the energy system within the flying ship increased with each energy storm that exploded.


    The most direct consequence of this was the significant loss of energy that was supposed to be supplied to Uzzah, as well as the reduction of magical power that Uzzah could control!


    Once the energy system inside the ship had suffered over thirty-seven percent damage, the power controlled by Uzzah started to plummet uncontrobly.


    The power bnce that they had barely maintained was slowly slipping towards imbnce!


    Uzzah, Greem, and every adept involved in this operation were helpless in seeing this inevitability.


    After all, the fact that a group of mere Second and Third Grades could even manage to stall a Fourth Grade Elven Sword Saint for so long was already a miracle. Moreover, it wasn¡¯t as if the Fourth Grade Sword Saint had beenpletely unharmed throughout this one and a half hours of fighting.


    The shadow energy everywhere around him was continually assaulting his body.


    Agassi might have relied on his exceptional magic resistance and robust Physique to endure this corrosion, but the shadow powers had left evident marks upon his body.

 Chapter 708 Poisonous Human Ball

    By the time Uzzah¡¯s powers silently fell back to Third Grade, it had only been an hour and forty minutes since the start of the battle.


    At the moment, there were only twenty minutes left in the two hours that Alice had requested.


    Those twenty minutes sounded short, but trying to buy that much time was a bloody and challenging undertaking!


    Uzzah, having regressed to Third Grade, was still as ferocious and violent as before. Sadly her only fate, if she were to confront the Fourth Grade Sword Saint, would be a beheading.


    Three consecutive times, Uzzah had charged forward with her energy form, and each time, her energy form had been exterminated by the Sword Saint the very moment she got close.


    Greem, who was managing things behind the scenes, knew that Uzzah had lost the ability to stall the enemy. Wasting any more energy on her would be pointless.


    After casting a spell and summoning Uzzah back to his side, Greem controlled most of the magical energy and injected it into the magical cannons littered across the cabins.


    The Elven Sword Saint Agassi strode through the distorted metal corridors, sending invisible de strikes into the air with every wave of his sabers. The magical cannons hidden in the corners of the cabins and the end of the corridors were split in half after a single shot. The multitude of defensive power wasn¡¯t able to obstruct the enemy¡¯s advance in the slightest.


    Only those metal magical machines lunging down the corridors with earthshaking steps barely managed to slow down the Sword Saint. That said, these machines that weighed eight tons and went up to four meters tall could hardly endure more than half a second in front of the Sword Saint. They were then split into many parts and mechanical shards by several rapid slices.


    Greem had no choice but to inject the following magical machines with excessive magical energy, in hopes that the energy explosions during their death might create some degree of trouble for the enemy!


    Sadly, after half a year of constant and intense battle, the magical machines remaining in the flying ship were far too few. Even with Greem personally controlling every machine on a suicide mission against the Sword Saint, he had great trouble slowing down the Sword Saint¡¯s progress. In the end, Greem even decided to perform simple repairs on the engineering machines and send them to the battlefield as well.


    Greem had even thought of copsing and sealing the corridors to stop the Sword Saint¡¯s progress. However, the half-meter thick metal walls were as soft as cheese beneath the elf¡¯s snow-white shes. The elven Sword Saint decided to give up on the existing metal corridors and instead started to cut a path forward with his sabers. He shed at the metal walls along his way and moved toward the core of the ship in a straight line.


    At this point, Greem had already sent out all the cannon fodder he could field. Still, he had only managed to buy seven minutes.


    There were still thirteen minutes left. What was he supposed to use to buy more time?


    The cannon fodder had all died. Was he...was he supposed to send the adepts to their deaths?


    "I¡¯ll go!" The usually quiet Dragonborn Zacha was the first to step forward.


    One had to admit that the dragonborn were moving and loyal individuals once they had recognized a person as their leader. In the past, Zacha held no resentment for Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms, even when his master almost wholly devoured him.


    Ever since Arms had transferred his soul contract to Greem, the subject of his loyalty had be this male adept from the World of Adepts.


    Yet, none of these things had stopped him or his loyalty!


    Apart from Mary and Alice, the only person that Greem couldpletely trust was this blindly loyal Second Grade dragonborn. That was why Greem hesitated when he saw Zacha volunteering for this task. He couldn¡¯t bear to let a subordinate like this die just like that.


    The adepts on the scene couldn¡¯t help but lower their heads dejectedly when they sensed Greem¡¯s expectant look sweeping over them.


    It was a Fourth Grade Sword Saint!


    Even the robust magical machines had been diced into pieces likemon vegetables. It was impossible for the tough dragon scales and armor of the dragonborn to endure a single strike from the Sword Saint. Thus, it was clear that anyone below Third Grade would instantly die if they were to confront the elf!


    Even Third Grade Uzzah would probably die in a single sh if she were to fight the Sword Saint with her actual body, let alone these meager adepts.


    They couldn¡¯t just ignore the threating at them. If the adepts were to allow the Sword Saint to continue cutting his path toward them, everyone here would not be able to escape death.


    As the atmosphere within the room rose to a tense boiling point, an old and hoarse voice abruptly rang out.


    "None of you need to go. I alone am enough!"


    Everyone raised their heads in surprise, only then realizing that the one to speak was the old, hunchbacked Poison Hag Endor.


    Greem¡¯s furrowed his eyebrows. He intended to reject this offer.


    After all, Endor was one of Alice¡¯s only remaining rtive in this world. If anything were to happen to her, Alice would probably resent herself for the rest of her life!


    Yet, this matter did not allow Greem too much time to hesitate or think. Uzzah was already speaking beside him.


    "I¡¯m in favor of that!" Uzzah looked at Endor solemnly before saying to Greem; "She is prepared to die. Let her go!"


    As a Third Grade witch, Uzzah was wise and knowledgeable enough to instantly recognize that Endor had already ingested excessive amounts of poison. She would not be able to live more than fifteen minutes even if she weren¡¯t sent to her death!


    Greem looked at Endor¡¯s old face that was gradually turning back. He felt an odd weight in his heart and finally, without another word, nodded in agreement.


    "Give this to Billis. He might have a use for it in the future."


    Endor casually threw a knowledge crystal at Greem and started cackling andughing wildly. She leaned against a staff that was almost twice her height and dove head first into one of the metal corridors, the metal floor nging with every step she took.


    Endor quickly advanced through the metal corridor, casting away her staff while madly swallowing the color contents of the various jars and bottles she had at her waist.


    Her left hand pulled out the cork from a small gourd, and she took out apletely ck centipede-like insect from within. She stuffed the insect into her mouth and started chewing with all her strength. ck and pungent insect blood seeped out of the gaps in her teeth, mixing with her own blood that was flowing from the cuts from the insect shells. Endor¡¯s appearance became increasingly haunting and horrifying.


    That was only a start!


    Endor stumbled forward, continuously stuffing and downing all sorts of scary bugs and strange potions.


    They all had different effects, but the changes they were causing in Endor was the same.


    Endor was swelling.


    The formerly 1.6 meters tall and 35-kilogram heavy witch had now turned purple. Her body was also rapidly swelling in size, like a ballon being pumped full of air.


    Endor¡¯s initially small body seemed as if it had been injected with too much gas, swelling up to two, three, four, and even five times the original size; she was just swelling like that. Her wrinkled skin was pulled so taut that it was almost translucent. If one were to stand in front of Endor at this moment, they would vaguely be able to see the roiling and viscous liquids within her.


    A yellow-green smoke trailed behind Endor¡¯s ugly and bloated body, clinging to the corridors and letting out an unbearable sizzling sound.


    The surfaces of the metal corridor where Endor¡¯s body passed by were filled with pockmarks and craters from the corrosion of the acid. The half-molten metal ceiling turned into ck metal liquid and started to drip from above like molten wax.


    For a moment, the entire metal corridor seemed like it was melting!


    ............


    Agassi was walking between the metal corridors with a livid expression.


    The elven sabers in his hand danced about, deflecting the energysers shooting out from everywhere. At this point, he no longer cared for exterminating this non-lethal ¡¯ trash.¡¯ He focused on searching for the enemy¡¯s tracks.


    He sawpletely metal corridors, a spacious central hall, a smallb filled with mysterious apparatuses, and several tiny metal cabins whose purpose was unknown to him.


    As Agassi walked through this world of metal and endured the unceasing storm ofsers, his fury and anxiety grew by the minute.


    What was it that these enemies were trying to achieve?


    He couldn¡¯t understand their purpose, nor could he even attempt to guess at it!


    He was here merely by amand that had been given to him under the joint orders of the elven court and the elven temples. He was to lead a group of elves to utterly exterminate this group of evil witches that had been causing chaos within Garan.


    In truth, Agassi had been unconcerned when he first got news of his assignment.


    The enemy didn¡¯t even have a Fourth Grade among their ranks, yet they dared stir trouble within Garan, a continent protected by a pantheon of gods?


    That was why he had confidently promised the elven court that he would achieve his mission before he set out.


    Yet, in the previous encounter, he had been forcefully denied entry into the ship for an entire hour by a fake Fourth Grade propped up by a strange spell. Meanwhile, the squad he led had suffered decent losses. It was undoubtedly a terrible blow to his reputation and renown!


    Agassi stormed through the twisted metal corridors, his heart fuming with anger and frustration. Initially, he had still been trying his best to find the passages that led downward. In the end, he could no longer hold back his frustration and decided to slice his way through the metal walls and proceed to the bottom of the ship.


    Another snow-white de shed across...


    He instantly opened a gaprge enough for him to pass through in the metal wall before him. He quickly lifted his leg and strode across.


    Agassi swept across this thirty-meter long metal corridor with his sharp eyes. He didn¡¯t try moving to either side and instead walked to the metal wall at the other end intending to continue cutting through the walls.


    However, the moment he lifted his saber, Agassi paused in his tracks and turned his head to look into the darkness of the corridor.


    A strange creature emanating a pungent odor was howling and slowly shambling toward him from the darkness.


    The fetid odor spread throughout the corridor as a wind blew by. Despite his magic resistance, even Agassi couldn¡¯t help but feel dizzy when he inhaled the smell.


    However, this minor difort vanished without a trace under the effects of his powerful inner power!


    Just a poison creature sent to block the road; the enemy only had these tricks up his sleeves.


    Agassi couldn¡¯t be bothered with the creature after he took a single nce.


    How could it possibly catch up to his fast speed with such slow movements?


    Agassi didn¡¯t intend to waste any time on the enemy. He raised his sword and prepared to cut the wall and move forward.


    The very moment his eyes looked away, the bloated figure lunged forward and cried out eerily, "Why don¡¯t you die with me!"


    The next second, the poisonous human ball that had swelled to its limits exploded!

 Chapter 709 A Difficult Choice

    The viscous liquid covered the entire corridor and Agassi¡¯s position was no exception.


    A thinyer of inner power shrouded his body and blocked all of it.


    Agassi was unbelievably furious as he watched the poison slowly drip down from his barrier!


    When had a Fourth Grade been as seemingly worthless as he was now? To think that even a mere First Grade witch dared tosh out at him. Though such ¡¯inferior¡¯ poison could hardly deal any damage to him, the witch¡¯s efforts were an act of immense scorn toward a Fourth Grade powerhouse like himself.


    Poison Hag Endor had, in one go, devoured countless terrifying poisons. She had then proceeded to stimte all of her essence and Spirit, driving them toward self-destruction and amplifying the power of the mixed poison.


    There were two hundred and sixteen points of acid damage along with two hundred and forty-seven points of rot damage!


    The fact that a First Grade witch could unleash such shocking power was beyond expectations.


    Sadly, while such damage might represent a tremendous threat to a Second Grade, against a Fourth Grade, it was no different from a mere bug self-destructing in front of a lion. There was no threat to its life; only, perhaps, being able to make the lion frown at the smell!


    Agassi immediately directed his inner power barrier forward and prepared to advance.


    Awkwardly enough, the barrier trembled but didn¡¯t move.


    That...that slimy poison. Apart from its toxic properties, the liquid had surprising adhesiveness. It had managed to bind Sword Saint Agassi to the spot he currently stood.


    Aaaaahhhhh!


    Agassi was no longer able to contain the fury burning within him. His violent inner power erupted outward, sending countless golden shockwaves rippling away from himself.


    The sturdy metal deck, the sticky poison, the harmful smoke, and the half-corroded metal corridor; absolutely everything had been reduced to nothing during the storm of blinding golden de light in a single instant. No metal could have endured the tens of thousands of high-frequency shes from the Fourth Grade Sword Saint at this moment.


    The Fourth Grade Elven Sword Saint Agassi hovered proudly in the air, both des in hand. No substancerger than a grain of sand remained within a fifty-meter radius of himself.


    The Sword Saint¡¯s berserk strike had created an empty sphere in the center of the flying ship a hundred meters in diameter. A hundred meters away, at the now mirror-smooth edge of the corridor, the cabin was exposed to Agassi, and a corner was shaven away by the wild attack.


    With the obstruction eliminated, the leader of the enemy frantically disappeared down the end of a different corridor.


    Agassi wasn¡¯t in a hurry to pursue him. Instead, he remained still in the air and spent seven seconds to regte his breathing.


    Even Agassi couldn¡¯t unleash such a powerful move easily.


    Once he had restabilized the boiling inner power within his body, Agassi put on a wicked grin and lifted his sabers. He intended to exterminate these evil adepts in one fell swoop.


    Sadly, the enemies were still one step ahead of him!


    Almost at the same moment that he finished regting his condition, the flying ship shuddered. A tremendous surge of wild magical energy flowed across the metal corridors and burst forth from the cracks in the walls. It charged toward Agassi with the force of falling mountains and rippled outward.


    The space furnace had exploded!


    In truth, the self-destruction of the space furnace had always been the strongest ace that Greem held tightly in his hands. However, because the battlefield and the ship itself would be destroyed after the self-destruction, Greem had no choice but to withhold it as hisst option. He was to use it as a means of escape.


    ording to Greem¡¯s original n, the modification of the flying shipbined with Uzzah bought time for Alice to get the Staff of Divination. They would then immediately leave. Greem was confident he would be able to force back the pursuing elves with the ship¡¯s self-destruction and stall enough time for them to retreat.


    Unfortunately, despite all of Greem¡¯s calctions, he had never expected Alice to choose to forcefully advance after obtaining the Staff.


    She was choosing to advance immediately at such a dangerous moment?


    Greem honestly couldn¡¯t understand Alice¡¯s decision.


    Since Alice had chosen this path, then Greem, as her greatest ¡¯investor,¡¯ had no choice but to silently support the battlefield for her sake.


    Thebination of the flying ship and Uzzah had slowly crumbled under the assault of the elven Sword Saint until it finally fell apart.


    The enemy had destroyed all one hundred and seven magic energy cannons in the ship.


    The only remaining sixteen magical machines had all been put to use, dying in the glory of battle.


    The twenty-one hastily repaired engineering machines had also gone to stop the enemy only to be destroyed.


    The determined Endor had gone forth alone to stop the elf and had died.


    Such tremendous sacrifices had only managed to stall the elven Sword Saint for ten minutes in total; it was still ten minutes away from the two hours that Alice had requested.


    Ten minutes.


    It sounded like a moment, but in this battle, it was more than enough for the elven Sword Saint to slice them into pieces a hundred times over!


    That was why Greem immediately gave the order to detonate the space furnace the second he sensed the Sword Saint had escaped from the poison.


    Having prepared for this ahead of time, Greem had copsed the tunnels outside the dragon¡¯s den. All of the adepts and goblins were hiding in the small ditch outside the treasure hall of the dragon¡¯sir.


    With the mountain itself containing the explosion, the entire tide of magic created by the space furnace¡¯s destruction poured upward toward the exit of the valley.


    For a while, the entire stretch of mountains trembled and shook as the rumbling noise spread across thend.


    It was as if a stampede of bulls had ravaged this formerly beautiful and peaceful valley. The tide of magic had snapped countless ancient trees and ripped the greenery away from the ground, throwing it into the air and revealing the ck dirt and gray stone underneath.


    Even the flying ship, which had managed to survive the attacks of two Fourth Grades, was blown away by the gigantic shockwave and disintegrated into metal shards and jagged pieces in midair that bombarded the forest and mountain, ravaging them beyond recognition.


    The adepts hiding in the dragon¡¯s den joined hands to castyers of defensive magic and warded off the falling stones and rocks. The walls above, beneath, and around them were shaking unstoppably, rumbling as they did so. Several goblin engineers couldn¡¯t dodge in time and were crushed to death by the falling rocks, filling the space with the scent of blood.


    It was fortunate that Green Dragon Ohgu had spent quite some effort when choosing this dragon¡¯s den of his.


    Even with all this damage, there were no signs ofplete integrity loss apart from somerge cracks and small patches of copsing stone. It helped prevented several unnecessary deaths!


    They barely managed to hang on until all of the ferocious magical energy exhausted itself. All the grass, dirt, and rocks that had been blown into the sky fell piece by piece. This peaceful valley appeared before everyone¡¯s eyes once again, now wholly unrecognizable and ruined.


    The mountain where the dragon¡¯s den was situated had snapped at its waist. The entire upper half fell nted and pierced the left side of the mountain in a weird position. Tremendous amounts of rock and sand sealed the exit of the den. Carving a way through would probably take a very long time and plenty of manpower.


    Not a single patch of green could still be seen inside the valley.


    All the trees, grass, and nearly half a meter of dirt had been ripped away tond here and there over the forest within a ten-kilometer radius.


    The silent valley and the forest around it had been shaved bald by the shockwave of the explosion. From high above in the sky it looked as if a massive crater had suddenly appeared in the vast green sea of trees. It was extremely conspicuous!


    Only a single lonely silhouette remained in the air above the deste valley.


    Agassi might have avoided that explosion, but he wasn¡¯t unharmed.


    His muscr left arm was bloody. Crimson snakes trailed freely down his arm, soaking the handle of his de before dripping down to the ground.


    The wounds weren¡¯t serious, but he, a Fourth Grade Sword Saint, had been injured at the hands of a group of Second and Third Grade adepts! This painful reality was what had truly wounded his pride!


    Aooooo!


    He released an earthshaking yell. Agassi finally let out everything he had, whirling his hands madly and sending out one bright de beam after another at a rate of thirteen shes per second.


    Agassi¡¯s body itself didn¡¯t move. He merely shook his wrist and used the de radiance as weapons, furiously slicing away at the mountain where the dragon¡¯s den was. The iparably vicious shes would leave terrifying de marks every time theynded on the rock. Each of these marks measured two meters in depth and seven to eight meters in width.


    As these furious blows shot out, rocks were carved away from the walls of the mountain. Clouds of dust rose to the skies and obscured everything in sight.


    Even the thick clouds of dust could not hide the blinding light of the de light. This humongous mountain was actually trembling and shivering under the continuous assault of the Sword Saint.


    As Agassi furiously carved away at the mountain, a strange tunnel started to appear and extend toward the inside.


    Naturally, there was no way for the adepts within the mountain to realize what was happening outside.


    However, the sudden trembling of the mountain after it had settled down, paired with the rumbling noise from outside; this...this was certainly not good news!


    Of the people present, Uzzah undoubtedly possessed the most powerful senses. She closed her eyes and felt for themotion outside. Her expression froze as she growled in panic, "Dammit, that Sword Saint¡¯s gone mad. He...he intends to cut his way in through the mountain."


    The faces of the adepts nched when they heard Uzzah¡¯s words.


    Everyone here had personally witnessed the Sword Saint¡¯s might. If he were to charge in here...


    Uzzah couldn¡¯t help but speak furiously, "Why are you still dragging your feet? Hurry up and call for Alice and run together. If we wait any longer, none of us will survive!"


    Sofia and Snowlotus, who had been guarding the entrance to the hall, stepped forth and said firmly, "The leader very clearly stated before she shut herself in the hall¨C no one is to disturb her!"


    "What time is it already? You guys are still hung up over the advancement," Uzzah¡¯s voice was gradually turning cold: "If you guys are unwilling to call for Alice, I will go in and call for her myself!"


    Sofia and Snowlotus¡¯ expressions turned into ones of panic. They both turned to look at Greem.


    If anyone here could still stop Uzzah, it would have to be Greem.


    Was he in a hurry to escape and willing to make Alice give up on her advancement? Or was he willing to take the risk of waiting just a bit longer?


    The Dark Witches, the Fate Witches, and the Crimson adepts couldn¡¯t help but cast their eyes toward the proudly standing Greem.

 Chapter 710 Emergency Retrea

    t


    "Lady Uzzah, I will not me you if the Dark Witches wish to take a premature leave!"


    Greem, in his bright red adept¡¯s robe, frowned and calmly spoke. It was as if he hadn¡¯t heard those increasingly loud rumblings.


    "Greem, why should you chain yourself to a single tree until your death? Alice might be the leader of the Fate Witches, but she only has the pathetic strength of a First Grade. She barely has any authority or influence within the Council of the Northern Witches. If you are willing to join us Dark Witches, I can guarantee that our leader will provide you with more resources,rger territories, and better development opportunities. You..."


    Uzzah was in a rush, but she was still willing to attempt to recruit a male adept as excellent as Greem for the sake of the n.


    The development of the Northern Witches in the center of the continent in recent years had not been smooth. If she could get such an ambitious and talented male adept to ally with the n, it would undoubtedly be a massive help to them.


    The faces of the deputy leaders of the Fate Witches, Sofia and Snowlotus, soured when they heard these words. Yet, they had no ability or qualification to argue against a Third Grade Dark Witch. They could only look at Greem with upset faces, wondering if Uzzah¡¯s offer would move him.


    "Three minutes left!"A gentle smile appeared on Greem¡¯s young but determined face, "We will know the results in just three more minutes. Are you not willing to wait just a bit more?"


    Uzzah opened her mouth to try and convince Greem again but was interrupted by a massive rock falling from above.


    The rumbling sound was getting closer. The violent strikes of the Sword Saint had struck the nearby tunnels, causing the sound to reverberate within the tiny space of the dragon¡¯s den and echoing and hurting the eardrums of every adept.


    "I can¡¯t wait here any longer," A savage expression shed across Uzzah¡¯s sinister face, "I won¡¯t stay here and die with you. We Dark Witches will be going ahead!"


    Under her orders, the three remaining Dark Witches quickly gathered at Uzzah¡¯s side. A thick cloud of pitch-ck darkness surged outward and enveloped their bodies, filling the corridor with strange and twisted gray shadows.


    A few secondster, the shadows dispersed and not a single Dark Witch remained.


    It hadn¡¯t been long since thest surviving Fate Witch advanced; it was clear that she had not gotten used to situations like this. An expression of envy couldn¡¯t help but appear on her face when she saw the Dark Witches diving into the Shadow ne.


    Whenever she thought about the fact that she had to wait here for her leader that might or might not be alive, the young Fate Witch¡¯s face filled with panic and anxiety.


    "What about you people?" Greem took in the expression of everyone present and asked very solemnly, "I won¡¯t force you to stay. Anyone that wishes to leave now may leave."


    Wind Adept Deserra, Medusa Dana, Goblin Tigule, and Dragonborn Zacha bowed in unison beneath Greem¡¯s burning stare, respectfully giving their reply, "We will follow our Lord to our deaths!"


    Meanwhile, the blood knights, the blood elves, and Vanlier all silently stood behind Mary. Their expressions were cold and unaffected as if they would do whatever it was that Mary asked them to do.


    "What are you looking at me for?" Mary rolled her eyes at Greem unamusedly, "Of course I¡¯m staying with you!"


    Greem¡¯s tightly bound face finally rxed a bit as he gravely said, "Two minutes!"


    Time was slowly ticking away.


    This insignificant time that no one usually took note of seemed so long and torturous at this moment!


    Everyone held their breaths and silently listened for the rumblinging from a ce nearby.


    The tunnel the Sword Saint was digging had made it through most of the mountain; it was piercing straight toward their location. Judging from the sound, it was only twenty to thirty meters away from where they were.


    As the Sword Saint¡¯s violent strikes continued to assault the mountain, it began to shudder even more violently. The dust falling from above was almost enough to bury the adepts.


    To avoid the Sword Saint picking up any elementium fluctuations, none of the adepts erected magical shields and instead chose to use their bodies to endure the falling rocks from around them. The air in the tunnel was bing increasingly dusty. The suffocating dust was everywhere, making it almost impossible to breathe.


    Fortunately, none of the adepts were weaklings. A couple of hours without breathing wouldn¡¯t kill them.


    However, the anxious and uncertain wait made them feel even more pained. The adepts didn¡¯t know what it was they were waiting for¨C a sessful escape, or a tragic death. The more uncertain the future, the more panic they felt!


    "One minute!" Greem had used mental messages to speak to everyone this time.


    With a loud crack, one of the stone walls exploded into pieces. A single brilliant de beam shot out of the stone. The de light silently cut through the crowd, piercing the body of a blood knight and shing past Snowlotus¡¯ left arm.


    The next second, blood was in the air.


    The blood knight was instantly sted into a mist of blood. Snowlotus¡¯ left arm also fell off without a sound. A warm fountain of blood surged from the wound.


    Snowlotus let out a pained gasp but swallowed the sound before she couldplete it. However, the thick scent of blood still diffused in the air and was quickly picked up by the Sword Saint who was searching for them.


    "Attack!"


    Just as everyone¡¯s scalps buzzed and they stood still at a loss, Greem shouted out loud. He was the first to gather a massive magma fireball in his hands and throw it at the wall where the de radiance hade.


    The next second, a barrage of spellsnded on the stone wall in the distance.


    The violent attacks had caused yet another series of rocks to fall from above. The adepts scurried in the narrow space, dodging the giant boulders falling from above. The process had been perilous, but they had finally managed to seal the Sword Saint outside.


    Still, how many of the Sword Saint¡¯s attacks could such a slight mound of stone endure?


    Just as everyone worried and stewed in their anxiousness, the long-shut door to the hall suddenly opened. A slender and elegant silhouette stood behind it, silently looking at all the adepts.


    "Thank you, everyone!" Alice¡¯s familiar and cool voice rang out, "I have advanced! We can escape now!"


    Greem stood forth and looked Alice in the eye. A smile of relief appeared on his tightly wound face when he saw her determined nod.


    The next moment, Greem waved hisrge hand as six earth-yellow golem coresnded on the ground, quickly forming into six giant stone serpents.


    "Hurry, hurry, hurry. All of you, get into the stone serpents. We will leave through the ground."


    Greem had never really used these low-grade advanced apprentice level stone serpents after he advanced to an adept. Yet, at this moment, they were the most suitable choice as mounts to travel underground!


    From the absolute despair of an impossible enemy to the joy of escaping their predicament, the adepts had absolutely no time to adjust their feelings before the stone serpents swallowed them.


    The adepts still had some privilege and could have one serpent to themselves. Meanwhile, Mary¡¯s vampire subordinates had no such luck. They could only share the same snake.


    After devouring everyone, the stone serpents dove into the ground below at Greem¡¯smand and started to tunnel wildly into the earth around the mountain. Thest stone serpent remaining in the cave shook its massive body and slithered into the treasure hall. It greedily swallowed the piles of magical gemstones and glimmering magical weapons, one big mouthful at a time.


    When an earthshaking explosion echoed from outside the cave, the stone serpent finally and reluctantly gave up on the rest of the dragon¡¯s hoard. It dove into a stone wall and madly tunneled after the others.


    A few secondster, Elven Sword Saint Agassi strode into the cave, shrouded in blinding golden light.


    When he saw the six holes one meter in diameter and the empty den left behind, he let out a furious roar at the sky.


    He had no interest in even looking at the shining golden treasure hoard of the dragon.


    For the first time, the Fourth Grade Elven Sword Saint Agassi was astounded by the cruel and ferocious tactics of these otherworldly adepts.


    ............


    The stone serpents silently tunneled underground.


    Through the cracks in its body, Greem could clearly see the harsh earth being smoothly parted to each side of its body. The stone serpents were like a fish in water, freely swimming between the rockyers.


    Severalrge boulders would asionally appear before being left far behind.


    The stone serpents were only advanced apprentice golems after all, and they could not borrow too deep into the underground space. Otherwise, their earth elementium bodies would be crushed by the immense pressure.


    After diving a certain distance along the rockyers, the stone serpents turned and moved diagonally toward the surface.


    Greem and Alice were sharing a stone serpent.


    Alice stood straight in front of Greem and silently watched the rocks, insects, roots, and other misceneous objects passing by.


    "Endor is dead!" Greem finally spoke after a moment of hesitation.


    "I know..." Alice¡¯s reply was cold, yet calm.


    "You know?" Greem was stunned and blurted out this question.


    "I knew before I advanced." Alice didn¡¯t turn back. Her tone was still as calm as before.


    However, Greem knew Alice too well. He frowned, sensing the roaring rivers beneath the thick ice of Alice¡¯sposure.


    Greem extended a hand and grabbed Alice¡¯s shoulder. He could feel her body trembling slightly.


    "Just let it all out if you want to cry!" Greem said dejectedly.


    Alice still didn¡¯t turn back. However, Greem could faintly feel the immense pain she was holding in her heart.


    The path of pursuing strength was a lonely one!


    Most of the time, they had to make great sacrifices for even a sliver of strength. Such a price was not something that anyone could bear to take on!


    "Greem, can I ask something of you?" After a long pause, Alice finally replied sorrowfully with a question.


    "Tell me."


    "If, one day, you obtain enough power, I hope...you can destroy this ne for me!"


    "I will!"

 Chapter 711 Return to Shadow Island

    Faen ne, Shadow Ind.


    The ind that had been quiet for some time had once again be lively.


    The port stopped several sea ships that had returned full of loot at the western side of the ind. Under the shoutedmands of their supervisors,rge groups of non-humanborers busily moving the heavy loads from the port to the massive stone warehouses near the coast.


    This prosperous scene hadn¡¯t stopped since the Cmity of the Witches began.


    The endless stream of goods being transported from the Faen and Garan Continents had almost filled all of Shadow Ind¡¯s outer warehouses to the brim. Some of the warehouses near the center of the ind even had to be put into use as prisons to jail the wealthy merchants or ves they had abducted.


    The sessful headway of the war had allowed the witches on Faen Continent to join hands and conquer a small coastal duchy. They had then rallied lost nobles and bandits to their cause, forming an improper and chaotic ¡¯Witch Alliance.¡¯


    No matter how one put it, the war perpetrated by the Pale Witches had now allowed them to establish a real foothold on Faen Continent. Even if the Witch Cmity were to conclude, the ruling forces of the continent would have a much harder time driving them away.


    It was the witches¡¯ immense haul that naturally attracted all of therge merchant unions and ve traders of Faen Continent. Of course, the great merchant unions still had to protect their reputation. The ones they sent to trade with the witches were dark proxies that they controlled.


    In conclusion, the Pale Witches were the ones who benefitted the most from this Witch Cmity!


    No major breakthroughs might have happened on Garan Continent, but the ce had still been thrown into utter chaos by the witches and was scrambling to reestablish order.


    Disregarding everything else, just the one million undead that had surged out of the Death Scar in the central area of Garan had resulted in nearly two hundred thousand civilian casualties to the forest elves. The elven kingdom had sent elite armies and many elites to exterminate everyst one of the undead.


    However, the Fantasy Forest that had been ravaged by the undead was severely damaged. At least a hundred years was needed for aplete recovery.


    Moreover, the Dark and Fate Witches had exceeded the quota of their missions, wrecking the elven kingdom¡¯s Pegasus Spring and Dragoncliff as they passed by. The Dark Witches stationed on the Echo Isles reported that the elven kingdom had forever lost the strange magical beasts that were the pegasi.


    Moreover, they had also rent apart perpetually peaceful lives of the forest dragons at Dragoncliff. Nearly a third of the green and emerald dragons had been led away by a thunder dragon from another world.


    To think that such a thing could happen. In all honesty, this exceeded the expectations of all the people and dragons!


    It had been nearly six months since the start of the battle, and the conclusion of the Witch Cmity was quickly approaching. The witches that hadpleted their missions or those that desperately required rest all started to return to Shadow Ind.


    ording to their agreement, the Pale Witches would only reopen the nar door and send everyone back to the World of Adepts on the eighth month after the start of the Witch Cmity. Consequently, the Dark and Fate Witches would have to stay on Shadow Ind for two more months despite havingpleted their missions ahead of time.


    The Dark Witches that had arrived back at Shadow Ind before the Fate Witches met up with theirpanions that had just revived from the soul energy pool. Their ranks filled up once again. The witches from the other branches that had returned from Faen ne were d to see this happen. They quickly and expensively recruited the Dark Witches as hired hands for onest push before the Cmity ended.


    As such, the Dark Witches quickly joined the ranks of the various witch branches after a few short days on the ind, boarding ships that led to Faen Continent.


    ............


    Greem and his party finally arrived at Shadow Ind.


    Thest time they had left, they had ostentatiously left on the flying ship. Now the group was much less conspicuous when returning this time, boarding a ship that was sending ves to the ind as their transport.


    They stepped off from a dirty and stinking ship on a swaying nk and were immediately surrounded by a group of overseers and ves upon setting foot on the stone port. However, the ves immediately scattered to the sides when they saw the eye-catching adept¡¯s robe that they were wearing. They didn¡¯t dare to block the path of these esteemed adepts.


    A witch in charge of managing the port hurried over and respectfully bowed when she saw Greem and Alice in the lead.


    "Wee back to Shadow Ind, Lady Alice. Please follow me!"


    As a territory of the Pale Witches, Shadow Ind had been strictly divided into fixed areas based on social strata.


    The twenty to thirty kilometers in the center of the ind was an adept-only area. Only adepts and individuals they acknowledged were free toe and go.


    Ordinary outsiders could never possibly get close to the ce!


    Meanwhile, the zones outside of the central area were split in four: the south, the east, the west, and the north.


    In particr, the western zone was a port mainly used for transporting goods and functioned as a ce for transitionary storage. The northern zone was the trading area, where all sorts of businesses and merchants set up shops and auctions. To the east was the magic area, responsible for selling equipment and items rted to the supernatural. The southern zone was the ve area, whererge-scale ve auctions were held daily.


    The little witch led Greem and his party past the lively port and into the crowded warehouses before they finally reached the entrance to the adept¡¯s area after five kilometers on a path of gray stones.


    Bloodsucking nts and terrifying magical beings filled the perimeter of the adept¡¯s area. Small entrances could only be found in some specific directions, which were guarded by both witches and voodoo armies.


    This way, the enemy would have immense trouble sneaking into the adept¡¯s area, even if they managed to make their way onto Shadow Ind!


    The witches guarding the entrance shone a strange crystal stick at Greem and the others, only letting them into the adept¡¯s area after confirming everyone¡¯s identities.


    Now that they were here, they could move about freely as they liked. There were no longer any limitations!


    Greem and the other might have paid a tremendous price on this trip to Garan Continent, but their harvest was just as bountiful.


    In terms of human resources, the Fate Witches, including Alice, had sent eight individuals, but only four had returned. Fortunately, Alice had sessfully advanced to Second Grade, causing the pressing concern of her fading life to disappear entirely.


    With the three to five hundred years of lifespan that a Second Grade adept had, Alice possessed plenty of time to slowly experience andprehend the unseen benefits that the Staff of Divination had brought to her.


    Meanwhile, on Greem¡¯s side, the losses were terrible!


    First were the losses in manpower. Poison Hag Endor and Three-Headed Demonhound Unguja had both died on Garan. Mary had lost a blood knight but had also gained seven blood elves as her new subordinates; her strength had increased rather than decrease. Bug Adept Billis was still yet lost near Greenwater City. Though he was safe for the moment, he would not be able to return in the foreseeable future.


    What came next were the resources, and those were truly a sea of loss.


    The most significant loss had to be the flying shi, along with the one hundred magical machines and the fifty goblin engineers and technicians riding upon it.


    Of course, he couldpensate for these losses through the Goblin ne. However, the space furnace that had self-destructed was one-of-a-kind. It was not possible to build any more such battleships until Greem found suitable magical alloy for its material.


    Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder was also the only one remaining of the newly created magical machine warriors. The other pseudo-Second Grade Goblin Bomberman had been lost during the battle of the dragon¡¯s den, leaving Greem with a lot of regrets.


    When all these things piled up together, their value easily exceeded a million magical crystals. It was difficult to recover these losses even if they were to sell every one of the abducted forest elves at absurd prices.


    Fortunately, this internar war had allowed greater interactions and bonds between the Crimson n and the Fate Witches. From a neutral perspective, the Fate Witches had finally positioned themselves properly and were showing some signs of assimting with the Crimson n.


    That was undoubtedly the greatest bounty for Greem!


    A Second Grade Witch of Fate that had cast off the shackles of her life force whom he couldpletely trust; perhaps Greem was the only one that clearly recognized that he was the greatest winner of the war.


    In the history of the Northern Witches, the Fate Witches had been their ¡¯eyes¡¯ that helped them explore and observe the external world. They bore the mission to look into the future and point them in the right direction!


    That was why the Fate Witches rarely held excessive power and only relied on the protection of their witch sisters to continue surviving. That was also why their status among the witch branches was aloof.


    Greem had actually intercepted Alice and pulled her into his faction. Given that to be the case, the Crimson n would have no troubles in the foreseeable future. They would be embracing a massive opportunity for development.


    All the Crimson adepts could finally rx after settling into the Shadow Ind¡¯s adept¡¯s tower. As a reward for this battle, every adept was given around ten to thirty elven ves, as well as magical gemstones measured by the kilograms.


    Of course, the most important reward was the otherworldly knowledge they had obtained from Garan!


    The forest elves were split into two major caster systems: elven casters and druids. Though the core of their system revolved around divine magic, their knowledge still had a great deal of reference and research value to the adepts, who were casters themselves.


    As a reward for following the n through all those risks and dangers, all the participating Crimson adepts and Fate Witches obtained a copy of a knowledge crystal. The significance of this knowledge crystal was far, far higher than those elven ves and magical gemstones!


    At any rate, there were only two more months before the nar door was supposed to open. Some of the more restless n adepts gathered with the Fate Witches and joined the witches on Faen in their conquest.


    The witches of the various branches were having a fun time against the natives of Faen Continent. They would be able to make it back just in time for harvest season and might be able to obtain a different kind of bounty.


    Mary led Wind Adept Deserra, Medusa Dana, and Goblin Tigule to Faen. Only Dragonborn Zacha appeared to have no interest in the matter, loyally staying by Greem¡¯s side.


    Greem took the opportunity to stay on Shadow Ind. He organized what he needed to, sold off what he had to, and then utilized this chance to collect special resources found on Faen ne.


    After all, while many of these otherworldly resources could also be found in the World of Adepts, the price was chillingly exorbitant!

 Chapter 712 Advancement Statistics

    [Alice. Beginner Second Grade.


    Profession: Leader of the Fate Witches.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 4 | Physique 3 | Agility 5 | Spirit 22


    Profession Skills: Sense Fate, Divine, Fate Interference...]


    The blue light slowly faded as Greem closed his eyes in exhaustion, rubbing his stinging temples.


    Greem had just severely exhausted the Chip¡¯s scanning and probing abilities to perform aprehensive construction of Alice¡¯s basic stats. Of course, this was only possible with Alice intentionally lowering her instinctual defenses and retaliatory instincts.


    Otherwise, there weren¡¯t many people in this world who could bear witness to the leader of the Witches of Fate¡¯s abilities.


    "How is it? Did youe to any conclusions?" Alice yawned slightly and stretched her body as if she hadn¡¯t seen Greem¡¯s glowing blue eyes.


    Everyone had their little secrets. There was no need to uncover everything¨C that would make life a bit too boring!


    "Your body is too weak!" Greem solemnly and unamusedly said, "Could your identity as a Witch of Fate also devour your basic attributes? Apart from your Spirit which has gone past twenty-two points and exceeded the threshold for Second Grade, the rest of your body¡¯s attributes are still at the same level as when you were First Grade. In fact, some of them have even fallen slightly."


    "My Spirit has reached twenty-two points? I thought it was only twenty-one. Hehehe, it seems the Staff of Divination truly suits me!"


    "Don¡¯t change the topic. Listen to what I¡¯m saying," Greem rubbed his temple even harder now, "Judging from your attributes, I strongly suspect that your unique profession has certain energy-draining traits."


    "What do you mean?"


    "It means that your profession leans toward Spirit, very much like most elementium adepts. Moreover, your profession will slowly absorb the other attributes to feed your Spirit. That allows your Spirit to improve at a rate greater than even elementium adepts!"


    "Eh?!" Alice was undoubtedly very interested in this topic, "Doesn¡¯t that mean my Spirit will improve much faster than yours?! This...this is a good thing!"


    "Don¡¯t just look at the good parts!" Greem scolded, "It can also burden your Strength, Physique, and Agility, causing them to decrease continuously. If this keeps going, you might be as weak as a chick, as frail as paper, and as slow as a snail."


    "So what about that? I¡¯m a Witch of Fate anyway. I only need to point, do some behind-the-scenes work, and leave all the fighting and killing to you guys." Alice was still maintaining her nonchnt attitude.


    "No, you¡¯re wrong," Greem shook his head and said, "The Witches of Fate of the past might have tried many ways to raise their Spirit. Based on the characteristics of your profession, it¡¯s very likely that only methods used to nurture Spirit were highly effective. Even if you tried to train your Strength or cultivate your Physique, the returns must have been inferior. They might even have shown signs of regression. That¡¯s probably what led to this unfortunate practice of Fate Witches only focusing on Spirit."


    "You are saying..."


    "I¡¯m being very clear. You should formte a more well-rounded and optimized attribute improvement n based on the characteristics of your profession. It doesn¡¯t matter whether they are ns for nurturing the Spirit or the body; it will benefit your Spirit in the end!"


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but be shocked.


    "You...you aren¡¯t making me promote the stuff of body refining adepts among the Fate Witches, are you?"


    Alice felt the entire world spin and her future go dark when the thought of frail Fate Witches being shut in closed rooms and soaked in tubs of poison to train their bodies popped into her mind.


    Sofia was probably the only one who would enjoy a life like that!


    Greem managed to guess Alice¡¯s thoughts. He chuckled and said, "It¡¯s not an impossible n, as long as you lot are willing."


    "No! I will never agree!" Alice immediately panicked, "I...we...canpensate through eating."


    Er...very well, then. Customizing your diets is indeed one way to do it!


    "Oh, right. Apart from my attributes, are there any other problems with my advancement this time?"


    Greem brooded for a moment and couldn¡¯t help but speak with a hint of frustration in his voice, "You Fate Witches have given up on almost all defensive andbat magic, only keeping those few profession-rted skills you have. That¡¯s why I suspect that the profession skills of Fate Witches have to be immense!"


    Alice closed her eyes and sensed for a moment when she heard this. A momentter, she finally opened her pretty eyes again, "I had already mastered divination before I became the Witch of Fate. After I became the Witch of Fate, I gained mastery over the ability to sense fate. This time, through my advancement, I only obtained one new ability¨C Fate Interference. Its power is very intangible, and even I can¡¯tpletely figure it out."


    "Oh? What use does it have?"


    "It seems...maybe, probably...to allows me to change the trajectory of fate for certain very minute matters. Moreover, the use of this power requires me to exhaust 1,500 points of the power of Fate."


    "How much power of Fate do you have stored up now?"


    "13,511 points!"


    "How could you have so much?" Greem was shocked, "I remember you mentioned thest time that our whole affair on the Goblin ne onlyted you four thousand points."


    "Perhaps it¡¯s because of this!"


    Alice mysteriously smiled and flipped her slender fingers palm up. A delicate card materialized out of thin air. The card spun between her slender fingers, and Greem could clearly see the Staff of Divination and its unique design disyed on the face of the card.


    [Beep. Detecting abnormal high-energy aggregated Fate object. Form of existence: Magical staff. Sealed.]


    What exactly was Fate? Wasn¡¯t it supposed to be an intangible existence? How was it possible for a nearly solid energy shell of Fate to appear?


    Greem shook his head in frustration. He was utterly confused by the Chip¡¯s data.


    If Alice could lend him the Staff of Divination for some time to do research, then he might be able to get some answers. However, Greem could only let out a deep sigh and shake his head helplessly with a bitter smile.


    His current strength did not allow him to research such a profound and superior power. Even Alice herself, the leader of the Witches of Fate, was only using it on instinct. She was probably ignorant of the true nature and origin of the power of Fate!


    Greem was only Second Grade now. He was still stuck on the level of elemental maniption and mastery. It wasn¡¯t until he reached Fourth Grade and finally gained a preliminary mastery over some lower narws that he would have a chance at continuing research on a power as advanced as that of Fate.


    Greem lowered his head to recall a particr memory and theorized, "It is said that this Staff of Divination used to be a pseudo-artifact that a human God of Divination of Faen ne bestowed upon their own god messenger. When this god died in the war between the human and elven pantheons, the Staff was lost to the hands of outsiders. The fact that you obtained so much power of Fate in a single instance might have something to do with the fall of that Divination God!"


    "These things are too profound. We had best take our time to research it only in the future. Speaking of which, you just looked at my attributes. What about yours and Mary¡¯s?" Alice asked out of curiosity.


    Greem smiled and waved his hand. Fire elementium quickly gathered and formed into rows of text before Alice¡¯s eyes.


    Greem. Intermediate Second Grade.


    Profession: Elementium Adept (Fire Specialization).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 11 (18) | Physique 13 (20) | Agility 10 (8) | Spirit 26 (29).


    Note: Attributes in brackets refer to post-transformation statistics. Profession Skills: Body of mes, me Fiend Transformation.


    Apprentice Level Skills: Fire Arrows, me Serpents, Burning Hand, Magical Fireball...


    First Grade Skills: Magma Fireball, Meteor Shower, Fire Core Explosion, Firestorm, Fire Prison...


    Second Grade Skills: Doomsday Volcano, Scarlet Firestorm, Demonic Wall of Fire, Meteor Crash...


    Compared to Alice¡¯s profession skills, the fire spells that Greem possessed as a specialized Second Grade fire adept were innumerable. Be it the auxiliary Fire Stream, the defensive Lava Shield, or even the offensive Doomsday Volcano, Greem¡¯s crammed skill list utterly dazzled Alice. Her small cherry mouth opened wider and wider until she could no longer close it.


    Mary. Beginner Second Grade.


    Profession: Bloodline Adept (Vampire).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 13 | Physique 14 | Agility 26 | Spirit 17.


    Profession Skills: The Embrace.


    Apprentice Level Skills: Blood Mist, Blood Bullet, Bat Transformation, Blood-drain Regeneration, Blood Sense...


    First Grade Skills: Contract of Blood, Blood Frenzy, Blood Maniption...


    Second Grade Skills: Blood Mist Corrosion, Bloody w, Boiling Blood...


    Compared to Alice, Mary¡¯s attributes were almost perfect. Back on Earth, she would have been a superhero that couldpare to Wonder Woman. However, here in the World of Adepts, Mary was still far from the most powerful fighting force.


    The so-called strongest in this world only referred to those Fourth Grade adepts.


    However, in his heart, Greem knew very well that even the Fourth Grade powerhouses that dominated the World of Adepts were nothingpared to the Great Adepts that had stepped out beyond the bounds of the nes.


    The Great Adepts who could freely travel in the space beyond the realms, who could pass through the energy storms in search of suitable nar spaces to rob, were the true core powers of the adepts!


    Compared to them, practitioners in the World of Adepts were like ants hiding in their nest. Individually, there might be one or two of them who were significantly more significant than the rest. However, in the eyes of the Great Adepts, even thergest of ants was no more than an ant. There was no possibility that they could pose a threat.


    If the ants jumped around too freely, the Great Adepts only needed a single finger to crush them!


    That was why Greem tried his best to maintain a low profile, even after he had advanced to Second Grade. He didn¡¯t want to fall under the watch of those ultra-powerhouses prematurely.


    Otherwise, his fate would be decided by the whim of those individuals!

 Chapter 713 The Bug Adept Returns

    Billis was one and a half monthster than hispanions in arriving at Shadow Ind.


    As a ship crashed into the reefs at the shoreline with a resounding thud, a massive hole opened in the right bow. There was the ear-piercing sound of the ship¡¯s hull grinding against the sand at the bottom of the sea. The salty seawater surged in from the damaged spots as the boat gradually started tilting. Large numbers of splintered nks, barrels, and other misceneous objects became scattered on the surface of the sea.


    Billis turned into a cloud of ck smoke and rose from the deck of the ship, crossing a hundred meters of the sea andnding heavily upon the beach.


    Several dozen muscr sand giants with undefined faces emerged from the beach, surrounding the bug adept the moment hended.


    "Give your name, intruder!" A cold voice boomed from above.


    From the shadow of his lowered hood, Billis lifted his head slightly as his four green eyes¨Ctworge and two small¨Clocked onto the strange witch floating on her flying broom twenty meters above him.


    Perhaps because she sensed the familiar magical flux around the intruder, the patrolling Pale Witch did not have the golems attack.


    "Billis, Crimson n adept. We came here with the Fate Witches!"


    A few months away had only thickened Billis¡¯ aura of malevolence and savagery. His body, cloaked by the robe, also seemed to be fatter than before. The ck robe was still wiggling where the Pale Witch¡¯s vision could not reach as if the body under it was not that of a human¡¯s.


    "Billis?" The hovering witch took out an inspection crystal and started to scan Billis with it. As expected, the aura she extracted from Billis matched with the one stored in the crystal.


    "Very well, your identity has been confirmed. You may enter the ind now! That said," The witch had just announced the result of the inspection, and her tone immediately turned, "The ship you are riding on has been registered with Shadow Ind; it is protected by the Pale Witches. Why is it that I can¡¯t sense any trace of life on that ship now?"


    The stranded ship was tilted toward one side on the beach not far away.


    No crew members had jumped into the sea, and no humans called for help. Apart from the dull thuds of waves crashing against the hull, everything was eerily quiet!


    "Well, you know, the journey here took a bit too much time! I...I can¡¯t quite control these...precious babies of mine." Billis shrugged with a trace of resignation. A ck substance fell from his ck robe, plopping on the beach and quickly dispersing into thousands of ck insects. They promptly dove back under his clothing.


    "Your excuse is not epted, foreign male adept!" A trace of dissatisfaction appeared on the face of the Pale Witch, "You have publicly attacked a native organization under the protection of my Pale Witches. You must receive the corresponding punishment. One hundred magical crystals! We will deduct one hundred magical crystals from your profits as punishment and warning!"


    "A hundred magical crystals? It¡¯s only thirty-seven native mortals. They weren¡¯t even actual professionals. How could it be so expensive? You guys are so unfriendly to your allies." Bug Adept Billis immediately started grumbling unhappily when he heard of the punishment.


    "Male adept, if you refuse to ept your punishment, I have no choice but to expel you from Shadow Ind in the name of the Pale Witches! Choose. Will you ept or reject your punishment?!" The Pale Witch insisted.


    "Very well, very well. I ept! You people that stay behind to guard the base dare treat your allies fighting on the frontlines in this manner; I will beining to the high-grade witches in your n." There was no helping the situation. Billis might be dissatisfied, but he had no choice but to ept his punishment.


    "Follow it inside! It will bring you to the ind center. Also, yourpanions have already returned to Shadow Ind. You will find them on the fifteenth floor of the adept¡¯s tower at the ind¡¯s center." The patrolling witch turned and left on her broom after saying that.


    The sand giants surrounding Billis also copsed into the sand once more. Only one giant remained to lead Billis into the depths of the ind.


    Not much longer after it left the beach, the sand giant fell apart, and the job of guiding Billis was left to a Shadow Mastiff hiding in the shadows. They passed through a small swamp, where the task was once again passed to a Chaos Lasher.


    It was an odd magical nt that resembled man-eating flowers. A human face was Imprinted upon its sunflower-like disc, and two vine-like appendages extended out of its two-meter-long stem. Hooks and slimy, green liquid covered these limbs.


    The roots beneath it split into two strands, much like the two legs that humans had. The Lasher shambled across the ground with a weird gait.


    These nts were magical creations that most adepts loved to farm near their homes as scouts or guards. They not only had long lives but could also feed on their own and did not require an adept¡¯s daily care.


    Billis got a proper look at all the ssic voodoo beasts and magical nts in the adept¡¯s handbook on this trip.


    Under the guidance of these creatures, Billis passed through the multiple outer areas and sessfully entered the ind center after retrieving a strange crystal that resembled an identity te.


    Billis met his master in a room on the fifteenth floor of the tower. The master that had abandoned him on Garan¨C Second Grade Fire Adept Greem.


    Greem was visibly thrilled to see Bug Adept Billis¡¯ sessfully return as well. After some customary wees, Greem tossed a knowledge crystal into Billis¡¯ hands.


    "You did very well on Garan! As a reward for your bravery, this knowledge crystal is yours. That¡¯s just my personal reward! As for the portion that all n adepts get, you can find Snowlotus to retrieve it. Well then, if you don¡¯t have any other matters to pursue, then just take the time to rx and rest on Shadow Ind. I still have a magical experiment I need toplete."


    Almost as if he was racing for every second, Greem breezed through the wee ceremony and vanished from the room in a st of fire.


    In the World of Adepts, even within the same n, there were no intimate rtionships between individuals. Everything depended on material benefit!


    It was the ability of the Crimson n to give them the benefits and knowledge they needed, as well as its ability to guide their rapid growth that caused so many ambitious adepts to submit themselves to Greem willingly. Meryl was Greem¡¯s student and might have some personal feelings invested in the Crimson n. However, it was mostly knowledge and benefits that prompted the other n adepts to join.


    That was why conversations between adepts tended to be so cold and straightforward!


    Knowledge crystal?


    A light of confusion flickered in Billis¡¯ eyes. He weighed the crystal in his hands and threw it into his lotus-shaped mouth before swallowing it in a single gulp.


    Hm? It was the poison knowledge and rted magical knowledge that that Poison Hag Endor had organized.


    He had tried to buy this stuff from her many times and had been rejected time and again. Why had she so generously handed everything over this time?


    Still, he quickly cast this trace of doubt aside.


    With this poison magic in hand, Billis had a new direction with the creation and breeding of his insects. In the future, the massive swarm that hemanded would probably be most aptly named Cmity Beetles.


    Billis quickly strode out of Greem¡¯s room as he fantasized about the future.


    All of his past resentment about being abandoned vanished in an instant upon obtaining this knowledge crystal that was well worth hundreds of thousands of magical crystals. His only thought was on the methods to collect the necessary poison resources and the search for suitable ritual items.


    Snowlotus¡¯ room was on the seventh floor of the tower.


    Billis only found out about what had happened to the n during this period after finding and talking to her.


    The flying ship had been destroyed, Endor had died inbat, and Alice had sessfully advanced to Second Grade.


    All of these events frightened Billis to the very core when he heard about them.


    For some reason, he felt as if him being surrounded by the enemy alone wasn¡¯t that uneptable anymore. The two First Grade adepts shivered in fear when they thought of the terror of the Fourth Grade powerhouses, even as they were within the absolute safety of Shadow Ind.


    Billis sessfully obtained his n reward from Icdy Snowlotus.


    A knowledge crystal containing portions of the otherworldly knowledge that the n had obtained from the forest elves.


    Twenty thousand magical crystals.


    Fifteen elven ves (First Grade profession owners).


    Three magical equipment (First Grade).


    Thousand-Year-Old Treeheart.


    ......


    ......


    These rewards added up to a total of a dozen, but the ones that Billis most prioritized were the first five. His present self, after the wild carnage and evolution in Faen, had increased in power to the peak of First Grade.


    He should start thinking about the matter of advancing to Second Grade in three to five years after he returned to the World of Adepts!


    Billis immediately collected some of the smaller rewards from Snowlotus, but he would have to im things like the ves, the equipment, and the treeheart from the tower¡¯s public depository.


    After bidding Snowlotus farewell, he made his way to the third floor.


    In all seriousness, this was a market that the tower had specially set up to store the ves and equipment that the witches or their ns had obtained as loot.


    Compared to the silence of the other floors, this ce was lively beyond Billis¡¯ imagination.


    Inside were crowds of people brushing past each other, clothes and species of all sorts, dazzling products, goods, as well as a myriad of ques and shops.


    The ck-robed Billis froze at the entrance to the floor. His green eyes swept across everything in an instant, and for a moment, he had no idea where to go.

 Chapter 714 Slave Marke

    t


    Maybe it was the influence of Billis¡¯ conspicuous ck garb.


    A handsome and dark-skinned youth ran up to Billis and bowed as he said, "Lord Adept, where is it that you wish to go? Bill is willing to serve you!"


    Billis looked at the youth with his green eyes and asked in the oddly ented Faen tongue, "How did you know I am an adept?"


    It wasn¡¯t odd that he was suspicious. There were many other people like him in the lively market, cloaking themselves in thick robes or traveler¡¯s hoods and not revealing even an inch of their skin as they snuck about.


    The fact that a weak native youth could identify him as an adept under such circumstances was clearly beyond Billis¡¯ expectations.


    The native youth was momentarily shocked before bowing and exining with a weird look on his face, "My Lord, we mortals who have been permitted entry into the tower are all required to wear this."


    Billis followed the youth¡¯s eyes and found an odd brooch pinned to the cor of the boy¡¯s shirt. Billis lifted his eyes and looked around to see that everyone was wearing a simr brooch on their chest.


    When he closed his eyes, he could vaguely sense the weak magical flux radiating from the brooches.


    So that¡¯s how it is!


    This security measureid down for foreign mortals was probably something only the adepts were excused from. That was why...


    "I want to go to the Pale Witches¡¯ ve market. Bring me there!"


    "Please, my lord!"


    As the owners of the tower, the Pale Witches¡¯ ve market was located at the most prominent location of the third floor. The area took up was also half of the entire floor.


    All the ves caught by the witches were imprisoned here, awaiting the day the portal was opened to be sent back to the World of Adepts. However, considering the ¡¯ticket¡¯ that passing through the nar door required, not all ves would be brought back.


    Of the four hundred elves that the Dark Witches had abducted from Garan, there were many seniors and children. In fact, these elves formed arge percentage of the poption. Regardless of their strength, the base price for passing through the nar portal was a hundred magical crystals.


    Yet an ordinary elf could not sell more than two or three dozen magical crystals when sold at the market price in the World of Adepts. Meanwhile, the costs of elves with unique talents or those who were fighters were easily several times that of ordinary elves.


    As such, no one would be willing to spend that kind of money to transport a bunch of loss-generating goods back to the World of Adepts unless necessary!


    The Crimson n had also managed to abduct a total of six hundred forest elves over their six months in Garan. If they were to bring all the elves back to the World of Adepts, not only would they not be able topensate for the travel fare, they would even suffer losses.


    That was why ordinary elves and sick or disabled elven fighters would be eliminated and sold to Faen natives through the Pale Witches¡¯ ve market. Only specially selected exceptional goods were worth the investment to bring back.


    As a reward from his n, Billis could choose fifteen elves from the group as part of his personal collection. Whether he decided to auction them or use them as experiment material, all the profits belonged to the adept themselves.


    It was Greem¡¯s generosity that made the n adepts so willing to bear enormous risk to fight with him in a different world.


    Billis walked into the shop opened by the Pale Witches, and the first things he saw were the old wooden cages ced in a row along the stone wall. Some people were standing in the wooden cages, while others were sitting or even lying down, but all of them were otherworldly ves.


    The wooden cages weren¡¯t big. They were only ten square metersrge, but every one of them was packed to the brim with ves of different species, races, and genders. Among them were hignd dwarves who excelled at mining and smelting, kobolds who were proficient at digging and tunneling, ogre magi with two heads and who stood at five meters tall, metail lions with bright yellow fires on their tails...


    Of course, there were plenty of forest elves abducted from Garan as well!


    A group of young and passionate teenagers surrounded Billis upon seeing him enter. They spoke in their non-fluent adept¡¯s tongue and diligently served this mysterious adept hiding under this ck robe.


    The native youth that led Billis here had been awkwardly shoved aside.


    Now that they were here, there wasn¡¯t much he could say.


    "I¡¯m here to im the rewards of my n. This is the im number!" Billis took out a bronze te and tossed it about in his hand.


    "This is the te of the Crimson n. Their prisoners are being kept in wooden cages twenty-five to forty-one in Area One. Luna, bring him there!" The old witch sping and slowly reading a book behind the wooden table only raised an eye to nce at Billis before returning to her own business.


    A young teenage girl immediately stood forth and did as she was told.


    Area One was located at the center of this enormous market. It was clear that an unusuallyrge number of vers and merchant representatives had assembled here, for the sounds of their arguing and haggling was deafening and intense. If it weren¡¯t for fighting being forbidden in the market, some of the more passionate fellows would not have been able to hold back.


    One had to admit that war was the best shortcut to getting rich!


    Opportunities for obtaining unique products from Garan were few and far between for the nobles of the Faen Continent. Thoughrge fleets of ver ships always snuck to Garan on an annual basis, the storms of the sea, the raids of the seafolk, and the existence of the elven patrols made it challenging to abduct any elves. The number of kidnapped elves was so small that they could be counted with both hands.


    Meanwhile, the debaucherous and extravagant manners of the human nobles made them excessively obsessed with the exotic and beautiful forest elves. That was why the price of forest elves, be they male or female, was always exorbitantly expensive on Faen Continent!


    The price of a powerful intermediate First Grade ogre might not evenpare to that of a beautiful apprentice-level elf.


    When the young girl brought Billis to a row of wooden cages, the bug adept saw the emblem of the Crimson n upon the thick and old pir of the pens¨C a giant ming hand.


    The cage interiors were packed full of forest elves whose eyes burned with fury.


    Not a single weakling or senior was among them. All of them were young elves with excellent figures and pretty faces. Without exception, a magical circr brand had been ced on both of their shoulders, cutting them off from all elementium power. The effect of Weakness furtherpounded the fatigue of the elves. They were no longer as light and agile as they used to be when scaling the hundred-meter trees of Fantasy Forest.


    Billis¡¯ arrival also drew the attention of the merchants gathered near the cages.


    The more clever ones of the lot quickly moved away when they saw Billis¡¯ odd garb, giving way to the best spots in front of the wooden cages.


    Billis walked around the Crimson n¡¯s cages and realized that he couldn¡¯t find too many ordinary elves inside.


    There were six hundred First Grade elvenbatants. That was quite the loss for the elven kingdom!


    He didn¡¯t see any Second Grade elves.


    Of course, this was only natural.


    An elf as valuable as a Second Grade couldn¡¯t possibly be imprisoned in such a crude and harsh environment. They had to be concentrated at a higher-ss facility. There were agile and tattooed war dancers among these First Grade elves, along with flexible and fast elven archers.


    Those who had special abilities¨Csuch as elven casters, druids, or beastmasters¨Cwere specially selected and enclosed together in a neighboring cage.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for the fact that he wouldn¡¯t be able to bring the entirety of his insect army back to the World of Adepts, Billis would probably have chosen to stay on Garan and slowly devour all of the forest elves, bit by bit.


    As a bug adept, his individual strength was still toocking; he didn¡¯t have too many powerful spells he could use. His swarm and insect soldiers were the deciding factor in almost all of his battles. That allowed him to overwhelm opponents stronger than himself, forcefully wearing away powerful creatures that were far superior to him. However, his insects were not beneficial to his personal strength.


    As such, Billis had to find a bnce between the improvement of his swarm and the enhancement of his abilities.


    His grandest and wildest dream was to own a resource-rich material ne of his own and to transform all the creatures within into his swarm, hoarding all of the resources for himself.


    When that happened, he would be the master of the swarm and the one who reigned over tens of thousands of nes. He would be the great bug adept revered by all adepts!


    Sadly, he had been taught a cruel lesson of reality after experiencing multiple nar wars. It was no more than a fantasy for him to achieve this dream as a mere First Grade. That was why, for the sake of his future development, he had given up on the hundred thousand-strong insect army he had so painfully raised in Garan. Billis instead chose to bring part of the elites back with him to the World of Adepts.


    At this moment, what fifteen elves he should pick became a question he needed to ponder.


    Ordinary elven fighters could only be used to hatch swarm insects; only elves who also possessed elementium powers could be used to raise insect soldiers. As such, Billis paid most of his attention to the elven casters and the druids.


    Just as he was brooding with indecision, a crass head ver found the courage to move to his side.


    "My Lord, were you willing to give your elf ims to us? We are willing to purchase them at a high price. Moreover," The ver head lowered his voice and said, "we can get you things that you might be interested in."


    "Things I might be interested in?" Billis snickered with his hoarse voice and said, "What things could you mortals possibly have that could satisfy me, hmph."


    "My lord, this is a list of our inventory at this time. Why don¡¯t you give it a look?"


    The head ver carefully took out an ancient parchment and opened it in front of Billis.


    Billis nced at the piece of parchment, and his bug¡¯s face beneath the hood¡¯s shadow couldn¡¯t help but betray a trace of shock.


    Hm? Why would they have this?

 Chapter 715 Treasure Hunting in Another World

    Nightmare Flower was an extremely rare magical nt.


    The bright red color of its petals and stalk often caused ignorant individuals to transnt it into their homes or gardens unknowingly. They would never have dreamt that they had invited a deadly flower of assassination into their home.


    The Nightmare Flower could slowly absorb the Spirit of nearby lifeforms, inflicting mental fatigue upon the victims. If the victim were only an ordinary person, they would experience tremendous weariness as well as nightmare after nightmare. That was why the flower was known as the Nightmare Flower.


    As the absorption of Spirit was a prolonged process implemented through a Spirit forcefield, most people wouldn¡¯t even notice that it was the culprit. Consequently, those who lusted after the beauty of the Nightmare Flower and transnted it into their gardens would always die of inexplicable mental failure.


    Of course, such a low-level magical nt couldn¡¯t possibly be of any harm to adepts. After all, their sensitive Spirits allowed them to sense the strange forcefield generated by the Nightmare Flower easily.


    ording to Billis¡¯ understanding, Nightmare Flowers that had been feeding on human Spirits for ten years could be used to brew a special Keenthought Potion. This Keenthought Potion was a Second Grade potion even in the World of Adepts. It could continuously replenish an adept¡¯s Spirit for half an hour.


    The difficulty of his advancement would definitely be much lower if he could consume a Keenthought Potion during his attempt.


    That was why Billis paused for a moment when he suddenly saw the ¡¯Flower of Misfortune¡¯ listed on the inventory. He couldn¡¯t help but extend his insect w to pinch the parchment and demanded with a soft voice, "What does this Flower of Misfortune look like? Describe it to me."


    The crass-looking ver head immediately leaned over at the first sign of a prospective venture. He didn¡¯t care about Billis¡¯ non-human hand and started to describe the appearance, age, and look of the flower in great detail.


    Billis immediately fell into deep thought after hearing the ver¡¯s description.


    In all honesty, he hadn¡¯t had too much hope when he asked the question. After all, this was the Faen ne, not the World of Adepts. The names of the flowers might be simr, but there was a possibility that they were twopletely different nts.


    However, judging by the person¡¯s descriptions, Billis had absolute certainty that the Flowers of Misfortune growing in the Faen ne were the rare Nightmare Flowers found in the World of Adepts.


    Of course, the Faen ne also had plenty of casters and had thus discovered the unique characteristics of this magical nt. That said, the alchemy system of Faen was not as developed as the World of Adepts. They did not have any effective methods of extracting the spirit within the Flower of Misfortune.


    That was why the Nightmare Flowers that could easily sell for six thousand magical crystals per nt were only considered an auxiliary alchemical material here. Their base price was approximately two to three hundred magical crystals.


    Perhaps it was the scarcity of the ntbined with the different name that prevented it from being discovered by the Pale Witches. Otherwise, Billis would never have experienced such a fortunate event.


    Billis immediately dragged the head ver to a corner without any hesitation and started a round of negotiations while being careful to keep his cards close to his chest.


    The head ver might have figured out that the Flowers of Misfortune were more important to this adept, but he didn¡¯t push the price excessively out of his desire to leave on friendly terms.


    After a round of negotiations, Billis turned over his im of the fifteen elven ves to the head ver, while the man handed over four twenty-year-old Flowers of Misfortune.


    After Billis had sessfully pocketed the four Flowers of Misfortune, the only thing left was for the head ver to pick the ves he wanted.


    The ver had clearly figured out which goods he wanted, as he quickly picked out the elven ves that he liked. His choice was very much beyond Billis¡¯ expectations.


    If Billis had been the one to choose, he would have gone for those with high elemental affinity and those with power. Though the head ver had only chosen First Grade profession owners, they mysteriously included every single profession: archers, casters, and druids.


    Moreover, he didn¡¯t choose the few advanced First Grade elves. He instead opted for several beginner First Grades.


    Billis turned his green eyes around several times before he discovered the surprising truth. The elves that the ver had chosen might not be the strongest, but he had chosen slender bodies, perfect figures, and their pretty and youthful faces; the slenderness and beauty of the elves were perfectly embodied in these individuals!


    After selecting the ves he wanted, a native teenage girl waved a crystal stick and dispelled the defensive arrays around the wooden cages. She then unlocked the doors and ousted the chosen elves out of the cages.


    The elves inside the wooden cages immediately started cursing and crying, turning the ce into a chaotic mess of shouting and yelling.


    However, thepounded effect of the sealing and weakening spells had turned the once mighty forest elves into frail beings. The native girl was a normal human at best. Her muscles weren¡¯t even developed. Yet, any single strike from her easily brought a master sword dancer to the ground.


    An indescribable sorrow and tragedy rose in the hearts of the elves as they saw their once undefeatedpanions turn into defenseless weaklings, causing them to cry out loud.


    The people around the cages didn¡¯t feel a trace of sympathy for the tears of these weaklings. Instead, they all let outughter as if savoring the suffering of these ves.


    Billis did not leave immediately afterpleting the trade. Instead, he turned to look at the other head ver and merchant union representatives.


    "Since you are all here now, why don¡¯t you show me any good things you have in stock!"


    The other vers and merchants were already itching to go after seeing theirpanion¡¯s trade. They immediately swarmed the adept and took out the inventory lists they had carefully prepared.


    And who¡¯d have known? After some close examination, Billis discovered two rare materials that he was extremely interested in¨C the Redscale Overlord and the Poisondragon Water.


    The former was an odd insect with tough red scales, while thetter was a poison potion.


    Though Billis couldn¡¯t confirm their effects in the short term, collecting them for research would have significant benefits for his insect modifications in the future.


    These rare materials had slipped past the due to the misevaluation of the Pale Witches, or perhaps due to them not caring for such ¡¯small¡¯ profits. Somehow, they hadnded in Billis¡¯ hand. Naturally, there was no way he would let them pass.


    Billis spent the rest of his time in the ve market. Not only did he dly trade away his reward from the n, he even spent half of the twenty thousand magical crystals he had just received.


    In exchange, he obtained plenty of odd flowers and herbs, along with some strange insects and poisonous bugs.


    There was never such a time where Billis had so strongly felt that otherworldly nar wars were truly the fastest way to wealth!


    ............


    Even as Billis was enjoying his search for treasure in another world, his Crimson n leader Greem received a mysterious guest.


    Honestly, Greem had never imagined that a familiar face would visit him in this other world.


    "Lord Arms, I didn¡¯t think you were still in Faen."


    Greem was sitting inside his room, leisurely enjoying the rich wine in his hand.


    The guest took off his hood and revealed his head of long, blue hair. It shimmered with crackling electricity that, when paired with his handsome and sturdy face, gave an intimidating appearance.


    It was the Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms!


    Arms was standing straight, and his amber eyes swept from side to side before he offered his praise, "You adepts are truly powerful casters that are famed across the multiverse. To think you could build such a mysterious and powerful magical structure even upon thend of a different world. No wonder you people could fend off the attacks of the natives and survive here."


    Greem didn¡¯t know whether to cry orugh at the dragon¡¯s forced and awkward ttery.


    "Lord Arms, we are already old partners. I will most definitely help with anything you need!"


    In honesty, the Third Grade thunder dragon was bearing quite the considerable risk in disguising himself and visiting Greem in this manner.


    Where was this?


    This ce was an adept¡¯s tower guarded by a Fourth Grade witch!


    Even with the Third Grade thunder dragon¡¯s might, he would be captured alive within minutes if he was to catch the attention of that witch. That was why he would never have dared to take a single step into this tower if not for his faith in Greem.


    Greem hadn¡¯t done anything to him even when he was utterly sealed thest time. This time, they were in someone else¡¯s tower. Greem wouldn¡¯t be the greatest benefactor if he sold him out here. As such, Arms was confident that Greem would never sell him out in this ce.


    Still, as a Third Grade dragon, asking for help from a Second Grade adept was a request that was extremely hard to put into words!


    "Er, did I heard that in two more weeks it would be the day you adepts open the nar door and return to the World of Adepts?" It was a simple sentence, but Arms practically butchered it with how much he was stuttering and mumbling.


    That said, Greem still understood what he was trying to say.


    "Indeed, the nar door will open in fourteen more days." Greem looked at Arms with an expression of surprise, "Could it be that my Lord wants to follow us back to the World of Adepts?"


    It was no wonder Greem was so shocked. The day of the nar door¡¯s opening would also be the day the witches were their most alert. It didn¡¯t matter how good Arms¡¯ Transfiguration was; he would not be able to sneak across sessfully. Moreover, the Third Grade thunder dragon had been forcefully summoned here from Lance through a contract summoning. All he needed to do to return was to borrow the power of the contract. Why would he need to use the World of Adepts as a transit point?


    "Don¡¯t worry, my Lord. If you wish to travel to Lance through our world, I might be able toe up with some ideas for you!"


    "And if there are more people trying to travel the same way?"


    "Oh?"


    "Eleven dragons. Can you think of a way to help me bring them back to Lance?"


    "Ah."

 Chapter 716 Extorting a Dragon

    After a few questions, Greem finally figured out Thunder Dragon Arms¡¯ reason for still staying on Faen.


    Arms had actually broken into the Dragoncliff and brazenly abducted eleven powerful dragons from the forest dragon tribe.


    This iron truth caused the corner of Greem¡¯s mouth to twitch upwards. His facial muscles were almost in a spasm from trying to restrain hisughter.


    He had never thought that that one random move of his had caused the elves to suffer such tremendous losses. Greem felt extremely gleeful and exhrated, especially after the beating he had taken at the hands of the Sword Saint.


    The situation was apparent now. The thunder dragon had abducted eleven dragons of various grades from the forest dragons, but he didn¡¯t have the ability to bring them back to Lance. It was easy for Arms himself to return to Lance, but it was impossible for him to take eleven dragons with him!


    With no options left, Arms could only turn his mind to the only Second Grade adept he knew.


    Eleven dragons, one of which was Third Grade, three who were Second, and seven who were First.


    To think that he was the one to introduce such an alluring flight of dragons to Arms, only for them to fall into Arms¡¯ pocket. Greem¡¯s was currently experiencing intense internal turmoil. His handsome face wasn¡¯t quite sure whether tough or cry.


    Consequently, for a moment, Greem had no idea how to respond to Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms¡¯ question.


    "I can agree to that request, Lord Arms!" A crisp female voice rang out from the side, "We can guarantee that you and your dragon subordinates will all safely arrive in Lance. However, the associated costs for travel..."


    Arms¡¯ eyes went wide as he saw the suddenly appearing Alice.


    "Second Grade!? Even you are Second Grade already!" The thunder dragon couldn¡¯t help but stutter.


    Dragons and adepts were twopletely different creatures.


    Dragons had long lives, powerful individual strength, and an enviable legacy.


    It also caused them to develop a unique worldview.


    For the dragons, a hundred years were far too short. That amount of time would pass by in a matter of a few naps. However, a hundred years would take up the lives of most other short-lived beings.


    Dragons very rarely made friends with humans¨C not because they were unwilling, but because it was unnecessary.


    In all honesty, any human that could reach a level as powerful as a dragon would usually be at the end of their life as well. Making friends out of such people wasn¡¯t practical for dragons. If the perhaps only took a nap, then by the time they woke up their friend would be long dead, with a corpse in the earth probably dposing into unrecognizable bones.


    The adepts might be reasonably powerful, but they had also inherited much of humanity¡¯s weaknesses and ws.


    Even Fourth Grade adepts could not live longer than the dragons!


    Maybe it was their short lives that caused all adepts to mature and grow at a shocking speed and efficiency.


    When they hadst met two months ago, Alice was a dying person whose life force was in itsst vestiges. Yet...yet when they met again, she had already advanced into a Second Grade.


    Moreover, for some unknown reason, Arms would feel a vague sense of unease every time his eyes fell upon Alice¡¯s youthful body and appearance. It was as if there was something inside her slender and frail frame that demanded respect, even from him.


    "You¡¯ve absorbed the pseudo-artifact?" Arms blurted out without thinking much.


    The Second Grade Green Dragon Ohgu had also be his subordinate. Arms had gained some degree of understanding concerning the things that Greem and Alice had done over the past few months.


    "Not yet; I¡¯ve only absorbed a bit of it!" With the restoration of her life force, Alice¡¯s pretty looks and exquisite figure had been restored as well. Her spiritual aura had also be plentiful and filled.


    At this moment, just the very sight of her sweet smile would brighten the mood of anyone nearby, let alonemunicating mentally with her!


    This change would not be observable to weak individuals. They would have no idea that their minds were already under her control. Only Third Grade powerhouses like Arms could sense that odd overwhelming sense of familiarity that apanied every word, action, and move that Alice made.


    Creature Affinity!


    Arms couldn¡¯t help but frown slightly.


    He didn¡¯t know when, but the spirit that Alice radiated had somehow gained a trace of Creature Affinity power!


    Only Third Grade powerhouses like himself could resist the infectiousness of this Affinity power. Weak lifeforms whose Spirits were far below himself would unknowingly treat Alice as one of their own the moment they saw her.


    Those who were unable to resist Alice¡¯s Affinity power would never attack her of their own will.


    This...was a pretty decent method of self-defense!


    That said, even if Alice were to advance once more, she was still a frail witch that wouldn¡¯t be able to take a single hit from a Third Grade thunder dragon.


    Arms quickly broke free from the clutches of Alice¡¯s Affinity and reminded himself of the topic they were discussing.


    "You have a way to send eleven dragons to Lance? Tell me, how much would it cost?"


    "As you know, passing through the nar door means an unavoidable confrontation with the Fourth Grade witches. As such, I need to expend extra efforts to help you hide the aura of the dragons. I will lower the price for this service and only ask for two hundred thousand magical crystals..."


    "Two hundred thousand magical crystals? Not much, not much at all. I¡¯ll take you up on that."


    Honestly, this was the most challenging part of the smuggling operation.


    Trying to bring eleven dragons through the nar door under the watch of a group of high-grade witches was no more difficult than an ogre sessfully advancing to be a rogue and then proceeding to steal from a dragon¡¯s hoard.


    The unique odor and elementium aura of the dragons would not be able to escape the spiritual senses of high-grade witches, even with dozens of kilometers between them. That wasn¡¯t even mentioning the fact that most of the eleven dragons were First Grade. They didn¡¯t have the power required to conceal their own auras.


    If Arms was to boldly approach the portal on the day it was opened, there was no avoiding his fate of being captured and ughtered by the Fourth Grade Pale Witch.


    Before Arms could agree to the offer with a brilliant smile, Alice followed with another sentence.


    "...and for passing through the nar door, ten thousand magical crystals for each First Grade dragon, twenty thousand for each Third Grade, and fifty thousand for each Third Grade..."


    "So expensive?" Arms¡¯ smile froze on his face. He kept it up and said, "Very well, very well. That¡¯s not a problem."


    Unfortunately, Alice wasn¡¯t done speaking.


    "...the same price for teleporting from the headquarters of the Witch Alliance to the Tower of Fate..."


    Arms couldn¡¯t even keep on a forced smile at this point.


    "...and the same price again for teleporting from the Tower of Fate to Lance."


    This time, Arms¡¯ face turned utterly green. His odd, narrow pupils filled with the anger of humiliation.


    All these teleportation fees added together was already pushing toward a million magical crystals. Even if Arms were a dragon lord, he would have had trouble paying such a massive amount of money.


    It was practically forcing a dragon to hang himself!


    "However, considering Lord Arms¡¯ financial situation, we can ept payment by installments, pawns, or pledges with other items. Of course, if Lord Arms is willing to join the Crimson n, the costs as mentioned earlier can be immediately shed in half." Alice looked at Arms with a big smile on her face, as sweet as an angel. Yet, Arms clearly saw on her back a pair of devil wings that couldn¡¯t be any cker.


    "I could never bow my head before a weakling. That is the unchanging will of us dragons!" Arms still proudly roared even when he was cornered.


    "What a shame, then!" The smile on Alice¡¯s face was still the same, "Since you and your subordinates are not members of our n, you are unable to enjoy the privilege of having the costs reduced by half. Given that case, Great Lord Arms, I wonder how you intend to pay us for the teleportation costs?"


    "Er..."


    Arms deted almost instantly, despite his prideful and unyielding attitude just a moment ago.


    For the first time in the past two months, he couldn¡¯t help but regret how many dragons he had abducted.


    If...if only a few less green dragons had chosen to follow him, then the financial pressure he was facing might be just that bit less. A million magical crystals. It was a million magical crystals! If he owned a million magical crystals, why would he have needed to spend so much time and effort to run to a different ne to rob those brokeass goblins?!


    Aaaahhhhhhhhh!


    He had been roaming Faen ne with the cute emerald dragon over the past two months¨Cas if they were on their honeymoon¨Ceven as he basked in the adoration and admiration of his subordinates. Arms had been up in the clouds over his personal charm and had been giddy with joy.


    However, at this moment, the only thing left for him was unending frustration and regret!


    With the hoarding habits of the dragons, he should be able to fill in the massive sum he was missing if he went to borrow from the cute female dragon!


    When he thought of Iritina¡¯s coy expression filled with admiration for himself, Arms hesitated.


    The selfish and lustful nature of the dragons was known throughout the world.


    He put himself in Iritina¡¯s shoes. If he were Iritina, Arms would probably fly into a rage the moment he realized the dragon he liked had set their eyes on his hoard.


    No! He couldn¡¯t try to borrow anything from Iritina!


    How about making the other dragon subordinates pay for their own teleportation?


    If he did that, these dragons he had managed to draw to his side would probably leave him immediately.


    It was a difficult problem no matter how Arms thought about it. The previously prideful and intimidating Arms instantly turned into a frustrated teenage dragon, unable to make a decision even after he gritted his teeth and pondered for most of the day.


    "Lord Arms, we can ept other treasures as payment if you have of such things in your possession!"


    "Dream on. You evil fellows; don¡¯t ever think of getting your hands on my treasure!"


    Like an ignited explosive, Arms immediately flew into a rage the moment someone even impliedying a finger on his treasures.


    "Then... Lord Arms, I have another n here for you to pay with contributions instead. Were you willing to give it a listen?"


    At this point, Greem very clearly smelled a thick scent of conspiracy around the sweetly smiling Alice.


    Ahem. Arms was in for trouble.

 Chapter 717 Return

    The day of the nar door¡¯s opening had arrived.


    After eight long months of ughter in another world, the various branches of the Northern Witches had all returned to Shadow Ind.


    Those who had yet to return at this time were very likely never to return again.


    Everything came with a cost!


    The reduction of their ranks had happened to all the witch branches.


    The Dark Witches lost two witches, the Death Witches one, and the Coldwinter Witches one. If one were to tally up all the witch branches¡¯ casualties, most of them had suffered about one or two losses, apart from the Fate Witches.


    However, the Fate Witches still weren¡¯t the ones with the most substantial losses!


    Shockingly enough, the False Witches that had chosen to venture into the Oceanic Empire had beenpletely wiped out, with the sole exception of a Third Grade witch. That said, she didn¡¯t seem to be too mournful. It was likely that they had aplished their mission as well.


    With sacrifice came rewards!


    Though the witches had all suffered losses, their spoils were bountiful as well.


    Chests upon chests of rare treasures, cage after cage of otherworldly magical beasts, rows and rows of ves, and purses or storage rings bursting at the seams.


    The deaths of theirpanions might have been heartwrenching, but the surviving witches had all been tempered by the mes of war and had seeded in gathering plenty of resources. One had to admit that it was this method of the major adept organizations that allowed them to filter the weak and select only the elites.


    At the same time, it effectively caused the more valuable resources to tilt toward the hands of the strong.


    Of course, the witch branches couldn¡¯t possibly announce their true bounties. They had all been very careful to conceal their biggest gains from their expeditions. The only things that they allowed the others to see were the ves and the magical beasts which couldn¡¯t be effectively hidden.


    The Coldwinter, Pale, Death, Agony, and Deceit Witches had chosen to invade the human kingdoms. As such, the ves and magical beasts they brought back were of every species, almost spanning the entirety of known species on the Faen Continent.


    Meanwhile, the Dark and Fate Witches went to the elven kingdom. Consequently, their ves were forest elves and nature magical beasts of various grades. In particr, the Dark Witches, for whatever crazy reason, had brought back with them a total of over four hundred forest elves. Even the young and the old were included among them. It appeared they were an entire tribe of elves.


    Bringing so many elven ves back to the world of adepts would probably cost them several millions of magical crystals just in terms of the transportation fee. Such an extravagant use of money shocked all of the witches. They couldn¡¯t help but guess at the reasoning behind the Dark Witches¡¯ actions.


    Inparison, the Fate Witches had lost half their numbers only for their leader to advance from First Grade to Second Grade. It almost didn¡¯t seem as if their trip had been worth it! However, considering the Fate Witch branch had just been resurrected, and that Alice was the one person bearing all of their hopes, making such a decision didn¡¯t seem all that odd anymore.


    The Fate Witches¡¯ spoils didn¡¯t seem all that eye-catching either.


    Fifty carefully hand-picked elven ves and three dozen nature magical beasts. Such a number of spoils was barely passable. Moreover, who knew what the Fate Witches were thinking? To think they were bringing back with them a dozen pungent Three-Headed Lizards.


    Three-headed lizards might not be found easily in the World of Adepts, but they did exist. As long as one was willing to put in the work to search the ck Forest, they would be able to catch a couple of these lizards. Yet, the Fate Witches were willing to blow an exorbitant amount of teleportation fees to bring these beginner First Grade monsters back to the World of Adepts. It was almost as if they had too many magical crystals to spare.


    However, these were all inconsequential details. What truly gripped the attention of the witches was the False Witch that had escaped by herself. She waspletely and utterly alone. There were no spoils to be seen, nor even a trace of a prisoner. It was as awkward as it could be.


    A few of the Third Grade witches who were leading their respective factions couldn¡¯t help but approach her upon seeing this.


    Sadly, no matter how they tried to tease something out of her, they could not figure out what the False Witch¡¯s mission target was.


    While the witches chattered amongst each other on the gigantic teleportation za on the inner ind, the adept¡¯s tower inside the volcano started to tremble. A blinding white light projected onto the square as a spatial rift surging with violent energy slowly tore through the air.


    The massive array hidden under the teleportation za started functioning, and a mysterious light array formed from pure magical energy slowly materialized, spinning with the spatial rift as its center.


    Two odd giants appeared on both sides of the rift. They let out a savage roar and pulled at the edges of the breach. There was a ripping sound as the rift started to widen and expand. Once it was thirty meters wide, the two giants roared and instantly transformed into two towering golden doors, firmly stabilizing the rift.


    "Let¡¯s hurry up and pass through the portal! The flesh of something like a Cloud Giant is tough to find these days. This spatial door can only held open for fifteen minutes. All of you, hurry up."


    As the Pale Witch hurried the other witches, those who hadpleted their headcounts and paid their teleportation fees slowly started moving.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether they were human, beast, or even the magical beasts shut in the metal cages; everything that touched the shimmering nar door was instantly sucked into it, vanishing without a trace.


    The cries and yells of the prisoners grew louder and louder.


    Perhaps they had realized that once they passed through this door of light, what awaited them would no longer be the world the prisoners were familiar with, nor the people they knew. Their pastpanions and rtives would be forever gone with this step, never to be seen again!


    ............


    The World of Adepts, Werning.


    Where the Witch Council was located.


    The strange phenomenon caused by the tremors in the nar space had yet to vanishpletely.


    Layers of spatial ripples trembled around the portal opened in the teleportation hall. Every time they shook, a strange creature would be spit out from within.


    The prisoners and magical beasts that had never experienced such internar teleportation were all lying helplessly within their cages. It was clear that they were enduring the pressure from thews of the World of Adepts. The weaker individuals had mouths wide open, inhaling and exhaling as hard as they could. Every breath was as difficult as a battle of life and death.


    Conversely, every single witch and adept that stepped through the door of light appeared to be even more energized and refreshed.


    A rxing aura continuously surged toward them from the surrounding air. It was like the warm embrace of a mother,forting the adepts and making their souls drift.


    It was amon urrence for adepts returning from a different world.


    After all, the World of Adepts was where their soul¡¯s origin resided. It was only here that adepts could unleash their powers to their fullest. Comparatively, they were always in a state of suppression and rejection while in another world.


    "Hurry, hurry. Take all these prisoners for processing. These elves are too frail. If we don¡¯t do something about it as quickly as we can, most of them will die here."


    Several tall voodoo beasts that had been waiting outside the hall promptly rushed in under the orders of the witch in the lead. They helped the witches in moving the spoils and ves out of the chamber.


    Alice, dressed in her purple starry robe, extended her hands and stopped the witches and voodoo beasts approaching to help them.


    "We don¡¯t need your help with our spoils. Tell your superiors to hurry up and open the teleportation array. We want to return to the Tower of Fate immediately!"


    The witches were utterly befuddled upon hearing this.


    What? Teleporting to the Tower of Fate?


    Had Alice gone mad?


    It didn¡¯t matter how many spoils and ves she had brought back with her; hiring a mercenary and traveling to the Tower of Fate bynd wouldn¡¯t cost more than a few thousand magical crystals. However, teleporting would easily cost up to hundreds of thousands of magical crystals.


    While the witches were stunned in shock, a witch stood forth.


    "Open the teleportation array. I also need to return to our headquarters immediately."


    The witches looked over. It was the only surviving False Witch.


    It seemed there was something odd with the two witch branches. They were worried that dragging things out would invite variables and that was why they wanted to return as soon as possible.


    The Sidonthiria n in charge of managing Werning had no reason to deny such a request.


    Soon, once the other witch parties had exited the teleportation hall, the teleportation array once again got to work.


    Dong, dong!


    Two dull thuds rang out in the space, and the Fate Witches disappeared from the array, quickly followed by the False Witch.


    ............


    "Hurry up, hurry up. This, this...and this as well. Take them out of the room now!"


    Under Sofia and Snowlotus¡¯ orders, the witch apprentices that had received news of their return and had been waiting here quickly surged forward. They either used Levitation or simplymanded the voodoo beasts to lift the chests of spoils out of the teleportation array.


    They only moved one-third of the spoils and prisoners. The remaining chests and cages were ced within the teleportation array, along with the cage full of three-headed lizards.


    "We Fate Witches have lost quite a lot of strength this time. We might need quite a bit of time to reorganize our matters here. I¡¯ll leave everything there to you," Alice stood outside the teleportation array, waving her hand at Greem as she said, "The matter over in Lance isn¡¯t easy to deal with. You need to be careful as well."


    Then a white light rose and enveloped the array.


    By the time the white light faded, there was nothing left in the array.


    ............


    Lance. The metal fortress.


    A blinding white light radiated from the portal as multiple silhouettes suddenly appeared on the teleportation tform.


    Arms, who had transformed into a three-headed lizard, roared and broke free of the illusion when he smelled the familiar andforting aura of his ne. He smashed through the wooden cage and let out a moan as he stretched his body.


    The other dragons followed suit and broke out of the cage. They roared loudly as they returned to their original forms.


    For a moment, the formerly spacious teleportation tform was wholly taken up by a dozen ferocious dragons. Now it appeared narrow and tiny.

 Chapter 718 Trouble at the Metal Fortress

    "Wee back, my master!"


    A somewhat deep voice rang out from the side.


    "What is with these dragons? Are they all your ves?"


    "That¡¯s enough, Gazlowe. We can talk about thatter. Let¡¯s start with a report about the situation on Lance since I¡¯ve been gone!" Greem hastily interrupted the brain monster and changed the topic.


    "Er, master. The situation here seems like it¡¯s possible...that it isn¡¯t too good!" Brain Monster Gazlowe was stuttering with every word as if they were something he was having trouble mentioning.


    Before Greem could pursue the matter, he felt the floor tremble and the mountain itself shake. A resounding dragon¡¯s roar prated through the thick stone and metal walls, reverberating above the skies of the fortress.


    A dragon is attacking the metal fortress?


    Greem frowned again.


    "Master, ever since you left the metal fortress, those dragons have been attacking the ce like they have gone crazy. Theye here to stir up trouble every two to three days, alwaysing in flights of six or seven dragons. Their grades range from First to Third Grade. It seems they are determined to duke it out with us!" With the backbone of this ce having returned, Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe immediately went into grumbling mode.


    It was clear that he¡¯d had quite the hard time from these uninvited flying lizards over the past few days!


    "Project an image from the outside and let me see!" Greem solemnly said.


    Lance was a rare treasure trove of dragons. It wasn¡¯t dragons that you could find in here, but mountains of moving magical crystals. That was why Greem would never, under any circumstance, abandon this forward base: this impregnable metal fortress.


    The safety of the metal fortress was undoubtedly his most significant concern in situations like this!


    A metal tform slowly rose in front of Greem, and a white crystal embedded in it projected a giant light screen in front of him that perfectly disyed the situation outside the fortress.


    It was evident that the perspective of the image was from the top of a mountain approximately five kilometers away. One could very clearly see everything happening outside the metal fortress from this angle.


    Seven dragons were soaring in the blue skies outside the mountain where the fortress was located, rearing their heads and letting out earthshaking dragon roars. Every so often, one of the dragons would suddenly fold its wings and dive against the dozens of energy beams to unleash a terrifying breath of dragonfire against the stone and metal walls.


    These ck fires of fury were like roiling pirs of me. They turned into massive fans of destruction as the dragons swung their heads from side to side. The viscous ck mes continuously assaulted the stony exterior of the mountain, and the heat was so intense that it even caused the rocks to melt.


    In the blink of an eye, the parts of the stone wall where the dragonfire had swept past started to drip toward the ground like molten liquid, revealing the dark-golden metal wall beneath.


    A metal fortress managed by Gazlowe naturally wouldn¡¯t just sit around and allowed itself to be breached. Several terrifying beams of energy shot toward the dragon in a barrage. Even the tough scales and excellent magic resistance of the dragons couldn¡¯t endure magical attacks of this intensity.


    The dragon only managed to unleash its breath a single time before its massive body was shot full of holes. Blood sprayed into the air and soaked the dragon in ayer of its own blood.


    The dragon winced in pain and let out a painful cry. It pped its wing wildly and pulled itself up into the sky as it struggled to escape the radius of the energy beams.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh internally. These attacks were something only dragons could do. Any other magical creature would have been turned into skewered meat from that rain of energy beams that measured at two hundred and ten points of power. How could they possibly have escaped alive from such a terrifying attack!?


    That was probably a First Grade dragon!


    To think that even a First Grade dragon could survive a volley from the metal fortresses¡¯ cannons. Those Second Grades...


    The very thing that Greem was concerned about happened before he couldplete his thought.


    A Second Grade dragon roared at the sight of apanion being wounded. It flew to a nearby mountain and picked up a half-ton boulder with its ws. It then flew as high as it could before folding its wings and diving downward.


    Seeing that the situation was turning sour, a dozen ck cannon barrels immediately extended out of the fortress once more. Magical light gathered within them as they fired at the diving dragon.


    Like watching a high-definition fantasy animation, the Second Grade dragon used its dragon breath to clear the path, neutralizing most of the energy beams. The remaining shots hit its shining scales, and though they managed to leave a few wounds, they were far from being able to threaten the dragon¡¯s life.


    The dragon was diving at lightning speed now.


    The cold winds howled as they passed by the well-defined spikes of the dragon. It used its excellent flying technique to continue elerating as it dragged the boulder along with its ws, smashing toward the fortress like a crashing meteor.


    Once its speed and momentum had reached its peak, the dragon loosened its grip and barrel-rolled to a side. Meanwhile, the stone that had been elerated to its limit whistled and crashed into the wall of the fortress before everyone¡¯s eyes.


    Dong!


    An earthshaking sound rang out as a massive indentation impacted the metal wall. The loud metallic bang left Greem¡¯s ears ringing, and he couldn¡¯t hear anything for a moment.


    For some reason, Arms, the emerald dragons, and the green dragons had all gathered behind Greem, curiously watching everything that was happening through the screen.


    "The fire dragons!" Arms bent down with his gigantic body and moved to Greem¡¯s side. He said with a bit of self-satisfaction at the adept¡¯s misfortune, "It¡¯s Philippa and her army. You are in trouble!"


    Philippa was that Third Grade female fire dragon staying in Doomsday Castle.


    She had agreed to Second Grade Wind Dragon Cherkes¡¯ request and sent out her dragonborn army to assault Greem and his fortress without much consideration. Unfortunately, this three-hundred dragonborn army had been exterminated by the adepts in the depths of the Swamp of Sorrows, along with the two hundred Dragon Cultists.


    The female fire dragon had gone utterly berserk ever since then!


    She had personally attempted to attack the fortress the first few times and suffered quite a few injuries under the concentrated attacks of the magic energy cannons. She didn¡¯t give up in spite of this. In fact, she even went back to the Doomsday Volcano to gather manpower for the express purpose of attacking the fortress.


    All the male dragons that had at one point been her guests were summoned to follow her in constantly harassing and attacking the fortress. Thanks to the efforts of these dragons, the energy reserves of the metal fortress had not increased but had instead started to dry up. It immensely frustrated Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe.


    One couldn¡¯t think too highly of Gazlowe because of his high grade; his actual offensive and defensive powers were extremely weak. Most of his powers were invested in the magic generator furnace and the metal fortress.


    One could say that the magic generator furnace was his heart, the fortress was his body, and Gazlowe was no more than a brain monster that coordinated all of that!


    Gazlowe had also tried to send those magical machines to chase away the dragons.


    Sadly, this was like sending sheep to a tiger¡¯s mouth. Gazlowe had sent out a hundred-men army, yet less than ten managed to crawl back. The rest had all been smashed to pieces by these violent lizards!


    Ever since then, Gazlowe had no longer dared to send anyone to challenge these dragons. He simply relied on the strong fortress, its endless supply of magical energy, and its magical cannons to forcefully maintain his position.


    However, this caused Gazlowe to ultimately fail at executing the operation of excavating Lance that Greem had entrusted to him.


    These dragons had also learned to deal with the fortress. They were sturdy and tough, and thus, acted as the leading force in dealing with the fortress. Meanwhile, their subordinate dragonborn and associated troops were stationed nearby, forming a strict perimeter and wholly sealing the metal fortress within it.


    In all honesty, Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe had always been proud and arrogant.


    Even after he became Greem¡¯s contracted ve, he still believed that he had only lost due to a moment¡¯s carelessness. Deep in his heart, Gazlowe would never admit that this Second Grade male adept was smarter and more capable than himself.


    However, the torture he had to endure over the past few months forced Gazlowe to painfully admit that he had no methods to deal with these ruffian dragons. He could only rely on the cannons to keep the dragons out of the fortress.


    Gazlowe had no means of dealing with the perimeter and was forced to stay turtled up inside the fortress.


    That was why Gazlowe¡¯s long tortured soul started to burn with passion when he suddenly saw Greem return once more, especially with such a massive flight of dragons behind him.


    For the first time, Gazlowe hoped from the bottom of his heart that this ¡¯weak¡¯ adept master of his coulde up with a way of chasing these dragons out of his territory as soon as possible.


    Greem did not respond to Gazlowe¡¯s passionate request. Instead, he turned to look at Arms.


    "Lord Arms, what do you think about the situation before us?"


    "Kehkehkeh. Brat, does this count as you asking me for help?" The eyes of the Third Grade thunder dragon lit up. He immediately became a sleazy merchant, "You two really extorted quite a lot out of me for this trip back. Now you want me to fight your fights for you for free? Two hundred thousand magical crystals. I won¡¯t do it for even a single crystal less."


    One had to admit that even the usually proud dragons became extremely stingy and seedy after associating with the adepts for so long.


    Greem smiled as an unconceble teasing expression appeared on his young and handsome face.


    "Lord Arms, you¡¯ve brought so many dragonpanions back with you this time. I was wondering where you intend to settle them? It can¡¯t be that you intend to squeeze them all into your own territory, can it?"


    Arms¡¯ face froze for a moment. His smile dissolved and he finally started pondering this troublesome question.


    As a Third Grade dragon lord, Arms¡¯nd was only three to four hundred kilometers wide. Such a piece ofnd would be enough for twenty to thirty human lords in the human world. However, it was far, far too small for dragons.


    He had suddenly brought eleven dragons back with him this time. It would truly be very cool to show them off with him in the lead and invite the envy of all other dragon lords. However, settling them in his tiny territory didn¡¯t seem entirely appropriate. It was too shabby.


    Arms couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes in thought.

 Chapter 719 New Collaboration

    Lance was the dragon¡¯s paradise.


    However, the prerequisite was that you had to be of a legitimate dragon bloodline.


    Emerald dragons might not be able topare to the pure golden dragons, but they were already be considered a legitimate bloodline. Unfortunately for the green dragons, they were not of a legitimate bloodline.


    It was still possible for such impure dragons to win territory for themselves if they were strong and fierce. However, they would have to endure the rejection and ostracization of the orthodox dragons that prided themselves on their pure bloodlines.


    It would be no problem for the emerald dragons who had followed Arms to be dragon lords of their own in Lance. However, if those green dragons tried to set themselves up as dragon lords, they would most definitely be beaten up by neighboring dragons.


    It was an unwritten rule in Lance, and even Arms couldn¡¯t do anything about it!


    It was important to note that Arms had made many promises when recruiting the dragons in Faen. He had described Lance as the perfect paradise for dragons. If he failed to fulfill his obligations, then it was unavoidable that they would feel betrayed and leave his side.


    That was why Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms couldn¡¯t help but fall silent after hearing Greem¡¯s question.


    "My lord, you have already recruited so many men under yourself. Your forces are strong and plentiful, so why not try and expand yournds?" Greem chuckled coldly and maliciously. His intent to incite trouble was clear as day.


    Arms knew he was only trying to benefit himself in the chaos, but Greem¡¯s suggestion had hit a soft spot indeed. That was why Arms couldn¡¯t help but hesitate.


    "I only realized aftering here that you dragon lords often have civil wars over the matter of territory as well. The winners obtain thend, and the losers are forced to move away. This is true, isn¡¯t it?!" Greem continued to advise.


    "But us dragons would never kill each other. Even the losers are allowed to leave with their hoard safely. That is the bottom line we will never allow outsiders to tread upon!" Arms said, dissatisfied and proud.


    Obviously, he didn¡¯t think very well of the adepts¡¯ reputation for pursuing their enemies to their death, including his own kind.


    "Of course, of course. I would never force you to go against the spirit of dragons," Greem chuckled, "However, Lord Arms, the next time you intend to chase away a dragon, could you give us notice ahead of time? You desirend and subjects. I want the loser. As long as the loser leaves their territory, whatever happens to them after should have nothing to do with you, right?"


    Arms waspletely silent. He was once again rendered speechless by the ingenuity and calcting nature of the human adepts.


    These human adepts appeared to have no principles or bottom line that they adhered to; they would even tear away at their own kind. It was only natural that they were so much more brutal toward others. However, no matter how Arms pondered over the issue, this seemed to be the only way to solve the problem.


    After all, Greem had indeed been a great help in smuggling the eleven dragons from Faen to Lance. Moreover, ording to Arms¡¯ contract with Alice, he would have to help out Greem for quite a while topletely wipe away his debt.


    Arms gritted his teeth and finally made up his mind.


    "I will chase away these dragons for you without asking for anypensation. However, from this day forward, you must clear away all dragonborn armies and subordinate forces of any territory that I set my eyes on. I will deal with the dragon lords. If...if there are any unexpected bounties, I...I want half of it."


    Greem smiled leisurely.


    Arms was being indirect with his words, but Greem understood what he meant.


    This bastard clearly wanted to share in the loot, while keeping his hands clean of the blood of his kind.


    From now on, Arms would be able to challenge other dragons around him as a dragon lord himself. If his opponent were defeated, Arms would have no choice but to let them leave with their hoard as were the rules of the dragons. When that happened, it would be the adept¡¯s turn to strike and intercept the dragon.


    The ¡¯unexpected bounties¡¯ he was talking about were probably referring to the personal collections of the defeated dragons!


    Though Greem couldn¡¯t achieve the full extent of what he wanted, he still agreed wholeheartedly. The dragon and the adept once again signed a new contract of alliance.


    Once theypleted the contract, the twelve dragons simultaneously charged out of the metal fortress under Arms¡¯mand and lunged at the female fire dragon and the six male dragons circling the skies.


    In all honesty, seeing a flight of dragons suddenly emerge from the imprable metal fortress was a shocking sight for Third Grade Philippa, let alone the other First and Second Grade dragons.


    Moreover, these dragons that had abruptly appeared were lunging toward them and attacking their confused allies without any warning.


    Arms¡¯ dragonflight was superior both in numbers and dragon grades. Consequently, it only took a matter of two to three rounds of exchanges for a dragon on Philippa¡¯s side to turn and flee with a cry of agony.


    Thenguage of the dragons shook the skies as roars continued without end.


    Sadly, regardless of how Philippa cursed and roared, Arms remained silent and wickedly struck at her with his beloved Emerald Dragon Iritina.


    Even Philippa, who prided herself for her title as the Star of Apocalypse, couldn¡¯t fend off the ferocious attacks of two Third Grade dragons working in unison.


    Plenty of dragon blood rained down from the sky along with massive dragon scales.


    Philippa, unable to hold off the nking attacks of the two dragons, finally considered retreat. She beat her tattered red wings and fled toward her territory with all she had. She could no longer spare a thought for the male dragons who were still stubbornly fighting on the battlefield.


    Though Arms¡¯ dragons had full advantage over the enemy, they didn¡¯t strike with lethal force. More urately, the Dragon Covenant forbade dragons from killing each other. Fighting for a mate or territory was epted, but ughtering one of their own was strictly prohibited.


    If any dragon were to kill one of their own, the Great Dragon God would punish them, and they would forever be the public enemy of all dragons!


    That was why Arms and his dragons had no choice but to watch as these dragons fled, injured and wounded, even with their superior force.


    "Gazlowe, send out your eyeball guards. Find out where every single dragon came from and where their territory is. Hmph! They daree to our base to show off? We will find the opportunity to deal with all of them, one by one." Greem coldly shouted after the two flights of dragons had left.


    "As you wish!"


    The dragon disaster that had been guing him for half a year had finally concluded. Gazlowe was also brimming with fury and anger. With Greem¡¯s permission, the stones on a hidden face of the mountain moved aside to reveal a massive entrance. Thirty or forty metallic eyeballs then surged out like a swarm of bees, quickly flying in the direction that the dragons had fled.


    At the same time, more engineering robots surged out of the fortress and started repairing the walls and the magic energy cannons. Some of the robots even started harvesting boulders from the nearby mountains and sticking them against the wall.


    This way even dragons, with their fantastic sight, would have trouble finding the location of the fortress when flying above.


    The metal fortress was now being controlled by Gazlowe to continue mining the metal from beneath the mountain. The energy he needed all came from the magic generator furnace, and there was no need for external input. That made it even harder for anyone to discover the fortress.


    After establishing the development ns for Lance, Greem finally entered the portal and returned to Fire Throne after a year of absence.


    ............


    World of Adepts, Fire Throne.


    Greem had just emerged from the portal and immediately ran into Gargamel, who had hastily hurried over to wee him.


    "The prisoners and loot have all been dealt with, I trust?"


    "Yes, sir!" Gargamel respectfully replied, "All the loot has been recorded and stored in the warehouse. The ves have been imprisoned on the second level. That said, seeing that my lord has sessfully returned, do you think we should prepare arge weing banquet tonight?"


    Greem paused for a moment upon hearing this and gave the matter some thought.


    He didn¡¯t care for such banquets, but with the strengthening and expansion of the n and its members, such feasts were probably a good thing. After all, this was a significant event for members of the n to interact and get to know each other!


    "Mm, that will do! n it at your own discretion! The time will be tonight and make the location be the third level of the tower."


    "Understood, my lord. I will go and prepare now!" Gargamel nodded and gave a simple report on the tower¡¯s situation before turning to leave.


    Greem slowly walked to the fourth level of the tower and, just as expected, he saw Mary lying upon the bed in his room.


    He didn¡¯t know when, but she had changed into a thin and smooth ck silk robe.


    The silk robe wasn¡¯t veryrge. The top was barely able to cover Mary¡¯s petite and delicate shoulders and exposed her white, slender neck, and her perfect corbones, as well as the top half of her breasts. The bottom of the robe didn¡¯t even go past her knees, revealing Mary¡¯s slender and long legs along with her perfect feet.


    "What is it? Alice didn¡¯t make you stay over at her ce?" Mary¡¯s pretty and seductive face was arranged in a light smile and filled with unconceble jealousy, "Have the matters over at Lance been dealt with?"


    As Mary¡¯s jade white body lightly stretched on the silky smooth bedsheets, even Greem couldn¡¯t help but give a big gulp.


    "Do you have any ns for celebration then?" Mary continued to ask with an enchanting voice.


    She even started rolling about the bed like a young teenage girl. As her movements became more exaggerated, the sides of the robe opened and closed to reveal her two white thighs. Even the extremely arousing area beneath her stomach could vaguely be seen, distracting Greem immensely.


    "I originally intended to shower and change before attending the banquet, but I¡¯ve changed my mind now!"


    "Oh...what have you decided to do instead?" Mary stopped rolling around in her curiosity and propped up her body slightly to ask.


    Greem looked at the distracting scenery before him and roared, "I¡¯ve decided, before the banquet, I¡¯ll...eat you first!"


    Greem lunged forth, and the room was instantly filled with Mary¡¯s unrestrainedughter like the ringing of silver bells.

 Chapter 720 Clan Banque

    t


    The weing banquet was held on the third level of the tower, just as scheduled.


    Almost everyone who could participate in this banquet was one of the first members of the Crimson n.


    Though neither n Head Greem nor Lady Mary was here, the atmosphere in the banquet was just as passionate and lively.


    Most of the n adepts had just returned from another ne. Their purses were full, their pouches were bursting, and their skills had improved by quite a bit. Disregarding everyone else, even the inconspicuous Bug Adept Billis had managed to advance from intermediate First Grade to peak First Grade.


    If everything went well, then in another dozen years he might be the second n adept after Lady Mary to advance to Second Grade.


    Second Grade.


    If one were frank, this grade was already the stopping point of most adepts¡¯ fantasies.


    As for Third and Fourth Grade? Without exceptional talent and stunningly lucky encounters, most adepts would never be able to reach such a height even if they were to dedicate their lives towards work and improvement.


    The Adept¡¯s Handbook provided a veryprehensive summary of the adept¡¯s advancement system.


    First, anyone who wanted to be an adept needed to have adept talent. They would be able to be an apprentice adept.


    The so-called adept talent was actually referring to elementium affinity!


    ording to statistics from the Adept¡¯s Association, in the World of Adepts, the chance of a baby born amongst mortals having elementium affinity was only 1.31%. That meant that only a maximum of thirteen out of a thousand humans could be apprentice adepts with elementium affinity.


    Of these thirteen apprentice adepts, half of them would remain asmon men due to their inability to master meditation. The remaining half would have to take things one step at a time and slowly advance from beginner apprentice to intermediate apprentice, and from advanced apprentice to pseudo-adept before finally qualifying to attempt advancement to an adept.


    ording to the data, the sess rate of an apprentice adept advancing to an adept was no more than 15%.


    However, given any individual apprentice, this sess rate could still be increased by various means and resources. That was why some adepts liked to joke that the birth of an apprentice relied on luck, while the creation of an adept relied on umtion!


    It didn¡¯t matter how terrible an apprentice¡¯s talent might be. As long as the n was willing to invest the resources in cultivating them, their chances of advancing would be far higher than those without any backing.


    That said, the World of Adepts was still a fair world!


    Even the fortunate descendants of adepts born with a silver spoon could not raise their sess rate to a full 100%, regardless of how many resources had beenmitted to the effort. In fact, even an 80% sess rate was hard to achieve. As such, while having a giant mountain to rely upon could increase the sess rate significantly, there was still a 20% chance of failure.


    Meanwhile, apprentices who had nothing to rely upon would have the minimum chance of 15% to seed as long as they became pseudo-adepts.


    That was why no one would dare to look down upon any pseudo-adept. Who knew whether the dazzling halo of a protagonist would fall upon a particrly fortunate person, allowing them to instantly rise to be one of the true masters of this world¨C an adept!


    Meanwhile, Second Grade adepts were not something that could be achieved through experience and knowledge alone. More often than not, it demanded special techniques or unusual talents. Otherwise, the group that formed 70% of the adepts would not be First Grades, but Second Grades instead.


    Compared to orthodox adepts like Meryl, Bug Adept Billis¡¯ advancement speed was terrifying.


    He hadn¡¯t spent more than seventy years to advance to peak First Grade since he first advanced to an adept. The most direct reason that led to this was him dedicating his entire life to endless ughter.


    Whether it was the Goblin ne, Lance, or even thetest Faen ne, he had been fully involved in battles and had been a vital force. It was such constant and bloody trials that allowed Billis to obtain such an extraordinary advancement speed.


    Meryl, Deserra, Gargamel, and the others might envy him, but they could only shake their heads and sigh. After all, they couldn¡¯t possibly emte his life of living on the knife¡¯s edge. If they tried tomit to such a life forcefully, they might lose their lives before they could even improve their powers.


    There was only a total of approximately a dozen adepts in the banquet hall on the third floor.


    Meryl, who had hastily returned from the Goblin ne, dragged Deserra to a side and softly questioned him about their experiences in Faen. asionally, Meryl¡¯s eyes swept across the entrance of the banquet hall. She was clearly waiting for the arrival of her teacher, Greem.


    As the host of this banquet, Gargamel was busy walking around the hall and greeting the various adepts. Meanwhile, a pretty and voluptuous forest spirit stood at his side, brushing away every single female apprentice that tried to approach Gargamel with a cold and indifferent expression.


    A pretty young girl in a jade green dress trailed between the two of them, tightly holding onto the forest spirit¡¯s hand. She was looking around the ce with curious eyes.


    Moreover, she also had the power of a First Grade!


    Apart from these few human adepts, the rest of the adepts were of other races.


    Dana the Medusa was fairly close with Charon, the leader of the manticores. The two of them were huddled in a corner, sipping at their wine sses like the human adepts did as they talked in low voices.


    The only ones that could provide the banquet with its atmosphere were the vampires that Mary had brought back with her.


    Soros and Windsor, the only two surviving blood knights, were dressed in bright and blinding crimson armor. Paired with folded bat wings behind their backs, they looked very dashing and handsome indeed. In stark contrast to them were the six blood elves ranging from First to Second Grade.


    There were males and females among them, but even the male elves had pretty faces, making it hard for anyone to determine their sex based on their looks.


    These blood elves were not of the quiet kind, seeing as they took the initiative and led the hall in a dance. Their delicate faces and elegant dance moves sessfully attracted the attention of all the male adepts.


    The atmosphere of the banquet instantly ignited!


    Apart from proper adepts, there were also seven to eight adepts who were qualified to attend the banquet.


    They could not enjoy the privileges of the adepts and were not the main characters of this banquet. However, as the reserve forces cultivated by the n, they could still participate in such n banquets and were getting a taste of the atmosphere and methods of interactions between adepts.


    Of course, if they could win the fancy of an adept during the banquet, any resource needs they might have in the future would be solved.


    That was why these pseudo-adepts had all taken the time to dress up. The men were handsome, and the women were beautiful. They walked around and struck up conversations with everyone, making for a truly eye-catching sight at the banquet!


    Meanwhile, Goblin Merchant Snox was also an active participant of the banquet.


    He relied on his history as Greem¡¯s earliest follower to casually drift from circle to circle and group to group. He made conversation with everyone using the unique passion of a goblin merchant, cracking jokes and entertaining, almost as if he was the protagonist of the banquet.


    The ones providing service during the banquet were a group of female apprentices that had been specially selected, along with a few exceptionally obedient otherworldly ves¨C forest elves.


    One had to say that any group would have different individuals in them: some who were stubborn, while others knew how to adapt.


    These forest elves hadn¡¯t been in Fire Throne for more than a day, but they had already dejectedly resigned themselves to their new identities. They put on their ve cors and seriously attended their roles as elven waitresses.


    It was a wise move from them.


    Almost every single forest elf that Greem had brought back were fighters, and some of them were at the level of Second Grades. They might have been superior individuals and nobles back home, but here they were no more than delicate dolls that the adepts could toy with in the palms of their hands.


    They might be able to live longer if they were obedient. And if the elves insisted on being stubborn, the dissection table would be their final resting ce!


    Of course, if they were to run into some evil adepts with unusual hobbies, turning them into sex ves or specimens to add to a collection wasn¡¯t out of the ordinary.


    Finally, midway through the banquet, Greem walked in with the dressed-up Adept Mary, while he was dressed in a ck adept¡¯s robe.


    Dragonborn Zacha and Goblin Tigule followed behind them.


    The arrival of the four Second Grades in the n immediately pushed the atmosphere of the banquet to its climax!


    All the n adepts stopped their chatting and dancing to give apuse and wee these elites. The young pseudo-adepts pped the hardest of them all, and their faces flushed red with excitement from being able to witness this legendary character of their n.


    It was said that this Crimson n leader of theirs was a fantastic individual that had risen to Second Grade by his own power.


    He had started from a swamp tower, made his name in the Underground World, and excelled at manipting elementium golems. He had once beaten pseudo-adepts as an advanced apprentice and threw the World of Volcano into chaos as a pseudo-adept.


    However, the one event that could best mark the legend of this man was the unknown battle that had urred in the shadows!


    Three adepts that had just advanced turned the tables against the evil adept that had tried to kill them in a blood sacrifice. They murdered the adept even as their lives were held in the adept¡¯s hands.


    It had be his most famous battle!


    From then on Greem could not be stopped, and he quickly rose from a nameless adept to an immensely powerful elite.


    me Demon. me Fiend.


    Such titles were given to him again and again, and each time signaled the defeat of yet another powerful enemy.


    He had walked all this way and sessfully nted his very own adept¡¯s tower on the map here in this part of the ck Forest.


    As for his adventures into other nes, summoning a mighty dragon, ughtering a vampire family, and returning victorious from another ne yet again? All of these feats were the distinctive footprints that marked the rise of a powerhouse.


    Why were the adepts, pseudo-adepts, and apprentices present in the banquet here?


    They were here precisely for the sake of joining the side of this powerful adept; to share and bask in the profits of war that others could not enjoy.


    If the Crimson n were to rise under the leadership of such a legendary n head, then all of them who had joined early would rise along with him, obtaining more resources and benefits!


    And that was the only reason why everyone had gathered here!

 Chapter 721 Grand Banque

    t


    Greem and Mary¡¯s appearance immediately brought the n banquet to its first climax!


    Greem was not a body-refining adept and had none of their strong, steel-like muscles. However, his two-meter body was still perfectly proportioned and in excellent shape.


    He possessed tough and well-defined muscles, smooth skin with a gleam of red, and unique tattoos that covered his entire neck.


    Greem stood proudly in front of everyone, his long crimson hair running down his back and almost reaching his waist. Paired with the intimidating scarlet light in his ck eyes, he radiated an aura of wickedness, mystery, and wisdom rolled into one.


    Mary, holding hands with him, was also brimming with charm!


    She was an absolute beauty; ripe and pretty.


    Mary¡¯s face was delicate and wless, with distinct features. Her small, red lips spread in azy yet satisfied smile. Her shining crimson eyes were like two pure and clear rubies embedded in her perfect face, enchanting and bewitching.


    Mary wasn¡¯t in the habit of always wearing armor. Most of her white and slender skin was exposed, and only a thin silk dress was draped across her sexy body. The outfit wasn¡¯t toorge either. The upper half of it was barely able to cover a portion of her breasts, while the lower half didn¡¯t go below her knees, revealing plenty of snow white flesh.


    Such a dress would better be said to be seduction rather than concealment!


    Mary¡¯s attractive appearance made it hard for others to associate her with the idea of an evil adept. However, the pair of small but delicate bat wings on her back, as well as her blood-red eyes, were constant reminders of her true identity.


    It was like a dangerous and forbidden game of thrills. Step by step, Mary ensnared the ignorant and drew them into her enchanting and zing mes.


    For some reason, when all the females at the scene saw the handsome, yet also gentlemanly, male adept walk with Mary¡¯s hands in his own, they felt a trace of disappointment surge up their hearts, even as they were awestruck at the sight of the couple.


    If...if only the hand that Lord Greem was currently holding was theirs. How perfect would that be?


    Mary¡¯s crimson eyes swept across the field and a light smile once again appeared on her face.


    Everyone who was swooning promptly broke free of their daydream when Mary¡¯s gaze swept across them. They hurriedly offered their most passionate apuse and smiles. Just now, their Spirits had barelye into contact with Mary¡¯s own bloody and intense Spirit, and theirs had immediately shrunk into their bodies like rabbits running into wolves.


    It was only at this moment that they came to the chilling realization that the target of their envy had been a genuine Second Grade adept


    If they had infuriated her, no one here would be able to shield them from her fury and punishment!


    "You are very charming, did you know," Mary continued to walk forward elegantly as shemunicated with Greem mentally, "I sensed a trace of murderous intent in the eyes of those few girls just now!"


    A light smile still hung upon Greem¡¯s face. He continued to nod and acknowledge all of his guests, even as he replied, "I am a conservative man! You wear something so revealing again, and I will spank you on the ass when we get back."


    "Spank me if you want to. It¡¯s not like you haven¡¯t done that before..."


    That was what Mary said, but red mist still shimmered around her.


    In the blink of an eye, her seductive and revealing red dress had been reced by a perfect and delicate red gown. She had changed so fast that Greem hadn¡¯t captured her movements at all.


    "Let¡¯s make this clear first. I¡¯ll listen to you this time, but you will have to y a game of queen with me when we get back!" Mary rolled her eyes as an idea popped into her head.


    Greemughed, and a dominating aura burst forth from his muscr body.


    "Sure. As long as you beat me, I¡¯ll listen to anything you say!"


    Mary instantly went berserk over this!


    Greem let go of Mary¡¯s dangerous hand without being fazed, walked to the center of the hall, and pped twice.


    Seeing that the n head had a speech to make, everyone quickly went silent and held their breaths as they listened to this legendary man.


    "Crimson Adepts. As your n leader, I have to drink three sses with everyone here today."


    "After so many nar wars, several familiar individuals among us have departed forever. This first ss is dedicated to ourpanions who have sacrificed themselves for the cause of the n! To Sabrina, and to Endor."


    Greem drank all the wine in his ss in a single shot.


    "To Sabrina..."


    "To Endor..."


    The adepts responded loudly, drinking alongside their leader with solemn expressions.


    The waitresses in the room hurriedly walked around and refilled their cups.


    "This second ss is to you, everyone here in the hall! It is yourbined efforts and endeavors that allowed the Crimson n a chance to progress steadily. To everyone."


    Greem once again finished his ss.


    Excitement took over the faces of all the adepts as they downed their drinks as well.


    "This third ss is dedicated to our glorious future! I believe that with everyone¡¯s effort, the Crimson n and all of us here will achieve our dreams and walk toward glory."


    All the adepts roared in agreement and raised their sses for yet another drink.


    In particr, Snox¡¯s sharp voice stood out very much.


    With the soaring morale and the fiery atmosphere in ce, Greem took the opportunity to loudly announce the internal rewards for the n adepts.


    The trip to the Faen ne had been a bountiful one. They might have suffered tremendous losses, but their bounties were equally as great. This was the best time for the n adepts to share in the boons of the war.


    The rewards for all adepts that had participated in the nar war were four to five times that of stationed adepts. Moreover, they¡¯d also had the chance to gather personal loot and resources on the battlefield. With the announcement of these battle merits, the core and peripheral members of the n became apparent at a single nce.


    One had to acknowledge that Mary and Billis were the ones who profited the most from Faen this time.


    They had both led troops to assault the elves, creating the perfect battlefield for the main force of the n to attack the central mountains.


    As a Second Grade vampire adept, Mary had even gathered many powerful servants about her. No one would have been surprised at her being at the top of the battle merit rankings. However, Billis¡¯ ranking over the other two Second Grade adepts as a First Grade himself, second only to Mary, was undoubtedly beyond everyone¡¯s expectations.


    Greem announced to everyone present that Billis would be a core adept of the Crimson n. From here on out, he would be able to enjoy the treatment reserved for Second Grade adepts, even before he had advanced. That meant that Greem was optimistic about Billis¡¯ development and that he was prepared to cultivate him as the sixth Second Grade adept of the n.


    All the adepts and pseudo-adepts of the n couldn¡¯t help but cast an envious gaze at Billis after hearing all this. They knew very well that Bug Adept Billis would be a new rising star in the Crimson n.


    The only thing they could do was raise their sses and give their respects.


    Billis wrapped himself in thickyers of robes and cloaks, even during the banquet; not a piece of skin was showing. His evolution had been too thorough, leaving not a trace of humanity upon his body. He looked exactly like a bug person.


    To avoid frightening everyone he came across, Billis could only hide his looks with thick robes wherever he went. It was the only way to avoid the fearful and shocked looks he got from others.


    Despite the honor he had just received, Billis wasn¡¯t at allcent. He returned the congrattions of his peers by raising the winess with his insect ws under his deerskin gloves. The four beady eyes under his hood glowed with a fearsome green light.


    As one of the mostmitted participants of the Faen ne expedition, Billis knew very well that the n¡¯s journey into the other ne had not been for resources or prisoners. It had been for the Fate Witches located in the cold north.


    The number of resources and prisoners obtained from this battle had been secondary. Most importantly, Alice had sessfully advanced to Second Grade, and the Fate Witches were finally showing signs of assimtion with the Crimson n.


    The most significant gain for the Crimson n this time was obtaining the trust and dependence of the Fate Witches led by Alice.


    That was why, unknown to outsiders, the Tower of Fate in the Northern Lands had secretly be an outpost of the Crimson n.


    The powerful Second Grade Fire Adept Crimson n Leader Greem had Bloody Queen Mary¡¯s full support on his left, and Fate Witch Leader Alice¡¯splete aid on the right. Given a chance to develop his forces, Greem would be fated to soar up high and be unstoppable by any power or individual.


    It was because Billis was perfectly aware of this that he tucked away all ambition and desires that he should not have and started to consider his rtionship with Greem seriously.


    His body had been bestowed upon him by Greem. Even the Queen Bug that hadpletely assimted with his soul had been given to him by Greem. Consequently, Billis could not stop Greem from retaliating if he ever had thoughts of rebellion.


    Perhaps continuing to stay in the Crimson n was a decent choice as well!


    ............


    Just as the Crimson n was celebrating, the Tower of Fate in the Northern Lands was also undergoing a time of both pain and celebration.


    Their leader Alice had sessfully returned and had advanced to Second Grade. It was undoubtedly deserving of celebration. However, four of the seven Fate Witches that had apanied her had permanently died upon that distant otherworld.


    It was undoubtedly yet another heavy blow to the Fate Witches who had just started growing stronger!


    That was why after the prisoners and spoils taken from Faen had been distributed by Icdy Snowlotus and Berserk Witch Sofia, Alice walked to the cold and deserted astrology tform alone.


    Here, in this lonely and quiet world of solitude, Alice hugged her knees and sat in the corner of the hall. She looked at the starry sky above, two streaks of tears silently flowing down her cheeks.


    It was only now that she could be herself, without any reservations, and cry all she wanted for her dead Granny Endor.

 Chapter 722 The Rise of the Crimson Clan

    The return of the n¡¯s main force bolstered the morale of the Crimson n.


    Some time ago, the n had almost sealed off the Fire Cave that led to Fire Throne in order to prevent the tower from being invaded by enemies while it was rtively undefended.


    Of course, no such problems existed now.


    Fire Throne, Magma Hall, and Fire Cave were once again open to the public. The mercenaries, adventurers, and apprentices that had been waiting all along had surged into the underground adept¡¯s tower, turning it into a lively ce once again.


    Moreover, any of the outsiders that entered Fire Throne immediately discovered some things that werepeletely different from before.


    First, the tower¡¯s defense system had be even stricter.


    In the past, Fire Throne¡¯s security and patrolling tasks had always been managed by the manticores and the security arrays due to ack of sufficient voodoo beasts. Now, these menial and tiresome jobs were left to some odd magical machines.


    Unlike the usual metallic golems that other towers had, these magical machines had clear signs of otherworldly styles and designs. The energy cirction andbat systems were also radically different from the golem constructs of the World of Adepts.


    Either way, these new forces meant that Fire Throne¡¯s strength had increased.


    Second, a new batch of nature treasures had started to appear in the markets of Fire Throne.


    Be it thousand-year treehearts, unicorn horns, or evenrge stocks of enchanted longswords, elven longbows, and nature staffs, the items all suggested something more to what had happened to the n. The marks of a massive otherworldly civilization could be seen in these treasures.


    Such arge number of alien treasures and weapons appearing in Fire Throne could only mean that the Crimson n had sessfully conquered another ne again. Moreover, that ne was home to plenty of nature creatures.


    Some more conniving individuals spread this information to the outside, instantly drawing the attention of the few adept ns around the area.


    It was clear from the items that Fire Throne was showing to the outside world that the Crimson n had, at the very least, sessfully conquered two to three otherworldly nes withpletely different power systems. More importantly, their losses didn¡¯t seem to be too immense. At the very least, the known members of the Crimson n were all still present; there was no obvious thinning of their numbers.


    That was actually the one thing the other ns couldn¡¯t understand!


    Any adept n that has tried a nar invasion would understand the difficulty of such a task.


    Trying to devour an entire ne with the strength of a mere adept n was extremely difficult. A dozen adepts sent over to another ne would have trouble establishing a firm outpost, let alone conquering an entire ne.


    One simple mistake and you could be surrounded by the ne natives and exterminated.


    On the surface, this so-called Crimson n only had seven or eight adepts of various grades. Moreover, most of them were First Grade adepts. What techniques had they relied on to obtain these victories, one after another?


    Luck? Weak enemies? Powerful allies?


    It was these questions that caused neighboring adept ns to turn their attention to this newly established Crimson n.


    It still wasn¡¯t much of a fuss until all the adept ns attempted to investigate the Crimson n¡¯s strength!


    No one when it had happened, but the weak Crimson n in their minds actually already possessed nine Second Grades.


    Crimson n Leader Greem was a Second Grade fire adept, Bloody Queen Adept Mary was a vampire adept, Dragonborn Zacha a Second Grade magical warrior, and Goblin Tigule could pilot the Second Grade Goblin Shredder. Apart from these individuals, there were also two Second Grade Blood Knights and three Second Grade Blood Elves in the Crimson n.


    These odd magical creatures might not have been ablepare to orthodox Second Grade adepts. But whenbined, their forces were still a terrifying one to watch out for.


    Compared to the Second Grades, the number of First Grades in the Crimson n seemed very low.


    There were: Earth Adept Meryl (Intermediate First Grade), Bug Adept Billis (Peak First Grade), Wind Adept Deserra (Beginner First Grade), Medusa Dana (Advanced First Grade), Manticore Charon (Advanced First Grade), Potions Master Gargamel (Intermediate First Grade), Forest Spirit Eva (Intermediate First Grade), Nature Adept Emelia (Beginner First Grade), Goblin Snox (Beginner First Grade), Old Fox Vanlier (Intermediate First Grade) and six Blood Elves (Beginner First Grade).


    In any other adept n, the First Grade adepts were the most numerous since they were the fundamental fighting force. On the other hand, the number of Second Grade adepts, who functioned as the critical fighting force, was the lowest.


    However, this principle of most ns¡¯ development didn¡¯t seem to hold true for the Crimson n.


    The number of Second Grades in the Crimson n showed signs of overtaking that of the First Grade members. This...this was almost unbelievable!


    Moreover, most adept ns had to try their utmost to expand their territories. They used their tower, resource sites,castles, and other facilities to act as nexuses to control even morend and poption. It was the only way to discover more apprentices with adept talents and establish a proper and organized system of cultivating adepts.


    However, the Crimson n was a misfit in that manner. Not only was their n headquarters located inside the ck Forest, there was also no poption ornd around them for them to control. Even the n adepts behaved like hermits, rarely ever leaving the small tower buried deep underground.


    This caused the Crimson n to appear out of ce alongside the other adept ns. They were like carriages onpletely parallel lines. Both parties would have had nothing to do with each other if it weren¡¯t for the other ns deliberately trying to find out more about the Crimson n.


    However, with the increase of the n¡¯s strength, there was no longer a need for them to maintain their previous mystique.


    The development of the n and the improvement of the adepts could not be separated from resources and knowledge. Relying solely on one¡¯s own n to passively gather these things would undoubtedly be a very slow process. It would also affect the rate of improvement for the n adepts.


    That was why, with Greem¡¯s approval, most of the nature treasures, weapons, and a group of the forest elves were put on auction at Fire Throne. With Snox as the host, they sessfully attracted many n representatives and ve merchants around Zhentarim, allowing the strength of the n to slowly but surely increase.


    Fire Throne was no longer that rural cecking in resources and materials. Instead, it had be a well-visited hub of Ailovis in the centralnds.


    With Fire Throne at the forefront, thend between it and Pinecone Town became ¡¯familiarnd.¡¯


    The small forest paths gradually becamerge, clear roads. The forest beasts and magical creatures that lived in these areas were all exterminated by visiting monster hunters and adventurers. As a result, several small settlements started to appear and develop into human towns.


    The ck Forest was slowly pushed back toward the north, returning the area around Fire Throne, and a hundred kilometers to the south of the tower, to the humans.


    However, ording to the agreement between Greem and the Zhentarim Association, this newly excavatednd would all belong to the Association. It would be managed and ruled over by individuals sent by the Association.


    The adepts of the Crimson n might have been upset by this, but they were intimidated by the name of the Zhentarim Association, so no one dared to step forth andin.


    ............


    It was deep in the winter.


    A delicate and luxurious noble¡¯s carriage slowly cruised along the forest road.


    Thest trace of sunlight vanished under the dark sea of trees over the distant horizon, causing the road to turn dark and sinister.


    Even though therge carnivorous beasts in the nearby woods had mostly been driven away, it was still dangerous to travel through here alone at night.


    Willems pulled apart the curtains of the carriage and gazed into the deep and sprawling forest as he fell into deep thought.


    The cold night breeze entered the carriage along the road, chilling him to his bones and causing him to shiver.


    Willems tugged on the delicate noble¡¯s cape he wore and covered the equally fancy armor beneath it. As the eldest son of the Andorras, he was a noble with the title of Baron. He had also learned the ways of horsemanship and horseback fighting with knights and wasn¡¯t simply an entitled and weak noble.


    It was at this moment that a deste and drawn-out wolf¡¯s howl rang out from the depths of the forest, instantly throwing Willems into a panic.


    "Jem, can we reach Fire Throne by tonight?" Finally, the long and lonely trip made him ask this childish question to the butler and coachman that had followed him all these years.


    "My Lord, I¡¯m afraid we can¡¯t reach it tonight!" Coachman Jem blew out a breath of warm air from his mouth to warm his hands as he said, "There¡¯s still over twenty kilometers of mountain road from here to Fire Throne. We will probably have to stop and stay over at Goathorn Vige."


    "Goathorn Vige." Just the lowly and crude name alone informed Willems of how shabby the ce was. It probably had no facilities and only consisted of rundown straw houses.


    That meant no warm andfortable guest rooms, no delicious bread or warm soup, and definitely no beautifuldies that could uplift his spirits. Willems became irritated, once again uncertain of the mission he bore upon his shoulders.


    The man sighed helplessly and let go of the curtains, blocking out the cool air from the outside.


    Once Willems¡¯ mood had recovered, he took out the ancient and elegant magical parchment and unrolled it.


    The delicate lines of words written on the parchment with magical ink appeared before his eyes.


    "......hereby appoints the eldest son of the Andorra family, Baron Willems, to proceed to XXX and take charge of all thend, produce, and poption there. He is to be the undisputed ruler."


    At the end of the parchment, the unique magical seal of the Zhentarim Association could be seen, along with the magical brand of two of its elders.


    There was a new lord for this ce!

 Chapter 723 Crimson Majordomo

    Fire Throne, Third Level.


    Inside a magical room, Crimson Majordomo Gargamel solemnly listened to the reports of his subordinates. The cute and pretty teenage Adept Emelia sat by his side, toying with a delicate nature pendant in her boredom.


    The five subordinates were all dressed like mercenaries or adventurers. It was clear that they were outside forces that had served the Crimson n. A sinister person wrapped in ck robes was also standing in a corner of the room where the light couldn¡¯t reach them. The person remained as silent as a piece of wood.


    "...he is the eldest son of the Andorra family and is first in session..."


    "...the Association elders summoned him before he left, but we have no idea as to the matter of their discussion..."


    "...two n adepts came along with him. Both of them are only First Grade..."


    "...it¡¯s said that he has a lord¡¯s proof of identification with him given by the Association..."


    "...he is hurrying to Fire Throne now. It¡¯s likely that he will be staying over in Goathorn Vige tonight..."


    The subordinates voiced, one by one, all of the information concerning the new lord assigned by the Association to serve in this area.


    As the human settlements started to form, the honeymoon between Fire Throne and the Zhentarim Association officially ended. For a very long period henceforth, the Zhentarim Association would choose to pressure Fire Throne and force them to join the Association as one of its obedient members.


    Obviously, this utterly went against the foundations of development decided by Greem!


    Of course, public incidents to provoke the Crimson n were unlikely to happen. However, if the new lord remained hostile toward Fire Throne upon taking his assignment, then the supply and trade of the Crimson n would be significantly affected.


    It was probably one of the strategies of the Zhentarim Association.


    If the Association didn¡¯t assign a suitable ruler in time, then the Crimson n would be able to use the advantage of their tower to expand their influence to every individual within the Ailovis area.


    From then on, any human or magical creature that wanted to settle in this ce would be at the behest of the Crimson n. They would not be able to establish a position for themselves here without the agreement of the Crimson n.


    However, once the ruler appointed by the Association arrived in Ailovis, the Crimson n would have no choice but to limit their influence to an area of five kilometers around the tower, as per the magical agreement they had signed. That would undoubtedly cause the n to lose all the resources of the forest in the two hundred kilometer stretch north of the tower.


    Through the constant ¡¯purification¡¯ by the adept¡¯s tower, this part of the ck Forest was no longer a ce that terrorized humans. It was a tamednd that was most suited for excavation and development. Letting such a ripe piece of bounty slip past their fingers would be an immense loss to the Crimson n.


    Moreover, Fire Throne was located deep inside the ck Forest. If the ruler arrived, the territory next to the n would not belong to them, but to a human noble that had deeply hostile intentions against them.


    That...would undoubtedly put the n in a difficult situation!


    Guarding the Crimson n¡¯s only passage to the outside world with a human noble; that was how the Association intended to slowly torture and wear down this newly founded adept n. If the Crimson n couldn¡¯t resist the urge to retaliate, then the Zhentarim Association,¨Cwho were hiding behind the scenes¨Cwould step forth and stir trouble by acting as mediators in the conflict.


    Of course, regardless of how the Association settled the conflict, the conclusion would not be beneficial to the Crimson n.


    At any rate, there were plenty of human nobles. The Crimson n could kill as many as they wanted to. Once they were done killing, the Crimson n would have to pay an unimaginably steep price for their actions!


    That was why this new lord bore a tragic fate upon his shoulders as an obstacle that the Association had sent to harass the Crimson n. He was fated to win benefits for the Zhentarim Association that they couldn¡¯t otherwise obtain through ordinary means, but only at the cost of his own life.


    As such, the Crimson n that had obtained information ahead of time was immediately filled with hostility and loathing for the arrival of this new lord.


    However, this poor fellow was only bait that the Association had merely cast out. Killing him would give the Zhentarim Association the perfect entry point to meddle in the affairs of Ailovis. It would be detrimental for the long-term development of the Crimson n to allow the Association to extend their hands into this area.


    That was why Gargamel, as the majordomo of the Crimson n, had to treat this issue very seriously, even if he was only an ordinary noble.


    "Father, if you don¡¯t like that human lord, I can just kill him for you. Why do you need to get upset over this?" Emelia, who was sitting by his side, asked confusedly. The girl looked to be only fifteen or sixteen, but there was no weight or nervousness to her voice when she talked about murder, almost as if it was something as casual as afternoon tea.


    "We can¡¯t just kill him!" Gargamel sighed helplessly, "He might not be at all important, but the Andorra family he belongs to is a subordinate force to one of the five great adept ns of Zhentarim¨C the Braibant n. If the Braibant decide to pursue the cause of his death, they will have an excuse to extend their influence into the territory of our Crimson n."


    "Then let¡¯s just make some trouble for him and make it impossible for him to establish himself here," Emelia said in disdain, "Those human nobles are allzy and indulgent people. The environment here is terrible. Let¡¯s see how long he canst here."


    Gargamel was in full agreement with her daughter¡¯s suggestion.


    The adepts knew very well what the human nobles were like. It was mere fantasy to expect them to work and raise a town out of nothing alongside the poor vigers.


    After thousands of years of reinforcing these sses, the rule of the adepts was not something that civilians with no supernatural powers could rebel against. As the dogs and servants of the adepts, these human nobles became superior beings, enjoying extravagant lives that the ordinary person couldn¡¯t possibly imagine.


    This Baron Willems, as the first in line for session in his family, had been sent to a ce like this. One couldn¡¯t help but suspect that he had been tossed out like a pawn to be a sacrificial piece in the internal conflict of his family.


    The presence of the two n adepts beside him further confirmed this suspicion of Gargamel¡¯s.


    With the protection of the adepts, Willems could not die from idents or at the hands of magical beasts. The only one in the entirety of Ailovis who had the power to kill him while he was under the protection of two adepts was the Crimson n.


    They couldn¡¯t kill him, but they couldn¡¯t allow him to do as he wanted either, as that would restrict the actual influence of the Crimson n. Gargamel frowned before a sinister smile appeared on his face.


    "Take these. Remember, you have to find a way to mix these into the new ruler¡¯s food. One pill a day for an entire month," Gargamel took out a vial and tossed it to one of his subordinates who was dressed like a rogue. When he saw his subordinates hesitant expression, Gargamel quickly consoled them, "Don¡¯t worry, that isn¡¯t poison. Even the two adepts can¡¯t find anything once it¡¯s mixed in the food."


    Gargamel didn¡¯t exin anything more to his subordinates.


    Emelia sniffed with her nose and quickly analyzed the function of this drug based on the smell left in the air.


    Heartlost Drug!


    It was a type of medicine refined from Psychedelic Grass. It wouldn¡¯t harm the human body if ingested once or twice. In fact, it would even provide the user with a sense of rxation. However, excessive consumption would cause dependence and addiction.


    Of course, such ¡¯minor¡¯ side-effects were nothing to adepts. However, they were terrifying for humans, who had weaker control over their Spirits!


    If it weren¡¯t for this matter today, Gargamel would never have made a medicine like this for a mortal, especially with his identity as a potions master. Only a drug like this could pass the Poison Sense of the adepts and sessfully be sent into the mouth of that Baron Willems.


    After quickly and efficiently dealing with the matter of the new lord, the subordinates started reporting on thetest situation of the ck Forest north of Fire Throne.


    ording to the feedback of traveling mercenaries and adventurers, a group of evileyes had appeared near Mist Mountain. They numbered over two hundred and had taken up an underground cave, frequently emerging to harass enemies.


    Some crystal mines of decent quality had also been found in Crystal Valley. However, a group of harpies had gathered there. There weren¡¯t too many of them¨Conly about a hundred¨Cbut they were still more than enough to deal withmon adventurer groups.


    The wyverns and the wyvern king that had initially been settled near Fire Throne had no choice but to move deeper into the ck Forest after realizing how helpless they were before the adepts. After a few years of searching and exploration, adventurers had found the new den of the wyverns.


    ......


    As the majordomo of the Crimson n, all these things, as menial and insignificant as they were, had to be dealt with by Gargamel. There was no helping it. Almost the entirety of the Crimson n wasposed ofbat adepts. All the n adepts were either hiding in their rooms and theirbs or they were running around searching for the knowledge and resources they needed.


    In all seriousness, there weren¡¯t very many adepts in this world who could so diligently dedicate themselves to worldly tasks as Gargamel could.


    It was because they understood the importance and irreceable nature of Gargamel¡¯s position that even n adepts of higher grade were respectful toward him.


    Greem also knew very well the significance of Gargamel¡¯s existence. That was why he had specifically sent a squad of thirty magical machines to protect him. Gargamel was surrounded by magical machines whenever he went out to manage problems. It was an astounding and impressive sight.


    Gargamel knew his worth as well, and thus, became even more diligent and hardworking in his business for the n!

 Chapter 724 Fire Throne

    Fire Throne, Fourth Level.


    Greem was leaning over his worktable, seriously and silently drawing something on a piece of parchment.


    After this internar war, Greem had once again recognized hisck of magical equipment.


    He had been busy with all sorts of matters since bing a Second Grade adept and hadn¡¯t had the spare time to go collecting fire-type equipment that was suited for him. That indirectly reduced hisbat power!


    It was important to note that an elementium adept who wished to increase their grade had to undergo a long period of knowledge umtion and spiritual refinement to synchronize their Spirit with their body. It was the only way to maximize one¡¯sbat power.


    However, the time required to do this was unbelievably long. Consequently, many adepts could only look toward the collection of suitable magical equipment to quickly increase their power by a significant amount.


    Suitable magical equipment could often increase an adept¡¯sbat power by several times!


    Manybat adepts even adjusted their techniques to increase theirpatibility with their magical equipment, all so that they could further unleash the power of the gear.


    Greem¡¯s opponents in the past had mostly been otherworld natives. As such, he hadn¡¯t truly felt the effects of having insufficient magical equipment. However, once the focus of the n was back on the World of Adepts, Greem would have a much harder time trying to obtain an advantage against adepts of the same grade, given the level of his current equipment.


    While they were still First Grade adepts, their Spirits had not been sufficient to sustain a reckless and all-out battle between adepts. Thus, the weight of external forces in a fight became even more significant. Back then, Greem had been aided by his magical golems and could even fight off numerous enemies. He¡¯d had the absolute advantage in battles against adepts of the same grade.


    However, ever since he¡¯d be a Second Grade adept, the frequency of battling an opponent of the same level had been reduced tremendously.


    After all, Second Grade adepts were the main fighting force in all ns and organizations. Any fight that broke out between two such adepts would have an immense effect on themselves, the environment, and the forces behind them. That was why, unless necessary, the chances of a fight breaking out between Second Grade adepts was much lower.


    Take for example Greem helping Mary deal with a Second Grade from the vampire n. His action had caused them to be mortal enemies with the vampire n. Even now, the adepts of the Crimson n had to be cautious when going out on distant expeditions. They were fearful that a leak of information would cause them to be the target of that vampire n.


    These days, Greem had started studying thebat power of Second Grade adepts in the World of Adepts through more indirect means. He was shocked to find that his power, even whenbined with that of the me Fiend of Terror, was only slightly below average. That had to do with hisck of knowledge and resource umtion, but even more to do with the fact that he had neglected to convert his knowledge and resources into power.


    That was why Greem took this rare free time to sit back and systematically study the data that the Chip had collected and organized. He also started thinking about the most optimal way of allocating his resources and turning them into activebat power.


    After some thought, Greem realized that he should delve deeper into his usage of elementium golems.


    The elementium golems in the past had mostly functioned as portablebat golems.


    He was able to summon them duringbat, give them somemands, and leave them be. Their moves in battle relied entirely on the Chip¡¯s remotemands.


    Now that Greem had the runic knowledge collected from the Knight¡¯s ne and the magical machinery knowledge from the Goblin ne, he had an impulse and instinct that made him want tobine the two of them.


    Greem had once thought of creating unique constructs thatbined the strengths of elementium golems and metallic magical machines¨C the metal golems. However, he couldn¡¯tplete the project due to limitations in the magical alloy. He¡¯d had no choice but to walk down an alternative path to create an external magical machine armor.


    In his two lives, the unique mechanical Gundam suits of Earth had left the most profound impression on him!


    He had be a powerful adept with mastery over destructive powers. Some things that remained only in the imagination in the past had some chance of being realized now.


    What were Gundams?


    No more than externalpound armor!


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the defensive forcefields, the strong alloy armor, or the transforming weapons. These things were no longer unattainable fantasies, but small ¡¯obstacles¡¯ that could be solved throughplex alchemy and advanced smithing technique.


    The pilots of the Gundams in the past had been weak humans. That was why they required such strong defenses.


    However, Greem was a powerful elementium adept himself. Greem didn¡¯t need to expend so much effort to protect himself. If he truly intended to build simr external armor, the crucial point of consideration would be how to maximize the user¡¯s elementium power output.


    After reading up on most of the rted material, Greem finally gave the Chip his order to research an otherworldly version of the Gundam.


    [Beep. Received host¡¯stestmand. Commence research on information rted to ¡¯Combat Support Compound Exoskeleton Equipment.¡¯


    [Beep. Data library demonstrates that such a ¡¯Combat Support Compound Exoskeleton Equipment¡¯ would have these basic functions and abilities. Please add or subtract functions as required by the host¡¯s needs.


    [Beep. Life system circtory system. Construct aplete life system circtory system within the equipment, with the host¡¯s human race as the temte, with the purpose of supporting the host¡¯s survival ability in harsh nar environments.


    [Beep. Battlefield reconnaissance system. Allows equipment to possess the primary function of gathering and collecting necessary information on the battlefield.


    [Beep. Battlefield operationalmand tform. The host can use this tform toplete operationalmand over the entire battlefield.


    [Beep. Body sub-function enhancement system. Enhance the attributes of a specific part of the body with an exoskeleton made with magical machinery and an energy circtory system constructed with runic energy.


    [Beep. Otherworldly energy amplification system. Amplifies the level of otherworldly energy manipted by the host through magical energy, improving the host¡¯s offensive strength.]


    [......]


    [......]


    A series of beeps went off in Greem¡¯s mind.


    Greem repeatedly mulled over his original intentions and the knowledge and resources he currently held, trying his best to weigh the possible effects of every option listed by the Chip on the final product.


    To summarize: the more functions he added to this Combat Support System, the more coordination was required between each sub-system. The knowledge and resources demanded of him would also be exponentially terrifying.


    Trying to pursue all of them in Greem¡¯s current situation was a dead-end!


    The Chip could indeed design a powerful assistive battle armor by adding in all the avable functions. However, much of the knowledge and resources required were not currently avable to him. Just gathering these things would probably expend a hundred years of his time.


    After some careful consideration, Greem believed that it was best to start with a simplified version.


    "Chip, remove all unnecessary functions and leave only the most fundamental Body Enhancement and Otherworldly Energy Amplification system. Give me some practical sample models."


    [Beep. Order received. Starting spection on basic assistive armor model based on current data.]


    Greem closed his eyes and emptied his mind, injected all of his Spirit into the Chip, and used all he had to support the data calction and model construction.


    Seven hours, twenty-four minutes, and fifty-one secondster, the Chip projected a strange model in Greem¡¯s mind.


    [Beep. ording to the data, there are approximately seven hundred and neen pieces of equipment that fit the host¡¯s requirements.


    [Excluding those with excessive grade requirements, five hundred and eighty-six are left.


    [Excluding those that require unavable knowledge and resources, seventeen are left.


    [Excluding unnecessary function options, two are left.]


    As the Chip filtered out the models based on Greem¡¯s demands, the exotic armors in Greem¡¯s mind slowly started fading away. In the end, only two odd objects remained, slowly spinning in his mind.


    Greem¡¯s attention was first drawn to the equipment on the left.


    As he turned his attention to it, a bright beam of light illuminated the equipment from above, allowing Greem to see its every detail clearly.


    It was strange equipment that resembled metal armor. Tiny magical machinery was ced inside the golden chestte, and runic energy was used to connect the different devices.


    Every time Greem¡¯s eyes fell upon a particr part of the armor, an exploded view of theponents and its energy cirction would appear before him, allowing him to understand its construct perfectly.


    This whole armor would increase all his physical attributes by three points and possessed the terrifying ability to amplify all fire magic damage by forty five percent. However, to achieve this level, the magical alloy used to forge this armor would have to be the Queyras Alloy that Greem had obtained from the Goblin ne.


    Judging from the size of the armor, he would probably have to exhaust all the remaining Queyras Alloy to have a chance atpleting it. That also meant that Greem would not be able to forge any more magic generator furnaces or space furnaces before he found a recement alloy!


    Greem¡¯s passionate gaze lingered on this armor for a long, long time before he reluctantly looked away.


    As Greem¡¯s eyes moved on, the second armor set was also lit up with a pir of light.


    It...was notplete magical armor. Instead, it was an odd set of magical equipmentprised of multiple smaller set pieces.


    Greem could see five subordinateponents¨C a crown, an armband, a belt, a pendant, and a pair of boots. Each element had its own unique attributes and magical effects. When put together, they would form aplete magical set system.


    The setpiece name that the Chip had given to them was¨C Fire Throne!

 Chapter 725 Second Grade Magical Equipment Se

    t


    Burning Suncrown. Second Grade magical equipment. Magical crown. Increases magic resistance by 10 points and fire resistance by 20 points. The wearer will be enchanted with Ring of Fire, capable of dealing 40 points of fire damage/per second.


    Emblem of Fire. Second Grade magical equipment. Magical armband. Increases magic resistance by 5 points and fire resistance by 10 points. The wearer will possess the Fire Molding ability and can mold elementium mes into weapons of any shape.


    The Fearless. Second Grade magical equipment. Magical belt. Increases magic resistance by 5 points and fire resistance by 10 points. The wearer will possess the Fire Summoning ability and can summon a certain number of fire elementals from the Fire Elementium ne.


    Ash. Second Grade magical equipment. Magical boots. Increases magic resistance by 5 points and fire resistance by 10 points. The wearer will possess the Fire Regeneration ability: health regeneration will be doubled while the wearer is standing within magical mes.


    Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath. Second Grade magical equipment. Magical essory. Increases magic resistance by 5 points and fire resistance by 10 points. The wearer can concentrate the fire energy in the pendant and release it in a single breath, forming a fan-shaped me shockwave in front of the wearer.


    The Fire Throne set was made from five loose pieces. Each of them was Second Grade at the very minimum and possessed their own magical abilities. Whenbined, they exhibited some strange set abilities.


    Two set pieces: Immune to fire damage.


    Three set pieces: Fire magic exhausts half as much Spirit.


    Four set pieces: All of the wearer¡¯s fire magic is enhanced with one Second Grade magical effect (Spell Pration, Critical Spell Strike, or Extended Spell Range).


    Five set pieces: Once all set pieces are equipped, a Burning Domain will automatically form around the wearer, restricting all non-fire spells in a five-meter radius around the wearer. Anyone that casts a spell within the Burning Domain will temporarily forget that spell after a sessful cast. All units moving within the Burning Domain will have to endure a burning effect.


    ......


    ......


    Greem gulped when he saw the long list of attributes attached to the set.


    This Second Grade magical equipment might not be all that powerful individually, but when put together into a set, their odd magical abilities made Greem drool.


    This set was the most optimal solution that the Chip had given Greem after summarizing all the data.


    The knowledge required to forge this Second Grade magical equipment was already avable. The necessary resources were also things that Greem could easily gather with his current strength. That was why Greem couldn¡¯t help but hold his breath again when he turned his eyes from the equipment to the lengthy list of resources behind them.


    What a long resource list!


    Greem saw the names of countless rare resources on it. Moreover, the required amount and unit price listed behind the resources caused the oxygen to surge out of his brain. Greem felt dizzy and was having difficulty breathing.


    He endured the trembling of his Spirit and braved reading through the resource list. He finally saw the total cost of production given by the Chip¨C 1,350,000 magical crystals!


    The base price of forging such a Second Grade magical equipment set was already 1,350,000 magical crystals. That didn¡¯t even include the cost of the associated magical knowledge or the losses from failed attempts.


    For the first time, Greem started to understand the significance and importance of knowledge and resources to an adept!


    Even an extraordinarily talented genius adept would have no choice but to spend day after day toiling slowly to raise his Spirit if he didn¡¯t possess sufficient influence and resources. Moreover, the power they obtained through their hard work would be insignificant to that of adepts who easily obtained powerful magical equipment through their n.


    Even the most intense of hard work, the most extraordinary of talents, would be crushed to pieces under a sea of resources and the thousand-year umtion of a massive n, turning into no more than footnotes for the defeated.


    It was at this moment and this instant that Greem once again understood how convenient it was to control a mature adept organization with his hands. It made collecting knowledge and resources so much easier. Otherwise, he could only do like most other adepts did and join an adept n reluctantly, offering his magic abilities in exchange for magical crystal rewards and some essential resources.


    Rare resources and high-grade knowledge would still have to be obtained through life-risking ventures into the ck Forest or participation in internar wars. Otherwise, the high price of these things would be enough to crush any free adept without a n to back them.


    If they didn¡¯t want to take risks, they would have to slowly collect the necessary knowledge and resources through long years of service. It undoubtedly took up an immense amount of time and energy.


    As such, when Greem looked at the basic equipment models provided by the Chip, he wasn¡¯t looking at magical equipment. He was looking at towering and unreachable mountains of magical crystals.


    Greem would have to squeeze everyst bit of juice out of the Crimson n¡¯s reserves to even have a chance atpleting this Fire Throne set. Consequently, he could notplete the set in a short amount of time!


    The more practical solution was to choose one or two pieces of the set and forge those first to increase hisbat power. Once the n¡¯s financial situation was in a better spot, he could consider creating the rest of the set pieces.


    If that was to be the case, then which pieces should he choose?


    Greem¡¯s passionate gaze roamed about the five magical pieces as he gritted his teeth and considered how he should make his choice.


    Whenpared to each other, the Burning Suncrown provided the highest resistance of the five set pieces. It was also clearly the core equipment of the set. However, the Ring of Fire it provided ovepped with Greem¡¯s mastery of the same spell. If the effect of the two spells couldn¡¯t be stacked, then the value and efficiency in picking it would be much lower.


    Meanwhile, The Fearless¡¯ most eye-catching skill was its ability to summon a group of fire creatures. Elementium golems could entirely rece this ability and could notplement orpensate Greem¡¯s current abilities.


    Now that these two pieces had been excluded, it was easier to make a choice. Greem only needed to choose between the Emblem of Fire, Ash, and the Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath pendant.


    Greem frowned and pondered the question for quite a while. Finally, he made up his mind and chose the Emblem of Fire and Ash, the boots. He already possessed plenty of offensive magic. A free Second Grade Dragon¡¯s Breath spell wasn¡¯t enough to attract his interest. Instead, the unique abilities of the other two magical equipment gave him something to look forward to.


    The initial cost estimate of creating the Emblem of Fire and Ash was four hundred and sixty thousand magical crystals. Moreover, he would also have to purchase some fire dragon¡¯s hide, fire agates of the highest quality, and a type of unique magical alloy known as meloathe Iron.


    Greem had plenty of high-quality fire agates.


    He had obtained these after scouring the nest of Second Grade Green Dragon Ohgu back in Faen ne.


    meloathe Iron was a more troublesome material to obtain. It was a unique magical material formed from Pyrophobic Stones found deep in volcanoes after they had been soaked in the blood of fire creatures for a long time. It was very rare for such a material to appear naturally. Consequently, they only truly emerged in theboratories of high-grade alchemists.


    If Greem needed it, his only choice was to send people to buy some from the forces scattered around Zhentarim. Of course, he could also find some in the shops and auctions that the Silver Union had set up in the central area. However, the price was proportional to its rarity.


    It was thest material¨Ca fire dragon¡¯s hide¨Cthat troubled Greem the most!


    It was hard to findrge dragon-type beasts in the World of Adepts nowadays, not to mention pureblood fire dragons.


    Since he was to forge a piece of Second Grade magical equipment, it was clear that a Second Grade fire dragon¡¯s hide would be the most suitable material.


    However, Greem might not be able to deal with a Second Grade fire dragon, even if he were to bring along all the Second Grade adepts in the n. After all, dragons were universally known to be powerful beings. They had absolutely no problem fighting off multiple enemies.


    Moreover, the dragons weren¡¯t stupid either. If they were fighting a losing battle, they could just p their wings and fly away. Greem and his adepts would have an immensely difficult time stopping them from escaping.


    The only ones in the Crimson n who had the endurance to take a Second Grade fire dragon head-on were Dragonborn Zacha and Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder. However, as a half-blood dragonborn, Zacha was very easily affected by a dragon¡¯s aura of might.


    It was likely that his legs would be trembling even before he started fighting.


    It wasn¡¯t hisck of courage, but his half-dragon bloodline being affected by the dragon¡¯s presence!


    The other tank, the Goblin Shredder, was agile on the ground despite its heavy metal body. However, it was no better than a clumsy bear when the battle took to the skies. Having it fly up into the air and intercept the dragon would be aical sight.


    The only ones in the n who could match the dragons in flight speed were Mary and her blood knights and blood elves. However, these people were all pseudo-Second Grade. They had the attributes of Second Grade creatures, but they didn¡¯t have thebat power to match.


    Moreover, vampires naturally had a weakness they could notpensate for¨C their weak defenses and frail bodies. A massive dragon¡¯s breath would be more than enough to exterminate the lot of them.


    That was why Greem had often resorted to schemes and geography to constrain the dragons¡¯ movements and flying abilities when facing them in the past. He would then fight as fast as he could and knock out the dragons with wild attacks in the shortest time possible, before they could even react.


    Otherwise, once the dragons realized the situation they were in, they could easily use the advantage of their resilient bodies to drag the Crimson adepts into a gueri war. When that happened, the ones who would die wouldn¡¯t be the dragons, but Greem and his adepts!


    All these troublesome matters made the crafting process almost impossible. Any other adept would probably have to choose a recement material with simr attributes to a fire dragon¡¯s hide. For example, the hide of a fire lizard, or the skin of a zebird.


    However, Greem happened to have a certain ne of Lance in his hands. Since there was a female fire dragon like the Third Grade Star of Apocalypse Philipa, it shouldn¡¯t be a problem finding a suitable Second Grade fire dragon. It seemed there was one such Second Grade fire dragon in the dragonflight that had followed Philipa to assault the fortress.


    Greem fell silent in thought and started contacting Brain Monster Gazlowe, who was far away in Lance.

 Chapter 726 Dragonslaying Expedition

    As expected, Greem obtained information on the Second Grade fire dragon he wanted from Gazlowe.


    Bamler Borratec. Second Grade fire dragon. Dragon Lord of the Searing Canyon in the Burning ins, ten thousand kilometers away from the Stalon Mountains where the metal fortress was.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for Philipa inviting the dragon, Greem¡¯s influence would not have extended to such a distant ce, even in three to five years. Naturally, he would not have gotten in contact with this Second Grade fire dragon.


    Now that they had a clear target, Greem no longer hesitated. He started ordering Gazlowe to gather information on Second Grade Fire Dragon Bamler Borratec as quickly as possible.


    At the same time, Greem started to make the proper preparations for this dragonying expedition.


    Fire dragons like this often lived in extremely harsh environments, such as volcanos or undergroundva seas. Neither area was a ce that ordinary individuals could set foot.


    Greem¡¯sbat power would not be affected in such an environment and would, in fact, increase tremendously. However, the other adepts in the n would not enjoy such a boon. Their strength would be significantly limited there.


    To prevent the n adepts from being affected by the environment, they had to prepare things like fire-resistant equipment, magic-resistance potions, healing potions, and healing wands ahead of time. Of course, if they could get a map of the Second Grade fire dragon¡¯s den before the fight started, their victory would be much more assured.


    Greem handed this reconnaissance task to Old Fox Vanlier and two blood knights.


    They would set off from the metal fortress and sneak all the way to the Second Grade fire dragon¡¯s base. They would then have to find a way to abduct a dragonborn servant and obtain a map of the fire dragon¡¯s pce through interrogation.


    The task of collecting fire-resistant equipment was left to Snox.


    As the future manager of the Crimson n¡¯s finances, such a minor task was his responsibility toplete!


    Meanwhile, anything rted to potions was left to Gargamel. He was a potions master, after all. Fulfilling the needs of the Crimson n was no problem as long as he had sufficient materials.


    The few Second Grade blood elves that had joined the n had just switched from nature affinity to blood affinity; they were still figuring out how to control their powers for use inbat. As such, they would not be participating in this dragonying expedition. Otherwise, they would definitely be the first casualties.


    Apart from internal preparations, Greem was also trying his best to recruit external help.


    Unfortunately, Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms had no interest in victimizing his own kind. He firmly rejected Greem¡¯s invitation. However, Greem personally suspected that Arms¡¯ disinterest was purely due to his subordinates being emerald and green dragons. These two types of dragons were nature and forest dragons and wouldn¡¯t fancy staying in a zingnd of fire that had no trace of green.


    Even if he helped Greem obtain the Burning ins and the Searing Canyon, both the spoils and territory would only belong to the adepts. Arms would get nothing.


    Though this was a somewhat uncharitable suspicion, Greem believed this to be the actual answer, especially given his understanding of Arms!


    After facing rejection from the thunder dragon, Greem could only ce his hopes of reinforcement in the dragon-devouring female assassin¨C Oliven. He promised to retrieve only a suitable amount of dragon hide as well as the dragon crystal after killing the fire dragon. Oliven dly agreed to this offer and hurried to the metal fortress.


    Oliven hadn¡¯t been idling about while Greem and the Crimson adepts were absent from Lance. She had been spending her days roaming near the dens of the various dragon lords. When she met Greem again, she immediately and very firmly requested to exchange this information for the Second Grade fire dragon¡¯s dragon crystal.


    After all, devouring the entirety of a dragon was the only way to provide Oliven with a noticeable increase in power. The evolution ability of a dragon devourer would be severely hampered if they couldn¡¯t devour the fairly significant dragon crystal.


    Trying to exchange a bunch of non-crucial information for a Second Grade dragon crystal they were bound to get? Greem was amused and almostughed out loud at Oliven¡¯s naivety.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Oliven spent her days roaming about in the wild and rarely ever interacted with others. Even though she was talented and intelligent, she couldn¡¯t help but betray her low social skills.


    Greem once again smiled and offered his conditions to this dragon-devourer who possessed the title of Dragon Hunter.


    Join the Crimson n and be an official adept of the Crimson n!


    As long as she did this, Greem would be willing to offer a Second Grade fire dragon crystal as her pay. Moreover, Oliven would be able to enjoy the same privileges as the other n adepts from now on.


    Oliven didn¡¯t reject this offer immediately like she hadst time. Instead, she spent a whole two weeks to think about it. The ruin of her family and the extinction of her kind had made her distrustful of all other people.


    However, the temptation of aplete Second Grade fire dragon was too immense. Oliven had practically suffered through these two weeks with minimal amounts of sleep.


    In the end, Oliven could not resist the urge and desire to grow stronger and agreed to Greem¡¯s conditions.


    Unbeknownst to the outside world, the Crimson n had recruited yet another strange Second Grade¨C Dragon Devourer Oliven.


    In all seriousness, Oliven¡¯s Second Grade power was very much inted!


    If she was fighting against a dragon, there was no doubt that she would be able to unleash the strength of an advanced Second Grade. However, if she weren¡¯t dealing with a dragon but a Second Grade adept, Oliven would be no more than a beginner Second Grade female assassin.


    Moreover, ording to the employment agreement signed between the two parties, Oliven refused to leave Lance. She was only willing to provide the Crimson n with the necessary fighting power on that ne. Greem didn¡¯t push too hard on this matter. After all, the Crimson n was not facing an imminent threat of war in the World of Adepts. Currently, most of their efforts were still invested in Lance. As such, their goals were essentially the same.


    ............


    Burning ins, Searing Canyon.


    It was and that was perpetually burning.


    Everything on the ground that could ignite had already been burned to ashes. The only things left were a field of red-hot rocks and a thickyer of ash.


    Dense volcanic clouds floated two hundred meters above the ground, turning the sky dark and gray. The sun hanging in the sky was like a dark red fireball, slowly radiating heat and light without any of its usual warmth and gentleness.


    Walking on this scorchingnd that could catch fire at any moment was an intolerable experience. Even the air that one inhaled was unbearably hot and scalding. An ordinary person would probably have all of the water in their bodies drained away by the heat in less than half an hour, leaving only a dry and cracked corpse behind.


    The only things that could survive in thisnd were fire magical beasts or elementium creatures. All other living beings had either migrated or turned into someone¡¯s lunch.


    Either way, there was no point in living in a ce like this without exceptional fire resistance!


    Neers to thisnd often thought of the Burning ins as a dead zone where life could not bloom and where deathly silence reigned supreme.


    However, when they entered the ins, they would be shocked to find countless creatures living in this harsh environment. There wererge groups of intelligent lifeforms among them, like the ckiron Dwarves, the Firethroat Dragonborn, mebelly Ogres, ckstone Orcs, and countless other magical creatures such as Magma Beasts, Lava Beetles, Magma Elementals, and many other elementium creatures with limited intelligence.


    As the subordinates of the Second Grade Bamler Borratec, the Firethroat Dragonborn were the undisputed rulers of this ce. Meanwhile, the ckstone Orcs and the ckiron Dwarves were only subordinate forces of the Firethroat Dragonborn, helping them maintain their rule over the Burning ins.


    Meanwhile, Second Grade Fire Dragon Bamler Borratec hid deep within the Searing Canyon.


    The so-called Searing Canyon was just a fissure that had opened up in the center of the Burning ins.


    A long and narrow fissure had been opened in the ground here. Looking down from above, one could still see the roilingva a thousand meters below. Bamler¡¯s den was constructed in the side of a wall just one hundred meters above the sea ofva.


    Under the oversight of the dragon, the ckiron Dwarves had only managed to dig out a windingbyrinth there after losing a hundred of their own. The bedroom of the fire dragon lord was located at the end of thebyrinth.


    In all truthfulness, Old Fox Vanlier had not been able to obtain a map of the fire dragon¡¯sbyrinth, even after he had tried his best. ording to the dragonborn guard they had captured, the Second Grade fire dragon lord had devoured all ckiron Dwarves and dragonborn guards in charge of constructing thebyrinth once it waspleted.


    Moreover, Bamler had set up a fearsome number of magical traps and rms inside thebyrinth.


    It was topletely prevent the possibility of outsiders trying to get at his hoard!


    Sadly, regardless of how many traps and murder weapons Bamler had prepared, he could not extinguish Greem¡¯s determination and resolution to kill him and take his hide.


    However, the only flying ship they possessed been lost in Faen ne. That caused the Crimson n to lose their ability to drop magical machine squads. Marching tens of thousands of kilometers to the Burning ins with an army of magical machines and crossing through seven or eight dragon lord territories while they did so was an impossible task.


    That was why Greem quickly gave up on the idea of a war. He instead chose to carry out this dragonying expedition as a rapid execution with an elite group!


    The participating adepts were naturally the current Second Grade main force of the Crimson n.


    As the leader andmander of this operation, Greem was naturally taking part. The other participating adepts included Mary, Zacha, Tigule, Oliven, Bug Adept Billis, and the two blood knights.


    This group could be said to be the strongest force that the Crimson n could bring out!

 Chapter 727 Burning Plains

    One monthter.


    After traversing many rough mountains and hills, Greem¡¯s party of six finally arrived at the Burning ins they had heard so much about.


    The entire world changed before their eyes when they climbed across one steep mountain.


    The brilliant sun in the sky was covered beneath ayer of dark gray mist; only a sullen red wheel could vaguely be seen.


    However, the most eye-catching feature of the area wasn¡¯t its sky or the ever-present heat waves, but the geography.


    When one looked into the distance, they wouldn¡¯t be able to find any other color apart from red. There were dark rednds and the crimson rocks. A strange power had twisted this once beautiful mountain into a burningnd with almost no life.


    Fissures andva pools of various sizes were everywhere. Therge-scale eruptions of underground volcanoes over the years had turned all the rocks here into magma, forever altering the geography of thend. The mighty volcanoes, shattered mountains, and jagged magma fields impressed all outsiders with the destructiveness of nature!


    A massive volcano was still spitting out thick ck smoke and volcanic ash in the distance at the very limits of the adepts¡¯ range of sight. asionally, some zing piece of volcanic rock would fly out of the volcano and crash somewhere, leaving a trail of ck smoke in the air.


    A rolling river ofva meandered at the foot of the volcano, where many elementium creatures could be seen frolicking about.


    Greem looked away from the volcano and returned his gaze to the earth beneath him.


    His thick boots pressed against the ground and crushed the dirt. It could no longer be called earth. Not a single patch of moist soil could be seen. The only things present were crumbling pieces of rock and stone.


    [Beep. Environment probe datapleted.


    [Mainponents of the air are as follows: 63% nitrogen, 23% oxygen, 12% carbon dioxide, 0.8%methane,...


    [Air temperature: 46 degrees Celcius.


    [The air containsrge amounts of toxic and harmful substances that are hazardous to the human body.


    [Host¡¯s Physique ispatible with the current environment. Body cell activity has increased, elementium sensitivity has increased, Spirit and stamina regeneration slightly increased.]


    ......


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a silent sigh as he looked at the datapiled by the Chip. This ce was only the outer area of the Burning ins, yet the temperature was already forty-six degrees. If they were to press on into the center of the Burning ins, the temperature there would probably exceed the thermometer!


    If Greem were an ordinary person, just the current environment would be enough to kill him a thousand times over. There was no need to even talk about dragonying. He would probably be long dead before he could see a single hair of the dragon.


    However, Greem felt a sense of rxation and freedom that permeated his body upon arriving in this ce. Those hot winds and that maddening heat were not only any threat to him, but they were even rejuvenating his spirits and causing the blood in his body to be vigorous.


    A light click rang out as the pebble by Greem¡¯s feet rolled away. A half-meter long miniature fire lizard emerged from beneath the ground and stared at the adepts briefly before scurrying away.


    "Let¡¯s go. There are still two hundred kilometers from here to the fire dragon¡¯s den. We need to hurry up!" Greem quickly surveyed his surroundings and led his party toward the towering volcano in the distance.


    Mary, Oliven, and Billis were all draped in thick ck cloaks. Their physical features were well-hidden as they silently followed Greem into the distance.


    A good half of Goblin Tigule¡¯s long robe dragged behind him due to his short stature, rustling as it scraped across the ground. Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s massive body couldn¡¯t be hidden either. He decided to toss away his cape and march at the end of the group in his shining armor of wind indurium. He held his lightning spear in one hand and the Frozen Mallet in the other.


    Stealth was no longer useful now that they were here.


    At any rate, their party was powerful enough to hold their own even in a frontal confrontation against that Second Grade fire dragon. Thus, no one expended any effort to hide and instead made a beeline straight for that impressivelyrge volcano.


    After all, the rendezvous point they had agreed upon with Vanlier was there!


    The Burning ins might have looked harsh and empty, but there were plenty of fire beasts and elementium creatures hiding all over.


    When Greem and his party stepped on the sand and marched forward, greedy and burning gazes looked upon them through the cracks in the crimson rocks and shadows of massive magma boulders, locking onto the adepts and refusing to leave.


    Instinctively, these creatures could sense a harsh and unforgiving aura around the adepts. They didn¡¯t dare to attack recklessly. That said, their instincts as bloodthirsty creatures wouldn¡¯t allow them to let such rare fresh meat slip away from their mouths.


    As Greem¡¯s party slowly progressed, they could see signs of hordes of fire creatures around them.


    Once Greem and the adepts entered the depths of the Burning ins, they ran into the first group of ignorant fools that dared to stop them on their path.


    It was a patrol group of ten ckstone Orcs!


    ckstone Orcs were a small branch of the massive orc bloodline.


    They were all muscr and bulky individuals with intimidating gaits and even more threatening looks.


    Due to theck of wood or any such produce in the Burning ins, everything that the orcs wore on them was special leather armor that they had skinned from fire creatures. Their weapons were also varied and differed from individual to individual.


    Some had crude stone sticks, and some had bone spikes they had snapped off the body of some otherrge creature. Of course, most of them were equipped with fearsome metal hammers orrge clubs with exaggerated designs.


    Every orc warrior stood at two meters tall, with broad chests, thick waists, and muscles that seemed forged from iron. They hadrge mouths, fangs, and had odd runes painted on their faces with red dye. Their massive nose rings jingled from their heavy breaths.


    The leading orc smashed his massive warhammer in front of the adepts and blocked their path.


    His fierce eyes swept across this unique party and finally fell upon the dragonborn at the rear.


    "Hey, big one; which lord do you serve? Why¡¯d youe to our ce?"


    This orc captain was speaking in traditional orcish, but a few odd Dragontongue pronunciations had been used, making for a bizarre-sounding sentence. However, Greem and the others didn¡¯t seem to care. Instead, they red sinisterly at these orcs from underneath the shadows of their hoods, as if they were looking at dead people.


    The average level of these orcs was no more than pseudo-adept level. That said, each and every one of them had the bodily strength of a First Grade body-refining adept. Moreover, staying inside the Burning ins for an extended period of time had also caused their bodies to develop fire resistance far stronger than ordinary creatures.


    However, this ¡¯meager¡¯ strength was entirely insignificant before Greem¡¯s party!


    "Who¡¯s going?" Greem looked at these pathetic pseudo-adept level fools strutting in front of him. He smiled chillingly and secretly sent mental messages to everyone.


    Oliven remained unmoving.


    Tigule gripped the crystal golem talisman dangling on his chest, wondering if he should let out the Goblin Shredder now. Dragonborn Zacha had yet to take a step or speak before Maryughed and struck.


    Red shadows shed all over the ce.


    Mary took off her hood and revealed her pretty face. Arge and steaming heart pulsed in the right hand she had extended from under her cloak.


    The orc captain¡¯s eyes were wide open, staring unbelievably at the still-beating heart the opponent was holding in her hand. It was a long timeter before he remembered to look down and examine his chest, only to see a massive hole and a fountain of blood where it once was.


    That heart was his.


    This thought hadn¡¯t entirely formed in his mind when the orc captain roared, dropped his weapon, and copsed heavily to the ground.


    Mary lifted the orc heart and raised her hand as if to down an entire ss of wine in a single go. She immediately started spitting out the blood and tossed the heart away as far as she could.


    "These orcs¡¯ blood is foul. Dammit! They deserve to die!" A stern look shed in her crimson eyes, "Billis, I¡¯ll leave these fellows all to you! "


    The cloaked bug adept acknowledged Mary¡¯s words and stepped forward. He waved his loose sleeve as a massive swarm of insects surged outward, turning into ten ck arrows and shooting toward every single orc.


    The orc warriors roared upon seeing this and raised their weapons to cut these ck arrows into pieces. However, the arrows immediately scattered and turned into swarms of ck insects, lunging at the orcs faces and bodies.


    In the blink of an eye, all nine orc warriors and the fallen orc captain werepletely covered in ayer of squirming ck insects.


    The orc warriors tossed away their weapons and used theirrge fists and palms to swat away at the insects on their bodies. They smashed several of the insects into pungent blood and pulp, but even more of them crawled into the orcs¡¯ bodies through their orifices or simply dug inside through the wounds they had inflicted.


    The orc warriors roared and howled in agony. These swarm of ck insects had actually devoured them alive!


    Though everyone had seen this scene y out many times before, they still couldn¡¯tpletely get used to it.


    ughter was natural to adepts, and they weren¡¯t opposed to it. However, not every adept could ept making ughter such a bloody and cruel affair. In particr, Tigule felt his stomach roll, and he frowned.


    He would probably be gagging if he wasn¡¯t trying his best to hold it back!

 Chapter 728 Besieged

    With the extermination of the orc squad, the fire creatures that had been walking around the area instantly vanished without a trace.


    They might not have been the most intelligent of creatures, but their instinct for danger was exceptionally sharp.


    They scattered the moment they realized that Greem and his party were dangerous characters and went straight back to their nests to hide.


    The adepts couldn¡¯t be bothered to deal with these unintelligent creatures either. They continued down the mountain after putting on a good show of force.


    Sprinting fifty kilometers in a single breath was nothing difficult with the Physique of the adepts.


    Greem¡¯s party arrived at the foot of the towering volcano by sunset.


    The air had reached shockingly high temperatures here. The adepts had no choice but to radiate the elementium particles within their bodies to neutralize the vigorous fire elementium around them. Otherwise, even the cloth robes and capes that they were wearing would burst into mes from the heat.


    The stifling smell of sulfur in the air beneath the mountain was so pungent that it caused headaches for everyone. Apart from Greem, who was able to endure the experience easily, the adepts had no choice but to erect elementium barriers to maintain the cirction of their life systems.


    While the adepts could use their magic to protect themselves, Dragonborn Zacha and Goblin Tigule couldn¡¯t do so.


    Zacha was in better condition. His twenty-four points of Physique allowed him to endure environments even ten times worse than this. Other than a bit of annoyance at the baking heat, this tiny ¡¯obstacle¡¯ couldn¡¯t even faze the Second Grade dragonborn.


    However, Tigule was almost at his limits.


    The Goblin Shredder he piloted might have the might of a Second Grade, but he was only at intermediate First Grade. The adepts could use their magic to sustain themselves in this environment while the dragonborn could endure the punishment with his extreme Physique. Meanwhile, Tigule, a mere First Grade goblin, could only pant in short and hurried bursts.


    There was no way to lock the moisture in your body in this ce. Just sweating itself would kill you!


    The part of Tigule¡¯s robe that had been dragging against the ground was starting to show signs of scorching as well.


    However, in the next second a me barrier surrounded the goblin, pushing away the burning air around him.


    Tigule immediately felt much morefortable.


    He was First Grade, after all. His Physique was several times strongerpared to an ordinary human. It was hisck of fire resistance that made him so weak in this environment.


    The Un¡¯Goro Volcano was a rtively famous active volcano in the Burning ins. It was perpetually shrouded in smoke and heat waves that radiated continuously from the ce. Standing at the foot of the mountain, they could hear the roiling and rumbling inside the belly of the volcano through the thick stone structure of the mountain itself.


    A terrifying river ofva several dozens of meters wide wound about the foot of the mountain. Hundreds ofvakes and pools of various sizes had formed beside this river.


    This ce naturally became the ce where fire elementals gathered in the highest numbers!


    These fire elementals were mostly unintelligent low-grade elementium creatures that could only instinctively gather around areas where fire elementium was most concentrated. They had lived here for a long time and treated the volcano as their own home, fervently keeping outsiders from entering.


    That was why a dozen human-sized zing fire spirits jumped out of the nearestva pool the moment Greem¡¯s party approached the volcano. These fire spirits started yelling and cursing something at the adepts the moment they emerged from theva pool.


    However, no one here could understand the strangenguage of the fire elementals.


    Seeing that Greem and the others did not intend to back away, the fire spirits raised their zing arms in anger, and several elementium fireballs crashed toward the adepts like meteors.


    "You started this!"


    A fireballnded in front of Mary, the resultant heatwave lifting a corner of Mary¡¯s robe and causing her long red hair to billow in the wind.


    This act of intimidation undoubtedly infuriated Mary!


    A red silhouette shed across the ce.


    After Mary returned to her original spot, the fire spirits exploded into piles of charcoal and ash despite being thirty meters away. Mary had just relied on her extreme Agility and imperceptible speed to pierce the fire cores within their bodies, resulting in the scene before them.


    However, just as these fire spirits exploded like fireworks, Mary let out a sudden cry.


    She held her right hand with her left and screamed angrily.


    "I want to kill these bastards. I want to kill these bastards. They...they actually scorched the nail polish I had just applied!"


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh when he heard this.


    These fire spirits might only have the power of an advanced apprentice, but they were made of the purest concentrated essence of fire elementium. In particr, their fire cores were basically elementium mes whose temperatures went up to two to three thousand degrees. Mary¡¯s w might be protected with her blood energy, but not sustaining any damage after piercing a dozen clusters of elementium fire in a row was simply looking down upon these fire spirits.


    "Tigule, I¡¯ll leave these fellows to you!" Greem instructed softly.


    "Understood!"


    Tigule, who had been troubled by the harsh environment all this while, finally received an order from Greem. He raised his arm and summoned the towering four-meter Goblin Shredder from within the golem talisman. He quickly scampered into the pilot¡¯s seat and shut the opening. This towering magical machine warrior finally started moving, nging with every move it made.


    The appearance of this massive object naturally attracted the attention of all elementium creatures that had been roaming the area.


    Unlike the fire creatures, elementium creatures had no natural human-like emotions. That included things such as fear and reluctance. There was no need to incite them or draw them into conflict. These elementium creatures all emerged from theva river or the magmakes upon discovering an outsider breaking into their homes. They gathered together and charged at the adepts.


    Fire spirits, fire crows, magma hounds, fire serpents, fire deities, fire elemental elders.


    For a moment, it was as if every single fire elementium creatures recorded in the Adepts¡¯ Handbook had been enchanted with a spell as they emerged from ancient legends and started assaulting this tiny group of adepts.


    Their numbers were many, and their powers ranged from beginner apprentice to advanced First Grade, almost including every single grade in between. Moreover, their means of attacks were mostly simr. They were either elemental fireballs, me shockwaves, orva sshes.


    When umted, such attacks were terrifying, even for a fire adept like Greem, let alone Tigule.


    Dammit, we just stabbed a ho¡¯s nest.


    Greem roared and tossed out that Second Grade elementium golem of his.


    An earthshaking roar rang out as the seven-meter-tall body of the me Fiend of Terror stood up in front of the party. zing fires shrouded it, and surgingva and scalding magma covered its body.


    "Battle! Destroy!"


    The me Fiend of Terror shouted wicked and malicious battlecries as it strode toward the volcano with its thick magma legs.


    The elemental fireballs that had been shot at it exploded continuously upon its giant body, but they couldn¡¯t do any damage to it. Only the Magma Fireballs or me spears that contained a bit of earth elementium could deal a little damage to it.


    However,pound magic of this kind could only be used by high-grade fire elemental elders or fire deities.


    The me Fiend of Terror strode forward to the very front, using its massive body to attract the enemy¡¯s firepower. Meanwhile, the Goblin Shredder followed behind, asionally using the propellers on its back to elerate into the midst of the fire elementium creatures and execute the more threatening high-grade enemies.


    Though these fire elemental elders were of a pretty high grade, they did not have tough, imprable bodies. That was why theirrge bodies of mes would self-destruct from the backflow of elementium after their fire core had been shed in half by the Shredder¡¯s metal chainsaw.


    One had to admit that the ultra magical alloys that Greem had exhausted to forge this Second Grade magical machine warrior were well worth the money. Even the iron-hard bodies of the magma hounds couldn¡¯t stop the wild shing power of the metal chainsaw. The fire cores of the elementium creatures couldn¡¯t resist the piercing power of the metal drill.


    Unless it was seven or eight high-grade fire elementals self-destructing at the same time, the explosions had no hope of damaging Tigule who was hiding inside the Goblin Shredder.


    Bug Adept Billis, who was only First Grade, was so terrified at the chaotic scene of flying fireballs and ravaging me streams that he dug underground. Though the ground¨Cwhich was nearly two hundred degrees warm¨Cwasn¡¯t all thatfortable, it was better than being hit by the barrage of fireballs from the fire elementium creatures.


    Mary hid in the center of the group. Initially, she was invested enough to jump into the battlefield and instantly murder anyone who came close with her rapid speed. However, after a while, the dense concentration of fire elementals turned the ce into a suffocating sea of fire. Mary had no choice but to stay by Greem¡¯s side and took out the crimson longbow she had neglected for a long time to start revising her archery skills.


    The tall dragonborn, Zacha, followed closely behind Greem, helping him cover for any attacks from the rear. His lightning spear pierced and scattered the elementium fireballs flying across the sky. The heatwave that radiated from the explosion was no more than a warm breeze of wind; they couldn¡¯t harm his body.


    The group of adepts charged ahead as they ughtered the elementals. In the blink of an eye, they had fought their way through the siege of fire elementals and made it to Un¡¯Goro Volcano.


    One had to admit that the Orb of Deceit that Mary had sold to Oliven was very effective.


    Oliven was part of Greem¡¯s party, but none of the fire elementals¡¯ attacks were directed at her. She casually walked alongside the adepts, asionally dodging a stray fireball and became the most carefree person of the group.


    By the time Greem and his party reached the volcano, the swarming fire elementals stopped at the foot of the mountain and red at them, but they didn¡¯t continue following them.


    That was because the volcano was the territory of the powerful fire lord!

 Chapter 729 Volcanic Cave

    It didn¡¯t matter which world it was. The strongest individuals would always hold the best territories!


    It was a universalw.


    After setting foot on Un¡¯Goro Volcano, the one thing that Greem¡¯s party kept running into was an odd species¨C mebelly Ogres.


    These were powerful magical creatures that had extremely high fire resistance and exceptional skill in fire magic. Apart from their rapid-fire spells, these mebelly Ogres also hadrge and muscr bodies. Even the ckstone Orcs couldn¡¯t deal with their savage strikes when they lifted their magma staffs to engage in a fight.


    Perhaps it was because they always stayed in the volcanic caves, but these mebelly ogres were allrge and massive. Their skin was also a dark red, and almost as hard as the volcanic rocks here. Even more annoying was how intelligent they were, to the point that they could even tame creatures like the magma hounds and magma beasts as their servants.


    The adepts constantly had to deal with packs of snarling magma hounds when fighting with these ogres. They would then have to deal with the mebelly Ogres themselves, who had enhanced themselves with a Berserking Spell before rushing up with their thick magma staffs.


    Using magic against these enemies was a bit of a waste. As such, the one who fought at the very front was still Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder. The fullmetal armor forged out of Queyras magical alloy waspletely unharmed, even when assaulted by a dozen fireballs.


    Meanwhile, the wildly spinning drill on the Shredder¡¯s left arm and the whirring chainsaw on the right were not weapons that the ¡¯frail¡¯ bodies of the magma hounds and mebelly Ogres could resist.


    Tigule piloted the Goblin Shredder with finesse, moving through the enemies¡¯ ranks like an agile monkey with a drill on the left arm and a chainsaw on the right. Loud shing and rending sounds rang out as the enemies were driven away and ughtered.


    The body of the magma houndsposed of many tiny magma rocks split into two halves upon being sliced by the chainsaw. The hotva within them spilled forth, sizzling upon the already dry and withered volcanic stones.


    The tough skin of the mebelly Ogres was pretty tough. From Greem¡¯s observation through the Chip, their skin improved their defense by at least two levels. That meant that without magical weapons that were at least enhanced with +3 sharpness or the Pration enchantment, one would not even be able to harm these mebelly Ogres.


    Sadly, even the toughest of defenses could fall to a kitchen knife!


    If a kitchen knife didn¡¯t do the work, then throw in a hammer into the mix!


    Tigule realized that killing these ogres with edged weapons was pretty tricky. Even the extremely sharp drill took two to three seconds to prate the enemies¡¯ chest. Thus, Tigule changed his strategy and stopped cutting or stabbing the ogres. Instead, he merely smashed them with all he had.


    Truthfully, the Goblin Shredder also had immense Strength that went up to twenty-six points. Whenbined with its heavy metal body, the Shredder could smash its weapons at its enemies as if they were warhammers. The mebelly Ogres couldn¡¯t endure these blows, even with their Strength.


    A single blow to the head would smash their skulls into their chest cavities.


    Consequently, Greem and the other adepts got a good show of wild and savage fighting as they trailed behind the Shredder. A burning trail soaked red with blood andva wound up the top of the mountain, while the horrifying corpses of the mebelly Ogres served as an equally eye-catching scene.


    The Shredder stood at the forefront, while Zacha guarded the rear. The adept party sessfully reached the waist of Un¡¯Goro Volcano.


    They found a reasonably clean ce in a small cave here and set up camp as they waited silently for Vanlier to meet up with them.


    With his blood master Mary here, there was no concern he wouldn¡¯t be able to find his way here!


    Perhaps they had been too savage in ughtering their way up the mountain, but Un¡¯Goro volcano was rife with howling and screaming right now.


    Those furious mebelly Ogres could only roar and curse from a distance, but they didn¡¯t dare to charge into the cave to fight them to the death. It wasn¡¯t until midnight that the mebelly Ogres, perhaps tired from all their cursing, scattered and returned to their caves to sleep.


    The nights in the Burning ins were the same as the days.


    Though the sky was much darker, it was still dark red and murky from the mes andva that lit up the ce.


    After setting up some rm arrays at the entrance, Greem and the other adepts started to rest inside the cave.


    At their level, they wouldn¡¯t tire even if they didn¡¯t eat, drink, or rest for several days in a row. However, in such a dangerous environment, maintaining themselves at their best condition was the optimal choice.


    Tigule was also exhausted from fighting for the entirety of the day.


    He did not have the unbelievable Spirit and Physique of the adepts. The exhaustion of his stamina and Spirit from piloting the Second Grade magical machine as a First Grade was immense!


    After returning the Shredder to the golem talisman, Tigule simply ate some food, drank some water, and wrapped himself in his cape to sleep.


    Though the cave entrance had been sealed with a me Barrier, the heat waves were still surging in from the outside. They were situated on an extremely active volcano after all; the rumbling of theva beneath them never stopped. asionally, they could even feel the mountain quake.


    The fact that Tigule could still fall sound asleep in such an environment was a testament to how exhausted he was!


    The night shift was naturally left to the dutiful Dragonborn Zacha.


    Greem leaned against a piece of rock and closed his eyes to rest his mind.


    He couldn¡¯t enter deep meditation in this ce and thus could only close his eyes to soothe his slightly tense mind.


    He had brought with him nearly all of the elites of the n for this dragonying expedition. It was very likely that they would be able to sessfully ughter the Second Grade fire dragon with such a force. However, everything in this world was unpredictable. Even a small mistake could cause a terrifying oue to unfold.


    In its current state, the Crimson n could not bear to suffer any mistakes.


    It was unlike the period where the Crimson n hid underground and umted its strength. Greem and the Crimson n¡¯s dominant rise to power had already attracted the attention of many adept ns. If the main force of the n were to suffer a substantial loss at this moment, those hungry wolves would not give up a chance tosh out at the Crimson n. Moreover, the enemies hiding in the shadows woulde in droves to nurture their strength with the flesh of the Crimson adepts.


    That was why Greem currently bore much more stress than ever before. Almost every single move he made had to be thought over and over again, making sure that the best reaction was used to deal with any situation that could arise.


    Just as Greem¡¯s emotions were fluctuating, the light pping sound of wings came along with the night winds from outside the cave.


    Then, the rm arrays were set off!


    A short momentter, Old Fox Vanlier arrived with Blood Knight Soros, both of them covered in ash and dust.


    Dragonborn Zacha, who had silently been standing at the entrance, looked at them with his sharp eyes before moving aside and letting them in.


    It was clear that Vanlier and Soros¡¯ days on the Burning ins hadn¡¯t been pleasant. Apart from their shriveled Spirits, there were still burn marks that hadn¡¯t faded from their bodies.


    That they hadn¡¯t been able to recover from their injuries despite the vampires¡¯ powerful regeneration abilities proved that the creatures here were far more formidable than the other dragon lord territories.


    "Go and catch two ogres and make sure they are alive!" Greem gave simple instructions.


    Zacha acknowledged the order, lifted his warhammer, picked up his spear, and charged out of the cave.


    With the density of the mebelly Ogre poption on Un¡¯Goro Volcano, he should be able to catch one or two of them just by finding a nearby cave. Not long after, the unique battlecry of the ogres rang out. A short momentter, it returned to silence.


    The light in the cave dimmed.


    Zacha lifted a bloody mebelly Ogre in each hand and strode into the cave before he dropped them in front of the vampires.


    "Rest for a while and recover first!" Greem said casually.


    The two vampires hesitated for a moment and looked at Mary, who was silently lying down on her side in a corner of the cave. With a nearly imperceptible nod from her, the two vampires finally crouched over the necks of the ogres and started drinking the spicy and stinging blood of the creatures.


    In all honesty, the blood of mebelly Ogres wasn¡¯t delicious; it wasn¡¯t on the day-to-day menu of the vampires. The blood had been infused with far too much fire elementium, and it tasted too dry and bitter. It was a far cry from the sweet, rich blood of the forest elves.


    However, there was no leeway to be picky in a situation like this. Recovering and ensuring their survival was the highest priority!


    "Have you guys obtained any new information after all this time here?" Greem asked softly.


    As the leader of this expedition, these were the kinds of questions he had to be concerned with.


    After all, thest update they received was from one month ago. All this time, Greem had been sneaking about with his dragonying team and had lost contact with Vanlier. That was why he was anxious that new variables might have cropped up.


    "Don¡¯t you worry, my lord! We have been patrolling near the fire dragon¡¯s den for the past month, and we have not seen it exit. To avoid missing anything, I even arranged for one of the blood knights to stay there while I came back to report. I assure you that nothing will go wrong. Judging from the time that has passed, the wounds the fire dragon suffered on Stalon Mountain should have healed already. However, these dragon lords love sleeping, and sleeping for up to three months is nothing odd for them."


    Old Fox Vanlier seemed like he knew what the n leader was worried about. He immediately assuaged Greem¡¯s concerns with his first few words.


    It would truly be a joke if the fire dragon weren¡¯t home after they had dragged all the elites of the n on this long march!


    The extended absence of the n¡¯s primary force in its current circumstances would easily invite unnecessary troubles. Greem couldn¡¯t possibly have all his elites wait here without clear information. That was why Greem had been troubled all this while¨C because he was worried about such an unprecedented situation urring.


    Now that the fire dragon was confirmed to be home, everything was going to be a breeze!

 Chapter 730 Blackiron Tower

    The den that Fire Dragon Bamler lived in was still a hundred and fifty kilometers away from Un¡¯Goro Volcano.


    The adepts would unavoidably pass through the camps of the ckiron Dwarves and the ckstone Orcs if they wanted to get there.


    Due to ack of cover in a vast and mountainous region like the Burning ins, trying to sneak into the dragon¡¯s den while hiding from the local natives was virtually impossible. After a brief discussion with Vanlier, Greem finally decided to move to the Ironstone Hignds and advance to the den through the ckiron Dwarves territory.


    They rested for one night.


    The party moved at the first sign of light on the second day, departing from Un¡¯Goro Volcano under the sharp res of the many mebelly Ogres.


    With Old Fox Vanlier as their guide, the party¡¯s progress hastened slightly.


    They first went straight north until Un¡¯Goro vanished from sight before turning northwest and walking along the Firefeather Mountains. After passing through the Abyss of Ka¡¯el and making it through a terrifying nest of Ankara beetles, the adepts finally started to close in on ckiron Tower, controlled by the ckiron Dwarves.


    The ckiron Dwarves might have the word ¡¯dwarf¡¯ in their name, but their appearance and temperament were utterly different from the dwarves mentioned in the historical chronicles. They weren¡¯t as gentle or kind as ordinary dwarves, and they weren¡¯t even as weing of guests.


    These fellows who lived in ckiron Tower and spent their days in the red-hot furnaces forging and refining magical ckiron metal were of short stature, had bushy beards, and bulging muscles.


    However, their personalities were extraordinarily violent and savage. They would ignite the ckiron bombs wrapped around their bodies at any slight provocation and rush to self-destruct and bring the enemy down with them. Indeed, in this magical world of Lance, these ckiron Dwarves still insisted on using their ckiron pickaxes to dig and mine and continue to improve their ckiron rifles and cannons.


    When Greem and his party first approached that towering ckiron Tower standing in the valley between two massive mountains, they heard a dull cannon shot. Dense smoke rose from a shooting tform from the center of ckiron Tower. A watermelon-sized iron ball then sted a magma boulder into pieces, just fifty meters to the right of the adepts. The iron ball continued rolling even further away.


    The initially wide and open magma ins started to narrow here where the path forward became obstructed by the two massive mountains that stood in the way. The terrifying tower that the ckiron Dwarves had spent a thousand years reinforcing with magical ckiron metal stood right in between these two cliffs.


    One had to pass through ckiron Tower if they wanted to make it through the valley. And anyone who tried to cross through ckiron Tower would have to deal with these ckiron Dwarves.


    With the cold and violent personalities of the ckiron Dwarves, the only way of dealing with them was probably..bat!


    After the first cannon rang out, the massive metal door at the bottom of the tower also opened to the sounds of grinding mechanical parts. Squads of ckiron Dwarves in metal chesttes emerged in perfect formation. They all had ckiron rifles on their backs and explosives at their waists.


    They charged forward, yelling their odd battlecries as they did so.


    Even with Greem¡¯snguage library, he had trouble analyzing this mutated dwarvennguage.


    The ckiron Dwarves fired immediately after exiting the tower, without any attempt to negotiate or discuss.


    Old-fashioned ckiron rifles rang out. They crackled loudly and the metal bullets they shot out clinked against the shields of the defenses. Tigule had no choice but to summon the Goblin Shredder once again and leap intobat, charging at the reckless and ignorant ckiron Dwarves.


    The tall Dragonborn Zacha took a few steps forward and used his massive body to cover for Greem. He courageously stood at the front, raising his hands to protect the more easily injured eyes, while letting the other parts be. After all, dragonborn had tough scales on their bodies. Those metal bullets could only send sparks flying when they hit him, with no possibility of actually wounding him.


    As for Mary, she casually leaped about in the rain of bullets and let the wild storm pass her by. She would only raise a finger and flick when she ran into attacks that she couldn¡¯t dodge.


    Vanlier didn¡¯t have Mary¡¯s ability and could only shriek and hide behind Soros. Blood Knight Soros lived up to his identity as a Second Grade knight. Though he was disdainful toward Vanlier¡¯s cowardice and shamelessness, he didn¡¯t abandon him.


    Soros brandished his longsword and swatted away the metal bullets flying toward him beforeunching a counter-charge at the ckiron Dwarves.


    Meanwhile, Bug Adept Billis didn¡¯t even seem to fear these purely physical attacks.


    He slowly walked forward, his body trembling slightly as he did so.


    Every time he trembled, it meant that a metal bullet had hit his body.


    Yet, it was almost as if he didn¡¯t feel the impact. After advancing sufficiently far forward, Billis suddenly opened his terrifying insect mouth, and a swarm of insects surged out from within. This swarm gathered into a cloud in the skies and surged at the enemy like a dark shadow.


    They swarmed the enemy wherever they went, using their nightmarish numbers to devour the enemies.


    One couldn¡¯t see anything that was happening inside the ck cloud, but the fearsome crunching sounds that came from within were bone-chilling.


    Over the past few days, Billis had managed to digest and absorb the knowledge crystal that Endor had left behind. As such, he could now transfer poison attributes to every single individual insect in the swarm. The swarm under hismand no longer solely relied on physical attacks, but also horrifying poison damage.


    However, given how weak these ckiron Dwarves were, their corpses were gone long before the poison could even act. Billis¡¯ improvement flew under the radar of the other adepts.


    As for the burden of the group, Oliven? She chose to once again daydream in the battlefield.


    At any rate, those ckiron Dwarves wouldn¡¯t actively attack her as long as she didn¡¯t attack them. The special effect of the Orb of Deceit was just as powerful as before!


    Beng! Beng! Beng!


    The strongest of the ckiron Dwarves was only at the advanced apprentice level. The rest were even weaker. If it weren¡¯t for the cracking ckiron rifles in their hands, Billis alone would have been able to wipe them out.


    Unfortunately, just as this thought emerged amid the adepts, something changed at the front of the battlefield.


    Beng...beng...beng!


    Several deafening sounds rang out as massive explosions appeared, causing several terrifying mushroom clouds in the distance. The Goblin Shredder that had just run into the ranks of the dwarves and was ughtering their numbers immediately charged out of the dust cloud, covered in dirt.


    Judging from how it was stumbling about, Tigule had probably been stunned and fazed by the apocalyptic explosions of the enemy. Billis also waved his ugly insect w and let out a furious shriek in the direction of the battlefield.


    That round of explosions had caused tremendous losses to his swarm, enough to make him feel hurt by the loss!


    Savage. Truly savage!


    These ckiron Dwarves were as vicious to their kin as they were to enemies. They would wildly ignite their explosive packs and charge at the enemy when they were losing.


    These ckiron bombs might only have individual power of one hundred and sixty points and might not be able to kill Tigule¨Cwho was well protected under this magical machine¨Cbut the explosive shockwaves were enough to make him suffer. The poison swarm that had been recklessly ughtering the dwarves died in droves, causing Billis to shriek and howl.


    Each poison insect that he could currently breed in his swarm only had seven points of Physique. They could not possibly live through such a terrifying explosion that could even directly kill a First Grade adept.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown at the sight of this.


    To think a group of dwarves that were not even First Grade could stop their advance. That was not a good sign!


    Greem felt rage rise up his heart. He mumbled quickly, and after a dozen seconds of chanting, a yellow, head-sized fireball suddenly appeared on his right palm.


    This odd fireball was entirely different from the magma fireballs and magical fireballs he usually fired. At a nce, this blinding fireball not only radiated no warmth, it even gave off an odd, chilling feeling.


    It was a Coldme Fireball that had undergone improvement by the Chip. Its method of attack was also even more wicked and malicious.


    Greem flipped his palm and pressed it downward. The Coldme Fireball vanished into the crimson rock below without a single sound.


    A hundred meters away, the smoking and bloody battlefield was immediately sealed by a strange, chilling aura. Traces of chill winds seeped out from under the ground, avoiding the swarm and freezing all of the ckiron Dwarves in ice.


    In the blink of an eye, the previously violent battlefield had turned into a world of ice and snow. The ckiron Dwarves were frozen in all sorts of odd poses. Their wicked smiles were still fixed on their faces as they were sealed in a thick block of ice.


    Due to the speed of the frost, some metal bullets that had just shot out of the rifles had also been frozen along with the guns themselves, forming odd and weird human ice sculptures on the battlefield.


    However, this was the Burning ins after all. The temperature of the air and ground was shockingly high. Even the powerful magic of a Second Grade adept couldn¡¯tst very long. As the heat waves raged, the human sculptures started to melt, but the cracked ice continued to burn coldly like actual fire.


    The ckiron Dwarves that had been wrapped in the Coldme started to burn once their bodies were exposed to air; they simply melted before everyone¡¯s eyes.


    Indeed, the bodies of the ckiron Dwarves melted, just like the ice around them!


    With a single move from Greem, the one hundred surviving ckiron Dwarves outside ckiron Tower were exterminated.


    The ckiron Dwarves who were still hiding in the tower finally felt fear upon witnessing this scene.


    Kuangdang! A loud boom rang out. The two massive metal doors of ckiron Tower were firmly shut again.

 Chapter 731 Fire Dragons Den

    One had to admit that the ckiron Dwarves were nothing in front of this powerful squad that had traveled a long way to y a dragon.


    Perhaps in the Burning ins, they might be able to own a rtivelyrge territory as their base with their imprable ckiron Tower and their explosive weapons, bing one of the most excellent subordinates of the Second Grade fire dragon. However, the fate of the ckiron Dwarves came to an end when they ran into Greem and his party!


    Greem didn¡¯t even need to lift a finger. Mary led Vanlier and Soros on the battlefield, transforming into bloodsucking bats and infiltrating the tower through its gun port. What came after was a brutal and reckless ughter.


    Now that they knew how the ckiron Dwarves did things, the three vampires would never give them the chance to execute their n. They either killed the dwarves instantly upon seeing them, or they simply fled the st zone when they realized the enemy had ignited their explosives.


    Standing before ckiron Tower, the only thing that Greem could hear from the outside was the ckiron Dwarves¡¯ cries of despair. Explosions regrly went off, starting from the lowest level of the tower. Greem looked on as massive tongues of mes shot out of the gun ports and the observation tforms as he listened to the cracks of rifles. The bloody ughter extended from the bottom of the tower all the way to the top. The weak ckiron Dwarves finally despaired and broke down before the three phantom-like killers.


    The doors of ckiron Tower once again opened. But this time, it was opened with the sheer force of the Goblin Shredder!


    It was clear that Tigule was also embarrassed by his prior failure against these weaklings. As such, he had every intention to wash away that blemish with an absolute ughter.


    Sadly, no ckiron Dwarves ran out of the tower even after the doors had been opened. The entirety of the first level was littered with corpses in strange shapes and states. Many of them had been blown up beyond recognition.


    Several corpsesy on the spiral stone staircase at the side of the hall. They still held their snapped and smoking rifles tightly in their hands. Pungent ck blood flowed down the stone stairs, gathering into a ckke in a corner of the hall.


    ckiron Tower had been constructed rtively high, and the vampires had killed the dwarves too quickly. The battlefield had already reached the upper levels of the tower, and the cracking of rifles could no longer be heard on the first level. However, the might of the ckiron bombs was still immense. The tower was still trembling and shaking, sending dust and metal powder falling from the ceiling and filling the ce with an atmosphere of danger and warfare.


    The ckiron Dwarves on the higher levels had tried using their bombs to destroy the staircase and halt the enemy¡¯s advance. Sadly, while this may have worked against ordinary enemies, but it was no more than digging one¡¯s own grave against the adepts.


    If the staircase was gone, then they just had to go outside!


    The vampires charged out of the tower, flew one level above, and reentered through the gun ports and observation spots. In doing so, the ckiron dwarves had sealed their only path of escape, leaving them incapable of anything other than embracing their deadly fate. Many ckiron Dwarves were forced to roar and ignite the explosives wrapped around their bodies before exploding in despair as the enemy distanced themselves.


    They couldn¡¯t fight if they wanted to, and they couldn¡¯t even bring the enemy down with them either!


    The remaining ckiron Dwarves fell intoplete despair, madly jumping out of the tower before the vampires could reach them. With their tiny bodies,ck of flying abilities, andck of deceleration methods, they could only turn into pulps of blood around the tower.


    Finally, after twenty minutes, this three-hundred-meter-tall iron tower that housed four hundred ckiron Dwarves fell into a deathly silence.


    After doing a simple sweep of the tower, the adepts found a set of neatly arranged iron ingots and other special metals in the warehouse of the ckiron Dwarves. Naturally, they found quite a lot of mithril, wrought gold, scale copper, magical metals, rare resources, and some valuable magical gemstones.


    The ckiron Dwarves had gathered these valuables as offerings to the fire dragon lord. Now they went into the pockets of the adepts. Everyone who participated received a share of the spoils. Every single member of the party took a reasonable percentage of gemstones and resources that they could use, and Greem packed the rest of the stuff.


    The massive amounts ofmon metals could only be left behind.


    Though Greem had once again sealed the warehouse and reinforced the doors with simple magical seals, such an excellent structure would not be left unupied, even in these wildnds. It was inevitable that other natives would take over this tower once they had gone.


    When that happened, this tower would be the home of a new lord of the area.


    Thus, any more seals Greem put on the area would be pointless!


    ............


    They would arrive at the Firethroat Dragonborn¡¯s territory after passing through ckiron Tower.


    There was no reasonable environment or space for outside races to survive or reproduce in this scorching crimsonnd.


    Just walking on this searing magma floor would cause your boots to sizzle and roast on contact. The adepts had no choice but to radiate part of their elementium particles to protect their shoes. Otherwise, they would have to start walking barefoot in less than a quarter of a kilometer of travel.


    The arrival of the party had alerted the Firethroat Dragonborn here.


    Roars rang out in session within the crude camps in the distance. Soon, squads of Firethroat Dragonborn had gathered and were advancing in the direction of ckiron Tower.


    In truth, the leader of the Firethroat Dragonborn had already received news of the adepts the moment they set foot in the Burning ins.


    However, these outsiders had only active near the outside areas of the Burning ins at that time and were not showing signs of invading the inner region. That was why the Firethroat leader only ordered the subordinates forces in the outer areas to take note of the outsiders¡¯ movements and was not at all concerned.


    After all, Lance was the private ne of pureblood dragons. The chances of war breaking out between dragon lords were minimal. Even when two dragons were hostile with each other, the ones who did the fighting would be their subordinate dragonborn or local forces. Incidents, where dragons went all the way to attack the opponent¡¯s den, had never happened before.


    The Firethroat leader only ordered his subordinates to remain alert. That was already a sign of great caution!


    Sadly, regardless of how much he tried, he would never have expected these outsiders to be so quick and decisive in their advance.


    He had just received news of a group of outsiders breaking into the Burning ins. The very next day, the enemy had made it past Un¡¯Goro Volcano and had gone missing. By the time the Firethroat leader became aware of their predicament and started to search for these outsiders¡¯ location, smoke had already risen from the direction of ckiron Tower. It was a request for help.


    The previously calm Firethroat leader could not remain calm after that!


    He sent troops to the fire dragon¡¯s nest to report on the situation while wildly gathering the dragonborn around him to form ranks and hurry to ckiron Tower.


    Unfortunately, his actions were still one step too slow!


    There was probably no one who would have expected that these outsiders would be able to exterminate all of the ckiron Dwarves in less than twenty minutes, casually pass through ckiron Tower, wrap around the Firethroats¡¯ camp, and advance on the fire dragon¡¯s den.


    By the time the Firethroat leader arrived at the tower, panting in exhaustion, the only thing he saw was and of death and silence, filled with dwarf corpses. The enemy was long gone.


    A fool might have scattered his forces in this situation and start searching for the enemy near the tower. However, the Firethroats¡¯ leader was an experienced veteran. His heart sank when he saw the situation before him and immediately led his men in the direction of the fire dragon¡¯s den without any hesitation.


    It was sixty kilometers from the Firethroat Camp to ckiron Tower, and eighty-five kilometers from ckiron Tower to the fire dragon¡¯s den. Even with the outstanding Physique of the Firethroat Dragonborn, sprinting a distance of one hundred and fifty kilometers in one single session was unreasonable!


    While the Firethroats were running along the scorchingnd, Greem¡¯s party had already reached the fire dragon¡¯s den and had met up with the blood knight who had stayed there.


    ............


    A narrow fissure that ran for over six kilometers could be seen here at the center of the Burning ins.


    When looking down from the edge of the fissure, you could see the surging river ofva a few thousand meters below. The steaming heat waves and the acrid smell of sulfur made this ce a forbidden zone for all life.


    Any individual that got too close to the fissure would be killed by the harsh air, even if they were not roasted to death by the heat.


    "My lord, I have guarded this ce for twenty days, and I have not seen the fire dragon emerge." The blood knight responsible for guarding this area ced his hand over his chest and respectfully gave his report to Greem.


    It was clear that he¡¯d experienced a rough time here over the past few days.


    Not only were most of his clothes red and melting from the heat, but even his body was also full of scorch marks.


    The fact that such apparent injuries could be left on a Second Grade blood knight was more than enough proof of how harsh the environment was and how few living creatures could exist here. The Firethroat Dragonborn might be everywhere, but the blood knight didn¡¯t dare to attack them for blood out of fear of alerting the enemy.


    "Mm, I have made a note of your contribution. Now, get back into the party." Greem gave a few words of praise before turning and speaking to the others, "The fire dragon¡¯s den is below. Let us go!"


    Having said that, Greem was the first to jump down the fissure.


    The burning heat waves surged up from below but were kept away from Greem¡¯s body through the me barrier around him.


    Fire shed with fire, and the me barrier turned bright red from the heat, violently crackling as it did so.


    Greem ignored this and looked at the crimson stone walls as he fell.


    Finally, just two hundred meters away from the river ofva, Greem saw a protruding stone tform on a wall to the north. He could vaguely see the glimmer of magical runes there.


    There!


    Greem, who was still falling at extreme speeds, focused as he cast Fire Teleportation.


    The next second, fire shed upon the round tform as Greem¡¯s tall body appeared there.


    He had finally reached the fire dragon¡¯s den¡¯s entrance!

 Chapter 732 Fire Dragons Labyrinth

    The fire dragon¡¯s cave wasn¡¯t without defenses!


    Greem had justnded, yet two Firethroat Dragonborn immediately roared and lunged at him from inside the cave. The long-handled axes in their hands glowed with a flickering red light as they smashed them at the enemy, who had yet to stabilize himself.


    Advanced First Grade!


    The two Firethroat Dragonborn were both advanced First Grade elites. However, their strength was still nothing before a Second Grade adept.


    A me Halo of Repulsion shoved the two dragonborn away. Greem then lightly patted the Scroll of Voodoo at his waist, and the Voodoo Doll emerged along with the Stitch Ghost Golem.


    "The two of them are yours."


    Greem gave a simplemand and then ignored the two dragonborn.


    The two magic servants giggled and floated toward the towering dragonborn warriors.


    It was at this moment that Mary flew down from above along with her two blood knights. Though they possessed the strength of Second Grades, the three of them hated this environment with a passion. Wisps of ck smoke had even started rising from the surface of their bodies.


    While Mary was upset and cursing about the harsh environment here, a long and drawn out cry came from the fissure. Then, the massive and heavy body of the Goblin Shredder crashed down like a set of weights.


    Tigule had already tried his best to maintain his bnce while shooting out decelerating jet streams from the back of his machine. Sadly, the air currents in theva valley were chaotic and random, making it difficult for the goblin to control the trajectory of flight and leaving him no choice but to crash like a massive piece of iron.


    Greem sighed and waved at the crashing Goblin Shredder from a distance.


    Red light immediately engulfed the massive body of the Shredder, and it gradually started decelerating. Once its speed had sufficiently slowed, the red light began to move the machine toward the teleportation tform through some unknown force.


    "Thank you, boss. Thank you so much." When he finally found his bnce on the tform again, Tigule¡¯s shrill and frightened voice rang out from within the Goblin Shredder.


    It seemed like the Goblin Shredder still had some pretty significant ws. It was best to find some time to improve it after this.


    Oliven and Billis, who came right after, could both reach the tform through their own strength. However, when it came to Dragonborn Zacha, Greem had no choice but to act again and move him over.


    Once Zacha hadnded, and Greem turned around, the Voodoo Doll and Stitch Ghost Golem were already hovering gleefully in front of him. As for the two Firethroat Dragonborn? One of them had been poisoned to death, his face green and in agony. The other dragonborn¡¯s eyes had opened so wide that they almost split apart, his face filled with terror and fear.


    At this point, all members of the team were present except for Old Fox Vanlier, who was too weak and had been ordered to find a ce outside to hide.


    What came next was the meat of the journey: finding the Second Grade fire dragon.


    Starting from the tform, the first thing that the party had to do was pass through that winding and booby-trappedbyrinth. They would not even be qualified to face that fire dragon if they couldn¡¯t even make it through thebyrinth.


    "Billis, it¡¯s on you!" Greem said.


    The reason he had brought the First Grade Billis along on dragonying operation was for this moment.


    Billis, stillpletely cloaked in his ck robe, nodded slightly. He took one step forward, faced the multiple entrances to thebyrinth, and his body scattered.


    The ck robe silently drifted to the ground as countless ck beetles swarmed out from beneath the cloth. They weren¡¯trge, but their movements were fast and ferocious. The massive swarm instantly split into five or six armies of the same size and climbed toward the various tunnels in front of them.


    These swarms might have split into different groups, but Billis¡¯ mind still remotely controlled them. Every time one of the bug armies ran into a fork in the path, they naturally split into even smaller armies. Like a ceaselessly splitting flood, the ck swarm quickly engulfed every passage in the fire dragon¡¯sbyrinth.


    That said, if it were so easy to explore the fire dragon¡¯sbyrinth, it wouldn¡¯t have be the base that the fire dragon lord relied upon.


    A short momentter, they heard rumbling explosions from multiple spots in thebyrinth.


    Billis¡¯ swarm had finally triggered the magical and mechanical traps that were set up everywhere. Every explosion signaled the death of dozens and even hundreds of insects. Though each individual loss wouldn¡¯t hurt Billis at all, the umtion of damage from the continuous advance of the swarm was still not something that Billis could ignore.


    The ck robe that had drifted onto the ground evaporated wordlessly, turning into a cloud of ck smoke. The ck smoke formed into many winding lines in front of the party¡¯s eyes. These lines seemed to still continue to extend and stretch into the air.


    It was the map of thebyrinth; the route that Billis had pieced together with the lives of tens of thousands of insects.


    Greem looked at the map emotionlessly, but the Chip in his mind was already scanning and analyzing the map at high speed, finding the nearest and quickest path in the exceedingly tangled nest of lines.


    Finally, one hourter, one of the hundreds and thousands of insect armies sessfully emerged from thebyrinth and was immediately greeted by an overwhelming st of fire and fury.


    It was the fire dragon lord!


    "Found him!" Greem¡¯s face rxed as he shouted, "Let¡¯s go."


    Having said that, he took the initiative and charged into thebyrinth.


    Dragonborn Zacha raised his Frozen Mallet and smashed a corner of the teleportation array on the stone tform before following Greem into thebyrinth. The other Crimson adepts looked at each other and followed after their leader without hesitation.


    In the blink of an eye, this ce had been emptied! Not a single silhouette could be seen here!


    With the swarm scouting the way forward, there were no more mysteries to thisplicated and windingbyrinth. Greem and the others walked down an underground tunnel still burning with fires and traveled past plenty of roasted insect corpses.


    As this was the shortest path, it also undoubtedly had the most magical traps. Billis¡¯ swarm had paid a massive price to make it through here.


    However, Greem wouldpensate the bug adept for all these losses in the form of n rewards once the operation had concluded. After all, amongst the Crimson n¡¯s new generation, Billis could be considered the most likely to attempt advancement to Second Grade adept in the foreseeable future!


    Greem and his party easily made it through the fire dragon¡¯sbyrinth and immediately ran into the Second Grade fire dragon, who was already waiting for them.


    If the fire dragon lord couldn¡¯t sense such a considerablemotion in hisbyrinth, he would truly have be a blind and deaf dragon.


    It was arge and handsome adolescent male fire dragon!


    When it sat in the tall and spaciousva hall and raised its head high to gaze coldly at the adepts, everyone could feel the terror running through the depths of their hearts.


    Greem was the one walking at the very front and, as such, was the first one to endure the chilling dragon¡¯s aura of might.


    [Beep. Detecting foreign mental energy intrusion. Should mental barrier be activated to cut off said energy?


    [Warning. Warning. If said mental energy is not cut off, host will experience -5 Spirit and -3 Agility in 7 seconds. Counting down from now: 7...6...]


    "Activate mental barrier!"


    [Order received. Mental barrier has been activated! It is estimated that all mental energy will be expelled after three seconds.]


    From the others¡¯ perspective, Greem was only fazed for a few seconds before quickly breaking free of the effect of the dragon¡¯s aura of might.


    Meanwhile, behind him, Mary, Tigule, Zacha, and the others all radiated the faint light of a mental barrier. The source of the light seemed to be an odd magical talisman hanging from their necks or waists.


    These were Soul Protection Talismans that Greem had specially bought from the Silver Union. Each of them was worth eight thousand magical crystals!


    The Second Grade fire dragon flew into a rage when he saw the strange magical flux radiating from the bodies of his enemies.


    Given how prepared the enemies were, it seemed today¡¯s battle was unavoidable.


    Fire Dragon Bamler raised his head and stared at Greem before roaring in a thundering voice, "Who...who are you people? Why have you invaded Lord Bamler¡¯s quarters? State your intentions, or else."


    The fire dragon opened his mouth and shed his chillingly sharp fangs. The adepts could see the zing ball of fire quickly forming in his throat.


    "Let¡¯s just fight if that¡¯s what we are going to do. What¡¯s with all the words!"


    Mary had always been one whose movements were quicker than her thoughts. She cast away the obtrusive cloak on her body, red her wings, and charged headfirst at the terrifying fire dragon.


    She was fast, but the fire dragon was even faster.


    A breath of incredibly hot dragon¡¯s breath rolled toward here like an unmoving wall.


    Mary might be impulsive, but she wasn¡¯t stupid.


    Taking on the dragon¡¯s breath of a Second Grade fire dragon with her defense and magical resistance was impossible; she would only be burned into cinders.


    She beat her bat wings, and her slender body made four or five crimson shadows in the air before finally avoiding that fan-shaped breath.


    Greem strode forward without hesitation and raised both of his arms. An equally turbulent stream of fire sted toward the dragon¡¯s breath as the two shed with each other.


    Dragon¡¯s Breath versus me Stream!


    Red dragons were high-grade, fire-attribute magical creatures, while Greem was a famous fire adept.


    Both parties were practically immune to low-grade fire damage. When the two sts of fire shed with each other, terrifying temperatures and heat waves spilled everywhere across the room.


    For a moment, the center of theva hall split into two areas, each ravaged by a different me trying to gain the upper hand on the other. It quickly turned the surrounding area into a burning sea of fire.


    The conflicting parties were of the same grade and had roughly the same level of control over fire. Consequently, it turned into an equally matched showdown.


    However, Greem¡¯s Physique and Spirit clearly couldn¡¯tpare with such a higher magical creature. Greem was knocked back several steps from the immense impact. His boots even started smoking from the friction against the floor, leaving two eye-catching skid marks on the ground.


    Dammit. This fire dragon has so much strength!


    Greem grumbled resentfully.

 Chapter 733 Dragonslaying Battle

    First round: Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath vs me Stream.


    It was the fire dragon¡¯splete victory!


    Greem¡¯s body even stumbled back uncontrobly from the sh of the two zing fires.


    Hispanions immediately came to back him up after seeing this.


    The next second, Zacha¡¯s Chain Lightning and the Goblin Shredder¡¯s Goblin Rocket Ver. 2.0 shot at the fire dragon. However, their attacks were neutralized or detonated by the dragon¡¯s breath before they could even reach the dragon.


    The towering fire dragon slowly shook his wicked head and put his full strength into maintaining the shockingly powerful me breath, sweeping across in a massive fan shape.


    The fire dragon¡¯s massive size gave him surprising lung capacity.


    If the dragon were sting fire from above, the duration of this dragon¡¯s breath would be sufficient to form a massive wall of me thirty meters wide and eight hundred meters in length. No creature covered by the mes would survive. Even mighty earthen fortresses would explode into a horrifying sea of fire inside a dragon breath of such intensity.


    The fire dragon¡¯s breath wasn¡¯tposed of pure elementium fire. A strange, viscous substance that could only be found in the bodies of dragons had mixed into the breath in decent quantities. It caused the fire dragon¡¯s breath¡¯s to possess an extraordinary adhesiveness that elementium mes did not own. Once these fires spread to an object, they would stick to its surface and use surging mes to burn everything that could ignite!


    That was why Zacha and the Goblin Shredder could not extinguish the fire from the dragon¡¯s breath that had grazed them, no matter how hard they tried.


    Just as Fire Dragon Bamler was wreaking havoc among the adept¡¯s with a single dragon¡¯s breath, he suddenly let out a cry of agony. He immediately shut his mouth and stopped his attack. Mary¡¯s slender body silently appeared near his head; one w ferociously stabbed near his snout.


    An Agility-type adept assassin like Mary could not possibly break through the fire dragon¡¯s tough scales and his hard skull without the help of powerful magical equipment.


    The fire dragon grunted in pain and was forced to stop his breath. The right hand with which Mary had used all her force to attack was also bloody and injured now.


    However, the blood was only Mary¡¯s. Her attack had not even managed to pierce the fire dragon¡¯s scales.


    The fire dragon roared in anger before opening his fangs and letting out an earthshaking roar to intimidate the enemy. It was only then that he reached out with his head and bit wickedly at Mary¡¯s slender body.


    "Back. Don¡¯t fight it head on...move around."


    Seeing the dire situation that hade about, Greem immediately tossed an instant-cast magma fireball at the fire dragon¡¯s mouth and tilted his head a little off course. The me waves from the explosions also knocked Mary away as she was stunned from the close-distance dragon¡¯s roar.


    Though Mary had to suffer a bit of fire damage for this, she had managed to avoid the fatal bite of the fire dragon!


    Mary was a Second Grade adept after all. Her Spirit had reached seventeen points, putting her resistance against the dragon¡¯s aura of might at a decent level. She had only been hit by the aura at too close of a distance earlier, throwing her mind into chaos for a moment. Once she left the area, her mind immediately returned to normal. She turned into a crimson shadow, shing away from the spot.


    Ka, ka, ka!


    Mary evaded the several furious bites of the fire dragon with her agile movements.


    Mary¡¯s maneuvers had also bought time for her fewpanions who were in charge of holding down the fort against the dragon. Zacha and the Shredder didn¡¯t bother with dealing with the fires still burning on them. They immediately roared and charged at the fire dragon from the left and right.


    The Goblin Shredder¡¯s drill and chainsaw shed with the right w that the fire dragon had swung at it. As blood flew everywhere from the impact, the Shredder¡¯s massive body was also blown away by the fire dragon.


    Dragonborn Zacha took the opportunity to lunge forward and smash the Frozen Mallet in his hand on the thick, left hind leg that the fire dragon was using to support his weight.


    Fire Dragon Bamler let out a pained hiss and that leg of his immediately bent.


    The fire dragon turned his head with agility and speed not matched by his massive size. His golden, zing eyes fixated upon Dragonborn Zacha.


    To think it was a Second Grade dragonborn warrior!


    Bamler¡¯s mind turned rapidly. For the first time, he started to seriously consider if a dragon lord had joined the ranks of those conspiring against him. It was important to note that, on Lance, all dragonborn servants would only believe in and serve one dragon lord during their entire lives.


    No dragon lord would be willing to part with their dragonborn servants, for they were one of the most valuable pieces of their hoard! Moreover, the cultivation of a Second Grade dragonborn servant was so difficult that it could even bring a dragon to tears. That was why Bamler couldn¡¯t help but start having doubts when he saw a Second Grade dragonborn warrior in the ranks of the outsiders.


    However, doubts and suspicions were only that- doubts and suspicions. There was no room for thoughts or hesitation during battle.


    Bamler lit up Zacha with a brief dragon¡¯s breath and without any hesitation, engulfing the dragonborn in ayer of fierce and violent magical fire.


    The two blood knights yelled and stormed forward. Before they could even sh the fire dragon more than three times, they were mmed into the walls of the hall by a wicked dragon¡¯s tail. The terrifying snapping of bones was clear for all to hear. The two blood knights had almost been turned into blood paste. Even the runic longswords they had used to soften the blow were bent at a scary angle.


    Though they were both Second Grade creatures, a rampaging fire dragon had an overwhelmingly immense advantage against the vampires.


    "Don¡¯t confront it directly; keep moving around while attacking it."


    As themander of this battle, Greem¡¯s feelings were the most solemn of them all. He yelled out orders as he tossed out the me FIend of Terror while transforming into a zing me Fiend himself.


    Two giant me Fiends, who were asrge as himself, simultaneously and suddenly appeared in theva hall. The Second Grade fire dragon wreaking havoc throughout the battlefield stopped his attack and assessed the two new enemies from a distance.


    The atmosphere in the battlefield abruptly froze!


    The Goblin Shredder that had been blown away by the fire dragon once again approached with heavy footsteps and stood at the side of the two me Fiends. On the other end, Dragonborn Zacha had barely been able to extinguish the hot mes on his body with the powers of electricity. He stood up, charred and burnt.


    The four dragonyers stood side by side, forming an imprable wall of iron and steel, standing right in front of Fire Dragon Bamler. Meanwhile, Mary beat her crimson bat wings and descended behind the fire dragon, at a distance, sealing of his only exit. The two blood knights, on the other hand, coughed up blood as they desperately stuffed some kind of potion that resembled a blood sac into their mouths. As their flesh snapped and crackled, their broken bones and smashed organs recovered at a miraculous speed.


    Fire Dragon Bamler¡¯s gaze finally turned serious for the first time.


    He had absolute confidence in smashing any one of these enemies here to pieces and roasting them into cinders if he engaged them in a one on one duel. However, when they banded together and wound themselves like a tight rope, the price he would have to pay for victory became immense.


    However, the wealth and treasures he had spent several hundred years to umte were hidden right in the bedroom behind him. If he were to escape or be defeated, these treasures would no longer be his. The moment that thought appeared in his mind, Fire Dragon Bamler went berserk. Blood shot up his eyes, and his entire body radiated an intense and fearsome killing intent.


    Without further provocation, Fire Dragon Bamler opened his mouth and let out a drawn-out dragon¡¯s roar that intimidated everyone on the battlefield. He then lunged straight at Greem with a fierce expression.


    He could clearly tell that these adepts hailed this evil male adept as their leader. As long as he dealt with this adept, the enemy¡¯s threat would immediately be cut in half.


    The group of humans was once again entangled with the dragon as a terrifying battle that shook the entire underground space broke out.


    The second round of conflictsted only seven minutes.


    The first ones to be expelled from the battlefield were still the two blood knights.


    They had been uncontested and unchallenged in their battles against the forest elves in Faen ne. However, in this brutal dragonying battle, they were the first to be thrown out due to their bodies being ¡¯too weak.¡¯


    Pa, pa!


    The two blood knights were once again smashed into the hard stone walls, forming two human-shaped marks in the walls. The fronts of their bodies that had been hit by the dragon¡¯s wings were so smashed up that they were a pulp of blood and flesh that no one could recognize. They were stuck on the wall like paintings. They struggled with all their strength and still couldn¡¯t get themselves off of the wall.


    The second person to be thrown out was Dragonborn Zacha.


    He might have been wearing a mental defense magical equipment on him, but the fear of dragons ingrained into his soul origin caused him to be unavoidably terrified of that aura of might. Another dragon¡¯s aura of might intimidated his soul, and a heavy, sharp dragon w smacked him away.


    The part hit by the dragon¡¯s w was severely depressed, and the three w marks had left behind grievous wounds. If it weren¡¯t for a tornado erupting from the wind indurium armor negating a portion of the damage, a good half of Zacha¡¯s body would have been torn off, leaving him severely wounded.


    Zacha only stopped rolling after mming into a stone wall.


    Without another word, he took out the various life potions from his pouch and drank them as fast as he could. After following Greem, he had also learned how to regenerate quickly with the use of medicines like the adepts did. If he were to rely on his robust body to heal itself regardless of the damage, as he had always done in the past, then he would have no chance to rejoin the battle today!


    Smacking away the dragonborn had also caused Bamler to fall under the wild revenge of the dragonying squad.


    Greem¡¯s Fire Core Explosion quickly exploded on the fire dragon¡¯s chest, leaving a massive wound there. Dragon¡¯s blood poured out of the injury, falling on the ground and igniting it and turning into yet another sea of fire. Meanwhile, the me Fiend of Terror charged forward without any regard for its safety and severed the fire dragon¡¯s left wing with a single sh of its magma me sword.


    The fire dragon roared in pain and crouched down, using the tough horn on its head to gore the me Fiend¡¯s chest and stir it around.


    The me Fiend of Terror tossed its massive sword aside and gripped the dragon¡¯s horn with its thick magma hands, starting a contest of strength against the creature with its very own body.


    The water-tank sized hole became even more extensive and broader as they fought.


    Boilingva spilled forth from the opening, pouring all over the fire dragon¡¯s face and scalding it, causing it to roar without end.

 Chapter 734 Dragonslaying Adepts

    "Oliven, if you don¡¯t act now, then you will have no share in this dragon!"


    Even during this intense time-sensitive battle, Greem still didn¡¯t forget to roar furiously at Oliven, who was moving around the outside of the battlefield.


    Of course, he made sure to use mental messages when doing so.


    The whole point of paying such a high price to hire her was to capture this Second Grade fire dragon in a single move. Yet, despite how fierce the fight had be, she still had not moved. It was no wonder that Greem was absolutely furious.


    "What are you in a rush for," Oliven was still walking in circles around the main battlefield, cloaked in her ck cape, "If this stupid dragon senses my aura, there¡¯s no doubt it will try to escape with all it has. Who amongst us can stop it, with its powerful strength and physique?"


    "Then what¡¯s your n?" Greem was practically screaming now.


    "Inflict some more wounds on it. It¡¯s best if the wounds can limit his movements."


    "I¡¯ll trust you one more time. Thirty seconds... if you don¡¯t act within thirty seconds, this deal of ours is off."


    Greem might be leaving mean words, but he wasn¡¯t idling about.


    He appeared behind the fire dragon¡¯s giant body with a Fire Teleportation and bent down to avoid the slender tail whipping at him. borate magical chants came out of his mouth like a machine gun, and a barrage of magma fireballs whistled toward the dragon like meteors, sting the dragon¡¯s side.


    The fire dragon¡¯s magic resistance allowed it to be utterly immune to the fire damage of the magma fireballs, but he couldn¡¯t avoid the magma shards that shot out after the explosions.


    Greem¡¯s violent attack blew away arge patch of dragon scales on the right side of the dragon¡¯s body, leaving wounds of various sizes and turning his torso into a bloody mess. Of course, these were only flesh wounds. Though it covered arge area and looked reasonably serious, he had done no damage to the vital organs.


    Even so, this attack was still a severe blow to the fire dragon!


    Bamler howled in agony and pulled out his horn from the me Fiend¡¯s chest, bright red from being burned by theva, and turned to bite at Greem.


    Greem relied on the Fire Teleportation to flee, consecutively dodging four charges and bite attempts from the fire dragon. In the end, he didn¡¯t manage to avoid everything. A brief dragon¡¯s breath hit him and blew him against a stone wall.


    The fire dragon wanted to rush ahead and follow up with more attacks, but he was stopped by an equally berserk Goblin Shredder. After exchanging a few violent blows, the massive Shredder was once again blown away by the fire dragon, who was therger of the two.


    Mary, who had been moving around the fire dragon all along, immediately struck the moment the Shredder vanished.


    In a frontal confrontation, Mary¡¯s ¡¯weak¡¯ offensive power would probably be insufficient to disce a single scale. However, with the numerous injuries that Greem and the others had created, the terror of Mary¡¯s attacks started to show, bit by bit.


    Mary¡¯s crimson silhouette moved about the perimeter like a phantom. She would charge onto the fire dragon while he was dealing with other attacks and could not defend himself and inject clouds of blood mist into his exposed flesh. Regardless of how high the dragon¡¯s magic resistance was, he could not possibly have forged his body to be utterly impervious to all poison and acid.


    The moment the blood energy entered Bamler¡¯s body, it started to recklessly attack all blood vessels and organs under Mary¡¯s vague maniption. Though the pulsating fire elementium would neutralize most of the blood energy in the fire dragon¡¯s blood and muscles, the damage it dealt before vanishing was enough to make the fire dragon suffer immensely.


    At this point in the battle, it seemed like both parties were ending up injured and losing!


    A group of adepts had surrounded the fire dragon in hisva hall, and his wounds were fairly grievous as well. Still, while Greem¡¯s Crimson adepts had suffered no casualties yet, their injuries were no better than the dragon¡¯s.


    If this situation kept up, victory could go to either side!


    At this moment, Oliven, the trump card, finally struck. And her very strike instantly caused Second Grade Fire Dragon Bamler¡¯s attitude to turnpletely.


    Oliven cast away the obstructive ck robe and revealed her agile assassin¡¯s garb underneath it. Her body then shed as she charged right at the fire dragon.


    Even during the most intense moments of the battle, Fire Dragon Bamler had still been paying full attention to every change on the battlefield.


    The ck-robed individual who had been staying out of the battle had attracted his attention a long time ago, but he had only not attacked them because he didn¡¯t want to make another enemy.


    Seeing that the enemy was charging right at him, Bamler immediately forced the annoying Mary away with his long tail and raised his body, opened his mouth, and unleashed a sudden me breath to devour Oliven¡¯s slender frame.


    To be brutally honest, the only one in thisva hall who dared to deal with the fire dragon¡¯s breath head on would be Greem, the fire adept. Everyone else had no choice but to flee and hide in the face of this terrifying dragon¡¯s breath. Even a metal lump like the Goblin Shredder would face the risk of having its metallic joints melted and stalling if it were bathed in the breath for more than a dozen seconds.


    A slender assassin like Oliven who was not protected by any magical defenses would probably have her physical defenses consumed in less than three seconds.


    That was why everyone¡¯s heart skipped a beat when they saw Oliven being drowned in that ferocious breath. She had been everyone¡¯s hope. Even a leader as calm andposed as Greem felt a skip in his heart.


    Yet, the next second, the miraculous scene that unfolded made everyone gasp in wonder!


    The mysterious Oliven had curled into a ball and pulled the cape on her back over herself. She had used that thin fabric to resist this fire dragon¡¯s breath, worth four hundred and sixty points of magical damage. Once her body had passed through the attack, Oliven let go of the cape and unfolded her stance. Her hands reached to her waist and grabbed the two dragontooth daggers.


    LIke Mary, Oliven walked on the path of high Agility. That made it such that their Strength and Physique could not be too high. Trying to pierce a fire dragon¡¯s scales with such ¡¯weak¡¯ Strength was impractical thinking!


    Surprisingly, this time was different. Mary¡¯s close-range strikes had only left her scrambling and escaping in a hurry. Yet, Oliven betrayed everyone¡¯s expectations. The daggers in her hands seemed like they were cutting through butter. They instantly pierced through the fine scales on the fire dragon¡¯s neck and left a half-meter-long cut on it.


    Bamler winced in pain and roared. He extended his neck and tried to chase and bite at the swift silhouette. However, Oliven was like a dancing fairy, dodging left and right away from the fire dragon¡¯s fangs with ease. The daggers in her hands were like legendary weapons that could cut through anything. A simple stab would leave a bloody hole, and a simple sh would leave behind a bleeding trail.


    These once imprable dragon scales were as frail as tofu before Oliven¡¯s hands. They could not even resist a single ¡¯touch¡¯ from her.


    Bamler¡¯s multiple attempts to retaliate were ineffective, and even the dragon¡¯s aura of might that had always worked was useless against this female assassin. As he roared in anger, his snout sniffed a few times, and his face turned dramatically.


    "Dragon devourer...you are a dragon devourer!"


    Fire Dragon Bamler didn¡¯t take too long to match this assassin to the terrifying enemy in the legends of dragons.


    Dragon devourers. They were a strange race and profession that all dragons hated to no end.


    Be they male, female, young, or old. Once they became a dragon devourer, they were the enemies of all dragons across the multiverse.


    As dragon devourers, they typically appeared no different from ordinary individuals. Only when they fought with dragons would they reveal all sorts of remarkable abilities. If a dragon devourer¡¯s magic resistance were typically one point, then their magic resistance would be ten points when they fought a dragon.


    The tough dragon scales on the surface of a dragon¡¯s bodies were as thin as paper and as soft as tofu in the eyes of dragon devourers.


    Dragon devourers that had not grown into power might not be scary!


    After all, even the strongest of ants couldn¡¯t possibly bite a buffalo to death.


    However, once a dragon devourer had gathered power through devouring dragons, they were the most terrifying existence to the dragons!


    Every dragon they consumed would allow them to obtain that dragon¡¯s magic resistance and growth potential perfectly. By the time they ran into the next dragon, their magic resistance wouldn¡¯t just be ten times their previous resistance, but twenty or thirty times that.


    An individual who was not afraid of a dragon¡¯s aura of might or a dragon¡¯s breath and who could ignore the defenses of a dragon; how could the dragons not be terrified!?


    Even more astounding was the fact that a dragon¡¯s everything, be it their wealth, treasures, or even their flesh, blood, bones, and tendons, would all be the nutrition of the enemy if they were defeated. And they wouldn¡¯t even get the chance for their souls to return to the Dragon God¡¯s embrace.


    Upon discovering Oliven¡¯s identity as a dragon devourer, Bamler immediately switched to escaping.


    Sadly, Greem had already predicted this oue.


    While Bamler was enduring Oliven¡¯s unrestrained attacks as he fled, Greem brought the badly injured Zacha and the dented Shredder to block his path. Behind Greem, Mary and the two grievously wounded blood knights formed the second defensive line.


    Meanwhile, the fire dragon had already destroyed the me Fiend of Terror. It had reverted to its core form and rolled into a corner of the hall. It seemed it could not be used again unless it was brought back and fixed.


    "Move." The flustered and exasperated fire dragon could only use his ferocious dragon¡¯s breath once again to open up a path.


    Unfortunately, this time, no matter how hard he tried and even if he coughed up his lungs, he could not make Greem take one step backward. The fire adept had gritted his teeth and was standing his ground. Greem¡¯s palms had also been carbonized after forcefully fending off the violent breath of a Second Grade fire dragon.


    Bamler flew into a rage and tried to charge his way through.


    At this moment, the Shredder had run to his back and grabbed his slender tail, pulling and anchoring him to the spot. Zacha raised his Frozen Mallet and his lightning spear, smashing the two injured hindlegs of the fire dragon.


    Mary and the two blood knights took to the air and threw all of their attacks at the dragon¡¯srge eyes.


    For a moment, the fire dragon could not escape the fetters of the adepts, no matter how he roared and struggled.


    Oliven once again dove down from behind the fire dragon.


    This time, her target was Bamler¡¯s highly raised head.

 Chapter 735 Battle of the Stone Stairs.

    Chapter 735 Battle of the Stone Stairs.


    Billis stood alone in silence at the entrance of the fire dragon''sbyrinth.


    It was several thousands of meters underground after all. There was even a rolling river ofva right beside him. It was only natural that the cave was unbearably warm.


    However, the waves of dragon roars and terrifying aura of might that emanated from thebyrinth caused Billis'' body to tremble uncontrobly. The bug adept once again realized the massive difference in power between himself and the people on the other end.


    Second and First Grade. A terrifying gulf existed between even beginner Second Grade and peak First Grade.


    Consequently, he could only guard the exit path alone while the Second Grades were fighting the fire dragon with all their strength.


    Just as his thoughts started to wander, a series of odd wing beating sounds came from the valley above. Old Fox Vanlier plunged down from above, his bodypletely covered in fire.


    The temperature here was far too high. Even intermediate First Grade Vanlier could not survive here for long.


    "Careful¡­careful. Those dragonborn have charged all the way back."


    Small fires were all over his furry bat body. Vanlier had practically mmed onto the teleportation tform like a crashing ne. When he finally transformed into his human form again, his body was covered in ck scorch marks and boils of various sizes.


    Apart from the so-called teleportation array, the only way to travel from the top of the valley to this teleportation tform was a single narrow, winding path. Right now, a horde of Firethroat Dragonborn were roaring and walking down the stairs, swarming toward the tform.


    At this moment, the roar of the dragon could still be clearly heard from thebyrinth. Even the valley was quaking intensely.


    It was apparent how intense the battle between the two parties was!


    "Dammit, dammit! The battle hasn''t ended yet! How are we supposed to stop those dragonborn when they get here? With just the two of us?" Vanlier couldn''t help but start grumbling.


    "Four!" Billis'' ghostly green eyes remained unblinking under his robe.


    "Four?"


    Vanlier had just asked the question when the Voodoo Doll and the Stitch Ghost Golem hovered out from the shadows. The two dolls started to let out an odd and sinisterugh.


    The two little guys might only be the size of a palm, but they were actually First Grade magical creations. Each of them had strange abilities that werepletely different from the norm. Still, even with the two of them, there were only four First Grades present. It didn''t seem to be enough to deal with the berserk dragonborn that were swarming towards them!


    While Vanlier''s gaze flickered about, Billis'' body started squirming as somerge insect projections rolled out from within. A short momentter, these insect projections solidified into actual ferocious mantises before Vanlier''s eyes. These mantises were surrounded by shing jade green runes.


    One, two, three, four.


    In the blink of an eye, the empty tform filled up with twenty-two magical mantises with slender bodies, t wings, and wicked scythe-shaped limbs.


    "Go my precious; let there be a bloody banquet here!"


    As Bug Adept Billis hissed, the magical mantises stood up on their hind legs and made sparks with their scythe limbs. It was now that they extended their wings and lunged at the berserk dragonborn walking down the steps.


    A battle of blood and flesh unfolded now!


    The two instinctively murderous dolls immediately followed after the mantises at the sight of this.


    Meanwhile, Vanlier, who had always acted as an advisor, felt his heart tremble when he saw the mantises. He had long heard of Bug Adept Billis'' improvement and his renown for being the rising star of the Crimson''s second generation adepts that was most likely to advance to Second Grade in the short term.


    However, this was his first time witnessing Billis'' power for himself!


    With that swarm of his and these fierce insect generals, he could probably stand his ground against certain Second Grades. As for the First Grade adepts back at the n? He could probably crush them with such power.


    It seemed he would have to try and get closer with this bug adept and establish a bit of a rtionship.


    Old Fox Vanlier thought to himself as he took out some potions and started to treat his wounds.


    Some time ago, the roars from thebyrinth had gone silent.


    "Lord Billis, in there¡­" Vanlier asked with a bit of hesitation.


    He might be a First Grade Crimson adept like Billis, but the vast difference in power made him unconsciously treat Billis like a Second Grade adept.


    Perhaps satisfied by Vanlier''s respect, the cold and silent Billis finally spoke.


    "They''ve won over on master''s side! They are sweeping the battlefield right now. It didn''t end too well for the fire dragon!"


    Billis might have suffered tremendous losses from scouting earlier, but some bugs had still survived after all. With these insects as miniature scouts, Billis was able to witness the entirety of the Second Grade adept''s glorious dragonying feat from a third person perspective, even while absent.


    In all honesty, Billis might have been satisfied with his current strength. However, when he saw the scene of the battle between the Second Grade adepts and the fire dragons, he immediately amended his position.


    One couldn''t think too much of him right now because of his powerful army. If he were actually to be sent onto the battlfield of a Second Grade, everything he had would turn into dust.


    So what if he had a virtually endless swarm of insects? A single dragon''s breath from that Second Grade fire dragon would exterminate the majority of them! So what if he had ferocious insect generals? They couldn''t even break through ayer of the Second Grade fire dragon''s skin! The insects and insect generals might be uncontested against opponents that were of the same grade or weaker than them. However, if they were to run into difficult enemies, any number of them would not be as useful as that dragonborn.


    That was why the battle that erupted in theva hall also caused Billis to fall into contemtion. He started reflecting on his evolution path and his role within the n. Perhaps he would advance to Second Grade very shortly. It was better to figure it out now rather thanter.


    A bloody and brutal battle was happening on the winding stone stairs carved into the walls of the hotva valley.


    Due to how narrow the stairs were, only one dragonborn could fit at the same time. Consequently, the Firethroats formed themselves into one long line and charged down the steps. Billis'' magical mantises either unfolded their wings or climbed up the walls to intercept the dragonborn along the stairs, breaking out into a bloody conflict.


    The Firethroat Dragonborn were all muscr and massive, and therge long-handled axes in their hands were unstoppable when they waved them. However, such heavy weapons could not be used to their fullest potential on such a narrow path. They weren''t as agile or mobile as the slender and fast mantises either.


    Whaty beneath the stairs was a dark and swirling river ofva. Even with the excellent fire resistance of the Firethroats, falling into the river would mean death. That was why the mantises constantly circled the stairs and looked for spots of weaknesses among the dragonborn before diving at them.


    Due to the harassment of the insects, a Firethroat dragonborn asionally take a misstepped and fell from the stairs, plunging into theva with an audible plop. Dragonborn like these had no chance to struggle and save themselves. The zingva devoured them in a mere two to three seconds. Not even a bubble popped on the surface.


    "What''s the situation here?"


    A familiar male voice rang out. Greem walked out of thebyrinth with the adepts. The only person missing was the Dragon Devourer Oliven.


    It was clear that the dragonying battle had left the Crimson adepts injured. Some of them even carried fairly grievous wounds. However, the joy of victory was painted on everyone''s faces. They were excited.


    "Those Firethroat Dragonborn have all hurried back. My Lord, do you think we should retreat now?" Old Fox Vanlier asked respectfully.


    "Now now. That Oliven''s still¡­never mind. Let''s try and stall a bit longer for her!"


    With Greem''s order given out, a trace of wickedness appeared on the faces of these Second Grades that had just won a battle.


    The battle against the fire dragon had been too dangerous and stifling. The battle had been trying with only their power and numbers. It caused an indescribable fire to umte in the hearts of every one of them. Now that they saw these dragonborn warriors who hade to court death, the Crimson adepts couldn''t suppress their killing intent any longer.


    "Let''s go!" A scorched and burnt Mary beat her wings and took to the skies, leading her two badly injured blood knights against the Firethroat Dragonborn.


    They were all severely wounded from the previous battle and were in need of high-energy blood to replenish the exhaustion of their strength. The sight of so many Firethroat Dragonborn was like the sight of a moving blood bank. Their glee showed on their faces.


    Zacha and the Goblin Shredder had been kicked about by the fire dragon like a ball for the entire duration of the battle. Now that they finally had a chance to relieve their anger, they wouldn''t possibly give up on it. Simrly, they too charged onto the stone stairs.


    Inside theva hall, an unbearably bloody ceremony was unfolding.


    The previously intimidating and berserk fire dragon was now lying on the floor like a dead dog. Hisrge abdomen swelled massively, forming a barrier of flesh and tendons. One could vaguely see the silhouette of a girl curled in a ball inside him.


    The fire dragon''s limbs had all been shattered, and its neck was bleeding profusely while missing arge patch of his hide.


    Under the guidance of a mysterious force, all the life energy of the Second Grade fire dragon, along with his overwhelming Spirit and dragon soul, was slowly vanishing. Even the blood, bones, flesh of his body, and the dragon crystal in his skull were melting into a surge of energy by the corrosion of a strange force and slowly being assimted by the mysterious girl.


    The power within the mysterious girl''s body started to boil in this ce where no one could see.


    A strange and immensely powerful flux was slowly forming.

 Chapter 736 Crimson Dormancy

    Second Grade Fire Dragon Bamler¡¯s undergroundbyrinth had copsed!


    This scary bit of news spread throughout Lance with the speed of a gue.


    Every dragon that heard this news was shocked and started listening for the source of the story and its reliability. Some more meddlesome dragons even took a special trip to Bamler¡¯sbyrinth and attempted to verify the truth of the news with the dragon himself.


    Sadly, that Second Grade fire dragon had vanished without a trace, almost as if he had evaporated into thin air.


    Thebyrinth he¡¯d constructed had utterly copsed, just as the rumors imed. The ma.s.sive amounts of rock and stone that hade down from its copse also fell into theva river and blocked it. Theva that continually surged under the Burning ins had begun to surge up to the surface, forming a ma.s.sive magmake where the valley once was.


    That stopped the desire of meddlesome dragons to continue pursuing the matter!


    Along with the Second Grade fire dragon, his subordinate Firethroat Dragonborn had also vanished. The sight of those tall silhouettes in crimson scales patrolling the burningnds could no longer be seen around the valley.


    ording to some of the higher magical creatures left in the Burning ins, it seemed as if Bamler had strangely vanished after some odd outsiders had broken into his territory. Meanwhile, theck of sufficient information made it difficult for anyone to investigate the true ident.i.ties of these outsiders.


    After six months of sloppy inquiries, the dragons that got no useful information finally lost their patience and scattered.


    As such, the question of the mysterious vanishing of Second Grade Fire Dragon Bamler became a mystery of Lance!


    ............


    Even an entire Second Grade fire dragon still couldn¡¯t boost Oliven up onto the throne of Third Grade.


    That said,pared to before, she was much stronger, be it in terms of magic resistance, physical strength, or spiritual strength. More importantly, she seemed to have inherited some racial abilities of the fire dragon. Just like Bamler, she could unleash a lethal, wide-area fire breath.


    Even Greem fell into a daze at the sight of a pet.i.te and cute girl releasing a ma.s.sive fan-shaped fire dragon¡¯s breath like a dragon. Though the adept had modeled the high-grade spell Dragon¡¯s Breath after actual dragon breath, the spell itself was still far inferior to the real thing.


    The dragon weapons that Oliven carried with her had also gained even more powerful and terrifying powers after absorbing the vengeful spirit of the fire dragon. These powers might not be able to do much against other races, but they were especially effective against dragons.


    After all, the dragonsoul curse entangled in the weapons was not something that ordinary dragons could easily endure!


    In fact, when facing off against Oliven, low-grade dragons would even have to suffer her dragon¡¯s aura of might. Oliven would only need to let out a ma.s.sive roar, and all dragons that were at least two sub-grades below her would flee in terror. They wouldn¡¯t even be able to muster the courage to surround her and beat her.


    However, the surge in Spirit also made it impossible for Oliven to hide herself like before perfectly. Until she managed to digest and absorb the remnants of this dragonsoul curse, Oliven was not suited to continue staying in Lance.


    Otherwise, all the dragon powerhouses of Lance would be attracted to the dense dragon devourer aura and track her down to the metal fortress!


    That was why Oliven had no choice but to suppress her Spirit and follow Greem¡¯s adepts to Fire Throne, bing a new Second Grade adept of the Crimson n. On the surface, the Crimson n now had a total of four Second Grade adepts.


    As for Dragonborn Zacha, the two blood knights, and the three blood elves? Their unique status made it such that they could only be considered Second Grade servants of Greem and Mary, rather than official adepts with independent souls.


    However, the fact that a newly risen adept n that had not been established for more than five years had such power waspletely beyond everyone¡¯s expectations. It also meant that the individuals who had joined the Crimson n during its infancy were bound to reap ma.s.sive profits. They would be the biggest winners!


    However, the wellspring appearance of Second Grade adepts in the n also applied tremendous pressure to the current First Grades of the n. If they didn¡¯t hasten their advancements, they would probably be excluded from the core of power in the near future, cast away as peripheral members of the n.


    After giving out the fire dragon¡¯s h.o.a.rd to the partic.i.p.ating adepts based on contributions, the remainder was returned to the n¡¯s warehouse. It was only now, after so much toiling and working, that the Crimson n had finally stabilized for the first time. The focus of development had finally returned to Fire Throne.


    The recruitment of multiple Second Grade adepts and the growth of the First Grade n adepts caused the fame and might of the Crimson n to grow with each pa.s.sing day.


    One had to admit that a small adept¡¯s tower like Fire Throne could no longer hold the entirety of the Crimson n!


    The power and forces of the n desperately needed expansion. Thus, the choice of their future development path became ever more critical.


    After several discussions between Greem and Alice, they finally decided to construct the new Crimson n¡¯s tower in the north.


    Zhentarim might have looser adept forces and organizations with greater potential for development, but the struggle between the ns was also exceedingly brutal. b.l.o.o.d.y conflicts between adept ns urred every so often. It was only the suppression of the Zhentarim a.s.sociation that kept these conflicts from erupting into war all over the ce.


    Greem had always stayed outside of the Zhentarim adept groups, which was what kept him from being embroiled in a cruel adept¡¯s war. He had remained within the newly excavated area of the ck Forest after leaving the Sarubo n and establishing the Crimson n. That was how he avoided bing the new prey of those adept ns.


    There were too many people who wanted to attack the Crimson n. However, there was nothing they could do against an organization that stayed cooped up in their underground tower. If the Crimson n had their ownnds, vis, and resource sites in the central area of Zhentarim, they would most definitely have been split up by the surrounding ns already.


    Unfortunately, the Crimson n had none of these things.


    Moreover, the Crimson n seemed like it had no interest in these inherited territories and resource sites. It had not extended the influence of its n even a single step beyond the tower despite the scale that they now possessed.


    The only known property of the Crimson n was a small adept¡¯s tower hidden underground- Fire Throne. Yet, this tower was also the hardest piece of property to take over. Even the Third Grade vampire n had fallen before Fire Throne. Other adept ns had no interest in traveling thousands of miles to try and crack this tough nut.


    It wasn¡¯t that surrounding adept ns didn¡¯t want to deal with the quickly rising Crimson n; it was that they couldn¡¯t find a way to do so!


    The Crimson n that had yet to even walk out of their tower already had countless enemies in the center of the continent. Among them was a vampire n with an unresolvable grudge, two other adept ns who had hostile ties with them, and even the old Sarubo n wasn¡¯t on speaking terms with them.


    Such tremendous ability to draw hatred was unique amongst all the small adept ns!


    Consequently, the Crimson n would surely experience attacks and conspiracies from these enemies if they were to attempt to expand their forces in Zhentarim, be it on the surface or in the shadows. When that happened, it wouldn¡¯t be worth all the ha.s.sle and losses they would suffer.


    It was the consideration of all these factors that caused Alice to suggest Greem expand the Crimson n toward the north. Though the witches here were fairly xenophobic, with Alice, the Witch of Fate¡¯s leader backing him, the s.p.a.ce for development for Greem and his Crimson n would still be infinitely more abundant than at the center of the continent.


    Now that they had decided their future direction, it was naturally time to determine the address of the new n base!


    Excessively prosperous and bountifulnds were already under the governance of witches of other branches. The areas that had been given over to the Fate Witches over the years were either barren saltnds or bordends infested with magical creatures. Even a top-grade adept n would have to prepare themselves for loss if they were to attempt to expand in ces like these.


    However, Greem didn¡¯t seem to mind at all.


    His ideal adept¡¯s empire waspletely discongruent with the World of Adepts of the present. Perhaps it was only this process of building up from nothing that could help him discover his true path forward.


    After running to and fro the north for five long months, Greem finally decided on the new territory of their n- a ce called Icewind.


    Icewind.


    It was a frigid ce neighboring the ck Forest to the east of the Northern Lands.


    There were almost no human viges or cities here. Even the closest adept¡¯s tower was four hundred kilometers away. It was actually the territory of the Coldwinter Witches, but they were unwilling to part with a bountifulnd in the center of the Northern Lands and thus gave this hundred-kilometer-wide frozen in to the Fate Witches.


    Due to the difficulty of raising Fate Witches, they had not managed to take over their direct subordinate territoriespletely yet. Such a border area to the ck Forest naturally turned into nothing more than an ornament, a barrennd managed by no one.


    No witches were willing to stay here, and without the protection of a powerful adept¡¯s tower, there were naturally no citizens who dared to stay here. As such, Greem found absolutely no living people in Icewind when he traveled the entirety of the area, apart from one or two dozen hunter families!


    Such a territory might be a profitless bone for others, but it was a decent springboard for Greem. After circling out an area on a hill five kilometers away from the ck Forest, the tower builders that Greem had hired quickly arrived.


    Just like in the center of the continent, the tower builders that Greem hired still belonged to a subsidiary force of the Silver Union, based in the Northern Lands. For the sake of his n¡¯s future development, Greem gritted his teeth and asked them to construct a medium tower.


    A medium tower, fifteen levels tall, with all magical facilities possible!


    The cost of constructing a medium tower matched its functions and power. The price was so high that it made Greem want to curl up and cry.


    One million, two hundred thousand magical crystals; a million and two hundred thousand magical crystals!


    Just the odd change in the price of a medium tower couldpare to that of a small tower.

 Chapter 737 Clan Strategy

    However, a price like that was still eptable.


    After all, Greem had already scoured four dragon¡¯s dens clean. The resources and gemstones he had gained would be more than enough to support the construction of this new tower without any problems.


    Moreover, he had already gathered the materials and resources required to forge the two set pieces of Fire Throne during this time. Greem would naturally need to take this opportunity to reorganize his resources and power.


    Due to how remote the ce was, there were no suitable stone materials for the construction of a tower, making it take as long as two months for this medium tower to bepleted. To avoid trouble from the Coldwinter Witches, Alice specially sent Icdy Snowlotus over as the overseer.


    One had to admit that the Silver Union had its own unique perspective on golem creations and tower construction. For the first month, the resource caravans they sent over continued without stopping, turning the cold and silent Icewind into a lively market.


    The resources they had gone to such lengths to transport were all heavy stones and towerponents that had undergone heavy processing. Meanwhile, the three Silver Union adeptsmandedrge groups of magical stone and metal statues along with construct golems to build the tower. In just a dozen days, they managed to erect an icy tower ny meters in height and three hundred meters in diameter.


    Indeed, to better match the environment and elementium traits of Icewind, the Silver Union adepts had rmended an ice tower to Greem. The outside of the tower was constructed with Icefrost Stone, a type of special material that could continuously strengthen itself by absorbing wandering ice elementium from the air.


    That made it very well suited for Icewind.


    It was because the area was at the northern border and its weather was always cold and dry. In the twelve months of a year, the temperature would only rise above zero degrees Celsius during the seventh and eighth months. It typically remained below negative twenty degrees for the remainder of the year.


    With these favorable conditions in ce, this tower¡¯s central defensive power should reach between four hundred and fifty to six hundred points, even without considering its magical defenses. If the tower¡¯s defensive systems were activated at a suitable time, the tower¡¯s defensive power could reach a shocking one thousand points.


    Even a Third Grade adept could not harm the tower in the slightest, even without an adept of the same grade hosting the tower!


    More importantly, as a medium-sized tower, it could control environmental changes within a radius of five kilometers. Of course, trying to achieve such a tremendous effect required an immense amount of energy exhaustion from the tower. It would very likely affect the other energy systems of the tower.


    The original Fire Throne was only a small tower. It might have all the required magical facilities within it, but the number of facilities was limited. A fully functional alchemyb needed to provide basic service to over two dozen adepts and a hundred adept apprentices simultaneously. Yet, any one of the major experiments of a high-grade adept could easily go on for one to two month.


    This situation was not beneficial for the improvement of the n adepts and the apprentices if it persisted!


    With the appearance of this medium tower, this awkward situation finally changed for the better.


    The wide and s.p.a.cious apprentice hut allowed the apprentices to no longer be cramped up within their small stone rooms in groups of two or three. The expansion of the tower¡¯s s.p.a.ce also gave adepts and apprentices more s.p.a.ce to move about and conduct their activities.


    The new n book storage was also replenished with plenty of new books, most of them being new knowledge from other worlds. Of course, high-grade knowledge remained in the grasp of the n. However, some enlightening basic knowledge and subjects had already been opened to all n members.


    Being able to obtain rare materials and otherworldly knowledge through the n that couldn¡¯t be found outside, and having the privilege to purchase these items at a discount, was the most attractive part of being a n adept!


    Why else was it that every single apprentice adept tried their very best to be members of major adept ns? It was because of the welfare and privileges that wandering adepts and apprentices could never hope to get.


    It was important to note that most apprentice adepts didn¡¯t have immense talents, nor did most of theme from wealthy and influential n.o.ble families. Even the slightest of discounts and privileges could mean less need to undertake risks and less need to partic.i.p.ate in dangerous magical creature hunts or ruin explorations.


    As an apprentice, without the protection of powerful magical equipment and theck of sufficient defensive and offensive magic meant that the oue of every single adventure rested in the hands of Lady Luck.


    That was why adept ns with good benefits and plentiful resources were able to attract many apprentice adepts continually. And with sufficient apprentices, only then would the adept ns be able to select those with talent and potential for focused development.


    A good adept cultivation system was the key for ns to establish themselves in the World of Adepts!


    The Crimson n that Greem had establishedcked in this particr aspect.


    One had to admit, Greem¡¯s progressive development strategies had a ma.s.sive impact on the Crimson n.


    Looking across the entirety of the Crimson n, the only true Second Grade adepts were only Greem and Mary. Individuals like Tigule, who piloted the Goblin Shredder, or Dragon Devourer Oliven, were only outsiders with the strength of Second Grade in the end.


    Meanwhile, Zacha, the blood knights, and the blood elves were only Second Grade servants of Greem and Mary. They could not be considered official adepts of the tower.


    If one were to do a head count, they would find that the Crimson n¡¯s Second Grade lifeforms had outnumbered the number of First Grade adepts. The n¡¯s future development was facing a dangerous situation of an overdeveloped head and an insufficiently grown base.


    One could responsibly a.s.sert that ny-nine percent of the Crimson n¡¯s strength rested with Greem and Mary. If anything happened to either of them, the n¡¯s power would experience a destructive copse.


    Greem had been spending his past few years in endless conquest and ughter, all for the sake of providing the n¡¯s development with sufficient nutrients. Now that he had the Goblin ne in one hand and a slowly expanding Lance in the other, with no significant operation nned, it was time for him to turn back and reorganize the n¡¯s developmental frame.


    The Goblin ne was the first private ne of Greem¡¯s conquest. Meryl was currently stationed there, and there was no fear of any major revolt. Due to theck of the necessary workforce for in-depth excavation, the Crimson n had left this n¡¯s improvement to the Goblin Empire¡¯s development. The adepts only existed as supreme rulers behind the scenes.


    After the intense quake that had affected the entirety of the Goblin ne, the goblins had fully realized the ma.s.sive difference between their power and the adepts¡¯ power. Though reluctant, they had no choice but to obediently be the ves of the adepts and ept the rule of these otherworldly adepts.


    Meanwhile, the most significant yield for the Crimson n from the Goblin n was its rich ore resources.


    One had to admit, as a low-magic world, the Goblin ne might be severelycking in magical creatures and magical resources. However, the ne¡¯s metal and ore reserves were shockingly high.


    The Crimson n, represented by Meryl, adopted a rtively gentle ruling method over the Goblin Empire. On the one hand, they transportedrge amounts of adept resources to treat the goblin n.o.bles and indulge them in their luxurious lives, while on the other, they unfairly traded a ma.s.sive number of metal ores and special alloys with the goblins in exchange for some adept resources.


    The flying ship that had been destroyed in Faen had only been forged with the ma.s.sive amounts of metal from the Goblin ne. Judging from the current scale of trade between the Crimson n and the goblins, Greem would only need another six months to save enough resources to build a second flying ship.


    Judging from the data from Meryl, the number of resources that the Crimson n could obtain from the Goblin ne on an annual basis was worth as much as five hundred to eight hundred thousand magical crystals.


    Of course, if the Crimson n were a bit more brutal and savage, they could easily double their profits from the Goblin ne. Though if they did that, it would be hard to guarantee the order in the Goblin ne.


    If the goblins started trouble, the Crimson n would have to a.s.signrge groups of adepts to suppress and end the revolts. When that happened, the Goblin ne would be an absolute sinkhole of war, dragging most of the n¡¯s resources and military strength into its pull.


    Given all these factors, such a choice was not a good one. Instead, the ruling order that Meryl had established was the most logical and effortless!


    Meanwhile, Lance was Greem¡¯s biggest concern right now.


    The magical resources and dragon resources there were so plentiful that it made him want to cry. But given the Crimson n¡¯s current strength, they could not devour the ne whole.


    That was why, rather than the n conquering Lance, it was better to think of it as the n secretly establishing a forward base in Lance, while covertly hunting down low-grade dragons for profit.


    Of course, the risk of hunting dragons was higher than simply reaping the profits of the Goblin ne. Moreover, they couldn¡¯t kill too many dragons in a short period of time, or it would quickly draw the attention of the dragon lords.


    However, the profits of a single sess were immense!


    Take for example the most populous member of Lance- the Second Grade dragons. A live dragon transported to the World of Adepts could easily sell for six hundred to eight hundred thousand magical crystals. If they ran into adepts that desperately needed dragons, then this price could easily double again.


    Moreover, this was just the price of the dragon itself!


    Don¡¯t forget, every single one of these dragons was a wealth-h.o.a.rding, treasure-collecting millionaire. If the entire nest was cleaned out, just the worldly wealth and treasures would exceed the worth of the dragon itself.


    If appropriately managed, the profits of hunting a Second Grade dragon in Lance would be approximately two million magical crystals. However, half of these resources and wealth would have to be given out to the partic.i.p.ating n adepts. The n itself could only gain a profit of a million magical crystals.


    Even so, the ne profits of Lance were way higher than the low-magic Goblin ne!


    More importantly, it was only through Lance that Greem and the other adepts could obtain adept resources that could greatly benefit them. On the other hand, the Goblin ne could only provide them with low-end metal reserves.

 Chapter 738 White Tower

    In the World of Adepts, the construction of any individual adept¡¯s tower would create a ma.s.sive impact on its surroundings.


    Apart from its environmental effects, the main impact of the tower would be the very concept of the tower¡¯s territory.


    The area where the tower¡¯s power and influence reached would be the fixed territory that the tower¡¯s owner could control and possess.


    This simple concept was almost etched into the soul and consciousness of every single adept, making them uphold it as if it was a belief.


    That was why almost every single branch of the Northern Witches received news of the appearance of an adept¡¯s tower in Icewind. Among them, the most shaken were the Coldwinter Witches.


    After all, this vastnd used to belong to the Coldwinter Witches. It was only due to some ¡¯indescribable¡¯ reasons that pa.s.sed it into the hands of the Fate Witches. Now, the d.a.m.ned male adept that carried the banner of the Fate Witches actually intended to construct an adept¡¯s tower here. It had clearly gone beyond the expectations of the Coldwinter Witches.


    The Coldwinter Witches were also a witch branch that had only reestablished themselves after many difficulties and challenges. Their current branch leader was only Third Grade. As such, though their overall strength might be superior to the Fate Witches, they were still far weakerpared to the other witch branches.


    The Coldwinter Witches had no choice but to admit their new reality after several of their messengers were turned away by Icdy Snowlotus.


    They would forever lose actual power over Icewind and its surrounding territories. From now on, they would have to rely on the Fate Witches¡¯ good will any time they wanted to pa.s.s through Icewind to enter the ck Forest!


    The adept¡¯s tower of Icewind finally opened under the curious but shocked attention of the many witches.


    One had to admit, the activation of the elementium altar of every single adept¡¯s tower was always mesmerizing! Even though Greem had already experienced it twice, he couldn¡¯t suppress his excited emotions when experiencing it once again. Even his mental consciousness couldn¡¯t help but undte along with the elementium flux of the tower itself.


    When Greempleted the activation of the tower¡¯s spirit alone in the control hall of the eleventh floor, several elementium halos appeared at the base of the tower. Then, floor by floor, they lit up the structure of the tower and started moving toward the top of the tower.


    As the defensive magic of the tower belonged to the ice and snow attribute, most of the elementium particles attracted toward it were ice particles. A ma.s.sive number of ice particles slowly gathered around the outside of the tower, each of them like a minuscule light that couldn¡¯t be seen with the naked eye, gradually building up into a miniature blizzard.


    From a distance, the entire tower was hidden in white and blinding snow, making it difficult for anyone to sessfully gaze upon its actual appearance.


    That was only after the activation of the tower¡¯s elementium altar. There weren¡¯t enough elementium energy reserves, causing the blizzard to only manifest within a hundred meters of the tower. With the daily functioning of the tower, the elementium reserves in the energy room at the lowest level would eventually be filled, and this kind of blizzard could easily extend over five kilometers away.


    This way, any foe that held hostile intentions toward the tower would have to endure the blizzard even as they attacked the tower. Moreover, as the owner of the tower, Greem could invest even more elementium energy to strengthen the intensity and radius of the snowstorm in specified areas.


    The price paid for any operations against the tower would always be immense!


    Many Crimson adepts had teleported here from the center of the continent for the tower activation ceremony today. As such, it was extraordinarily lively here as well. Meanwhile, the pseudo-adepts and apprentices of the n had to spend two to three months traveling through the ck Forest to get here.


    While everyone was gathered around the tower to sense the minute changes in the surrounding elementium particles, the gates of the tower suddenly opened as Greem walked out from within.


    As a Second Grade adept, Greem was undoubtedly at the peak of his life. His looks had been fixed at his current appearance, with both the youth and vigor of a young man and theposure and ableness of a middle-aged man.


    He had yet to go through the first hundred years of his four-hundred-year-long lifespan. There were still plenty of good times for him to enjoy and experience. That was why all the adepts couldn¡¯t help but hold their breath for a moment when he emerged from the tower, bathing in the magical halos still coursing through the building.


    "Come on in. From now on, this will be our new home!"


    The Crimson adepts who were present started cheering when they heard Greem¡¯s invigorating words.


    After .u.mting sufficient power, the Crimson n had finally taken its first firm and determined step toward the outside world after .u.mting adequate strength!


    All the adepts and apprentices surged into the tower, carrying with them a trace of curiosity and excitement.


    The outside world might be one of ice and snow, but once they crossed that barrier of light, it was a beautiful world as warm as spring.


    In the center of the first floor was a broad and brightly lit magical hall. At the very front of the room was a vast library. One could see the shelves of magical tomes stacked within through the barrier of light. On both sides of the library were clean and neat magical houses.


    The spiral staircase leading to the second floor was located in the corner of the hall.


    The floor of the hall wasposed of smooth and shining obsidian. Profound magical pictures and strange runes had even been carved into them. Every time an apprentice stepped on top of the tiles, their magical powers would interact with the energy coursing through the array, activating some phantasmal and beautiful light projections.


    They would be small girls running about barefoot, or a lively fawn prancing about, or a flower fairy dancing in the winds, or small young dragons breathing fire...


    These strange fellows would appear and fade out of existence whenever an adept or apprentice walked through the hall, apanied by strange sound effects and fantastic lighting.


    For the adepts, these were only the most basic of light and shadow illusions and were barely worth mentioning. However, these illusions were magical power that apprentice adepts dreamt about.


    Beautiful yet phantasmal, ridiculous yet so real.


    Leaving the group of pseudo-adepts and apprentice adepts to explore and get used to the new tower, Greem led the n adepts onto a short-range teleportation array and instantly arrived at the fifth floor.


    Once everyone had taken their seats in the meeting hall, Greem¡¯s pa.s.sionate gaze swept past each of their faces.


    With the scale that the Crimson n had developed, the internal adept force required proper reorganization and distribution. There wasn¡¯t much to be done over at Fire Throne. It was even said that the Zhentarim a.s.sociation had sent over a n.o.ble lord to attempt to contest the Crimson n for thends surrounding the tower.


    Greem took the opportunity to move most of the n¡¯s forces over to the north.


    Gargamel and Forest Spirit Eva remained in Fire Throne to manage the day-to-day tasks there, while Meryl was summoned back from the Goblin ne to manage the daily functions in the new tower here. The matters in the Goblin ne would be handed over to Medusa Dana instead.


    With such an arrangement, the power structure and veins of the Crimson n were slowly fleshed out and expanded.


    At Fire Throne, Gargamel would be the majordomo, aided by Forest Spirit Eva, Emelia, and Manticore Charon. Oliven would be stationed there, while Greem would also spend most of his time training there as well.


    At the new tower in the north, Meryl would be the majordomo, aided by Icdy Snowlotus, Bug Adept Billis, and Wind Adept Deserra. Mary and the bloodkin she led would be stationed here.


    In the Goblin ne, Medusa Dana would be the majordomo, aided by Goblin Tigule.


    In Lance, Brain Monster Gazlowe would be the majordomo, aided by Dragonborn Zacha.


    First Grade adepts would manage most of the daily tasks in these ces. Meanwhile, no specific duties had been a.s.signed to the Second Grades of the n. They only needed to train and improve their power constantly. This way, the group would be able to call upon them when the n needed their strength.


    For the first time, the Fate Witches were involved in the management of apprentices within the n, along with its daily matters, as new members of the n. Moreover, Alice had specially sent word that a batch of witch apprentices would be sent over to undertake trials here once the new tower had started operating properly.


    From the day the new tower waspleted, the joining of the Crimson n and the Fate Witches had officially begun!


    "Teacher, the new adept¡¯s tower has been constructed, but we can¡¯t just keep going on without a name for it, can we? What do you think we should name it?" As the majordomo of the new tower, Meryl was naturally the most concerned over this matter.


    Greem looked at everyone present and mulled it over for a while.


    "White Tower. We shall just call it White Tower!"


    ............


    Lance. The thunder dragon¡¯s territory.


    Avish and luxurious pce sat atop the mountainous hills.


    Most of the buildings in the pce were constructed to be extraordinarilyrge and grandiose. The furnishings inside the rooms were also well beyond the extravagance of a human emperor¡¯s pce.


    At this moment, on a tform to the east of the pce, Thunder Dragon Arms had once again transformed into his human form and was lying against a soft bed while draped in smooth silk robes. He was enjoying the diligent service of four or five elven beauties while appreciating the performance of the dancers below.


    Of the five elven beauties, two were ma.s.saging his legs while one was peeling away grape skins and feeding him with a smile on her face. Meanwhile, one of the other two was holding amber-colored wine in her hands and bringing it forward for him to drink at his instructions. Thest one was holding a jade tter for him to spit out the grape seeds.


    Though these forest elves captured from Faen appeared to be happy and joyful, the corners of their eyes betrayed their resentment and suffering.


    Just as Arms eyes started to ze over and he prepared to embrace the elven beauties and bring them into his room for a round of pleasantries, a dragon¡¯s roar rang out from the distant horizon.


    Wild winds blew across the skies as a ma.s.sive dragon with shining emerald scales descended upon the tform.


    As the emerald dragon beat her wings, a small storm formed on the tform beneath her. The soft beds, silk curtains, wine jugs, incense pots, fans, coffee tables, the fruits; everything, even those elven girls in skimpy clothing, were blown about and unable to stand still.


    After letting out her fury, the emerald dragon was finally shrouded in a surge of blue mist, transforming into a pretty girl in emerald armor.


    "Look at what you¡¯ve done, Arms! Hmph!"


    It was the beauty of the emerald dragons that Arms had tricked intoing to Lance- Iritina!

 Chapter 739 Various Affairs

    Seeing that it was Iritina that had arrived, the handsome, n.o.ble face of Arms first betrayed a trace of awkwardness. He then got up and put on a forced smile, "My Iri Baby, didn¡¯t you go look for a shelter you¡¯d like? How did it go? Did you find anything?"


    "Hmph! To think of how great you talked about Lance. I only just realized that this ce is already stuffed full with dragons," Iritina¡¯s face was full of resentment, "I¡¯ve flown for over five thousand kilometers, and I did find one or two ces I¡¯m happy with. However, those ces already have owners. I can¡¯t even find a single piece ofnd without an owner!"


    Arms quickly went forth and embraced his sweetheart¡¯s slender waist when he saw how angry she was.


    "Didn¡¯t I already tell you? It doesn¡¯t matter if there¡¯s an owner already. Juste back and tell me if you have a ce you like. As long as it isn¡¯t a direct subordinate of one of those Fourth Grade big bosses, this lord will help you take theirnd!"


    "You mean it?" It was only upon hearing this that Iritina¡¯s cold face finally showed a trace of joy.


    "Of course!" Arms couldn¡¯t help but pat his chest and start boasting again, "You¡¯ve been in Lance for a while already. You should have witnessed this lord¡¯s might and influence here. As long as I¡¯ve given my word, there will be no problems."


    "You better be telling the truth, otherwise..." Iritina looked around at the skimpily-dressed elven girls on the tform. A slender hand silently pinched the fat on Arms¡¯ waist, "I¡¯ll have a good settling of this deal with you."


    Arms might have excellent Physique, but even he can¡¯t deal with such a prative ¡¯close-ranged attack.¡¯ He could only put on a smile and fawn, "Of course, of course. As long as it¡¯s something my baby says she wants, I will definitely get it for her!"


    "Good! The ce I want is called the Forest of Ancient Trees. There¡¯s a Second Grade wood dragon staying there. Hurry up and chase him away for me."


    "The Forest of Ancient Trees? Wood dragon?" Arms brooded silently as a trace of unease gradually rose in his heart, "Is there a hugeke near that ce?"


    "Yeah! I also think that theke is simply too beautiful. It¡¯s so suitable for me to y and bathe in." The jade green eyes of the emerald dragon beauty Iritina immediately zed over in admiration when she talked about theke.


    "..."


    Arms expression instantly fell apart as he awkwardly said, "Dear, you see, wouldn¡¯t it be better...if you chose another ce again..."


    "Why should I change my decision? What¡¯s wrong with that ce?"


    "There...there...that Second Grade wood dragon might not amount to much, but there¡¯s a Third Grade gem dragon backing him! It¡¯s not going to be easy provoking a dragon like that!"


    "What are you scared of? His master is a Third Grade, and you are also a Third Grade. Can we not beat them once you add me to the equation?" For some reason, perhaps due to the boredom in Faen, Iritina had be a lot more ferocious and battle-hungry since leaving her n.


    Arms face was filled with hesitation and reluctance when he thought of fighting against a gem dragon.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Though they were both Third Grades, there was a ma.s.sive difference between their strength.


    Those gem dragons might not be exceptional when it came to other things, but in terms of magical defense, they were the undisputed powerhouses. The Gem Armor on their bodies was like the ultimate counter to magic. No elementium magic, regardless of attribute, could easily prate theyer of armor to harm their bodies.


    Moreover, the Prismatic Spray that the gem dragons were skilled in covered almost the entirety of the elementium attributes. As such, without the all-epa.s.sing magic armor of the gem dragons, the other dragons could only endure their magical attacks.


    That was why long-ranged Dragontongue magic and mid-ranged dragon¡¯s breath were no use against gem dragons. Only melee w and fang strikes could deal a certain amount of damage to them. However, Arms would have to endure the gem dragon¡¯s Prismatic Spray if he wanted to engage the enemy in a melee forcefully.


    Such a pestering way of fighting would hurt him too much. Even if he were to emerge victorious, he would suffer significant damage!


    However, women that had fallen into the quagmires of stubbornness were not that easily persuaded. It was the same for female dragons.


    After a series of discussions that consisted mostly of roaring, Arms finally and helplessly agreed to Iritina¡¯s request. A short momentter, several thunderous roars rang out as two dragons took to the skies from the tform, beating their wings and hurrying into the distance in a particr direction.


    Soon, the two ma.s.sive bodies had turned into two insignificant ck dots on the horizon.


    ............


    Northern Lands. Icewind, White Tower.


    There was a small tform located at the waist of the tower.


    Icdy Snowlotus leaned against the stone fence and gazed into the far off ck Forest. The light in her eyes flickered, but who knew what she was thinking.


    This ce was a frosty hignd. The climate was arid and cold. Chilling cold air whistled past the tower, blowing the microscopic ice particles the tower had gathered into the air and making them dance. They were like pretty ribbons knitted with snow and frost as they swayed in the wind.


    It was sixty or seventy meters above the ground, and the temperature was so cold that a dripping bead of water would turn into ice before it hit the ground.


    Yet, Snowlotus was only wearing a thin silk dress, seemingly unaffected by the cold. Instead, it was the opposite. The cold air here made her feel even more liberated and energized.


    Her natural Physique was of the ice attribute and especiallypatible one with the environment here. Standing here and gazing into the distance had be her greatest interest and hobby ever since the White Tower was constructed.


    Unfortunately, as one of the most important figures of the White Tower, she couldn¡¯t find time for herself even if she wanted to!


    Footsteps rang out lightly from the tower behind her. A slender and pretty elven maid walked out, bowed, and said, "Lady Snowlotus; Lady Meryl has invited you to her ce!"


    Perhaps it was because the temperature here was far too low. The elven girl¡¯s body couldn¡¯t help but start shivering.


    In truth, she shouldn¡¯t have feared such a little chill with her powers as a First Gradebat profession holder. However, ever since the adepts restrained her with their wicked abilities, her powers had left her, leaving her with this pale and beautiful body.


    Fortunately, the witch that asked for her to be her maid wasn¡¯t a deviant or a pervert. Otherwise, this once beautiful dancer of the night would have had no other option but tomit suicide.


    However, now that she had fallen into the hands of the adepts, her fate was no longer in her control. Even death was far too extravagant for them.


    Here, death wasn¡¯t the end, but the start of a different kind of torture!


    "Faelin, are you doing well here?"


    Snowlotus wasn¡¯t in a hurry to leave. Instead, she extended a white yet chilling right hand and caressed the elf lightly with her palm.


    "Thanks to mydy, Faelin is doing very well!"


    "That¡¯s good," A somewhat meaningful smile surfaced on Snowlotus¡¯ face: "Don¡¯t try and save thosepanions of yours again. Otherwise, even I won¡¯t be able to save you when you break the rules of the tower!"


    Faelin¡¯s already freezing body trembled once again.


    Here in this evil tower where adepts reigned supreme, the forest elves were no more than maids and toys that served and attended to them. Any forest elf that dared to rebel would not meet a good end. Punishment from the adepts would be getting off lightly. Severe offenses would be met with execution. That was before the body and soul of the offender was transformed into some sort of corpse princess that resembled undead creatures.


    Ever since she became Lady Snowlotus¡¯ maid, Faelin had already witnessed three of herpanions punished at the hands of the adepts and turned into cold and undead corpse princesses that could only obey orders. Even more tragic was seeing the souls of her threepanions trapped within their original bodies through magic, forced to live a life of suffering every single day.


    "My Lady, as long as you can help liberate my threepanions from their suffering, I...I will forever obey you!" Faelin bit her frozen lips so forcefully that a streak of blood slowly dripped down her chin. However, Faelin seemed unaware of her wound and continued to prostrate herself before Snowlotus, even as she shivered.


    "You still haven¡¯t understood yet!" Snowlotus shook her head as she spoke, her cold eyes without a trace of sympathy, "You are my property in the first ce. What use is it to ask a wish of me? Moreover, those corpse princesses are the properties of other adepts. They are not things I can simply take away from them!"


    "My Lady..."


    "Enough!" Snowlotus rejected decisively, but her tone immediately softened, "However, recently I do have a magical experiment I need to do. I stillck a willing experimental subject. If you can suggest a qualified subject to me, I might be able to help you purchase them."


    "I¡¯m willing...I¡¯m willing." Faelin abruptly lifted her lowered head, "My Lady, use me for the experiment, please! As long as you can liberate their souls, I am willing to be your experimental subject!"


    "This experiment will hurt a great deal."


    "I am not afraid!" Faelin¡¯s face was filled with determination and grit.


    "Very well!" Snowlotus sighed, "Since you are so determined, I will give you a try! Your threepanions will most definitely be liberated once the experiment is finished."


    Having said that, Snowlotus walked into the tower without expression on her face.


    Behind her, a single teardrop flowed down Faelin¡¯s determined eyes.


    Sadly, the teardrop froze into a bead of ice before it even left her face, smashing against the cold floor of the balcony and shattering into a million pieces.


    Eighth Floor of the White Tower. Magical Hall.


    Meryl, who was surrounded by arge group of elven servants and magical golems, suddenly lifted her head and looked at Snowlotus, who had walked into the room. She couldn¡¯t help butugh softly, "Lady Snowlotus, you¡¯ve finallye! I was just thinking of discussing the matter of moving citizens into ournds with you."


    Meanwhile, Old Fox Vanlier was also in a n.o.ble¡¯s butler attire. He was busy dealing with doc.u.ments and messages. Seeing that the two witchdies had something to talk about, he waved his hand, and the elven maids in the room promptly exited without a sound.

 Chapter 740 Clan Planning

    Having a territory, but no citizens within its bounds, was like eating meat without salt- nd and vorless!


    Those barefoot farmers and citizens were of practically no help to the Crimson n. They even wasted much of the n¡¯s time and effort to help them develop a living. However, out of consideration for the long term, this was one step across the iron threshold that had to be taken!


    Where did adeptse from?


    They could be recruited or hired, but such adepts would always be outsiders. It was difficult to cultivate such adepts and turn them into loyal n adepts of the Crimson ns. They needed to recruit a suitable number of artisans and civilians, establishing an orderly rule and selecting apprentice adepts with exceptional talents.


    It was the only way to produce individuals that could be trusted. There was no need to doubt apprentices that came from the n¡¯s territories, for all they owned and all they were would be bound to the Crimson n¡¯s prosperity. That was the only way to cultivate n adepts that were truly loyal to Greem.


    There were tens of thousands of outside adepts. They chased the benefits and, naturally, would leave for benefits. If the n were to ever run into a crisis that demanded oveing a sacrifice, the only ones that could step forth would be those n adepts.


    That was why the Crimson n had no choice but to establish the n¡¯s system for new blood, one step at a time, even if the price for cultivating n adepts was immense!


    Now the n already had a territory of its own, with no opportunistic enemies around them. It was the best time to recruit en ma.s.se and establish their banner. Meryl couldn¡¯t wait to start discussing the matters of the poption with Snowlotus immediately after taking control of White Tower.


    It was actually a problematic issue!


    Icewind was already a bitter wastnd of snow and frost. To make things worse, it was right next to the ck Forest and did not have the protection of an adept¡¯s tower. That was why the total poption within several hundreds of kilometer did not exceed a hundred.


    Trying to establish the foundations of the Icewind n territory with so few people was practically impossible.


    To sum it all up, Icewindcked poption. Severely so!


    There were plenty of legendary stories of Northern Witches of the past who cut through the thorns and led their poption to establish new witch territories in the ck Forest. However, the legendary witches in those stories weren¡¯t setting up shop from scratch like the Crimson n was doing.


    They either had the support of n forces or witch branches. They had the workforce when they needed the workforce and the military force when they needed the military force. Even so, it took them hundreds of years and many conflicts that went back and forth to even have a chance at seizing a piece ofnd from the powerful magical creatures to establish a stable and peaceful territory where they could flourish.


    Moreover, the number of civilians that died during the process to harsh environments, gues, poison mists, wild beasts, and magical creatures was uncountable. It was only through the .u.mtion of human lives and the determination of the witches that they had obtained sess in the end.


    In contrast, the Crimson n had a tower and had the adepts. They onlyckedrge numbers of people that could inject life into the region.


    "Lady Snowlotus, could I inquire what ns the Northern Witches in the past used when they wanted to recruit civilians?" Meryl waited until only Snowlotus and the diligently working Vanlier were left before unhurriedly asking the question.


    "Civilians are the most valuable resource of every witch branch; they will not easily be given up for sale. If Lady Meryl desperately requires some civilians, I can return to the few inherited territories of the Fate Witches and forcefully conscript some for you. However..."


    Snowlotus couldn¡¯t help but pause for a moment when she reached this part.


    "The environment here is too harsh, and there are no daily resources as well. Even if I were to conscript some civilians, they would probably have a hard time surviving here. We can¡¯t possibly let those farmers and merchants live in the adept¡¯s tower as well, after all!"


    Even Meryl, the manager, couldn¡¯t help but be troubled after listening to Snowlotus¡¯ints.


    It was true! Even if they conscripted the civilians, how they would manage to survive in such and of snow and ice was a severe problem! Were they supposed to get a bunch of civilians and just let them idle about with nothing to do? Was the Crimson n supposed to pay for their living expenses instead?


    "What about we find a way to move some goblins over from the Goblin ne to work as temporary civilians? They have the smarts, the techniques, and can help the tower with some maintenance and management work." Meryl suggested doubtfully.


    "Meryl, there¡¯s something I need to remind you of. If there are too many members of other races in a territory, it will make it even more difficult to recruit wandering travelers and free men looking for a ce to settle." Snowlotus kindly reminded.


    Meryl couldn¡¯t help but be dejected.


    She could easily imagine such a scenario.


    If there were too many non-humans in a territory, it would affect the perception and sense of safety of the human civilians. If they were to hesitate because of such concerns, the poption of Icewind would stagnate and never increase. If these human civilians were all scared away, what were they supposed to do? Recruit goblin apprentices, ogre apprentices, and dwarf apprentices instead?


    "Then...Lady Snowlotus, apart from ordinary civilians, are there any other ways that can allow us to obtain arge number of civilians in a short amount of time?" Meryl couldn¡¯t help but ask hesitatingly.


    "You mean to say, human ves, don¡¯t you?" Snowlotus showed a faint smile.


    "Indeed! I want to know if there¡¯s a way to obtain arge group of cheap human ves in the Northern Lands."


    "Battles between witches very rarely happen in the Northern Lands. Even when there are conflicts, most of them are resolved in the Witch Council. As such, there are no such things as ves of war here."


    Meryl¡¯s face couldn¡¯t help but turn solemn.


    "However, Zhentarim is a festeringnd of war and conflict. The disagreements between the various adept ns are always ongoing. If you really need civilians, I can purchase some ves from Central under the name of the Fate Witches."


    "Oh, there was such a thing?" Meryl¡¯s eyes instantly lit up, "If you were to purchase these ves, how many would you be able to get? And what is the price?"


    "If a n war breaks out in the central area, then there will possibly be a loser. The civilians of the defeated n will likely be taken away and sold to other adept ns. We Northern Witches also have representatives there and can take a share of such ve trade. The approximate number of ves circting in the market in a year is around two to three thousand. We Northern Witches can get around four to five hundred of those ves. The price is about five hundred magical crystals per ve."


    "That¡¯s a very reasonable price! I want them all." Meryl raised an eyebrow as an expression of glee appeared on her pretty face.


    Snowlotusughed and shook her head, "I meant the Northern Witches, as an entirety, can get four to five hundred of the war ves. When it is split up into the individual branches, my Fate Witches can only get twenty to thirty ves."


    "Only twenty to thirty..." Meryl couldn¡¯t help but dete when she heard this.


    At such a slow rate of injecting new blood, the Crimson n would not be able to establish aplete frame of development even if they were to toil for another hundred years.


    "If you think that¡¯s too little, then go and catch the people you need! Wars might not be allowed between the witch ns in the Northern Lands, but it¡¯s not the same at Zhentarim. As long as you have a good enough reason, those old fogeys of the elder council can only watch on, even if you were to exterminate an entire n. When that happens, the opposing n¡¯s poption and resources will be all yours, wouldn¡¯t it?"


    Meryl rolled her eyes. Snowlotus¡¯ words might sound sarcastic and crude, but the logic was there. If they had no other choice, they could give this method a try.


    After politely ending this pleasant conversation with Snowlotus, Meryl brought Vanlier and the organized materials along to consult her teacher.


    Meryl finally met her busy teacher Greem in his room on the thirteenth floor.


    Over the past few days, Greem had been busy forging his adept set piece.


    He had obtained the fire dragon¡¯s hide, but he needed to tan the hide through aplicated process. It was the first time Greem was dealing with such high-quality magical materials. The smoothness of the dragon¡¯s hide would be severely affected if any problems cropped up during the tanning process.


    Moreover, the most valuable thing about the fire dragon¡¯s hide was the strange fire elementium powers contained within it. Greem had to find a way to draw out this power to ultimately bring out the value of this expensive material.


    It was important to note that grandmaster-level tanners were equally as precious as alchemists in major adept organizations and ns! After all, the hide or skin of a powerful magical creature could only unleash its fullest potential after perfect and proper treatment.


    Such technique and methods were also rare alternative knowledge!


    "What did you say, poption?" Greem¡¯s mind was still immersed in his magical equations and experiment. It took him quite a while to finally understand Meryl¡¯s intention in visiting him.


    "Yes, teacher. Our territory is severelycking in people right now. We need to find a way to obtain arge number of civilians as soon as possible!"


    "Mm. In the long term, civilians are a must!" Greem fell silent for a bit and a sort ofposure that only the long-lived possessed appeared on his face, "However, the facilities of our territory are not yetplete. The civilians will have a hard time surviving even if we manage to recruit them. So, in the short term, it¡¯s best to bring some goblins over from the Goblin ne to fill in the numbers for the moment."


    Meryl opened her mouth in shock. To think her teacher would have such aprehensive and detailed thought process, despite only being a few years older than herself. The matters he addressed matched those of Lady Snowlotus.


    "But...teacher, if there are too many non-human civilians, it will affect our recruitment of human civilians in the future." Meryl exined her thoughts with some frustration.


    "It won¡¯t happen." Greem smiled and said, "Make sure to have the majority of the goblins we recruit this time be technicians and engineers. Once they arrive, their main mission will be to construct housing and vige models for other civilians toe. Then, they will build processing factories."


    "Processing factories?" Meryl was utterly confused. She felt as if she couldn¡¯t quite keep up with her teacher¡¯s ideas.


    "Of course. Processing factories are a necessary existence!" Greem casually continued, "Icewind is too cold. It¡¯s not suitable for farming or herding. Yet, we must provide the civilians we recruit with a stable living. My idea is to organize adepts and apprentices to hunt and gather in the ck Forest. Then, the hunted spoils and gathered nts will undergo the necessary processing in the n factories. We can then have the new civilians learn to be craftsmen with specialized skills."

 Chapter 741 Goblin Apprentice

    Year 32,856 of the Era of Adepts. The 12th day of the 5th month of the year.


    The first group of goblin apprentices that had been recruited pa.s.sed through the internar portal and appeared in the public teleportation room on the first floor of the White Tower.


    Little Locke was the youngest among these goblins.


    Short statures half that of a human¡¯s, wide feet, coa.r.s.e, dark green skin, crooked noses, andrge, limp ears; this was how green goblins ordinarily looked.


    Little Locke might have been more handsome than most, but all goblins looked the same to other races. He didn¡¯t appear to be any different from his peers.


    Sadly, even with the forcefield barrier of the tower, most goblins were still pressed against the cool floor by the vast and profound nar consciousness the instant they appeared in the World of Adepts. Many frail goblins had even fainted without a sound already.


    The individuals in charge of the teleportation seemed to be prepared for such a scene. Several young men and women in apprentice garb walked into the teleportation array and fed the goblins some sort of blue potion. Meanwhile, they did not do anything to those who were still conscious.


    Little Locke had always been an individual with a healthy body since he was a kid. Though he also felt that ubiquitous and constant heavy pressure crushing down on his body and spirit, he still managed to endure it sessfully and did not fall unconscious.


    When he saw a young human girl feed apanion beside him that blue potion, causing thepanion to wake up immediately, Little Locke couldn¡¯t help but lick his lips in envy. He asked softly, "I...can I also...drink...have a drink?"


    Little Locke was stuttering, but he was using themonnguage of the World of Adepts.


    Ever since the adepts had conquered the Goblin ne, thenguage of the adepts had be a highernguage that all upper-.s.s citizens of the Goblin Empire had to master. Little Locke was very fortunate. His brilliance and intellect allowed him to be one of the first chosen to travel to the World of Adepts.


    The apprentice was a young and pretty female. Her slender figure was visible under the thin cloth robe. Her personality also appeared to be very gentle and kind. She was not showing any signs of discrimination against these ¡¯lower¡¯ ves from another ne.


    "You don¡¯t need to drink it. The fact that you can resist the suppression of the nar consciousness with your own Spirit is more than enough proof of your excellent Spirit potential. Try your best to etch this odd feeling into your heart. It will be the key to your future development."


    The female apprentice¡¯s voice was gentle and sweet, causing Little Locke¡¯s panicking heart to once again calm down.


    It was a whole seven minutester before all the goblin apprentices were slowly moved out of the teleportation array under the instructions of an adept. Soft sobbing could be heard from the party. There were still five of theirpanions who had not managed to endure the nar suppression and had died.


    It was only a result that hade to be due to the tower¡¯s forcefield weakening part of the suppression. Without the tower, a good half of these goblins would have died immediately.


    After all, the World of Adepts was a major ne that was several tens of thousands of times stronger than the Goblin ne. The high-magic environment and nar pressure here were no different from putting these lifeforms of a lower ne on a roller coaster. Those with slightly weaker Physique would be instantly eliminated!


    There were as many as forty goblins that had been teleported over this time. Not counting the five that had just died, there were still thirty-five goblins. There were some among them who were experienced veteran goblin engineers, as well as some well-trained goblin technicians. However, the majority of them were still intelligent, bright, and talented young goblins.


    As adept servants that had been chosen to serve here, they were allowed to live on the bottom floor of the tower. There, groups of five goblins were a.s.signed a stone room. There was nothing else in there apart from some simple wooden beds and a shared wooden table.


    The young female human apprentice that Little Locke had just be acquainted with was Eco, and she lived on the second level of the tower. The treatment of the apprentices was far better than the young goblins. They had their rooms to themselves, and there were far more ces in the tower that they could go.


    As adept servants that had just joined the n, the first thing that Little Locke and the other goblins had to do was systematically learn thenguage of the World of Adepts. They would also have to gain aprehensive knowledge of the situation of the World of Adepts, along with its ores, nts, and animal resources.


    In all honesty, having thisrge group of goblins sit on towering stools where their feet couldn¡¯t touch the ground and follow along thenguage teacher¡¯s lesson to learn a newnguage was a different kind of struggle and suffering. Outsiders could hardly imagine how tough it was. Moreover, there were many old goblins with white hair and muscr goblin technicians in this group.


    Having such a group of goblins of different ages, backgrounds, and professions enunciating thenguage of the adepts in their strange ents was truly a hrious scene.


    Though the learning ability of most goblins caused plenty of trouble for the human schrs who hade to teach them, brilliant young goblins like Little Locke still won the unanimous praise of all the teachers.


    At the personal interruption of an adept from the higher floors of the White Tower, seven goblins-Little Locke chief among them-were chosen. They were moved to the second floor of the tower and started a life of apprenticeship much like the other human apprentice adepts.


    At this time, it had only been one and a half months since Little Locked had arrived at the White Tower. The second batch of forty goblins arrived at the teleportation array.


    ............


    The Magical Hall of the eighth floor of the White Tower.


    Meryl was staring into the monitoring crystal on the wooden table along with Snowlotus. It was the scene in the teleportation array on the first floor that was being disyed in the crystal. Old Fox Vanlier, as the aide to the majordomo, dutifully waited to the side.


    "Cough, another six goblins died again." Mery looked at the copsed goblin in the array, swept across with her Spirit, and gained precise knowledge of the oue.


    "It can¡¯t be helped. After all, they don¡¯t have an actual adept¡¯s tower over on the Goblin ne. Without the ability to reduce the power of the nar teleportation, it is only natural that the goblins who have weak bodies or Spirits die!" Snowlotus¡¯ cool gaze swept across the monitoring crystal as well. She then asked curiously, "What is it that that teacher of yours is nning? Having these goblins learn alongside our witch apprentices; this...if the Witch Council learns of this, the conservative old hags would not rest until they came here and razed White Tower."


    A faint smile appeared on Snowlotus¡¯ face as she said this. It seemed she was already imagining the furious and exasperated looks on the faces of those conservative witches.


    "My teacher was quite clear in what he meant! Goblins who pa.s.s the test and meet the Spirit requirements will be trained as apprentice adepts for a moment. Meanwhile, those who did not meet standards will be expelled from the tower and be made to go work in those...in those high-energy food processing nts."


    The intent to smile grew even more in Snowlotus¡¯ eyes when she heard the tower¡¯s majordomo p.r.o.nounce these odd words with such difficulty.


    That odd male adept always came up with fantastical ideas. For example, the magic-energy food processing nt that Greem was pushing for this time targeted those ordinary mortals with no supernatural powers. More specifically, it was targeted at middle to low-.s.s human n.o.bles.


    The White Tower neighbored the ck Forest. It had an unprecedented wealth of magical creature resources!


    The adepts and apprentices in the past only needed to hunt enough to fulfill the food requirements of the White Tower itself. As for specially processing some of the magical creature meat to provide for the human n.o.bles, there was no such precedent.


    After all, the World of Adepts centered around the adepts. All considerations of benefits were also based on the adepts. Setting aside the adepts and providing ordinary human n.o.bles with high-energy magical creature meat was something that no one had ever attempted.


    After all, there was practically no interaction between adepts and mortals in the World of Adepts!


    The adepts were rulers, whereas the mortals were ants and sheep resting beneath their feathers. The human n.o.bles were no more than shepherd dogs helping the adepts manage the sheep. To have a n.o.ble adept lower their minds and think from the perspective of n.o.bles and mortals, was something practically impossible!


    Though some low-grade adepts in desperate situations might lower themselves to be magical advisors to major n.o.bles, they were few and far between. Fellows like them that had lost their dignity as adepts were also excluded from the social circles of mainstream adepts.


    However, an up-anding Second Grade fire adept and rising n leader like Greem was not thinking about socializing with other adepts and was instead thinking about how to ¡¯serve¡¯ those lower human n.o.bles? This was truly somewhat beyond Icdy Snowlotus¡¯ expectations!


    What did the n.o.bles have?


    Wasn¡¯t it just some shiny gold coins, ugly oil paintings, vases, and animal hides? What use was it to obtain this ¡¯trash¡¯ from them through trade? It was important to note that the only real currency among adepts was magical crystals.


    That was why Snowlotus couldn¡¯t help but be confused by Lord Greem¡¯s thoughts, so much so that she even found them ridiculous and funny. Still, the Crimson n was his. The White Tower was his. Whatever it was that he wanted to do, she should just let it be.


    Snowlotus was basically watching every development of the White Tower with the curious att.i.tude of a bystander!


    "Lady Snowlotus, how are the civilians you have been recruiting on your side?"


    "Don¡¯t worry about it, Adept Meryl. Leader Alice has been very concerned with the n after I sent news of it back to the Tower of Fate. She has already started conscripting civilians from the few nearby subordinate territories. The first group of civilians to migrate over will arrive in two months; they will number three hundred. You guys had best have the preparation workpleted by then."


    "Three hundred people? Two months?" Meryl couldn¡¯t help but mumble and repeat the numbers. Old Fox Vanlier, on the other hand, immediately started moving his brush and recording the numbers.

 Chapter 742 Development Of The Territory

    No one knew when, but the formerly silent Icewind became lively once again.


    Humans and intelligent lifeforms from various regions started to gather here, working and toiling toward a united goal.


    There were the apprentice adepts of the Crimson n, the witch apprentices of the Fate Witches, the goblin apprentices selected from the Goblin ne, as well as wandering apprentices that hade for the reputation of the n. The Crimson n¡¯s higher-ups had demonstrated rarepa.s.sion toward these apprentices, allowing them to reasonably enjoy the privilege of using the magical facilities of White Tower.


    The s.p.a.cious andfortable living environments, the peaceful and harmonious atmosphere of study and schrship, the powerful adept teachers, the systematic andprehensive library, and the plentiful magicalboratories; all of these became the most attractive of mas, firmly drawing the hearts of the apprentices to the tower and making them the loyal followers of the Crimson n.


    Several different cliques had quickly formed within the apprentices after a few months of trials and studies. Several small social circles centered around powerful apprentices had silently developed based on the potential and talent of the individual apprentices themselves.


    The core of these circles were almost always pseudo-adept apprentices!


    Such pseudo-adept apprentices always belonged to a unique group in any n. They might still belong to the category of an apprentice adept, but they were already starting to enjoy the privileges of a newly advanced adept from many other aspects.


    In fact, even part of the basic curriculum of the apprentice adepts was taught by them.


    It caused them to be towering and shining figures in the hearts of most other apprentices, bing pioneers that were admired and idolized.


    As an outsider, Little Locke was introduced by Eco and was sessfully able to join her social circle. It was a study group built around the pseudo-adept Ponta.


    Ponta. Human, thirty-seven years old. He was a Pseudo-Adept with an affinity for dark elementium, born in a small human kingdom in the Vikas Region of Zhentarim. ording to the customs of human kingdoms, Ponta seemed to retain his ident.i.ty as a prince. He had been sent into the adept¡¯s tower after he was discovered to have magical talents at a young age.


    He was also one of the earliest free apprentices that had chosen to join the Crimson n after its establishment. His power could only be considered average amongst the six pseudo-adepts of White Tower. However, due to his ability to summon a powerful shadow a.s.sa.s.sin, he was the one type of pseudo-adept other pseudo-adepts did not want to provoke.


    Pseudo-adepts oftencked powerful defensive magic before their advancement to official adepts. As such, no pseudo-adept opponent would want to try and experience a taste of the wicked shadow de of an untraceable shadow a.s.sa.s.sin.


    In truth, Little Locke was not qualified to join a learning a.s.sociation like this one with his power of a beginner apprentice. However, Eco¡¯s rmendation, as well as his own odd ident.i.ty as a goblin mechanic, drew the interest of Ponta, who allowed the goblin to join them.


    After two months of study, Little Locke had grasped the basic meditation technique. Apart from that, he had also very unexpectedly awakened to his talent as a goblin mechanic. It gave him a strange ability that resembled bloodline powers. It allowed him to bring out thebat power of magical machines to their fullest potential.


    Sadly, he hade to the World of Adepts with absolutely nothing on him. There wasn¡¯t a powerful magical machine he could manipte to his benefit. Moreover, magical machines often contained a myriad of mechanicalponents and magical parts. Little Locke¡¯s weak Spirit couldn¡¯t possibly sustain such delicate and sensitive maniptions.


    Thus, with no options left to him, Little Locke could only pay out of his own pocket to purchase some magical machinery modification knowledge. He also bought some of the cheapest metals and proceeded to construct an eyeballbat machine.


    He called it an eyeballbat machine, but in truth, it was only a metal ball that could not be any cruder.


    It was only the size of a human head and freely propelled itself in the air through pressurized air shot out of small ports located all over its body. To reduce its weight as much as possible, he had carved out the inside of the metal ball entirely. In ce of metal, the interior was carved with a series of wind arrays.


    The most direct consequence of this was a sharp decline in the metal ball¡¯s physical defense. However, in exchange, it obtained rapid movements and a fast flight speed in the air.


    The only offensive option of the eyeballbat machine was a ruby shard embedded in an indentation. The eyeballbat machine could gather wandering elementium energy through the energy gathering array and then shoot out an eleven-point heat ray through the ruby shard.


    Due to the impurity of the fire elementium within the ruby shard, this was the most powerful attack that the machine could muster, even with Little Locke¡¯s efforts. If Little Locke wanted to improve the power of the heat ray further, he would have to swap out the ruby shard for something of higher quality- a wed ruby, perhaps.


    However, while a ruby shard only cost three magical crystals, a wed ruby went for as much as twenty magical crystals. The ma.s.sive price difference forced the poor Little Locke to go for the cheapest and most avable materials.


    The magical intensity of the ruby shard could only sustain an attack rate of one shot every five seconds. Anything beyond this frequency had a high possibility of burning out the arrays within the eyeballbat machine and ruining the precious shard.


    Even so, a magical machine helper that did not require too much control allowed Little Locke to rapidly be one of the few strongest individuals amongst the beginner apprentices. After all, being able to fire an apprentice-level spell with fifteen points of power in five to seven seconds was already decent for a beginner apprentice.


    Other beginner apprentices had to constantly be wary of the agile metal monster zipping about in the sky when fighting with Little Locke. With two against one, there were very few individuals among the newbies who could beat Little Locke!


    To train the practicalbat skills of the apprentice adepts, the White Tower would organize a venture of fifty kilometers in the ck Forest on a weekly basis for some of the apprentices. They were to hunt and kill some apprentice-level beasts or magical creatures. Of course, White Tower would always send an official adept to lead the party on every operation. The adept would bring the apprentices to a suitable area before allowing them to split up and act independently.


    One had to admit that the management of Crimson n¡¯s White Tower took a well-thought-out approach to the trials that the apprentices had to undertake.


    If the apprentice parties ran into trouble in the forest, they were free to request help from the leading adept. However, if they did so, all their spoils would automatically belong to the adept. That was why the apprentices preferred to gather around a pseudo-adept. It afforded them some additional protection in moments of crisis.


    After all, with the power of the pseudo-adepts, they were entirely capable of unleashing a single First Grade spell if they exerted to their limits!


    It was a fairly important ability to have in the border region of the ck Forest. A pseudo-adept that had grasped a First Grade spell might not be said to be undefeatable, but it would make most of the area safe for them to travel.


    It was also the ce in which their value to the other apprentices best manifested themselves!


    The spoils of the apprentices in the ck Forest would belong entirely to themselves or their party. They could sell these spoils to the merchant unions under the n once they returned to White Tower, or they could also host an auction themselves. The gold coins and magical crystals earned through such hunts were sufficient to sustain their lifestyle in White Tower.


    The subordinate trading firms and auction houses of White Tower separated the prey and their spoils into different qualities. The apprentice-level beasts and magical creatures were directly sent into the factories, where they were processed into sealed metal cans by the goblins working there before being put into boxes and transported to the continent¡¯s central area.


    There, the Happy Coin Trading Firm established by Snox would be responsible for selling the goods to every human n.o.ble¡¯s vi and city.


    The flesh of ordinary beasts might not attract the interest of the human n.o.bles, but the meat and hides of low-grade magical creatures were still popr products.


    After all, everyone knew that the bodies of magical creatures contained some degree of elementium energy. Being able to absorb this energy through daily consumption regrly would provide a p.r.o.nounced increase in an individual¡¯s Physique and elementium affinity.


    Such minor changes might be insignificant in the eyes of the adepts, but they had immense meaning to the human n.o.bles, who had enjoyed all manners of luxury and only sought to extend their lives for a few more years!


    If these n.o.bles could consume magical creature meat on a daily basis, they could improve their Physique. However, more importantly, it could increase the chances of their descendants possessing magical talents.


    And that was what the n.o.bles truly wanted!


    Of course, this change in percentage was a negligible one; only a small tick in the third or fourth digit past the decimal point. Still, through the incredible oratorical skills of Snox, who could turn a dead man living, the meat was exaggerated and described as mythical meat that could forever change the fates of the n.o.ble families.


    With some intense and effective marketing, Snox sessfully started a new trend in Zhentarim- a trend towards eating healthy and improving one¡¯s Physique through magical creature meat. Moreover, this trend was something that other ns could not take advantage of!


    Every single adept n had their own hunting parties that were responsible for killing magical creatures and gathering rare magical nts for the consumption of adepts. That should naturally give them the advantage needed topete with Snox. However, firstly, the amount they hunted was still too little. It was insufficient to satiate the appet.i.te of such arge group of human n.o.bles. Secondly, the preservation of magical creature meat was a difficult task that demanded quite a lot of rare materials.


    If the meat were meant for the consumption of the adepts, the rich adepts would have no problem spending money on the preservation process. That allowed the hunting parties to make profits easily. However, trying to provide meat at the same price to middle and low-.s.s human n.o.bles was a foolish endeavor. These n.o.bles would not be able to afford such avish magical creature feast even with all their worldly wealth.


    The subordinate goblin engineers of White Tower had specially created a vacuum-sealed metal lunchbox for this matter, solving the issue in a perfect yet affordable manner. This process allowed for the possibility of selling high-energy magical creature meat at a low price!


    It was through such methods that the White Tower sessfully developed a living for the civilians who arrived in its territory. They only needed to learn the simple operation skills of a streamlined factory under the tutge of the goblin technicians, and a qualified worker would be born!


    Chapter Notes:


    Editor Ryu: If you¡¯re enjoying Age of Adepts, now is a great time to stop by our Patreon and consider supporting this fine series! Patreon is mine and Eris¡¯ sole form of ie for working on this series, and everyone who supports us through Patreon helps ensure the continued trantion and release of AoA. The AoA Patreon has contribution tiers that give you ess to advance chapters of the series (fully tranted and edited) up to 15 chapters ahead of the GT releases. Thanks for your readership, and we hope to have your patronage as well.


    For those who would like to kick in a couple of bucks and aren¡¯t looking for advance chapters, we also have a Ko-Fi for one time donations and support. It doesn¡¯t see much use (h.e.l.l, if you have a few bucks, you might as well be a Patron and get a few extra chapters ahead), but people still asionally help us through that, and every bit of support helps.


    As always, more than anything, thank you everyone for your continued readership and support of Age of Adepts!


    -Ryu

 Chapter 743 Ash And The Sourcestealer

    The thirteenth floor of the White Tower.


    As a mighty Second Grade adept, the trivial matters of the bottom floor of the tower no longer concerned or affected Greem¡¯s daily routine and studies.


    Greem had now resigned all his management powers to his subordinates.


    Of course, Greem¡¯s public exnation was the need to train the n adepts and mold them into leaders. In truth, it was only a way for him to shirk off his responsibilities.


    Looking down at the daily lives progressing on the lower floors of the adept¡¯s tower as a Second Grade gave Greem the illusion that he was a chess yer silently brooding above a game board. The future of the Crimson n, the efforts of the n adepts, and the swarm of apprentices and civilians that had gathered like ants- all of these were no longer lives in Greem¡¯s eyes, but insignificant specks.


    The only difference was that some specks were a bit smaller and some were a bitrger!


    At this moment, one or two specks could no longer attract his attention. It was only when those specks gathered together on the chess board and rampaged furiously that he could bother to even cast a bit of his attention upon them. Moreover, this sort of focus had a bit of randomness and coincidence to it. There was no urgency or desperate concern.


    He was much like azy farmer that looked up to the sky and waited for his harvest toe. He was only responsible for sowing the seeds at a suitable time and thening back to check on them the next time he remembered. The time it took for him to check back often rted to the length of the magical experiments he was working on.


    If the seeds he sowed had failed to flower, the worst thing he would need to do was nt them again. If they seeded in growing, he would dly harvest only the portion he needed. As for the rest of the crop? They naturally became thepensation of the lower adepts for all their efforts.


    Thus, many of the things that Meryl was trying to aplish to the best of her abilities were only casual thoughts that had popped up in Greem¡¯s mind.


    It was the different perspectives with which beings of different dimensions looked upon the same matters!


    For Greem, he was the Crimson n leader and naturally had an obligation to lead the n territory to prosperity and wealth. However, the specific steps and ns that led to each oue were carried out and executed by adepts like Meryl. Greem only needed to convey his instructions.


    Greem didn¡¯t even need tomit to realizing the n himself. All he needed to do was take note of the matter¡¯s development at required times and suitably push the progress of the projects forward. In Greem¡¯s eyes, the immensely important training in the ck Forest for Little Locke and the other apprentices was no more than a smallponent in the practical training of the n apprentices.


    Even if arge group of apprentices died in the ck Forest, it would only dy the n¡¯s rise by five or six years.


    A single ident could mean the end of their lives to Little Locke and the apprentices. However, for a Second Grade adept who¡¯s lifespansted four hundred years, it was only a slightly longer magical experiment that had failed toe to fruition.


    Even if they failed, all the adept needed to do was wipe away the failures and rece them with new ¡¯experiment materials.¡¯ The adept could then continue with this constant process of n development, exploration, and experimentation.


    Moreover, even as Greem continually corrected the n¡¯s developmental ns, most of his attention was taken up by the magical experiments at hand. The thing that he was most concerned about was undoubtedly the creation of the two set pieces of Fire Throne.


    For this purpose, he had even hired a sewing master from the Northern Witches at an expensive rate. He had the sewing master sew fire dragon boots of the perfect size with the fire dragon¡¯s hide, tendons, and fire marrow crystal. Greem then personallypleted the final step of the creation process, using special techniques to activate the fire arrays that had been carved earlier under the surface of the fire dragon boots.


    As a bright yellow me burned around these boots, all the impurities on them were burned away, leaving only the purest and most fundamental base. Finally, the magical patterns and runic lines carved within the boots faintly showed on their surface, forming a mysterious and wondrous pattern on the outside.


    At this point, Greem had expended several hundreds of thousands of magical crystals and three months worth of time. The first loose piece of the Fire Throne, the Boots of Ash, had finally beenpleted!


    As Greem¡¯s first Second Grade magical equipment, Ash could not only provide Greem with higher magic resistance, but it could also release a Burning Path without demanding any Spirit exhaustion on Greem¡¯s part. This way, Greem would leave behind a small zing trail with fires one meter in height and two meters in width wherever he walked.


    Any creature that walked into the Burning Path would have to endure fire damage of sixty points a second. Moreover, the Burning Path couldst for as long as three minutes.


    It also meant that Greem could easily set up abat environment beneficial to himself all over the battlefield. Greem¡¯s regeneration would double while he was in the mes. It undoubtedly improved his stamina and ability to sustain in battle!


    Moreover, as an unexpected boon, the Boots of Ash even provided Greem with a +1 Spirit bonus. It was something that even the Chip had not predicted. Greem suspected that this had something to do with the fact that all the fire dragon materials used in creating Ash hade from the same source.


    Bless the mighty Second Grade Fire Dragon Bamler. He had not only offered up the best hide upon his body, but he had also offered up a three-meter-long fire dragon¡¯s tendon and a fire marrow crystal formed from his spine. Of course, the rest of his body had not gone to waste either. It had been wholly devoured by Dragon Devourer Oliven, bing the nutrition she needed to continue growing in power.


    Sadly, Oliven couldn¡¯t possibly allow Greem to scan her body and soul origin with the Chip. Greem could only estimate the extent of her improvement based on her external performance.


    Oliven.


    Advanced Second Grade, Female.


    Race: Unspecified.


    Profession: Dragon Devourer.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 10Physique 12Agility 21Spirit 20.


    Bloodline Abilities: Reverse Dragon¡¯s Might, Dragons¡¯ Bane...


    In particr, when Oliven was dealing with dragons, her magic resistance would double, and most of her attacks would ignore the dragons¡¯ magical and physical defenses. These unique profession abilities were too good when used for dragonying.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but think of stealing a portion of a dragon devourer¡¯s bloodline ability.


    However, Greem quickly quashed this boring idea from his mind upon gaining an indirect understanding of the weaknesses of dragon devourers.


    First, dragon devourers were only powerful against dragons!


    When facing other species, most of the dragon devourers¡¯ abilities became useless, instantly turning them into weaklings.


    Second, dragon devourers were themon enemies of the dragons!


    One couldn¡¯t think too much of Arms¡¯ current rtionship with Greem. Though it seemed to be a very close rtionship, if he were to discover a dragon devourer subordinate to Greem, there was no doubt that he would instantly be an enemy.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The bloodline talents of dragon devourers were too terrifying. They were murderers practically tailored to dealing with the great dragons. If any single dragon devourer were to be sufficiently powerful, they would pose an immense threat to Lance; no, even the entire dragon species.


    If Greem were to steal parts of a dragon devourer¡¯s bloodline talents, his rtion to all dragons would be forever locked at the level of a blood feud!


    When that happened, all dragons would not stop until he was utterly exterminated, wherever he went.


    The dragons were a dominant gctic species that couldpare to the powerful adepts. Could there possibly be a good ending for Greem if he attracted their ire?


    It was precisely due to such concerns that Greem could only look on and allow the Sourcestealer in his hands to go unused.


    After thest dozen years of experimentation and cultivation, Greem had bred the unique talent-stealing insect to its third generation. ording to these few years of bloodline experiments, Greem discovered that most lifeforms could only endure having no more than 15% of their bloodline power gics altered.


    If one were to discuss this in terms of the lifeform Grades that the adepts were so used to using, it meant that the degree of every bloodline change could not exceed two sub-grades.


    A beginner Second Grade adept could only, at the very most, rob part of the talent of an advanced Second Grade lifeform. If they exceeded this limit, the body of the person receiving the talents would break down due to their inability to endure the demands of the bloodline powers, causing aplete copse in their gic chain.


    Such wounds would directly affect the receiver¡¯s soul origin. There would be no saving them!


    It was only at this point that Greem realized why the dragons had to have such robust Physiques. Without such tough Physiques, their bodies probably wouldn¡¯t be able to be hosts to such immense bloodline powers!


    Sourcestealers. It had been three or four years since Greem managed to cultivate them. Apart from using them to transfer the talents of some lifeforms during his bloodline experiments for the necessary data, the remaining Sourcestealers were still kept alive on the highest floor of Fire Throne.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare to easily use the Sourcestealers on himself, for the modification of bloodline talents might be easy, but it was near impossible to backtrack once you realized you had gone down the wrong path!


    His current talent might not be considered exceptional, but the me Fiend¡¯s body with me specialization had given Greem terrificbat lethality and battlefield domination abilities. If he identally ¡¯contaminated¡¯ his bloodline and failed to get his ideal result, he would not be able to do anything.


    Of course, apart from himself, Greem could also use the Sourcestealer on his many subordinates to gather some experience for his own future bloodline talent transfers.


    However, after some consideration, Greem could not find the most suited underling he needed for this experiment.


    People with suitable conditions weren¡¯t at the proper loyalty levels, yet those who were utterly loyal had great responsibilities and didn¡¯t have the time to partic.i.p.ate in his bloodline experiments. Meanwhile, those who were too weak were not deserving of having a hard to breed Sourcestealer used on them.


    The Crimson n of the present had plenty of troubles. Almost every single n adept had a problematic mission weighing on their shoulders. If he were to cause one or two adepts residing in core positions of the n to copse due to his bloodline experiments, then the n¡¯s operations would stall and even regress.


    That was something that Greem would not want to see happen!

 Chapter 744 Origin Contrac

    t


    The Boots of Ash had beenpleted. What came next was naturally the magical armband- the Emblem of Fire.


    He had already prepared the fire dragon¡¯s blood and the highest-quality fire agate used for creating the Emblem of Fire, but Greem stillcked half of the required meloathe Iron. Such rare and high-grade resources always had low yields. Moreover, Greem didn¡¯t know too many high-grade alchemists, making it hard for him to gather sufficient amounts of the metal on short notice.


    When Greem was about to dy this project for a few years in search of the metal, Alice reached him with invigorating news.


    The meloathe Iron had been located!


    Greem hurried to the Tower of Fate as fast as possible upon receiving news of this. Waiting there for him was a frowning Alice.


    "Is there something odd about the news?"


    "There¡¯s nothing wrong with the information. I can confirm that the opponent does have a tremendous amount of Fireloathe Iron, enough for you to create your magical equipment..."


    "Then what are you hesitating for?"


    "The problem is, I wasn¡¯t the one who found them. They were the ones who found me!"


    Greem¡¯s expression immediately turned solemn upon hearing this.


    If Alice herself had divined this information, Greem would not be worried at all. But since the opponent was the one that had actively sought her out, it meant at least two things.


    One, the opponent had definitelye prepared and clearly understood what Greem badly needed at the moment.


    Two, the opponent¡¯s target was Greem, and they didn¡¯t seem to need to hide this fact.


    "Where is she?"


    "In the hall on the fifth floor!"


    Seven minutester, Greem met that mysterious Northern witch in a magical hall.


    It was a middle-aged witch who looked utterly ordinary. She wasn¡¯t too old, but the sinister look between her brows was so dense that it couldn¡¯t be shaken away. One could feel fear in their hearts just by looking into her eyes.


    [Beep. Detecting high-energy magical forcefield. Cannot prate. Cannot scan.]


    The brief notification from the Chip in Greem¡¯s mind caused him to pause for a moment.


    It wasn¡¯t as if he hadn¡¯t made contact with high-grade adepts, but even that Third Grade Dark Witch had not been able to conceal her aura to such an imprable degree. Add into the equation the faint fear that he felt when he got close, and Greem¡¯s heart trembled. He started to suspect that she might be a Fourth Grade witch.


    A Fourth Grade witch. Even in the crowded and talent-filled Northern Lands, such powerful adepts were few and far between. To think that she woulde to seek him. It couldn¡¯t help but make Greem slightly nervous.


    "You are Greem?" As if she sensed Greem¡¯s nervousness, the middle-aged witch asked.


    "Yes!"


    "Second Grade fire adept?"


    Greem hesitated for a moment and answered the question once more.


    "I have a mission here that I need someone to aplish for me. The reward for the mission will be fifteen kilograms of meloathe Iron. Will you ept?" The middle-aged witch immediately got to her purpose here.


    "A mission?" Greem licked his lips lightly. Fifteen kilograms of meloathe Iron would be more than enough for his creation of the Emblem of Fire, "May I know what mydy needs me to do?"


    "Molten Core! I need a Molten Core that is at least of Second Grade!"


    Greem gulped and a strange expression betraying a trace of I knew it was going to be something like that appeared on his young and handsome face.


    Molten cores could typically only be found in the bodies of higher fire creatures. It was like their heart and was a core organ where all the fire essence gathered within the body of a fire creature. It was hard to find a lord-level fire creature in the World of Adepts. As such, one would have to go into another world to obtain a molten core.


    A molten core of at least Second Grade meant that Greem would have to kill a Fire Lord of Second Grade or above. The difficulty of this mission made his scalp buzz at the very thought of it.


    "You don¡¯t need to worry about where to find a fire creature like that. I have the nar coordinate of a Second Grade Fire Lord right here. Kill it and retrieve the molten core for me!" The middle-aged witch coldly said. She then raised her hand and tossed a glowing red orb at Greem.


    Greem raised his hand and lifted the orb with his powers before using ayer of me to keep it in front of him.


    [Beep. Detecting strange spiritual flux. Detecting nar coordinates of other worlds within. Initial estimates suggest them to be world coordinates of the Fire Elementium ne. Requesting instructions from host. Connect?]


    Greem hesitated for a moment before releasing the barriers on his Spirit.


    The red orb of light instantly merged with Greem¡¯s mind. Greem closed his eyes and lowered his face to conceal the constantly shing blue lights in the depth of his eyes. He quickly managed to extract the world coordinates hidden within the spiritual signals.


    At the same time, a strange scene imprinted with Spirit started to appear in Greem¡¯s mind.


    It was an odd world entirelyposed of fire.


    The sky was burning. The earth was burning.


    Even the mountains, rivers, streams, rocks, gra.s.s, and other objects in this world were slowly burning.


    A giant humanoid formed from a ze of mes stood silently in the center of this world of fire. It was approximately ten meters in height and was held together by golden-yellow mes all across its body. Several ornate magic bands radiating dense magical auras were embedded around its limbs, waist, and neck.


    It was the binding of these magic bands that allowed the strange golden-yellow mes to only flow within its semi-translucent body of mes without spilling to the outside.


    Moreover, Greem could vaguely see the glowing crimson heart of fire through that might body- the molten core.


    The Chip was still hard at work.


    Apart from an unknown nar coordinate of the fire elementium world, the Chip also managed to extract a trace of the Fire Lord¡¯s origin aura from the Spirit imprint. With this aura, Greem no longer needed to worry about mistakenly recognizing another Fire Lord as this one!


    Second Grade. A Second Grade Fire Lord indeed.


    "Mydy, you mean," Greem carefully thought over his tone, "You mean to have me go to the Fire Elementium ne, a.s.sa.s.sinate this Fire Lord, and then bring his molten core back to you?"


    Greem could only use the term ¡¯a.s.sa.s.sinate¡¯ to describe this mission.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The four great elementium nes were wondrous worlds of great depth after all. Naturally, all beings that lived within the Fire Elementium ne were fire elementium creatures. Moreover, they lived in groups. A Second Grade Fire Lord in the Fire Elementium ne would possess a ma.s.sive territory of several hundreds of kilometers at the very minimum. The fire elementium army subservient to him would not number below a hundred thousand.


    Disregarding whether Greem could even defeat the Fire Lord in singlebat, he alone would probably be exterminated into dust by the Fire Lord¡¯s army.


    That was why Greem intentionally used the term a.s.sa.s.sinate. He couldn¡¯t imagine any other way to exterminate a Fire Lord with such power and such a ma.s.sive army.


    It was at this moment that Greem vaguely understood the opponent¡¯s intentions ining here.


    The fact that she wanted the molten core was only a front. Her true purpose was to murder that Second Grade Fire Lord.


    She might be much, much more powerful than the Fire Lord, but even she couldn¡¯t do anything to a Fire Lord hiding in the Fire Elementium ne. There was no special reason for it. The unique characteristics of the Fire Elementium ne made it such that any outsiders could visit it, but they would find it extremely difficult to survive there.


    There was no breathable air there, nor water, food, or roads. The only things that existed there were perpetually burning mes. Non-fire creatures would have no choice but to continually maintain their magical defenses and endure the corrosioning from the entire world.


    Moreover, there was only fire elementium there. Adepts of other attributes would not be able to sustain themselves even if they were able to survive. That was why it made sense for the witch to look for a fire adept specifically.


    At least a fire adept would be able to retaliate to some extent when they reached there and wouldn¡¯t have all their magic power worn away by the environment. As for whether he could defeat the Fire Lord, that was Greem¡¯s problem to deal with!


    "You...have agreed?" The middle-aged witch asked coldly.


    Greem hesitated for a moment. Before he could even turn to look at Alice, her mental message rang in his mind.


    "Agree to her conditions! I can guarantee that there is no trap behind it!"


    It was only now that Greem felt certain and nodded his head in agreement.


    Alice, who was listening to the conversation from a corner of the hall frowned slightly. An expression of confusion appeared on her face.


    As if concerned that Greem would change his mind, the middle-aged witch took out a magical contract and threw it at him.


    "You can read the contract. Sign it if you agree to the conditions!"


    Greem swept across the parchment with his eyes and instantly read its contents and understood them perfectly. The contents were just as the witch had promised. There were no lies or traps in them.


    Greem fell silent for a moment and slowly said, "If you believe in me, why don¡¯t you give me the meloathe Iron first. I have more confidence inpleting the mission this way!"


    "That is no problem!" The middle-aged witch tossed out a wooden earring as if she wasn¡¯t concerned that Greem would go against his word at all. Inside the jewelry was the fifteen kilograms of meloathe Iron that Greem so urgently needed.


    Given how generous the witch was being, Greem naturally had no reason to drag his feet. He concentrated a trace of Spirit at the tip of his finger and slowly pressed it on the signature spot on the magical contract. As a brand of fire slowly appeared on it, the yellow light that represented the establishment of the contract instantly entered Greem and the witch¡¯s body.


    Such an origin contract had a rtively high binding ability on the adepts. If adepts dared to go against an origin contract, they would have to endure the bacsh, henceforth causing their soul origin to stagnate. If a Fourth Grade witch formed this contract, the magical effects would evenst for one or two hundred years.


    That meant that Greem¡¯s powers would never improve so long as he had yet toplete the contract!


    That was something that most adepts would never want to try to experience.

 Chapter 745 Difficult Decision

    "Why did you agree to her conditions? Do you not find so many things odd about this matter?"


    Alice impatiently rushed to Greem once the middle-aged witch had left and asked.


    Greem was momentarily stunned.


    "Was¡­was it not you who had me agree?"


    "When did I tell you to do that? I''ve been telling you not to sign the contract, and you kept saying you were confident."


    Both of them were talking on their own, and they suddenly fell silent in the middle of their argument.


    "I think I might know which branch this witch came from!" Alice spat out resentfully, gritting her teeth as she did so.


    "The Deceit Witches." Greem''s mind was very fast as well. He quickly found the core of the problem after reviewing the various abilities of the different witch branches in his mind.


    "Only they have such abilities to trick us into epting the contract. It seemed the person earlier had simultaneously taken on the guise of both of our mental frequencies and tricked both of us!"


    To even be able to disguise her mental frequency; for the first time, Greem felt fear toward these Deceit Witches.


    It was important to note that one''s mental flux and frequency was like his ''identity document.'' It was unique and difficult to replicate. There were many asions where the eyes and the ears could trick a person, but mental flux and frequency alone could not be used for trickery.


    It was something that was practically public knowledge to adepts!


    That was why adepts often recognized each other based on their individual mental fluctuations, rather than the more easily cheated physical senses.


    Yet now, even mental flux and frequencies were no longer reliable tools to lean on!


    That damned witch. She had actually disguised her mental flux and simultaneously conversed and misguided both Alice and Greem in front of their very faces, sessfully baiting Greem into signing that damned magical contract.


    Since the witch herself had been in disguise, there were no guarantees that the damned contract itself wasn''t without its deceptions.


    Concern shed across Greem''s young and handsome face, "Then¡­this contract¡­"


    Alice''s brow furrowed, "Helen, hurry and prepare the astrology ceremony. I''ll need to use it immediately!"


    The magic fairy who had been quietly sitting on her shoulder immediately acknowledged the instruction and flew out of the room.


    Half a dayter, the results of Alice''s divination came back.


    Indeed, there were some serious problems with the contract!


    Firstly, it was important to establish that the Second Grade Fire Lord did indeed exist. There was no doubting this fact. Otherwise, the magical contract would not have been able to be established in the first ce. Secondly, the nar coordinates of the fire elementium ne honestly pointed toward the location of this Fire Lord. There were no deceptions in that regard.


    However, the one thing that the middle-aged witch neglected to tell Greem was the fact that this Second Grade Fire Lord wasn''t any ordinary rural lord. Instead, he was a newly advanced Fire Lord who was looked well upon by the great Fire King Groms.


    Fire King Groms might not be that important of a character in the Fire Elementium ne, but he was still a wicked individual whose lifeform grade went up as high as the Fifth Grade. Of course, apart from his own terrifying abilities, Groms also had a massive fire elementium army underneath him that numbered three million.


    That was the truly terrifying aspect of Fire King Groms!


    Of course, the majority of these three million soldiers were still fire elementium that had yet to advance to even First Grade. However, one couldn''t look down upon these low-grade fire elementium that even beginner apprentices could easily dispatch. Once gathered together, they were still a terrifying force that could eliminate everything in their path.


    The Fire Lord that the Witch of Deceit had cheated Greem into assassinating was one of the most trusted Second Grade Fire Lord subordinates of this Fire King Groms.


    Greem''s felt his head swell in the face of this task!


    Assassinate. The opponent''s power and influence were too massive. It was too easy for him to provoke an enemy that was too strong for him to deal with.


    To not assassinate. Greem had already signed the magical contract. Dragging this out would only result in locking his powers at intermediate Second Grade with no room for improvement. Though Greem had absolute confidence in the Crimson n, his control over the n would indirectly weaken tremendously if he, as the n leader, stagnated in the improvement of his power.


    After all, most adepts still hailed power as the ultimate good!


    Though knowledge was respected as well, knowledge that couldn''t be converted into power might as well not be!


    "Why?" Greem asked solemnly.


    He had trouble understanding why he had been deceived. If the opponent had intended to harm him, a simple Fourth Grade witch would be more than enough to wipe the entire Crimson n from the map. Yet, they had chosen to use such a clumsy and roundabout manner, all for the sake of sealing Greem''s power at its current state for one or two hundred years?


    Alice fell into a brief moment of silent thought before speaking to Greem in a mncholic tone, "Sorry. This time, I might have been the one to drag you down."


    Greem was shocked as he said, "Why would you say that?"


    "We have gotten too close recently," Alice sighed and exined, "The Northern Witches have always formed a system of their own and particrly dislike the intervention of outside forces. I am the leader of the Fate Witches after all. Though the strength of the Fate branch has yet to return, the other witch branches are still unwilling to see me be too intimate with an outsider."


    "That''s why they thought up such a rtively gentle scheme. One in which you wouldn''t take up arms against them while still being able to indirectly knock me, the outsider, down a few pegs. Quite a brilliant n!" Greem quickly figured out the idea of the scheme and understood the backstory behind the incident after expanding upon Alice''s revtion.


    The only thing they didn''t know now was which branches among the Northern Witches had had a hand in this conspiracy!


    Of course, those witch leaders thought it beneath them to conspire against a Second Grade male adept. However, as long as they revealed their intent to teach Alice a lesson, plenty of subordinates would arrange and n such a matter for them.


    In the end, Greem had still been tricked by these Northern Witches!


    "They managed to shield themselves from my fate senses. It suggests that there are probably False Witches involved. Meanwhile, the one who tricked you into signing the magical contract today was a Deceit Witch. Don''t be intimidated by her aura. I already verified earlier that the origin aura on the contract is only that of a Second Grade witch. She tricked the two of us very convincingly."


    That was just a Second Grade Deceit Witch?


    Greem''s eyes were opened wide, and he took quite a while before he finally exhaled.


    Damn! These Deceit Witches were way too good at their Deceit magic! To think they could disguise themselves as a Fourth Grade witch without betraying a single w in their facade. Greem still felt it unbelievable even as he recalled the scene now!


    It seemed his establishment of the n''s framework in the Fate Witches'' territory had still crossed a line in the Northern Witches'' book. When he selflessly helped Alice back in Faen ne, the Northern Witches could still turn a blind eye and pretend that Greem was a male adept that Alice was manipting in the palm of her hand.


    Yet now, Greem''s Crimson n had brazenly started to recruit civilians in the home territory of the Northern Witches and had nted his banner on theirnd. That undoubtedly invited the dissatisfaction of many of the witch leaders, making them feel as if this was a foreign male adept''s influence seeping into witch territory.


    That was why these witch leaders would drag Greem into this conspiracy out of nowhere and feed him metaphorical poison. Meanwhile, Greem had no choice but to grit his teeth and silently swallow this bitter pill, even though he knew what was happening.


    Everyone knew how vital one hundred years of time was to a Second Grade adept. Even with Greem''s exceptional talent and terrifying advancement speed, stagnating for one or two hundred years would ruin his life!


    "I''m sorry." Alice''s eyes turned red as tears started to fall.


    In the end, this matter was uninvited trouble that Greem had to endure due to Alice. It was only natural that Alice was so upset and resentful about the situation!


    "Don''t be in such a hurry to sob and give up!" Greem quickly returned to his usualposure after a brief fit of anger, "Tell me first, is there still any way to break ourselves out of the current situation?"


    Alice looked at Greem in surprise. She saw the calm and collected light reflecting from his ck eyes. It was only now that she realized that Greem had not been beaten down by this ident and was still calmly thinking of a way to solve the problem and retaliate.


    It was a trait that all individuals destined for greatness had to possess!


    Secretly impressed by Greem''s calm state of mind, Alice wiped away the tears in the corners of her eyes and started to calm herself down to think for Greem''s sake.


    Half a momentter¡­


    "I havepletely sorted out the cause and effects of the situation. There are only three paths that lie ahead of us.


    "One is to do nothing and simply wait until the effects of the contract wear off. I''ve done some divination, and this magical contract can probably hold you back for approximately one hundred and thirty-nine years. Once the contract loses effect, you will still have over a ny percent chance to advance to Third Grade before your life force runs out, given your potential."


    Greem shook his head slightly, and Alice could only continue her analysis.


    "The second choice is to find a way to force that Deceit Witch to abandon this magical contract willingly."


    Greem shut his eyes and mulled over it for a long while before finally shaking his head with much difficulty.


    Since the opponent hade prepared, they had probably taken precautions against such measures. Abducting a Second Grade Deceit Witch in the Northern Witches'' territory was practically impossible, even with Alice''splete cooperation. Greem could only grit his teeth and give up on the option!


    "Then only thest option is left! Find a way to kill that Second Grade Fire Lord. Once he dies, the magical contract would bergelypleted. The remaining effects of the contract will not be enough to seal the improvement of your power." Alice decisively brought up thest deadly path.


    It might seem like the most simple of all the paths, but it was actually the most dangerous of the three!


    Since the opponent obviously didn''t want Greempleting this contract, there was no guarantee that they wouldn''t have something nned for the encounter with the Fire Lord.


    Given that case, Greem could no longer treat the Second Grade Fire Lord as a mere Second Grade Fire Lord when assessing his strength. Perhaps Greem would travel to the given nar coordinates, only to arrive in front of the terrifying and endless fire elementium army of the Fire Lord.


    Still, in the end, a Fire Lord was a Fire Lord. At the very best, he was only a somewhat stronger fire elementium creature. How intelligent could he possibly be?


    Greem gritted his teeth and said determinedly, "The third option it is then. I will kill that Fire Lord."

 Chapter 746 First Time in the Fire Elementium Plane

    The urrence of this unexpected event undoubtedly messed up Greem''s cultivation ns.


    The urgent matter at hand wasn''t how to increase his power, but to create that Emblem of Fire armband as soon as possible. After all, it was thebination of two set pieces that could provide Greem with actual fire immunity, rather than before where he had to turn into his body of mes to be immune to fire.


    If he had no choice but to go into the Fire Elementium ne, he would not have a singlepanion who could apany him.


    The Fire Elementium ne was the world of the fire elementium creatures. Second Grade adepts like Mary and Alice would not be able to endure the burning mes for extended periods of time, regardless of how good their magic resistance was. Even the tough Dragonborn Zacha couldn''tst in this aspect, let alone them.


    That was why the only person that Greem could rely on was himself!


    If hispanions couldn''t survive in the Fire Elementium ne, what other options were avable to him?


    The Fire Elementium ne was a pure elementium ne. The ne itself rejected all other elementium apart from fire elementium. All magical equipment or essories that needed to absorb external elementium to function would only have one use. They could not be replenished after being exhausted.


    Magical scrolls, magical potions, wands, essories; all of these tools could no longer be of much help to Greem.


    What about magical golems then?


    These elementium golems were what had helped Greem the most since he started his rise to power. Could he still rely on them to break through the storm this time?


    The expectation of his elementium golems quickly fell as he started to delve into more detailed information on the Fire Elementium ne.


    That ce excluded all elementium apart from fire elementium to an extreme degree. Elementium golems like the Wind Dragon and the Decayer would rapidly exhaust their internal elementium energy reserve there. The only ones he could use there were probably fire elementium golems.


    It wasn''t necessarily a bad thing!


    At the very least, the me Fiend of Terror would be able to manifest for extended periods without any damage due to the ne''s rich fire elementium. With the aid of the me Fiend of Terror, a powerful fire adept like Greem would probably have no problem surviving in the Fire Elementium ne.


    The only trouble was the uncertainty as to what traps the wicked witches hadid around the Fire Lord. If Greem were tracked down by the enemy the moment he entered the ne, he would have nowhere to go in the Fire Elementium ne where he had no allies or friends!


    The event that had happened to him concerned some secrets of the Northern Witches'' higher-ups after all. As such, Greem did not reveal anything about the situation to the people around him. He could trust Mary, but she was an impulsive and irritable person. Greem was worried that she would sneak behind him to find trouble with the Deceit Witches if she found out about the incident.


    Thus, Greem handed all of his authority over White Tower to Meryl and returned to Fire Throne under the excuse of performing a major magical experiment.


    A fire elementium altar had been constructed in Fire Throne as well, which allowed Greem to open a passage to the Fire Elementium ne at any time he wished. Thus, Greem felt like there was a need to first travel to the Fire Elementium ne for reconnaissance.


    The creation of the Emblem of Fire armband still required three to four months. It would be best for him to familiarize himself with the Fire Elementium ne during this time.


    After returning to Fire Throne from White Tower, Greem first summoned Gargamel to ask about the tower''s situation. He then set down some tasks to bepleted and waved Gargamel away.


    Once Gargamel had left, Greem used his authority as the owner of the tower to move the fire elementium altar from the first floor of the tower into his own room.


    The massive fire elementium altar had three tiers. It was twenty meters long and thirty meters wide, while eachyer was three meters tall.


    The marble surface of the altar''s base was carved full of strange magical lines and runes. Many of them were sketches of various fire elementium creatures. An elementium brazier was lit at the four corners of every tier, with a bright yellow elementium me burning within them.


    A wide, thick b of marble had been ced at the top of the altar. It was the altar tform, where the casters would present their sacrifices to the Fire Elementium ne.


    Ordinary fire elementium altars had two purposes. One was to summon powerful fire creatures from the Fire Elementium ne through sacrifices, while the other was the megate that Greem needed to use. It was only through the megate that Greem could sessfully travel between the World of Adepts and the Fire Elementium ne.


    Once the fire elementium altar had been ced in his room, Greem used his authority to separate a dedicated power channel from the energy room and connected it directly with the fire elementium altar. This way, he wouldn''t need to worry about the megate dispersing on its own due to ack of energy.


    Greem carefully inspected the fire elementium altar once again after he''d done everything. He confirmed that there were no problems before waving his hand and activating the fire elementium altar.


    As abundant fire energy surged into the fire elementium altar without stop, the altar started to light up, tier by tier, from the base. The runes and arrays etched upon the altar began to activate wherever the fire energy coursed through, slowly but surely burning with dense and zing mes.


    Greem stood atop the altar tform and hesitated for a moment before taking out the ze of Destruction from his storage ring. It was a staff that had apanied him for a long time. Alice had given him the ze of Destruction shortly after her own advancement to First Grade. With the increase of Greem''s powers, this First Grade magical equipment was no longer suitable for him.


    If that was the case, then let it unleash its power one more time!


    Greem raised his arm and lightly ced the ze of Destruction into the narrow socket located at the center of the tform. As overwhelming fire energy flowed into the staff through the altar, the ze of Destruction turned bright red in color before turning a blinding white as it grew brighter and brighter.


    By the end, the light it emitted was so strong that one couldn''t look straight at it.


    The lights glowed and hovered above the altar. They then slowly gathered together and formed into the shape of a phantasmal door of light. Through this shimmering door, Greem could vaguely sense the destructive pulses of fire energy on the other side.


    The megate leading to the Fire Elementium ne slowly opened.


    The temperature in the magical room started to rise rapidly. The glimmer of elementium defenses began to show on the surrounding walls, floorboards, and ceiling, repelling the fire energy radiating into the air. Otherwise, the intensity of the fire energy from the opening of the megate would have melted even the enchanted stone materials.


    If that happened, Greem''s little secret could no longer be concealed!


    Greem''s towering body stood in front of the megate. He looked around him to ensure that all the defense and security arrays had been activated and that all his preparations were going ording to n. It was only then that he turned and leaped into the megate.


    ¡­¡­¡­¡­


    This was a burning world!


    The sky was burning. The ground was burning. Everything in the world was burning.


    There was no air here, nor food, and naturally no water.


    Of course, just when you thought this ce to be and void of life, this unique world would prove otherwise with its own odd and twisted narws¨C sometimes fire could also be life!


    Greem quickly lost all his physical senses after stepping through the megate.


    He had no vision, hearing, sense of touch, and no sense of smell. Even his sense of space had vanished. The only thing that could help him in this strange and twisted world was his extended Spirit.


    It was like falling into a dark and bottomless abyss. Everything around him was hidden behind a heavy shroud of darkness, making it impossible for Greem to see anything, even if his eyes were wide open. Greem quickly regained hisposure after a brief moment of panic. He started to converse with the Chip.


    "Chip, what is it with me? Why can''t I see anything?"


    [Beep. ording to the narws of the elementium world, no other elementium particles aside from fire elementium particles exist here. That is why normal human organs are no longer suited for this new world. Host must direct the reconstruction of the sensory system with his Spirits as the framework.]


    "Begin construction now!"


    [Beep. Host''s instructions received. New sensory system in process of construction. Estimated time required: Seven seconds. 7¡­6¡­5¡­4¡­3...2¡­1.]


    As the countdown ended, Greem felt the darkness before him fade away. The shape of nearby objects started to be clear and appear in his vision. The strange mental flux extended in every direction like ripples on the surface of the water, feeding everything it sensed back to the source of the flux.


    A brand new world slowly presented itself to Greem, just like that!


    Greem slowly turned about and earnestly sensed the world around him.


    It was a deste and quiet in. Apart from two or three sharp broken rocks around him, there were no other lifeforms or objects.


    Greem squatted down in curiosity and felt the soft grass under his feet with his hand. The grass here was utterly different from material nes. All the grass and flowers were of a single color: red. If it weren''t for the fact that the tactile sensation resembled that of grass in the material ne, Greem would have suspected that they were only mes of a different state.


    Greem applied some force and plucked a handful of red grass from the ground, cing it in his palm for better observation.


    It was an ordinary handful of grass, but everything from its roots to its leaves was bright red. Even the dirt entangled in its roots was a dark red. The fire grass seemed to have lost the constant nourishment of fire elementium upon leaving the ground. It quickly wilted and withered away, losing all of its life force in an instant.


    The next second, the grass in Greem''s hand¨Calong with the dirt on its roots¨Cexploded into sparks of fire in a sizzling st.


    Greem could sense pure and concentrated fire energy in these sparks!

 Chapter 747 First Scou

    t


    Dammit, wasn''t this firegrass?


    Greem''s mouth widened in shock.


    Firegrass could be considered a low-grade adept resource in the World of Adepts. Half a kilogram of such high-quality firegrass could easily sell for two or three magical crystals.


    But here¡­


    Greem stood up and looked at the boundless ins of firegrass in his vision. The shock and surprise in his heart were immense.


    He was screaming inside his mind. If he built a stable megate here and sent out the adepts and apprentices to harvest all the firegrass here, the finances of the Crimson n would instantly stabilize.


    However, Greem''s passionate heart immediately cooled down after some quick thought.


    The reason he could be here was due to the tower providing the fire elementium altar with a constant and massive supply of energy to sustain the megate. The adept''s tower would have to constantly exhaust energy to maintain the stability of the megate.


    Every second and every minute he spent exploring the Fire Elementium ne was draining away at the magical crystal reserve of Fire Throne.


    The harvesting of firegrass alone was probably insufficient to prop up such an extravagant otherworldly exploration!


    Moreover, the harsh environment of the Fire Elementium ne meant that ordinary apprentice adepts could not survive here at all. Even the official adepts could not spend too much time here. Otherwise, the continually burning mes would eat through their defensive barriers and exhaust all their magic.


    Even surviving here was a chore, much lessboring for long periods of time. Given all these factors, the very idea of sending workers here to harvest firegrass became a ridiculous notion.


    No wonder adepts had never thought of excavating this ce, despite its bounty of fire resources. The truth was the costs and profits involved in the excavation were severely imbnced. One was fated to suffer losses if they were to try something like this!


    Greemughed at his own misconception and brushed away the non-existent dust on his hands. It was now that he turned his attention to the few dark rocks near him.


    The surface of the rocks was rough and hard to the touch, much like the rocks of the material nes. However, when Greem''s Spirit extended into the stones, he instantly felt the overwhelming and pure fire energy contained within.


    Fire essence rock was yet another low-grade fire resource of decent quality. If he had arge amount of fire essence rocks, he would never have constructed Fire Throne with such low-quality volcanic rock.


    This was truly the Fire Elementium ne. Greem couldn''t sense the presence of any other elementium particle in the environment, be it earth, water, wind, light, dark, or nature. One couldn''t assume the usual elementiumposition still existed with the presence of the sky and ground. Everything in this world was constructed from those ubiquitous fire elementium particles.


    It was only the guidance and restrictions of the narws that caused the fire elementium particles to exist in different states. Once their unique physical state was broken, they would disassemble into the most basic and primal fire elementium particles in the shortest time possible before assimting into this odd and twisted elementium world once again.


    With the powerful x-ray vision and scanning functions provided by the Chip, Greem could continuously analyze this strange world in front of him. Unlike other foreign worlds he had broken into, Greem did not sense the suffocating and terrifying nar suppression.


    The elementium worlds were truly one of the fewpletely open worlds in the multiverse!


    Perhaps due to the uniqueness in the formation of the elementium worlds, their nar space did not reject the coincidence and connection with other worlds. The casters of any material ne could use simple magical arrays to travel between the various elementium nes, even going so far as to use them as transit points in their internar travels.


    Moreover, the elementium worlds did not reject visits from outsiders and would not ever defend themselves strictly like most material nes, which were afraid that some annoying bugs might find their way into their bodies.


    Greem had tried to activate his elementium sight, but he was instantly blinded by the intense red light, scaring him into deactivating it.


    Greem turned back, and the megate was still silently standing behind him. The dense fire elementium in the surrounding air was drawn toward the megate and disappeared from Greem''s senses after entering the door of light.


    As long as the megate was still here, there would be a tight connection between this ce and the magical room in Fire Throne. Under situations where the fire elementium concentration was imbnced, the fire elementium around the megate would naturally diffuse towards the room in the tower to equalize the concentrations.


    If intelligent fire elementium creatures saw such a distinct phenomenon, they would be interested enough to figure out the cause. Given that to be the case, it seemed some special magical arrays had to be arranged on the side of the tower to ensure that no ignorant fools tried to stir up trouble.


    Greem ced his right hand on the megate and silently connected with the distant Fire Throne. The megate started to copse and shrink under his precise instructions, slowly but gradually. Finally, it became a strange spatial node the size of a thumb.


    The megate could not be shrunk any further after turning into a spatial node. At the very least, Greem''s knowledge of spatial studies did not allow him to convert the spatial node into an invisible spatial node.


    Greem did not cut off the connection between the node and Fire Throne.


    As long as the spatial node was still here, Greem didn''t need to worry about his retreat path to the tower being cut off. Though this would continuously exhaust the tower''s energy, this spatial node had to continue to exist to ensure that he didn''t be a lost traveler.


    If this spatial node vanished, the chances of a new megate anchoring on the same spot were minuscule, even if a new megate was immediately opened on the Fire Throne side. That was due to ne drifting and errors in connection. It was very likely that the megate would appear in a random area hundreds of kilometers away.


    In fact, if Greem was unlucky, the megate might even appear underground, inside stones, or even within the bodies of some unfortunate individual.


    It would be exceedingly hard for Greem to find the megate when that happened!


    The reason Greem ced the ze of Destruction on the altar as the host of the megate was to leave behind a clear nar coordinate. He had been using the ze of Destruction for so long that he could sense every elementium movement within the staff. It was most suited to mark the nar coordinates.


    The nar consciousness in this whole new world was neither friendly nor hostile toward Greem.


    After several advancements and evolutions, the part inside him that was a fire adept became extraordinarily active. It was almost as if he was a long-lost son that had finally returned to his home. There was an overwhelming impulse to throw himself into the embrace of his mother. Meanwhile, the human part of him deeply sensed the terror of this world. It had be extremely dejected and weak.


    Greem was currently still maintaining his human form. A fresh red barrier covered his human body, refusing any contact with the surrounding air.


    After all, a human''s body of flesh and blood would probably be reduced to cinders within three seconds in the violent environment of the Fire Elementium ne. Even with his powers as a Second Grade fire adept, Greem would have to endure the oppression of the harsh environment if he didn''t turn into his body of mes.


    Greem even radiated a portion of his fire energy to attach to his clothes and resist the corrosion of the fire elementium. Otherwise, he would be running around shamelessly buck naked!


    After doing all this, Greem casually tossed out an adept-level earth elementium golem. The three-meter tall earth elementium clumsily got up from the ground and was instantly engulfed in explosive mes.


    Twenty-seven secondster, the explosive crack of a crystal core rang out as this adept-level earth golem copsed and disintegrated without a single sound.


    Its half-meter thick y body had been burned to ashes by the fires along with the golem core deep within its body. That was why it had ''died'' in twenty-seven seconds, even without anyone attacking it.


    It was an earth elementium golem, known for having the highest defensive power. If it had been a water or wind elemental instead, they would havested for an even shorter amount of time.


    Greem sighed. It seemed his golem army could not be put to use here.


    He looked around into the distance. In this world, his vision was reduced to a radius of two hundred and seventy-one meters. Everything outside his visual range was a bright red, making it hard to discern what was in the distance.


    Greem picked up a handful of dirt from beneath his feet and let it slowly slip from his fingers as he chanted a spell. A short momentter, a pale, emotionless face appeared in the air.


    It was a low-level magical spirit gathered from the earth through magic. Greem could gain some simple information about the area within a fifty-kilometer radius through some crude questioning.


    "Are there any intelligent lifeforms nearby that canmunicate with me? I need to know their positions and numbers."


    "East¡­big things¡­many."


    The pale face replied in inarticte adept''snguage and then dispersed.


    Greem sighed helplessly once again.


    All he acquired by expending the energy of a Second Grade spell was a couple of answers that could not be any cruder. This Spiritcall was a real headache of a spell sometimes!


    East? Which direction was east in this Fire Elementium ne, where everything in every direction was just bright red?


    Big things? In the eyes of a magical spirit, anything taller than Greem would probably be considered big, wouldn''t they?!


    Many? That was the worst answer of them all! How many was ''many'' exactly?


    Still, being able to obtain such information in a world where he had no information was good enough.


    Greem rubbed his head and ced all his hopes on the Chip''s analysis.


    Since it had been a magical spirit summoned with magic, it had naturally been bound by the rules of the adepts. Soon, the Chip managed to confirm the direction of east and indicated it with a blue arrow in Greem''s vision.


    Greem looked to the west and thought for a bit before finally running in the direction of the blue arrow. The Second Grade Fire Lord indicated in the contract was somewhere in the west. However, Greem was currently still exploring the Fire Elementium ne and did not have the luxury to think about the assassination of the target.


    It was best to first familiarize himself with the Fire Elementium ne!

 Chapter 748 Blazefire Spirits

    Greem ran into a group of zefire Spirits when he walked in the direction given by the magical spirit.


    Compared to ordinary fire elementium, such humanoid zefire spirits already possessed elementary intelligence and social traits. They lived on arge ck mountain burning with a huge me and kept all outsiders from getting close.


    It seemed as if they were guarding something there!


    Greem secretly got close to the ck mountain with mes and silently observed each and every action of these zefire spirits.


    The spirits were truly gigantic creatures. Even the young spawn were three meters tall, while the First and Second Grade spirits easily reached between five and seven meters.


    Judging from their appearance, they were humanoid creatures formed of bright yellow mes. They had humanoid bodies, arms, and heads, but everything below their waists was a blurry cloud of fire.


    Greem couldn''t discern any differentiating sexual characteristics after much observation. Perhaps these elementium creatures had no such thing as sex to begin with.


    During the time he had been observing, most of the zefire spawns had been ying about on the ck mountain, never leaving its boundaries. Meanwhile, the adolescent zefire spirits had formed patrol groups and were continually patrolling the surroundings of the ck mountain.


    Their groups were allposed of six zefire spirits. The leaders were all Second Grade while the members were all First Grade.


    Greem could see some beehive-like holes at the top of the mountain from a distance. Those might be their homes. Still, due to the existence of the patrol groups, Greem had no chance to get close to the ck mountain or to scout the ce.


    Everything living in the fire elementium ne was a fire elementium creature of the same origin. They didn''t require food, water, and air like humans did, but they still needed the constant nourishment of the fire elementium. Most fire creatures living in the fire elementium ne were extremely violent as well. They also hoped to be stronger as quickly as possible.


    For them, a home was where fire elementium was most concentrated and dense!


    Since the zefire spirits took the ck mountain as their home, then there had to be a powerful fire elementium cluster point in the ck mountain. Maybe there were some fire treasures or relics.


    Greem hid in the surroundings of the ck mountain for quite a while and ultimately made his decision to strike against these zefire spirits.


    Of course, the main factor driving his decision was the discovery of no Third Grade beings among the spirits. Moreover, he badly needed to umtebat experience against fire creatures now. Thus, after much pacing about, Greem could no longer hold back. He moved.


    There was a sparse patch of forest at the foot of the ck mountain.


    Several tall, bare fire trees were spread out evenly over a range of thirty miles. These trees had no leaves nor tender branches. The thick stems of the fire trees were only sharp and erect spikes that pointed toward the sky. One could even vaguely see viscous red liquid slowly flowing underneath their dark red bark, much like flowing magma.


    The sharp roots of the fire trees were also embedded deeply into the earth, desperately taking in fire energy from the underground fires.


    A squad of zefire spirits silently walked through this forest of fire trees.


    There was no day and night cycle in the fire elementium ne. As such, most fire creatures had no concept of time. They simply executed any mission given by their leader to the best of their abilities. It was only when the fire energy within their bodies had been mostly exhausted that they would return to their dens and recharge.


    These spirits could dutifully remain at work for years on end as long as they still had plenty of fire energy within their bodies.


    This group''s patrol mission was to survey this fire tree forest. They had walked past this fixed route more than tens of thousands of times and were exceedingly familiar with every fire tree and patch of earth along the way.


    Their mission was to chase away low-grade fire elementium that had wandered into the ce, as well as to be on alert for attacks from the other surrounding fire creature tribes.


    There were not many disagreements or bad blood between the fire creatures of the fire elementium ne. The only reason for conflict was to rob the opponent of their fire elementium cluster point. Thus, the wars between tribes had never ceased!


    Today, this group of zefire spirits once again stepped upon this familiar path, silently making their way through the ghastly and sinister fire trees.


    The one walking at the forefront of the group was naturally the leader and the Second Grade zefire spirit. He was a whole seven meters in height, and a pair of golden mes burned fiercely upon his humanoid head. When he slowly hovered near the fire trees, everything within a one-kilometer radius would fall into his vision without exception.


    They had barely made it a quarter of a kilometer into the fire tree forest when a wandering fire elementium entered their security perimeter another quarter of a kilometer ahead.


    It was a beginner fire elemental only one meter in height. It only possessed the strength of a beginner apprentice and was obliviously walking between the fire trees, as if it had yet to gain intelligence.


    Of course, if it had gained intelligence, it would not have ignored the warning signs that the zefire spirits had left around the perimeter.


    Seeing that a brat had trespassed into theirnd, the leader of the group waved his arm and impatiently ordered, "Doug, go deal with it!"


    A First Grade zefire spirit following at the rear of the squad acknowledged the instruction. He then bent down and elerated forward, charging at the ignorant fire elemental in the distance.


    With the difference in their power, a single punch from the zefire spirit would be enough to pulverize the opponent''s fire core and cause it to disintegratepletely.


    It was only once the First Grade spirit had reached within a hundred meters of it that the beginner fire elemental appeared to sense danger. The little thing turned and ran without any hesitation.


    "Hm? Does that thing know how to run?" The First Grade zefire spirit known as Doug couldn''t help but be surprised. He hastened the fire cloud on his bottom half, and the speed of his pursuit increased abruptly.


    Seventy meters. Fifty meters. Thirty meters. Ten meters.


    The distance between the two continued to close until Dougpletely caught up with the elemental. He then raised his massive fists of fire and smashed them down upon the burning core inside the elemental.


    "Careful."


    The Second Grade zefire spirit that had been observing from a distance was only half-heartedly watching. However, when his subordinate closed in on the fire elemental, he suddenly sensed some abnormal fire elementium flux.


    Sadly, his reminder waste!


    A seven-meter tall me Fiend of Terror suddenly emerged from behind a fire tree. It immediately thrust a lethal attack at the First Grade zefire spirit upon its entrance.


    A giant magma fist smashed downward, crushing the head of the First Grade fire spirit into scattered mes. Before the zefire spirit could drive his headless body out of range of the me Fiend, a massive magma hand had pierced his chest and retrieved the fire core within.


    For the fire creatures, all of their fire energy and mental consciousness came from this fire core. If it were destroyed or removed from their bodies, the remainder of their me body would be wild, unbound fire. It would instantly scatter to the winds.


    "Bastard, hurry up and hand over Doug''s fire core."


    The zefire spirits in the distance were furious upon witnessing this. They charged over madly under the lead of the Second Grade zefire spirit.


    They had clearly seen that the me Fiend of Terror that crushed theirpanion was a terrifying Second Grade creature. However, they had a Second Grade captain and four First Grade members in the group. They weren''t at a disadvantage in a fight against this brute.


    Sadly, their elementary intelligence couldn''t possibly allow them to escape the schemes of a Second Grade adept!


    By the time they arrived at the me Fiend, their path of retreat had been sealed off by Greem.


    The battlested only fifteen minutes before ending!


    Both parties were fire creatures, and thus, both of them werergely immune to fire damage. However, the fire spirits relied on their numbers to continuously use fire arrows, Firestone Shockwaves, and Ignites to attack the me Fiend constantly. That caused the me Fiend''s Lava Shield''s to ssh everywhere.


    Meanwhile, the Second Grade zefire spirit demonstrated unparalleled courage and ferocity. He brandished his fists and engaged the me Fiend of Terror in a melee.


    One had a body of mes, while the other had the body of a me Fiend. One only had Inferno Shields, while the other had the more sturdy Lava Shields. When these two giants bashed and struck at each other with bare fists, the battlefield turned brutal and violent.


    Seeing that the me Fiend had the absolute advantage in the fight against the Second Grade fire spirit, Greem unhesitatingly struck at the remaining First Grades.


    Both parties were using fire spells, but the me bodies of the First Grade zefire spirits were not as tough as Greem''s Lava Shields. After two or three rounds of exchanging attacks, one of Greem''s Lava Shields had been destroyed, while only one of the First Grade fire spirits was left.


    The others had been sted into pieces by the fierce and solid magma fireballs. Even the fire cores within them had melted!


    Greem used a Fire Teleportation to appear behind thest surviving First Grade spirit. He then reached with his hand, and a zing hand formed of pure fire elementium gripped the spirit.


    "Let''s go! The fire spirits on the mountain seem to have been alerted!"


    Greem looked behind him and saw squads of zefire spirits rushing down the ck mountain. He snorted lightly and closed his fist. The First Grade fire spirit was then crushed into pieces by the zing hand.


    When the hand opened up once more, only a fist-sized fire core remained, its surface still burning with small licks of fire.


    At this moment, the me Fiend of Terror conjured a twenty-meter-long me whip from thin air and used it to bind the Second Grade spirit, who was desperately trying to escape.


    The des of Coldme in Greem''s hand ravaged toward the immobile fire spirit like an unrelenting storm, slicing off his head and arms. The me Fiend of Terror roared and punched through the spirit''s chest before he could recover, forcefully pulling out the fire core within him.

 Chapter 749 Forest Exploration

    The fact that a Second Grade zefire spirit had been taken down so easily was well beyond Greem¡¯s expectations.


    However, the very next second, the surprise on Greem¡¯s face was reced by deep terror.


    [Beep. Warning. Detecting chaotic energy signals. Countdown to fire core explosion: 5...4...]


    "Toss it...toss it fast."


    Greem was already mentally connected with the me Fiend. Thus, the me Fiend swung its arm and threw the Second Grade fire core into the distance with all its strength the very moment Greem sensed something wrong with the fire core.


    [2...]


    [1...]


    As the Chippleted thest of its countdown, the energy aura of the fire core suddenly erupted. Then a destructive mushroom cloud appeared on the spot.


    At this point, the fire core was only a hundred meters away. Such a short amount of time hadn¡¯t been enough for Greem and the me Fiend of Terror to teleport away from the radius of the explosion. Just as the two of them appeared two hundred meters away with their Fire Teleportation, the terrifying me shockwave was already upon them.


    Greem¡¯s adept robe was instantly torn into rags by the st. The me Fiend turned around and stood in front of its master, using its broad, tough back to shield Greem from the me shockwave.


    If someone were to look from above the fire tree forest, they would see a massively violent halo of fire engulfing everything within a radius of two and a half kilometers. Even the ten-thousand-year-old fire trees with deep roots were instantly uprooted by the ravaging shockwaves as if they were crude straw houses.


    A terrifying mushroom cloud of fire, roaring shockwaves, destructive tides of mes; the entire ce appeared to be a horrifying scene from an apocalypse.


    If this were a material ne, such fearsome energy explosions would most definitely have left a massive crater. It was even possible that the st would have corroded through the rockyers and forced out the undergroundva, causing the formation of a smallvake.


    However, this was the fire elementium ne after all. The surrounding ground and air absorbed most of the fire damage. Even though the energy tides in the central area affected by the explosion seemed destructive and terrifying, it wasn¡¯t as threatening as it looked. For every thousand meters that the fire tide extended outward, the energy level would decrease by one or two levels. Two and a half kilometers away from the center of the explosion, the sea of fire had already fallen to a temperature of two to three hundred degrees from its original thirteen thousand degrees.


    Such temperatures were already very close to the average warmth of the Fire Elementium ne!


    Greem forced himself to get up once the fire tides had calmed down. The body of the me Fiend was in tatters now. Massive damage could be seen across its robust body made of magma andva.


    Crack. The body of the me Fiend copsed. It once again reverted from a seven-meter tall me monster to a fist-sized magic golem core.


    The self-destruction of the Second Grade zefire spirit had severely depleted the elementium energy stored within the magic golem core. The me Fiend of Terror could no longer maintain its massive size and had been forcefully knocked back to its original form.


    The sounds of roaring could still be heard in the distance, and they were quickly closing in.


    Greem picked up the golem core without hesitation and turned to leave the battlefield.


    He ran all the way back to where the megate was, restored it to a size sufficient for passage, and immediately dove inside.


    This massive door of light formed of pure mes quickly fell apart after that!


    Fifteen minutester, arge group of zefire spirit arrived in pursuit. They surrounded this stretch of grass that still had traces of spatial flux remaining.


    A short momentter, a female fire spirit with aplete humanoid form arrived amidst the zefire spirits.


    All the spirits, including the Second Grade zefire spirits, respectfully bowed when she appeared.


    "Lady Manzda, the enemy escaped from here." The Second Grade zefire spirit in the lead took a step forward and respectfully exined the situation.


    This high-grade fire spirit that had just appeared wasn¡¯t like her other low-gradepanions with a humanoid upper body and a fire cloud for the lower half. Instead, she had the shape of a human female.


    Her body was curvaceous and covered in an odd crimson armor. Even the features of her face were extremely defined, though not as gentle or soft as an actual human¡¯s. Reddish-brown hair flowed down her back, asionally ring with a small sh of fire here and there.


    "I smell the aura of a wicked otherworldly adept. It seems the one who assaulted our patrol group earlier was an adept from the World of Adepts. Since he¡¯s already run away, there¡¯s no further need to be concerned. However, from today onward, make sure to monitor all spatial weak-points in a fifty-kilometer radius of the mountain. If anyone finds those evil adepts sneaking over again, immediately send troops to exterminate them!"


    "Understood!"


    "Understood!"


    The zefire spirits acknowledged the order before slowly dispersing.


    The few remaining spirits worked together to set up security traps around this weak point.


    That way, they would be immediately notified whenever an outsider snuck into the fire elementium ne through this ce!


    ............


    Greem was only relieved once the megate had vanished entirely.


    His short adventure in the Fire Elementium ne had made him understand the terror and horror of the other world.


    The Second Grade zefire spirit might have had a sturdy body, but he didn¡¯t have too manybat techniques and methods of murder. Looking at their fighting methods from a bystander¡¯s perspective, they appeared to be primitive and clumsy. It seemed most of the battles between fire creatures ended up in close range fights. The fire spells were only methods used to control the enemy and grind away at their patience.


    Still, though their methods might be primitive, their tempers were violent and ferocious. They were not only harsh toward the enemy but themselves as well. To think that they would detonate their fire core the moment they were caught!


    That was the final medium that carried their consciousness core!


    Once it was destroyed, thest trace of their existence would also be wiped away. Such ferocity and determination was not something possible for ordinary individuals!


    Greem stood upon the high fire elementium altar for a while. He finally rxed once he was sure that the spatial fluctuations had wholly vanished and that no signs of an invasion from another world were going to appear.


    He opened his palms. The golem core of the me Fiend of Terror rested in his left hand, while three First Grade fire spirit cores rested in the right. The difference in grades and the absolute overwhelming of power had caused these three First Grade fire spirits to be destroyed and their cores taken before they could even self-destruct.


    Now that they had fallen into Greem¡¯s hands, they could no longer self-destruct of their own free will, even if their soul consciousness was still attached to the fire cores!


    However, Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown when he lifted up the golem core for further inspection.


    He had the Chip do aplete scan of the me Fiend¡¯s golem core and finally got a more detailed report. The core couldn¡¯t bepletely repaired without at least an entire month of work.


    This expedition hadn¡¯t been entirely worth it!


    He had obtained three First Grade zefire spirit cores, but he had also caused the core of his Second Grade me Fiend to be damaged. This was an unprofitable trade!


    No wonder adepts liked to go in groups when exploring other worlds; it was because the risk involved was so huge.


    Greem shook his head and sighed. He could only turn and leave the secret room.


    Let the next exploration of the Fire Elementium ne be one month from now then!


    ............


    The forest was full of trees, tall and massive.


    An adventure group of five individuals was cutting their way through the bushes and making their way through the ck Forest with much difficulty.


    The person responsible for opening a path was a bald and muscr man of great stature. He wore leather armor and held a machete in his hands. He cut through the crisscrossing vines with difficulty and used his massive body to make a winding little path in this dense forest, slowly advancing.


    Four odd individuals of various sizes stood behind him, all covered in thick, ck cloaks.


    The group walked along silently. Apart from some panting from the bald man, no other sounds could be heard.


    "Where are we now? How much further is it from that Serpentfowl Cliff?"


    Suddenly, the thinnest individual of the group couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    Judging from the voice, it was a pretty, young woman.


    "Eco, shush! This is the ck Forest. It¡¯s best not to make any sound before we discover any danger." Thergest person among the four individuals in ck cloaks scolded softly. His tone wasn¡¯t severe, but it possessed a prestige thatmanded respect.


    "It¡¯s fine, boss. We all know how good you are! This is just the edge of the ck Forest. Could there even be any threat to you?" The ck-robed individual at the rear of the group had almost been driven insane by the severe and unbearable environment of the forest. He took off his hood and started taking in the cold and humid air.


    They were all apprentice adepts with ¡¯weak¡¯ Physiques. They would copse after a quarter of a kilometer in the ck Forest if they were in metal armor. As such, with only light robes to protect them, they had to put on anotheryer of thick traveler¡¯s cloak to protect themselves from the sharp thorns and branches.


    The direct consequence of this was that every one of them was dying from the heat!


    The person called the ¡¯boss¡¯ was naturally the young pseudo-adept with dark affinity¨C Ponta.


    This time, he was personally leading four of his closest subordinates to Serpentfowl Cliff. Naturally, their goal was the delicious serpentfowl eggs. Of course, this was the serpentfowl mating season. If they could steal one or two serpentfowl chicks from their nests, they would make a killing with this venture!


    However, serpentfowls were still pseudo-adept magical creatures. If their tracks were exposed, it would be much more difficult to escape unscathed.


    That was the main reason Ponta had asked his team members to sneak about silently!

 Chapter 750 Depths of the Fores

    t


    Shadow¡¯s Light. Apprentice squad.


    Leader: Pseudo-Adept Ponta. Male, thirty-seven years old. Dark elementium affinity.


    Four members: Body-Refining Apprentice Dakso (Advanced), nt Apprentice Eco (Female, Intermediate), Transfiguration Apprentice nco (Intermediate) and Goblin Magical Mechanic Little Locke (Beginner).


    Originally, Little Locke wasn¡¯t qualified to be a member of Shadow¡¯s Light with his current power. However, due to the insistent rmendation of Eco, the magical mechanic path¡¯s non-reliance on raw power, and special skills that it possessed, Ponta allowed Little Locke to be a member of the group.


    This five-person group was reasonably well-formed. They had Body-Refining Apprentice Dakso as the tank, nt Apprentice Eco as the healer, and a magical mechanic who specialized in reconnaissance and disruption. This way, the party would be able to deal with enemies reliably, even if they were powerful magical creatures. The core of the party, Pseudo-Adept Ponta, would be allowed to output damage with all he had.


    On the other hand, the transfiguration ss was a unique advancement trajectory that had suddenly appeared over the past six months in White Tower. Much of the knowledge system of the transfiguration path came from a mysterious world known as Faen. It was said that there was a wondrous profession known as a druid in that world. These druids could use their nature¡¯s affinity to converse with nts and animals.


    Moreover, the most powerful ability of those druids was the ability to transform into ferocious magical beasts freely. They were unchallenged on the battlefield with the instant-cast racial abilities and powerful bodies that they gained through these transformations.


    The adepts of the Crimson n had modified this knowledge system slightly upon obtaining it, creating a new subject branch within the n¨C the Transfiguration ss.


    Apprentice adepts who had mastered transfiguration would be able to freely change between three forms: hellbears, shadow cheetahs, and windhawks. That allowed them to possess more varied and unusualbat methods.


    Of course, these tree transformations were only the basic subjects that every transfiguration apprentice had to master. If they wanted to possess more powerful transformation abilities, they would have to traderge numbers of points and magical crystals for the necessary knowledge in the n¡¯s library. Consequently, over the past few days, the more profitable n missions that took ce in the ck Forest had be extremely popr. They were almost always taken by parties formed by pseudo-adepts the moment they were put up.


    Meanwhile, the lone-wolves among the apprentices could only pick the smaller missions that no one fancied or stay within the tower and slowly do their daily missions.


    The improvement of apprentice adepts was almost solely achieved through the umtion of points and magical crystals.


    If you were one step behind your peers, you would always remain behind. You could only rely on tasks like cleaning upbs, assisting adepts with selecting magical materials, or acting as management staff for magical facilities to make any profit. Trying to improve drastically with such menial tasks was no more than fantasy.


    As such, all Crimson apprentices with some degree of ability and talent had started moving recently. They had almost cleared out the entirety of the ck Forest around White Tower. The magical creatures living here were not going to be expelled without a fight. They started to ambush the Crimson apprentices on a much more frequent basis.


    Several parties had already been ambushed, and casualties had started to surface among the apprentices.


    The n had specially sent Bug Adept Lord Billis into the ck Forest for this matter. Lord Billis had killed eleven lord-level First Grade magical creatures in a single hunt. Thus, the arrogant magical creatures immediately fell silent once more. They started to show signs of migrating deeper into the ck Forest.


    However, this also caused the danger levels of the ck Forest to fall by several degrees, making it the best ce for all apprentice adepts to explore and train themselves.


    "nco, do you want to die?" Ponta scolded unhappily, "Lord Billis might have exterminated the lord-level magical creatures here, but there are still many adept-level magical creatures left. Do you think that our group can survive an encounter against such enemies?"


    "Boss, our luck isn¡¯t that bad, is it?" nco was a slick youth with a quick mouth on him. He wore leather armor, and two blue stripes ran down beneath the burning iron fist n-emblem on his chest. That meant he had mastered two transformation forms, leaving only the windhawk form.


    "Who knows if it¡¯s bad. Still, if we actually run into an enemy, I¡¯ll be the first to stuff you into the magical creature¡¯s mouth." Ponta threatened wickedly, but anyone could hear the bantering tone behind his words.


    "Why don¡¯t...we find a ce to rest first!" Female apprentice Eco gently suggested, "We have been walking in the ck Forest for half a day. It¡¯s about time we find a ce to rest and gather ourselves."


    Eco and Ponta¡¯s rtionship had been warming up quickly over the past couple of months. Naturally, Ponta wouldn¡¯t ignore the words of the person he liked.


    "Little Locke, hurry up and find a safe and clean ce nearby."


    "Understood!"


    The little goblin that had been silently walking in the center of the group immediately took out his eyeballbat machine upon receiving his instructions. He tossed it into the air.


    A metal ball the size of a human head levitated in mid-air, just like that.


    Creak!


    As the dull mechanical gears started to grind, the mysterious patterns on the surface of the machine lit up. A mechanical shutter opened, revealing a single dark-red mechanical eyeball.


    The mechanical eyeball could freely turn and look about, just like a human eye. Moreover, when the ruby shard in the center of the eye started charging energy, it could unleash a powerful scalding ray. That counted as a decent offense as well.


    The little goblin then took out a metal hat of odd design and put it on his head. The top of the cap was fitted with a thought-wave amplifier, allowing him to control the eyeball machine remotely, even if it was several kilometers away. The front of the metal hat was also fitted with a futuristic-looking eyepiece on one side. It allowed everything that the eyeballbat machine ¡¯saw¡¯ to be projected to the eyepiece, giving the little goblin aplete grasp of thebat situation around the device.


    Once he had prepared everything, Little Locke gave the order and the machine dove into the nearby woods. It swiftly and agilely wrapped past the dense leaves and thick branches, dodging past the winding vines, and rapidly vanished into the depths of the ck Forest.


    Little Locke held his breath and used all his concentration to control the machine as it quickly traveled through the ck Forest as it rapidly scanned the forest beneath itself.


    Soon, Little Locke let out a breath.


    "Found it...that direction, one and a half kilometers away. There¡¯s a somewhat hidden mountain ridge there. There¡¯s a water source nearby, and it is quite suited for a camp."


    Ponta nodded in satisfaction.


    This little goblin might not be much inbat, but his pouches were stuffed full of odd magical machinery. Each of them had their own unique ability. In conclusion, he was a decent adventuringpanion!


    "Let¡¯s go, go, go. We can rest there for an hour before continuing. We must arrive at the n¡¯s Campsite Three before it turns dark." The members of the party couldn¡¯t help but let out a soft hurrah at Ponta¡¯s orders.


    Their steps immediately became faster and livelier, much like their current mood.


    The so-called n campsites were just campsites that had been modified out of the dens of the lord-level magical creatures that Lord Billis had exterminated. All apprentice parties adventuring in the ck Forest could head to the nearest n campsite to seek temporary shelter if they couldn¡¯t find a safer and more suitable rest area.


    There were defensive arrays and clean rest sites that the adepts had set up there. It was much better than camping out in the wild and nibbling away at their stale bread rations. Still, the most satisfying part about the campsites was their safety.


    They could light campfires as they liked in the campsites, which allowed them to cook delicious food. Moreover, they also had clean and tidy beds to sleep. What else could they possibly ask for in the ck Forest!


    ............


    The depths of the ck Forest.


    The ck-robed Billis stood alone in the cold winds on top of a short cliff, allowing the corners of his robe to billow in the winds.


    When the members of Shadow¡¯s Light slowly approached Campsite Three, Billis turned about. His four ghostly green eyes fixated upon a particr spot in the vast forest.


    At this moment, his eye bugs were spread across the ck Forest in a fifty-kilometer radius.


    The apprentice adepts that had entered the ck Forest appeared to be on their own, but everything they were doing was under the strict supervision of Bug Adept Billis.


    The n had not sent Billis here just to exterminate those foolish magical creature lords, but to ¡¯protect¡¯ this new blood of the n in secret.


    Billis would not participate in the usual training and exploration of the apprentice parties. Even when parties ran into danger, Billis would not need to act, as long as the risk was still within an eptable range.


    After all, the only way that the apprentices could gain the nutrition they needed for growth was by treading the line between life and death!


    Still, if the parties were to encounter powerful magical creatures that they had no hope of defeating, Billis would secretly act and turn the danger into safety through discreet methods.


    Of course, the n would never let such a thing be known to the apprentices.


    Bug Adept Billis¡¯ mission wasn¡¯t just a burdensome one, but one that demanded plenty of attention and finesse as well. If it weren¡¯t for his ubiquitous eye bugs and his terrifying number of insects, an ordinary adept would have plenty of trouble undertaking a protection mission like this one! He was basically an undercover babysitter!


    Of course, apart from protecting the apprentices, Billis¡¯ responsibilities included the expulsion of those ferocious magical creatures.


    Right now, the incidental discovery of an eye bug allowed Billis to find the tracks of a humanoid magical scorpion. This magical creature that possessed many insectoid traits was the kind that most interested Billis. Billis could always extract plenty of evolution genes beneficial to his improvement from them.


    Billis¡¯ greenpound eyes shed as a series of chittering sounds rang out from the dark forest below him. As the leaves of the massive ancient trees rustled, several semi-translucent magical mantises quickly vanished into the forest.

 Chapter 751 Early Morning Routine

    Fire Throne Tower.


    Greem slowly awoke from his deep sleep.


    The first thing he did upon opening his eyes was to have the Chip scan his body and confirm his mental state.


    [Beep. Host¡¯s Spirit is at 26.3892 points.]


    Greem frowned slightly. He once again felt the mysteriousness and power of magic.


    The Chip¡¯s scan was extremely urate, so much so that it had included four digits past the decimal point. Greem had spent four hours in deep meditationst night as well. However, the value of his Spirit seemed to have beenpletely locked down by a mysterious force. His daily meditation could not cause it to grow by even a trace.


    Greem also had the Chip do a moreprehensive and in-depth scan on his brain. Sadly, it still couldn¡¯t manage to find the key to the magical contract¡¯s binding of his Spirit improvement.


    After all, the domain that the Chip had mastery over was only the material world of actual substance. Strange magic such as the magical contract required Greem to personally experience and learn to be able to understand their workings.


    In all honesty, Greem had even initially suspected that the magical contract¡¯s seal was caused by mental hypnosis. He had put himself in a suggestive state and had the Chip reverse-hypnotise him.


    Unfortunately, that had failed as well!


    After a period of research, Greem was finally confident that the magical contract was being enforced on his mental consciousness through the mysterious narws. As such a power was beyond his current abilities, the seal of the contract was not something that he could analyze and decipher alone.


    Research the narws? He could discuss it once his Spirit was high enough to analyze thews of the material ne¡¯s functions!


    It was a hard limit.


    One wasn¡¯t qualified to even touch the narws before they reached this level. And if he couldn¡¯t even touch the narws, how was he supposed to research it?!


    Fortunately, with the aid of the Chip, Greem didn¡¯te out empty-handed from this uninvited disaster. At the very least, Greem had unexpectedly gained a vague understanding of the way the narws worked through his resistance against the magical contract.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. After all, the narws were affecting him personally this time!


    Greem frowned as he pondered and slowly got up from the bed.


    The first thing to do after waking up was naturally to clean up and freshen up.


    However, Greem¡¯s natural disposition toward water elementium and natural water had turned into one of disgust ever since he had advanced to be a Second Grade fire adept. Under ordinary circumstances, Greem very rarely showered any more. The only water he woulde into contact with was the water he drank to sustain his human body.


    Greem¡¯s room wasrge. Veryrge.


    Apart from the sizeable, luxurious bed in the dead center of the room, the most eye-catching furniture was the grand and ornate magic mirror in the corner.


    At this moment, Greem stood proudly in front of the magic mirror.


    The multiple blood elf servants who had been waiting there for a long time rushed forward and surrounded him. They started to get to work diligently. Unfastening his soft sleeping robe, taking off his light spider-silk undergarments, brushing his waist-long crimson hair...


    Greem was naked once all the clothes had been taken off.


    The muscles on his body had perfect lines and were very well-defined, and not a single trace of fat could be seen on his body. The ratio of his limbs could only be described as perfect and coordinated. One could even see the pure fire-energy coursing through his body likeva, due to the translucent skin of his dark-red body.


    When paired with his long crimson hair and his intimidating and zing bright ck eyes, Greem¡¯s entire being radiated an aura of mystery and wickedness!


    The blood elf servants around him couldn¡¯t help but betray thirst and lust in their eyes as their gazes lingered on every single muscle and curve on Greem¡¯s perfect body. The masculine aura of their master intoxicated them, just as the overwhelming blood energy in his body drove them mad.


    Greem ripped his fists as a bright red me emerged from the pores of his skin, instantly turning him into a ferocious and towering humanoid of mes. A short momentter, all the stuff attached to his body, such as dust and dead skin, had vanished without a trace!


    With Greem¡¯s current pyromancy skills, the blood elf servants wouldn¡¯t be hurt in the slightest, even if they were right next to him. These blood elf servants seemed to have gotten used to this sight. They stepped forward the moment the mes vanished and helped Greem into a brand-new spider-silk undergarment before draping his body in therge red adept¡¯s robe that represented the pride of a fire adept.


    Greem merely closed his eyes throughout the entire process. He had been changed without even needed to lift a single finger. As for the little bit of body contact and few touches that these seductresses squeezed in during the process of changing? It couldn¡¯t be helped.


    They giggled as they surrounded Greem, their seductive looks revealed for all to see. Their slender fingers regrly brushed across Greem¡¯s explosive muscles as they helped him change.


    The giggling didn¡¯t cease, and the teasing shoves they gave each other made them all the more enchanting.


    If it weren¡¯t for there being so many of them, and Greem¡¯smanding aura keeping them in line, some of the blood elves would probably have thrown themselves into his embrace.


    They had a very clear understanding of the situation after all.


    Since their mistress had been willing to ce them at the side of her beloved male adept, her meaning was fairly clear.


    Either way, they would be willing to endure some slight punishment from their mistress Mary if it meant being able to seduce this handsome young male adept into spending one night with them. After all, his muscr body and boiling blood energy were all steps that led toward the evolution that they dreamt about!


    In the past, Greem might not have been able to restrain himself before so many beauties, even with his self-discipline.


    However, with the increase in his power and spiritual will, such superficial seduction could no longer move his well-hidden ¡¯human heart.¡¯ There was nothing wrong with intercourse as a means to soothe the body and mind either, though excessive indulgence in such activities was a taboo for those with ambition.


    After probingly teasing for a bit, and still faced with Greem¡¯s cold expression, the blood elves had no choice but to step back regretfully.


    A momentter, Greem was calmly eating breakfast in the spacious living room.


    The warm sunlight fell into the room through the narrow yetrge window and illuminated Greem. He started to enjoy the medium-rare underground fire dragon ribs slowly. Meanwhile, a First Grade blood elf mage stood by his side. She bowed as she used her pretty voice to give him a report on the n¡¯s recent budget and financial situation, along with the various bits of information that the two adept¡¯s towers had gathered.


    Fire Throne was deep underground. Naturally, there couldn¡¯t possibly be any sort of warm sunlight. Everything that Greem was currently enjoying was being simted by the tower using elementium energy.


    The adepts had always been willing to spend on facilitating an excellent state of mind!


    The roast meat on Greem¡¯s te was two kilograms in total. It had been roasted with much care and effort. It was fragrant and golden on the outside, while on the inside, it was soft and tender. A delicious sauce had also been poured over the meat. Greem put on his napkin, sliced a small piece with the silverware, and put it in his mouth. Theplex,pound vor of the gourmet ribs exploded in his mouth.


    The vor carried the delicacy of the meat itself, enhanced by the taste of the sauce. However, what enchanted Greem the most was the dense fire elementium aura that lingered between his lips.


    One had to mention that a single bite of underground fire dragon ribs that had been cooked in this manner was equal to six minutes of meditation. Moreover, this way of replenishing fire elementium energy had no side-effects or issues with over-consumption. It was the one single way in which all adepts liked to restore their elementium energy!


    However, excellent underground fire dragon specimens hid deep in magma volcanoes. Finding and sessfully hunting them was not an easy task. If it weren¡¯t for Greem having discovered one or two underground fire dragon packs in the magma tunnel beneath Fire Throne, even he wouldn¡¯t dare to be so extravagant as to enjoy such an expensive meal on such a frequent basis. They easily cost over a hundred magical crystals per meal, after all.


    Of course, it wasn¡¯t as if there weren¡¯t better delicacies in this world!


    At the very least, there was a recement ingredient that was far superior to the underground fire dragon within the areas that Greem could reach.


    That was...actual fire dragon meat!


    Underground fire dragons were only hybrid dragons, after all. They were merely a branch of the many mixed-blood descendants of the dragon. Of course, the quality of its meat was several times lower whenpared to an actual fire dragon.


    Greem hadn¡¯t gotten to taste the Second Grade fire dragon fromst time. Apart from some materials on the side, everything else had been devoured by Oliven.


    In all honesty, it was weird. The Second Grade fire dragon was as big as a hill, while Oliven was a petitedy. Greem could hardly even imagine how she had managed to devour an entire Second Grade fire dragon.


    Though Greem had wanted to witness it for himself, Oliven had chased all of them out under the excuse of personal privacy. Moreover, the Firethroat Dragonborn had attacked at that time. Everyone had been busy with the fighting and had thus forgotten about this matter.


    Second Grade fire dragons were difficult to deal with and hard to find as well. However, Lance had plenty of First Grade fire dragons.


    Over the past few days, Greem had set several tasks for Brain Monster Gazlowe. He had him find out the number of First Grade fire dragons in Lance, as well as their homes. Once this information was obtained, all of Greem¡¯s future fire dragon meals would be secured with the help of the Crimson n¡¯s dragonying squad!


    Greem scarfed down the food in front of him as he silently listened to the report.


    He didn¡¯t respond to most of the information and data, simply having the Chip store it instead. It was only when he heard something that interested him that he would stop eating and have the beautiful blood elf mage exin in more detail.


    And today, Greem ran into a topic that interested him very much!

 Chapter 752 The Truths of The World

    The World of Adepts appeared to be engaged in a war against another powerful ne!


    The source of this information was absolutely reliable.


    That was because it came from the leader of the Fate Witches¨C Alice.


    Supposedly, Greem should never have had the chance toe into contact with information and power of this level, given his current qualifications and background. If Alice hadn¡¯t unreservedly given him this information that the Fate Witches had obtained, Greem wouldn¡¯t possibly have known about these ¡¯fights between gods,¡¯ even if the outside world had copsed around him.


    Moreover, the information from Alice also showed that the opponents of the World of Adepts this time appeared to be a tiny branch of the World of Gods¨C the Orc Pantheon.


    The so-called World of Gods wasn¡¯t the same as the local deities of Faen. Instead, they were a faction of gods formed from powerful pantheons thatmanded faith across multiple nes.


    Regardless of how powerful they were, the gods of Faen onlymanded the faith and belief of a single isted group of people. Death was the only fate awaiting these gods should Faen ever be destroyed.


    Meanwhile, most of the gods in the World of Gods had spread their faith to a minimum of a dozen nes. This way, the gods would have a massive number of believers and gain an amazing amount of faith power. The grade of their divine power was so overwhelming that it struck despair into the hearts of their enemies.


    Moreover, these gods thatmanded multi-nar faith could no longer be as easily exterminated; not with the destruction of a single ne, at least. These gods had no chance of dying before each and every one of the faiths they had spread had been extinguished.


    If there were anyone within the multiverse who could live eternally, these gods whomanded multi-nar faith would be amongst them!


    Moreover, the ones who were fighting against the World of Adepts this time were one of the stronger branches of the pantheons of the World of Gods¨C the Orc Pantheon. The main god of the pantheon was the God of Beasts that possessed the extreme power of Eighth Grade¨C Arugel. He also held the horrifying title of the One-Eyed Tyrant.


    He was a vicious and violent person with a wild thirst for battle and war. Most of his believers were also barbaric races who enjoyed cruelty and murder. As he always appeared before his believers in the form of a one-eyed orc d in heavy and crude ck armor, his fanatics would often blind themselves in one eye to pay their respects.


    Arugel also had nearly twenty gods of varying importance under him. Every one of them was an orc god who was skilled in battle andbat.


    This time, a conflict had broken out between the mighty Orc Pantheon and the World of Adepts for unknown reasons. Both factions were fighting each other in countless rim worlds, destroying each other¡¯s satellite nes. For a moment, the fires of war burned across hundreds and thousands of medium and small-sized nar worlds.


    Of course, as thend of origin of the adepts, the World of Adepts had been very carefully protected by the Great Adepts and had not been involved in the war. Still, the World of Adepts had sentrge groups of adept armies to the various battlefields in response to the summons of the Great Adepts in the Ounds. They engaged in merciless battle across many material nes against the believers of the Orc Pantheon with no end yet in sight.


    ording to Alice, more than seven nes of various sizes had been headed toward copse or destruction in just the past hundred years due to the effects of the war. Even if the lifeforms on each ne were counted by the billions, the number of lives that had been lost in the fires of war had reached a shocking number.


    Even such a vicious and bloody war was only an insignificant wave in the massive multiverse. The other pantheons of the World of Gods and the other powerful races of the multiverse were merely watching this minor disagreement in the hopes of being entertained.


    A hundred years and ten billion lives were no more than a back-and-forth game of chess in the eyes of those powerhouses, high up in their seats of power and authority!


    The main reason Alice had leaked this information to Greem was in hopes that he did not misjudge the true power of the Northern Witches.


    Most of the power of the Northern Witches had been tied up in this war over the past hundred years. As such, what information on the witch branches¡¯ power that Greem could usually glean did not reflect their actual situation.


    Once the various witch branches started to recall the warring adepts stationed in the lesser nes, their power could easily swell by five or six times. If any Ound Great Adepts were dragged into the affair, their authority would be so immense that the Crimson n and the Fate Witches put together would not be able to do anything.


    If Alice had not broken free of the maniptions of the first Witch of Fate, they would still have a powerful Witch of Fate behind them, supporting them from the back. Unfortunately, Alice had killed the puppet clone left behind by the first Witch of Fate, making an enemy out of her.


    What Alice had always been trying to understand since bing the new Witch of Fate was why the Tower of Fate had activated once again. Why had she been dragged into the Battle of Fate? Why would the first Witch of Fate leave behind such a fearsome puppet clone?


    Alice had not been able to find an answer. She had found no response or feedback from the World of Adepts, even when she exhausted her life force to divine and scry. Yet, ever since Alice had advanced to Second Grade, it was almost as if she had broken free from an invisible chain of fate. Alice mysteriously obtained some vague hints from the world consciousness.


    The activation of the Tower of Fate, the bloodiness of the Battle of Fate, and the appearance of the witch¡¯s puppet clone¨C absolutely everything had to do with the first Witch of Fate!


    In all seriousness, the first Witch of Fate lost a great ce to gather the powers of fate when she was forced to leave the World of Adepts. Unwilling to let this slide, she used the Tower of Fate and the Battles of Fate to start an easily constructed game of ¡¯livestock.¡¯


    The cyclical copse of the Fate Witches was actually all orchestrated by this first Witch of Fate!


    She used the consciousness brand that she¡¯d left in the narws of the World of Adepts to push forth a Battle of Fate every couple hundred years. She had gathered arge group of ¡¯blessed champions¡¯ at the Tower of Fate and had her puppet clone be the host of the sacrificial ceremony.


    This way, a ¡¯new¡¯ Fourth Grade Witch of Fate would be instantly created!


    Once this puppet clone stepped into the Ounds, carrying with her the massive reserve of the powers of fate that she had umted over the years, the first Witch of Fate would find her with her methods and devour her. This method allowed the first Witch of Fate to fulfill her goal of collecting the powers of fate from the World of Adepts.


    The one thousand years of extinction of the Fate Witches had to do with her excessively harsh andplete harvest of fate power during thest cycle. This act of hers had invited bacsh from the nar consciousness and brought ruin upon the Fate Witches. Now, after a thousand years of silence, the first Witch of Fate sensed the powers of fate gathering once again. Naturally, she hadn¡¯t been able to resist the temptation to put into motion a new cycle of the Battle of Fate.


    Sadly, due to the intervention of the nar consciousness, her puppet clone had unexpectedly died at Alice¡¯s hands. That undoubtedly dyed her n to gather the newest powers of fate tremendously, whisking all future Battles of Fate onto a different path that she could not manipte in the palm of her hands.


    In fact, the mastermind behind this incident with the Witch of Deceit was this first Witch of Fate, who had her eyes set upon Alice.


    Of course, as Alice¡¯s creditor and her future spouse, Greem was extremely curious about this first Witch of Fate. Unfortunately, Alice would not speak her name no matter how hard he pressed.


    It seemed that this had to do with a specific strange ability of the Fate Witches!


    Even far, far away, hiding in another world trillions of kilometers away, the Witch of Fate would be able to mysteriously sense everything to do with her if someone were to utter her name or even think of it.


    It sounded ludicrous and odd, but the truth was simply that unbelievable!


    As such, Alice would never spill her name to anyone before she could obscure her fate senses. Of course, this included Greem as well.


    Eighth Grade Orc main god, the adept faction, the first Witch of Fate...


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shiver when he saw these terrifying words, even as he was securely standing within the perfectly safe harbor that was his own adept¡¯s tower. He couldn¡¯t help but be shocked at all the obstacles that stood in his way along his journey of fate.


    If he were only an insignificant being in the World of Adepts, he would not ever have anything to do with these lofty battles between gods. However, now, with his gradual steps toward greatness, and Alice¡¯s rise to bing an irreceable aide, these seemingly intangible and ridiculous stories of legend had taken the front stage. They became poison thorns in his heart, making it hard for him to sleep or rest peacefully.


    In the eyes of the first Witch of Fate, Alice and Greem were only wicked ants that had messed up a corner of her chessboard due to the maniptions of the nar consciousness. They were not worthy of treatment as equal opponents.


    Moreover, Alice was still weak and posed no threat at all to her. That was why she couldn¡¯t possibly forcefully eradicate Alice¡¯s existence. She chose instead to use conspiracies and schemes to cut off her wings while pondering over how she should direct the chaotic state of the board back onto the ¡¯proper¡¯ track by Alice¡¯s own hand.


    One had to admit that bing Second Grade adepts meant that Greem and Alice had broken free of the fetters of the lower ss. The level of their world view had expanded and increased by an infinite degree. The secrets of the world and the Great Adepts that people so often talked about started to fill their ears as well, allowing them to understand the truths of the world hidden behind theyers of mist.


    However, the more they knew, the greater the burden on their hearts. Even Greem, with all his power and confidence, could only try his best to survive in this strange and odd world.


    Greem waved away the beautiful blood elf mage giving the report, sighed, and finally dealt with his breakfast proper.


    There was a bit of a joke saying amongst the adepts.


    Only adepts who could eat were powerful adepts!


    The energy exhausted in the use of any supernatural power was incredibly amazing. One could not cast a destructive spell without a powerful body. And where did energye from? Eating, naturally.


    That was why Greem gave himself the order to eat; to eat as much as he could whenever he ran into difficult problems that he did not have the solutions to.


    At the very least, this would make him slightly stronger than before.

 Chapter 753 Crafting the Armband

    Inside a secret magic room.


    Bright¨Cbut not piercing¨Cpure white magicmps lit up every corner of the ce.


    Greem stood in front of a delicate alchemy tform, carefully and seriously pouring the molten meloathe Iron from the magical crucible into the metallic mold. Once it had cooled to a half-solid state, Greem lifted his carving knife and started to attentively carve patterns and runic lines onto the metal.


    meloathe Iron was the best metallic material that Greem could use to forge this armband, and the melting point was as high as 9,327 degrees. Due to its excessive hardness and excellent magic resistance, Greem could only carve the lines for the fire arrays in the iron while it was half-molten.


    Moreover, to prevent more aplished adepts from rapidly reading and analyzing the contents of the arrays, Greem had to add decorative patterns and lines over the actual offensive and energy-gathering arrays to conceal their real powers.


    The worst part was that he had to do all this while the molten iron was not yet solid.


    Greem estimated that he had two hundred and ten seconds from the iron being poured into the mold until itpletely cooled. Greem had toplete one offensive array, twenty-five energy-gathering arrays, four hundred and twenty-one support runes, and seventy-four magical patterns during this time.


    He had to carve all of those lines onto a single metallic armband with a diameter of seventy centimeters and a width of thirty centimeters. It was easy to imagine how difficult a task it was. Moreover importantly, Greem had to finish the entire process in a single take; there could not be any pauses or breaks in between. Otherwise, even magical carving knives enchanted with Sharpening and Armor Pration would not be able to leave a single mark on the armband once the metal had cooled.


    "Lower the temperature of the magical me by seven degrees..."


    Greem split off a bit of his Spirit and connected it to the central control crystal on the alchemy tform to lower the 9,800-degree magical mes by an imperceptible seven degrees.


    "No.3, assist with the activation of the arrays."


    Greem split off another bit of his Spirit and adjusted the settings of the tform based on the Chip¡¯s instructions.


    "Magic injection of carving knifeplete."


    After activating the Sharpening and Armor Pration effects on the carving knife, Greem lightly ced the tip of the de against the surface of the shockingly hot molten metal. Under the light movements of his wrist and the agile maniptions of his finger, the carving knife glowing with yellow light started to move and turn along the surface of the armband, almost imperceptibly.


    The lines it carved were as thin as spiderwebs, yet they were connected without breaks and ran all over the armband in intricate patterns. An ordinary man would not even be able to see these lines clearly without a powerful magnifying ss, but Greem often had to carve a perfect three-dimensional array on an area the size of a grain.


    The depths of Greem¡¯s ck eyes shone with a blue light as bright as a star. He had activated the Chip¡¯s scanning and magnification abilities to their limits toplete this gargantuan task.


    The thirty-centimeter-wide surface of the armband had been magnified three thousand times by the Chip. This was already wide enough in Greem¡¯s eyes for him to carve freely. However, correspondingly, the initially thin magical carving knife now appeared to be as thick as a stone pir and just as clumsy to wield.


    Greem used his agile fingers and wrist to control the carving knife, making it wrap around the surface of the armband rapidly ording to the blue lines projected by the Chip. During this process, Greem¡¯s wrists and fingers had to apply a consistent force. Otherwise, the lines drawn by the knife would have varying depths, severely affecting the functions and effects of the future product.


    At this moment, the bottom of the armband was still at the terrifying temperatures of six or seven thousand degrees. If it weren¡¯t for Greem being a Second Grade fire adept, he would have had trouble persisting without incident, especially with how much contact he was having with the armband.


    Due to the magical characteristics of meloathe Iron, it had excellent resistance to heat rays, forcing Greem to carve the patterns personally. Thankfully, with his past hundred years of experience in cutting magical golem cores, Greem still managed to finish the product without any mishaps.


    Greem let out a breath of relief as he carefully put this half-finished product in his left hand. He pinched some golden quartz sand and scattered it over the armband¡¯s surface. The armband absorbed most of the powder in a blinding golden light, turning its surface an eye-catching bright yellow.


    Quartz was a moremon energy-gathering material used in the creation of magical items. It could also perfectly assimte with meloathe Iron and would not cause an elementium rejection effect.


    It was only when all this was done that Greem finally started assessing this iplete Emblem of Fire. Indeed, this wasn¡¯t the final form of the Second Grade armband. Instead, it was only a half-finished product.


    It was an ornate armband created with crimson meloathe Iron as its base material. The energy-gathering substance within it resonated with the wandering elementium in the air, causing it to continually be shrouded in a thin veil of bright red light.


    Its ornate design and appearance was a model that the Chip had decided upon after examining tens of thousands of simr pieces of magical equipment, while itsplex magical arrays had undergone hundreds and thousands of optimizations and corrections by the Chip before being applied.


    Greem reveled in the beauty and perfection of this art!


    He yed with it for much of the day, unwilling to part with it, before finally and reluctantly cing it on the velvet cloth over the tform.


    The base of the armband was nowplete. All Greem needed to do now was melt the fire agates down and embed them into the sockets of the armband using a special technique. Of course, before this, Greem still had to concoct a neutralizer from the fire dragon¡¯s blood. That was a particrly troublesome task!


    A quick estimate showed that he would have to work for another month before he couldplete the Emblem of Fire. After hisst adventure, Greempletely understood that his n to explore the Fire Elementium ne was best done after he equipped the two set pieces of Fire Throne.


    Greem rubbed his temple as he dwelled over his daily routine for theing month. His head hurt and stung a little.


    Though the carving process had been a brief two hundred and ten seconds, he had spent them in a state of extreme tension and focus. The job of carving itself had also exhausted much of his Spirit. As such, Greem felt the fatigue now that he was finally rxed.


    He waved his hand and extinguished the magical fires on the alchemy tform. He then cut off the magical energy supply to the tform and left the tools where they were, in all their mess and chaos. Greem yawned and rubbed his eyes as he walked out of theboratory.


    It was time to get a good rest!


    ............


    Serpentfowl Cliff.


    The afternoon sunlight shone down through the canopy upon the grassynd below the cliff.


    Three serpentfowl hatchlings were ying on the grassy greennd, while two other hatchlings were curled up in a nest and having a good nap.


    Most of the adolescent serpentfowl had gone out looking for food. Only two female serpentfowls were still keeping watch over the nests on the cliff. They crouchedzily inside the caves of the cliff and bathed in the sunlight, asionally peering out to look at the hatchlings below.


    Seven or eight white serpentfowl eggs with light yellow spotsy in a nest in the innermost corner of the cave. Some bones that had been picked clean were scattered around the nest as well.


    The forty-kilometer area around the cliff was the hunting ground of the serpentfowls. The more ferocious magical creatures and beasts had already been driven away to further away ces. That was why these two serpentfowls weren¡¯t concerned about the safety of the cliff, even though most of the adults had gone out hunting.


    "What a good chance. An incredible chance."


    The few apprentices of Shadow¡¯s Light pushed aside the tall grass in front of their view and looked at this peaceful world with shifty eyes. Their hearts were filled with excitement.


    The adult male serpentfowls were all gone, and only two female serpentfowls remained. There couldn¡¯t be better news than this.


    The apprentice group had stayed here for two entire days and finally found this chance. They immediately went to work.


    Gemogemogemo.


    A metal chick emerged from the ck Forest with wooden steps, letting out a strange metallic noise.


    This strange object immediately attracted the attention of the three serpentfowl hatchlings ying in the field. They stopped chasing each other and bent down to take a good look at this odd fellow they had never seen before.


    These little animals did not sense any dangerous aura from the chick and saw no need to run back to the nest.


    The metal chick pped its wings, shing its shiny body. It took one round around the field before clucking and running back into the ck Forest.


    The three bloodthirsty hatchlings immediately beat their wings in excitement and chased after the chick.


    Three big and one small; all four of them disappeared into the ck Forest.


    A short momentter, one of the serpentfowls on the cliff looked out with its snakehead. This time, it was shocked to find that three of the hatchlings were missing.


    The female serpentfowl immediately cried out. Its peculiar cry possessed the shrillness of birds, but also the hissing noise of snakes.


    The sad cry reverberated around the cliff and lingered for a long while.


    A short momentter, the two female serpentfowls flew out of the nest and started circling about the cliff, anxiously looking for the missing hatchlings.


    The other two napping hatchlings ran back into the nest in a hurry upon being woken up.


    The two serpentfowlsnded on the field and flicked their snake tongues. Soon, they picked up on the trail of the hatchlings.


    The serpentfowls quicklymunicated with a bunch of hisses. One of them returned to guard the nest, while the other took to the skies and chased in the direction the smell of the hatchlings vanished toward.

 Chapter 754 The Disaster of the Serpentfowls

    The female serpentfowl found the tracks of the hatchlings after flying for a kilometer.


    The three hatchlings were curled up together near a pile of rocks in the forest. Their heads hung limply by their bodies with not a trace of movement from them.


    The serpentfowl cried and dove down from the canopy. It snapped many branches along the way as its ferocious bodynded heavily in the woods, gouging the earth as it did so.


    The female serpentfowl was a bit smaller than a male, and had much brighter and prettier wings.


    Their strength might be inferior to the males, but their speed and the toxicity of their venom was superior.


    The serpentfowl lunged toward the rocks. Her one and a half meter long snakehead immediately sensed the life force in the hatchlings when it touched them.


    The hatchlings weren¡¯t dead!


    The serpentfowl¡¯s pounding heart finally rxed.


    Just as she nudged the hatchlings with her head, a round metal ball rolled out from beneath them and bumped against her bird ws.


    What was this?


    As the serpentfowl bent down to inspect the strange object, several dozen holes abruptly appeared in the metal. A dense green gas released into the air.


    The poison gas swiftly engulfed the serpentfowl¡¯s body.


    She took a few steps backward out of shock, but her odd snake-bird hybrid body started swaying before she could get out of the poison cloud. She was stumbling like a drunk.


    The poison gas was indeed toxic. In fact, it was a potent poison!


    Unfortunately, this much poison was still insufficient to bring down a creature that was poisonous itself.


    A wild wind blew across the ce as a muscr bald man jumped out of the bushes. The long de in his hand smashed down upon the head of the serpentfowl.


    The female serpentfowl was only at the pseudo-adept level at best. Her snakehead might be protected by fine scales, but even they could not defend against such a ferocious strike. If the bald man hadn¡¯t struck with the back of the knife, his nine points of strength would have cleaved the head in half.


    A dull thud rang out and blood sttered from the serpentfowl¡¯s head. Her head had almost been bashed into pieces.


    The serpentfowl cried out in pain, swayed about, and finally fell with a thud.


    Thest scene reflected in the serpentfowl¡¯s eyes was of a few human silhouettes walking toward her with wicked smiles!


    "It fell...it fell."


    nco startedughing gleefully, and the other apprentices were full of smiles as well.


    "What about it, boss? Do we stop here or do we keep going?"


    "Of course we are gonna keep going," There was a wicked smile on Ponta¡¯s face as well, "There¡¯s still three hours before dark; those male serpentfowls won¡¯t be back so soon. We should take this opportunity to clear out their nests. Don¡¯t forget, the most valuable things about the serpentfowls are actually their eggs!"


    "Then we must act faster. We need to find a ce to hide after we finish searching the nests, or the male serpentfowls will find us." Body-Refining Adept Dakso prompted his teammates, bloody knife still in hand.


    "Let¡¯s go. Eco; you and Little Locke stay here and bring the serpentfowls back to our hiding spot. We will meet up with you once we are done searching the nests!" Ponta decisively ordered.


    "You guys be careful!" Eco said longingly.


    The three apprentices vanished into the forest in the blink of an eye.


    Eco looked around for a while and finally retracted her gaze after the three of them had disappeared entirely from sight. She sighed faintly, "Let¡¯s get moving on our end as well then!"


    "Alrighty!" Little Locke replied. He took out seven or eight magical machineryponents from his pouch and started to put them together in the clearing.


    In less than seven minutes, he had basicallypleted a three-meter-tall miniature magical machine warrior of smaller stature. Little Locke pulled open the tailgate on the back of the machine and carefully slotted in three sets of magic energy batteries into it.


    The next second, the miniature magical machine warrior stood up before the two apprentices, grinding and nging with all sorts of metallic sounds.


    "Magical Machine Worker J001 reporting for duty. Please give work orders."


    One-meter tall Little Locke appeared all the shorter in front of this towering machine. Still, Little Locke seemed to be more energetic and confident than ever before when in front of his magical creation.


    "Don¡¯t just stand there bumbling. Go over and carry those prey. We are gonna start running immediately!" Little Locke jumped about and gestured wildly as he finally gave his first order.


    The magical machine warrior that was made entirely out of scrap metal appeared to have no magic energy weapons at all. The only thing that could be said to be a weapon was probably its giant mp-like metal hand.


    The energy source of the magical machine warrior mighte from magic energy batteries, but one could see plenty of other technologies on its pieced-together body. There were signs of steam valves, switches, suspension systems, grinding gears, and metal levers.


    The machine worker walked toward the serpentfowls with heavy steps after receiving its order. It tossed them onto its shoulders before following the goblin and the female apprentice toward their hidden spot.


    Meanwhile, at the Serpentfowl Cliff, the other serpentfowl that had stayed guard over the ce was flying in the sky. It asionally dove down and used its terrifying snake bite and sharp bird ws to attack these invaders.


    Sadly, though it had the power of a pseudo-adept, it was not equipped with any weapons. It could only fight three fully-armed human apprentices with its bare body. Moreover, one of the three apprentices was a dark pseudo-adept whose abilities were not inferior to its own.


    The aerial attacks of the serpentfowl were all blocked by Body-Refining Adept Dakso.


    Dakso calmly blocked all the attacks with his tower shield, giving his twopanions the perfect environment to use their spells.


    Pseudo-Adept Ponta¡¯s shadow arrows and nco¡¯s armor-piercing crossbow bolts all delt decent damage to the serpentfowl. In particr, the constant barrage of shadow arrows had a very high chance of ignoring defense. They would corrode the serpentfowl¡¯s feathers and skin every time they hit its body, revealing the red blood and flesh beneath.


    After fifteen minutes ofbat, the badly wounded serpentfowl realized that it could not deal with these invaders. It cried and took to the air, trying to escape toward the forest.


    "Trying to go look for help? Stay!"


    Ponta put on a wicked smile. He had been secretly gathering power for this moment. He strode forward, and the dark energy in his hands gathered into the form of a dark spear. He threw it at the serpentfowl with all his strength, piercing through its body with the spear.


    The serpentfowl fell from the sky with a pained cry.


    "Dakso, you go retrieve the corpse! nco,e with me to the nests!"


    The three apprentices immediately split up with victory in sight. They started to perform the clean-up for today¡¯sbat.


    Yet, just as the three apprentices scoured Serpentfowl Cliff and packed up all the eggs and hatchlings, a strange, loud cry came from the distant horizon.


    "Dammit, it¡¯s those male serpentfowls! They¡¯re back! Let¡¯s leave, quick."


    Ponta, who had the most attuned Spirit sense, immediately changed expressions. He could no longer care for a more detailed search of the caves. He whistled and immediately started running with his twopanions.


    As many as seventeen adolescent serpentfowls were living on Serpentfowl Cliff. They had dealt with two of them, which left fifteen serpentfowls more.


    That was fifteen pseudo-adept-level serpentfowls!


    Regardless of how prepared or well-equipped they were, the apprentices could not deal with the attacks of the entire flock if they were trapped in the cave.


    The hatred from the killing of their mate and the grudge for stealing their eggs was at stake. If the three of them were to fall into the hands of the serpentfowls, they would not die happy deaths.


    Dakso and nco immediately picked up the massive bags, even without Ponta¡¯s instructions. The three of them sprinted down Serpentfowl Cliff. Ponta took the rear, scattering a strange yellow powder as he retreated.


    This alchemical powder could effectively disrupt scent trails left in the air, leaving magical creatures who relied on their sense of smell helpless in tracking down enemies.


    However, relying on this method alone to throw off the pursuit of the serpentfowls was still too risky. Ponta quickly took out a magic wand and quietly whispered several words.


    A short momentter, Little Locke received the magical transmission and sent out his eyeballbat machine. The machine flew into the skies and started shooting at the serpentfowls.


    These heat rays, with only eleven points of power, could not possibly kill the serpentfowls; it only made them shriek in pain a few times. The eyeball machine turned and fled without any hesitation after drawing the attention of all the serpentfowls. It flew toward the edge of the ck Forest with me streams sting out of its jets.


    The serpentfowl flock was infuriated and distracted by the eyeball machine before they could even figure out what had happened at home. They cried out loud and beat their wings to chase after the machine. Soon, they vanished from sight.


    Shhhh!


    The three apprentices could finally rx, seeing that the serpentfowl flock had been drawn away. They brought their spoils with them and calmly returned to their hiding.


    This hiding spot was a deep ditch that Little Locke had made the machine worker dig in a forest clearing. He then covered and concealed it with woody nts and vines. The effect was much better than merely hiding in a cave or between rocks.


    "Good job, Little Locke! There will be your share in these spoils once we get back!" Ponta was clearly very satisfied with Little Locke¡¯s contributions in this adventure. For the first time, he recognized him as a teammate.


    "Thank you, boss. Thank you."


    Little Locke grinned widely!

 Chapter 755 Sea of Ashes

    The Fire Elementium ne.


    It was a boiling sea of fire here.


    The boundaries between earth and sky were no longer as distinct here. The entire world had turned into a dreary, zing furnace.


    Since the Fire Elementium ne was a world of pure fire elementium, it was only natural that other elementium particles could not appear. It caused the basic framework of the world to be formed of only fire elementium that had temporarily taken on different states of existence.


    Naturally, one could see material fire elementium all over the Fire Elementium ne; the existence of fire elementium was ubiquitous. However, if one were to look at the entire nar space as a single entity, they would find the distribution of fire elementium to be imbnced.


    The areas with less fire elementium were naturally the more impoverished and barren regions of the ne. Meanwhile, the areas with denser concentrations of fire elementium would always be taken up by powerful fire elementium creatures. These fire elementium creatures might not have much desire or greed¨Cor even the scheming minds of other intelligent lifeforms¨Cbut their instinct to be stronger still drove their simple and violent thought processes.


    Everyone in the world agreed that fire elementium creatures were the most ferocious and warlike branch of the four major elementium.


    The Sea of Ashes was a rtively famous ce in the Fire Elementium ne. An area with a radius of nearly five thousand kilometers had been burned to nothingness by a terrifying fire. Naturally, the regions bordering the Sea of Ashes became the ideal home to powerful fire creatures.


    The one living in the depths of the Sea of Ashes was Fifth Grade Fire King Groms.


    At this moment, a magma giant five meters tall arrived in front of an ancient altar at the border of the Sea of Ashes.


    Five mysterious guards d in green-white mes abruptly appeared around the empty altar once the giant stopped walking.


    "Stop there! This is the quarters of Fire King Groms. State your intent!"


    These mysterious fire guards were no more than three meters in height and had inconspicuous appearances, being far less muscr than the magma giant before them. However, there was a world of difference between their powerpared to the giant.


    The magma giant was only Second Grade, while these five mysterious guards all possessed the terrifying power of Third Grades. If a fight broke out between them, the fire guards wouldn¡¯t need more than five seconds to take apart this giant who had yet to learn how to conceal his aura.


    "Revered Firespirit guards, I am a lord serving beneath the great Fire King Groms. By his instructions, I havee here for an audience today!" The magma giant¡¯s loud voice boomed.


    "An audience by his instructions? Wait here. We will verify this with the king himself!"


    The fire spirit in the lead turned and knelt before the ancient altar to silentlymunicate with a certain powerful existence in the distance.


    A short momentter, the fire spirit stood up and solemnly said, "I havemunicated with our Lord. You are not lying. You may enter now!"


    The five fire spirits stood on five nodes that had extended from the altar and started pouring their energy into the tform.


    The ground trembled slightly.


    The red sea of fire not far behind the altar suddenly parted under the force of a mysterious energy, revealing a clear path leading toward the depths of the sea of fire.


    "Go in! Remember; don¡¯t touch these mes, or else."


    The fire spirit didn¡¯t finish, but the meaning behind his words was clear as day.


    The magma giant acknowledged the reminder and walked onto the path toward the depths of the Sea of Ashes.


    It was as if translucent ss had been fitted around him. The swirling fires could not affect him while he was on the path, regardless of how fiercely they zed. Instead, the magma giant could faintly sense the terror and power of the sea of fire through the invisible force separating them.


    Though he had the power of a Second Grade, as well as shocking fire resistance, he would be reduced to ashes in less than fifteen minutes in a sea of fire like this. It couldn¡¯t be helped. Most of thews of the Fire Elementium ne became extremely vague and chaotic when they reached this ce. They could no longer be restored to their former states.


    The fire corridor was long. Extremely long.


    The magma giant had to walk for three entire days and nights before reaching the other end of the passage. When he emerged, he was stunned by the sight in front of him.


    An extraordinarily tall and magnificent pce stood at the center of the Sea of Ashes. This pce levitated just above the zing sea of fire as if it was a majestic beast of legend guarding the ce. Its jaws were wide open and invited its lowly prey to enter of their own ord.


    The ones supporting the pce were over a hundred thick stone pirs. Each of them would take five grown adults to encirclepletely, and they were shrouded with golden mes. Several strange fire runes would asionally appear on the pirs.


    The wooden pce, the stone pirs; the Fire King¡¯s way of doing things was indeed beyond the limits of the magma giant¡¯s imagination. It was important to note that any foreign substance could not exist for extended periods inside the Fire Elementium ne.


    These stones and wood that appeared so insignificant had to be rare treasures that the Fire King had somehow obtained from a different world. Otherwise, they would have been reduced to ashes in such a terrifying ce.


    The terror of the Sea of Ashes was something that even fire elementium creatures could not endure!


    Beneath the magma giant was a small round stone tform only two hundred meters wide. A strange array much like the one on the altar outside had also been ced at the center of the tform. The stone tform was connected with the pce in the distance by a floating path of stone that was no more than ten meters in width. From a distance, there seemed to be two or three dozen stone tforms simr to the one he was standing on in this massive space.


    It could be assumed that these stone tforms connected to different regions on the outside of the Sea of Ashes. Only with Fire King Grom¡¯s approval could the fire lords have the chance to enter the Sea of Ashes to meet this legendary existence personally.


    The magma giant collected his feelings and walked toward the pce along the tiny path.


    From a distance, this strange pce didn¡¯t appear to be too big. However, when he arrived before the wide, spacious square, the magma giant¡¯s five-meter body instantly seemed as small as a bean beside the building. It was significant.


    The magma giant didn¡¯t dare to take another step once he arrived here!


    He went down on one knee and shouted with his booming voice, "Great Lord Groms, your loyal servant Artes hase by your orders!"


    A short momentter, a loud and deep voice reverberated throughout the ce.


    "Rise!"


    This voice wasn¡¯t too loud, but when it lingered around the pce, it absorbed the nearby fire energy and became frightfully loud and intimidating.


    "Great Lord Groms, what orders do you have for me?"


    Fire elementium creatures were simply like that in nature. They cared not for all those troublesome courtesies and formalities, and they couldn¡¯t bother with lies and facades. Even someone as lowly as the magma giant went straight to asking his master¡¯s intentions the moment he arrived.


    "Artes, I need you to kill an adept!"


    "O¡¯ Great Lord Groms, as long as you give me the name of this adept, I will lead my army of fire to finish him." Magma giant Artes once again kneeled upon receiving his master¡¯s orders and expressed his loyalty with a passionate tone.


    "You don¡¯t need to go through such troubles this time! Simply stay in your territory, and there will be a human adept who will attempt to assassinate you. He is only Second Grade."


    "......"


    Artes raised his head and his giant face formed of magma and fire was filled with confusion.


    "You don¡¯t need to know why. Just stay in your territory and then kill the human adept who breaks into yournd. Once you aplish your mission, I will allow you to move from Dustfire Valley into the Pir of Ashes."


    Artes¡¯ face was filled with wild joy upon hearing this.


    The Pir of Ashes was only a hundred and fifty kilometers away from the Sea of Ashes. It was a desirable ce of fire elementium concentration. Typically, only Third or Fourth Grade fire lords would be granted the opportunity to rule over territory like this. It made them rulers with genuine authority.


    "Understood, my master. Your loyal servant Artes willplete his mission!"


    "Leave if you understand already! Remember, I am waiting for good news from you."


    Magma Giant Artes bowed respectfully as the voice vanished. He then turned and walked back along the way he came.


    It was only when the magma giant¡¯s silhouette had vanished entirely from this strange world that Groms¡¯ voice once again rang out.


    "How is it? I have already assigned the task you asked of me. What about the matter you promised me?"


    A momentter, a ghostly female voice rang out in the space.


    "When have I, Maysa, ever gone against my word? Big fire person, the contract we signed stipted that I will only tell you the location of the object once the matter isplete. The contract has not been fulfilled yet, and you have the face to ask me for it?"


    "Heheheh...old witch, do you think anything unforeseen could still happen? It is only a puny Second Grade adept. If he dares enter our world, my subordinate will naturally find him and crush him. Do you think that a Second Grade adept could kill a Second Grade fire lord underling of mine? Hahaha, you are way too childish."


    "I don¡¯t care what methods you use or what you resort to. You mustplete what I asked of you or don¡¯t you even think of finding out the location of that thing from me. "


    "Fine, fine...dealing with you old hags is always troublesome. I¡¯ll go and take a little nap. It¡¯s only a matter of a dozen years anyway, and it will be over soon. Don¡¯t you forget your promise then, alright?"


    Having said that, the Fire King¡¯s voice finally fell silent. The cold female voice also vanished without a trace!


    A dull boom rang out as the zing fires of the Sea of Ashes once again surged and ravaged the area,pletely engulfing this unique pce.

 Chapter 756 Ambushed

    Greem was utterly ignorant of everything that had happened in the Fire Elementium ne. He was still busy at work in Fire Throne.


    The process of crafting the Emblem of Fire was a delicate task of constant tempering and alchemical skill. Even with the Chip¡¯s help, Greem¡¯s progress was just as slow.


    Fortunately, Greem had sufficient patience and resources which allowed him to continue walking forward despite his repeated failures. Bit by bit, he managed to prepare all of the materials required to craft the Emblem of Fire.


    The base of the armband was the firstponent to be finished. However, just that base alone would not qualify as Second Grade fire magical equipment. After soaking the armband base in the fire dragon¡¯s blood for ten days, Greem finally reached thest step in the crafting process.


    He neutralized the liquid made from the molten fire agate with the neutralizing agentposed from the fire dragon¡¯s blood, then poured the mixture into the rune grooves that had been carved into the armband ahead of time. The three-dimensional runic arrays on the armband could only form aplete energy cirction system once these rune grooves were connected.


    Once that was done, thebination of the metal, runes, and the energy together would genuinely make a piece of Second Grade magical equipment that could help Greem. Before that, it could only be considered a pile of rare materials!


    To craft his second Fire Throne set piece, Greem spent most of his days in the magicalboratory, sparing time only to eat, meditate, and read rted tomes and books.


    Of course, if it weren¡¯t for the daily meals being greatly beneficial to his body, and the meditation as the only way to replenish his Spirit, Greem would probably have gritted his teeth and skipped out on those activities as well!


    The intense external pressure had not only failed to take apart his confidence and crush his will. It sessfully triggered that stubbornness and wildness hidden deep within his heart.


    The more the enemy wanted to defeat him, the straighter he would stand! The more the enemy tried to kill him, the more interesting of a life he would lead!


    Greem blocked out all external interference and devoted himself whole-heartedly to the crafting and refining of the Emblem of Fire armband.


    When it came to alchemy and alchemy alone, Greem had no teacher; he couldn¡¯t possibly have a teacher.


    With one Golem Creation Manual as his introduction to the subject, and with the help of the Chip, Greem had managed to turn himself into an ¡¯underground master alchemist¡¯!


    Of course, he was an overly specialized ¡¯alchemist.¡¯ His knowledge and ability were concentrated solely on the creation of magical golems and the crafting of artifacts. Greem had no knowledge in the other branches and domains of alchemy. He knew so little that even an alchemy apprentice could beat him in that aspect.


    Still, perhaps it was stubbornness and madness that allowed Greem to improve so rapidly in the arts of artifact creation. Greem¡¯s title as a master alchemist was fully deserved at the moment the Emblem of Fire came into existence!


    Year 32,856 of the Era of Adepts. The twenty-fifth day of the seventh month of the year.


    Seventy-eight days after Greem had signed the magical contract and the thirty-first day since he had scurried back from his exploration to the Fire Elementium ne, the long-awaited Emblem of Fire had finally been sessfully created.


    When the two set pieces of Fire Throne simultaneously connected with his soul, an odd resonance effect emerged.


    There was no magic being set off or any intentional activation of life forcefields. There was only one single halo of fire revolving around his body.


    Elementary Fire Immunity!


    It was unlike advanced fire resistance. What Greem had obtained was elementary fire immunity.


    Fire immunity was different from fire resistance. These were two entirely different concepts.


    Fire resistance was just a living being stimting their life energies to resist the energy strength of the corroding fire elementium. Regardless of how high a being¡¯s fire resistance was, they could only resist fire energy damage within mes. They still had to endure a part of that damage if they were dealing with certain variants of fire energy.


    For instance, there was the physical damage from fire arrows, or the explosive shockwaves and scalding from a magma fireball.


    However, fire immunity waspletely different!


    Fire immunity meant that the individual would never have to endure any type of energy damage from fire or any its variants. Though Greem had only obtained elementary fire immunity and was only immune to some low-grade fire energy damage, this was already of massive help to him.


    After all, the most populous creatures in the Fire Elementium ne were those brainless low-grade fire elementium that only knew how to wander about aimlessly. Greem no longer needed to worry about being focus-fired on and brought down by these weak creatures now that he had elementary fire immunity!


    This way, the massive fire elemental army of that Fire Lord had be a useless ornament. Greem only needed to watch out for those high-grade fire elementals now.


    On the day after his sessful crafting and after a night of peaceful rest to replenish his Spirit, Greem once again opened the megate and snuck into the Fire Elementium ne.


    One had to admit that the stubbornness of fire elementium creatures was truly impressive!


    Greem had just emerged from the megate when he was instantly drowned in a storm of a dozen explosive fireballs.


    Ferocious mes, violent shockwaves, and extreme temperatures that could vaporize even steel.


    Terrifying mes devoured Greem¡¯s vision in a single instant. The fire damage¡¯s energy intensity that the Chip was projecting in his mind was also increasing exponentially. In the blink of an eye, the strength of the attack had reached five hundred and thirty-six points.


    An attack of this strength would be enough to obliterate most First Grade adepts. Of course, unprepared, even Second Grade adepts would suffer terrible losses from such an attack.


    However, by the time the surging mes gradually dispersed, the First Grade fire spirits crowding around the megate were shocked to find that their target was still standing on the spot.


    Not only had he suffered no damage, but the red adept¡¯s robe on him also appeared to be utterly untouched beneath the cover of a strange halo of fire. Moreover, the adept was now looking around him with a hostile gaze. An unconceble rage could be seen in the light from his ck eyes.


    Dammit! These pig-headed fire spirits had sat here and waited thirty-one days for him!


    This...what kind of dumb and devastating obstinacy was this?!


    Greem looked around and immediately realized that the location of the megate wasn¡¯t the same asst time. There were absolutely no signs of ins around him, which was more than enough evidence that he was at least fifty kilometers away from where he had arrivedst time.


    These fire spirits had been able to catch his arrival despite such a huge deviation in the location of his appearance. The only possibility of this happening was that the spirits were monitoring all weak spatial points in this area.


    Filled with a trace of anger at his ambush and the desire to test out the power of the two Fire Throne set pieces, Greem roared and extended his hands. They immediately burst with zing and searing mes.


    Burning Hand!


    This apprentice-level spell could only travel for half a meter at the hands of an apprentice adept. However, when cast by a Second Grade fire adept like Greem, the same spell shed with mes five to six meters tall.


    The eleven First Grade fire spirits had backed off and put up defenses for fear of some powerful spell from the human adept. They immediately rxed when they saw him cast such a crude fire spell. Instead, they surged forward and lunged at the enemy.


    As First Grade fire spirits of the Fire Elementium ne, their fire resistance was shockingly high; they did not need to worry that this human adept¡¯s low-grade fire spell could possibly harm their bodies. Instead, they took the opportunity of the adept casting a spell to close in on him for close quarter strikes.


    After all, given the powerful fire defense that the human adept had just shown them, long-ranged fire attacks were probably ineffective. If that was the case, then meleebat was the only trick left up their sleeves!


    Just as the eleven fire spirits charged to Greem¡¯s side, the zing fire in his hands trembled and contorted. The smoking mes were then concentrated and forced into brilliant spears as red as a ruby.


    "Go!"


    Greem roared as the mes in his hands were driven to their extremes. Eleven crystalline spears that were tougher than steel extended from his palms. They instantly pierced the chests of the fire spirits and ran through the fire cores hidden deep within their bodies.


    The eleven fire spirits trembled and remained frozen on the spot, unable to move.


    As Greem clenched his fists, the eleven crystal spears immediately dispersed into intangible mes and returned to his palms.


    The eleven fire spirits started to tremble increasingly fiercely. Finally, their shattered fire cores could no longer constrain their fire forms. Boom, boom, boom! Several small me explosions urred in a chain, engulfing the area into an overwhelming storm of fire.


    Of course, such explosions triggered by the destruction of their souls was much, much less potent than the self-destruction caused by their own will. Greem simply stood on the spot and treated it as a warm gust of wind. He didn¡¯t even bother to dodge.


    Hopefully, these fire spirits had not managed to send out a message in time!


    Greem mumbled to himself after dealing with these fearless grunts.


    However, Greem knew it was no more than wishful thinking. The fire spirits had probably reported on the situation to their headquarters at the very instant he teleported over.


    He couldn¡¯t stay here for too long. Otherwise, there was a real possibility he would run into those terrifying Second and Third Grade individuals!


    Greem had more than eighty percent chance to win against a single Second Grade zefire Spirit with his current power. If he faced off against two zefire Spirits, his chances of victory would fall to thirty percent. With three of them, Greem would have to run as far as he could. Otherwise, he would die a terrible death after being ground away by the enemy.


    As for a Third Grade fire spirit? Greem had no other way of dealing with a being like that apart from having the me Fiend of Terror self-destruct and buy some time for him to escape.


    Fortunately, the one good thing about the Fire Elementium ne was the rarity of Third Grade creatures, much like the World of Adepts. They were not individuals that one simply ran into. Otherwise, Greem would never have dared toe exploring in such a dangerous and lethal world!


    After turning around and shutting the megate, Greem cleaned up the battlefield and started his journey to explore the Fire Elementium ne.

 Chapter 757 Strange Plane

    The Fire Elementium ne was truly the world of the fire creatures.


    Meanwhile, a pure fire adept like Greem also undoubtedly enjoyed a massive boost to his fire powers here.


    Sadly, all the creatures here had shockingly high fire resistance. Otherwise, Greem would most definitely have treated this otherworldly exploration as a casual monster-whacking trip.


    To reduce the chances of being discovered, Greem had no choice but to perform fire conversion on his body and reveal his body of mes. There were far too many low-grade fire elementium that wandered around aimlessly in the Fire Elementium ne, much like himself.


    These fire elementium creatures would roar and charge at any otherworldly intruders they saw, yelling all sorts of weird slogans and battlecries like "Eliminate the intruders," "Let the fire warm your heart," and then immediately break out intobat. Moreover, these fire creatures had absolutely no reservations about self-destructing if they found the enemy to be too powerful to deal with!


    Greem, in his current state, could easily exterminate apprentice-level and even First Grade fire elementals with a flick of his wrists. However, battles against them would always leave a mark of varying degree upon the spot. All this would undoubtedly leave a trail that would allow the pursuers to chase after him.


    Thus, Greem disguised himself as a wandering fire humanoid of First Grade to avoid all unnecessary troubles. He carefully advanced in the direction he had decided upon.


    Of course, Greem wasn¡¯t idle along the way. The new ¡¯Fire Molding¡¯ ability he had just gotten became his greatest toy, providing him with plenty of entertainment.


    It was a strange ability that the Emblem of Fire had provided him with. When he summoned magical mes around his hands, he could make these mes change and shift form ording to his will. After countless attempts and experimentation, Greem had sessfully imitated over a hundred different weapons, including knives, swords, ws, shields, spears, whips, and bows.


    ording to the data gathered by the chip, this Fire Molding ability could be divided into two different states: melee and mid-ranged. Melee weapons that could be imitated included: knives, swords, warhammers, ws, shields, and many more. The quality of the weapons and defensive equipment couldpare to First Grade magical equipment. Mid-ranged weapons that could be imitated included fire whips, fire bows, as well as arrows formed from concentrated fire, providing Greem with a certain degree of mid-ranged offensive options with Fire Molding.


    There were many options avable to Greem, but randomly shifting between the various weapons forms duringbat would most definitely invite trouble. Greem had the Chip repeatedly calcte the most effective weapon forms for battle after having it gather the sufficient necessary data. He prepared to incorporate these weapon forms as part of hisbat abilities.


    Moreover, the Emblem of Fire and Ash had already resonated with his soul. As such, apart from his human form, he would also be able to benefit from the massive boost provided by the two pieces of Second Grade magical equipment even after he turned into his me Fiend form.


    Ash provided Greem with +1 Spirit, while the Emblem of Fire provided +1 Strength.


    Moreover, these attribute bonuses were not something that the origin contract could limit.


    Greem repeatedly tested his Fire Molding ability along the way, even as he surveyed the unique scenery of the Fire Elementium ne. Two bright yellow mes burned in his palms, asionally shifting into different weapon forms.


    It was almost as if Greem had discovered a newnd. His hands used the simple Fire Molding ability to turn the fires into all sorts of new things. One moment they would turn into a shimmering shield of fire, the next it would be a fire whip with adjustable range, and then it would be upper body armor fit with ws before turning into a fire longbow.


    Of course, apart from these basic weapon forms, Greem was also ovee by a momentary surge of yfulness. He manipted the fires to turn into the form of a magic energy cannon. Sadly, the most crucial part about the cannons¨Cthe runic arrays within their core¨Cexhausted too much of his Spirit. Thus, the magic energy cannon that Greem had conjured only had an awesome look and could only fire the most basic of energy fireballs.


    "Chip, is it possible to solidify a powerful ranged weapon form?" Greem gave it a bit of thought and finally started to look through the Chip¡¯s data library.


    [Magic-energy marksman form. The simtion of the form of the energy cannon through Fire Molding while using the host¡¯s right arm as the carrier for the cannon and the host¡¯s right shoulder as a support structure for the turret. The mode of offense is energy fireballs. Attack intensity is estimated to be between a hundred and seventy to two hundred and ten points. Attack frequency will be three shots per two seconds.]


    A three-dimensional projection slowly started turning within Greem¡¯s mind as the Chip¡¯s notification rang out.


    The three-dimensional form of the host was still Greem¡¯s me Fiend appearance. However, his arms were no longer the appearance of bare magma hands. Instead, they were covered by two shining energy cannons embedded into them. The body of the barrels extended up Greem¡¯s arms, before turning into an odd mode of armor when they reached his shoulders.


    Greem had always preferred to controlrge portions of the battlefield in the past, turning everything within vision into a sea of fire at his whim. However, such abat method had its limitations in small-scale skirmishes. Area-of-effect spells could not do sufficient damage to opponents of the same grade due to the dispersion of power.


    With the ability of Fire Molding, Greem could now rapidly transform into the magic energy marksman form by turning his hands into cannons. Of course, this attack method was reduced to inflexible and straightforward energy fireballs. Still, that rapid attack rate and powerful energy intensity of two hundred points made it an excellent option to decide a battle.


    "Approximately how long will it take toplete the design of the magic energy marksman form?"


    [Beep. Fundamental knowledge and magical theories are already in possession. Rtedbat module designs and optimization requires an estimated 37 hours, 56 minutes, 33 seconds.]


    "Begin now!"


    [Beep. Host¡¯s instructions received! Model of magic energy marksman form is currently being constructed.]


    As the Chip began the massive number of calctions required for theplex optimization process, Greem felt his Spirit drain at a rapid pace. In the blink of an eye, he had lost five points of Spirit. If it weren¡¯t for his Spirit reaching twenty-six points after his advancement, and the +1 bonus provided by Ash, Greem would not have been able to endure such an intense demand of Spirit.


    Greem immediately stopped walking. He looked around and quickly found a small fire pool that was suited for him to recover his Spirit. He charged over without any hesitation.


    As for the original owner of this pool? It was an advanced First Grade Fire Deity, but Greem simply ignored his existence!


    A short momentter, the First Grade Fire Deity¡¯s fire core had been removed by Greem and faded into sparks. Meanwhile, Greem jumped into the pool of fire andfortably started to bathe.


    Ordinary mortals could only enjoy hot springs. Only fire creatures of the Fire Elementium ne could enjoy such a unique fire bath!


    ............


    While Greem was casually enjoying his life of fire, a vast horde of fire creatures had started to search for signs of an outsider far, far away in Dustfire Valley. They had received instructions from Fire Lord Artes.


    However, the ck mountain that Greem had appeared on was several tens of thousands of kilometers away from Artes¡¯ Dustfire Valley. As such, the Fire Lord couldn¡¯t possibly find any trace of Greem, even if he was to tear his territory apart.


    However, the Second Grade Fire Lord Artes was not an incapable individual either. He quickly recalled his troops after an inconclusive search and instead switched to a facade of loose security while keeping up the intensive hunts. He had also spoken with the neighboring Fire Lords and cast a massive around Dustfire Valley.


    This way, the human adept would not be able to escape his scouts and his eyes, regardless of which direction he approached from!


    The only thing that Artes felt to be a shame was hisck of knowledge about the human adept that was to assassinate him. That made it hard to prepare traps and ambushes based on the enemy¡¯s personality and habits. However, Artes quickly calmed down when he remembered the seven thousand soldiers he had in hisnds.


    All that was left was waiting for that human adept to attack him!


    ............


    One had to admit that the Fire Elementium ne was truly a higher ne most suited for fire adepts to train in and explore.


    The Heart of mes in Greem¡¯s chest had been beating even more strongly ever since he entered the ne. The frequency of fire energy pumping out of the heart also significantly increased.


    More importantly, the nar consciousness here appeared to be willing to embrace all fire beings, allowing them to live as they liked in this strange world freely. If it was possible, Greem nned to construct a magicalboratory here in the future.


    If he were ever expelled from the World of Adepts, treating this ne as his second origin ne wouldn¡¯t be a bad choice!


    It was a vast and wide in of fire!


    Fissures and valleys were all over the scorched earth. Terrifying and hot jets of air would asionally burst forth from the ground, forming red pirs of fire on the surface, each measuring several hundreds of meters high.


    These pirs of fire all had temperatures reaching seven thousand degrees. Even the native fire creatures could not endure such astounding heat. They would be burned to ashes when hit by these roiling me streams and fire pirs.


    Then, as the fire pirs burst into the sky, some fire crystals or strange magical gemstones would be expelled from the ground alongside the explosions. These things were massively beneficial to those low-grade fire creatures. As such, there were plenty of fire creatures that roamed these parts despite the danger.


    From a distance, one could see the wandering fire spirits, fire elementals, and fire humanoids drifting about everywhere in this massive space.


    When Greem arrived here, he had run into an unprecedentedly massive explosion. Countless rare fire materials were expelled from underground, sending a rain of gems pouring down from the skies.


    It was the first time Greem had seen such a phenomenon in the Fire Elementium ne. He couldn¡¯t help but be attracted to it.


    Fire agates, fire crystals, firestones, fire cores, magma shards, and numerous strange fire materials.


    Greem stood on the edge of the sea of fire and silently let his vision sweep across the ins. Suddenly, his pupils shrunk as they were drawn to a strange gem rolling across the sky.


    It was that!

 Chapter 758 Essence of Fire

    Essence of Fire!


    It was a type of peculiar elementium essence born of the purest fire.


    If absorbed into his body, it would increase Greem¡¯s elementium affinity for magical mes.


    That was why Greem immediately used Fire Teleportation and charged into the fire ins the instant he saw the Essence of Fire. He sprinted with all his strength toward the gemstone.


    Three low-grade fire spirits were already fighting amongst each other for the gemstone over there.


    Fire spirits were actually a type of low-grade fire creatures. They had not even managed to umte the energy required to solidify their forms, which caused them to appear like amorphous, shifting blobs of fire. One could only vaguely make out a humanoid face within all the mes.


    Their primary mode of offense was the use of explosive fireballs, fire shockwave sts, and Ignite.


    If any of them were to be thrown into a material ne, they would pose an immense threat to unarmed mortals. A beginner First Grade fire spirit could easily use its pyromancy to burn down a human vige.


    However, in the Fire Elementium ne, most of their attacks could hardly even threaten the other fire creatures. With their offensive options being so severely ineffective, theirck of defensive powers became all the more striking.


    Greem looked on from afar. He could see the Essence of Fire¨Ca crystalline elementium gemstone¨Csilently lying on the edge of an underground fissure. The three low-grade fire spirits were ripping into each other around the Essence of Fire as if they were mad dogs, ferocious and intent of getting what they wanted.


    For a moment, elementium fireballs and me shockwaves ravaged through the sea of fire. Though the fire spirits blocked most of the fire damageing their way, they still couldn¡¯t avoid their bodies of fire slowly being damaged by the wild attacks of their foes.


    Three beginner First Grade fire spirits who couldn¡¯t even solidify their forms dared to set their sights on such a valuable and precious treasure; Greem roared internally and quickly closed in on the battlefield with multiple Fire Teleportations.


    Perhaps because they sensed Greem approaching, the three First Grade fire spirits started to panic.


    Even in the Fire Elementium ne, where elementium creatures ran amok, beings that had evolved whole bodies were not easy opponents. That was why the three fire spirits immediately knew that a problematic enemy had arrived when they saw Greem¡¯s fire-d humanoid body.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Essence of Fire, they would have run with their tails between their legs the very moment they saw Greem. Sadly, their instincts and desire to evolve that came from the depths of their consciousness core controlled their bodies. They loitered around the battlefield, unwilling to leave empty-handed.


    Greem managed to cross a distance of one and a half kilometers and appeared in the battle in a matter of seventeen seconds.


    With a single Fire Teleportation, he appeared behind two fire spirits engaged inbat. The mes zing in his hands instantly turned into a broad executioner¡¯s de with horrifying jagged teeth. With a single strike, he shed apart the bodies of the two fire spirits.


    Thest surviving fire spirit finally turned to leave at the sight of this. Sadly, the moment it moved, a fire whip cut across the air and obliterated its unstable body of mes, leaving sparks falling to the ground.


    After quickly clearing up the battlefield, Greem ran towards the Essence of Fire. Just as he was five steps away from the Essence of Fire, a strange me rushed past his side and whisked away the gemstone moments before Greem could reach it.


    Who?


    Greem¡¯s heart shook. His face formed from mes turned abruptly and looked at the towering humanoid that had majestically emerged from a pir of fire.


    A Second Grade fire elemental elder!


    The Chip scanned the opponent¡¯s data andpiled it in a single second. Greem¡¯s face gradually darkened as he saw the information.


    Fire Elemental Elder.


    Second Grade elementium creature.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 14 | Physique 16 | Agility 8 | Spirit 2


    One had to admit that fire elemental elders that had mastered most fire spells had achieved elementary fire immunity. When paired with their five-meter-tall bodies, the fire elementium within them became even more concentrated andpressed to the limits. Though they had no tough outer shell, their body of mes was already sufficiently sturdy whenpared to other fire elementals.


    The fire elemental elder absorbed the Essence of Fire into its palm. It then red at Greem with its ferocious, burning eyes, towering over Greem with its superior stature as if ready to fight at any moment.


    Both of them were Second Grade creatures, and their abilities were of almost the same level. If it weren¡¯t for the irresistible temptation of the Essence of Fire, they would not cross swords so easily.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and silently stepped back as if intimidated by the opponent¡¯s fierce appearance. It seemed like he was giving up and retreating. The Second Grade fire elemental elder was extremely satisfied at the sight of this. It gripped the Essence of Fire tighter in its palm and turned to find a suitable ce to absorb it as soon as possible.


    As the fire elemental elder turned, Greem lifted his face as a cold light filled with killing intent burst forth from his zing eyes.


    Greem lifted his right arm and pointed at the fire elemental elder. A Fire Prison forged from mes rose from the ground and caged the elemental.


    A First Grade binding spell like this couldn¡¯t possibly restrain the movements of someone with the power of the fire elemental elder. It punched furiously, and its ming fists reduced the prison into sparks.


    As fast it escaped its constraints, the fire prison had forced the elemental elder to remain in the same spot for one second.


    One second¡¯s time was more than enough for an evil adept who knew how to take advantage of opportunities in battle.


    First, Greem hurled three magma fireballs at the elemental elder. While it was busy dodging and defending itself, Greem disappeared with a Fire Teleportation and appeared behind the enemy. The mes in his hands formed into the shape of a giant sword and stabbed toward the location of the fire core in the elemental¡¯s body.


    The fire elemental elder roared in anger. With an instance of Fire st, it knocked away the three magma fireballs and proceeded to use a me Halo of Repulsion to push away Greem.


    As Greem stumbled away, the fire elemental elder motioned with its arm, and a meteor fireball crashed from above, smashing into the afterimage that Greem had left behind.


    Boom!


    The meteornded, and the ground quaked.


    The afterimages shattered into pieces and turned into sparks, while a meter-deep crater had been carved into the burningnd beneath their feet. The bottom of the hole was filled with web-like cracks, while the sshing sparks had burnt everything nearby, turning them a bright red.


    However, Greem¡¯s towering and zing body was the only thing that could not be found in the roiling mes!


    The fire elemental elder was surprised. It gripped the Essence of Fire in its left hand and rapidly drew a rune in the air with its right. A short momentter, the rune vanished as a strange me ripple rippled outward with the elder at its center.


    All the burning mes around the fire elemental elder were extinguished when they came into contact with this me ripple; a clean space had been created on the battlefield.


    When the fire ripple expanded ten meters away from the elemental elder, a distortion suddenly appeared in the empty air. Greem¡¯s body stumbled out of the spot and was knocked away.


    Kehkehkeh...dumb brat! To think you would try and use such a way of hiding yourself in the mes to ambush me. Prepare to suffer the consequences!


    The fire elemental elder roared arrogantly and waved its arms. A meteor fireball was quickly formed and crashed toward the other fire humanoid.


    The fire elemental elder was still a bit confused, even as it hurled the fireball at the enemy.


    Hasn¡¯t it just been a moment? Why¡¯s the fire humanoid¡¯s size a bit different from before?


    However, before the fire elemental elder could finish its thought, the fires behind it split. Another zing giant emerged from the mes, and the fire sword in his hand stabbed toward the fire elemental elder.


    Dammit! Why is there two of them?


    For a moment, the fire elemental elder thought that the enemy had used a fire projection to create a false clone to distract it. However, when the elemental elder¡¯s Spirit swept across the two fire giants, its body trembled in fear. It was so scared that it almost threw away the Essence of Fire in its hand.


    To think...to think that both of the giants were real and that both of them were Second Grade!


    This moment of shock caused the elemental elder to lose its chance to escape.


    The two Second Grade fire humanoids closed it on the elemental elder, using their instant-cast fireballs to bombard its body. Regardless of how resilient and sturdy the elemental elder¡¯s body was, it had to break beneath the repeated attacks of two opponents of the same grade. It was starting to fall apart.


    The fire elemental elder roared furiously and started to concentrate all of its attacks on one of the fire humanoids. It could clearly sense that this fire humanoid was its real enemy. The other one was only a fire puppet that the former had summoned!


    Seeing that the elemental elder had seen through his tricks, Greem promptly turned to run.


    It was two against one. It was a certain victory, and Greem didn¡¯t need to risk his life because of an idiot¡¯s momentary impulse.


    Thus, Greem turned to run and used guerri tactics to stall the fire elemental elder, allowing the me Fiend of Terror to chase after the elder and bombard it with attacks.


    The three of them chased after each other on the burning ins, just like that.


    Greem quickly ran while pursued by the elemental elder. An eye-catching Burning Path silently burned where he set foot upon.


    The fire elemental elder ignored the path after looking down for a brief moment.


    A Burning Path that only dealt sixty points of fire damage per second was nothing to it with its elementary fire immunity. As such, it never gave much thought about the Burning Path and simply stood in it as it chased after Greem.


    Greem chuckled when he saw the enemy falling into his trap. He yelled, "Coldme!"


    As the magical mes rapidly turned into coldmes with freezing effects, the elemental elder slowed down as it bathed in the green-white fires.


    Strike while it was down!


    Greem and the me Fiend immediately went all out, and a storm of magma fireballs consumed the enemy¡¯s form.

 Chapter 759 Fire Affinity

    The fire elemental elder died!


    A Second Grade fire elemental elder died a humiliating death beneath the bombardment of Greem and the me Fiend of Terror, just like that.


    Any Second Grade adept in the World of Adepts would have had plenty of life-saving spells and powers. They would not have been so easily disposed of as the elemental elder. If a Second Grade adept had died in battle, it would be a major event that could cause a tremendousmotion in the local area.


    However, in the Fire Elementium ne filled with fire creatures, the death of a Second Grade creature was as ordinary as the death of a chicken in a farmer¡¯s home. There wouldn¡¯t be someone jumping out unexpectedly seeking vengeance. After all, even the wandering fire creatures didn¡¯t seem to care less about what had happened.


    As long as the fighting didn¡¯t involve them, they were perfectly fine with wandering the ins and looking for things that could help them evolve.


    Of course, this was a manifestation of their unevolved intelligence. Otherwise, they would probably have run as far away as possible at the very sight of two vicious Second Grades engaged inbat!


    Greem held two bright red crystals in his hand once the brutal battle had concluded.


    One was a clear, fire-red crystal with a jadelike appearance. One could only vaguely make out a strange me swimming within the solid crystal if they brought it close to their eyes.


    The other crystal was a heart-shaped gemstone burning with fire. An overwhelming sense of heat could be sensed emanating from within the gemstone.


    Elementium creatures were truly elementium creatures. It didn¡¯t matter which grade they had achieved¨C they were still tragically broke and destitute. Greem had gone to such lengths to kill the Second Grade fire elemental elder¨Ceven summoning the me Fiend of Terror¨Cand all he got for his efforts was a Second Grade fire core.


    If he hadn¡¯t managed to kill the fire elemental elder instantly, the elemental elder would have self-destructed, and Greem would have had absolutely nothing to show for the ordeal. Greem would probably be unable even to cry if that had happened!


    The Fire Elementium ne was arge ne, and the fire creatures within it were numerous. They could be counted in the trillions. Moreover, fire creatures didn¡¯t have lifespan limitations like other intelligent lifeforms. Strictly speaking, they belonged to a special long-lived species.


    Still, the vast majority of these creatures were unintelligent, bumbling elementium beings that did not even possess mental consciousness. They had no recognition or understanding of good or evil that other species had. However, that didn¡¯t mean that they had no intelligence whatsoever.


    In truth, the powerhouses among the elementium creatures had intelligence that far surpassed themon man, and perhaps even the dragons. After all, some of them had existed since a time far more ancient than the dragons themselves.


    Despite howzy the elementium creatures tended to be, and theirck of talent for cultivation, the massive number of individuals in the Elementium nes and the gradual umtion of power still caused a frightening amount of powerhouses to be born in these worlds. The number of these monsters would terrify most material nes.


    Otherwise, Greem wouldn¡¯t have run into a wandering Second Grade fire elemental elder in such a backward, rural ce in the middle of nowhere. The opponent also clearly wasn¡¯t wise enough. Itcked an instinctual sense for danger and had engaged inbat against a same-grade opponent like Greem, all for the sake of an Essence of Fire.


    The result of this decision was Greem obtaining a fresh Second Grade fire core alongside the Essence of Fire. As long as he had the chance to return to Fire Throne, Greem had the means to turn this Second Grade fire core into yet another loyal and reliable elementium golem.


    Thus, after some thought, Greem had to admit that the Fire Elementium ne was indeed the most suitable ce for him to train and gain in power. If he had a hundred year¡¯s time to train here, he had absolute confidence in raising a golem army formed entirely of Second Grade elementium golems from scratch.


    If he then changed professions and became a tiny Fire Lord here wouldn¡¯t be such a bad idea either.


    At the very least, these dull and foolish elementium creatures were much easier to deal withpared to adepts of the same grade!


    After some thought, Greem decided not to hurry away from these burning ins. Instead, he found a slightly more peaceful cave nearby and impatiently started to absorb the Essence of Fire.


    The whole matter of assassinating the Fire Lord was full of weird instances. It was very likely that he would trigger a death trap set down by the enemy if he approached the Fire Lord prematurely. Thus, Greem had already made his decision to treat this assassination mission as a rare chance for a ¡¯vacation¡¯ and ¡¯training.¡¯


    Since he managed to find a treasure here, it was only natural that he stayed here for a few more days.


    Every single Essence of Fire was immeasurably precious to fire adepts.


    After all, treasures that could improve elementium affinity could only be found at unreasonably high prices back in the World of Adepts. Naturally, Greem wouldn¡¯t so easily give up on this chance to obtain them for free.


    For the next month, Greem stayed in this cave and spent day after day absorbing and digesting that Essence of Fire.


    The me Fiend of Terror wasn¡¯t idle while he worked either.


    Greem sent out a hundred beginner apprentice fire golems in a single go and spread them out over the several-dozen kilometers wide ins. He had them silently monitor everything that was happening nearby. Once a valuable fire treasure or magical gemstone was expelled from underground, the me Fiend would rush over and retrieve it as soon as possible.


    For a moment, tension overtook the ins.


    Some of the smarter fire creatures, realizing that a powerhouse had arrived in the vicinity, made the right decision to flee. At any rate, the Fire Elementium ne was a vast world. There were countless other ces like this one here. There was no need to run into a confrontation with this fearsome elite over some resources and treasures.


    The only ones left here were dumb idiots that didn¡¯t even possess an independent soul consciousness.


    The me Fiendbored hard, and Greem, the boss behind the scenes, enjoyed the fruits of his work, living a carefree life in the area. Greem¡¯s improvement here in the Fire Elementium ne was definitely faster than back in the World of Adepts.


    One monthter.


    A humanoid statue in a silent cave covered in a thickyer of ash suddenly trembled.


    The specific action couldn¡¯t be clearly seen, but the volcanic ash on Greem¡¯s skin melted like virgin snow, quickly flowing down his body.


    As the ashes from his eyebrows fell off, Greem slowly opened his eyes.


    Two blinding golden fires were suddenly lit in the dark cave, illuminating the entire space.


    "Chip, assess my current attributes!"


    [Beep. Host¡¯s instructions received. Self-assessment beginning.]


    As the Chip¡¯s familiar voice rang out once again, a screen of light projected into Greem¡¯s mind. His bodily attributes were listed upon the screen in detail.


    Greem. Intermediate Second Grade.


    Profession: Elementium Adept (Fire Specialization).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 11+1 (18) | Physique 13 (20) | Agility 10 (8) | Spirit 26+1 (29).


    Note: Attributes in brackets refer to post-transformation statistics.


    Profession Skills: Body of mes, me Fiend Transformation.


    Greem¡¯s power was only that of an intermediate Second Grade fire adept in the World of Adepts. His powerful fire spells might have great might in arge-scale war. However, fire adeptscked sufficient mobility in skirmishes between adepts and had trouble shaking off close-quarter pursuits from adepts of other disciplines.


    It was a universally-known and epted fact!


    However, Greem¡¯s power increased tremendously when he transformed into the me Fiend. The 29 points of Spirit and 20 points of Physique allowed him to sweep aside most adepts of the same grade and be a terrifying overlord that dominated the battlefield.


    The one unfortunate drawback to this was his inability to sustain the me Fiend form for extended periods of time, even after sealing a me Fiend¡¯s Heart in his own body. If he went all out, the me Fiend transformation could only be maintained for a mere fifteen minutes.


    In those fifteen minutes, Greem at his full power could evenpare to beginner Third Grades to some limited extent. However, once the fifteen minutes were up, the reverted Greem would only have the strength of an intermediate Second Grade adept. He would be crushed in moments by an actual Third Grade.


    However, if the battlefield was in the Fire Elementium ne, Greem was confident he could extend the me Fiend Transformation to thirty minutes.


    It was basically his powers being doubled!


    The origin contract had now sealed his soul brand, and no substantial change to its nature was possible. Thus, Greem wasn¡¯t paying attention to his attributes when he read the assessment report. Instead, he was focusing on his elementium affinity.


    A bar chart slowly appeared before Greem¡¯s eyes.


    From top to bottom, the bars of various colors represented the affinity of Greem¡¯s body toward the myriad of arcane powers.


    The ones at the top were naturally the ones with the highest affinity, and it decreased as they went down.


    In the very first ce was the fire attribute. The length of the bar was nearly the sum of all the other bars, and its color was a vibrant red.


    In second ce was the earth attribute. Its length was only one-fourth of the fire bar, and its color was a deep yellow.


    The third was the metal attribute. Its length was only one-twelfth of the fire bar, and its color was a dull, rusty brown.


    There were as many as five or six affinity bars after them, but their lengths were pathetically short, and Greem had no interest to even look at them.


    The longer the bar, the higher the affinity Greem had with elementium particles of that attribute. This way, Greem would obtain greater achievements through his daily meditations and training with the same amount of effort.


    Greem had spent the past few days devouring and digesting the Essence of Fire. It had allowed his fire affinity bar to increase by a minimum of one-seventh. Moreover, if one were to look closely, they could find a strange trace of gold on the bright red bar of the fire attribute.


    This golden color represented Greem¡¯s understanding of thews of fire.


    One day, when Greem¡¯s knowledge and understanding of the firews had reached a level that granted him control, it would be the moment he obtained the power of the narws.


    And the power of thews was a supreme domain that only Fourth Grade adepts coulde into contact with!

 Chapter 760 The Danger Approaching the Tower

    ording to the grade division of the adepts, the adepts could be divided into the First through Ninth Grade.


    However, if one were to sort the adepts based on the power level that theymanded, they would find that low-grade adepts only had mastery over elementium powers. It wasn¡¯t until the adepts reached Fourth Grade, and their mastery over a certain force had reached its limit, that they could possess the power ofws.


    From that day onwards, Fourth Grade adepts could change their title from ¡¯Elementium Adept¡¯ to ¡¯Principle Adept¡¯!


    The difference in power between elementium and principles was so significant that they couldn¡¯t even bepared on the same level.


    At the very least, within a ne, the power of principles andws was a powerful force that couldpare with divine power.


    If an adept had mastered elementium power, they would be able to gather wandering magical elementium around them through the use of Spirit when casting a spell. That would allow them to increase the might and effects of the spell. At this moment, the rtionship between adepts and elementium particles was like the rtionship between a suitor and the one being pursued. What mattered was the synergy and chemistry between the two parties. Harmony and co-existence were most crucial.


    However, once they had mastered the power of thews, an adept¡¯s rtionship with the elementium particles would turn into that of master and servant. The elementium particles would move at everymand, incapable of going against the will of their master.


    Furthermore, above the power ofws, there was an even more fearsome power of domains!


    Once an adept had achieved the utmost mastery over the power ofws, they would be able to use this power to weave a space of power around them that waspletely subject to their control. The strength of such an area of power naturally had everything to do with the adept¡¯s mastery over theirws of choice, the depth of their understanding over thesews, and the number ofws that they understood.


    Such adepts were often referred to as ¡¯Great Adepts¡¯!


    The main reason Great Adepts had such immense trouble entering ne worlds was due to their own space of power experiencing irreconcble shes with the narws of the ne worlds. These conflicting differences caused the Great Adepts to be rejected by all ne worlds, leaving them with no choice but to create small ne worlds of their own to reside within.


    Of course, above the power of domains, there seemed to exist a sort of higher, more mysterious power!


    Greem had only heard adepts speak and gossip of such a power, but he had never been able to verify the truth of its existence.


    Of what nature this power was, and how it functioned, Greem had absolutely no idea. Even though he had scoured all the magical tomes and ancient books he could find, he still had not managed to find even a mention of such power.


    It was rumored that this power was something that only Great Adepts of the Ninth Grade could possess. Even among adepts, it was said that there were only three such individuals.


    As a bright yellow me zed across his body, all remaining ashes vanished during the crackling of mes. Greem was still maintaining his fire person form when he emerged from the cave.


    Outside the cave, the five-meter-tall magma body of the me Fiend was still as eye-catching as ever. A small pile of gemstones rested beside it upon the scorched, ck earth.


    Greem¡¯s eye had just swept toward the gemstones, and the colorful and brilliant magical auras immediately attracted him.


    Though 99.99999% of theposition of substance in the Fire Elementium ne was fire elementium of various states, this didn¡¯t mean that the ne was void of all other elementium particles.


    It was just that all other substances would burn to cinders within this singr ne world where fire elementium held the absolute uncontested dominant position. The dposed elementium particles would either be expelled from the ne world or be forced together andpressed by the harsh environments. This process caused them to turn into high-quality elementium crystals and magical gemstones.


    Such treasures would have had all of their impurities burned away by the environment of the Fire Elementium ne. The elementium particles within these crystals were hundreds of times denser than gemstones in ordinary ne worlds.


    As such, elementium crystals and gemstones found in elementium nes were all of the highest-quality that could hardly be found in the world. Of course, their price in the World of Adepts was proportional to their rarity. These crystals were necessary materials for high-grade adepts who wished to construct powerful magical arrays.


    Greem walked forward and searched through the pile of crystals, but he did not find another Essence of Fire. Instead, he discovered plenty of elementium crystals. Most of these were of earth elementium.


    Greem did a simple assessment based on what he saw, and he estimated that this pile of treasure would be worth a minimum of two hundred thousand magical crystals if brought back to the World of Adepts. It also meant that he had sessfully earned a small adept¡¯s tower after only a single month in the Fire Elementium ne.


    Thinking back to the past when he was still a First Grade adept, ten and twenty thousand magical crystals had been enough to drive him to join the ranks of the ne invaders with no concern for his own life. However, now that he had be a Second Grade adept, obtaining ten times the number of magical crystals than what he had once coveted seemed like no more than an inconsequential dream. He was as calm andposed as ever.


    Greem quickly put the treasures into his pouch and recalled the beginner fire golems he had sent out. The only managed to retrieve forty of the one hundred fire golems he had sent out. The rest of them had all been lost upon this burning in.


    Once again, Greem had the impulse to establish a magicalboratory within this Fire Elementium ne!


    Perhaps it was only then that he could deal with theck of adept resources here and convert the materials he had gathered into actual power that he couldmand.


    When that happened, Greem would easily be able to turn theboratory into his personal golem processing factory with the inexhaustible magical materials of the Fire Elementium ne and the systemic knowledge and techniques of the World of Adepts. He could establish his golem army at a far quicker pace and with far more stability.


    However, while the thought itself was a brilliant one, many difficult problems still had to be solved in the process of realizing this idea.


    What stood before Greem¡¯s way currently was his immenseck of understanding of the Fire Elementium ne. He wasn¡¯t familiar with the geography or the distribution of the fire natures here.


    If his identity was exposed, the Fire Lords and Fire Kings here could probably wipe out all he had worked for with a wave of their hands, like crumbling a sand castle.


    As such, before he could guarantee his own safety, Greem had best first figure out where to establish the small magicalboratory!


    After wiping away all traces of himself here, Greem unsummoned the me Fiend and once again started on the journey of finding that Fire Lord.


    ............


    World of Adepts, Fire Throne.


    Gargamel was extremely troubled.


    Right now, he was anxiously pacing in front of the teleportation room. Anxiety, frustration, and anger were piled upon his wrinkled old face, making him appear even more elderly than he was.


    "Alright, alright. Father; you¡¯ve been managing this tower for dozen of years at the very least. Why can¡¯t you remainposed even after all these years? You¡¯ve already clearly reflected the problem that the tower is facing to the higher-ups. Even if that irresponsible n leader returns from the other world, he has no reason or excuse to me or fault you. I really don¡¯t know what you are so frustrated over." His daughter, Emelia, who had already grown into a pretty teenage girl, stood by the side, her face full of disdain. Not a trace of urgency could be seen on her rxed face.


    "Different. This is different!"


    Gargamel was still winding around the same spot irritatedly.


    "The master has only been gone for a month, yet something so major has popped up over here at the tower. As the majordomo, I am fully responsible. Sadly, who knows where he¡¯s gone this time. I can¡¯t contact him at all. Cough. I have already sent news of the situation here to the Fate Witches and the White Tower. I just don¡¯t know whether they can send some powerful individuals to deal with the situation here. Cough..."


    "Hmph! What does the terrible situation here have to do with us? The one stirring up trouble on the outside right now is a Third Grade vampire. Can we even deal with such a powerful adept with the strength of our adept¡¯s tower? If the master dares to say something bad about you when hees back, I¡¯ll make sure he gets it." It might have been a few years since Emelia turned into a First Grade adept, and her appearance might be that of a teenage girl, but if one were to keep count, they would find that her true age was no more than seven years old.


    Her exceptional talent and brilliant mind allowed her to master profound and mystic magical knowledge easily, but theplexities of interrtional dynamics between adepts was not something that she could so quickly understand with a bit of intelligence.


    Thus, Gargamel could only sigh at her words of ¡¯constion.¡¯


    While the father and daughter pair remained silent, white light shimmered within the teleportation room. An overwhelming spatial flux gradually began to fill the room. The mysterious array hidden beneath the floorboards slowly appeared as powerful magical energy was injected into it. The room was illuminated a brilliant white, making it impossible to stare directly at the source of the light.


    Someone was teleporting!


    The father and daughter were initially surprised, but that quickly turned into joy. They rushed toward the entrance of the teleportation room and silently waited for the teleportation to end.


    As the powerful spatial fluctuations shed with each other within the teleportation room and vanished, a powerful white light shed at the center of the array. One could vaguely see several towering figures emerge.


    Once the white light had faded, Mary stepped out in her red crystal heels. Behind her were two blood knights in eye-catching armor and capes, along with two seductive and slender blood elves.


    Behind the blood elves were the tall and ferocious Dragonborn Zacha and Goblin Mechanic Tigule, who was in skintight leather armor.


    Seven Second Grades!


    The reinforcements were actually seven Second Grades!


    For the first time, Gargamel felt a sense of relief.


    "I need to know the situation here immediately. You had best give me a detailed report now!" Mary solemnly said as she strode toward the magical hall.


    "Yes, yes, of course. I¡¯ll give my report now." Gargamel immediately followed after Mary.


    Emelia pouted disdainfully and had no choice but to follow after the group.

 Chapter 761 Clan Meeting

    Baron Willems was dead.


    Of the two adepts apanying the baron, one was dead, and the other was severely wounded.


    Upon returning to the Zhentarim Association, the wounded adept that had barely managed to survive had firmly insisted that the Crimson n adepts had attacked them. That stirred up a ho¡¯s nest. The old fogeys of the Zhentarim Association had not yet made a statement, and the elders and executors beneath them were already causing amotion. They were requesting strict punishment on the murderers that had killed an Association adept.


    The few small adept ns around Fire Throne also started jumping up and down and turned all their spearheads toward this steadily rising Crimson n.


    The Crimson n was a newly raised adept n after all. Theycked sufficiently important allies in Zhentarim, while their enemies could easily be found everywhere. Thus, an Anti-Crimson n alliance was quickly forming, to no one¡¯s surprise.


    The main force of the Anti-Crimson n Alliance was the few small ns surrounding Fire Throne. Their headquarters were too close to the Crimson n. If the Crimson n ever chose to expand outward, they would all be affected to some degree.


    Rather than wait for the Crimson n to go stronger and assimte them, they preferred to take apart the Crimson n while its forces were split up.


    Of course, these small adept ns had worked hard beforemitting to the operation. They had performed some in-depth reconnaissance regarding the adept forces of the Fire Throne.


    The Crimson n had strategically split up their forces to the Northern Lands. Most of their n¡¯s strength had been transferred over to Icewind, which was under the control of the Northern Witches. Such odd and unconventional logic was regarded as a terrible idea by other adept ns.


    Though transfer of manpower and resources was still possible through long-ranged teleportation arrays, the splitting up of the n¡¯s towers would still limit this kind of interaction due to the number of magical crystals needed for every teleportation.


    If the Crimson n had a few dozen years to manage theirnd slowly, they might have been able to settle their roots into both of these ces while using Fire Throne and White Tower to spread the n¡¯s influence and power over an even broader area. Sadly, both Fire Throne and White Tower were in a temporary state of weakness andcked military strength during the initial period following the split.


    A formerly clenched fist so suddenly opened naturally meant that the strength of both towers would be weak.


    The adept ns couldn¡¯t do anything about White Tower, but Fire Throne was well within reach.


    Under the encouragement and interference of enemies in the shadows and on the surface, a terrifying storm targeting the Crimson n was quickly brewing.


    As the majordomo of Fire Throne, Gargamel had naturally received countless reports, pieces of information, and news about this situation. Sadly, the number of adept forces that he could mobilize was far too small. Consequently, he had no power to deflect the increasingly harsh situation that was pressing toward them.


    Over the past few days, the roads to the south of Fire Throne had been cut off by their enemies. The markets and towns around the tower were also experiencing significantly lower traffic. Most adventurers, mercenaries, and apprentices had left this area and were silently waiting for a n war to erupt!


    In the past, suchrge-scale adept n wars were not be allowed by the Zhentarim Association.


    After all, the ones exhausted in the war were all fundamentally forces of the Zhentarim!


    If adept ns were allowed to exterminate each other as they liked, the Zhentarim Association would lose the fundamental force that allowed them to fend off the invasions of the three major adept forces. However, the elimination of the weak and the survival of the strong was still necessary on a smaller scale.


    After all, a powerful adept¡¯s n could only climb to the peak by stepping upon the bones of their enemies!


    When the Association adept was murdered near Fire Throne, the Zhentarim Association secretly loosened their control over the area. They even started, knowingly or otherwise, to contact the nearby forces to form an intimidating Anti-Crimson n Alliance.


    Now that the Alliance had gathered sufficient force, they slowly started to eat away at the fringes of Fire Throne. If they were allowed to establish themselves in the outer areas, Fire Throne would probably have to deal with an organized and prepared siege against them.


    Adept¡¯s towers might be known to be imprable and indestructible, but that also depended on what kind of enemies they were dealing with.


    In the hands of a Third Grade adept, the tower would be nigh invulnerable; even a Fourth Grade adept would not have absolute confidence in breaking the tower and killing the Third Grade adept. However, the upper limit of power that the tower could unleash in the hands of a Second Grade adept was much lower.


    With proper strategy, forceful means, and sufficient adepts, razing a small adept¡¯s tower was not all that difficult!


    Consequently, the surroundings of Fire Throne were engulfed in an atmosphere of fear during this period. Even the n adepts and apprentices didn¡¯t dare to take a single step out of the tower.


    "Firstly, I need to rify something," With Greem absent, Mary naturally took on the seat of the leader, "This is a massive conspiracy targeting us!"


    Mary paused for a moment here, her crystalline ruby eyes sweeping across the entire ce.


    The many adepts present were all settled in their spots and silently listened to Mary¡¯s announcement.


    The ones standing by Mary were naturally her bloodkin.


    They were Soros and Windsor¨Cthe two pseudo-Second Grades¨Cand the two pretty blood elves with long ears. Old Fox Vanlier hadn¡¯t appeared among the ranks ofbatants this time, as he had to stay in White Tower to assist Meryl.


    The other two Second Grades of the n, Dragonborn Zacha and Tigule, were each standing in a corner of the hall silently listening to Mary speak.


    Strictly speaking, they couldn¡¯t be considered as core adepts of the Crimson n.


    Dragonborn Zacha was the first Second Grade soul servant that Greem had received. Everything he did was ording to Greem¡¯s will. Now that Greem was far away in the Fire Elementium ne, Dragonborn Zacha was basically without his master. Though he was participating in the n meeting with a somewhat nonchnt attitude, it didn¡¯t mean that he had to offer his loyalty to this weak and frail Mary.


    Tigule only had the power of a First Grade himself. He relied entirely upon the unique mechanic profession of the goblins to freely control the Second Grade magical machine Goblin Shredder. Now that the Goblin ne had be a possession of the Crimson n, this goblin warrior had no choice but to reluctantly join the ranks of the adepts for the sake of his people.


    However, Tigule only bowed before the powerful Adept Greem within the Crimson n. This Adept Mary had yet to reach a level where she couldmand him.


    To represent how much the Fate Witches¡¯ valued the problem at hand, Alice had also sent her powerful subordinate over¨C the Berserk Witch Sofia. This crude and muscr woman was sitting in a corner with her thick staff in her arms and appeared not to be paying attention to the speech.


    Apart from these proud individuals, the other ones in the hall were all internal adepts of Fire Throne.


    Crimson Majordomo Gargamel, Forest Spirit Adept Eva, their beloved daughter Adept Emelia, Manticore Leader Charon; the tower had originally recruited some free adepts, but considering that they weren¡¯t exactly the most reliable, Greem did not summon them to participate in this internal n meeting.


    Mary looked across the room and saw that they were a group of divided soldiers. She couldn¡¯t help but frown deeply.


    "Greem is now exploring the Fire Elementium ne. It¡¯s unlikely that he will return to the n in the short term. Before he returns, I have already met with Alice. The danger that Fire Throne is currently facing is very likely a conspiracy of enemies behind the scenes!"


    "Lady Mary, could you speak in detail about the specifics of the situation?!" Dragonborn Zacha was truly the most loyal soul servant. His rage instantly ignited when he heard that this operation against them could threaten the safety of his master.


    "The current situation is extremelyplicated. I can only describe it in more simple terms," Mary licked her red lips and sternly said, "Greem went to the Fire Elementium ne by the power of Fire Throne and has left his nar positioning coordinates here. If this ce is taken down and the nar positioning coordinates are lost, Greem will have to go to great lengths if he wants toe back!"


    "You mean to say that those bastards out there are attacking the tower so that master is lost in another ne?" Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s voice immediately raised by degrees and blinding lightning arcs started crackling on his bright blue scaled body.


    "Indeed!" Mary nodded and said, "As such, we must guard the tower until Greem returns. We cannot let them destroy the positioning coordinates here."


    "Understood, Lady Mary!" Dragonborn Zacha¡¯s voice instantly filled with killing intent, "Zacha is willing to listen to Lady Mary¡¯s orders before master sessfully returns. I will send those rats packing back to their nests!"


    Mary nodded in satisfaction as her gaze quickly focused on goblin Tigule.


    Even the veteran couldn¡¯t help but feel shivers run down his spine in the face of the spiritual pressure from a Second Grade vampire adept. Tigule grumbled about the big guy¡¯s frankness and recklessness inside his heart as he sighed. He had no choice but to put on a smile and step forward.


    "Lady Mary, I too, am willing to listen to your orders while Lord Greem is absent."


    Since the two Second Grade powerhouses of the n had already made their intentions clear, the assignment of thebat missions that followed would be much easier. As for the First Grade adepts of the n? They could only listen to orders in a situation like this. They were not qualified to attempt to negotiate.


    "Gargamel, you can report on the enemy¡¯s situation now."


    "Understood, Lady Mary!"


    Gargamel stood out from the side. He cleared his throat, looked at the core adepts of the n, and loudly began to exin the situation.


    "There are currently five separate forces who are preparing to invade our Crimson n: the Kam n, the Andorra n, the Cenas n, the Magic Forest Hut, and Layton Adept Academy.


    "They have currently stationed most of their forces in the Kam n¡¯s territory and are preparing to use that ce as a jumping-off point to quickly invade our Crimson n.


    "The noble army that they have gathered totals thirty thousand people and is put together by three small adept ns. The number of official adepts is already over a hundred individuals, but the number of adepts of Second Grade and beyond has yet to be confirmed..."

 Chapter 762 Gathering of Adepts

    The adepts were a group of extraordinarily pragmatic and practical individuals!


    Having them risk their lives was an impossible feat without sufficient rewards or hidden benefits.


    However, once they smelled blood, they would instantly turn into the most frightening hunters in the world and use their scary magic to tear off sufficient flesh from the body of the enemy to sate their greed.


    The Kam n, the Andorra n, the Cenas n, the Magic Forest Hut, and the Layton Adept Academy.


    They were five foreign names, and each one of them represented a small adept force that was individually insignificant within Zhentarim. Trying to put together a hundred adepts with their influence and power was nearly impossible. Gargamel was ny percent certain that other forces had also indirectly participated in this attack against Fire Throne.


    It might not have been long since the establishment of the Crimson n, but their few brutal victories had let the world know of the strength and prowess of Crimson adepts. Last time, the enemy had been defeated in front of Fire Throne, even with a Third Grade vampire adept leading the charge.


    That vampire n had been crippled ever since then, only able to maintain their organization by defending their n castle. They couldn¡¯t even take a step out of their home.


    Gargamel had sent some subordinates to investigate the situation. It appeared that there were some odd fellows amongst the ranks of the enemies who resembled vampires. If this information turned out to be true, it would mean that one of the enemies that Fire Throne would have to face would most definitely include Third Grade Vampire Adept Haine Vik.


    Currently, this so-called Anti-Crimson n Alliance was still gathering their forces in the Kam n¡¯s territory. That was about a straight distance of a hundred kilometers away from Fire Throne, and it was already the closest rallying point that they could find.


    What stood between the Kam n¡¯s outpost and Fire Throne was a mountainous and tiny forest road. A small caravan might barely be able to travel by that path, but a massive army of several tens of thousands of soldiers would have immense trouble doing so. In particr, most of their supplies and logistics would not be able to make it through the path.


    Moreover, the Crimson n had no territory for them to conquer and take over. The only way for the enemy to wipe away the existence of the Crimson n was to assemble enough cannon fodder to invade the underground adept¡¯s tower. It was undoubtedly a massive risk!


    As such, the main force of the enemy could only be the one hundred adepts they had put together. Rather than fighting a war, the ten thousand-strong army from the nobles were here to act as fodder.


    Ever since Mary had arrived in Fire Throne, the Crimson n had all of their members and subordinate forces retreat into the tower. Every single member of the n was hiding underground instead of showing themselves outside.


    However, Fire Throne still managed to send outrge groups of goblin construction machines to destroy the road between the tower and Pinecone before the enemies arrived.


    The main force of the enemy would first have to repair this road if they wanted to approach Fire Cave!


    The enemy seemed to have realized the intentions of the Crimson n. Topletely seal the Crimson n within the underground cave, they sent out ten adepts ahead of the main force. These adepts rushed to the exterior of Fire Cave and set up a temporary camp.


    Once the Crimson adepts were contained underground, the enemy¡¯s main force finally started marching down the forest road, slowly and with much difficulty.


    ............


    The night hung low, and the sky was full of stars.


    Fire Cave, after a dozen days of silence, was once again filled with traffic and liveliness.


    Extravagant and fancy tents popped up all over the ce, like mushrooms after rain. They had almost covered the entire area.


    A hundred adepts from various factions were gathered here, spending night after night discussing the specifics of attacking the Crimson n. The servants they had brought with them were scattered around the camp, keeping watch over the Crimson n and guarding against any attacks.


    Meanwhile, as many as twenty or thirty adepts that represented their respective factions were sitting inside the massive camp at the center of the campsite. These adepts were silently listening to missions being assigned by the two leading adepts.


    There were only two leaders of the group, and both of them were Third Grade!


    One of them was naturally the Third Grade Vampire Haines Vik, who had volunteered to help, while the other was the only Third Grade adept of the Kam n, the Death Heralding Crow, Yurga.


    There were also eleven Second Grade adepts of various attire at the side of these two Third Grade adepts. The rest were allbat adepts of peak First Grade.


    The Kam n was the closest adept n to the Crimson n. ording to their private agreements, this ce would be the territory of the Kam n once Fire Throne was conquered. Once that was done, all parties that had participated in the battle would invest in the construction of a mid-sized human city and enjoy the profits from the ck Forest¡¯s resources.


    It was precisely the allure of these massive benefits that caused the Kam n tomit all of their resources and military force to the invasion of the Crimson n. They had brought almost all the adepts and soldiers of the n along with them this time.


    Now that they had arrived here and sessfully contained the Crimson adepts underground, they had to carefully think over the question of how to conduct the battle.


    The adepts might have traveled light, but all of their siege weapons and soldiers had been abandoned fifty kilometers away. They were still making the grueling journey across the muddy forest road.


    Given their current progress, it would take a minimum of seven days for the army to arrive.


    The adepts could not wait any longer!


    Every single day¡¯s time was valuable to them. They couldn¡¯t tolerate wasting seven days on waiting for those cannon fodder soldiers.


    On the very night they arrived at Fire Cave, the two Third Grade adepts had summoned all of the adepts. They started to discuss the matter ofunching an early attack against Fire Throne to suppress the enemy.


    There was still a quarter of a kilometer of underground caves that needed to be traversed from Fire Cave to Magma Hall. One could easily foresee that the Crimson n adepts had set upyers uponyers of magical traps.


    As such, their most urgent priority was to clear a path toward the Magma Hall.


    This task was left to the fourteen adepts of the Magic Forest Hut.


    The Magic Forest Hut was a small adept force in the center of Zhentarim. They were known for their skill at creating low-grade magical items. The leader of this force was a Second Grade alchemist adept. His thirteen subordinates were also skilled in alchemy.


    Naturally, the Second Grade Alchemist Adept Roy was upset at such an assignment. However, once Third Grade Adept Yurga promised that the adepts of the Magic Forest Hut would not need to participate in the siege against the tower after they had cleared the traps, Roy finally assented, though still somewhat reluctant.


    While the adepts continued to rest and prepare for the uing battle, the fourteen Magic Forest Hut adepts dove into the dark Fire Cave.


    ............


    Fire Cave.


    Due to the existence of the undergroundva sea, the temperature within the cave was a dozen degrees higher than the outside world.


    Second Grade Adept Roy immediately smelled the pungent and dense scent of sulfur after stepping into the tunnels. He couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    It was said that the Crimson n had many Second Grade adepts!


    Even as a Second Grade adept, Roy couldn¡¯t help but feel some fear at having to carry out such a task of spearheading the way.


    They intended to exterminate the enemy and uproot them with the mobilization of the army this time. It would be odd if the enemy didn¡¯t fight back with all their might under such circumstances!


    Consequently, Roy immediately stopped walking upon entering the tunnels. He waved at his subordinates.


    As alchemist adepts, they naturally had their own unique way of battle.


    Two of the thirteen First Grade alchemists stepped forward. They took out a vial from their pouches strapped full of potions, took away the cork, and tossed it in front of them.


    The next second, two sturdy, one-meter tall earth elementals emerged from the ground and silently stood before the adepts.


    "Go forth and scout the way!" The two adepts immediately gave their orders.


    Two earth elementals with humanoid forms made of ck earth immediately charged toward the other end of the tunnel with heavy steps.


    They only made it ten meters before a magical trap on the wall of the tunnel triggered.


    An explosive fireball instantly exploded between the two earth elementals!


    The fierce mes and violent shockwave knocked the earth elementals on their backs. The surface of their bodies quickly dried and cracked like smashed y.


    Two advanced apprentice-level earth elementals were destroyed by an explosive fireball trap, just like that!


    The adepts of the Magic Forest Hut didn¡¯t care about such losses. After blocking the remnants of the shockwave with a magical shield, the two adepts once again took out two blue potions and threw them in front of them.


    As the potion vials rolled forward, blue and viscous liquid flowed out from within and gathered in a ball upon the tough and warm floor.


    As the adepts performed a simple magical summoning rite, two ice elementals radiating freezing air climbed out of the liquid. They also only had the power of an advanced apprentice, but they possessed long-ranged ice attribute offensive spells.


    The two ice elementals clearly disliked the environment. They looked about in frustration the moment they were summoned. Only two blue lights glowed on their featureless faces.


    "Go!"


    These low-grade elementium summonscked any full intelligence or consciousness. As such, they couldn¡¯t understandplex orders. Consequently, themands given by the adepts were often very simple and straightforward.


    The two ice elementals immediately roared and charged into the depths of the cave!


    Who knew that the moment they stepped past the remains of the earth elementals, an explosive fireball exploded between the two of them.


    A short momentter, once the fire shockwaves had subsided, only two scorch marks could be seen on the spot. Not a trace of the ice elementals remained!


    The two alchemists shrugged and tossed out another two new vials.


    This time, two advanced stone elementals rose from the ground!

 Chapter 763 Slow Advance

    Earth elementals, ice elementals, stone elementals, lightning elementals, fire elementals...


    As long as it was a cheap and inexpensive elementium lifeform, the alchemists didn¡¯t mind summoning them from a distant otherworld to use as the cannon fodder for this scouting expedition.


    At any rate, a single vial of low-grade elemental summoning potion was only worth three magical crystals. Trading them for explosive fireball traps worth twelve magical crystals was worth it, no matter how you looked at it!


    The thirteen First Grade alchemist adepts took turns at their job, continually summoning all sorts of elementium lifeforms and ordering them to charge into the magma tunnels that led toward the lower levels. The continuous explosions and waves of searing heat turned this underground world upside down. Even the loose rocks and dust on the walls were falling from above.


    The tunnels were filled with suffocating dust and the smell of fire and smoke!


    "Enemy detected!"


    Every summoned elementium lifeform had a fragile soul connection to the alchemist adepts who had summoned them. The adepts would be able to obtain some information about the enemy through the soul feedback when the elementals were destroyed.


    While the elementium servants of the alchemists continued to dive into the tunnels, one of the alchemists suddenly shouted.


    "It wasn¡¯t a trap that killed my elementium servants, but...but a sort of never-before-seen metal golem!"


    It was obvious that the information he got from the soul connection was extremely vague and unclear. It made it difficult for him to describe the enemy.


    "Where?" The leader, Adept Roy, couldn¡¯t help but ask solemnly.


    "To the front and right. The second magma tunnel."


    Two new elementium lifeforms immediately charged into the tunnel he pointed out after he reported the enemy¡¯s position.


    These were two strange wind elementals!


    They didn¡¯t have humanoid bodies, and their appearances were simply miniature tornados. Two red lights in the center of the swirling winds functioned as their eyes. These elementals floated lightly in the air. They were almost weightless, which made them unsuitable candidates for triggering the traps.


    However, their flight speed was extremely fast, making them the perfect flying scouts.


    The two wind elementals had just turned a corner when they immediately ran into the strange metal golem that the adept had described. Both parties looked at each other from ten meters away, then immediately started charging at the same time.


    Several wind des cut across the air and sent sparks flying when they hit the three-meter tall humanoid golem encased in a gleaming metal shell. The terrifying creature ignored the attacks of the wind elementals and lifted both of its thick metal arms. Several metal cylinders extended from the front and fired rapid metal bullets that were so fast they couldn¡¯t be seen with the naked eye. The bullets struck the wind elementals, causing their bodies to tremble uncontrobly.


    The two beginner wind elementalspletely scattered after three seconds, their consciousness cores having been destroyed.


    The alchemist adepts looking at the freeze-frame of the metal golem projected on the light screen frowned. They quickly assessed the grade level of this metal golem.


    Adept-level!


    Of course,paring such a clumsy and slow metal golem to an official adept was thinking too highly of it. Still, considering its tough and imprable metal body and its rapid-fire goblin guns, it could easily counter ordinary apprentice adepts. Apprentice adepts would probably be murdered before they could even resist.


    Even pseudo-adepts had to watch out when dealing with these metal golems. After all, their weak magical defenses couldn¡¯t deal with the wild barrage of these metal bullets.


    "It seems we need to take out some real fellows to deal with this."


    An alchemist wickedly smiled as he took out arge vial and threw it onto the ground in front of him.


    The entire tunnel filled with the stench of rot as a gigantic slime-like monster emerged from the ground with its massive body.


    "Dammit, Singh! Can¡¯t you summon some more conventional magical beasts? Have it move away from us." The alchemist adepts covered their noses. A few of the female adepts even red furiously at the guy that summoned the slime creature.


    "It can¡¯t be helped. Other summoned creatures don¡¯t have the advantage against this metal lump in such tight corridors. The only way to deal with metal golems is either through brute force or corrosive acid." Adept Singh shrugged and ordered the ooze to crawl toward the other end of the tunnel slowly.


    Seven minutester, the ooze sessfully encountered the metal golem!


    There was no need for orders. The two creatures on opposing sides immediately started attacking each other savagely.


    Naturally, the metal golem was still using its rapid-fire metal bullets.


    In such a tight, narrow space, all it had to do was guard one end of the tunnel, and the enemy would have absolutely no chance at making it across. It was impossible to do it without paying a hefty price!


    One after another, the metal bullets filled with kic energy crossed the fifteen-meter distance and crashed into therge viscous body of the ooze.


    ......


    Several small holes appeared in the ooze¡¯s soft body. ck and pungent acid water poured out from the wounds. However, the slime seemed utterly ignorant to this fact and several appendages extended from its soft, jelly-like body, reaching toward the Archer magical machine.


    Small openings opened in its body as it approached, constantly shooting pungent acid at the joints of the Archer. The ck slime sizzled when itnded on the Archer¡¯s metal body, and thick white smoke rose into the air.


    The Archer had been programmed by the goblin engineers to defend this ce to its dying breath. As such, it did not take a single step back, even as the enemy continued to close in on it. The metal guns on its arms had already turned red from such rapid firing, but the stuttering gunfire of the bullets did not pause, even for a second.


    When the ooze reached the halfway point, two shoulders of the Archer split apart and revealed the array of goblin rockets within. The next second, eight goblin rockets shot out under the propulsion of bright yellow mes and embedded themselves in the body of the ooze.


    Beng! Beng! Beng!


    A series of energy explosions went within the fat and ugly body of the slime. It was like a water pouch that had been filled with too much liquid. Its body stretched to its limits and let out a terrifying straining sound.


    It seemed the expansion had reached a certain limit!


    Alchemist Adept Singh, who had been calmly watching the battle from behind the scenes, changed expressions.


    The next second, two more goblin rockets shot into the ooze¡¯s body and caused another round of explosions.


    This time, the ooze could no longer expand its body any further to neutralize the energy shockwave. It simply exploded before the eyes of the alchemist adepts.


    The entirety of the fifteen-meter-long tunnel was painted in a coat of sticky and pungent ck acid. Countless animal bones and hide remnants were mixed in with the mess. The entire shaft started to melt under the effect of the acid, almost as if it had turned into the stomach of a horrifying magical creature. The suffocating stench of its acid filled the air.


    The Archer that had been ordered to guard the corridor has also been sshed with acid. The surface of its metal body had been corroded into mud. Two thuds rang out; the metal arms of the Archer had been corroded and fell to its feet.


    A short momentter, the Archer crumbled as sparks flew out from within its body. It had finally malfunctioned!


    An adept-level ooze against an adept-level Archer magical machine ended with both of them defeated.


    Of course, this had to do with the geography here as well.


    If the Archer had been able to maneuver about and kite the enemy freely, it could probably have taken down this ooze with minimal damage. Unfortunately, there were no ifs in war.


    Adept Singh finally managed to eke out a smile when he saw the metal golem defeated. Still, losing an adept-level summon caused his heart to bleed.


    After all, an adept-level magical beast such as this easily went for a hundred magical crystals on the market. Losing it here like this made his heart hurt, even though he wasn¡¯t strapped for money.


    Just as his frown turned into a smile, a new Archer stepped out from the darkness on the other end of the tunnel. Its nging footsteps were clear to all as it appeared in sight of the alchemist adepts.


    Wew!


    The next second, a small hole appeared in the machine¡¯s chest as a thick stream of fire shot out, burning the entire tunnel.


    The acid might be terrifyingly corrosive, but even it couldn¡¯t endure such intense burning.


    A short momentter, the magical machine stopped the mes, and the tunnel turned as hard as steel once again. However, the surface of the walls, made of volcanic rock, had be uneven and filled with craters, much like the surface of the moon when inspected at a close distance.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it. A sort of odd firing device appeared from its back and started to shoot out round metal discs at various spots of the tunnel. These metal discs let out spikes uponnding and fixated themselves.


    Ayer of light shone over their smooth metal surfaces.


    Goblin Landmines!


    Having aplished all this, the Archer squatted down and raised its thick metal arms, aiming at everything in the other end of the tunnel. As hot air was expelled from the vents on its back, the revolver rifles within its metal arms started to roar wildly.

 Chapter 764 Advance and Ambush

    The advance on Fire Throne was unprecedentedly difficult!


    It was entirely beyond the imagination of the alchemist adepts. The Crimson n had stationed a shocking number of metal golems in the underground tunnel. Though these golemscked any offensive elementium abilities, their imprable metal bodies and destructive goblin guns allowed them to exterminate any invader that appeared before them.


    Moreover, apart from the goblin revolver rifles, they were also equipped with goblinndmines, goblin rockets, and goblin methrowers.


    Armed with all these goblin weapons, they became one-man armies capable of stopping enemies many times their number.


    The Magic Forest Hut alchemist adepts¡¯ dream to clear up the underground tunnel with the use of cheap elementium summons was shattered.


    The Archers were not unbeatable, but the price that the alchemists had to pay to destroy them was several times the original.


    Initially, Adept Singh had managed to destroy an Archer with an adept-level ooze. However, the goblin technicians behind the scenes immediately adjusted the equipment and attack patterns of the Archers, ensuring that such a thing would not happen again.


    In all of the following battles, the alchemist adepts had to pay three to five times the price of the Archer to take down any of the critical checkpoints in the tunnels. In particr, legions of magical machines appeared in some of the underground stone halls.


    They weren¡¯t very many in number¨C usually only appearing in groups of five or six.


    However, when gathered together, their metal bullets became a terrifying barrage. Any living being that appeared in front of them would be shredded and torn apart. The powerful metal bullets could even ricochet multiple times on the rock walls of the tunnels, making it hard for the enemy to predict their trajectory.


    The alchemists even had to apply physical, magical shields to their adept-level elementium servants. Otherwise, they would be destroyed before they could even get to the enemy. They would have been reduced toical target practice for the enemy.


    After charging through several paths, the Magic Forest Hut adepts had managed to destroy seventeen of the Crimson n¡¯s Archers. However, they had also paid the price of forty-two adept-level summoning potions in exchange. They had made it no more than seventy-five meters of progress.


    Even the typically rich and wealthy alchemists couldn¡¯t help but start gasping when they thought of the four to five hundred meters toe.


    Landlords might have quite a bit of grain to spare, but even the wealthy couldn¡¯t waste things like that!


    However, even though the situation was terrible, and the adept-level beasts were so ineffective, the alchemist adepts didn¡¯t intend to roll their sleeves up and participate in the fights personally.


    It was important to note that among the adepts, alchemists were often regarded as support adepts, along with potion masters, enchanters, and appraisers. Their personalbat prowess was extremely limited, and they relied entirely on magical potions to fight.


    Thus, after a long period of time, they became a unique group of fighters that were unwilling to risk their own lives and face the enemy personally.


    If they had to fight, they would rely on poisoning or summoning potions to gather a horde of cheap summons and flood the enemy. Furthermore, most alchemists liked to form groups to prevent enemies from diving at them and assassinating them before they could do anything.


    These alchemist adepts would definitely be able to endure the bullet barrage of the Archers and charge up to them if they were willing to take the risk. Their adept-level defensive spells were sturdy enough for that. When that happened, they would have much greater chances of exterminating the enemy and would be able to save quite a few of their adept-level summoning potions.


    Sadly, doing so would mean putting themselves at risk.


    If anything unexpected were to happen, they might be in danger of dying!


    Given the nature of the alchemist adepts, they would never lead the charge as long as there was a one-percent chance of a threat to their life. Hiding behind their elementium servants mighte at a high cost, but at least they didn¡¯t need to risk their own lives.


    It was better to pick the lesser of two evils!


    The alchemists of Magic Forest Hut continued their extravagance, justified in their logic.


    A group of vampires that had been hiding in ambush in the darkness of the caves for a long time cursed in annoyance.


    They¡¯d seen cowards, but they¡¯d never seen such cowardly ones!


    These sackless piece-of-shit adepts. What else could they do aside from summoning some elementium servants?


    Soros furiously cursed as he led several Second Grade vampires to hide in the shadows at the top of the cave.


    The enemy¡¯s advance was too slow and too cautious. That undoubtedly made it impossible for the vampires to ambush them. The narrow and hard tunnels made advancing difficult for the enemy, but it also made it difficult for the vampires to ambush them.


    With no choice left to him, Soros could only send a secret message to Gargamel and have him recall some of the Archers to weaken the resistance in the first half of the cave. It finally allowed the alchemist adepts to enter the underground hall that they had chosen as their ce of ambush.


    The enemies were retreating step by step. Though the price they paid for this was expensive, victory was in sight, wasn¡¯t it?


    The enemies in the underground hall had been disposed of. It was only now that the Magic Forest Hut alchemists entered the next hall and started inspecting the area.


    The thirteen First Grade adepts formed several groups. Some focused on summoning offensive elementium servants to storm into the following tunnels, while others summoned powerful high-grade earth elementals to reconfigure the geography of the hall and create better conditions for the main force.


    Though plenty of elementium servants had died in battle, there was still an uncountable number of voodoo beasts and summoned creatures gathered around the alchemists.


    The alchemist adept¡¯s concerns for their own safety had truly reached unbelievable degrees!


    It was already the second stone hall they had taken over.


    Much like the previous one, they swept away what they needed to and cleaned what they had to. There were also a few adepts who were mainly responsible for ensuring the safety of the tunnels.


    Several scanning waves of various elementium attributes swept across the stone hall, over and over. They did not sense the existence of any life forms or strange creatures. It was only now that the alchemists let down their guards and turned their attention to the attack and exploration of the underground tunnels toe.


    Just above the alchemists, in a spot they couldn¡¯t see, something was happening. It was a natural dent in the ceiling of the stone hall. There, a fist-sized stone carved full of strange patterns moved, revealing a narrow space behind it.


    Four vampires that had transformed into their bat forms climbed out of the space and hung upside down in the shadows. They narrowed their crimson eyes and silently looked at the busy alchemists below.


    These small stone spaces had been carefully dug out by the goblins. The stones sealing their entrances had even been carved with mysterious runes meant to obscure detection and hide auras. That was what allowed them to hide from the alchemists¡¯ spiritual scans and magical probing.


    Now, they were only waiting; waiting for a signal to strike from the tower.


    When that happened, it would be time for them to go all out and ughter the damned enemies below!


    ............


    Inside Magma Hall.


    Rows of neatly ordered Archers stood in silence as they waited forbat orders from the tower.


    Mary, dressed in her skintight crimson armor, stood proudly on the spot. She was listening to the explosionsing from the tunnels. Through all these loud sounds, Mary¡¯s special hearing senses managed to filter and recognize the supersonic signals mixed within.


    "The enemies have walked into the trap! Tell the defense party to counterattack!"


    After coldly giving out an order, Mary transformed into a palm-sized bat and quickly flew into the tunnels.


    "Hurry, hurry, hurry...give out the order for all Archers to immediately counterattack."


    Manticore Leader Charon immediately chased after Mary and gave out the order.


    The crimson bat that was Mary was like a sh of red lightning in these tunnels. She quickly glided through the dark underground space. Mary passed right by the magical machines in the tunnels and headed straight for somece in the distance.


    Her appearance was like a signal for the attack that was quickly being sent out. The eyes of the Archers waiting in the tunnels lit up as they snapped out of their defense and security modes. They transformed into their humanoidbat forms once again as they strode after Mary and charged toward the upper levels.


    In the blink of an eye, Mary arrived at the underground hall where the battle was raging on.


    Three Archers and twelve adept-level elementium servants were shing with each other. Two magical machine remnants rested in the corner of the battlefield, along with several times more corpses of magical creatures.


    Mary¡¯s sudden appearance undoubtedly drew the attention of both parties engaged inbat, but Mary seemed unaware of their gazes. She didn¡¯t seem to care about the battle happening below her. She passed straight by the fighting creatures and dove into the tunnel behind them.


    It was a powerful Second Grade adept!


    It was that vampire adept on the list!


    The alchemists who were observing the battle from afar with projection spells let out a gasp simultaneously.


    Dammit! That scary Second Grade vampire was headed straight for them!


    "What are you scared of? It¡¯s just her alone, and there¡¯s so many of us here. There¡¯s no need to be afraid of one vampire." Second Grade Roy lectured his subordinates, and the alchemists finally calmed down.


    "Have the voodoo beasts and elementium servants seal her path of retreat. We will surround and kill her here!"


    As Roy shouted, the adepts promptly gave the orders to their servants, and a temporary perimeter was hastily put together.


    When the colorful magical potions exploded, Mary¡¯s lightning-like silhouette appeared at the end of the hall.


    "Tremble, weaklings, for I will bring death to your side!"


    Mary let out her battlecry and lunged at the enemy before her.


    She quickly locked onto the leader of the Magic Forest Hut, dressed in the most extravagant clothes and holding hisposure¨C Second Grade Alchemist Adept Roy.


    The battle erupted in an instant!


    Chapter Notes:


    Editor Ryu: If you¡¯re enjoying Age of Adepts, now is a great time to stop by our Patreon and consider supporting this fine series! Patreon is mine and Eris¡¯ sole form of ie for working on this series, and everyone who supports us through Patreon helps ensure the continued trantion and release of AoA. The AoA Patreon has contribution tiers that give you ess to advance chapters of the series (fully tranted and edited) up to 15 chapters ahead of the GT releases. Thanks for your readership, and we hope to have your patronage as well.


    For those who would like to kick in a couple of bucks and aren¡¯t looking for advance chapters, we also have a Ko-Fi for one time donations and support. It doesn¡¯t see much use (hell, if you have a few bucks, you might as well be a Patron and get a few extra chapters ahead), but people still asionally help us through that, and every bit of support helps.


    As always, more than anything, thank you everyone for your continued readership and support of Age of Adepts!


    -Ryu

 Chapter 765 Battle Between Adepts

    Second Grade Vampire versus Second Grade Alchemist.


    Both of them were the same grade. At the very least, the strength of their souls was at approximately the same level. There were no concerns about grade difference suppression or a crushing defeat.


    As unconventional individuals amongst adepts, the power of Second Grade vampires was almost entirely invested into Agility. However, to avoid massive ws appearing in the overall coordination of their bodies, they still had to work hard on their Strength, Physique, and Spirit.


    If her Strength were too low, Mary¡¯s attacks against her enemies would be too weak.


    If her Physique were too frail, her speed would only make it easier for her to hurt herself.


    If her Spirit were insufficient, she would have trouble controlling the finer and more detailed movements of her body.


    All these factorsbined made it such that Mary had to raise her other bodily attributes to a certain standard, even though her Agility was her absolute trump card. That was the only way for her to unleash the fullest potential of her extreme Agility.


    In contrast to Mary, the Second Grade alchemist adept stood on the extreme opposite of the spectrum.


    Alchemist adepts were still ssified as elementium adepts. Naturally, this meant that their primary focus was Spirit. As they didn¡¯t need to engage in meleebat like body-refining adepts, they rarely ever spent time improving their Strength or Physique.


    Meanwhile, Agility was their shameful weakness!


    However, all these weaknesses could not be said to be ws for alchemist adepts.


    If they were too weak, they could simply drink an Elixir of Giants.


    If their Physique was too bad, they could drink an Elixir of Dragons.


    If their Agility was too low, they could use a Potion of Haste.


    In fact, even if theycked Spirit, they could choose to drink a Potion of Ancient Knowledge.


    Either way, they would be able to drink away any ws that they might possess!


    It was such an extreme thought process that drove alchemist adepts away from the habit of seriously training their own body. If they were to take off their magic robes, put aside their magical equipment, and remove all of their magical enhancements, their Physique would not be much higher than the average human.


    Moreover, they also didn¡¯t seem to be all that passionate and active when it came to training their Spirit, which was supposed to be the one attribute they relied on.


    As Second Grade adepts, most elementium adepts would choose to spend much of their time on raising their Spirit. For example, Greem, despite only twenty years since his advancement, had managed to raise his Spirit from twenty-one points to twenty-six points.


    Alchemist adepts, on the other hand, spent most of their time in theirboratories on the collection, organization, and brewing of alchemical potions!


    That also caused Roy to only possess twenty-four points of Spirit despite having advanced seventy-nine years ago.


    This number might have been passable amongst ordinary Second Grade adepts, but it was utterly inadequate in the face of Bloody Mary, whose Agility was as high as twenty-six points.


    At the very least, Roy was at a certain disadvantage on the battlefield!


    After all, alchemist adepts were naturally not skilled inbat!


    The battle erupted the very instant Mary charged onto the battlefield.


    Roy had undoubtedly done very well as the defending.


    In just half a second, he had taken out various colorful potions from his pouches and activated them.


    The first vial thrown into the battle suddenly exploded, and a thick gray mist was released. A powerful aura appeared and the grey mist quickly gathered into a humanoid creature that was five meters tall.


    From a distance, this powerful lifeform had a body, arms, head, and even some vague facial features. However, everything below its waist was still a swirl of mist and fog.


    This Second Grade cloud giant roared loudly upon being summoned. It then rushed at the approaching Mary.


    Roy still didn¡¯t feel safe, despite the cloud giant stalling Mary and him being protected by multiple alchemists and magical creatures. More and more vials exploded in his hands.


    Some of these potions exploded into brilliant magical lights and applied magical halos on Roy and the lifeforms around him. Some summoned odd wind spirits that giggled as they turned invisible and vanished in the air. Some solidified into an oddly-colored magical armor that clung onto his body. Some summoned a massive, twenty-meter long, one-meter thick ck mamba on the spot that cautiously watched Roy¡¯s surroundings for danger.


    That was only Adept Roy¡¯s battle preparation. There were thirteen more First Grade adepts around him. When they acted together, the explosion of mysterious lights and magical enhancements, along with the summoning of their servants, was bright enough to blind an ordinary mortal.


    A moment ago, these alchemist adepts had been alone in the room. The very next, they were surrounded by a massive crowd!


    Just as they alchemist adeptspleted theirbat preparations, the cloud giant they had put out as a sacrifice vanished amidst its cries and roaring.


    Summoned creatures were summoned creatures after all. Even though it was of the same grade as Mary, there was still a massive difference in strength. Mary managed to pierce the consciousness brand within its body after thirty seconds, causing it to fade into oblivion.


    Mary had now returned to her Bloody Sorceress form: the skintight crimson armor, crimson wings, sharp ws, protruding fangs, and her zing red eyes.


    Mary beat her bat wings and slowly approached the alchemist adepts. Her intimidating aura resembled that of an empress descending upon her subjects. The fearsome smell of blood filled every corner of the stone hall.


    The many alchemist adepts couldn¡¯t help but turn white as a sheet, even while hiding within the horde of magical creatures and protected byyers of magical defenses.


    "Adept Mary, stop dreaming of fending off our invasion!" Adept Roy, who thought himself safe, couldn¡¯t help but say, "The number of adepts in our alliance is beyond your imagination. Surrender quickly, and we can give you a chance to join us. Or else..."


    Adept Roy¡¯s passionate gaze swept across Mary¡¯s seductive body. A zing me of desire rose up in his heart.


    "What? Interested in me? Thene out and let me take a look at you!" Mary chuckled as a beautiful and sweet smile appeared on her face. Only those who knew her well could sense the anger bubbling in her cold eyes.


    ¡°Fend off your invasion? Hahaha, why does it look like I¡¯m the one attacking you guys now, then?"


    "Damned girl, don¡¯t you talk back. Once we¡¯ve broken into your tower, you will grovel before me and beg for mercy." Roy cursed angrily, utterly ignorant that Mary¡¯s crimson eyes were glowing ever brighter as he talked. They were almost as bright as stars at night now.


    "Hmph! Do you think you guys are the only ones with numbers? Numbers are useless before true power. Only power and power alone is fundamental for establishing ourselves. Come out, my servants."


    Mary opened her wings to their limits and shouted with the tone andmand of the Bloody Queen.


    As her high-pitched voice reached its limits, a horrifying energy aura abruptly erupted from the shadows on the ceiling. Four powerful bloodkin appeared simultaneously and dove at the backs of the alchemist adepts.


    Four more Second Grades?


    Though the energy aura in their bodies was one or two levels weaker than a Second Grade adept, that overflowing soul aura was indeed that of Second Grades.


    The enemy had sent five Second Grades to deal with the Magic Forest Hut. One of them was even the famous Bloody Queen. This...this was way too over the top!


    The thought of running arose in Adept Roy¡¯s heart before the fight had even started.


    However, nearly eighty percent of the adepts of the Magic Forest Hut were here. If he, the leader of the organization, were to run now, the remaining adepts would be subjected to the ughter of the enemy. It would be far too big of a blow to the Magic Forest hut!


    Thus, Roy expelled the idea from his heart the moment it appeared.


    Defend. Wait for our allies to send reinforcements.


    After making up his mind, Roy no longer dared to hold back. He threw out another two vials glowing with brilliant magical light. In a single move, Roy summoned a blood giant and a lightning elemental, both of them Second Grade creatures. It was only now that he felt a bit calmer andposed.


    "Charge! End it fast!"


    Maryughed coldly as her silhouette turned into a crimson bolt of lightning. She leaped headfirst into the alchemists¡¯ range of attack. The two blood knights and blood elves followed in order,unching their ferocious charge as well.


    The next second, blinding light erupted in the hall, and a dozen magical lights of various colors gathered together and turned into an overwhelming magical tide that engulfed the bodies of the vampires.


    The alchemist adepts were considered elementium adepts still. Though they experimented with potions a lot more, they did not wholly abandon their fundamental spells and magic. The thirteen First Grade adepts cast thirteen First Grade spells, while Roy¡¯s Second Grade Starfire Poison Cloud engulfed all five of the vampires in a light yellow cloud.


    The next second, the spells exploded and rang out. The magical creatures roared as elementium explosions appeared everywhere. Flesh and blood sttered across the ground, and the sounds of elementium shields shattering mixed into the chaos, turning into a deafening sound wave that furtherplicated the scene.


    However, during this chaos, Mary and her four subordinates had sessfully broken free of the range of attacks.


    Though their bodies and armor had been ravaged by the tide of magic, Mary and her two blood knights had each managed to catch a First Grade alchemist adept.


    These captured adepts hung limply from their arms; it seemed their limbs had been disjointed. However, they were still entirely conscious and yelling for help.


    Sadly, before the other alchemists could even respond, Mary and her two blood knights sank their fangs into the necks of their prey and started sucking.


    The wounds on their bodies healed and recovered at a visible rate as they were shrouded by blood energy. Soon, not a scratch was left.


    The faces of the alchemist adepts, Roy included, immediately turned green!

 Chapter 766 Bloody Battle of the Stone Hall

    While the intense battle began in Fire Cave, everything happening underground was also being projected in the central tent on the surface.


    Sinister smiles appeared on the faces of the adepts in the tent when they saw the terrible performance of the Magic Forest Hut adepts. The alchemists had always relied on their monopoly over their potions to behave arrogantly toward their peers. Every single adept n here had been subject to their attitude.


    Now that they got to see those alchemists being beaten like dogs, it wasn¡¯t humiliation that arose in their hearts, but a genuine, heartfelt pleasure.


    These alchemist adepts should have been taught a lesson a long time ago. They should have been made to understand that the only thing that adepts should believe in was still power!


    And they were only a bunch of ves to knowledge!


    Still, they were their allies this time. As such, they couldn¡¯t just sit by and let them be ravaged by the vampires.


    Third Grade Vampire Adept Haines Vik looked at the pretty figure dashing between the alchemists on the screen. He couldn¡¯t help but betray a sinister killing intent.


    Dammit, dammit, dammit. It was all because of this woman that his Vik Family had encountered their most significant defeat and loss in several hundred years. This woman...this woman caused the Vik family to regress by three hundred years.


    Haines couldn¡¯t suppress his restless blood when he thought of his descendant¡¯s blood flowing through the body of an outsider. He thought of his hundreds of years of efforts going to waste.


    This damned woman must die!


    This damned woman must die!


    This damned woman must die!


    Haines tried his best to suppress his emotions and elegantly said, "Since we have drawn out that woman, then let me end this thoroughly!"


    Haines was visibly inhaling to calm himself down when he said the words that woman.


    All operations of this alliance were led by Third Grade Adept Yurga of the Kam n. As such, Haines still needed to tell him if he wanted to participate in the fighting.


    Third Grade adepts would never be held back!


    Haines¡¯ suggestion was immediately approved. His silhouette flickered in the tent as the vampire had vanished without a trace.


    ............


    The Underground Stone Hall.


    The bitter battle between the two parties was still ongoing.


    As an official Second Grade adept, Mary put all of her attention on the Second Grade alchemist adept. In a mere three minutes, they had exchanged over one hundred and seventy-four blows. The amount of damage they had inflicted on each other was awe-inspiring as well.


    Only one of the two Second Grade elementium servants that Roy had summoned was left.


    The lightning elemental had fallen to Mary¡¯s ferocious attacks, but it had also managed to shock and carbonize the right half of Mary¡¯s body. If it weren¡¯t for Mary sucking blood in time and regenerating her wounds, today¡¯s battle would havee to a swift end.


    As a vampire adept, Mary¡¯sbat style was exceptionally fearless and ferocious.


    She relied on her high Agility and swift figure to continually weave in and out of the alchemists¡¯ defensive circle, asionally charging in to wound or abduct an enemy with her sharp ws. These First Grade fellows were no more than human targets in her eyes. Their movements were stiff and slow, while their magic had trouble locking onto Mary¡¯s phantom-like form.


    Most of the alchemists had no choice but to swap out their powerful single-target spells to area-of-effect spells in hopes of forcing back the ghostly vampire by stacking all of their damage.


    If Mary¡¯s attacks were said to be like those of a phantom assassin, then the two blood knights were like human tanks. They had been knights to begin with, and the battle techniques they knew were also mostly centered around mid to close range. Consequently, the two blood knights brandished their crimson longswords and tackled the enemy line at the very start of battle, enduring the constant attacks from the alchemists.


    Crimson Cross!


    Bloodrage Charge!


    Fierce Strike!


    Crimson Storm!


    ......


    The many knight techniques that came from their hands would easily exterminate groups of magical creatures and elementium servants. Meanwhile, most of the enemy¡¯s attacks could not deal much damage to them after being weakened by the blood mist around them and wind indurium armor they wore.


    Even if a focused barrage of attacks wounded them, they could consume blood to replenish their lost life force. Their bodies were stuck in an endless cycle of being damaged and being healed.


    As for the two Second Grade blood elves? They didn¡¯t have such tough bodies and could only use the Blood Bullet, Blood Boil, Bloody ughter, Vampiric Aura, and various other blood magics that they had just mastered to attack the enemy from afar.


    These blood magic spells might not be too powerful in terms of offensive effects, but they excelled at disrupting enemies.


    Blood Bullet was only a single crimson energy ball fired at the enemy. The energy ball contained some degree of blood corrosion effect.


    Blood Boil could cause the target¡¯s blood to boil, thus depriving them of the ability to move.


    Bloody ughter was more like a charm spell. It could cause the target to lose their rationality and be overtaken by an impulse to ughter.


    Vampiric Aura was an even more sinister blood-magic. Creatures engulfed by its halo would have all of their lost life force absorbed by the blood elves, turning into energy that sustained the blood elves in battle.


    These two blood elves were stirring up trouble from the outside. They periodically used Bloody ughter to turn one or two of the alchemists into red-eyed madmen, forcing them to take up their staffs and beat the people around them.


    Fortunately, adepts affected by Bloody ughter would temporarily forget their spellcasting abilities. The effect would also onlyst for three to five seconds on First Grade adepts. Otherwise, the alchemist adepts¡¯ defensive line would have been torn down by their own magic.


    However, with the blood elves opening up holes in their defenses, the two rampaging blood knights could quickly increase the size of these holes, turning them into weak spots that the enemy could not patch up.


    The alchemists had no choice but to drink vials of soul-protection potions to defend against the killing impulse rising in their hearts. At the same time, they had to continually summon more elementium servants to stop the advance of the blood knights.


    Both parties were caught together in an arduous and bloody battle in the hall!


    When it came tobat power, it was clear that the adepts of the Magic Forest Hut had the numerical advantage.


    Apart from their magical creatures and elementium servants, each of these alchemist adepts also possessed one or two offensive magics of great power. Their focused fire would always inflict tremendous wounds on one of the blood knights and cause him to cry in pain. They weren¡¯t weak in close quarters either. Every one of them had bundles of instant-cast magic wands. Even if they were to use each of them a single time only, they would be able to drown the enemy in a tide of spells.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the blood knights¡¯ unique ability to regenerate by consuming blood, there was a real possibility they would have been ground down to their deaths!


    The Magic Forest Hut adepts might be able to drive back the enemy with their ferocious firepower for the moment. However, if the battle drags on, the magical creatures and elementium servants that formed their defensive circles would be wiped away. The disadvantage of fighting against Second Grades as First Grades would immediately be apparent.


    They wove signs for casting, they quick-summoned servants, and they repeatedly used magic wands. Most of their attacks relied on magic potions and magic wands, causing them to use up very little of their own magic power. However, once the battle dragged out, their untrained and unrefined Spirits will have trouble keeping up with the opponent¡¯s pace.


    For the four Second Grade vampires, these Magic Forest Hut adepts were like a herd of sheep working together to fend off a wolf pack. Initially, they could still square off against the wolves with their perfect formation and courage. If their defensive line was torn apart and one or two of the wolves made their way in, the flock would immediately fall apart. They would no longer be able to fight against the enemy like before.


    The moment the herd of sheep scattered, Mary appeared beside Adept Roy like a phantom assassin.


    "You want to kill me? You are not qualified!" Adept Roy yelled madly as he pulled out the cork from a small vial in his hands.


    As yellow and green mist spread into the air, he roared and took the fog into his own body, turning his skin a dark green.


    Mary brushed past him, and her sharp ws left three bone-deep cuts on his unprotected neck. Under normal circumstances, Roy would have had to cover his neck with his hand and retreat from battle.


    However, he roared and pulled out a magic wand from his waist. An instant-cast Sr Ray put a hole in Mary¡¯s stomach.


    Moreover, the wound on his cleanly cut throat appeared to be pale and clean; there wasn¡¯t a single drop of blood from the injury. Countless squirming tentacles emerged from the skin around the cut. They meshed together quickly, and the fatal wound was healed in a matter of seconds.


    Hmph! Zombification.


    Mary groaned in pain. She quickly understood why the opponent hadn¡¯t died and had instead retaliated so quickly.


    The mist that he had just absorbed must have temporarily allowed him to possess the ability to zombify his flesh. This way, he was able to avoid some mortal flesh wounds. He took advantage of Mary¡¯s ineffective strike to rapidly lock onto her position and counter with a magic attack.


    Mary smiled coldly upon understanding what had happened.


    If she didn¡¯t possess the ability to regenerate by sucking blood, she might have been afraid of this strange ability to trade wound for wound. However, now...Mary let out a battlecry and extended her wings. She once again turned into a sh of lightning as she charged at Adept Roy.


    The two parties passed by each other!


    Two new holes appeared on Mary¡¯s body while a terrifying gap appeared where Roy¡¯s heart was.


    "You can¡¯t kill me!" Roy yelled wildly, his face full of madness, "Once our reinforcements arrive, this will be your grave!"


    While he shouted, Mary turned about andunched a third charge.


    Roy¡¯s face couldn¡¯t turn any paler!

 Chapter 767 Marys Choice

    The moment of exchanging blows was extremely brief!


    With Mary¡¯s exceptional Agility, she could choose to move around the outside and close in when she wanted to attack. Roy¡¯s attacks would never be able to catch up to her.


    However, considering the enemy reinforcements that could arrive at any time, Mary could only choose to break through the situation by force and establish the battlefield advantage by trading wound for wound.


    The blood giant beside Roy had simr elementium attributes to Mary. As such, both of their blood magic lost effectiveness, and they could only rely on their strong bodies to fight.


    Mary had no choice but to pay the price to break through the blood giant¡¯s defense quickly!


    The blood giant cut open a half-meter long gash on Mary¡¯s right arm as she passed by. Some strange energies had been attached to her wound as well, causing her regeneration ability to be temporarily ineffective.


    However, this way, Mary would be able to confront Second Grade Alchemist Adept Roy.


    It was difficult to catch Mary¡¯s phantasmal figure at this lightning instant. Only the powerful spiritual senses of a Second Grade adept could make out Mary¡¯s current position.


    Without any hesitation, two vials bubbling with purple potions flew at Mary. Meanwhile, Adept Roy crushed another potion in his hand as he stumbled backward, causing an earthy-yellow mist to gather in front of him.


    First, Mary felt her consciousness fade for an instant; everything in front of her began to turn chaotic and upside down. The mist engulfed her, and her body tightened up. Her skin immediately lost all feeling as this strange numbness quickly spread toward the insides of her body.


    Dammit! These were Hallucination and Petrification Potions!


    Other elementium adepts couldn¡¯t possibly instant-cast so many offensive spells that could break through a Second Grade adept¡¯s defensive forcefield, especially in such a short time frame. However, alchemist adepts were simply like broken bugs in aputer system. They could achieve such an astounding effect by using potions instead of spells.


    Of course, for this very express purpose, they had even invented ande up with a professional handling method to toss out potions rapidly!


    The retreating Adept Roy promptly stopped when he saw that Mary had been affected by his potions. He took out a mysterious wand glowing with rainbow light from near his waist and pointed the purple-red crystal at the tip of the rod at the immobilized vampire. He quickly chanted the activation code for the wand.


    Ruin!


    This magic wand was enchanted with a Second Grade single-target elementium spell¨C Ruin!


    All targets hit by Ruin would have the elementium power within their bodies go out of control and explode. The target of the spell wouldpletely disintegrate, from their flesh bodies to their souls.


    There weren¡¯t very many adepts who had mastered such a terrifying spell, and those that could enchant a wand with it were even fewer. Even Adept Roy had paid a high price to obtain this wand.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for the massive loss they had suffered here today, Roy would never have been willing to use up such a trump card.


    Though the spell inside the wand could be used repeatedly after recharging, such a powerful Second Grade magic wand would take five days to recharge. This ace could not be used for the following five days!


    However, using up a trump card to kill a Second Grade vampire seemed to be worth it, no matter how you thought about it!


    After a short activation chant, a gray beam shot out and reduced ¡¯Mary¡¯ to dust. Not a trace of her was left.


    Roy opened his eyes wide as rms red in his mind.


    Regardless of how low Mary¡¯s magic resistance was, she should not have been reduced to nothingness in the face of a Second Grade Ruin! What about her magical equipment? What about the vampire core in her body? Internal elementium explosions shouldn¡¯t be big enough to vaporize the clothes as well, could they?


    This...this was an illusion!


    Roy instantly understood everything and his arm shook. The magic wand of Ruin vanished, and eight potions of various colors mysteriously appeared between his fingers. Given one second¨Cno, half a second¨Che could re-arm himself with these potions with multiple effects.


    Sadly, weightless crimson lightning passed by his side without a sound. The next second, his arms flew into the sky along with the eight potion vials andnded far away.


    Aaaaaah!


    Roy howled in agony as a fountain of blood spurted from his severed arms. He was quickly stained in red.


    The blood giant, surrounding magical creatures, and elementium servants charged forward and once again used their bodies to protect Adept Roy. Meanwhile, Mary¡¯s pretty figure appeared across from them. She was licking the dripping blood from her sharp ws using her full, red lips.


    Good...very good. This Second Grade alchemist adept had lost all ability to resist. She could now bring him back and turn him into her food. In all seriousness, Mary had never tasted the fresh blood of a Second Grade adept since she had be a Second Grade vampire.


    However, just as she took a step forward and prepared to deal the finishing blow to these annoying fellows, a sense of danger that came from the depths of her soul instantly overtook her entire being.


    Mary lunged backward without hesitation and retreated several dozens of meters.


    The next second, a cloud of blood mist engulfed her original position.


    The mist was dense and smelled intensely of blood. Terrifying blood corrosion power was contained within the fog, as it was clear from the strange sizzling sound of corrosion that came from the mist¡¯s contact with the air and the ground.


    The initially tough volcanic rock floor melted at a visible rate under the corrosion of the blood mist. Soon, a crimson pool of blood one meter in diameter had appeared on the ground.


    Mary¡¯s body trembled and her face instantly flushed white!


    If she hadn¡¯t dodged earlier, her entire body would have been melted there and turned into part of the blood pool. Her magic resistance was no more than a joke before blood corrosion powers of this level.


    Dammit! This was just a precursory skirmish. How did it turn into the personal show of a high-grade adept so quickly!?


    Mary didn¡¯t need to look with her eyes or sense with her Spirit. Just this terrifying elementium blood pool was enough to inform her of her new enemy. He was an old opponent of the Crimson n and the nemesis in Mary¡¯s life!


    The blood knights and blood elves retreated from the battlefield without another word. They gathered before Mary and red with their crimson eyes at the tunnel leading to the surface.


    A tall and skinny figure slowly emerged from the darkness.


    Before his appearance could be clearly seen, his intimidating crimson eyes were already shining through the darkness.


    Pride, disdain, and unconceble hatred shone in those crimson eyes, forcefully cing an overwhelming aura of might upon Mary¡¯s mental consciousness.


    Mary¡¯s trembling intensified, and the blood knights and blood elves in front of her crumbled to the ground. Their limbs gave way as their entire bodies shivered uncontrobly.


    "Haines Vik!" Mary gritted her teeth and pronounced this wicked name with a cold and chilling tone.


    The figure in the darkness slowly approached. Finally, he broke free of the shadows aa the light in the stone hall fell upon him.


    He wore extravagant and fancy noble clothes, had neat, slick brown hair, and a carefully trimmed mustache. This outsider appeared utterly different from the average adept in terms of appearance. In fact, his elegance made him look more like a human noble.


    However, those strange crimson eyes that were bright as stars betrayed his true identity. His entire being was shrouded in a veil of mystery.


    Compared to before, this ruler of the Vik Family appeared significantly older. The wrinkles on his face were also apparent for all to see. It was evident that the past few years had not been kind to this Third Grade vampire n leader.


    At the very least, his Spirit seemed to be a lot more shriveled and worn-out!


    "Gargamel, I need back-up!"


    Mary silently used a messaging spell tomunicate with Gargamel, who was within the adept¡¯s tower.


    A short momentter, a redyer of light appeared around Mary and her bloodkin, helping them resist the spiritual pressure projected by the Third Grade vampire.


    The disabled vampires instantly regained their energy, and they got up from the ground with pale faces. Though they had temporarily returned to normal, they still didn¡¯t dare to lock eyes with the Third Grade vampire in fear of their mental consciousness being suppressed again.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Their bloodline origin came from Mary, and the vampire bloodline flowing through Mary¡¯s body originated from this Third Grade vampire in front of them.


    Seeing this vampire was like seeing their bloodline ancestor. Being able to stand up straight with the protection of the tower was already an incredible feat!


    The four subordinates transformed into bats and fled back underground with Mary¡¯s approval. As long as Haines was here, they would not be able to help Mary at all! As such, it was best to flee as soon as possible.


    "My lord, these vampires killed five of my adepts. You can¡¯t just let them go." Adept Roy protested as he hastily healed himself and reattached his arms through some strange method.


    Unfortunately, his protests fell on deaf ears. Haines only had eyes for Mary at this moment. He couldn¡¯t care less about a few Second Grade blood servants.


    "Good. Very good," Hainesughed coldly, "I thought your first thought upon seeing me would be to flee! Who knew this bloodline would assimte so perfectly with you. Good...very good; simply too excellent!"


    No one could understand what Haines was feeling or thinking as they listened to him mutter to himself wildly.


    However, what surprised the adepts was that the Second Grade female vampire had no intention of fleeing in the face of Adept Haines increasing aggression. Instead, she bared her fangs and looked as if she was about to counterattack at any moment.


    What? She...she intended to challenge a Third-Grade vampire with the strength of a Second Grade?


    For a moment, everyone was stunned!

 Chapter 768 Vampire Civil War

    Second Grade versus Third Grade?


    It was something that couldn¡¯t possibly happen in the World of Adepts.


    Such a thing could never happen, regardless of how powerful the Second Grade adept was and how weak the Third Grade adept was.


    The World of Adepts was one of the famousrge nes of the multiverse. Its division of the adept grades was also undoubtedly one of the most authoritative ones. A certain busybody once did a calction. For every increase in an adept¡¯s grade, the adept¡¯s power would increase significantly by over ten times.


    It was precisely due to the strictness of the World of Adept¡¯s division of grades that the adepts had be such a famous and intimidating group in the multiverse.


    Thus, all the adepts in the stone hall and the tent were stunned to see this Second Grade female vampire prepare herself for battle against the intermediate Third Grade Vampire Haines.


    This Bloody Mary seemed to be a fearless person.


    Of course she was fearless. She had an adept¡¯s tower supporting her from behind.


    The adepts in the tent started gossiping and talking. Finally, someone pointed out the real reason behind Mary¡¯s actions. The talking adepts immediately understood what was happening. That was right; she was within the radius of the tower!


    The discussion outside naturally couldn¡¯t disturb the two vampires.


    "Not bad!" Even Haines himself couldn¡¯t help but praise Mary, let alone the people outside. However, it was hard to tell whether he appreciated Mary¡¯s reckless impulse, or whether her unmoving will actually moved him.


    After all, the fact that she could stand straight and resist the power of the bloodline while he was right in front of her was already well beyond his expectations!


    In the end, vampire adepts belonged to the ranks of bloodlines adepts. The power of their bloodline was almost entirely woven into the core contents of their growth and development. It had probably been etched into their flesh, their bodies, and their souls.


    That was why having a bloodline adept resist their bloodline origin was no different from having them fight against themselves. There was no chance of victory.


    At the very least, there had never been such an urrence in the history of bloodline adepts!


    The power that the tower remotely sent over was supporting and protecting Mary¡¯s mind, allowing her to avoid enduring the instinct to submit that came from the depths of her soul and bloodline. The bloodline of vampires might not be all that impressive, but it was extraordinarily savage and unrelenting. The energy or bloodline power of any other species could only be nutrition for its further growth. There was no possibility of assimtion with other bloodlines.


    In theory, even a dragon, once converted into a vampire, would turn into a pure-blooded vampire in the shortest time possible. A situation where the vampire bloodline co-existed with the dragon bloodline was not possible. From this aspect, the vampire bloodline was even more overbearing than a dragon bloodline and even more extreme!


    For instance, some major vampire families could give birth to blood descendants by natural means. As this rxed part of the bloodline shackles on descendants, truly independent souls only had a chance of appearing from among such descendants. Meanwhile, blood servants created through the Embrace were personal soul ves that purely belonged to themselves. These servants had no true freedom or independence.


    As Mary had perfectly inherited the vampire bloodline of Leicester, she waspletely free, from a particr perspective. However, Mary¡¯s current understanding and exploitation of her bloodline power was still too limited. That was what caused her to be restrained by the constant spiritual pressure and bloodline summonings of her blood origin.


    The blessing of the tower improved Mary¡¯s abilities significantly. She red coldly at the approaching Haines and bent down slightly. The blood energy in her body started to circte and rise at a wild pace.


    The next second, the two vampires of different grades bared their sharp fangs simultaneously and charged at each other with all of their savagery and brutality.


    Mary¡¯s body had initially been very slender and frail. Even her five fingers were just as long and white.


    However, now, as the surging blood energy filled her hands, her slender fingers turned crimson red as her nails started to grow wildly. They had be sharp and gleamed with a cold light.


    Ever since she had advanced to Second Grade, Mary had fallen in love with this pleasant feeling of ripping her enemy¡¯s throat and piercing their hearts with her ws. Moreover, such close-ranged attacks made it easier for her to absorb sufficient blood to regenerate the damage to her body and the Spirit she had exhausted.


    The two high-grade vampires were like two rapid and ferocious storms, tearing at each other with wild abandon in the stone hall. However, it was clear that Haines¡¯ speed, Strength, Agility, and Physique were all above Mary¡¯s. More significantly, whenever Mary¡¯s blood energy tried to stop Haines¡¯ wounds from healing, the blood energy would simply be absorbed. Meanwhile, Mary couldn¡¯t deal with Haines¡¯ blood attacks with such ease!


    If it weren¡¯t for the blessing of the tower providing Mary¡¯s attributes a certain degree of improvement, she would probably have had immense trouble keeping up with Haines¡¯ speed and rhythm. She would have been unable to do anything other than stand there and be toyed with like a dull puppet.


    Even so, Mary was at an absolute disadvantage in this civil war between vampires. She was forced to dodge with all she had, and the terrifying gashes on her body were only increasing in count and severity.


    Mary had no way of obtaining any blood from Haines¡¯ body. She asionally opened up deep cuts on his body, but the ripped flesh would regenerate in a short amount of time. The blood that had been spilled would also turn into odd fanged creatures in midair.


    These drops of blood seemed to have a mind of their own and would wriggle and twist in the air. The closest drop of blood to Haines would turn and instantly dive into his body. The ones that were further away would drop to the ground and transform into all sorts of weird shapes as they bounced and jumped after him.


    It was a shocking scene to behold!


    Mary felt exhausted after a mere seven seconds in battle.


    For some unknown reason, the wounds Haines inflicted also bled blood-energy at an extraordinary rate. Mary couldn¡¯t stop the loss of blood essence even when she consciously locked down the blood energy within her body. What made things worse was the fact that she couldn¡¯t get any blood from Haines.


    Such loss without any hope of replenishment was taking a toll on Mary, even with her Physique; she couldn¡¯tst much longer.


    Mary tried her best to fight as she retreated, and the two of them dashed all over the narrow tunnels of Fire Cave as they fought. If it wasn¡¯t for the remote protection of the tower, Mary would have long since been captured by Haines and turned into his prisoner.


    Several squads of Archers hiding in various spots in the darkness released furious tongues of fire and violent storms of metal to engulf Haines.


    Sadly, all they could capture were the afterimages that Haines left in the air. Haines¡¯ real body flickered to a corner of the tunnel like a phantom as he pursued Mary and quickly exterminated the Archers.


    The imprable alloy bodies of the Archers exploded intoponents and metal shards under the corrosion of a Third Grade vampire¡¯s blood energy. They didn¡¯t evenst more than a moment. As the two vampires extended the battlefield underground, such explosions from the magical machines became even more frequent.


    "Dammit, Lady Mary can¡¯tst much longer! We have to find a way to bring her back." Gargamel shouted angrily, his voice filled with unconceble worry and concern.


    Mary was already the most powerful adept of the tower at the moment. If even she couldn¡¯t fend off the attacks of a Third Grade adept under the support of the tower, how were they supposed to deal with the siege that came after?


    The other Second Grade bloodkin could not be sent out again.


    It was clear from their fear of Haines that the effects of a battle between high-grade vampires on them were too great. In such a situation, the only ones that could help Mary were Dragonborn Zacha and Tigule.


    Tigule was still hesitating, but Zacha had already courageously lifted his Frozen Mallet and Lightning Spear. He roared and charged into the dark and narrow tunnels. Tigule let out a bitter smile. He was worried that something might happen to Zacha. Thus, he let out the Goblin Shredder, jumped into the machine, and followed after the dragonborn.


    If a Second Grade couldn¡¯t deal with that Third Grade vampire, then three of them would fight him at once!


    Zacha and Tigule were enveloped in the crimson magical forcefield created by the tower¡¯s blessing. They roared and lunged out of the darkness, quickly joining the battle against Haines.


    One had to admit that the heavy armor and dragon scales on Zacha, as well as the Goblin Shredder¡¯s thirty-centimeter-thick alloy armor were way too dense for a vampire to pierce. Even though every w attack from Haines carried with it over three hundred points of blood attribute damage, he couldn¡¯t do anything if his attacks couldn¡¯t pierce the enemy¡¯s armor.


    If they were the only two dealing with Haines, then the old vampire had over a hundred ways to slowly use his blood energy to destroy their defenses before murdering them. However, when the three of them gathered together¨Cthe dragonborn attacking, the Goblin Shredder defending, and Mary stalling¨Cthen even the Third Grade Haines couldn¡¯t help but be troubled.


    If he tried to focus on Mary, she could easily kite him for a period of time with her twenty-eight points of Agility (her own twenty-six points with a +2 bonus from the tower). During this time, the Second Grade dragonborn¡¯s lightning spear and Frozen Mallet, along with the Goblin Shredder¡¯s magical guns, posed a decent threat to the Third Grade vampire.


    At the very least, Haines could no longer ignore the threat that they represented!


    On the other hand, if Haines wanted to focus on the two of them, the dragonborn¡¯ssting lifeforce and the goblin¡¯s speechlessly sturdy machine made them challenging targets.


    Third Grade Haines weaved between the three enemies, always finding gaps and opportunities to dive in. He would asionally scratch Zacha, strike at Mary, or lead Tigule about in circles. However, he still had no way to exterminate any one of them quickly.


    Thus, the battle continued in this awkward stalemate!

 Chapter 769 The Adept Towers Trouble

    Inside the main tent at the camp.


    The various leaders and representatives of the adept ns were gathered together and silently watched everything happening on the light screen.


    Sinister and chilling smiles appeared on their faces when they saw Third Grade Haines bogged down by Mary and the other two Second Grades. Some adepts who didn¡¯t get along with the old vampire even let out cold snorts.


    "Lord Yurga, what do you think? Do we need to send reinforcements to Lord Haines?" Some adepts suggested.


    Everyone here could clearly see that the enemies were only able to square off with the old vampire due to the tower¡¯s blessing. Once the camp sent out enough manpower, the Crimson adepts would not have enough power to threaten the many Second Grade adepts here.


    Just as everyone got excited, the sinister adept sitting at the very front coldly said, "Everyone, have you forgotten how the Vik Family lostst time?"


    Everyone¡¯s heart sank, and the volunteering for battle quickly quietened down.


    Indeed,st time, Old Vampire Haines had charged into the Magma Hall before him and his family members had established themselves. In the end, the sly Crimson n guided boilingva into the tunnels, sealing their exit before summoning a Third Grade thunder dragon to defeat them all.


    The strategy was a simple one, but there was no easy solution with the geography being what it was here!


    Fire Throne was hidden deep underground. It was impossible to invade the tower unless they went down there. However, if they were to bring their armies down into the underground world, they could quickly have their exit path cut off by the Crimson n due to the environmental advantage. Judging from this aspect, that fire adept had done quite a lot of thinking when he chose this ce to build his tower.


    "Then what should we do?" The adepts couldn¡¯t help but be troubled now, "Even if we wait until the army arrives, how are we supposed to attack their tower if we don¡¯t dare to go underground? We can¡¯t possibly wait for them to starve to death, could we?!"


    Adept Yurga cackled chillingly, "You people are getting worried too early. I have already sent men into the undergroundva sea by another route. They are to create an eruption there. When that happens, the opponent will be facing a much bigger problem than us, given that they are situated right by the edge of theva sea. Also, every day that theva sea is in chaos is a day that they will not be able to obtain magical energy from the underground sessfully. That¡¯s more advantageous to our attack as well, isn¡¯t it?"


    The adepts were d to hear this.


    They looked around the tent and quickly realized that they were indeed missing a few familiar faces, particrly those of fire adepts. As such, they knew well enough to sit back down in their seats.


    Meanwhile, the bloody battle was still going on in the underground tunnels!


    Mary, Zacha, and Tigule were retreating as they fought. The battlefield had already extended near the Magma Hall. Fire Throne could provide them with five Fire Shields every one minute, and every Fire Shield could resist around two hundred points of elementium damage.


    When taking into consideration their magic resistance and defensive forcefield, such a defense was already very shocking.


    Unfortunately, they were currently dealing with a Third Grade adept.


    Though vampires were not known for their offensive power, their extremely high Agility gave them stunning attack sped and frequency, not to mention their fearsome ability to regenerate by sucking blood. The three-person group¡¯s Fire Shields neversted for more than twenty seconds before they were shed to pieces by the old vampire¡¯s sharp ws.


    For the remaining forty seconds, the three of them had to rely on each other¡¯s cover and counterattacks to force back the phantasmal crimson silhouette of Haines.


    Meanwhile, the wounds that they had risked their lives to inflict upon him would quickly vanish without a trace amid some crimson light. The slow Dragonborn Zacha, in particr, became the focus of the vampire¡¯s attacks and a moving blood bank for him to infinitely regenerate.


    Mary¡¯s speed was not as quick, her attacks were not as powerful, and the enemy entirely suppressed her bloodsucking abilities. For the first time, Mary felt the pain and helplessness that her past opponents had experienced!


    In the past, Mary had always relied on the various advantages of vampire adepts to stick to the enemy and ferociously trade blow for blow before taking in blood and healing her wounds. The old vampire was perfectly replicating this hated style ofbat of hers and using it on her. One could easily imagine how angry and upset she was.


    From the start of the battle, Mary had been roaring in anger and trying to find ways to trade wounds with Haines.


    Unfortunately, even with the blessing of the tower, the difference inbat power between her and Haines could not be offset. However, as the three of them approached the tower, the power being transmitted to them increased.


    By the time the three of them were fighting Haines in the Magma Hall, the tower was glowing with red light and consistently applying Fire Shields on the three of them.


    Break one, and there would still be another behind it. Break two, and four would be applied to them.


    With the full force of the tower behind them, Mary and the others were surrounded continuously by multiple Fire Shields that helped them block the wild attacks of the vampire.


    At this point, Haines finally stopped his attack with much resentment. He turned and fled without another word.


    Trying to kill these three enemies while the tower still existed was no more than fantasy. Moreover, the deeper they prated into the radius of the tower, the easier it was for the enemy to focus their firepower on him.


    The offensive power that coulde out of a small adept¡¯s tower was not something that even a Third Grade adept would want to try for themselves!


    Mary, Zacha, and Tigule hesitated for a moment, but they did not go forth to intercept Haines.


    They had thoroughly understood the might of a Third Grade adept after the bloody battle earlier. If they were to put their lives on the line, their chance of victory would still be no more than twenty percent, even with the tower protecting them.


    If the n¡¯s military force suffered severe losses, how were they supposed to conduct the drawn-out defense that came after?!


    As such, Mary didn¡¯t dare to provoke Haines any further, regardless of how impulsive and battle-hungry she was. Otherwise, even if they were to wound Haines severely, the few of them would not escape unscathed.


    With the retreat of the leading forces on both sides, this first contact before the great battle ended without a hitch!


    .........


    Fire Elementium ne.


    Greem furiously took off the ck Qiraji Resonating Crystal and ended his conversation with Alice.


    Though he was far away in the Elementium ne, he still knew very well of what had happened recently in Fire Throne back in the World of Adepts.


    If it weren¡¯t for the repeated guarantees from Alice, Greem would not have been able to stop himself from returning.


    "Do you want a group of teammates who can fight with you, or do you want a group of servants and subordinates that can only cheer you on? If you take the lead against everything thates at you, and always ce yourself in the most dangerous spot, do you think that Mary and the others have a chance to grow? Believe me, though they will encounter ¡¯certain¡¯ levels of danger, this danger will be worth it in the long term. In fact, I would say it is necessary."


    Greem had no choice but to extinguish the idea to immediately return to Fire Throne when he thought of Alice¡¯s well-meaning advice. He continued to carry out his exploration of the other ne carefully.


    During this past month, he had sessfully traveled several tens of thousands of kilometers and visited many strangends of fire. More importantly, he had obtained a whole storage ring¡¯s worth of fire treasures.


    He had also run into some native Fire Lords of the Fire Elementium ne during this period.


    In a ce as vast as the Fire Elementium ne, any powerful fire creature could call themselves a Fire Lord. Thend they ruled over could be a small fire pool that took up several dozen square kilometers, a remote fire valley, or even a massive stretch of volcanoes.


    As for their power? They ranged from anywhere between First Grade to Third Grade.


    Thus, along the way, Greem exterminated all First Grade Fire Lords that he encountered, adding more fire cores to his pouch. When he ran into Second Grades, he would test out their abilities and find ways to trap them and kill them if they were reasonably weak. After all, fire elementium creatures had simple and impulsive minds. They were easily baited with a bit of provocation.


    Greem himself was also a powerful fire adept. When aided by the me Fiend of Terror, there was no powerful Fire Lord that could endure theirbined devastation, especially if they prepared some hidden magical arrays ahead of time. Greem¡¯s pouch had three Second Grade fire cores added to them during this journey.


    Still, if you always go up the mountain, you will eventually run into a tiger. These killings eventually brought unnecessary trouble upon Greem!


    Just a while ago, Greem had messed up and drew the ire of a Third Grade ming Tiger. Ever since then, he had been caught in endless pursuit.


    He ran for over three thousand kilometers and crossed through the territories of seven or eight Fire Lords before he finally tricked the ming tiger in another direction with an adept¡¯s cunning and a fire clone. It was only then that he got the chance to find a fire cave to hide in and use his ck Qiraji Resonating Crystal tomunicate with Alice for a moment.


    It was only with Alice¡¯s reassurance that Greem decided to let go of his worries of home and cast all his attention to the research and analysis of this strange world.


    He had no choice but to admit that the Fire Elementium ne was truly a higher ne that was worth dedicating time and effort to understand and master.


    Firstly, the size of the ne was no smaller than the World of Adepts. It was also arge ne.


    Secondly, the upper limit of energy it could endure within the ne was also much higher than the World of Adepts and most other material nes. After this period of analysis and research, Greem discovered that the Fire Elementium ne could host elementium creatures as high as the Seventh Grade.


    That meant Greem had to be extremely careful and cautious when exploring this ne. Otherwise, a small Second Grade fire adept like himself would not even be able to endure a single p from a high-grade elementium. Even a Fourth Grade fire elementium could exterminate Greem without a chance for him to escape, let alone a Seventh Grade.


    For a high-grade fire elemental, killing him was no more difficult than killing a fly!

 Chapter 770 Strange Flaming Tiger

    Greem was on a wild run!


    For some reason, the Third Grade ming Tiger had been pursuing Greem closely ever since it hadid eyes on him. If it weren¡¯t for some special tricks by Greem, it would probably have caught up.


    He had used a fire clone to misdirect the ming tigerst time, but he didn¡¯t make it a hundred kilometers away before the ming tiger appeared on his tail again. Of course, the ming tiger only discovered a temporary camp that Greem had set up to rest in. With the fire rune he left behind, Greem instantly knew that it was the tiger that had found his camp.


    A Third Grade ming tiger was not a target he could defeat!


    Thus, Greem had no choice but to start running with everything he had again.


    In all honesty, the Fire Elementium ne was an excellent ce to train and cultivate, but it was definitely not suited for a vacation.


    The scenery here was so repetitive that it was miserable!


    There were either stretches of magma pools, an endless sea of fire, or some strange ins, hills, and volcanoes shrouded in smoke.


    The scenery was repetitive, dry, and the creatures were dull and stiff. The powerful fire elementium creatures might be intelligent, but they didn¡¯t seem to have anything resembling entertainment. Four seasons a year, year after year, the only thing that the fire elementium creatures seemed to do was endlessly wander the ne until they found a ce with sufficient me energy for them to settle in.


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel as if he was turning into a dull person after living for so long in this world. All the conspiring and deceiving in the past was like a dream from a past life. The memories of those times had been shattered by the monotonous life that he was currently leading.


    However, Greem¡¯s understanding of the fire elementium creatures had deepened after spending so long in this world.


    Throughout his endless wandering in the Fire Elementium ne, Greem had witnessed the process of a fire elemental¡¯s birth more than once.


    In all honesty, fire elementium creatures were born in the manner described in books¨C born of fire, die in fire!


    A strange fire flux would appear in an empty ce. Then, a bright-red fist-sized me would emerge. After absorbing some of the wandering fire elementium, the fire would form a vague face.


    It was the mostmonly seen low-grade elementium creature of the Fire Elementium ne¨C a Fire Spirit.


    Fire spirits possessed the strength of a beginner apprentice the moment they were born. They could spit low-intensity elementium fireballs with an offensive power of between five to ten points.


    If these low-grade fire spirits were allowed to absorb fire energy freely, they could grow into powerful fire elementals and me spirits within a hundred years. Their power then would be approximately equal to an advanced apprentice!


    After bing a fire elemental or a me spirit, it meant that they had started to possess aplete body and soul consciousness. Though this soul consciousness was fragile, it was enough for them to use explosive fireballs and area-of-effect fire spells with offensive power of up to thirty points.


    If the Fire Kings ever waged war against another ne, they could be considered the most fundamental fighting forces of the Fire Elementium ne!


    They might not amount to much in the Fire Elementium ne, but in any other ne, an individual that could casually toss out massive fireballs of thirty points could easily be considered a decent spellcaster. Yet, there were just so many such individuals in the Fire Elementium ne. The Fire Kings could go to any random spot and immediately recruit a whole army of them. There was no need to cultivate or train them specially.


    It was this peculiar trait of the Fire Elementium ne that caused this ce never tock soldiers.


    If it wasn¡¯t because most other nes were not suited for fire creatures to reside in, and because most Fire Kings had no interest in taking trips to other worlds, even arge ne like the World of Adepts would not have much chance of winning against the Fire Elementium ne.


    After all, the massive group of fire creatures born and nurtured in the Fire Elementium ne was not something that other material nes could hope to emte.


    Out of curiosity, Greem had also caught some newly born fire spirits and thoroughly dissected them. Though he did not have a well-equippedboratory, the Chip¡¯s detailed scans and x-ray vision allowed Greem to discover some things.


    Fire spirits could entirely be said to be thebination of fire energy and a consciousness brand. The fire energy of a newly born fire spirit naturally came from the ubiquitous energy field all over the Fire Elementium ne. However, where did the consciousness brande from?


    Greem had checked the fire spirits. Most of their consciousness brands were pure, but fragile, and there were no memories or consciousness shards within them. That was why newly born fire spirits were so dull and stiff. However, the attention-oriented Greem still discovered some soul shard remnants on individual consciousness brands.


    Most fire spirits were a bundle of shapeless mes with no consciousness at birth. However, those fire spirits that preserved pieces of consciousness would shape the mes that formed their bodies into weird shapes based on the memory fragments in their consciousness brands.


    These could be beasts, humans, things, or even wind.


    At any rate, the broken past consciousness in the soul shards, as well as the memories in them, drove the actions of the newly born fire spirits, causing them to simte their forms from their ¡¯previous lives.¡¯ As such, it could be deduced that the ming tiger that was tracking Greem belonged to such a situation.


    As it possessed parts of its memory and experience from its previous life, it walked on a roadpletely different from native fire creatures in their own process of growth. At the very least, the ming tiger was vastly superior to the other fire creatures Greem had met in terms of soul activity and curiosity.


    If he had the chance, Greem would naturally want to capture the ming tiger and dissect its body to thoroughly understand the birth process of an elementium creature¡¯s soul consciousness. However, considering the difference in their power, Greem could only avoid the tiger and find ways to evade its relentless pursuit.


    In all seriousness, this ming tiger was really entirely different from the other fire creatures that Greem had encountered.


    The zefire mespirits that Greem had first encountered gave up on pursuing him after five hundred kilometers, even though he had killed so many of their people. Yet, this Third Grade ming tiger had chased him for over five thousand kilometers. It was almost as if it wouldn¡¯t stop until it had caught Greem.


    This...this was the part that made Greem helpless, but also the part that surprised him the most!


    Greem had a feeling that the reason it was pursuing him so fervently wasn¡¯t to devour him. It seemed there was something more to it. However, Greem had no confidence to test this theory of his when faced with the threat of a Third Grade fire creature. He could only run as fast as possible and as far as he could.


    Greem¡¯s current form was that of a three-meter tall fire elemental, and his entire body was d in ayer of bright red mes. To avoid trouble, Greem had concealed his humanoid body and turned it into a vague cluster of me.


    After all, a stable and defined body of me was a mark of a high-grade fire creature. Individuals like those drew the attention of local creatures wherever they went. To avoid unnecessary attention, Greem disguised himself as a First Grade fire elemental that had yet to obtain a solid form.


    These were undoubtedly the most numerous kind in the Fire Elementium ne, as well as the most inconspicuous.


    While Greem was making his challenging hike through the ne, a fire rune he had left behind him was once again triggered. Greem¡¯s face turned green when he sensed the vague image transmitted by the fire rune.


    Dammit, it was still that tiger!


    It¡¯d already been ten thousand kilometers, why was it still tracking him?


    The fire rune was triggered fifty kilometers away. That meant that the tiger was getting closer and closer.


    Greem sighed. He had no choice but to run while teleporting and searching.


    As expected, Greem sessfully found arge sea of fire stretching for several dozens of kilometers at a ce fifteen kilometers away. A fire field with no substance and no solid form like this was one of the mostmon scenes in the Fire Elementium ne. They were a bit like the rivers andkes of material nes.


    After a bit of hesitation, Greem gritted his teeth and dove into the field, instantly vanishing without a trace.


    Even with his fire immunity, Greem could not ensure that he would not take damage in such a pure field of fire. Though his body might be immune to the fire damage, the soul brand and spirit consciousness attached to it still had to endure the immense pressure of being burned by fire.


    Fortunately, he had alreadypleted the process of elementiumizing his Spirit. He didn¡¯t need to worry that his soul brand and consciousness would be assimted by the fire as long as he did not stay within the field for more than an hour.


    As such, choosing to travel through the fire field was the simplest way to wash away the tracks he left behind!


    Fifteen minutes after Greem disappeared into the fire field, the edge of the area zed with mes. A strange creature engulfed in violent fires suddenly appeared here.


    It was a violent ming tiger whose body flowed with static mes. Its body wasn¡¯t toorge at only three meters long, but it was full of powerful and overwhelming fire energy.


    At the very least, three meters was too small for Third Grade fire creatures.


    The strength of every fire creature in the Fire Elementium ne directly corrted with the power of the fire energy stored within their bodies. Therger their bodies, the more fire energy they could store, and the more powerful the being would be. How were they supposed to save arge amount of fire energy if they didn¡¯t have arge body?


    It was a humble and straightforward truth!


    At least, most elementium creatures obeyed thisw.


    However, this strange ming tiger had forcefully broken thisw. It was very likely that it had mastered some method orw topress fire energy.


    And this was a sign of a high-grade fire creature!


    The ming tiger lifted its nose and sniffed about when it appeared. It then slowly walked toward where Greem had entered the field. Its deep yet colorful eyes of me stared into the field as if it was thinking about something.


    If Greem were still here, he would most definitely be shocked by the human expression on the tiger¡¯s face and eyes. Much like a stroke of color in an ink wash painting, this ming tiger betrayed a vor and style that was entirely alien in this repetitive and dull world.

 Chapter 771 Fire Marke

    t


    The Fire Elementium ne could becking in some things, but the one thing it would neverck was fire.


    The fire elemental that Greem turned into traveled through the roiling sea of fire. The Boots of Ash allowed him to not only not exhaust Spirit while doing so, but even allowed him to feel even more rejuvenated as if he could continue swimming in this field for eternity.


    However, the blue counter that the Chip had projected in his vision was slowly ticking away.


    The pleasant and rxed feeling that Greem had in the sea of fire might be real, but the notification from the Chip was also equally as shocking. If he stayed in the sea of fire for more than an hour, there was a possibility he could bepletely assimted by the active fire elementium here.


    When that happened, his soul origin might even shift, taking an irredeemable step toward bing an elementium creature!


    That was not in his original n.


    However, if he were to take this step, he would have to choose between his two identities as an adept and an elementium creature. The Fire Elementium ne would no longer reject him if he became an elementium creature. Moreover, elementium creatures typically had long lives and no natural predators within their ne. With sufficient time, Greem was confident he could grow into a great Fire King!


    However, if the Fire Elementium ne assimted his soul origin, he would lose his identity as a native of the World of Adepts. From then on, he would never have anything to do with his previous life in that world.


    The identity of an adept was still crucial for Greem¡¯s growth and development henceforth!


    Greem knew very well that the four Great Elementium nes were home to the four legendary Elementium Masters. Their power was said to be of Ninth Grade. Greem would have to overthrow them if he wanted to establish himself in the Elementium ne.


    Judging from this, it seemed the adept faction was more convenient for his growth.


    Greem was cautious and tried his best to maintain his identity as an adept in the World of Adepts.


    It was entirely impossible to distinguish nar coordinates within the sea of fire. Thus, Greem stepped through the fire and quickly traveled across the zone. Finally, he emerged from the sea of fire with five minutes left on the clock.


    It was apletely foreign location.


    There, Greem saw a crude and humble vige.


    Several strange fire beings entered and exited the vige. They were like humans, moving about with their zing bodies as they paced in front of the market stalls as if they were looking for something.


    Elementium creatures also had markets and trade? I thought they didn¡¯t even have the concept of personal property?


    Greem frowned and couldn¡¯t help but walk toward this otherworldly market out of curiosity.


    It was a public market; there were no guards or managers. Moreover, those who could make it there were also fire-creatures that had gained higher intelligence. They were different from their dull low-gradepanions that could only wander around using their instincts. Almost all of them possessed intelligence equal to their power.


    When Greem turned into a fire elemental and entered the market, several passing high-grade me spirits nced at him before leaving without another word.


    So many Second Grades. So many Third Grades!


    Greem gulped with some difficulty as he nervously walked past several fire creatures of various forms. For the first time, he was stunned by the power of the Fire Elementium ne.


    In the World of Adepts, Third Grade was already the core fighting force of the various great adept ns. They might have Fourth Grade adepts behind the scenes, but those individuals acted as final trump cards and leaders. They very rarely intervened in battles between low-grade adepts.


    However, in the Fire Elementium ne, First Grade creatures were as numerous as the hairs on a cow, while Second Grade creatures were like dogs in an ordinary world. Even Third Grade creatures were everywhere. At the very least, Greem could count at least five Third Grade fire creatures in this market that took up no more than twenty thousand square meters.


    Moreover, their appearance made it difficult for Greem to ascertain their true identities instantly.


    Greem¡¯s eye slowly swept across the entire market, and he realized that most of the individuals setting up stalls were First and Second Grade. They had no stores or booths or even boards. They just merely stood by the roadside and ced several strange objects in front of them.


    Of course, things that could appear here could only be fire treasures. Some of them were even unknown objects collected in some random corner of the word. They might not know the exact value of these things, but they could be sure that they were no ordinary objects if they could survive in the environment of the Fire Elementium ne.


    However, while Greem¡¯s eyes wandered across the center area of the market, he saw a strange creature that should not have appeared here.


    A ming Demon!


    It was a Second Grade ming Demon with a tall and skinny body, evil tattoos drawn across its chest, devil horns on its head, and a cape of me on its back.


    It wasn¡¯t an elementium creature but a true-blue abyssal demon.


    In all seriousness, the me Fiend that Greem transformed into was a higher-grade form of the ming Demon!


    At this moment, the Second Grade ming Demon was like all the other fire creatures. He took up a spot in the center of the market and had a small stall of his own set up. Greem saw some other otherworldly beings beside it: fire dwarves, fire gnomes, and several others.


    They seemed to represent a particr faction of their own and took up areas of their own as they called out for business. The entire market appeared to be exceedingly lively with their presence.


    Greem paused for a moment and couldn¡¯t help but walk toward them.


    Fire Dragon Fruit, Fire Flowers, Fire Agate, Fireburn Wood, meloathe Iron, Firestones, Essence of Fire.


    Essence of Fire?


    Greem finally stopped in front of a stall.


    As he had just devoured an Essence of Fire, Greem was extremely familiar with its aura. Yet, three of these Essences of Fire were arranged together in a row at this stall, shining with their odd zing light.


    Greem lifted his head and looked at the owner of the stall.


    It was a seven-meter tall me giant. Hisrge body of mes was extraordinarily stable, and his mes were solid. He opened his bright-red zing eyes when he saw Greem pacing before his stall and coldly nced at Greem.


    His power was at a shocking Second Grade as well!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped; there were still too few individuals amongst First Grade elementium creatures who could gain higher intelligence on the Elementium ne. Only those higher-grade existences had a chance of obtaining sufficient intellect.


    "Little guy, you can¡¯t provide me with what I want! I suggest you had best leave!" The me giant spoke with his booming voice.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Greem might be Second Grade, but the fire elementium he had turned into at the moment was only three meters tall. He was truly a little guy in front of this giant, and it was no wonder he was being looked down upon.


    "Hey big guy, did your seniors not tell you that absolute form doesn¡¯t represent absolute power? You haven¡¯t even told me what you want?" Greem proudly replied.


    After this period in the Elementium ne, Greem had gained some degree of understanding of the personality of these fire creatures.


    They were all straightforward and impatient individuals. They spoke whatever was on their mind and would never wind about the topic as humans did. Thus, a stiff and strict tone didn¡¯t necessarily represent hostility. It was merely the way of expression that they were used to!


    The me giant bent down, and his massive body approached like a mountain. He started sniffing about Greem.


    "I see. You are not actually ourpanion but an outsider in disguise. Very well then. You might have what I need in your possession!"


    Greem¡¯s expression turned. He didn¡¯t expect the opponent to be able to sense his aura, even after he had tried his best to seal it. Moreover, this damned fellow had a loud voice that sounded like exploding mines. Almost all creatures in the market had turned their heads and looked toward them.


    "I need the blood of some high-grade fire creatures! It has to be Second Grade at the minimum and the stronger it is, the better." The me giant practically roared when he talked.


    Greem was stunned for a moment. He only understood after a while.


    The blood of a fire creature?


    The entire fire elementium ne was filled with elementium creatures. They didn¡¯t even have skin, let alone blood. No wonder the giant was so excited upon discovering that he was an outsider.


    "Big guy, stop dreaming. How could he possibly have what you want? Listen to me; you had best choose our fire lizard¡¯s blood. If you agree, I can trade fifteen kilograms of fire lizard blood with you for an Essence of Fire. How about it, this price is twenty percent higher than earlier." The ming demon interrupted from several dozens of meters away, as if he didn¡¯t want the material he had his eyes on taken away by another person.


    "Fire lizard blood is too low-quality. My children could never obtain the favor of the fire if I used their blood!" The me giant roared as anger shed on his face.


    Greem paused for a moment as the relevant data was immediately projected in his mind.


    The me giants were also amon fire creature of the Fire Elementium ne. There was a unique method to the birth of individuals within their tribes. It was said that one had to offer the blood of some fire creatures to the fire that their tribe worshipped if they wanted to awaken the intelligence of their descendants.


    Such primal ancestor worship was prevalent amongst most elementium creature tribes. In fact, the great Master of Fire was said to have be an Elementium Master of the ne through the faith and worship of trillions and trillions of fire elementium creatures.


    Greem quickly browsed through the information provided by the Chip and instantly understood the reason behind the me giant¡¯s desire for powerful fire creature blood.


    "Big guy, perhaps I might have what you need." Greem chuckled and took out a y jar the size of a human head. The opening of the pot was sealed shut with sealing runes shing upon it.


    "What is this?" The me giant looked down and shook his head as he said, "It doesn¡¯t matter what it is. It is too little. It can¡¯t be enough for my children to use!"


    Greem did not waste any words. He brushed across the jar¡¯s opening, and the light faded from the sealing runes. Then, the strange stinging spell dispersed into the air.


    "This...what is this?" The me giant lifted his nose to smell as his voice exploded in the air of the market like a giant bomb, "Could this be...it¡¯s dragon blood!"

 Chapter 772 Magma Talisman

    Dragon blood?


    Amotion rose throughout the market as if everyone had been alerted by the me giant¡¯s roar.


    Several fire creatures gathered toward them, sniffing and sensing the strange dragon aura in the air.


    Greem waved with his hand, and an agile mini-dragon emerged from the y jar at the behest of his powerful fire energy. The dragon circled in the air, spit out a small stream of fire, and slowly dispersed.


    "It¡¯s dragon blood! It¡¯s Second Grade fire dragon blood!"


    There were some individuals who possessed a good eye among the surrounding fire creatures. There was an unconceble surprise in their voice when they spoke up as well.


    Just as the me giant¡¯s face lit up with mad joy, the expression of the ming demon turned dark.


    "Trade. I¡¯ll trade," The me giant lifted his hand as massive me halo engulfed Greem and himself, "Hi, little guy, I¡¯m called Mansur. How do you intend to make this trade with me?"


    Greem looked around, and his Chip informed him that this fire halo simultaneously possessed the ability to defend and iste all information. He couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by the godly mastery of fire creatures over fire skills.


    "I have two and a half kilograms of fire dragon blood here, and it is blood from a pure-blooded Second Grade fire dragon."


    The joy in the me giant¡¯s zing eyes thickened.


    The fire dragons were undoubtedly the most ancient and longsting among all magical fire creatures. There were very few magical creatures whose blood contained as dense a fire aura as them. If their descendants were to offer fire dragon¡¯s blood during the enlightenment ceremony, Mansur was confident that they would most definitely be able to obtain one or two decent fire talents.


    It was important to note that even the descendants of the most powerful of me giants had a chance of failing when they attempted to awaken into a me giant. Once they failed, their bloodline would vanish, and they would devolve into ordinary elementium fire spirits.


    However, if they used this fire dragon¡¯s blood, the chance of failure would be reduced to its minimum, and there would even be a chance that they would obtain some decent fire talents from the ancestral me spirit.


    As such, the previously cold me giant Mansur became extremely excited. In fact, he was the one who was afraid that something might happen during the trade.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and finally offered a decent price.


    "One Essence of Fire for every half a kilogram of fire dragon¡¯s blood."


    me Giant Mansur rubbed his hand with a bit of pity. This price might not have exceeded his expectations, but it was still a trade that was well worth it.


    It was important to note that Essences of Fire might be valuable, but one could always find them in those fire fields if they were patient enough. Moreover, Essences of Fire did not provide pure fire creatures like themselves with as much benefit as they did to outsiders.


    However, a fire dragon¡¯s blood waspletely different.


    The two might both be Second Grade fire materials. However, the scarcity of thetter made fire dragon¡¯s blood much more valuable than the Essence of Fire in the Fire Elementium ne. Thus, Mansur was still basically satisfied with the price that this human adept had offered him.


    The two individuals exchanged the goods on amicable terms and put away their ¡¯spoils¡¯ with much satisfaction.


    me Giant Mansur suddenly reminded Greem before the me halo dispersed, "You are that human adept from the World of Adepts, aren¡¯t you? Be careful, little guy. There are quite a lot of people nearby who are looking for you. Remember to run faster once you leave the market. Of course, if you run into any trouble, you can seek shelter at my tribe. Remember, my tribe¡¯s settlement is at..."


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled.


    He had been constantly worried about falling into the enemy¡¯s trap ever since entering the Fire Elementium ne. However, that had only been conjectures of his own after all. He couldn¡¯t verify the truth that there was a trap set up for him. However, the me giant¡¯s words were the first time Greem¡¯s guess had been verified.


    The mission to assassinate the Fire Lord was indeed a conspiracy. If he directly went to the territory of that Fire Lord as per the agreement, what awaited him would be an entire army of zing elementals.


    Greem sighed softly. He couldn¡¯t help but be concerned for thetter half of his journey.


    Once the me halo had dispersed, me Giant Mansur nodded at Greem. The giant then strode out of the fire market and sprinted toward his tribe¡¯s settlement.


    Meanwhile, Greem was surrounded by a group of fire creatures that had been waiting the whole time. Among them were some of those fearsome Third Grade fire creatures.


    "Human, do you still have fire dragon¡¯s blood in your possession?" An exceptionallyrge magma giant pushed aside the others and loudly asked.


    This magma giant had the power of a Third Grade. Red magma and rolling mes formed its entire body. It was ten meters tall, and the ground rang when it walked. Ordinary small creatures couldn¡¯t even stand straight within twenty meters of it.


    "I still have one kilogram left!" Greem didn¡¯t lie to this group of eager fire creatures.


    Fire creatures might have been violent, impulsive, and prone to fight at any time, but they had a certain stubbornness for obeying the rules of trade that outsiders couldn¡¯t easily understand. Though they were extremely anxious, they would not interfere before they finished the deal. That was why the Third Grade magma giant had waited until the me giant was done, despite being significantly more powerful.


    From this aspect, fire creatures seemed to emphasize the holy rules of trade much more than most intelligent beings. At the very least, one could not see any robbery or forced trades happening within this fire market.


    "One kilogram...very well, it¡¯s a bit less than what I wanted, but it¡¯s still enough for my purposes!" The magma giant grumbled in resignation, "Little guy, look at this thing. Do you need it?"


    The magma giant stuffed hisrge hand into his body and retrieved a two-meter-long firece poker from within.


    Greem looked at the object carefully, and the Chip very quickly determined its true nature based on the information it had gathered.


    Fire Coral Magma Staff!


    It was an elementium staff that could significantly enhance a fire caster¡¯s offensive power. Due to its body being forged out of fire coral magma, its toughness was even superior to some heavy weapons. Using it to smash enemies during close quartersbat was not a bad choice.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s estimate, this fire coral magma staff could provide a 15-25% bonus to offensive power. That was already an excellent effect!


    Greem thought for a moment but shook his head in the end.


    The magma giant didn¡¯t give up either. It chuckled and stuffed the staff back into his body. It then took out a handful of Second Grade fire cores. There seemed to be five of them.


    Greem shook his head even quicker this time.


    Second Grade crystal cores might be valuable, but he had all the time to collect them while he was in the Fire Elementium ne. He didn¡¯t need to exchange them for the precious fire dragon¡¯s blood.


    The magma giant started to get more nervous as if knowing that it was almost hitting the bottom of his reserves.


    The third time, it took out a magma talisman from his chest.


    "Little guy, this is a magma talisman that has been etched with my soul aura. As long as you hold this talisman, you can summon my soul projection to fight for you. Each magma talisman can only summon a soul projection once. The projection willst for fifteen minutes, and its Strength will be approximately Beginner Third Grade. This...should be enough for all your remaining dragon blood, eh?"


    Greem¡¯s eyes lit up as he shouted, "Two magma talismans! I want to exchange for two magma talismans!"


    The magma giant started tough, "Human adept, don¡¯t be too greedy. Your dragon¡¯s blood is a Second Grade material at best. Meanwhile, my magma talisman, that¡¯s a Third Grade item."


    Greem took out another jar without hesitation, "Two kilograms for two talismans. That¡¯s fair now, isn¡¯t it?!"


    The magma giant was stunned for a moment before breaking out intoughter, "You outsiders, always so sly and greedy! Very well, very well. Two it is then!"


    The magma giant took out a firestone from his body, shaped it into a talisman, and then blew a sliver of pure golden fire into the thing. A short momentter, a new magma talisman had beenpleted!


    Greem passed the two kilograms of fire dragon¡¯s blood to the magma giant and took the two heavy magma talismans. He then had the Chip perform a quick scan of both of them.


    [Beep. Two strange soul brands discovered. Initial estimates suggest these to be soul projection equipment. Said talismans are 8.5 kilograms heavy, while the soul projections are 825 points strong. These talismans allow the summoning of a weakened magma giant to fight for you.


    Duration: 15 minutes.


    Soul Projection Grade: Beginner Third Grade.]


    A Third Grade item; this was an authentic Third Grade item!


    Though it was a one-use item and it onlysted for fifteen minutes, a Beginner Third Grade magma giant¡¯s soul projection could help Greem with a lot of things. For instance¨C instantly crushing a certain annoying Fire Lord.


    After obtaining what he needed, the magma giant left the fire market.


    Greem could only regretfully exin to the remaining fire creatures that he had no more dragon¡¯s blood left. Everyone only reluctantly scattered then.


    Just as Greem turned to leave the fire market, the ming demon¡¯s hoarse voice rang out by his ear.


    "Hey human adept, do you want to make a trade with me?"


    Greem stopped and slowly turned to stare at the abyssal demon d in hot mes.


    "What can you give me? And what do you want to get out of me?"


    The ming demon¡¯s attitude was extremely enthusiastic, "Human adept, there¡¯s no need to be so guarded. You should know that we all came to this rural ce because we are looking for the rare fire materials here. It¡¯s rare that I get to meet a friend from the World of Adepts here. Why not we take the opportunity to trade for what we each need?"


    Greem hesitated for a moment and finally dispersed the mes covering his face and revealed his true face. He proudly said, "Let¡¯s officially get to know each other. I am Greem from the World of Adepts and the n Leader of the Zhentarim Crimson n!"


    The ming demon chuckled, "I, Guard-Captain Kzoyde of Prince Gerobarrick, am at your service!"

 Chapter 773 Underground Battle

    The conversation with ming Demon Kzoyde was extremely pleasant and casual!


    Once Greem¡¯s silhouette vanished into the market, a sinister and chilling smile appeared on Kzyode¡¯s wicked and fearsome face.


    "Sir, should we send people to follow him?"


    A faint human form appeared beside the ming demon without a sound. The silhouette looked just like a one-meter-tall child, but its faint image gave off a sense of terror and sinisterness.


    Fireshade Assassin!


    It was a type of strange creature that was half-demon and half-elemental. It was a foreign mixed-blood creature that wasn¡¯t acknowledged by the natives of the Fire Elementium ne. They were often recruited as assassins by more powerful individuals due to their skill at stealth and assassination as well as their excellent work ethic.


    "No need! He¡¯s a popr bounty target in the Fire Elementium ne right now. We don¡¯t need to get involved in the personal hunt of some stupid Lord; it¡¯s just a bounty given out by a mere Second Grade Lord. It¡¯s not worth enough to offend a Second Grade adept!"


    "Then we are not doing anything at all?"


    "No, that¡¯s a terrible idea! We must still im the bounty from the Lord. At any rate, there¡¯s one-third of the reward we can get just by providing the location of that adept. We might as well take it. Go, hurry up and inform the Lord¡¯s subordinate of the news of the human adept appearing in Gaba Market. Also, tell them we can provide them with a magical portrait of the human adept and see what price they are willing to pay! Hehehe, this kind of no-risk profit is what we should be going after. We are merchants after all."


    ming Demon Kzoyde¡¯s chillingughter rang out in the market.


    The fireshade assassin shivered, quickly hid, and hurried on his assignment.


    Greem dove into the fire field once more after leaving the market.


    Greem immediately threw away the map of the Fire Elementium ne that the ming demon provided him with after recording all the information on it with his Chip. ording to the Chip, the parchment contained a minimum of at least three very well-hidden ways for it to be located. If Greem carried the map with him, his whereabouts would be entirely within the hands of the enemy.


    This map was also rtively crude!


    Only a few approximate location names and geography had been marked on it.


    Of course, this also had to do with the more rxed nature of the elementium creatures.


    They wandered the entire ne after their birth and hardly cared about where they were or what was around them. As such, they never felt the need to name these locations, let alone actively draw more detailed maps.


    As such, Greem only knew that the market he had just left was known as the Gaba Market and that it was a small public market. The remainder of the information on the map was far too vague.


    Seas of fire stretching for hundreds and thousands of kilometers could be seen almost everywhere within the Fire Elementium ne. Nothing existed within these seas apart from fire and mes. In fact, most fire creatures could not survive within these seas for extended periods of time.


    It was only between the gaps of the fire seas that there was a chance for strange geographicalnd features to form. Thesends, hills, ins, and volcanoes with fixated forms were where the fire creatures mostmonly congregated.


    Many powerful fire tribes took over some areas where fire elementals gathered and treated the ce as their home. Just like that, unorganized tribal territories were created.


    With the help of his mission nar coordinates and this crude map, Greem finally confirmed that his target lived in a particr area known as Dustfire Valley. That ce was twenty-five thousand kilometers away from where he currently was. If he continued at his current pace, he would take a minimum of a month to arrive there.


    Moreover, various channels of information allowed Greem to sense that he had been trapped in a great storm. A massive, tight seemed to have been prepared over the area and was waiting for him to enter.


    Greem had no choice but to slow down when faced with such a situation. He turned and walked in a different direction to find a more unpopted area to digest those Essences of Fire.


    Given the vastness of the Fire Elementium ne, Second Grade Fire Lords like Artes did not have the power needed to monitor and govern the tens of thousands of square kilometers that was his territory. In all honesty, Artes¡¯ influence was aplete nk outside of Dustfire Valley.


    Trying to construct an information web with these scattered and unbound fire elemental subordinates was impossible. They were incapable of doing such fine and detailed work!


    Greem immediately washed away all of his tracks upon leaving Gaba Market by walking through the sea of fire. He then dove into a hidden ce and concealed himself. Even if Artes were to send out all of his subordinates and dig away three feet of dirt from the ground, he still would not be able to find Greem.


    The formerly lively bounty hunting activity quickly cooled down with the main character missing from the y!


    ............


    World of Adepts, Fire Throne.


    At this moment, the Magma Hall was already filled with the private army of the nobles.


    These people who came from far away had brought plenty of craftsmen and servants with them. They used the forest¡¯s endless lumber to create batches of siege weapons. Now they were using these siege weapons to slowly advance toward the tall tower in the center of the hall.


    However, their advance was extremely difficult, for there was an even more powerful magical machine army standing in their way.


    The battle between the two partiessted for three days and nights.


    The attacking noble¡¯s army sentrge groups of cannon fodder at the enemy, all of them raising thick wooden shields over their heads and yelling battlecries as they slowly pushed toward the tower. Behind them were the heavy-infantry groups that the nobles had spent significant amounts of money to put together.


    These heavy infantry soldiers were all equipped with enchanted heavy armor that was two fingers thick. They were encased in so manyyers of metal that they looked like walking cans, and barely any gaps could be seen in the fronts of their armor. Even their cylindrical helmets only had a cross-shaped slit over the face.


    As elite troops of the noble¡¯s army, the heavy infantry was equipped with maces, ils, battleaxes, and other such weighty weapons. They formed rows of ten people and squeezed together. From a distance, they looked like a metal wall that could freely move in every direction.


    Behind them were a group of archers in crude leather armor. They had longbows and axes in hand. They were not the usual members of a noble¡¯s private army; just hunters and mercenaries that had been temporarily hired.


    Supposedly, an army like this should be enough for them to ughter most enemies. Unfortunately, when the opponent was not a human army, they became the ones who were ughtered.


    Approximately a hundred three-meter-tall magical machines stood before the tower in a loose defensive line. They unleashed a metal barrage at the approaching noble army with violent magic-energy rifles.


    Over two dozen spider-shaped robotic golems were waiting at the very front of the formation. They were all five meters tall, and their spindle-shaped spider bodies, spider heads, and ws were all forged ofplex alloy gleaming with magical light.


    Four pairs of ck metallic legs were arranged along their torsos, the tips sharp as knives. When they climbed with their fast speed, their legs would leave tiny holes in the tough rock floor.


    These spider-shaped robotic golems mainly relied on a pair of giant w-shaped chainsaws to attack. When they charged at wooden shields and rushed into the crowd with their metallic limbs, their massive chainsaws buzzed loudly. Blinding sparks flew everywhere as steel shed with flesh.


    Regr human infantries were cut apart by these golems without any chance of resistance, turning into mutted corpses. The heavy infantry soldiers were able to survive for a bit longer. They could surround the golems and use their heavy weapons to smash the metal bodies with all they had.


    As long as they possessed sufficient strength and sturdy weapons, they still had a chance to shock and destroy the magical machinery within the bodies of the robotic golems, causing the machines to lose allbat ability.


    However, at this moment, the robotic golems shot out red mes from their spider heads. The density of the enemy and theck of agility of heavy infantry caused the soldiers to die a horrible death. That sight of human bodies being roasted within those melting metal cans was a terrifying one to behold.


    The mes from the golems were all alchemical fires of over two thousand degrees. Even being grazed by this fire could turn you into burnt bones. The heavy infantry clothes ignited in the surging tides of me. Even their metal armor had heated to a bright red.


    There were no servants to help them to take off the heated armor in this chaotic battlefield. These heavy infantries were boiled alive as they cried out in agony. ck smoke even came out from inside their armor.


    The nobles flushed a pale white at this deste sight. All of them cast their gazes toward the adepts sittingfortably at the very back.


    With the approval of the high-grade adepts, several official adepts walked toward the rampaging golems with many more apprentices behind them.


    The spells came in a storm as three dozen apprentice-level spells and three adept-level spells worked together to push over the robotic golems. The robotic golems might have been coated in ayer of magic-resistant metal, but this coat was unavoidably damaged in the battle earlier. It was only natural that they were defeated by the concentrated fire from the adepts and apprentices.


    Thick ck smoke emerged from the bodies of the robotic golems amidst thunderous explosions. Their limbs went limp, and their massive metal bodies copsed. With the intervention of the adepts, all of the golems had lost the ability to fight.

 Chapter 774 Prelude to the Attack

    The remnants of the machines were a massive obstacle.


    To avoid the machinery pieces from affecting their follow-up attacks, the invaders had no choice but to send outrge groups of mule animals to drag away the still smoking metal pieces.


    Though the battle was still raging in front, and the magical machines couldn¡¯t possibly turn their attention toward these unarmed and unprotected servants, the stray bullets still brought them massive damage.


    The metal bullets were the size of pigeon eggs and caused sparks to fly when they hit the volcanic rock walls, leaving small holes and craters on them. When these bullets hit the mules and the humans, they pierced right through and leftrge wounds behind.


    The three days worth of back-and-forth battle had brought about tremendous casualties to both sides of the conflict!


    Over two thousand of the noble army soldiers had died since the start of the battle, and as many as three thousand of the servants had died as well. Meanwhile, the Crimson n paid the hefty price of seven dozen magical machines.


    Such casualties were more than worth it in the eyes of the adepts.


    An adept-level magical machine cost a minimum of a thousand magical crystals. Losing seventy magical machines meant that the Crimson n had suffered losses of over seventy thousand magical crystals. Comparatively, the dead and wounded among the soldiers and servants appeared insignificant.


    Being able to wear away the magical machine reserves of the Crimson n with lowly mortals was extremely beneficial to the adepts in various aspects. At the very least, they had managed to significantly reduce the amount of enemy retaliation they would need to endure while sieging the tower.


    The attacks of individual magical machines might not have been able to threaten the official adepts, but when they gathered together and focused fire, even a Second Grade adept¡¯s defensive spells had trouble holding strong. That was especially the case if the magical machine army was to work in tandem with the Crimson n. They represented a massive threat to the adept¡¯s invasion.


    Given that to be the case, the adepts were more than happy to trade the deaths of mortal soldiers for the quick decrease in the number of magical machines. Though the information showed that the Crimson n had conquered a Goblin ne with abundant metal reserves, trying to forge an endless army of magical machines with just this resource alone was no more than a fantasy.


    After all, all the coreponents of higher constructs had to be animated with Construct Awakening. That was not a process that could be undertaken by the un-magical such as mortal craftsmen or goblin technicians. The Alliance adepts were confident in being able to exhaust the Crimson n¡¯s magical machines with this ten-thousand strong army. It would pave the way for their attack on the tower itself.


    Driven by such a strategy, the reluctant and pale nobles were already shouting and organizing the next attack, even without instructions from the adepts.


    Several of the more powerful noble¡¯s armies had already been wiped out during the first few charges. Thest few attacks had all been led by mixed groups of elites that the nobles had put together.


    Moreover, their coordinated attacks were always be greeted with the apocalyptic retaliation of the tower¡¯s defense system whenever they approached the tower. Several explosive fireballs would shoot out of the tower, dragging behind them a long tail of ck smoke as they razed the frontlines of the noble¡¯s army.


    The noble¡¯s army rapidly crumbled¨Csurrounded by violent me shockwaves and deafening explosions¨Clike sandcastles on the beach. It was fortunate that the Crimson n adepts didn¡¯t dare to leave the tower to pursue them due to their absolute numerical disadvantage. Otherwise, the army would not have the courage or confidence to assault the tower repeatedly.


    Yet, regardless of how intense the frontline fighting had be, and irrespective of how many casualties the soldiers had suffered, the adept leaders remained unmoving in their tents. They were silently waiting for good news from the adept squad they had sent out.


    Finally, on the fourth day of the battle, an intense quake came from beneath everyone¡¯s feet.


    All theva wells spread across the Magma Hall simultaneously erupted with boilingva, and a thunderous boom rang out throughout the cave.


    "The volcano¡¯s about to erupt!"


    "This ce is going to copse!"


    "We have to run!"


    The warriors on the battlefield were scared out of their wits and scrambling all over the ce. Meanwhile, the Alliance adepts who had been waiting for this moment showed expressions of joy and surprise.


    It was finished!


    Indeed, it was done.


    Theva sea beneath the Magma Hall did not continue to swell as it had in the past and engulf all of the invaders. Instead, it started to tremble and ripple after a period of quakes.


    This initially calm and steady sea of magma was like a little girl throwing a tantrum. It started to recklessly unleash its destructive power, causing it to affect Fire Throne¡¯s absorption of fire energy from it.


    The main reason Greem had chosen to construct a tower here was that the magma sea was a decent source of energy that could provide the tower with an endless source of powerful fire energy.


    However, with the rioting of the magma sea, Fire Throne was not only incapable of drawing out fire energy, it even had to exhaust its own energy reserves to make up for the adverse effects caused by the uprising. It indirectly weakened the offensive and defensive power of the tower!


    Adept Yurga, who had been silently waiting for this news, rose from his seat with a broad smile on his face. He looked at the surrounding adepts and proudly said, "Everyone, the fire-adept squad we sent out has sessfully destroyed the enemy¡¯s energy source. Now the enemy has lost control over the magma sea, and the one thing we were most worried about can no longer happen. Our attack against the adept¡¯s tower will begin immediately. We cannot give the enemy a chance to breathe and recalibrate."


    "Adept Gerndt, you will lead the adepts of the Andorra n in the first wave of attack."


    "Adept Hymu, you will lead the adepts of the Cenas n in the second wave."


    "Principal Gilles, you will lead the adepts of Layton Academy in the third wave."


    ¡°Adept Roy," Yurga¡¯s gazended on the somewhat solemn Roy, "Your Magic Forest Hut will be responsible for battlefield protection and rescue. Once the third wave has ended, we of the Kam n will try tounch the main attack and see what remains of their tower¡¯s defensive power."


    "Well then, that is all. Now, everyone, let us start!"


    With the infamous title of the Death Heralding Crow above his head, no one dared to question Yurga¡¯s decision. All the Second Grade adepts who were named could only nod and acknowledge his instructions solemnly and hurry to prepare for the attack.


    The battle had gone on for so long. The power of the Crimson n should be very much exhausted now. Starting another fight while their tower¡¯s energy cirction system had yet to recover from the chaos should disrupt the pace of their defense!


    With high confidence in themselves, the Alliance adepts that had been hiding behind the scenes finally set foot upon the battlefield for the first time.


    There were two ways of attacking an adept¡¯s tower. Either you struck once and shattered its defensive system with a brutal assault that exceeded its total magical defense, or you prepared for a drawn-out siege to continuously suppress its defensive system with an endless stream of attacks to exhaust its energy.


    Both options were proof of the terror of a tower¡¯s power!


    If it weren¡¯t for the Alliance having found a way to cut off Fire Throne¡¯s energy source, they would not even have the confidence to assault a fully operational adept¡¯s tower guarded by powerful adepts.


    The Andorra n responsible for the first wave of attacks did not just send out their n adepts. They summoned the noble¡¯s armies subject to their n and ordered them tounch their most ferocious assault. Meanwhile, the n adepts hid among the soldiers and looked for opportunities to attack the tower in front of them.


    After the multiple rounds of battle, the soldiers of the Andorra n had already suffered severe casualties. They had gone from their initial seven thousand men to the current four thousand. However, the Crimson n¡¯s magical machine army had also fallen from their peak of a hundred machines to its present thirty.


    The two Second Grade adepts of the Andorra n ced the priority of their attack on the remaining thirty magical machines. If they were able to sweep away these obstacles with this attack, the next few waves would be able to strike at the tower itself.


    Inside the tower.


    Crimson Majordomo Gargamel was extremely busy right now.


    The rms from the energy room in the lower levels of the tower had caused him to go into a panic. Before he could figure out the reason behind the elementium altar losing its function, the Alliance adepts had started to move.


    Gargamel¡¯s face turned solemn as he looked at the Andorra n adepts that were slowly advancing toward the tower alongside the noble¡¯s army.


    "Lady Mary, what do you think we should do now?"


    Gargamel had no idea what to do and could only seek their current leader¡¯s opinion.


    "What is there to be worried about?!" Mary appeared as apathetic as ever before, "You stay in the tower and manage the matter of the energy room. I will bring a few people out with me to fight! We have to conserve the energy in the tower. Don¡¯t use it to attack the enemy actively; just have it bless us with some basic magical defenses."


    Mary waved her hand and called to her side the two blood knights and two blood elves. They prepared to go tobat.


    Zacha was indeed a loyal servant. Mary hadn¡¯t named him, and already he was the first to step up.


    "Lady Mary, bring me along for this fight!"


    Mary thought for a moment and slowly shook her head.


    "Don¡¯t be in such a rush to go fight. This attack of the enemy is a siege, and we have to be prepared for a drawn-out conflict. The vampires I¡¯m bringing with me can all rapidly regenerate. They won¡¯t suffer a reduction in theirbat power due to drawn-out fights. That¡¯s why you should let us fight the first few rounds. You and Tigule are both made of flesh. It¡¯s best to reserve you two for when the enemy Third Grades join the fray. Otherwise, we don¡¯t have absolute assurance that we can sessfully return to the tower when attacked by Third Grades."


    "So keep your eyes on those two Third Grade adepts."


    Having said that, Mary proudly rushed out of the tower doors with her four vampire subordinates and the thirty surviving Archers.

 Chapter 775 The First Wave

    The Andorra n.


    They were a medium-sized n with a bit of renown¨Ceven within Zhentarim¨Cmostly known for their bloodline adepts. Their main bloodline was that of a powerful otherworldly creature known as Bloodmouth.


    When they slowly advanced toward the tower among the ranks of the noble¡¯s army, the massive doors of the tower abruptly opened. Arge group of metallic machines swarmed out the doors with several odd individuals mixed amongst the machines.


    It was Mary and her vampire subordinates!


    The leaders that the Andorra n had sent were both Second Grades.


    Gerndt. A Second Grade bloodline adept.


    Gullit. A Second Grade body-refining adept.


    There were as many as twenty-one First Grade adepts as well.


    When they saw Mary and her vampires enter the fray, the Andorra adepts couldn¡¯t help but be more cautious as they silently waited for the battle between adepts to break out.


    The first to start the battle was naturally the outside forces of both parties.


    Sixty-three magical machines against the two-thousand strong noble¡¯s army under the Andorra n. Both sides engaged in a battle of life and death at the outbreak of contact.


    One had to admit that the Andorra n¡¯s noble¡¯s army was elite and powerful. Their confidence and courage had not been shattered by the imprable wall of magical machines and the storm of metal beating against their bodies. In fact, they had reached their peak amidst their screams and battlecries.


    The first groups to sh with each other were naturally the spider-shaped golems and the heavy infantry.


    The seven robotic golems were like metal monsters that only knew ughter. They charged into the tight formation of the nobles as the wild whirring of metal chainsaws rang out.


    Two giant w-shaped chainsaws turned along with the bodies of the golems, drawing crimson arcs through the tough shields and flesh. The heavy infantry surrounding these metal monsters were shocked to find thin, neat cuts appear on their thick steel armors.


    A short momentter, red blood seeped out from the cuts before breaking into an unstoppable fountain.


    Hula! A dozen shield warriors instantly crumbled into minced meat beneath the wild, charged, and sweeping strikes of the golems. The steel armor on their bodies had already been twisted beyond recognition by the fearsome force of the monsters.


    Their retaliation, be it from sharp swords or heavy battleaxes, could only cause sparks and uneven scratches when they shed against the shiny, smooth body of the robotic golems. These scratches were dense and looked severe, but they could not stop the machines from continuing their ughter.


    shing and piercing attacks were the type of assaults that these all-metal golems were least afraid of!


    A low horn rang out from behind the ranks of the noble¡¯s army.


    The shield warriors surrounding the robotic golems tightened the formation with all they had, trying their best to limit the movement space avable to the golems with their hardy wooden shields and tough metal armor. Some strong men equipped with clubs and ils rushed forward and used all their strength to smash the golems¡¯ metal bodies.


    The elegant mechanical constructs could not endure such powerful strikes and impacts!


    After a few rounds of rushing and smashing, several of the golems started to let out odd, ear-piercing sounds of grinding metal. A short momentter, thick ck smoke came out of various parts of their structures as they finally copsed amidst the nging sounds of hammering blunt weapons.


    The process of destroying one robotic golem often demanded a bloody price of two hundred lives on the part of the nobles.


    Moreover, while the robotic golems were pushing back against the army, the Archers fired away without any intervention. The rain of metal bullets repeatedly and continuously exterminated the soldiers.


    After all, the soldiers who were fully equipped in armor were a minority in the army. Most of them were still ordinary fighters in half-te or leather armor. A force like this cold unleash decent fighting power in a battle between nobles, but they could only serve as cheap cannon fodder in a war of adepts like this one.


    The fifty-six Archers maintained a rtively loose formation and took up an area in front of the tower, where they used their dense storm of metal bullets to send the army packing and scrambling in every direction. The massive metal bullets would create a hole when they hit the wooden shields and sparks when they struck the rock walls. When they hit a human body, they would prate the bodies of multiple warriors and leave countless howling and crying casualties on the ground.


    "Do away with the tough ones in the front, then have these warriors charge at the magical machines at the back." Adept Gerndt, who was hiding in the crowd, quicklymunicated with the other Second Grade, Adept Gullit.


    Gullit nodded and became the first to unleash his full force!


    As a Second Grade body-refining adept, Gullit did not depend on powerful spells like the elementium adepts. Instead, he chose to strengthen himself with his Spirit and spells. He wore golden armor and drew the long and narrow de from his back in a single motion. The adept then strode toward the closest robotic golem.


    The robotic golem seemed to have recognized this threat as well, as it forced back the surrounding shield warriors with its metal chainsaws and pressed toward Gullit with its eight metal limbs.


    Both parties quickly approached each other.


    When there were only five meters between the two of them, the robotic golem raised its head, and a half-meter-thick fire pir shot out of itsrge metal mouth. The st of fire devoured the body of the adept.


    Mary, who had been sneaking toward the frontline, stopped moving and hid under the shadow of another robotic golem. She silently started to observe this impromptu battle that had broken out between man and machine.


    Arge number of alchemical substances had been mixed into the mes of the golems. Their highest temperatures could reach a shocking one thousand and seven hundred degrees. Moreover, the fire had an extremely adhesive trait. Unfortunately, attacks like these were still far too weak for a Second Grade adept!


    A low shout rang out from the sea of fire. Gullit¡¯s skinny yet trained body broke through the raging mes and appeared near the golem. His body rose with a blinding de radiance before the golem¡¯s chainsaws could reach him.


    The next second, the golems two ws and head silently slid down toward the ground before everyone¡¯s eyes. The surface of the cut was smooth as a mirror¨C testament to the sharpness of Gullit¡¯s magical weapon.


    The golem had lost all its battlefield sensing and remote control abilities without its head. And without its metal chainsaws, it had lost its primary offensive ability. Only a massive metal shell was left, leaving it to wave its eight sharp limbs and charge around the crowd.


    The warriors that had just retreated surged forward once again. They used their wooden shields to defend against the piercing strikes from the golem as they desperately smashed its metal body with heavy hammers and ils. The golem¡¯s body finally let out squeaking and grinding sounds under the constant hammering. It slowly copsed to the ground from the attacks of the soldiers.


    However, before it died, the golem¡¯s sharp limbs pierced through the bodies of three human warriors, skewering them like kebabs. Finally, it fell silent.


    As a Second Grade body-refining adept, Gullit had already tempered his body into a special weapon. The toughness of his muscles and bones couldpare to beginner Second Grade protective magical equipment. Every one of his fists wouldnd firmly in battle, and every sh would see blood. In a matter of moments, he had executed three of the robotic golems.


    Only two machines were left standing between the Archers and the soldiers. The bnce of the battlefield had quietly tipped toward the invaders.


    The other Second Grade, Adept Gerndt, also started roaring. His formerly skinny body abruptly started expanding and distorting.


    In an instant, Gerndt¡¯s body was covered in ayer of strange ck scales. His own body had transformed into a big-headed carp with sharp and wicked teeth. His arms turned into two powerful fins, supporting his fat body on both sides and providing it with the ability to move. His two legs merged to form a fat tail also covered in ck fish scales.


    It was a strange magical creature known as a Bloodmouth. It had robust mobility both onnd and in water. However, its primary weapon was still its terrifyinglyrge mouth that could open to a nightmarish extent. Inside the mouth were sharp and fearsome serrated teeth.


    Being torn by the jaws of such a monster could instantly break anyone¡¯s bones. Moreover, its horrifying maw was directly connected to its bottomless stomach. Any living beings swallowed by this creature would have to endure the damage from its stomach acid as well.


    A horrifying magical creature like the Bloodmouth could even devour and digest the robotic golems, who were almost several times its size. The horror of its stomach was no more evident than here!


    FIre Throne might still have some magical machine reserves, but they couldn¡¯t possibly let the two Second Grade adepts have free reign over the battlefield.


    Mary shouted, "You two handle that body-refining adept. Leave this ugly fish to me!"


    After some quick and simple instructions, Mary turned into a crimson sh of lightning and rapidly approached Adept Gerndt. The two blood knights behind her, Soros and Windsor, changed directions and hurried toward the rampaging Second Grade Body-Refining Adept Gullit.


    Gerndt had just torn a golem to pieces. The metal chainsaw that the machine so desperately fought back with only sent sparks flying against his fine fish scales, but they couldn¡¯t harm him whatsoever.


    The bloodmouth opened his mouth and bit through the golem¡¯s thick metal limb. He then held the arm in his mouth and started crunching and swallowing as if it was a stalk of sugarcane.


    The bloodmouth stared with his bloated dusk-yellow eyes when he saw Mary approach. He opened his mouth to reveal a chilling smile.

 Chapter 776 The Combat Escalates

    As a bloodline adept, Gerndt was practically fearless after transforming into the bloodmouth!


    If Mary had been an elementium adept, he might still have been worried about being kited and worn down by long ranged spells. However, Gerndt had nothing to be concerned about against a vampire that specialized in Agility.


    The weak attacks of vampires was a universally known fact. Trying to break through his fine scales with Mary¡¯s thin ws was no more than a delusion. Without the ability to deal damage, the talent of the vampires to consume blood and regenerate would be useless.


    Meanwhile, Mary would be in a terrible pinch if the chilling jaws of the bloodmouth caught her. Regardless of how strong her magical defenses were, she would not be able to escape the fate of being bitten in half.


    Thus, Gerndt did not retreat when he saw Mary approaching. Instead, he put on a wicked smile and rapidly charged at Mary with his fat body, like a magical fish that couldn¡¯t walk onnd.


    If one had to pick out a weakness of the bloodmouth, it would be theirck of long-ranged skills. Their mobility was also on the slower side amongst Second Grades. However, their tough defensive scales and fearsome mouth that could devour everything made up for most of these weaknesses, turning them into ferocious magical creatures that most would not dare to provoke.


    Mary rapidly began to circle the bloodmouth upon nearing him. She also started frequently using her crimson ws to prod and probe for any weaknesses on his body. Gerndt ignored Mary¡¯s attacks and relied on his scales to block them all. He also started moving about, trying to get Mary¡¯s body within the range of his bite.


    In truth, most of Mary¡¯s attacks possessed the two different effects of blood corrosion and shadow damage. However, they still couldn¡¯t deal any visible damage to the heavily armored bloodmouth.


    Meanwhile, the bloodmouth¡¯s attacks were clumsy and slow. It had failed to catch her, even after several attempts to snap after Mary¡¯s phantasmal silhouette. Even when he asionally struck, he would quickly discover that they were afterimages that Mary had intentionally left behind to bait him into revealing weaknesses when attacking.


    Mary quickly started giving up after three minutes of circling and striking the bloodmouth.


    Mary¡¯s attacks could not easily prate the fine scales that covered the fat fish¡¯s body. Meanwhile, the parts that could be known as weak spots¨Cthe eyes, the mouth, and the anus¨Cwere all very well covered.


    Mary had moved to the bloodmouth¡¯s back several times in hopes of striking at his anus. Unfortunately, the bloodmouth¡¯s anus was beneath its massive fishtail. The t and powerful tail hadpletely covered the weak spot, leaving Mary no possibility of striking at it. Unless Mary could bait the bloodmouth into using his tail to strike at her, she would not have a chance tomit to this n of action.


    The other most ring weakness of the bloodmouth were the eyeballs above his mouth. Theycked the protection of the fine scales and appeared to be the most easily attacked part of his body.


    However, Mary was not an idiot either. After a few tries, she quickly discovered that the weakness was no more than a trap that the bloodmouth had left for his enemies.


    An enemy would have no choice but to arrive in front of the bloodmouth if they wanted to attack his eyes. Yet, the front of the bloodmouth¡¯s body was precisely where his giant mouth was. Regardless of whether he chose to spit Void Ooze or Acidic Spit at the enemy, he would inflict tremendous damage.


    Void Ooze could trap an enemy in a spot and reduce their speed tremendously for a short period. On the other hand, Acidic Spit was an even more terrifying acid that could destroy and weaken all known magical armor and defensive spells.


    If the enemy were even somewhat slow in their movements and allowed the bloodmouth to obtain a chance to do so, the magical fish would be able to swallow the enemy in a single bite. One couldn¡¯t expect too much of Mary just because she was Second Grade. Even she would have no chance of escaping from his stomach if she were swallowed into his body!


    Mary had no choice but to concentrate all her attacks on the back of the bloodmouth, sending scale dust flying everywhere as she scratched with her ws, leaving scratch marks all over the tail. However, the bloodmouth didn¡¯t seem to mind. He continued to turn his body and snapped continuously with his wicked mouth, letting out a threatening and intimidating crunching sound as he did so.


    Mary couldn¡¯t harm the transformed Gerndt, and Gerndt couldn¡¯t catch the phantasmal female vampire. The battle between the two quickly turned into a stalemate.


    On the other side of the battlefield, Soros and Windsor had managed to locate Second Grade Body-Refining Adept Gullit.


    The three of them were all of professions that preferred directbat. As such, they immediately started shing with their weapons upon encountering each other.


    As a body-refining adept, Gullit had refined his entire body to be as tough as steel. When aided with defensive spells and his life forcefield, he became speechlessly invincible. The blood battle techniques that the two blood knightsnded on Gullit were mostly dispersed by his defensive forcefields. What remained of their force couldn¡¯t even scratch the body-refining adept.


    In contrast, the immense strength of Gullit, paired with his magical de, represented a huge threat to the blood knights with every sh he executed. The magical de could cut through Soros and Windsor¡¯s armor and leave a deep wound if it ever struck them.


    More importantly, the two blood knights would not be able to consume blood and regenerate if they couldn¡¯t even wound Gullit. If one of the knights were to be injured and forced to escape and target another human warrior to recover, the remaining blood knight would have to face Gullit alone and be at considerable risk of being executed.


    Thus, in a matter of just fifteen minutes, Soros and Windsor had experienced many risky exchanges. They had no choice but to retreat as they fought, barely dealing with Gullit¡¯s attacks this way.


    That said,pared to the problematic situation that Mary and the blood knights were in, the blood elves were having a much more rxed time.


    They transformed into crimson bats and weaved between the crowd, quickly diving toward the location of any adepts they spotted. The ones they were looking for were all First Grade adepts of the Andorra n. Though they were all experienced veterans with exceptionalbat ability, all their techniques and skills were useless when dealing with two fearless Pseudo Second-Grade blood elves.


    The two blood elves weren¡¯t concerned with dodging or avoiding damage. They relied on their superior grade advantage to crush the enemy. They would boldly cling to an opponent¡¯s defensive shield when they got the chance, scratching and biting with all they had. They couldn¡¯t even be bothered to dodge the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    The Andorra adepts had no choice but to grit their teeth and ce their hopes on their defenses when dealing with such unreasonable and unstoppable Pseudo Second-Grades. However, regardless of how talented a First Grade adept was, they would be at a massive disadvantage when contesting a Second Grade in offensive intensity alone.


    The result was the same, even if the enemy was only a Pseudo Second-Grade!


    Two First Grade adepts of the Andorra n died just like that, having their shields forcefully broken and their bodies drained of all their blood. Meanwhile, the wounded blood elvespletely recovered to their initial state after consuming their blood. They roared and charged at new enemies.


    Apart from escaping, all the First Grade adepts they had set their sights on could not do anything. They dared not confront the vampires in directbat.


    For a moment, all the Andorra adepts were terrified by the blood elves and chased all over the battlefield. However, apart from the two adepts who were killed at the very start of the battle, the other adepts became more cautious when they recognized the terror of the blood elves.


    They would immediately turn tail and run when they saw any sign of the blood elves approaching them, never giving a chance for them to get close. However, this made it difficult for the adepts to cooperate with the noble¡¯s army and strike a fatal blow at the line of magical machines.


    The human warriors that had been abandoned by the adepts could only raise their wooden shields and travel across the uneven Magma Hall with incredible difficulty, enduring the storm of bulletsing their way.


    In just half an hour, another one thousand human fighters had fallen into the muddy puddle of blood beneath them.


    The expressions of the Alliance adepts turned solemn when they saw this. They were once again surprised by the Crimson n¡¯s reserve of forces.


    If this tower had belonged to their own ns, which of them would have dared to charge out the tower and fight against the powerful Alliance with eight times their number? Yet, this enemy had dragged their magical machines out of the tower and started to battle against the Alliance to buy time for the tower to recover.


    The fire adept squad might have sessfully caused the uprising of the magma sea below and cut off all chances for the tower to continue absorbing fire energy. However, such arge-scale interference could not be maintained for long. If the Crimson n managed to drag out the battle until the magma sea calmed down, it would be challenging to repeat the trick.


    Thus, the higher-ups of the Alliance could no longer sit still for much longer when they saw that the Andorra n was having trouble breaking through the magical machines after such a long time.


    Under the orders of Third Grade Yurga of the Kam n, the Cenas n that was supposed to rece the Andorra n one hourter entered the battlefield prematurely.


    When an additional sixteen adepts entered the battleground with an extra three thousand human fighters, the atmosphere of the battlefield froze over!


    It was important to note that the Cenas n¡¯s forces had three Second Grade adepts.


    Their arrival could substantiallypensate for theck of high-grade fighting forces on Andorra¡¯s part. The three thousand human fighters might not be able to affect the grand scheme of things, but the three Second Grades were an important weight that could affect the bnce of the entire battle.


    The higher-ups¡¯ idea was actually straightforward. They wanted to force Mary and the other vampires to retreat and provide space for their noble¡¯s army to exterminate the magical machines. The Alliance army could only officiallyunch their attack against the tower once they did away with the annoying obstacle that was the magical machine army!

 Chapter 777 The Tense War

    With the entrance of the Cenas adept, the situation that was starting to look good for the Crimson n quickly turned the other way.


    Fire Throne had been slowly umting and gathering energy. However, it now had no choice but cast out a web of blinding red light, providing all the Crimson adepts and magical machines on the battlefield with fire protection. What immediately came after was the area-of-effect Meteor Shower that the tower had been charging up.


    Arge, ming cloud mass suddenly gathered on the thirty-meter-tall ceiling of the Magma Hall. zing fires andva bubbles roiled within those clouds, staining the entire space dark-red as if it was a realm of ghosts.


    The adepts in the attacking party immediately used their tricks and exited the frontlines upon seeing this ill omen. Meanwhile, the four thousand soldiers and servants were abandoned on the battlefield as sacrificial pawns.


    All the human warriors lifted their heads and looked at the massive boiling red clouds above them, terrified and concerned. As more fire energy surged from the tower to the clouds, they increased in size, filled with massiveva bubbles the size of watermelons.


    Breathing became difficult for everyone beneath the oppression of the powerful fire elementium aura. What entered their lungs when they inhaled was no longer cool, fresh air, but surges of searing heat waves.


    "Run!"


    "We can¡¯t wait here to die!"


    As the fire elementium gathered at a frenzied pace, the warriors that had been driven mad by the ughter immediately came to their senses and scattered fearfully in every direction. Even the horses they were riding had gone out of control. They would not listen to any orders and ran about blindly, biting and charging at each other.


    The entire battlefield was instantly plunged into a scene of apocalyptic chaos!


    However, before the mortal army of the Alliance could escape from the range of the fire clouds, a thunderous boom rang out from above. As theva bubbles within the clouds popped, waves of fire started to fall from the sky along with countless drops ofva that freely spread red mes everywhere across the hall as they descended.


    Theva bubbles spontaneously exploded into ferocious fire halos when theynded on the ground, engulfing everything within ten meters in a terrifying storm of golden mes. Lava bubbles that popped in mid-air were like beautiful fireworks instead, sending blinding mes scattering across the sky.


    Everything and every being devoured by the mes would turn into ck smoke in an instant, vanishing entirely from the mortal realm. The only proof of their former existence was a small pile of ash left on the scorched earth.


    It was a Meteor Shower that Fire Throne had especially enhanced for the purpose of attacking their enemies. Judging by the radius and intensity of this spell, its effect was approximately equal to seven Second Grade Meteor Showers being cast simultaneously.


    Mortals caught within the spell¡¯s radius had no chance of survival. Even the First Grade adepts were very likely to die if they couldn¡¯t dodge in time and were struck by more than threeva bubbles.


    As such, nearly half of the Magma Hall turned into a zing sea of fire with the descent of this ¡¯ultra¡¯ Meteor Shower. Most of the soldiers and servants of the Andorra and Cenas n had perished. Even three First Grade adepts had died to the spell.


    The few Second Grade Alliance adepts that were trapped in the sea of fire barely escaped after being surrounded by Mary and the others.


    This Meteor Shower might be powerful, but there was still a ways to go before it could kill a Second Grade adept.


    For a moment, the Alliance adepts and noble¡¯s army struggled to escape from the sea of mes. They immediately copsed from exhaustion after stepping out of the boundaries of the sea of fire, no longer able to get up.


    It was at this moment that they thoroughly understood the terror of an adept¡¯s tower.


    Just a casual attack from the tower had exterminated the three thousand Alliance soldiers and forced the adepts of the Andorra n and Cenas n back to the entrance of the Magma Hall.


    Supposedly, the Alliance adepts should be feeling upset and angered at having encountered such a terrifying assault. However, everyone only saw smiles on the faces of the Alliance higher-ups.


    "Truly a group of people who can¡¯t retain theirposure!" Yurga smiled chillingly, "To think they would use such precious magical energy to deal with a mortal army with no offensive ability whatsoever. Aren¡¯t they so willing to part with their reserves..."


    "Truly," Old Vampire Haines also smiled sinisterly, "If this much magical energy was properly used, it would have been more than enough to exterminate even a Second Grade adept. Yet, they use it to deal with cannon fodder. Hehehe, it seems we can think of ways to continue baiting more tricks out of them!"


    The other Second Grade adepts present nodded as well, their faces full of joy.


    Everyone here had spent a lot of time in their adept¡¯s towers. They might not have an entirely urate count of how much fire energy that spell had cost, but they had a pretty good guess.


    If the Crimson n adepts had found a way to bait the Alliance adepts near the tower before striking with this thunderous attack, most of the Second Grade adepts would not have been able to endure it. However, the Crimson adepts had wasted such a fearsome attack on mere mortals. That meant the safety of the Alliance adepts had been further assured.


    If such a scenario could happen two or three more times, the small adept¡¯s tower would not have much energy reserves left!


    If the power reserves of the tower¡¯s energy room were exhausted, they would have to sustain the tower¡¯s functions by consuming magical crystals. That would be an astronomical cost that even the adepts wouldn¡¯t dare imagine. The Crimson n couldn¡¯t possiblyst longmitting to such a wasteful act with their magical crystal reserves from only ten years of establishment.


    The main reason why the Alliance adepts very rarely approached the tower, despite how long the war had gone on for, was out of fear of the tower¡¯s retaliation. Even Third Grade adepts like Yurga and Haines were at high risk of dying if they were stalled at the tower by the desperate attempts of the Crimson n while being bombarded by the ferocious attacks of the tower.


    The adepts all treasured their lives extremely. They would never be willing to set foot upon such dangerous ground that could threaten their lives. That was why they had sent so many soldiers to exhaust what remained of the tower¡¯s magical power, even after cutting off Fire Throne¡¯s connection with theva sea below.


    The high-grade adepts would only be willing to step on the battlefield and attempt to capture the tower its energy room had been depleted of half its power.


    Without the blessing and protection of the tower, the small crew of the Crimson n couldn¡¯t possibly be the match of the alliance of five ns. When that happened, the Alliance could seal off all paths of exits, and they might even be able to snatch the nar coordinates of the two lesser nes in the Crimson n¡¯s control along with all the resources and materials stored within the tower.


    It was said that one of those nes was a bountiful ne of dragons. There were plenty of dragons to rob in there, along with innumerable natives to enve. That was the real reason that these five ns could unite as one.


    Otherwise, no one would be as stupid as to throw away so many of their mortal soldiers all for one small tower that they couldn¡¯t even take away with them.


    The Alliance quickly made some adjustments while the sea of fire raged on in the Magma Hall.


    The Andorra n that had suffered severe casualties retreated to rest, while the Cenas n chose another thousand-man army to fight during the next round. They would charge toward the tower once the sea of fire had been extinguished, and force the enemy to use the defensive powers of the tower once again.


    The Crimson n also started making some slight adjustments beneath Fire Throne.


    The Archers no longer stood at the front of the tower. Instead, their formation was pulled back, revealing the front of the tower to the opponents. The invaders would have to rush at the magical machine¡¯s line of fire while enduring the tower¡¯s attacks if they wanted to get at the Archers. Otherwise, they would have to endure the bullet storm from the Archers while assaulting the tower.


    That would leave the Alliance adepts with no choice but to step within the attack range of the tower.


    It would provide the Crimson adepts with an opportunity to retaliate with all they had.


    Both parties were weighing the options avable to them and trying their best to figure out how to wear down their enemy. Finally, fifteen minutester, the deathmatch erupted once again!


    The battle inside the Magma Hall was intense and bloody.


    Armies of human warriors charged onto the battlefield and fell on their way toward the enemy. Their bodies were broken and twisted, quickly gathering into little hills of corpses. Then, a new group of warriors would step over the mountain of dead bodies, raising their shields as they silently and numbly pressed forward.


    There were no battlecries or courageous roaring. It was almost as if all the soldiers knew their fate beforehand and only fearfully advanced forward under the urging of the adepts and nobles.


    The Archers behind the tower had been reduced from their original thirty-five to their current twenty-two machines. The Alliance had also buried five thousand men in front of the tower. It was already the sixth group of soldiers charging now!


    From the start of the battle, over twelve thousand soldiers and servants had died, while a total of seventeen First Grade adepts from the various ns had fallen in battle.


    Meanwhile, the Crimson n were entirely unharmed apart from some magical machine losses!


    However, leaders on both sides knew that the losses of the Crimson n were no less than the Alliance.


    After all, the energy of the tower was the Crimson n¡¯s lifeline! Now, the power had dropped to 57%; it was a hazardous level of energy for the tower.


    Should the energy reserves of the tower no longer be able to pose a threat to Third Grade adepts, it would be time for Haines and Yurga to strike. Even with the blessing and protection of the tower, the Crimson n would have a hard time fending off so many Alliance adepts with their current military force.


    The reason the Alliance adepts had waited so patiently was for the moment the Crimson n reached their limits.


    Once the tower gates had been broken, it would be the moment for the Alliance adepts to go all out!


    That moment slowly approached as the war continued.

 Chapter 778 Bug Adept Advances

    Icewind, White Tower.


    Though White Tower was in the Northern Lands and did not have urate information on everything that was happening in the n headquarters, gossip and rumors still quickly spread throughout thend.


    Most of the n adepts within the tower had been drawn back into Fire Throne where they were desperately fending off the invaders. However, judging from what news they received, the situation didn¡¯t seem to be looking up.


    That caused the members at White Tower to be anxious and concerned!


    Fortunately, Majordomo Adept Meryl was still here. With the collective efforts of her and Icdy Snowlotus, they quickly managed to suppress the hint of chaos and uprising that was stirring amongst the others.


    Meryl had been beyond busy during these few days.


    On the one hand, she had to work hard on managing the daily matters of White Tower. On the other, she had to keep a close eye on all the news from Fire Throne and remain prepared to provide headquarters with the most significant backup of resources and manpower that she could muster.


    Of course, Meryl also had to split off part of her attention to watch over all themotion on the ninth level of White Tower!


    The most famous of Crimson n¡¯s First Grade adepts, Bug Adept Billis, had suddenly returned and shut himself in his room on the ninth level right before the crisis at Fire Throne had broken out. ording to what Meryl knew, the n had already provided Billis with the necessary materials for advancement to the Second Grade a long time ago. Billis choosing to shut himself away at this moment was most likely so he could advance to Second Grade in the shortest time possible.


    The addition of another Second Grade to the Crimson n while the battle raged on at the frontlines was an extremely beneficial thing from every possible perspective. As such, Meryl sent Old Fox Vanlier to Billis¡¯ door in hopes of getting news of his advancement at the first possible moment.


    ............


    Inside Billis¡¯ room.


    The disturbances of the outside world could no longer affect Billis¡¯ mind.


    Here in this wholly sealed magical room, Billis had taken off the thick ck robe he always kept around himself andpletely revealed his wicked and ugly bug body.


    After the past hundred years of murder and ughter, there was no longer a trace of human features on him.


    Gleaming ck shell, ugly lotus-like mouthpart, sophisticatedpound eyes at the front of his insectoid head, and thick, clumsy ws.


    Billis was crouching against the ground like a true bug. His abdomen rapidly swelled and shrunk as crackling sounds rang all over his body. It was almost as if his current bug body could no longer host the massive amount of power that he had devoured.


    Countless cracks appeared on his dark ck shell, widening over and over with every passing second. One could even see the semi-translucent abdomen sac swelling to its limits through the cracks on his shell. Some unknown, yellow viscous liquid was churning within there. One could also asionally see strange eggs in the shape of tadpoles.


    As a bug adept, Billis¡¯ advancement was most definitely different from an ordinary adept.


    His current situation was nothing like an ordinary human adept¡¯s advancement. Instead, it bore more simrity to the evolution of magical insectoid creatures.


    Billis rolled and ground against the floor in agony as dense acid mist spewed out of his ugly mouthpart and hid his body within a fog. The acid mist sizzled when it came into contact with the air and the ground. However, Billis¡¯ screams and cries toned down when his splintering body came into contact with the mist.


    It was almost as if this terrifying acid mist had the ability to nourish and heal him, soothing some of the pain of his shell tearing apart!


    As a core adept of the Crimson n, Billis was able to enjoy many unique benefits.


    The Crimson n had obtained arge number of life-attribute crystals after the war in Faen ne. These crystals had now all been devoured by Billis, turning into his biggest reliance to sustain himself until hepleted the evolution.


    However, Billis was once again faced with a difficult choice during this process of evolution.


    The process of advancing to Second Grade was a decisive turning point of deciding the path of his insect evolution. Billis needed to choose between the two options of strengthening his bug body and enhancing his swarm.


    If he chose to strengthen his bug body, he would leave behind his weak self and allow his shell toughness and magic resistance to increase by a hundred times. When that happened, he would be able to rely on his sturdy body to endure the attacks of ordinary Second Grade adepts.


    That was clearly a choice that would lead him onto the path of abat insect!


    If he chose to strengthen his swarm, he would only experience a minor increase in his physical and magical defenses. Most of his evolution abilities would be concentrated on the swarm that he led. Moreover, all the magical skills that he has mastered would be able to benefit his swarm through the effect of his amplifying aura.


    This choice would undoubtedly allow him to remain the master of his swarm and a brood leader that relied on his insects to fight!


    After some thought, the cowardly Billis, who preferred not to have direct confrontations, chose to walk down the evolution path of a Brood Leader.


    Once he confirmed his evolution path, strange changes started happening to Billis¡¯ body.


    The color of his ck shell shifted continuously, while his thick ws and limbs became even denser and stronger. However, these changes were still not as obvious as the changes to his abdominal sac.


    Digestive and excretory organs could no longer be seen in his evolved sac. All the space within there had been segmented into cavities of various sizes. Billis could freely breed unique insects to his specifications in these cavities.


    The evolved Billis could no longer umte life energy by devouring food and flesh as he had before. Without his stomach and digestive acids, he had lost the ability to sustain himself through food consumption. Instead, he had to rely on the life energy that his swarm obtained to support his own life.


    Thus, it should be said that the evolved Billis was more a mobile insect hive than an adept!


    The first thing Billis did afterpleting his difficult evolution was summoning the magical mantises he had created. Twenty-three Intermediate First-Grade magical mantises gathered around him like loyal guards. They bent down slightly and silently offered him their loyalty.


    Billis¡¯ appearance might not seem to have changed much from before his evolution, but if someone were to examine his insides, they would find that he had undergone a tremendous transformation.


    Billis looked upon these magical mantis bodyguards of his seriously. When he extended his Spirit onto their soul brands, these Intermediate First-Grade mantises started to writhe and cry in pain, even as tremendous changes urred to them.


    Their bodies stretched out, their wings expanded, and their bones grew while their terrifying scythe-shaped arms became even sharper. They even glowed with a strange magical light.


    Five magical mantises had sessfully advanced into Voidreavers before Billis¡¯ face.


    It was a ferocious Beginner Second-Grade magical creature!


    They might have kept their appearances as magical mantises, but they were far more formidable and ferocious.


    Voidstep gave them the unique ability to enter the interspatialyer temporarily. This ability was remarkably suited for walking through obstacles or avoiding attacks. They could only maintain Voidstepping for three seconds with their current power, while the cooldown was eighteen seconds.


    Moreover, they could also allow this ability to temporarily enhance their scythe limbs and imbue them with the ability to ignore all defenses.


    However, sadly, their Physique after evolution was considered weak among Second Grade magical creatures. They were predators with weak defenses yet powerful attacks.


    Uponpleting their evolutions, the insects¡¯ life-grades changed.


    The five Voidreavers beat their mighty wings and crouched right before Billis, while the other magical mantises retreated further away out of fear. They silently crouched on the ground, not daring topete with these Voidreavers for the position at the front.


    Meanwhile, the massive swarm spread out even further away, turning into a squirming circle as they silently protected their swarm leader.


    Billis looked upon these newly advanced Voidreavers with satisfaction on his face. For the first time, he felt the power of being a bug adept. Billis did not feel like a Second Grade adept would have the chance to escape or survive if they were surrounded by all five of these Beginner Second-Grade Voidreavers.


    If one were to pick out any weakness of the Voidreaver, it would be their inability to use scrolls, potions, or magic wands like other human adepts. They fought purely with their powerful bodies. Otherwise, Billis would have absolute confidence in simultaneously fighting three or four Second Grade adepts anding out victorious.


    After all, adepts treasured their lives, while his insect generals were fearless!


    ............


    Adept Meryl immediately hurried over once Billis stepped out of his room.


    Though Meryl couldn¡¯t see any part of Billis¡¯ body hidden under his ck robes, she was certain that he had sessfully advanced.


    That was because the Beginner First-Grade Meryl felt an odd sense of fear and terror from the depths of her heart just from standing near him. If it wasn¡¯t because Billis knew well enough to restrain his ferocious insect aura, Meryl might not even be able to stand straight before him.


    The spiritual pressure from the grade suppression and Billis¡¯ unique aura of cruelty blended together, elevating him from being a mere master of insects hated by all!


    "Billis...Lord Billis," Meryl bit her lips and tried her best to suppress the wild fear surging from the depths of her heart, "Congrattions...on bing...a Second Grade adept!"


    "Tsssss..."


    Billis savored her fear with an expression of intoxication. He could no longer suppress the joy within him as he let out an unbridled shriek.

 Chapter 779 Gazlowes Ambitions

    The Lance ne.


    Inside the giant metal fortress, all of the machines hummed as they ran at their highest efficiency.


    A thousand meters underground, deep in the mines, hundreds of construction machines were hard at work in the lightless tunnels; there were no humans here at all. As such, there was no need for any illumination. All the machines were working in pitch-ck darkness, moving the ores they had excavated into the elevators.


    These newly excavated ores were mostly iron ores with high metal content. They first needed to be broken into pieces at the ore crushing workshop before being sent to the smelting factory for preliminary metal smelting. They would then have to be thrown into the refining workshop to be forged into metal ingots that were easier to store and transport.


    The various tightly-connected workshops rang with the hum of machines as the conveyor belts moved without stopping. It was only when the one-meter-squared metal ingots weighing one ton arrived at the warehouse that this entirely automated process of excavation, smelting, and forging was considered to beplete.


    Ever since Brain Monster Gazlowe had started controlling the metal fortress and set down roots in Stalon Mountains, the excavation of resources and creation of magical machines had not stopped for a single moment. In just under five years, an extensive metal vein stretching for hundreds of kilometers had been exhausted. The foundations of the Stalon Mountains had been deprived, and severe sinkholes and earth copses had happened in many areas.


    On the other hand, Gazlowe had obtained as many as one hundred and ten thousand magical machine warrior prototypes.


    Unfortunately, they were only prototypes and notbat units with activated intelligence modules. It wasn¡¯t that Gazlowe didn¡¯t want to activate all of them. Rather, the energy supply of the metal fortress couldn¡¯t keep up.


    The everyday activity of a magical machine warrior would exhaust a minimum of four to six magical energy batteries. This consumption would even double duringbat instances. However, Gazlowe¡¯s magic generator furnace could only generate a maximum of eight hundred magic energy batteries daily, even when running at full capacity.


    Moreover, apart from the magic energy batteries, the metal fortress was also responsible for sustaining the functions of many other things. The creation of magical machines and the research workshops all demanded arge amount of energy. Given all these considerations, generating five hundred magic energy batteries was the limit of production for the magic generator furnace.


    To ensure magic energy was conserved to the fullest extent, all magical machine warriors that walked off the conveyor belt were kept in their prototype state and remained unactivated. They were then moved into several emptied mountains and stored within. Meanwhile, the metal fortress could keep activated the bare minimum of one hundred and fifty magical machine warriors.


    After all these years of umtion, Gazlowe had finally managed to gather one million magic energy batteries. That meant Gazlowe, after so many years of hiding in silence, finally had the material foundation to erupt with an unstoppable force.


    Just as Gazlowe was silently thinking about which nearby dragon lord to unleash his fury upon, a rare guest appeared at the metal fortress.


    "O¡¯ respected Lady Alice, wee to the metal fortress. How can I be of service?" Though Gazlowe was one entire grade above Alice, the brain monster knew his status and position very well. As such, he behaved extremely subservient and enthusiastic before this woman who was very likely to be the spouse of his master.


    Alice, who had be pretty once again, was dressed in her purple starry robe and standing in the vast metal hall. There was nothing in sight aside from the tinum-white metal floor. Gazlowe¡¯s magic generator furnace had already be the magic energy source of the entire fortress, and it could not easily leave the power cabin. As such, Gazlowe could onlymunicate with Alice using mental messages.


    In her hands, Alice held a mysterious staff that was significantly taller than herself. The lively magic fairy on her shoulder looked around and asked softly, "Sir Gazlowe, did you receive the warning alerts that came from Fire Throne a while ago?"


    A short momentter, Gazlowe¡¯s unique mental flux radiated through the metal hall.


    "I have received the alerts and responded to the call for help. Two hundred magical machine warriors and twenty thousand magic energy batteries have been sent over to the tower."


    "These are not enough to resolve the predicament that Fire Throne is currently in!" Alice replied firmly.


    "That is not my problem, mydy!" Gazlowe chuckled coldly and said, "Master¡¯s order before he left was for me to protect this metal fortress and provide the Crimson n with a stable and safe outpost. Everything else happening in the World of Adepts is not within my administrative authority!"


    "Fire Throne is vital to your master. It should not be lost to the hands of the enemy in this manner!"


    "The answer is still the same!" Gazlowe insisted, "This is not my problem. If you wish for me to further contribute, you will need orders from my master."


    Alice smiled.


    Greem might always maintain a weak connection with her, but he was in a dangerous ce right now. They couldn¡¯t alwaysmunicate with each other. As such, Gazlowe¡¯s insistence was really only an excuse.


    It was clear that Gazlowe was already treating the entire metal fortress and everything within it as his personal property. He was not willing to offer them up to ¡¯others¡¯ apart from his master. Though he didn¡¯t mind cooperating with the other adepts and the Crimson n, trying to have him mobilize his forces and resources was no more than a delusion.


    Alice had prepared for such a situation.


    "Sir Gazlowe, you intend to go down the path of mental specialization, don¡¯t you?! I wonder, what are your thoughts on the direction of your future advancement?"


    The hall suddenly turned silent.


    A short momentter, Gazlowe¡¯s mental flux appeared once again.


    "I have heard that you are a great Witch of Fate! May I know what suggestions and guidance you have for my current development?" Surprisingly, the somewhat arrogant Third Grade brain monster became exceedingly humble now.


    "There¡¯s not much in the way of suggestions or guidance. I am just curious and interested in your current state. Someone as smart and arrogant as yourself must have nned far ahead for your own life. However, I must remind you. Never, ever underestimate the importance of the development of your origin!"


    The hall fell silent once again.


    "You mean to say that I have somewhat deviated from my origin now?"


    Alice once again smiled casually.


    "What do you think?"


    "...I was originally a Duke of the Goblin Empire and found ways to transform myself into my current state to break free of the limitations of my lifespan. For this purpose, I have utterly given up on my identity as a goblin, and I regard myself as a brain monster. As such, my soul origin should be...Spirit!"


    "As long as you understand!" Alice lightly grabbed Helen, who was darting about in front of her and ced the fairy on her shoulder before saying, "Your soul origin walks the path of mental specialization. The trait manifested from that path is the ability to assimte with metal that has been infested with your magical energy. This powerful ability is your greatest tool and has helped you create such a massive metal fortress. If you had no energy or resource limitations, you could easily build an entire capital of steel on your own."


    Gazlowe felt no pleasure from Alice¡¯s words of praise. He was wordlessly waiting for the turn in her voice.


    As expected, Alice¡¯s tone changed, and she started speaking the words he least wanted to hear.


    "Unfortunately, such a powerful ability has also misguided you, causing you to forget your soul origin. Your origin is Spirit and mental power, not the forging of magical machines. Creating so many magical machine warriors might give you the false illusion of bing stronger, but I wish to ask you one more question. Has your power improved once since you chose to assimte with the magic generator furnace?"


    The metal hall was silent once again.


    This time, it was truly silent. Even the rumbling in the distance and the faint trembling of the ground stopped all of a sudden. This city forged purely out of metal had suddenly fallen into actual silence.


    After a long, long time...


    Gazlowe¡¯s mental flux once again connected with Alice.


    "It seems that I have wasted all these years in vain, exhausting all my energy on creating a meaningless magical machine army. If I can¡¯t find a development that truly suits me, my journey of advancement will probably halt here at the Third Grade forever. This...this is something I...absolutely cannot tolerate."


    "Your train of thought doesn¡¯t always have to be this extreme. Your current actions aren¡¯t entirely wrong. At the very least, you can only have the chance to think about your future development if you can guarantee your safety at the moment. Thesest couple of years haven¡¯t been wasted. You have managed to create a magical machine army to protect your safety. It will be the foundation and body with which you will execute your will from now on. As long as you find the right direction, your progress forward will be much faster, especially with the help of these magical machines."


    "But I am very confused. I really have no idea how a true brain monster is supposed to advance. Should I let my brain cells divide and increase in size, or should I find ways to devour the brains of other intelligent lifeforms? I am perplexed and very troubled."


    "Perhaps I can provide you with a way to obtain knowledge on a suitable advancement method for brain monsters."


    "It that¡¯s true..."


    Gazlowe¡¯s mental flux suddenly intensified, and the entire metal fortress echoed with his mental ¡¯message¡¯ that he had practically roared out loud. It was fortunate that Alice knew well enough to cut off their mental connection. Otherwise, she would most definitely have been stunned by the mental shockwave of a Third Grade brain monster.


    "However, my information is never free. Let¡¯s see how much you are willing to pay now!"


    The hall filled with the whispers of Alice and Gazlowe, their voices slowly turning softer as they spoke.


    Finally, the hall reverted to its daily ¡¯calm¡¯!

 Chapter 780 Battle of the Adepts Tower

    World of Adepts, Fire Throne.


    The battle in front of the tower was nearing its conclusion.


    After seven days and nights of constant fighting, the two hundred magical machines that Fire Throne had dispatched had all been lost in Magma Hall. The Alliance paid the price of twenty-six adepts and twenty-four thousand soldiers for this result.


    Of course, the losses of the former was what made the hearts of the Alliance leaders ache.


    After all, regardless of how many soldiers they lost, they could raise the banner of recruitment in their territory and replenish the ranks. If there weren¡¯t enough young men, they could have their citizens increase their birth rate. At any rate, civilians were like chives; harvest one batch, and they would slowly regrow after a while. The adepts had never been worried about not having enough mortal soldiers.


    However, the loss of these twenty-six adepts truly hurt the hearts of the Alliance higher-ups.


    If these twenty-six deaths had all been inflicted upon a single n, it would have been enough to cause that n to disband.


    As such, one could easily imagine how intense and bloody the battle in the Magma Hall had been over the past week!


    In particr, one of those twenty-six adepts was a Second Grade adept from Layton Academy. It had infuriated Layton Academy Principal Second Grade Adept Giles so much that he nearly went berserk.


    Layton Academy only had a total of three Second Grade adepts. One of them stayed guard in their headquarters, while Principal Giles joined the Anti-Crimson n Alliance with the other.


    The situation on the battlefield had been looking good during the first few rounds of attacks; everything was basically within the control of the Alliance. Unfortunately, the exhaustion of the elite soldiers and the weakness of their servants caused the ordinary humans to start showing signs of breakdown.


    To avoid the mortal army from copsing at the frontlines, the Alliance adepts had no choice but to appear at the forefront as well. They had to use their powerful offensive magic to do away with the annoying magical machines.


    Meanwhile, the Crimson adepts took advantage of them approaching the tower to strike and gain a situational numerical advantage. As such, those unfortunate Alliance adepts had died at the hands of the Crimson n, one by one.


    It was the same for that murdered Second Grade adept.


    When he had gone near the tower and started wreaking havoc upon the magical machines, the seven Crimson n Second Grades that had been waiting in the tower struck in unison. Those assigned to seal off the exit path sealed it off, the interceptors intercepted the enemy, and the close-range fighters engaged in meleebat. After a few bouts of brutalbat, the Second Grade adept from Layton Academy died at the hands of Mary before hispanions could arrive.


    Third Grade Vampire Haines Vik had also intended to ambush Mary during this fight but was forced back by the terrifying lightning cast by the tower. The attack of the tower caused Haines to retreat from the battlefield for two whole days.


    Still, despite the numerous miracles that the Crimson n had achieved in battle, they could not save the tower from the fate of being conquered.


    With the exhaustion of the tower¡¯s energy, the brilliant radiance that shrouded the tower had vanished. The tower could no longer support an omnidirectional forcefield defense. It had to temporarily suspend its defensive system and redirect what remained of its energy to the offensive arrays in hopes of intimidating the greedily waiting Alliance.


    The reason the Crimson n had been able to achieve the miracle of twenty-six adept kills, at the cost of no casualties to themselves, was due to the tower¡¯s constant magical blessing and the threat of its powerful magical arrays. Why was it that the high-grade adepts never set foot within a hundred meters of the tower, despite already being on the battlefield? It was that they did not want to be sacrificial offerings beneath the might of the tower¡¯s offensive system!


    The Crimson n¡¯s energy reserves were still too low. Otherwise, the Alliance adepts would never have dared to attack a tower supported with sufficient energy, even if they had twice their number. Unless all the Alliance adepts could unite together with the courage to die for their cause, no one would be foolish enough to test the tower¡¯s strength with their own life.


    After all, when hosted by a Second Grade adept, the tower¡¯s offensive arrays could even threaten the life of a Third Grade adept.


    However, with the decrease in the tower¡¯s energy, the threat to high-grade adepts was starting to lessen as well. The activity of the Alliance high-grades was increasing exponentially.


    After all these days of continuous assault, cracks had begun to appear on the surface of the tower that had once intimidated tens of thousands of magical creatures.


    Moreover, as the main battlefield, the Magma Hall had be a nightmarish furnace of blood and flesh. Upon stepping into the hall, anyone would feel their head ache from the pungent stench of blood. The most terrifying thing of all was all the piles of corpses littered across the ce.


    Piles of mauled bodies could be seen from the entrance of the hall to the center of the battlefield, where they piled even higher and wider. Broken and bloodied corpses twisted in all sorts of unspeakable shapes and forms. It was horrendous.


    As the battle had gone on for far too long, the corpses of the first Alliance dead could not be moved away from the battlefield. The servants had no choice but to cart them away and pile them in a corner of the Magma Hall instead. As the battle increased in intensity, there was no longer even time for clearing away the dead bodies. The soldiers of the Alliance could only step over the piling forest of blood and flesh, fighting against the magical machines around the tower as their feet sunk in the blood and mud.


    Twenty thousand Alliance corpses lined the Magma Hall. As the survivors stepped on and fought upon their bodies, the bodies became even more deformed, rendering it impossible to discern their original appearances. Only rotting ck blood escaped from the corpse piles, leaving dry, ck rivers on the scorching floor of Magma Hall.


    The foul blood was evaporated by the heat, turning into a bloody mist that lingered in the air as if it was hell itself. The stronger humans risked infection in such a putrid environment if they stayed for more than fifteen minutes. Meanwhile, the weaker ones might even die instantly.


    The surviving soldiers continued to fight and battle in this harsh environment, using battering rams and the weapons in their hands to desperately attack the tower gates and the crimson tower itself. Wave after wave of warriors fell, only to be reced by a new stream of warriors.


    Their strength became weaker as time went on, and their courage had all but worn away. However, under the threats of the adepts and the nobles, they still had to muster the bravery to yell and assault that looming and immovable tower.


    Every time a certain number of them gathered around it, the tower would tremble as thousands of normally hidden magical lines would light up. Magical energy would be channeled and collected at the top of the tower, forming into a massive spell of enormous power to st the enemy to pieces.


    The mortal men could not defend themselves against such powerful magic without any magical protections themselves.


    Plenty of flesh was burned to ashes, machines torn to pieces, and souls vanished from this ce, howling as they disappeared. Some individuals with strong grudges did not immediately vanish upon death. Instead, they roamed the battlefield as wraiths just as they did in life.


    Some retained their appearance in life, though now shimmering with light and a bit more translucent. They either stood on the ground unresponding, knelt and cried, or wandered and shambled about aimlessly.


    Every time a living being passed by them, they would stare with their lightless eyes and extend their translucent hands, howling for help. And when their wishes went unfulfilled, they would fly into a rage, transforming into ugly and ferocious wraiths that lunged at the Alliance soldiers.


    One might not think much of them due to them being intangible beings, but they could still do a certain amount of spiritual damage to the living.


    Due to the gathering of souls on the battlefield, the Alliance soldiers¡¯ invasion was severely interrupted.


    Supposedly, the strength of a mortal¡¯s soul should not have allowed them to turn into spirit beings in such a short time frame. However, far too much magical energy was radiating in this battlefield, and far too many lives had been lost. All these factors created thisnd of wraiths and ghosts.


    The Alliance adept had no choice but to send apprentices to exterminate these collections of resentment that refused to leave after their deaths.


    Meanwhile, the adepts continued to observe this bloody and cruel war from behind the lines.


    The deaths of the soldiers were no more than a mundane number to them. Though they would have to pay outrge sums ofpensation after this, it was still a thousand times better than having them attack the tower themselves. Some Alliance adepts who needed significant numbers of souls for magical experiments even snuck onto the battlefield and used special equipment to collect the souls of the soldiers.


    The Alliance leaders chose to look past such actions.


    After all, they had done such things before, just on a smaller scale and not as conspicuously. At any rate, these souls would disperse and return to the river of souls even if they didn¡¯t collect them.


    Rather than that, why not have them contribute a little to their masters in life before thoroughly vanishing?!


    "How much energy does the tower still have left?" Third Grade Adept Yurga coldly asked.


    A First Grade adept beside him quickly took out a piece of strange equipment and pointed it at the tower. Soon, he obtained an urate number.


    "They have 1,275 pulnars left, sir!"


    A pulnar was a unit of measurement that adepts designated for magical energy. One pulnar was equivalent to the magical power of a First Grade fireball. While 1,275 pulnars might sound like a lot, it was extremely little for a tower.


    "Very good. Very good," Yurgaughed coldly and said, "We¡¯ve waited for so long and this moment has finally arrived. I now call for all adepts to enter the battle. We shall attempt to exhaust the enemy¡¯sst dregs of magical energy in two hours and enter the tower itself.


    "The first adept to enter the tower will be entitled to the first choice of spoils. The n that this adept belongs to will also gain an additional three percent of the share of spoils."


    "I hereby dere that this battle for the adept¡¯s tower has officially begun."

 Chapter 781 Bug Adept Descends

    Compared to the high morale of the Alliance, Fire Throne was currently engulfed in an atmosphere of sorrow.


    Though no losses had urred among the Crimson adepts, a cataclysmic danger was approaching the n with the gradual depletion of the tower¡¯s elementium pool.


    Fire Throne no longer had the extra energy to maintain the tower¡¯s defensive system. That gave the invaders a reason to attack the tower¡¯s foundations itself. As the thudding continued, the entire tower trembled and quaked slightly.


    The windows had now been sealed off with stone blocks, and all remaining magical energy had been converted into force walls and fire barriers to seal the tower¡¯s gates. Consequently, the tower no longer had the power to cast down lightning and thunder to exterminate the enemies swarming about the tower. Still, with the enemy¡¯s crude machinery, they would need a minimum of half a day to create a passage through the three-meter-thick foundations of the tower.


    The greatest threat to the tower now was still those Alliance adepts, not these soldiers who were swarming about like ants.


    As all the entrances had been sealed shut, the only way into the tower was the gate.


    The Crimson adepts all gathered in the magical hall on the first floor andmanded thest remaining Archers to shoot at the crowd of humans outside through small openings. Pupupu! The dull sound of metal bullets piercing through human bodies rained on. The Alliance soldiers no longer seemed to care about their own lives and continued to sh at the sturdy tower with their weapons fearlessly.


    The structure of the tower made of volcanic rock might not be indestructible, but it was stronger than steel and had very high fire resistance. If the tower could inject magic energy into the walls and activate the Hardening Arrays within them, the Alliance soldiers would not even be able to damage the walls with their mortal weapons.


    Sadly, now that energy was running low and all the reserves were being used to seal the gates, the enemies could swarm around the tower and attack it with all their strength.


    Perhaps because they sensed the problematic situation that Fire Throne was in, they formerly cautious Alliance adepts also started bing active. They silently snuck close to the tower and started using powerful spells to bombard the unprotected walls.


    Volcanic rock might be hard and fire resistant, but it had limits when it came to defending against spells of other attributes. The surface of the tower¡¯s walls started to crumble and break under the impact of the ferocious spells. Dust cascaded down from above like snow.


    The tower was in grave danger!


    The more dangerous the situation, the easier it was to observe the loyalty of the n adepts.


    Medusa Dana, Manticore Charon, Berserk Witch Sofia, Blood Knights Soros and Windsor, Blood Elves Faely and Talionia, Forest Spirit Eva and Daughter Emelia, as well as Dragonborn Zacha.


    Together, they sealed off the entrance to the first-floor hall with all they had, taking turns to charge out and attack the Alliance soldiers trying to enter the tower. Their magic power and stamina were quickly exhausted under the tide of enemies. Most of the adepts bore wounds of varying severity.


    If it weren¡¯t for the tower¡¯s protection and the healing from potions, some of the adepts would have already copsed!


    In such a desperate situation, the adepts had to choose between escaping and defending to theirst breath.


    Sending away all the adepts with the teleportation array while the tower still had the energy to cut off the enemy¡¯s interference was undoubtedly the best method to reduce the n¡¯s losses. However, just as Gargamel started doubting the idea of defending the tower, Mary stepped in as the temporary leader, dispelling all objections and insisted on the n to defend.


    Her reasoning was simple¨C Alice had promised her that Fire Throne would not fall!


    Mary believed deeply in this prophecy.


    Naturally, her bloodkin subordinates would always stand on her side.


    As Greem¡¯s soul servant, Dragonborn Zacha showed a spirit of true loyalty and constantly remained at the very frontline when defending the tower. In contrast, Tigule was much more hesitant and started an unfriendly ¡¯conversation¡¯ with Mary.


    However, just as the two of them were engaged in an argument, the teleportation array on the fourth floor mysteriously activated. It seemed as if someone wanted to teleport over to the tower.


    Mary, Tigule, and Gargamel couldn¡¯t help but look at each other.


    Of course, the only people who would know the coordinates of the teleportation array would be an ally. However, to think that there would be an adept who woulde to Fire Throne while it was in such dire straits was unimaginable!


    White light shed within the array, and a familiar yet foreign person in ck robes appeared before their silent gaze.


    "Bi...llis," Gargamel¡¯s mouth opened wider and wider, his tongue even tripping when trying to call out the name of the neer, "Lord...Billis."


    Gargamel stuttered, but he finally managed to sputter out the word ¡¯Lord¡¯ after some difficulty.


    Once upon a time, this apprentice adept named Billis was a downtrodden fellow working under him. If it weren¡¯t for Gargamel introducing him to the n leader, this little guy would probably still be living a difficult life amongst the apprentices.


    Still, it had only been so long. A former apprentice had now grown to a level where even he had to respectfully refer to them as Lord. A strange sense of a vanquished dream crept up in Gargamel¡¯s heart. He couldn¡¯t help but wonder if he had chosen the wrong path to walk down.


    "Not bad. As expected of someone I had high hopes of; you managed to be a Second Grade." Mary looked up and down and assessed Billis in his ck robes. Though he had covered his body very well, the close distance still allowed the others to sense his grade vaguely.


    "My greetings, Lady Mary!" Perhaps because Mary had brutally beaten him during his apprentice years, Billis still felt fear when seeing Mary in front of himself.


    Moreover, an insect master like himself was most afraid of agility-type assassins. Billis had confidence in exterminating adepts of other sses with his shockinglyrge swarm and newly evolved insect generals, but these tricks were useless against Mary alone.


    Mary¡¯s abnormal speed was something that even the evolved Voidreavers couldn¡¯t match. Moreover, if they were topare subordinates, Mary¡¯s four Second Grade vampires were not that far behind Billis¡¯ own. As long as her subordinates could stall the five Voidreavers for a moment, Mary could easily pluck off Billis¡¯ head.


    Billis¡¯ technique of dissolving into the swarm and avoiding the enemy¡¯s attacks was also useless before Mary.


    After all, ever since Billis assimted with the Queen Bug, his soul brand had been in Greem¡¯s control. Even if he were to turn himself into tens of thousands of separate pieces, Greem could still easily find the medium of his soul in the mess of insects. Meanwhile, as Greem¡¯s concubine, Mary also seemed to have been given certain privileges over the soul brand.


    That was the main reason why Billis was always scared of Mary!


    "You came just in time. We can¡¯t hold for much longer, but the reinforcements that Alice promised still haven¡¯t arrived. We need you to stall the enemies outside the tower for a while. You don¡¯t have any objections, do you?" Mary asked with a smile on her face, but not a trace of begging or request between her eyebrows.


    "I have none...no objections at all," Billis instantly shrieked, "The n has invested so much in me, it is only natural that I need to contribute in a moment of crisis like this."


    Billis strode out of the teleportation room and walked toward the magical hall.


    Billis¡¯ body under the robe started shedding something as he walked, like dumplings falling into water. Balls of ck beetles fell to the ground along the way. These ck beetles were all the size of fists; they had hard shells, sharp fangs, and two pairs of wings on their backs, onerge and one small.


    It was almost as if a portal had opened under Billis¡¯ ck robe. Swarms of ck beetles surged out from within, gathering into groups and taking to the skies as they stormed down the spiral staircases.


    The screams of female adepts and the roars of male adepts abruptly rang out from the magical hall. Fortunately, they promptly received a magical message from Mary. That was why they refrained from striking this swarm of insects that was brushing past their clothes and their hair.


    "It¡¯s Lord Billis."


    "He has advanced to Second Grade."


    Some adepts who were privy to the situation immediately figured out what had happened.


    To think that a powerful Second Grade adept had emerged in this moment of danger. It was a blessing worth celebrating!


    The insect swarm circled in the air of the hall before turning into a ck arrow and shooting toward the crowd gathered outside the light barrier of the gate.


    The Alliance soldiers that had been attacking the force wall with full force were immediately trapped in a ck flood. They started to stumble backward, swinging the des in their hand helplessly as they did so.


    The ck beetles did not fear conventional weapons at all. Even greatswords could only create sparks when shing their shells. The beetles would spin about a little, recalibrate themselves before rejoining the swarm and attacking the enemies.


    The tens of thousands of ck beetles gathered into a flood as if they were a gue of locusts and swept across the crowd. The crunching sound of snapping jaws didn¡¯t cease wherever they went. When the ck flood swept past the masses, the only things they left behind were broken bones and shattered armor.


    There was only a single swarm initially. However, as more and more beetles surged out of the tower, the hive began to split off.


    For a moment, a dozen swarms weaved between the crowd like ck ribbons of death, biting and tearing, spreading fear across every corner of the battlefield.


    The Alliance army had finally fallen apart!

 Chapter 782 The Death Heralding Crow

    At this point, the existence of the Alliance army was no longer necessary!


    From start to end, the ten thousand Alliance soldiers had been no more than cannon fodder that the adepts used to exhaust the tower¡¯s defensive power. Now that Fire Throne was on itsst legs, the remaining adepts were more than enough to finish the job.


    Thus, the Alliance adepts mixed in with the army immediately rushed out in response to the Crimson adept¡¯s retaliation.


    Naturally, given they had the courage to attack Fire Throne, the five ns had already performed a thorough investigation of the Crimson n. Of course, they had heard of the name of Bug Adept Billis.


    However, a First Grade mutated bloodline adept was not a target they would be wary of!


    Six or seven adepts instantly threw out magical fireballs and engulfed massive numbers of ck beetles in the explosions.


    They believed that one fireball from them would easily turn thousands of these beetles into dust. To their surprise, though the fireballs were exploding in session, and some charred insect corpses were falling from the skies, the number was far lower than what they had expected.


    From the looks of it, a magical fireball with 110 points of power could only cause the death of two dozen beetles, and only those caught at the center of the explosions. Most of the beetles found at the edges of the explosions were only wounded and had not even lost the ability to move.


    The sight of this caused all the adepts to pause for a moment.


    Elementary resistance?


    Could such a massive swarm of insects all possess elementary resistance? How many resources did the bug adept have to consume to achieve this!


    While the adepts were stunned, the swarm immediately responded to the assault on them. They started to split and gather like intelligent creatures, quickly forming into six separate armies and lunging back in the direction the spells hade from.


    What a terrifying swarm.


    The Alliance adepts praised it with wicked smiles on their faces. They then started concentrating several powerful area-of-effect spells and throwing them at the swarm. The spells they chose this time were more potent and engulfed an evenrger area. The soldiers who were caught between the two forces could only howl and scatter in every direction. They no longer dared to charge at the enemy ranks.


    The speed of the ck insect swarm was slightly beyond the Alliance adepts¡¯ expectations. Though plenty of charred corpses were falling from the sky, it did not affect the speed of the swarm in the slightest. Just as the Alliance adepts finished preparing their next spell, the swarm descended upon them.


    The six Alliance adepts standing at the very front were immediately confronted with a difficult problem!


    Should they dispel the magic in their hands and run away, or should they toss the spell at the insects?


    The swarm was so close to them now. If the adepts threw their spells at it, they would be caught in their area of effect as well.


    In that one instant they hesitated, the swarm devoured their bodies.


    Brilliant and colorful magical barriers immediately popped up in the pile of squirming beetles. The Alliance adepts that had been caught in the horde of insects started ughtering the insects biting at their shields while calling for help from theirpanions.


    Even from a distance, the only things within sight were those ugly and wicked ck beetles; there were simply too many of them. They came wave after wave, like a squirming hill of insects, drowning the six adepts in a ck tide.


    The spells of the Alliance adepts exploded within the swarm, blowing the ck beetles into broken bits and pungent ck blood. However, before their spells even vanished, the adepts would be drowned by another wave of insects.


    The Alliance adepts trapped within the swarm watched as their magical shields became thinner and thinner, shouting for help as they continued to bombard the horde around them. In the end, two of the Alliance adepts were powerful enough to st a way through the swarm and escape the flood of insects, their barriers still crawling with beetles.


    The swarm broke the remaining four adepts¡¯ shields before help could arrive. Deste screaming rang out. The four adepts beat their bodies all over frantically, but they still couldn¡¯t stop the beetles from entering their bodies through their eyes, ears, mouth, nose, and even skin.


    Dong! Dong!


    Two dull explosionster, a good chunk of the swarm had been blown to bits. Two massive craters appeared in the center of the ck insect tide before being instantly filled by insect corpses and blood.


    Two adepts who knew their fate was death had self-destructed!


    At this moment, there were already seventy-six Alliance adepts in the Magma Hall. Naturally, there was no way they could stand by and watch this terrifying swarm continue ughtering theirpanions. A hail of powerful explosive fireballs, chain lightning, acid mist, and icence barrages shot toward the swarm.


    Just as the beetles started to fall inrge numbers, two Alliance adepts who had been sting away at the swarm froze. The explosive fireballs in their hands suddenly dispersed. Their heads shot up several meters into the air and rolled into the distance.


    The cuts to their necks were smooth as if a sharp and quick de had severed them.


    A fountain of blood spurted into the sky, and an insect with a slim body appeared for a momentary sh, vanishing from sight in the very next second.


    "There are magical insects. They can hide their presence..."


    "They are all Second Grades."


    The Alliance adepts immediately panicked. One by one, they started to cast magical shields on themselves and tried their best to stay with theirpanions.


    Unfortunately, the Alliance adepts were still mostly First Grade. They could only be the target of ughter in the face of a group of Second Grade magical insects that could hide.


    Aaaaaaah!


    There was yet another series of tragic cries. Three Alliance adepts who had been standing back to back were ambushed by five Second Grade Voidreavers. As the sharp scythe-limbs shed at the adepts, their shields shattered, and their bodies were chopped up into uneven pieces that fell upon the ground.


    The three adepts all belonged to the Kam n, and this incident instantly incited the fury of Third Grade Adept Yurga.


    Yurga let out a strange shriek as his entire body exploded into a cloud of thick, ck smoke. This cloud of smoke spread out and dispersed like a living thing. Then, shrill shrieks rang out from the depths of the ck smoke while a vast murder of red-eyed crows emerged from within.


    Red-eyed crows were originally low-grade magical creatures. Even beginner apprentices could quickly deal with one to two of them.


    However, this murder of red-eyed crows that Third Grade Yurga had created were all variants that had undergone multiple mutations. A third eye had opened at their brow, apart from their two existing crimson eyes. However, this third eye was typically shut, making it hard to tell that it even existed.


    The murder of crows instantly descended upon the battlefield. They spread out and started letting out hoarse ear-piercing shrieks. Strange soundwaves rippled through the air, immediately forcing out the five Voidreavers who were traveling in the interspatialyers.


    The crows swarmed the Voidreavers the moment they showed themselves, and the two parties engaged in a wild battle. The five Voidreavers showed no signs of weakness. They too summoned a dozen magical mantises, causing the battlefield to be even more chaotic and bloody.


    A murder of crows gathered in the air and formed into the appearance of Third Grade Yurga.


    He was cloaked in ck robes and a chilling smile appeared on his face as he coldly said, "You dare confront my Death Heralding Crows head on? Kehkehkeh. Now, I¡¯ll let you know where I got my name!"


    As he sent an intangible mental fluctuation outward, the murder of red-eyed crows who were fighting with the Voidreavers and mantises started shrieking in unison. At the same time, a strange gray eye slowly opened between their brows. A death ray shot out from that eye.


    If one red-eyed crow could shoot a single death ray, then hundreds and thousands of red-eyed crows could shoot out hundreds and thousands of death rays. These death rays shot into the midst of the magical insects, mostly focusing on the Second Grade Voidreavers.


    Individual death rays might not have been frightening. After all, innate abilities with the trait to cause instant-death were affected by multiple factors, including the difference between Spirit and the magic resistance of the target. However, if multiple Death Heralding Crows assaulted any unfortunate individual, the chance of instant-death by these rays would stack together.


    Beng! Beng! Beng!


    The ranks of the magical insects immediately deted like exploded balloons. Over half of the magical mantises were instantly exterminated, while two of the five Second Grade Voidreavers were killed in a sh.


    Death Heralding Crows. Death Heralding Crows.


    When the Death Heralding Crows shrieks, death descends!


    Billis, who had silently been watching from the hall, spat out ck blood and started stumbling.


    In all honesty, with his current Spirit, even having half of the swarm being exterminated in an instant would hardly shake his mind or cause his origin to quake. However, Billis was extremely wounded by the ¡¯Deration of Death¡¯ being sent over through the soul brands when the Death Heralding Crows exterminated the insects.


    It was as if he had been affected by the innate talents of the Death Heralding Crows while behind the lines.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    Billis cursed repeatedly and let out a scream of his own to recall his insect army. Those damned crows were the perfect counter to his swarm. Not only could they exterminate his insect generals, but they could also even affect the person behind them.


    That...that was unbelievable!


    The ck swarm immediately started retreating. Even the Voidreavers and magical mantises did not care to fight the Death Heralding Crows any longer. They desperately started escaping back to the tower.


    The situation that had started looking better for the Crimson n was immediately overturned beneath the terrifying might of a Third Grade adept!

 Chapter 783 The Towers Predicamen

    t


    It was the power ofws.


    All the Second Grade adepts who had just witnessed the might of Third Grade Adept Yurga couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh in their minds.


    In all seriousness, it couldn¡¯t be considered an actual use of the power ofws. At the very best, it was only scratching the surface of that power. Otherwise, Bug Adept Billis would already have died to this terrifying Law of Instant-Death. There was no way he would still be standing after that attack.


    One could tell that Yurga had only just made contact with part of the Laws of Instant-Death and had only just assimted them into his magical attacks. One couldn¡¯t look down upon his power, even if it were only a fraction of the narws¡¯ full potential. It was already a terrifying finisher that most Second Grade adepts would have no way of surviving.


    If it weren¡¯t for therge swarm sharing the damage with Billis, and if Billis himself was the one who had to endure the death rays, then even this newly risen bug adept would have died before achieving his full potential. He would have snapped his wings on this first flight of his.


    It was also an unfortunate day for Billis!


    It had been such a perfect debut, yet he had been pped in the face by a Third Grade adept after only a minute¡¯s worth of arrogance. Moreover, he had no choice but to escape and hide in the tower without taking a step outside again.


    That short sh was already evidence of the massive gulf in power between Second and Third Grade adepts, despite only a single level standing between them. It was an overwhelming beatdown. The unstoppable Second Grade bug adept had been a nightmarish existence to the First Grade adepts. Yet, he became the one who was crushed underfoot when matched against a Third Grade adept.


    The grade difference of the World of Adepts was difficult to overturn through experience and technique!


    The bug adept might have been beaten back, but the arrogant morale of the Alliance adepts had also been suppressed. The First Grade Alliance adepts looked at the damaged, yet firm, tower and looked at each other. Hesitation grew in their hearts uncontrobly.


    The mission rewards that the high-grade adepts had promised might bepelling, but nothing was more valuable than their own lives.


    Who knew what else woulde crawling out of the Crimson n¡¯s adept¡¯s tower? If they led the charge and drew out another ¡¯bug adept,¡¯ they would be trapped in a true abyss, and no one would risk death to save them.


    That was why the battle in front of the tower was showing signs of slowing down.


    "Hmph, a bunch of cowards." Adept Yurga coldly snorted when he saw this. He immediately starting naming names, "Mucha, you lead the attack on the adept¡¯s gates. I can sense it; the tower doesn¡¯t have much energy left."


    Mucha was a Second Grade adept of the Kam n and an able subordinate that Yurga had personally trained. It was a crucial moment in the war. Yurga couldn¡¯t possibly override the authority of the other n leaders and order the adepts to charge. As such, his only option was to have adepts of his own n take the lead.


    Mucha was a middle-aged man with a golden circlet on his head and a rough appearance. He acknowledged the orders and immediately rushed toward the frontlines with his First Grade adept subordinates.


    With the Kam n adepts in the lead, the adepts of the other ns no longer behaved as fearful as before. They too followed along and lunged at the gates. They knew very well that Yurga would take action if anything else came from the Crimson n. After all, his own n adepts were on the line.


    As the Alliance soldiers retreated and the Alliance adepts advanced, the battle at the gates became even more intense and bloody. The Alliance adepts herded powerful voodoo beasts toward the adept¡¯s tower to assault the force wall with all their might. Meanwhile, the Crimson adepts behind the gates had to continuously exterminate the hordes of enemies to reduce the strain on the tower¡¯s energy reserves.


    Voodoo beasts, magical machines, summoned creatures, corruptors, war statues, and otherworldly magical creatures.


    These dispensible servants reced the adepts as the main fighters at the frontlines. Meanwhile, the cautious adepts hid behind them and used all sorts of colorful spells to bombard the tower. On a battlefield like this, any outstanding performance by an adept¡¯s servant would be like an application for a ticket straight to hell.


    For example, you had the war statue, entirely forged out of special alloy and standing eleven meters tall. It was a tool that the Magic Forest Hut alchemists had specifically summoned to umte more contributions in this war.


    These statues were ughter machines specially designed forrge-scale wars. They kept a humanoid appearance and had not undergone any kind of ornamental carvings or decorations on the surface, revealing the wild color of the special alloy they were made of. The most eye-catching features of its giant body were the magical lines that flowed throughout it. These lines appeared and faded from sight, asionally appearing due to powerful magical energy flow.


    The war statue held aicallyrge metal axe in its hand. The massive de wasrger than the gate of a human city and sent winds rippling through the air whenever it moved, reminding all living beings to run away from its might.


    This war statue gave an outstanding performance the very moment it appeared!


    A single strike for a single enemy; the war statue smashed down with its axe, and a three-meter-tall magical machine was crushed t, almost as if the statue was ying a game of whack-a-mole. It had only been three minutes since it had appeared, and the statue had executed five Crimson n machines.


    If this giant were allowed to rampage on the battlefield, the tower would have a hard time resisting its ferocious attacks. As such, a strike team led by Zacha and Tigule rushed out of the tower without hesitation and intercepted the statue thirty meters away from the tower.


    The strike team was formed from First Grade Crimson adepts and thest twenty Archers. They quickly spread out to make space for the two Second Grades. Meanwhile, Zacha and Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder started an intense fight against the war statue, whose power was equal to that of a Second Grade adept.


    The battle was fierce but short. The war statue had been utterly destroyed after only a minute and a half.


    The war statue¡¯s broken body had copsed in front of the tower, trembling as rumbling noises came from within its body. All of its magical arrays started exploding in session. Finally, the statue stopped all movement and turned into a burning heap of junk.


    The victorious Dragonborn Zacha and Goblin Shredder had also paid an enormous price for this.


    Zacha¡¯s body was covered with terrifying wounds left behind by ravaging elementium spells. Most of the scales on his body had fallen off, and two of his four muscr legs had been broken. He held them in the air and off the ground, immense pain shooting through his body with every movement he made.


    Purple blood seeped out of his many wounds, forming into a small river behind him. What was even more terrifying was the fact that his wind indurium armor had been shattered and twisted beyond recognition. There was even a frightening fist indentation on the chestte.


    If it weren¡¯t for thebined protection of the wind indurium armor and the Fire Shields, Zacha would already have died to the heavy metal fists of the war statue.


    Meanwhile, the otherbatant, the Goblin Shredder, also had one foot in the grave!


    If it weren¡¯t for the interference of the Alliance adepts, thebination of Zacha and Tigule would have easily taken down this war machine meant only for sieges. However, in today¡¯s environment, they had no choice but to confront the war statue, even as countless magical attacks threatened their safety.


    This three-meter-tall Goblin Shredder was undoubtedly inferior to the war statue in terms of power and Physique. As such, it had topensate for it with its fearless attacks and rapid movements.


    The Goblin Shredder had only managed to create a small crack in the statue¡¯s chest after depleting all of its goblin rockets. Tigule then covered Dragonborn Zacha as he rushed to the statue¡¯s chest and engulfed the area with ferocious lightning arcs.


    The armor of the war statue was beyond human imagination. Trying to take it down with ordinary physical attacks was a colossal task. However, once they created a crack that led to its internalponents, it was a much easier job to defeat it!


    The thin lightning sts crept into the crack and detonated the magical energy within. That was how they had sessfully defeated this giant.


    Zacha, who had taken on the role of the primary offense, was undoubtedly the most severely wounded. Eva and Emelia, who had rushed up to administer first-aid once the Goblin Shredder dragged him back to the tower, couldn¡¯t even be sure if he was still alive.


    Only six of thest twenty Archers returned. The rest had been left on the battlefield by the enemies¡¯ attacks. Dana the Medusa and Manticore Charon had also made it back, but their wounds were no better than Zacha¡¯s. They copsed the moment they entered the tower.


    The situation near the tower was extremely tenses now. If it weren¡¯t for the four vampires rushing out to ughter the enemies, intimidating them for a moment, the situation would be much, much worse.


    Even so, the hall was now engulfed in a sorrowful and tragic atmosphere. Many were wounded and hurt. Even Berserk Witch Sofia, who hade over from the North to assist them, had suffered heavy wounds. She was barely keeping the enemies at bay with one arm in a sling.


    The situation that had been turned around with the bug adept¡¯s appearance once again be grave!


    At this moment, the entire burden was weighing upon Mary¡¯s shoulders.


    Fight? Or retreat?


    All the n adepts were waiting for her decision!


    If she didn¡¯t make the choice soon, the tower¡¯s energy would be depleted. Would they, the adepts who had fought for the n until the veryst moment, still have a chance to escape then? If the n¡¯s elites were all buried here, was there still a reason for the Crimson n to exist?


    The silence of the adepts and the bloody battle on the frontlines tested Mary¡¯s heart with each passing moment.


    Fighting a downhill battle as a leader was undoubtedly an enjoyable experience. However, at such a moment of crisis, when everyone¡¯s lives hung upon one decision of hers¨C that intangible pressure was not something that an ordinary person could bear!


    If Alice had lied to her. If Alice¡¯s reinforcements were just a step toote. If the n adepts couldn¡¯t handle the pressure and cracked ahead of time...


    Countless possibilities ran through her mind and gued her, but she had to present a calm andposed demeanor.


    There were countless moments where Mary had the impulse to charge out of the tower and fight without restraint. Fighting to her death would have been better than standing still and silently enduring this torture of the heart.


    Alice, where are you exactly?


    Will you...will youe...

 Chapter 784 Otherworldly Gues

    t


    The once solemn Fire Throne now shook uncontrobly!


    Large areas of damage had appeared on the surface of the tower. Some more impatient Alliance adepts were alreadymanding their voodoo beasts to charge into the tower and initiate ¡¯urban warfare¡¯ against the Crimson adepts in the narrow corridors. Casualties on both sides were increasing exponentially.


    The energy supply of the tower might not be sufficient, but the magical doors and traps that filled the interior of the tower were still active. The Crimson adepts undoubtedly had an immense advantage when fighting in an area like this.


    They could quickly retreat or move away if the situation turned against them. The Alliance adepts would be at considerable risk of triggering traps if they pursued them while they escaped. That would cause the Alliance adepts to be surrounded and ambushed by enemies many times their number.


    Every single ce could be a battlefield between adepts as both parties moved throughout the tower.


    There were many structures within the tower. Yet, how could they possibly endure being ravaged by a war between adepts? One by one, they burned in the fires of war before copsing into ruin. As the Alliance adepts continued to surge into the tower, the ruined areas increased in number and the area where the Crimson adepts could move freely started to decrease.


    The low-grade adepts of the Alliance didn¡¯t dare push too hard with Billis¡¯ swarm and Mary¡¯s vampires holding them back. As such, they barely managed to gain control over two levels of the tower after half a day.


    As the teleportation array was located on the fourth floor, the Crimson adepts would lose theirst chance to escape if they retreated another time. The Crimson adepts held fast at the entrance to the third level, beating back wave after wave of advances from the enemies. Casualties were severe on both sides.


    Even the old vampire Haines Vik had tried to break through this passage with his overwhelming Third Grade power, but he was forcefully beaten into a retreat by the Crimson n¡¯s eight Second Grades. The Crimson adepts knew very well what the situation was now that the battle hadmenced to this stage. Hope lied ahead, while death waited behind them; there was no retreat now. Everyone abandoned all pointless thoughts that had been guing their minds and used every ounce of their power to stall the progress of the enemy.


    In the end, the two Third Grades of the Alliance led a group of Second Grades in a charge against the entrance. Seeing that it was impossible to stop this attack, Mary had no choice but to detonate the magical traps to dy them. She then led the Crimson adepts one level up and chose to fortify themselves at the entrance to the fourth level.


    However, the Alliance adepts were unconcerned with a brute force attack at this point.


    They sentrge groups of adepts to attack the entrance of the fourth floor and tie down the forces of the Crimson adepts to that location. They then secretly sent some elite adepts to dig down from the first level to find the path to the energy room on the second underground level.


    Once they cut off the connection between the energy room and the tower, the teleportation array would naturally lose its ability to function. When that happened, the Alliance adepts could take their time to whittle down the remaining Crimson adepts. It was the best n of action to reduce allied losses.


    In this moment of crisis, a white light shed throughout the teleportation room on the fourth level. The spatial flux increased in intensity as a massive, shaking portal opened in the room after much difficulty.


    The tower was alreadycking in energy. With such arge portal forcefully wringing away what was left, the elementium pool quickly bottomed out. With the energy supply cut off, the massive portal started trembling intensely, and it appeared to be on the verge of copse.


    The many Crimson adepts were stunned, and in their moment of shock, an evenrger mental flux bellowed in their minds.


    "Bastards...bastards. A whole bunch of bastards. I came here to help you guys fight a war, and you bastards even make me pay the energy for the portal? I hate you people so much."


    As this powerful mental fluctuation rang out, strange energy from a distant world rushed into thisrge portal, finally stabilizing it.


    A sharp tearing sound rang out. The space within the portal appeared to have been torn apart by a powerful force. A strange metallic golem shot out thousands of colorful energy beams from its body, widening this rift in space before finally crawling out of the portal with much difficulty.


    It was only once the metal golem stood before everyone that they realized it was a good eight meters tall. The thickness of its metal shell was astounding. A squid-shaped brain floated in a dark-yellow liquid inside the golem¡¯s semi-translucent chest. The brain was staring fiercely at everyone present in the room.


    Indeed, the brain floating in the liquid might not have eyes, but its unique mental appendages were staring at every adept on the fourth level without any restraint.


    "Heheh. I was wondering why that brat Alice was in such a hurry. So you guys have already been beaten so terribly by the enemy! Goddamn, the lower levels have already been torn apart by the enemies. Even the energy center has fallen into their hands. You guys are really useless. To think you could be beaten into a pulp while defending with an adept¡¯s tower."


    The strange brain seemed to be able to ignore all physical obstacles and magical defenses to look at the entirety of the tower. It had only set foot in Fire Throne for ten seconds, yet it had already figured out the situation of the battlefield.


    "You...you are that brain monster, Gazlowe." The other adepts had not seen Gazlowe¡¯s appearance after his transformation. Only Mary could recognize him due to his familiar mental flux, which she had been acquainted with when fighting in the Steel Capital.


    "Technically, I am not Gazlowe; just a split-off brain of his. That idiot made his brain far too big, and he can¡¯t go anywhere now. He had no choice but to split ¡¯me¡¯ off and allow me to be his clone to travel in his ce while dropping by to save you guys on the way." This strange brain trapped in the golem¡¯s chest became more excited as he spoke. He also appeared to greatly despise his original self.


    The Crimson adepts automatically filtered away all his silly mutterings and clung on to the keyword: ¡¯save¡¯!


    This big brain was here to save us?


    A trace of suspicion appeared in the eyes of the adepts.


    They could tell that the brain¡¯s metal golem was a humanoid magical machine. However, while the armor was very thick and sturdy, there was no sign of even half a magic energy rifle or cannon.


    Was it nning to save them with its brain?


    As a clone of the brain monster, the small brain monster undoubtedly possessed powerful mental abilities as well. His intangible mental appendages waved about in the air. Any thoughts unguarded by magic were naked before him. He could easily capture everything that people were thinking about.


    As a clone of a Third Grade brain monster, being doubted by a group of First and Second Grade adepts was an immense humiliation. The brain monster roared and let out a mental st wave, stunning all of the adepts and almost causing them to faint.


    "I don¡¯t care who you are, Big Brain. Since Alice asked you toe over such a long distance, you should get to your job! Or are you going to watch as Fire Throne is taken apart into ruins by the enemy?" Mary said unhappily.


    "I have already said this. I am not Big Brain, I am a split-off brain of his. My name is Gru...Gru......Gru!" The small brain monster roared in anger. Of course, he was stillmunicating with mental messages.


    However, he was getting to work even as he roared.


    Several energy beams of various colors emerged from his metal golem body and connected him with the teleportation array and the portal above it.


    What happened next shocked all of the Crimson adepts.


    Powerful magical energy surged out of his body, entering the teleportation array and the portal, easily sustaining their functions. A portion of the magical power was diverted and flowed toward the central control hall. It seemed he intended to take full control of the tower.


    Energy. What powerful energy!


    The Crimson adepts weren¡¯t the only ones who were shocked at this moment. The two Third Grade adepts on the third level also lifted their heads and looked in surprise. Their gazes passed through the thick walls andnded on the metal golem.


    However, their gazes onlysted for a second before being cut off by a magical barrier that had risen from the ground.


    A magical barrier?


    Yurga and Haines were surprised. They once again focused and realized that the exhausted tower was once again ¡¯reviving¡¯ with the introduction of a strange surge of energy.


    "Dammit. Ignore the energy room; we have to destroy the central crystal here first." Yurga roared furiously.


    "Dammit, dammit, dammit...we¡¯ve all been tricked. This tower actually has a second energy source. Hurry up; we must destroy the central crystal of the tower before its defense systems are activated." Even Haines had been driven into a rage.


    It was precisely because Fire Throne¡¯s defensive system had been depowered that they even dared to break into the higher levels of the tower. If the defensive systems were to be activated at this moment, they, who had overextended into enemy territory...


    Even the two of them felt their heads hurt when thinking of the might of an adept tower¡¯s defensive system, let alone ordinary First or Second Grade adepts. They wouldn¡¯t even have a chance to resist the system.


    Just as the two of them started panicking, some sort of trouble urred on the higher levels. The entire tower trembled.


    The Alliance adepts who were gathered at the entrance to the fourth level let out horrifying screams and ran away like a herd of sheep being chased by a wolf.


    "What¡¯s the matter? Stand your ground, people!" Yurga roared out angrily as the leader of the adepts, but his words stopped in his mouth before he couldplete his sentence.


    He could very clearly see a swarm of magical machines flood out of the fourth level, each of them with magic energy cannons in their hands and chasing after the Alliance adepts.


    And their number? Like a flood of metal: vast, endless, and uncountable.

 Chapter 785 Magical Machine Army

    The number of magical machines that were charging down from the fourth level of the tower was shocking.


    They advanced in unison andunched a vicious assault at the Alliance adepts within the winding corridors; the first few Alliance adepts could not dodge in time. They were riddled with holes by a storm of bullets before they could even see if their instant-cast spells had any effect on the flood of metal.


    In truth, these metal bullets could only inflict physical damage and should only have posed a minor threat to the defenses of an adept. However, the number of rounds was simply overwhelming.


    The adepts¡¯ magical shields were instantly shattered, their bodies quickly following after.


    The wildly advancing magical machines didn¡¯t care about the Alliance adepts they had just killed. They continued pushing rapidly toward the lower levels under the control of the person behind them.


    There were some individuals with strange and unique skills amongst the Alliance adepts. They used Earth Alteration to raise uneven stone pirs across the corridors to temporarily seal off the path of the magical machines. They then hastily gathered into a defensive formation in the third level hall.


    The Alliance adepts might not belong to just a single n, but as noble and wise adepts, they still had thebat discipline to fight in cooperation with one another.


    Several body-refining adepts and bloodline adepts stood at the forefront. They roared and prepared themselves to endure the attacks that woulde their way. Meanwhile, the many elementium adepts took out their staffs and started to chant their spells loudly. The alchemists of the Magic Forest Hut once again summoned swarms of elementium creatures and had them fill the empty spots on the frontlines.


    These weak minions might not have been of much use, but they were perfectly suited as fodder for the enemy¡¯s firepower.


    There wasn¡¯t much time for them to prepare at all. A mere dozen secondster, the fierce and ferocious magical machine army smashed through all the obstacles, pushing down walls as they charged into the magical hall.


    A blinding stream of spells surged forth from the ranks of the adepts, sting into oblivion the twenty-seven magical machines that had entered the hall. There was absolutely no resistance at all. Yet, before the storm of spells had even ceased, another wave of magical machine warriors entered the fray.


    The Andorra adepts yelled and transformed into bloodmouths with terrifyinglyrge jaws. They twisted their fat bodies and shed with the magical machine warriors.


    A thundering thud rang out. Deep dents had appeared on the surface of the dozen magical machines at the very front, and uneven bite marks could be seen on their metal bodies. Meanwhile, several of the bloodmouths had also sustained some injuries from the sh. However, they didn¡¯t seem to mind at all and flicked their fat tails, sending the magical machines flying backward.


    A storm of metal bullets descended.


    Since the magic energy rifles and cannons in the hands of the magical machines were all powered by magic energy, there were none of the loud bangs produced by alchemical gunpowder. However, the fearsome barrage was still as terrifying as ever. Sparks were sent flying as the bullets crashed against the magical and elementium shields of the frontline adepts, causing their defenses to tremble without stopping.


    Only five seconds had passed when the second wave of attacks from the elementium adepts descended upon the magical machines.


    The destructive flood of elementium engulfed the metal machines and twisted their bodies beyond recognition.


    The machines had no sense of fear. The ones behind immediately filled in the ranks once the ones in front had fallen. It didn¡¯t matter how many the adepts exterminated; the magical machines that swarmed out of the corridors didn¡¯t seem to be decreasing in number.


    Dammit. How many magical machines did the Crimson n store in reserve?


    The faces of all the Alliance adepts flushed white!


    They had no idea what was currently happening in the fourth level teleportation room now. Arge portal loomed steadily above the array as four to five magical machine warriors walked out from it with every passing second before heading downstairs under the orders of the small brain monster, Gru.


    Brain Monster Gazlowe hadmitted everything for Alice¡¯s promise.


    Apart from teleporting the small brain monster to Fire Throne, he had even allowed Gru to bring along the magic energy furnace. It was precisely because of the existence of the magic energy furnace that the teleportation array could be supplied with an endless stream of magical energy. It allowed him to bring the entire magical machine army to this bloody battlefield.


    Small Brain Monster Gru might not look like he cared, but today was most definitely a painful yet glorious day for Gazlowe.


    It might have been very liberating to crush the enemy by recklessly unleashing his magical machine army upon them. However, Gazlowe was currently squandering the energy and magical machine reserves that he had umted over thest few years in the metal fortress.


    Faraway in Lance, Gazlowe¡¯s heart bled wildly with the death of each wave of magical machines.


    When the Third Grade brain monster decided to smash the enemy with his reserves from the past few years, the enemy standing in his way was fated to misfortune!


    The conflict between the magical machine army and the Alliance adepts quickly intensified. Large numbers of casualties urred every moment. With theiryered defensive formation, the adepts had managed to keep the magical machines in the corner of the hall since the start of the battle. They had made it impossible for the machines to sessfully spread out and had thus restrained the machines¡¯ ability to capitalize on their nightmarish numerical advantage.


    However, the magical machines weren¡¯t dull idiots either. They possessed a powerful warfare mastermind with themand of Small Brain Monster Gru. The magical machines on the frontlines could not make any progress at the entrance of the corridor. Meanwhile, the magical machines behind them weren¡¯t just standing still and waiting for something to happen. Instead, they used their bodies as weapons and tore down the stone walls that were standing in their way, forcefully creating several more paths of attack.


    While the Alliance adepts were busy assigning forces to seal off these openings, the magical machines dove into their lines without any hesitation. They were fighting with a numerical advantage and creating as much chaos as they could. At any rate, the magical machine army didn¡¯t mind any casualties they suffered. Trading the life of one adept with the lives of ten magical machines was still more than worth it.


    The magical machines continued to swarm into the room, quickly taking up the edges of the hall.


    The elementium adepts who were protected in the back and could freely chant theirrge-scale spells were now forced to engage in meleebat with these machines. They used instant-cast spells and instant wands to dispose of the machines quickly. However, the rate at which they were doing so was much slower than before.


    At this moment, casualties finally started urring amongst the body-refining adepts and bloodline adepts who had been fighting at the frontlines of the war.


    The battlefield situation that had once appeared to be orderly was rapidly thrust into chaos. Signs of an upset was starting to show.


    The two unbearably furious Third Grade adepts emerged from within the ranks. Both of them resorted to their special techniques and easily exterminated the machines that charged at them.


    Third Grade \Vampire Haines started wandering through the hall, his movements quick as a phantom and his ws soaked in crimson energy waving in the air. Every strike from his w would pierce the body of a machine and wreck its internal mechanisms. Meanwhile, Adept Yurga transformed into a massive group of Death Heralding Crows. The birds crowed and weaved between the ranks of the machines.


    Pupupu!


    The gray death beamsnded like arrows upon the machines. One by one, the devices were coated in a visibleyer of gray before suddenly falling to the ground, their soul connection with Gru having been cut off.


    "Dammit, dammit, dammit! These fellows are not easy to deal with at all!" The small brain monster cackled coldly in front of the portal. He couldn¡¯t help but extend his Spirit toward the tower¡¯s central control crystal.


    He might be able to defeat these enemies with the power of the magical machine army alone, but he was sure to suffer tremendous losses this way. That was why Gru ced his hopes on the defensive system of the tower itself. Thebined might of the tower and the firepower of the magical machine army gave him the confidence to exterminate all of these damned enemies.


    "Authority...authority. I want authority." Gru waved his tentacle-like appendages and shouted loudly.


    Gargamel hesitated for a moment before finally stepping forward. He used his Spirit tomunicate with the control crystal and handed over his authority to Gru. Small Brain Monster Gru started chuckled chillingly to himself after obtaining authorization over the tower. He then struck a lethal blow at the Alliance adepts in the hall.


    The battle between the magical machines and Alliance adepts raged on in the magical hall on the third level. While both parties were engaged in inseparablebat, a massive surge of magic energy raced through the stone walls around them, rapidly lighting up the mysterious arrays within them.


    This subtle change might have eluded the low-grade adepts who were engaged in the intense battle, but it couldn¡¯t escape the notice of the two Third Grade adepts, whose spiritual senses were stretched across the entire battlefield.


    No! The enemy had managed to activate the tower¡¯s defensive systems in the end. This ce was dangerous now!


    Several profound and mysterious arrays surfaced on the walls under the solemn and watchful eyes of Haines and Yurga. All the adepts in the hall felt the elementium power within them stall. Their intimate connection with the elementium particles seemed to have been shut off by some sort of protective forcefield. They could no longer wield their elementium powers as freely as they had before.


    Magic-Interference Barrier!


    The Alliance adepts present were no rookies. They instantly figured out the effect of this Magic-Interference Barrier.


    Currently, all magic of other attributes¨Capart from fire¨Cwere under immense interference within the tower. If they were fortunate, their spells would only fail. If they were unfortunate, they could even suffer spell bacsh!


    The appearance of the Magic-Interference Barrier instantly affected thebat potential of the adepts.


    Those who wielded fire among the elementium adepts were only a minority. The shields on most of the other elementium adepts flickered before disappearing. Without shields to protect them, the First Grade elementium adepts were no more than pathetic individuals whose physical state was only slightly better than the average human.


    The defensive linepletely copsed in a matter of seconds!


    The Alliance formed from the various ns could no longer sustain itself. All the adepts gathered around the high-grade adepts of their own ns and started fleeing the tower without hesitation.


    "Don¡¯t run. If we can rally, charge up to the fourth level, and destroy the enemy¡¯s teleportation array, we still have a hope of victory." Yurga shouted with all he had.


    Sadly, at this juncture of life and death, there was no longer anyone who was willing to listen to his orders!

 Chapter 786 Attack of the Magical Machine Army

    Perhaps Yurga¡¯s orders were the best warfare strategy for the Alliance adepts.


    Unfortunately, having the adepts shed blood, sweat, and sacrificing themselves to fight an uphill battle against the ferociously advancing magical machines was perhaps asking too much of them!


    A Third Grade adept like Yurga might have confidence in escaping unharmed, but most First Grade adepts were condemned to certain death. It was because they recognized this that the Alliance adepts had scattered and run away without any hesitation.


    At a moment like this, it would be much better to enhance themselves with a speed-increasing spell if they had the energy to spare. As long as they could outrun theirpanions, they had a high chance of escaping sessfully.


    "We have no chance of getting away at all! The gates of the tower have already been sealed once more." Yurga¡¯s deste and trembling voice could be clearly heard over the chaos of battle. However, the many Alliance adepts still charged down the tower without turning back.


    The number of Alliance adepts had already been reduced to sixty-eight people before the battle in the hall had even started.


    This retreat instantly left only the low-grade adepts of the Andorra n on the battlefield.


    These First Grade adepts who had transformed into bloodmouths were fighting desperately with all their strength, bloodied and beaten. They wanted to retreat as well, but it was impossible to move with the crowd of magical machines around them. They resentfully fought while cursing those bastards who had sent panic spreading throughout their own allies.


    Unfortunately, they had been standing too far forward and retreating was now a colossal task.


    Second Grade Adept Gerndt, who was the leader of the Andorra n adepts here, looked on with bloodshot eyes as his subordinates sumbed to the enemies. They fell, one after another, even as they tried their best to endure amidst the attacks of the countless magical machines. He gritted his teeth furiously, but in the end, he let out a sigh of resignation. He and Gullit looked at each other before turning and escaping without any regard for their juniors.


    The four Andorra First Grades who had transformed into bloodmouths felt like they had been submerged in ice when they saw the two Second Grade adepts of their own n give up on them. Their movements slowed down for an instant, and they were instantly torn to pieces and stomped into unrecognizable meat paste by the horde of magical machines.


    At this point, all the adepts of the Andorra n had died in battle with the sole exception of the two Second Grades!


    The second ones to have misfortunate befall them were the alchemists of Magic Forest Hut.


    They had constantly neglected the training of their physical bodies and were always in contact with poisonous or highly radioactive magical materials. As such, their bodies were far weakerpared to an ordinary adept. Consequently, it was only natural that they were the ones who eventuallygged behind while everyone escaped.


    The swarming machines quickly overtook the alchemists and exterminated them before they could even put up a resistance. Only Second Grade Adept Roy managed to escape the encirclement due to the protection from his Second Grade elementium servants.


    The many Alliance adepts ran down three levels of stairs. Yet, when they finally arrived at the first level, they were horrified to find that the gates had been shut tight.


    A semi-translucent force wall had sealed off their only path of escape!


    Turning back and fighting against the machines at this point was unlikely to work. They had already lost all the will to fight.


    The adepts behaved like panicking noblewomen when they saw their path blocked. They frantically lunged at the force wall and attacked with their spells. Just one. Just a single crack in the wall and they would be able to escape. The promise of life and hope was just ahead, causing them to lose all sense of rationality.


    Meanwhile, at a corner on the second level, Mary and several other adepts sessfully intercepted Third Grade Vampire Haines Vik with the use of a short-ranged teleportation spell. The other Third Grade, Adept Yurga, rapidly passed by them as if he didn¡¯t see anything. He did not intend to help the old vampire.


    The Anti-Crimson n Alliance had already been utterly defeated. There would be no turning the tables, even if they exterminated Mary and the rest. Instead, it would be best to lead his n adepts and escape while Haines was dealing with the enemies.


    Squads of magical machines rumbled past them. Haines turned into a crimson sh of lightning and weaved between the storm of bullets. Every strike from his crimson ws would destroy a magical machine. Mary, the blood knights, and the blood elves circled the battlefield, asionally gathering together tounch a blitz attack against Haines.


    As a vampire, Haines was not good at defense. Though he managed to dodge most of the machines¡¯ attacks with his rapid movements, the unrelenting rain of bullets still beat him bloody. If the magical machines were made of flesh and blood, Haines might have been able to sustain his violent offense by consuming blood and regenerating.


    However, the fully metal machines were all metal and magic energy; they were not organic creatures in any manner. Most of Haines¡¯ power could not be unleashed when fighting against such foes. He could only rely on brute force to crush the enemy.


    Initially, as blood descendants of Haines, Mary and her vampires should have had great trouble unleashing their power. However, with the mental barrier that Small Brain Monster Gru had cast on them, the six high-grade vampires could weave between the magical machines and tussle with Haines.


    If it were only Mary and her vampires, they would have had a hard time doing anything against the Third Grade Haines. However, with the aid of the many magical machines and the mental defenses of Gru, as well as the blessing of the tower, the vampires were able to keep Haines engaged inbat and trapped on the second level of the tower.


    This way, Haines was also separated from the Alliance adepts.


    It was already fire and fury in the first level magical hall. Thunderbolts and fireballs were everywhere.


    Ever since the defensive system had been reactivated, the internal traps and barriers had gued these Alliance adepts. The offensive arrays carved onto the tower walls were constantly spitting fireballs, chain lightning, thunderstorms, whirlwinds, and icences at the adepts.


    These spells were endless as long as the magic energy supply wasn¡¯t cut off!


    The Second Grade adepts might be able to endure a bombardment of this degree, but most of the First Grade adepts had be herrings inva¨C defeated without much effort.


    The remaining adepts howled in despair as they cast more magical defenses on themselves and continued attacking the force wall. With everyone¡¯s effort, the force wall finally started trembling and distorting. It appeared as if it was about to shatter.


    "Make way, all of you. Let me do it!" A sharp voice rang out from behind as Yurga emerged from the army of machines, covered in blood with his robe in tatters.


    Yurga charged to the front of the force wall and exploded into a murder of crows. Countless beams of death rays then shot at the wall.


    A crisp crack was heard, and the force wall finally fell apart!


    There were no longer any obstacles before them. The Alliance adepts promptly used all their individual skills and escaped the adept¡¯s tower.


    Some drank potions and dove into the magma floor, vanishing without a trace, while others summoned flying familiars and took to the skies. A few poured powder on their bodies and disappearedpletely. Some adepts simply strode and rushed out of Fire Cave.


    Third Grade Yurga reformed his body and turned back to look. His suspended heart finally rxed when he saw that at least two-thirds of the Kam n adepts had sessfully escaped. His heart filled with hatred and anger when he realized that this operation had ended with such a tragic conclusion.


    After their failure in exterminating the Crimson n, the Kam n was very likely to be the subject of their counter-attack, given their close proximity to Fire Throne. However, the casualties of Magic Forest Hut and the Andorra n were far worsepared to them. Almost all of their low-grade adepts had been lost in that tower.


    Perhaps, if he struck at these ns as soon as possible upon returning, they might be able to make up for their losses this time!


    Having made up his mind, Yurga secretly sent a message to the Second Grade adepts of the Kam n. The Kam Second Grades started to subtly trail behind the only remaining Second Grades of these two ns, even as they made their own escapes.


    The magical machine army didn¡¯t know of these schemes and plots between the adepts. They were like hunting hounds that had locked onto their prey. They pursued the adepts closely and sent them packing with their ferocious bullet barrages.


    The alliance of the five adept ns had assembled a grand total of one hundred and six adepts when they first gathered. Yet, the ones who sessfully escaped Fire Cave now were no more than a measly thirty-four individuals. That meant a total of seventy-two adepts had fallen in Fire Cave over the nine-day siege of the tower.


    It was a glorious and surprising victory for the Crimson n, regardless of how you looked at it!


    Sadly, no one had any idea what the Crimson n had sacrificed for this victory and what they had lost.


    This battle over the tower ultimately ended after another half a day.


    The thirty-four adepts who had escaped had now disappeared into the pitch-ck ck Forest. The magical machine army stopped after emerging from Fire Cave and turned to clean up the battlefield.


    Not all of the seventy-two adepts had died. The Crimson n had managed to capture twenty-six of them; all of them were adepts of the First Grade. Among them, seven were Andorra adepts, five were Magic Forest Hut adepts, eight were Layton Academy adepts, four were Cenas adepts, and two were Kam adepts.


    Without exception, all of these adepts had been inflicted with severe wounds and had lost all ability to resist.


    The Crimson n imprisoned them after giving them necessary treatment.


    Meanwhile, Third Grade Haines Vik had also be a member of the prisoners. The Crimson n had paid the price of twenty-six magical machines before sessfully exhausting his blood energy.


    Mary immediately sent Haines to the sealing room after capturing him.


    Whether she would be able to advance to Third Grade in the future depended entirely on this bloodline ancestor of hers!


    The battle of Fire Throne utterly shook Zhentarim.


    Almost every single adept n hadn¡¯t believed that the Crimson n would be able to survive this cmity. Who would have expected that the Crimson n were able to beat back the alliance of five adept ns with the use of a surprising number of magical machines and went on to kill and capture many adepts?


    It was an unbelievable battle between adepts!


    For a moment, the name of the Crimson n was known throughout the center of the continent!

 Chapter 787 Growth of the Clan

    The shock of the Battle for Fire Throne only grew with each passing day!


    Five adept ns joining hands to exterminate a n that had been established for less than ten years had ended up defeated. Not only were their mortal armiespletely ughtered, more than half of the one hundred official adepts had also lost their lives. Only a few of them had made it back to their ns.


    It was entirely beyond everyone¡¯s expectations. It also caused many high-grade adepts to cast their attention on this insignificant new n.


    Full ownership over a lesser ne with ess to all its resources and poption was the dream of all adept ns. It would allow them to turn the lesser ne into a talent and soldier manufactory. However, any adepts who had participated in a nar war knew very well how difficult it was to conquer a foreign ne perfectly. It was simply too hard to have the proud natives submit with the limited number of adepts in a n.


    Most adept ns only upied their lesser nes as outside forces or ne merchants. That was the only way to reduce and lower the fear and rejection of the natives toward them. Of course, after years of infiltration and encouraging conflicts amongst the natives, the adepts would eventually be able to manipte the actual rulers of the ne and indirectly gain the ability to exploit its resources.


    However, such a process often took an extraordinarily long time.


    The typical workflow of invading and taking control of a small-sized ne would require five to ten years of hard work and maniption. If it was a mid-sized ne, then the time taken could even extend as long as a hundred years.


    However, this Crimson n was going against all conventions. They had taken a mere ten years to gainplete control over two fairly powerful lesser nes. Some busybodies did some analysis and suggested that one of the nes was a magical machine world popted by goblins, while the other was a dragon ne filled with pureblood dragons.


    In theory, the Crimson n should not have had the power to so easily conquer two such nes. Even if theymitted all of their forces to this cause, being able to establish an adept¡¯s camp in the foreign ne would have been an enormous task, not to mention enving the local natives who possessed such immense power in their hands. That should have been impossible!


    The surprising thing was that the Crimson n had somehow done it anyway.


    Aside from invading the two nes, they had even gainedplete control of the magical machine world through some unknown method. Otherwise, the Crimson n would not have been able to summon tens of thousands of metal golems from the magical machine world to crush the Alliance and save them in their moment of crisis.


    All the adept ns close to Fire Throne immediately started worrying after hearing this news.


    They were extremely concerned that they would one day wake up to find all of their n¡¯s territory taken over by the Crimson n, and their tower surrounded by an army of these cheap metal golems. Exchanging their precious lives for the lives of those low-cost metal golems was a trade that could never possibly be worth it!


    For a moment, many adept ns in the Ailovis Region could no longer sit still. They started to forge secret alliances andmunicated with each other countless times. They had the mind to organize an evenrger Alliance to invade andpletely exterminate such a lurking threat.


    However, all the adept ns quickly ceased their operations after sending out spies and scouts to do reconnaissance on Fire Throne.


    My god, the surrounding area of Fire Throne had now turned into abyrinth of magical machines!


    The entirety of Fire Cave and Magma Hall had been taken over by patrolling magical machines. Trying to make it through these two ces to spy on the condition of Fire Throne was no more than a fantasy under such circumstances.


    As such, attempting to form another alliance to invade the Crimson n without any knowledge as to what was happening in their tower would only result in the same conclusion¨C a flood of magical machines to ughter all invading adepts.


    After they returned to their respective headquarters and territories, an internal struggle immediately erupted among the five adept ns who had been defeated by the Crimson n. The Kam n that had managed to preserve the strength of their n took the opportunity to invade the Magic Forest Hut and the Andorra n. The former was defeated and surrendered to the Kam n, turning into a satellite force of theirs. Meanwhile, thetter lost all of their worldly territories and were forced to turtle behind their one remaining adept¡¯s tower, barely managing to preserve thest fire of their n.


    The Cenas n and Layton Adept¡¯s Academy also retreated to their headquarters after a series of turbulence and invasions, sessfully making it through this challenging period.


    However, when news of Third Grade Haines Vik¡¯s capture at the hands of the Crimson n got out, the Vik Family¡¯s vampire castle in the southwest of Zhentarim was immediately taken over by the other vampire families. For a moment, the members of the Vik Family were forced to escape into unknownnds or submit and joint another vampire family.


    Just like that, a vampire family that had existed for three to four hundred years vanished without a trace!


    Unlike themotion in the outside world, the Crimson n was engulfed in an atmosphere of joy and celebration.


    Still, while there were those who were smiling, there were also those were crying.


    Small Brain Monster Gru was the one who wanted to cry the most amongst them.


    The Crimson n had obtained the most significant benefits and spoils out of this war. However, they were also the ones who suffered the most considerable losses.


    The counterattack¨Cwhich hadsted no more than a day¨Chad resulted in over six thousand magical machines scrapped and over eight hundred thousand magical energy batteries consumed. Though the losses to the magical machine army were only one-twentieth of Gazlowe¡¯s total reserves, the depleted magic energy batteries ounted for two-thirds of his entire supply.


    The metal fortress could not possibly unleash such a powerful army of soldiers again without a few years of rest and umtion!


    Once the situation in Fire Throne had stabilized, Gru once again traveled back to Lance through the portal. The control authority of the two thousand magical machines remaining near the tower was left with Gargamel, and the machines were to function as the lookouts for the tower temporarily.


    However, Fire Throne had no means of sustaining such a vast army of magical machines without Small Brain Monster Gru¡¯s magic energy furnace. They had no choice but to recall most of the machines and store them within the tower as strategic resources. Only a two hundred strong magical machine squad continued to guard the tower.


    Even this was only a temporary measure taken in response to the conclusion of the battle.


    These two hundred magical machines would be cut down even further once the situation hadpletely calmed down. The tower didn¡¯t have the energy supply to power all of them, let alone repair the damage to itself.


    As members of the adepts, everyone still had to obey the so-called Adept¡¯s Handbook. As such, the Crimson n higher-ups were really having trouble deciding how to deal with these adept prisoners.


    They had managed to obtain countless rare resources and treasures in need of dire appraisal after looting the dead bodies and storage spaces of the seventy dead adepts. However, the opinions of Mary and the others were divided when it came to the treatment of the twenty-six surviving adept prisoners.


    Given Mary¡¯s personality, she would have had all these adepts executed without exception. In fact, she would have loved to personally do the deed, either turning them into her blood ves or squeezing out everyst bit of their blood essence. Unfortunately, this ridiculous idea was rejected by all of the adepts.


    No one cared what you did in the foreign nes you controlled. However, if you were to act so brashly and irresponsibly in the World of Adepts, you could be sure that the old fogeys of the Zhentarim Association would be knocking on your door in no time.


    Given the unique traits of the vampires, they were strictly forbidden to Embrace and create new vampires within the World of Adepts. Otherwise, the few vampire families would not have needed to go to such great lengths to expand their families through natural reproduction.


    Moreover, Embracing required the exhaustion of bloodline power and bloodline source.


    If Mary became truly blinded by greed and turned all twenty-six of these adepts into her vampires, then there was no doubt that her gade would fall. Losing the grade she had worked so hard to attain for twenty-six ordinary vampire subordinates; Mary might be greedy, but she wasn¡¯t a fool.


    Ever since she had returned from the Faen ne, Mary had realized the disadvantages of reckless Embracing. She no longer dared to indiscriminately expand her ranks as she had before. It was best to umte her bloodline powers if it weren¡¯t an exceptionally talented individual she was dealing with.


    The Crimson n had initially been waiting for the defeated ns to send representatives to discuss the matter of ransom. Yet, despite waiting for a long time, no representative had arrived. The Crimson n sent some people on reconnaissance and were shocked to find out what had happened. Three of the five adept forces had been crippled. One had grown from all the conflict, while the Magic Forest Hut had just turned into a subordinate power of the Kam n.


    These ns could barely even defend themselves at the moment. Where would they find the resources to spare for ransoming their n adepts?!


    When the Crimson n conveyed this information to the prisoners, they fell silent. In particr, the alchemist adepts of the Magic Forest Hut were boiling with anger. There would be no doubt that they would have started a fight with the adept prisoners of the Kam n if they hadn¡¯t had their magic powers restrained and their magical tools taken away.


    After another two months of painful waiting, only the two Kam adepts were ransomed by their n at an exorbitant price. The rest of the adepts became abandoned pawns that no one cared about.


    These adepts were not going to be resigned to the rest of their lives being spent wasting away in prison. One by one, the prisoners started to initiate discussions with the Crimson n in regards to their welfare and treatment after submitting to and joining the Crimson n.


    Naturally, as defeated enemies, their status could not bepared to ordinary adepts who hade to offer their talents.


    They would have to ept being enved by magical contracts for a very long period of time and serving as vassal adepts of the Crimson n. They could only regain their right to choose for themselves once they had made it through the entirety of their service.


    Finally, after some difficult discussions and negotiations, both parties came to a conclusion.


    The adept prisoners would serve as vassals for twenty years. During these twenty years, they would sign a magical contract with the Crimson n and be half-enved n members. It was only after the twenty-year period was up that they had the freedom to choose whether to leave or remain.


    The first adepts to submit after they settled the discussions were naturally the alchemist adepts. Their Magic Forest Hut had already been taken over by the Kam n. They would be submitting to the Kam even if they went back. Rather than that, they might as well establish their roots in the Crimson n.


    The addition of these alchemists instantly caused the Crimson n adept forces to increase in power. In fact, with the lead and guidance of Gargamel, a new alchemist branch was founded within the n.


    With the alchemists of Magic Forest Hut serving by example, the remaining adepts didn¡¯tst for much longer. Gradually, all of them dejectedly epted the magical contract and served as the lowest of adepts in the Crimson n.


    The addition of twenty-four official adepts caused the Crimson n¡¯s initiallycking adept force to swell in number. Apart from the crippled Fire Throne having to undergo repairs slowly, the entire n had benefited from the war. Even White Tower, far away in the Northern Lands, had obtained some benefits as a few vassal adepts were sent their way.


    With these adepts forming the foundations of the tower¡¯s framework, many lessons andbat divisions that couldn¡¯t be sustained in the past slowly started appearing.


    The entire Crimson n continuously absorbed nutrition from the blood and flesh of their defeated enemies and were once again slowly rising on the path toward power and prosperity!

 Chapter 788 Contracted Familiar

    There was a boundless and terrifying sea of fire!


    The skies burned, as did the ground; the entire world was burning intensely.


    One could not sense the terror of these baseless mes when looking from afar. It was only when you were inside the sea of fire that you could understand the tremendous damage that twelve-thousand-degree mes could inflict upon the human body.


    Even the low-grade fire creatures didn¡¯t dare to set foot in such a sea of fire. Otherwise, there was a possibility the fire could burn their souls and reduce their consciousness to ashes.


    Yet, it was in such a sea of fire that the mes suddenly moved. Fire elementium particles were drawn from the surroundings and formed into a massive humanoid face.


    The mes trembled.


    The face opened its eyes and looked at its surroundings in confusion. It was only then that its eyes ze and burned with the unique soul light of intelligent lifeforms.


    Dammit, where exactly was this? Why can¡¯t I sense even a trace of fire creature soul fluctuation? Could I have deviated from the plotted path and ended up in the depths of the sea of fire?


    Greem started cursing after a series of questions.


    Dammit, dammit, dammit! It was all because of that damned ming tiger! If it weren¡¯t because of its relentless pursuit, he would never have run into such a dangerous area without any regard for his safety. To think, he couldn¡¯t even detect his current nar coordinates!


    [Beep. Warning. Warning. Seven minutes and twenty-eight seconds left before soul assimtion. Request that host finds the closest path of exit from the origin sea of fire. Consciousness is at risk of dissipating. Soul is at risk of assimtion.]


    "Don¡¯t just warn me. Help me determine my position. I need a direction."


    [Judging from the intensity of the sea of fire, host can escape by traveling one hundred and fifty kilometers to the north!]


    The next second, a blue light shone in Greem¡¯s fire-formed face. The Chip projected an arrow and pointed in a certain direction.


    "Hopefully we¡¯ve managed to get the ming tiger off our tail!" Greem sighed. His soul consciousness then silently moved away as the face dispersed without another sound.


    Fifteen minutester, the fires here parted, and a three-meter-long ming tiger formed entirely of flowing mes appeared. It strode proudly and casually toward the location before lifting its nose and sniffing the air. Finally, its eyesnded on where Greem¡¯s face had previously formed.


    "Hehehe. Trying to y this kind of game with me, are you? You¡¯re too green! You¡¯ve already remained in the origin fire sea for over an hour now. You must be in a hurry to find the closest piece ofnd. Hmph. Judging from this clue, I shouldn¡¯t go wrong now."


    The ming tiger¡¯s eyes swept about its surroundings before locking onto a particr direction. It then stepped upon the intangible fires and leaped away.


    If Greem were still here, he would have realized that the direction the tiger was tracking was the same as the one he had set off in.


    Half an hourter, Greem sessfully emerged from the sea of fire and stood at the edge of a stretch of mountainous volcanoes. From a distance, he could see a towering volcano on the horizon piercing the clouds. The ck smoke had engulfed most of the surrounding regions, giving the entire ce the appearance of an apocalyptic hellscape.


    Meanwhile, several two-meter-tall fire spirits were wandering aimlessly about the smaller volcanoes nearby. They looked as if they had been walking around the area for a long time.


    Greem looked just like them in his current state. He looked just like a two-meter-tall elementium fire spirit. However, Greem had just emerged from the origin sea of fire, and his body of mes carried some purple origin mes on it. He needed to find a ce as soon as possible to absorb or extinguish these origin mes.


    Even his body couldn¡¯t endure the origin mes for an extended period, despite having elementary fire immunity!


    Greem had absorbed five Essences of Fire in the past two months and had raised the fire affinity of this body to a specific limit. From now on, there would be no room for improvement for his fire affinity if his soul origin didn¡¯t improve.


    After leaving Gaba Market, Greem had advanced north along the sea of fire. He had visited two other fire markets and gathered a sufficient number of Essences of Fire. There were still two Essences left after using up five of them. He intended to trade with fire adepts upon returning to the World of Adepts. He was certain that he would be able to obtain some decent treasures in exchange.


    However, all that wouldeter. Greem¡¯s current priority was dealing with the origin mes on his body.


    Greem had just taken a step when his body froze on the spot.


    With his three-hundred and sixty degree spiritual senses that had no blind spots, Greem realized that a strange ming tiger had silently appeared behind him. Meanwhile, the opponent¡¯s flowing,va-like mouth was resting just two fingers behind his body of mes. Its majestic patterns, ferocious aura, and the unique concentration of a hunting predator terrified Greem.


    Greem was sure that there had been nothing behind him just a second ago, not even elementium fire. Yet, this terrifying Third Grade ming tiger had appeared out of nowhere, just like that. It was holding its breath like a stalking predator as if waiting for him to turn his head before severing his neck with a single bite.


    Of course, elementium fire spirits did not have necks. Their entire body was a zing fire. Only their heads and limbs showed some humanoid features. However, on the whole, they did not have the delicate and frail features of a human.


    Dammit, it was that Third Grade ming tiger!


    At the same time that Greem realized this, a sudden ze of fire engulfed his entire body. The next second, his body halfway up a volcano a quarter of a kilometer away.


    A loud explosion rang out. Greem¡¯s mental consciousness had just relocated from a distance. He extended his spiritual appendages outward and once again discovered the ming tiger behind him, a strange smile on its face.


    Greem didn¡¯t know how a tiger would smile, but he was certain that the tiger definitely was.


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered with what the tiger is smiling about. He immediately activated Fire Teleportation for a second time. If this had been in the past, and before he had managed to increase his fire affinity, Greem would not have been able to cast the second Fire Teleportation in such quick session after the first one. He would have needed a minimum of three to five seconds of buffer time between each Fire Teleportation to redefine his fire positioning.


    Unfortunately, when Greem once again stepped out of the mes, he discovered the ming tiger behind him again. It seemed that the distance between him and the tiger had not changed at all despite the two Fire Teleportations.


    Greem let out a sigh and finally stopped trying to run.


    Since the opponent had already demonstrated the massive gulf between their powers in this manner, there was no longer any need for him to keep up his futile struggle.


    Greem very slowly and gently turned backward.


    His gentle actions were so slow that it looked like those of an eighty-year-old grandma. Every single move of his was easily perceivable and clear for all to see.


    As expected, the ming tiger didn¡¯t move this time. Instead, it faced Greem head-on. The distance between them was so close that they could hear each other¡¯s breath.


    "Go on, run. Why aren¡¯t you running anymore?" The ming tiger finally spoke was using mental messages.


    "Given your exceptional pyromancy skills, I wouldn¡¯t be able to escape even if I were to teleport another hundred times!" Greem said with a bitter smile on his face.


    "Hmph, as long as you understand!" The ming tiger snorted and said, "You outsiders always think you haveprehended the entire Fire Elementium ne after mastering only the most superficial aspects of fire. You always run around the ne as if it¡¯s your own home. If I weren¡¯t the one you ran into, you probably wouldn¡¯t even know how you died!"


    Greem couldn¡¯t say anything to that at all. He could only maintain his bitter smile.


    Still, he, a Second Grade adept known for his wisdom and knowledge, was actually being reprimanded by a magical fire creature, which adepts had always regarded as slow and foolish. This irony in reality indeed filled Greem¡¯s heart with resentment!


    "Youe from the World of Adepts?" The ming tiger casually looked at Greem¡¯s body of mes after scolding him before tossing out this question.


    "Yes!" Greem answered without any hesitation.


    "Are you still maintaining contact with the World of Adepts?" An urgent expression appeared on the tiger¡¯s face.


    "Yes!"


    "Then you can return to the World of Adepts any time you wish?" The tiger asked hesitantly.


    "I can¡¯t!" Greem shook his head and said, "I came here by opening a nar rift through the use of my tower. I will need to recalcte the anchor point and find the nar coordinates left behind by the tower if I want to return!"


    The tiger shook his head as if he didn¡¯t understand and couldn¡¯t be bothered to try.


    "Don¡¯t tell me about these things that I don¡¯t understand. Just tell me whether you can bring me back along with you when you go back to your tower."


    Judging by the fierce expression of the tiger, he was obviously trying to convey an unfriendly message of ¡¯if you can¡¯t do it, I will eat you now.¡¯


    "You...you want to go to the...World of Adepts?" Greem was instantly stunned.


    What was the World of Adepts?


    It was a ce where the evilest and most selfish individuals in the multiverse lived! It was where the adepts lived!


    A Third Grade ming tiger might be a powerhouse in the Fire Elementium ne that could easily bully a mere Second Grade fire adept like Greem who had ¡¯broken in¡¯ here. However, if it were to go to the World of Adepts, it would instantly turn from predator to prey and be the best target that the high-grade adepts wouldpete over.


    "You don¡¯t need to care what my purpose is. Just tell me whether you can do it!" The tiger pressed even further, and the me streams that rolled out of its mouth started charring Greem¡¯s fire spirit body.


    "Of course, of course, of course. As long as you are will it to be, I can make it happen for you!" Greem hastily agreed to the request.


    It was only then that the ming tiger moved his ferocious mouth away from him.


    "Good. We can set off once you sign this contract!"


    The next second, a mysterious contract formed from fire appeared from nowhere and appeared in front of Greem.


    Greem quickly read through the contents of the contract, and the colors of his face changed several times in a row.


    "What...what is this? You want me to be your contracted familiar?!"

 Chapter 789 Dustfire Valley

    The contents of the contract in front of Greem shocked him.


    This...how could this be possible?


    However, after some quick thinking, he realized that there wasn¡¯t anything odd about the feasibility of a contract like this.


    After all, the bodies of most adepts had be indistinguishable with those of magical creatures during their process of improvement.


    However, adepts were the cultural cornerstones of the great World of Adepts. They were always the ones enving all sorts of magical creatures. There had never been a case of an adept being contracted to a magical creature.


    What was this ming tiger trying to do?


    Just as Greem¡¯s gaze started to turn cold as he prepared to release the me Fiend of Terror silently, the ming tiger seemed to have seen through his actions. It coldly chuckled as it said, "You were so excited when I asked you to lead me to your adept¡¯s tower earlier. Hehehe. You don¡¯t think I¡¯m dumb enough not to know that the adept¡¯s towers are an adept¡¯s strongestbat tool, do you? I would be a fish on the chopping block once I enter your tower. Establishing a ve contract like this for my own self-preservation shouldn¡¯t be a problem, right?"


    Greem could only put away all his intent to lie and cheat when dealing with a tiger as sly as this. He started to treat it earnestly and honestly.


    Intelligent life¨Cany intelligent life¨Cfrom any ce would have a brain as smart as an adept¡¯s. Most of the time, they appeared to be excessivelyzy or bloodthirsty. However, that wasn¡¯t because they had lower intelligence. Instead, it was their spiritual instinct that drove them to pursue the method ofmunication that was most direct and convenient for them.


    However,municating with them was a somewhat annoying matter for adepts. The difference in lifestyle, species, thought processes, and interests all resulted inpletely distinct logical thoughts. When two such individuals sat together for a discussion, it was only natural that their words would turn into fists.


    Unfortunately, Greem would never ept such a magical contract, even if he were to die!


    A man could be killed, but never humiliated!


    Greem might treasure his life, but it wasn¡¯t at the cost of everything else. Moreover, his spiritual senses and the Chip¡¯s scans allowed him to realized that the ming tiger didn¡¯t hold much hostility toward him. Rather than insurance for its life, the magical contract was more of a prank negotiation from the ming tiger.


    At the very least, the little dot of light projected in Greem¡¯s mind as the ming tiger remained white despite his seemingly threatening pose.


    White meant neutrality.


    Red meant hostility. The greater the hatred, the brighter the color.


    Greem meant friendliness. Simrly, the deeper the green, the more friendly the individual.


    The information gathered by the Chip showed that the aura radiating from the ming tiger was very much neutral; the tiger had no hostile intention to murder him. The various shows of intimidation were only a way to get Greem to do what it wanted.


    In all honesty, the tiger probably couldn¡¯t even guess that an inconspicuous Second Grade human adept like this could break through the protection of its life forcefield and determine its true intentions by scanning its emotional spectrum.


    Greem became extremely calm andposed with this information from the Chip.


    After a five hour long negotiation, Greem finally arrived at a cooperative agreement with this ming tiger.


    Greem would help Third Grade ming Tiger Cindral avoid attention by the Will of the World of Adepts and sneak it into the ne. Meanwhile, Cindral would have to help Greem kill the Second Grade Fire Lord Artes.


    Greem had originally thought he would be able to terrify the ming tiger by naming the individual standing behind Second Grade Fire Lord Artes. Sadly, the tiger only betrayed an indifferent smile of disdain upon hearing of the Fifth Grade Fire King Groms.


    That made it harder for Greem to figure out the true depths and background of Cindral!


    After another seven minutes spent chanting and casting spells, Greem finallypleted the magical contract with Third Grade ming Tiger Cindral. The golden magical contract hovered in the air, continuously extracting the souls of Greem and Cindral as coteral. If either side were to go against their agreement, the soul offered up as coteral would instantly be exterminated.


    Greem offered up two-thirds of his soul for this cooperation agreement, while Cindral only offered up a fingernail¡¯s worth of his. It was a representation of the massive difference in their power!


    The contract represented a more considerable restriction on Greem.


    If Greem were to breach the contract, he would instantly lose a vast majority of his soul. He would immediately die from such a blow, even though he was a Second Grade adept. Meanwhile, Third Grade Cindral would only be paying a meager price. If he were to be punished by the contract, he would only feel a slight headache. It was far from capable of killing him or turning him into an idiot.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. It was the greatest difference between the powerful and the weak!


    Any single hair from Cindral¡¯s body would be thicker than Greem¡¯s waist. It was the same contract, yet Greem had to offer up nearly all that he owned to evenpare to a shred of Cindral¡¯s soul.


    No number of magical equipment could make up for the woeful difference in power between grades!


    However, at the very least, Greem had managed to avoid being wholly enved by the tiger. They might not be equal in power, but they were individuals of equivalent standing within the contract.


    Greem knew very well that he hade here to the Fire Elementium ne to kill Fire Lord Artes, and he could only return to the World of Adepts once he aplished this mission. If Cindral wanted to arrive in the World of Adepts as soon as possible, helping Greemplete his task was the best avable option.


    Cindral pouted at Greem¡¯s request before turning without hesitation and vanishing into the sea of fire. He left only a sentence behind when he disappeared.


    "When you want to go back to the World of Adepts, simply find a sea of fire and call my name three times. I will be able to find you!"


    Greem¡¯s heart shook when he heard Cindral¡¯s words.


    Would he be able to sense me as long as I call his name three times? This...why does this sound like the power ofws is involved? Could it be...?


    As a Second Grade fire adept, Greem might be considered a decent fighting force in the World of Adepts. However, once he stepped out of the ne, he realized that there were too many iprehensible and unexinable mysteries of higher lifeforms from higher dimensions.


    No wonder the World of Adepts had set the starting limit at Fifth Grade for adepts who wished to explore the outer realms. There had to be certain reasons for it. Adepts below Fifth Grade might think of themselves as fully-realized powerhouses, but there were far too many uncontroble risks in the process of exploring the outer realms.


    That was why Greem had to be extremely careful while he was exploring this otherworldly Fire Elementium ne. He could not let himself be put in an awkward spot where he had no control over his life again!


    Greem found a rtively quiet ce and dealt with the origin mes on him. He then attempted to locate the ming tiger, but he couldn¡¯t find it no matter what he tried. Still, he had a feeling that Cindral hadn¡¯t gone all that far. The tiger was probably still watching him from somewhere nearby.


    It was amon problem with all elementium creatures!


    Theycked any concept of time in their minds. They were always slow at doing things and didn¡¯t care about the passage of time. That was why trying to threaten the Third Grade ming tiger with time was not an option. Cindral couldn¡¯t care less if he were to arrive in the World of Adepts tomorrow, or next year.


    Time was practically static in an elementium ne!


    Of course, all of this had much to do with the long lifespans of the elementium creatures.


    Greem tried everything he could think of, but he still failed to locate the ming tiger. With no choice left to him, Greem could only begin his journey once again and run straight toward the den of Second Grade Fire Lord Artes.


    ............


    Dustfire Valley.


    It was a destend filled with dust and fire.


    A massive valley ran across a vast in. The interior of the valley was dark and dim, covered with dusty air and me pirs that asionally sted out of the cracks in the walls. There was no chance of seeing what the inside of the valley was like from the outside.


    There was an ancient city deep in Dustfire Valley, with typically one or two hundred thousand citizens in it. They were all intelligent lifeforms with minds of their own. The civilians here might be a bit more honest and violent than humans, with none of their slyness. However, there were enough to make up aplete, though primitive, city.


    Greem immediately started to run into more fire creatures once he entered the edges of Dustfire Valley.


    After all this time, Greem had mastered the technique of disguising himself as a fire creature.


    Firstly, the fire spirit he disguised himself as couldn¡¯t be too small.


    Though high-grade fire creatures didn¡¯t assess power based on size, low-grade fire creatures still did. Therger you were, the more powerful the fire energy in your body. As long as the fire spirit that Greem hid as was sufficientlyrge, the low-grade beings would flee at the sight of him. They would never dare to harass him or look for trouble.


    Secondly, he couldn¡¯t be too active.


    The Fire Elementium ne was a dull and boring ce. All the fire creatures here moved with a slow rhythm and spent their days wandering idly through different regions.


    It wasn¡¯t until they developed a mind of their own in their fire core that they could break free of their chaotic primal state and awaken the consciousness of their individuality.


    This fact was reflected in the personalities and appearances of most fire creatures. That was to say¨C iparably dull and slow!


    Even intelligent individuals with a mind were several levels behind humans when it came to the activity of their soul and the clever use of their intellect.


    Thus, Greem turned himself into a five-meter-tall fire spirit with a stiff, emotionless face and slowly walked past the two Molten Giants guarding the entrance of the valley. The giants only nced at him before looking elsewhere.

 Chapter 790 Rough Executor

    It was a strange city filled with fire creatures.


    Fire creatures were not proficient in building or smithing. As such, most of the buildings in the city were caves dug into the dark red walls. These buildings were then connected with twisting and winding tunnels. The ceiling of these caves had been made to be very tall to amodate therge bodies of the fire creatures. The tunnels were broad as well.


    Much like most human cities, this fire city also had facilities such as inns, taverns, grocers, arcane shops, and auction houses. However, the ones managing these ces were not necessarily the native fire creatures of the Fire Elementium ne.


    Greem walked amidst the crowd of people through the entirety of this fire city. It was no more than two kilometers wide, and there was only a total of two or three dozen shops. Surprisingly, he found a material shop run by an adept.


    Tokke¡¯s Materials!


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled when he saw the shop name written in the adept¡¯snguage on the outside of the cave. He couldn¡¯t help but walk into the store.


    It was an extremely crude cave. It was only one to two hundred square meters in size. Rows of stone tforms had been carved into the walls, where strange items were disyed. However, without a single exception, every single one of them contained dense fire energy.


    A listless little fire spirit was crouching on the counter. It only started to get up when it saw a customer enter and looked at Greem.


    The fire spirit looked as if it only had the power of an advanced apprentice.


    Of course, Greem still appeared like a towering First Grade fire spirit. He dragged a tail of fire behind his zing body as he slowly walked into the store.


    A trace of joy appeared on the fire spirit¡¯s emotional humanoid face when it first stood up. However, its previously passionate expression reverted to one of boredom once it recognized Greem¡¯s fire spirit form.


    "Do you wish to buy something or sell something today? If you are trying to sell something, I¡¯m afraid to tell you that our little shop is not exactly equipped to do so during this period. If you are trying to buy something, everything that the shop has is already on disy. You may pick and choose at your discretion."


    It seemed to have memorized these words and immediately regurgitated them when it opened its mouth. However, Greem¡¯s attention was not on the fire materials it was introducing. Instead, he was thinking about the change in expression that the little fire spirit betrayed when it saw him.


    There was joy on its face when it saw a customer arrive. It was ¡¯human nature¡¯ and easily understandable. However, its joyful expression vanished when it saw Greem¡¯s fire spirit appearance. It seemed as if the fire spirit wasn¡¯t d about having a customer.


    There was something odd about this!


    Greem¡¯s eyes swept across the shop and found a few unknown objects etched with magical runes on the surface. Judging by these items, there was no doubt that this shop had something to do with adepts.


    "You...are...shop...owner?" The fire spirit Greem had turned into asked with a slow and stiff tone.


    Thenguage of the Fire Elementium ne was an ancient nativenguage. Its vocabry was, and the pronunciation was bizarre as well. It was difficult for a ne traveler to master thenguage without plenty of experience.


    Naturally, as a Second Grade adept, Greem had no such issues.


    He could effortlessly retrieve the portion of knowledge rted to thenguage from native creature soul shards by using Soul Arrest. Meanwhile, he could easily mimic the unique ent of the fire creatures by changing the internal structure of his fire form.


    Apart from absorbing the Essences of Fire to raise his fire affinity, Greem had spent hisst few months observing and mimicking the native creatures.


    The fire spirit showed no signs of suspicion at Greem¡¯s behavior and only shrugged helplessly.


    "This store isn¡¯t mine. I¡¯m just a helper hired by a human adept. Our...shop owner...was taken away by the Lord. It¡¯s already been a few months, and they still haven¡¯t been released yet."


    Greem¡¯s heart shook as he instantly knew what he did wrong.


    In all seriousness, all of the fire creatures he had seen since entering the Fire Elementium ne appeared to be foolish and slow, even though they did appear to show signs of intelligence. He¡¯d thought that Cindral was an exception, but now, it seemed like he had underestimated that Fire Lord.


    That Fire Lord had arrested the adept who had set up the shop but didn¡¯t order the shop to be shut down. That was clearly meant as a web, cast out to catch him. Every single individual who walked into this shop would probably be subject to strict investigations by the Fire Lord¡¯s subordinate.


    His disguise might be very realistic, but there would certainly be ws if he were caught and interrogated.


    Even at this moment, Greem could sense seven or eight powerful fire humanoids rapidly approaching the store with his sharp senses.


    "Does this shop have a backdoor?" Greem grabbed the little fire spirit and asked hurriedly.


    "Yes, it¡¯s in the back." The fire spirit was shocked. Its skinny fire finger had not even pointed to the ce, and the giant fire spirit in front of it had already turned into a ze of fire and vanished from sight.


    Greem had just disappeared when a massive wave of heat rolled into the shop. Arge group of ferocious molten giants walked in.


    "Where¡¯s the big guy that came in earlier?"


    "Hurry up and speak! Where is he?"


    "Speak."


    Several five or six-meter-tall molten giants surrounded the one-meter half fire spirit and roared with their deafening voices.


    This fire spirit with only advanced apprentice powers practically froze on the spot. It pointed at the back of the shop with its trembling hand.


    The molten giants immediately brushed aside the counter in their way and crashed through the stone door that was half their size to chase after Greem.


    Greem quickly walked across the small alley behind the shop. Hisrge body of mes rapidly morphed as he walked. By the time he exited the alley and joined the crowd of people, his body had already shrunk to three meters. He¡¯d also made plenty of minor changes to his face and appearance.


    There was no way the enemy would suspect a ¡¯weak¡¯ First Grade fire spirit like himself if they were to search for him based on his earlier appearance.


    Moreover, fire spirits, me spirits, and fire elementals were the mostmonly seen fire creatures in the Fire Elementium ne. Almost half of all the fire creatures on the street had the same zing humanoid appearance as Greem. There were only some slight differences in the details.


    However, these differences were hard to tell as long as you weren¡¯t a native of the ne!


    Greem had dissected and scanned plenty of fire elementals and fire spirits over the past few months to understand their body structure and appearance. With the delicate energy maniption abilities of the Chip, he couldpletely replicate the looks of the fire spirits he had met, down to the finest detail.


    Thud, thud, thud! The loud footsteps rang out as the molten giants ran out of the alley. They immediately grabbed the fire spirit closest to them and dragged it before their eyes for a better look.


    Most fire beings were wild and impatient creatures that couldn¡¯t be bound byw or discipline.


    This First Grade fire spirit was furious at having been suddenly attacked. It might know that it was not the opponent of these molten giants, but the mes around its body still zed as a stream of fire shot at the giants.


    The molten giant in the lead betrayed a wicked smile on its gruff face. It immediately picked up the fire spirit and smashed it against the ground. This single throw broke the fire spirit¡¯s body into pieces. It took dozens of seconds before this fire spirit finally managed to gather its me together around its core.


    "We are acting on Lord Artes¡¯ orders. Otherworldly spies have entered Dustfire Valley. All fire spirits are to follow me to the Lord¡¯s hall to verify themselves now. If anyone dares resist, then this fellow will be your fate!" The molten giant straightened its body, stepped upon the unfortunate fire spirit, and loudly announced to everyone present.


    The previously peaceful fire city instantly exploded withmotion upon hearing such an order.


    The fire elementals were all creatures with extreme tempers. How could they possibly endure such an attitude? One by one, they waved their arms furiously at the molten giants. Some, who possessed even worse tempers, started to gather fireballs in their palms as if they were about to start a fight without another word.


    Greem was mixed in among the berserk fire spirits while the street was thrown into chaos. He was the first to throw an elementium fireball at the six-meter-tall Second Grade molten giant. The next second, over a hundred fireballs of various shapes and forms whistled through the air and smashed toward the giants.


    The faces of the giants instantly turned.


    Goddamn! So many fireballs! They weren¡¯t all that powerful individually, but when such an incredible number of fireballs were stacked together, the might of their explosion was still formidable. Even molten giants like themselves didn¡¯t dare to endure the blow, despite their me bodies that were as tough as steel.


    The molten giants gathered together and crouched down, using their tough magma backs to protect their more fragile body parts.


    Beng! Beng! Beng!


    After a tremendous explosion, a small mushroom cloud rose from where the molten giants were standing, and a searing me shockwave spread outward in every direction.


    The entire fire city couldn¡¯t help but tremble at this moment!


    "How bold! Going against the Lord¡¯s orders is rebellion. Come, men! Capture them all and put them in prison." As the giant roared, the molten giants stationed all over the city rushed out of their posts and started attacking every single fire spirit in sight.


    The entire city was plunged into chaos in a single instant!

 Chapter 791 Stealthed Observation

    All fire creatures in the Fire Elementium ne were free!


    Unlike the lord-subject rtionship in most material nes, Second Grade Fire Lord Artes only had management authority over Dustfire Valley and not lordship over all fire creatures within the city.


    The only ones in Dustfire Valley who were truly subordinate to Lord Artes were his molten-giant guards and an army of three hundred fire elementals. The other fire creatures were all free beings and were not under the jurisdiction of Artes.


    Thus, when the Second Grade molten-giant captain furiously wanted to capture all the fire spirits for interrogation, he instantly incited the anger and fury of all the fire creatures.


    There were no weaklings among the fire creatures of Dustfire Valley. Seventy to eighty percent of them were already advanced fire spirits, me spirits, and fire elementals with defined forms. Some of them were even Second Grade wanderers.


    When the molten giants started to charge into the fire city to capture the free fire spirits, the chaos immediately spread to every corner of the city.


    Meanwhile, Greem took advantage of the chaos to sneak into an unnoticed corner. He then took out a bright blue potion and drank everything. A short momentter, his zing body abruptly turned transparent, and after a bit longer, even thest bits of his existence vanished without a trace.


    The invisible Greem carefully snuck toward the towering fire hall in the depths of Dustfire Valley.


    Fire Lord Artes lived in that hall. The ce was different from the rest of the valley, for there was a quarter-kilometer-wide magma pool in the center of it. The fire pool led directly to the underground depths. Redva pirs sted out of the pool asionally, frequently making waves in the liquid.


    Lord Artes was currently lying within the magma pool. He was using his massive hand to ssh his own body with the scalding magma. When the red liquid of surprising temperature flowed down his muscr body, the roaring fire energy seeped through his stone skin and into his fire core, causing him to moan lightly in pleasure.


    The magma pool beneath him was not a natural pool. Instead, it was a unique fire pool that had been created by using the unique geography andndscape of Dustfire Valley. All of theva rivers were sealed off and redirected toward one ce to form the pool.


    For a fire creature like himself, soaking himself in pure fire energy on a daily basis and taking the energy into his fire core was the only way to improve his own power slowly.


    Due to the unique nature of fire elementium in the Fire Elementium ne, advancement materials of attributes other than fire could not be found at all. Thus, apart from daily umtion, powerhouses of the Fire Elementium ne had no other way of improving themselves. After all, they couldn¡¯t travel the ne in search of knowledge or resources that suited them as the adepts did.


    Artes had been staying in the hall ever since he returned from his meeting with his master. He had left the task of searching and capturing the human adept to his subordinates while hezily enjoyed the luxurious life of bathing in boilingva.


    A mere six months had passed in an instant while he enjoyed himself!


    Artes was not in a hurry.


    Much like most fire creatures, his mind held absolutely no concept of time.


    His master might have given him a mission, but there was no time limit to itspletion. As such, he could still enjoy the carefree life of a lord while slowly waiting for the appearance of the mysterious adept.


    Yet today, an intense fire flux came from the city in the distance while he was enjoying his bath. A deafening sound traveled through the valley and reached the hall.


    Mm? What was happening?


    Artes stood up in the pool. The scalding liquid flowed down his strong body, and a wave of heat as scorching as ten thousand degrees ravaged the entire hall.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Artes walked to the entrance of the fire hall with heavy steps and gazed at the city below. Fires were zing while fireballs soared throughout the air. It seemed that a wave of chaos and uprising was spreading throughout the entire city.


    "What¡¯s the matter?" Artes¡¯ loud voice resounded within the hall, "What has happened in my territory? Why is there chaos? Where is Firerend?"


    The two molten giants guarding the entrance of the hall got down on one knee and reported with their booming voices, "My Lord, Captain Firerend sent back news earlier. They have found the fire spirit spy and are now in the process of arresting him!"


    "What a mess!" Artes instantly flew into a rage, "Almost seventy percent of the free citizens in this city are fire spirits. Does Firerend intend to arrest all of them? That stiff-minded fool! You, go and tell him to immediately give up on the arrest and restore my city¡¯s peace and quiet."


    "Understood!" A molten giant acknowledged the order and turned to stride toward the city center.


    A short whileter, Artes¡¯ order was received and executed, and the chaotic city instantly regained its calm. Apart from twenty or thirty fire spirits that had been surrounded and beaten down by the molten giants, some of the buildings in the city center had also been affected. Several shops had even copsed.


    The molten giants would never apologize or givepensation over these losses. The fire spirits that had regained their freedom could only curse in anger before fleeing Dustfire Valley and finding a ce to treat their wounds.


    The invisible Greem saw the towering figure at the entrance of the fire hall from far away. His intimidating aura and his attitude toward the fire creatures around him informed Greem as to his identity. Greem was almost certain that this fire creature was his target.


    It was Second Grade Fire Lord Artes!


    Compared to a human lord or king, Artes¡¯ arrangement of his security was crude and loose. Human kings would need towering walls and castles on the outside,rge amounts of patrolling soldiers on the inside, and specially hired powerhouses to act as their guards.


    Even so, some kings would still be concerned. These kings would go on to set up plenty of traps and mechanisms where they lived to prevent assassinations and ambushes targeted at them.


    However, these strategies were clearly useless in the Fire Elementium ne!


    In the end, Artes himself was the most powerful individual in Dustfire Valley. He didn¡¯t need too much useless trash surrounding himself.


    Greem circled the hall several times while stealthed and only found two molten giants standing guard at the entrance. The fire hall was also an open space supported by dozens of thick pirs. That broad space was enough for Greem to enter and exit freely.


    It was imprisoning a cat with a cattle fence!


    Such magma pirs might stop big guys like the molten giants, but they were as wide as city roads for the three-meter-tall Greem. Greem kept a healthy distance between himself and the guards and entered the hall from a different direction. He narrowed his eyes and silently assessed this Second Grade Fire Lord Artes.


    He was a five-meter-tall molten giant.


    His entire body was formed of pieces ofrge magma rocks while blinding red light shone through between the cracks. A surge of liquidva flowed within his body. One could feel the shocking heat radiating from Artes even from forty or fifty steps away.


    Blue light flickered in Greem¡¯s eyes as he used a strange magical light spectrum to reveal the rippling heatwaves around himself.


    Though Artes had not intentionally increased the intensity of his mes, his fire energy was already sufficient to form a Fire Domain of his own.


    All creatures that stepped into the Domain would have to endure fire damage of sixty-eight points at all times!


    Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire was actually an embryonic form of the Fire Domain. It was most likely a product of the adepts finding inspiration and knowledge from the fire creatures; a weakened ring of fire replicated with the use of magic.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare to get too close to the opponent as he was worried that the fire energy radiating from his body would be detected. He could only analyze and collect data on the opponent from a distance.


    The Chip quickly projected an approximation of Second Grade Lord Artes¡¯ attributes based on the degree of light refraction caused by the fire energy and the intensity of the radiated energy aura.


    Artes.


    Second Grade. Molten Giant. Dustfire Valley FIre Lord.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 27 | Physique 24 | Agility 7 | Spirit 13


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown when he saw Artes Strength and Physique. Both of them had already exceeded twenty points.


    Judging by this, Artes walked the path of physical strength and power. His Strength and Physique were at a shockingly high level. With his 24 points of Physique, he could easily endure two to three of Greem¡¯s Second Grade spells to the face without being severely harmed.


    Moreover, his 27 points of Strength would allow him to smash through Greem¡¯s Lava Shield with a single punch and continue to put a hole in Greem¡¯s chest.


    There were also two peak First Grade molten giant guards outside the hall. If Greem couldn¡¯t kill Artes in under five seconds of ambushing him, he would have to deal with the guards as well. Greem had no way of dealing with both of the guards while also fighting against a powerful opponent of the same grade.


    Greem hesitated for a moment before silently sneaking out of the hall.


    Of course, he left a magical eye in a corner of the hall before he left. It was only then that he retreated from Dustfire Valley and found a hiding spot.


    After all, there was a time limit to his high-grade Invisibility Potion. He couldn¡¯t enter Artes¡¯ Fire Domain either. Otherwise, the invisibility potion would instantly vanish the moment his body took damage!

 Chapter 792 Fire Pool Ambush

    Greem spent the next few days spying and peeking!


    Unfortunately, Lord Artes was like your standard recluse. He spent all of his days soaking in that magma pool of his and was hardly ever seen going out patrolling or visiting his subjects. Even the asional guard captain that came to give a report would be sent away after a few words.


    It demonstrated that the Fire Lords of the Fire Elementium ne did not have too much desire for influence and authority. They diverted all of their efforts into absorbing fire energy and increasing their abilities. This method of improvement was extraordinarily primitive and crude. It was almost an insult to the superior resources and convenience they possessed.


    With the magical eye that Greem had nted, Lord Artes had absolutely no secrets to speak of. Greem repeatedly thought about his n of assassination as he continued his constant monitoring of Artes.


    A frontal assault would not work!


    Artes was a powerful Second Grade Fire Lord. Greem would not have more than a forty percent chance of beating him in a direct challenge, even if he were to pull out all the stops. If the First Grade molten giant guards were involved as well, then Greem¡¯s chance of sess would fall to a mere ten percent.


    If he was even more unlucky and the Second Grade molten giant captain was at Artes¡¯ side, then he wouldn¡¯t stand a chance!


    That was why Greem had decided on an ambush and assassination from the very start.


    Moreover, Greem had to find a way to weaken his target¡¯s strength before the operation. Otherwise, the Fire Lord would only need to survive for seven or eight minutes before all the molten giants of the city would be upon Greem.


    Fortunately, Greem had purchased an expensive set of Icecrystal Frostmarrow prior to his arrival here in anticipation of his assassination. It was a strange marrow taken from the nds of magical ice creatures. It was a scarce and precious material.


    Drinking potions made out of this marrow would significantly improve the power of ice adepts. On the other hand, if fire adepts were to consume them identally, they would be faced with the terrifying consequence of polluting their fire origin.


    Of course, Artes was too powerful for Greem to trick him into swallowing the Frostmarrow. Greem would have to find a different, more indirect way to achieve this.


    This day, Greem snuck out of his hiding spot and silently entered the city.


    After all his while of patrolling and scouting, Greem had the geography of the citypletely figured out. In fact, he knew the key spots better than anyone else.


    He had nted over a hundred alchemical bombs on most of the supporting pirs of the city. When the time came, Greem remotely detonated all of them without hesitation.


    Chaos and madness once again descended upon the city after forty days of peace and quiet.


    The pirs supporting the stone ceiling were blown away. Shattered rocks and copsing boulders fell from above, burying nearly one-fifth of the city in rubble and dust.


    The deafening explosions and trembling quakes instantly drew out the resting Artes from his hall.


    Greem turned himself invisible again and dove into that magma pool while Artes was roaring in anger outside.


    The first thing that Greem did upon entering was set up a strange fire array at the bottom of the pool. There were three levels to this fire array, and each of them had their own magical effect.


    The first was to absorb the fire energy of the magma pool and funnel it to Greem, serving as replenishment for him while he was fighting. The second effect was a Fire Prison. A Fire Prison that isted the target would be constructed on the edge of the pool with the energy from within as the power source. This way, he wouldn¡¯t need to be concerned about interruptions from the outside world!


    The third effect was a barrier of invisibility that could hide Greem¡¯s soul aura and prevent him from being detected ahead of time.


    After setting up the trap, Greem ced a small magical trap at the ce where Artes most enjoyed lying upon, hiding the sealed Frostmarrow within.


    Once hepleted all these preparations, Greem dispersed his true body and allowed himself to be a cluster of fire before hiding at the bottom of the fire pool.


    With the concealment of the invisibility barrier, Artes would not discover his existence without specifically scanning the area. After all, Fire Lord Artes was only proficient at physical fighting. His Spirit was only at 13 points. On the other hand, Greem¡¯s Spirit could reach 29 points if he underwent both phases of the me Fiend Transformation.


    Such power was enough for him to duel with Artes, especially with the aid of the me Fiend of Terror!


    Time spent waiting always went by incredibly slowly.


    Artes¡¯ territory had been blown to rubble, and yet his useless subordinates couldn¡¯t even find a sliver of the enemy¡¯s shadow. Such a thing would infuriate anyone if it happened to them.


    Artes beat up three of his molten-giant subordinates before finally feeling somewhat relieved. He ordered his only Second Grade subordinate, Firerend, to lead a group of molten giants on a search throughout the city. He also ordered his fire elementium army to hurry to the entrance of Dustfire Valley to shut off the ce entirely.


    No creature would be allowed to exit Dustfire Valley until the culprit was found!


    This time, Fire Lord Artes¡¯ orders were executed firmly and thoroughly.


    Large groups of fire elementals took up the entrance and formed perimeters. Meanwhile, the molten giants repeated the orders of their lord and gathered all of the fire creatures within a cave for further identification.


    Artes then assigned two more molten giants to his fire hall. This way, the number of First Grade molten giant guards at his side increased to four. It was unprecedentedly high security for the molten giant tribe, who only had twenty-seven members in total.


    After furiously reprimanding his subordinates, Artes once again walked to the magma pool with his substantial body and jumped in without any hesitation.


    The bottom of this fire pool was nted downward slightly. The edge of the pool was only three meters deep, while the center was approximately seven or eight meters deep. As such, nearly half of Artes¡¯ body was still exposed on the outside while he stood at the edge.


    The disruption had distracted Artes, causing him to pay no attention to the pool itself. He slowly sat down and leaned against the edge, only leaving his one-meterrge head outside of the magma. Artes did not choose to nap while he waited for the results of the search. Instead, he slowly shut his eyes and silently absorbed the rich fire energy radiating from the roilingva.


    Greem slowly reformed his body and opened his eyes while Artes was distracted.


    As a Second Grade fire adept, the fire energy within Greem¡¯s body was also shockingly intense. There was no way Artes could not have detected him while he was right in front of the molten giant. That was why Greem had dispersed his form ahead of time and relied on the fire energy of the magma pool to conceal his existence.


    Now that he was about to act anyway, Greem started to reform his body as quickly as he could.


    First transformation: Body of mes!


    Second transformation: me Fiend¡¯s Body!


    As two towering me Fiends emerged from the pool, all of the fire energy in the magma pool was disrupted as an iparably powerful mental consciousness quickly pressed toward Lord Artes.


    Mm...what was happening?


    Artes opened his eyes abruptly and nced at the bottom of the fire pool.


    An intense surge of fire energy had suddenly gained substance there and was rushing toward him like a massive hill.


    Enemy!


    The enemy was at the bottom of the magma pool!


    Artes roared when he instantly understood. He then started to stand up and prepare for a fight.


    Unfortunately, Greem¡¯s Spirit had alreadyshed outward.


    The first to hit Artes was naturally the magical trap that Greem had set on the wall of the pool.


    As a fire rune appeared and shattered, a brilliant crimson light the size of a fist hit Artes¡¯ thick magma leg. The next moment, a red light spread out, and a frost aura that terrified Artes emanated from the spot of impact.


    In just an instant, Artes and the dozens of meters of magma pool around him were frozen in ayer of blue ice crystals. Ayer of frost crept up Artes magma body and worked toward his chest, head, and arms.


    If thisyer of frost reached his fire core or soul origin, then he would probably have no chance of advancing every again.


    Fire countered ice, while ice countered fire!


    Both of these attributes were counters to each other. There was no real strength or weakness between them, only partial numerical superiority or inferiority!


    With Artes¡¯ power and the endless fire energy of the magma pool, the power of frost within the Forstmarrow would be exhausted in less than seven minutes. However, before it was exhausted, the sudden burst of frost energy still had the upper hand around Artes surroundings. It burned and caused Artes to howl in agony.


    While the fire energy that Artes gathered in his body fought against the invading frost energy, theva at the bottom of the pool sshed everywhere. Two gigantic me Fiends rose from theva andunched their most ferocious attack at him.


    At the edges of the pool, the redva twisted together under thepulsion of some outside force and formed several dozens of meter-thick fire pirs,pletely sealing off the pool.


    Through the gaps in the pirs, four molten giants who had hurried over when they heard themotion could see their lord being attacked by multiple enemies. They immediately started to smash and tackle the pirs with all they had. Sadly, the endless energy being supplied by the magma pool repaired any damage to the me pirs in an instant.


    The guards couldn¡¯t help but roar out loud in anger.

 Chapter 793 Blood Battle at the Fire Pool

    The Fire Prison had temporarily prevented the molten-giant guards from interfering, but Greem didn¡¯t have that much time to act.


    Second Grade spells could only keep a six-meter-tall Fire Lord, made of volcanic rocks as hard as steel, in check. They wouldn¡¯t be able to harm him in the slightest. Moreover, the casting of a Second Grade spell required a fairly long channeling and chanting time. There was no way that Greem would have the room to cast spells freely unless Artes was a deaf fool.


    However, Greem¡¯s magical traps had still managed to trap the Fire Lord for five seconds, and these five seconds were enough for him and the me Fiend of Terror to work together to cast an extremelyrge Magma Fireball. Artes had just expelled the frost energy from the surface of his body and was blown to the ground by this powerful fireball. A deep crater one-meter in diameter appeared in the center of his chest, sending cracks in every direction around it.


    A battle between fire users was simply this violent and aggressive!


    The burning effect of me was practically negated against each other. As such, the only damage that could be done to the opponent had to be with hard fists or the physical effects of the spells they used.


    When the berserk Artes roared and climbed up from the pool, the me Fiend of Terror charged forth with a magma executioner¡¯s de. Meanwhile, Greem stayed back and quickly chanted a profound spell.


    The me Fiend of Terror specialized in elementium powers and wasn¡¯t possibly a match for the ferocious Artes in a close-range encounter. However, it still had to charge without hesitation to buy time for Greem¡¯s spell.


    Greem absorbed all the fire energy he could from the mysterious array he hadid in the pool and used his Fire Molding ability to gather the fire elementium between his hands into sharp fire spears. He then shot the spears toward Artes.


    Though his eighteen points of Strength after transformation was still inferior to a monster like Artes, it was more than enough to break through Artes¡¯ defenses when throwing weapons. The crimson fire spears turned into bolts of fire and pierced into the gaps in Artes¡¯ magma body before detonating in shocking, explosion-like powerful fireballs.


    Artes might be immune to fire damage of this level, but he wasn¡¯t resistant to the piercing damage from the spears themselves or the shockwave impact of the explosions.


    The magma armor on Artes¡¯ body fell off,yer byyer. Soon, his true form was revealed.


    Artes enjoyed bathing in theva for two reasons. He could absorb the pure fire energy within, while also drawing upon the magma to increase the thickness of his body¡¯s surface. No wonder he never got sick of bathing in theva, even after so many years.


    A tough outer shell provided one with a considerable upper hand in battles between fire creatures!


    At this moment, Greem truly understood what it was like to see two six-meter-tall fire creatures battle in front of him. As the earth trembled from the brutal fight, the entire magma pool was subjected to a cmity. Large pools ofva sshed out toward the surroundings as the fire hall itself quaked and trembled.


    Overall, it seemed like Fire Lord Artes was beating up on the me Fiend. His massive and heavy magma fists sent sparks flying everywhere when theynded on the me Fiend¡¯s head. In fact, it seemed as if the me Fiend¡¯s head had started to twist and distort in shape.


    If it weren¡¯t for the mysterious array at the bottom of the pool supplying the me Fiend with energy, it would have been destroyed by Artes within one or two minutes of the fight.


    However, despite the overwhelming beatdown it was receiving, the me Fiend of Terror was doing its job. Every time Fire Lord Artes wanted to get up and lunge at Greem, the me Fiend intercepted him and continued the fight.


    Meanwhile, the constant fire spear attacks from Greem were also making it difficult for Artes to concentrate on the battle against the me Fiend. Even with all his wild power and unyielding body, Artes could not fight off two opponents of the same grade at once.


    Artes started roaring as he fought.


    Several deep shouts rang out in session from the center of the city, and towering molten giants emerged from the buildings. They knocked aside the low-grade fire elementals in their way and rushed to the fire hall with all they had.


    An unusually tall and muscr molten giant stood out among the rest.


    Judging from its size and its posture when striding, it was that Second Grade Guard Captain Firerend!


    Greem saw all of his happening through the magical eye he had left outside. His face, even hidden under the mes, flushed white.


    He only had three minutes at most now.


    There was no chance of seeding at killing a powerful Second Grade Fire Lord if he took no risks. If he waited too long, then Artes¡¯ many subordinates would arrive; the Fire Prison wouldn¡¯tst more than a few seconds then.


    At this instant, Greem gave up on his long-range harassment tactics. He turned and roared as he formed a magma sword in his hands. He lunged forward and worked together with the me Fiend to fight against Artes.


    The power of long-ranged fire spells was too easily weakened and resisted when dealing with a Second Grade Fire Lord. A Second Grade fire spell was far less effective than a fire fist thrown with all his strength.


    It had only been two fire creatures brawling earlier. Now, it was three!


    Greem was not Artes¡¯ opponent when it came to Strength.


    Even after transformation, Greem only had 18 points of Strength, while Artes had 27. Just a little bit more, and Artes would have an overwhelming advantage against Greem.


    Five points of difference in Strength caused Greem to be knocked back with every exchanged blow. He stumbled backward, having trouble even standing still. If the difference in Strength had reached 10 points, then Greem¡¯s fire fists would have been smashed to pieces by Artes¡¯ magma fists.


    That would have been an even more terrible scenario to behold!


    [Lower your head; dodge two meters to the left. Upward sh. Location of attack has been marked.]


    Greem himself had no talent for brawling and was relying entirely on the Chip¡¯s notifications to aid him in battle. He lowered his head and dodged a violent fist from Artes. He then stepped two meters to the left and dodged another sneaky knee strike.


    Greem took advantage of Artes¡¯ momentum and shed upward with his magma sword, going from below to above, cutting right across Artes¡¯ exposed chest. The serrated de of the sword shed with Artes¡¯ strong magma body, sending sparks into the air and spilling redva out on the ground.


    It wasn¡¯t actualva, but the blood flowing through Fire Lord Artes¡¯ body!


    With the help of the Chip¡¯s powerfulbat-aid system, Greem¡¯s vision was filled with colorful lights and continually appearing and vanishing red lines. The red lines appeared on Artes¡¯ body, highlighting the gaps in his defenses and the weak points on his body.


    These red lines steadily shifted and changed as Artes continued to move about. A dark red line on his chest earlier would vanish by the time Greem reached a position to attack as Artes changed his own pose.


    The red lines vanished and appeared, always appearing on different parts of Artes¡¯ body. Attacking these ces would cause maximum damage with minimum force. ording to the Earth terminology from Greem¡¯s previous life, these were likely ¡¯critical hits¡¯!


    The red lines were always shifting in position. Greem could hardly even catch one-fifth of them with his current fighting skills. However, just these one-fifth of these ¡¯critical hits¡¯ allowed him to wound Artes repeatedly during the fight.


    However, Greem wasn¡¯t doing all that well either. His magma sword had been snapped in half, while half his head and chest had caved in. Moreover, the me Fiend of Terror acted as the principal offense and was practically crippled now. It was in a terrible state.


    As Second Grade creatures, their battle shouldn¡¯t look so crude and ugly!


    Ordinary battles between Second Grade creatures always started with long-range bombardment, trying to find the opponent¡¯s weaknesses while they moved around and dodged the enemy¡¯s projectiles. It was only when magical powers could not effectively harm the enemy that they would attempt to go into a melee. None of them would be like Greem, entering a cruel life-and-death battle at the very start of the fight!


    There was only one chance!


    Artes would never give him a second chance if he failed to kill him this time.


    Greem took out all he had and bet everything upon this ambush. He was giving his all!


    From the start of the battle until now, Greem had relied on the Chip¡¯s assistance to leave seven or eight holes in Artes¡¯ body. His own body had also been beaten up by Artes¡¯ heavy magma fists and was in terrible condition.


    However, such damage wasn¡¯t enough to kill the Fire Lord with his 24 points of Physique. At this moment, the molten-giant reinforcements had already arrived at the entrance of the fire hall. They would only need a dozen seconds to arrive at the Fire Prison.


    Greem didn¡¯t have much time left!


    We¡¯re going in.


    Greem roared and appeared near Artes with a Fire Teleportation. Untamed fire energy gathered between his hands and turned into a new magma sword which he stabbed into the crater on Artes¡¯ chest.


    The Fire Lord¡¯s reaction was swift. He opened his left hand and grabbed the front of the sword, allowing the red magma to ssh onto his hands, refusing to let go. He then lifted his right fist and smashed it at Greem¡¯s battered head with ferocious strength.


    The massive fist whistled through the air. The immense air pressure was already pressing against Greem¡¯s Inferno Shield even before it had made contact.


    Greem¡¯s eyes turned cold and solemn.

 Chapter 794 Mission Accomplished

    Fire fists rained down from above.


    However, they were intercepted by a pair of fire hands that appeared out of nowhere.


    The me Fiend of Terror had been beaten beyond recognition, yet it still clung onto Artes¡¯ heavy right arm with its crippled body. Three six-meter-tall fire giants were entangled together, rolling around and fighting in the magma pool.


    Greem took advantage of the me Fiend dragging down Artes¡¯ arms to lean in toward the enemy. He then used his burning hands to stab the massive crater on the Fire Lord¡¯s chest. Shattered stone dust from the hole fell as Greem pierced with his hands as the cracks started to spread further throughout Artes¡¯ body.


    Artes began to struggle and resist with increasing intensity as if he sensed the threat of death. His powerful stone arms pummelled the me Fiend furiously. The me Fiend¡¯s elementium body finally dispersed, incapable of enduring any more punishment.


    The crystalline magical golem core fell into the pool and vanished within, only leaving behind a few bubbles.


    It was already the third time the enemy had destroyed the me Fiend of Terror while it was summoned!


    As Greem¡¯s enemy increased in strength, even a Second Grade me Fiend of Terror could notst until all of its energy was exhausted. Moreover, summoning a Second Grade magical golem took up too much of Greem¡¯s Spirit, making it difficult for him to call up a swarm of golems to surround the enemy like he used to do in the past.


    With the me Fiend removed from the battle, only Artes and Greem were left in the fire pool.


    Fire Lord Artes¡¯ massive magma fists thudded against Greem¡¯s body, and Greem¡¯s Inferno and Lava Shields exploded into shards within a second of their formation.


    The heavy blows made Greem dizzy. His entire field of vision was filled with sshing redva, and his body was breaking at ces, giving him trouble maintaining the stability of his form. However, Greem was already absorbed in the fight. He ignored the torrent of strikes and stabbed at Artes¡¯ chests desperately.


    The crack there was growingrger andrger.


    Artes, given his strength, could have blown away Greem with a single punch. However, Greem had turned his left hand into a fire whip and wrapped it around Artes¡¯ waist to prevent this situation from happening. This way, he would be able to attack Artes¡¯ chest with his left hand, even if the Fire Lord¡¯s fists were also disassembling his body.


    Both of the giants rolled throughout the pool trading blow for blow. The ferocious battle threatened to raze the entire ce to rubble.


    At this moment, Second Grade Molten Giant Firerend had already rushed into the fire hall and was attacking the Fire Prison with all he had. As expected of a Second Grade, the power he possessed was far beyond the total of those four First Grade molten giants. The destructive power of his strength was also iparable.


    The Fire Prison was being taken apart at a visible pace.


    At this intense moment of the battle, a crisp cracking sound came from the crater on Artes¡¯ chest.


    Greem had finally pierced through the half-meter thick magma shell!


    Greem¡¯s ferocious fire hand instantly stabbed into Artes¡¯ chest and grabbed onto a fire core that was the size of a human head. As fire energy with violent, destructive powers surged into Artes¡¯ body, a series of explosions urred within. Greem¡¯s fire energy took the opportunity to enter and sessfully restrain Artes¡¯ soul consciousness.


    A soft sound rang out.


    Greem pulled out his right hand, and Artes¡¯ massive fire core turned dark red in his palm before cooling into a gray heart of stone.


    The surroundings turned silent.


    The molten giants stopped their attacks and looked at the stone heart in Greem¡¯s hands with expressions of shock and surprise. They had lost all desire to fight, in addition to the ability to think clearly.


    Their lord had died.


    All the molten giants dejectedly looked at this sight as the sentence echoed throughout their minds. Finally, Firerend was the first to wake up from the shock. His dimmed eyes turned bloodshot once again as he pointed at Greem and roared, "Kill him!"


    It was only then that the other molten giants recovered and roared in unison, "Kill him; avenge our lord!"


    The next moment, the Fire Prison copsed under the stone fists of the molten giants, exposing the ravaged fire pool.


    Greem quickly stored the stone heart that contained Artes¡¯ soul and rapidly reverted his transformation. By the time he regained his appearance as a two-meter-tall human adept, the molten giants had already arrived in front of him.


    Greem was on hisst legs as well now.


    The battle against Artes had been brief, but shockingly intense; it had drained him of almost all the fire energy within his body. There were at least two dozen molten giants surrounding him, and one of them was Guard-Captain Firerend, whose grade was the same as his.


    There was no meaning to any furtherbat now that he had aplished his mission.


    As such, Greem dove toward the bottom of the pool, picked up the golem core, and made his way toward the crack below, swimming away like a fish.


    Firerend¡¯s mad roars of fury rang out from behind him.


    Greem ignored all of this and quickly swam away against the current ofva.


    Fifteen minutester, Greem emerged from a crack with much difficulty. This ce was one and a half kilometers away from Dustfire Valley. One could only vaguely see the dust and fire of the valley from this distance.


    Mission aplished. Finally, the mission had beenpleted!


    Greem¡¯s eyes turned wet, apanied by a sudden sense of ease and rxation. He had never doubted his ability nor his luck along the way. Now, it seemed fate was on his side. Otherwise, sneaking into a higher ne to assassinate a powerful elementium lord that was just as powerful as himself would have been no more than a dream.


    While Greem reveled in his victory, a strange voice rang out from beside him.


    "You human adepts truly have some skills! To think you would be able to kill an actual Lord with a body as weak as yours. Hehehe, it seemed I¡¯ve underestimated you as well."


    Greem was terrified by this voice that hade out of nowhere. It wasn¡¯t until he turned around that he saw the ming tiger crouching idly behind him and staring at him with his fierce eyes.


    "Cin...Sir Cindral, should ¡¯t you...be waiting for me near the coordinates of my tower?"


    "Hehehe, I had nothing to do anyway. So I followed you and watched how you killed that Artes. Not bad, not bad. Your n was perfect, and you gave it your all as well. It was fairly interesting!"


    It was fairly interesting...


    Greem¡¯s eyes couldn¡¯t help but turn wet again.


    How could it just be ¡¯fairly interesting¡¯? It was such a big thing. If his luck or power were slightly worse during that fight, then he would have received the tragic fate of death in another world. Yet, such a life-and-death battle was only ¡¯fairly interesting¡¯ in the eyes of this Cindral.


    The look in the Third Grade tiger¡¯s eyes didn¡¯t change at all. He didn¡¯t seem moved by Greem¡¯s self-mockery.


    "My mission here isplete! Then, for the rest of the trip, I wee Sir Cindral to visit my private adept¡¯s tower." Greem shook his head and cast away these pointless thoughts. He forced himself to put on a smile and respectfully extended an invitation at the tiger.


    "Let us set off then!" On the contrary, Cindral was very interested in this topic and immediately stood up to leave.


    Greem had no choice but to follow after closely him.


    ............


    Lance. The Metal Fortress.


    An impatient dragon was pacing around the metal hall.


    Finally, Arms could no longer suppress his frustration and stopped his pointless pacing. He roared angrily at the empty hall, "It¡¯s been eleven days. It¡¯s been eleven days since I came here. Why has your human master not appear yet? No, I must see him immediately. At once...immediately."


    A short momentter, Gazlowe¡¯s strange voice rang out in the metal hall.


    "Sir Arms, I apologize for this matter, but there is nothing I can do. From what I understand, Lord Greem is currently traveling in a different world and will have trouble returning in the short term. Even if I could send news of you to him, he couldn¡¯t possibly abandon his mission for something as minor as this. As such..."


    "Minor...minor," Almost as if he had been infuriated by this word, Arms voice immediately turned an octave louder, "My woman has almost been taken away by someone else, and you call it minor. Believe me; I can turn this ce into a sea of fire with a single dragon¡¯s breath!"


    Arms was practically threatening at this point.


    "I really can¡¯t do anything, Sir Arms. Judging by your description, this matter involves a terrifying Fourth Grade dragon. An individual of this level exceeds my authority. I have to wait for Lord Greem to return to make a decision, regardless of how worried you are!"


    After the catharsis of yelling, Arms once against started pacing in the hall.


    Wait, wait, wait. What else could he do apart from waiting now?


    Arms felt like his heart was being boiled in oil whenever he thought of his prettydy-dragon crush in the arms of another dragon at this moment. He couldn¡¯t sit still at all.


    That damned Greem, where did he go?

 Chapter 795 City of Machines

    Goblin ne. City of Machines.


    As the gathering ce of all magical machine technology in the Goblin ne, the City of Machines had be the dream capital that all goblin engineers and technicians dreamed of.


    It had initially been a private territory of Princess Vanessa of the Goblin Empire, but ever since the otherworldly adepts had arrived in this world, it had be where they lived and set up theirboratories.


    An adept¡¯s tower rose from the city now and was one of its most striking and memorablendmarks!


    Due to their fear of the evil adepts, the goblin civilians had been unwilling to serve these individuals that had robbed them of their rule over the ne. However, with the passing of twenty years, the older generation who had been filled with terror at the brutality and wickedness of the adept invasion slowly died of old age.


    The new generation of goblins might not like the adepts, but their memories of their brutality were not as clear and imprinted as their predecessors.


    Correspondingly, more goblins were willing to embrace the changing of the times. They eagerly approached the tower and offered themselves into the service of the adepts, bing the representatives and subordinates of the adepts across the continent. These same goblins quickly turned from ordinary goblins into fearsome and respected pilots of magical machine warriors who had the power to overwhelm ordinary goblin machine warriors.


    Moreover, the gentle and friendly attitude of the beautiful Adept Meryl during her rule of the Goblin ne had also substantially dissolved the hostility of the goblin nobles. Of particr note were the constant supply of life potions, beautification potions, charm pins, wands, magic scrolls, and elementium talismans that came from the World of Adepts.


    These were all fantastic luxury items that the goblin nobles desired beyond all else. They represented an immense attraction to the goblins, who typically didn¡¯t live beyond twenty to thirty years. Moreover, the constant cries of Goblin Sage Snox for his believers to not resist the adepts through violent means helped improve the rtionship between the two. Instead, Snox called for all goblins to extend discourse and business to the adepts with conditions attached.


    Such an idea fell in line with the thoughts of the higher ss goblins. As such, somerge-scale merchant groups and unions also joined the ranks of the coborators. The goblins slowly epted the existence of the adepts and their identities as the rulers under such daily indoctrination and guidance.


    As their most charming ruler, Adept Meryl had unparalleled influence within the Goblin ne. The massive City of Machines was built around the adept¡¯s outpost under her call for action, surrounding the tower at the center of the city.


    The new city was a ssic capital of steel as well as the capital of magical machines!


    No wooden or stone buildings could be seen here; only metal fortresses forged of tough alloy. Moreover, it wasn¡¯t stagecoaches or mules that ran in the streets but smoking goblin chariots and mechanical hawkstriders.


    Those who could live within the City of Machines were almost always individuals who had unique abilities when it came to metal forging or magical machine construction. They belonged to dozens of different goblin merchant groups, and their main job was the purchasing of otherworldly resources and materials.


    Adept Meryl set down strict trading guidelines during her time governing over the City of Machines. Even the adepts had to offer magical crystals and magical items of ¡¯equal value¡¯ if they wanted to obtain the resources of the Goblin ne. Of course, the prices of all trades were determined by the Crimson adepts and the goblin nobles after discussion.


    However, Meryl¡¯s most brilliant move was announcing the beloved Princess Vanessa as her disciple and dering her as the eternal ruler of the City of Machines, never to be influenced by the stationed adepts.


    That yed to the hearts of the moderate goblins immensely!


    The second adept to be stationed in the Goblin ne after Meryl was her disciple, Wind Adept Deserra.


    Naturally, as her disciple, there was no reason for Deserra to modify the ruling structure that his teacher had set out. Within these twenty years of the Crimson n¡¯s rule, the goblins had slowly shifted from a monarchy system, with the goblin royalty at its center, to a method of influence revolving around this prosperous City of Machines.


    It was afternoon today. The warm sunlight fell from the skies, causing the metallic city to shine brilliantly.


    Princess Vanessa stood silently upon the balcony of the seventh floor of the tower. She looked down quietly at the gleaming metal buildings and the crowds walking through the full streets.


    As the red mechanical eye in her delicate socket adjusted slightly, she could even clearly see the faces and expression of the pedestrians in the street, even from two kilometers away. There was no sorrow or agony from being ruled by the wicked adepts on their faces. Instead, everyone was busy, as if they were working hard for a beautiful future.


    Could there be happiness in being ruled over by an invader?


    Vanessa tilted her delicate head, filled with confusions and uncertainty, along with mechanical gears and magical energy.


    Her soul had been preserved by the adepts ever since her idental death in the Steel Capital. The adepts had used their evil methods and put her soul in apletely metal body to draw Tigule and the goblin royalty to their side.


    And she, through such a method, aplished the immortality that most goblin nobles dreamed of!


    Once upon a time, the Vanessa who loved her people and dreamed of bringing them toward a future of prosperity and greatness had suffered in agony. She had wanted to end this boring immortality of hers countless times. Unfortunately, her metal body turned her into an undying monster.


    Swords couldn¡¯t sh through it.


    Arrows couldn¡¯t pierce through it.


    Even starvation wasn¡¯t an option; she didn¡¯t need to eat anything apart from absorbing some magical energy.


    Suffocation? She had not breathed since her reincarnation into this body.


    Her body made of ultra-alloy also made death by jumping nearly impossible. Even if she were to wreck her body, the adepts would only need to make her a new one.


    After experiencing a period of darkness and suffering, Princess Vanessa finally epted her new body with the encouragement of Tigule and many other supporters. She then started a new life.


    She lived in the adept¡¯s tower, studied the new and mysterious knowledge of the World of Adepts, and learned about the strange plethora of nar worlds out there. For the first time, Vanessa felt liberated!


    The past her might have loved her people and loved this world, but she was undoubtedly a frog in a well. Isted, shut off, numb, unlearned, and sealing off her people in a narrow world with her so-called ¡¯love.¡¯


    A world like theirs would eventually be found by another world. There was no such thing as peace or harmony between nar worlds¨C only naked profit and uncontrolled martial force.


    In contrast, the adepts that had invaded the Goblin ne were willing to adopt a gentle rule over them. It was...in truth, the greatest happiness that the goblins could afford!


    For some reason, ever since the wondrous otherworldly knowledge had expanded her worldview, Vanessa had fallen madly in love with thebination of machinery with magical energy. Under her encouragement, a group of young goblins was selected to be apprentices of the newly established subject of magical machinery in the City of Machines. Arge group of goblin engineers also started researching the topic of magical machinery.


    Just as she was watching over this exotic city that represented the assimtion of the goblins and the adepts, two goblin maids arrived behind her and bowed.


    "Princess, Lord Schr?der requests an audience!"


    Schr?der was the finance minister of the City of Machines. An audience with him would either be a request for magical crystals or an application for a research project on magical energy. In the end, it would have something to do with magical power.


    Most goblins had no affinity with magical power and could not sense the existence of elementium particles. As such, if they wanted to research magical energy, they could only do in-depth research by breaking down the magical power produced by magical crystals. As for the Queyras alloy that could be used to create space furnaces? All of it was in the hands of adepts. Ordinary goblins had no chance ofing into contact with any.


    Even back during the founding of the City of Machines, Adept Meryl went through immense trouble to obtain a space furnace from the adept leaders to serve as the power supply of the City of Machines. Otherwise, trying to sustain a city asrge as this with only magical crystals was no more than a delusion.


    However, trying to promote the development of the entire City of Machines with a single space furnace meant that the distribution of its magical energy was essential. The one hundred and six metal furnaces in the city required energy. The twenty-seven smelting factories required energy. The thirty-two construction workshops required energy...


    Apart from that, there was also a pile of research that required magical energy to be continued, including projects from the magical alloy refinery, the metal ratioboratory, the magic machine research center, and the magical energy development center.


    Under such a severe magical energy shortage, Princess Vanessa could only try her best to eke out a magical energy quota for everyone while applying for more from the adepts.


    Fortunately, with Tigule¡¯s status as a Second Grade magical machine pilot, the goblins had decent standing within the Crimson n. The magical crystals that he sent back to the City of Machines every month also became rare resources that the goblin engineers and technicians fought over.


    It was during these moments that the typically polite, green-skinned runts would start yelling in the city council. There were several times where it even escted to physical conflict. Such chaotic scenes undoubtedly upset Princess Vanessa as well, causing her to sneak out to this balcony to enjoy the scenery instead.


    Unfortunately, as the supposed ¡¯ruler¡¯ of the city, she had to deal with all these people who were constantly calling for more resources and energy that they so desperately needed.


    Perhaps, it was also time for her to find a way to request an audience with that powerful adept.

 Chapter 796 Changes in the White Tower

    The World of Adepts. Icewind, the White Tower.


    After the past few years of cultivation, the once deste Icewind had changedpletely.


    The beginnings of a small vige had appeared in a forest clearing just three hundred steps away from White Tower. The buildings there were made of logs and seemed to be heavy, but sturdy. There were about three or four dozen families scattered across the vige, with a small za at the center of the settlement. A few shops and unique buildings were scattered about as well.


    Due to the tower¡¯s protection, the chill winds from the east became warm and gentle before they reached the small town. The average temperature of Icewind used to be around 17.8 Celcius, but it had now stabilized at 0 degrees.


    Such temperatures could no longer affect normal outdoor activities for humans!


    It was difficult to conduct any farming or animal husbandry in a ce like Icewind. As such, most of the civilians there were hunters. They would form groups and enter the edges of the ck Forest on a good day to hunt for wild beasts or low-grade magical creatures.


    With the appearance of the White Tower, the magical creatures near Icewind had all retreated into the depths of the ck Forest. That took away the prey that the hunters relied on for their livelihood. However, as more and more Crimson adepts and apprentices ventured into the ck Forest, the hunters decided to settle near White Tower and sought to be recruited and employed by these people.


    These magic casters were undoubtedly the most wealthy group of individuals in this world!


    As long as they served the adepts well, any simple bag of gold that they got from them would be enough for them to lead avish lifestyle for several months.


    It was dusk once again.


    It was the time when the apprentice groups that ventured into the ck Forest returned.


    Anyter and night would fall. Most beasts and magical creatures would then be active, and walking in the ck Forest would be a serious risk. As such, any groups that did not manage to find the hidden camping spots before nightfall were to return to White Tower.


    It was undoubtedly the time when the town was most lively!


    The seven people of Shadow¡¯s Light emerged from the ck Forest in the moonlight,ughing as they walked toward the town.


    The five at the front were apprentices, while the two dragging a lion-like prey along on a crude wooden tform at the back were the hunters they had hired.


    It had only been half a year, and Shadow¡¯s Light had undergone tremendous changes.


    The captain, Ponta, was still a pseudo-adept. His powers hadn¡¯t improved too much, but the staff in his hands had changed from the Staff of Intelligence, which gave a minor boost to his Spirit, to his current Shadow Wand. This wand could effectively reduce the difficulty of casting shadow spells for Ponta. It had cost him two hundred magical crystals¨C nearly a third of his magical crystal ie over the past six months.


    However, with the aid of this wand, he could now sessfully cast some shadow spells that he used to have trouble with. It was an incredibly amazing thing for a pseudo-adept, whose life revolved around magic and spells.


    Meanwhile, Body-Refining Apprentice Dakso was still an advanced apprentice, and Transfiguration Apprentice nco was still an intermediate apprentice. That said, the other two members had changed tremendously.


    nt Apprentice Eco was now an advanced apprentice. Judging by the array of magical equipment on her, she was treated very well by her teammates. Still, little goblin Locke was the one who had changed the most. He was now an advanced goblin magical mechanic. A golem machine that creaked nonstop followed behind him.


    The golem might look frail and weak with its one-meter height. However, on an actual battlefield, it was as effective as almost five intermediate apprentices.


    Firstly, it was a massive monster ¡¯attractor¡¯!


    Any magical creatures drawn toward the team would most definitely attack this noisy little guy first.


    Secondly, this small guy¡¯s ability to escape and dodge was unmatched!


    No one had any idea how Little Locke hade up with and invented this golem. Its offensive ability might be terribly weak, but its ability to avoid attacks was shockingly powerful.


    If an enemy attacked it, the golem would instantly transform into a spider-type golem with eight metal legs and weave between the dense greenery as if it was tnd. Apart from exhausting their stamina trying to catch the golem, the pursuing magical creatures would not even be able to touch it.


    This way, the members of Shadow¡¯s Light couldfortably dole out damage and take down one powerful beast or magical creature after another.


    Even when idents urred and the little guy was torn to pieces by agile beasts or flying creatures, it could easily be repaired as long as Locke the goblin magic mechanic was still around.


    It was through all these strangebat machines that Locke was able to be an advanced apprentice in a matter of half a year. It also allowed Locke to be one of the leading forces of Shadow¡¯s Light.


    The team was surrounded by a group of people that had been waiting for them the moment they entered the town. Hunter Hank and Thor called for help, and the vigers moved over to carry the fire lion¡¯s corpse into the town.


    Fire lions were amonly seen low-grade magical creature in the ck Forest. It also had the power of a beginner First Grade. However, magical creatures were still magical creatures in the end. They might be sufficiently powerful, but their intelligence had not kept up with their might.


    Thus, an adept-level fire magical creature had been hunted down by a group of apprentice adepts who were only advanced apprentices on average.


    The most valuable thing on the fire lion was its fire crystal core, as well as its soft and warm mane.


    An adept-level core could quickly sell for a hundred and fifty magical crystals and more. Meanwhile, the fire lion¡¯s mane was the main ingredient in the crafting of a mecloak. Its basic price was around thirty magical crystals. Apart from these, the fire lion¡¯s fangs, bones, tendons, flesh, and blood were all spoils of war that could be converted into magical crystals.


    However, fire lion¡¯s meat was tough and sour, making it a mediocre cooking ingredient.


    However, it was because of its cheap price and how easy it was to purchase that it was a favorite item of many body-refining apprentices.


    If they carefully butchered this adolescent fire lion, then they could obtain approximately a hundred kilogram of meat. The body refining apprentice, Dakso, had already reserved fifty kilograms of meat in advance. The cost of buying the meat would be deducted from his share of the ie this time.


    An extremely professional ughterhouse had already been established in the town.


    It took no more than fifteen minutes for this hundred-kilogram fire lion to be taken apart finely, packaged, and then handed over to the Shadow¡¯s Light team. All the team paid in exchange was three magical crystals and some fire lion bits that they did not require.


    In truth, the town was their final destination as well.


    All the butchering, appraising, and selling was done in the town.


    The information here would be sent to White Tower and the Crimson n. If any adept were to be interested in the goods here, they could reserve it directly. Then, the matter of preservation and transportation would be left to the people of the town. The members of Shadow¡¯s Light only needed to wait for the magical crystals toe in.


    Such work distribution undoubtedly decreased the pressure of logistics and supply on the apprentice groups, allowing them to divert more attention to the improvement of theirbat skills. The acquisition of magical knowledge might be crucial for all apprentice adepts, but for most of them, turning that knowledge into correspondingbat power was undoubtedly even more important!


    After handing over the prey, the two hired hunters returned homes with smiling faces and tworge pouches of gold. On the other hand, the apprentices walked toward the only tavern in town.


    There, they ran into another group of apprentices who were also celebrating their hunt¨C Bloodsucking Fang.


    Just from the name alone, you would know that this was abat group purely made up of apprentice-level vampires. There were seven members on the team, and all of them were pretty men and women in luxurious clothes. Some of them were even blood elves with sharp ears and sharper fangs.


    These vampires might not possess the diversity of spells that other apprentice teams did, but with their rapid movements and bat transformations, they could freely travel in and out of the ck Forest to hunt. With the Battle of Fire Throne, Lady Mary had made a tremendous contribution to the n. These vampires in the lower levels of the n also gained more reputation and status this way.


    At the moment, the vampire faction had be the most significant faction within the Crimson n. Even Tigule, who was backed by an entire lesser ne, could notpare to Mary.


    The vampires, the Fate Witches, and the magical mechanic goblins; these three forces owned eighty percent of the Crimson n¡¯s resources and authority, each supporting the Crimson n as a pir. Of course, this was only the crude opinions of the lower sses.


    Only the higher-ups of the Crimson n knew the secret that thergest force in the Crimson n wasn¡¯t the vampires, but the mysterious Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe.


    During the Battle of Fire Throne, Gazlowe had only revealed a bit of his power and had managed to send the Alliance of five ns packing. If Greem was willing to bring him back from Lance to the World of Adepts, then there was a possibility that the Crimson n could instantly rise from a small n to arge one, only one step away from those ultra-ns.


    If one were to pick out any weakness of the Crimson n now, it would be theck of a high-grade adept who could support and defend the n. At the very least, without a Third Grade adept, the Crimson n would never be acknowledged as arge n.


    That was not something that could bepensated for with an army of magical machines!

 Chapter 797 Apprentice Duels

    Though both parties were from the Crimson n, their rtionship wasn¡¯t exactly harmonious.


    At the very least, Bloodsucking Fang didn¡¯t get along with Shadow¡¯s Light.


    "Yo, isn¡¯t this the Ponta who only knows how to go around collecting garbage? How did he make it out of the ck Forest safely?" A sweet voice rang out from the counter the moment they entered the tavern. However, the words caused the members of Shadow¡¯s Light¡¯s expressions to change.


    "I was wondering who it was. To think it was the one known as the most pretty of White Tower, Lord Lens! Where did you find the free time toe here for a drink today?" Ponta¡¯s face turned into a scowl, and he retaliated with a bitter smile on his face.


    The one who spoke was a middle-aged man, though with a pretty face and a sweetly soft voice. He was dressed in a delicate noble¡¯s robe and wore a noble¡¯s emblem on his chest, though it appeared unfamiliar to everyone¡¯s eyes.


    These vampires had alle from the Faen ne. They were all blood elves with pretty faces, slender bodies, and two sharp ears peeking through their light green long hair.


    As noble blood elves, these outsiders to the World of Adepts still maintained much of their habits from before their conversion. They had perfectly inherited all of the merits and ¡¯shorings¡¯ of the Faen forest elves. They were a group of radical individuals who judged others severely by their appearance; they hated all creatures whose looks were imperfect.


    They often despised and looked down on the less handsome adepts of White Tower, let alone a green-skinned goblin such as Little Locke. If it weren¡¯t for the overprotective Bloody Mary that stood behind them, a group like theirs would already have been expelled from the tower by the adepts.


    Still, they knew very well their capabilities and didn¡¯t go over the line to provoke the more powerful adepts like Bug Adept Billis. Still, they kept their arrogant and prideful attitudes in their daily interactions, using all they had to insult the ¡¯ugly¡¯ around them.


    At least three of the five Shadow Light¡¯s members were regarded as ¡¯unsightly¡¯ by the vampires. Only the young and pretty Eco was assessed as ordinary. Meanwhile, the shadow pseudo-adept Ponta managed to obtain a decent due to bonus points from his power.


    However, they hated little goblin Locke with a passion and believed that it was a humiliation to have such an ugly creature as apanion.


    As such, this group of blood elves had already crossed swords with all apprentice parties to varying extents. Naturally, things always ended on a bad note.


    Little Locke¡¯s face turned bright red when humiliated by these apprenticepanions, and his teeth creaked from how he was gritting them. After all, goblins were a synonym for lowly and humble in most material nes!


    Excessively short lifespans, as well as ack of a systemic knowledge-legacy, caused all goblins to be treated as foolish lower magical lifeforms. Moreover, they were the weakest and most cowardly of the magical creatures, making them the best targets for rookies who wished to test themselves.


    Before he stepped out of the Goblin ne, Locke had been proud of his green skin and his identity as a goblin. It wasn¡¯t until he had studied the systematic andprehensive Monster¡¯s Encyclopedia, and found the critical assessment of adepts toward the goblins, that Locke finally understood the goblins¡¯ status in the eyes of the other intelligent races.


    One could say that Little Locke¡¯s wild passion in study and training himself all this while was a manifestation of his anger over this assessment.


    He wanted to prove that he and the goblins were not as terrible as described in the Monster¡¯s Encyclopedia. Goblins were also an intelligent and knowledgeable race, not a beginner¡¯s gift pack that anyone could butcher and tear apart!


    In all seriousness, the goblins were truly on the lower end of the nar food chain, the main reason for that being theirck of elementium sense.


    Little Locke was an example!


    He was an Advanced-apprentice now, but the magical aura within his body was only at the level of a human Beginner-apprentice. There was no way he could evenpare to the blood elves, who naturally possessed elementium affinities.


    It was precisely due to their low elementium affinity that the goblins were forced to give up being casters and turned to research and machinery. Magical machinery was the path forward that they found for their species!


    Their bodies were too weak? Then make up for it with magical machines with bones of steel and metal.


    Their magic power was too weak? Then make up for it with magical energy batteries.


    Lacking the ability to sense elementium particles and manipte them? Then make up for it with magical machines tailored to their needs.


    It was due to them devoting their entire species¡¯ efforts toward the research of magical energy and the piloting of magical machines that they found an alternate path forward and became magical machine pilots.


    As such, when faced with the blood elves¡¯ insults, the one-meter-tall little goblin leaped into the air and waved his fists about as he shrieked, "A duel...a duel. I request a duel! I won¡¯t let you insult us goblins. Apologize to me now, or I have the right to request a fair duel!"


    The pretty blood elves at the counterughed, and the pretty-boy blood elf Lens was practically falling over withughter.


    "Haha; Ponta, I am simply too impressed. To think you would bring a clown with you when you go out on missions. Hahahaha!"


    Ponta¡¯s face turned even darker. If it wasn¡¯t for Eco holding his arm tightly, there was no doubt he would have punched that pretty face of Lens.


    Lens was only an Advanced-apprentice. There was no way he could be the opponent of a Pseudo-adept. Still, the blood elves excelled at kiting and harassment. Lens wouldn¡¯t be afraid of him in such a narrow space.


    "What is it? Do you question Little Locke¡¯s identity as an apprentice?" The foul-mouthed nco started talking, "His identity as an apprentice was personally announced and conferred upon by the n head. Are you questioning the n head now?"


    The faces of the blood elves turned when they heard this.


    They were members of the Crimson n as well. Naturally, they knew of Lady Mary¡¯s rtionship with the n head. They couldn¡¯t help but re at nco when he provoked them, gritting their teeth in anger.


    Perhaps, in their minds, Lady Mary was of the same grade as the n head, and she might not necessarily lose to him in a duel. As such, all of the blood elves were a bit upset that Lady Mary willingly submitted to that fire adept.


    However, such things could only remain as thoughts and never spoken out loud. Otherwise, they would be harshly punished by the higher-ups, and even Lady Mary wouldn¡¯t protect them then.


    "Don¡¯t just strike with your tongue here. I was just trying to say that a lowly creature like that has no right to be an apprentice. It is only suited as a dissection subject on ourboratory tforms." Lens stood forward and roared loudly.


    "Then, duel with him!" nco replied with a face of disdain, "Could it be that you don¡¯t even dare to ept the challenge of a mere goblin?"


    "You..."


    "Fine, we ept the challenge!"


    Just as Lens was about to retort, a cold female voice interrupted the exchange.


    Everyone looked over and saw that it was the captain of Bloodsucking Fang, Blood Elf Pseudo-adept Seria. Seria used to be a First Grade elven archer back in the Faen ne. However, after conversion into a blood elf, the change to her attributes had been too intense, causing her to revert to the pseudo-adept level.


    There was a great chance for her to return to First Grade once her body had wholly assimted with her bloodline powers.


    Seria¡¯s former strength provided her with a different state of mind and worldview whenpared to the other apprentices. As such, she wasn¡¯t constrained by the narrow and drastic view of appearance supremacy. Her red eyes swept across Locke¡¯s body and her pretty brows scrunched together into a frown.


    "Big Sis, is there something wrong?" One of the blood elves moved over and asked.


    "It¡¯s nothing. Maggie, warn Lens not to let down his guard. That...that green-skinned fellow is a bit odd. Don¡¯t let Lens embarrass us blood elves!"


    "Understood, Sis!"


    With the acknowledgment of two Pseudo-adepts, this duel became a certainty!


    The location of the duel was decided to be the round za in the center of town. The square was tiled with thick green stones, andrge braziers burned around it. It was both broad and bright enough for the apprentices to duel there.


    At any rate, the apprentices couldn¡¯t unleash excessively powerful spells with their power; this small za was enough for their fight. Naturally, the loser would have to pay for the repairs of any damage done to the buildings or the road.


    "The duel can¡¯t be performed for nothing. I am willing to offer our fire lion¡¯s core as wager!" Once both fighters were ready, and the onlooking apprentices had gathered, Ponta couldn¡¯t help but shout out loud.


    "Hmph! We won¡¯t lose! I¡¯ll use a wyvern¡¯s core as wager!" Seria wouldn¡¯t be outdone and replied loudly as well.


    A wyvern¡¯s core was the magical crystal within a wyvern.


    Though it was a First Grade magical creature, its tough skin, poison ws, and flying ability made it a fearsome beast even amongst First Grade magical creatures. The value of its magical crystal was twice that of a fire lion and even more.


    An expression of excitement appeared on Ponta¡¯s face when he got this reply.


    As the captain of the team, he had witnessed Locke¡¯sbat power over these days. He knew very well how strong he was. Little Locke¡¯s chance of victory was fairly high when fighting against an Advanced-apprentice blood elf!


    Seria looked at the crowd around them, and coldly said, "Since there are no more objections, I hereby dere that the duel begins now."


    As she finished, Lens instantly transformed into a palm-sized bat and quickly approached the ditzy goblin Locke on the other end.

 Chapter 798 Little Lockes Debu

    t


    Little Locke wasn¡¯t in a hurry to retreat in the face of the approaching blood elf. Instead, he took his time to equip a strange metal helmet.


    The next second, three metal balls the size of fists took to the skies and revealed the rubies embedded within them. The golem machine creaking behind Little Locke suddenly started swelling as well. As the metal gears creaked and extended, a crude, two-meter-tall magical machine formed.


    Now that all this finished, Little Locke smashed the button on his belt, and a dome-shaped protective forcefield enveloped him.


    The Invincible Belt was a magical energy item that Little Locke had invented himself. It could erect a dome-shaped defensive forcefield with energy supplied from magical energy batteries. As it did not require any magical input from Locke himself, he could turn his attention to other things.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    The lunging Lens ran into the semi-translucent forcefield and was instantly stunned by the impact. Yet, before he could beat his wings and escape, the three revolving metal eyeballs appeared to have received instructions and locked onto Lens¡¯ bat form. Three red heat rays shot toward him from different angles.


    Forty points.


    Lens¡¯ rich personal experience allowed him to judge the energy intensity of the heat rays before they reached him. Though forty points of damage wasn¡¯t too intense, they would have no problem piercing through the body of a transformed bat.


    Supposedly, the blood elves would turn into their human forms once they had closed the distance between them and their enemies, using their rapid attacks to circle the enemy. However, this time, the barrage of energy beams forced Lens to dodge and run. He couldn¡¯t find any chance to attack Locke¡¯s defensive forcefield.


    Just as the bat wildly dodged about, the crude machine on the ground creaked and charged at him as well.


    Pu!


    The first gift from the machine was a swirling pir of fire. Strange alchemical powder shot out of the machine¡¯s skinny arms, which turned into searing alchemical mes when they came into contact with the air, burning the bat as it gave chase.


    The faces of the blood elves around the arena turned dark.


    Dammit! Why were the tricks of this goblin so nasty?


    Fortunately, Lens was a smart and sharp guy as well. He quickly erected ayer of blood mist to protect himself.


    He then pped his wings with all he had and rushed out of the area covered by the mes. The moment he escaped from the mes, three sizzling heat rays shot toward him.


    Lens screamed and started maneuvering. It took him a lot of effort to dodge two of the beams, and thest remaining one pierced through his right wing to leave a small, scorched hole on its edge.


    Dammit! I had best deal with these three annoying metal balls first!


    The thought ran through his mind, and Lens couldn¡¯t be bothered with the little goblin for now. Instead, he turned abruptly and targeted one of the metal eyeballs.


    As if it had sensed Lens¡¯ intent, this metal eyeball stopped attacking and started to move through the air like an agile bird, making unpredictable movements all over the ce. Lens¡¯ flight speed might have been swifter than the metal eyeball, but it wasn¡¯t that easy to catch the machine when it was focused purely on escaping. That was particrly the case given howrge the za was.


    Moreover, the two metal eyeballs were still sticking behind him like pieces of gum, continuously shooting off their attacks. However, these two sly eyeballs weren¡¯t getting too close to Lens either. They would instantly switch their roles of bait or hunting dog at any moment if they discovered Lens intended to change targets.


    For a moment, these three eyeballs dragged Lens along the ride like a dog taken for a walk. There was nothing the vampire could do at all.


    Naturally, the golem machine could not fly and couldn¡¯t participate in the battle happening in the skies. However, under Little Locke¡¯smand, the machine stopped and proceeded to transform. Spikes emerged from itsrge metal feet and fixed it on the spot as its metal back opened to reveal a trove of goblin rockets.


    "Locke Improved Rocket Launcher Number Three."


    Little Locke shouted loudly. Boom! Boom! Boom! A series of goblin rocketsunched into the sky, propelled by orange alchemical mes at their tails.


    Lens, who was still being tortured by the three metal eyeballs, felt a chill run down his spine. It was only now that he saw the seven rockets rapidly whistling toward him.


    He shrieked and turned to charge downward. He dodged in the air above the town, but the seven rockets were still pursuing him closely while their zing trails left a beautiful picture in the night sky.


    Lens no longer cared for his reputation now; he just wanted to get away. The vampire dove into the crowd and started to weave between the legs of the hunters and apprentices in his bat form. The group was instantly thrown into chaos as they ran in every direction to avoid the goblin rockets.


    Little Locke sighed and sent out an invisible order with the thought-amplifying device on his head. The seven rockets suddenly switched directions, rushing up into the air before exploding into blooming fireworks three hundred meters high in the night sky.


    The onlooking apprentices started cursing. They were clearly upset with Lens¡¯ despicable and unsavory actions.


    Seria looked at the crowd coldly as she stood at the edge of the za, and the voices in the darkness quickly went silent.


    Lens took advantage of Little Locke¡¯s diverted attention towards the careful maniption of his rockets to revert to his human form and lunged at the goblin.


    Zeng, zeng, zeng!


    For a moment, Lens utilized his rapid movements to their fullest potential, circling Little Locke¡¯s protective forcefield and leaving crimson w marks on it.


    These melee attacks might not be all that powerful, but the blood energy in them possessed a terrifying corrosion effect. Thick red smoke rose from the forcefield as it sizzled. A thickyer of the shield had been shaved away by the corrosion.


    Little Locke felt cold sweat run down his body at this attack. He quickly gave themand, and the three eyeballs returned to use their heat rays once again to force Lens away. The golem machine also straightened its body and rushed to Little Locke¡¯s side to watch his back.


    Lens found an opportunity to forcefully break through the screen of heat rays while Little Locke was in a panic. He sessfully destroyed one of the eyeballs, but he paid the price of having his shoulders pierced by two heat rays to aplish this.


    If this wasn¡¯t a duel, Lens could have dived into the forest and used his bloodsucking regenerative abilities to heal his wounds. Unfortunately, there were no ¡¯blood treats¡¯ for him on this battlefield.


    He had not managed to deal any visible damage to Little Locke up till now. As such, there was no chance for him to recover any damage. On the other hand, the eyeball machines and the golem had no flesh or blood that he could feast upon.


    The blood elves watching couldn¡¯t help but frown, and their hatred for the goblin magical mechanics deepened once more. It was truly an anti-human profession.


    Perhaps because the wounds on his body caused Lens to go berserk, but he actually managed to use his speed and agility to destroy the two remaining eyeballs after gritting his teeth and chasing after them.


    Without the harassment of the eyeballs, the clumsy golem had no way of keeping up with the blood elf¡¯s phantasmal movements. Lens once again left the machine behind him and left a bloody mark on Little Locke¡¯s forecfield.


    Finally, after repeated attacks, the forcefield dispersed, exposing the goblin within.


    If this was a battle in the woods, Locke could have retreated by relying on his teammate¡¯s cover to erect a new forcefield after swapping out a new battery for the belt. Unfortunately, he had no such opportunity in a duel like this.


    Lens took advantage of this great opportunity and lunged forward furiously.


    He even sacrificed his left arm to the chainsaw attack of the golem just to get past. However, once he made it past the golem, there was no longer anything standing between him and the goblin.


    "You damned little thing. Go and die."


    After an entire night of humiliation, Lens roared and rushed at Locke.


    Just as Lens prepared to murder Locke in a single strike, the goblin took out a small and delicate energy beam gun.


    "Haha, even the most powerful heat ray can¡¯t help you now."


    Sadly, before Lens could even finish speaking, a sky-blue beam of energy shot out from the gun.


    It¡¯s blue?


    Lens¡¯ hadn¡¯t finished the thought when his body had already be enveloped in ayer of blue ice. The coldness of this ice was beyond that of ice in the natural world. It froze not only Lens¡¯ body, but also his mind as well.


    Little Locke leaped a hundred meters away with his rocket boots, stumbled, and stabilized himself.


    Behind him, the frozen Lens behaved like a clumsy boar. His body flew across the za and smashed into a crude wooden house.


    Screams and the sound of tumbling tables and chairs rang out from the house.


    Frost Ray Gun!


    Little Locke spun the gun about his finger brazenly and blew away the non-existent smoke from its barrel. He then casually put the gun back on his belt.


    A row of five guns of different colors rested there, each of them seemingly corresponding to an energy ray of a different elementium.


    The wild cheers of many goblin apprentices immediately rang out from the crowd.

 Chapter 799 Arms Reques

    t


    After a long time spent on repairs, the badly ravaged Fire Throne finally had regained its luster.


    A small portal slowly opened on the fire altar in a magical room on the fifth floor, and two fire creatures of different shapes appeared.


    Due to the existence of the tower¡¯s defensive system, several coils of energy chains extended from the walls the moment the creatures appeared. They wrapped around the fire creature on the left andshed at the one on the right.


    "Back off!"


    As the shout rang out throughout the room, the defensive systems shut down, and the energy chains that had extended to the ming tiger vanished without a trace.


    The zing shroud of fire dispersed, revealing Greem¡¯s young, handsome face beneath. The red elementium mes quickly turned into a red adept¡¯s robe and fell upon his broad and muscr body.


    "Lord Cindral, wee to my tower. Do you intend to leave at once, or do you wish to find a ce to rest first?"


    Greem was once again in his tower. He could sense the diverse energy spectrum and magical runes about him. That indescribable sense of power caused him to no longer fear the threat of the Third Grade ming tiger.


    One couldn¡¯t think too much of Cindral¡¯s might just because of his disy of power in the Fire Elementium ne. Here in the World of Adepts, suppressed by the world consciousness, he would not be able to square off against the owner of an adept¡¯s tower. Also, both of them had signed a friendly contract that forbade mutual aggression and violence.


    However, the methods of adepts were strange and unpredictable. Cindral couldn¡¯t be sure that Greem didn¡¯t have any unique means by which to work around the contract and set out a deadly trap for himself. As such, the tiger shook his head when he heard Greem¡¯s question and said, "I still have some matters to attend to. You just need to use your authority over the tower to send me into theva sea."


    "If that is the case, then I won¡¯t ask Lord Cindral to stay any longer. Please..."


    Not much longer after the first portal on the fire altar had closed, a new portal slowly opened under Greem¡¯s control. One could vaguely sense the overwhelming fire energy on the other side of the door of light, and the rumbling sound of surgingva echoed throughout the room.


    Cindral sensed with his Spirit and confirmed that it was an open sea ofva on the other end. He chose not to dally any longer and immediately leaped into theva, disappearing without a trace.


    Once the portal had closed, Greem considered for a moment and shut his eyes to sense everything within the tower.


    It seemed the tower had received severe damage sometime earlier. Several of the lower floors were detached from the control of the defensive system, and plenty of energy dead spots had appeared on the defensework of the tower walls. That meant the energy nodes within the tower walls had been damaged. They couldn¡¯t be restored to their previously integrated state without extensive overhauls and repairs.


    Greem¡¯s spiritual appendages were like tentacles and freely extended throughout the tower¡¯s structure and along the energywork. He silently assessed the damage left behind after thest battle.


    Apart from the damage to the tower itself, Greem also sensed the minds of several dozen adepts within the tower. The soul aura of these adepts was unfamiliar and foreign, but without exception, all of their soul brands had been left in the central control crystal of the tower.


    Naturally, as the owner of the tower, Greem possessed the highest authority!


    He quickly read through the records of everything that had happened in the tower, including the brutal battles that had ensued around Fire Throne. Soon, he figured out the origins of these foreign adepts.


    To think they were adept prisoners that had chosen to serve the Crimson n to work off their crimes!


    Greem also found several magical messages from Lance and the Goblin ne in the control crystal. In particr, the number of magical messages from Lance reached the hundreds. It seemed Gazlowe was in a hurry to talk with him.


    Greem hesitated for a moment before contacting Gazlowe in Lance through the crystal.


    Who knew that the moment the connection went through, another familiar soul flux butted in.


    "Greem. Greem, you finally came back! Hurry up and help me! As long as you can help me get Iritina back, I¡¯ll be willing to establish apanionship contract with you."


    It was Thunder Dragon Arms!


    The so-calledpanionship contract was just a more elegant name for a dragon envement contract.


    Once a dragon signed a contract like this with another individual, it would no longer be able to reject requests for aid in battle. Still, as apanion, the other party couldn¡¯t force it to fight excessively powerful enemies. In most material nes, the intelligent races could only be the proud dragon knights by establishingpanionship contracts with dragons!


    The fact that a Third Grade thunder dragon was willing to surrender part of his freedom meant that the situation was fairly severe.


    As such, Greem didn¡¯t agree to Arms¡¯ request on impulse and instead started to draw out all the details from Arms¡¯ mouth.


    As expected, the reason Arms was willing to be Greem¡¯s contracted dragon was to have Greem help him deal with a powerful Fourth Grade dragon¨C Wing of the Azure Sky, Krille.


    Arms had indeed led an idyllic-like life after tricking the emerald and green dragons to follow him back to Lance. Unfortunately, the prideful Iritina was not a dragon that could be restrained to a tiny Third Grade dragon¡¯s territory.


    She led the green dragons on conquests everywhere, taking over the territories of three Second Grade dragon-lords in a row. However, one of those dragons was a direct subordinate to Fourth Grade Krille.


    Just as expected, the reckless behavior of Iritina and the other dragons drew the powerful Fourth Grade dragon upon them.


    However, what no dragon had expected was for Wings of the Azure Sky Krille to be attracted to Iritina¡¯s shocking beauty the moment he met her. After a bit of fighting around and getting to know each other, Krille sessfully captured Iritina¡¯s heart, and the two dragons got together to move into the same ce.


    Once Arms realized the situation, he hurried over, only to be beaten up by Krille.


    Naturally, he was not the opponent of a Fourth Grade dragon with his power. He could only swallow this humiliating and bitter pill. In the end, he made his decision and came here searching for help from Greem.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for thisck of options and his inability to find another helper to deal with a Fourth Grade dragon, he would never have extended the offer to an adept.


    Forming apanionship contract with an adept meant that it was very likely that he would lose his most precious freedom!


    Third Grade Arms had still been wondering if this decision of his was worth it. However, now that he sensed Greem¡¯s hesitation in his mental flux while listening to the request, Arms couldn¡¯t help but feel anxious once again, concerned that the adept would reject the offer.


    After all, agreeing to his offer meant engaging in direct conflict with a Fourth Grade dragon!


    Even Fourth Grade adepts would have to think over such a matter repeatedly before making a decision.


    Just as Greem was silent and frowning in thought, a hidden mental message rang out in his mind.


    "Agree to his offer! I can help you think of something to deal with the Fourth Grade dragon!"


    It was Alice¡¯s voice.


    Greem instantly calmed down with Alice¡¯s assurance. He pretended to hesitate for a bit longer and then feigned reluctance as he agreed.


    Arms couldn¡¯t help but let out a long roar when he heard this mysterious adept agree to his request.


    "That is it then. If you help me beat that Krille and take back Iritina, I will immediately sign apanionship contract with you."


    Greem let out a cold snort, "I will do my best when ites to defeating Krille, but I can¡¯t make any promises when ites to taking back Iritina."


    "That will work too. I swear in the name of the Dragon God, if you chase away Krille from Iritina¡¯s side, I will immediately sign apanionship contract with you without hesitation!" The furious Arms cut his finger immediately and swore with immense binding power using an origin contract.


    "Then wait for my news! I will arrange for this matter as fast as I can."


    After consoling Arms, Greem cut off the connection with Lance and silently contacted Alice, far away in the Tower of Fate.


    Alice appeared to have been waiting for him for some time. Their mental fluctuations almost instantly connected with Fire Throne as the medium.


    "Alice, do you actually have the confidence to deal with a Fourth Grade dragon?" Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask doubtfully.


    The Crimson n did not have the ability to deal with a Fourth Grade dragon, even if they were to exhaust all of their forces. In fact, a slight mistake could expose the existence of the metal fortress and cause Gazlowe to be expelled from Lance.


    When that happened, the Crimson n would lose their sturdy metal outpost and their n to benefit from Lance would be gone. The losses to the Crimson n would be immeasurable!


    That was why Greem was so concerned about Alice¡¯s n.


    "Don¡¯t worry. I already have a n to deal with this matter!" Alice consoled with a gentle tone, "Dealing with the Fourth Grade dragon won¡¯t use any of the n¡¯s forces."


    "You mean?"


    "Mm. The Fourth Grade hags of the Northern Witches still owe me a favor. It¡¯s time for them to pay it back now!"


    Fourth Grade witches?


    Since Alice had said so, it meant that the Crimson n would have to open up the abundant dragon resources of Lance to the Northern Witches as well. It was a bit of a pity, but Greem believed that this was inevitable when he thought of those powerful Fourth Grade dragons in Lance.


    After all, there was no way that the Crimson n could swallow the entirety of Lance without first removing these Fourth Grade dragons.


    But now, it seemed there was a chance!

 Chapter 800 Clan Matters

    It had been half a year since Greem left the n. With his return, all the umted matters and business crashed down upon him.


    Greem had to spend five days just to deal with the stuff rted to Fire Throne.


    The sudden n war had wrung Fire Throne dry, almost causing the n to lose all of its umted wealth and power along with it. The Crimson n might have won the war on the surface, but theirck of strength prevented them from turning the victory into fruits of war.


    As such, apart from the twenty-four adept prisoners, the Crimson n¡¯s profits after the war were nearly zero. In fact, due to the enemies breaking into the tower and inflicting severe damage to the lower levels of the tower, Greem had to investrge numbers of magical crystals for repairs.


    If this was an ordinary n war, Greem, as the victor, could rob sufficient magical crystals and resources from the five adept ns to make up for the losses. However, the enemy had been defeated, but the Crimson n did not have any forces to conquer and raid the opponent¡¯s territory or resource sites.


    Consequently, all these benefits fell into the pockets of other ¡¯outsiders.¡¯


    The Kam n that had spearheaded this war had lost this battle. They relied on their rtively untouched forces to devour and assimte the Magic Forest Hut before going forth to raid the other crippled ns.


    The strength of the Kam n increased through this ordeal, and they became even more challenging opponents.


    The Crimson n had been holding back before this due to Greem¡¯s absence as their leader. They weren¡¯t aggressive enough and had lost plenty of great opportunities. Now that Greem had returned, the morale of the Crimson n instantly soared sky high.


    After a discussion with Gargamel, Greem, as the Crimson n¡¯s leader, dered war against the Kam n. He sent Bug Adept Billis and Mary to conduct indiscriminate retaliatory attacks against all Kam territories and resources sites.


    The adept ns in Zhentarim were not allowed to startrge-scale wars without proper reason. Now that the Kam n had just attacked the Crimson n, Greem had plenty of reasons tounch retaliatory strikes.


    At the very least, the old fogeys of the Zhentarim Association could not object to the war, even if they had a bone to pick with the Crimson n. They could only silently watch on as the fire and smoke of war once again rose from the Kam n¡¯s territory.


    Of course, the Crimson n wasn¡¯t just starting any war. It was a retaliatory offense.


    As such, the Crimson n did not make use of any worldly army.


    They simply sent six n adepts. Yet, even these six adepts disturbed the Kam n to no ends and created plenty of trouble for them.


    The reason was straightforward¨C all six of these Crimson adepts were Second Grade adepts. Moreover, some of them were even powerful individuals who functioned simrly to an actual army, like Bug Adept Billis.


    If one were to seriously assess the strength of both parties, the only one that could truly defeat Billis and Mary was Third Grade Death Heralding Crow Yurga.


    Unfortunately, Billis and Mary did not leave a clear trail to follow. They refused to engage in direct conflict against the Kam n, preferring to move around and take down one resource site and territory after another. If any Kam n adept dared to emerge from their adept¡¯s tower, they would be surrounded by a group of Second Grade Crimson adepts.


    In just two months, the previously infamous Kam n had lost seven resources sites, three thousand soldiers, and five n adepts.


    For a moment, everyone in the Kam n was panicking. They had lost nearly half of their earthly territory, and the reputation of their n had been tarnished.


    ............


    While the n war was ongoing, Greem left Fire Throne for the Goblin n.


    Greem epted the audience from Princess Vanessa and a few dozen goblin nobles in the higher levels of the adept¡¯s tower. Apanying Greem was the Goblin Sage Snox.


    The goblins of the lower sses might not know the true identity of Snox, but there was no deceiving these goblin nobles and merchants of high authority.


    The goblins might have been unhesitatingly obedient in the past out of fear of the adepts. However, after such a long time of integration and assimtion with the adepts, they truly understood that there was no point in resisting the rule of the Crimson n. Thus, the goblin nobles and merchants instead started thinking about cooperating with the adepts to gain more benefits.


    Snox, who spent his days in the Goblin ne, knew very well what these goblins were thinking. Thus, with a bit of work, he contributed to the urrence of this audience.


    The goblins took the opportunity of today¡¯s ceremony to express their loyalty to the leader of the adepts to obtain his trust and further their n of in-depth cooperation.


    From now on, the goblins of the Goblin ne would be able to lean on the working system of the adepts and extend their reach to ces beyond their own ne.


    This way, the goblins would break free of their status as ves and be partners and strategic allies of the Crimson n.


    Greem wasn¡¯t opposed to this either!


    The tradework of the Crimson n in the World of Adepts was still too limited; the main reason for that being theirck of sufficient loyal personnel. Now, the many merchants of the Goblin ne were gathered here together and expressing their desire to help Greem establish trade nodes all over the World of Adepts.


    It was a n with plenty of benefits and no downsides to speak of!


    After agreeing to the goblins¡¯ request, Greem sent Snox to negotiate with the nobles and merchants while he followed Princess Vanessa to a secret room.


    "Greem...Lord Greem, I wish to make a request as the Casten of the City of Machines. Please approve our use for one additional space furnace. We simplyck too much energy here. It is no longer enough for the City of Machines¡¯ continued expansion!"


    Greem looked at the princess calmly kneeling in front of him but did not simply agree.


    He still remembered back when he scoured the Steel Capital. They had only managed to obtain enough Queyras alloy for five space furnaces. Forging the magic generator furnace of the metal fortress had used up one portion of the alloy. Creating the Second Grade Goblin Shredder used up another, and building the flying ship that crashed at Faen ne used up yet another.


    Before this, Greem had also promised to provide Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe with another magic generator furnace since he paid such a huge price to save Fire Throne.


    Under such circumstances, Greem only had materials left for one space furnace.


    As such, Greem rejected Vanessa¡¯s request without much thought.


    The space furnace had the fantastic power to supply the user with magical energy endlessly. Such power could only be ced in the hands of trusted subordinates; Vanessa clearly didn¡¯t fit the criteria. If she possessed such power, she might start to distance herself from the adepts and hold unnecessary and dangerous thoughts.


    Greem did not pity the dejected Vanessa.


    He could sense that the princess¡¯ hatred and resentment for the adepts had not vanished. In fact, it was showing signs of intensifying and deepening. If she didn¡¯t learn her ce, then Greem would have to get rid of the unstable factor that was the princess, even if he had to lose a Second Grade subordinate in Tigule.


    Greem arrived at White Tower after returning from the Goblin ne.


    As a newly establishednd, this ce was more lively than when he first came here.


    The arrival of sixteen new adepts undoubtedly filled in many empty spots within the n, cing certified individuals in all the various subjects and branches.


    Greem spent ten days to meet with these new adepts and establish some degree of rapport.


    Though they had only chosen to submit to the n due to the threat to their lives, it was also true that their arrival was what propped up the Crimson n. Without their existence, the Crimson n would perpetually be stuck in an awkward situation where the few powerful adepts were the only pirs of the n, and the others could only watch on.


    However, with the increase of n adepts, the resources within the n started to be insufficient.


    At this moment, Greem had to think about a way to earn more magical crystals and resources. It was the only way to support such arge group of adepts.


    Of course, finding a suitable ce and constructing a resource site there was what most adept ns would do. However, the operation of a resource site required a substantial initial investment.


    The Crimson n couldn¡¯t possiblye up with such a sum of money after the brutal war they had just experienced!


    With no choice left to him, Greem cast his eyes upon Lance.


    Thest few dragon hunting activities had brought two to three million crystals of profit to the n. That was something Greem still remembered clearly. Now that his purse was empty, Greem¡¯s mind immediately wandered to the dragons.


    Greem felt like he had profited immensely after the difficulties he had experienced in the Fire Elementium ne. In particr, the restrictions on his soul origin had wholly vanished after providing the mysterious witch with the requested item. His power had been increasing rapidly since then.


    It had only been twenty to thirty years since his advancement to Second Grade, and Greem was already seeing a slight possibility of advancing to Third Grade.


    However, his umtion wasn¡¯t sufficient yet, and his magical knowledge reserve was alsocking. As such, Greem had been spending the past few days traveling everywhere and trying his best to settle the n¡¯s internal matters.


    He required more time to think about and reflect upon matters of future development.

 Chapter 801 Skirmish in the Camp

    There was a small camping spot near the trading road.


    The trees and bushes in a three hundred meter area had been cleared away, while a small river flowed nearby. It was the best ce for travelers and merchants to camp.


    The ce was filled with people even though the sun had only just set.


    Therger merchant groups took up a corner of the camp, using their heavy carriages and carts to mark out an area as their own. Traveling merchants would often gather to light a campfire and enjoy dinner together.


    The fragrance of vegetable broth and the bubbling of cooking meat was enough to make the hungry travelers gulp and lick their lips.


    Meanwhile, the women that came along would go to the nearby river and wash before dinner. It was a rare chance to let loose after an entire day sitting inside a carriage. Theirughs and giggles rang out from a distance like silver bells, causing some men to look in their direction.


    The entire camp had a casual and rxed atmosphere to it!


    Dadada.


    The crisp sound of galloping horses came from the trading road.


    A man in ck robes slowly entered this lively temporary camp on his horse.


    Perhaps intimidated by the sinister aura of this man, the camp slowly turned silent.


    The men put away what they were working on and stood up to assess this neer.


    There was a magical white horse from the Salovia region. It was not only handsome but also fiercer and more ferocious than ordinary low-grade magical creatures. As such, one couldn¡¯t possibly tame and ride such a magical horse unless they were a powerful knight themselves.


    The one riding on the horse was cloaked entirely in ck robes, not revealing a single inch of skin. A hood shrouded the rider¡¯s face in a dark shadow, giving the man a cold and sinister aura from a distance.


    Everyone saw the emblem of a burning fist on the chest of this mysterious person.


    "It¡¯s someone from the Crimson n."


    "It is a lord adept, or is it an apprentice?"


    "I don¡¯t know."


    Those who could join the camp were all individuals who had traveled the world and seen all manner of things. They instantly recognized the neer¡¯s identity. Ayer of fear covered their previously cautious and confused gazes.


    Everyone hurriedly bowed and paid their respects with fawning smiles on their faces.


    "Who here is from the Duro Trading Group?" The man on the magical horse yelled in a deep voice.


    The few hundred people of the camp immediately looked toward a particr group of individuals in the corner of the camp: eight light carriages and thirteen or fourteen adventurers or mercenaries. The leader of the group was also in robes. He had short golden hair and looked very young.


    Seeing that everyone had cast their gazes toward them, the man with the golden hair took off his cloak and revealed the gray apprentice¡¯s robe beneath it.


    "The bastards of the Crimson n have caught up. Friends, let us fight now."


    As the man shouted, half of his thirteenpanions took off their cloaks and revealed their armor underneath.


    "Apprentice adepts."


    "From the Kam n."


    Some within the n knew of the current local political situation and instantly identified this group of people.


    Dammit! It was said that the Kam n was fighting with the Crimson n. If they start a fight here...


    The previously peaceful camp was instantly thrown into chaos. Be they man or woman, old or young, everyone started running away. Just as the camp descended into disorder, the man on the horse engaged with the one dozen Kam n forces.


    The man in the ck robes wasn¡¯t an adept. He was only a pseudo-adept.


    Meanwhile, the Kam n forces were made up of four advanced apprentices, three intermediate apprentices, and seven n warriors.


    Seven apprentice-level spells immediately greeted the ck-robed pseudo-adept the moment the battle started.


    Unfortunately, they were all blocked by a wall of wind that rose from the ground.


    Weng! Weng! Weng!


    The series of magical explosions rocked the wind wall, causing it to tremble and vanish with the first wave of attacks.


    "It¡¯s a wind pseudo-adept. Cole, you hold the front. Avril; you, Anna, and Tony are responsible for long-ranged attacks on the outside. Leiger, Gray Ear, you two are with me."


    With themands of the golden-haired man, the seven Kam apprentices quickly surrounded the Crimson apprentice. Theyunched a ferocious attack from every direction. Meanwhile, the n warriors around them raised their weapons and shields before valiantly charging at the only enemy before them.


    In an instant, red fireballs, crackling lightning, chilling frost des, green acid arrows, and rising earth spears filled the space. The numerous spells devoured the battlefield like colorful fireworks, engulfing all of the apprentices and warriors.


    The apprentice adepts¡¯ physiques were not much better than the n warriors, but their magical defenses protected their weak bodies. The seven n warriors undoubtedly became the first sacrifices in the fast-paced exchange of spells.


    Both the allied spells that exploded on the enemy¡¯s defenses, and the enemy¡¯s wind des, were lethal to these warriors who were unprotected by magic.


    A few of the n warriors copsed under the magical explosions.


    Elementium damage and wounds could be seen all over their bodies despite their leather armor and chainmail. Even a magical breath of cold air could freeze a warrior and kill him, let alone the frost des and knives.


    The swords and shields of the n warriors were practically useless against the might of elementium magic.


    Their only purpose on the battlefield was to attract the enemy¡¯s attention and firepower, even bing a human shield when necessary.


    The battle onlysted a mere fifteen minutes before ending!


    The victorious was naturally the more powerful Crimson pseudo-adept.


    A one-sided ughter was the mostmon sight when there were no opponents among the enemy who could match his power.


    The apprentice-adepts had been sliced up by terrifying whirlwinds andy in puddles of their own blood on the ground, hanging by a thread. Even the body-refining adept had been cut in half at the waist, spilling his guts all over the ce.


    Only the golden-haired man still kneeled upon the bloody battlefield, breathing heavily and with much difficulty. Fine cuts covered his body, hands, and face. Any slight movement would cause blood to trickle from his wounds.


    He panted heavily and ignored the thin wounds on his faces, choosing instead to re wickedly at the Crimson pseudo-adept who was treating himself to the side.


    He couldn¡¯t have defeated seven ferocious apprentices unharmed either.


    His ck robes had been burned all over the ce, and a fist-sized wound was visible on the left side of his waist along with an acid wound on the right shoulder. Signs of elementium frost and lightning showed on the rest of his body.


    This crimson pseudo-adept was a young man with a sinister and savage look on his face. He had taken out a bubbling purple-red potion and pulled out the cork. The man hesitated for a moment before gritting his teeth and pouring the medicine over the hole created by the acid arrow.


    The wound sizzled as white smoke rose from the flesh. The young pseudo-adept let out a short cry as beads of sweat rolled down his forehead.


    The intense pain finally subsided after he used some purification potion to clear out the rest of the acid in his wound. The pseudo-adept finally rxed after using some ointments and healing potions to deal with the rest of his injuries.


    Even as beaten up and exhausted as he was, the ferocity and terror that radiated from within him intimidated the people hiding and watching from a distance. This man might not be an adept yet, but his impressive power that allowed him to crush the enemy and decide their fates turned him into a conqueror that stood above all else.


    He was like a kingly lion standing upon a cliff with immense satisfaction and pride that came from looking upon itsnd and subjects!


    If one were to call the merchants and bodyguards in the camp livestock, then he was a magnificent wolf watching over them! Moreover, he was a bloodied lone wolf who was even more ferocious because of it!


    No matter how severe his wounds, no livestock would daree close as long as he was still standing!


    After quickly treating his wounds and waiting for them to cease being an issue, the young Crimson pseudo-adept walked toward the battered enemy corpses and started a thorough search for a special item.


    Unfortunately, even after aplete search that included sifting through the bloody scraps, he still didn¡¯t find the objective of his mission.


    The face of the pseudo-adept turned dark, and he set his sights on thest surviving advanced apprentice.


    "Talk. Where did you ce the storage ring you secretly snuck out with you? Hand it over and I can let you live. Or else..."


    The pseudo-adept stepped forward and waved his hand. A green de of wind gathered between his palms.


    "Ptoo!" The golden-haired man knew he was destined for death and instead became exceedingly tight-lipped, "You scum of the Crimson n. I wouldn¡¯t tell you anything, even if you killed me."


    Before he could finish, a sh of green light whizzed past the golden-haired man. The right arm he had been using to support himself was severed at the elbow, and blood soaked the ground below.


    Aaaaaah!


    The man¡¯s screams sounded especially tragic and dismal in the dark night!

 Chapter 802 Might of the Bug Adep

    t


    After a simple interrogation, the young pseudo-adept managed to pry out the location of that item from the mouth of the dying enemy.


    A few days earlier, Lady Mary had led a group of adepts to destroy a second-ss resource site belonging to the Kam n. The Kam adepts stationed at the site had died, but nearly half of the resources stored in the warehouse were gone.


    Many Crimson apprentices were sent out to hunt down the Kam remnants who got away.


    He was undoubtedly fortunate to have caught the apprentices that had snuck out of the resource site. ording to the n¡¯s rules, he was entitled to one-third of the spoils from this fight. A strange cheerful-yet-pained smile appeared on the pseudo-adept¡¯s face when he thought of the massive number of resources from the second ss resource site.


    The storage ring stuffed full of resources had been hidden in the carriage of one of the apprentices. The young pseudo-adept cut off the golden-haired man¡¯s head without any hesitation and strode toward the wagons. Just then, a sinister old man in white robes emerged from the darkness, leaning on a staff taller than himself and cackling as he showed himself.


    The maple leaf emblem of the Kam n was pinned before his chest.


    "An adept. An official adept!"


    The Crimson pseudo-adept stepped backward in terror and mumbled as he looked at the emerging Kam adept.


    The pseudo-adept screamed and turned to run toward the darkness as if he had just remembered the horror of an adept.


    However, a dark tentacle emerged from the ground and instantly bound him, causing him to fall into the puddle of blood on the ground.


    "Stay there. If I find you doing anything suspicious, you know what will happen!" The sinister old man coldly said to the pseudo-adept.


    The old adept walked toward one of the mules and pierced its stomach with his right hand. Naturally, there was no way a mule could endure such terrifying damage. It leaped about for a bit before twitching and falling to the ground dead.


    When the old man¡¯s right hand emerged from the bloody mule¡¯s stomach, all of the undigested substances fell out as well. A gleaming bronze ring rested amidst this waste.


    "Hahaha......thank god these kids were smart enough to bring out five years of resource reserves from the resource site. The magical materials shortage of the n is mostly resolved now, hahaha."


    The sinister old man reached forward to pick up the ring.


    Suddenly, the earth where the ring had been was broken apart as a swarm of ck beetles emerged from below. A tide of insects instantly swallowed the ring!


    Dammit! It¡¯s the bug adept.


    The old adept immediately understood the situation and tapped his staff against the ground. A strange wave rippled in every direction from beneath him. All the ck beetles that entered within range of the wave exploded into pieces after a few seconds of painful struggle, turning the old man¡¯s surroundings into a scene of carnage.


    The old man quickly took out a vial after halting the swarm¡¯s advance and drank its contents. As green wings appeared behind his back and took him to the skies, an ear-piercing sound came from his surroundings.


    Silhouettes shed in the darkness.


    Three or four invisible shadows dashed past the old man¡¯s body.


    The sinister adept let out a pained cry before turning into diced flesh and falling from the sky.


    The ck tentacles the old man had summoned dispersed with his death.


    The pseudo-adept climbed up from the ground, hurriedly showing his emblem without any care for the wounds on himself while shouting, "I greet you, Lord Billis! I am Andor, a disciple of Deserra. Thank you for your aid!"


    In truth, Bug Adept Billis still hadn¡¯t shown himself yet. The swarm of insects was gathering around the pieces of flesh and bringing the storage ring to the crack in the ground. The next second, even more ck beetles gathered together and formed a strange humanoid shape.


    "You are Deserra¡¯s disciple? Mm, the reward for this mission will be yours then. Take this ring to Lady Mary and im your reward!"


    The tens of thousands of squirming beetles formed a lifelike humanoid form. As the man made of insects opened its mouth, a hoarse hissing rang out, and the ring was tossed into the hands of the pseudo-adept.


    Andor couldn¡¯t be happier to hear this. He carefully stashed the ring without any dy.


    "Have the people in the camp been cleared?" The humanoid formed of insects turned to look at the terrified crowd hiding in a corner of the camp.


    "Not yet!" Andor hurriedly took out a piece of paper and started reading loudly, "Lord Bug Adept, I have already made some investigations. Two parties in this camp belong to the Kam n."


    "Who are they?" The insect humanoid screeched.


    "The Red Leaf Trading Group and the Stag Trading Group! The Red Leaf Trading Group belongs to the territory of Kam noble Count Vanrays, while the Stag Trading Group has over seventy percent capital investment from the Kam n."


    Like a deration of death, Andor¡¯s words caused the members of these two groups to shiver in fright. The people around them rapidly fled from them.


    "Kehkehkeh. You dare work with the people of the Kam n? Die."


    The bug adept hissed, and the swarm instantly engulfed these defenseless mortals. The tide of insects weaved through the crowd, not harming the irrelevant and only dragging the members of these two parties into the sea of insects.


    By the time the sound of crunching bones had vanished, and the ck swarm retreated to the bug adept¡¯s side, two dozen sets of white skeletons were left in the camp. No trace of flesh remained.


    After clearing up the camp, the bug adept split into tens of thousands of ck beetles and dove underground once again. The victorious Crimson Pseudo-Adept Andor no longer dared to remain here. He leaped onto his magical horse and galloped into the darkness.


    The area regained its peace and quiet, and the people hiding in the woods finally dared to return to the camp. A chill struck their hearts when they saw the bloody, scattered corpses on the ground.


    As mortals with no supernatural power in a world ruled by adepts, they did not qualify to be involved in fights between adepts. Regardless of how intense the battle between two adept ns might be, there would always be a day when it came down to negotiations andpromise.


    However, there was no other possibility aside from death for mortals like themselves.


    Tonight¡¯s circumstances were direct evidence that the newly established Crimson n had the distinct upper hand. They had not only conquered the Kam¡¯s resource site but were daring enough to pursue and hunt down the Kam¡¯s apprentices and adepts. That was a clear sign of the massive difference in power between both forces!


    It was said that the Crimson n didn¡¯t even have a Third Grade adept, while the Kam n at least had a Third Grade adept to defend them in the worst case scenario. Why was it that the fighting power of both parties appeared to be the inverse?!


    These people who barely knew anything about the secrets of the adepts could only sigh as they packed up their bags and prepared to leave this temporary camp, even if they had to travel at night.


    Now that the Kam n had lost an adept here, they would be sure to send people to investigate this ce.


    If they remained here, then there was no doubt that they would be targets of investigation and revenge for the Kam n. As such, most of the travelers and merchants fled the camp and left this battle-ravagednd without any hesitation.


    ............


    Werning.


    This ce was the location of the Northern Witches¡¯ Witch Council.


    Alice was smiling as she talked with the few influential witch leaders in a magical room.


    Supposedly, those who appeared here were all Fourth Grade witch leaders. Someone with such meager power like Alice shouldn¡¯t even be seen here.


    However, the strange ability of the Witch of Fate was far too significant. No witch leader dared to ignore or look down on any word that came out of Alice¡¯s mouth.


    After all, the might of a Witch of Fate depended on herpatibility with the powers of Fate, rather than her own prowess. Of course, the higher her power, the more immense the power of Fate she could wield. It made her an existence that no witch leader could afford to offend, only befriend.


    In all seriousness, during the peak of the first Fate Witch¡¯s reign, she could provide any witch leader with a powerful +3 Halo of Fate. That witch leader would be favored by the powers of Fate for the next year and remain in a state of extreme luck and fortune.


    How terrifying was the might of +3 Luck?


    With +1 Luck, you could find gold nuggets while eating rice, gold bars while you were drinking water, allies when you went outdoors, fox spirits that wished to repay your debt when you went into mountains, and powerful teachers desperate for a disciple when you tried to jump off a cliff and end your life.


    WIth +2 Luck, you could stroll through a mountain of knives and a sea of fire, sleep soundly in a rain of bullets and arrows, or discover yourself to be the descendant of a legendary adept when you looked at your family tree.


    And +3 Luck? You would win every gamble, regardless of how poor the chance to win. When you fought against powerful enemies, they would either bite their tongue while chanting or incite a magical bacsh out of nowhere, causing them to be crippled for life.


    Either way, a witch that obtained a luck blessing would be uncontestably powerful!


    Though Second Grade Alice didn¡¯t possess such terrifying blessing abilities yet, the witch leaders were willing to wait for her growth, given her immense potential for greatness.


    Meanwhile, today¡¯s gathering was a result of Alice¡¯s invitations. As such, when the powerful Fourth Grade Death Witch Leader Khesuna, Dark Witch Leader Circe, and Pale Witch Leader Silvia appeared in the secret room, the atmosphere suddenly tensed up.

 Chapter 803 Opening the Plane

    "Alice, what are you nning this time?"


    After the first Witch Council with this girl, the witch leaders no longer dared to look down upon this young witch. As such, Death Witch Leader Khesuna only frowned and questioned impatiently.


    The expansion of nar worlds had not been going well for the Death Witches over the past few years. They were still engaged in deadlybat against the orcs of various worlds. Anyone would be impatient and frustrated if they were dragged from a bloody and tense battlefield to an old, rotting castle at such a crucial time, let alone Khesuna.


    The other two witch leaders hadn¡¯t spoken yet, but their expressions were the same.


    "From what I understand, you, my elder sisters, have yet to catch suitable magical pets for yourself." Alice¡¯s age was insignificant in front of these witches. Naturally, she lowered herself and tried to win the witches¡¯ favor by using a more gentle tone.


    "You have a suitable rmendation?" Khesuna appeared moved.


    "How about a Fourth Grade dragon pet?" Alice smiled, intentionally keeping things in the dark.


    "Where? Is there a flight protecting it? Of which element?"


    The three Fourth Grade witches couldn¡¯t help but pursue the matter the moment Alice finished speaking. Even the eyes of Dark Witch Circe, who shared the worst rtionship with Alice, lit up at the news of this.


    In all honesty, other Fourth Grade adepts would probably frown when talking about a dragon of the same grade as if they were about to face down a terrible enemy. However, this group of Fourth Grade witches was smiling and brimming with excitement when talking about Fourth Grade dragons. It was almost as if they would instantly go over to where they were and abduct them once Alice gave them the location.


    If Greem could see this sight, he would most definitely feel some slight sorrow over the tragic future fates of the Fourth Grade dragons of Lance.


    "As you know, the male adept that has always supported me from behind the scenes has a dragon ne in his hands." Alice stuttered as she spoke, two red blushes appearing on her pretty face.


    "A dragon ne!"


    The three Fourth Grade witches let out moans of happiness. Even the Pale Witch Leader Silvia couldn¡¯t help but tremble.


    Of course, it wasn¡¯t out of fear, but out of extreme excitement!


    "I¡¯ve long since heard of dragon nes. It¡¯s said that those nes are filled with dragons, where theirirs are everywhere, and dragons of every element can be found.


    "We can catch whichever one we like. I have always dreamt of owning such a ne. If I did own a ne like that, I am certain I would faint from the pleasure." Silvia licked her lips and expressed her tion with a dreamy voice.


    The other, older witch leaders weren¡¯t as moved as Silvia, but their burning, glowing eyes still betrayed their inner thoughts.


    "Alice, you mean to say that the rights to the ne still remain in the hands of the male adept?" Khesuna answered with a question, calm andposed.


    Alice nodded silently.


    "I¡¯ll go meet that male adept!" Circe stood up and spoke, "How could such a good thing stay in the hands of a weak male adept?! I¡¯ll provide him with enoughpensation and have him hand over the world coordinates of that dragon ne!"


    Alice¡¯s eyes instantly turned wide with shock!


    Khesunaughed softly and said, "Alright, alright, stop scaring Alice. Tell us then, since the male adept contacted us through you, does he want us to deal with the Fourth Grade dragons there?"


    Alice put on a helpless and bitter smile before nodding in acknowledgment.


    She might have the ability to control the powers of Fate, but she was far from being able to scry on a Fourth Grade witch. Fourth Grade witches already possessed immensely destructive powers. Their understanding and hold over the narws were not something she could hope to match with her ¡¯amateurish¡¯ ways.


    Moreover, all who managed to be witch leaders had all reached their positions after thousands of years of bloody battles and nasty plots. There was no way her little tricks and thoughts could escape the eyes and ears of these old foxes.


    As such, Alice stopped beating around the bush and started using promises of real benefits as bait. A shocking negotiation had begun between her and the Fourth Grade witch leaders.


    In the end, both parties reached a basic cooperative agreement.


    The Crimson n, led by Alice and Greem, would asionally open up Lance to the witch branches and allow powerful witches to enter and capture the dragon pets they wanted.


    Correspondingly, the Death, Dark, and Pale Witch factions had to respect the Crimson n¡¯s ownership of Lance. They had to enter Lance based strictly on the schedule of the Crimson n and were not allowed to destroy the natural ecosystem of Lance.


    In addition, for every dragon pet that they sessfully captured, the witches had to pay arge additional sum of magical crystals or resources.


    After these series of agreements, it was as if the Crimson n had conditionally opened up Lance to the three witch factions while also pulling in some powerful help for themselves. Of course, the price that the Crimson n had to pay for this was several powerful pureblood dragons from Lance.


    The dragon lords were all there. You could freely capture them as you pleased. Capture them, and the dragon belonged to the witch, while their andnd belonged to the Crimson n. All the witch had to do was pay an additional sum of magical crystals aspensation.


    It was a profitable business with no cost at all, no matter how you looked at it!


    Once the agreement was signed, Alice finally revealed all of the information on this time¡¯s target¨C Wings of the Azure Sky, Krille. With a ¡¯traitor¡¯ like Arms, all of the secrets of the higher dragons were no longer secrets to Greem.


    The division of elemental dragons was different in the World of Adeptspared to the other worlds.


    The so-called Wings of the Azure Sky Krille was actually a blue dragon, which was the wind dragon that the adepts so often spoke about.


    These dragons excelled at manipting the forces of the wind and were the fastest at flying among all the dragons. The first thing that one needed to think about when attempting to capture or hunt down a wind dragon was how to limit its movements and terrifying speed.


    However, it was no longer Greem¡¯s problem to ponder. Instead, it was a question posed to the witch leaders now.


    Dark Witch Circe and Pale Witch Silvia chose to give up on Krille after obtaining the detailed information on it. Only Death Witch Khesuna¡¯s eyes were still gleaming with interest.


    Since this Fourth Grade dragon was not their preference, both Circe and Silvia left, one after another. Still, they both left their respective contacts before leaving. Naturally, Circe preferred shadow-type dragons, such as nightshade dragons, ck dragons, or void dragons. On the other hand, Silvia preferred frost dragons and spectral dragons.


    Before she left, Dark Witch Leader Circe turned and gave Alice a long, meaningful look. She then whispered with a secret mental message, "Though I don¡¯t like you, I won¡¯t have a hand in the battle between you and the first Fate Witch from now on. You will no longer need to worry about me doing anything to you henceforth."


    Having said that, Circe turned and left without looking back.


    Alice¡¯s tightly gripped fists finally loosened when she heard this.


    She had always been careful and on guard against moves from the other witch branches all this while. She couldn¡¯t easily trust any of them, even those who were outwardly friendly toward here.


    The main reason for that was the existence of the first Fate Witch!


    ording to the path of the past Battles of Fate, Alice had been destined to die inside the Tower of Fate. Everything she owned would then have be the nutrition that the new Witch of Fate¡¯s clone required to grow. However, it was the existence of a variable like herself that caused the ten-thousand-year n of the First Fate Witch toe up empty.


    She had already be an annoying prick in the eyes of a major character somewhere in the outer realms ever since she had be the official leader of the Fate Witches. If it weren¡¯t for the protection of the World of Adepts¡¯ world consciousness, Alice would already be a pile of bones. She would have fallen to the schemes of the immensely powerful first Fate Witch.


    The fact that Alice was still alive wasn¡¯t because she was smart, or because the enemy couldn¡¯t do anything to her. It was because the enemy needed her alive!


    One could imagine that if the first Fate Witch used her methods to kill Alice, then the massive amount of Fate power that Alice had gathered would return to the World of Adepts. It would not benefit the First at all.


    However, if she allowed Alice to grow up, Alice would eventually ascend past Fourth Grade and be forced to step out of the World of Adepts. When that happened, Alice would be a ripe, fresh fruit. All the First had to do was pluck it, and she would obtain everything that Alice currently possessed.


    The n might have deviated from the original, but the final result was the same.


    As such, the first Fate Witch had been secretly manipting and guiding Alice¡¯s development over the past few years, with no intentions of killing her yet. However, the witch of the outer realm was unprecedentedly wicked and vicious against all variables that could interrupt the trajectory of Alice¡¯s growth.


    That was obvious from the disasters that had befallen Greem!


    Since Circe had already expressed such sentiment, it meant that the entire Dark Witch faction would no longer interfere in the internal struggle between the two Fate Witches. That was great news for Alice!


    If she could remove the influence of the first Fate Witch within the World of Adepts, and perhaps even turn it around, she could regain a certain degree of initiative in this severely imbnced match.


    Alice finally let out a heartfelt smile with a guarantee like this!


    Khesuna had no interest in Circe and Alice¡¯s secret. She was more interested in the internal environment and foreignws of Lance. Only by taking these factors into consideration could she maximize the chances of capturing the Wings of Azure Sky.


    Alice introduced Khesuna to Greem without any hesitation!

 Chapter 804 Preliminary Cooperation

    Lance. The Metal Fortress.


    As a blinding white light shone from the teleportation room, an intense spatial flux started to wash over everything within the room. However, this energy was blocked by the metal boards containing magical energy and couldn¡¯t spread any further outward.


    By the time the ultra-long-range teleportation wasplete, two silhouettes slowly became visible inside the array.


    "Greetings. My greetings to Lady Khesuna¡¯s arrival at our metal fortress!"


    As the owner of this ce, Greem naturally had to be the one to wee the Fourth Grade Witch.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel his scalp buzz at the sight of the two Fourth Grade witches in the teleportation array. Even his breathing turned short and unmeasured.


    The one in front was none other than Death Witch Leader Khesuna, who Alice had introduced to him. The one behind her was the Fourth Grade Death Witch Deputy-Leader Felmyst.


    In all honesty, this was Greem¡¯s first time seeing a legendary Fourth Grade witch. There was a surge of irrepressible excitement, even through the anxiety and nervousness.


    Khesuna was a powerful Death Witch that had long since made a name for herself. She didn¡¯t look ugly at all. There was even an indescribable beauty to her looks. She had white, smooth skin, a delicate but cold face, flowing long silver hair, and light leather armor on her body.


    One could hardly tell that she was an olddy several thousands of years old just based on her appearance. If Greem ignored the chilling powers of death that this Fourth Grade witch possessed, then he could easily mistake her for a witch only several years older than Alice.


    Felmyst, who followed behind Khesuna, looked just as lovely and cold. Her entire body was shrouded in a cloak of alienating power of death. It seemed Felmyst walked the path of an undead summoner. She wore a robe of cloth on her body and a small bone staff at her waist. The death aura emanating from the staff was suffocating.


    Greem could sense that the temperature of the environment had fallen by a minimum of seven degrees Celcius since the Death Witches had arrived at the Metal Fortress. For some reason, Greem was feeling chills run down his spine continuously.


    That was especially the case when Khesuna stared at Greem with her pale white eyes void of pupils. He could feel a thoroughly chilling aura throughout his entire body.


    [Beep. Detecting intense negative energy radiation source. Host is enduring negative-energy corrosion. Mutation reaction will ur to host in approximately 3 minutes and 26 seconds. Please leave as soon as possible."


    Greem looked at the perpetually rising negative-energy radiation value that the Chip was projecting in his mind. The blood-red digits had already exceeded three hundred and were showing no signs of stopping yet.


    Three hundred points?


    The entire space within a hundred meters of the Death Witches was being assaulted by negative-energy corrosion of three hundred points. This intensity was nearly identical to the radiation value of nuclear reactors back on Earth.


    Moreover, this wasn¡¯t the peak intensity of the Death Witches, only the reaction from the death energy that they were unintentionally emitting. Just from this alone, one could easily imagine how terrifying an all-out attack from them would be!


    It would probably be no less potent than the detonation of a small nuclear bomb!


    Greem put on a resigned and bitter smile.


    Leave?


    He was the owner of this ce. If news of him running when the Fourth Grade witches came on a visit were to get out, he would turn into a joke among all of the Northern Witches.


    Fortunately, the witches didn¡¯t seem to have any intention of embarrassing Greem and knocking him down a peg. After assessing Greem for a while, they finally controlled their leaking magical energy and started surveying this towering metal fortress instead.


    With Khesuna¡¯s powerful Spirit, she almost instantly realized the oddity of this fortress.


    The entire metal fortress was charged with an indescribable magical energy aura.


    This energy aura wasn¡¯t the sort that was radiated by ordinary magical equipment. It was more like the energy that flowed through a person¡¯s veins and blood. It was energy that filled every inch of the metal¡¯s space. From inside to out, top to bottom, this entire metal fortress was like a strange lifeform of its own. There was a rhythmic beat to the surge of magical energy in the fortress.


    Like a human¡¯s breath and pulse!


    "Hmm? Could this metal fortress be a metal lifeform?" Khesuna looked around her and finally couldn¡¯t resist the urge to ask.


    Khesuna had seen plenty of things. She had explored hundreds of nes with different environments, creatures, and resources, and she wasn¡¯t particrly surprised by this strange lifeform of a creature.


    What she was curious about was how a mere Second Grade male adept could have a perfect metal lifeform as his subordinate. How exactly did this male adept manage to make a strange metal lifeform like this submit?


    Greem put on a forced smile when Khesuna raised this question. He shouted, "Gazlowe. Since Lady Khesuna has already discovered you, you might as well show yourself now!"


    As his voice reverberated throughout the metal fortress, the walls beside them split open, and Gazlowe¡¯s split-off brain Gru stepped into the metal hall.


    Though the Crimson n had already decided to work together with the witches to excavate Lance, some secrets still had to be protected. Apart from Third Grade brain monster, Gazlowe, the most important secret of the n in the fortress had to be the magic generator furnaces that provided the fortress with its endless magical supply.


    At the very least, before the Crimson n had the absolute power to defend themselves, Greem did not intend to reveal the existence of the magic generator furnaces to other adepts. Magical machinery that could endlessly extract magical energy from the nar void would most definitely attract the attention of countless high-grade adepts.


    If the high-grade adepts possessed such technology, they could easily forge tens of thousands of magic generator furnaces inbination with their immense knowledge and resource reserves. When that happened, the Crimson n would not even have a chance at picking up the leftovers.


    As such, the one stepping forward this time was only Gazlowe¡¯s split-off brain Gru. The energy source of Gru¡¯s magical mechanical body was no longer a magic generator furnace either. It was just a hive-array of magic energy batteries.


    Such technology and technique might have its uniqueness, but it wasn¡¯t advanced enough to incite the greed of other adepts.


    Meanwhile, Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe hid deep underground with the magic generator furnaces. To ensure that they weren¡¯t discovered, Gazlowe even put up a mental barrier outside the magic generator furnaces. This, inbination with theyers of metal walls and thousands of meters of rocks, was what prevented the Fourth Grade witches¡¯ probes.


    The two Fourth Grade witches quickly lost interest in researching the brain monster when they saw Gru¡¯s clumsilyrge form and its power that was only the peak of Second Grade.


    "Felmyst and I need a room to rest in. Apart from that, I need more detailed andprehensive information on the Wings of the Azure Sky. Send these things to my room!"


    Gru led Khesuna and Felmyst to a quiet room.


    They might be Fourth Grade witches, but they still required a period of time to recover from Lance¡¯s nar suppression. At the same time, they needed to digest the newest information on Krille ande up with aprehensive n of capture.


    If their n failed, the target would be much more alert, and their subsequent attempts would be much more likely to fail. As such, the two witches had no choice but to be as cautious and careful as they could be!


    A Fourth Grade dragon¡¯s power in the ne world that he resided in was most definitely beyond an ordinary Fourth Grade adept. Though Khesuna was no ordinary witch, she was still in Krille¡¯s territory and Krille¡¯s world, while also enduring immense nar suppression.


    Under such circumstances, even she didn¡¯t have a guarantee of gaining the upper hand against a Fourth Grade dragon. Thus, after some thought, Khesuna brought along a Fourth Grade deputy leader from one of their lesser nes.


    This way, with the cooperation of two Fourth Grade Death Witches, their chance of sess was much higher!


    ............


    It was said that Wings of the Azure Sky Krille lived in a ce known as Tempest Keep.


    A towering peak several thousands of meters tall stood there. There were hardly any lifeforms, though. The air was thin, and even the mightiest of hawks could not fly against the fierce winds.


    Apart from some dragonborn servants, there were also some mutated wind spirits guarding Krille¡¯s pce andir.


    As a Fourth Grade dragon, Krille not only possessed a territory of his own in Lance but also vastnds in three other smaller nes. In fact, Krille had even be a guardian lifeform with devoted followers in an exceptionally small ne.


    That allowed him to possess some degree of control over the power of faith!


    Every year, on the fifth day of the eleventh month, the three lesser nes would open nar portals and offer their offerings to the great Wings of the Azure Sky. Apart from many fruits and treasure, there were also plenty of exotic native beauties.


    Natives from other nes had to endure terrifying nar bacsh and harsh environmental conditions when they arrived at a ce as harsh as Tempest Keep. Only a third of every one hundred beauties could live beyond ten days.


    The rest would die tragically in constant work and pain, turning into poor souls lost in an alien world!


    With the robust Physique of a Fourth Grade dragon, there was no way Krille would ever favor these tan, rough-skinned native beauties. Even if their pretty looks and figures managed to attract the Fourth Grade dragon, they would still die when servicing him in bed after he had turned into a ferocious human male.


    There was no way ordinary human women could deal with the strong Physique of a Fourth Grade dragon!

 Chapter 805 Forceful Assaul

    t


    Tempest Keep.


    Standing below the steep cliffs of the mountain, one could hardly see the extravagant pce in the clouds, even if they raised their heads and looked.


    The seven-man party that included Greem had traversed multiple mountains and had finally arrived at this isted peak. It would be another three thousand meters from here before they could reach the pce of the Fourth Grade dragon.


    "We will be going ahead! Remember to act ording to the n." Khesuna coldly said. She then raised her hand and summoned a Beginner Fourth-Grade corpse dragon to carry her and Felmyst to the top of the peak.


    After seeing the Fourth Grade witches leave, Greem calmly said, "Arms, it¡¯s about time we left!"


    Arms, who was in his human form, was extremely reluctant, but he knew that they couldn¡¯t dally any longer. Once the Fourth Grades started fighting, anyone near the battlefield would be victims of their fight. The main reason he hade along was the need to restrain the Third Grade emerald dragon beauty, Iritina.


    Iritina had been staying in Tempest Keep all this while. Arms had not managed to lure her to a different ce, regardless of what he tried. However, he had no choice but to try again, as today was the day when the Fourth Grade witches were going to try and capture the dragon. There would be no unharmed eggs in an overturned nest. If he didn¡¯te with the adepts, there was a high chance that Iritina would be a victim of this battle!


    Thus, Arms let out a roar of unwillingness before his body started gaining in size. In just five seconds, he had transformed from a two-meter tall young man into a thirty-meter-long thunder dragon.


    Greem, Mary, Zacha, and Tigule climbed onto his back and held onto the one-meter long spines there.


    Aooooo!


    A dragon roar rang out as Arms extended his twenty-meter-wide dragon wings and beat them with all he had. With a powerful kick from his hind legs, hisrge body rose from the ground with four people on his back. Arms hurried after the corpse dragon¨Cnow a tiny ck dot in the distance¨Cand ascended toward the peak.


    To avoid prematurely alerting the security around Tempest Keep, Greem and the others were going to assault the Wings of Azure Skies in the most direct fashion.


    The two dragons pped their wings and lunged toward the pce at a straight angle, one after another. As a dragon¡¯s flight speed was simply too fast, Greem could only barely hold onto the thunder dragon¡¯s spine as he billowed in the wind like a g on a pole.


    Mary knew how to fly as well, which made her more well-adjusted in this scenario.


    Zacha and Tigule knew neither how to fly or be blown in the wind. They could only hang onto the spines for dear life, shutting their eyes as they felt the chill winds whistle past their ears.


    Since this peak was the private property of a Fourth Grade dragon, the entire road winding up toward the pce was guarded by many dragonborn. They were stationed in caves dug into the cliffs. Naturally, when they saw two dragons dash past their eyes and toward the pce, they started hollering and ringing their bells before gathering in groups and rushing to the top.


    Without dragons to lead the way, the adepts would have had to fight their way to the peak from the very foot of the mountain. When that happened, the Wings of Azure Skies would havepleted all of his defensive preparation by the time Greem and the others arrived, regardless of how slow his reaction could be.


    Moreover, this was Lance, a ne of dragons!


    Krille would never have imagined that two Fourth Grade powerhouses would have assaulted him so directly and confronted him at his pce itself.


    Half of the three thousand meter cliff was traversed in an instant. Just as the two dragons broke through the cloudyer and continued upward, strange, shrillughter came from the space around them.


    "Careful, the wind spirits havee!" Mary had sharp eyes and reminded the rest of her group of the iing threat.


    Greem turned his head around and looked for the nearly transparent wind spirits as he tried his best to block the harsh gustsing his way.


    With the Chip¡¯s elementium sight, Greem quickly found a few flickering green silhouettes around them.


    Wind spirits were mutated wind elementium. They had an elementary humanoid form, and their entire bodies were made out of flowing green and white wind elementium. Due to their skill at riding the winds, they were difficult opponents where the air currents were the fiercest.


    The speed of their flight was swift, and their bodies blended into the background, making it difficult for ordinary people to catch a trace of their movements. Furthermore, they rarely fought their enemies head-on. They preferred to use their high speed to stab their enemies with transparent wind spears.


    A single strike and they would leave!


    The adepts wouldn¡¯t have been afraid of such attacks if they were on level ground. However, they were currently hanging onto Arms¡¯ back and ascending upward. There weren¡¯t very many techniques they could use to deal with the wind spirits in such a situation.


    Above them, three wind spirits were trying to use their wind spears to knock the witches off the back of the corpse dragon. Sadly, they screamed, and their bodies dispersed the moment they even got close.


    The fate of three of theirpanions terrified the wind spirits. They no longer dared to deal with the corpse dragon or the witches on its back.


    Instead, they turned their eyes and dashed toward Greem and the rest.


    Arms braced himself as a giant ball of lightning gathered in his throat. It seemed he intended to use a lightning storm to drive away these annoying things.


    "Ignore them. Leave these things to me!" Greem patted the thunder dragon¡¯s back lightly, and Arms dispersed the lightning and continued flying upward.


    Greem tilted his head, and blue light shed in his eyes. He quickly locked onto the seven wind spirits diving at them.


    The next second, red light shot out of Greem¡¯s eyes as two beams of burning Sr Rays swept across the sky. Where theser swept past, the transparent wind spirits were revealed before turning into a chaotic current of air as they screamed in agony.


    These wind spirits were First Grade at the very strongest. They had no other advantages apart from their transparent bodies and rapid movements.


    If it were a different adept, they might try and protect themselves with area-of-effect magic to ward away attacks from the spirits. However, Greem was not all affected by the unadvantageous environment due to the Chip¡¯s elementium sight. He continued to shoot out Sr Rays and turned the humanoid wind spirits into currents of hot air.


    The four or five dozen wind spirits could onlyugh or weave around them, but couldn¡¯t fly close enough to Greem to do anything. For a moment, the two parties continued to fly upward while engaged in a stalemate.


    Due to the interruption of the wind spirits, Greem and the other adepts were a step behind the witches.


    By the time Armsnded on the top of the cliff, the corpse dragon and the two witches were nowhere to be seen. However, a bloody path of broken dragonborn limbs and scattered flesh extended all the way toward the elegant, extravagant pce.


    If one listened carefully, they could vaguely hear the roars and cries of dragonborn warriors from the depths of the pce!


    "They have fought their way inside! Let us guard the entrance then!" ording to the original n, the Fourth Grade dragon was the main target of the Fourth Grade witches. As the supporting forces, Greem and the others only needed to clean up the pawns.


    "Iritina."


    Thunder Dragon Arms roared and prepared to charge into the pce, but Greem stopped him.


    "Arms, it is a battlefield of Fourth Grades in there right now. Are you sure you want to take the risk of going in?"


    "But Iritina is inside."


    "Don¡¯t worry! Their target is only that Krille. I have already talked to the witches; they won¡¯t kill Iritina."


    "But..."


    "There are no ¡¯buts.¡¯ You either choose to stay with us here and guard this ce until the battle ends, or you charge in right now and mess up Lady Khesuna¡¯s n. Two paths, your choice!"


    After stuttering for half a day, the reluctant Third Grade thunder dragon hung his prideful head.


    "I¡¯ll stay here."


    Greem finally let out a sigh of relief in his heart.


    He had wanted to tie this Third Grade thunder dragon to his wagon from the very start. However, Arms had been an arrogant and prideful individual from the very beginning. He very rarely listened to Greem¡¯s words and ns.


    Greem had gone all out this time and used the threat of a Fourth Grade witch to suppress Arms¡¯ will.


    One should know that Fourth Grade Krille had several powerful subordinates under him. Apart from two Third Grade dragon lords, he also had a trusted Third Grade dragonborn servant.


    The Third Grade dragons might be Krille¡¯s subordinates, but they had their own territories in the surrounding areas. They would only arrive in front of Krille when summoned. As such, apart from Krille the Fourth Grade dragon, there was only Third Grade Emerald Dragon Iritina and a Third Grade dragonborn leader around Tempest Keep.


    The reason Greem wasn¡¯t willing to let Arms leave was that their team was probably incapable of dealing with a Third Grade dragonborn without him. Having Arms stay was for the express purpose of having him deal with the Third Grade dragonborn.


    They didn¡¯t have to wait for long. Half a minuteter, arge group of dragonborn roared and stormed out of a camp to the side of the cliff, led by a muscr and powerful dragonborn leader.


    When contrasted with the First and Second Grade dragonborn, the Third Grade dragonborn appeared to be particrly ferocious and strong.


    Before it could shout out its first order, Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms roared and charged forward. His massive body crashed into the dragonborn¡¯s, and he smashed into the ranks of the enemy while still fighting against the leader.


    Arms was a massive creature thirty meters in length and a dozen meters in height. The Third Grade dragonborn leader might be greatly inferior in size, but his sturdy stature and scaled body turned him into a steel chariot himself.

 Chapter 806 Bloody Battle In Front Of The Palace

    These two massive creatures crushed through the ranks of the dragonborn, instantly causing immense damage to the reptilian soldiers.


    Whether it was being hit by the powerful tail strike of the thunder dragon, or being crushed by the one-ton weight of the dragonborn leader, the bodies of the dragonborn would copse, breaking their bones and causing them to throw up blood upon the ground.


    "You go deal with the wind spirits above!" Greem looked at Mary and shouted out his orders.


    Mary¡¯s attacks were rtively weak, which made her ineffective against the tough-hided dragonborn. As such, Greem relegated an easier task to her.


    "Zacha, you guard the pce gates and make sure no one gets in. Tigule, you attack with me!"


    After quickly handing out the assignments, Greem tossed his golem core and summoned the me Fiend of Terror. At the same time, he roared and started his transformations.


    The next second, two massive me fiends rose from the ground and started bombarding the dragonborn with magma fireballs.


    Tigule acknowledged his orders and released the Goblin Shredder from his golem talisman. He then dove into the machine within seconds. The next moment, the Goblin Shredder roared and started moving its body. It waved the metal chain and drill on its hands and stood unhesitatingly in the path of the dragonborn.


    A series of magma fireballs exploded in the ranks of the dragonborn. The ferocious me shockwaves and sshing rain of magma instantly killed the eleven foremost dragonborn. They copsed beneath the rain of fire, the metal armor on their bodies softening in the extreme heat and turning into flowing liquid that sizzled against the flesh and scales underneath.


    Greem and the me Fiend stood side by side. One was responsible for conjuring fire all across the field, while the other was responsible for intercepting the enemy. In just an instant, they had managed to engulf an area of a hundred meters in front of them in zing fire.


    The First Grade dragonborn warriors started howling in pain from the magical mes the instant they entered the sea of fire. Apart from burning their bodies, the violent mes even got into their insides through their ears, eyes, noses, and mouths, turning their internal organs into ash as well.


    Many dragonborn warriors stumbled through the sea of fire, only to copse in mes before they could even cross swords with the Goblin Shredder. Their muscr bodies were covered with burns and scorch marks.


    Only the Second Grade dragonborn could rely on the wind elementium around their bodies to break through the horrifying fire sea. However, what greeted them the moment they emerged from the mes was Tigule, waving his metal chainsaw and metal drill.


    ng, ng, ng!


    The noisy sound of cutting metal came from afar.


    The one and a half meter long metal chainsaw sent plenty of sparks flying every time it shed against the metal armor and tough scales of the Second Grade dragonborn. Meanwhile, the whirling drill always managed to create bloody gouges in the bodies of the dragonborn.


    The dragonborn might be immensely powerful and possess some of their dragon lord¡¯s elementium attributes, but they were still inferiorpared to a magical machine warrior armed to the teeth. Even the most trained martial artist would still be vulnerable to a kitchen knife, and even the most powerful of dragonborn could not do anything about the difference in equipment between them and the Goblin Shredder.


    The one dozen Second Grade dragonborn were kept at the edge of the sea of fire by the Goblin Shredder. Blood and severed limbs would apany every assault they attempted.


    The just recently repaired Goblin Shredder was once again tested with harsh battle conditions.


    Multiple heavy attacks werending upon its strong metallic body at every moment. Every strike from the heavy warhammers of the dragonborn caused the Goblin Shredder to tremble from the impact. Tigule was already dazed from all the shockwaves and was utterly deaf to all other sounds now.


    Seeing the dangerous situation that Tigule was in, Greem turned his firepower without any hesitation. A wild Firestorm, Meteor Shower, and a terrifying Doomsday Volcano engulfed the Second Grade dragonborn surrounding Tigule.


    Fire adepts truly lived up to their names as battlefield cannons!


    This ferocious attack from Greem instantly suppressed the growing ferocity and might of the Second Grade dragonborn.


    The dragonborn screeched from the pain of burning and started charging around the sea of fire in their panic. They could no longer stay within their tight formation.


    However, regardless of how tight the adepts¡¯ defenses were, there was no stopping the dragonborn with their shocking numbers. Greem had justid down a squadron of dragonborn, yet another started making its way through the fire before he could catch his breath. These new reinforcements roared and charged toward Greem.


    The Goblin Shredder was slowly pushed to a side of the battlefield by the army of warriors. Arge group of dragonborn warriors waved their warhammers and axes as they rushed toward Greem and the me Fiend. With no choice left to them, the firepower duo of Greem and the me Fiend of Terror could only engage in a melee with fireballs in the left hand and a giant sword in their right.


    The entire battlefield instantly descended into chaos!


    Greem and the others knew very well what they needed to do.


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms was fighting against the Third Grade dragonborn leader. He had a dragon¡¯s aura of might, and he also possessed the advantage in size and strength; victory was only a matter of time.


    Thus, Greem could only stall the dragonborn here with all he had and wait for Arms to defeat the enemy and return to back them up.


    After all, Greem¡¯s side only had four Second Grades, while the enemy had as many as two to three dozen.


    Mary was shrouded in a mist of blood in the skies above the cliff. She wove through the air like lightning, drawing out the death throes of wind spirits with every lunge.


    She ughtered three dozen wind spirits in a single go. The remaining spirits could no longer suppress the horror in their hearts and started fleeing in every direction.


    Mary didn¡¯t chase after them and instead beat her wings to ascend even higher into the sky. She looked down on the chaotic and bloody battlefield from her vantage point. When she saw Greem clumsily wave his massive fire sword against three Second Grade dragonborn, she dove downward without any hesitation.


    The dragonborn warrior she had locked onto raised his head and his four pupils focused on the descending crimson silhouette. A translucent wind de shrouded his axe as he roared and shed at the enemy.


    A dull thud rang out.


    The dragonborn and Mary were blown away at the same time.


    Mary¡¯s body shook as a crimson blood arrow shot out of her body, piercing two terrifying holes in the throat of the dragonborn warrior.


    The dragonborn stumbled backward and stabilized himself with his strong physique and powerful regenerative abilities.


    Trading wound for wound. Hmph! How could that frail woman ever be his opponent?!


    Before the dragonborn could finish his thought, the crimson silhouette dove at him once again from a strange angle.


    Dammit! My axe cut through her body earlier. She should be severely wounded now.


    There was no time for him to think. The badly wounded dragonborn warrior raised his axe and sliced downward. The two shadows once again split off in different directions.


    This time, the dragonborn warrior could no longer keep himself standing. His thick front legs trembled as he copsed to the ground. The axe was tossed to the side as he clutched the bleeding gouge in his throat with both hands. Regardless of how he tried to stop it, the blood continued to flow through his fingers like an overflowing river, quickly gathering into a pool before him.


    The dragonborn warrior struggled and raised his head, only for a rapidly approaching silhouette to be reflected in his eyes.


    Was she still human? She¡¯s just an unkible monster.


    The crimson outline shed past his body, and a massive head flew into the sky.


    Mary sensed the blood energy flowing from the dragonborn in his body. She quickly healed the damage to her body and beat her wings before snaking into the battlefield once more. Her bloody hands were like sharp daggers, quickly shing past the throats, eyes, ears, armpits, and crotches of the dragonborn.


    Every warrior that Mary attacked couldn¡¯t help but let out a grunt of pain. Their strikes, shes, or even desperate grapples all failed tond.


    Mary was like a crimson phantom, dashing through the ranks of the dragonborn, dodging their attacks, and using her crimson energy-infused hand to attack their weak spots.


    With Mary¡¯s frail body and the dragonborn¡¯s tremendous strength, she was like a ss doll weaving between a stampede. Even slight contact would shatter her bones and snap her tendons, rendering her crippled and wounded. Mary could only use her high Agility to its limit, sliding past the axes and hammers at a speed invisible to the eye, refusing to let any of the weapons touch her.


    "Greem, how long do we have to hold? What are the witches doing? Why haven¡¯t they started yet?"


    Mary roared at Greem as she ughtered the dragonborn.


    Before Greem could reply, a deafening roar came from the depths of the pce.


    "Witches. You are Fourth Grade witches."


    Immediately after, the massive pce behind Greem and the others copsed amidst quaking and shaking. A fifty-meter-long dragon rose from within the rubble and flew into the distance as it roared.


    Dammit, the witches couldn¡¯t have let the dragon get away, could they?


    Greem¡¯s heart was gripped with concern. However, he looked up and saw a strange chain of light attached to the Fourth Grade dragon¡¯s body. One end of the chain was embedded in the body of the dragon, while the other was firmly in the hands of Khesuna.


    With this chain of light, the Wings of Azure Skies would never be able to shake off Khesuna, regardless of how it tried to fly and escape.


    The other Fourth Grade witch, Felmyst, pursued it on a strange undead dragon. The other Fourth Grade corpse dragon roared and emerged from the pce ruins, its massive wings twisted and damaged beyond recognition.

 Chapter 807 The Battle Concludes

    The Shackles of War!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but raise his head and let out a long sigh.


    As a Second Grade adept himself, Greem had heard of this powerful adept¡¯s war equipment.


    It might not look like much, but it was true Fourth Grade magical equipment. Moreover, it was terrifying narw equipment.


    Enemies that were chained by these shackles had almost no chance of escaping. There was no breaking free from the bonds of the shackles before exterminating the one that held it in their hands.


    "Iritina."


    While Greem silently appreciated the magnificent fight between the Fourth Grades and ughtered the dragonborn, a deafening roar rang out from somewhere nearby.


    Greem turned around and saw a bloody dragon covered with wounds. If it weren¡¯t for his familiar profile and his damaged bright blue scales, Greem would never have been able to recognize the Third Grade thunder dragon.


    Arms roared and charged out of the battlefield. He dove into the copsed pce and let out a furious roar at the terrifying corpse dragon.


    It was only at this moment that Greem noticed the bloody dragon beneath the corpse dragon¡¯s thick and sharp w. He couldn¡¯t tell if the dragon was dead or alive. Judging by its slender figure and the strange emerald scales, this should be Third Grade Emerald Dragon Iritina.


    However, at this moment, she no longer possessed any of her former beauty. She looked as terrible as possible!


    Of the two pretty and elegant horns on her head, the left waspletely gone, while only half of the right remained. Copious amounts of purple blood were flowing out of her wounds,pletely covering her face and body.


    Wounds of various sizes covered her slender body; not a single scale could be seen on theserge injuries. In fact, bloody tendons and white bones beneath the flesh were exposed for all to see. Furthermore, a shroud of death energy was still clinging onto the wounds.


    Iritina¡¯s flesh was rotting to the corrosion of death energy at a visible rate, turning green and gray, void of all its former life energy.


    "Let go of Iritina. Hand over my Iritina..." Arms, just as badly wounded, rushed at the Fourth Grade corpse dragon and started roaring in fury.


    The corpse dragon might be severely wounded, but it cared not for the provocations of a Third Grade dragon. It continued to press on the dying Iritina with its heavy w while raising its head to re sinisterly at the eager thunder dragon.


    The battle in the sky was still raging on, just as intense as before. However, this corpse dragon had its flying ability taken away from it and couldn¡¯t rejoin the fight above. After some thought, Greem appeared beside Arms with a Fire Teleportation.


    "My lord, ording to the agreement signed between Lady Khesuna and me, this emerald dragon is my target. I must trouble you to hand her over. Furthermore, the battle on the ground has not ended yet. Shouldn¡¯t you lend us a helping hand to prevent these dragonborn from interrupting the n?"


    As the undead mount of Fourth Grade Death Witch Khesuna, the corpse dragon undoubtedly possessed extremely high intelligence. It let out a breath of cold mist in response to the request of an adept of the same faction before speaking, "Little adept, don¡¯t try and fool the great Artest with your little tricks. It¡¯s true that this little Third Grade dragon is yours; here you go. Meanwhile, the small fries over there are your job. Don¡¯te and bother me."


    The corpse dragon lifted its w and tossed the emerald dragon over to Greem and Arms.


    Greem¡¯s face turned pale. He was about to teleport away in the face of the dragon crashing toward him.


    Fortunately, Thunder Dragon Arms had been waiting to the side. He leaped forward and caught Iritina with his thick front limbs and wings. After lightly cing her on the ground, Arms started to deal with the shroud of death energy on Iritina¡¯s body.


    A few careful lightning breathster, the death energy was gone. However, Arms couldn¡¯t do anything about the death energy that had seeped into her organs.


    The dragons simply had magical resistances and regenerative abilities that were too powerful. That caused most low-grade recovery potions to be useless on them. Only high-grade potions had a chance of working on them.


    Then again, with the nature of the dragons, how could they possibly be carrying healing potions with them everywhere they went?!


    Arms circled the unconscious Iritina several times. He suddenly understood the situation and turned to crouch before Greem, looking at the adept with eyes full of expectations. He looked much more like a begging pug shaking its tail than a Third Grade dragon!


    Cough.


    Love was truly blind!


    Even a Third Grade dragon couldn¡¯t avoid it!


    Greem eximed in his mind. He couldn¡¯t deal with Arms¡¯ cute begging. He had no choice but to take out a small vial filled with a jade green liquid and started tossing it in his hand.


    Arms immediately recognized the green liquid brimming with life energy. It was a vial of Moonwater, which was the holy water of the forest elves and possessed powerful healing properties. Iritina was also a forest dragon and could make full use of the Moonwater¡¯s effect.


    Still crouching on the ground, Arms opened his eyes even wider and the wagging of the dragon tail intensified. Still, with the terrifying dust clouds he was setting off, ordinary creatures couldn¡¯t even deal with a fawning dragon like himself.


    "Are you sure you want to treat her right now?" Greem continued tossing the potion about as a gentle, devilish smile appeared on his face, "Are you sure you have the ability to keep her in check if she recovers now? Do you think she can still live if she still insists on saving the Wings of Azure Skies and ends up interfering with the witches¡¯ n?"


    This series of questions kept Arms on the ground. Tears had welled up in the eyes of the Third Grade thunder dragon, and his tail stopped wagging entirely.


    "Don¡¯t worry. With the Physique of dragons, there is no way she dies from these wounds," Greem continued speaking, "As long as we can end this battle quickly, we can bring her back to the metal fortress; treating her will be a matter of a single potion! However, before that, shouldn¡¯t you be doing something for me as well?"


    The Third Grade thunder dragon roared softly and instantly got up from the ground. He ignored the heavy wounds on his body and charged wildly into the ranks of the Second Grade dragonborn warriors.


    With a Third Grade thunder dragon as their main force, the pressure on Greem and the others was immediately cut in half.


    Without any threat to their lives, Greem and the others could focus their attention on maximizing their profit from this fight. They had been striking with all they had in their previous engagements out of fear that their attacks weren¡¯t violent enough to stave off the attacks of the Second Grade dragonborn warriors. However, they changed their tune now. They started to carefully protect these Second Grade dragonborn as best as they could.


    One by one, the Second Grade dragonborn warriors copsed to the ground beneath Thunder Dragon Arms¡¯ reckless strikes and bites, left with broken bodies and shattered limbs. Greem and his group immediately charged forward and knocked these dragonborn out before carefully transferring them to a safer location.


    In just fifteen minutes, Arms and the adepts had managed to deal with thirty-nine Second Grade dragonborn.


    Greem went back and checked on the Third Grade dragonborn leader after the battle concluded. He was surprised to find that he wasn¡¯t dead and thus moved the dragonborn to a safe location as well.


    While they were having fun doing their work here, the Fourth Grades in the sky were already engaged in intensebat.


    However, Greem and the others had no chance of watching the battle unfold with the speed and strength of these powerhouses. These Fourth Grade elites often flew several kilometers in the blink of an eye. They had moved between a dozen different locations of battle since the start of the fight. The entire battlefield spanned hundreds of kilometers.


    Greem had secretly let out a few dozen apprentice-level wind critters. Unfortunately, they either couldn¡¯t catch up with the speed of the Fourth Grades or were crushed to pieces by the shockwaves from the battle.


    That allowed Greem to understand once again that a Fourth Grade battlefield was not one that he could participate in at the moment!


    Greem no longer cared about the result of the battle between the witches and the dragon. He started an immediate excavation of the copsed Fourth Grade dragonir after dealing with most of the dragonborn warriors.


    Several strong stone golems were summoned and made to remove the rubble and copsed buildings. Bit by bit, they dug toward the depths of their. No one knew what benefits Greem had secretly promised the corpse dragon, but it also passionately helped out with the looting.


    Greem could sense the ferocity and wildness of the Death Witches¡¯ assault throughout the digging process. All the magical traps along the way had been activated. Many of the wounds on the Fourth Grade corpse dragon were probably rted to this as well.


    It was due to the corpse dragon¡¯s wild and reckless advance that the two witches had been able to charge into Krille¡¯s chambers so quickly. The dragon had clearly been unprepared for battle when they entered.


    With Corpse Dragon Artest leading them at the front, Greem and the others dug their way to the Fourth Grade dragon¡¯s chamber without any mistakes. When all of the dirt and bricks had been moved away, Greem and the other adepts were instantly dazzled by the blinding brilliance.


    The wealth of a Fourth Grade dragon was too shocking!


    Greem might have made a mental estimate in the past. However, after what he had witnessed today, Greem had no choice but to admit that poverty had truly limited his imagination!


    His eyes couldn¡¯t help but water when he saw the sea of gold coins and the countless treasures buried beneath it.


    I¡¯m rich!

 Chapter 808 A Massive Commotion

    The task of moving a Fourth Grade dragon¡¯s treasure made Greem extremely busy!


    Wings of Azure Skies Krille had already been captured alive. To avoid any unexpected incidents, the two Fourth Grade witches chose not to stay at Tempest Keep at all. They immediately returned to the World of Adepts through the metal fortress with the barely-alive dragon.


    However, before they left, the witches took a trip to their. In the blink of an eye, half of the hoard was gone. They had only left half for Greem after seeing how much effort he had put into the mission. Otherwise, Greem wouldn¡¯t even have been able to get a single scrap of the leftovers.


    Of course, Corpse Dragon Artest had also stuffed his stomach full of treasure before the two witches had taken their share. The size of his body made it difficult for him to use any storage equipment. As such, Artest could only use his massive stomach as a temporary storage box.


    These items were his personal spoils from the battle. Even Khesuna couldn¡¯t easily take them away from him, despite being the master.


    Once all these ¡¯big bosses¡¯ had left with a share of the spoils that satisfied them, the remaining half of the dragon¡¯s hoard fell into Greem¡¯s hands. One couldn¡¯t underestimate the value of the hoard after having so much taken away from it. The number of resources and the variety of treasures in it was still enough for Greem to turn a massive profit.


    The metal fortress was very far away from Tempest Keep. Even a straight-line distance was a horrifying twenty thousand kilometers. Greem and the others didn¡¯t have the strength required to bring all of these spoils back with them without leaving any behind. All the storage rings and belts they had with them had been stuffed full of treasure, but it wasn¡¯t even one-tenth of the whole hoard.


    Greem and the others had no choice but to abandon the less valuable gold coins and magical gemstones and ce their focus on the strange and odd artifacts.


    Insisting that things he couldn¡¯t understand had to be valuable artifacts, Greem spent the next two days in the sea of treasure and relied on the Chip¡¯s scanning functions to look for precious items. He was specifically looking for things with powerful energy reactions or those with absolutely none at all.


    How could a Fourth Grade dragon and his refined taste allow for a mon¡¯ item to be mixed into his hoard? Even a fool thinking with his toe would know that was impossible. As such, the more ordinary an item in the hoard appeared to be, the more likely it was a rare artifact that exceeded the system of energy ratings.


    In the end, Tempest Keep was not a ce that they could stay at for long. The Fourth Grade dragon also had descendants, along with plenty of dragon subordinates. They usually stayed in their own territories and reigned supreme. However, if they heard of an incident urring to their leader, they would most definitely rush over to investigate the situation.


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, this Wings of Azure Skies Krille was one of the seven Fourth Grades in the entirety of Lance. He had over two hundred dragon lords beneath him. If all these dragons managed to hurry over in time to surround the adepts in their, it would not be a good ending for them!


    After hastily raiding the Fourth Grade dragon¡¯s hoard, Greem and the others silently left Tempest Keep with a dozen dragonborn ves in tow. No one knew if it had been intentional, but Greem did not take the effort to exterminate all living witnesses near Tempest Keep when he left.


    On the other hand, Arms didn¡¯t even notice this oddity with how careless he tended to be. Instead, he was simply excited at having taken back Iritina and obtaining plenty of treasure.


    It wasn¡¯t until they had returned to the metal fortress that they heard from Gazlowe.


    A massivemotion was rippling throughout Lance!


    Greem had always been reckless in his hunts in Lance. They had raided and hunted down three Second Grade dragons and four First Grade dragons. Yet, themotion had only been minimal then.


    There was a minimum of two thousand dragons throughout the entirety of Lance. Hardly anyone would care about a small decrease in this number. No high-grade dragon lord would take the effort to travel tens of thousands of kilometers to a rural ce just to find evidence and search for a murderer.


    However, when it was a famous Fourth Grade dragon lord who had been attacked in his ownir, it was apletely different matter. This terrifying and shocking incident immediately incited a tremendous riot in Lance. For a period of time, the dragons were riled up. Every one of them emerged from their chambers and theirirs, searching everywhere for the location of the dragonying murders.


    Gazlowe¡¯s information revealed that as many as three Fourth Grade dragon lords had already issued warrants and requested their subordinate dragon lords to conduct a thorough investigation of all outsiders in their territories. A report would instantly be made if they found any traces of the dragonyers.


    The scale of this disturbance was clearly beyond Greem¡¯s expectations. It was very likely to bring tremendous danger to the metal fortress. Even Thunder Dragon Arms became restless after hearing of this news. He carried Iritina on her back, along with all the various treasures he had taken from Krille¡¯s hoard and hurried back to his territory.


    Greem chuckled coldly in his heart when he saw Arms leave in a hurry.


    The dragon would never truly be on Greem¡¯s side if he refused to give up on his identity as a dragon lord. Greem already intended to make this arrogant Third Grade thunder dragon fully submit by making use of this uing crisis.


    To avoid being caught by the dragons in a single go, Greem had already held a long discussion with Gazlowe before they¡¯d set out on the expedition to Tempest Keep. The magical machine army stored underground in the metal fortress had already been secretly transferred to a differentnd.


    If the metal fortress was discovered and sieged by the dragons, Greem, Gazlowe, and the adepts could still tuck their tails and escape. They could continue developing their underground kingdom in a different area. At any rate, the ore veins beneath the Stalon Mountains were already at their limits after all these years of mining. They needed to move away anyway.


    Greem had already made his preparations in expectation of a dragon crisis that could befall them at any time.


    Unfortunately, though Greem was fully prepared, Arms was not.


    In all seriousness, he was the one who actively started this war. His purpose had been to exact vengeance for having his lover taken away from him. Yet, despite yelling for revenge all this time, Arms had never truly reflected on the tremendous impact that the death of a Fourth Grade dragon lord would wreak upon Lance and himself!


    Perhaps, deep in his heart, he had never believed this to be a possible task!


    Things had happened way too fast, leaving him with absolutely no time to think things over.


    Initially, Arms¡¯ mind had been filled with thoughts of resentment and anger at having been humiliated. He had not been able to think of anything else. Later, he had be a mere participant in the event, swept along the currents for the ride with no ability to guide the progression and trajectory of events.


    After the dust had settled, the return of his lover and the immense amounts of treasure he had obtained caused him to be blinded with joy.


    This series of events had destroyed Arms¡¯ ability to think, causing him to walk into the massive pit that Greem had dug for him, step by step.


    Now the oil pan was set, the fire was lit, and the hearth was burning warm. All Greem was waiting for was for Arms, the protagonist, to simply jump into the pain and end it all!


    In the end, Greem was just an outsider. Even if he was defeated, he could abandon the metal fortress and return to where he came from. If Lance was no longer a safe ce to be, there was still the World of Adepts to fall back on. On the other hand, it seemed there was nowhere else for Arms to go apart from Lance.


    While Greem happily dealt with the dragon¡¯s hoard in the metal fortress, he also silently waited for the incident to blow up.


    Just as he expected, everything happened in the blink of an eye!


    Firstly, plenty of survivors had been left at Tempest Keep. These survivors described the appearances of the invading enemies. Naturally, outsiders like Greem were foreign and unfamiliar to the dragons. However, the existence of a Third Grade thunder dragon stood out like a sore thumb.


    As dragons themselves, the dragon lords harbored an intense hatred for all traitors!


    With a clue as obvious as a Third Grade thunder dragon, it became much more convenient to investigate the dragonyers.


    There were quite a lot of thunder dragons among the dragon lords of Lance, but those who could reach Third Grade were still a minority. Even if they were to search blind, the dragons would have quickly found their way to Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms.


    Furthermore, the metal fortress had been a cmity to its surrounding dragons over the past few years.


    In particr, in the incident with Third Grade Philippa Eilhart, Arms had shown himself and publicly stood on the side of the invaders. It had been a significant conflict at Stalon Mountains back then!


    Now, with the eruption of this crisis, all of these past events were dug up and used as evidence.


    The dragon lords cast their increasingly doubtful eyes at the young and sessful Third Grade dragon lord, Arms.


    Just as the dragons were nning an assault on Arms¡¯ territory to capture and interrogate him, Arms managed to find out about the n through his secret connections with the thunder dragons.


    Arms might be a Third Grade dragon lord, but even he had be restless when he first caught news of this. If he was brought before the high-grade dragon lords, and his spoils were exposed as evidence of his wrongdoings, it was very likely that his title would be voided, and he would be imprisoned until his eventual death.


    That...that was not an oue he could ept!


    After some long andborious thought, Arms could only choose to take his wealth, Third Grade Emerald Dragon Iritina, and five low-grade green dragons to seek shelter at Greem¡¯s ce.


    Iritina had initially hated Greem to no ends. In fact, she had even considered leaving Arms and establishing a ce for herself in Lance. Unfortunately, thising crisis had be a storm that swallowed everything in its way. No person and no dragon could remain uninvolved.


    Iritina had the most direct connection to the disappearance of Wings of the Azure Skies Krille. If she fell into the hands of the dragons who sought vengeance or searched for information, she wouldn¡¯t end up any better than Arms.


    Just a single bite from each of the one hundred dragons serving beneath Krille would be enough to tear Iritina to pieces!


    It was a dead-end situation like this one that forced Iritina to suppress her seething hatred ande to seek refuge from Greem.

 Chapter 809 The Dragonflight Descends

    Lance. The Metal Fortress.


    The hoard brought back from Tempest Keep had already been organized, properly stored, and transported back to the World of Adepts.


    This raid alone could bring as much as six to seven million worth of profit to the Crimson n. Furthermore, mixed amongst the many magical crystals, crystal cores, magical materials, and treasures wererge numbers of mysterious items that were awaiting appraisal.


    In particr, most of the magical equipment was not suited for the massive physiques of the dragons but was still included in their hoard like a collection of art pieces.


    With the sharp eye of a Fourth Grade dragon, the lowest of this magical equipment would have to be Second Grade. Some of it might even be powerful Third or Fourth Grade equipment. Though the dragons couldn¡¯t use these items, the adepts could easily make use of them with some slight modifications.


    With the appearance of such arge number of exceptional items, the equipment of the Crimson adepts would definitely improve significantly!


    Moreover, after performing a rough inventory of the dragon¡¯s hoard, Greem was surprised to find that most of the materials required to forge the other three Fire Throne set pieces had also been found. The remaining materials could easily be gathered in the World of Adepts with a few magical crystals.


    Without hesitation, Greem set a deadline for Crimson Financial Manager Snox to collect these materials. He also assigned a million magical crystals as capital for Snox to gather the long list of missing materials.


    After all this time working together, the nobles of the Goblin ne had finally lowered their heads to the Crimson n. Some of the nobles and merchants were trying their best to engage in more extensive cooperation with the adepts.


    The five most famous goblin merchant groups had already sent as many as six hundred professionals to travel to the legendary World of Adepts. After enduring the harsh nar bacsh, they rushed to various areas across the World of Adepts and set up shop everywhere under the banner of the Crimson n.


    The Crimson n could even send apprentice adepts to follow along and guard these goblins in Zhentarim and the Northern Lands. However, the goblin merchants had to rely on elite magical machines to protect them when they entered the Silver Union and Adept¡¯s Association territories.


    Fortunately, the World of Adepts had aplete and perfect system of governance. They were unlike lower nes where the natives would kill and ughter outsiders like them as they liked.


    Moreover, the Crimson n had now established themselves both in Zhentarim and the Northern Lands. Any adept or group that infringed upon the Crimson n¡¯s benefits would have a hard time escaping retribution for their actions. As such, the goblin merchants¡¯ lives would be guaranteed as long as they didn¡¯t go too far into chaotic, untamed areas.


    This global expansion undoubtedly spread the Crimson n¡¯s influence across the entire World of Adepts. It should have taken the Crimson n over a hundred years, and the lives of numerous adepts and apprentices, to achieve.


    Yet now, with the support of countless goblin merchants, they had achieved astounding sess in just six months.


    Still, reports of raids were continuallying from all over the ce. Instances of threats and extortion were also numerous. In fact, two goblin merchant groups had beenpletely exterminated. Not a single person had lived to tell the tale.


    As subordinate members of the Crimson n, they could not die in vain.


    Greem sent Soros and Windsor, the two blood knights, to hurry over in response. They were to start a series of extensive investigations to reveal the truth. Judging from the reports they had been sending back, they were getting closer to finding out the perpetrators. Greem estimated they would be able to find the murderers soon.


    Once they discovered the murderers, the Crimson n would be able to use the incident as an excuse to raise a bloody storm of revenge in that location!


    Greem dealt with all these little matters as quickly as he could. It was then that he turned all of his attention to the uproar in Lance.


    Seventy-eight days after Tempest Keep was assaulted and thirteen days after Arms came to Greem with his dragonflight, the dragons of Lance descended upon Stalon Mountains.


    For a moment, lithe and muscr dragons could be seen all over the thousand kilometer stretch of the Stalon Mountains. They either circled high in the air or glided right above the forest canopy, leaving majestic silhouettes in the blue skies.


    Over a hundred dragons of various attributes and grades roared as they circled the tallest peak of the Stalon Mountains. A dozen dragons stood atop the mountain, gathered around two exceptionallyrge dragons whose scales were of an entirely different color from the rest.


    The golden scales of the dragon on the left was gleaming in the bright daylight. His body was muscr and ferocious, with a long beard on his long and narrow head. When he stood upright, his entire body appeared as if it had been sculpted out of pure gold. It radiated the intimidating and sacred magical aura of the dragons.


    A gold dragon!


    It was a terrifying Fourth Grade gold dragon!


    Meanwhile, on the right side of the peak was a rare gem dragon.


    Gem dragons were a unique branch of the various dragon races. Every one of them possessed powerful soul abilities. They could roughly be divided into the amethyst dragons, crystal dragons, topaz dragons, sapphire dragons, and a few others.


    The dragon here had light purple scales that looked like crystals and glowed with brilliant color. It was a Fourth Grade amethyst dragon.


    The most important reason amethyst dragons were ssified as gem dragons was their ability to embed magical gemstones on their own bodies. They would be able to activate the magical gemstones on their bodies in a fight and bombard an enemy with magic attacks.


    Moreover, the strange scales on the amethyst dragons possessed a peculiar ability to turn them invisible. It made them all the more dangerous!


    Such rare dragons were hardly ever seen, even in dragon nes.


    Yet today, they had all left theirfortableirs and gathered, silently making preparations for the vengeance of the dragons toe.


    There were two Fourth Grade dragons and sixteen Third Grade dragons on this tiny mountain peak. Ordinary Second Grade dragons weren¡¯t even qualified to set foot on this ce. They could only circle the summit and await the orders of the high-grade dragon lords.


    The two Fourth Grade dragons raised their bodies and silently listened to Third Grade Fire Dragon Philippa describe the situation of the outsiders in the mountains. She exined when they had appeared here and established themselves, which dragon lords they had harassed, and how Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms hade to assault the fire dragons when they were sieging the metal fortress.


    One by one, Philippa described all of the events that had transpired. Almost half a day had passed by the time Philippa was done.


    Golden light glowed from the Fourth Grade gold dragon¡¯s eyes after hearing Philippa¡¯s descriptions. He roared, "The truth is clear now! These are invaders from the World of Adepts. They have broken into Lance and killed many of our brethren. I am now certain that they are the ones responsible for the attack on their of the Wings of Azure Skies. Toril, it¡¯s our time to move now!"


    The Fourth Grade amethyst dragon, Toril, narrowed his eyes as a savage smile appeared on his face.


    "We have gathered here today to exact vengeance for Krille, the Wings of Azure Skies. With the evidence we have now, we can be certain the invading adepts are the ones responsible for Krille going missing. As such, there is no longer any need to continue waiting. Today, we will break through the enemy¡¯sir and kill all adepts who have invaded our home. Set out!"


    "Set out!"


    As the two Fourth Grade dragons gave their order, the one hundred dragons gathered around the mountains roared in unison. The deafening sound of their roars reverberated throughout the Stalon Mountains!


    The dragons took to the skies and flew toward the enemy¡¯sir, which had long since been identified and marked.


    The dragonflight attacked!


    The fruits they had reaped earlier were so sweet, and the trouble that they had to endure now was so bitter.


    The metal fortress that had most of its magical machine army and metal reserves relocated was still standing in the distance. There was no morebat personnel inside the empty fortress apart from ten thousand magical machines waiting on alert.


    The metal fortress would fall eventually.


    Assigning Crimson adepts there to die along with the fortress was meaningless.


    Greem and Gazlowe did not attempt to move thest defensive forces after removing most of their resources and metal reserves. If the dragons believed the fortress was so easy to break through, they were wee to try.


    Though defeat was inevitable and capture was a matter of time, Gazlowe was confident that the imprable wall of the fortress and the ten-thousand-strong magical machine army would give the dragonflight a painful and memorable lesson!


    That was the main reason that Greem had remained in the fortress along with Gazlowe!


    ............


    After seventeen grueling hours of waiting, the dragonflight arrived!


    Dragon roars echoed outside as muscr dragons cut across the sky, diving past the cloudyer and charging at the mountain where the fortress was built.


    There were no battlecries or insults. Both parties were engaged in mortalbat the moment they ran into each other.


    The metal fortress had always been hidden inside the massive mountain as a disguise.


    With the belly of the mountain fully excavated, there was only a thinyer of several dozen meters of rock maintaining the structure of the mountain.


    At this moment, several dozen dragons of various colors and attributes were unleashing their dragon¡¯s breath upon the mountain. The mountainyer over the fortress melted like wax, revealing the shiny metal shell beneath.

 Chapter 810 The Black Sun, Once Again

    Over a hundred holes opened above the surface of the metal fortress, and ck gun barrels emerged from within.


    Shockingly intense magical energies started to gather within the barrels beneath the terrified gazes of the dragonflight.


    The next second, over a hundred energy beams shot out toward the dragons.


    For a moment, the dragon roars continued without stop as they circled and tried their best to avoid the shots. The sky descended into chaos in an instant.


    Three of the dragons did not manage to avoid the attacks in time, and seven or eight energy beams hit their bodies. Their wings were immediately injured, and blood sshed everywhere. Those dragons roared in agony and fell toward the ground.


    A dozen metal doors suddenly opened at the foot of the metal fortress. A hundred three-meter-tall magical machines charged out from within and lunged at where the dragons hadnded as if they wanted to execute these fallen creatures.


    Naturally, there was no way the dragonflight would watch on as their brethren were ughtered. A group of dragons immediately braved the barrage of energy beams and dove at the magical machines below.


    Dong, dong, dong!


    Energy pirs of various colors and attributes weaved together, forming a tight but uniform web of energy in the air near the fortress. The dragons that swooped downward grunted in pain. They forcefully broke through the suppressive fire with their tough scales and exceptional magical resistance before engaging in a brawl against the magical machines on the ground.


    Dong! Dong!


    One by one, the dragons descended to the ground with ferocious vigor. With the help of their downward momentum, their muscr ws pierced through the bodies of the magical machines. They then followed up with strikes from their powerful wings and tails, sending the magical machines¡¯ broken bodies flying into the air.


    A single First Grade dragon was capable of easily crushing an entire squadron of First Grade magical machines due to their massive size and powerful defense. However, even dragons couldn¡¯t avoid damage in a direct confrontation like this.


    This was especially the case given that these machines were improved ¡¯magical¡¯ versions that Gazlowe had specially tinkered with. Their primary weapons were no longer the goblin rifles, which only consisted of purely physical damage. Instead, they were equipped with magic energy guns that shot out energy beams. If they didn¡¯t hold back with their magical energy and fired all at once, the one hundred energy beams at a close distance would injure the dragons, even with their magical resistances.


    Two of the First Grade dragons were immediately riddled with holes by the barrage. The remaining First Grade dragons also grunted in pain as visible holes shot through their bodies. Only the Second Grade dragons could endure such a savage attack and storm into the ranks of the magical machines to tear them apart.


    Terrifying dragon breaths that extended as far as a hundred meters, and covered as much width as eighty degrees in front of themselves.


    Muscr, spiked dragon tails that sent violent winds rippling through the air when they struck.


    Powerful dragon wings that measured thirty meters from end to end that swept the machines to the ground with every swipe.


    Sharp teeth that could tear apart even a pir of metal.


    Powerful ws that could gouge massive holes in the torsos of the machines.


    For the powerful dragons, every single part of their body could be the sharpest of weapons. They were like tigers in a herd of sheep. Every lunge and every turn they made would sweep a bunch of machines to the ground.


    Unfortunately, their most potent dragon¡¯s aura of might did not affect the machines. Otherwise, their advantage on the battlefield would only increase.


    While the few Second Grades were ughtering the machines, a deafening roar rolled across the skies like a muffled thunderstrike.


    "Dodge it."


    Dodge?


    Dodge what?


    The dragons could recognize the familiar voice; it was Fourth Grade Gold Dragon Stuart.


    The problem was, what were they supposed to dodge?


    The Second Grade dragons on the ground lifted their heads. Their sharp eyes immediately caught the sight of arge ball of light on the exterior of the fortress.


    If the modified magical machines were ying with energy beams, then the fortress cannons were shooting energy pirs. Meanwhile, this ball of energy in front of the dragons¡¯ eyes was several times thicker than the energy pirs of the cannons. Moreover, the inside of the energy ball contained the vicious and chaotic magical trait of the outer space.


    All the light nearby had been devoured and consumed by this energy ball, causing it to appear like a massive ck sun. It radiated a wild surge of magical energy that horrified even the dragons.


    "Run."


    "Run, quick!"


    It was obvious that charging up an attack like this was exceedingly difficult for the metal fortress as well. The colossal amount of energy gathered by the ck sun was already causing visible distortions in the surrounding light and space.


    If an attack like this were tond on a Second Grade dragon, they would be vaporized in an instant, let alone a First Grade dragon. Magical resistance was already meaningless at this point. If it were a Third Grade dragon, they had a high likelihood of surviving as long as they weren¡¯t within the core radius of the ck sun.


    However, if the attacknded cleanly on their bodies, then this chaotic energy attack of over 1,300 points in intensity was not something that any Third Grade dragon could endure!


    The Second Grade dragons that were still ughtering the machines were immediately scared out of their wits. They shoved past the magical machines around them and started to take to the skies. Unfortunately, these sacrificial magical machines would never let them do as they pleased. They lunged at the dragons with no regard for their own well being, grabbing on to their tails and limbs and forcefully pinning the dragons to the ground.


    While the dragons used all their strength to smash the machines to pieces, the fortress in the distance trembled. The ck sunnded where the dragons were most concentrated, crashing like a meteor from space.


    The next second; silence!


    A ck halo abruptly erupted from the battlefield on the ground without a single noise. It devoured all of the dragons and machines. There was no struggling, no cries of agony; only the ck halo. The firm ground itself was corroded away by the violent energies wherever they traveled, forcefully shaving seven meters off thend.


    The ck sun first copsed inward, sucking in all the surrounding energy particles and air,pressing and agitating them. It stood still for a single second before letting out a tide of energy that moved mountains.


    The entire area caught in the st zone was shaved clean by the destructive shockwave. The dirt on the surface was thrown into the air before being minced into minute particles by the magical energy, mixed in with all the other substances, and blown away into the distance by the st wave.


    The metal fortress, being the closest to the st zone, was the first to be impacted by the explosion. It trembled and shivered during the massive st. The ten-thousand-year mountain that enveloped the metal fortress started to copse during the quaking, revealing theplete metallic form of the fortress beneath.


    The metal fortress truly lived up to its name. It did not fall in the face of such an intense shockwave.


    However, while it had not been destroyed, the undefended dragons faced a much more horrible fate.


    Not counting the dragons on the ground, every First and Second Grade dragon in the sky was instantly killed when they were engulfed by the ck halo. Even the dragons circling above the battlefield were stunned by the deafening explosion. Before they could regain their wits and flee even higher, the energy shockwave reached them.


    The dragons were blown back by the violent energy. Many of them crashed into theirpanions, inflicting broken wings and shattered bones.


    For a moment, the slightly advantageous situation was turned against them by the enemy¡¯s murderous attack!


    This one attack from the metal fortress had caused seven deaths and eleven injuries. Four of the seven dead dragons were Second Grade. The ferocity of this strike was already no weaker than a blow from a Fourth Grade powerhouse in terms of energy intensity.


    The two Fourth Grade dragons watching from above roared at the same time.


    They had truly never expected this to happen.


    Such an inconspicuous metal fortress. No Fourth Grade powerhouse could be sensed within, yet it had managed to unleash the violent trait of chaos magic. That attack alone could have severely wounded them if they were careless, let alone lower-grade dragons.


    They could no longer sit behind the lines now.


    As a loud roar echoed throughout thend, the two Fourth Grade dragons beat their wide wings and dove at the fortress.


    Since they were the ones leading the attack today and there were no enemy Fourth Grades, it would be a stain upon their reputation if the dragonflight suffered too many losses. Consequently, these two Fourth Grade dragons personally joined the fight just half an hour after it started.


    The breaths of these two Fourth Grade dragons were easily above one thousand points in intensity. Their breaths washed against the walls of the fortress. Even after being reinforced with plenty of magical energy, the thick metal walls could not stop the breaths from prating it.


    The outer walls started to melt like snow on a sunny day.


    In the blink of an eye, a round hole two meters in diameter and four meters deep had appeared on the wall. The boiling breath entered the metal fortress and ravaged everything it contacted.


    If it were goblins or adepts hiding behind the metal walls, then this blow alone would have inflicted major losses on the Crimson n!


    However, at this moment, Greem, Gazlowe, and the split-off brain Gru were the only ones inside the fortress. They were hiding in the metal hall at the core of the fortress. The enemy had to pierce through threeyers of four-meter-thick walls and multiple metal gates before they could reach them.


    Beneath their feet was a simple teleportation array that had been constructed on the fly.


    They would never die alongside this metal fortress that was destined to be sacrificed.


    Detonating the reserve magical energy in the metal fortress and teleporting them away; this was the brilliant feast that Greem and Gazlowe had prepared for the dragonflight after a long time of nning!


    As for whether the dragons could digest this meal? That wasn¡¯t any of their concern.


    Anyone who dared to invade the territory of the Crimson n¨Ceven a Fourth Grade dragon¨Cwould have to have a few teeth knocked out of their jaw.

 Chapter 811 Elegy of the Dragonfligh

    t


    The war raged on.


    In truth, the conclusion to this battle at the metal fortress had already been determined from the very start.


    The only thing that Greem and Gazlowe could do was to make the invading dragonflight bloody themselves before the metal fortress. They had to make them pay the highest price possible for their recklessness and ignorance!


    Two Fourth Grade dragons led a dozen Third Grade dragons in an attack against an undefended metal fortress; it couldn¡¯t have been any easier.


    The dragons used their long-ranged breaths and focused their fire on the magic energy cannons along the walls, destroying them one by one. After dealing with these annoying ¡¯thorns,¡¯ the dragons finally approached the fortress to tear it apart.


    Gazlowe, expecting the arrival of the dragonflight, had already performed immense adjustments to the insides of the fortress. All the warehouses, workshops, refineries, and pipes had been taken apart. The metal waste products from this process hadn¡¯t been useless. All of it had been put toward the internal modification of the metal fortress.


    The ce was like a massive metal maze now. Scores of metal walls andyers of metal gates divided the interior of the fortress into battlefields of various sizes. The ten thousand magical machines that had been activated ahead of time were silently waiting for the dragonflight¡¯s arrival.


    When one of the Fourth Grade dragons used its terrifying dragon breath to create an opening in the wall, several of the dragons tucked their wings and climbed into the fortress. Naturally, what greeted them was a storm of energy beams and violent magic energy cannons.


    Gazlowe wasn¡¯t holding back on the consumption of magic energy or the loss of magical machines any longer. The fierce fire from the magic energy cannons didn¡¯t even avoid the positions of the magical machines. If a dragon could be killed at the cost of a few dozen or even a few hundred magical machines, it would be more than worth it.


    It wasn¡¯t easy for the dragons to dodge the rain of attack in such a narrow area. The scales of First Grade dragons couldn¡¯t endure such a brutal beating, and only the Second Grade dragons could survive the storm and go after the heavy firepower.


    After several failed attempts to break in, the dragonflight changed their strategy. The Second Grade dragons became the vanguard and attracted the firepower of the magical machines, while the First Grade dragons were responsible for wrecking the cannons and the machines.


    The siege¡¯s progress quickened with this strategy.


    After just an hour, the outer wall of the metal fortress had fallen to the dragons. All of the magical machines started to retreat to the second line of defense. During this battle, Gazlowe had also made use of his wits and obtained the greatest spoil since the start of the fight.


    A Third Grade dragon had died inside the metal fortress.


    Ordinary energy beams could barely tickle these Third Grade dragons. Even the magic energy cannons with as much as two hundred points of intensity could hardly threaten them. As such, many of the Third Grade dragons started to take up roles as vanguards and tanks due to their confidence in their sturdiness and defense.


    Gazlowe had taken advantage of their pride toy a trap. He furiously suppressed all the other dragons with firepower while reducing the intensity against a single direction. In doing so, he sessfully lured a Third Grade dragon into the midst of the magical machines.


    No matter how many of these First Grade magical machines there were, they would have immense trouble dragging this Third Grade dragon to its grave. However, it was entirely possible with magic energy cannons supporting this army of machines.


    In the end, seeing was believing. Even the proud dragons had never expected the enemy would be savage enough to unleash that terrifying ck sun within their own ranks. By the time the Third Grade dragon sensed the rapidly gathering chaotic magical energy and attempted to escape, its retreat path had already been sealed off by an army of magical machines.


    Boom!


    A giant, muffled explosionter, the Third Grade dragon reared its neck and roared before melting like a candle in a furnace at the core of the ck sun. The destructive effects of the chaotic magic energy couldn¡¯t be more noticeable when it exploded in such a narrow and constrained area.


    The dragons that had been trapped in the ranks of the magical machines melted into ck goo along with the machines. Molten metal mixed with blood and flesh and was vaporized by the ensuing energy shockwave before it could cool down.


    The ferocious and violent magical energy repeatedly crashed and bounced back against the walls of the metal fortress, causing its destructiveness to go up by another level.


    The dragons circling outside the fortress only felt the giant metal structure tremble before the formerly imprable outer wall started melting like wax. The life flux of the two dozen dragons inside vanished without a trace. No one could sense their soul auras either.


    It was clear that the ck sun that detonated inside the fortress had not only destroyed their powerful bodies but had also burned away their souls.


    From now on, these legendary figures would no longer fly in the beautiful skies of Lance.


    The gaze of every single dragon froze when they looked at the fortress that had been ravaged by the magical energy. They hovered in the skies, stunned and silenced. Every thought in their minds had flown away as they looked down upon the smoking and ravaged battlefield below. Their hearts were empty, and no one knew what they should do or what emotion they should have to express what they were feeling.


    It was a deste scene in the ce below them, where the metal fortress had once been.


    Trees, dirt, and even pieces of the metal walls had been blown away. The exposed ck rocks were covered with flesh and limbs smashed to a pulp. Purple-ck dragon blood flowed from the twisted ruins, gathered into a stream, and trickled toward the crater produced by the explosion.


    The broken dragon corpsesid alongside the shattered magical machine parts like an abstract drawing frozen in time. It was a frightening sight to behold from a distance.


    The dragons only saw one or two familiar silhouettes moving about at the edge of the explosion; they were a Third and Second Grade dragon. They might have been fortunate enough to survive the st, but their once elegant and beautiful bodies were now filled with gouges and wounds of all sizes. Sharp pieces of metal were inside their injuries. Every slight movement would cause the shrapnel to cut into them and cause more blood to flow down their bodies.


    A few of the dragons hastily roared and dove down to save these two luckypanions of theirs.


    The other dragons let out an earthshaking roar with bloodshot eyes. They started to repeatedly cleanse the remaining structures of the metal fortress with their wild dragon breath.


    Most of the magical machines had already been destroyed in the previous explosion. Only a few survivors charged out from the ruins, shooting at the dragons with their energy beams.


    Soon, they too were destroyed by the dragon¡¯s wild breath.


    The entire battlefield was silent once more!


    The dragons had won.


    They had obtained victory in this battle in a manner they would never ept!


    The dragonflight whimpered in sorrow.


    ............


    Seventeen thousand kilometers away from Stalon Mountains.


    The brilliant light of a temporary teleportation portal illuminated every inch of space in a dark cave.


    By the time the white light started to subside, Greem, Gazlowe, and Gru had appeared within an array.


    The Crimson adepts who had been waiting here stepped forth and offered their greetings.


    They had witnessed the heroic sight of the metal fortress¡¯st battle through a live magical projection.


    Greem and Gazlowe had not personally been involved in the fight. However, they had managed to rely on the metal fortress and its strange characteristics to inflict a bloody wound on the dragonflight.


    That...that was already far beyond the ability and means that an ordinary adept should possess!


    There was no right or wrong. It didn¡¯t matter how Greem had achieved this result. Any adept that possessed such power deserved respect.


    After the two Crimson adepts had paid their respects, Third Grade Dragon Arms walked forth in his human form after a bit of hesitation. He too greeted Greem and Gazlowe.


    Greem hadpleted his side of the agreement. It meant that now, Arms could be considered his contractedpanion. The two might appear to be equal in status. However, considering that Greem was currently sheltering Arms, there was already a subtle difference in their positions.


    Having a Third Grade dragon bow before a Second Grade adept was far too embarrassing. Arms could not bring himself to do something like that yet.


    However, Greem didn¡¯t seem to mind at all.


    Bowing one¡¯s head was always difficult the first time. However, by the time you got used to doing so, your position and your partner¡¯s would have changed immensely.


    With the battle today, Greem had tantly disyed his might to Arms, Iritina, and the proud green dragons. The fight at the metal fortress once again demonstrated that Greem, and the entirety of the Crimson n, possessed the terrifyingbat power to kill Third Grade dragons.


    That was the only reason Arms was willing to lower his head!


    "Arms, you recognize both of the Fourth Grade dragons that attacked the metal fortress today, don¡¯t you? Who are they?" Greem asked as he stepped out of the portal and moved toward the hall.


    "They are Gold Dragon Stuart and Amethyst Dragon Toril. The two of them are two of the only seven Fourth Grade Great Lords of Lance." Arms walked along Greem¡¯s side and started to talk about what he knew, albeit hesitantly.


    "Good. Very good," Gazlowe said resentfully, "Gazlowe, immediately send their information and details to Alice and have her check which witch leader might be interested. Hmph! Since they dare destroy my tower, I want them to pay with their lives and freedom!"


    The ruthlessness in Greem¡¯s words caused even Arms to shudder in fright.


    That was a group of Fourth Grade dragons!


    A ¡¯mere¡¯ Second Grade adept dared use such a tone to dere the fate of Fourth Grade dragons. It truly shocked the Third Grade Arms.


    For a moment, all sorts of emotions welled up in Arms¡¯ heart!

 Chapter 812 Clan Business

    The injury to the dragons during the battle at Stalon Mountains was indescribable!


    The despicable nature and cruel means of the adepts had struck fear into their hearts.


    After a headcount, the dragons confirmed that as many as thirty-four dragon lords had died at Stalon Mountains. That was nearly one-third of their total number. Moreover, the only spoil they obtained was a horrifying graveyard made of molten metal and dragon corpses.


    As the tattered dragon corpses were already covered in the cooled molten metal, breaking apart this metal coffin to find every single body would be an impossible and heartbreaking task.


    The two Fourth Grade Great Dragon Lords had to excavate the crater beneath the metal fortress and bury the fortress ruins alongside the metal graveyard. They then assigned an army of Dragon Cultists to guard the site.


    The furious dragons tore the fortress apart, but they still found no signs of the adepts. That meant that the damned adepts had also sessfully escaped after tearing a hefty piece of flesh out of the dragons.


    As for whether they escaped back to the World of Adepts or remained in Lance? No one knew the answer to that!


    However, the very thought of such a ferocious viin hiding near them sent chills into the hearts of all dragon lords. Every one of them swore to themselves to properly clear out the areas surrounding their territory.


    The dragonflight remained at Stalon Mountains for two long months. They scoured every piece of the mountain and every inch of the ground. Still, they did not find a single trace of the adepts. They all had their own territories and subjects, and, naturally, they were concerned about thieves going after their hoard if they were absent for extended periods.


    Thus, from the third month onwards, an increasing number of dragons started to leave the mountains and return to their territories.


    Fourth Grade Great Dragon Lords mightmand immense authority and respect, but they could not forcefully have their subordinates do their bidding indefinitely. Thus, after several fruitless searches, the two Fourth Grade dragons could only roar and take to the skies, leaving with their respective subordinates.


    As Great Dragon Lords, their territories were several tens of thousands of kilometers away from here. If it weren¡¯t to exact vengeance for Fourth Grade Krille, the dragons would never have traveled so far, especially with howzy they were.


    Now that they had left, it meant that there was no longer a Fourth Grade dragon keeping the enemy in line within this massive area of over five thousand square kilometers. All the First, Second, and Third Grade dragons here would have to pray for their own fates if those adepts were to return!


    Meanwhile, the adepts couldn¡¯t care less about the dragon lords shivering in theirirs. Just the internal matters of the n were enough to keep Greem busy with work.


    The new stretch of mountains that Gazlowe had chosen as their base was also an area with abundant metal reserves.


    The belly of the mountain that had just been excavated was only a hundredth the size of the original metal fortress. Meanwhile, Gazlowe had gathered all of the metal ingots from before and was working day and night to infuse them with the magical energy from the magic generator furnace.


    Right now, Gazlowe controlled the massive magic generator furnace, while Gru controlled a new, miniature magic generator furnace. This was Greem¡¯spensation to Gazlowe for all the effort he had put in over this time!


    With two magic generator furnaces constantly working to transfer magical energy, a small metal fortress was starting to shape up. However, to avoid the sounds of excavation being heard from the outside, Gazlowe had to reduce the size, scale, and the number of mining machines at work.


    Furthermore, to avoid the ck smoke from smelting metal attracting the attention of the native tribes, the sly Gazlowe even sent out a magical machine army to trigger a catastrophic volcanic eruption in the depths of the mountains. He took advantage of the changes to the environment to exterminate all intelligent lifeforms near the camp in a targeted manner.


    Judging from the current situation, Gazlowe needed at least seven months to restore this base to the scale of the original fortress.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped; Lance was on full alert right now. A swarm of Dragon Cultists would investigate any odd urrences in an area. If these Dragon Cultists were defeated or killed, then dragonborn scouts and dragon lords would personally make the trip to investigate the matter.


    Consequently, Greem brought his dragon ¡¯subordinates¡¯ back to the World of Adepts while the new fortress was under construction.


    Greem had originally intended to ce these dragons, who were unwillingly taking shelter with him, in the Goblin ne. However, that was a low-magic ne. The magical aura was heartbreakingly thin, and the dragons immediately refused.


    Greem had no choice but to bring them back to the World of Adepts, cing them in both Fire Throne and White Tower.


    The Crimson n wasn¡¯t wealthy enough to construct towering dragoncliffs for these dragons. As such, the dragons had to be ced near the two towers. As long as they didn¡¯t fly fifty kilometers away from a tower, and had the magical emblem of the Crimson n on them, they would not need to worry about being abducted by adepts of the other ns.


    The emerald dragon beauty Iritina seemed to have developed a bit of dislike for Thunder Dragon Arms, and the two Third Grade dragons decided to stay in separate ces. Iritina led the seven green dragons to stay in a forest thirty-five kilometers northeast of White Tower and started a rtively carefree life. Meanwhile, Thunder Dragon Arms temporarily stayed at Fire Throne and lived the life of a hermit of some sort.


    The arrival of these dragons undoubtedly spread the name of the Crimson n. Many ns and adepts who were in a rush to obtain dragon resources hurried to the Crimson n to find out about the price of the dragons.


    After all, dragons might not be the most powerful amongst all wild magical creatures, but they were definitely the most famous and awe-inspiring of them all!


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but consider promoting dragons as the leading brand and product of the Crimson n when faced with this overwhelming response.


    While Greem was silently giving his all to the management of the n, the battle between the Crimson n and Kam n raged on.


    As the Crimson ncked any other n properties and territories apart from their two adept¡¯s towers, the Kam n had no targets to attack. It forced them to remain on the defensive resentfully.


    Moreover, the Crimson n had sent the powerful Second Grade Bug Adept Billis, who was an army on his own. A few blood elves also assisted him. Their pervasive, mercurial attacks allowed them to raid all of the Kam n¡¯s territories, vis, cities, and resources sites over and over again. Many adepts guarding these resource sites had also been killed.


    Yet, every time the Kam n attempted to counterattack, they failed to catch the trail of the bug adept and vampires. Even when they sent out the Second and Third Grade powerhouses of their n, they could only ughter the apprentice adepts of the Crimson n.


    And even in this endeavor, the bug adept could beat them ten to one.


    The Kam¡¯s means of murder were too conventional and straightforwardpared to Billis, who had a swarm of countless insects.


    ............


    Misty Valley.


    Fifteen kilometers away from Stonefield City was a narrow valley that remained cloaked in a dense mist all year long.


    It was said that there was a strange magical creature within the valley who could breathe out the mist. This creature had taken the ce as itsir. As long as no living being entered the area and disturbed its slumber, it would never wake up. However, once it awakened, it would not be satisfied until it ate at least ten humans or more.


    Such rumors spread throughout the nearby viges and cities, causing countless merchants and civilians to fear for their lives at the very mention of the Misty Valley.


    Of course, this was only the information that ordinary civilians could know of.


    Only some nobles in Stonefield knew the truth.


    There were no magical creatures in Misty Valley. It was only a First ss resource site that the Kam n had secretly ced there! As for all these ridiculous rumors, they were only stories that the nobles had spread to prevent the civilians from interrupting the peace of the resource site out of curiosity.


    Of course, any resource site would be defended by powerful magical arrays, and apprentices and adepts alike.


    Span was one such apprentice adept in Misty Valley!


    Span was fifteen this year and an intermediate apprentice. His talent and background were mediocre. HIs father was an ordinary tailor in Stonefield, while his mother was just a cooking maid helping in a noble¡¯s kitchen.


    His lowly parentage didn¡¯t provide him with handsome looks or exceptional ability. However, when he was discovered to have elementium talent by a Kam adept at the age of seven and brought into Misty Valley, his life changedpletely.


    He might only be an ordinary intermediate apprentice in Misty Valley, but in the eyes of the Stonefield nobles, he was a worthwhile investment that had emerged from among the locals.


    From the moment he entered Misty Valley, his father became a small official subordinate to the city lord and was gifted a small mansion with two levels and a garden of its own. His mother also left behind the tough life of working and cleaning. She too became a noblewoman who could order a maid around.


    Span obviously noticed the changes to his family, which caused the youth to mature rapidly.


    In the second year since entering Misty Valley, he became a beginner apprentice and in the fourth, an intermediate apprentice. Now, troubled by his innate talent, Span couldn¡¯t wait to be an advanced apprentice.


    As one of the apprentice adepts stationed at Misty Valley, Span¡¯s daily mission was to patrol the few ¡¯flowerbeds¡¯ at the edge of the valley. The soul-eating flowers and killer trees here were all low-grade magical nts that weren¡¯t much of a threat to apprentices like himself. However, they were extremely dangerous for any ordinary person who wandered into the ce.


    ording to the agreement between the n and the Stonefield nobles, the city would send over a group of death row criminals every month to serve as food for the magical nts.


    Yet, today, despite waiting from sunrise to sunset, Span did not see that familiar ck prison carriage.

 Chapter 813 The Pressure on Greem

    Span had a very strange dream!


    In that dream, he turned into an odd beetle, only the size of a nail. He was quickly climbing through a grassy in high above the clouds.


    He wrapped around many obstructing boulders (dirt particles), climbed over many towering trees (fire pokers), and continued on his way toward the giant mountain before him. Finally, after much difficulty and having traversed thousands of mountains and rivers as well as endured all sorts of trials and tribtions, he arrived at a pitch-ck cave. A viscous liquid was slowly flowing out from the cave.


    He dove into the cave without any hesitation and vanished in an instant.


    Span shivered in fright and got up from the field.


    He rubbed his aching head, somewhat unsure of how he had suddenly fallen asleep at this. Moreover, the insect in his dream had been so real. Span couldn¡¯t help but wipe away the saliva on his face and smack his tongue.


    It was almost as if there really was that sickening stench in his mouth!


    Could he have been manipted by some mysterious magical creature in the Misty Valley? Why else would he have had such a ridiculous ¡¯daydream¡¯? Span shook his head and focused his senses to look for any oddities in his body. However, he was surprised by the rumbling sounds of wheels from the forest road.


    The carriage carrying the death row criminals was here!


    These damned, unpunctual mortals; it was time to give them a lesson.


    Span strode toward the carriage with an unsuppressible rage inside him.


    Just as Span and the ck carriage made contact, a ck-robed individual on a cliff in the distance turned and looked in their direction. The man¡¯s gazended upon the intermediate apprentice through the thick mist and the many branches and leaves.


    The hundreds of ghostly-greenpound eyes shone with an iprehensible and strange light beneath the shadow of the hood.


    "Calm down, my little babies! When the fruits are at their sweetest, remember to bring back their souls, flesh, and Spirit¨C all of it. Kehkehkeh."


    The voice was hoarse and deep. It was the strange voice of Bug Adept Billis.


    There was one First Grade adept and thirty-seven apprentice adepts at this Kam n resource site. Exterminating them with Billis¡¯ current strength was as easy as the flip of a palm.


    However, Billis would never so easily ughter them, having run into such excellent puppet hosts. Should a monstrous adept like himself start a ughter in the strictly regted Zhentarim area, it would very likely cause high-grade adepts to intervene in the conflict.


    It was only during moments of n wars like these that both parties were allowed to use whatever methods they had up their sleeves without worrying about intervention.


    This resource site was one of the targets that Billis had chosen.


    Of course, simply sending out the swarm to devour all of them and take all of the resources was too simple. A ughter like that was not of any interest to Billis now. The heartworms he had spread throughout Misty Valley was his highest aim ining here.


    He didn¡¯t even let the First Grade adept go. Every single adept and apprentice adept in Misty Valley had been infested with the heartworms he had spread. With their mediocre abilities, they would never sense the existence of the heartworm without resorting to special magic rituals or techniques.


    As long as these heartworms had a chance to grow to maturity, everything belonging to the opponents would be the stepping for Billis¡¯ continued growth.


    Growing and strengthening himself had be Billis¡¯ sole concern ever since he advanced to Second Grade.


    Meanwhile, this n war was undoubtedly the best stage for him, where he could ughter and harvest to his heart¡¯s desire.


    He needed their souls, their flesh, and most importantly, he needed the Spirit they had spent so much time cultivating.


    After confirming that every lifeform in Misty Valley had been infested with the heartworms through sensing their souls, Billis left.


    He was in no hurry. No hurry at all. No hurry to harvest these delicious fruits that stilled need to be watered and fertilized. The war was going to be a long one. He had plenty of time to wait until these cute little worms brought back with them everything that his enemies possessed.


    ............


    Greem was very busy.


    Apart from the n matters, there was arge group of prisoners that he had to deal with in Fire Throne.


    Apart from the Third Grade vampire they had caught during thest war, there was another powerful Third Grade dragonborn prisoner in the sealing room on the second level. Moreover, there were eleven more Second Grade dragonborn in the prison underground.


    These dragonborn were all stubborn individuals, and making them bend the knee was nearly impossible.


    The Crimson n alsocked sufficiently powerful necromancers or voodoo beast craftsmen, making it difficult to turn these dragonborn into powerful undead or voodoo beasts. Consequently, after a discussion with Gargamel, Meryl, and Alice, Greem decided to put them up for sale at Snox¡¯s goblin merchantpany.


    A Second Grade dragonborn would not sell cheap, even as an experimental subject.


    As such, all of the Second Grade dragonborn were priced at five thousand magical crystals, while the Third Grade dragonborn was priced at seventeen thousand magical crystals.


    Apart from this,rge amounts of high-grade dragon materials also appeared at the merchantpany. Dragon crystals, dragon brains, dragon bones, dragon horns, dragon teeth, dragon tendons, dragon spinal fluids, dragon blood, dragon scales, and even rare materials meant for those with special interests¨C dragon penis!


    All of these materials were on sale, ranging from First to Second Grade.


    The terrifying thing was the fact that Third Grade dragon materials were actually mixed into this array of products. Some busybodies, after appraisal, decided that the harvesting of these Third Grade materials had been a little too violent and that the quality of the materials had gone down. Still, there was no stopping the passion and zeal of the adepts who came rushing over while waving their magical crystals in hand.


    Third Grade dragon materials were still Third Grade dragon materials after all. Even if the quality was a bit lower than it should be, they couldn¡¯t be reced by low-grade dragon materials. Moreover, manyrge-scale magical arrays and Third Grade spells demanded items to be Third Grade at the lowest. That resulted in a perpetual shortage of high-grade magical creature materials.


    Evenrge ns or adept forces would stockpile Third Grade materials to prepare for unexpected cases of emergency.


    The Crimson n would never have sold these materials without the massive ne in their pocket that was Lance. After all, if the n held onto these Third Grade materials, they could use them to set up even more powerful offensive arrays in their tower.


    When that happened, they would just wait and watch to see which idiot dared to attack them!


    However, now that they possessed Lance, they could have as many dragon materials as they wanted. That was why the Crimson n had the confidence to trade them for much needed magical crystals and other resources. Otherwise, no one would dare sell such strategic resources!


    Every single n needed a stable source of magical crystal ie if they wanted a sustained growth and development, be it through the excavation of resource sites, the raiding of another nar world, or the monopolization of a trade. That said, all of these ventures were extremely risky and took plenty of time to aplish. A slight mistake, and one could end up empty-handed.


    Greem now had two lesser nes in his hands. He had the massive amount of cheap metal and countless technicians from the Goblin n. The cute, little dragons that were basically sculpted out of magical crystals he had scoured from Lance; the injection of this fresh and nutritious blood was what allowed the Crimson n to continue growing stronger.


    It was only when the Crimson n had grown stronger that it could better support the development of Greem¡¯s own powers.


    In all seriousness, it was a mutually beneficial rtionship!


    At the very least, the current Crimson n was supported by the trifecta of Greem, Mary, and Alice. It was certain to develop at a much faster pace than an ordinary adept n.


    However, though the momentum of the n¡¯s development was nearly unstoppable, there was a rtively sizeable hidden concern. This very concern had brought tremendous psychological pressure down on Greem.


    It was his personal strength!


    There were already a dozen Second Grade adepts and creatures in the Crimson n now. He even had three Third Grade creatures he had somehow tricked to his side. Yet, as the Crimson n leader, Greem was still Second Grade. That was far too low, no matter how you looked at it!


    In fact, it was precisely Greem¡¯s ¡¯low¡¯ grade that had resulted in the current instability.


    There was the restlessness of the Third Grade dragons above and the pursuit of the Second Grade bug adept from below. Greem¡¯s position was unstable if he, as the leader, did not possess the power to make others fear and respect him.


    That was the situation that most adept ns faced!


    The leader of every n had to be the most powerful one, not the wisest or the smartest. Why was that the case? It was simple. The core that maintained the unity of the n had never been the respect for rank or intelligence. It had always been a regard for brutal and naked power that could crush everything in its way!


    If you had the power to crush everything, then you would have intelligent schrs and sages to aide you. You would have brilliant managers to deal with everything for you. However, if the leader of the organization were weaker than his underlings, then the organization would be in a perpetual state of restlessness and constant suspicion between allies.


    When that happened, the internal conflict alone would cause the organization to break up and vanish from the annals of history!


    Consequently, after several reminders from Alice, both direct and indirect, Greem treated his advancement to Third Grade as the most critical issue facing the n.


    "Chip, disy mytest data."


    [Beep. Body scanplete. New statistics are as below.


    [Greem, Advanced Second Grade.


    Profession: Elementium Adept (Fire Specialization).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 13+1 (20) | Physique 15 (21) | Agility 11 (9) | Spirit 28+1 (30).


    Note: Attributes in brackets refer to post-transformation statistics.


    Profession Skills: Body of mes, me Fiend Transformation...]


    Greem¡¯s basic abilities had improved by leaps and bounds with the conclusion of his trip to the Fire Elementium ne. Just thirty years after his advancement, he had reached the advanced level. He was only a stone¡¯s throw away from the peak of Second Grade.


    Moreover, his fire affinity was at its limit; it couldn¡¯t be improved in the short term.


    It was about time for him to consider Third Grade now!

 Chapter 814 Exchanging Conditions

    "Chip, search for the conditions required to advance to Third Grade!"


    [Beep. Order received. Starting a search of data library.]


    Following a strange buzzing sound, the Chip soon returned with the content that Greem needed.


    [Beep. ording to the content in the data library,bined with the Host¡¯s current bodily attributes, there are two requirements for the Host¡¯s advancement to Third Grade.


    [One. Spirit has to reach twenty-nine points. It is a necessary condition for advancement to the Third Grade.


    [Two. Obtain the knowledge and resources required for advancing to Third Grade.


    [Host currentlycks the necessary knowledge on high-grade methods of Spirit utilization and elementium conversion, along with an auto-construction model for the energy system and understanding of the high-grade magical characteristics of fire elementium. Concerning the resources, a detailed list has also been attached.]


    The Chip started projecting some information into the depths of Greem¡¯s mind, and a long list of sixty-three advancement resources slowly unfolded.


    Greem took a brief look and quickly noticed many rare fire materials. Many of them were resources as scarce as the Essences of Fire.


    The resources weren¡¯t a big problem. With the prosperity of the World of Adepts that came from robbing tens of thousands of lesser nes, he could easily purchase any sort of resource that he was looking for. The only question was how many magical crystals he would need to spend.


    Greem did a simple calction and estimated that he only needed approximately 1.4 million magical crystals to purchase all the missing resources and materials.


    The only thing that troubled him was the knowledge that he currentlycked.


    Almost all significant ns and adept forces treated high-grade knowledge as their most valuable asset. They strictly ssified and sealed away such knowledge. They might be willing to make a trade when it came to the resources, but even approaching the topic of the knowledge they possessed was a taboo. There was absolutely no possibility ofing into contact with this information without first signing a contract of servitude with them.


    Greem might have dominated across battlefields over these years and amassed impressive wealth, but he was not making much progress in procuring information. All of the knowledge necessary for advancement listed by the Chip belonged in the high-grade category. Unless Greem was willing to abandon the Crimson n and join a major adept organization, there was no way he could obtain such knowledge.


    Faced with such a difficult problem, the first person Greem turned to was Alice, far away in the Northern Lands.


    Soon, with the remote connection between their two towers, Greem had managed to contact Alice.


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but frown when she heard Greem list out the list of knowledge he needed to acquire.


    "The high-grade utilization of Spirit and the high-grade magical characteristics of fire elementium? We might have the rted knowledge to these two topics in the Tower of Fate¡¯s library, but I have no clue about the other two you mentioned. The Tower of Fate has been inactive for a thousand years after all. The resources and knowledge archives are severely iplete. You might have to make a deal with the witch leaders if you want to obtain thest two pieces of information!"


    Alice paused for a moment to think before continuing,


    "I will try and think of something for you on this matter! Perhaps I might even be able to get something from the Death Witches. Wait for my news!"


    Then the connection with Alice was cut off.


    Greem might be feeling fervent about his advancement, but he knew that there was no rushing such matters.


    Moreover, his Spirit was only at twenty-eight points now. It was an entire point away from the peak of twenty-nine points required for advancement. Don¡¯t underestimate the importance of this one point. With Greem¡¯s current speed of improvement through meditation, it would take him several years of hard work to achieve twenty-nine points.


    As such, Greem turned his attention to the forging of thest three set pieces of Fire Throne after leaving the matter of searching for high-grade knowledge to Alice.


    The primary materials for creating the Fire Throne set had been obtained after raiding their of the Fourth Grade wind dragon. Snox had also managed to gather most of the remaining materials. Thus, Greem took this rare opportunity to begin the preparatory work for the third set piece in his tower.


    Greem chose the coreponent of the Fire Throne set as his third set piece¨C the Burning Suncrown.


    The Burning Suncrown¡¯s Ring of Fire could merge with Greem¡¯s own, raising the intensity of the move¡¯s fire damage. It was extremely helpful to hisrge-scale control over the flow of battle!


    The experience of having created so many magical golems was beneficial to Greem when it came to creating magical equipment. Along with the help of the Chip, the chance of failure had been reduced to an unimaginable level!


    With just thirty-seven days, Greem had managed to create the third Fire Throne set piece; a piece of equipment that solely belonged to him alone.


    The Suncrown appeared like a slowly flowing ring of fire.


    It was a crown forged of meloathe Iron, with plenty of fire runes created with winding metal twines entangled around its structure. The Firemarrow Diamond embedded at the front of the crown not only possessed a dream-like beauty to it, but also the miraculous ability to amplify the intensity of fire spells.


    As Greem excitedly ced the Burning Suncrown on his head, the three set pieces he was wearing instantly resonated with his soul. A faint red light shrouded his body.


    This halo of mes could remain on the surface of Greem¡¯s body to passively increase his fire resistance. Furthermore, it could be expanded like a Ring of Fire to form a giant dome one hundred meters in diameter. Any creature or substance engulfed in the dome would have to endure burning damage from the magical mes constantly.


    Greem shut his eyes and performed some estimations. Upon assimting with his own Ring of Fire, the Burning Crown¡¯s Ring of Fire could increase the damage to one hundred and fifteen points of damage per second. Greem had only achieved this level of destructiveness after he reached intermediate First Grade.


    However, an intermediate First Grade adept needed to weave signs and chant for three to five seconds to unleash a spell of one hundred and fifteen points of intensity. Moreover, Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire was a passive area-of-effect effect. He could still cast another spell while the Ring of Fire was burning the enemy.


    Any enemy that walked into Greem¡¯s Ring of Fire would be under the equivalent of constants attacks from an intermediate First Grade adept. If the enemy¡¯s magical defenses couldn¡¯t defend against an onught of this intensity, the mes would reduce them to ashes without even requiring Greem to lift a single finger.


    If Greem were to ever run into arge group of First Grade adepts in the future, he only needed to leap into their midst with a Fire Teleportation and activate his Ring of Fire. The entire world would be purged in less than five seconds!


    Greem also obtained a new set ability after activating the third set piece of Fire Throne.


    Fire magic exhausted half as much Spirit!


    It was an extremely practicalbat ability. It could double Greem¡¯s capacity to put out damage on the battlefield. Moreover, this ability applied to elementium golems as well.


    That meant that Greem could simultaneously support two Second Grade golems in a fight with his current Spirit. If he were to include himself, then there would be three powerful Second Grade fire creatures simultaneously appearing in the battlefield.


    Who among all Second Grade adepts could survive the mad bombardment of three me Fiends of Terror?


    Greem became unbearably excited at the very thought of that barbaric scene of flying fireballs and sshing magma.


    Fire adepts were always the eye-catching focus of every single battlefield!


    It was only on a true battlefield that fire adepts could unleash their destructive might!


    Perhaps it was a butterfly effect triggered by his thoughts, but Alice personally arrived at Fire Throne while he was caught in his grand dreams of ravaging the battlefield. She had brought along the two books she had talked about, along with some groundbreaking news.


    Given how well their cooperation had gonest time, Death Witch leader Khesuna agreed to Alice¡¯s request and lent Greem the two pieces of advancement knowledge that he so urgently needed. However, aspensation, Alice had to support the deration of war that the Death Witches had announced.


    A deration of war?


    Alice had no choice but to patiently exin the matter to Greem when she saw how confused he was.


    Not long ago, a lesser ne belonging to the Death Witches was attacked by the beast gods of the World of Gods. The entire ne had been defeated, and even the Third Grade witch stationed there had not managed to escape in time. She had died at the hands of the invading beast gods.


    Such an act undoubtedly meant another war for the Death Witches.


    That was why Death Witch Leader Khesuna had announced a strongly worded deration of war against the beast gods during the witch council. She swore to exact bloody retaliation against the pantheon of the beast gods and called upon the other witch branches to join them in battle.


    It was under such circumstances that Khesuna had agreed to Alice¡¯s request. However, in exchange, Alice would have to actively support the deration of war that she had set out.


    That also meant Alice had to organize a sufficiently powerful expedition army and follow the Death Witches as they invaded other nes and fought for the glory and honor of the Northern Witches!


    The Fate Witches under Alice had only just undergone the bloody battle of Faen. The number of official witches they had had been reduced to four. They would not be able to restore their numbers to their former peak without a few decades of rest and restoration.


    It was alreadyplicated to aplish many things within the Northern Lands with so few witches, not to mention invading a different world altogether. As such, Greem had to put together a powerfulbat force and join the Death Witches¡¯ expedition under the banner of the Fate Witches if he wanted the two remaining pieces of advancement knowledge.


    Greem fellpletely silent.


    After three days of examining and weighing all the pros and cons that he knew, Greem finally decided to join the nar war of the Northern Witches. Greem also spent a lot of effort thinking about the participating members of this war.


    The Crimson n was fully established now. Theirnds included the Zhentarim area and the Northern Lands, both of which required high-grade adepts to defend. Greem could no longer call upon allbat adepts within the n like he used to.


    The n would experience a power vacuum if he did so and the assets near Fire Throne and White Tower were very likely to face invasions from unknown enemies.


    Thus, after much thought, Greem decided to leave Bug Adept Billis in Fire Throne and assign him two blood knights and two blood elves. He was to maintain the aggressive offense against the Kam n. Meanwhile, Dragonborn Zacha was stationed at White Tower. Safety was not a concern, especially with the emerald dragon and green dragons who were staying near the tower.

 Chapter 815 Planar Door

    After some thinking, Greem drafted up the following list ofbat personnel.


    Third Grade: Thunder Dragon Arms.


    Second Grade: Greem, Alice, Mary, Tigule, and Split-Off Brain Gru.


    First Grade: Wind Adept Deserra, Medusa Dana, Berserk Witch Sofia, and four newly recruited adepts.


    Magical machine army: one hundred Shield Defenders, three hundred Archers, thirty magic energy chariots, two hundred eyeball fighters, ten goblin engineers, fifty goblin technicians...


    It was the entirety of the military force that the Crimson n could currently mobilize!


    Still, this force was distinctly stronger whenpared to the one that had entered Faen.


    Death Witch Leader Khesuna might have put out a deration of war, but the actual fight was dyed until six months from now. It couldn¡¯t be helped. Crossing worlds to invade a stronghold nar world without sufficient power and preparation was practically putting oneself on the chopping block.


    As such, the Death Witches had to be very careful in their choice of target even though they had already sworn to exact bloody vengeance upon the beast gods. They would also have to make feints and prevent the enemy from finding out which world was their real target.


    A massive nar door was being hastily constructed in Werning.


    The Death Witches became increasingly active with each passing day, using all sorts of means to search for and locate nar world coordinates possessed by the beast god pantheon.


    Supposedly, such nar world coordinates were ssified secrets. No outsiders should know of these coordinates apart from the higher-ups of the beast god pantheon. However, the World of Adepts had been at odds with the World of Gods for tens of thousands of worlds. Both sides had gained aprehensive understanding of each other through their constant battles and exchanges.


    As such, the Death Witches only spent some magical crystals to easily obtained seventeen nar coordinates belonging to the beast gods from the Silver Union and the Adept¡¯s Association.


    These nar coordinates were not half-developed primitive nes. Instead, they were nes of faith and belief filled with powerful locals and beast god believers. The Death Witches had publicly announced that they were giving up on all profits from this nar incursion. Their only purpose was to douse the arrogant fires of the beast gods and take revenge for their dead sisters.


    Therefore, this nar invasion was not a war of subjugation, but one of utter destruction!


    The Death Witches weren¡¯t trying to destroy a tribe or an empire, but an entire ne.


    They wanted to ughter an entire ne¡¯s worth of beast god believers to return the deed of humiliation that the beast gods had done to the Death Witches.


    The Death Witches even sent outrge numbers of witches to sneak into these nar worlds and create a false sense ofplete mobilization and all-out war to trick the enemy. However, most of these witches were only pawns to confuse the enemy. Only a select few of them were carrying powerful locating devices on them.


    Once the Death Witches had determined their target, they could connect the nar door with the enemy¡¯s world based on the signal transmitted from the locating device. That would open a portal that led directly to a ne of beast god believers.


    When that happened, the army gathered by the witch branches would only need to charge in and ughter everything in sight!


    Of course, utterly destroying a ne was a colossal task. The witches would have to find a way to destroy the ne world¡¯s origin.


    Greem might not possess the means to do so, but the Death Witches did!


    The goal of the Death Witches in invading the ne was to destroy their ne origin. Meanwhile, the responsibility of Greem and the others was to ughter as many beast god believers as they could and extinguish the enemy¡¯s faith nodes. That would disrupt their ns for reinforcement and provide the Death Witches with more time to perform their rituals and sacrifices.


    Thus, the Death Witches began six-month-long psychological warfare and feints against the beast god pantheon surrounding this nar invasion. The number of high-grade individuals who had died during this endeavor had reached double digits for both sides.


    One hundred and thirty-one days after Khesuna dered war, the nar door wasplete!


    It was an exceedingly tall stone door.


    The entire frame of the stone door was made of an unknown dark ck stone, and countless magical runes had been etched onto its structure. When powerful magical energy was injected into the base of the stone door, all of its runes lit up.


    A brilliantyer of light slowly unfolded from the center of the stone door.


    Strange light ribbons of various colors drifted out of the door, twisting and dancing in the skies above. They were connected and severed here and there, floating and shimmering in the air, much like the pretty lights that you would see in an area with strong maic fields.


    Signs of severe gravitational disruption also started appearing near the stone door.


    Many pebbles, dirt, and even carriages were no longer bound by gravity and started floating into the air. Meanwhile, gravity abysses that couldn¡¯t be identified with the naked eye had also appeared in other areas. The horrifying gravity instantly crushed any lifeform that set foot in these gravity abysses. Their bodies and organs would bepressed into delicate mincemeat.


    Moreover, areas of gravity disruption like these tended to be random and ever-shifting. There was no pattern to be spoken of.


    All apprentice adepts had already retreated from the teleportation za. Not a single one of them dared to get close to the nar door. Even high-grade adepts like Greem didn¡¯t dare to walk in areas of obvious gravity, space, time, and maic field distortions like these. Otherwise, they would risk the chance of being injured.


    Greem stood proudly at the southwest corner of the za. He narrowed his eyes, and blue light shone from within as he silently scanned the extent of distortion near the nar door.


    The drifting light ribbons might look intangible and harmless, but the Chip¡¯s data on them was glowing with a blinding red light.


    One thousand one hundred and seventeen points!


    These drifting light ribbons that looked like beautiful pieces of silk actually contained terrifying spatial rifts. They could instantly cut a person to pieces if they were ever to make contact. Even if you had magical defenses protecting you, the light ribbons had enough shocking cutting power to sever a person in half through all the shields. It would leave your upper body in a nar space, and your lower body in another, different nar space.


    Without a way to defend against spatial severing, even a Second Grade adept was destined to die if they ran into these light ribbons.


    In contrast, those areas of gravity disruption appeared to be so much more harmless!


    The closer it was to the nar door, the more severe the distortions.


    Traversing the nar door under such terrifying conditions was not possible for ordinary apprentice adepts.


    "The Death Witches have already set off!" Alice, who was standing beside Greem, reminded him softly.


    Greem¡¯s eyes turned when he heard this, and he quickly found the group of Death Witches.


    Two Third Grade Death Witches had arrived in front of the nar door. Greem didn¡¯t know what method they used, but the subtly trembling light door started to stabilize and calm down.


    The abnormalities near the nar door were immediately cut in half.


    Large numbers of intermediate and high-grade undead gathered together under the orders of the Death Witches and shambled through the light door during this rare period of calmness.


    Greem instantly recognized ironhide zombies, ckblood zombies, poison zombies, undead mages, skeletons, undead warriors, and dark knights amongst their ranks. Moreover, he could see terrifying liches riding on towering skeletal dragons in the middle of this undead army. They were dressed in magical robes and held short bone staffs in their hands.


    Greem could asionally see terrifying Third and Fourth Grade existences within their group. High-grade undead like these could quickly be Undead Lords in a skeletal ne. Yet here, they were only servants and casters subordinate to the Death Witches, albeit with slightly higher standing than the ordinary undead.


    The undead were filthy and numerous. Their vile and twisted forms were an ugly sight to behold. However, their numbers were shocking. They were continually being teleported over, yet there was still no end to their numbers even after an hour.


    Greem could vaguely hear shoutinging from the other side of the light door with his hearing.


    It seems that the people on the other side were well-prepared!


    If that were the case, then the vanguard forces would have to endure the most ferocious brunt of the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    No wonder the Death Witches had the undead walk at the very front. They were being used as cannon fodder to wear down the enemies on the other side!


    Aooooo!


    A shocking roar reverberated throughout thend. Death Witch Leader Khesuna appeared on the Fourth Grade Corpse Dragon Artest.


    The appearance of the corpse dragon instantly introduced chaos to the orderly ranks of the undead army.


    All the undead fearfully moved to each side, making way for this massive corpse dragon covered in rotting grey flesh and iron-green scales.


    Artest strode toward the door with heavy footsteps, letting out a deafening roar at the high-grade undead around him as he did so. All the undead that he stared at shivered uncontrobly and stepped backward as if they couldn¡¯t endure the dragon¡¯s ferocious aura.


    The corpse dragon disappeared behind the door with Khesuna on his back. A few high-grade Death Witches quickly followed after and entered the other ne.


    It was only now that the undead once more became quiet and resumed their march into the portal.


    The march of the undead took five hours in total.


    It was the Dark Witches¡¯ turn now.


    The Dark Witches had also sent over a thousand fighters, including pure shadow creatures like shadow hounds, shadow warriors, and shadow assassins. Furthermore, quite a few of them were half-shadow creatures with twisted forms. Greem saw the characteristics of nar creatures on these half-shadow beings, along with the unique, sinister aura and ferocity of shadow creatures.


    The shadow creatures were of various grades as well. There were Third and Fourth Grade existences, as well as weaklings that were barely First Grade.


    Still,pared to Greem¡¯s magical machine army, they were already extremely powerful!

 Chapter 816 First Battle

    The magical machine army fighting under the banner of the Fate Witches was the fourth group to enter the nar door.


    As many goblins in the group were only at apprentice level and below, the Crimson adepts had no choice but to apply magical defenses on them ahead of time. The goblins were also made to drink defensive potions to maximize their chances of survival.


    However, twelve goblins were still crushed to pieces by the distorted nar powers during the process of crossing the door.


    The sensation of crossing a nar door was a bizarre one. Greem himself felt like it had only been an instant, but the Chip recorded a lengthy seventeen seconds of nk memory. Greem had clearly been in a certain strange state of spatial transition during those seventeen seconds. His mind had not been able to break through the confines of time to allow him to experience the entire process.


    Greem had a feeling that he might even be able to affect the teleportation process if he could maintain Spirit activity while under this state of spatial transition.


    Unfortunately, Alice¡¯s spatial talent had beenpletely converted into a talent for fate. Otherwise, he might have been able to learn something from her.


    Still daydreaming and wondering about the possibilities, Greem opened his eyes and was immediately stunned by the bloody and savage battlefield before him.


    The portal was located in a deste in. There was only dried and cracked earth around them, along with pebbles and rocks of various sizes. At the moment, several hundreds of thousands of living beings and monsters were crowded around the portal, bathing every inch of thend with their blood or that of their enemies.


    The first ten thousand undead to swarm through the portal were now crowded around the portal and using their bloated and ugly bodies to stall the enemies. Fighting to the death against these unholy beings were a group of otherworldly orcs of towering stature and bulging muscles.


    They hadrge bodies, giant mouths, fangs that protruded from their lips,rge eyes, and explosive muscles. Their skin was a light green and hadrge pores in it. Their veins were thick as serpents, and they wore crude animal hides and chesttes on their bodies. Almost every inch of their exposed skin was covered in indigo tattoos.


    Their weapons were still extremely primitive.


    They were either thick stone bats, giant spiked bats, or terrifyingly huge metal axes and warhammers. Judging by these weapons, these orcs did not excel at smelting metal. The weapons they used were far too primitive and crude. There weren¡¯t any of the blinding and chilling gleams that the human weapons tended to have, nor were there any delicate patterns resulting from the forging process.


    However, these crude weapons still demonstrated intimidating might in the hands of these orcs and their barbaric strength!


    They had no magic or supernatural powers to speak of. They were relying purely on their strong bodies and terrifying strength to battle against this army of undead, shadow creatures, and spirits. However, every time they unleashed their deafening battlecries, a mighty bloodline power would ripple from the borate tattoos on their bodies. This power would significantly enhance their strength, speed, physique, regeneration, and magical resistance.


    Greem stood before the portal and narrowed his eyes as he silently assessed this sprawling, chaotic, and bloody battlefield.


    With the help of the Chip¡¯s powerful sight, Greem could perfectly include everything within three and a half kilometers in his senses. When his attention shifted to a certain area, the Chip would be able to rapidly magnify a panoramic image of that area and project it before his eyes.


    Greem could see that the orc army wasn¡¯t the primitive native tribe he had imagined them to be. They were a powerful race with proper means of war and a coherent division ofbat tasks.


    At the moment, the ones standing at the very front and battling against the witches¡¯ army were the green-skinned orcs he had seen earlier. They were wild and barbaric warriors that were relying purely on their strength and adrenaline to fight against equally terrifying enemies.


    Behind the green-skin orcs, Greem saw harpies with human faces and eagle bodies. He also saw spear-throwing gnolls, centaur warriors, orc shamans with tribalistic tattoos all over their faces, war mammoths the size of hills, and terrifying cyclopes who could throw giant two-meter-wide boulders across hundreds of meters.


    It wasn¡¯t a group of primitive locals with no intelligence. No, they were an actual orc army!


    Fortunately, there didn¡¯t seem to be too many of them.


    At least, there wasn¡¯t yet enough of them to cause any trouble for the witches¡¯ army.


    The vanguard witches had risked their lives and buried a locating stone here at the very start of the battle. The stone provided the witches of the World of Adepts with the coordinates for teleportation. The nearby orc tribes quickly gathered by the divine decree of the beast gods, and they charged at the witches under the lead of the orc leaders.


    It was fortunate that the reinforcements from the nar door arrived very quickly. The undead army that swarmed out of the portal instantly shed with the orc warriors charging at them. The orc troops continued to gather upon this battlefield while the portal kept spitting out countless strange creatures to wreak destruction upon thend.


    Initially, the orcs had still been able to contain the witches¡¯ forces near the portal. However, as more and more creatures emerged from the entrance with increasing power, the orcs were slowly pushed back.


    Even with all the orcs risking life and limb to assault the enemy forces, there was no stopping the constant swarm of troops from the portal.


    On the ground, orcs were battling with undead and shadow creatures.


    In the skies, translucent spirits and wraiths fought against the harpies.


    Several sharp wooden spears descended on the tide of undead like raindrops in a downpour, while massive boulders crashed into their ranks and left bloody splotches behind them wherever they rolled.


    On the whole, the weapons and defenses of the orc army were still too crude and simple. They could notpare to the powerful voodoo beasts that the enemy witches had spent so much effort creating. If it weren¡¯t for how crowded the defensive line was, this army of thirty thousand orcs would not have been able to hold back the voodoo beasts at all.


    Since they had already arrived at this battlefield, they could not just remain as listless spectators on the side.


    Greem nodded at Gru, and the split-off brain piloted its three-meter tall mechanical body toward the battlefield. Behind Gru, rows of fearsome metallic machines raised their magic energy guns and marched forward along with Gru, firing as they advanced.


    One had to admit that the voodoo beasts that the witches had made were all extremely powerful individually. All of them possessed terrifying might inbat. However, on a battlefield, they either crowded together and limited their own mobility or rampaged about the area, knocking down their own allies. The ranks of the voodoo beasts were chaotic and disorderly, with no praiseworthy acts of cooperation at all.


    Meanwhile, the magical machine army that Gru led was starkly different from the witches¡¯ soldiers. The few hundred magical machines moved as one. Their formation was strict and tight. The magic energy rifles in their hands might not have immense individual power, but they would always choose to focus their firepower on a single area whenever they shot.


    Even the orc Skullsplitters, who had resilient bodies, were incinerated when shot by so many energy beams. Their muscr bodies were riddled with holes in an instant.


    A single volley was capable of exterminating all orcs in an area of one hundred square meters.


    It was through such constant advances that the formation of orc Skullsplitter squads within range of the magical machines started to fall apart.


    It also indirectly created a path forward for the voodoo beasts.


    The undead tide swarmed forward in front of the magical machines, filling up the gaps created in the orc army. It thoroughly flushed all of the orcs¡¯ efforts to contain the witches down the drain.


    The eye-catching performance of the magical machine army instantly caught the attention of many powerful witches.


    They were either hovering in the skies or sitting on the backs of their magical pets, but all of them were assessing these inconspicuous machines with expressions of shock and surprise.


    The witches here might not be proficient in the techniques of creating metallic golems, but they did have some degree of understanding as to how it was done. Compared to the more convenient and simple voodoo beasts, the creation and assembly of metal golems were far more tedious and difficult. It also demanded a surprising amount of metallic ores.


    Consequently, most witches here did not forge metal golems, simply because they believed that they were not as cost-efficient as their own undead and shadow creatures. Metal golems were pretty decent when ced in a tower and used as stationary guards. However, when bringing them into actualbat, even losing one of them was enough to induce heartache. Repairing these metal golems was aplicated task as well.


    After all, they couldn¡¯t possibly bring along the technicians and logistics groups responsible for golem parts every time they brought the golems out for battle, could they?


    It was due to such reasons that the witches had given up on using metal golems as a fighting force on expeditions. However, this didn¡¯t mean that metal golems were not powerful!


    Metal golems were loyal, powerful, robust, and had surprisingly strong defenses. Even more valuable was their ability never to feel fatigue. As long as there was a sufficient supply of magical crystals, they would be machines of perpetual motion, continually fighting until the moment they came apart.


    This magical machine army under the banner of the Fate Witches was almost wholly made up of First Grade metal golems.


    Yet, thebat prowess they were disying was superior to the disorderly voodoo beast army. They appeared to be much easier to use.


    The powerful witches also clearly saw the strange metal giant marching at the front of the magical machines. That machine was an even stranger existence. As it walked forward, blue energy beams shot out of itsrge metal body.


    Magical machines hit by this beam immediately became charged with energy. The frequency of their rifle shots and the intensity of their attacks had increased to some extent.


    Hmm? That appeared to some sort of strange energy source that could remotely provide energy to the entire magical machine army.


    The curious witches couldn¡¯t help but secretly extend their Spirits toward the machine.


    Unfortunately, a crystalline forcefield radiated around the machine and blocked the Spirits of the witches.


    Eh? That was even stranger. It seemed it was not just an energy source machine, but a metal lifeform as well.


    The witches couldn¡¯t help but be even more intrigued!

 Chapter 817 Bloody Battlefield

    The war raged on!


    Unlike skirmishes of three to five hundred fighters, a battlefield of tens or hundreds of thousands ofbatants was exceptionally brutal and bloody.


    It didn¡¯t matter how individually powerful you were. You had to maintain a low-profile on a battlefield as chaotic and intense as this one as long as you weren¡¯t invincible yet. You could not catch the attention of the enemy.


    Otherwise...


    Greem personally witnessed an undead knight shrouded in a chilling aura of death ravage the battlefield unchallenged upon his towering skeletal mount with his Third Grade prowess.


    Numerous Orc Skullsplitters shivered before the sight of his mighty mount, and countless more orc powerhouses were split in two by the knight¡¯s gleaming, two-meter-long sword. The Halo of Fear followed the knight wherever he went, causing all orcs to flee in terror.


    For a moment, the undead knight¡¯s ferocious might was unstoppable. No one dared to test its blinding edge.


    However, the knight quickly caught the eye of a few equally powerful opponents in the ranks of the orc army.


    Wuuuuuuu!


    Fierce winds howled in the air, and a few giant rocks the size of millstones smashed toward the knight, creating sonic booms as they hurtled across the sky.


    The Third Grade death knight courageously sliced three of the rocks to pieces but was hit by the final one. His bones snapped, and his armor dented as he was blown away tond amid the undead.


    His skeletal mount had also been crushed to bits and scattered across the earth.


    The death knight got up from the ground with much difficulty. Though most of his bones had been broken and cracked, the soul fire deep in his skull was still unharmed. Just as he attempted to absorb the surrounding death energies to repair his broken body, the earth around him started to tremble violently.


    The Third Grade death knight struggled as he lifted his head. The blood red soul fire deep in his empty eye sockets abruptly shrank into a cross-shaped gleam as he watched on with terror. A war mammoth had smashed through the undead crowd and was charging toward him with earthshaking steps.


    The beast¡¯s body was asrge as a small hill, its trunk was as agile as a python, and its slender tusks were as sharp as battering rams. Even more terrifying were those giant feet that were as thick as pirs of stone and asrge as carriages. They were moving toward him with unstoppable momentum.


    The war mammoth stampeded across the death knight¡¯s body, crushing his body and the skull that contained his soul fire into bits and pieces of bone.


    The deste howl of a Third Grade death knight¡¯s soul rang throughout the air.


    The orc shaman sitting high upon the war mammoth¡¯s back waved his thick horn staff and started yelling in a strangenguage that no one could understand. A blinding red light gathered in his palm every so often and shot into the body of the mammoth below.


    A dozen orc spearthrowers gathered around the orc shaman. They shouted loudly as they threw the short spears in their hand at the unmoving masses of undead below. The war mammoth that had been sent into a frenzy by the Berserking Spell raised its trunk and let out a long trumpeting sound that echoed across the battlefield. It then charged toward the portal.


    In front of the eight-meter-tall war mammoth, most of the undead were like dwarves before a giant. They had no hope of stopping the mammoth¡¯s wild advance with their size and strength.


    However, this arrogant war mammoth only lived for forty-three seconds longer than the Third Grade death knight.


    The high-grade undead of the army let out a volley of spells under the direction of the liches hidden among them. Their barrage of spells turned the mammoth and the one dozen orcs on its back into tattered rags full of holes.


    The giant mammoth crumbled to its knees with a sorrowful cry before falling to the ground!


    A massive dust cloud was sent spiraling into the skies.


    Blood was still sshing everywhere. Broken limbs and severed heads danced int he air.


    Countless orcs were fighting and battling against the tide of undead across the sprawling frontline of the battlefield.


    They had forgotten death, putting their lives on the line against the enemy.


    Yet, their lives appeared to be cheap and worthless at this moment!


    With their axes and hammers, countless orc warriors bathed in blood, cutting or smashing to pieces the endless zombies. However, the thick, rotten, purple-ck blood that sshed everywhere carried a terrifying virus with it. Clouds of yellow and green smoke erupted everywhere on the battlefield, causing the orc warriors caught within them to cough violently.


    Therge areas of rot and pus that had appeared on their bodies caused them to bleed with every movement. Their bulging muscles quickly rotted away, and their muscr forms started to copse and wither.


    Rotblood zombies, poison zombies, gue zombies.


    Undead with withered forms started to explode into clouds of smoke as the orc army ughtered them. Soon, most of the battlefield had been engulfed in poisonous smoke clouds.


    These smoke clouds even started to gather into a gue tide under the maniption of the high-grade undead. The wave then surged toward the ces where the orcs gathered in the highest concentration.


    The orc warriors may not fear powerful enemies, but they had no means of dealing with these lethal, microscopic viruses that they could neither smash nor kill. Their previously tight formation gradually started to fall apart.


    Pupupu!


    A series of massive fireballs shot out from behind the orc army, creating a sea of fire in the middle of the gue tide.


    The shrieks of countless tiny poisonous insects gathered into one massive sound wave that reverberated in the air above.


    For a moment, countless poisonous insects and viruses were burned to death by the heat of the mes!


    That might not have stopped the advance of the gue tide, but it had significantly reduced the damage that the witches could deal with the gue. It allowed the badly beaten orc army to recuperate and not be immediately defeated temporarily.


    It was the orc shamans!


    The witches behind the undead cast cold res at these orc shamans draped in hides and feathers, with magical tattoos drawn all over their faces and bodies.


    These orc shamans appeared to be skinnier and frailerpared to the average orc.


    However, given howrge and thick the horn staffs they held were, smashing a few enemy skulls wouldn¡¯t be a problem either.


    In terms of ability alone, even the weakest of warriors in the orc army had a more outstanding Physique than an advanced body-refining adept. In fact, most of the qualified orc warriors in the army had bodies as tough as body-refining pseudo-adepts.


    Supposedly, an official adept of the World of Adepts could easily ughter a dozen orc warriors. However, if the numbers were to increase by any more, then even a First Grade adept was at risk of injury.


    If both parties were engaged in a deathmatch with nothing reserved, then a First Grade adept might be able to exterminate twenty or thirty orc warriors. However, the adept themselves would die under the crude yet simple stone hammers of the orcs.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The bodies of the adepts themselves were far too fragile!


    If one could bypass those multipleyers of shields and magical defenses, then the adept himself might not be much stronger than an ordinary human. A de to the neck or a stab to the stomach and even those noble adepts would die.


    Meanwhile, these orc shamans were like a weakened version of official adepts.


    The magical powers they possessed were far too crude. Apart from the Berserking Spell, Bloodlust, and Great Fireball, they had no spell or magic of great might. The more mystical aspect to the orc shamans was their ability to wield the powers of four elementium attributes simultaneously. Moreover, their enhancing magic, along with their healing and offensive skills, were allpleted through the use of totems.


    They would ce these one-meter wooden totems into the earth before them and rapidly summon the corresponding magical elementium in their hands. The magic they unleashed might not be very powerful, but it was swift.


    Greem narrowed his eyes and watched from behind the battle.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s senses, he could tell that the strange tattoos on the bodies of the shamans appeared to be resonating with the patterns on their totems on a certain elementium frequency.


    The oscition and fluctuations of the magical radiance from the tattoos and the totems were almost entirely identical!


    What was this? Magic resonance or elemental harmony? What method then did they use to cause a cold, inanimate object to be akin to a living being, and be able to sense and absorb the wandering elementium in the air?


    Were the totems miniaturized and weakened versions of an elementium altar?


    A series of questions rose in Greem¡¯s mind.


    No wonder those adepts loved to go on otherworldly conquests. As expected, any other world possessed plenty of mysterious knowledge and secrets for them to explore and decipher!


    At this moment, Greem wanted to capture an orc shaman, split his skull apart, and conduct some thorough research.


    However, even from a distance, he could see the muscr and well-trained orc demasters surrounding the orc shamans. He had no choice but to stuff this idea into the depths of his heart silently.


    If the Skullsplitters were ordinary orc warriors, then these orc demasters were elite orc warriors on the level of body refining adepts.


    They might not be very tall, and their bodies might not be as muscr as ordinary orcs, but their every movement was exceedingly fast and agile. The weapons they used weren¡¯t dull and heavy warhammers or greataxes either. Instead, they only used t and long knives or terrifying longswords.


    That meant that their attacks excelled at speed and agility, along with explosiveness!


    If Greem simply charged over and got surrounded by a group of orc demasters with their giant razors, he wouldn¡¯t end up much better than a piece of meat ced in a slicer.


    These demasters possessed extreme physical explosiveness and attack speed. Whenbined with the four elementium powers that the orc shamans could summon, they became a challenging foe. There might not be any high-grade individuals among that group of shamans and demasters, but even a peak Second Grade fire adept like Greem didn¡¯t dare to test the waters.


    Maintaining a low-profile on such a brutal battlefield was the only way to survive!


    The orcs weren¡¯t justprised of idiots with all brawn and no brain. Under Greem¡¯s observation, the orcs far behind the frontlines were most likely the true powerhouses of the orc army.


    Greem was only curious why they were being so patient and biding their time. They had yet to start an assault on the portal after so long. Couldn¡¯t they see that the orc army was almost copsing under the attacks of the witches¡¯ forces?

 Chapter 818 Lies and Deception

    Xan¡¯tish Sharpfang was silently observing the battlefield.


    Seventeen elders and leaders of the Witherwater City Tribe Alliance stood behind his towering body.


    Fourth Grade Berserk Warrior Mau¡¯ris was the most annoyed person among them all. He was continually pacing near Xan¡¯tish, loudlyining and questioning the strategy at y, "The brats have all gone charging up the frontlines! Are we just supposed to wait here and do nothing?"


    Xan¡¯tish replied solemnly without even turning his head, "I have already contacted the S Tribe. They will be joining the war with thirty thunder rocs soon."


    "Thunder rocs, thunder rocs, thunder rocs...are we orcs unable to fight without thunder rocs?"


    "We aren¡¯t here to fight today. We are here to destroy the enemy¡¯s portal." Xan¡¯tish finally turned his head. His broad and bloodshot eyes were filled with an unconceble fury, "You have heard the holy decree of the beast gods themselves. The invading enemies this time are not the usual sort. They are fearsome witches who have sworn vengeance against us. If they establish a foothold here, then our Strongwoods ne will be in danger."


    "Then all the more reason you should let me onto the battlefield to ughter them. I¡¯ll butcher every enemy on the ground, and then you guyse from the skies once the thunder rocs arrive. Isn¡¯t that even better? " Mau¡¯ris was still doggedly arguing.


    Xan¡¯tish grabbed Mau¡¯ris by the cor and stared at him angrily, "You are the most powerful warrior of our group now. As the leader of the Witherwater City Tribe, Imand you to calm down and wait for the true battle to arrive."


    "Hasn¡¯t the battle already started? Our brats can¡¯t hold the line for much longer."


    "If you aren¡¯t blind yet, you should be able to see what is happening. Not a single one of the powerhouses among the witches have shown themselves yet! What are they waiting for? Their gue beasts are powerful and many. Our orc army has no chance of winning against those monsters. That is why the witches are waiting...waiting for a chance to lunge at our own powerhouses and kill them all! You tell me, dare I put at stake thest force of Witherwater City without the absolute certainty of victory?"


    The two orc powerhouses had loud voices. The massive soundwave from them shouting at each other alone was enough to shock an ordinary human to death.


    The elders and leaders standing behind the two orcs were of various backgrounds. There was the minotaur chieftain, who had a humanoid body and a massive cow¡¯s head. There were lion-people with lion faces and golden fur over their humanoid bodies. There were also harpies with gray wings and hooked beaks for mouths.


    Amongst all these elders, the cyclops elder was undoubtedly thergest and most eye-catching.


    The cyclops elder looked like a strong human who had been erged several dozens of times. He had a body, two legs, two arms, and the same facial features as a human. The only unusual feature of the cyclops was the single eye at the middle of his forehead.


    Ordinary cyclopes were ten meters tall¨Crger and more ferocious than war mammoths. This Third Grade cyclops elder, on the other hand, was a massive twelve meters in height. Disregarding everything else, just a single finger on hisrge hand was as thick as a human¡¯s waist.


    The one eye on its face blinked continuously, a dense dirt-yellow elementium aura radiating from within. If needed, this cyclops elder could use three seconds to form a two-meter-wide boulder with the earth elementium gathered within his eye. He could then use his immense might to toss it at his enemies.


    Rock throwing was a racial ability that all cyclopes were capable of from a young age. They could hit any target within five hundred meters with pinpoint uracy. As the most powerful person of his tribe, the cyclops elder could throw his rock as far as seven hundred meters away.


    These human trebuchets were the strongest fighting forces in the technologically backward ne of Strongwoods.


    Even the proud dragons that soared in the skies above didn¡¯t dare to enter an area where the cyclopes lived casually. There had even been champions throughout the long history of the cyclopes who had managed to kill dragons all by themselves!


    However, the cyclopes on this ne had lost all of their past freedom and faith. They had been reduced to a powerful fighting tribe subordinate to the massive Orc Empire of Strongwoods.


    Upon seeing the two orcs arguing with each other, Cyclops Leader Apto bent down and ¡¯whispered¡¯ with his thunderous voice, "Xan¡¯tish, my kids have already been fighting for over two hours. They must be very worn out now. What do you think? Should we let them retreat and rest for a while?"


    The cyclops might be able to gather earth elementium into boulders, but this racial ability of theirs wasn¡¯t without limit either. They might be able tost for a long time in an ordinary battle. However, the constant focusing of elementium and throwing of boulders had exhausted most of their stamina and soul origin.


    That was why Cyclops Elder Apto, feeling sorry for his people, had put forth such a request.


    "No!" Naturally, his request was rejected by the orc leader without any hesitation, "The situation of the battlefield is already difficult and dire. If we lose the suppressive fire from your boulders, the orc army will copse. Have your people hold on for a little. Our assault party is almost here."


    Apto sighed helplessly and straightened his body once more.


    Mammoth Leader Rieth and Centaur Elder Kanem, who stood beside the cyclops, looked at each other, their eyes filled with grief and concern. They too had tribe members fighting on the frontlines.


    The orcs might notpare to powerful fighting tribes like themselves when it came to Strength and Physique, but the orcs could conquer and enve them through the might of their entire species. Why? All because of the orcs¡¯ shocking reproduction rate!


    The lifespan of an orc was only sixty or seventy years, while their birth cycle was only a measly thirteen years.


    That meant that it only took thirteen years for a newly born orc to give birth to the next generation. Meanwhile, these fighting tribes had unbearably long birth cycles.


    The cyclopes were the most powerful and easily lived up to a hundred and seventy years, but their birth cycle took a hundred years. The mammoths were mighty beings and could live up to a hundred and fifty years, but their birth cycle took sixty years. The centaurs were slightly weaker, but could still live for a hundred and twenty years. Their birth cycle was forty years.


    As such, even though their individual prowess was far above the orcs, the overall might of their species was far inferior to the ¡¯weak¡¯ orcs, who had been blessed by the Beast God!


    As such, the elders and leaders of the various tribes could do nothing about their precious younglings risking their lives to stop the witches¡¯ forces, as worried as they were.


    ............


    On the other side of the battlefield, many high-grade witches had gathered before the portal. They were surveying the bloody ughter urring at the frontlines while listening to the surviving vanguard witches report on the situation of Strongwoods ne.


    Strongwoods ne was a resource-rich, mid-sized ne with high biodiversity.


    Naturally, the ones who ruled this ne were the main targets of the witches¨C the Orc Empire!


    The capital of the Orc Empire was located in a ce known as Dweiden and was twelve thousand kilometers away. The closest orc city was known as Witherwater City. Over one hundred and ten thousand green-skinned orcs of various tribes lived there.


    The orc army that had surrounded the portal and was currently attacking them hade from there!


    ording to the information gathered by the scouting witches, Witherwater City had almost a hundred powerhouses. Powerhouses, in this context, referred to tribe fighters of Third Grade and above.


    The witch scouts had buried the locating stone seven hours ago. The first orc force¨Cwhich had arrived five hours ago¨Cwas a squad of three hundred harpies. If it weren¡¯t for the vanguard force being sufficiently powerful and well-equipped, they would never have been able tost until the witch forces arrived to reinforce them.


    It was precisely due to the covert nature of the witches¡¯ operation that they had managed to catch the Orc Empire by surprise.


    The Beast God had detected the locating stone the moment it sent out a long-distance signal. However, the time he took to give the orcs a divine decree, and the time it took for the orc tribes to gather and advance toward the battlefield, had provided the witches with the best opportunity to open the internar portal.


    The armies of the orcs were still marching toward the battlefield, while the witches¡¯ forces were still swarming through the teleportation gate.


    Just like that, the forces of both parties shed in a deadly battle on the deste ins. The witches had a clear advantage now. They were forcing the orcs away from the portal and were eating away at the orcs¡¯ military strength.


    The orcs had always been a species where every single member could fight.


    Since Witherwater City had one hundred and ten thousand orcs, they could field an orc army of one hundred and ten thousand.


    However, the ones that could arrive at the battlefield early were still elites after all. If they were all exterminated here, then the only soldiers left would be the weak and elderly. They might not be weaker than a human army, but they were insignificant before the powerful forces of the witches.


    If this battle went well, the witches might even be able to take over Witherwater City.


    This way, the witch forces would no longer be an isted army that had traveled from afar. Instead, they would be a significant military force with a stronghold from which they could strike and defend. As such, the decision of the witches after a discussion was the bury all of the orc elites here, leaving not a single one to escape back to Witherwater City!


    It was this decision that caused the witches to hold back arge batch of powerful voodoo beasts instead of directly releasing them onto the battlefield. Meanwhile, they relied on these intermediate and low-grade undead to stall the orc army and slowly wear them down.


    Of course, even the ns of the orc powerhouses behind the lines were well within the expectations of the witches.


    A flock of thunder rocs no more than Second or Third Grade and you think it would be enough of a trump card in a nar war like this?


    Truly a bunch of uneducated bumpkins!


    The witchesughed coldly, their voices full of disdain.

 Chapter 819 The Wild Tides of War

    In the fifth hour of this nar battle, the long-awaited thunder roc assault squad finally arrived.


    It meant that the bloody and cruel battle on the ground had lost its meaning and purpose. The focus on the war had now shifted to the skies.


    There were as many as sixty Third Grade powerhouses on the side of the orcs now. Most of them were orc warriors and orc shamans of menacing stature, while the rest were exceptional fighters of other races.


    The orc warriors and shamans either rode on war mammoths or thunder rocs. They charged straight at the massive portal that was still spitting out monsters with unstoppable momentum.


    The real battle that would decide the victor of this nar war had finally begun!


    Perhaps because they saw the orcs move out, the witches could no longer sit still. One by one, they cast their magic and took to the skies. In particr, Death Witch Leader Khesuna was a most eye-catching sight to behold. She cut through the air on Fourth Grade Corpse Dragon Artest and stood in the way of the orcs.


    It had always been a pure deathmatch when it came to nar wars. There was no possibility of truce or harmony.


    As such, there was no need to converse or negotiate. It was a simple charge at the enemy upon contact.


    One had to admit that the orc warriors were ferocious and courageous fighters, especially after they advanced to higher grades. Their offensive power was off the charts, allowing them to y everything in their way, be they man or monster. Unfortunately, they possessed a massive w; they were utterly incapable of flight or long-ranged attacks.


    Orc warriors naturally had no affinity with elementium whatsoever. Even across their entire race, only one in ten thousand orcs could master elementium affinity and be orc shamans. That was one-twentieth the probability of humans and one-four hundredth the probability of the elves.


    Thus, even after advancing to a high grade, orc warriors had no way of converting their life energy into any kind of great inner power as the elves or humans could. Consequently, they could not master any form of powerful mid-ranged offensive skills. Even after advancing to higher grades, they only obtained stronger bodies, increased explosiveness, improved magical resistance, and better regeneration abilities.


    There was nothing else apart from these!


    The witches wouldn¡¯t be afraid of such warriors regardless of how high their grade was!


    As the two parties rapidly approached each other in the skies, the first wave of attacks erupted in the enemy¡¯s ranks. They were still five hundred meters away from each other.


    The only ones among the orcs that couldunch long-range attacks at this distance were the thirty thunder rocs and the orc shamans.


    The storm of dazzling lightning sts and crashing fireballs were devoured by an even more blinding and terrifying flood of spells before they could reach the witches. The surge of magic then sted through and ravaged the orcs.


    The Third Grade thunder rocs were still capable of erecting thunderlight barriers to protect themselves and the orcs on their backs. Though they were undoubtedly suffering in the ferocious tide of magic, they were still surviving. Meanwhile, the thunderlight barriers of the Second Grade rocs were smashed to pieces after just three seconds. The creatures could only grunt in agony and try their best to avoid the fearsome spells shooting toward them.


    Meanwhile, the harpy powerhouses following behind the rocs beat their wings and weaved in-between the rain of magical attacks. They had neither magic nor scales to protect their bodies. They were fated to crash while howling if the shockwaves of the spells even so much as swept by their soft and fragile wings.


    The one hundred meter altitude wasn¡¯t enough to kill them immediately. However, what waited beneath them was a horde of hungry and howling zombies.


    This volley of spells alone cost the orc assault squad one-third of their members.


    Those who fell from the sky had to cross another thousand meters of the battlefield and countless terrifying undead to evene into contact with the portal. One couldn¡¯t assume that these moaning undead with drool dripping from their mouths were easy opponents.


    No one knew where there might be Third and Fourth Grade undead hiding in such arge army. The more inconspicuous liches only needed a Finger of Death or a Power Word: Death to instantly kill the unfortunate ones with less resilient Spirits.


    Unfortunately, the orcs who focused purely on training their physical bodies and not their Spirits undoubtedly fell into this category of unfortunate individuals!


    The magic slinging that had urred in the air had also attracted Greem¡¯s attention. However, what really drew him were the Third Grade orcs that were raining down from the sky.


    The chance of finding and fighting against a Third Grade being in the World of Adepts was slim. Even if he did find an opportunity to challenge a Third Grade being, it would probably mean that the Crimson n was in a moment of immense crisis. You could never find a situation like this, where Greem was looking around to find the easiest Third Grade to pick off!


    Hmm? The one that just fell from the sky with half his body charred seemed to be an orc demaster...nope. He couldn¡¯t choose him! demasters had too much offensive power. There weren¡¯t very many in Greem¡¯s group who could endure a single violent blow from a demaster.


    Hmmmmm...that seemed to be a Third Grade thunder roc falling over there. No, there was an orc on its back. Moreover, that orc appeared to be Fourth Grade!


    Greem¡¯s ck eyes shone with blue light as he quickly analyzed the basicbat power of each and every ¡¯turnip¡¯ raining from the skies. A powerfulyer of life forcefield surrounded most orc powerhouses. It distorted the probing waves of the Chip and made it incapable of obtaining data that was too specific on the orcs.


    However, Greem was still trying his best to find the less dangerous targets among all the blinding red lights with the vague information from the Chip.


    After all, he hade here to Strongwoods to help under the banner of the Fate Witches. He wouldn¡¯t be able to stand tall and proud in front of the witches if he didn¡¯t have any achievements to show for it. Helping the witch forces ughter the low-grade orcs earlier could only be considered obligations already expected of him. Trying his best to injure or kill the enemy¡¯s high-grade fighters in such an intense nar war was the only real way to measure his contributions.


    After assessing the strength of his own forces, Greem quickly and boldly set his sights on the isted Third Grade orcs.


    "What exactly are you waiting for? Shouldn¡¯t this be the best time to run forward and kill? There are so many delicious meals here today." The eager Mary standing by his side licked her red lips as her crimson eyes shifted across the muscr ¡¯blood treats¡¯ in the distance. It was almost as if she couldn¡¯t make up her mind as to which treat to enjoy.


    Alice had a cute smile on her face, her curious eyes wandering up and down Greem¡¯s body.


    She might be the Witch of Fate and possess the ability to see the trajectory of most individuals¡¯ lives. However, in truth, she could not see much for this ¡¯master¡¯ of hers.


    She had vaguely discovered this unique characteristic of Greem¡¯s soul a long time ago!


    Any of her divinations would be distorted and be unpredictable as long as they involved Greem. Such an abnormality wasn¡¯t caused by any individual. Rather, it was the protection granted by the narws, knowingly or not.


    It meant that anyone who tried to pry into Greem¡¯s secrets would only obtain incorrect and inurate results!


    It wasn¡¯t just Greem alone who possessed this characteristic. Even those who gathered around Greem would gain this ¡¯unpredictable¡¯ trait of his and be ¡¯variables¡¯ who deviated from their original trajectory of fate.


    Take Mary, for example. Given the trajectory of her original fate, she would have had immense trouble advancing to adept. She should have died while she was an apprentice adept. But now...


    Alice was the same!


    Alice had divined her own fate countless times. Her fate trajectory was to have stopped when the Tower of Fate was activated. Yet, it was her ¡¯idental¡¯ meeting with Greem and her envement that caused the unexpected deviation in her fate trajectory.


    However, the chain reaction from this deviation was toorge, so much so that even the first Witch of Fate could not do anything about the changes.


    There were countless times where Alice had the opportunity to sever the soul contract between her and Greem since she had advanced to be the Fate Witch. However, Alice silently gave up on the idea after repeated thought.


    She had no confidence in squaring off against an old monster, who had lived for several dozen millennia, without the blessing of the ¡¯fate ckhole¡¯ that was Greem. Alice could see the situation very clearly. Her most significant edge against the old hag wasn¡¯t her identity as the Witch of Fate, nor was it the numerous subordinates beneath her. It was Greem.


    That was why Alice had tied her fate so closely to Greem¡¯s all this while. Though her romantic feelings were part of the reason for her decision, it was more so an instinctual response from the depths of her soul and guidance from the powers of Fate.


    If fate let them meet and let them help each other, then naturally, she could only resign herself to that fate!


    While Alice was smiling withplicated emotions, the other Crimson adepts cast their trusting sights at Greem.


    They believed in this n leader of theirs. They believed in his choice and in his judgment!


    The rise of the Crimson n was unstoppable under his lead. It was a certainty! And them? They were the witnesses and founders of this very miracle! They basked in the glory!


    Greem¡¯s unmoving body trembled beneath the gaze of hispanions and subordinates. He finally found a suitable target.


    A Third Grade orc shaman and a Second Grade thunder roc.


    Thisbination might have slightly exceeded his original n, but it was still well within the Crimson n¡¯s ability to hunt.


    Greem immediately put forth a series ofmands without any hesitation.


    Precise coordinates instantly appeared in Gru¡¯s mind. The split-off brain was still slowly advancing through the tide of undead at the moment. With his orders, the formation of three hundred Archers immediately turned and started bombardment against a specified area.


    A rain of heat rays instantly covered the area where the Third Grade orc shaman hadnded.


    At the same time, the Crimson adepts who had been staying near the portal started to surround that area.


    Several towering figures approached the ce, chief amongst them the duo of Greem and Arms!

 Chapter 820 Pseudo-Third Grade

    A Third Grade thunder dragon might not be the most powerful being to appear on the battlefield today, but it definitely had the most shy entrance of them all!


    A massive dragon shrouded by blinding lightning appeared before everyone¡¯s eyes with a giant me humanoid riding on his back. The two of them charged into battle, surprising everyone else.


    They didn¡¯t intervene in the high-grade battle above them. Instead, they headed straight for an orc shaman who was shaking his head and trying to pull himself out of a crater. Meanwhile, beside the shaman, there was a smoking thunder roc struggling to get up.


    The thunder roc was clearly at its limits, but the Third Grade orc shaman was rtively unharmed.


    One had to admit that the orcs¡¯ Physique was a terrifying,puter-bug-like existence. This orc shaman only seemed to have been inflicted with some slight surface wounds despite having crashed from a hundred meters in the air. A little treatment and he would be an energetic monster in battle once again.


    This orc shaman had just managed to find his bearings when he was instantly caught by surprise by the volley of Scalding Rays shot his way. However, these elementium beams of no more than forty points of intensity were no issue for the shaman. He raised the staff in his left hand to shield his face while enduring the rest of the attacks with his powerful Physique.


    The concentrated volley of Scalding Rays created plenty of tiny red dots on the orc¡¯s green skin, but they failed to break through his tough hide.


    The orc shaman narrowed his eyes and calmly assessed this strangebination rushing at him through the small gaps in his staff.


    A dragon and an adept?


    And only a Third Grade and a Second Grade! The Third Grade dragon was probably the contractedpanion of the Second Grade adept. If he could kill off the adept promptly, the Third Grade dragon should be forcefully banished back to his original ne under the power of the contract.


    There were no idiots amongst those who could achieve Third Grade and beyond!


    The orc shaman had already decided on a feasible n ofbat at the very instant he sensed Greem and Arms¡¯ presence.


    The area that the orc shaman hadnded in was where the fighting was most intense. However, after the volley of Scalding Rays descended on the field, not a single creature dared step within fifty meters of the ce, orc and undead alike.


    The orc shaman didn¡¯t dare to dally either. He waved a coarse andrge hand, quickly nting five totemic pirs around him. Four of them were elementium totems. They were each ced two meters away from him in four separate directions, glowing red, white, green, and yellow.


    The fifth totem was ced right in front of himself. The strange carvings on the totem resonated with the shaman¡¯s tattoos and both started to pulse in synchronicity.


    The effects of this strange totem caused the shaman¡¯s Strength, Physique, Agility, and Spirit to increase tremendously. Greem was still a distance away, but he was surprised to find that the orc shaman had increased by two minor grades. The shaman had risen to advanced Third Grade.


    My god, he just increased his own grade by two minor tiers.


    Greem immediately narrowed his eyes.


    As expected, there were no easy opponents in an otherworldly battlefield!


    It seemed even a target he had carefully picked wasn¡¯t so easily dealt with!


    If this had been half a year ago, Greem would have turned at the sight of such a powerful enemy. However, he had absolute confidence in victory today. Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms was one reason for this. However, an even more crucial reason was hispletion of the Fire Throne set!


    Five set pieces: Once all set pieces were equipped, a Burning Domain would automatically form around the wearer, restricting all non-fire spells in a five-meter radius around the wearer. Anyone that cast a spell within the Burning Domain would temporarily forget that spell after a sessful cast. All units moving within the Burning Domain would have to endure a burning effect.


    He had been hiding in his tower and toiling day and night for this moment. Greem had managed to forge the five-set pieces of Fire Throne before the internar war had begun. The fully-activated set did not betray Greem¡¯s expectations either. It had improved his power by an entire tier.


    After having the Chip appraise and gather data on the set, Greem was pleasantly surprised. Though each individual piece of Fire Throne was Second Grade magical equipment, they possessed terrifying might that could match Third Grade equipment whenbined.


    That meant that the Second Grade Greem finally possessed some abilities that allowed him to threaten a Third Grade powerhouse!


    The Third Grade thunder dragon opened his mouth and let out a blinding lightning breath that surged toward the orc shaman. Meanwhile, a sh of fire engulfed Greem¡¯s body, and he appeared thirty meters in front of the orc shaman with a massive bang.


    Powerful and searing elementium mes sted out of Greem¡¯s towering body, roasting the air and ground around him. The already crushed pebbles on the ground started to soften under the mes, and the earth became scorched.


    The orc shaman was only two meters in height, while Greem, after undergoing his Body of mes transformation and his me Fiend Transformation, stood at five meters tall. Hisrge body was covered in red-hot magma and roiling elementium fires. The pressing heat waves would suffocate any enemy that got close to him.


    The orc shaman immediately shot a beam of light at the bright red totem in front of him. A blinding red light then rose from the totem itself. In an instant, three Inferno Shields surrounded the shaman¡¯s body and helped him block the heat waves and fire from Greem.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it yet!


    As the orc shaman shot out a thick beam of light at the earth-yellow totem, a seven-meter-tall earth elemental rose from the ground and stood in front of him.


    The Third Grade thunder dragon¡¯s lightning breath hit the elemental square on its massive body. The violent lightning elementium and the sturdy earth elementium shed and neutralized each other. The advanced Second Grade earth giant disintegrated into a cloud of dust after just five seconds of being summoned.


    However, this buffer was more than enough time for the orc shaman to gather a massive fireball and hurl it at the Third Grade thunder dragon.


    This elementium fireball might only be at the level of a Second Grade spell, but the energy intensity within it was a whopping six hundred points. If this fireball were to make contact, it would hurt the Third Grade thunder dragon pretty badly.


    Greem stood up straight and coldly chuckled as he strode toward the shaman with heavy steps. The Burning Domain around him expanded and enveloped the orc shaman within its area.


    The shaman immediately roared and started gathering another fireball after throwing thest one.


    Unfortunately, the violent fire elementium gathered in his palms but didn¡¯t properly take shape.


    The orc shaman felt his mind flicker for an instant as he mysteriously ¡¯forgot¡¯ all chants and magical handsigns rted to elementium fireballs.


    Dammit! It must have something to do with the fire adept!


    A savage smile appeared on the shaman¡¯s cruel and terrifying face. He casually waved away the fire elementium in his palm and focused entirely on the water totem behind him.


    However, what shocked him was the fact that the typically subservient magical elementium had suddenly be unfamiliar to him. They were all stuck at the stage of elementium molding, incapable of forming into proper spells.


    Dammit, what magic was this! How could it interrupt someone else¡¯s magic-casting?


    The shaman was only stunned for a second, and a massive thunderstorm started to form around him.


    Unfortunately, Arms¡¯ lightning spell also failed!


    This domain of elementium interruption made no distinction between ally or enemy. All spells were restricted as long as they weren¡¯tposed of fire elementium. As such, Greem was the only one who could still cast magic within this domain.


    After several ineffectual attempts, the orc shaman immediately understood this to be the effect of the red domain around him. He no longer wasted any effort on the elementium totem. Instead, he grabbed his staff and rushed at Greem, waving it about with proficiency.


    Spells were only one of means for an orc shaman to attack the enemy. They were no weaker than an ordinary orc warrior when they wielded their staff in closebat.


    The Third Grade thunder dragon that had also lost his elementium abilities also roared and rushed forward.


    Even without his elementium powers, a thunder dragon¡¯s physical prowess was still one of the best among higher magical creatures!


    With the Third Grade thunder dragon as his meat shield, Greem raised his arms and concentrated the fire elementium into multiple fire spears. He then threw them at the orc shaman with all his strength.


    After activating Fire Throne and transforming into a me Fiend, Greem¡¯s Strength had reached a total of twenty points. Though he was still inferior to fighters who focused primarily on Strength, he was more than qualified as a human ballista.


    The fire spears cut through the air and flew at the shaman, forcing the orc to knock away the projectiles, even as he battled with the dragon.


    The fire spears each had four to five hundred points of power and could explode when they came into contact with the enemy.


    Without the thunder dragon¡¯s interference, the orc shaman could easily deal with such attacks. However, his only response now was to clumsily deflect them with all he had. The asional spear that swept past his defenses would knock him back and cause him to cry in pain as the fires burned him.


    Orc shamans might be tough, but they were weaker than thunder dragons of the same grade when it came to size and Strength. If it weren¡¯t for Arms being wary of the hefty staff in his hands, the situation of the battle would be overwhelmingly against the shaman.


    However, with Greem interfering in the battle as a ¡¯pseudo-Third Grade,¡¯ the orc shaman¡¯s situation plummeted quickly. Soon, he fell into the terrifying killing array of the dragon and the adept!


    The Crimson n members who had been cleaning up the surroundings of the battlefield were utterly shocked. They had never thought that their Second Grade n leader would dare to involve himself in a battle between Third Grade beings. Moreover, judging from how the fight was going, he yed a reasonably pivotal role.


    Mary, who was flying among the tide of undead, couldn¡¯t help but furrow her brows!

 Chapter 821 Witherwater City

    A pained and angered cry rang out on the battlefield. The orc shaman finally fell at the hands of Greem and Arms.


    Several Shield Defenders that had prepared ahead of time strode forward and dragged the shaman¡¯s scorched body and the dying roc to the backlines of the battlefield.


    Greem and Arms did not hesitate at all. After somemunication, they immediately rose and lunged at another isted Third Grade centaur.


    Meanwhile, Mary and Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder were also secretly hunting surrounded Second Grade orcs in other corners of the battlefield.


    In this situation where the witches had the absolute advantage, and the main forces of the orcs were being kept in the sky, there were no longer any powerful elites amongst the Second and Third Grades on the battlefield.


    The adepts were also proficient with strange and unconventional spells. Paired with the adepts¡¯ numerical advantage, orc powerhouses being surrounded and beaten was everywhere to be seen. As these orc elites were slowly dealt with, the already copsing orc army finally fell apart.


    War had always been so brutal!


    If the orcs had momentum on their side, they would dare tounch a more ferocious charge at the undead tide, even if there was only a hundred of them in total. However, once morale fell apart, the still twenty-thousand strong orc army started fleeing like panicking ducks.


    The higher-ups of the witches had already decided to take down Witherwater City. How could they possibly let these orc remnants escape as they wished? Under themand of the Death Witches, the undead tide started swarming in the direction that the orcs had fled in. Meanwhile, the half-shadow creatures appeared here and there, continually nking the retreating orc forces.


    The nar battlefield was a good fifty-five kilometers away from Witherwater City.


    The orc army had put aside most of their heavy siege weaponry after receiving the holy decree. They then made a long march to assault the witches¡¯ portal while lightly equipped. Unfortunately, after eight hours of bloody battle, all of it was for naught!


    Even if the orcs¡¯ Physiques were several times that of a human¡¯s, such a long ordeal hadpletely exhausted their stamina, making such an arduous journey an impossible one.


    Many orc warriors had already copsed on the ground from exhaustion. They had no strength to resist even when the swarm of undead dragged them into the horde.


    Defeat all the way back to the city; an utter defeat.


    The orc army was routed in such a decisive manner that it was a hard sight to bear!


    An even worse fate awaited the orc assault squad, who had now been surrounded by enemies. Their grades were not inferior to those high-grade witches, but they were definitely not the opponents of the witches in actualbat.


    After exterminating nearly half of the orc powerhouses, the witch leaders held a discussion. Death Witch Leader Khesuna would herd the tide and continue pursuing the survivors of the orc army. Meanwhile, Dark Witch Leader Circe would lead the shadow army on a straight march toward Witherwater City.


    Meanwhile, the weak Fate Witch faction would clean up the battlefield alongside the Coldwinter and Agony Witches. They would also be responsible for transporting the spoils of war to Witherwater City.


    The portal was already slowly closing after transporting all of the witches¡¯ forces.


    By the time all of the orcs and witches left the ins, the only things remaining here were scorched bones andrge pools of crimson blood.


    ............


    Witherwater City.


    The one in charge of the city¡¯s garrison was the leader of the Stonehammer Tribe¨C Dava.


    Over fifty thousand orc elites had been sent out of Witherwater City since they received the Beast God¡¯s decree. They marched fifty kilometers to attack the witches¡¯ portal. Meanwhile, Dava stayed in the city, gathering all fighting forces from the surrounding territories and keeping a close eye on the battlefield in the distance.


    Harpy patrols discovered the first batch of fleeing orcs at three in the afternoon.


    In the two hours that came after, Dava received bad news after bad news, each more terrifying than thest!


    The invading witch forces had defeated the orc army!


    The witch forces were using the undead tide to herd the orc remnants toward Witherwater City.


    And above all, what frightened Dava the most, was the mysterious disappearance of all wolfrider and harpy patrols he had sent in the other direction.


    ording to the military standards of the orcs, all patrols and lookouts were to send a report back to Witherwater City at specified intervals. But now, WItherwater City had lost all contact with the few watchtowers and lookouts outside the city. Even the troops sent to investigate had not returned.


    That...was undoubtedly lousy news that couldn¡¯t get any worse!


    It seemed the enemy intended to take advantage of the defeat of the orc elites to conquer Witherwater City. Dava saw the situation for what it was, but there was nothing he could do about it.


    After all, Xan¡¯tish Sharpfang had taken with him all the elite forces of the city. The remaining orcs might be capable of fighting, but theycked strict and proper military training. They were untrained soldiers, incapable of being formed into an effective fighting force.


    Upon understanding the severity of the situation at hand, Stonehammer Chieftain Dava could only put forth a conscription notice of the highest order. He mobilized all orcs and subordinate races of the city to take up arms on the walls.


    For a moment, a crowd gathered on the mighty and towering walls of Witherwater City. Squadrons of minotaurs with ck horns on their heads pushed heavy war machines on the ground, transporting them to the tower at the middle of the walls.


    Perhaps it was the ferocity and might of the orcs that caused them to enjoy brutal and frontal fights against the enemy. It was this ferocity and power that allowed the orcs to be the uncontested rulers of Strongwoods ne.


    However, it was precisely this style ofbat that caused them to regard war machines and strategy with disdain.


    Naturally, this wouldn¡¯t matter if they always had the advantage on the battlefield.


    However, now that the orcs were the weak ones and needed to fortify their city, this imperfection of theirs became exceedingly obvious and scary.


    When the orc remnants finally arrived at the outskirts of Witherwater City, their sad state of affairs shocked all of the onlookers. Anyone who saw the survivors couldn¡¯t help but gulp in nervousness.


    Packs of ghouls had emerged from the undead tide and were swiftly catching up with the orc remnants on a dusty road just a kilometer away from Witherwater City.


    The exhausted orcs could only choose to stay and defend, resisting the attacks of the undead army while desperately calling for help from the city.


    A terrible disagreement broke out in Witherwater City at the sight of this!


    These orc remnants were Witherwater forces, to begin with. Almost every orc warrior had rtives and friends awaiting their arrival inside the city. The defenders could no longer suppress their anxiety upon seeing their close ones enduring the attacks from terrifying undead just outside their city. Many of them rushed to the city gates, intent on opening them to save their loved ones.


    The defenders on the city walls shed with the emotional orcs, causing the morale of the garrison to drop.


    The highestmander of the garrison was Dava. He knew what the situation was, but he knew what he needed to do as well.


    If he refused to send troops to save these soldiers, then the heart of the people would be lost without a fight. However, if he were to send reinforcements, it would probably be what the undead tide approaching from the horizon was waiting for.


    Dava hesitated, but in the end, he could only sigh and order for the gates to be opened. A troop of three thousand soldiers was sent to rescue the surrounded orc remnants.


    This order was undoubtedly one of the reasons that resulted in the quick fall of Witherwater City!


    The army sent out of the city was a mixed team. The main force was an army of two thousand minotaurs. These minotaurs were supported by three hundred wolfriders, six hundred centaurs, and a hundred harpies.


    What greeted them outside the city were the ghoul army and wraith army that the Death Witches had specially prepared for this situation.


    Over a thousand wraiths descended from the skies at the start of the battle. They cackled coldly while turning their bodies intangible and charging into the orc army.


    Wraiths were a particr sort of beingposed of the dead¡¯s resentment and space substance. They didn¡¯t have actual bodies and were immune to most physical damage. Their attacks didn¡¯t possess any physical effects either. They could only use their chilling core of resentment to corrode their enemy¡¯s souls.


    Thus, their attacks all possessed tremendous soul-corrosion effects and could effectively drain the enemy of their Spirit, vitality, and soul energy!


    There were far too few amongst the orcs who possessed elementium powers, and conventional weapons could hardly injure the wraiths. Consequently, the semi-translucent wraiths dove through the arrows of the centaurs and the spears of the harpies. The wraiths stormed to their sides and plunged their ws into the enemy¡¯s body, frantically grabbing for something within.


    The centaurs and minotaurs attacked by the wraiths could not hurt them no matter how they waved their wooden pirs and spears. Instead, they were the ones who were rapidly losing soul energy beneath the attacks of the wraiths. They lost their ability to think or fight. Their bodies froze, and they fell to the ground.


    The appearance of the wraiths instantly introduced chaos into the orc army.


    At this moment, the ghoul army arrived from every direction.


    The minotaurs roared with bloodshot eyes and stomped the feet with their broad hoofs. The three-meter tall wooden pirs in their hands were waved about ferociously, smashing one ghoul after another to pieces.


    However, these ghouls did not fear death.


    They might be far inferior to the minotaur warriors in terms of Strength and Physique, but they possessed agility far above the enemy.


    The ghouls weaved up and below, dodging the wooden pirs and asionally tearing off a piece of meat from a minotaur or adding a new gouge to their muscr body.


    The ws and fangs of the ghouls were covered in terrifying poison. Even if the minotaurs were still going strong after being attacked, their stamina and Strength was unavoidably starting to fall.

 Chapter 822 The Battle for the City

    Many orcs crouched on the city walls.


    They looked on as their loved ones fought with the terrifying undead outside the city, and they watched as they failed to break free of the undead. This situation caused them to be increasingly worried and anxious.


    The harpies were fighting with the wraiths in the sky.


    The minotaurs, centaurs, and wolfriders were fighting with the ghouls on the ground.


    From the looks of the situation, the orc warriors were living up to their ferocious name. They were splitting the ghouls in half like cabbage and turning the monsters into mincemeat.


    However, the forces sent to reinforce the survivors of the war were kept four hundred meters away from each other. They could not gather together, no matter how they tried.


    At this moment, conflict abruptly erupted within Witherwater City.


    No one knew when, but hordes of ck shadow creatures with evident otherworldly traits emerged from various shadowy corners of Witherwater City. These shadow creatures immediatelyunched the most ferocious of attacks at the orcs closest to them.


    At this moment, the only ones left within the city were either women, children, or the weak elderly. Massive numbers of casualties started to appear when such a group of people suddenly faced these fierce monsters.


    The orcs that had been worried about their rtives outside the city immediately let out deafening roars. They charged down from the walls wildly and engaged these uninvited shadow creatures.


    A dozen Dark Witches had also infiltrated the city. They didn¡¯t confront these orcs in directbat. Instead, they relied on their shadow stealth abilities to move about the ce. Every time they reached a new area, they opened up a tiny portal to the Shadow ne at the foot of some wall. They would then summon a squad of apprentice shadow creatures from within.


    asionally, First Grade shadow creatures would be mixed within the ranks as well.


    Taking down a fortified city defended by fifty thousand orcs with these small fries was an impractical idea. However, they couldn¡¯t be more suited to introducing chaos into the orcs¡¯ ranks.


    All orcscked affinity with elementium. Apart from the orc shamans being capable of manipting and summoning some degree of elementium power, most of the otherbat professions relied entirely on physical attacks. Strongwoods ne fairlycked in magical resources. That caused the orc warriors tock any kind of magical equipment and resulted in them being unable to effectively and rapidly exterminate the shadow creatures.


    The unique ability of shadow creatures to ignore defenses and armor also resulted in many casualties amongst the orc warriors. Moreover, traces of shadow power would be attached to their wounds, making them incapable of healing until orc shamans dispelled the shadow energy.


    Thus, with an army of shadow creatures, the one dozen First and Second Grade shadow witches managed to create a massivemotion in Witherwater City and terrorize the orcs.


    Meanwhile, the Death Witches¡¯ undead tide could already be seen on the horizon. Bit by bit, they were flooding the orc remnants and their rescuers, both of whom were struggling outside the city walls.


    The massive undead horde did not pause at all. It crashed against the walls of Witherwater City like a dense ck tide.


    Witherwater City only had two city gates: the east, and the west. Watchtowers and bastions made up most of the towering walls, while powerful ballistae and rapid-fire crossbows could be seen peeking out from the battlements. Every one of the bolts on these crossbows was two meters long and as thick as a baby¡¯s arm. The bolt itself was forged with refined iron, making them gleam with a cold light in the day.


    As the tide closed in on the city, the bolts rained down from the walls, whistling through the air, passing through the undead, and turning them into skewers on the ground.


    This terrifying scene would have scared the wits and morale out of the attackers, had they been human. However, the undead of the witches had no such problem. They continued to howl and lunge at the twelve-meter-tall wall against the rain of arrows.


    The walls of the orcs were made of rough and hard stone. Countless sharp wooden stakes had also been ced on the wall. These stakes were meant to be used against therge-scale beast stampedes that asionally urred. No one had ever expected them to be used against these terrifying undead.


    The undead tide surged near the wall, gathering into clumps of flesh and pushing against each other as they tried their best to scale the wall. The zombies were exceedingly slow and had extremely clumsy movements. However, as the pile of bodies continued to grow in size, the undead started to extend toward the top of the wall slowly.


    The faces of the orcs who were throwing rocks down the wall were green with terror. Even their limbs were trembling from the very sight of the enemy.


    From their vantage point, all they could see were the reckless and vicious undead and their ugly mugs. These undead did not seem to know the concept of fear. They continued to reach with their filthy ws and howl at the enemies above them, even as rocks fell upon their heads and arrows descended on them.


    They were not living beings, only dead corpses moving under the effects of magic!


    If an orc were to be devoured by such undead, their soul would probably fall to the lower worlds for eternal torment, even with the blessing of the Beast God.


    It was such an understanding that caused these usually pious believers to feel a trace of fear from the depths of their heart. A strong desire to flee quickly followed!


    However, the savagery and strong will deep in the soul origin of the orcs washed away their fears immediately. The soldiers roared and continued their assault on the undead beneath the wall.


    The bows were firing, and oil was sshing everywhere.


    A single fire arrow followed, and a massive me erupted on the ground below.


    The pungent and vomit-inducing smell of burning corpses immediately filled the air.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and sigh as he watched from behind the lines.


    The undead army might be cannon fodder made by the Death Witches, but they couldn¡¯t be so recklessly thrown away either! nar warssted for a long time. One had to be prepared for a drawn-out conflict whenever they wanted to conquer a fully-developed ne.


    Now that the portal had been closed, these were all the undead that the witches had in Strongwoods. If all these undead were killed at the start of the war, what were they supposed to use to stop the real army of the Orc Empireter?


    It seemed like he would need to help the undead tide a little.


    With Greem¡¯s instructions, Split-Off Brain Gru once again led the Archers slowly toward the city walls. Gru stopped the machines once they had reached a suitable position. He then ordered the Archers to unleash all their firepower toward the top of the wall to suppress the garrison there.


    Three hundred Archers outfitted with magic energy guns stood on the spot and let out beams of red lights from their rifles. These volleys of shots, each with three hundred Scalding Rays, was more than enough to cover a sixty meter stretch of the wall.


    The orcs who had parapets to hide behind were fortunate and managed to evade this ferocious attack. However, the orcs who were throwing rocks at the undead beneath them were not so lucky. Their bodies were riddled with holes as they fell from above, crying in agony.


    Orcs were ferocious and fearless. Orcs were the most powerful and mighty warriors of Strongwoods ne! However, there was still nopensating for the massive gulf in equipment between them and their opponents.


    The equipment of the orcs was made of materials from the deste northwest ins. The inscked sizeable metal reserves as well as cksmiths skilled at forging excellent weapons and armor. Consequently, it was hard to find excellent equipment on an orc warrior.


    They only had their thin animal hides and their own tough bodies!


    The orcs might be powerful, but their bodies were still ultimately made of flesh. Apart from dodging as well as they could, there was nothing they could do to defend against the volleys of Scalding Rays.


    Dava, who was watching the battlefield from within a fortified bastion fort, punched the sturdy stone wall furiously. Crushed rock fell from the point of impact, where a massive crater had formed.


    "These damned witches, where did they find so many metal golems. No, we can¡¯t let the soldiers defend while under such concentrated fire. Go, tell the cyclopes that it¡¯s their turn to fight."


    A messenger immediately ran out of the room.


    A short momentter, a dozen cyclopes slowly ascended the city walls under the lead of another cyclops.


    Their appearance immediately attracted the attention of the witches below.


    Cyclopes that could throw boulders? It seemed that those were the only long-range forces of the orcs!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be anxious when he saw the cyclopes appear.


    These three hundred Archers were his main force in this nar war. Greem would probably die of heartache if they were destroyed at the hands of these Second Grade cyclopes.


    Thus, Greem grit his teeth and forced out augh. He lifted his hand and threw out two magical golem cores, summoning two five-meter-tall me Fiends. He roared and transformed into a giant me Fiend shrouded in mes.


    The sudden appearance of three me Fiends caused all eyes on the battlefield to fall on Greem.


    The two me Fiends of Terror followed Greem¡¯s lead on his left and right. The three giants walked before the Archers and started summoningrge-scale Scarlet Firestorms, Meteor Showers, and Doomsday Volcanoes at Witherwater City¡¯s walls.


    The offensive power of a Second Grade spell might be a limited threat to Third Grade creatures, but it was no less than an apocalypse for low and intermediate-grade orcs.


    Several meteors crashed from the skies, causing devastating damage to the walls in the distance as the me shockwaves sted outward. Scarlet pirs of fire, ten meters in diameter, erupted all over the walls, devouring two to three dozen orc warriors every time they appeared.


    These magical fires burned on the city walls. Those First Grade orc warriors were reduced to ashes in the zing mes without the time to call for help. Even the Second Grade orcs could only rely on their strong bodies to escape from the mes. Even then, their bodies were charred here and there.


    Moreover, these magical fires would not simply disappear. Instead, they continued to burn and even ignited the wooden siege machines on the city wall.


    Witherwater City was immediately thrust into chaos!

 Chapter 823 The Battlefield Settles For Now

    In terms of purebat prowess, Greem¡¯s existence in this battle was not outstanding in any way.


    However, as the universally acknowledged sweeper of the battlefield, fire adepts posed a huge threat to the enemy when they were allowed to cast their magic. In fact, they might be an even more significant threat than those high-grade adepts.


    Right now, three five-meter-tall me Fiends stood shoulder-to-shoulder, using their terrifying fire magic to engulf the entire stretch of the battlefield rapidly. The five hundred meters on this side of the city wall was plunged into a sea of fire in an instant.


    Fires zed as the sea of mes continued to rise.


    All the orcs who were engulfed by the mes either fell to the ground in agony or ran around madly while the fire ate away at their flesh. Still, the only oue was turning into scorched bones and ash.


    This tragic sight instantly roused the powerhouses of the orcs to action.


    Huhuhu!


    Six giant boulders, two meters in width, crashed down from somewhere on the wall.


    They flew straight at the me Fiends.


    Greem and the two me Fiends of Terror turned the direction of their firepower without any hesitation. First, a series of magma fireballs destroyed these boulders. Then, an even more ferocious volley of spells flooded the spot where the rocks hade from.


    Ah, ah!


    The unique cries and shrieks of somerge creatures rang out from the walls.


    The cyclopes had been engulfed in the sea of fire and could only escape, screaming in pain as they did so.


    Though the fires burned strong, they were sessfully able to escape to safety due to their sturdy Physiques.


    Unfortunately, the bastions and watchtowers on the walls were far too low. They could not hide the tall bodies of the cyclopes. Otherwise, it wouldn¡¯t be that easy for Greem to burn them either.


    The cyclops king was a Third Grade existence. How could he possibly be afraid of a mere Second Grade fire adept? The cyclops king let out a deafening roar. The one eye in the center of his eye shot out a yellow beam and created a massive boulder in his hands. He then threw the boulder toward Greem with all his strength.


    His powerful Third Grade strength caused the boulder to whistle against the wind. Its speed was so exceedingly fast that it even started burning from the friction against the air. A simple boulder now appeared like a meteor racing through the sky!


    The blue light gleaming deep in Greem¡¯s burning eyes started to send him ring warnings of danger.


    The enemy¡¯s attack was far too powerful. It was no longer something he could hope to stop with his fire spells!


    Greem roared, "Dodge." Meanwhile, he and his me Fiends instantly teleported away.


    The army of Archers standing behind Greem immediately scattered to either side under Gru¡¯smand.


    A massive boom rang out. The meteor crashed at Greem¡¯s original position, leaving deep marks in the ground as it continued forward. Two Archers at the rear of the formation couldn¡¯t avoid the meteor in time and were hit directly. Their bodies made of pure metal instantly exploded into countless metal shards and pieces.


    Another explosion rang out as the ming boulder exploded into thousands of rocks when it stopped rolling. An area of thirty meters square was engulfed in a sea of fire.


    Greem emerged from another area with a bang. His heart couldn¡¯t help but tremble slightly as he assessed this attack from the cyclops king.


    Third Grade creatures were Third Grade creatures, after all!


    Even though he only had the power of earth elementium, he had managed to unleash the might of both earth and fire through his raw, brutish strength. Moreover, the power of his attack rendered Greempletely speechless. If Greem had not dodged the attack, this boulder alone would have destroyed Greem¡¯s body and wipe out two to three dozen of the Archers hiding behind him.


    Just as thoughts of retreat slowly crept up on Greem, Death Witch Leader Khesuna arrived behind him on her corpse dragon.


    "Male adept, have your subordinates continue assaulting the city wall. We will deal with the enemy¡¯s attacks!"


    With Khesuna¡¯s assurance, Greem was finally relieved. He reorganized the Archers and started to bombard the top of the city wall with all he had.


    Even the Coldwinter Witches had formedbat parties and gathered where Greem was. They too were using their ice magic to ravage the garrison on the city walls.


    Thisbination of ice and fire instantly plunged the Witherwater garrison into a hell of extremes.


    There was a sea of mes on one side and a rain of ice des on the other. The orcs had a difficult time just staying atop the wall.


    The enemy¡¯s barrage instantly stifled the orc defense. The orcs could only be bothered to dodge the terrifying spells. They had no more effort to spare to deal with the undead horde swarming up from below.


    Greem immediately capitalized on his advantage and started to extend the bombardment even further, keeping the orcs inside their watchtowers and bastions. The undead tide that climbed up the wall quickly spread out and shed with the orcs lunging at them.


    Perhaps because they had realized the destructiveness of these elementium adepts, the orcs immediately sent some powerhouses to deal with Greem secretly. Unfortunately, they ran into the most powerful person on the witches¡¯ side.


    How powerful was Death Witch Khesuna? Greem might not have known this before the battle today, but he had a thorough understanding now.


    One couldn¡¯t underestimate her for being a witch. She was far more savage and ferocious than most male adepts.


    Khesuna forcefully beat a Fourth Grade orc demaster and a Fourth Grade centaur ambushing in unison. In fact, one died in the end, while the other escaped with severe injuries. Such immense power was beyond Greem¡¯s imagination!


    With the defeat of the garrison and the deaths of the powerhouses, a massive vacuum of military presence had appeared in Witherwater City, which was still suffering from the attacks by the shadow creatures. Thus, the horde of undead swarmed into the city and started ughtering the orcs.


    Some of the orc powerhouses had long since escorted some of the citizens out of the city and toward the in when they first saw the winds turn. However, nearly thirty thousand orcs were still trapped in Witherwater City. They were now sheep to the ughter with nowhere to run.


    By the time night fell, Witherwater City had changed owners. It was now a city under the rule of the Northern Witches.


    The unruly orcs had already been dealt with and turned into magical materials for creating new undead. The remaining orcs were forced to be tragic and pitiful ves under the witches. They became vebor used to conductrge-scale reconstruction of Witherwater City.


    The sea of fire on the city wall had been extinguished and the undead tide quickly stationed themselves on top of the wall. They now yed the part of loyal lookouts. The various witch branches entered Witherwater City and started to search for the rumored spoils recklessly.


    Strongwoods ne was indeed an unbearably impoverished ne!


    Almost every single orc could fight. As such, they very rarely hunted or toiled the earth. These lowly jobs were left to the subordinate races. That meant the orcs were a scary andbative, yet unproductive, race! They had relied purely on their barbaric strength to enve and rule over all others in the ne!


    Unfortunately, this time, they had run into a steel wall. They had run into the even more powerful, even more organized, and even more advanced Nothern Witches.


    Those who could cross the nar door to arrive in Strongwoods ne were almost entirely elites among the Northern Witches. It was only natural that the orcs were the ones getting crushed when such a powerful force shed with the tiny Witherwater City.


    It indirectly demonstrated the might of the Northern Witches!


    Night fell, and cold winds descended.


    It was unusually cold and miserable near the outskirts of Witherwater City during the night.


    Alice¡¯s Fate Witches had been assigned to the northwest corner of the city.


    That had been the manor of an orc powerhouse in the past. However, times had changed now, and it was no more than a temporary shelter for the Fate Witches.


    The buildings of the orcs were typically made of rough gray stone. They appeared to be tall and magnificent but were in truth crude and raw upon closer inspection. After all, the orcs hailed strength as beauty and prided themselves on their rough manners. They weren¡¯t as appreciative of beauty as the humans and elves were.


    Consequently, their architecture had no aesthetic appeal norfort to speak of.


    It was a massive manor of a Fourth Grade orc powerhouse, and there were no luxurious goods to be seen. There were only simple furniture here and there.


    Still, the orcs had quite a lot of ves in their manors. Moreover, they were of various races.


    For instance, butlers responsible for ounts were of the rabbit people, cooks of the boar people, and maids of the rabbit, fox, and snake people. These subordinate races weren¡¯t as courageous or bloodthirsty as the orcs. Instead, they were like fearful and cautious worms.


    They did not even know how to resist the undead when they attacked. Apart from shutting their doors and hiding under their nkets, they could not do anything else. That was why they surrendered without any hesitation when the witches executed an orc powerhouse before their eyes.


    When Greem stepped into the manor with his subordinates, trembling silhouettes could be seen kneeling on each side of the door.


    At this moment, all orcs that dared to rebel against the witches had already been ughtered.


    The witches had only kept the subordinate races here to take care of their daily needs. After all, the undead tide was only suited as cannon fodder. Asking them to cook food and heat water was an impossible task.


    Greem had already returned to his human form now. His ck eyes swept through the crowd of people and discovered no abnormalities. He then turned to his subordinates and said, "We have worked hard for an entire day now. Let us have a simple rest here! If any of you are interested in them, you may take them away as you please."


    Having said that, Greem hastily entered the manor.


    He couldn¡¯t be bothered even to dine or wash himself. He ordered someone to clear out a room for him before lifting the corpse of the Third Grade orc shaman into the room.


    Right now, Greem was extremely interested in the tattoos and totems of the orc shaman.


    He had a feeling that his understanding of magical tattoos would significantly improve if he could decipher the secrets behind these tattoos!

 Chapter 824 On the Stage, Behind the Scenes

    The Crimson adepts immediately became active after seeing Greem leave.


    It was a rare experience toe to a different ne. Moreover, the adepts had just obtained a massive victory. They were understandably excited and couldn¡¯t help but want to express this in some manner.


    Their gazes swept across the otherworldly ves in the courtyard and couldn¡¯t help butnd on the maids with pretty faces and exceptional figures.


    Hmph! Those damned orcs sure did know how to enjoy themselves.


    This thought appeared in the minds of more than one adept.


    These servants were all beautiful and seductive. It wasn¡¯t hard to tell why their masters had chosen them as servants.


    In truth, the existence of these maids truly opened the eyes of the Crimson adepts.


    Who would have known that they could be so pretty? Those green-skinned orcs were all rough and coarse in appearance, so much so that it was hard to look at them straight. However, these girls of the subordinate races were utterly different from the orcs. They had a very attractive, exotic charm to them.


    The rabbit girls all had a pair of snowy white ears that drooped behind their head, giving them a charming appearance. Their faces were smooth and white, with two light dimples and a pair of snow-white teeth when they forced a smile. It was easy on the eyes.


    Meanwhile, the foxdies all had shapely faces, slender waists, and a long, fire-red tail behind them. Their hips swayed as they walked, giving them a very different charm.


    Still, the most unique of them all was the snake girls. Their upper halves were women, while their lower halves were in the form of a snake, long but equally as beautiful. In particr, their strange jade eyes and full breasts covered in thin snake scales were particrly eye-catching.


    The four Crimson adepts that followed along with the group were new recruits that had submitted to the n after thest n war. Naturally, they didn¡¯t dare to fight with Mary and the other core adepts over the ¡¯spoils.¡¯ They could only wait eagerly by the side while waiting for Mary and the others to choose.


    Mary could have been said to have given her all in today¡¯s battle. She had feasted on plenty of enemy blood. Consequently, she was exhausted now. She waved listlessly at the rest of the adepts and went to find a room to rest.


    As a Third Grade thunder dragon, Arms could not change the promiscuous nature of his being. He immediately chose three of the rabbit girls, four of the foxdies, and a snake girl. It was then that he left the hall, crowded by all these women.


    As a green-skinned goblin, Tigule¡¯s sense of beauty waspletely different. He could not possibly have any interest in these ¡¯ugly¡¯ females. Thus, he gave up his choice and found a ce to rest.


    Only Wind Adept Deserra was licking his lips greedily.


    However, in consideration of his image in Dana¡¯s eyes, he had no choice but to bear the pain and give up on his selection as well.


    Medusa Dana didn¡¯t seem to care for Deserra¡¯s intentional ttery. Instead, her eyes circled those snakedies who looked much like herself. Surprisingly, Dana waved her hand and took away all five of the remaining snakedies, leaving the four new adepts to feel pity that they couldn¡¯t do the same.


    After a simple discussion, the four new adepts split up and took away the maids that they liked.


    For a moment, the sound of promiscuity could be heard throughout the entire manor. It was the moaning of pretty servants in beds everywhere!


    ............


    In a brightly lit room.


    The corpse of the Third Grade orc shaman wasid upon a tough wooden table.


    The animal hide robe he wore had already been taken off, revealing the muscr body and violet tattoos beneath.


    Greem lightly pressed against the shaman¡¯s chest. It didn¡¯t feel like flesh to the touch at all. Instead, it felt like cow leather that had been treated over and over again, robust and sturdy.


    It was an innate trait of the orcs¨C hard skin.


    Their skin could even resist shes from sharp weapons after some training. This way, the orcs were practically wearing a thickyer of leather armor even when they were unarmored. It could allow them to be immune to sixty percent of shing and piercing damage, along with twenty percent of blunt force damage during battle.


    That was a decent racial ability, no matter how you looked at it!


    Greem¡¯s nimble fingers slowly moved about the orc shaman¡¯s body. With the help of the detailed Chip¡¯s scanning abilities, all of the orc shaman¡¯s bones, veins, organs, and secret acupressure points appeared before Greem¡¯s eyes.


    Orcs were truly orcs, after all. The shaman had ayer of tough and tight-knight muscles beneath the skin.


    Judging from the Chip¡¯s data, the toughness of the orcs¡¯ muscles were ten times that of elves and a hundred times that of humans. Just this point alone could allow one to easily imagine how much destructive power an orc warrior could have when fighting with all his strength!


    Beneath the steel-like muscles were the extremely dense and thick bones. These bones were extraordinarily thick and even. Exceedingly deep veins wrapped around these bones, allowing the orcs to evenly distribute all force they took across their entire body, reducing the damage and pressure that the bones themselves had to endure.


    The organs of the orc shaman were also starkly different from the humans of the World of Adepts. They might seem somewhat simr, but upon detailed dissection, Greem found that the orcs in Strongwoods ne were utterly different from the orcs he had seen in other nes. These were two races of entirely different lineage.


    To avoid damaging the orc shaman¡¯s tattoos, Greem did not do a direct dissection. Instead, he had the Chip perform aplete scan of his body.


    The strange totems of the shaman were ced beside him.


    Though the totems had lost their original elementium activity following the death of the orc shaman, Greem could sense traces of some mysterious power lingering on them.


    Divine power.


    Though the power was weak and unfamiliar, Greem had undergone a nar war in Faen and instantly recognized the true origin of this magic.


    It was divine power!


    In the end, orc shamans were the believers and practitioners of Beast God Aruger in the mortal realm.


    The power they possessed wasn¡¯t cultivated by them, but was gained through pious prayer and pleasing the Beast God.


    These orc shamans didn¡¯t know how to gather and release elementium powers by themselves. It was a divine blessing they had obtained by praying to Aruger. In all seriousness, every single elementium attack that the orc shamans unleashed in battle was transmitted from Aruger through the faith system.


    That handily exined why Greem¡¯s Burning Domain so easily disrupted the orc shaman¡¯s elementium spellcasting abilities. The main reason wasn¡¯t Greem obstructing the elementium particles from gathering. Instead, it was because he had managed to disrupt the orc shaman¡¯s faith channel with the Beast God deep in his soul.


    That meant the orc shaman had lost the protection and blessing of the Beast God. It was the real reason why he had lost the fight!


    "Chip, you are done scanning the tattoos and the carvings, right?"


    [Beep. Both three-dimensional patterns have been stored in the data library. Comparisons are now being conducted and analyzed. A basic conclusion will be obtained in an estimated 23 hours, 48 minutes, and 14 seconds.]


    Another twenty-three hours.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but yawn. He finally felt the exhaustion in his Spirit.


    He had been fully involved in the bloodbath today. He had even been the most ferocious cannon during the siege, turning half of the city wall into a sea of fire by himself.


    That undoubtedly took an immense toll on his Spirit!


    Now that he finally got to rx, Greem immediately felt worn out.


    Greem did not directly go to rest. He was the Crimson n leader after all. Thus, he went to talk with Gru, who was wandering about the orc manor.


    As a monster and someone who didn¡¯t even personally participate in the battle, Gru had no possibility of being exhausted. Thus, the magical machines surrounded the manor under hismand, keeping a tight guard over the ce.


    Greem finally went to sleep in his room after doing all this.


    ............


    Pompes City.


    As the capital of the Strongwoods Orc Empire, Pompes City was a holy city in the hearts of all orcs.


    In particr, a towering and magnificent Beast God temple stood in the heart of the city.


    Currently, countless orc shamans sat within thergest hall of this temple. They were furiously shouting and bickering with each other.


    "This is the holy decree of the Beast God. The enemy is the terrifying witches who havee here with the intent to destroy our ne. We absolutely cannot allow them to find a foothold in our world." A Fourth Grade shaman roared madly.


    "We know this, but Witherwater City has already fallen. We have lost a hundred and ten thousand orcs for this purpose." An elderly orc with a purple-gold crown on his head replied worriedly.


    "A sacrifice like that is nothing. As long as we beat the invaders, Lord Beast God will definitely reward you greatly. When that happens, your family and your people will obtain the eternal blessing of the Beast God." Another Fourth Grade shaman loudly ¡¯consoled.¡¯


    Under the various threats and promises of the high-grade shamans, this elderly orc had no choice but to sign on the parchment they had presented him and adorn it with his seal.


    With this parchment, the orc shamans could finally mobilize all military forces in the name of the Orc Empire. They couldmand these forces to engage in onest deciding fight against the witches!


    Once the orc shamans exited the hall with great excitement, the elderly orc king turned and kneeled before the towering statue of the Beast God. There he prayed, anxiously and softly, his face contorted with sorrow.

 Chapter 825 - Greems Harvest.

    Chapter 825 Greem¡¯s Harvest.


    Greem was woken up by the strange notification sound of the Chip.


    He slowly emerged from his deep meditative state and was immediately flooded by a series of messages and notifications.


    [Beep. Detected unknown energy resonance system. Data iplete.


    [Beep. Detected unusual means of soul repose. Data being collected.


    [Beep. Detected otherworldly versions of energy amplifying arrays. Models have been recorded.


    [Beep. Detected otherworldly versions of life amplifying arrays. Models have been recorded.


    [Beep. Detected otherworldly versions of energy-gathering systems. Models have been recorded....


    [......]


    A series of notifications instantly flooded Greem¡¯s mind, putting him in a temporary daze after waking up from his meditation.


    Greem took half a day before managing to take a look at all these notifications. They were mostly strange arrays that the Chip had discovered and extracted from the orc shaman¡¯s tattoos and totems. These arrays might differ from the magical array system of the World of Adepts, but they functioned in much the same way. Thoroughly researching them would pose a tremendous benefit to Greem and his understanding of magical patterns.


    Greem¡¯s own Strength was still too weak. The amplification to his bodily power after two transformations had only been his basic insurance in multiple fights against powerful enemies. If his magical pattern knowledge system could improve by leaps and bounds, it would allow him to improve his current me Fiend Transformation tattoos. It would undoubtedly be of tremendous help in all battles here on out.


    It was precisely this reason that caused Greem to be so interested in the tattoos of the orc shaman!


    Of course, trying to figure out the origin of the tattoos¡¯ magic, true visual observation and simple imitation was no more than fantasy, like attempting to fish the moon out of a well. However, byparing the tattoo patterns with the adepts¡¯ magical pattern studies, Greem could find their simrities and differences. That could allow him to obtain quite a lot of new knowledge and inspiration.


    The magical pattern studies developed in a different ne ording to a different system of power had to have unique traits. Still, it was possible to pursue the origins of the most fundamental of the magical patterns.


    The magical pattern studies of the World of Adepts was mostly the study of three-dimensional magical arrays. They very deftly utilized the magical runes hidden within the array to cause resonance with the elementium particles in the air. In doing so, the arrays could guide and focus the elementium into a terrifying power that could even change the material world.


    That was why mastering high-grade and variation runes became the only way to improve in the field of magical pattern studies in the World of Adepts!


    However, the magical pattern studies in Strongwoods ne still retained the chaotic and primal runic systems that the ancient adepts had used in the past. With the modifications and changes made by the Beast God Aruger, these simple magical patterns gained the strange ability tomunicate with the gods to construct faith channels and deliver divine energy.


    Orc shamans used the seed of divine magic bestowed upon them by the Beast God in tandem with their life energy system to unleash their elementium magic and supernatural abilities.


    Orc shamans might have some advantage over adepts when it came to Physique and Strength, but they were far, far inferior when it came to the most essential trait of spellcasters¨C Spirit. Whenparing orc shamans and adepts of the same grade, their Spirit could often be ten to fifteen points lower. It resulted in them being incapable of unleashing powerful spells and being liable to exhaust their Spirit too rapidly in battle.


    To work around the awkward reality of orc shamans having a terrible elementium affinity, Beast God Aruger bestowed upon them the remarkable Soul Repose ability. It allowed them to split off part of their soul and ce it within the totems. They could then use the totems to rece themselves as additional sources of energy.


    With the totem pirs, the orc shamans no longer needed to worry about theck of elementium energy during battle. Moreover, with the aid of the totems, any orc shaman could instantly be a caster of all four attributes. That allowed them to have more options and more logical magicbinations in spellcasting battles.


    However, everything had two sides!


    These blessings caused the so-called orc shamans to beplete servants of the Beast God.


    Their power came solely from the great Beast God Aruger. If their actions infuriated Aruger, the god could punish them and cut off the faith channel with which they obtained their divine magic seed. The orc shaman would then instantly be reduced from a powerful and revered spellcaster to a lowly orc with nothing to his name.


    This power obtained without work was like a terrifying addiction. It was impossible to rid oneself of it once you were addicted.


    No orc shaman could bear the emptiness of losing power, and even less so the rapid plummeting of their status in society. To protect their status and power, they would only crouch even more before the feet of great Beast God Aruger and loyally offer up all they possessed.


    Unlike the development of civilizations in other worlds, nar worlds affected by the various gods were often stuck in a state of suspended development and regressed technology. Excessively prosperous and advanced lives could very easily cause believers to ¡®fall into depravity.¡¯ They could be lost in the advancement of technology, resulting in their faith and respect in the gods weakening.


    That was why almost all worlds that were ruled by the gods would be stuck forever in a primal and crude society. The followers that fervently believed in their gods lived within an ordinary and in society. Bitter conflict and severe societal issues continued to exist between the various sses.


    The effect of scarce resources caused their lives to be harsh and miserable. One had to work ten times, a hundred times, harder to barely feed themselves and live on in poverty.


    Even so, it was all this suffering that caused the nobles, who were favored by the gods and therefore enjoyed a good life, to be the target of envy of all others. Those lowly peasants in the lower sses would have only one way to climb the socialdder and lead a genuinely luxurious and opulent life. They would have to try their very best to win the favor of and please Beast God Aruger.


    That was why the more disasters and suffering that a god brought down upon a ne, the more believers they would be able to gain. That further allowed them to purify the members of their core believer group.


    It had undoubtedly be the standard process of ruling for all gods!


    For example, Strongwoods ne had been ruled over by Beast God Aruger for over ten thousand years. Yet, the current state of its society was still the rtively crude and primal tribal system.


    They might have established the mighty Orc Empire and defeated the military forces of all other races. However, their civilization and societal system were like a tiny bug suspended in ancient amber, forever locked at a particr stage by the god high above them.


    Numerous races had tried to rise again in Strongwoods ne, but the Orc Empire had defeated all of them by virtue of their overwhelming might. Moreover, the Orc Empire and its poption of seven million became thergest ve owners of the ne, holding the leash to all other races. They did nothing productive, but possessed the bestnd, enjoyed the best resources, and abducted the beauties of the various species for their carnal pleasure.


    It was their suppression and violence that caused the primal societal state of Strongwoods ne to continue as it was for tens of thousands of years. Otherwise, if even a weak race like goblins could develop to such a scale, there was no reason that the society of Strongwoods ne should still be so crude and primal!


    Whether the gods were a bane or boon to a nar world was truly hard to tell sometimes!


    It was precisely because they saw through all these tricks and deceit of the gods that the adepts, who prided themselves as the incarnations of intelligence and wisdom, had such an unharmonious rtionship with the gods.


    To maintain the purity and singrity of faith in their nes, the gods strictly forbade the entry of adepts into their worlds. That was to prevent the spread of any ¡®evil¡¯ knowledge. After all, no adept could naturally be born from a primal and chaotd. Even from their very nature, the gods and adepts were at odds with each other!


    Both parties would fight to the death when they ran into each other, with no possibility of yielding ground.


    The information Greem had received from Alice revealed the real reason for Death Witch Khesuna¡¯s rallying of the Northern Witches into Strongwoods ne. It might appear to have been vengeance for the Beast God destroying one of her lesser nes. In truth, it was because of a conflict that had broken out between the beast god pantheon and the Great Witches in the outer realms.


    These two forces went back and forth, destroying each other¡¯s nes and assassinating the opponent¡¯s leaders. Hundreds and thousands of nar worlds had been dragged into the conflict of these two factions.


    In all seriousness, Khesuna was herself responding to the deration of war put forth by the Great Witches. Otherwise, she would never have had anything to do with the Beast God¡¯s ne, trillions and trillions of kilometers away. Most of her territory was within the World of Adepts, after all.


    When Khesuna led the Northern Witches into Strongwoods ne, the Great Witches were also intercepting a squad of reinforcements from the beast god pantheon. Why else had the Northern Witches not run into any clones or incarnations sent down by the beast god pantheon, despite having been here for more than thirty hours?


    Still, the perimeter of the Great Witches wasn¡¯t wholly imprable. If the war dragged on, the gods of the pantheon would be able to find ways to cast down clones. This war of the witches would be much more difficult.


    After all, a clone cast down by a god might be Fourth Grade, but their knowledge andbat techniques were far superior to a Fourth Grade witch trapped within a ne. Thus, even the powerful Khesuna had to be concerned about the possibility of fighting against the same-grade clone of a beast god.


    On the third day of holding Witherwater City, Khesuna gathered all the various witch factions and started assigning elite squads to destroy the Beast God temples located all over the Orc Empire.


    As long as these powerful faith nodes were destroyed, the beast god pantheon would lose their foundation to descend upon Strongwoods ne, even if the Great Witches failed to stop them. At the very least, the clones and incarnations of the gods would be much weaker without the support of these faith nodes. They would not be as strong as they usually were!

 Chapter 826 - Embark on the Journey

    Chapter 826 Embark on the Journey


    In truth, this was a necessary step in the invasion of all god nes!


    The first step was to find a way to send scouts into the ne through the use of spatial rifts. They were to function as agents there.


    This step might be risky, but as long as the agents could adapt to the changes in situations, they had a rtively high chance of sess.


    As every single ne was different and unique, the agents either had to have a powerful ability to defend themselves or the ability to assimte into the local society. Otherwise, they would have trouble traveling the alien world and finding a suitable location for teleportation.


    The scouts that had entered the Strongwoods ne this time were a coalition group of Death and Deceit Witches.


    After determining the teleportation point, the second step was to work from both within and outside the ne to open the portal and allow the invading forces to enter.


    It was undoubtedly the riskiest step of all!


    The scouts had entered the enemy ne through the use of natural spatial rifts inside the ne or other simr paths. These paths were not only narrow but extremely dangerous. They did not allow any truly powerful individuals to traverse them. Only some small ¡®rats¡¯ could jump in and out of these rifts.


    Dozens of incidents of nar invasions would happen to every ne on an annual basis. Most of these ¡®invaders¡¯ were just unfortunate fools who had been identally dragged in by spatial turbulence. Of course, some amongst them were nar travelers who were journeying everywhere across the world!


    The local magical creatures would probably devour the weaker ones among these travelers before they could even walk out of the wildnds. The more powerful ones might be able to stir some trouble and hide in certain areas.


    However, if the identities of these people were exposed, they would most definitely be faced with the full force extermination of the local ruling creatures of the ne.


    As such, entering the ne from a spatial rift might not be able to attract the gods¡¯ attention. However, if someone was trying to open a stable portal within the ne that led to a different world, the unusual spatial flux could not be concealed from the powerful gods who had mastered the narws.


    That was why the first thing the invading party had to deal with upon crossing the portal was the massive swarm of natives who hade to kill them. The brutality of nar wars was proportionate to the forces of the ne¡¯s locals!


    The nar invasion that Death Witch Khesuna organized this time had been very sessful. It wasn¡¯t until the nar portal hadpletely stabilized that Beast God Aruger gave his holy decree and rallied the nearby orc believers to intercept them.


    Unfortunately, Witherwater City could not be considered a significant city in the Orc Empire. The strength and power of the believers here were limited, and it was why the invading witch forces had so easily beaten them. They lost not only all of their elite forces, but also Witherwater City itself.


    Now that they hadpletely taken control of Witherwater City, the witches couldn¡¯t wait to push the nar war into the third phase.


    It was an all-out attack; a wild assault to destroy all foundations of faith in the Orc Empire!


    The witches would send out hundreds of parties consisting of hundreds of undead across the vast realms of the Orc Empire. These undead were to invade and exterminate orcs wherever they went, attacking whatever viges they ran across. Meanwhile, the orc cities and towns with a little bit of size would have to be personally dealt with by the witches. They would either do so through gue or fire. Either way, no chance of reprieve would be afforded to the orcs.


    Meanwhile, the Fate Witches led by Alice were assigned three orc cities to deal with. They were all small cities with a poption of thirty to fifty thousand. These cities were all on the same marching route and were ideally suited as targets to be destroyed in a single go.


    It wasn¡¯t just the Fate Witches. The other seven witch factions were also assigned simrpulsory missions to exterminate orcs and destroy the Beast God¡¯s temples. Inparison, the task left to the Fate Witches was rtively easy. Take, for example, the Death Witches. As the ones who had started this nar war, they naturally had to shoulder a greater and more difficult burden.


    A powerful undead expedition army prepared to march on Pompes, the capital of the Orc Empire, under the leadership of a Fourth Grade Death Witch. They would try their best to anchor the main military forces of the Orc Empire near the capital and prevent them from disrupting the ns the witches were making at Witherwater City.


    They hadn¡¯t invaded the ne to conquer it; they were here to destroy it. As such, the witches would arrange an extremely ¡®grand¡¯ blood ceremony in Witherwater City. They would use a special method to taint and destroy the nar origins of Strongwoods ne. This process required an astonishing amount of ¡®native materials.¡¯ It also required the witches to send troops to search the surroundings and capture native orcs.


    Greem and the others only stayed in Witherwater City for a short two days before packing their bags and embarking on their journey toward the mission location.


    Three hundred and eighty-nine magical machines and thirty magic energy chariots carryingrge amounts of resources brazenly marched into the distance under the escort of two hundred eyeballbat machines. The apanying goblin engineers and technicians also became the operators of the chariots and the ones who maintained the magical devices. The existence of Split-Off Brain Gru, on the other hand, provided the army with the capacity for sustainedbat.


    What appeared in front of them upon exiting Witherwater City was a boundless in.


    Deste and quiet, with withered grass quivering in the wind.


    When one stood upon the only dirt road of the in and looked around, they would only be able to see tall grass around them. The official road wound on and stretched into the grass, extending into the distance.


    The orcs were almost all barbaric people with brawns for brains. Naturally, they would not understand the importance of convenient transport and traffic to a ruling ss with a vast territory!


    Though there were quite a lot of wise individuals among the subordinate races, their status was lowly, and thus their words were of no consequence. They could not possibly convince the orc rulers to take a tremendous effort, time, and resources to construct and maintain important roads within their territory.


    Thus, the only road before Greem and his soldiers was this uneven, dirt road full of wild grass and moss.


    When the magic energy chariots, each six-ton heavy, rumbled across the middle of the dirt road, two deep wheel ruts marked the ground. The magical machines stowed all their weapons and ran alongside the chariots with uniform steps.


    The tops of the chariots had been opened, revealing the helmets and heads of the goblins with goggles on their faces. They had pairs of binocrs hanging from their necks which they would asionally lift to their eyes to look around them.


    However, the grass here was too dense and tall. The goblin lookouts would not be able to find any enemies even if there was a squad of orcs crouching in the grass right beside them.


    Something whistled through the air, sending wild winds rippling across.


    An eyeballbat machine the size of a human head rapidly dashed across the in. The wild currents it propelled out of its body blew the grass about violently. Suddenly, it dove down from the sky and stopped three meters above the grass, as if it had made some discovery.


    A blinding Scalding Ray shot into the grass.


    A short momentter, the eyeball machine dove into the grass. When it returned to the skies once again, it held a furry brown rabbit in its small robotic arms. A hole had appeared on the rabbit¡¯s head. It couldn¡¯t be any more dead!


    The goblin lookouts in the chariots all let out some soft cheering.


    They would have fresh rabbit meat for today¡¯s lunch.


    The army continued down the winding dirt road quickly. Their numbers were many, but they were still traveling at a shocking forty kilometers per hour.


    Pirs of thick ck smoke could be seen in the distance along the way. Every column of smoke represented an orc vige that had been baptized by the undead. The orc civilians caught in the nar war were either killed by the undead and joined their number, or they were abducted to Witherwater City and turned into a sacrifice for the blood ceremony.


    To these orc civilians, both options meant the end of their lives and the loss of their home.


    Fairness, justice, and rights were no more than a luxury in this terrifying universe where might made right!


    The magical machine squad sprinted at a high pace, asionally running into witch squads that were heading in the same direction. These witches were either riding on giant ve beasts or herding their voodoo beasts, making haste toward the destination of their mission.


    Whenever Greem¡¯s party ran into such a group, they would quickly split off on their separate ways after a short greeting.


    The witches that were slowly ¡®crawling¡¯ on the ground couldn¡¯t help but be envious when they saw the army of the Fate Witches thunder past their sides with their tight formation and excellent weaponry.


    If it wasn¡¯t out of consideration for their servants and voodoo beasts, the witches could quickly fly five hundred kilometers in a single day. However, this was a different world, not the safe and peaceful World of Adepts. As such, they could not put aside the guards and voodoo beasts that ensured their safety.


    That, in turn, severely limited the mobility of the witches.


    The high-grade witches might dare to move freely, fight whenever they wanted, and retreat to safety whenever they liked. However, most of the First Grade witches on their side did not have the courage or ability to do so. Their chances of survival and retaliation were not pretty if they ran into orc powerhouses without the protection of an army of voodoo beasts.


    They were here to conquer and destroy this world, not to die!


    That was why they would rather go slower than risk their lives and venture into where orc powerhouses were active.


    Compared to that, the Fate Witches¡¯ ride was both safe and fast. It made them both envious and jealous.


    All the witches knew the situation of the war now!


    The main reason that they were having such a leisurely time was due to their actions catching the Orc Empire by surprise. After exterminating the Witherwater City army,rge orc cities and armed forces could not be found within five hundred square kilometers.


    The Orc Empire would have to take the effort to rally stronger armies from distant ces if they wanted to extinguish these witches. However, with the broken and primitive road systems of Strongwoods ne, it would take them weeks to do so.


    That was why the quicker the witches could finish their respective missions, the safer they would be.


    If they dragged it out for too long, they were likely to run into orc reinforcements during their mission. When that happened, it would be the witches¡¯ turn to flee in a hurry!

 Chapter 827 - Elegy of the Orcs

    Chapter 827 Elegy of the Orcs


    The journey had also allowed Greem and the others to truly witness the valiance of the orcs!


    Whether it was the orc wolfriders that formed groups and came howling like wild beasts, or the lone orc warrior intent on ambushing stragglers from the witch forces, every one of their actions could not escape the eyes in the sky.


    If it were just a solitary orc, a volley of Scalding Rays from the sky would be enough would turn them into skewered meat. If there were too many attacking orcs, the magical machine army would be able to rapidly spread out and fortify their position with a warning from the eyeball machines. They could then put up plenty of terrifying magic energy cannons. The Archers would nk either side of the chariots and bombard the orcs¡¯ position with their rifles.


    The wolfriders were courageous. They endured the rain of cannon fire and charged across the ins with their vicious wolf mounts, roaring and waving the gleaming des in their hands around. Meanwhile, the orc warriors were naked from the waist up, lifting their wooden shields in front of themselves and waving their crude wooden sticks as they strode after the wolfriders.


    The dense volley of cannon fire exploded in the grass, and the violent me shockwaves ravaged outward, sending bits of grass, dirt, and dust flying everywhere. The wolfriders were mostly dressed in leather armor with a wolf helmet on their heads. Their defenses were so crude that it was hard to take them seriously.


    Even slightly harder clumps of dirt would leave bruises on their bodies, let alone the magical mes. When the fire engulfed these wolfriders, they and their wolves would instantly be ignited. They could only roll on the ground and cry out in pain then.


    With the eyeball machine in the sky pointing out their position, the orcs were exterminated from a distance before they even entered within range of vision. Some courageous fellow might asionally charge out of the bushes despite the odds, but they would instantly be blown to bits by a magic energy st to the face.


    The orcs were well-known as a race with no elementium affinity. It was hard to find a trace of any magical weapon throughout the Orc Empire, let alone magical essories distinguished by their more refined and delicate artistry. Trying to brave the pration of magic energy beams with their strong bodies and without any external magical resistance was no more than a joke!


    It wasn¡¯t that the orcs were not courageous or that they were not terrifying enemies. Rather, all of these became inconsequential when their enemies were powerful adepts from a different ne. Apart from falling to the ground and howling in agony, they could do nothing to the magical machines.


    Overwhelming defeat. It was a tantly overwhelming defeat!


    Even the powerhouses amongst the orc tribes could not escape being bombarded by the magic energy cannons if they appeared within one and a half kilometers of the army.


    The adepts continued forward, ughtering as they went!


    The orcs wildly and recklessly assaulted this magical machine army, sustained by the unique bravery and savagery of their race. Unfortunately, the difference inbat power between both parties was too significant. It left the orcs with no means of realizing their courage and martial might. Their assaults had turned into tragic acts of suicide.


    The Crimson n adepts stayed inside the magic energy chariots in veryfortable conditions. They smoked cigars and drank wine as they slowly appreciated the sight of the struggling orcs through their monitoring crystals. The only enemy that disrupted their peace was a Third Grade orc demaster.


    This orc relied on his sharp senses and amazing speed to break through the outer perimeter and reach the chariots.


    After which, he very tragically ran into Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms and interrupted his happy times.


    This Third Grade thunder dragon had no discretion. He even brought his concubines along with him when he went out on missions. Still, he did not hesitate at all when he saw the Third Grade orc demaster. He immediately transformed into his thunder dragon form after charging out of the chariot wrapped in bedsheets.


    The Third Grade demaster wasn¡¯t a fraud either. Every sh from his long and narrow de would easily split open the outer armor of the magic energy chariots. However, his fortune was spent when he ran into the ill-tempered Thunder Dragon Arms.


    This orc demaster¡¯s heart was also beating wildly, having suddenly seen a thirty-meter long dragon and experiencing his intimidating aura of might up front. He desperately increased his speed and circled the thunder dragon. He would asionally take advantage of the thunder dragon¡¯s size and his immobility in the formation of chariots to dodge the dragon¡¯s attacks and close in for a few hasty strikes.


    The shes of the orc demaster might not have broken through Arms¡¯ scales, but they did manage to make him wince in pain.


    Thunder Dragon Arms finally flew into a rage after failing to kill the opponent despite his repeated attempts at attacking. He had even been cut a few times.


    The next time the orc avoided his head and charged from the side, Arms quickly activated the wild lightning elementium in his body.


    The blinding lightning that emerged from his body instantly flooded his surroundings. The orc demaster that had juste near him was immediately caught in big trouble.


    The blinding lightning storm went away just as fast as it came. The orc demaster stumbled away from Arms by the time the lightning was gone. Scorch marks left by the lightning covered his entire body, and some parts were even giving off ck smoke.


    The orc demaster that had been severely wounded by the thunder dragon ultimately became a prisoner of the adepts. Meanwhile, the thunder dragon quickly transformed into his human form and rushed back into the chariot after obtaining victory. The sweet voices of women could be heard from within. It seemed like he was receiving the praise and adoration of his many concubines.


    In all honesty, the concubines that could follow Arms out of Witherwater City should genuinely thank him. If it weren¡¯t for the Third Grade dragon, they would have been left in Witherwater City and be sacrifices for the impending blood ceremony.


    When that happened, their fates would look very much different!


    ............


    Makren City.


    It was a small border city located in the southeast area of the great in.


    The orcs in the city were no more than thirty thousand in total. Moreover, at least half of them were centaurs who herded animals in the wild for the Orc Empire.


    Naturally, there was a small Beast God temple in the city.


    The fate of Witherwater City had reached the orcs of Makren City one day earlier.


    Just as the orcs summoned the seven leaders of the subordinate races to discuss the matter of attacking Witherwater City, news of a witch army rapidly approaching Makren from the official road arrived.


    The intercepting squads sent out by the orc viges along the way had all been defeated. Even the famous Third Grade Orc demaster, Sadin, had been captured alive by the witches.


    The council room, previously lively with calls for marching toward the witches, immediately froze upon hearing this news!


    The entirety of Makren City put together only had one Third Grade berserker and five Second Grade powerhouses. Moreover, it was said that there was a Third Grade dragon hiding among the ranks of this approaching witch army. If this news was to be trusted, how were to supposed to fight back?


    Just this Third Grade dragon alone would be enough to wipe out all the orc elites of Makren City, let alone the terrifying adept who couldmand this dragon!


    If humans were the ones confronted with this situation, then there was no doubt that the higher-ups of Makren City would choose to run or surrender. Unfortunately, these two words had never existed in the orc dictionary. That was why the orcs decided to resist to the very end and swore toy their lives to defend the temple of the great Beast God, even if they knew they were outmatched.


    Half a dayter, the magical machine army of the Crimson n arrived at Makren.


    The orcs might be courageous, but they weren¡¯t simple-minded enough to charge out of the city and engage with the powerful witch army on the in.


    They hastily pulled up the drawbridge, shut the city gates, and drove arge group of centaur spearthrowers up the city walls. With the deep ditch, the tall walls, and the ferocious spear-throwing of the centaurs, they were confident they could keep the enemy outside the city walls. After all, the centaurs could pierce stone and metal with their spears as long as the target was within fifty meters.


    Sadly, their enemies were no ordinary opponents. They were apletely mechanized magical machine army!


    The orcs holing up behind the walls were just where Greem wanted them.


    With Greem¡¯s orders, the three hundred and eighty-nine magical machines moved into formation a hundred meters outside the city gates. Twenty magic energy chariots arranged themselves in a row behind the magical machines. The ear-piercing sound of rumbling metal rang out, and four robotic arms appeared out of both sides of the chariots, pinning them firmly to the ground. ck cannon barrels then emerged from the tops of the chariots.


    Magic energy cannons. Each was four to five times more powerful than the magical energy beams shot out from the rifles, with an offensive might of up to 170 to 210 points. That was already at the level of an all-out attack from a First Grade elementium adept.


    More importantly, the attack range of the magic energy rifles was only thirty to three hundred meters, while the range of the magic energy cannon was as high as seven hundred meters. Consequently, Greem had never intended to have the magical machine army assault the city directly. Instead, he intended to have some artillery action with the intent of minimizing casualties.


    Once the magic energy chariots switched to their long-ranged cannon forms, blinding clusters of red light started to gather inside their cannon barrels. Seven secondster, the chariots trembled as the fire-magic energy bolts turned into massive fireballs and shot out of the barrels. They cut across the sky with a red streak, flying past the city wall andnding in the city.


    Twenty magic energy chariots, twenty fire magic energy sts; giant fireballs devoured the entirety of Makren City in an instant.


    The Crimson adepts emerged from their chariots one by one and observed the city from behind the formation. They could only see clusters ofrge fires erupt all over the city, shaking the stone buildings and lighting up the sky.


    The entire city was instantly plunged into a sea of fire!


    The orcmander crouching on the city wall and peeking down from behind a parapet felt a chill run down his entire body. Even his heart felt the cold.


    What was it that the witches had brought with them? How had they managed to shoot fireballs from such a great distance?


    Just as he intended to give the order to attack, he regretfully realized that even the closest metal giant was a hundred meters away from the wall. The centaurs would have a tough time hitting the enemy from such a distance, even with their arm strength.


    Even as the orcmander hesitated, an even more shocking and horrifying incident urred.

 Chapter 828 - The Fall of Makren City

    Chapter 828 The Fall of Makren City


    Under the orders of a strange five-meter metal giant, all the magic energy chariots slowly adjusted their cannon fire and targeted the centaur forces on the wall, along with all the parapets and bastions.


    ¡°Hurry and dodge!¡±


    The orcmander had to shout at full volume to be heard, but his voice was still drowned out by the deafening cannon fire.


    The entire four hundred meter stretch of the wall was engulfed in exploding fireballs.


    The limbs and organs of countless centaurs and orcs flew into the air. One after another, the watchtowers and bastions crumbled in shes of fire, the terrified screams of orcsing from within.


    ¡°Attack...attack! All-out attack!¡±


    The orcmander shouted out hisst order with a hoarse and cracking voice as he witnessed the apocalyptic sight before him. His towering body was then blown to pieces in an exploding st of me.


    Staying on the walls and defending the city was no longer possible. All the orcs would be sted to death before they even touched the enemy if they didn¡¯t find a way to charge forward now.


    Countless lithe and agile silhouettes took to the skies from the zing walls.


    They had strange bodies and brownish-gray wings. They held wooden spears in their hands and flew at tremendous speeds.


    Harpies. It was the harpies!


    Greem had already prepared for this only air force of the orcs.


    The harpies had just taken to the skies and had not even gotten into formation to prepare to dive at the enemy. Just then, a hundred eyeballbat machines whistled through the air and charged at them. What apanied the eyeball machines was a dense storm of Scalding Rays.


    The harpies could not be considered as having strong bodies amongst the orc forces. Moreover, to lighten their flight weight, they were not equipped with metal armor. Their only weapons were five short throwing spears and a single wooden spear. Their typical method ofbat was to fly above the enemy before raining down spears from above. Once they had exhausted all of their spears, they would then wield their three-meter long wooden spears and dive at the ground.


    Such abat tactic might be effective against enemies without air forces, but it was no more than a suicidal move against the magical machine army.


    When the frail bodies of the harpies ran into the volley of Scalding Rays, it was a sad sight that one couldn¡¯t even bear looking at. Several valiant harpy warriors continued to climb even higher but were immediately intercepted by eyeball machines.


    Red Scalding Raysnded in the ranks of the harpies. Almost every single attack could ground one of the harpy warriors. The pitifully crashing harpy warriors mmed down heavily upon the hard dirt, like sacks of potatoes. Their internal organs ruptured instantly as they spat out blood on the ground, while the rows of Archers harvested what was left of their lives.


    The towering drawbridge fell with a thud. The half-meter thick wooden gates were pushed apart, and a swarm of orcs stormed out of the city.


    Greem had aplete grasp of the enemy¡¯s movements, and he had already made preparations for the situation. Ten of the magic energy chariots continued to bombard the city walls, while the other ten turned their cannon fire toward the city gates. Ten giant fireballs exploded in the ranks of the horde of orcs before they could even cross the drawbridge.


    Blood everywhere, limbs all across the ce...


    The valiant orcs were met with a painful blow the moment they exited the city and before they could reach their enemies. Those who managed to make it across the drawbridge despite the cannon fire were immediately greeted with a barrage of hundreds of energy beams.


    The orcs, with their wide-open eyes and warhammers in hand, were riddled with holes after just a few steps. They stumbled forward, blood continuing to pour forth from all the holes in their bodies.


    Finally, they fell to their knees and their chests, but continued climbing forward with all their remaining strength.


    A second volley of energy beams swept across the field, and the grim battlefield fell silent once more!


    When the might of two opposing parties were on entirely different levels, personal courage and bravery could no longer affect the development of the battle.


    Hordes of orcs charged out of the city, one after another, and one after another they fell to the ground.


    Again and again, bloody and cruel!


    However, regardless of how the orcs charged, they could not make it across that invisible line. They could not touch that row of mighty metal giants. The enemy¡¯s cannon fire was simply too ferocious; so ferocious that their bodies of flesh and blood could not stand it.


    Finally, after leaving thousands of corpses in front of the city gates, the orcs retreated into the city, wailing in pain and sorrow. The magical machine army took the opportunity to extend the range of their cannon fire and bombarded the tall structures that remained in Makren City.


    The orcs hid on the other side, at the bottom of the wall, wooden shields over their heads. They were enduring the beating bitterly, waiting for the moment the enemies charged into the city. Since they couldn¡¯t make their way out, then they would wait until the enemy entered the city to engage them in urban warfare. With the ferocity and courage of the orcs, they would be able to tear a few pieces of meat off of the opponent in closebat, even if the enemies were made of metal and steel.


    Unfortunately, they underestimated Greem¡¯s resolve, as well the terror of the magical machine army with Split-Off Brain Gru behind them.


    Gru¡¯s metal body stood in the center of the magical machine army. Beams of blue energy connected himself to the surrounding magical machines at all times. Both the Archers and magic energy chariots could obtain sufficient magical power from the energy ribbons.


    The magical machine army had no risk of running out of energy as long as he was around!


    Not a single orc or any member of their subordinate races could be seen throughout therge Makren City. Everyone was hiding in the shadows and under the rubble, enduring the repeated bombardment and cleansing of the magic energy cannons.


    The eight-meter-tall city wall finally crumpled under the constant bombardment of twenty magic energy cannons, copsing into rubble and stone. The eyeball machines that had exterminated the harpies formed groups and flew into Makren City. They hovered twenty meters above the ground and quickly searched for all remaining life in the city.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the copsed stone walls or the scorched houses. The eyeball machines could deftly weave through the destruction and use their sizzling Scalding Rays to sweep every dark corner they found.


    The surviving orcs used all the tricks they had left against these eyeball machines, throwing their axes, casting theirs, or simply jumping into the air. The numbers of the eyeball machines also started to decrease with this effort.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Earthshaking footsteps echoed throughout the battlefield.


    Rows of magical machines entered the city in a loose formation, stepping across the broken stones of the city walls and the burnt beams of the houses. They didn¡¯t spread out or attempt to search those dark and narrow ces. Instead, they fired a goblin rocket at whatever life response they detected through the strange gems fitted into their eye sockets.


    A dozen energy beams instantly shredded any orcs that charged out of the darkness.


    Almost all the buildings in the city had been razed. Even the rare house that remained standing could not endure the attacks of the magical machines. They destroyed everything in their path. Walls copsed, and houses fell, bing dust on the wind.


    If they ran into orcs that continued to resist by hiding behind tough watchtowers, the magical machines only needed to call for another round of bombardment from the magic energy cannons. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. It waspletely silent once again!


    Nearly a hundred magical machines raised their rifles and arrived at the small Beast God temple. Thest remaining two thousand orcs and centaurs of Makren City had fortified themselves here. They formed a human wall with their bodies and faced off against the magical machines in a sad and desperatest stand.


    After two hours of constant rifle and cannon fire, there was no longer an unharmed orc and centaur among them. Even the Third Grade orc berserker was covered in blood. The animal hide on his body had been scorched ck by the mes. The Second Grade orcs around him also carried various wounds, blood streaming down their faces and their limbs.


    At this moment, the orc berserker was standing at the very front of the formation. He carried two giant double-edge war axes on his back while holding arge and rough tribal g in his hand.


    There was no wind in the city, but the g had wholly unfolded. It showed the image of an orc raising a warhammer and shouting toward the sky.


    Greem slowly stepped onto the battlefield with his many Crimson adepts. They stood a hundred meters away and coldly faced off against these orc remnants. The orcs¡¯ eyes were bloodshot, and they stared at each and every adept with eyes of immense hatred.


    The Warhammer Tribe based in Makren City was done for!


    They had lost their city, their territory, their people, and their warriors. Soon, they would lose the only faith of the orcs that now stood behind them¨C the Beast God temple.


    ¡°Adepts, why do you attack our cities, ughter our people, and raze our temples? Why?¡± Perhaps knowing that they were facing a dead end, the orc berserker¡¯s voice was hoarse and filled with sorrow.


    ¡°There is no why. The reasons might be many, but I have no need to exin them to you. You and I are only chess pieces with no true agency. Your responsibility is to defend this city, while mine is to destroy this ne. As for a reason? Who really cares about that?¡± Greem replied coldly.


    The orc warrior knew he would not get the answer he wanted from Greem¡¯s mouth. Thus, he waved the g in his hand and nted the thick post into the ground. He reached behind his back and grabbed his axes before roaring and charging at Greem.


    The orc berserker let out an intimidating battlecry as he rushed forward. His originally two-meter-tall body once again swelled in size and became even more muscr. His ck feet let out a great sound every time they stepped against the ground. From a distance, it sounded like thundering war drums.


    Pupupu!


    A series of Scalding Rays hit the orc berserker¡¯s body like burning metal rods. The orc berserker only lifted his axe and protected his face against the attacks. He then jumped forward, allowing the Scalding Rays to crash against his body.


    The Scalding Rays that could pierce through walls only left small red dots on the orc berserker¡¯s ck body; they could not pierce through his tough skin.


    A wicked smile appeared on the berserker¡¯s face. A faint light shone across his axe as he shed forward quickly. The axe was only two meters long and could not reach the magical machines which were two to three dozen meters away. Yet, as the light left the weapon, a half-meter long ripple instantly passed through the bodies of five Archers.


    The magical machines stopped firing, and metal parts and pieces exploded like fireworks.

 Chapter 829 - Beast God Temple

    Chapter 829 Beast God Temple


    The orc berserker was ughtering in a frenzy.


    His mouth widened to reveal a wicked and contorted smile, not unlike that of a beast. The arms waving his axes had be much thicker, and his swelling muscles continued to squirm as the thick blood vessels beneath the skin twisted and turned.


    A brutal yet explosive power started to surge wildly through his body with the blessing of some divine power. His mind was quickly washed of all rationality. He only wished to ughter his way into the crowd and destroy everything that he did not like.


    The silhouette of an orc raising a warhammer and shouting at the sky could be seen on the orc berserker¡¯s now erged back. It was just like the image on the tribal g.


    The already ferocious orc warrior became even more unstoppable after obtaining the blessing of divine power!


    His bare feet thudded against the ground with every step, leaving cracks and craters in the earth. The axes in his hands moved with every step. Not a single magical machine could endure the attacks of the Third Grade orc berserker and the terrifying slicing ability of those odd ripples.


    In all honesty, the ripples the orc berserker was sending out weren¡¯t a strange magical ability. It wasn¡¯t a knight battle technique created with thebination of life energy either. Instead, it was pure, violent strength!


    The orc berserker¡¯s Strength was now at thirty-seven points. That was already a great and unstoppable level of Strength. At the very least, Strength of equal level could hardly be found within the ne.


    As such, with every wave of his axes, the orc¡¯s violent power would wildly press against the air at the de of the axes. The air would then bepressed into visible ripples before spreading outward toward the enemy. This way, the orc berserker managed to create an alternate form of long-ranged attack using his superior Herculean strength, despite having no such long-ranged abilities of his own.


    These ripples might not be able to reach far, but they were unstoppable, violent, and easy to use within two to three dozen meters!


    He pushed forward, wreaking destruction and havoc wherever he went!


    The First Archers were like matchstick men before the Third Grade orc berserker. They were blown to bits with the slight contact. They couldn¡¯t even dy his advance, let alone stop it.


    In the past, the First Grade magical machines had always been the ones to crush the enemy with their powerful strength and indestructible bodies. Today, they had be the ones being crushed by the orc berserker.


    The entire battlefield was brutal and terrible!


    The orc berserker might be in a frenzied and irrational state, but he still knew that his greatest enemy right now was the human adept in red robes, with red hair and ck eyes. As such, even as he ughtered the enemies around him, his body, erged to the point of contortion, continued to charge toward Greem.


    A hundred meters was no more than seven or eight seconds to a Third Grade orc berserker.


    In a single instant, he cut his way through the formation of Archers and arrived in front of Greem.


    Seventeen magical machinesy down behind him, either split apart from the waist, shoulder, or even crushed to pieces. Not a single one of them remained intact.


    A series of explosions rang out!


    Ugh!


    An axe whistled through the air and shot toward Greem, carrying with it four waves of air ripples, one horizontal and three vertical.


    An attack of this level couldn¡¯t be defended against with magical defenses.


    That was the main reason why most spellcasters did not enjoy engaging fighters in closebat!


    Most of the spells that spellcasters used were only a result of concentrating elementium power. That was the case even for single-target spells. When the spell hit the target and exploded, it was still considered a divergent and scattered force.


    However, all fighting professions were capable of condensing their strength again and again. Even when theyshed out with their attacks, the power would not be scattered, and all the force would be gathered at a single point. This skill gave fighters the unique ability to prate and break through defenses far more effectively than spellcasters!


    As a Second Grade adept, Greem¡¯s magma shields might be able to endure two to three magical attacks from an adept of the same grade. However, they could not block a close-range strike of a fighter of the same grade.


    When faced with the reckless strike of a Third Grade orc berserker, he teleported away without any hesitation.


    Boom! A fiery explosion rang out.


    As the halo of fire erupted, Greem¡¯s towering body appeared in an empty spot a hundred meters away.


    Mary let out a battlecry and turned into a crimson shadow, fast as a phantom, and engaged the orc berserker.


    It was an ¡®engagement,¡¯ but in truth, the orc berserker was the only one attacking wildly; Mary was putting her all into dodging.


    After increasing her power to advanced Second Grade and experiencing repeated run-ins with powerful enemies, Mary had already umted some strategies and techniques to deal with high-grade enemies.


    The orc berserker in front of her might have thirty-seven points of Strength, but his Agility was no more than eighteen points. Such attributes might allow the orc to decimate First Grade creatures, but his wild attacks could not catch up to Mary¡¯s agile form, with her twenty-seven points of Agility.


    However, Mary had also tried countless times to strike with her corrosive blood ws as she circled the orc. She had no way of prating that invisible life forcefield around him.


    In high-magic worlds, invisible forces such as Spirit and life could also form a terrifying force when they reached a certain degree of density. In particr, when life energy was significant enough to distort space and maic fields, an invisible life forcefield would be formed.


    Mary could rely on her high Agility to avoid the orc¡¯s clumsy and violent attacks while she was outside of the forcefield. However, if she were to enter within range of the orc¡¯s life forcefield, any moment of hesitation or mistake could spell disaster for her.


    With the offensive power of this Third Grade orc berserker, a single hitnded on Mary would crush her to bits and pieces. An attack like that might not be able to kill her instantly, but she was not willing to taste such horrifying pain!


    The battle between Mary and the orc berserker thrust the battlefield into chaos.


    All the Crimson adepts and magical machines had to dodge the violent air ripples that were flying all over the ce!


    One hundred meters away, Greem roared as three six-meter-tall me Fiends of Terror rose from the ground, once again bing the focus of allbatants.


    ¡°Kill.¡±


    Greem let out a deep roar and gave his order. The army of Archers and Shield Defenders charged forward from every direction andunched a charge at the final remnants of the orcs.


    Therge and ferocious body of the Third Grade thunder dragon was particrly eye-catching amid the charging machines.


    Upon seeing this high-grade magical creature that should only exist in legends, the orc berserker¡¯s frenzied will paused for a moment. His irrational mind showed signs of turning back in the face of the oppressive dragon¡¯s aura of might.


    However, the effect of the orcs¡¯ barbaric and violent soul origin caused the orc berserker to remain enraged.


    He roared furiously at the Third Grade thunder dragon beforemencing a death charge toward Arms.


    The battle finally concluded after thirty minutes.


    As expected, the orc remnants were beaten down by the magical machines with many, many casualties. Once the final orc warrior standing before the temple was defeated, the battle concluded.


    When Greem¡¯s zing body appeared before the temple doors, three frail and skinny orc shamans stepped into his path, shivering in fright.


    A 1.8-meter tall orc shaman might be reasonably tall for a human, but they were as small as dwarves before giants when facing off against a six-meter tall fire humanoid.


    Greem lowered his head, his bright-yellow burning eyes staring at the orc shamans in front of him. He spoke sarcastically with a loud and prideful voice, ¡°A Second Grade and two First Grades; what is it? Do you intend to stop me with your puny bodies?¡±


    The one day and night of praying had exhausted all the stamina and Spirit of the three orc shamans, but what truly made them despair was their inability to contact the great Beast God. It was almost as if they had been interrupted by some potent interference. They had already lost the necessary connection with the main temple in Pompes, let alonemunicating with the great Beast God Aruger.


    Without the blessing of the Beast God, the orc warriors¡¯ strength in battle had regressed immensely. If it weren¡¯t for the Beast God temple having stored a bit of faith power before the fighting, it probably would have copsed in the fierce bombardment earlier.


    Now, the only Third Grade orc berserk in the cityy in a puddle of blood. The Third Grade thunder dragon that had fought with it was covered in wounds as well, but it was recovering quickly with the careful treatment of the adepts. The other orcs had either died in battle or were maimed beyond recovery; they could no longer help defend the temple.


    At this moment, the three of these old and weakly orc shamans were the only ones in Makren City who could stop the enemy from advancing!


    ¡°Evil invaders. As long as you leave this ce, we can choose not to pursue your past misdeeds.¡± An orc shaman, as skinny and frail as an elderly human, shouted with all his strength.


    Purple and ck spots that came from aging covered his bony body. Just these few words had left him gasping for breath. The noise from his chest was like a squeaking old bellow.


    One could tell that he wasn¡¯t far from death just by looking at him.


    However, the pride and glory of the orcs that surged through his body kept him standing before the me giant, stopping the monster from walking forward with his own frail body.


    ¡°Pursue? Hahaha,¡± Greemughed out loud as if he had just heard the funniest joke in the world, ¡°You might not have heard this clearly earlier, so I will tell you again. We aren¡¯t here to invade your people.


    ¡°We are here to destroy this ne!¡±


    As Greem¡¯s loud voice rang in the hall, his zing magma hand smashed downward.

 Chapter 830 - Ancient Secrets

    Chapter 830 Ancient Secrets


    The once lively Makren City was now a stretch of ruins.


    Apart from the stones and tiles that couldn¡¯t be burned to ashes, all the wood of the buildings had been put to the torch in the great fire.


    The magical machine army finally started searching for spoils under themands of the goblin engineers once the fire had been extinguished and the temperature of the ce had cooled down slightly. Greem did not involve himself in this process. Instead, he brought the Crimson adepts straight to the Beast God temple and started a careful, serious investigation of every inch of thend and every single pattern to be seen.


    The power system of Strongwoods ne was starkly different from that of the World of Adepts.


    The orcs ce more emphasis on unearthing the potential and explosiveness of the physical body. They believed in and followed the Beast God Aruger and, in turn, obtainedrge numbers of divine blessings from him. However, most of this divine magic was used to improve their Physique and sustained explosiveness. They were considered auxiliary blessings and could not be used asbat techniques.


    Moreover, the orc shamans didn¡¯t fixate on the acquisition of knowledge and techniques like the adepts did. Instead, they devoted themselves entirely to the praise and worship of Beast God Aruger. As long as they could win the favor of the Beast God, they could increase their grade through divine power and strengthen themselves through its use.


    That was why the Beast God temples were the only way for orc shamans in Strongwoods ne tomunicate with and contact Beast God Aruger!


    Greem and the others destroyed the temple in Makren City. No one in a hundred-kilometer radius of this ce could obtain the divine blessing of Beast God Aruger. If the Beast God¡¯s divine power did not empower the orcs of Strongwoods ne, they would only be a group of slightly stronger beasts against the witches. They would no longer be of any threat.


    If one were to think of Beast God Aruger as the source of their divine magic, then the Beast God temples were divine power ry stations. It was through the temples rying divine power that the surrounding orc viges could obtain the chance tomunicate with the Beast God using their own crude Beast God altars.


    It was what was known to the adepts as the channels of faith.


    These channels of faith worked both ways. They could gather the faith power of the orc believers and transfer it to Beast God Aruger. They could also feed back Aruger¡¯s divine power upon his believers. The grander the altar, the broader the channel of faith.


    The small Beast God altars of the orc viges could, at best, transfer First Grade power. Therger orc towns could transfer Second Grade power. Meanwhile, medium and small cities like Makren and Witherwater could only transfer power as high as Third Grade.


    Throughout the entirety of the Orc Empire, including the main temple of Pompes City, there were only threerge altars capable of transferring Fourth Grade power!


    As long as the Northern Witches avoided these three areas and survived the first wave of retaliation from the orcs, they would have plenty of confidence in finishing this problematic mission of theirs.


    As a veteran of nar invasion, Greem had a profound understanding of this entire process himself.


    However, at the moment, he had devoted all of his attention andprehension to the analysis and research of the Beast God temple before him.


    If ordinary orcs were simple one-way receivers, then the Beast God temples were control and ry tforms capable of receiving and sending out power. Greem was genuinely fascinated by how a temple could be capable of such a feat.


    If he could figure out the principles behind it, he might, with the help of the Chip, be able to gather the power of his subordinates or even his own power and send it all to another individual or another group of individuals.


    Greem had once learned from a tome that a group of extremely special arcanists existed in a particr corner of the multiverse.


    As spellcasters, they too were capable of freely casting spells, much like mages, adepts, and sorcerers.


    However, the main factor distinguishing them from mages and adepts was their exceptional ability to gather power across many different individuals. They were able to share the most minute of power to all their allies and collect everyone¡¯s strength for their use. That made spellcasting extremely easy for them and meditation much less difficult.


    It was said that the greatest inventions of the arcanists were their two terrifying magical facilities: the magic pools and the spell pool!


    The magic pools were just as they were named. They were unique facilities used to gather magical energy.


    With these magic pools, the arcanists no longer needed to meditate and umte magic energy, nor did they need to spend year after year slowly improving their Spirit. All the additional magical energy from their daily meditations would be stored in these magic pools. When they fought against enemies, they could draw on the pure magical power of the pool through unusual methods.


    The effects of the spell pools were simr. The only difference was that they did not store pure, chaotic magical energy, but formed and solidified spells.


    The arcanists regrly stored spells that they did not require in their spell pool daily. They could then draw on these spells when needed. This way, they had all the magic power and spells they could ever need, turning every single arcanist into a terrifying spell cannon. They could wear down and exhaust any opponent of the same grade with their constant barrage of spells.


    However, such arcanists also had a huge w. Their Spirits would always be lower whenpared to opponents of the same grade. If the opponent managed to disrupt their soul connection with the magic and spell pools, then their power would instantly regress from a master of magic to a mere apprentice.


    Consequently, to avoid being separated from their magic pools and spell pools, the Great Arcanists (Eighth Grade) put in the research and developed a strange arcane tower that could follow them around the world.


    In such a manner, the Great Arcanists rapidly rose to be an exceedingly powerful force in the multiverse!


    Sadly, these arcanists that loved knowledge more than their own lives ultimately fell at the hands of a certain powerful god. The great Arcane Empire that they had once established vanished just like that, leaving plenty of ancient ruins in the depths of various nes waiting for others to explore and excavate.


    The reason they were defeated was all because of a mighty Goddess of Magic.


    The Arcane Empire was prosperous and powerful then. To obtain magical apprentices with better elementium affinities, they invadedrge and small nes under the rule of various gods with no discretion at all. They spread arcane knowledge as they wanted throughout these nes and cultivated magical apprentice as they liked.


    Naturally, the powerful gods of the World of Gods were not happy with this and fought plenty of times against the arcanists. Unfortunately, with the aid of their many magical facilities and arcane towers, even the main gods had a hard time defeating the powerful Great Arcanists.


    In the end, some arcanists even took their quest for knowledge to the extreme; they started to capture gods to research their secrets.


    The World of Gods would not have been so furious if the arcanists had only been fighting over nes and believers against the gods. However, when the arcanists turned their eyes toward the gods themselves and started to dissect them as if they were lowly magical creatures, they became unprecedentedly furious!


    Yet, what could do they do? They could neither beat the arcanists nor win in a conflict against them! The powerful gods that had lived for several hundreds of thousands of years got together and started discussing. They came up with an extremely sinister and terrifyingbat n.


    With the cooperation of the various gods, a Goddess of Magic with the power of a main god (Eighth Grade), willingly destroyed her own god kingdom, scattered her believers, gave up on her immortal god body, and reincarnated as a small girl with amazing talent.


    This reincarnated girl ¡®happened¡¯ to be discovered by the arcanists, who brought her back to their arcane towers and cultivated her into a magical apprentice...an arcanist. She became a high-grade arcanist and, finally, the youngest Great Arcanist in history.


    Moreover, she started promoting a sort of vast magicalwork after bing an apprentice.


    It wasn¡¯t until that she had be a Great Arcanist that her ground-shattering idea was picked up upon by the other Great Arcanists. Together, they started research on thiswork.


    The young and pretty arcanist hoped for all Great Arcanists to offer up the magic and spell pools of their arcane towers in the spirit of sharing. They would then use these powerful arcane towers as the foundation to construct a strong magicwork that could cover the entirety of the multiverse.


    This way, be they Great Arcanists, high-grade arcanists, or even ordinary arcanists, they would be able to tap into the magicwork wherever they were in the multiverse. They could then arm themselves with the powerful magic in the magic and spell pools to defeat all enemies.


    This tremendous and wondrous n from the mouth of the pretty young female arcanist instantly moved all of the Great Arcanists. With the support and promotion of all these Great Arcanists, the construction n for the magicwork promptly started.


    After a thousand years and thebined power of fifteen Great Arcanists, they finally managed the preliminary construction of the magicwork. Tomemorate this young and pretty girl arcanist, they decided to use her arcane tower as the core to activate and run the entire system.


    Unfortunately, at the most crucial moment of the ceremony, the girl who functioned as the host of the magicwork willingly sacrificed herself and detonated the entire magicwork.


    As the magicwork had now connected the arcane towers of all the Great Arcanists, and they, all the intermediate and high-grade arcane towers, disaster struck. This shocking explosion engulfed all arcanists and their arcane towers.


    Without a doubt, most of the arcanists died in that explosion, including the Great Arcanists!


    Meanwhile, the Goddess of Magic, who only had her physical body destroyed, returned to the World of Gods with only her soul and was received with overwhelming hospitality. With the support of several powerful pantheons, this Goddess of Magic ascended to the throne of the God King, bing one of the few Ninth Grade gods.


    Greem had only been impressed by the gods¡¯ patience and strategic vision when he read these ancient records in the past. However, now that he hade into contact with the World of Gods, he had a strange feeling that the gods had stolen the achievements of these arcanists in some aspects.


    The faith channels that he was seeing and their functions couldn¡¯t help but make him think of those arcanists existing in the ancient past!


    Perhaps, when that Goddess of Magic restored her identity as a god, she brought along some unexpected changes to the gods of the World of Gods.

 Chapter 831 - Greems Research

    Chapter 831 Greem¡¯s Research


    The battle of the Beast God temple ended abruptly.


    The magical machine army stayed in the ruins of Makren for two days. Some simple repairs were done to the damaged and destroyed magical machines to replenish their numbers. Greem also took this opportunity to conduct a thorough scan of the Beast God temple, as well as all the magical patterns and divine runes carved in it.


    Once he had done all this, the magical machine army once again set off on their journey. Of course, the Beast God temple was destroyed in a hail of cannon fire before they left.


    The magic energy chariots advanced toward the next orc city under the protection of the Archers. Meanwhile, Greem and Alice hid in a small cabin on a chariot and started to work together on researching their spoils from the Beast God temple of Makren.


    Regardless of whether Greem believed it, his greatest spoil from the destruction of Makren City was that tribal g that the Third Grade orc berserker had nted on the battlefield.


    With the Chip¡¯s detailed andprehensive scan, Greem confirmed that this g of the Warhammer Tribe possessed the abilities to catch souls. The souls of all the orcs of the tribe that died in battle were attached to this g, turning them into strange existences that were much like earthbound spirits.


    Naturally, the spiritual strength of a typical orc made it impossible for them to retainplete memories and soul consciousness upon leaving their physical bodies. As such, the only things that they still possessed were pure instincts and an intense passion for battle.


    After hundreds and thousands of years, the souls of countless orcs had gathered in this g, and theirbined consciousness had given birth to some strange spirit existences. These orc spirits were known as heroic spirits in the orc tribes.


    Such heroic spirits had no real form. They could only maintain their existence by attaching themselves to tribal totems, and the key to their continued existence was the power of faith as well as new soul energy. They could absorb faith power and the souls of newly dead orc warriors from around the g.


    Of course, the faith power that they absorbed would be taken in by Beast God Aruger once it reached a certain level. Some of the most exceptional heroic spirits would also be chosen to enter Beast God Aruger¡¯s god kingdom. There, they would have a new body forged for them with the use of divine power and serve the great Beast God in battle in a different world.


    These tribal totems with heroic spirits within them could also provide the orc tribes with great magical blessings. The mysterious aura of the tribal totems allowed the Physique, Strength, Agility, Spirit, limb flexibility, and reaction time of all orcs to improve drastically.


    As such, the stronger the heroic spirits of an orc tribe, the more mighty they were inbat!


    Meanwhile, inrge orc tribes that had endured for over ten thousand years, there existed spirit beings that were superior even to heroic spirits¨C the ancestral spirits. Not only could these ancestral spirits increase the fighting power of the orcs through an aura, but they could also temporarily leave their tribal totems and possess the body of the champion of the tribe, allowing the champion¡¯s power to increase several fold.


    It was a special ability that only god messengers were capable of in the past!


    Due to the interception of the Great Witches, Beast God Aruger had yet to cast down any clones or incarnations in Strongwoods ne. However, he was still able to transfer some degree of power through the channels of faith. Should a Fourth Grade god messenger use such a method of possession in battle in the future, then even a few Fourth Grade witches together might not necessarily be able to deal with them.


    Thus, the more he understood of the secrets of Strongwoods ne, the more careful Greem became.


    His current power was at a very awkward level, where it was insufficient to deal with more powerful enemies and too much for weaker enemies. When he transformed into the me Fiend of Terror, the Fire Throne set always allowed him to crush opponents of the same grade. However, while his attacks could inflict a certain amount of damage against Third Grade opponents, his own body was somewhat frail inparison.


    It was fortunate that he had Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms as his bodyguard. Arms helped him deal with the mightier Third Grade opponents. Otherwise, the magical machine army would already have been turned to scrap by the countless orc powerhouses.


    Still, the one that benefitted most from this trip wasn¡¯t Greem. Instead, it was Mary, who had sat by and reaped the spoils of every single battle.


    Be it the Third Grade orc shaman they killed in the first battle, or the Third Grade orc demaster they caught along the way, or even the orc berserker they had killed in Makren City; not a single drop of their blood had gone to waste. Mary had consumed all of them.


    That caused Mary to be in a state of constant sleepiness, much like someone in a fooda from overeating!


    The four surrendered adepts that had followed along this expedition were no longer as conflicted with the Crimson n after all these days of working together. It didn¡¯t matter if it was the daily scoutings or working with the magical machines; they behaved in an extremely helpful manner. Though there were no outstanding performances, they did their job well.


    With these subordinates sharing the burden of all these jobs, Greem had a lot more free time on his hands.


    He no longer needed to deal with the small orc assaults along the way personally. All of it was left to the Crimson adepts to deal with. It was only when some excessively powerful Second Grade or Third Grade orcs appeared that Greem would drag along Arms and appear on the battlefield to make quick work of the enemy.


    The rest of the time, Greem remained in his room, silently researching that tribal g under Alice¡¯s guidance. The Chip¡¯s deciphering work was going very smoothly. It had mostly deciphered the strange runes found in the Beast God temple, and the rest was likely to be done before they returned to the World of Adepts.


    The reason that the Chip¡¯s deciphering job was progressing so quickly had to do with Greem¡¯s increase in Spirit, as well as the stupidity and straightforward nature of the orcs.


    It was important to know that, even in the World of Adepts, only sixty to seventy percent of the runes in most arrays had actual meaning. The remainder of the runes were only put into the array to trick and confuse the enemy. Many arrays would intentionally make use ofplicated and elegant decoy runes to hide the real purpose of the array.


    However, the novel arrays and divine runes that Greem had scanned from the Beast God temple had not undergone any obscurement or falsification. If one could decipher the function of the corresponding rune, they would instantly understand much of the workings behind the array.


    It indirectly lowered the workload of the Chip and its need for trial and error, saving a lot of time for Greem!


    These orcish runes seemed to cover nearly thirty percent of the arcane realm of Strongwoods ne. If Greem could gain a full understanding of these runes, it would propel his runic studies to the next level. At the very least, the enhancement provided by Greem¡¯s me Fiend Transformation could still be higher.


    The next orc city was Andorhal, four hundred kilometers away from here.


    The magical machine army charged through the intercepting parties along the way and arrived at Andorhal in just two days.


    From a distance, this looked like a small city that was distinctively orcish.


    The towering walls were made of stone bs. Several sharpened wooden stakes had been ced into the wall, and several skeletons were pinned onto it as well. Judging from the clothing of the skeletons and their size, these were individuals of other races that had been defeated in battle.


    Countless bastions unique to the beast tribes stood upon the wall along with watchtowers.


    These bastions were low and had tiny entrances. Countless small slits had been opened on these bastions, allowing the short and little mousepeople warriors to stab with their spears from within.


    All the buildings within the city were exceptionally tall and magnificent.


    However, their surface had not undergone any careful polishing, giving it a wild and rough look.


    It seemed as if the orcs of Andorhal had known of the arrival of the magical machine army since a long time ago. Just a single look from a distance and one could see many orcs within the city. One could also see several orcs and wolfriders on the towering walls.


    ¡°How do we fight this battle?¡± Several Crimson adepts gathered near Mary and silently waited for her instructions.


    Mary stood atop a magic energy chariot. She startedughing coldly as she looked at the embattled city of Andorhal.


    ¡°Eudy, you bring along a hundred Archers, thirty Shield Defenders, five magic energy chariots, and set up a formation on the left; the wolfriders hiding two and a half kilometers away might try and assault our ranks from there when the battle starts. Their numbers could well be in the tens of thousands. Remember, not a single one of them is to be let past you.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°O¡¯Neal. You bring fifty Archers, twenty Shield Defenders, five magic energy chariots, and set up on our left nk. ording to the reconnaissance of the eyeball machines, approximately seven thousand orc warriors are hiding in a dense forest one and a half kilometer away from there. You keep them inside that forest.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Deserra, I¡¯ll leave the frontlines to you. You will have a hundred Archers, thirty Shield Defenders, and ten magic energy chariots. st this city with all your strength and raze everything within it to ashes.¡±


    ¡°Yes, Lady Mary!¡±


    ¡°Everyone else stays by my side. We will wait and strike at the enemy once their main forces show themselves.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    Medusa Dana and Berserk Witch Sofia acknowledged the order, as did the other two new adepts. Meanwhile, Split-Off Brain Gru and Goblin Tigule loafed about by her side.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The three of them were all Second Grade, each with their own factions and background. Those two had no obligation or need to listen to Mary.


    As the leader of this party, Greem had yet to show himself for this battle. Instead, he released the Spirit of Pestilence and the Stitch Ghost Golem that he had so painstakingly raised. The enemies they had run into over the past few days had been too powerful. They were easily Second and Third Grade existences, leaving the two peak First Grade dolls without any chance to go on a ughter.


    It was an opportunity to let them feast!


    As the giant fireballs from the magic energy cannons flew into the city of Andorhal, a new battle started!


    Taking the painful lesson of Makren City in mind, the orcmander of Andorhal did not keep all his forces huddled within the city. Instead, all of them were lined up outside the walls. Once the enemy started attacking the city, the wolfriders and orcs hiding in the distance began to rush at the magical machine army from their left and right nks.


    Anotherrge army of winged people took to the skies from inside the city. They intended to break through to the center of the magical machine army and drag this lone witch force into a grueling up close fight.

 Chapter 832 - The Witches’ Plan

    Chapter 832 The Witches¡¯ n


    Sadly, while the orcmander¡¯s idea was good, he had tragically run into Greem and the adepts.


    With their surprising number of eyeball machines, the battlefield was practically transparent to them!


    It didn¡¯t matter how perfectly the orc wolfriders and warriors had hidden. They could not possibly hide from the life sensors of the eyeball machines. They were arge cluster of blinding red dots hidden in the forest and the ins. Unless themander of the magical machine army was a blind man, there was no way he wouldn¡¯t have seen this.


    The traps that the orcs had prepared ahead of time wereughably childish once they were aware of it!


    The orcs could only attempt to use strategy to make up for the difference in military might. However, these orcs were single-minded barbarians who only knew how to brave a storm of attacks and rush to the enemy¡¯s side. They didn¡¯t seem to have much strategy or tactics to speak of.


    Consequently, the battle of Andorhal once again proved the might of the adepts and the superficial strength of the orc tribes.


    Any individual in the orc army would be an excellent soldier, be it in terms of Physique orbat ability; they were leagues above human soldiers. Unfortunately, the weak and the strong were reversed when they were dealing with the magical machine army of the adepts who had invaded their world.


    The indestructible ones were the enemies, while the weak and frail were them!


    The battle onlysted for three hours.


    The orcmander who saw no hope of victory rang the horn of retreat. The orc warriors could only reluctantly swallow this bitter fruit and drag their broken and battered bodies into the distance, running without looking back.


    As this was a battle in the ins, the magical machine army had no means of pursuing the orcs once they scattered.


    The ferocity of the magic energy cannons and the dense attacks of the magic energy rifles were what staved off the flood of orcs. Given the situation, the magical machine army dared not disrupt their own formation and spread out to capture these defeated enemies. If they were to be ambushed by orc powerhouses during this process, the magical machine army would undoubtedly suffer tremendous losses.


    Moreover, the purpose of this attack wasn¡¯t to kill orcs but to destroy their altars and temples. That was the most crucial element of the mission!


    The magical machine army was ambushed by a squad of orc powerhouses when they entered the city. In total, they lost thirty magical machines in the ensuingbat. However, these Second Grade orc warriors were still severely injured by the barrage of beam attacks from the Archers.


    Strongwoods necked magic-resistant equipment. These orc elites only wore leather armor made of the fur and hide from high-grade magical creatures. Though such armor still had a certain degree of magic resistance, it could not endure the ferocity and frequency of the Archers¡¯ attacks. When the orcs charged into the ranks of the machines to exact their violence, the Archers cared not for friendly fire. They continued to unleash their magic energy beams on the orcs at the fastest rate possible.


    The orcs could still endure such attacks for as long as thirty seconds.


    However, how many machines could they possibly destroy in these few seconds?


    Not to mention, there were still a significant number of Shield Defenders in the ranks of the magical machines. Thesebat machines held steel tower shields in their hands and specialized in closebat defense. If they were able to box off the orc powerhouses, then what awaited the orcs would be a barrage of energy beams and magical spells of frightful power.


    The Spirit of Pestilence might not be all that lethal on the battlefield, but its ability to spread gue and diseases was second to none.


    The Spirit of Pestilence had taken the opportunity of the battle earlier to spread out gue spores while the orcs were retreating. The spores had now attached themselves to the defeated orcs.


    When the orcs escaped to the surrounding viges, the gue spores would also be brought to the various orc settlements. That was when the Spirit of Pestilence would show its true might!


    Meanwhile, the Stitch Ghost Golem was a strange existence simr to spirit beings. It was undoubtedly the bane of the orc warriors.


    Its peculiar body sewn from cloth and rocks allowed it to be unharmed by any physical attack. Meanwhile, its three ghost guards could directly attack an enemy¡¯s soul; the orcs¡¯ strong bodies were utterly useless before it. In fact, it made them more susceptible to the Stitch Ghost Golem¡¯s techniques, making it easy for the Golem to invade their bodies and turn them into soul ves.


    Arge amount of high-quality flesh on this battlefield also caused this group of paranormal beings that feasted on meat to be all the more savage and vicious.


    The Stitch Ghost Golem was a terrifying spirit roaming the battlefield while the three howling ghost guards circling it asionally charged into the body of an orc warrior. If the possession failed, then the ghost guards would burst forth from the orc¡¯s body as specks of white light and quickly search for the next target.


    If the possession seeded, the orc warrior would be a ve of the Ghost Golem. He would turn the weapon in his hand and start wildly attacking thepanions around him. Once the soul ve died, his soul would be brought back by the ghost guard to be devoured by the Stitch Ghost Golem.


    With the three ghost golems ughtering on the battlefield, the aura on the Stitch Ghost Golem grew increasingly stronger. It seemed very likely that it would advance on the battlefield.


    In all honesty, after such a long time following Greem and all the countless battles they had been involved in, it was time for them to advance as well. Otherwise, they would not be able to keep up with Greem¡¯s incredible advancement speed!


    Mary and the others easily conquered Andorhal.


    For some reason, no Third Grade orc powerhouses were present in this battle. The few remaining Second Grades tried in vain to rely on street warfare to slow down the advance of the magical machine army. Unfortunately, they were met with thebined attacks of Mary and Tigule.


    It wasn¡¯t until Andorhal had been conquered and all surviving orcs and shamans had been exterminated that Greem slowly emerged from his chariot.


    He obtained yet another tribal g from this battle, along with many new orcish runes.


    These things were enough for him to continue with his research during the uing trip!


    The third orc city was known as Gordunni and was two hundred kilometers away from Andorhal.


    Unfortunately, it wasn¡¯t until Greem and his army arrived at Gordunni that they realized the city had beenpletely evacuated. Not a single orc was visible anymore.


    What happened to the first two orc cities had already spread to Gordunni.


    The number and strength of the orcs in this city could notpare to Makren or Andorhal. As such, the orcs knew themselves to be powerless and had no choice but to take their families with them and flee into the wild. However, what they didn¡¯t realize was that Greem had sent the Spirit of Pestilence out everywhere during his journey here. gue spores had been spread in every orc vige or town along the way, polluting the water sources there.


    Greem had even intentionally released arge group of orc prisoners, making sure to leave deeply hidden gue viruses in their bodies before they left.


    As long as they fled back home to their orc settlements, the orcs there would also experience a gue of terrifying scale in a month.


    Greem¡¯s only reason for doing this was to massacre the orcs and reduce their poption as much as possible. That would affect the orcs¡¯ faith system and was a preparation made in anticipation of the uing final battle of the ne.


    Greem wasn¡¯t the only one to do this either!


    Every single witch force out on missions had received simr tasks to spread gues and viruses. The witches had no intention of conquering this ce, after all. They might as well go all-out with no reservations.


    With the crude healthcare system of Strongwoods ne and their pathetically low numbers of shamans, treating the orcs and avoiding this cmity was no more than wishful thinking.


    The civilization of the World of Adepts shed with the civilization of Strongwoods ne, and it ended in an overwhelming beatdown. If the Beast God hadn¡¯t been backing the orcs, then the Northern Witches would have easily made the Strongwoods orcs submit, turning them into a source of ves for the witches.


    However, now, the witches were trying to forcefully destroy the ne to establish dominance and make an example out of their enemies. Every single lifeform living in Strongwoods ne would experience an inescapable cmity in one month, turning into one of countless vengeful spirits across the universe.


    As for how to destroy a ne? Greem only had vague ideas of how to do so. He knew that one had to destroy the ne¡¯s nar origins. However, he had no clue about the specifics. That was a secret closely guarded by the high-grade witches, and Greem had no chance of gaining such knowledge.


    Either way, it definitely had something to do with the blood ceremony the Death Witches were currently preparing in Witherwater City!


    As the witches did an excellent job of keeping their secrets, the Orc Empire had yet to realize their abnormal actions. They simply continued to amass forces and prepared to contact the Beast God for a final push to expel the evil witches, much in ordance with the typical flow of nar invasions.


    How could these foolish orcs possibly know that the witches weren¡¯t even here to conquer them? They were here to destroy them!


    The witches out on missions took advantage of the orcs¡¯ hesitation and struck everywhere, destroying all their cities and temples within five hundred kilometers of Witherwater City. This way, the orc army would first have to deal with this five hundred kilometer of no man¡¯snd and a terrifying gue zone, even if they managed to push back against the witches.


    This move alone allowed the witches to turn the gathering orc army into a useless force.


    It seemed the Orc Empire had no other means to stop the Northern Witches now, apart from gathering all of their orc powerhouses into a formidable strike force. Only these orcs of Second Grade and above could pass through the gue zone and arrive safely at Witherwater City.


    Ordinary orcs would die by the number without any hopes of even reaching the city walls.


    After destroying the three orc cities and Beast God temples, Greem unhesitatingly led his magical machine army back to Witherwater City. He couldn¡¯t wait to arrive and look at the preparations of the Death Witches.


    How exactly were they going to achieve the destruction of an entire ne?


    After eleven days, the magical machine army led by Greem was the first to return to Witherwater City. Their results in battle were so glorious that they obtained a personal audience with Death Witch Leader Khesuna.


    There, inside the city, in a vast orc council hall, Greem and Alice met the Fourth Grade witch who they had not seen in a long time!

 Chapter 833 - Alice’s Decision

    Chapter 833 Alice¡¯s Decision


    Greem and the others had only left Witherwater City for half a month, yet everything here had be so unfamiliar.


    The once blue skies had turned a dark red. Strange and brilliant elementium ribbons floated and hovered in the air, entangled with each other and forming a beautiful, though terrifying, scene.


    All the orcs within five hundred kilometers of the city had either been captured by the witches or had fled for more remote locations. It was the only reason this bizarre scenery had yet to been discovered by the orcs.


    Greem lifted his head and looked at the wandering lights that had almost descended onto the roof of the orc council hall before entering. He couldn¡¯t help but sigh to himself. The orcs didn¡¯t have much time left!


    These wondrous, beautiful, and seemingly phantasmal prismatic lights weren¡¯t intangible substances; they indeed did exist.


    They were mainly formed of the magical elementium leaking from within Witherwater City. It was a sign that the sacrificial ceremony that the Death Witches had been preparing had already started. It was only to avoid alerting the orcs and drawing them out into a full-force confrontation that the ceremony had not beenpletely put into motion.


    Death Witch Khesuna waited casually inside the council hall, not a single expression on her delicate and cold face. It wasn¡¯t the first time Greem had wondered if Khesuna had turned her body into an existence simr to corpse princesses.


    Otherwise, given the tendency for Death Witches toe into contact with and absorb negative energy, her flesh and blood should not be preserved in such a perfect state. Of course, one couldn¡¯t dismiss the possibility that Khesuna practiced some secret technique to maintain her appearance and prevent it from being corroded by the negative energy.


    That said, a Death Witch refusing to embrace the power of deathpletely went against the essence of what it was to be a Death Witch. That was why Greem was reasonably confident that whaty beneath Khesuna¡¯s pretty face and skin was not living flesh, but wholly dead and rotten meat.


    The smell of her corpse rot could probably be detected from miles away if she didn¡¯t conceal it with secret methods!


    It was this understanding that allowed Greem to not be enchanted by Khesuna¡¯s ice-beauty looks. The most valuable thing to a Fourth Grade Death Witch was her terrifying Fourth Grade death powers, not this sack of skin or her looks.


    A trace of anger rose in Khesuna¡¯s heart as she watched Greem and Alice walk into the hall, side by side.


    How was this Alice so useless?! She hadn¡¯t seemed to have managed to charm the male adept and had instead been charmed by him. How was a witch like this qualified to be one of the leaders?


    That was a thought shared by all Northern Witches!


    Those who could enjoy luxury and glory in the Northern Lands could only be powerful witches. Meanwhile, the male adepts were either subordinates or concubines. They were strictly prevented from ever achieving status above the Northern Witches.


    This extreme and perverted ideal of ¡®witch supremacy¡¯ was, in truth, the mainstream belief of all Northern Witches!


    What about romantic rtionships between men and women, and feelings of love? These fake things did not exist in the minds of most Northern Witches at all. If it weren¡¯t out of consideration for their own biological needs and their requirement for descendants, most of the Northern Witches would probably seal off the Northern Lands and forbid any male adepts from entering their territory and seducing the more weak-willed young witches.


    From Khesuna¡¯s perspective, Alice failing to manipte this male adept in the palm of her hands, despite being the leader of the Fate Witches, was already a failure on her part. Not to mention that she was cing herself on the same level as him; these were all signs that Alice was being corrupted and falling toward depravity!


    Still, Alice was a leader of a witch faction after all. She might still be at Second Grade, but she had the same amount of authority as Khesuna on the Witch Council. Though upset, Khesuna did not show her emotions. Instead, she appeared all the more calm and collected.


    ¡°You¡¯vee back so quickly. Could it be that you have finished the mission I assigned to you?¡±


    Her tone was cold and void of any warmth.


    Still, for a Fourth Grade witch, this was already a sufficiently ¡®gentle¡¯ attitude toward Greem and Alice! Any other Second Grade adept would not even have the chance to stand straight before Khesuna.


    Do not assume that this Fourth Grade witch was just a small girl because of her delicate looks and beautiful appearance. The memory of her standing proudly upon Fourth Grade Corpse Dragon Artest¡¯s back while battling another Fourth Grade dragon was still engraved in Greem¡¯s mind, fresh as when he first saw it. He dared not forget that scene!


    ¡°It has beenpleted,¡± Alice smiled gently, ¡°These are the things we brought back with us.¡±


    At her motion, Greem waved his hands, and three animal-hide gs filled with orcish vor appeared in the center of the hall. The orc council hall was immediately engulfed in a savage and primal aura the moment the gs appeared. Everyone¡¯s ears could vaguely hear the deste and deep drumming sounds of the orcs.


    The gs of the Warhammer, Dhaka, and terock tribes.


    Khesuna nodded expressionlessly, once again acknowledging their results.


    Of the dozen witch forces they had sent out, Alice¡¯s troops were the first toplete the mission and return to Witherwater City. In all seriousness, their mission hadn¡¯t been the hardest one. However, it wasn¡¯t the easiest one, either. The fact that Alice had managed to arrive before all the other groups indirectly demonstrated the strength and efficiency of her group.


    It was important to note that there were indeed Third Grade witches among some of those other groups. Meanwhile, there were no other high-grade adepts in Alice¡¯s group apart from the arrogant Third Grade thunder dragon.


    Since they had managed toplete their mission, they should naturally obtain the reward they deserved!


    Khesuna flipped her palm, and three magical balls of various colors hovered before her.


    ¡°These are the three pieces of high-grade knowledge we agreed upon beforehand. You can take them away with you now. Remember, you are only allowed to show this knowledge to members of the witches. You are not to spread them to any others.¡±


    A brilliant me flickered in Greem¡¯s ck eyes while he stood silently behind Alice. His heart couldn¡¯t help but be moved by Khesuna¡¯s words.


    These were the only three pieces of high-grade knowledge that he was currentlycking.


    Once he got his hands on them, bing a Third Grade adept would only be a matter of time!


    Perhaps because she sensed the passion burning in Greem, Alice nced at him slightly and reminded him to remain calm with her eyes. She then stepped forward and took the three magical balls of light.


    ¡°Since you have achieved your goal here, will you still be participating in the uing battle? If you are willing to continue fighting for us Death Witches, I still have some things you might be able to use here with me.¡±


    This time, Khesuna took out a strange magicalmp. All sorts of mysterious patterns had been engraved on the antiquemp. The magical aura radiating it was the power of Fate that she so desired.


    ¡°Destiny Guide.¡± Alice practically moaned when she spoke the name of themp. Judging from her appearance, she was stuck in a great internal struggle, full of reluctance.


    Destiny Guide was a piece of magical fate equipment passed down by the ancient witches.


    This item might not be of any use in the hands of other adepts, but in the hands of a Fate Witch like Alice, it could unleash resounding might no weaker than a pseudo-artifact.


    If Alice could personally light up this magical fate equipment while she traversed the long river of Fate, she would never get lost in its crossroads.


    The Destiny Guide would be able to safely bring her soul back to her body regardless of how dangerous the situation she had found herself in!


    That was the true meaning of the existence of Destiny Guide!


    Finally, Alice¡¯s longing gaze shifted away from the magicalmp. She said decisively and firmly, ¡°No, thanks. The power of us Fate Witches is not enough to participate in the uing battle. I wish to return to the World of Adepts as soon as possible!¡±


    Greem, who was standing behind Alice, hesitated a few times. In the end, he decided against speaking his thoughts.


    ¡°Very well, then!¡± Khesuna put on a slight smile and said: ¡°You and your men have to stay in Witherwater City for another three days. We will be hosting our sacrificial ceremony three days from now. Before the ceremony begins, we will open an ultra-long-range portal to send away some of our forces. You may choose to leave at that time. Very well; you may leave and go rest now. Remember, do not take a single step out of where you stay in the three days you will be spending in the city. Otherwise, we Death Witches will not be responsible for any idents that ur.¡±


    Khesuna was truly not jesting.


    By the time Greem and Alice returned to the orc manor fromst time with the other n members, the doors were already guarded by a group of undead.


    The manor wasrge, but when you stuffed a hundred magical machines and several dozen magic energy chariots into the ce, there would no longer be enough space to stand, let alone sleep. Fortunately, the magical machines didn¡¯t need a ce to rest. The one dozen goblins packed themselves in a single room and barely managed to make enough space for the Crimson adepts.


    However, this time, the orc servants and maids in the manor had all vanished without a trace. If it weren¡¯t for Arms always bringing four beautiful maids with him, Greem and the adepts would probably be unable to even find a cook in the kitchen.


    Once they had returned to the manor and retreated into their room, Greem looked up at the dark red sky. He couldn¡¯t help but ask Alice, ¡°Why did you reject Khesuna? That item seems like it would have been a tremendous help to you!¡±


    Alice stopped by the door and shook her head silently. She didn¡¯t turn back as she spoke, ¡°It¡¯s not worth it! It doesn¡¯t matter how important a piece of equipment is. It will never be as important as our own lives.¡±


    ¡°You mean to say that there will be danger here?¡± Greem was shocked.


    ¡°Not that it will, but that it must!¡± Alice softlyughed as she said, ¡°Don¡¯t you underestimate those gods just because of how easy the past few days have been. If the gods were to unleash their true might, then we would be no more than some slightly stronger ants!¡±


    Greem fell silent for a moment before nodding his head.


    He was already somewhat feeling the loss of control at this stage of the nar war.


    There was no doubt that the Beast God Aruger would exact wild and reckless revenge against the witches once he realized their true intentions. When that happened, the war here would most definitely escte in severity.


    At that time, even Fourth Grade witches might not be the ones directing the flow of the battlefield. Second Grade adepts like themselves would probably end up being just like what Alice had described¨C only slightly stronger ants on a vast battlefield!


    It was best to leave as soon as possible.


    Greem immediately dismissed all thought of watching the spectacle. An intense desire to retreat had taken its ce.

 Chapter 834 - The Root of Corruption

    Chapter 834 The Root of Corruption


    The year 1775, Month 11, Day 18 of the Beast God Calendar.


    It was the fifteenth day of the otherworldly witches¡¯ invasion into Strongwoods ne, and the nned blood ritual ceremony had finally begun!


    A dense bloody aura had already engulfed Witherwater City before the sun had risen. The two hundred thousand orcs that the witches had captured and brought into the city instantly became victims under the des of the witches, dying in the various hidden ritual spots.


    Naturally, the primary location of the ritual was in thergest and most magnificent hall of Witherwater City.


    It had once been the temple of Beast God Aruger, but it was now a ritual hall where his believers were ughtered like pigs. The cruelty and bloodiness of the world were an eternal constant. It was a pity and a shame, but nothing could be done about it.


    As many as fifty thousand orc believers had their throats cut apart and pushed into a deep pit that had been dug in the hall. Warm blood trickled from their contorted corpses in a strange and eerie pattern, gathering at the bottom of the hole. As the number of orcs pushed in increased, the blood started to rise, covering all the corpses in their blood.


    The souls of the dead orcs slowly dispersed from their bodies and started ascending toward the sky in ordance with the narws. However, the moment they came into contact with the walls of the pit, mysterious glowing runes appeared and prevented them for leaving.


    The souls that could not return to the mother river of souls began to be restless and unruly. Bright red lights lit up in their formerly dull and lifeless eyes. They crashed wildly into the walls, shambled amongst the corpses, or curled into a ball and started crying.


    Many souls still seemed unable to ept the reality of their deaths. They continued wandering in the pile of corpses, trying to find their bodies and return to that warm and peaceful world.


    As orcs continued to die, more and more souls gathered within the pit. This ce had turned into a loud and boisterous market where the screams and shouts of the wandering souls could be heard everywhere.


    A dozen ck-robed witches with unkempt hair were sitting on earthen tforms by the hole. They looked at each other and started to perform an odd and almostical dance around the pit. As they mumbled out their evil prayers, a strange power began to flow into the bottom of the pit, budding and growing.


    A short momentter, an evil seed buried at the bottom of the pit emerged from the earth. From within the pool of blood and the mountain of corpses, it extended its first ck sprouts.


    With the dense aura of death in the pit of corpses and the incantations of the Agony Witches, this strange sprout started to grow taller and stronger at a rapid pace.


    Gulp! Gulp!


    A mouth, filled with small, sharp white teeth opened on the sprout, and the nt started consuming the blood around it. The stem had initially been a finger thick. However, it quickly started to swell and grow in size. One could vaguely see the flowing blood and the undigested meat through its dark ck exterior.


    There was a strange slithering sound. A small opening had opened at the tip of the little sprout as a dozen tentacles emerged from within.


    These tentacles started to grow thicker and stronger as the sprout grew in size and strength.


    Soon, they were the size of pythons. They twisted and squirmed, piercing into the orc corpses around them before splitting, multiplying, and growing within the bodies. The sound of chewing could be heard as the orc warriors¡¯ muscr bodies started to wither and shrink at a visible rate.


    Before all the nutrition had been drained of the orcs¡¯ bodies, new serpentine tentacles would tunnel out of the corpses¡¯ orifices and find a new target.


    It was like an evil tree growing wildly through the consumption of blood and flesh. In the blink of an eye, these serpentine vine tentacles had skewered every single corpse in the pit. From a distance, these tens of thousands of orc corpses were like fruits hanging from this strange and chilling tree.


    Devouring all of the orc corpses wasn¡¯t the end of it. The evil tree¡¯s fifty-meter-thick trunk once again opened up, and a swarm of strange, gray mosquitoes flew out. These mosquitoes swarmed toward the souls of the orcs like a ck tide.


    An originally intangible orc soul was suddenly entirely covered by these gray mosquitoes, causing him to howl and shriek in terror. However, a strange sucking sound was let out, and the screams of the soul faded in volume. His soul also started to be paler and fainter.


    Finally, as the mosquitoes scattered, nothing was left of the orc soul they had surrounded!


    These orc souls might have lost most of their memories, but they still retained their instinctual savagery and fear of death. Some of the souls started hiding out of fear, while others charged forward and started fighting the mosquitoes with their fists and feet.


    Unfortunately, these mosquitoes were the counter to spirit beings. It didn¡¯t matter how the orc souls tried to resist or retaliate; they could not do anything to the mosquitoes. Meanwhile, the bugs¡¯rge mouths allowed them to pierce into the bodies of the souls and absorb their pure soul energy.


    Mosquitoes whose abdominal sacs had filled up would return to the evil tree and feed the soul energy to it. This action immediately caused the corrupt tree to grow and strengthen even faster.


    An odd ck barrier started to appear around the evil tree. Within that boundary, the narws of Strongwoods ne began to materialize as silver chains. The strange tree then extended its serpentine tentacles toward these narw chains.


    The silver narw chains promptly gave out an unbearable sizzling sound when they came into contact with the tentacles of the evil tree. ck smoke started to rise as the narws invested even more potent force into the bacsh against the tree.


    Several ruptures immediately appeared on the previously sturdy trunk and branches of the evil tree. Blood and flesh spilled out of these wounds, and the corrupt tree squirmed and trembled as it uttered horrifying shrieks.


    The tree had no mouth, ear, eyes, or nose. Naturally, it could not let out a sound. This shriek could only be heard on the spiritual level.


    Almost every single adept, orc, and lifeform in Witherwater City could hear this strange cry. The ones with more resilient Spirit fared better and were barely able to resist the effects of this mental cry. Meanwhile, those of First Grade and below were severely affected. Purple streaks of blood started to flow from all of their orifices. It struck a tremendous blow against their Spirit.


    Some individuals with weak Spirit died directly to this spiritual shockwave!


    Even the few First Grade adepts that Greem had brought along had been injured, grasping their heads and calling out in pain. Naturally, the goblin engineers and technicians, without exception, had all died to the mental attack.


    ¡°No! The Root of Corruption isn¡¯t faring well against the narws! Hurry, bring all of the high-grade sacrifices over.¡± Death Witch Khesuna had been carefully monitoring the entire process. She immediately shouted at the sight of what had happened.


    Several orc elites were immediately brought to the side of the pit under her instructions, before being pushed in alive.


    These powerhouses started cursing at the witches when they saw the mountain of corpses inside the pit, along with the strange and terrifying tree. At this moment, many ck tentacles emerged from the bodies and dove into their nostrils, ears, eyes, and mouths before tunneling into their green skin.


    The orc powerhouses immediately fell silent!


    This ce was once again drowned in the loud devouring sound.


    With the flesh and souls of these orc powerhouses as replenishment, the defeated evil tree once again extended its tentacles toward the narw chains. With the increasingly violent nar bacsh being unleashed, the chains turned from solid silver to a blinding gray.


    A chilling scream abruptly rang throughout the entire ne!


    At this moment, be it orc or centaur, male or female, strong or weak, every lifeform in Strongwoods ne stopped what they were doing and turned to look into the distance, confused and lost.


    Something terrible for them seemed to be happening there.


    Only the more spiritually sensitive or those who hade into initial contact with the narws could sense the nar Consciousness¡¯ rage and fury through the vibrations of the narws.


    Someone had deeply angered the nar Consciousness!


    In fact, it seemed as if they had even caused it to sustain some damage.


    The powerhouses were horrified.


    What was the nar Consciousness?


    It had no solid form and was not a pure being with a conscious of its own. Instead, it was the amalgamation of the collective consciousness of the hundreds of billions of lifeforms and substances within the ne. Before the ne grew to be arge one, this nar Consciousness was like an embryo growing within it. It had noplete or independent consciousness, only crude and straightforward instincts.


    Of course, these outsiders had managed to hurt it through special means, causing it to feel a threat to its existence. It used this unique method to imprint its deep hatred for all the invaders in the depths of the souls of all living beings of this ne.


    The ne was its body, and the nar Consciousness was its crude instinct that it had just awakened. Meanwhile, the narws were the tools with which it ruled and controlled a nar space. Now, some outsiders had invaded the narws and were fighting with it over control of the nar space. These were mortal enemies that could not be forgiven!


    The very next moment, these evil witches had sessfully turned themselves from powerful enemies to its unforgivable mortal nemesis.


    Only those who had personally experienced the consequence of doing so could understand the terror of having done so!


    Greem pushed apart the wooden windows in his room and looked at the terrifying, crimson sky. For the first time, he felt the unrelenting hostilitying from the nar Consciousness.


    His breathing suddenly became forced andbored!

 Chapter 835 - Terrifying War

    Chapter 835 Terrifying War


    Witherwater City had now be the most eye-catching location in the entire ne.


    It wasn¡¯t just the orc powerhouses. Even the kings and leaders of the subordinate races, hidden deep in the woods and forests, cast their attentive gazes toward the city.


    Every powerhouse on the ne now understood the true intentions of the witches through the narws.


    Corroding the nar origin, corrupting the narws, exterminating the nar Consciousness.


    These damned witches actually dared to destroy the entire Strongwoods ne!


    If the witches only wanted to invade Strongwoods ne, then this war was no more than a battle for dominion between the witches and the orcs. The other races were being so heavily suppressed by the orcs that there was no reason that whatever surviving forces they had would ever intervene.


    However, the witches were intent on destroying Strongwoods ne. It was a massive problem that rted to the existence and survival of all Strongwoods creatures. Naturally, there was no way the powerhouses and kings of those other races could remain in hiding.


    For a moment, the skies of Strongwoods ne were filled with all sorts of individuals. There were orcs riding on giant flying beasts, ck-skinned natives in strange grass clothing with odd markings on their bodies, or even towering giants striding toward Witherwater City like a crashing meteor.


    These elites of Strongwoods, be they male, female, old, young, orc, or otherwise emerged from their hidden bases. They charged wildly toward the isted Witherwater City in the northwestern ins, using all the methods avable to them.


    Just three hours after the Root of Corruption was nted, arge group of orc powerhouses had arrived in front of Witherwater City with the use of Greater Teleportation. They immediately started attacking the city with wild abandon.


    However, the witches had already used the past two weeks of rest to construct a simple adept¡¯s tower inside the city. With the war tower as a defensive fortress, the witches were able to fend off the enemy¡¯s attacks despite having inferior numbers of Fourth Grades.


    The Fourth Grade voodoo beasts and magical creatures that the witches had summoned kept the orcs outside the city gates under the fortified WItherwater City. Meanwhile, the terrifying spells unleashed in unison with several high-grade witches inflicted horrible damage on the attacking orc powerhouses.


    In a nar battlefield like this, where Fourth Grades were the ones who dictated the ultimate conclusion, First Grades could only be considered fodder. Only Second Grades and above could barely qualify as footsoldiers. It wasn¡¯t until you reached Third Grade that you would have the opportunity to charge across the battlefield and destroy enemy lines.


    That said, even a Third Grade would die in seconds on a battlefield like this if they were unfortunate enough to run into a Fourth Grade.


    While the battle on the frontlines broke out in full force, Greem and his subordinates finally got the news to retreat while they silently rested in their manor.


    It was a seductive and pretty Banshee of Hatred that came to notify them. Given how opaque the banshee¡¯s body appeared to be, her grade was above Greem.


    However, even if she was of the Third Grade, she was only a vassal and servant of the witches. That was why she still had to bow in respect to Alice and Greem, the witch leader and the Second Grade n leader.


    ¡°Lady Alice, Lord Greem, the portal has been prepared. You may leave now!¡±


    The first to cheer upon hearing this good news was the Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms.


    ¡°That is fantastic news. Hurry, let us go; we shouldn¡¯t stay here any longer...it¡¯s simply too terrifying for me!¡± As a Third Grade dragon, Arms was able to sense even more of the truth and reality of the world hidden behind the scenes than Greem was capable of.


    Ignoring everything else, just the intense shing of narws at the center of the city was enough to terrify Arms¡¯ tiny heart. Now that so many Fourth Grade orcs had appeared outside the city, the dense and vicious killing intent was causing his heart to beat erratically. He could hardly even sit still.


    If it weren¡¯t for the witches sealing off all spatial teleportation abilities around Witherwater City, Arms would probably already have fled from Strongwoods ne from the fear he was feeling.


    Inparison, Greem¡¯s understanding of the narws was vastly inferior. It was far shallower, evenpared to Alice. That was why while Alice was enduring the shockwaves of the power of thews with a pale face, Greem was like a small ant on top of an anthill.


    The world before him was so strange. Everything he felt, saw, and heard was so unbelievable and bizarre. It didn¡¯t matter how hard he tried to look, to listen, or to experience. It was like he had been shut in a ss vat, and was having trouble understanding andprehending what it was he had contact with!


    Laws. The power ofws.


    What was their true nature? Where did their powere from? How did they encircle all things in the world in a tight and orderly, yet keep the same beings in question ignorant of their existence and even willing to obey them without question?


    One had to admit that Greem had obtained many things after all these years of running about and raiding. However, he stillcked much understanding of the narws.


    Any form of power, when driven to the limit, could be transformed into some sort of variantw. Thesews were the most reliable and potent weapons of the adepts!


    Greem led all the Crimson adepts and the massive magical machine army toward a za in the southeastern corner of the city with the guidance of the Third Grade banshee.


    A twenty-meter tall, ten-meter wide door of light had already been opened here, in the center of the za. A powerful spatial fluctuation radiated from the portal.


    Witch forces from other factions were also silently awaiting the order to retreat in another corner of the za.


    In truth, the reason they were here was only to help the Death Witches get rid of all distractions. There was no need for the witches to exhaust their elites on such a brutal and savage nar battlefield after all.


    At this point in the nar war, it was no longer a worldly conflict, but a pure deathmatch, where every blow was struck with the intent to exterminate and destroy. Anything under Third Grade was mere cannon fodder on such a horrifying battlefield. Even Third Grades couldn¡¯t guarantee their own survival.


    As such, they had already fulfilled their duty and obligation as allies as best as they could!


    The deadly battle that came next only required the Death Witches¡¯ participation!


    They, on the other hand, were better off retreating from this battlefield as soon as possible.


    The crimson sky above Witherwater City was almost as if heaven itself was bleeding. It was so gloomy that it even cast a shadow in the hearts of all people seeing it.


    An earthshaking st rang out south of the city, causing Witherwater City itself to shudder and tremble. A thick and violent lightning chain cut across the sky, illuminating half the horizon and causing the elementium barrier above the city to shake uncontrobly.


    The war tower erected at the center of the city released a massive pir of magical light, sustaining the barrier. asionally, the tower would unleash a tidal wave of magic into the distance, out of the city walls.


    The towering walls and theyers of elementium barriers obstructed the vision of the people inside, preventing them from seeing the situation of the battle. However, judging from the deafening roars and battlecries from far away, one knew that the intensity of the war had risen to a peak.


    The portal had been opened, and thus, the witches started gathering their forces and returning to the World of Adepts in an orderly fashion. Greem stood by the portal while assessing the battlefield in the distance, waiting for the magical machines to enter the door of light slowly.


    It was not his battlefield, nor was it a battle in which he could interfere!


    Greem¡¯s heart pounded in fright and nervousness when he sensed those waves of destructive auras shing with each other.


    He had underestimated the three major adept organizations all this while!


    Unlike the superficial strength in the center of the continent, the Silver Union and the Northern Witches were hiding some truly terrifying power below the surface. Their ordinary and average might on the outside was only a facade.


    The Death Witches he hade to understand through various information agencies only revealed two to three Fourth Grade Witches. However, today, he could sense as many as six Fourth Grade witches on this battlefield alone.


    If such a hidden force gathered in the World of Adepts, it would have been more than enough to change the political situation of the center of the continent.


    Moreover, if the Death Witches were able to hide their high-grade fighting force in their lesser nes in such a manner, was it even possible for the various factions to be as weak as they looked? Apart from the Fate and Coldwinter Witches that had just begun to rise and umte power, the other witch factions were probably just monsters pretending to be sheep.


    If the Northern Witches had such power, what did the Silver Union and the Adept¡¯s Association look like?


    It was highly probable that the reason the three major adept organizations had been able tost through tens of thousands of years in opposition of one another had much to do with their hidden strength!


    Without the ability to take down the other organizations in a single strike, with a Ninth Grade Great Adept backing each organization, no single force would ever dare to be the one to start a fight.


    While Greem was deep in thought, a loud st rang out in the skies above.


    Greem lifted his head in horror.


    Rip!!!


    He heard a loud tearing sound as a massive opening was torn in the skies above. A vicious-looking orc head entered the barrier and roared at the city beneath.


    ¡°Damned insects, stay here and die.¡±


    Boom!!!


    The world shook as even the nar space became unstable.


    The fluctuations caught the two magical machines that were crossing the portal through space. As the portal trembled, space waspressed and smashed like a broken mirror. The destroyed spatial flux spread outward, cutting the two magical machines and turning them into looseponents.


    Even if the materials used to forge them were the toughest magical alloys in the world, they were still as frail as tofu in the face of such spatial ripples.


    Greem and all the other adepts did not even look at the terrifying sight of the magical machines¡¯ destructions. Instead, they lifted their heads and looked on in horror at the terrifying orc that was trying to squeeze into the ne.


    As he continued to tear and rip, the once hundred-meter-long spatial rift had now turned a kilometer long. One could even see the golden arm and shoulder of the orc now.


    ¡°It¡¯s...it¡¯s a vassal god of Beast God Aruger. It¡¯s Garon!¡±

 Chapter 836 - The Meaning of Life

    Chapter 836 The Meaning of Life


    It was Garon Arcadas, the God of ughter in the orc pantheon, Seventh Grade, and one of the subordinate gods of Beast God Aruger.


    Unlike the gods of other pantheons, the orc pantheon worshipped violence and bloodshed. Consequently, every one of them was extremely skilled in battle. They were like wild beasts born for battle. Their savage and cruel forms could be seen at the frontlines wherever there was war.


    It was precisely this nature of theirs that made it easy to persuade the orc pantheon and drag them into all the wars of the gods. Moreover, they were fearless inbat and always showed themselves in their real bodies.


    The gods of the orc pantheon were already powerful. When they appeared in their true bodies, they were uncontested when they fought against the weak and powerless clones and incarnations of the other pantheons. Consequently, the orc pantheon was one of thergest and most powerful pantheons in the World of Gods. They were not a group that ordinary pantheons could hope topare to.


    The Death Witches¡¯ mission here to destroy Strongwoods ne was akin to pping the orc pantheon across the face. Thus, it was no surprise when the God of ughter himself appeared and seemed to be preparing to break into the ne to exterminate all witches.


    Seventh Grade!


    A Seventh Grade god was simply far, far, far toorge for a medium ne.


    This God of ughter Garon was a muscr orc measuring tens of thousands of meters tall. He wore heavy and crude ck armor while wielding a massive double-edged axe.


    Just as the God of ughter was trying his best to rip apart the nar barrier and forcefully entering the ne, a massive ice arrow cut across the void and hit his body.


    The ice arrow shattered and the extreme chill within it cast a coat of crystalline frost over his ck armor.


    ¡°Garon, our battle is not over yet! Why are you in such a hurry? Are you trying to escape?¡± Compared to Garon¡¯s massive body, the mysterious witch that had just appeared was so tiny one could easily miss her. However, the powerful spells that she cast with a flick of her hand were enough to chill Garon to the bone, making it difficult for him to move.


    The sudden ambush enraged Garon. His body was still stuck in the nar barrier, after all. He roared furiously, ¡°Erdis, you only know how to run. Fight me head-on if you can.¡±


    Garon was roaring, that was for sure. Still, he would never dare to continue forcing his way into Strongwoods ne slowly while enduring the attacks of a Seventh Grade witch.


    Thus, the God of ughter could only pull himself out of the barrier resentfully and turn to charge at the terrifying witch.


    The Seventh Grade witch known as Erdis behaved just as Garon said. She immediately turned into a statue of ice when she saw Garon lunge at her. The statue shattered, and Erdis vanished from the spot. She was fifty kilometers away by the time she appeared once again.


    The space of the outer realm wasrge enough for these horrifying powerhouse to fight each other to the death.


    Garon¡¯s ten-thousand-meter tall body made it such that every stride he took in space was equivalent to four kilometers of distance in an ordinary nar area. He raised his double-edged axe and roared loudly as he chased after the witch.


    The profiles of the two powerful beings slowly disappeared into the distance, quickly vanishing without a trace.


    The rift that Garon had torn into the barrier of Strongwoods ne started to heal and shrink under the effects of the ne¡¯s regenerative ability. The space storm of the outer realm entered the ne through the spatial rift, bringing tremendous devastation to the surroundings of Witherwater City.


    The void of space wasn¡¯t void of anything!


    The outer realms might seem empty and void of any substance, but they contained powerful and intense magical energy. Such powerful energy filled the entirety of space, freely flowing and vibrating under the guidance of a mysterious power, like a tide of magic.


    All substances in space had to endure being bombarded by magical energy constantly. Without the existence of the nar barriers, it was impossible for so much intelligent life to exist inside the material nes. The so-called rivers and mountains and ins and rocks would be minced to pieces before the tide of magic energy before being scattered across every corner of the multiverse.


    It was the existence of nar barriers that allowed the material nes to be isted and protected from the energy corrosion of outer space, turning them into gentle spaces suited for the cultivation of life. Otherwise, no life would be able to flourish or even be born in the constant corrosion of space storms, let alone the diversity that we now see.


    Consequently, when Garon tore a rift in the ne barrier, the space energy surging into the ne brought about a horrifying cmity upon the life and nature around Witherwater.


    Several frightening space tornadoes quickly formed around Witherwater, dragging everything on the ground into them and tearing them into fine particles before casting them five hundred kilometers away.


    The formerly scarce greenery of the earth quickly vanished before the destruction of the space energy. All the frail life in it died under the breath of the chaotic magic energy.


    Thend was now deathly silent!


    Witherwater City, right below the spatial rift, had also been caught in the disaster. It was where the space storm had dealt the most substantial blow. The elementium barrier had shattered in an instant, exposing Witherwater City to the energy storm.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the war tower erecting several small barriers to protect the critical facilities within the city, this urrence alone would have caused shocking damages to the Death Witches.


    Even so, countless undead had been worn away by the violent space energy where the magical barriers could not reach, turning into dust and ash. Rows of undead fell over, first turning into bones, then powder, and taken into the skies.


    A magical shield had also been erected at the za where the portal was, fending off the surging magic energy.


    Greem looked around him and looked on with shock as the apocalyptic scene unfolded before his eyes. For a moment, he was speechless.


    It was the terrifying damage that beings of Great Adept level could unleash!


    Their every action did not just harm the lifeforms of the ne, but the very ne itself.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how tremendous the damage to Strongwoods ne would have been even if the Seventh Grade God of ughter had managed to pass through the nar barrier and wipe out the witches.


    In fact, one slight mistake by him could have brought about devastation to the ne worse than the witches ever could!


    Now that Garon had been drawn away by that equally terrifying Nothern Witch, the nar battle would have to continue.


    Unless the Death Witches¡¯ n was stopped, or the orc powerhouses were dealt a fatal blow, this nar war would never end!


    nar wars always ended with the defeat of one party. It was the truest face of nar wars!


    Greem shook his head and sighed. He turned to look at the restabilizing portal and entered it without any more hesitation.


    ............


    What waited on the other side of the portal was, naturally, therge za of Werning.


    The returning witch forces exchanged some greetings before leaving Werning.


    A nar war that gathered the elite forces of the Northern Witches in this manner might be a new sight for Greem, but it was ordinary fare for most of the witches.


    The Northern Witches had some internal conflicts, but they were unusually united when it came to external expansion. Inparison, the center of the continent where the various adept ns stood appeared to be far too dispersed. They were like a tray of loose sand.


    Greem immediately calmed himself down after stepping out of the portal. He quickly regained his normal mental state.


    He had just experienced the bloody storm and apocalypse of Strongwoods ne. Yet, with a single step, he had returned to the peaceful World of Adepts. This great juxtaposition made Greem feel as if he was trapped in a ridiculous dream!


    Right now, he was the leader of a rising adept n in the World of Adepts. He had a bright future ahead of himself. Meanwhile, that other world far, far away had be a ughterhouse where the orc pantheon and the Death Witches went at each other wildly with all they had. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the Death Witches¡¯ Root of Corruption ultimately seeping into the nar chains of Strongwoods, polluting the ne Consciousness, and consuming the nar origins.


    When that happened, it would be the moment Strongwoods ne fell apart and was destroyed!


    This process was irreversible and unstoppable!


    Greem might not have any emotional attachment to the hundreds of billions of lifeforms in Srongwoods, but his heart twitched at the very thought that he had witnessed an entire ne of living beings be the sacrifices of a battle between some powerful beings.


    Greem would not feel guilt or burden from ughtering hundreds or thousands of ne natives. However, when the casualties rose to the hundreds of billions, even Greem became lost.


    Life should not be so dirt-cheap. It shouldn¡¯t be cast aside in such a meaningless fashion!


    Respecting life didn¡¯t mean that Greem wanted to be a pacifist advocating universal love. It was merely an attitude and way of thinking about living for him.


    The multiverse had given birth to all sorts of nar worlds. These many different nar worlds had then given birth to billions upon billions of lifeforms. The world would only be filled with life if there were enough living beings.


    Perhaps this was the central axis by which the multiverse could continue developing!


    Without a doubt, what Greem needed to do was to ensure his path of development matched that of this central axis. Otherwise, he would forever be a member hated by this world.


    While Greem was silently considering his options going forward, a message from the distance interrupted his thoughts.


    Something had happened at Fire Throne!

 Chapter 837 - The City of Rhein

    Chapter 837 The City of Rhein


    ¡°Arbitration?¡±


    Greem immediately heard this shocking news when he reached Fire Throne.


    ¡°Yes!¡± Gargamel replied respectfully, ¡°The news came from the Zhentarim Association. It¡¯s said that the Third Grade n leader of the Kam n has put forward a request for arbitration to the Association. He requests a scheduled match to settle the difference between the two ns. The old fogeys of the Association have already agreed to this request.¡±


    ¡°Where were these old fellows when those five ns united to attack Fire Throne. Now they think about arbitration?¡± Greem¡¯s thick brows scrunched together as a hint of solemnity appeared on his young and handsome face.


    Greem had not sworn or cursed in the slightest, but that contained, imposing aura of his was enough to cause Gargamel to shudder. The degree of his bow nted even further.


    ¡°What did they say?¡± Greem casually said.


    ¡°The Kam n seems to have gotten the Association elders to apply pressure on us. Two Association elders have already approached us and request that we stop the attacks on the Kam. The arbitrating elder has already arrived at Rhein. He has summoned the two n leaders to receive his arbitration there on the ninth day of the sixth month!¡±


    The ninth day of the sixth month?


    It was already the fourth day of the month today. Didn¡¯t this mean that he only had five days left to prepare? Moreover, the public city of Rhein was over a thousand kilometers from Fire Throne. If he hadn¡¯t returned from Strongwoods ne in time, there might not have been a person of authority within the n of sufficient bearing to represent himself in this meeting!


    Greem smiled coldly.


    It seemed like the opponents already knew that he wasn¡¯t in the World of Adepts. That was why they had chosen to take this course of action. If Greem was to be absent from this arbitration, they were likely to use more despicable methods to rob the Crimson n of their spoils in battle.


    ¡°How is the war going on the frontlines?¡± Greem¡¯s mind turned, and he couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    The enemies had a powerful Third Grade adept, after all. How was it that he was willing to set aside his own face and reputation and request for a forced intervention and arbitration when challenged by the Second Grade Billis? Could something have happened on the battlefield?


    The sensitive Greem immediately thought of Billis.


    Even Gargamel, who managed the n behind the scenes, immediately gave his praise when the bug adept was mentioned.


    ¡°My lord, Lord Billis is amazing! You have no idea. During the days you were gone, Lord Billis wreaked absolute havoc upon the Kam. It¡¯s said...it¡¯s said that,¡± Gargamel swallowed his spit, licked his dry lips and continued with a face of surprise and shock, ¡°Lord Billis visited every resource site and worldly territory of the Kam n, and nted a sort of puppet insect inside all of the apprentices and adepts.¡±


    ¡°Puppet insect?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know what it is actually called either. I have only heard of this through the n¡¯s intelligencework. Either way, the Kam n abruptly lost all connection and contact with all of their resource sites. So, they sent some people to investigate these sites; all the apprentices and adepts had died, turned into insect nests by Lord Billis. It¡¯s said that the state of their death was extremely horrifying. Extremely so.¡±


    ¡°And what about the Kam¡¯s Third Grade?¡±


    ¡°Third Grade Yurga¡¯se out of hiding to intercept Lord Billis a few times. Unfortunately for him, Lord Billis can scatter into tens of thousands of tiny insects and easily evade his pursuit. That is why Yurga has no choice other than to grit his teeth and request for Association arbitration. If he were any slower, Lord Billis would probably have ended up knocking on the front doors of their headquarters!¡± It seemed like Bug Adept Billis¡¯ performance in the n war this time not only intimidated the enemy n members but even the Crimson Majordomo Gargamel himself.


    Greem thought for a moment with a frown on his face, before finally speaking up.


    ¡°Find a way to contact Billis. Have him stop the attack against the Kam n! Since the Association has already sent out Fourth Grade adepts, we might invite the fury of the old fogeys if we overdo it. The current Crimson n cannot yet afford to anger those Fourth Grade adepts!¡±


    ¡°Understood! I will go to contact Lord Billis now.¡±


    Gargamel turned and left in a hurry.


    Mary, who was listening from the side, giggled and said, ¡°Who would have thought that the little bug who shuddered at the sight of me has turned into such an important character now. He has so many of those swarms under him that even losing tens of thousands of them at once wouldn¡¯t be a blow to him. Any n having to deal with the invasion of such a monster would probably have a head-splitting headache. Hehe. I really do pity that Adept Yurga now!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and smile bitterly as well.


    Someone like Billis was tough to put down once you let him develop and grow. His personalbat power was not as powerful as a Second Grade adept. In fact, he probably hadn¡¯t mastered all that many offensive spells. However, while defeating a person like him was easy, killing him was impossibly difficult.


    As long as Billis was willing to cast aside the pawns to save himself when he ran into a powerful enemy, he could easily escape. However, if he were to run into anyone weaker than himself, his newly-formed insect general squad and his endless swarms of insects were his trump cards.


    Bug Adept Billis was a near undefeated existence when the enemy didn¡¯t have the means to counter him!


    At the very least, that was the case among Second Grade adepts.


    If Greem hadn¡¯t left a unique mark on the assimted bug mother ahead of time, even he wouldn¡¯t dare to say he would be able to suppress such a powerful Second Grade adept.


    It was fortunate that Greem had the means to keep Billis in check. Otherwise, there was no doubt that the bug adept would have run far and wide, living a life of freedom for himself alone.


    That was why Greem intentionally contacted Billis through by proxy of Gargamel. He wanted to see what attitude Billis would hold toward his orders. If he were to reject themand or do something else under the guise of subservience, Greem would have no choice but to consider the matter of suppressing Bug Adept Billis!


    ¡°Let me go! Gargamel is only First Grade. Billis might not ever obey his orders.¡± Mary chuckled and said, ¡°That little bug used to be terrified of me in the past. I will go and bring him back from the battlefield.¡±


    The Crimson n was cruciallycking powerful fighting force at the moment. Obviously, Mary didn¡¯t want to detonate the deeper conflicts within the n over some ¡®small issues.¡¯ That was why she had volunteered herself to recall Bug Adept Billis.


    Greem smiled at Mary and nodded slightly. He had clearly understood Mary¡¯s intentions as well.


    Maryughed and got up from her chair. She swayed her hips and loudly ordered as she walked out of the room, ¡°Go, summon Soros and Windsor for me. I want to see them in front of me in seven minutes!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    The few vampires standing behind her immediately bowed in acknowledgment before vanishing in a puff of blood mist.


    The trip to Strongwoods ne had been short, but it had been a bountiful harvest for Mary.


    In all seriousness, the one that had the most plentiful feast in Strongwoods had to be Bloody Queen Mary!


    All the Third Grade orcs that Thunder Dragon Arms and Greem had taken down had turned into her blood treats. If it weren¡¯t for her Spirit being insufficient to Embrace Third Grade entities, she would probably have two more Third Grade vampires subordinate under her.


    Even so, Mary¡¯s powers had improved by leaps and bounds. From a certain perspective, herbat ability was already equal to Greem¡¯s.


    Of course, this was referring to Greem before he obtained the Fire Throne set.


    ............


    The City of Rhein.


    It was a beautiful city located near Crystal Lake.


    The bright sun of the sixth month was when it was at its mildest. The golden sunlight shone upon the surface of the crystallineke, providing the ce with gentle warmth.


    Greem, Mary, and Billis were all riding on a manticore of their own. They swooped across the surface of theke, attracting the attention of the many nobles on theke.


    ¡°Father; father, I want to fly in the sky like those sir adepts when I grow up.¡± A noble boy, seven or eight years of age, looked on in envy at the ferocious manticores flying over his head. He became especially excited when he saw the silhouettes of the adepts riding on them.


    The father of the noble boy, a man in his middle ages, revealed a bitter smile.


    ¡°My boy, that requires talent. Not everyone can be an adept!¡±


    ¡°Talent? What kind of talent?¡± The boy asked, somewhat confused and curious.


    ¡°The talent to be an adept!¡± The nobleman rubbed the soft, golden-curled hair of his son and smiled bitterly, ¡°Without such talent, it doesn¡¯t matter how hard you work or how smart you are. It will never matter!¡±


    His deep sigh floated across the pretty surface of theke.


    Greem and the two others didn¡¯t pick up on the small urrence beneath them, nor did they care.


    In just two days, they had managed to arrive in Rhein from Fire Throne.


    The three manticores beat theirrge leather wings and rose high into the skies. They flew over the towering city walls, rows of beautiful architecture, and quickly approached the adept¡¯s tower rising into the clouds.


    It was a massive fifteen-level tower. The top of it was a take-off andnding tform. Currently, quite a few adepts werending there with their magical beasts.


    The three manticores carrying Greem, Mary, and Billis raised their heads and let out a deafening roar. They then abruptly elerated andnded on a wooden tform that had been temporarily constructed on the spot. The air currents from the manticores¡¯ wings almost blew away the apprentice waiting there. The young apprentice hugged a wooden pir and persisted through the st of air before jogging up to the adepts.


    ¡°We will be staying here for a few days. You must remember to feed these manticores.¡± Greem exined and tossed a bag of magical crystals at the apprentice. He then turned and left for the entrance without turning back.


    The young apprentice hurriedly caught the crystals, repeatedly bowing after doing so.


    When he identally stared in the eyes of the ck-robed man at the back of the group, his heart trembled and he almost lost grip of the crystals in his hand.


    What a terrifying look in his eyes.


    It wasn¡¯t until the three foreign adepts had vanished that the young apprentice¡¯s mind became active once again.


    ck robes, green eyes.


    Could he be that one? Was he the person that had turned the Kam n upside down over the past few months. Bug Adept Billis?


    The young apprentice couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air. Even the magical crystals in his hands started to feel like hot potatoes now!

 Chapter 838 - Yurgas Choice

    Chapter 838 Yurga¡¯s Choice


    Rhein City. Adept¡¯s Tower.


    Inside a wide, golden hall.


    The elegant crystal chandelier hanging high on the ceiling released a gentle, yellow glow. It washed against the beautiful murals, coloring the ce a royal gold while lending it a solemnity of sorts.


    Adepts in robes of various colors held crystal sses in their hands, nodding and acknowledging each other with gentle smiles on their faces. Some acquainted adepts had gathered in small groups of two or three, quietly whispering and making conversation between themselves.


    Several apprentices dressed in fine formal wear were standing by the entrance, diligently receiving every arriving adept. When a visiting adept showed their invitation, printed in gold foil, a loud apprentice would shout the n and name of the guest.


    Of course, such an announcement was like a rock sinking in the sea for most of the visitors. The adepts in the hall were all preupied with their own matters; they hardly cared about who had arrived.


    However, when the apprentice standing by the doors shouted the name of ¡®Adept Yurga of the Kam n.¡¯ almost all of the adepts stopped speaking. They couldn¡¯t help but turn their heads and cast their gaze upon the Third Grade adept who had just entered the hall.


    Of course, what attracted their attention wasn¡¯t his identity as a Third Grade. After all, even within this hall itself, there were as many as five Third Grade adepts. What really drew their attention were the gossip and rumors that were spreading throughout the central area like wildfire.


    An organized alliance of five adept ns, led by two Third Grade adepts, were defeated by a new n that had only been established less than three decades ago. One of the Third Grades had even been caught and imprisoned in the opponent¡¯s tower.


    That was already a terrible mark to the reputation of everyone involved in the alliance!


    Even more embarrassing for the defeated Kam n was the fact their territory was being upturned by a mere Second Grade adept. It was said that over forty percent of the Kam¡¯s low-grade adepts and apprentices had been devoured by the bug adept. The losses were heavy.


    Moreover, Third Grade Adept Yurga had failed to kill the bug adept after two attempted ambushes. He had even let the enemy slip into their headquarters and allowed a direct descendant and heir of his family to be feed.


    To think that such a result had developed in a confrontation between a Third Grade and a Second Grade. It was no wonder that the Third Grade adepts of the Central Continent all betrayed expressions of disdain whenever they talked of Yurga.


    That said, the only ones that couldment on Third Grade adepts had to be other Third Grade adepts!


    The expressions of judgment quickly faded from the faces of the adepts in the hall. They pretended to once again return to their lively conversation. However, their ears and eyes still somewhat lingered on Yurga, secretly observing his every move.


    It was said that Adept Yurga had already requested for the forceful intervention of the Zhentarim Association. The location for the arbitration was set within the adept¡¯s tower of Rhein. It indirectly exined why Adept Yurga had appeared here!


    The forceful intervention of the Association?


    The adepts secretly talked andmunicated with each other. None of them could understand Yurga¡¯s actions.


    Were the old fogeys of the Association so easily dealt with?


    Yurga had given up the initiative in his n¡¯s war the moment he requested for arbitration. He had now put the future and the fate of his n in the hands of the Association elders. The Kam n would have to pay a hefty price to sate the bottomless appetites of the elders now!


    Yurga, dressed in ck robes and wearing a calm expression on his face, walked through the hall. All the adepts he met along the way bowed and pressed their hands against their chest in a show of respect. He continued to walk to a corner of the hall, ignoring all of these greetings and approached a middle-aged man in white robes.


    Several Second Grade adepts gathered around the man immediately turned to pay respects to Yurga before silently stepping aside.


    ¡°How has the thing I asked you to arrange gone?¡± Yurga didn¡¯t seem to mind all the surrounding adepts whispering about him. He immediately asked his question in a soft voice.


    ¡°The matter is still as troublesome as before!¡± Frustration shed on the face of the Third Grade adept in white robes, ¡°They refuse to back down and insist that the Kam n will have to hand over two First ss resource sites. Otherwise...¡±


    A wicked smile suddenly appeared on Yurga¡¯s face. It was so drastically bent that even his face look twisted and contorted.


    ¡°Well...very well. As expected, even the bastards of the Association can¡¯t wait to tear a few bites out of us while we are down. Have those assholes forgotten? If it weren¡¯t for their coaxing, I would never have taken the initiative and started this war in the first ce!¡±


    Yurga¡¯s voice was practically cracking now as the sound waves would even hurt the ears.


    However, the two translucentyers of forcefield around them ensured that no sound would get out.


    ¡°You had best calm down! You were the one that messed up, after all!¡± The white-robed adeptined unamusedly, ¡°I have no idea how you two even managed to make a living for yourself. To think that two of you together would get pushed into such a corner by a new n without even a Third Grade adept! Won¡¯t you look at it now? There isn¡¯t a way for this thing to end amicably now.¡±


    Splotches of purple and red instantly appeared on Adept Yurga¡¯s face as all sorts of twisted expressions surfaced on it. Still, he chose not to erupt in the end. Instead, he let out a hearty sigh and buried all of his anger and frustration in his heart, seemingly as if he would leave everything to fate.


    ¡°That brat isn¡¯t as weak as described in your reports. The power of his subordinates is mysterious. I do not have a clear grasp of it, even now!¡±


    ¡°We have already done some research. That brat was really not with the n when the war broke out. He was trapped in the Fire Elementium ne. Despite this ideal scenario, you and Haines did not manage to seize the day and destroy hisir. Isn¡¯t it just great now? Haines has been caught and you...you can¡¯t even deal with a Second Grade from their n. The elder has already spoken. Give over those two First ss resource sites, and he will give your n an opportunity to turn things around.¡±


    ¡°What kind of opportunity?¡± Yurga asked hurriedly.


    ¡°A fair duel!¡± The white-robed adeptughed sinisterly, ¡°The opposing n doesn¡¯t even have a Third Grade adept. If you can¡¯t even grasp an opportunity like this, then I figure it would be best for you to step down from being a n leader!¡±


    Yurga¡¯s expression stalled for a second, and he couldn¡¯t help but lower his head in contemtion.


    ¡°What are you hesitating for? Could you be unable to defeat a mere Second Grade fire adept already? I¡¯ve only managed to get this chance for you after a lot of effort. You couldn¡¯t be afraid of something like this, could you?¡±


    Another name was announced at the entrance of the hall while the white-robed adept tried to convince Yurga.


    ¡°Crimson n Leader Adept Greem, Adept Mary, and Adept Billis have arrived.¡±


    A dozen adepts from various ces had already entered the hall since Yurga started talking with the white-robed adept. However, none of these inconsequential ¡®small fry¡¯ had managed to draw the attention of the two Third Grades.


    It was only when the names of ¡®Crimson n,¡¯ ¡®Greem,¡¯ and ¡®Billis¡¯ reached their ears that Yurga lifted his head abruptly. His cold, sharp eyes immediately cut across the few hundred meters of distance tond on the three adepts walking into the hall.


    It wasn¡¯t just Yurga. Even the white-robed adept and everyone else in the hall stopped talking.


    They stopped moving as well, save to turn their heads and look at the entrance. These looks¨Csharp, curious, resentful, surprised¨Callnded on Greem and the two others.


    The hall fell silent, and the air suddenly froze.


    ¡°Billis, it seems you¡¯ve established quite the name for yourself during this time!¡± Greem led the way into a hall, a faint smile on his handsome face. His tall and muscr body stood straight, making him seem all the more reliable as if he could prop up the sky even if it were to copse on him.


    Meanwhile, Mary, dressed in her crimson armor, was still as pretty and seductive as ever. Her perfect figure and delicate appearance. Her voluptuous chest and hips, swaying as she walked. She held onto Greem¡¯s arm as she walked into the hall, a glint shining in her ruby-like eyes as they swept across everyone present. A maddeningly alluring smile appeared on her beautiful face.


    When he heard Greem¡¯s banter, Billis couldn¡¯t help but lift his head and look around the hall, still cloaked in his thick ck robe. The strange, ghostly greenpound eyes under the shadow of his hood gleamed with a cold light. All adepts that crossed eyes with him felt a shiver in their hearts, and they couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    What a sinister bug adept!


    The eyes of the other adepts were very sharp. They instantly determined the identities and standings of the three individuals based on how they were dressed and where they were standing. Though several somewhat yful eyesnded on Greem and Mary, most of the other people kept their gaze around Billis.


    They had seen many, many fire adepts, but a bug adept as strong as Billis was a first for the center of the continent!


    It undoubtedly piqued the curiosity of the adepts.


    ¡°I seemed to have spotted the old crow. He¡¯s in the southwest corner, and he¡¯s staring at us.¡± The smile on Mary¡¯s face was the same as ever as she softly sent a message.


    Greem and Billis¡¯ eyes immediately shifted across the hall andnded on Third Grade Adept Yurga.


    The eyes of the two parties met and shed in chilling fashion.


    It was almost as if sparks had appeared in the air.


    Naturally, those who could make it into the hall could not possibly be ordinary individuals. Almost every adept had their small social circle and source of information. Consequently, they all had a basic understanding of the situation between the two parties.


    The adepts couldn¡¯t help but step aside when they saw the tense atmosphere that had broken out at first sight. They provided a straight and direct path between Greem and Yurga.


    Though Greem had never before seen Third Grade Adept Yurga, his attention was fully concentrated on the Third Grade adept due to the guidance of the unique aura.


    ¡°Come, let us go and give our greetings!¡± Greem smiled generously and led Mary and Billis toward Yurga and the white-robed adept.


    ¡°You can go and tell that fellow now. I¡¯ll agree to his request. The two First ss resource sites will be handed to him immediately. Have him arrange the matter properly. I definitely...will...receive...them, with all I have!¡±


    A cruel smile appeared on Yurga¡¯s face after he quickly sent a message to the white-robed adept. He then coldly stared at the three approaching adepts.


    The atmosphere of the hall turned ever more solemn.

 Chapter 839 - A Fair Duel

    Chapter 839 A Fair Duel


    Sworn enemies tended to collide violently upon meeting.


    However, they were in the public location that was the Rhein Adept¡¯s Tower. Moreover, Greem hade at the invitation of the Association. It cut off all possibility of Yurga taking the chance to plot anything against Greem.


    His reputation might be in the mud, but he could not set aside appearances still. Yurga might harbor great hatred and resentment within him, but he still had to keep up the dignity of a high-grade adept on the outside.


    ¡°My greetings, Lord Yurga!¡± Greem was the first to bow and offer his greetings to Yurga respectfully.


    The two of them did not share a subordinate rtionship or any familial ties. An active greeting from Greem as a Second Grade adept was about as appropriate as it could ever be. Yurga could not pick at anything to criticize.


    ¡°You people. Very good; you are all very good!¡± Yurga¡¯s face was cold as stone as he squeezed these words out between his teeth.


    His furious red eyes red at the silent bug adept standing behind Greem, unblinking.


    He wanted nothing more than to kill these three people in front of him on the very spot. However, what frustrated Yurga the most still had to be this Bug Adept Billis. It was this rat who never fought anyone head-on and only ran about assaulting low-grade adepts.


    The reason the Kam n was in such a terrible situation was due to this damned bastard ravaging all of the Kam¡¯s resource sites and territory without exception. All the low-grade adepts were either killed or turned into monstrous insects. All of the apprentices had their blood and Spirit drained from their bodies.


    His actions had been so vicious and vile that the Kam n would need a hundred years to regain its former strength even if it managed to survive the crisis this time.


    Such terrible actions were supposedly strictly forbidden in the World of Adepts!


    However, this was no ordinary time either, as it was a period of war between the two ns. Bug Adept Billis had also not spread the fires of war anywhere beyond the Kam n. Yurga could only swallow this bitter fruit without another word and request help from the Zhentarim Association.


    The consequence of this request? Yurga felt his heart writhe in pain every time thought about it!


    A First ss resource site. That was something that every n had to expend considerable resources to create. It was the very foundation by which a n could hope tost and develop throughout the years. Now, the only two First ss resource sites of the Kam n had be the possessions of the locusts in the Association. Meanwhile, he had to watch as a few Second Grades paraded boastfully before his eyes.


    The elementium flux around Yurga was intense and chaotic. Just as his heart was sumbing to fury, the white-robed adept¡¯s cold voice rang in his mind, ¡°Yurga, you cannotsh out here! They are all here because the Association invited them. Not to mention, most of the adepts here know what the situation is. If yoush out here, any agreement between you and the Association will be void. Don¡¯t you force me to chase you with an executor in tow!¡±


    The white-robed adept turned and looked calmly at Greem and the two others. He said, ¡°You must be n Leader Greem of the Crimson n! I am Laurent, the leader of the Disciplinary Corps of the Zhentarim Association. I am the one who invited you here.¡±


    The Disciplinary Corps of the Zhentarim Association


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled slightly.


    He had some faint impression of this name. Someone seemed to have warned him that this Disciplinary Corps was an adept organization with immense authority in the center of the continent. The organization was almost whollyposed of elitebat adepts. Their responsibility was to exterminate and clean up the rotten eggs among the adepts.


    They were the ones responsible for capturing and hunting down those who had vited the Adept¡¯s Code of Conduct!


    This group was a powerful adept organization with actual authority and capacity to act. Greem couldn¡¯t provoke these vicious and malicious individuals if he wanted to establish himself here.


    Greem hastily put his arm to his chest and bowed in respect.


    ¡°Since you are all here already, let us not waste any time;e with me!¡±


    Yurga, Greem, and the others walked to a magical room under the lead of Adept Laurent. They took seats inside the room and started a difficult negotiation.


    Once everyone was seated, Adept Laurent calmly started, ¡°During this period of time, your two parties have churned up a storm in the Ailovis area. It has already severely affected the basic order of the region. I represent Elder Nics and Elder Matthew of the Association and hereby solemnly warn you two that you must end this war in the shortest time possible. You must also provide exnations for certain incidents of massacre and ughter that have urred during the period of war.¡±


    At this point, Laurent paused as his gaze fell on Billis.


    ¡°O¡¯ respected Lord Laurent, I am sure that you already know of the entire story.¡± Greem was not at all intimidated by the threat of Laurent and replied with a smile, ¡°The cause of this matter was because Lord Yurga of the Kam n led people to attack our n headquarters and killed a great many members of our group.¡±


    Adept Laurent did not reply. For the first time, he narrowed his eyes and assessed this young n leader.


    ¡°As such, in ordance with the Adept¡¯s Code of Conduct, we of the Crimson n, having repelled the enemy¡¯s attack, naturally possess the right to exact vengeance against the opposing n. Moreover, we have strictly adhered to the Code of Conduct throughout the process of vengeance and have not caused any disturbance to territories of adepts not of the Kam n.¡± Greem smiled and said, ¡°I believe that the Association wouldn¡¯t rob us of our right to vengeance, would they?¡±


    Adept Laurent had no choice but to exin himself when Greem put forth the question, ¡°No, no, no; please don¡¯t misunderstand what I mean to say. I have never said that the Association wanted to rob you of your right to vengeance. However, the war between you two has already involved far too many territories and resources. It has had a fairlyrge impact on the overall strength of the center region. As such, the Association elders hope that you may end this war through more ¡®reasonable¡¯ means!¡±


    It was Greem¡¯s turn to narrow his eyes now.


    ¡°May I know what is this reasonable means that Lord Laurent is speaking of?¡±


    ¡°A n duel!¡± Adept Laurent put on a sinister smile but continued speaking as if it was a fair decision, ¡°Yurga has already requested for a forced intervention and arbitration from the Association. Two Association elders have also approved this request. Your two ns must immediately stop all acts of conflict and settle this dispute through a fair duel.¡±


    ¡°A n duel? How will it be done?¡±


    ¡°Your two ns must each send a n member to decide victory, defeat, death, and survival through a fair duel. The defeated will have to providepensation and apologize to the victor, while also paying for all damages and reparations from the war.¡±


    Mary, who was sitting behind Greem, immediately let out a shrill cry when she heard these strict conditions.


    ¡°Fair? How is this fair in any manner? We have clearly won this war. On what grounds do we need to participate in such a n duel.¡±


    Mary had just gotten up from her seat in her fury when Third Grade Adept Laurent flicked his finger. A green light bloomed as a dozen wooden ropes made of intertwining branches reached out from beneath her and tied her to her seat.


    ¡°Little person, someone probably hasn¡¯t taught you a proper lesson on how to respect a high-grade adept. Kehkehkeh. Just those words earlier would be enough for me to convict you of the crime of disrespecting a high-grade adept. Hmph!


    ¡°Do you think the central region is a ce where a mere Second Grade vampire like yourself can do as you like?¡± Terrifying magical fluctuations rippled between Laurent¡¯s hands as he coldly looked down upon Greem and his two subordinates.


    ¡°Today¡¯s meeting is to notify you of this matter, not to discuss it with you. Therefore, if you have anyints, feel free to raise them with Elder Nics and Elder Matthew. Hehehe, but if I were you, I would not do that. After all, the two elders were the ones who made the decision. Even if you were to send yourints to the Zhentarim Association, it wouldn¡¯t end much better.¡±


    ¡°I understand!¡± Greem frowned, ¡°It seems that the one representing the Kam n will be Lord Yurga then. Then we of the Crimson n can also choose our challenger as we like?¡±


    ¡°Hmph, of course not! It is a battle between your two ns. No other ns or forces can be involved in it. As such, the one representing the Crimson n can only be an internal member of the Crimson n with the identity of an adept. No outside help is allowed!¡± Adept Laurent continued to chuckle as he spoke, ¡°I have heard that your n has some dragons from another world in it. They can¡¯t be considered as members of the Crimson n, and they cannot represent your n in battle!¡±


    Greem¡¯s eyes turned sharp upon hearing this, and Mary struggled even more furiously. Billis also raised his head abruptly. His ghostly green insect eyes swept past Adept Laurent before he looked down once more.


    Greemughed chillingly as he said, ¡°Until this moment, our n has yet to register a Third Grade adept with the Association. Do you mean to say that we are to send a Second Grade to have a ¡®fair¡¯ duel with Lord Yurga the Third Grade?¡±


    Greem spoke with a tone dripping with frost. He gritted his teeth especially hard when he spat out the word ¡®fair.¡¯


    ¡°You can think of it that way!¡± Adept Laurent was still smiling without a care in the world, ¡°At any rate, this duel has already been approved by two Association elders. You will have to agree with it even if you don¡¯t. Otherwise, we, the Disciplinary Corps of the Association, will have the right to deal with the rebellious figures who refuse to abide by the Association¡¯s rules!¡±


    ¡°Time, location?¡± Greem¡¯s forced smile had almost broken into one of unrestraint fury.


    ¡°Three days from now, inside the public arena of this tower!¡± Laurent still had a shit-eating grin on his face, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we will make sure to keep order. Nothing will be able to disrupt the order there!¡±


    Greem no longer said anything. He turned back and poked with his finger. A red me concentrated in his hand into a strange de which quickly sliced through the wooden ropes binding Mary.


    The ropes snapped where the de went, and Mary regained her freedom.


    ¡°Three days from now; we will be there!¡±


    Greem left the magical room after coldly leaving behind this sentence.

 Chapter 840 - The Arena

    Chapter 840 The Arena


    Three dayster.


    The public arena of the Rhein Adept¡¯s Tower.


    News of the duel between the Kam n and Crimson n had already spread all over the tower. It had be the most popr topic of conversation for the people.


    As internal information about the two ns was slowly revealed, more and more people started to understand the story behind this duel.


    The Kam n had a powerful Third Grade adept!


    Death Heralding Crow Yurga. In the central region, this terrifying name could even stop the cries of an infant and put a halt to an adept¡¯s step.


    Yurga might not be the most powerful of the Third Grade adepts in the central region, but his fearsome death beams made him a terrifying figure that even other Third Grades didn¡¯t dare to provoke for no reason.


    Yurga could kill anyone and anything in his way if he activated the Death Gaze effect of his death beams. He was practically an elite Third Grade adept!


    On the other side, the Crimson n was a newly risen adept n. No Third Grade adepts registered with the Association had appeared within the n yet. It was highly likely that the Crimson n would have to challenge Third Grade Yurga with a Second Grade adept.


    Challenging a Third Grade with a Second Grade; was there even any purpose to a duel like this?


    Perhaps the Crimson n would immediately surrender and hand overrge quantities of magical crystals aspensation for the Kam¡¯s losses. Or maybe they would send out Bug Adept Billis and use his death to end this meaningless farce!


    Despite all the chatter, no adept cried out for the obvious injustice that the Crimson n was facing.


    The physical might of a n was truly a portion of the n¡¯s power, but was its soft influence not as well?


    The Crimson n had always strong-armed their way through all their problems since their establishment. They had never attempted to socialize or win the favor of the Zhentarim Association. The fact that they ran into a wall in this scenario was not beyond the expectations of the adepts.


    Apart from raising their strength, adept ns in the central region also had to establish a good rtionship with the Association. It was best if they could find one or two Association elders who could represent the welfare of their n. That was the only way to ensure the sessful development and growth of a n.


    However, the n leader of the Crimson n was a rookie. He had not only failed to find someone to rely on but had even offended the elders of the Association on some issues.


    The so-called Association elders were all prominent figures at Fourth Grade. Naturally, they wouldn¡¯t go through the extra effort to make trouble for a Second Grade adept. However, several unexpected problems had still found their way to the Crimson n because of this strained rtionship, causing them to have a difficult time dealing with it all.


    The two parties finally met in the public arena at the promised time.


    The tall spectator¡¯s stand around the arena had been filled with adepts and apprentices who hade to watch the show.


    Adept Laurent represented the Disciplinary Corps and walked onto the tform to announce the cause for this duel. It was now that he cast his sight onto the two parties involved.


    ¡°Yurga, you are the only one that hase from your Kam n. I assume you will be the one representing the Kam n in battle?¡±


    ¡°Indeed!¡±


    Yurga¡¯s ck robes trembled, and his entire being exploded into a cloud of ck smoke. The smoke drifted to a side of the arena before reforming into Yurga¡¯s human form.


    ¡°Greem, who do you Crimson n intending to send into battle?¡± Adept Laurent asked loudly.


    Bug Adept Billis, who was standing behind Greem, shivered. He couldn¡¯t help but lift his head and stare calmly at the expressionless Greem.


    He lowered his head when he crossed eyes with Greem. Instead, it was Mary who actively responded to Greem¡¯s gaze, volunteering herself for the task.


    ¡°Me. The one representing the Crimson n in battle will be me!¡±


    This shocked everyone. The young and handsome leader of the Crimson n actually took this immensely dangerous mission upon his shoulders and was now striding into the arena.


    ¡°No. Greem, you can¡¯t go yourself.¡± Greem¡¯s sudden action was clearly beyond Mary¡¯s expectations. Her face flushed red as she charged toward Greem without any regard for herself.


    Unfortunately, her body mmed into a defensive shield that had risen around the arena, keeping her outside. Regardless of how she scratched or attacked, the blood energy could not create an opening on this resilient and dense defensive shield. In fact, the ripples of energy caused Mary¡¯s nails to snap and her fingers to bleed.


    Bug Adept Billis was utterly stunned and remained frozen on the spot.


    In all honesty, he would never have guessed that this situation would ur even if was allowed to guess ten more times.


    Winning against a Third Grade as a Second Grade was impossible. Instead, the adept who attempted this colossal task was facing a very high likelihood of death!


    With the resentment between the two ns, Adept Yurga would never show mercy to a Crimson adept. The chance to rightly murder the opponent and obtain victory in the n war in doing so was too attractive. Adept Yurga would undoubtedly be fighting his hardest.


    After leaving Mary and Billis behind, Greem strode to a side of the arena and locked eyes with Adept Yurga from afar.


    ¡°It¡¯s you?!¡± Surprise also appeared on Yurga¡¯s gaunt and withered face.


    Of course, he wasn¡¯t fearful of Greem. It was simply because he couldn¡¯t figure out Greem¡¯s purpose in doing this.


    Was he not afraid of death? Or was the title of the Death Heralding Crow so weak that it could no longer intimidate anyone?


    Yurga chuckled coldly as his entire body slowly floated ten meters off the ground. His already crimson eyes started to turn an even more brilliant shade of red.


    ¡°Good; very well, let us properly settle the disagreements between our ns here then!¡±


    Yurga¡¯s body exploded once again, and a thick, ink-ck cloud of smoke engulfed half of the arena. The ck mist rolled across the stage; no one could see what was inside, but they could hear the loud and noisy squawking within. It seemed the ck mist had already been filled with arge flock of Death Heralding Crows.


    The aura of this Third Grade adept had already been so fearsome before the battle started. It seemed like he intended to overwhelm and crush Greem!


    ¡°Little guy, you are a brave one, but this decision is not a very wise one. I will give you a minute¡¯s time to prepare now. After a minute, I will announce the start of the duel.¡± Adept Laurent¡¯s voice rang out in the arena. It was clear that he didn¡¯t think highly of Greem¡¯s chances either.


    Greem¡¯s face was solemn. He took in a deep breath and threw out two magic golem cores. As they roared and transformed into six-meter tall me Fiends of Terror, Greem also started changing.


    First transformation: body of mes!


    A wild surge of elementium fire came out of every corner of Greem¡¯s body, creating a swirling pir of fire around himself. His flesh body quickly turned into one of elementium me as his size increased to four meters.


    Second transformation: me Fiend¡¯s body!


    Greem opened his mouth and roared.


    As the elementium in his body was converted, his frail fire body turned into a giant me Fiend forged out ofrge magma rocks and boilingva. His entire body swelled to over six meters tall.


    For a moment, three six-meter-tall me Fiends of Terror stood in a triangle formation, causing the arena to be a giant zing sea of fire.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it.


    Several elementium halos shed on Greem¡¯s body as a semi-translucent barrier emerged from within, creating a terrifying Burning Domain around the me Fiends. In the blink of an eye, the three me Fiends vanished into the sea of fire, making it hard to find any trace of where they were.


    The sea of me pushed back against the ck mist, and for a moment, though the defensive shield had yet to be taken down, the intimidating aura of both fighters was already at a standstill.


    Holy shit? Was this a level that a Second Grade adept could reach?


    The adepts gathered around the stands were stunned speechless and soon started gossiping and whispering about what they had just witnessed.


    Though the elementium ripples on Adept Yurga¡¯s side were stronger, they currently appeared to be evenly matched against Greem¡¯s fires. After all, Adept Yurga was known for his strange and vicious moves. He couldn¡¯tpare with a fire adept known for being a battlefield cannon when it came to ir and presentation.


    ¡°Time is up. I hereby announce that the duel has begun!¡±


    As Adept Laurent announced the start of the battle, the defensive shield separating the center of the arena vanished without a sound.


    The very next instant, the rolling ck mists shed with the surging fires, creating an unpleasant sizzling noise. Countless Death Heralding Crows pped their ck wings inside the ck cloud and charged into the sea of fire, rapidly extinguishingrge patches of me. However, the sea of fire also lunged at the birds with terrifying force, roasting one crow after another into ashes, causing them to explode into mist once more.


    Yurga hid within the ck mist; his massive Spirit turned into numerous thread-like appendages extending toward the depths of the sea of fire. As long as he could find Greem¡¯s position, crushing him would over in a sh with the spiritual pressure of a Third Grade and the death beams of the crows.


    Even a lion hunting a rabbit would have to give its all!


    The Kam n¡¯s humiliation over the past few months needed to be washed away with a thorough victory. As such, Yurga would never provide the young adept with any chance to drag this out or even surrender after a short stand-off.


    Yet, what surprised Yurga was the fact that the strange fire barrier was quickly expanding. It had now engulfed the entire one-kilometer diameter of the arena. Yurga also felt a strange magical power within the mes.


    The elementium powers within his body lost its original activity and became dull and slow. Yet, the opponent¡¯s fires didn¡¯t seem to be affected. Instead, they were burning fiercer and stronger.


    An elementium-restricting barrier?


    A gloomy look overtook Yurga¡¯s gaunt face.


    Dammit! This brat¡¯s power might not be much, but his special techniques can truly catch people by surprise!

 Chapter 841 - Exterminating the Golems

    Chapter 841 Exterminating the Golems


    How was a Third Grade adept strongerpared to a Second Grade adept?


    Higher magic resistance, a tougher body, more terrifying spiritual pressure: all these were only superficial differences. What truly separated and distinguished between Second and Third Grade was their mastery and control over elementium particles.


    The adepts wereposed mainly of humans. Their bodies were too small, and the magical energy that could be contained within their bodies was vastlyckingpared torge magical creatures. Consequently, they needed to continually absorb wandering particles from their surroundings during instances of intense fighting topensate for their immense energy consumption.


    Apart from a few that excelled and specialized in body refining, most Third Grade adepts only had bodies that were seven or eight times stronger than an ordinary mortal. That might sound amazing, but in a high-grade battle, their bodies would not be able to stand even one ferocious attack.


    As a bloodline adept, Yurga gained a tremendous Agility bonus when he transformed into the Death Heralding Crows. However, his Physique and life force were still his ring weaknesses. Yurga was still a frail adept with high offensive power and low defensive power!


    Of course, this ¡®weakness¡¯ was only rtive to Third Grade adepts!


    A stalemate quickly presented itself soon after the duel between this Second and Third Grade begun.


    One side was covered in thick, ck smoke, while the other was a zing fire.


    Both parties invaded each other, tussled with each other, repeatedly and madly exhausting the magical energy of the other.


    The young Second Grade fire adept demonstrated power no weaker than his opponent. He was not at all behind in the battle between the two domain spaces.


    It undoubtedly shocked many of the spectating adepts!


    Still, in their opinion, such courage and bravery were meaningless. How much advantage could a Second Grade fire adept have in a fight for elementium particles against the pressure of a Third Grade adept? Once all outside replenishment had been cut off, how long could he maintain the fierce Burning Domain with his own magical energy?


    When that happened, Yurga wouldn¡¯t even need to press the issue. Greem would have to dispel this immensely costly elementium domain. Without the protection of the elementium domain, killing him was as easy as the flick of a finger for Adept Yurga. A Death Gaze formed from hundreds and thousands of death beams; how could that possibly be something that a Second Grade adept could survive!


    While the spectating adepts talked amongst themselves, Yurga had apletely different experience while in the sea of fire.


    Dammit, why do these fires hurt so much when they burn?


    As a Third Grade adept¨Cand paired with some secret defensive spells¨CYurga¡¯s magic resistance was already at two hundred and seventeen points. He already had an elementary level of fire immunity. Even so, when he dove into Greem¡¯s sea of fire, the 1,326 crows he had transformed into still very truly felt the damage from the mes.


    A terrifying stream of fire swept from the side. A dozen Death Heralding Crows failed to dodge in time and were hit by the tail of the me. They were instantly reduced to ashes and utterly dead. There were always some Death Heralding crows at the edge of the ck mist failing to avoid the mes in time and falling prey to them.


    Dammit! Where had that fire adept hidden?


    Yurga¡¯s massive Spirit delved through the sea of me, but he still could not find the young fire adept. Even the two elementium golems had vanished without a trace. If this continued as such, he could continue to re-manifest those dead crows with magic power, but his power would continue to be exhausted.


    A fight against a Second Grade adept shouldn¡¯t be so difficult, could it?!


    The frustrated Yurga immediately took action, and a thousand Death Heralding Crows squawked and charged into the fire. They beat their wings while firing death beams into the mes with their crimson eyes.


    Strangely enough, a deep and low grunt rang out in the empty Burning Domain. The next moment, a vast stretch of the fire was extinguished. It was almost as if these mes were lifeforms with souls of their own.


    As the crows continued to spread out, the sea of me¡¯s area started to shrink drastically. The ck mists took the opportunity to surge forward and take over much of the territory of the Burning Domain.


    Greem, who had been hiding in the sea of fire, let out a sigh. He knew that the sea of fire alone could not stop the Third Grade adept¡¯s advance. He could only ry newbat orders to the two me Fiends through a mental message.


    The sea of fire was abat space that Greem hadid out for himself. He would not allow the opponent to be the ruler of this domain.


    When the crows started to attack the sea of fire recklessly, its retaliation swiftly came!


    mes zed as two towering me Fiends appeared in the depths of the searing mes. They summoned arge cloud of fire the moment they appeared and swept it toward the Death Heralding Crows flying at the edge of the ck mist.


    The entire space where the cloud of fire passed was like a boiling furnace. Everything ignited.


    Apart from the cloud of fire, the two me Fiends also created massive magma fireballs andunched them into the ck mist. The erupting magical mes and fearsome heat waves instantly turned many of the crows to ashes.


    However, just as the two me Fiends struck, the fires around them dimmed, and a strange humanoid figure the size of their leg appeared.


    When Yurga appeared, the crimson eye on his forehead shot out a thick death beam which hit the me Fiend. It struggled for half a second before exploding into sparks and mes in a resounding roar.


    The expertly-hidden golem core within its body flew out during this apocalyptic scene. The core silently disintegrated in midair, crumbling into tiny pieces.


    An intermediate Second Grade me Fiend was destroyed by Yurga, just like that!


    Greem felt a sharp pain in his mind as this happened. That trace of Spirit attached to the me Fiend¡¯s core also vanished along with it. If it wasn¡¯t because he had predicted the situation and promptly cut off his mental connection with the me Fiend, Yurga¡¯s Death Gaze might have been able to reach him as well.


    Even so, the loss of a powerful subordinate in such a simple manner hurt Greem¡¯s heart.


    It was important to note that Greem would never have been willing to sell such a mighty golem. If this golem were put on the adept¡¯s market, it would sell for a minimum of a hundred and seventy thousand magical crystals. This price was almost the same as some more inferior adept¡¯s tower.


    But don¡¯t think that was expensive!


    Regardless of how good a tower was, could you take it around with you? On the other hand, such an elementium golem was wholly portable and could be summoned at any moment and any ce to storm the enemy lines. Such convenience and power was something that an adept¡¯s tower could notpare to!


    Yet, the Third Grade adept had exterminated such a valuable elementium in an instant. It was only natural to imagine the shock that Greem was feeling right now.


    After all, apart from a few more elementium protections and the Fire Throne set, Greem wasn¡¯t that much more powerfulpared to the me Fiend. If Yurga could exterminate the me Fiend in an instant, killing him wouldn¡¯t be that much more difficult.


    Consequently, Greem started to worry about his own safety, even as he felt hurt over the loss of magical crystals.


    After all, the elementium golems could still be constructed, even if he lost them now. However, if his soul were to explode, it would indeed be the end!


    It was this consideration that caused Greem to not dismiss the other me Fiend, despite a moment¡¯s hesitation.


    It was not the time to be upset over some magical crystals.


    What had been his initial motivation for creating elementium golems to begin with? Wasn¡¯t it to have them charge the enemy lines in his ce? Now was precisely the time Greem needed them to sacrifice themselves!


    The moment Yurga exterminated one of the me Fiends, the other did not retreat. Instead, it turned toward Yurga and unleashed its most furious and wild firepower on the Third Grade adept.


    The ck mist was sted into, and even the corners of Yurga¡¯s robes started to turn ck and scorched.


    As a Third Grade adept, Yurga couldn¡¯t possibly be troubled by such an ¡®insignificant¡¯ attack. He smiled slightly, and his body once again erupted into a flock of red-eyed crows. These birds pped their wings and scattered in every direction.


    As the me Fiend once again gathered elementium mes in its hand, the sea of fire behind it parted as Yurga mysteriously appeared out of thin air.


    The next second, a thick Death Beamnded on thisst remaining me Fiend.


    This six-meter tall, four-ton heavy giant fell to a magical beam, and its body disintegrated into shards and sparks. The golem core did not escape the effects of the magic either and shattered along with the body.


    In just fifteen seconds, three hundred and forty thousand magical crystals had turned to dust!


    A red blush appeared on Yurga¡¯s pale face after using his power twice in a row. His breath also started bing slightly ragged.


    ¡°Hmph! Damned brat, what are you going to use to stop me now? Let¡¯s see where else you can hide once I extinguish all of your mes.¡±


    Unfortunately, before his voice could evennd, two roars rang out in the depths of the sea of fire. Two more gigantic me Fiends appeared.


    Dammit, dammit, dammit! Why did that bastard bring so many high-grade elementium golems with him?


    Yurga might not know the exact price of these golems, but given their intermediate Second Grade strength and their resounding might inbat, these elementium golems could not havee cheap. That...that damned brat! Where did he find the wealth to obtain so many elementium golems?


    Moreover, judging from the standard size andbat power of these golems, they had to be created in the same batch. Trying to find an alchemist who could custom-make such exquisite golems would have cost a mountain of a fortune.


    This...


    A short piece of information shed across Yurga¡¯s mind in his moment of frustration and surprise.


    ¡°Greem. Second Grade fire adept between intermediate and advanced level. Possesses the special ability to craft elementium golems...¡±


    Dammit! These golems were all crafted by Greem himself!

 Chapter 842 - Are You Finished Yet?

    Chapter 842 Are You Finished Yet?


    Yurga had justprehended the origins of the golems while the two towering me Fiends were already roaring and charging at him.


    Moreover, a small me portal suddenly opened deep in the sea of fire. Countless low-grade fire creatures rushed out from within and sped towards the Third Grade adept alongside the me Fiends.


    Yurga¡¯s face darkened.


    The fire adept seemed to have realized his weakness. He knew that this Death Gaze imposed an immense burden on him as well. Firing this beam four or five times during an ordinary battle was no issue. However, shooting them at a high frequency was an unbearable burden on Yurga as well.


    Even Yurga didn¡¯t dare to face the storm of fireballs and meteors head on. His body scattered, erupting into a flock of red-eyed crow as he quickly escaped the tide of spells¡¯ range.


    As a Third Grade adept, he could not tolerate being chased around by a group of lowly elementium creatures.


    He reformed three hundred meters away and let out a roar. The ck mist around him instantly gathered into a massive silhouette of a Death-Heralding Crow. A crimson eye opened on the figure and looked at the elementals in the distance.


    Like a reapere to life or ghosts seeking vengeance, an image of a small Death-Heralding Crow appeared on the heads of all the fire creatures. The images then let out a haunting shriek.


    All the fire creatures froze before exploding where they stood!


    In all honesty, the magnificent sight of several hundreds of otherworldly fire creatures exploding at once was breathtaking. Though the most powerful of these fire creatures were only First Grade, most of them were at the intermediate apprentice level; Adept Yurga managed to wipe them out in a single move.


    That indirectly demonstrated the terror of a Third Grade adept!


    Greem was slowly moving on the other end of the field.


    After the trials and tribtions of the Fire Elementium ne, his fire affinity had reached an extremely high level. If it weren¡¯t for the limits of his own grade, he might have even higher fire affinity than some fire creatures in certain aspects.


    It was this unique trait of his soul that allowed Greem to assimte his body of mes into the sea of fire and rely on its chaotic aura to hide him. Thus, he had sessfully evaded the spiritual senses and scans of Adept Yurga.


    However, hiding like this was not a viable long-term n either. Once Yurga extinguished all the mes or spread eyes throughout the area, he would be able to pick up on Greem¡¯s position using the weak mental fluctuations Greem gave off.


    When that happened, Greem would not be able tost ten seconds before Yurga¡¯s fearsome Death Gaze.


    Even at the heat of battle, Greem didn¡¯t dare to show himself. He simply relied on the reserves of magical golems he had stored ahead of time, and the Fire Summoning provided by the Fire Throne set to wear out Yurga.


    The two me Fiends had not died with the fire creatures.


    Suchrge area-of-effect eye magic was still too scattered. It had no problems killing the low-grade fire creatures. However, it was still insufficient when used against two intermediate Second Grade me Fiends.


    Yurga furiously charged close to the me Fiends, enduring their attacks as he did so. He then used two sizzling beams of Death Gaze to deal with them as well.


    ¡°Kehkehkeh. Damned brat, you think you can rely on these unqualified elementium golems to beat a Third Grade adept? You...¡±


    Yurga, who had now exterminated all the enemies in sight, hovered in the smoking air. As he boldly insulted his opponent in hiding, two familiar and furious roars rang out from deep within the fires.


    Two tall me Fiends stepped out of the sea of fire with rumbling steps. They roared and rushed forward as they wildly threw magma fireballs at Yurga.


    Da...dammit, that bastard still had elementium golems of this grade?


    At this moment, it wasn¡¯t just Yurga who was shocked. Even the spectating adepts and Adept Laurent were almost driven mad at the sight of what was happening.


    God! Was it in vogue to smash people with magical crystals these days? Those fighting in the arena weren¡¯t elementium golems; they were piles of walking magical crystals. Using such an expensive mountain of magical crystals topete with an enemy and having them be destroyed in a single instant, one by one; the immense psychological impact to the master of these golems wouldn¡¯t be any smaller than what the enemy was dealing with!


    This...this was already the fifth or sixth one, wasn¡¯t it?


    That was probably more than a million magical crystals added together, right?


    Anyone would have to put their hand to their heart when they imagined a million magical crystals gone with the wind, just like that.


    As expected, just a minuteter, the two new me Fiends had been reduced to rubble, their soul brands smashed to pieces.


    The instant the two me Fiends were killed, a sh of fire appeared in the sea of fire and roars rang out. Another two towering figures stood up from within.


    ¡°Damned bastard. Are you finished yet?¡±


    At this instant, even Yurga, who thought himself a calm andposed person, couldn¡¯t help but swear.


    The spectating adepts had opened their eyes and mouths wide in shock. None of them could believe their eyes. Meanwhile, the apprentices had been counting their fingers and helping that young fire adept n leader count his losses since the start of the battle.


    A million magical crystals. That was a million magical crystals!


    The apprentices shouted in their hearts and minds, roaring furiously.


    They gripped their fists tight as their bodies trembled. For the first time, they felt the limits of their logic.


    If...if those million magical crystals were theirs. That image, that scene; it must be unimaginably wondrous!


    These one million magical crystals were more than enough to buy the loyalty of a few desperate adepts, along with arge group of fearless apprentices. Yet now, with the repeated sts of Death Gaze, these mountains of magical crystals around them were copsing into dust and their dreams along with them.


    For a moment, countless adepts and apprentices in the arena became disappointed and disillusioned!


    Even Mary and Billis were a bit shocked at the sight of this, let alone the outsiders.


    Dammit, a duel could be dealt with this way?


    In particr, Bug Adept Billis couldn¡¯t help but start counting his fingers and calcting how many insects he would need to kill a me Fiend.


    A swarm probably wasn¡¯t enough!


    The offensive and defensive power of a swarm were still too weak. It would have trouble getting close to the me Fiends who had their Rings of Fire. A me Fiend wouldn¡¯t even need to fight. They just needed to activate the Ring of Fire, and they would be able to roast most of the swarm.


    Inparison, only the First and Second Grade insect generals could break through the me Fiend¡¯s shell to break the golem core within.


    Given his current number of insect generals and their overall power, killing a me Fiend was still possible. However, he would have to pay the price of losing half of his insect generals to do this. If he went all out, killing two me Fiends who were working in tandem with each other was still possible.


    However, he would have to prepare himself to lose all his insect generals and all of his swarm!


    Yet, two me Fiends appeared to be nothing to that strange n leader of his. Just look at it. Look at it! The seventh and eight me Fiends were roaring and appearing once again!


    For a moment, for some reason, Billis felt a bit of sympathy for that Third Grade Adept Yurga, who had been ¡®dominating¡¯ the entire battle.


    His luck was justpletely in the gutter!


    Mary also let out a sigh of relief.


    The danger was resolved, and a chance for victory had appeared for her lover. Naturally, her mood had turned around.


    ¡°Very good, very good. You bastard Greem. You had such a trick up your sleeves, and you didn¡¯t tell me ahead of time? You made me cry for nothing all this while. Hmph! Just you wait and see how I¡¯ll deal with you once we get back home.¡±


    Meanwhile, the white-robed Adept Laurent started frowning.


    Dammit, how did those bastards from the information department do their job? How did they manage to fail to gather such vital information on the target? You bastard Yurga, has your brain been eaten by a dog? Stop tussling with those brainless elementium golems and hurry up and find the brat.


    Unfortunately, regardless of how he cried internally, the situation in the arena had already been unimaginably turned around!


    When the seventh and eighth me Fiends fell before Yurga, the ninth and tenth me Fiends appeared out of thin air.


    At this point, the spectating adepts and apprentices had ovee the psychological shock as their thoughts were back and working on the fight.


    They shouted and cheered vigorously as they watched with excitement at how the Third Grade adept destroyed the piles of magical crystals again and again, before watching new piles of magical crystals roar and arrive in the arena.


    They no longer cared about the oue of the battle. They were simply curious how many magical crystals this legendary fire adept n leader was prepared to use to crush this Third Grade adept. Two million, or three million?


    It was this odd thought process that caused all the adepts and apprentices to ce bizarre wagers on Yurga within their own minds.


    ¡°Neen of them.¡±


    ¡°Eighteen.¡±


    ¡°I say sixteen. Can¡¯t you see that Adept Yurga is already panting? I bet he can take him down with sixteen elementium golems.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! What do you know? Panting just means he¡¯s furious. Any adept can show an explosion of potential in a duel of life and death. That¡¯s why I¡¯ll bet twenty-one!¡±


    Some more acquainted adepts and apprentices even started gathering together and began wagering.


    Just as they were all excitedly pretending to be ¡®experts¡¯ at analysis, the battle took an unexpected turn.


    The new me Fiends started self-destructing when they charged at Yurga!

 Chapter 843 - Yurgas Fury

    Chapter 843 Yurga¡¯s Fury


    In truth, the self-destruction of the elementium golems was well within Greem¡¯s ns.


    It was only because Yurga had always struck too fast and killed instantly every time that he had yet to put it to n until now.


    Now, after instantly killing eight me Fiends in a row, even Yurga couldn¡¯t help but start feeling some exhaustion. Death Gaze severely wore away at the soul origin. Yurga and his exceptional Spirit could not endure firing the beam so many times in session.


    It was actually amonce urrence in battles between high-grade adepts!


    Intermediate and low-grade adepts would often turn the world around them when they fought, battling for days and nights. Sometimes, the battle would even drag all the way out until both parties had exhausted all of their magical power. Conflicts between high-grade adepts would never end up in a scenario like this. Victory and defeat were often decided in moments.


    Those who could be Third Grade always held some unconventional and powerful trump cards in their hands. Once the battle started, there would be no mercy. They would try their best to kill the opponent in the shortest time possible, leaving no space or time for the opponent to retaliate.


    As a veteran Third Grade bloodline adept, Yurga relied on this strange bloodline and possessed the powerful innate ability to kill an enemy instantly. It was this move that gave him the shockingly powerful title of the Death Heralding Crow in the central region.


    Unfortunately, he had run into an even more bizarre Second Grade challenger today!


    Greem was the n leader of the Crimson n and a powerful Second Grade fire adept. He also possessed the mysterious ability to manipte mes.


    With his Burning Domain and the massive sea of fire, his body had already assimted with the mes, making it difficult for Yurga to find his real body. Meanwhile, the me Fiends he secretly summoned wildly charged at Yurga.


    If Yurga ignored the me Fiends and focused solely on finding Greem, then he would be subject to quite a beating. If two intermediate Second Grade me Fiends were allowed to unleash their full might, they could cause some shocking destruction. At the very least, Yurga dared not test the power of their attacks.


    However, Yurga had no better means of quickly dealing with two me Fiends apart from his Death Gaze. Of course, he could still kill the two golems even if he didn¡¯t use Death Gaze, and then simply fall back on his powers as a Third Grade adept.


    If that were the case, he would leave the two me Fiends with some time for preparation.


    You aren¡¯t going to use your Death Gaze any more? Alright then, I¡¯ll just self-destruct!


    One of the me Fiends was responsible for upying Yurga, while the other rushed forward recklessly and self-destructed. This way, Yurga might no longer need to exhaust his soul origin, but he would now have to endure the might of an intermediate Second Grade elementium golem¡¯s self-destruction!


    Greem¡¯s spirit consciousness flowed slowly through the sea of fire. He could also pick up on the might of the self-destruction through the explosion¡¯s shockwave.


    Six hundred and twenty-nine points!


    That was already a very shocking energy level!


    At the very least, Adept Yurga¡¯s robes were already burnt when he escaped from the mushroom cloud. His face was grim and ck with smoke. From a distance, he looked like a beggar in rags.


    While he was scrambling to recover from the explosion, the other me Fiend charged at him.


    It wasn¡¯t that easy to humiliate and bully a Third Grade adept either!


    Yurga straightened his body furiously and extended a scorched hand at the me Fiend. A handposed of pure ck mist smashed onto the golem¡¯s thick, solid chest.


    The mist hand shed with the magma, sizzling fiercely.


    The mes on the me Fiend¡¯s half-meter thick magma chest stalled as a w-shaped indentation appeared. The indentation was so deep that it had prated the me Fiend¡¯s chest.


    As a hole appeared in the chest, searing hotva spilled out from within. Flowing out along with theva stream was a crystalline elementium core glowing with prismatic light.


    However, at this moment, the elementium core was glowing with a red light. The fire elementium energies were wild and chaotic as if they were about to go out of control.


    Yurga let out a cold snort when he saw this. His body exploded into a flock of crows that squawked and flew away.


    The next moment, a gigantic mushroom cloud erupted in the center of the arena.


    A wild elementium ze quickly spread outward, rapidly catching up with those escaping Death Heralding Crows. The Death Heralding Crows might have excellent resistance, but even they could not endure an energy explosion of this level. Over a hundred red-eyed Death Heralding Crows had their bodies blown to shreds of ck mist.


    Under ordinary circumstances, Yurga would surely have escaped out of the radius of the elementium mes to reduce the burden on his energy supply. This time, Yurga went the exact opposite way. He charged above the mushroom cloud and transformed into one gigantic Death Heralding Crow before ring viciously at the sea of fire below with his red eyes.


    When the two new me Fiends appeared somewhere in the sea of fire, Yurga folded his ck wings without hesitation and dove downward with a tail of ck smoke behind him.


    He had just made it halfway when the two summoned me Fiends lifted their heads and locked onto his position. They raised both their hands, and four boiling streams ofva shot out toward him like four massive pirs of fire.


    The Death Heralding Crow that Yurga had transformed into uttered a soul-shocking shriek. The voice was sharp and loud enough to tear a person¡¯s eardrums, and even space started to wrinkle beneath the ripple of energy.


    The thick pirs ofva were blown away where the soundwave spread.


    Yurga¡¯s body abruptly elerated, and he charged across the rain of fire under cover of the ck mist, arriving at the location where that strange mental flux had originated.


    ¡°Get out here!¡±


    As Yurga shouted, arge flock of Death Heralding Crows formed from out of the ck mist. The sizzling death beams shot in every direction as if they cost nothing.


    The sea of fire around Yurga faded, revealing a scorched-ck arena floor.


    A stumbling figure appeared at the edge of the fire, his Spirit clearly damaged by the death beams.


    ¡°Brat, don¡¯t think of escaping alive now that I¡¯ve managed to drag you out.¡±


    Yurga revealed a wicked smile. His body vanished, evading two meteors that the me Fiends hadunched at him. When he once again appeared, he was in front of the towering figure and extending a ck mist hand toward the opponent¡¯s chest.


    The hand had only reached halfway before Yurga¡¯s face soured and he quickly had to erupt into a thousand crows again.


    But it was toote!


    An even more terrifying explosion of fire rose with the towering figure at its center. The st engulfed most of the Death Heralding Crows into its impact.


    It was apparent that Yurga also had a transformation ability simr to Bug Adept Billis, where he would not die as long as one of his manifested creatures was still alive. Thus, it was only when the remaining two to three hundred crows escaped into the distance and reformed into Yurga¡¯s appearance that everyone understood the tremendous damage the detonation from earlier had dealt him.


    The smoke protecting Yurga was already too thin to cover his body. Burn marks and blisters could be seen covering the entirety of his withered form. Part of his carbonized flesh started peeling off, revealing the pink and tender flesh beneath along with the beating organs.


    The previously confident Yurga now had a pale face, seemingly devoid of all color. He clutched the hole in his chest with all he had and took out a magical green potion from his belt with much difficulty before consuming it.


    Strangely enough, Yurga¡¯s severe wounds immediately started healing once he drank the potion.


    Even the massive burns and wounds on his body started to heal at a visible rate.


    Without hesitation, Yurga took out several magical potion bottles of various colors and extreme potency and started drinking all of them. As the effects of the potions took hold, the damage to his body began to recede, and even his weakened Spirit showed noticeable recovery.


    If even a Second Grade like Greem could obtain a sacred healing potion like the Water of the Moonwell, then how could Yurga possibly becking such medicines as a Third Grade adept?


    However, the physical damage that the elementium fires dealt to Yurga was not as severe as the damage to his ego and pride.


    To think that he would sustain such massive damage in a battle against a Second Grade fire adept! How was Yurga supposed to feel about this? Where was he to put his face now? Moreover, the damage to his reputation had already been established. Even if Yurga were to unleash his full might and kill off Greem now, he would probably have a hard time changing the way that other Third Grade adepts looked at him.


    Even more terrifying was the fact that the towering me humanoid that exploded earlier wasn¡¯t Greem¡¯s actual body. It was only a fire clone he had summoned. It was only because Greem had used some mysterious spell that caused the clone to radiate the same mental flux as himself that he had managed to trick Yurga into its proximity.


    While Yurga was caught up in his frustration and unquenchable fury, the two annoying me Fiends once again charged at him. The series of fireballs they were shooting off bombarded his location like a storm.


    The fury within him, with nowhere to go, finally erupted!


    Yurga once again transformed into a massive Death Heralding Crow shrouded in ck smoke. He drew out ck lightning in the sky, quick as a phantom, and instantly pierced through the bodies of the two me Fiends.


    When he finally stopped in the sky, the ck smoke promptly extinguished theva and mes on his body. There, he held two glowing golem cores in his hands.


    Yurga¡¯s attacks had been too fast and too ferocious. It was far beyond the limits of the me Fiends¡¯ reaction.


    The two me Fiends had their hidden golem cores removed from their bodies by the opponent without even the chance to react. If it weren¡¯t for the Ring of Fire and theva on them dealing a substantial amount of damage to Yurga, these two me Fiends would have died in a very humiliating and worthless manner.


    Yurga felt the rapidly berserking fire elementium within the two cores, and a wicked smile appeared on his face. He smashed his two hands together, and cracks appeared on the delicate and perfect golem cores before they exploded into fireworks.


    Yurga crushed the cores before they could detonate!

 Chapter 844 - The Battle Concludes

    Chapter 844 The Battle Concludes


    The might of a Third Grade adept was horrifying when they went all out.


    The next four me Fiends that Greem summoned were also destroyed by Yurga in much the same fashion, turning into sacrifices before the famed title of the Death Heralding Crow.


    However, the me Fiends of Terror truly lived up to their names. They managed to cause pretty substantial damage to this Third Grade adept with their retaliation before dying. This umtion of wounds quickly affected Yurga¡¯s ability to fight, making it difficult for him to so ¡®easily¡¯ dispatch one me Fiend after another.


    Greem had also been forced to drink a vial of moonwater to recover the loss of his magical powers and Spirit.


    He had only managed tost until now against Yurga with his Second Grade Spirit due to the Fire Throne set¡¯s unique set effect of cutting fire magic Spirit exhaustion by half. Greem had to summon a me Fiend almost every fifteen minutes while opening a fire portal to summon fire creatures to upy and exhaust Yurga.


    It was due to these ¡®lowly¡¯ little tricks and a frightening loss of magical crystals that Greem gained an equal footing against a Third Grade adept. He had not shown himself on the battlefield from the very start of the battle until the very end. However, the me Fiends and fire creatures he summoned were all over the ce, turning the entire arena into a scary sea of fire.


    The individual lethality of Yurga was amazing, and he was no weakling even amongst Third Grade adepts. However, he was somewhat powerless against Greem¡¯s swarming strategies.


    If Greem ever dared show himself, even ten of him together would be turned into hotpot by Yurga in a single go!


    However, Greem was nowhere to be seen now, while his me Fiends were extremely hard to deal with.


    If Yurga were even slightly slower in reacting, the me Fiends would self-destruct without any hesitation. That was what made Yurga¡¯s head hurt.


    Such a mighty intermediate Second Grade elementium golem would be worth a lot in the market. Yet, the young Crimson n leader abandoned them without a second thought. Moreover, he wasn¡¯t dropping just one or two of them, but an entire pile of them.


    Yurga felt like he was in perpetual agony when fighting against such a strange opponent!


    Yurga might have intended to destroy a few more me Fiends at the start of the battle to upset Greem. However, the number of elementium golems that Greem had summoned had already gone past his psychological bottom line. Yurga¡¯s state of mind was utterly shaken now.


    He was no longer as confident as before.


    He had no idea how many elementium golems that Greem still had in reserve!


    If...if the number of elementium golems he had was immense, wouldn¡¯t I be basically digging my own grave with this duel? Wouldn¡¯t I have led myself to my demise?


    The more he thought about it, the wilder his imagination became. Yurga¡¯s state of mind went from the initial rage to the current nervousness. Hisbat style also unintentionally became much more reserved.


    The n might be important, benefits might be important, but in the end, they were not as important as his life!


    One could never be too careful.


    If Greem had as many as twenty elementium golems¨Cno, eighteen golems¨Cthen his life would be in danger.


    You knew his own abilities the best. After this one hour of intense fighting, Yurga had already fired eight Death Gazes and five area-of-effect Death Beams in session. Such intensity was already far beyond the limits of his body. If it weren¡¯t for the potions, Yurga would be wholly exhausted now and forced onto the defensive.


    Perhaps the potions might heal his physical wounds and recover his magical power and Spirit, but they could not eliminate the lethargy and feeling of defeat that he was feeling right now.


    The Death Gazes he was firing were still powerful withoutpare, and he was still invincible to the me Fiends. However, deep down in his heart, an unconceble fear was slowly growing.


    If he was defeated...


    This question that he had never once considered before the battle appeared in his heart for the first time. He quickly mped down on the idea, not daring to think of it, yet unable to forget either.


    Elementium magic of most attributes could not be sessfully cast within this mystical Burning Domain; only innate abilities like Death Gaze and physical attacks could circumvent its effects. Under such circumstances, Yurga¡¯s exhaustion was tremendous as well.


    Kill a thousand enemies at the cost of three hundred of your own!


    Yurga was not having an easy time or going unscathed every time he exterminated a me Fiend. Even a Third Grade bloodline adept like himself could not stand it if all the ¡®three hundred¡¯ were stacked together.


    Of course, without the Burning Domain, Yurga would have been able to move freely and gopletely uncontested with his immense power. He would have long since dealt with the Second Grade fire adept. The battle would never have been so forcefully drawn out to this awkward state.


    If Yurga imed that he felt no trace of regret at this moment, he would be lying to himself and everyone else.


    At this moment, Yurga was so regretful that his intestines were green!


    Wasn¡¯t it just attacking a newly established adept n? How did it slowly escte to this situation? If Yurga had the chance to choose again, he would have firmly rejected that Association elder¡¯s messenger¡¯s suggestion to mobilize troops.


    Aren¡¯t those bastards just cing him in a pit and a fire?


    Regardless of how regretful he was and how upset he was, Yurga had to grit his teeth and finish this duel before him.


    The situation had already reached this state. It was no longer a matter of whether he was willing to let the young fire adept go. Rather, it was a matter of whether the opponent wanted to reach for the thousand-year miracle of ying a Third Grade as a Second Grade!


    Whenever Yurga thought of himself potentially bing the Third Grade adept held in the highest contempt across the entire world, his anger and frustration boiled to a peak within him. He wanted to ughter something to let it all out. However, whenever he remembered that he could pay the price of his life for reckless attacks, he immediately cowered.


    His emotions and spirits swayed between these two extremes, momentarily disying barbaric viciousness at times, and cowardly retreat at others. It undoubtedly caused the oue of the battle to be shrouded in even more mist and uncertainty!


    Yurga¡¯s state of mind was aplete mess now!


    It wasn¡¯t just Greem who could see this. Even the adepts and apprentices on stage could pick up on this.


    By the time the fifteenth me Fiend fell in the arena, Yurga was engulfed in the self-destruction of the sixteenth me Fiend due to his injuries slowing him down.


    This time, when Yurga struggled out of the sea of fire, he reached into his pouch and froze on the spot.


    The high-grade potions for recovery had all been used up!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Regardless of how smart or wise Yurga was, he would never have expected to receive such massive physical wounds at such intensity. Thus, the number of potions for physical wounds in his reserves were far less than the number of medicines meant for recovering Spirit.


    This meager supply of potions had been exhausted after just three rounds of use.


    When Yurga dragged his injured body around the arena, unable to find suitable potions, the two me Fiends once again charged at him.


    This time, Yurga was truly scared!


    He could still fire one or two Death Gazes to deal with these two me Fiends with his remaining Spirit and soul origin. However, thisst bit of his power was reserved for dealing with the Second Grade fire adept. If he used them up here, what could he rely on to exterminate the opponent of his duel?


    Yurga had no choice but to drag his wounded body along and kite the me Fiends. He had to drag out the fight and allow his body to heal better.


    Greem, who was in hiding, also realized that this was Yurga¡¯s n. He silently summoned a fire portal and sent arge group of fire creatures onto the battlefield once again.


    Yurga was unbelievably furious when he saw this cannon fodder hop onto the arena.


    The cannon fodder was nothing at all. Even a shockwave from Yurga¡¯s battle with the me Fiends would exterminate most of them. However, any of the surviving trash only needed to stall his movements slightly, and the two pursuing me Fiend would be able to catch up and detonate.


    Yurga was already terrified of their sts!


    He had lost the ck smoke protecting his body. He had lost the aid of the potions. Don¡¯t even mention the detonations of the me Fiends; just the Burning Domain in the background alone was slowly causing Yurga to experience the horror of magical mes.


    The Burning Domain with no more than a hundred points of power was applying constant, unavoidable damage.


    When Yurga was powerful, he could naturally ignore such weak ¡®damage.¡¯ However, once the battle entered the endgame, such ¡®insignificant¡¯ damage became thest straw to break the camel¡¯s back. It caused Yurga to be hurt. Very hurt.


    Finally, Yurga copsed under the me shockwave of the neenth me Fiend andpletely fell unconscious.


    Greem was afraid that Yurga was putting on a show, and he refused to show himself yet. It wasn;t until hemanded the me Fiend to chop off Yurga¡¯s head and burn his body that Greem appeared at the edge of the battlefield.


    Greem looked at the slowly fading defensive barrier around the arena and unhesitatingly took Yurga¡¯s ugly and vicious head into his own hands. He then quickly gouged the strange red eye embedded in Yurga¡¯s forehead.


    The red eye was still exceedingly soft when he first took it out.


    However, as Yurga¡¯s soul aura started to fade, the strange red eye rapidly solidified and turned into an amber pearl. Upon closer inspection, there was a gray cross in the center of the pearl, and Greem could clearly sense a faint magical flux.


    Unfortunately, he couldn¡¯t absorb Yurga¡¯s massive soul into this red-eye under everyone¡¯s gaze. Otherwise, the remaining bloodline power might be even stronger!


    Greem thought to himself as he lifted his head and looked at the arbitrating adept walking toward him with a sour face¨C Laurent.


    This oue was entirely beyond his expectations. It had caught him by surprise.


    In all honesty, even Laurent himself didn¡¯t know how to face Greem now.

 Chapter 845 - Expansion of the Crimson Clan

    Chapter 845 Expansion of the Crimson n


    The oue was well and truly beyond everyone¡¯s expectations.


    When Greem walked out of the arena while tossing around the strange red eye in his hand, the stands were utterly silent.


    The spectating adepts watched him silently withplicated looks in their eyes. For a moment, not a single person walked forward to congratte him.


    In the end, it was Mary and Billis who, all smiles, gathered at Greem¡¯s side and offered their blessings.


    A trace of a smile finally appeared on Adept Laurent¡¯s face. He strode to Greem¡¯s side and loudly said, ¡°Very good! I never expected you to be hiding such a special trick. Good...very good.¡±


    Greem knew that Laurent was probably cursing him somehow in his heart right now. As such, he showed no courtesies.


    ¡°Lord Laurent, ording to the contract of the duel...¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t need to say anymore. Everything will go ording to the contract!¡± Adept Laurent¡¯s face turned extremely ugly when Greem brought this up, ¡°As the victors of this fight, the Crimson n has the right to take away a suitable portion of warpensation from the Kam n. As Yurga is dead, thispensation will be shouldered by all members of the Kam n.¡±


    Laurent took out a yellow parchment and handed it over to Greem.


    Greem took the paper and looked at it. It was a long list of all the territories and resources belonging to the Kam n.


    With the help of the Chip, Greem managed to find problems with this list after a single look.


    ¡°Lord Laurent, ording to what I know, the Kam n seemed to have two First ss resource sites. Why are they not on this list?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Yurga pledged those two First ss resource sites to the Zhentarim Association before the contract was signed. What? Do you want to take them back from the hands of the Association elders?¡± Laurent had a nasty expression on his face.


    He hadn¡¯t managed this thing well enough and allowed this brat to turn the tables. If news of this got back to the Zhentarim Association, he would be scolded by the elders. It was only natural that he bore such a sour expression.


    Those who could be Association elders were all famous Fourth Grade adepts in the Zhentarim area. Greem was smart enough to shake his head immediately.


    Laurent¡¯s face finally rxed when he saw Greem leave atst.


    ¡°Three Second ss resource sites and seven Third ss resource sites. In addition to several stretches of noble¡¯snd that make up over two hundred square kilometers of territory; brat, don¡¯t you be too greedy!¡±


    As the Kam n was located in the Ailovis area, many of their inherited territories were not far away from Fire Throne. Consequently, the Crimson n immediately rose to be one of the most influential adept ns in Ailovis after taking over these resource sites and territories.


    With Fire Throne as the n headquarters, the fundamental influence of the Crimson n stretched north to the ck Forest, south to the Ironstone Hignds, west to Stopwater Lake, and east to Morgan Stonecastle. This stretch ofnd, mines, civilians, and resources measuring as much as three hundred square kilometers would be the direct territory of the Crimson n.


    Moreover, these ces had already be notably developed. They only needed to go through the formalities with the Kam n and change the noble management at these ces. The Crimson n could then easily take this territory under their control.


    Apart from some local nobles that needed to be cleansed for being too close with the Kam n, there wasn¡¯t much else to be worried about. These nobles had no loyalty to the Kam n. They were only a bunch of pug dogs living at the will of the adepts.


    One or two bones would be enough to make them change their banners and be ¡®loyal¡¯ subjects of the Crimson n!


    After obtaining the duel pact, Greem handed it off to Billis and had him deal with the handover from the Kam n. The only Third Grade of the Kam n had already died at Rhein. The remaining First and Second Grades had best stay honest if they wanted to live. Greem didn¡¯t mind cleaning them up should any of them dare bare their fangs.


    Greem might have obtained a wless victory after this forced duel, but he had also exhausted his entire reserve of high-grade magical golems that he had been umting for the past hundred years. At the moment, he only had one me Fiend summoning core left.


    As such, there was no way Greem could sleep tight if he didn¡¯t manage to get back these losses from the Kam n.


    The Kam n was now a toothless tiger. The remaining Second Grade adepts couldn¡¯t even do anything about Bug Adept Billis. Thus, Greem didn¡¯t need to worry about the Kam going against the agreement.


    After the matter at Rhein had concluded, Greem led Mary back to Fire Throne, while Billis hurried to the Kam headquarters.


    When Greem returned to Fire Throne, all the Crimson adepts and apprentices had gathered at the hall on the first floor. They immediately cheered loudly when Greem entered and bowed in respect, ¡°Long live the n leader!¡±


    Even the submissive adepts who had just joined the Crimson n were exceedingly happy and excited.


    After this battle, there would no longer be an adept group that couldpare to the Crimson n in Ailovis. From here on out, the Crimson n would step into a historic period of explosive development.


    Those weaker ns of Andorra, Cenas, Layton Academy, and the Magic Forest Hut that had merged with Kam would all have to face the pressing offensive of the Crimson n.


    They could either give up on all worldly territories and resource sites, pulling back all adepts and apprentices to their headquarters, and holding in there in hopes of a miracle, or they leave far and wide, giving up everything they had in Ailovis and find some way to nt their roots in a public adept city to preserve their adept legacy.


    Both of these paths were difficult and harsh!


    Should the core figure of a n fail to keep control over the situation, it was very likely for n members to defect.


    As expected, once the news of Yurga¡¯s death had spread throughout Ailovis, Layton Academy was the first to announce their seclusion from all external matters. They sealed the gates of their academy and transitioned into a semi-reclusive state.


    Meanwhile, though Layton Academy did not expressly say so, they had already cut off all contact with their resource sites and territory, as if anyone who wanted them could take over.


    Meanwhile, the Andorra n, which had the worst rtionship with the Crimson n, had no choice but to pack their bags and move their n headquarters into Rhein. As for those worldly territories and resource sites that they couldn¡¯t take away? They were left empty and became ces without owners.


    Only the Kam n had been doing well in the region due to their assimtion of the Magic Forest Hut.


    Before they could even catch a breath, the only Third Grade of their n, n Leader Yurga, had mysteriously died at the hands of that Second Grade Crimson n leader. Such a heavy blow caused the entire Kam n to fall into a state of ruin.


    After bing the Kam n leader, the most powerful Second Grade adept could only suppress his anger and humiliation to hand over much of the n¡¯s property to the visiting bug adept. In particr, the handing over of the already developed resource sites caused the Kam n¡¯s power to be cut by seventy to eighty percent. From then on, they had be a weak and powerless small n of Ailovis.


    With the protection of the agreement, they did not need to worry about the continued devastation of the Crimson n for the moment.


    However, when the entire Ailovis region had be thend of the Crimson n, the Kam n would still have an exceedingly hard time trying to continue living in the gaps between the Crimson n¡¯s influence.


    Without resource sites, they lost their spring of adept resources. Without worldly territories, they lost their source for new apprentices. These two things were the foundation for any adept n tost long.


    Now, the Kam n had lost both!


    Following Layton Academy¡¯s announcement, the Kam n also announced their retreat into their headquarters, no longer involving themselves with any of the local matters in Ailovis.


    Thus, with the stepping down of one adept organization after another, the Crimson n truly started rising!


    Greem immediately hid within his room once he returned to Fire Throne. Mary and Gargamel were the ones to give the order for three dozen Crimson adepts to walk out of the tower and be stationed in various resource sites across Ailovis.


    For a time, the Crimson n had a total of one First ss resource site, seven Second ss resource sites, and sixteen Third ss resource sites. The number of worldly territories and human cities was uncountable.


    After five busy years, the Crimson n finally finished its initial distribution for the worldly territories and the change in management. The Crimson n¡¯snds took up over sixty percent of Ailovis. It was an area of over two thousand square kilometers that was split into one dukedom, three marquisdoms, four counties, and plenty of viscounties and baronies.


    There were a total of seventeen human cities in this massive territory, along with two hundred and sixty-three towns and viges, one million subjects, and seven mines and quarries.


    The Crimson n¡¯s adepts were simply far too insufficient after gaining all thisnd. Thus, they started to hire and recruit a group of wandering adepts as well and barely managed to keep the entire area running.


    In terms of just the number of adepts and the area of their territory, the Crimson n had already far surpassed their old masters¨C the Sarubo n. They were now a sizeable adept n that couldn¡¯t live up to their name.


    The only thing that the Crimson n wascking now was presentable high-grade adepts.


    It was fortunate that they had a Third Grade thunder dragon and a Third Grade emerald dragon as their ultimate fighting force. That was the only thing that kept the Crimson n¡¯s highest military power from being toocking. Otherwise, such a ¡®bloated¡¯ and ¡®fat¡¯ body would have attracted the scheming eyes of the outside world.


    During this period of change and turbulence, the Crimson n leader that obtained the first victory ever in the World of Adepts against an adept of a grade above him had been hiding in his tower. He had not shown his face at all.


    Thus, the years passed by just like that, one by one.

 Chapter 846 - Advancement Preparations

    Chapter 846 Advancement Preparations


    [Beep. Advancement data has been organized. Disy now?]


    Greem, who had been deep in meditation, was woken up by the newest notification from the Chip.


    He slowly opened his eyes.


    ¡°Disy it!¡±


    His mind flickered as a flood of data shed by.


    The speed of data transmission could not be captured by the naked eye. Fortunately, elementium adepts excelled at Spirit. Their Spirit, after strengthening, could not only change and morph freely but also had an excellent ability to help with thinking and increased brain processes.


    It was the main reason that high-grade adepts had an eidetic memory and could masterplex three-dimensional arrays with their minds alone.


    Greem had done simr calctions before. After bing an adept, every point increase in his Spirit was akin to connecting to another intelligence center. The higher the Spirit, the more intelligence centers that were working in tandem. Thus, the brain of an adept would get smarter and smarter, able to process those mountains of mysterious information.


    One could frankly im that the mind of every adept was already like a terrifying and intelligentputer. However, theycked the necessary operating system, and one could only drive the brain to work with one¡¯s own childish and crude logical instincts.


    In this process, the Chip undoubtedly helped Greem a lot!


    It was only with the Chip¡¯s organization of data and resources that he could maximize the true potential of each point of Spirit.


    ¡°Chip, disy my current bodily attributes!¡±


    [Order received; data has been transmitted.]


    Some light crackling rang out as a very familiar data board appeared before Greem¡¯s mind.


    [Greem.


    Peak Second Grade.


    Profession: Elementium Adept (Fire Specialization)


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 14+1 (20) | Physique 17 (21) | Agility 11+1 (9) | Spirit 29 (30)


    Note: Attributes in parentheses refer to post-transformation statistics. Profession Skills: Body of mes, me Fiend Transformation...]


    After all these years of umtion and training, Greem¡¯s Spirit had finally reached the peak of Second Grade: twenty-nine points. It couldn¡¯t be helped. These days, the Chip had been unable to capture any signs of his Spirit improving regardless of how he meditated and trained.


    It was important to note that the cooperation of the Chip and his Spirit had now allowed for capturing the smallest difference and increase in it, all the way down to five decimal points. Unfortunately, despite half a month passing by, neither meditation nor consuming potions to increase his Spirit allowed it to increase by even a little.


    Even the two points of Spirit that the Fire Throne set provided him had lost their effectiveness!


    Judging from this, Greem¡¯s Spirit would forever be locked at twenty-nine points unless he found a way to advance to the next grade.


    Maximum Spirit was only a fundamental condition for advancing to Third Grade. What was left was whether his magic studies had reached the required standards. On this point, Greem had absolutely no issue, especially with the help of the Chip.


    ¡°Chip, how has the analysis of the subject knowledge required for advancement gone?¡±


    [Beep. All adept knowledge analyzed. Prepared to transmit at any time.]


    ¡°Transmit now!¡±


    His mind flickered again as a series of magical studies with fire magic at its core started to surge into Greem¡¯s brain in an orderly fashion. Much of this knowledge was stuff that Greem had never learned before, but with the in-depth analysis and proper organization of the Chip, all of the impurities and mistakes had been removed. It now flowed through Greem¡¯s mind as a pure stream of data.


    Though most of the knowledge was foreign, it was quickly stored in the depths of Greem¡¯s consciousness when it flowed into his mind. It became like information that Greem had studied for dozens of years and was a part of his soul instincts.


    Any adept knowledge needed countless magical experiments to prove and confirm, from beginner to expert in the subject. It required a long time for thought and umtion. However, with the Chip, Greem skipped over much of this time-consuming work.


    Every piece of knowledge transmitted into Greem¡¯s mind was ever so familiar to him. It had already be part of his system of knowledge.


    After thoroughly analyzing and mastering the High-Grade Methods of Spirit Utilization, Greem instantly understood the ridiculous mistakes he had made in the past with Spirit. He also gained an elementary understanding of how high-grade adepts rapidly use Spirit in battle.


    He contrasted what he had learned with the memory of his fight with Yurga and quickly found things that resonated.


    When high-grade adepts fought, they rarely expended the effort to fire spells with stable elementium models. Instead, they usedrge amounts of primal elementium particles to bombard the enemy. Thus, they skipped the process of elementium molding, allowing their spells and attacks to be faster and more vicious.


    As for the slight bit of loss in the elementium¡¯s might? That could entirely be made up for with faster casting. Compared to the traditional method of handsigns and chanting, battling like this gave them more flexibility and allowed them to do as they pleased.


    However, manipting unmolded elementium particles was always moreplicated than handling formed spells. That was why this style ofbat had been possible for high-grade adepts only. Even if the low-grade adepts wanted to do this, they would fail because of their insufficient Spirits.


    Meanwhile, Elementium Conversion was a mandatory lesson for all elementium adepts!


    It was only when an elementium adept had mastered elementium conversion that they could adapt to wherever they were andplete their spell systems. For example, Greem frequently used Lava Shields and Magma Fireball. These were spells thatbined fire and earth magic. If Greem had no understanding of earth magic, he would not be capable of handlingpound magic of this nature.


    Moreover, elementium conversion was also critical knowledge for stepping out into the void of the outer realm. If Greem could not master elementium conversion, he would have trouble surviving in the strict and harsh environment of outer space.


    Disregarding everything else, just the matter of not having drinking water would kill a high-grade adept!


    Greem still retained a human body of blood and flesh after all. Though the need for food and water had been reduced to the minimum of a human body¡¯s needs, it couldn¡¯t bepletely removed. Under ordinary circumstances, Greem wouldn¡¯t be affected by fasting, even for three to five days. However, if this period were dragged out to ten days, Greem would start showing severe signs of weakness in battle.


    If he didn¡¯t have the minimum food and water intake required to sustain his flesh in a month, then he risked the actual possibility of dying of thirst and hunger!


    However, as long as Greem advanced to Third Grade, this limit could be extended to over six months.


    That meant Greem would only need to eat every six months to meet his biological needs.


    The reason elementium conversion was so important was because of the Create Water spell that the adepts had invented.


    In circumstances where they couldn¡¯t get away from another world or ancient ruin, and where drinking water couldn¡¯t be found, adepts could use Create Water to create elementium water for their consumption. However, elementium conversion was undoubtedly a prerequisite for learning Create Water.


    Of course, the Coldme rune that Greem had previously mastered also belonged to the subject of elementium conversion. However, Greem had only managed to use the Coldme in the past by relying on some iplete runes. It was like something he knew how to use but of whose principle he didn¡¯t understand.


    Now that he had mastered elementium conversion, Greem had a chance to decipher the Coldme runepletely!


    Still, both of these subjects were not as useful to Greem as the Energy System Auto-Construction Model. It was the true core knowledge that Greem needed to advance to Third Grade.


    In the past, Greem had always relied on his body¡¯s instinct when forging his body of mes. He let his flesh and fire energy remain in a very delicate energy bnce. This process was done by destroying the body¡¯s original structure and allowing fire elementium particles taken from outside to seep into his bones, tendons, flesh, and organs. He was using small, delicate fire energy fields to protect his most vulnerable human parts.


    In all seriousness, Greem¡¯s body of mes might be very powerful, but his human body was still as frail as china. A slight bit more force could cause him to shatter into pieces!


    With the knowledge of the Energy System Auto-Construction Model, Greem¡¯s body could now adjust and optimize itself based on the conditions and situation. He could now turn the multiple independent and tiny energy fields into aplete and self-consistent system of energy cirction.


    This way, his human body would no longer be his weakness and w, but a strong foundation to his fighting power!


    ......


    ......


    This advancement knowledge flowed through Greem¡¯s mind, each part of it moving him and causing new thoughts to pop up. Whenbined, these subjects pointed the way to a higher grade!


    However, Greem would always have walked down certain ¡®wrong paths¡¯ during his studies, growth, and development in the past. He needed to correct these mistakes before he actually advanced.


    Moreover, this process was one that took a considerable amount of time!


    Furthermore, the orc totem tattoos he got from Strongwoods ne had also yielded some results. They would be of great help to his transformation tattoos.


    Before he advanced, he had to confirm the newest version of his me Fiend Transformation tattoos.


    Once he finished that, Greem could rely on the immense modification process of the advancement stage to his body and Spirit to assimte the new tattoos, allowing him to possess a powerfulbat ability the moment he stepped into Third Grade.


    Moreover, the Soul Repose ability he had obtained from the orcs had also shown some decent research conclusions. It would be excellent if he could use the advancement to incorporate this ability into part of his own.


    Greem was also carrying far too many magical contracts bound to his soul. Trying to step across the threshold of Third Grade was extremely difficult with so many burdens on him. Thus, after some thought, Greem gave up on the soul contracts of the Stitch Ghost Golem, Zacha, and Snox. He only kept the soul brands of Alice and the Spirit of Pestilence.


    After this period of getting along with them, Greem was confident that he had the loyalty of Zacha and Snox, even without the soul contracts. Meanwhile, the Spirit of Pestilence was enough as a soul pet. The Stitch Ghost Golem would only drag down their improvement in their future.


    However, now that he had nurtured the Stitch Ghost Golem into a Second Grade ghost spirit, it would be a waste to just throw it away like that. Greem intended to take advantage of the soul modification process of the advancement to peel away the Stitch Ghost Golem and forge some sort of strange magical equipment.


    This way, he would be able to make full use of the Stitch Ghost Golem while also lightening the burden on his soul!

 Chapter 847 - The Passing Years

    Chapter 847 The Passing Years


    Greem had gone into seclusion once again!


    This news was only spread to the higher-ups of the Crimson n. The outside world had no idea of this.


    As for the purpose of this seclusion, only a few people knew of it.


    This seclusion took up eight years.


    ............


    ¡°Lady Mary is back!¡±


    ¡°Lady Mary is back!¡±


    The announcement quickly spread throughout the adept¡¯s tower.


    The apprentices who stayed in the tower for personal matters rushed out of their rooms and respectfully bowed before the beautifuldy.


    ¡°Wee back, Lady Mary.¡± Sentences like those rang out, filling the tower.


    Mary couldn¡¯t be bothered by the greetings and swaggered down the line of people.


    Eight years was already a very long time for an ordinary person.


    However, it was no more than the time required for arge-scale experiment for high-grade adepts.


    Thus, eight years had passed, and Mary¡¯s appearance had almost not changed at all.


    If one had to pick out something different, it would be that she was now more mature and more beautiful!


    Her skin was as wless and white as jade, and her silk-like crimson hair rained down her back, swaying along with her seductive steps.


    Her face was delicate and perfect, two glowing crimson eyes embedded above. From a distance, they looked as crystalline as an ideal pair of rubies. The corners of her eyes tilted upward slightly, and a faint smile always hung on her rose-like lips.


    She wore bright red body-tight leather armor with skintight leather pants beneath. A green beltplimented her figure and drew out her slender waist.


    Those shocking curves and that beautiful skin were maddening to all that saw her!


    Anyone who beheld her for the first time would think of her as a pretty girl of no more than eighteen or neen. Who would ever have imagined that this was a vicious vampire adept who could kill without batting an eye and who had ughtered thousands in another world!


    Trailing along behind her were the most popr group in the Crimson n¨C the Rouge Corps.


    At the very front and right behind Mary was the girl with somewhat mysterious origins, Emelia.


    In just eight years, Emelia had grown into a young and attractive girl. Her slightly curled green hair rested on her shoulders, and she wore a strange robe woven from green vines. There was a short magic wand radiating green light in her hand as well. She had a light smile on her face, and her eyes were wandering from person to person in the crowd.


    Her power was now at peak First Grade!


    It was obvious that Emelia had won Mary¡¯s favor over the past few years, which was why she now stood at the very front of the Rouge Corps. Behind Emelia were seven female blood elves.


    They all had slender figures, sharp ears, delicate faces, and seductive figures. Their most apparent trait were those crimson eyes, adding a tint of evil charm and a hint of killing intent to their beauty!


    These blood elves weremonly at First and Second Grade. They consisted of fighters of various sses from warriors, to spellcasters, to healers and archers. They had be powerful subordinates of Mary during battles outside.


    Everyone loved to look at pretty girls, not to mention the Rouge Corps, who were both lovely and powerful. All the apprentices of Fire Throne surged out of their rooms and weed Lady Mary¡¯s return with their most sincere and warm apuse.


    The Crimson n¡¯s influence had seeped throughout every corner of Ailovis during this time.


    With the immense pressure from Second Grade Bug Adept Lord Billis, three small adept organizations already had their legacies cut off and had no choice but to join the Crimson n. If it weren¡¯t for the Zhentarim Association suppressing the Crimson n and preventing them from expanding as they liked, the entirety of Ailovis would probably be the Crimson n¡¯s territory now. There would no longer be any voices of discord and any ¡®trash¡¯ that stood in their way!


    Bug Adept Billis expanded the n¡¯snd in Ailovis, while Mary chose to bring her vampire army to go ck off in Lance.


    In just three years, Brain Monster Gazlowe had managed to construct a new metal city in a new area¨C The Capital of Eternity.


    To avoid this city from falling to the aerial attacks of dragonflights like thest one, Gazlowe had madly strengthened its defensive functions with no regard for the cost.


    It had a shell with a magical alloy that was three meters thick, along with five giant magic energy cannons and over a thousand regr magic energy cannons. If one were to take into consideration the seventy thousand magical machines stored within the fortress, a dragonflight would have to pay an immense price to break through. It was a price so hefty that even a Fourth Grade dragon would cry at the thought of it.


    After the Capital of Eternity was constructed, Mary, Zacha, and Tigule became frequent guests of the ce.


    While Greem was in seclusion, Mary, Zacha, and Tigule had been leading a dragonying party around. They robbed quite a lot of dragons, ughtering and capturing the First and Second Grade dragons that were alone. Dragon Devourer Oliven had alsoe after hearing the news. She became the most hidden dagger in the group.


    In these eight years, two Third Grade witches had also taken magical crystals out of their pouches toe to the Capital of Eternity and use the most violent methods possible to abduct two Third Grade dragons. The Crimson n had gotten a million and two hundred thousand magical crystals from this trade, along with two dragonirs containing all sorts of treasures and resources.


    Of course, the increasingly rampant activity of the Crimson n once again drew the rm of the dragon lords. Three years after the Capital of Eternity was constructed, arge dragonflight led by five Third Grade dragons once again attacked en masse.


    The result of this battle shocked the dragons immensely!


    Two of the five Third Grade dragons were injured and forced to escape. Meanwhile, the other dragons either ran or were captured by the enemy. It was an utter defeat for the dragons.


    The presence of the two magic generator furnaces provided an unlimited supply of magical energy to the one thousand magic energy cannons, turning the skies of the Capital into a no-fly zone. Meanwhile, the giant magic energy cannons that were practically a full-force attack from a Third Grade powerhouse heavily injured the attacking dragons.


    The two wounded Third Grade dragons had been injured by these giant cannons!


    As these magic energy cannons took a long time to charge up¨Cand an even longer time to cool down¨CGazlowe had no choice but to create five of them. When the dragonflight invaded, he used the magic energy cannons to bombard from a distance. The giant magic energy cannons could be reserved for continuous attacks at a close range.


    A wild flurry of untrained yet powerful blows could even kill a trained master of the martial arts!


    Such an indestructible metal citybined with the overwhelming firepower defense immediately caused the dragonflight to run into a wall and face defeat in front of the giant cannons.


    In this battle, the Crimson n obtained seven dragons, one of which was a Second Grade!


    No one knew if it was the goddess of fortune possessing her or the Second Grade dragon being extremely unfortunate, but Mary managed to Embrace the Second Grade dragon on the very first try. She had turned it into a Blood Dragon.


    This way, apart from two Second Grade blood knights and three Second Grade blood elves beneath Mary, she now also had a Second Grade blood dragon. It turned her vampire army into thergest force in the Crimson n!


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for Greem and Mary¡¯s intimate rtionship, even he would have to start feeling concern over such an overly powerful subordinate.


    Mary had just led her underlings into the magical hall, and the shouts and screams of the apprentices rang out from behind like a tidal wave. With thebined strength of two blood knights and the blood dragon, a Second Grade dragonpletely wrapped in magical chains was lifted through the tower gates.


    These days, Lady Mary always reaped rewards when she went on excursions in Lance. Still, most of her spoils were small First Grade dragons. A living Second Grade like today¡¯s was pretty rare. It meant that the Crimson n would now have an additional million magical crystals of ie!


    ¡°You, you, and you; throw this earth dragon into a prison and make sure it is properly locked up. See which foolish client might fancy it. You, send the gems and materials in the sack to Lana and have her work harder to appraise all of the stuff. Remember, tell her that if she dares to mistake another Third Grade Morningstar Gem for a glowstone and send it to Snox¡¯s ce, I will personally hang her from the wall and teach her a lesson.¡±


    Mary opened her broad bat wings and floated to the top of the hall. Here, she could see all the members gathered here.


    The ones she had appointed to lift the dragon to the prison were all body-refining apprentices that the n was cultivating. They all had the power of an advanced apprentice or pseudo-adept. Only muscle monsters like them could lift such a heavy Second Grade earth dragon.


    The n appraiser, Lana, rushed into the hall and happened to hear Mary¡¯s criticism of her. Her face immediately turned red as fire. However, when her eyes shifted to the multiple sacks on the blood dragon¡¯s back, a cold sweat rolled down her face. She couldn¡¯t help but scream out loud, ¡°So...so many.¡±


    It would have been alright if they were everyday items. With Lana¡¯s adept-level Spirit, an apprentice-level Identify would deal with the issue. However, if they were magical items, every one of them had to be appraised with an adept-level Identify or Magic Item Discovery to obtain a vague answer of what it was.


    However, there was so much of the dragon¡¯s treasure here. How many adept-level Identifies would she need to use to appraise all of them?


    When the first few dragon hoards were brought back, Gargamel the Crimson majordomo had to specially open up a fountain of magic energy from the energy room to Lana¡¯s room. She had to drink magic energy potions whenever she ran out of power and drink a Spirit activity potion whenever she ran out of Spirit. Even then, it took her fifteen days and nights of continuous work toplete her mission.


    However, the dragon hoard this time was two to three timesrger than thest. The quality of the magical items was also much higher than in the past. This...Lana would probably have to appraise to her very death to finish the mission, wouldn¡¯t she?!


    The next instant, this adept-level appraiser that the Crimson n had specially trained and cultivated betrayed an expression of tragic sorrow as if life was more painful than death.

 Chapter 848 - Spring in the Showers

    Chapter 848 Spring in the Showers


    Mary, who bore the title of the Bloody Queen, had always been a hands-free leader.


    The matters of fighting were hers to deal with, but all the logistics that came after were left to her subordinates.


    She hovered in the air, using a series of crisp and fast orders tomand the adepts and apprentices around. She finally returned to her room on the fourth floor after everything had been arranged.


    The members of the Rouge Corps also scattered and went to attend to their personal matters.


    A short momentter, Mary arrived in her room.


    Her crimson eyes looked about the familiar room, and she stretchedzily before quickly kicking away the soft buckskin boots on her feet. She then took off her clothes and yawned as she walked toward the bathroom.


    A pool made of white marble was in the corner of the room, with steaming out of the water. Countless brilliant rose petals floated on the top of the warm pool water. The delicate, stone-carved faucets on corners of the pool were letting hot water flow out, and the fresh smell of flower and grass filled the air.


    Two blood elf maids in light dresses knelt by the pool, their heads tilted downward. They didn¡¯t dare lift their heads to look at Mary¡¯s moving and seductive figure.


    Maryughed softly, and her soft and delicate feet swept across the cool floor as she walked toward the pool naked.


    However, just as she arrived in front of the two blood elves, her body froze. She turned around as her crimson eyes stared coldly at an empty spot in the hall.


    ¡°Who is it? Get out here.¡±


    As she shouted, Mary¡¯s slender and pretty fingers grabbed forward. A sizzling crimson hand appeared in midair and grabbed at that suspicious spot in the air.


    ¡°It¡¯s been so long since we¡¯ve seen each other and your temper is still as hot as ever!¡± The clear voice of a male rang out in the air as the crimson hand dispersed while it was still flying forward.


    Mary¡¯s body trembled when she heard this familiar voice. Blinding red light shot out of her crimson eyes.


    A tall, muscr figure slowly appeared in the air.


    That perfectly proportionate body, those well-built muscles, that crimson and radiant skin, and those strange tattoos that covered his entire body.


    Mary couldn¡¯t help but cry out in surprise.


    ¡°Greem, it¡¯s you. Are you finally out?¡±


    Greem¡¯s crimson hair flowed down his back. He was only wearing a red robe on him. As he stood there and smiled, his entire being radiated a wicked, mysterious, and wise aura.


    Mary¡¯s Spirit slowly extended toward him, but when it reached near him, it was stopped by a blurry and transparentyer of mes. Her Spirit could not get any closer.


    Mary could also vaguely feel the powerful and fearsome magic within Greem¡¯s body through the life forcefield.


    ¡°You are already Third Grade?!¡± With a bit of a sense of loss and a bit of joyfulness, Mary narrowed her eyes and looked at Greem as she resentfully spoke.


    ¡°Still worrying about who¡¯s stronger and who¡¯s weaker?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but chuckle, ¡°It seems you have improved quite a lot over this period of time as well. You can probably consider advancing to Third Grade soon!¡±


    ¡°So what? Won¡¯t I still get left behind by you again?¡± Mary couldn¡¯t help butin again.


    However, she immediately thought of something, and her crimson eyes glowed.


    ¡°Eight years.... It¡¯s been eight years you¡¯ve hidden in your secret room, and apart from the elementium golems sending you food consistently, you didn¡¯t even send out a single message.¡±


    ¡°A little bit of a problem came up during the advancement. Fortunately, it has been perfectly resolved!¡± Greem hurriedly exined when he saw the dangerous glint of light in Mary¡¯s eyes.


    Unfortunately, it wasn¡¯t that easy to coax a resentful Mary. She leaped onto Greem with a single step and used her shockingly springy thighs to wrap around Greem¡¯s waist. She leaned toward Greem¡¯s ears and said, ¡°You are so mean. You didn¡¯t evene out once in eight years. Tell me, how do you intend topensate me now?¡±


    Greem did not say anything else in response to the deep passion of his lover. He immediately found her full lips and gave her a passionate kiss.


    Red blushes immediately appeared on the pale faces of the two blood elf maids. Their lowered heads became even lower.


    The two figures in an embrace jumped into the pool and immediately started wrapping about each other wildly.


    Seductive moans quickly rang out from within the steam and water.


    ............


    News of Greem¡¯s sessful advancement quickly spread throughout the Crimson n.


    No one was amazed at this result. They only thought of it as natural.


    The appearance of a Third Grade adept could allow the name of the Crimson n to rise even further. They would be like a sun at noon in Ailovis, uncontested and unchallenged. With Greem as the Third Grade adept of the n, the Crimson n no longer had any significant concerns. The foundation of their n was bing ever stronger.


    It was only with a Third Grade adept behind the scenes that the Crimson n could indeed live up to their name as arge adept n!


    Of course, it was impossible for the Crimson n to be a super n without a Fourth Grade adept.


    [Greem. Beginner Third Grade.


    Profession: Elementium Adept (Fire Specialization)


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 18+2 | Physique 21+1 | Agility 11+1 | Spirit 32+4.


    Profession Skills: Body of mes, me Fiend¡¯s Body...


    After this advancement, Greem had broken free of his reliance on the me Fiend Transformation. He had wholly assimted the power of the magical tattoos into himself. The enhancement to his attributes that required the transformation was now part of the me Fiend¡¯s body. Moreover, there was no longer a time limit to it.


    The five set pieces of Fire Throne were Second Grade magical equipment. However, together, they could reach the level of Third Grade magical equipment. That was especially the case once Greem had risen to be a Third Grade fire adept. He was now capable of unleashing their true power.


    After peeling away all unnecessary soul contracts, Greem¡¯s only remaining Soul Equipment, the Spirit of Pestilence, also improved tremendously. It had now be a strange existence of peak Second Grade. When Greem needed to fight, the Spirit of Pestilence could apply a Poison Aura on him, increasing his poison resistance while allowing all of his attacks to possess some degree of poison damage.


    However, Greem had only just advanced and had yet to master a single Third Grade spell.


    Currently, he would need one or two years to analyze and calcte the Second Grade spells to turn them into Third Grade spells. It wasn¡¯t a good time for him to fight veteran Third Grade adepts during this period.


    Fortunately, with the Chip doing most of the deduction andputation, Greem was free to pursue any other thing that he liked. Once the Chip finished with its calctions, Greem could receive thepleted models of the Third Grade spells and rapidly turn them into his own strength.


    Thus, the first calction of a Second Grade spell that Greem had the Chip perform was the Magma Fireball.


    It was the Second Grade spell that Greem was most familiar with and the one he used most frequently.


    ¡°Chip, prepare to conduct re-analysis and calction of the Second Grade Magma Fireball and expand it into a Third Grade spell.¡±


    [Beep. Order received. Prerequisite knowledge is avable, data calction in progress...estimated time required: 36 days, 15 hours, 29 minutes, and 35 seconds.]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes when he heard the Chip¡¯s feedback.


    In the World of Adepts, spells that suited oneself were the most potent spells.


    Though the various major adept ns and organizations stored knowledge about a certain number of high-grade spells within their organizations, the ones released to the public were always those with basic models. These spell models either brought along heavy side-effects or had tremendously strict pre-conditions.


    As such, every high-grade adept would have to perform adjustment and optimization of their spells for their own purpose to better suit their soul attributes and magic characteristics.


    If he had the Chip and still needed so much time to create a new Third Grade spell, how did the other Third Grade adepts manage to tide over this period of power vacuum?


    ............


    White Tower.


    White snow danced as it descended from the skies.


    Three consecutive days of heavy snowfall had covered the entirety of Icewind in a thickyer of snow.


    From both a distance and up close, everything in the world had be wrapped in silver. It was stunning.


    A group of apprentices was carefully and diligently clearing away the snow at the teleportation za in front of White Tower under themand of an adept.


    Just then, the teleportation array beneath the snow let out a milky-white light. The light quickly extended to every magic energy node and the core of the massive array.


    As the runes lit up in session, the snow on the array started to be pushed outward by the defensive arrays. Several apprentices who didn¡¯t make it out of the way in time were covered in snow.


    ¡°Hurry, hurry. All of you leave the teleportation array; someone¡¯s teleporting over!¡± The adept hasty voice rang out as the apprentices rushed out of the array. They cleaned up their appearance a little and frantically stood behind the adept.


    Just then, the white light in the teleportation array turned into an entire stretch of light. The transparent protection barrier now wholly covered the array. This barrier of light could prevent spatial fluctuations from reaching outward, while also protecting the teleporting adepts. That was why a defensive array was often a most carefully maintained part of a teleportation array.


    A muffled boom rang out. White light shed, and spatial power rippled through the air. Two towering figures appeared in the array, one male and one female.


    Adept Uka quickly bowed when he saw that familiar figure and those familiar bat wings, ¡°Wee to White Tower, Lady Mary!¡±


    Uka was a newly advanced male adept with a skinny figure and sharp eyes. He was also a local of the Northern Lands. Due to him being unable to endure the discrimination and horrible treatment of the Northern Witches, he chose to join the Crimson n as a pseudo-adept. He then proceeded to advance sessfully with the resources of the n.


    It was due to such a debt that Uka had always felt indescribable gratitude to the Crimson n. That was why he had actively epted the difficult task of maintaining and managing the teleportation array.


    As a head figure of the Crimson n, Mary had frequently traveled between the two towers over these years. That was why Uka knew her very well. However, when Uka tilted his head and secretly looked a the tall male adept beside her, his eyes immediately ran into a pair of burning eyes radiating powerful might.


    Uka immediately felt his eyes hurt in that momentary exchange of looks. A strange burning sensation even surrounded his entire body.


    He quickly bowed down even further, shutting his eyes tight. Tears flowed down his cheeks, traces of blood seemingly flowing along with the tears.


    Chapter Notes:


    Editor Ryu: If you¡¯re enjoying Age of Adepts, now is a great time to stop by our Patreon and consider supporting this fine series! Patreon is mine and Eris¡¯ sole form of ie for working on this series, and everyone who supports us through Patreon helps ensure the continued trantion and release of AoA. The AoA Patreon has contribution tiers that give you ess to advance chapters of the series (fully tranted and edited) up to 15 chapters ahead of the GT releases. Thanks for your readership, and we hope to have your patronage as well.


    For those who would like to kick in a couple of bucks and aren¡¯t looking for advance chapters, we also have a Ko-Fi for one time donations and support. It doesn¡¯t see much use (hell, if you have a few bucks, you might as well be a Patron and get a few extra chapters ahead), but people still asionally help us through that, and every bit of support helps.


    As always, more than anything, thank you everyone for your continued readership and support of Age of Adepts!


    -Ryu

 Chapter 849 - The Changes in White Tower

    Chapter 849 The Changes in White Tower


    ¡°You are a new adept that just advanced two years ago?¡± Greem assessed Uka and asked softly.


    Uka barely managed to open his tearing eyes. He felt his eyeballs hurt, and he knew they had received actual damage. When he heard the question, he had to open his eyes forcefully and bow while replying. ¡°My lord, it hasn¡¯t yet been two years since I advanced. I am responsible for guarding the teleportation array here!¡±


    Mary started chuckling when she saw Uka¡¯s fearful look.


    ¡°Look at yourself. All this time in hiding and even the adepts in the n don¡¯t recognize you anymore.¡±


    Greem scratched his nose and let out a bitterugh. He then took out a small vial of potion and tossed it to Uka.


    ¡°There are a few drops of life stock solution in there. Remember to drop them in your eyes, or they will end up blind from being burnt!¡±


    Uka instantly gripped the vial tightly when he heard that there was life stock solution in it. He put on a smile and said, ¡°My lord, you are...¡±


    Greem didn¡¯t reply. Instead, he stood there and nced at the distant horizon.


    A ck dot rapidly increased in size at the edge of the white horizon. A ferocious storm followed the silhouette.


    ¡°I knew it was you, Greem. You made me wait for a long time.¡±


    A magnificent dragon thirty meters in length and covered in fine blue scales beat his wings and dove down from the skies above. He then rapidly transformed into a broad-shouldered man in blue scale armor.


    He started shouting at Greem as he charged over. He seemed exceptionally furious.


    However, when he detected the strange elementium vibration and theyer of distorted and transparent magical mes around Greem, he fell silent.


    ¡°You...you¡¯ve be Third Grade?¡±


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms stared at Greem with a look of disbelief. His green eyes were filled with shock and surprise.


    Though he knew that Greem would advance to Third Grade eventually, this was much, much faster than his expectations.


    If Greem were just a Second Grade adept, then the Third Grade Arms would still possess the upper hand in their contract, even though it was meant to be apanionship contract of equal standing. Now that Greem had also be Third Grade, the contract¡¯s constraints on Arms were much stricter than before.


    It indirectly meant that Arms¡¯ status had gone down!


    That was what Arms was truly concerned about.


    The adepts and apprentices here all shivered in fright when facing a Third Grade dragon¡¯s aura of might at such close distance. However, what surprised them more was the name that the Third Grade thunder dragon had called out.


    Greem.


    Wasn¡¯t...wasn¡¯t this the name of that legendary leader of the Crimson n that had gone into seclusion for many years?


    Could it be?


    As expected, the tall adept that had apanied Lady Mary raised his head and looked calmly at Arms. He then smiled as he said, ¡°Long time no see, Arms!¡±


    Arms looked at Greem in shock, incapable of responding for quite a while. Finally, he sighed and spoke, ¡°You adepts are beings who cannot be measured withmon logic. You aren¡¯t even two hundred years old now, are you? And you¡¯ve already advanced to Third Grade. Cough. I still remembered back when I was two hundred years old. I was just a tiny First Grade dragon, always following behind the...¡±


    Arms voice turned softer and softer when he started recounting his memories. An expression of loss and nostalgia appeared on his face.


    Just then, Meryl, who was stationed at White Tower, led seven n adepts out of the tower and toward the teleportation array. The ten magical machines responsible for the order of the tower stepped onto both sides of the road, standing in the way of the crowd of adepts and apprentices.


    ¡°Congrattions, teacher, congrattions.¡±


    Meryl was the first to bow, and the seven n adepts that followed also did so.


    Greem slowly retracted the energy aura he was radiating, just in case he blinded another group of n adepts.


    His present self could emit enough fire energy to harm any lifeform that dared to stare at him, even without activating the Burning Domain. As a Third Grade adept, the First Grade adepts were now as frail as ants in his eyes. If he didn¡¯t keep his energy aura to himself, even the light and heat that he unintentionally radiated would be enough to blind them or turn them to ashes.


    Greem now understood why those high-grade adepts chose to iste themselves and rarely ever got together with the low-grade adepts. The main reason was the massive volume of the energy aura within their bodies. Compared to the low-grade adepts, they were like gargantuan beasts before ants.


    High-grade adepts would have always to contain their aura when with low-grade adepts. They didn¡¯t even dare to take a slightly heavier breath. One mistake and they could bring about irrecoverable damage to these frail ants.


    This feeling of always holding back and being extremely careful was undoubtedly an unpleasant one!


    Of course, the urrence of this situation also had to do with the fact that Greem had just advanced.


    The fire energy within his body was as dense asva now; it was continually radiating heat of over a thousand degrees. When such heatbined with the fires around him, they formed a strange and distorted life forcefield. If ordinary lifeforms stared at him, it would be no different than looking straight at a burning sun.


    Even those First Grade adepts and their frail eyeballs could not endure the bacsh of such fire energy if they were unprepared. If that Uka didn¡¯t find a way to treat his hurting eyeballs, he might actually risk losing his sight.


    Little Goblin Locke was mixed in with the crowd. He looked upon that legendary and powerful n leader through the forest of legs and watched as he slowly passed through the crowd and strolled toward the tower surrounded by all the adepts.


    Just then, he had secretly activated the energy monitor on his goggles. However, when he pointed them at the n leader, the monitor immediately started smoking. It had malfunctioned.


    That caused Little Locke, now a pseudo-adept, to be utterly speechless.


    Were Third Grade adepts already so powerful?


    An important figure that others could only look up to. How perfect the world would be if that could be him...


    Little Locke started drooling as he fantasized wildly in midday.


    The Shadow¡¯s Light group had now wholly dispersed. Pseudo-Adept Ponta was undoubtedly an unfortunate individual. He had undergone bacsh during his advancement process, and his power had regressed to that of an advanced apprentice. Moreover, after inspection by several adepts, his Spirit was confirmed as being irrecoverable. He no longer possessed the chance to reach for adept level!


    Thus, four years ago, Ponta left the Crimson n and returned to his home.


    It was said that he married a wife there and had a kid. He now led a peaceful, albeit ordinary, life of a mortal.


    Meanwhile, nt Apprentice Eco, who had been Ponta¡¯s lover, had barely managed to promote to advanced apprentice level and was now studying potions underneath Adept Saru. Given her current progress, she would have immense difficulty reaching pseudo-adept level before her Spirit solidified.


    Talent like this would not gain her many resources in any adept n!


    Body-Refining Apprentice Dakso was still an advanced apprentice. He was now a member of the Machine Supremacy, abat group that Locke had formed. Meanwhile, the other member¨CTransformation Apprentice nco¨Chad unexpectedly died in the ck Forest.


    It was said that he had been torn to pieces by a two-headed ogre chieftain!


    Though Locke had used alchemical bombs to st the ogre¡¯s cave and take revenge for nco, he could not change his death.


    In the past eight years, over sixty apprentices of the Crimson n had died for various reasons in the ck Forest to the east. However, their sacrifice wasn¡¯t in vain. The Crimson n had also managed to exterminate over several hundreds of magical creature tribes.


    It was due to the continued expansion and killing of these apprentices that the one hundred and fifty kilometers east of the tower was now a safe zone. Even ordinary people with no supernatural powers could go in there for routine jobs like logging and gathering, as long as their luck wasn¡¯t too terrible.


    To increase the basic defensive level of the civilians, the Crimson n started to promote a sort of alchemical rifle among the popce. The gun required no magical energy or individual talent. Any adolescent would only need some short practice to understand how to use the rifle.


    These alchemical rifles and their metal bullets had as much as fifteen points of physical damage within a radius of ten to seventy meters. That was already very close to the offensive power of a beginner apprentice¡¯s spell!


    However, training a beginner apprentice first required a certain degree of elementium affinity. It also needed one to two years to break through the threshold of meditation. Meanwhile, alchemical rifles had no such limitations. As long as the civilians of White Tower practiced hard, they could be allotted the guns and easily possess a certain level of ability to defend themselves.


    This way, the civilians would no longer need to worry about wild beasts when going in and out of the ck Forest. With sufficient cooperation, they could even hunt down some low-grade magical creatures that slipped through the.


    To fully equip the civilians, these alchemical rifles were provided to everyone at no cost. Moreover, the civilians could im a certain amount of free ammunition as long as they were registered with White Tower.


    It was one one of the policies by which the Crimson n was swaying the locals to their side!


    If it weren¡¯t for their possession of the Goblin ne, the Crimson n would not have the wealth and power to have the luxury of arming the lower sses.


    With Adept Meryl¡¯s diligent governance, seven small viges and a town had appeared around White Tower. The purpose of their existence was to provide the residents of the tower with daily resources. Of course, they also had within them certain entertainments, such as underground brothels.


    ording to the data, the number of civilians registered with the White Tower of Icewind had reached three thousand. This number was already more than enough to fulfill the daily needs of White Tower!

 Chapter 850 - The Capital of Eternity

    Chapter 850 The Capital of Eternity


    Lance, the Capital of Eternity.


    The light in the array slowly faded away, finally revealing the one dozen towering figures standing within.


    The teleportation array was constructed at the top of a magnificent tower of steel; a hall of ironpletely protected the formation. One could see the vast skies of Lance in a single nce through the narrow windows nearby, along with its fluffy clouds.


    The entire sky was filled with a sense of freedom and leisure!


    Arms could no longer endure the yearning in his heart. He strode out of the metal hall and transformed into his dragon form before roaring and taking to the skies. Eight dragons of various colors followed behind him, roaring as they took off.


    After eight years away from Lance, these dragons were at their limits.


    In Lance, they were the sky, the gods, and the rulers of everything below!


    They could freely fly above the blue skies and use their aura of might to terrify and scatter the ants below. They could descend whenever they wanted, enjoy any food they liked, abduct whatever beauty they fancied, and take whatever wealth they saw.


    However, in the World of Adepts, the dragons weren¡¯t the rulers. It was the adepts.


    Even a tiger would have to crouch, and even a dragon would have to sleep in that sinister and strange world. Keeping a low profile was the key to longevity there. If they were to draw the eye of a high-grade adept, there were far too many powerful beings in that world who could kill them!


    Arms, who had been used to luxury and pleasure, could not get ustomed to such an environment.


    He had seldom flown freely in the skies of the World of Adepts in these past eight years. His usual range of activity was also limited to the fifty kilometers of woods around White Tower. Should he have left the protection of White Tower, his life would have been at risk.


    Arms, Iritina, and the green dragons became exceedingly excited upon returning to Lance. They started flying and ying in the sky.


    For a moment, the air above the Capital of Eternity was filled with dragon roars, making the ce much more lively than usual.


    The appearance of such arge flight of dragons did not frighten the constantly moving crowd within the steel capital. These Lance natives of various skin colors and races stopped and looked at the dragons flying above. They then continued their journey, utterly unphased.


    As half a master of the Capital of Eternity, Split-Off Brain Gru was already waiting respectfully before the teleportation array.


    He confirmed the ¡®rumors¡¯ when he saw Greem in his red robes and the powerful magical aura he radiated. He couldn¡¯t help but tter, ¡°Wee, O¡¯ respected Master Greem!¡±


    Greem¡¯s eyes swept toward Gru. He could sense a trace of weight and seriousness to Gru¡¯s every word and action. There was no longer the same levity as before.


    It seemed these beings liked to differentiate their treatments based on the power of the individual they were dealing with.


    With the power of a Second Grade, Greem hadmanded a Third Grade brain monster in the past. Consequently, he was met with all sorts of excuses and insincerity. He needed to trim those unnecessary malicious thoughts in Gazlowe¡¯s big brain every so often.


    However, now that Greem had advanced, the attitude of Split-Off Brain Gru immediately did a one-hundred and eighty-degree turnaround. For the first time, Greem felt sincerity behind the words ¡®master¡¯!


    Greem walked into the steel hall and arrived at the edge of the tower. He slowly looked down at the metal city below.


    In all honesty, this Capital of Eternity that Gazlowe had constructed was bing increasingly like those cities of steel that Greem remembered from his past life.


    The steel tower was seven hundred meters tall, but it wasn¡¯t even the tallest building in the steel capital.


    The entirety of the Capital of Eternity as built into the mountains. All the buildings and facilities were made of special metals. It gave the city a strange sense of cold, gray indestructibility.


    The center of the Capital was a massive tower of steel. It was one kilometer thick and slowly tapered off near the top, vanishing in the clouds. The rest of the buildings were attachments stuck on, like strange branches and thorns on the tower.


    The teleportation tower that Greem was currently on was one such building.


    The insides of the Capital of Eternity only allowed entry to magical machines and adepts. The other native forces that lived near the Capital could only choose to build their own straw houses and strange buildings at the foot of the tower.


    From seven hundred meters above, Greem even saw a stretch of swamp and forest with hundreds of swamp creatures living in it.


    ¡°What is that?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    ¡°Master, that is where the wends lizardmen live!¡± As a bit of a master of the ce, Gru naturally knew everything there was to know about the surroundings of the Capital, ¡°I originally intended for them to stay in the Capital of Eternity, but their daily lives can¡¯t be separated from the swamp. So, I had no choice but to carve out an area there for them to live.¡±


    Greem nodded silently.


    With his extraordinary sight, he could even see the massive forges that the hignd dwarves had built near the Capital, along with the lighthouse-styled insect nests of the swamp flies and the nests of the thunder rocs at the peak of the hills in the distance. In fact, Greem even saw some shadow creatures moving in a corner where there was arge cloud of dark, ck mist.


    It seemed that the Capital of Eternity had gained control over the entire surrounding areas during these past few years. Moreover, conscious management and nning had also been put into the affairs of the subordinate races. It was a disy of Brain Monster Gazlowe¡¯s highest worth!


    ¡°How did you manage to gain control over the subordinate races?¡± Greem continued asking.


    ¡°The big guy had already mastered Brainwash. He can use his power to control the leaders and core figures of these tribes. As such, there is no need to be concerned about their loyalty!¡±


    Gru¡¯s reply also caught Greem by surprise.


    Brainwash? Wasn¡¯t that a was a high-grade skill among soul powers? Through what means had Gazlowe managed to master it?


    Gru seemed to have seen through Greem¡¯s surprise and gave a simple exnation.


    ¡°A few years back, Mistress Alice sent back some Mind yers from the World of Adepts.¡±


    Greem instantly understood everything before Gru could finish.


    No wonder. Mind yers were known throughout the multiverse as experts at soul powers.


    They were powerful and evil hermaphroditic creatures that fed on the brains of intelligent lifeforms. They could strengthen and empower themselves by absorbing the brain and consciousness core of their prey. They had humanoid bodies, but a strange, squid-like head.


    Their eyes had no pupils and were a pure milky white. Four constantly squirming tentacles grew near their mouths, two long and two short. The bodies of the Mind yers were a light purple, and their skin was cold and as stic as rubber. Their skin was also covered in ayer of disgusting slime.


    Apart from their soul and mental powers, the Mind yers had almost no other abilities. That was why they were a terrifying race of people that could harness soul power to their limits.


    They could use their powers to brainwash intelligent lifeforms and turn them into their loyal servants.


    They could also use their powers to mimic the effects of all sorts of magic. Moreover, magic mimicked in this manner was not affected by magic resistance.


    Ordinary Mind yer spawn were also known as Illithids and started as First Grade creatures. Only adolescent Illithids were known as Mind yers, and these were powerful Second Grade beings at the very minimum.


    Giving Gazlowe a Mind yer she managed to catch was a good move on Alice¡¯s part.


    Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe had a peculiar body and terrifying power, but not the individualbat ability to match. The main reason being his origin as a weak goblin. Consequently, even after bing a Third Grade brain monster, he could not naturally master fearsome soul powers.


    Alice had found a good teacher for Gazlowe!


    However, whether Gazlowe peeled the Mind yers apart or just devoured their brains was a mystery to Greem! He wouldn¡¯t want to know either, even if he did have the opportunity to.


    That scene would probably make him throw up everything he had eaten from the night before.


    After exiting the teleportation tower, Grem walked down a winding corridor and several other walkways before finally entering the interior of the steel tower under Gru¡¯s lead. The ones standing guard here were all fully-armed magical machines. Judging from their models and the magic energy weapons they were using, they were much stronger than the Archers and Shield Defenders from before.


    Greem could even see shadows of the Gundams back from Earth in these machines!


    Apart from ordinary First Grade magical machines, Greem also saw some strong magical machine warriors with unique designs among them. Their armor gleamed with a cold light and radiated magical light. It was clear that these armors were made of special magical alloys.


    Thebat power of a magical machine warrior like this was already at the level of a Second Grade creature. If they were all taken out for a run, they would be a terrifying army.


    Gru¡¯s exined that they werebat magical machine warriors forged of magical alloy and powered by magic energy. They all possessed the power of a Second Grade and numbered around forty.


    Due to their low numbers, they couldn¡¯t form arge group and could only protect Split-Off Brain Gru and some crucial parts within the tower. That was why Greem didn¡¯t see too many of them along the way.


    Greem and Gazlowe met at the center of the steel tower in the core of the Capital of Eternity.


    Gazlowe¡¯s brain was as massive as a building and floated in an even more enormous ss vat. He was connected with the two magic generator furnaces below him through countless metal pipes. A flood of magic energy would st out of the furnaces every moment, surging into Gazlowe¡¯s brain before being transferred to various corners of the Capital through individual pipelines.


    Here, Gazlowe was the brain of the Capital of Eternity as well as the host of its massive energy pool!

 Chapter 851 - Subduing the Brain Monster

    Chapter 851 Subduing the Brain Monster


    No wonder Split-Off Brain Gru was the only one running outside on errands these years.


    With Gazlowe¡¯s steadily swelling brain, it would probably be unimaginably difficult to go outside.


    When Greem walked into this iron hall, tens of thousands of vicious and hidden spirit threads wrapped toward him from every direction. If Greem hadn¡¯t prepared, it was very likely the spirit threads would have prated the depths of his soul and caused some unexpected circumstances.


    If this had been in the past, it might have seeded. However, with the increase in grade, Greem¡¯s Spirit had also improved. Though it was still far less potent than Gazlowe¡¯s Spirit, it was more than enough to protect himself.


    With a single thought, he exacted his will!


    The translucent and distorted life forcefield around him immediately started burning, causing even the air temperature of the surroundings to rise rapidly.


    Greem didn¡¯t change in size, but his iparably wild mental consciousness had already spread throughout the entire hall along with the erupting fires. Those tens of thousands of spirit threads were quickly defeated when they came into contact with his invisible mes.


    The brain silently floating in the massive ss vat suddenly moved, and a massive mental consciousness descended upon everyone.


    Greem did not cower. He stood tall, and two bright yellow mes burned in his ck eyes. The invisible mes engulfed his entire body as his fiery eyes red at the big brain.


    A series of notifications from the Chip rang in his mind.


    [Beep. Detecting signs of foreign Spirit intrusion. Detecting signs of foreign Spirit intrusion. Mental barrier and Spirit defense have been affected. Requesting host distance self from the source of mental abnormality.]


    Regardless of how many notifications the Chip sent, Greem did not choose to escape from the iron hall. Instead, he raised his fire energy to its limits. The massive heart from the abyssal me Fiend in his chest pumped wildly. With every pump, fire energy of frightful intensity surged throughout Greem¡¯s body, providing him with the tremendous amount of energy he needed to maintain his Burning Domain.


    Several parts on his tall body started to glow with a blinding magical light, one by one.


    The elegant and delicate Burning Suncrown on his head, the Emblem of Fire armbands that glowed like halos of fire around his arms, the Fearless belt that coiled around his waist like ava serpent, the Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath that hung from his neck like a miniature sun, as well as Ash, the boots that burned with horrifying mes.


    The magical might contained within this powerful magical equipment connected rapidly as strange runic lines and arrays lit up with power. They formed a strange Burning Domain that engulfed everything within sight.


    All substance within this light-red Burning Domain ignited with an unusual fire.


    The skies were burning, the ground was burning, and even the empty air started to burn with an odd yellow me, which quickly spread outward.


    The Burning Domain instantly shed with the mental power descending from above, tearing and ripping into each other at various points in the air.


    They were like two massive armies: one as ferocious as fire, vicious and fast, the other with threads like des, wrapping forward in endless waves, slicing to pieces any substance or Spirit in the way.


    The two opposing forces shed and tussled with each other in the air. One moment, the fire would gain the advantage, and the next, it would be the mental power instead. The two forces went back and forth, turning the massive hall into a battlefield. It was an even fight, though brutal and savage.


    In general, Gazlowe¡¯s Spirit presence was undoubtedly several dozens of times that of Greem¡¯s. However, when it came to the offensive and defensive power of their Spirits, Greem had the upper hand.


    One wasrge but scattered, while the other was small but concentrated.


    The two forces didn¡¯t seem to be on the same level, but after repeated shes, it was clear that Greem¡¯s smaller Burning Domain was superior.


    The Burning Domain started to expand in the struggle against the mental power, bit by bit. Soon it would engulf the entire hall and its several hundreds of square meters. It was already at the edge of the massive ss vat.


    Once Gazlowe¡¯s brain was caught in the battle, he was doomed to lose!


    ¡°Congrattions, master, for advancing to Third Grade.¡± The extensive mental consciousness suddenly retracted all of its power the next instant. An exceptionally calm mental voice rang out throughout the hall.


    Greem also reined in his Burning Domain and let it sit quietly before the ss vat. He hovered into the air and stopped at the same level as the brain.


    One was a strange brain that was asrge as a giant beast, while the other was a human so small that he could be overlooked in a room.


    The two individuals faced off against each other as if about to start a fight!


    ¡°There¡¯s no need for so much tension between us!¡± The mental voice rang out in the air once again.


    A smile finally appeared on Greem¡¯s solemn face as he calmly said, ¡°Of course, a great power has to be subject to a great mind. It is indeed better for us to settle some things as soon as we can.¡±


    ¡°Your power has obtained my approval! Before any new breakthroughs happen to me, I will not have any thoughts of disobedience or betrayal. Hopefully, you can believe me on this!¡± The mental voice spoke slowly, fully demonstrating the careful thought that Gazlwoe had put into this.


    Greem calmly replied, ¡°I believe you! Moreover, I look forward to your breakthrough very much. If I cannot harness your power and suffer the bacsh from you, I will not me you at all. I will only me myself for not working hard enough.¡±


    The hall suddenly fell silent.


    Brain Monster Gazlowe¡¯s strange mental voice finally rang out after a long pause.


    ¡°You are a powerful adept worthy of respect! Hopefully, you will continue to be this powerful forever!¡±


    Having said that, the giant brain floating in the ss vat turned from a bright red in Greem¡¯s elementium sight to a friendly light green.


    Greem let out a breath of relief deep in his heart.


    These high-grade servants were truly difficult to deal with, each one more than thest. If the master¡¯s power were slightly insufficient, he would be at considerable risk of a bacsh. Take the situation from earlier, for example. Had Greem failed to defend against the invasion of the mental powers, it was very likely he would have ended up having his consciousness and mind taken over by Gazlowe.


    When that happened, he would be a soul servant of the Third Grade brain monster. He would offer up all his wealth and knowledge before willingly providing his brain to the monster as nourishment.


    It was the fate of most soul servants of the Mind yers!


    ¡°Really, Alice? She found a way to empower Gazlowe, and she didn¡¯t tell me? If it weren¡¯t for my advancement to Third Grade and the Burning Domain formed by the Fire Throne set, as well as the new magical tattoos, it would probably have been tough to win in this battle.¡± Greem thought angrily to himself.


    That said, he didn¡¯t really me Alice.


    She must have seen this scene unfold ahead of time, which was why she had so confidently helped Gazlowe improve his abilities. Still, being kept in the dark and almost getting a fast one pulled on him upset Greem a little.


    He had managed to use his own power to subdue Gazlowe¡¯s ¡®restlessness¡¯ and once again obtained actual authority over the Capital of Eternity.


    In truth, during these days when Greem had been in istion, Gazlowe had only maintained the most basic level of cooperation with Mary and the others. After all, with the endless supply of energy, the tens of thousands of magical machines, and his new mental powers, Gazlowe had already covered all his soft spots. He now possessed the capital and ability to establish himself within Lance independently.


    If it weren¡¯t for the magic generator furnace and his soul both still containing the soul brand that Greem left behind, Gazlowe would probably already have chased out all of the Crimson adepts and witches and led a life of his own.


    There was almost no better way to subdue such an ambitious individual apart from raw power.


    Such individuals of ambition and strength only bowed before a higher power.


    If you were more powerful than them, you held the reins over their life and death. They would be the most loyal and convenient tools of war under your employ. However, if the power dynamic was turned around, they would instantly be the most terrifying demons. Bacsh and biting at the master¡¯s hands were only secondary. The true horror was in them possessing the ability to inflict unbearable torture upon their former master.


    And this was what terrified Greem the most!


    Of course, Greem was now in a stage of explosive growth. He did not need to concern himself with these ¡®fine details.¡¯ However, should the speed of his improvement ever start to slow down, he would need to consider the risks of bacsh from Gazlowe.


    Being a sessful n leader was not easy!


    It had only been ten days since Greem had emerged from istion and he had already been to three ces using various means to subdue the three ¡®boss-level¡¯ individuals in his n. It was only then that he had managed to stabilize his position once again.


    However, this wasn¡¯t the end of it. It was only the warm-up leading to the real show.


    That was because Greem had left the true ¡®boss¡¯ for the very end. The Crimson n could only rest easy once he had ¡®subdued¡¯ her!


    ............


    The World of Adepts, the Tower of Fate.


    Greem had rarely stepped into this ancient tower since Alice became its owner.


    This tower had also seen dozens of owners, but in the end, there was only one owner.


    That person was the First Witch of Fate and the one who had established a miraculous and glorious legacy for herself¨C Maysa.


    It was she who had created the Tower of Fate, she who had established the Fate Witch branch that hadsted for tens of thousands of years, and she who had embedded the legacy of the Fate Witches into thew systems of the World of Adepts; she who had stepped into the void of space and transcended into a legend among the Northern Witches.


    There were countless stories of her, while her monuments had endured tens of thousands of years of beating, and her mark filled every corner of the Tower of Fate.


    Every time he came to this silent and mysterious tower, Greem would feel the illusion of his consciousness being suppressed and his spiritual activity lowering.


    However, he had toe to the Tower of Fate to meet someone this time. Someone vital to him.


    Only ¡®she¡¯ could be the wings he needed to soar in the skies; only ¡®she¡¯ could point out the path forward in the dense mist surrounding him.


    And ¡®she¡¯ was also the person that Greem cared about the most. His lover!


    A witch!

 Chapter 852 - Greems Intentions

    Chapter 852 Greem¡¯s Intentions


    Alice chose to personally wee Greem at the door of the teleportation room.


    She couldn¡¯t help but giggle when she saw Greem¡¯s severe and solemn expression.


    ¡°What are you so tense about? Could you be here to fight a war?¡±


    Greem raised an eyebrow and spoke with a double entendre, ¡°I am here to fight a war!¡±


    Alice froze for a moment first, before breaking into augh.


    All these years of luxury, authority, and experience had caused Alice to lose her past naivety quickly. She had be more mature and beautiful while also having learned how to keep her thoughts to herself.


    As she let out unrestrainedughter, the palm-sized elementium fairy, Helen, emerged from Alice¡¯s hair.


    She immediately beat her small wings and flew to Greem¡¯s face when she saw it was him. She put a hand on her waist and pointed at him with her magic wand as she shouted, ¡°I knew it was you! You must be here to brag because you think you are powerful now. Hmph! Let me tell you, while I, Helen, am here I won¡¯t let you bully Alice.¡±


    ¡°How did you know I was here to bully Alice?¡± Greem asked with exaggerated surprise.


    Alice immediately blushed. She red at Greem with a pout on her face and started grinding her teeth.


    ¡°Very good, very good. You big bad bastard, I knew you had wicked intentions toward Alice. Just you wait; I will let you taste some pain.¡±


    Before she had even finished, Helen waved her wand as a light, magical radiance entered the stone wall beside her.


    Greem grunted as he felt his surroundings weigh down upon him and a powerful force tugged at him from beneath. It was as if the tower wanted to press him against the ground.


    Gravity maniption?!


    If this were a gravity spell cast by Helen alone, it would have been impossible to attempt to subdue a Third Grade adept. However, Helen was very smart. She took full advantage of her tower authority and took out part of the tower¡¯s magical power to suppress Greem.


    It was what made feel a tremendous weight as if a mountain upon his shoulders!


    Greem was not a body-refining adept who trained in physical strength. His advancement might have allowed his Strength to be at the level of beginner Second Grade body-refining adepts, but a body supported with elementium was not as beneficial as a body obtained through rigorous training.


    Greem grunted, and his expression changed. He tugged at the cor of his robe and saw a strange shing rune on his shoulders.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be secretly surprised.


    As a Third Grade adept, it wasn¡¯t just his offense and defense that had improved. The massive amount of elementium energy, life force, and mental consciousness that he possessed was enough to distort the life forcefield around him slightly. Ordinary spells would have a tough time even hitting him.


    However, this little fair Helen was indeed an elementium fairy. She could inflict the magical effect directly on Greem¡¯s body through the life forcefield.


    Only an elementium fairy could so easily use such an unusual ability!


    However, now was not the time to discuss their strange abilities.


    Being struck with a gravity spell of as much as three hundred points without any preparation was too much for Greem, even with his twenty points of Strength and twenty-two points of Physique.


    Greem could only wildly gather his fire energy to resist the effects of the increased gravity.


    Trying to square off against an entire adept¡¯s tower with the individual¡¯s power was still a little insufficient.


    As the gravity on his body gradually increased, Greem¡¯s face turned even redder. Magical mes shot out of his ck eyes, and creaking sounds starteding from his trembling knees.


    Only defending and not retaliating wouldn¡¯t help him with this ¡®naughty¡¯ little fairy. Thus, Greem grabbed at Helen, and arge cloud of me emerged from thin air and engulfed her. However, these magical mes did not erupt. They simply trapped the fairy and did not hurt her.


    If it weren¡¯t for Helen being Alice¡¯s contracted creature, Greem would probably have retaliated with the Burning Domain the moment she attacked.


    This ce might be the Tower of Fate, and Helen might be a fairy with elementium powers, but the attacks of a Third Grade fire adept were still not something she could endure.


    ¡°Dispel the gravity spell, or I will have barbecue fairy for dinner tonight!¡± Greem threatened the fairy with a mean look on his face.


    Unfortunately, this elementium fairy who was not at all experienced in the affairs of the world was also a real piece of work. Though she was crying from Greem¡¯s mean face, she was not letting go of the magic wand in her hand at all.


    ¡°You...you¡¯re bullying me. I won¡¯t let you go so easily.¡±


    Even while surrounded by magical fire and trembling in fright, Helen was still waving her wand with all her force, drawing the magical energy of the Tower of Fate into that strange Rune of Gravity.


    The next moment, tragedy befell Greem!


    The gravity on his body suddenly multiplied, causing his barely enduring knees to give way. He almost kneeled on the ground.


    Greem had no other choice left to him. He let out a furious roar and the Burning Domain, raging with explosive fires, shot out of his body.


    To avoid harming Alice and the little fairy, Greem had to carefully control the size of the Burning Domain and not engulf them within. With the magic energy isting ability of the Burning Domain, the gravity effect acting upon Greem was instantly weakened by half. It was only then that Greem lightly wiped away the cold sweat on his forehead and stood up straight.


    ¡°Alright, Helen, stop messing around!¡± Alice shook her head and said with a bitter smile, ¡°If he weren¡¯t letting you have your way, you would already have been injured! Do you still want to continue making trouble?¡±


    Elementium fairies were very powerful, but their power was built upon the might of their host.


    Magic Recovery, Lessened Magic Consumption, Elementium Resonance, Elementium Shackles, Exceptional Resistance, Spirit Focus...


    Most of the magical abilities they possessed were supportive in nature. The stronger their host, the more powerful the host would be after being enhanced with their magic. However, an elementium fairy could not possibly be the match of a Third Gradebat fire adept in terms of pure dueling ability!


    Alice grabbed the still ranting Helen and cut off her resonance with the elementium pool of the tower. She then flicked her on the forehead as punishment, and this meaningless ¡®battle¡¯ finally came to an end.


    ¡°This isn¡¯t some opening act the two of you came up with ahead of time, is it?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but scratch his nose as he asked with a bitter smile.


    If his power were even slightly weaker during that short ¡®battle,¡¯ he would have been forced to kneel on the ground. When that happened, he would be a bitcking in confidence toe here and conquer Alice.


    ¡°Well, you¡¯re the one who wanted toe and bully me after you gained some new abilities,¡± Aliceined with some resentment on her face.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be slightly surprised, ¡°You...already know my purpose ining here?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Isn¡¯t it to make Alice your little lover? You wish.¡± The little fairy Helen waved about her fists furiously in Alice¡¯s grasp.


    If it weren¡¯t for Alice, she would probably have charged forward and treated Greem to a full martialbo.


    Greem smiled awkwardly.


    That was indeed his primary purpose ining here!


    Greem was not at all interested in whatever fancy romance and dream-like courtship there was out there. His only thought now was how to get Alice into bed and turn her into his woman.


    Alice might have shown a lot of feelings for him over the years, but no amount of ¡®spoken¡¯ romance could be more firm and solidpared to an actual rtionship of the flesh. That was why Greem had indeed intended to establish their rtionship under the guise of sending news of his advancement.


    This way, he would no longer need to spend time guessing at the nature of their rtionship!


    With the power of fate at her fingertips, Alice knew perfectly what Greem had been thinking. She was both shy and angry, but there was also a trace of sweetness contained within the anger. Alice couldn¡¯t get used to thisplicated feeling. In the end, she could only re at Greem wickedly and helplessly said, ¡°Come with me! There are some things I should make clear to you now.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t go with him. That lousy guy¡¯s just waiting for the chance to pounce on you!¡± The little fairy stretched her neck and shouted out loud.


    Two blushes of red shed on Alice¡¯s face. She once again flicked Helen on the forehead before whispering a few words in her ear and letting go.


    Helen stopped making trouble. She red at Greem before beating her wings and disappearing into the distance, leaving behind a trail of fairy dust.


    ¡°Youe with me!¡± Alice sighed softly and led the way.


    Greem followed behind her. He couldn¡¯t help but be enchanted when he saw her swaying hips as she walked in front of him.


    Alice might not be as sexy as Mary, but she was a rare beauty as well.


    These years of nobility, authority, and luxury had caused Alice to cultivate a unique charm and style. There were the innocence and passion of a young girl, yet also the maturity and sturdiness of having experienced the world. The various bewitching aspects to her personality would cause someone to fall in love unknowingly.


    Unfortunately, and to Greem¡¯s disappointment, Alice didn¡¯t lead him to her room, but the astrology tform at the top of the Tower of Fate.


    It was currently the time when the golden sun was at its brightest and most blinding. The astrology tform was now a sea of gold, and nothing was obstructing the vision when looking out from here.


    The mysterious array embedded beneath the floor of the tform had slowly activated after sensing Alice¡¯s arrival, turning the surrounding walls transparent. It allowed the person conducting the astrology ceremony to see all the stars above with a single nce.


    It was the first time Greem hade to see Alice¡¯s astrology tform. He couldn¡¯t help but be stunned in awe.


    He could imagine the sight of Alice, standing alone on this astrology tform in the dead of night when the stars were at their brightest. That mesmerizing silence, that immeasurable depth of the skies above, and that strange feeling of being thrust into that endless space. It must be very, very lovely!


    Still, regardless of how beautiful the tform was, it couldn¡¯t possibly be a good ce for romance, could it?


    Greem grumbled angrily.

 Chapter 853 - On the Astrology Platform

    Chapter 853 On the Astrology tform


    ¡°Hey, can you throw away those nasty thoughts in your mind for a moment and have a proper talk with me?¡±


    Alice ced her hands together in front of herself in a cup, as if holding a lotus in them.


    As her magic power surged, the initially t marble floor started to shine with intense magical light. Powerful magical energy surged out from within, drawing a massive andplex array in the air around Alice.


    As the astrology ceremony began, a vast stream of star power poured down from the skies above, filling the entire tform with strange lights and rapidly flickering projections. Yet, when one tried to focus and look at the images in closer detail, they would have trouble understanding the meaning the images were trying to express.


    [Beep. Detecting the presence of narws. Initial estimates suggest them to be the powers of Fate.


    [This is an exceptionally powerful and mysterious force. It would even be considered a higher force among thews. Data currently being gathered.]


    Greem looked around him. The entire tform had beenpletely engulfed in this strange power of Fate, giving the ce an ancient feeling of age and passing time.


    They were no longer in the astrology tform at the top of the Tower of Fate, but in a vast and boundless desert.


    Look into the distance, and all you would see is fine, dirt-yellow sand and golden light shining from the sun above.


    Only Greem and Alice were present in this vast desert.


    ¡°Where is this?¡± Greem picked up the sand beneath him and rubbed it between his hands. It was coarse and hard. It wasn¡¯t an illusion, but something that existed.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know!¡± Alice sighed sadly as she said, ¡°The power of Fate is too mysterious, and I still can¡¯t harness this power. That is why I have no choice over where it brings me most of the time.¡±


    ¡°It?¡± Greem replied with a question.


    ¡°It!¡± Alice put her hands behind her back and smiled lightly, ¡°When a ne develops to its limits, the nar Consciousness will awaken, and a great will is born. Most of the nar worlds we have seen so far have only given birth to a vague and undefined nar Consciousness. Those consciousnesses are constrained by theck of ne resources and are unable to continue growing. However, the world we live in, the World of Adepts, is already qualified to rise from a nar Consciousness to a World Consciousness. That...will be a World of Adepts with its very own will!¡±


    Greem listened closely.


    As an adept that had advanced to this point from a low-grade, he naturally possessed a reasonably deep understanding of the concept of a nar Consciousness. However, the matter involved higher mystic knowledge, and he could not learn many of the world¡¯s secrets.


    Now, Alice was giving him a lesson, providing him with the most urate picture of the nar world!


    The World of Adepts had already given birth to a nar Consciousness and was preparing to grow into a World Consciousness!


    Such a secret would never be written in any magical tome and would never be learned of by low-grade adepts.


    ¡°You mean to say we live in a nar world with its own mind and consciousness? Can it hear and sense all thoughts and actions of any creatures within itself?¡± Greem felt a chill run down his spine.


    Alice smiled slightly as she said, ¡°Don¡¯t think of the nar Consciousness as a crude awareness much like us humans. It is more thebination and amalgamation of the consciousnesses of billions of lifeforms and substances within the ne. That amalgamation of consciousnesses is too vast andplex. It has no chance of gaining direct awareness.¡±


    ¡°Then what does it possess?¡±


    ¡°Instinct!¡±


    ¡°Instinct?¡±


    ¡°The instinct to survive, to develop, and the instinct to grow stronger.¡±


    ¡°Isn¡¯t that just the same as feral beasts?¡±


    ¡°That is how it should be. The nar Consciousness has always been so simple. It can never gainplex and sensitive emotions or consciousness like humans can. It is like a barely month-old baby, desperate to grow but with no means of expressing its thoughts.¡±


    ¡°When you put it that way, it feels like the nar Consciousness is very frail.¡±


    ¡°It is not frail in any manner! It might not have a clear consciousness and mind, but it has tremendous power. It controls thews, the ne, power, and us who live within it.¡±


    ¡°Why did you want to bring me here?¡±


    ¡°Because only here, engulfed in the power of Fate, can our conversation bepletely secure. We can only avoid being listened in on by that ¡®person.¡¯¡±


    ¡°That ¡®person¡¯?¡± Greem started thinking.


    ¡°Yes, the First Witch of Fate, Maysa. She is already a Seventh Grade witch!¡±


    ¡°Seventh Grade.¡± Greem sucked at his tooth gum. He felt his head hurt, ¡°You mean to say that she¡¯s our enemy now?¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s my enemy!¡± Alice ced extra emphasis on the word ¡®my,¡¯ ¡°However, if you choose to help me, she will probably also include you on her list of enemies.¡±


    ¡°Can I ask a simple question? Why is she our enemy?¡± Greem¡¯s tone also turned solemn.


    ¡°Because her power is far too great, and because she dreams in vain of robbing the authority of the World Consciousness. Because she has disrupted the flow of Fate in the World of Adepts. All this while, she has been relying on her strange abilities to steal the power of Fate from the World of Adepts. It has severely affected the birth of the World Consciousness. That is why the nar Consciousness is furious, and that is why it has chosen me!¡±


    Greem listened quietly and couldn¡¯t help but draw in a deep breath of air.


    Alice might not have said much, but every word revealed some deeper secret of the World of Adepts. Without her analysis, he would probably have spent his entire life unknowing of this reality of the world, hidden deep behind the scenes.


    ¡°You mean to say that the nar Consciousness can no longer tolerate Witch Maysa, and that is why it hasunched the Battle of Fate and plotted a way to make Maysa¡¯s n fail? Your choice and your growth were all under the maniptions of the nar Consciousness?¡± Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but shudder when he reached this point.


    If...if that nar Consciousness was indeed like an almighty ruler, always observing everything within the ne, then was there still privacy in front of it? Were there still secrets?


    ¡°Where have your thoughts gone,¡± Alice couldn¡¯t help butsh back, ¡°The nar Consciousness is not as tasteless as you, alright?! It just instinctually dislikes Maysa¡¯s frequent interference in the fatews. As such, it repeatedlyunched the Battles of Fate. Then, it tried to create variables that Maysa cannot control within these Battles.¡±


    ¡°You and I are these variables!¡±


    ¡°Indeed!¡± Alice said in agreement, ¡°However, this doesn¡¯t mean that we now have someone backing us. The nar Consciousness does not have a clear enough mind to distinguish between ally and foe. It might have pushed me forward as the hand to disrupt Maysa¡¯s n and control over the fatews in the World of Adepts, but it has no concern for my safety or life. It will not mourn for me even if I fail, nor shed a single tear. It will simply push forward another champion of Fate from the ne.¡±


    ¡°You mean to say that we have be the tools of the nar Consciousness pushed forth to fight against the Seventh Grade Witch Maysa, and we will receive no special reward or authority for this?¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡± Alice nodded and said, ¡°The nar Consciousness might have given me the title of the champion of Fate, but it has no intention of standing on my side. I might enjoy some convenience and privileges when ites to the use of the powers of Fate, but it is still far from enough to fight against a Seventh Grade witch. So, it¡¯s not that I don¡¯t want to jump into your embrace. It¡¯s just...are you sure you want to bear this heavy burden on your shoulders?¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but betray a bitter smile when he heard this.


    He was already in a lot of trouble. Who knew Alice¡¯s problems were even more extensive and numerous than his own?


    While Alice was drowning in her sorrows and hesitation, Greem suddenly stood before her. He took her into his arms and gave her a fierce kiss.


    A good seven minutester, Greem finally let go of Alice¡¯s somewhat swollen lips. He looked into her eyes and said, ¡°From now on, you are mine. Only I can bully you from today onwards. Anyone else who wants to bully you will have to go through me!¡±


    For some reason, warm tears started to well out of Alice¡¯s amber eyes when she heard Greem¡¯s simple and even crude words. Her nose was sour, and her vision was already blurry from all the tears. Her beautiful eyes were even swollen red from all the crying.


    She had been so, so lonely all this while!


    At least, in the past, she¡¯d still had Endor at her side tofort and encourage her.


    However, with Endor¡¯s death in Faen, she had lost her only rtive. She had no one to turn to, even with all theints andmentations in her mind. She could not find apanion to bear her burden with her.


    That was why the walls that Alice had so painstakingly built around her heart instantly crumbled to dust when she heard Greem¡¯s genuine words.


    Her soft arm wrapped about Greem¡¯s neck, and for the first time, she offered up a kiss. She then leaned against Greem¡¯s ears and mumbled, ¡°You will make me fall in love with you this way, you big bad guy.¡±


    This simple sentence instantly incited Greem¡¯s lust.


    Amidst some wild tussling and wrestling, the two silhouettes finally merged as one.


    ............


    Outside the astrology tform, the hard-headed Fairy Helen was abnormally quiet.


    She bit at her slender finger lightly as she silently spied on everything happening in the hall.


    She was clearly having trouble understanding some actions of humans.


    Even though the emotions transmitted over from the soul contract were those of joy and pleasure, she was only hearing moans of ¡®agony¡¯ and seeing requests for mercy.


    Meanwhile, that big bad guy was giddily and very excitedly enjoying the situation. He had almost bullied Alice to death now.


    The two of them were obviously fighting, but why were they fighting in such a weird fashion?


    Moreover, Alice clearly wouldn¡¯t like it if she broke in and interrupted them.


    With a bit of disappointment, Helen pped her translucent wings and flew back to herir.


    Perhaps she could get some guidance from herpanions!


    Helen silently thought to herself.

 Chapter 854 - Strange War

    Chapter 854 Strange War


    An adept advancing to Third Grade wasn¡¯t too significant of an event, even in the World of Adepts.


    After all, the World of Adepts was arge-sized higher ne. Third Grade adepts might not be as numerous as the stars in the sky, but there were still plenty of them.


    However, a Third Grade adept as glorious and powerful as Greem was a rare sight. He stood out as a shining star in the crowd.


    When news of the young n leader of the Crimson n advancing to Third Grade spread throughout thend, Greem instantly became a blinding, rising star of the center region.


    It wasn¡¯t just the Zhentarim area. Even a small half of the Northern Lands was passionately talking about this legendary fire adept.


    In just two hundred years, he had passed through three thresholds and be a famous and renowned fire adept. An adept like this had the most potential to advance to Fourth Grade. There was no doubt that this particr aspect of Greem¡¯s advancement was what caught the eyes of the adepts.


    The various major forces immediately changed their attitudes toward this quickly rising Third Grade adept. They offered their olive branches and tried their very best to invite Greem to join their factions. Those adept ns and major organizations might have Fourth Grade adepts protecting them from behind the scenes, but they were existences only meant to be used as ¡®nuclear weapons¡¯ to intimidate the enemy rather than fight at the frontlines. Most daily n activities still revolved around Third Grade adepts.


    The Crimson n that Greem had established might be developing at a decent pace, but it was still too frail in the eyes of the significant adept forces.


    The various representatives of therge adept ns visited Fire Throne over a matter of days. Every one of them promised all sorts of benefits.


    If Greem was willing to join their n, they could provide him with all the knowledge and resources he needed to raise his ability and work toward Fourth Grade. This way, Greem didn¡¯t need to expend effort toward managing the n and could focus entirely on improving his skills.


    Such conditions were already sufficiently generous for most adepts!


    However, such conditions obviously could not tempt Greem. He rejected all of the offers.


    Compared to some people obsessed with individual power, Greem ced more priority over the feeling of achievement at carving a ce for himself out of nothing. In particr, with the Chip¡¯s assistance, the magical knowledge and technical experience that required an extensive amount of time to umte was no longer a problem for him. He could take out much more time to invest in n matters or research problems that interested him.


    As opposed to living under someone else¡¯s roof and reacting to every whim and will of theirs, he would much rather work for himself and find his own wealth!


    What Greem never expected was for news of his Third Grade advancement to spark a considerablemotion in the Northern Lands, apart from just the one he had started in Zhentarim.


    The witches, with their severe obsession with matriarchy, also broke out into intense arguments amongst themselves over a male adept like Greem.


    Many tower owners and witch leaders voiced their opinions. Either this male adept was to be expelled from the Northern Lands, or he was to marry a yet unmarried tower owner and be a member of the witches¡¯ subordinate forces. Among all these witch leaders, the one that was shouting the loudest was naturally Coldwinter Witch Leader Morgana.


    Morgana was the weakest amongst the witch leaders, with only the power of Third Grade. Yet, at the same time, she was the youngest of them all, at only six hundred years old.


    A six hundred-year-old hag might be some sort of monster in the eyes of a mortal, but she was as young and tender as an eighteen-year-old maiden whenpared to the other witch leaders, who were easily over a thousand years old.


    Alice might be even younger than her, but she was only Second Grade and had no means of subduing a powerful male adept of the Third Grade. If Alice and Greem were allowed to be a couple, their power dynamic clearly couldn¡¯t reach the essential requirements in the minds of the Northern Witches, where a man was lower than the woman.


    Thus, Greem would have to choose a partner from among the pile of ancient Third and Fourth Grade monsters if he wanted to remain in the faction of the Northern Witches.


    The influential witch leaders had even convened a Witch Council for the express purpose of discussing Greem¡¯s partner in marriage.


    During this Witch Council, the typically gentle and quiet Alice turned into a spooked little wild cat. For the first time, her temper was fiery, and her words were abrasive. She shouted and issued threats of war at every single witch that dared to set eyes on Greem.


    The first person she had to deal with was that Coldwinter Witch Leader Morgana.


    With no choice left to them, the Witch Council could only permit this theatrical andical n war.


    The war would only be between the Fate and Coldwinter Witches, while the oue of the battle would decide whose hands the Third Grade male adept would end up in and whose partner he would be.


    Though this matter concerned Greem, he had absolutely no say or choice in the issue. He could only passively ept the decision of the witches. Moreover, as the reward of the war, Greem himself was not allowed to intervene in the battle between the two witch factions.


    Greem was stunned when he heard this news!


    He had never expected his advancement to Third Grade to lead to such a ridiculous event. He had never thought that there would be a day where he himself would be a wanted good with a price, waiting on a shelf to be chosen by a witch who fancied him.


    Not only had such a ridiculous thing happened, but the Witch Council had also notified all witch towers of this war through the use of written notices. One could only imagine how many tower owners would be sitting back and eating their popcorn, waiting to see a joke at the expense of the Fate Witches in the uing war.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The Coldwinter Witches might have experienced countless instances ofplete destruction, and the new Coldwinter faction had only been established five hundred years ago. However,pared to the Fate Witches who had only been re-established two hundred years ago, they were immensely powerful already.


    Moreover, the Fate Witches had to be the most inept at fighting amongst all the witch factions!


    Their unique profession abilities were all limited to divination and astrology. They had absolutely no unique skills rted tobat. Without the protection and support of the other witch factions, the Fate Witches could not possibly survive in as harsh an environment as the Northern Lands.


    However, should they possess a powerful army in their hands, the Fate Witches predictive ¡®Fate Sense¡¯ and cheat-like ¡®Divination¡¯ would be able to put together the power of the entire military and allow them to unleash force far beyond the sum of their parts!


    That was the true meaning to the existence of the Fate Witches!


    However, the Fate Witches had only been re-established for less than two hundred years. Even the witch leader, Alice, had only just reached beginner Second Grade. She had very few witches under her lead; so few, in fact, that they could be counted with both hands.


    Trying to use such a force to fight against the Coldwinter witches, who had seven to eight times their military power, appeared to be a fool¡¯s errand no matter how you looked at it. It was no different from putting your face in front of the enemy¡¯s palm and asking to be pped. However, this thing had now involved her lover. It didn¡¯t matter how difficult or arduous the task would be; Alice had no choice but to push forward without any hesitation.


    When the news spread out, a hugemotion erupted within the Crimson n as well.


    The first to blow up was the temperamental and irritable Mary.


    Alice alone was more than enoughpetition for Greem. Now that another Morgana had jumped out of the woodworks, Mary instantly blew up like a barrel of gunpowder!


    During a joint meeting between the Crimson n and the Fate Witches, the infuriated Mary mmed the tabletop and furiously dered war against Morgana, the woman whose face she had not even seen. She swore to defend her lover¡¯s chastity even at the cost of her own life.


    Meanwhile, the vampires were also enraged, and all requested to go into battle for their mistress.


    Amongst them, Emelia was the one that made the most noise and moved around the most. She waved her little fists and shouted non-stop within the Rouge Corps as if she wanted to drag the enemy to the grave along with her.


    The second one to stand up and speak was White Tower Majordomo Meryl.


    She was a student of Greem¡¯s, as well as the most respected and beloved core adept of the leaders of the Crimson n. She might only be at intermediate First Grade, and couldn¡¯t even rank in the top ten powerhouses of the n, but she was a central character in the authority of the Crimson n.


    The other Second Grade adepts might excel atbat and ughter, but they were inept at managing n matters and dealing with more trivial tasks such as the allocation of resources.


    Judging from the Goblin ne and White Tower alone, one could see how all n matters that Meryl managed were dealt with in an orderly and suitable fashion. The allocation of resources had always been fair as well, and all things progressed positively under her guidance.


    Given this to be the case, Meryl was also an irreceable core character of the Crimson n!


    Her words carried a lot of weight to them.


    She expressed immense fury at this somewhat humiliating decision from the Witch Council. However, because this had always been how the Northern Witches acted, the Crimson n had no choice but to deal with the matter using the thought processes and methods of the witches.


    If that was the case, it seemed like a jointbat cooperation with the Fate Witches was unavoidable!


    The key to the problem was what methods of cooperation was avable to the two parties? How was the gathering of information on the Coldwinter Witches going? What did they need to be aware of when fighting against the Coldwinter Witches?


    As they listened to Meryl list out all of these crucial questions one by one, the Fate Witches in attendance looked at each other. In the end, they had no choice but to hand over all the information they had on their hands.


    The Coldwinter Witches were known as the mostbat-proficient faction of the Northern Witches.


    The ice and snow magic that they specialized in was verypatible with the harsh environment of the Northern Lands. Consequently, their abilities were significantly enhanced by nature when fighting outside.


    However, the Coldwinter faction had experienced many crises over the years, and their witch legacy had also been cut off for long periods of time. Thistest Coldwinter branch had only just regained their inheritance five hundred years ago. Though they were much more developed than the Fate Witches under Alice¡¯s rule, they were still inferiorpared to those factions that hadsted for several thousands of years.


    At this point, the Coldwinter Witches only had a single Third Grade witch, who was their faction leader; Morgana, the woman who had started this conflict to begin with. The Coldwinter Witches had sixty-seven witches in total, eleven Second Grades, and fifty-six First Grades. Apart from them, the Coldwinter Witches also had twenty-eight subordinate adepts, most of them outsider First Grade male adepts.


    The headquarters of the Coldwinter Witches was in Icesnow Valley, located in the southeastern corner of the Northern Lands. It was only a straight-line distance of three hundred and fifty kilometers away from White Tower.


    Apart from these, the Coldwinter Witches also possessed thirty-one n territories, eighty-nine human cities of various sizes, twenty-six resource sites of different sses, and four million direct subjects.

 Chapter 855 - War of the Witches

    Chapter 855 War of the Witches


    A war between the Northern Witch branches was entirely different from wars in the center region.


    In the Zhentarim region, any war started between two adept ns would bring about tremendous devastation and carnage. The utter destruction of an adept n was easily one of the starting conditions for the war to conclude.


    The defeated would be vanquished, and the victor would take all!


    Defeated adept ns would be pulled out by the roots as their very name was wiped out of existence.


    Meanwhile, the victors would devour all that belonged to their enemy, taking over new territories and resource sites while imprisoning and enving the adepts and apprentices of their enemy. They would grow strong and fast from the corpse of their defeated foe.


    On the other hand, the Northern Witches had stringent rules for war between themselves.


    No ughtering of civilians, no destruction of resource sites, and even more so, no killing of the opponent¡¯s adepts and apprentices. With such strict conditions about war, any party that failed to restrain the scope of battle and disrupted the local civilians or any other witch faction would be instantly be judged as the loser.


    Consequently, the battles between witches were elegant and restrained, which was a far cry from the darkness and cruelty of Zhentarim!


    Both Mary and Billis let out a sigh of disappointment in unison when they heard this.


    For the two of them, a constant war was the only thing that could keep them going in battle. Their strength was built entirely upon the blood and flesh of their enemies.


    The witch war this time had far too many limiting conditions. They clearly wouldn¡¯t be able to enjoy a free and liberating ughter. It also caused them to lose all interest in the uing witch war instantly; they couldn¡¯t get their spirits up at all.


    By the decision of the Witch Council, Greem was not allowed to interfere in this war. However, his many subordinates were not limited in this aspect and could freely join the Fate Witches as foreign reinforcements to be powerful fighters charging at the very frontlines.


    However, Alice very clearly warned that the Third Grades of the Crimson n were not suited for involvement in this affair.


    Be it Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms, Emerald Dragon Iritina, or even Second Grade Gru, their appearance on the battlefield would immediately cause the scale and level of the war to go up.


    If the Fate Witches could get foreign reinforcements, wasn¡¯t it the same for the Coldwinter Witches?


    It wasn¡¯t too much trouble for the Coldwinter Witches. Witch Leader Morgana only needed to call in a few favors and drag a single Fourth Grade witch into the battle, and the war would lose all meaning.


    That was why they couldn¡¯t rattle the snake before the battle and cause Morgana to waste such a precious favor in her desperation to win the war. That was perhaps the key to this war!


    Of course, with Alice¡¯s presence on the side of the Fate Witches, Morgana¡¯s psychological baseline was no longer a secret.


    As long as no Third Grades from the Crimson n or Second Grade Split-Off Brain Gru appeared on the battlefield, Morgana would not be willing to make use of this trump card of the Coldwinter Witches.


    Moreover, though Morgana could have a Fourth Grade witch join the battle using some favors that the Coldwinter branches of the past had umted, Alice, as the Fate Witch leader, also held simr aces in her hand. If the war reached this point, it would only be wearing away at the hidden powers of both factions.


    No witch leader would be willing to cast away their hidden strength in such a meaningless battle for pride under ordinary circumstances; not unless it was a moment of life and death for the branch.


    Thus, Alice started to pick her team and quickly put together a suitable army.


    On the side of the Second Grade adepts, Alice would be the leader, reinforced by Mary and her vampires, Dragonborn Zacha, Goblin Tigule, Dragon Devourer Oliven, and the Spirit of Pestilence, all from the Crimson n.


    As for Bug Adept Billis? Alice personally made sure he was off the list.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Billis¡¯ means of attack were way too bloody and cruel. Every single move was meant to kill and butcher. It was an absolute taboo in the Northern Lands, where the civilian poption was already very scarce!


    Meanwhile, the Spirit of Pestilence, as Greem¡¯s Soul Equipment, had never exposed its power to the outside world. This time, it had joined the ranks of the Fate Witches and took on the role of a terrifying magical spirit with a mysterious identity.


    As long as it didn¡¯t unleash its terrifying gues and viruses, the Coldwinter Witches would have no evidence of its identity even if they were to suspect it.


    On the other hand, the First Grade adepts were led by Berserk Witch Sofia and Icdy Snowlotus, supported by a group of blood elves and arge army of the improved Archers. Such an army was enough to deal with the provocation of the Coldwinter Witches!


    ............


    The battle happening in the Northern Lands had excluded Greem from the very start.


    As such, whenrge groups of Crimson adepts hurried over to the Northern Lands for war, the person in question could only return to Fire Throne and began his semi-reclusive life.


    Upon returning home, Greem immediately started examining the first Third Grade spell he had mastered after his advancement¨C Vicious Fireball!


    Fireball spells could be considered the mostprehended and mastered spells among all public fire attribute spells.


    From the apprentice-level Small Fireball, to the adept-level Magical Fireball, to the Second Grade Magma Fireball, the might and radius-of-effect of the fireball spells increased exponentially. Now, with the continued optimization and enhancement performed by the Chip, the Second Grade Magma Fireball had advanced to the Third Grade Vicious Fireball, and its power had increased significantly.


    The apprentice-level Fireball spell required three to seven seconds of chanting. It had a thirteen-second cooldown, exhausted two points of Spirit, and dealt between thirty to thirty-five points of power. Its power was rtively highpared to spells of the same grade. Moreover, the Fireball spells also possessed a ssh radius of one to two meters, making it a rtively cost-efficient offensive spell.


    The First Grade Magical Fireball required one to five seconds of chanting, had an eleven-second cooldown, exhausted two points of Spirit, dealt between ny to one hundred and fifteen points of power and had a ssh radius of three to five meters.


    The Second Grade Magma Fireball required one to three seconds of chanting, had a seven-second cooldown, exhausted two points of Spirit, dealt between two hundred and twenty to two hundred and forty points of power and had a ssh radius of five to ten meters.


    The Third Grade Magma Fireball required one to two seconds of chanting, had a five-second cooldown, exhausted two points of Spirit, and dealt between three hundred and ten to three hundred and thirty points of power. It had a ssh radius of twenty to thirty meters and also possessed the two special effects of fire poison and Coldme.


    That was merely the basic offensive power of the Vicious Fireball.


    If one were to include the thirty percent power increase from Greem¡¯s fire specialization and the effects of his profession cutting down Spirit consumption, cooldowns, and chant times of fire spells by half, an ordinary Third Grade Vicious Fireball cast by Greem¡¯s hand would deal a shocking four hundred to four hundred and thirty points of damage.


    It was already sufficiently shocking for an instant-cast Third Grade spell.


    With this Vicious Fireball spell alone, Greem could quickly exterminate those Second Grade adepts with mediocre magic resistances in an instant.


    Moreover, Vicious Fireball was an instant-cast spell in his hands.


    With his current thirty-six points of Spirit, he only needed a single point of Spirit to fire a Vicious Fireball; Greem could simultaneously shoot thirty-six Vicious Fireballs.


    Apart from those monstrously powerful existences, there were almost no adepts among the Third Grades who could withstand the bombardment of thirty-six Vicious Fireballs. Even the Third Grade Adept Sanazar of the Sarubo n could be sted to death by the Vicious Fireballs if she didn¡¯t transform into her dragon form.


    However, if Sanazar did manage to transform into the Flying Venom Dragon, her exceptional magic resistance and poisonous nature would render Greem¡¯s spellsrgely ineffective. After all, the fire poison in the Vicious Fireballs would bepletely useless. Even the effect of the Coldme would be greatly discounted.


    In an all-out battle, Greem¡¯s chance of defeat and death would be over seventy percent if Sanazar managed to break through his bombardment and reach his side. However, if Greem could maintain a distance of one to two hundred meters for an extended period and attack Sanazar with long-ranged spells, his chance of victory would be eighty percent.


    Of course, such percentages were established upon the assumption that the opponent wouldn¡¯t run.


    With Greem¡¯s current mastery over his magical powers, he had no method of preventing the enemy from leaving should they decide to turn and flee!


    Thus, the second enhancement task that Greem gave the Chip after the Vicious Fireball was the Lava Shield.


    One offense and one defense.


    Vicious Fireball was basically enough for an offense. Meanwhile, Greem required suitable protection if he wanted his defense to reach the standard of Third Grade. After some thought, Greem decided that the Lava Shield possessed the two critical traits of elementium and physical protection, and was far more sturdypared to the Inferno Shield.


    All these factors led Greem to decide on the Lava Shield as the first defensive spell to strengthen!


    It was important to note that even the Third Grade Adept Sanazar possessed the mid-ranged ability to spit poison after transforming into a flying venom dragon. Without a suitable Third Grade defensive spell, Greem would be a ss cannon, shattering into pieces with a single touch.


    Even with his current twenty-two points of Physique, he wasn¡¯t well-protected enough. That level of Physique had to be paired with a strong defensive spell to maximize the protection he would get. Thus, after obtaining a means of offense, the one thing that Greem needed the most was a Third Grade defensive spell that matched his grade and attributes!


    [Beep. Spell improvement task received. Original spell model is the Second Grade Lava Shield. Prerequisite knowledge conditions are satisfied. Estimated time required: 48 days, 22 hours, 37 minutes, 54 seconds.]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a long sigh after hearing the Chip¡¯s feedback.


    Theplexity of magical system knowledge had reached a new level since he became Third Grade.


    Now, even improving a Second Grade spell easily took up over a month of time. Greem would probably need a minimum of ten years if he wanted to turn all the Second Grade spells he knew into new Third Grade spells.


    Time was no longer as urgent for high-grade adepts as it was for low-grade adepts.


    With the lifespan of a Third Grade adept, Greem had hundreds of years worth of time to while away. Some adepts with less willpower were very likely to be entranced with a life of ease and enjoyment, ultimately forgetting their origins as adepts.


    However, Greem clearly wouldn¡¯t be such an individual.


    After just a few days of rest in his room, Greem threw his entire body and mind into new magical experiments!

 Chapter 856 - The Cottage in the Forest

    Chapter 856 The Cottage in the Forest


    The ck Forest.


    There was a spot that had been left wholly untouched and yet to be excavated.


    Tall and firm trees filled the area, covering the forest in a pitch-ck shade with their dense foliage.


    The ck dirt of the earth was hardly exposed as a dense cover of fungus and moss grew above the ground. Of course, there were even more thorny brambles, bushes, and magical vines that crept everywhere.


    It didn¡¯t matter what time of day it was. A light shroud of ck mist lingered in the ce, making it seem as if it was a magical forest.


    Yet, a crude cottage abruptly stood there in this strange no man¡¯snd; it was a stark contrast to the surrounding environment.


    A door creaked as a beautifuldy in green robes emerged from within the cottage. She held in her hand a mysterious staff decorated with strange patterns.


    She had a slender waist, beautiful figure, delicate facial features, long, light-green hair, and the long, sharp ears.


    Unexpectedly, this beautifuldy was a forest elf from a different world.


    Pushing open the wooden door, Melinda stood before the clearing in front of the cottage, her heart filled with terror and despair.


    This little cottage was her prison cell, and the hideous ck Forest was the prison that contained her.


    The howls and roars of all sorts of wild beasts and magical creatures could be heard deep in the night. Even hidden within the cottage, Melinda could hear the movements of the magical creatures prowling near the cabin due to her sharp sense of hearing.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the strange circle of magical nts around the house that stopped the magical creatures, she would probably have been torn to shreds and eaten.


    The circle of magical nts only covered an area of approximately fifty square meters. As such, Melinda¡¯s range of activity was limited to these fifty meters. If she ever stepped out of the circle, she woulde face to face with the various strange and ferocious magical creatures of the ck Forest.


    Melinda had never thought that this would happen to her; that as a forest elf, she would one day be trapped within a forest.


    On the first day she was imprisoned here, she tried tomunicate with the nts.


    Unfortunately, every ancient tree and wild grass in this forest only returned to her a fierce desire for flesh and a twisted sense of consciousness close to insanity.


    If Faen¡¯s Fantasy Forest was like a herbivore, then the ck Forest was a vicious carnivore. It wasn¡¯t just the magical beasts. Even the grass and flowers of the ce were filled with a savage and terrifying aura of violence.


    A forest elf¨Ca member of those hailed as the Children of the Forest¨Cactually had trouble making their way through this vicious forest where danger, death, and ughter were everywhere. Even if that horrifying demon did not ce any shackles or chains on Melinda, she had nowhere to run. Her only ce was here in the cottage, where she diligently tended to that demon¡¯s strange ¡®moonwell.¡¯


    Indeed, no one knew how, but that scary demon had actually nted a moonwell in front of the cottage. The reason for Melinda¡¯s existence was to take care of the moonwell and hasten its growth.


    Every time night fell and the full moon hung in the skies, a single, quiet, and elegant beam of moonlight would descend on the cottage,nding on that strange moonwell. If Melinda knelt before the moonwell when this happened and prayed zealously, her mental consciousness would vaguely return to that dreamy Fantasy Forest.


    The familiar smell of the earth, the familiar scent of the grass, fairies beating their wings and weaving between the trees as the trees themselves swayed in the winds and greeted her...


    The crisp and joyful voices of herpanions could even be heard in the distance.


    It was the only time of the day when Melinda was happy!


    Ever since this moonwell was nted here, the strange roots surrounding the moonwell had faced problems with the environment and the earth. It had started shriveling and withering. It was only due to Melinda¡¯s continued use of Rejuvenation, Cleanse Ground, nt Growth, and various other nature magics that revived the moonwell.


    It took six months for the moonwell to barely adapt to the environment and once again sink its roots deep into the earth, taking in the entirely different magical power of this world. After another half a year of recovery and nourishment, this one-meter deep moonwell with a half-meter diameter finally seeded in gathering a small pool of clear, jade-green moonwater.


    Melinda had also secretly tasted the water.


    Just that mouthful of moonwater had nearly burned a hole through her stomach. If she hadn¡¯t managed to treat herself in time, she would probably have died to this otherworldly version of moonwater.


    Melinda was still a First Grade forest elf priest.


    She was yet unable to analyze the exact reason for the drastic change to the moonwell¡¯s water with her knowledge and understanding.


    She had initially been concerned that that demon would give up on this ce due to the change in the moonwater. If that happened, she would have to return to that terrifying adept¡¯s tower, locked up in a dark prison, or waiting to be chosen by an adept and turned into those damned blood elves or an experimental subject.


    There had been over a hundred forest elves with her when the adepts abducted them. However, after all this time, there were no longer manypanions who could maintain their pure faith and their beautiful souls.


    If the demon had not chosen Melinda for her identity as a priest, she would probably not have escaped the same fate as herpanions.


    And that demon; that demon was actually a young, handsome man with a wise and powerful aura, along with a wicked charm. Disregarding both of their identities and factions, he would have been an incredibly charming individual to fall in love with.


    Unfortunately, their identities, status, factions, and beliefs were utterly at odds with each other. It filled Melinda¡¯s heart with regret and sorrow!


    It was almost the time when night came and the full moon rose. The demon would be here soon.


    The somewhat panicking Melinda quickly walked to a corner of the clearing. A strange wooden well appeared here.


    The wooden well protruded half a meter above the ground, where green vines and branches wrapped around it. These vines didn¡¯t grow on their own; they were embedded alongside wooden patterns on the well, slightly projecting outward, looking as lifelike and fresh as actual vines.


    Perhaps because they sensed Melinda approaching, the vines and branches along the moonwell also became active. Several buds bloomed, and a fragrant scent filled the air. For the first time, the deathly quiet forest became a warm and peaceful ce.


    Melinda knelt lightly in front of the moonwell. She held her nature staff in one hand and caressed the moonwell with the other while she mumbled softly, repeatedly singing praises and prayers to the Moon Goddess.


    No one knew when, but a sliver of quiet and elegant moonlight shone through the canopy andnded within the well.


    A strange and mysterious power rippled within the moonwell as Melinda continued to pray religiously and sing praises of the Moon Goddess. Several beautiful streams of light started to flow along the walls of the well. If one looked carefully, they would see that these beautiful lights were made up of tiny runes.


    A dense shroud of nature power spread outward. Part of it stimted the moonwell¡¯s roots to continue growing, while another seeped into the dirt and the air, changing the environment around the well. Yet another portion of the nature power gathered within the well, condensing into droplets of green liquid containing a peculiar magical aura.


    Just as Melinda fell into a strange trance-like state of meditation and hallucination, a st of fire rose in the corner of the clearing.


    The fire went as fast as it hade.


    When it erupted, it did not harm the nts around it at all. In fact, it didn¡¯t even startle the elven priest, still lost in her prayer.


    When the fire faded, Greem¡¯s tall and handsome figure appeared on the spot.


    This cottage was one of his magical experiments, made to demonstrate the wonders of the moonwell as a magical facility of the elves.


    Judging from the current effects, this was the only ce to have seeded. The other two locations had both failed.


    Of course, there were many possible reasons for the failures, but the most suspicious one of them all was Melinda¡¯s identity as a priest.


    She was the only elven priest to have been abducted back from Faen. The other two locations were being looked after by an elven mage and a druid, respectively. They also possessed nature magic much like Melinda, but unfortunately, their moonwells had withered, bit by bit.


    Of course, the experiment here with Melinda couldn¡¯t be considered aplete sess!


    ording to a sample that Greem had taken, the moonwater produced here waspletely different in nature to those produced in the Faen ne.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s analysis, the concentration of the new moonwater was 230% more than that of the Faen moonwater.


    That meant that any adept that drank the new moonwater would have the elementium bnce within their body disrupted by the magical aura, causing their magical power to go berserk.


    The new moonwater was not only not a life-saving cure, but a deadly and lethal poison!


    However, given the unique nature of the new moonwater, a sort of strange magic essence could be obtained if the water was put through a unique process of extraction.


    This magic essence was a powdered form of the essence of magical power. It was an extremely precious magical material in high-grade alchemy and could provide high-grade magical items with the unique attribute of automatic magic regeneration.


    In the high-grade markets of the World of Adept, every gram of magic essence could sell for two thousand magical crystals.


    Given the production rate of moonwater from this moonwell, as much as fifty grams of magic essence could be extracted every month.


    Of course, the Chip¡¯s investigations and calctions provided Greem with a new line of thought.


    If the refinement process could be improved, the magic essence powder could be further refined into Empowered Magic Essence. Empowered Magic Essence could allow ordinary individuals with no magical talent to possess magical power and step upon the path of bing an adept.


    That was what Greem truly had his eyes set on!

 Chapter 857 - Flame Jet Combat Suit

    Chapter 857 me Jet Combat Suit


    The World of Adepts nevercked high-grade adepts.


    These high-grade adepts were continually trying new methods of reproduction in hopes of extending their bloodline.


    Be it by natural reproduction orboratory cultivation, the chance of producing a talented descendant was always present. However, it was much more likely for a bloodline descendant with no elementium talent to be born.


    Given the difficulty of high-grade adepts giving birth to bloodline descendants, such untalented progeny could only be abandoned and left to live an ordinary life of luxury and decadence in the worldly territories. A high-grade adept might even see dozens of generations of descendants die if he lived for a longer time.


    The magical essence extracted by high-grade alchemycked vitality and life force. It could not provide mortals with new magical attributes even after refinement. However, this magical essence that came from the mutated moonwell possessed a strange aura of life. When refined to a certain degree, it even possessed the ability to turn the rotten into the wondrous and allowed even a mortal to possess magical power.


    It was undoubtedly further insurance for many high-grade adepts who were desperate for bloodline descendants. It would allow them to leave no regrets behind.


    However, given the current production output of the moonwell, only fifty grams of magical essence could be extracted per month. It would take six months to gather enough magical essence for refinement into Empowered Magical Essence.


    However, considering the bright future and potential of the Empowered Magical Essence, Greem had already determined its price to be a minimum of two million magical crystals. After all, this was a monopoly! He had never heard of anything else simr to this in the World of Adepts!


    Though the Breeding Flowers could achieve a simr effect, they were consumable treasures of a limited amount. Moreover, no one knew where they grew in the various nar worlds and where to harvest them. They were vastly inferiorpared to the Empowered Magical Essence and its continued production.


    Moreover, while two million magical crystals was a sky-high price for most low-grade adepts, it was only the basic cost of arge-scale experiment for a high-grade adept. If spending two million magical crystals could ensure that no ¡®weaklings¡¯ appeared among their descendants, which high-grade adept would spare the money to do so?


    Just as Greem was silently observing Melinda¡¯s every action, the elven priestess finished her prayer ceremony. Slowly, she recovered from her trance-like state.


    The moment she opened her eyes, Melinda saw that terrifying and handsome ¡®demon¡¯ standing beside her!


    There was only one meter of distance between the two of them.


    Melinda gasped in surprise, but quickly covered her mouth and stepped back, seemingly fearful and cowering.


    Greem did not mind the behavior of the elven priestess.


    He reached over and bent down to look at the moonwater. It had now filled half of the moonwell. A smile appeared on his face. In another three to five days, it would be enough for refinement into the first bottle of Empowered Magical Essence.


    ¡°Your performance during this period has been excellent!¡± Greem looked at the elven priestess with a gentle smile on his face, ¡°Speak. You may ask any request of me, and I will fulfill it as long as it is within my ability!¡±


    Carrot after the stick!


    The girl had not cked off at work and had been diligently praying every day. That was undoubtedly deserving of a reward.


    ¡°I...I...¡± The lips of the elven priestess trembled as if she was hesitating.


    ¡°So be it if you don¡¯t have any requests. I have matters to attend to if you¡¯ll excuse me!¡± Greem turned to leave.


    ¡°No...I do have a request.¡±


    ¡°Speak!¡±


    ¡°I want...I want a fewpanions to apany me!¡± The elven priestess finally mustered the courage to say her request.


    Greem turned back, looked at the priestess, and tilted his head to think for a bit.


    ¡°I will bring you apanion tomorrow, but you must properly instruct her of the rules here. If your performance from henceforth continues to be at this level, I will release all of yourpanions, one by one.¡±


    Melinda¡¯s pretty eyes immediately lit up. She hurriedly walked forward and said, ¡°I will definitely be obedient! I will make sure they listen to me, as well. You...you don¡¯t need to be worried about me!¡±


    The elven priestess had not undergone anybat training back in the Faen ne.


    Her only daily tasks were to do some cleaning in the elven temples or altars, while asionally hosting some public prayer ceremonies.


    That was why Melinda¡¯sbat prowess waspletely negligible despite her being at First Grade.


    Greem did not say anything else. He nodded at the priestess before walking two steps away and vanishing in a burst of fire.


    Melinda bit her lips and thought for a long time. s, she knelt in that beam of moonlight and silently prayed toward the moon in the sky, ¡°Great Moon Goddess, what should I do? Is what I am doing now right or wrong? I pray for your guidance.¡±


    Unfortunately, this was not the Faen ne. It was the iparably powerful World of Adepts. The Moon Goddess Meve that she prayed to was not powerful enough. She could not extend her divine power to this corner of the multiverse.


    Her prayer was fated to fall on deaf ears!


    While Melinda once again fell into her trance-like state of prayer, Greem once again appeared somewhere nearby in the ck Forest. He looked across the two and a half kilometers of towering ancient trees, his gaze falling upon that cottage in the woods.


    A series of strange sounds came from the air. It was the sound of beating wings.


    A fanged bat,pletely red in color, emerged from the dark woods. The bat transformed into a pale middle-aged noble in delicate robes in front of Greem¡¯s eyes.


    ¡°Lord n Leader, what orders do you have in summoning Vanlier?¡±


    ¡°That cottage is a secret experiment location I have set up; you must not allow anyone to destroy it. Send some subordinates and seal off the area. Make sure no outsiders make their way in. I don¡¯t care if they are magical creatures or adepts. Exterminate anyone that trespasses with extreme prejudice. Notify me as soon as possible if someone that you cannot deal with shows up!¡±


    ¡°Yes! I¡¯ll make the necessary arrangements now.¡±


    A defensive array might have already been set up around the cottage, but Greem was still worried. Thus, he ordered more forces to secure the area. It wasn¡¯t until the ce was well-protected that he turned and left.


    ............


    White Tower.


    In a secret room.


    A st of fire erupted as Greem¡¯s towering figure stepped out into his room.


    His mastery and control over fire were increasingly refined now. As long as he left a magical brand in a location ahead of time, he would be able to instantly teleport to that ce using the subtle senses between the mes.


    Of course, a mid-ranged Fire Teleportation like this could not exceed twenty-five kilometers. It also required some degree of setup ahead of time, making it impractical inbat.


    However, ever since reaching Third Grade, manybat strategies that he had long since thought of but couldn¡¯t enact in reality had be possible.


    Currently, what Greem wanted to optimize most was his mobility!


    As an elementium adept, being a cannon on the battlefield was the best way to make use of his powers.


    However, his severeck of mobility spells in the past had often forced Greem to transform into the me Fiend and serve as a half-baked me warrior. Now that he was Third Grade, his fire magic was increasingly elegant and excellent.


    After a long time of calction and deduction with the Chip, Greem finally came up with a feasible enhancement n.


    A me Jet Engine!


    me jets were a simple application of fire magic to begin with. It involved firing out concentrated fire particles in a cone shape toward a specific direction to inflict area-of-effect damage.


    Now, Greembined his usual me jets with the Fire Molding ability of the Fire Throne set and created me armor for himself. The purpose of this armor wasn¡¯t for defense, but mobility.


    Much like having many tiny jet engines, the fire armor could expel searing me jets under the effects of Greem¡¯s immense fire energy. It used the counterbnce force from the me jets to employ rapid movement in a limited area.


    However, this kind of movement based upon sudden eleration required Greem to get used to its application slowly.


    Thus, Greem took two to three hours from theing days to train his reflexes.


    He set up hundreds of sharp stakes in a chaotic fashion within the room. He then forced himself to activate the me Jet Engine and weave through the stakes at an extremely high speed.


    Of course, out of concern for his safety, Greem also made sure to cast a few Fire Shields around himself.


    Unfortunately, during the first two weeks, Greem only seeded at turning himself into a ming cannonball. Every time the me Jet Engine was activated, he became a ming meteor that crashed through the wooden stakes and smacked into the stone wall.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Fire Shields, he would probably already be half-dead.


    These tragic dayssted for half a month before he finally managed, barely, to control the speed of the me Jet Engine. However, every time he weaved through the array of wooden stakes, some unexpected error in his cooperation with the Chip woulde up. The result of every mistake meant disaster for the wooden stakes.


    They were either burnt to char by the me jets or smashed to pieces by the scrambling Greem.


    Having no progress after so much training also caused Greem to lose confidence in his own athletic talent. He could only transfer all control over the me Jet Engine to the Chip in his mind.


    Compared to the vague athletic sense of the human mind, the Chip¡¯s control over the me Jet Engine was more precise and agile.


    Every time the me Jet Engine was activated, Greem would turn into a ming humanoid, rapidly weaving, advancing, and retreating through the dense array of wooden stakes. Unfortunately, though his movements were swift, his expression was utterly distinct from his actions.


    Greem¡¯s screams never stopped as he watched the stakes rapidly sh past his eyes and quickly approach him. Though he waspletely unharmed after all the practice and had correctlypleted all of the actions, his robes were soaked through with bead-like drops of sweat.


    Such first-person point-of-view practice was more exciting than riding a rollercoaster from his past life a hundred times over!

 Chapter 858 - Dispute Amongst the Witches

    Chapter 858 Dispute Amongst the Witches


    Entvija.


    As arge trading city, Entvija was well known throughout the Northern Lands.


    There were circles of trading areas and fancy mansions in the city with the adept¡¯s tower at its core. The crowd here was massive, and people were brushing past each others¡¯ shoulders when they walked through the streets.


    One had to admit that though the Northern Witches were a little too barbaric inbat, their attitudes toward civilians were the best among the adept organizations.


    Perhaps it was due to the cold, harsh weather of the Northern Lands, along with the vastnd and a low number of civilians, but the poption was a rare resource as well here.


    That was why massacres very rarely happened in the Northern Lands. Even conflicts between witches rarely ever involved ordinary people.


    Entvija was a ssic public city. It did not belong to any one witch branch and was instead a trade capital left to the management of the Witch Council. The witches in charge of order in the city had to keep a fair attitude toward every single witch branch. They maintained a neutral stance in all situations.


    Arya was an official witch belonging to the Witch Council.


    It was currently her shift in patrolling this city.


    Arya sat upon her flying broom and casually flew across the sky of the city.


    Elegant and exquisite buildings stood below her feet as the crowds surged through the streets.


    Many carriages were slowly moving through the traffic with all sorts of goods and products stacked on them.


    The civilians took off their hats when they saw a witch fly across the sky, cheering at Arya¡¯s silhouette as she passed by. It was enough evidence that the local witches were genuinely beloved by themoners.


    Arya performed a patrol of the trade district on the eastern side of the city at this time every day. When she passed by the Biden Magical Hut, she would give Aunt Fenrin a visit and have a taste of her homemade honeycakes. Then she would fly over to the Kentor Florist in the outskirts, delivering a foxtail flower to her beloved Witch Minnie.


    As a witch on shift duty in Entvija City, Arya spent most of her time in a casual and leisurely fashion.


    The order andw of the city were maintained by the nobles and city guards sent by the Witch Council. They were only responsible for patrolling and having fun. It was only when a significantmotion urred that the city guards could not deal with that they would appear as arbiters.


    When Arya swept across the sky on her broom as if it was yet another casual and uneventful day, a magical me suddenly rose from the Paran district in the distance, bursting into fireworks in midair.


    Hm? That was an rm signal from the city guard!


    Arya paused for a moment before driving her broom in the direction of the firework, flying quickly into the distance.


    By the time she arrived in the Paran District, two of her sisters had already arrived.


    They rode on their broomsticks as well, hovering above the streets and whispering into each others¡¯ ears as if discussing something. They nodded at Arya when they saw her arrive.


    Paran District was a famous trade district of Entvija City. The stores of several majorpanies were located on the street, making it a top priority of the witches as well.


    Arya might have arrivedte, but she could still clearly see everything on the ground while hovering sixty or seventy meters above it.


    At this moment, two parties were coldly facing off each other in front of the doors of the Kimbes Company. The city guards who had hurried over to themotion surrounded the two parties. They held weapons in their hands, but none of them dared to intervene in the conflict between these two groups.


    There was only one type of people that could make the Entvija city guards hesitate¨C witches!


    As expected, as Arya¡¯s eyes swept across the area, she immediately saw seven or eight individuals dressed like witches in the two groups. Arya quickly understood their identities through the emblems pinned on their chests.


    It was the Fate Witches of Dragonblight and the Coldwinter Witches of Icesnow Valley!


    Arya¡¯s head buzzed the moment she saw them. She instantly felt a headache.


    ¡°Arya, look,¡± One of the two witches that had arrived earlier flew toward her and said, ¡°They started fighting here! Should we intervene or leave them alone?¡±


    ¡°How should we intervene?¡± Arya couldn¡¯t help but put on a bitter smile, ¡°The Witch Council approved the battle between them. All witch branches are not allowed to interfere before their battle is concluded. That includes us as well.¡±


    ¡°Then, are we supposed to just let them start a fight here? This is Paran District!¡±


    ¡°Fight, fight...just let them fight! Either way, we will make them pay for anything that they destory. We just need to make sure they don¡¯t cause any coteral casualties or hurt any civilians.¡±


    ¡°Well...I guess that¡¯s the only way we can do this!¡±


    The three witches mumbled to each other and quickly decided on a n of action.


    Arya was the oldest among the three of them and the strongest as well. Thus, she flew above the witches of the two parties.


    The city guards surrounding the street finally let out a breath of relief when they saw the witch on duty arrive.


    They might have excellent equipment, rigorous training, and had dealt with trouble-makers in a heavy-handed fashion, but even these fearless guards couldn¡¯t help but cower when dealing with witches.


    The witches squaring off against each other in the streets lifted their heads and looked at Witch Arya.


    ¡°This is Entvija City. If your two branches have any conflicts, please take it outside of the city. Do not disrupt the order here!¡± Arya was still trying her best to the very end.


    ¡°Hmph! They insulted our leader earlier. They must apologize to us now!¡± The leader of the Fate Witches was the Berserk Witch Sofia. Two young Fate Witches followed behind her.


    These two young Fate Witches were unfamiliar faces. It seemed they had only just advanced recently. Consequently, they appeared nervous when faced with the provocation of the other witch branch. Even the magic wands in their hands were trembling slightly.


    Four Coldwinter Witches were standing across from them. Each of them had crystalline ice shields floating around them and a snowstorm raging within their eyes. They looked upon the three Fate Witches with cold smiles on their faces.


    A dozen witch apprentices stood behind both parties, along with several dozen guards.


    It seemed the witches of the two factions had run into each other when shopping in the Paran District. That was what had led to the current conflict and stand-off.


    ¡°Haha! You want us to apologize? Then let¡¯s see if you have the might to back that up.¡±


    ¡°Indeed. You Fate Witches have been re-established for over a hundred years, and yet you have no more than pawns in your entire faction. That is more than enough proof of your leader¡¯s inability. If I were you, I would already be thinking of joining someone else.¡±


    ¡°Just you few people and you hope to stand a chance against us Coldwinter Witches? We will teach you a proper lesson today.¡±


    It was clear that the Coldwinter Witches held the advantage in the current situation. That was why they were unwilling to let go of this golden opportunity and were so eager to start a fight.


    Seeing that her words had no effect, Arya shook her head helplessly and flew toward the city guards.


    ¡°You guys, don¡¯t just look. Hurry up and send people to evacuate the civilians nearby.¡±


    ¡°Then...them?¡± A captain of the guards started stuttering.


    ¡°Don¡¯t concern yourself with them. Those witches will settle their conflict by themselves. Just seek the loser forpensation once the battle is over!¡±


    The face of the captain steadily turned sour when he heard this terrible job fall on his head.


    Regardless of how weak the witches of these two factions might be, the soles of their feet were higher than the top of his head.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for the demands of his post, he would never want to be involved in a battle between two witch factions.


    The witches were about to fight!


    The city guards mobilized and immediately dispersed the crowd near Paran District, leaving a spacious battlefield for the witches. Everyone held their breaths and found cover as they silently watched the fight that was about to erupt.


    Arya and the two other witches on shift duty flew even higher above and observed the fight from the air.


    ¡°Just surrender, Sofia!¡± The Coldwinter Witch in the lead stood out, ¡°You Fate Witches are naturally inept atbat; it¡¯s best if you surrender as soon as possible. You just need to sit in our n¡¯s prison for a couple of weeks and wait until the battle concludes. Then, you can go back to Dragonblight. Otherwise...¡±


    She didn¡¯t finish the sentence, but the threat was fully expressed!


    ¡°Hmph! Don¡¯t start gloating too early!¡± Sofia waved the thick and heavy stick in her hands. She let it fall to the ground as it smashed through the tough stone tile, sinking deep into the earth, ¡°Let the dogs out.¡±


    As Sofia shouted, she and the two witches behind her simultaneously threw out a glowing elementium core. The elementium cores took in dense earth elementium as they flew threw the air. They then transformed into three towering stone golems amidst a blinding yellow light.


    Three advanced First Grade stone golems!


    These stone golems were all four meters tall, their bodies wholly pieced together with massive boulders. Their shocking weight caused the surrounding buildings to tremble when theynded on the street.


    The three stone-golems roared and charged at the Coldwinter Witches on the other side of the street the moment they were summoned.


    ¡°Dammit! Elementium golems!¡± The Coldwinter Witch leader shouted out loud, ¡°Guards, stop them!¡±


    The guards in white armor that stood around the witches immediately rushed forward upon receiving their orders. They raised their shields against the stone golems.


    A horrifying explosion rang out, much like that of a heavy truck running across a field of watermelons.


    The first few guards at the front were crushed to minced meat by the massive fists of the stone golems, their entire bodies exploding into blood and flesh. Even more guards were blown away by the swinging fists, turning into birds without wings as they soared across the air.


    However, their desperate effort allowed them to stop the stone golems in their tracks!

 Chapter 859 - The Savage Sofia

    Chapter 859 The Savage Sofia


    Just as the stone golems were wreaking havoc with the guards, the attacks of the Coldwinter Witches arrived.


    Arrows of snow and ice crashed against the rock bodies of the stone golems, instantly coating their bodies with ayer of crystalline frost. The movements of the golems became dull and slow.


    With the assistance of the Coldwinter Witches¡¯ magic, the guards finally managed to stabilize their formation. They surrounded the stone golems, taunting them into attacking while having the stronger guards use heavy weapons like warhammers and ils to smash the legs of the golems.


    Pebbles flew everywhere, and rocks started to fall.


    For a moment, the entire street was filled with dull thudding sounds of metal against rock.


    ¡°Nashi, you and Thurman stall the stone golems. Aina and I will deal with Sofia and the rest first,¡± the leader of the Coldwinter Witches shouted. However, her words stopped before she could finish the sentence. She opened her eyes wide and watched as the three Fate Witches on the other side of the street took out some strange metal talismans. The Fate Witches then shook their hands and released three towering and ferocious metallic machines from within.


    ¡°Careful. Hurry up and cast shields on yourselves.¡±


    Unfortunately, a storm of metal bullets shot toward the Coldwinter Witches before her words could reach their ears. Several Scalding Rays were also mixed into the metal barrage.


    The guards surrounding the stone golems were the first to fall victim. One by one, they fell to the ground, shot by the terrifying metal bullets. They might have been wearing leather armor, but even a slight graze from a metal bullet caused a cloud of blood to burst into the sky.


    If a bullet hit them square on the body, then the massive gaping wound would be more than enough to knock them to the ground.


    As the three Archers fired without stopping, a good half of the armored guards were instantly put to the ground, inflicted with prating and crippling wounds.


    The metal bullets did not stop after clearing the battlefield. They continued whizzing toward the wide-eyed Coldwinter Witches.


    A crackling sound, much like that of popcorn, rang out in the air.


    The ice shields around the Coldwinter Witches trembled furiously. Even the street walls behind them were riddled with bullet holes.


    ¡°Dammit! They actually brought metal golems out with them! Hurry! Hurry up and summon some snow beasts.¡±


    Naturally, as the branch that was most proficient inbat, the Coldwinter Witches were not so easily beaten.


    The four Coldwinter Witches immediately started using their signature abilities after defending against the first wave of attacks.


    A Coldwinter Witch remained behind the ranks and started to summon monsters of ice and snow wildly.


    A broad zone of snow and frost quickly formed as she chanted, and many strange ice and snow creatures lunged out from within, howling and yelping. There were Frost Beasts made entirely of transparent ice crystals, snow wolves covered in ice shards, frost giants with two heads and four arms, as well as Frost Crittersposed out of only cold air.


    These monsters roared as they charged out of the snow, rushing bravely at the stone golems in front.


    Another two Coldwinter Witches worked together and erected an Ice Shield, protecting them and theirpanions from the storm of bullets and energy beams. The leader of the witches now had the space to go on the offense. She put on a wicked smile and levitated into the air, where she started to cast a massive snowstorm above the heads of the Fate Witches.


    The apprentices of both parties also started shouting and joining the battlefield.


    However, their abilities weren¡¯t enough for them to truly participate in a battle between official adepts. They could only cast their spells to protect themselves and barely survive in the corners of the battlefield.


    A sight that caused everyone¡¯s jaw to drop immediately unfolded. The Fate Witches were not favored in this battle. However, even their apprentices started throwing out elementium cores and summoning a horde of strange elementium golems.


    Among them were giant stone serpents that could break through defenses, towering fire elementals that functioned as sheer firepower, as well as wind elementals with shocking speed.


    These elementium golems were at the pseudo-adept level at best. They should not have been able to affect the battle, but they were far too numerous. Twelve pseudo-adept level elementium golems charged forward and put up a messy fight. They broke through the perimeter of snow beasts and allowed the three advanced First Grade stone golems to arrive in front of the Coldwinter Witches.


    The Ice Shield erected by the Coldwinter Witches shattered under the giant stone fists of the stone golem. The two witches that were maintaining the barrier quickly fell to the ground, robbed of allbat ability and coughing up blood.


    The witch that was attacking the Fate Witches from midair flew into a rage when she saw this happen. Her snowstorm changed directions and blew toward the apprentices.


    The wild chill blew across the apprentices, instantly turning them into ice sculptures on the spot before they could even run.


    Arya and the other two witches who were watching from above couldn¡¯t help but frown at the same time. They were slightly infuriated by the mad actions of the Coldwinter Witch.


    To think that she would publicly attack a group of apprentices as an official witch herself. Such an action would draw ire from onlookers, regardless of how justified her response was. If it weren¡¯t for the decision of the Witch Council, Arya and the witches would not have been able to hold back from interfering.


    However, the madness of the Coldwinter Witch leader only served as a prologue to their defeat.


    As the Ice Shield shattered, they lost all their ability to defend against the stone golems and the Archers.


    The Coldwinter Witch in charge of summoning snow beasts also had her shield shattered by a stone golem. She copsed to the ground and started spitting up blood from the impact. Only the witch in the lead was still using her rapid ice spells to circle around and fight back.


    Unfortunately, even she quickly fell to Berserk Witch Sofia¡¯s thick wooden staff.


    Once Sofia transformed into the Berserk Witch, she could shrug off the freezing and slowing effects of her opponent¡¯s ice spells. It was why she could catch up to the Coldwinter Witch while the stone golems were incapable of doing so.


    After knocking the enemy leader unconscious, Sofia led the two Fate Witches back and started to rescue the frozen apprentices.


    The apprentices hadn¡¯t been sealed in ice for too long. Except for two rtively weaker apprentices, they sessfully saved everyone else.


    A glint of savagery shone in Sofia¡¯s only eye when she saw casualties among the witch apprentices that she had brought along with her.


    When she walked to the Coldwinter Witch leader with her wooden staff in hand, the opponent was still ring furiously as her, even as she crouched upon the ground and coughed up blood.


    ¡°Sofia, you got us! To think you even brought golem talismans and elementium summoning cores with you. Hmph! Without them, you...¡±


    While the Coldwinter Witch was still baring her teeth and spitting out insults, Sofia lifted her wooden staff and let it fall. The staff smashed down upon the witch¡¯s frail skull, causing it to explode into blood and bits of bone instantly.


    The entire street immediately fell silent.


    The three neutral witches floating in the air were also shocked into silence. For a moment, no one knew how to react.


    ¡°You think you can still live after killing our people? Hmph!¡± Sofia snorted coldly and lifted her wooden staff once again. She shook off the dripping crimson liquid at the end of the staff and turned to look at the three remaining Coldwinter Witches.


    ¡°No. Don¡¯t...don¡¯t kill us. We...didn¡¯t kill any of your people.¡± The Coldwinter Witch that Sofia was ring at instantly turned pale. Her entire body trembled in fright.


    ¡°We lost two people, and you guys only seemed to have lost one. This isn¡¯t fair, is it?!¡± Sofia had a wicked smile on her face.


    Everyone was at a loss of words.


    You lost two apprentices there, but the Coldwinter Witches lost an advanced First Grade witch!


    Could that even bepared?


    However, no Coldwinter Witch dared to argue with Sofia as she red so fiercely at them.


    ¡°Compensation...we are willing to offerpensation!¡± The three Coldwinter Witches hurriedly exined.


    ¡°Hmph! Save your magical crystals for yourself! Right now, we have one more death on our side. That isn¡¯t fair, so your side needs to have one more person die. Speak; who will you choose to die?¡±


    Sofia¡¯s sinister voice had just reached their ears, and all the Coldwinter witches and apprentices couldn¡¯t help but shiver in fright at the same time. Their faces turnedpletely white.


    They looked at each other¨Cthe three witches and twenty-one apprentices¨Call at a loss of words.


    ¡°Hmph! Since you guys don¡¯t want to choose, then I¡¯ll choose for you!¡± Sofia unhesitantly lifted her thick wooden staff once again.


    ¡°I¡¯ll choose. I¡¯ll choose...her!¡± The highest-ranking witch of the three remaining Coldwinter Witches saw that Sofia¡¯s one-eyed red was fixated upon her and hurriedly pointed at one of the apprentices.


    The chosen apprentice was instantly terrified beyond her wits. She screamed and immediately leapt to her feet in an attempt to run.


    Dong, dong, dong!


    A wave of bullets shot toward her, tearing the apprentice to shreds. Her broken body and bits of her flesh stained the surrounding apprentices a crimson red.


    The witch apprentices shouted out in horror. Some of them even fainted on the spot.


    ¡°Capture all of them and bring them back to the tower. Execute anyone who resists!¡±


    Sofia smashed the staff into the ground as the Fate Witch apprentices quickly hurried forward to bind their enemies. Even the three witches were not spared.


    Meanwhile, the white-armored guards were left to their own devices. No one dared to lift a finger to save them regardless of how much they screamed and begged for help.


    The three neutral witches finally descended from the sky after some hesitation, seeing that the Fate Witches had taken control of the scene.


    The battle today had crossed some lines!


    However, Arya and the two other witches could only look at each other. Not a single one of them dared to step forward and correct Sofia¡¯s ¡®mistake.¡¯


    Weren¡¯t the Fate Witches usually weak and ipetent individuals? Since when were they so savage and violent?


    The city guards in the distance were shivering in fright as well.


    They might be used to bloodshed and violence, but when the target of the killing and violence was a group of witches, they couldn¡¯t help but be terrified.


    What were witches? They were the noblest ss of individuals in the Northern Lands who held the most privilege in their hands!


    Since when could they be hunted like wild beasts? It was unthinkable!


    Sofia casually tossed Arya a sack of magical crystals aspensation for the destroyed walls and floorboards. She then led her subordinates and departed into the distance with the prisoners in tow.


    Not a single person on the entire street dared to stand in their way!

 Chapter 860 - The Winds of Freedom

    Chapter 860 The Winds of Freedom


    The battle that broke out between the Fate and Coldwinter Witches was a surprising trend from the very start.


    During the next month, hundreds of conflicts erupted all over the Northern Lands. The Fate Witches that had seemed so weak reversed all expectations and demonstrated fearsome courage and savagery.


    The Fate Witches might be at a numerical disadvantage in a witch-level war, but they did not back down at all.


    They seemed to have managed to ce a summoning core and a golem talisman in the hands of every single Fate Witch. If the Coldwinter Witches were to start a fight against them, they had an elementium golem to defend them and a magical machine to assault the enemy lines. Paired with multiple instant-cast magic wands and scrolls, the Fate Witches turned from sheep to big bad wolves, devouring a dozen Coldwinter Witches in a single go.


    Of course, there weren¡¯t many Coldwinter Witches who died. Most of them were simply defeated, captured, and imprisoned in the Tower of Fate in Dragonblight. It seemed they would not be able to regain their freedom until the war ended.


    The sudden explosion of strength from the Fate Witches didn¡¯t just stun the Coldwinter Witches alone. Even the witches of the other branches, who were watching from the sidelines, were utterly bewildered.


    After all, these elementium and metal golems were artifacts of significant cost. Most adept towers only had enough money to use them as stationary guards.


    To bring them out along with you?


    A small golem talisman could easily cost over twenty thousand magical crystals on the market. Moreover, they were rare items that could not be bought so easily, even if one could afford them. It was hard to obtain these strategic items from the Silver Union without some special connections.


    Summoning a First Grade elementium golem and a First Grade magical machine during a battle between First Grade witches might not tilt the scales of war too severely. However, when it was a battle between two witch apprentices, a single and sudden pseudo-adept level elementium golem would significantly impact the oue of the fight.


    Most of the participants in the battles that had erupted across the Northern Lands were witch apprentices. How massive of a deal was a pseudo-adept level elementium golem? The Coldwinter apprentices could slowly tell you all about it with their own tragic stories.


    The addition of these elementium golems caused the Fate branch to go uncontested in battles between apprentices!


    The opponent¡¯s witch apprentices were either defeated and captured or sent packing back to their territories.


    For a long time, Coldwinter apprentices would turn tail and run at the very sight of Fate apprentices. None of them dared even initiate a direct battle.


    One could reasonably im that the Coldwinter Witches were at aplete loss against the Fate Witches in this contest. They were not far frompletely losing the war.


    However, the Coldwinter Witches¡¯ slump was instantly overturned with the participation of the Second Grade witches.


    After all, Second Grade witches were Second Grade witches. They were not so easily pushed back by the likes of First Grade witches aided with some elementium and metal golems.


    Disregarding everything else, just the sheer number of Second Grade witches exposed the weakness of the Fate branch.


    The Coldwinter Witches had eleven Second Grade witches, while the Fate branch only had a single one. Moreover, that person was Alice, their leader, who could not so quickly appear on the battlefield.


    The Fate Witches were at aplete disadvantage whenparing the strength of their Second Grades.


    The Fate branch didn¡¯t stand by idly while this group of Second Grade Coldwinter Witches stepped on the battlefield and started sweeping up the Fate Witches. Instead, they sent out arge group of Second Grade fighters from other races belonging to their subordinates forces.


    Second Grade vampire adepts, Second Grade dragonborn, Second Grade magical machine warriors, Second Grade Dragon Devourer Oliven, Second Grade Spirit of Pestilence.


    These sinister and vicious non-human Second Grades were utterly devoid of the pride and nobility of the adepts. They frequently resorted to ambushes and sneak attacks, as well as using superior numbers to overwhelm their enemies. Theyunched multiple assaults in cooperation with the Fate Witches while the Coldwinter Witches were still wholly ignorant of their existence.


    In a short amount of time, three of the Second Grade Coldwinter Witches were beaten within an inch of their lives, and two were captured alive.


    When news of such results circted, it instantly caused amotion in the Northern Lands. Even Third Grade Morgana, who stood guard in Icesnow Valley, could no longer sit still.


    How did things develop to this point?


    The power of the Coldwinter Witches was ten times that of the newly re-established Fate Witches.


    This battle should have ended with the tragic defeat of the Fate Witches, and Morgana would have quickly taken the male adept under her wing. However, the reality was far from the ideal. Now, it was the Fate Witches who had the Coldwinter Witches on the ground, rubbing their faces furiously into the dirt.


    It was undoubtedly an unprecedented psychological blow to Morgana!


    Morgana had no choice but to walk out of Icesnow Valley and personally join the battlefield.


    The enemy seemed to have predicted this would happen. The moment Morgana emerged from Icesnow Valley, the Fate Witches began aplete strategic retreat. They abandoned all of their outer territories and resource sites, recalling all their witches and apprentices to the Tower of Fate in Dragonblight, where they turtled up inside.


    That left Morganapletely hanging in the air!


    She couldn¡¯t possibly run over to the Fate Witches¡¯ base and bully the mortal armies and nobles who were left, could she? Especially with her status and identity! However, attacking the Tower of Fate; that was the origin tower of the Fate Witches. Even a Fourth Grade witch didn¡¯t dare break into the tower, let alone a Third Grade like herself.


    However, leaving the Fate Witches as they were...


    Dammit! There were at least thirty Coldwinter Witches and over a hundred apprentices still imprisoned in their tower. If she ignored their livelihoods, then the reputation and honor that the Coldwinter Witches had built over the course of five hundred years would vanish without a trace.


    Not to mention there were two Second Grade Coldwinter Witches still locked up in the Tower of Fate. She couldn¡¯t abandon them, even if she were to abandon all the other witches!


    For a moment, this somewhatical conflict fell into an awkward lull.


    ............


    Ever since he reached Third Grade, Greem was surprised to find that the World of Adepts that he was so acquainted with had be so unfamiliar.


    It was like identally opening a door and realizing that the world behind that door was apletely different one.


    Third Grade could be considered having crossed over the threshold of being a high-grade adept. It was an entirely different world from being a Second Grade.


    As Greem silently thought alone in his room about the new magic that had just been analyzed, a strange blue light crashed against the tower¡¯s defense system. The incident startled him. As a small opening tore in the tower¡¯s defense system, the blue light flew before Greem and turned into an odd invitation letter.


    The invitation letter was formed from blue elementium particles. Rows of letters mysteriously appeared on the note as it floated before Greem.


    The message was straightforward. It was an invitation for Greem to join an adept organization known as the Winds of Freedom. The rted privileges and duties of joining this organization couldn¡¯t be any simpler. It seemed that he only needed to leave his magical brand on the letter to be a member of this adept organization. He would enjoy ess torge amounts of information, resources, and knowledge not avable to the outside world.


    Meanwhile, the only limitation that the organization ced on Greem was for him to bravely stand out and defend the benefits of all Zhentarim adepts with his power should the Zhentarim area evere under the invasion of any of the three major forces.


    Greem instantly understood the situation from this information. It was probably an adept organization formed by the old men of the Zhentarim Association. The purpose of the organization was to unite the adepts of the central region to resist any invasions from the three major adept organizations.


    Greem had not reached the requisite power level before this and, thus, had not been privy to the existence of this organization. Now that he had be a Third Grade, he finally received their invitation.


    It could be seen that the threshold for entering the Winds of Freedom was to be Third Grade!


    It indirectly demonstrated the massive difference between this organization and other small adept organizations.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and finally extended a single finger burning with a bright yellow me, and pressed it against the invitation letter.


    The golden me instantly left the mark of a burning fist upon the blue letter.


    The next second, the blue elementium particles scattered into a sky full of glowing lights and leaving behind a strange palm-sized mirror on the spot.


    Greem took the mirror in his hands as a notification immediately rang from the Chip in his mind.


    [Beep. Detecting strange Spirit port. Initial appraisal suggests it to be a Spiritwork port. Results of data scans: Safe.]


    A Spiritwork port?


    Greem paused for a moment but abruptly understood something.


    He had always been curious about something all this time. The state of civilization in the World of Adepts had always appeared to be too primitive and inferior. Regardless of how you looked at it, the World of Adepts was one of the powerful spellcasting factions of the multiverse. Their origin homnd should not be this backward.


    Yet, the appearance of this round mirror fully demonstrated that Greem had not truly entered the civilization of the adepts. His past self had always been a lone wolf in the wilderness, wandering outside the periphery of the adept civilization.


    Without any hesitation, Greem thrust his Spirit into the round mirror.


    The next second, he found himself in a sea of information as the massive amount of data instantly flooded him.


    If Greem had been alone, he would probably be moaning in agony at this moment.


    Fortunately, with the aid of the Chip, any amount of data would not be able to run down Greem¡¯s mental consciousness.


    Greem had been sitting in his secret room. Now, he felt as if he had entered a strange Spirit world, turning into some sort of pure mental consciousness body within this realm.


    After just three seconds, Greem got used to this body of consciousness, and he tried to open his eyes.


    ¡°Wee to the Winds of Freedom. Is there anything I can do for you?¡±


    The first to appear in front of Greem was a young, pretty girl in a fancy dress. She smiled sweetly at Greem and bowed in respect.


    Greem looked around in confusion and then looked down at himself.


    This ce was a special stone room, only ten square meters in size. There were no decorations, furniture, doors, or windows; it was simply Greem and the girl standing in the room.


    Greem extended his hands and put them in front of himself.


    As expected, he didn¡¯t see his original hands, but a cluster of strange shimmering light. This world and this girl in front of him didn¡¯t exist in reality either. They were only illusions simted through the use of magic.

 Chapter 861 - Trading Hall

    Chapter 861 Trading Hall


    ¡°Where is this?¡± Greem finally couldn¡¯t help but ask this question.


    ¡°Sir, this is the entrance to the Winds of Freedom¡¯s Spirit Illusion Realm. You can find any resource, information, or magical knowledge you need here.¡± The beautiful girl exined with a smile on her face.


    ¡°Then tell me about the basic situation of this Spirit Illusion Realm!¡± Greem ordered without any reservations.


    He could clearly see that, despite being extremely life-like, this beautiful girl didn¡¯t actually exist and was no more than a light-projection simted with the use of magic. As for whether there was actually a young girl controlling this ¡®body¡¯ behind the scenes or an old adept full of wrinkles on his face, Greem had no idea whatsoever.


    That was why he paid no heed to the girl¡¯s ttering and instead turned his attention toward this fascinating Illusion Realm.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, sir. All your personal information and behavior within the Spirit Illusion Realm will be securely protected. Apart from a few authorities of the organizations, no one can see any of your information.¡±


    ¡°You are currently at the entrance of this Spirit Illusion Realm. There are seven stone doors before you, each one leading to a different area. Door One leads to the Trading Hall. You can purchase and sell all sorts of resources and magical items there. Moreover, the resources traded in the hall will not be limited to just those from the World of Adepts.¡±


    As the girl started her introduction, three strange stone doors suddenly appeared on the stone wall in front. They were marked with the numbers one, two, and three in the symbology of the adepts.


    ¡°Door Two leads to the Knowledge Hall. There, you will find most magical knowledge and subjects avable in the World of Adepts.¡±


    ¡°Door Three leads to the Mission Hall. You can find suitablepanions there to apany you on explorations of mysterious and foreign worlds.¡±


    ¡°As you have only just joined the Winds of Freedom, you only possess the lowest level of security ess. You may only visit these three areas. The other areas will only be avable once you have umted sufficient contribution points.¡±


    With his knowledge from Earth in his past life, Greem quickly grasped the functions and purpose of this Spirit Illusion Realm without much trouble. In fact, Greem¡¯s illusion body started to shift under the control of his Spirit consciousness. Soon, he had managed to replicate his real appearance in the Illusion Realm.


    However, for the sake of hiding his identity, he created a mask of fire and hid his face.


    It was best to go to Hall One first. It might be possible to indirectly understand the strength of the Winds of Freedom through the wealth of resources there!


    Greem¡¯s spirit consciousness body crashed into Door One and instantly passed through.


    There was a long, winding stone corridor behind the door, with countless stone doors along the corridor. Adepts continuously emerged from the stone doors and walked down the hall toward somece.


    Greem took a look around him and turned back to touch the stone wall. It was hard and solid, while the surface was rough and cold; it felt just like a stone wall in reality. It could be seen how terrifying the ability of the adept who created this Spirit Illusion Realm was!


    ¡°Chip, can you analyze everything here?¡±


    [Beep. Host¡¯s instructions cannot bepleted. Aplete system of narws protects this ce. Any hostile probes will trigger the correspondingw powers.]


    The power ofws!


    Greem brooded for a moment and finally gave up on the idea of looking into the secrets of this ce. He followed the corridor and walked into the distance.


    After several hundreds of meters, he arrived at the exit.


    A massive underground stone hall appeared in front of his eyes when he stepped out of the corridor. Thick stone pirs were everywhere, and several adepts could be seen close to every single pir. These adepts had their hands against the columns and were seeminglymunicating with someone or something.


    The entire hall was utterly silent, and all the adepts were busy with their own business. The ce was void of the usual liveliness and bustling noise of a market.


    Greem hesitated for a moment before walking to a stone pir. He pressed his hand against it, and a series of fast-moving pieces of information were projected into his mind.


    Looking For: Dragon-rted Healing Essence. Price will be negotiated in person.


    Selling: ck Prince¡¯s Eye. Possesses the ability to absorb spirit bodies. 2,000 magical crystals.


    Selling: Undying Intelligence Potion Tablet (Fragment). 17,000 magical crystals.


    Selling: Azure Blue Magical Thread.Excellent quality. 9,000 magical crystals.


    Looking For: Undying Soul, Third Grade. Price will be negotiated in person.


    Trading: 100 grams of Dragonscale Flower in exchange for 300 kilograms of Bloodstone.


    Selling: 50 grams of Origin Ore. 1.5 million magical crystals.


    ......


    ......


    Row after row and line after line of trade requests rolled through Greem¡¯s mind. He had not even heard of the names of most of these items, let alone their functions and value.


    Compared to the goblin shops that Snox had set up across the continent, the items and resources here were what truly suited high-grade adepts.


    Greem performed a simple search and even found Essences of Fire in the list of items.


    Looking For: 5 Essences of Fire. Can exchange with magical crystals or Chaos Gems.


    What were chaos gems?


    Greem was still confused, but the Chip had already found the rted data on them.


    Chaos gems were a sort of magical gem only found in outer space. They possessed a trace of chaos energy. When used on certain items, they had a percentage chance of changing the magical traits and attributes of those items. Of course, they were more likely to destroy the object instead.


    They were a bizarre artifact with a very strange use!


    Greem still had some Essences of Fire on hand, but he only had three of them; it wasn¡¯t enough to fulfill the requirements of the purchase request. Moreover, those chaos gems didn¡¯t seem to hold any purpose for Greem.


    Thus, Greem quickly gave up on the trade after browsing through it.


    Greem thought for a moment. Over the past few years, the Goblin ne and Lance had been steadily providing the Crimson n withrge amounts of resources. These two nes had already be the foundations with which the Crimson n rose to power. Thus, what they mostcked currently was not magical crystals, but a sort of special alloy known as Queyras Alloy.


    The metal known as Queyras was currently the only magical alloy suited for constructing space furnaces and magic generator furnaces. Other magical alloys might be better than Queyras alloy in terms of physical durability or elementium resistance, but they couldn¡¯t handle the wild corrosion of space energy.


    After constructing a small magic generator furnace for Split-Off Brain Gru awhile ago, Greem only had enough Queyras alloy left on hand for a single space furnace.


    That was why Greem had recently been pushing Snox to search and gather for all information rted to Queyras alloy in the World of Adepts. Unfortunately, he found nothing at all!


    Greem had always been somewhat resentful of Snox because of this, believing that he had not been careful and thorough enough in his work. Now, it seemed as if it wasn¡¯t the fault of the little goblin. Instead, such Queyras alloy was a high-grade resource to begin with. It was not something that someone of Snox¡¯s level coulde into contact with.


    Now that he had the opportunity, Greem silently started to search for all product information rted to Queyras.


    As expected, three trade requests instantly appeared before his eyes.


    Looking For: 1000 kilograms of Queyras Alloy. Price will be negotiated in person.


    Trading: 300 tons of Queyras metal ores in exchange for one Frost Origin Substance.


    Trading: 3000 kilograms of Queyras Alloy for 1 Lich Phctery.


    Greem looked at the three lines of information before him, and the muscles in his face started to twitch.


    The first one was the same as him¨C a request to purchase Queyras alloy. He could ignore that one.


    The other two clearly held a Queyras ore vein in their hands, but the items they wanted to trade it for made Greem¡¯s scalp buzz at the very sight of them.


    Frost Origin Substance. Anything that had the word ¡®origin¡¯ attached to it would cost a hundred times more than any product on the market.


    Origin Substances were physical manifestations of certainw powers.


    Laws were undoubtedly the most potent force within nar worlds. However, this power was intangible and invisible. There was no point at which to research or study it. One could only slowly understand thews through their personal mastery of magic.


    However, in specific environments and locations, the powers of thews couldbine with certain substances in a nar world, giving birth to precious origin substances.


    The second request asked for Frost Origin Substance. That had to be a mysterious substance manifested from the concentration of icews. Adepts who were in a rush to understand icews would undoubtedly improve tremendously if they were to obtain a Frost Origin Substance.


    However, such Frost Origin Substances were, without a doubt, Fourth Grade items. A Third Grade adept like Greem would not have a slim chance to evene into contact with them.


    Meanwhile, the lich phctery mentioned in the third request was also a Fourth Grade artifact.


    Possessing a lich phctery was like gaining control over an obedient Fourth Grade lich. That alone was more than enough to demonstrated the worth of Queyras alloy!


    Greem sighed and gave up on his ns to purchase Queyras alloy here.


    It seemed he would have to look for rted mine information in other nar worlds if he wanted to obtain arge amount of Queyras metal. If he possessed a Queyras mine in his hands, he would be able to instantly put the massive metal resources of the Goblin ne to use.


    It wouldn¡¯t be until he possessed arge amount of Queyras alloy and could forge magic generator furnaces of sufficient size and number that he could bring the metallic creations on the blueprints to life. These were things like the Sky Patrol Ship, the Goblin Golem Dragon, the Dimensional Ripper, and the Thunder God Titan.


    Before this, Greem could only dream of the power of these metallic creations.


    After gaining a simple understanding of the Trading Hall¡¯s functions, Greem patted his body and cut off the connection between his mental consciousness and this Spirit body.


    The next second, he opened his eyes, and his consciousness had returned to the secret room in Fire Throne.


    Greem closed his eyes for a moment and found nothing wrong with his condition.


    The self-examination of the Chip yielded the same result.


    It seemed like the Spirit Illusion Realm was a significant location for high-grade adepts to gather and interact. Meanwhile, the fact that the Winds of Freedom could put together so many high-grade adepts was evidence of its umted power and background.


    Truly, who knew how many Fourth Grade monsters stood silently behind the Winds of Freedom?


    Greem thought to himself.


    Chapter Notes:


    Editor Ryu: If you¡¯re enjoying Age of Adepts, now is a great time to stop by our Patreon and consider supporting this fine series! Patreon is mine and Eris¡¯ sole form of ie for working on this series, and everyone who supports us through Patreon helps ensure the continued trantion and release of AoA. The AoA Patreon has contribution tiers that give you ess to advance chapters of the series (fully tranted and edited) up to 15 chapters ahead of the GT releases. Thanks for your readership, and we hope to have your patronage as well.


    For those who would like to kick in a couple of bucks and aren¡¯t looking for advance chapters, we also have a Ko-Fi for one time donations and support. It doesn¡¯t see much use (hell, if you have a few bucks, you might as well be a Patron and get a few extra chapters ahead), but people still asionally help us through that, and every bit of support helps.


    As always, more than anything, thank you everyone for your continued readership and support of Age of Adepts!


    -Ryu

 Chapter 862 - Knowledge and Mission

    Chapter 862 Knowledge and Mission


    Much like the Trading Hall, the Knowledge Hall behind Door Two and the Mission Hall behind Door Three were filled with high-grade adepts from all over Zhentarim.


    Some of them had concealed their figure and appearance, while others didn¡¯t bother with the effort.


    Greem probed around a little with his Spirit and was surprised to find that most adepts moving around the Spirit Illusion Realm were Second Grade adepts. That couldn¡¯t help but make him extremely confused!


    After asking the girl acting as his guide, Greem discovered that the lowest threshold to join the Winds of Freedom wasn¡¯t Third Grade, but Second Grade. As for why Greem only received the invitation after he reached Third Grade? That most likely involved interference from some individuals within the organization.


    That also meant that some people had mobilized their authority and resources to deny the Winds of Freedom¡¯s invitation to Greem when he was Second Grade. It wasn¡¯t until Greem had advanced to Third Grade, and that individual¡¯s authority was no longer enough to maintain such an operation, that Greem had been invited.


    In all honesty, before he joined the Winds of Freedom, Greem had truly been a littlecent about the influence and resources he held in his hands. He believed his power and resources wereparable even amongst adepts of his same grade. However, this little bit ofcency was smashed to bits in the Trading Hall and Knowledge Hall. He once again recognized the wealth and breadth of resources that these veteran adepts had umted over hundreds of years. It was not something that a rookie like himself could hope to match.


    The shelves upon shelves of magical knowledge in the Knowledge Hall epassed almost every single aspect of the system ofws in the World of Adepts. Unfortunately, with his neer¡¯s authority, Greem could only browse magical knowledge as high as the Second Grade.


    He would first have to increase his contribution points before he could even think of looking at Third Grade content!


    If Greem could produce a set of First Grade information not recorded in the organization¡¯s data library, he would obtain a hundred contribution points. For Second Grade knowledge he would earn a thousand points. Third Grade, ten thousand points.


    However, if he wanted to browse knowledge, he required points as well. First Grade required fifty points, Second Grade required four hundred points, and Third Grade needed seven thousand points. Moreover, this was just the basic cost. It would rise correspondingly for knowledge of a unique nature or greater effectiveness.


    Over the past eight years, Greem¡¯s Crimson n had slowly devoured three to four insignificant small-scale organizations in the Ailovis region. Greem had also obtained some fairly interesting knowledge legacies from these forces.


    The Chip ran some calctions. If this knowledge was contributed to the library, it could bring about approximately 1,400 points of contribution.


    It might not be enough for Greem to obtain Third Grade knowledge, but it was enough for some Second Grade fundamentals.


    That was already enough for Greem!


    After all, with the Chip and some First and Second Grade fundamental knowledge, sessfully sequencing and generating Third Grade knowledge wasn¡¯t aplicated matter. It simply required time.


    Thus, Greem sold the knowledge he had to the Winds of Freedom without any hesitation. He then used the 1,370 points to obtain three sets of Second Grade fundamental knowledge.


    Soul Parasitization Experiment.


    Aidiven¡¯s Notes.


    Crimson Cemetery.


    Soul Parasitization Experiment was research on high-grade spirit beings. If thoroughly analyzed, Greem would obtain significant improvements in the protection of spirits and souls.


    Aidiven¡¯s Notes were the research contents left behind by a mechanical adept. The notes mentioned the topic of assimtion between flesh and magical metal. It had some degree of referential utility for the Iron Titan being constructed in the Goblin ne.


    Meanwhile, Crimson Cemetery was simply a book of introduction on the vampires. It also provided some insights and potential solutions to the bloodline limit that existed among them. The book might not bepletely urate, but it would still be a great help in solving Mary¡¯s bloodline limit problem.


    Greem arrived at the Mission Hall after spending all his contribution points. It was now that he realized that this was the ce to earn contribution points quickly.


    Many high-grade adepts had put out bounties in this hall. The contents covered everything from the exploration of other worlds, searching ruins, adventuring in the ck Forest, and even hunting down high-grade magical creatures. The most basic reward for these missions was arge number of contribution points.


    These missions were also divided into Second and Third Grade based on their danger level. Second Grade missions meant that the enemies that would be encountered during the task would be Second Grade. Naturally, Third Grade missions meant that they would be Third Grade.


    However, what Greem never expected was the long list of Fourth Grade missions in the Mission Hall.


    He didn¡¯t think that any Fourth Grade adepts woulde here to ept a Fourth Grade mission. All these Fourth Grade missions would have to be undertaken by a group of Third Grade adepts.


    One could easily imagine how dangerous these missions were!


    ......


    Nevernight City Ruin Exploration Mission. Third Grade.


    Mission Issuer: Adept Angmar. Third Grade.


    Mission Contents: Proceed to the southwest corner of the Nigon region to explore the ruins of Nevernight City.


    Mission Rewards: 50,000 magical crystals. 2,000 contribution points.


    MIssion Requirements: Recruiting five Third Grade adepts.


    ......


    Coarse Hill Demon Investigation. Third Grade.


    Mission Issuer: Zhentarim


    Mission Contents: Three years ago, tracks of demons appeared in viges near Coarse Hill. Seven viges became victims of blood sacrifices. Second Grade Association Adept Kede went to investigate and discovered traces of a Third Grade demon before going missing during the investigation.


    Mission Rewards: 70,000 magical crystals. 3,000 contribution points. Reward will double if the demonir is found.


    Mission Requirements: A group of adepts Second Grade and above.


    ......


    Greem also unexpectedly saw a familiar name amongst the many missions.


    ......


    Dragon Hunting Mission. Third Grade


    Mission Issuer: Adept Sanazar. Third Grade.


    Mission Contents: Green Dragonir discovered in a lesser ne. Two Third Grade adolescent green dragons, one male and one female. The female dragon is currently expectant. Hiring adeptpanions to hunt the dragons.


    Mission Rewards: 20,000 magical crystals. 800 contribution points. Dragon corpse will belong to mission issuer, and participants will obtain a share of the dragon¡¯s hoard based on contribution.


    Mission Requirements: Two Third Grade adepts.


    ......


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but smile slightly when he saw this mission.


    It seemed his old friend Lady Sanazar hadn¡¯t been cking off during the past couple centuries either. She had been wildly improving her power. The Flying Venom Dragon bloodline of hers was somewhat simr to Oliven¡¯s Dragon Devourer Physique. They both liked to devour dragons of the same grade to improve their own abilities.


    However, while Oliven seemed to devour any dragon without qualm, Sanazar leaned toward acidic dragons like the green dragons.


    As for the lesser ne mentioned in Sanazar¡¯s mission, Greem suspected it was the Knight¡¯s ne he had helped the Sarubo n conquer. To his understanding, there was arge green dragon tribe in that ne.


    It was very likely that the green dragon tribe had been forced to retreat from the ne after the adepts conquered it. That said, it was still very possible that one or two green dragons were staying back in the ne to give birth. After all, it was hazardous for a pregnant female dragon to cross through a spatial rift recklessly!


    However, Greem had a bit of trouble understanding why Sanazar didn¡¯t turn to herpanions in the n and instead chose to recruit adepts from the outside.


    After gaining a simple understanding of the nature of this Spirit Illusion Realm, Greem finally withdrew from it. He then put away the round mirror and stored it properly.


    The round mirror was his tool ofmunication with the Spirit Illusion Realm, and the best ce to enter the Realm seemed to be his tower. It was only in his own tower that the mirror could be continuously supplied with magical energy and sustain Greem¡¯s mental consciousness activity in the Realm.


    If Greem chose to ess the Realm in the wilderness, safety would be a problem. Furthermore, the elementium consumption would be immense as well.


    Meanwhile, if he were in another world, theck of information exchange towers would make it impossible to connect to the Spirit Illusion Realm.


    Greem wouldn¡¯t get addicted to a magical tool like this.


    In the end, the Winds of Freedom had only gathered together high-grade adepts through the sharing of knowledge, resources, and information. As for its actual influence and power? That would depend on the skills and organizational abilities of the Fourth Grade adepts behind the organization.


    ............


    The Sealing Room.


    Greem would take the time toe here and visit an old friend every single day.


    Third Grade Vampire Haines Vik was locked in a massive floating array in the sealing room. He could not move at all.


    A hollow silver tube the size of a finger had been pierced into his exposed chest, reaching all the way into his heart. Drips of viscous, dark purple blood flowed down the tube. A jar the size of a human head caught the blood dripping out of the old vampire¡¯s heart; it looked as if it was almost full.


    Greem waved at the jar and took it into his hand. He covered the container and drew a sealing rune on it before carefully stashing it in his storage ring. However, he immediately took out a new y jar and ced it before Haines.


    Greem did not leave after doing all this. Instead, he took out a crimson crystal and waved it at the old vampire.


    ¡°Sir Haines, it¡¯s time for your meal now!¡±


    Haines grunted. He couldn¡¯t even be bothered to open his eyes, much less take a single look at that blood crystals.


    He had been imprisoned in Fire Throne for ten years. The only reason he had been able to live until now was due to these blood crystals. How much better than death was living in such suffering?


    He didn¡¯t think that his opponent was keeping him alive out of some reservation or concern. It was most likely that this was all for that damned bitch.


    The reason Haines was alive was that he was food the male adept was providing that bitch Mary.


    Once Mary had umted sufficient blood energy and reached peak Second Grade, it would probably be the time his life ended.


    Leicester had died like that. He had turned into a stepping stone for Mary¡¯s advancement to Second Grade.


    He would die an even more tragic death and be the sacrificial piece for Mary¡¯s advancement to Third Grade.


    Haines wanted nothing more than to end his life immediately when he thought of his eventual end. He would never give the enemy the chance to progress upon his dead corpse.


    Sadly, his weak body could not ovee the powerful sealing ability of the tower.


    Haines was almost always kept in a dazed state of consciousness. It was only when this terrifying demon came that he would be woken up with special methods and tortured in the cruelest ways possible.

 Chapter 863 - Secret Experiment

    Chapter 863 Secret Experiment


    As expected, the silence of the old vampire was only returned with cruel vengeance from Greem.


    Greem¡¯s right hand held the bloody crystal. It burst into mes as the crystal made of concentrated dragon blood slowly broke down and turned into a ball of strong-smelling blood mist.


    As the mes continued to increase in heat, the temperature of the mist also started to rise. Soon, it gathered in front of Greem and turned into a bubbling crimson water ball.


    Once the temperature approached the boiling point of dragon blood, Greem chuckled and pushed the water ball forward.


    It floated into the array of light and came into contact with the old vampire¡¯s body.


    The four weeks of bloodletting had left the old vampire¡¯s origin withered and dry, and he was already hanging on by a thread. Yet, when his body came into contact with the boiling blood, it immediately absorbed the blood into his body like a whale thirsting for water.


    It wasn¡¯t the old vampire¡¯s intention, but an instinct of his body!


    The blood of a Second Grade dragon was indeed an excellent tonic for the old vampire in his current state, but perhaps not boiling dragon blood.


    As the vampire¡¯s body instinctively took in the boiling dragon blood, it quickly seeped into his body and surged toward the heart along with the flow of blood.


    ¡°Ah!¡±


    A long and tragic cry.


    The already weak old vampire was stuck inplete pain and ecstasy.


    The boiling dragon blood was coursing through his dry veins, nourishing the nearly withered cells along the way. Yet, as it was providing Haines with power, it was also boiling and scalding all of his cells and tissues, causing him unbearable agony.


    The old vampire struggled with all he had. The gray wings behind his back unfoldedpletely, but just three secondster, they were bound and sliced to countless pieces by the magical chains around him.


    Red spots started to appear all over the old vampire¡¯s pale skin. Countless small mes started burning on his body. Haines raised his head and opened his mouth in an attempt to let out an agonized scream. However, it was a jet of dark red mes that burst forth, carrying with it the scent of roasted meat.


    After a long time, the tortured and battered vampire finally managed to let out a grunt. His entire body was like a reed in cold winds, shivering and trembling unstoppably.


    If it had been anyone else, such gruesome torture inflicted on such a weak body would have killed them.


    However, the vampires were a resilient race. The boiling dragon blood might have brought him the most extreme pain, but it was also rapidly healing all of his wounds. It didn¡¯t take long. Soon, Haines¡¯ body had recoveredpletely, and he was restored to peak condition.


    However, his Spirit had hit rock bottom after such intense agony. He only had the strength to pant now!


    Havingpleted all of this, Greem carefully looked over the sealing array and ensured there were no problems. It was then that he turned and left the sealing room.


    Two magical machine warriors with Second Grade power stood beside the door, keeping solemn guard over the ce.


    ¡°Continue to guard this ce well! No one is allowed inside without my orders.¡±


    Greem gave a simple order before erupting in a st of fire and vanishing from the spot.


    He was already in a secret magical room on the fifth floor by the time he reappeared.


    There were no windows or doors here, making it impossible to break in through conventional methods. Even Greem would have to rely on the magical brand he had left in the room if he wanted to get in.


    This room was an extensive biologyboratory. All sorts of ss vats of various sizes could be seen everywhere, protected behind defensive barriers. These were either the organs of magical creatures, formless tissue, creature specimens, or even some strange, unnameable substances.


    It was chilling to even walk through the collection of disys!


    A specially forged blood coffiny silently in the corner of theboratory.


    The blood coffin was carved entirely out of a massive piece of blood crystal. Complex patterns had been carved onto the walls of the coffin and were lit up by the blood energy rippling out from within.


    Greem walked forward, pushed open the coffin, and frowned when hit by the pungent smell of blood.


    He held his breath, took out the jar, took away the seal, and poured the blood into the coffin.


    The addition of the blood caused the blood level in the coffin to rise even further. It was so full it was almost overflowing.


    Greem nodded in satisfaction.


    This blood coffin specially prepared for Mary¡¯s advancement was now ready. The sacrificial ceremony in the sealing room was also prepared. Now, he only had to wait for Mary to raise her power to peak Second Grade!


    Greem ced the lid back onto the coffin and sealed the blood energy inside. He wasn¡¯t in a rush to leave yet, though. He turned and walked to a different corner in theboratory.


    Here, inside the giant magical barrier, was an exotic unicorn. It crouched on the ground breathingboriously, the color of life slowly draining from its eyes.


    A tumor the size of a fist was quickly moving through its swollen stomach before finally stopping where its heart was. Greem then faintly heard the chittering sound of flesh being torn and devoured.


    The process of waiting was long and tedious, but Greem was not at all impatient.


    Ten entire hourster, a dull thud rang out as a strange creature the size of a palm emerged from the body of the unicorn,nding on the ground.


    Judging from its appearance, it was a creature that resembled a small mastiff. It had no hair throughout its body, and its skin was covered in the blood and flesh of the unicorn. The creature only had two thick hind legs and no front legs to speak of. The creature¡¯s bare, fleshy head wasposed mostly of its broad, bloody mouth.


    The creature sat there after emerging from the unicorn¡¯s body. It opened its mouth and extended a flexible, fifty centimeters long tongue and started licking all the blood and flesh off of its body.


    A milky white me suddenly burned on the skin of the unicorn, its flesh now wholly devoured. The ze turned the rest of the body, along with the hair, into a pile of ashes. Only a crystalline horn was left on the spot.


    The creature suddenly saw Greem through the barrier of light and immediately lunged forward adoringly.


    Its weak and frail body crashed against the barrier, and it fell to the ground. The creature struggled to get up before letting out a wailing cry at Greem.


    No one could possibly connect this creature with the idea of a pet just by the looks of its rows of bloody teeth.


    ¡°Come, let me see what powers you have inherited from devouring a unicorn,¡± Greem spoke softly to the creature.


    This creature was the Sourcestealer that Greem had taken the painstaking effort to nurture to maturity.


    As for why an insect appeared so much like a beast after maturity, that was not something that Greem could understand.


    Greem ced his right hand on the barrier, only half a meter away from the Sourcestealer.


    The formerly gentle and obedient Sourcestealer immediately turned restless. Viscous saliva dripped from the gaps in its teeth, corroding little holes into the magic resistant metal floor when itnded.


    The Sourcestealer¡¯s murky, yellow eyes were fixed upon Greem¡¯s right hand as if it was raring to go.


    There was no doubt that the Third Grade Greem was a much more delicious preypared to the dead unicorn!


    Parasitic creatures like the Sourcestealers had no so-called loyalty or emotion. All intelligent beings in the world, as long as it was something they could hunt, were on their list of prey.


    ¡°Simmer down and show me what you can do. Or else...¡±


    The smile on Greem¡¯s face was unchanging, but a trace of killing intent slowly emerged in his ck eyes.


    The Sourcestealer was still hungering for his flesh.


    Greem flicked his fingers, and a me the size of a small finger suddenly appeared on the back of the Sourcestealer.


    Fire shed with flesh, and a strange sizzling sound rang out.


    The Sourcestealer immediately started shrieking in pain.


    Strangely enough, as it shrieked, a powerful light burst forth from the horn left in the ashes of the unicorn. The magical fire was instantly extinguished when the milky white lightnded on the Sourcestealer¡¯s back.


    As the rest of the milky white light surged into the Sourcestealer¡¯s body, the scorch marks left by the fire were instantly erased.


    ¡°Holy power.¡±


    Greem muttered the name with a certain praising tone.


    Greem could sense that power from earlier clearly. It was holy power, which was unique to the unicorns.


    Such holy power possessed the magical effect of cleansing and dispelling. It was an ability that no other races could hope to replicate.


    Naturally, a talent-stealing creature like the Sourcestealer couldn¡¯t possibly possess such holy power. Yet, after devouring the bloodline talent of a young unicorn, it could now unleash this odd holy power with the use of the horn.


    It meant that the talent-stealing of the Sourcestealer had seeded!


    Greem immediately activated a particr array in the barrier without any hesitation.


    A gray anesthetic gas came out of a corner and quickly filled the barrier.


    The Sourcestealer¡¯s body quickly started swaying when it took in the gray gas.


    However, it quickly activated arge ball of white light to cover its body and resist stubbornly against the gas.


    Greem had no patience to wait until the holy power was thoroughly exhausted. He lifted his hand, and a few beams of red Scalding Rays shot into the barrier, leaving several holes in the body of the Sourcestealer.


    The gray gas spontaneously surged into these wounds and entered the Sourcestealer¡¯s body.


    It staggered about a bit before finally falling to the ground.


    It might have stolen the unicorn¡¯s powerful innate ability, but it stillcked sufficient magical power to sustain the use of the abiltiy due to the limits of its own biological construction. It also didn¡¯t possess the unicorn¡¯s powerful magic-resistant skin. Thus, it couldn¡¯t even resist First Grade Scalding Rays and promptly fell unconscious.


    Seven minutester, the Sourcestealer was ced on a cold dissection tform.


    Greem put on a gray adept¡¯s robe, turned on the bright magical lights, and opened the Sourcestealer¡¯s body with a single slice.

 Chapter 864 - Adepts Temptation

    Chapter 864 Adept¡¯s Temptation


    White Tower.


    Regardless of how heavy the snow was outside, it was always warm as spring in here.


    Little goblin Locke pushed open the doors of the secret room and stumbled out from inside.


    This damned advancement ceremony had exhausted nearly seventy percent of his life force; he had barely managed to seed in his.


    His suddenly boosted Spirit rippled and undted controbly, slowly returning to his mental consciousness ording to the meditation technique that had been earlier established. These undtions wouldst for six months and would only stop once Little Locke had managed to stabilize his Spirit Origin.


    A small, scrappy, and battered magical machine ran out from behind him, creaking as it circled about. Then, it transformed into a tiny spider golem amidst some confusing motions and the sound of twisting metal. A seat just the size of Little Locke had been left on the elliptical metal tform.


    Little Locke had chosen to lower his Physique and Strength to stimte an abrupt increase to his Spirit during the advancement ceremony earlier. That was how he had barely managed to allow his Spirit to reach the minimum threshold for advancement. The most significant side effect of this decision was different degrees of regression to his Physique and Strength.


    In particr, his Physique had been weakened below the level of an ordinary human!


    At this moment, it wouldn¡¯t even take an adept or a magical creature to kill him. Even a child with a simple stick could beat him to death now.


    Locke, as he currently was, was truly weak enough to fall over to a stiff breeze!


    However, this condition was only temporary.


    As a First Grade magical mechanic, Locke had plenty of ways to regain his lost Physique after his increased Spirit had stabilized. The simplest method was to eat the Underground Fire Set provided by the tower.


    The set was made from the meat of Underground Fire Dragons, found in the depths of volcandscapes. They might have the title of ¡®dragon,¡¯ but they were truthfully fire lizards that lived nearva seas. They might not look like much, but they were faux-dragons of sorts.


    Naturally, their flesh possessed indescribable nourishment for the body!


    Of course, this was also because Little Locke was far, far, far too poor.


    If he had sufficient magical crystals on hand, he could totally choose the more high-quality fire dragon meat.


    Indeed, fire dragon meat! Real fire dragon meat; fresh dragon meat procured from the body of a ferocious fire dragon!


    Little Locke had never heard of such extravagant treatment in other adept¡¯s towers.


    The fact that White Tower could provide an unlimited supply of fire dragon meat was intangible internal welfare that attracted the envy of many foreign adepts.


    Unfortunately, few magical crystals that Locke had umted had all been spent on that advancement ceremony. By the time he stumbled out of the secret room, he only had seventeen magical crystals in his pouch.


    Clearly, he was not qualified to enjoy a fire dragon meal with such wealth.


    Making apromise and having an Underground Fire Dragon set to nourish his weakened body was still an excellent choice!


    However, when he pushed open the door of his room, a wave of cheering came from outside. It almost knocked him to his feet once more.


    No one knew when, but all sorts of people had already gathered outside his door.


    Human apprentices, goblin apprentices, witch apprentices. Of course, the majority of them were still all sorts of goblins from the Goblin ne.


    The crowd of goblins filled the entire corridor in front of Locke¡¯s room. They swarmed inside the moment he opened his door, lifted him, and started tossing him about in the air.


    It was the highest etiquette of celebration for the goblins, afforded only for heroes and victorious soldiers.


    Arge group of goblins gathered around Locke, extending their arms to touch his body, taking pride from this simple act alone. They leaped about, yelling in joy and happiness.


    The apprentices of the other races were still standing around on the outside with a sense of propriety, pping while smiling at Locke.


    ¡°Alright, alright. You guys hurry up and put Lord Locke down. His body can¡¯t stand your rowdiness at the moment.¡± A goblin captain in delicate warrior¡¯s armor shouted, finally putting a stop to the goblin¡¯s attempt to lift Locke out on parade.


    He pushed aside the crowd and arrived in front of Locke, where he smiled and bowed as he said, ¡°Lord Locke, congrattions on your advancement to adept. I offer you my sincere congrattions from Lord Snox. Apart from that...¡±


    The captain waved his hand as a group of goblins dressed like chefs ran forward. Each of them held fancy trays in their hands. They removed the silver cover and revealed the perfectly roasted fire dragon ribs beneath.


    The rich and fragrant smell instantly caused Little Locke¡¯s stomach to growl. His body desperately needed replenishment of energy, and a voice was wildly calling out from all over his body, ¡°I want to eat. I want to eat.¡±


    If it weren¡¯t for his decorum as an adept keeping him cool, Locke probably wouldn¡¯t have been able to resist the urge to lunge forward and dig in.


    His spiritual aura after bing an adept was utterly iparable to back when he was an adept.


    As he listened to the calls of ¡®Lord Locke¡¯ around him, Little Locke finally truly felt the nobility and status of an adept for the first time. Locke¡¯s mind quickly matured as the crowd cheered and crowded around him. A trace of dignity and pride that an adept should possess appeared naturally on his face, as it should be.


    An intangible spiritual pressure slowly emanated from him, and the goblins gathered around Locke instinctively restrained their smiles and backed away. Only the goblin warrior continued to stand before him, unfazed.


    ¡°You said...you are representing Lord Snox?¡± Little Locke asked with some hesitation.


    Snox¡¯s name held a very significant position in the hearts and minds of all goblins!


    Much like superstars in the Goblin ne, the idols of every goblin were the undefeated Lord Tigule and the brilliant Lord Snox.


    One was a military force and the other a political force. The two of them represented the goblins, providing a rare chance for their race to develop and grow in the Worlds of Adepts where humans were the rulers.


    Without their pioneering the way forward, the goblins would have had a hard time escaping their fates of being enved and exploited. Without them standing at the forefront, the tens of thousands of goblins would never have stepped out of their ne and walked brazenly in the World of Adepts as certified merchants and goblin apprentices.


    These tremendous results were enough to put the names of Snox and Tigule down in the history books as equals to the wise predecessors of all goblins. They were only more respected, never less!


    Thus, even Little Locke felt a little exhrated and moved when he heard this familiar name.


    ¡°Yes, Lord Locke!¡± The goblin warrior respectfully said, ¡°Lord Snox heard that the first official adept of us goblins was about to be born, and he specially sent me over to congratte you. And these are the gifts for you!¡±


    ¡°Did Lord Snox say anything else apart from this?¡±


    ¡°He also said that if you were willing to join the Goblin General Chamber of Commerce, the cost for all the materials you require from henceforth would be provided by the Chamber. Apart from this, the Chamber of Commerce is willing to provide you with sponsorship of five hundred magical crystals a month. Also, you will have purchase priority over all resources and materials managed by the Chamber of Commerce.¡±


    This goblin warrior was an eloquent speaker as well and quickly promised Locke all sorts of conditions and support. He couldn¡¯t help but be moved.


    Just as he was about to agree, his eyes swept across the human apprentices waiting outside. Their eyes glinted with light, filled with an eager fervor as if they couldn¡¯t wait to talk to him.


    The increase to Locke¡¯s Spirit also provided him with a sharper, more intelligent mind, along with finer thinking. He held back what he was about to say and instead replied with a polite smile. He then patted his stomach and said, ¡°I¡¯m hungry now!¡±


    ¡°Lord Locke wants to eat now! All unrted personnel should leave for the moment!¡±


    As the goblin warrior shouted, these apprentices and goblins that hade to celebrate had no choice but to step out of his room reluctantly. Meanwhile, this first magical mechanic of the goblins finally had a chance to sit down and feast, served by diligent servants.


    Meanwhile, as his closepanions, Body-Refining Apprentice Dakso and nt Apprentice Eco could only stand in the crowd. They looked at the noble and proud goblin from a distance, not able to take a step toward him.


    Lord Locke was already too busy now; he had no time to meet his teammates at the moment.


    Moreover, what could they do even if they met Locke? The massive gulf between adept and apprentices was not something that could be filled with flimsy sentiments of the past.


    Adepts. This world had always belonged to the adepts!


    ............


    White Tower.


    In a bright, magical room on the twelfth floor, Meryl was reading through a series of magical documents. She had a frown on her face. Most of these were requests for materials submitted by n adepts.


    The more documents she read, the deeper the wrinkles on her forehead.


    Finally, she put down her magical pen and started rubbing her head as she fell into thought.


    Old Fox Vanlier stood by her side, helping her work. He lifted his head and looked at Meryl in confusion.


    ¡°Requests for ordinary resources and materials have increased by 37% sincest month. It is a tremendous expense!¡± Meryl exined her frustration.


    Vanlier, who was dressed in a gentlemanly noble¡¯s outfit, let out a bitterugh and consoled her, ¡°Lady Meryl, don¡¯t worry about it. The resource sites in the Ailovis area of the Central Region will be sessfully functioning in another three months. When that happens, the n will have no need to purchase ordinary resources and materials from the outside. We will be able to sustain ourselves with our own production.¡±


    ¡°I know of everything that you are talking about, but that¡¯s still going to take three months! The n¡¯s current magical crystal reserves have dipped below a million. It is concerning.¡±


    ¡°Why not...let the dragon hunting squad in Lance mobilize again?¡±


    ¡°We can¡¯t. The group just killed two First Grade dragonsst month. Themotion from that time hasn¡¯t died down yet. It¡¯d be very likely for them to run into entire dragonflights if they were to act now. We had best wait a little longer. Speaking of which, did anything out of the ordinary happen in the tower today?¡±


    ¡°There was something, Lady Meryl!¡±


    ¡°Oh, tell me about it!¡±


    ¡°A goblin from the goblin apprentices that the n leader forcefully brought over has actually sessfully advanced. He¡¯s currently celebrating in the lower levels right now!¡±


    ¡°Mm? Goblin adept? It sounds a little awkward, but it is a boost to the n¡¯s strength. Go and tell that goblin to join White Tower, and all the First Grade knowledge of the n will be open to him. All those stinking merchants and useless warriors can stand aside!¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡± Vanlier smiled when he heard this.


    Resources, authority, women, magical crystals, and knowledge. What would that lucky little guy choose when these things were ced before him?


    Hehe, I do look forward to his answer.

 Chapter 865 - Daily Routine in the Laboratory

    Chapter 865 Daily Routine in the Laboratory


    The fifth floor of Fire Throne.


    Inside theboratory.


    Greem put down his surgical knife in pity and started to clean up the operation tform.


    The experiment on the Sourcestealer had been very sessful. The creature had perfectly inherited some innate abilities of the unicorn. Still, transferring the natural abilities within the Sourcestealer to a third party became a new problem.


    Bloodline had always been a matter of purity, and any impurities would directly affect the possibility of future advancements. Greem only had elementium affinity and was considered a pure human in terms of his bloodline.


    He had not given up on his human form even after three advancements.


    In the end, the so-called Body of mes and me Fiend¡¯s Body were just transformation skills belonging to his elementium affinity. If he thoroughly converted into an elementium body, he would most definitely gain a boost to his fire damage. However, he would then suffer during his subsequent advancements as a consequence.


    Anyone who was a spellcaster knew that elementium lifeforms lived for curiously long times, but had an especially difficult time advancing.


    If Greem had chosen to be a fire creature when he was Second Grade, he would never have advanced to Third Grade so quickly.


    It was trade-off!


    Greem¡¯s bloodline was like a piece of nk paper with plenty of space to grow and express himself.


    However, he had to pick his bloodline carefully. He had to ensure his new bloodline would assimte perfectly with his current fire affinity, instead of conflicting and disrupting it.


    However, before this could be a possibility, Greem would first have to umte some necessary experience in bloodline istion and transntation. However, these things were the hardest to get your hands on. After all, research and secrets rted to bloodlines had always been the most ssified information in any adept n or organization.


    Greem might have stayed in the Sarubo n for some time, but he¡¯d had no chance ofing into contact with such secrets with his power and status then. Meanwhile, it was no more than a fantasy to attempt to obtain such research from the outside world.


    No n or force would ever publish such research results. Moreover, bloodline-adept ns always severely put down adepts who conducted private research into bloodline istion and transntation. If such secrets were ever to be released, it would ce all bloodline adepts in a perilous position.


    A bloodline was a strange and intangible power.


    It existed within the flesh and soul of all creatures and was iparably powerful yet mysterious and profound.


    Bloodline research in the past had always focused on the blood of the target creature. Adepts believed that regrly removing impurities and increasing the concentration of high-energy substances within the blood would allow them to find the source of power behind bloodline creatures.


    The Chip also fundamentally agreed with this direction of research after some analysis and organization.


    Other adepts might not be assisted by a Chip, but their minds weren¡¯t much inferior to it. After tens of thousands of years of continuous research, the adepts¡¯ understanding of bloodlines had reached an extremely refined level. How could they possibly overlook something that even the Chip could discover?


    Thus, the source of all bloodline power would be uncovered by blood research!


    Meanwhile, Greem had the perfect conditions for such research.


    He had sessfully extracted all the blood from the creature¡¯s body and was trying his best to figure out what made it different.


    With the magnification array on the operation tform and the Chip¡¯s detailed scan, Greem started to magnify a slide of the creature¡¯s blood much like scientists on Earth in his previous life.


    One had to admit, Greem saw too many mysterious substances in the blood slide that were utterly different from his previous world.


    The creature¡¯s blood had been dehydrated in a very refined manner, getting rid of most of the water content. The only things that remained were small amounts of protein, some living tissue, cell remnants, dead bacteria, and small parasites. Those things might not typically be visible, but they made up over 96% of blood content, and there were hundreds of different substances.


    Getting rid of these elements required a different process for every single one of them.


    Any problems that arose during this process would cause the blood purification process to be in vain.


    In all honesty, the ancient adepts had no tools like magnification sses, heaters, coolers, evaporators, filters, and separators. The fact that they had managed toplete simr bloodline research with magical arrays alone was enough to massively impress Greem!


    Right now, Greem had absolutely no idea how adepts in the past had managed to aplish such a feat. He could only walk down this path once again based on his own understanding and the help of the Chip.


    High-energy substance? What was this substance that could bring about tremendous magical power? What rtionship did it have with the soul? How was it passed down through the generations?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but scratch his head.


    These were apparently problems that he needed to research and deal with, one by one!


    Greem emerged from the biologyb and went for a shower to get rid of the smell of blood. He then casually started to enjoy the most sumptuous feast of the day.


    With his current abilities, he would not die even if he were to go without food for an entire month. However, eating and meditation were still essential ways by which he increased his powers.


    In particr, fire dragon ribs had be an irreceable meal for Greem ever since he obtained control over a dragon ne. Compared to meditation and gathering elementium particles to increase the upper limit of his Spirit, consuming fire dragon ribs was a superior method to improve his power.


    While his body took in pure fire elementium energy, the high-energy substance in the fire dragon meat could also continually nourish his body. Potent magical power demanded a powerful body to contain such power!


    Why were dragons all so huge? To sustain their powerful bloodline requirements!


    Take, for example, the Sourcestealer. It might have robbed the unicorn of its bloodline talent through its strange ability, but it did not have the unicorn¡¯s robust Physique and holy-power-infused muscle tissue. That was why it could not unleash arge-scale a Purification Halo as unicorns could.


    It was like cing a powerful generator in a run-down chariot. Not only would the host be unable to make full use of the power, but the power itself would cause the host¡¯s body to disintegrate. Their gic sequence would also fall apart.


    Of course, if the strange creature was given a few years or a few decades to adapt to its new power, it could gain a body simr to the unicorns. After all, only a vessel like this was suited for the bloodline talent to unleash its full potential.


    Even with the increase to his grade, how could Greem possibly hope to unleash more magical might if he was unwilling to change the form of his human body!? After all, his two-meter-tall body could only contain a finite amount of magic power!


    That was why Greem had to gradually improve his Physique through devouring high-quality food and allow his flesh to be able to contain more magical energy. That was something that all adepts undertook behind the scenes.


    In the end, humans were a short-lived species. Their bodies were frail as well, and they possessed no exceptional racial talents. Their only strength was possibly their average abilities in all aspects, leaving them with no excessively lethal weaknesses.


    Any adept that wanted to be stronger had to use any means necessary to change and transform their body. From then on, they would have stepped onto a one-way road with no way to turn back.


    That was a problem all adepts had to face!


    Greem set aside five kilograms of fire dragon ribs for himself every day.


    Of course, this wasn¡¯t a problem of Greem being unable to consume more than that. Instead, it was the perfect number the Chip had obtained after some precise calctions.


    With his current Physique, five kilograms of fire dragon ribs required precisely a single day to digest and absorb.


    This amount was just enough not to waste any food or time.


    After enjoying the only meal of the day, Greem spent the rest of his time in the alchemicalb.


    After conquering the Goblin ne, Greem had naturally taken over plenty of magical machine technology from the hands of the goblins. The Chip¡¯s analysis revealed that it was entirely possible tobine this otherworldly technology with his own golem creation techniques.


    Greem had theorized thebination of elementium golems with magical machines a long time ago.


    However, turning this idea into reality required solving a lot ofplicated issues.


    Firstly, high-magic alloys.


    Secondly, energy effects.


    Thirdly, a magical spirit.


    Should any of these three issues not be resolved, thebination of elementium golems and magical machines would remain nothing more than a pipe dream.


    High-magic alloys were the first problem that Greem needed to ovee when creating these new elementium magical machines.


    Of the thousands of metals that the Chip held in its data library, only seventy of them possessed some magical conductivity, and less than five of them possessed full conductivity.


    The elementium golems that Greem had currently created consisted of over sixty percent of all existing attributes. Without a suitable magical metal to conduct the magical energy, the machines would not be able to unleash their power.


    Over the past few days, Greem had been continuously selecting suitable magical metals and trying his best to create a high-magic alloy that could meet his requirements.


    Greem¡¯s requirement for the high-magic alloy was full magical conductivity and the ability to deployrge amounts of magic power.


    Meanwhile, things like physical defense and magical resistance could be solved by other means.


    Energy effect. It was a basic requirement for the elementium magical machines to unleash powerfulbat might.


    Adept¡¯s had consciousness cores to memorize and cast spell models. How were these elementium magical machines supposed to fight then?


    Would they work as moving cannons like the Archers? Would they shoot energy beams and possess magic energy rifles?


    Doing so would undoubtedly wipe away the powerful advantage of elementium golems in being able to cast spells naturally. If they were to fight in such a manner, Greem might as well just enhance the Archers instead!


    Meanwhile, a magical spirit was the only way to provide elementium magical machines with artificial intelligence.


    However, to do this, Greem would first have to master some soul spells.


    At the very least, he would require soul spells at the level of master necromancers.


    Greem intended to have the Chip control these magical machines, but with his current level of souls studies, he was far from being able to have a copy of the Chip function as the core of a magical spirit.


    Fortunately, after advancing to Third Grade, Greem had plenty of time to make up for his deficiencies in the past.

 Chapter 866 - Elementium Magical Machine

    Chapter 866 Elementium Magical Machine


    Dian City.


    It was a public city directly managed by the Witch Council. It was also an important entry point into the Northern Lands.


    For the Goblin Chamber of Commerce who intended to expand their business into the Northern Lands, this city was undoubtedly a crucial point of focus for them.


    Furor had returned to this city along with a group of goblin merchants.


    The Northern Lands might be rtively safe, but the goblins of the Crimson n were still considered a subordinate force of the Fate Witches. As such, they ran into challenges from the Coldwinter Witches during this period of war.


    As such, it was best for the goblins to travel with the goblin merchants who were escorted by magical machines.


    Furor sessfully entered Dian City with the magical emblem of the Crimson n.


    Furor bid farewell to Ol¡¯ Tok, the captain of the merchant group, at a junction in the street. He then made his way through three streets and finally arrived at the shop that the Goblin Chamber of Commerce had set up here.


    The main business of this shop was the trade of ves, transportation of goods, mining, and logging. They also privately dealt in firearms and poached goods.


    However, magic energy rifles, magic energy cannons, magical machines, and other supernatural weapons were contraband under the Northern Witches¡¯ decree. To avoid infuriating the rulers of thisnd, the goblins kept a low profile and sold ordinary weapons like goblin rifles and alchemical bombs.


    At the moment, the great goblin leader Snox was making contact with the witches in Dian City. He was trying to obtain the rights to sell supernatural items. However, the negotiations weren¡¯t going very smoothly. It seemed like the witches intended to make a decision only after the war between the two witch factions had concluded.


    That undoubtedly infuriated and frustrated Snox immensely!


    However, what made him even more frustrated was the bad news that Special Envoy Furor had brought back to him.


    Locke, the goblin who had just advanced to be a magical mechanic, had chosen to join White Tower and be a contracted adept there. It was a tremendous blow for Snox!


    Snox promptly started pacing around his room restlessly when he heard Furor¡¯s report, loudly cursing at that goblin ¡®traitor¡¯ who didn¡¯t know better.


    To think that he, as a goblin, refused to help his brethren and instead ran toward the human¡¯s adept¡¯s tower; what a failure of a goblin!


    Still, regardless of how he cursed and yelled, it did not change the cruel reality.


    The Goblin General Chamber of Commerce, as it currently was, could not attract any adept with power!


    The Chamber of Commerce had set upmunication sites in over thirty cities on the Continent of Adepts, shops in over a hundred cities, and had one hundred and twenty-seven goblin merchant groups of various sizes.


    A rough calction would reveal that Snox had over ten thousand armed units on hand, along with six hundred magical machines.


    Yet, the number of adepts and apprentices that he possessed numbered no more than thirty individuals. Ny percent of these were adept apprentices. Only two of them were actual adepts, and both of these adepts were beginner First Grade wandering adepts.


    The Goblin General Chamber of Commerce was indeed a subordinate force of the Crimson n and could request official adept protection from headquarters in times of crisis. Still, this was not their own power in the end. Moreover, help from headquarters might not always save them in emergencies. Most of the time, goblin engineers sent to investigate and look for mines in the depths of the ck Forest had to rely on the protection of the clumsy and slow magical machines.


    It inflicted massive casualties on the talents of the Chamber of Commerce.


    However, despite how harsh the environment seemed to be and how dangerous the situation was, Snox never gave up on his resolution to expand his influence andwork.


    He traveled all across thend, making contact with the local authorities and tempting them with bribes, all in an attempt to obtain a monopoly over a product or the rights to trade special goods.


    Naturally, what Snox had to offer were those exotic ves of war.


    Though most of the Faen elves had fallen into the hands of the n adepts, Greem managed to use his channels to obtain some inferior products. With them as his invitation to the door, Snox sessfullypleted his negotiations in five Northern Witch cities.


    However, Snox ran into an iron wall in Dian City, where trade arrangements were most important.


    That damned Third Grade casten of the Death Witches hadn¡¯t agreed to his request, even after epting three Second Grade dragonborn, two Faen male elves, and a hundred strong ogre ves.


    In the end, Snox used other means to gain more insight into the issue. He found out that this Third Grade Death Witch was friendly with the Coldwinter Witches. No wonder she was dragging out the negotiations and refused to give the Chamber of Commerce a permit to trade!


    If it weren¡¯t for the Fate Witches standing behind the Chamber of Commerce, this witch would probably have sent troops to round them up.


    Snox was already unbearably furious when Furor brought back the bad news. No wonder Snox started cursing out loud! His anger couldn¡¯t be contained any longer.


    The Goblin Chamber of Commerce wasn¡¯t a single entity on its own. Instead, it was only thebination of four to five goblin forces. There was the ckwater Tycoons who specialized in the ve trade, the Risk Investment Company that specialized in mining and logging, as well as the Musen Merchant Group that enjoyed trading firearms...


    The reason Snox could unite these goblin tycoons beneath him was due to his great personal rtionships with the various adepts of the Crimson n. However, if he were to make any significant mistakes in an important business decision, the tycoons and business leaders beneath him wouldn¡¯t wait to rece him.


    That was what made Snox most concerned and frustrated!


    The reason he was in such a hurry to obtain a powerful adept force of his own was to keep these ambitious and eager wolves in line. Unfortunately, he had failed on the very first step he tried to take!


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    Alchemyb.


    The sizzling sound of solder rang out as sparks flew across the air. A magical machine exoskeleton made for assistance inbat was starting to take shape.


    It looked like massive metal armor gleaming with a cold blue light due to the magical alloy it was made of. A long row of venttion ports could be seen in the back of the armor, letting out white steam.


    Giant interconnected gears could be seen on every joint of the machine.


    These gears would spin wildly every time the armor took a step. The forcefield generators ced all over the machine could also form forcefield of their own. When paired together, they could erect a dome-shaped defensive forcefield that covered the entire construct.


    The weapons on the armor included both the rapid-fire energy rifles and the area-of-effect magic energy cannons. A mysterious three-dimensional array filled the chest cavity of the armor, and a crystalline elementium golem core was embedded in the node of the array.


    A magical machine like this had always relied on magic energy batteries for mobility in the past.


    Without a small magic energy generator, such magical machines had to retreat frombat every half hour to swap out their batteries. That was not a problem in small-scale skirmishes, but it became a severe limiting factor in intense wars.


    Greem was now trying tobine elementium golems with magical machines. It would allow elementium golems to possess a full metal shell to protect their frail cores while allowing magical machines to possess a perpetually beating heart of elementium.


    This theoretical idea was entirely feasible after a few preliminary experiments.


    However, the high-grade elementium magical machines that Greem personally made only used materials and resources of the highest-grade. Consequently, the cost of each unit was speechlessly high. If Greem wanted to mass-produce these machines, he would have to further optimize and perfect the three techniques of high-magic alloy, energy effect, and magical spirit.


    Greem personally manipted a Scalding Ray beam to solder together thest coreponent of the elementium magical machine. He mmed shut the metal door beneath its chest and took a few steps backward. After confirming with the Chip that there were no problems, he gave the order to activate the elementium magical machine.


    [Beep. Order to activate elementium magical machine has been given.


    [System self-inspecting.


    [Defensive forcefields all normal.


    [Elementium furnace has begun operation. All operations green. Output efficiency normal.


    [Magic energy cirction system supplying energy to all other parts. Feedback results excellent.


    [Mobility armor assistance system online. Signal is good. Beginning function tests.]


    As theplex and refined magic energy systems started their operation, the two-meter-tall elementium magical machine slowly started moving and stood up from the ground.


    It was almost as if a massive fireball had been stuffed into its thick chest; red mes and searing waves of heat surged outward. Extremely pure fire energy flowed out of the golem core, slowly lighting up the entirety of the machine¡¯s body.


    The magical alloy that gleamed with a cold blue light started to turn red and boiling hot from the surging fire energy, much like a me giant that had been fished out of a volcanic sea.


    Ka, ka!


    The elementium magical machine strode forward with heavy steps under the control of the Chip. It raised the two magic energy rifles on its arms and started firing as it advanced.


    The red beams crossed a hundred meters of distance and shot into the stone walls of the tower, leaving ten-centimeter deep craters in the stone. It was important to note that even the inner walls of the tower were protected with magic energy. Ordinary attacks had to first break through the magical defenses to damage the walls.


    The elementium magical machine¡¯s energy rifles would be enough to pierce the armor of human soldiers if it could leave a ten-centimeter crater in the wall of the alchemyb.


    The Chip performed some calctions and revealed that these high-energy rifles had as much as two hundred and sixty points of power with the power supplied by the golem core. It was already as powerful as the all-out attack of a Second Grade adept!


    After finishing his tests with the rifle, Greem ordered the magical machine to test the magic energy cannon on its back. The machine squatted down, and the barrel slid to its shoulders and locked in ce. Three secondster, a blinding red fireball shot out of the cannon, thoroughly scorching the wall of theb.


    Four hundred and twenty-points!


    Greem finally broke out into a smile when he saw the energy intensity that the Chip was disying.


    As expected of the first elementium magical machine he had spent three hundred and fifty thousand magical crystals to create. Its basic attack power was first-rate even amongst Second Grade adepts. In fact, it could even threaten Third Grade adepts under certain circumstances!

 Chapter 867 - Silent Swamp

    Chapter 867 Silent Swamp


    The war going on between the Fate Witches and the Coldwinter Witches was both strange and ridiculous.


    The difference in power between both parties was so massive, yet their performance inbat was the extreme opposite.


    The apprentices and witches of the Fate branch didn¡¯t seem to care about their territories and resource sites being attacked. They would immediately retreat if they found themselves on the losing end. If the Coldwinter Witches insisted on pursuing them, they would even leave behind their elementium golems to buy them the opportunity to flee the battlefield.


    However, whenever the Fate Witches gained the advantage, the entire group of witches and apprentices would form a suicide squad. They would use cheap elementium golems and have them charge the frontlines, where it was the most dangerous. Meanwhile, they would hide somewhere safe behind or use instant-cast magic wands and magic scrolls to attack their enemies.


    Consequently, the Fate Witches kept their casualties at the absolute minimum in most battlefields!


    The Coldwinter Witches did a count and discovered that their losses were at a shocking 11:1 ratiopared to the Fate Witches.


    Even Morgana, who typically remained in Icesnow Valley, could no longer keep herposure after reading those heartbreaking casualty reports. Just two months after the war had begun, Morgana charged out of Icesnow Valley with a group of Frost Guardians.


    Strangely enough, the entire tide of the battle turned the moment the Third Grade witch appeared on the battlefield.


    All the Fate Witches and apprentices retreated to the Fate Tower in Dragonblight as per their orders. The ones who were left fighting with the Coldwinter Witches were all Second Grades of the Crimson n.


    The Coldwinter Witches thought of all sorts of ways to hunt down these powerful Second Grades, but their efforts were fruitless.


    They might have injured the Second Grade dragonborn and forced the Goblin Shredder to retreat, but one of their own Second Grades had also been forcefully abducted by Mary and her forces.


    If one were to count all of their casualties, the Coldwinter Witches had practically lost every significant military force that they owned!


    It seemed Morgana couldn¡¯t ept this reality. She personally joined the battlefield in her frustration and intended to teach the enemy a vicious lesson.


    Unfortuantely, Zacha, Tigule, and Mary worked together often and never confronted Morgana head-on. The Crimson n wouldn¡¯t fight when she joined the battle, choosing only to scatter and retreat.


    However, if they ever discovered a Second Grade of the Coldwinter Witches isted, Mary would lead a group of Second Grade vampires and go on the assault.


    The Coldwinter Witches¡¯ frost magic was powerful in both offense and defense. However, even they had tremendous difficulty fighting off the attacks of multiple vampires. That wasn¡¯t even mentioning that amongst these vampires hid Mary, the Bloody Queen who was almost at peak Second Grade.


    Mary¡¯s attacks were slightly weak. Her ws, enhanced with blood energy, only had one hundred and eighty points of power. Still, there was no denying that Mary¡¯s attacks were as fast as lightning.


    Trading damage for speed!


    At a rate of three attacks per second, Mary¡¯s Bloodshade strikes were terrifying when stacked together.


    After integrating the otherworldly runes, Mary¡¯s ordinary attacks contained both the corrosion of blood energy and the defense-bypassing ability of shadow damage.


    These two magical traits were not lethal, but they were exceedingly troublesome to deal with. Even if the Coldwinter Witches wrapped themselves in a thick shell of ice, they could not stop these two magical effects from seeping through.


    Apart from Third Grade Witch Leader Morgana, the other Coldwinter Witches couldn¡¯t do anything about Mary. They couldn¡¯t fight her if they wanted to, nor could they escape. It didn¡¯t matter how much they cried or wailed; they couldn¡¯t escape the ceaseless assault of the vampire flock.


    ............


    Silent Swamp.


    As rarely seen geography in the vast ins on the outskirts of Dragonblight, Silent Swamp could be considered a reasonably dangerous hazard zone.


    Puddles and pools of mud could be seen everywhere, cloaked in a heavy, humid fog. Many ces appeared to be grassy fields, but anyone that stepped in these ces would immediately fall into the swamp, filled with silt and murky water.


    Many aquatic magical creatures lurked in the corners of the swamp. They would silently stalk any outsiders that entered the swamp, following them while submerged under the silt. Once the outsider was trapped in the mud of the swamp, they would lunge forward like savage beasts, ripping off warm flesh from their enemy¡¯s body with their sharp ws. It would be a feast for them.


    Almost no traveling merchants dared to pass by Silent Swamp due to the sinister and dangerous nature of the ce.


    However, a group of witches that descended from the skies shattered the silence here today.


    Morgana jumped off of a three-meter tall snow eagle. She stepped on the squishy dirt and couldn¡¯t help but frown when she smelled the gag-inducing pungence of the swap.


    ¡°Are you sure they are in here?¡±


    Morgana asked the person beside her, Deputy Leader Cerro.


    Cerro was a Second Grade witch with a handsome face and a beautiful figure. However, her expression was so cold that it made her look inhuman as if she was a snow woman brought to life.


    When she heard the question, Cerro cast a spell before solemnly nodding and said, ¡°They are still here. Zivelina made sure to coat her with ayer of Coldwinter Chill when she got hit. The opponent won¡¯t be able to neutralize that frost aura so easily.¡±


    Morgana also closed her eyes to sense for the aura.


    As expected, a familiar frost aura led straight into the depths of the swamp. It was slowly dispersing.


    ¡°Then hurry up and move! Don¡¯t let that bitch Mary slip out of our hands again. Cerro, you lead some people and surround her from this end. Find her. I will go and cut off her escape path from the other end. We must capture this damned Bloody Queen today!¡±


    Morgana stepped forward, and her entire body instantly froze into a giant ice sculpture.


    The next second, the sculpture shattered, leaving behind a ground full of ice shards with Morgana nowhere to be seen.


    ¡°You all heard the leader¡¯s words?¡± Cerro ordered with a cold expression, ¡°Form pairs and spread out. Find that Mary. Let¡¯s see if the vampires still dare to show themselves with our leader here. Let¡¯s go!¡±


    The Coldwinter Witches mobilized a total of eight witches for this massive operation. Apart from Third Grade Morgana and Second Grade Cerro, the other six Coldwinter Witches were all Second Grades as well.


    The witches bowed and acknowledged their orders. They then used their own spells and quickly rushed into the Silent Swap.


    On a small ind in the depths of the swamp.


    The surroundings were all silt and water that would cause one to sink if stepped upon. The hundred-meter-square ind was the only ce with solid dirt.


    Mary was currently on this ind.


    She stood at the edge of the ind, standing tall and proud as she looked into the distance.


    The fog here was heavy, and vision was severely limited.


    Moreover, silt, mud, water, bushes, thorns, and sinister ghost trees were everywhere; there were far too many ces to hide. The Silent Swap itself also seemed to have its own mysteries. Even spiritual senses couldn¡¯t pierce that veil-like fog.


    As such, finding a hidden individual was nearly impossible if they were thirty meters away!


    ¡°Hmph! You won¡¯t be able to escape!¡± Apletely bound and bloody witchy at Mary¡¯s feet. She spoke resentfully, ¡°With the Coldwinter Chill on your body, our people will be able to smell you even from five kilometers away. You won¡¯t be able to escape to Dragonblight this time.¡±


    ¡°Escape? Why would I escape?¡± Mary¡¯s expression remained unmoving, a faint smile on her face.


    ¡°Our leader has already caught up. Do you think you can fight off a Third Grade witch?¡±


    ¡°Hehe, you are right, indeed. Morgana hase. However, she has already wrapped around to the back of the Silent Swamp to cut me off. There are no longer any Third Grade witches on the battlefield in front of me!¡±


    ¡°You...what are you nning?¡± Zivelina saw Mary show no signs of panic despite being pursued. Moreover, Mary appeared to have a perfect grasp of everything happening outside the swamp.


    Zivelina couldn¡¯t help feel a trace of unease creep up her heart.


    Could it be?


    Unfortunately, before she could gather her thoughts, Mary lifted the tip of her foot and kicked the witch into the swamp in front of them.


    ¡°Bastard...you...¡±


    Zivelina only managed to curse a single time before sinking into the swamp water, leaving a couple of bubbles behind. Several clear traces of movement under the water could be seen iling toward the spot where she had sunk.


    It was just a couple of adept-level magical creatures. They couldn¡¯t really kill a Second Grade witch, even if she was injured and restrained. That said, a little bit of pain was unavoidable!


    Having done all this, Mary leaped forward without any hesitation. She beat her wings and turned into a crimson sh as she surged toward the direction the witch hade from.


    A blue spot of frostbite on the right of her waist vanished at a visible rate under the assault of her ferocious blood energy.


    Somewhere in the Silent Swamp.


    Ryp hovered gently ten meters above the swamp, slowly flying forward while assessing everything below.


    The swamp wasn¡¯t a static body of water. Instead, it slowly flowed in a particr direction. It was just theyer of soft grass on top of the swamp that gave the wrong impression that it was unmoving.


    There were also clearly quite a lot of wild magical creatures in the mud.


    Be it sludges, drowned zombies, or ghost nannies....


    None of these creatures could escape Ryl¡¯s spiritual senses.


    Mary had always been known for her cruelty and cunning ns. The Coldwinter Witches were never her opponents in a duel. However, at this moment, Ryl was apanied by herpanions on each side. Both of them were two hundred and fifty kilometers away from her. It made her feel a bit more rxed.


    It didn¡¯t matter how savage Mary was; she could alwaysst for three to five seconds, right?!


    As long as Ryl could stall for three to five seconds, herpanions would be able to reach her, and that so-called Bloody Queen would have a slim chance at escaping. This way, they would be able to capture a significant enemy without alerting the leader. It would be a considerable contribution to the n.


    The rewards would have to be satisfactory when she returned!


    The Coldwinter Witches searched in a loose formation, all for the sake of luring out the enemy as soon as possible.


    While Ryl was slowly searching, she suddenly sensed the aura of the Coldwinter Chill from somewhere in front of her. Moreover, that individual with the aura was charging toward her with the speed of an arrow.


    Dammit, it¡¯s Mary!


    Ryl immediately narrowed her eyes.

 Chapter 868 - One More

    Chapter 868 One More


    The battle immediately broke out!


    The mist thirty meters in front of her parted as a crimson silhouette shot toward Witch Ryl like a sh of lightning.


    The instant-cast Frost Shield stopped the opponent¡¯s bloody hand just in time.


    While the opponent¡¯s form was coated in ayer of frost and her movements were temporarily slowed down, Witch Ryl waved the instant-cast magic wand in her hand. A storm of sharp ice des and a vortex of cold wind blew the opponent into the air.


    Small cuts instantly appeared all over the enemy¡¯s slender body, but the chill froze these wounds before the blood could spill out. Not much blood could be seen despite the numerous injuries.


    Something wasn¡¯t right; Mary couldn¡¯t be this weak, could she?


    Witch Ryl quickly understood that something was off and frowned. She instantly focused and tried to send news of this to herpanions, who were rushing to her aid. Yet, at this moment, the crimson silhouette forcefully broke free of the snow that imprisoned her and once again lunged at Ryl.


    Dammit! That was the enemy¡¯s n!


    Though she understood what was happening, Ryl had no spare energy to warn herpanions when dealing with an opponent of the same grade. The two beautiful forms, one red and one white, shed together, turning the swamp into an absolute mess.


    The witches near Ryl¡¯s side sent alerts to theirpanions after receiving her warning. They then quickly approached her position. Witch Cerro was also a peak Second Grade. She took the lead and charged to the forefront.


    In doing so, they indirectly left the two witches who were at the edge of the search formation in the very rear.


    La was one such unfortunate witch!


    She was at the rightmost of the fan-shaped search formation. By the time the alert reached her, the twopanions to her left were already making their way toward the battlefield. When she finally received the alert and stopped to change directions, there was already a kilometer between herself and her partners.


    A single kilometer was usually nothing to adepts. At full speed, La would only need thirty to forty seconds to catch up to herpanions.


    However, in the eyes of someone with wicked intentions, this one kilometer was the distance between life and death!


    Just as La turned to hurry to the battlefield, five crimson silhouettes descended on the swamp she was at.


    Two of them had emerged from the mud, one hade from the ghost tree nearby, and two had just dove down from the clouds above.


    In the blink of an eye, they had surrounded the isted La.


    The ones who had no aversion to filth and were willing to hide in the mud were Soros and Windsor, the two blood nights. They blew away the dirt on their bodies upon showing themselves andunched two immensely powerful crimson sword sts at the Coldwinter Witch from thirty meters away.


    Meanwhile, the three blood elves lunged toward La and sealed off the space she had to retreat or dodge.


    Dammit!


    La didn¡¯t even have time to curse these vampires for their insidiousness. She quickly threw up a Frost Shield and started casting chilling winds to freeze the blood elves on the spot.


    These blood elves were the same grade as her and, thus, had shockingly high magic resistance. La¡¯s ice magic could barely keep them frozen for half a second. However, this half a second was enough for her to weave between her enemy¡¯s strikes and avoid the barrage of attacksing at her.


    However, she was dealing with five Second Grade vampires!


    Individually, none of them was her opponent. However, when all five of them lunged at her with no regard for their own life, it was a whole different story.


    That put La in an extremelypromised situation.


    Dammit, it had already been ten seconds! Were herpanions all deaf and blind? Couldn¡¯t they see the battle that had erupted here?


    Witch La fought on with all she had while constantly looking in the direction where herpanions were.


    Herpanions weren¡¯t idiots either. They immediately understood the enemy¡¯s n when they sensed the eruption of energy from behind them. However, when they turned and prepared to reinforce their ally, Mary beat her crimson wings and showed up in front of them like a sh of crimson lightning. She stopped both of the Coldwinter Witches all by herself.


    The two Coldwinter Witches were powerful, but they were dreaming if they believed they could take down this viciously fast Bloody Queen in just one or two minutes.


    They battled for seventy seconds before Mary shrieked and fled the battlefield before the other witches arrived. She had to endure the attacks of the two other witches as she vanished into the depths of the swamp.


    The two Coldwinter Witches were stunned for a second before realizing that both battlefields to their left and right had fallen utterly silent. It seemed all the battles had concluded.


    Just as they were hesitating and deciding which direction to go in, Deputy Leader Cerro arrived with the other three witches. They held a bloodied blood elf in their hands, frozen in a block of ice.


    That was lucky. They had finally caught one of the enemies.


    Just as this thought appeared in their minds, the witches immediately thought of La, who they had left behind. Their faces turned pale once again.


    One for one?


    Were they trading a blood elf for one of their witches?


    This trade seemed to be bnced on the surface, but the Coldwinter Witches couldn¡¯t help but frown now that it had happened.


    These blood elves were all monsters forcibly created with sinister magic. They could not be considered formal Second Grades and were not truly powerful. Meanwhile, a Coldwinter Witch of theirs was cultivated slowly over the years, costing vast amounts of resources.


    The two weren¡¯t even on the same level; they couldn¡¯t even bepared.


    The Coldwinter Witches were definitely the ones to lose out from a trade like this.


    ¡°Kill her?¡± A witch with a cold and severe expression asked with a sharp tone.


    Cerro shook her head silently.


    ¡°We can¡¯t!¡± One of the other witches exined dejectedly, ¡°Kill her, and they have an excuse to kill our sisters. Don¡¯t forget, two of ourpanions have already fallen into their hands.¡±


    Deputy Leader Cerro narrowed her eyes and looked at this strange ce. She spoke coldly, ¡°I have been to this Silent Swamp. There was none of this sinister and wicked fog. It seems this was a battlefield they had set up ahead of time. We are the careless ones. We stepped into their arena far too simply.¡±


    ¡°Then...are we still searching for them?¡±


    ¡°Search!¡± Deputy Leader Cerro ordered, ¡°I have already informed the leader. She is now moving toward us from the outside. If those vampires still want to go for round two. Hmph! I will make sure they all stay!¡±


    The Coldwinter Witches nodded and once again split off, slowlybing the area for vampires.


    However, this time, they shortened the distance between each of them to a mere two hundred meters.


    What the Coldwinter Witches didn¡¯t know was the fact that ten eyeball machines were slowly gliding in the skies above the fog of Silent Swamp.


    A Disruption Array had already been set up in the depths of the swamp. It disrupted everyone¡¯s Spirit and caused them to be inurate. However, the Crimson adepts had prepared ahead of time and had set up special surveince crystals all over the swamp. They then used a peer-to-peer system to send the information they gained to the eyeball machines above the swamp, where a real-time map of all movements was distributed to the vampires inbat.


    Through this method, a blood elf could be used as bait to lure the witches into breaking their formation. Mary could then personally intercept and cut off all possible reinforcements from the isted witch. That was how they had managed to capture a Coldwinter Witch at the cost of a blood elf.


    Thus, Mary¡¯s prisoners had gone from one to two.


    However, just as Mary and the other vampires were gathering together to discuss a new assault, the eyeball machines transmitted disturbing news.


    A tremendous snowstorm was rushing toward them from the back of the swamp. Everything that the storm swept across was frozen in ice. Even the surveince crystals they had set up ahead of time had lost their connection.


    It was clear that Morgana had lost her patience and was bulldozing her way into the battle!


    ¡°You guys bring the prisoners back first. I want to have a bout with this Morgana!¡±


    Mary was not willing to lick a bloody knife and lose everything she had won in a fight against a nearly berserk Third Grade witch. Thus, with her orders, the vampires scooped out the battered Zivelina from the swamp, transformed into massive blood bats, wrapped around the destructive snowstorm, and secretly snuck back to Dragonblight with both wounded witches in tow.


    They were basically in Fate Witch territory once they entered Dragonblight; all the magical creatures there were under the control of the Tower of Fate. If the Coldwinter Witches dared to trespass, the road to the tower would not be a peaceful one!


    However, Mary did not leave. Instead, she carefully and slowly started to organize the items and equipment on her. She made use of these actions to calm herself down and rx.


    There was no excitement about having to battle a Third Grade witch soon, nor was there any anxiety. Mary¡¯s heart was calm and collected, much like that still, silent vampire heart of hers.


    Vampires had no heartbeat!


    It was precisely theirck of ability to create blood that the vampires were forced to drain others of their blood to make up for it.


    Their hearts might no longer move and had lost their original functions, but they were still the most important organ for vampires. That was because most of their soul consciousness was stored in their heart. That was the actual medium and host of their soul.


    Greem could fight against a Third Grade adept as a Second Grade. Why couldn¡¯t she?


    Mary slowly elerated as this unyielding pride burned within her, flying straight toward the snowstorm.

 Chapter 869 - Marys Path

    Chapter 869 Mary¡¯s Path


    Mary dashed through the swamp at an unprecedented speed.


    Numerous swamps and withered ghost trees appeared in her vision before vanishing behind her. The scenery started to blur. All objects turned into splotches of color that mixed together, making it ever harder to distinguish between them.


    Mary could now fly across the sky even without the help of the bat wings on her back.


    A long crimson afterimage dragged behind Mary as she made her way across the swamp. The tips of her feet lightly touched the grass floating on the marsh. That slight bit of force was enough for her to walk across it.


    A swirling snowstorm was ravaging the Silent Swamp in the distance. Where the snowstorm passed, mud and swamps were froze while thorns and bushes were sealed in ice. Even the ferocious magical creatures that hid a dozen meters beneath the mud were turned into ice sculptures by an extreme chill, quickly losing all of their life force.


    The snowstorm was advancing at a very high speed.


    The silhouette of a slender, tall woman could be seen hovering at the edge of the wild storm. The terrifying snowstorm was like a beautiful veil cast upon her lithe body, covering the world in white and blue as she walked forward.


    There were still two hundred meters of distance between them, but Mary already felt her body swaying in the wind. It was if she were about to be whisked away by the fierce winds. The destructive snowstorm in the distance was rushing straight at her.


    ¡°Good, very good. I¡¯ve remembered your name. Mary; I hope you won¡¯t regret what you are doing now! Now die!¡± The hateful and chilling voice of Morgana came from within the storm.


    Immediately after, a few dozen white snowballs shot out of the storm. They flew forward rapidly while shooting out frost arrows in every direction around them.


    A rain of frost arrows instantly engulfed Mary¡¯s body.


    She instantly raised her Spirit to its limits.


    The world in front of her started to magnify and slow down.


    The frost arrows shooting toward Mary filled every corner of her vision. Some of them were flying straight at her, some of them were curving around, some of them were spinning wildly, and others were rotating in the wind. They ran into each other, knocking into each other, and caused the trajectory of the already chaotic rain of arrows to be even more unpredictable.


    Ordinary adepts could probably only erect a shield to defend against a rain of arrows like this.


    However, Mary¡¯s mind was thoroughly immersed in the battle. She had already forgotten fear and death. Her form turned into a sh of crimson lightning as she casually strolled through the dense storm of arrows.


    Indeed, when she raised her Spirit and speed to their limits, these two attributes couldbine and give rise to this mysterious scene, almost as if she were living in a world of slow motion.


    The snowstorm was raging in the distance, the swamp creatures were quickly freezing over around them, and the wild rain of arrows was all around her. All these things were like images moving one page at a time in Mary¡¯s eyes. She could see every detail and everything that was happening.


    Power. What was power?


    This ferocious storm started by Third Grade Morgana had to be considered an extreme manifestation of ice, right? However, in the eyes of truly strong individuals, the power of this storm was far too dispersed. It failed to properly concentrate the power of frost at a single point and inflict maximum damage upon the enemy.


    Mary even had the confidence to brave through the Third Grade Frozen Orb that Morgana had cast while only sustaining some wounds. That was probably the most significant and unavoidable w of all elementium magic!


    Mary was like a powerful queen strolling through a world that had been put on pause, casually walking past one arrow after another. When she reached ces that were far too dense with arrows, she would extend a slender finger. Crimson energy coiled around that finger as she brushed against the bolts. The arrows¡¯ sharp point would shift by several degrees, missing their target.


    From Mary¡¯s perspective, these were only pages of still images. However, in Morgana¡¯s eyes, it was mysterious and unsettling!


    Countless frost arrows had covered the entire space, so tightly packed together that there was no empty space to be found.


    Yet, that damned Mary was like an elegant noble casually roaming through her own garden; not a trace of horror or fear could be gleaned from herposed appearance. Even worse was the fact that it looked like she had been possessed by the champion of fate herself, absolutely unharmed as she walked through a storm of arrows.


    Strangely enough, when the arrows reached Mary, it was almost as if they were peasants that had just met their monarch. All the arrows naturally avoided her and shot past her. All the frost arrows shot across the sky, and every single one of them brushed past Mary¡¯s hair, ears, neck, body. All of them just barely missed their mark.


    Mary was utterly unharmed after that barrage of Frozen Orbs. Apart from her face being a bit flushed, she was unfazed.


    Morgana was horrified!


    Mary was panting intensely.


    She had only maintained that wondrous state for five seconds and she had perfectly avoided an extremely lethal Third Grade spell. If she could keep herself in that fantastic state for extended periods, wouldn¡¯t she be able to defeat all her opponents easily?


    That said, though it had only been five seconds, those five seconds had exhausted nearly all of her Spirit. If it weren¡¯t for the robust Physique of a Second Grade vampire, she would probably have copsed already.


    Dammit, that instantaneous burst of power took up so much energy.


    Mary cursed as she quickly retreated. As she escaped from the Third Grade witch, she took out a crimson blood crystal and threw it into her mouth.


    The blood crystal made of concentrated Second Grade dragon blood quickly turned into active blood energy within her body, allowing her exhausted Spirit to be rejuvenated.


    Morgana had been stunned by Mary¡¯s performance. She only just now realized Mary¡¯s strange condition and instantly understood that Mary must have activated some sort of secret technique to stimte herself to make it through her spell unharmed.


    However, this technique seemed to have a shocking drawback; it had drained her of her Spirit in just a few seconds. If that was the case, then she was no big deal!


    Morgana was no longer surprised by Mary¡¯s performance once she understood this. She waved both her hands as arge cloud of frost and ice started to move toward Mary.


    With Morgana¡¯s mastery over ice magic, Mary would probably be turned into an ice sculpture the instant the frost aura engulfed her. When that happened, she would be at the mercy of the Third Grade witch!


    Mary quickly retreated, and the cloud of frost pursued closely behind. The forefront of the tide of frost was no more than half a meter away from Mary¡¯s wings.


    Mary had no choice left to her; she raised her head and let out a shriek, and a violent surge of blood energy instantly spread out around her. The speed of her flight instantly increased by fifty percent from the boost of this blood energy. She slowly started to pull away from the tide of frost behind her.


    Morgana might excel at ice magic, but she wasn¡¯t as specialized in flight.


    This burst of power from Mary allowed her to put some distance between the two of them. Soon, Mary had disappeared into the depths of the mist like an arrow shot from a bow.


    Morgana pursued another kilometer before reluctantly stopping.


    The snowstorm roared and raged around her, turning the surroundings into a world of ice and snow.


    Unfortunately, regardless of how furious she was, there was no changing the fact that the enemy had escaped!


    That damned Second Grade vampire. Herbat power was no match for her, but that terrifying speed alone left Morgana incapable of doing anything.


    So what if her magic powers were tremendously powerful?


    Everything was for naught if she couldn¡¯t catch up!


    For the first time, Morgana started to slightly regret never putting in a bit more work into her speed in the past.


    This short ¡®contact¡¯ in the depths of the Silent Swamp was not known by anyone else.


    Mary might have exhausted her Spirit, and her body might have been slightly injured from the explosion of blood energy, but her heart was boiling with excitement. It was so much so that she couldn¡¯t keep herselfposed.


    That was because she had clearly seen her future path of development during the battle earlier.


    This style ofbat was what suited her the most. It was also immensely powerful!


    Mary did not dy at all. Her body turned into a crimson sh as she flew fifty kilometers and returned to the Tower of Fate.


    At this moment, Mary was suddenly extremely confident in her advancement to Third Grade!


    ............


    The Tower of Fate.


    Alice stood on the astrology tform alone, silently looking into the distance.


    Of course, she couldn¡¯t possibly see everything that was happening in the Silent Swamp from this distance, but everything that had just unfolded was disyed in a massive mirror wall in front of her.


    The vast and brilliant star power slowly faded, and Alice¡¯s lonely figured appeared frail and weak. Elementium Fairy Helen circled around her furiously, raising her voice as she questioned Alice.


    ¡°Why did you help her...why did you help her? That person is yourpetitor! Why would you exhaust your own power to help her? If it were me, I would curse her to lose control of her power and die at the hands of that Third Grade witch.¡±


    Alice had just made it through her lethargy. She put on a pale smile when she saw Helen¡¯s furious appearance.


    ¡°You little brat, where did you learn all these bad things? You¡¯re still young. You don¡¯t understand the meaning of apanion! If we started scheming and plotting against each other, then this newly formed organization would soon begin to falling apart. The more powerful our allies, the better they can protect us. Isn¡¯t that...good?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! I can¡¯t convince you either way. Still, I don¡¯t think you should have helped that Mary girl. She...she¡¯s always wrapped around that guy!¡± Helen¡¯s voice got smaller and smaller.


    ¡°That¡¯s my business, isn¡¯t it?¡± Alice chuckled weakly, ¡°Alright, no more bantering. Bring me back to rest, please!¡±


    As the master and the fairy slowly left the room, the astrology tform once again turned dark and silent!

 Chapter 870 - Combat Power Comparison

    Chapter 870 Combat Power Comparison


    How was a Third Grade more powerful than a Second Grade?


    If one were to analyze in simple and broader terms, it would be tremendous power, better Physique, higher speed, and frightening Spirit!


    However, no adept would possibly increase their attributes in such a roundabout manner. There were always trade-offs and prioritization. As such, the elementium adepts prioritized Spirit, while giving some attention to Physique and altogether abandoning Strength and Agility. Meanwhile, body-refining adepts were split into three different categories. Some emphasized Strength, others Physique, and others, much like Mary, focused on Agility.


    On the other hand, the specialization of bloodline adepts depended on what bloodline they had inherited.


    If they inherited the bloodline of a Giant Raging Ape, their Physique and Strength would be enhanced immensely, while also making sure Agility didn¡¯tg behind. Spirit would be their only weak point. If they inherited the bloodline of a fire dragon, all of their attributes would be enhanced to a considerable extent. In particr, their fire magic would be uncontested.


    However, such analysis was only a summary of the statistics of the adept and wasn¡¯t sufficientlyprehensive!


    One couldn¡¯t forget that, as Third Grade adepts, these individuals had easily lived for several hundred more yearspared to an average Second Grade adept. During these hundreds of years, they could use all the techniques and methods avable to them to improve their base power and uncover more of theirtent potential to walk even further on the path of magic.


    That was why Morgana, as a Third Grade Coldwinter Witch, had not only extremely high Spirit, but also very decent numbers for the rest of her attributes.


    Morgana. Advanced Third Grade.


    Profession: Elementium Adept (Ice Specialization)


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 24 | Physique 21 | Agility 16 | Spirit 37.


    Profession Skills: Icecold Bloodline...


    Even though Morgana was a Third Grade elementium witch, both her Physique and Strength had exceeded twenty points. That also meant she had a sturdy body no weaker than that of a Second Grade body-refining adept.


    This way, be it in terms of endurance or regenerative powers, she was at the same level as a Second Grade body-refining adept.


    Perhaps the only difference between her and a Second Grade body-refining adept would be their reflexes and close-quartersbat skills. She might not be able to win against a Second Grade body-refining adept in close-quartersbat without her spells, but her superior physical and elementium resistance was already at their level.


    If she were to empower herself with some Third Grade spells, she could pick up a massive mallet and fight a Second Grade body-refining adept on even ground for hundreds of rounds.


    Sixteen points of Agility also meant that Morgana¡¯s running speed was about the same as Mary when she was at First Grade.


    It might still be too slow against Mary, whose Agility was now at twenty-nine points, but it was more than enough in most battles.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for the speed bonus to her cast time from raising her Agility above fifteen points, Morgana would probably not have bothered investing her time into this attribute that had little to no effect on herbat prowess!


    Meanwhile, Spirit was rted to many things, including spell power, magic effect duration, magical effect trigger chance, and a series of other attributes.


    With Morgana¡¯s thirty-seven points of Spirit, any simple ice arrow from her hand, even without the enhancement of magical equipment, could reach three-hundred and seventy points of power. On the other hand, the Second Grade Ice Shield of a Second Grade elementium adept could only defend up to three hundred and fifty points.


    Even an adequately defended Second Grade adept was as frail as paper in front of Morgana. Just a few simple instant-cast Third Grade spells would allow her to pierce through their eggshell and turn them into an ice sculpture.


    With the physical and magical resistance of a Third Grade witch and the enhancement of other Third Grade spells, Morgana¡¯s defense could easily reach six to seven hundred points. Even if she did not retaliate against a Second Grade elementium adept, the opponent would not be able to do anything against her.


    However, all this had yet to factor in Morgana¡¯s magical abilities!


    It was important to note that Morgana was a Coldwinter Witch leader who possessed the Icecold Bloodline. All her ice spells were superior to ordinary Coldwinter Witches, be it in terms of power, radius, or effect.


    If she were to activate her Icecold Bloodline, all of her ice spells would have no cooldown.


    When that happened, she alone would be able to turn everything within five kilometers into a world of ice, void of life, in just thirty seconds.


    The power of the Coldwinter Witches was well known even in ancient times!


    Meanwhile, Mary, who had fought with Morgana, was a vampire who was close to peak Second Grade. She walked the path of a bloodline adept.


    Mary. Peak Second Grade.


    Profession: Bloodline Adept (Vampire).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 15 | Physique 17 | Agility 29 | Spirit 18.


    Profession Skills: The Embrace.


    It could be seen from their basic attributes that the distance between Second Grade Mary and Third Grade Morgana was vast. They weren¡¯t even on the same level!


    Of course, part of this had to do with Mary¡¯s own profession abilities.


    As a vampire adept, most of Mary¡¯s profession skills manifested in the Embrace.


    Unlike other adepts, Mary had the ability to create lesser descendants rapidly.


    That was why those vampire descendants had to be taken into ount when estimating her realbat power.


    Currently, Mary had two advanced Second Grade blood knights, three beginner Second Grade blood elves, and an intermediate Second Grade blood dragon that was still in the process of recovering. Apart from these, she also had thirteen First Grade blood elves and nearly a hundred ordinary vampires.


    If she could put all these subordinates to battle, Mary would be one of, if not the most, powerful individual among Second Grade adepts.


    Still, though Mary¡¯s power was immense, she was no more than an insignificant side character. She could be vanquished with the flick of a finger whenpared to Third Grade Coldwinter Witch Leader Morgana.


    However, with Mary¡¯s extraordinary Agility, Morgana would have a hard time catching her without the use of geography or some outside force. After all, the twenty-nine points of Agility had given Mary extreme movement and reaction speed. Unleashed to their limits, most creatures in the world were static before her eyes.


    That said, Mary had a hard time remaining in that intense condition for an extended period with her eighteen points of Spirit.


    Judging from her short encounter with Morganast time, Mary could only maintain that condition for five seconds. Five secondster, she would be forcefully disconnected from this strange, ultra-sensitive state due to her Spirit being exhausted.


    Otherwise, in apletely motionless world, even a mighty witch would not be able to escape death at her hands.


    That short encounter with the Third Grade witch had taught Mary a lot. At the very least, she believed she had found a path of development that was extremely suitable for her. If she could make improvements to this ultra-sensitive state, herbat power would definitely improve exponentially.


    Thus, Mary hid in her room after returning to the Tower of Fate and did not show herself again.


    It seemed that she would not leave until she hadpletely figured out this strange new ability of hers!


    ............


    Silent Swamp.


    The once terrifying magical swamp had now changedpletely.


    Massive storms ravaged the swamp, leaving piles of snow and shivering creatures wherever they went. Everything in the world was frozen into thick ice crystals.


    The ferocious magical creatures gathered throughout the swamp had all turned into shiveringmbs before a berserk Third Grade witch. Every single one of them was turned into an ice sculpture without the chance to retaliate.


    The Silent Swamp now truly lived up to its name. It was an utterly quiet ce with no life to be seen anywhere!


    A destructive storm circled Morgana as she stood alone at the entrance to Dragonblight. She looked at the mysterious tower in the distance, unable to conceal the fury and anger in her heart.


    A bunch of rats and they dared to use schemes and tricks to y around with her. Morgana¡¯s humiliation was iparable.


    This month of defeat and failure was like a p across her face every time she thought of all the insults she had hurled toward Alice during the Witch Council two months ago. Morgana could even imagine the disdainful looks of scorn the witch leaders would give her the next time she appeared at the Witch Council.


    The pride of a Third Grade witch could not be tainted!


    Morgana roared in her heart, and her eyes, filled with thundering fury, mysteriously turned a milky-white, much like the storm raging around her.


    ¡°Leader, you can¡¯t go!¡± Cerro hurriedly led the other witches to Morgana. An expression of concern finally appeared on her cold and expressionless face.


    Yet, when she saw Morgana¡¯s terrifying eyes that had turned pure white from fully unleashing her magical power, Cerro knew that she could not stop what was about to happen.


    Morgana had triggered her Icecold Bloodline now. If she didn¡¯t unleash this fury within her, she might even hurt her own body.


    The Coldwinter Witches looked at each other and had no choice but to step aside and watch as Morgana turned into a massive snowstorm and slowly walked into Dragonblight.


    ¡°Ryl, have the third Frost Guardian squadrone over from Enmis. Ceanas, you return to the n headquarters and bring all the snow beasts over to Dragonblight. Circa, you lead the rest of them and stay by the leader¡¯s side. Also, make sure to keep yourselves safe.¡±


    The other witches quickly went into action with the orders of Deputy Leader Cerro. They got onto their brooms and hurried toward all the locations of their assignments.


    They might possess the ability of temporary flight as Second Grade witches, but using magical flight equipment was still faster and more convenient for long-distance trips.


    Meanwhile, Cerro herself continued to stand where she was. Finally, she let out a sigh and slowly vanished from the spot.

 Chapter 871 - Witch Challenge

    Chapter 871 Witch Challenge


    Morgana slowly walked across Dragonblight, one step at a time.


    Everything within her vision was a tragic and cursednd drowned in overgrown grass. She could asionally see massive dragon bones hidden by the dirt and sand in the distance.


    After tens of millions of years of winds and sand, the bones werepletely white, absent of any other color. The ghostly and vengeful cries of resentful spirits could be heard every time the cold winds blew through the bones.


    Countless strange creatures roamed the barren grasnds, yellow sand, and ck earth. They gathered in packs of two and three, restlessly patrolling thisnd cursed by the dragons. Whenever they saw outsiders enter, they lunged forward in a swarm, using their fearless ferocity and terrifying numbers to leave the gravediggers in thisnd forever.


    It was said that a cursed dragonbone altar was hidden in the depths of Dragonblight, while the materials used to create the altar were the bones and dragon crystal of a high-grade dragon.


    That was why so many gravediggers and treasure hunters continued to rush to this ce despite knowing of its danger. They all dreamed of digging up one or two dragon crystals and living a life of no worries.


    Of course, they came, and they stayed.


    From then on, another group of howling spirits roamed Dragonblight.


    Naturally, as the leader of the Coldwinter Witches, Morgana knew much more about this legendpared to the average person!


    The dragonbone altar did indeed exist.


    However, it didn¡¯t exist in the wastnd, but deep beneath the foundation of the Tower of Fate.


    Do you want to dig out the dragonbone altar? Sure, raze the Tower of Fate first!


    The reason the Tower of Fate could be thend of origin of the Fate branch was very much due to that dragonbone altar. One could reasonably im that the Tower of Fate would not be so mysterious if not for the dragonbone altar.


    Where exactly did the ability to sense fate that all Fate Witches were born withe from? The altar beneath the Tower of Fate.


    As such, rather than the owners of Dragonblight, it was much more urate to call the Fate Witches the guardians of Dragonblight!


    As for why the Fate Witches woulde into possession of such a dragonbone altar? Judging from information stored in the Witch Council, it seemed it had something to do with the Witch Queen of ancient times. However, the specific details were lost to history due to missing records and the passage of time.


    In her fury, Morgana had ignored all the taboos left behind since the ancient times and broken into Dragonblight with destructive anger.


    It seemed they had sensed the intense killing intent, for the vengeful spirits, magical creatures, and monsters of the wastnd charged toward Morgana fearlessly.


    With the fall of the previous Fate branch, the power of these wild beasts had regressed tremendously. However, the order to defend the tower left in their soul brands still existed. That was why the monsters and magical creatures continued to charge courageously at the snowstorm, even if they knew they were not the opponent of this Third Grade witch.


    With their weak First Grade powers, they were turned into all sorts of oddly-shaped ice sculptures by a chilling wind before they coulde within a hundred meters of Morgana. A thousand-meter-wide path of snow was left behind as Morgana strode forward. Crystalline ice sculptures in various poses could be seen along both sides of the trail.


    If you wiped away the snow on the surface of the sculptures and looked through the half-meter-thick ice, you would see the vicious beast within.


    Sadly, they had now lost their lives and turned into new wandering spirits in Dragonblight.


    No beast or magical creature coulde near Morgana during all fifty kilometers of her journey to the Tower of Fate. Naturally, there was nothing to stop her advance.


    However, as the ferocious snowstorm arrived at the Tower of Fate, the one-kilometer-wide natural phenomenon appeared like a small vortex before the massive tower. It no longer seemed as terrifying and mighty before.


    Morgana stood proudly before the Tower of Fate, allowing the wildly spinning storm to break against the gray body of the tower. She shouted furiously with her loudest voice, ¡°Alice,e out here!¡±


    This voice was so loud and fierce that it caused the wastnd around her to shudder. A group of vengeful spirits even flew out of the tower and started circling the walls.


    A strange silhouette formed purely of light silently appeared in front of Morgana. As the light shimmered, the shape took on Alice¡¯s appearance.


    ¡°Lady Morgana, I didn¡¯t think you would personally visit my Tower of Fate. Wee!¡±


    Morgana pushed her hands to either side, and the snowstorm mysteriously split apart, revealing her tall and slender figure.


    ¡°Alice, don¡¯t put on a show for me. How do you intend to end this war?¡± The fire in Morgana¡¯s heart burned brighter when she saw Alice¡¯s calmposure. Naturally, her tone became even more fiery.


    ¡°That would depend on your attitude!¡± Alice was still smiling gently: ¡°The Coldwinter Witches have no actual conflict with us Fate Witches. This battle was purely a battle of pride. As long as you are willing to put this behind you, this war can end at any time!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Easy for you to say. But who is topensate us Coldwinter Witches for all the losses we have suffered over the past month?¡±


    ¡°Lady Morgana, wars between witches have always been like that. You have to bear the losses of losing a war if you want to start a war. I have already tried my best to keep those meaningless killings to a minimum in the battles before this. Otherwise...¡±


    ¡°You mean to say,¡± Morgana narrowed her eyes and it seemed as if a ferocious snowstorm was brewing in her white eyes, ¡°You mean to say that my subordinates can¡¯t beat yours?¡±


    For some reason, this time, the usually gentle Alice refused to back down even slightly.


    ¡°Isn¡¯t that reality, Lady Morgana?¡±


    Morgana¡¯s fury turned even fiercer. Even the snowstorm blowing around her started to be even more ferocious.


    ¡°I will kill you! I will kill you...¡±


    ¡°Lady Morgana, don¡¯t you forget, it is strictly forbidden for us witch branches to kill each other. It is particrly prohibited for battles to happen between the witch leaders. Any witch that breaks the rules will have to be punished severely by the Witch Council! What is it? Do you intend to challenge this rule?¡±


    ¡°I have not forgotten. However, Alice, don¡¯t you forget either, our branches are now at war. Can you refuse if Iunch a branch challenge at you now?¡±


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but narrow her eyes as an indescribable light shone within.


    ¡°I cannot refuse it!¡±


    ¡°Hmph, as long as you understand!¡± Morgana snorted coldly, ¡°As a Third Grade witch, I¡¯m not willing to bully a mere Second Grade witch such as yourself either. So, if you surrender and hand over the imprisoned Coldwinter Witches, I...¡±


    ¡°I ept your challenge!¡±


    ¡°...can look past the transgressions and let you continue...what? What did you say?¡± Morgana was interrupted by Alice before she could finish. She was utterly shocked.


    ¡°I said, I ept your challenge!¡± Alice repeated her words once more, pronouncing every syble with the utmost seriousness.


    ¡°You understand what you are doing?¡± The chill from Morgana¡¯s white eyes pressed forward, and her entire body radiated a murderous aura.


    ¡°I¡¯ve simply epted your branch challenge!¡± Alice once again appeared calm and rxed, ¡°However, you are a Third Grade, and I am a Second Grade. You don¡¯t mind if I bring along a few subordinates, do you?¡±


    ¡°Who do you intend to bring with you?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry; I won¡¯t break any of the rules and bring those Third Grade dragons with me. I will only bring four subordinates, and all of them will be Second Grade. There¡¯s no problem, is there?¡±


    ¡°No...no problem!¡± For some reason, the sudden strike from Alice caught Morganapletely off-guard. She started stuttering, unsure of how she should respond.


    To think a Second Grade witch leader would dare to ept the challenge of a Third Grade witch leader. She couldn¡¯t possibly be her opponent, even if she brought along a few more Second Grade subordinates! Morgana was somewhat confused when facing this bizarre situation.


    She was the one that issued the challenge. Why was it Alice seemed even more eager than she was?


    Was...was there a scheme behind this?


    But Alice already expressed that she wouldn¡¯t bring along any Third Grades. How was she supposed to turn the tables then?


    She couldn¡¯t possibly believe that four or five Seconds Grades would be enough to take down a Third Grade, could she? Moreover, it was a Third Grade witch who was the leader of an entire witch branch!


    Could Alice also possess arge number of elementium golems?


    Greem¡¯s legend of defeating a Third Grade veteran adept as a Second Grade had already spread throughout the Continent of Adepts. Even Morgana, who lived in the Northern Lands, had heard the news.


    However, such a victory required far too many conditions to happen!


    Firstly, the location of the battle had to be a restricted area, such as an arena.


    Without such a restriction, any Third Grade adept would have the ability to retreat from battle at any time the fight turned against them. They would never be tortured to death by such a despicable tactic that relied on pure numbers.


    Secondly, irregrs who possessed as many elementium golems as Greem were extremely rare.


    If it weren¡¯t for the shocking number of Second Grade elementium golems in his possession, and hisplete disregard for the cost of their sacrifice, he would never have forced a veteran Third Grade adept into such an awkward position.


    Of course, the most decisive battlefield advantage was Greem¡¯s ability to hide in the sea of fire.


    If it weren¡¯t for that powerful ability to conceal himself and keep the Third Grade adept from finding his true form, he would never have been able to drag out the battle as long as he did.


    It was all these various factors added together that caused that Third Grade adept to fall victim to Greem¡¯s schemes!


    However, Morgana had chosen this ample space in front of the Tower of Fate as the battlefield. There was no chance of her being surrounded and beaten to death. Furthermore, unlike the Death Heralding Crow, Morgana possessed many area-of-effect ice spells. She wasn¡¯t afraid of multiple enemies.


    Thus, after some quick thought, Morgana nodded and agreed to the challenge!

 Chapter 872 - Display of Powers

    Chapter 872 Disy of Powers


    Two groups of people stood before the Tower of Fate.


    Only one person stood on the left. Naturally, that was Third Grade Witch Morgana, who had conjured a massive snowstorm around herself.


    As for the five standing on the right, they were all from different races and had a diverse set of appearances and personalities. From left to right, they were: Alice, Mary, Billis, Tigule, and Gru.


    All of them were Second Grade!


    The two parties stared at each other from four hundred meters away, a thirst for victory shining from their eyes.


    ¡°Are you sure you want to fight me with this group of Second Grades?¡± Morgana¡¯s body was once again engulfed by the snowstorm and lifted into the air. Her silhouette could hardly be seen through the snow and wind. However, her cold voice still reached everyone¡¯s ears without any problem.


    Though Morgana didn¡¯t insult them, the disdain and pride she had as a Third Grade witch fighting against Second Grade adepts were already more than apparent. The way both parties carried themselves fulled demonstrated this as well.


    Every one of the five Second Grades were trying to keep as low a profile as possible. It seemed like none of them wanted to attract the attention of the Third Grade witch.


    Alice appeared just as casual andposed as usual, letting Little Helen hover and fly around in front of her. Several silver chains shot out of the two-meter gray staff in her hands and entered the bodies of her allies. One of the chains even pierced through the thick barrier of snow and entered Morgana¡¯s body.


    Naturally, the spell she cast on herpanions was Fate Premonition!


    It would allow Mary and the others to sense the direction in which danger wasing from two to three seconds in advance.


    Meanwhile, the spell cast on Morgana was Rend Fate!


    From this moment onward, Morgana would lose the blessing of fate, bing abandoned by fate itself until the effect of Rend Fate had faded.


    It was akin to the harsh punishment of having one¡¯s Luck reduced by two levels!


    Morgana was not a Fate Witch and was not directly blessed by the powers of fate. However, the fact that she could be the leader of the Coldwinter Witches was indirect evidence that she carried as much favor with fate as Alice did.


    With a single Second Grade Rend Fate from Alice, Morgana had temporarily lost contact with her destined path. Until she defeated Alice, her past fortune would be gone without a trace. Any slight misstep and she would be on the receiving end of significant misfortune.


    Morgana, still hidden in the snowstorm, let out a roar.


    Even though she did not understand what that chain of light had done to her, she vaguely felt the faint rejection of the world toward her.


    For a moment, even the ice particles that she controlled freely stalled slightly.


    ¡°Dammit, what did you do to me?¡± Morgana shouted furiously and cast out arge cloud of ice with a wave of her hand, ¡°Die for me.¡±


    This massive white cloud formed of pure frost and chill immediately pressed toward Alice and the four Second Grades the moment it emerged from the snowstorm.


    The white cloud and the extreme chill within it already caused the air to crackle and freeze as it flew across. Some smaller hail and frost quickly started to appear, adorning the pure white cloud with an azureyer.


    What a beautiful spell!


    What a terrifying spell!


    These two extreme emotions appeared in the hearts of everyone, but the very next second, they started to panic. Everyone used their personal methods to avoid this attack from a Third Grade witch.


    Alice flicked her finger, and a strange stone glowing with silver light appeared on her head.


    The strange stone immediately refracted hundreds of silver threads thatpletely covered Alice and Helen. The next second, the silver light shed, and Alice had vanished from the spot.


    Mary had the best dynamic vision amongst all the Second Grades.


    She turned her head and spotted Alice¡¯s slowly reappearing body in a dim corner two kilometers away.


    Hmph! Aren¡¯t you fast when you run?


    Mary snorted in disdain and quickly beat her bat wings, leaving the spot as if the attacking at her was moving in slow-motion.


    The white cloud and blue mist were inches away from Mary.


    However, they continued to fail to catch up to her by mere millimeters. Movement and stillness, fast and slow; Mary had perfectly grasped the bnce between these factors, making one wonder silently at her power.


    Alice and Mary had already escaped. The other three remaining adepts also disyed their wondrous techniques and fled from the ce.


    Bug Adept Billis was undoubtedly the best at escaping amongst them!


    His ck robe suddenly copsed, and a ck swarm of insects turned into wisps of ck smoke and seeped into the earth below, vanishing without a trace in a single instant.


    Meanwhile, Split-Off Brain Gru was terrified by the might of this simple attack from the Third Grade witch.


    Five hundred points. The core temperature of the cloud was already close to absolute zero. It could deal over five hundred points of frost damage to any lifeforms caught in it.


    Gru had used an expensive magical alloy with extremely high magical resistances when crafting the machine that hosted his body. Still, if there was no need, he didn¡¯t want to experience such a terrifying magical attack head-on.


    A beam emitter on Gru¡¯s shoulder let out a blinding light, and a ck rift was instantly cut open before him. Gru extended his two metal hands and pulled the spatial rift even wider apart until there was enough space for him to dive inside.


    One secondter, a bright light suddenly shone somewhere five kilometers away. The nar space was once again sliced open, and Gru emerged from within after enduring the spatial storm between the spatialyers.


    In the blink of an eye, the Goblin Shredder was the only person left standing on the battlefield!


    Goddamit! Bloody hell! What in the name...these disloyal bastards!


    Tigule muttered and cursed under his breath as he hurriedly activated the emergency escape mechanism on the Goblin Shredder.


    Several dozen metal pipes extended from its tall back, and bright yellow mes spat out from within. The Goblin Shredder¡¯s twelve-ton body immediately shot outward at an unbelievable speed.


    At this instant, the Goblin Shredder¡¯s flight speed could alreadypare with Mary¡¯s.


    However, it did not have Mary¡¯s fine and precise controls and could only fly away in a straight line. If there were any errors in the calctions and any obstacles that appeared in the path of escape, Tigule would probably have to run straight into the obstacle with a face full of despair.


    That said, with the Shredder¡¯s sturdy body and insane speed, it could probably smash through the obstacle even if it were an entire mountain!


    The pure white ice cloudnded on the ground, and thousands of tons of extreme cold surged out from within, wildly spreading across thend. The earth froze over wherever the chill went, and everything in the way withered and died. Ayer of ice crystals, several meters thick, quickly extended outward across the uneven terrain of the wastnd.


    If someone were to observe the battlefield from the sky, they would see a massive circle of ice suddenly appear near the Tower of Fate. It turned everything within two and a half kilometers into a dead, void world of ice and cold.


    Meanwhile, Morgana continued to hover in the center of the snowstorm. Her hair billowed in the wind and her milky-white eyes trained on the proud and slender figure standing at the edge of the circle of ice.


    Alice had teleported right to the edge of the explosion of ice. Even one meter less and the extreme st of ice power would have engulfed her. The fact that she had correctly grasped the radius of the spell meant that she had perfectly grasped the limits of Morgana¡¯s power. She knew everything about Morgana¡¯s abilities.


    That undoubtedly made Morgana even more resentful and irritable!


    Morgana raised both her hands as the power of ice within her body surged into the storm around her. A door made of crystalline ice and snow slowly opened above the massive circle of ice.


    Frost Guardians and snow beasts of various shapes and forms emerged from the door of ice, roaring and charging toward Alice. Morgana then put her hands together. A massive ball of cold air gathered in her palms, turning into a terrifying Frozen Orb.


    ¡°Die!¡±


    Morgana shouted as she hurled the Frozen Orb at Alice.


    Snow beasts were charging toward her from the ground, and countless frost arrows shot out from the Frozen Orb above. When a Third Grade witch moved, the momentum of her attack engulfed everything. It was a truly horrifying sight to behold.


    ¡°I¡¯ll leave these grunts to you, Billis!¡± Alice said, with an airy smile on her face.


    She didn¡¯t even need to act herself. The little fairy flying around her waved the matchstick wand in her hand, and an elementium barrier appeared before them.


    Elementium Invalidation Barrier!


    Cold Immunity!


    Elementium Disruption Forcefield!


    ......


    ......


    Helen finally returned to Alice and slumped onto her shoulder after putting out five or six barriers in front of them.


    The frost arrows wildly spinning toward them caused theyers of elementium barriers to shiver from the impact. Yet, strangely enough, the thin defenses blocked all of the attacks. They didn¡¯t even allow any of the frost and chill to seep through.


    A dissatisfied shriek rang out somewhere around Alice.


    Seven or eight holes suddenly erupted in the earth in front of her. A tide of ck insects swarmed forth and met with the vicious snow beasts.


    One ck and one white, the two colors shed with each other, seeping and blending with each other.


    The snow beasts that the Third Grade Coldwinter Witch leader summoned were not like ordinary magical creatures. Apart from the horde of First Grade creatures, there were also terrifying Second Grade beasts of various forms. However, the swarm they met with were no easy opponents either. There were as many as two dozen Second Grade insects hidden among the tens of thousands of ck beetles.


    Hundreds of casualties appeared as they shed and bit at each other.


    However, it was clear that the snow beasts had the advantage due to the frost aura surging from their bodies!


    ¡°Tigule, help him!¡±


    Alice was like an extremely calmmander, providing direct and straightforward orders with every development that cropped up in the battle.


    A sizzling sound came from the distance. Several dozen goblin rockets billowing out bright-yellow mes left a trail across the sky as they dove toward where the snow beasts were most concentrated.

 Chapter 873 - Miracle of Fate

    Chapter 873 Miracle of Fate


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    A series of explosions erupted among the beasts!


    Wildfires and a ferocious shockwave washed over the snow beasts.


    For a moment, there was an increase in many snow beast casualties.


    However, how could Morgana¡¯s rise to leader of the Coldwinter Witches ever have been predicated upon these grunts?


    While the snow beasts were tussling with the opponent, she had already flown to where the battle was happening. She waved a single hand, and tens of thousands of snow swords flew out of the storm, shooting toward her enemies.


    Judging from the indiscriminate attacks, she couldn¡¯t care less if the snow beasts were caught in the fire.


    Dammit, dammit!


    Billis repeatedly cursed as he hid in the shadows. He desperatelymanded his swarm to turn into ck smoke and escape. Meanwhile, the Second Grade Voidreavers beat their wings and scrambled out of the battlefield.


    Their silhouettes slowly vanished after a short while. Only a slight shimmer in the air was visible before they disappeared without a trace.


    The overwhelming snowstorm ravaged thend along with the countless des of ice and snow. Many of the snow beasts were torn to pieces and killed by the barrage of transparent ice crystals. Meanwhile, some of the ck smoke also failed to escape and was caught by the storm. The haze once again turned into fist-sized ck beetles with tough shells and sharp fangs.


    These ck beetles let out a strange shriek as they tumbled around in the cold winds, frost creeping up their shells.


    The speed of their flight slowed, and the ice des quickly caught up and shredded them to pieces. The corpses of insects rained down from the skies, their broken shells and severed limbs trapped in thick blocks of ice before they even hit the ground.


    ¡°Mary, draw her attention!¡±


    Silver light shimmered around Alice as she moved about the battlefield, teleporting once every second. Severalvish and delicate tarot cards spun wildly around her. Yet, no matter how they turned, circled, and continued to dance around Alice in a strange and wondrous trajector, the back of the cards always faced outward while the faces kept toward her.


    With just a thought, Alice only needed to extend her hand to one of the tarot cards to make it flow into her hand. She could then instantly equip the item sealed within the tarot card.


    While Morgana wasunching her attack, Alice had already summoned the Witch¡¯s Mask, the Mercury essories, the Hourss of Time, and the Staff of Divination, thoroughly equipping herself with items.


    The Witch¡¯s Mask was a piece of Fate equipment. It could blur the enemy¡¯s senses and cause them to gloss over the existence of the wearer unintentionally.


    Morgana¡¯s spell would have no effect on Alice as long as her eyes weren¡¯t fixed upon her.


    Mercury essories were another set of Fate equipment. Alice would never be affected by any adverse effects while she was wearing them.


    With this item, Morgana¡¯s area-of-effect frost aura would not be able to restrain Alice.


    Meanwhile, the Hourss of Time was a piece of powerful Fate equipment. If Alice was willing to fill it with her Fate power, she could rewind time from one to five seconds ago.


    With the Hourss of Time, she would never leave behind any regrets on the battlefield!


    As for the final item, the Staff of Divination, that was Alice¡¯s mainbat equipment that she had mastered the most.


    With the Staff of Divination in hand, the entire world was transparent before Alice¡¯s eyes!


    A strange sonic boom rang out in the air when Alicepletely equipped herself.


    Crimson lightning cut across the sky and pierced into the storm.


    With her extreme speed and the protection of her blood energy, Mary was able to reach Morgana¡¯s side before the seeping cold could reach her.


    A loud crackling sound rang out as the blood energy surrounding Mary froze into crimson chunks of ice from the frost aura.


    They crackled as they fell from the sky. Mary was like a butterfly dancing around a candle fire, rapidly attacking Morgana several times in a row. She then hurriedly escape from the snowstorm when she saw ferocious ice energy gather around Morgana.


    It had only been a trip in and out that took no more than three to five seconds, yet Mary had already lost more than thirty percent of the blood energy within her body. That caused her to start stuffing blood crystals into her mouth the moment she escaped Morgana¡¯s range of attack.


    ¡°Gru; attack here, here, here, and here.¡±


    While Morgana was distracted by Mary, Alice quickly sent out orders to Split-Off Brain Gru, who was hiding at the edges of the battlefield. Though Gru might not seem to have as muchbat potential as the Goblin Shredder, he was uncontested when it came to the amount of his magical energy output.


    After all, no one would stuff a terrifying magic generator furnace into their stomach!


    With Alice¡¯s guidance, several red dots mysteriously appeared on the destructive snowstorm around Morgana. These were the areas that Alice had instructed Gru to attack!


    Gru let out a roar and his five-meter-tall, substantial body squatted down. A half-meter-thick ck cannon barrel emerged from his back. The next instant, terrifying magic energy surged into the cannon as seven beams of energy urately hit the seven red marks.


    The gigantic snowstorm suddenly stalled for a second. If it weren¡¯t for Morgana realizing something was wrong and using her powerful ice magic to keep the storm spinning, that one powerful attack from Gru would have been enough to destroy the storm.


    Much like how Greem liked to spread mes everywhere the moment he started fighting, most of Morgana¡¯s magic was improved tremendously with the presence of the snowstorm. Moreover, with the snowstorm around Morgana, anyone that tried to attack would have to pay a heavy price to reach her!


    With that one attack from earlier, Gru had caught the attention of Morgana from three and a half kilometers away.


    The other Second Grade adepts were annoying to deal with and couldn¡¯t present any real threat to her. However, this iron tin can¡¯s attack had almost caused her protective spell to fall apart. Morgana instantly prioritized Gru as the first target for extermination.


    Morgana let out a crisp battlecry, and severalrge scale ice spells descended upon Gru like an avnche.


    Dammit! Bastards...protect me, won¡¯t you?!


    Gru quickly threw out countlessyers of forcefields while calling for help with his mental connection to the others. He dodged within the destructive ice spells while desperately making his way outward.


    Still, how could a Third Grade witch¡¯s elementium spell be so easily survived?


    The wild ice magic froze the earth and even the sky, sealing Gru in a thickyer of ice. As a cold breeze blew across, all of the ice crystals instantly disintegrated, returning to the smallest of ice particles.


    Gru, who had been jumping about actively just now, also turned into shards of ice. He was nowhere to be seen now. Only a magic generator furnace remained where he stood, still glowing with ghostly blue light!


    It had not even been six minutes since the start of the battle, and only three rounds of attacks between the two parties, yet one of Alice¡¯s four helpers had died in battle. The other Second Grade adepts couldn¡¯t help but feel terror rise in their hearts at the same time.


    ¡°Hahahaha! A bunch of Second Grades, yet you dare toe and send yourself to your graves. I...¡±


    Morgana startedughing wildly, but herughter stopped halfway as if she was a chicken that had just been grasped by the neck.


    Alice remained calm. Prismatic light suddenly shone from the Hourss of Time at her waist. Everything quickly returned to silence.


    Meanwhile, a small and delicate projection of an hourss appeared where Gru had died. The sands of time within the projection mysteriously began to flow backward, returning to the upper half of the hourss.


    While the Hourss of Time was rewinding, mysterious narws started to extract the billions of metal particles from the ice shards nearby. The metal particles were then put together around the magic generator furnace once again ording to a certainw and a certain order, as if stacking blocks of wood.


    It was almost as if someone had pressed the rewind button on spacetime. Gru¡¯s already shattered body was pieced together before everyone¡¯s eyes.


    When thepletely dead brain that was Gru once again appeared within the defensive shield of his metal body, thest bits of sand drained away from the hourss and it slowly faded into nothingness.


    ¡°You bastards, you just watch me die? I want to curse...hm? How am I still alive?¡±


    His messed-up perception of spacetime and all the strange information surging into his mind from the narws caused the newly revived Gru to bepletely confused.


    ¡°Why aren¡¯t you running yet? Do you want to die again?¡± At this moment, Alice¡¯s sweet voice rang out in Gru¡¯s mind, absolutely unamused.


    Gru immediately turned and ran without any hesitation.


    Damn, what was that magic? How was it so powerful? It could even save someone that had been turned to pieces?


    Mary, Tigule, and Billis saw this mysterious scene unfold in front of them from where they were hiding. The shock in their hearts was indescribable. However, along with the immense shock came tremendous joy.


    Hell, were they even afraid of death with such a powerful ability helping them?


    The morale of the Crimson adepts instantly reached a peak without even a single word exchanged between them!


    They were celebrating in joy, while Morgana was utterly stunned.


    Dammit, dammit, dammit! Was this the true power of the Fate Witches? It is truly as mysterious and profound as recorded in the history books!


    Still, since they were now her opponents, she would never let them have the chance to turn the tables.


    Now that she had made up her mind, Morgana¡¯s will to battle erupted, and she chose the teleporting Alice as her new target.


    Alice was the core of today¡¯s battle. If she wasn¡¯t dealt with, who knew how many more such miracles she could still produce with her mysterious Fate magic.


    Morgana silently dashed toward Alice, her terrifying snowstorm still raging around her!

 Chapter 874 - Morganas Despair

    Chapter 874 Morgana¡¯s Despair


    As everyone knew, the Fate Witches had never been consideredbatants.


    As such, Fate Witches were harmless individuals in the eyes of most people.


    However, today, Alice had only shown a portion of her power, and Morgana had tasted the terror of a high-grade Fate Witch.


    Due to the existence of Rend Fate, Morgana¡¯s luck had been terrible since the start of the battle.


    It unknowingly caused her to miss many excellent opportunities to kill her enemies quickly.


    As a veteran Third Grade witch that had advanced over two hundred years ago, failing to finish a chant and cast a spell wasn¡¯t something that should happen to her. Yet, Morgana had already failed toplete a spell twice since the start of the battle half an hour ago.


    One time, it was a loose thread from a silk handkerchiefnding in her mouth, causing her to make a mistake while chanting. That resulted in her failing to deal a heavy blow to Mary while she was breaking through the snowstorm.


    The second time was when a sudden backflow current erupted within the snowstorm and brushed against her Ice Shield. This particr Ice Shield happened to run out of magic energy at the same time and shattered on its own. Morgana had been interrupted by the backflow current and missed a perfect chance to kill Alice.


    These two errors appeared to have a logical cause and effect, and one could easily believe that these were extraordinary coincidences.


    However, Morgana knew very well that these were no coincidences or idents; it was the actual manifestation of Rend Fate reducing her luck by two levels!


    Things like luck were always things that couldn¡¯t be seen nor touched.


    Still, one had to admit that they indeed did exist!


    The effect of Luck +1 and Luck -1 wasn¡¯t just as simple as the oue of rolling dice. Rather, changes to one¡¯s luck would affect the individual¡¯spatibility with the ne¡¯s world system.


    It was important to note that the nar consciousness was the aggregation of billions of lifeforms within the ne, along with the trillions of basic elementium substances. An individual with -1 Luck would feel tremendous maliciousness from the world around them when they interacted with anything within the ne.


    Any intelligent lifeforms they ran into would naturally feel hate and hostility toward them at first sight. Meanwhile, any beasts they met would also attack them without hesitation.


    Even lifeless, inorganic substances would create trouble for them!


    An insignificant pebble on their path, a splinter not properly shaved away from a wooden bench, a transparent fishbone mixed in the soup, a moment¡¯s dizziness in a critical moment while concocting a high-grade potion...


    A person with -1 Luck would feel as if the world itself was their enemy, constantly tripping them up and setting up obstacles. Not a single thing they wished for woulde true, and everything they feared woulde to life. That was the true power of -1 Luck!


    Right now, Morgana was enduring the punishment of -2 Luck!


    If she were an ordinary person instead of a Third Grade witch, there wouldn¡¯t even be a need for any ns or fighting. Just the series of idents caused by -2 Luck alone would be enough to leave her begging for death.


    Currently, this misfortune manifested on the battlefield as the many ¡®mistakes¡¯ that Morgana mysteriously made, causing her to lose many opportunities to end the battle quickly.


    That was what caused this utterly imbnced battle tost for as long as it had!


    Meanwhile, these four adepts who doubted and could not trust each other were starting to disy decent cooperation under Alice¡¯smands.


    Alice had clearly be themander among these five Second Grades through her unique perspective over the battlefield and her strange Fate magic.


    Mary, on the other hand, relied on her abnormal speed and Agility to be the assassin and firefighter of the team.


    Billis relied on his gathering and dispersing swarm, along with his terrifyingbat insects, to roam the battlefield and fend off Morgana¡¯s endless snow beast army.


    Goblin Tigule utilized the Goblin Shredder¡¯s powerfulbat abilities and became the primary offensive fighter against Morgana¡¯s outer defense.


    Split-Off Brain Gru relied on the magic generator furnace and all his powerful magic energy cannons to hold the position of the long-range cannoneer.


    These adepts all had their powers, each with their own unique abilities and specialties. Yet today, they had gathered together around Alice and finally unleashed their fullest potential.


    The battle was brutal yet strange. The oddity of the fight could be seen everywhere!


    Every time Morgana unleashed potent ice magic, it would be the Second Grade adepts¡¯ turn to disy their life-saving skills!


    Any mistake when fighting against a Third Grade witch could be the difference between life and death.


    During this ny-minute-long battle, Mary had died three times, Tigule five times, and Gru one time. Meanwhile, Alice, who had plenty of trump cards hidden up her sleeve, and Billis, who excelled at hiding, remained alive for the entirety of the fight.


    Morgana¡¯s massive snowstorm was blown away by a particrly powerful magic energy cannon barrage from Gru at the forty-first minute. From then on, Mary stayed at Morgana¡¯s side like an annoying fly.


    She would use her wild and ferocious attacks to wear away at Morgana¡¯s ice shield every time Morgana showed any sign of weakness.


    Even with Tigule drawing away fire, and even with her twenty-nine points of Agility allowing her to retreat and advance in the blink of an eye, Mary still unavoidably ¡®died¡¯ at Morgana¡¯s hands three times.


    One time, it was due to her being too greedy and not retreating when Morgana¡¯s defensive shield was one hit away from shattering. The dy in her movements caused her to be frozen by a sudden Ring of Ice that appeared around her.


    Being frozen for three seconds in front of Morgana was enough for Morgana to kill Mary ten times over.


    The second time was when Mary was riddled with holes by a storm of Frost Rays by the enraged Morgana.


    The third andst time was when Morgana used her frightening Lonely Winter spell to freeze Mary to her death. When Morgana activated her Icecold Bloodline to unleash the Third Grade spell Lonely Winter, she could erect a domain of extreme cold around her that stretched for two hundred and fifty meters.


    This time, both Mary and Tigule were caught in the spell and were frozen to death in a pretty, yet deadly, world of snow and ice.


    If it weren¡¯t for Alice¡¯s perfect mastery over the Hourss of Time, one of the two might have had to die to Morgana¡¯s attack!


    After several deaths, the five-person team finally figured out some method of dealing with Morgana.


    Most of Morgana¡¯s ice magic was very powerful and had a tremendous freezing effect. However, these spells required three to seven seconds of chanting and casting. Moreover, there were some obvious signs of casting before she unleashed the spells.


    In addition, Alice¡¯s Staff of Divination allowed her to predict Morgana¡¯s exact target. All these factors added together gave the five adepts perfect opportunities to escape.


    If Morgana wanted to single out and exterminate one of them, Alice would notify them ahead of time. That person could then turn and run immediately without worrying about attacking. If Morgana intended to unleash an area-of-effect spell, Alice would be able to predict it and inform the adepts of the safe distance away from her.


    Thus, they could retreat beyond the affected radius and easily use long-range spells to bombard the immobile Morgana.


    After being toyed with in this manner several times, Morgana was bubbling with rage. Yet, there was nothing she could do!


    Alice was simply far too annoying.


    It was okay if she alone was a slippery mouse, but even her four teammates had been turned into slick mice, running around her and weaving about. They would always hide where it was difficult for her spells to be effective, resulting in most of her ice magic to be meaningless fireworks.


    Single-target spells might be overpowering when fighting against such a group of individuals, but it was hard to kill them with such spells. Onlyrge Third Grade spells could deal inflict damage to them.


    However, Third Grade spells were not cabbages found on the roadside. Even with her Icecold Bloodline boosting the regeneration of her ice powers, she could not use Third Grade spells with such high frequency!


    No one knew when, but Morgana had turned from the initial ruler of the battlefield to a panting mouse catcher. The threat of death she posed to her opponents was shrinking by the minute.


    Of course, as the Third Grade Coldwinter Witch leader, Morgana had much more than this!


    Halfway through the battle, and in a fit of rage, Morgana summoned a Third Grade Raging Snow Patriarch.


    It was a monster that greatly resembled a barbarian. It was four meters tall, had four strong limbs, thick gray hair, and a t, ugly face. It excelled at throwing snowballs. The snowballs it threw were not the soft Frost Orbs that First Grade adepts used. Instead, they were terrifying snowballs, one meter in diameter and weighing half a ton.


    The snowballs each dealt one hundred and fifty points of physical damage, one hundred and twenty points of frost damage, and inflicted seventy points of ssh damage around a one-meter to ten-meter radius.


    When the Raging Patriarch started bombarding the adepts with eight snowballs a second, the cooperation between the five of them was interrupted.


    In the end, it was Tigule who made the sacrifice at the key moment, using his life to draw Morgana¡¯s firepower. The remaining four of them used this time to trade blows with the Patriarch wildly.


    In the end, with Alice pointing out the Patriarch¡¯s weakness, Gru shot out an energy beam with the full force of his magic generator furnace concentrated behind it. The beam pierced the Patriarch¡¯s chest and shattered its consciousness core to pieces.


    Of course, it was Billis sacrificing seven of his Void Reavers to break through the Patriarch¡¯s defenses that provided Gru with the opportunity to kill it in a single hit.


    Without the Patriarch¡¯s assistance, the protection of the snowstorm, and the army of snow beasts, Third Grade Coldwinter Witch Leader Morgana finally showed signs of lethargy. Thus, Alice and the others dragged the battle into its third hour.


    Chapter Notes:


    Editor Ryu: If you¡¯re enjoying Age of Adepts, now is a great time to stop by our Patreon and consider supporting this fine series! Patreon is mine and Eris¡¯ sole form of ie for working on this series, and everyone who supports us through Patreon helps ensure the continued trantion and release of AoA. The AoA Patreon has contribution tiers that give you ess to advance chapters of the series (fully tranted and edited) up to 15 chapters ahead of the GT releases. Thanks for your readership, and we hope to have your patronage as well.


    For those who would like to kick in a couple of bucks and aren¡¯t looking for advance chapters, we also have a Ko-Fi for one time donations and support. It doesn¡¯t see much use (hell, if you have a few bucks, you might as well be a Patron and get a few extra chapters ahead), but people still asionally help us through that, and every bit of support helps.


    As always, more than anything, thank you everyone for your continued readership and support of Age of Adepts!


    -Ryu

 Chapter 875 - A Mission Arrives

    Chapter 875 A Mission Arrives


    The battle was finally put to a stop by a third party!


    Seeing that her leader could not obtain victory, the Coldwinter Witches led by Cerro immediately interfered in the fight and took the dejected Morgana away with them.


    Naturally, ording to the agreement, Alice and the others obtained the victory in this battle.


    Morgana was not directly defeated, which left some face for the Coldwinter Witches. Still, this war between the Fate Witches and the Coldwinter Witches had concluded with their defeat.


    This shocking conclusion rendered the entirety of the Northern Lands speechless!


    The Crimson n had sessfully survived their crisis.


    Though most of the Northern Witches were still dissatisfied with Greem and Alice¡¯s rtionship, they could no longer make an issue out of the Crimson n¡¯s status.


    Of course, while the other witch branches suffered no losses during this war, the Coldwinter Witches had lost tremendously. They not only had to give up half of their worldly territories aspensation but even one-third of their resource sites.


    If it weren¡¯t for the solid foundation that the Coldwinter Witches had umted over all these years, this massive blow might have plunged the entirety of the Coldwinter branch into a major crisis!


    Additionally, after the war concluded, the Coldwinter Witches had to hand over several sets of high-grade magical equipment as a ransom to take back their captured sisters. That indirectly eased the Crimson n¡¯s awkwardck of alchemists.


    Greem might have mastered some degree of alchemy, but he invested most of his efforts into golem creation and magical patterns. His skill with magical equipment creation was mediocre at best. There weren¡¯t very many items or pieces of equipment among the dragon hoards they had found that were suitable for the adepts. As such, these spoils of victory solved a big problem for the Crimson n.


    This battle seemed to have left asting impression on Mary. She shut herself in her room in Fire Throne upon returning from the Tower of Fate. No one knew what she was secretly preparing for.


    ............


    Greem caught wind of this news while he was enjoying his feast of fire dragon ribs!


    Upon hearing of such a significant event that could potentially decide the future direction of the n, Greem paused his actions for a moment and replied with a simple ¡®oh.¡¯ He then tilted his head and continued thinking about the matters he still had to tend to.


    At its current scale, the Crimson n was no longer an organization that could be sustained by a single Third Grade adept. This improvement of the n¡¯s power was mandatory if it wanted to continue developing and expanding. At the very least, many more Crimson adepts apart from Greem needed to step up and contribute to the prosperity of the n.


    It was the only way the Crimson n could have a future!


    If a single pair of fists were the n¡¯s weapon to conquer the world, then when Greem copsed, the Crimson n would be a pack of rats fleeing a sinking ship.


    Right now, people like Alice, Mary, and Billis were stepping forth, gaining pride and glory of their own. That was what Greem had most hoped for and what he was most exhrated about!


    As the highest authority in the Crimson n, having high-grade subordinates who could take on burdens for him meant that Greem could take out more time to spend on content that interested him.


    Greem quickly browsed the Third Grade spells that the Chip had recently optimized while he ate; a sense of pride couldn¡¯t help but swell from deep within his heart.


    Vicious Fireball. Third Grade single-target fire spell.


    Cast time: 1-2 seconds. Cooldown: 5 seconds.


    Expended Spirit: 2 points.


    Offensive power: 310-330 points.


    Effective radius: 20-30 meters.


    Possess the magical effects of fire poison and Coldme.


    Magma Armor. Third Grade defensive earth and fire spell.


    Cast time: 2-4 seconds. Cooldown: 45 seconds.


    Expended Spirit: 3 points.


    Physical defensive power: 450 points.


    Elementium defensive power: 300 points.


    Possesses me retaliation effect.


    megate. Third Grade fire summoning spell.


    Cast time: 8-15 seconds. Cooldown: 15 minutes.


    Expended Spirit: 7 points.


    Can summon fire creatures with a total of 1270 points of fire energy (highest level summon is a Third Grade me elemental).


    Molten World. Third Grade area-of-effect fire spell.


    Cast time 10-16 seconds. Cooldown: 50 seconds.


    Expended Spirit: 6 points.


    Can summon a massive 100*80 meters me pir. Offensive power in the thirty-meter wide core area is 450-480 points. The power of the fire decreases as the distance increases. For every 10 meters, the power of the mes is reduced by 50 points.


    Meteor Burst. Third Grade single-target earth and fire spell.


    Cast time: 8-12 seconds. Cooldown: 35 seconds.


    Expended Spirit: 4 points.


    Fire damage: 260-280 points.


    Physical damage 220-240 points.


    Effective radius: 20-30 meters.


    Possesses 40 points of earth-attribute ssh damage.


    Fire Teleportation (short-range). Third Grade mobility fire spell.


    Cast time: 3-5 seconds. Cooldown: 25 seconds.


    Expended Spirit: 3 points.


    Can teleport to any area where fire runes have been set up ahead of time.


    Maximum teleportation distance: 3000 meters.


    These five spells were all the Third Grade spells that Greem had obtained from the Chip¡¯s continued optimization. They did not use the same models as other conventional Third Grade spells. Thus, if Greem were to hand them over to the Winds of Freedom¡¯s Knowledge Hall, he was incredibly likely to obtain the corresponding contribution points.


    However, these were allbat spells that Greem had prepared for himself. If the specific numbers of the spells were shown to the public, it would be effortless for his opponents to obtain the core statistics of hisbat tactics.


    This factor alone made it such that Greem could never put them out in public!


    Meanwhile, the first elementium magical machine now possessed some degree ofbat power after all these days of optimization and refinement. However, due to theck of a magic generator furnace, the average Second Grade elementium magical golem crystal core could only sustain it for five minutes of all-outbat.


    Greem had barely managed to keep it fighting for fifteen minutes through the harmonization of three Second Grade elementium golem cores.


    It made Greem even more desperate to obtain a new batch of Queyras alloy.


    Hydra, the first golem that the majority of the Goblin ne¡¯s engineers had gathered to construct, was almost ready for operation as well. Yet, the magic generator furnace that was supposed to function as its energy core was still nowhere to be found.


    As such, Greem frequented the Trading Hall of the Spirit Illusion Realm even more.


    However, the terrifying price of Queyras alloy and ores left Greem without any options.


    Perhaps because of his past year of continuous search and questioning for Queyras alloy, he finally attracted an individual interested in a trade.


    This day, Greem had finally concluded his daily meditation and once again entered the Spirit Illusion Realm. He was stopped by an incredibly youthful-looking, skinny man when he entered the Trading Hall.


    ¡°You are...Fire?¡± The tall and skinny man carefully assessed Greem.


    Fire was the unique codename that Greem had given himself. After all, here in the Spirit Illusion Realm, he required a fake identity with which he could interact and trade with others.


    ¡°I am Fire! Do you have any business with me?¡±


    ¡°I have a mission here with me. You might be interested.¡± The skinny man smiled mysteriously.


    ¡°Mission? Shouldn¡¯t that sort of thing be in the Mission Hall?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes.


    In the Spirit Illusion Realm, his appearance was that of a humanoid me. Moreover, his face was covered by a golden mask. Others would have a hard time figuring out his true identity through these external traits.


    ¡°That¡¯s not for you to worry about; just take a look at this mission first!¡± The skinny man flicked a finger as a purple-ck orb of light flew toward Greem.


    [Beep. Detecting odd data stream. Requesting instructions from host. Allow connection?]


    ¡°Connect!¡±


    As a cool feeling surged into his consciousness form, a strange set of information appeared in his mind.


    ......


    Molten Fire City Creature Banishment Mission. Third Grade.


    Mission Issuer: Molten Fire Casten


    Mission Contents: The Molten Fire City of the Skettis Region has been invaded by an otherworldly fire creature over the past two years. Currently, it has caused the deaths of one Second Grade adept, three First Grade adepts, and many more apprentices. The underground mine of Molten Fire City has also been severely affected.


    Mission Rewards: 50,000 magical crystals. 1,200 hundred contribution points.


    Mission Requirements: Recruiting two Third Grade adepts.


    ......


    Greem gave it a quick look before shaking his head disinterestedly.


    He was still solidifying his power after advancing to Third Grade, and it wasn¡¯t ideal for him to leave the n to participate in a dangerous mission. As such, he rejected it without any hesitation.


    The thin man seemed to be prepared for this. He whispered to Greem with a voice transmission, ¡°I heard you have been searching about for Queyras alloy.¡±


    Greem stopped in his tracks when he heard this.


    ¡°You have news about Queyras alloy?¡±


    ¡°To tell you the truth, there is Queyrqas alloy in the underground mine of Molten Fire City. However, the mine mostly produces Eternium ore. Queyras ores are only an associated mineral!¡±


    Greem narrowed his eyes.


    ¡°You are the Casten of Molten Fire City?¡±


    The tall man smiled slightly, ¡°The Casten of Molten Fire City is a Fourth Grade adept. I am only a hired adept working beneath him.¡±


    Greem sensed the man¡¯s aura carefully. He might not know the person¡¯s true identity, but there was no doubt that he was a Third Grade adept.


    ¡°Can you tell me more about this mission?¡± Greem hesitated for a moment, but in the end, he could not help but ask.


    ¡°That beast broke into Molten Fire City two years ago. Its origins are bizarre. It seems as if it snuck into Molten Fire City through the underground tunnel beneath theva sea. It upied the magma sea near the underground mine after it arrived and has continually harassed the voodoo beasts who descend to mine the ores. As of now, the losses to workforce and equipment are uncountable.¡±


    ¡°You people did not make a n to capture and kill it?¡±


    ¡°It seems to be a fairly intelligent fire creature and is exceptionally sly. It never dives too deep into Molten Fire City and only devours some eternium ores near the mines. The casten wanted to capture it, but whenever the casten gets close, the creature dives into the sea and hides. Once the casten leaves, it immediately shows up and starts causing trouble again. We have suffered all of its harassment over these two years!¡±


    ¡°Has its power been confirmed?¡±


    ¡°Intermediate or Advanced Third Grade. We have already sent people to confirm it. If it weren¡¯t for the environment there being suited to it so much, we would have seized it. Any other Third Grade fire creature would have been caught.¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but lower his head and start thinking when he heard this.


    It seemed that they had found him because of his identity as a fire adept.


    The skinny man couldn¡¯t help but promise another reward when he saw the offer sway Greem.


    ¡°I have heard you have been looking for Queyras alloy everywhere. If you can banish that creature and return the mine to its normal state, our casten has promised that some Queyras metal can be added to the list of rewards.¡±

 Chapter 876 - Golden Hall

    Chapter 876 <strong>Golden Hall</strong>


    Greem arrived in Rhein City three dayster.


    The Skettis Region, where Molten Fire City was located, was hundreds of thousands of kilometers away from the Ailovis region; it required crossing four different regions. Ordinary flying voodoo beasts could not possibly traverse such long distances. The flying ships of the Silver Unions were required for such a journey.


    The treatment that Greem received upon arriving at Rhein waspletely different from thest time he came.


    He had just gotten down from the manticore and had yet to enter the lodgings he had arranged, yet an adept was already waiting for him at the door. They had been sent by the manager of the adept¡¯s tower.


    ¡°Lord Greem, what business do you have here in Rhein? If there is anything you need, please tell us.¡± The person responsible for his reception was a Second Grade mechanical adept. Most of his exposed skin had been reced by a strange silver-white metal, making for a fairly scary appearance.


    ¡°I need to proceed to the Skettis Region on business. I also need to take the flying ships here.¡± The mission didn¡¯t require him to keep any secrets, so Greem didn¡¯t hide his destination.


    ¡°No problem! There will be a flying ship due west in two days. I will make sure to arrange passage for you! In addition,¡± The mechanical adept smiled, ¡°The tower is hosting a routine adept¡¯s gathering at the Golden Hall tonight. I wonder if you...¡±


    ¡°I understand! Send someone to notify me once the gathering starts!¡±


    ¡°Very well, I will tell them now!¡±


    The mechanical adept immediately left with a smile on his face after Greem agreed to go to the gathering.


    It was clear that the higher-ups of the Rhein adept¡¯s tower looked forward to Greem¡¯s presence.


    It was important to note that the Ailovis Region, where Rhein City was located, had mostly fallen into the hands of the Crimson n at this point. The rise of the Crimson n was now an undeniable fact. Under such circumstances, establishing a good personal rtionship with Greem would undoubtedly have tremendous benefits for the development of the city.


    Thus, be it for personal or official reasons, the leaders of Rhein City had to show Greem proper respect.


    There might still be some people who would oppress others if they were a Second Grade adept. But setting aside the Fourth Grade monsters who wouldn¡¯t easily show themselves, Third Grade adepts were already the most powerful force in the World of Adepts.


    In particr,bat adepts like Greem, who demonstrated tremendous power, could only be won over, never beaten down.


    The attitudes of the Rhein adept tower¡¯s leaders was a stark contrast to thest time Greem came to the city. There were some slight intentions to fix the cracks created from theirst encounter.


    Greem knew this very well.


    He also intended to take this opportunity to make contact with the high-grade adepts of Zhentarim.


    ............


    When night finally fell, the Golden Hall was already filled with noble adepts from various levels of the tower.


    The routine gathering for the tower adepts should have been hosted five dayster, but the arrival of an esteemed guest meant that the higher-ups had no choice but to bring it forward.


    The adepts who stayed at the tower had all figured out the identity of tonight¡¯s mysterious guest through various channels. As such, they had all arrived to the Golden Hall ahead of time, taking up some better spots and conversing with their friends as they waited for the guest to arrive.


    Of course, their private conversations never left the topic of the battle in the arena.


    Some adepts who weren¡¯t present asked softly, while those who had witnessed the entire event started to describe it with life-like detail.


    A Second Grade adept defeated a Third Grade adept in a duel. Such a thing should never have happened, yet it had urred in Rhein City. That caused the adepts of Rhein City to feel pride for a long time.


    A group of performers in beautiful clothes were performing elegant music in the corner of the hall. Waiters and waitresses in uniforms were weaving between the adepts with smiles on their faces, serving fine wine and dessert on their silver tters.


    Meanwhile, adepts in all sorts of robes casually stood all over the hall,ughing and whispering amongst themselves as they drank and talked. In particr, some female adepts with pretty looks and notable figures were dressed very seductively and quickly became the center of attention at the banquet.


    There were only three Third Grade adepts who typically stayed in Rhein¡¯s adept¡¯s tower. One of them had headed north to settle some personal matter and had yet to return. Only two Third Grade adepts appeared in the Golden Hall. One was Third Grade Body-Refining Adept Zavest, while the other was Third Grade Earth Adept Ragnar.


    They stood in the center of the hall, surrounded by a group of subordinate adepts. They talked amongst themselves casually while asionally looking toward the entrance to the room.


    ¡°How much exactly do you know about this Adept Greem? I heard he isn¡¯t even two hundred years old this year. Is this reliable news?¡± Third Grade Body-Refining Adept Zavest had not been in the tower thest time Greem came to Rhein. As such, he had not met him and was skeptical about all the rumors he had heard.


    Earth Adept Ragnar lifted a deep red ss of wine and shook it lightly in his hand. There was a faint smile on his face.


    ¡°I don¡¯t really know much more than you do. Everything I¡¯ve heard is from those rumors as well. Still, he is truly very young. The rumor that he is not even two hundred might just be real!¡±


    ¡°Sss,¡± Zavest couldn¡¯t help but draw in a cold breath of air, ¡°Not even two hundred years old! Doesn¡¯t...doesn¡¯t that mean he is very likely to advance to Fourth Grade?¡±


    ¡°Just in terms of how much time and potential he has, he is very likely to be a Fourth Grade adept in the future!¡± The smile on Ragnar¡¯s face had not faded at all. He chuckled slightly and said, ¡°This time, those people who want to suppress this young adept are probably having a headache!¡±


    Zavest let out a dryugh as well.


    The conflict between Greem and his old n, the Sarubo n, was well known to everyone. Now that Greem¡¯s Crimson n was rising steadily in the Ailovis Region, the Sarubo n was probably the one party that was feeling the worst.


    In the past, many opportunists had suppressed Greem to win favor with Great Adept Sarubo. However, Greem had now be a Third Grade adept and demonstrated the potential to advance to Fourth Grade.


    Under such circumstances, which idiot would rush forward to offend a future Fourth Grade adept like him?


    In fact, until they had a new Fourth Grade adept, even the Sarubo n was looking for ways to make peace with Greem!


    Great Adept Sarubo might have tremendous power, but he was unfortunately in the outer realms and could not return to the World of Adepts. It undoubtedly caused the Saurbo n to lose their only possibility of suppressing Greem. Of course, if Greem wasn¡¯t a fool, he would not actively provoke the Sarubo n either. After all, with two Third Grade bloodline adepts standing behind them, the Sarubo n was still a fairly powerful group in the Central Region.


    The First and Second Grade adepts gathered around the two Third Grade adepts could onlyugh or listen silently as the conversation went on. At this moment, the only ones who could cut into their discussion were those who were closest with the two Third Grade adepts.


    ¡°Teacher, the tower received some news from the North a few days ago. It seems to have some rtion to this Lord Greem!¡± The one who had spoken up was a middle-aged adept who was at Second Grade. He had a solemn expression on his face.


    He was the disciple of Third Grade Earth Adept Ragnar.


    ¡°Oh? Tell us about it.¡± Ragnar nodded and said.


    ¡°Yes, teacher! This news came from the ck Rose Merchant Group from the North. It is said that the battle between the Fate Witches and Coldwinter Witches has concluded! Teacher, can you guess which party won?¡±


    ¡°Supposedly, the Coldwinter Witches should have won. But since you asked this question, could the Fate Witches have won instead?¡± Ragnar couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes.


    ¡°Yes, teacher! The news they brought back was clear. The Fate Witches are the victors.¡±


    Zavest, who was listening from the side, couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    ¡°We were talking about Greem and now you two are talking about the Northern Witches. Could the Northern Witches have something to do with this Greem?¡±


    Ragnar shook his head and sighed, ¡°Zavest, you are still too uninformed about such news! You might not know this, but the young Greem¡¯s rtionship with the Fate Witches is not shallow at all. It¡¯s said that the leader of the Fate Witches this time might be Greem¡¯s secret lover. Say, isn¡¯t that news a bombshell?¡±


    ¡°What? There was such a thing?¡± Zavest¡¯s eyes immediately opened wide with shock and disbelief.


    The leaders of the Northern Witch branches were all seen as Fourth Grade witches in the Zhentarim Area!


    Being able to be involved with them meant resources, wealth, influence...you could have anything you wanted!


    For a moment, even Zavest felt envy toward that lucky boy.


    ¡°Lord Greem has arrived.¡±


    As the apprentice at the entrance loudly announced this name, all the adepts in the Golden Hall stopped talking and turned to look at the door.


    There, a handsome young man with a muscr body walked in, his ck eyes cutting across everyone andnding on the two Third Grade adepts.


    The two Third Grade adepts immediately lifted their sses and nodded to acknowledge his arrival.


    Greem strode toward them.


    The subordinate adepts that had gathered around the two Third Grade adepts knew well enough to step away and leave a proper ce for the three of them to talk.


    ¡°Wee, Adept Greem!¡±


    ¡°Thank you for your hospitality. I am proud to be able to visit the two of you.¡±


    After exchanging some simple greetings, the three of them got together and started talking happily.


    Matters of cooperation was not brought up at all during their conversation. It only had to do with the things of note for adepts upon advancing to Third Grade. From this perspective, though the three adepts appeared to be conversing with each other, it was actually the two veteran adepts silently teaching and guiding Greem, the newly advanced adept.


    For a moment, the atmosphere of the banquet was lively and joyous!

 Chapter 877 - Daily Life on the Journey

    Chapter 877 Daily Life on the Journey


    Two dayster.


    A flying ship belonging to the Zhentarim Association rose from a tall wooden tform. It slowly adjusted its trajectory before elerating toward the west.


    Meanwhile, as one of its passengers, Greem was mixed in with the crowd on the deck.


    Those who could board the flying ships were either adepts or higher nobles. As such, though there weren¡¯t very many people on the deck, they behaved in an orderly fashion.


    Due to the many factions and organizations in the World of Adepts, there was no single standard for an adept¡¯s dress code. Of course, there were no limitations on the colors of their clothes either.


    Typically, most elementium adepts liked to wear soft and light cloth robes due to their weaker Physiques. On the other hand, body-refining adepts and bloodline adepts dressed with much more variety. From light leather armor with decent defense to full metal armors with shocking defense, there was almost nothing they wouldn¡¯t wear.


    It was difficult to analyze the actual power of an adept by what they were wearing!


    To avoid unnecessary trouble, Greem did not wear the red cloak he usually wore. Instead, he chose an ordinary ck robe enchanted with Fly.


    Consequently, ordinary people would easily mistake him for a low-grade adept from his appearance!


    Greem had no interest in talking with other people. He ced his hands on the railing as he silently looked at the scenery below. His mind was still recalling all the private conversations he¡¯d had in the past two days.


    No one would talk about more private matters in public locations.


    However, once Greem returned to his room, many adepts hade to visit him, two of which were representatives of the two Third Grade adepts.


    It had seemed like these people were all optimistic about the Crimson n¡¯s development. They proposed all sorts of extremely favorable cooperation and trade agreements as representatives of their ns. In fact, some of these offered agreements were so favorable that they were providing the Crimson n with benefits without any strings attached. They were likely in hopes of establishing a rtionship with this quickly rising n.


    However, most tempting baits typically had the hardest hooks to swallow. These people, who were trying to associate themselves with the Crimson n at great cost of resources and magical crystals, definitely carried massive trouble on their backs. If Greem were to take the bait, he would essentially be shouldering a certain degree of the burden for these people.


    If the enemies and rivals of these parties were only medium and small ns, the Crimson n could agree to their offers without any hesitation. However, if their troubles involved any high-grade adepts, then the Crimson n would be finding problems for themselves!


    That was why, during his two-day stay in the adept¡¯s tower, Greem had no spare time at all. All of his time was spent talking with these people from all sorts of backgrounds.


    With all the information in his hands and the guidance of the two Third Grade adepts, Greem naturally knew how to deal with these uninvited guests.


    He directed them to Crimson Majordomo Gargamel, who was in Fire Throne, and left alone to board the flying ship.


    The distance from Ailovis to Skettis was almost fifty-five thousand kilometers. Even with the speed of the flying ship, it would take them half a month to arrive. Greem had more than enough time to rx and enjoy this trip.


    When the ship reached a high altitude and started cruising through the clouds, the temperature on the deck fell abruptly. Those ordinary nobles couldn¡¯t endure such cold temperatures, no matter how influential they were. As such, they had long since retreated into the cabins that were protected with elementium barriers.


    At the moment, those who could stay on the deck were all official adepts!


    It was a loose crew of one dozen adepts. Judging from the way they dressed and their spiritual fluctuations, most of them were First Grade adepts and no one he had to watch out for.


    Only an old adept with white, balding hair in a corner of the deck discreetly nodded and bent down when he saw Greem¡¯s eye sweep across him, putting on a ttering smile as he did so.


    Greem had the Chip¡¯s assistance and immediately understood what was happening.


    It seemed this person had the opportunity to participate in the tower¡¯s banquet and had seen him before.


    Greem had no time to deal with a small fry like this. His gaze paused on the old adept for a second before moving elsewhere. The old adept knew his status well enough and didn¡¯t dare disturb Greem. Instead, he turned and started talking with another adept.


    The adepts were arge group. Naturally, there were all sorts of people among them, all with different personalities and interests. Some were interested in conversation, while others preferred to keep to themselves.


    After running into a wall twice in a row, he finally managed to strike up a conversation with a pair of young male and female adepts. The two adepts were clearly a couple, and their rtionship was enviably intimate.


    Greem stayed on the deck for a bit longer before getting bored of the scenery and turning to walk into the cabin.


    The old adept who was still engaged in conversation followed Greem with the corner of his eye. He finally let out a breath of relief when he saw Greem leave. It was an honor to run into such a legendary adept, but the pressure was immense as well.


    The couple seemed to have noticed the behavior of the old adept and secretly assessed Greem.


    A fiery look of infatuation appeared in the eyes of the young female adept when she saw Greem¡¯s tall silhouette disappear into the cabin.


    ¡°He looks like a strong adept! Could he be a body-refining adept?¡±


    It seemed like the male adept was not satisfied with his partner¡¯s behavior. He frowned and said, ¡°What¡¯s good about body-refining adepts? They¡¯re always soaking themselves in all sorts of weird juices. They always have a weird stink on them.¡±


    Goddammit! Truly a bunch of rookies and amateurs that have never seen the world. To think they dared to makements about an unknown adept in public. These are really two brats that have no idea how ¡®death¡¯ is spelled.


    The old adept quickly interrupted the couple¡¯s ¡®ramblings¡¯ and continued to passionately describe his previous mission to them, ¡°That ruin was on the edge of the ck Forest. It had been scoured by people a few times before, but there were still some things left in there. As long as you listen to me, I guarantee you can get some decent resources from there.¡±


    The old adept continued on his rant. However, by this time, Greem had already entered the cabin. The magical array around it kept him from hearing the rest of the conversation.


    Greem was only listening casually to the conversation of these small fries. He wouldn¡¯t take any of their words to heart.


    The old adept was a useless adept with no chance of advancement, only barely reaching his current level through the sheer passage of time. Moreover, Greem could sense a very well-hidden trace of hostility in the old man¡¯s eyes and slick promises.


    It seemed like those two young adepts had be his prey. If he managed to trick them into that so-called ¡®ruin,¡¯ they would either walk into traps or be betrayed. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what their oue would be.


    Still, what did this have to do with Greem?


    ............


    As the elders of the adept¡¯s tower had previously notified them, the adept managing the flying ship made sure to leave thergest and most luxurious room on the ship to Greem.


    The space inside the flying ship wasn¡¯trge. Apart from the warehouse at the bottom-most level, the rooms left for the passengers were exceedingly narrow and small. Even the official adepts typically stayed in those tight rooms. However, Greem had apletely different feeling when he was led to his quarters by the managing adept.


    The room before him was not only broad and brightly-lit, but was also clearly split up into two sections.


    The outer section was the living room and the study room, while the inner part was the bedroom and a separate workshop. There was even a small alchemy tform in the workshop.


    This way, Greem would be able to process some simple alchemical items even during this journey.


    At this point, ordinary First and Second Grade magical golems could not provide him with any help. However, Third Grade elementium cores were not so easily obtained. Greem could only try his best to forge some lower-grade magical golems to bolster thebat power of his n adepts.


    The n¡¯s resource sites were already starting toe online. Combined with the massive dragon resources of Lance, the Crimson n had a very stable resource-harvesting system. Under such circumstances, the convenient and practical elementium golems, as strategic resources, were no longer sold to the outside world. Instead, they were kept as exclusive benefits of the Crimson adepts.


    On this boring journey, reading books, looking at the scenery, and taking some time to create special elementium golems; all this became a daily routine for Greem!


    The effect of meditation on improving Spirit was insignificant for Greem as he was now. However, after hundreds of years of developing this habit, four hours of daily meditation was a fixed routine for him.


    The improvement from such meditation might be minor, but if Greem persisted over the years, he might be able to obtain decent results.


    It was impossible to be a powerhouse without such routine hard work!


    Even during this seemingly leisurely trip, the Chip in Greem¡¯s mind was still operating at high speed, analyzing one task after another in an orderly fashion.


    Ever since bing Third Grade, the increase to his Spirit had caused an unprecedented improvement to the Chip¡¯s calction and organization abilities. Greem also discovered that his mind could now managerge amounts of data at a fast and efficient rate, even without the help of the Chip.


    He roughly estimated that his mind, as of now, couldpare to the Chip when he was First Grade!


    It indirectly exined how high-grade adepts were able to deal with thoseplex, multiyered three-dimensional arrays. With their powerful Spirits, every high-grade adept¡¯s brain had been developed tremendously. Their minds were no weaker than intelligentputers from Greem¡¯sst life.


    In fact, for the sake of increasing the capacity of their minds, some adepts would even use special magic to stimte the wild growth of their brain, before cutting off a part of it and storing it in their own adept¡¯s tower. This way, with the inherent connection between their brain and their split-off brain, these adepts would possess extraordinary memory and nearly infinite memory storage.


    It was almost as if they had a more rudimentary ¡®Chip¡¯ regrly assisting. If Greem ran into such individuals, his advantage of having the Chip would be leveled, and there would be no advantage to speak of.


    That was why the Chip was a tool and not the master. Greem had to fully unleash his own power and potential aside from relying on the Chip!

 Chapter 878 - Adept Civilization

    Chapter 878 Adept Civilization


    It was an entirely different world!


    This intense feeling would wash over Greem every time he traveled in the World of Adepts, giving him a unique experience every time.


    On Earth from his previous life, all of the photosynthetic energy for nt life came from the sun alone. Consequently, the weather, environment, humidity, and temperature of the region were allyered predictably and uniformly.


    However, in this strange high-magic world, every lifeform and geographical feature was affected by the flow and current of magical power, resulting in manifestations of all sorts of strange and bizarre features.


    Overall, the effect of the high-magic environment caused the nts and animals to be robust andrge. Towering nts measuring over a hundred meters were everywhere. Moreover, many of them were showing signs of turning into magical nts. Meanwhile, the animals were shockingly ferocious and terrifying. Even the cute rabbits that people on Earth loved could evolve into carnivorous magical creatures. Such creatures were so violent that they even put the wolves on Earth to shame.


    Though the humans in such a high-magic environment had also evolved to be stronger, faster, and had more stamina than their Earth counterparts, they were still at a massive disadvantagepared to wild magical creatures.


    If it weren¡¯t for some of the humans breaking beyond their physical and mental limits and taking hold of new supernatural powers, they would never have been the rulers of this ne.


    The environment where humans lived had also been changed significantly due to the abnormal flow and gathering of magical aura.


    There was the vast and boundless ck Forest, magical swamps constantly obscured with dense and thick fog, deserts that spanned for eternity, wild and untamed jungles, dangerous and gigantic mountain ranges, and white kingdoms of nothing but ice and snow.


    The Continent of the Adepts as seen from above the flying ship was like multiple massive yet different continents. From a distance, one could always find some exotic locations in the unpopted swamps and mountains. The climate and environment in these locations were discordant from the surrounding area. They were like magical gems scattered across the continent, breathtaking and astonishing.


    These ces werergely created due to abnormal magical aura currents caused by the unique development of geographic features. Then, as the adepts put in the effort to modify these ces, they were turned into resource sites advantageous for magical nts and creatures to grow.


    From then on, the adepts gained a stable, long-term source of the incredible amount of adept resources they required!


    One could say without any reservations that the adepts¡¯ stable growth had an inseparable rtion to their development and use of such resource sites.


    As such, when the flying ship cruised above theyer of clouds, and Greem saw all the mountains and rivers below him, a strange emotion slowly grew within his heart.


    The geography below him wound and stretched with mountain ranges everywhere. Some extended for tens of thousands of kilometers, while others were steep and dangerous. The specks of human viges, towns, and cities were scattered all across them. Throwing in the dots ofkes and rivers in-between, a perfect human world appeared before Greem.


    Yet, this perfect human world was, in truth, controlled by adept organizations of various sizes.


    In the World of Adepts, the vast number of undeveloped wilnds and the boundless ck Forest meant that human kingdoms required the protection of powerful adepts. Without the adepts, the humans would have a hard time defending against the invasions of these powerful magical creatures, wild races, and mutated monsters.


    There was no pure human kingdom. The rulers of most city-states would choose to be subordinate to a powerful adept organization, providing yearly offerings in exchange for protection. The two forces benefitted each other and formed a system of their own.


    As such, the true owners of this seemingly peaceful, calm, and beautifulnd were not the ordinary humans working hard upon it, but the massive group of adepts that resided at the top of the golden pyramid of the human world.


    Supposedly, the difficulty of advancing to be an adept meant that this peak of the pyramid should be a small minority that possessed tremendous power. However, with the massive extension to their lifespans upon advancing, the adepts had turned from a ¡®small minority¡¯ into an extremelyrge group after tens of thousands of years had passed.


    If these people remained in the World of Adepts, the world itself would have had a hard time satisfying their incredible amount of needs. Out of consideration for the long-term development of the World of Adepts, these powerful adepts all left their homeworld, both voluntarily and involuntarily. They ventured into the outer realms and created a whole new kind of world in the depths of space.


    Those who remained in the World of Adepts, truthfully speaking, were only seeds of the adept faction!


    Every hundred years, the World of Adepts had to send a new batch of fresh blood to the adept faction in the outer realms. That was how they continued to extend the adept civilization!


    ............


    Greem slowly closed the book in his hands.


    He closed his eyes and gradually reflected on his understanding of the entire adept civilization.


    He might not know much about the secrets of the ancient adepts, but it didn¡¯t stop him from observing and thinking about the development of the adept civilization from the perspective of a third party.


    It was also one way and one method by which high-grade adepts got to know themselves and the world around them.


    Trying to break through the limits of the ne and obtain thew powers of a higher grade were impossible if a higher-grade adept didn¡¯t first understand the development of the nar world, or have their path align with the origin consciousness of the world.


    Take Greem, for example!


    Since he chose fire specialization, he could only try his best to master thews of fire.


    There were two paths avable to him if he wanted to achieve this goal.


    One was spending years to research and practice, continually refining his originpatibility with thews of fire, and using time and experience to break through the threshold of thosews.


    Most creatures of the Fire Elementium ne advanced through this method.


    However, this method had both upsides and downsides.


    The upside was that whenever an adept broke through the thresholds of thesews, their power would improve rapidly, allowing them to be a member of the principle adepts. The downside was that such a process required so much time that it was depressing. It was impossible to bear through that long and painful timespan if you were not an elementium creature whocked any concept of time.


    Greem might have an extremely long lifespan now, but it was still far from the near-immortality of Elementium Creatures. Thus, the advancement method of the elementium creatures was not suitable for him.


    The second method was to use external items to shorten this process of research and experience indirectly and, thus,plete the necessary umtion of knowledge on thews of fire.


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, most high-grade adepts actively participated in nar wars. It was not only to develop and strengthen their adept faction but also to obtain those exceedingly rare ¡®nar origins.¡¯


    nar Origins were manifestations of the narws of a neworld.


    These narws were usually abstract and intangible, born from the origin consciousness of the nar world, before being woven into a massive and invisible web that covered the entire neworld and all of its substances and creatures.


    Under ordinary circumstances, all substance and life within the ne would follow thews of the ne. They would be born, grow, strengthen, age, and die in an orderly fashion. Though every rock, piece of dirt, life, and soul had their own unique features and would undergo a unique life of their own, every single one of them was in fact governed by a tight, fine web from behind the scenes.


    This web was the narws that enveloped and permeated everything and anything!


    However, these were only the usual circumstances.


    Under certain abnormal situations, the nar web of the nar worlds would also show signs of malfunction and irregrw fluctuations. These abnormalities could easily result in the unexpected deaths of millions of creatures in the world, causing damage and loss to the nar web.


    This portion of nar power that had wandered away from the web would form ¡®origin substances¡¯ when theybined with elements within the ne. These so-called ¡®origin substances¡¯ were, in truth, wondrous objects that contained the narws within them.


    If one were to obtain such an origin substance and use special methods to extract the narw powers contained within, they would be able to use it to great effect when understanding the narws.


    If a high-grade adept didn¡¯t want to fail toprehend the narws before they died, searching for such origin substances was undoubtedly a workable path of action!


    Of course, such origin substances were rare and few within a ne.


    However, nar worlds that had been severely injured and damaged due to the invasion of other species was a different story. The damage to the nar origin and the destruction of the nar web would cause the chance of origin substances appearing to increase dramatically. Some more extreme adepts would even intentionally damage the nar stability of the ne they were invading to facilitate the birth of origin substances.


    The mass deaths and extinction of nar creatures during this process was none of the adepts¡¯ concern.


    The reason the adepts werebeled as an evil faction perhaps had to do with this cruel and terrifying way of doing things!


    From what Greem understood in the Spirit Illusion Realm, anything that wasbeled with ¡®origin substance¡¯ was a Fourth Grade adept resource. Adepts below Fourth Grade did not have the wealth nor power even to get involved with such items.


    Of course, their price matched their names. Each and every one of them was shockingly expensive.


    Though Greem had the assistance of the Chip and could shorten the time required toprehend thews of fire by a hundred times, it was still impossible to finish the process without a minimum of a thousand years.


    If he had the fortune to advance to Fourth Grade, he would probably have to walk upon the difficult path of searching everywhere for fire origin substances!


    Greem thought a bit about his future before adjusting his posture on the deck chair and letting the warm sun shine upon him. His entire body was filled with ease and rxation.


    All the fighting and killing over the past few years had constantly kept his spirit in a tense state.


    This time, there were no urgent objectives he had toplete on this trip. Thus, Greem treated it as a sightseeing trip and let himself rxpletely.

 Chapter 879 - Proceeding to Molten Fire City

    Chapter 879 Proceeding to Molten Fire City


    The Skettis Region.


    The City of Oss.


    Greem got off the ship at the closest public city to Molten Fire City¨C Oss, as was agreed in the contract.


    Neither the old adept nor the young adept couple could be seen on the ship; they had probably gotten off the ship during the trip while Greem was meditating!


    Greem¡¯s massive Spirit swept across the flying ship and instantly picked up on everything happening within. In fact, even adepts who did not activate defensive forcefields could not escape his mental senses.


    Ordinary First Grade adepts did not feel his spiritual scan. Only some more spiritually sensitive Second Grade adepts could faintly detect something odd in the air. Still, even these people could not capture the source location of this Spirit.


    The adept in charge of the flying ship might have discovered something, but out of fear of the might of a Third Grade adept, he would not take any action as long as Greem didn¡¯t cross the line.


    Greem slowly walked off the flying ship on the nk along with the rest of the crowd.


    A massive and prosperous adept cityid before his eyes.


    Zhentarim, at the center of the continent, was made up of thirty-one different regions.


    The smaller regions were approximately seven to eight hundred thousand square kilometers in size, while therger ones could stretch for millions of square kilometers. Theirnd was vast and wide, their resources rich and plentiful, and their poption made up for over sixty percent of the entirety of the Continent of Adepts.


    Under such circumstances, almost every region was a whole new world of its own.


    The local rulers might still be mortal humans, but their species, skin color,nguage, and culture were vastly different from the other regions. However, under the rule and management of the adepts, thenguage of the adepts, based in the Sendtnguage, had be the officialnguage of the entire continent.


    Ordinary civilians naturally had no right nor energy to learn this uniquenguage. Only the nobles could start learning the adept¡¯s speech at a young age, cultivating their young into excellent talents in the adept civilization.


    Of course, if a child of an ordinary human family were found to possess adept talents, then this family would experience an overwhelming change.


    The local nobles would fight for the chance to sponsor this child¡¯s study at an adept¡¯s tower or academy. If the child were lucky enough to be an adept, any slight bit of reciprocation would be a brilliant opportunity for the local noble to rise to a higher power.


    It was the existence of these situations that made the local nobles willing to go to bloody war to take an apprentice with excellent talent under their wing.


    Some more influential nobles even put their children into adept academies while they were very young. If their child had a talent for magic, they could continue studying in the academy. If they didn¡¯t have the ability, they would remain there and try to socialize with as many apprentices as possible to find a suitable target for investment.


    The superior group that was the adepts was tightly linked to the massive noble system in this manner, making for an interesting and unique ecosystem seen in every region.


    Greem had just gotten off the flying ship when a luxurious and extravagant silver carriage stopped before him.


    The person who got off the carriage was a Second Grade adept in a ck robe. Pinned to the adept¡¯s chest was a fancy insignia with a ck base and red pattern.


    Judging from the design of the insignia, he came from Molten Fire City, the people who had invited him here.


    ¡°You must be Lord Fire? Lord Karak has already given me orders. I have been waiting here for you for three days. If you have no other business, Lord Karak wishes that you can arrive at Molten Fire City as soon as possible.¡±


    Greem lifted his head and looked at the City of Oss in the distance. He could only regretfully say his farewells to this city in his heart.


    ¡°I have nothing else to do. Let us set off now!¡±


    The two adepts boarded the silver carriage and rode out of thending zone. They turned onto a gray road and quickly hurried northeast under the escort of a hundred strange cavalry.


    Greem quickly scanned these riders when he got on the carriage. The attributes of these soldiers promptly appeared before him after the fine spiritual scan.


    Lizard cavalry. A select group of armed forces at intermediate First Grade. They wereposed of cave lizards and human knights.


    These lizard riders were clearly on the frailer side when it came to their physique. Though they were protected by an elegant set of chainmail on the outside, they were ill-suited to ferocious charges on the battlefield. However, there were flesh pads on the feet of the cave lizards they rode. These flesh pads could form tiny suction cups, not only allowing them to travel in absolute silence, but also allowing them to make it across most obstacles. In particr, they excelled at sprinting across narrow and rugged terrain.


    These lizard riders all carried custom-made tooth spears in their hands. The handle of the spear was only a mere three feet long, while the de itself was six feet. The edge was filled with plenty of barbs and spurs, while the tip of the de had a foot-long blood groove. They gleamed with a cold, blue light.


    Be it the chainmail or the weapons; all this equipment was enchanted. They posed a decent threat, even to adepts.


    Moreover, judging from their standard-issue armor and weapons, Molten Fire City mustmand tremendous influence around the local area. Otherwise, there was no reason they could have sustained suchrge-scale biological modifications on the lizards.


    Meanwhile, the Second Grade adept responsible for receiving Greem showed no signs of fear or hesitation when meeting with a Third Grade adept like himself. Instead, he started talking andmunicating very confidently.


    From his introduction, Greem learned more about this strange adept organization known as the Molten Fire City.


    The headquarters of Molten Fire City was located in a stretch of volcanoes in the northeast area of Skettis.


    Much like the Crimson n, they were arge organization that ruled over the entire Skettis Region.


    The lord of Molten Fire City was a Fourth Grade adept who had three deputies beneath him, all who were at Third Grade. Meanwhile, there were over two to three hundred contracted and hired adepts living in Molten Fire City.


    This organization known as Molten Fire City wasrger than the Crimson n in terms of scale alone. Moreover, the Skettis Region they ruled was a vast region with a massive area and plenty of resources, even whenpared to the entirety of Zhentarim.


    The Ailovis region that the Crimson n ruled was one of the small regions at the borders of Zhentarim. They could not possiblypare to the significantly developed Skettis Region in any aspect.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out an internal sigh when he recognized this fact.


    In all the adept wars of the past, the forces that had been devoured by the Crimson n were only small organizations. Even the Kam n was barely at the level of a mid-tier organization.


    Defeating an opponent like this had made Greem gloat to himself for a bit. Now that he had ventured out of his own territory andpared his own power to other veteran forces, the juxtaposition caused Greem to develop a sense of danger.


    There was much more to be done with regards to the development of the Crimson n!


    ............


    Molten Fire City.


    After five days of continuous travel, Greem and the party finally arrived at the border of the volcanoes.


    It was hard for ordinary carriages to travel through here. The Second Grade adept invited Greem onto a cave lizard, and they dove into a natural underground cave that had been further expanded upon.


    Compared to the dark caves that Greem had been to in the past, it was clear that this ce was highly developed.


    Though there wererge and small caves all along the way, obtrusive stctites and stgmites had been destroyed and taken away. Still, the rugged and uneven terrain made it extremely difficult for an ordinary person to travel. Only local creatures like the cave lizards could freely move through such an area with their unique abilities.


    These cave lizards could even rapidly run across the ceiling and walls when they reached especially uneven areas. It was, perhaps, the main reason why Molten Fire City had tamed and modified cave lizards on such arge scale!


    Greem could feel the temperature of the environment rapidly rise after he entered the cave.


    In fact, he could even smell the suffocating scent of sulfur through the cracks and rifts all around them.


    As a fire adept, Greem felt no disgust toward such a harsh environment; only an instinctual excitement and joy.


    The Molten Fire City had modified the formerly dark underground area. Plenty of glowstones had been installed along the way, illuminating the cave with a dark red glow. There were nearly no subterranean creatures to be seen anywhere.


    That was understandable.


    As the main entrance and exit of Molten Fire City, it was only natural they would send adepts and apprentices to clear out the underground creatures regrly. As long as no underground creatures set up home nearby, there would be norge-scale activity around the area.


    After traveling through these winding and uneven tunnels for two days, Greem and the other adept finally arrived at Molten Fire City. Of course, the organization had also set up four or five small outposts along the way. Judging from the poption, they were almost at the scale of ordinary human viges on the surface.


    Greem¡¯s group had run into at least thirty or forty merchant groups along the way.


    Their wooden chests and packs were filled with local products of Molten Fire City, from animal hides to herbs, ores, and ingots.


    Unfortunately, there was no Queyras ore.


    Greem was not surprised by this at all.


    The value of Queyras ore was far, far beyond that of ordinary magical gemstones. If they were to be carted out for sale, Molten Fire City would never hire such a simple group to be responsible for it. Thus, the merchant groups he saw were only selling and purchasing inferior byproducts dug out from the mines.


    The truly valuable Eternium and Queyras ores must have been kept in the hands of Molten Fire City. This ¡®trash¡¯ that came attached with the ores then became the precious products that the nearby human organizations would fight over.


    It seemed Greem had to properly make contact with the leaders of Molten Fire City if he wanted to obtain Queyras alloy!

 Chapter 880 - Molten Fire City

    Chapter 880 Molten Fire City


    In all seriousness, Molten Fire City was just a massive underground city built in the belly of a volcano.


    Of course, the core building here was a powerful adept¡¯s tower.


    However, unlike the rest, this adept¡¯s tower was not built upon the volcanic rock, where the foundation would be stable. Instead, it was built within the flowing magma.


    There were only a few fixed points of time during the year when the tower would be revealed as theva sea subsided. During the rest of the time, the tower would be hidden beneath the boiling and flowing magma sea, cut off from the rest of the world.


    Thus, this adept¡¯s tower became the residence of the Fourth Grade city lord!


    The other adepts of Molten Fire City¨Cthe other deputies included¨Call resided in the underground tunnels around the tower. The uneven volcanoes, winding undergroundbyrinths, and many modified voodoo beasts filled this underground world with life. Activity and movement were everywhere.


    The entirety of Molten Fire City was split into three levels. The inner core area was the adept¡¯s area.


    As the elementium concentration and activity here were shockingly high, ordinary humans could not survive in this environment for extended periods. Only adepts could live and move about in this area.


    Naturally, outside the core area was the apprentice area.


    With the istion effect of the energy barrier, the energy radiation here was much lesspared to the core. This was the ce where most apprentices lived. Be it for study, research, or their daily activities, the central area of operation for the adept apprentices was the outer circle around the core area.


    Meanwhile, outside the apprentice area were the small settlements such as viges or supply points. These ces were popted by ordinary people who provided service to the apprentices. These included hotels, inns, mercenary camps, underground ck markets, and other specialized services. Of course, the maids of these hotels were often involved in more explicit and shadier business as well.


    However, these outposts were mostly filled with fearless miners who providedbor for Molten Fire City.


    It was important to note that the main reason the Fourth Grade adept had built a massive adept¡¯s tower here was because of the impressive metal vein in the depths of this volcano. The quality of the magical metals stored here was exceedingly excellent. The number of reserves was also shocking. It turned the mines into thergest source of ie for the Molten Fire City organization.


    Of course, such a colossal metal reserve required plenty of manualbor to excavate.


    Molten Fire City spent a massive capital to construct thisrge underground city, all to gain ess to the enormous reserves of magical metals beneath their feet. Thousands of miners of various races toiled daily in theseplex, winding tunnels, putting their lives on the line for the profit of Molten Fire City.


    The more Greem understood about this city, the more impressed he became.


    The size of the poption, the scale of it, and the amount of trade alone were a hundred timesrger than the Fire Throne of Crimson n.


    Though he envied the prosperity, Greem did not harbor the extravagant hopes of one day owning such a territory.


    Almost all the high-grade resources of the World of Adepts had been divided between the major organizations and high-grade adepts. Such high-grade resources would not bring him massive magical crystal ie if they fell into his hands; it would only be perpetual war.


    Without the power to intimidate his enemies, the revtion of such resources would draw the covetous gazes of Fourth Grade adepts. Meanwhile, the Crimson n had no Fourth Grade adept of their own.


    If such resources were to fall into his hands, it would not be a fortune. It would be an affliction, so bad that it could bring about the extermination of the entire n.


    The few waves of adept wars aimed at the Crimson n a while ago appeared to have been caused by disagreements between the ns. However, the source of these conflicts was, in truth, the ne of Lance that the Crimson n held in their hands.


    It was a decent dragon ne with an inexhaustible source of dragon resources.


    Those were not resources that a newly established n should possess!


    The wealth of the Crimson n invited the hunt of a pack of multiple small and intermediate ns.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Crimson n having a fairly good foundation with several tricks up their sleeves, Greem¡¯s newly established n would have be food for the others. When that happened¨Chaving lost the power of his n and left alone¨CGreem would have had no choice but to hand over the world coordinates of Lance and bebeled as a loser. He would be theughing stock of all adepts!


    ......


    As he dwelled on his thoughts, Greem was led through the outer outposts and across the apprentice area, before finally arriving in front of an underground cave.


    A dark red barrier stood here, barring his way forward.


    The lizard riders that had escorted them reined back their mounts and stood respectfully on either side. Only Greem and the Second Grade adept walked into the barrier of light.


    It was like walking through a wall of water. There was almost no resistance.


    However, as he walked through the barrier, Greem could feel four or five scan waves of various purpose rapidly and very faintly sweep across his body. Unfortunately, these probes were all kept outside by theyer of transparent mes on Greem¡¯s body.


    It seemed the adept had received a magical message from somewhere in the distance. The other adept smiled as he bowed and said, ¡°Lord Fire, pleasee with me! Lord Karak is already waiting for you.¡±


    The meeting location was a gray underground stone hall. A Third Grade and two Second Grades were already waiting here. Smiles appeared on their faces when they saw Greem arrive.


    The Third Grade Lord Karak looked just like he did in the Spirit Illusion Realm: tall and skinny with a jade green gemstone embedded in his forehead. He was very weing to Greem.


    ¡°You must be that legendary fire adept n leader from the Ailovis Region, aren¡¯t you? So honored to meet you, Lord Greem!¡± There was a smile on Karak¡¯s face as he nodded slightly at Greem.


    The two Second Grade adepts were a pair of male and female adepts. They looked young and were secretly assessing Greem as they stood behind Adept Karak.


    Everyone who could be a high-grade adept had excellent talent and exceptional luck. Still, being able to advance to Third Grade before he was two hundred years old meant unbelievable talent.


    That was why these two Second Grade adepts of Molten Fire City couldn¡¯t help but be excited when they saw this legendary fire adept whose name had been the talk of Zhentarim for a while. In particr, the young female adept¡¯s eyes dazzled when she saw Greem¡¯s handsome look and muscr body.


    Greem wasn¡¯t at all surprised that they had managed to investigate his identity.


    He had already done some research before he came here. Molten Fire City was a famous major organization of the Center Region and was a mighty force. This much was evident from the fact that they could monopolize a vast region all for themselves.


    The Skettis Region where Molten Fire City was located was simply too far from the Crimson n. The two parties couldn¡¯t possibly have any conflicts over welfare and resources and, thus, there was a minimal possibility for any sort of unresolved resentment and hostility. Greem need not worry about his safety here.


    That was why Greem was not at all surprised or concerned when Karak revealed his identity.


    ¡°I am also very honored to be able to visit Molten Fire City. Everything here is simply so breathtaking. It is obvious that your organization¡¯s monopoly over the Skettis Region is no sheer luck.¡±


    ¡°Haha, Sir Greem, you praise us too much!¡± Adept Karak chuckled slightly, before shifting the topic of conversation, ¡°We have invited two adepts for the mission we gave out. The other adept should arrive two days from now, so I will have to bother you to stay here at our ce for that time. So, for these two days, I believe I should let Adept Freina apany you and bring you on a tour!¡±


    The Second Grade female adept standing behind Lord Karak stepped forward and smiled as she said, ¡°Lord Greem, why don¡¯t I bring you around for a bit first?¡±


    This Adept Freina had pretty looks and a fairly hot figure. Her well-cut white robe further emphasized her pale skin and thin waist. However, Greem quickly looked at her and could sense slight energy radiation on her face and body.


    It seemed her looks and figure had all been processed with magic.


    Such a situation was prevalent among low-grade adepts. After all, beauty amongst female adepts was also a resource that could be taken advantage of. However, simr situations were rarely seen among high-grade adepts. Those who could be high-grade adepts were all individuals with strong will and determination. Such female adepts were often even more potent than male adepts in many aspects. How could they possibly ever do something as lowly as to offer their body in exchange for resources!


    ¡°Thank you!¡± Greem smiled and followed Freina out of the stone hall.


    Once the sound of Greem and Freina¡¯s footsteps vanished into the depths of the tunnel, the other Second Grade male adept asked, ¡°Lord Karak, what should we do over at the mines? If Lord Greem intends to go into the mines with the mission as his excuse, should we stop him?¡±


    The tall and skinny Kara lowered his head and thought for a moment before slowly speaking, ¡°This Greem is here for the Queyras ores. As such, you must keep a close eye on Mines 2 and 3. When necessary, you can let him enter Mine 4 freely, but he must never approach Mine 2 and 3. Speaking of which, has that ming tiger been around to cause trouble over the past few days?¡±


    ¡°It hasn¡¯t attacked the mines ever since it was injured by Lord Dorian with the arrayst month. However, there have been signs of its activity around Mine 2 for thest two days. I suspect it is secretly scheming something.¡±


    ¡°Assign more people to Mine 2. We must not give it the space to break in. Thest time it broke into Mine 3, it killed far too many miners. It¡¯s already severely affected the production of eternium ore!¡±


    ¡°Understood, I will make the arrangements myself!¡±


    ¡°Mm. Do it well and make sure no incidents happen again. In addition, the sealing master we hired is arriving soon. Once all the people have arrived, we will immediately set off to capture and kill that ming tiger. Before this, you will have to find a way to track that tiger¡¯s location. It will be best if you can find out the location of its den.¡±


    ¡°This...¡± An expression of hesitance and reluctance appeared on the face of the adept. However, he quickly gritted his teeth and said, ¡°I will make sure to do so!¡±


    The two adepts left the stone hall, and the ce returned to silence once again.

 Chapter 881 - The Lava Sea

    Chapter 881 <strong>The Lava Sea</strong>


    For the next two days, Greem toured all of the public areas in Molten Fire City, apanied by the pretty Freina.


    Molten Fire City¡¯s scale was not small at all. If it had been built on the surface instead, it would have been the size of an intermediate city. However, the entire poption of the city was no more than three to four thousand people. Moreover, seventy percent of these were servants that lived in the outposts of the outer areas.


    The core area, which could sustain up to twenty or thirty thousand people, was popted by a mere two to three hundred adepts. Moreover, most adepts spent their time in the libraries and theboratories. Even on the rare asion that they emerged from their shelters, they would be upied with business. It caused the massive central area to be a ghost town, void of any life despite all the pretty gardens and parks.


    Greem could tell that Freina was lusting after him. In fact, he probably only needed to beckon with his finger, and this female adept would make her way to his bed at night.


    However, Greem was upied with his thoughts at the moment and was in no mood to y such a game with her. Thus, for the next two days, the resentment in Freina¡¯s eyes grew until it was obvious to any bystander.


    Greem honestly couldn¡¯t be bothered to care. That was because the more information he obtained, the more of a strange feeling he got.


    It was very likely that his ¡®enemy¡¯ on this trip was an acquaintance!


    When he found out from Freina that the culprit was a Third Grade ming tiger, his heart almost jumped out of his mouth. Moreover, when he saw the magical projection from Freina¡¯s monitoring crystal, he was certain that it was the Third Grade ming tiger he had smuggled over from the Fire Elementium ne¨C Cindral.


    Speaking of which, Molten Fire City was also an unexpected victim.


    They had set up plenty of arrays and adepts around the underground mine when they first excavated it, all for the sake of preventing enemies from breaking in. Above the tunnel was the adept¡¯s tower where the Fourth Grade adept resided.


    The invasion of any enemy was impossible under such strict protection.


    Yet, despite all their precautions, what they had never expected was for the enemy toe from the depths of theva sea instead of the surface.


    A Third Grade ming tiger with extremely high intelligence emerged from theva sea two years ago. It had invaded multiple mines in a row, devouring and taking with itrge amounts of metal ores. It also caused theva sea to flood into the mines and kill as many as six hundred miners.


    From then on, the Third Grade ming tiger seemed to have decided to make this ce its home. It hid in the depths of theva sea and snuck into the underground mines whenever it found the time to do so. After several of these incidents, the output of metal ores in Molten Fire City plummeted, and many of the miners they hired were injured or dead.


    As the manager of the mines, the adepts of Molten Fire City would never sit by and watch as a magical creature wreaked havoc in such a core area of their n. They had formed parties to surround and capture the ming tiger, but it had always managed to slip away through theva sea, which was everywhere around them.


    If the adepts they sent were too few or too weak, they might even invite retaliation from the ming tiger and suffer severe casualties. Send too many adepts, and the ming tiger would turn and vanish into theva sea.


    Though Molten Fire City had a few fire adepts as well, they were all at Second Grade. Sending them to search for the Third Grade ming tiger in theva sea was like throwing a meat bun at a dog. While the other adepts could manage to fight somewhat if they parted the boilingva with a magical array, they would be on a one-way trip if they went too deep into theva sea.


    Over the past few months, the adepts of Molten Fire City had to set aside their work and stand guard near the underground mines. It was a terrible affair that upied everyone¡¯s time.


    They had no choice but to put out a high-grade mission to the outside world in hopes of recruiting a sufficiently powerful fire adept to capture and kill the tiger. Of course, concerned that a single Third Grade fire adept would be insufficient to deal with the ming tiger, Molten Fire City also hired a Third Grade sealing master.


    A Third Grade fire adept, a Third Grade sealing master, and a Third Grade from Molten Fire City. A force like this should be more than enough to exterminate that Third Grade ming tiger!


    After gaining an understanding of the situation, Greem couldn¡¯t help but request that Freina bring him to the mines for a look.


    Freina hesitated for a moment and requested permission from Lord Karak with a magical message. It was then that she brought Greem toward the tunnels deep underground.


    After winding about the tunnels for half an hour, Greem could very clearly feel the concentration of fire elementium rise dramatically. The smell of sulfur in the air also became thicker.


    Finally, in a vast underground stone hall, Greem saw the crowd that he had not seen above.


    Here was a ce that had to be passed by before making your way to the mines. The stone hall was packed with ves of various races, their legs shackled together with tattered pieces of cloth the only thing covering their lower bodies.


    They all had muscr bodies and tan skin. Their naked upper bodies were covered with grime and whip marks. They might be tall and ferocious, but their eyes were filled with numbness and sufferance as they formed queues to pick up their tools to venture into the mines again.


    On the other side, there was a group of ves that had just emerged from the mines.


    They all carried wooden baskets on their backs, each one as tall as themselves, filled to the brim with ck ore. The surface of the ores reflected the light of the glowstones, making them gleam with brilliant and beautiful color.


    These were all rough, unprocessed ores. Though the metal content in these ores was fairly high, it was hard to tell what the primary metal content was without further crushing and filtering.


    The ones responsible for examining, weighing, and recording the mined ores were all adept apprentices. Arge group of human mercenaries gathered around them. They were responsible for the order in this underground hall. Meanwhile, the two adepts stationed here were lying on wooden chairs at a side of the hall. They were drinking tea while joyously talking about something.


    Naturally, the pathway used by the ve miners and subordinate mercenaries was a separate and distinct one. The one that Freina brought Greem through was a tunnel that only adepts had ess to.


    The two First Grade adepts hurriedly stood up, went over, and bowed in respect when they saw Adept Freina arrive.


    ¡°The beast hasn¡¯te here to make trouble over thest few days, has it?¡± Freina might act like a clingy little bird in front of Greem, but she carried herself with plenty of dignity and authority in front of these low-grade adepts.


    ¡°No, no, not at all.¡±


    ¡°Then open the tunnels. This esteemed guest of ours and I are going into theva sea to take a look!¡±


    ¡°Yes, madam!¡±


    With Freina leading the way, the two stationed adepts had no objections whatsoever.


    Under their lead, Greem and Freina dove into a barren tunnel. They took a few turns and arrived at a stone wall, smooth as a mirror.


    The two stationed adepts both took out a strange magic wand and pointed at the center of the wall in unison. A peculiar magical flux shimmered across the wall, and a massive stone door appeared in the center of the gray stone wall. The stone door silently slid apart, revealing the crimsonva flowing beyond the light barrier.


    A barrier had risen here the moment the doors opened, keeping theva outside.


    Even so, the temperature of the tunnel rose rapidly, quickly reaching over a hundred degrees.


    An ordinary human would probably be fully cooked in three to five seconds if they stayed in an environment like this. Even the two posted adepts couldn¡¯t help but start wiping away the sweat on their foreheads.


    Greem¡¯s eyes swept across theva, and the Chip scanned the crimsonva sea that filled the world beyond the barrier.


    ¡°The environment in theva sea is a bit moreplicated. I will apany you inside!¡± Freina smiled as she said.


    Greem shook his head and said, ¡°I won¡¯t be going far. I will just take a look at the environment nearby. It will give me more confidence in the battle toe.¡±


    Having said that, he spared the courtesies and strode toward the light barrier. A scarlet magical barrier suddenly appeared around him before he slowly passed through the wall and entered theva sea.


    Theva sea might seem static, but its viscous liquid was continually flowing. It was only because the entire space was filled with boilingva that it gave people the illusion that it was unmoving.


    Greem had just passed through the light barrier, and the barrier around him immediately sustained a crushing force of over five hundred kilograms. The sizzlingva was pressing toward the center of the sea. Naturally, Greem had to endure this strange force as well now that he was in the sea.


    He hesitated for a moment before slowly retracting the barrier back into himself. The boilingva around him instantly pressed down and enveloped him.


    The boilingva made contact with his warm skin, but it did not sizzle; instead, warm surges of energy coursed through Greem¡¯s body. It was such afortable sensation that he almost moaned.


    If he were still Second Grade, he might have been able to endure the extreme heat, but he would never have been able to endure the terrifying pressure. Now that he had advanced to Third Grade, his body¡¯s affinity for fire elementium had reached an extremely high level. Not only did he feel no pressure while immersed in this sea ofva, he felt as free as a fish in water.


    However, Greem still had to separate a portion of the fire energy within him to protect his robes. Though he could endure the extreme heat, his clothes could not.


    He would have to protect his clothes with fire energy if he didn¡¯t want to run about naked!


    Other adepts might find traveling through theva sea a difficult matter, but there was no such problem for a fire adept.


    Greem chuckled as his entire body immediately dispersed, turning into a humanoid cluster of fire as he traveled through theva. Greem dashed about the depths ofva with me jets of various angles, moving at speed several times that of his flight in the air.


    For a fire adept, fire was truly their home field!

 Chapter 882 - Old Acquaintances

    Chapter 882 Old Acquaintances


    Greem returned to the underground tunnel after two hours in theva sea.


    Moreover, it was obvious that these two hours of investigation had not exhausted too much of his power.


    Freina expressed genuine marvel at this.


    With her intermediate Second Grade powers, she could barely remain in theva sea for fifteen minutes. The few Third Grade adepts of Molten Fire City might be able tost longer, but they too could only barely survive in theva sea. They wouldn¡¯t be able to use ten percent of their power if they were to run into the Third Grade ming tiger in that unique environment.


    Low-Grade resistance potions did fine against ordinary me environments, but they were inadequate against an entire sea of flowing magma and a viciously sly ming tiger.


    If it wasn¡¯t for this, the dominant Molten Fire City would never have exposed their weakness and went to the outside world for help.


    Thus, Freina was genuinely d when she saw how free and easily Greem moved through theva sea.


    ¡°I have a basic understanding of the environment here now; let us return!¡± Greem looked very rxed, causing smiles to appear on the faces of the Molten Fire City adepts as well.


    The two stationed adepts hastily waved their special wands and sealed the entrance to theva sea once again.


    When Greem partedpany with Freina, he turned and nced at the slowly closing stone doors. A faint but meaningful smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.


    ............


    In the depths of theva sea.


    The flowing magma was as viscous as jelly. Ordinary adepts would have difficulty passing through this area, even if they had full fire immunity.


    Real fire creatures all had their own unique way of moving through such areas!


    Theva sea returned to peace and quiet once Greem left. Theva continued coursing ahead ording to its usual pattern. The speed was not as fast or ferocious as rivers on the surface, but the flow of theva was just as unstoppable.


    A strange, red, glowing gemstone slowly rolled about along with this stream ofva.


    When the preset time had arrived, a single red dot glowed on the surface of the intricately carved gemstone. This red dot appeared to be insignificant in the bright, crimson sea ofva, but the red point of light quickly spread throughout the entire jewel.


    The elementium gemstone wildly absorbed the nearly solid fire elementium around it and quickly formed a two-meter tall fire humanoid. Asrge amounts of fire elementium filled the interior of the fire humanoid, a new ¡®Greem¡¯ was born in the depths of theva sea!


    It was a new fire spell containing some basic functions of the Chip, formed with a magical golem core as a base, andbined with Soul Repose as well as a projection spell¨C Fire Clone.


    The fire clone avoided the runic arrays attached around the underground tunnels with the help of the elementium ripples of theva sea. It quickly swam away into the depths of the sea once it was fully formed.


    As this technique was still not fully developed, the fire clone only had the strength of a beginner Second Grade. It might not be suited as an assistant, but it was more than enough as a scout and ¡®messenger.¡¯


    As a pure fire creature, the clone was able to move freely in theva sea despite being only Second Grade. Moreover, it transmitted a message to its surroundings with the unique elementiumnguage of fire creatures as it probed deeper into theva sea.


    Cindral...Cindral...Cindral...


    It wasn¡¯t a loud voice nor a resounding one, but it could travel very far through the ubiquitous fire elementium here.


    All the way until the strange voice was picked up by a certain strange existence.


    It was a giant magma rock the size of a hill.


    Theva sea hadpletely eroded the soft dirt and stone on the surface. All that was left was therge metallic ores that even the high heat of theva could not melt away. From a distance, the surface of the rock was very uneven, filled with honeb-like holes everywhere. The surface gleamed with a metallic shine.


    It was the existence of these strange metals that prevented theva sea from further destroying the stone, allowing it to exist in its current form in this terrifying environment.


    Yet, at this moment, a strange, three-meter long fire tiger engulfed by raging mes was crouching in a small den carved out within the rock. Its eyes were shut as it enjoyed its sweet sleep. All sorts of metal ores of various sizes and shapes were spread out in the cave around him, along with many more magical gemstones.


    There was a purple-red metal ore visible in the ming tiger¡¯s stomach through its semi-translucent body. A brilliant crimson fire enveloped the metal ore. The ming tiger would absorb the molten liquid from the ore and assimte it into its own body.


    If Greem were here, he would be surprised to find that the tiger¡¯s aura grew stronger as the purple-gold liquid slowly merged with the tiger¡¯s body.


    However, this increase in its aura was extremely slow. Greem would probably never realize without the help of the nano-scanning ability of the Chip in his mind.


    The increase in power might be slow, but it was guaranteed.


    If this ming tiger had enough time and enough of the purple-golden ore, it might just be able to increase its power to peak Third Grade through this method.


    That was already very shocking!


    Over the past two years, ever since he had realized that the mines contained the eternium ore that he required, Cindral had stayed here, refusing to leave. Every so often, he would run over to the human¡¯s outpost and take some of the stuff he needed.


    Unfortunately, eternium ore was also something that the adepts needed badly. Though Cindral had managed to obtain quite a lot of metal ores during his raids, there were very few of the eternium ores that he so badly needed.


    Cindral had no choice but to excavate a hidden den near the human outpost and start a gueri war against the human adepts.


    Yet today, while Cindral was pleasantly absorbing the molten eternium liquid, an unknown elementium flux scanned across his body.


    Cindral...Cindral...


    Cindral stood up abruptly, his ming face filled with an expression of disbelief.


    Why...why does it seem like someone¡¯s calling my name from outside?


    Could it be a conspiracy of the human adepts?


    But how did they know my name? Was an environment as harsh as theva sea insufficient to prevent the divination spells of the human adepts?


    Cindral was suspicious and surprised, but he had no intention to stay here any longer.


    As the fire roiled, Cindral slipped out of the den silently and slowly moved toward the source of the strange elementium flux in a roundabout manner.


    This feeling...why did it seem familiar?


    ............


    Inside theva sea.


    Greem¡¯s fire clone quickly traveled through theva, constantly stirring theva and transmitting his message through the medium, letting it spread out through the massiveva sea.


    It had already been an hour, and he had still found nothing.


    Oh? Could the ming tiger have hidden somewhere even further?


    The fire clone frowned and turned to continue spreading its voice in a different direction.


    However, just as the fire clone turned, Greem was shocked to find a giant ming tiger of pure mes standing behind him, sizing him up with curious eyes of golden fire.


    They were so close to each other that they could hear each others¡¯ breathing.


    The sulfuric mes exhaled from the tiger¡¯s nostrils was so hot that they could almost ignite the skin of the fire clone.


    ¡°We know each other?¡± ming tiger Cindral asked curiously.


    He was indeed very curious.


    This fire humanoid gave him a faint sense of familiarity, but the method used to solidify its form was very advanced. It was difficult to sense the mental flux hidden within the humanoid without first destroying the humanoid itself.


    Cindral only seemed to know one adept in the World of Adepts, but that person was just a Second Grade adept. He couldn¡¯t possibly create a clone and travel so far just to find himself!


    While Cindral was stunned in suspicion, the face of the fire clone shimmered and turned into Greem¡¯s face.


    ¡°Cindral, we¡¯ve only been apart a few years, yet you¡¯ve forgotten me?¡±


    ¡°I knew it was you!¡± Cindral paused for a moment before lifting his snout and started sniffing about the fire clone. He then said with utter shock, ¡°You...you advanced?¡±


    ¡°Thanks to you, Cindral, my travel to the Fire Elementium ne was incredibly bountiful. I only just advanced to Third Grade a few years ago!¡±


    ¡°You won your bounty with your own ability; no need to pin it on me.¡± Cindral¡¯s golden eyes suddenly shone, ¡°You came here this time because the adepts at the outpost above invited you?¡±


    ¡°Indeed!¡±


    ¡°Then what do you intend to do? Help them deal with me?¡± Cindral betrayed a fierce and savage expression when it said this.


    ¡°Do you think I would have sent my clone here if I wanted to deal with you?¡± An amused expression appeared on Greem¡¯s face.


    This ming tiger might be smart and sly, but his personality was just as straightforward as the other elementium creatures. He didn¡¯t overthink like the human adepts tended to.


    ¡°Then what are you here for?¡± Cindral couldn¡¯t help but be confused now.


    ¡°Before we start negotiating, I think its best we figure out what we want out of this. May I know what Lord Cindral has been staying here for?¡±


    Cindral hesitated for a moment.


    He sensed no hostility from Greem. After a bit of hesitation, he told the truth.


    ¡°I need the eternium ores here!¡±


    An enchanting smile immediately appeared on Greem¡¯s face when he got this answer.


    ¡°Good. Very good.¡±


    ¡°What is good?¡±


    ¡°Our goals aren¡¯t in conflict, because what I need here is Queyras ore.¡±


    The ming tiger probed, ¡°You mean we can work together?¡±


    ¡°We must! Perhaps we cane up with a brilliant n that benefits both of us if we carefully discuss the matter.¡±

 Chapter 883 - Secret Battle

    Chapter 883 Secret Battle


    Inside Molten Fire City.


    A small wee banquet was well underway.


    Greem and the newly arrived sealing master were undoubtedly the stars of tonight¡¯s banquet. They were weed warmly by the leaders of Molten Fire City.


    Unlike the banquets of the past, this weing banquet was held in a massive stone hall. The ones participating in the feast were all adepts of Second and Third Grade.


    The three deputies of Molten Fire City had all attended the banquet as well, though one of them was clearly a body created with a projection spell.


    Karak.


    Male, Third Grade, Elementium Adept (Poison).


    Tall and skinny, a jade green gemstone embedded in his forehead.


    Lynas.


    Male, Third Grade, Body-Refining Adept.


    A bald and muscr man with a giant golden sword on his back,


    Dorian.


    Male, Third Grade, Array Master.


    He had a sinister face, and his exposed skin was covered in colorful and strange patterns.


    Adept Lynas was not personally present at the Molten Fire City. He was only attending the banquet with a body formed by a projection spell.


    Meanwhile, the Third Grade sealing master that had hurried over from the Asia Region in the south was a middle-aged witch with an expressionless and sinister face. She had nted eyes, a broad nose, and was simply ugly; it caught Greem by surprise.


    It was important to note that neither organ transntation or limb regeneration was a difficult matter for adepts with their knowledge and techniques. Altering your own body and appearance was child¡¯s ypared to that. Anyone could do it.


    That was why Greem had never seen an especially ugly individual among all the adepts he had seen up until now.


    Only those whose bodies had been severely corrupted or polluted by magic and had their soul origin damaged would have horrible and disfigured appearances.


    Moreover, Greem sensed no sign of artificial magical construction on this Third Grade sealing master.


    That meant her current appearance was her original appearance.


    However, Greem had no prejudice against this. After all, there were far too many unique characters among the adepts. In truth, people like here were usually horrifyingly powerful.


    After all, it meant that all her achievements to date had been obtained by her own diligence and power, without any opportunistic behavior.


    p, p, p.


    Adept Karak pped his hands together a few times, and all the adepts in the hall fell silent and looked toward him.


    ¡°Today, we have the honor of inviting the legendary Adept Greem from Ailovis and the powerful Adept Yunid from Asia. Let us wee them with our warmest apuse!¡±


    Thunderous apuse instantly rang out throughout the hall.


    Greem stepped forward with a smile and looked around. He then lifted his winess and drank all of the liquid before stepping back.


    There was no smile on Yunid¡¯s face. She lifted her ss and brought it to her mouth slightly.


    There were as many as two or three dozen Second Grade adepts from Molten Fire City in the hall. They were all silently assessing these two Third Grade adepts with expressions of surprise and curiosity. In particr, their gazes hung around the legendary fire adept Greem for the longest period of time.


    Though the Ailovis Region was hundreds of thousands of kilometers away from Molten Fire City, news of Greem killing a Third Grade adept in arenabat as a Second Grade himself had reached them as well.


    To be utterly honest, at this very moment, the name of this Third Grade legendary fire adept might even be more widespread than the names of some Fourth Grade adepts!


    Now that this person had advanced to Third Grade, how powerful was he exactly?


    Many of the adepts in the banquet were extremely curious and couldn¡¯t wait to find out.


    However, no one dared to break courtesy during such an event to walk forward to ask a brazen question like that. As such, the adepts could only keep their curiosity to themselves and wait to see Greem demonstrate his power in the future.


    High-grade adept gatherings were always more straightforward and directpared to low-grade adepts.


    They could all return to their own matters after some simple introductions and conversation.


    Some adepts who were hung up on their experiments or had specific duties in Molten Fire City silently left the hall. Meanwhile, Greem and Yunid entered a more hidden and quiet room under Adept Karak¡¯s invitation.


    Here, Adept Dorian gave them aprehensive and detailed introduction on the ming tiger.


    Adept Karak couldn¡¯t help but turn toward Greem when Adept Dorian was done with his report.


    ¡°Sir Greem, you went into theva sea yesterday. Do you think the ce is suited to be our battlefield?¡±


    Greem narrowed his eyes and thought for a moment before shaking his head lightly.


    ¡°The internal temperature of theva sea Adept Freina brought me to is over 3,400 degrees. The pressure of theva is also over 212 points. I have no problem moving in there, but anyone else, even the few of you here, won¡¯t be able tost more than an hour.¡±


    The three Molten Fire deputies exchanged looks when they heard Greem¡¯s words.


    ¡°We also came up with a hunting n after recruiting the two of you.¡± Karak slowly said.


    ¡°Oh? Why don¡¯t you tell us about it!¡± Yunid¡¯s sharp voice rang out.


    ¡°We intend to set up a trap near the underground mines and lure the ming tiger into the trap. Once the tiger has entered the trap, Lord Dorian will use the runic arrays hidden in the mines to expel all fire powers within one kilometer. When that happens, Miss Yunid can take the opportunity to seal it.¡±


    ¡°Then what will I do?¡± Greem asked with a frown.


    ¡°Of course, you will have to hide in theva sea ahead of time. Once the ming tiger has walked into the trap, we will be responsible for capturing the tiger. You need to obstruct its escape path. We must not let the ming tiger escape into theva sea again!¡±


    Greem frowned again.


    As the person responsible for the operation, Karak had arranged for all the deputies to be together, such that they could protect each other. Yunid was also hidden in the shadows and only needed toe out when the ming tiger had nowhere else to run. This way, it seemed like all the risk was ced on him.


    Once the ming tiger had entered the trap, it would most definitely fight with all of its power to escape back into theva sea.


    He was the one who had to put his finger in the gun barrel. Hehehe, what a good mission!


    Greem caressed his chin and chuckled coldly, his face full of dissatisfaction.


    ¡°Sir Greem, if the mission is a sess, we can make the decision and add a hundred kilograms of Queyras ore to the mission reward.¡±


    A hundred kilograms of Queyras ore? If it was refined into Queyras alloy, it probably wouldn¡¯t even be enough for half a space furnace, much less the expensive magic generator furnace.


    Greem finally stopped smiling and spoke with a serious tone: ¡°Lord Karak, that is a Third Grade ming tiger! Push a tiger into a dead end, and it will retaliate with all it has. I¡¯m afraid I will have a tough time dealing with the tiger alone. I cannot bear the crime of letting it escape if it does manage to do so!¡±


    Karak finally betrayed an awkward expression. He turned around and had a simple discussion with the other two deputies before finally turning toward Greem again.


    ¡°How about this......we of Molten Fire City will assign two Second Grade fire adepts to you. They will listen to all your orders. If the mission is a sess, we...we will be willing to pay you one hundred and seventy kilograms of Queyras ore!¡±


    At this point, Greem knew that this was their psychological bottom line. He had no choice but to nod and agree to the offer reluctantly.


    ¡°The operation will be set for two from now. Lord Dorian will arrange the runic arrays as soon as possible. Once the trap is set, we will act ording to the n and hope that the tiger falls for it.¡±


    ............


    Inside Cindral¡¯s den.


    The adepts were secretly discussing the details of their n in the distant city. Lord Karak probably never expected everything in the room to be projected to these two through the soul brand of the fire clone.


    Cindral crouched on the pile of metal ores, watching the projection of the fire clone intently and listening to all the things that the adepts were saying.


    Though he was confident in its fire powers, Cindral still felt fear creep up his heart when he heard of the arrangements of the adepts.


    If...if he didn¡¯t know about all this and was lured into the trap with ore as bait, the chances of escaping the attacks of five Third Grade adepts was nearly zero!


    Those weren¡¯t five cabbages; they were five Third Grade adepts!


    In all honesty, just the array master alone had managed to wound Cindralst time through the use of his strange magical abilities.


    It horrified Cindral, who had always looked down upon the human adepts.


    He had no choice but to admit that though the human adepts were far inferior to the powerful elementium creatures when it came to their Physique and control of elementium powers, they were far, far ahead of elementium creatures in terms ofbat techniques and schemes.


    Even this fearless tiger couldn¡¯t help but want to run when he heard of this sinister n.


    ¡°You heard it as well. Those bastards are nning toy down such a terrifying trap in the mines. I think we should cancel our ns for operation for the moment! I...I can run off elsewhere and y for a few years. I will juste back once they¡¯ve run out of patience!¡± Cindral said with some hesitation.


    The fire clone was speechless when he heard these dejected wordse out from his ally¡¯s mouth.


    Still, at least he had a new understanding of how difficult dealing with fire creatures could be!


    In all sincerity, Cindral¡¯s n was the simplest way to deal with the problem, but also one that made Greem speechless. Still, it was not to Greem¡¯s benefit, and thus, he had no choice but to refute the idea.


    ¡°Cindral, do you not believe in my mind? Don¡¯t worry; I wille up with the perfect n and make their operation go in vain. Meanwhile, we can find ourselves a bountiful harvest and leave immediately after!¡± Greem could only use his oratorical skills and try his best to persuade this sly ming tiger.


    ¡°Your n better be as good as your speaking skills, otherwise don¡¯t even think of having me go to the mine to deliver myself to death!¡±

 Chapter 884 - The Flaming Tiger Appears

    Chapter 884 <strong>The ming Tiger Appears</strong>


    Two dayster.


    Greem silently assessed the flowing crimson light pouring through the light barrier at the entrance to theva sea. He seemed to be able to faintly hear the rumbling of the coursingva beyond the boundary.


    ¡°Lord Greem, we will be counting on your protection during this operation!¡±


    The two Second Grade fire adepts sent by Molten Fire City were actually a pair of siblings: a brother and sister. The slightly older brother had a serious expression on his face and gave Greem a simple introduction on him and his sister. Meanwhile, the sister remained silent throughout, walking closely behind her brother as he and Greem talked.


    However, judging from the looks she was sneaking at Greem, her personality was fairly lively. Her looks were somewhat decent as well.


    ¡°Mm, we will act ording to the circumstances.¡± Greem replied and stepped into the light barrier first.


    These two Second Grade siblings didn¡¯t dare walk into theva sea as simply as Greem had just had. Instead, they quickly chanted and cast some spells. It was only after applying a series of elementium halos and drinking a bunch of spirit regenerating potions that they dared to cross through the barrier carefully.


    If First Grade adepts were beginners that had just peeked into the hall of truth, then Second Grade adepts were truth seekers that had fully taken the first step.


    Thisva sea in front of them was already three hundred meters below the surface; ordinary adepts would have trouble surviving here. Although these two fire adept siblings could endure the mes and intenseva pressure here, they were exhausting their powers at every moment.


    They were far less casual and rxedpared to Greem¡¯s performance.


    Those who could be fire adepts had all naturallypleted their body elementiumization.


    Three nearlypletely transparent me humanoids looked at each other in the dark redva as they silently dove toward the position they had agreed upon ahead of time.


    The underground mines of Molten Fire City had all been fortified with countless defensive arrays to preventva from breaching it. Unfortunately, many of these arrays had been damaged by the Third Grade ming tiger, causing the mine to suffer immense losses.


    Though theva within these tunnels had been drained, and the defensive arrays had been repaired, the entirety of the mine¡¯s defensive system was now in shambles and pieces. They were no longer one continuous entity as they had been before.


    This time, the array master of Molten Fire City took advantage of this w in the system. He specifically left a seemingly unintentional gap in the defense system of the mine to lure the ming tiger into the trap.


    However, a trap like this couldn¡¯t be too expresslyid out. Whether the ming tiger would take the bait, and when, was unknown to anybody!


    Greem and the Molten Fire City fire adepts¡¯ mission was to hide in the depths of theva sea and rush out to seal off the tiger¡¯s exit path once it had entered the mine.


    It was a simple n in theory, but challenging to execute in reality. The two fire adept siblings followed closely behind Greem, nervous and anxious.


    Naturally, as Second Grade fire adepts, the power of the siblings was immense. Their ability to hide their tracks was also astounding after they had transformed into their me humanoid forms.


    However, they couldn¡¯t help but be impressed when they paid attention to the Third Grade legendary fire adept, ¡°Truly, a legendary fire adept.¡±


    Even though they were so close to him, they couldn¡¯t sense any distinction between the mes that Greem had turned into and the mes in theva around them.


    Greem slowly walked through theva as if he was just another cluster of burning fire that could be seen anywhere in the molten sea. If it weren¡¯t for being able to see Greem¡¯s existence physically, they would not even be able to distinguish Greem from the background mes.


    The three adepts traveled quickly through theva sea and soon arrived at the predetermined location.


    A three-meter wide, five-meter tall spindle-shaped runic rock was floating in theva here, slowly moving around. The runic stone sensed the arrival of the adepts, and the strange runes carved upon it lit up in session, flickering with an inconsistent glow.


    The female fire adept stepped forward and pressed her translucent palm against the elementium barrier created by the runic stone. She chanted a series of words, and the rock trembled lightly. The elementium barrier parted slightly as a small door appeared on the surface of the solid rock.


    The three of them hesitated no longer and quickly went into the door.


    The space inside the stone was not significant to being with. Now, it appeared crowded when three adepts were stuffed in it.


    Once the entrance to the stone had closed, the three adepts sat down and barely had enough space for everyone. However, any slight movements they made would unavoidably cause some limb contact.


    The runic stone was a part of the security system set up in theva sea to monitor for activity around the mines. The ming tiger would not be able to avoid passing by this stone if it wanted to enter them.


    The three of them were safe while they hid here.


    To avoid awkwardness, the fire adept siblings shut their eyes and silently rested as they waited for a message from off in the distance. Greem looked around him and assessed the runic stone he was in.


    The inside of the stone was not empty. The walls around Greem were carved full of strange runes and magical inscriptions.


    Greem could see that some of these were energy-storage runes, while others were energy-absorption runes, defensive arrays, or rm runes. Though he didn¡¯t really understand the mechanism of the runic stone, he could still learn a lot through these arrays carved within it.


    As a part of the security system, the runic stone was too predictable and straightforward alone. It was difficult to stop the enemy from sneaking past it through various means. That was why the runic stone here usually had an adept stationed within it.


    With the tireless scans of the runic stone and the powerful spiritual scans of the stationed adept, ordinary enemies would have an incredibly difficult time trying to sneak into the mines without being discovered!


    Greem could sense the arrays carved on the walls of the stone continually resonating with the two Second Grade adepts. The stone and the adepts aided each other, their aura and powers merging and improving their spiritual senses by leaps and bounds.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask, ¡°Was this runic stone purchased or something that your organization created on your own?¡±


    The siblings opened their eyes and looked at Greem curiously.


    In the end, the brother was the one that spoke.


    ¡°The basic knowledge on the runic stone was purchased from the Silver Union, but I believe Lord Dorian was the one who personally created it! ording to my knowledge, most adept organizations create stuff in this manner. After all, our own security and defensive system can¡¯t be left in the hands of others. It¡¯s safer to create it ourselves.¡±


    Greem nodded and once again shut his eyes and fell silent.


    The siblings looked at each other and could only shrug. They once again returned their attention to the scanning of theva sea around them.


    However, they didn¡¯t remain quiet for long. The female fire adept suddenly opened her eyes and said with a surprised voice, ¡°There¡¯s movement at the mines! The ming tiger seems to be destroying the walls of the mines.¡±


    Greem opened his eyes, and an expression of thought appeared on his face.


    ............


    At this moment, a ming tiger was furiously destroying the stone walls outside the underground mines.


    Unlike the stone in other regions, the stone walls around the mines showed no signs of melting or disintegration, despite being soaked in terrifyingva. Arge amount of metal mixed within it caused the volcanic rock here to be as tough as steel. It was also capable of resisting prolonged heat conditions, making it extremely difficult to destroy.


    However, the tiger didn¡¯t seem to mind.


    He stood in the flowingva, waving his ws formed of mes and smashed them again and again upon the steel-like walls.


    As powerful as the Molten Fire adepts were, they could not protect the entirety of the mine and its dozens of kilometers of tunnels with runic arrays. That was why the runic arrays were mostly concentrated around the weak points of the mines, as well as its entrances and exits.


    However, today, the ming tiger that had been missing for so long went the other way. He did not try to sneak into the mine and instead chose to dig furiously at a spot in the mine where the adepts couldn¡¯t defend.


    The molten eternium he had absorbed over the past few months had caused his elementiumized body to appear somewhat different. The sharp ming ws made of pure fire not only contained tremendous power whenever they struck, but also caused ferocious winds to ravage across theva, demonstrating their horrifying physical power.


    A single w would cause a half-meter deep crater to appear on the sturdy wall, and the bottom of the hole would be filled with terrifying cracks. The ming tiger continued to dig without any stop, w after w. Soon, he had dug out a massive pit that was seven or eight meters deep.


    If he kept digging at his current speed, he would only need half a day to dig through another three dozen meters of rock and enter the tunnel.


    That was clearly beyond the expectations of the Molten Fire City higher-ups. Even the Third Grade adepts behind the scenes could no longer sit still.


    Two of the Third Grade adepts appeared simultaneously in theva sea with an intense magical flux.


    Unlike Greem¡¯s transformation into an elementium form to merge with theva, the two Third Grade adepts were a poison adept and an array master respectively. They were not suited forbat in theva sea.


    However, now that the plot had swerved away from their expectations, and the tiger had not entered the trap, the two of them could only reluctantly strike out and hope to draw the tiger into the trap.


    Adept Karak and Adept Dorian stood in a giant rolling stone, pushing away all theva in their way as they charged toward the tiger.


    The two forces immediately broke out into a deathmatch outside the mines.


    Rather than a fight, it was more the two adepts defending and trying their best to fend off the countless attacks from the Third Grade ming tiger.


    The power of the tiger, while he was in theva sea, was shockingly high.


    His three-meter body flickered about the stone ball, vanishing and reappearing. Every time he appeared, the tiger would be apanied by a loud roar and ferocious w attacks, causing the earth elementium on the stone¡¯s surface to tremble uncontrobly.

 Chapter 885 - Battle Under the Sea

    Chapter 885 Battle Under the Sea


    As Third Grade adepts, how could they not retaliate when attacked?!


    Adept Karak waved his hand, and a giant ball of poison shot toward the ming tiger.


    The ming tiger roared and leaped, vanishing from the spot instantly. When he once again appeared, the tiger was on the other side of the stone ball. The tiger continued his attacks.


    The ball of poison instantly erupted in theva sea upon missing its target, staining all theva within a hundred meters ck. If this were onnd, any nts and creatures within a hundred meters would have died to the poison. Even tiny microbes and bacteria would have trouble surviving it.


    Unfortunately, they were currently three hundred meters below ground in a massive sea ofva. The might of the poison was tremendous, but it was also severely limited by the harsh environment here.


    The poison halo that would typicallyst for half a month vanished from the tide ofva after just ten seconds. The poison cloud formed from the spell also couldn¡¯t spread out and simply dispersed.


    Adept Dorian lifted his staff and repeatedly pointed it at the tiger.


    Every time the staff tapped the ground, a radiant runic array would appear beneath the ming tiger.


    Unfortunately, the Third Grade ming tiger would get out of the way with his immense strength and agile movements before the runic arrays couldpletely unleash their binding effects.


    Adept Dorian immediately went all out. The tip of his staff glowed brilliantly as several arrays with various functions whipped toward the tiger, likessos. If the tiger failed to dodge any single one of those arrays, he would be bound to the spot by the rain of arrays that followed.


    That would then create the perfect opportunity for Adept Karak¡¯s poison attacks!


    Sadly, the tiger was not only iparably sly but also exceptionally sensitive to energy fluctuations.


    He would rapidly change positions if he picked up any slight abnormality in the elementium around him. He would never give his opponent the chance to bind him. Meanwhile, the two Third Grade adepts¡¯ attacks barely reached the tiger. The spells were having a difficult time taking effect on the beast through the flowingva.


    The three Third Grades traveled through theva sea as they fought, repeatedly switching positions and forcefully turning the sea into a chaotic storm ofva.


    The location where they fought was more than two kilometers away from the runic stone where Greem and the two siblings were hiding. As such, the three of them had a hard time getting a proper sense of the situation on the battlefield. They only had a rough understanding of how the battle was going through the simple messages that the Third Grade adepts were sending them.


    Back in the battle, Karak and Dorian, who were turtling within the transparent stone ball, were almost going mad with anger!


    The ming tiger was sly beyond their imagination.


    If the two of them lunged forward to fight the tiger, he would jump at them and take on the fight. If the two of them retreated as they fought in an attempt to lure the tiger into the array traps, then he would just leave and continue digging a hole in the wall.


    After two to three attempts, the stone ball the two adepts were hiding in was at its limits, even though the two of them could still continue fighting.


    After all, Karak and Dorian were a poison adept and an array master, respectively; neither of them was an earth adept. This stone ball was something they had summoned with a piece of magical equipment.


    If the ball was to shatter, they would lose their protective equipment and could only fight with the tiger while pushing apart theva around them. The situation they were in would only get worse.


    If the battlefield shifted to the surface, the two higher-ups of Molten Fire City would not fear any enemy. However, in this unbearable environment, their spells could not be unleashed to their full effect.


    That was why the two Third Grade adepts had immense trouble suppressing that ursed Third Grade ming tiger no matter how hard they tried!


    Finally, Karak had no choice left and could only send the signal for Greem to participate in the battle.


    Inside the runic stone.


    The two siblings opened their eyes at the same time and said to Greem with a low voice, ¡°Lord Greem, Lord Karak has requested that you join the battle!¡±


    Greem feigned surprise and said, ¡°This seems to be different from the original n, isn¡¯t it? The trap hasn¡¯t been sprung yet. If I were to join the battle now and scare the tiger away...¡±


    The brother said with a bitter smile, ¡°Lord Karak has already noted that the n can no longer be carried out. We can only chase away the tiger before we formte a new n. We will find another opportunity to discuss how to deal with the tiger after this!¡±


    Now that this had been said, Greem had no reason to refuse to help. He immediately turned into a cluster of mes, slipping out of the gaps in the runic stone and hurrying toward the battlefield.


    Two and a half kilometers of distance was no more than a dozen seconds worth of traveling for a Third Grade adept.


    The tiger that had been fighting with the two adepts suddenly stopped and lifted his head. His eyes stared deep into theva sea as if he had sensed the arrival of a powerful enemy.


    The two Third Grade adepts knew what wasing and would never let the ming tiger leave. They immediately used their most potent spells to keep the tiger rooted.


    The stone ball trembled intensely and finally fell apart.


    A magic ring on Karak¡¯s right little finger abruptly shattered, sending a turbulent current of energy throughout the air. It was obvious that the ring was utterly destroyed.


    Adept Karak¡¯s mood turned sour at having lost a piece of Third Grade magical equipment.


    Karak roared and used the poison halo dispersed around him to keep theva from pressing toward him while extending his right hand toward the tiger.


    !


    A giant green hand suddenly appeared between Karak and the tiger, furiously grabbing at the beast.


    ¡°Help me keep him there.¡±


    Dorian, who was now standing in an invisible three-dimensional runic array, gritted his teeth when he heard Karak¡¯s magical message. He pulled off the lion tooth pendant around his neck and tossed it at the tiger.


    The pendant exploded into shards of bone while it was still flying through the air, turning into a fast wave that spread outward in a fifty-meter radius.


    The tiger was caught within.


    The next second, a quicksand trap appeared beneath the tiger. His gigantic body fell downward as half of him was buried before he could even struggle.


    At this moment, Karak¡¯s green hand arrived, in perfect synchronization with the quicksand trap.


    The Third Grade ming tiger was furious at thisbination attack.


    He struggled with all his strength. A red light glowed within the quicksand trap, and he managed to free two of his ws.


    The ming tiger pressed against the edge with a w, lifted his head, and let out a deafening roar at the green hand grabbing at him. Ayer of golden mes emerged from his body and blocked the green hand.


    The fire and the poison shed with each other, letting out an odd sizzling sound.


    The poison hand rapidly melted away, while the formerly golden fire quickly turned a sickly green!


    While the tiger was engaged in a stalemate with the two Third Grade adepts, the sea ofva behind the tiger parted. A nearly invisible human silhouette emerged from theva and lifted his hands. A smoldering me whip immediately wrapped around the tiger¡¯s body.


    The ming tiger was a fire creature to begin with. Naturally, he could not be wounded by mes.


    However, the me whip kept the tiger bound solidly upon the spot, robbing him of all its agility and speed.


    ¡°Nice.¡±


    Karak immediately let out an excited yell when he saw Greem¡¯s attack take effect so quickly.


    He and Adept Dorian immediately flew to the tiger¡¯s side, intent on taking down the tiger in cooperation with Greem.


    Meanwhile, Sealing Master Yunid had also appeared and was hurrying toward them.


    Just as Greem was trying his best to keep the tiger tied up, his face changed color. He quickly sent a voice transmission the other adepts, ¡°Run!¡±


    Greem himself abandoned the whip and vanished from the spot in a st of fire.


    Er...why?


    Karak and Dorian did not have any tacit understanding or coordination with Greem after all. They couldn¡¯t help but be stunned for a moment when they heard his message. This one moment of hesitation caused them to suffer tremendously!


    An iparably powerful aura mysteriously erupted from the ming tiger¡¯s body! A ten-meter tall molten giant appeared out of thin air. It let out a resounding roar as its wild and vicious fists rained down upon Karak and Dorian.


    Third Grade. Yet another Third Grade!


    Where did this onee from?


    Countless thoughts appeared in the minds of the two Molten Fire City higher-ups, but they found no answer.


    The frail Karak and Dorian dared not take one of the frenzied giant¡¯s wild attacks to their bodies. They desperately retreated.


    Yet, the immense force of the molten giant¡¯s fist had already reached them through theva.


    The impactnded, and half of the shields around the adepts were shattered.


    The second impactnded, and the two adepts stumbled away, their faces full of shock and horror.


    A third blow and the two adepts coughed up blood in unison.


    Seeing that the fourth blow was about tond and the two adepts were to be unavoidably wounded, Greem suddenly appeared by their sides and teleported away with them in tow.


    However, regardless of how fast his Fire Teleportation was, the impact from the molten giant¡¯s fist still caught up with them, causing the three of them to be blown even further away amidst the turbulent currents.


    The molten giant that had erupted with such tremendous power rapidly crumbled after these few punches, once again turning into a cluster of chaotic elementium.


    ¡°Soul projection; dammit, it¡¯s an elementium talisman!¡±


    Yunid¡¯s sharp voice suddenly rang out in the distance.


    She had witnessed the entirety of the fight and had very clearly seen that the molten giant was not a physical elementium being, but a soul projection created by an elementium talisman. The soul projection only held so much power and copsed once all of it was spent.


    Though it was only a projection, it had managed to unleash such explosive power in the short instance it had appeared. That caused the faces of the Third Grade adepts to turn.


    Moreover, the Third Grade ming tiger had also took the opportunity of the soul projection unleashing its might to break free of the quicksand and dive into the depths of theva sea.

 Chapter 886 - Rapid Regeneration

    Chapter 886 Rapid Regeneration


    The beast used a supernatural item?


    This unexpected reality stunned the adepts immensely.


    Once upon a time, crafting alchemical items, equipping powerful magical equipment, and using magical tools en masse had all been the biggest distinctive traits of human adepts over other intelligent races.


    When it came to Strength, the human adepts were inferior to the ogres.


    When it came to Physique, the human adepts were inferior to all manner of ferocious magical creatures.


    When it came to Agility, the human adepts were inferior to the Faen elves.


    When it came to Spirit, the human adepts were inferior to the naturally gifted monsters.


    Yet, the human adepts had forcefully managed to put these fierce magical creatures, monsters, and intelligent beings beneath them, turning into the terrifying ruler that reigned over them. What was it that allowed them to do so?


    Of course, it was the vast amounts of alchemical items, magical tools, magical equipment, and their powerful ability to organize and mobilize!


    In the eyes of the adepts, most elementium creatures refused to use alchemical items.


    It had to do with their personal preferences, but even more so, theck of a systematic andprehensive alchemy system among elementium creatures. Some brilliant, high-grade elementium animals might find some natural magical gemstones to use as auxiliary equipment in battle. However,rge-scale, artificially-created supernatural items were rarely seen.


    The wild attack that the ming tiger had unleashed earlier was an amazing tool from the molten giants.


    It undoubtedly confused the adepts!


    However, regardless of how confused they were, the incident had already happened and they had no choice but to ept the result.


    The two adepts that had managed to escape severe injury immediately nodded and expressed their thanks toward Greem.


    In all honesty, the attacks from the Third Grae ming tiger couldn¡¯t deal too much damage too them. After all, elementium damage could be reduced or negated through various means; only pure physical attack could not be stopped. Unless the two adepts had prepared items such as ghost scepters or other simr spells that would allow them to temporarily turn into spirits to avoid physical attacks, the ferocious strikes from the molten giants werepletely unavoidable!


    Judging by the strength of its blow from earlier, the two adepts would probably have required one or two months to heal their broken bodies if they had not dodged the attacks.


    At their current level, their extremely high Physique made it such that it was challenging to inflict severe, permanent damage to their bodies. However, if such damage was to ur, it meant a dreadful oue.


    It was important to note that the body of a Third Grade adept had often been trained and polished countless of times. It was refined into apatible Physique formed by the daily assimtion from their mental flux. If part of their body was regenerated, or a new body part was transnted, they would requirerge amounts of time and resources to adjust the new body part and make itpatible for their soul and mental flux.


    During this time, thebat power of the injured adept would unavoidably decrease!


    That was why Karak and Dorian were genuinely grateful for Greem¡¯s help. Their rtionship was now much warmer and closer than before.


    The failed operation caused the adepts to be dejected. After exchanging a few words, they returned to Molten Fire City together.


    ............


    Deep in theva sea, Cindral¡¯s den.


    The ming tiger roared in anger.


    ¡°Dammit, what does your true form actually want? Didn¡¯t we say we were going to stage a battle? How did it end up being such a huge fight? You made me almost fall into the hands of the adepts.¡±


    Cindral¡¯s body of mes originally glowed with flowing red mes, but he was now covered with dark spots that were quickly stretching and expanding all over its body. From a distance, it looked just like abscesses on the bodies of other animals.


    Moreover, as the dark spots spread all over, the mes that burned on Cindral¡¯s body were also corroded, turning dark and lightless, almost as if they were going to be extinguished at any time.


    For the first time in his life, Cindral was weak and sickly, seemingly powerless and listless.


    It was a type of poison; a terrifying poison that could even destroy magical fires!


    The fire clone stood there silently, its nearly-liquid red mes surging through its body as if it did not see the condition of the tiger.


    ¡°Sir Cindral, your performance today was very good. Under these circumstances, I¡¯m sure that the adepts will think that you cannot attack the mines for the time being!¡±


    ¡°Dammit, do you not understand what I¡¯ve told you?¡± The fire clone¡¯s calm attitude caused the ming tiger to erupt in fury, ¡°Just now, the other ¡®you¡¯ almost caused me to die. I need an exnation from you now, otherwise...¡±


    The ming tiger stepped forward menacingly, his sharp fangs closing in upon the fire clone¡¯s body.


    ¡°Sir Cindral, I believe that as allies in cooperation, we should have some necessary trust between us! Shouldn¡¯t you look beneath yourself before you let the anger get to your head?¡±


    Beneath me?


    ming Tiger Cindral paused for a moment. He lowered his head and was shocked to find that aplicated and intricate magical array had been carved out on the floor of his den. However, no magical crystals had been embedded in the few grooves where the magic nodes and circuits ran through. It had not been activated, and thus, evaded his attention.


    ¡°What is this? What did you do to my den while I was gone?¡± Cindral might have lived longer than Greem, but it was apparent that he was not skilled with this mysterious, high-grade arcane knowledge. As such, his burning eyes were opened wide as he stared at the fire clone.


    Cindral swore in his heart that he would mercilessly strike if he sensed any trace of danger. He would never give the enemy a chance to plot against him.


    ¡°This is an energy-gathering array. It is also a basicponent in most magical arrays.¡± The face of the fire clone once again turned into Greem¡¯s face, ¡°If you want to heal the wounds on your body quickly, you can quicken this process by a dozen times with this array.¡±


    Cindral lowered his head and sniffed the array.


    As a high-grade fire creature, though he could not understand suchplex and refined things, he possessed a sense for danger that other creatures did not. He could not smell any threat in that winding array filled withplicated runes!


    Instead, the array gave him a feeling of peace and calm.


    ¡°Activate it! I warn you, don¡¯t you y any cheap tricks behind my back.¡±


    The fire clone spat out a storage ring and took out a pile of crystals from within, carefully embedding them into the circuitry of the magical array.


    As the magical energy surged through the circuits, the magical runes containing mystical power lit up, forming a small array that covered the entire den.


    When the array was activated, the sea of fire elementium in the environment immediately surged toward the den like a raging tide, instantly increasing the elementium concentration by over ten times. Moreover, as the array continued to function, more and more elementium gathered, causing mist-like scarlet mes to appear inside the den.


    Cindral took a small breath.


    The concentrated and pure fire elementium had already started to turn into fire energy. It was far easier to absorbpared to the free fire elementium wandering in the air.


    Cindral could absorb fire elementium in this manner even without the magical array. However, that was through the use of his own powers and was far less efficient than the energy-gathering array.


    Cindral did some rough estimates. The efficiency of this array at absorbing fire elementium was nearly twenty to thirty times that of his innate ability. That meant sleeping here for a single day would make for one month of umtion for him!


    Cindral had no habit of faking courtesy. Upon noticing that the array was beneficial to him, he found the mostfortable spot in the array to crouch down beforezily stretching his back.


    When the tens of thousands of red dots flocked and surged into his body, the poison elementium that had troubled him for so long started to shrink and vanish from the repeated cleansing of the fire energy. The jade-green dark spots grew smaller and smaller, and Cindral¡¯s body turned increasingly brighter and red.


    Even the damage from the battle earlier slowly started to heal due to the constant gathering of fire elementium.


    Judging by the pace this was going, the damage caused by the battle would be healed within a matter of three days!


    The fire clone manipted the array, all while slowly scanning the ming tiger¡¯s body structure.


    This action would usually invite the hostility and retaliation of the ming tiger. However, with the array as a connecting medium, Greem¡¯s spiritual scan finally managed to break through the tiger¡¯s distorted forcefield and collect data on its body.


    ming Tiger.


    Advanced Third Grade Elementium Creature (Fire).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 21 | Physique 30 | Agility 21 | Spirit 38.


    Racial Abilities: Body of mes.


    From the attributes, it seemed like Cindral no longer had the overwhelming advantage whenpared to Greem. Cindral¡¯s attributes might be superior to Greem¡¯s. But when taking into consideration all the equipment and tools that Greem had, he might even have the upper hand against Cindral.


    After all, human adepts did not pride themselves on their bodies, but their minds!


    [Beep. Model of ming tiger¡¯s body structure has been formed. Data being collected.


    [Target creature¡¯s core statistics are protected by a life forcefield. Data gathering failed.


    [Currently scanning the surface-level body structure.]


    Naturally, as a free, unbound creature, Cindral would not release his spiritual defenses and allow Greem to do as he liked. That was why he could only obtain the data and information he wanted¨Cwith the help of the Chip¡¯s scan and his own senses¨Cthrough the energy aura unintentionally released by Cindral¡¯s breathing and energy exchange.


    Though he was not able to obtain an entirely urate model with this method, he still managed to assemble a somewhat vague construction of the tiger¡¯s model.


    A three-dimensional ming tiger slowly appeared in the mind of Greem¡¯s fire clone.

 Chapter 887 - Battle in the Mines

    <strong>Chapter 887 Battle in the Mines</strong>


    Three dayster.


    An intimate scene was happening in a finely furnished bedroom.


    The two naked bodies, one male and one female, were tightly intertwined as they fought with all they had.


    ¡°So good, so good...babe, you are the best!¡±


    Freina¡¯s white and naked body was now covered in beads of sweat. Her voice was even somewhat hoarse from all the shouting. Greem, who was still as energetic as before, would asionally apply fire resistance on her before transforming into therge and powerful me Fiend form.


    The sudden increase in size from his transformation almost ¡®tortured¡¯ Freina to the brink of death. The intense heat that seeped right into her heart gave her an entirely different feeling. If she didn¡¯t have her powers as a Second Grade adept, and if she were any other witch or apprentice, she would never have been able to endure the ¡®punishment¡¯ that this legendary adept Greem was doling out.


    Yet, just as the two were at the height of their interaction, a red light entered the room and ran into Greem¡¯s red barrier, where it circled about helplessly.


    ¡°It¡¯s...it¡¯s mypanion¡¯s...message. Let me see what it is.¡± Freina shouted with some difficulty, her eyes almost entirely rolled back into her head.


    Greem opened a rift in the barrier, and the red light lunged toward Freina before turning into a strange rune slowly rotating as it hovered in the air.


    ¡°Freina, I don¡¯t care what you are doing right now. Hurry up ande to Mine Three. That ming tiger...¡± An urgent male voice reached their ears. However, it was clear that his situation was bad, as his words were interrupted by a deafening tiger¡¯s roar.


    The rune also silently dispersed before their gaze!


    Dammit, it¡¯s that ming tiger.


    As one of the executives of Molten Fire City, Freina naturally had an obligation over the safety of the mines. Upon hearing the emergency there, she immediately broke free of Greem¡¯s embrace and hurriedly departed after putting on her clothes.


    Greem first revealed a strange smile before slowly putting on his own clothes and walking toward the bottom levels of the city.


    Six to seven days in Molten Fire City was enough for Greem to gain a thorough understanding of every de of grass and piece of wood here.


    Greem smelled the thick scent of blood in the air the moment he arrived in the bottom levels of the city. He also sensed the hot air pressing against his face.


    The cries and screams of humans were everywhere.


    Large groups of ves struggled as they climbed out of the depths of the tunnels, their bodies, hands, and faces, all filled with blisters and scorch marks. In fact, there were even people who ran out of from the tunnels still fully on fire and burning to death. These people fell onto the ground soon but continued to shriek and howl in agony.


    It was an unbearable sight to behold!


    Though there were many adepts in the hall, no one paid any attention to these ve miners, nor would any of them cast their magic to heal them. Their attention was concentrated on the interior of the mine, their hands gripping their instant-cast wands and scrolls tightly and preparing to fight at any time.


    These adepts stationed in the mines immediately let out a breath of relief when they saw Greem arrive from the higher levels. Two of them quickly went forward and greeted him.


    ¡°Lord Greem, you¡¯vee.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s the situation inside the mine? Where¡¯s Lord Karak and Lord Dorian?¡± Though Greem already knew the situation here perfectly, he still feigned ignorance and asked the question.


    ¡°Lord Karak and Lord Dorian have already entered the mines. Lady Freina also just entered.¡± One of the adept in charge of this location hastily exined, ¡°Lord Karak said before he entered that if you and Lady Yunid arrived, you should hurry inside to help them!¡±


    Even though Molten Fire City had been courteous and respectful to Greem over these few days, they had never allowed him to set a single foot inside the mines. That was why Greem remained extremely curious about Mine Three, which was where the eternium ores were produced.


    Just then, the ugly Adept Yunid also hurried over.


    ¡°Shall we go down and take a look?¡± Greem asked.


    Yunid nodded without any hesitation.


    The two of them came to the entrance of the mine and were instantly met with a warm heat wave surging out of the tunnel.


    Greem lifted his hand, and a barrier of fire appeared around the two of them.


    In the blink of an eye, the powerful heat waves turned into a warm, gentle breeze.


    The winding tunnel before them was four meters wide and three meters tall. There were no decorations on the walls or the floor, and the exposed surfaces were simply the tough volcanic rock. However, one could faintly see the gleam of metal in the uneven rock walls with the illumination of the fire.


    They were the metal particles mixed in the rocks!


    The two adepts had only made it a hundred steps into the mine before a flood of viscous redva obstructed their path. It was apparent that the lower half of the entire mine was now submerged inva.


    While the two of them hesitated, theva before them bubbled intensely. The battle inside was clearly still ongoing. Moreover, it seemed to be a very intense fight!


    ¡°Since we are here, we might as well go down and see what¡¯s happening!¡± This time, Yunid was the one to speak first.


    Greem smiled and walked in front of her.


    A massive me suddenly ignited on his tall body as, in a single instant, he transformed into a nearly translucent me humanoid.


    Silently, he stepped into theva. Not a single bubble rose from him diving into theva, almost like a drop of water falling into a pond, leaving no traces behind.


    This ce was the best battlefield for a fire adept.


    Adept Yunid eximed in her heart before erecting a defensive barrier to keep theva outside. She then strode into the depths of theva tunnel.


    The crimsonva split before her eyes, sliding past the two sides of her transparent barrier. The immensely hotva shed with the shield, causing this sealing master of the south to feel a bit of pressure. Moreover, the deeper she went into the tunnel, the higher and more apparent the pressure.


    In the end, Yunid was still a Third Grade witch. This bit of pressure wouldn¡¯t be able to stop her. Moreover, with Greem advancing through theva before her, she did not need to worry about her safety and could concentrate solely on repelling theva.


    Greem suddenly stopped at arge fork in the path.


    It was an underground hall. It used to be filled with all sorts of furniture, and a small pile of ores had also been ced in the corner of the room. However, at this moment, all of the items were submerged in boilingva. All things wooden had vanished without a trace, with only a few unique items barely being able to survive theva.


    Freina struggled and escaped from one of the entrances here. She hurriedly and joyously ran toward Greem when he saw the me humanoid he had turned into.


    It had only been fifteen minutes since they parted, yet Freina was already covered in moderately severe wounds.


    Her hot and seductive body was now covered in scorch marks. Three ck w marks scarred her pretty face. All of her exposed skin was also covered in blisters and burns.


    Judging by her stumbling gait, it seemed that she was even more severely injured than she looked.


    Greem hurried forward to grab her before patting her on the back. A strange magical power surged forth and instantly dispelled all of the mes on her body. In fact, the fire poison that had entered into Freina¡¯s body also turned into sparks of fire and slowly dispersed into the air.


    Arge air bubble instantly enveloped Freina, allowing her to float within theva.


    ¡°Lord Karak is fighting with the tiger in Mine Three. Lord Dorian¡¯s gone to activate the array. Lord Greem, you must help Lord Karak.¡± Freina saw Greem as a savior and grabbed his me hand and shook it.


    ¡°I understand. You go out first!¡±


    Greem nodded and pped the bubble with his hand. The air bubble then flew outward through the tunnel, with Freina inside it.


    ¡°It seems Lord Greem makes friends really fast!¡± Adept Yunid chuckled softly before passing by Greem and diving into Mine 3.


    There was a faint smile on Greem¡¯s face as he followed after.


    The location where Karak and the tiger were fighting was two hundred meters below Mine Three.


    Here, inside a somewhat wider tunnel, two Third Grades of different races were fighting with all their strength.


    Karak was now standing in the corner of the tunnel, his back against a stone wall. He waved a small and delicate magical dagger in his hand, fending off the attacks of the tiger that wereing from every direction. The jade green gemstone on his forehead continued to let out ripples of green halos that rapidly polluted everything around him.


    It was obvious that Karak was not the match of the Third Grade ming tiger in meleebat. Still, the tiger appeared to be wary of the short dagger he was waving in his hands and didn¡¯t dare to press forward too aggressively.


    The two parties squared off against each other intensely with such attacks and parries, trying to break the stalemate.


    Greem and Yunid¡¯s arrival triggered the tiger¡¯s senses. He let out a roar as a massive wave of fire surged toward the two adepts, while he lunged at Karak.


    Karak seemed to be prepared for the tiger¡¯s attack. He waved his dagger, and a terrifying jade serpent was quickly formed and bit at the lunging tiger. The gemstone on his forehead let out another wave that shot toward the tiger¡¯s body.


    Usually, the tiger would avoid the poison adept¡¯s attacks. Yet, for some reason, the tiger charged into the attacks without dodging; the tiger ran straight into the jade wave and the giant serpent.


    Aooooo!


    A resounding roar rang out as the ming tiger smashed through the wave. The dagger had also stabbed into his shoulder. However, the tiger continued to charge forward without hesitation and viciously bit at Karak¡¯s head.


    Karak¡¯s poison spells had no use in theva. There was nothing he could do against the ferocious tiger and could only run desperately toward Greem and Yunid.


    Greem and Yunid looked at each other and rushed forward.

 Chapter 888 - Information Obtained

    Chapter 888 Information Obtained


    Battles between high-grade adepts were quickly decided, but it was incredibly difficult to kill an opponent.


    If the enemy wasn¡¯tpletely cornered, it was nearly impossible to kill a Third Grade creature.


    Thus, when Greem, Karak, and Yunid all stepped forward to surround the ming tiger, the beast immediately turned and ran without hesitation.


    If the mine were in its proper condition, the three adepts would have had more than enough means to deal with this damned tiger. However, all of the tunnels were now filled with thick and swirlingva. Greem was still doing fine, his speed almost unaffected, but Karak and Yunid could only be slowly left behind.


    The three adepts and one tiger ran through the winding tunnels, ying their game of cat and mouse.


    Seeing that they wouldn¡¯t be able to catch the tiger, Greem let out a roar and shouted, ¡°You guys keep chasing, I¡¯ll run ahead and intercept it!¡±


    Having said that, his body of mes exploded as he vanished.


    Large amounts of fire elementium quickly gathered at the entrance of a cave somewhere in the distance and Greem slowly appeared.


    The fleeing tiger immediately turned upon seeing his path blocked by his enemy. He turned and slipped right into a smaller tunnel by the side.


    After a hundred years of constant excavation and digging, Mine Three was filled with tunnels that led everywhere like a spiderweb. It might be beneficial for the ve miners when they traveled down into the mine, but these tunnels had currently be the paths of escape that allowed the tiger toe and go as he pleased.


    Greem teleported ahead of the ming tiger several times to intercept it, but his efforts were always in vain due to Karak and Yunid¡¯s failure to catch up in time.


    Karak and Yunid were still waiting for Dorian to activate the arrays and trap the tiger in the tunnels. However, after fifteen minutes of pursuit, they still saw no signs of the arrays being activated and instantly knew that something had gone wrong on Dorian¡¯s side.


    Karak tried to contact Dorian while they continued their chase, but he got no response.


    After several attempts, Adept Yunid also became frustrated at the situation.


    ¡°Greem, bring me along with you! We can split up and intercept the tiger.¡±


    As Third Grade adepts that belonged to different factions, it was difficult for them to have perfect synergy and cooperation.


    Yunid had only requested Greem¡¯s help due to how furious she was. Otherwise, she would never let an unacquainted adept touch her body.


    ¡°Understood!¡± Greem responded. The elementium in the air instantly gathered, and he appeared beside Adept Yunid. He grabbed her by her left shoulder and immediately appeared in front of the ming tiger¡¯s path with Fire Teleportation.


    Yunid freed herself from the disorientation of teleportation with her powerful Spirit the instant she appeared. The white staff in her hand quickly wove a tight golden web in the air that wrapped toward the tiger.


    Cindral was terrified.


    He easily sensed that the webs woven from golden lines faintly contained the aura of narws. They seemed thin and flimsy as if a single strike would tear the web to pieces. However, Cindral knew that if any part of his body were to touch the web, he would unable to escape today.


    He leaped mid-run, and his body shimmered in theva, vanishing from the spot much as Greem had. When he once again appeared, he was behind Greem and Yunid, sprinting once again.


    Naturally, there was no reason the ming tiger wouldn¡¯t know how to use Fire Teleportation when Greem himself knew how to!


    Dammit!


    It was easy to cast the golden web, but it wasn¡¯t so easy to take it back.


    It would take at least two to three seconds to pull the web back into the staff. Obviously, Yunid couldn¡¯t move during this time.


    Greem had no choice but to abandon her and teleport to Adept Karak¡¯s side, grabbing him and disappearing once more.


    The tiger seemed to be prepared for Greem¡¯s consecutive teleportations now.


    He changed directions and ran without hesitation upon seeing Greem and Karak disappear. It caused Karak to start cursing furiously after appearing from the mes.


    ¡°Greem, only you can keep the tiger here now. Don¡¯t bother with the two of us. First, catch up with the tiger and stall for time. We will arrive right after.¡±


    Karak finally understood the situation at this point. Only Greem could fight with the ming tiger in this harsh environment. The other adepts probably couldn¡¯t catch up even if they tried.


    To maximize Greem¡¯s chances of sess, Karak waved his hand, and a crimson orb flew toward Greem.


    ¡°This is the topographic map of the underground map. Keep the tiger here.¡±


    Greem looked at the orb, and the Chip¡¯s notification instantly rang in his mind.


    [Beep. Data stream port detected. No security problems detected upon scan. Requesting instructions from host: Allow connection?]


    ¡°Connect!¡±


    Greem brought the orb of light under his nose and sniffed. The light then seeped into his body.


    The next second, a three-dimensional map of the weblike tunnels of the mine appeared in his mind.


    Got it!


    Greem was overjoyed.


    All the circus and monkey act with Cindral was for this one moment.


    Without theplete topographic map of the underground mine, he would not be able to know the exact location of the resource warehouses of Molten Fire City.


    The mines?


    What was in there?


    Unprocessed and unrefined raw ores, gemstones, scrap, and a whole bunch of waste.


    How could these things be of any use, regardless of how much Greem managed to steal?!


    From the moment he arrived in Molten Fire City, Greem had set his sights on the ¡®resource warehouses¡¯ that very likely existed in the city!


    It was arge underground mine. The daily amount of ore excavated from this ce had to be tremendous. Transporting them to the surface for refinement and extraction and transportation them back to Molten Fire City for storage was very unlikely.


    That was why there had to be an alchemyb somewhere in Molten Fire City. It was very likely that metal ingots that had already been refined could be found there.


    If metal ores were only small change that Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to work for, then these refined ingots were the precious treasures of Molten Fire City!


    However, with Greem¡¯s identity as an outsider, he would never have been able to get ess to information such as the location of these warehouses, even if he were to scour all the famous locations of Molten Fire City. To avoid alerting or rming Molten Fire City, Greem couldn¡¯t attempt to get the information through Freina. As such, he had to rely on force.


    As he turned into fire and chased after Cindral in the tunnel, he waited for further analysis results from the Chip.


    Since Karak was willing to hand over the topographical map of the mines, he must have wiped away some extremely crucial information. However, Greem didn¡¯t mind him doing so. With the Chip, he could find anything he wanted on the map as long as there were any slight traces left behind.


    Mines One through Four looked like dense spiderwebs on the map. However, outside the spiderwebs, apart from the few tunnels leading toward the surface of Molten Fire City, there were three more subtly hidden tunnels.


    The alchemyb had to process arge number of metal ores daily; it couldn¡¯t be too small. Moreover, the path to and from theb had to be fast and easily essible. There should also be a hidden path that led to the surface.


    Combining all of this information and data, the approximateyout he got from his observations, and the topographical map before him, the Chip quickly and effortlessly locked onto an empty spot on the map.


    With this information in hand, Greem instantly sent a message to ming Tiger Cindral, who he was still pursuing.


    Cindral immediately turned back and started a fight with Greem.


    The two of them ravaged the depths of the mine with their Fire Teleportations, flickering about like apparitions as they sted each other with their attacks. Finally, they arrived at the location where Cindral had dug into the mines. Both Cindral and Greem charged into the sea ofva, moving further and further away as they tussled with each other.


    The ripples and shockwaves from the depths of theva sea caused the entire region to go into turmoil.


    Karak and Yunid stopped at the point of entrance and looked at each other.


    Keep chasing? With their speed in theva sea, they would never be able to catch up to the two who were fighting inside. Give up on their pursuit? Greem was fighting for their sake now; giving up as the master of Molten Fire City was...


    ¡°Lady Yunid, I will have to trouble you with the task of helping Greem. I need to return to see what has happened to Dorian. It seems like something has happened on his end as well.¡± Karak quickly made up his mind, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Lady Yunid. We of Molten Fire City promise that item will be delivered to your hands regardless of the results of the battle! You can trust our Molten Fire City to uphold that reputation.¡±


    At this point, Yunid had no reason to object.


    Moreover, with Greem holding back the ming tiger, the risk she had to undertake was well within control. It was worth a risk!


    ¡°Good, don¡¯t forget what you¡¯ve said!¡±


    After agreeing to Adept Karak, golden light spread out from Yunid¡¯s staff, diverting theva away from her. She then quickly charged into the depths of theva with the barrier of light around her.


    Though it was impossible to see anything in theva sea, and even Spirits couldn¡¯t search too far forward, the shockwaves from the battle in the distance still guided her way.


    However, what Yunid didn¡¯t know was that the two ¡®battling¡¯ in theva sea were no longer Cindral and Greem, but Cindral and Greem¡¯s fire clone.


    At any rate, the distance between them and Cindral¡¯s Third Grade power was more than enough cover to conceal the true identity of the Second Grade fire clone.


    Meanwhile, the real Greem had turned into a cluster of mes, sneaking back into the mines. He avoided Karak and Yunid and quickly made his way to the location he had uncovered.


    This intense battle instantly turned into a strange and unpredictable fight!

 Chapter 889 - The Scheme Succeeds

    Chapter 889 The Scheme Seeds


    Molten Fire City. The control center of the mine¡¯s defensive arrays.


    Several dozen adepts were strewn about the hall, their bodies covered in wounds of varying severity.


    The array that had been carved into the center of the hall¡¯s floor had now been destroyed beyond recognition and could no longer be activated.


    Meanwhile, Array Master Doriany in a pool of blood aside a broken pir, silent as he received treatment from Adept Freina.


    Adept Karak¡¯s face instantly turned dark when he stepped into the room.


    ¡°What¡¯s the matter? Who attacked this ce?¡± Karak shouted loudly.


    ¡°It¡¯s...that ming tiger.¡± Dorian stuttered through the pain.


    His left leg appeared to have been smashed by something and was nowpletely ttened. ck streaks of blood flowed down all of his orifices. It was obvious that his internal injuries were severe as well.


    ¡°The ming tiger?¡± The corner of Karak¡¯s mouth twitched, and he spoke with a ghastly expression, almost as if he had seen a ghost, ¡°How could it be the tiger? It...it was just fighting with the few of us in the underground mines!¡±


    Dorian appeared to be extremely weakened from his wounds, but even he had to roar in anger when he heard Karak¡¯s words.


    ¡°I¡¯m the one that wants to ask you what¡¯s happening! Why was I attacked by that tiger the moment I arrived here with my men? Moreover, that bastard summoned a molten giant again and smashed the central control hall to pieces.¡±


    Karak¡¯s face was full of disbelief. He then turned to Freina and asked sternly, ¡°You saw it as well?¡±


    ¡°I saw it!¡± Freina hastily nodded her head before stuttering, ¡°But...¡±


    ¡°But what?¡±


    ¡°I keep having a feeling that though this tiger appears the same as the previous one and emits the same aura, I have a feeling that it isn¡¯t the same one.¡±


    Dorian also moaned feebly, ¡°I have the same feeling! It feels like this tiger¡¯s power is a bit weaker than the original one. However, the molten giant it summoned was the same asst time!¡±


    Karak drew in a cold breath of air.


    There...there wasn¡¯t just one tiger?


    If there was more than one tiger, why was it that they never showed themselves prior to this?


    While he was brooding, a faint red light suddenly shone on the snake-eye ring on Karak¡¯s right index finger.


    It was amunication ring he used when contacting some of his direct subordinates in Molten Fire City.


    He reached out and rubbed the ring, bringing it to his mouth and frustratedly said, ¡°Antok, don¡¯t bother me if you don¡¯t have anything important to say. Right now, I¡¯m...¡±


    ¡°My lord,e here quickly, please! Theb and the warehouse are being attacked.¡± A desperate cry for help came from the other side of the ring the moment it connected. More screams and cries could be heard behind him; faintly, there was the familiar sound of a tiger¡¯s roar.


    Karak¡¯s face instantly turned ck.


    Dorian and Freina, who had heard the message as well, showed the same expression.


    It didn¡¯t matter how heavy their losses in the underground mines were, or if the ve miners were to all die¨C they would not even bat an eyelid. As long as Molten Fire City was around, and as long as they were around, everything would return to normal eventually.


    The worst that would happen would be a few weeks of the cities¡¯ ore production would be lost!


    Losses of this amount were still bearable for them as deputies of Molten Fire City.


    However, the secretb and resource warehouse were crucial locations!


    Even the lord of the city would have toe out of his ten-year seclusion if something were to happen there. And the consequence of disturbing the lord; the three of them shivered just at the thought of it.


    Dorian, who had intended to return to his room for further treatment, immediately pulled out a magical dagger from his belt. The cold light of the de gleamed, and Freina¡¯s left leg was severed perfectly.


    Strangely enough, not a drop of blood flowed from the wound.


    Freina let out a pained cry. Her face turned pale as her body trembled, but she dared not move at all.


    Dorian pressed Freina¡¯s severed leg against his own. He then took out a vial of purple potion and poured it over the disjointed part.


    A light white cloud of smoke rose, and some translucent and adhesive liquid instantly appeared on the wound. It was a disgusting sight.


    However, the next second, Dorian could stand and walk normally with both legs.


    ¡°Being Freina back for treatment!¡± Dorian waved a Molten Fire City adept over and handed Freina to him. He and Dorian hurried toward that secret location.


    As the two of them quickly traveled through the tunnels, Dorian questioned softly:


    ¡°How many resources are stored there?¡±


    Karak replied with a pale face, ¡°We typically send the resources to the lord¡¯s tower every three months. It¡¯s been ten years since the lord¡¯s tower has been opened, and all of the stock is in there.¡±


    Dorian felt like the world was spinning around him when he heard this reply, and he almost spat out a mouthful of blood.


    ¡°Rx, don¡¯t worry. The ming tiger is just a beast, how big can its appetite be? How many of the resources can it take away with it even if it were to gorge on the stock? The missing share...if we grit our teeth, pool our resources together, and have the ves work overtime in the mines, we might be able to make up for it.¡± Karak continued to console himself as they made their way to the warehouses.


    However, when he and Dorian arrived at the secretb through a pathid with tracks, it was already hell on earth.


    Copsed and broken experiment tforms and containers were everywhere in the massive alchemyb. Yet, they couldn¡¯t see a single one of the alchemists working here. Still, plenty of scorch marks could be seen on the clean floor of theboratory.


    Piles of ck ash and dust could be seen in the center of these scorch marks.


    These piles must have been the only things the alchemists left behind!


    The magical statues guarding theboratory had all been blown to pieces, their remains scattered across the room. The two Second Grade adepts stationed in this ce were also missing, their fates probably a bleak one.


    The two of them didn¡¯t stay here for long. Instead, they quickly rushed toward the warehouse at the back of theb.


    The moment they charged into theb, they saw a terrifying ming tiger standing proudly in the middle of the room.


    The beast was casually swallowing a storage ring into its stomach. The tiger¡¯s lips curved when it saw the adepts arrive, betraying an almost human smile before vanishing in a st of fire.


    The control center of the underground arrays had been destroyed, causing this ce to lose the ability to restrict long-ranged teleportation.


    The two adepts could not stop the tiger from leaving, regardless of how furious and resentful they were.


    The two adepts looked around the warehouse after the tiger had left. When they saw the utterly empty room, they couldn¡¯t help but cough up blood at the same time.


    It was big trouble now!


    ............


    In the depths of theva sea. Cindral¡¯s den.


    A ming tiger appeared in a burst of mes. A shining red positioning rune was on the floor of the cave.


    The ming tiger smiled and slowly shifted into Greem¡¯s appearance amidst some twisting and contorting.


    Over the past few days, the fire clone had been silently scanning Cindral¡¯s attributes and body structure. For this purpose, it had even constructed a ming tiger model with eighty percent likeness to the original thing.


    Greem used his Fire Molding ability and the ming tiger model to give himself Cindral¡¯s appearance. With this appearance and his use of fire spells, it would be difficult for the average adept to differentiate between him and Cindral.


    Moreover, before hemitted to this line of action, he even made subtle contact with Alice in the Northern Lands and had her blur his Fate path. This way, even if someone discovered any evidence that he left behind, they would have difficulty pursuing the truth with divination spells!


    Since they had managed to return safely, they would have to finish the performance they had started.


    Greem closed his eyes and sensed for a moment before turning and charging out of the den. He hurried in a certain direction in the depths of theva sea.


    The ¡®battle¡¯ in theva sea was still ongoing.


    The ripples of shockwave churned the sea, but whenever Adept Yunid arrived at the scene of battle, the two fighters would already be at another spot, causing another wave of ripples.


    Yunid had no choice but to grit her teeth and continue chasing.


    Greem secretly snuck back to the battlefield and greeted Cindral. He then spat out a storage ring and threw it to the fire clone. The two swapped ces and Greem continued ¡®fighting¡¯ hard against Cindral, while the Second Grade fire clone quickly escaped under cover of the shockwaves.


    This time, the adept and the tiger did not continue teleporting away. Instead, they started to fight even more fiercely on the spot.


    For the first time, Greem unleashed his full power.


    As his soul flux rippled outward, several pieces of strange magical equipment slowly appeared on his body.


    A fine, extravagant magical crown appeared on the head of the me humanoid. At the same time, a pair of magical armbands with delicate carvings appeared around his arms. A sh of light appeared on his waist, while an intense magical aura appeared around his legs and neck.


    Moreover, all this magical equipment appeared to be deeply connected to Greem¡¯s soul, forming a perfect magic energy system with his consciousness core at the very center of the system.


    A set. It was a magical equipment set!


    Adept Yunid almost cried out in surprise, and deep envy could be seen when she gazed Greem¡¯s towering body.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it.


    A strange wooden doll covered in runic lines appeared on Greem¡¯s shoulder, letting out a strange and sinister smile at the ming tiger before it.


    More Soul Equipment!


    Moreover, it had already gained intelligence and the ability to materialize a body.


    At this point, Adept Yunid was no longer just envious, but tantly jealous!


    Dammit! Where did this young fire adept find so much Soul Equipment? Was he the bastard of some important Fourth Grade adept?

 Chapter 890 - Mission Halted

    Chapter 890 Mission Halted


    ording to the agreement, ming Tiger Cindral and Greem had to have a fight between them!


    Moreover, they also needed this battle to conclude the entire incident.


    That was why Cindral also focused and prepared to fight with all he had when he saw Greem¡¯s actions.


    However, Cindral could no longer remain as calm when he saw such powerful magical equipment appearing on Greem¡¯s body one piece after another.


    Once upon a time, back on the Fire Elementium ne, he had toyed with Greem like a cat did a mouse. Not a single one of Greem¡¯s actions had managed to break free of his control. Today, when that same fire adept stood before him as a powerful and consolidated aura burst forth from Greem¡¯s body, Cindral became somewhat disturbed.


    If one were to count the time, it had been less than ten years since they hadst met. Yet, Greem had transformed entirely and grown so much?


    While Cindral became shaken, an armor of fire gathered around Greem¡¯s body. The armor was covered in magical patterns and released a faintly intimidating aura.


    Cindral couldn¡¯t sit still when he sensed the tremendous pressureing from Greem. He let out a few roars as his entire body started swelling rapidly as if he was a balloon. His originally three-meter long body had now increased to five meters, and his ferocious aura had heightened and be more intense as well.


    Seeing that the two fighters were unleashing the fullest extent of their power and were seemingly putting their lives on the line, Adept Yunid quickly hid herself and silently started preparing her sealing spells.


    She knew that her arrival couldn¡¯t possibly have escaped the tiger¡¯s senses.


    However, as long as she stayed away from the battlefield, the ming tiger clearly wouldn¡¯t run away with his tail between his legs out of pride of his power.


    As long as she had a good grasp over this psychology, she might have the chance to capture this tiger today.


    Just as this thought appeared in her mind, a vast, massive, and powerful will descended upon the area. There was one second where even the furious and boilingva sea seemed to halt for a brief moment before continuing surging forward unstoppably.


    That will immediately locked onto the three individuals.


    Cindral, who had been raring to go earlier, retracted his aura the next second and quickly fled into theva sea like a terrified cat, tail between his legs.


    Judging from the way he was running, he wouldn¡¯t be turning back again this time!


    Greem, who had justpleted hisbat preparations, was now shocked and at aplete loss. His fighting spirit had deted in the blink of an eye when it came into contact with that vast will.


    Fourth Grade. It was the spiritual senses of a Fourth Grade adept!


    In just 0.1 seconds, Greem understood the source of this will and hastily retracted his own spiritual flux, guarding his mind and not resisting against that powerful will.


    That will was like a flowing sea of Spirit, quickly scanning the entire location.


    When the spiritual appendages caught the traces of fire that Cindral had left behind when escaping, a cold snort faintly rang out in the air. However, the spirit sea quickly turned its attention to Greem and Yunid, particrly focusing on Greem.


    ¡°You...are the guests that Karak invited?¡±


    A spiritual flux silently entered the minds of the two adepts, and a sinister and dry male voice rang out in their minds.


    ¡°My greetings, Lord Alfred! I am Yunid of the Horn n.¡± Adept Yunid might be a prideful adept, but she dared not disy any arrogance before a Fourth Grade adept. Her reply was respectful, much like that of an apprentice to an official adept.


    ¡°My greetings, Lord Alfred! I am Greem of the Crimson n.¡± Greem also hastily gave his greeting. Though the Fourth Grade adept had not physically descended upon the ce, everything within the area engulfed by his powerful will wasid out before his eyes.


    Greem might not have met this Molten Fire City lord before, but he had done some investigations ahead of time.


    This Adept Alfred was also a powerful adept that had risen from the grassroots. He excelled at soundwave magic, and his affinities were also very umon. However, none of this stopped him from building a solid foundation and ascending to Fourth Grade after six hundred years.


    At this point, ordinary adept resources were mostly useless to him. The resources he required could only be slowly gathered from the tens of thousands of nar worlds. Molten Fire City might always im that he was hiding in his tower, but no one knew if he was inside the tower!


    After all, many high-grade adepts would leave their soul brand in their personal towers before slipping out to explore the countless nar worlds. The purpose of hiding one¡¯s tracks was to avoid enemies with vendettas from attacking their tower while they were gone.


    Naturally, there were benefits and downsides to such a way of doing things!


    The enemies would naturally note knocking on the doors while they couldn¡¯t confirm his absence. However, if the adept were to get lost or trapped in a dangerous ruin while exploring the nar worlds, it would be incredibly difficult to find someone to save them.


    That was why in the Central Region, filled with powerful adepts, it was verymon for the powerful adepts of various ns to go into several decades of seclusion, hiding from the rest of the world. It wasn¡¯t until their n found all sorts of ways to break into the tower that they would discover the soul brands of these adepts broken and shattered.


    Moreover, if news of this were to spread to the outside world, it was very likely to trigger a drastic change to the n¡¯s ranking.


    After all, many adept ns were propped up by a single powerful core adept. If anything were to happen to this core adept, then it wasn¡¯t umon for the n to just fall apart.


    That could be seen with the vampire Vik Family.


    Regardless of how tremendous a setback the n suffered, they would have a chance to rise again while Old Vampire Haines Vik was still around. However, once Haines became the prisoner of the Crimson n, all the neighboring ns instantly tore the Vik Family apart. Greem did not even need to lift a single finger.


    That was why Greem suspected that this powerful Fourth Grade adept was held up at a particr spot in a different ne world, given that he had not been seen in over a decade. However, now that he sensed that overwhelmingly powerful Spirit, he immediately extinguished any thoughts he shouldn¡¯t be having and suppressed all of his arrogance, offering the entirety of his respect to this powerful adept.


    ¡°A creature from the Fire Elementium ne? Hahaha, I never thought my Molten Fire City would be so lively while I was gone. Good work, the two of you. Come back for now! I believe that beast won¡¯t dare to show up any longer!¡± Adept Alfred¡¯s cold voice boomed in theva, causing even Greem and Yunid to feel fear.


    Greem was d that he had hidden the storage ring with all the resources on the fire clone. If all that loot were still on him, it would not have evaded the spiritual senses of this potent Fourth Grade adept.


    Though items in a storage ring should not be able to be discovered with spiritual scans, it might be apletely different matter for a Fourth Grade ¡®old monster¡¯ like this!


    Who knew if this Fourth Grade adept had the strange ability to sense for Eternium and Queyras alloy through space. If he were to discover Greem had something like this on him, then Greem would have immense trouble getting out of the gates of Molten Fire City.


    Greem and Yunid looked at each other when they received the invitation from the Molten Fire City lord. They then hurried back to the underground tunnels.


    Adept Karak was already waiting for them at the entrance.


    When he saw the two of them sessfully return, he stepped forward with a smile and said, ¡°Come with me please, the two of you. Our Lord wishes to see you!¡±


    The sudden arrival of their city lord after ten years should have been an incredibly joyous event. However, there was not a single trace of happiness on Karak¡¯s face. Even the smile was forced.


    Adept Yunid didn¡¯t know the truth behind the scenes. She was confused, but she didn¡¯t dare to voice her questions. Meanwhile, Greem pretended not to have noticed anything, and there was no change to his expression.


    Alfred met them at the upper levels of Molten Fire City in a special stone room.


    The decoration of the stone room was straightforward, with Adept Alfred sitting on a stone chair dressed in a gray adept¡¯s robe. When the three of them entered the room, Adept Alred opened his eyes as his gaze fell upon Greem and Yunid. The two of them couldn¡¯t help but start sweating.


    At their level, an increase in a single grade meant a rise in power by ten to twenty times. It didn¡¯t even need toe to a battle. Just an ordinary gaze from Alfred and the two of them could feel a powerful force weighing upon their bodies.


    Moreover, such spiritual pressure bypassed all defenses and magical resistances. It only had to do with one¡¯s spirit resilience.


    As such, when Greem and Yunid stood in front of this adept, they felt as if they were sitting on needles, as ufortable as could be.


    Greem wanted to look at Adept Alfred¡¯s appearance, but unfortunately, his spiritual senses and the Chip¡¯s probing scans were all suppressed within his body by an invisible force, unable to extend outward. Under such circumstances, he could only rely on his physical vision to get information on his surroundings.


    Unfortunately, a cluster of light hovered around Adept Alfred¡¯s face, causing Greem to be unable to see his true appearance.


    Adept Alfred did not care about Greem looking at him. In fact, there was no reason to care.


    He looked at the two of them before finally speaking with a chilling tone.


    ¡°The two of you did a good job today. Karak, you may deal with the assigned mission as if it waspleted. Send them off once they have obtained their mission rewards!¡±


    ¡°Yes, sir!¡± Karak hurriedly agreed to the order.


    ¡°But...the tiger has yet to been caught?¡± Adept Yunid paused for a moment.


    Greem also opportunistically feigned surprise on his face.


    ¡°No matter, it is just a small beast. We of Molten Fire City will deal with it ourselves! The two of you may leave after taking your rewards. We still have some private matters to settle and won¡¯t be keeping you here any longer.¡±


    The two adepts clearly picked up on the Fourth Grade adept¡¯s intent to have them leave and made no attempts to insist on remaining. Though they didn¡¯t know why they were chased away before the mission waspleted, they could guess that some internal matter had urred to Molten Fire City.


    Greem and Yunid left for the City of Oss under the escort of a group of soldiers after quickly retrieving the rewards they were promised from Karak.

 Chapter 891 - Successful Return

    Chapter 891 Sessful Return


    Molten Fire City. Inside the secret stone room.


    Karak turned and returned to the secret room after sending Greem and Yunid away.


    Adept Alfred was frowning, seemingly deep in thought.


    ¡°Sir, this is my mistake. Please, punish me!¡± Karak admitted his fault with frustration written all over his face.


    Alfred waved his hand and interrupted impatiently, ¡°Of course this is your fault. It is just an elementium beast. It might be a bit sly, but can¡¯t we do anything about it with the power of our Molten Fire City? Why did you need to go to the Winds of Freedom and publicize this incident? You even brought two outsiders of unknown background into the city.¡±


    Karak hastily lowered his head as he acknowledged the berating.


    ¡°Hmph! The effect on the mines would be a minor decrease in our resource ie at the very worst. However, if these two adepts were spies from another party and end up leaking those secret experiments I have set up on the upper levels of Molten Fire City, can you bear that responsibility?¡±


    ¡°Sir, it is precisely because I was concerned about spies that I did not issue a mission through the regr method. Rather, I personally chose two suitable candidates myself. I have investigated their backgrounds thoroughly, and there are no problems at all.¡±


    ¡°No problems at all?¡± Adept Alfred chillinglyughed as he said, ¡°If there were no problems, how would it have been such a huge incident? How would our resource warehouse in the lower levels have been robbed?¡±


    ¡°This...my lord, do you mean to say that these two adepts are suspicious?¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s nothing wrong with the female adept, but I can¡¯t tell when ites to that male adept! I keep having a feeling that his goal isn¡¯t pure, as if he is making some movements behind our backs. However, I sense no irregrity about him. Otherwise, I would not have let him leave alive.¡±


    Karak paused for a moment when he heard this, before softly speaking, ¡°My lord, should I send people to investigate him?¡±


    Alfred thought for a moment before shaking his head and said, ¡°Might as well! The few experiments I have in the tower are close topletion. They require protection and guarding right now. As such, I cannot leave. You send some people out to im that they are purchasing eternium ores at a high price and see if he makes any reaction.¡±


    ¡°Understood, I am off to arrange the matter now!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! If he is indeed the culprit, I will personally tear his n up by the roots and make him regret everything he has done here at Molten Fire City today!¡±


    ............


    One monthter, Greem sessfully returned to Fire Throne.


    He quickly dismissed his subordinates after entering the tower and arrived at the fire altar alone. He then waved his hand and lit up the center of the runic array at the top of the tform.


    As strange ripples of fire spread across the air, Greem extended his right index finger and sliced softly across his left palm. Red blood flowed from the open wound, dripping onto the fire waves, one drop by another.


    With this blood essence serving as a guide, the fire altar carried his mental consciousness and instantly crossed tens of thousands of kilometers, descending upon a certain spot in theva sea of Molten Fire City.


    The next second, the fire altar trembled slightly as a dark red spatial rift opened above the altar. Two silhouettes of different sizes emerged from the rift.


    It was Cindral and his fire clone, who had been hiding and running about theva sea over the past few days!


    ¡°Brat, we¡¯ve waited for so long. We can finally split the loot, can¡¯t we!¡± Cindral eagerly shouted when he emerged from the spatial rift into the room in Fire Throne.


    To be honest, Cindral was a trustworthy ally.


    Greem¡¯s fire clone was only intermediate Second Grade. Despite being alone with the fire clone for such a long time, Cindral had not acted to take the storage ring for himself. That caused Greem to be delighted.


    The fire clone walked to Greem¡¯s side, taking out the storage ring from its mouth and putting it in his hands before running into his body and turning them into one person once more.


    Greem smiled as he grabbed the ring. With a wave of his hand, he ced everything inside it into the room.


    There were nearly a hundred wooden boxes of the same size.


    Cindral rushed forward and smashed apart one of the wooden boxes with a single smack. Dozens of rectangr metal ingots scattered across the floor, ringing with the crisp sound of metal.


    The metal ingots were extraordinary heavy and immediately emitted tiny elementium rainbows when they came into contact with the wandering particles in the air.


    Magical alloys!


    Cindral smashed open another crate, this one filled with rows of purple ingots, glowing with a faint purple light.


    Cindral excitedly lunged forward at the sight of such pure eternium ores, grabbing them wildly and stuffing them into his mouth.


    Fire creatures typically were not of the habit of using space storage items. They gorged on the good stuff that they liked and used their massive stomachs as storage.


    ¡°Lord Cindral...¡± Greem, who couldn¡¯t stand the sight of this happening, called out to the tiger.


    ¡°What is it?¡± Cindral looked at Greem anxiously, ¡°I took such a huge risk, yet I can¡¯t even take a bit of your stuff?¡±


    Greem shook his head speechlessly as he extended his hand and passed a storage ring to Cindral.


    ¡°Since it has been such pleasant cooperation, this storage ring is my gift to you. With this, you can take away anything that you need from here.¡±


    ¡°Really?¡±


    ¡°Really!¡±


    Cindral looked at Greem doubtfully, but after some thought, he grabbed the storage ring and very carefully put three crates of eternium ingots in it. He knew very well what the human adepts were capable of. He didn¡¯t just assume that they meant what they said even if they were offering a tremendously beneficial deal. If one touched on their psychological bottom line by being excessively greedy, you would probably have a hard time walking out of the tower.


    That was why Cindral kept his greed in check and only took an amountrge enough for him to use.


    Meanwhile, Greem simply put away the rest of the boxes.


    It was a simple process, and the Chip had already calcted all of the ingots in them.


    There were ny-six wooden crates in total.


    Thirteen of them were eternium ingots, making a total of three hundred and ny ingots for a total of one hundred and twenty tons.


    Thirty-two of them were Queyras alloys, making a total of nine hundred and sixty ingots for a total of two hundred and seventy tons.


    Twenty-four of them were magical alloys, making a total of seven hundred and twenty ingots for a total of one hundred and seventeen tons.


    Seven were mithril, making a total of two hundred and ten ingots for a total of three hundred kilograms.


    Five were adamantite, making a total of one hundred and fifty ingots for a total of three hundred and eighty tons.


    ......


    ......


    The crates of metal ingots had undergone multiple refinement processes, all of them high-grade metals; they were high-grade resources that were hard to find even on the market. If they were all put on sale, Greem and the Crimson n would not face ack of magical crystals for dozens of years toe.


    Greem didn¡¯t care much for the other magical metals, but the Queyras alloy alone caused him to break out into a smile immediately.


    With this Queyras alloy, the massivebat magical machines that had been dyed in the goblin ne could be finally finished. Moreover, the addition of every new magic generator furnace meant the formation of yet another magical machine army.


    However, now was not the time to celebrate yet. Greem looked at Cindral and asked curiously, ¡°Cindral, where do you intend to go to digest these eternium ingots now that you have so many of them? If you don¡¯t mind, why don¡¯t you stay here at my Fire Throne for a little while?¡±


    ¡°No need for that,¡± Cindral rejected almost immediately, ¡°I came to the World of Adepts this time to find a suitable metal that could solidify my body. With these eternium ingots, I need nothing else more. I should return to the Fire Elementium ne now.¡±


    ¡°A good idea!¡± Greem might not have achieved his goal, but he couldn¡¯t be bothered by a small hup like this, ¡°Should I open a nar tunnel to send you back?¡±


    Cindral chuckled.


    ¡°Don¡¯t you forget, I am a true-blue native creature of the Fire Elementium ne. I don¡¯t need your help to go back to thend of my origins. Next time youe to the Fire Elementium ne, you cane find me!¡±


    He jumped above the fire altar and swiped with his two sharp ws repeatedly. With the surge of elementium flux from earlier that had yet to dispersepletely, Cindral forcefully tore a spatial rift leading to the Fire Elementium ne and dove inside, vanishing without a trace.


    After he left, a palm-sized tiger model appeared on the altar.


    Greem picked it up and sensed Cindral¡¯s aura on the model.


    It seemed this was themunication item Cindral left behind. If he did indeed return to the Fire Elementium ne, it would be much easier to find Cindral by sensing his aura.


    After sending Cindral away, Greem waved his hand and closed the fire altar. He then returned to his room.


    Crimson Majordomo Gargamel had already been waiting here at his door for a long time.


    ¡°Is anything the matter?¡±


    Greem asked curiously upon taking a seat.


    At its current scale, the Crimson n had over three to four hundred adepts and apprentices, along with a hundred worldly territories and resources sites. The management of this massive n was naturally left to Gargamel and Meryl.


    In general, the affairs of Ailovis were managed by Gargamel, while Meryl managed things over at White Tower in the Northern Lands.


    Most of the time, Greem was a hands-off leader and did not concern himself with the n matters.


    At any rate, establishing the Crimson n was to provide a ce for the people he cared about, while also making it more convenient for him to collect resources. Greem would never be willing to waste his time over n matters.


    That was why, out of his original intentions and personal interests, Greem left the authority over all n affairs to Gargamel and Meryl. He only needed to deal with managing the core power of the n.


    That was also why, under ordinary circumstances, Gargamel would never trouble him with mundane n matters.


    However, his visit today meant that there had to be a matter which he could not decide upon or deal with!


    Gargamel hesitated for a moment before finally speaking.


    ¡°My lord, it¡¯s about Emelia!¡±


    ¡°Emelia? What¡¯s happened to her?¡± Greem asked in surprise.


    Everyone in Fire Throne knew that Emelia was the absolute sweetheart of Gargamel and Eva. They would have cradled her in their mouth if she wouldn¡¯t melt from it, absolutelyvishing her with all their love.


    Could something have happened to Emelia with her two parents doting over her like that?


    ¡°My lord, nothing has happened to Emelia. But...¡±


    ¡°But what? Hurry up and speak, I don¡¯t have the time to y riddles with you!¡±


    ¡°She...she seems to have undergone some mutations.¡±

 Chapter 892 - Soul Fusion

    Chapter 892 Soul Fusion


    Greem hadn¡¯t seen her for a few months, yet Emelia had be even more beautiful again.


    In contrast to Mary¡¯s hot spiciness and Alice¡¯s mysteriousness, Emelia had a phantasmal and ethereal lightness to her.


    From her appearance, Emelia looked just like a young girl of fourteen or fifteen. She had a head of long, soft green hair and a seductively wicked and unruly smile could always be seen on her delicate face. She wore a long green robe woven of vines and nts that dragged against the ground as she walked, and she had a pretty crown of flowers on her head. Her dress had no sleeves, fully showing her long and slender fingers, the nails painted with the green juices of touch-me-nots, pretty and flirtatious.


    With the maturity of age, Emelia was no longer as naughty as she had been when she was a kid. She was quiet and polite, greeting Greem respectfully the moment she entered the door, before silently standing at Gargamel¡¯s side without another word.


    This action seemed to be incongruent with her past personality!


    When the pretty Emelia stood side by side with the old and balding Gargamel, it was hard to believe they were father and daughter. The contrast in appearance was too stark.


    Greem narrowed his eyes. The Chip had been quietly scanning and probing for Emelia¡¯s bodily attributes ever since she entered the room. With the different of two grade levels, the nature barrier surrounding Emelia could not stop the Chip¡¯s scan waves. The information Greem was getting back caused him to frown.


    [Beep. Target creature currently being scanned.


    [Name: Emelia


    Species: Unknown


    Lifeform Grade: Peak First Grade


    Profession: Nature Adept


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 6 | Physique 9 | Agility 7 | Spirit 19


    [......]


    A series of scanned data gathered together, forming the model of a young and pretty nature adept in Greem¡¯s mind. However, when the model scans reached Emelia¡¯s legs, they immediately became a series of scattered and unorganized numbers, as if there was some strange thing there that could obstruct the Chip¡¯s scans.


    Greem smiled gently.


    ¡°Emelia, I heard your father say that recently you ran into some trouble?¡±


    Emelia stood forward and nced at Gargamel unamusedly before saying, ¡°It is no big problem. It is just a slight issue that hase up during my body assimtion. I can resolve it myself!¡±


    Greem¡¯s smile turned even gentler.


    ¡°Could you let me see?¡±


    Emelia let out a bitter and helpless smile. She knew she couldn¡¯t refuse the request of this n leader. She lightly lifted up her green robe. Unexpectedly, what appeared before Greem wasn¡¯t a pair of pretty legs, but a mess of tentacle-like roots entangled together.


    The roots weren¡¯t very thick, but many fine whiskers coiled and intertwined with each other in aplex manner.


    They were bound together, twisted into one another, all while thrumming and beating as if they were the appendages of a horrifying hundred-limbed squid. What astonished Greem more was the fact that the skin of these roots appeared to be semi-translucent. He could very clearly see the green-white juices flowing within.


    Moreover, as the roots squirmed and extended, spots of nature¡¯s light orbited around the roots. If one were to ignore their appearances, then they were as pretty and moving as a fantasy garden.


    This nt mutation started from the calf down. The upper thigh was still the plump white leg of a human girl, but from the knee onward, the leg turned into a hundred strange nt roots entangled together. However, these roots were clearly under Emelia¡¯s control as well. They did not affect her daily life or mobility.


    ¡°Were there such symptoms as well while Eva was growing?¡± Greem turned and asked Gargamel.


    Gargamel shook his head and sighed, frowns on his wrinkled face. It was clear that he was anxious about the condition of Emelia¡¯s body.


    After all, this change toward nt-like features had started quite a while ago.


    However, initially, only Emelia¡¯s feet had been affected. While Gargamel and Eva were anxiously flipping through books searching for the cause, the ntification process had extended to her knees.


    Now, some thick green veins had also started appearing on Emelia¡¯s white legs.


    It was evident that this was symptomatic of the change that was about to ur. If they didn¡¯t find a way to halt this ntification process, it was obvious that Emelia would turnpletely inhuman in one year¡¯s time.


    Though the World of Adepts did not reject non-human adepts, these non-human adepts would never be able to truly assimte into the ranks of mainstream adepts, who were mostly human. That would cause them to have a much more difficult time obtaining knowledge and resources in the futurepared to human adepts.


    Since even Eva felt like Emelia¡¯s condition was strange, it fully meant that the little girl¡¯s growth had gone beyond the control andprehension of the two of them. Otherwise, with how much they doted on Emelia, they would not have needed toe to Greem for help.


    However,pared to Gargamel¡¯s worry and panic, Emelia herself appeared to be reasonably calm.


    Thus, Greem had no choice but to expel Gargamel from the room before having an honest talk with Emelia.


    Once Gargamel had left with some hesitation, Greem stared at Emelia coldly as a mysterious but sinister smile appeared on his face.


    ¡°Gargamel is my subordinate and Eva has worked for the Crimson n for so many years. As the n leader, I have an obligation to protect their interests. Are you Emelia, or are you something else entirely? Tell me, honestly. Otherwise...¡±


    As he said this, a light red Burning Domain engulfed ¡®Emelia,¡¯ a shroud of fire circling two meters around her. The mes surged and licked at her as if they were about to devour her at any moment.


    With Emelia¡¯s powers as a First Grade, the Burning Domain only needed to close in to turn her into ash within three seconds.


    ¡°I am Emelia...¡± This green-haired, purple-eyed girl stared directly into Greem¡¯s eyes and said in a sincere voice.


    ¡°Then let down your soul defenses and let me personally confirm it!¡±


    ¡°...and Yara¡¯s soul fused together!¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    ¡°Please believe me. I am the daughter of Gargamel and Eva! Only...only I have fused with a foreign soul.¡±


    ¡°Fused...¡± Greem repeated, his eyes narrowing even further.


    ¡°Yes, fused; not devoured!¡± Emelia emphasized once more.


    ¡°Open up your soul. I have to check it myself!¡±


    Emelia knew that this was something that had to be done. As such, she had no choice but to release her defense and allow Greem¡¯s slightly searing spiritual appendages to extend into her mental sea.


    It was just like a red-hot iron rod had been stuck into her mind and twisted about. Emelia¡¯s body convulsed and her eyes rolled back into her head, tortured to the brink of death. However, she had no choice but to endure this agony and allow Greem to slowly search for what he wanted.


    The pain of this process was not something that an ordinary person could endure!


    That was why most spells that searched for and extracted knowledge would leave behind severe and irreversible mental damage in the victim. Even if the spell were to seed, the victim would be driven to insanity or death!


    Fortunately, Emelia was an adept. Her Spirit had undergone dozens of years of training and was a hundred times stronger than an ordinary person¡¯s. In addition, Greem was as careful and gentle as he could be. These were the only factors stopping her from turning into an idiot.


    When Greem¡¯s Spirit slowly retreated from Emelia¡¯s mental consciousness, she was drenched in sweat and twitching on the floor.


    ¡°No...now...you be...believe me, don¡¯t you!¡± Even though it was only a simple sentence, Emelia stuttered and paused, her voice weak and powerless.


    Her body had curled into a ball now as shey on the floor, the hundreds of strange roots twisting about each other.


    Greem brooded in silence.


    The girl was not wrong. There used to be two independent souls existing in this body. However, the two souls had now fused perfectly, incapable of distinguishing between one or the other.


    Once again, it was a fusion, not a devouring!


    ording to what she had said, one of the souls should be the mixed-blood descendant of Gargamel and Eva known as Emelia, while the other was a foreign soul known as Yara. If Yara¡¯s soul had devoured Emelia, Greem would have killed her without any hesitation or mercy.


    However, now that their souls had fused, Emelia was Yara and Yara was Emelia. There was no longer any distinction between the two. It was a difficult problem to deal with!


    While Greem was investigating the girl¡¯s soul, it was havoc outside his room. It seemed someone was wildly attacking the door to his chamber, loudly banging at his door protected by defensive arrays.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and finally released the defensive restrictions on the door.


    A loud bang rang out as the doors swung wide open. Eva charged in from the outside, disheveled and covered in blood.


    That was probably the damage inflicted on her from the autonomous retaliation of the defensive restrictions.


    If it wasn¡¯t for Greem discovering her actions ahead of time and cutting off the retaliatory attacks, her wounds might have been even more severe.


    The room of a Third Grade adept was not so easily broken into!


    Forest Spirit Eva saw the twitching Emelia the moment she entered the room. She lunged forward and took her daughter into her arms while screaming furiously at Greem.


    ¡°What have you done to her? If anything happens to my daughter, I will put my life on the line against you.¡±


    Gargamel rushed into the room covered in bruises, pulling at Eva¡¯s arm with all he had.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be impulsive. I¡¯m the one...that asked for our lord¡¯s help in today¡¯s matter.¡±


    A stifled p rang out as a green vine smacked Gargamel away, leaving him rolling across the ground and moaning as he struggled to get up.


    ¡°If...if anything happens to our daughter, I...you, both of us don¡¯t need to live any longer.¡±


    Greem sat casually on his chair, silently watching as this familyedy unfolded.


    In the end, the one that stopped Eva was Emelia.


    Once Gargamel and his family left the room in a mess, Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes and mutter to himself, ¡°Spore princess? Interesting...¡±

 Chapter 893 - Magical Machine Golem Dragon

    Chapter 893 Magical Machine Golem Dragon


    Goblin ne, City of Machines.


    There was a massive alchemyb underneath an adept¡¯s tower.


    Tight, dense scaffolds were built all over therge thirteen thousand square meters assembly workshop. Countless goblin engineers and technicians climbed up and down the scaffolding, soldering, cutting, banging, and making so much noise that it was almost like a market in there.


    Surrounded by all the scaffolds, one could faintly see the shape of a massive magical machine construct.


    It was a massive magical machine golem dragon constructed entirely of metal. Its body was a hundred meters long from head to tail, supported by six thick and sturdy metal legs. Every detail and pattern carved on the machine was exceedingly pretty and realistic.


    The creation of this magical golem dragon made use ofrge amounts of Firegrime Copper, causing its surface to appear an odd shade of dark red. Whenever someone struck its metal body with considerable force, sparks woulde flying out and ignite the clothes of the ¡®attacker.¡¯


    That was why emergency fire rms would be ringing on some spot of the giant dragon every few minutes before they were extinguished by a goblin firetruck that had been waiting there for orders.


    When Greem walked into the workshop in thepany of Deserra and a group of advanced goblin engineers, this messy scene was what he saw.


    A hundred meter long giant magical machine golem dragon.


    Greem narrowed his eyes slightly, assessing the machine as he silently thought.


    It was important to note that even among actual dragons, beings that were a hundred meters long were ancient or primordial dragons, often Sixth Grade at the very least. Yet, these tiny, weak, bean-like goblins had managed to create a machine of this scale with their perfect and refined machine craftsmanship! Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by their abilities!


    However, even if the goblins were to gather all the advanced technicians and engineers of their entire ne, this was the limit of what they could do. Without the magic generator furnace technology that Greem provided, they would never be able to power such a massive mechanical construct, even if they were to fill all of the dragon¡¯s insides with steam-powered engines.


    It seemed the goblins had long since understood this idea. Ever since Greem, the Crimson n leader, had arrived at the Goblin ne and the City of Machines, the smartest and most senior of the goblin engineers had been following him around. The goblin was constantly rambling about ck of funds,¡¯ ¡®many casualties,¡¯ ¡®few apprentices,¡¯ and a whole host of other words like a monk reciting his prayers.


    Of course, the one thing he made sure to talk about the most was the giant magic generator furnace on the blueprint!


    Given the four hundred ton weight of the golem dragon, this massive magic generator furnace would have to possess at least one-third the efficiency of the mega generator furnace that Gazlowe had assimted to be able to power such a massive construct.


    Considering all the magic energy weapons that would have to be added to the machine, the new magic generator furnace to be forged had to have the same level of efficiency and power as that mega magic generator furnace.


    However, Greem had to make use of a precious magic spring to create that mega generator furnace. It would cost a lot more Queyras alloy if he wanted to create another magic generator furnace that couldpare to that!


    That was why Greem¡¯s mind was quickly calcting the estimated Queyras alloy required even as he walked around the golem dragon and evaluated it.


    He had obtained a total of two hundred and seventy tons of Queyras alloy this time. ording to the most recently optimized model data from the Chip, he could construct approximately sixty-seven space furnaces or twenty-six magic generator furnaces. However, if he wanted to forge arge magic generator furnace, he would need to use three to four times the usual amount of Queyras alloy.


    Greem¡¯s head swelled and hurt every time he thought of the Sky Patrol Mothership, the Goblin Dragonce, the Dimensional Ripper, and the legendary Thunder God Titan. He had a feeling that all his assets would be cast to the wind with the help of these weak goblins.


    However, the golem dragon was only a prototype. It was a project meant to umte construction experience for the true killer machines that came after. Amongst those massive magical machine constructs, Greem paid the most heed to the Patrol Mothership and the Thunder God Titan.


    This magical machine golem could onlypare to a Fourth Grade creature at the very best. Still, it was too clumsy and could not fly after all. If the Fourth Grade enemy were too sly and started gueri warfare against it using these weaknesses, the dragon would have a hard time dealing with them.


    It was evident from the fact that Fourth Grade Death Witch Leader Khesuna could beat an actual Fourth Grade dragon in a duel.


    That was why, in Greem¡¯s mind, this future golem dragon could only be the lowest level Fourth Grade magical machine, even if it were sessfully created!


    However, given the Crimson n¡¯s currentck of a Fourth Grade adept, the existence of a Fourth Grade magical machine was a good thing either way.


    At the moment, the only question was whether this endeavor would be worth it!


    Greem stopped walking at the thought of this. Instead, he turned and looked at the old goblin that nearly ran into him from following too closely behind.


    ¡°You.¡±


    ¡°I am Gonga, the current Dean of the Goblin Empire¡¯s Royal Engineering Academy and the construction supervisor of this magical golem dragon!¡±


    ¡°You seemed to have mentioned a lot of technical and logistical problems earlier. I¡¯m not interested in those at present. My only concern is what you can give me if I provide you with arge magic generator furnace with sufficient power.¡± Greem ced his arms behind his back, raising his eyes and putting on an arrogant expression.


    The goblins around him immediately held their breath when they heard his words.


    All the goblins that could be here were advanced engineers at the very minimum. They had all been fully involved in the creation of the golem dragon. Naturally, they all knew the value of arge magic generator furnace. In the past, they hadined to the stationed adepts about theck of apprentices, funds, and constant casualties. But now, the only thing that genuinely bothered them was theck of a powerful heart that could power the magical golem dragon!


    Countlessints, countless requests, countless expectations.


    Every time, they were rejected by the adepts. And every time, they got no reason for the rejection. That undoubtedly caused these goblin engineers to be anxious beyondpare, unable to sleep or sit still, fearful that such a massive magical machine project would go to waste.


    Today, they had finally, for the first time, heard news of therge magic generator furnace and from the mouth of the Crimson n leader himself. How could it not cause them to go into a frenzy with delight?


    ¡°A powerful Fourth Grade magical machine golem dragon!¡± Dean Gonga shouted with all his strength, ¡°Fourth Grade...it is Fourth Grade! It will most definitely help you sweep aside all of your Fourth Grade enemies.¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but chuckle internally when he saw the old goblin shout with all he had and sending saliva flying all over the ce as if he couldn¡¯t be more worried that Greem wouldn¡¯t believe him.


    Fourth Grade.


    These goblins that had been used to being kept in a cage, like tigers in a zoo, probably could not even imagine how terrifying an actual Fourth Grade creature was!


    Did they think that those Fourth Grade adepts would break into some foolish melee, like some stupid warrior, against the dragon?


    The might of a Fourth Grade adept was far beyond the limits of worldly imagination. And they certainly had plenty of means to deal with a slow and clumsy brute like this.


    So what if its size was massive? So what if its entire body was forged purely of magical metals?


    Against a true Fourth Grade adept, it was no more than a pathetic and tragic target. Defeating the magical golem dragon wouldn¡¯t be a problem. The real question was whether the opponent was willing to pay the massive price of taking down a target as sturdy as this.


    Greem was not at all fooled by the old goblin¡¯s passionate rant. Rather, he had a far more urate andprehensive understanding of the golem dragon than the old goblin!


    ¡°Fourth Grade magical machine construct? Good, very good.¡± Greem did not pop old Ganga¡¯s fanciful bubble of idealism. Instead, he turned the topic of the conversation, ¡°Then what practical difficulties are standing between you andpleting this goal?¡±


    ¡°This...¡± Old Gonga hesitated for a moment.


    Even with the might of the City of Machines as it was, they would have tomit all of their resources to create a magical machine construct of this scale. Disregarding the technology and workforce, just the transport teams required to move the metal ingots reached over a hundred in number.


    They traveled through the various major mines every day, collecting the ores and taking them thousands of kilometers to the City of Machines. There, they were processed by the smelting, refinement, and extraction workships before finally being ced in the hands of the goblin technicians.


    The magical alloy smelting and crafting that came after were thenpleted in a small goblinboratory. The daily production from thesebs was no more than a few hundred kilograms of refined alloy. To put together the amount of alloy the golem dragon required, thousands of goblin engineers and technicians were working restlessly through day and night. The number of goblins that had died in thebs and on the operating tforms alone numbered in the hundreds.


    The sole reason they were all putting their lives on the lines was to personally see a ¡®god-tier¡¯ magical machine construct born from their hands!


    For some native creatures who could not step out of the ne due to their racial restrictions, Fourth Grade was indeed the highest level within their world.


    The title of god would not be inurate at all!


    It was because of how much the goblins had put into the project that Gonga was so concerned that the difficulty of his request might scare away this young human adept.


    ¡°...we can solve all other difficulties by ourselves. However, three problems can never be solved with the power of us goblins alone.¡±


    ¡°Speak!¡±


    ¡°First is the problem of the adept apprentices. The lord adepts have assigned us five adept apprentices, and we have be able to do some runic circuit carving under their guidance. However, the number of goblins who have grasped this skill is still far too little. At the very least, if we want to finish carving all the runic circuits and various arrays within the golem dragon, the current number of adept apprentices is still far from sufficient.¡±


    Greem gave this some thought. Soon he had obtained the internal information about the n and replied to the old goblin decisively.


    ¡°From the day after tomorrow onwards, I will assign a hundred adept apprentices from the n to you. The number of adepts will also be increased, and I will have them cooperate with your work.¡±


    The surrounding goblins immediately let out a wave of cheers!

 Chapter 894 - Goblin Faction

    Chapter 894 Goblin Faction


    ¡°Secondly, we have an urgentck of various gemstone resources here.¡±


    ¡°The Goblin ne, as you know, produces very, very few magical gemstones. Even if we asionally find some gemstones, the quality is often inferior. Therefore...¡±


    Greem fell silent for a moment when he heard old Gonga¡¯sints.


    He knew of all these situations. Gargamel and Meryl had reported these things to him as well.


    However, considering that the Goblin ne had not been the primary concern of the Crimson n in the past, the portion of resources allocated to the City of Machines was the smallest of them all.


    Right now, with the sudden supply of Queyras alloys he had obtained, the goblin faction would indisputably rise to the same level of the adept and vampire factions. An appropriate shift in resource allocation was necessary!


    Now that he had made up his mind, Greem gave his promise without any hesitation.


    ¡°From now on, the City of Machines will do a count of all goblins who are advanced technicians or engineers. Their basic treatment will be the same as adept apprentices. Those who are individually chosen to join magic energy workgroups will be treated the same as official adepts. Go down and perfect the few main magical machine ns and give me a list of resources you need. I will inform Gargamel to prioritize the resource requirements here.¡±


    ¡°This...this...¡± Old Gonga couldn¡¯t help but start choking up with tears as he mumbled.


    In the past, the goblins had always been relegated to an inferior, subordinate position within the Crimson n. Apart from Duke Tigule and Sage Snox, they had no voice in most n matters.


    Now, the Crimson n leader had personally conferred high-grade goblins the same status as adepts and apprentices. How could that not cause the old goblin to break into tears of joy?


    ¡°Alright, don¡¯t get so emotional yet,¡± Greem interrupted Gonga¡¯s crying and frowned as he said, ¡°You said you have three problems, what¡¯s thest one?¡±


    Gonga hastily wiped away his tears and pulled his green hair behind his ears before confidently speaking, ¡°I shall venture to ask you, n leader, for a bit of Queyras alloy. This special magical metal is a key material in our construction of space furnaces and magic generator furnaces. I wish to organize a group of goblins to do in-depth research on Queyras alloy and see if we can find a simr recement! This way, your development will no longer be limited by the amount of Queyras alloy.¡±


    Greem nced at the old goblin and the other green goblins around him in shock.


    They barely reached his waist in height, but their confidence and ¡®wild¡¯ tone forced Greem to assess them in a new light.


    Greem had already analyzed the special effects of Queyras alloy thoroughly through the use of the Chip. Trying to create a simr magical alloy by modting metal proportions was going to be very difficult.


    However, the old goblin¡¯s suggestion was truly one that favored the n¡¯s long term interests!


    As such, after some slight thought, Greem opened his mouth and said, ¡°Queyras metal is a magical metal. The goblinboratories of your City of Machinesck the appropriate equipment to analyze and break down the metal. Since you lot intend to do this, then Iet theboratory be at White Tower! You will select a group of experienced veteran engineers to stay at White Tower. I will especially provide you with an exclusive alchemyb there.¡±


    The goblins immediately broke out into cheers.


    Only Wind Adept Deserra put on a faint smile. Clearly, he understood Greem¡¯s intentions.


    For a long time toe, Queyras alloy would be the essential adept resource of the Crimson n. Many core operations of the n would have to revolve around Queyras alloy.


    Under such circumstances, there was no way that Greem, as the leader of the n, could hand over such an important strategic resource to a group of goblins whose loyalty and trustworthiness could not be guaranteed. The reason Greem set theirb in White Tower back in the World of Adepts was to keep these high-level goblins under the eyes of the n.


    This way, any results that they sessfully obtained through their research would rapidly fall into the hands of the n. That would keep them from making any demands from the n higher-ups just by virtue of holding important research results in their hands.


    That was why Greem seemed like he was thinking out of consideration for the goblins, but in truth, he was putting a nail into the board for the goblins¡¯ future development.


    Of course, this was no conspiracy of any sort. Rather, it was a bold and brazen open conspiracy!


    Naturally, with the pure and straightforward minds of the goblins, there was no way they would understand the profound implications behind Greem¡¯s ns. Instead, they were all moved beyond words by the bright future that Greem had promised them.


    After solving the difficulties of the goblins, Greem prepared to leave the Goblin ne. However, he received a request for an audience from Goblin Princess Vanessa.


    It left him no choice but to stay for a while longer.


    He met Vanessa in a hall on the upper levels of the adept¡¯s tower.


    It had been a while since they had met, and the princess¡¯ appearance had changed tremendously. A strange mental flux had also appeared around her.


    Judging from this trend, this development...


    Greem was slightly stunned. Did she intend to walk the path of a mechanical adept?


    As expected, some of the books that Greem had people send over to the Goblin ne had indeed attracted the interest of Princess Vanessa. In her current condition, it seemed like going down the path of a mechanical adept was her only choice.


    There were no issues with having a person¡¯s soul injected into an alchemical golem. However, if this were to remain the case for extended periods, problems would arise.


    Without the nourishment of blood, flesh, and the aura of life, Princess Vanessa¡¯s soul would only grow weaker and weaker, less and less active. If she refused to be turned into an undead creature and remained in her artificial body, the wilting of her soul was an inevitability!


    If she could sessfully advance through the path of a mechanical adept, she could at least retain the condition of her soul, ensuring that it was nourished by magical energy. That would help her break free of her current awkward state of being neither goblin nor golem.


    However, it was apparent that the weak-magic environment of the Goblin ne was ill-suited for a goblin who intended to walk the path of a mechanical adept. Thus, Vanessa requested that Greem allow her to enter the White Tower for studies.


    Greem gave the request some thought and secretly asked Deserra some questions, before finally agreeing to Vanessa¡¯s request.


    The White Tower of the present now had two goblins who had advanced past the threshold of adept and had be official adepts registered under the Crimson n. As long as they were prevented from assembling and forming a faction of their own, they were no big threat.


    Meryl managed the White Tower. She was more than capable of keeping a few goblin adepts under her thumb. As such, Greem wasn¡¯t particrly concerned about the matter.


    After watching Princess Vanessa leave in high spirits, Greem had a simple conversation with Deserra, who was stationed in the Goblin ne, and confirmed that the rule over the Goblin ne was still stable and facing no problems.


    With this in mind, Greem finally prepared to leave for the Tower of Fate in the World of Adepts.


    The war between the Fate and Coldwinter Witches had just concluded there. Alice had already asked for him to attend the celebratory banquet of the Fate Witches several times.


    However, just as he arrived in the upper level of the tower and was about to use the teleportation array there to return to the World of Adepts, white light shimmered around the array. A short momentter, a dense and massive body appeared before him.


    It was Gru¨C Gazlowe¡¯s Split-Off Brain Gru!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be momentarily stunned when he saw the squirming squid-like brain inside Gru¡¯s five-meter tall metal body.


    ¡°What are you here in the Goblin ne for?¡±


    Of course, Greem was curious. After all, Gru was the only clone of Gazlowe; he could almost fully represent the brain monster. The expansion in Lance meant that this period should be when Gru was the busiest. Why would he have the time toe over to the Goblin ne?


    Gru¡¯s squid-like brain immediately squeezed out a humanoid smile when he saw Greem.


    ¡°My Lord, I specially came here to the Goblin ne to invite you.¡±


    ¡°Invite me?¡± Greem was even more confused now.


    ¡°Yes! We heard that you have been busy working over here in the Goblin ne. My original self has a lot of things he wishes to talk about with you! That¡¯s why he had me specially make the trip to bring you over!¡±


    Greem vaguely understood what was happening when he saw the squid brain¡¯s fawning smile.


    Another trouble brought about by the Queyras alloy.


    That brain monster had fairly sharp ears and nose didn¡¯t he?!


    Greem hadn¡¯t even told Gargamel about the newly acquired Queyras alloy. He had only revealed a little about the new supply, yet Gazlowe had already heard of it in Lance.


    Not a bad job of gathering information!


    Greem smiled and casually said, ¡°Let¡¯s go then. I was just wondering how the development of Lance was going!¡±


    The two of them did not stay for much longer. They teleported directly into the Capital of Eternity in Lance.


    ............


    Lance, the Capital of Eternity.


    Once again emerging from the array, Gru led Greem through a series of suspended corridors, steel towers, and winding stairs. It took them an hour of walking to reach the core hall of the steel tower where Gazlowe resided.


    It had only been a short while since Greem had seen this ce, but a few more Second Grade magical machine warriors could be seen near the hall.


    However,pared to an official Second Grade like Tigule, the magical machine warriors created by Gazlowe could only demonstrate powerparable to Second Grade within the range of his control. If they were to leave the steel tower and lose the endless magic energy supply from Gazlowe, their power would drop below Second Grade.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped! The brain monster did not have that much Queyras alloy to forge magic energy cores for every one of them!


    As such, they could only reside in the steel tower, serving as Gru and Gazlowe¡¯s guards and keeping the Lance natives living in the Capital of Eternity in check.


    Gazlowe¡¯s vast and massive spiritual will immediately fell upon Greem the moment he stepped into the hall.


    However, unlike the tension fromst time, Gazlowe appeared to be very careful and gentle this time, like an obedient little child!

 Chapter 895 - Haggling

    Chapter 895 Haggling


    ¡°Speak. Why did you want to meet me?¡± Greem asked unamusedly.


    ¡°My lord, I heard you promised the goblins on Goblin ne some Queyras alloy?¡± The air in the steel hall vibrated slightly. Gazlowe had to create a voice by vibrating the air with his mental powers to amodate Greem.


    ¡°News spreads fast for you!¡± Greem smiled faintly, ¡°It hasn¡¯t been long since I said those words in the Goblin ne and you¡¯ve already heard them here in Lance!¡±


    ¡°Of course. The Goblin ne was my homeworld, after all. I still have some connections there.¡± The brain monster chuckled.


    ¡°I warn you, the priority of your current development is Lance. You must defend this forward outpost with your life. The dragons must not expel you from this ne. You had best not interfere with whatever is happening over at the Goblin ne and affect the n¡¯s development.¡± The brain monster¡¯s performance in recent years had been excellent, but Greem couldn¡¯t help but remind him to stay in line again.


    Gazlowe feared the strong but went after the weak. If Greem didn¡¯t keep a tight grip over him, it was very likely that it would result in bacsh from him.


    As for loyalty? Greem wasn¡¯t as foolish as to believe in the loyalty of a Third Grade brain monster!


    He and Gazlowe might appear to be master and subordinate, but they were, in truth, more like allies. Gazlowe had long since been capable of wiping away the brand that he had ced in his soul in the past.


    If it weren¡¯t for some tricks Greem had left in the ultra-magic generator furnace and Gazlowe¡¯sck of confidence in surviving the bacsh from the Crimson n, he would have broken free of Greem¡¯s soul bindings a long time ago!


    As such, Greem had to be extremely careful and cautious whenever he dealt with this Third Grade brain monster who was flying higher and higher, always at risk of snapping off the strings that kept him bound.


    ¡°Understood! Don¡¯t worry, my lord. The dragons have tried many times already. They might be able to damage my Capital of Eternity badly, but removing it entirely is no more than a fantasy. If they dare toe again, I will make them regret it!¡±


    ¡°Good.¡±


    ¡°My lord, you see...the development of the Capital of Eternity has reached a bottleneck. In the short term, the dragons won¡¯t be able to break into the capital, but neither will we be able to break out; the main problem being Queyras alloy! My lord, don¡¯t you think you should assign a bit of Queyras alloy to the Capital of Eternity as well?¡± The brain monster probed cautiously.


    Greemughed coldly and said, ¡°Those goblins made a promise to me. They will make me a magical machine golem dragon with Fourth Grade powers within one or two years. That is why I was willing to provide them with Queyras alloy. What about you? What can you give me? You do not intend to take away such a treasure from me with nothing in return, do you?¡±


    Greem¡¯s tone might not be friendly, but Gazlowe was suddenly excited.


    He was petrified that Greem only had that much Queyras alloy in his hands. If that were the case, he would never have been able to obtain a single scrap of Queyras alloy even if he were to be unbelievably persuasive. After all, the value of a Fourth Grade golem dragon was shockingly high. He could not provide anything of equal value to pry the Queyras alloy from the hands of the goblins.


    ¡°My lord, I can provide you with yet another magical machine army, consisting of a thousand magical machines.¡±


    ¡°I have no need for a magical machine army for the moment. The development of the Crimson n is fairly stable, and we have no urgent pressure of war. Keep the magical machines for yourself!¡±


    ¡°My lord, I can help you attack dragon lords.¡±


    ¡°Truly, with the magical machine army you currently possess, it should be no problem for you to conquer a few dragon territories. However,¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes and smile, ¡°How many dragons can you catch for me?¡±


    ¡°...¡± Gazlowe fell into an awkward silence.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. That was where his power was mostcking!


    The tens of thousands of magical machine soldiers were like a flood of steel, capable of razing thends and dens of any dragon lord below Fourth Grade. However, Gazlowe could not capture any of the dragons. He was utterly helpless in that regard.


    He might be Third Grade himself, but he was not skilled at battle.


    Even with his mental powers as means of offense, his cowardly personality meant that he was unwilling to set foot on the battlefield unless absolutely necessary. Meanwhile, of the many machines he had created, none could take to the skies.


    However, which dragon lord of Lance couldn¡¯t fly?


    The dragons wouldn¡¯t just be waiting to die in their dens when they see the unstoppable magical machine armying for them. They would probably have packed their bags and fled before the army even reached their homes.


    That was why it was easy for the magical machine army to defeat a dragon lord, but capturing them as they flew freely in the skies was nothing short of fantasy.


    If Greem were willing to provide him with some magic generator furnaces, he would be able to create a fleet of flying ships, and the problem would be solved!


    That was why Gazlowe couldn¡¯t help but want to request for an advance payment of Queyras alloy, even if he knew it was a bit embarrassing to do so.


    Seeing that Gazlowe had fallenpletely silent, Greem shifted the topic of conversation.


    ¡°Where¡¯s Thunder Dragon Arms? What has he been doing during these past few years?¡±


    The one who replied to his question was Gru.


    ¡°Lord Arms has taken up residence in a wide territory a hundred and fifty kilometers to the southwest of the Capital of Eternity. He¡¯s living the good life there! The female dragon¡¯s mating with him once again.¡±


    ¡°Mm, have him watch out and be careful! At this moment, most of the dragon lords of Lance probably already know of his connection to us. Make sure he doesn¡¯t get lured into a trap of the dragons.¡± Greem frowned as he said.


    ¡°I will ensure the safety of Lord Arms¡¯ territory!¡± Gru still had a fawning expression on his brain-face, ¡°My lord, I heard you already havends in both the Central and Northern Regions of the World of Adepts. You must becking arge aerial force right now. Why not you let me forge an undefeatable aerial fleet for you!?¡±


    ¡°Oh? What do you mean, specifically?¡± Gru¡¯s proposition piqued Greem¡¯s interest.


    ¡°We of the Capital of Eternity are swimming in metals, butck magic generator furnaces. If you can provide us with two magic generator furnaces, we will create a Sky Patrol Mothership for you, free of cost. Don¡¯t you forget, the magical machine blueprints in the hands of the little goblins all came from my original self while he was still a goblin.¡±


    Gazlowe remained silent throughout, seemingly assenting to Gru¡¯s suggestion.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes.


    ¡°Give you two magic generator furnaces, you keep one for yourself and use the other to create a Mothership for me? Is that what you mean?¡±


    ¡°Yes, sir!¡±


    ¡°Hehehe, this proposition sounds good. But those little goblins seem to be able to do this as well. Moreover, if I gave them two magic generator furnaces, they would be able to provide me with two Sky Patrol Motherships!¡±


    Gru¡¯s squid-like brain subtlymunicated with his main self.


    Without any hesitation, Gru increased his offer.


    ¡°Two magic generators, we provide you with a Mothership along with a three-hundred strong magical machine army, all of them high-quality advanced First Grade fighters.¡±


    ¡°I provide you with three magic generator furnaces, you make me two Motherships and give me five hundred magical machines.¡±


    ¡°This...¡±


    ¡°Moreover, the Mothership you make for yourself will have to be beholden to orders when the n requires its service. Of course, if any damages were to happen to the ship, the n will reimburse you andpensate for the losses!¡±


    Gru silently discussed with this main body for quite a while before ¡®reluctantly¡¯ agreeing.


    In truth, this was only a strategy of the brain monster!


    It sounded as if this deal would force the brain monster to pay a considerable sum. However, at its core, it did not hurt any of Gazlowe¡¯s real benefits. What did he lose in creating Motherships and magical machines for Greem?


    Just some magical alloy and time!


    He could make up for the magical alloy by finding metal veins in Lance to mine. The factories and magical energy used to create the machines all belonged to himself. With enough time and effort, he could produce as much magical alloy as he wanted.


    That was why Gazlowe believed the deal to be worthwhile, even if Greem¡¯s conditions appeared to be extremely ¡®strict.¡¯


    ¡°Then, my lord, how many magic generator furnaces do you intend to provide us with initially?¡± Gru finally couldn¡¯t suppress the urge to prove at Greem¡¯s bottom line.


    ¡°Let¡¯s proceed with six magic generator furnaces! When you show me four Motherships, I will hand over the six magic generator furnaces.¡±


    Gru couldn¡¯t help but be overjoyed.


    Six Motherships; this was no big problem for the Capital of Eternity. It would take them a month at best to sessfully create all of them. However, that would be straining the metal reserves of the city.


    It seemed like they had to increase the number of mine scouting parties on the outside to find all avable metal veins near the city.


    Both parties quickly reached an agreement, one that satisfied and pleased them both!


    Greem did not stay in the Capital for much longer. Instead, he returned to the teleportation array and went back to the World of Adepts.


    ............


    World of Adepts, Tower of Fate.


    When the blinding white light of the array faded, Greem saw Alice, who was waiting there to greet him.


    Berserk Witch Sofia and a newly advanced Fate Witch followed behind her.


    Her face looked even paler than thest time he had seen her, but her mental condition didn¡¯t seem too bad.


    ¡°How are you? I heard you exhausted quite a lot of Fate power during this war. You didn¡¯t damage your soul origin, did you?¡± Greem strode out of the array and held Alice by her waist.


    Even though they had already consummated their rtionship, Alice was still not used to Greem¡¯s public disys of affection. Her face blushed when she felt Greem¡¯s warm andrge hand wrap around her waist. She nced at him angrily but did not push away the hand.


    ¡°It¡¯s been a few days since our victory and you only just came after I called for you so many times. Hmph! It seems I have no ce in your heart.¡± Alice couldn¡¯t help butin.


    ¡°Don¡¯t change the topic of conversation. Tell me, how much Fate power did you lose during this war?¡± Greem once again asked softly.


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh, ¡°We Fate Witches do not have muchbat power to speak of; all we can rely upon is the blessing of Fate. Thank the stars that we won in the end. Otherwise, I would have suffered a huge loss!¡±

 Chapter 896 - Doverand Basin

    Chapter 896 Doverand Basin


    Alice might have beaten Morgana, but in the end, it was a narrow victory!


    Morgana had lost the reputation of the Coldwinter Witches and one-third of the n¡¯s resource sites, while Alice lost all the Fate power she had so painstakingly umted over the years.


    It was important to note that this was the capital that Alice had only managed to umte after participating in three nar wars!


    Still, the Fate Witches had obtained a massive opportunity due to this war. Their overall strength was now skyrocketing.


    At the moment, there were as many as seven Fate Witches in the Tower of Fate. Though it was not yet at the level before their invasion into Faen, the average quality of the witches was higher.


    Moreover, with the gradual increase of their territory, the Fate Witches were receiving more and more apprentice seeds from all over thend. The seven Fate Witches ran all over their territory, day and night, selecting talented individuals from amongst these apprentice seeds and taking them back to the Tower of Fate.


    Those with inferior talent were then ced in nearby resource sites for study and further training.


    For the first time in the hundred years since their revival, the number of witch apprentices gathered in the Tower of Fate exceeded a hundred individuals. That was a spectacr event that has never before happened in the history of the Fate Witches!


    A hundred witch apprentices would only be too few apprentices in any other witch branch, never too many. However, it was different for the Fate Witches.


    As everyone knew, Fate Witches were not known for theirbat power. They had almost no professional skills rted tobat at the lower grades. Only those like Alice, who had endured until they were Second Grade, would have chances to shine on the battlefield after mastering skills rted to blessing and cursing an opponent¡¯s fate.


    Before this happened, most Fate Witches could only rely on instant-cast magic wands and scrolls to protect themselves. It indirectly increased the difficulty of their survival on the battlefield. That was why it was said that Fate Witches mainly needed the protection of a third party before they were fully developed.


    These lethal ¡®weaknesses¡¯ caused the witch apprentices of the Fate branch to be far less numerous than the other branches. Meanwhile, the only ones who could form a codependent rtionship with the Fate branch were probably the False Witches, who had strict talent prerequisites and a tremendous difficulty advancing.


    It was said that the essential requirement that False Witches set when selecting apprentices was being female, having no immediate rtive, and awakening a talent for illusion before the age of eight.


    These prerequisites alone shut out most candidates, let alone the problematic advancements toe. That was why the False Witches mostly ran a single-student system. That was to say that every False Witch would only take a single student throughout their entire lives.


    That also caused the legacy of the False Witches to easily be cut off due to unexpected incidents!


    In all honesty, if the Northern Witch branches were to be ranked by how weak they were and how few members they had, the False Witches would most definitely sit at the top.


    Quickly followed by the Fate Witches, of course.


    If Alice had not met Greem, the shallow roots of her n would not have allowed her to survive that painful First Grade journey. Now, with the in-depth cooperation of the Fate Witches and the Crimson n, the Fate Witches were well protected by magical machines and elementium golems. They were no longer as frail and weak as they were before.


    The development of the Fate branch finally started to elerate under such circumstances!


    After staying with Alice at the Tower of Fate for two days, Greem hurried to White Tower after receiving multiple urgent messages from Adept Meryl.


    White Tower had turned into a lively ce these days.


    After five years of colonization, the Crimson n¡¯s influence had reached a hundred and fifty kilometers deep into the ck Forest. This action undoubtedly touched upon the nerves of many powerful magical creatures. As such, a well-expected stampede had erupted!


    This magical tide of monsters that sprung from the depths of the ck Forest was both an opportunity as well as a trial for the Crimson n. If they resisted this stampede, they would gain control of all the richnd and forest around them. If they failed, everything would return to zero. The efforts and resources the n had invested over the past five years would go to waste, utterly in vain.


    In the face of such immense pressure, Meryl immediately started summoning powerful adepts within the n to the frontlines to stave off the enemy. Apparently, Zacha and Tigule had already arrived and were fighting with the magical creature lords of ck Forest.


    Meanwhile, the champion of the n, Bloody Queen Mary, was very close to advancing to Third Grade. As such, she was hiding within Fire Throne, waiting for the time toe. However, her powerful servants were all present on the battlefield, propping up a sturdy defense for the n.


    The other powerful adept, Bug Adept Billis, was off exploring some ancient ruins in the Central Region. He was temporarily out of contact.


    Consequently, Meryl was still worried about the frontlines. She could not sleep well and had no choice but to repeatedly urge Greem, the n leader, to hurry to White Tower. Greem could only reluctantly leave the Tower of Fate and teleport to White Tower.


    ............


    Doverand Basin.


    It was a vast basin with fire red cockb growing all over the ce. The geography was high in the west and low in the east. Overall, the basin was shaped like an oval.


    It was the widest ce in the vast ck Forest and, naturally, became the most intense battlefield between the Crimson n and the stampede of magical creatures.


    A sturdy fort had been built with Doverand Basin at the center. Arge group of Crimson adepts and apprentices led civilians in the defense here, sticking a tough nail into the wing of the beast stampede. Though quite a few beasts and magical creatures had scurried to White Tower, the magical creature lords with the most power and influence were pacing outside the fort.


    Even the magical creature lords didn¡¯t dare to step into the area covered by the White Tower before these human adepts on the outside had all been exterminated.


    The battle continued.


    On the highest spot of Doverand Basin, on the west side, the Crimson adepts were organizing civilians and goblins to build an extremely strong wooden fort.


    The forest and bushes around them had been cleared. Thick and sturdy logs had been sharpened and beaten into the dirt, forming a strong wall around them. Two meters off the ground upon the walls, a series of shooting ports had been carved into the wood. Magic energy rifles gleaming with the shine of metal extended from these ports.


    The one thousand White Tower civilians and goblins inside the fort all had a magic energy rifle of their own. They even had a short pistol at their waists.


    The rifle fired weak versions of Scalding Rays, powered by magic energy batteries. They had a range of a hundred and twenty meters and an offensive power of eleven points. Ordinary beasts had no such thing as magic resistance. The Scalding Rays would leave a clean hole on their bodies with no chance for them to defend. Such attacks would wound magical creatures if they were anything below First Grade.


    The pistols at their waists were primitive goblin guns. They relied on metal bullets fired through alchemical gunpowder to hurt the enemy. It had a range of ten to forty meters and an offensive power of eight points. Each goblin gun might be weak, but when fired in a barrage, they could even wound a FIrst Grade magical creature.


    One could reasonably im that the ordinary civilians and goblins of the Crimson n would not have been able to fight against the magical creatures and beasts had it not been for the n¡¯s promotion of magic energy rifles and goblin guns. However, with these simple weapons, any fellow that could press a trigger was a magical creature hunter. They could hide behind the sturdy walls and easily ughter the swarm of beastsing at them.


    When the horde of wild beasts and birds of prey swarmed out from the east of ck Forest and charged toward the forest across the uneven basin, red dots of light lit up upon the walls. Sizzling beams cut across the sky,nding where the beasts were most concentrated.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether they were thick and fat razor boars, fleet-footed berserk apes, or lithe and agile jaguars¨C none of them had an easy time crossing the midpoints of the basin.


    The Scalding Rays were like the eyes of the reaper, bringing death with them wherever they went. One beast after another howled and copsed to the ground where the red lights crossed, with bloody holes shot into their bodies.


    When the more robust magical creatures took to the frontlines to shield the others with their magic-resistant bodies, the Crimson adepts behind the walls would drown them with ferocious magic.


    Testing the might of human adepts with crude skin and flesh was an unfair test to begin with!


    However, this unfair scene urred again and again on this chaotic battlefield.


    Most beasts fell during their charge. Even the asional fortunate creature that made it to the wall would be met with a row of magical machines forged of pure metal.


    Magical machines and elementium golems were powerful guards that almost every official adept within the Crimson n possessed. These machines were steel shields, while the elementium golems were explosive weapons. They had both be irreceable assistants of the Crimson adepts.


    It was impossible to charge up to a Crimson adept¡¯s side before first beating their machine and their golem!


    While blood was spilled in the basin, the seven Second Grades of the Crimson n were calmly standing in front of the tent at the center of the fort, assessing the battle from afar.


    Dragonborn Zacha, Goblin Tigule, Blood Knights Soros and Windsor, Blood Elf Isa (Mage), Lilia (Magic Archer), Spa (Shapeshifter).


    As the core fighting force of the Crimson n, these seven Second Grades represented Greem, the goblin faction, and the vampire faction respectively. They were already the strongest force of the Crimson n, excluding the few top-tier adepts of the n.


    They knew very well that these wild beasts did not qualify to assault the White Tower if they could not even break through a fort such as this. The surface reason the Crimson n had chosen this ce to fend off the stampede was to reduce the pressure around White Tower, but in truth, it was an internal selection and elimination of the n.


    Over the past few days, many new adepts had risen to power in the Crimson n. The higher-ups were intending to use this stampede as a means of sifting out the elites. As such, these Second Grades were only here as thest line of defense. The ones who were truly embroiled in the deathmatch were the First Grade adepts and apprentices.


    They were the true protagonists of this battle!

 Chapter 897 - One Corner of the Battlefield

    <strong>Chapter 897 One Corner of the Battlefield</strong>


    Adept Locke was incredibly busy!


    As a newly advanced adept, Little Locke relied on his expert magical machine maniption techniques to quickly ascend as a celebritybat adept in White Tower.


    Locke had been assigned to the left side of the fort for this battle. He led a group of two hundred goblins in defense of a fifty-meter stretch of the wall. The two other adepts that had been assigned to the same area were Blood Elf Archer Sandor and Human Adept Adreica.


    Judging by this assignment alone, it was apparent that every zone of defense was made up of a team of adepts from all the major factions.


    While he was engaged in battle, Little Locke¡¯s mind kept thinking back to the things that the goblin hero, Tigule, had secretly told him. Tigule not only told him about the real purpose behind this stampede defense, but he also told him to perform to the best of his abilities and increase the reputation of the goblin faction.


    It was his awareness of the situation that made Goblin Adept Locke behave so courageously and selflessly in battle. He was also curious whether Blood Elf Archer Sandor had also received the news of this ahead of time. Why else would a long-ranged magic archer like herself behave so aggressively on the battlefield?


    Little Locke did not choose to hide in the fort but instead came to its exterior. A strange, two-meter tall magical machine golem was running beside him, exceedingly active and surprisingly lethal in battle.


    This magical machine did not make use of the same dome-shaped metal body like the other magical machines. Instead, it was constructed with a rtively primitive and crude wind-up clockwork system. Not many parts of its body were covered with metal pieces, leaving much of the internal construction exposed to everyone¡¯s eyes.


    It shambled about the battlefield with its wild, penguin-like movements, asionally transforming into all sorts of ughter weapons.


    If the enemy were too far away, it would creak and transform into a smoking goblin tank, bombarding the opponent from a distance with its powerful magic energy cannons. If the enemy charged into mid-range, it would creak as it turned into an Archer, disrupting the enemy¡¯s movements with fast and rapid gunfire.


    If the enemy continued rushing ahead, it would turn into a two-meter tall wind-up goblin, engaging in melee with hooks and chainsaws. It would even fire out goblin rockets to destroy the enemy at close range.


    It was the protection of this magical machine that allowed Little Locke to remain uncontested on the battlefield.


    An even more powerful flying disc floated above his head, keeping a tight guard over the airspace around him. Any ferocious bird of prey that came within a hundred meters of Locke would have to endure its fierce attacks.


    It had two primary means of attack. It relied on the two red gemstones to fire beams from a distance, and sharp des extending out of its sides when it came to a melee. When the disc spun around the flocks of birds at seventy revolutions per second, no flesh or bone could stop the terrifying slicing power of the spinning disc.


    Meanwhile, Locke held two blue Frost Ray guns in his hand, shooting down any creature that made it past his defenses. His shooting skills were terrible, but with the help of the Locke III Combat Goggles, he was a perfect sharpshooter.


    Any beast that got hit by the Frost Rays would be instantly sealed in a crystal half a centimeter thick. Before they could break free of the constraints of the ice crystal, the magical machine golem and the flying disc¡¯s attacks would descend, tearing them to pieces.


    All the goblins defending within the tower were loyal fans of Adept Locke. They would cheer loudly every time Locke tore apart one of the ferocious magical creatures. The dense barrage of Scalding Rays from the walls shot down most of the beasts charging at Adept Locke.


    Compared to Little Locke, Magic Archer Sandor¡¯s battle appeared to be elegant and clean, much like the work of a master artist.


    Sandor fought on the battlefield alone.


    She used a crimson longbow with an exaggerated and strange design as her weapon.


    As she casually wove through the battlefield, the many beasts and magical creatures chased after her, but their fangs and ws could only tear through the afterimages she left behind. While she dodged between the beasts and monsters, she would either pull lightly at her bow and fire a crimson arrow through the opponent¡¯s skull or wave the bow and use the de of the bow¡¯s body to slice the enemy¡¯s throat.


    Neither the enemy¡¯s fangs nor the blood they spilled could ssh onto her slender and tall body.


    Sandor roamed the battlefield, seemingly slow but actually fast and rapid in her extermination of the powerful magical creatures mixed amongst the beasts.


    If too many beasts gathered around her, she would jump off of the back of a beast, gather her energy in mid-air, and create a crystalline crimson magic arrow between her fingers. The arrow would then shoot into the horde.


    A massive blood spell would then abruptly erupt amongst the beasts!


    Be it Crimson Impact, Blood Poison, or even Enraging Mists, every single spell would bring maximum damage and chaos to the stampede.


    With her on the battlefield, the powerful magical creatures could not even get close to the wooden walls of the fort; they all died humiliating deaths in the stampede.


    Compared to Little Locke¡¯s ferociousness and savagery and Sandor¡¯s agility and fast movements, the First Grade human adept performed much more poorly.


    He was an adept from the Magic Forest Hut who had surrendered to the n!


    He was also a potion master¨C an essential and irreceable part of the n¡¯s development!


    With Little Locke and Sandor fighting at the frontlines, Potion Master Adreica could rx and safely unleash his might from below the walls.


    Adreica knew the situation well enough. He threw out a few vials of potion at Locke and Sandor, the erupting mists enhancing them with beneficial support spells. He mainly provided Sandor with enhancements to her agility, with a bit of bonus to her stamina regeneration. Meanwhile, Locke had his Spirit raised, along with his Spirit regeneration.


    This way, the two adepts would have a demonstrably increased sustainability on the battlefield!


    After enhancing his twopanions, Adreica threw out a dozen magical potions. These potions erupted and summoned three-meter tall elementium earth golems, wind spirits surrounded by raging cyclones, ice warriors formed of hard blue ice, as well as slimes that smelled like rotten mud.


    These summoned elementals charged into the horde fearlessly under Adreica¡¯s orders, battling with their unique elemental abilities. Meanwhile, Adreica used a magical golem core to summon an advanced First Grade stone golem to protect him.


    This way, his safety was guaranteed!


    Simr scenes were ongoing around the wooden fort that the adepts had constructed. It filled the battlefield with a strange atmosphere alongside all the bloodiness and cruelty.


    Of course, war was always strange and unpredictable.


    Not all adepts could handle the invasion so easily and effortlessly.


    In certain regions, both adepts and apprentices were ambushed by magical creatures in a moment of carelessness, losing their lives in the horde and bing the defeated of the battlefield. However, in general, the rhythm and pace of the battlefield were still dictated by the Crimson adepts. The stampede was a surging wave, only capable of repeatedly beating against that seemingly weak yet imprable line of defense, breaking themselves into pieces upon the sturdy wall.


    The performance of the horde dissatisfied the magical creature lords behind the scenes.


    A deafening roar rang out as an intermediate Second Grade ming tiger charged out of the woods with two dozen of its family members. They pushed aside the beasts in their way and made for the fort.


    The ming tigers were a sort of fire-element magical creature. Their fur was bright red, and they looked a flowing ball of fire when they sprinted across thend. First Grade ming tigers had mastery over a power known as meball. They could concentrate raging fire elementium in a fist-sized fireball. The projectile had a range of thirty meters and dealt between sixty and ny points of damage.


    The Second Grade ming tiger leading the charge also possessed a strange ability reminiscent of Burning Path, turning everything into fire where it crossed.


    If they were allowed to assault the fort, the n adepts on the outside would not be able to stop them. It was an attack from a Second Grade magical creature, after all.


    Locke and Sandor clearly didn¡¯t have good luck, as the Second Grade ming tiger had chosen to break through their area of defense.


    A cold glint of light gleamed in Sandor¡¯s crimson eyes. She quickly approached the ming tiger pack, her red boots stepping upon the backs of the wild beasts. Once the tigers were within range, she stomped her feet hard, avoiding the lunging strikes of two jaguars and rising to mid-air.


    A pair of crimson bat wings appeared silently, rapidly carrying her backward through the sky. She focused and quickly gathered a spell-charged arrow between the bowstring and bow.


    Sandor assessed the situation and fired an arrow enchanted with Enraging Mists into the midst of the beasts. She was hoping to disrupt their offense with magic that created chaos.


    Unfortunately, when the arrow shot toward the ming tigers, an eagle¡¯s cry rang from the flock above them.


    A Second Grade wing eagle lunged from the sky, its two powerful ws reaching forward and grabbing at Sandor¡¯s head.


    Wind eagles excelled at manipting wind elementium, making them the fastest amongst magical creatures of the same grade.


    Sandor had been distracted and only noticed the ming tiger. As such, she was caught unprepared by this sly and cunning Second Grade wind eagle.


    Sandor was almost about to be injured by the Second Grade wind eagle when a one-meter-wide and half-meter-thick floating disc charged over toward them.


    The wildly spinning des shed with the eagle ws wrapped in a vortex of air. Both the disc and the bird fell backward simultaneously as blood spilled into the air.


    The right w of the wind eagle had been sliced open and was now bleeding.


    The flying disc had been blown away by the impact as well. A massive dent appeared on the disc, and cracks were visible everywhere.


    The flying disc wobbled in the air and stumbled back toward Little Locke.

 Chapter 898 - Battle of the Second Grades

    Chapter 898 Battle of the Second Grades


    With the appearance of the Second Grade magical creatures, a shocking reversal immediately took ce on the battlefield.


    The previously unstoppable First Grade Crimson adepts quickly received a critical impact. Defending adepts in several regions were defeated beneath the attacks of Second Grade magical creatures, with a few deaths cropping up here and there.


    However, with their impable teamwork and countless magical items, most of the Crimson adepts still managed to escape the evil ws of the magical creatures while escaping back into the fort, terrified and covered in wounds.


    The Second Grades of the Crimson n stood before the tall tent in the center of the fort. They looked at each other, nodded, and charged onto the battlefield.


    They were only testing the n adepts after all. It would not be worth it if arge number of the adepts were to die at the hands of the Second Grade magical creatures. Thus, with the appearance of the Second Grade magical creatures, the Second Grades of the Crimson n also joined the battle.


    Zacha was wearing fine wind indurium armor, holding the lightning spear in his left hand and the Frozen Mallet in his right. He let out a roar as he charged out of the fort, running straight into the duo of the Second Grade ming tiger and wind eagle.


    Though they were all Second Grades, and the beasts had the numerical advantage, their power wasn¡¯t on the same level. Zacha¡¯s powerful Physique allowed him easily defeat any of them even without his arsenal of powerful magical weapons. Now that he was armed to the teeth, he was more than a match for two opponents of the same grade.


    The ming Tiger King was a vicious and savage beast, but it was inferior to Zacha when it came to size. It let out a roar as it fired a Tiger Roar Bomb from its bloody mouth. The tiger then leaped away and started running around Zacha, hoping to catch his back open for an opportunity to attack.


    The Tiger Roar Bomb was a variant me ball. It turned into a red fireball the moment it left the tiger¡¯s mouth, shooting toward Zacha¡¯s chest.


    Zacha did not dodge or avoid the attack at all. He stood tall as a swift sh of blue lightning shot out from his lightning spear, running straight into the fireball. Wild lightning and crimson fire shed in the air, erupting into a blinding cluster of me and lightning storms that ravaged the area.


    A wind vortex shot out of his wind indurium armor, engulfing Zacha¡¯s body and protecting him from the wandering elementium storm.


    The unharmed Zacha would not let the ming tiger king continued its barrage. His gigantic body moved through the fire and thunder, speeding toward the opponent. Zacha¡¯s heavy footsteps left strange dragon-like prints in the dark earth as he thundered across the ground.


    Zacha shouldn¡¯t have been able to catch up to the tiger with his speed. However, his armor gave him increased movement speed, allowing him to turn into a blue blur as he kept close pursuit on the tiger. Zacha charged through a horde of beasts, crushing countless unfortunate creatures beneath his feet.


    The Second Grade wind eagle circled in the sky. Whenever it discovered any weakness from Zacha, it would let out a cry and dive down from the air like a white-green wind missile.


    However, it had an absolute disadvantage against the powerful magical weapons in Zacha¡¯s hands.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the lightning spear or the Frozen Mallet; its frail body could not endure attacks from either of these weapons. It was still fine when the eagle fired some wind des from the skies, but when it got close to Zacha, it was at risk of being hit by the weapons. Any slight graze from that weaponry meant severe injuries and broken bones.


    After just five rounds of fighting with Zacha, the Second Grade wind eagle was hit in the w by the mallet.


    It not only disrupted the Windwing spell protecting the eagle and churned the winds into chaotic currents. It also caused the bird¡¯s w to break with a loud snap.


    The wind eagle beat its wings with all it had, dispelling the frost power spread across its body. It then barely avoided the follow-up lightning chain before taking to the sky once more with an agonizing cry.


    While the wind eagle was tussling with Zacha, the ming tiger turned into a ball of fire and arrived at the dragonborn¡¯s side. The two of them started fighting, engaging in a horrifying melee fight seventy meters in front of the fort walls.


    The ming Tiger King was a vicious and cunning individual as well. It had intentionally avoided Zacha¡¯s tough armor when attacking and instead focused its attacks on his quadrupedal lower half where he could not defend so well.


    Tiger ws shrouded in red mes left ck scorch marks when they cut across Zacha¡¯s tough dragon scales. The fire also caused his lower body to sizzle as it burned and cooked.


    Unfortunately, while its attacks barely broke through the dragonborn¡¯s scales, the tiger itself was hit by rapid chain lightning.


    Bzzzz!


    A powerful and numbing electric current surged throughout the tiger¡¯s body, turning its fur ck.


    Before it could drive out the numbing sensation from the shock, Zacha endured the pain of his wounds and stood up straight. The heavy mallet in his hand smashed down heavily upon the tiger¡¯s skull.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    Mixed with a loud impact was a crisp cracking sound.


    The Tiger King let out a pained howl, but its head had been split open. The purple-ck blood that spilled forth was frozen into shards by the frost powers of the Frozen Mallet before it hit the ground. The ming Tiger King was frozen into a blue ice sculpture, stuck in its previous stance.


    Before the Tiger King could respond, Zacha¡¯s second and third hammer strikesnded on its head once again, unrelenting and unforgiving.


    The tiger was frozen in ayer of ice crystals, before being smashed to pieces, before getting frozen again and smashed free once more.


    The ming Tiger King was furious, but all its anger could only be contained within its body. It could not even let out a roar as the berserk dragonborn smashed its head to pulp, coating the ground with its brain matter and ending its life with a gruesome death.


    After killing the enemy with one swift series of attacks, Zacha lifted the tiger¡¯s corpse with his lightning spear and threw it into the fort. It was then that he pulled himself together and started swallowing multiple vials of healing potion as he reassessed the battlefield.


    The skin that had been burned by the fires quickly shed as ck dust. The fresh flesh beneath it quickly healed and scabbed before being covered by newly grown scales.


    In a fair fight and void of all his weapons, Zacha¡¯s power was only about equal to the ming Tiger King. He might have been able to suppress the tiger with his superior Physique, but defeating it would have been much more difficult.


    Much less torturing the tiger to death in such a dominating fashion, as he just had!


    One of them was wearing three to four pieces of Second Grade magical equipment, while the other was utterly unequipped and was only fighting with tooth, w, and instinct. The difference inbat power was so vast that it was unbelievable.


    Looking across the battlefield, one could see that each and every Second Grade Crimson adept was able to deal with multiple magical creatures of the same grade due to their tremendousbat power and magical equipment.


    In particr, Tigule¡¯s Second Grade Goblin Shredder was an unstoppable killing machine. Three Second Grade magical creatures were simultaneously attacking it, but none of them could break through the machine¡¯s tough metal shell.


    Meanwhile, the wildly spinning disc and chainsaw in the Shredder¡¯s hands would leave beasts inches from death if the weapons even slightly grazed their bodies.


    Engaging in gueri warfare against the Shredder?


    Godammit! The storm of bullets from the Shredder gave the three magical creatures an immense headache!


    It didn¡¯t matter whether their movements were agile and flexible, or slow and clumsy; Tigule would simply barrage them with bullets and rockets after locking on.


    The three magical creature lords finally understood what tragedy and pain were when they ran into this stubborn metal can. There was nothing they could do at melee range, and moving themselves to a distance only made them targets.


    They circled the Goblin Shredder, desperately dodging left and right, but their bodies were still slowly riddled with holes from the constant hail of bullets. If it weren¡¯t for the innate savagery emanating from their very souls as magical creatures, they would probably have tucked tail and ran a long time ago.


    Meanwhile, the blood knights and blood elves were excellent butchers on the battlefield.


    As long as the magical creatures could not kill them instantly, they would be able to wear them down slowly through their bloodsucking attacks.


    For a moment, countless magical creatures ran all over the battlefield as a rain of bullets flew across.


    Several Second Grades fought ferociously in the middle of the horde, unconcerned for their own wellbeing.


    The horde avoided them wherever they went, and all the beasts and magical creatures ran as far as they could. Not a single one of them wanted to be anywhere near the battlefield of these Second Grades.


    With the Second Grades fighting amongst each other, the battlefield was left to the First Grade adepts and magical creatures once more.


    Both parties shed beneath the walls of the fort, engaged in an intense fight.


    At this moment, a strange roar came from the depths of the ck Forest.


    All the Second Grades on the battlefield stopped fighting and looked in that direction. A powerful aura rose from that ce, almost as if it was a massive and unstoppable wave surging toward the battlefield.


    Third Grade!


    It was a Third Grade!


    The Crimson adepts didn¡¯t need to pay attention to know what wasing. Their expressions transformed tremendously as, for the first time, they lost confidence in their victory in this war.


    Third Grade. To think they had a Third Grade magical creature lord standing behind their backs.


    This terrifying reality drained the color from everyone¡¯s faces. The high morale from all the fighting up until now crumbled in an instant.


    A row of towering ancient trees at the edge of the ck Forest snapped in half in front of the adepts¡¯ concerned looks, revealing the terrifying magical creature behind them.


    It was a giant, brown-gray meatball, eight feet in diameter.


    Its body was covered in uneven scales the color of metal.


    A bloody mouth could be seen at the center of the ball of meat, taking up half of the body and filled with sharp fangs. A massive vertical eye was above the mouth but not yet opened. Seven or eight snake-like tentacles extended from the meatball like braids. A strange eyeball could be seen at the tip of each tentacle, closing and shutting constantly.


    These eyestalks had tough skin, and faint whipping sounds could be heard as they moved through the air.


    A Beholder. This Third Grade magical creature lord that had just appeared was actually a Beholder!

 Chapter 899 - Greem Appears

    Chapter 899 Greem Appears


    Beholders were evil and twisted magical creatures.


    They possessed mighty mental powers and excelled at using mind magic to turn intelligent creatures into their servants. The multiple eyestalks on their bodies could each fire a magical beam with a different attribute. Not only were these beams extremely lethal, but they also fired instantly.


    As the beholder¡¯s body possessed anti-gravity forcefields of its own, they could easily hover in the air. Moreover, the massive eye at the center of its fleshy body could fire a Light of Temptation, instantly taking control of an enemy¡¯s body.


    Consequently, a powerful beholder would often enve hundreds and thousands of ves to construct a safeir for itself. It would then be the ruler of the den, governing over the life and death of every single one of its subordinates and ves.


    The Second Grades of the Crimson n immediately retreated into the fort at the sight of the Third Grade beholder. There, theymenced a nervous discussion about their next n of action.


    If it were just an ordinary Third Grade magical creature, they might have been able to keep it away from the fort by working together.


    However, all the Crimson adepts lost their confidence in victory when they were dealing with a terrifying Third Grade beholder.


    Among them all, Tigule was the one with the loudest voice.


    ¡°Zacha; Meryl repeatedly emphasized that you were the one in charge before we arrived here at this battlefield. Tell us, how are we supposed to continue fighting this war? You aren¡¯t as foolishly loyal as to fight against a Third Grade beholder as a Second Grade yourself, are you? That¡¯s a Third Grade and a beholder! You will probably be charmed the moment you get close to it and turn into its newest ve.¡±


    It was only natural that Tigule feared the beholder as much as he did.


    The goblins were not known for their Spirit. Amongst all the Second Grades here, Tigule was the only one fighting with a magical machine when he was only an advanced First Grade himself. Consequently, he was genuinely terrified of the beholder¡¯s mental powers.


    The Goblin Shredder might have a shockingly high physical defense and decent magical resistance, but it could not shield its pilot from such intangible mental powers.


    Tigule, and individuals like Zacha, who only had muscle and limited mental resistance, were basicallymitting suicide if they even got close to a beholder. The monster only needed to order them tomit suicide, and it would be able to kill them without even lifting a finger.


    As the beholder slowly entered the battlefield with its horrifying aura, the atmosphere in the fort instantly thickened and froze.


    The civilians and goblins inside the fort also started to be restless.


    If the situation turned bad, the adepts all had the means to escape. That would leave the ordinary humans behind with a bunch of weak apprentices. How were they supposed to stop the attack of the stampede then?


    While everyone was growing anxious and nervous, a strong and powerful male voice rang in Zacha¡¯s ear.


    ¡°Zacha, help me lock on to your position. I am teleporting over!¡±


    It¡¯s Greem! It¡¯s the n leader!


    A smile immediately appeared on Zacha¡¯s broad, indigo face.


    He roared and stepped forward, tearing off a metal tag from his neck and grabbing it in his hand. He then concentrated wild lightning power and injected the energy into the tag.


    As the tag turned increasingly brighter from the lightning powers, it also became red and hot, burning Zacha¡¯s hands and causing his flesh to sizzle. Even so, the dragonborn clung on to the tag, sping it firmly between his hands as he raised it before him.


    A short momentter, a profound and mysterious light array radiated from the metal tag, causing the air itself to vibrate slightly in its own unique fashion.


    A Fire Teleportation rune!


    The Second Grades of the Crimson n were unlike those low-grade adepts with no proper knowledge. They almost instantly recognized the true nature of this strange light array. Its appearance usually meant...


    As this thought appeared in everyone¡¯s mind, a burst of fire erupted in the center of the array. A faint yet tall silhouette appeared out of thin air, quickly materializing.


    It was the n leader. It was the n leader!


    A deafening wave of cheers spontaneously erupted within the fort!


    The beasts outside the fort suddenly stopped moving, confused and fearful as they sensed the aura of ughter pressing toward their faces. The Third Grade beholder also stopped moving, staring firmly at the unnerving form that had appeared.


    Fire Teleportation!


    It was a fire spell that Greem had only mastered after advancing to Third Grade.


    The low-grade Fire Teleportation had only allowed him to teleport to an area within his visual radius, up to a maximum of four hundred meters. Meanwhile, the upgraded version had a much more extended range. As long as Fire Teleportation runes had been set up within a hundred-kilometer radius, Greem would be able to use his tremendous mastery over mes to instantly teleport over.


    Meryl had already considered this when she chose the Doverand Basin as the battlefield.


    As such, Greem immediately had teleported over from the White Tower without any hesitation upon hearing about the change at the frontlines.


    He was not at all worried about running into an excessively powerful opponent.


    After all, the initiative in this battle had always been in Meryl¡¯s hands.


    The bold yet careful Meryl had long since figured out the power and distribution of the magical creature lords around the tower before the stampede broke out. The existence of this Third Grade beholder was a surprise to the low-grade adepts and ordinary civilians, but that was not the case for the leaders of the n.


    The reason Zacha was chosen as themander of this battle was due to him having once been Greem¡¯s soul servant, and because of his continued loyalty. That was why the Fire Teleportation rune used for locking on to his position was left in his care.


    And Zacha did indeed live up to his obligation, sessfully guiding Greem over to the battlefield!


    ............


    The fire finally dispersed.


    Greem¡¯s vision was once again clear.


    His massive Spirit instantly engulfed the entirety of the basin, and he promptly understood the situation. His Spirit unavoidably shed with the sinister and chilling Spirit of the beholder.


    Greem lifted his head and locked eyes with the beholder, through the towering fort walls, through three hundred meters of distance, and through the horde of countless strange monsters and beasts.


    A st of fire immediately rose around Greem¡¯s tall body. However, an evil white-green will seemed to be wrapped within the mes, causing him to shiver slightly.


    Scorch marks mysteriously appeared on the beholder¡¯s hovering body. It had to fire off several magical beams of various colors from all its eyestalks at itself to dispel those strange magical fires that were burning on its body.


    Greem frowned slightly. He had to raise the output of his fire energy somewhat before he could sessfully drive away the evil will around him with his Burning Domain.


    Both parties gained aprehensive understanding of their opponent¡¯s strength after just a single exchange. Their expressions couldn¡¯t help but turn stern and cold.


    If this were the extent of tricks up Greem¡¯s sleeves, the battle against the beholder would be much more unpredictable. However, as of now, Greem had already stabilized has Spirit and gained possession of several trump cards. He would not fear the challenge of a Third Grade beholder.


    Greemughed beneath the worshipping and admiring gazes of the people around him. He then walked across the sky toward the beholder.


    Greem rapidly armed himself as he walked forward.


    Burning Suncrown, Emblem of Fire, The Fearless, Ash, Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath; the five pieces of Second Grade magical equipment let out an overwhelming surge of fire aura thatbined with Greem¡¯s soul aura, forming a strange,rge red barrier around his body.


    This Ring of Fire quickly enveloped the beasts and creatures around the fort as he walked forward.


    After he had advanced to Third Grade, the Ring of Fire had turned into the Burning Domain, bringing frightful magical damage. The five-hundred-meter Burning Domain brought catastrophic damage down upon the horde when it appeared.


    All beasts caught in the red barrier had wild fire energy surge out of their orifices, turning them into ash before they could even leave.


    Ordinary beasts and birds had no magical resistance and vanished into dust within a single second. Even the more powerful magical creatures were only slightly better off than them, enduring for three to five seconds before dying a painful death.


    Only First or Second Grade magical creatures at the edge of the Burning Domain could barely escape with their life.


    The fearless horde immediately fell into chaos before a human volcano like this. The creatures quickly escaped into the distance, leaving the battlefield at the center of the basin to the two powerful Third Grades.


    The beholder started waving its eyestalks in frustration when it saw Greem¡¯s domineering performance. Several magical barriers of various colors quickly emerged on its body.


    This powerful human adept appeared to be an elementium adept specializing in fire.


    Individuals like these might have tremendously powerful fire spells, but their bodies were much more frailpared to Third Grade magical creatures. As such, the Third Grade beholder quickly prepared itself to engage its opponent in closebat.


    However, before it could execute its n, the human adept started undergoing some strange transformations.


    An odd, palm-sized doll suddenly appeared on Greem¡¯s shoulder. Its body was covered in strange patterns, and a sickly-green poison halo hung around its body, giving its small stature an even more wicked and peculiar vibe.


    The appearance of the Spirit of Pestilence added a fire poison effect to Greem¡¯s Burning Domain.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it.


    Greem waved his hand as a two-meter tall elementium magical machine created entirely from metal appeared in front of everyone.


    Everyone could see the iconic metal body of a magical machine on this strange being, while also sensing the unique elementium flux of elementium golems on it. As Greem ced a miniaturized magic generator furnace into the elementium magical machine, it gained a staggering increase in power.


    It was almost as if a small sun had been ced into the machine¡¯s chest, as it was now spewing out red mes and searing heat waves. A surge of incredibly violent and pure magic energy flowed out of the magic generator furnace, slowly lighting up the entire body of the elementium magical machine.


    Its originally ghostly blue metal body started to turn red-hot from the injection of the powerful magical energy. The elementium magical machine had transformed into a fearsome me humanoid.


    The expression of the Third Grade beholder finally soured when it sensed the intensity of the magic energy projecting from the machine!

 Chapter 900 - Greems Battle

    Chapter 900 Greem¡¯s Battle


    Greem had always been the most mysterious character within the Crimson n!


    As the founder of the Crimson n, Greem had the prestige of being known as a legendary fire adept. He was also one of the few powerful adepts who had managed to advance to Third Grade before they were two hundred years old.


    There were even private rumors that Greem possessed a dragon ne. It was said that he had defeated a Third Grade adept as a Second Grade and that he had an intimate rtionship with one of the witch leaders of the Northern Witches.


    When so many rumors gathered upon a rising adept like him, it was enough to turn him into a powerful adept who was envied, admired, and respected by all. Naturally, a powerful adept like that was what people would follow and admire.


    That was why Greem had always been a ¡®god¡¯ of sorts within the n!


    However, he never really showed himself, choosing instead to indulge in his research and magic. He rarely ever involved himself in the specifics of n matters. That was why many newly recruited Crimson adepts had not even had the chance to see him even once.


    However, this did not hinder their admiration or respect for him.


    In their hearts, n Leader Greem was omnipotent and could not be defeated!


    That was why an overwhelming will to fight erupted from their hearts when they saw Greem personally descending in such a dominating fashion. The adepts all started cheering and shouting.


    ¡°Long live Lord Greem!¡±


    ¡°Our n leader is undefeated!¡±


    For a moment, a loud wave of cheers rose through the sky as the entire fort fell into a celebration.


    Greem and the Third Grade beholder hadn¡¯t even started fighting, but the Crimson n was behaving as if victory was in their hands. Their fervent behavior instantly brought the atmosphere of the battlefield to a boiling point.


    Greem released the newly forged Third Grade elementium magical machine at the start of the battle and even ced a new miniature magic generator furnace into its core. With two against one, they had the Third Grade beholder at aplete disadvantage.


    Kirkburn squirmed anxiously with hiss eyestalks waving more urgently as the eyes opened and shut.


    As the only Third Grade magical creature lord of this stretch of the ck Forest, Kirkburn possessed tremendous power and authority. Of the two dozen Second Grade magical creatures running around the battlefield, eight were mind ves of his.


    Unfortunately, two of them had be sacrifices of the war in the skirmish earlier, dying at the hands of the human adepts. Thezy and cautious behavior of the other second Grade magical creature lords also infuriated Kirkburn.


    That was why he had personally appeared on the battlefield to use his immense powers to crush these outsiders that didn¡¯t know better.


    However, that wish of his was unlikely toe true now.


    That was because a powerful individual that made him feel a trace of fear had suddenly appeared and was standing in his way. Moreover, that person...that person had actually summoned an equally powerful Third Grade.


    Kirkburn smacked his lips. He couldn¡¯t think of a word to describe this towering magical machine golem before him.


    A metal construct, an elementium golem, or abination of both?


    Before he coulde to a conclusion, the gigantic magical machine golem controlled by the human adept roared and charged at him.


    What did it feel like when the earth quaked and the mountains trembled? What did it feel like when the sky was copsing, and the ground was splitting apart?


    Kirkburn immediately understood what these felt like when the machine golem moved.


    The two-meter body of the elementium machine was rtively smallpared to most metal constructs, but it still weighed as much as seventy tons. When it sprinted across the earth toward the beholder, every one of its footsteps would leave a deep crater in the firm dirt.


    All the beasts and magical creatures that failed to escape from its path were instantly crushed to pulp beneath its feet, sticking to its soles as their remains were scattered across the earth. The ones that narrowly escaped death were also knocked around by the quaking of the earth and could not flee quickly.


    The elementium magical machine raised its right arm as it charged at the beholder. Its elementium hand vanished abruptly, revealing a ck cannon barrel beneath.


    The next second, dense fire elementium gathered within the cannon, forming a concentrated fireball the size of a fist before it shot quickly at the beholder, spiraling through the air as it did so.


    It only took 0.3 seconds for the fireball to crash into the beholder¡¯s energy forcefield and erupt into a blinding cluster of mes.


    The forcefield blocked most of the me shockwaves, but the remaining energy waves still pushed the beholder away.


    Five hundred and ten points!


    Kirkburn¡¯s heart tightened when he saw this.


    The opponent¡¯s strange golem was able to inflict an attack of over five hundred points so easily. It caused Kirkburn to lose confidence in the battle today for the first time.


    The battle that ensued went just as Kirkburn had predicted. He was immediately trapped in a difficult fight.


    The power of a beholder came from its magical beams that could bypass any defense.


    The seven or eight eyestalks could simultaneously fire magical beams of different colors and attributes. Each one of them could inflict extreme pain and torture on the enemy.


    Ray of Enfeeblement.


    Ray of Blindness.


    Ray of Chaos.


    Ray of Fear.


    Scorching Ray.


    Frost Ray.


    Ray of SLowing.


    These various unique powers and weakening effects added together upon the victim. Though they were not that powerful individually, together, they could make life a living hell for the opponent.


    However, these magical beams were unprecedentedly awkward when used against an elementium magical machine.


    The elementium magical machine was immune to all adverse mental effects. Meanwhile, those insignificant offensive powers could not even break through its outer energy forcefield. With a miniaturized magic generator furnace as its source of power, the elementium magical machine¡¯s energy forcefield reached up to eight hundred points of strength. Moreover, it would never face the possibility of running out of energy.


    It also meant that Kirkburn would not be able to break through the energy forcefield without an attack of over eight hundred points of power. How could the beholder¡¯spound attackspare to the miniaturized magic generator furnace when it came destructiveness and sustainability!?


    The elementium magical machine immediately forced the Third Grade beholder away the moment it appeared on the battlefield. Their attacks caused sparks to fly everywhere when they crashed against each other¡¯s forcefields. Unfortunately, it was evident that the elementium magical machine¡¯s shield was tougher, and its attacks more severe.


    After just two rounds of attacks, Kirkburn felt a chill in his heart.


    He could not even move the machine, yet the machine was causing his forcefield to crackle and snap, crumbling at the edges. If it weren¡¯t for his many eyestalks and rapid regeneration, he would be utterly exposed to the machine¡¯s attacks.


    Though he still had ayer of fine scales on his body to defend against elementium and physical damage, that was hisstyer of defense. Kirkburn didn¡¯t want to use his body to test the enemy¡¯s ferocious fire unless it was absolutely necessary.


    Since he couldn¡¯t do anything about this golem, then he would assault its owner!


    The human adept¡¯s defense couldn¡¯t be as imprable as this golem¡¯s, could it?!


    His eyestalks shed forward like whips, smacking away two fireballs hurling toward him. He then froze the ground beneath the golem with a Frost Ray and vanished from the spot as his body trembled.


    [Warning, warning. Detecting unusual spatial flux. Scans suggest it to be pinpoint teleportation magic. Teleportation coordinates are: XXX, XXX.]


    Greem, who had been watching coldly from two hundred meters away, smiled faintly. His body blurred as he shed fifty meters away. Three dozen meter-long eyestalks whistled through the air and shed at his previous position just as he left.


    The beholder emerged from the spatialyers, regaining his vision and locking onto Greem¡¯s position once more.


    Three of the eight eyestalks dangling around it fired out beams of Frost Rays, trying their best to slow down the machine¡¯s charge. Meanwhile, the other five turned and bombarded Greem.


    In truth, Kirkburn himself was within Greem¡¯s Burning Domain while attacking him. The fire elementium that had mysteriously gathered in the air turned into terrifying magical mes, sizzling and crackling as they burned away at his forcefield.


    The two hundred points of fire damage were not significant, but the domain was a constant source of magical damage. Kirkburn felt the tremendous pressure even with his immense power.


    This amount of fire damage was nothing if he could end the fight quickly. However, if it dragged on, two hundred points of fire damage per second was no small deal, even for the beholder.


    Greem was not in a hurry to rally with the elementium magical machine. He pulled himself together and started his first battle against an enemy of the same grade since his advancement.


    At this moment, Greem had a set of fire armor around him, perfectly protecting his body.


    He didn¡¯t look like an adept now, but a mighty warrior of mes. He had me armor on, with an inferno shield and fire spear in his hands. He casually dodged left and right while counterattacking against the barrage of magical beams.


    A web of magical rays shot toward him in front of his gleaming blue eyes. Though the gaps between the beams were small, there was still space for Greem to weave between them.


    If Greem possessed Mary¡¯s exceptional Agility and inhuman reflexes, he could casually stroll through the rain of fire. However, his Agility did not allow his body to perform suchplex movements. He had to rely on the small fire jets hidden all over the fire armor to rapidly blink away from the zone of the beholder¡¯s attacks.


    Meanwhile, his counterattacks were the fire spears formed by Fire Molding, asionally mixed with some Third Grade Vicious Fireballs. The more powerful Meteor Burst took too much time to chant. Thus, Greem decisively gave up on casting the spell.


    Kirkburn instantly felt heavy pressure the moment the fight started!

 Chapter 901 - The Battle Concludes

    Chapter 901 The Battle Concludes


    This human adept might not have had the same imprable defenses as the elementium magical machine, but he was still despairingly powerful and mysterious.


    Most of the magical beams Kirkburn fired had missed, avoided by the adept¡¯s strange movements. Even the asional beam that made contact was blocked by the adept¡¯s shield andva armor.


    His attacks couldn¡¯t threaten the adept, but the adept¡¯s attacks made him hurt tremendously!


    The fire spears that Greem casually threw at Kirkburn were all shot down by the magical beams. However, the Third Grade Vicious Fireballs possessed horrifying offensive power.


    The three hundred and thirty points of fire damage werebined with an odd fire poison and Coldme effects that made it extremely difficult for the beholder to defend. If it weren¡¯t for his scales having sufficient defensive power, Kirkburn would already have been wounded by Greem¡¯s attacks.


    While Kirkburn was busy dealing with Greem¡¯s attacks, a deafening roar rang from behind. A frenzied, towering giant strode across the earth, charging toward them with unstoppable momentum.


    Being stalled by the continuous barrage of Frost Rays for seven seconds was an incredible humiliation to the elementium magical machine. The machine itself might not care about this, but the fire clone hidden within the device was furious.


    Visible spatial distortions and cracks could be seen around the machine from its extreme magical energy output. The Frost Rays that had initially been slowing down its movements directly lost their function, allowing the elementium magical machine to charge toward the beholder unobstructed.


    Kirkburn also possessed decent melee abilities, but they were still shy of a magical machine¡¯s strength. As such, he concentrated power without any hesitation, preparing to once again teleport out of the magical machine¡¯s range of attack.


    However, this time, the elementium magical machine would not let him leave so easily!


    The machine lifted its right hand under themand of the fire clone and grabbed at the beholder from afar.


    The magical elementium in the air quickly gathered as an elementium hand that covered the skies formed, smashing toward the beholder in a tight fist.


    Unprepared, the magical energy that Kirkburn had just gathered around himself was forcefully dispersed. The energy forcefield around him turned to stray sparks after only 0.3 seconds of resistance. The elementium fist then smashed furiously into his body.


    A massive dent appeared in Kirkburn¡¯s two-meter wide body, and the sound of crushed flesh and broken scales was clear for all to hear. His round shape bounced away like a ball, rolling through the air for hundreds of meters. Its bloody mouth opened, and a stream of blood spewed forth like a fountain.


    His soft and sturdy sphere-shaped body might have helped him neutralize most of the violent force, but the remaining shockwaves still caused him tremendous damage.


    Before the beholder could recover from this ferocious strike, a red silhouette teleported over. A Vicious Fireball then erupted on his body in a massive explosion.


    Aooooo!


    A tragic and agonized mental scream boomed in the minds of all living creatures.


    Those who had mental defenses or resilient Spirits did fine. They only felt a bit of dizziness. Meanwhile, the ordinary humans and beasts started bleeding through all of their orifices before mysteriously copsing to the ground.


    The mental shockwave that the beholder released due to its injuries made no distinction between friend and foe.


    The humans and goblins inside the fort were protected by an elementium barrier that managed to absorb some of the power of the mental shockwave. As such, while many of the civilians copsed, they were only injured, not dead. However, the horde gathered outside the fort waspletely unprotected and exposed to this terrifying shockwave, resulting in many casualties.


    If someone were to observe the battlefield from the skies right now, they would see many of the beasts copsed on the ground near the battlefield, as if a massive scythe of death had just sliced through the area. Only a few magical creatures had barely managed to survive and were howling in agony on the spot.


    The beasts that had been quietly waiting for the conclusion of the battle between the Third Grades erupted into chaos. Countless monsters started fleeing into the woods, ignoring the orders of the powerful magical creatures. The First and Second Grade magical creatures also started assessing the battlefield with suspicion and doubt. A desire to retreat emerged in their hearts.


    However, at this moment, Kirkburn¡¯s massive body once again appeared as the mes slowly subsided.


    He managed to barely hover thirty meters in the air with his unique anti-gravity barrier. However,pared to his dominating and overwhelming aura from when he had first appeared, he was now in an absolutely terrible state!


    A half-meter crater had appeared on the right side of his body, while he had lost half of his sharp fangs. Scraps of meat and flesh could also be seen hanging on the remaining half.


    While scraps of flesh would usuallye from the enemy¡¯s body, they were all his flesh today.


    The wounds on his body were not all that significant to him. What truly pained Kirkburn were the fine cracks that had appeared on the crystalline eye in the center of his body. It looked as if the eye would shatter instantly if any more force were applied.


    The brown scales on his body were also covered in scorch marks from the mes. The flesh exposed where the scales had peeled off were burnt and charred. These charred pieces of flesh also started to peel off as the beholder moved, turning into dust as a gust of wind blew past.


    Tragic, tragic, tragic.


    Unbelievably tragic.


    At this moment, Kirkburn looked like nothing more than tragedy manifested!


    The First and Second Grade magical creature lords turned and fled without any hesitation when they saw the situation. Only the six Second Grade magical creature lords under Kirkburn¡¯s mental control started roaring and charging at the human adept standing in the sky.


    ¡°The enemy has been defeated.¡±


    ¡°We can¡¯t just let them escape like this.¡±


    The adepts of the Crimson n immediately got excited. One by one, they courageously charged out of the fort and used their various magic spells to catch up to the magical creature lords fleeing into the forest.


    Kirkburn also had no doubts. He endured the violent attacks of Greem and his elementium magical machine as he fled from Doverand Basin, coughing up blood all along the way.


    Though Greem and the elementium magical machine could easily crush the beholder in battle, they still did not have sufficient power to stop him from escaping. If Mary had sessfully advanced to Third Grade, they would have had a chance at stopping the beholder with her extraordinary Agility.


    Though Greem possessed powerful fire spells and the elementium magical machine had incredible piercing attacks, they held no advantage when it came to speed. They could only severely injure the Third Grade beholder and watch as it escaped into the ck Forest, bloodied and beaten.


    The injuries he had sustained would require at least three to five years to heal.


    As such, the Crimson n didn¡¯t need to worry about this unfortunate beholder for the next three to five years!


    The magical creature lords had already started running. Naturally, the beasts they had gathered also started fleeing in every direction.


    The Crimson adepts chased for a while longer and finally returned to Doverand Basin after confirming that the beasts would not turn and fight anymore.


    The First Grade adepts and apprentices were all sent out to exterminate the magical creatures still left in the woods. Meanwhile, the civilians and goblins were mobilized to search for surviving magical creatures and beasts on the ravaged battlefield.


    The viges near White Towercked food for winter at the moment. The meat of these beasts was great nutrition for an ordinary person. As long as they extracted the poison nds and the terrifying magical organs, the flesh of the magical creatures would allow the civilians to grow stronger over time.


    Moreover, the chance of apprentice adepts emerging from a poption that frequently ate magical creature meat was ten times that of ordinary humans.


    It was a universally known fact in the World of Adepts!


    However, most adept ns did not have such tremendous power to provide their civilians with magical creature meat. The civilians of White Tower only happened to ride on therge-scale expansion of the n. That was why they were able to enjoy copious amounts of magical creature meat over an extended period of time.


    Moreover, no other adept n would be willing to arm their civilians with magic energy rifles and goblin firearms. It was such that apprentice adepts and adepts were the only ones who could hunt magical creatures. In such cases, there was no way the noble adepts would ever serve the civilians with magical creature meat!


    Given all these conditions, only the Crimson n was capable of being so extravagant in the treatment of their civilians. It was all due to therge amount of goblin equipment they had obtained from the Goblin ne.


    The Crimson n ughtered arge number of the beasts and magical creatures of the ck Forest during this stampede. The survivors had then escaped even further and deeper into the ck Forest.


    That meant that the two hundred square kilometers of the ck Forest to the North of White Tower was no longer as dangerous and terrifying as before. Many regional ores and nt resources could now be properly excavated.


    However, to do this, the Crimson n would have to recruit even more civilians and free peoples from the outside.


    After returning to White Tower, Greem held a discussion with Meryl. They authorized the goblins to send out an engineering party to Doverand Basin to take down the fort and reconstruct it as a more secure and safe forward base for the Crimson n.


    Once that was done, they only needed to send some adepts and apprentices over, paired with some magical machines. They could then defend against any magical creature attacks from the ck Forest.


    This way, the vast area between Doverand Basin and White Tower would be a safe zone where the civilians could freely move about and farm.


    Meanwhile, the Crimson n had not given up on the magical creature lords that had escaped. They sent out many elite pseudo-adept parties to investigate their locations. In particr, the Third Grade beholder was a focus of their investigations.


    Greem didn¡¯t mind personally visiting the beholder if they discovered its hiding spot, adding some necessary trophies to his collection.

 Chapter 902 - Fourth Grade Magical Machine

    <strong>Chapter 902 Fourth Grade Magical Machine</strong>


    Goblin ne, City of Machines.


    The gigantic goblinboratory beneath the adept¡¯s tower.


    The scaffolds wrapped around the giant magical machine constructs had mostly been taken apart now. Only one or two tform elevators were left for the convenience of goblins moving up and down the machine.


    The outer construction of the golem dragon had beenpleted. The remaining tasks were all being performed inside of the construct. The twenty-meter-square magic generator furnace had already been ced in the appropriate location yesterday. Currently, arge group of goblin technicians was gathered in the narrow and winding metal corridors of the golem dragon. They were banging and hammering away as they put on the final touches for the energy cirction system that would go on a test run soon.


    An ordinary magic generator furnace was insufficient for powering a golem dragon as massive as this. Only arge magic generator furnace such as this had a possibility of achieving such a task. The intensity of the magical energy being put out by the magic generator furnace near the core was shockingly high. It was a difficult test and burden for the magical alloy that was supposed to carry the energy throughout the machine.


    If a single pipe were to break due to the pressure from the magic energy, the chaotic magical power would spill into the narrow and sealed metal corridor, killing any goblin that was not wearing a special suit.


    The goblins had to perform arge number of tests and practicalbat simtions to discover hidden ws, even after the magic generator furnace was ced in the machine.


    ¡°Caution, caution. Magical machine golem dragon energy cirction system load test Number 116 is beginning soon. All unrted personnel leave the danger zone. All unrted personnel leave the danger zone.¡±


    The hoarse yet somewhat excited voice of the old goblin Gonga rang out from a distinctive horn.


    Some goblin technicians and engineers hurriedly climbed out of the golem dragon and left the machine through the elevators after hearing this warning.


    After repeating the warning three times and confirming that all unrted staff had left the machine, Gonga picked up the inte and gave the goblins in the core cabin the order to increase energy load.


    ¡°Preparing load increase test Number 116. Caution, initial load intensity is 3%. Increase load by 3% every time I give the order. Do not exceed this energy limit.¡±


    ¡°Understood, understood. Core Energy Cabin Goblin Technician Gagamu is ready. Long live goblins! The golem dragon has no equal!¡± The fervent roar and hail of a goblin technician rang out from the other side of the inte.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. If any leaks were to happen in the pipes, the most severe of magical pollution and radiation would ur in the core energy cabin. More than a few dozen goblins had already died in the cabin over the hundreds of days. Even the ones that somehow managed to survive had been polluted and corrupted into unidentifiable monsters.


    Even so, there were still swarms of goblins volunteering themselves for the task due to their passion for magical energy and their hopes for the rise of goblins.


    With Gonga¡¯s order, a young goblin wearing a special quarantine suit in the core energy cabin passionately connected the pipes and slowly pushed the energy valve to where the number three had been etched.


    A small gap opened up in the energy pipes, which were forged from special magical alloy. The wild, magical energy that had been gathering in the magic generator furnace rapidly surged into the pipes as if it had found an outlet. The surge of energy recklessly charged outward.


    The mysterious runes carved along the pipes quickly lit up and slowly extended through each part of the golem dragon along theplicated pipes.


    The strange creaking sound of energy channels under pressure immediately started ringing out in the corridors inside the dragon. Several monitoring sites spread throughout the golem dragon quickly started giving their reports.


    ¡°Monitoring Site JYN037 has detected energy information. All facilities operation normal.¡±


    ¡°Left Ventricle Monitoring Site facilities have started operating. Current condition: Excellent.¡±


    ¡°Distributed Energy Storage Center 5 has started operating. Currently monitoring status.¡±


    ¡°Turret 97 has started charging, all operations normal.¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    Of course, it wasn¡¯t impossible for ws or problems to ur in such a sizeable magical machine. While Gonga and the advanced engineers awaited for condition reports anxiously, an urgent call came from the inte.


    ¡°Calling headquarters; slight energy leaks detected at Monitoring Site 129. The rescue team has started emergency repairs. Requesting for all higher-order energy circuits to be cut off.¡±


    After so many tests and simtions, Gonga already had the thousands of energy pipeline diagrams and energy monitoring sitesmitted to heart. He could instantly give the goblin stationed near the higher-order nodes of the energy pipelines the order the shut the valve based on the location of the leak.


    Soon, the energy leak was under control, and the goblins had barely suffered any losses.


    The 3% energy supply quickly filled all the pipelines of the golem dragon and activated some of the basic runic arrays. The giant, brown golem dragon looked as if it had gained life. It now looked much more active and filled with vigor.


    However, 3% of energy was not enough to power such a vast magical machine. Gonga immediately gave Gagamu the order to increase the energy supply after all conditions had stabilized.


    Soon, the energy valve was raised from the 3% point to the 6% point.


    The roaring magical energy thrashed through the metal pipes, the majority of which raced towards its destination, while the magical alloy absorbed small portions of it. This share of magical energy caused the metallic muscles of the golem dragon to swell and grow in size, one by one.


    The metal pipes filled with magical energy were like dirt soaked with water. They possessed some degree of ability to resist the corrosion of the magical power now. As the energy valve was slowly raised, this one hundred meters tall and three hundred meters long golem dragon finally came to life!


    The fierce magical energy surging throughout its body formed a strange energy resonance effect. It engulfed all the metallic muscles and constructponents in a violent yet orderly energy field. Part of the energy even spilled out of the golem dragon, forming a barrier simr to an energy forcefield.


    Most of the goblins were scratching their heads in confusion at this strange turn of events. Only the adepts stationed at theb betrayed expressions of extreme joy when they investigated the forcefield with their spells.


    An anti-magic forcefield!


    It was a variant of high-grade energy fields. It could effectively iste or weaken the intensity of magical energy, even destroying spell constructions that had yet to be fully formed.


    The golem dragon possessed ayer of an anti-magic barrier, so trying to exterminate it with magical power was going to be exceedingly tricky. The most effective way of dealing with the magical machine golem dragon would be through physical attacks!


    However, would a one hundred meters tall, three hundred meters long magical machine construct made entirely out of metal fear physical attacks? It was the coldest joke in the entire world!


    The very thought of the enemy being unable to faze the magical machine dragon with their spells, while the dragon could bombard its enemy with all the magic energy cannons on its body; how amazingly awesome would that be!?


    With this Fourth Grade magical machine dragon, they could easily siege any enemy headquarters or adept¡¯s tower. Of course, it still wouldn¡¯t be much use against those Fourth Grade monsters. Meanwhile, the protection of the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon meant that the Crimson n now could negotiate and gain leverage against Fourth Grade adepts.


    Nightfall.


    As the stationed adept of the Goblin ne, Wind Adept Deserra¨Cwho had witnessed the entire activation process of the Fourth Grade dragon¨Cimmediately wrote a detailed andprehensive inspection report for n headquarters.


    Moreover, he subtly submitted a report at the end of the document as well: ¡°With Regards to the Possibility of the Evolution of Magical Goblins!¡±


    As the highest-ranking adept of the Crimson n in the Goblin ne, Deserra had sensitively noticed the fact that some goblins participating in the construction of the golem dragon were showing signs of magic-infusion.


    Their bodies were stronger, their strength greater, and their personalities more impatient and intense. However, their bodies had decentpatibility with the violent magical energy surging out of the magic generator furnace.


    Of course, such a change was not apparent at the current moment. It was so slight that an ordinary adept would not pick up on the difference unless they were at Deserra¡¯s level.


    However, with the activation of the golem dragon, the goblin engineers and technicians that would apany the machine were very likely to be polluted by the excessively rich magical energy and mutate in some degree and manner.


    It was undoubtedly an issue that fascinated the adepts immensely!


    ............


    Lance, the Capital of Eternity.


    The core hall in the steel tower.


    The brain took up half the space in the hall, squirming about while Gru stood in front of the ss vat andmunicated with it.


    ¡°We just got the news that the golem dragon in the Goblin ne has been sessfully activated!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! What does their magical machine golem dragon count for? All its attributes are shockingly low. It is no more than intermediate Fourth Grade trash despite having such a powerful magic generator furnace. Hmph! If those resources were in my hands, I would have created a peak Fourth Grade masterpiece!¡±


    ¡°Is there any point in saying this? Greem is always cautious of us. He would never investrge amounts of resources in our Capital of Eternity. If it weren¡¯t for wanting to borrow our technique of creatingrge magical machines, he would never even have handed over the Motherships for us to create.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s right! How far is the progress on the six Motherships? When will the six magic generator furnaces he promised arrive?¡±


    ¡°The six Motherships are off the production line. They are now being outfitted with magic energy weapons in the assembly workshops. The construction should bepletely done in another two days. When that happens, I will personally go and insist on the magic generator furnaces.¡±


    ¡°Do you think that Greem will allow us to forge the Iron Titan?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t even think about it! Permitting us to build the Motherships was already Greem¡¯s bottom line. After all, the Motherships are no more than auxiliarybat magical machines. However, the Iron Titan...I doubt whether he has enough Queyras metal on hand to support such an enormous project. If we were the ones to build the Titan, we would not have enough metal with the amount we are secretly excavating from Lance. Do you think he would provide us withrge amounts of magical alloys from the Goblin ne?¡±


    Cough!


    The hall once again returned to silence after a drawn-out sigh.

 Chapter 903 - Mary Advances

    Chapter 903 Mary Advances


    Even asid back as he was, Greem was the leader of the Crimson n and had to take a long time to deal with all the reportsing from various ces.


    There were requests for resources, research proposals, applications for leave, routine task reports, job duty summaries...


    In just two or three days, a thick stack of documents from the n headquarters and its various outposts had been ced on Greem¡¯s wide wooden table. Given the thickness and height of this stack of papers, Greem was worried they would kill him when they copsed onto him.


    Gargamel and Meryl had managed most of this stuff in the past.


    Now, Eva had dragged Gargamel away by the ear as the two of them worried over Emelia¡¯s mutation. He had set the internal matters of Fire Throne aside for the moment. Meryl seemed to sense tremendous pressure from within the n as well. It appeared many were dissatisfied with her remaining an intermediate First Grade adept despite having advanced several decades ago.


    Thus, she tossed the n matters to Greem and ran into the ck Forest for some training.


    With his two most essential subordinates on leave, Greem was buried in work.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Chip¡¯s help, he would have been driven mad by these two weeks of ¡®diligent work.¡¯ It was a good thing he only needed to repeat the words that the Chip hade up with onto the documents and put on his stamp after it was done.


    Fortunately, Meryl had left the excellent assistant Vanlier before she left, or Greem might actually have gone insane.


    The sessful activation of the Fourth Grade magical machine golem dragon was undoubtedly excellent news. Vanlier immediately presented it to Greem. Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes and think for a moment after taking a good look at Deserra¡¯s report.


    The appearance of the Fourth Grade golem dragon was very timely, making up for the fatal weakness of the Crimson n¨C theirck of a top-tier fighting force. However, the actual deployment of the dragon also required extremely high political finesse and strategy.


    Apart from this, Gazlowe also submitted a report, pushing for the six promised magic generator furnaces. Though Greem had already pledged to provide Gazlowe with the generator furnaces, how it was done and when were all matters of consideration.


    Gazlowe was not a trustworthy individual. Greem was concerned that Gazlowe would take over Lance and cast the Crimson n aside if he managed to strengthen the power he held beyond a certain degree. It was these concerns that kept Greem from ever permitting Gazlowe toy his hands on the golem dragon and the Iron Titan.


    On the other hand, Thunder Dragon Arms, Emerald Dragon Iritina, and their flight of green dragons were an additional force he used to intimidate the brain monster and keep his ambitions in check. As long as Gazlowe didn¡¯t put on the g of rebellion and cut off the Crimson n¡¯s connection to Lance, Greem would allow him independence.


    However, if he hoped for more and reached beyond what he was given, Greem didn¡¯t mind giving him a small lesson!


    If this had been in the past when Greem had yet to advance to Third Grade, he could only try his best to console the brain monster and keep him on his side. However, now that he had the power of a Third Grade, he possessed the ability to punish Gazlowe at certain key moments.


    That was why Greem¡¯s attitude toward Gazlowe was in a very delicate bnce now.


    That said, Greem was not focused today and was somewhat dismissive of all the crucial matters of the n. Instead, his attention was focused on a particr spot in the higher levels of Fire Throne.


    Mary had not emerged from her room for many days. She had even activated her room¡¯s defensive arrays and isted herself from all outside information. Even Greem, with his tower authority, could only barely sense her soul flux remaining active, though it fluctuated with severe intensity.


    Mary had already reached the peak of Second Grade half a year ago. Moreover, the experience from the battle at the Tower of Fate had provided her with plenty of insight. She had shut herself in her room upon returning.


    ording to Greem¡¯s estimations, she wouldn¡¯t be as foolish as to attempt advancement now.


    After all, advancing to Third Grade was a significant step for adepts.


    Those below Third Grade could only be considered of lower and intermediate grades. You were only a high-grade adept once you were Third Grade and beyond. The changes to an adept¡¯s soul origin from this process was shockingly immense.


    Greem had already made a series of preparations for Mary, including sealing a Third Grade vampire and putting it in Mary¡¯s hands. Still, this stupid woman should at least have told him before she attempted advancement to give him time to prepare himself mentally!


    Greem could only shake his head regretfully when he thought of Mary¡¯s personality.


    Impulsive, brash, impatient, and prone to anger; these were the most distinctive traits of Mary¡¯s personality!


    Though Mary appeared to be extremely happy over Greem¡¯s advancement to Third Grade, the stubborn will and pride deep in her heart were clear to see.


    It was obvious from how passionate and explosive she was in bed!


    Right now, she also had the chance to advance to Third Grade. The fact that she had suppressed her impatience and stalled her advancement until now was already praiseworthy.


    That was why Greem did not take a single step out of Fire Throne, even when such tremendous changes had urred in the Goblin ne. He wanted to stay within Fire Throne, guarding the tower, guarding the room, and keeping the outside world from disturbing Mary¡¯s advancement.


    He counted with his fingers. It was almost about time that something came out of Mary¡¯s advancement!


    ............


    Inside the secret room.


    The chamber had now turned into a crimson sea.


    Pungent blood bubbled from the massive blood pool in the center of the room, filling every corner. When the crimson mist washed against the walls, it would be pushed back by a shimmering magical barrier.


    The blood in the pool bubbled, pungent and viscous, while the energy aura within was so speechlessly dense. Several dragon souls bound by the magical arrays would asionally manifest in the forms of dragons, rearing their necks and letting out tragic cries of anger.


    Unfortunately, they could not escape the pool of blood or their tragic fates of having the essence of their blood slowly absorbed into the enemy¡¯s body, regardless of how they struggled or roared.


    An elderly noble in fancy clothes was bound above the pool with five silver chains. The coarse chains pierced through his corbone, ribs, shoulder des, and ankles, chafing against his skin and flesh. The wounds would never be able to heal.


    Drops of sticky, dark red blood dripped down into the pool beneath him. Every drop of blood would cause a terrifying blood storm to ravage the pool.


    A figure could be vaguely seen lying at the bottom of the deep pool, silently absorbing the overwhelmingly charged blood energy.


    The leap from Second Grade to Third Grade was a leap in one¡¯s very essence; a massive reconstruction of the essence!


    If First Grade adepts were only cannon fodder in a ne war, then Second Grades were powerhouses amongst the cannon fodder. Meanwhile, Third Grades were fully-fledged soldiers of a nar invasion.


    Though they were still far from being the ones to issuemands, they were no longer cannon fodder that could be cast aside!


    Moreover, the vampire bloodline that Mary possessed was known for its speed of advancement, only restricted by the limits of the bloodline shackles. Without Greem having captured Haines Vik, Mary would have had almost no chance of advancing to Third Grade.


    What Mary needed now was to drain Haines of all his blood, using it to purify and cleanse her own bloodline to break the bloodline shackles and allow her to advance to Third Grade.


    If she were to absorb all the blood directly, the power contained within a Third Grade vampire¡¯s blood was very likely to turn the tables and devour her instead. That was why Mary needed this high-quality blood pool to purify and cleanse Haines¡¯ essence blood of all traces of his soul. It was only then that she could gradually absorb and assimte all that belonged to him.


    The blood coffin that Greem had carefully made for her was also prepared in the corner of the secret room.


    Once she had absorbed everything from the old vampire, as well as all the blood energy within the pool, she would get into the blood coffin and fall into a prolonged sleep. With the aid of the mysterious and profound magical arrays on the coffin, Mary could sessfully go through with her advancement in her sleep.


    This process of advancement was something that Greem had personally customized for her. It was entirely different from other vampires.


    Greem had used his understanding of Mary and the old vampire to design this nearly idiot-proof advancement process that eliminated all possibilities of human error.


    As long as Mary¡¯s innate talent wasn¡¯t absolute trash, her chances of a sessful advancement through this process was as high as 89%.


    However, when Mary would emerge from the coffin was still an unknown. Greem could only silently keep guard over Fire Throne, waiting for her good news.


    This waitsted for seven years.


    ............


    Seven yearster.


    Inside the secret room.


    The blood mist in the secret room had entirely dispersed.


    The blood pool on the ground had already dried up. No blood could be seen anymore. There was only a thickyer of ck dust at the bottom of the pool.


    The old vampire bound by the silver chains was long dead. All the flesh was gone from his body, leaving only a broken set of bones and a torn robe hanging in midair, unmoving.


    Meanwhile, the strange blood coffin that had not moved in seven years trembled slightly with a slight creak.


    A short momentter, the movement from the blood coffin became increasingly prominent.


    As the person in the coffin struck with all her strength, the tightly shut coffin lid moved aside, revealing its contents.


    A white and slender female hand grabbed the edge of the coffin.


    Perhaps fed up with the dirty air in the coffin, the owner of the slender hand slightly waved in a fit of anger. The nearly half-ton coffin lid flew away and smashed heavily into the opposite wall.


    The naked Mary sat up from the coffin, grabbing her head as she moaned softly.


    Who am I? Why am I here? Where is this?


    A tide of memory and emotions surged out of her body, allowing her to find herself once again.


    I...I am Mary.

 Chapter 904 - Fight

    Chapter 904 Fight


    As Mary¡¯s ruby eyes turned from confusion to rity, aid-back and deep male voice suddenly rang out by her ear.


    ¡°The advancement seeded? Come out and let me take a look!¡±


    It was Greem.


    Mary¡¯s lips moved upward when she heard this familiar voice, revealing a strange, unpredictable smile.


    The next second, blood energy surged out of her body, quickly forming fine leather armor on her torso, along with a fancy fauld and a pair of red boots. Simple material modification like this was an easy trick after advancing to Third Grade. Apart from magical items and some special metallic substances, Mary could manifest any ordinary item through her blood energy.


    Such a high-grade elementium conversion technique was the unique ability of high-grade adepts. Compared to alchemical material modification, items created through alchemy had a more stable basic structure and were identical to the original material. Meanwhile, the basic items created through energy possessed the shape butcked the same stability of the structure.


    Armor like this would disintegrate and turn back to blood energy within an hour if it left Mary¡¯s body.


    Inside Greem¡¯s room.


    Mary strode out with her back straightened, her face full of pride and unconceble giddiness.


    Greem shut the thick magic tome in his hands and narrowed his eyes to assess Mary. Finally, he let out a sigh of relief, ¡°Third Grade. You are finally Third Grade!¡±


    It had been seven years, and Greem¡¯s appearance had not changed at all. He still looked as handsome and vigorous, as dashing and charming. However, with the passage of time, a trace ofposure and elegance had faintly appeared on his young and lively face. There was also a sort of dominance and majesty unique to those who had held power for extended periods.


    Mary appeared to be somewhat dissatisfied with Greem¡¯s reaction. She raised an eyebrow as a hint of anger appeared on her delicate and seductive face.


    ¡°What is it? Were you worried I couldn¡¯t make it past this threshold?¡± Mary grit her teeth, as if she were about to eat someone.


    ¡°A little bit!¡± Greem smiled casually and replied honestly, ¡°In all honesty, information rted to the advancement of vampires is far too rare. Even I cannot guarantee that all the preparations I made would have worked or been useful. That¡¯s why...¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s why...you are doubtful of my current power, isn¡¯t it?¡± Mary gradually raised her voice, a trace of danger glowing in her eyes.


    ¡°It¡¯s not that I doubt your power; I¡¯m just worried that the insufficient preparations might affect your future potential of development.¡± Greem wasn¡¯t an idiot either. He immediately changed his tune when he saw Mary on the brink of breaking into a frenzy, like a female jaguar ready to pounce at any time.


    Sadly, he still underestimated howpetitive and prideful Mary was!


    Mary let out a shriek and lunged forward. She grabbed Greem by the cor and dragged him outward.


    ¡°You doubt my power? Let¡¯s go and duke it out in the practice room now.¡±


    Greemughed. He suddenly reached an arm around Mary¡¯s waist and whispered into her ear, ¡°No need to go to the practice room if you want to fight. Come along with me!¡±


    mes burst out around them, and the two of them vanished from the spot.


    When they once again appeared, they were on a towering cliff somewhere in the ck Forest.


    The cliff was utterly t, covered in green mosses and vines.


    If one were to look around, they would see a sea of trees waving in the wind, green until the edge of vision. It was the vast ck Forest that covered the entirend. Some unidentifiable yellow and green birds quickly flew across the canopy, extending their necks and letting out sharp, drawn-out cries.


    A trace of calm peace was contained within this breathtakingly pretty view!


    Mary might not have possessed asrge a Spirit as Greem to capture every movement around her perfectly, but her Third Grade senses still allowed her to tell if there were any powerful magical creatures in the vicinity.


    ¡°Where is this?¡± Mary lifted her head and gazed into the distance, looking at the bright red sun that was sinking into the horizon at the edge of the sea of trees.


    ¡°Fire Throne is one hundred and fifteen kilometers east of here.¡± Greem smiled and said, ¡°I call this ce, Greencliff!¡±


    ¡°The geography of this ce is far too excellent. There is no way there are no magical creatures here!¡±


    ¡°There used to be a wind eagle¡¯s nest here, but I caught all the birds and brought them back to the tower.¡±


    ¡°Any creature that could build a nest here is probably no small fry! Second Grade or Third Grade?¡±


    ¡°Third Grade.¡±


    Mary turned back and gave him a seductive smile.


    ¡°It seems you¡¯ve improved fast over these past few years! To think you can even take down a Third Grade magical creature so easily now.¡±


    Greem shook his head with a bitter smile, ¡°Why do I not feel happy at all when I hear yourpliments? You don¡¯t actually intend to fight, do you?¡±


    ¡°Of course, we are fighting! We must fight!¡± Mary ground her teeth lightly, ¡°I said this a long time ago. If you can beat me, I¡¯ll listen to you. Otherwise...¡±


    Greem opened his mouth to argue, but an extremely dangerous feeling engulfed his body.


    It wasn¡¯t lethal, but he would not enjoy it if he didn¡¯t dodge now!


    Without any hesitation, Greem¡¯s body abruptly erupted, vanishing from the spot in a burst of mes.


    A crimson and slender hand shed through the fire, leaving a trail of crimson marks.


    Fire shed in the air two hundred meters away as Greem reformed his body with fire elementium. However, his expression froze the moment he appeared. He lifted his left sleeve and found three deep cuts on his forearm.


    Blood flowed from the wounds, dripping across his entire arm.


    What a fast attack.


    Greem frowned. He had never expected to be wounded by Mary with how fast he had dodged out of the way.


    mes flickered on his arm as pure fire energy surged into the wounds from his powerful me Fiend¡¯s heart. A series of crackling sounds could be heard as the mes washed away the blood energy clinging to his injury. The cuts slowly started to heal.


    Mary hovered above the cliff, licking the blood on her ws as she showed Greem a seductive smile.


    ¡°How about that now? You won¡¯t underestimate me any longer, will you? If you don¡¯t be careful, you will have to suffer a lot more from now on.¡±


    Greem let out a chuckle and finally regarded this ¡®duel¡¯ seriously!


    mes surged as the Burning Crown, Fire Emblem, Fearless, Ash, Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath, and that armor ofva¨Cpowerful magical equipment of unique designs and tremendous energy¨Cstrated to appear on his body.


    However, Mary¡¯s outline flickered before Greem couldplete his preparations, vanishing into the air like a crimson shadow.


    Her silhouette had not actually vanished. Her speed was so fast that the dynamic vision of most adepts was insufficient to capture her movement. Even though adepts had spiritual senses, the disruption of Mary¡¯s strange phantom clones would cause an opponent to pick up on a dozen life signs around them, all of them belonging to Mary.


    Moreover, their spiritual senses were not enough for them to distinguish the real Mary from the dozen clones!


    However, Greem was no ordinary adept!


    Red dots had reced Mary¡¯s one dozen phantoms in his mind with the help of the Chip¡¯s all-epassing dynamic senses. Moreover, even though the intensity of these red dots were simr, there were slight differences between each of them.


    Other adepts might have difficulty recognizing this difference in an instant, and Greem couldn¡¯t do so as well, but the Chip could!


    In his mind, the Chip had constructed a sense-space with thebination of his Burning Domain. It then connected the red dots, assembling a strange and unpredictable pattern of movement. The final target in the chain of dots was...


    Greem let out a roar and turned around abruptly. He pushed forward with both his hands and an Inferno Shield instantly formed and pushed outward.


    Boom! A muffled explosion rang out.


    A white and slender female hand pierced through the Inferno Shield and grabbed at Greem¡¯s right waist.


    Without this shield that happened to stand in Mary¡¯s path of attack, Greem would only have realized she had gotten closer after he was injured. However, with the jet engines on his armor, Greem was able to dodge Mary¡¯s crimson sh by a hair.


    Moreover, the Inferno Shield he had pushed forward crashed into Mary¡¯s body, giving her a small punishment for attacking him.


    One had to admit that Mary¡¯s speed had experienced a breakthrough after advancing to Third Grade.


    Despite missing, she still had time to pull her right hand back, shing the shield to pieces and vanishing from the spot before the mes could erupt.


    The ¡®trap¡¯ that Greem had so painstakingly designed for her had not managed to hurt her at all!


    ¡°Chip, what¡¯s going on? Why was there a mistake?¡± Greem silentlymunicated with the Chip as he quickly moved across the canopy.


    [Beep. Error in basic attribute collection. The earlier attack was designed based on Mary¡¯s attributes in the past. It is different from target creature¡¯s current attributes.]


    ¡°Immediately gather target creature¡¯s basic attributes and fix all mistakes! ¡±


    [Beep. Gathering target¡¯s basic attribute sample. Estimated time required: twenty-seven seconds.]


    Twenty-seven seconds? It wasn¡¯t exactly a long time, but it wasn¡¯t short either. It would be a painful twenty-seven seconds against an ultra-fast adept.


    Greem let out a roar. The Burning Domain shot out of his body and engulfed the surrounding area. Lava Shields and Inferno Shields appeared, orbiting his body rapidly.


    A shing sound could be heard as a crimson form charged into the Burning Domain, piercing through five Inferno Shields before quickly disappearing from the Burning Domain and vanishing into the slowly dimming sky.


    Her speed was way too fast. Greem might have captured her path of movement, but the two Vicious Fireballs he fired had been easily dodged. The Fire Dragon¡¯s breath that Greem spat out chased after Mary, extending all the way out of the Burning Domain.


    Apart from shattering a bunch of afterimages, the breath couldn¡¯t even reach her sleeves.


    However, Mary wasn¡¯tpletely unharmed either.


    Greem¡¯s Burning Domain had now reached two hundred points of fire damage. Mary would not be able to avoid the damage as long as she was in the red barrier. Domain-type fire damage like this could not be avoided with high speed.

 Chapter 905 - Time Freeze

    Chapter 905 Time Freeze


    The same tall cliff.


    Mary¡¯s tall, slender body once again appeared.


    However,pared to her casualposurest time, she appeared to be in a much more awkward, roughed-up state now.


    The right hand that had pierced through Greem¡¯s shield was now scorched ck, while there were simr burn marks on her delicate body and crimson armor. Though these marks vanished amidst a cloud of blood energy in less than five seconds, frustration still emerged on Mary¡¯s pretty face.


    ¡°That damned Burning Domain!¡± Mary shouted resentfully.


    If it weren¡¯t for the all-epassing Burning Domain, Greem would not have been able to hit Mary with his spells, all of which relied on his vision or spiritual guidance. Moreover, those powerful area-of-effect spells took too much time to chant. They gave Mary too much space to assault Greem.


    As such, he had no chance of harming Mary as long as she didn¡¯t run into Greem¡¯s defensive spells. Her speed was almost beyond the limit of spiritual senses.


    Unfortunately, all of this was ruined by the damned Burning Domain!


    Mary had no chance of defeating Greem unharmed while the Burning Domain existed.


    She would have to continually concentrate blood energy to resist the effects of the Burning Domain while she was within its radius. Mary would have to give up on her assault, regardless of how good of an opportunity it was, if she sensed her blood energy being run down by the Burning Domain. She needed to retreat from the domain and recover her blood energy before continuing her attack.


    That gave Greem the chance to rest and repair his shields!


    That was why, in Mary¡¯s eyes, Greem was like a monster covered in spikes. She had to endure the terrifying sensation of being buried in spikes if she wanted to get a shot at him.


    She had always been Greem¡¯s ally in the past. Naturally, she had never needed to be the receiving end of this unpleasantness. However, now that she was his enemy, Mary felt just like all his past foes. She hated nothing as much as she hated Greem¡¯s Burning Domain.


    Fire Resistance Talismans, Scarlet Crystals, Fire Flowers, Fire Dragon¡¯s Hide.


    I will buy all of these things after this fight, even if I go bankrupt!


    Mary shouted furiously in her heart as she unfurled her wings and began circling rapidly around Greem.


    She knew that Greem¡¯s mes could apply fire poison and Coldme to his enemies at any time. If the Coldmes froze her, she would not be able to endure the attacks that came after.


    The tremendous offensive power of a Third Grade fire adept would be enough to turn her into ashes within seconds. As such, Mary had to be careful when choosing her angle and position of attack. She could not provide Greem a single chance to retaliate.


    It might look like she had the initiative in this battle, where she was able to retreat and attack at any time while Greem could only watch. That said, if she were to make any small mistake, this battle for her pride could end in an instant. There was no such thing as luck.


    However, where was her chance to win if she only circled and never attacked? The only way to create a possibility of victory was to continuously risk herself and go on the offense, using her endless offensives to force Greem to show a weakness.


    However, attacks like these were double-edged.


    At the same time as it brought danger upon Greem, it ced Mary herself in jeopardy.


    However, with her personality, there was no way she would ever be fearful of a little danger.


    Mary transformed into a lightning-fast crimson silhouette, weaving through the forest like a blood-red phantom. It was undoubtedly incredibly tricky to continually track the movements of such a speedy shape.


    Mary was able to break free of Greem¡¯s spiritual tracking every time he hesitated before she broke into the Burning Domain from an unexpected angle. She would then charge to Greem¡¯s side and wreak havoc.


    Moreover, when Greem¡¯s Spirit finally caught up, Mary would escape from the Burning Domain like a gust of wind, circling in the air like a crimson phantom once more.


    Every time this happened, Greem would hastily reform his magical shields, while Mary quickly healed her burn wounds with blood energy.


    Theck of strength to end the battle in a single strike meant that the two of them were stuck in this meaningless war of attrition. Both Mary and Greem started to be impatient and frustrated after a few rounds of such exchanges.


    One was an exceedingly fast Agility adept, while the other was a fire adept with shocking firepower.


    Both of them had their advantages, weaknesses, and expertise. It was tough to decide a victor when they were engaged in a fight like this.


    [Beep. Target creature data gatheringplete.


    [Mary, Beginner Third Grade.


    Profession: Bloodline Adept (Vampire).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 15 | Physique 17 | Agility 31 | Spirit 21.


    Profession Skills: The Embrace, Shackles of Blood, ???, ...]


    One had to admit that as a vampire adept, most of Mary¡¯s bodily attributes appeared to be somewhat weak. Her Agility was the only exception. At thirty-one points, there was no denying that she was a true Third Grade powerhouse.


    If she¡¯d had a bit more time to nourish her body and train herself, she might have been able to improve on these attributes.


    However, trying to challenge Greem with her current attributes was an overestimation of her abilities!


    Greem had been on the defensive for the majority of this battle by having to split part of his attention on the Chip¡¯s data collection. Now that he had obtained the data, there was no longer any meaning to this battle dragging on.


    Greem immediately erupted with his real power without any hesitation!


    He lifted a hand and smacked the Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath pendant hanging around his neck. A wave of mes immediately surged forward, engulfing the air around him.


    Mary¡¯s crimson form wove between the mes almost entirely unharmed. However, there wasn¡¯t much space left for her to dodge.


    Greem also turned into a bluster of mes and started chasing after Mary¡¯s figure. The boots of Ash glowed with a bright yellow me, leaving trails of burning footprints in the air.


    Greem trying to catch Mary with his thirteen points of Agility was like a clumsy seal trying to bite at a dragonfly. There was absolutely no effect aside from causing some sshes in the pool.


    Mary hadn¡¯t seemed to have expected Greem to chase after her with such a simple method. A yful idea appeared in her mind, and she ran in front of Greem, taunting him to catch up. The two of them yed a game of cat-and-mouse in the sky above the cliff, turning the already dark sky bright red with mes.


    The aura of the two Third Grade powerhouses raged across the battlefield. Some magical creatures that snuck close to observe themotion turned tail and fled without turning back after sensing a familiar aura among the two.


    Greem had been a disaster for the magical creatures in the ck Forest nearby. He had been visiting them repeatedly over the past few years to refine hisbat skills. Greem had almost challenged every single known Third Grade magical creature within five hundred kilometers of Fire Throne.


    Either Greem beat the magical creatures to the point they ran as far as they could, or Greem was defeated and ran as fast as he could back to Fire Throne. Regardless of the result, Greem always engaged alone, never calling on anypanions or summoning that powerful elementium magical machine.


    As such, Greem had defeated all the nearby magical creatures with his own power!


    Now, Greem¡¯s means ofbat were extremely diverse. He would never strike without purpose.


    However, Mary had no idea about any of this.


    That was why she finally stepped into a trap when she was trying her best to taunt Greem with the intention ofunching an unexpected assault on him!


    In a battle between Third Grades, one¡¯s spiritual appendages were always locked onto the opponent, even though there was absolutely no bodily contact. Even if the spiritual focus were broken off, it would quickly lock onto the opponent again. There would be no chance for the enemy to remain free of one¡¯s Spirit for extended periods.


    That was why it was usually challenging to set a trap for an opponent under such circumstances.


    However, today, Greem had brazenly dug a trap in front of Mary, and she had run into it without realizing anything.


    The trap was a well-hidden fire array!


    The materials used to make that trap were the fire footprints that the boots of Ash left in the air.


    Greem appeared to be leaving chaotic footprints all over the sky, but he was secretly constructing a hidden fire array that stretched for a hundred meters. When Mary unknowingly dashed into the area, the one hundred footprints in the air lit up simultaneously. A faint fire array then enveloped Mary.


    Truly, whatever you were most afraid of was what would appear in front of you!


    Mary¡¯s most terrifying power was her uncontested speed.


    Naturally, the trap that Greem had left for her was one that was used to limit her speed.


    As the mes rose to the sky and the array revealed itself, an extremely cold fire wrapped around Mary, attempting to encase her in ice.


    Mary¡¯s face instantly flushed white!


    If the Coldmes truly caught her, this battle would unquestionably end in her defeat. It was an uneptable oue for the prideful Mary.


    In the blink of an eye, Mary let out a shrill cry. Silver light lit up on her body as she instantly appeared several hundred meters away, having broken free of the Coldme array¡¯s bindings.


    Meanwhile, Greem¡¯s eyes opened wide, his face with an expression of disbelief.


    How...what just happened? How did Mary break free of the Coldme trap?


    His eyes couldn¡¯t see what had happened, no did his spiritual sense capture what had transpired, but the Chip¡¯s battlefield recording function had perfectly recorded the entire event. With the Chip¡¯s battlefield records that had been slowed down by a hundred times, Greem could clearly see the battlefield seemingly freeze the moment Mary screamed. It was then that she stepped past the Coldmes and escaped the trap.


    Time freeze.


    Was Mary¡¯s speed so extraordinarily fast that she could achieve the effect of freezing time itself?


    Mary couldn¡¯t help but be shocked at that moment!

 Chapter 906 - State of the Crimson Clan

    <strong>Chapter 906 State of the Crimson n</strong>


    Time Freeze, also known as Time Stop, was definitely at the level of high-grade spells.


    However, how could Mary have mastered such top-tier spacetime magic as a vampire? Greem quickly realized his mistake after a moment of surprise.


    It wasn¡¯t actually Time Freeze; it was a strange spell whose effect was simr to Time Freeze. When Mary started to burn her Spirit to boost her pace, reflexes, and mental speed forcefully, her personal speed crossed a certain threshold that allowed her to obtain this strange power.


    That said, this magical effect appeared to exhaust her Spirit tremendously. Mary had lost half of her Spirit from just escaping Greem¡¯s Coldme trap. If it weren¡¯t for her Spirit increasing immensely from her Third Grade advancement, the exhaustion from the move would have been enough to empty her Spirit and cause her to fall unconscious.


    ¡°Can you freely control this state of yours?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask softly.


    ¡°It¡¯s difficult!¡± Mary¡¯s Spirit had shriveled after half of it was exhausted. She appeared to be lethargic even while answering Greem¡¯s question, ¡°When I enter that state, I can clearly feel everything around me suddenly slow down, moving at a snail¡¯s pace. Meanwhile, my...my Spirit starts to burn rapidly.¡±


    ¡°What about your control over your body?¡± Greem immediately cut to the critical issue.


    If entering the hypersensitive state could allow Mary¡¯s speed to exceed the senses and mental speed of other adepts, wouldn¡¯t she be invincible at that moment?! She would be the only one able to freely move while others were frozen in time. As such, the crux of the issue was the degree of Mary¡¯s control over her own body while in this state.


    Mary paused to think for a moment before shaking her head slowly: ¡°It¡¯s very, very difficult. In the moment, it feels like the entire world has turned static. Even the air seemed to have frozen and turned solid. Moving in that state requires me to use a hundred times more energy than usual, and it takes a huge toll on my stamina.¡±


    ¡°The move relies on your Agility, burns your Spirit, and exhausts your stamina. It seems like from now on, all three of these factors will be your priority if you want to master this state of hypersensitivity.¡±


    ¡°What do I need such high stamina for? I¡¯m an Agility-type assassin!¡± Mary appeared a little dispirited.


    ¡°What do you know? Your hypersensitive state is a very decent means of attack. It is only because your Agility, Spirit, and Physique aren¡¯t at a qualifying level that the ability is so inconsistent. If you can improve all three of these attributes, you will have a much easier time controlling this state. At the very least, it won¡¯t be like today, where escaping a single trap took more than half of your power.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! If I really had this ability, I would definitely carve my name on your chest.¡± Mary was somewhat disappointed at being unable to suppress Greem even after bing a Third Grade.


    ¡°Ha. that will have to depend on whether you will be able to break the defensive spells around me in such a short time. If you could do that, I would definitely surrender...haha...ow!¡±


    Seeing as Mary had lost her interest to continue fighting, Greem also slowly retracted the burning Domain and theyers of Inferno Shields around him. Mary instantly appeared beside him the moment the fire spells around him disappeared. She extended a slender finger, pinching the meat at his waist and turning it left and right.


    Greem immediately drew in a breath of cold air. For the first time, he felt like he had withdrawn his defenses far too early!


    ¡°Come on, bring me back! It¡¯s been a long time since I bathed. I feel like my body is already starting to smell.¡± While Greem gritted his teeth in pain, Mary suddenly let go and leaned to whisper in his ear.


    ¡°Alright, alright. We will go back and shower now!¡± A smile instantly appeared on Greem¡¯s face.


    The next second, mes erupted in mid-air as the two figures vanished from the spot.


    As the magical mes slowly extinguished, thend once again returned to deathly silence!


    ............


    News of Mary¡¯s sessful advancement to Third Grade caused a ratherrgemotion in the Crimson n once more. The second Third Grade of the n had emerged, which meant that the foundations of the Crimson n were even stronger than before.


    Apart from the few mega-ns backed by those old elders, the Crimson n could be considered one of the most powerful of the new ns in Zhentarim and the Central Region.


    Even though the Crimson n already possessed two Third Grade adepts¨Cand the majority of the Ailovis Region¨Cthey were still looked down upon as an upstart force in the eyes of most adepts. That was because it had not even been a hundred years since the establishment of the n. They were still a long way off frompeting with the actualrge ns when it came to the number of total umted resources.


    Even if they were unstoppable for the moment, they could run into the risk of copse at any moment if they provoked the wrath of a Fourth Grade adept!


    Without a Fourth Grade adept within the n, or supporting the n in the World of Adepts, it was impossible to be a ruler and tyrant over a region. One still had to remain as low-profile as they could, and as careful as they could. The ones who truly possessed the right to speak in this world were the powerful Fourth Grade adepts.


    Mary received an invitation to the Winds of Freedom not long after her advancement, as was the custom.


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, no more than three people in the Crimson n had received an invitation from the Winds of Freedom: himself, Mary, and Billis. Though Zacha, Tigule, and Mary¡¯s blood knights and blood elves were all Second Grades, none of them had received an invitation from the Winds of Freedom.


    Judging from this, the Winds of Freedom also very strictly abided by some ancient rules. They were mostlyposed of native local adepts of the Central Region and were extremely selective of outsiders.


    Mary had not been outside for seven years. She was already somewhat unfamiliar with the n¡¯s internal matters and development.


    Over the next few days, she was shocked to find that the development of the Crimson n had been unusually fast.


    Currently, the n was obviously split into four distinctive factions: the vampires, the goblins, the brain monster¡¯s group, and the local adepts.


    In terms of strength alone, there was no doubt that Mary¡¯s vampires were the strongest. They made up more than half of the n¡¯s Second Grade fighting force. Now, with Mary¡¯s advancement to Third Grade, the power of the vampires was sure to follow and be even more eye-catching.


    However, none of the other factions couldpare to the goblin faction when it came to numbers, scale, and degree of pration. In particr, over the past few years, the number of goblin adepts had noticeably risen due to the sponsorship of goblin nobles and moguls.


    Right now five goblins within the Crimson n had advanced to be magical mechanics, with three others had advanced to be alchemists. Their power might be mediocre, but when they gathered together, it was not a force that could be ignored.


    Moreover, all these goblins were backed by Goblin War God Tigule and Goblin Sage Snox. They had decent influence even within the n itself!


    That was especially the case recently, as the n had been actively expanding their influence and constructing their own information and resource collection systems. The goblin merchants and moguls spread all over the continent provided the n with immense support in this aspect. Consequently, the higher-ups of the n had intentions to promote some goblins into the core of the n. That was also the key to the goblin faction¡¯s rapid development.


    The other major faction of the n was naturally the brain monster bloc led by Gazlowe. Their main range of activity was in Lance, with the Capital of Eternity as the center of their operations.


    With the Capital of Eternity as their headquarters, the brain monster bloc had more than enough power to crush the other factions within the n. They might not look like much, but they were protected by tens of thousands of magical machines and were sheltered beneath the imprable Capital.


    Greem and the Crimson n had gone to great lengths to keep the brain monster bloc on their side over the years. Still, their work had not gone to waste. The leisurely and ambitious Third Grade brain monster did not act selfishly and keep Lance to himself. He instead opened up the Capital of Eternity to the Crimson n.


    From a certain perspective, the brain monster bloc wasn¡¯t entirely an internal faction of the Crimson n. Instead, they more resembled a neutral force that leaned toward the n.


    Finally, thest faction was the local adepts who propped up the very backbone of the Crimson n.


    It was only the difficulty of raising adepts and having them advance that caused them tog in terms of developmental speed. It made them incapable ofpeting with the other three factions.


    However, the Crimson n¡¯s roots were in the World of Adepts. As such, the status of adepts was immovable, regardless of the circumstance.


    This organization of native adepts might be weak, but they still possessed the mainstream ruling position within the n.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was Crimson Majordomo Gargamel, Meryl of the White Tower, or even Deserra in the Goblin ne; they all held authority in the Crimson n despite their low grades and insignificant power.


    Naturally, the one that stood behind them all was Greem, the legendary Third Grade fire adept!


    Though Greem had rarely left Fire Throne for the past few years for the sake of protecting Mary, his power was apparent for all to see. Even though it hadn¡¯t been long since he advanced to Third Grade, he was considered one of the most powerful Third Grade adepts of the Central Region due to that powerful elementium magical machine of his.


    The Crimson n had also run into some crises over the years.


    However, ever since the Crimson n brought the Fourth Grade metallic golem dragon back from their lesser ne, all of these dangers and hidden currents vanished quickly.


    What was real power in the World of Adepts?


    Fourth Grade!


    As long as a n was protected by a Fourth Grade adept, it meant that they would never copse for all eternity. No one would dare to challenge their dignity.


    It was the same even when it was a Fourth Grade magical machine golem dragon!


    For a moment, even those famous Fourth Grade adepts couldn¡¯t help but cast their attention toward this rising Crimson n.

 Chapter 907 - Crimson Prospects

    Chapter 907 Crimson Prospects


    The Crimson n appeared to be unusual among all the adept ns!


    In total, it had only been less than six decades since they went from an unknown to a rising star.


    And how long did five or six decades mean to an adept n?


    For a worldly kingdom, it might mean the end of a dynasty, but for a low-grade adept, it was only an increase in a minor grade. For a high-grade adept, it was only enough time toplete a major magical experiment.


    Yet, these five or six decades were enough for the Crimson n to grow from an unknown small n to a massive force that was rivaled only by the major ns.


    This process would take other adept ns up to hundreds and even thousands of years toplete.


    Even more miraculous was their legendary n leader.


    He had barely be an apprentice adept with his lowly talent, and he suffered arduous days in a low-level resource site of the Sarubo n. Yet, with onepulsory mission from Zhentarim, thispletely ordinary apprentice ascended into the skies, rapidly growing in strength and power.


    The legends even imed that he had been a beginner apprentice when the mission started but had turned out to be an advanced apprentice when it waspleted.


    Jumping two minor grades in a single mission was enough to demonstrate his extraordinary and legendary background, even if it was only two minor grades as an apprentice.


    From then on, his momentum was unstoppable, advancing to a pseudo-adept not long after returning to the resource site, thereby earning him the attention of the Sarubo n.


    However, no one had any idea how it was that Greem came to be an adept.


    Even though some adept organizations had expended significant efforts in their investigations, they could only barely figure out that some ident had urred at the resource site that Greem was stationed at. Even the stationed adept had died an unnatural death. Greem, Mary, and another adept who manipted bugs benefited from this misfortune to advance and be adepts sessfully.


    Half a year after advancing, the three of them were tossed into a nar war by the Sarubo n. It was said that Greem¡¯s performance there was exceedingly outstanding, earning him the favor of Great Adept Sarubo. He had sessfully made his way into the circle of higher-ups of the Sarubo n.


    Moving forward, Adept Greem appeared to have multiple disagreements with the leaders of the n. Stories of internal arguments and conflicts were often heard.


    Thus, Greem and Mary officially left the Sarubo n once their contract of service was up. It was said that this event caused an internal split in the Sarubo n. A substantial number of adepts and apprentices followed after the two of them and left the Sarubo n.


    However, this was when Greem finally started on the legendary path of his life!


    In less than a hundred years, Greem had managed to establish the Crimson n with his small personal tower as its headquarters and had even made multiple ventures into other worlds. He advanced once again, less than a hundred years after he first advanced, to be a famous Second Grade adept.


    It was during this time that the name of the Crimson n became more and more widely known!


    However, the incident that truly spread the name of the Crimson n was the existence of the dragons.


    The Crimson n seemed to have forged a path to a dragon ne and were able to continually obtain dragon resources as well as the enviable treasure hoards of the dragons. These two elements were the springs of wealth that allowed the Crimson n to rise to power as quickly as it had.


    With the wealth and resources they stole from the dragon ne, the Crimson n immediately multiplied their assets and rapidly went from an insignificant, tiny n to a small n.


    It was the excessive speed of their rise to power that attracted a pack of ¡®wolves¡¯ to them.


    Five adept ns and organizations led by the Kam n united and found an excuse tounch an adept war against the Crimson n. However, the results of the war were simply unexpected. The Crimson n was able to beat back the allied forces of the five adept ns with an army of metal golems while their legendary n leader was absent from the World of Adepts.


    It was this miraculous turning of the tides that allowed the Crimson n to feed upon the blood of the defeated and grow even faster. They broke free of the constraints of Fire Throne, grabbing much of thend in the Ailovis region and threatening to be a medium n in the span of a single night.


    To suppress the continued growth of the Crimson n, the Third Grade n leader of the Kam n¨Cveteran high-grade adept Death Heralding Crow Yurga¨Cchose to issue a n challenge. It was the unbelievable battle that forged Greem¡¯s identity as a legendary adept.


    A Second Grade fire adept and n leader of a newly risen n had killed a veteran Third Grade adept in front of the public using his miraculous means.


    Such an unprecedented incident in the history of the World of Adepts passed just like that!


    After devouring Kam and a few other ns, the Crimson n quickly established their footing in the Ailovis region and started to extend their influence to the territory of the Northern Witches.


    In the extreme cold of the north ruled over by the witches, the Crimson n had somehow managed to gain favor with the Fate Witches and took over arge piece of territory in a ce known as Icewind. It was said that the Crimson n¡¯s development there went smoothly, not at all inferior to Ailovis of the Central Region.


    In fact, there were quite a lot of adepts privately spreading the rumor that the legendary fire adept of the Crimson n appeared to have an intimate rtionship with the leader of the Fate Witches¨C Alice. That seemed evident from the breadth and depth of their cooperation.


    That dissatisfied many of the old fogeys of Zhentarim!


    From their perspective, this meant that the Crimson n had be vassals and vanguards of the Northern Witches, eventually bringing the forces of the Northern Witches into the entirety of Zhentarim.


    Over these years, the influence of the Crimson n was limited within the Ailovis region and other new territories they carved out of the ck Forest. Attempts at expanding into other regions were met with severe retaliation from the local adept organizations and ns.


    It caused the goblin faction of the Crimson n to be able to only extend their influence to some neutral cities, despite all their efforts. Those personal territories andnds did not wee their arrival.


    There were even multiple incidents of goblin merchant groups being robbed and exterminated halfway on their journey.


    With the increasing growth of the Crimson n¡¯s forces, their enemies started to be more subtle with such operations and became better at cleaning up all trails they left behind.


    Unfortunately, with the assistance of the Fate Witches, the Crimson n were always able to find the perpetrators and the forces behind them, regardless of how they tried to wipe away their tracks. After a few medium adept organizations copsed beneath the Motherships and magical machine armies of the Crimson n, no other organization dared to haphazardly strike at them anymore!


    While some Fourth Grade adepts gradually shifted their attention onto the Crimson n and let out word that they would keep the n in line, the legendary fire adept brought a Fourth Grade giant metallic golem dragon back from one of his lesser nes.


    It immediately silenced all the waves that were starting to rise on the outside world!


    Though dark undercurrents were still surging beneath Zhentarim, no adept organization dared to continue opposing the Crimson n on the surface.


    It was fine if the Crimson n had no Fourth Grades; dealing with them would have been a simple matter. However, now that a Fourth Grade golem that seemed to possess tremendous power had appeared in the Crimson n, the Fourth Grade adepts immediately fell silent and extinguished any thoughts of stomping the Crimson n out of existence.


    Even some of the Fourth Grade adepts that had a significant chance of beating a dull Fourth Grade golem were not willing to take such unnecessary risks.


    With their power and reputation, the adept organizations and ns they represented would never fall as long as they still lived. No Fourth Grade adept would make enemies of an adept of the same grade. No amount of wealth or resources would tempt them into striking at another Fourth Grade adept.


    That was because no adept n or organization would be able to stand the all-out retaliation of a Fourth Grade adept, even if they were protected by another Fourth Grade adept.


    Once an adept advanced to Fourth Grade, the difference in personal ability and techniques between those of the lower grades reached an iprehensible level. A bloodline curse or a death spell could cause a n to spontaneously fall apart, suffering from an incredible number of casualties.


    That was why those Fourth Grade adepts were not willing to provoke another Fourth Grade adept over small numbers of resources if not necessary.


    The Fourth Grade golem of the Crimson n might not have the same level of destructive power as a Fourth Grade adept, but who knew what other terrifying trump cards that Greem fellow might still be hiding under his sleeve? That was why, with their longevity andposure, the Fourth Grade adepts were not willing to run into this steel wall unless the Crimson n was the first to provoke them.


    ............


    Northern Lands, White Tower.


    An elegantly-designed Mothership, the shape of a cigar, slowly floated across the skies of White Tower.


    Due to its use of magic energy as a power source, the Patrol Mothership did not emit the same metallic grinding of other vessels that were caused by gears.


    Mothership Chiwa silently crushed the clouds in her way, elegantly cruising across the sky. Goblin Magical Mechanic Little Locke stood at the edge of the ship on his toes, looking excitedly at the dark ck forest, the towering trees, and the rugged mountains racing by below.


    As a newly advanced n adept, Locke had neither the power nor experience to take control of such a powerful Mothership. However, considering his background as a goblin, Meryl assigned him to Chiwa, serving as a subordinate under Second Grade Knight Soros.


    Soros was the captain of Chiwa, while Little Locke was only one of three adepts aboard the ship.


    Their mission was to patrol the stretch of ck Forest between White Tower and Doverand City.


    Of course, the daily resources and construction materials of the newly established Doverand City were all provided by Chiwa.

 Chapter 908 - Doverand City

    Chapter 908 Doverand City


    The silver Mothership Chiwa casually glided across the sky.


    It was not yet afternoon, and cotton-like clouds filled the sky.


    As a fierce current shot out of the bottom of the Mothership, the white clouds were shredded to pieces, leaving behind a trail of tattered clouds that stretched for several kilometers.


    Only half of the setting sun remained above the forest on the horizon. The gentle and refreshing winds were soothing to the face.


    The Mothership was farrger than the flying ships of the past. Just the deck alone was twice the size of a football field. However, only ten or so people were allowed to move around on it. Most of them were apprentices on board the ship, while the remainder were mercenaries and merchants heading to Doverand City for work.


    A small machine that was slightly more than a meter tall spun around Little Locke like a clumsy metal golem, even asionally using its pincer-like hand to poke at Locke. Its name was Wreck-it Wrath. It also let out a rumbling sound from its mouth. Combined with all the metal gears, axels, and levers nging about its insides, it gave off an exceedingly boisterous impression.


    One couldn¡¯t look down on Wreck-it Wrath simply because of its shoddy appearance; tattered and with much of its insides exposed. It was the goblin magical-mechanic Locke¡¯s most importantpanion in battle.


    Wrath could rapidly transform during battle under Locke¡¯s control, switching into its realbat mode. In that form, Wrath was three meters tall with wildly revolving knives and energy des all around its body. It was not at all weak at charging the enemy lines, even whenpared to the other close-ranged magical mechanics.


    When needed, Wrath could also change into a long-range sniping mode, using arge magic energy ray gun and improved goblin rockets to bombard the enemy with firepower.


    As such, at least seventy percent of Locke¡¯s totalbat power came from this seemingly insane and run-down machine.


    A floating disc, half a meter in diameter, also silently floated above Locke.


    As it was not in itsbat mode right now, the des around the floating disc had been retracted. Only a metal eyeball extended from beneath the disc, looking all around at its surroundings.


    As the Mothership had been installed with a magic generator furnace and had a plentiful supply of energy, there was more than enough to sustain a transparent forcefield around the ship to keep out the cutting winds. Otherwise, ordinary humans like the mercenaries and merchants would not be able to set foot on the deck.


    Ignoring the high-altitude winds, whose strength was enough to rival actual typhoons, just the heat loss caused by the air current would be enough to freeze a person over.


    However, these human mercenaries and merchants could now casually walk on the deck and look down upon the forest beneath them. Such leisure and casual pleasantness could hardly be found elsewhere!


    While Adept Locke put up a deck chair and a coffee table to enjoy his afternoon tea, a slender and beautiful silhouette blocked his view.


    ¡°Hi, Little Locke; you¡¯re cking off here again.¡±


    Locke didn¡¯t need to open his eyes; the sweet voice alone told him who had arrived. It was his newly madepanion¨C Magical Archer Sandor.


    It was due to Little Locke¡¯s reckless attempts to save her that Sandor had not been injured at the hands of the ferocious magical creatures back at the battle of Doverand Basin. Consequently, Sandor had invited Little Locke to the bar after the campaign and the two had drunk until they couldn¡¯t anymore.


    Just like that, the two of them turned into friends andpanions that crossed the races.


    Little Locke pushed up his jade-green goggles and revealed his handsome little eyes, waving his tiny fists unamusedly as he did so.


    ¡°Stand aside, Miss Tall. You¡¯re blocking my sunshine!¡±


    ¡°Tch! With how rough your skin is, there¡¯s no use in sunbathing.¡±


    ¡°Leave me alone,¡± Little Locke turned over his body in satisfaction and let the gentle, warm sunlight evenly shower down upon his back, ¡°Instead of taking care of your skin with some facial care along with your sisters, you came here to look for me all of a sudden. You are definitely up to no good. Tell me, what do you want to do?¡±


    ¡°You do know me best. Hehe...shortie, did you hear? A herd of Catoblepones appeared near Doverand City.¡±


    ¡°What? Catoblepones?¡± Little Locke immediately climbed up from the deck chair in his excitement, ¡°Where? Where?¡±


    The Catoblepas was a type of magical creature. They were hideous, with the head of a boar, yet the antlers of deer. Their tough skin was covered in spikes, while their stumpy yet sturdy limbs had horse hooves at the end.


    Usually, an adolescent catoblepas was only a First Grade magical creature. If it weren¡¯t for their preference for living in groups, they would hardly be considered as powerful magical creatures.


    Little Locke had constantly been improving hisbat magical machines recently, and the antlers of the catoblepas was a material that he urgently sought. White Tower¡¯s goblin shops had these antlers in stock, but the price made him scratch his head. If he could hunt down a herd of catoblepones himself, he could save the thousand magical crystals he would have spent otherwise.


    Little Locke immediately became impatient when he heard Sandor¡¯s news.


    ¡°Quickly, tell me, where are those guys hiding? I¡¯ve already hired two explorer teams, and I still haven¡¯t managed to track any of them down. Where did you get your news? Is the source reliable?¡±


    Sandor stretched her pretty body in the sun when faced with Little Locke¡¯s barrage of questions. Sheughed as she said, ¡°Don¡¯t care how I got my new. Just tell me whether you are going.¡±


    Little Locke hesitated for a moment, ¡°Do you have some other conditions? Tell me.¡±


    ¡°Naturally, those idiots are all hiding in the stinky swamps. If you want me to apany you to that gross ce, you will have to help me catch a mandrake first.¡±


    Little Locke instantly understood, ¡°No wonder you came to look for me. Mandrakes are highly poisonous and are skilled at manipted vines as well as nt roots. Only a metal golem such as Wrath can deal with them. Very well, it¡¯s a deal then!¡±


    Sandor immediately smiled when Little Locke agreed to her proposal.


    Mandrakes might be exceedingly poisonous and were filled with sticky, sap-like blood, but they were also highly valuable alchemy materials. A liquid made from mandrakes could be used as a material in scrying spells. It would go for a reasonable price if it were sold to the Fate Witches.


    After settling on the conditions, Sandor lifted Little Locke and spun him around in her moment of happiness. She then kissed him on the cheek before elegantly walking away.


    Two blushes immediately appeared on Locke¡¯s green face.


    The Mothership was now above Doverand Basin.


    Its massive hull covered a small half of the sky, startling some vultures and a flock of white birds, sending them flying into the distance. The sound of fleeing beasts faintly came from the dark ck Forest. The nearby forest started to be restless.


    The Mothership was too big to actuallynd. Once it slowly descended and hovered a hundred meters above Doverand Basin, a few dozen flying goblin ships with various shapes and forms took off from the deck. Theynded in the basin below in puffs of steam and smoke.


    Over a hundred human mercenaries and merchants sat on these ships, along with a shocking number of construction materials.


    Doverand Basin had now be a massive construction site.


    As many as two hundred construction machines were diligently ttening the ground and chopping down trees under themands of the goblins. Large logs the radius of two to three humans had been piled in a small hill by a corner of the basin, while several steampunk-fashioned buildings rose from the ground.


    As the overseers, the goblins had safety helmets on and were ordering the construction machines in and out of the construction site. Dust was everywhere with lots of loud noises. The entirety of Doverand Basin was bubbling with activity.


    Mothership Chiwa traveled twice a day between White Tower and the soon-to-be Doverand City, transporting arge amount of construction material and daily goods. Thus, their arrival only made Doverand Basin all the more lively.


    Adept Locke had just stepped off of a goblin shuttle with Wrath and Quickwit when a goblin stopped him. It was General Manager Zixil, dressed in a neat and well-pressed uniform.


    ¡°Lord Locke, if you have the time, I hope you can go to Pa Mazk¡¯s ce. It seems like he¡¯s looking for you about some business. Also, Supervisor Zorbin of the Risk Investment Company is looking for you. He said that the mithril ingots you ordered have arrived.¡±


    Sandor had no interest in these petty goblin matters. She poked Locke.


    ¡°It seems like you are going to be busy for a while. Remember, look for me at seven in the morning tomorrow. As for the location, you should know it.¡± Having said that, Magical Archer Sandor promptly left.


    As they disliked how noisy the construction site was, the blood elves stationed in the basin had made their own little camp to the west, in the ck Forest. Sandor naturally went to meet up with her sisters after arriving.


    In all honesty, having some nspeople that took the same side as you was extremely convenient in a major organization. At the very least, it meant that Sandor had a much better informationworkpared to LIttle Locke.


    After waving farewell to Sandor, Locke casually grabbed a little goblin that barely reached his chest to show him the way. With his current reputation, there were almost no goblins in the goblin faction that did not recognize him.


    This little goblin was also one of the many youths that had been chosen from the Goblin ne to study here. Adept Locke was undoubtedly his idol. Thus, the little goblin skipped and hopped, bringing Adept Locke to Pa Mazk¡¯s goblin shop.


    Locke hesitated in front of the low and narrow doors of the shop for a moment before finally setting foot inside.

 Chapter 909 - Magic Energy Association

    Chapter 909 Magic Energy Association


    Pa Mazk was an old, hunched-over goblin with a wrinkled face.


    In all honesty, the fact that he had managed to survive the nar suppression upon arriving in the World of Adepts was already well beyond Locke¡¯s expectations.


    If he were to stand beside Locke, outsiders would treat them as grandfather and grandson. However, no one could guess that Pa Mazk was actually a goblinpanion that Locke had grown up with¨C his most intimate friend, in fact.


    A smile immediately appeared on Pa Mazk¡¯s wrinkled face when he saw the little goblin bring Locke over.


    ¡°Little Harold! Since you¡¯vee, why don¡¯t you help me watch over my store for the moment? I have some things to talk about with Locke.¡± Pa Mazk took out a well-crafted mechanical chicken from the below the ck countertop and tossed it to the little goblin. He then nodded at Locke, and the two walked into the storehouse behind the shop, one after the other.


    The storehouse was crowded and dark. Tall metal shelves were everywhere, filled with strange constructions of various shapes and unknown purposes.


    Pa Mazk did not take a light with him either. He simply stood there in the darkness, silently looking at this childhoodpanion of his, nowpletely different.


    The basic lifespan of a green-skinned goblin was only thirty to forty years. Even proper healthcare could not extend their lives beyond sixty years.


    However, ever since Locke had sesfully advanced to First Grade in the World of Adepts, the nourishment of magic energy meals and the magic energy in the surroundings had caused his life to go far beyond the lifespan of an ordinary goblin. If no idents urred, Locke had at least one hundred and twenty more years to live.


    It was a much shorter lifespan than the average human adept, but it was still shocking whenpared to the majority of hispanions.


    That was why, when this pair of childhoodpanions stood together, one looked like a young seven-year-old goblin at the peak of his youth, while the other looked like an ancient relic, mere steps from his grave.


    The difference in their appearance was so vast that it made both the goblinsment at the passage of time!


    ¡°Did the princess send you?¡± Locke¡¯s eyes glinted in the darkness.


    ¡°How...how did you know?¡± Pa Mazk opened his mouth wide in shock, his surprisepletely genuine.


    ¡°Ha! if it had been Lord Tigule or Lord Snox who sent you, you would not have been so secretive about the whole affair.¡± Ever since he had advanced to be a magical mechanic, Locke¡¯s drastically increased Spirit had made his mind and thought process entirely different from before, ¡°No matter how I think about it, her Highness the princess is the only one who would go to such lengths!¡±


    Pa Mazk finally broke free of his utter shock after a long while.


    The young and ¡®handsome¡¯ goblin before him was so familiar, yet so foreign to him!


    What was familiar was that young and youthful appearance, and what was foreign was that meaningful smile on the face of his childhood friend.


    Pa Mazk finallyposed himself and asked the question.


    ¡°Locke, her Highness asked me to ask you a single question. Do you still think of yourself as a goblin?¡±


    Locke closed his eyes and thought for fifteen minutes before finally opening them once again.


    ¡°I have green skin. The blood that flows in me is goblin blood. Of course, I am still a goblin! That is an irrefutable truth!¡±


    ¡°As long as you still think of yourself a goblin,¡± Pa Mazk secretly let out a breath of relief, ¡°Her Highness wants you to join the Magic Energy Association!¡±


    What was toe had finallye now!


    Locke let out a sigh and fell into deep thought once again.


    Over the years, with the massive numbers of goblins that had assimted with the Crimson n, many goblin organizations had sprung up in Fire Throne, White Tower, and all the various goblin outposts.


    Groups like The Steam Kings, the Magical Machine Research Association, the Goblin Mutual Aid Association, Green Peace. Some of these organizations were attempts at renaissance, trying to bring back the glorious past of the goblins and their era of steam power. Others purely wanted to gather the goblins together and prevent them from being bullied by the other races.


    However, the most famous of them all had to be this Magic Energy Association founded by Princess Vanessa herself!


    Upon the foundation of the Magic Energy Association, Princess Vanessa called out to her people, attempting to gather all goblins with supernatural powers. She wanted them to conduct in-depth research on magic energy and gain greater mastery over the energy, making the goblin faction powerful and glorious once more.


    It sounded like a brilliant intention and was an ideal worthy of praise.


    Sadly, very few people responded to the call!


    Disregarding a newly advanced adept like Locke, even the great goblin war god Lord Tigule had not joined the Magic Energy Association. Meanwhile, goblin sage Lord Snox directly refused Princess Vanessa¡¯s invitation.


    This incident even caused a fairlyrgemotion and argument amongst the goblins.


    Some imed that this was the result of the few leaders of the goblin race fighting for power, while other imed that Princess Vanessa¡¯s ambition was too great, such that no one dared to get close to her.


    Regardless, the Magic Energy Association was still sessfully founded at White Tower under the strong insistence of Princess Vanessa.


    Some time earlier, Locke had even heard rumors that Princess Vanessa was attempting to get close to Dean Gonga in an attempt to drag all the goblin engineers in the magical alloyboratory into her Association.


    That caused Locke to have be increasingly confident about his suspicions.


    Princess Vanessa had truly not given up on the past glory of the Goblin Empire yet. She was still trying to strive toward some degree of independence and freedom. Moreover, the one she most wanted to take after was probably Brain Monster Gazlowe, who had carved out his ownnd in Lance!


    The Magic Energy Association. The princess had probably cast all her hopes on magic energy, believing that the goblins would be able to break free of the adept¡¯s rule once they mastered it, thereby achieving true independence.


    It was understandable for a goblin with a narrow worldview and limited experience to have such wild dreams and thoughts. However, as a goblin who had advanced, Locke¡¯s worldview was on an entirely different ne.


    What was magic energy?


    No more than a mysterious power that filled the entirety of the universe, both inside and outside the nar worlds!


    It was through magic energy that the humans gave birth to adepts, thereby developing their great adept civilization.


    The World of Gods relied on the power of faith to create gods of various importance, gaining dominion over a part of the world.


    Powerful races of the universe such as the Titans relied on thepatibility of their bodies with magic energy to take over and dominate the entirety of the multiverse.


    So many races and worlds had managed to empower themselves through magic energy. Theoretically, this meant that the goblins could do so as well.


    Unfortunately, the Goblin ne was one of the rare low-magic nes!


    The nar environment there was insufficient to provide for a systematic society of magic energy users. Consequently, this pushed the Goblin ne onto a unique path of development¨C steam-powered machines.


    Unfortunately,pared to magic energy, the power of steam machines was still too weak.


    That was why the entire Goblin ne had be the spoils of the Crimson n after one ¡®unexpected¡¯ adept invasion. The many goblins had then be lowly ves and servants.


    The entirety of their ne¡¯s resources was free for the enemy to take, and the whole of the ne¡¯s poption was free for the enemy tomand. This life might be bitter, but it was an unavoidable fate for the Goblin ne.


    Locke had read many books since he came to the World of Adepts and had gained tremendous and mysterious power. When he once again turned back and assessed his world and his nation, he felt a deep sense of pity, sadness at its misfortune, and anger at its inability to save itself.


    The goblins were not a mighty race to begin with. When they were put into a low-magic world, it was only natural that they would appear to be weak across the board. The elites and the forces of the entire ne had gathered together and, yet, they still couldn¡¯t fend off the invasion of a tiny adept n. What could theyin about?


    From another perspective, if the Goblin ne was a high-magic ne, would the goblins have managed to gain the ruling position of the ne through their steam machines with their naturally weak and frail bodies?


    If one were to take ten thousand steps back to look at the issue, it was clear that Adept Meryl of the Crimson n was already one of the very rare pacifists amongst the adepts. The policies and means by which she governed the Goblin were so gentle that even Locke felt like she indulged the goblins far too much. No other adept n would possibly have given the goblins so much freedom and power!


    Moreover, none of the many goblins that Locke knew had any idea. The Adept Meryl that they feared like a tiger and respected like a god was only an ¡®insignificant¡¯ First Grade adept in the Crimson n. Above her, there was the terrifying Second Grade Bug Adept Billis, the mysterious Second Grade Witch Alice, and the unimaginably powerful Third Grade legendary adept Greem and Bloody Queen Mary.


    The very idea of resisting the rule of the Crimson n was undoubtedly dangerous. It even posed the risk of dragging the entirety of the goblin faction into a bottomless abyss!


    When Princess Vanessa first gained control over magic powers, the vanity of bing stronger had caused her ego to inte. She was no longer able to recognize the irredeemable difference in ability between the goblins and adepts.


    Resist...what were they supposed to resist with? Magic?


    The adepts had researched magic energy for more than tens of thousands of years, and the goblins hoped to overtake them with their decades of research? It was a bet with stakes that were far, far toorge. With a slight mistake, the entire Goblin ne would be lost.


    If the resistance failed and the goblins were branded as traitors, then every one of them would have to pay a heavy price.


    The very thought of losing his current life and being branded as a ve to toil in a dark and dingy mine caused Locke¡¯s heart to be restless.


    ¡°Locke...Locke; will...will you join us?¡± Pa Mazk asked fearfully.


    ¡°I will!¡± Locke suddenly gave a gentle and beaming smile, ¡°Mazk, you are my best friend after all. I will help you, even if I don¡¯t help anyone else!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s good. That¡¯s good.¡± The anxious Mazk finally let out a breath of relief, ¡°I will arrange for you to meet with the princess¡¯ secret messenger now.¡±


    ¡°No hurry. I still need to go to the ck Forest for a few missions tomorrow. I will only return after about four days. It won¡¯t be toote to meet with the messenger then!¡±


    ¡°Very well then, I will have the messenger wait here for you for a few days. Come back as soon as possible, alright!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I wille back, for sure. We are all goblins. Goblins will help goblins!¡±


    ¡°Yes, goblins will help goblins!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s right, Mazk, fix up your goblin shop a bit, will you? The door of the shop is so narrow and small. It¡¯s obvious that it¡¯s not open for outside service. It¡¯s gonna draw the suspicion of outsiders.¡±


    The two goblins left the storehouse, with Pa Mazk repeatedly agreeing to the suggestion.

 Chapter 910 - Doomsday Castle

    Chapter 910 Doomsday Castle


    ¡°Magic Energy Association...¡±


    Meryl put down the parchment in her hand and couldn¡¯t help but mumble.


    Vanlier, who had been organizing documents by the table, suddenly ceased his movements. He couldn¡¯t help but interrupt, ¡°That Princess Vanessa has suddenly be very active recently.¡±


    ¡°Do you know who the people she has contacted are?¡± A trace of a smile appeared on Meryl¡¯s pretty and gentle face.


    ¡°It seems she has sent messengers to anyone on the goblins¡¯ side who has any sort of reputation!¡±


    ¡°Quite the ambition she has.¡±


    ¡°Isn¡¯t it all the fault of those magic-enhanced goblins!?¡± Vanlierined, ¡°Ever since Adept Deserra discovered a way to safely infuse the goblins with magic without affecting their intelligence, the goblins¡¯ emotions have erupted.¡±


    ¡°I think it¡¯s time to find a chance to put them in their ce!¡± Meryl turned to look at Vanlier, ¡°Start making movements on your side as well. nt a few spies in the Magic Energy Association and keep a constant eye on their activities. Immediately give me a report if they try and make contact with key figures!¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s right; Lady Mary has been out of her seclusion for a while now. What has she been doing recently? She isn¡¯t bothering my teacher, is she!¡±


    ¡°This...I don¡¯t dare to probe into Lady Mary¡¯s affairs. However, Lady Mary seemed to have dragged Lord Greem to Lance a few days ago.¡±


    ¡°Lance? Why did they go there?¡±


    ¡°I heard...I heard they are there to hunt a Third Grade female fire dragon!¡±


    ............


    Lance, Doomsday Castle.


    As a magnificent castle floating above ava sea, Philippa Eilhart¡¯s den was unique.


    The rural geography and harsh environment made it such that ordinary creatures could not survive in this ce.


    Consequently, no other ces of shelter could be found near Doomsday Castle apart from the searing earth, the winding valleys, and the vast stretch of volcanoes. In such an environment, the only things surviving, other than pure fire creatures, were fire-attribute creatures who preferred fire or had the ability to endure the heat.


    Such creatures tended to have sour flesh. Even dragons could not tolerate the taste.


    That was why the dragonborn guards of Doomsday Castle had to travel one to two hundred kilometers away to hunt in other regions on a daily basis. It was the only way to satiate the Third Grade fire dragon¡¯s shockingly tremendous appetite.


    However, today was somewhat different. Two uninvited guests had broken into Doomsday Castle for some reason.


    For the past few decades, there had been a pack of rat-like outsiders secretly hunting down the dragons. However, their power was limited. They only dared to set their sights on the smaller First and Second Grade dragons. They had never dared to choose a Third Grade dragon as their target.


    That was why the Third Grade female fire dragon was able to continue living her life of luxury and enjoyment in Doomsday Castle.


    Unfortunately, today, her luck had run out!


    A silver Mothership crossed the mountain stretch and settled upon the scorched earth like a ruler descending upon his domain.


    When it steadily stopped in the air above the castle, two powerful adepts, one male and one female, flew out of the ship. They stood in the air, silently looking down at therge castle floating in the center of theva sea.


    It was apparent that the people in the castle were already alerted to the arrival of the adepts. Ant-sized ck dots could be seen moving and running around the massive za and all the various buildings.


    A powerful dragon¡¯s roar rang out as a somewhat fat fire dragon rose from the castle, pping her dark red wings.


    Greem stood in the air, silently looking at everything beneath him.


    Seeing that the owner of the castle hade out, he lifted his hand and cast a defensiveyer of fire around Mary. His body then erupted into mes and instantly appeared in front of the fire dragon.


    Unlike the elegant and flowing lines of other dragons, this female fire dragon was unusually obese. Her massive size was even two to three roundsrger than dragons of the same grade. Greem couldn¡¯t help but be concerned about whether her wings could support her body when he saw her hover in the sky with such an effort.


    Philippa narrowed herrge eyes and marveled when she saw the blinding fire elementium suddenly form into a tall, handsome, and young male adept.


    The dragon¡¯s sense of beauty amodated for everything and was not limited by age or race!


    Philippa couldn¡¯t help but be aroused when she saw a handsome human male adept appear before her. The shiny saliva leaking out from between herrge and sinister teeth almost dripped from her mouth.


    ¡°Handsome boy, you are pretty fit, aren¡¯t you? Did youe to sister¡¯s ce to be friends with me?¡±


    Damn! Ran into a lovestruck dragon!


    Greem could already faintly hear Mary¡¯s wild chuckling from above him.


    ¡°Lady Philippa, can¡¯t you tell that we are here for revenge?¡± Greem reminded her unamusedly.


    ¡°Revenge?¡± The fire dragon was shocked. Her massive dragon eyes opened even wider as she looked Greem up and down from a distance, ¡°I don¡¯t think we have met, have we?¡±


    ¡°You might have forgotten this, but the Stalon Mountains that you brought people to assault was my territory.¡±


    Stalon Mountains. Wind Dragon Cherkes. Fourth Grade Dragon Wings of the Azure Sky Krille.


    A series of associated names immediately allowed the female fire dragon to understand the severity of the situation before her. Her lovestruck expression quickly faded as a ferocious expression appeared on her vicious dragon head.


    ¡°You...you are the leader of the outsider adepts at Stalon Mountains. You were also the ones that captured Krille?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe, you don¡¯t need to know about that. The reason I brought people here with me today is to take my revenge for you destroying my territory back then. You had best go with us obediently.¡±


    Before he could finish, a surging dragon¡¯s breath engulfed his form.


    Even higher up in the sky, Mary, who hadpleted all of herbat preparations, waved her hand. She signaled for the Mothership to put some distance between them. It was only after that she folded her bat wings and dove at the fire dragon at a speed indistinguishable to the naked eye.


    The fire dragon might look like a lovestruck fool, but she had taken notice of Mary¡¯s movements a long time ago. She quickly stopped her breath when she saw Mary¡¯s silhouette vanish. Her two wings beat forward furiously as herrge body instantly moved back by three meters.


    A sharp tearing sound erupted.


    A phantom-like crimson outline shed past the fire dragon, its sharp ws tearing apart the air and leaving countless blood marks in the sky.


    The fire dragon let out a roar and beat her wings once again, attempting to chase after the crimson silhouette to retaliate.


    However, the moment she shifted targets, what was left of the dragon¡¯s breath abruptly dispersed. A towering humanoid of mes stepped out from within, holding a Magma Fireball in his hands. The man smiled sinisterly and shot the fireball at her.


    A hundred meters could be considered a safe gap for low-grade adepts, but it was no different from melee distance for high-grade adepts.


    The fireball instantly arrived in front of the fire dragon and exploded into a massive cluster of mes the moment it left Greem¡¯s hand.


    Both of them yed with fire. The damage of fire spells on each other was negligible. That was why Greem had chosen the Magma Fireball¨Cwhich carried a portion of physical damage with it¨Cas his means of attack.


    The violent me shockwaves crashed against the fire dragon¡¯s enormous body along with arge number of magma shards. They crackled against her dark red scales and sent sparks flying when they hit her.


    Dammit, it was an annoying fire adept!


    The fire dragon roared in anger. She no longer cared for the bothersome little bat around her. Instead, her massive body, covered in surging mes, lunged at the young male adept.


    She could tell that the female adept¡¯s offensive power was not very high. Her ws had no chance of prating her scales and hurting her. Meanwhile, the male adept was a fire adept that excelled at offense. She had to deal with him very carefully.


    The three Third Grades charged about in the air above Doomsday Castle, fighting wildly and furiously. Wave after wave of heat and fire spread outward in every direction like an unstoppable tide, surging at the castle beneath.


    mes descended from the skies, igniting roaring pirs of fire wherever theynded. Even those tall and sturdy buildings could not tolerate the extreme heat and started to copse amidst the ze. If these mesnded on the dragonborn guards, they would instantly ignite all the magical energy within their bodies. They would turn them into human torches and spew mes from every orifice and pore on their bodies. They would be reduced to ashes in the blink of an eye.


    It was almost as if an actual apocalypse had descended upon Doomsday Castle. Rooms fell apart as people darted about in chaos.


    While the dragonborn were panicking, a shrill cry could be heard. A massive cluster of mes fell from the sky, smashing a deep crater into the tough za. When the erupting mes slowly faded, a slender form climbed out of the hole, burnt all over.


    Behind her, theva in the crater had yet to cool down, still bubbling and roiling violently.


    The scorched figure moved her body with much difficulty. The carbonized skin on her body started to ke and fall off, revealing the still steaming flesh beneath.


    The scorched figure stood up straight, and her burnt eyelids opened, revealing a pair of crimson red eyes. She nced at the sky resentfully before turning her gaze to the dragonborn guards nearby.


    For some reason, the dragonborn guard that she stared at felt an uncontroble fear in his heart. He had wanted to escape with his heavy body when the figure lunged onto his body.


    The difference in size was massive. One was asrge as a truck, while the other was as slender as a willow in the wind. However, if they were to truly fight, even ten dragonborn guards wouldn¡¯t be the match of a severely injured Mary!


    No one knew what Mary did, but the dragonborn guard immediately lost all ability to resist once she leaped onto his back. He simply allowed her to crouch down on his neck and drain him of all his blood.


    After a series of sucking sounds, the body of this advanced First Grade dragonborn was obviously withered and dry. Five secondster, when Mary wiped her lips and got up, she had already recovered her natural beauty and dashing charm.


    Not a trace of a wound could still be seen on her white and smooth skin!


    Mary felt the plentiful bloody energy in her body as she lifted her head and stared at the fat figure still fighting in the air. She let out a cry and unfurled her wings, charging into the sky once more like a rapid crimson silhouette.

 Chapter 911 - Neat and Clean

    Chapter 911 Neat and Clean


    Fire Dragon Philippa had lost!


    A terrible defeat!


    The one who had truly defeated her was none other than a metal golem with an exceptionally unique design.


    Even though it was a metal golem, it could unleash powerful magical energy just like elementium creatures. However, even if she had wanted to say it was an elementium golem, it possessed an imprable body of iron and steel on the outside.


    There had been a Third Grade elementium magical machine as the primary offensive power, paired with a Third Grade fire adept assisting as well as a Third Grade vampire adept harassing from the sidelines. Philippa might have had tremendousbat power, but even she couldn¡¯t deal with attacks from so many enemies.


    Even the Mothership had started to use its magic energy cannons to bombard the fire dragon from above. Five goblin ships and a few dozen goblin helicopters had circled the skies, engulfing Philippa in a rain of gunfire.


    These attacks might have had incredible difficulty in piercing her Third Grade dragon scales to injure her, but when the barrage was dense enough, there were always some lucky attacks that managed to slip between the gaps and pierce into her flesh. It had caused Philippa to grunt in agony over and over again.


    A fair battle?


    Such a thing had never and would never exist among the adepts!


    It was such an immensely powerful dragon-ying party. Just the elementium magical machine alone would have been enough to square off against the Third Grade fire dragon, let alone having the assistance of Greem, Mary, and the whole army of goblins.


    If the elementium magical machine had any w, it would be its weight. It was simply too heavy for the powers of elementium to lift it into the air and allow it to fly.


    Fortunately, Greem had put his me jets constructed with magic arrays to use and applied them on the magical machine. Though it looked a bit clumsy and wobbly while it flew, there was no denying its effectiveness.


    Large alloy webs, metal harpoons with heavy chains, Wands of Binding.


    The goblins on the ship had tried everything that could be used to kill a dragon. In the end, they discovered that the twin-headed chain hammer was the most practical.


    The twin-headed chain hammers fired from the goblin cannons wrapped around the fire dragon¡¯s body, neck, limbs, and even her wings. It was tough to break free from the chains once they were wrapped around her. The strength of the Third Grade fire dragon and her searing dragon¡¯s breath might have been enough to destroy the alloy chains, but Greem and Mary would never have allowed her the time to do so.


    With Greem and Mary¡¯s attacks as cover, the elementium magical machine had shed with the fire dragon in a spectacr disy, like a heavy cavalry in the skies. The dragon and the magical machine had rolled across the air, fighting savagely as they did so. Finally, both of them crashed into Doomsday Castle.


    There was a deafeningly loud rumbling. Stretches of buildings abruptly copsed. zing fireballs could vaguely be seen through the massive dust cloud from the impact, along with a long tail whistling through the air alongside a pair of dark red wings fully unfurling.


    The elementium magical machine¡¯s hard iron fist smashed onto Philippa¡¯s head. If she hadn¡¯t lowered her head and crouched in time, that punch would have been enough to crush her eyeball. Even so, Philippa had managed to save her eye, but not the horns on her head.


    The ferocious punchnded on her dragon horn. It snapped in half, and blood sttered everywhere, drenching Philippa¡¯s face in an instant.


    The elementium magical machine then extended both of its giant iron hands. One grabbed onto the metal chain on Philippa¡¯s neck, while the other made a fist. Again and again, punch after punch, it railed on the fire dragon¡¯s frail neck and head with a rhythmic pace.


    The fire dragon¡¯s fine and tough scales were able to save her from piercing weapons and effectively disperse the impact of heavy weapons, and the berserk Philippa avoided most of the punches with her agile limb movements. She then wrapped forward onto the elementium magical machine, using every part of her body to attack the enemy as they rolled around on the ground and tore at each other.


    With her thick, sharp dragon ws, along with her de-like fangs, Philippa wildly tore at the elementium magical machine¡¯s body, primitive and savage. Her almost metallic long tail also sent sparks flying when it whipped against the machine¡¯s metal body.


    If the two of them had been the onlybatants tthis time, Philippa might just have been able to rely on her tough body and expert brawling skills to secure the final victory.


    Unfortunately, the elementium magical machine wasn¡¯t her only enemy!


    Greem and Mary quickly hurried over. Together with the goblin helicopters in the sky, they concentrated their firepower into the pir of dust. The elementium magical machine was protected by its sturdy metal body and received far less damage. Meanwhile, Philippa only had her dragon scales and suffered immensely. She was instantly bloodied and wounded all over.


    In the end, it was a full-power Meteor Burst from Greem that had ended Philippa¡¯s final struggles. It blew away most of the scales on her back and left a half-meter wound on the spot.


    Even a Third Grade fire dragon, as tough as they were, could not endure such a heavy blow.


    The severely injured fire dragon was defeated in the battle against the elementium magical machine. She was pressed down against the ruins of the castle and hammered with wave after wave of punches.


    The dragonborn guards of Doomsday Castle could not sit by and watch as their ruler was being devastated in this manner. One by one, they climbed out of the copsed ruins and charged at the battlefield, roaring and shouting.


    However, at that exact moment, severalbat magical machines descended from the skies on steel wires, standing in the path of the guards. The two forces began an unbridled, deadly battle above the ruins.


    Greem hovered over the ruins and surveyed the entire battlefield, using Vicious Fireballs to blow away the dragonborn that swarmed. It didn¡¯t matter if they were First or Second Grade; they were no different from frail bamboo sticks in front of him.


    asionally, a particrly hardy Second Grade dragonborn had reached Greem, but Mary¡¯s phantom-like movements and terrifying ws made swift work of them.


    Mary¡¯s attacks might be weak, but that was only rtive to Third Grade powerhouses.


    When her enemies were those clumsy First and Second Grade dragonborn, it was like slicing away at immobile, rotting wooden stakes.


    After an entire hour, Mary and Greem had finally dealt with the majority of surviving dragonborn guards in the castle. At the same time, the elementium magical machine had finally climbed out of the rubble covered in cracks and dents. Its scuffed right hand dragged the fire dragon by its long, metallic tail.


    The fire dragon had lost all ability to retaliate after so many repeated blows. She did not even show any signs of struggling or resisting when the elementium magical machine dragged her out of the ruins.


    Her fat and robust dragon body was now a mess of blood and flesh. The few ferocious spells that had hit her had blown away most of the scales on her back and belly. The exposed flesh was covered in signs of elementium injury. Even her wings had been broken, limping weakly beside her.


    The thick dragon w on her right hind leg was bent at a terrifying angle.


    The horn on herrge, vicious dragon¡¯s head had been snapped in half with blood flowing from the wound. Her right eye was also swollen shut. Her long snout had been punched hard a few times and was a mess of purple blood now. Nearly half of the sharp, dagger-like fangs in her mouth had fallen out as well.


    The fierce and savage fire dragon Philippa was now coughing up blood, filled with a sense of despair. Judging from how erratic her breathing was, she was clearly on death¡¯s door.


    Compared to the past, the fire dragon¡¯s poor condition was genuinely tragic!


    A shadow fell upon everyone in the castle.


    Therge silver hull of the Mothership slowly descended, pressing toward Doomsday Ind like a giant silver mountain.


    The Mothership eventually stopped when it was a hundred meters above theva sea.


    A door opened at the bottom of the hull, and a thick cable fell with thirty construction machines clinging onto it. With their help, the gigantic body of the fire dragon was finally dragged onto the Mothership.


    The other magical machines were also busy at work, digging through the ruins of the castle, uncovering the dragon¡¯s hoard, and searching for dragonborn guards that were still alive. Though every one of them was busy, they proceeded with their many tasks in an orderly fashion.


    It wasn¡¯t until the battle had concluded that Gru arrived at Doomsday Ind on a goblin ship.


    Though Doomsday Castle itself had been severely damaged, sixty percent of the buildings and living facilities were still intact. If a bit of effort was put in and they were fixed, the ind could even be used as a decent outpost.


    The Mothership was the property of the Capital of Eternity. Thus, ording to the agreement, the fire dragon belonged to Greem and Mary, while the hoard would be split 8:2 between Greem and the Capital. The den of the dragon would go to the Capital and serve as a new outpost for the brain monster¡¯s expansion.


    Once Doomsday Castle had been cleaned up, Greem and Mary boarded the Mothership and returned to the Capital of Eternity. Gru left behind ten construction machines and forty war machines to continue cleaning and fixing up Doomsday Ind.


    The next time he came back, Gru would bringrge numbers of construction robots and resources. They would try and turn Doomsday Ind into an imprable iron fortress in the shortest time possible.


    When the Mothership sessfully arrived in the Capital of Eternity, a powerful dragon¡¯s roar suddenly rang out from the distant horizon.


    A short momentter, a mighty thunder dragon covered in bright blue scales appeared in view, along with an elegant emerald dragon. They quickly caught up to the Mothership.


    When Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms and Third Grade Emerald Dragon Iritina took their human forms and boarded the Mothership, they saw the tragic state of Third Grade Philippa and instantly fell silent from shock.


    Philippa might have had a bad mouth and an uncouth temper, but she was undoubtedly an extremely strong dragon.


    If one were to be absolutely honest, Arms was not the opponent of this fire dragon. Even with Iritina¡¯s help, they barely had a sixty percent chance of beating Philippa.


    Yet now, a powerful Third Grade dragon lord like this had be the prey of human adepts. The psychological impact had shocked them to the very core of their souls.


    Were dragons still as powerful and undefeatable as before?

 Chapter 912 - The Fire Dragon and the Sourcestealer

    <strong>Chapter 912 The Fire Dragon and the Sourcestealer</strong>


    World of Adepts, Ailovis Region.


    Fire Throne Tower.


    The spoils obtained from Doomsday Castle had been transported back. Eva was organizing the adepts and apprentices to appraise and sort the items.


    Such arge sum of wealth couldn¡¯t possibly all be kept in Fire Throne. Be it magical gemstones, materials, equipment, metal ores, art pieces, or some unknown relics, all of them would have to be shared with White Tower.


    Technically, as the leader of the n, all this wealth belonged to Greem.


    However, for the sake of supporting the n¡¯s operations, Greem only took out ten percent of the total spoils as his personal collection. The approximate share of spoils was: ten percent to Greem, ten percent to Mary, thirty percent to Fire Throne, and fifty percent to White Tower.


    As the main forces of this hunt, Mary and Greem naturally had the right to choose their spoils first.


    Greem chose Third Grade Fire Dragon Philippa, and Mary reserved half a ton of Third Grade fire dragon blood. Though the remaining treasure was split three and five between Fire Throne and White, Eva still wanted to try to keep the best of the spoils at Fire Throne.


    It would be best to hand over some of the useless art pieces to White Tower and keep as much of the magical materials and equipment in Fire Throne.


    The leader of every region had to fight a little over such n welfare!


    However, Greem would usually not interfere in such insignificant matters.


    It wasn¡¯t a good thing if the n was too united and peaceful on the inside. Necessarypetition and the elimination of the weak was unavoidable.


    To avoid the entire n being defeated by an enemy in one fell swoop, it was split into two¨C Fire Throne and White Tower. They could simultaneously develop in both Zhentarim and the Northern Lands. This way, the two regional headquarters would have their own foundations and their own trajectory of development.


    Given the current situation, there were fewer obstructive forces over at White Tower, and the momentum of their development was more ferocious than Fire Throne. Meanwhile, Fire Throne was where Greem resided and received some degree of welfare benefits due to this.


    From an overall standpoint, Gargamel was weaker than Meryl when it came to recruiting and managing high-grade adepts. That was due to his own limited strength and humble backgroundpared to Meryl, who had a proper adept upbringing.


    Meryl had Greem, the legendary adept, as her teacher, along with a host of adept disciples such as Deserra beneath her. The sly old fox Vanlier also assisted her. Meryl could mobilize far more adept resources within the Crimson n than Gargamel.


    At the very least, with Vanlier¡¯s connections, Meryl could mobilize the vampire faction to some degree. That alone made her incontestably superior to Gargamel!


    Meanwhile, what did Crimson Majordomo Gargamel have on his side?


    Most of the subordinates he couldmand were insignificant small adepts or some old veterans that had been recruited when the Crimson n had just been established. These were individuals like Medusa Dana and Charon the Manticore.


    These veterans might have some degree of influence in the Crimson n, but with the rapid rise of the n¡¯s authority, they were quickly being pushed out toward the periphery. If they didn¡¯t work harder, their most likely oue was being sent to some lesser ne orrge resource site of the n where they would be stationed until their death.


    It was unavoidable!


    Moreover, with the passage of time, Gargamel was getting increasingly older. If he still could not advance soon, no one knew if he could even live for another fifty years.


    Meryl undoubtedly had a much more significant advantage in this regardpared to Gargamel!


    ............


    Inside the secret room.


    The severely injured Third Grade Fire Dragon Philippa crouched on the ground, hanging to life by a thread.


    Countless runic chains extended from the arrays on the walls around her, binding her securely. Even moving a single finger was tremendously difficult.


    As her control over her body had been taken away, the fire dragon could only barely open her eyes to re at the damned male adept who was looking her up and down.


    ¡°Human, what exactly do you want? If it¡¯s a good time you want, there¡¯s no need to be so violent!¡± Perhaps, because she recognized that there was no helping her situation, the fire dragon finally softened her stance a little. She continued to throw some seductive looks Greem¡¯s way even as shemunicated mentally with him.


    However, with her size and appearance, she would probably be one obesedy even if she was in human form. Those fawning looks she was giving Greem almost made him throw up.


    ¡°I don¡¯t want your body.¡± Greem shook his head and said.


    ¡°...¡± The fire dragon¡¯s expression froze, ¡°Then you probably have your eyes on my power! I can¡¯t be your dragon pet. However, I am only willing to be your personal pet. That female vampire shouldn¡¯t even think about it.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t exactly need you to be my dragon pet.¡± Greem continued to shake his head.


    ¡°Then what do you want? You...you won¡¯t kill me, will you? I am the powerful Star of Disaster Philippa. You...you won¡¯t waste a treasure like me, will you?¡± Seemingly thrown into a panic by the male adept¡¯s mysterious behavior, the fire dragon could no longer remain asposed as before.


    ¡°I want your bloodline talent. Can you give me this?¡± Greem smiled sinisterly.


    ¡°What exactly are you trying to do? You have no dragon bloodline in you. The bloodline legacy of us dragons can¡¯t be transferred either. You...¡±


    Just as the fire dragon was roaring about in exasperation, Greem waved his hand as a metal cage locked up in the corner of the room with a series of runic arrays slowly opened. A small beast shuffled and climbed out from within.


    It was a strange beast that resembled a small mastiff.


    The reason it was said the be strange was that its size was utterly different from the usual evolution pattern of powerful magical beasts.


    Its skinny and frail body was only the size of a mastiff. Its skin was smooth and without any fur. It had a pair of powerful hind legs that allowed it to run rapidly, but no front legs to go with them. There were no tough scales on its smooth head, nor sharp horns, or even eyes, ears, or nose. It only had a single terrifying, fanged mouth.


    This mouth took up nearly two-thirds of its entire head.


    There was no acid-spitting ability, no poisonous saliva, no tough scales, no powerful body, no tremendous strength, no elementium powers.


    Yet, it was this seemingly ordinary, odd beast with no special powers that caught all of the fire dragon¡¯s attention upon its appearance.


    ¡°What...what is this? What...what are you trying to do with it?¡±


    For some reason, the fire dragon felt a shiver run down her spine. An inexplicable feeling of danger caused her heart to race wildly!


    However, the suppression and bindings of the tower made her incapable of performing any movements. The fire dragon¡¯s tightly shut mouth silently opened up as the silver chains pulled backward.


    The strange beast extended an agile tongue from itsrge mouth. The tongue vibrated lightly in the air and quickly detected the existence of Greem and the fire dragon. The two equally delicious scents of food caused the beast to prop up its body with its hind legs and run towards Greem.


    Greem frowned slightly.


    Dammit! Has his current elementium talent already eclipsed the bloodline talent of a Third Grade fire dragon and made the Sourcestealer choose him as the target?


    The thought appeared in his mind and tranted into action.


    A sharp killing intent emanated from Greem, causing the temperature of the around him to rise slowly.


    Perhaps because it sensed the dangerous aura around Greem, the Sourcestealer stopped in its tracks. It carefully sensed its surroundings for a bit longer before reluctantly switching targets and leaping into the fire dragon¡¯s slightly open mouth.


    If the fire dragon had possessed any ability to resist, she would have been able to deal with this creature. She wouldn¡¯t even have needed her dragon¡¯s breath or her powerful ws. A single sneeze would have wiped out a whole horde of these useless, defenseless beasts.


    However, as she was currently, the fire dragon could only watch as the beast lunged into her mouth.


    She might not know what the beast was and how it would hurt her, but that terror from the very depths of her soul frightened her immensely.


    The fact that a low-grade beast with no elementium talent or special powers could make her feel such an incredible sense of danger was more than enough proof that it possessed unique powers beyond her understanding!


    Moreover, would that damned male adept ever use a worthless beast to threaten her?


    ¡°Make it stop. I will agree to whatever you say...quick...make it stop...guhuhguh...¡±


    As Philippa roared with all her might, the beast dove into her mouth, stepping over her tongue and sliding down her gullet.


    The fire dragon roared with all she had, attempting to gather a cluster of mes in her throat to burn the beast to death. Unfortunately, the mental flux she gathered was instantly shattered to pieces by the silver chains around her. That cluster of fire vanished before it could growrger than a small me.


    Without Greem¡¯s permission, this Third Grade Philippa would not be able to gather even a spark of mes in Greem¡¯s tower.


    Just as Philippa roared and struggled, the beast had entered her body and started to move about. For some reason, the fire dragon¡¯s extremely corrosive stomach acid did nothing to the creature. It opened its mouth and began tearing at her stomach, ravaging within.


    Philippa had a feeling that the beast was aiming for her heart and spine!


    Unfortunately, this revtion came a bit toote. Philippa¡¯s entire body trembled in agony as her Spirit shuddered furiously. A series of mental messages asking for mercy surged toward Greem.


    ¡°I admit defeat. I was wrong. I surrender!¡± Philippa was in tears now, ¡°As long as you make the beaste out, I will agree to anything...anything you want.¡±

 Chapter 913 - Bloodline Rune

    Chapter 913 Bloodline Rune


    Unfortunately, it was all toote now!


    Greem decided to use his authority to cut off the fire dragon¡¯s mental senses of the outside world.


    Philippa¡¯s mental messages instantly vanished, leaving a poor, agonized fire dragon in the room who could not even lift a finger.


    Attempting to rob a Third Grade fire dragon of her bloodline talent through the Sourcestealer was undoubtedly aplicated task. Even after exhausting all sorts of rare resources to strengthen the creature, there was still a 43% chance of failure.


    Moreover, the Sourcestealer dying was only a small matter if he failed. The Third Grade fire dragon¡¯s bloodline quality would also decrease due to pollution from the dead Sourcestealer. That was why Greem¡¯s attempt was risky.


    If the attempt to devour the bloodline talent failed, he would suffer a personal loss as great as one to two million magical crystals!


    However, if it were to seed, it would be an incredible help to him.


    The process of anxious waiting was undoubtedly a very long one.


    Greem could sense that the beast had sessfully torn a path all the way to therge heart of the dragon. It was now attached to the spot, not moving at all.


    Thus, one day went by.


    Then, two days.


    For eight days, this beast remained utterly stationary.


    However, its body and bodily construct had changed tremendously over these eight days.


    The terrifying mouth at the front of its head had vanished entirely, and its long tongue had pierced into the fire dragon¡¯s heart, turning into an alternative blood vessel connecting its body to the heart. Its thick hind legs had also disappeared, reced by two soft meat spikes the size of a baby¡¯s arm.


    The meat spikes extended through the body of the fire dragon, their edges stabbing into her tough spinal column.


    Once the heart and spinal column were under the control of the Sourcestealer, Philippa gradually started losing all sense of her body. She had only lost control over her body due to the suppression of the tower¡¯s sealing powers. She still had a perfect understanding of everything happening within her body.


    However, Philippa¡¯s mental consciousness had now retracted within her mind. She hadpletely lost all sense and control of her body parts. It was as if she had been caged in a dark space. Philippa was now utterly ignorant of everything happening outside and anything that could be harmful to her!


    Greem had also cut off her Spirit frommunicating with the outside world. As such, Philippa was isted, forced to aimlessly and passively await her unknown fate.


    Yet, the only result that came from this was one that she would never be able to ept!


    The Sourcestealer¡¯s process of stealing bloodline talent was not as simple as it looked. All the risk and danger of failing were gathered within the strange blood sack it had now turned into. The process of stealing was a long one, and it took thirty-three days in total.


    During this time, Greem remained in the room aside from asionally leaving for food and rest. He watched over and recorded all the miraculous changes and phases that the Sourcestealer underwent.


    Philippa¡¯s soul vanished on the seventeenth day, signaling the death of a powerful Third Grade being.


    On the thirty-third day, the massive sack that was now one meter in diameter finally split open. A strange creature that was neither dragon nor insect climbed out from within and started tunneling its way out of the dragon¡¯s body.


    Every bloodline had a host body that was suitable as a medium. The narws also provided all creatures with their innate talents based on the characteristics of their bloodline. A fire dragon¡¯s bloodline was undoubtedly incredibly powerful and violent. Consequently, it also required a sufficiently robust body to host it.


    The Sourcestealer¡¯s internal body construction underwent tremendous changes every time it robbed a different talent. These changes often had an integral rtion with the abilities it took.


    Through the massive library of magical creature information that Greem had on the Chip, he was sure that the core of the Sourcestealer¡¯s new form was somewhat simr to that of a fledgling fire dragon. However, it still retained a trace of insect characteristics on some irrelevant and unnecessary sub-organs.


    An enhanced tranquilizing mist sprayed onto the mutated Sourcestealer the moment it emerged from the fire dragon. This small creature with sharp fangs, a long face, crimson skin, webbed wings, and thick hind legs only managed to let out a short breath of fire before fallingpletely unconscious.


    Greem had personally raised this Sourcestealer. He had a perfect understanding of all its organs and basic magic resistances. Though its magic resistances had increased after its mutation, it still could not endure the tranquilizer that Greem had specially concocted.


    ¡°Contact Gargamel and have him clean up the spot. He can deal with the Third Grade fire dragon¡¯s body as he wishes, but remember to retrieve the dragon crystal inside and bring it to me.¡± After a simplemunication with the tower¡¯s spirit, Greem grabbed the fire insect with his invisible elementium hand and turned to leave.


    In another slightly smaller biologicalb, an experimental tform with aplete set of tools had already been prepared. It was only waiting for a specimen.


    Greem had conducted four talent-stealing experiments in the past seven years and had seeded twice. However, Greem still couldn¡¯t extract the bloodline talent he personally wanted from the surviving Sourcestealers.


    Sourcestealers were creatures as well. The bloodline talent they stole from other animals had been transformed into their own innate talents through their unique abilities. It was immensely difficult to correctly extract this bloodline talent with the means currently avable to the adepts.


    Any other adept would probably have to ept this oue silently.


    However, Greem was different. He was aided by the Chip and could rely on its precise controls and in-depth analysis to conduct operations at a gic level.


    As such, Greem nted some magical runes in the Sourcestealer¡¯s body ahead of time, through thebination of surgical operations and magic. He then relied on these magical runes to reverse-engineer the process of the Sourcestealer¡¯s talent-stealing.


    In this way, Greem had indeed sessfully obtained a strange, mysterious rune!


    When the Sourcestealer¡¯s flesh, skin, organs, and bloodline had all been dissolved into a single mess, a glowing crimson rune appeared on the operation table due to the interference and guidance of the potent narws.


    It was a mysterious rune that was entirely different from the current runic system of the World of Adepts.


    If the runes of the World of Adepts were a type of t rune used to move the narws with elementium powers as leverage, then this newly acquired one was a never-before-seen three-dimensional rune.


    Greem attempted to use the Chip¡¯s deep scans to analyze the secrets behind this mysterious rune, but his actions nearly caused it to disperse and disintegrate.


    Through some simple scans and analysis, Greem was shocked to find that this seemingly simplew rune wasposed of a series of magical patterns andw chains. Due to theck of nourishment of bloodline power, this mysterious rune was extremely frail, despite how powerful it appeared to be.


    If it hadn¡¯t been in ab within the tower and isted from all pollution and disruption by a strong elementium barrier, even a slightly bigger breath of air from Greem could have utterly destroyed it.


    Greem had no choice but to create a new purification spell and seal the rune within a small air-tight bubble created with the spell. It was the only way that Greem could keep the mysterious rune from being affected by wandering magical elementium and preserve it for extended periods.


    After an arduous battle and thirty-three days of painful waiting, Greem had finally obtained the thing he had always dreamt of¨C a bloodline rune!


    Greem lifted the air bubble carefully and held his breath as his eyes greedily feasted upon this slowly rotating rune beneath the gentle white light of theb.


    He had tried all sorts of techniques, but Greem still could not analyze any mysterious items rted to the narws with his current abilities. The oue was the same, even with the help of the Chip.


    Greem estimated that he could only analyze the deeper secrets of the bloodline rune if he could advance to Fourth Grade and improve the Chip¡¯s calction and scanning abilities by another level. Currently, he could only sit atop a treasure mountain with no way of entering within.


    There was nothing Greem could do about this!


    How should he use this bloodline rune now that he had obtained it?


    He already possessed great fire talent now. If he abruptly introduced the bloodline of another race into his body, it was unknown how it would affect his power and future development.


    Before he could obtain more specific data and information, Greem wasn¡¯t so foolish as to use it on himself. If the two bloodlines could not assimte, they would sh with and pollute each other. That wouldn¡¯t bring about an explosion of power for him, but a dead end in his path forward.


    That was why Greem had to be cautious, cautious, and even more cautious on the path of bloodline assimtion.


    The ideal way of using this bloodline rune now was to transnt it onto an adept and then observe the effects of the bloodline rune on their innate potential over a long period of time. Greem would only attempt to treat his own bloodline after he had gathered all the necessary data.


    After all,pared to those geniuses with truly great bloodline talents, Greem¡¯s human fire talent was insignificant!


    Who should he use this bloodline rune he had extracted from a Third Grade dragon on?


    Using it on an ordinary adept would be a real waste of the innate potential of a Third Grade fire dragon. It was best if he used it on the people within the n who were of the most help to him.


    Mary?


    Haha, what a joke!


    Mary¡¯s vampire talent was no weaker than the fire dragon¡¯s bloodline talent. At the very least, a vampire¡¯s innate ability was undoubtedly even more dominating and unpredictable when it came to the exclusivity of other bloodlines. If different bloodlines shed with the vampire¡¯s, they would have a hard time escaping a fate of being devoured.


    That would be aplete waste of this fire dragon bloodline rune!


    Alice?


    Her Fate Witch bloodline appeared to be even stranger and more unpredictable than this bloodline rune. It also required no modification.


    How about, her?


    Greem¡¯s eyes narrowed as the form of a female adept slowly appeared in his mind.

 Chapter 914 - An Adepts Power

    Chapter 914 An Adept¡¯s Power


    World of Adepts, White Tower.


    Adept Meryl was silently spacing out in a wide hall on the seventh floor with a piece of parchment in her hands that had just arrived.


    There was only one short line of words on the smooth piece of parchment, ordering that she was to immediately transfer control authority of White Tower to Fate Witch Snowlotus and hurry to report to Fire Throne.


    The letter provided no exnation or timing for her departure.


    No one could rob Adept Meryl of all her influence in such an abrupt letter. No one but the person who wrote it!


    The unique mark of fire magic still slightly burned in the lower right corner of the parchment; it didn¡¯t damage the letter itself in the slightest.


    Of course, Meryl recognized this to be the personal magical emblem of her teacher, Greem.


    She lightly traced the red mark with her finger. She could feel the magical aura radiating from the mark, even as she felt a slight burning pain.


    It was a magical emblem her teacher had personally ced on the parchment!


    If there were something her teacher needed to convey to her, a magical message would have been enough to summon her. Yet now, this official letter from her teacher had very clearly requested she hand over her control authority over White Tower. The implications behind this werepletely different.


    Did something happen within the n? Was someone ndering her behind her back? Was this letter forged?


    A series of questions arose within her heart, but Meryl gradually calmed down as she caressed the unique magical emblem of her teacher.


    White Tower had always been co-managed by Meryl and Snowlotus. However, Meryl was typically the one in charge, while Snowlotus only managed matters rted to the Fate Witches. As such, it was necessary for her to temporarily hand over her authority over White Tower to Snowlotus when her teacher reassigned her to a different ce.


    However, Meryl had managed White Tower for so many years. Almost all of her time and effort had been spent on this ce. All of those development ns, long term and short term, were all proceeding in an orderly fashion. Meryl was truly worried that her sessor would ruin these projects now that she had been suddenly transferred away.


    Snowlotus witch had far too cold of a personality. Her means of dealing with conflicts were also far too crude. Meryl would be lying to herself if she said she wasn¡¯t concerned about handing over all one thousand adepts and apprentices of White Tower to her!


    ¡°What do you know about this letter?¡± Meryl frowned and couldn¡¯t help but turn to ask Vanlier, who was standing beside her.


    The handsome vampire dressed in noble robes elegantly replied, ¡°The letter was sent over by Lady Mary¡¯s messenger. Only people who can be trusted handled the letter. There is no problem with it. Moreover, Lady Mary sent a message along as well. It is a good thing. You must not hesitate!¡±


    The letter was sent by her teacher through Lady Mary, and not through the usual means ofmunication between Fire Throne and White Tower. That meant her teacher did not hope for Fire Throne to catch wind of the news too early. Could something have happened to Gargamel?


    With all sorts of doubts and uncertainties in her mind, Meryl summoned Snowlotus and handed over a fist-sized crystal rune to her. This crystal rune was the core item used to control the tower spirit of White Tower. It was also the most important symbol of Meryl¡¯s status in the past.


    Snowlotus seemed to be already aware of something. She asked no questions and simply asked Vanlier to continue carrying out his duties. Meanwhile, White Tower announced Adept Meryl to be involved in an important magical experiment and would not be seeing any subordinates in the short term.


    Such asions were rare, but they had happened a few times over the years. As such, it didn¡¯t really draw any suspicion from the people of White Tower.


    ............


    The light of the teleportation slowly faded.


    Meryl finally endured the spatial confusion of long-ranged teleportation as her vision became clear once again.


    It was not the public teleportation array of Fire Throne, but the secret teleportation array on the fifth floor of the tower. That was why Meryl immediately saw a tall fire humanoid standing outside the array when she opened her eyes. The humanoid was silently assessing her.


    Naturally, Meryl knew that this fire humanoid was her teacher¡¯s fire clone. She hurriedly bowed in respect.


    ¡°It¡¯s good that you¡¯ve arrived!¡± The fire person nodded at her slightly, ¡°Come with me. You might need to stay here for a while this time.¡±


    Meryl arrived at a biologicalb on the fifth floor under the guidance of the fire body. Meryl was both excited and in awe when she saw the gallery of ss jars and all the strange specimens floating within.


    It was the secretb of a high-grade adept!


    Even if she were Greem¡¯s disciple, she would not have been able to take a single step in her without a good reason. However, everything that appeared before her now pointed toward the fact that her teacher had taken a firm stride forward in his research of creatures and bloodlines.


    Still, Meryl would have a hard time determining the subject and direction of her teacher¡¯s research given her own reserve and understanding of higher-grade knowledge. However, she had her own unique way of appraising the research¨C she looked at the grade level of the specimens.


    She could hardly recognize ten percent of the hundreds of living specimens in theb. Moreover, the only specimen creatures she could recognize were all terrifying Second Grade and Third Grade magical creatures.


    The most obvious specimen of those was one Meryl could very clearly recognize. It was the Third Grade beholder that the White Tower had run into during their expansion seven years ago. The beholder had be a living specimen in her teacher¡¯sboratory. It floated in a ss jar filled with brown-yellow liquid, bobbing up and down, its fate unknown.


    Four more specimens radiated the same aura of power as the beholder.


    Though they were long since dead, the power and viciousness in their aura was something that would not quickly vanish, even in death!


    Meryl passed through rows of wicked and horrifying specimens and finally arrived at a small operation tform, where she saw her teacher.


    The fire clone walked forward, lightly touching Greem¡¯s body and once again merging with him.


    It was then that Greem straightened his body and turned to look at Meryl.


    ¡°Teacher, were you the one that summoned me?¡±


    Meryl felt a sense of genuine exasperation every time he looked at Greem¡¯s young and handsome face.


    Even though her teacher was older than her, she, the disciple, was the one that looked older on the outside.


    Though Meryl¡¯s face was still as pretty as ever, there was a trace of age and experience between her eyes at having seen the world. Greem was still as handsome as dashing as ever. He radiated a great youthfulness from his entire being, from his straight nose to his dark and soulful ck eyes.


    With the short two to three hundred year lifespan of a First Grade adept, at one hundred and forty, Meryl had indeed reached the midpoint of her life. Meanwhile, her teacher had be a Third Grade adept, with a basic lifespan of seven to eight hundred years. At one hundred and sixty, there was no doubt that he was still in his prime.


    It was what made it seem like Greem, the teacher, was younger and more youthful than Meryl, the disciple. Of course, this was a ubiquitous sight amongst adepts and something that they had already gotten used to.


    ¡°Mm, I specially summoned you this time. You will stay here for this period of time. Don¡¯t keep contact with the outside world anymore. I have a special magical experiment, and I need you to stay here and cooperate with me toplete it!¡± Greem ignored the confusion in Meryl¡¯s eyes and immediately exined the future arrangements.


    ¡°But teacher, the projects over at White Tower have only just started running well. Many things still require my attention at Doverand City and Moussent. Princess Vanessa is also nning something at White Tower. The harvesting of resources from the resource sites this season also requires nning soon. The trade with the Dark Witches...¡± As Greem¡¯s disciple, Meryl was more intimate and indulgent with her behavior. She couldn¡¯t help but softly protest.


    However, her words were quickly interrupted by Greem.


    ¡°Meryl, what is the most important thing to an adept?¡± Greem stood tall with his towering figure, his ck eyes looking at her indifferently.


    ¡°Knowledge? It seems like many adepts hail knowledge as power! However, over these years, I feel like influence and authority is very important as well. With influence, you can gather resources faster and at a higher quality. Influence seems to be important as well! Still, typically, many adepts worship talent and believe that talent can decide everything.¡± Meryl gave the question serious thought. Her expression shifting over and over as her mind wandered.


    ¡°Meryl, the most important thing to an adept is power!¡± Greem said decisively.


    ¡°Power?¡± Meryl couldn¡¯t help but mumble and repeat what Greem had just said.


    ¡°Power is what an adept should truly be pursuing. It is only when we have power that we can stand proudly above everyone else, bing amanding race that can rule and dominate all things within the universe.¡± Greem paused for a brief moment, ¡°The knowledge, influence, and talent you speak of are nothing more than the means by which adepts obtain power. If you have knowledge but no ability to convert it into powerful magical abilities, then knowledge is weak!


    ¡°Influence is a derivative of power. It is a side-effect of the manifestation of power. It should not be the pursuit of a powerful adept!


    ¡°Talent, on the other hand, decides the ease with which an adept obtains power! If one has exceptional talent, there is no doubt that they can elerate their improvement and make their path of advancement easier and shorter. ¡±


    ¡°However, in the end, they are all derivatives born for the sake of power. As adepts, we should not pursue these branches and twigs. Rather, we must head straight for the origin and capture the very source of an adept¡¯s power.¡±

 Chapter 915 - Talent Modification

    Chapter 915 Talent Modification


    Meryl¡¯s breath gradually slowed.


    The advice of her teacher washed over her heart like the toll of evening bells, forcing her to reflect deeply on all she had done over the past few decades.


    Meryl had invested far too much time and energy in things other than magic for the sake of the n¡¯s development and her own indescribable pride. Though the n was doing very well under her management, her own power within the n had slipped from first-tier, to second-tier, and was even at third-tier now.


    Still, Meryl had her own troubles regarding this problem.


    Ever since she had been an apprentice, she knew all too well that her adept talent was mediocre at best. Being able to advance to First Grade with her talent was already extremely lucky. There wasn¡¯t much chance she could advance to Second Grade.


    It was this understanding that caused her to give up on the difficult study and learning of magical knowledge, to abandon those repetitive magical experiments, and instead choose to invest most of her effort and time into theborious tasks of the n.


    It gave her tremendous authority and a false sense of power. This false sense of power intoxicated her, making her relish in her position. Even now, she still did not think that her actions had been incorrect.


    Rather than struggle for a possible future and spending day after day on magical studies and dull magical experiments, why not be practical and enjoy the present? Why not live a more enjoyable and luxurious life?


    It was hard to say that her line of thought was necessarily wrong. However, when such a tremendous opportunity was ced before Meryl, she still behaved as a proper adept would.


    ¡°Fire dragon¡¯s bloodline?¡± Meryl couldn¡¯t help but exim when she saw the glowing crimson rune hovering and spinning in the transparent air bubble.


    ¡°Indeed. It is the mystery rune formed from the fire dragon¡¯s bloodline that I mentioned to you. If you are willing, I can nt this rune within your body and allow you to possess the bloodline talents of the fire dragons within half a year. It is much, much stronger than your original elementium talent! Are you willing?¡±


    There was no thought or hesitation. Meryl immediately and hastily nodded her head, again and again.


    Possessing a more considerable bloodline talent, owning more profound magical knowledge, and being able to unleash unbelievably powerful spells were all things that every adept dreamed of in their sleep. How could she possibly hesitate or reject such an opportunity!


    All of Meryl¡¯s past doubts and hesitations were mostly caused by her inferior talent. She¡¯d had no choice but to give up on her dreams due to her inabilities. Why would she ever waste her time on such ¡®boring¡¯ and worldly tasks if she could possess the powerful bloodline of a fire dragon!


    Greem nodded his head in satisfaction at Meryl¡¯s joy and firm decision.


    ¡°Then take off your clothes and lie down on the operation tform!¡±


    Meryl did not hesitate at all at her teacher¡¯s orders. She quickly took off the robes and underwear on her body and obediently lied down on the brightly lit tform.


    Meryl had always been a fairly beautiful adept. Though her figure wasn¡¯t as seductive or explosive as Mary, it was still curvaceous and full. At the moment, she was lying down on the operation tform; her silver-gray hair spread across behind her like silk. There was not a single piece of clothing on her as she kept her legs together and pressed her arms before her chest.


    Even though no charm magic had been cast, there was an indescribable and faintly alluring atmosphere in the air!


    In truth, the status and power of the adepts meant that they weren¡¯t as strict and harsh about the male-female rtionship as usual people. There were plenty of handsome men and pretty girls amongst the apprentices who would be willing to get into their sheets as long as they wanted to. They only needed to curl their fingers, and the worldly nobles would send cart after cart of beauties to their homes, all in the hopes of obtaining some degree of political shelter.


    As such, the private lives of most male and female adepts were extremely debaucherous. In fact, some of their preferences and interests could already be considered perverted and twisted!


    However, as an adept that Greem had personally promoted, Meryl had always led a reasonably clean and honest life. Though she was no longer a virgin, it was still obvious from her fine skin, full breasts, and unshaved crotch that she kept her private life in check.


    Her most private body parts were all exposed before her teacher, yet Meryl disyed no shame or embarrassment as an ordinary girl would. Instead, she calmly turned her head and looked at her teacher.


    ¡°You just got here today. I can¡¯t possibly start transnting the bloodline rune so hastily. Right now, I need to do aprehensive check of your body and take some samples to prepare for the transntation itself. Rx a little and work with me.¡± Greem gently exined and waved his hand to light up all the various arrays enchanted on the operation tform.


    Several bright, but not blinding, light arrays appeared and illuminated Meryl¡¯s pale skin such that it was almost translucent.


    Greem sat properly before the tform. Blue light quickly shed in his ck eyes as he controlled the arrays to cover Meryl¡¯s entire body slowly.


    Meryl. Intermediate First Grade.


    Profession: Elementium Adept (Earth).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 4 | Physique 8 | Agility 5 | Spirit 14


    As the arrays began functioning and the Chip started its deep scans, Meryl¡¯s basic attributes began to appear in Greem¡¯s mind. Such attributes were indeed somewhat weak among First Grade adepts. Meryl alsocked actualbat experience and outdoor training, resulting in her having barely any fighting skills.


    She was the perfect embodiment of an ordinary schrly adept!


    Greem would be able to fight five rookies at Meryl¡¯s level, all at the same time, even if he regressed to First Grade. If he could choose the battlefield, then he would be able to take on a whole dozen of them.


    Apart from her basic attributes, Meryl¡¯s adept talents were also extremely mediocre!


    In all honesty, her advancement to First Grade had involved an immense amount of luck.


    Advanced First Grade would have been the limit of her potential without the interference of an outside force. There was nearly no chance of advancing to Second Grade.


    However, what troubled Greem wasn¡¯t Meryl¡¯s talent, but her elementium affinity.


    Meryl had advanced as an earth elementium adept. Naturally, her highest elementium affinity was earth.


    From the info bar provided by the Chip, Greem could clearly see that earth elementium was her leading elemental power. It took up seven boxes on her talent bar. The second was metal, taking up two boxes. Finally, the nt attribute took up half a box, while all the remaining attributes shared the final box.


    There were absolutely no signs of fire affinity on her elementium affinity chart. Converting her to a fire dragon¡¯s bloodline was truly equivalent to transforming her entire being now. The difficulty of the task made Greem want to scratch his head.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but think of his other adept disciple when he saw Meryl¡¯s affinities¨C Am.


    If Am hadn¡¯t been tempted by the Sarubo n and became a traitor, his fire elementium affinity and attribute would have made him the perfect host for this fire dragon bloodline rune.


    Sadly...


    Who knew if he would kill himself in frustration if he knew what an excellent opportunity he had passed over due to his foolish ignorance?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but think to himself as he carefully and slowly examined Meryl¡¯s body.


    The initial examination revealed that Meryl was not suited as the inheritor of the fire dragon bloodline. If they forcefully proceeded with the operation, it was very likely to result in a tremendous waste of the fire dragon bloodline¡¯s potential.


    It was important to note that Star of Disaster Philippa Eilhart was once a powerful existence of advanced Third Grade. She even had a chance of advancing to Fourth Grade!


    If this fire dragon bloodline rune was transnted onto Meryl, the Chip estimated that the limit of Meryl¡¯s development would be beginner Third Grade. Meryl would have a chance of advancing to Third Grade within her lifespan as long as she put in the effort.


    However, beginner Third Grade would be the limit of her potential.


    After bing a Third Grade, her potential would be exhausted, and she would have no chance of improving any further!


    Greem did not conceal anything about Meryl¡¯s situation and told her truthfully everything about his examinations and predictions. Meryl remained lying on the tform and listened to everything, her face pale and void of color, her body trembling and shivering.


    In truth, it was aplex feeling to hear an outsider solemnly announce the limits of your potential. Even though Meryl already knew her talent was terrible, it was still a bitter and miserable sensation to be told her own ¡®point of death¡¯.


    However, being able to improve the limit of her talent from advanced First Grade to beginner Third Grade was already a tremendous blessing!


    Meryl solemnly nodded to her teacher with tears in her eyes.


    Then the matter was settled!


    Greem also made up his mind now.


    Greem didn¡¯t mind the slight bit of wasted potential in the bloodline rune.


    So what if he could find an adept with extremepatibility with this bloodline rune? The hope of advancing to Fourth Grade was still just as minute and insignificant! Even the original owner of the bloodline, Philippa, had such a difficult time advancing to Fourth Grade. Could her sessor possibly outdo her?


    As such, losing a bit of the bloodline rune¡¯s potential in exchange for Meryl¡¯s loyalty and explosive improvement in power was more than worth it. Why would he not do it?


    Now that he had made up his mind, Greem no longer spent his time thinking about all irrelevant matters. Instead, he concentrated his efforts into thinking about how he could sessfully transnt this bloodline rune into Meryl¡¯s body.


    Direct transntation was definitely out of the question!


    The fire dragon bloodline in the rune would most assuredly sh with the earth elementium affinity currently within Meryl. If they forced the issue and caused a rejection, then the copse of the bloodline rune would not be a small matter. Meryl¡¯s elementium talent would be polluted, resulting in her death. It would be a terrible loss.


    Before the transnt, Greem would first have to do some degree of modification to Meryl¡¯s body. The current priority was to reduce the intensity of the conflict between her earth affinity and fire elementium.


    After scanning its data library, the Chip provided three possible solutions to this crisis.

 Chapter 916 - Bloodline Modification

    <strong>Chapter 916 Bloodline Modification</strong>


    ¡°First proposal: synthesizing the bloodline with Bloodline Reconciling Agent!¡±


    At this stage in the World of Adept¡¯s development, research on bloodline talent had already reached a peak. However, most research was kept, monopolized, and sealed away from the outside world byrge adept organizations.


    However, such monopolization was only concerning low and mid-grade adepts. Third Grade adepts like Greem already had far too many means by which toe in contact with such taboo content.


    Not counting the three major adept organizations, there were still plenty of adept forces in Zhentarim that were known for their synthesized bloodlines. For example, the Holopole n of the Thousand Needlepine Region, the Gulet n of Whitevalley Rivends, and the Kaedwen n of Flotsam.


    These ns had raised many famous adepts through their massive knowledge reserves on bloodline synthesis and were powerful forces in their respective regions. That said, synthesizing bloodlines were not a proper path of advancement. The more bloodlines of powerful creatures one assimted, the more power the adept would gain, but the lower their development potential would be.


    Almost all synthesized bloodline adepts faced aplicated issue¨C the loss of the ability to improve themselves and continue advancing!


    Did you wish to advance even further? Sure, the only way to do that was to assimte more powerful and more excellent bloodlines. If one couldn¡¯t find or gather such bloodlines, then their power would not improve at all.


    If one were to step on the path of synthesized bloodlines, they would have to continue walking on this narrow path without having the chance to turn back. They would turn themselves into monsters without humanity, and all the weird bloodlines they had assimted caused them to lose the capacity to create descendants.


    It was said that the descendants of synthesized bloodline adepts were all monsters, without exception!


    The fact that there were so many strange creatures, corruptors, and mutants in the Worlds of Adepts was in no small part due to the work of these bloodline assimtors.


    To reduce the side-effects caused by assimting bloodlines, these adepts had to regrly consume bloodline synthesis potions to ease the conflict between all of theirplicated bloodlines.


    That was why the Chip¡¯s first suggestion was to purchase bloodline reconciling agents to reduce the conflict between the fire dragon bloodline and Meryl¡¯s elementium talent. However, if she were to do so, there was a possibility Meryl would mutate into a strange dragon-human hybrid.


    The dragonborn were likely created in this manner!


    Greem was obviously not too taken by this proposal.


    What was sopelling about the fire dragon¡¯s bloodline? Its sturdy body, excellent magical resistance, and natural affinity for fire elementium.


    What was powerful about a human adept¡¯s talent? Their wisdom, vast knowledge reserves, and their superior intelligence.


    If this assimtion would damage Meryl¡¯s intelligence, then the value of the operation would fall exponentially and be worthless. Rather than turn Meryl into a half-human, half-dragon monster, Greem would have been better off turning the female fire dragon into his pet.


    After some consideration, Greem quickly gave up on this idea.


    ¡°Second proposal: bloodline devouring.¡±


    ¡°Have the fire dragon bloodlinepletely rece Meryl¡¯s original bloodline by having it devour the other, forming a new and stable bloodline legacy.¡±


    ¡°Pros: Meryl can perfectly inherit the entire legacy of the Third Grade fire dragon. Cons: Meryl will deviate from a human adept existence and be a dragon.¡±


    This proposal also fell short of Greem¡¯s ideal requirements.


    He didn¡¯t want to create another female fire dragon known as Meryl after just killing one known as Philippa.


    The path of an adept was one that should not be abandoned!


    ¡°Third proposal: bloodline enhancement.


    ¡°Modify Meryl¡¯s body gradually using the fire dragon bloodline, allowing subject to gradually get used to and ept the bloodline, thereby forming a bnce between the human body and the fire dragon bloodline. In the end, the foreign bloodline will assimte with the host in the form of magic enchancement.


    ¡°Rted information on such bloodline enhancement can be obtained by referring to draconic sorcerers.¡±


    Greem narrowed his eyes and couldn¡¯t help but seriously consider the idea of bloodline enhancement.


    It was the method he was most familiar with.


    His current lifeform state belonged to the realm of bloodline enhancement.


    He had talents and specializations rted to the human body, but for the most part, both his flesh body and Spirit had been elementiumized. Greem could quickly turn into a fire elementium creature if he were willing to abandon thest shred of the burden that was his human body.


    However, if he did that, he would be rejected by the World of Adepts and would end up wandering in foreign realms like the Fire Elementium ne.


    As such, Greem still possessed a human body and an adept¡¯s bloodline. The fire elementium modification was only a magical ability of his. Though this would reduce some of the power of his fire spells, it allowed him to retain the most valuable parts of being an adept.


    Judging by this, there was nothing wrong with Meryl stepping on the same path as him; a simr path of bloodline enhancement!


    Having made his decision, Greem quickly drew up a bloodline modification n for Meryl.


    For the first week, Meryl was forced to be a glutton, eating every four hours, and eating fifteen kilograms of fire dragon meat for every meal. In this manner, Greem would force Meryl to swallow fire dragon meat several times her body weight in a single day.


    The meat had all undergone processing by Greem. It had been soaked in magical potions and liquids. Apart from improving Meryl¡¯s absorption of the fire elementium essence, it would also enhance Meryl¡¯s affinity for fire elementium. Greem mixed thest remaining Fire Essences he had into these potions for Meryl¡¯s consumption.


    All Meryl had to do daily was to meditate repeatedly to hasten the digestion of the Fire Essence within the meat. She would often have to start eating before herst meal had beenpletely digested.


    Every time, Meryl would stare at therge chunks of fire dragon meat with a sickly green face before opening her mouth wide and stuffing it all down her throat with the spirit of a desperado. She would straighten her neck and swallow the meat even if she was choking and on the verge of copse.


    The dense essence of fire within the fire dragon steaks constantly radiated out, turning her skin bright-red as the vicious fire elementium particles ravaged her insides and disrupted her earth elementium cirction.


    In this manner, she was tortured by Greem¡¯s insane meal ns for seven days before sessfully entering the second phase.


    One had to admit that Greem¡¯s n, though somewhat insane and cruel, had produced a pronounced effect on Meryl¡¯s Physique.


    Before the whole ordeal, Meryl¡¯s elementium affinity chart showed absolutely no affinity with fire elementium. However, after the experience, her fire elementium affinity had jumped all the way to be her second-best affinity, almost at the same level as her earth elementium affinity.


    For the second phase, Greem started bloodline modification on Meryl. He opened up her chest and cut a small opening in her heart, where he transnted the fire dragon bloodline rune.


    An operation like this was child¡¯s y for adepts like them. It couldn¡¯t be simpler.


    After the transntation wasplete, Greem took out a diluted bottle of moonwater and slowly poured it into Meryl¡¯s abdominal cavity. As the jade-green liquid washed over her organs, the small cut on her beating heart quickly healed. Her chest also required no stitching. Greem simply pressed her skin together and washed it with moonwater. When the blood was all washed off, only smooth skin could be seen.


    No anesthetics had been used throughout the operation. Meryl calmly observed the entire procedure performed by her teacher with the help of a mirror.


    Once the operation waspleted, Greem ced his hand on Meryl¡¯s chest and silently sensed the bloodline rune sealed within her heart. He asked softly, ¡°Are you ready?¡±


    Meryl gritted her teeth and nodded, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, teacher, I am ready!¡±


    ¡°Very well!¡± Greem replied. His fingers waved through the air, creating a rune formed of red fire which slowly lowered into Meryl¡¯s body.


    The effect of the fire rune caused the seal on the bloodline rune within Meryl¡¯s heart to loosen. A trace of fire dragon bloodline seeped through and was quickly absorbed by Meryl¡¯s beating heart.


    ¡°Ah!¡±


    Meryl was calm andposed, but her skin had now turned blood-red, covered with red splotches. Her slender naked body arched upward as she let out a small breath of yellow mes from her mouth.


    In that one instant, the fire essence from the fire dragon bloodline boiled her blood and nearly cooked most of her organs.


    Greem grabbed with his right hand, and the fire rune floated out of Meryl¡¯s body. The uproar from the bloodline rune also faded away.


    Meryl moaned in agony as she turned and drank a bottle of healing potion, before shutting her eyes and waiting for her organs to heal. The tens of thousands of wounds gradually recovered due to the effect of the potion, but the terrifying pain from being burned by that fire had been etched into Meryl¡¯s mind and soul.


    After seven minutes, Meryl felt her body and mind calm down once again. She then opened her eyes and nodded firmly at Greem.


    Thus, the fire rune entered her body once more, inciting the bloodline rune again.


    ¡°Ah!¡±


    Meryl¡¯s suppressed cry of pain lingered and echoed in theb. Her naked body was now as red as a rose, and her skin was covered inrge beads of sweat.


    Even with the buffer from earlier and the experience of the first time, the burning pain from all over her body still tortured Meryl endlessly. Her slender body curled into a ball and her muscles spasmed from the pain. Her body trembled intensely as her cries filled the room over and over.


    This time, it took Meryl fifteen minutes to regain control.


    When she secretly nced at the fire rune hovering above her, fear and hesitation could be seen in her eyes.


    However, the thought of bing stronger was far stronger than the pain itself.


    After collecting herself, Meryl gritted her teeth and once again nodded at her teacher.


    The next second, howls of agony and suffering filled the room.

 Chapter 917 - Meryls Return

    Chapter 917 Meryl¡¯s Return


    The path of an adept was not built in a single day!


    Those who attempted to take a shortcut would always pay a heavy price. It would often be one that an ordinary person would not be able to endure.


    Right now, Meryl was enduring inhuman torture and agony for her past sloth and indulgence.


    Tremendous power required an equally tremendous Physique as the host. The reason the dragons were all so massive was to be able to contain their powerful bloodline talent.


    However, the dragons required year after year of long sleep to digest and absorb their bloodline powers. Meryl, on the other hand, was attempting to assimte the bloodline rune in a short period of time; it was only natural that she would suffer some pain. This cruel modification process was unavoidable unless she could seal herself somewhere and meditate over a long period, much like a dragon.


    Over the entire month, Meryl was always between heaven and hell. One leg in life and one in death, she struggled and endured painfully between the two.


    The bloodline rune started by slightly radiating a trace of fire dragon aura, cooking her flesh and boiling her blood. By the end, all the fire essence that had umted within her body was slowly released and started to change and modte her life cirction system passively.


    First was the heart. This core organ of life gradually grew bigger and stronger from the changes produced by the fire dragon heart. A human heart had trouble enduring the shockwaves from a fire dragon¡¯s aura. As such, two small auxiliary hearts had unknowingly grown to the side and back of Meryl¡¯s heart.


    Through their joint absorption and filtering, the fire dragon aura no longer ravaged her body as it had in the past. Instead, the aura became the source from where colossal bloodline powers slowly emerged.


    The organs and blood vessels in Meryl¡¯s body also became tougher, more flexible, and significantly more fire-resistant. In fact, many of her muscles and tissues had even undergone iprehensible changes, bing more suited for the cirction and storage of fire energy.


    During this time, Meryl¡¯s body also showed some signs of draconification.


    Every time she consciously gathered fire energy, a thinyer of dark red scales would appear on her skin. They rang with a metallic sound when tapped. Moreover, whenever Meryl gathered fire energy in one of her hands, her slender and white hand would turn into a scale-covered dragon w. Her ws could easily pierce alloy shields with less than one hundred points of defensive power as well as easily crush stone into a fine dust.


    That proved the draconified Meryl had experienced an immense improvement in Strength and Physique.


    Once Meryl had wholly adapted to the bloodline rune and was capable of elementary fire energy maniption, Greem gave her aprehensive analysis once again.


    Meryl. Advanced First Grade.


    Profession: Bloodline Adept (Fire Dragon Transformation).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 16 | Physique 17 | Agility 9 | Spirit 17


    One had to admit that the changes from the bloodline modification on her power were truly immense.


    Her Strength had gone from 4 to 16 points, her Physique from 8 to 17, her Agility from 5 to 9, and her Spirit from 14 to 17. The increase in her attributes was truly breathtaking!


    If one were to say that Meryl only used to be an ordinary First Grade adept that did not even deserve the title of a veteran, then her power was now very close to the level of elite adepts. She was no weaker than an elite adept when it came to her attributes. The only difference was probably in her fighting techniques and spellcasting abilities.


    However, this was only her ability after the first stage of assimtion with the bloodline rune. From now on, as her assimtion degree with the bloodline rune increased, her basic abilities would also improve exponentially.


    When that happened, she would only need to put in a little bit of effort, and she would be able to crush those elite adepts of the same grade easily.


    Unfortunately, Meryl¡¯spatibility with the fire dragon bloodline was still a bit insufficient. She could only manage a partial draconic transformation at First Grade. Either dragon scale protection, dragon¡¯s breath, or bloodline aura intimidation; these were all decent defensive and offensive skills.


    She would probably have to wait until Second Grade to have a chance atplete draconic transformation.


    With the firm foundations established by the Third Grade fire dragon, Meryl¡¯s path to Second Grade had already beenid out for her. She only needed to assimte and absorb the rune now, slowly waiting for her power to cross the threshold of Second Grade.


    From this aspect alone, Meryl¡¯s advancement to Second Grade was much, much simpler than most people¡¯s!


    It was also a demonstration of how having a powerful adept standing behind you would make the path of advancement a smooth and effortless one. It was the main reason why most low and intermediate-grade adepts were willing to bemanded by a high-grade adept.


    In just five months, Meryl had sessfullypleted her fire dragon bloodline modification and assimted the bloodline rune. All sorts of hidden and unseen benefits would slowly reveal themselves over the next decade, pushing her back to the second tier fighting force of the n once more.


    It was the bountiful reward that her legendary teacher, the Crimson n leader, had bestowed upon her for her years of service!


    Of course, Greem also took this opportunity to gather the bloodline modification data he wanted sessfully.


    ............


    World of Adepts, White Tower.


    The light from the teleportation started to fade slowly. Meryl opened her eyes with a bright smile on her face.


    The benefits brought to her by bloodline modification were simply too many. Even the dizziness from teleportation was much shorter now.


    Meryl had intentionally picked the public teleportation array at he za outside White Tower as her destination this time.


    Thus, as she casually walked out, the n adept stationed at the edge of the array hurriedly and confusedly bowed in greeting. The adepts and apprentices walking by the teleportation za also stopped in their tracks in dumbfoundedness. They made way for her and respectfully gave their greetings.


    It had already been half a year since they hadst heard of Adept Meryl.


    White Tower imed that Adept Meryl was conducting a major magical experiment and, thus, was temporarily not receiving any outsiders. Witch Snowlotus from the Fate Witches had also reced her in authority.


    The adepts and apprentices living at White Tower felt this small change most profoundly and most sensitively. However, the higher-ups of the Crimson n remained silent throughout. As such, no adept dared to question the whereabouts of Meryl.


    The apprentices might not be too shocked at suddenly seeing Adept Meryl once again, but the n adepts were all stunned in befuddlement. They could hardly believe their own eyes or spiritual senses.


    The elementium aura and mental flux of every adept were unique and possessed their own frequency and wavelength.


    However, the Adept Meryl before them, though the very same person, had undergone aplete change in elementium aura and mental flux. Moreover, after just six months, Adept Meryl¡¯s figure had changed tremendously. She was now taller and had seemingly stronger muscles.


    Meryl used to only be one hundred and seventy centimeters in the past, but she was now nearly two entire meters!


    Her previously light blue eyes had also turned dark red, with the light of fire faintly glimmering at the fringes.


    Every time the adepts locked eyes with her, they would feel their eyeballs sting with pain as if they had been slightly burned. The adept apprentices didn¡¯t even dare to stare directly at this once gentle female adept. Otherwise, their eyes would most surely water and hurt so much that they would not be able to open them.


    What moved everyone the most was that vague spiritual pressure that hung faintly around Meryl. It caused the heart of every person around her to beat erratically and uncontrobly.


    The apprentices were not experienced or well-versed. They had no idea what this effect was. However, the Crimson adepts had a very clear idea of what it was.


    Dragon¡¯s aura of might!


    A weakened version of a dragon¡¯s aura!


    Since when did Meryl possess spiritual pressure that could imitate a dragon¡¯s aura? It was unthinkable!


    Meryl casually walked into White Tower amid the little storm she had personally started. She then took one of the flying discs and flew toward the higher levels of the tower.


    News of her return quickly spread through the tower. Of course, this included Snowlotus who was sitting on the hall of the seventh floor and Vanlier, who was standing by her side to help her.


    Snowlotus waved away the water mirror in front of her as a cold smile appeared on her white and pretty face.


    ¡°Your old master¡¯s flexing her power to me! It seems like her bloodline modification at her teacher¡¯s ce went very well.¡±


    Vanlier still had a fawning smile on his face, but he gave no quarter with his words.


    ¡°I will only ever have one master¨C Lady Mary herself!¡±


    Snowlotus was stunned for a moment. She knew that she had made an indiscreet remark.


    Lady Mary was indeed one of the strongest individuals in the Crimson n. Apart from her own terrifying Third Grade power, she possessed arge group of Second Grade vampires under to her. Though Snowlotus and the Fate Witches were not under the governance of the Crimson n, she still had to maintain respect in words and attitude toward an influential individual like that.


    It was a rule of the adepts that all low-grade adepts must obey. Otherwise, a high-grade adept would have more than enough excuse to punish her and teach a lesson.


    Though Snowlotus was not interested in authority over White Tower, or even the internal matters of the Crimson n, she still couldn¡¯t beposed at seeing the changes that had urred to Meryl.


    The increase in strength of any party in the tight coboration of the Crimson n and the Fate Witches would cause the barely maintained power bnce to tilt in one¡¯s favor.


    The simultaneous advancement of Greem and Mary to Third Grade had already significantly impacted the Fate Witches. If a few more powerhouses appeared within the lower level adepts of the Crimson n, it would be increasingly harder to maintain the bnce between their two forces.


    As such, Icdy Snowlotus felt no joy upon seeing Meryl¡¯s triumphant return. Instead, she felt a deep sense of defeat and danger deep in her heart.


    Compared to the Crimson adepts, the Fate Witches were improving far, far too slowly.

 Chapter 918 - Bloodline Modification Package

    Chapter 918 Bloodline Modification Package


    Meryl had sessfully returned with a massive increase to her power!


    News quickly spread throughout White Tower and its surroundings like an infectious gue.


    White Tower was now no longer the old, isted adept¡¯s tower. Its entire territory included White Tower, Doverand City, Moussent City, and three towns. Its area covered over three hundred kilometers and as many as twenty thousand subjects were living here.


    However, the number of these civilians was a little inted. Nearly five thousand of them were goblins from the Goblin ne.


    The fact that they could purchase a ticket to teleport from the Goblin ne to the World of Adepts was a testament to the power or background of these goblins. They were either wealthy individuals, regional managers of some merchant group, or talented geniuses that had made tremendous contributions in the City of Machines to receive rmendations.


    Regardless of what their background was, their arrival had immensely furthered the livelihood and financial prosperity of White Tower and its surroundings.


    It indirectly allowed for more White Tower civilians to obtain ie and a livelihood in the area.


    Unlike the civilians, who were more concerned with the stability of authority of White Tower, the adepts that lived in White Tower were more interested in the reason behind Meryl¡¯s sudden increase in power.


    No one here was an idiot. The obvious signs of bloodline modification on Meryl could not be concealed from the eyes of the public.


    Rumors began to spread that the Crimson n had mastered a safe andprehensive bloodline modification technique.


    Though Zhentarim maintained their high-suppression attitude toward the research of bloodlines, the study of all adepts privately involved some degree of bloodline research. Thus, the leaders of Zhentarim turned a blind eye to the situation. As long as no widespread bloodline mutation that affected worldly kingdoms arose, they couldn¡¯t be bothered to investigate every rumor and punish those responsible.


    Moreover, adept ns and organizations with actual power also had their own unique bloodline modification research projects. Though adepts that had undergone bloodline modification or synthesis would lose a portion of their development potential, it was a decent means by which to increase the power of a n rapidly.


    Those who had an excellent adept talent and the confidence to grow stronger slowly were a minority, after all. Most among the adepts were intermediate and low-grade adepts with ordinary talent and could only ever hope to remain at the level of First and Second Grade.


    Even advancing to First Grade was already remarkably fortunate for them. A single step upward was dangerous and painful. Who among these people would care if their development potential was cut off if there was a shortcut that allowed them to sessfully advance to Second Grade and extend their lives by a few more hundred years?


    Truthfully, Greem¡¯s path of advancement had been too easy. It had caused him to gain apletely incorrect understanding of the difficulty of advancement for most adepts. He had no idea how attractive even an imperfect bloodline modification was to low-grade adepts who desired nothing but more power and more authority!


    For an adept that had been stuck at First Grade for two hundred years and had already reached the limit of their lifespan, any hope of advancement was something they would never be willing to give up on. They couldn¡¯t care less about all the adverse effects, be they bloodline bacsh or the exhaustion of their potential.


    It was evident from the first adept that Greem had known¨C Adept Anderson.


    For the sake of advancement and improvement, Anderson had resorted to using a blood sacrifice, which was a method with severe side-effects. It was a testament to how insane Anderson had gone for the sake of advancement!


    That was why an uproar started amongst the Crimson adepts when rumors of the n possessing the technique and means to modify bloodlines spread. Those who believed they could not advance with their own abilities immediately gained new hope. They started to ask within the n about content rted to bloodline research.


    As the first subject, Meryl instantly became the center of attention.


    Her every move and action was noted and observed by interested parties. Through this, they hoped to deduce the degree to which the n¡¯s bloodline research had progressed.


    One had to say that Meryl¡¯s bloodline modification was hugely sessful!


    The potent fire dragon aura continued to nourish and strengthen her body and bloodline, allowing her attributes to keep increasing. Even though she had not been involved in any form of body refinement, Meryl had turned from a weak female adept to an individual with a body as strong as any other First Grade body-refining adept.


    Many professional body-refining adepts could not reach the level of her body in terms of Strength and Physique alone.


    That undoubtedly caused the body-refining adepts to be embarrassed and furious at themselves!


    After a long period of observation, the Crimson adepts finally confirmed that Meryl had assimted a fire dragon¡¯s bloodline. Moreover, judging from the amount of power she had obtained, the power of this fire dragon was not lower than Second Grade. That meant Meryl only required one or two decades of umtion before she would have a chance of sessfully advancing to Second Grade.


    It was the greatest stimtion to most adepts.


    Finally, as this trend started to spread throughout the n, it reached the ears of Greem, who had isted himself in his room.


    The bloodline modification that had such serious side-effects had such a vast market amongst low-grade adepts? In all honesty, Greem could barely believe his ears when he first heard this.


    The side-effects were severe, you know? Well, it seemed like they really didn¡¯t mind!


    The difference in status between First Grade and Second Grade adepts was massive, much like the difference between heaven and earth. Not to mention that advancement also meant an extension of one¡¯s lifespan. Most First Grade adepts would cast their only hope upon bloodline modification after all of their efforts had failed.


    However, even the simplest of bloodline modifications was not cheap. A bloodline modification that could increase an adept¡¯s grade was shockingly expensive. Thus, low-grade adepts with empty wallets were more willing to obtain the investment of n resources through signing contracts of servitude, all in order toplete their bloodline modification.


    The undercurrents surging through the n moved Greem slightly. He started to contact Meryl and Gargamel frequently to discuss this matter.


    Meryl had no more concerns biting at her back now. She couldfortably sit on her position as the majordomo of White Tower while not neglecting the increase in her own power. Meanwhile, Gargamel, who was in the same position as her, could only nce at Greem with puppy eyes and sigh in frustration.


    Gargamel was over two hundred years old now. Both his body and his magic were showing obvious signs of weakening from age. If it weren¡¯t for his service to Greem that allowed him to umte enough resources to host the lowest-level life extension ceremony for fifty years of lifespan, he would already be dead.


    Even so, Gargamel¡¯s current power was only advanced First Grade. It was still immensely far away from the peak of First Grade. There was nearly no chance for him to advance to Second Grade before his lifespan was exhausted.


    That was why Gargamel¡¯s desire for bloodline modification was stronger and more urgentpared to Meryl!


    Truthfully, Greem did not intend to conduct the bloodline modification operation he had used on Meryl on a widespread basis. After all, bloodline modification required the bloodline origin of a powerful creature and a carefully raised Sourcestealer. Both of these were scarce resources, and the cost required for them was terrifyingly high.


    If it weren¡¯t for the sake of gathering some necessary data for his own bloodline modification, Greem would not have been so extravagant in his projects.


    However, the reaction within the n indirectly reminded him that it was possible to attempt some more efficient, low-cost bloodline research with the help of the Chip. At any rate, those low-grade adepts were only pursuing an advancement to the next grade and a few hundred more years to live. Greem had no need to waste something as precious as a Third Grade dragon on them.


    It was better to find a Second Grade magical creature that was easy to raise, and that could reproduce very quickly.


    Whether those adepts would be able to obtain powerful auxiliary abilities through such a bloodline modification was not within Greem¡¯s realm of consideration!


    Either way, the cost of the operation would have to be cut down as much as possible. The cheaper it was, and the easier it was to raise the magical creatures, the better.


    However, it was only reasonable to improve the bloodline quality of individuals such as Gargamel, who had made tremendous contributions to the n.


    With this in mind, Greem split the bloodline modifications into three different tiers¨C low, intermediate, and advanced. He then had the Chip conduct a filter and search for bloodline origins, as well as propose a usible method of modification. Meanwhile, Greem instructed Gargamel and Meryl toe up with changes to the n adept contribution system to allow adepts within the n to exchange their contribution points for a bloodline modification service.


    The Crimson n had established aprehensive contribution point system over the past hundred years. They had invested plenty of precious resources into this system: elementium golems, metal golems, magic essence, diluted life stock solution, and many other goblin alchemical products.


    The adepts of the Crimson n could obtain magical crystals and contribution points by epting n missions, then exchange for valuable resources within the n at a lower cost than the market rate. There were even many wandering adepts who were willing to join the Crimson n to obtain elementium golems and metal golems in order to resell them and make a profit off of that.


    After all, the golems of the Crimson n were fairly well known in Zhentarim!


    Now, with the appearance of the bloodline modification package, a tsunami-like uproar immediately blew up within the n. The value of the n contributions points quickly skyrocketed as the adepts fought over them.


    After all, the contribution points of the n could be traded!


    Many true veterans of the n reserved the top-ss package the moment the modification project came online. That included senior members such as Snox, Tigule, and Gargamel.


    In particr, Gargamel and Snox were facing a harsh predicament. They didn¡¯t have much of their lifespan left!


    It would have been alright if they had never tasted power in the past. They could lie down in the mud, shut their eyes, and their lives would be over. However, the two of them had already deeply indulged in power and authority. It was only now that they realized the value and preciousness of life.


    That was why they had to choose the best bloodline package for themselves, even at the cost of everything else.


    Thus, some things that had still been brewing in Greem¡¯s mind and was far from fruition had already be the most sought-after resource within the n!

 Chapter 919 - Adept Expedition

    Chapter 919 Adept Expedition


    The introduction of the bloodline package instantly created a massive uproar within the Crimson n.


    The package was split into three tiers¨C low, intermediate, and advanced.


    Low-tier bloodline packages would only assimte the bloodline of monsters and magical creatures, allowing the modified adept to possess some degree of unusual magic. Moreover, only intermediate and advanced tier packages could improve an adept¡¯s power and let those who had reached a dead-end a chance to reach for the next grade.


    The price of these packages matched their value¨C so despairingly high!


    Even the lowest tier of bloodline packages required a minimum of twenty thousand contribution points, while the most sought-after intermediate-tier packages required fifty thousand contribution points.


    However, on the n¡¯s mission list, the contribution points obtained by a First Grade adept through being stationed at an outpost or resource site only clocked in at three hundred points a year. The daily n activities such as patrolling, hunting, potion brewing, or crafting only usually awarded a hundred points or so.


    As such, the only way for most n adepts to umte sufficient contribution points before the end of their lives was probably war.


    Like all adept ns, the Crimson n¡¯s rewards for participating in nar wars and adept wars was the most bountiful. They easily awarded three to four thousand points.


    It also caused an unstoppable wave of requests for war within the Crimson n.


    Greem, Mary, Alice, and few of the core adepts gathered together to have a discussion. They quickly came up with a feasiblebat operation.


    The various forces of the World of Adepts were intertwined in sophisticated rtionships. Attempts to initiate a war here would very likely lead to the esction of a conflict that could not be halted. Meanwhile, the Goblin ne was entirely at peace; there was no need to stir any trouble there. As such, after some selection, the most suitable ce for war had to be Lance.


    After a few decades of expansion and development, the Crimson n had established themselves firmly in Lance. As long as multiple Fourth Grade dragons didn¡¯t show up in the worst-case scenario, the Capital of Eternity was an indestructible steel fortress that could fend off the invasion of any number of dragons.


    Over the past few decades, the Crimson n had remained subtle and low-profile in their excavation of Lance¡¯s resources. That was to avoid bacsh from the dragon lords. Even when they hunted dragons, they did it as secretly as possible, very rarely conducting an open invasion into theirnds.


    This time, Greem intended to go for a big one. He set his sights on the closest Fourth Grade dragon lord to the Capital of Eternity¨C Amethyst Dragon Toril.


    Their of this Fourth Grade amethyst dragony within Crystal Valley, twenty-three thousand kilometers northwest of the Capital. The forces that Greem organized would have to pass through multiple dragon territories to arrive there. There were a total of twenty-three First Grade dragons, seven Second Grade dragons, and two Third Grade dragons.


    It was truly a difficult journey,ced with danger at every turn.


    However, the Crimson n would have to pay the price if they wished to remove those annoying Fourth Grade dragons that clung onto the ne like stubborn nails.


    The Crimson n might not have dared to provoke these Fourth Grade dragons ten years ago. However, with the introduction of the Fourth Grade metal golem dragon into the ranks of the Crimson n, they were confident. The dragon was also now outfitted with many magic energy cannons, and its ability was at the level of an average Fourth Grade creature.


    That was the main reason why Greem dared to challenge a Fourth Grade dragon!


    Greem also intended to take this opportunity tob through the core fighting force of the n to select individuals with potential for further grooming.


    The announcement of this Lance expedition immediately drove the Crimson adepts to sign up eagerly. Those who were troubled by theirck of contribution points hastily hurried to the Capital of Eternity to join the expedition. All of their past fears of nar wars were swept away.


    For a moment, nearly sixty percent of all elite Crimson adepts had gathered in the Capital of Eternity, making the scale of this expeditionrger andrger by the day!


    Year 32,889 of the Era of Adepts. The eleventh day of the sixth month of the year.


    Seventeen days after the war order was issued, the expedition army at the Capital of Eternity finally set off.


    The giant metal gates on the west side of the Capital slowly moved apart with grinding metallic sounds and nking chains, revealing a massive, towering giant made entirely out of metal.


    It appeared to be a fifteen-meter-tall, thirty-meter-long giant metal dragon.


    It had two pairs of thick and firm metal legs beneath it, and its giant metal head gleamed with the cold blue light of magical metal under the sun. It dragged a ten-meter-long tail of steel behind it, filled with spikes and nails as if it was a morningstar.


    When a steel dragon like this stepped forward and rumbled onward, the entire earth seemed to tremble slightly. The four metal legs left giant craters three meters in diameter and one meter deep whenever theynded.


    Naturally, the massive expedition army would not just consist of such a steel dragon. Over a hundred goblin chariots followed around the dragon, like soldiers surrounding their general, charging into the distance in perfect formation.


    Meanwhile, a silver Mothership silently hovered above the clouds and the army, surrounded by three to four dozen smaller, more agile goblin ships. Even further away from the Mothership, over a hundred eyeballbat machines wove about, diving into the bushes, the forest, and the swamps as scouts.


    Every time they discovered a danger zone, they summoned a goblin ship and purged the area with goblin rockets and a barrage of energy beams.


    It didn¡¯t matter what had initially hidden there. Whatever it was, it would be riddled with holes and be of no threat to the army.


    It was this three-dimensional scouting force that brought about disaster for the native creatures and lookouts in the path of the expedition army. They lost their insignificant little lives before they could understand what had happened.


    Of course, with howrge of a scale the army was, the more powerful native creatures fled at the very sight of them, as long as they weren¡¯tplete idiots.


    Greem and the other adepts resided in the Mothership above and could see the countless beasts and magical creatures emerge from theirirs in a panic. The creatures gathered into a massive swarm and fled toward the distant horizon.


    The golem dragon was the slowest creature of the entire expedition, but even it moved at a decent fifty kilometers an hour. The vanguard chariots would always stop after pulling ahead to wait for the big guy behind.


    Meanwhile, Greem and the higher-ups remained in the Mothership, making their own preparations as the party slowly advanced.


    For this expedition, the Crimson n had mobilized one Fourth Grade magical machine golem dragon, one hundred and two goblin chariots, one Mothership, forty-five goblin flying ships, and one thousand one hundred and seventy magical machines. Those were only thebat machines. The Crimson n had also mobilized all of theirbat personnel.


    Third Grade: Greem, Mary, Thunder Dragon Arms, and Emerald Dragon Iritina.


    Second Grade: Alice, Gru, Billis, Zacha, Tigule, Oliven, two blood knights, three blood elves, and seven green dragons.


    The rest were sixty-seven First Grade adepts and three hundred and twenty-six apprentices.


    Apart from these fighters, there were also two hundred and fifty-seven goblin pilots and technicians.


    Naturally, the procession of such a vast army raised amotion wherever they went, sending all manners of creatures fleeing in panic. Somehow, a small stampede had formed in front of the procession!


    Adepts interested in the magical creatures and the natural environment boarded the goblin ships and spread out in dozens of kilometers of the army to search for samples and increase their collection. It was unavoidable that conflicts between native beings and magical creatures urred during this process.


    Every ship was apanied by five to ten magical machines and equipped with three magic energy cannons. It was more than enough firepower to raze an ordinary enemy. If they ran into powerful magical creatures, the adepts would quickly send out magical messages to the army behind them.


    Thus, even more adepts and goblin ships gathered to drown the enemy with ferocious firepower.


    Most of the native magical creatures might have tremendous power, but theycked the ability to fly.


    They were no more than moving targets in front of the goblin ships, unable to escape the pursuit of the adepts even if they ran until they frothed at the mouth.


    One magical creature after another that had been beaten within an inch of their lives were transported back to the Mothership. All sorts of magical nts with special traits were also collected and pocketed by the adepts.


    Adepts who excelled at brewing potions or creating voodoo beasts also became extremely busy with work in the cabins of the Mothership. Though the army already had arge number of magical machines as cannon fodder, a few more voodoo beasts would also be a cheap means of reinforcement.


    After such a brazen march and raid of thends, the expedition party finally arrived in the territory of their first target after two days.


    It was the province of a small First Grade dragon. It stretched for approximately a hundred kilometers and had two small cities and a dozen native viges within its area.


    Sadly, the eyeball machines sent to the Steelback Mountain where the First Grade dragon lived revealed that the dragon had already fled. Even its crudeir had been emptied thoroughly. Not even a single gold coin could be found.


    This situation undoubtedly left Gru, who had nned their marching route, in an awkward position. He could only curse and swear at the spinelessness of these dragons.


    In truth, they couldn¡¯t exactly fault this small dragon.


    The adepts¡¯ expedition army was sorge and yet so audacious. The dragon lords would have heard news of their arrival even if they had practically no means of information and were the biggest sloths in the world. The dragon lords typically had many other flying scouts as subordinates apart from the dragonborn.


    These scouts would be able to figure out the might of this massive army if they probed about a little.


    Would a mere First Grade dragon lord dare to fight against a powerful adept army that had emerged from the Capital of Eternity? Dragons were not stupid. Of course, they would flee as quickly as they could.

 Chapter 920 - Valley Ambush

    Chapter 920 Valley Ambush


    The dragon lords had all fled.


    However, there were still many scouts and spies left behind in their territories. These forces would oftenunch ambushes at the adept army as they passed by.


    They were either packs of dragonborn warriors or fearless native tribes. Regardless, no force could move that giant metal army that stretched on like a snake.


    They came, they attacked, and they were forever left in the ground.


    How could they possibly know that their well-hidden ambushes were so crude and inferior in the eyes of the adepts? Hundreds of eyeball machines hovering hundreds of meters in the air released scan waves of various colors through a small egg-sized hole underneath their structures.


    It didn¡¯t matter if the dragonborn and natives were hiding in the swamp, ditches, or the bushes; their massive life forces would not escape the detection and scans of the machines. The ambushes they thought to be perfect had all been discovered by the eyeball machines, and the information was ryed to the adepts in the army.


    Thus, several goblin chariots would suddenly diverge from the wildly advancing army and charge at these ¡®traps.¡¯


    Before they even got close to the traps, the goblin chariots would fire their magic energy cannons consecutively and blow the surroundings of the pitfalls to pieces. The dragonborn and natives that were forced out of their traps were shredded to pieces of flesh and blood by a barrage of energy beams and cannon shots before they could approach the chariot.


    If there were a Second Grade creature amongst the hidden enemies, the goblin chariots weren¡¯t able to deal with them in a frontal confrontation. They instead turned about and engage in gueri warfare. How many magic energy cannon shots could the most powerful Second Grade dragonborn possibly endure? If the enemy remained standing, there were still adepts within the chariots. Powerful spells with strange effects would descend in a downpour. Even the most powerful of enemies would copse in grief and resentment.


    From the very start to the end, none of these dragonborn or native tribes had any chance of catching up with the goblin chariots. Moreover, the long-ranged abilities they possessed were either heavy throwing spears or semi-mid-ranged metal darts. They were utterly ineffective apart from adding a few dents into the metal shells of the chariots.


    One the one side, you had fully-equipped murder machines from a higher ne. On the other, you had isted and primitive natives. Even though the individual power of the dragonborn was more than sufficient to crush the goblin pilots and adepts within the chariots, it was an utterly one-sided ughter against their favor.


    The ones that were felled were the stronger, yet more primitive and unskilled, dragonborn. Meanwhile, the victors were the sly goblins who were individually weak but had armed themselves to the teeth with magic and machines.


    It wasn¡¯t an exception that only happened in skirmishes. It was the forceful domination of an otherworldly civilization against a primitive one!


    The difference between the two civilizations was immediately evident from the sh between the two forces. It was not something that could bepensated for by personal courage and passion. At the very least, these lone soldiers were not powerful enough to ignore the difference in skill and equipment!


    The army went straight through the First Grade dragon¡¯s territory like a spear. The army did not need to stop for rest or reorganization. It simply and forcefully rolled through the disorganized ¡®attacks¡¯ in the area and marched forward ording to the nned route.


    Some ignorant local natives and magical creatures had initially been dissatisfied with the army marching through theirnds and had prepared to pursue and attack the rear. However, that small bit of ferocity and pride in their hearts vanished in an instant when they saw the hill-like metal dragon marching at the very front.


    The foreign adepts had built a terrifying metal dragon and were bringing it everywhere to challenge the dragon lords. Such news spread out in every direction like a gue, causing every being that heard it to be somewhat eager for what was toe.


    In all honesty, all the intelligent native tribes in Lance apart from the dragonborn and the Dragon Cultists held deep-seated anger and hatred for the dragon lords.


    When the dragon lords were the ultimate force within the ne, they had no choice but to endure and submit. However, if the dragon lords were pinned into the swamp by another powerful enemy, the hatred that had been brewing for the past few thousand years of envement would rapidly erupt!


    They had no idea if the adepts were holy beings sent to deliver them unto salvation. However, when the authority that the dragon lords previously maintained with immense martial force copsed overnight, the tides of rebellion that erupted all over the ce quickly devoured the disorganized dragonborn and Dragon Cultists.


    In just three days, the metal parade had crossed the dragon¡¯s territory and entered thend of another Second Grade dragon.


    The Second Grade dragon was not much better than the First Grade dragon. The border guards it had amassed instantly fell to the ferocious cannon fire of the metal tanks. Thus, the Second Grade dragon also hastily packed his things and fled with all the wealth he had obtained.


    ............


    This ce was a narrow valley between two towering mountains.


    The Dragon Cultists that hade from all over Hardwell were busy at work, building a sturdy stone fortress and wooden tforms in the southern entrance of the valley.


    Several dragonborn warriors with muscr physiques were spread out throughout the valley, leaning against the walls and resting as they gritted their teeth and sharpened their weapons. Meanwhile, the short ratmen and lizardmen around them bent down and delivered baskets of food.


    Dragonborn Warrior Hanna casually picked up a ck piece of cheese from the vine-woven basket and threw it into his mouth. He only took a single bite before spitting out everything in a violent coughing fit.


    ¡°Dammit! Bastard, this...what is this?¡± Hanna roared furiously after digging out a piece of cheese from his throat, stillced with traces of blood.


    In his anger, Hanna crushed the ratman servant in front of him into a pulp with a single fist.


    ¡°Stop being picky! Eat all of the food!¡± A dragonborn leader patrolling within the valley shouted with an even louder voice, ¡°Do you think this is still our dragonborn camp? You think there are still sweet and tasty Salo ribs waiting for you? Stop dreaming. Eat all of the food now. We still have to fight with those otherworldly invaders in a bit.¡±


    The dragonborn warriors all over the valley lifted the ck pieces of jerky in their hands. They could not distinguish what part of meat or what creature it came from, no matter how they tried. They could only close their eyes and swallow it all.


    The pungent and bitter taste lingered in their mouths and their noses, causing every dragonborn to frown and curse without end.


    Just eating this unknown jerky that was no better than tree bark was too difficult. A dragonborn warrior suddenly had an inspiration. He grabbed a ratman servant beside him, twisted its head off, and let the blood drizzle into his mouth.


    Indeed, the jerky and the cheese were no longer as unbearable as before with the addition of the fresh blood.


    The other dragonborn warriors followed his example, picking up the servants following them, twisting off their heads, and drinking all their blood.


    For a moment, the entire valley was filled with the rough shouts of the dragonborn, mixed with the soft and sharp death throes of the ratmen and lizardmen.


    Several native workers that had been caught from nearby viges were working hard at the entrance of the valley, trying their best to fortify the defenses made of stone. Thick, sharpened wooden stakes were hammered into the earth, the points painted with terrifying poison with extreme lethality.


    Trolls, ogres, pigmen, bearmen; all sorts of muscr native ves were hard at work. Meanwhile, the Dragon Cultists in ck robes waved their whips, yelling and hollering for the ves to work harder.


    Looking from the entrance of the valley, a pir of dust rose from beyond the horizon, as if a massive creature was rapidly approaching.


    Mos tipped the hood on his head slightly with his whip, raising his head to assess the sky.


    Many ck dots the size of seeds were dancing in the dark sky above him. Judging from the height and path of their flight, they could not be mountain eagles. That was because the things were circling far too quickly. Mos had never seen flying creatures with such unpredictable flight paths in his life.


    What were those? Flying magical creaturesmanded by the adepts? Or alchemical creatures made by the adepts through their strange arts?


    A series of questions arose in his heart, but he found no answers.


    As an essential individual in the Cult of Dragons, Mos naturally had his own set of his skills and abilities.


    A short, quick chant rang out as Mos enchanted himself with an Eagle Eye spell. It was then that he clearly distinguished the true identity of the ck dots.


    ¡°Go. Notify Lord Zamu. The enemy¡¯s scouts have arrived!¡± Mos grabbed one of the Dragon Cultists and ordered sternly.


    The cultist immediately rushed off into the depths of the valley, hastily and clumsily.


    A short momentter, the earth rumbled as an army of dragonborn warriors charged out of the valley in perfect formation, long battleaxes in hand. The leader was Second Grade Zamu,mander of the dragonborn army.


    ¡°Where...where is the enemy?¡± Zamu held two massive des in his hands as he stepped in front of the ck-robed Mos, where he roared with all he had.


    Mos pointed at the sky with his whip.


    Zamu ced a hand over his eyes. His serpentine eyes suddenly shrunk, and his powerful vision allowed him to instantly catch sight of the strange ck dots circling in the dim sky.


    The surfaces of the ck dots were smooth and shiny under the sunlight, gleaming with a ghostly blue light unique to magical metal. It was obvious they were not magical creatures that belonged to Lance.


    ¡°Everyone hide in the war fortress. Those are the flying scouts of the enemy!¡±


    At Zamu¡¯smand, the dragonborn warriors dove into the fortress or leaned against the walls, instantly concealing themselves.

 Chapter 921 - Dragonborn Defeated

    Chapter 921 Dragonborn Defeated


    Of course, themotion in the distant valley could not be concealed from the adepts.


    With the life detection arrays fitted within the eyeball machines and the infrared beams of the goblin¡¯s technology, the entire geography of Deadmoon Valley and the many red dots within it had already appeared in themand hall of the Mothership ten kilometers away.


    Magical equipment that resembled a tome was embedded into the floor in the center of the hall. As the data from the eyeball scans were transmitted back to the ship, the panoramic geographic map disyed by this magical equipment became even clearer and detailed.


    ¡°Eighty-three dragonborn, four hundred and sixty-five native creatures, two of which are Second Grade and one hundred and three of which are First Grade. The rest are all insignificant rabble. However, it seems like the opponent has arranged some soldiers on the cliffs above with plenty of boulders and logs prepared. They probably intend to ambush us with the boulders when we pass through the valley.¡± Adept Meryl confidently analyzed as she stood in the center, dressed in arge red robe.


    All the Second Grades of the Crimson n were gathered around her, silently observing this battle. Even Gru was standing to a side with his metal body, silent throughout the meeting.


    It was no more than a pebble in their path. There was no need for powerhouses like them to mobilize. They were only here in an attempt to score some contributions for the n.


    While the Second Grades watched on dispassionately, Meryl¡¯s orders had already reached the army below. Twenty goblin chariots immediately left the formation and elerated toward Deadmoon Valley. Ten goblin skyships followed closely behind, covering the sortie from above.


    The twenty goblin chariots suddenly stopped one kilometer away from Deadmoon Valley. They spread out in an arc and swapped into siege cannon mode. Over a hundred Archers leaped out of the ten skyships that followed behind them. These Archers used their metal bodies to form an unbroken line of defense in front of the chariots.


    The dragonborn and Dragon Cultists hiding within the valley had never experienced the power of the goblin magical machines. While they were stunned in confusion at the enemy¡¯s abrupt pause on the frontlines, the magic energy cannons started to fire.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    A blinding red light suddenly glowed within the ck cannon barrels that had extended out of the chariots. sma fireballs containing ferocious magical energy crashed down toward the valley, dragging long trails of ck smoke behind them as they traveled across the sky.


    What was this?


    The ordinary dragonborn and Dragon Cultists were still confused as they watched everything unfold in the distances. However, Zamu and Mos had already turned pale, their hearts beating wildly and furiously.


    ¡°Cover...everyone find some sort of cover!¡±


    Zamu¡¯s loud voice immediately echoed throughout the valley.


    Unfortunately, his battlecry was quickly drowned out by earthshakingly loud noises.


    The sma fireballs exploded with a loud bang wherever theynded as soon as they came into contact with something solid. First, a flood of bright blue sma lightning slithered outward, quickly followed by wave after wave of violent, surging me shockwaves.


    A single sma fireball could engulf an area of ten to twenty meters. Twenty sma fireballs together were enough to raze the entrance of the valley in a single instant.


    It was destroyed with sma and razed in a sea of fire.


    Meanwhile, they burned away at the lives of the dragonborn and Dragon Cultists hiding within the valley!


    The impact of the me shockwaves might have been on the weaker side, with only one hundred and twenty points of power, but they covered arge area and were truly a tool of ughter in war. Meanwhile, the sma lightning that erupted outward covered a slightly smaller area but dealt upwards of one hundred and eighty points of lightning damage.


    The dragonborn warriors fared better against such magical attacks with their robust Physique and excellent magical resistance. However, the Dragon Cultists only had ordinary magical resistance and instantly became victims of the magic¡¯s destruction.


    Dragon Cultists caught in the me shockwaves were bathed in fire, screeching as they ran around the valleys as human torches. They ran left and right, calling for help from those around them, or rolled about the ground in an attempt to douse the fires.


    Unfortunately, it was a magical fire that burned on their bodies. It was not something that could be extinguished by sand or water.


    The first me shockwave washed over the ce, and twenty howling human torches started running through the valley. The second me shockwave rolled across thend, and the human torches copsed to the ground, reduced to burning bonfires. The third me shockwave blew across, and all signs of life ceased, revealing charred and crumbling corpses beneath the fire.


    Meanwhile, the Dragon Cultists that had been caught in the sma lightning were instantly vaporized and extinguished from existence.


    After the first wave of attacks, twenty-three Dragon Cultists had died, with eleven more severely injured. Two dragonborn warriors had also perished, with many more injured.


    The two dragonborn warriors who died were the most unfortunate ones. They had been caught in the crossfire of two or three sma fireballs; they were turned to ashes before they could even cry out in agony.


    Just as the valley descended into chaos, the goblin chariots in the distance jerked violently once more. Another twenty sma fireballs rose into the air and fell toward the valley.


    ¡°Dammit, dammit, dammit!¡±Second Grade Dragonborn Leader Zamu cursed with all he had. He had never seen an enemy with such terrifying long-ranged attacks.


    Though there were also magical creatures with powerful ranged attacks in Lance, they could not form on a sufficientlyrge scale, let alone be enemies with the dragon lords. Yet, these insignificant enemies before their eyes were able to unleash magic energy of such power by hiding in their metal buildings.


    It...it was entirely outside of Zamu¡¯s expectations!


    Against such an enemy, they would have to find ways to approach them and engage them in a melee.


    Sadly, the dragonborn leader had no time toment his faulty strategy, for the second wave of attacks had now descended.


    The path between the two steep mountains was only thirty meters wide and stretched for over a kilometer from south to north. Dodging sma fireballs crashing from the skies in such a narrow space was an impossible task.


    As such, Zamu raised the two giant des in his hands and gave the order for his dragonborn to charge at the enemy immediately.


    He also took to the very frontlines, stepping across several charred figures as he did so. He smashed through the stone fortress and lunged wildly at the goblin chariots. Several dragonborn warriors covered in soot and shrouded in the smoke also started rushing behind him, stumbling a little as they did so.


    However, the moment they revealed themselves, countless goblin missiles dropped out of the goblin skyships above, instantly drowning them in a festival of explosions.


    The wild sts of the alchemical explosives were lethal on the battlefield as they sent shrapnel shooting across the air. Without exception, every dragonborn warrior that had emerged from the valley was now injured, their purple-ck scales covered in blood stains and bloodied wounds.


    The various injuries all over their bodies bled profusely with every step they took.


    As expected of a Second Grade dragonborn leader, three elementium shields had appeared around Zamu, keeping most of the attacks away from his body. Only some small scratches were visible on some parts of his lower body where the shields could not reach.


    Just as Zamu attempted to approach the chariots in a single dash, a gray aura suddenly appeared around him, reducing his speed by half. The deste ins in front of him suddenly turned into quicksand, causing his thick limbs to sink the moment he stepped within.


    A First Grade Curse of Decripification!


    A First Grade Quicksand Trap!


    One couldn¡¯t underestimate them simply because they were First Grade spells. When used on Second Grade Zamu, they were just as effective as Second Grade spells.


    While Zamu and a few of the dragonborn warriors were caught in the quicksand, the ck cannons on the chariots creaked and moved, setting their sights on these immobile targets.


    Meanwhile, the Archers guarding the chariots raised their magic energy rifles and unleashed a barrage of energy beams at the enemies within sight, as fast as they could.


    Prative Scorching Rays.


    Frost Rays that could slow the enemy¡¯s movements.


    Petrification Rays that could turn a part of the enemy¡¯s body into stone.


    Blinding Rays that would blind the enemy.


    ......


    Magical beams of various colors and effectsnded on the charging dragonborn, causing their bodies to fall under all sorts of weird magical effects as they groaned in pain.


    While the Archers¡¯ attacks obstructed the dragonborn, several ferocious sma fireballs descended on them, instantly causing horrifying damage to their ranks.


    The bodies of the dragonborn warriors were like snow before a blinding sun where the sma lightning crackled. Their body parts melted into green smoke, crippling them and covering them in even more wounds. As the waves of fire spread out, the tattered scales of the dragonborn could no longer protect them. Their flesh burned beneath the mes, and they started howling from the unbearable pain.


    Above them, goblin missiles and alchemical bombs rained down like a perpetual storm. Below them, the quicksand trap sealed their path forward. In front of them, Archers bombarded their bodies, and in the distance, goblin chariots annihted their allies with magic energy cannons.


    The dragonborn had only just charged out of the valley, and they had already been stopped. They could only raise their battleaxes over their heads, grit their teeth, and power forward with all they had.


    Finally, a few lucky dragonborn warriors made it through the purgatory of blood and flesh, shing with the Archers in closebat.


    Several Archers were torn to pieces by their vicious and fearless strikes. Sadly, the Archers far outnumbered these warriors. The few already injured dragonborn warriors were quickly riddled with holes from a barrage of energy beams at close range. Tragically and heroically, they copsed three hundred meters away from the goblin chariots.


    The leader known as Zamu ultimately howled and fell helplessly to the constant waves of sma fireballs. His body was scorched ck, and pieces had been carved out everywhere. It was hard even to identify him now.


    As the dragonborn frontline was torn apart, the one hundred eyeball machines in the air dove down and soared past the two cliffs. Beams of Scorching Rays fell like raindrops. The native warriors hiding above the cliff and in the shadows of the valley started fleeing, crying as they did so, before being shot down, one by one.


    In just thirty minutes, the enemies within Deadmoon Valley had beenpletely exterminated!

 Chapter 922 - Silver Dragon Visits

    Chapter 922 Silver Dragon Visits


    It was a tant ughter!


    The number of dragonborn hiding in ambush, paired with the perfect geography of Deadmoon Valley, should have allowed them to fend off the attack of an army that was a few thousand strong.


    Unfortunately, their enemies were no ordinary beings; they were an adept army that had traveled from a different ne.


    Their ability wasn¡¯t even on the same level as the dragonborn!


    Consequently, the entire battle was like a game, an interesting hunting game. The goblins¡¯ overwhelming bombardment decimated the powerful dragonborn army who had once possessed a dominating position in Lance. The only result at having paid such a hefty price was the destruction of a meager seven Archers.


    Once the battle had concluded, both the dead and living dragonborn were transported back to the Mothership, where they were used as materials for voodoo beasts or flesh golems. Meanwhile, the seven destroyed Archers were sent back to the goblin workshop for dismantling and reassembly. Fifteen minutester, seven brand-new Archers walked off the assembly line.


    Taking that into consideration, the ambush arranged by the Second Grade Zamu had not only inflicted zero losses to the adept expedition but had provided them with arge batch of valuable, high-quality corpses.


    The energy exhausted by the goblin chariots in their bombardment was replenished upon returning to the army. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the Mothership in the sky or the giant magical golem dragon following behind the army. The powerful magic generator furnaces were not only able to sustain the functions of the two goliaths. They had plenty to spare for the magical machine army.


    That was why such low-intensity skirmishes could not possibly bring any losses to the adept expedition army!


    However, the natives of Lance had no idea about this. In fact, they would have a hard time simplyprehending the very concept.


    From their perspective, an enemy army that had ventured deep into their territory would naturally be defeated once their logistics had been cut off and they were faced with constant harassment.


    Unfortunately, their minds and reasoning would have a tremendously difficult time understanding this adept force whose knowledge and ability overwhelmed them by dimensions.


    The enemies in Deadmoon Valley might have been vanquished, but the narrow path of the valley could not possibly fit the colossal body of the golem dragon. The metal parade slowly gathered before the entrance and awaited answers from above.


    The old yet energetic Gonga jumped up and down in the metal body of the dragon, screaming as he did so.


    ¡°Forward...forward. Let those bastards who¡¯ve underestimated us witness the true might of this beautiful baby. Prepare the Destruction Beam. Let¡¯s give this valley a makeover.¡±


    While Gonga screeched with all his heart, the giant dragon continued forward. Its four thick, firm limbs left craters behind as it continued to stride toward the valley.


    The goblin chariots that had gathered in front of the valley hastily retreated to either side to avoid being turned into pancakes.


    As the golem dragon walked forward, its head moved about in an agile fashion. A blinding red light suddenly glowed deep in its one-meter-wide eye sockets. Then two terrifying red lights, half-a-meter-thick in diameter, shot out of its eyes and sliced the walls of the valley in the distance.


    For an instant, it seemed like nothing had happened. Three secondster, massive dust clouds rose from the cliffs, apanied by a wave of explosions as the walls copsed before everyone¡¯s speechless gaze.


    Ten meters off of each side.


    The terrifying red beams sliced ten meters off of the walls on both sides before they copsed from the horrendous pressure and expansion of the temperature within the rocks.


    The valley used to be thirty or forty meters wide, but it was now another twenty meters wider. It was just barely enough for the golem dragon to pass through. The golem dragon did not even pause for a moment. It stepped through the debris and wreckage, paving the road forward as it advanced. Somehow, it managed to squeeze its way through this one and a half kilometer long valley.


    The Crimson adepts in the Mothership above couldn¡¯t help but look at each other. They were once again stunned by the might of this Fourth Grade magical machine.


    Fourth Grade. That was the power of a Fourth Grade?


    Truly as destructive and stunning as they had expected.


    Though the fight earlier was fierce, it had only been a small battle of low intensity. If it had been this Fourth Grade golem dragon that had been involved in the fight, it would not have taken much effort at all. It only needed to sweep across the valley with its beams to vaporize the enemies in an instant.


    It didn¡¯t matter how tough the Second Grade dragonborn were. Could they possibly survive being crushed beneath the feet of the Fourth Grade golem dragon?


    The Destruction Beam from earlier might sound immensely threatening and powerful, but in truth, it was no more than a Scorching Ray. However,pared to ordinary Scorching Rays, these were fired with the aid of the super magic generator furnace. It was more potent and more effective.


    Even if it were the same spell, the magical effects would bepletely different given the amount of magic energy infused within it.


    A high-temperature concentrated light beam of one hundred points of power was known as a Scorching Ray. Two hundred points of power, and it would be known as a Sr Ray. Meanwhile, a high-temperature concentrated beam with an energy ss of eight to nine hundred points like the one that the dragon had fired already possessed elementary destructive traits. These beams possessed a trace of destruction energy within them.


    Most magical shields in the world could not endure concentrated beams of such high intensity, let alone when the attacks were so focused and fast. Even Greem would have been disintegrated if those two Destruction Beams had hit him.


    No number of magical shields would be effective against an attack of such intensity!


    As such, much like a heart-pounding fantasy show, the gigantic metal dragon roared and advanced through the towering valleys, forcefully creating a wide path between the two mountains.


    However, this wide road had been covered beneath the copsing cliff walls. The forceful manner of the dragon¡¯s passage had caused even more debris to rain down, making the path even more difficult to travel.


    It was awkward!


    The magical golem dragon had managed to make it across by sheer force, but the path behind it was now covered by tens of thousands of tons of rocks. The goblin chariots could not traverse terrain like this, nor could they change the geography like the golem dragon.


    Thus, under themand of the Mothership, the goblin skyships descended and used alloy wires to suspend the chariots, using over half a day to transport all of the chariots to the other side.


    With this battle as an example, the dragon lords that came after learned their lesson.


    They no longer gathered armies to sh with these adept forces. They came up with different ideas.


    If a frontal conflict didn¡¯t work, then they would turn to more subtle means!


    The Dragon Cultists took off their robes and scattered, blending into the ranks of native creatures andunching ambushes at the enemy when the goblin chariots stopped to rest. They acted as suicide squads tounch death charges at the adepts, hid near the camps to poison the water sources, or destroyed the roads ahead of time to slow down the enemy¡¯s march.


    Some of these operations seeded and killed goblins in the army, but most of them failed.


    After all, with the eyeball machines scanning from the sky, any lifeform that attempted to approach the army paid with their lives.


    Of course, not all dragon lords were so ¡®wise¡¯!


    The fourth dragon lord territory that the adepts passed through was thend of a First Grade dragon. This idealistic and passionate First Grade dragon refused to submit before the might of the adepts. He risked his own life and attempted to assault the adepts with his fast flight speed and mighty dragon¡¯s breath.


    As such, he came, and he stayed, sessfully turning into the first valuable spoil of the adept expedition army!


    This First Grade dragon was beaten ck and blue, then pinned to the deck of the Mothership with steel tools dozens of tons in weight. He cried day and night, but no rescue came for him.


    Finally, the arrogance of the adept expedition army attracted their first formidable enemy!


    ............


    The army avoided most swamps, hills, and deserts under Gru¡¯s lead, always traveling on ins or wastnds.


    Today, the army of metal were camped and resting by ake. Several loud dragon cries could be heard on the distant horizon.


    The goblins that had been bathing or retrieving water from thekeside quickly dressed and got into their goblin chariots. Meanwhile, the golem dragon also adjusted its stance and pointed its head toward the ck dot on the horizon that was growingrger.


    A short momentter, a wild gust of wind swept across the camp. Apletely silver dragon with a prideful and elegant stance stopped above the golem dragon.


    It was obvious that he was exceptionally fearful of the golem dragon, as he stopped half a kilometer away from the adepts.


    This silver dragon beat his slender wings and hovered in the air pridefully as he silently assessed the giant metal dragon and the First Grade dragon now bound to the collosal machine. After a while, the silver dragon lifted his head and looked at the Mothership above the clouds. It was then that he broke the silence with his thunderous roar.


    ¡°Outsiders, what are you trying to do, exactly? Why are you invading the ne of us dragons? Do you want to torture our kind?¡±


    Greem smiled from within the Mothership.


    It was a Third Grade silver dragon!


    It was probably because the might of the expedition army had exceeded the limits of the dragon lords¡¯ ability to respond that they had sent this silver dragon to find out their intentions. The dragons would not be interested in the motives of any other weakling. They would simply wipe them out of existence with a dragon¡¯s breath. Who would ever want toe out to such a rural ce to ask a question if it wasn¡¯t necessary?


    The roar of mes rang out in the air as the tall silhouette of a human adept appeared on the head of the golem dragon.

 Chapter 923 - Otherworld Poison Battles

    Chapter 923 Otherworld Poison Battles


    The silver dragon couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes and stare at the neer.


    ¡°Who are you, sir, and what should I call you?¡±


    After the fire dispersed, Greemnded steadily on the head of the magical golem dragon.


    The dragon had two long metal horns on its head, with a small twenty-meter square tform in front of them. Greemnded firmly on that tform and looked at the silver dragon with a smile on his face


    A Third Grade human adept.


    The silver dragon didn¡¯t require any detection spells to know the identity of the adept. He quickly determined the opponent¡¯s power and attributes based on the intensity of the mes created by the teleportation spell.


    Moreover, he also smelled the stench of a dragonsoul curse on the adept. Many dragons had fallen victim to his hands. Otherwise, the dragonsoul curse lingering around him wouldn¡¯t be so thick and repulsive.


    The silver dragon barely suppressed the anger rising within him and narrowed his eyes to speak, ¡°I am Aldres of the silver dragons. You are now stepping upon my territory and ying my subjects. As such, I have the right to ask you, what is it that you intend to do?¡±


    ¡°So it was Lord Aldres!¡± The smile on Greem¡¯s face was even wider now, ¡°I am known as Greem, and Ie from the World of Adepts. We are here today for...¡±


    Greem¡¯s voice suddenly turned quiet at this point of the sentence, the rest of his words bing as soft as the beat of a mosquito¡¯s wings.


    The silver dragon was befuddled for an instant. However, his expression abruptly changed before he could voice his confusion.


    ¡°Bastards. You damned adepts!¡±


    No one knew when, but a crimson silhouette had snuck beneath Aldres¡¯ shadow. It had smashed through the ground and was charging toward him at a thunderous speed.


    Though the sudden assault caught him by surprise, was there any way a Third Grade silver dragon would havee here wholly unprepared? Silver light shed in the air, and the Aldres¡¯ body vanished from the spot, reappearing a hundred meters to the side.


    However, just as Aldrespleted his teleportation, he sensed elementium turbulence above his head. A massive fireball crashed squarely onto his back, exploding into a massive cloud of mes.


    Scorching jets of me surged out of the fireball, almost instantly roasting the scales white-hot. Even the flesh beneath Aldres¡¯ scales had started sizzling.


    Aldres could not care for his reputation or dignity any longer. He beat his slender silver wings rapidly as his entire body cut across the sky in an elegant arc like a silver thread, just barely dodging a white beam that the golem dragon had fired at him.


    With his rapid speed and impable flying technique, Silver Dragon Aldres managed to avoid thebined attacks of Mary and Greem once again, finally escaping from his predicament.


    ¡°You bastards. You have none of an adept¡¯s dignity nor pride. Just wait to be exterminated upon thisnd.¡± The silver dragon furiously cursed as he fled into the distance with all he had. His roar could be heard from dozens of kilometers away.


    A cluster of mes erupted in the sky, and Greem¡¯s tall silhouette slowly appeared. Mary beat her wings and approached him.


    ¡°Silver dragons are truly the speedsters among the dragons. They are just as bothersome to deal with as the wind dragons. It will be difficult to make that fellow stay with just the two of us.¡± Greem shook his head and sighed as he looked at the vanishing figure of the silver dragon.


    Mary lifted her right arm and looked at the hand that had now turned into a blood-red w. She chuckled slightly, ¡°You gave him a fireball, and I gave him a w. That¡¯s probably more than he can swallow for now. Did you really intend to keep him here?!¡±


    It was as expected!


    The dragons¡¯ robust Physique and powerful elementium powers made them excellent fighters among creatures of the same grade. Under ordinary circumstances, a Third Grade dragon could easily deal with two to three human adepts of the same level.


    The reason Greem and Mary¡¯s attacks so badly beat Aldres was mostly due to the involvement of the Fourth Grade golem dragon.


    The golem dragon might not be able to fly or even move about quickly, but its attacks were far too powerful!


    Even Fourth Grade elementium adepts could notpare to the magical golem dragon in terms of the intensity of their attacks.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Regardless of how tough a human¡¯s body was and how excellent their elementium affinity, there was no exceeding the mighty magic generator furnace. It didn¡¯t matter how broad a human¡¯s blood vessels were. They would not be a match for the energy pipes of the golem dragon, which were so wide they were basically corridors that chariots could run across.


    As such, the Third Grade silver dragon had to keep most of its attention on the golem dragon even when tussling with Greem and Mary. That was why Greem and Mary¡¯sbined attacks injured him and forced him to retreat so hastily.


    Mary might have been able to catch up with the silver dragon, but she would not be able to make him stay. Greem might have been able to keep the dragon here, but it was almost impossible for him to catch up.


    The two of them could only watch with pity as the Third Grade Aldres left in front of their eyes.


    However, the two of them weren¡¯t bothered by Aldres¡¯ escape.


    They were about to arrive at hisir anyway. They just had to strike straight at his den and see if he would stay and defend his home!


    ............


    Silver Dragon Aldres¡¯ir was located at a ce known as Storm¡¯s Peak.


    It was a dangerous mountain peak that rose into the clouds.


    The geography around the mountain wasn¡¯t dangerous in the slightest. It was strange because the mountain existed in the middle of a stretch of ins.


    The peak was exceedingly tall, the path there dangerous and steep. There were almost no means by which a person could climb to the top.


    Silver Dragon Aldres¡¯ir was built at the very top of the peak,pletely isted from the rest of the world.


    Naturally, this terrain kept out the magical golem dragon and the goblin chariots, but it could not stop the Mothership.


    Greem and the Crimson adepts left the army stationed at the bottom of the mountain while they boarded the Mothership and ascended to the top. The air was thin at the peak, and the winds were cold. Mist and clouds could be seen everywhere. Ordinary humans would have difficulty surviving in such an environment.


    Greem frowned slightly upon reaching the peak.


    It was too quiet here. Clearly, the silver dragon had already taken off.


    Greem gazed at the giant cave nearby and turned to look at Billis, who was standing behind him.


    Billis understood his intentions immediately. He stepped forward, and tens of thousands of ck beetles swarmed out of his robe and charged into the cave in a ck tide.


    A short momentter, the ck cave trembled and shook, the sounds of elementium explosions echoing outward.


    Billis let out a grunt and said, ¡°There¡¯s nothing left in the dragon¡¯s cave save for plenty of elementium traps and magical contraptions. It seems like that fellow intended for us to have a bad time here.¡±


    Billis had lost nearly twenty percent of the bugs he had sent out, cloaking his face in a dark gloom.


    ¡°Hmph! Does he think he can make us retreat with just some traps? Contact Gonga and tell him to raze this mountain!¡±


    A short momentter, after Greem and his adepts had boarded the Mothership and left the mountain, the lone peak in the clouds shook furiously. Then, it slowly copsed amidst a thunderous, earth-splitting roar.


    News of Storm¡¯s Peak being forcefully destroyed by the adepts quickly spread out.


    This time, those who were still ignorant of the might of the adept expedition were finally jolted awake.


    Even a Third Grade dragon lord had to flee in fear of the enemy and lose hisir in the process. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how powerful the enemy was!


    For the rest of the journey, there were no more ipetent fools who dared to disrupt the adept¡¯s army.


    Moreover, the dragons weren¡¯t fools either. Based on the adepts¡¯ marching route, they quickly figured that their target was the territory of Fourth Grade Dragon Lord Toril.


    That was what shocked and confused them tremendously!


    What were they counting on? A group of human adepts with no more than Second and Third Grade abilities dare challenge a Fourth Grade dragon lord?


    It was simply unbelievable!


    Were they counting on that strange metal dragon?


    The dragons that had been evicted from their homes quickly gathered together, believing they had found the heart of the issue. They started using all the means avable to them to investigate the power of the metal dragon.


    Of course, no dragon would be willing to risk their own lives for such an investigation, but they were more than happy to send some dragonborn guards and high-grade Dragon Cultists for the job!


    Thus, a good half of Lance was stirred into action by the orders of the dragon lords, along with a massive bounty. Powerful dragonborn warriors and native creatures with unique skills swarmed toward the adept expedition army and started to assault their forces.


    And who would have known? There were indeed some unique individuals amongst these talents that had been gathered from all over Lance.


    Some of these individuals excelled at hiding their life signs. They would hide near the goblin camps and ambush the goblins when they left to fetch water. It caused decent casualties to the goblins.


    However, the frequent patrols of the goblin chariots also inflicted substantial damage to the enemy. The native elites had to pay the price of a dozen lives on average to kill a single goblin.


    Some individuals who were skilled at poison also attempted to poison the goblin¡¯s water source. Unfortunately, the army possessed aprehensive testing system and quickly discovered their plot. With the potion masters in the army, there was no chance of any goblins being poisoned to death.


    After all, the poisoners of Lance were more like voodoo doctors whenpared to the potion masters that had been systematically trained in the World of Adepts!


    Their knowledge and abilities were not even on the same level. After a single round of exchanges between the two parties, the potion masters sessfully drove out the Lance natives and foiled their attempts at poisoning.


    It also reminded Greem that now was the adepts¡¯ turn to spread their poison!

 Chapter 924 - Blow to the Face

    Chapter 924 Blow to the Face


    A dragon¡¯s power was not to be underestimated!


    In particr, once the prideful dragons learned to engage in guerri warfare themselves, the expedition army¡¯s casualties began to skyrocket.


    Upon learning that the ordinary dragonborn and locals were incapable of threatening the fully-armed magical machines, the First Grade dragons let go of their dignity, put away their pride, and turned themselves into guerri soldiers. These dragons started to harass the scouts of the army frequently.


    They soared toward the adepts in flights of three to five and left soaring just as quickly. They never tried to approach the magical machine army, only ever keeping a close eye on the eyeball machines. They used the native tribes to draw out the eyeball machines before they took to the skies and use their sharp ws and boiling breath to destroy the machines.


    They didn¡¯t linger either when the army sent chariots after them. They scattered and escaped with their superior speed, never getting drawn into a fight with the goblin chariots.


    If any of the goblinmanders became impulsive and dared to chase after them with a goblin skyship; hehehe, these scattered dragons would immediately converge upon them the moment they left the reinforcement range of the army, teaching the goblins a vicious lesson with their powerful might.


    Even with an adept defending the skyship, these ordinary goblin nes could not endure the attacks of two or three First Grade dragons!


    Moreover, there were often some Second Grade dragons hidden amid these First Grade dragons.


    After losing two goblin skyships and three n adepts, the higher-ups in the Mothership finally prohibited the adepts from pursuing ¡®fleeing¡¯ dragons.


    After tasting the sweetness of victory and seeing that the adepts were no longer taking the bait, the dragons became even more daring with their actions.


    Some Second Grade dragons also gathered together in flights and repeatedly attacked the magical machine army.


    They didn¡¯t try and charge into the army but instead flew along with the goblin machines, waiting for a chance. If the chariots dared to move out and create any space within their formation, the dragons would rush down and raze their ranks with their terrifying breath. asionally, the dragons would also y a game of cat-and-mouse with the skyships in the air.


    Though these actions didn¡¯t cause too much damage to the enemy, they effectively dyed the marching speed of the army.


    Most of the goblin chariots could only gather around the golem dragon and advance at a snail¡¯s pace. If it weren¡¯t for the expedition army consisting mostly of magical machines, as well as their non-reliance on energy supplies, they might just have been brought down by the constant harassment of the dragonflights.


    The expedition that the Crimson n had organized this time was a dragon-hunting game to begin with. Though their de seemed pointed at Fourth Grade Toril, every Crimson adept knew that it was nearly impossible to capture or kill that Fourth Grade dragon. At the very least, the Crimson n in its current form did not possess the ability to do so.


    As such, the purpose of startling the dragons was actually to gather all of the dragons to make it convenient to catch them all in a single strike.


    That was why the expedition army was in no hurry to push forward. Instead, they continued to maintain their slow marching speed, slowly teasing out more and more dragons. As the number of dragon lords that joined the attacks increased, as many as a hundred dragons actually gathered together at its peak.


    Numbers gave rise to courage!


    They might not have dared to assault the magical machines when their numbers were few, but now that they had a hundred dragons, their confidence inevitably began to swell.


    The metal dragon might have the might of a Fourth Grade, but it was slow and could not fly. As long as they didn¡¯t get close to it, would they, with their tough skin and exceptional flight ability, fear a bunch of human adepts who only dared to hide inside their metal cages?


    The massive dragonflight gathered in the ins known as the Northern Wastnds and stood in the way of the magical machine army.


    An unprecedented and earthshaking war immediately broke out!


    The adept expedition army had brazenly traversed through the territories of so many dragon lords and destroyed theirs of seven dragons. Such infuriating actions had naturally incited the unanimous fury of the dragon lords.


    It wasn¡¯t just the victims themselves. Even dragon lords who had heard of this news from thousands of kilometers away had rushed out of theirirs and hurried day and night for this war. Of course, they had note alone. Every dragon lord brought with them a group of dragonborn guards.


    As all the dragon lords gathered, they managed to bring together a dragonborn army of over six thousand soldiers!


    Of course, apart from the main dragonborn force, there were also nearly thirty thousand Dragon Cultists and two hundred and sixty-thousand native servants.


    The dragon lords grew even more confident with such arge army. The flights that patrolled around the magical machine armies became more active and even more aggressive.


    At this point, the army no longer marched forward. Instead, they chose a slightly more open field and established their defensive line. Goblin chariots and goblin skyships formed an imprable steel wall with the golem dragon at the very center.


    Meanwhile, the Mothership hovered above the golem dragon, shielding it from attacks from above while also functioning as themand center!


    In all truthfulness, the adepts were the initial aggressors, and the dragon lords were the ones who were forced on the defensive. However, with the apparent shift in power between the two parties, the strategic dynamic of the battlefield was instantly overturned.


    No one knew when, but the dragon lords had be the aggressors, and the adepts from afar were now the defenders. Both parties met upon the Northern Wastnds and started their absolute deathmatch.


    After a few simple rounds of probing and exchanges, the dragons were finally unable to suppress their burning desire for revenge; theyunched a full offensive.


    This morning, the dragonborn, Dragon Cultists, and native tribes hastily finished their breakfast and rushed out from all their hiding spots in the surroundings. They gathering outside the Northern Wastnds in great numbers.


    The one hundred dragons also took to the skies, circling and flying above. The roars of the dragons would not stop.


    Under the orders and threats of the dragon lords, the native tribes gathered together into a massive horde, charging wildly at the towering steel line in the depths of the Wastnds.


    Forest trolls, quillboars, ogres, ratmen, wild goblins, swamp things, mountain giants, hill dwarves, gnolls, kobolds, hairy rhinos, giant beemen. One by one, rare species that were rarely ever seen in the outside world roared and charged at the looming magical machine army.


    Some of them rode on forest wolves, dashing across thendscape. Some beat their wings and flew across the earth. Others shook their muscr bodies and roared as they lumbered forward, while more sprinted ahead in packs.


    For a moment, the Northern Wastnds became a disy of the native species of Lance, making for an eye-opening sight!


    Unfortunately, this was a war!


    Moreover, it was the cruelest and most bloody of all wars¨C a nar war!


    The magic energy cannons started firing with over a kilometer between them and the enemies. The ny-seven goblin chariots gathered around the golem dragon, forming a metal defensive line that stretched for an entire kilometer.


    When the enemies stepped within the radius of the chariots¡¯ attacks, all the magic energy cannons on top rapidly charged with energy. They trembled furiously as ck and red energy fireballs rose into the air, cutting elegant arcs across the sky and crashing into the tide of creatures in the distance.


    The skyships in the air also zed with mes as goblin missiles whistled toward the crowd along with the fireballs.


    It was a rain of energy fireballs and goblin missiles at the very start of the battle!


    In all honesty, the natives of Lance had probably never seen such a beautiful and awe-inspiring scene. Many creatures which were in the middle of their charge couldn¡¯t help but slow down their movements, raising their heads to behold this magnificent sight with bated breath.


    They watched as the pretty fireballs and roaring metal sticks approached from a distance until they finallynded in their midst.


    It was almost as if their world suddenly copsed in the very next second. The constant explosions filled their ears, and their eyes were flooded with the images of erupting red light and the shredded bodies of theirpanions.


    The native creatures that had survived the extreme heat and violently explosive shockwaves were still devoured by the waves of fire. These creatures had most of their bodies instantly vaporized by the multiple crashing streams of elementium. The asional limb that avoided the most intense of the elementium explosion was be reduced to cinders by the fires dancing through the sky.


    Only those who were fortunate enough to be at the edge of the explosions could leave with their body parts intact.


    However, as the magical fires started to ignite everything that could catch on fire, the frontline turned into a fearsome field of mes. There was no longer a path of retreat for them.


    While the surviving natives still swayed between their fear of the destruction and their joy in surviving, rows of towering magical machines stepped into the mes, brushing past the smoke and appearing in their line of sight. These metallic monsters raised their arms, and ck barrels appeared at the ends.


    They strode forward, firing beams of nearly translucent energy.


    Compared to the magical beams with their unique effects, these transparent energy beams were more destructive and had a shocking prative effect.


    There was no such thing as an elementium counter or magical immunity. Pure-energy beam attacks like these had even more horrifying offensive strength!


    It didn¡¯t matter if it was the tough skin of the trolls and ogres, the mortar armor of the quillboars, or even the thick fur of the hairy rhinos. None of them could stop the energy beams from prating.


    A bloody hole that ran through the bodies of the creatures would appear where the beams traveled. They could not be blocked, and they could not be dodged.


    For a moment, these survivors still could not understand what was happening. Their bodies were riddled with holes by these ¡®invisible attacks,¡¯ and they crumpled to the ground, soaked in blood.


    The momentum of the war was forcibly halted by such terrible bloodshed the moment it started!

 Chapter 925 - Bloody War

    Chapter 925 Bloody War


    Ignoring the unlearned Lance natives, as even the knowledgeable dragons had never seen such a terrifying and bloody scene.


    A single round of barrage from the magical machine army had torn a pretty ring of fire in the battlefield.


    Numerous flesh and sand particles shot across the zing field like bullets, along with a countless number of dismembered limbs and body parts.


    This single round of attacks had caused over ten thousand deaths among the ne locals. The number of injured and maimed was even higher.


    However, what stunned the dragon lord were the rows of magical machines that had emerged from the adept¡¯s defensive perimeter. They cleaved the ranks of the local natives in half while the mes burned and swept away all the survivors in the ring of fire, like a gust of wind against fallen leaves.


    So what if they were ogres and trolls with tough skin and resilient life forces? They were still riddled with holes by the rain of energy beams. While they struggled and lunged at the Archers, the machines spat out ten-meter long me jets from their arms.


    With energy beams for long-rangedbat, methrowers for melee engagements, and their imprable steel bodies, the Lance natives finally met their executioners in the magical machine army. They fell helplessly to the ground.


    Even the ogres and trolls had fallen so easily, let alone those scrawny gnolls, goblins, and kobolds. Their wooden bats, sharpened spears, and stones were like scrap before the fully-armed machines.


    If they struck with their wooden bats, they snapped in half.


    Throw with their spear, and it would break into splinters.


    When they tossed their stones, the only things they could leave on the metallic shells were small white dots.


    Soon, thepletely disarmed natives had only their bodies and their fearless spirits to rely on. Unfortunately, courage could not stop energy beams. Even tough skin could not endure the burn of hot me jets. The ne natives were trapped in an awkward position on the battlefield.


    Charge forward? Their weapons and defenses were inferior, and their only fate was to be crushed and destroyed like gnats.


    Retreat? It was a zing sea of fire behind them, and the towering magical machines were still pressing toward them.


    For a moment, agonized howls and cries filled the inside of the ring of fire. Towering figures copsed to the ground from the barrage of energy beams while the rest continued to fight with all they were worth.


    The silhouettes of the human adepts could be faintly seen behind the rows of magical machines.


    They would never personally set foot upon the dangerous frontline. Instead, they casually surveyed the battlefield behind the protection ofyers of magical machines. If they found sturdy beasts like the hairy rhinos charging through the magical machines, they would approach with wicked smiles on their faces.


    Magical scrolls, magical wands, and spells of every color hurled toward the enemy. These rampaging monsters would instantly feel their limbs turn weak and quickly be surrounded by a horde of magical machine.


    No one knew how long the war wouldst. As such, most adepts had prepared arge number of magical items as a substitute for their own spells. Preserving one¡¯s power in such a massive and brutal battlefield while using voodoo beasts and golems to wear away at the enemy¡¯s forces was the way of war that the adepts were best at!


    The battle in the fire ring raged on. Meanwhile, the army of natives outside the mes was so utterly terrorized by the zing fires that they dared not step forward.


    They did not have the exceptional magical resistance of the dragons and the dragonborn. They could not cross this sea of mes without suffering injuries. Some unfortunate individuals were even shoved by their panions¡¯ surging from behind, taking a nosedive into the sea of fire. Their faces were full of terror and turned into howling living torches.


    For an instant, the momentum of the natives¡¯ offensive stalled!


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!


    The dragons soaring in the blue skies above cursed in their low voices and used their deafening roars to give orders to the dragonborn beneath.


    Tall dragonborn with muscr Physiques stepped forward. They picked up the scrawny natives and hurled them into the sea of fire.


    A dozen dragonborn did the same, forcefully using the lives of the natives to pave a path through the mes.


    ¡°Charge! All of you, charge forward...¡±


    As the dragonborn roared in unison, the more burly natives followed their example. They started picking up their weakerpanions and throwing them into the mes. The sea of fire before them started showing signs of weakening from their bodies and blood.


    More natives took this opportunity to surge into the ring of fire, enduring the pain of the burning mes.


    The goblin chariots¡¯ energy fireballs were still roaring in the distance, firing every five minutes. However, even the most ferocious of attacks and the most furious of mes could not stop the charge of the natives any longer.


    At the barbaric urging of the dragons and dragonborn, the two hundred thousand local natives raised their wooden weapons and charged at the magical machines on the frontlines, fearless and savage.


    A melee bloodbath broke out just like that!


    However, as the masterminds of the war, neither Greem nor the dragons cared for the casualties on the battlefield.


    They would roar wherever the offensive had stalled and bolstered their soldiers further. They gave an order whenever the defense seemed to have loosened and assigned even more reinforcements. It seemed like they paid a lot of attention to the battlefield, but in their hearts, these were no more than pawns that could be sacrificed at any time.


    As long as their sacrifice had value and could whittle away at a sufficient number of the enemy, none of the higher-ups cared who lived!


    Greem had already released the Spirit of Pestilence onto this massive battlefield. The Spirit had already cast a Poison Halo outside of the magical machine army. However, in a brutal battlefield like this, where life and death were determined in a single instant, it was hard for poison attacks to demonstrate any obvious effects.


    However, things quickly umted, and even sand could make a tower. Every native that died to poison on the battlefield promptly rotted and exploded into clouds of green and yellow poison mists that infected even more creatures. Part of the souls of the dead would turn into faint white light and gather around the Spirit of Pestilence, causing its aura to grow ever stronger.


    It had been so long since the Spirit of Pestilence had started following Greem, but it had never truly had a full meal. Greem was already a Second Grade adept, yet it was still an advanced Second Grade. It was indeed an insult to its title as Soul Equipment.


    Today, upon this bloody battlefield, Greem had finally released all its limitations and gave it the right to kill and ughter as it pleased.


    Bug Adept Billis and a slew of Crimson adepts were also among the number active on the battlefield.


    Billis¡¯ direction of evolution fated him to be unsuited to battles between powerhouses. Instead, chaotic battlefields like these were his true calling.


    The ck beetles beat their two pairs of wings, forming a ck flood that thrashed across the battlefield, tearing and devouring every native they ran across. Meanwhile, the five Void Reavers led the eleven magical mantises, turning into living whirlwinds as they swept wildly across the battleground.


    The ne natives boldly charging at the forefront of the smoking chaos of the battlefield found their heads suddenly fling into the sky as they sprinted forward, a fountain of blood spurting from the stumps that were their necks.


    The Void Reavers that were capable of hiding between the interspatialyers were invisible demons to the ne natives. Their lives were harvested without even figuring out the location or shapes of the enemies.


    Meanwhile, the magical mantises with their inferior stealth would appear all over the battlefield, using their extreme speed to go uncontested amongst the enemies. They wildly ughtered one enemy after another.


    They consciously avoided the tougher and hardier opponents, choosing the weaker ne natives as their targets. In this way, they dominated the battlefield without any contest.


    Dana and Charon also stepped onto the battlefield with their tribe members, ughtering those who had slipped through the cracks of the magical machines. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was Dana¡¯s snake arrows or Charon¡¯s aerial dives. Every one of their attacks was lethal to the unarmored ne natives.


    Even when they ran into the asional tough guy, Medusa would only need to exhaust her power to fire a Petrifying Gaze at close range, and the enemy would turn into a helpless target.


    With the increasing expansion of the Crimson n, their chances of performing on the battlefield were quickly decreasing. Thus, they valued such an opportunity even more and were both battling with all they had.


    Meanwhile, Second Grade Gru stood tall upon the back of the golem dragon, thousands of winding, serpent-like energy chains extending from his body. The magical golem dragon beneath him was not participating in the battle. Instead, it radiated simr energy chains as Gru, only in more significant numbers and denser concentration.


    These energy chains swam and extended into the air, asionally connecting with individual goblin chariots or skyships. Whenever the energy chains made a connection, plenty of magical energy would flow into the machine through the white chains.


    It was through Gru and the golem dragon¡¯s constant provision of energy that these one hundred chariots and one thousand magical machines could ughter and attack without stopping. Otherwise, a battle of such intensity should have drained them of all their magical energy.


    Meryl sat within themand center of the Mothership, acting as the highestmand on the entire battlefield. Meanwhile, the Second Grade Crimson adepts that excelled atbat and ughter were standing upon the deck of the Mothership, looking at the dragonflight circling in the skies.


    Standing before all of them was Greem, Mary, Alice, and the elementium magical machine.


    Greem had ced his fire clone within the elementium magical machine, serving as a copy of the Chip.


    Meanwhile, he personally stood at the edge of the deck, coldly surveying the dragon lords.


    Trading fodder? In all seriousness, the Crimson n had never lost the edge in a contest of fodder since obtaining the Goblin ne.


    Once most of their cannon fodder had been whittled away, these dragons would probably not be able to resist the urge to step onto the battlefield.


    That was when today¡¯s battle would truly start!


    Greem waited in cold silence.

 Chapter 926 - Battle Against the Dragonflight

    Chapter 926 Battle Against the Dragonflight


    It was an uneven nar war!


    The number of ne natives surrounding the adept army was dozens of timesrger, yet they were at a disadvantage on the battlefield. In fact, there were even signs of the battle turning into an organized ughter by the magical machines.


    If the Crimson n had only still possessed those one dozen adepts, invading another world would probably have worn away at their numbers and eventually killed them. However, as the Crimson n established a powerful andplete magical machine army system, they possessed the ability to fend off repeated attacks from entire hordes of enemies.


    Realizing that the natives alone could not move the adepts¡¯ defensive line, the dragon lords had no choice but to send forth the dragonborn and the Dragon Cultists.


    These two forces were thergest foundation stones by which the dragon lords had sessfully maintained their rule over the tens of thousands of years. However, now that their very livelihoods were at stake, these excellent subordinates had no choice but to step forward without fear for their lives.


    The participation of the dragonborn and Dragon Cultists caused the atmosphere of the battlefield to boil over ever further immediately.


    The magical machines had managed to keep the frontline outside of the defensive perimeter as they continued to kill the enemy with their exceptional melee and rangedbat capabilities. Moreover, the magic energy cannons on the chariots functioned as a field of fire, continually bombarding the enemies¡¯ route of attack and creating a no man¡¯snd all over the battlefield.


    Yet, with the dragonborn army descending upon the battlefield and the rain of spells from the Dragon Cultists, the magical machines that functioned as the first line of defense started to falter.


    Under Meryl¡¯s orders, many of the magical machines started to retreat. In their ce, summoned creatures and newly crafted voodoo beasts roared and charged forward. Naturally, these minions could not stop the momentum of the dragonborn and Dragon Cultists. The defensive perimeter started to be increasingly unstable and shaky.


    However, while the dragonborn and Dragon Cultists were tearing away at the adept perimeter, mixed amongst the crowd of ne natives, the Mothership and all the other goblin skyships had got into position above them. ck gun barrels had extended out of their hulls.


    The next second, one thousand cannons fired in unison!


    An even more massive me halo appeared around the adept¡¯s defensive perimeter.


    It was not the effect of a spell, but the magnificent sight caused by a thousand scattered energy fireballs erupting at the same moment.


    To fully maximize the effect of this attack, the adepts had used the summoned creatures and voodoo beasts to draw the dragonborn and Dragon Cultist close to this line of extermination. It was only after many precise calctions that they conducted this indiscriminate bombardment.


    Of course, the lethality of this operation was shocking!


    This one all-out bombardment had wiped out thirty percent of the dragonborn and nearly half of the Dragon Cultists. No one paid any attention to the ne natives, but their losses were tremendous as well.


    Such ferocious energy attacks stunned to the dragon lords to their core as well.


    They knew very well the might of this bombardment. If these ferocious energy attacksnded on them, the First Grade dragons would not be able to escape unscathed. If they were unfortunate enough to be hit by more than five energy fireballs at once, they might just be killed on the spot. Such a blow would severely injure even the Second Grade dragons.


    Perhaps only the Third Grade dragons could roam freely in such a terrifying and brutal battlefield. The other dragons could only plead for their lives!


    However, the dragons weren¡¯t all foolish creatures with brawns for brains.


    After such a long period of observation, they quickly discovered some of the ¡®ws¡¯ of the adept faction.


    After therge-scale bombardment, the density of cannon fire from the perimeter would experience seven minutes of ¡®low-tide.¡¯ Though the magical machines on the ground were still propping up the frontline, their firepower had been reduced by over forty percent.


    The dragons also quickly locked onto a critical figure.


    It wasn¡¯t Bug Adept Billis, who was uncontested on the ground, or the Third Grade human adept proudly standing above the Mothership. Instead, it was a three-meter tall metallic humanoid protected by both the golem dragon and the Mothership.


    They knew that his role in the adepts¡¯ ability to defend against enemies a hundred times their number was immense, just by seeing the energy chains slithering about him and providing energy to the machines all over the battlefield!


    One could im that he was the one that was sustaining the entire magical machine army.


    As such, the dragons circled as they roared and discussed their next strategy, even as they searched for defensive gaps in the adepts¡¯ formation. The five Third Grade dragons of the flight undoubtedly became the core of the entire group.


    A crude and direct battle n quickly formed as they bickered and roared.


    There was no conspiracy or scheme. It was violent and straightforward, in ordance with the dragons¡¯ aesthetic and preference for violence!


    Seven minutester, yet anotherrge-scale bombardment was unleashed, and a massive halo of death appeared on the battlefield once again.


    The appearance of this death halo was like the dragons¡¯ call to battle. They let out short and crisp roars as all one hundred of them joined together to form a sea of dragons, beating their wings and roaring as they lunged at the Mothership.


    To avoid falling into the Mothership and the golem dragon¡¯s web of firepower, most of the dragons kept a high altitude and relied on the Mothership to shield them from the golem dragon¡¯s attacks.


    Two to three kilometers of distance was plenty for an ordinary person, but it was no more than two beats of a wing for the dragons soaring in the blue skies.


    The intermediate and high-grade adepts of the Crimson n had been waiting for this for a long time. They narrowed their eyes, hearts beating uncontrobly.


    Greem stepped forward and let out a battlecry, ¡°Mary and I will upy them; the rest of you fight with the Mothership behind you. Remember, never go more than two hundred and fifty meters away from the Mothership.¡±


    Alice stepped forward, dressed in her starry robe. She pointed her radiant Staff of Divination lightly at Greem and Mary, and two mysterious and beautiful clusters of starlight entered their bodies.


    Fate Premonition!


    It was a mysterious enhancement that could not be specifically described with words.


    Whenever danger that threatened oneself descended, the one blessed with Fate Premonition would be able to sense the direction and intensity of the threat ahead of time.


    This Fate Premonition was more urate and provided a clearer warningpared to the ordinary Danger Sense and Future Sight.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it!


    Alice borrowed the power of the Cards of Fate and focused her energy to enhance Greem and Mary with even more enhancements¨C Luck, Fate¡¯s Concealment, and Shield of Faith. Elementium Fairy Helen also waved her small magic wand to enhance the two of them with Enhanced Resistance, Rapid Reaction, Anti-Elementium Barrier, and four to five more barriers and enhancements of various effects.


    Add to that Greem¡¯s own Lava Armor, Lava Shields, one dozen Inferno Shields, as well as Mary¡¯s blood aura defense, and the two were beaming with magical light. Beautiful, magical halos and orbiting elementium shields shed with each other, letting out brilliant and blinding light into the air.


    They looked at each as Greem stepped forward to grab Mary¡¯s waist. The next second, both of them instantly vanished in a pir of zing fire.


    The mes erupted, and light pervaded the sky.


    Greem and Mary appeared in the path of the dragonflight¡¯s charge.


    They looked at each other deeply once again before abruptly splitting off. At that same moment, a dozen dragon breaths of various colors and attributes swallowed their afterimages.


    Greem was flying quickly through the sky.


    It was not precisely flying anymore. Instead, Greem was gliding rapidly with the dozens of small me jets installed all over hisva armor. That was why Greem¡¯s flight was several times faster than an ordinary Fly spell.


    Regardless of how arrogant and wild he was, he would never dare to charge into the midst of the dragons. Instead, he chose to move around the dragonflight, using Magma Fireballs to disrupt the rhythm of their flight.


    The five Third Grade dragons could ignore an instant-cast Magma Fireball from a Third Grade adept, but that was not a luxury the other dragons could afford. If those First Grade dragons were hit by one of these erupting fireballs, they would instantly fall from the sky, howling in agony from their scorched and burned body.


    Even the Second Grade dragons would pay a heavy price if the Magma Fireballs hit them square!


    The massive dragonflight was thrown into chaos just by Greem¡¯s appearance. All the First Grade dragons hastily dodged while the Second Grade dragons circled about and retaliated with short bursts of dragon breath.


    Only the five Third Grade dragons roared and rushed ahead to close the distance.


    One had to admit that the excessive size of the dragonflight was a burden to them as well.


    Greem could freely rain destruction amidst the dragons. The other dragons could do nothing to him as long as he avoided the five Third Grades. Meanwhile, the five Third Grade dragons had to avoid the panicking First Grades scurrying past them and were dragged into a game of cat-and-mouse.


    In just thirty seconds, Greem had sent three small dragons crashing from the sky. There were plenty more who had been injured by the mes and shards of magma.


    On the other side of the battlefield, Bloody Queen Mary had be a crimson devil, charging into the dragonflight and tearing wounds into the small dragons with her quick movements and rapid shes.


    Two of the five Third Grade dragons had no choice but to split off, leading seven or eight Second Grade dragons in close pursuit of Mary. They used their furious breaths to eliminate one hyper-realistic afterimage after another.


    For a moment, the dragonflight was thrown into utter chaos!

 Chapter 927 - The Battle Continues

    Chapter 927 The Battle Continues


    The might of the dragons was well-known throughout the entire multiverse!


    Their meleebat ability, mid-ranged dragon breath, and long-ranged dragon magic were all incredibly dangerous and iparably powerful.


    Under ordinary circumstances, a dragon could easily crush three to five human casters of the same grade.


    That could be seen from what was happening to the vampire adepts.


    The two blood knights and three Second Grade blood elves were flying around the dragons in a pack, delivering a beating to any dragon they caught. Those First Grade dragons were brutalized like sheep to the ughter before them.


    However, this small pack of vampires felt like they were practically kicking an iron wall whenever they ran into a Second Grade dragon.


    The sharp attacks of the two blood knights might be able to harm the Second Grade dragons, but their defenses were inferior. Meanwhile, the three blood elves werepletely defeated in offensive power, defensive power, elusiveness, and magical resistance. They quickly became targets of the Second Grade dragons¡¯ pursuit instead.


    If it weren¡¯t for the forcefield protection provided by the Mothership, these three blood elves would have long since been vanquished by the furious dragon breath of the Second Grade dragons.


    In preparation for their all-out fight against the dragons, a humongous semi-translucent forcefield had appeared around the massive hull of the Mothership. The breaths of the dragons and their dragon magic shattered into sparks when they crashed onto the forcefield, unable to damage the ship whatsoever.


    A small personal forcefield had also appeared around all the Crimson adepts engaged inbat, providing a defense of seven hundred points of power. Whenever the shields were on the verge of breaking, the adepts only had to hide within the Mothership¡¯s forcefield, and the guards would quickly regenerate with Gru¡¯s energy chains.


    It was equivalent to blessing every Second Grade Crimson adept with a Third Grade defensive spell that could be continuously regenerated!


    As long as they didn¡¯t venture too far into the flight of dragons and get surrounded, their lives would not be at too much risk.


    It was thisyer of protection that prompted the Second Grade Crimson adepts to be so exceptionally courageous and willing tomit. Even those who typically loved hurling spells from behind a wall of meat shields were now charging to the very front line, fighting bravely like warriors.


    Meanwhile, the golem dragon had raised its head and was silently looking at the battle in the skies. Its broad and scaled back started to twist and contort without stop. Several goblin cannons more than three meters in diameter rose from within its abdomen and began to adjust their barrels ording to the movements of the dragons above.


    There were two reasons it had yet to attack. First, the dragons were too far away; it was easy for them to dodge the attacks from such a range. Second, the five Third Grade dragons had yet to enter optimal firing distance. Firing the cannons now would alert them prematurely.


    Greem and Mary might be keeping the Third Grade dragons busy, but they still needed the Fourth Grade golem dragon to take them down.


    This fight also demonstrated the power difference between Greem and Mary.


    In a fair duel, Greem could fend off any Third Grade dragon with the help of the elementium magical machine. If he ran into a dragon that was not skilled at flight or escape, he had a seventy percent chance to capture it alive.


    Mary could also fight any Third Grade dragon on even grounds without losing a single inch. However, the final result would most definitely be a stalemate, with neither her nor her opponent possessing any way of harming each other. The dragon could not catch up to Mary, and Mary could not inflict sufficient damage upon the dragons.


    After all, vampires did not have tremendous offensive power.


    It was merely the nature of her profession and affinities. There was nothing she could do about it!


    However, if Mary could obtain powerful magical equipment that waspatible with her origin attribute, she could instantly solve this w of hers. Otherwise, Mary would need to raise her current Second Grade subordinates to Third Grade and rely on numbers if she wanted to establish herself among all other Third Grade creatures.


    The thought of obtaining a Third Grade subordinate through the Embrace was best kept within her dreams. If Mary ever tried to put this thought into action, it would drain her of all her origin blood.


    It was only now that Mary thoroughly understood why the top-tier vampires of the World of Adepts did not use the Embrace to establish an organization utterly loyal to them and instead resorted to primitive reproductive methods to create bloodline descendants.


    In the end, it was all about origin blood!


    Mary had created five Second Grade vampires and dozens of First Grade vampires through the Embrace. These vampires were, thus, constrained by her origin blood. Without Mary¡¯s permission and unlocking of their restraints, none of the vampires beneath her would be able to advance.


    That was her right as their blood master!


    Correspondingly, if she Embraced far too many subordinates at once, it would bring a tremendous burden to her origin blood, even as it allowed her numbers to swell and increase. Such a strain would subtly affect the rate at which Mary¡¯s power increased and the difficulty of advancing to the next grade.


    To lighten the burden on the origin blood while still raising qualified subordinates, most vampire ns still relied on primitive reproductive methods to give birth to the next generation. It was only when they had exceptionally excellent bloodline descendants that the blood master of the n would break the exception to Embrace them and make them a loyal servant.


    If Mary were sufficiently powerful now, she could even directly raise one of her Second Grade subordinates to Third Grade through a bloodline blessing. However, this unreasonable act would consume far too much of her origin blood. It was something that would only happen at theter stages of Third Grade for Mary.


    By then, Mary¡¯s origin blood should be much more plentiful. A strange situation where she promoted her subordinate would only happen if she also had no hope of personally advancing. No blood master would be willing to share the origin blood they had so painstakingly cultivated with an underling that had no hope of reaching greater heights otherwise.


    ............


    The bloody battle in the sky continued.


    It was a world of blood and fire on the ground.


    There were roaring dragonborn warriors, charging ogres, sinister Dragon Cultists hiding among the natives as they cast their spells, tough and sturdy trolls, chittering ratmen throwing rocks from a distance.


    These servants of the dragons fought against the magical machines with all their strength as mes burned around them and explosions continued to assault their ears.


    Sizzling energy beams cut across the air as me jets roasted the enemies to a crisp. The magical machines wildly fired as they raised their giant metal fists and exchanged blows with the enemy.


    The battle was brutal and bloody; it was a horrifying scene from a nightmare to behold!


    The magical machines charged through the horde of creatures, their ughter leaving waves of blood in their wake. The natives stormed forward, their wooden bats and stone sticks breaking upon the machine bodies before they were promptly disemboweled and crushed to a pulp by the machine¡¯s ferocious metal fists.


    If too many natives surrounded them, the magical machines would shoot out streams of fire, turning all life around them into living torches. The battle was a gruesome purgatory now.


    Even the crudest of stone sticks would damage the machines if the ogres and trolls were the ones wielding them. If the damage sustained exceeded the limits of the machine¡¯s endurance, they too would die.


    However, the army had already established a perfect andprehensive charging and maintenance system. Magical machines that were severely damaged knew well enough to retreat behind the perimeter, where they were quickly fixed up by the technicians there.


    That was why the magical machine army had managed to maintain their perimeter with this thin kill zone, even though both sides were suffering heavy losses.


    In all seriousness, the greatest threat to the magical machine army were still those dragonborn warriors.


    They had power, equipment, and magic; they were practically the representation of the perfect warrior. The only thing holding them back was the difficulty in breeding and their pathetic numbers.


    There were at least three thousand dragonborn warriors of various attributes on this battlefield today. If they could form up and start a charge, they would be a destructive force against the machine¡¯s boundary.


    Fortunately, the goblin chariots in the back were sufficiently powerful. The violent energy fireballs were always chasing behind the dragonborn warriors, never giving them the time nor opportunity to group up.


    The magical machines were undoubtedly at too high a disadvantage against the dragonborn warriors. As such, the First Grade adepts of the Crimson n became the main force responsible for the assassination of these dragonborn.


    Zacha and Tigule were not good at flying and had no choice but to retreat from the battlefield in the sky. Instead, they descended to the battlefield on the ground and started ughtering these dragonborn warriors alongside Billis. Apanying them was Arms and Iritina.


    They were dragons, after all. Though they had already betrayed their kind, fighting their kin in such a brazen manner was still difficult. To avoid the awkwardness of the situation, the two of them transformed into their human forms and started ughtering the dragonborn and natives on the ground.


    With them on the battlefield, even the Second Grade dragonborn warriors were not capable of causing much trouble.


    Whenever a Second Grade dragonborn started to build up momentum, Arms would charge over to it. A dose of dragon¡¯s aura at close range caused the dragonborn¡¯s knees to weaken and its Spirit to break. A quick p to follow up and it would probably be on its deathbed, regardless of its grade.


    It didn¡¯t matter which dragon lord they belonged to. The dragonborn warriors of Lance always had one w that existed at the very core of their existence¨C a fear of the dragon¡¯s aura of might. It was the means by which the dragons controlled the dragonborn and made sure they never went out of control. It was a rule that all dragon lords followed strictly.


    Compared to the cruelty on the ground, the battlefield in the sky appeared somewhat nonmittal.


    The dragons in the battle, be they First, Second, or Third Grade, were all spoiled and pampered dragon lords. If they were asked to pige, loot, and kidnap beauties form a different ne, they might put their all into the task.


    However, having them fight bloody battles against adepts without regard for their own lives was asking for a bit too much!


    In their minds, a hundred dragons gathered together would most certainly have exterminated these adepts with overwhelming force. However, when they actually entered the battlefield, they were shocked to find that the enemy adepts were sly and sinister fighters, with attacks that hurt them to their very bone.


    It indirectly weakened the First Grade dragons¡¯ will to fight!

 Chapter 928 - On the Flying Deck

    Chapter 928 On the Flying Deck


    The power of a Third Grade adept was no longer something that could easily be described with pen and paper.


    Even as he was surrounded and bombarded by attacks from the dragons, Greem was still leaping about the battlefield actively and vigorously.


    The three Third Grade dragons tightly pursuing him were Silver Dragon Aldres, Shadow Dragon An, and Water Dragon Dominier. Of the three dragons, Aldres the silver dragon was the only one who could barely keep up with Greem¡¯s teleportations. An and Dominier were not skilled at flying and were left far behind.


    After a fruitless pursuit, the three dragons held a discussion. Aldres would continue chasing Greem and keep him from ughtering the lower-grade dragons. Meanwhile, the shadow dragon and the water dragon would turn and assault the Mothership nearby.


    The forcefield barrier of the Mothership had saved it from countless dragon breaths since the start of the battle. Visible damage had started to umte on the barrier.


    Some Second Grade dragons were thrilled to see this and swarmed through the cracks, boarding the deck of the Mothership. Once they entered the barrier, the legions of magical machines and the fixed turrets made them suffer.


    However, what shocked them the most was that strange golem zing with magical fire yet possessing a body of steel and metal. The golem actually possessed both the elementium attacks of magical creatures and the sturdy Physique of metal constructs. It was powerful at both melee and rangedbat. It forcefully pinned two Second Grade dragons to the ground, breaking their bones before dragging them into the ship.


    It was only then that the dragons abruptly realized that this...this was a Third Grade magical machine!


    With such a powerful being guarding the deck and the entrance to the ship, there was no way the lower-grade dragons could make it through.


    ¡°You keep it busy; I¡¯ll break in and see what¡¯s inside.¡± Shadow Dragon An let out a low roar before his body exploded into ck smoke and vanished without a trace.


    Hispanion, Water Dragon Dominier, roared and charged at the elementium magical machine.


    Water dragons, also known as white dragons, were dragons withmand over the water element. They excelled at manipting and controlling water elementium.


    The ice dragon that Greem had once hunted was only a variant and branch of water dragons.


    In all seriousness, water dragons were not good at battle. Their physical strength was inferiorpared to the other dragons like fire and earth. However, much like the magical characteristics of water elementium, water dragons excelled at slowing down the opponent and creating a mist.


    That often allowed them to possess the initiative when fighting!


    Thus, Dominier charged onto the flying deck.


    Immediately, vast clouds of water particles dispersed from his crystalline body, spreading outward along the metal deck. Hisrge body also turned transparent in an instant as he blended into the mist.


    Ci! Ci! Ci!


    A dozen energy beams and five energy fireballs quickly cut through the water dragon¡¯s position, but none of them came into contact with their target. The giant cluster of mes created from the fireball¡¯s explosion also failed to cause an elementium shockwave like before. Instead, the fireball strangely started dimming after a single sh.


    It was like a cannon that had been stuck underwater. The initialmotion was considerable, but the final product was no more than a muffled st.


    While everyone was stunned into uncertainty, the nearly translucent water dragon suddenly appeared at the edge of the mist. His tail struck against a metal turret fixed on the side of the deck.


    The metal cannon instantly stopped firing as a loud crack rang across the ship. Its entire metal frame and barrel distorted beyond recognition.


    Ci! Ci! Ci!


    Another series of magic energy beams and fireballs descended.


    However, the Third Grade water dragon twisted his body and disappeared by diving into the mist.


    The next time he appeared, he was at another edge of the mist. He charged into a group of magical machines, tearing with his ws and fangs while striking with his tail. In just six seconds, he had torn five of the magical machines to pieces, leaving behind a pile of scraps.


    The water dragon then calmly turned and disappeared into the mist while enduring the barrage of energy beams and fireballs.


    Even Meryl, who fancied herself a calm andposed person, couldn¡¯t help but start cursing furiously inside themand center. As she yelled and shouted, a series of detection waves, life scans, and countless strange magic ripples swept across the mist. However, not a single one of them picked up on anything.


    An inconspicuous metal cabin opened up onto the deck. a First Grade Crimson adept stuck his upper half above the deck and tore seven magical scrolls in a single motion.


    Create Wind!


    Tornado Vortex!


    Doomsday Storm!


    ......


    There were spells from First Grade all the way to Third Grade. Each one of them was a spell with tremendous power and immense effect.


    Unfortunately, it was almost as if the mist that crowded the deck was made of lead. It didn¡¯t matter how the tornado and winds raged, as they could only tear or disperse the fog in certain regions. Once the winds had calmed down, the mists gathered once again, turning the ce hazy and hampering all vision.


    This Crimson adept immediately turned and ran upon seeing the ineffectiveness of the scrolls.


    However, the mist in front of the cabin shimmered as a translucent water dragon suddenly appeared. With a single w, it smashed against the forcefield barrier outside the cabin.


    A powerful dragon w caused the barrier to dent inward, its sharp ws even leaving deep marks on the cabin itself.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Mothership¡¯s barrier, the Crimson adept would have been dead meat regardless of how many defensive spells he had cast on himself. The wild impact blew away the Crimson adept, causing him to cough up blood violently as he escaped into the ship.


    As Dominier¡¯s slender tail swept down upon the cabin, the entire room creaked before being ttenedpletely.


    However, the Crimson adept had already sessfully escaped!


    While Dominier was attacking the metal cabin, the elementium magical machine, still searching for the location of the enemy, quickly approached. Its heavy metal fists had yet to arrive, but its vicious magical energy had already washed over the water dragon.


    Judging from the position that the elementium magical machine was cutting in from, it was intending to cut off the dragon¡¯s path of retreat and stop it from returning into the mist.


    Meanwhile, Dominier was attempting to draw the elementium magical machine away from the main entrance on the deck. As such, he was in no hurry to return to the mist. Instead, he turned around, and a pir of water shot forth toward the magical energy surging toward him.


    The two surges of magical energy of entirely different attributes shed in the air, causing a violent elementium explosion.


    The dragon and the machine battled with each other in the elementium tide even as they approached each other.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    A series of loud explosions rang out as the elementium magical machine¡¯s metal fists rained down on the water dragon¡¯s shields, sending water flying everywhere. Meanwhile, the water dragon lowered his head and used his sharp horns to stab and push at the magical machine.


    The elementium magical machine grabbed the horns with its two metal fists, and the two giants rolled about on the deck.


    For a moment, the dragon¡¯s roars could be heard throughout the ship as they threw the deck into chaos.


    As the dragon and the machine fought each other, the main entrance of the deck suddenly opened as thirty magical machines marched out from within. They attacked the water dragon wildly as they approached.


    Dominier was annoyed by their harassment, and the battle started to tilt in favor of the elementium magical machine.


    However, beyond anyone¡¯s senses, an undetectable shadow power slowly flowed through the shadows beneath a turret on the deck.


    An looked at the battlefield around him and hesitated for a moment.


    If he helped Dominier at this moment, they could establish an advantage. However, the best option now was to break into the massive flying ship and kill all the human adepts hiding within.


    It was the true meaning of today¡¯s battle!


    Understanding that, the shadow dragon turned and looked at the main entrance, nowpletely open. The shadow energy within him moved, and his body suddenly went from the turret¡¯s shadow to the shadow of the human adept closest to the entrance.


    At this moment, the entrance to the interior of the ship was right in front of him. He only needed to apply a bit of force to break through the barrier outside the door, and he would be inside.


    The very thought of the enemy having no one to stop his mad ughter once he was within caused An¡¯s heart to beat unstoppably. After all, all of their main forces had already beenmitted, and only weaklings were left inside.


    Ready. Charge...


    Just as the shadow dragon prepared to assault the barrier with all he had, the human adept he was hiding under suddenly lowered her head and smiled faintly at the shadow he was within.


    The smile was so pretty and so brilliant that An was stunned for that one instant.


    This Second Grade female adept is so pretty!


    Is she smiling at me?


    These two thoughts had just surfaced in An¡¯s mind when he immediately woke up.


    Something¡¯s wrong...she¡¯s already discovered me.


    In all honesty, An had already used his subtle spiritual senses to scan the entire Mothership before he used Shadow Teleportation. He had not discovered any lifeform that could threaten him.


    That was why he had been bold enough to leap over in an attempt to charge into the Mothership.


    The female adept whose shadow he had dived into was only Second Grade fodder. Her elementium flux was so weak he had barely picked up on it. She should not be able to threaten him at all.


    Yet, the scene before him sent a chill down his spine. He smelled the faint scent of a trap behind this!


    Without any hesitation, An immediately erupted with all his power.

 Chapter 929 - Sending You All the Way to Your Grave

    Chapter 929 Sending You All the Way to Your Grave


    Shadow dragons. Just as the name implied, they were a sort of variant dragon.


    They might be called dragons, but at their very core, they were more like powerful shadow creatures.


    They had dark ck scales, and theirrge and vicious bodies were always radiating dense and obscure shadow aura. They had ck horns, ck body, ck wings, ck ws, and a ck tail.


    Even their dragon¡¯s breath was ck.


    It was this unique magical trait that made the shadow dragons one of the best at hiding themselves. They might look asrge as a hill, but they could assimte with a piece of shadow as small as a palm.


    Very few people could notice them hiding in the shadows before they attacked.


    However, Shadow Dragon An¡¯s luck was terrible today.


    That was because he had chosen to hide in the shadow beneath Alice, the Witch of Fate.


    His every action might indeed go unnoticed by most Third Grade creatures, but it could not get past Alice, who was standing near the main entrance.


    Alice had long since discovered the existence of Shadow Dragon An through her Fate Sense.


    That was why she had pretended to be innocuous and stood alone by the entrance.


    The moment An entered the trap, Alice smiled and sessfully cast her Fate spell with Helen¡¯s help.


    Fate¡¯s Corridor!


    It was a restraint-typebyrinth Fate spell. Alice could cast this spell as long as she was in contact with the target creature, trapping the victim in a mysterious, profound, and massive maze.


    This maze would not harm the enemy in any way and would only trap them within for fifteen minutes. If the enemy could see through the secrets of Fate¡¯s Corridor or had sufficient brute force, they had a high likelihood of escaping before the duration ended.


    However, this much time was more than enough for Alice to do something!


    Just as An realized something was wrong and was about to erupt with all his power, a light shed before his eyes. He suddenly found himself on a winding stone bridge. Mist shrouded both ends of the floating bridge as if it had been constructed on thin air.


    An looked around him. Apart from more winding bridges, there was nothing else in this vast space. Moreover, a door of light could be seen standing silently at the end of every bridge.


    The doors shimmered with light, seemingly connected to each other.


    An paused for a moment and looked at the world around him once more. A sense of familiarity crept up in his heart. It seemed like...like a particr otherworldly space he had heard of in the past. Spatial teleportation and flight were restricted there, and the intruder could only attempt to escape by testing out the doors of light, one by one.


    An was shocked as he lowered his body in anticipation, but nothing happened.


    Dammit, he could not sense the existence of the Shadow World from here!


    Supposedly, An¡¯s Third Grade abilities should have allowed him to use his tight connection between his soul origin and the Shadow World to return to Lance, with the Shadow World acting as a springboard of sorts. However, strangely enough, he could no longer sense the Shadow World within this mysterious magical corridor.


    An tried beating his wings, but he could no longer go any higher after his body hovered a meter above the ground.


    It seemed flight and levitation were all prohibited within this world.


    An¡¯s face instantly turned dark.


    He finally remembered what this ce was.


    Fate¡¯s Corridor. It was Fate¡¯s Corridor!


    Without Fate¡¯s guidance, anyone that entered Fate¡¯s Corridor would have to silently wait until they were returned to their world.


    An finally crouched down in sorrow.


    ............


    Alice had been stunned by the roar of the shadow dragon before he was transported away. Her body was still shaking.


    It took her a dozen seconds to barely break free of the overwhelming dragon¡¯s aura.


    Though she had used a small trick to trap the shadow dragon in Fate¡¯s Corridor, the difference between their power was still present.


    If Alice were Third Grade, she would be able to trap the shadow dragon inside Fate¡¯s Corridor for an entire hour at the very minimum, unlike now where it would onlyst for a mere fifteen minutes.


    Fifteen minutester, the shadow dragon would be returned to wherever he had been through the power of Fate.


    When that happened, a furious Third Grade shadow dragon would appear right beneath Alice in her shadow, and she would have to pray for herself!


    Alice charged into the Mothership without any hesitation, quickly establishingmunication with Meryl as she ran toward the lower levels.


    ¡°Quick, open the magical prison. I need to use it now!¡±


    Alice was a frail Fate Witch, after all. All of her elementium powers had been sacrificed to the powers of Fate. It caused her Physique to be frail as well. If it weren¡¯t for little Helen flying by her side and enhancing her with Windwalk and Bull¡¯s Strength, Alice wouldn¡¯t even be able to make it to the magical prison at the lowest level of the Mothership in time.


    The Crimson n hade here for the dragons specifically. For the sake of capturing even more of them, a magical prison used to imprison and seal the dragons had been specially constructed in the Mothership.


    The ce that Alice was hurrying toward was a cell used for imprisoning high-grade dragons.


    ¡°......¡±


    Alice ran as fast as she could as she checked the time left, running past corridor after corridor. She even asionally had to sprint down flights of spiral staircases.


    ¡°68, 67, 66...¡±


    ¡°32, 31, 30...¡±


    When Alice counted down to fifteen, the magical prison was finally within sight. Some magical machines had already opened the doors to the cell, and a few Crimson adepts were hastily activating the sealing arrays within.


    Alice ran into the prison in a single breath and stood in the slowly activating array in the center. Meanwhile, Helen waved her magical wand, activating all other arrays in the prison and connecting them with one another.


    ¡°8, 7, 6, 5...¡±


    Little Helen waved her limbs about and chased all the Crimson adepts and magical machines out of the room. She then proceeded to assume full control over the control panel of the prison.


    ¡°4, 3, 2...¡±


    The wand in the fairy¡¯s hand glowed with blinding white light. All of the sealing arrays were raring to go but were made to remain in a state of preparation.


    Only a high-grade elementium creature like Helen could do something like this. An ordinary adept would not be able to manage so manyplex sealing arrays with such ease and control.


    ¡°1...¡±


    As Alice let out onest shout, power erupted from her shadow as a massive draconic creature abruptly emerged from within.


    ¡°You, di...¡±


    An, having been forcefully contained within Fate¡¯s Corridor for fifteen minutes, was beyond furious now.


    He, a proper Third Grade dragon, had fallen face-first into the trap of a mere Second Grade female adept. How could this not make him rage, not make him roar in anger?


    The moment An sensed the flux of spatial power and the witch¡¯s aura right above him, he immediately...


    Before his overwhelming shadow power could truly burst forth, his tremendous spiritual senses swept across his current environment.


    Dammit, this...this is...


    Before he could even finish his sentence, an immense sealing power washed forward, sealing him along with the Second Grade witch within the magical array.


    It didn¡¯t matter how strong a Third Grade dragon was; they could not fend off a sealing array.


    Moreover, it was therge magic generator furnace of the Mothership that was powering the sealing array, while the host of the formation was a high-grade elementium fairy. As such, An¡¯s roars immediately fell silent. His entire body, as well as his shadow power, spiritual flux, and his mind itself, were all instantly restrained.


    To fully capture this dragon, Alice had willingly sacrificed herself and sealed herself within the array as well.


    Helen looked at Alice and the dragon, frozen within the array like wooden sculptures. She let out a sigh and carefully sealed the array and shut the prison doors.


    It was the best she and Alice could do with their powers.


    After all, they were dealing with a Third Grade dragon.


    Being able to seal a Third Grade dragon at the cost of Alice¡¯s immobility was already an excellent result!


    The rest would fall upon Greem and whether he could rescue Alice without releasing the Third Grade shadow dragon. Otherwise, a single mistake in his actions could cause Alice¡¯s death and the extermination of her soul.


    When little Helen beat her wings and returned to themand center, the first thing she ran into was Meryl¡¯s questioning eyes.


    ¡°The Third Grade dragon has been sealed,¡± Helen said, dispiritedly.


    ¡°That¡¯s good...good. Speaking of which, where¡¯s Lady Alice?¡± Meryl patted her chest in relief before asking curiously.


    ¡°She¡¯s sealed together with the dragon!¡± Little Helen pouted and darted about the air anxiously, ¡°Alice is trying too hard. To think she would choose such a dangerous method. What¡¯s good about that big guy? Making her risk her life to capture a shadow dragon, hmph.¡±


    The little fairy got angrier the more she rambled. She even waved her wand and made a miniature version of Greem in the air, before lunging forward and beating down on the model. Meryl was speechless.


    At this moment, the battle on the Mothership had also started to reach the boiling point.


    The shadow dragon had yet to return since his departure, and nothing seemed to have happened within the ship either.


    That undoubtedly made Water Dragon Dominier increasingly frustrated and suspicious.


    After a few rounds of bloody exchanges, Dominier had to admit that he was no match to this strange golem when it came to meleebat.


    The golem was superior, with a sturdier body and greater strength. In addition, there were annoying magical machines around them and a series of metal turrets all raining down on him. Dominier was actually losing to a strange golem in meleebat.


    The water dragon frantically peeled away the magical machine and turned to run.

 Chapter 930 - The Battle Concludes

    Chapter 930 The Battle Concludes


    Water Dragon Dominier has fallen!


    The reason he fell was not because of the elementium magical machine¡¯s continued advances, but the giant goblin cannon on the golem dragon.


    Two goblin cannons with barrels over three meters in diameter had been rising on the wide metal tform on the golem dragon¡¯s back ever since Dominier set foot on the Mothership¡¯s deck.


    All the fighting was happening on the Mothership¡¯s deck. The cannons of the golem dragon were an indiscriminate attack and should not have had the chance to fire. Thus, it had been silently waiting for its time.


    Dominier¡¯s scrambling retreat gave the golem dragon the perfect opportunity to disy its power.


    Hassled by the elementium magical machine and the many metal golems, the water dragon still managed to cut a path of destruction with the sheer might of a dragon. He smashed through the forcefield of the Mothership and charged into the air. It was this act of his to destroy the forcefield that brought cmity upon him.


    The forcefield around the Mothership had over seven hundred points of defensive power. Even the robust body of a Third Grade water dragon would be stalled for three seconds upon smashing through the field.


    The magical golem dragon took full advantage of these three seconds and fired both of its goblin cannons. Two energy pirs that connected heaven and earth immediately crashed into Dominier¡¯s already bloody chest.


    The Wave Shields around his body had already turned to mist from breaking through the forcefield.


    As such, the energy pirsnded straight on his bare body. Hisstyer of defense¨Chis dragon scales¨Cwere prated after just half a second. The two columns of light pierced through his body, rushing into the skies and vanishing in the distance.


    There wasn¡¯t even time for shock or grief. The terrifying magical energy hadpletely corroded Water Dragon Dominier¡¯s body. His dragon soul was instantly destroyed in the overwhelming tide of energy.


    His crystalline body stumbled and fell headfirst from the sky.


    This scene was witnessed by all the dragons and all the ne natives on the vast battlefield.


    A mighty Third Grade dragon fell just like that before their uneasy gaze, silently and withoutmotion!


    The dragons in the sky followed the two white pirs downward with their eyes, their gazesnding on that towering metal dragon. Though every one of its actions was clumsy and stale, and its appearance was crude and ugly, the dragons could not help but regard it with unconceble fear and shock at the moment.


    The eyes that looked upon the golem dragon contained something different now!


    Fourth Grade.


    It was a Fourth Grade magical machine, after all!


    Perhaps the power of a Fourth Grade magical machine could only be verified through the weak death throes of Third Grade creatures.


    The dragonflight had been far too arrogant, believing that they would be able to deal with this clumsy and crude giant with their absolute numbers and honed techniques. The death of a Third Grade dragon lord had pped them to their senses.


    A Fourth Grade would always be a Fourth Grade.


    The only one that could deal with a Fourth Grade was another Fourth Grade.


    Without any hesitation, the dragonflight turned to flee.


    Terrible and anxious roars filled the skies as the giant creatures retreated.


    Meanwhile, the dragonborn, Dragon Cultists, and ne natives still battling the machines and adepts to the death were at a loss. They didn¡¯t know whether they were to continue their offense or to retreat along with the dragons.


    Chaos filled the battlefield.


    It was at this moment that the expedition army, having endured the horde of enemies for so long, finally started their counterattack.


    Thest remaining four hundred magical machines surged forward and started firing at every hostile target within their vision. A swarm of eyeball machines rushed ahead, soaring through the air and shooting beams of blinding Scalding Rays into the crowd.


    The adept army¡¯s retaliation was thest straw that broke the back of the panicking natives. All of them dropped their weapons, cast their armor aside, and ran into the distance without turning back.


    The original horde of an army instantly scattered like a nest of hos that had lost their home. They screamed amidst the thick, ck smoke and dancing mes, running without any sense of direction.


    The battlefield was in utter chaos now. The enemy did not know where their tribe was, nor where the camp was. The only thing they knew was to get away from those terrifying demons, and away from that rumbling metal dragon.


    Holding their positions was meaningless at this point. All the chariots and skyships had charged out of their defensive formation and started to hunt down these scurrying ants. Even the golem dragon was on the hunt.


    The low-grade Crimson adepts set their sights on the disorganized dragonborn, while the Second Grade Crimson adepts chose the First Grade dragons as their targets.


    In their panicked retreat, many dragons strayed from the flight due to the chaos or their injuries. The Second Grade adepts who could fly were all immensely excited and were hunting the fleeing dragons with wild abandon.


    On one side, you had dragons desperate to break through the enemies. On the other, you had adepts drunk with greed.


    The two parties shed with each other, causing even more explosive sparks!


    The brutality of the battle in the skies was even harsher and more terrifying than the fight that had preceded it!


    After seven grueling hours, this battle on the Northern Wastnds of Lance ended with the defeat of the dragonflight. As many as thirty-four dragon lords had fallen in the Northern Wastnds. Though most of them were barely adolescent First Grade dragons, there were still as many as seven Second and Third Grade dragons.


    In particr, Third Grade Water Dragon Dominier died on the field, while Third Grade Shadow Dragon An was still missing. These two incidents set off a bomb in the hearts of all dragons.


    These adepts from a higher ne were no longer insignificant otherworldly ants, but terrifying invaders that the dragons could do nothing about.


    The traditionalbat strategies that the dragons excelled at no longer worked in front of the enemy. Instead, any mistake would cause isted dragons to be the target of their hunts. This tremendous difference in their psychology was not something that the undefeated dragons could get used to.


    These noble dragons had always opened portals to other nes in the past, relying on their martial power and unrivaled flying ability to wreck the kingdoms of other nes to destroy one civilization after another.


    What they obtained was the mountain of glittering wealth that they hoarded in theirirs.


    A purebred dragon had over ten thousand years of life to enjoy from adolescence to old age. Nearly three-fifths of that time was spent in afortable sleep, with the remaining two-fifths either spent on raids and robberies or traveling to the destination of their raids and robberies.


    If a purebred dragon could not fill hisir with wealth and treasure before adolescence, then he did not even possess the qualification to attract a pretty mate.


    It was these countless sessful raids and wars that gave the dragons the illusion that they were the blessed champions of the world, the noble rulers that reigned over everything. The sky was their yground, and the earth was their pasture. Everything within the world was no more than a decoration or tool used toplement and adorn their territory.


    In the hearts of most dragons, this universe had always belonged to them, only to have parts of it stolen away by dirty and wretched thieves. Their raids were only small trips taken outside to take back what was theirs.


    From the past to now, there were only stories of dragons robbing the nes of others, never of an otherworldly raceing to steal from a dragon ne.


    Thus, the battle of the Northern Wastnds utterly shocked all the dragons. It made them understand that their kingdom had also been invaded by a rude and barbaric enemy, a thief, a robber, and a butcher. And their favorite target was none other than the original owners of this ne¨C the dragons!


    ............


    The fires were still burning.


    The heavy smoke had turned an area of a dozen kilometers into a world of dust and ashes.


    Looking from hundreds of meters above the ground, the deste Wastnds had undergone aplete change.


    Several hundred mes could still be seen smoldering on the earth, sending thick pirs of ck smoke into the sky to obscure the horizon.


    In the scorch marks left behind by the sea of mes, burnt corpses were scattered everywhere, left in all sorts of strange poses. It didn¡¯t matter if they had been mighty trolls or weak gnolls in life; they were now all indistinguishable smoldering bones.


    The dragonflight had retreated, and all the surviving natives had fled without a trace. The only ones who could continue moving around this field of mes were the adepts.


    Goblin chariots drove across the wreckage of the battle as eyeball machines swept across the ground at a low altitude. Whenever they found something of value, a group of construction machines would rush forward to retrieve it and toss it into the recycling cart.


    This war had brought tremendous losses to the expedition army as well. They had lost over seven hundred magical machines, twelve goblin chariots, and seven skyships, not to mention all the other misceneous losses.


    Even the most valuable asset of the Crimson n¨Ctheir precious adepts¨Chad taken casualties! As many as five of them had died in battle.


    However, corresponding to their losses were the spoils that they had obtained. It was an inestimable amount of wealth. From all aspects and perspectives, the Crimson n had made an absolute killing out of this battle against the dragons in the Northern Wastnds!

 Chapter 931 - A Dragon Intercepts

    Chapter 931 A Dragon Intercepts


    Corpse of a Third Grade water dragon obtained.


    Sealed Third Grade shadow dragon obtained.


    Four living, and one dead, Second Grade dragons captured.


    Twenty-seven First Grade dragons of various attributes, twenty living and five dead.


    Six hundred and thirty-eight dragon warriors of First to Second Grade, and over a thousand Dragon Cultists.


    Over three thousand ne natives of various races.


    ......


    The list of spoils was nearly three feet long, and this was only a rough census. More detailed andprehensive information would take the Crimson n almost five days of work toplete.


    After herding the prisoners to a safe ce for imprisonment, the Crimson n sent out arge army of construction machines to collect the damaged and destroyed magical machines on the battlefield. Though many magical machines had been smashed to iron pancakes and torn to pieces by the powerful natives, there were still plenty of magical alloys and rare resources that could be recycled from their wreckage.


    There was a small magical machine production line within the Mothership itself. It was capable of recycling, modifying, and producing magical machines at any time. The efficiency of the production line wasn¡¯t very high, but it was enough for the Mothership¡¯s needs.


    The Crimson n¡¯s power was starting to falter at this point of the war.


    Though the losses in magical machines could be slowlypensated for by the Mothership, they had way too many dragons and natives as prisoners. It would be ridiculous to drag them along on their journey to challenge the Fourth Grade dragon.


    Moreover, Alice had sealed herself in with the Third Grade shadow dragon to capture him alive. The matter of saving her couldn¡¯t be dyed for too long, either.


    As such, the leaders of the Crimson n gathered for a simple discussion. They all believed that the army should not continue forward and should instead return to the Capital of Eternity to reorganize.


    After two days in the Northern Wastnds, the expedition army turned back instead of continuing north. They marched back in the direction they came.


    They did not bring all of the native prisoners with them as well. They merely selected eight hundred of the most powerful ves and warriors to their liking and herded them onto the flying deck where they were kept prisoner.


    That would keep the detainees from dragging down the march of the army.


    They had traveled for twenty-three days, and now it took them twenty-seven days to return. After all their grueling efforts, they could see the peak of the Capital of Eternity at the edge of the horizon.


    While everyone was in high spirits in anticipation of the hot baths andfortable sleep toe, the army suddenly stopped their march.


    Some confused Crimson adepts emerged from the chariots and the cabins, looking to each other for the reason of this abrupt stop.


    As the massive cloud of dust kicked up by the army slowly settled, the towering figure of a dragon finally appeared before them.


    It was an exceptionally majestic and beautiful dragon.


    Ayer of light-purple scales enveloped his entire body. From a distance, the dragon looked like a natural sculpture made of purple crystals, crystalline and wondrous. Magical gemstones could be seen embedded all over its scales as well.


    This seventeen-meter-tall and thirty-five-meter long dragon glimmered under the glow of the gentle sun, making for a fantastical sight, almost as if he was an illusion himself.


    A Fourth Grade Amethyst Dragon!


    None of the Crimson adepts were rookies that had just stepped onto the battlefield. They all understood the established target for this first expedition armyunched by the n. As such, the Crimson adepts immediately understood who it was that had intercepted the army.


    The Fourth Grade amethyst dragon that they had so wanted to challenge¨C Toril!


    One could estimate how strong a Fourth Grade dragon was, even if they had never personally seen one. That was why the Crimson adepts immediately jumped back into their chariots and skyships, where they activated the forcefields and prepared for a vicious battle that was to break out.


    Naturally, as the leader of the party, Greem had to step on the very frontline.


    A cluster of mes erupted, and Greem appeared on the head of the magical golem dragon. The golem dragon reared its neck and let out a low roar before striding forward and squaring off against the amethyst dragon in front of the rest of the army.


    Inside themand center of the golem dragon, Old Gonga was already leaping up and down with excitement. He swept aside the operators and leaned enthusiastically against the monitoring crystal, where the image of the amethyst dragon was being disyed.


    ¡°A Fourth Grade dragon. A real, actual, genuine Fourth Grade dragon! Our magical golem dragon can only be considered a true Fourth Grade magical machine after we defeat it. Otherwise, we will forever have to endure the name of a pseudo-Fourth Grade. All of you need to focus! We must perform to the best of our abilities. We cannot bring shame upon our magical golem dragon.¡±


    ¡°Yes, sir!¡±


    ¡°Yes, sir!¡±


    As the magical golem dragon was the product of adept and magical machine civilization, the actual piloting of the golem was performed simultaneously by magical spirits and goblins.


    For a moment, the Crimson n was not able to find a powerful magical spirit that could match the might of the golem dragon. Thus, they could only settle for the use of multiple smaller magical spirits. That was why the magical spirits¡¯ purpose was only to direct and coordinate the golem dragon¡¯s movements, while the magic-infused goblin technicians and operators were the ones giving the spiritsbat orders.


    Indeed, after working with a magical creature like the golem dragon for so long, these green-skinned goblins were showing signs of bing magical.


    The magical energy that filled the inner corridors of the golem had incited the mutation of the goblins. It caused their skin to turn an even darker shade of green, their muscles to be stronger, and sharp ws to grow on their limbs.


    Apart from stronger bodies and quicker movements, the magical goblins also became more excited and radical in their emotions. They quickly fell into a state of berserk fury at the slightest of provocation.


    After some research, the adepts found nothing that would damage their intelligence. As such, they let the issue slide and paid no mind to it.


    These magical goblins might have been ¡®crazy¡¯ and ¡®insane,¡¯ but they fundamentally understood that everything they possessedy within the grasp of the adepts. That was why they remained just as respectful to the adepts of the Crimson n, never daring to challenge their authority.


    Greem stomped his feet lightly and quickly sent a message, ¡°Gonga, you better cool down. Don¡¯t do anything without my orders.¡±


    The frenzied old Gonga immediately shivered in fright. He hastily stood straight and replied loudly, ¡°Don¡¯t worry master, we will listen to you. Your loyal ve, Gonga, awaits your orders!¡±


    It was then that Greem nodded in assurance and turned his sights back on the Fourth Grade dragon that had intercepted them.


    This Fourth Grade amethyst dragon was perfect and beautiful no matter how you looked at him. His body looked less like a living creature than a wless piece of art. Just looking at him could make a person obsessed and infatuated.


    ¡°Might our esteemed guest by Sir Toril himself?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    His voice wasn¡¯t loud, but the resonance and shockwave of the powerful fire energy made it a loud andmanding voice.


    The unmoving amethyst dragon finally shifted.


    He stretched his slender and elegant neck, and a pair of pretty prismatic eyes looked toward Greem.


    Greem¡¯s heart sank slightly as an indescribably powerful spiritual pressure crashed down upon him like a mountain. If it weren¡¯t for the spiritual and mental defenses he had set up ahead of time, he would have had a hard time looking unfazed at the mere gaze of a Fourth Grade dragon.


    ¡°You are the leader of this adept army?¡± The amethyst dragon finally spoke.


    His voice was crisp and clear, with the clear and resounding quality that came with colliding crystals. It was refreshing to hear it. However, the aura that the words were steeped in still struck fear into the hearts of all the adepts, making it hard for them to gather the will to fight.


    ¡°I am Greem, leader of this army as well as the owner of the Capital of Eternity behind you! You may speak to me if there¡¯s anything you wish to talk about.¡±


    ¡°Good, very good.¡± The amethyst dragon¡¯s voice instantly turned cold, ¡°You evil adepts broke into our dragons¡¯nds and started an indiscriminate ughter. Are you not afraid of the revenge of us dragons?¡±


    A faint smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face.


    ¡°Sir, you aren¡¯t a wyrmling that just emerged from your shell. How could you speak such childish words?! How many otherworldly civilizations have you dragons invaded and destroyed? Why is it that you be so furious and such a proponent of justice when it is your ne that bes the target of an invasion? If you are here to threaten me, then I advise you to choose another path. If you are here for negotiations, then present yourself with the proper attitude.¡±


    ¡°You dare.¡±


    Greem¡¯s calm tone of voice had clearly infuriated the Fourth Grade dragon. He roared in anger, and his colorful crystal wings unfurled. The terrifying majesty of a Fourth Grade dragon was on full disy.


    Greem stared coldly, not showing any signs of fear or recoil.


    Behind him, the chariots, skyships, the Mothership, and the golem dragon had all revealed their ck cannon barrels, slowly charging up and gathering powerful magical energy within.


    The army waited in grim silence, waiting to fire in unison at a single order.


    The other magical cannons might not be able to threaten the Fourth Grade amethyst dragon, but the few giant cannons reaching out from the golem dragon and the Mothership made him frown. He could faintly sense a trace of danger on them.


    The Fourth Grade dragon couldn¡¯t help but fall into thought at the sight of this army that was armed to the teeth.


    Finally, he withdrew his wild disy and once again looked at Greem.


    ¡°Human adept, I am not here to fight today, but to negotiate and...trade!¡±


    The amethyst dragon gritted his teeth when speaking the word ¡®trade.¡¯ Even his tone seemed to fluctuate for a moment.


    ¡°Oh? I wonder what you intend to negotiate and trade about?¡±


    A sincere smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face as he passionately pursued the topic.


    ¡°I am here to ransom the dragons!¡±

 Chapter 932 - Dragon Against Dragon

    Chapter 932 Dragon Against Dragon


    ¡°Ransom? Ransom how?¡±


    Even with all his experience, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be suspicious of this word.


    ¡°Hand over all imprisoned dragons, and I can absolve you of your crimes and draw up the metal city and allnd within a hundred square kilometers as your territory. From now on, you will have the same authority as the dragon lords and may move freely about within Lance. However, you and your subordinates are never to attack any of the dragon lords from this day forth!¡± The amethyst dragon solemnly warned, as if this was the greatestpromise he could make.


    Greem¡¯s expression froze, and he couldn¡¯t help but break out into a cold smile.


    Wasn¡¯t it just recruiting us adept!?


    Return the dragons and gain the same authority as the dragon lords...fuck, I¡¯m a proper Third Grade adept. What do I want the influence of a lord in your ne of Lance for? For this hundred square kilometers of territory? For the ignorant natives in this territory?


    Ogres, trolls, gnolls. Which of these can I not just catch from another ne? Do I need toe to your dragon ne to catch them? What was most valuable in a dragon ne? Of course, it was the dragons!


    Every single high-grade dragon of Lance was a wealthy and rich tycoon. Capture any one of them, scour theirir and the Crimson adepts would instantly have their pockets filled their treasure and gold.


    Do I need to give up on such tremendous wealth and resources for the empty title of Lord?


    Greem chuckled.


    ¡°And if I don¡¯t ept?¡±


    The crystal-clear eyes of the amethyst dragon glowed with a cold and sinister light as he roared loudly, ¡°Then prepare for war! You will endure the wrath of a Fourth Grade dragon.¡±


    The amethyst dragon¡¯s beautiful crystal wings once again unfurled as a wild and barbaric aura pressed toward the adepts.


    ¡°Hmph, you talked so much, yet it just ended in a fight anyway.¡±


    Greem waved his hand. At his signal, the Mothership, skyships, and chariots silently retreated into the distance, leaving only him and the golem dragon on the battlefield.


    However, Gru and Mary stayed and stood behind him.


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms and Emerald Dragon Iritina also hid within the Mothership, not daring to reveal themselves to this Fourth Grade dragon leader.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped.


    Against a Fourth Grade dragon, weak subordinates were of no help and would instead be weaknesses that the enemy could exploit. It was easier for them to retreat and have the high-grade fighters deal with the Fourth Grade amethyst dragon.


    In all honesty, the true might of the golem dragon had never been verified since its creation.


    The Crimson n might have ssified it as a Fourth Grade magical machine, but most of the other adepts in their world only considered it a pseudo-Fourth Grade golem.


    After all, it was hard to find a suitable Fourth Grade opponent for the magical golem dragon in the World of Adepts.


    A reckless challenge against other Fourth Grade adepts meant a provocation to start an adept war on the Crimson n¡¯s part. Regardless of the oue, it would be an incredible blow to the n¡¯s foundations and development.


    That was why the golem dragon had not had any experience battling against a Fourth Grade creature in the ten years since it had been created.


    However, today was indeed the best chance for verifying its might!


    Even if the amethyst dragon hade in peace, Greem would never have so quickly given up on the opportunity to fight.


    As the weaker forces retreated, the only ones left in this massive space of over fifteen kilometers was the golem dragon and the amethyst dragon, staring down at each other.


    Greem, Mary, and the elementium magical machine stood on the golem dragon¡¯s head, while Gru secretly entered the belly of the dragon. When the fighting reached its most intense, the ultrarge magic generator furnace of the golem dragon alone would not be enough for its power output. Thus, Gru needed to provide some auxiliary support and indirectly enhance the power of the golem dragon.


    The battle approached, and the golem dragon¡¯s four thick metal limbs dug into the earth beneath it. The magic generator in itsrge chest cavity started to function at maximum capacity, outputting as much magical energy as possible.


    Overwhelming magical energy thrashed through the energy pipes within its body, most of it being absorbed by the magical machinery spread across its structure. However, there was always excessive magical energy that seeped through the metal, creating a horrifying energy radiation zone around the golem dragon.


    Ordinary magical creature would not be able to survive in such high-radiation areas. The violent and active energy particles would destroy the elementium stability of their muscle tissues and cause them to die a painful death.


    Countless turrets arose on the broad back of the gigantic machine, and ck cannon barrels spun about and locked onto the amethyst dragon in the distance. The most impressive of which was the two giant goblin cannons at the center of the dragon¡¯s back.


    In all honesty, anyone would be scared to see a cannon barrel with a diameter of three meters!


    Seeing that the fearsome magical machine hadpleted itsbat preparations, the Fourth Grade Amethyst Dragon Toril roared. He did not take to the skies and instead chose tond and circle the golem dragon on its limbs.


    Toril¡¯s impressive battle experience allowed him to discern that the golem dragon¡¯s mobility was pathetic and that it relied mostly on its metal body and powerful cannons. Against such an opponent, taking to the skies would not aplish much. The machine only needed to wait, and he would not be able to harm it in any fashion.


    Apart from dragon¡¯s breath and Dragontongue magic, Toril had no other means of attacking from a distance. Even thinking with his pinky, Toril could tell that he would not fare well in an exchange of bombardment. There were far too many cannons outfitted on that golem dragon.


    In fact, if he took to the skies, his flying speed would never be able to match the rate at which the cannons turned. When that happened, he would be turning himself into the easiest target for the opponent!


    Perhaps because they had discovered themotion here, but a Mothership rose from the Capital of Eternity as well. It did not approach the battlefield and simply observed from a distance.


    Fourth Grade Amethyst Dragon Toril paid it no heed and continued to circle the golem dragon slowly. His body gleamed and glittered in the gentle sun, bing even more colorful and fantastical.


    Amethyst dragons were pretty skilled at hiding themselves as well.


    However,pared to the mist-morphing abilities of the water dragons, their stealth relied on light refraction and visual avoidance. That meant the naked eye would only be able to see the afterimages created by the light refracted by the amethyst dragon¡¯s scales if your spirit was unable to lock on to the actual being.


    Greem was worried that a group of magical goblins might not be able to fight against the Fourth Grade amethyst dragon, even with the golem dragon. That was why he had chosen to step forth and act as the golem dragon¡¯s eyes.


    He might not be of the same grade as Toril, but the panoramic vision and the Chip¡¯s scans were a counter to such light refraction. With Greem present in the battle, the golem dragon would have no fear of being unable to locate its exact target!


    Toril circled the golem dragon twice and familiarized himself with the ground around them. Finally, he could no longer suppress his fury and lunged at the enemy with heavy steps.


    The golem dragon did not hold back either. Its entire body glowed with light, and a downpour of cannon fire greeted Toril.


    However, these attacks were all from ordinary magic energy cannons. The two giant barrels were still primed but had not been fired.


    As expected, this charge was a feint from the amethyst dragon.


    He quickly moved aside after the initial charge and avoided most of the cannon fire with unprecedented agility and speed. The magic energy cannons could not catch up to the phantasmal speed of the amethyst dragon no matter how quickly they turned their barrels.


    The small number of energy fireballs that did not miss was blocked by a transparent forcefield around the amethyst dragon¡¯s body. Apart from some slight energy waves, they had not been able to harm the dragon at all.


    ¡°Correct firing mode, switch to regional diffuse bombardment!¡± Gonga shouted inside the golem.


    One momentter, the magic energy cannons on the golem dragon no longer pursued the silhouette of the amethyst dragon. They instead started to bombard the possible areas where he could stop at in an irregr pattern of bombardment.


    Although it increased the number of energy fireballs that hit the amethyst dragon, the points of impact were much more scattered. They still could not injure the dragon apart from causingrger energy waves.


    Greem and Gonga sighed at the same time.


    Fourth Grade dragons were truly difficult to deal with!


    They had no choices now. If they wanted to threaten the dragon, they would have to concentrate the cannon fire. However, this made it very easy for the dragon to dodge with his speed and movements. If they chose diffuse bombardment without a specific target, it would scatter the strength of the attacks and be a waste of firepower.


    As expected, upon realizing that the cannons on the golem dragon were of a minimal threat to himself, Toril dashed forward once again, charging straight for the golem¡¯s right front leg.


    The golem dragon was over a hundred meters long, while the amethyst dragon was only thirty meters long. Though they were both at Fourth Grade, the magical machine dragon was a good dealrger and stronger than the amethyst dragon.


    Like a hulking giant fighting against a small fighter only the height of his knees, the initiative remained firmly in the hands of the amethyst dragon despite the size differential.


    The golem dragon did not back down when the amethyst dragon lunged at it. It moved forward with its thick and firm metal limbs and charged in response. The giant metal mouth opened to its limits and bit at the amethyst dragon¡¯s head.


    Those rows of sharp metal teeth gleamed with a cold light. From close up, it looked as if a row of hills were crashing down upon you.


    However, the next second, the golem dragon¡¯s head swerved left as the amethyst dragon¡¯s tail whipped across the right of its face.


    The sharp sound of a tail cutting through air rang out loud.

 Chapter 933 - Battle of Dragons

    Chapter 933 Battle of Dragons


    Rather than physical damage, it was an immense psychological humiliation that had been inflicted upon the golem dragon when the amethyst dragon¡¯s tail hit it.


    The eyes of the previously calm andposed Gonga immediately turned red as he red with anger.


    Under his berserk control, the golem dragon also turned into a frenzied bull, lunging without any hesitation to bite and tackle the amethyst dragon.


    In response to the golem dragon¡¯s relentless pursuit, the amethyst dragon dodged with agile and graceful movements, while repeatedly using crystal breath to erode the joints of the golem¡¯s frontal limbs.


    The breath of the amethyst dragon was of a unique elementium-corrosion attribute. The Crystallizing Breath could rapidly seep into the target creature¡¯s muscle structure and turn all organic substance in came into contact with into lifeless crystal.


    Such attacks were undoubtedly exceedingly harmful to creatures of flesh and blood!


    Unfortunately, the magical machine golem dragon was an alchemical creation and had no muscle to speak of. Though the magical alloy would also experience some degree of mutation due to corrosion from the breath, the damage was significantly mitigated.


    After seeing no results from his repeated Crystallizing Breaths, Toril immediately switched to magical bombardment.


    The crystal magic that amethyst dragons possessed was more niche magic, and there weren¡¯t very many spells they could use. However, amethyst dragons had unique ways of circumventing the inconvenience. They would search for powerful magical gemstones and embed them onto their scales.


    This way, they would not need to prepare their Dragontongue magic during battle. They only needed to activate the magical gemstones on their bodies to sessfully fire powerful elementium spells. It created a special method ofbat unique to the amethyst dragons.


    No one saw the amethyst dragon chant anything. It simply wove around the golem dragon¡¯s massive body as several crystalline gemstones on its body lit up, turning into ferocious elementium magic that surged toward the golem dragon.


    The attacks were concentrated, and the target was obvious¨C the joint of the golem dragon¡¯s right front leg.


    Ice Ring Howl!


    Doomsday Storm!


    Devastating Thunder!


    Inferno Impact!


    Ring of Gravity!


    ......


    High-Grade elementium magic was bombarding the metal leg of the golem dragon at such a close distance. As magically resistant as it was, the magical alloy was damaged to some extent.


    However, the magical golem dragon remained unable to touch the amethyst dragon no matter how it thrashed and snapped.


    The difference in theirbat techniques and movement speed was too vast!


    If this situation were allowed to continue, the golem dragon would be slowly toyed to death, even with its imprable body. Thus, without any hesitation, Greem and the elementium magical machine attacked the amethyst dragon in unison.


    The Third Grade spells that Greem had currently mastered were probably only enough to scratch an itch for the Fourth Grade amethyst dragon. He was still far off from being able to break through the dragon¡¯s defenses to wound him.


    However, in coboration with the elementium magical machine, and with both of them each controlling one of the giant cannons on the golem dragon¡¯s back, they could unleash terrifying power.


    Boom! Boom!


    In all honesty, these two shots were really off their mark!


    The direction that the cannons were pointing at was empty before they fired. However, shockingly enough, as the two energy pirs shot forward and intertwined together in midair, the amethyst dragon inexplicably appeared in their path.


    The two seemingly randomly fired energy pirs ¡®luckily¡¯ hit the amethyst dragon.


    Unfortunately, just as the pirs of energy were about the make contact, the amethyst dragon¡¯s crystal body twisted abruptly, turning his belly away and causing the beams to graze past his back. Though the st had missed the front of the body, it had still left horrifying scorch marks and deep gouges on the exquisitely beautiful scales.


    The amethyst dragon howled in agony before escaping the range of the golem dragon¡¯s cannons in a few flickers. It was then that he had the opportunity to inspect the ¡®injury¡¯ on his back.


    Rather than an injury, it was more like damage inflicted on the amethyst dragon¡¯s scales!


    The two cannon shots from earlier were far from hurting the amethyst dragon himself. However, the fact that his most treasured protective scales had been so severely devastated undoubtedly infuriated the amethyst dragon, who valued beauty and perfection above all else.


    Toril turned his head, and his glowing eyes locked onto the two humanoids controlling the cannons atop the golem dragon¡¯s back.


    Dammit! It was them!


    They were the ones who had used a strange ability to predict the location of his teleportation and gave him an unexpected blow across the back. Otherwise, a pair of Third Grade gnats wouldn¡¯t even show themselves before him. A single w for each would be enough to kill them.


    Toril roared furiously in his heart as he controlled his crystallization powers to grow new crystals where the scales had been damaged, hiding the burns and gouges. However, the act of doing so also ruined the perfect, flowing lines of his scales. It only made Toril angrier.


    Without any warning or derations of death, Toril¡¯s body turned into a beam of light as he charged toward the golem dragon. The golem dragon did not back down either. It opened its mouth and roared as it charged forward with its massive body.


    The two Fourth Grade creatures, onerge and one small, instantly shed with each other.


    Though they were both Fourth Grades and were supposed to have a simr level of Strength, the difference in size and muscle foundations meant a massive gulf in their fundamental Strength. The smaller amethyst dragon was the one that lost in this contest of power.


    A loud, dull thud rang out.


    The golem dragon¡¯s elerating body suddenly slid backward, its four heavy metal limbs tearing up the ground as it stabilized itself. The vicious horn at the front of its head had snapped in half, and even its skull seemed to have suffered some light distortion.


    Inparison, Amethyst Dragon Toril was in a far more terrible state.


    Cracks had appeared all over its crystalline scale armor, with horrifyinglyrge gaps visible everywhere. Even Toril himself had been blown over two hundred meters away. In the end, he had to rely on his wings to regain bnce and not crash to the ground.


    The amethyst dragon paid no heed to his wounds. He lifted his bloodied head and roared at the golem dragon, ¡°Again!¡±


    His crystal wings beat wildly as he lurched forward like as a beam of light once again.


    ¡°Hmph, you are sending yourself to your grave!¡±


    Gonga, who was sitting in a metal chair inside the golem dragon, waved his hands about as he roared. He then straightened the mind-synchronizing helmet on his head andmanded the metal dragon to tackle the enemy again.


    The demands of the battle required Gonga to direct nearly seventy percent of the magic generator furnace¡¯s energy to form an invisible but imprable force wall on the dragon¡¯s head. Gonga was confident this would allow them to deal even greater and more terrifying damage to the amethyst dragon in their next sh.


    Greem felt something off about the situation, but he couldn¡¯t pinpoint the specific issue.


    Amethyst Dragon Toril wasn¡¯t supposed to be someone so easily driven mad by anger! Why...why did he choose such a primitive and direct method of confrontation?


    Was there a trick behind this?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be moved at the thought of this. He started to make preparations of his own silently.


    As expected, Toril¡¯s crystal wings red just as the dragons were about to run into each other. His slender and elegant body made a graceful arc as he wrapped around the golem dragon¡¯s vicious horn and flickered above it.


    Just as his perfect body cut across the golem dragon¡¯s back, Toril turned his slender neck and unleashed a short Crystallizing Breath on the two towering figures there.


    As a Fourth Grade, Toril¡¯s Crystallizing Breath was enough to kill an unprepared Third Grade adept, even if it wasn¡¯t fully charged.


    Unfortunately, as sly as he was, Greem was more sly!


    At the instant the dragon¡¯s breath left Toril¡¯s mouth, the elementium magical machine gave up on its cannon and lunged to Greem¡¯s side, protecting him with its own giant body of steel. A barrier then rose from its feet and protected the two of them.


    The breath instantly prated the barrier and crashed on the elementium magical machine¡¯s body.


    Its magical alloy quickly showed signs of aging and deterioration, with tiny particles of crystal asionally appearing here and there. Greem could sense the magical machine¡¯s magical energy fall below half in an instant, with various parts in its body starting to be dysfunctional.


    That said, this was not the time to care about his subordinates.


    Greem roared and turned the cannon abruptly, instantly locking onto the amethyst dragon and smashing the button to fire.


    Apart from providing the telekic barrier from earlier, Gru had also silently taken on the task of charging this cannon himself.


    As the cannon trembled, a beam of pure-white energy shot forth, catching up to the amethyst dragon¡¯s gliding body and sting its back.


    Aooooo!


    A deafening dragon¡¯s roar rang out. Toril had let out his most pitiful cry since the start of the battle. His body tumbled away from the impact of the beam, crashing into the ground and leaving a five-hundred-meter-long ditch before reluctantly stopping.


    The entire battlefield instantly fell silent!

 Chapter 934 - Danger Behind the Scenes

    Chapter 934 Danger Behind the Scenes


    Smoke rose from the massive crater.


    A burnt and grimy w dug into the edge of the crater as a vicious and battered dragon¡¯s head appeared above it.


    The elegance and nobility from before the fight had vanished without a trace. Toril stared at that massive metal dragon with red eyes filled with hatred and anger.


    The golem dragon was quickly adjusting its posture and pointing its head toward him once again. Two towering figures still stood above its back. The odd smirk on that human adept¡¯s face felt like daggers in Toril¡¯s heart.


    God could be the witness that Greem had no intention of mocking or making fun of a Fourth Grade dragon. However, at this moment, having been so badly beaten, Toril¡¯s inner mentality was sensitive and fragile. Any change in expression on his enemy¡¯s face would be perceived as an insult and humiliation directed at him.


    Toril let out a silent roar and grabbed the edge of the crater with all his strength. His massive body once again lunged at the enemy as a beam of light.


    If the battle earlier had consisted of kiting and harassment, then now he was putting his very life on the line!


    The cannon st from earlier had hit Toril on the left of his back, leaving a half-meterrge wound there. A short crystallizing breath had stopped the spurting blood. The growth of crystal clusters inside his wounds was agonizing, but what truly hurt Toril was the very fact that he had been injured.


    He, a proper Fourth Grade amethyst dragon, leader of hundreds of other dragons, was a powerful leader in Lance. Today, he had not only failed to save his subordinates, but he had also allowed an ant-like Third Grade adept to harm his noble and perfect body.


    It was an unbearable humiliation to Toril!


    At this moment, Toril had forgotten all about the benefit of dragonkind or any thoughts ofpromise. He had even forgotten about pain, danger, and superficial glory. For the first time ever, he fought with the enemy with all his solemnity and cruelty.


    As Toril faced the situation seriously, the golem dragon¡¯s ws were quickly exposed.


    It could not fly, and its movements were slow. These weaknesses could be somewhat concealed through proper defensive techniques and relying on a more retaliatory strategy as opposed to taking the offensive.


    However, once the Fourth Grade dragon abandoned his superficial vanity and all useless performances, he became exponentially more dangerous. Again and again, Toril pushed Greem and the golem dragon toward the edge of death.


    If it weren¡¯t for his wariness of the two terrifying cannons, Toril would have leaped on top of the golem dragon¡¯s back and started tearing into its body with his sharp fangs and ws.


    It was like a giant buffalo was battling with an agile roon. It didn¡¯t matter how Gonga yelled and shouted, or how the golem dragon lunged and thrashed about; they still could not even touch the amethyst dragon. Toril used his dragon breath, his tail, and his magical gemstones to attack the golem dragon as he rapidly moved about and dodged.


    Greem and the elementium magical machine were controlling the giant goblin cannons and firing as fast as they could, all while trying their best to dodge the dragon breaths that Toril asionally blew in their direction.


    Meanwhile, Mary chose to circle about the perimeter of the battlefield.


    She also found a chance to assault the amethyst dragon, but she only managed to cast Boiling Blood on one of his wounds before she was forced away by a massive dragon¡¯s breath. It was unknown if her attack had any effect on the amethyst dragon, but the crystallizing breath turned half of her body into clear crystals.


    If she hadn¡¯t escaped fast enough and drank all the blood of a Second Grade dragonborn prisoner on the Mothership, the corroding crystal clusters would have turned her into a human-shaped crystal sculpture.


    The frailty of a Third Grade adept before a Fourth Grade dragon was no more evident than this!


    In all honesty, if it wasn¡¯t for the golem dragon¡¯s forcefield and the elementium magical machine¡¯s selfless protection, Greem might not havested as long as Mary did.


    The two parties fought against each other, tearing up the ground and sending tremors into the air. It wasn¡¯t until they had ravaged all thend within fifteen kilometers that there was finally some sort of oue.


    After this six-hour long battle, Greem had finally obtained the fundamental attributes that he needed.


    Toril. Fourth Grade Amethyst Dragon (Gem Dragon). Male.


    Dragon breath is the more umon Crystallizing Breath. Size is rtively lightpared to the average dragon. Prefers powerful magical gemstones. Possesses Light Refraction, Visual Avoidance, Attack Deflection, and otherbat abilities.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 44 | Physique 42 | Agility 33 | Spirit 42.


    Inparison, the golem dragon¡¯s attributes were: Strength 48 | Physique 46 | Agility 17 | Spirit 21


    The golem dragon clearly possessed a certain degree of advantage in a contest of Strength and Physique. However, it did not possess the conditions to obtain victory. Moreover, it was outssed by the amethyst dragon in terms of speed. If it weren¡¯t for the artillery of cannons protecting it, the golem dragon would have long since been torn to scrap by the amethyst dragon.


    As such, the true key to winning this battle was whether the amethyst dragon could tear apart the magic energy cannons and the two giant cannons on the golem dragon while the barrage was restricting its movements.


    Unfortunately, under the full cooperation of Greem and the magical goblins, the Fourth Grade amethyst dragon failed to break the golem dragon¡¯s thick right limb, even after exhausting all of his stamina and consuming all of his dragon¡¯s breath.


    Toril had no choice but to give up on the fight. He resentfully took to the skies, red his wings, and flew northwest.


    Greem hesitated for a moment but gave up on his thoughts of pursuing the amethyst dragon with the Mothership.


    He might have been greatly weakened, but he was still a Fourth Grade dragon.


    The Mothership could not outspeed the dragon, making it very susceptible to kiting. Moreover, the Mothership¡¯s defenses were not as imprable as the golem dragon¡¯s. If the amethyst dragon found a chance to bring down the ship, then all of their efforts for the past month would have been for nothing!


    After chasing away this uninvited guest, the adept expedition army reorganized themselves and returned to the Capital of Eternity.


    The return of the army and the massive quantities of spoils they brought with them caused this cold city forged of steel to be a lively ce once again. The limping magical machine golem dragon was immediately sent into a workshop upon returning. Arge group of construction machines swarmed forward and started aprehensive condition check and maintenance run.


    The badly battered right leg became the main focus of the checks and maintenance. Many goblins and machines climbed all over the golem dragon¡¯s body to conduct repairs. Deafening hammering could be heard everywhere, while the blinding light of welding beams lit up the area.


    However, Gazlowe was upset. The magical goblin leader, Gonga, with his rough green hair, thick skin, and vicious appearance, refused to let any of the construction machines of the Capital enter the golem for maintenance.


    The only tasks that the construction robots of the Capital were allowed to perform were external maintenance. All the internal checks were done solely by the magical goblins.


    It made the Third Grade brain monster extremely dissatisfied.


    He had observed the battle of dragons from start to end, more focused and concentrated than any person or goblin. The might of the golem dragon enticed Gazlowe immensely and made his heart ache to no end.


    To think that such a powerful war machine hadnded in the hands of those useless and cowardly goblins. How could they, with their crude, lowly, and uncreative minds, ever possibly unleash the true might of the golem dragon?


    Gazlowe was confident that with his unstoppable mental powers, the golem dragon would be able to pin the Fourth Grade amethyst dragon to the ground and forever keep it captive.


    Unfortunately, with his rtionship with his human master, such a killing machine would never fall into his hands.


    Gazlowe knew very well what would happen if his master gave him this golem dragon. It would be an instant rebellion.


    With the Capital of Eternity as an unmoving outpost and a war machine as powerful as this golem dragon, Gazlowe could deal with the might of any dragon or dragonflight in Lance alone. If he didn¡¯t rebel then, he would be putting his name as a Third Grade brain monster to shame!


    Perhaps because of direct orders from Greem, the damned magical goblin not only refused to let any construction machine into the golem dragon, but even forbade all of the goblins from leaving the golem dragon.


    That cut off any possibility of Gazlowe using his mental powers to charm or possess the goblin technicians.


    Moreover, Greem did not stay for long after the checks on the golem dragon were finished. He immediately brought the army and the dragon back to the World of Adepts.


    These decisive actions caught Gazlowe entirely by surprise.


    He aborted some terrible thoughts of immediately rebelling, sieging the dragon, and killing all the Crimson adepts before he could even put them into action. It was a real shame.


    Gazlowe had thoughts of obstructing their return to the World of Adepts, but he couldn¡¯t help but hesitate when he reflected on the power they possessed.


    At this moment, the Crimson n had two Third Grade adepts, two Third Grade dragons, and a shocking number of adepts at theirmand. Even if the two forces were to break out into a fight within the Capital of Eternity, where he had the home ground advantage and an endless magical machine army, he still had no confidence in winning the battle against the calm andposed adept.


    If he failed to obtain the golem dragon during the fight and lost his Capital in the process, he would be in grave trouble. After all, the Crimson adepts could get up and leave for the World of Adepts, while he had to stay here.


    The reason the Capital of Eternity had been unbroken for the past few decades was due to its steel walls and countless magical machines. If anything were to happen to the Capital, the vengeful dragons would not sit still for it to rebuild.


    When that happened, Gazlowe would be facing a long and arduous life of wandering and hiding once more!

 Chapter 935 - Clan Glory

    Chapter 935 n Glory


    Greem let out a breath of relief when the pure white body of the White Tower was finally in sight.


    As the teleporting party was simply toorge, the teleportation room within the tower could not fit all of them. As such, the final teleportation destination was set as the massive teleportation za in front of White Tower.


    Even though Greem was confident that Gazlowe wouldn¡¯t attempt anything too impulsively, he still kept his guard up in case anything out of the ordinary happened.


    He understood the brain monster¡¯s personality far too well.


    Gazlowe had both the scheming nature and arrogance of a Third Grade brain monster, along with the cowardly and abject nature of a goblin.


    When massive benefit presented itself before him, he could abandon all the virtues of loyalty, principles, andpanionship without any hesitation. However, when something threatened his safety, he would begin to waver, regardless of how small the risk or howrge the chance of sess. In the end, he would let a brilliant opportunity slip between his fingers.


    That was the true nature of the Third Grade brain monster!


    It was his deep and cuttingprehension of Gazlowe that caused Greem to be so confident in Gazlowe¡¯s inaction. However, the Capital of Eternity was not a ce to linger. Greem was worried that some small things might trigger Gazlowe¡¯s irrepressible greed and optimism if they stayed for too long.


    As such, the n army did not stay at the Capital for too long and quickly returned to the n¡¯s outpost.


    When the massive expedition party appeared in the teleportation za, deafening cheers immediately rang out in front of White Tower.


    The sudden disappearance of such a massive group of n adepts and elite apprentices had already drawn the attention of individuals with malicious intentions.


    Everyrge-scale otherworldly hunt and exploration represented a tremendous and unpredictable danger to most adept ns. So many previously dominating and rising ns had abruptly fallen from grace simply because incidents in their otherworldly ventures had brought an enormous blow to the might of the n.


    When they saw the n expedition party sessfully return from the foreign ne, every adept and apprentice of the Crimson n felt an unconceble joy and excitement from the very depths of their hearts.


    Most of the n members had sessfully returned, which meant that the risk had disappeared and the only thing that was left was counting the loot.


    As the Mothership descended to the ground, rows of otherworldly ves in metal chains walked off the deck under the guard of the magical machines. These ves assessed their surroundings with expressions filled with shock, fear, and confusion.


    When they saw the looming tower stretching above the clouds and the adepts in their magical robes, they couldn¡¯t help but lower their heads and listlessly stepped into the tower, herded by the tall metal golems.


    There were ogres, muscr and tall withrge bellies, as well as nes of skulls and teeth hanging from their necks.


    Trolls of great stature, with developed muscles, slender and strong limbs, fire-red hair, and vicious fangs.


    Fearsome werewolves with brown fur, sharp ws, and powerful legs.


    Female centaurs whose lower half was the body of a horse, white and sturdy, and the upper half of a human female, their breasts wrapped with a thinyer of hide.


    Mountain giants that stood at seven meters tall, with rough yellow skin and terrifying brute force.


    ......


    ......


    All sorts of otherworldly ves of different sizes and species could be seen in the long line of ves. Most of them were tall and muscrborer ves, with the asional skilled and agile ves mixed amongst them.


    Meanwhile, the female ves mostly had shocking beauty, special techniques, or seductive figures. All of them drew the attention of the adept apprentices and caused them to mutter and talk amongst themselves.


    Inparison, the Crimson adepts were far moreposed. Their eyes wandered between the ves, asionally stopping on a certain one as they fell into deep thought. Most of their attention was concentrated on the ves that were suited as guards for themselves.


    After the ordinary nar natives had been walked into the tower, the more powerful creatures who had been locked with heavy shackles were walked off the ship. These were the ferocious and massive dragonborn warriors, the Dragonborn Cultists dressed in robes and radiating magical aura, or some especially fierce high-grade magical creatures.


    Most of these creatures were quality First or Second Grade goods. Some of them were even Third Grade magical creatures.


    They had been powerful lords in Lance that possessednds of their own and lived a rtively free life even under the rule of the dragons. Here, they had be unfortunate ves, stripped of all their freedom and could only wait in grim silence for the adepts to choose them.


    One day in the future, they would be branded with the mark of a ve and be forced to serve a powerful adept forever.


    However, no one would care for the thoughts of these otherworldly ves, nor empathize or sympathize with them.


    Such a conclusion was fated to happen over and over again from the day the adepts started to invade the nes of other races. Even the adepts themselves, who now ruled as the masters, would have to dejectedly ept their fate of envement if another powerful race ever conquered the World of Adepts.


    It was the inevitable conclusion of nar worlds expanding outward into the universe!


    The procession of ves continued.


    As therge and vicious dragons were brought out from the cabins, the Crimson n members that were gathered around the za all broke out in a tsunami of cheering and screaming.


    The atmosphere of the n was immediately ignited!


    Dragons. These were dragons!


    They were rulers, predators, and raiders that stood at the top of the massive food chain in every ne. They robbed and raided, taking over mountains and forests, ravaging and piging one intelligent race after the next, with no one being able to stop them in any manner.


    But now, they had be the spoils and prisoners of the Crimson n.


    Their meat would be served on the dining tables of the adepts, their blood turned into the food of blood adepts, their bones crafted into weapons, their spinal fluid mixed into potions. Their bodies would be taken apart by the adepts; every bone, tendon, rib, piece of flesh, and scale would be utilized to their utmost potential, bing resources that the adepts would fight over.


    It might be a disaster for the dragons, but it was a banquet and a buffet for the adepts!


    The spirits of the Crimson n adepts rose with the appearance of every dragon, bing even more excited and more uncontroble.


    Even n members who did not have the opportunity to participate in the distribution of such high-level resources cheered with all they had, inexplicably joyous and d.


    The sess of everyrge-scale hunt meant a growth in the n¡¯s power, and even they would be able to enjoy the boon that came with such growth.


    The appearance of Second Grade dragons after the First Grade dragons pushed the emotions of the n members to an extreme. It was a sea of cheering throughout the entirety of Icewind.


    Then, amid the waves of shouts and cries, the grand prize to be shown from the hunt was finally revealed.


    Guarded by four goblin chariots and a massive number of magical machines, a strange dragon with gleaming scales and a body over thirty meters in length was carted down from the ship. It had vicious horns, a majestic head, a massive, yet streamlined, body, and sharp and terrifying ws.


    The apprentice adepts held their breaths and silently muttered beneath their breaths.


    ¡°A Third Grade dragon.¡±


    ¡°Third Grade.¡±


    Only the more knowledgeable of the adepts could recognize that this was an exceedingly rare water dragon.


    This time, it was the adepts¡¯ turn to mutter amongst themselves.


    Some of the adepts who prided themselves on their vast reserve of knowledge moved their lips slightly and described all they knew of water dragons through magical messages. Adepts who were collecting high-grade water resources started to raise their eyebrows. It was clear that the appearance of this dragon moved them.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it yet. Thest thing toe out of the ship was a massive prison cell with a ck cloth draped over it, making it impossible to see the contents within. However, judging from the level of adepts guarding the cell, it was clear that the value of the prey within was far above the dead Third Grade water dragon.


    That was because the Crimson adepts saw the silhouette of the Crimson n leader, legendary Fire Adept Greem, among the group escorting the cell. Meanwhile, the little Fairy Helen, who always followed by Alice¡¯s side, was unexpectedly sitting on Greem¡¯s shoulder, her face full of worry and anxiety.


    A prey personally escorted by the legendary fire adept himself!


    The adepts couldn¡¯t help but be more curious as to the victim inside the metal cell.


    Unfortunately, the high-grade adepts of the n didn¡¯t seem to have any intention to answer their curiosity. They directly transported the metal cell to the upper levels of the tower.


    Adept Meryl stopped Greem at the entrance of the fourteenth floor.


    She was here to ask about the distribution of the spoils among the n for this war.


    Greem paused to give it some thought, all while ignoring the little fairy on his shoulder. Helen was making trouble here and there, clearly dissatisfied that he wasn¡¯t immediately saving Alice.


    ¡°Distribute it ording to the list we drew up on the way back! Reward all n members that participated in the battle of the Northern Wastnds with the highest level of contribution points. Mary will personally host the celebration banquet tonight, but I won¡¯t be present.¡±


    Meryl nodded over and over, noting down everything that Greem was telling her, before turning to leave.


    Naturally, the ones caged within the cell were the shadow dragon and Alice, both of whom were currently sealed. Though the two of them were sealed inside, it was hard to guarantee Alice wouldn¡¯t be hurt by the shadow dragon when the seal was released. As such, when and how to release the seal were both things that had to be appropriately nned ahead of time.


    Helen intended to have Greem invite a Fourth Grade adept and use their tremendous power to hold back the wild retaliation of the Third Grade shadow dragon as they saved Alice.


    Greem gave the issue some thought and came up with a different idea.


    However, while Greem sat alone in his room and nned the operation, an unexpected request for an audience took him by surprise.


    There weren¡¯t very many subordinates in the Crimson n who could directly contact Greem; this person was one of those special exceptions.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and finally decided to put Alice¡¯s matter aside for a while as he met with this special ¡®guest¡¯!

 Chapter 936 - Contract

    Chapter 936 Contract


    When he showed up at the meeting hall, the ¡®guest¡¯ was already waiting there.


    It was a woman.


    Her face was covered by a ck cloth mask, obscuring her facial features.


    The ck, skin-tight leather suit she wore wrapped her body tightly and emphasized all her curves; it was a pleasing sight to the eyes. She had draped a loose robe over her leather armor to fit her identity as an adept, but there was still no concealing that perfect figure.


    ¡°Miss Oliven, how has your time in White Tower been? Why is it that you wanted an audience with me?¡± Greem said gently with a smile on his face, not at all putting on the airs of a high-grade adept.


    Oliven twisted about on the couch in frustration at the sight of this calm andposed adept before her. She tried speaking a few times, but the words just wouldn¡¯te out.


    ¡°Greem...my lord.¡± Oliven¡¯s face was practically blood red after gritting her teeth and spitting out the word lord.


    This strange dragon devourer that was a guest member of the Crimson n clearly had too much to say to Greem, with absolutely no idea how to start. It was apparent that she had yet to get used to the difference in status between her and the male adept in front of her.


    In the past, she had only joined the Crimson n out of greed for easier ess to dragon resources. She was Second Grade then, as was the male adept before her. They had been of the same status and level. However, a few decades had passed, and now he had advanced to Third Grade while she was still a Second Grade.


    Even though Oliven already had the power of a peak Second Grade, she was still a Second Grade. She had no means ofparing to a Third Grade. For the first time, she felt an indescribable threat and pressure, and it came from this male adept that stood in front of her.


    It wasn¡¯t as if he was intentionally assaulting her with his aura. It was simply the result of the forcefield fluctuations of a high-grade adept caused by their tremendously powerful life energy and spiritual intensity.


    Oliven only felt a slight bit of difort near Greem¡¯s side. Low-grade adepts would probably feel an actual sense of pain as if they were sitting on a cushion of needles. Meanwhile, ordinary apprentice adepts would be at risk of death if they got too close to Greem.


    ¡°Oliven, did youe to look for me to be stuck in a daze?¡± Greem still had a gentle smile on his face, but the impatience in his brows and tone was more than obvious.


    Oliven had always kept a certain degree of distance away from the Crimson n. Even though she bore the name of a Crimson adept, she had rarely contributed her all to the n. As such, Greem¡¯s dissatisfaction over her behavior was also showing in his attitude.


    If it weren¡¯t out of consideration for their past ¡®connection¡¯ and Oliven¡¯s unique profession abilities, Greem wouldn¡¯t even have taken the time to meet her.


    Perhaps because she sensed Greem¡¯s impatience, Oliven put on a frustrated and troubled expression, before finally speaking, ¡°Greem...Lord Greem, I wish...I wish to have that Third Grade water dragon.¡±


    As expected, she was here for the water dragon.


    Greem could tell that Oliven had reached a bottleneck at peak Second Grade. Any further improvement required unique methods. The adepts could advance by using the knowledge passed down by their ancestors, but dragon devourers had to use the bloodline of the dragons if they wanted to advance.


    Demanding that Oliven hunt a Third Grade dragon on her own with her current ability was undoubtedly asking for too much.


    That was why Oliven couldn¡¯t help but get excited when she saw the n take down a Third Grade dragon. That said, suddenly bringing up such a request with her current rtionship to the Crimson n was a bit too abrupt.


    Greem chuckled coldly.


    ¡°Oliven, it¡¯s been a few decades since you joined the Crimson n. I wonder, what can you offer in exchange for this Third Grade water dragon?¡±


    ¡°Thirty...thirty thousand magical crystals, and...and two thousand contribution points.¡± Oliven stuttered.


    As a Second Grade dragon devourer who had spent a few decades in the n, this small amount of wealth was more than an indication of herck of active participation in n matters.


    ¡°Thirty thousand magical crystals and two thousand contribution points. Hehehe, Oliven, do you know the base price of this Third Grade water dragon?¡± The smile on Greem¡¯s face turned even colder, ¡°Its dragonsoul might have dispersed, but its base price is still well above two million magical crystals. With what little you have...¡±


    Perhaps knowing that her request was too extreme, Oliven gritted her teeth and said, ¡°Lord Greem, I know I have not been performing too well in the past few years. However, if you give me this water dragon and allow me to advance to Third Grade, I promise...I promise to be as obedient as Lady Mary. I will do anything you tell me to!¡±


    ¡°Anything I tell you to?¡± Greem raised an eyebrow.


    ¡°Anything you tell me! ¡°Oliven straightened her slender and tall body once more as she repeated with firm conviction.


    Greem chuckled, ¡°You do know that Mary and I have more than an ordinary rtionship. Can you do this as well? ¡±


    ¡°I can!¡± Oliven spoke with iron certainty, ¡°Anything she can do, I can do.¡±


    Greem smiled at the sight of Oliven, offering up her person. He extended a right hand and slowly moved it toward Oliven¡¯s heaving chest, wrapped under the leather suit.


    Oliven¡¯s body trembled as she gritted her teeth. However, she did not avoid Greem¡¯s touch and watched in anxiety as the male adept¡¯s hand got closer and closer to her breasts.


    Just as the two were about to make contact, Greem had a thought. His hand shifted directions, and he abruptly took off Oliven¡¯s mask, causing her to gasp softly.


    What a hideous face was hidden beneath that mask!


    Arge mouth that went across her entire cheek was opened slightly, revealing the white, sharp fangs within. The teeth were like daggers spread across her jaw, vicious and terrifying.


    Where the nose was supposed to be was just smooth flesh, with no sign of a nose.


    If the mask were not taken off, Oliven¡¯s eyebrows and face alone would make her an incredible human beauty. However, take away the mask, and the human beauty instantly became a terrifying monster with a face too horrifying to behold.


    Such a sight could not faze Greem after so many years of training.


    He had dissected plenty of magical creatures and humanoid nts. Every one of them was a monster amongst monsters and a magical creature among magical creatures. They were not only hideous but strange, weird, and possessed bizarre organs and disgusting bodily liquids.


    As such, Oliven¡¯s true face only surprised him slightly, rather than scaring him.


    Moreover, Greem could very clearly see that Oliven¡¯s appearance as a human had been fairly decent.


    However, this unique path of the dragon devourers to improve their abilities had caused some uncontroble mutation and corruption of her body. These changes could undoubtedly increase her lethality against dragons from all aspects, but it also unavoidably brought her further and further away from her human origins.


    It wasn¡¯t just Oliven. Even among the high-grade adepts of the World of Adepts, individuals who retained their human forms were a small minority. Most of the high-grade adepts had all sorts of monstrous and strange appearances.


    After all, the body of a human was too weak and frail. The upper limit of power that it could contain and endure was far, far too low. If a high-grade adept were too attached to his human body, then his basic power would be weaker than hispanion of the same grade who had undergone changes.


    It was a universal truth known in the World of Adepts!


    Once Greem was done looking at her face, Oliven put on her ck mask once again and covered her inhuman features.


    ¡°This is all I can offer you. However, I can sign a soul contract with you. As long as you give me the Third Grade water dragon, I will listen to everything you tell me after I advance to Third Grade!¡± With her greatest secret exposed, Oliven stopped holding back and seriously offered up her conditions.


    Trading a dead Third Grade water dragon for a possible Third Grade dragon devourer; it seemed like a fairly good deal.


    However, it would not be eptable if Oliven continued to behave as she had before, without putting in effort in her contributions!


    Greem waved his hand in the air without any hesitation and drew several fire runes of various shapes. These fire runes floated in the air between them, bumping into each other as they wandered about. Finally, they pieced together to form a strange magical contract.


    ¡°Take a look at this contract, and sign it if you think it¡¯s fair. Once you¡¯ve signed the contract, I will find you a suitable Third Grade dragon!¡± Greem said casually.


    He was an actual Third Grade adept now. Weaving a magical contract like this with a wave of his hands was a simple matter. This contract might seem simple, but it contained all sorts of magical knowledge he had obtained from other worlds. It had incredible soul-binding abilities. Thus, he did not need to worry about Oliven going against her word after advancing to Third Grade.


    Oliven gazed at the contract with anxious feelings. She did not recognize most of the fire runes here. However, wherever her eyesnded, the contents and details of the rune she looked upon would unfold like a book.


    There was no need to recognize the runes, nor to decipher them, as the information contained in each one flowed into her mind directly.


    The conditions of the contract were just as she had described. The Crimson n would provide her with a Third Grade dragon such that she may advance to Third Grade. Upon advancing to Third Grade, she would have to devote herself wholeheartedly to the service of the Crimson n for two hundred years.


    These conditions sounded harsh, but Oliven was overjoyed.


    She had been in the World of Adepts for so many years that she was well-acquainted with how the adepts did things.


    There would never again be a second adept n that would offer her such excellent and lenient conditions.


    It caused Oliven to be unbelievably d. She had already made up her mind to grit her teeth and ept any unreasonable condition that Greem would throw at her.


    After all, with her talent, her lifespan would be extended by a minimum of six to seven hundred years upon advancing to Third Grade. Taking out two hundred years from that to work for the Crimson n didn¡¯t seem all that uneptable!


    Oliven immediately cut her finger and left her soul brand on the magical contract.

 Chapter 937 - Successful Rescue

    Chapter 937 Sessful Rescue


    World of Adepts, White Tower.


    Fourteenth floor.


    While the adepts of the Crimson n were celebrating at the banquet on the lowest floor, the most powerful adepts of the n were gathered here, silently waiting for Greem¡¯s delegation of tasks.


    The metal cell had been transported here and had been ced in the center of a magical hall.


    It was arge, round hall.


    The insides were utterly empty, just the way casters liked it, and was so tall and wide that it was impressive.


    The tall ceiling was hidden in a patch of darkness, while a gentle yet bright light illuminated the space near the ground.


    Countless runic lines that resembled blood vessels extended all over the ground and the walls, seemingly chaotic and disorderly, yet hiding some profound and mysteriousw amongst them. Countless magical runes of various forms, patterns of different sizes, and words of multiple shapes weaved together, forming a mysterious yet incredibly vast runic light array.


    Greem stood tall before the metal cell, waving his hands and using his authority as the master of the tower to weave a mysterious three-dimensionalwork.


    Naturally, Greem himself could not aplish such a feat.


    However, with the assistance of the Chip, a task like this that demanded a tremendous number of calctions and effort waspleted in the blink of an eye.


    Under Greem¡¯s artistic control, strands of energy connected with the White Tower¡¯s energy system. All sorts of magical power surged through these circuits, overwhelming and unstoppable.


    The magical energy would cause countless unique and small magical marks to be born whenever they passed through a magical nexus. These magical marks would circle about in swarms, gathering into mysterious runes. These runes would then arrange themselves once more ording to a specific pattern and form hundreds of barrier spaces.


    These magical marks would then further merge, assimting perfectly through theyers of runes and barriers and connecting and supporting one another. In the end, the marks would connect all of the magic lines in the room, turning into one single entity than enveloped the hall, while connected with the massive arrays spread all over the tower itself.


    Mary, Arms, Iritina, Oliven, Snowlotus, the two blood knights, and three blood elves all watched Greem wave his hands with expressions of shock and admiration. For the first time, they experienced the might of a high-grade adept.


    If they were the ones who had to construct such an array, it would have taken them at least several weeks. Yet, their n leader had managed to build it in a mere hour, all by himself.


    It was simply unbelievable!


    Snowlotus was a bit better. Havinge from a major n of the Northern Witches, she could almost understand most of the content. The others had already given up on deciphering the contents of the array, having experienced headaches and dizziness just at the sight of it. They only knew that the aura of the array was getting stronger and more borate.


    The only one amongst them who could provide Greem with some degree of help was the elementium fairy, Helen.


    As such, Greem left the construction of most of the energy circuits and magical nodes to Helen, while he focused on the coreponents of the array.


    The most crucial aspect of this rescue operation was to deny the shadow dragon any time or opportunity to harm Alice. That was why Greem so patiently constructed this unusual sealing array.


    He had to release the seal to rescue Alice. However, releasing the seal also meant that the shadow dragon would regain his freedom.


    If a Third Grade shadow dragon went berserk with his strength within the tower, it would require the power of everyone here to keep him suppressed.


    That was also why Greem was treating this matter with such seriousness and solemnity!


    Greem and the Chip concocted this method of rescuing Alice. It was highly feasible, but it required the full cooperation of everyone present.


    ¡°You all remember what I told you earlier?¡± Greem once again looked at the subordinates gathered around him after he finished constructing the sealing array.


    Mary, Arms, and Iritina, the three primary forces in this operation, stood forward and nodded silently.


    Greem used his Spirit to check the array thoroughly. After confirming that there were no problems, he waved his hand and severed the energy system of the array within the metal cell.


    Ka ka ka!


    The metal cell trembled and shook violently as the flow of spacetime that had been sealed for so long once again returned to normal.


    Shadow Dragon An and Alice, whose consciousnesses and thoughts had been sealed at that very instant, ¡®woke up¡¯ at the same time. From their perspective, it was like taking a quick nap and waking after a brief moment.


    ck smoke rose around An, and his tremendous shadow power bound and constrained Alice¡¯s movements. His heavy w then smashed down toward Alice¡¯s head like a giant mountain.


    With his power and speed, saving Alice was nearly an impossible task!


    However, just as his ck w was about tond, an immaterial crimson silhouette flickered, and Alice vanished without a trace from the shroud of smoke.


    The wnded, and the smoke dispersed, but there was no sound of sttering blood or broken bones.


    Naturally, with his spiritual senses, An would not be tricked by the sight before him. His shadow power trembled, and he immediately dragged Mary out of hiding, despite her having escaped ten meters away with Alice.


    ¡°How dare you! Die!¡±


    Though An was confused at what was happening around him, he would never let a mere Third Grade weakling like this escape with his prey. An opened his mouth and abruptly let out a deafening dragon¡¯s roar. An overwhelming aura of might washed outward, instantly stunning Mary and Alice, bringing them to the brink of unconsciousness.


    An then extended his tail and swept forward, intending to exterminate these two annoying gnats in a single strike.


    However, just as his tailshed forward, two equally loud roars rang at close distance. Arms and Iritina shot forward, using their muscr bodies to block the shadow dragon¡¯s attacks.


    A thunder dragon and an emerald dragon?


    The two new opponents that had suddenly appeared befuddled An. Still, his tremendous Spirit scanned across the hall, and he instantly understood the situation he was in.


    He was no longer on the battlefield from before.


    Judging from the situation and the location, he was very likely trapped in the enemy¡¯sir.


    Backed into a corner, the shadow dragon immediately unleashed his most vicious and violent attacks. A sea of shadow substance surged from his body as if threatening to submerge the magical hall in an instant.


    An wasn¡¯t a fool either.


    He had immediately understood his situation after a single spiritual scan. Naturally, what was left was to use everything at hismand to break through the siege and escape.


    This entire space had been wholly locked and sealed by the enemy. Not only could he not sense the existence of space powers, but he also could not even detect the Shadow ne that he relied so heavily upon. An started to wildly corrode the barrier space with his shadow powers, even as he battled with the two dragon traitors lunging at him.


    As long as he could create a small hole in the space here, he would be able to use his immense shadow powers to escape into the Shadow ne.


    When that happened, even a Fourth Grade powerhouse would not be able to catch him in there.


    Unfortunately, all of his actions and thoughts were well within the Chip¡¯s predictions.


    In the few short seconds Arms and Iritina upied An, Oliven abruptly appeared at Mary¡¯s side. She used her sharp fingers to sever the rope-like shadow powers and dragged Mary and Alice out of the metal cell.


    In the blink of an eye, An, Arms, and Iritina were the only ones left in the metal cell.


    ¡°Arms, retreat now!¡±


    Greem controlled the sealing array and had it slowly close as he ordered the elementium magical machine to stand by the entrance to the cell.


    Iritina was the first to emerge from the cell.


    Though the fight onlysted mere moments, her emerald-green scales had turned much darker. Several parts of her body were shrouded in lingering ck smoke, causing her scales and flesh to sizzle.


    Meanwhile, Thunder Dragon Arms was crackling with lightning. Arcs of lightning and thunder shed with the roiling ck smoke, corroding and destroying one another.


    He had tried escaping the metal cell several times now, but Shadow Dragon An always obstructed him and forced him to continue fighting. Iritina became enraged at the sight of this and turned to charge back into the cell. However, Greem stopped her before she could do so.


    ¡°Don¡¯t go. Let the elementium magical machine do it!¡±


    Under Greem¡¯s orders, the towering machine stepped forward and extended its hands. Two thick and furious jets of fire instantly ignited the space within the cell.


    This attack was an indiscriminate st of fire!


    Shadow Dragon An wasn¡¯t the only one howling in agony. Even Arms was being scorched and burned terribly by the mes.


    With the shadow dragon forced back by the fire, Arms managed to stumble out of the cell. The elementium magical machine stood his ground at the entrance, pushing back the shadow dragon¡¯s charges over and over with its streams of fire.


    Thus, the massive sealing array within the metal cell was once again activated amidst the shadow dragon¡¯s cries of despairs. An was sessfully sealed once more.


    Greem and the others had possessed no way of dealing with the shadow dragon before this, as Alice was within the cell as well. Now that Alice had been rescued and the shadow dragon sealed once more, they had countless ways and methods of dealing with him.


    After sessfully sealing the dragon and having the elementium magical machine guard the cell, Greem finally had the chance to approach the three girls in the corner of the hall.


    Alice¡¯s Spirit and stamina were clearly at their limits after such a long period of imprisonment.


    She was crouching on the ground, her face pale and haggard.


    Snowlotus had already run over, cing Alice in her embrace as she fed her bottle after bottle of life potions.


    Meanwhile, the little fairy anxiously circled in the air.


    Though Mary had only moved for three short seconds, she had used her hypersensitive state, causing her Spirit condition to be in an even worse state than Alice. If it weren¡¯t for her blood subordinates quickly feeding her their own blood, she would probably have fallen unconscious on the spot.

 Chapter 938 - Great Dragon Lord

    Chapter 938 Great Dragon Lord


    Though there were some hups in the process, the result was a satisfactory one.


    Snowlotus brought Alice back to the Tower of Fate for rest and recovery after her rescue. Meanwhile, Mary had also recovered after enjoying her feast of blood. Even Arms and Iritina, who did most of the work earlier, were healing rapidly after a series of emergency treatments.


    Even though thebined might of everyone present was several times that of a desperate Third Grade dragon, it was still a tense and concerning situation.


    However, after this battle, everyone¡¯s attitude was significantly different from before.


    Back when Greem was still a Second Grade fire adept, the two Third Grade dragons and the Second Grade Oliven had only maintained a facade of obedience toward him. They did not give their all when working on the tasks delegated to them. The main reason for that being Greem¡¯sck of power tomand these powerful beings from other worlds.


    Now that he had sessfully be a Third Grade fire adept assisted by a Third Grade female vampire and an elementium magical machine, things were different. More importantly, he had under hismand a magical golem dragon that could fight a Fourth Grade dragon to a ¡®standstill.¡¯


    Under such practical considerations, the wavering loyalties of these individuals were finally consolidated. They started to consider obeying Greem¡¯s orders.


    In the end, the only reason Greem had managed to win the loyalty of these powerful individuals was because of his power!


    Irrefutable power!


    ¡°Oliven, you saw that shadow dragon earlier. How about it? Isn¡¯t it more suitable for you than the water dragon?¡± Greem turned his head and asked the female assassin.


    The mental flux Oliven was radiating started to tremble when she heard Greem¡¯s question.


    ¡°Are...you sure that you want to give me thispletely untouched shadow dragon? I...I guarantee you that I will sessfully advance to Third Grade and even obtain some powerful shadow-rted abilities!¡±


    ¡°Then, he is yours!¡± Greem had always been generous when it came to his subordinates.


    Arms and Iritina, who had turned into their human forms and were receiving treatment form the Crimson adepts, both nced at Oliven in disgust. At this moment, they finally understood the true identity of this assassin dressed in ck.


    Their racial instincts caused them to hate and resent Oliven¡¯s very existence from the depths of their soul. If it wasn¡¯t out of fear and consideration of Greem, they would probably have reverted to their dragon forms and sted this dragon devourer with their destructive breaths.


    However, even the two dragons couldn¡¯t help but be moved when they saw Greem¡¯s generosity in rewarding Oliven.


    ¡°Greem,¡± Arms hesitated for a moment, before stuttering as he said, ¡°This time...we...seemed to have caught quite a few...dragons ourselves.¡±


    Arms actually blushed when he said the words we, something he had rarely ever done.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Arms and Iritina had never been too concerned with the significant battles in Lance and had barely contributed to the fights. If Arms and Iritina had given their all during the battle at the Northern Wastnds, not a single one of the five attacking Third Grade dragons would have escaped alive.


    That was why Arms felt particrly guilty when ¡®negotiating¡¯ with Greem.


    The beautiful emerald dragon Iritina hastily shoved herpanion aside and stood forward when she saw his pathetic behavior.


    ¡°Lord Greem, we wish to ask for a small group of dragons to bolster our ranks. What do you think?¡±


    Greem narrowed his eyes and smiled casually.


    ¡°I seem to recall that you already have eight green dragons under you!¡±


    Iritina spoke dejectedly, ¡°They are only green dragons. Their power and bloodline can neverpare to pure-blood dragons. Such weak green dragons are often severely discriminated against in Lance!¡±


    Greem smiled. It seemed like bloodline was a very important matter, even amongst the dragons.


    Just as Iritina believed that there was no hope for negotiations and betrayed an expression of sadness, Greem suddenly spoke.


    ¡°Iritina, if you two suddenly gained a flight of pureblood dragons as your subordinates, you should be able to be great dragon lords, am I right? Especially with the talent you two possess!¡±


    The two dragons trembled, and Arms hurried forward to exin.


    ¡°Greem, don¡¯t overthink our intentions! The reason we are asking for those smaller dragons isn¡¯t to establish our own force, but...but because we cannot bear to see them ughtered while they are at such a young age.¡±


    Iritina¡¯s face had also turned pale white.


    ¡°No, no, no,¡± Greem smiled as he exined, ¡°I think the two of you misunderstood my aims! I¡¯m not worried about you having malicious intentions. I genuinely wish to raise you to the pedestal of a great dragon lord!¡±


    The two dragons were stunned, and they looked at Greem with expressions of disbelief.


    Iritina¡¯s breathing became heavy, and her face started to turn red with excitement.


    ¡°You...you want to...help us be...great dragon lords?¡± Arms asked in surprise.


    ¡°With your talents and abilities, being stuck here in the World of Adepts will not allow you to unleash your real power. Thus, if the two of you are willing, you are free to recruit subordinates amongst the First and Second Grade dragons caught during this expedition. Any dragon that is willing to submit to you and sign a contract of loyalty may return to Lance with you.¡±


    ¡°I believe, with the original eight dragons and a new batch of pureblood dragon subordinates, the two of you will be entirely qualified to im the title of great dragon lords amongst the Third Grade dragons, thereby bing rulers in one region of Lance.¡±


    Both of the dragons held their breaths as they repeated the fresh and boiling phrase of ¡®great dragon lord¡¯ with their hearts, over and over. The excitement and confusion in their hearts blended, making it increasingly harder to distinguish between the two emotions.


    The Crimson n had captured over three dozen dragons this time. They couldn¡¯t make any promises with the more established and developed Second Grade dragons. However, those small First Grade dragons were all fledglings that had juste of age and that had never experienced any danger. They only need to scare them a little before consoling them, and it was very likely to win them to their side.


    They probably only needed to walk around them in a circle in their dragon forms, and it would be enough to terrify most of those cowardly dragons into submission.


    Arms and Iritina¡¯s hearts were burning so fervently at the thought of the admiration and obedience of so many dragons that they could probably cook an egg already.


    ¡°Is this...real?¡± Arms could barely believe his ears.


    He then immediately started hissing in pain as Iritina pinched him on the waist.


    ¡°It seems like it¡¯s real!¡± Iritina finally nodded assuredly.


    ¡°I will not only allow you to take away some of the dragons but also...once you im a territory within Lance for yourselves, you may form an alliance with the Capital of Eternity and our Crimson n. You can also spread the news that any dragon lord that submits to us will no longer be victims of the Crimson n¡¯s attacks!¡±


    The eyes of the dragons lit up, and they couldn¡¯t help but lower their heads and think about Greem¡¯s suggestion.


    There were over ten thousand dragons in Lance.


    They were scattered across every corner of the ne. Apart from a small group that sought shelter beneath the massive wings of a mighty high-grade dragon, most of them were free dragons, unbound and unfettered by any obligations.


    Even those Fourth Grade dragon leadersmanded no more than one to two hundred direct subordinate dragons.


    Being able to gather a dozen dragons around him would already be a massive aplishment for a Third Grade dragon such as Arms. If...if everything Greem promised him was real, then Arms could already foresee himself properly establishing his im as a great dragon lord.


    A Third Grade great dragon lord whose authority and influence exceeded that of a Fourth Grade dragon.


    Arms licked his lips over and over, moved by no more than an immaterial phrase.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, leave Lance to me! I promise to raise a massive dragon army for you. If those little bastards don¡¯t listen to me, then I¡¯ll bring dragons along with me and beat them up.¡± Arms patted his chest and made a bold deration.


    Greem¡¯s lips moved slightly, as if he wasmunicating with someone far away with magic. A short momentter, he turned to Arms and said, ¡°You may go now. I have already spoken with Meryl. You two can go and make those dragons submit now!¡±


    Arms and Iritina could not be bothered with continuing their treatment. They were almost fighting to charge out of the magical hall.


    Mary sauntered over to Greem¡¯s side as she watched the two dragons hurry into the distance. She asked curiously, ¡°Why are you being so kind to these two dragons? Be careful they don¡¯t bite back once they¡¯ve grown!¡±


    ¡°Lance isn¡¯t stable at all,¡± Greem sighed inmentation, ¡°If the brain monster is allowed to continue growing, then I¡¯m concerned he may backstab us at a crucial moment in the future. As such, making enemies for the Capital of Eternity and giving them a rival is the best way to suppress their ambitions!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be worried about this issue.


    The Crimson n¡¯s foundations were still too weak. Even now, they had only conquered two lesser nes.


    The Goblin ne provided the Crimson n with arge number of metal ore reserves and goblins that acted as technicians. It was considered a low-level necking in resources. Meanwhile, Lance was the only resource ne in the Crimson n¡¯s grasp. Apart from basic ore materials and flora and fauna resources, their most attractive product was the dragon resources.


    One could even im that the dragon resources of Lance were what had sustained the Crimson n¡¯s rapid development today. If this resource site was cut off, the Crimson n would immediately run into an awkward situation where they ran out of momentum.


    As the n leader, Greem had no choice but to think ahead and start nning for the future of the n.


    A single tree could not make a forest!


    The Crimson n still possessed far too few nes.


    At the very least, the two lesser nes they currently had were not sufficient to sustain the grand ambitions and magnificent dreams that Greem held in his heart.


    Perhaps it was time for another round of expansion for the Crimson n!

 Chapter 939 - Black Wing Association

    Chapter 939 ck Wing Association


    In the end, as many as seventeen dragons chose to submit and follow after Arms.


    There were two Second Grade dragons and fifteen First Grade dragons.


    These dragons had lost a war and were abducted to the World of Adepts by the Adepts; they had already prepared themselves for death. The psychological impact of a dragon suddenly appearing and telling them they could return to Lance was immense.


    It wasn¡¯t just the inexperienced young dragons. Even the four Second Grade dragons couldn¡¯t help but be moved at the offer and struggled immensely with their decision.


    The first few dragons to surrender all followed behind Arms dejectedly after signing a contract and being released. It was apparent that their spirits had beenpletely broken. However, after Arms leaned by their ears and whispered, they immediately became much more excited and started to burn with will and determination once again.


    A few of the captive dragons that were closer could clearly hear their conversation. The damned evil thunder dragon was actually encouraging the young dragons to immediately head to theirs of the captured or dead dragons upon returning to Lance. They would most definitely make an unbelievable profit as long as they acted fast enough.


    The other captive dragons immediately started roaring and creating amotion.


    The very thought of them being torn up for their tendons, skinned for their hides, cut up for their bones, and sliced for their scales; every single part of them turned into materials for the adepts¡¯ rituals and experiments. That very thought caused the dragons to mourn in tragedy.


    The other dragons hesitated even more when they saw the first few dragons released from captivity and eager to return to Lance. A few initially stubborn dragons became resentful at the thought of their hoard being taken by these cowardly bastards after their tragic death in another ne!


    After thinking the offer over, they finally surrendered, reluctantly.


    ............


    Lance, the Capital of Eternity.


    The spatial flux radiating from the teleportation tower had yet to settle down before several muscr and massive dragons flew out of the teleportation hall. These giant creatures started to circle in the sky.


    The steel capital that had still been calm and orderly the previous moment immediately broke out into chaos the very next. All the nar natives that sought shelter in the Capital of Eternity hid within the buildings of steel as they looked at the dragons with looks of terror.


    The massive tower of the Capital of Eternity immediately shut all exits and entrances. ck gun barrels reached out and started to charge energy as fast as they could.


    Just as a battle was about to break out, a Third Grade thunder dragon with bright blue scales and a jade-green emerald dragon appeared in the skies.


    ¡°Lord Gazlowe, please do not open fire! These are all my subordinates. They can be considered a vassal dragon army of the Crimson n now.¡±


    An entrance in the center of the tower opened up, and the three-meter tall Gru walked out onto a wide tform under the protection of a group of magical machine warriors. He lifted his head, looked at the dragons flying in the air, and roared with his squid-like brain.


    ¡°Arms, what are you ying at? What dragon army are you speaking of? Why have I never heard of this?¡±


    ¡°Gru, you have no authority to question this matter. Go tell your main brain that from now on, I, Arms, am one of the most powerful great dragon lords of Lance. Have your magical machine warriors observe. Do not disturb or harass any of my subordinates. From now on, any dragon that wears the Crimson n emblem is one of ours. None of your subordinates or you are allowed to take a single step into their territory!¡±


    Having finished roaring, Arms beat his blue wings, leading the dragons into the sky and flying toward their temporary territory in the southwest.


    The furious and angry Gru was left on the spot alone.


    Once the dragonflight had left, Gru cursed and returned to the tower of steel. He got onto a floating metal disc and quickly arrived at the metal hall where his Third Grade main brain resided.


    Though the Third Grade brain monster was hidden in this well-guarded metal hall, he had a perfect grasp of everything happening in the Capital of Eternity. As such, Gru was immediately reprimanded upon stepping inside.


    ¡°You had best treat Arms with a more friendly attitude in the future. Can¡¯t you tell? They have already grown their wings. He is willingly bing a nail of that male adept, hammered into our ne of Lance.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! There¡¯s no way we could win such a spineless dragon to our side. Why don¡¯t we find a suitable opportunity and secretly kill him!¡± Gru was still roaring resentfully.


    ¡°Killing a Third Grade thunder dragon?¡± The massive, hill-sized brain floating in the giant ss vat was clearly a bit bigger than before, ¡°Unless you can get the Third Grade thunder dragon into this tower where I can personally suppress his Spirit, while you lead the magical machine warriors to snap off all his fangs and ws, it will be difficult. With our current reserve of military power, defeating him is easy, but killing him is near impossible.¡±


    ¡°Why...why?¡± Gru was still howling, ¡°Why can that male adept start a war against the dragonflight? Why can he fend off a Fourth Grade dragon, while we can only hide within this city of steel and extend our influence to the dragon territories around us at a snail¡¯s pace? What do weckpared to him?¡±


    Gazlowe fell silent.


    After a long pause, he finally spoke once again, his tone heavy and dull.


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter how many magical machine warriors we build, for there are only a group of warriors! What weck is a general that can hold his own and a mighty fighter that can dominate the battlefield. Without a general and a powerful fighter, we can only remain on the defense, with no means of going on the offensive. That is, perhaps, our most significant w!¡±


    Gru also fell silent.


    He, who had stepped on the battlefield multiple times, knew the situation very well. Though he had participated in most of the nar wars in Lance, he had always been hiding within the army, heavily protected by arge group of magical machines and Crimson adepts. In the end, he was, at best, an auxiliary force.


    His auxiliary powers were not sufficient to deal with a high-grade battlefield if the army wascking in sturdy meat shields and fire cannons like Greem, the elementium magical machine, and the magical golem dragon.


    As such, the Capital of Eternity could only start skirmishes when divorced from the power of the high-grade Crimson adepts, making some small profit off of the First and Second Grade dragons. Gru had no other method of dealing with a Third Grade dragon apart from holding his position and waiting for reinforcements.


    ¡°Big guy, maybe it is time for us to push forward with Project Titan!¡±


    ¡°Project Titan? Hmph! Do we have the ultrarge magic generator furnace required to activate the Iron Titan? Throughout the entire Capital of Eternity, this ultra magic generator furnace that I am attached to is the only thing that can barely activate the Iron Titan. If the Titan were to fight at full-force, it would be able to suck me dry within minutes.¡±


    ¡°If we throw in the furnace in me and the furnaces on the two Motherships?¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s still an energy insufficiency of 57%. It won¡¯t be enough to let the Iron Titan unleash its full power!¡±


    ¡°Cough.¡±Gru finally fell utterly silent.


    ............


    Lance started to be incredibly chaotic.


    A group of dragon robbers that had emerged from nowhere was traveling everywhere, robbing one dragon territory after another, oneir after another. They called themselves the ck Wing Association.


    Initially, these dragons that chose to rob their own kind had some degree of self-control. Their targets were only theirs and territories with no owners.


    However, after their first taste of sess, their swelling greed caused the members of the ck Wing Association to break into the territories andirs of actual dragons. They used their numbers to take down one dragon lord after another, sweeping clean their treasure hoards andnds.


    For a moment, the dragons of Lance were on high alert. None of them dared to keep their treasures and resources hidden within theirirs. Instead, they split them up into troves and hid them in multiple secret locations. This event undoubtedly represented a tremendous safety risk to the hoards of the dragons.


    Even some famous thieves and robbers throughout Lance became motivated and started to set their sights on the dragons¡¯ treasures.


    Conflict after conflict, robbery after robbery, all these caused the dragon lords a tremendous amount of work and frustrated them to no ends.


    No one knew who spread the news, but it was rumored that one only had to join the ck Wing Association and obtain a Crimson emblem, and their territories and treasure would be free from harassment.


    Dragon Lords without a leader and dragon lords who enjoyed secretly attacking others joined the ck Wing Association. This mysterious dragon organization unknowingly became a terrifying and massive entity!


    ............


    The World of Adepts. The Tower of Fate.


    Several witches were gathered in a mysterious room, whispering amongst themselves.


    Alice¡¯s body had basically recovered after a month¡¯s rest.


    Though the shadow energy within her body had beenpletely removed, her flesh and Spirit that had been corroded required a long time to recover slowly. It was a process that couldn¡¯t be rushed, making Alice¡¯s face appear pale and haggard still.


    ¡°Snowlotus, these are your rtives, so you introduce them, please!¡±


    Alice gently smiled as she looked at the two visiting witches.


    As a Fate Witch, Icdy Snowlotusughed slightly and gave a simple introduction, ¡°This is the owner of our n¡¯s Italil Tower, and this is my mother, Rena!¡±


    Snowlotus¡¯ mother, Rena?


    Alice moved her eyes onto that pretty and seductive witch and some vague Fate feedback appeared in her mind.


    Loss of contact from ne...rebel organization...teleportation array opened.


    It didn¡¯t take long for Alice to gain a basicprehension of the cause and effect of what had happened through all the vague information. Meanwhile, as she browsed through the news, an unexpected bit of detail caught her attention.


    They had that over there.


    Alice suddenly became overjoyed!

 Chapter 940 - The Chessboard of Fate

    Chapter 940 The Chessboard of Fate


    ¡°You want me to help the Deceit Witches? Why?¡±


    Greem asked in shock while inside a secret room of Fire Throne.


    Sitting across him was Alice, who had specially made the trip from the Northern Lands. Her expression was solemn as if she was concerned about something.


    ¡°Because these Deceit Witches are not good at fighting, because I am desperate to establish a good rtionship with the Deceit Witches, and because that ne is not that dangerous. Most of all, because there, I can find...¡± Alice took the initiative and sat in Greem¡¯sp, where she whispered a name in his ear.


    ¡°What, you can find...¡±


    Greem cried out in surprise, but his mouth was covered by Alice¡¯s hand before he could say the name.


    ¡°You can¡¯t say the name. Otherwise, unpredictable changes will ur in the whole event.¡±


    ¡°Why is it like this?¡± Greem shook his head in frustration, ¡°I keep having a bad omen as if this entire thing was explicitly constructed to deal with me.¡±


    Alice put on a slight smile.


    ¡°It¡¯s not to deal with you, but me!¡± She suddenly lifted a finger and pointed at the sky, ¡°That old hag can¡¯t sit still again. She¡¯s trying to set a trap for us.¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but speak resentfully, ¡°If we know it¡¯s her trap, why can¡¯t we just not step into it?¡±


    The smile on Alice¡¯s face turned bitter.


    ¡°Now that you know that it¡¯s a trap sheid down for us, do you think I should still step into it?¡±


    An expression of doubt and struggle appeared on Greem¡¯s face. He thought for a long while and finally gritted his teeth and frustration to say, ¡°If that can really be found there, I...I still want to go and give it a try.¡±


    He then let go of all his doubts, ¡°Why shouldn¡¯t we step into the trap? If she wants to lure us into a trap, she will have to throw out bait that can draw us in. Wouldn¡¯t it be the perfect scenario if we could steal her bait and avoid the hook all at the same time?¡±


    ¡°It won¡¯t be that easy!¡±Alice smiled bitterly, ¡°I hope you give this matter some proper thought; don¡¯t make a rash decision. Once you decide to join the fray, the trajectory of events will no longer be within our control. In that dangerous and isted environment, your every action and behavior will all affect the oue tremendously. Moreover, I won¡¯t be able to offer you much help.¡±


    Greem replied with a question, taking the matters just as seriously, ¡°Will there be opponents that I can¡¯t deal with there?¡±


    Alice shook her head, ¡°No. ording to the information I have obtained, there are only two Fourth Grades in that ne. One has been badly injured by the Deceit Witches and has gone missing, while the other is now leading troops and sieging the witches¡¯ outpost. As long as you are careful, your chances of running into them aren¡¯trge at all!¡±


    ¡°Will there be other hidden enemies? A Fourth Grade that has concealed his identity, for instance?¡±


    ¡°Hehe,¡± Aliceughed proudly, ¡°Don¡¯t look down on me. I might not be as powerful as that old hag, but I am still the Witch of Fate blessed by the world consciousness. If she had nted anything in that world, it would not have evaded my Fate premonitions!¡±


    Greem shook his head and sighed, ¡°You two are always fighting with each other, but what is it that you are striving for?¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s the Witch of Fate, and I am also the Witch of Fate. How could we know which of us can truly represent Fate if we do not cross swords? Moreover, the initiative in this conflict has always been in her hands. I have only ever responded to the call to battle!¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s so immensely powerful. Would it be that difficult for her to kill you?¡± Greem asked out of confusion.


    ¡°She is much more powerful than me at the moment, with a tremendous amount of influence and authority as well. As long as she is willing and pays the price to hire a Fourth Grade witch, she could easily push me to death. However, she cannot do that, for she is a Witch of Fate. If she wants to beat me¨Cif she wants to kill me¨Cshe will have to do it with the hand of Fate, not that of a bystander. Otherwise, she will not be able to endure the bacsh of the powers of Fate from her origin world!¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t understand!¡± Greem shook his head in a daze as he said, ¡°Why is it that you two women could make such a simple matter soplicated?¡±


    Alice smiled and used her hand to smooth the wrinkles on Greem¡¯s forehead.


    ¡°This is a matter of Fate Witches. You don¡¯t need to understand. All you need to know is that this is a board she hasid out, and you are the only piece in my hand. It¡¯s okay if we don¡¯t enter the game. She cannot do anything to us while we hide in the World of Adepts. However, once you decide the join the fray, you must be careful of any tricks she pulls. Remember, you must shatter this chessboard to pieces!¡±


    ¡°And there are benefits for you as well if I win?¡±


    ¡°Of course. You are the one I chose, after all! You winning means me winning. The feedback of the powers of Fate might even let me advance to Third Grade.¡±


    Greem drew in a breath of cold air, and his hands couldn¡¯t help but slowly inch up toward Alice¡¯s waist.


    ¡°No, no, this is uneptable. You get all the benefits, and I have to be theborer that does all the hard work? Tell me, how do you intend topensate me?¡± Having said that, Greem brought his mouth gently to Alice¡¯s ears and licked the smooth and white helix of her ear, all while he whispered, ¡°You haven¡¯t done those few positions I talked aboutst time. Make it up for me tonight, won¡¯t you?¡±


    Alice immediately turned red, all the way up her to her ears, and the room descended into an atmosphere of unbearable intimacy.


    ............


    Henvic ne.


    It was a lower ne that was in the process of intense conflict.


    Ever since the Deceit Witches had set their sights on Henvic ne and sessfully established an outpost and an adept¡¯s tower, there was no escaping their fate of being conquered and enved.


    Henvic was a small ne, and its magical density was only of the middle-lower sspared to most nar worlds. It was just a bit better than a low-magic ne like the Goblin ne. Though the passage of time had allowed for some Fourth Grade creatures to be born here, they were inferior to other high-magic nes, be it in terms of quality or quantity.


    Henvic might be small, but it had andmass nearly thirty percent that of the Continent of Adepts, along with dozens of kingdoms of various sizes. The dominant nation was a vast human kingdom known as Zambez. The only two Fourth Grade human powerhouses of Henvic belonged to this Zambez Empire.


    When the Deceit Witches invaded this ce, they constructed a forward base at a ce called the Dabyrie Hignds. They then seeded in erecting their adept¡¯s tower.


    Since then, the war between the witches and the natives had never ceased.


    The resources of Henvic ne were never plentiful, resulting in the ne not receiving any real attention from the Deceit Witches. As such, the witch stationed in Henvic¡¯s forward base was only a Third Grade Witch of Deceit.


    With the adept¡¯s tower, their army of powerful and ferocious voodoo beasts, a single Third Grade witch, and twenty intermediate and low-grade witches, they were enough to ensure the safety of the forward base. They had defeated the army of the Zambez Empire countless times and inflicted heavy losses upon them.


    Unfortunately, during one of the recent sieges, one of the two Fourth Grades of the Zambez Empire broke into the adept¡¯s tower with no regard for his life and destroyed the internar teleportation array. It was a vital strike against the forward base, causing the Deceit Witches to lose their reinforcements and be isted troops in a foreign ne.


    Though the Fourth Grade responsible for this predicament had been severely injured and forced to retreat from battle, the other Fourth Grade powerhouse led their troops to siege the base in an attempt to topple the tower.


    The situation at Henvic was extremely precarious!


    What made things worse was the fact that the high-grade members of the Deceit Witches were all held up in other nes and could not be mobilized. As the leader of the Deceit Witches, Angelina intended to send some powerful subordinates into Henvic and transport some of the most critical resources for repairing the teleportation array to the tower.


    At the moment, the person of choice was Second Grade Rena.


    After all, she was the majordomo of Henvic ne.


    Now, her inadequate management had caused two dozen of their witch sisters to be trapped in a foreign ne. She was obligated to personally right this wrong.


    However, as a schr witch that had spent her years infort and luxury, herbat prowess was insignificant. Even her power as a Second Grade was something that had been forcefully attained by means of her identity as the daughter of Fourth Grade n Leader Angelina.


    To save her own life, Rena searched for a way to find a reliable bodyguard for herself. Thus, through her rtionship with Icdy Snowlotus, she managed to contact Fate Witch Leader Alice.


    Alice couldn¡¯t seem to be bothered initially. However, she had unexpectedly discovered something in Henvic ne through her Fate premonitions. That, in turn, drew the attention of the Crimson n leader¨C the Third Grade legendary fire adept, Greem.


    There was a trace of inevitability amidst all these twists, turns, and coincidences!


    Naturally, Alice could smell the thick scent of Fate¡¯s interference throughout all this.


    That was why Alice immediately knew this was a game that her old opponent had set for her the moment she saw Witch Rena. Rena might not know anything at all, and might even believe that all this was a result of her decisions and coincidental incidents.


    However, Alice could faintly see an invisible hand silently manipting everything behind the scenes.


    There were no signs nor evidence, but she knew the opponent existed and was also silently watching her every move and decision!


    The next time, when Alice returned to the Tower of Fate to inform the anxiously waiting Rena of her sessful recruit of Greem, Rena couldn¡¯t help but break out into an expression of joy and surprise.


    In all honesty, she hadn¡¯t held high hopes in her journey here.


    At the very best, she had been hoping to hire the legendary Bug Adept Billis and, if Snowlotus held enough sway, even Third Grade Bloody Queen Mary.


    However, the one that would be joining here was the powerful Third Grade fire adept, the legendary n leader of the Crimson n. How could it not make her overjoyed!


    After agreeing on a time and location, Witch Rena and the apanying master of Italil Tower turned to leave.


    Alice could faintly hear the unconceble and triumphantugh in the air!


    ¡°Hmph! The game has just begun. We will see how it goes!¡±


    Aliceughed just as coldly.

 Chapter 941 - Forceful Entrance

    Chapter 941 Forceful Entrance


    Year 683, Month 6, Day 11 of the War God Calendar.


    It was an iparably peaceful twilight.


    The sky above a primal forest near the east coast was a light purple. The Continent of Henvic was also gradually going quiet after a day of noise andmotion.


    However, during this moment of peace and quiet as the birds went home, the horizon lit up once again.


    A strange crackling sound filled the air as the sky turned bright red as if a crimson torch had stabbed it. An endless sea of fire could be seen everywhere.


    The rift in the sky grewrger andrger as three insignificant ck dots flew out from the shadows of the mes, blown about by the ravaging winds of space. They then turned into three ming meteors and crashed in different corners of this world.


    The mes in the sky continued to burn as the air trembled and quaked.


    Greem was caught in a violent space storm, spinning wildly like a top that was continually beingshed by a whip, his body rolling through the air uncontrobly.


    One moment he was facing up, and the next, he was facing down.


    The whole world rotated violently in front of him as the sky and earth switched positions over and over again. Even with his Physique, Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel dizzy and nauseous.


    The ground quickly flew by beneath his feet as mountains and rivers appeared in his sight, only to vanish past the horizon before he could see them clearly. Greem turned into a red meteor, crashing through the clouds and mming into the ground with a long crimson tail dragging through the sky.


    If it weren¡¯t for his me barrier protecting him from the corrosion of the space storm, he would have been reduced to dust when he traveled through the space rift. It wouldn¡¯t have made a difference if his body was made of adamantium.


    A Third Grade adept!


    It was his tremendous Physique as a Third Grade adept that allowed him to endure these inhumane tortures and crash toward the quickly approaching ground.


    Boom!


    A loud and rumbling explosion rang out. A vast stretch of the forest was destroyed, and dust flew up into the air.


    A series of towering ancient trees slowly fell amidst the sound of cracking wood. They then started burning intensely from the fires falling from above. A ferocious and tall me giant rose from a pitch-ck crater at the end of this long, clear path of mes. The giant slowly assessed its surroundings.


    A moment before he crashed, Greem had transformed into a me giant, just barely avoiding the damage that the violent crash would have done to his body of flesh and bones. He looked around him and realized this waspletely foreign territory. It wasn¡¯t even a matter of where this was. He had no means of determining the cardinal directions.


    A cold and sinister light gleamed in Greem¡¯s burning eyes when he lifted his head and looked at the ck trail left by his crash.


    Hmph! That old hag had prepared something to take him down a notch the moment he entered Henvic.


    Under usual circumstances, he and the other two Deceit Witches would have secretly snuck into Henvic through a spacetime rift. It would have been much better than their current situation in terms of both safety and stealth.


    However, an unexpected space storm had disrupted their ns of sneaking into the ne while also hurling all three of them to different regions of Henvic.


    In the past, Greem would have only pinned this on his bad luck. However, now, he could clearly sense that the world itself was cursing him tremendously with vicious, malicious intent. Even the energy aura on him was shrinking and shriveling at a rate visible to the naked eye.


    This world does not like me!


    Greem sighed resentfully.


    No nar world would like an uninvited invader, particrly when this invader possessed a nar consciousness brand on him that filled it with extreme disgust.


    The bright yellow mes slowly extinguished. Greem had no choice but to revert from his body of mes due to the suppression of the ne.


    The other fires in the forest quickly died out, and the mountain winds blew across the ce.


    Greem felt an unexinable chill as the cold winds caressed his naked body.


    His original clothing had all been destroyed by the mes. He had no choice but to take out a new set of traveler¡¯s clothes from his storage ring. By the time he was done dressing, a low roar had rung out from the forest as a massive gray bear emerged from within.


    The bear immediately roared at Greem upon appearing. It crouched down and began a fierce and heavy charge at him.


    It had arge body, brown and gray hair, a low roar, and arge, slightly, opened mouth. However, what drew most of Greem¡¯s attention was still its bloodshot eyes.


    Hmph! It was just a beast that was driven by the instincts of the nar consciousness!


    If it still had intelligence, it would never have been as foolish as tounch an attack against a Third Grade adept. It was only when the instincts and impulse of the nar consciousness had obscured its original awareness that it would lose its sense for danger as a beast andmit to a suicidal act like this.


    Greem let out a cold grunt and raised his left hand. Arge amount of fire elementium quickly gathered in his palm, forming a red elementium fireball.


    ¡°Hm...¡± Greem let out a curious sound. He couldn¡¯t help but shift his attention to the fireball in his hand.


    With his might as a Third Grade adept, even an elementium fireball he casually created should be over three hundred points in power. Moreover, the elementium fireball could be enhanced with additional effects such as fire poison and Coldme ording to his will.


    Greem could clearly see that the elementium fireball in his hands only had one hundred and thirty points of power. It was only at the level of a mere First Grade elite adept.


    Dammit, why was the nar suppression here so intense?


    While Greem was in a daze, the gray bear had arrived near him.


    Those bloodshot eyes, that deafening roar, those sharp teeth; it was right in front of him!


    ¡°Move!¡±


    There was no time to hurl the elementium fireball any more. Greem shouted as he made a fist with his left hand and punched the bear square in the jaw.


    The sound of snapping bones rang out as this four-hundred-kilogram-heavy berserk bear was blown away like a sandbag struck by a giant. It crashed through countless bushes and felled two giant trees before finallying to a stop.


    Greem threw the fireball in his right hand and caused it to erupt into a giant ball of mes on the body of the bear.


    The smell of burnt hair filled the air, mixed with the faint smell of cooked meat.


    ¡°Chip, what¡¯s the situation on the self-assessment?¡±


    [Beep. Self-assessmentplete. Host¡¯s current bodily attribute are as follows:


    [Strength: 18+2 (12+2) | Physique 21+1 (10+1) | Agility 11+1 (6+1) | Spirit 32+4 (12+4).


    [Note: Attributes in brackets are the highest amount of power that the host can currently unleash.]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air when he saw such numbers.


    Didn¡¯t that mean he could only unleash the power of an elite First Grade adept at the moment?


    It was fortunate that he had never given up on the cultivation of his body¡¯s basic attributes over these years. Though his attributes had been shed in half, hisbined might was still not a force to be underestimated. At the very least, he was still not an entity that a gray bear with seven points of Strength and eight points of Physique could hope topare to.


    It was because his Strength was an entire seven points higher than the bear that he could create such an outstanding knockback effect.


    In the end, Greem was a Third Grade adept. Even without his terrifying fire spells, his tremendous Strength and Physique alone would be enough for him to go unchallenged in this primal forest without too many wild, magical creatures.


    Perhaps intimidated by Greem¡¯s ughter of the bear, the sound of fleeing beasts could be heard all over the forest, rustling the leaves as they fled. Not a single creature dared to remain close to Greem any longer.


    ¡°Chip, how is the deciphering of this world¡¯s narwsing along?¡± Greem asked with a frown.


    As a Third Grade adept, he was feeling incredibly frustrated and ufortable at having lost most of his power so abruptly.


    [narw deciphering has begun. Current deciphering progress is 1%. Estimated time remaining: 107 hours, 33 minutes, 24 seconds.]


    A hundred and seven hours? Given the length of this ne¡¯s night and day, it was no more than four days. He should be able to unleash eighty percent of his power by then.


    As for one hundred percent? That was something he couldn¡¯t even dream about.


    This ce was a foreign ne, after all. The environment and magical density of the ne were only simr to the World of Adepts, not identical. Being able to perform at eighty percent of his usual capacity was already making full use of the Chip¡¯s abilities.


    Elementium adepts without the assistance of the Chip would be lucky to be able to use sixty percent of their total power. That was the main reason why most adepts viewed foreign ne invasions as the most dangerous task out there.


    They would be leaving a familiar environment, unprotected by an adept¡¯s tower or voodoo beast, while their power was cut by nearly half. Even small fry that they could eliminate with a single turn of their palm would be incredible opponents now. If they ran into an enemy of the same grade, it would be difficult to guarantee their own survival.


    That was why no adept enjoyed such isted ventures behind enemy lines unless absolutely necessary!


    Greem calmed himself down and checked his equipment. It was then that he remembered the two witches that had snuck into Henvic along with him. One of them was a Second Grade, and the other was a Third Grade. They seemed to have been separated by the space storm as well and whisked to some unknown corner of this world.


    Naturally, it was impossible to die with their abilities.


    The problem was that the essential item for this trip¨Cthe core for the internar teleportation array¨Cwas still on the Second Grade witch. If anything were to happen to her, his n to return to the World of Adepts would be toast.


    It was best to meet up with them as soon as possible.


    Having made his decision, Greem bent down and picked up a handful of ck dirt from the ground. He then silently chanted a profound spell under his breath.


    It took several minutes for Greem to sessfully form a magical spirit with no sentience and consciousness of its own from the dirt.


    The magical spirit floated before Greem, with a phantasmal human face formed out of faint white smoke. The face had no expression and silently awaited Greem¡¯s question.


    ¡°Tell me, in which direction lies the closest human city?¡±


    The white smoke turned into a small arrow and pointed in a specific direction. It then silently dispersed before Greem could ask a second question.


    Greem shook his head with a bitter smile before running in the direction pointed out by the spirit.

 Chapter 942 - The Unfortunate Blade Princess

    Chapter 942 The Unfortunate de Princess


    The World of Adepts, the Tower of Fate.


    The magical light radiating from the astrology ritual at the top of the tower was just as blinding and enchanting as ever in the night sky.


    The entire adept¡¯s tower shimmered with prismatic light. From a distance, the whole structure looked like a seductive beauty dressed in a formal dress, making for an unforgettable sight.


    Meanwhile, a solitary wooden table sat alone at the top of the tower, where the astrology rituals were typically held.


    Silky ck velvet draped over the surface of the table, hiding its legs. A smooth magical mirror had been ced on the table, and some tarot cards in used condition were scattered before it.


    Alice sat silently at the table, her gaze fixed upon the reflection in the mirror.


    The astrology hall wasn¡¯t dim, but Alice¡¯s appearance in the magic mirror was hazy and obscure. Moreover, when Alice extended a hand to caress the tarot cards facing up on the table, the reflection in the mirror remained unmoving, only staring coldly at her through the thin ss.


    ¡°I¡¯m older than you, so it wouldn¡¯t be excessive for you to call me ¡®sister,¡¯ would it?¡± The entire astrology hall was empty apart from Alice herself. Even Helen was nowhere to be seen. Yet, Alice was silently whispering to herself like a mental patient.


    ¡°Incredible moves, sister! You managed to split them up at the very start of the show. It seems you have a series of other ns to follow it up, as well. Why don¡¯t I try and guess who you are going to send out for them next?¡±


    The reflection in the mirror did not move, but the pretty eyes on the hazy face appeared to be wise and calm. Still, it was perhaps too calm, so much so that it seemed to be cold and merciless.


    Alice casually drew a tarot card from the deck and ced it in front of the mirror. The card¡¯s face was a continually shifting silhouette, making it hard to discern its contents.


    The look of the reflection in the mirror fluctuated, betraying a faint sense of mockery.


    A mere Second Grade junior of hers dared to challenge a Great Witch like herself with astrology?


    It was the greatest joke in the world!


    Alice wouldn¡¯t even have the opportunity to see the face of the card with her power, let alone pry into her future ns.


    Alice was not dejected at all. She swiftly grabbed the Staff of Divination at her side and lightly tapped the tarot card as she mumbled, ¡°Who cares what you are!? I will just curse you with the worst possible luck!¡±


    Bright, magical light shimmered from the Staff of Divination, gathering into a torrent of Fate that surged into the card. The powers of Fate then transformed into a set of mysterious shackles of Fate, sealing the entire card.


    The ck shape in the mirror finally moved. She lifted her head and nced at Alice coldly before letting out a cold snort as the mirror faded to ck.


    The mental connection between the two Fate Witches was abruptly severed!


    ............


    A small ck hole slowly opened somewhere in the vast primal forest.


    de Princess Katherine carefully avoided a small space shard and finally arrived at her destination after much difficulty¨C the ne of Henvic.


    Yet, just as she stepped out of the ck hole, the massive nar consciousness crushed down upon her, forcefully pushing her power from peak Third Grade to peak First Grade.


    It was a demotion of two whole grade levels.


    The sudden disappearance of her power, and her badly exhausted Spirit, caused her to trip on a vine on the ground and fall t on her face. Just as coincidentally, there was a fresh, steaming pile of animal feces in front of her. She crashed right into it,pletely unprepared. Her entire upper body was buried in the filth.


    There was soft popping sound as Katherine plucked herself out of the pile of shit with some difficulty. An unbearable stink lingered around her nose. The immensely infuriated Katherine was just about to let out a scream, when she lifted her head and saw a massive behind, along with the strange dragon head of a creature peeking out from the side.


    The two looked at each other, both stunned by this horrific sight!


    As the tyrant of this stretch of the forest, Tyrannosaurus King Mosh had never expected there to be another living being that dared to disturb him while he was relieving himself, much less with such a strange method as emerging from a ck spatial wormhole.


    A spatial wormhole? An otherworldly invader?


    Meanwhile, de Princess Katherine, who had emerged from the wormhole after traversing space with much difficulty, had also never expected the old hag to open the exit of the wormhole right at...at the toilet of a giant magical beast.


    The two stared at each other, just like that, while slimy and wet...shit was still trickling down Katherine¡¯s entire face.


    It seemed like King Mosh¡¯s stomach wasn¡¯t doing well these few days. It was clear he had eaten something difficult to digest.


    A sh of anger appeared on Katherine¡¯s face beneath her metal mask, and her shing, red mechanical eye gleamed with a cold light. Five metallic appendages shot out of her modified body, and the metal des at their tips started to spin and roar wildly.


    However, before the berserk Katherine could begin her attack, the shocked tyrannosaurus king shivered. Its massive asshole quivered as another st of watery shit showered Katherine¡¯s entire body.


    There was a deadly silence in the forest.


    A terrifying scream that could rend the heavens broke out, apanied by the dull sound of metallic des slicing against flesh and bone. That was then followed by the wild roars and howls of the tyrannosaurus king.


    A short momentter, the tyrannosaurus king¡¯s mountainous body copsed in the woods. A small and slender form held his giant head in her hands as she slowly walked out of the forest.


    Finally, the sound of choking and vomiting rang out from a patch of bushes in the distance.


    ............


    Lakeside Town.


    It was a human town that sat on the west coast of Silentwater Lake.


    Silentwater Lake was a deep, vastke. The water was clean, the seaweeds plentiful, and the temperature perfect for life, making for a ce teeming with marine life. Most famous among them was the spotted sunfish, a fish whose meat was plentiful, with a smooth texture. This fish made up a sizeable majority of the trades between merchants of other cities and the fishermen of the town.


    The surface area of Silentwater Lake was massive and took up over one-sixth of thend of the Cedrac mountain area. From Lakeside Town in the west, to the Tower of Ilgr in the east, theke stretched across the entirety of the Cedrac Mountains. The shape of it was like a dragon crouching upon thend, its wings folded against its back.


    As this was a neutral region, the mountain areas around it were rife with danger.


    Wolfspiders lurked to the east, as terrifying orc tribes ruled in the north, and jackals and wolves stalked the forest. Dozens of people in Lakeside Town died every year due to the invasions of beasts and orcs. For a small border town with a poption of no more than two thousand, this was an incredibly dangerous environment.


    The mayor of the town was a human man over the age of fifty. His name was Gandas, a higher knight with a fiery personality. A tall stone fortress had been constructed at the edge of the town with one hundred and fifty imperial warriors living within. Theirmander was also a powerful higher knight.


    The power system of Henvic was more inclined toward the profession of holy knights. It was somewhat simr to the Knight¡¯s ne that Greem had once invaded. However, unlike the Knight¡¯s ne, where magical power was viewed with hostility and hatred, the natives of Henvic preferred research on thebination of magical powers and warrior techniques.


    Their faith was also a simple one. It was a primal worship of holy light, without any specific deity to which the religion belonged.


    One could say that the faith of Henvic ne was still weak and incapable of supporting the existence of even the weakest of gods!


    However, two powerful Fourth Grade holy knights existed within Henvic ne.


    If either of them were fortunate enough to advance to Fifth Grade, they would naturally be able to gather the holy light faith of the entirety of the ne, thereby bing a great god.


    However, there was no matured power system or avable prior experience for reference in such a primal and primitive ne. As such, the two Fourth Grade holy knights were relying entirely on personal umtion and luck to take that one crucial step forward.


    Still, it was more than evident that luck was the primary factor here!


    The grading system of the holy knight profession in Henvic waspletely different from the adepts. They could roughly be split into: Trainee Knight¡ªKnight¡ªIron Knight¡ªSilver Knight¡ªGold Knight¡ªHoly Knight.


    The two higher knights of Lakeside Town were only First Grade iron knights.


    Greem couldpletely ignore such a force.


    When it came to race, the humans of the Zambez Empire were not too different from the humans of the World of Adepts. They had tall and muscr bodies with short brown hair and were often seen wearing light x robes of various colors.


    The ss oppression of Henvic ne was not severe. At the very least, the rulers of Zambez still allowed ordinary civilians to wear colorful clothes. In the World of Adepts, civilians could only wear gray.


    Any individual that dared to step out of line and wear the colors of a noble would be imprisoned by sheriffs and guards where they would be beaten up.


    To that extent, life in Zambez Empire was rtively honest and free!


    In a more unpopted corner of Lakeside Town, Greem used magic to enchant a woman that hade to fetch water. He then extracted societal information on the Zambez Empire along with theirnguage from her mind. It was then that he took out a ck traveler¡¯s cloak to cover his body and slowly walked along the small path toward this scenic town.

 Chapter 943 - Blade Princess Katherine

    Chapter 943 de Princess Katherine


    A sturdy and beautiful stone bridge that stretched across Silentwater Lake split the town into east and west. The only tavern in town was located on the east coast of theke.


    It was early in the morning. Though the tavern was already open, there weren¡¯t many guests yet.


    Thus, when Greem stepped into the tavern wrapped in his ck cloak, no one took notice at all. Even Ol¡¯ Willy, who was yawning as he wiped down the counter, paid no heed after the first nce.


    Greem might have hidden most of his body and face with the cloak, but one could tell he was a human from his exposed hands and chin.


    Adventurers and mercenaries like this were amon sight in a border region like Lakeside Town.


    Both the savage werewolves of the forest and the orcs of the north had handsome bounties in the Zambez Empire, thereby attracting many hunters who overestimated their abilities. These adventurers were frequent guests of the tavern, and Ol¡¯ Willy was more than familiar with their kind and how they dressed.


    ¡°You¡¯re an unfamiliar face. You just arrive in Lakeside Town?¡± Ol¡¯ Willy quickly poured a mug of Thunderbeer and slid it down the counter to the man in the ck cloak, ¡°This one¡¯s on me!¡±


    Greem took down his hood and put on a bright, gentle smile as he raised the mug and cheered, ¡°Thank you! Cheers to your health!¡±


    Fluent and local Zambezian came out of Greem¡¯s mouth when he spoke.


    Ol¡¯ Willy couldn¡¯t help but be stunned for a moment when he saw the young man¡¯s long crimson hair, white skin, tall nose, and ck eyes. He scratched his head as he said, ¡°Are you from the north of the Empire? We don¡¯t often see people that look like you over here!¡±


    Greem smiled and didn¡¯t answer the question. He simply ordered some stew and started eating in the corner of the tavern.


    While Greem was eating and thinking about his next step forward, amotion came from the distance, apanied by the loud sound of warning bells.


    ¡°Goddamit! It must be those beholders again.¡± Ol¡¯ Willy cursed under his breath as he walked to the door and looked in the direction of the stone bridge.


    He was instantly stunned with shock.


    The stone fortress on the other end of the stone bridge was not only in mes and smoking, but was ring with the sound of warning bells. All the civilians of Lakeside Town emerged from their homes and looked at the stone fortress in the distance with concerned and worried faces.


    The stone fortress was the only military facility outside of town. One hundred and fifty imperial soldiers lived within, ensuring the safety of the town throughout the year.


    However, smoke signals were now rising from the fortress. That was not a good sign.


    Town Mayor Gandas hastily rushed out of the town hall. He led two of his subordinates and ran toward the stone fortress, all while shouting at Ol¡¯ Willy.


    ¡°Ol¡¯ Will, stop staring. Hurry up and gather all the young people in the town and have them wait for orders. I will lead some people to check out the situation!¡±


    Having said that, he left in a hurry.


    Ol¡¯ Willy hesitated for a moment and shivered when he turned back.


    The young man from earlier was standing behind him all of a sudden, lifting his head and gazing at the smoke in the distance.


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, young man, but I¡¯ll have to close my tavern for the moment. If you really are an adventurer, then please do stay and help our Lakeside Town. I am anxious that the enemy this time will be extremely dangerous.¡±


    Greempletely ignored this old man with his barrel-like physique. Instead, his eyes were fixed on the distance.


    Elementium fluctuations.


    Greem could sense an intense elementium fluxing from the distance where the smoke rose. There was a faint feeling of something familiar.


    ording to Greem¡¯s understandings, casters did not exist in significant numbers in Henvic ne. Moreover, this elementium flux seemed discordant with the power system of this ne, seemingly as if...it was the magic of an adept.


    Greem narrowed his eyes.


    He had clearly seen that the Deceit Witches had crashed in twopletely different directions while they were traversing the spatial rift; they couldn¡¯t have hurried over in such a short time to meet with him. That was why Greem felt no sense of intimacy from this unexpectedly familiar flux of power. Instead, he felt a bad omen.


    Friend or foe? A coincidental crossing of paths, or someone headed straight for him?


    Greem turned, left the tavern without hesitation, and sprinted out of town away from the direction of the smoke.


    Ol¡¯ Willy could only shake his head and sigh when he saw this. He quickly moved his fat body down the streets to gather the young folks.


    There were over two thousand people in the town. Apart from the old, the sickly, and the young, he could still easily pull together a group of seven to eight hundred young men. They didn¡¯t know the situation outside of town either. They could only hold clubs, pitchforks, and torches in their hands as they blockaded the bridge and waited for news with bated breath.


    Dawn came, and the gravel road leading to the stone fortress was now engulfed in ayer of light mist, making it difficult to see into the distance.


    All of a sudden, a pained cry came from the distance as a stumbling figure charged onto the bridge with a torch in hand.


    ¡°It¡¯s York.¡±


    ¡°Go check it out. It¡¯s York. He went with the mayor earlier.¡±


    Some of the townspeople had sharp eyes and quickly recognized the man who was hastily running back toward them.


    ¡°York, what happened at the stone fortress?¡± A muscr man emerged from the crowd and asked loudly.


    ¡°Dead, dead...they are all dead. The mayor...¡± York exasperated as he stumbled forward.


    A sharp whistling sound suddenly rang out from within the mist.


    A strange disc-shaped de flew out, wrapping around York¡¯s neck before it flew back into the fog.


    York¡¯s body froze as the head on his neck fell to the ground before rolling into the crowd.


    The crowd stepped back from the head, their faces green from shock and fear. Shouts and screams started to ring out throughout the crowd.


    A small and slender silhouette slowly appeared from the mist. Five or six strange appendages waved around her.


    It was a strange woman that walked out of the mist, half human and half machine. She wore fine and fancy ckbat armor. Half of her skin and face were still human, but the other half had been reced with strange silver metal.


    The most striking feature on the cold, hard lines of her faces was the pair of glowing red mechanical eyes.


    ¡°She¡¯s...she¡¯s from the other world. She¡¯s a witch!¡± The experienced Ol¡¯ Willy stepped backward in terror, his voice sharp enough to shatter the eardrums of the people around him.


    A witch? She¡¯s a witch?


    This horrifying news instantly terrified the townspeople to their core.


    Otherworldly witches had invaded Henvic ne. That was news that every citizen of the Zambez Empire knew. However, the holy knights of the Empire had already surrounded the witches at Dabyrie Hignds. It was said that they had almost exterminated everyst one of them.


    How was it possible for them to appear here, at the northernmost end of the Empire in Lakeside Town?


    Several of the more cowardly townsfolk immediately turned to run. However, the half-machine witch let out a shriek as four terrifying disc-des instantly flew out and cut them in half.


    Their remains copsed to the ground, the thick scent of blood and the frightening gore causing many of the civilians to pass out directly.


    ¡°Stand there. No one move!¡± de Princess Katherine casually walked forward as she threatened loudly, ¡°Anyone runs again, and you will end up like them.¡±


    All of the civilians retreated to the sides of the stone bridge and made a wide path for the witch.


    ¡°I am searching for a person. If any of you can tell me his location, I can spare you your life.¡±


    de Princess Katherine took out a crystal ball and activated it with her magical power, projecting the image of a tall and handsome young man into the air. Judging by the facial features, the garb, and the physique, there was no doubt that it was Greem.


    Several of the people in the crowd had seen Greem at the entrance of the tavern. They immediately recognized him and couldn¡¯t help but look toward Ol¡¯ Willy.


    Katherine¡¯s spiritual senses were extremely sharp. She instantly noticed the looks of the people directed at the short and fat Willy. Several buzzing metal des approached Ol¡¯ Willy, driving back the crowd and trapping him in the middle.


    ¡°You¡¯ve seen this man?¡± A strange smile appeared on Katherine¡¯s cold and frozen face.


    ¡°I¡¯ve...seen him.¡±


    ¡°Where is he?¡±


    ¡°He...he went...¡±


    Just as Ol¡¯ Willy was about to point into the distance, a quick fireball flew out of the mist andnded on him.


    A loud explosion rang out as Ol¡¯ Willy exploded like a barrel of wine. The me shockwave evaporated his blood before it could evennd.


    The civilians immediately scattered in terror, their screams and cries filling the town.


    Katherine couldn¡¯t be bothered with these boring gnats. Instead, her mechanical eye creaked as she slowly locked onto the towering figure stepping out of the fog from the other end of the stone bridge.


    ¡°Greem.¡± Katherine put on a sinister smile, ¡°I thought you would be running with all you have! You dare to step up so voluntarily?¡±


    ¡°Run? Why would I run?¡± Greem brushed aside the mist and stopped a hundred meters away from Katherine as he smiled and said, ¡°You are Third Grade, as am I. Neither of us can use our full strength in this god-forsaken ce, so why should I fear you?¡±


    ¡°Because you are an elementium adept, and I am a mechanical adept!¡± de Princess Katherine¡¯s crimson mechanical eye glowed even brighter, ¡°The effects of this other ne are more significant against you. Moreover, I am a hunter adept!¡±


    Katherine¡¯s metal boots abruptly stomped against the ground, and her petite body no taller than 1.6 meters shot out like an arrow toward Greem.


    Her metallic appendagesshed forward as five glowing metal des shed at Greem from various angles.

 Chapter 944 - Small Town Doomsday

    Chapter 944 Small Town Doomsday


    The de-discs spun furiously as the winds blew violently.


    de Princess Katherine fighting at full force was like a metal hedgehog, spinning wildly around Greem. Her sharp metal hand des caused Greem¡¯s Inferno Shields to loudly crackle as they struck over and over.


    Meanwhile, the metal des spinning around her were slicing into Greem¡¯s defensive spells as well. An Inferno Shield with over three hundred and fifty points of power was reduced to cinders in less than three seconds.


    Fortunately, Greem had created seven of these Inferno Shields all at once. Thus, he barely managed to hold on until he cast the next spell.


    Due to the existence of the nar suppression and the difference in narws, the instant-cast spells of the past now required two to three seconds of chanting and hand gestures to activate. That was why elementium adepts were at a natural disadvantage in closebat, with far less fluid and natural movementspared to Katherine¡¯s mechanical magic.


    me Pir!


    A me Pir smashed outward with Greem as the center, the stone tiles beneath his feet rapidly softening and melting from the extreme heat. Soon, the tiles had turned into flowing magma.


    Even with her resistances, Katherine did not dare to fight Greem within such ferocious mes.


    Her athletic body abruptly flickered forty meters away and avoided the most concentrated region of the me Pir¡¯s power. Meanwhile, her bright, silver right hand opened wide with the palm pointed at Greem. Her fingers moved slightly, still controlling the five spinning metal des in the air.


    These five metal de-discs were made out of an extraordinary material. They were unaffected by Greem¡¯s elementium mes and continued to tackle and slice at hisst two remaining Inferno Shields.


    Greem let out a cold grunt and pointed with his hand. An Inferno Wall suddenly rose between him and the de Princess, separating the stone bridge into two halves. He let out a battlecry and transformed into a five-meter tall me Fiend. His hand of magma reached into the air and grabbed two of the metal des.


    Though the metal des had been restrained, they were still rampant and ferocious weapons with a tremendous capacity for harm.


    The des continued to spin and shudder wildly, even in his hand of magma, as if they were trying their best to escape.


    Greem couldn¡¯t care for the intense, cutting pain from his hands. He put both palms together as barbaric fire energy surged toward the two metal des. The two silver des started to turn red from the flood of such violent fire energy, but they remained just as active as before.


    Greem let out a yell and pped his two hands together with all he had. The two red-hot metal des ran into each other with tremendous force.


    A loud snap rang out as thin cracks finally appeared on the des. They disintegrated into shards of metal smaller than a finger.


    Katherine also let out a grunt from the other side of the Inferno Wall. It was obvious that her Spirit, which had been attached to the metal des, had also been damaged from the destruction.


    Upon realizing that Greem had the ability to destroy her des, Katherine made the three remaining des quickly move away and avoid his catching hands.


    While Greem seriously dealt with the attacks from the three spinning des, mes suddenly sshed from the Inferno Wall. A silver metal spike pierced through the wall and ran through his left shoulder. The metal spikes had actually been aimed at Greem¡¯s heart. He had only managed to avoid the lethal attack by dodging just in time.


    Greem let out a howl in agony and raised his hand to destroy this metal spike as he had done with the metal des. However, a tearing sound rang out as the metal spike pulled out of his wound like a fish, ripping a nasty gash in his arm as it did so.


    Redva immediately flowed from the wound, dripping onto the sturdy stone bridge below and burningrge holes into the material.


    It was then that Greem noticed a finger-thick silver chain attached to the end of the spike. The de Princess Katherine had controlled the metal spike through this chain.


    Katherine promptly lunged the moment the seven-second-long Inferno Wall ended. She shed with her des, stabbed with her spikes, or weaved around with her hand des. Her mechanical body was like an armory of its own, having undergone so many modifications. All sorts of strange offensive weapons could shoot out and appear at any time and from any position.


    Compared to an elementium adept, all her attacks required no chants or no elementium molding. They fired at her mere thought, and each and every one of them was incredibly powerful. A weapon that could be collected by a Third Grade mechanical adept and ced within her body could not possibly be a mediocre product!


    It didn¡¯t matter whether it was the metal des, the metal spikes, or even her hand des. All of them glowed with magical power, clearly enhanced and reinforced with all sorts of anti-magic capabilities.


    Piercing. shing. Sharpen. Reinforcement. Armor Pration.


    Almost all offensive effects that Greem had heard of were on the de Princess¡¯ magical weapons. If it weren¡¯t for the umtion of all these devastating effects, the metal weapons would never have been able to pierce Greem¡¯yers of Inferno Shields and magma armor to harm him, regardless of how sharp and durable they were.


    One had to admit that most of Katherine¡¯s abilities truly countered elementium adepts.


    The modification through mechanical magic had allowed Katherine¡¯s own magical resistances to reach a shocking level as well. Moreover, she had obviously and intentionally improved her fire resistance for this trip. Consequently, Greem¡¯s area-of-effect fire spells were almost entirely useless against her. Only reinforced single-target fire spells could pose a threat to her!


    Moreover, her powerful anti-magic and defense-pration abilities caused most of Greem¡¯s defensive spells to be ineffective. There were many times where Greem had to use some desperate means that harmed even himself to force Katherine away.


    It had not even been fifteen minutes since they had started fighting, but it was already turning out to be a grueling and painful fight for both sides.


    Katherine was burnt all over and gasping for breath, while Greem¡¯s magma body was littered with cuts and wounds, with him appearing in faltering spirits.


    Greem had also discovered some problems with his abilities through this fight.


    Some problems that he, as a high-grade adept, needed to take note of!


    Compared to low and mid-grade adepts, high-grade adepts¨Cparticrlybat adepts or hunter adepts that specialized in murder as Katherine did¨Cno longer pursued fancy spells with demonstrable and immense power. Instead, they preferred fast, concentrated, and more rapid means of death.


    During his battle with Katherine, Greem had only seen her repeat the same few methods of attacking. He had never seen her cast an area-of-effect spell that required any chanting or handsigns. All of her attacks were simple, direct, barbaric, and violent in the sole pursuit of instantaneous explosive power and unpredictability in its offense.


    Greem was not used to such a style ofbat at all. There were quite a few times where he had to endure Katherine¡¯s attacks as he squeezed out a powerful high-grade spell. It undoubtedly gave the opponent even more chances to attack him!


    Greem didn¡¯t even dare to cast Fire Teleportation in his battle against Katherine. The half-second pause in his actions was enough of a window for the mechanical adept to strike him three times. Moreover, Greem couldn¡¯t be sure that the short distance of the Fire Teleportation would allow him to break free from Katherine.


    If she had a means of tracking short-ranged teleportation, Greem would pay a heavy price for attempting to do so!


    As Third Grade adepts from another world, both of them experienced terrifying nar suppression, and their powers had been affected to some extent,rge or small. Even so, the battle between the two adepts still left a devastating impact on this beautiful and peaceful Lakeside Town.


    Wave after wave of me shockwaves that radiated outward, one magma fireball after another, seas of fire that spread with the wave of a hand; all of these horribly damaged the small town.


    Stretches of residential homes were ignited by the sshing Magma Fireballs, engulfing the entirety of Lakeside Town in a sea of crackling fire. The townsfolk cried out loud as they fled in every direction. A me shockwave swept by, and everyone instantly copsed, reduced to unrecognizable charred bones and dust on the spot.


    They might not have been the targets of the adepts, but the shockwaves created by the reckless battle between two Third Grade adepts were enough to obliterate the entire town.


    Neither of the two adepts was at their peak. As such, the offensive power they had wasn¡¯t sufficient to instantly defeat the other. Thus, after a difficult battle, Greem chose to retreat without any hesitation.


    Using the high-grade Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath stored within his pendant, Greem forced back the de Princess and quickly summoned a megate. Hundreds of fire creatures immediately swarmed out and rushed at Katherine.


    Though these fire creatures could not harm her, they could keep her stalled on the other side of the bridge. With this short time Greem bought for himself, he chanted his spell and used FIre Teleportation to flee the battlefield.


    The enraged Katherine swung her spinning des, executing most of the fire creatures in a single sh before charging across the stone bridge and smashing the megate into oblivion. This way, the fire creatures lost their source of reinforcement and became much easier to deal with.


    The de Princess couldn¡¯t be bothered to deal with the summoned creatures. She walked to a spot on the battlefield and picked up the metal particles left by the destroyed des before tracking Greem in the direction the fire aura had vanished.


    Having lost their target, the remaining fire creatures started to wander in the mes that were burning wildly in Lakeside Town.


    The sea of mes spread wherever they went, turning all things into ashes and the entire forest region around the town into a zone of death where nothing living dared set foot!


    At this time, the two otherworldly Third Grade adepts had shifted their battlefields to new grounds. They started a massive game of tag across the depths of the Cedrac Mountains.

 Chapter 945 - Battle in the Night

    Chapter 945 Battle in the Night


    It was deep into the night.


    The Cedrac Mountains appeared particrly quiet under the lightless curtain of night. One could almost say it was void of life.


    It had only been three days, and Greem and Katherine had fought each other nine times, creating nine death zones throughout the Cedrac Mountains.


    The beasts and magical creatures of the Cedrac Mountains might not be all that intelligent, but even they became incredibly cautious and sensitive to their environment when under the constant threat of death. A disastrous stampede would break out wherever the two adepts set foot.


    Whether beast, bird, or powerful magical creature, all the living beings would scramble to escape the area. None of them dared to remain near the two adepts for even a brief instant.


    Moreover, over time, the two adepts¡¯ analysis of Henvic¡¯s narws progressed. The power they could unleash increased, and the destruction of the environment around them became increasingly terrifying.


    During one of their battles, Greem¡¯s megate summoned thousands of fire creatures. They forcefully turned a valley in the mountains into an apocalyptic world of flowingva and smoldering magma.


    Combined with the unique geography of the valley, the megate was likely to exist for a long time toe. The fire creatures that had traveled to the valley through the megate would be the guardians of the location, stopping any creatures from approaching it.


    Meanwhile, the two adepts that had created this new hazardous area paid no heed to the tremendous damage their reckless actions inflicted upon the Cedrac Mountains. They were still immersed in their intense fight.


    They fought in the day, but there was no peace toe in the night either. Both parties would find all sorts of sinister and wicked means of assassinating and ambushing each other. Unfortunately, all of their attempts until now had failed!


    Neither of the two adepts could end this war quickly. They had no choice but to turn it into an exhausting back-and-forth!


    It was hard for both of them!


    Greem started a bonfire at the foot of a snowy peak once night had fallen.


    A wild boar that had unintentionally run into him was roasting above the fire.


    Greem personally did all the work of skinning, gutting, cleaning, seasoning, and cing it on a spit above the fire. With the Chip¡¯s assistance, he coulde up with hundreds of recipes for roasting, cooking, and frying the boar at any time, turning himself into a world-ss chef and the boar into a mouthwatering dish.


    As Greem turned the spit and coated the boar withyers of sweet sauces, he lifted his head and looked toward the other spot of fire in the distance, his face filled with unconceble joy over his opponent¡¯s misfortune.


    Another campfire was also burning furiously at the top of a mountain five kilometers away.


    Unfortunately for the de Princess Katherine, it was not boar meat or wolf meat that was roasting above her campfire. It was snake meat. Moreover, judging from the colorful scales that had yet to bepletely removed from the snake, Katherine was cooking a poisonous snake.


    It wasn¡¯t that Katherine disliked boar or wolf meant, but that she could not find any of them.


    Though she had washed off all the tyrannosaurus feces on her, the unique stench had yet to vanish. It caused Katherine to be utterly unable to find anyrge creatures within five kilometers of her, regardless of where she went.


    Norge creatures meant no source of food. Though Katherine had brought some nutrition pills with her, those could only maintain her stamina and would not allow her severely exhausted Strength to regenerate quickly enough.


    Adepts were powerfulpared to an ordinary person, but their immense power also demanded replenishment through extravagant eating habits. Katherine might be as petite as the girl next door, but her appetite easily outmatched ten muscr men after a long day of work.


    To make up for theck of proper food over these days, Katherine had almost eaten all the rats and snakes in the mountains.


    She wasn¡¯t an elementium adept and could not naturally recover elementium power through meditation and sleep. She was a mechanical adept. The source of all her strength came from her Physique, and the recovery of Physique could not be divorced from the consumption of food and excellent sleep.


    Consequently, her energy reserves had continuously been falling since she had entered the Henvic ne. She had also suffered immensely over these few days of constant fighting against that damned male adept.


    After devouring a few half-burnt snakes and slightly relieving the burning sensation of hunger in her stomach, Katherine took out a bit of her time to repair the magical weapons she had with her.


    She took out some spare metal des from her storage ring and reced the ones that had been damaged during the day. Katherine also took out some magical materials and used the light of the campfire to repair her damaged parts and body slowly.


    In all honesty, a pretty and petite girl taking out parts of her body like they were mereponents to clean and maintain them before cing them back into her body under the flickering light of the campfire in the night was a horrifying sight to behold.


    It sent shivers right down the spine!


    Meanwhile, Greem was enjoying his feast while relying on the wind spirits he had sent out to spy on this powerful mechanical witch.


    She was not a witch of the Northern Lands from the modern era!


    At the very least, Greem had never heard of such a mechanical witch in the Nothern Lands!


    Yet, she clearly bore the smell of an adept from the World of Adepts.


    As such, Greem deduced that she was likely a stationed adept of the Nothern Witches in one of their many lesser nes. Moreover, she was an adept that had been specially trained for ughter and assassination.


    In all honesty, if Greem¡¯s abilities had been even the slightest bit average, he would have been shredded to pieces by this mechanical witch. However, with the continued increase in his progress in analyzing the narws, Greem could unleash even more power.


    Finally, a clear beep could be heard as Greem finally got the notification that he had been waiting so long for.


    [Beep. nar analysisplete. Progress 100%. Host¡¯s basic power has recovered. Highest potentialbat power will be 78.21386291% rtive to the World of Adepts.¡±


    Greem was not interested in the long series of numbers that came after the first two digits. Though the amount of his unlocked power did not reach the expected eighty percent, seventy-eight percent was still more than enough for him to work with.


    He had always fought alone in the battles before this instead of using the elementium magical machine. It wasn¡¯t because he wanted to train himself. Instead, his severely restricted Spirit was far below the required threshold tomand the Third Grade elementium magical machine. Releasing it would have instantly drained him of all his Spirit.


    Exposing such a ring weakness to a mechanical witch that specialized in killing would have been akin to purchasing a ticket straight to hell! As such, Greem had no choice but to grit his teeth and use his unrefinedbat techniques to battle against the mechanical witch.


    Fortunately, the years of nar warfare had provided him with quite a lot of training. The excellent magical equipment on him further improved his power, just barely allowing him to remain a match for the witch instead of being her prey.


    Still, a fire had been burning in Greem after all these days of bitter fighting. When he heard the Chip¡¯s notification, he cast aside the ribs in his hands without hesitation and strode toward the bonfire in the distance.


    The mechanical witch seemed to have her own unique means of tracking and investigation, as well. She immediately stood up in confusion when Greem started to move and gazed into the dark forest.


    The two of them had been indiscriminately fighting all this while, regardless of location or time. However, night battles were still few and far between. After all, both of them needed time to recover their Spirits and heal their wounds.


    Neither side was willing to force the other into a dead-end before they had utter certainty at victory. Doing so would only make them suffer terrifying and irrecoverable damage. As such, nighttime became an unspoken time of truce between the two. Though assassinations, poisoning attempts, harassment, and all sorts of tricks continued uninterrupted, full-frontal confrontations had yet to ur.


    That was why Katherine couldn¡¯t help but be on her guard when she saw the male adept¡¯s strange actions.


    Given the current circumstances, she was still the one that held the advantage. She still had superiorbat power. Most of these skirmishes and battles ended with her victory and his retreat. When it came to battle cunning and smarts, however, Greem was still a cut above her.


    Most of the time, Katherine found herself having trouble turning herbat advantage into an opportunity for victory, all due to Greem¡¯s sly and sinister tricks. These factors were what made this otherworldly hunt turn into such a tedious and dangerous affair.


    Given Katherine¡¯s understanding of the male adept, the reason he was so impatient to fight her must be due to him obtaining an opportunity to turn the tides.


    What would that be?


    While Katherine was thinking to herself and preparing for battle, Greem had already charged out of the woods.


    ¡°Brat, was the beating you took from me a few days ago not enough for you? You were scurrying about like a rat. Why would youe and seek your death today...¡±


    Katherine didn¡¯t manage to finish her words. Greem had released the elementium magical machine without any pause.


    Katherine¡¯s face instantly turned green at the sight of this two-meter-tall magical machine rising from the ground. Violent magical energy was radiating from its gleaming alloy body.


    Third Grade. Dammit! It was a Third Grade magical machine!


    The de Princess¡¯ crimson mechanical eye quickly determined the magical machine¡¯sbat power based on the intensity of the magical energy and the destructive aura it radiated.


    Dammit, dammit, dammit! Apart from Agility, this magical machine was slightly stronger than her in Physique, Strength, and Spirit. Katherine could barely maintain a sixty percent chance of victory against a giant like this.


    However, her body would be significantly damaged, and her power weakened even if she won.


    If she were to fight this giant while dealing with the male adept at the same time? Katherine felt a chill run through her heart. The chance of victory she calcted was no more than three percent.


    de Princess Katherine let out a roar, and five metal des spun forward, intercepting the assault of the two enemies. She turned and fled without any hesitation, quickly vanishing into the darkness of the forest.


    Reputation, dignity; what were those?


    They seemed like things that only living people would require.


    Just like that, a massive battle prematurely ended before it could even begin!

 Chapter 946 - Nighttime Confrontation

    Chapter 946 Nighttime Confrontation


    Thest month had been the most difficult of times for the Zambez Empire.


    Most of the high-grade knights of the Empire were gathered at Dabyrie Hignds under themand of the powerful Fourth Grade Holy Knight Rnd, besieging the tower of the evil witches.


    Yet, at this moment, some more powerful and evil adepts broke into Henvic ne and started ravaging the northern regions of the Empire.


    These outsiders didn¡¯t seem to belong to the same faction, as they immediately broke out into a wild and unrelenting battle against each other upon arriving. Compared to them, the natives of Henvic were far too frail and insignificant.


    They would be destroyed in the apocalyptic fight if they even got close, let alone attempt to stop these outsiders. The man and the woman were both adepts from another world. Their reckless actions had already destroyed two border towns and created numerous no man¡¯snds in the Cedrac Mountains that no one dared approach.


    Moreover, as the two adepts left the Cedrac Mountains and moved toward the inner regions of the Empire, the losses and casualties caused by their fighting started to skyrocket. Their actions even caused a disaster in the north of the Empire.


    The source of the disaster was not Greem nor Katherine, but the Spirit of Pestilence.


    As a small peak Second Grade Spirit of Pestilence, it could not participate in the fight between two Third Grade adepts. Greem rarely summoned the Spirit during the fighting in the day. He would only send it out at night to harass Katherine.


    Of course, the only way the Spirit of Pestilence cold fight was through poison!


    Spreading poison over the ground and air everywhere Katherine might travel through, poisoning the water sources where Katherine might rest, even poisoning the creatures that Katherine might hunt down for food; in essence, the Spirit of Pestilence was happy to spread plenty of biological poison and gue spores over anything that Katherine mighte into contact with.


    Unfortunately, Katherine was prepared. Her resistance to poison was also shockingly high. She never fell into a single trapid by the Spirit. Instead, it was themon forest creatures that became unintended victims of the poison.


    Those who were poisoned to death were of no consequence. However, some more resilient and stubborn forest creatures brought the gue spores out of the mountains with them, spreading the epidemic to an even wider area.


    For a moment, the northern regions of the Empire were rife with the gue as it spread rapidly across thend.


    During yet another lightless night, the two neighboring bonfires were the only source of illumination throughout the wilnds.


    It was only the end of summer and the start of autumn, but the nights in the wild were already remarkably cold.


    Greem sat by the fire, roasting the deer meat in his hand with expert technique. A crystalline amber sauce was thered all over the meat, sizzling softly above the mes. Two drops of golden yellow oil dripped onto the bonfire below, causing some light crackling and popping.


    The strange, doll-like Spirit of Pestilence sat quietly on Greem¡¯s shoulder, propping its chin with its hand as it brooded in silence. Orbs of dark green light would asionally rise from its palm-sized wooden body, circling several times before sinking into its body once again.


    Greem was close enough to sense strands of strange energy merging with the Spirit of Pestilence every time the orbs of green light lit up. The Spirit¡¯s energy aura would then increase ever so slightly.


    In all honesty, this slight bit of improvement was utterly insignificant. Even Greem would never have detected such a change if it wasn¡¯t for his soul connection to the Spirit and the detailed scans of the Chip.


    However, even the weakest of energy would umte to a significant amount if it continued to pile on!


    Greem had a pronounced feeling that the Spirit of Pestilence had been wildly gathering energy over the past few days to break through that sturdy Third Grade threshold.


    The faint traces of energy that it absorbed came from the life forms killed by its poison.


    Naturally, weak forest creatures like centipedes, lizards, and harmless snakes provided immensely weak life energy when they died to the gue poison. However, as the gue spread through the human kingdom, the life energy that the Spirit of Pestilence obtained immediately started to increase exponentially.


    The strange life narws that applied to the Spirit of Pestilence meant that any living being that died to it would increase its power!


    There was no doubt that the Spirit of Pestilence was the one who had benefitted the most from the past month. Greem had also started to develop his own style ofbat after the month¡¯s worth of training and fighting. It had been a reasonably beneficial experience for him, as well.


    Inparison to them, de Princess Katherine was run-down and ragged!


    Two hundred meters away from Greem¡¯s bonfire, Katherine had also started her own fire. The two of them were squaring off against each other from a distance.


    Due to some unknown reasons, Katherine still could not hunt down anyrge carnivorous or herbivorous creatures. As such, her diet consisted solely of rats, snakes, lizards, and other critters that could be found everywhere.


    If one were to ignore the metal half of Katherine¡¯s face and body, she was a petite and slender beauty. The shape of her face was beautiful, but her tightly-pressed lips were thin, like two sharp razors, and her eyebrows brimmed with biting, killing intent.


    At this moment, she was resentfully ring at Greem, who was enjoying his dinner in the distance. Meanwhile, she twisted her hands, snapping all the bones of the ck-Scaled Snake in her hands and causing all the fine scales to ke off like snow.


    She stuffed the snake into her mouth and swallowed without even needing to chew. This two-meter-long snake waspletely devoured in two to three seconds, with only an inch-long snake¡¯s tail still quivering by her mouth at the end of it.


    Katherine continued staring daggers at Greem and the wooden doll monster on his shoulder as she sucked furiously. Just like that, thest bit of the snake¡¯s tails disappeared into her little mouth.


    There was no one normal amongst those who could be Third Grade adepts!


    The famous poison of the ck-Scaled Snake was no more than a joke to Katherine. Her inhuman stomach could even digest energy crystals when necessary. Thus, Katherine¡¯s magical energy was quickly replenished after devouring the elementium crystal cores of two Second Grade magical beasts.


    The purpose of eating living creatures was more to absorb their tissue structure to maintain her strange, half-human, half-machine body. Moreover, Katherine had to ingest a reconciling agent on a daily basis.


    It was a ck and viscous magical potion that was much like a lubricant for machines!


    It was only through the biological activity brought about by this reconciling agent that mechanical adepts could prevent their human parts from breaking into conflict with their mechanicalponents. It was precisely due to their constant consumption of a potion as pungent as this reconciling agent that they had lost all sense of taste.


    Mechanical adepts were utterly incapable of distinguishing between tastes!


    In their eyes, food was only differentiated by its energy content and blood activity. There was no such thing as bitter, sweet, savory, sour, or spicy. While Greem still needed all sorts of fine cooking steps before he ate, the de Princess was different. Most of the time, she omitted these intermediary steps and directly swallowed her food alive.


    Man and woman, the two Third Grade adepts silently faced off with two hundred meters between them, all while quietly adjusting their body conditions.


    A new battle could erupt at any moment if the conditions allowed for it.


    Two hundred meters was nothing to both of them. Katherine could cross that distance at full power in just three seconds, enough time for Greem to release aplete Third Grade spell. Meanwhile, the Third Grade elementium magical machine had been reduced to a ¡®useless¡¯ block of iron due to its horrendous speed!


    Katherine would turn and run without any hesitation the moment Greem released the elementium magical machine.


    At any rate, Greem and the elementium magical machine would have no chance of catching up to her with their speed.


    Moreover, Greem had no intention of so easily letting news of the elementium magical machine being powered by a magic generator furnace get out. That was why he put on an appearance and hastily unsummoned the elementium magical machine once Katherine had fled, as if he was concerned that it would run out of energy.


    It was only when Greem was feeling lethargic and required deep meditation to recover his Spirit that he would release the elementium magical machine for extended periods. The device could protect him and provide him with the time to rest in peace.


    It was evident that this battle with the Third Grade mechanical witch was going to be a long and drawn-out one. Greem needed to ensure his Spirit and power were always at their peak. de Princess Katherine would also flee with all she had whenever she felt exhausted, finding a ce sufficiently hidden and distant to rest and eat.


    Greem had also tried sending low-grade wind spirits and earth elementals to track her, but they were always left in the dust.


    When Greem attempted to lose Katherine while she was gone and recuperating, this half-machine witch would always manage to catch up without any effort, even across distances of hundreds of kilometers. It was almost as if she had a perfect grasp of Greem¡¯s movements.


    After a few consecutive attempts, Greem was utterly speechless. He gave up on his intention to lose the mechanical witch and started to focus his efforts on fighting.


    Thus, this awkward situation where neither side could do anything about the other had emerged!


    Peace? It was impossible when they belonged to different factions and bore conflicting missions on their shoulders.


    Bathe in blood and battle to their deaths? As ambitious Third Grade adepts with great dreams and wills, neither Greem nor Katherine were willing to die in this dirty and lowly ne.


    Both of them would abandon any advantage they had at the very first sight of the threat of mutual destruction when they fought. They would rather wait for the next opportunity.


    They still had long lives to live and far too many beautiful things for them to enjoy and experience. There was no need to send themselves to an early grave over some resources and a mission.


    Yet, while the two adepts were resting and eating as they stared at each other, an intangible chill ran across both their bodies.


    It wasn¡¯t a change in the environment or a disruption in magical energy, but a strange feeling in their souls that could not be described with words. It was almost as if...as if they were suddenly in the sights of some mighty creature. Their entire bodies and souls were subconsciously shrinking and quivering.


    Dammit! This feeling again.


    Nothing good happened whenever they got this feeling!


    As expected, while the two Third Grade adepts cursed internally, a wave of human voices came from the darkness. Torches lit up. The sound of stomping hoofs rolled across like a storm.


    The enemy had appeared!

 Chapter 947 - Holy Light

    Chapter 947 Holy Light


    Their guests were a squadron of cavalry.


    Thunderous galloping washed across thend as a troop of two to three hundred cavalry soldiers barged into the wastnd and stopped their horses three hundred meters away from the bonfires of both adepts.


    It was an elite cavalry force from the Zambez Empire. An eye-catching emblem had been carved onto the chesttes, shields, and weapons of every member. Unfortunately, neither Greem nor Katherine were citizens of the Zambez Empire. It hadn¡¯t been long since they had arrived on this ne either. As such, neither of them recognized the emblems or identities of these soldiers.


    However, even if they knew of this information, it would still have no bearing on them.


    The power levels of this ne were iparable to the World of Adepts, so much so that the two adepts looked down upon the traditional martial forces of this ne.


    Even though Greem and Katherine could not unleash their full power in Henvic ne, their tremendous fighting ability and myriad of unpredictable spells gave them the confidence to kill any native Third Grade that appeared before them.


    Meanwhile, the low-grade ne natives were no more than ants before them. They could kill as many of them as there were, without any concern for their numbers. As long as they retained their immense mobility, no creature on this ne could capture or defeat them!


    It was precisely their confidence and power that made Greem and Katherine turn their heads and assess the intimidating Zambezian cavalry with looks of interest instead of showing any signs of fear or intent to retreat.


    The cavalry was the Saint Martin Chivalric Order that had been stationed in the nearestrge city of Hakans.


    The leader was a bald, muscr man with a full beard. His build wasrge and muscr, but not excessively so. Determination and will were written all over his sharp and cold face. Old and battered knight¡¯s armor covered his straight, robust body. The knight¡¯s emblem on his chest¨Ca shieldid over a sword¨Cwas a big clue to his true identity¨C Division Head Kent of the Saint Martin Chivalric Order.


    It was a vast army of elite knights, but the one that led was no more than a mere Second Grade Silver Knight.


    Though the brilliant light of flowing magical powers could be seen all over their bodies, and their magical armor and weapons glowed brightly, they still appeared like a nest of ants beneath the eyes of the two adepts. Theycked a Third Grade leader, after all.


    However, these Saint Martin knights did not seem to have figured out the grade levels of these two adepts. They dismounted in unison upon arriving and arranged themselves in formation before marching toward the bonfires.


    The knights hesitated for a moment when they were one hundred meters away from the bonfires. It was then that they adjusted their direction and slowly approached and surrounded Greem. The one dozen knights that remained at the rear of the group did not dismount but instead maintained charging formation in Katherin¡¯s position, as if warning her not to move.


    Pity for the weak? Or was it picking on the weak?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel a trace of awkwardness when he saw these ants choose him as their target. Anger also started rising within him.


    Without any hesitation, he summoned the elementium magical machine and unleashed his Burning Domain.


    Greem had not released the Burning Domain in all his fights with the de Princess. He did not want to exhaust his power.


    Attacks lower than a certain intensity were effectively useless against a Third Grade opponent like Katherine. Only highly-concentrated magical powers and physical attacks could break through her defensive forcefields and injure her.


    Yet, when Greem was dealing with a swarm of ants that relied on their numbers, the Burning Domain that covered hundreds of meters of area instantly became a zone of death.


    The Saint Martin knights let out their battlecries, ¡°The light is with me!¡±, ¡°For glory!¡±, and many others. Layers of bright holy light radiated from their bodies as they charged at Greem.


    However, the first to greet them was not Greem¡¯s spells, but the elementium magical machine¡¯s indestructible body and its unstoppable fists.


    Dong. Dong. Dong.


    The elementium magical machine charged into the knights¡¯ ranks with heavy steps and zing mes, instantly making for a bloody and cruel ughter.


    Dong! Dong! Its left and right fists swung forward, and two Saint Martin knights in heavy armor were blown into the air and crashed twenty to thirty meters away. Their bones snapped beneath the heavy armor, and they stopped moving upon hitting the ground.


    The chesttes of the two knights were deeply dented and glowing a bright red, like the red-hot piece of a branding iron. Crimson blood slowly seeped out from beneath their bodies, soaking the earth around them.


    The other Saint Martin knights raised their magical longswords and shields as they surrounded the elementium magical machine and started shing and bashing furiously.


    Holy Cross!


    Judgement of Light!


    Divine Storm!


    Hammer of Justice!


    ......


    It was almost as if a cksmith was in the vicinity. The deafening sounds of shing metal would not stop. Blinding holy light and overwhelmingly powerfulbat techniques followed after the knights¡¯ loud shouting.


    Sparks came flying off of the magical machine¡¯s body as they shed and cut with all they had. However, like a boulder in the face of a violent torrent, the elementium magical machine remained unmoving. Instead, it blew away knight after knight with its punches and knocked them down with its fireballs, exhausting their numbers with violent but straightforward attacks.


    As if they had realized the elementium magical machine to be a summon of the terrifying adept, Division Head Kent led a group of his most elite subordinates and charged into Greem¡¯s Burning Domain.


    Dry, suffocating, blistering heat and magical mes were everywhere.


    These native knights of Henvic ne immediately understood the might of a Third Grade fire adept upon entering the Burning Domain. The adept had not even lifted a finger, but his barrier was already causing the holy knights to suffer the pain of being roasted alive.


    ¡°Convert your holy emblems to fire resistance!¡± The toughmander shouted.


    He then raised his wide longsword as a milky-white halo spread outward, enhancing all the holy knights with ayer of radiance.


    Exceptional Fire Resistance?


    Blue light shed in Greem¡¯s ck eyes, and he quickly scanned the attributes of the halos enhancing these holy knights.


    Fire resistance +50.


    With this blessing, the fire damage caused by the Burning Domain was reduced by more than half. Moreover, the remaining half of the damage was slowly being reduced as they cast all sorts of strange blessings and halos on themselves, so much so that the fire resistance was almost reaching the level of elementary fire resistance.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes.


    It seemed he had still underestimated these ne natives.


    Their individual power might not be much, but when gathered together, their pure and united faith in the holy light allowed them to enhance themselves immensely!


    However, ants were still ants. Even strengthened and blessed, they were merely ants that had been strengthened and blessed!


    Greem raised his hand, and a Second Grade Magma Fireball instantly formed in his hand.


    He turned his head downward and hurled the Magma Fireball into the ranks of the knights. The me shockwaves from the explosion shot magma shards in every direction, like hundreds and thousands of bullets.


    Seven or eight First Grade holy knights copsed silently, their armor filled with massive holes created by the magma shards. Their flesh and clothes inside the armor were ignited by the heat. mes started rising from the gaps in their armor. The smell of burnt meat quickly spread through the air.


    The Magma Fireball had smashed the shield of Division Head Kent to pieces.


    The enchanted shield with divine protection was worth well over ten thousand gold pieces, but it had shattered in an instant. Second Grade Kent braced his longsword in front of him, creating a Shield of Holy Light and protecting himself from the shockwave and rain ofva that came after.


    If Kent still did not know the grade of this adept before, he instantly understood now that he had experienced an attack from the adept. It was a Third Grade adept!


    The Saint Martin Chivalric Order was a proper Chivalric Order stationed in Hakans, thergest city in the north of the Zambez Empire. Their power was well-known, even throughout the Empire.


    The highest authority the Empire had stationed in Hakans had sent many spies and scouts to investigate the truth behind the destruction of Lakeside Town since the incident. However, before they could procure urate information, the two otherworldly adepts had fought their way through and out of the Cedrac Mountains, causing indescribable damage to the civilians along the way.


    Judging from the direction of the two adepts, they were heading for the Empire city closest to the Cedrac Mountains¨C the City of Ta.


    In order to prevent Ta and its sixty thousand residents from bing sacrifices at the hands of the adepts, the holy knight order had no choice but to abandon the sturdy city walls and their army of foot soldiers, electing instead to gather their most elite and rush over to the scene.


    They ran into Greem and Katherine in the wild, just thirty meters away from Ta; as such, this battle broke out.


    When Kent understood the level and might of this adept, he knew that this battle was an unwinnable fight. He shouted, and the badly beaten knights quickly retreated from the Burning Domain, attempting to flee into the distance and regroup.


    Kent, the Second Grade Silver Knight, let out a battlecry and charged toward Greem while covered inyers of light.


    The Burning Domain started to be wild and vicious as Greem poured more Spirit into the magic. Several zing jets of mes sted toward Kent, making it impossible for him to progress. His armor and longsword started to turn red and boiling beneath the violent mes. Parts of his exposed skin also began to be scorched ck.


    However, Division Head Kent had a stubborn will. He endured the storm of fire and approached Greem, one step at a time. He left behind a ck and scorched footprint on the ground with every step.


    By the time he was twenty meters away from Greem, his entire body had already ignited with magical fires, and his skin crackled with mes. Still, he persisted like a fish swimming against the river, walking forward one step at a time.


    His skin had been reduced to charcoal, and the protection of light around him was riddled with holes. Even his life aura had almost wholly withered. Only the flicker of light in his chest remained as pure and sacred as it had always been.


    Finally, Greem could not stand it any longer. He pushed his lips together and blew. A transparent cluster of mes blew against Kent¡¯s body, instantly disintegrating his armor and turning his body into ashes. His entire being had vanished.


    Only a small cluster of extremely pure, white light remained the air!

 Chapter 948 - Mutual Defeat

    Chapter 948 Mutual Defeat


    The Saint Martin knights finally started retreating!


    After several futile and hopeless charges, they finally realized the gulf in power between them and the enemy before them. They gave up on the battle and started retreating into the distance.


    There had been approximately two to three hundred of them when they had arrived, but their ranks were less than a hundred when they fled.


    From start to finish, Greem had not taken a single step away from the bonfire. Apart from striking once at the Second Grade Division Head, the other Saint Martin knights had all fell casually to the ming metal fists of the elementium magical machine. de Princess Katherine had also remained unusually quiet and had not taken the opportunity to assault Greem.


    Of course, this was most likely because she didn¡¯t have the chance to do so!


    After all, even when the ¡®battle¡¯ was at its most intense, Greem was still keeping over eighty percent of his attention on her.


    However, both Greem and Katherine couldn¡¯t help but betray hesitation and lick their lips when they saw this pure, holy light left behind by the devoted and courageous Second Grade Silver Knight.


    This wisp of pure, holy light was a branch of apletely different power system. It was utterly distinct from the adept path of knowledge and modification and was a lot more simr to the faith system of the World of Gods. However, most nes that belonged to the Gods worshipped an actual, existent deity, while the bone-headed knights of Henvic ne worshipped an intangible sort of spirit or belief.


    The Light? A sort of light that was filled with sublime and holy ideals?


    What was the purpose of worshipping such a thing? Could this light listen to the prayers of its believers and grant them all sorts of blessings?


    Out of the natural contempt that the adepts held for the Gods, Greem didn¡¯t think highly of the Holy Light faith of the natives here. However, a loyal and pure believer of the Holy Light had now died in front of him. His body had turned to ash, yet thest traces of his soul rested within a cluster of bright white light that was now hovering before his eyes. The mental impact of this discovery was tremendous to Greem!


    This wisp of holy light was far too frail!


    If Greem retracted the Burning Domain, even a slight wind from the wild would cause the holy light to vanish without a trace. However, Greem had a feeling that the holy light and the soul attached to it wouldn¡¯t just disappear like that. Instead, they would probably be guided toward a specific ce by the narws and be part of a greater consciousness.


    It was a strange and unjustified feeling, but Greem was confident in his intuition.


    The source of his confidence was the Chip¡¯s analysis of the Henvic ne.


    Greem was not powerful enough to decipher even the most surface-levelws of this nar world. As such, the Chip mostly performed investigations into the effects and use of the narws. There were still countless unachievable thresholds to cross before they achieved actual control over thews.


    The faith of Holy Light was undoubtedly one of the few higher powers of Henvic ne. The value of researching it was most definitely above the basic narws.


    Now, here was a shortcut to examining the power of Holy Light faith standing right before him. It might be entirely different from the source of the adepts¡¯ powers, but it was still a precious research subject.


    [Beep. Presence of pure spiritual energy detected. Said energy can be captured, absorbed, or destroyed. Please make your decision.]


    Greem could understand capturing and destroying it. However, what was the purpose of absorbing it?


    ¡°Chip, what are the effects of absorbing this Holy Light?¡±


    [Beep. It is a kind of extremely pure and refined Spirit energy. After extracting the spiritual impurities within, it can rapidly increase the host¡¯s Spirit attribute.]


    Increase the Spirit attribute?


    All of Greem¡¯s hairs almost stood on their ends.


    Ever since bing an adept, he had searched countless times for ways and items to increase his Spirit quickly. Unfortunately, there were no other methods avable apart from the meditation techniques of the adept system.


    Of course, some exceptionally rare adept resources could achieve the same effect. For instance, the Holy Water of the elves in Faen, the Spirit mixture sold by the Silver Union, and the giant¡¯s brain that often appeared in adept markets worked. Unfortunately, these items were often high-grade resources belonging exclusively to adepts of Fourth Grade and above. They were way beyond Greem¡¯s league.


    What was the most significant factor limiting an adept¡¯s ability to advance? Naturally, that would be the speed at which their powers improved.


    Greem was currently walking the path of an elementium adept. His primary focus was, therefore, Spirit.


    Even after he advanced to Third Grade and experienced a period of rapid Spirit improvement, his Spirit had only gone from thirty-one points to thirty-two points. The rate at which his Spirit increased had gradually slowed down since he reached thirty-two points.


    Greem figured some estimations. Given the current rate of his improvement, it would take ten to twenty years of grueling training and continuous meditation to increase his Spirit by a single point. Moreover, the increase in Spirit always became slower and more difficult when you reached the peak of the grade.


    Many adepts exhausted their entire lives and remained unable to raise their Spirits to the threshold for advancement.


    If adepts could sessfully advance by hiding in their towers, there wouldn¡¯t be so few Fourth Grade adepts throughout the World of Adepts. If they didn¡¯t find ways to obtain resources that could expedite this process, most adepts would only die in their towers of old age and in despair.


    That was why even the calm andposed Greem couldn¡¯t help but fall into a daze when he heard the Chip¡¯s notification.


    In his absent state of mind, he impatiently reached out to grab this wavering wisp of light.


    The fire beside him dimmed as sharp and howling wind screeched across the air.


    Greem didn¡¯t know when it happened, but de Princess Katherine had crossed the two hundred meters between them and appeared beside him. She held two metal spikes in her hand and had already severely dented the semi-translucent me barrier between the two of them. Meanwhile, the five metal discs had wrapped around to his back and were slicing the barrier from multiple different angles.


    Regardless of how powerful a Third Grade me Barrier¡¯s defense was, they could not possibly endure the all-out attack of a Third Grade mechanical witch. Itsted only 1.7 seconds before it shatteredpletely.


    After the barrier was reduced to sparks, it was Greem¡¯s defensive forcefield that was under attack.


    It was hisst defense, a forcefield formed of Spirit and fire energy!


    The elementium magical machine that was still chasing after the Saint Martin knights let out a howl and hastily rushed toward the fire. Meanwhile, the Spirit of Pestilence swaying its legs on Greem¡¯s shoulders unleashed a Death Curse upon Katherine.


    One was a hundred and twenty-meters away, incapable of solving the imminent danger at hand. The other was only Second Grade and incapable of blocking the attack of a Third Grade mechanical witch.


    The only one that could save Greem was himself!


    A single second of absent-mindedness had brought about a crisis of death upon Greem. It was more than enough proof of the savagery and terror of a duel between high-grade adepts.


    The two metal spikes were still piercing forward, striking straight at Greem¡¯s brows.


    The distance between the two of them was less than half a meter now.


    The Sharpness and Pration spells enchanted upon the spikes were still in full effect, shattering the barrier and the energy forcefield into sparks and cinders. Katherine¡¯s own thirty-one points of Strength allowed the metal spikes to continued forward steadily. Otherwise, the elementium turbulence caused by the explosion of the me Barrier and the energy forcefield would have been sufficient to disrupt any follow-up attacks.


    The all-out Death Curse of the Spirit of Pestilence turned into a cloud of gray smoke and entered Katherine¡¯s body, causing a smudge of gray to appear on her face of flesh and steel. However, her thirty-six points of Physique allowed her to endure the first wave of effects from the Death Curse and push the spikes steadily forward.


    The gleaming points of the spikes were no more than five centimeters away from Greem¡¯s eyebrow now.


    Thest defensive forcefield was badly indented now, the surface filled with fine cracks as if it was about to shatter in the very next second.


    Once the energy forcefield was gone, his death would be sealed. He would have no chance against a hunter adept like the de Princess with his crude melee skills.


    Crack!


    A faint crackling sound came from a withered branch in the bonfire beside them.


    The steadily zing me erupted as a giant me humanoid formed from the red mes.


    The light flickered on the spot, and Greem mysteriously swapped positions with the towering humanoid figure.


    The defensive forcefield shattered, and the spike drove into the head of the me humanoid, sting it into cinders and sparks. Katherine¡¯s spikes and metal disc-des shed, and the humanoid figure waspletely obliterated.


    Greem¡¯s pained and angered howls abruptly filled the air.


    The next second, the humanoid figure in the mes took on Greem¡¯s appearance and threw two giant fireballs towards Katherine.


    Dong! Dong!


    The massive fireballs exploded on the scene, and Katherine let out a tragic cry. Her entire body turned into a whirlwind of des as she backed away from the ravaging firestorm. She flickered, and her entire body appeared a hundred meters away. Katherine shed once more, and she was already at the edge of Greem¡¯s vision. Another secondter, she had vanished without a trace.

 Chapter 949 - Furious Pursuit

    Chapter 949 Furious Pursuit


    Katherine finally knew how terrifying a rabbit¡¯s retaliation could be when it was backed into a corner!


    She had always maintained the absolute initiative in her battle against Greem.


    As a mechanical adept, all of herbat techniques required next to no incantations or handsigns; all of her magical abilities were used to enhance herbat abilities and offensive options. As such, she was most capable of countering elementium adepts in meleebat, where their powerful elementium spells required more space to unleash.


    Greem might be a deviant even amongst elementium adepts with meleebat abilities that were nearly on par with his fire spells, but he was still no more than a rookie whenpared to Katherine.


    Without the elementium magical machine¡¯s assistance, Greem would have long since died to herpound, three-dimensional attacks. She would only need to suffer some heavy losses in return.


    Of course, this had only been Katherine¡¯s understanding of the situation!


    Now that she had ambushed Greem and destroyed the wisp of holy light as she did so, she had incited Greem¡¯s wrath.


    The typically calm andposed fire adept exploded with anger. Greem pursued Katherine unrelentingly with the elementium magical machine.


    It didn¡¯t matter how quickly Katherine scaled the mountains, crossed the rivers, and traversed the woods. Greem might be momentarily lost, but the horde of low-grade wind spirits in the air allowed him to catch up quickly.


    The de Princess finally realized the severity of the situation after spending most of the night fleeing from Greem.


    That damned male adept had plenty of elementium golems as his mounts. He only needed to sit upon them and order them to charge ahead. Meanwhile, Katherine had to run on her own two feet with her strength.


    If she were in perfect condition, her Physique would allow her to easily persist in this chase for three days and three nights. However, she was currently covered in wounds and gravely in need of rest and treatment, not the reckless pursuit of a fire adept.


    Healing would exhaust her stamina and fleeing even more so. Yet, rest was the only thing she had no time for. Moreover, she had also taken the poison attack of the Spirit of Pestilence head-on during the battle earlier. Though most of the poison damage had been rendered immune by her tremendous Physique, the remaining poison continued to destroy and wreck her body.


    Katherine had taken some potent antidotes along the way, but the poison that the Spirit of Pestilence had nted in her was apound curse of the mostplex sort. The poison would never bepletely cleansed unless she first lifted the curse.


    However, Katherine could not even spare five minutes to do so. She had no choice but to continue running while enduring the suffering of curse and poison!


    Of course, Katherine had also been plotting retaliation as she escaped. Unfortunately, the male adept seemed to have learned his lesson. He never let the elementium magical machine leave him, constantly keeping it at his side as his guardian.


    Even Katherine didn¡¯t dare to turn and fight under such circumstances. Her only option was to grit her teeth, keep her head down, and continue running away!


    Thus, the two adepts continued in this pursuit and unknowingly traversed over three hundred kilometers ofnd. Meanwhile, their reckless pursuit and escape had naturally attracted the intervention of the Zambez Empire¡¯s standing army.


    Hakans.


    A peaceful city sat upon a vast and wide in.


    As the capital of the Northern Regions of the Empire, Hakans was famously known as a military stronghold.


    Thousands of merchants and travelers moved through her daily. The number of carts and carriages was innumerable and kept the path to Hakans congested continuously.


    However, as the long line of traffic slowly moved forward, dust clouds arose on the distant ins, followed by an immensely tragic howling. An intangiblemotion spread from a distance toward the city, slowly affecting every individual in the traffic.


    The travelers and merchants all felt an ill omen within their hearts. They lifted their heads and looked toward the source of the disruption. Some more crafty people had already left the line and were starting to flee into the surrounding ins.


    While the crowd was confused and started to break into a panic, an indescribably terrifying spiritual pressure washed across them, apanied by howling winds.


    No one could discern the identity of the golden silhouette that had shed past them. They didn¡¯t even have any idea if it was a person or an item. However, the sharp sound caused by the howling winds in the shape¡¯s passing forced everyone to sp their ears and let out agonized moans as their bodies shivered and trembled.


    Blood was streaming from everyone¡¯s ears and eyes while the winds passed by. Their faces were stricken with horror, totally clueless about what had happened.


    While everyone was caught in fear and panic, some individuals that had recovered from the scream suddenly pointed into the distance and let out a heartrending yell.


    The crowd turned and looked, only to see two giant creatures charging toward them, onerge and one small.


    Therger creature appeared to be a massive serpent formed purely of stone. It crushed countless carriages and carts along the way and continued forward without dy. Beside the stone serpent was a towering metallic giant whose body spewed forth blinding red light. It was also striding with rumbling steps.


    Any man or vehicle in their way would be instantly crushed like insignificant earthworms upon the ground. Horses whinnied and copsed where they went, the cargo in their carts knocked down onto the road as their owners screamed in terror as they fled.


    Those with sharper eyes could even see a red-robed figure sitting upon the serpent¡¯s head, his eyes fixed in the distance zing with fire and lightning,pletely ignoring the chaos happening beneath.


    Adepts.


    Adepts from another world.


    Naturally, some more knowledgeable people in the crowd immediately understood the identities of the pursuer and the pursued.


    However, what could they do against a Third Grade adept from another world with their measly power?


    When some unintelligent fellows picked up rocks and wooden nks to bash the slithering stone serpent, the crowd finally attracted the adept¡¯s attention.


    The next second, a faint-red barrier of mes quickly engulfed the entire area.


    Almost at the same instant that the Ring of Fire enveloped the surroundings, the entire ce transformed into a sea of mes.


    Terrifying magical fires instantly ignited every substance within the barrier: carts, cargo, bags, nks, humans, grass. Even the ck earth beneath their feet quickly started melting before the raging fires.


    It was almost as if a dome-shaped furnace had been erected in the area. All life and substance were rapidly melted and turned into ash as the stone serpent charged forward.


    All the people in the way of the Ring of Fire quickly escaped from their carts and ran as far away from the road as they could.


    Frantic rms also went off in Hakans in the distance.


    As the most prosperous and vital central city of the northern regions of Zambez, Hakans was stationed with plenty of holy knights.


    A group of holy knights had just reached the closest city gate on warhorses when they ran into the fleeing Katherine.


    After attempting to flee in every direction and still being unable to escape from the berserk fire adept, Katherine had no choice but to draw him toward the most heavily guarded stronghold¨C Hakans.


    Perhaps the dense crowd and the legions of ferocious hoy knights would allow her to escape the fire adept¡¯s mad pursuit.


    The most powerful of the holy knights that had hurried to the gates was also a Second Grade Silver Knight.


    He had just arrived at the city gate and stopped his horse. He had not even identified the disorder in the distance when Katherine set her sights upon him.


    The de Princess had already made contact with these holy knights. She had a perfect grasp of their strengths and weaknesses.


    With sufficient time to bless themselves with holy light, every holy knight would be an iron can protected byyers of halos. All sorts of magical resistances and physical resistances would be present, making it exceptionally difficult to kill them. However, if they were caught by surprise and without the protection of the holy light, their divine armor would be fragile.


    As such, Katherine struck to kill without any hesitation the moment she discovered these holy knights.


    Her silhouette flickered as she instantly crossed the ten-meter-long iron gates of the city, appearing in the middle of the ranks of holy knights. Five metal disc-des shot out of nowhere, turning into a formation of death thatpletely engulfed the nearby knights.


    Katherine herself charged at the Silver Knight, first immobilizing him with her spiritual pressure before passing through his body and shredding him and his warhorse into pieces of flesh.


    This one moment of dy had allowed Greem to approach the city. He let out a furious warcry and pointed with his finger. A massive cloud of fire appeared above the heads of the holy knights and pressed down upon them.


    Naturally, a long-ranged attack like that could not possibly hit Katherine. She simply elerated and charged out of the cloud before heading straight into the city. The mes devoured the knights that had been scattered by the metal des after a single cry.


    A short momentter, only indistinguishable carbonized ash remained on the spot. Greem had already ravaged through the battlefield on the stone serpent, continuing his chase after Katherine.


    The gate of Hakans might be tall, but it was still too small for this enhanced stone serpent.


    The stone serpent¡¯s giant body and tail swept against the city walls, causing dust to scatter everywhere and pieces of rock to copse from the structure.


    Seeing that the serpent was ill-suited for battle in the city, Greem unsummoned it and rushed into the city with the elementium magical machine.


    A dozen wind spirits floated in the sky, acting as Greem¡¯s ears and eyes while helping him track down the de Princess Katherine while cautiously watching for changes within the city.


    If theck of Third Grade natives he had encountered in the battles before this had been due to the enemy¡¯s slow information system and rigid means of transmitting orders, then the chances of him running into one now would be much greater. After all, he had now broken into their city.


    Greem might be confident in his power, but even he didn¡¯t dare be surrounded by multiple Third Grade natives.


    As such, Greem pursued Katherine tightly and charged into the massive city of Hakans, both nervous and expectant of the Third Grade natives.

 Chapter 950 - Gold Knight

    Chapter 950 Gold Knight


    Greem didn¡¯t have to wait long. The high-grade knights finally appeared.


    Hakans was thergest city in north Zambez.


    Even with his arrogance and hypercritical standards, Greem had no choice but to admit that this was a beautiful and prosperous human city.


    The towering walls surrounded the city, while the wide and t stone roads mapped out stretches of winding streets. Hakans had an excellent drainage system that kept the streets dry and clean, without any of the griminess typically seen in other cities.


    There was the livelymercial area, the congested warehouse area, the elegant and grandiose noble area, as well as the Chapel of the Holy Light standing tall in the center of the city.


    The architectural style of the Zambez Empire leaned toward soft and rounded features of gentle beauty. Looking down from above through the view of the wind spirits, Greem could see that every single building appeared to be so massive and beautiful. The roofs of the buildings were always round domes.


    The most eye-catchingndmark of the city had to be the massive chapel sitting in the center of the city. It was a strange religious building in its own right that almost every Zambez city would construct.


    The Holy Light Chapel was the central area of activity for the holy knights. They did their daily training there, along with their chivalry lessons and holy light assimtions. However, the main function of the chapel was as a cemetery for holy knights that died in the line of battle.


    A massive crypty beneath the chapel, used for the express purpose of storing the bodies of dead holy knights. The chapel would open its gates at the same time every week, allowing the believers to enter to pray and sing the praises of the Holy Light, as well as the warriors that had sacrificed themselves for the Empire¡¯s sacred cause.


    As members of the Zambez Empire, the holy knights that were trained in the Chapels often became important pirs of strength that ensured regional stability across the nation. Ordinary imperial soldiers were only the foundational force used to maintain order amongst themon folk. The holy knights that admired the Holy Light and kept to their beliefs were the real powerhouses of Henvic ne.


    That was why the first mission Greem assigned to the wind spirits upon entering Hakans was to monitor the activity of the holy knights within the city.


    One had to admit that the holy knights were indeed terrifying individuals who had undergone strict training and possessed incredible discipline andbat power.


    The gates of the Holy Light Chapel rumbled and swung open moments after the adepts entered the city. A group of holy knights in exquisite knight armor charged out from within. They rode on muscr and sturdy warhorses whose hooves stomped against the ground like thunder as they rushed toward the enemy like a whirlwind.


    The tall knight at the forefront wore a fine suit of silver armor. His helmet covered his entire head and face, and only a pair of calm,posed, and determined eyes could be seen through the cross-shaped opening on the faceguard. The warhorse beneath him was particrly tall and strong. It almost sounded as if thunder were striking and tigers were roaring when it sprinted across the city.


    Naturally, Greem didn¡¯t judge the enemy on their size or atmosphere, but by scanning their energy aura. The holy knights were not like the adepts. They had no idea how to distort or conceal their aura. Thus, this method of obtaining data was the most reliable and direct way of doing so.


    With the help of the wind spirits¡¯ vision, Greem chanted a few words, and the holy knights storming down the streets immediately turned into red light spots of various intensities.


    There were a total of three hundred and four points of light.


    Most of the points were light red. Judging from the intensity of the energy, these two hundred and eighty-two knights were at First Grade. Apart from that, there were also twenty-one spots of light that glowed with a deeper red. It was evident that these were Second Grade Silver Knights. Meanwhile, the knight in silver armor at the very front was shining with blinding red light, making for a fearsome sight to behold.


    Greem narrowed his eyes as a vicious expression appeared on his face.


    Third Grade. He¡¯d finally run into a Third Grade of Henvic ne!


    Much like how imperial armies often looked down upon militias and local armies, Greem, who came from the World of Adepts, looked down upon this man of the same grade who came from a low-magic ne.


    Holy knight? No more than a group of warriors trained in both the mystic and martial arts!


    Weaker than the body-refining adepts when it came to physical force, and inferior to the elementium adepts when it came to the mastery of elementium magic. They had only barely made it to the higher ranks due to the blessing of the mysterious Holy Light. How could they ever possibly hope topare to a proper adept like himself!?


    Fully confident and disdainful of the knights, Greem did not choose to avoid their charge. Instead, he rushed toward them.


    Meanwhile, de Princess Katherine had oddly vanished without a trace after charging into Hakans.


    Theplexity of life auras in the city and the geography itself provided her with far too many ces to hide. Even Greem had no ability to continue pursuing her.


    Thunder rumbled along the streets as horse hooves smashed against the earth.


    The formerly peaceful and quiet street broke out into panic as the terrified civilians scattered and hid within their shops and houses. When Greem and the elementium magical machine arrived at the broad avenue leading straight to the Chapel of Holy Light, the roaring legion of holy knights had also just appeared at the other end of the street.


    ¡°In the name of the Holy Light! Knights, charge!¡±


    ¡°Charge!¡±


    Deafening warcries and roars reached the skies as the holy knights charged forward in formation. They raised their double-edged longsword and yelled out short holy prayers.


    ¡°Valor!¡±


    ¡°Resilience!¡±


    ¡°Glory!¡±


    ¡°Blessing!¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    As the short prayers filled the air, beams of blinding holy light started to gather upon their bodies. Layer afteryer,yer uponyer, the prayers stacked atop each other and merged. It made every knight radiate with such majesty and holiness that it was hard to look straight at them.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown as he watched with a cold eye.


    He wouldn¡¯t have been worried if it was only an illusory light effect. However, the Chip¡¯s scans and analysis revealed that the holy light around the knights contained high magical energy.


    Valor gave them protection over their souls.


    Resilience provided them with intermediate magical resistance.


    Glory increased all of their attributes: Strength, Physique, Agility, and Spirit.


    Blessing even shielded the holy knights from certain mortal strikes.


    ......


    The mundane First Grade Iron Knights were nothing in Greem¡¯s eyes. However, with theyers of holy blessings piled upon them, their power rose exponentially, so much so that Greem couldn¡¯t help but brood in silence.


    Meanwhile, the Second Grade Silver Knights had been enhanced to a level where they were a threat to Greem.


    However, that wasn¡¯t the end of it!


    Apart from their single-target holy blessings, the holy knights were also capable of fearsome group blessings.


    The leading Third Grade Gold Knight shouted as he raised his longsword above his head. A milky white sacred halo appeared beneath his feet and instantly provided all the holy knights with a brilliant Aegis of Light.


    Divine Protection!


    A Third Grade holy knight ability!


    It provided all holy knights within sixty meters of the scared halo with an Aegis of Light with a defensive power of four hundred points.


    Apart from that, the Third Grade Gold Knight was also chanting even more holy prayers as he charged forward. Almost everybat technique he was unleashing was a group blessing.


    Holy Strike, an increase to Physique and critical hit chance!


    Holy Shock, a boost to Strength and physical damage!


    Dawn¡¯s Light, a reduction to elemental damage!


    ......


    In all honesty, when the hundreds of holy knights applied their various divine protections to themselves and their allies, the glorious light that pierced the heavens was so bright it could blind the enemy before them.


    These holy knights had been no more than weak sheep in Greem¡¯s eyes when they first started charging. However, now halfway across the street, they had transformed into ferocious tigers armed to the teeth.


    Greem¡¯s expression finally couldn¡¯t help but change!


    That was because, at this moment, the berserk aura that the Third Grade Gold Knight gave off had far surpassed his own.


    Name: Unknown


    Gender: Male


    Profession: Gold Knight


    Bodily attributes: Strength 34 | Agility 16 | Physique 35 Spirit 28


    Greem felt his head swell when he saw the attributes being fed back from the Chip.


    Two of the Third Grade¡¯s attributes had exceeded thirty points after receiving the myriad of holy blessings. Greem¡¯s surprise was immense.


    It was important to note that even a proper elementium adept like Greem, who came from a higher ne, only had one attribute that exceeded thirty points. Moreover, this was his attribute after transforming into the me Fiend of Terror. His usual attributes were only weaker than the Gold Knight.


    Dammit! I can¡¯t fight this fellow head on!


    The thought had just appeared in Greem¡¯s mind, and he immediately slowed down in his path. The elementium magical machine charging alongside him rushed forward. Even more terrifying magical energy surged out of the gaps in its metal body.


    The magical machine roared as both parties drew to a close. Itunched a rapid charge under the propulsion of powerful magic energy, and its blinding red metal fist smashed down upon the Gold Knight, howling with violent winds.


    The opponent let out a battlecry. His entire body was encased in blinding holy light as he raised his longsword and bucked his horse, shing wickedly at the magical machine¡¯s fist.


    Dong!


    A deafening st rang out as an energy shockwave spread from the point of impact, engulfing all living creatures in the street and around it.


    The elementium magical machine¡¯s body sunk down as its two giant metal legs were hammered into the stone road. The sound of sshing blood rang out from beneath the Gold Knight¡¯s armor as he and his horse slid backward from the impact.


    The tough hooves left sparks in the air as they rubbed against the ground, leaving four clear ditch marks in the road.

 Chapter 951 - City Battlefield

    Chapter 951 City Battlefield


    It was obvious that the first exchange of blows between the elementium magical machine and the Gold Knight had ended in a stalemate!


    However, unlike the holy knight, the elementium magical machine wasn¡¯t backed by an army of subordinates.


    While the machine was struggling to extract its legs from the ground, the holy knights had already surrounded it. They were shing rapidly against its metal body with their longswords, causing sparks and energy to spill everywhere.


    Meanwhile, the Gold Knight readjusted himself within seven seconds. The few Second Grade Silver Knights that gathered around him pressed their longswords against their heads and chanted some incantations. Beams of Holy Recovery and Light¡¯s Illumination were cast upon the Gold Knight.


    The beams of holy light instantly negated the small bit of damage that he had sustained, and the Gold Knightpletely recovered.


    Even more holy knights wrapped around the elementium magical machine and lunged at Greem as they shouted the name of the Holy Knight.


    Goddammit! As expected of the peak fighting force that rules over the Henvic ne! They have their moments of brilliance!


    Greem coldly assessed their abilities as he grunted and started his own transformation.


    Vicious and violent magical mes surged out of his orifices, instantly engulfing him and turning him into a terrifying me humanoid. His originally two-meter-tall body started to swell like a balloon. The stone path beneath his feet rapidly softened and melted from the intense heat of the mes, turning into redva that flowed upward along Greem¡¯s thick legs.


    In the blink of an eye, Greem had turned into a six-meter-tall me Fiend of Terror wrapped in dark-red magma. Crimsonva surged within his body, along with fires of extreme temperatures.


    Greem was a giant after his transformation. The shops and buildings beside him only reached up to his shoulder, while the holy knights could only barely reach his waist.


    A massive Burning Domain extended outward and enveloped most of the street and the buildings at his sides.


    Fearsome fires ignited without a single sound!


    The ordinary people hiding in the houses nearby did not even have the time to scream. They were instantly turned into human torches and copsed into piles of ashes. The wooden homes and everything within them burned, transforming the entire street into a sea of fire.


    The holy knights were wrapped by fires that had abruptly kindled on them before they could even get close to Greem. A brilliant Aegis of Light emerged from their bodies and kept the magical mes away from them, but there was no stopping the raging sea of fire from crackling and burning away at the shield.


    Still, the courageous holy knights remained unfazed by this scene of terror. They bravely charged the me Fiend and shed at its magma legs with their longswords coated in holy power.


    The retaliatory fire damage from the magma caused the Aegis of Light to tremble with every sh. Lava flowed out of the cracks in the magma, adding yet another constant source of damage against the sacred blessing protecting them.


    It was difficult for Greem to bend down and fight these tin cans with his transformed size. As such, he stomped his feet and waved his hands, summoning pirs of zing mes from the ground around him.


    The First Grade Iron Knights could not endure such powerful fire magic regardless of how many holy blessings they had been empowered with. When the me pirs engulfed them, they were blown into the air along with their warhorses. By the time theynded, they would have be a pile of ck ashes and smoldering bones.


    ¡°A contest of numbers is it? Haha, I¡¯ll let you see what I can do!¡±


    Greemughed arrogantly and summoned a massive megate while under the attack of two dozen holy knights. A short momentter, intense mes spewed forth from the megate as strange creatures formed purely of elementium mes charged out from within in all shapes and sizes.


    ¡°Go, citizens of fire, turn this ce into a sea of mes!¡±


    Under Greem¡¯s summoning and maniption, a massive horde of fire creatures broke into the Henvic ne, charged down the street, and shed with the charging holy knights. A portion of them had their own wills and intentions. They left the battlefield and swarmed toward the surrounding streets and alleys.


    As pure fire creatures, the greatest joy in their life was turning everything in the world into their personal yground. Even without intent, mes rose as fires spread where they went. Surging mes quickly devoured the city buildings outside of the battlefield.


    Of the four basic elemental creatures, the earth elementals were known for their sturdy defenses and ferocious attacks, the wind elementals for their agile movements and vicious assaults, and the water elementals for their gentle flexibility and permeating ability. Meanwhile, the fire elementals were known for their pure destructive ability.


    When such a horde of fire elementium creatures invaded a city, it was practically a deration of that city¡¯s death sentence!


    Of course, struggling was a necessary process before anything truly approached death.


    The holy knights formed two distinct groups, surrounding the elementium magical machine and the transformed Greem as they fought with all they had.


    The elementium magical machine, now Greem¡¯s strongest helper, had finally sustained visible damage beneath the repeated attacks of the holy knights. It was the first time it had sustained such severe damage since its activation. However, it had also kept the Gold Knight upied and incapable of approaching Greem.


    Meanwhile, the transformed Greem did not fear these swarming holy knights. With the protection of the magma armor and the Inferno Shields, he could boldly unleash all sorts of powerful fire magic upon them.


    Numerous holy blessings might protect these holy knights, but even that couldn¡¯t shield them from powerful magical attacks of such frequency and intensity. Moreover, the Burning Domain still continually burned away at their defenses. In just fifteen minutes, over three dozen Iron Knights had died to Greem¡¯s magical mes.


    Greem had also attempted to release the Spirit of Pestilence. Unfortunately, most of its attacks were countered and nullified by these holy knights and incapable of demonstrating its actual might. In its fury, the Spirit of Pestilence turned to leave the battlefield and started spreading gue spores throughout the city.


    These past few days of continued ughter had allowed the Spirit of Pestilence to gather sufficient life energy to approach the threshold of Third Grade. Now that they had arrived in an area with such a dense poption, it would not give up on this perfect opportunity for ughter.


    With the Spirit of Pestilence¡¯s gue and the fire creatures wreaking havoc throughout the city, the seventy thousand civilians of Hakans quickly descended into the shadow of panic and death.


    Greem was also starting a tide of ughter of his own on the main battlefield!


    After wearing down all theyers of the knights¡¯ defenses, Greem¡¯s fire spells could deal significant damage to every one of them. These abruptly copsing figures and bodies burned to a crisp immediately incited the utmost wrath of the Gold Knight.


    As he shouted out hismands, most of the Silver Knights retreated and surrounded the elementium magical machine. That provided the Gold Knight with the time and space to charge at Greem.


    Greem smiled faintly.


    He had no interest in shing head-to-head with an iron can wrapped inyers of holy blessings. When the Gold Knight approached him, he kept him at a distance with a me Halo of Repulsion. He then squatted down leisurely as his massive body vanished in a giant pir of mes.


    An equally massive pir of fire appeared on the other side of the street, where the knights¡¯ formation was the densest, and Greem walked out of the mes with his gigantic stature.


    The me shockwave and the devouring Burning Domain instantly engulfed the holy knights. Greem grabbed with both his hands, and several Magma Fireballs formed within them before he threw the balls in every direction.


    These Magma Fireballs exploded into a giant twenty-meterrge cluster of mes wherever theynd, washing everything in their radius with a fearsome rain ofva.


    How could these First Grade Iron Knights endure such a violent offense!? They were knocked off their feet by the vicious mes as the boilingva ate through their armor and caused them to roll about the ground and scream in agony.


    The brutality and cruelty of the battlefield called to mind the horrors of hell itself!


    The unsessful Gold Knight shouted in anger. He then turned his horse around and charged at Greem once more.


    Greem yed the same trick again, sealing off the knight¡¯s path with a Demonic Wall of Fire as he approached before vanishing with a Fire Teleportation.


    It was the natural result of a battle between a caster and a magical warrior!


    As long as the magical warrior had no means of rapidly closing the gap and dragging the fight into a melee, there was no meaning to their pursuit.


    Every sessful caster would preserve their mobility spells as best as they could to put distance between themselves and the enemy. That was why proper utilization of mobility spells was a fundamental that all experienced casters needed to master in thebat manual of the adepts!


    It was clear that this was a tremendous weakness for the holy knights.


    Theirck of mobility was an unforgivable reason for defeat!


    The Gold Knight also started to shown signs of injury after several rounds of this meaningless kiting due to Greem¡¯s incessant fire spells. Most of those imprable holy blessings on him had been worn away.


    Thest few Second Grade Silver Knights that were still empowering him and healing his wounds were also quickly dying to Greem¡¯s ferocious attacks.


    Two hours after the start of this wild battle, the scales slowly began tipping toward Greem.


    Yet, just as Greem evaded another one of the Gold Knight¡¯s attacks with a Fire Teleportation, the debris beside him erupted. A quick silhouette charged out from beneath and arrived behind his back.


    de Princess Katherine. It was the de Princess, Katherine!

 Chapter 952 - Badly Wounded Once Again

    Chapter 952 Badly Wounded Once Again


    Katherine¡¯s body spun wildly, turning into a golden tornado as she gripped her metal spike tightly with both hands and went for the me Fiend¡¯s heart.


    The timing of her attack was impable¨C it was the small window when Greem had justpleted his Fire Teleportation. Moreover, Greem¡¯s movements were far less agile and slower to react after he transformed into a me Fiend.


    Her attack was also targeted at the most crucial high-energy organ. If she seeded in her ambush, the damage to Greem would either kill him or cripple him without a doubt.


    However, Greem had pursued her all the way here to Hakans. He also knew that she had hidden herself secretly before the battle broke out.


    How could he not have prepared a contingency for her!


    He was not fast enough to escape Katherine¡¯s attacks with the me Fiend¡¯s movement speed, while enduring her well-prepared attack at close range would only be a foolish decision. As such, Greem disintegrated without any hesitation!


    As Katherine turned into a violent golden tornado, and the tip of her sharp spikes was only half a meter away from making contact with the me Fiend¡¯s magma armor, this humongous six-meter tall-giant made of magma,va, and mes instantly disintegrated.


    Hundreds and thousands of magma shards fell to the ground like a copsing mountain. Theva and mes flowing within also went out of control immediately and started spilling and spreading everywhere.


    Katherine pierced through the copsing stone andva with the metal spike like a drill with her body of des as a saw. Everything in contact was minced into fine particles. Strangely enough, she neither sensed nor detected any life energy aura.


    The golden tornado vanished as Katherine once again stood upon the smoldering ruins in the form of a human girl. She held her breath and started searching for the male adept¡¯s location once more.


    The sudden appearance of the young girl had also attracted the attention of several nearby fire creatures. Out of their hatred for life, they roared and charged at Katherine.


    ¡°Rats! Die.¡±


    Katherine, still filled with frustration over her failed ambush, motioned, and the metal disc-des beside her swung. Five golden glints of light instantly sliced past the body of the fire creatures. These fire creatures that were no more than First Grade were instantly dispersed and reduced to a rain of fire.


    The strange sound of metal grinding against metal could be heard amidst this rain of fire.


    Katherine turned back to look and was surprised to find a survivor among the fire creatures. It roared and charged forward, even as it rapidly swelled and increased in size. One of Katherine¡¯s metal disc-des was now a zing, revolving saw of death against its back, but it could not even cut a single inch into the creature¡¯s body.


    The energy aura of this fire creature whose appearance so resembled a magical tiger was also increasing wildly, even as it grew to a gigantic size.


    First Grade...Second Grade...Third Grade.


    This otherworldly ming tiger whose power had been no more than pseudo-adept level had transformed into a terrifying Third Grade fire creature within a matter of three seconds. Katherine could hardly feel her own body or soul at this moment.


    How...how is this possible?


    Aooooo!


    A deafening roar came out of the tiger¡¯s mouth. It braved the attacks of the metal disc-des and charged courageously toward Katherine.


    Dammit! It was an elementium helper that the male adept summoned from another world. Moreover, it¡¯s a Third Grade helper!


    Katherine¡¯s mental state was in shambles now.


    She had a pretty good idea that the Third Grade ming tiger that had been posing as a mere fire spirit had probably been prepared for the Gold Knight if she hadn¡¯t appeared. However, now that she had revealed herself, she immediately became the focus of all the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    Unfortunately, the current circumstances did not allow her time to hesitate or mourn her decisions.


    A loud explosion rang out as the human and the tiger crashed into each other, turning these ruins into a terrifying battlefield.


    The Gold Knight was charging over upon his warhorse. He abruptly stopped his mount upon seeing this unfold. For a moment, he was utterly confused at the sight of this fiery and intense battlefield.


    Enemies, enemies...all of them were enemies!


    Should he catch them all in a single strike, or should he help one side beat the other first? Or should he watch as they brawled it out amongst themselves and intervene once they were both wounded and exhausted?


    In his moment of hesitation, disaster struck the holy knights that were attacking the elementium magical machine. One of the Second Grade Silver Knights failed to dodge in time and was set on fire by the mes sting out of the machine¡¯s right hand. He and his horse were scorched entirely ck.


    Though hispanions managed to save him on time by dragging him aside and using Holy Recovery on him repeatedly, his severe wounds meant that he would not be able to rejoin the battle. Thus, a gap appeared in the ranks attacking the magical machine, providing it with the chance to escape.


    The Gold Knight could no longer be bothered with these two enemies that were tearing away at each other. He immediately turned around and charged at the elementium magical machine.


    Meanwhile, a strange human face suddenly appeared in a flickering me at the edge of the battlefield above a zing building. The face opened its golden eyes as it coldly assessed the battlefield.


    Seeing that the Gold Knight had ignored the battle of the Third Grades in favor of attacking the elementium magical machine, the face let out a coldugh and turned its attention back to the de Princess.


    Of course, this human face was something that Greem had manifested with his powers. This ability was something he had learned from the ming tiger, Cindral. Hiding one¡¯s body with actual fire was the unique skill of some fire creatures! Without Cindral¡¯s guidance, Greem would not have been able to achieve such a feat without several dozens of years of training.


    Greem turned into a cluster of pure mes and liberally traveled across the massive sea of fire.


    Compared to his human form or his me Fiend form, a body of pure and shapeless fire was morepatible with Greem¡¯s soul origin. It was also stranger and unpredictable. His movements had also be unprecedentedly quick and subtle since he turned into pure fire.


    He was able to travel freely to any ce with fire. There was no need to even draw on his magical powers. It significantly reduced the possibility of the enemy discovering him.


    Greem circled Katherine and Cindral, observing their battle as he looked for the best opportunity to strike. He knew that Katherine was aware of his existence. Moreover, he knew that she was definitely searching for ways to locate him, the best of which was to betray a weakness and lure him into striking.


    Thus, the timing he was looking for must not be a trapid out by the opponent. It would be a test of his judgment!


    ......


    Katherine was still fighting with all she had.


    This ming tiger was unusually difficult to deal with!


    Unlike the elementium forms of ordinary elementium creatures, this ming tiger had apletely different body that was tough and sturdy.


    Indeed, his half-elementiumized body seemed to have been mixed with some sort of strange metal, causing it to disy astounding toughnessparable to super magical alloys. The remaining half of Katherine¡¯s human face couldn¡¯t help but twitch at the sight of this vicious ming tiger confronting her in a melee battle, yielding not a single inch to her metal des and spikes.


    She was screaming internally, even as she fought.


    It was important to note that these five disc-des and two metal spikes were all high-grade magical equipment. They were not only made with extremely tough materials but had also been enhanced with multiple practical anti-magic effects.


    Yet, evenpound attacks like these felt like beating against a solid statue forged of super-alloy when they hit the tiger. Apart from some sparks and a deafeningly loud sound, they could not even slice off a single hair from the tiger.


    The ming tiger was also taking full advantage of his sturdy me body. He lunged, pounced, spewed fire, swept with his tail, and let out stunning tiger roars, leaving Katherine with no time or space to spare at all, much less to split her attention and search for the damned fire adept.


    However, her sharp battle instincts allowed her to faintly sense a deeply hostile intent flowing through the fires around her. Unfortunately, the ming tiger¡¯s actions left her with no ability to determine the source of that hostile intent.


    It undoubtedly made the already wounded and upied Katherine be increasingly frustrated and suspicious of everything around her.


    Just as Katherine was starting to be consumed by paranoia, Cindral let out a huge roar. His overwhelming and berserk aura gathered into a cone-shaped shockwave that crashed into Katherine¡¯s quickly moving body.


    The de Princess¡¯ petite body shivered slightly, and her mind was blown into a slight daze from the abrupt soundwave attack. Both Cindral and the hiding Greem pounced at this excellent opportunity, sting Katherine with their most ferocious attacks.


    Aaaaaah!


    Even with her arrogance, Katherine could feel the aura of death approach her from the attacks by two powerful Third Grades.


    She no longer dared to hold back. She lifted her head and let out a sky-rending screech. A dozen disc-des shot out of her body and formed a fearsome array of destruction in tandem with the first five des. They spun wildly around her body.


    Any attack or spell that attempted to hurt her would first have to be sliced and shed up by the metal array. It was a multiyeredposite attack. Any being that wished to break through to Katherine¡¯s side would have to endure one hundred and seventy-three physical damage every second.


    Moreover, once these attacks added up, even the toughest of defensive spells would fall.


    Cindral had just reached Katherine and left seven fearsome gashes on her body with his ming ws. He was shocked and quickly fled from the des. Even as quick as he was, he was still viciously shed by seven or eight of the des.


    Damage of this level was too much for Cindral¡¯s body, even after it had been strengthened.


    A pained roar rang out as Cindral scrambled out of the de array.


    On the other side, the powerful Third Grade fire spell that Greem had prepared for so long was already locked onto Katherine. It was Molten World. A blindingly dense fire halo appeared beneath Katherine¡¯s feet as a massive pir of me abruptly erupted with Katherine at its very center.


    The temperature of the surroundings rose rapidly. A thousand degrees...two thousand degrees...three thousand degrees.


    The overwhelming heat ignited all of Katherine¡¯s clothes and caused her exposed flesh to be red-hot. The blistering air made it difficult for her to breath. She felt the few flesh organs within her body shrivel and char as she did so.


    Manipting five disc-des was Katherine¡¯s usual level of ability. She would only release all the des within her when she was fighting for her life.


    The tremendous Spirit exhaustion caused by this move was intolerable, even with her Spirit!


    Katherine no longer cared about attacking Greem. Instead, she fled away as fast as she could with her severely injured body.


    This time, she truly could not bear any more damage!

 Chapter 953 - Killing a Third Grade

    Chapter 953 Killing a Third Grade


    Greem hesitated for a moment in the face of a severely wounded Katherine. In the end, he decided to let her go.


    It wasn¡¯t mercy he was showing. It was simply not worth the effort.


    A Third Grade mechanical witch was still a Third Grade mechanical witch. Even with all her wounds and injuries, she still possessed terrifying power sufficient enough to drag the enemy along with her.


    The wounds from this time were iparable to theirst encounter.


    The damage from theirst fight had only been superficial, and both her soul origin and the foundations of her body had not been affected. She had only needed a bit of time to rest and recuperate to recover to peak condition. The wounds this time were far more severe. Apart from the tremendous damage to her physical body, fire energy seemed to have seeped into her soul origin as well.


    A horrifying injury like that was unlikely to heal in the Henvic ne!


    Katherine¡¯s only solution now was to return to a higher ne as soon as possible and search for suitable resources that could purge the destructive mes within her body. If she took too long, there was even the possibility that her grade could regress.


    That was an even more uneptable oue than death for an arrogant adept!


    Greem let out a breath of relief after chasing away the de Princess. He could finally focus his efforts on dealing with these holy knights.


    In truth, there were another three thousand imperial soldiers in Hakans apart from these holy knights. Unfortunately, with their strength, they were not qualified to participate in a nar war of this level.


    Disregarding the rampaging Greem and the elementium magical machine, just the peak Second Grade Spirit of Pestilence alone would be enough to raze Hakans to the ground. The city garrison had attempted to approach the battlefield to reinforce the holy knights when the battle first broke out.


    However, a hundred soldiers were exterminated into oblivion by the aftershock of the spells before they could even get close. By the time the fire creatures swarmed the city, the Hakans garrison could only fight with them in the city across all the streets and alleyways.


    Even as courageous and patriotic as they were, these soldiers were still far too frail and insignificantpared to these otherworldly fire elementals.


    Battlecries rang throughout Hakans as thick smoke clogged the city, and heatwaves burned the civilians.


    Hakans appeared like a crimson purgatory when seen from above. All the people and buildings had been dragged into a terrifying banquet of ughter and destruction.


    A strange gust of wind suddenly blew across the massive sea of fire. The mes gathered together and slowly formed into a seven-meter-tall me giant.


    The face of the giant came into focus soon and appeared to be very simr to Greem¡¯s face.


    ¡°You are not going to make me help you deal with this strange knight as well, are you?¡± ming Tiger Cindral slowly limped over to Greem¡¯s side, his body covered in wounds. He crouched above the debris and looked at the Third Grade Gold Knight fighting the machine in the distance, ¡°I¡¯ll have to refuse that suggestion if you do! That fellow looks like a solid meat shield wrapped in iron. I¡¯ll be at a huge disadvantage if I fight with him. Also, remember, I¡¯ve already returned one of the three favors I owe you!¡±


    One had to admit that the elementium magical machine was truly immensely powerful!


    Even surrounded and trapped by a Third Grade and a group of Second Grades, all of its essentialponents were still perfectly protected, although its metal shell had been badly sliced and cut. It was still as powerful as when it had been at the start of the battle; it continually attempted to injure the Second Grade Silver Knights while surrounded by enemies.


    If any of the Silver Knights were to take a solid blow from its metal fists, they would have to retreat from the battle and recover. The blessings and defenses of the holy light could not protect them from such tremendous magical power.


    Moreover, the machine asionally unleashed an incredibly powerful magical attack and inflicted devastating damage to all holy knights around it.


    If one were to be brutally honest, the elementium magical machine was capable of unleashing power even beyond Greem¡¯s ability. After all, regardless of how courageous he was, Greem would never dare to charge into the middle of his enemies to unleash his spells.


    Still, despite how powerful the magical machine was, it was fighting against a Third Grade Gold Knight and dozens of Second Grade Silver Knight. Its defeat was only a matter of time!


    The Gold Knight fended off most of the elementium magical machine¡¯s attacks, leaving the Silver Knights free to attack it with all they had. It was through such a method that the elementium magical machine started to falter in front of them.


    That was why Cindral, always aware and assessing the situation, was not willing to sh with these iron cans that could fight, tank, and heal.


    Greem chuckled and replied with a deep, booming voice, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, old pal, when have I ever cheated you? I¡¯ll summon anotherpanion and let him charge at the very front. You shouldn¡¯t have any problem following behind him, will you?¡±


    ¡°Mm? What else can you summon?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe, watch me.¡±


    Greem stepped forward, his hands of me quickly drawing multiple fire rune before his chest as ancient and profound incantations came forth from his mouth.


    Cindral tilted his head and listened for a moment before his majestic eyes opened wide as he spoke with shock, ¡°Dragon oath? You...you can summon a dragon?¡±


    Greem had no time to reply to him.


    His loud and powerful chants reverberated throughout the battlefield. The fire runes shed with each other in midair, quickly piecing together to form an ancient magical contract.


    A strange wormhole appeared in the air under the power of this magical contract. Then, a thirty-meter long bright blue dragon emerged from within and squeezed into this lower ne with much difficulty.


    ¡°I smell a stinking stench here. Master, do you need me to fight for you so quickly?¡± The neer was obviously Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms, who was having a smooth time in Lance.


    Arms couldn¡¯t help butin the moment he entered Henvic. It was apparent that he could not get used to the incredibly thin concentration of magical energy here.


    Arms¡¯ voice was loud. Even though he was not roaring intentionally, his overwhelming aura of might and his deafening voice washed across the entirety of Hakans. Of course, Greem and Cindral were the only ones who understood Dragontongue. The holy knights of Hakans only heard a long and fearsome dragon¡¯s roar, with no idea of what the dragon was saying.


    The Gold Knight had intended to destroy the elementium magical machine in one fell swoop before returning to duel with the sly adept once again. However, just as he increased the pace at which he attacked the tall metal golem, the adept summoned yet another massive and mysterious dragon.


    Even he started to panic!


    Greem lifted his head and looked at the thunder dragon beating its wings and hovering above him. He eximed loudly, ¡°Arms, do you see this city before you? As long as you help me exterminate that Third Grade knight, I will allow you to raid this city to your pleasing. Any treasure or wealth that you find will belong to you. I will not take a single portion of it!¡±


    ¡°You mean it?¡± Arms already massive dragon eyes turned even wider when he heard Greem¡¯s words.


    He looked around. With the wealth of knowledge that the dragons possessed, he quickly assessed the size of the city before him and the possible wealth it contained. Naturally, he could tell that it was arge city, and a prosperous one even among other human cities.


    Moreover, judging from the current situation, this city had yet to be visited by other dragons and was a ripe fruit bursting with wealth. It was the best target for a raid.


    However, since this was a foreign ne, it was unknown how long Greem¡¯s ¡®weak¡¯ Spirit could sustain his existence here. As such, Arms dared not dy. He lifted his neck and roared before pping his wings and charging at the holy knights.


    The dragon had yet to arrive, but his terrifying soundwave dragon breath had already descended!


    Arms¡¯ soundwave dragon breath was indeed an unusual ability. Most people that fought with him for the first time would be blindsided because of this.


    The intangible yet vicious soundwave quickly engulfed all the holy knights around the magical machine, forcing them to lift their hands to cover their ears. However, purple and ck blood still leaked out of their eyes, noses, mouths, and ears.


    The blessings of the holy knights were mighty. Though their hearts were ringing with pain and their organs were shuddering from the soundwave dragon breath, they still survived.


    However, while they had managed to endure the soundwave, the horses beneath them could not!


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms dove down and flew over the heads of the knights. The horses whinnied and copsed to the ground where he passed; their organs had shattered to pieces. The knights were thrown to the ground.


    Apart from the Third Grade Gold Knight, who had barely managed to shield his horse with holy light, all the other knights¨Cthe Second Grade Silver Knights included¨Chad been dismounted.


    A good chance.


    Cindral couldn¡¯t help but let out a roar and charge onto the battlefield as well.


    ¡°Greem, I¡¯ve given my all in the battle today as well. Count a portion of the city¡¯s wealth mine.¡±


    The tiger opened his mouth slightly and spewed out several zing hot fireballs as he ran forward, sting and wounding the knights.


    As a spellcaster, Greem would not charge forward like the ming tiger, the thunder dragon, and the elementium magical machine. He stood tall amid the burning wreckage and waved both his hands. Fire spells quickly formed and ravaged the battlefield.


    Scarlet Firestorm!


    Meteor Shower!


    Doomsday Volcano!


    Explosive Fireball!


    ......


    When a powerful fire adept was allowed to unleash his full might fearlessly, the entire battlefield and even the whole city would shudder and tremble!


    The Third Grade Gold Knight, who had been tearing through the battlefield earlier, could finally no longer stand his ground against the attacks of four Third Grade powerhouses.


    As the magical machine crushed his warhorse to pieces, Arms paralyzed him with a massive beam of lightning. Cindral then tackled him and blew him into the air, where Greem sted him into oblivion with a Meteor Burst!

 Chapter 954 - Harvesting the Holy Light

    Chapter 954 Harvesting the Holy Light


    With the death of the Gold Knight, the resistance of Hakans came to an end.


    Without a Third Grade to keep the adept in check, the other First and Second Grade Silver Knights were useless regardless of how numerous they were. Simple numbers were no longer a solution at the level of Third Grades.


    The crippled holy knights seemed to have realized their defeat as well. They forcefully reorganized their forces and retreated to the Holy Light Chapel, hoping to rely on the high ground to defend against the adept¡¯s terrifying attacks. The idea was a decent one, but the reality was always crueler than the most brutal horror story.


    After exterminating the Gold Knight, Arms charged into the sky with a loud cheer. He took a brief look at the city below and immediately headed for the most extravagant mansion. There wasn¡¯t much time left. He still had to raid the public treasuries and estates of the rich and noble. It was an extraordinarily professional and demanding job.


    As such, he didn¡¯t intend to waste even a single bit of his time!


    The magnificent Holy Light Chapel before him was clearly a mystical religious building. Raiding a ce like that would require dealing with too many stubborn defenders. Not only was this a waste of time, but the fruits of such an effort would also probably only be some ancient texts or the relics and armor of some past great character.


    These things might bear significant meaning and history for the members of the church, but they were far too pointless for the dragons, who loved shiny and glittering treasures. He would probably be made aughing stock if he returned to Lance with such ¡®treasures.¡¯


    Arms rushed toward the city lord¡¯s mansion in the distance without a second look at the chapel.


    Meanwhile, Cindral also didn¡¯t intend to return empty-handed. It was one of the rare times he was ¡®touring¡¯ in another ne. He immediately leaped away and headed for themercial area of Hakans after seeing the direction the dragon had left.


    There must be some rare treasures there that couldn¡¯t be found anywhere else as well!


    In the blink of an eye, only Greem and the battered elementium magical machine remained on the battlefield. Of course, there were also all the corpses of the holy knights as well.


    The elementium magical machine roared and chased after the retreating holy knights under Greem¡¯s orders, heading toward the Holy Light Chapel. Greem, on the other hand, walked casually to the remains of the Third Grade Gold Knight.


    The incredible attacks had ravaged his body. Greem¡¯s finishing Meteor Burst had even ruined his body beyond recognition. The holy armor he wore had been distorted severely, and the exposed skin had been charred ck and utterly carbonized.


    Greem bent down and carefully examined this broken corpse; blue light flickered in his ck eyes as he scanned its insides. The Ring of Fire had already been released, cutting off all possibility of the Gold Knight¡¯s soul fleeing from the spot.


    The Chip had analyzed the strange holy light that they had failed to collectst time. Its formation was due to pure and condensed sacred light pairing with a strong and resilient soul. Both factors were utterly crucial in the creation of holy light!


    In all seriousness, the Holy Light that the knights believed in was actually the steadfast knight¡¯s chivalry that they held in their hearts!


    The knights of Henvic ne had simply found a visible and understandable form for their intangible faith- a pure light. They used light to represent the purity of their hearts, and light to describe their bright future.


    It was a sort of primitive faith that still existed in a primordial and chaotic form!


    Light was a basic energy that existed everywhere in a nar world. It had no consciousness nor intelligence and was as ordinary of an element as it could be. However, when all these knights ascribed and ced so-called ¡®justice,¡¯ wisdom, faith, and hope in their hearts upon the light, then it was no longer what it originally had been.


    Faith itself was a potent force in the nar worlds. Thus, the medium of the holy knight¡¯s faith¨Cthe light¨Cbecame sacred, holy, and powerful.


    Perhaps the adepts mightugh and look down upon the holy knights for their foolishness and ignorance in having a non-sentient, non-intelligent light as the source of their faith. However, even the adepts could not deny that the holy knights had indeed obtained power through their ¡®Holy Light¡¯ and created a legacy out of it.


    From this perspective, the holy knights were actually living a purer and more genuine life than the god spiritualists of the World of Gods!


    After all, they had no faith-hungry gods riding above their heads, nor strict and rigid religious teachings to restrict their every move.


    The holy knights relied on their devoted faith and the daily practice of their beliefs to have their faith seep into thews of light. One could say that the light in Henvic ne was massively different from thews of light in the World of Adepts.


    With the aid of the power of the Holy Light, the knights had managed to imprint their belief and faith upon the narws. Regardless of where you were born on the ne or what race you were, you would be able to feel the existence of the Holy Light through the power of the narws, so long as you agreed with the faith and principles of the holy knights with your very being and soul.


    Greem had no found simr ¡®faith remnants¡¯ like the Holy Light, despite having invaded two worlds with ne-wide faiths and killing many of their believers. He believed that the main reason for this was due to the existence of the gods!


    The souls of these believers had been branded with the mark of the gods. The moment they died, their souls were returned to the river of souls under the guidance of the narws or invited into the god kingdoms through a channel of faith. Both options would not leave such a product of faith and soul behind in the material ne.


    Meanwhile, those who possessed such powerful and resilient souls in the god kingdoms could still lean against the power of faith with their soul consciousness even in death. These individuals often became heroic or holy spirits.


    Either way, these souls were strange individuals that would not simply vanish, but could attach themselves to remnant energies and continue existing in the material world!


    Of course, the gods couldn¡¯t be more eager to guide such existences into their kingdoms and help materialize them with their divine power, such that they could continue working in the service of the gods in the god kingdoms. However, the Holy Knight worshipped by the holy knights of Henvic had no self-consciousness. It would not actively guide the heroic and holy spirits of the dead knights back to the source of faith.


    That was why the strange scene of a remnant ¡®Holy Light¡¯ would ur!


    It undoubtedly provided Greem with the possibility of intercepting the ¡®Holy Light.¡¯


    However, today was clearly different from the situationst time. When Greem carefully cremated the body of the Gold Knight, the Holy Light, more intense than the one from the Silver Knightst time, started to sh with the Ring of Fire repeatedly. It was almost as if there was some powerful force summoning it and making it impatient to return.


    Greem lifted his head and looked in the direction the Holy Light was attempting to flee. There, in front of him,y the path to the majestic Holy Light Chapel.


    The Holy Light Chapel?


    Greem started brooding in silence.


    ording to the memory fragments he had extracted from the minds of the nar natives, these Holy Light Chapels served as living quarters and training grounds for the holy knights, while also being the cemeteries for knights that died in battle. Perhaps it also served the same functions as the various temples of the World of Gods.


    Greem might not know how to tinker with the soul, but as a knowledgable adept, he still knew seven or eight methods of capturing and storing a soul.


    He took out a strange crystal ball the size of a fist and drew a dozen magical runes above it. These runes were peculiar, as well. They glowed as bright as day and radiated immense magical power when they were first drawn. However, as they burned into the surface of the crystal ball, they turned dark and faded, void of any magical aura.


    Once the soul-gathering crystal had beenpleted, Greem lightly waved it at the Holy Light. The light trembled and was reluctantly absorbed into the space within the crystal ball by a strange power.


    He got it! He finally got what he wanted!


    Greem straightened his back and looked at the scarred battlefield after collecting the Third Grade Gold Knight¡¯s remnant Holy Light.


    The bodies of over a hundred holy knights were still scattered all around him.


    Greem smiled. He chained the soul-gathering crystal to his waist before striding forward. As he walked forward, a silent and transparent me spread outward, instantly reducing the one hundred corpses into flying ash.


    Bright and faint Holy Lights appeared from within the gray dust and ashes before floating toward Greem¡¯s waist like a flock of swallows, silently gathering into the crystal.


    There were a total of one hundred and twenty-nine corpses, but only seventy-two Holy Lights were collected. The other knights either had their souls utterly destroyed or did not have a sufficiently pure faith. In conclusion, not all holy knights were able to form Holy Lights upon death!


    While Greem slowly harvested his spoils, the Holy Light Chapel in the distance was already flowing with a river of blood and corpses.


    The surviving holy knights retreated to the chapel, using itsrge gates as a barrier as they defended against the elementium magical machines¡¯ attacks with sturdy shields. These small fries of no more than First and Second Grade couldn¡¯t possibly be the match of the elementium magical machine. However, when their powers werebined into a strange Holy Light resonance, they managed to form a defense that the machine could not so quickly destroy.


    Thus, the two parties were stuck in a bloody back and forth in front of the gates to the chapel.


    The elementium magical machine might have constantly been ughtering low-grade holy knights, but the ants standing in its way were still an entire army and could not be fully exterminated.


    Too slow, I can¡¯t wait any longer.


    Greem cleaned up the battlefield and immediately walked toward the Holy Light Chapel. As he traveled to the Chapel, he casually gathered Vicious Fireballs in his hands andunched them into the crowd.


    Without a Third Grade to hold him back, these weaklings were no more than toothless ants before his six-meter stature. As the fireballs exploded, dozens of holy knights started to fall in clouds of smoke and pools of blood.


    If it weren¡¯t out of concern for his powerful spells affecting the harvest of Holy Lights, Greem would not even treat these knights seriously.


    Too weak!


    Weakness itself was a sin in the nar worlds. It had to be cleansed with blood and fire.


    It was a tradition that the adepts of the World of Adepts had always upheld!


    A principlepletely unrted to justice.

 Chapter 955 - Crime and Punishment

    Chapter 955 Crime and Punishment


    The holy knights of Hakans had already fallen into despair.


    Regardless of how they resisted, and regardless of how they struggled, they still could not stop the attacks of this metal creature before them. While they used their life and their flesh to dy its steps, an evenrger and more terrifying me giant charged forward.


    Its fireballs exploded into the crowd, the massive clusters of fires and me shockwaves burning their bodies and charring their flesh. The metal creature roared and charged into their ranks while their formation was disrupted.


    The defensive line of the knights finally copsed!


    Greem walked into the chapel over the bodies of the knights.


    He cast out mes as he strode forward, turning the bodies of the dead knights into ashes. The milky-white holy light from their bodies then darted toward the crystal on Greem¡¯s waist as if attracted by a ma.


    Several lines of poetry praising the Holy Light had been carved on top of therge and elegant gates of the chapel, along with decorative carvings and patterns. Barriers like these weren¡¯t known for their defensive power!


    The elementium magical machine tackled the gates lightly, and they fell backward, crushing some of the knights beneath them. Several knights charged out amidst all the shouting and floating dust, still covered in bloodstains as they raised their longswords.


    Unfortunately, their meager strength was nothing in front of the ferocious elementium magical machine, regardless of how many blessings were upon them!


    The elementium magical machine stepped forward, raising its two thick metal arms. A series of ice spears, crackling lightning webs, pirs of fire, and tornados shot forward.


    These magical energies were not as powerful as the spells of the adepts, but they came like a torrent and a barrage. Their absolute numbers knocked down most of the still resisting knights. The asional holy knight that managed to approach the elementium magical machine with a shield in hand would be blown away by a simple metal fist before he could even disy his excellentbat technique.


    Technique was so frail and meaningless before absolute strength. There was simply no room for it toe into y!


    Inside the gate was a massive field. It seemed like this was the training grounds where the holy knights arranged their daily practice. Several wide corridors around the field led toward different areas in the chapel.


    The road that went straight from the field led to the tall and majestic chapel.


    It was the ce where the holy knights sat and meditated as theymunicated with the great Holy Light. It would typically only be opened to believers on the day of prayer, where they would be allowed to pray here and pay respects to the warriors who had given their lives in service of the Empire¡¯s holy work.


    To the left of the training grounds was a series of tall wooden houses. It was obvious that these were the quarters of the holy knights. There was also an extensive library and a dining hall within. To the right were the armory, prison, and otherrge military buildings.


    Apart from the hundreds of holy knights, another two hundred trainee knights had been selected from all over the Empire to train here. In addition to all the servants and artisans, this ce housed a minimum of a thousand individuals.


    However, as the elementium magical machine and Greem rushed into the chapel, the Ring of Fire engulfed the ce. The ordinary mortals were instantly turned to dust without even the chance to scream. Only the powerful holy knights could barely resist the burn of the magical mes with their holy blessings.


    However, with their power, how long could they possiblyst in the Ring of Fire?


    When Greem walked forward, sparks shed in the houses as he passed by. Dust and ashes then floated to the ground. There was simply no room for ordinary people to survive.


    The groups of holy knights that raced out of the buildings shouted as they swarmed ahead, but were quickly knocked down by the elementium magical machine. When their numbers grew toorge, such that the magical machine couldn¡¯t take them down swiftly, Greem would toss a Vicious Fireball from behind, and the world would fall into silence in an instant!


    The difference in power was too vast. Even with the knights¡¯ fearless courage and determined will, they could not stop Greem.


    In just fifteen minutes, the elementium magical machine had knocked down thest group of holy knights and entered the cathedral. Several dozen injured holy knightsid there on the ground, covered in wounds and on the brink of death. Most of them had severe injuries such as broken and severed limbs. It was evident that these were all critical patients that could not be saved.


    Apart from these injured members, there were also several hundred ordinary people hiding in the corner of the cathedral. They looked at the giant metal creature and the demonic me giant that had barged into their holy sanctuary as they shivered in fright.


    Resistance? These otherworldly invaders possessed power and might beyond their imagination. They didn¡¯t even have the right to stand in front of Greem, let alone resist.


    The eyes of the people swelled with fear and despair as they looked upon the approaching crimson barrier. The children and the elderly embraced each other as tears streaked down their cheeks. Even the young men and women could only grit their teeth and wait for death to descend upon them.


    ¡°Wait.¡±


    Just as their final fate was about to arrive, a young holy knight in an exquisite half-te stood forward. The knight drew a longsword as tall as they were and pointed it at Greem as they shouted, ¡°Demon, we are the people you want. These ordinary people are entirely unrted. If you let them go, we...we will be willing to stop our resistance!¡±


    The young knight¡¯s voice was crisp yet loud, still with a trace of girlish childishness that had yet to fade away.


    As she took off her helmet, a young and childish face was revealed, mired with a pained expression that was mixed with both confusion and determination.


    A young trainee knight.


    Though she had gathered the courage to step before Greem and the elementium magical machine, her trembling longsword was an indication of her tumultuous mental state.


    With his six-meter height, Greem would never be able to sessfully enter the cathedral regardless of howrge they had made it.


    As such, mes surged around him as he forcefully burned an entrance through the side.


    He couldn¡¯t help but chuckle when he saw this young trainee knight stand in his way. He bent down slightly, and mes gathered in his eyes. A red st of fire washed over the young girl¡¯s sword, melting it in an instant and leaving only a short chunk of metal.


    The girl cried out in surprise. The red-hot hilt in her hand dropped to the ground, burning small holes into the wooden floor and sending smoke into the air.


    The girl¡¯s weak body trembled before this towering me giant. Due to how close they were, she could even feel the mes of the giant licking her hair and armor. Every time she breathed, it was not sweet air that entered her nose and lungs, but burning currents that felt as if they could melt her bones and char her flesh.


    Her nostrils were burning, her chest was burning, and her entire body felt as if the intense fires were burning it. The girl¡¯s face flushed bright red. She could barely breathe now.


    Greem looked around the cathedral and finally stopped walking forward. He started to restrain the fire energy that continually radiated from his body. The temperature of the air within ten meters of him dropped from a terrifying three thousand degrees to a mere one thousand and two hundred degrees. It was a tremendous drop in temperature, but it was still more than lethal enough for mortals whocked protection.


    ¡°Indeed, life should not be wasted so simply!¡± Greem said solemnly, ¡°You may leave with these mortals! Everyone below the Iron level may leave. I will only give you three minutes.¡±


    Greem spoke in Zambezian. The ordinary people hiding in the corner stopped crying when they heard this, and the light of hope returned to their faces.


    ¡°Three minutes...you only have three minutes! When the time is up, everyone here must die!¡±


    The servants, craftsmen, and ordinary people that hade here to hide looked at each other when they heard the me giant roar again. They didn¡¯t know whether they should believe the words of this otherworldly demon.


    Finally, a middle-aged man plucked up the courage to stand up and carefully walk around the me giant. It wasn¡¯t until he reached the doors of the cathedral that he started running with all he had.


    With someone taking the lead, the rest of the people suddenly remembered the urgency of the situation. They helped each other up and nervously walked past Greem, fleeing out of the cathedral.


    It was only because Greem had unsummoned his Ring of Fire and restrained the fire energy from his body that they had the chance to escape. Otherwise, the might of a Third Grade fire adept would have allowed him to kill everyone in the cathedral with just the energy aura he was radiating. He did not even require a spell.


    Greem was not a man who enjoyed senseless ughter to begin with. The reason he was killing the knights was only for the strange holy light that formed upon their death. There was no need for unnecessary ughter if the ordinary people did not get in his way.


    It was for the same reason that he allowed the trainee knights below Iron level to leave.


    These trainees had yet to advance. Their bodies couldn¡¯t possibly create sufficiently powerful holy light power, and killing them would yield nothing. As such, Greem didn¡¯t mind letting them leave.


    Greem had no considerations as to whether they would continue fighting against him in the future upon escaping.


    Even a Third Grade Gold Knight would perish before him. What threat could these young knights that had yet to reach First Grade pose to him?


    ¡°No, I won¡¯t leave.¡± Even though she was shivering in terror, the young girl insisted, ¡°My life belongs to the Holy Light, and I am willing to sacrifice myself for it!¡±


    Greem smiled and lifted his right hand. A tremendous amount of fire energy instantly gathered upon his palm.

 Chapter 956 - The Crypt

    Chapter 956 The Crypt


    ¡°No, wait.¡±


    A half-burned holy knight lifted his remaining arm to prop himself up as he shouted, ¡°Leave, Catherine! The Holy Light teaches us to be willing to sacrifice, but our sacrifice must have value. If you don¡¯t leave, then they will probably stay as well, just like you.¡±


    Judging from his armor, he was a Second Grade Silver Knight.


    However,pared to the wounded knights around him, his wounds were also the most grievous. He was on the brink of death, and even his voice was hoarse now.


    The young girl froze when she heard this. She finally looked around and discovered a hundred trainee knights just like herself slowly approaching the enemy and standing in-between them and the injured knights. In their eyes was fear, terror, confusion, but more than that, there was a determination that had not been there before.


    ¡°Take them and leave! Pass on the Holy Light forever. We must not let the Holy Light of the northern counties be extinguished.¡± The Silver Knight¡¯s voice was drained of all strength now and could not continue.


    Time continued to flow by, second by second. This trainee knight, known as Catherine, had never known such a painful and agonizing decision. Seeing as the time limit set by the zing giant was approaching, she finally gritted her teeth and said, ¡°Let¡¯s go.¡±


    She turned and took the initiative, leaving by the massive hole that had been burned into the building.


    The other trainee knights exchanged nces at the sight of this and finally followed after her.


    What are they doing? Why do they have to make me look like some big bad demon king?


    Greem grumbled, dissatisfied in his mind. He was utterly oblivious to how much his appearance and behavior were no different from the terrifying big bad demon kings in the stories.


    Greem had no interest in ughtering these trainee knights that couldn¡¯t be extracted for any value. The blinding fire elementium gathering in his hands turned into a giant me halo as he chanted his incantations. The halo then spread to the bodies of the trainee knights.


    The trainee knights immediately became nervous. They tensed up, believing that the me giant had gone against his word. However, the me halo simply shimmered around them and did not hurt them in any manner.


    ¡°You may leave now!¡± Greem¡¯s thunderous voice boomed, ¡°This halo has my soul aura. You will not be attacked by the dragons, ming tigers, or the fire creatures while the halo is on you. Remember, leave this city immediately. Do not stop along the way. The fire halo will onlyst for fifteen minutes!¡±


    The trainee knights looked at each other upon hearing this. They weren¡¯t sure if they should hate this evil me giant or be grateful to him. Withplex emotions on their faces, they looked at each other once again with confusion and slowly left.


    However, what they didn¡¯t realize was a tiny and delicate fire runended on Catherine¡¯s shoulder as the fire halo enveloped her. The rune flickered once and mysteriously disappeared.


    She remainedpletely ignorant.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but betray a mysterious smile on his fiery face as he watched these young knights leave.


    He might not be bothered about these little fellows, but it didn¡¯t mean he was ignorant of the small little tricks they had been pulling behind his back. Several important figures had been mixed among the first group of ordinary civilians to leave. They may have been dressed in peasant garb, but the Chip¡¯sprehensive spiritual scans revealed everything underneath. Their silk underwear and the seals and documents they were hiding exposed their identities.


    It was obvious that they were prominent figures of Hakans, possibly the likes of the city lord and governor.


    If Greem were Arms, he would definitely detain them. It would make raiding the city treasury much simpler and quicker.


    Unfortunately, Greem couldn¡¯t care less about these worldly treasures. What he wanted were these holy knights before him. That was why he did not stop these important individuals from escaping in the crowd.


    Meanwhile, his decision to let the trainee knights leave was not just because of his disinclination for unnecessary ughter, but also to figure out where they were headed. Now that the most significant Holy Light Chapel of the north had been taken down, Greem would be traveling the region to clear out all the smaller chapels in the surrounding cities.


    However, the Zambez Empire was a massive nation with vastnds, strong armies, and the protection of many holy knights. Though he might have defied their expectations and conquered one of theirrge cities, it didn¡¯t mean that they were entirely without means of retaliation.


    If they mobilized a group of high-grade holy knights, Greem would be in trouble. Just two or three Gold Knights would be able to stop him in his tracks. If he were to make any mistakes, he would be the one on the run.


    It was a foreign ne, after all, and a nation filled with hostility toward him!


    As long as he didn¡¯t run into the two Fourth Grades, Greem¡¯s Third Grade abilities should be enough for him to run amok in thisnd. Still, he had to be cautious of the traps that the ne¡¯s natives could set up for him.


    If he was lured into a trap and surrounded by multiple opponents of the same grade, there was a risk of dying here. He had to admit that possibility, as prideful as he was. That was why any opportunity to obtain information on the holy knights¡¯ movements was invaluable.


    This trainee knight known as Catherine might not be powerful, but she had an indomitable spirit and a pure heart. She was incredibly suited to walking the path of a holy knight. After all the hardship she had just endured, it was very likely for her to be epted as a disciple of a high-grade holy knight. Thus, Greem would be able to obtain some private information on the movements and mobilization of holy knights with her as the medium.


    It wasn¡¯t just Catherine. Greem had silently nted fire runes in several promising individuals among the fleeing trainee knights. These fire runes were typically hidden and would not affect their hosts in any manner. However, if the host¡¯s mental consciousness were to focus strongly on Greem, it would draw his attention from thousands of miles away.


    A fire rune such as this involved a significant number of arcane fields, including transformation studies, spirit energy, curse magic, and even divination. Even Greem had only mastered these subjects upon advancing to Third Grade.


    By the time the small fry had left, the cathedral was finally quiet. Only the dying holy knights and some extremely devout Holy Light believers were left behind. Greem wasted no words. He waved his hand, and a massive wave of fire surged across, instantly turning everything inside the building into ashes.


    Greem licked his lips in satisfaction after sessfully harvesting a hundred clusters of holy light. His eye fell upon his feet.


    ¡°Here. Dig downward!¡±


    The powerful elementium magical machine temporarily served as a construction machine under Greem¡¯s orders. His bulky fists pounded against the charred floor of the cathedral and dug a massive hole into the ground.


    When the hole was five meters deep, the earth copsed, and the heavy machine fell into a massive cavern.


    Greem wasn¡¯t surprised by this. He chanted a few words, and his body of mes shrank rapidly and reverted to his human form.


    The Burning Suncrown, the Emblem of Fire, Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath, Ash, the Fearless, and a crimson adept¡¯s robe slowly appeared on his body, each of them radiating a faint red light. It was then that Greem jumped into the hole and gentlynded at the bottom of the cave.


    It was a simple and crude crypt. One-meter-square boxes had been dug into the walls around them. Each box contained a set of skeletons wrapped tightly in gray bandages. Contained in some of the small boxes were some ancient, rusted armor and weapons.


    There wasn¡¯t any of the brilliant light of jewelry or treasure within the crypt, nor any valuable art pieces. From a distance, this ce looked like a long-sealed market of antiques; the whole ced was covered in dust and dead air. Dust and cobwebs had gathered atop all the items, making it hard to discern the contents beneath them.


    The elementium magical machine had fallen down here along with a ton of rocks and loose sand, making a mess in a corner of the crypt. Countless withered bones fell out of their boxes and were scattered across the ground.


    Greem frowned slightly upon seeing everything in here.


    He didn¡¯t have the patience to search for the valuables in here slowly. He waved his hand once more as a massive me shockwave recklessly ruined the crypt.


    Anything that could survive a thousand years had to be valuable, as would be anything that could survive a me shockwave. As for whether valuable notes or scrolls would be destroyed in this inferno¨C that was none of Greem¡¯s concern.


    As the mes repeatedly washed over the cave, the cobwebs turned into ashes, dust into shards of ss, bonespletely burned, and the metals melted. By the time all the ¡®junk¡¯ and ¡®scrap¡¯ were turned to dust, the real treasures hidden among them started to show.


    Either a shard of a bone that was impervious to the mes, a piece of gleaming metal ore, a magical longsword radiating a faint light, or even a strange shield with a muted color.


    However, none of these could attract Greem¡¯s attention. His eyes were focused solely upon the strange coffin in the center of the crypt.


    It was arge coffin forged of a strange, unknown metal. It sat silently at the center of the crypt, its surface carved with intricate and exquisite carvings. It was unusual for the holy knights, who had always pursued simplicity and humility.


    It was important to note that even the Second and Third Grade holy knights were also wrapped in a thinyer of bandages before being ced in the boxes of the crypts. The most impressive of them might be buried with the weapons and armor they had used in life.


    Therefore, this luxurious and extravagant burial only further emphasized the weight of this holy knight¡¯s identity!


    An expression of joyous surprise finally appeared on Greem¡¯s face.

 Chapter 957 - Fourth Grade Holy Ring

    Chapter 957 Fourth Grade Holy Ring


    Fourth Grade. It was definitely Fourth Grade!


    The elementium machine stepped up to the exquisite coffin under Greem¡¯s orders and pushed the lid aside with all its strength.


    Cold, rotting air came spewing out of the container, abruptly causing the temperature in the crypt to drop by several degrees.


    If it hadn¡¯t been the Holy Light Chapel, Greem might be extremely concerned about the possibility of the Fourth Grade corpse mutating. Fourth Grade was already the limit of power in most nar worlds. An individual at this level only needed to take one more step forward, and they would be an inch away from immortality.


    That was why most Fourth Grades who had reached the end of their lifespans would make arrangements for the treatment of their corpses ahead of time. Without any proper preparations, the strength of a Fourth Grade creature¡¯s physical body and Spirit almost guaranteed their conversion into undead creatures upon death.


    That was why the Zambez Empire ced the corpses of all dead holy knights in the underground crypts of the Holy Light Chapels. It was to rely on the pure Holy Light to prevent their bodies from transforming into powerful, undead creatures.


    The crypt¡¯s function as a memorial and means of remembrance was only an excuse to conceal the truth!


    A middle-aged man with a brutish facey inside the coffin. He wore golden full-body armor with a strange shield carved with a golden flying tiger lying above his body. A particrly long longsword had also been ced at his side.


    This Fourth Grade holy knight might have been dead for hundreds of years, but his appearance and skin looked almost as if he were still alive. At a nce, it looked like he was taking an afternoon nap.


    Blue light flickered in Greem¡¯s ck eyes, and he quickly scanned the silent body. There was not a single trace of soul aura detected within his body, though the strength of his physical form was oddly well-preserved.


    A necromancer would surely have been overjoyed to see such a perfectly preserved Fourth Grade corpse. However, Greem was not skilled in necromancy. He was probably unable to turn this corpse into a powerful undead creature. As such, he would have to take his time considering how to maximize the value of the body best.


    Greem carefully reached in to touch the Fourth Grade corpse while silently chanting an activation spell in an attempt to store the body in his storage ring. However, when the faint spatial flux enveloped the corpse, a surge of magical energy flowed out and disrupted Greem¡¯s actions.


    What was happening?


    Greem narrowed his eyes and observed. He quickly discovered the source of the incident by following the flow of magical energy!


    Greem found a magical ring with arge rock crystal embedded in it on the right little finger of the corpse. Despite hundreds of years of silence and age, it remained bright with magical energy and shrouded with light; it was clearly the sign of a treasure.


    It wasn¡¯t just the magical ring. The armor, weapon, and shield that were buried with the corpse all glowed with a purple light. Given the energy level that remained on these magical items, Greem was certain that they were all Fourth Grade magical equipment.


    Even if he couldn¡¯t use these items, they would be worth a fortune back in the World of Adepts.


    Greem carefully removed the rock crystal ring from the corpse¡¯s finger and lifted it to his eyes for further examination.


    [Beep. Detecting a high-energy magical item. Conduct deep scan?]


    ¡°Scan it!¡±


    An ordinary magical ring would either store certain unique spells within it or be able to provide status enhancements to its wearer. However, this was a Fourth Grade ring. Naturally, the power it contained was iparable to an ordinary magical ring. However, Greem clearly could not use the ring until he had analyzed it.


    There was a sizzling sound in his mind as his Spirit rapidly depleted. Finally, seven minutester, the Chip stopped its scans and analysis.


    [Beep. Deep scanpleted. Magical item attribute analysis is as below.


    [Item Name: Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring


    Item Grade: Fourth Grade¡±


    Item Attributes: +5 Strength | +3 Physique | +1 Agility


    Item Characteristics: This is the magical ring that Fourth Grade Holy Knight Sodden most treasured in life. It possesses indescribable power and might. ording to the wielder¡¯s will, the ring may convert any energy into pure holy light, or attach four hundred points of holy damage to any of the wielder¡¯s attacks against an enemy. This enhanced holy attack ignores defense and magical resistance.]


    ......


    Greem¡¯s eyes opened wide as he stared nkly at the words the Chip had projected in his mind. His entire body couldn¡¯t help but tremble in excitement.


    Dammit! It was truly a Fourth Grade magical ring. Disregarding the basic attributes it provided to its wearer, the characteristics of the item alone were unbelievably powerful!


    Every attack would be enhanced with four hundred points of holy damage. That was terrifying power that exceeded most of Greem¡¯s Third Grade spells. The only question now was whether this additional damage was only active for melee attacks or applicable to long-ranged spells as well.


    If it applied to long-ranged spells as well, then the power of Greem¡¯s spells would increase by four hundred points. Moreover, these four hundred points of power would ignore defense and magical resistance, all while containing the unusual holy attribute.


    Greem lifted Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring and kissed it over and over, before finally and giddily putting it on his right little finger.


    He then immediately had the Chip scan his attributes.


    [Greem, Beginner Third Grade.


    Profession: Elementium Adept (Fire Specialization).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 18+7 | Physique 21+4 Agility 11+2 | Spirit 32+4.


    Profession Skills: Body of mes, me Fiend¡¯s Body.]


    Now, even without his transformation, Greem possessed twenty-five points of Strength and twenty-five points of Physique. At this level, he could fight with a Second Grade Silver Knight on even footing, even while bare-handed. In fact, his body would be able to endure the full-force attack of a First Grade even without magical protection.


    This Fourth Grade corpse could no longer resist the spatial flux of the storage ring after Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring was taken off.


    Greem finally settled what he had set out to achieve after cing the corpse and everything within the coffin inside his ring. He started to walk around and collect all the items that had not been destroyed by the me shockwave.


    It was a very rare bounty, and Greem collected almost all the mysterious items in the crypt. After walking through the tomb three times and confirming nothing had been left behind, Greem led the elementium magical machine and returned to the surface.


    He had stayed in the underground crypt for two entire hours. He had only realized that Arms and Cindral had vanished after he stepped out of the cathedral and took to the skies.


    After all, they were summoned from other worlds through a magical contract. They could not remain in Henvic for extended periods. Once the duration of the summon was over, they would return to their original nes under the binding of the spell.


    That was why Greem wasn¡¯t surprised at their disappearance.


    From high above, Greem could clearly see that this once peaceful and beautiful city had now been ravaged and reduced to rubble.


    The wild battle between the Third Grades earlier had even destroyed the three streets and countless buildings at the city¡¯s center. The megate that Greem had summoned had also unleashed thousands of otherworldly fire creatures.


    He had not ced any restrictions on these creatures. They roamed the human city as if it was a ruin meant to be explored, aimlessly and destructively traveling throughout Hakans.


    Due to their instincts as fire creatures and their hatred for life, they spread mes everywhere they went and ughtered any living being they saw.


    These fire creatures were the ones who caused the most destruction to Hakans!


    Then came Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms and Third Grade ming Tiger Cindral. They were only here for the treasure. They couldn¡¯t be bothered to ughter the humans as long as they didn¡¯t stand in the way between them and the treasury.


    However, Greem could see smoke rising from the luxurious city lord¡¯s mansion. Most of the buildings¡¯ roofs were destroyed, and several of the warehouses had copsed entirely. It was a tragic sight to witness.


    Themercial area on the other end of the city was also zing with mes as if everything there had been set on fire.


    Greem shook his head and let out a sigh. He didn¡¯t dare stay here too long. He unsummoned the elementium magical machine and summoned a First Grade stone serpent instead. They then dove into the ground and vanished without a trace.


    ............


    The World of Adepts, the Tower of Fate.


    The familiar astrology tform at the top of the tower.


    Even though it was the brightest time of the day now, this room remained as dark as ever. The ceiling was filled only with the faint light of countless stars. The room was so dark that it was almost intimidating.


    Alice still sat before the wooden table, dressed in her long starry robe. Her silky smooth hair ran down behind her back. She was casually arranging the tarot cards in her hand while gently whispering with the ck shadow in the magic mirror.


    Given how intimate they were being, an outsider just might have mistaken them for the best of friends!


    ¡°It¡¯s already been a month. How is it? What does the situation on your end look like?¡± Alice pursed her lips and chuckled as she shuffled the cards, ¡°Why do I sense the life aura of the person you sent getting somewhat weaker? They couldn¡¯t have been surrounded and caught by the nar natives, could they?!¡±


    The ck shadow in the mirror remained silent as it listened to Alice¡¯s mocking words. It simply continued staring through the mirror.


    The battle for the power of Fate was bizarre and unpredictable. It did not rely on raw power and might alone, like other conflicts.


    For body-refining adepts, whoever had the higher Strength and Physique would have a greater advantage inbat. The same logic was applicable among elementium adepts, though their focus was on the strength of their Spirit.


    However, for these two Fate Witches, increased power would only allow them to make more calctions at a deeper level, without being able to influence the oue of the battle of Fate.


    As the two of them both cast their attention on the distant ne of Henvic, their powers of Fate would disrupt each other, making both of them incapable of grasping every single change that was urring there. They could only rely on some vague sense of Fate and their divination spells to predict the developments in the situation. Moreover, there was a considerable buffer and dy to their divinations, as well.

 Chapter 958 - Reinforcements

    Chapter 958 Reinforcements


    The Witch of Fate was an exceedingly mysterious and bizarre profession.


    The tremendous power they possessed was not suited for direct involvement inbat. They preferred hiding behind the scenes like perverted peeping toms, using the river of Fate¡¯s power to conceal their existences and the moves they made.


    The number of factors that needed to be taken into consideration when using the powers of Fate to attack an opponent was countless, so much so that it inspired despair. The two Witches of Fate could only go against each other by pushing their opponent into the whirlpool of Fate with all they had. They would have to rely on the power of Fate to kill the enemy.


    However, since Alice knew of the existence of this First Witch of Fate, how could she possibly give her the chance to do so? Alice had barely taken a step out of the Tower of Fate over the past few days. The protection of the nar consciousness left the First Witch of Fate without any chance to work her powers.


    Ever since Alice had obtained the artifact-level Staff of Divination from Faen, the First Witch of Fate had lost all ability to control the trajectory of Alice¡¯s fate.


    Henvic ne had now be the strange battlefield upon which the two Fate Witches fought using their control of Fate. Alice had the advantage of the nar consciousness¡¯ protection, while the mysterious First Fate Witch had her own numerous tricks and hidden pieces. The situation in distant Henvic became increasingly chaotic as both of them exerted their influence over the world!


    ............


    In a cave of a wild beast, thirty-five kilometers to the west of Hakans¡¯ ounds.


    The five Earth Maulers that called this ce home had now been turned into bloody corpses. de Princess Katherine had skinned them, removed their meat, and roasted them upon the zing bonfire.


    She tore at the bear meat in her mouth so viciously that it was almost as if she was pretending the meat to be that damned enemy of hers. In just the blink of an eye, several dozens of kilograms of meat was gone, but Katherine was still starving.


    Her stomach had been modified to digest and absorb energy quickly and conveniently.


    Her modified stomach could crush, dissolve, andpletely absorb even hard magical crystal cores or magical crystals of pure energy, let alone ordinary food.


    As a high-grade mechanical adept, Katherine¡¯s ability to digest and absorb food had reached an unbelievably efficient level. An ordinary human might only be able to take in ten to twenty percent of the nutrition in the food they ate, but Katherine could absorb as much as eighty percent.


    It meant that Katherine obtained more energy substance than an ordinary person when eating the same food!


    Even so, even after devouring all the bear meat, the energy meter inside Katherine¡¯s body still remained just as close to the red warning line.


    However, the energy she had absorbed from the food was quickly converted into the physical strength required by her body. The energy started to stimte and repair her carbonized skin.


    The crackling sound of rapidly healing muscle fibers could be heard from Katherine¡¯s body as she feasted on the meat. The burnt flesh on the surface of her skin ked off, revealing red, squirming, and growing fleshy tissues beneath.


    The damage to her mechanical parts could be repaired through mechanical magic, but the losses to her flesh tissues would have to bepensated through the consumption of food!


    Katherine had no choice but to unleash her ace technique, destorm, to escape from Greem and the ming tiger¡¯sbined attack back in Hakans! It had undoubtedly made her wounds even more severe.


    That was why she had fallen into an eating frenzy after escaping Hakans and running all the way here.


    Just as she managed to stabilize her wounds and prevent them from worsening, a strange beeping sound came from her waist.


    Katherine¡¯s expression froze. After resentfully hurling her half-eaten bear¡¯s palm aside, she reached down and took out a ck, fist-sized crystal.


    Katherine threw the ck crystal into the air, and two red beams shot out of her eyes onto it. The strange gem immediately started spinning in mid-air.


    The cave that had been illuminated red from the bonfire silently turned a dark ck as if the curtain of night had swept over the light itself. Everything around Katherine vanished without a trace, leaving only a phantasmal silhouette.


    ¡°How...is the...job going?¡± Like a recording with faltering energy, the message from the ck outline stuttered, seemingly disrupted heavily by something.


    ¡°Mydy, Witch of Fate, you found me a real good assignment,¡± Katherineughed coldly and sinisterly, ¡°The information you prepared for me only mentioned that he was a Third Grade elementium adept that had just advanced. It made no mention of a powerful Third Grade golem by his side, along with a Third Grade fire creature that could be summoned from another ne. Did you intend to send me to my grave against someone of such power?¡±


    Katherine had fled too early during the battle of Hakans and had not seen Third Grade Thunder Dragons Arms appear. Otherwise, she would only be several times more furious than she currently was.


    As a mechanical adept that excelled at meleebat, she did indeed have over an eighty percent chance of defeating an elementium adept of the same grade. However, that was only under ordinary circumstances. If she had known that the opponent could easily summon multiple Third Grade helpers, Katherine would never havee to this rural, piece-of-shitnd to kill herself, regardless of what the Witch of Fate had promised her.


    That was why all of Katherine¡¯s resentment and anger that had been umting over the past few days erupted when she finally met the person behind all this!


    Perhaps infuriated by Katherine¡¯s rebellious attitude, a look of anger shot out of the eyes of the silhouette in the darkness. A faint mental message then flowed into Katherine¡¯s mind.


    ¡°Katherine, I won¡¯t be talking nonsense with you. I¡¯m exhausting Fate power to cut off that little bitch¡¯s disruption tomunicate with you. Time is precious. Your ineptitude has disappointed me greatly. A veteran adept that has advanced for over three hundred years, and yet you still can¡¯t beat a brat that has only advanced for thirty years?¡±


    ¡°How can you me me for this? It is clearly a problem with the information you provided me. That brat can easily summon two to three helpers of the same grade at will. How am I supposed to fight with him?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! I have investigated the situation you speak of. That brat is truly somewhat strange. Even my sense for Fate doesn¡¯t allow me to see through him. As such, the prior n must be changed. Immediately guide Natagu and the two others into Henvic ne. The mission to hunt down that brat will be taken over by the three of them. Meanwhile, you will immediately go and kill that witch carrying the core for the long-ranged internar teleportation array. You must not let her deliver the core to the witch¡¯s tower.¡±


    ¡°You...intend to trap that male adept in this ne?¡± Katherine hesitated before she spoke, ¡°Then how are we supposed to return after the mission ispleted?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! That¡¯s not for you to worry about!¡± The ck shadow spoke coldly, ¡°I will have Natagu bring a temporary internar teleportation array with him. It should be enough for the four of you to sessfully return!¡±


    Katherine thought for a moment and found no issues with the n. Thus, she agreed.


    Rather than find a new location, it was better to make do with the current one. Katherine immediately started carving a ten-meter-wide array inside the cave.


    Katherine shouldn¡¯t have had ess to such advanced high-grade teleportation knowledge with what she knew. However, there was currently a Witch of Fate at the Great Adept level guiding her inside her mind.


    Even so, it took more than half a day for Katherine to carve the foundations of the teleportation array into the ground.


    A proper teleportation array should be carved in an area filled with energy. Thend would have to be hardened and ttened before a standard teleportation array was carved out with professional workmanship. There were over ten thousand magical runes and lines that had to be drawn during this process, with no deviation or mistake in the angle or positions of the carvings.


    Any slight mistake would cause the teleportation array to fail, and the individuals that were teleporting would be lost in some unknown and mysteriousnd.


    This cave clearly could not reach any of these conditions. Katherine was no professional array master, either. This teleportation array she had carved was as crude as it could get. If anyone dared to attempt internar teleportation with such an array, they would not even know how they died.


    However, there was no helping the fact that a powerful Witch of Fate backed Katherine. Just by exhausting a ¡®little¡¯ of her powers of Fate, this teleportation array with less than a seven percent sess rate sessfully transported the three adepts.


    Milky-white light faded from the cave as dust and smokended on the three powerful adepts that had just arrived.


    To prevent their elementium shields from disrupting the precision of the teleportation, the three adepts had not employed any defensive spells. They had endured the entire process with their tough physical bodies alone.


    However, not a single one of them expected the point of teleportation to be a crude cave with a bonfire, rather than a broad tform or a secure teleportation room.


    To lessen the burden of the teleportation array, the Great Adept in Katherine¡¯s mind had even canceled the magical protections around it. As such, the whirlwind from the spatial flux blew all the dust and smoke into the air, causing the three recovering Third Grade adepts to be ambushed by unpleasantness the moment they appeared.


    The three adepts walked out of the array, coughing and covered in dust.


    ¡°Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! Katherine, you bastard! Can¡¯t you justy down a defensive array? Who does things like this?¡± The adept in the lead immediately started roaring at Katherine furiously the moment he walked out of the array.

 Chapter 959 - The Unfortunate Katherine

    Chapter 959 The Unfortunate Katherine


    ¡°Hmph! You people must haveughed at me plenty before you arrived! This is just my response to that.¡±


    Katherine was clearly acquainted with the three adepts and immediately replied.


    Two of the new adepts were female, while thest one was a male.


    The leader was the male adept, dressed in a long purple robe, and possessing a snake¡¯s head instead of a human¡¯s head. A snake¡¯s tongue could be seen flicking from his mouth as he spoke, though the hissing made it difficult to understand him. A pair of strange green eyes with reptilian pupils gleamed coldly on his head, making for an intimidating sight.


    He was a serpentine adept whose origin bloodline had manifested.


    Of the other two women, one had a head full of white hair, a face full of wrinkles and spots, and wore a ck robe. She leaned against a pitch-ck wooden stick even taller than herself, her back almost bent at a right angle. The other woman appeared cute and pretty. She was dressed in an exceedingly seductive manner, and a purple crystal was embedded in her forehead. Her every move and action carried with them a distinctive charm.


    The three adepts violently coughed as they emerged from the smoke and dust. Regardless of how they had looked like before, their faces were now all ck and their bodies coated in dust and soot.


    ¡°Katherine, you bastard, you dirtied my face.¡± The pretty witch valued her looks tremendously. As such, she was far more furious that her twopanions.


    As she shouted, a shapeless wave radiated from the purple crystal on her forehead, causing the other three adepts to be somewhat absent-minded. At this moment, every smile, chuckle, frown, and wrinkle on this young witch¡¯s face tugged at their heartstrings and teased their minds.


    Even dying at this very moment would be worth it if they could win her fancy and time!


    However, this instant of wavering in their minds onlysted for a single second. Katherine let out a cold snort and extended her arms. Two sharp metal spikes appeared in her palms.


    ¡°Benija, you whore. Use your spiritual magic on me again, and I will kill you.¡±


    The young witch known as Benija smiled faintly asyers of thin yet firm telekic barriers shimmered out of her purple crystal and protected her.


    ¡°Kill me? Come on then; we will see who will be the one doing the killing!¡±


    The other old witch cackled sinisterly and shuffled to a side without making a sound, as if expressing her neutral stance.


    The serpentine adept stepped forward between Katherine and the young witch as a barbaric and chilling aura abruptly gathering around him. A terrifying eight-meter-long serpent with indigo scales manifested above his head as his origin bloodline stimted his magical energy.


    ¡°Enough! Put away your magic and spells! Don¡¯t forget. We are not here to fight amongst ourselves, but toplete the mission that the Lady has assigned us. No one is to strike out against apanion before the mission isplete. Otherwise...¡±


    One had to admit that the power of a bloodline adept was something that other adepts could not hope topare to.


    Disregarding everything else, just his ability of manifestation allowed him to suppress all the other adepts with his terrifying serpentine true form. Judging from the energy aura he radiated, he wasn¡¯t far from peak Third Grade.


    The old and ugly witch known as Guinevere was an expert at poison and an intermediate Third Grade adept. The young and pretty one was called Benija, skilled at spiritual magic and also an intermediate Third Grade.


    If a party like theirs could cooperate seamlessly, then they would be able to unleash unimaginable power against their enemies!


    However, as was their nature, every adept was selfish, sly, and cruel. To have them abandon all their prejudices to work together with all they had was no more than a pipe dream!


    The three adepts were enduring fearsome nar suppression from their initial arrival at Henvic ne. As such, they were in no hurry to move. Instead, they gathered together to listen to Katherine¡¯s describe her experiences over the past month and the basic situation of their target.


    The three adepts had initially been somewhat doubtful about Katherine¡¯s description of the young fire adept. They felt as if she was exaggerating the opponent¡¯s might to downy her own carelessness in her defeat. However, their eyes filled with shock and terror when they saw the burn marks still left on Katherine¡¯s body.


    A brat that had just advanced twenty to thirty years ago could beat Katherine so severely?


    A powerful Third Grade elementium magical machine. What was that? A new metal golem created by the Silver Union?


    A Third Grade ming tiger summoned from the Fire Elementium ne; that was much more likely. After all, fire adepts had an incredibly easy time in the Fire Elementium ne. Conquering a small piece ofnd there and befriending some Fire Lords was well within the imagination.


    However, fire summons like these typically didn¡¯tst too long. Moreover, all of these adepts had prepared Scrolls of Banishment. These scrolls were most effective against such otherworldly summons.


    Meanwhile, the old poison hag, Guinevere, developed an interest in the Spirit of Pestilence that Katherine described as the magical pet of the fire adept. She somewhat suspected that the Spirit of Pestilence was likely the initial form of some powerful Soul Equipment.


    If they could imprison the fire adept and find a way to peel the Spirit of Pestilence from his soul instead of killing him immediately, she might have a chance to research or experience the mysteries of Soul Equipment.


    It was important to note that Soul Equipment was extremely rare and valuable even for high-grade adepts. In particr, Soul Equipment that perfectly suited one¡¯s soul origin and elementium talent was something that could onlye with tremendous luck.


    Guinevere¡¯s old and withered heart couldn¡¯t help but start beating furiously again upon hearing of their target possessing a poison-attribute Soul Equipment.


    Benija, who possessed Innate Charm, paid most of her attention to Katherine¡¯s description of the young male adept¡¯s appearance. Benija felt her entire body turn hot at the very thought of her enemy being a young, handsome, and powerful male adept. Her body couldn¡¯t help but shiver and tremble.


    She pinched her legs together and couldn¡¯t help but start rubbing them together slightly. Lust spilled out of her eyes, scorching like fire as if she couldn¡¯t wait to seduce the enemy.


    Benija might have looked like a lusty woman on the outside, but she was, in truth, a ssic poison widow with a dark, dark heart. She liked seducing and charming powerful male adepts before nting a spirit seed in their mental consciousness once she ensnared them.


    Thus, the Spirit that the adept had so painstakingly obtained through meditation would be transferred to Benija.


    Spirit that had been taken by Benija in this manner would never be able to be restored through sleep or meditation. The unfortunate victims would suffer a permanent decrease to their Spirit limit.


    After a simple report, Katherine left the cave without any hesitation.


    After leaving the task of hunting Greem to the three new adepts, she only had to deal with a Second Grade witch. This simple and easy task couldn¡¯t make her any happier. Katherine was also secretly imagining the scene that would y out when her threepanions ran into Greem.


    If the three idiots ended up being as arrogant as she had been when she arrived, then they would be in for a surprise and a brutal beating. If, just hypothetically, that bitch Benija died on the battlefield, it would be the most pleasant thing for her.


    Katherine continued to move toward the southwest of the Zambez Empire ording to the Lady¡¯s instructions, even as all sorts of thoughts ran through her mind. The disruption of Fate meant that even the Lady could not find Witch Rena¡¯s exact location. However, she could still obtain a vague position and prevent Katherine from running all over the Zambez Empire without a lead.


    Rena might not be powerful, but she was a Witch of Deceit after all. If she hid, Katherine had no confidence in finding her in a crowd, even if she was an entire grade above her.


    However, with the Lady¡¯s continuous guidance, finding this witch was not a difficult matter at all!


    That was why Katherine was extremely rxed now.


    Yet, just after she crossed a stream with a smile on her face and traveled through a broad and empty area, she stopped before a cliff.


    The trees nearby trembled as an army of knights in simple armor ran into her as they cleared the path with their swords.


    Holy knights. Why did she run into a group of holy knights here?


    The corner of Katherine¡¯s mouth twitched. Was this damned streak of misfortune not over yet?


    ¡°Witch.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s a witch.¡±


    Katherine¡¯s strange appearance could not be concealed. Thus, the knowledgeable holy knights immediately recognized her identity.


    Enemies with a grudge tended to sh violently upon meeting!


    The holy knights raised their swords and shields, surrounding Katherine in a fan-shaped formation.


    Katherine also gripped the metal spikes in her hands tightly, a wicked smile crossing her face. A cold, starving gleam of ughter shone in her crimson mechanical eye.


    In a single scan, she detected that this group of thirty to forty knights consisted only of weaklings. The most powerful of them were two Silver Knights, while the rest were only Iron Knights. Knights like these were cannon fodder in her eyes to easily ughter and dispose of.


    She had lost many of her metal des in Hakans and suffered tremendous damage. However, sweeping aside such fodder was still no problem. More crucially, the humiliation and anger she had been bottling up from her encounter with the male adept could finally be released through this ughter.


    However, just as Katherine prepared to fight, the bushes behind the holy knights split apart, and another holy knight walked forth.


    Katherine¡¯s crimson eye swept over him, and she immediately bent over in pain from the blinding radiance. Her mechanical heart started beating intensely.


    Dammit! It¡¯s a Fourth Grade!

 Chapter 960 - Third Grade Spirit

    Chapter 960 Third Grade Spirit


    There was a cave that used to be dark and damp.


    However, after some simple modifications, Greem turned it into a simple, yetfortable, underground home.


    Since leaving Hakans, Greem had found a safe ce nearby. He then had the stone serpent dig thirty meters downward before excavating a crude fifty-meter-square cave.


    The humidity underground was no problem. A simple barrier of heat turned the damp dirt into hardened earth. Greem then ced an illumination stone in the ceiling and imbued it with magical energy, making the cave bright.


    He released the elementium magical machine as a lookout before making a bed of stone in a corner of the cave and lying down to sleep.


    It had been twenty-seven days since he broke into the Henvic ne. Greem had not had any proper sleep over the past month due to the constant harassment of that annoying de Princess. Even deep meditations were rare. Though he was a Third Grade adept and his body was as tough as most magical creatures, spiritual exhaustion was still unavoidable.


    The constant running and fighting, the spiritual bacsh from having his fire clone destroyed, and the energy he had exhausted in the battle of Hakans; all of these factors added together had worn Greem down. He immediatelyid down on the bed once the safe house waspleted and fell into a deep, deep sleep.


    Indeed, sleep was the best way to relieve exhaustion and mental pressure for humans!


    After a long, sweet rest where all his mental fatigue faded away, Greem finally woke up. He sat up in confusion, yawned, stretched, and shook his head before finallying to.


    ¡°Chip, how long have I been sleeping for?¡±


    [40 hours, 37 minutes, 52 seconds.]


    ¡°Er...that was long!¡± Greem rubbed his starving stomach and said with a bitter smile, ¡°No wonder I¡¯m so hungry.¡±


    In truth, the Physique of a Third Grade adept should allow him to not feel starvation after a month of going without food. The only reason Greem felt hunger was due to the excessive exhaustion of his energy.


    The me Fiend¡¯s Heart that he had modified and transnted into himself when he was First Grade was a Second Grade magical organ at the very best. The energy output and power enhancement it brought to Greem while he was weak was undoubtedly immense. In fact, Greem¡¯s ability to transform into a me Fiend only manifested through the me Fiend¡¯s Heart by guiding out the demonic aura within it.


    Now that he had advanced to Third Grade, the fire spells that he used and cast were easily four to five hundred points in power. The Second Grade me Fiend¡¯s Heart could no longer sustain such energy levels. The power enhancement of the me Fiend¡¯s Transformation was also much less significant than before.


    Against a Third Grade enemy, the Transformation that had helped him prevail against so many opponents had be an awkwardly useless magical ability. It was not as flexible as the Body of mes, nor as agile.


    It was precisely the ¡®incapability¡¯ of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart that caused Greem¡¯sbat prowess to becking. He was no longer capable of dominating the entire battlefield with an overwhelming presence as he always had before.


    If he didn¡¯t need to fight, his body¡¯s need for fire energy would remain low, and the energy output of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart was still somewhat sufficient. However, in an intense fight, the fire energy from the me Fiend¡¯s Heart becamecking, requiring Greem to exhaust much of his Spirit to absorb and gather the wandering magical energy in the air.


    It was the main reason why Greem¡¯s fire energy reserves had plummeted so quickly!


    Where did energye from? Naturally, it came from high-energy food!


    That was why, much like de Princess Katherine, Greem chose to feast as a means to replenish his energy.


    However, while Katherine only got so much from some First Grade Earth Maulers, Greem took out Third Grade fire dragon meat from his pouch. He roasted it in a simple fashion and immediately started feasting.


    The energy difference between the two was iparable!


    After devouring five kilograms of fire dragon meat and feeling the warm sensation in his stomach, Greem let out a belch of satisfaction. His mind was now as clear as it had ever been.


    After some proper sleep and a decent meal, it was time to inspect his rewards from the fight at Hakans.


    The Fourth Grade Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring was undoubtedly a high-grade magical item that was far beyond Greem¡¯s power level. With the ring, Greem possessed the overwhelming ability to crush other ordinary Third Grades, despite only being a beginner Third Grade adept himself.


    To avoid exposing its power too early, Greem cast Concealment on it to make it less ostentatious.


    After ying with the holy ring for the better part of the day, Greem finally ced it back onto his right little finger and turned to examine the other items.


    The next second, the Spirit of Pestilence that had merged with his soul climbed out of the air. It then ran around in front of him like a delicate doll.


    Third Grade.


    Greem wasn¡¯t the only one that had profited from the battle of Hakans. The Spirit of Pestilence had also advanced to Third Grade. Moreover, this advancement had allowed its state of existence to undergo some strange changes.


    At First Grade, this Soul Equipment had existed entirely in the form of a magical tome.


    At Second Grade, it transformed into a wooden doll whose body was carved full of strange runes.


    Now, at Third Grade, it had be increasingly closer to an actual lifeform. At the very least, the Spirit now looked just like a strange boy with dark green skin and ghostly green eyes. It stood one meter tall, naked, and without a sexual organ between its legs.


    Its every action appeared somewhat dull and slow, without the grace of an actual lifeform. However, when ¡®he¡¯ started running around Greem gleefully, Greem had a fleeting, wrong impression that he had a ¡®son.¡¯


    ¡°Master, I want a name, too.¡±


    While Greem was smiling and thinking about the situation, a childish voice rang in his ear. The Spirit¡¯s request couldn¡¯t help but strike him with a strong impression.


    ¡°Name? Why do you want a name?¡± Greem asked with a smile on his face.


    ¡°Because Master has a name, Alice has a name, and Mary also has a name. That¡¯s why...I want a name too!¡± It was obvious that this was the first time that the Spirit of Pestilence had initiated interaction with another individual. It stuttered a little at first, but its speech quickly became fluent and natural.


    Greem noticed something. The Spirit of Pestilence had a mental connection with himself, and they could understand each other¡¯s thoughts in an instant. There was no need for it to use speech¨C this ¡®clumsy¡¯ and ¡®ancient¡¯ means ofmunication.


    Yet, it had still insisted onmunicating in this fashion. Moreover, it was using Zambezian, thenguage of the Zambez Empire. The Spirit of Pestilence had ess to Greem¡¯s massive knowledge reserves through the fact that it was assimted with Greem¡¯s soul.


    Though its own talents and attributes restricted it from casting fire spells, the magical knowledge organized and assembled by the Chip was shared with the Spirit.


    Greem let out a long sigh.


    After putting in so much effort and exhausting such a tremendous amount of resources, he had finally raised the level of this soul-bound entity to Third Grade. From now on, it would no longer be an awkwardly unhelpful existence, but a powerful Third Grade assistant that could genuinely aid him.


    However, wasn¡¯t one meter a little too short? Also, what other abilities did it have?


    Seemingly picking up on Greem¡¯s questions, the Spirit of Pestilence opened up its mind and revealed its secrets to Greem.


    [Target Creature: Spirit of Pestilence (Temporary Name)


    Target Species: Magical Contracted Spirit


    Target Grade: Third Grade


    Target Bodily Attributes: Strength 3 | Physique 8 | Agility 5 | Spirit 31


    Target Magical Attribute: Poison


    Target Innate Abilities: Poison Halo, gue Spores, Soul Toxin, gue Modification


    ......


    ......]


    All sorts of abilities with strange names and effects filled the list of skills projected by the Chip. These were the basic abilities that the Spirit of Pestilence now possessed. They would continue to increase in power as it grew stronger.


    Greem looked at the Spirit¡¯s attributes and couldn¡¯t help but fall into thought.


    It was evident that the Spirit of Pestilence was a unique contracted creature that could only unleash its real strength while under the protection of someone else. Its Strength, Physique, and Agility were on the lower side and were barelyparable to First Grade adepts who had just advanced.


    Most of its power was concentrated on Spirit alone.


    The only question now was, how did it fight? That was probably something that it would slowly figure out and correct through a long journey ofbat.


    ¡°From now on, your name will be Remi!¡±


    The green boy cheered in joy upon hearing Greem¡¯s words. He leaped about before running over to y with the big guy (the elementium magical machine).


    Meanwhile, Greem hesitated for a moment before taking out the strange soul-gathering crystal at his waist. He lifted it to his eyes.


    ¡°Chip, scan and examine the crystal!¡±


    [Beep. Scan starting.]


    As his Spirit drained away, blinding blue light shone out of Greem¡¯s ck eyes and onto the soul-gathering crystal. Thousands of sharp shrieks rang out faintly from the crystal; the noise was so loud that it made Greem¡¯s head hurt momentarily.


    Fifteen minutester, the Chip¡¯s scans finally came to an end as a new examination report appeared before Greem.


    [Scan Target: Soul-Gathering Crystal


    Target ssification: High-Level Energy Amalgamation


    Target Number: A total of 175 higher energy units detected. The total energy level is at 7963 Pato. There is 1 Third Grade unit with an energy level of 4214 Pato, ounting for 51.92% of the total energy. There are 18 Second Grade units with an energy level of 2946 Pato, ounting for 36% of the total energy. There are 156 First Grade units with an energy level of 803 Pato, ounting for 12% of the total energy.


    [Upon deep scan and analysis, such high-level, pure faith energy can be absorbed and assimted to increase host¡¯s Spirit.


    [Host has to purify Spirit energy regrly after absorbing said faith energy. Otherwise, unpredictable Spirit mutations may ur. Resources required for Spirit energy purification ceremony are as follows: ......]


    Greem eyes lit up upon seeing the information projected by the Chip. His interest had been piqued!

 Chapter 961 - Sudden Enemy

    Chapter 961 Sudden Enemy


    Ever since stepping upon the path of an adept, the difficulty of advancement had constantly tortured Greem.


    Before bing an adept, theck of the necessary means to obtain resources meant that all apprentice adepts had to rely on what little fell through the fingers of the adepts to empower themselves.


    After bing an adept, meditation techniques were no longer as effective in improving their power. Most of the time, the adepts had to emerge from theirboratories to develop themselves more quickly and efficiently. They would have to travel through barbaric wastnds, ancient ruins, and hazardous ces, risking their lives to obtain the resources they needed.


    Perhaps staying within the safe sanctuary that was their adept¡¯s tower might have allowed them to survive until the moment their lifespan came to its end. However, the slow increase in their primary attribute would be like a noose around their necks, slowly tightening day by day and year by year.


    If they couldn¡¯t advance to the next grade before their lifespan ended, then what awaited them was a withering body, exhausted Spirit, and a rotting soul. Compared to an ordinary person, this process toward their death wouldst for a dozen years until their soul had dispersed entirely.


    This process of awaiting death was so long and terrifying that most adepts that approached the end of their lifespans often became more evil, madder, and more hysterical in their actions.


    Time might be plentiful for adepts, but it was still like a terrifying Grim Reaper that would punctually visit you. This Grim Reaper would use the world¡¯s dullest, slowest de to slowly sever your connection to this world until eternal darkness finally arrived.


    That was why scheming to obtain resources and finding ways to increase one¡¯s primary attribute became the one constant theme of every adept¡¯s life!


    The path of the elementium adept that Greem had chosen was a difficult path with Spirit as its primary attribute. Every additional increase in his base Spirit was significant to him. That was because every point of the base attribute would be ten times, even a hundred times, more significant when paired with proper magical spells and powerful magical equipment. It made him noticeably more powerful inbat.


    It was not hard to imagine how significant base Spirit points were to Greem!


    Now, the Chip¡¯s data told him that there was a method to rapidly increase his Spirit that did not require year after year of meditation. Howrge of an impact was this to Greem?


    Greem had the Chip conduct a deep scan of the crystal at least three more times. Each time, he got the same result. It was only then that hepletely believed the Chip¡¯s report.


    Meanwhile, he paid no heed to the side-effects that the Chip mentioned at the end of the report.


    Greem wasn¡¯t arrogant or reckless; he simply knew how difficult it was to increase his Spirit.


    Year after year of meditation with a still unchanging Spirit attribute. Breaking into perilous ruins to find suitable resources, servingrge ns and organizations for decades on end to obtain some resources that they had monopolized...


    Compared to all these, a bit of spiritual bacsh and side-effect was nothing at all!


    Any adept in Greem¡¯s position would choose to strengthen their Spirit without any hesitation. That small side-effect was a matter to consider after his Spirit had been increased!


    After all, greater power meant more influence and more resources. Would one be worried about ack of means to deal with an insignificant side-effect like this one?


    Of course, the pure holy light stored within the soul-gathering crystal still needed to be purged of the remaining soul shards before it could be used. The soul shards of the holy knights were like impurities mixed within the light of faith. If they were not purged ahead of time and were absorbed by Greem into his consciousness, it would cause fearsome consequences.


    There were many adepts in the World of Adepts who researched evil spells that absorbed other¡¯s Spirit for their own benefit. However, these spells all required the user to face the terrible cmity that was a spiritual bacsh.


    Much like a shirt sewn from numerous threads of varying colors and materials, it might look perfect and new on the outside, but any slight pressure would cause it to fall apart instantly.


    That was why these adepts invented some unique spells or special magical equipment to suppress the bacsh deep in their soul. The consequence of doing so was their constant need to manage their mental state. If their minds were severely wounded, there was a possibility for the split personalities hidden within them to take over control of their bodies.


    However, the n that the Chip had provided Greem with was distinctly different. In fact, it was even somewhat unbelievable.


    ording to Chip¡¯s scans and analysis, the holy light that Greem had collected was utterly different from the souls of the dead that other adepts collect. They were more simr to unowned and ¡®free¡¯ power of faith. Moreover, they could wear away at all outside energy and external consciousness.


    If such holy light were stored away as is, the remaining soul pieces of the holy knights contained within would be able to continue existing for a long time with the holy light as the medium. That was clearly not beneficial to Greem¡¯s intentions of absorbing the light.


    The Chip suggested that Greem split off a portion of his mental consciousness and ce it into the soul-gathering crystal, where it would fight with the souls for control over the holy light. If the holy light within the crystal had consolidated firmly, then Greem would undoubtedly bemitting suicide in doing so.


    However, the light within the crystal was in a state of disharmony. The souls of all the holy knights were tattered and iplete. They were only capable of attaching themselves to the light in an instinctual fashion, howling day and night over their tragic future fates.


    This situation was undoubtedly suited for Greem to pick them apart, one by one.


    Greem¡¯s split-off soul only needed to defeat them one after another. He could then rob them of their holy light and gradually be stronger. Once the split soul had devoured all the other souls and gathered the holy light together, it could then choose to disintegrate. The enhanced split soul would be nutrition to be assimted by the holy light.


    In doing so, Greem would not experience any side-effects when assimting the holy light to improve his Spirit!


    Meanwhile, the issue of purity in absorbing external spirit energy was a different problem entirely. At any rate, with his influence and wealth, hosting a spirit purification ceremony every so often would not be too much of a burden on the n¡¯s financial circumstances.


    However, it was difficult to split off a portion of his soul in such a crude and rural ce. He would have to return to the World of Adepts and use the alchemybs of the tower to do so.


    While Greem held the crystal in his hand and nning his future operations, a slight movement came from within the depths of his soul. He was drawn away by a strange scene far away from here.


    It was a forest path located fifteen kilometers east of where Greem had hidden himself.


    A transparent apprentice-level wind spirit hovered in the air, slowly patrolling on a specific path. Just then, three silhouettes of varying sizes appeared on the road in the distance.


    They were all wrapped in thick ck traveler cloaks. Even their faces were obscured by the hoods, making it impossible to discern their identities or professions. However, given from their vague outlines, it was two women and a man. The trail they were taking was strange.


    The wind spirit that Greem had left there as his eyes and ears immediately and subtly lowered its height. Itnded on the canopy and silently gathered a light wind before blowing it at these three individuals.


    Just as the breeze was about to reach them, the smallest person of the three¨Cthe one trailing at the rear¨Csuddenly lifted her head. Her pair of bright and blinding eyes red coldly at the wind spirit.


    A light flickered as the wind spirit in the distance lost its soul connection to Greem.


    Supposedly, these wind spirits that Greem had scattered were remotely controlled by the Chip. Their daily patrol paths and scouting duties were left to it. If there were no emergencies, the Chip typically filtered out irrelevant information on its own.


    However, now that the Chip was projecting a scene from a wind spirit in Greem¡¯s mind, it meant that the situation had exceeded the threshold of a typical crisis. It required intervention and action on Greem¡¯s part.


    ¡°Chip, can you confirm their identities? Are they holy knights or adepts?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    In all honesty, Greem would rather fight against two Third Grade natives than one Third Grade adept. After all, the spells of the adepts were far tooplex and mysterious. Most of the time, even if an adept was stronger than another adept, it was still possible for them to lose their lives to some particrly sinister spells.


    The Chip quickly disyed the final image captured by the wind spirit before its death. It also started to zoom in on the image.


    The appearance that had initially been obscured by the dark shadow of the hood slowly became clearer as the image was erged.


    It was the face of a pretty, seductive woman. She had beautiful features and smooth skin. The red that ran beneath her face showed her bountiful life force. Even the fine hairs on her skin appeared to be even and smooth, without a single imperfection. However, what drew Greem¡¯s attention wasn¡¯t her beauty, but her glowing eyes and the strange crystal on her forehead.


    After repeatedly examining and appreciating this pretty face, Greem¡¯s heart became heavy with concern.


    Adepts. There was no doubt. They were definitely adepts from the World of Adepts!


    A few more enemies aiming to kill him had broken into Henvic ne. Moreover, the mastermind behind all this might still be nning to stuff even more hunters into this ne!


    The exposed witch had to be Third Grade. Judging from how her abilities functioned, she appeared to be a psionic¨C a special adept profession that could use mental and spiritual magic.


    However, were the other two Third Grades, or Fourth Grades? If they were Third Grades, then what were their abilities?


    Greem, who had been getting a little carried away over his bountiful spoils, was immediately put in an uneasy mood by these sudden enemies.


    The enemies had already started exterminating the scouts he had ced outside. Moreover, given the direction they wereing from, they were traveling from Hakans; one of them had to be an expert at tracking.


    It seemed like a battle against them in the future might be unavoidable!


    After wrapping up his thoughts, Greem immediately started packing up and preparing to run.

 Chapter 962 - Fleeing Five Hundred Kilometers

    Chapter 962 Fleeing Five Hundred Kilometers


    The same path in the forest.


    The bright light from Benija¡¯s purple eyes slowly faded away as an intangible mental flux spread outward with her at its center.


    ¡°What is it? Did you discover anything?¡± Serpentine Adept Natagu was walking at the forefront. He stopped his footsteps and asked softly.


    Benija had the strongest Spirit of the team. Thus, she understandably became the guide and scout of the party. The reason they had managed to track Greem all the way from Hakans to here was due to Benija¡¯s strange mental sensing ability.


    ¡°I just exterminated a wind elemental. It didn¡¯t seem like a wild elemental, so it¡¯s very likely a monitor the target ced there.¡± Benija replied quickly while her mental flux still quietly scanned for all movement around her.


    Nothing on the entire path, be they squirrels or birds hiding within tree hollows, or snakes and rats crouching beneath the dirt, could hide from Benija¡¯s mental senses.


    Any creature that still had life signs in the area would appear in her mental consciousness as unique points of light. Benija chose to ignore those extremely tiny dots. Meanwhile, her mental flux would cause therger creatures to avoid their strange party unknowingly.


    The world in Benija¡¯s purple eyes was pretty, swirling, and colorful. Apart from the material image before her, she could see the distribution and flow of magical elementium in the air through her elementium sight.


    The fire adept hade through here two days ago; it was obvious from the density of the faint red fire elementium particles left in the air. Elementium adepts were massive elementium reactors, after all. Even if they tried their best to restrain their energy radiation, they would still change the elementium particle density of the ces they traveled through.


    That was why Benija could see a faint red ribbon stretching all the way from Hakans into the distance. The path the fire adept had taken was as bright as a bonfire in the night to her. She couldn¡¯t even overlook it if she tried.


    In fact, through the fire elementium particles left in the air, Benija could faintly estimate the fire adept¡¯s basic power, condition, and rough emotional state.


    It seemed the fire adept had obtained a plentiful bounty from the local city. Even the fire elementium particles he left behind carried a faint trace of joy and excitement. Through the aura of the particles, Benija could genuinely tell that this was a young adept full of talent, whose body contained fiery and vicious power.


    He was young, very young. He was so young that it even exceeded Benija¡¯s expectations.


    The elementium aura he left behind carried with it the warm taste of youth, so dense that it made Benija envious. It was like the sweet and enticing smell of a newborn baby!


    ¡°You mean the enemy has already discovered us?¡± Natagu¡¯s ghostly green eyes stared coldly at Benija. She felt as if her entire body had been wrapped in the slimy, cold forked tongue of a snake. It was a terrible sensation!


    ¡°Yes. When I crushed that wind elemental, I vaguely felt a strange spiritual energy watching over us. However, this spiritual energy doesn¡¯t seem to belong to a lifeform, which is what is throwing me off.¡± Benija bit her lower lip and replied in frustration.


    ¡°Hmph! It might be one of that fire adept¡¯s magical techniques!¡± Natagu said coldly, ¡°The Lady¡¯s information did state that he excelled at golem creation. He is always followed by powerful elementium golems at the same grade as himself. It seems like we are getting very close to his hiding spot! Let¡¯s go; pick up the pace. Don¡¯t let him escape!¡±


    The old, hunchbacked witch Guinevere lifted her head and sniffed the air before shaking her head in disappointment. It appeared the fire adept had not released the Spirit of Pestilence. Otherwise, she should have been able to smell that unique elementium aura that belonged to a Spirit like that.


    The three had a simple discussion but did not dy for long before continuing their pursuit.


    ............


    Inside a vast and massive forest.


    Greem stood on a tall cliff peeking above the sea of trees and gazed into the distance.


    A massive mushroom cloud of fire was rising there, apanied by a rumbling halo of dirt and dust that was spreading outward.


    ¡°How is it, Chip. Did you detect anything?¡± Greem asked silently in his mind.


    [Beep. Strange energy has engulfed the trap area. Unable to detect specific bodily attributes.]


    The Chip¡¯s feedback undoubtedly disappointed Greem. He couldn¡¯t help but follow up with another question, ¡°No specific bodily attributes, but what about their rough energy level? There should be a rough estimate for whether they are Third Grade or Fourth Grade, isn¡¯t there?¡±


    [Third Grade. Judging by the intensity of the energy feedback from the trap area, there is no Fourth Grade energy reaction present. The three target creatures are currently estimated to be Third Grade. uracy of judgment is 76%. More data required for correction.]


    ¡°Finally, good news!¡± Greeem licked his lips and narrowed his eyes, ¡°As long as there isn¡¯t a Fourth Grade, I won¡¯t be afraid, no matter how many Third Grades there are. The worst case is all of us ying a game of hide-and-seek in here! I don¡¯t believe that they will risk the danger of attracting a Fourth Grade native to fight me to the death.¡±


    mes erupted around Greem, and he appeared a few hundred meters away in the air. The fire around him formed into a pair of wings, carrying his body as he flew across the sky. After just two hundred meters, Fire Teleportation came off cooldown, and Greem¡¯s zing body flickered away once again.


    This alternating use of Fire Teleportation and Wings of Fire allowed Greem to make his way to the southwest of the Zambez Empire as fast as possible.


    Naturally, his brazen actions exposed him thoroughly to the people of Henvic.


    The citizens living in this ancient kingdom finally had the luck to witness the terror of an otherworldly adept!


    The Zambez Empire, in the northwest region.


    The sky appeared as if it was burning, the roiling clouds of fire staining it a bright red color.


    The sound of thundering mes could be heard everywhere.


    Greem flew through the sky several hundred meters above the ground, flickering forward every five seconds. The red and radiant Wings of Fire left a path of zing clouds behind him. Every time he teleported, a slowly spreading halo of fire would be left on the spot.


    To travel as fast as he could, Greem no longer cared if his actions disrupted the civilians below. He drew upon the me Fiend¡¯s Heart as hard as he could, causing it to ferociously beat and howl as it sent pure fire energy to every part of his body.


    The fire energy that surged through his body possessed temperatures up to three to four thousand degrees. The energy level was also terrifyingly high. Even so, the maximum output of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart was still barely enough to support Greem¡¯s wild actions.


    After traveling for seven hundred kilometers, Greem finally found a massiveke and dove into it.


    ............


    Cascara Lake.


    It was thergestke in the central region of the Zambez Empire, with the clearest waters and the most bountiful aquatic resources.


    The coursing River Bain and the Fenris River that wound throughout a good half of the Empire met here, forming a region ofke and marsh that stretched for dozens of kilometers.


    As this was the inner region of the Empire, it had not experienced a baptism of fire and blood in hundreds of years. Even the witch invasion in the south of the Empire had not had any effect here.


    As they say, you eat by where you live!


    Most of the civilians here were fishermen. Though their daily routine was hard work, it was still a much more peaceful and casual life than those who lived in the bordends, where fire and war were constant.


    Even though this ce did not have the prosperity or liveliness of arge city, it had its own unique peace and quiet.


    However, today, massive clouds of fire had started burning on the distant horizon, apanied by deafening and continuous rumbling.


    A gigantic ming meteor cut across the sky and crashed into the depths of Cascara Lake.


    The fearsome me shockwave shed with the pirs of water that had been blown into the air, causing steam to cover much of theke. As theke started to boil, countless half-cooked silver barracuda floated to the surface of the water. Meanwhile, the strange meteor had already sunk to the bottom of theke.


    Countless people who made a living in Cascara Lake had personally witnessed this apocalyptic scene, but their primitive and humble minds could notprehend what terrors thaty behind it.


    Half an hourter, Greem walked out of theke from a spot where the seaweed grew in dense patches, his entire body steaming as he did so. He had not taken two steps onto the shore, yet his robes were already dry from the fire elementium¡¯s heat.


    Greem turned and looked at the path he had taken as a wicked smile appeared on his young and handsome face.


    He had traveled so brazenly and recklessly across the Empire. What would the three hunters choose to do?


    Would they do as he did and charge across the country? Or would they sprint across thend on their own two feet with faces filled with resentment? Neither option was a choice they would like to make.


    Even with his power, Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel a wave of exhaustion after fleeing such a long distance in a single journey.


    He quickly restrained the fire energy he was radiating and disguised himself as an ordinary traveler before turning and walking to the east of Carasca Lake.


    ording to information that the Chip had gathered, there was a human city of moderate size there. It was perfect for hiding his tracks and collecting information on the witches.

 Chapter 963 - The Tragic Katherine

    Chapter 963 The Tragic Katherine


    The City of Z.


    It was a moderate-sized city with a poption of more than fifty thousand. It mainly traded in sea products from the nearby Cascara Lake, transporting the products to every part of the Zambez Empire through the convenient rivers and streams that ran near the city.


    That was why when Greem arrived at themercial road leading to Z, he discovered that all the carriages traveling on it were transporting boxes upon boxes of fish.


    Greem had used magic to change his appearance to better disguise himself.


    He put away his eye-catching adept¡¯s robe and equipment and wore simple leather armor and pants. A two-handed longsword was slung over his shoulder, and a gray traveler¡¯s cloak was draped around him, making him look like an adventurer that was walking through thends.


    His appearance had also been changed slightly. His dark red hair and ck eyes had all vanished, making him look about the same as the civilians of the Empire.


    He casually stopped a merchant party traveling along the road and bought his way onto their wagons with two silver coins. He then squeezed beside Old Tom, the driver of the wagon full of fish, as they slowly continued to ride towards the city in the distance.


    As Z slowly approached, the wagons and pedestrians on themercial road started to grow in number.


    In the dense traffic, traveling merchants and coachmen that passed by each other shouted and hollered to the others, greeting them warmly like they had known each other for years.


    However, five kilometers away from Z City, the thunderous stomping of hooves rang out in front of the crowd.


    The wagons and pedestrians on the road hastily dodged aside, allowing the silver-armored knights to charge past them with their tall horses, leaving a trail of dust in the air.


    Though the travelers and merchants had panicked at the appearance of the silver-armored knights, none of themined about it. Instead, they returned to the road after the knights had passed and softly started to discuss the reason for the knights¡¯ haste.


    ¡°It must be because of the strange incident at Cascara Lake.¡± Old Tom waved the whip in his hand and mumbled softly, ¡°It has to be; such a terrifying thing happened there. Those sir knights must have been going there to investigate!¡±


    ¡°The strange incident at Cascara Lake?¡± Greem asked in confusion.


    ¡°You don¡¯t know? Judging from where you came from, aren¡¯t you returning from Cascara Lake? Could you...could you not have seen the scary ming rock that fell from the sky yesterday?¡± Old Tom had a look of disbelief on his face.


    ¡°Oh, you¡¯re talking about that rock! Such things aren¡¯t all that strange or unusual. There¡¯s no need to make such a big deal out of it.¡± Greem replied with ease.


    ¡°You¡¯re an adventurer. These things might not seem amazing to you after traveling from south to north and east to west, but I, Old Tom, have lived in Z City for over thirty years. This is the first time I¡¯ve seen something so scary. You might not have seen what happened with your own eyes. After that fiery rocknded, a good half of theke¡¯s surface started boiling. The dead fish and prawns that floated up to the top were so dense that it was horrifying.¡± Old Tom was a pretty talkative person. He couldn¡¯t stop once he started chatting about the strange thing that happened yesterday, and it seemed like he wanted to take out everything he knew of the incident.


    Greem also chatted with him, throwing in a question orment every so often. However, his thoughts drifted to the holy knights that had just ridden past them. There had been six First Grade Iron Knights, but not even a single Second Grade Silver Knight. Greem couldn¡¯t help but be less excited over the Holy Light Chapel in Z.


    Greem didn¡¯t mind making a hugemotion again if the Holy Light Chapel of Z was sufficientlyrge. However, if it were too small in scale, it wouldn¡¯t be worth exposing his identity and his trail.


    ............


    Natagu was in a terrible mood at the moment!


    The Lady had already warned him multiple times how difficult it was to deal with the fire adept. She had told him to be as careful as he could be, but Natagu had remained confident due to their superior numbers.


    However, his thought of having a pleasant hunt was shattered by the cruel reality before half a day had even passed.


    That damned bastard had escaped in such a brazen and arrogant manner. It was obviously challenging his tolerance and patience.


    Just as he was about to erupt with anger and chase after him in the same brazen manner, a short message for help caused him to calm down.


    The message had been sent by the mechanical witch, Katherine, who had left on her own. The message was short. It was just two words: save me. Natagu and the others could not get a response when they tried to contact her after that.


    What had happened to Katherine?


    The three adepts that had just arrived on Henvic couldn¡¯t help but start wondering.


    Supposedly, a Third Grade adept should be virtually unstoppable in a lower ne like Henvic. In their eyes, as long as they didn¡¯t run into those few terrifying Fourth Grades, the other Third Grade holy knights were no more than ¡®fake pdins¡¯ that did not have the protection of a god!


    The so-called holy knights might seem powerful, with their high-grade knight battle techniques and holy light divine spells that made them resemble spellcasters. They were skilled at both melee and close range, and they were learned in both the martial and mystical arts. However, in the eyes of the adepts, they were ssic jacks-of-all-trades. They were ¡®trash professions¡¯ that were neither experts at magic nor physical fighting.


    Moreover, all four of the adepts that had arrived in Henvic werebat adepts. Every one of them was a hunter back in the World of Adepts. Would they run into danger in this lower ne with their power? de Princess Katherine could probably fight her way out of a circle of several Third Grade knights and escape even if she were caught in one to begin with!


    To think that the opponent could beat her so severely that she had to call for help. No, so badly that she would be quickly defeated after she called for help. The three adepts couldn¡¯t help but think of the two famous Fourth Grade holy knights of Henvic ne.


    There were only two Fourth Grade Holy Knights on this ne. One was attacking the witch¡¯s tower in the south, and the other was recuperating from his massive wounds in the Empire. Could...could this Holy Knight that was recovering from his injuries be moving now?


    They had no idea that a brutal battle had just ended in a forest sixty kilometers to the north.


    Over half of the holy knights that had hurried over from the Empire had turned into casualties. The forest they were in had been ravaged, filled with felled trees and ditches created by a powerful force.


    The terrifying de Princess Katherine¡¯s two hands and a leg had been cut off and pinned to the cliff with a massive longsword.


    Even in such a desperate situation, the ferocious Katherine had still managed to unleash fearsome energy beams from her mechanical eye, slicing the trees and bushes to pieces and defacing the entire geography.


    The Fourth Grade Holy Knight in the party had a stern and determined expression on his face. His short white hair stood straight on his head, making him look as majestic as a raging lion.


    Upon seeing how savage this disabled evil witch remained after having three of her limbs cut off, the Fourth Grade Holy Knight charged to Katherine¡¯s side and reached with his right hand. He did not fear the energy beam shooting out of her eyes at all. Two fingers stabbed and scooped, plucking the half-flesh and half-mechanical eyeball out of Katherine¡¯s eye socket.


    Aaaaaah!


    Katherine opened her mouth and let out a pitiful cry. Five or six gaps opened up on her spine. Metallic appendages reached out from within and struck at the Holy Knight.


    ¡°Hmph! Outrageous.¡± The knight snorted and stretched with his hand, quickly grabbing the metallic appendages with his right palm.


    He then applied force, and Katherine reared her neck and screamed even more desperately. The appendages connected to her spine broke at the base, leaving a few bloody holes on her spine. The purple and ck blood seeped out of her wounds, along with the foul-smelling reconciling agent. The stench was so overpowering that a few of the holy knights started choking and couldn¡¯t help but step back.


    Katherine was still moving her body in an attempt to fight back despite the horrifying wounds she had received.


    The Holy Knight finally lost his patience. He reached out and gouged a few of the joints on Katherine¡¯s body.


    The neck, the shoulder, the chest, the waist, and the tailbone.


    This series of critical strikes immediately severely dislocated or destroyed the modified metal joints in Katherine¡¯s body, shutting down her control over her mechanical or organic parts.


    Katherine¡¯s body finally went limp, incapable of any resistance!


    The Holy Knight looked at the battlefield around him after finally taking down this barbaric mechanical witch. His heart filled with shock and anger when he looked at the ruined forest around him and the holy knights that were scattered across the ground.


    He was shocked at the savagery and ferocity of these foreign invaders.


    He was angered at their disregard for the lives of Henvic ne.


    Fourth Grade Holy Knight Ad Carrhae was finally enraged!


    All the adepts deserved to die. They couldn¡¯t be allowed to continue existing in Henvic.


    His emotion of extreme anger triggered the wounds on his body, making him cough intensely and spit out a mouthful of ck blood. Shards of organ and muscle fibers could be faintly seen in the ck blood.


    It was more than enough evidence that the terrible wounds he had received in the witch¡¯s tower had not stabilized at all. In fact, they were showing signs of aggravation.


    To reduce the casualties among the ordinary holy knights when attacking the witch¡¯s tower, Ad Carrhae had personally breached the tower with his tremendous might and destroyed the internar teleportation array there. He had received a destructive blow by thebined attack of the stationed witches.


    If the holy light he possessed hadn¡¯t been the most specialized at healing and neutralizing foreign energy, Ad Carrhae would never have escaped that tower alive.


    He might have survived, but the terrifying wounds on his body tortured him gravely.


    Ad Carrhae had no choice but to leave the battlefield and return to the Empire to recuperate, using the Sanctuary Space of the Great Holy Light Cathedral to heal his wounds.


    Unfortunately, just as his wounds were showing signs of healing, the omnipotent Holy Light sent a grave warning to him. ording to the Holy Light, new enemies would invade from the north of the Empire. Moreover, their arrival would bring about a fearsome disaster for the holy knights!


    It was this terrifying omen that caused Ad Carrhae to drag his broken body all the way to the north of the Empire, rushing day and night with a troop of holy knights to arrive as quickly as he could. They even cut through the Avelli Mountains, Starfall Valley, and the primal woods to save time.


    Who knew if it was the guidance of the Holy Light or the tremendous misfortune of the enemy, but their party had run into this lone otherworldly witch while they were traveling through Fellhammer Mountain.


    After a bloody battle, this barbaric half-human, half-machine witch was taken down by the injured Fourth Grade Holy Knight Ad Carrhae after she had wiped out half of the other holy knights.

 Chapter 964 - Trading Information

    Chapter 964 Trading Information


    Greem easily made his way into Z after paying the toll.


    He spent half the day strolling through the city and quickly grew disappointed.


    There was indeed a Holy Light Chapel in the city, but its scale was much smaller than the one in Hakans. Greem only felt a single Second Grade energy aura in the city, while the rest were all First Grade or lower.


    After some hesitation, he gave up on the idea of attacking the chapel. Instead, he headed to a tavern at the eastern edge of the city.


    Rose and Wine.


    That was the name of the tavern. It sounded ssy, but when Greem pushed open the two grimy doors and set foot within, he was immediately assaulted by the stench of cheap perfume, sweat, and the unique fragrance of oatmeal stouts. He frowned.


    The sun had not even set, but the ce was already filled with customers.


    Greem was still dressed like a mercenary with a sword. His two-meter stature made him appear particrly intimidating, and he radiated a threatening aura just by standing in the dim entrance of the tavern.


    Several muscr men who were hollering and swaying their way out of the doors ran into him. Their drunk eyes crossed the two cold eyes of the towering figure, and they immediately became half-sober.


    These men were all members of the Willie Brotherhood in the downtown area of Z City. They were typically rough and barbaric men and were known for being mean brawlers on the streets. Yet, for some reason, their hearts were beating wildly today just by running into this tall figure whose face they could not even see clearly. They stepped aside obediently and left the way to the counter open.


    Everyone that Greem passed, be they passionate drunkards, waitresses with food on their trays, or even hooded figures whispering in the shadows, turned pale when he walked by them. They hastily got out of his way.


    Many people who thought of themselves as courageous also instinctively stepped back only to realize their cowardice after the affair. However, while anger rose in their hearts and they prepared to rely on the alcohol in their system to start some trouble, their rising emotions were immediately quenched when they saw the towering back of that person once more.


    The fat tavern owner wiped off the beads of sweat from his face with his oily rag and pushed a smile onto his face.


    ¡°This...sir, what are you looking for?¡±


    It was obvious that Greem was a wandering mercenary from the way he dressed. However, when you stood in front of him and looked into his eyes, an indescribable spiritual pressure would fall upon you that was so dense that you felt like you were suffocating.


    The difference in the lifeform level between them was too significant. Even when Greem tried his best to restrain his spiritual pressure and energy, ordinary people still could not remain calm when they stood in front of him.


    ¡°I need information.¡±


    Greem was not trying to hide his intentions, either. He calmly stated his goal as he tossed a small bag onto the counter.


    The crisp sound of coins rang as the bag fell on the grimy counter. The expression of the tavern owner immediately turned into a passionate one.


    His right hand swiped across the counter with agility utterly disproportionate to his size, and the heavy bag vanished in an instant. He moved so quickly that even Greem somewhat suspected that he had ¡®Thief¡¯ as a secondary profession.


    The fat meat on the owner¡¯s face jiggled as he put on a fawning smile.


    ¡°Sir, do you see that skinny man in the corner. His name is Locke. He¡¯s the leading source of information here in Z. You can ask him anything you want. Don¡¯t tell him I told you this, but he¡¯s a senior member of the Little Knife Association!¡± Greem tilted his head and looked at the man in the corner of the tavern, even as he listened to the tavern owner¡¯s rambling introduction.


    It was a skinny man dressed in ck clothes. He looked very ordinary, without any distinguishing characteristics on his entire person. Only his spirited and wandering eyes betrayed his sharp and agile mind.


    Locke had already noticed Greem the moment he entered the tavern. He was now whispering with thepanions beside him while ncing at Greem from the corner of his eyes. When Greem looked toward him at the tavern owner¡¯s words, Locke couldn¡¯t help but wince slightly.


    Greem¡¯s towering figure was already looming over Locke¡¯s table before he could think of a way to slip out of the tavern. The massive shadow he cast caused the faces of everyone on the table to turn. Sweat started to appear on their foreheads.


    ¡°You are Locke? I need to buy some information from you!¡± Greem got straight to the issue, speaking with a tone as cold as ice.


    Upon hearing that he was here for Locke, the other people who were dressed like him immediately vacated the table and left the space to the two of them.


    ¡°So you are here to buy information? That¡¯s good, that¡¯s good.¡± Locke rxed as a fawning smile appeared on his sharp and skinny face, ¡°How may I call you, sir? And what kind of information do you intend to purchase?¡±


    ¡°I want to know what happened in Hakans.¡±


    The smile on Locke¡¯s face instantly vanished when he heard Greem¡¯s words, reced by an unconceble shock and terror. His gaze then wandered over Greem¡¯s person with suspicion and shock before he softly whispered, ¡°Sir, what you want to know is all ssified information. The imperial intelligence officers have already warned us not to go snooping about the matter.¡±


    ¡°You mean...you have no idea at all?¡± Greem¡¯s voice turned cold.


    ¡°Hehehehe. Sir, don¡¯t look down on our Little Knife Association. We do have the information you want. The problem is that it¡¯s limited to the Empire only. We can¡¯t sell it any outsiders!¡±


    Before Locke could finish speaking, a white crystal the size of a fist rolled across the table before him.


    Even in this darkest corner of the tavern, where the pirs had obscured most of the light from the oilmps, there was no hiding the unique magical light of the white crystal. The dim light immediately triggered magical energy resonance in the white crystal when it shone upon the gem, causing it to glow brilliantly and illuminate a good half of the tavern as if it was high noon.


    The white crystal was a magical gemstone that was best used to absorb, gather, and magnify light. It was one of the best treasures that holy knights used to forge their high-grade holy weapons. As such, it was definitely worth a fortune in Henvic ne.


    Locke immediately dropped his calm facade and slipped the crystal under his shirt. The blinding white light finally faded once the crystal had been hidden from the light. The corner of the tavern turned dark once more.


    The entire tavern had fallen silent. Several people who had been blinded by the light were rubbing their eyes while secretly ncing at them.


    ¡°That¡¯s enough, more than enough. Sir, that is definitely more than worth the cost! But,¡± Locke exined with clenched teeth, ¡°The Empire has reminded us to keep an eye for anyone who is looking for information on Hakans. As such, if I don¡¯t know your identity, I...¡±


    Locke¡¯s words hung in midair.


    The towering figure kept his back against the people in the tavern and held his right hand over his chest. A small, milky-white light slowly appeared on his palm. The white light was so pure and so holy that even Locke couldn¡¯t help but let out a few prayers for the Holy Light in repentance of his past wrongdoings.


    ¡°So that¡¯s who you are indeed! It¡¯s much easier then. I won¡¯t conceal anything. Just tell me what you want to know.¡±


    Holy knights held tremendous influence in Henvic ne that exceeded the worldly realm. The many virtuous, holy knights that willingly traveled thend to exterminate beasts, punish evil, and save the injured caused this group of righteous fighters to be epted as the holiest profession by people from all walks of life.


    Even someone like Locke, who walked in the shadows and darkness, showed due respect and admiration when he met a holy knight.


    ¡°Sir, I can¡¯t take this. Just tell me what you want to know. I will help you to the best of my abilities.¡±


    Greem shook his head and did not take the white crystal back. Instead, he started to ask some questions in a soft voice.


    Several minutester, Greem nodded in satisfaction and turned to leave the tavern.


    Greem had already obtained the answers he wanted from Locke. As such, he no longer had a reason to stay in Z. He bought two muscr horses, some food and water, and headed south out of the southern city gates.


    The Little Knife Association was indeed a famous intelligence organization of the Zambez Empire. They might not have a perfect grasp of everything that happened in Hakans, but they had gotten the basics right.


    The Z City that Locke lived in was a good eight hundred kilometers away from Hakans. It had only been four days since the battle of Hakans, yet he already had such detailed information.


    That was already unexpected for an underground organization that worked in the darkness!


    Greem had managed to verify the trustworthiness of Locke¡¯s information through this test. What he really wanted to know was not the Empire¡¯s information on Hakans, but the location of the two Deceit Witches.


    They had entered Henvic with him two months ago and were only scattered due to some unexpected factors. Greem heard from Locke thatmotion seemed to have risen to the west of the Empire one month ago. Someone had reported the appearance of a witch there.


    The Holy Light Chapel had sent arge group of holy knights to hunt down the witch and seemed to have trapped the enemy in a ce known as the Forest of Darkness.


    Greem felt like he needed to go there and investigate, regardless of whether the witch was actually Rena.

 Chapter 965 - Forest of Darkness

    Chapter 965 Forest of Darkness


    The Forest of Darkness.


    Compared to the World of Adepts, the Zambez Empire¡¯s excavation of the ne¡¯s resources was still at a primitive stage. Most of the ne¡¯s remaineed unexcavated as forests andnds. The range of human activity was still significantly limited by the many dangerous creatures in the wild.


    The Forest of Darkness on the western border of the Empire was one such area.


    There were many primal creatures and terrifying magical beasts inside the forest. They gathered there, breeding and living, forming a unique ound world that rejected the very existence of humans. It was a harsh problem that most ne worlds had to deal with.


    Natural selection, where only the strong may live!


    The powerful magical creatures had be the actual rulers of most regions in the ne with their powerful physiques and ferocious fighting styles. They fought for themselves, their families, or their tribes, ruling over the most resource-rich regions of the continent.


    Compared to them, an intelligent species like humans had almost no means ofpeting.


    Humans had no powerful physical prowess, natural magical talent, or sharp ws and fangs at birth. It forced humans to gather in groups, trying their best to survive in the gaps between the primal beasts and barbaric magical creatures.


    If it weren¡¯t for humanity¡¯s excellent ability to learn, create, and study from the magical creatures to obtain strange and powerful skills to pass onto the next generation, humans would have absolutely no chance of being the rulers of their nes!


    The first adepts of the World of Adepts had obtained their mysterious powers through the imitation of the natural magical patterns on the bodies of powerful magical creatures. Then, after tens of thousands of years of constant umtion, perfection, and enhancement, they had finally created an effective system of cultivating adepts.


    It was through the adepts that stood out within humanity that people managed to stand victorious above the magical creatures in the World of Adepts, bing the ruling species of the ne. However, as the adept grew stronger with each passing day, they gradually became a new ¡®race¡¯ that was entirely distinct from ordinary humans!


    The path of development for most nes followed a simr trajectory!


    Henvic ne was clearly on a simr path as well, but the power system its people had discovered was one simr to that of deity worship¨C a belief in the Holy Light.


    Most humans of Henvic believed in the Holy Light, pushing a non-living, unconscious, natural phenomenon onto the pedestal of divinity. Belief was a form of power as well!


    It was the persistent belief of millions of life forms in Henvic that allowed the Holy Light to be an iparably powerful force. At the very least, such power had be ingrained within Henvic¡¯s narws, bing an important pir that supported the continued development of the nar consciousness.


    With the backing of the nar consciousness itself, the Holy Light could reciprocate its faith, pushing its most devout believers to the peak of power within the ne.


    As long as Henvic ne continued down its current path, Fourth Grade Holy Knights would continue to be rise over thousands and thousands of years. One of them would eventually break through the limits of the ne, advancing to Fifth Grade and making history there.


    At the moment that knight advanced to Fifth Grade, he would naturally be the first powerful god of Henvic, with the Holy Light as his source of strength. When that happened, Henvic would finally have the foundation it needed to establish itself in the multiverse and start expanding outwards into other worlds!


    Unfortunately, the Deceit Witches had discovered Henvic ne before it could give birth to a guardian deity of its own. The Witches broke in and established a tower at Dabyrie Hignds.


    From that moment onwards, Henvic had been ced on a countdown timer toward its inevitable envement!


    If Holy Knight Ad Carrhae had not ced his life on the line to destroy the internar teleportation array within the witch¡¯s tower, the Deceit Witches would have been able to swallow the ne whole within a maximum of four or five decades. Henvic would then have be a lesser ne ruled over by the Deceit Witches.


    Now, with the change in circumstances, the holy knights seemed to have regained an advantage. They now had the chance to defeat all the Deceit Witches in a single assault and expel the evil forces out of Henvic ne.


    That was why the local Holy Light Chapel had immediately mobilized all members for an extermination when they spotted signs of witch activity in the west. They had sessfully trapped the witch inside the Forest of Darkness.


    However, the witch¡¯s magical ability was far too strong. She could transform herself into any form, thereby obtaining the trust of an unsuspecting individual and turning them into her guardian.


    A Second Grade Silver Knight was caught unaware in this manner and tempted to betray the Holy Light. In doing so, he became a Dark Knight. The witch sessfully escaped into the Forest of Darkness under the protection of this Dark Knight, and there she hid from the pursuit of the holy knights.


    As time passed, two Third Grade Gold Knights and twenty-one Silver Knights had gathered in the army of holy knights surrounding the Forest of Darkness. Yet, the target of their pursuit was only an ordinary Second Grade witch.


    ............


    Devon carefully searched as he walked through the dark and damp forest.


    He had taken off his heavy metal armor to make it easier to move and fight in this environment. He was only wearing silver chainmail on his body, with a thick cloak wrapped around him. The longsword he was used to using had also been swapped for a rapier. He also carried a round and polished steel shield. That was all his equipment.


    The Forest of Darkness lived up to its name. A massive canopy covered the skies and obscured most of the light cast down from above, causing the woods to be a dark and lightless ce. The forest was just as dark in the day, and the sun could hardly be seen.


    All sorts of terrifying magical nts lived in such a dark ce.


    They were mixed in with the other ordinary green nts. Anyone who wasn¡¯t a schr or an experienced hunter would have difficulty recognizing them. Ordinary people would be dragged into living bramble bushes by berserk vines if they got close to these nts without any preparations. They would then be stabbed by sharp branches and stakes before their blood was absorbed and their flesh eaten.


    To avoid alerting the enemy, the Second Grade Silver Knight Decon did not enhance himself with any holy light protections. He simply relied on his sensitive reactions and fast shes to deal with any magical nts that tried to strike at him.


    The Holy Light of the knights excelled at enhancement, healing, and purification, but not searching and tracking. Decon had to rely more on his swordsmanship more than his eye-catching holy light magic in this Forest of Darkness.


    The forest was very silent.


    Magical creatures and beasts that lived in this forest had learned to stay silent when they were not yet the most powerful beings that lived here. They would hunt, feast, mate, and rest in silence, remaining as quiet as they could up until thest moments of their death.


    Noise would attract enemies, as would the brilliant holy light.


    Thest few holy knight squads that had entered the forest to search for the witch had many men and were even led by high-grade knights. However, they had all suffered heavy casualties due to their brazen manner of action. The beasts and magical creatures that hid in the Forest of Darkness seemed to hold tremendous contempt for outsiders. They were easily drawn to noise and light, where they would strike at the holy knights from the shadows.


    In the end, the holy knights were just a group of human warriors that had been enhanced by the Holy Light.


    With their enhanced Strength and Physique, they could easily crush magical creatures of the same grade while fighting on level ground. However, here in the Forest of Darkness, where it was hard to see clearly, thebat prowess of the holy knights was significantly weakened.


    The long marches, rivers, and streams made it impossible for them to wear bulky metal armor. As such, they had no way of protecting themselves from sudden acid attacks that came from magical vines and nts. The bushes and brambles that grew everywhere made it difficult for them to swing the longswords they were so used to wielding. Yet, the rapiers and shortswords they had swapped for their weapons had trouble slicing through the necks of powerful magical creatures.


    The few knight squads that made it deep into the Forest of Darkness all returned in failure. Many Iron Knights had died in the process.


    The two Gold Knights had no choice but to scatter the Silver Knights into the forest and have them carefully search for the location of the evil witch and the traitor knight. They were to send a message back to the camp as soon as they discovered their tracks. The two Gold Knights would then be able to rush straight for the enemy and end this hunt with the smallest number of casualties possible.


    Nightfall.


    As the sunlight faded, the Forest of Darkness became even more mysterious and scary.


    Devon silently wandered in the depths of the forest, his feet stepping upon the moist and sticky dirt.


    He took immense care in where he stepped for every movement he made. It was either exposed dirt or rotting piles of leaves, but never where the thorns and branches were the densest.


    It was possible that such ces were traps that had been disguised by the magical ns. Furthermore, stepping on dry branches could easily create unnecessary sound and draw the attention of the creatures in the darkness.


    Apart from his feet, Devon also had to keep a constant eye out for the green vines hanging down from the trees above. Many of them were bloodsucking vines in disguise. All sorts of poisonous snakes and insects also liked to crouch against the vines where they could silently fall onto an unsuspecting victim when they walked past.


    Devon advanced carefully, quickly waving the rapier in his hand.


    The bloodsucking vines in his way were all cut to pieces by his rapid shes, and purple-ck liquid scattered everywhere. Snakes and serpents with severed heads fell to the ground, their bodies twitching violently and making a mess out of the leaves.


    However, Devon suddenly stopped moving. He lifted his nose and sniffed the air.


    The faint scent of a woman was mixed into the damp, heavy, and rotting air, along with the strange sound of flowing water.


    Devon narrowed his eyes, held his breath, and followed after the smell.

 Chapter 966 - Devon’s Death

    Chapter 966 Devon¡¯s Death


    There was a small pool located deep in the forest; it was the only water source above ground within several dozens of kilometers.


    At this moment, it was upied by a youthful and pretty figure.


    The sound of sshing water hade from here.


    A pretty, naked woman stood in the pool where the water reached up to her waist, gently cupping the water and sshing it against her body. This small pool that was no more than twenty square meters in size was not deep at all. It appeared an emerald green color andpletely covered the woman¡¯s body from the waist down, only revealing her perfect upper body.


    She had a soft and slender waist that one could fully wrap around with a single hand, a shockingly curvaceous bosom, and a smooth, ivory-like back and neck. They were all so stimting to the eye that it would stun any onlookers.


    The woman hadn¡¯t seemed to have noticed Devon approaching at all. She continued to ssh water over her body and gently rub her chest.


    Devon squatted down as lightly as he could, concealing himself within the thick bushes while he narrowed his eyes and looked at the surroundings of the pool. Devon saw a pile of clothes and essories scattered upon arge rock to the east of the pool. He also saw a belt carrying several vials of various colors and a pouch that was stuffed full.


    Yet, no matter how he looked, he could not discover the silhouette of that traitor¨C that man who had betrayed the Holy Light and embraced the darkness.


    A trap, or carelessness on the enemy¡¯s part?


    Devon did not know.


    However, this was indeed a rare opportunity to strike.


    The witch was naked and was several steps away from her equipment. If...if he could strike now, he had an incredible chance to wound her severely. He might even be able to kill her here.


    Devon¡¯s heart couldn¡¯t help but start beating.


    Should he retreat out of caution and report the position of the witch, or should he attack now?


    For a moment, he started hesitating.


    At this moment, a soft rustling sound came from the forest on the other side of the pool. A fawn came bounding out of the bushes and straightened its neck to look at the witch in the pool curiously. The beautiful witch also seemed to have been surprised by this unexpected guest and started chuckling seductively. She then chanted a few strange words that Devon could not understand. She waved her hands lightly as two emerald ribbons of water reached out from the edge of the pool and wrapped around the fawn before it started fleeing out of fear. The water ribbons slowly pulled the animal toward the witch.


    A good chance! The enemy was casting an evil spell, and the target wasn¡¯t him!


    Devon no longer hesitated. Overwhelming holy light surged within his body and rapidly turned into bright enhancements around him as he sang his prayers.


    Seal of Righteousness!


    Blessing of Might!


    Holy Protection!


    Righteous Verdict!


    Holy st!


    To maximize his offensive power, almost all of the blessings were used to enhance Devon¡¯s Strength and Agility while blessing his weapon with the holy attribute. Holy Protection was the only defensive spell.


    Instincts from dozens of years of training allowed the Second Grade Silver Knight Devon toplete all his blessings in just two to three seconds. His power grew exponentially from the enhancement of the potent Holy Light.


    His original 21 points of Strength had now increased to 24 points from the +3 Strength provided by the Second Grade Blessing of Might. It further increased to 25 points from the +1 Strength provided by the Seal of Righteousness.


    Such physical Strength already made him a match for most Second Grade magical creatures!


    His Agility, Physique, and Spirit also increased by different degrees from the multiple holy light blessings.


    If Devon were only a beginner Second Grade before the blessings, then he was now an advanced Second Grade fighter. His power had increased by two minor grades.


    The only unfortunate aspect of his circumstance was hisck of proper equipment. He was not wearing holy armor, nor was he using the single-handed longsword that he was most used to. However, the addition of the holy light and his incredible Strength turned that rapier in his hand into a lethal weapon.


    Just as the pretty witch discovered themotion, she turned her head in shock. Devon leaped forward and used Charge in midair. His entire body turned into a de of light, enveloped by the holy light as he stormed ahead like lightning, striking at the ¡®unprepared¡¯ witch twenty meters away in the pool.


    The witch¡¯s pretty face appeared to be so terrified and distorted from the pressure of the blinding holy light. She retreated desperately, sending two pirs of water into the air against the ¡®holy de¡¯ charging towards her as she did so.


    ¡°Die, witc...¡± Devon¡¯s body slid across the surface of the pool like an arrow. His rapier glowed with a thick, almost solid, light. In the blink of an eye, it was only half a meter away from the witch¡¯s smooth white neck.


    Just then, an ebon de reached out from the disturbed waters of the pool, quickly stabbing into Devon¡¯s unguarded stomach.


    The Holy Protection Devon had cast on himself appeared to be useless before this strange longsword. The holy knight was skewered as the sword thrust all the way to the hilt. The fearsomely sharp edge of the sword appeared behind Devon¡¯s back, along with a fountain of blood.


    Moreover, as Devon¡¯s momentum carried him forward, the sword effortlessly sliced his body in half from the chest onwards. With his chest and abdomen sliced in half, warm organs started to spill out into the emerald pool below.


    Devon¡¯s charging form swerved after being so mortally wounded, and his body crashed into a pile of rocks at the other end of the pool. Thanks to the potent protection of the Holy Light, he still retained a trace of life force, even after receiving such a horrible injury. He turned his head with much difficulty and looked at the ck sword.


    The pool water split apart as a tall ck figure rose from below.


    Devon furiously cursed when he saw the familiar standard issue armor and the strange longsword containing dark powers, ¡°Traitor!¡± Then, all life faded from his body, and he died on the spot.


    Rena was already back on the shore now, still naked and vulnerable. She pressed her hand softly against her neck.


    Streaks of crimson blood were slowly seeping out from there, appearing particrly scary.


    ¡°Dammit...you should have struck earlier!¡± Rena shouted in anger, ¡°That bastard almost beheaded me earlier.¡±


    Rena had truly been unprotected by any defensive spells earlier, to lure the knight into the trap better. If she hadn¡¯t moved quickly enough and dodged the sharp edge of the rapier, it might have ended in mutual death for both of them.


    The towering figure shrouded in the powers of darkness didn¡¯t seem to have heard the witch¡¯s words ofint at all. He slowly walked out of the pool and brushed away the pieces of flesh and blood on his body, all while ring coldly at the naked witch.


    The anger on Rena¡¯s face faded in an instant when she saw her retainer¡¯s behavior, turning into a gentle and caring expression instead.


    She did not turn to dress herself, either. She simply walked to the side of the tall figure and caressed his cold, hard helmet, ¡°What is it? Are you still angry at me? Do you not feel that sensation of power throughout your body since bing a Dark Knight? It is countless times better than when you were a believer of the Holy Knight! You should feel it now. The so-called power of the Holy Light is only a borrowed power, after all. Only such power truly belongs to you yourself.¡±


    As a Deceit Witch, every word that Rena spoke from her mouth as she leaned against the figure would subtly cause a strange magical fluctuation. The light of hatred and suffering in the figure¡¯s eyes finally weakened when it heard these words.


    ¡°Let¡¯s leave!¡± After a short moment, the tall figure finally spoke in a cold tone, ¡°I can sense the unrest in the Holy Light in the distance. They know about Devon¡¯s death now.¡±


    ¡°And the two Third Grades?¡± Clearly, Rena was only afraid of the high-grade knights and could hardly be bothered by the holy knights that were the same grade as her.


    ¡°One remains at the edge of the forest. The other is already closing in on us. He should be able to arrive here in another thirty minutes!¡±


    ¡°Then why aren¡¯t we running!¡±


    Rena immediately panicked upon hearing that a Third Grade holy knight was making his way here. She hastily dressed and quicklybed over Devon¡¯s possessions before diving into the depths of the forest with the Dark Knight.


    Thirty minutester, a squad of holy knights carefully found their way here and discovered the gruesome corpse of theirpanion by the pool.


    A middle-aged man with a determined face and aposed expression bent down by Devon¡¯s ravaged body. He rubbed the still-fresh blood of hispanion between his fingers, and wrath finally appeared on his face.


    Devon¡¯s body was still shrouded in a dense aura of darkness. It was clear that he had been killed by the traitor that had given himself to the darkness. To think that he cared not for past ties and had murdered a formerpanion in such a cruel manner. It made him unbelievably furious!


    ¡°You guys bring Devon¡¯s corpse back. I will chase after them!¡± The Gold Knight stood up straight, ¡°They haven¡¯t gone far.¡±


    He drew his one-handed longsword and rushed into the forest before his subordinates could say anything else.


    With the opposition between the Holy Light and darkness, the witch and her knight would not be able to escape his pursuit so long as the trace of dark aura remained in the air.


    The forest shed past his eyes.


    The branches and bushes that got in his way obscured the pathpletely.


    Ke had lost all theposure that a holy knight should have. He ignored all the obstacles in his way, rushing through them with his holy armor and Holy Light Ward and allowing them tosh against his body.


    It was only when he ran into tough patches of brambles and thorns that he would strike with his sword and sh a path into the forest with a violent holy light strike.


    He no longer cared if the enemy detected the flux of his holy light. As long as he was fast enough, he did not believe that the revulsive couple could escape his pursuit!

 Chapter 967 - The Vanished Dark Knight

    Chapter 967 The Vanished Dark Knight


    After giving chase several kilometers, Ke finally caught up to Rena in a clearing in the woods.


    Rena was only a Second Grade witch that had attained her level through potions and resources obtained due to her connections. She typically lived infort and luxury and had never really experienced realbat. That was why her decision to flee had appeared to be hesitant and indecisive.


    By the time the Dark Knight discovered the enemy approaching, Rena was no longer able to escape from a berserk Gold Knight with her Physique.


    Rena turned her head and looked behind her. The blinding radiance that emanated from the Gold Knight when he sprinted only made Rena even more flustered and terrified.


    She secretly took out a small vial of potion, opened the cork, and started chanting a strange spell. Apletely ck, three-tailed scorpion climbed out of the bottle. Its three tails stood straight up and shot a gray beam at the towering Dark Knight.


    The Dark Knight froze on the spot.


    ¡°Go, stall him with your life.¡±


    Rena hastily gave the Dark Knight a suicide order and continued to flee frenziedly into the forest.


    An expression of despair, hatred, and relief appeared on the face of the Dark Knight beneath the helmet. He took out the massive longsword at his waist and turned to engage the Gold Knight.


    Enemies with a grudge tended to sh violently upon meeting!


    Even though the Dark Knight knew this was a suicidal act, he was under thepulsion of the damned witch¡¯s unusual magic. Thus, he gathered his densely evil aura and shed at the Gold Knight¡¯s cluster of holy light.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    The power of darkness shed with the power of holy light.


    Light and darkness neutralized each other, and sparks flew from the shing longswords.


    The Dark Knight had only just fallen, after all. His mastery of the powers of darkness was stillcking. Moreover, there was a tremendous difference between his Strength and the Gold Knight¡¯s Strength. It was almost as if he had been blown away by an elephant. He flew across the clearing, snapping countless branches and bushes until he finally crashed into a tall and ancient tree.


    This entirely artless crash had dispersed all the powers of darkness from the Dark Knight¡¯s body. His bones and organs were also slightly injured by the impact. If it weren¡¯t for his armor neutralizing most of the force, he would probably have died immediately from the Strength of the Gold Knight.


    Even so, he had lost all his ability to resist. His body was stuck in the tree, and even slightly struggling caused purple and ck blood toe flowing out of his shattered armor.


    On the other hand, Ke had been mildly injured against the berserker strike of a Second Grade Dark Knight. However, as a holy knight who had the protection of holy light, the minor wounds were immediately healed within two seconds.


    Ke walked up to the Dark Knight and lifted his facete with the tip of his longsword, revealing the sickly pale and youthful face beneath.


    ¡°Essi Daven, what was the cause of your depravity?¡± The tip of Ke¡¯s de was trembling slightly.


    Essi Daven had been an elite that his chapel had specially chosen and trained over the years. He had be a Second Grade Silver Knight despite his young age. If he hadn¡¯t made any mistakes, he would have be a respected Third Grade Gold Knight within three to four decades.


    It was Ke that personally gave Essi Daven the order to pursue the witch upon hearing of her appearance near the chapel. It was Ke¡¯s goodwill. He had hoped that Essi would perform well in this witch-hunt, thereby obtaining even more grace from the Holy Light.


    It would undoubtedly have been exceedingly beneficial to his power and talent!


    Perhaps he would be qualified to preside over a Holy Light Chapel of his own in another region once he seeded in this operation.


    Unfortunately, his fate took an unexpected twist upon meeting the evil witch.


    For some unknown reason, he quickly became depraved and fallen. Lured and aided by the evil witch, he embraced the darkness and became an enemy of the Holy Light. What else could infuriate Ke even more? What else could make him so unreasonably mad?!


    That was why Ke had been so desperate to capture Essi Daven. He had to ask him why personally.


    Sadly, thepletely fallen Essi Daven remained silent. His gaze was unfocused, and traces of darkness radiated from his eyes as if he had no intelligence to speak of.


    The longsword in Ke¡¯s hand quivered slightly. There were several times when he wanted to cut off Essi Daven¡¯s head, but he couldn¡¯t bring himself to do it.


    Finally, a cold light gleamed in Ke¡¯s eyes. He sliced off both of Essi¡¯s legs with two quick shes, then picked up his dark longsword and pinned him to the tree by the left shoulder.


    Ke left immediately after doing this, his eyes drifting in the direction where the evil witch had fled. He continued his pursuit.


    One had to admit that Rena was truly one useless Second Grade witch.


    Even with the three minutes that her Dark Knight had gained her, she still couldn¡¯t escape from Ke¡¯s pursuit.


    She didn¡¯t know how to hide her tracks or how to avoid her enemy¡¯s pursuit. In theplex terrain of the Forest of Darkness, Rena only managed to run for two and a half kilometers before Ke once again caught up to her.


    This time, there was no longer anyone who could help her!


    Ke had caught up to Rena¡¯s side just by braving all her magical attacks. He then struck her on the back with the t of the de and knocked her unconscious.


    After searching and taking away all of Rena¡¯s vials and essories, as well as severing all her tendons, Ke grabbed her by the hair and dragged her all the way back.


    There was no proper path in the Forest of Darkness. Ke also made sure to walk where the brambles and thorns were most dense. Witch Rena¡¯s body was soon covered with hundred and thousands of cuts and wounds along the way. By the time they arrived at the withered tree, Rena¡¯s clothes had turned into rags, and her exposed skin had been utterly ravaged.


    Ke suddenly stopped in his tracks and looked at the empty tree.


    The longsword he had thrust into the tree was still there, but Essi Daven, whose legs had been cut off and whose bones had beenpletely shattered, had mysteriously vanished.


    It wasn¡¯t just his body that had disappeared. Even his two severed legs were gone without a trace!


    ¡°Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!¡± Ke thrust Rena against the tree and started circling frantically on the spot.


    His plentiful tracking experience told him that Essi Daven had not left on his own. Rather, he had been saved by an outsider. Moreover, the person who saved him was not only powerful but also possessed a unique means of stealth. Otherwise, something would have been left behind; there was not even a single trace or clue.


    The witch¡¯spanion?


    Ke picked Rena up and lifted her before his eyes. He red at her viciously.


    ¡°Speak! Do you have any otherpanions here? Who saved Essi Daven?¡±


    Naturally, since the Gold Knight had snapped Rena¡¯s spine, she had no means of resistance. She lifted her terrifying face covered in blood and scratch marks and screamed curses at the holy knight.


    ¡°Let me go! Let me go! Kill me, and mypanions will avenge me!¡±


    He pped Rena twice across the face brutally before she could finish her words. Bruises instantly appeared on her face, and most of her teeth also became loose from the impact.


    ¡°I don¡¯t want to hear another useless word from your mouth. Speak! Who are yourpanions? Where are they hiding? Tell me this, and I will give you a quick death. Otherwise, wait to bathe in the Holy Light!¡±


    The enemy¡¯s savagery instantly broke Rena¡¯s spirit. She was no longer as fierce and unreasonable as she had been before. Her entire body trembled as she spoke.


    ¡°No more. There are no more! There were three of us this time, but an ident happened when we were traveling through the spatial rift. We were split up.¡±


    ¡°Where have the other two gone?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know! I really don¡¯t! I am just here to transport the materials for the magical array. Where theynded in this ne from the space storm, I...really don¡¯t know!¡±


    There were divine spells that allowed the holy knights to discern truths from lies. Ke finally gave up his interrogation after confirming that the broken witch was not lying.


    Since it wasn¡¯t the witch¡¯spanion, then it was very likely a native magical creature of the Forest of Darkness!


    Essi Daven¡¯s aura of darkness matched this ce very well, indeed. Was he devoured by a magical creature that passed by? Or had he been brought back to the magical creature¡¯s den?


    Ke found no answers, no matter how hard he thought. In the end, he gave up on searching for Essi. Instead, he picked the captive witch up and sprinted out of the forest.


    Once his silhouettepletely vanished from the forest, a pale face suddenly appeared on the ancient tree where the dark longsword was embedded. The face gazed in the direction where the Gold Knight had disappeared.


    It blinked a few times and opened itsrge mouth, spitting out Essi Daven from within the tree.


    His two legs had mysteriously been reattached.


    After much difficulty, Essi Daven finally got up from the damp ground and looked at this face in silence.


    Ever since he embraced the darkness, he felt like his soul had been covered with a thin veil. Everything he heard and saw and thought waspletely different from before.


    This human face gave him a simr feeling of peculiarity.


    ¡°Hehe, that little witch has quite some tricks up her sleeves. To think she managed to activate the talent for darkness hiding within you. That¡¯s a win for this Lord. I never expected to pick up a decently talented Dark Knight in such a lowly ne. Good, good, good. Come with me now, you!¡±


    The human face on the tree opened its mouth as wide as it could, opening a spatial tunnel in the tree that led to a mysterious space.


    The still confused Essi Daven only hesitated for a moment before diving into the dark tunnel and vanishingpletely from Henvic ne.


    Ke, having left earlier, was utterly ignorant of everything that had just transpired.


    All his attention was focused on the captive Witch Rena.

 Chapter 968 - The Fate of the Witch

    Chapter 968 The Fate of the Witch


    Haisas City.


    It was not yet harvest season, but the citizens of Haisas were as excited and joyous as if it was a time of celebration.


    The entire city bubbled withmotion as the majestic holy knights in shining armor escorted the creaking wooden cage through the streets.


    A witch. So that was a witch!


    The Zambez Empire had suffered greatly since the otherworldly witches had invaded the Henvic ne.


    They raided the mines and seized the high-grade resources, treating the entire ne as their garden and doing as they liked. Sometimes, to punish ces that rejected the witch forces, they even released gues and had no concern for the deaths of ordinary civilians at all.


    It was the past hundred years of such atrocities that caused the people of Zambez to hate the witches with such intense passion. There was a deep-seated resentment that emanated from their very being.


    That was why all of Haisas¡¯ poption took to the streets when they heard the holy knights¨Cthe personification of justice itself¨Chad captured the terrifying witch from the Forest of Darkness and put her in a cage. As the enclosure wheeled down the streets of the city slowly, the people of Haisas greeted her with rotten leaves, dirty water, and sharp stones.


    The people chased after the cage, cheering as they threw their rocks at the shivering witch within. It was obvious that this witch had once been a woman of exceptional beauty, with an enviable figure and a perfect face.


    Unfortunately, the unrelenting hatred of the holy knights ensured her torture in their hands. Now, she was shut in a cage like a beast and ridiculed, attacked, and humiliated by themon people.


    The devastating damage to her person and the fear of death had chased away Rena¡¯s former brilliance and beauty. Her hair was a tangled mess, and her robe had been torn into rags and ribbons that couldn¡¯t hide her body.


    She had all sorts of scratch marks and bruises on her exposed skin. What was once smooth and white now showed signs of wrinkles and spots, like withered tree bark.


    Rena looked at the people cheering around her prison with a numb expression, simply letting the rotten vegetables and sharp pebbles hit her body. She did not seem to have any intention to shield herself or dodge the projectiles.


    ¡°Burn her.¡±


    ¡°Tie her to the stake.¡±


    Rena¡¯s body twitched uncontrobly and intensely every time such a yell came from the crowd.


    Her heart was filled with hatred, and her soul contained nothing but unfathomable resentment.


    Unfortunately, frightening anti-magic shackles had been ced on her wrists and ankles. They were made of special magical metal and could not be easily destroyed by acid or other corrosive spells. Countless tiny metal spikes lined the insides of the shackles, piercing into her flesh. Even the slightest of movements would cause intense pain to wash over her entire body.


    A special mask covered her face, and an egg-sized metal ball had been stuffed in her mouth. These things prevented Rena from chanting incantations or making handsigns, even without the guards overseeing her.


    Low-grade instant-cast spells could not be cast inside this wooden cage either. It had been drawn with all sorts of strange runes. Henvic might be a low-magic world, but its research on magic had notgged behind at all.


    They were still capable of researching an anti-magic barrier like this, with the holy light as the power source!


    Rena¡¯s cage was immediately sent to the Holy Light Chapel of Haisas City. More and more holy knights were gathering there, with as many as five Third Grade Gold Knights already present.


    The number of Gold Knights wasn¡¯t to keep watch over a mere Second Grade witch but to protect the core magical array materials they had obtained through searching Rena¡¯s person.


    The attack on the Dabyrie Hignds had been ongoing for six months now. Though the Zambez Empire was suffering terrible losses, the witches were also at their limits. Given the current momentum, the mighty Empire would only need to grit their teeth, ignore the necessary sacrifices, and they would be able to break into the witch¡¯s tower in another three to four months.


    If the witch¡¯s tower obtained these magical array ingredients and fixed their internar teleportation array, all of the losses that the Empire had sustained over the past year would have been for nothing. That was why, even with the tension at the frontlines, the holy knight alliance still sent three powerful Gold Knights back to Haisas City. Inbination with the two Gold Knights near the area, it was a total of five Third Grade Gold Knights guarding the witch and the magical array materials.


    The Fourth Grade Holy Knight Ad Carrhae had also turned west instead of continuing his journey north. He was hurrying here to meet the holy knights in Haisas City. With a Fourth Grade Holy Knight escorting the group, they would be able to safely bring the witch and the materials back to the capital.


    Safety was only assured once they were in the capital!


    As such, three days after Witch Rena was brought into Haisas, and seven days before the Fourth Grade Holy Knight arrived, the disguised Greem reached the city along with the crowd.


    Haisas City was practically under martialw now. The Holy Light Chapel was firmly guarded by holy knights that had hurried over from all over the Empire. The Haisas City guards still managed the security of the city and the identification of the travelers, but the city gates, the customs, and several other key positions were reinforced with small groups of holy knights.


    Military control had been applied to these locations to prevent the witch¡¯spanions making it into Haisas. The examination at the city gates was unusually strict. Many ordinary merchant groups and caravans had already been denied entry. These people had no choice but to take temporary residence in the nearby towns.


    Greem, who had hurried over after hearing the news from the Forest of Darkness, had no choice but to intercept a First Grade Iron Knight. He killed the knight and changed into the standard armor of the holy knights. He then rode a tall horse to the gates of Haisas.


    The city guards that surrounded the gates saluted upon seeing Greem¡¯s holy knight armor. They then sent someone to report Greem¡¯s arrival to the holy knights stationed there.


    Soon, three holy knights emerged from the city with a dozen trainee knights and quickly arrived in front of Greem and his horse.


    ¡°The Light be with us! Brother from afar, which Chapel have youe from?¡± The three holy knights were all First Grade Iron Knights. The one at the very front was a middle-aged man with a full beard. He pressed his hand against his chest and greeted Greem warmly.


    Greem leaped off his horse and returned the greeting with the same gesture, ¡°The Light be with us! It is good to see you. I am Eadric from Bael¡¯dun City on the edge of the Avelli Mountains. I was traveling near the Forest of Darkness when I heard that Haisas was gathering the forces of the Holy Light. I rushed here, hoping to contribute my own insignificant power!¡±


    ¡°So you¡¯re from the Avelli Mountains! No wonder you look so unfamiliar! Wee, brother! Haisas wees you!¡± The holy knight in the lead said with a smile on his face, ¡°I am Heilit, and today I am on duty at the city gates. Speaking of which, I remember Old Christopher was the one in charge of Bael¡¯dun. I used to drink with him. How is he now? He¡¯s still doing good, isn¡¯t he?¡±


    Greem ambled toward the city with hispanion, shaking his head and smiling as he replied, ¡°Sir Christopher had already retired from old age and returned to his hometown of Frostspring valley five years ago. The one managing Bael¡¯dun now is Sir mande Graythorn. He also left seven months ago, leading many of our brothers to Dabyrie.¡±


    Greem had already obtained all the crucial information from the memory fragments of the holy knight he intercepted and killed; such simple word games would never trick him. He diffused the knight¡¯s suspicions in a few words and made him let down his guard.


    The knight gave Greem a regretful smile after leading him into the inner city, ¡°My sincere apologies brother, but I can only escort you up to here. I still need to wee our brothers of the Holy Light from all over thend. Totti will bring you to the Chapel! You need to report to Vindicator Athera once you¡¯re there. He will give you your assignment!¡±


    The two saluted each other once again, and the trainee knight Totti led Greem to the majestic Holy Light Chapel at the center of the city. It was the tallest and most magnificent building in the city.


    Haisas was under martialw now, but there were still over sixty thousand civilians in the city. With them walking the streets, the city was just as lively as ever. All the civilians hurriedly stepped aside and bowed when they saw two holy knights in brilliant armor walking down the streets.


    Greem could tell that they genuinely admired and respected the knights¨C these believers who carried out the will of the Holy Light. Their respect was not forced in any manner. It was authentic and came from the depths of their souls.


    It was proof that the strange power of the Holy Light had been ingrained in the hearts of all who lived in Henvic ne. The Holy Light was the personification of light and justice!


    The genuine admiration of the people aroused the trainee knight¡¯s sense of honor. His young face was filled with unconceble excitement as he walked by Greem¡¯s side. The subtle looks that he snuck at Greem¡¯s magnificent armor became filled with even more passion and envy.


    As a trainee knight, Totti was only wearing ordinary steel armor. The armor had not yet been carved with intricate and beautiful light runes. On the other hand, all holy knights of First Grade and above wore sacred armor enhanced with the power of the Holy Light. The holy light¡¯s power that they called upon would merge with the power of the armor, creating a sort of divine protection for them.


    Greem had examined this protective force before. The holy light protection of a First Grade Iron Knight could deflect one hundred and forty points of elementium magical damage. When Greem was still a First Grade adept, his strongest single-target Explosive Fireball only dealt one hundred and fifteen points of damage.


    A First Grade Iron Knight could have endured Greem¡¯s fireball attack and charged up to him. Of course, Greem would have taken no more than three seconds to release a First Grade Explosive Fireball. Thus, in a battle between a First Grade adept and a First Grade Iron Knight, the knight would be at an advantage in a small, narrow room.


    However, if there were sufficient space, and the First Grade adept had powerful mobility spells, the Iron Knight would be kited to death. After all, no one would be able to be as fast as a rogue while they were wearing dozens of kilograms of armor!

 Chapter 969 - Hiding and Plague

    Chapter 969 Hiding and gue


    Vindicator Athera¡¯s room was to the left of the training grounds in the Holy Light Chapel. It was a simple wooden house.


    As Greem stepped into the wooden house under Totti¡¯s lead, Vindicator Athera was battling vigorously against the massive pile of documents on his table. Athera lifted his head at the sound and looked at the two with his crusty and dark-circled eyes. He stared at them in confusion for quite a while until his eyes finally regained focus.


    Athera was a Second Grade Silver Knight!


    Even though working a desk for so many years had caused his Physique to drop and a belly to appear, the holy light power he radiated was undoubtedly that of a Second Grade.


    ¡°Report! O¡¯ respected Sir Vindicator Athera, trainee knight Totti...¡± the young trainee knight stood straight, saluted, and started reporting in a loud voice.


    Unfortunately, he was stopped by the impatient officer before he could finish.


    ¡°Alright, alright. Totti, youe here at least three times a day. I¡¯m already done listening to all your boring greetings, even if you aren¡¯t. Also, remember to praise the Holy Light first the next time you open your mouth!¡±


    ¡°Yes, Lord Vindicator!¡±


    ¡°Very well, you can return to your post. I will wee this brother myself.¡±


    ¡°Yes, Lord Vindicator!¡±


    Totti saluted once again before turning and leaving the wooden house.


    Vindicator Athera shifted his gaze to Greem.


    ¡°The Light be with us! My greetings, respected Lord Vindicator. I am...¡±


    Greem did not dare to dally at all. He immediately started reporting to Athera ording to the customs of the knights. Of course, he made sure to keep what he said consistent with before. Greem wasn¡¯t worried that the enemies in this otherworld would expose his ¡®lies¡¯ without aprehensive intelligence system.


    Moreover, with Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, Greem could easily convert his elementium powers into pure light elementium. He would have no problem tricking these holy knights as long as he didn¡¯t need to fight.


    In all honesty, there was probably no one among the holy knights who could even imagine an otherworldly adept infiltrating their ranks. After all, the Holy Light was a product of the power of faith¨C one of the forces that the adepts hated above all else!


    Naturally, the Vindicator was happy to see this young holy knight that had traveled from afar and was willing to sacrifice everything for the Holy Light. Though the legendary Lord Ad Carrhae would be arriving in a few more days, Haisas City was still in great danger before that happened.


    The major city of Hakans in the Empire¡¯s northern region was said to have already been destroyed in an adept invasion.


    Two Third Grade adepts had broken into Hakans and started fighting. They even summoned a horde of terrifying fire creatures in the city. Even with a mighty Third Grade Gold Knight defending Hakans, it had fallen without question.


    The Third Grade knight had died in the battle, and Hakans was reduced to rubble.


    Over two hundred holy knights had burned to their deaths in that conflict, and their souls returned to the embrace of the Holy Light.


    This loss had badly crippled the northern headquarters of the Holy Knights. They would not be able to regain their scale and quality of forces without a few hundred years of recuperation and development. The impact of this event on the Zambez Empire was not inferior to the first invasion of the evil witches a hundred years ago.


    With Hakans City as an example, there were no longer any holy knights that dared to say that the Holy Light Chapel was an absolutely safe ce. In particr, with the transportation of the witch and the magical array materials to Haisas, the atmosphere had turned unbearably tense.


    Worried that Haisas would follow in the footsteps of Hakans, the Holy Light Commander and Vindicators of the city hurriedly sent a summons to all nearby Holy Light Chapels, calling for their knights to defend the glory of the Holy Knights.


    Countless knights answered their call, and the Holy Knight Chapel of Haisas became overcrowded and overpopted!


    After giving Greem a brief exnation of the situation, Haisas apologetically requested that he stay in an inn near the Holy Light Chapel. Of course, all his living costs would be paid for by the Chapel.


    Naturally, Greem expressed understanding over such a rude ¡®request¡¯ and pleasantly agreed to the proposition.


    Thus, with two soldiers that Athera had sent to guide him, Greem sessfully found himself in arge inn two streets away from the Holy Light Chapel. Greem met many holy knights from variousrge cities around Haisas here at the inn.


    Of course, they were all First Grade Iron Knights.


    Regardless of howcking the facilities of the Holy Light Chapel were, they would always be able to make some space for Second Grade Silver Knights. Those who were arranged to live outside the Chapel were almost all Iron Knights.


    Such treatment would have dissatisfied the knights of any other nation or kingdom. However, these holy knights were true believers of the Holy Light. Nobody was bothered by the difference in treatment. Instead, they gathered together to passionately discuss the news of the evil adepts that could appear at any time.


    With Iron Knights of all walks of life settled together in one space, there were bound to be people who were better informed.


    An audience quickly appeared around these knights to listen to them describe the ¡®story¡¯ that had urred in the north of the Empire in vivid detail.


    A me Fiend, a zing giant, a mechanical witch, creatures of fire, and a dragon.


    Any one of these many ¡®story¡¯ elements would have been enough to make these Iron Knights feel the danger of the situation, let alone so many of them put together.


    Even the greatest of cities defended by all the holy knights in the world would have be a sacrifice to war against such powerful and evil adepts. Unless there were a guardian like a Fourth Grade Holy Knight, the knights would have to pay an unbelievable price to defeat adepts like these.


    Greem also unexpectedly obtained extremely valuable information through the conversation.


    A Fourth Grade Holy Knight was hurrying toward the city from the north. He was expected to arrive in Haisas within seven or eight days.


    This news was spread by the high-grade holy knights of the Chapel to boost the morale of the Iron Knights and calm their spirits. However, they never expected that that terrifying fire adept would have infiltrated their ranks and obtained such valuable and strategic information.


    Would Greem be able to fight against a Fourth Grade Holy Knight with his power?


    Of course not! What a joke that was!


    If the news were that the Fourth Grade knight would arrive at Haisas tomorrow, Greem would most definitely have left tonight without hesitation. This trip to Henvic was only amissioned task after all. Greem did not need to put his life on the line for it.


    The reason Greem had fought with such wanton abandon and recklessness in Hakans was that no one there could pose a threat to his life. Greem was more than confident in escaping even if multiple Third Grades had surrounded him.


    It was this confidence that made him decide to take the risk and maximize his profits in the shortest amount of time possible!


    Upon hearing all the scattered pieces of news today, Greem managed to piece them together to obtain a conclusion that sent chills down his spine.


    The reason the Fourth Grade Holy Knight had so suddenly appeared in the north was likely to hunt him down.


    Greem had only managed to avoid the de of the Fourth Grade Holy Knight by sheer coincidence. The pursuit of the adept hunters after his departure of Hakans was what made Greem flee for over five hundred kilometers in apletely different direction.


    Who knew if his pursuers had stayed in the north? If they had hesitated even slightly and remained in that region, they might just have run into that Fourth Grade Holy Knight.


    The adepts might have always looked down upon warriors and knights, but they still had to pay their due respects to high-grade powerhouses. Otherwise, they would not even know how they died!


    He had gotten a firm grasp of the situation in Haisas. The one who had fallen into the hands of the Holy Knights was none other than the Witch Rena, who had hired him for protection. The most crucial things on this trip¨Cthe materials for repairing the magical array¨Chad also fallen into the hands of the holy knights.


    Even Greem had to scratch his head in this situation.


    He had to conduct a rescue operation! The question was how to save, and what to save!


    If Greem could only choose one of the two, he would undoubtedly retrieve the magical array materials.


    It was pretty simple. Greem could only return to the World of Adepts if he sent the materials and resources back to the witch¡¯s tower and helped them fix the teleportation array. As for Rena? He would give it a try if the conditions allowed for it. If it were too much of a risk, then he would treat her as dead!


    The current priority was figuring out the situation inside the Holy Light Chapel, the location of Rena¡¯s imprisonment, and where the materials had been stored. Greem could only remain in hiding until he obtained more specific information.


    However, passively lying in wait forever was not his personality!


    He had to attempt his rescue before the Holy Knight arrived at Haisas. Otherwise, once the Holy Knight arrived in Haisas, the higher-ups would most assuredly hand the materials over to him. When that happened, Greem would never dare to rob a Fourth Grade Holy Knight, even if he had the courage of ten thousand bears!


    Time was of the essence. He had no time to slowly infiltrate and make his way into the inner circles of the knights. As such, Greem immediately started his operation the night he arrived at Haisas.


    Spirit of Pestilence Remi had already been released before they entered the city!


    The Spirit of Pestilence waspletely different from before. Its Third Grade powers gave it the ability to defend itself. The resonance between their souls allowed it to maintain a subtle and mysterious connection even with hundreds of kilometers between them.


    Greem only needed to have a thought in his mind, and an order would be transmitted to Remi, who was hiding outside the city.


    Thus, a sudden and abrupt gue immediately ravaged the outskirts of Haisas City!


    In a single night, thousands of infected patients appeared in the dozen towns and viges around Haisas. Their symptoms were all the same, and their sickness was so incredibly infectious that the holy knights of Haisas were quickly alerted.

 Chapter 970 - Eve of Action

    Chapter 970 Eve of Action


    The sudden gue on the outskirts of the city further emphasized the critical nature of the situation.


    The higher-ups of Haisas had only theorized that thepanions of the witch might attempt to save her, but that theory had now turned into bloody reality.


    In a single night, over a dozen towns had been infected with a deadly gue.


    The disease came with such ferocious momentum and intense infectiousness that even the rulers of the nation were shocked to hear of its symptoms.


    Ordinary medical officers could not do anything about the gue. They couldn¡¯t even protect themselves from being infected by it. The only means of curing and removing the gue spores were the holy knights¡¯ Light¡¯s Healing.


    However, a divine spell such as Light¡¯s Healing was demanding. Even the First Grade Iron Knights could only cast the spell five times a day if they pushed themselves to their limits. Meanwhile, the many trainee knights in the city would exhaust all of their divine power after a single use of the spell.


    Faced with such a situation, the leaders of Haisas could only selectively send the holy knights to the towns and viges whose residents were suffering the most from the gue. Still, could droplets of water ever hope to extinguish a zing inferno?


    In just a single day, the number of infected quickly rose from a thousand individuals to ten thousand. The epidemic was showing signs of spreading to Haisas City.


    That horrified themanders of Haisas!


    At the moment, Haisas housed many true nobility of various ranks within the city, apart from the powerful and influential holy knights. These nobles might have always relied on the power of the holy knights to maintain their rule, but when they were faced with the threat of the gue, their voice couldn¡¯t help but go against the holy knights.


    The many nobles that lived in Haisas requested that the city gates be sealed and for the infected to be kept out of the city. Meanwhile, the low and intermediate-grade holy knights hoped for Haisas to ept more refugees to shelter them beneath the glory of the great Holy Light.


    The nobles and the knights, who had always worked together seamlessly, finally had their first severe ideological conflict. A small misunderstanding even broke out near the city gates!


    For a moment, chaos broke out in Haisas City, and even the Holy Light Chapel itself was surrounded by the lower nobility.


    After a series of negotiations and discussions behind the scenes, the nobles of Haisas reluctantly agreed to open up the eastern areas of the city to the refugees. The Holy Light Chapel would also station a certain number of holy knights in the noble¡¯s area to ensure that the gue would not spread to them.


    Thus, Greem had the fortune of bing a personal bodyguard that the nobles were fighting over!


    As the disturbance grew, the Holy Light Chapel hastened their interrogation of the captured witch.


    They quickly obtained detailed information on the two other adepts from her. Arge group of Iron Knights was then sent to nearby viges to search and hunt for the adepts.


    Of course, given how terrifying the Third Grade fire adept had been, the Holy Light Chapel sent two Third Grade Gold Knights to the surrounding areas as well, apanied by a significant number of Second Grade Silver Knights. It would allow them to exterminate the adepts if and when they found them.


    The tremendous force that the Holy Light Chapel had put together was unknowingly divided and weakened!


    However, the scheme that Greem had arranged had affected someone else¡¯s ns. It had forced the other Deceit Witch out of hiding, despite her seamless disguise.


    The Third Grade Deceit Witch Italil had also gone into hiding in the outskirts of Haisas, with simr intentions as Greem. Unfortunately, due to their mutual distrust, she had no means ofmunicating with Greem in time.


    When Greem¡¯s gue was put into action, the massive army of Iron Knights unexpectedly found Italil in cooperation with the local garrison.


    Both forces broke out into a terrible fight in a ce known as Redwood Vige. Third Grade Italil demonstrated her might and decimated the holy knights that had attacked her, along with the one hundred vigers that lived there.


    She had prodded the ho¡¯s nest now!


    The already furious holy knights started to gather at Redwood Vige, along with the two Gold Knights that had been sent out of the city.


    There were no weaklings among those who could be Third Grade witches. Moreover, Italil was a famous tower owner even amongst the Deceit Witches. Rena had brought her here precisely because of her tremendous martial prowess. It was unfortunate that they had been separated during their travel here. Otherwise, with Italil¡¯s protection, Rena would never have ended in such a tragic situation.


    Indeed, how could a powerful witch like this ever be forced into retreat over mere natives!


    Witch Italil had broken out into a gueri war against the holy knights pursuing her, making for a game of cat-and-mouse around Haisas City. With the exceptional shapeshifting and deception abilities of the Deceit Witches, Italil moved about like a phantasmal spirit, always appearing with a different form in a different ce.


    She intentionally avoided the two Gold Knights, choosing the Silver and Iron Knights as the targets of her wrath. In this three-day-long pursuit, she alone forcefully killed over a few dozen holy knights above First Grade.


    The tremendous pressure of the conflict left the Haisas Holy Light Chapel with no option but to send another Gold Knight to participate in the witch hunt.


    With three against one, the holy knights finally managed to find the perfect opportunity and cornered Italil in a town known as Sea¡¯s Bounty. The town had a poption of over a thousand. Italil managed to severelyplicate the holy knight¡¯s search by hiding in the crowd with her shapeshifting abilities.


    After waiting in Haisas City for five days, Greem finally found the perfect opportunity to strike.


    Only two Gold Knights were left in the Holy Light Chapel.


    Witch Rena was imprisoned in a hidden confessional room in the Chapel, guarded by a Third Grade Gold Knight known as Ke. On the other hand, through his observations, Greem noted that the magical array materials were most likely in the hands of a holy knightmander known as Lambert.


    Lambert was also a Third Grade Gold Knight!


    Of the two Gold Knights, one had been assigned to watch over the witch, and the other had been assigned to protect the materials. Such an assignment perfectly distributed the risk that each knight had to bear. Thus, Greem put into action the operation that he had nned for so long!


    ............


    Nightfall.


    Haisas City.


    Greem pushed open the wooden window of a luxurious room in the noble¡¯s area in the western area of the city.


    The curtain of night hung low, and the stars were dim. Even the moonlight cast upon the earth carried a faint hint of crimson.


    Dong. Dong. Dong.


    Soft knocking sounds came from the door.


    ¡°Sir Eadric, it is time for dinner!¡± The maid¡¯s voice came from outside the door.


    ¡°Tell your master that I will be praying for the Holy Light for the entire night tonight. I won¡¯t be joining him for dinner. Do not let anyonee in and disturb my prayers!¡± Greem rejected in a stern voice.


    ¡°Yes, sir!¡±


    Soft footsteps rang out, and it became quiet once again.


    Greem lifted his head and looked at the faintly crimson night sky. He raised a finger and slowly started to gather the fire elementium in the air.


    Radiant fire elementium was stripped from the colorless air and gathered at Greem¡¯s fingertip, causing it to glow brighter as it turned hotter and hotter. It seemed as if it would burst into a great me at any moment.


    At this moment, an intangible yet firm power appeared above Greem¡¯s head and started to extend toward his position.


    Holy Ward!


    The fire elementium Greem had gathered upon his fingertip had reached a threshold. Any more and it would instantly burst into an actual elementium fire. When that happened, the Holy Ward that enveloped the entirety of Haisas would be triggered, and the holy knights at the Chape would be alerted.


    The holy knights of Henvic walked the path of faith, and their only mastery of magical powers was through the singr form of the Holy Light. However, thousands of years of development and focus had allowed them to discover alternative uses of the holy light.


    For instance, this Holy Ward that covered the city of Haisas!


    Using the sensitivity and exclusivity of the Holy Light, a gigantic Holy Ward had been erected around Haisas. Any active or passive gathering of magical elementium within this barrier would trigger and activate bacsh from it. Fortunately, Greem was only gathering the fire elementium on a small scale and had not allowed it to turn into an actual fire.


    Otherwise, even an apprentice-level spell would have resulted in bacsh from the Holy Ward.


    Apart from monitoring and detecting magical energy fluctuations, the Holy Ward could also create a single-elementium environment. It was also a trap that the holy knights had left for the adepts.


    If any adepts were to think too much of themselves and broke into Haisas City alone, the holy knights controlling the Holy Ward from the Chapel would switch the state of the barrier from passive to active. When that happened, all other magical elementium apart from holy light would be restricted within Haisas City.


    It was incredibly terrifying for otherworldly adepts who were now neck-deep in enemy territory!


    As such, apart from gathering information over the past few days, Greem had also continuously been testing the reactions and mechanisms of the Holy Ward. Through the Chip¡¯s examination of the power flux, he had confirmed the exact location of the holy array.


    Greem would first have to dispel this ward if he wished to assault the Holy Light chapel.


    He would never be as foolish as to battle two Third Grade Gold Knights under the suppression of the Holy Ward.


    Greem sorted out his emotions beneath the crimson moonlight and once again reassessed hisbat n. After confirming that there were no ws, he finally released an order to attack to a specific remote ce in the distance.


    The Holy Ward might be exceedingly sensitive to magical elementium, but it clearly could not obstruct the faint connection between souls.


    With Greem¡¯s orders given, the Spirit of Pestilence Remi finally put the ns into action!

 Chapter 971 - Assault on Haisas

    Chapter 971 Assault on Haisas


    Haisas was attacked at midnight.


    The assault came from outside the city.


    Hundreds and thousands of infected civilians that had been transformed into poison zombies swarmed from every direction, wildly charging at the city gates.


    Spirit of Pestilence Remi had spread the gue seeds across all the nearby human settlements for this moment. The number of people who he had secretly infected reached into the thousands. To avoid rming the knights, all of these gue seeds had remained inert within the bodies of the merchants and vigers, reducing their lethality to the minimum.


    When Greem gave the order, Remin instantly activated all of the gue seeds.


    In a single instant, thousands of humans across a dozen towns immediately copsed to the ground, howling in agony. Their bodies then started to transform into terrifying poison zombies. Those with a weaker Physique died tragically in the painful transformation process.


    Only seven or eight hundred managed to survive the process and be poison zombies.


    However, this was enough!


    Remi gave an order, and all the people who had now lost their minds and turned into poison zombies surged recklessly toward Haisas. They scaled the city walls with inhuman speed and agility, instantly shing with the city guards that had hurried to the defense.


    Rather than a sh, it was more like a bloody ughter!


    These poison zombies did not know death. They had also lost all of their sense, making them fearless warriors. Each one of them leaped across the ground as if they had wings, moaning and howling as they lunged at the city guards.


    The guards¡¯ swords felt like they hadnded on tough hide when they struck the zombies. The impact alone caused their wrists to go numb, but none of their attacks could wound the enemies.


    These senseless poison zombies feared no sharp weapons and were tremendously strong. They leaped around the walls, pushing the warriors to the ground and tearing pieces of flesh off of their bodies. Their teeth and ws had be as sharp as beasts and were coated with terrifying poison. Even a slight scratch would be enough to cause a human warrior to die of poison within a dozen seconds.


    Moreover, these newly dead warriors began to twitch and scream once Remi floated past them. As soldiers selected to fight for the Empire, every one of them had excellent Physique. Most of them survived the poison zombie transformation and started to w their way up from the ground.


    They tossed aside the swords in their hands and were still dressed in the armor they¡¯d worn in life. Their skin turned a fearsome dark green color, covered with plenty of purple and ck spots. They howled like the other zombies and sprinted on all fours like beasts, quickly joining the army of monsters leaping down the streets and attacking the civilians.


    There were still sparks of battle continuing across the city walls, but those were only the efforts of a few Iron Knights defending a single tower to the very end. When the impatient Remi personally stepped upon the battlefield, thisst bit of resistance was finally squashed.


    Three zombies dressed in the standard armor of the holy knights now stood behind Remi, only capable of howling like beasts.


    It was effortless to create these poison zombies, but they were really only effective against ordinary people. Individually, each of them was only as powerful as a beginner apprentice adept. Even the trainee knights could quickly deal with multiple zombies.


    That was why Remi never treated them as the main force of the attack. Instead, he ordered them to scatter and break into the homes of civilians to infect as many humans as they could.


    Hundreds of poison zombies broke into Haisas City, instantly turning the ce into a hellish purgatory.


    The helpless civilians ran in every direction, panicked and terrified. Their screaming voices, howls, cries, and pleas for mercy filled the entire night sky, waking the silent city from its quiet sleep.


    Ordinary humans had no means of retaliating against the poison zombies. Their only recourse was to close their eyes and wait for death.


    Apart from having no sensation of pain, no fear of death, and terrifying poison, these zombies also possessed the agility of panthers. They scaled walls as if they were t ground and traveled from building to building as if they had wings.


    The people ran through the streets, helplessly crying for help. Meanwhile, all around them, lithe and agile figures could be seen freely jumping from building to building and wall to wall.


    These figures would asionally lunge out of the darkness, pushing the humans to the shadowed ground before gathering together and sharing the feast of flesh.


    Some courageous and more powerful men finally stood forward, using their swords and knives to cut down the poison zombies. However, the zombies did not seem to mind the massive wounds and gashes on their bodies. Even if they were missing a hand or a head, they continued to bite and scratch away at their enemies.


    They were not thoroughly dead until they had beenpletely ground to pieces!


    Moreover, when they died, a green and yellow cloud would emanate from their bodies. Any living creature that came into contact with these clouds would be infected with gue seeds in the blink of an eye.


    Those who had mustered the courage to retaliate quickly lost all their will when fighting against such resilient monsters.


    They abandoned their wooden clubs and metal weapons, fleeing to hide. Not one of them was willing to continue fighting against such undying monsters.


    While the poison zombies ravaged the city of Haisas, squads of well-trained city guards in armor stepped forward and formed formations at all street junctions. Then, under the leadership of the holy knights, they shouted battlecries and slowly pushed ahead.


    A few of the unintelligent poison zombies leaped down from the houses above, lunging at the array of spears with their bare hands and feet.


    They jumped and sessfully impaled themselves on the forest of long metal spears. They ignored such terrifying piercing wounds. Instead, they continued to wriggle their bodies, allowing the spears to pass through their flesh such that they could slowly approach the array of shields.


    Their ck ws scratched against the metal shields, leaving terrifying marks upon the surface. Pungent poison smoke came drifting out of their wounds, quickly engulfing the front of the shield formation.


    Three shieldsmen started coughing intensely as the formation began to distort slightly.


    ¡°Do not panic. Maintain formation and continue forward.¡± The holy knights acting as themanders shouted.


    White holy light then descended from above, dispelling the gue virus that had just infected the soldiers and allowing them to recover. The holy knights lifted their swords and sliced the poison zombies hanging from the spears to pieces before using fire to ignite the smoke and burn it to nothing.


    Clearly, ordinary poison zombies were not very effective against the holy knights.


    The holy knights countered both their poison and sharp ws.


    From a particr perspective, the holy knights were indeed the bane of all evil creatures!


    At the moment, Haisas City was filled with powerful holy knights, many of them capable of fighting against Remi himself. As such, the Spirit of Pestilence chose to hide behind the scenes, furiously creating more poison zombies to assault the ranks of the holy knights. That might have inflicted tremendous casualties upon the poison zombies, but it also upied many of the holy knights within the city.


    While the gue zombies continued to fight with the holy knights in the streets of the city, Greem had changed into proper Iron Knight attire and was slowly walking toward the Holy Knight Chapel.


    Along the way, he could see the holy knights and soldiers who had gathered in a hurry. The streets around the Chapel were already under strict martialw; no one was allowed to approach. Only a few of the higher nobility of Haisas City could seek temporary shelter in the Holy Light Chapel under the protection of the knights.


    The other nobles could not even take a step into the Holy Light Chapel, no matter how they cried or begged or cursed or screamed. However, they were still in a much better position than ordinary civilians. After all, they were surrounded by arge group of city guards and holy knights who could protect them.


    The city had now descended into chaos, and themand hierarchy of the city guards and holy knights had be less organized.


    Dressed as an Iron Knight, Greem managed to arrive at the gates of the Holy Light Chapel, almost entirely unobstructed.


    Towering barriers had been erected here, guarded personally byrge groups of holy knights.


    These knights couldn¡¯t help but grab their swords upon seeing someone approach. Their breath caught in their throats. However, they silently let out a sigh of relief when they saw Greem¡¯s armor.


    A Second Grade Silver Knight walked forward and shouted, ¡°What is your name? What are you doing here instead of staying at your station at this moment?¡±


    Greem spoke with a solemn face, ¡°Bring me to see the Lord Commander, I have found tracks of the adepts in the city!¡±


    ¡°What? Where are the adepts?¡± The expression of the Silver Knight froze, and he quickly and anxiously asked.


    ¡°This is urgent. Bring me to see the Lord Commander now. I was sent to the noble¡¯s area a few days ago and identally discovered someone colluding with the adepts. They brought the adepts into the city and even secretly held some terrifying and evil ceremonies.¡±


    ¡°What? These damned nobles.¡± The Silver Knight immediately gritted his teeth and said, ¡°Very well, this is useful information. I will bring you to see the Lord Commander now. Only he can give orders for such an important matter. Come with me!¡±


    Having said that, the Silver Knight turned to leave a few orders to his subordinates. He then hastily led Greem into the interior of the Holy Light Chapel.


    As the two walked into the chapel, Greem looked around at all the buildings inside this ce.


    ¡°Sir, I secretly took a look at their evil ritual earlier. It is very likely going to be used to attack our Holy Ward. Is the security there sufficient?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry!¡± The Silver Knight casually pointed at a brightly lit hall to the right of the cathedral and exined, ¡°Three Silver Knights guard that ce. The enemy will have no chance of...¡±


    Suddenly, before he could finish, he felt an overwhelming elementium fluxe from behind him.


    When he turned his head in shock, it was a rapidly growing metal fist that greeted him.

 Chapter 972 - Force Against Force

    Chapter 972 Force Against Force


    The Holy Ward might be able to stop magical elementium other than holy light from gathering and taking shape, but the ward could not inhibit semi-summoned metal golems like the elementium magical machine.


    The elementium magical machine crippled the Second Grade Silver Knight with a single punch before roaring and charging toward the hall with thunderous steps.


    It ignored all the Iron Knights along the way, simply rushing ahead with no regard. A dozen Holy res and Holy Light Strikesnded on its metallic surface to no avail. They could only make sparks without the ability to harm its core in any manner.


    The magical machine charged ferociously. Both the blinding holy spells and the courageous holy knights standing in the way were blown to pieces by its imprable body of steel, shattered into nothingness.


    A Silver Knight heard themotion outside and stormed in with sword in hand. He shouted, ¡°Who dares make am...¡±


    Before he could finish, a giant metal fist the size of a washbasin crashed toward his face with whistling winds.


    The Silver Knight was barely able to shield himself with his sword, but both his longsword and his body were bent in a shocking arc from the impact of the punch. He returned to where he came from, coughing up blood as he flew into the hall.


    The elementium magical machine charged into the hall without any hesitation as well.


    This hall had once been an armory. However, the equipment and shelves had all been taken away, while a broad and mysterious array had been carved on the ground.


    The mysterious array was still functioning when the elementium magical machine and Greem stepped into the hall.


    Tremendous, sacred holy light power flowed through the array, faintly resonating with the cathedral nearby. The milky-white holy power outlined a mysterious and wondrous array in the air. An indescribably powerful fluctuation would surge out of the array with every revolution it made.


    The elementium magical machine did not feel much when it stood at the edge of the Holy Ward. Greem, on the other hand, felt a trace of chaos break out in the fire energy within his body upon setting foot in the hall. The fire energy was no longer utterlypliant to his every whim and will.


    The other two Silver Knights guarding the hall helped up their limpingpanion. Their gazes fell upon the ferocious and towering elementium magical machine first before turning to Greem.


    ¡°Who are you? You...who exactly are you?¡± The tallest Silver Knight asked in a severe tone, clearly confused by Greem¡¯s attire.


    So wordy.


    Greem sighed in annoyance and snapped his fingers.


    ¡°Smash it. Smash it all!¡±


    Greem could tell that this Holy Ward was entirely powered by high-grade magical creature cores. Of course, the power source also contained the umtion of hundreds of years of the Chapel¡¯s faith.


    Compared to the World of Adepts, the arrays here were still too crude. A basic defensive array did not even protect them. Of course, it might also be possible that the holy knights had too much faith in their martial prowess and believed that three Silver Knights were enough to defend the Holy Ward.


    If that were the case, then they would be paying a tremendous price for their mistake and oversight!


    The ten-ton elementium magical machine didn¡¯t even need to try. It simply ran inside the Holy Ward, and its heavy steps crushed the weak stone floorboards into pieces.


    With the foundation of the array damaged, the mysterious light formation in the air vanished. Greem instantly felt the fire energy in his body return to normal.


    ¡°Aaaah, you evildoers. How dare you destroy the ward. None of you will leave today.¡±


    The eyes of the two Silver Knights opened wide in shock when they saw this. They immediately drew their swords and charged into the fight.


    Still dressed in an Iron Knight¡¯s armor, Greem lifted his head and gave them a cold smile. Vicious fire energy once again erupted from his body.


    In the blink of an eye, Greem swelled into a terrifying, six-meter tall me giant. The armor and clothes on him were instantly vaporized, and the surging mes revolved around his body, their tongues licking away at the top of the ceiling to burn a massive hole into the building.


    A wave of overwhelming aura burst forth from the giant¡¯s body. The two Silver Knights felt like they were walking against a furious current. Even taking a single step toward Greem was difficult and impossible.


    The extreme heat and fearsome mes quickly spread throughout the hall. The clothes and hair of the Silver Knights started to singe and vaporize rapidly. Even with a thickyer of holy light protecting them, they could still feel their exposed skin stinging with pain as they withered and cracked.


    They opened their mouths to scream and yell, but only fire came out from within.


    They wanted to charge and move forward but found it impossible to step a single inch.


    They looked down and saw that their silver boots had melted and merged with the red-hot floorboard beneath them. Their delicate armor and longswords had also turned into semi-liquid metal as if they had been made of wax instead. The equipment no longer even looked the same.


    Just as the Silver Knights screamed in terror, Greem casually hurled a Vicious Fireball their way and killed them in an instant.


    Second Grades; could he not do whatever he wanted against these ordinary and indistinct Second Grades? Moreover, with the enhancement of Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, every one of Greem¡¯s attacks would be empowered with 400 points of holy damage.


    Such terrifying offensive power was not something that a few Second Grade Silver Knights could hope to endure!


    Whether holy damage could harm holy knights was a non-existent topic of contention.


    Take Greem, for example. He was a fire adept. Could he be utterly immune to fire damage? Could other adepts not harm him with fire spells? Even the very suggestion of the question was an insult against elementium magic!


    As a fire adept, Greem was only more resistant to firepared to the average adept. If the fire damage of the opponent exceeded his resistance, he would still be wounded by the mes.


    Simrly, the holy knights were only skilled at manipting and controlling the power of the Holy Light. They still had to endure the corresponding damage of other individual¡¯s holy light attacks. The only difference was the degree of damage that they would endure.


    However, with the might of Greem¡¯s Third Grade Vicious Fireball and the four hundred additional points of holy damage, these Silver Knights were undeniably dead, regardless of what resistances they might have had.


    The shockwave from the fireball¡¯s explosion washed across the entire hall like a crashing wave. Three Silver Knights were reduced to ashes in the waves of fire that came after.


    Just then, a rapid beam of white lightning sliced into the room, shing an X-shaped opening into the wall of the hall. A towering knight in full body-armor stepped forth, unrestrained fury bursting from the tiny gap in his helmet.


    The strange longsword in his hand was radiatingyers of pure, white holy light.


    ¡°Greem.¡± Clearly, thismander of the holy knights had already known of the fire adept¡¯s name through the mouth of their captive witch.


    ¡°Lambert, I have been waiting a long time for you!¡± Greem stood tall and pushed down the copsing walls with hisrge body.


    Commander Lambert had already predicted this scene happening in front of his eyes ever since the witch was transported to Haisas City. However, the savagery and recklessness of the opponent had far exceeded all his expectations.


    He didn¡¯t understand. Even though they were both Third Grade, what gave the opponent such immense confidence as to break into the headquarters of them holy knights and begin a ughter?


    Could...could these Third Grade adepts from another world simply be that much stronger than Third Grade Gold Knights?


    However, the Holy Light would never be able to give him a logical exnation.


    Just as Lambert brandished his blinding sword of light and prepared to face this daredevil of an adept, the elementium magical machine roared and charged at him.


    Meanwhile, Greem started to draw fire runes in the air while loudly chanting deafening incantations. As he cast his spell, spatial ripples appeared near his head, forming into a temporary spatial wormhole.


    While Greem was quickly casting his spells, a dozen Silver Knights surrounded him. They ignored the zing heat of the Burning Domain and charged to his side, wildly hacking away at his wall of Inferno Shields and the two Lava Shields.


    Unfortunately, they couldn¡¯t tear down the shields quick enough!


    As the final incantationpleted, the wormhole took shape, and a vicious dragon with bright blue wings appeared before the crowd.


    ¡°Why did you summon me again so quickly, Greem? I haven¡¯t even recovered from my wounds fromst time.¡±


    This thirty-meter-long dragon let out an earthshaking roar once he emerged from the wormhole. His overwhelming aura of dragon¡¯s might spread throughout the Holy Light Chapel.


    Naturally, the natives of Henvic ne had never seen a living dragon, much less understood theplex and challenging Dragontongue.


    ¡°Hmph! I don¡¯t see youining when you reap the benefits, and you push around whenever I get you to run some small errands. Look for yourself! This is a new city. The quicker you finish, the more time you have to go gather your wealth.¡± Greem shouted in his giant form.


    ¡°Hmm? A new city. It¡¯s a new city, but it¡¯s not asrge as thest one!¡± With Arms tremendous Spirit, he could easily sense the intensity of life aura within several kilometers.


    His heart bled profusely every time he remembered how he had only raided the city lord¡¯s castle and two to three vis from the previous city before being forcefully sent back to Lance.


    Thus, now that a brand new treasure chest had appeared before him, he couldn¡¯t be more excited!


    Arms roared furiously and opened his maw, unleashing a terrifying storm of lightning onto the battlefield. He then folded his wings and dove at the holy knightmander like a courageous champion.


    Dragontongue magic might be convenient, but his own robust body was more reliable for ending the battle as soon as possible. As for whether a melee might cause him to suffer more wounds...this problem no longer existed in Arms¡¯ greed-filled eyes!

 Chapter 973 - Combat Sense

    Chapter 973 Combat Sense


    Grades didn¡¯t mean everything in the infinite universes!


    It was only a means of differentiating the changes of a species at different levels of strength.


    However, this differentiation of grades became less meaningful whenparing across different species.


    Take the current situation, for example. Even though all the fighters appeared to be Third Grade, an unexpected oue would present itself if everyone fought with all they had.


    Simply put, Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms utterly eclipsed Gold Knight Lambert in power.


    Both of them relied primarily on their Strength and Physique, with Spirit as their secondary source of power. They used both physical strength and arcane forces inbat. However, Arms thoroughly crushed Lambert in all of these aspects due to his tremendous attributes as a dragon.


    Even though they were both at Third Grade, Arms only needed to pay a small price to exterminate Lambert.


    Meanwhile, Arms had no chance of beating Greem now that he possessed both the Fire Throne set and Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring.


    Taking into consideration the elementium magical machine, Greem even had a significant likelihood of killing this arrogant Third Grade thunder dragon. The reason Arms had been so obedient as ofte had much to do with Greem¡¯s rapid growth in power!


    Now the Third Grade thunder dragon and the Third Grade elementium magical machine had joined hands to fight against the holy knightmander. Lambert roared out loud in fury and anger, but there was no changing his situation of being beaten down by his two enemies.


    If it weren¡¯t for therge groups of Second Grade Silver Knights charging into the fray and using their bodies as shields to desperately obstruct the dragon and the machine, Lambert would already be dead.


    Greem did not participate in the fight. Instead, he stood to the side, his zing eyes sweeping across all the buildings as a hint of disdain glowed through his eyes.


    This Holy Light Chapel had two Third Grades stationed. Yet, only one had arrived. That obviously meant that the other Third Grade knight was waiting in the shadows for a chance to strike. That knight¡¯s target was very likely Greem himself!


    Hehehe. If you won¡¯te out, then I¡¯ll smoke you out like a rat!


    Greem snickered to himself and immediately started chanting the major spell Summon megate.


    With him, the elementium magical machine, and Arms fighting in the Holy Light Chapel, the ce had already been turned into utter chaos and a mess from their sheer size and power. If another horde of terrifying fire creatures were to appear, this battle would be over.


    Just as Greem got halfway through his chant, a white light shed in the hall behind him. A powerful sword radiance fast as light and white as snow instantly appeared behind him.


    A series of crackling sounds rang out.


    The Inferno Shields and Lava Shields around Greem were all destroyed by this one longsword; it contained tremendous holy power. The longsword sliced against the fire giant¡¯s waist, tearing a one-meter long and half-meter deep gash into the magma armor.


    Red mes spilled forth from the giant¡¯s body, along with boilingva.


    The athletic figure dodged Greem¡¯s giant hand and sliced upward with his de, chopping off another two fingers.


    The series of wounds caused Greem to fly into a rage. His Strength and Physique had indeed increased after he turned into a me giant, but his Agility had also been reduced to an uneptable level.


    Greem was no longer willing to y a game of cat-and-mouse with his opponent. He lifted his thick zing leg and stomped against the ground. The next second, a powerful halo of fire erupted around him and spread outward.


    Any living creature within range of the me halo would be pushed back fifty meters and have to endure 220 points of fire damage.


    me Halo of Repulsion!


    It was one of the Third Grade fire spells that Greem had carefully chosen for the Chip¡¯s optimization. It possessed both a damaging and knockback effect, making for a shockingly practical spell in battle.


    The Gold Knight was a fast swordsman specializing in Agility. He immediately retreated upon seeing the halo of fire approach. The Halo of Repulsion remained half a meter from his feet, unable to catch up to his fleetingly fast silhouette.


    After fifty meters, the energy of the wave had worn out and dispersed into singing sparks. The Gold Knight stopped his body and once again charged toward Greem like a sh of lightning.


    Even though he would have to endure the fire by diving into the sea of mes, the resistance of a Third Grade Gold Knight allowed him to cut a few more wounds on Greem¡¯s body before his protective holy light was burned through.


    At their level, attempting to win against an enemy without sustaining damage was nearly impossible. Most of the time, it was a matter of who was more ruthless.


    As long as you are more heavily injured than me, as long as I can recover faster than you, then that will be enough!


    However, what Ke never expected was that this otherworldly fire adept he was fighting was no ordinary adept. The adept was a melee adept who was capable ofpeting at close range as well.


    With the Fire Molding ability of the Emblem of Fire, Greem couldpress and reduce his size, turning himself into a terrifying three-meter-tall humanoid bursting with bright yellow mes. A fire shield formed in his left hand and a firence in his right. He gave Ke no opportunity to close the distance, immediatelyunching thence at the knight.


    All of the material world vanished from Greem¡¯s sight, instead reced by patches of color in various shapes and sizes. With his Elementium Sight, Greem could directly see the flow of magical elementium. He could vaguely make out the distribution of power within his opponent¡¯s body.


    Spots of red light in different sizes and intensities were scattered across Knight Ke¡¯s body, mostly concentrated around his legs, chest, and right wrist. These spots were not unmoving and unchanging. Instead, they were continually shifting slightly with every stance and movement that the Gold Knight made.


    When Ke nted his foot against the ground and mysteriously changed trajectory, the red light on his legs was practically blinding. When Ke charged to Greem¡¯s side to attack, the right wrist by which he held his sword would let forth a powerful light.


    However, Greem paid the most attention to the massive white light on Ke¡¯s chest.


    Countless white threads extended from that white light, connecting all of his limbs and organs throughout the body. It was the white light that supported Ke and allowed him to maintain his phantasmally quick movements.


    With the aid of the Chip, Greem was able to defend against the attacks of this agile knight through analysis of the flow of power within the knight¡¯s body. Greem would always be able to predict the strange and sudden movements of the knight ahead of time. If Ke¡¯s Agility had not exceeded Greem by so much, he would probably have been wounded by the firences.


    It was thebat support system that Greem and the Chip had produced after much thought and refinement.


    ording to Greem¡¯s initial ns, this system should have at least helped him obtain perfect control over the battlefield. It didn¡¯t matter how many enemies there were or how powerful they were. Their power could not be present everywhere and at every moment. Greem could move freely across the battlefield by seeing through the state of thebat and predicting it ahead of time.


    He could move to where the enemy¡¯s power was the weakest¨Cmove to where the enemy could not exert control¨Cbefore closing in and ying the enemy on the spot with the lowest risk possible and with the least amount of energy required.


    It was a good thought, but the reality was much harsher!


    Controlling the battlefield required one to have a perfect grasp of the enemy¡¯s dynamic movements. The Chip¡¯s ability was enough against ordinary people. However, when dealing with an opponent at the same grade or above, the Chip had a tremendous amount of work to do. It needed energy vision, elementium sight, remote distance sensing, dynamic movement capturing, and a series of other abilities to support its calctions, not to mention the massive amount of calction itself.


    The use of all these abilities exhausted Greem tremendously.


    His current Spirit could not support the use of so many analytical abilities. At the very least, Greem could not do so in the heat of battle.


    Rather, the Chip could not do it!


    The Chip could provide simple elementium sight and energy vision at the moment. However, it could not entirely capture the dynamic movements of the opponent. After all, enemies of higher grades tended to have exceptionally sharp and immediate responses. They would instantly correct theirbat strategy once they discovered Greem changing his ownbat stances and attack patterns.


    When the Chip calcted the enemy¡¯s next position and attack, it not only had to calcte all sorts of factors such as Strength, Physique, Spirit, battle conditions, and battle environments, but it also had to calcte the enemy¡¯s potential reaction to Greem¡¯s adjusted movements.


    All of these demanded a remarkably powerful calction ability!


    Clearly, in its current form, the Chip was not capable of such a colossal task.


    Even so, the few simple support systems it provided helped Greem¡¯s battle tremendously!


    From Ke¡¯s perspective, it almost seemed as if his opponent was a devil who could read his mind. It didn¡¯t matter what feints he used or what misleading footwork he made; the opponent would always throw his fire spears at the most awkward spots.


    Many fire javelins that he assumed were inurate shots would prove to be frightening and calcted attacks after one or two seconds. That was because Ke would often be forced into the radius of the explosion of these javelins by the enemy¡¯s powerful attacks.


    Though the protective holy light deflected most of the mes, Ke was quickly exhausting the holy light power within himself as well. Once the holy light power vanished, Ke would start to sustain damage while remaining within the opponent¡¯s Burning Domain.


    When that happened, it would probably be his turn to be the prey!

 Chapter 974 - Unexpected Enemy

    <strong>Chapter 974 Unexpected Enemy</strong>


    The battle was short but unusually brutal.


    Naturally, the conclusion of the battle had been decided from the very start!


    The first to fall was the holy knightmander.


    Regardless of how honed his technique was, and how pure his holy light, Lambert had to fall beneath thebined forces of two powerful foes with such incredible physical strength. His longsword had been broken by the elementium magical machine, while his body had been charred by ferocious lightning.


    After settling the battle, the Third Grade thunder dragon took to the skies and lunged at the most prosperous area of the city after hastily ncing around. Of course, he didn¡¯t forget to throw in onest vicious dragon¡¯s breath for the other holy knight before he left.


    Ke, who had initially been barely able to hold his ground against Greem, instantly found himself in a tragic spot. The dragon¡¯s breath staggered him and caused his holy protection to falter. Greem¡¯s chain of Vicious Fireballs then immediately devoured the area he was standing in.


    By the time he charged out of the mes shouting at the top of his lungs, his clothes had already been turned to cinders. Even his sturdy holy armor had been blown to pieces with only parts of the metal armor still barely hanging onto his body. The skin beneath the armor was full of scorch and scratch marks. In particr, there was a terrifying gash several dozen centimeters long on his right ribs. The flesh on the gash had already been burnt and carbonized.


    Third Grade. It was the Third Grade of Henvic ne!


    A subtle, cold smile appeared on Greem¡¯s zing face.


    These Third Grades might be considered some of the most powerful people in Henvic ne, but they were still no more than bothersome prey in the eyes of the mighty adepts.


    With Greem¡¯s current ability, a single Gold Knight was nothing to him. Even if the two Gold Knights were to fight together, Greem still had a high chance of winning with the assistance of the elementium magical machine. If all five Gold Knights of Haisas were here, Greem would not fear them a single bit. If he went all out and relied on the elementium magical machine, Arms, and the newly advanced Spirit of Pestilence Remi, they would be just as powerful as the five knightsbined.


    If Greem were willing to grit his teeth and burn another ace of his by summoning Cindral from the Fire Elementium ne, he would have a sixty or seventy percent chance of defeating all five Gold Knights at once!


    However, Cindral was not Greem¡¯s subordinate. He had only promised to help three times. As such, Greem would not want to waste the promise of a Third Grade ming tiger in such a ce unless it was absolutely necessary.


    Both Gold Knights had been defeated, and the survivors were only Silver and Iron Knights. The un-graded trainee knights did not even have the ability to step onto the battlefield.


    Just Greem¡¯s Burning Domain or Arms¡¯ aura of might would have been enough to put them down.


    When the gulf in power was so incredibly vast, they didn¡¯t even have the chance to sacrifice their own lives, let alone gather together to threaten the enemy.


    The battle was over!


    Greem chuckled and bent down. He prepared to capture these two defeated Gold Knights and find the magical array materials.


    However, when his body started to bend, a sharp whistling sound cut across the air. Greem turned slightly, and the periphery of his vision caught sight of an overwhelming crescent sword radiance.


    Holy Light Strike!


    It was a Holy Light Strike!


    [Beep. Beep. Beep. Warning. Warning. Detecting exceptionally strong energy signatures. Initial estimates suggest energy levels to be that of Fourth Grade.]


    Deafening rms rang in Greem¡¯s mind, but his ¡®clumsy¡¯ body clearly could not dodge this sudden and ferocious sword radiance in time.


    Fortunately, the elementium magical machine was standing right by him. It opened its hands and moved forward just in time to block the sword radiance.


    The violent Holy Light Strike shed with the magical machine¡¯s forcefield and cut it apart without any resistance, like a hot knife through butter. The one-meter-long crescent sh struck the elementium magical machine upon its imprable metal body and left a terrifying gash upon the metal.


    With just five more centimeters, the sh would have cleaved through the elementium magical machine¡¯s thirty-centimeter thick body and killed it!


    After enduring such a fearsome blow, the elementium magical machine was blown into the air and crashed into the ruins of the buildings behind it, as if a berserk elephant had hit it.


    The elementium magical machine had been severely damaged, despite its superior defense. If that Holy Light Strike had hit him instead...Greem gulped nervously. A trace of fear rose from the depths of his heart for the very first time.


    He stood up straight, quickly replenishing his magical defenses while looking at the towering figure striding through the gates of the Holy Light Chapel.


    Short but firm, prickly hair, an ordinary and honest face, as well as a majestic and intimidating expression of wrath. Greem¡¯s heart started to sink further and further.


    Fourth Grade. It was a genuine Fourth Grade Holy Knight!


    The energy radiating from his body was as brilliant as a rising sun at midnight. It was so bright that Greem couldn¡¯t help but order the Chip to lower the intensity of his Elementium Sight.


    ¡°How is this possible? You should have needed another three days to arrive here.¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but start panicking at this moment, even with all hisposure.


    He had properly investigated and confirmed the position of the Fourth Grade Holy Knight before he proceeded with his n.


    He had left the imperial capital on the twelfth day of the sixth month, leading a group of soldiers up north towards Hakans. By the time Greem ughtered Hakans on the seventeenth day of the sixth month, this Holy Knight had only been halfway on his journey. He had only arrived at Hakans after Greem had fled all the way to Z City.


    Greem had entirely avoided the Holy Knight¡¯s route in this manner!


    Even if the Holy Knight had received news of Haisas and started traveling towards this city, he should not have arrived so quickly! Could...could something out of the ordinary have happened?


    As Greem¡¯s eyes flickered withplex emotions, he noticed three seemingly familiar silhouettes behind the Fourth Grade Holy Knight.


    Even though they were all covered in thick ck cloaks, with their faces hidden beneath the hoods, Greem still recognized them through their ¡®familiar¡¯ energy aura and unique elementium flux.


    It was them!


    The three strange adepts that had traveled here to hunt him down!


    Could these bastards have chosen to work with the Holy Knights?


    Greem felt his whole world spin. He was terrified by the horrifying reality he was witnessing.


    However, all of his questions and suspicions were immediately answered.


    The holy knights might have terrible mobility, but with the aid of three adepts from a different world, traveling five hundred kilometers in the span of four days no longer seemed all that impossible.


    However, this meant that the two waves of enemies that had been chasing him were now colluding with each other! Meanwhile, his situation...


    Greem didn¡¯t dare hesitate against the Fourth Grade Holy Knight striding toward him. He immediately waved his hands and summoned a storm of fire that rained down upon the knight. He was very sinister in his attack, as well. This rain of fire very clearly included the two defeated Gold Knights within its radius.


    ¡°Hmph! You dare!¡±


    The Fourth Grade Holy Knight shouted and quickly fired out two Holy res at the Gold Knights. The withered silhouettes of the Gold Knights trembled as they spat out a stream of magical fire before opening their eyes.


    Their injuries might still be severe, but the Holy re had activated the holy light within their bodies. Ayer of milky-white light emanated from within them and started to heal their wounds.


    Meanwhile, the rain of fire turned into scattered heatwaves and chaotic me currents when they reached within three meters of the Gold Knights, guided by a strange power. The mes could not hurt them at all.


    Greem had no intention of continuing the fight now that a Fourth Grade Holy Knight had appeared.


    The rain of fire was to obstruct the movements of his enemies while restraining the Holy Knight and forcing him to focus on protecting the two Gold Knights.


    Greem took this opportunity to charge into the ruins. He unsummoned the elementium magical machine and fled to the west of the city without turning back.


    The three adepts following behind the Holy Knightughed coldly, intending to intercept Greem¡¯s escape. However, a violent gust rushed above them, and a terrifyingly powerful web of lightning enveloped them.


    ¡°Damn you, Greem. I knew you wouldn¡¯t give me an easy job. Dammit dammit dammit, this is a Fourth Grade big guy.¡± The Third Grade thunder dragon¡¯s majestic body glided past the Holy Light Chapel. He desperately escaped into the distance after unleashing onest lightning breath upon the adepts below.


    The three adepts and the Holy Knight lifted their heads at the same time. They couldn¡¯t help but be temporarily stunned when they saw the majestic body of the dragon.


    That legendary fire adept could summon a dragon?


    It seemed like such an individual could not be allowed the time and space to grow any further!


    Holy Knight Ad Carrhae grunted furiously and pointed his longsword at the dragon in the sky. A beam of white holy light immediately descended upon Arms¡¯ body. Arms only managed to struggle for a few seconds before being enveloped by the holy power and banished back to Lance by the effect of the spell.


    At this moment, Greem had already escaped over five hundred meters into the distance. Fire flickered around him as he continued to flee to the west of the city with all he had.


    ¡°ording to our agreement, this guy is ours! You don¡¯t have any objections, do you?¡± The adept in the lead asked with a cold voice, a strange hissing sound mixed in as he spoke.


    ¡°Leave, you evil adepts! Remember, if you harm any of the citizens of the Zambez Empire, our agreement will end. I will personally capture each and every one of you and purify you with the Holy Light!¡± The Fourth Grade Holy Knight warned sternly.


    The muscles on Serpentine Adept Natagu¡¯s face twitched, but he reluctantly suppressed his anger. He led his twopanions away, chasing after Greem by the aura of fire he had left behind.

 Chapter 975 - Poison Against Poison

    <strong>Chapter 975 Poison Against Poison</strong>


    The old witch, Guinevere, suddenly paused when she stepped out of the Holy Light Chapel. She turned to look in a particr direction of the city.


    ¡°Old hag, what are you dragging your feet for? If we wait any longer, that fire adept will be long gone.¡± Natagu spoke coldly.


    ¡°You two, go ahead! I want to go take a look over there.¡± The old witch cackled wildly, ¡°I can sense a sweet aura of gue spreading in that direction. The fire adept¡¯s gue pet is over there!¡±


    The serpentine adept hesitated for a moment, but nodded his head in the end, ¡°Splitting up is a good idea as well! You chase after that Spirit of Pestilence, and we will chase after the fire adept. They will be meeting up eventually anyway. It gives us more insurance. Alright, let¡¯s go!¡±


    Natagu casually summoned a twenty-meter long ck Mamba and chased after the dense fire aura in the air with the psionic Benija.


    The old witchughed sinisterly and slowly walked into the darkness of an alleyway, her tall ck staff tapping against the ground with every step.


    The zombie horde in the city¡¯s northern area was retreating.


    After receiving Greem¡¯s orders, Spirit of Pestilence Remimanded the zombies to move out of the city immediately. The weaker zombies were abandoned, left to scurry within the city and upy the holy knights.


    Most of the zombies who were at the apprentice level or above rushed past the city walls towards the ins in the distance. There were a dozen among them who had sessfully advanced to be First Grade Wights.


    Compared to poison zombies, wights had more withered bodies, but their skeletons wererger. Their Strength, Physique, and Agility were also all greatly improved. Their muscles were tougher and denser. Even without protective armor, their bodies had as much defensive power as ordinary enchanted leather armor.


    Their movements were more agile and flexible, while their limbs had evolved to include sharp ws, allowing them to climb along walls or ceilings easily. Their strange flexibility also allowed them to perform all sorts of unusual movements that humans could not.


    As such, their means of ughter were far more numerous and far more terrifying than the poison zombies!


    Remi was one-meter tall and looked just like a boy of four to five years of age. He was sitting on the back of the strongest wight, leading all the feral undead as their swarmed past the city gates and the moat to make their way into the wild.


    Remi looked around at the darkness surrounding him as he charged ahead on top of his servant. He felt as if a pair of sinister eyes were always watching him.


    He was a unique lifeform evolved from a contracted spirit, after all. He did not have the systemic knowledge of the adepts and did not learn spells in the same manner. All of his current abilities were formed naturally and by instinct. It was almost as if he would unlock innate abilities whenever he grew stronger. Strange and unusual abilities would simply appear in his mind, carved deep within his soul.


    Even without study or practice, he would be able to use them proficiently. Much like breathing and sleeping, it was merely an instinctual part of his being!


    The innate ability Remi that obtained upon advancing to First Grade was gue Spores!


    Second Grade, gue Halo!


    Third Grade, gue Modification!


    gue Spores allowed Remi to turn himself into an incubator, using his gue talent to produce and release terrifying gue spores continuously. Remi could further control these gue spores to allow them to either be more lethal, more infectious, or more painful.


    gue Halo allowed Remi to turn into aplete Spirit of Pestilence. Not only could his body rapidly spread gue spores, but all gue creatures fighting beside him would also spread gue viruses with their teeth and ws.


    In all seriousness, Remi¡¯s power only came to be after he advanced to Third Grade and gained the ability of gue Modification.


    In the past, creatures that died by his gue would not provide Remi with anything else apart from a bit of their life energy. However, with gue Modification, all beings that died to the disease had a chance of rising under the control of the spores, bing gue creatures under Remi¡¯smand.


    Moreover, these gue creatures could also evolve through bloody and cruel ughter!


    Their path of evolution was different from the worldly means of increasing in grade. They utilized a system of evolution by ughter. Ordinary creatures would never be able to advance to First Grade in the course of a single night. However, seventeen of Remi¡¯s gue zombies had advanced to First Grade wights after a single night of ughter in Haisas City.


    Of course, a big reason for their rapid evolution was because of their identities before their deaths. Most of these First Grade wights had been trainee knights or Iron Knights to begin with. Their talented bodies and the quality and quantity of the ¡®food¡¯ in Haisas made it more likely for the zombies to evolve shortly upon their conversion.


    However, these gue creatures would never be able to escape their binding to Remi¡¯s soul, regardless of how much they evolved and advanced!


    They were dead creatures, after all¨C only resurrected by Remi¡¯s strange powers. As such, Remi was the undisputed king to these seven hundred gue creatures. He was the ruler they would defend with their very lives!


    From a certain perspective, gue creatures were almost the same as undead creatures.


    However, the difference was in their source of power. gue creatures were resurrected and sustained by the gue spores, while undead had their souls supported by negative energy.


    The ufortable feeling in Remi¡¯s heart grew as he continued escaping with his zombies.


    He turned back abruptly, and his ghostly green eyes caught sight of a strange silhouette in the crimson night sky.


    It was an odd witch riding upon a flying broom. She had a tall witch¡¯s hat, a head full of white hair, sagging cheeks, wrinkles and spots all over her face, and a waist that almost bent at a right angle.


    The old witch was flying in the sky right now. Arge crimson moon hung behind her, making her figure seem all the more ominous and fearsome.


    A Third Grade witch!


    And a witch that specialized at poison!


    Remi analyzed and determined the identity of the opponent in no time at all.


    After all, they both used poison. That familiar scent could be smelled from hundreds of meters away.


    ¡°Kehkehkeh. To think, it was a contracted spirit that had evolved to Third Grade. I¡¯m in luck. Tsk, tsk, tsk. You¡¯ve even developed conscious sentience. It seems that little brat didn¡¯t hold back on investing in you, did he?!¡± The old witchughed sinisterly and started mumbling to herself as if Remi was not a threat at all.


    She might be the only person here, but Remi was leading a small ¡®army¡¯ of his own. Yet, she still behaved as if victory was assured. It was pretty simple, really. This army of zombies had not truly taken shape yet.


    A group of apprentice-level zombies and a dozen First Grade wights were no threat at all to a Third Grade poison witch like herself. They wouldn¡¯t be a threat still, even if they grew to ten times their current number.


    A Third Grade adept was no longer a being that could be worn down by mere numbers.


    Killing any Third Grade required the proper conditions, geography, and a sufficientlyrge army of fodder. All three were necessary.


    Meanwhile, the might of the Spirit of Pestilence itself was nothing in the eyes of the Third Grade poison witch. If it weren¡¯t for her distasteful preference for torturing her enemies, Guinevere would have already struck at the Spirit of Pestilence.


    Dammit. It was a poison witch!


    ¡°Hello, is something of the matter?¡± A sweet smile appeared on Remi¡¯s dark green face. He blinked with his pale green eyes and looked at the old witch intently, seemingly full of curiosity.


    As he spoke, a cluster of terrifying and tiny gue spores spread into the air, so minuscule they could not be seen with the naked eye. The spores quickly moved toward the witch, like invisible ink.


    Two hundred meters was just a matter of six to seven seconds for strange gue spores like these!


    ¡°Heheh. Brat, trying to act cute in front of me, are you? Well then, let me show you the might of my poison techniques.¡± The old witchughed sinisterly.


    Remi¡¯s green eyes saw a simrly invisible cloud of poison mist spread from the witch¡¯s body, quickly colliding with his gue spores.


    The two previously invisible poison clouds immediately appeared in midair. They tore at each other, devouring and consuming the other like two fighting beasts, trying their best to corrupt the other into their own.


    The two clouds of poison mists were only shing between Remi and the witch, but as time passed and the winds blew across the air, they started to spread outward until they covered the entire ins.


    They bubbled and trembled, corrupting each other, devouring each other.


    The poison zombies and wights caught in the mists immediately became the central battlefield where the poisons fought for dominance. Large areas of rot appeared on the body of any zombie that was caught in the fog, despite their tough skin. It was almost as if they had been corroded by acid, revealing their still-fresh flesh beneath the withered skin.


    The two clouds of poison mists flew into a frenzy when they sensed the presence of blood and flesh. They surged into the bodies of the zombies, fighting for control in every muscle, nerve, and organ.


    Whenever one side obtained an advantage, they quickly spread outward, turning more flesh and bone into their own kind. ck smoke rose from the orifices of the zombies, and their bodies quickly started to rot and decay.


    In the blink of an eye, a zombie of apprentice level was reduced to a pile of spotted and corroded bones.


    The newly gathered poison mists would join the fray, strengthening the might of their own side.


    These poison mists were like the most oil-hungry machines, while the oil they burned was the flesh of any living creature!

 Chapter 976 - Forced into Desperation

    Chapter 976 Forced into Desperation


    ¡°Kehkehkehe. Brat, you found the right person if it¡¯s a contest of poison you want. Let¡¯s see who is the more poisonous of the two of us!¡±


    As the poison witch cackled, a thicker, denser dome of invisible poison rose around her and wrapped toward Remi from every direction.


    Even though they were a cloud of innumerable microscopic viruses, Guineveremanded them as if they were her own limbs. They were more disciplined than an army of a thousand battles and more obedient to her will than the most submissive of ves.


    Remi¡¯s expression instantly turned at the sight of this. He patted the wight beneath him, and the creature quickly turned and charged into the distance. All the low-grade zombies remained on the spot. Some even willingly rushed into the poison mist to be hosts for the spreading spores.


    For a moment, the entire field was engulfed in dark, ck mists, as if the whole world had been plunged into a hazy realm of illusions.


    With the witch¡¯s sight obscured, the other dozen wights scattered, each running in a different direction.


    ¡°Trying to run? Kehkehkeh. Brat, you had best stay here!¡± Naturally, there was no way the witch could not pick up on Remi¡¯s location, having long since locked onto him. Sheughed sinisterly and rushed into the mist, protecting herself with the thick dome of poison she had just conjured. She was intent on pursuing the fleeing Spirit of Pestilence.


    However, just as she charged into the poison mists, all of the poison around her started to seethe and explode.


    Explode?


    It was a special ability that was far beyond the old witch¡¯s expectations!


    The poison viruses that she had used possessed all sorts of abilities: infection, corrosion, assimtion, mutation,tency, aggressive breakout...but none of them could explode. That seemed to belong in the realm of elementium magic?


    Still, regardless of how shocked and horrified Guinevere was, the massive cloud of poison continued to explode with her at the very center of it all.


    Much like elementium magic, these small and tiny gue spores, these microscopic and lethal viruses, all exploded brutally. And she, the great Poison Witch Guinevere, was caught right in the center of the explosion when the poison mists erupted.


    Her moment of carelessness and arrogance had exacted a ¡®heavy¡¯ price on her!


    Cough, cough, cough!


    Guinevere stumbled out of the explosion, coughing and panting intensely as she did so, her face ck with poison. She then fell from the sky like a bird with broken wings.


    It was two minutester before she managed to expel the poison lingering on her body. She then resentfully took out a colorful cake of herbs from her jar and chewed it.


    She went into another coughing fit. This time, it was purple-ck blood then came out of her mouth, with pieces of internal organs mixed in.


    Guinevere finally rxed after disposing of the gue spores in her body in this self-destructive manner. However, in doing so, her already frail Physique went down by another two or three points. It would be incredibly difficult for her to regain the lost Physique in the foreseeable future.


    The old witch opened her sharp eyes wide and gritted her teeth as she cursed the wicked moves of the Spirit of Pestilence. Still, she was more shocked by his peculiar control over poison. To think he could cause poison viruses to explode. Was it poison magic, or was it an innate ability?


    She had no idea.


    The only real way to know was to catch that Spirit of Pestilence and properly dissect him.


    The old witch had not actually lost in the earlier bout. She had only been caught by a small trap of the Spirit of Pestilence in her moment of carelessness. The poison andtent spores in her body had been driven out almost immediately after, though they had managed to affect the witch¡¯s organs and Physique to some extent. However, this much was only a minor injury for a Third Grade poison witch. Her frustration stemmed mostly from the slight to her reputation.


    She got up from the ground indignantly, patting off the dirt on her robe while cursing that quick-witted brat. The magical broom she had used as her flying transport had been blown to pieces by that explosion earlier. It could no longer fly.


    The old witch specialized in poison magic, not flying magic.


    That was why she had purchased this magical broom¨C to increase her mobility. It was the newest model of the Lightcycle series, and the fastest of them all, the Lightcycle 2000.


    Who would¡¯ve known that the broom would have been destroyed by the hands of an amateur brat in her moment of carelessness?


    Guinevere¡¯s entire body trembled with anger. She had no choice but to take out another flying broom and get onto it with some difficulty. She whizzed off into the sky, chasing in the direction that the Spirit had fled.


    The explosion from earlier had also caused the witch to lose her mental lock-on to the Spirit of Pestilence. Whether she could catch up to him now depended purely on her luck and her mediocre tracking magic.


    As the Spirit of Pestilence and the witch left, the ins quickly regained its former peace.


    However, the remaining poison mist slowly seeped into the surrounding soil and vegetation, causing them to rapidly wither and die as if all their life force had been drained away.


    If no holy knights came here to perform arge-scale purification ritual, this ce would likely be a zone of death stretching for several kilometers. No creature nor nt could live here. In fact, there was even a tremendous risk of being infected by gue viruses if they got too close.


    This brief battle between the two Third Grade poison users had created a gue zone of several kilometers in Henvic. It was more than enough of a demonstration of the terror and power of Third Grade creatures!


    If high-grade spellcasters were allowed to abuse their power with no restraint, they would inflict irreparable damage upon the ne itself. If even Third Grades were capable of such destruction, then what about the Fourth Grades?


    Many of the infinite nes ced a maximum limit of power of Fourth Grade upon themselves. One could say that this was only inevitable.


    ............


    Greem quickly flew across the sky.


    He had turned into a formless cluster of fire, leaving behind a trail of mes as he quickly sped into the distance. The cluster of fire used Fire Teleportation every five seconds, instantly changing its trajectory and sting away in a new direction.


    Fire spells were incredibly powerful, but they left a clear trail behind when used to escape; it was inevitable.


    Though he had left the two adepts on his tail far behind, Greem didn¡¯t dare to rx at all. He continued to flee with all he had.


    He could sense a sinister aura that was as sticky as a serpent¡¯s tongue wrapped around him, tightly tracking his every move.


    It was the serpentine adept!


    Greem was sure that he had a strange tracking ability that allowed them to chase after him with perfect uracy. Moreover, they were also slowly closing the distance.


    Was it a spell or an innate ability? Even the Chip could not answer this question without specific information and resources. The mystery remained unanswered.


    After fleeing for half a day, and still incapable of breaking off this odd sensation, Greem gave up on his aimless escape. Instead, he changed his trajectory and headed straight for the closest active volcano.


    If escape wasn¡¯t possible, then let there be a fight!


    As the one being pursued, Greem naturally had the opportunity to choose a battlefield that best suited him.


    Gangsas Volcano was the most famous active volcano within the borders of the Zambez Empire. It was also the most vtile volcano of them all.


    From high above, Gangsas Volcano looked like a pretty, almost perfectly circr crater.


    The volcano itself wasn¡¯t very tall. An odd shifting sound woulde from beneath your feet when walking up its sloped surface covered in volcanic g. Due to the constant eruptions throughout the year, there was almost no green vegetation on the volcano or within several kilometers of it. There were only a few sparse trees five kilometers away.


    Greem had just arrived near Gangsas Volcano when he saw a rising plume of gray smoke. He could hear the constant rumbling of the magma as well.


    He could feel the dense fire elementium aura pressing in his face, and the fire energy in his body became agitated and excited in response.


    Greem only stopped in the air for a brief moment to take in the geography and conditions of the surroundings. He then transformed into a cluster of fire once again and dove into the slowly flowingva inside the crater.


    Greem turned himself into a humanoid cluster of fire and rapidly traveled through theva. This ce was practically home for him. It wasn¡¯t just that flowingva of over two to three thousand degrees wasn¡¯t an enemy of his, but that it was the very best helper as well.


    He summoned a megate a hundred meters deep in theva, releasing thousands of fire creatures, and had them scattered throughout this massive volcano crater. With the endless supply of fire elementium, this megate would be sustained for an incredible amount of time, allowing even more fire creatures to travel from the distant Fire Elementium ne to this rural Henvic ne.


    Unfortunately, summoned megates of this nature were always unidirectional.


    These fire elementals would have an incredibly hard time returning to the familiar Fire Elementium ne once they arrived in Henvic. Unless they had sentient intelligence like the ming tiger, Cindral, and knew how to open a small fire portal back to the Fire Elementium ne with their power, their only fate was to die in Henvic ne!


    After summoning the megate, Greem released the elementium magical machine and had it perform some quick repairs to its body.


    One had to admit that Fourth Grade Holy Knight Ad Carrhae¡¯s sh had been one terrifying cut. It had almost split the elementium magical machine in half. Without the magical machine, that one sh would have shattered Greem¡¯s body of mes, while the holy light power attached to the sword radiance would have purified his unprotected soul.


    Fourth Grade creatures could not be underestimated at all. Even though Greem looked down upon the holy knights with utter disdain, these knights still possessed the power to kill him in a single strike when they were at Fourth Grade.


    Moreover, it was said that Ad Carrhae had been in a state of severe injury and was far from his peak.


    If that were the case, then the power he possessed at his peak would only be even more fearsome!


    At the very least, Greem was not at all interested in aggravating such an opponent again.

 Chapter 977 - Standoff at the Volcano

    Chapter 977 Standoff at the Volcano


    It hadn¡¯t even been seven minutes before the two adepts arrived at the volcano.


    Their expressions turned when they saw the rolling smoke and felt the pressing heat waves.


    Their opponent was a famous and legendary fire adept. Though his name was unknown beyond the realm, they were hunters amongst adepts; they would never make the mistake of underestimating him. de Princess Katherine was a famous Third Grade in her own right, yet she had fallen at the hands of the natives due to her moment of arrogance and carelessness.


    If it weren¡¯t for Serpentine Adept Natagu appearing just in time to strike an agreement with the Fourth Grade Holy Knight, Katherine would have died in this pathetic and barren lower ne.


    The agreement inly stated that the three hunter adepts would not attack Henvic ne, but would also help in the holy knight¡¯s battle against the Deceit Witches. Of course, as a condition of exchange, the holy knights had to aid them in their pursuit of Greem.


    It was this suggestion that made the Fourth Grade Holy Knight let Katherine go and allowed him to rush to Haisas with the help of the three adepts.


    Naturally, the three hunter adepts would not give up the opportunity to hunt down the fire adept when they heard news of him in Haisas City. They tracked him all the way here, to this terrifying active volcano.


    Any adept would feel their head hurt at the very prospect of fighting a fire adept in such a ce!


    The advantage of this environment was too high. It wouldn¡¯t be a surprise if both of them were defeated here.


    However, Serpentine Adept Natagu and Psionic Adept Benija were not easy enemies, either. If the volcano were such a dangerous ce to stage an attack, then they simply would not do so.


    The two of them put up a tent near the volcano and started a small camp as if they were prepared to remain here for a long time toe. Yet, this very action struck straight at Greem¡¯s soft spot.


    The adept hunters could wait, but Greem could not.


    No, more urately, those Deceit Witches could not!


    If the materials for repairing the magical array could not be delivered in time, the witch¡¯s tower¨Chaving been cut off from all reinforcements¨C would foreseeably be razed by the local holy knights.


    Greem didn¡¯t need to risk his life to intervene and help in the matters of the Deceit Witches. However, if that internar teleportation array were lost, Greem would have to go to great lengths to return to the World of Adepts. The hunter adepts, on the other hand, clearly had no such trouble.


    Poison Witch Guinevere finally hurried over two days after the start of the standoff.


    That caused Greem to be under even more pressure.


    Remi had intended to meet Greem here, but considering the geography of the volcano would limit Remi¡¯s powers, Greem rejected his help.


    Just as Greem was hesitating about his decision to continue staying here, the badly injured de Princess Katherine arrived as well.


    Katherine had been badly crippled at the hands of Greem and the Fourth Grade Holy Knight. Her mechanical magic had been dispelled, and her limbs had been severed. She could not have been in an even more dire state. Such terrible wounds could only truly be healed after returning to the World of Adepts or the realms beyond. She could only patch the surface wounds while they were in this ne.


    The severed limbs had been reattached, and her broken mechanical heart was still barely functioning. As such, the incredibly furious Katherine decided to hurry to the volcano camp and join the ranks surrounding the fire adept.


    With her wounds, she was barely hanging on as a beginner Third Grade, despite her actual intermediate Third Grade ranking. Still, she could be of help in the battle.


    Her arrival also extinguished all of Greem¡¯s thoughts of escape.


    He might be able to fight multiple opponents while hiding in the volcano, but if he were to leave the volcano, every one of those hunter adepts would be a difficult opponent for him. Meanwhile, Witch Rena and those magical materials for repairing the array were no longer important; notpared to his own life.


    For the first time in his life, Greem had been forced into a corner, with no solution or means to deal with the problem!


    Greem had charged out of the volcano crater countless of times, battling with the four hunter adepts with the volcano¡¯s pool ofva behind him. Unfortunately, apart from destroying the surrounding area, he could not kill or even defeat a single one of them.


    Greem¡¯s primary opponent was always the serpentine adept, Natagu.


    His style ofbat was straightforward. He would turn into a terrifying twenty-meter long giant snake covered in purple-ck scales. This snake naturally had the resilient life force of snake creatures, along with a fearsome soundwave attack.


    Soundwave attacks were a niche of magic in the adept¡¯s arcane system. As such, there were very few spells that could defend against them. Soundwave attacks were also known for their ability to prate defenses. Even the elementium magical machine¡¯s sturdy body was not entirely impervious to it.


    As such, Natagu alone could restrain both Greem and the elementium magical machine. Meanwhile, the other two witches would greatly affect Greem during the course of the battle. One specialized in poison, while the other specialized in mental maniption.


    Whenever Greem betrayed weakness during a battle, Katherine charged up to his side with unmatched ferocity and cut open his defenses with her most ferocious attack. In fact, Katherine was more than willing to go wound-for-wound to injure Greem at all costs.


    This fact, in particr, was what caused him the most trouble!


    If it weren¡¯t for Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, Greem would have long since fallen victim to such a vicious group of enemies.


    ............


    Greem slowly opened his eyes in a secret cave beneath theva pool.


    This underground cave was over twenty square meters in size, undecorated with anything other than a simple stone bed. Small fire runes had been carved on the walls around the room, glowing with faint light as they kept the flowingva out of the cave.


    The elementium magical machine was guarding the entrance silently, itspound eyes projecting beams of multiple frequencies to keep a close eye on any movement in the sea ofva. It wasn¡¯t until Greem finally awoke from his slumber that the magical machine stepped aside and returned to its normal state.


    The first thing Greem did upon waking up was tomunicate with the Chip rapidly.


    He had set up many fire traps near theva pool. If the hunter adepts wanted to sneak into the volcano, they would trigger his traps without a doubt. And that would be his time to turn the tables!


    Unfortunately, perhaps out of fear of Greem¡¯s reputation, the four adepts were being excessively cautious. They were unwilling to take a single step into the crater, regardless of how many weaknesses Greem showed.


    It rendered most of Greem¡¯s preparations useless.


    Apart from the fire traps, all sorts of strange fire creatures had also scattered throughout theva pool. Greem put them under his powerful binding the moment they set foot here from the Fire Elementium ne, turning them into his eyes and minions.


    Unfortunately, even the strongest of these fire creatures were only at the peak of First Grade. They were useable as fodder but utterly useless as a means to chase away the hunter adepts.


    Hmph! If those hunter adepts won¡¯te looking for trouble, then I¡¯ll bring the trouble to them.


    After recovering from all the injuries and exhaustion from thest battle with deep sleep, Greem led the elementium magical machine and the horde of fire creatures out of theva pool.


    Only Psionic Adept Benija remained stationed at the crater.


    While she was idly using her mental flux to scan for movement near the crater, the silentva suddenly started boiling. A tremendous surge of fire energy rose from the bottom of the pool and stormed toward the top of the crater.


    Again!


    Benija lifted her slender hand to cover her mouth and let out a yawn. She then stretched and extended her Spirit toward this massive surge of fire energy. She had determined the enemy¡¯s numbers and power with her potent mental skills before they had even emerged from the pool.


    ¡°Hey! You guys, hurry up! It seems like the fire adept is looking for trouble again!¡±


    As Benija¡¯s mental message reverberated throughout the temporary camp, the three hunter adepts emerged from their tents. They rubbed their sleepy eyes and cursed as they flew toward the crater.


    When they arrived at the crater, Greem had also emerged from theva, appearing before them.


    ¡°What is it, brat? Was the Kiss of Death fromst time not enough of a lesson for you? To think you still dare toe out to y today.¡± Serpentine Adept Nataguughed coldly, his eyesnding on Greem¡¯s left hand through the shimmering red light that covered his body.


    Two deep bite marks could still be seen at the edge of his palm. The flesh and skin around the bite had already turned ck, and a bitter, tea-like scent could still be smelled in the air.


    It was a nasty mark that Natagu had left on Greem during theirst fight. It was a terrifying Kiss of Death that he had unleashed during their skirmish, manifesting in the form of a snake-shaped silhouette that prated Greem¡¯s defenses to bite him. If the opponent was careless, the serpentine shadow could even dive into their body and gnaw directly at their soul origin.


    It was fortunate that the Chip had reminded Greem so that he managed to block his chest with his palm, preventing the snake from delivering a lethal strike. However, the bite had delivered Greem a dose of snake poison. He had no choice but to resist its effects through a deep slumber.


    Greem¡¯s expression turned severe at the mention of the injury. However, he thenughed sinisterly and continued, ¡°Poison can¡¯t kill me yet. Instead, I¡¯m really upset that I didn¡¯t get to eat roast snakest time. What do you say, Sir Natagu!?¡±


    Natagu now wore a purple robe, but there were noticeable burn marks on his exposed skin.


    The fact that these wounds had not thoroughly vanished despite his Physique as a Third Grade bloodline adept was more than enough demonstration of the severity of the burns he had received.


    Both parties dug at each other with their words while ring viciously at their opponents. The atmosphere once again turned tense and murderous!

 Chapter 978 - A Savage Battle

    Chapter 978 A Savage Battle


    The first ones to charge onto the battlefield were naturally those fire creatures who acted as cannon fodder.


    Low-grade fire elementals, fire spirits, fire deities, fire wolves, magma hounds, infernals, and fire giants.


    All sorts of fire creatures of various shapes and forms swarmed out from behind Greem, roaring as they rushed at the four adepts standing above the crater. Waves of wild fire magic devoured the adepts before the creatures even arrived.


    Though this wave of attacks seemed iparably ferocious, there were no powerful fire spells mixed within. Most of these fire creatures¡¯ innate powers only included the use of elementium fireballs.


    Purple light shed in Benija¡¯s eyes, and an intangible mental fluctuation swept across the air, detonating the elementium fireballs before they could reach them.


    A tremendous fiery explosion urred right in front of the four adepts. The aura of the energy flux was shockingly powerful. However, the shockwave from the detonated fireballs was already on itsst legs when it reached the adepts. It could not move their seemingly thin defensive forcefields, let alone wound them.


    After two waves of useless fire attacks, the massive army of fire creatures had arrived near the top of the crater. Before they could scatter and surround the adepts, de Princess Katherine stepped forward. She pushed with her hands, and five metal des stood in the way of the fire creatures like fluttering butterflies.


    The disc-des spun, and their bodies of fire fell apart.


    The fire creatures at the average of beginner First Grade were sliced to countless pieces beneath this fearsome array of des, shattered into sparks before they had the chance to struggle.


    One wave was minced to pieces, and the next, minced to pieces as well.


    The five disc-des moved at Katherine¡¯s every whim and will, soaring through the horde of fire creatures. Their every attack left a ground full of sparks and scattered mes behind them.


    Even the most quick-footed and agile of the fire creatures could not escape the metal des the de Princess controlled!


    The elementium magical machine charged forward under cover of the fire creatures, rumbling as it swung its metal fists down upon Katherine. Vicious magical energy trailed the path of its punch, creating small elementium vortexes in the air as its fists traveled towards its target.


    As a mechanical witch, Katherine¡¯s attributes leaned toward Agility. However, her Strength was pretty impressive as well.


    Thus, she did not choose to dodge when faced with the magic-enhanced punch of the magical machine. The two metal spikes in her hands joined together and shed with the metal fists as a violent storm of steel.


    Katherine¡¯s body drifted across the air as she continued her wild attacks, borrowing the force of the elementium magical machine¡¯s punch to retreat rapidly. From a distance, it looked as if Katherine had been blown away by the elementium magical machine and had been the victim of that exchange.


    In truth, Katherine was unharmed, while a series of fine cuts and tiny dents now covered the magical machine¡¯s right arm. However, with the thickness of the magical machine¡¯s metal arm, this much damage could not affect itsbat prowess at all.


    It was much like a roon toying with a ck bear. Regardless of how the elementium magical machine lunged and darted, pummelling with its fists and sending wave after wave of magical energy shockwaves, Katherine remained a shadow. She moved and circled about the hulk, her metal spikes and disc-des sending sparks flying as they cut against its body of steel. The sound of grinding metal was piercing to the ears.


    Once Katherine was pushed back by the elementium magical machine, the fire creatures finally managed to break through the de array. They roared and charged at the remaining adepts.


    The next to take Katherine¡¯s ce was Benija.


    She didn¡¯t roar or shout or behave in any particrly eye-catching way. Her slender body simply stepped forward as several waves of invisible flux radiated from therge purple crystal on her forehead. The bodies of all the fire creatures caught by the wave stalled before disintegrating without any exnation.


    These massive clusters of fire exploded near the crater, sting the soft volcanic rock to pieces and sending them tumbling down into theva.


    If Katherine¡¯s way of ughter was within the realm of normality, then Benija¡¯s method of ughter was utterly iprehensible. Even Greem, all the way behind the army, could only detect the existence of the mental flux through his multiyered vision. However, he had absolutely no idea how this mental flux had destroyed the consciousness cores of the fire creatures.


    From his perspective, it looked as if the fire creatures had charged forward and mysteriously self-destructed. Their wild elementium fires then turned into giant fireballs and devoured the frontlines.


    Greem had no intention of summoning Thunder Dragon Arms.


    He wasn¡¯t arrogant. It was merely because the act itself was meaningless.


    The four hunter adepts would turn and flee without hesitation whenever Arms appeared. They used the vast space of the battlefield to wait out the dragon¡¯s summoning time.


    ording to the narws, Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms was not summoned to Henvic by an internar portal but through his dragon contract with Greem. As such, the time he could remain in Henvic was restricted by the narws.


    Even with their contract, Greem could only keep Arms within Henvic for fifteen minutes. It was more than enough for a fight but far toocking for them to pursue four hunter adepts who were solely intent of avoiding battle.


    As for escaping while Arms kept the adepts at bay...Greem had considered the idea, but in truth, the four hunter adepts wanted nothing more than that.


    After all, if he left the volcano, he would leave the shelter of theva pool behind. Greem was not so confident as to believe he was powerful enough to defend against all four of them without a geographical advantage. Thus, Greem gave up on the idea entirely after summoning Arms twice. He started to y this game of siege with the hunter adepts with all his seriousness.


    Seeing that all his minions had charged forward, Greem transformed into a me giant without any hesitation as well. He lifted his hand and summoned clouds of fire, which he cast down upon his enemies.


    The four hunter adepts could no longer remain unfazed against the ferocious attack of a Third Grade fire adept. Each of them started to carefully dodge those sshing Magma Fireballs and the crashing Meteor Showers, trying to avoid every one of Greem¡¯s attacks.


    For some reason, the fire magic that Greem used was shockingly powerful!


    The spells even contained light-attribute damage that could ignore their defenses.


    However, what troubled the hunter adepts the most was the magical effects of Greem¡¯s fire spells, which he could alter at will. Coldme, fire poison, explosion; the various strange magical effects were enough to drive an enemy insane.


    The fire poison was nothing much. With Poison Witch Guinevere around, they could cure themselves of any poison.


    However, the explosive fireballs and the Coldme fireballs were far too challenging to deal with!


    Greem¡¯s fire spells were terrifying enough with their intense heat. They could also explode and at any time, as well. That made them incredibly annoying to deal with. There were many times when Katherine was forced to exchange blows with the elementium magical machine because of the disruption shockwaves from a fireball¡¯s explosion.


    If her luck were any worse, she would have been frozen on the spot by Coldme. Even with her tremendous power, she would have been beaten within an inch of her life by the savage elementium magical machine.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The de Princess¡¯ power was at an all-time low after all, with all the severe injuries she had already sustained. She was stuck in a weakened state until she could return to the realms beyond for a thorough treatment!


    The four adepts immediately split up their work when they saw Greem step on the battlefield.


    Natagu and Benija worked together against Greem, while Katherine and Guinevere held back the elementium magical machine.


    Both parties demonstrated their myriad powers and shed with each other in this volcano crater with a diameter of over two and a half kilometers.


    The four hunter adepts had tried to have Katherine alone upy the elementium magical machine, while the remaining three rained down upon Greem, hoping to kill him through this n quicky.


    Unfortunately, Greem was surprisingly resilient and stood right behind a pool ofva from which he could draw even more power. As such, he stood unyielding against the attacks of three hunter adepts.


    Inparison, de Princess Katherine became the weakest of the group.


    The battle between Greem and the three adepts had yet toe to a conclusion, yet the elementium magical machine already had her on the ropes. A little bit more, and the duel would have ended in a clear defeat.


    It was that battle that caused Katherine to sustain even more damage and be further weakened.


    However, of the four hunter adepts, neither Benija, the psionic, or Guinevere, the poison adept were suited to dealing with the magical machine. They couldn¡¯t possibly hold it back either. Meanwhile, Serpentine Adept Natagu served as the main force of the attack. It made no sense for him to switch priorities and deal with the irrelevant magical machine.


    If he did that, Greem might have enough space to unleash his full might, bringing to bear a shocking threat against them all!


    The four hunter adepts had no choice but to rely on this ¡®gentler¡¯ approach to slowly wear down the fire adept.


    One had to admit that, as the leader of their group, Natagu¡¯s power was genuinely terrifying.


    When he transformed into the ck Mamba, he had scales that were as tough as the elementium magical machine¡¯s body of steel, as well as exceptional magic resistance that couldpare to that of the dragons.


    With his powerful physical and magical resistances, Natagu could even charge into theva and engage Greem in a melee. Whenever the two of them fought at their full strength, it would be as if Gangsas Volcano had erupted in full force. Wave after wave of blisteringva would surge out of the crater, along with plumes of volcanic ash that could blot out the sun itself.


    The earth rumbled as if it would be torn asunder, and the entire vicinity of the volcano became a near-apocalyptd of destruction where no living being could approach!


    The shockwaves created by the battle between the adepts caused the volcano to erupt with increasing frequency and intensity. All humans and creatures within fifty kilometers of Gangsas Volcano started to flee into the distance in front of this indescribable threat.

 Chapter 979 - Betting His Life

    <strong>Chapter 979 Betting His Life</strong>


    This great battle between the adepts at Gangsas Volcano did not cause too many casualties, mostly because of its remote location.


    However, since the adepts had started camping there, Gangsas Volcano had erupted every three to five days. It expelled thick ck smog and ash into the air, covering the skies and rendering all thend within hundreds of kilometers dead.


    As Gangsas Volcano was located in the center of the Zambez Empire, themotion there could not have gone unnoticed by the rulers.


    However, as if they were blind and deaf, the Empire pretended not to see or hear themotioning from the volcano, regardless of how much of chaos the adepts caused. In fact,rge groups of imperial soldiers even evacuated the civilians staying near the volcano and turned the entire area into a restricted zone.


    Of course, their exnation for the evacuation was that Gangsas Volcano had entered a period of frequent activity. Only some of the higher-ups of the Empire and some high-grade knights were privy to what was happening at Gangsas Volcano.


    Allowing a group of foreign adepts to fight as they wanted within thend they ruled sounded embarrassing. However, considering that the scourge of witches in the southwest had yet to be eradicated, the leaders of the Empire and the holy knights unanimously agreed that it was not wise to involve the adepts as well.


    Thus, time passed by just like that, one day at a time.


    Five days...ten days...one month...two months...three months.


    On the twenty-fifth day of the eleventh month of the calendar, six months after Greem and the others had arrived in Henvic through the wormhole, the witch¡¯s tower at Dabyrie Hignds finally copsed.


    Greem had caught wind of this news through Remi, who had been wandering around the Empire.


    Ever since Greem gave him the order to move about freely, Remi had chosen to wander the borders of the Zambez Empire, asionally raiding a vige to maintain and increase the number of his gue zombies.


    Over the past half-year, Remi had raised a gue army of over one thousand zombies. Unfortunately, arge target often attracted attention. The holy knights were quick to descend upon the undead horde.


    Remi was ill-suited for direct confrontation, to begin with. He scrambled away in terror in front of the holy knights and their Purify spell as quickly as he could. There wasn¡¯t even a need for a Third Grade Gold Knight to persecute him. He led hisst remaining one hundred elites into the forest and raided the local magical creatures of Henvic ne.


    There were none amongst the magical creatures who were capable of using Purify as the knights could. As such, Remi was like a fish in water and quickly rebuilt the scale of his gue army.


    With an endless source of new soldiers, Remi established the vast forest as his base, asionally emerging from the forest to harass nearby human towns to train his servants. In just two months, Remi managed to create a Second Grade gue subordinate subservient to him alone¨C the guebringer.


    A guebringer was a strange sort of creature that excelled at concocting, creating, and spreading gues. Their individualbat ability was nothing worthwhile; they were even weaker than low-grade poison zombies. However, they had the ability to create gue spores endlessly and could also adjust the magical traits of the spores based on the strengths and weaknesses of the enemy.


    This ability made them Remi¡¯s best helpers when it came to managing and expanding the gue army!


    Most of the time, a Second Grade guebringer would be able to quickly raise a decent gue army without Remi¡¯s help if left in a region bountiful with life.


    These guebringers all appeared exceptionally hideous on the outside.


    They had sickly, dark-green skin covered in viscous slime. All sorts of blisters swelled and throbbed throughout their bodies, green and yellow gue viruses breeding within. Every time one of those blisters popped, a lethal gue was released into the air.


    One could say that the terrifying yellow clouds permanently hung in the air wherever the guebringers traveled. The gue would forcibly modify all lifeforms infected by the yellow clouds. Those with weak Physiques would be dposed and turned into even more gue spores, while the stronger ones might be modified into hosts of the virus if they survived the process.


    These hosts were the low-grade poison zombies!


    These gue creatures that had been created with a furnace forged of tens of thousands of native lives started to be stronger and more elite as more and more incidents of ughter weremitted across thend. Groups of holy knights, imperial soldiers, militia, mercenaries, and all sorts of local armed forces; Remi¡¯s gue army fought to the death with these enemies in various towns, viges, ins, forests, and swamps.


    The weak were eliminated, and the strong remained, growing and evolving ever stronger through their ughter!


    One could responsibly say that all the gue creatures that survived in this environment became elite leaders of the pack. There were even ruler-ss gue creatures that had evolved four to five times.


    It was this army of gue creatures that allowed Remi to be a massive threat at the northwestern border of the Zambez Empire. If it weren¡¯t for the Deceit Witches upying so much of the Empire¡¯s forces, there would probably be high-grade knights arriving to hunt him down.


    However, on the twenty-fifth day of the eleventh month, Remi¡¯s good days came to an end.


    The witch¡¯s tower that stood upon Dabyrie Hignds fell before the Fourth Grade Holy Knights. All the Deceit Witches stationed there took to the winds, scattering in every direction like a pack of stray dogs.


    Remi immediately sent Greem the news via their soul connection before leading his army deep into the forest, not showing himself again. If he dared to continue lingering within the borders of the Zambez Empire, the next to persecute him would include those terrifying Fourth Grade Holy Knights.


    These were existences that even his master didn¡¯t dare provoke. It was best that he avoided their wrath!


    During the past six months, Greem had been tragically blockaded within Gangsas Volcano by the four hunter adepts. With the volcano behind him, the four hunters didn¡¯t dare rush in to find trouble with him. Yet, on the flip side, Greem didn¡¯t dare to take a single step out of the volcano either.


    This frustrating standoff between the two parties continued!


    Upon hearing that the witch¡¯s tower had fallen, Greem finally calmed down from his constant restlessness to push back the four hunter adepts. He hid deep in the volcano and went into seclusion.


    Since he could not beat his enemies, nor leave the volcano, any further fighting had lost all its meaning. He might as well calm down, take his time, and see how long these damned bastards were willing to wait it out.


    To Greem¡¯s surprise, these four hunter adepts were unexpectedly resilient.


    They kept close guard of the volcano crater, always keeping at least one adept on guard. Meanwhile, the other adepts hid in their campgrounds to rest or go to a nearby human town to purchase food and water.


    Though a Third Grade adept¡¯s need for such things had been driven down to an unbelievably low extent, food and water were still a necessity for their lives.


    These four hunter adepts had intended to force Greem out of the volcano with hisck of supplies, but they never expected how much fire dragon¡¯s meat Greem had carried with him in his storage ring. If Greem was frugal with his eating habits, the meat couldst him for as long as ten years.


    Greem also carried a Wand of Conjure Water with him. There might be very little water that could be conjured in theva cave, where fire elementium was at its densest, but it was more than enough for his consumption.


    Thus, the two parties continued their stalemate, one outside the volcano and one inside!


    ............


    Since Greem¡¯s path of retreat had been cut off, he stopped thinking about it.


    Instead, he took this rare chance of seclusion to conduct his projects. He hid in the cave and once again severed a piece of his soul, which he ced into the soul-gathering crystal.


    This action caused his soul aura to weaken abruptly!


    ording to the Greem¡¯s estimations, Greem¡¯s souls had shrunk by nearly one-third, severely affecting hisbat prowess.


    However, the higher the risk, the greater the reward!


    The soul-gathering crystal was filled with hundreds of soul consciousnesses that were now insentient clusters of pure, holy light. Greem¡¯s split-off soul was like a tiger among sheep when ced into the crystal. It could devour all of that unowned holy light power.


    Greem¡¯s split soul consciously devoured the holy light of the Iron Knights first. Once it had gotten stronger, it slowly started to attack the holy light of the Silver Knights. Its final target was naturally the only golden holy light contained within the crystal.


    While his split soul devoured the holy lights, Greem actively initiated another fight to conceal his abruptly weakened soul, sending therge army of fire creatures he had amassed to assault the enemy¡¯s camp.


    However, Greem¡¯s ¡®abnormality¡¯ couldn¡¯t escape the powerful senses of the psionic adept. The four hunters disagreed on their n of action when faced with the fire adept¡¯s suddenly weakened Spirit.


    de Princess Katherine and Psionic Adept Benija both believed that the fire adept had caused the weakness in his soul due to his own mistake during meditation. They wanted to take advantage of this opportunity to attack. Meanwhile, Serpentine Adept Natagu and Poison Hag Guinevere agreed that this was a trap that the fire adept had set to lure them in.


    Otherwise, which Third Grade adept¡¯s soul would suddenly weaken for no proper exnation!?


    It wasn¡¯t their fault for being too suspicious and skeptical of what they were seeing. After all, no adept would be as daring as Greem to sever his soul with the precarious situation he was in.


    If his opponents were rougher and morepulsive, they would have charged right into the pool ofva. Greem would then have immense difficulty fighting them off in his weakened state.


    However, the daredevil Greem had slowly gotten to know the traits and personalities of the four hunter adepts over their past six months of ¡®interaction.¡¯ After the Chip performed some in-depth analysis of their characters, Greem found the courage themit to this near-suicidal act.


    Very fortunately, he bet correctly!

 Chapter 980 - A Long Five Years

    Chapter 980 A Long Five Years


    The World of Adepts, the Tower of Fate.


    Alice dragged her exhausted body out of the astrology hall. She had just set foot out of the room when the little fairy Helen came flying in her direction.


    ¡°Unbelievable! Unbelievable! That bad woman is here again.¡±


    Helen spun around Alice¡¯s body three times before pausing in front of her with a pout on her face. She then waved her hand and cast Lifebloom and Energy Restoration on Alice. The former restored life and stamina, while thetter restored Spirit.


    With the two spells, Alice only needed half the time to recoverpletely from her exhausted state. It was an incredible boon for the adepts, who treasured their time above all else.


    The reason elementium fairies were valued so highly by the adepts was precisely because of such abilities!


    Bad woman?


    Alice paused for a moment, but she quickly understood that Mary had arrived.


    Since Alice was the owner of the Tower of Fate, Mary could not break into the higher levels of the tower without her permission.


    Even though she was exceptionally exhausted, Alice still dragged her sore and tired body down to the third floor to meet the furious Mary.


    ¡°What in the world are you guys doing? Where has Greem gone?¡± Upon meeting Alice, Mary impatiently asked, ¡°Right now, Zhentarim¡¯s Fabres n, Entom n, and Dener n have alle knocking on our doors, naming Greem by person and calling him out to resolve the issue of tension at the n borders. These ns are all led by a Fourth Grade adept. We can¡¯t just fight and beat them like before. We have to have Greem decide if we are to go to war or seek some sort of agreement.¡±


    Mary stayed inside the n over the past few months to manage all theseplicated andplex n matters. She was already fuming with frustration. Gargamel and Meryl were handling all the internal n matters perfectly, and the n¡¯s development was going well. However, the Crimson n was still caught in a vortex of a power struggle with several outside forces, and the external challenges it faced had not decreased at all.


    In fact, with the appearance of multiple high-grade adepts within the n, the external pressure they faced was only growingrger. A dark and thundering storm was very much brewing outside their gates.


    Disregarding everything else, the Crimson n had experienced several dozen cases of tension and skirmishes at the border of their territories. Either some nobles had been assassinated in Crimson territory, some nobles neighboring Crimson territory had started wars over small incidents, or some organization had used the Crimson regions of sheltering an escaped convict.


    These matters were usually only worldly matters and did not involve the n yet. However, when so many troubles and incidents urred at the same time, it drew the attention of Gargamel and Meryl.


    It was important to note that it had not yet been forty years since the Crimson n¡¯sst adept war. They had beat the alliance of five ns and forced them into retreat during that war. Now, some outside force had once again set their eyes on the Crimson n!


    Mary gave an order, and the goblin forces subordinate to the Crimson n quickly sent back information.


    This time, those who had set their eyes on them were no longer small ns and organizations. Instead, they wererge adept ns who could cause the entire Zhentarim Area to tremble with a single stomp of their feet.


    The Fabres n, the Entom n, and the Dener n.


    These well-known names were like pearls amidst a pile of ss marbles in Zhentarim, the center of the continent. They were iparably famous and glorious ns.


    There were hundreds and thousands of adept ns in the Central Region, but no matter how they fought, how they rose, how they killed, and how they fell, the ones who remained at the top was still the same five major ns. Fabres, Entom, and Dener were three of these five ns.


    Now, they had their eyes set upon the Crimson n. As one of the only two Third Grade adepts of the n, Mary instantly felt tremendous pressure upon her shoulders.


    She might excel at fighting and ughter, but she was not an expert at resolvingplicated human rtionships and working under theplexities of treaties and negotiations. As such, Mary ordered Dragonborn Zacha and Bug Adept Billis here and there to use their ferocious martial force to intimidate wave after wave of enemies.


    However, the worldly nobles and low-grade adept ns were only the fangs and dogs sent by the masterminds behind the scenes to harass the Crimson n. Chasing them away was not cutting off the ck hand that loomed behind in the shadows.


    If the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon hadn¡¯t been protecting the Crimson n, then some of these ns would probably have jumped the gun and dered war!


    It was these concerns that caused Mary to want Greem back in the n more urgently.


    Unfortunately, she knew nothing; she only knew that Alice had stopped by Fire Throne awhile ago, after which Greem had vanished mysteriously. She had absolutely no idea of Greem¡¯s actual whereabouts.


    That was why she had furiously hurried to the Tower of Fate to demand Greem¡¯s location from Alice.


    Alice only had a vague idea of the difficult situation that Greem had been caught in on Henvic ne. However, she didn¡¯t dare so quickly reveal such information to Mary, simple as it was.


    After all, she was still continuously monitored by that ¡®powerful nemesis¡¯ of hers!


    Alice might have trouble knowing more about what was happening in Henvic without clues, but that woman would have an even harder time than her as well. However, if Alice were to reveal anything she knew, she would not be able to stop the enemy from seeing her trump cards through the developmental patterns of the ¡®world lines,¡¯ even if she were to conceal the truth with her Fate magic afterward.


    It was the strange and odd nature of a battle between Fate Witches!


    Alice could only vaguely tell Mary that Greem had been temporarily trapped in another ne, but was unharmed and would naturally return after a short wait.


    Such unclear information obviously couldn¡¯t sate Mary¡¯s anxiety. However, she knew that Greem had always trusted and respected Alice¡¯s choices. Thus, she suppressed her burning anxieties and frustrations and stormed away from the Tower of Fate.


    Alice remained silent in the meeting hall for a short moment before returning to her room with a resentful sigh.


    ............


    In all honesty, the duration and difficulty of this standoff far exceeded Greem¡¯s expectations.


    Five years. Five long years had been waste on this rural otherworld.


    During these five years, Greem had tried countless times to charge out of theva pool and fight the four hunter adepts to the death.


    However, regardless of what he did, he still could not injure any of the adepts severely. Simrly, the four hunter adepts had enormous difficulty killing Greem as well.


    The two parties continued to battle each other, breaking out into a vicious fight every few days. It then became a fight every few weeks, then every few months. The tension between the two lessened with each passing day, both knowing that they could not do anything about the other. In the end, the periodic battles they had be less of an actual fight and more of a workout that they did every once in a while to relieve their boredom.


    Greem had created a smallb, having been trapped at the bottom of the volcano. Sometimes, when he forgot the time in his busy work and neglected to show himself for one or two months, the four hunter adepts would be the ones toe knocking on the volcano crater.


    The two parties went back and forth in this manner. In the blink of an eye, five years had passed at Gangsas Volcano!


    Over these five years, Greem might have been brought to the brink of mental and spiritual exhaustion, but Natagu and the others were not doing well either.


    As a bloodline adept who considered himself to be exceptionally talented, these five years stuck in Henvic was no less than torture.


    The magical energy of the environment could notpare to the World of Adepts or the realms beyond, at all. Meditation here could only barely recover their magical power. Trying to improve their Spirits was an impossible cause.


    It was akin to wasting five years for Natagu and the other hunter adepts!


    Moreover, being stuck at Gangsas Volcano meant that they could not gather any useful adept resources, nor embark on any magical experiments. As such, even while Greem was worn down by the five years, Natagu and the others experienced the same suffering.


    However, having epted themission by that Lady and resentful that they couldn¡¯t take down this insignificant fire adept, the hunter adepts could only continue their work here.


    As time passed, the situation in Henvic underwent some unexpected changes.


    The reinvigorated and restored holy knights became more eager to fight!


    Over these past five years, the holy knights had destroyed the witch¡¯s tower and hunted down the witch remnants across the ne.


    One could say that their hunt had been incredibly sessful. Most of the fleeing Deceit Witches had either been caught or executed and cleanly dealt with. Even the asional witch that slipped through their fingers went utterly silent and covert, hiding in some corner of the world, not daring toe out and cause trouble again.


    Once the pressure from the witches had been eliminated, the foreign adepts camping near Gangsas Volcano became a prick in their eyes.


    Though Natagu had a cooperative agreement with a Fourth Grade Holy Knight, that agreement seemed unnecessary now that the Deceit Witches had vanished. As such, more people had started appearing near Gangsas Volcano. Five adventurers first appeared here and died to Guinevere¡¯s poison.


    One day, Benija returned to the camp from her shopping trip covered in blood. She brought bad news back with her.


    Due to the constant eruptions from Gangsas Volcano, all the towns in the vicinity had been abandoned. Benija had traveled eighty-five kilometers to a small city while disguised to purchase their daily supplies.


    However, there was a group of high-grade knights stationed in that small city with no more than seven thousand civilians. Moreover, they had strict checks and Spirit scans for all visitors.


    Benija would have had no problem tricking them with her mental magic if it was only a group of Iron Knights. However, she had never expected that there were Third Grade Gold Knights there!

 Chapter 981 - The Situation Changes

    Chapter 981 The Situation Changes


    The blood on Benija wasn¡¯t her own.


    Regardless of how powerful her mental magic was and how easily she could enchant and fool the eyes, ears, and souls of the low-grade holy knights, she could not avoid examination from their holy light magic.


    Bless the world. Benija had traveled to many nes and seen countless native tribes and intelligent species, but she had never witnessed odd folks like these knights who would stop people on the street and cast Detect Evil over and over again. Exposed to this pure holy light, Benija¡¯s body instantly glowed with blinding red light. Her magical disguise of a kitchen maid purchasing supplies instantly vanished without a trace.


    In all honesty, that middle-aged knight who had been casually casting out a beam of holy light to engulf Benija never expected to catch a big fish either.


    With their Detect Evil, they had already caught a dozen assassins and thugs who worked in the shadows over the past few days. However, even the leader of the assassins, who was responsible for a dozen murders, did not radiate a light one-tenth as bright as this strange woman.


    He froze on the spot when she saw the blinding red light emanating from Benija¡¯s body; it was so deeply crimson that it was nearly ck!


    ¡°Catch...¡± the middle-aged Silver Knight had barely drawn his sword before he was knocked to the ground by a mental st.


    By the time he crawled up from the ground, still dizzy from the blow, the woman was nowhere to be seen on the street anymore. At this point, the Iron Knights examining the pedestrians on the road finally came to their senses, and several blinding Holy res shot into the sky.


    The entire town flew into a massivemotion!


    ¡°You said that there is a Gold Knight in that town?¡± Natagu narrowed his eyes and hissed, flickering his tongue as he did so.


    ¡°Hmph! If it weren¡¯t a Gold Knight, I wouldn¡¯t have been in such an awkward condition!¡± Benija wiped away the blood on her body unamusedly, ¡°The holy knights blockaded the city like mad dogs and started to search for me everywhere. They shined that damned holy light on everyone trying to exit the city.¡±


    ¡°Then what happened?¡±


    ¡°Then I fought with them at the city gates and killed a few.¡±


    ¡°You killed someone?¡±


    ¡°I killed someone! These bastards were all shouting ¡®Holy Light be Justice¡¯ and rushing at me! Did you expect me to bind my own hands and surrender?¡± Benija replied with a mocking tone.


    ¡°And what about the Gold Knight?¡± The expression on Natagu¡¯s face turned increasingly solemn.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t know there were Gold Knights in the city. I had nned to run after killing a few of the small fry, but two Gold Knights stopped me. I then found a way to escape and returned!¡±


    ¡°Two.¡± Natagu¡¯s emerald eyes shrank as his tone of voice turned cold.


    ording to the past habits of the Zambez Empire, sending a single Silver Knight to be the abbot of a Holy Light Chapel in a small town like this one would already be a massive exception. It had a poption of no more than ten thousand, after all. However, two Gold Knights had abruptly appeared in this town. It was clearly not a usual patrol or garrison for the holy knights.


    An ominous feeling rose in Natagu¡¯s heart!


    It couldn¡¯t be that the holy knights had gotten arrogant after ¡®exterminating; the Deceit Witches and were now cing their sights on them, could it? With the sheltered, ignorant, and prideful nature of the holy knights, they might be attempting to take this chance to eliminate all adept remnants from the ne and retake the reins of Henvic ne back into their own hands.


    It was indeed a good idea, but the holy knights were most definitely thinking too highly of themselves!


    The reason they had managed to ¡®sessfully¡¯ raze the witch¡¯s tower and exterminate the witch remnants had more to do with the internal conflict between the adepts than their own courage and self-sacrifice.


    Without the interference of the mysterious Lady they served, Witch Rena would not have ended up in such a tragic position. If it weren¡¯t for the cooperation of Natagu and the Holy Knight, Greem would have already decimated Haisas¡¯ Holy Light Chapel and fled with Rena and the materials for fixing the teleportation array.


    It was precisely due to the interference and effects of these many factors that the situation in Henvic ne had be so chaotic and unpredictable. Even Greem had been forcefully contained within a volcano for five years with no chance of escape.


    However, now that the ne was starting to regain its peace, the holy knights had be eager once more. They wanted to remove thest tumor on this ne¨C their enemies at Gangsas Volcano. It infuriated Natagu tremendously!


    If the enemy were only a small group of weak knights, the four hunter adepts would have been able to ughter hundreds or thousands of them. However, given Natagu¡¯s understanding of the Empire, there were probably two incredibly powerful figures standing behind the knights. Two people that even he didn¡¯t dare provoke.


    ¡°What exactly are they thinking of doing? Do they want to start a war with us?¡± Natagu roared viciously.


    ¡°You still don¡¯t understand?¡± Guinevere was indeed an old poison hag whose eyes and mind were as toxic as herself. She pinpointed the knights¡¯ intentions with a single sentence, ¡°They resent us for staying here for such an extended period of time and are using this as a way to force us to leave!¡±


    ¡°But, we still haven¡¯t caught that damned fire adept.¡±


    ¡°They won¡¯t care about that,¡± The old witch coldly said, ¡°They might have been able to suppress the news of our existence if our fight here had been brief and short. But once time passes, the news will eventually get out. News of outsiders fighting in the nation they ruled and even indirectly taking over and of fifty square kilometers. The holy knights will not be able to endure the pressureing from within the Empire!¡±


    ¡°They walk a path of faith and worship. If they cannot prove that the Holy Light is Justice, that it is an existence that vanquishes all evil, then their citizens¡¯ foundation of faith in the Empire will be shaken.¡± de Princess Katherine added coldly from the side.


    The four hunter adepts continued to discuss amongst themselves and almost immediately figured out the scheme lying behind the incident at the town. Who was the one that imed holy knights were no good at using their brains? This incident was a perfectly executed n.


    If the Fourth Grade Holy Knight used this incident as an excuse to tear apart their prior agreement, even Natagu would not be able to refute it.


    In the end, the cause of all this was the extended duration they had spent on this internar hunt!


    ¡°How has the fire adept been doing recently?¡± A cold light gleamed in Natagu¡¯s green eyes as he asked in a stern voice.


    He directed his question at Benija. Her spiritual senses were the most powerful among the four of them.


    ¡°He is still hiding beneath theva. It has been several weeks since we heard anything from him, and he appears to be conducting a special magical experiment. His spiritual flux is very intense!¡± Benija gave a quick and direct answer.


    ¡°Very well then; we won¡¯t wait any longer. We shall fight him head-on!¡±


    The other adepts expressed excitement, hesitation, and confusion upon hearing this, each with their own emotions.


    ¡°Go into theva?¡± The old poison witch hesitated for a moment, ¡°That is the fire adept¡¯s home ground. We will be at a severe disadvantage there!¡±


    ¡°It can¡¯t be helped. We will have to confront the fire adept directly, even if at a disadvantage.¡± At this point, Natagu had no choice but to abandon his past caution and wariness. He became vicious and straightforward in his ns, ¡°If we wait any longer, it will be those two Fourth Grade Holy Knights whoe hunting for us with an army. If we work together and take down the fire adept in a single fight while the holy knights are still mobilizing, we can leave this godforsaken ne as soon as possible. It is worth it, even if we have to pay the price for it!¡±


    Natagu red at everyone with a cold and cutting gaze.


    Katherine was the first to nod in agreement.


    After letting her wounds fester for so many years, andcking reconciling agent, much of her flesh had already been corrupted by the mechanical magic. They had turned ck and were rotting with a stench. Among the four of them, she was the one who most urgently wanted to return to the realms beyond.


    The second to nod was surprisingly not Psionic Adept Benija, but the sly and wily old hag Guinevere.


    ¡°Very well. It¡¯s not impossible if you expect this old hag to join you on your journey into theva. However, once we capture that fire adept, I want that Soul Equipment of his!¡±


    ¡°Soul Equipment? Do you have your eyes set on his Spirit of Pestilence? Soul Equipment is always merged with the host¡¯s soul. How do you intend to peel the equipment away?¡± Natagu narrowed his eyes and asked out of curiosity.


    ¡°That¡¯s not for you to worry about. Since this old hag has asked for it, I naturally have the means to strip the Soul Equipment from his soul. Though the process will greatly weaken the Soul Equipment, it will still function as an immensely powerful magical gue weapon. This old hag has plenty of ns in store for that Spirit of Pestilence!¡±


    Natagu hesitated for a moment but quickly agreed just to settle the matter as soon as possible.


    ¡°And you? What request do you have?¡± Natagu stared at Benija.


    ¡°I want that fire adept to spend a night with me. Just a single night will be fine!¡± Benija licked her red lips, her face filled with thirst and hunger.


    ¡°You do not intend to do anything to that fire adept, do you?¡± Natagu said coldly, ¡°Benija, don¡¯t forget. The Lady specifically named the fire adept as someone to be retrieved. If he is dead by the time we bring him before her, our mission reward will be cut in half!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! The Lady only said she wanted him alive. She didn¡¯t say we couldn¡¯t drain his Spirit. It shouldn¡¯t be a problem if a drain a bit of his Spirit, will it?¡± Benija then giggled and said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯t drain him to death. I will leave him some Spirit seeds.¡±


    After some more thought and confirming that there were no problems with the n, Natagu coldly said, ¡°Then I will have his Third Grade metal golem then. It seems like a good minion!¡±


    The old witch and Benija secretly cursed at Natagu¡¯s shamelessness, but they had all made their own requests. It wouldn¡¯t be appropriate to fight with Natagu over the mighty metal golem now.


    Naturally, this division of loot was based on their power levels, as well. Katherine was currently the weakest of them all and had no right to fight for loot.


    However, given her familiarity with the fire adept, she was confident that he would not capitte so easily. She looked at herpanions¡¯ vicious, joyful, and perhaps even eager expressions and felt genuine disdain in her heart.


    Hmph! Arrogant and prideful fools. If that fire adept was so easily done in, they wouldn¡¯t have been stuck here for five years. Hmph! If she hadn¡¯t been in a group with them, she would hope to see them bash themselves bloody against the obstacle that they were about to confront!

 Chapter 982 - Sudden Increase in Power

    Chapter 982 Sudden Increase in Power


    Gangsas Volcano, beneath theva.


    There was ava cave deep within the volcano crater.


    If one stood in front of the crimson barrier of light at the entrance to the cave, they would see the thick, heavy sea of magma rumble past their eyes. The volcanic rock that had yet to meltpletely had wrapped around theva, along with some unusual ores glinting with metal.


    The elementium magical machine guarded the entrance like a loyal hound, its eyes asionally gleaming with an odd light as it monitored all the movements in its surroundings. Various wavelengths of detection lights firmly protected this seemingly crude cave inyers, along with a variety of fire traps scattered across the pool ofva.


    Greem was lying down upon a stone bed in the cave. The soul-gathering crystal was on his chest, and he was performing a strange breathing exercise.


    The frequency of his breathing was unusually slow. He inhaled and exhaled an average of only five times a minute.


    He would inhale with his nose then exhale with his mouth, continuing to breathe at this odd frequency. Every time he inhaled, all the air in the cave would be instantly drawn empty. One could even faintly hear the hissing sound of the air as it traveled into his lungs. Meanwhile, every time he breathed out, a small stream of fire woulde surging out of his mouth, scorching the ceiling above until it was ck.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether Greem inhaled or exhaled. It sounded like thunder in the cave, as if a fire dragon was crouching and sleeping in his den.


    While Greem was engaged in his deep meditation state, his mind was faintly connecting to the soul-gathering crystal. A small and gentle stream flowed into his mind, nourishing and strengthening his mental world.


    In all honesty, even Greem had never expected that devouring all the unowned holy light and pure power of faith within the crystal would have taken such a long time. Somepletely unexpected changes even happened along the way.


    After such a long time trapped in the soul-gathering crystal, the souls of the holy knights that rested within the clusters of holy light had already been worn down to pure and unconscious spirit energy. That was why Greem¡¯s split soul could devour all of them to its liking, like a tiger among a herd of sheep.


    However, its actions had unintentionally awakened the pure, holy light left behind by that Third Grade Gold Knight.


    The Holy Light that the holy knights worshipped had one big feature- ¡®inclusivity.¡¯ This was also the ¡®Purification¡¯ that they so liked to talk about. Supposedly, when an ordinary holy knight died, their soul would find rest within thest cluster of pure holy light, where it would return to the origin and once again enter the system of the ne.


    However, when Greem intercepted the holy light, all of these things became trapped in the soul-gathering crystal. The souls of the other holy knights had already been ¡®Purified¡¯ by the holy light they were resting within. However, the soul of the Third Grade Gold Knight lived up to its grade. It had managed to endure the Purification of the holy light and managed to preserve part of itd consciousness.


    Without the stimtion from Greem¡¯s split soul, this portion of his consciousness might never have awakened. It would have slowly exhausted its power over time until the holy lightpletely assimted it. However, the appearance of the split soul activated the instinct for survival left in its remnant soul.


    The awakened soul of the Gold Knight started to instinctively retaliate against Greem¡¯s split soul, having lost most of its memories and consciousness.


    Thus, an unusual battle broke out within the fist-sized crystal!


    Given the resilience of the soul of a Third Grade Gold Knight, Greem¡¯s split soul was not a match at all, even though the Gold Knight¡¯s soul had lost most of its power. After all, Greem¡¯s split soul had not grown to its fullest strength yet. Avoiding it and hiding became the only possible course of action for the divided soul.


    Greem had no choice but to personally direct the split soul to aid it in its struggle against the Gold Knight¡¯s soul. With the help of the Chip, he avoided the opponent¡¯s pursuit while furiously devouring as much holy light and pure spirit energy as he could.


    After five long years, he finally managed to beat the soul of the Gold Knight and convert it into part of his own Spirit energy. Today was the day Greem would harvest his rewards.


    As he focused his Spirit and constructed a mental tunnel with his split soul, the split soul transmitted a stream of extremely pure Spirit back to Greem.


    After five years ofplete stagnation, Greem¡¯s Spirit finally started to increase exponentially beneath the monitoring of the Chip.


    32...33...34...35...


    As his Spirit continued to grow in strength, an overwhelming surge of spiritual pressure started to rise from Greem¡¯s body as well. Dense fire elementium automatically gathered around him, forming into invisible mes that burned wildly in the air.


    The cave silently descended into a sea of invisible mes. All material substances slowly started to melt before the heat of the terrifying mes.


    Even the Third Grade elementium magical machine had no choice but to erect an energy forcefield to keep these mes away from it. The transparent mes gently licked its energy forcefield, silently wearing away at its magical energy. Even the elementium magical machine could feel its power quickly drain away.


    The magical machine was fortunate to be sustained by a miniature magic generator furnace. Any other adept would have had difficulty surviving amid these transparent mes.


    It was clearly one of the high-grade effects of elementium magic¨C Arcane Oblivion!


    Arcane Oblivion was a unique effect that could rival the likes of Arcane Absorption and Magic-Breaking.


    Arcane Oblivion was also known as neutralization. It allowed one to use magical energy of equal amount to neutralize or reduce the opposing magical energy to oblivion.


    Arcane Absorption, on the other hand, was better described as an innate talent of certain races. It allowed those who possessed the ability to absorb part of the offensive magical energy and convert it into their own strength.


    Magic-Breaking was used to pierce and prate an enemy¡¯s magical defenses through specific techniques or magical effects. The reason the holy knight¡¯s Holy Light Strike was so terrifying was that it possessed both Magic-Breaking and Exorcising effects.


    Now, as Greem¡¯s Spirit continued to increase, his creature grade also rose from beginner Third Grade to advanced Third Grade. In fact, it was still rising even after crossing the threshold of advanced Third Grade.


    By the time the crystal shattered into countless pieces of ss shards, Greem¡¯s Spirit finally stopped at thirty-seven points. This number was still at the level of an advanced Third Grade, but considering the Fire Throne set and Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring¡¯s bonuses to his Spirit, Greem¡¯s Spirit was no less inferior to an adept at peak Third Grade.


    While Greem savored the feeling of power and invincibility from his massive increase in Spirit, he picked up on the abnormality on the outskirts of the sea ofva.


    The fire traps he had ced there had been triggered, one after another. An exceptionally slender and seductive figure charged at the very front, using her strange mental waves to detonate all the fire traps along the way.


    Three extremely familiar silhouettes rushed behind her, quickly making their way toward the cave¡¯s position.


    Hm? Was the enemy taking the offensive?


    Did something happen outside? Why else would these hunter adepts suddenly be so bold, after refusing to step into the pool despite him having tried to bait them in here hundreds of times?


    Greem slowly opened his eyes, a trace of confusion still lingering in his mind.


    However, when his eyes that were burning with golden mes opened, his muscr, glowing body instantly absorbed every trace of fire in the room, like a whale sucking in water.


    For an instant, all the fire aura in the cave vanished, and the temperature fell slightly below average.


    An unprecedented feeling of replenishment in Greem¡¯s Spirit made him feel exceptionally active. His powerful Spirit merged with the dense fire elementium aura outside the cave, making him feel as if he was one with the world itself.


    Very faintly, it seemed as if he could hear the shapeless sounds of thews of the universe as the ground and moved. Thews of fire that he had always dreamt of appeared as if they were right in front of him. However, when he reached to grab them, he was obstructed by an unseen barrier, making him utterly incapable of touching them at all.


    Just as rage boiled in Greem¡¯s heart and he prepared to muster all his mes to burn through this damned barrier, the elementium magical machine sent him an urgent alert.


    The enemies had arrived!


    As Third Grade adepts, most natural environments in the ne could no longer be considered hazardous to them. Even without the ability to manipte fire, their power allowed them to easily remain within this pool ofva for an entire day.


    However, it was apletely different matter to fight a fire adept of the same grade under such conditions!


    ¡°We are almost at his base,¡± Benija sent a mental message to herpanions, ¡°The fire elementium here is too vicious and wild. It¡¯s too much disruption for me. I can¡¯t continue locking on to the fire adept. That said, his mental flux still appears to be chaotic and unorderly. It seems like he has yet to turn away from his magical experiment!¡±


    ¡°No more hesitation, then. Act ording to the n once we see that fire adept. We must capture him today!¡± Serpentine Adept Natagu encouraged his party as he prematurely started to transform into a fearsome ck Mamba, shaking his thick and long tail as he swam forward into theva.


    Dirt-yellow halos radiated from his thick scales, keeping the shockingly hotva away from his body and preventing the heat and pressure from affecting him. The halos also asionally spread out to protect the old witch and the de Princess as well.


    They crossed three hundred meters in a matter of moments.


    When Natagu saw the dark red fire barrier at the entrance of the cave, he immediately shook his tail and surged past Benija, charging headfirst at the elementium magical machine standing at the front.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    A storm of bullets came firing out of the magical machine¡¯s hands, turning into a terrifying current of metal and fire. These projectiles shot through the viscousva and crashed against the body of the serpentine adept.


    A yellow Halo of Gravity wrapped around the barrage of bullets, causing them to swerve in a different direction and slide past his serpentine body harmlessly. Even the shots that found their mark were greatly weakened by the Halo of Gravity. They crackled against Natagu¡¯s scales, but they could not pierce his defenses at all.

 Chapter 983 - An Intense Battle

    Chapter 983 An Intense Battle


    The bullets did not prate his scales, but Natagu could still clearly feel the intense pain inflicted upon him by the vicious stream of metal and fire.


    The serpentine adept twisted his massive body, preventing the barrage from hitting his vital points as he opened his mouth and lunged at the elementium magical machine like a sh of lightning.


    The sharp fangs of the snake shed with the machine¡¯s metal arm. Both parties trembled and were knocked back. The violent force of their exchange spread out between the two of them, turning into several force shockwaves that pushed theva away, creating a vacuum ten meters in diameter.


    The flowingva might have been affected by the shockwaves, but the three silhouettes following quickly behind the serpentine adept were not. They passed through the me barrier without any hesitation and entered the cave.


    Katherine gritted her teeth as her silver body abruptly turned into a glowing bolt as she charged to the side of the elementium magical machine. Without any hesitation, she used her ace¨C destorm!


    A dozen metal des swarmed out like a hive of bees, revolving around the elementium magical machine and slicing with all their strength. Paired with the metal spike that Katherine wielded with the ferocity of a storm, the magical machine had to endure an unimaginably violent beating at every moment.


    Any other adept would not have been able to endure such ferocious attacks!


    However, the elementium magical machine was not a human adept, after all. It had a near-imprable body of alloy. Even if all of Katherine¡¯s magical weapons had been enchanted with armor-piercing and sharpening effects, it was still unrealistic for her to break through the machine¡¯s shell with herpound attacks.


    Katherine continued to circle the elementium magical machine as the sound of shing metal filled the room. The two metal spikes within her hands were like silverfish, swimming about and constantly stabbing where the magical machine¡¯s armor was the weakest.


    Sparks flew and shards of metal scattered across the ground. Fine scratches and notable dents started to appear on the elementium magical machine¡¯s body. It was like a clumsy ck bear, desperately lunging at Katherine but constantly missing its mark.


    The magical energy that they radiated bounced between the magical machine¡¯s body and the walls of the cave, gradually increasing the difficulty of Katherine¡¯s control over her mechanical body.


    Havingshed out with all her power, de Princess Katherine had managed to suppress the elementium magical machine for the moment and was furiously damaging it with all she had.


    With Katherine going full force against the magical machine, the other three hunter adepts were naturally free to surround and attack the young fire adept.


    The three of them frowned upon gathering around the fire adept. A trace of confusion arose in their hearts.


    His spiritual pressure didn¡¯t seem right!


    However, the situation gave them no time to think about or examine their opponent. Natagu was the first to hiss and charge forward.


    An earth-yellow Halo of Gravity appeared on Natagu¡¯s serpentine body, along with stone armor carved with profound and mysterious patterns. He opened his mouth slightly, revealing the terrifying white fangs and forked tongue within. He red at the fire adept with his strange reptilian eyes, and an intangible power of petrificationnded on Greem¡¯s body.


    The old witch grinned with her wrinkled mouth behind them. She started to chant some wicked and evil spells. Gray and ck circles of light appeared all around Greem and began to wrap around his blinding, zing soul.


    Psionic Benija chuckled and smiled lightly, using her sweet expressions and swaying waist tounch mental suggestion after mental suggestion at the unmoving figure before them.


    Greem lifted his head and looked silently at the Petrification Beam, evil curses, and mental magic flying toward him from every direction. His mind was unexpectedly calm andposed. Powerful fire energy he had never possessed surged within his body. He activated the five pieces of the Fire Throne set and connected Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, pushing his Spirit even higher until it reached a peak he had never before imagined.


    Thirty-seven points of origin Spiritbined with the bonus of the Fire Throne set instantly pushed Greem to the thirty-nine point limit. At this instant, he was only one step away from Fourth Grade!


    Without any hesitation, Greem lifted his hand and released a halo of fire.


    me Halo of Repulsion!


    It was a fire spell that was meant as both offense and control. Greem typically used it more to control his enemies and keep them at bay. Today, as powerful fire energy surged into the spell, this me Halo of Repulsion disyed a terrifying effect.


    It didn¡¯t matter if it was the lunging serpentine adept, the evil curses of the old witch, or even the intangible mental magic. All of them shattered helplessly against the me halo and were blown away.


    Even Natagu, who had twenty-nine points of Strength upon transformation, was forced to stumble backward, let alone Guinevere and Benija. None of them could even take a single step towards the fire adept. Meanwhile, the special powers and magic they had just unleashed at him had all vanished in the me halo as if they never existed to begin with.


    It was the Arcane Oblivion effect that Greem had just mastered!


    ¡°Impossible...impossible! How could he have be so strong so suddenly?¡± Seemingly terrified by the might of the fire adept, Natagu suddenly screeched and hissed, ¡°He must have used some sort of stimnt magic or item. His power can¡¯tst long. Keep fighting on!¡±


    With that ear-grinding hiss, Natagu once again opened his giant maw and dove into the still burning sea of fire to snap at Greem once more.


    For some reason, the mes that he had initially been able to endure now inflicted intense pain when they burned against his body. It was almost as if his scales could no longer shield him from the heat of the fire.


    However, such pain could not force Natagu to retreat. On the contrary, it only made him more savage and wilder!


    Greem had now turned into a me Fiend with a sturdy body. When he shed with the giant snake, the cave instantly copsed.


    Two titans fought and tussled with each other in this environment of crumbling rocks and floodingva as if there was nothing around them. The overwhelming waves of fire never stopped, but Natagu¡¯s Halo of Gravity crushed all fire,va, rock, and metal that approached them into pieces before flinging them away at the speed of bullets.


    The berserk serpentine adept was severely burned and blistered, much of his flesh scorched and charred. Meanwhile, the terrifying me Fiend he had coiled his body around was also struggling and resisting with all its might, even as he continued to bite at it with his vicious jaws.


    The serpent had tightly bound Greem¡¯s body, and the grip was only getting tighter. His entire body was creaking from the pressure.


    Equally infuriated, Greem cast Fire Teleportation and dragged the serpent even deeper into the depths of theva. There, he summoned one fire spell after another, each one more ferocious than thest. He had elementary fire immunity anyway. These fire spells dealt far less damage to him than the giant snake. Thus, Greem was more than happy to ¡®torture¡¯ himself in this manner.


    Fire spells that were enhanced with holy damage, the steadily zing Burning Domain, and the tremendous heat and pressure of the magma; Natagu had to endure inconceivable damage at every moment, so painful that he almost wished he would stop living.


    The poison witch and the psionic quickly hurried over. However, they were soon shocked by reality when they once again cast their poison and mental magic on the me Fiend of Terror.


    Two out of three of their curse and charm spells did not affect the opponent at all. Even the spells that took effect quickly faded. They were burned away and dispelled by the zing mes.


    Dammit! Such a situation only seemed to have appeared when they were fighting against high-grade adepts who were stronger than them. But...Greem shouldn¡¯t...


    Just as they were struck by confusion, Benija once again took her time to carefully scan the fire adept they were fighting. Finally, her expression changed, so obvious that everyone could see it!


    Dammit! Peak Third Grade. How was this possible?


    Compared to Guinevere¡¯s poison magic, Benija¡¯s mental magic relied more on the suppression of Spirit. Her mental magic was intangible and invisible before adepts whose Spirits were weaker than hers. These adepts had barely any chance of defending against her attacks. However, when used on adepts whose Spirits far surpassed her own, her mental magic would be directly resisted. The chance of failure would rise exponentially.


    How did he do it? Was it just as Natagu had said? Was he relying on some sort of forbidden spell or unique item? How long could he maintain this state?


    A series of questions rose from Benija¡¯s heart. For the first time, she could not help but start considering the possibility of losing this fight.


    Still, the situation remained a three-on-one. As long as they could endure until the fire adept¡¯s Spirit reverted to its original level, they still had a high chance of winning.


    As anxious as she was, Benija continued to pile on more and more mental spells upon the me Fiend.


    Mind Spike!


    Mind y!


    Mind st!


    Frantic Frenzy!


    Chaos Consciousness!


    ......


    One dangerous and powerful mental magic after another took effect on Greem, causing his movements to asionally be slow and dull as he continued to fight the giant serpent. Every time he paused was the best opportunity for the snake to deliver a strike.


    Be it a bite with his fangs, ash with his tail, or even a st of his Petrification Beam; all would inflict unspeakable damage upon the me Fiend!


    Guinevere continued to skirt around the edges of the battle, sinisterly chuckling as she spread poison and gue around the me Fiend. She would asionally rain down acid arrows and corrosion balls on the enemy in the hopes of prating his defenses and having the poison take effect from within.


    Unfortunately, the harsh environment here significantly limited the old hag¡¯s ability.


    The fearsome poison that had stood its own against the Spirit of Pestilence was now burned to ashes before it could approach the me Fiend. Even when she finally managed to afflict Greem with some poison, it was immediately purified by a strange holy light before it could attack the organs.


    Holy light? Since when had the fire adept mastered even the power of holy light?


    The old witch simply could not understand.

 Chapter 984 - The Ferocious Volcano

    Chapter 984 The Ferocious Volcano


    The battle was brief and brutal!


    After just fifteen minutes, Natagu could no longer keep going.


    The environment here, the enemy¡¯s spells, and the mes that steadily burned and ate away at his flesh all inflicted tremendous damage to him.


    The scales on his body had already turned crisp and bright red from the heat. Most of the flesh beneath had also withered or been carbonized. Every time the serpent bit and tussled with the me Fiend,rge patches of his scales and burnt flesh broke off from his body.


    After transforming into a ck Mamba, Natagu was enhanced with a powerful halo of earth elementium and gained an indefensible soundwave spell, along with fearsome Eyes of Petrification. Yet, at this moment, as his neck was in the grip of the me Fiend and fists were raining down upon his head, he had a feeling as if he was about to die in very next moment as if he no longer had any more strength to spare.


    While his head was within the me Fiend¡¯s grasp and enduring the pummeling, the flesh around his thousands of wounds was wriggling and squirming in an attempt to heal his body. The tissue grew wildly, desperately trying to regrow the portions that were missing.


    However, all of its efforts went up in smoke and ashes beneath the vicious mes.


    The new flesh that regrew quickly turned ck and burnt, the area beneath being reduced to ashes and scattering into theva. This constant, continuous repetition of agony was the main factor driving Natagu towards insanity.


    It hurt way too bloody much!


    The serpentine adept had been washed berserk with pain. He forgot everything and only knew how to use everything at his disposal to inflict the same pain upon his enemy.


    The snake¡¯s head had been pinned down and could not bite at the enemy, so the terrifying Eyes of Petrification sted out two gray beams that swept around at everything nearby. Even the thick and flowingva would instantly solidify when hit by the Petrification Beams, turning into solid chunks of rock.


    The two witches around them were still trying their best to attack Greem, all while avoiding Natagu¡¯s out-of-control Petrification Beams. It was chaos on the battlefield.


    The serpentine adept¡¯s thick and robust body continued to twist and tighten around the me Fiend of Terror, never loosening its grip even as the fearsome fire continued to pour off the me Fiend¡¯s body. Moreover, as Natagu went berserk, hisrge body started to coil tighter and tighter, causing the me Fiend¡¯s frame to creak at the pressure. It seemed as if he nned to crush the me Fiend to mincemeat.


    His slender snake tail flickered around repeatedly as a vicious whip, wildlyshing at the me Fiend¡¯s spiked back, never stopping even after it was covered in cuts and blood.


    The two titans continued to battle in the depths of theva, causing wave after wave of terrifying shockwaves to spread outwards. Rocks copsed where they traveled, and the volcano itself trembled. The pool ofva howled and roared as the colossal force shockwave forced the molten liquid outward, sending them surging out of the crater.


    Looking down from the sky above, Gangsas Volcano was erupting!


    The majestic crater had lost half its side, and an overwhelming tide of redva had surged out from below, where it cascaded down the uneven slope. Cracks had appeared all over the massive mountain. Raging currents of hot air burst forth from these ruptures, heating the very air itself.


    One could feel the pressing heat from thirty kilometers away!


    Gangsas Volcano had now turned into a zing torch, staining half the sky with a terrifying crimson red. Thick ck smoke rose into the air. Several still exploding boulders of mes shot out with theva, crashing down from above like zing meteors. These boulders created seas of fire wherever theynded.


    A party that had received orders and were hurrying to Gangsasa Volcano stopped at the edge of the fire.


    Several holy knights d in distinct armor and formidable aura consoled the warhorses beneath them. Still, they could not get their mounts to take a single step forward.


    As they looked at the erupting volcano in the distance and witnessed the apocalyptic scene unfolding around them, all of the knights were horrified to their very core. An unconceble look of terror appeared in their eyes that gazed toward the volcano.


    Was this the power of the adepts?


    Upending a mountain, shattering the earth, and igniting a volcano.


    A series of horrifying images and words rolled across their minds, but nothing could urately describe their current feelings.


    Personally witnessing the might of the otherworldly adepts caused the hearts of many holy knights to tremble. Perhaps, just maybe, just possibly, even that Lord Holy Knight might not possess such fearsome power!


    They quickly wiped the thought from their minds the moment it appeared. They then lowered their heads and recited the Ten Precepts of the holy knights before finally recovering from their moment of shock and terror.


    ¡°Thomas, return to the camp immediately and report everything we have seen here to Lord Ad Carrhae. He will decide what to do.¡± The one leading the party was a Second Grade Silver Knight, who quickly gave out an order.


    Without any disagreement or dy, the young holy knight whose name was called saluted and rode into the distance with his warhorse.


    Once theirpanion¡¯s silhouette had vanished into the distance, the Silver Knight shouted, ¡°Before our Lord¡¯s new orders arrive, we will continue with our previous mission¨C to scout Gangsas Volcano. Everyone dismount and proceed. Now...¡±


    As he shouted, this group of eight Iron Knights led by a Second Grade Silver Knight leaped off their horses and allowed them to sprint back in the direction they hade from.


    They reorganized themselves slightly, taking out their shields before stepping onto the scorched earth under the leadership of the Silver Knight.


    On the other side of the volcano, a strange army was also silently advancing through the dense and primal forest.


    The formerly lively forest had now turned oddly quiet and peaceful.


    Every forest creature: herbivores, carnivores, predators, and prey were now hiding silently in their dens, curled into a ball and shivering in fright as if they were small critters that had met their natural enemies.


    The entire forest was without sound, except for a fast and soft shuffling noise.


    If a hunter were to venture into the forest now, he would find countless hideous figures sprinting past the trees.


    These creatures appeared like zombies, still with many human features on them. However, they crouched on the ground, rushing through the forest on all fours as they made straight for the zing volcano on the horizon.


    Spirit of Pestilence Remi sat atop a particrly muscr gue beast. They charged out of the forest onto a cliff and stared at the zing pir of fire in the distance.


    Countless gue creatures shrouded in a green and yellow smoke sprinted in the vast jungle beneath and behind him. Despite their immense hatred and thirst for living beings, they passed by the dens and nests of the wild animals, never stopping to feast.


    They were all heading for the erupting volcano under themand of Remi.


    As for what they could do with their ¡®weak¡¯ bodies and ¡®meager¡¯ abilities in a battle of such scale? They would not think about such things, nor would they need to.


    As long as Remi gave the order, not a single one of these gue creatures would hesitate for a single instant, even if that order was to jump into the volcano and turn themselves into ashes.


    That was perhaps the scariest aspect of the gue creatures!


    ............


    While all these forces rushed towards the volcano, the battle at the bottom of Gangsas Volcano had reached a conclusion!


    Unexpectedly, the ones who were defeated were the more numerous hunter adepts.


    Greem was surprisingly powerful, and his sudden increase in Spirit had been the key that determined the oue of the battle.


    After enduring in the mes andva for fifteen minutes, the weakening of the me Fiend¡¯s strength that Natagu awaited still had not happened. He gritted his teeth and endured for thirty minutes...forty-five minutes...three entire hours.


    Unfortunately, regardless of how he endured during the battle, he still saw no signs of his enemy¡¯s strength weakening or failing. The brutality of their struggle was now etched deep in the mind of the serpentine adept.


    He no longer had the courage he first possessed, and his appearance was wildly different from how he had looked at the start of the battle.


    Most of his scales had fallen off from the boilingva and burning fire. The raw, exposed flesh grew and burned away and grew again. Natagu had now expended seventy percent of all his energy. Twenty percent of that alone was used to stimte the growth of his flesh.


    His twenty-meter long body was covered in scars and blood. Every time he traded blows with the me Fiend, thousands of ruptures appeared on his body. The heat would immediately vaporize the spilling ck blood before it had even traveled three feet from his body.


    One of his eyes on his proud serpentine head had been crushed, leaving only a ck and empty socket. Most of his sharp fangs and teeth had been broken, while the forked tongue had been torn away, leaving a still-bleeding stump.


    Natagu, the serpentine adept, was in a most terrible condition!


    However,pared to him, Greem didn¡¯t seem to be doing much better either.


    His seven-meter tall body was covered in gashes created by Natagu¡¯s fangs. These wounds were shrouded by ck smoke, the flesh within purple and rotting with a pungent stench. The sharp spikes on his broad back had been snappedpletely. ck blood flowed down his body along with redva.


    All his Lava Shields and Inferno Shields were shattered the moment they formed, crushed to pieces by ferocious spells just ten seconds after they were summoned. Even the magma armor on his body had crumbled to pieces, revealing the dark purple body beneath.


    The demonic power that a Second Grade me Fiend¡¯s Heart could provide Greem was no longer sufficient to deal with a battle of such magnitude and brutality. At this moment, Greem was purely sustained by the boundless fire energy in theva pool, using the power to heat his Burning Domain as much as he could to burn the hunter adepts to ashes.


    Finally, Natagu, the serpentine adept, could no longer endure the frontline with all his grievous wounds. He abandoned the battle and turned to escape!

 Chapter 985 - Leave No One Alive

    Chapter 985 Leave No One Alive


    The party of holy knights carefully approached Gangsas Volcano.


    Though the height of the volcano¡¯s eruption had passed, and the sky no longer appeared as if it was in the middle of an apocalypse, ming boulders still asionally burst out of the crater and crashed into the surroundings with a long, smoking tail.


    These boulders exploded wherever theynded, sending towering plumes of dust into the air as they crumbled into pieces.


    Since the holy knights were prepared, these boulders did not pose too much of a threat to them. If any of the stones got too close to the party, the Silver Knight would sh it to pieces with a Holy Light Strike. The shards of rock from the shattered boulder couldn¡¯t threaten the holy knights yet.


    However, the party still lost two members while climbing up towards the crater.


    While traveling through an area of dense cracks and rifts, a sudden current of blistering fire engulfed two of the holy knights. By the time the flow of fire subsided, only two burnt corpses were left. They still had their armor, but their flesh and tendons had all been burned to pieces, reduced to ashes falling from the sky.


    The party had no time to collect the remains of theirpanions. They could only offer silent prayers before continuing on their journey.


    None of the holy knights knew what awaited them. They only knew that their party had to obtain information on those adepts. It was the only way to provide a reference for the higher-ups to make the right decisions.


    Yet, just as they reached the waist of the volcano, the mountain itself started to tremble and shake intensely.


    A loud rumbling sound came from within the belly of the volcano.


    Amidst the deafening chaos, a violent aura that caused their very souls to cower descended. They felt their vision blur and their heartbeats quicken. Their legs trembled so much it was hard to remain standing.


    Dragon aura! It was a dragon¡¯s aura of might!


    The expression of the Silver Knight changed drastically as he quickly identified the source of this berserk aura.


    However, before he could turn to tell hispanions anything, an earthshaking explosion rang out from within the volcano. The cone-shaped crater then started copsing and falling downwards.


    Tons of volcanic rock, sand, dirt, and rumblingva came rushing down from above at breakneck speed, flooding the entirety of Gangsas Volcano¡¯s surroundings.


    This party of only seven holy knights did not even have time to scream before the unstoppable flood of blisteringva and dirt engulfed them. Three smoky figures came flying out of the crater during this apocalyptic scene, rushing into the distance without any hesitation.


    Aooooo!


    A long dragon¡¯s roar abruptly rang out.


    A bright blue dragon whose body flickered with blinding lightning rose from the crater, a majestic me Fiend of Terror standing upon his back. A ferocious ming tiger of shocking size could also be faintly seen in the sshing pir ofva beneath them.


    The three silhouettes immediately switched trajectory and scattered in three separate directions as if they realized the pursuers were behind them.


    ¡°The thunder dragon and I will chase the serpentine adept. You go and chase the psionic.¡± Greem shouted out loud from above Arms¡¯ back.


    He had paid too heavy a price for this battle. He would be driven mad by his frustration if he let the enemy escape like this.


    ¡°You are willing to let the old witch leave?¡± Cindral replied with indifference. His me-like body could freely travel through the fires. It was more convenient than Greem¡¯s Fire Teleportation, so he didn¡¯t quite care who it was that he had to chase.


    ¡°Hmph! She¡¯s the unlucky one. Someone¡¯s waiting for her where she¡¯s running!¡±


    After a simple exnation, Greem stepped onto the thunder dragon lightly. Arms let out a roar and beat his vast dragon wings wildly. A furious gust rose beneath him as he turned into a blue lightning bolt, hurtling through the air after the ugly serpent with Greem on his back.


    ¡°Hehehe, a Third Grade human psionic. Hmph!¡± Cindral let out a snort and walked through the empty air, his body quickly vanishing into the zing mes.


    He silently reappeared in a sea of fire several hundred meters away. He nced up at the witch, still flying above the forest a kilometer away from him and vanished once again.


    Benija hastily flew across the forest, furiously casting Spirit Wing, Fly, and Visual Avoidance upon herself as she did so. All of a sudden, she felt an unbearably savage heat swarm around her. Benija instantly knew she was in trouble.


    She looked behind her but found no enemy chasing after her. Still, she couldn¡¯t shake that feeling of danger. It only made her more fearful and cautious.


    Without hesitation, Benija dove into the forest below. She took out a vial of purple potion and drank it, mysteriously causing her to transform into a small gray mouse. She stood up straight and looked at her surroundings before carefully diving into the bushes after seeing no enemies.


    A short momentter, Cindral silently leaped down from a nearby tree. He lifted his nose and sniffed the air for the enemy¡¯s remnant aura.


    Psionics might not be great at much, but they were definitely one of the best at disguising and concealing themselves.


    Paired with theiryers of mental magic, an enemy would have an incredibly challenging time tracking her. Without a visual or spiritual lock on her person, ordinary divination and tracking spells were easily misled by her mental suggestions.


    However, a ming tiger was not a beast that could bepared to ordinary creatures!


    Cindral might not be able to smell the psionic nor the aura of her magic, but the fire energy that she had yet to dispel from her body did not escape his senses.


    The ming tiger followed the fire aura and wandered through the forest, intermittently sprinting for several kilometers at once. Finally, he stopped in front of a tall, ancient tree.


    He stomped with his right foot, and a surge of bright yellow mes spread outward, burning all the dead and rotten leaves to ashes. There, beneath the roots of the tree, was a small hole the size of a fist.


    Cindral let out a cold snort of disdain. He opened his maw and let out a stream of fire into the hole. The terrifying mes filled the winding tunnel, causing steam and hot air to rise from several different exits within a hundred meters of the tree.


    He very clearly heard a pained screame from somewhere underground!


    A short momentter, the transformed Benija escaped from a hole covered in smoke. A massive fire w pinned her to the earth before she could use her magic to disguise herself once again.


    Benija lifted her head in terror, only to see the terrifying maw of tiger growingrger andrger.


    ............


    Remi, who was leading the gue army in their advance toward the volcano, suddenly patted the beast beneath him and halted its movements.


    He paused for a moment to gather his senses as he quickly got a message from Greem.


    Mm? That old poison hag ising this way?


    A cold smile full of malicious intent immediately appeared on Remi¡¯s green face. He pouted slightly, and the gue army adjusted their trajectory, sprinting toward a specific spot in the forest.


    Remi¡¯s gue army just happened to run into the old poison hag by a small stream. She was quickly traveling through the forest on her flying broom.


    To avoid being tracked by the enemy, Guinevere chose to fly as low as she could, traveling through the dense foliage of the forest. She might be slower this way, but she would be better hidden.


    In truth, she had never stopped looking behind her as she flew. She had never expected anyone to intercept her from the front.


    That was why her already ugly face turned even darker when she saw the strange creatures streaming toward her and Remi sitting upon the back of a giant Second Grade beast.


    She tossed several vials of potions down on the ground. These potions turned into strange poison voodoo beasts uponnding. Most of them had the might of Second Grade creatures. One of them was even a Third Grade Toxic Swamp Lizard.


    Remi paid no heed to these enemies. He snapped his fingers, and the hundreds and thousands of poison zombies lunged forward, instantly drowning the enemy with their fearsome numbers. Those Second and Third Grade poison creatures were soon covered in hordes of poison zombies, forcefully pinned to the ground by sheer numbers.


    Meanwhile, the First Grade wights and Second Grade guebringer struck at the old hag.


    gue Arrows, gue clouds, poison shockwaves; all sorts of attacks quickly surrounded the old poison witch from every direction.


    The old witch waved her hand, and invisible poison scattered into the air. Even the wights could not endure the effects of the poison, despite being gue creatures themselves. When the toxin infected their scrawny bodies, they quickly rotted into slime and were reduced into a pool of noxious and pungent water.


    Ordinary gue creatures could only pester the old witch. They had no chance of killing her!


    Only a Third Grade could deal with a Third Grade.


    Reminmanded the gue beast beneath him to charge forward. They quickly arrived within a hundred meters of the witch while she was busy dealing with the wights. He then blew an invisible gust of poison in her direction.


    Even with her resistance to poison and toxins, Guinevere couldn¡¯t help but shiver in terror when the poison reached her. A sharp, stinging pain immediately came from every one of her internal organs, as if extremely tiny poison insects were furiously eating away at her body.


    ¡°Damned brat! You¡¯re digging your own grave.¡± The old witch screeched wildly as purple blood came streaking out from her eyes, ears, mouth, and nose. With the temporary increase in Spirit from her shout, a surge of invisible poison also started to spread throughout Remi¡¯s body.


    When it came to poison magic alone, Remi was most assuredly inferior to the witch, having only advanced a while ago.


    However, Remi also let out a berserk howl in the face of the old witch¡¯s self-destructive attacks.


    As he screamed, many of the poison zombies rushing onto the battlefield copsed on the spot. Remi had mercilessly taken away the trace of gue essence in their cores.


    With the replenishment of these gue essences, Remi barely managed to endure Guinevere¡¯s unusual poison spell. He then furiously injected even more gue seeds into the witch¡¯s body.


    The two masters of poison screamed at each other and began to tear away at their opponents viciously!

 Chapter 986 - Dead End

    Chapter 986 Dead End


    A deafening roar rang throughout the skies!


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms beat his wings and soared through the air with the arrogance of an emperor descending upon his empire, bending slightly to look at the shadow cutting through the forest.


    His emerald eyes were fixed upon the figure hastily fleeing into the distance.


    Natagu had long since exhausted his bloodline power after the grueling and bloody battle at the volcano. He had been forced out of his serpent form and had reverted to an ordinary human. It also unavoidably reduced his Physique slightly.


    Consequently, the wounds and pain that he could endure as a serpent became even more unbearable as a human!


    Natagu quickly flew over the trees, still coughing up blood as he did so.


    Purple-ck blood wouldn¡¯t stop flowing out of his eyes, ears, mouth, and nose. His face was twisted in a vicious look, and his overall appearance could not be any more terrible. However, he could not be bothered about his image at the moment. All of his attention was focused on escaping the pursuit of the enemy behind him.


    The damage to his origin powers was extremely severe, but the legendary fire adept chasing after him was not much better.


    However, the fact that he had a Third Grade dragon as a mount already ced him in an extremely advantageous position in this chase. Even though Natagu knew that it was near impossible to escape the pursuit of a Third Grade dragon, his almost copsed body and utterly exhausted Spirit gave him no courage to turn and fight the enemy.


    Godammit! It was just an internar bountymission he had taken on! He would be suffering tremendous losses if he failed the mission, but that was better than losing his life here.


    He was severely injured, and so was the fire adept.


    Natagu¡¯s wished for nothing other than for the fire adept to sumb to his injuries first and call off the pursuit to treat his wounds. It was this ¡®humble¡¯ wish that kept Natagu fleeing with all he had, all while drinking as many potions as he could.


    Unfortunately, as a bloodline adept whose primary ability was serpent transformation, Agility was not Natagu¡¯s strong suit!


    The Third Grade thunder dragon¡¯s lithe and majestic figure finally managed to catch up and loomed above him. Despair slowly crept into Natagu¡¯s heart.


    Arms let out a long roar before lowering his head and releasing several dragon breaths down on Natagu. In doing so, Natagu was forced to move about in the air and dodge.


    With every dragon breath, Natagu had to make a sharp turn in the air, changing trajectories to evade the violent lightning by a hair¡¯s breadth. The blue sea of lightningnded on the forest below, turning into a savage lightning storm that disintegrated all substances within its radius into a fine dust.


    Only some of the tougher and thicker trees that had lived for thousands of years could endure the violent lightning and remain standing after the destruction. However, their bark and leaves had all vanished without a trace, leaving only a smoldering trunk slowly burning from the mes created by the electricity.


    If Natagu were still at his peak, he might have dared to transform into the ck Mamba to face the thunder dragon head-on. However, his body was now in tatters, his Spirit was drained, and his bloodline powers were exhausted to the veryst drop.


    Without his transformation, Natagu did not have the courage nor confidence to continue fighting against this prideful dragon. Even as he was being toyed with by breath after breath of humiliating lightning, Natagu still refused to turn and fight against the enemy.


    He simply didn¡¯t have the strength!


    Unfortunately, though he wanted to avoid fighting now, the opponent clearly wouldn¡¯t agree to that.


    Having consumed Life Stock Solution and Spirit Recovery Potion, Greem¡¯s wounds were far less severe than Natagu¡¯s. Yet, even with the use of these two incredibly effective potions, Greem could only barely keep his wounds from worsening. Healing the damage was exceedingly difficult in his current conditions.


    During the three hours of brutal fighting, he had essentially endured the violent attacks of two other adepts, all while fighting against the serpent. Though the unique environment of the volcano weakened much of the poison witch¡¯s and the psionic¡¯s might, three hours of constant attacks had still inflicted horrifying physical damage on Greem.


    If it weren¡¯t for the great Physique of the me Fiend of Terror, along with the excellent physical defense and magical resistance, he would probably have been reduced to mincemeat by now.


    The more severe the damage he had suffered, the greater the anger that burned in Greem¡¯s heart.


    In the past, he might have given up on pursuing the enemy if only to treat his wounds fifteen minutes quicker. However, he had made up his mind today. At every possible cost, barring his own life, he had to make these enemies who had trapped him for so many years pay with their lives!


    de Princess Katherine was still trapped underground, fighting with the elementium magical machine. She had no chance of winning.


    Cindral was chasing the psionic. As long as he didn¡¯t go easy, he was very likely to capture her.


    Meanwhile, Remi was lying in wait where the old witch was headed. She would probably be caught in a terrible position as well. That said, even Greem had no idea how powerful Remi had grown since his advancement. He couldn¡¯t be sure if Remi could capture the old witch.


    However, Greem was confident that Serpentine Adept Natagu was dead!


    When Greem joined in the battle from behind Arms, Natagu could no longer defend himself. He failed to dodge in time and was engulfed by a Vicious Fireball. By the time he escaped from the cluster of mes, screeching and hissing, half of his body had been burned ck.


    ¡°Greem, don¡¯t you dare push me to the edge.¡± Even in the face of death, Natagu could not change his vicious and confrontational personality. He hissed and threatened, ¡°Are you sure you can endure my final counterattack if you were to force me into a corner?¡±


    The only reply he got was another two Vicious Fireballs.


    Now that his bloodline powers had been exhausted, Natagu could no longer transform into a ck Mamba. He could only hastily erect an elementium barrier and shield himself from the explosion¡¯s violent shockwave.


    The waves of fire engulfed the forest, turning the green vegetation and proud trees into ck coal. Natagu stumbled backward, no longer as arrogant and prideful as he once was.


    ¡°Heirimogongs. Void Poison Fang!¡± Natagu had a vicious expression on his face as he raised his right hand and shouted.


    A snake¡¯s eye ring on his right little finger suddenly glowed with blinding light. The light pierced through the radiant fire and shot towards Greem. At the same time, Natagu opened his mouth and spat out a poison ball the size of an egg, which he silently fired toward Greem and the thunder dragon.


    After firing this poison ball, Natagu¡¯s energy aura abruptly fell to half of what it used to be. He couldn¡¯t even be bothered to see the effects of his attack and instead stumbled away into the forest.


    Even with his physical and spiritual condition below the warning line, Natagu¡¯s robust Physique as a Third Grade bloodline adept still allowed him to sprint through the forest with the speed of a jaguar.


    As he fled into the woods, Natagu continued to look back for his enemies. In his moment of carelessness, he tripped on a vine and crashed into an ancient tree. He pulled himself together and picked himself up by leaning on a tree trunk before continuing to escape as far as he could.


    No one noticed that at the moment he grabbed the trunk to stand up, his left little finger fell off. The finger turned into an arrow and silently pierced into the trunk of the tree.


    Yet, Natagu continued to stumble into the forest as if nothing had happened.


    mes erupted in the clearing of the forest, and Greem coughed as he walked out from the fire, just in time to intercept Natagu.


    After a short and brief exchange of attacks, Natagu let out a wild scream, his eyes filled with blood. A fearsome halo of poison erupted outwards. To enhance the lethality of the poison halo as much as possible, Natagu even sacrificed his blood essence.


    As the sickly green halo spread through the forest, all substances within one square kilometer, be they nt or animal, were reduced to a radioactive glowing green liquid the instant they came into contact.


    Even with the Burning Domain to protect himself, the poison halo still managed to invade into the space around Greem. The dark red mes became sickly green as the poison advanced.


    Greem let out a subtle grunt. He then used Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring to quickly convert the powers of fire around him into holy power, setting up severalyers of defense. It was only through the Purification powers of the holy light that he managed to defend himself against the poison.


    After surviving the attack, Greem stood up straight and looked around him. He couldn¡¯t help but be horrified.


    Natagu hadpletely and utterly vanished. That terrifying poison had melted his body, soul, and his equipment. Meanwhile, all the nts within a square kilometer had turned into a bright green poison liquid, including the towering trees, vines, and bushes that covered on the ground. The entire area had been turned into and of poison void of life.


    Natagu self-destructed?


    What a ruthless man!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but exim, even as he was shielded byyers of holy light.


    However, just as he was shouting at the death of a Third Grade adept, a statistic projected by the Chip attracted his attention.


    [......Soul Completeness 63%......]


    Hm? What was this?


    The Chip had estimated thepleteness of Natagu¡¯s soul based on that one attack he had unleashed before his death. It was only 63%. That was odd!


    Without the Chip¡¯s data, Greem might have been stunned by Natagu¡¯s decisiveness and ignored the oddities of his death. Given his personality and way of doing things, was Natagu the kind of warrior to sacrifice his own life to take down the enemy?


    Given Greem¡¯s observations over the past few years, Natagu was not only not a warrior, but an extraordinarily sly and wily adept with plenty of schemes and plots. If he genuinely had to die, Greem was certain that he would rather get on his knees and beg for mercy thanmit suicide.


    Given that to be the case, Natagu¡¯s self-destruction now felt like more of a trick to hide the ipleteness of his soul.


    Greem lifted his head and looked at the path where Natagu had traveled. A cold and dangerous light gleamed in his eyes.


    Hmph! A 37% soulpleteness was more than enough for a full revival when used with specific secret techniques!

 Chapter 987 - Falling One By One

    Chapter 987 Falling One By One


    Greem casually strolled through the forest.


    With the powerful memory of the Chip, he could perfectly retrace the path that Natagu had taken. Blue light flickered in his ck eyes as all sorts of special vision functions activated, helping him scan and sense every inch of ground he was covering.


    Up to the dense canopy of the ancient trees, and down to the clearing where the vines and brambles grew abundant: no unusual activity within ten meters of Greem could escape his powerful spiritual senses.


    Finally, Greem stopped in front of the ce where Natagu had tripped. He stared at the tall tree there. Both Elementium Sight and the Chip¡¯s energy scans revealed a high-energy substance no more than ten centimeters in length within the trunk of the ancient tree.


    ¡°Natagu, if you really want to escape with your life next time, remember not to keep your storage ring with you.¡± Greem coldly said as he stood alone in the forest.


    The clearing was empty save for himself, and it wasn¡¯t clear who he was speaking to.


    A cool breeze brushed through the area, causing the leaves to shuffle and move. No one stood out to answer his question.


    ¡°Hmph! You still haven¡¯t given up at this point? Then I will make you show yourself!¡±


    Crimson light shed in Greem¡¯s eyes. Two terrifying Sr Rays quickly sliced through the tree, leaving two fine red lines in the trunk.


    The tree trembled before slowly falling in a loud rumbling noise, leaving a smooth stump wide enough that it required three people to encircle it fully. A human¡¯s finger wearing a strange ring was revealed in the center of the tree¡¯s core, slowly crawling on the wood.


    Perhaps understanding that its attempts to save itself and escape had been seen through, the finger no longer concealed itself. It slowly transformed into Natagu¡¯s appearance during a strange transformation process. However, Natagu was no more than ten centimeters in height at the moment. He was a miniature version of himself. Moreover, he was not wearing anything and could only hold up the ring around his waist to cover himself. It was a hrious sight to behold.


    ¡°Lord Greem...Lord Greem, as long as you let me go, I am willing to gift you with all my wealth and knowledge.¡± The miniature person screamed with all his strength. His voice was low, but Greem could hear him clearly.


    He looked at the storage ring,rge enough rtive to Natagu to be a h-hoop, and put on a malicious smile, ¡°All of your resources and your collection are kept within the ring, aren¡¯t they? It will be mine once I kill you. There doesn¡¯t seem to be a need for you to gift it to me!¡±


    ¡°No, no, no...my lord, those are only ordinary resources. I have even more resources hidden in the Ounds. As long as you let me go, I will give them all to you. Moreover, if you must kill me, I will let thisst bit of my soul self-destruct. Don¡¯t hope to get anything from my mind.¡± Natagu screamed with all his strength, as if trying to present himself to be fearless of death, yet also trying to be careful not to infuriate Greem.


    ¡°Your offer is not enough. You are a Third Grade bloodline adept, after all. What you are offering is most definitely not enough to pay for your life!¡±


    ¡°My lord, my lord. I have a temporary internar teleportation in my ring. You won¡¯t be troubled about leaving this damned ne once you have it!¡± Natagu tried his best to demonstrate his value.


    ¡°Still not enough.¡± Greem was still shaking his head.


    ¡°Then...Lord Greem, this humble one is willing to serve you! As long as you don¡¯t kill me, I can sign a contract of servitude with you and be your Third Grade servant. My lord, a Third Grade would act as your subordinate. That...should be able to satisfy you now, should it not?¡± Natagu was practically prostrating himself and begging like a ve to save his life now.


    ¡°Contract of servitude? Third Grade servant?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but fall silent, seemingly moved by the offer.


    ¡°Yes, yes. This humble one will release all the defenses around his soul for you to leave your soul brand within. My lord will no longer suspect this humble one¡¯s intentions anymore, will you?¡± Having said that, Natagu released all the defenses and restrictions around his soul without hesitation.


    Greem could sense that his soul was truly fully open to him now.


    He could leave his unique soul brand within as long as he wanted. When that happened, Natagu¡¯s very life and death would be in his hands, and Natagu would have to listen to his every word, never daring to be even slightly disobedient.


    Greem chuckled.


    ¡°Hmph! Natagu, when you were chasing me across the world, did you people ever imagined that this day woulde? I have never provoked you, yet you came to hunt me, traveling billions of kilometers from the Ounds to take my life. Yet now, you have be my captive prisoner. Say, aren¡¯t you just worthless?¡±


    ¡°Worthless, yes, worthless, incredibly worthless. This humble one is the epitome of worthlessness! This one should never have believed the words of that old witch ande to this damned ce to find trouble with your magnificence. Otherwise, this one would never have ended in such a terrible position. It is all because this humble one is a terrible judge of people. All because this one has horrible luck. It is no fault of my lord at all!¡± It seemed like Natagu was willing to abandon all dignity to survive.


    ¡°Hmph.¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to speak with such a ¡®shameless¡¯ servant anymore. He reached out with his finger, concentrating a trace of fire energy, which he slowly extended toward Natagu, who was standing on the stump.


    Natagu held on to the ring around his waist, carefully examining the approaching finger. It was only after he confirmed that it was only a soul brand attached to the finger that he closed his eyes and waited for the intense pain that woulde from within his mind.


    Any change to one¡¯s soul would inflict terrifying consequences to the victim. If it wasn¡¯t out of necessity, Natagu would never have epted such humiliating and harsh conditions. He was a fish on the chopping board now. He no longer had any other choice.


    Yet, just as the finger was about to reach Natagu¡¯s head, a cold gleam shed in Greem¡¯s eyes. Pure and vicious fire energy surged into Natagu¡¯s body, instantly causing him to swell to five or six times his size.


    ¡°Wh...why?¡± Natagu could not believe the sudden change in the situation.


    He had already begged and pleaded with all his being, and yet Greem was still killing him. Why? He could not understand at all!


    ¡°Hmph! If I were a Fourth Grade adept, I would most definitely ept your surrender. Unfortunately for you, I am only Third Grade at the moment.¡±


    Natagu could not hear the rest of Greem¡¯s exnation. With a loud explosion, the miniature Natagu was blown to pieces by the sudden surge of fire energy. He was sted into mincemeat, the blood reduced to ashes by the Burning Domain before it could even stter across the ground.


    Greem then took out an empty soul-gathering crystal and collected his tattered soul.


    It was the soul of a Third Grade adept. It might be damaged, but plenty of valuable magical knowledge and secrets could still be extracted from it. Moreover, given that Natagu had intentionally escaped with a split soul, he had probably kept all the valuable knowledge with the divided soul. Greem was lucky to get the lion¡¯s share of his knowledge.


    After destroying thest bit of Natagu¡¯s blood essence and collecting the soul, Greem picked up the storage ring as well. Having done all this, Greem closed his eyes and sensed his surroundings. After using the Chip¡¯s help to confirm that nothing had been left behind, he flew into the air and met with Thunder Dragon Arms. The two of them then turned and headed back for Gangsas Volcano.


    A short momentter, once Greem had returned to the volcano, Arms¡¯ summoned duration came to an end.


    Even with Greem¡¯s increased Spirit allowing for a longer summoned duration, Arms still had to return to Lance by the power of thews after an entire hour of pursuit and battling.


    ming Tiger Cindral was already waiting at the crater. The psionicy unconscious on the ground.


    However, Greem could still sense a weak life aura within her. She was not truly dead yet.


    ¡°Why didn¡¯t you kill her?¡± Greem asked out of curiosity, coughing violently as he did so.


    He had been far too badly injured in the battle from earlier. Though he had obtained the final victory, this body of his had also been functionally crippled. He would not be able to recover to his peak without a dozen years of quiet recuperation. It was simple. That battle had severely damaged his soul origin.


    Such wounds concerning the soul were the hardest to heal!


    ¡°This is a Third Grade witch and one that walks the path of the more niche mental and psionic powers. Are you sure you want to kill her just like that?¡± Cindral replied with a very humanoid expression, clearly not understanding why humans could so easily ughter high-grade beings of their own kind.


    There was a great deal of ughter and killing in the Fire Elementium ne, but most of that happened amidst the unintelligent, low, and intermediate-grade fire creatures. If a fire creature gained intelligence, they would never simply ughter another of their kind without good reason, regardless of their grade.


    That appeared to be the main reason why the Fire Elementium ne was so powerful!


    Meanwhile, in the eyes of adepts like Greem, anything that stood before their path would be exterminated without any hesitation, even if it was one of their own kind. There was no such thing as mercy for someone of their own kind!


    ¡°Am I supposed to let her continue to be my enemy if I¡¯m not to kill her? These high-grade adepts have plenty of ways to circumvent soul bondage. Moreover, they are backed by a powerful Great Witch. Even a soul contract might not be able to control them fully. If the Great Witch were allowed to remove the restrictions on her soul, wouldn¡¯t all this have been in vain? Wouldn¡¯t I have just made yet another formidable enemy!?¡±


    Greem had given considerable thought to this question. That was why he had never thought of enving these adepts. If he kept them at his side, the Great Witch could turn them against him once more, exposing everything about him to the witch. He would have no secrets to speak of.


    Thus, Greem shot out a fireball without any hesitation, reducing the unconscious Benija to ashes in a single instant. Of course, he took off all her magical equipment and storage ring to keep for himself.


    The strange purple crystal on Benija¡¯s forehead went into Cindral¡¯s collection.


    The Chip¡¯s scan revealed that the crystal was a piece of powerful Third Grade magical equipment. No wonder Cindral was so interested in it.


    Having obtained loot of his own, Cindral happily returned to the Fire Elementium ne.


    When he opened a megate and prepared to leave, the ming tiger turned and shouted something at Greem.


    ¡°This is the second time now. There is only one more left of the three pledges of assistance I promised you. Use it wisely!¡± Having said that, he vanished into the mes.

 Chapter 988 - Formless Fate

    Chapter 988 Formless Fate


    Cindral had just left when dust rose from the wholly copsed crater. A towering figure stumbled out of the ruins, dragging something behind it.


    Greem looked over and realized that the elementium magical machine was on the edge of being scrapped. Its body was badly torn up, covered in fearsome scratch and w marks everywhere. Much of the defensive armor protecting the vital parts were almost entirely destroyed. The machine¡¯s internal core array was exposed for all to see.


    Be dragged along in its right hand was the de Princess Katherine, who looked to be in even worse condition.


    She looked like a tattered bag that had been shed full of holes. The elementium magical machine had dragged her out of the rocks by a few metallic appendages extending from her spine as if she was a limp dog.


    One had to admit that the Third Grade mechanical adept was indeed one resilient person. Even as severely wounded as she was, she still clung on to life. A weak trace of life aura could be sensed within her body.


    As Greem casually gathered a Vicious Fireball within his palm to properly exterminate this mechanical witch that had bothered him for so long, his eyes swept past the strange mechanical skeleton exposed on her abdomen. He hesitated for a moment and tossed the fireball somewhere into the distance.


    A loud explosion rang out. The Vicious Fireball killed the Silver Knight¨Cwho had barely escaped from the volcanic mudslide and surgingva¨Cbefore he could understand what was happening.


    A short momentter, Greem absorbed a white cluster of holy light into his new soul-gathering crystal, along with what remained of the Silver Knight¡¯s soul.


    Just then, the leaves on the trees in the distance rustled as arge pack of oddly-shaped creatures sprinted out of the woods, stopping at the edge of the still-smolderingva. The animals then split up into two separate groups, revealing arge and hideous beast.


    Remi stood tall upon the back of this massive creature, proudly walking past all his gue beasts.


    Greem had only heard news of Remi¡¯s actions over the past five years through their soul connection. Now that they were meeting face-to-face, he immediately understood everything that Remi had been doing.


    Greem didn¡¯t care about the gue creatures. Instead, his attention was drawn to a strange figure behind Remi.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. All the other gue beasts were cowering humbly before Remi like sniveling peasants, while this one individual stood silently behind him. It was enjoying the glory and worship of the gue beasts alongside Remi himself.


    It was a humanoid monster standing at about one and a half meters in height. All of its skin had rotted and turned into pus, a slimy and repulsive liquid that covered its entire body. It looked like a human female whose entire body had been skinned. The pair of shriveled breasts on her chest were the only indications of her gender.


    She had rotten skin, slime, raw, exposed flesh, horrifying caved-in nostrils, bloodshot eyes, and limbs that had turned into ws with sharp nails. She might have once been a human female, but she was now a genuine monster.


    Even though this monster had been modified beyond recognition, Greem still managed to identify its former identity through the familiar shape of its face.


    Old Poison Witch Guinevere.


    No, Poison Witch Guinevere had vanished entirely now. The one that had reced her consciousness and continued to live on was only a Third Grade gue creature subservient to Remi¡¯s will. Moreover, judging from its active mental awareness and elementium flux, it was a high-grade gue creature with its own consciousness.


    What a tragedy. Guinevere had been a poison adept of intermediate Third Grade herself. Yet, one moment of carelessness, and she had fallen in this poor and rural ne. She had not only lost her dignity as an adept but had also been reduced to a living zombie obedient to the will of another.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh at this massive turnabout of Guinevere¡¯s fate and status!


    That said, he felt no regret or pity for what she had suffered. They were of opposing factions, after all. If he were to fall into their hands, he might well suffer an even more terrifying fate.


    Remi had the gue army stand at the edge of the forest.


    He then led this modified ¡®witch¡¯ to Greem¡¯s side upon the giant gue beast. He tossed a storage ring to Greem.


    It was the ring that Guinevere had been wearing. Naturally, it now fell into Remi¡¯s hands.


    Greem scanned it and picked out some of the rarer and more unusual items for himself. He then tossed the ring back to Remi, leaving the rest of the things untouched.


    Remi could now independently lead an army of his own. It was time for him to own a storage device with sufficient capacity. This storage ring fulfilled this exact purpose.


    As Greem¡¯s Soul Equipment, Remi¡¯s existence was incredibly unique.


    Greem could return Remi to his soul origin and use him as a powerful gue weapon. He could also allow Remi to move about freely and develop by his own will. Judging from the strange abilities that Remi had gained through evolution, it was truly suited for independent development.


    After all, Greem knew next to nothing about gue and poison. He couldn¡¯t properly guide Remi. As such, it was better to have him act as a clone of his that obeyed his orders andmands.


    Now that everything was settled, Greem reverted from his transformed state. As his Physique fell, the damage inflicted to his body assaulted him all at once, causing him to howl and moan in agony.


    Greem took off his robe. He could see the cuts and gashes that covered his tall and muscr body. Most of these wounds were also shrouded in strange energy: ck, gray, and purple-red.


    Every time the wounds quickly healed under the effect of his excellent Physique, the energy radiance would crackle and tear open the newly-healed wounds. Trying to recover through pure Physique was no more than a delusion before the energy remnants were dispelled.


    Apart from all the surface wounds he had suffered, Greem¡¯s organs were also filled with all sorts of curses and odd poison. If it weren¡¯t for the fact that he kept them at bay away from the crucial organs such as the heart, brain, spine, and the alveolus, Greem would no longer be able to stand under his own strength.


    It was time to find a ce to recover!


    Gangsas Volcano was now a ruin. The towering volcano had been sted into pieces. The shattered volcanic rock tumbled down the crater and sealed theva pool beneath a thickyer of rock. The energy within the volcano had been utterly spent. It was no longer as savage and wild as before. Only gray plumes of smoke continued to seep through the cracks, staining the sky above a pale gray shade.


    This ce was no longer suited as a base after that brutal battle.


    Moreover, he had just killed a Second Grade Silver Knight at the crater. That was more than enough proof that the holy knights had extended their reach all the way here.


    This ce was no longer safe!


    Greem unsummoned the elementium magical machine and followed Remi into the forest under the protection of the gue beasts. They then made their way to a base that Remi had secretly constructed in the woods.


    ............


    Everything happening in Henvic ne was constantly under the scrutiny of the two Fate Witches.


    They had both obtained news of the distant world through their minds, each expressing anger or joy at every turn of events.


    Naturally, Alice didn¡¯t know how furious the mysterious First Witch of Fate might be. All she knew for sure was how incredibly overjoyed she was.


    The mist hovering above the divination crystal had been mostly dispelled now. Fate¡¯s trajectory indicated that Greem would be able to return soon sessfully. Alice specially held a prayer ceremony because of this, using the power of the pseudo-artifact Staff of Divination to send Greem the blessings of Fate.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Alice knew that such ¡®weak¡¯ power could notpare to the likes of Great Witch Maysa, nor could it dispel the curse of misfortune that had been ced upon Greem. However, this prayer could still help Greem resist part of the effects of the misfortune.


    Otherwise, if a Great Witch¡¯s curse were to affect Greem without any hindrance, even the most unlikely misfortune would befall Greem as if it was an everyday urrence.


    Fate Witches might not be able to curse a person to death directly, but they could definitely plunge them into the deepest of misfortunes.


    Greem might look unstoppable and dominant in Henvic ne, seemingly invincible and undefeated. However, if he were dragged into a vortex of cmity, unfortunate things would happen to him every other minute. Running into a ghost upon exiting his home was a small matter, but running into a Fourth Grade Holy Knight upon exiting his house would be a disaster!


    Pouring the power of Fate into Henvic ne from a distant world in the realms beyond to subtly change the proper trajectory of the world and cause certain events to became ¡®certainty¡¯ all demanded a ridiculous amount of Fate power. Moreover, the nar consciousness of Henvic ne itself would not allow an outsider to interfere in the operation of its system. The two forces would sh, causing the initially clear trajectory of Fate to be increasingly chaotic and turbulent.


    There was the nar consciousness of a small ne, a powerful Fate Witch, and an incredibly weak Alice who continued to grit her teeth and persist. The formerly smooth and peaceful Fate trajectory had long since flown off the rails of its original path under the pull and distortion of these three separate forces. It was now rumbling and thundering down a track that no one could control or predict.


    The only thing that Alice could do in this situation was to bolster Greem¡¯s luck by as much as possible.


    It didn¡¯t matter where the freight train of Fate was heading. The more powerful the individual, the better they could take control of the chaotic and disorderly situation!


    This chaos in Henvic ne manifested itself in this moment. As Greem, Remi, and the army of gue beasts sprinted through the forest, just a small stream across from them were two powerful Fourth Grade Holy Knights rushing to Gangsas Volcano in the opposite direction with arge army of holy knights.


    Under the guidance of the muddied fate, this mighty army of holy knights had given up on crossing the river, despite the idea having crossed their minds countless times. They were always deterred by one reason or another.

 Chapter 989 - Bountiful Harvest

    Chapter 989 Bountiful Harvest


    The base that Remi had arranged for them to hide in was located deep in the forest.


    Remi had killed the native magical creatures and forest beasts that had lived here and turned them into materials for his gue army. As such, no living thing could be found within ten square kilometers, let alone anyrge, ferocious carnivores.


    Greem had no choice but to send out two First Grade stone serpents to hunt a buck at the outskirts of the forest for a little appetizer.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Greem had been gnawing on fire dragon ribs for five consecutive years under the volcano. Even though the high-energy food was incredibly beneficial to his Physique and his fire affinity, it was now utterly unappetizing to him. He would almost start throwing up at the very smell of fire dragon ribs.


    After hastily filling his stomach, Greem sat down by the campfire in the damp cave and pulled his robe tight around himself. For some unknown reason, he had been feeling abruptly cold and hot for the past day. The turbulent emotions within his heart could not be suppressed either.


    Remi and his gue army were guarding the ce on the outside, and there was no issue with safety. Greem lifted his hand and released the elementium magical machine from the golem talisman. He pulled it close to him and started to give it a close inspection.


    After a dozen seconds of the Chip¡¯s scanning, aprehensive count of damages was listed before Greem.


    Target Creature: Elementium Magical Machine


    Target Grade: Intermediate Third Grade


    Target Species: Combination of Elementium Golem and Magical Machines


    Target Bodily Attributes: Strength 37 (26) | Physique 39 (31) | Agility 11 (8) | Spirit 32 (27)


    ......


    ording to the Chip¡¯s statistics, the numbers in brackets were the current strength of the elementium magical machine.


    Due to the multiple battles it had consecutively fought, and theck of much-needed repairs and maintenance, thebat strength of the elementium magical machine had severely dropped. Apart from its Physique, which had barely remained at the level of a Third Grade due to the high-magic alloy its body wasposed of, its Strength and Spirit had all fallen below the level of Third Grade.


    An elementium magical machine like this might still be able to crush and overwhelm Second Grade Silver Knights, but its advantage would be much less distinct when fighting against a Third Grade knight.


    As the elementium magical machinebined too many unique systems of the elementium golems and the magical machines, repairing it was much harder than repairing an ordinary magical machine. Greem could only aplish such as task with the help of the specialized alchemyb in Fire Throne. Greem¡¯s only recourse now was to try and find some ordinary metals to repair the more obvious wounds on the elementium magical machine¡¯s body.


    The elementium magical machine was soon mended with a ¡®patchwork¡¯ of various colors. Though its defenses had improved slightly, it was still far from its peak condition.


    After half a day of banging and knocking, Greem finally managed to patch up all the more ring holes in the elementium magical machine. Its Physique had increased from 31 points to 34 points, but it was still a far cry from its original 39 points of Physique.


    Greem waved his hand and had the elementium magical machine stand-by at the entrance of the cave. He then carefully took out the Third Grade storage rings he had looted and started to appreciate their beauty and contents.


    It was important to note that most adepts would not bring all of their rare resources and wealth with them while crossing nes on their adventures. Still, Greem was very confident in the bounty he would find within these Third Grade storage rings. The reason was straightforward. They were the rings that Third Grade adepts kept with them at all times after all.


    As Natagu and Benija were both dead, the soul brand they had left on their rings had dispersed on their own. Greem managed to decipher the password set upon them with the help of the Chip in no time at all.


    All adept storage rings were protected by the double verification of a magical password and a personal soul brand. ess would be denied if any of these verifications were to fail. Now that the spirit brands had dispersed, Greem only required the magical passwords to unlock them.


    The first ring he examined belonged to Natagu.


    As Greem probed into the ring with his Spirit, the Chip quickly projected a list of items in his mind with its powerful scanning abilities.


    There were: 32,000 magical crystals, 104 magical gemstones of various types and attributes, 3 shed snakeskins, 1,068 snake scales, 17 kilos of ck Mamba poison, 73 Saro fruits, 225 grams of Dreamsource Grass, 12 grams of Sr Flowers, 11 instant-cast magic wands, 53 magical scrolls, 26 vials of magical potions, 1 runic teleportation array, and several pieces of magical equipment.


    Apart from all these magical items, there was also an assortment of personal items and life supplies. There were also quite a few unusual magical nts and rare ores that could not be found in the World of Adepts. These things were probably obtained in the space of the realms beyond.


    Setting aside the items whose value could not be assessed yet, the Chip estimated the value of the contents of Natagu¡¯s ring to be approximately two to three million.


    However, what caught most of Greem¡¯s attention was the one-use teleportation array and the five vials of bloodline potion.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s scan and analysis, two of the five bloodline potions were bloodline recreation potions, while the other three vials were bloodline purification potions. All of them were bloodline potions that had been specially developed for the ck Mamba serpent bloodline.


    With these potions, Greem had the means to create a few bloodline adepts with serpent bloodline within the Crimson n. However, there were already several ns with serpentine bloodlines in the Zhentarim area. If a few serpentine adepts were to appear in the Crimson n, it was very likely to attract misunderstanding and hostility from these ns.


    However, Greem didn¡¯t mind at all!


    Meanwhile, the one-use teleportation array was the key to Greem sessfully escaping from Henvic ne. With the runic array, Greem would no longer need to go by his original n¨C sneaking into Fire Elementium ne first and finding a way to lock-on to the coordinates of Fire Throne.


    The original n might have sounded simple, but several hazards and unknown risksy in the way of its execution. Moreover, Great Witch Maysa also appeared to have a few acquaintances in the Fire Elementium ne. If she were to hold a precise grasp of his location, the n of traveling to the Fire Elementium ne would be a massive risk of its own!


    Now that Greem had this one-use teleportation array that had been personally made by Maysa, he only needed to adjust the teleportation coordinates slightly, and he could very quickly return to the World of Adepts. If the Great Witch Maysa were to find out that it was her own doing that had sent Greem back home, she would probably be furious!


    Apart from the teleportation array, the bloodline potions, and the odd treasures of the realms beyond, the seemingly ordinary wands and magic scrolls were fairly valuable goods as well. Most of the instant-cast magic wands contained Second and Third Grade spells. These spells almost included every single possible magical element in the World of Adepts.


    Even the asional First Grade wand that Greem found contained extremely practical spells such as Locate Object, Time Reversal, and Dream Enchantress.


    One could be used to find an object while another could be used to view the urrences within an area over the past three hours. Thest one could be used to summon a Dream Enchantress to serve oneself.


    A Dream Enchantress was a strange creature who had a body of pure Spirit. They were harmless magical creatures who could use their powerful dream-creation abilities to weave a pseudo-realistic dreamspace for their summoner. As such, they were the most frequently summoned magical creatures by all manners of adepts, without contest!


    On the other hand, the magical scrolls appeared to be of much worse quality.


    That was to be expected. Natagu had already used all of the high-grade magical scrolls during all their battles. The only ones left had to be the ¡®defective¡¯ products.


    After happily ncing through Natagu¡¯s collection, Greem excitedly ced this storage ring on his finger. The ring¡¯s snake¡¯s eye gem glowed brilliantly. Greem now had four magical rings, almost enough for an entire hand.


    He then took a look at Benija¡¯s storage ring.


    It was also filled with piles of magical crystals, an assortment of magical gemstones, an equally shocking amount of magical materials and resources, and just as much magical equipment and essories. However, of all the treasures, the one that caught Greem¡¯s attention was a Second Grade starbeast corpse that was trapped within a piece of strange amber.


    A lightbulb went off in Greem¡¯s mind when he saw the starbeast¡¯s corpse. He immediately realized that this was that thing, the thing that had made him willingly take the risk of adventuring here in Henvic!


    Greem had the Sourcestealer and could extract innate abilities from the bloodline of certain magical creatures. It was something that only Alice and Mary knew about. Even Great Witch Maysa could not obtain such detailed and private information through the use of her Fate Divination.


    Alice had only known through the powers of Fate that she could find the bloodline ability she had always wanted if Greem came to Henvic ne. However, she had no idea what bloodline ability this would be, nor where it could be found.


    That was why Greem hade to this ne despite the tremendous risks; for himself and Alice.


    Yet, despite wandering in Henvic ne for such a long time and traveling to so many different ces, he had never heard of any information regarding starbeasts or unusual magical creatures. Just as Greem was starting to fall into despair and believed that Alice¡¯s premonition was only false information released by the enemy as bait, this item appeared in front of him in such a mysterious fashion.


    Benija. The psionic adept clearly came from the gxy of the realms beyond. How exactly did she manage to capture this Second Grade starbeast? And what sort of wondrous ability was hidden within the body of this Second Grade starbeast?


    Greem had no clue whatsoever. He could only silently wait until he was back at the tower to analyze the corpse. As for now, Greem grabbed the storage ring and kissed it furiously before solemnly cing it on his right hand.


    Greem quickly skimmed through de Princess Katherine¡¯s storage ring.


    It was just as valuable and filled with treasure, but there was nothing that could catch his attention like the starbeast¡¯s corpse. That said, Greem still found some odd metals in the ring that possessed unique magical traits.


    It was apparent that Katherine had been saving these metals to maintain her body and repair its damage.

 Chapter 990 - A Wind Rises

    Chapter 990 A Wind Rises


    The World of Adepts.


    Recently, the Crimson n¡¯s situation within Zhentarim had begun to grow worse.


    A rumor was starting to spread, iming that the legendary adept who had forged the Crimson n had died in a foreign ne. It was said that the leaders of the n were remaining silent about the news to avoid inciting panic.


    These rumors might have seemed entirely baseless, but it had struck a weak spot of the Crimson n.


    The Crimson n had multiple independent factions within. If it hadn¡¯t been for the legendary fire adept suppressing all voices of disapproval with his tremendous personal power and the loyal support of Mary, Alice, Meryl, and several other adepts, no one could have gathered this force of vampires, goblins, dragons, and witches and turned them into a gathering to be feared by the world around them.


    With Greem failing to appear in the n despite the many passing years, and core member Fate Witch Alice starting to seclude herself within her Tower of Fate, the operation of the entire n fell squarely upon the shoulders of Gargamel and Meryl, two mere First Grade adepts.


    Meanwhile, Third Grade Vampire Adept Mary was also the only person left of the n¡¯s high-grade fighting force.


    This,bined with the various unstable situations within and without the n caused some waves to begin to rise. Both the adepts who had begrudgingly surrendered during thest adept war, and certain ambitious individuals among the goblins, were carefully testing the Crimson n¡¯s real strength. They were all trying to find ways to break free of the n¡¯s control.


    During this time, some well-established major adept ns also expressed deep hostility towards the Crimson n. They began to suppress and bully members of the Crimson through subtle and overt acts alike.


    For a moment, many hostile incidents targeted at the Crimson n urred all across Zhentarim. Goblin merchant groups were chased out of certain territories, and several of the n¡¯s resource sites were attacked. Despite having conquered nearly eighty percent of thend in the Ailovis Region, the Crimson n had no choice but to withdraw their defensive line and shift their forces to the dozen most crucial First ss Resource Sites.


    As the de facto leader of the n, Mary had no choice but to take on the burden of heading the group, as unwilling as she was.


    For a moment, the vampire adepts were out and roaming, returning teeth for teeth and blood for blood. They beat back wave after wave of enemies with the most ferocious showing of force, even putting down three incidents of an uprising in the Ailovis Region aimed at overthrowing the Crimson n¡¯s rule.


    However, the more they killed and the fiercer they fought, the worse the situation for the n.


    All sorts of rumors were spreading about the n, along with the fires of war. The powerful mastermind behind the scenes appeared determined not to stop until the Crimson n had been thoroughly uprooted and crushed.


    Mary had no choice but to use her authority as the n leader to bring the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon from the White Tower to the central region. It would serve as the core fighting force in defense of Ailovis.


    That undoubtedly intimidated the mastermind and gave the Crimson n a chance to catch a breath.


    ording to their detailed investigations, the higher-ups of the n had finally figured the identity of the mastermind plotting to overthrow the Crimson n. That person was the current n leader of the Fabres n¨C Fourth Grade Body Refining Adept Den Fabres.


    In all honesty, most of the higher-ups were shocked and confused when they heard that Den Fabres was the one plotting against the n. After all, the Crimson n did not possess a genuine Fourth Grade of their own. That was why they had always remained incredibly respectful of these established ns, never fighting with them over territorial benefits.


    Yet, now, that Fourth Grade adept had suddenly struck at the Crimson n so viciously. It was truly beyond the expectations of the Crimson n¡¯s leaders.


    While everyone was caught up in confusion, Mary seemed to have vaguely understood something.


    Greem¡¯s entrapment in a foreign ne and the current predicament of the n were very likely both the plot of a single person.


    Upon understanding the cause-and-effect of the whole matter, Mary gave up on any thoughts of negotiating with the enemy. Instead, she started a full-force counterattack while fortifying the n¡¯s worldly territories and resource sites. Under her strong leadership, Bug Adept Billis, Dragonborn Zacha, Goblin Tigule, and the whole host of vampire adepts struck out at their enemies.


    If the enemy dared to destroy one worldly territory belonging to the Crimson n, they would exterminate all worldly nobles in three of the enemy¡¯s territories. If the enemy dared raid a resource site of the Crimson n, they would destroy five resource sites belonging to the enemy.


    The Crimson adepts had always been fearless and ruthless fighters. They were like venomous snakes, coiled offensively and retaliating against every single attack, refusing to back down orpromise even if it came at the cost of injuries to themselves.


    At the start of the battle, the Fabres n had mostly been aggravating and persuading other third party forces to attack and harass the Crimson n. However, once all these parties had suffered tremendously in the territories of the Crimson n and were intimidated by their show of force, the Fabres n finally moved.


    As a veteran n led by a Fourth Grade adept, the Fabres n had existed for over three thousand years now. The incredible amount of power and influence they had umted over the years was iparable to the Crimson n, which had only established itself less than a hundred years ago.


    As the Second and Third Grade adepts of the Fabres joined the fray to fight against the Crimson n, the entirety of Zhentarim boiled withmotion.


    Every single adept n and organization cast their attention on the Ailovis Region, silently waiting for a victor to emerge between the two groups. Some discussed the situation amongst themselves, some simply watched, and others pretentiously predicted the oue of the war.


    Still, regardless of how they talked and analyzed, the Crimson n was not likely toe out untouched from this war. After all, the enemy was led by a Fourth Grade adept with a force of three dozen Second and Third Grade adepts. They, on the other hand, only had two Third Grade adepts and a flight of unruly Third Grade dragons. The difference in power was too vast. They were hardly even on the same level.


    For a moment, all the minor organizations that had been obeying the rule of the Crimson n started be treacherous, either joining the enemy¡¯s side or choosing to remain neutral. This further reduced the morale of the Crimson n.


    Given the basic power of the two ns, some adepts dered that the Crimson n would be facing total defeat. At the very best, they could only defend Fire Throne¨Ctheir headquarters¨Cwith the might of the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon. As for their other territories and n resource sites; theycked the strength to defend them!


    However, the true cause of the Crimson n¡¯s disorganization was not the chaos andmotion that was brewing outside. It was the absence of Greem, their legendary n leader.


    The Crimson n had always been an adept n built around Greem¡¯s charisma and power. The tens of thousands of hearts belonging to the n had always been tied to Greem alone.


    If Greem was present, the n was present. If Greem was absent, the n was like a human whose skeleton had been extracted from their body, limp and incapable of any strength.


    Be it the brain monster¡¯s faction in Lance or the prideful dragons, everyone refused to listen to Mary¡¯s orders, only obeying on the surface and never genuinely acting ordingly. They never used their full strength to defend the honor and dignity of the n.


    Even the weaker goblin faction had much to say about Mary¡¯s orders. If it weren¡¯t for the vampire faction overpowering them by a long shot, the goblins would probably have seceded from the n to protect themselves.


    Given that case, the only ones who were obedient to Mary were a few of the core adepts, along with her subordinate vampire faction. Defending the vastnds of Ailovis and the many resource sites with such a force was no more than a dream.


    Mary had no choice but to shrink the n¡¯s forces further, abandoning the territories and resource sites on the outskirts. She concentrated what limited military force was within her hands and silently waited for a chance to tear a piece of flesh out of the Fabres.


    Her efforts finally bore fruit. The constant retreat of the Crimson n finally baited out some valuable targets into the battlefield.


    Excited at the prospect of profit, a group of Fabres adepts started a raid against a First ss resource site located near the Raul Wastnds, ughtering all the Crimson adepts and apprentices keeping watch in that ce.


    They were led by two Third Grade adepts!


    Upon receiving the call for help sent by the n adepts and apprentices before their deaths, Mary set aside her usual attitude of turning a blind eye. Instead, she gathered the elites of the n and made a beeline for the resource site.


    The Raul Wastnds were only three hundred kilometers away from the core region of the Crimson n. The arrogant adepts of the Fabres n never expected Mary to be so ferocious and spent far too much time raiding the ce. By the time they had filled their storage devices with loot and prepared to return to the n for a celebration, Mary had descended with seven Second Grade adepts, Billis, Zacha, and Tigule, sealing off their path of retreat.


    After a bloody battle, the Raul Wastnds were wiped off the map, and both parties suffered a terrible price for their confrontation.


    Two Second Grade blood elves died on the spot, with Mary suffering severe injuries and the other n adepts sustaining wounds of various severity as well. On the other hand, of the two Third Grade adepts of the Fabres n, one was heavily injured, and the other had sustained some light wounds. Five of their Second Grade adepts had died, and countless others were wounded.


    The battle of Raul Wastnds stunned the entirety of Zhentarim!


    In the eyes of the people, the only thing that the Crimson n could do in response to the aggressive advances of a veteran n was to defend their headquarters firmly and await the moment the enemy had exhausted all their strength and finally go on the retreat.


    No one could have expected Bloody Queen Mary to have the daringness to bite back and tear a bloody piece of flesh right off the back of the Fabres n. The deaths of five Second Grade adepts might not shake the foundations of the Fabres n, but it was no less than a wicked p across their face.


    Zhentarim bubbled withmotion for a moment. Everyone looked on silently to see how the Fabres n would react.


    It was said that the battle of Raul Wastnds had caused the Fourth Grade n leader of the Fabres n to fume with anger.

 Chapter 991 - Slaughter at the Castle

    Chapter 991 ughter at the Castle


    The curtain of night fell over thend.


    There was a small, rural, and unpopted forest.


    Through the sparse trees, the dim lights of Xavia Castle could be seen approximately one kilometer away.


    Two adepts wearing the Fabres n emblem on their chests red at the castle in the distance with wicked expressions. The one in the lead viciously said, ¡°It¡¯s here; Xavia Castle. Count Thomas that lives within has explicitly rejected our solicitations. The n has ordered that we must exterminate these foolish idiots today. Remember, leave no one alive. Every man and animal in that castle has to be exterminated. The spoils will belong to yourselves.¡±


    The eleven adept apprentices following behind the two adepts betrayed joyous expressions upon hearing this. The five dozen ck-armored guards standing even further away burst out into soft cheers.


    ¡°Very well, let¡¯s go!¡±


    As the adept gave the order, the eleven apprentices led the fifty guards out of the forest with swift steps and charged toward the gray castle standing in the darkness.


    They had already investigated the castle prior to this. There were only two adept apprentices in Count Thomas¡¯ castle. One was an intermediate apprentice and the other was an advanced apprentice. Neither of them could be considered powerful opponents.


    The mission reward offered by the Fabres n listed Count Thomas¡¯ head to be worth two hundred magical crystals, and the heads of the Crimson apprentices were fifty and a hundred magical crystals, respectively. The other vital members of Count Thomas¡¯ family were listed between five to ten magical crystals each.


    The official adepts leading the party might not care for such ¡®pocket change,¡¯ but the adept apprentices they led had gone mad with greed for the rewards. They stormed onto the battlefield as fast as they could.


    Even though it was already dark, the walls of the castle were still heavily guarded. Several guards were patrolling the entire length of the wall with torches in hand, as if enemies would attack at any time.


    Xavia Castle was only an ordinary worldly territory of the Crimson n located in the Ailovis Region. Count Thomas, who managed this castle and the sixty square kilometers ofnd around it, was only one of many worldly nobles within the Crimson n. Moreover, he was one of the most insignificant nobles of them all.


    However, as the surrounding noble forces all chose to defect to the Fabres n due to their overwhelming strength, Count Thomas stood out remarkably for his decision to wave away their messenger.


    It could be said that the entirety of Xavia Castle had been panicking from the moment they sent the messenger away. Everyone was waiting for an unknown cmity to descend at any time.


    If it wasn¡¯t for his granddaughter who was studying in White Tower of the Northern Lands, Count Thomas might not have found the courage to go against the will of a veteran adept n. Little Winnie had incredible talent. She was already an advanced apprentice at the young age of eleven.


    If nothing unexpected were to happen, Little Winnie should be able to be an official adept before she was thirty years old.


    Once Little Winnie became an official adept of the Crimson n, the Thomas family would find themselves with an opportunity to rise to power. It was precisely due to such considerations that Count Thomas found the courage to refuse the messenger that hade to solicit his surrender.


    Perhaps aware that disaster was unavoidable, Count Thomas sent away his most capable son along with his most talented grandchildren to Pinecone Town after turning away the messenger.


    That was where the Crimson n had firste to power. The town should not have been affected directly by this war.


    Meanwhile, he prepared himself for the worst and silently waited for disaster to descend. His idea was simple. He was hoping that the Crimson n would treat Little Winnie and the rest of his family well on ount of his loyal sacrifice.


    This way, when Little Winnie finally achieved power, the seeds left behind by the Thomas Family would be able to rely on her to rapidly strengthen and regain their former glory!


    When rms rang across the castle walls, Count Thomas closed his eyes in agony, alone within his room.


    He was eighty years old now, and did not have much time left. This was all he could do for his family.


    The other nobles might not be optimistic about the Crimson n¡¯s future.


    They had chosen to be fence-sitters, swaying to whichever side held the advantage. However, Count Thomas had a strange feeling that the Crimson n would still obtain the final victory, much like the way they had during thest n war. Once the Crimson n won, these nobles who had chosen to surrender to the enemy would be facing a bloody purge.


    Flowers grown with blood would grow stronger and bloom brighter!


    Count Thomas had chosen the right side during thest adept war. He had risen from the mere Baron Thomas to the rank of Count. However, he never expected a second choice to so quickly arrive in front of him, a mere dozen years after the first.


    The war this time was greater in scale, and the enemies of the Crimson n were even more terrifying. Choosing during such circumstances was only moreplicated. Fortunately, Little Winnie¡¯s existence saved Count Thomas from the trouble of having to choose.


    He was old now. He could no longer lead the Thomas Family. As such, it was time for him to sacrifice himself to win the family more space for development!


    Thomas trembled as he sat up from the couch. He drank the red wine in his winecup and stumbled to his bed. In his hand, a goldced dagger iid with a big bright ruby gleamed with cold light.


    Since the enemy had arrived, it was time for him to die!


    He did not wish to fall into the enemy¡¯s hands only to suffer even more torture. It was better for him tomit suicide.


    Just as he arrived by his bedside, a soft knocking sound rang at the wooden door.


    ¡°Lantz, don¡¯t try to convince me anymore. I will not leave with you guys! Hurry and escape before the enemies enter the castle! The secret passage at the stables in the backyard should let you leave the castle safely.¡±


    Lantz was one of the two Crimson apprentices that Count Thomas had hired at a high cost. He had attempted to convince the Count to escape to Pinecone Town with him countless times. Unfortunately, Count Thomas still rejected the offer after hesitating repeatedly. That was why Thomas had instinctively assumed the guest to be Advanced Apprentice Lantz when the knocking resumed.


    The wooden door opened.


    A tall and sinister figure loomed at the entrance. The bright light poured in from behind, adding a golden halo to his figure.


    This person was not Lantz!


    Thomas¡¯ heart thumped furiously. He stepped back in terror and said with a shaking voice, ¡°Who...who...who are you?¡±


    The tall figure ignored Count Thomas¡¯ question and walked to the window. He looked down upon the ck guards swarming into the castle through the narrow wooden window. A strange smile appeared on the peculiar face hidden beneath the shadow of the hood.


    Advanced Apprentice Lantz walked in from behind the towering figure with amp in his hand. He smiled at Count Thomas.


    ¡°Alright, Lord Thomas, stop thinking about death already. This is a Lord Adept sent by our n. He¡¯s here to bring you to Pinecone Town. Hurry up ande with me. The journey is very far still!¡±


    Who would be willing to give their life up if they didn¡¯t have to die?


    Count Thomas hastily put the dagger away upon hearing this. He couldn¡¯t be bothered to bring any of his wealth or treasure. He called for his closest servants and wives, got onto a ck carriage that had been waiting behind the castle for a while, and soon rumbled into the distance.


    The ck carriage might be inconspicuous, but it could not escape the eyes of the Fabres apprentices and guards. However, to their surprise, anyone that got within fifty steps of the ck carriage was shed in half by a silent and unseen de.


    Eight guards and two apprentices had already died to this mysterious killer from the time Count Thomas got onto the carriage to when it drove into the darkness.


    Of course, everything that was happening here had been discovered by the magical eyes activated by the Fabres adepts.


    An invisible eye in the night sky slowly moved to the back of the castle, secretly scanning everything in sight.


    Meanwhile, the ck figure was still looking out of the window in the Count¡¯s bedroom. He silently observed the ¡®deathmatch¡¯ happening between the ck-armored guards and the soldiers of the castle. The castle¡¯s soldiers were all brave warriors. However, they could not defend themselves when faced against the adepts¡¯ guards, who were dressed in magical armor and equipped with razor-sharp des.


    Just as the ck guards charged into the castle for a ughter, Lantz returned to the room after sending the Count away. He walked before the cloaked figure and bowed, ¡°My Lord, the castle has been emptied. Everyone who should be sent away has been sent away!¡±


    ¡°Good, very good. Then let my little babies have a proper meal once more!¡±


    A sinister screech came from the tall figure as countless ck beetles fell out of his cloak like dumplings falling into water. These ck beetles swarmed across the ground like a tide and surged out of the bedroom. They avoided the apprentice as they moved, making sure not to drag him into their midst.


    Even though Lantz knew that these beetles were under Lord Billis¡¯ control and would not harm him, he couldn¡¯t help but be nervous seeing the tide of insects pass by him at point-nk range.


    Lantz had to grit his teeth with all his strength to not let out a rude scream of fear.


    The fighting outside onlysted for a few moments before falling silent. All the guards and servants left behind in the castle had been killed. The guards and apprentices searching the castle quickly ran into the swarm of ck beetles.


    The sound of swinging swords, the crackling of torches, and the loud explosions of elementium fireballs quickly rang out from every corner of the castle.


    The sound of crazed fighting and terrible screams continued throughout.


    However, the guards who had been the predator earlier had now be prey in the eyes of others.


    Screams echoed throughout the castle but quickly fell silent, leaving behind only the strange sounds of gnawing and crunching in the darkness.


    ¡°Dammit! It¡¯s Bug Adept Billis.¡±


    The expression of the two Fabres adepts turned dark. Their hearts couldn¡¯t help but start beating furiously.


    The bug adept of the Crimson n was even more terrifying than the legendary fire adept.


    The legendary fire adept might be powerful, but he had only disyed his power in public a few times. He was far less dreaded than this bug adept who hadmitted ughter everywhere with far more cruel and bloody means.


    More importantly, Bug Adept Billis could be considered a core adept of the Crimson n.


    They might have failed this mission when they ran into him, but they would still be greatly rewarded if they reported his appearance to their leaders!

 Chapter 992 - The Battlefield is a Chessboard

    Chapter 992 The Battlefield is a Chessboard


    There was arge wooden ship.


    Unlike an ordinary wooden ship, it didn¡¯t sail on a river but, instead, slowly cruised through the air.


    Its tall mast, magnificent golden exterior, and sharp ram at its forefront gave it a strangely noble and majestic appearance. The eye-catching emblem of the Fabres n was branded on the side of the ship, where it was most visible.


    Meanwhile, groups of organized troops slowly marched forward on the ground below, with the wooden ship at the center of the army.


    Inside a secret room within the cabins.


    Seven adepts gathered before a magical sandbox, whispering in soft voices.


    The uneven shapes on the sandbox represented the geography of Ailovis, along with its most icondmarks and architecture. The entire area to the southwest had turned bright green, while the other regions were red, yellow, or a lighter shade of green scattered haphazardly across the region.


    Green represented territories that had surrendered or been conquered, yellow represented territories that still belonged to the Crimson n, and red designated territories that were currently contested.


    The seven Third Grade adepts discussed their strategy in soft voices. Every time they made a decision, they took a three-dimensional chess piece and ced it somewhere on the sandbox. The chess pieces would flicker with magical symbols of various colors and designs.


    Whenever any changes urred on the sandbox, a n member would immediately record the leaders¡¯ decision and send it outside. Once the orders had been passed downyer afteryer to reach the hands of the adepts and troops responsible for its execution, they would immediately leave and hurry off into the distance to aplish their mission.


    Of course, there were always parties that hadpleted their mission returning to the army.


    In this manner, the chess pieces to the side of the magical sandbox remained in a constant dynamic state!


    Just as the people in the room were busyying out more strategies, a few cracking sounds rang out from the magical sandbox. Several chess pieces within it suddenly exploded. Fine cracks first appeared on these pieces before the magic symbols branded upon them dimmed after flickering a few times.


    That typically meant a n adept had died while on a mission!


    The seven high-grade adepts weren¡¯t bothered by such a phenomenon if it happened at a few irrelevant locations. After all, this was a massive adept n war; it was impossible for there to be no deaths or casualties at all.


    However, five missions simultaneously failing, and this many adepts dying all at once; it couldn¡¯t help but demand their attention!


    Ummah, one of the seven Third Grade adepts, looked at the sandbox and began cursing beneath his breath.


    Four of the five missions that had failed were ones that he had given out. Even he had to be frustrated at the sheer coincidence of so many of his tasks failing. He felt as if he had just lost face.


    Ummah retook a good look. Chillwind, Silverspring Mines, Xavia Castle, the Stone Tower of Ilgr, and Alexston City. Those were all worldly territories or resource sites thaty outside of the Crimson n¡¯s core dominion. Supposedly, the forces sent by the Fabres n to each of these locations should have been several times that of the enemy. The chances of failure should not have been so high.


    Ummah picked up the shattered pieces located at Xavia Castle and immediately identified the adepts based on the extinguished magical symbols. With his authority as a core adept of the n, he quickly managed to connect to the spiritual frequency of that adept party.


    ¡°This is Adept Ummah from headquarters. Is there anyone still alive from the Crystal Spear squad?¡±


    ......


    Ummah had to repeat the same mental message several times to obtain a response.


    ¡°Lord Ummah, hurry...hurry ande...save us.¡±


    Judging from the spiritual frequency, it was an apprentice adept who replied. However, he appeared to be running away as fast as he could. The message was choppy and experiencing severe interference.


    ¡°I don¡¯t care who you are. Speak, who did you run into? Why did the mission fail?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s...the bug adept...it¡¯s...aah!¡±


    The apprentice let out a pained cry before he could finish.


    The connection cut off.


    Bug Adept. The core Second Grade Bug Adept Billis of the Crimson n?


    Ummah¡¯s forehead twisted into a frown.


    If it were that guy, then it would be a lot harder to execute the missions that came after.


    Since the incident urred in an area that Ummah was responsible for, the other Third Grade adepts smiled and ignored the situation. Only Adept Linus, who was close to Ummah, couldn¡¯t help but send a voice transmission, ¡°How is it? Do you need help?¡±


    Ummah rejected without any expression on his face.


    It was just a skirmish on the outskirts. As a veteran adept of the Fabres n, he had more than enough subordinates at his disposal. There was no need for him to request assistance from the other Third Grade adepts. If he did so, he would beughed at by the others.


    ¡°What¡¯s the situation on your end?¡± Ummah couldn¡¯t help but reply with a question of his own.


    The Tower of Ilgr was an area that Linus was responsible for. That was why Ummah had asked the question.


    ¡°A Second Grade blood dragon appeared and exterminated all the people I sent there. I¡¯m thinking of a way to trap and y it!¡± Frustration appeared on Adept Linus¡¯ face as he spoke, ¡°What about you?¡±


    Ummah picked up the broken chess pieces from the other three areas, his face as ck as ink.


    ¡°Dammit! It¡¯s the bug adept, the dragonborn, and that damned goblin. The core Second Grades of the Crimson n are all on my side of the battlefield.¡± It was only natural that he was so resentful. It was such a vast battlefield, yet the core fighting forces of the enemy were all creating trouble in the areas for which he was responsible. It was a tough nut to swallow.


    ¡°Bug Adept Billis? Be careful. That guy is bad news. Ordinary Second Grade adepts have no means of fighting against his insect army. It¡¯s easy for Third Grades like you and me to defeat him, but killing him is a lot more difficult.¡± The still furious Linus couldn¡¯t help but rejoice at his own fortune after hearing Ummah¡¯s reply.


    A soul adept was the most suited opponent for a person like the bug adept, who had countless clones. With the mastery of a soul adept searching for souls, they would be able to find Billis¡¯ true soul form in the horde of thousands of insects. Then, they could give him a lethal strike and leave no chance for his clones to escape.


    However, Ummah had no Second Grade soul adept subordinate to him. After some hesitation, he had no choice but to lower himself and ask for help from his other panions.¡¯


    He borrowed a Second Grade soul adept from another Third Grade adept and sent his own Second Grade elementium adept underling as assistance. Two against one and with a soul adept to counter the bug adept should give them more than an eighty percent chance to win the fight.


    Thus, sixty-seven seconds after failing hisst mission, Ummah ced a new chess piece at the location of Xavia Castle. A detailed series of orders were then transmitted down themand chain.


    ............


    Xavia Castle.


    The once quiet and beautiful castle had vanished now.


    Twisted corpses could still be seen strewn all over the copsed walls and damaged castle, lying in puddles of blood. Some of these were soldiers of the castle, others were the guards of the attacking adepts, and some were even apprentice adepts in gray robes.


    They died from various causes, but they had all now been turned into the incubation chambers of strange beetles.


    The abdomens of the corpses were bloated tremendously, their skin stretched to the limit, as thin as paper. The red blood solution inside their bodies was visible. Some hive-like insect eggs could be asionally be seen as the liquid swirled in their stomachs.


    Some strange gnawing sound could also be heard as well!


    Beng. Beng. Beng.


    As the hatching process concluded, the stomachs of the corpses erupted. Red, viscous fluid flooded the ground as swarms of ckrvae climbed out from within.


    These ckrvae were only the size of a fingernail. They shook their bodies and cast off the blood and flesh before opening their tough shells and extending two pairs of wings, one short and one long. The wings buzzed, and they took off into the air.


    For a moment, so many ck beetles rose from the ground that it appeared as if a ck plume of smoke was rising from the ruins of the castle.


    As an unseen spiritual shockwave spread out throughout the castle, the ck smoke split into two clouds. A portion of the beetles flew into the castle¡¯s various dark and damp spots, while the rest dove into the ground and vanished in the blink of an eye.


    Billis did not linger at the castle after aplishing all this. He led his personal army of seven Second Grade Void Reavers and thirty First Grade magical mantises and left brazenly.


    Billis had no intention of bringing the insects he had hatched at the castle with him. Instead, he had them hide within the castle. Thest order Billis gave them before leaving was to exterminate all lifeforms that breached it.


    Theckeys of the Fabres n would definitely send people to investigate the ce. When that happened, his insects would give them a warm wee.


    However, just seven minutes after Billis left the castle, the insects he left behind engaged inbat.


    Billis paused when he sensed the rapidly vanishing mental nodes, just one and a half kilometers away. He turned and looked at the distant battlefield.


    There were two enemies: one male and one female. Both were powerful Fabres n adepts.


    The male adept had a cold face. Light touches of frost gathered around the adept¡¯s face and at the tips of his fingers. He was an ice adept. The reason Billis¡¯ insect army had died so quickly was due to this elementium adept. The female adept had a slender figure and a pretty face. Her eyes radiated such powerful spiritual might that one would rather not stare into them.


    Billis had originally intended to spy on the two adepts through the eyes of the insects, but when he crossed eyes with the female adept, he felt his eyes burn and his head throb in pain, even from one kilometer away.


    Something even more terrifying came next. The female adept seemed to have locked onto the aura of Billis¡¯ soul through his eyes. She coldly shouted at him, ¡°You will not escape!¡±

 Chapter 993 - Clan Crisis

    <strong>Chapter 993 n Crisis</strong>


    Dammit! Second Grade Fabres adepts!


    Billis would have nothing to fear if they were just ordinary Second Grade adepts. However, he had a bad omen during that one instant where they crossed eyes. Billis had a feeling that he would be in big trouble if he tried fighting.


    Adepts had always trusted their instincts above all else.


    Even with his savage nature, Billis couldn¡¯t help but shiver in fright when he thought of the chilling stare from that female adept. Without any hesitation, Billis climbed on top of a particrly sizeable magical mantis. He led his personal guard into the forest, sprinting toward the core region of the Crimson n as quickly as he could.


    Meanwhile, all the swarms hiding in the nearby region charged out from underground under his orders and rushed towards Xavia Castle. Though these insects couldn¡¯t possibly threaten the two Third Grade adepts, they could slightly dy their pursuit.


    Of course, Billis couldn¡¯t care less about the losses to his insect army.


    ............


    In the end, those among the Crimson adepts who could strike with such recklessness and wild abandon like Billis were only a minority.


    The other Crimson Second Grades had all sessfullypleted the missions entrusted to them. However, they were all being pursued by powerful Fabres adepts in their process of retreating to headquarters.


    Dragonborn Zacha was responsible for clearing up the enemies in Silverspring Mines.


    The ce was a vital mine for rare metals. It made up for nearly forty percent of the Crimson n¡¯s rare metal needs. The reason Zacha had gone to Silverspring was to oversee the stationed adepts temporarily shutdown of the mine, as well as bring back thest three months of resources back to the n.


    The forces sent by the Fabres n to raid Silverspring consisted of four First Grade adepts. It would have been an easy task to defeat the only First Grade Crimson adept stationed there. Unfortunately, they ran into the dragonborn. As such, they barely managed to escape with one dead, one severely injured, and two slightly wounded.


    Of course, all the apprentice adepts and guards they brought with them had died at Zacha¡¯s hands.


    While Zacha was leading the mining party back to the n¡¯s core region, they were intercepted by a pursuing party of Fabres adepts at Deadwind Pass.


    The Fabres n hadmitted plenty of resources to take down dragonborn Zacha. They had sent as many as three Second Grade adepts to intercept him.


    The two forces shed in a bloody battle at Deadwind Pass, concluding with the defeat of the Crimson adepts!


    All of the low-grade Crimson adepts and apprentices died, while Dragonborn Zacha broke through with severe injuries and fled to the Crimson n¡¯s core region.


    At the same time, all of the n adepts that the Crimson n had sent to the various territories were ambushed and intercepted by Fabres n adepts. As the enemy had plenty of forces to spare, most of these battles ended with the victory of the Fabres n.


    The Crimson n had paid a heavy price to coordinate the retreat of their n members and resources!


    A Second Grade blood dragon, a Second Grade vampire, and seven First Grade adepts. Even with the explosive growth of the Crimson n over the past few decades, such a heavy blow still hurt the n to its very core.


    In particr, the vampire faction had suffered the heaviest losses!


    Vampire adepts were strange beings that were nearly unkible when battling against weaker creatures. However, for the knowledgeable and prepared adept, there were dozens of ways by which to properly kill them.


    Due to the difference in strength between the two ns, the Crimson n had already lost four Second Grades since the start of the war. All of these losses came from the vampire faction. Though the Fabres n had lost a much more concerning number of adepts, all of these casualties were peripheral First Grade adepts. Not a single core Second Grade adept of the n had fallen in the line of battle yet.


    The severe casualties of Mary¡¯s subordinates exceedingly infuriated her. She personally went out and hunted down two Second Grade Fabres n adepts. However, in doing so, her location was immediately confirmed by the Fabres n.


    Four Third Grade Fabres adeptsbined forces, ambushing Mary on her way back to headquarters and severely wounding her.


    As a result, the only Third Grade adept of the Crimson n had lost her ability to fight.


    The resistance against the Fabres invasion was weakened even further.


    If it weren¡¯t out of fear of the Crimson n¡¯s terrifying Fourth Grade magical golem dragon and their two Motherships, the Fabres n would haveunched an invasion of the Crimson n¡¯s core region the moment Mary escaped with her cruel injuries.


    However, as the stationed forces of the Crimson n were recalled back from the various regions, the two hundred and fifty-kilometer wide region with Fire Throne and Pinecone Town at its center had now be an imprable stronghold. There were enough magical machines to patrol and defend the entire area.


    The Fabres n had tried sending adepts to scout the enemy territory several times, but the magical machines always repelled them. Though both parties were suffering casualties, it was obvious that the Fabres n was sustaining more considerable damage.


    After all, the lives of their precious adepts were being traded for those cheap yet powerful magical machines!


    Moreover, there was no doubt that the number of Crimson n magical machines had reached a truly shocking level.


    It was often said that the Crimson n held a Goblin ne with tremendous amounts of metal ore within their grasp. The Goblin ne had both resources and low-cost technicians, which allowed for arge number of magical machines to be constantly sent to the n.


    These magical machines were the Crimson n¡¯s first line of offense during all these years of outward expansion!


    One could frankly im that the magical machines had won a great half of all the resources and territories that the Crimson n had obtained. Otherwise, given the current quality and quantity of the Crimson n, surviving through such a brutal and savage adept war would have been no more than a dream.


    The Crimson n had managed to catch up with the hundreds of years of umtion of otherrge ns in a matter of three to four decades. How did they aplish such a feat? Precisely through these dedicated and loyal magical machines!


    The Crimson n was now facing an existential crisis. All of the n adepts and apprentices had retreated to Fire Throne and were arming themselves to the teeth like a hedgehog. With that being the case, the ones who were roaming outside and keeping the enemy at bay out of fear of their might were these fearless and reliable magical machines!


    The Crimson n was defending as well as waiting. They waited for the return of that legendary person, waiting for the Fabres n to retreat after they had exhausted all of their strength.


    The Fabres n might be powerful and influential, but they weren¡¯t entirely without enemies.


    When they assigned most of the n¡¯s forces to the Ailovis region to wage war against the Crimson n, the defenses of the n headquarters became correspondingly weaker.


    No enemy would dare to strike so quickly in the short term, given the might and fear that the name of the Fabres nmanded. However, if the main force of the n were tied up in the war against the Crimson n for extended periods, idents would ur.


    Perhaps having learned their lesson from the adept alliance that was defeated by the Crimson n during thest war, the Fabres n chose a slow and steady approach. They forced the Crimson n to retreat to their headquarters with a shy and thunderous show of force. They then started constructing a sturdy outpost thirty-five kilometers to the south of Pinecone City.


    What worried the higher-ups of the Crimson n was the fact that the Fabres n continued to transportrge amounts of resources even after the outpost had beenpleted. It seemed as if they intended to construct an adept¡¯s tower on the spot.


    The Crimson n might not be that concerned if the Fabres n was only constructing an outpost. However, building an adept¡¯s tower right at their doorstep was pushing it too far!


    If they didn¡¯t disrupt the construction, and the Fabres¡¯ tower was allowed to be operational, then the Crimson n would have an incredibly hard time fighting their way out of their headquarters. As such, even though they knew they were no match, the Crimson n still organized an army of magical machines and struck at the enemy¡¯s outpost during the night.


    Even the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon joined the fray.


    Unfortunately, the Fabres n seemed to be expecting the attack. With the temporary outpost as their stronghold, they fought a brilliant defensive battle and exterminated the near one thousand magical machines that the Crimson n had thrown at them. In the end, the Crimson adeptsmanding the battle managed to return under cover of the magical golem dragon.


    Though the Crimson n had suffered heavy losses, they had also sessfully destroyed the adept¡¯s tower with the might of the magical golem dragon while only the foundation had been built. The Fabres n would have to spend another additional month if they wanted to transport the necessary materials and workforce to reconstruct the adept¡¯s tower.


    It created extremely beneficial conditions for Greem¡¯s sessful return!


    ............


    Henvic ne.


    After exterminating the hunter adepts, Greem had finally obtained his long-awaited ¡®freedom¡¯!


    Greem stayed in Remi¡¯s base for eight days. Apart from treating the severe injuries on himself, Greem also thoroughly dissected de Princess Katherine.


    The elementium magical machine wasn¡¯t as powerful as he expected it to be. As such, Greem was searching for ways to improve itsbat capabilities. The agility of Katherine¡¯s odd semi-mechanical form undoubtedly drew Greem¡¯s envy. Greem couldn¡¯t wait to understand and investigate the root causes of the mechanical adept¡¯s power.


    Afterparing the internal construction of Katherine and the elementium magical machine, Greem finally obtained a preliminary answer.


    Compared to Katherine, the elementium magical machine appeared like an ordinary factory-set machine. Its internal construction and energy system were assembled in a coordinated and well-rounded fashion. There were no apparent weaknesses at all. Meanwhile, Katherine¡¯s mechanical body was a tter of flesh and mechanical parts. It did not pursue bnce or well-roundedness but focused on partial strengthening and enhancement of specific organs.


    Most of the time, Katherine¡¯s offensive power was not as tremendous orsting as the elementium magical machine. However, when select mechanical organs functioned beyond their standard capacity, Katherine could unleash offensive power far beyond what the elementium magical machine was capable of for an incredibly short burst of time.


    Of course, this burst of power came at the cost of the lifespan of the mechanical organs!


    That was why most mechanical adepts had no choice but to carry plenty of metal with them, such that they could repair the damage to their organs at any time.


    One design was powerful and stable, while the other had shocking explosive power. For a moment, even Greem couldn¡¯t decide which model of operation was the superior one.

 Chapter 994 - Greems Ambitions

    Chapter 994 Greem¡¯s Ambitions


    In all honesty, the core of mechanical adepts¨Cthe mechanical heart¨Cwas very simr to an animated metal lifeform with its own consciousness.


    Not only could it integrate all the surrounding mechanical parts, but it could also wholly assimte itself into the energy cirction system of the human body, which used flesh and nerves as the foundations of its construction. From this aspect, the mechanical heart appeared to be much more like a parasitic existence, very much the same as the puppet insects that adepts used when creating flesh puppets.


    The only difference was that puppet insects parasitized experiment subjects, while mechanical hearts found their homes within the bodies of adepts.


    Mechanical hearts were capable of growing, as well.


    However, the nutrition they required for growth was entirely different from what the human body needed. It demanded arge number of rare adept resources and magical materials. Moreover, the conflict between the mechanical adept system and the adept¡¯s original body could only be dyed but never eliminated.


    A human¡¯s bloodline and nerves were still far too frailpared to machinery. Any impurities introduced into the body could break the delicate bnce that had originally existed.


    If human bodies were that frail, why was it that mechanical adepts were willing to repeatedly modify themselves upon those weak foundations instead of constructing an actual mechanical body for themselves?


    It had to do with a human¡¯s original system of energy advancement!


    Animated lifeforms constructed of pure metal might be powerful, but they faced tremendous difficulty in advancing. Moreover, once a human soul was transnted into a body of steel, their souls wouldck the necessary nourishment of life energy and begin to wither with every passing day. That made it even more difficult for an adept to continue improving themselves, unlike if they had a human body.


    Their obsession with the mechanical heart gave them greatbat prowess, but they had to rely on their flesh and blood organs to sustain these mechanical parts that had such a high demand for energy. Consequently, most mechanical adepts spent much of their time seeking a bnce between power and their own human advancement system!


    However, the concerns of the mechanical adepts did not apply to Greem.


    He didn¡¯t intend to modify himself beyond recognition. The sole reason behind his research on mechanical adepts was to improve the elementium magical machine; to make it stronger and more offensively capable.


    After thoroughly researching the de Princess, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by the ingenious ideas of the mechanical adepts.


    Katherine¡¯s mechanical eyebined multiple unique abilities, including low-light vision, elementium sight, dynamic movement capture, and many others. She had been able to perceive everything normally under any conditions during battle without needing to cast spells. Moreover, she could use her ¡®eye¡¯ alone to observe the flow of elementium around the enemy, along with any more subtle or inconspicuous movements they made.


    The metal brain shell she had modified possessed the ability to magnify thoughts and senses, allowing her to freely manipte the metal des as if they were part of her body. As long as she wasn¡¯t too far away from the disc-des, she could use her thoughts alone to alter and control the trajectory of the des to achieve the effect of explosive strikes.


    Meanwhile, Katherine¡¯s body had undergone multiple modifications ofpound mechanical spells. All sorts of strange alloy tes could be found beneath her smooth and firm skin. Whenever she was attacked, the first to be damaged would be the metal armor that she wore on the outside.


    If the might of the attack exceeded the limits of the metal armor, the remainder of the damage would be split between her flesh and the alloy tes hidden underneath her skin. The impact of the strike would be spread across the surroundings through a strange means of vibration.


    That made Katherine¡¯s physical and elementium resistance to be shockingly high. It had allowed her to endure the enemy¡¯s onught of spells while she charged to their side and unleashed her fury of steel and metal.


    Of course, such a means of attack left Katherine¡¯s body in a constant state of damage that incessantly required replenishment. These replenishments included repairing the metal damage done to the mechanicalponents, as well as healing the harm to her flesh.


    As such, de Princess Katherine requiredrge amounts of fresh meat and metal solutions in her daily diet!


    A living human adept would have to devour bloody, raw meat and drink pungent metal reconciling agents daily. The life of a mechanical adept pursuing strength was not one that could be endured by those with weak wills.


    Greem had obtained quite a few pieces of high-grade magical equipment from the hunter adepts.


    However, most of these items were created based on their strengths and weaknesses. Greem would have to return them to the forge and tweak them slightly if he wanted to use them. On the other hand, the auxiliary and support essories could be put into use immediately.


    Most of the magical essories enhanced the body¡¯s power to some degree. Unfortunately, a human adept could not enhance their physical body or their Spirit infinitely.


    For instance, the Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring that Greem wore already provided a +5 bonus to his Strength. As such, the +3 bonus offered by the Fire Throne set would be eclipsed by the Holy Ring. If Greem didn¡¯t find ways to refine his physical prowess and increase the limits of his Strength, then he would not be able to enjoy the tremendous benefits of stacking bonuses from both items.


    It was most practical and effective for an adept to improve their own bodily attributes. As for the idea of creating a powerful adept just by arming a person full of high-grade magical equipment? That was no more than an extremely childish andughable thought.


    Now that Greem had the +5 bonus Strength from Sodden¡¯s Holy Strength, all the magical essories that improved Strength were meaningless. Meanwhile, the +3 points of Physique provided by Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring left Greem with some space for more enhancement.


    However, this space was quickly filled by the Physique enhancement of the Fire Throne set.


    Moreover, now that Greem¡¯s Spirit had reached 37 points, any additional equipment bonuses would no longer be effective past 39 points. Thus, he took off one or two pieces of essories that improved his Spirit to reduce the burden on his mind.


    In doing so, his Strength, Physique, and Spirit had all reached the limits of his current body. Agility was the only attribute that still had significant room for improvement.


    ¡°Chip, disy my current bodily attributes.¡±


    [Beep! Scan starting. Host¡¯s bodily attributes are as follows:


    [Greem. Advanced Third Grade.


    Profession: Elementium Adept.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 18+5 (13) | Physique: 21+4 (11) | Agility 11+1 (7) | Spirit 37+2 (32).


    Profession Skills: Body of mes, me Fiend¡¯s Body, Fire Clone.


    [Host¡¯s body condition: Severely Injured. Note: Attributes in brackets refer to the upper limit of host¡¯s current capabilities!]


    These attributes were nothingpared to the more powerful of the high-magic species, but they were first-rate amongst adepts of the same grade.


    Twenty-three points of Strength meant that he could match a beginner Second Grade body-refining adept in a contest of power. That said, if he were to engage a body-refining adept in a melee fight, his terrible fighting skills would cause him to lose horribly. After all, eleven points of base Agility might be barely enough for a Third Grade elementium adept, but it was utterly inadequate in a proper melee.


    Power, amongst the adepts, was, is, and always would be rtive. There was no such thing as absolute power!


    Such Strength and Physique made Greem a fearsome primordial monster whenpared to an ordinary human. However,pared to a body-refining adept of the same grade, Greem would be like an infant whose baby teeth had yet to all fall out.


    Greem shook his head at the thought of this. He then gathered all the equipment scattered across the floor and stood up to exit the cave.


    There was a small stone tform outside the cave. A thickyer of scattered bonesy atop the tform. It was obvious that this was where a powerful magical creature once enjoyed its meals. If one were to stand upon the tform and look into the distance, they would find that this ce was located in a vast and endless sea of ancient trees.


    Only a stretch of green could be seen no matter where you looked.


    Unfortunately, ever since this ce became the home of the gue army, the sounds of singing birds and insects could no longer be heard. There was only silence apart from the whistling of the wind through the trees.


    However, Greem didn¡¯t seem to care about this. He stood at the edge of the tform and closed his eyes to listen for that strange, vague sound in the distance.


    He wasn¡¯t listening for the winds or the rustling of the leaves, but the faint message transmitted back from thousands of kilometers away by his fire runes.


    ¡°Remi.¡±


    ¡°Here!¡±


    As Greem called his name, Spirit of Pestilence Remi silently appeared beside him.


    ¡°Take your gue army and go east!¡± Greem gazed at the distant horizon with brooding eyes, ¡°Keep heading east and destroy all cities and viges along the way.¡±


    ¡°What is the target of my attack?¡± Remi asked out of curiosity.


    ¡°Jymeria City!¡±


    ¡°Jymeria? That¡¯s the capital of the Zambez Empire!¡±


    ¡°Yes, the capital. Make as much of amotion as you can, but be careful. Remember, you are allowed to abandon the mission and flee when you run into a Fourth Grade Holy Knight. Until them, your mission is to expand the gue army as best as you can and draw the attention of the enemy.¡±


    Remi¡¯s ghostly green eyes rolled about. He basically understood Greem¡¯s intentions fully now.


    He giggled at Greem and summoned his giant gue beast. He leaped on top of the creature along with the old poison witch and charged down the cliff.


    The trees surrounding the cliff started to tremble, and the leaves began to sway. A horde of gue creatures silently started sprinting through the woods, instantly forming a horrifying tide of gue beasts around Greem.


    Once the gue creatures had left, Greem pulled his robe up to hide his face before turning and striding southeast.


    Supposedly, an adventure and exploration of Henvic ne should have lost all meaning after Greem obtained the corpse of the starbeast. He should have returned to the n as soon as possible. However, considering the nourishment that the strange holy lights provided his Spirit, Greem felt like it wasn¡¯t toote to make a big haul before leaving.


    It was important to note that Greem would need at least two to three hundred years of work to increase his 37 points of Spirit to 39 points after he returned to the World of Adepts. On the other hand, he only needed to ughter some harmless holy knights here to be able to aplish the same thing. Why wouldn¡¯t he do that instead!?


    The reason he had sent out Remi and the gue army was to distract and draw away the two damned Fourth Grade Holy Knights. He would take this chance to ughter the low and intermediate-grade holy knights to collect sufficient holy light for his advancement to Fourth Grade.

 Chapter 995 - The Pitiful Witches

    Chapter 995 The Pitiful Witches


    One had to admit that Greem¡¯s perception of time appeared to have be different from an ordinary person¡¯s since bing an adept.


    Thest time he met Catherine, she had only been an ordinary trainee knight that he had spared. She had to use all her strength to be able to stand up straight before him.


    Yet now, she had be an Iron Knight respected and admired by all!


    It was this fact that caused Greem to realize that five years had passed in the blink of an eye.


    For Greem, these five years had been nothing but a slightly drawn-out fight between him and the hunter adepts. However, for other people, five years was enough for them to experience the significant milestones of their lives.


    Regardless of how quickly Catherine¡¯s power could have grown, she couldn¡¯t possibly have sensed the fire rune that Greem had subtly inserted in her body.


    Over the past five years, the fire rune had been transmitting countless bits of fragmented information back to Greem. However, he had ignored the information of his own ord. He had been busy fighting the hunter adepts. He couldn¡¯t possibly have had the time to examine the developmental journey of a mere trainee knight.


    However, having dealt with his enemies, Greem finally had the time to pick up the line that was Catherine. He immediately understood everything that had transpired in the past few years through the information stored in the Chip¡¯s data library.


    ckmountain City?


    Catherine was currently located in ckmountain City to the south of the Zambez Empire.


    It seemed like a den of Deceit Witch remnants had been discovered there. The holy knights were trying their best to rally their forces to capture all of them in a single attack.


    ording to the vague information ryed back from Catherine, the witch¡¯s base seemed to be managed by two Third Grade Deceit Witches. They had already beaten back several attacks from the holy knights, and the two forces had battled furiously in the forests, deserts, and swamps around ckmountain City. The war had already raged on for a substantially long time.


    For some reason, the two Fourth Grade Holy Knights that had been hurrying towards the battlefield suddenly turned around. It forced the holy knights to remain in a stalemate against the sly and sinister otherworldly witches, despite having superior numbers and having fought for over two months.


    As one of the aces of the new generation of Iron Knights, Catherine had performed exceedingly well in the battle against the witches. She had already personally ¡®purified¡¯ five witch believers, along with countless evil voodoo beasts.


    There were seven Third Grade Gold Knights within the army sieging the witches. That was what caught most of Greem¡¯s attention.


    He knew very well that the two Holy Knights must still be close to Gangsas Volcano at the moment. If Remi¡¯s gue army were to suddenlyunch an invasion on the Zambez Empire, the two Holy Knights would most definitely choose to exterminate these newfound enemies.


    When that happened, there would be no Fourth Grade Holy Knights holding the line anywhere near ckmountain City in the south.


    That battlefield would then be the best ce for Greem to freely collect all the holy light souls that he desired.


    As for whether this n would benefit the Deceit Witches? Clearly, that wasn¡¯t Greem¡¯s main focus or priority!


    ............


    Witherwood Valley.


    Six Deceit Witches wrapped in ck cloaks were gathered around a campfire inside a well-hidden cave, discussing a matter in hushed voices.


    ¡°We don¡¯t have much time left,¡± A one-armed witch said solemnly, ¡°The holy knights after us might have been lured to Raven Hill, but they wille to their senses eventually. If they turned around and increased the intensity of their search, the illusion array ced outside Witherwood Valley won¡¯t be able to buy too much time!¡±


    The one-armed witch might have been exining the situation and her analysis of it, but her eyes were fixed upon the tall witch that sat in front of them all. It wasn¡¯t just her. All the other witches present in the cave stared at the witch and waiting for her orders.


    The tall witch started coughing the moment she opened her mouth. The sound of her hoarse and wheezing voice was painful to hear, and her withered and scrawny chest rose and fell intensely. It took her a long time to calm the rampaging magical energy within her body.


    ¡°What is the situation at Mistvale?¡± Finally, she spoke.


    ¡°The holy knights broke through seven hours ago.¡± A witch with a head full of white hair said in a soft voice.


    ¡°And our sisters?¡±


    ¡°Two of them have died. The only survivor is already moving west. Judging from thest message she transmitted, the situation is not good!¡±


    ¡°Soulburial Swamp?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s been three days since thestmunication.¡± The voice of the white-haired witch turned softer and softer, ¡°I¡¯m afraid.¡±


    The faces of the witches all turned dark.


    Once upon a time, they had all been powerful adepts that reigned supreme across all the major nes. Now, after their witch¡¯s tower had been destroyed by the nar natives, they had be no more than street rats, hated and pursued by every being in this world. Such humiliation was enough to drive one to insanity.


    Ever since the tower was razed, their group of witches had been closely pursued by the holy knights like a pack of mad dogs.


    For the sake of preserving their strength and power, the remaining twenty Deceit Witches had no choice but to scatter. They hid from the holy knights and went into hiding around ckwater City.


    They had barely managed to regain their footing near ckmountain City. They created five secret hiding spots around the area, each protected with numerous defensive arrays, giving them a chance to rest and lick their wounds.


    Unfortunately, just two to three monthster, the holy knights arrived like sharks who smelled blood in the water. From the peak of the tallest mountains to the deepest abyss and valley, the holy knights would find the witches wherever they hid and ¡®purify¡¯ them one by one.


    Supposedly, those who could escape from the siege of the holy knights were all powerful witches in their own right. The number of Second Grade Deceit Witches was much higher than that of an ordinary party of witches. Unfortunately, even the most powerful witch would be much less powerful once she had lost all reinforcements, exhausted all her magical materials, and broke all her magical equipment.


    Even the most powerful of Second and Third Grade witches could be worn down to their deaths if theycked resources!


    In addition, there were simply too many holy knights. Their numbers were shocking, and each of them lunged forward vigorously after the one before them had fallen. Not a single one of them feared death. More terrifyingly, the number of high-grade holy knights pursuing the witches was no fewer than the Deceit Witches themselves.


    Consequently, the twenty-three witches from three months ago had been reduced to just twelve witches. The number of Deceit Witches had reached a tragic low. The ones who had caused all this were the damned knights that still pursued them stubbornly across the world.


    There were originally two Third Grade witches stationed in Henvic ne. One of them had already died at the hands of the Fourth Grade Holy Knight when their tower was broken. The other Third Grade witch, who had escaped with injuries, was the current leader of this discussion¨C the tall witch, Tess Xinnaya.


    She had been shed by a Fourth Grade Holy Knight while she was escaping, destroying more than half of her chest. If it weren¡¯t for the high-grade potions that she carried with her, she would have already died.


    However, the past few years of constant hiding and running left her no time to search for suitable ingredients or potions to treat her wounds. Consequently, though Tess Xinnaya had survived the attack, she had also been left with severe side-effects. As she currently was, she could only fight at the level of an intermediate Second Grade.


    If she unleashed power beyond the limit that this broken body could bear, the life system that was barely being maintained would copse in an instant. Given their currentck of medications, it would spell her death.


    As such, Tess Xinnaya¡¯s heart became filled with sorrow and panic upon hearing this string of bad news.


    She finally managed to take hold of her emotions after a long pause. She then opened her mouth to ask, ¡°And Tower Master Italil?¡±


    She might not be able to live up to her rank as a Third Grade now, but Witch Italil, who had been sent to reinforce them, was still a true Third Grade witch. Italil had met up with them while they were on the run.


    However, they resented her failure to save them. The loss of the magical array repair materials was the main reason for the fall of the witch¡¯s tower. As such, the stationed witches became dissatisfied with Witch Italil and refused to listen to her orders.


    Upon hearing Witch Tess¡¯ question, the other witches looked at each other. It seemed like none of them had any clue about the whereabouts of Witch Italil.


    Only the white-haired witch hesitated for a moment before speaking, ¡°Adept Italil seemed to have received a magical message yesterday. She only exined that she was going to meet a friend before leaving in a hurry. She did not ry her specific destination.¡±


    The faces of the witches immediately turned.


    ¡°Ilya, have you gone senile? Italil couldn¡¯t possibly have any friends here!¡± The one-armed witch said furiously, concern and worry written all over her face.


    The white-haired witch was surprised for a moment but immediately understood the situation, ¡°Are you are worried that she will betray us? That¡¯s not possible, is it? She is a witch! Those natives will never let her go.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Look at where we are now, and yet, you are still so childish. If she really intended to save us, she would never have left those crucial materials with that bitch Rena!¡±


    The words of the one-armed witch instantly drew the agreement of the other witches. They couldn¡¯t help but start cursing angrily.


    ¡°Lady Tess, we cannot hesitate any longer. Let us move now! Otherwise...¡±


    Just as they were talking amongst themselves, the witches¡¯ expressions changed as they all turned to look at the entrance of the cave.


    The defensive arrays they had ced outside Witherwood Valley had been triggered by someone. Judging from how quickly the person had passed through the arrays, it could only be Witch Italil, who held the same authority over the arrays as the rest of them.


    They might not be concerned if Italil was the only one returning. More importantly, the feedback from the arrays revealed that a stranger had followed Italil into Witherwood Valley.


    A stranger? In this ursed ne where only pursuers and hostiles roamed thend, strangers only meant enemies and enemies meant fighting and sacrifice. How many sisters had they sacrificed in Henvic ne over all these years?


    All the witches couldn¡¯t help but get nervous when they sensed a familiar life aura heading straight for the cave.


    Who was it that Italil had brought with her? Was it a friend or a foe?

 Chapter 996 - Teleportation Quota

    Chapter 996 Teleportation Quota


    The stranger who stepped into the cave with Italil was exceptionally tall.


    A thick ck cloak with a hood hid most of the stranger¡¯s body. Not a trace of skin was even exposed.


    A pair of eyes containing a strange ¡®power¡¯ stared out from under the shadow of the hood, singing and burning all who looked upon them. All the witches looking at the stranger¡¯s eyes had no choice but to look away. Some of the weaker witches even felt their eyeballs hurt as tears welled up and blurred their vision.


    Though the witches were somewhat intimidated by this, their reactions were calm andposed. There was even a trace of joy on their faces.


    The identity of the stranger might be unknown, but the power they used clearly belonged to the system of adepts.


    That was the main reason why the witches felt a trace of relief!


    ¡°Sisters, put your staffs away! Allow me to introduce an esteemed guest.¡± Italil was aposed middle-aged witch, but even she had a trace of excitement on her face now.


    However, before she could continue, the tall and scrawny Witch Tess had already stood out from the crowd and said, ¡°This must be Sir Greem from the Crimson n!¡±


    A strange smile appeared on the stranger¡¯s face beneath the shadow of the hood. He said with a jovial voice, ¡°I¡¯m very honored to meet you, Lady Tess!¡±


    The stranger took off his hood, and a handsome male face appeared before the witches.


    Well-defined facial lines, the corners of the mouth curled slightly upwards, thick eyebrows, majestic and unusual ck eyes, along with that dark red hair running down his back. The guest¡¯s face couldn¡¯t be considered handsome; it was only ordinary, at best.


    However, his eyes had amanding and powerful force in them. Tremendous confidence also radiated from the corners of his eyes. All this caused his face to carry a different sense of beauty to it.


    As a Third Grade witch, Tess naturally saw and sensed far more than the other witches did.


    She could very clearly ¡®see¡¯ that Greem had a pair of powerful ck eyes. Small crimson specks could be seen around the ck pupil, like tiny, beautiful diamonds of fire. Even with her spiritual resistance, Tess felt traces of burning pain in her Spirit when she looked into Greem¡¯s eyes. That meant the powers of fire within Greem¡¯s body were powerful enough to transmit power through consciousness alone.


    Moreover, his dark red hair wasn¡¯t his original hair color, either. It was an unintentional result from the overflowing fire energy within his body radiating outwards. If he could cross the threshold of elementium and step into the level of narws, all of these external changes would gradually vanish.


    However, those who could manipte the power ofws freely were all Great Adepts that had exceeded the limits of the ne. One would have to be at least Fifth Grade to gain total control over the narws¡¯ power. The extremely well-respected Fourth Grade adepts of the World of Adept had only just barelye into contact with the most surface-level applications of the narws. They still had a long journey to travel before they reach true mastery of thews.


    The witches immediately realized who the mysterious guest was upon seeing his face and hearing Witch Tess call out his name.


    Five years ago, when Rena traveled through the nar rift, she was apanied by another person, aside from Witch Italil. It was an adept hired from outside the n. It seemed to have been this legendary adept.


    ording to Witch Tess¡¯ analysis, the reason that the reinforcement mission had failed was likely because of legendary fire adept. That was especially the case after Witch Italil described the great battle that broke out in Haisas City in detail. The witches were certain that Greem was the cause of the mission¡¯s failure.


    The witches had also heard of the unusual circumstances at Gangsas Volcano during their escape.


    Unfortunately, due to the intense pursuit of the holy knights and the tight perimeter enforced by the Zambez Empire around Gangsas Volcano, the witches had no chance of sneaking through to investigate or obtain more information.


    However, the Deceit Witches still managed to figure out what was happening at Gangsas Volcano through the holy knights they had managed to capture and enchant. Several adepts from another world were battling at Gangsas Volcano, though neither party could defeat the other, miring both in a stalemate.


    The Deceit Witches had felt incredibly frustrated when they heard of this news.


    Even though they didn¡¯t know the true cause-and-effect behind the whole event, they could still figure out that this ¡®uninvited disaster¡¯ probably had something to do with these mysterious adepts. Naturally, this meant that the legendary fire adept, who was the target of all these hunter adepts to begin with, became a target of the witches¡¯ resentment.


    That was why the faces of the Deceit Witches all turned dark upon meeting the culprit behind their defeat.


    ¡°Sir Greem, don¡¯t you have something you need to say now that you¡¯ve seen the current circumstances of us Deceit Witches?¡± Witch Tess coldly said, her face turning dark as she did so.


    Greem rubbed his nose awkwardly and put on a bitter smile, ¡°Lady Tess, I am also a victim in this incident, you know!¡±


    Tess was furious and was about to retort, but Italil stopped her.


    ¡°Tess, let the pass go. Now is the time we need to work together. Sir Greem has brought some good news back for us. I suggest you listen to him first!¡±


    ¡°What news is it?¡±


    ¡°...¡± Greem looked around the room and hesitated for a moment.


    ¡°Just speak. Everyone here is a sister in arms willing toy down their lives for each other. There is no reason to hide anything!¡± Tess said in a chilling tone.


    Italil once again betrayed an expression of humiliation and frustration.


    Greem wasn¡¯t particrly bothered by the request. He looked at the witches in the room and softly said, ¡°I have a way to leave Henvic ne. However, there is only enough space for four people!¡±


    The air in the cave froze.


    Surprise and joy appeared on the faces of all the witches when they heard the first half of Greem¡¯s sentence. However, when they heard that only four people could leave, sorrow and disappointment returned to their faces.


    ¡°You have a one-use internar teleportation array?¡± Witch Tess was an extremely experienced veteran witch. She had managed to guess the truth based on Greem¡¯s words alone.


    ¡°Indeed! There is only a quota of four for the teleportation, and I will need two of them!¡± There was no need to hide this fact, so Greem simply stated the truth.


    He needed one slot of the quota to return to the World of Adepts, while the other was left for Remi¡¯s old witch subordinate.


    Remi was a part of Greem¡¯s Soul Equipment. He could return to Greem¡¯s body during the teleportation and would not take up a slot in the quota for the process. However, the modified old poison witch was a genuine Third Grade gue creature. She couldn¡¯t do the same as Remi.


    Greem could only bring as many as two Deceit Witches with him when he left.


    Seeing how passionate Italil was, she had obviously concluded that one of the quota slots was hers, given her identity as a Third Grade witch. After all these subtractions, there was one quota slot left for the witches in front of them!


    Moreover, given the selfishness of the adepts, Greem would never just hand over the chance to save two lives to the Deceit Witches without a proper reward.


    Naturally, Greem¡¯s original intentions were to bring the two Third Grade witches back with him. That was the best way to minimize the damage and losses that the Deceit Witches would suffer in losing this nar war.


    The rest of the witches that remained only needed to scatter, hide, and wait for the next rescue team to arrive to be able to return to the World of Adepts. However, the most powerful witches amongst those who remained would only be at Second Grade. It was unknown whether the n was willing to pay a heavy price just to bring back a bunch of First and Second Grade adepts.


    As such, if they missed this opportunity, the witches who remained here would face the risk of permanently being stuck in Henvic ne.


    No rescue from their homeworld, no one to talk to, pursued and hounded by the holy knights for all eternity; that was the terrifying future that they could foresee!


    ¡°Rena is there.¡± Tess lifted her hand and pointed to the distance in the east.


    ¡°Rena?¡± Greem asked curiously. He had never expected that the first Second Grade witch to fall into the hands of the Zambez Empire had yet to die.


    Italil whispered a few words of exnation to him.


    It seemed like Rena was now being imprisoned in ckmountain City, to the east.


    She had be the most vicious traitor in the hands of the holy knights. All the information and secrets of the Deceit Witches were being provided to the holy knights. It was the information she provided that allowed the holy knights to so urately pursue and hunt down the Deceit Witches.


    Moreover, the holy knights had brought Rena from the capital to ckmountain City to catch the witch remnants hiding nearby. They used her familiarity with the habits of the Deceit Witches and their methods of interaction to slowly mp down on and restrict the witches¡¯ living space.


    It could be said that the witches¡¯ contempt for Rena was only second to their hatred for the holy knights pursuing them now!


    After a furious discussion between the witches, they finally came to an agreement with Greem.


    Greem would provide the Deceit Witches with two spaces for teleportation, while the Deceit Witches would have to help him strike a vicious assault on the holy knights. However, to Greem¡¯s absolute surprise, the two people due for teleportation decided by the witches were Witch Italil and a First Grade witch with decent talent.


    Witch Tess was actually refusing to leave!


    Moreover, she suggested that the witchesbine forces with Greem to rescue Witch Rena from ckmountain City.


    Naturally, the witches all opposed the suggestion, but they all fell silent once Tess exined her reasoning.


    The reason Tess refused to leave was to increase the weight of the witch forces remaining in Henvic ne.


    Otherwise, if only a group of First and Second Grade witches remained in Henvic ne, they would have a difficult time surviving the pursuit of the holy knights. More importantly, it would make it incredibly unlikely for the n to pay a heavy price to rescue them!


    If Tess remained in the ne, then considering the value of a Third Grade witch, the chances of a n rescue would significantly increase. Of course, if Witch Italil were also willing to stay behind, the witches would be even more confident in a rescue mission from the n.


    That said, everyone here knew that that would never happen!


    Of course, rescuing Rena was out of the same consideration as well.

 Chapter 997 - Prisoner Rena

    Chapter 997 Prisoner Rena


    ckmountain City.


    It was a majestic city built against a mountain.


    All the buildings inside the city were built with local cksteel stones, which were pitch-ck and harder than steel. ck city walls, ck buildings, ck castle. The entirety of ckmountain City was as harsh and tough as the people were.


    The natives living near ckmountain City were all diligent and honest people who had adapted to be exceedingly brave and ferocious in this harsh environment. They typically tilled the fields, barely harvesting enough food to fill their stomachs. When the farming season was over, they would form groups and go to the mountain to hunt. The prey they killed became the main source of meat for the mountain people.


    It was this unusual life of both farming and hunting that forged the sturdy bodies and incredible will of the mountain people. Every person that walked out of this mountain was an excellent warrior. As such, they were also the most wee group of individuals in the imperial army.


    Perhaps, when it was constructed, the architects of ckmountain City had never meant for it to be a beautiful mountain city with scenic views. Perhaps they only wanted to make it the most hardened and imprable fortress in the world. Consequently, the buildings within the town had none of the softness or extravagance of other cities. They were all castles, forts, and watchtowers that could be used for military purposes.


    Rena¡¯s ¡®room¡¯ was located on the highest level of a stone tower at the back of the main castle.


    The room was not only spacious but also had an excellent view of the outside world. Tall but narrow slits could be seen on all four walls. As there weren¡¯t any windows, the howling mountain winds could rush into the hall freely, whisking away any unsecured objects before escaping from the slit on the other side.


    Of course, they would always take thest trace of warmth in the room away with them as well!


    When night fell, the hall would be unusually cold. Even the hardy mountain people would freeze to death in a single night if they didn¡¯t have the proper gear.


    Yet, at this moment, Rena was curled up on the icy floor in the center of the hall. She was dressed in rags, and her unkempt face was buried between her knees as her frail body shivered uncontrobly. Every time she tried to move, the cold alloy cuffs on her legs rattled.


    The alloy cuffs connected to a thick silver chain the size of a baby¡¯s arm. The chain wound about the room and went deep down into the building through a small hole in the center of the floor. If the chain were to be pulled taut, it would be just enough distance for Rena to reach the stone slits of the hall.


    Rena also wore an iron mask on her face to prevent her from spitting out the rock in her mouth. There were a pair of fingerless iron gauntlets on her hands. The countless sharp and cold spikes inside the gauntlet were already embedded within her flesh. Any slightlyrge movements Rena made would cause the spikes to tear open her wounds and cause the blood to flow.


    Rena only wore an incredibly ragged ck cloak despite how cold and open of a space she was in. Without the ability to gather magical power to warm her body, the only thing keeping her alive was the extraordinary Physique of an adept.


    Rena might not be a body-refining adept, but even she had 11 points of Physique after advancing to Second Grade.


    Her body might not look like much, but it contained a vigorous life force and regenerative powerparable to wild beasts in the woods. An ordinary, weak woman would have died countless times if subjected to the same torture Rena had endured. Apart from her pitiful appearance, the fire of life still burned hot inside Rena¡¯s frail body.


    There was never a moment in her life that Rena had ever wanted power and influence more!


    A me zed in her chest, constantly burning her soul.


    Rena¡¯s previous life had been incredibly indulgent and hedonistic, and she had risen to her position by way of her mother. She had enjoyed all the luxuries of the world, from sweet wines to handsome men. Yet, at this point, all that she had done in the past had only be sins upon her shoulders.


    To survive, to keep living, she hadmitted so many acts of betrayal against her sisters.


    Despite all she had done, five years had passed by without any reinforcementsing to rescue her; she felt nothing but despair now.


    Rena knew that her talent as an adept was not very good at all. Her mother had exhausted arge number of resources and still only barely managed to push her to Second Grade. That said, she was indeed very fortunate. She had unexpectedly gotten pregnant after a wild orgy and gave birth to Snowlotus, who had an excellent talent for ice magic.


    Believing that she hadpleted her calling in life, Rena became even more indulgent, participating in all sorts of hedonistic banquets daily, and spending her days in the arms of multiple handsome and pretty men. Even the magical abilities that she relied on as an adept had regressed to a pitiful state.


    Otherwise, given the might of a Second Grade witch, she would never have been so easily captured alive by the nar natives!


    As she was wallowing in self-pity, she lifted her head and looked into the dark skies of ckmountain City through the tall, narrow slits with her purple eyes.


    Her body might be severely restrained, but her extraordinary ability to sense elementium was still present.


    Just now, she suddenly sensed a weak gathering of wind elementium in the skies above the city. Moreover, the cluster of wind elementium was slowly roaming through the air.


    A natural formation, or...?


    Rena leaped up from the ground without hesitation, ignoring the blood spilling out from the wounds caused by the spikes on her restraints. She lunged at the stone slits and stared at the distant and empty horizon.


    Her sudden actions caused the silver chains to rattle and attracted the attention of the holy knight keeping watch on her.


    The metal boots nged against the stone steps. An Iron Knight walked into the hall from the spiral staircase in the corner of the room, followed by three guards.


    The first thing he saw was Rena grabbing the stone slit tightly, the silver chains pulled tight, and her ck blood streaming down her arms and legs. Bloody footprints had been left on the ground from her moving towards the open window.


    ¡°What are you doing? You are not allowed near the window.¡± The young holy knight shouted. His gaze towards Rena was filled with unconceble disgust and hatred. The three guards beside him took out whips wrapped with iron threads from their waists and startedshing at Rena¡¯s frail back.


    Aaaaaah!


    The whips whistled through the air, shing apart Rena¡¯s ck robe and leaving longsh marks on her grime-covered back.


    Rena continued to hold onto the windowsill tightly, raising her neck to let out screams of agony.


    As her scream contained a trace of her Spirit, it continued to reverberate around the tower for some time before scattering in the air.


    The strange cluster of wind elementium floating in the sky seemed to have sensed her scream and started to drift towards the tower.


    The wind cluster wasn¡¯t a natural formation. It was being controlled by someone.


    Seeing that Rena was not moving yet, the three guards started to pull on her chain and forcefully dragged her away from the window. As the chains tightened, the spikes in Rena¡¯s cuffs dug into her flesh, slicing into her bones.


    However, Rena was in a state of extreme excitement right now. She couldn¡¯t feel the pain in her body at all. Instead, shey on the ground like an insane person, all of her muscles twitching violently.


    The three guards marched forward and starting raining downshes upon her body, beating her flesh into a pulp and causing blood to stter everywhere.


    ¡°Stay here quietly and repent your sins. Your meal for today has been cancelled. Act up again, and you won¡¯t have anything to eat for tomorrow, either!¡±


    The young holy knights chosen by the Holy Light Chapel to watch over Rena were all ones who held extreme hatred towards the witch. They had either been persecuted by the witches in the past or had lost a family member to their actions. Only such knights could ignore Witch Rena¡¯s seduction abilities and loyally aplish their tasks.


    The wounds inflicted on Rena meant nothing to her. These injuries would heal in a single night. It was what the holy knights were most concerned about, but also what they were most envious of!


    After punishing Rena viciously, the young holy knight led the three guards back into the tower.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The hall at the top of the tower was simply too cold. Even the Iron Knights could not endure the severity of the mountain winds. As such, the holy knights and guards on watch were typically stationed inside the watchtower. They would onlye up and punish Rena when she created trouble.


    As for escaping¨C after having most of her magical power neutralized, Rena was no more than a witch with a slightly stronger Physique. She had no means of removing the spiked cuffs and mask made of special alloy metal. There was no chance for her to escape.


    When the hall returned to silence, and only the harsh winds could be heard, the strange cluster of wind elementium arrived outside the room. It almost appeared as if it wanted to enter through the window.


    ¡°Don¡¯te in!¡± Rena barely propped herself up from the ground andmunicated through mental messages, ¡°A holy light array has been hidden beneath the floorboards of the hall. Any cluster of elementium power will sound the rms.¡±


    The shapeless cluster of ¡®wind¡¯ seemed to have understood Rena¡¯s warnings. It stopped in the air outside the window.


    ¡°Who are you? Tess, or Italil?¡± Rena asked with a dejected expression.


    She had also heard somewhat about what had happened to her witch sisters.


    After all, the holy knights would unavoidably reveal some degree of information about the witch remnants when trying to interrogate her for their secrets. Naturally, she knew that the holy knights had brought her here to ckmountain City to capture thest two powerful Third Grade witches.


    ¡°Hehehe. Lady Rena, it has been a while!¡±


    What Rena never expected was for the mental message from the wind spirit to be a male¡¯s voice. That familiar voice and tone caused Rena to be overjoyed.

 Chapter 998 - Movement

    Chapter 998 Movement


    Greem and Rena¡¯s conversation was short and efficient.


    Rena couldn¡¯t help but feel a warmth spread throughout her body when Greem¡¯s unique mental flux vanished from the wind spirit. Hope once again sprung from her heart, lifting her spirit and making her entire person incredibly restless.


    The Poison Swamps.


    Why did the fire adept want her to lure the holy knights there? Did the witches intend to fight against the holy knights? What was the situation already? They should be saving her as soon as possible and finding a way to leave this damned world rather than fight against those holy knights.


    Rena thought to herself resentfully.


    Even though she was immensely dissatisfied that Greem didn¡¯t immediately save her, she was at his mercy. She no longer dared to put on airs as she had in the past. Instead, she started to use all her brainpower to think of a way to do what had been requested of her.


    Just tell the Third Grade knights the witches¡¯ ¡®hiding spot?¡¯ What an incredibly foolish idea! Then, how else could she draw the attention of the holy knights?


    For the first time ever, for the sake of her life and her freedom, Rena started to think with all she had.


    ............


    When Greem¡¯s mental consciousness finally returned from a distance, Witch Tess¡¯ resentful voice came from beside him, ¡°She deserves it! That bitch deserves to be punished like that!¡±


    To increase trust between himself and the Deceit Witches, Greem had not concealed anything whenmunicating with Rena through the wind spirit. Tess and Italil had observed the entire process through magic.


    Compared to Tess¡¯ resentment, Italil was more concerned with the uing battle.


    ¡°Greem, are you sure you want to ambush those holy knights in the Poison Swamps? You should know that ourbat power has dropped drastically after such a long time. Weck immensely in resources and materials. This war is not going to be easy.¡±


    Greem smiled casually.


    ¡°Naturally, since I nned to give the holy knights a thorough beating, I have already taken this factor into consideration. Take a look.¡± Having said that, Greem rubbed the snake¡¯s eye ring on his left finger, and a pile of items immediately appeared on the ground before him.


    There were First and Second Grade magical scrolls, magical wands, as well as potions of various effects. Of course, most of the items in the pile were still casting materials and all sorts of magical gemstones.


    The eyes of the two witches lit up upon seeing this.


    They might not have been so excited by such everyday items in the past. Given the power of the Deceit Witches, they could obtain any resources they desired. Such a meager pile of such things would have hardly drawn their attention.


    However, now that their connection to the World of Adepts had been cut off, and given the many years of wandering and battling they had endured, all of their resources and materials had already been exhausted. Though some potion masters and enchanters amongst the witches could use the resources of Henvic ne to craft substitutes, the quality and effects of these items were naturally iparable to the proper ones.


    That was why even the two Third Grade adepts couldn¡¯t help but be moved when they saw such arge number of resources and materials.


    Perhaps intent on disying his power in front of the witches, Greem rubbed another one of his rings and released even more resources, materials, and magical items.


    Italil silently looked at the giant pile of resources. She suddenly opened her mouth and asked: ¡°Greem, I heard you were trapped at Gangsas Volcano by several adepts from the realms beyond. Where have they gone now?¡±


    Even the smiling Tess couldn¡¯t help but be taken aback by the question.


    She had already seen some rtively rarer items in the pile of resources, for instance, the Dreamsource Grass. If she could brew the Dreamsource Grass into Blue Dreand, she could heal the most severe of her injuries in a short time.


    When that happened, she would be able to unleash the might of a Third Grade witch once again!


    Tess also found several other things in the pile that could help with her wounds. Though recoveringpletely wasn¡¯t quite possible, she could still improve her injuries immensely.


    The wildly excited Tess paused when she heard Italil¡¯s question. Her eyes swept past the gallery of items. She faintly understood the implication behind Italil¡¯s question now.


    Though these items weren¡¯t branded with the name or identity of their owners, it was obvious that the storage rings containing them and their method of storage were not the same. It appeared as if the trove of items was made by abination of resources from several different adepts.


    As such, even Witch Tess couldn¡¯t help but lift her head and silently stare at this confident young adept.


    Though the Northern Witches had almost ruled by matriarchy and looked down upon all male adepts, this adept before her radiated youth and liveliness, along with an unassableposure and dignity.


    ¡°Naturally, since they put me in such a terrible spot and even implicated you Deceit Witches in our conflict, I made sure to give them a painful time.¡± Greem brushed across the question with vague words, providing no details at all.


    However, the vague words and the mountain of evidence before them was enough for the two witches to guess at the fate of the hunter adepts.


    No shit! Even their storage rings had fallen into Greem¡¯s hands. They couldn¡¯t have ended up well at all!


    Though the two witches still had questions, the way they looked at Greem contained a different sentiment from before. At the very least, they became much more respectful and polite towards him.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. If any of them had been pursued by four hunter adepts who were well-prepared for the job, they would already be dead, let alone plotting to stir even more trouble in the ne!


    The attitudes of the two witches towards Greem changed in a very subtle way. The tone of their words even took on a trace of respect and modesty usually only reserved for higher-grade adepts.


    ¡°The situation of the witches will improve tremendously with these resources. I have already summoned the Deceit Witches in the other hidden spots. Another four or five sisters should be joining us shortly. By then, we will have the necessary military force we need to fight the holy knights.¡± Witch Tess, who hadn¡¯t initially been interested in war, suddenly became much more enthusiastic about the idea.


    Over the past five years, they had been chased and beaten around by these holy knights. One sister after another had fallen under their des. It would be a joke if Witch Tess didn¡¯t harbor fury and hatred in her heart.


    However, the weakness of the witches left them with no choice but to endure the suffering, always giving ground to fight for thest bit of space for survival. Now, they had been forced into a dead-end by the holy knights. Once the remaining high-grade witches were ¡®purified,¡¯ thest few witches would have no ability to create trouble even if they were to escape alive.


    When that happened, their only fate would be to hide and wander, only to rot and die in some rural and remote corner of the ne.


    ¡°We must hurry. The holy knights have to be lured into the Poison Swamps within seven days!¡± Greem warned with a solemn expression.


    ¡°Why are we in such a hurry? The holy knights are being very cautious right now. Luring arge group of them into a hazardous area will probably be very difficult!¡± Witch Tess frowned and said.


    ¡°We only have seven days! ¡°Greem coldly said, ¡°The subordinates I sent out are creating amotion in the central region of the Zambez Empire. They have already shed with the imperial army and the holy knights. The two Fourth Grade Holy Knights are also tied up in the affair. They can only buy us seven days. Once the two Holy Knights are free to move again, I believe that none of us will be willing to fight against them. Am I wrong?¡±


    Tssss!


    The two witches drew in a cold breath of air.


    Witch Tess immediately shouted furiously, ¡°I will urge them to speed up. We will set up magical traps in the Poison Swamps as fast as possible. Seven days it will be. Let us teach those metal canheads a proper lesson!¡±


    ............


    Taujura Camp.


    A stretch ofrge, harsh campsy across the area, each of them filled with white tents of various sizes, like clouds in the sky. The people walking in and out of the tents were all dressed in armor and beaming with zealous energy.


    It was thergest military camp set up by the Zambez Empire. Nearly thirty-six thousand imperial soldiers were stationed here, along with seven hundred and twenty-eight holy knights and trainee knights from all across the nation.


    The imperial army had already sent out troops to surround all of the woods near ckmountain City, with Taujura Camp as the center of operations. Their forces were slowly being sent out to search for the witches¡¯ tracks.


    These witch remnants were clearly specialized at hiding and disguising themselves. The illusion arrays they set up outside their bases could trick the senses of ordinary warriors, causing them to find nothing out of the ordinary. Only holy knights blessed with holy light could break these illusions and cause the witches¡¯ base to appear.


    As such, the search parties sent out by the imperial army always contained holy knights and trainee knights who battled against the sly and evil witches with their wits throughout the mountains and rivers.


    The holy knights had obtained tremendous results over the past year. They destroyed two witch bases in session, ¡®purifying¡¯ two First Grade witches and one Second Grade witch.


    The trainee knight who had killed the Second Grade witch at high cost obtained feedback from the Holy Light and immediately advanced to be an Iron Knight.


    That further boosted the fighting will of the young knights. They worked hard, neverining even as they scaled mountains and traversed ravines, sacrificing everything for the sake of the great Holy Light.


    At this moment, the idol of the trainee knights, and the young Iron Knight who had distinguished herself in battle, stood upon a tall hill. She slowly looked through the rowdy camp before her and frowned. The dark clouds in her heart grew heavier and heavier.


    ¡°Lady Catherine, are we not going out on a mission today?¡± A trainee knight standing behind the young Iron Knight couldn¡¯t help but ask in a soft voice.

 Chapter 999 - The Poison Swamps

    Chapter 999 The Poison Swamps


    ¡°Are there any movements in the surroundings recently?¡±


    Catherine was sitting upon a tall, red horse, d in delicate silver armor that entuated her curves.


    Catherine looked extremely slender on the outside, so much so that she even appeared weak. However, when she donned her full-metal armor, brandished her sword, and charged at the enemy, she would transform into a ferocious lion, more courageous and intimidating than all the male knights around her.


    That was why the trainee knights following at her side couldn¡¯t help but be confused when they saw her frown in frustration.


    ¡°Lady Catherine, what are you concerned about?¡± A young trainee knight found the courage to ask, ¡°The witch remnants have already been forced into the woods near ckmountain City. We will be able to find their hiding spots as long as we search patiently. The situation couldn¡¯t be better. Why is it that you seem worried?¡±


    Catherine shook her head in frustration.


    ¡°You have not personally witnessed the savagery of the otherworldly adepts. You cannot possibly understand what terrifying might they possess. I...I...¡± Catherine couldn¡¯t help but shiver as she spoke, as if she had been reminded of something incredibly scary.


    ¡°Are you talking about the Battle of Hakans!¡± The trainee knight probed.


    As Catherine¡¯s personal guard, they naturally knew of all the brutal battles she had experienced as a knight.


    It was said that Catherine used to be a member of the Hakans Holy Light Chapel. When the ce fell into the demonic hands of the adepts, Catherine had stood forward, despite being a trainee knight, single-handedly saving several dozen lives from the hands of the adepts.


    It was because of this experience that the holy knight leadership had assigned her to the south after the disaster of Hakans, to participate in the hunt for the witch remnants. Catherine had proven herself. She was not at all intimidated by the savagery of the adepts and instead disyed more courage than anyone else. She had managed to survive in a brutal fight against a Second Grade witch, even personally executing the witch in battle.


    It was from that fight that she had obtained incredible feedback from the Holy Light and immediately advanced to be an Iron Knight!


    All the knights here knew of every detail of Catherine¡¯s story. As such, they were very understanding of her concerns and worries. Anyone would be like her if their closepanions and friends were to die upon the battlefield¨C sorrowful, yet determined.


    ¡°Let¡¯s not talk about me,¡± Catherine quickly shook off her sentiment, ¡°Talk about the witches¡¯ recent movements! What is the situation with the monsters that appeared to the north of the Empire?¡±


    Another trainee knight that looked just as young as the other one quickly piped up, ¡°I know this. The monsters are truly frightening. They have the ability to spread a gue. Ordinary civilians have no means of defending themselves at all. Fortunately, the two Lord Holy Knights were close to the area where the monsters appeared. They were able to attack in time and blockade the monsters at Red Cloud Mesa. It is said that the two Lord Holy Knights are taking turns to exterminate the creatures. Over half of the monsters have been ughtered, and the spread of the gue has been halted.¡±


    ¡°And what about...what about the one hiding underneath Gangsas Volcano. What about that demon?¡± Catherine¡¯s entire body trembled as she spoke. It was almost as if she didn¡¯t even dare invoke the name of that demon.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know! The northern branch has lost another elite force to investigate the situation of the battle between the demons there. Unfortunately, they still have not managed to locate them at all. However, since the terrifying gue monsters appeared near Red Cloud Mesa, the demons shouldn¡¯t be far away either. The reason the Lord Holy Knights are keeping such a close eye on the region is likely out of this consideration.¡±


    Catherine shook her head.


    ¡°The Lord Holy Knights shouldn¡¯t have abandoned this battlefield! I keep having a feeling that the chaos created by the gue monsters in the north is only the enemy¡¯s trick. Their real target...is likely us!¡±


    ¡°Us?¡± The trainee knights looked at each other, bewildered by the absurdity of the situation, ¡°Do you mean that that terrifying demon will be meeting up with the witches here?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know. I really don¡¯t know. My heart is confused at the moment. I keep having a vague feeling of approaching danger, but I cannot discern the source of the danger. I...¡±


    While Catherine was struggling in frustration, arge pir of dust suddenly rose from the dirt road in the distance. Several fast horses and their riders shouted as they charged into the military camp, heading straight for therge tent at its center. The content of their words could not be discerned from a distance, but plenty of holy knights and imperial soldiers emerged from the tents when they passed by. These knights and soldiers started to talk amongst each other as if they were preparing for a battle.


    ¡°It¡¯s the troops that were sent to scout north!¡± A trainee knight raised a hand over his eyes to take a better look before suddenly shouting in excitement, ¡°They¡¯ve returned. They must have obtained some valuable information!¡±


    No one replied. Everyone simply got on their horses and rode down the hill toward the central tent.


    Arge group of holy knights had already gathered near the tent by the time they reached the center of the camp. Those who had arrived before everyone else were already talking amongst themselves, while those who arrivedter asked about the situation. Catherine quickly figured out why they were all so excited.


    They had found the base of the witch remnants!


    It wasn¡¯t exactly out of their expectations. The witches¡¯ base was located deep in the Poison Swamps, just as they had predicted.


    A party of holy knights sent to scout the Poison Swamps had fortuitously captured a First Grade witch trying to sneak into the Poison Swamps from a different region. They were able to extract the exact location of the witches¡¯ base from her.


    More importantly, the witch remnants seemed to have ns of abandoning that base. They were desperately summoning the nearby witches to gather. It was said that they were nning to leave that location and head north to join forces with the gue monsters.


    The three Gold Knights in the central tent didn¡¯t dare dy upon hearing such valuable information. They sent people to request for the four Gold Knights of ckmountain City to reinforce their ranks, while quickly summoning and rallying the holy knights to form an army with which to destroy the witches¡¯ base.


    They want to escape the Poison Swamps? Hmph, they can dream on!


    For some reason, Catherine felt an inexplicable panic in her heart when she saw thepanions around her eager for a final battle.


    However, there were as many as three to four hundred Iron Knights like herself in this camp. There was no room for her to offer her suggestion while the three Gold Knights ryedmands and instructions to all thebatants.


    The Poison Swamps were one of the more well-known hazardous areas near ckmountain City!


    The swamp was located in a low basin, stretching three to four kilometers from south to north and almost six kilometers from east to west. The whole ce was a fearsome swamp filled with pungent mud and puddles.


    Misty pine flowers grew throughout the basin, generatingrge amounts of poison gas in the damp environment. The enclosed geography of the region provided no space for the poison gas to disperse, resulting in a terrifying poison mist constantly hanging in the swamp¡¯s air.


    It was because of how terrifying the ce was that the locals near ckmountain City never dared to take a single step into the Poison Swamps. Only during a few short days in the sixth month of the year would the bright sun pierce the canopy of the trees to shine into the swamp, dispersing the poison mist umting there.


    The local natives would take advantage of this opportunity to enter and harvest some strange herbs and flowers that didn¡¯t grow outside of the swamp. Thus, only some of the older mountain people were familiar with the geography inside the swamp.


    The holy knights had further requested for ckmountain City to recruit old herbalists that had experience venturing into the Poison Swamps.


    ............


    The Poison Swamps.


    Even though it was still daytime with bright sunlight everywhere, the basin where the Poison Swamps were located was still covered in a dense mist that obscured almost all vision.


    There was no wind.


    The mist was like a thick veil over everyone¡¯s eyes. It clung to the air of the basin tightly, shrouding everything within.


    The ground of the Poison Swamps was covered in bubbling ponds of mud and dirty water. A thinyer of watergrass grew above the soft and pungent mud, making it even more challenging to distinguish between solidnd and soft silt.


    It was difficult to travel through the forest and the mountains. The elite holy knights who had changed into light chainmail had already sealed off the few exits of the Poison Swamps while the imperial soldiers were still making their way towards the area.


    Everyone was both excited and nervous as they stood at the entrances to the basin. They could see the white-shrouded Poison Swamps from a distance through the dense foliage of the forest. No one had any idea how the battle would y out.


    That said, their forces had the absolute initiative. They had already destroyed all of the defenses outside the witches¡¯ base. What could a dozen witch remnants possibly do against their overwhelming force and numbers?


    A temporary battle camp set up near the entrance of the basin.


    Approximately three hundred and seventy holy knights were gathered here, silently waiting for orders from their higher-grademanders. The remaining four hundred trainee knights were leading the imperial soldiers to control several critical geographical locations nearby.


    The poisonous mist inside the Poison Swamps was not something that ordinary people could hope to endure. As such, the imperial soldiers and trainee knights were all left outside the swamp. The four-hundred-strong army of holy knights was split up into two dozen parties. They entered the swamps under the lead of the local herbalists that they had managed to recruit and prepared to exterminate thest of the witches.


    Catherine was in a group of fifteen knights led by two Silver Knights. All of them lit their torches and followed an old but agile herbalist to the edge of the swamp.


    Before they entered, the herbalist took out some red beans and wrapped them in a piece of cloth. He then tied the beans and cloth beneath his nose before walking into the swamp, tapping the ground with a long wooden stick as he moved.

 Chapter 1000 - Swamp Creatures

    Chapter 1000 Swamp Creatures


    As they slowly entered the Poison Swamps, the party became increasingly nervous.


    It was all soft and slippery watergrass and duckweed beneath their feet. It was hard to stand firm on such ground, but it was much easier than everyone had expected.


    A thirty-meter-long rope braided of sturdy vines connected everyone, with the front of the line wrapped around the waist of the old herbalist. One of the Silver Knights followed close behind the herbalist, one hand holding the rope, the other holding his longsword. He was prepared for an attack at any time.


    After all, these swamps were home torge numbers of predatory creatures, poison, and plenty of other magical and demonic beings. It was a difficult ce to traverse.


    The two dozen parties of holy knights slowly entered the swamp one by one, keeping a distance of no more than ten meters between each group. It was to ensure that they could reinforce each other at a moment¡¯s notice. It also reduced the chance of them being ambushed by the witches.


    The seven Gold Knights near ckmountain City had all gathered here now, traveling in the center of the army while escorting Rena and the witch they had just caught. Given their superior numbers and power, the knights weren¡¯t worried that the witches would attempt a full-frontal assault. On the contrary, they were concerned that the witches would flee as far as they could and refuse to fight.


    In all honesty, it wasn¡¯t an easy matter pursuing those sly and agile witches while traversing through mountains and forests in a full set of armor for long periods.


    Catherine held a sword in one hand and a torch in the other, following the party as they trudged through the swamp.


    She could barely see within five meters of herself with the light of the torch. Everything beyond that distance was a faint shroud of white. The mist hovered around them as if covering everything with a thick veil, making it difficult to see properly.


    There was water vapor in the mist, which constantly tussled with the mes on the torch to make them crackle loudly. There was no proper road beneath them either; only the wet and slippery footsteps left behind by the other members of the party.


    Those at the rear of the party did not need to figure out the path forward. They only needed to trace the steps left on the ground.


    What kind of consequence would there be for making a wrong step in a ce like this? A young Iron Knight¡¯s experience would be the greatest evidence of the danger of these swamps.


    Perhaps it was because he was too preupied with his surroundings, or maybe he lost focus for an instant, but this Iron Knight stepped out of the ¡®grass¡¯ road and immediately fell into a puddle of mud.


    It was as if a blinding torch had been suddenly ignited in the swamp, as the water itself started to bubble instantly!


    The dirty sludge and filth of the swamp started to move visibly. Waves spread through the water as if some strange creature was squirming beneath. Moreover, as the Iron Knight continued to struggle in the mud, the unrest in the pool only intensified. Several distinct water ripples started to approach the knight from a distance.


    ¡°Everyone put in some strength and pull him up.¡± The Silver Knight let out a shout. The two people closest to the fallen knight immediately grabbed the roped wrapped around their waist and pulled with all their strength. A ssh rang out as they managed to rip the sinking knight out from the mud.


    The creatures hiding in the mud became incredibly furious at the sudden disappearance of their ¡®prey¡¯ and burst forth from the water.


    For a moment,rge groups of Ghost Nannies and Sludges appeared from the swamps around the knights.


    Ghost Nannies were humanoid monsters that looked like drowned corpses. They had dirty and unkempt hair, dark ck ws, and sharp fangs that were missing in a spot or two. Their ws and teeth contained terrifying poison, making them much more dangerous than even ghouls while they were in the swamps.


    Meanwhile, Sludges were low-grade magical creatures purely formed of pungent sludge and some other strange substance. They possessed several uniquebat abilities such as Sludge Bullet, Acid Spray, and Splitting Multiplication. Their offensive might wascking, and they were incredibly disgusting creatures.


    The party of holy knights was fearless against the horde of swamp creatures.


    Several Holy Light res sted forward, and every swamp creature that was hit by these res had their souls purified in the sacred holy light.


    Ghost Nannies turned into rotten corpses, while Sludges were reduced to a pile of mud. Perhaps picking up on the might of the invaders, the Ghost Nannies and Sludges quickly dove into the swamp and used the mud to evade the Holy Light res. Many Ghost Nannies rushed onto the grass road and engaged the holy knights with their formation stretched out over one and a half kilometers.


    If the imperial soldiers had been the ones to enter the Poison Swamps instead, they would already be plenty of casualties. Meanwhile, the holy knights who had the blessing of the holy light were incredibly lethal when fighting against these low-grade magical creatures and monsters.


    It didn¡¯t matter how sharp the Ghost Nannies¡¯ fangs and ws were. They couldn¡¯t pierce a holy knight¡¯s Holy Light Barrier and their thick Holy Light Armor. Meanwhile, their tough, leathery skin was as thin as paper to the longswords of the holy knights that contained tremendous holy light power.


    The holy knights made short work of the Ghost Nannies that intercepted them as if they were simply slicing vegetables for dinner. The souls of all the monsters were thoroughly purified. That said, the holy knights found themselves in an awkward position dealing with the Sludges and their long-ranged abilities.


    Sludge Bullets cut through the air one after another, crashing onto the knights¡¯ Holy Light Barriers and exploding into noxious sludge. That smell, that texture. It was so bad it almost caused the holy knights to break down out of pure disgust. Their noses were also suffering iparable torture.


    Using techniques like the Holy Light sh and the Holy Seal of Justice on such low-grade magical creatures would be far too much of a waste. As such, the less costly Holy Light res bombarded the Sludges. Naturally, these low-grade Sludges could not endure the purification of the Holy Knight and silently exploded into dead mud, one after another.


    However, before the holy knights could smile, the bodies of the Sludges in the distance started to reform, each of them turning into three slightly smaller Sludges.


    An even more torrential rain of Sludge Bullets and Acid Spray poured towards the knights at the very next moment.


    The most annoying thing about the whole affair was the fact that an ordinary Sludge could split twice. Each Sludge could split into three slightly smaller Sludges. That meant that the knights had to kill a total of nine Sludges to exterminate one ordinary Sludge properly.


    While this happened, the Sludges would have more than enough time to shower the area where the holy knights stood in their pungent sludge and the unusually strong acid they stored within their bodies.


    Soon, the entire group of holy knights was covered in a fearsome stench that hurt to even smell!


    All the knights were throwing up as they fought. It was such a hrious scene to behold.


    However, the holy knights were far more powerful than these monsters and magical creatures. Though the situation got a little out of hand, the holy knights had yet to suffer any casualties.


    Beams of holy light purified both the poison attacks of the Ghost Nannies and the Acid Sprays of the Sludges before they could inflict visible damage to the knights.


    The only unfortunate thing was that the holy light could only purify poison and acid. There was nothing it could do about the smell!


    As such, the holy knights that copsed on the battlefield weren¡¯t injured. They were simply overwhelmed by the overpowering stench.


    Catherine walked at the center of the party, silently chanting words of praise for the great Holy Light as she fired off Holy Light res at the figures moving in the mist.


    Her face was pale white, and she could barely breathe now.


    The water, the ground, and even her body were covered in slimy and disgusting acid. This fluid that had been brewing in the bodies of the Sludges for so many years released bright green smoke wherever itnded. It smelled just like the filthy waste material in the sewers after it had been left to rot and fester for years.


    Catherine had thrown up everything in her stomach the moment she smelled the stench. By the end, she even started throwing up her gastric acid.


    Even though the holy knights were weak from puking, they still fought valiantly...no, ughtered valiantly!


    Hordes of Ghost Nannies and Sludges rushed out from the mist from either side of the road only to howl as they fell beneath the swords of the holy knights.


    The battle might have been ¡®intense,¡¯ but the holy knights had not suffered a single casualty!


    The party that stretched for over one and a half kilometers suddenly stopped, trying their best to purify all these monsters and magical creatures rushing at them. However, while they were fighting with all they had, several incrediblyrge lizards emerged from the swamp.


    Dirt-yellow Petrification Beams shot out of their eyes. Several Iron Knights failed to dodge in time and were paralyzed on the spot.


    A visibleyer of green and gray started to creep across their skin. Soon, even their eyeballs froze over as they turned into stone statues.


    The Giant Lizards lunged forward, biting the petrified holy knights and dragging them back into the swamp.


    The next second, the water and mud bubbled and sshed everywhere. The other swamp creatures swarmed towards the petrified holy knights, furiously biting and tearing at them as they dragged them deeper into the bottom of the swamp.


    The rope around the holy knights had been bitten off, rendering theirpanions incapable of saving them.


    ¡°Bastards.¡±


    Several knights that witnessed this became ovee with anger. They brandished their swords and charged into the mud to fight with the swamp creatures.


    A single Iron Knight had no problem dealing with seven or eight Ghost Nannies while they were on solid ground. However, once they descended into the unique environment of the swamp, two to three Ghost Nannies were sufficient to toy with them.


    Thanks to the Giant Swamp Lizards, the swamp creatures were able to break through the defensive positions of the holy knights on several spots, dragging one holy knight after another into the swamp where they could not exert their strength.

 Chapter 1001 - Rain of Rotting Blood

    Chapter 1001 Rain of Rotting Blood


    The witches hade!


    The witches were definitely behind all this trouble. Otherwise, given the swamp creatures¡¯ abilities, they should never have been able to inflict even the slightest of casualties to the holy knights.


    The seven Gold Knights leading the army instantly understood what was happening. They took out their longswords and started castingrge area-of-effect blessings. Several beams of majestic and holy light shone from the front of the formation to the very tail. Every single person¡¯s body shimmered with a blinding and radiant light from within to without.


    All the swamp creatures were dark-attribute magical creatures. The dark energies within their bodies started boiling like acid when they entered the radius of the holy light, burning them and causing them to squeal in pain.


    The weakest of the monsters started to stumble when illuminated by the white light. Their entire bodies started rapidly melting as if they had been thrown into a pot of acid.


    Their evil souls that had now lost the protection of their sullied bodies were reduced to ashes by the pale white mes!


    For a moment, the advance of the swamp creatures had been halted.


    Shua. Shua. Shua.


    A series of holy lights continued to bloom around the knights. Any evil that was engulfed by the pure light was burned to ashes by the pale white fires. Both the Ghost Nannies hiding in the mud of the swamp and the incredibly resilient Sludges retreated from the holy light, revealing their true natures as lowly and fearful low-grade beings.


    Even the vile and pungent Poison Swamps themselves started to recede before the holy light. Two energies of different natures shed with each other; divine power and dark energy both tangled and tussled with the other, devouring and neutralizing the opposing energy. There was no room for coexistence.


    Traces of ck smoke rose from the swamp as the holy light continued to shine upon it, quickly vanishing as it was exposed to the infinite light. The once soft and loose ground of the swamp became firm and stable once again. It had now turned into a road that one could firmly walk upon.


    Naturally, all the monsters and magical creatures hiding in the depths of the mud has also been purified.


    Thebined force of seven Gold Knights was not something that these lowly monsters could hope to survive! This single attack had exterminated half of the swamp creatures gathered around the holy knights. The survivors were all hiding where the holy light could not reach, cursing at these invaders with the most vile and foulnguage they knew.


    Meanwhile, in the deepest parts of the sinister Poison Swamps, a circr stone altar was slowly operating.


    A dozen strange silhouettes of various shapes and sizes stood around the altar, silently waiting for something.


    When the overwhelming divine power rose into the sky from the edge of the Poison Swamps, the snake-shaped dagger floating above the altar started to radiate several strange magical runes. A dense aura of evil that could not be dispelled lingered upon each and every one of these runes. The runes immediately caused a resonance within the Bloody Altar the moment they appeared. Even the entire Poison Swamps seemed to have turned darker and more sinister.


    ¡°Seven sources of power. It seems like those seven Gold Knights have entered the Swamps!¡± A Deceit Witch with an old face silently sensed as her face lifted up to the brightly lit horizon in the distance.


    ¡°Good. It¡¯s time they tasted some pain themselves!¡± Another Deceit Witch cackled sinisterly.


    Many sisters of the Deceit Witches had fallen to the des of the holy knights over the past few years. As such, all of the Deceit Witches present were extremely excited and delighted whenever there was a chance to exact their vengeance.


    ¡°Let¡¯s move out. The swamp creatures on the outside won¡¯t be able to stall them for long! Before they reach here, let¡¯s have them taste the pain of the Rain of Rotting Blood.¡± Third Grade Tessmanded with her hoarse voice.


    Five Second Grade witches each stood at a corner of the Bloody Altar, silently transferring their power into it. The Bloody Altar was connected with several mysterious arrays hidden all over the swamps. It started to project the powerful and evil energy it received outwards.


    It might look peaceful where the witches stood as if nothing had happened.


    However, everything had turned about at the edge of the swamps, three to four kilometers away from the altar. Cmity had descended, and the swamps had be and of death where no life could remain.


    The already dark and depressing sky turned even bleaker.


    A gray aura of death and ck powers of evil seeped out from the ground below, mixing into the dense and heavy mist in the air, weakening all light within the Poison Swamps even further. The knights were practically blind now.


    Pungent rainwater fell from the skies, sshing into red blooms when it crashed against the muddy ground.


    Many of the knights lifted their heads, only to be horrified to find that this was no ordinary rain, but blood that was filled with an aura of decay.


    When the bloodnded on their armor, it immediately let out a sizzling sound, much akin to acid reacting with metal. If the bloodnded directly on their skin, a heart-wrenching, stinging pain would shoot through their bodies as their skin would start to bloat and rot. The sound of rotting flesh could be heard from the wounds.


    If the victims were not treated with holy light, all the flesh beneath the skin would rot away. Even the bones that were protected by muscles and tendons would turn brittle from the blood rain before the entire body finally copsed like a sandcastle.


    ¡°Put up your holy light protections. Don¡¯t let the blood rain touch your skin!¡±


    The high-grade knights shouted. Beam after beam of brilliant holy light started to rise through the ranks, engulfing the knights in a cluster of divine brilliance.


    The holy radiance around them purified the blood from the sky before it could reach the knights. The rain could no longer hurt them.


    ¡°Forward...continue forward. We must leave this area of rain as soon as possible.¡±


    Under the orders of the seven Gold Knights, the knights forcefully maintained their holy light and defended against the corrosion of the blood. They began to sprint forward on the just newly solidified ground. The sanctified ground started to loosen beneath the downpour of bloody rain. It almost appeared as if it was about to revert back into an evil and wretched swamp.


    Though the Rain of Rotting Blood had not managed to kill a single holy knight, it had effectively exhausted much of their holy power. Along the way, the seven Gold Knights had no choice but to maintain the divine magic Holy Radiance to protect the Iron Knights as best as they could.


    The Gold Knights might not be bothered by this amount of exertion, but they would probably start regretting their ¡®recklessness¡¯ once they slowly stepped into the inescapable webs that the witches had weaved for them!


    The same Bloody Altar.


    Witch Tess smiled coldly.


    ¡°They have made it through the Rain of Rotting Blood. It¡¯s up to the rot-poison voodoo beasts now! Liv, it¡¯s up to you now!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Lady Tess! After the past few days of my ¡®training,¡¯ these voodoo beasts should be sufficiently strong. The holy knights are the perfect appetizers for them,¡± a witch whose face was so pale and stiff that it appeared like a mask replied. She then turned and mounted an unusuallyrge Giant Lizard, charging into the mist and vanishing without a trace.


    Greem had seen everything ur over the past few days. He knew that this was a Second Grade witch who excelled at creating voodoo beasts.


    ¡°Liv¡¯s voodoo beasts may have been strengthened, but they still won¡¯t be able to inflict much damage to the knights. You few, immediately activate the Bloody Altar and enhance the rot-poison voodoo beasts with Rend, Bleed, Slow, and the other magical effects to improve them further.¡± Witch Tess clearly understood that these voodoo beasts that had been created on such short notice were not much of a threat to the knights. As such, she intended to increase their lethality through other means.


    In all honesty, the construction of the Bloody Altar and the various mysterious arrays they had set up throughout the swamps were all due to the resources and materials that Greem had provided. Without these resources, the witches were like skillful chefs without ingredients to work with. Even with all the magical knowledge and schemes in their brains, they would not have been able to make up for the massive difference in numbers between them and the holy knights.


    However, with these additional little ¡®tricks,¡¯ the witches could quickly wear away at the knights¡¯ power, bit by bit. Once the enemy was exhausted and mentally worn out, it would be their time to strike.


    The witches would not have been afraid of the holy knights before they lost their witch¡¯s tower, regardless of how numerous the knights might have been.


    However, in their current situation, they could only rely on these tricks to bnce the massive power and number disparity between them!


    As Third Grade witches that had lived for four to five hundred years, Tess and Italil had plenty of other tricks up their sleeves. Under their coordinatedmand, sinister spells and terrifying traps started to activate one after the other, causing the holy knights to suffer tremendous casualties and untold pain.


    As the mainbatant for the battle toe, Greem naturally would not be participating in these harassment tactics. Instead, he silently nursed his mind and thought about all the things he would need to focus on in the final battle.


    The reason he had so passionately encouraged the witches to engage the holy knights in one final battle was to make sure to make a proper killing before he left. It would be difficult to return to Henvic to collect some holy light souls once he left.


    Moreover, given the barbaric ughter that was about to happen, the Henvic ne¡¯s faith in the holy light would be significantly impacted. The order of knights would require at least one to two hundred years of umtion to regain their former scale and glory.


    As such, knowing how rare of an opportunity this was, Greem had to try his best to maximize his rewards.


    His targets this time were those high-grade holy knights.


    If he could capture all the high-grade holy knights that had entered the Poison Swamps, it would be the souls of seven Gold Knights and over fifty Silver Knights. That number of souls should be enough to push his Spirit to the peak of Third Grade.


    This journey to another world had allowed him to collect such an incredible amount of holy light souls, while also allowing him to ¡®unexpectedly¡¯ obtain the corpse of the rare starbeast. No matter how he looked at it, this was an amazingly bountiful yield beyond even his wildest expectations!

 Chapter 1002 - Clan Battlefield

    Chapter 1002 n Battlefield


    The World of Adepts. Zhentarim, Ailovis.


    The adept war between the Fabres n and the Crimson n was still going on.


    As one side was arge n and the other was only a medium n that had just reached its current scale recently, the bnce of power was extremely imbnced. It resulted in the war breaking out within the territory of the Crimson n from the very start.


    The rapidly developing Crimson n had owned over eighty percent of thends in the Ailovis Region at the start of the war. However, as the war progressed, the Crimson n gradually lost all their outer territories and resource sites. The n¡¯s military force had retreated to the center to defend the roots of the n, consisting of Fire Throne and Pinecone City.


    It could be said that the Crimson n had utterly lost!


    ording to the usual rules of adept wars, the Fabres n could stop the war now. They could send out representatives to the Crimson n to discuss the matter of reparations and territory division. Though the Fabres n couldn¡¯t possibly obtain all of the Crimson n territories and resource sites, they should have no problem taking sixty percent of all their assets as reparations.


    Yet, strangely enough, even though the Crimson n had been forced back to their smallnd of origin, the Fabres n appeared to have no intention of stopping its advance. The adepts, apprentices, and worldly soldiers of both parties were fighting a difficult battle near Pinecone City. Blood flowed through thends and the streets. Three cities belonging directly to the Crimson n had already been destroyed, each one of them hosting a poption of thirty to fifty thousand people.


    Meanwhile, the Zhentarim Association, which had always been very active in their enforcement of regtions, were oddly silent in the face of these actions, despite the fact that they were severely viting the standard code of conduct for adept wars. It seemed like they were tacitly allowing the Fabres n to do this.


    The only reason this situation had urred was due to the Fourth Grade adept standing behind the Fabres n.


    No one would dare to criticize the actions of a Fourth Grade adept.


    After all, on this strangend that was the Continent of Adepts, Fourth Grade represented absolute strength!


    No adept or organization was willing to stand in opposition to another Fourth Grade adept. Unless there were grudges that could not be resolved, fights between Fourth Grade adepts rarely happened. That was because all other adepts were far too weak whenpared to Fourth Grade adepts.


    If two Fourth Grade adepts were to sh, they would have a tough time killing each other. However, destroying that which their opponent treasured and the n that they had established could not be any easier.


    It was this concern that kept the Fourth Grade adepts in check.


    No one was willing to offend a well-established Fourth Grade body-refining adept for a newly risen n with no background and no support. As such, the many ns and organizations merely watched as the war raged on in Ailovis. No one intervened or interfered.


    In fact, many small and medium-sized ns tried their best to win the favor of the Fabres n. They were willing to support them with resources and even volunteered to fight on the frontlines. Thus, faced with the overwhelming swarm of enemies, the Crimson adepts had no choice but to retreat yet again, finally stabilizing the battle line one hundred and twenty kilometers south of Pinecone City.


    The reason the front halted there wasn¡¯t because of the might of the Crimson adepts, but because of the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon.


    With the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon as the core military force, paired with a hundred goblin chariots, three Motherships, and thousands of magical machines, the Crimson n was consuming a shocking number of magical crystals daily to maintain such a massive army of magical machines.


    If it weren¡¯t for the magic generator furnaces that solved the energy supply problem for therger machines, the cost of the magical crystals alone would be enough to bankrupt the Crimson n!


    Even so, the goblin chariots and magical machines still required a tremendous supply of magical energy. With the n¡¯snd of origin right behind them, they could be active within a range of a hundred and twenty kilometers with every charge.


    If they exceeded this radius, the enemy could cut off the energy supply line.


    That would cause thest military force of the Crimson n to face the possibility of utter copse and defeat. Of course, the overwhelming forces of the Fabres n weren¡¯t happy to be stopped by the ¡®tiny¡¯ Crimson n. They frequently sent adepts to breach the battle line and get near Pinecone City. They spread poison, destroyed amenities and war machines, and ughtered the citizens of the Crimson n. Theymitted all sorts of destructive acts, inflicting significant personnel and resource damage to the Crimson n.


    The Crimson n wasn¡¯t willing to sit by and wait until their eventual death either. With Pinecone City as a secure and stable backline, they could give their all in the fight against the Fabres n.


    If the enemy adepts dared sneak into their territory to ambush, ughter, and destroy, then the Crimson n was more than willing to lie in wait, slowly exhausting and wearing down the number of Fabres adepts. In particr, Bug Adept Billis, Mystique Emelia, Dragon Adept Meryl, and Mary¡¯s vampires stood out with their performances.


    Over the past year of bloody adept battles, the mostly unknown Meryl had sessfully advanced to Second Grade. She had now be a powerful bloodline adept who could transform into a Second Grade fire dragon. If it weren¡¯t for the time limit on her transformation, Meryl could probably instantly rise above the other veteran Second Grades of the n to be the strongest individual among the Second Grade adepts.


    She was also the only Second Grade in the Crimson n who had confidence in fighting her way back to the n if she ran into an enemy Third Grade adept.


    Meanwhile, Emelia had also advanced to Second Grade during the war.


    Her current form was also tremendously different from before.


    Afterpletely fusing with the soul of Yara the spore princess, Emelia possessed the soul origin of a human adept and the magical spores. From the waist up, Emelia still retained the appearance of a human girl. Her lower body had transformed entirely into that of the magical spores, which resembled the appendages of an octopus.


    The reason she was known as Mystique was because of her ability to ess her magical nt state freely. It allowed her to transform into a humanoid, magical nt that could walk on two feet.


    It was almost as if she had Stealth and Visual Avoidance activated as long as she was in a region covered in green vegetation. Moreover, her innate ability, Magical Spore Infestation, allowed her to control all lifeforms infected with magical spores.


    The adepts fighting against often found themselves in a horrifying situation where parts of their bodies were beyond their control.


    Compared to the two new rising stars of the n, Bug Adept Billis was still as powerful and evil as ever before!


    The Fabres n¡¯s bounty list had Billis listed even higher than Third Grade Bloody Queen Mary. His was the highest bounty, and he was the Crimson adept that the Fabres wanted dead above all others.


    Over twenty Fabres adepts had died at Billis¡¯ hands since the start of the war. Although most of these were only First Grade adepts, it was still an unbearable wound inflicted on the Fabres n.


    The Fabres n had racked their brains to kill this bug adept.


    Unfortunately, with his insect clones, Billis was too difficult to kill.


    Billis would hide whenever he ran into adepts of the same grade or higher. He refused to face an opponent of the same level in frontal conflict. However, he would turn into a savage and unrelenting beast when he ran into low-grade adepts out on missions.


    Truly, not a single de of grass grew where Bug Adept Billis traveled!


    Adepts were killed, and all their blood essence drained for his nourishment!


    Apprentices were killed and left to the insect generals for food!


    Ordinary soldiers were killed and turned into flesh embryos for his insect army!


    For a bug adept like himself, who could only evolve through ughter, the war was to him what water was to a fish. It immediately incited all the excitement within his being. Other adepts might need to return to base for replenishment and rest after their battles had concluded. However, Billis would weave between various battlefields day and night, looking for every single opportunity to attack the enemy.


    Billis would flee with every bit of his power when he ran into adepts who were tasked with hunting him, unhesitating even if he had to abandon tens of thousands of insects to survive. The enemy¡¯s flesh was his hatchery, and the enemy¡¯s life was the source of his energy. He was a ughter machine who never knew fatigue! If he wasn¡¯tmitting carnage on the battlefield, he was hurrying towards another battlefield to continue his ughter!


    Even the Fabres n had a difficult time against such a savage and cunning enemy.


    The Fabres n even sent out Third Grade adepts to participate in the hunt for him. Unfortunately, he simply shed his tail, abandoning half his insect army and all his magical mantises to escape.


    However, just two weekster, Bug Adept Billis once again returned to the battlefield by subsisting on the flesh and life of Fabres adepts. There were no signs of weakness and damage from when hest escaped from the Fabres adepts.


    The Fabres n once again increased the bounty of Billis¡¯ head because of this incident, causing his prize to rise above Mary¡¯s to be the number one on the bounty list.


    Apart from these core Second Grades, the vampire adepts also performed excellently.


    Their ability to transform into bats improved their mobility. It allowed them to avoid pursuit, while their ability to drink blood allowed them to recover from their exhaustion with the enemy¡¯s blood. They also possessed iparable stealth. All of these factorsbined allowed the vampire adepts to be efficient and enduring assassins on the battlefield.


    They traveled through the battlefield, instantly calling upon their allies when they discovered viable targets. A great number of vampires beyond the enemy¡¯s number of adepts would quickly gather, allowing them tounch a frontal assault.


    They might usually seem cowardly and cautious, but they were more ferocious and reckless than human warriors when they charged onto the battlefield. Fearless about wounds they would sustain, daring to trade injury for injury; all of these things were what made the vampire adepts so scary.


    If their elementium power weren¡¯t so weak, and their attacks insufficiently powerful, they would probably be as lethal as a single Second Grade adept.


    At the very least, the vampires managed to execute over a dozen enemy adepts during this war, more than Second Grade Zacha and Tigule.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. After all, Zacha and Tigule only excelled atrge-scale battlefields.

 Chapter 1003 - Goblin Machinist Sorcerer

    Chapter 1003 Goblin Machinist Sorcerer


    Apart from these core adepts, a group of elite adepts had also emerged from within the Crimson n.


    For instance, there was Dragon Devourer Oliven.


    Oliven had always been a peripheral member of the Crimson n. She very rarely participated in n matters, let alone adepts wars that had nothing to do with her.


    However, after sessfully advancing to Third Grade with Greem¡¯s ¡®investment,¡¯ Oliven had a favor to return. As such, she had no choice but to join this adept war.


    As a dragon devourer, most of Oliven¡¯s abilities were rted to dragons.


    Despite being a beginner Third Grade, she could unleash as much power as a peak Third Grade when fighting against dragons. Even if she was facing a Fourth Grade dragon, she could retreat without a scratch on herself.


    It was the powerful profession ability of a dragon devourer!


    However, when Oliven¡¯s opponent was anything other than a dragon, most of her active and passivebat techniques became unusable; it severely affected herbat prowess. During these times, she was basically no more than a beginner Third Grade Magic-Breaking assassin.


    Fortunately, she still had the underlying strength of a Third Grade creature. Whenever she appeared on the battlefield, enemy elementium adepts who were only capable of long-ranged spells with no means of protecting themselves in melee range didn¡¯t dare to act too recklessly. They would be forced to restrain their firepower and fight more defensively.


    Apart from Oliven, another force stood out the most during the war. That force was the two unique professions that appeared for the first time in the World of Adepts: the Goblin Magical-Mechanic and the Goblin Machinist-Sorcerer.


    Compared to the difficulty of advancing to a magical-mechanic, the machinist-sorcerer was a profession that almost any adult goblin could advance to.


    In all seriousness, this was a unique profession that had been specially adapted for the goblins!


    All goblins could sessfully master the fundamental mechanical and alchemical knowledge required for advancement. If the goblins underwent further training to understand magic energy principles and other arcane knowledge, they would then advance into a goblin machinist-sorcerer.


    Compared to the advancement of an adept, a goblin machinist-sorcerer would not experience any fundamental change to their Physique. Instead, they would passively gain some degree of control over mechanical magic weapons.


    When a group of tiny goblins no more than 1.2 meters drove massive four-meter robots onto the battlefield and drowned the enemy with a torrent of metal bullets, goblin rockets, and alchemical bombs...


    At the very least, the might of a goblin machinist-sorcerer on the battlefield was no less than a beginner First Grade adept...until they ran out of ammunition, of course.


    The most significant advantage of this profession was its ease of advancement!


    Through much research and systematic sorting, the goblin adepts had managed to cut away a considerable amount of content from the most difficult aspect of adept advancement¨C Physique improvement. They also got rid of many ¡®unnecessary¡¯ arcane subjects and studies. As such, the chance of an adolescent goblin sessfully advancing to be a machinist-sorcerer rose to a peak of 67%.


    The appearance of the goblin machinist-sorcerer provided the goblins with the opportunity to provide every single member of their race with a profession!


    However, the goblin machinist-sorcerer was a weakened version of a properbat profession, after all. It could not improve the natural Physique of the goblins.


    Regardless of how many goblins advanced to be machinist-sorcerers, their short lifespans were still limited by their race. That was an aspect of the goblin machinist-sorcerer that remained inferior to the other orthodox professions.


    The human adept profession relied on the investment of resources and the umtion of time to slowly gather a group of high-grade adepts. Meanwhile, this simplified profession of the goblins would only ever produce First Grade fighters. There was no chance of a Second Grade ever being created.


    That was because the short lifespan of the goblin was insufficient tost them until Second Grade advancement!


    After all these years of selection and training, as many as thirteen goblin magical-mechanics had appeared in the Crimson n. In particr, Adept Locke, who was improving fastest of them all, was already at advanced First Grade. Given his current progression, it was very likely that the first Second Grade of the goblins would be born in thirty to fifty years.


    Both the few goblin magical-mechanics and the numerous goblin machinist-sorcerers had already stepped upon the battlefield for this war.


    Judging by their performance on the battlefield, they were weaker when it came to matters of stealth and ambush. However, their capabilities on the meat-grinding field of battle were no weaker than the orthodox adepts.


    Put differently; if a goblin magical-mechanic or a goblin machinist-sorcerer was left in a forest with a human adept, then the human adept would most definitely be the one to walk out alive. However, if ten machinist-sorcerers were to step onto the battlefield simultaneously, they would devastatingly defeat ten opposing human adepts!


    In particr, goblin machinist sorcerers, who started out as magical goblins, had greater Spirit and Physique. That allowed them to control and manipte a greater number of even more ferocious magic-mechanical weapons. Compared to human adepts, who treasured their own lives tremendously, the goblins¡¯ savagery and violence inbat allowed them to dominate the battlefield.


    Answering offense with offense, and trading lives with lives. No human adept would be willing to do such a foolish thing, but these goblins didn¡¯t mind!


    As such, with the Crimson n¡¯s higher-level forces being so much more inferior to their opponent, it was the appearance of these fearless goblin machinist-sorcerers that established such a firm and imprable front against the enemy.


    Protected by the magical golem dragon, the magical machine army, the goblin chariots, and the Motherships, the Brutalblood Army formed by the goblin machinist-sorcerers became the one opponent that the Fabres n was least willing to face.


    In all honesty, when the Fabres adepts saw the vicious goblins hide in their magical machines and step onto the battlefield with their puffing steam engines, all whileughing as they reduced the battlefield to scorched earth with their magic energy cannons, goblin rockets, and alchemical bombs, an unbearable and indescribable anger would fill their hearts!


    The defenses of the magical machines they piloted were extraordinarily crude and had meager magic resistance. These machines would often blow up after one or two rounds of attacks from the enemy adepts. However, they didn¡¯t care!


    It was almost as if every single goblin machinist-sorcerer that stepped onto the battlefield knew that they didn¡¯t have long to live. None of them ever seemed to have any intention to turn around and replenish their ammunition. They only attacked as if they were racing with time itself; racing to unleash all the ammunition they had before their war machine was blown to bits.


    That was perhaps the only reason why they were so savage and brutal!


    They could throw away their lives like worthless paper, but the Fabres adepts could not.


    Moreover, as the line of battle slowly approached the Crimson n¡¯snd of origin, the room avable for both parties to ambush and sneak about shrunk dramatically. Most of the time, they had no choice but to return to frontal warfare.


    After experiencing the terror of the Crimson n¡¯s Brutalblood Army for the first time, the Fabres n had no choice but to order their own adepts to stand down. They had suffered tremendous losses, after all. Instead, they reced the adepts with a shocking number of modified voodoo beasts and metal golems.


    Thus, the two ns started engaging in a back and forth with Legas Valley at the center of the conflict, one hundred and twenty kilometers south of Pinecone City. They continuously pushed the battlefield back and forth, switching from location to location, turning one ce after another into a scorched and devastatednd void of all life.


    From an overall perspective, when it came to the quantity and quality of low-level adepts and military force, the Crimson n reigned superior over the Fabres n in many different battlefields.


    However, once the high-grade adepts of the Fabres n stepped onto the battlefield, Mary and Oliven were the only ones who could upy them slightly. Although Third Grade Emerald Dragon Iritina had also responded to the summons and arrived at the n battlefield with some of her flight, thiszy lizard refused to put in the effort while Greem was absent. She would never put herself in a position where she would be facing attacks from multiple adepts of the same grade.


    Moreover, a Fourth Grade body-refining adept was still hiding behind this battlefield.


    That was a powerful existence that could ¡®instantly¡¯ kill any one of them. As such, Iritina was extremely cautious and never left the golem dragon¡¯s radius of protection.


    Either way, with the dragonflight¡¯s presence, the enemy would have to take the terror of the dragons¡¯ attacks into consideration before they engaged in anyrge-scale battle. Consequently, after forcing the Crimson n back to theirnd of origin, the Fabres n had onlyunched a full-scale ground invasion a handful of times. Moreover, most of these incursions were smaller-scale ground pration operations.


    However, as time slowly passed, the Fourth Grade monster behind the Fabres n seemed to have gradually lost his patience. He started to pay more frequent attention to the war and intervened more often.


    Cloaked in the terrifying and suffocating shadow of this Fourth Grade powerhouse, the tiny advantages that the Crimson n had managed to build up before this had vanished without a trace. Every day, when the n adepts took on their missions and stepped onto the battlefield, their hearts were filled with anxiety.


    The reason the Crimson n had yet to copse was simply that the Fourth Grade adept still sat in the Fabres headquarters and had yet to show himself. To this day, the main forces responsible for the progression of war remained a group of Third Grade adepts.


    However, once the Fourth Grade adept lost his patience and personally stepped on the battlefield, the frontline that the Crimson n was currently holding up would copse in an instant. When that happened, no one knew if they could even protect the Crimson n¡¯sst city, even with the magical golem dragon fighting at the very front!


    Pinecone Town could not be lost!


    The Crimson n had developed the ce for so many years and had finally sessfully cultivated a certain degree of resource and manpower advantage. If they lost Pinecone City, they would have nowhere to evacuate the ten to twenty thousand people living in it. The narrow, small geography of Fire Throne did not have the space to do so.


    However, if the Crimson n were to simply abandon the citizens of Pinecone City, they would lose the n elites and backbone members that they required to reestablish themselves, even if they managed to force the Fabres n somehow to retreat.


    The worldly territories required smart and hardworking nobles to rule over them, and the various resource sites required diligent adepts and apprentices to manage them. Those who could remain loyal and unwavering to the n even under such a harsh situation were the foundational stones for the n to grow and develop in the future.

 Chapter 1004 - Eager

    <strong>Chapter 1004 Eager</strong>


    Pinecone City.


    As a human city developed from a small town in the wastnd, the natives were a tremendous minority. Therge numbers of new immigrants had reced most of them.


    Fire Throne was the ce where adepts lived and indulged in their research, after all. It was ill-suited as a ce to deal with the increasingly busy n matters that popped up. As such, Gargamel had already moved his office to Pinecone City twenty years ago.


    Since then, there were two centers of activity within the n.


    Adepts and apprentices delved into their magical research and took on n missions at Fire Throne. Meanwhile, the dailymunications and reports from worldly nobles and local resource sites were managed at Pinecone City.


    Pinecone City had undergone a series of expansion and renovations. The outdated, low, and old buildings were all razed. Rows of luxurious mansions were built in their ce. Moreover, due to privacy concerns, every single estate had its own defensive array and magical barrier that could prevent scrying from the outside.


    Consequently, wandering adepts or foreign apprentices, who had no right to enter Fire Throne to study, loved to rent mansions as their living space. Even the nobles of various ranks from all over the ce would stay in these mansions when they came to request an audience with Lord Gargamel.


    With the growing business and territory of the Crimson n, the traffic that Pinecone City experienced reached a peak of one to two thousand people a day. The city itself also had a standing poption of thirteen thousand. Such arge group of high-grade individuals naturally allowed the food, beverage, and entertainment industries of the city to flourish.


    One had to admit, despite the tiny scale and poption of Pinecone City, its standard of living was the highest throughout Ailovis.


    However, with the start of the adept war, all of the outer territories of the Crimson n had been conquered. The nobles, adepts, and apprentices loyal to the n had no choice but to escape back to Pinecone Town.


    For a moment, all the high-ss mansions, inns, and hotels in the city were full of nobles from all over Ailovis. Moreover, there were still even more refugees swarming into the city. In the end, magical tents with unique designs started to appear all over the ce and were quickly rented by the homeless nobles.


    The disced nobles gathered in Pinecone City daily, always searching and looking out for information about the frontlines.


    This ce was thest they could retreat to.


    If the Crimson n could not defend against the invasion, then they would unavoidably fall into the hands of the Fabres n with the defeat of Pinecone City. Given the Fabres n¡¯s cruelty and the grudges they held over the nobles for refusing their call for surrender, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what would happen to the nobles once they were captured.


    As such, when all-out war broke out in the south, everyone silently started to pray for the gods of luck¡¯s blessings.


    If the Crimson n obtained victory and beat back the enemy¡¯s invasion, they would celebrate, cheer, and dance in high spirits. If the Crimson n lost a battle and yet another territory, they would sigh, and clouds of sorrow would hang over the city.


    The emotions of the nobles in Pinecone City fluctuated with the progress of the war, rising and falling like a roller coaster, constantly flipping between heaven and hell.


    ............


    The mansion area.


    A few dozen goblin nobles in luxurious clothes were gathered in one of the mansions, conversing in loud voices and heated tones.


    ¡°This cannot continue,¡± a goblin in a well-ironed military uniform, who was clearly from the Musen Merchant Group that enjoyed selling firearms, raised his arms and shouted, ¡°We goblins have made enough sacrifices over the past few months. This cannot continue.¡±


    ¡°Indeed! Indeed,¡± a goblin to the side quickly agreed with him, ¡°I have already made the calctions. The number of machinist-sorcerers who died on the battlefield over the past month has exceeded two hundred. And what about the adepts? No more than five of them have died. That is not fair!¡±


    ¡°This isn¡¯t about what is fair and what isn¡¯t!¡± An old goblin from the research institutes with tortoise-shell sses on the rim of his nose shook his head. He said, ¡°Human adepts like fighting under the protection of the magical machines, while our machinist-sorcerers like charging onto the very frontlines. The ratio of casualties naturally differ.¡±


    ¡°But those sacrificed to the war mostlye from us goblins, even though our status and position are far inferior to the human adepts. We must protest this. We must fight.¡±


    ¡°When? When exactly? Now?¡± The old goblin pressed his sses against his face. A mocking smile appeared on his jade-green face, ¡°Are you sure you want to discuss the treatment of the machinist-sorcerers with Lord Gargamel, now, when the war is at its height?¡±


    The few goblins who had been shouting earlier immediately fell silent when the name of the sinister and vicious Gargamel was invoked. They stuttered, ¡°...we need to fight for our people¡¯s benefit, somehow.¡±


    ¡°Fools! Benefit is obtained with blood and sweat, not through a loud voice.¡± Pain shed between the old goblin¡¯s eyes, ¡°We can only choose to stand with the Crimson n now. If we want to obtain greater welfare for our descendants, we must be willing to fight and charge onto the frontline to fight for their interest with proper results on the battlefield, not by finding ways to drag them down.¡±


    The old goblin lifted his head and looked at his kinsmen. He then spoke solemnly, ¡°I know that some of you here have already made contact with the enemies and have gotten certain promises. However, I need you to reflect properly on the situation. If the Crimson n is truly defeated, how are you, the defectors, meant to ensure that they will make good on their promises?¡±


    Goblin Sage Snox stood at the very end of the table, one foot crossed over the other as two goblin beauties massaged his shoulders. He continued to take puffs from his thick cigar, motionlessly looking at the goblin leaders around him.


    ckwater Magnate Vice-Leader Gemisini Moneybags.


    Risk Investment Company Acting Director Razel.


    Musen Merchant Group Head Executive Mordekin.


    Goblin Chamber of Commerce Vice President Bausch.


    Magical Mechanics Federation Chairman Adept Locke.


    Brutalblood Army Commander Drusi La Salle.


    ......


    In all honesty, those who could be present in this room were all major figures that had emerged from the goblins. Though most of the representatives sent by the few major goblin forces were all deputies, they could fully represent the organization they served.


    In contrast, those whose influence and number were the most inferior, like Magical-Mechanic Locke and Machinist-Sorcerer Drusi, seldom spoke up. Instead, they coldly watched the clownish performance of the representatives from the sidelines, just like Snox, who had called for this meeting.


    Compared to the ckwater Magnate, the Risk Investment Company, and the Musen Merchant group, the magical-mechanics and machinist-sorcerers were a considerable minority. However, they also represented the true future of the goblin race.


    Yet, these goblins who had deeply experienced the changes brought about by the adepts¡¯ arcane system no longer shared the same minds as their formerpanions. Meanwhile, the old goblin who represented Dead Gonga of the Goblin Research Institute also seemed to have a moreprehensive, long-term picture of the future of goblins. He seemed particrly unwilling to participate in the fight for power between the others of his kind.


    Despite all this, the few foolish goblins seemed not to have understood the situation yet. They were still cautiously probing the old goblin with questions to see if he would provide some support in their ¡®righteous¡¯ fight for more individual rights.


    ¡°Support? What kind of support?¡± The old goblin narrowed his eyes and asked, even though he knew the answer full well.


    ¡°Of course, we are talking about that greatest bargaining chip in our hands.¡± The goblin in military uniform rubbed his hands nervously, ¡°I believe...if...it¡¯s possible, that the old dean is willing to apply some pressure with the golem dragon, the human adepts will cave-in to our demands!¡±


    When the words ¡®golem dragon¡¯ came jumping out of the goblin¡¯s mouth, the eyebrows of all the goblin leaders in the room jumped along with it. Their gazes turned sharp and cutting.


    This was a pace that would bring the goblins to extinction.


    Silently, a few of the goblin leaders exchanged looks. They started to consider their own routes of escape and development in the future.


    Betray the Crimson n?


    Such an idea was a path of no return!


    Living in the World of Adepts for so many years, and having their worldviews broadened to this extent, had allowed for the smart and knowledgeable goblin leaders to further understand the massive gulf in power between the Goblin ne and the World of Adepts.


    The Goblin ne¡¯s fate was sealed the moment it caught the eye of the adepts.


    In all honesty, the fact that the Goblin ne could fall into the hands of the more gentle and open-minded Crimson n was already their greatest blessing!


    If they had been even slightly less fortunate and had been invaded by any other adept n, it would most definitely have been aplete take-over, swiftly followed by the brutal and unrelenting exploitation of their race and homeworld. Acknowledge the status of goblins as citizens? Give them a chance to assimte into the adepts¡¯ system? These policies had never before appeared in the other adept ns.


    Citizens and ves. Every goblin here knew the tremendous difference between those two statuses.


    As such, though choosing to betray the Crimson n in their time of crisis to join another powerful adept n may sound like a good idea, it was not. If this n was executed, it would drag the entire goblin race into an abyss of death.


    The enemy desperately needed to do away with the influence and pressure created by the presence of the Fourth Grade golem dragon now. That was why they had promised such incredible amounts of benefits and welfare. However, if the goblins were to truly switch sides, what were they supposed to use topete with the human adepts of the enemy n?


    Would they really provide goblin adepts with the same status and treatment as the human adepts?


    Would they still allow the magical machine golem dragon to remain in the hands of the goblins once they managed to obtain such a powerful machine of destruction?


    Could the goblins really obtain freedom and power far beyond what they currently had?


    After experiencing the knowledge system of this new world, the goblins were no longer frogs stuck in a well. They now understood the brutality and savagery ofpetition between the nar worlds. How could they possibly be tricked by those empty lies, like these fools and idiots?


    The secret goblin meeting quickly ended with no conclusion.


    When the few foolish goblins went out to eat and enjoy themselves with thepany of a group of goblin beauties, the leaders who could truly decide the future of the goblin race finally gathered together once again.


    ¡°I see it clearly. It¡¯s the people from Musen Merchant Group who are stirring trouble.¡±


    ¡°Agreed! However, in my opinion, some of the goblins in the Risk Investment Company need to be dealt with as well.¡±


    ¡°Mm, we will report this to Lord Gargamel! I will try my best to fight for the right of execution. That should allow us to reduce the damage to our people to the minimum!¡±

 Chapter 1005 - Confrontation of Fate

    Chapter 1005 Confrontation of Fate


    The Tower of Fate.


    The Tower of Fate sitting high atop Dragonblight had already been shrouded in mist for an entire day and night.


    Ever since night fell, the top of the ever quiet and inconspicuous Tower of Fate had suddenly lit up like arge burning torch. Blinding and dizzying radiance came from atop the tower, piercing the mists and clouds as it shot through the sky.


    Many Fate Witches were gathered in the astrology hall inside the tower, desperately guiding the powers of the stars to point the way home for a certain lost child far away in the remote corners of the universe.


    The mists of Fate enveloping the tower were not the work of the Fate Witches. When the Fate marker pierced the skies and projected somewhere into the distant void, the mists rumbled and gathered together as if intending to cut off the pir of light.


    The mist shed with the pir of light, causing the skies above Dragonblight to shift and turn colors, making for a strange and unpredictable sight.


    Two incredibly powerful forces of Fate power shed, tangled, and neutralized each other. The clouds of Fate shards and chaotic Fate vortices created by this conflict brought about a cmity of extinction to the native creatures of Dragonblight.


    Even the Tower of Fate had no choice but to erect a forcefield to stop itself from being destroyed by the sh between the two powers of Fate.


    As those powers rumbled and surged in the skies, the world consciousness, that had been asleep in silence, abruptly moved. With an iparable and unmatched will, it crushed the foreign power of Fate cast upon its body to pieces.


    Like oil cast onto a brazier, the light projected from the Tower of Fate suddenly glowed tens of thousands of times brighter. The pir of light turned into arrows that pierced through the skies, instantly dispelling the pale white mist around the tower.


    A woman¡¯s faint grunt of pain could barely be heard from the void beyond the ne.


    This foreign power of Fate then gradually retreated from the Northern Lands and from the World of Adept itself, vanishing in the endless storm and energy tides of space.


    Back in the Tower of Fate, the fully equipped Alice opened her mouth and spat out blood, staining the Staff of Divination she held tightly in her hands. Her frail body trembled slightly, but she managed to grit her teeth and keep herself standing.


    Elementium Fairy Helen anxiously fluttered around Alice, constantly waving her wand to bless her with one spell after another. It was only due to these blessings that Alice had barely managed to endure the remote battle between her and that other Witch of Fate.


    Greem was still too careless in the end!


    The single-use teleportation array he had obtained came from Maysa, to begin with. There was no way he could escape her intervention if he wanted to return to the World of Adepts with that array. Fortunately, Greem had chosen the Tower of Fate as his destination when selecting the nar coordinates for the teleportation array, as opposed to Fire Throne. That decision was what allowed Alice to change his Fate.


    Witch Maysa attempted to use the powers of Fate to change the final destination of the teleportation array to transport Greem to somece in the realms beyond. Meanwhile, Alice relied on thebined strength of all her subordinate Fate Witches, the power of the astrology ritual, the Staff of Divination, and even a borrowed trace of power from the World of Adept¡¯s River of Fate to redirect Greem¡¯s nar coordinates back onto their proper path.


    Witch Maysa¡¯s reckelss action had also incited bacsh from the World of Adepts. It was hard to imagine that her condition was much better than Alice¡¯s.


    After a thirty-one hour dy, the milky-white light around the array finally started to fade. The silhouette of Greem and the three other people eventually turned from faint to solid as they became clearer in view.


    The moment the teleportationpleted, the three witches in the array fell to the ground and started retching violently. Even Greem, whose Physique wasparable to a Second Grade body-refining adept, remained dizzy for a long while before he could walk out of the array, step by step.


    As a Third Grade adept, Greem had already experienced hundreds of long-ranged teleportations. Even the internar, ultra-long-ranged teleportations would only take up to two or three seconds. Such a situation where the teleportationsted for over thirty-one hours had never happened before.


    It was like being caught in the intense sh of two separate spacetime forces.


    Even though it was only a short teleportation process, it had forcefully been drawn out to a seemingly unending drift through spacetime. Greem and the three others had a terrible time being caught in a rift between spacetime for such a prolonged duration.


    If it weren¡¯t for all of them being protected by powerful spells, the extension and tearing of the powers of spacetime would have been enough to leave incurable damage to their Spirits.


    The ones waiting outside the teleportation were naturally Alice, Helen, and Snowlotus, who had hurried over.


    They couldn¡¯t help but lift their eyes and look at Greem when they saw the three witches copsed near the array, foam spewing from their mouths.


    ¡°You took too much of a risk this time! You knew that the teleportation array was hers, and you still dared to use it. If it weren¡¯t for me realizing her plot in time and redirecting your coordinates, you would probably be somewhere in the realms beyond now, drinking tea with her!¡± Aliceined softly, her face full of fatigue and weakness.


    At this moment, even Greem knew that he had messed up.


    The difficulty of this teleportation had already alerted him to trouble. It was only now that he heard what Alice had to say that he understood the reason behind the issue.


    Seeing how frail Alice appeared to be and how weak her Spirit was, Greem could fully imagine the intensity of the conflict that had happened between her and the other Witch of Fate.


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry. This time, I was in too much of a hurry!¡± Greem stepped forward and lightly wrapped his arm around Alice¡¯s waist, letting her lean into him. He apologized softly, ¡°For some reason, I keep having the feeling that something is about to happen back at the n, which is why I was in so much of a hurry toe back.¡±


    Alice¡¯s face turned red, and she extended her hand to push herself away from Greem¡¯s embrace. Unfortunately, the exhaustion of her Spirit and stamina left her with no strength at all. Her two hands pressing against Greem¡¯s chest didn¡¯t seem like they were pushing at all. Instead, it almost looked like she was caressing him.


    Greem smiled and kissed Alice on her red lips.


    Alice whimpered but was quickly lost in that sweet and passionate kiss.


    ¡°Oh no, no, I¡¯m gonna get a stye,¡± Helen quickly sped her hands on her eyes and started flying about randomly through the air. Icdy Snowlotus grabbed Helen with her hands and flicked her on the forehead. She then put Helen on her shoulder along with her own little fairy, Hannah.


    After a long while, Greem finally let go of Alice. Her face was already bright red now, and she was swooning a little.


    After a short moment, after allowing her emotions to settle slightly, Alice pointed at the breathless witches and asked out of curiosity, ¡°Italil, why did shee back with you? What about Rena?¡±


    Snowlotus also straightened her ears when she heard Alice mention her mother¡¯s name.


    ¡°There¡¯s a limit to the quota for the teleportation, so only some of us could return first.¡± Greem simply exined, ¡°Rena is still in Henvic ne. She¡¯s helping the witches there rebuild a permanent base of operations. We have also brought the new teleportation coordinates back with us. The Deceit Witches should be able to bring back the rest of the witches once we hand them over.¡±


    Due to their powerful Fate Senses, both Alice and Snowlotus could tell that the story behind the scenes wasn¡¯t as simple as Greem had described. However, they had no time to ask for details in front of these outsiders.


    Under Snowlotus¡¯ instructions, the two fairies flew over to the three witches and waved their wands. Colorful light entered their bodies, helping them deal with the remainder of the spacetime power.


    Italil and the old poison witch were both Third Grade witches. Their Physiques and Spirits might be inferior to Greem, but they still had a decent foundation. When the chaotic spacetime powers vanished from their bodies, they rubbed their heads and slowly got up from the floor.


    That teleportation was definitely out of the ordinary!


    It was just an internar teleportation, yet it had almost killed her.


    Italil knew that there was more behind the whole thing, but she didn¡¯t quite feel like she could ask about the truth in front of Alice and Greem. The only thing she could do was greet the two and express her gratitude.


    As a Third Grade Deceit Witch, Italil had a personal witch tower that belonged to her in the Northern Lands. She was no ordinary figure, be it in terms of personal might or the n she belonged to. That was why Rena had asked for her protection and escort in the first ce.


    ¡°The reason I managed toe back alive from Henvic is all due to Lord Greem¡¯s efforts. I owe you a favor now. Once I have reported on the situation to the n, I will make a special trip to your tower to pay a visit!¡± After sincerely thanking Greem, Italil pulled the other First Grade witch along with her and stepped into the teleportation array to return to her tower.


    Both Alice and Snowlotus¡¯ mouths were in the shape of a perfect circle when they saw how respectful the Third Grade witch was to Greem, who was Third Grade as well.


    It was important to note that most Northern Northern Witches were believers in the matriarchal structure. They had never paid any respects to male adepts whose powers they deemed inferior to their own. Italil was an owner of a witch tower, after all. Her status among the Deceit Witches was only inferior to the two Fourth Grade witches. She typically never showed any respect to other male adepts, yet she referred to Greem as ¡®Lord.¡¯


    Alice and Snowlotus couldn¡¯t help but specte about what had happened in the distant ne of Henvic. What was it that had made Italil so humble before Greem? Her attitude was so respectful; it was almost as if she was treating Greem as a Fourth Grade adept!


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but nce at Greem in confusion. Though his aura was mysterious and profound, so much so that even she couldn¡¯t see the true extent of his power, his soul was definitely at the level of a Third Grade.


    Greem seemed to have noted the confusion of the two women. He smiled casually and said, ¡°There¡¯s no need to wonder. I can find some time to tell you the whole story if you want to know!¡±


    Alice could only nod her head. It was then that her gazended on the old poison witch, who had stayed behind.


    Third Grade. It was a Third Grade witch!


    Still, wasn¡¯t her aura way too strange?!


    Alice kept having a feeling that this monstrous, seemingly inhuman being had a faint trace of soul connection with Greem. A contract...yes, this was the smell of a soul contract!


    ¡°She...is a Third Grade witch you forcefully enved?¡± Alice couldn¡¯t help but ask in shock and horror.


    Greem wasn¡¯t a soul adept or a psionic. He shouldn¡¯t have the ability to capture someone as his ve, should he? Moreover, the witch was a Third Grade too. What kind of soul contract could have such tremendous binding power?


    ¡°Not me. Him!¡± Greem shrugged and lifted his hand to summoned Spirit of Pestilence Remi.


    Alice looked at the other strange Third Grade figure that appeared out of thin air. Her small face couldn¡¯t help but start twitching in disbelief.

 Chapter 1006 - Frost Giant Army

    Chapter 1006 Frost Giant Army


    Alice quickly locked down the news of Greem¡¯s sessful return to the World of Adepts.


    When Mary finally saw the returning Greem on the fifth level of Fire Throne, she instantly lunged and bit him viciously, just to let out all her pent-out frustration from the years of being beaten down by the Fabres n. However, her little tantrum turned into a ¡®naked brawl¡¯ which ultimately ended in a difficult but definite victory for Greem!


    Since Greem had directly teleported to the top level of Fire Throne through the Tower of Fate, no more than five people in the n even knew about his return.


    Ever since she advanced to Third Grade, Mary had always believed herself to be Greem¡¯s equal in various aspects. She thought that she would have no trouble leading the n alone. However, after this period as the head of the n, she fully understood the difficulties of a n leader.


    If you put all the Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim together, there would be a minimum of eleven or twelve of them. Each of these Fourth Grade adepts had founded their own n or organization. However, if one were to make a proper count, they would discover that there were only five ns in Zhentarim that could be consideredrge-sized.


    Why was this the case? The only reason was that developing and strengthening a n would tie up far, far too much of an adept¡¯s effort!


    Many adepts¡¯ intentions in establishing a n were either to make a shelter for their blood descendants, or in hopes of making it easier to collect rare resources and magical items. They were not willing to spend too much effort and time on things other than the arcane. That was why establishing arge n in thepetitive central region of the continent was so immensely difficult.


    That was particrly the case for ns like the Crimson n. They rose to power far too quickly, and they had gathered too many resources in their hands, threatening the territories and resource sites of other nearby adept ns while simultaneouslycking a true powerhouse to protect them. That was the real reason why the Crimson n had been caught in a constant state of war for the past hundred years!


    For instance, the Sarubo n that Greem originated from might not have a Fourth Grade adept within the n, but a Sixth Grade Great Adept was standing behind the scenes in the realms beyond. As such, no group would be so bothered as to find trouble with the Sarubo.


    Though conflict and tension between surrounding adept forces persisted, the Sarubo n had never really faced a crisis that threatened their very existence, as the Crimson n had.


    Yet, no more than fifty yearster, the Crimson n was once again faced with an existential threat!


    The Fabres n, as one of the fiverge ns of the central region, was led by a Fourth Grade adept and had as many as fifteen Third Grade adepts. To ensure that the Crimson n had no chance of turning the tables, they had forcefully summoned seven Third Grade adepts from the foreign nes they ruled, as well as from the realms beyond.


    Dealing with the Crimson n with such a powerful force should have been an easy matter. After all, the Crimson n only appeared to have two Third Grade adepts on the surface. As for the massive flights of dragons that the Crimson n could summon from another ne? In truth, the Fabres n waspletely unintimidated by that prospect.


    The Crimson n had their own mercenaries made up of natives from other nes, but as arge adept n, so did the Fabres n. Their mercenary force would only be stronger than the Crimson n¡¯s.


    As the line of battle slowly pushed toward Pinecone City, and the resistance from the Crimson n began spiking up in intensity, the famous subordinate armies of the Fabres n also started to make their appearance.


    The first to appear was naturally the Frost Giant army.


    One of the lesser nes that the Fabres n had conquered was a world of ice and snow. They had formed a powerfulnd forceposed purely of Frost Giants from that ne.


    Frost Giants were a winter variant of the giant species. They appeared like stout, muscr humans, though each of them stood at an average of five meters tall. They had frost-white skin and pale-blue braided hair.


    Frost Giants also had genders, though both male and female giants were powerful warriors.


    Some individually powerful Frost Giants might even master frost magic without any input or mentor, turning them into unusual frost magicians. The range of their magic might be narrow, but their spells often had shocking power and area-of-effect.


    Fortunately, the chances of a Frost Giant Mage emerging in a Frost Giant tribe was still negligible. Of the five hundred Frost Giants fielded by the Fabres n, only seven of them were Frost Giant Mages.


    However, when these Frost Giants stepped upon the battlefield, the pressure that the Crimson n faced increased exponentially!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Even though most of the Frost Giants were just ordinary warriors, they still knew the basic spells of Frost Armor and Freezing Gusts. In fact, thebination of these two incredibly simple spells and their raw strength made them more terrifying opponents than the Frost Giant Mages.


    When five hundred Frost Giant warriors standing five-meters-tall, with towering physique and dense muscles, rushed onto the battlefield d in freezing Frost Armor and bone-chilling gusts howling around their bodies as they waved their heavy enchanted battleaxes, the defensive line of the Crimson n was instantly torn to pieces.


    The three-meter-tall magical machines stood in a row and unleashed their barrage of metal bullets at the wildly advancing Frost Giants. However, the warriors covered their faces and throats with their thick arms, ignored the stinging pain from the rest of their bodies as they charged at the machines. They roared in anger and swung their axes, smashing the magical machines into the air.


    Large dents would instantly appear at the point of impact on the machines¡¯ bodies.


    Their solid bodies were crushed to pieces and came off like kes of metal, revealing the wildling spinningponents within. Fine cracks would also appear around the dent, extending all the way to the back of their metal shells.


    Several magical machines fell apart in midair from the overwhelming force before they could evennd!


    The series of exploding magical circuits and the sudden destruction of the source of magical power caused the destroyed machines to erupt into giant fireballs, shooting tens of thousands of metal shards in every direction.


    Due to theirrge size and physique, even a First Grade Frost Giant warrior had incredible strength that could match that of a Second Grade body-refining adept. In a direct confrontation, the magical machines could not even endure a single violent blow from a Frost Giant.


    The Frost Giant army managed to break up the formation of the magical machines on the very first charge. They then quickly shed with the magical machines at the second and third lines of defense.


    Themanders of the Crimson n also went into a fury. Under their orders,rge groups of magical machines charged out of their defensive lines and joined the chaotic battlefield.


    Torrents of metal bullets stormed across the battlefield and sted against the muscr forms of the Frost Giants. The Frost Armor that they formed around their bodies couldn¡¯t fully protect every single part, but they made sure to cover their throat, heart, crotch, and armpits as tightly as possible.


    The Frost Giants couldn¡¯t protect the rest of their bodies and decided to stop trying, allowing the enemy to attack those ces as much as they wanted.


    The barrage of bullets rained down upon the giants. Some of the shots had their kic energy dispersed by the Giant¡¯s dense muscles and deflected to the side. Some crashed into the Frost Armor, failing to injure the giants in the slightest and only managing to cause shards of ice to fall to the ground. Some managed to avoid the armor and pierce a giant¡¯s tough, leather-like skin, embedding themselves into muscle-fiber and bone, though even these bullets were quickly shaken off as the giants strode forward.


    The Frost Giants only had their Frost Armor sted to pieces when three to five magical machines concentrated their fire. It was then that they would be riddled with holes in a storm of metal. Even so, the wounded giant would still roll on the ground howling for several minutes before finally dying.


    That was more than enough evidence of the resilience of a Frost Giant¡¯s life force!


    The Frost Giant warriors did not have the strict discipline and formation of humans. They charged in groups of three to five, rampaging through the battlefield as they did on their hunts, freely ughtering any magical machine that entered their range of attack. The magical machine army sent out arge number of melee magical machines. These machines held a shield in one hand and brandished a two-meter long steel sword in the other as they shed with the giants.


    The Archer machines scattered and traveled further away from the battlefield before using their roaring magic energy cannons and an endless stream of bullets to drown the enemy. Typically, five Archers had to continuously barrage a single Frost Giant for over three minutes to take it down. Meanwhile, the magical machines would have to endure the repeated assaults of the Frost Giants.


    As a result, the magical machine army had to suffer casualties of seven to ten units just to kill a single Frost Giant.


    While the Frost Giants upied the firepower of the magical machines, the intermediate and high-grade adepts of the Fabres n stepped onto the battlefield under cover of the Frost Giant Mages.


    Snowstorms that eclipsed the sun, violent and destructive lightning sts, shadow spears shrouded in fearsome ck smoke, magical fireballs of shocking power. With the protection of the meat shields at the front line, the adepts could unleash their offensive might to the fullest extent, delivering appalling losses to the Crimson n¡¯s magical machine army.


    However, the Crimson n was not to be outdone.


    Loud steam whistled as the four hundred-strong Brutalblood Army of goblin machinist-sorcerers rushed into battle.


    Compared to the nd and simple attack patterns of the magical machines, the machinist-sorcerers attacked by all sorts of means and with all kinds of weapons, making it a feast for the eyes.


    The magic energy rifles equipped on the front of their machines unleashed magical energy beams of various colors, while the magic energy cannons equipped on their shoulders let out artillery fire without stopping as they marched forward. Alchemical me of surprising temperature shot out of their outstretched arms, extending for dozens of meters and burning viciously.


    A small tform on the back of the machines was also consistently throwing alchemical bombs and self-destructing devices to every corner of the battlefield.


    A goblin machinist-sorcerer was practically a moving arsenal. They rumbled as they advanced, all while steadily opening fire at every moving enemy around them.


    That heavy rain of bullets, that ferocious firepower, and that unstoppable aura of dominance instantly uplifted the sinking morale of the Crimson forces.

 Chapter 1007 - Modified Beasts and Gargoyles

    Chapter 1007 Modified Beasts and Gargoyles


    Trying to break through the Crimson n¡¯s defensive line with an army of Frost Giants alone was a little difficult.


    As such, when the frontline descended into a massive, chaotic battlefield that stretched for two kilometers, the Third Grade adepts of the Fabres n had no choice but to send in the second subordinate army onto the battlefield.


    The modified beast army.


    It was a terrifying crowd formed entirely of a particr fearsome beast from another ne. There were over seven hundred of these creatures.


    Every single member of the army was a strange beast with a lithe figure, golden scales, and whose appearance resembled a sabertooth tiger. They had a foot-long-w at the end of their limbs and leaped through the air as if they were flying. They appeared almost like ferocious and agile magical beasts.


    However, every time they stomped against the ground, a tiny crater would be left on the spot. That indirectly revealed that they possess power that could match their agility!


    It was a powerful army that excelled at offense, simultaneously possessing strength, agility, and offensive power. Moreover, judging by the golden scales that had been stimted to grow on their bodies through some unique method, their defense would not becking either.


    If the Fabres n had sent out the modified beast army from the very start, they would have had trouble copsing the Crimson n¡¯s defensive line, given their size. Now that the line of defense had been torn to shreds by the Frost Giants, the modified beast army had the perfect opportunity to storm forward and tear an evenrger wound into the enemy.


    The modified beasts that thundered onto the battlefield almost instantly suppressed the morale of the Crimson n that had just been lifted by the Brutalblood Army. The unusual animals swarmed onto the battlefield in packs, lunging, and using their sharp ws and teeth to pin the magical machines to the ground.


    These beasts were also clearly a dominant species with incredible intelligence. They intentionally avoided the metal shells of the machines and attacked their weaker joins and magic energy weapons. Their ws even tore through the rifles and cannons forged from magical alloy.


    Without their energy weapons, the magical machines could only fight in the most primitive of ways. Naturally, they weren¡¯t as powerful when doing so.


    Even when a magical machine¡¯s roaring firepower was unleashed upon the beasts, the metal bullets would be deflected by the golden scales that were as hard as steel. The magic energy beams would also bounce off harmlessly. Only exploding magical energy fireballs would leave a bowl-sized burn mark on their bodies.


    However, this amount of damage was not enough to take down these strange tigers, with their almost four-meterrge bodies. Quite the contrary, the intense pain would further stimte the beasts, causing them to be more ferocious, more savage, and more fearless in their ughter.


    Many of the creatures broke through the line of magical machines and reached the formation of the goblin chariots at the mid-rear end of the army. They turned the ce into a mess.


    For a moment, the offensive firepower of the goblin chariots¡¯ cannons stalled severely!


    Just as the strange tigers went unchecked deep in the defensive lines of the Crimson n, dragon roars could be heard from Pinecone City in the distance. Several majestic dragons covered in green scales beat their wings and took to the skies, descending upon the battlefield in the blink of an eye.


    Most of the dragons that had appeared were the green dragon subordinates that Iritina had brought with her from Faen.


    Though they were only at First or Second Grade, their dragon¡¯s aura of might and their natural predatory instincts allowed them to reign superior over these modified beasts.


    Indeed, it was undeniable that these alien tigers were not a native species that had naturally evolved in a nar world. Instead, they were modified beasts that the Fabres adepts had bred and cultivated using several different but powerful alien magical creatures.


    Even if the adepts had employed various methods to give them powerful defense, offense, and regenerative powers, they could not change the fear of dragons that had been etched deep in their souls.


    When the overwhelming dragon¡¯s aura of the seven green dragons spread across the field, it wasn¡¯t just the tigers that started faltering. Even the Frost Giants began to show restraint in their attacks,cking any of their former courage or bravery.


    The seven Third Grade adepts were all watching the battlefield on the floating wooden ship far behind the lines, either through their crystal balls or through the use of Eagle Eye.


    When the green dragonflight charged onto the battlefield and incited chaos among the foreign armies, two of the Third Grade adepts let out a disgruntled grunt. Clearly, the Frost Giant Army and the Modified Beast Army were managed by the two of them!


    The subordinate armies they were responsible for cultivating for the n might have decent offensive power, but they had massive ws as well. A severe light gleamed in the eyes of the two adepts. They were obviously thinking about more ways to further strengthen their soldiers once this war was over.


    ¡°Since the enemy has released the dragons, it¡¯s about time we send out the Gargoyle Army!¡± The one in the lead was an elderly Third Grade in a gold-lined robe. He turned his face, and his gazended on a young female adept wearing a golden headband, ¡°Triumph, it is up to you next!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Lord Kagan!¡±


    The young adept smiled sweetly before turning and walking to the edge of the ship. She touched her headband, and several mysterious mental waves transmitted through the air.


    Five kilometers behind the battlefield, a group of elite adepts were secretly stationed in a hidden valley. The Second Grade adept leading the party immediately gave an order when he received the instructions from his superior. ck-armored guards ran through the valley and opened a series ofrge wooden boxes engraved with mysterious and profound magical runes.


    There were many of these wooden boxes. As many as two to three hundred, in fact!


    As the seals on the boxes were undone, the magic-sealing boxes exploded as green and gray creatures charged into the sky from within, screeching as they approached the battlefield.


    The appearance of the strange creatures immediately drew the attention of everyone on the battlefield. In particr, the Crimson n¡¯s forces quickly adjusted the eyeball machines hiding in the sky to look at the true forms of the new approaching enemies.


    ¡°Gargoyles.¡±


    ¡°They are gargoyles!¡±


    ¡°They must have prepared them for our dragons.¡±


    The leaders of the Crimson n cursed in frustration, but there was nothing they could do.


    Supposedly, gargoyles were not particrly powerful animated creations. There was no reason to be so concerned about them.


    However, these gargoyles were different from the usual variety. That was obvious from the strange stone they seemed to be made out of, as well as the magical patterns that had been carved onto their hard stone bodies. Moreover, as animated magical creations, they had no souls or intelligence to speak of. They would not need to worry about the effect of the dragons¡¯ aura of might.


    Two hundred and seventy advanced First Grade gargoyles beat their heavy stone wings and flew across the battlefield. The two green gemstones embedded on their ugly, ape-like faces gleamed with a sinister light.


    They headed straight for the green dragons upon appearance. Theirrge numbers and their two-meter-tall bodies practically allowed them to blot out the sun.


    Faced with the approaching army of gargoyles, the seven green dragons reared their heads and roared. They once again took to the skies. After circling above the battlefield once, they folded their wings and dived down upon the gargoyles.


    The gargoyles were made entirely out of arge and strange rock. The odd magical patterns carved on their surface made their bodies as tough and sturdy as golems of steel. However, while steel golems couldn¡¯t fly, they could.


    Though their speed in the air was extremely slow, and their maximum altitude reasonably low, they were still able to fly.


    When the green dragons formed into an assault formation and dove downwards, the gargoyles continued flying slowly under the control of the adepts behind the scenes. It almost seemed like they had no intention of dodging the dragons¡¯ attack at all.


    The seven green dragons dived at high speed. When they reached within three hundred meters of the gargoyle army, they opened their mouths in unison and unleashed thick breaths of green smoke. Their bodies then tilted to the side and glided away from the rear of the gargoyle¡¯s formations. While they did so, they made sure to sweep their heads over the gargoyles and smother most of them in green smoke.


    It was the poison breath of the green dragons!


    Unfortunately, all the adepts of the Crimson n started frowning when they saw this. Meanwhile, the Fabres adepts were chuckling coldly.


    Were gargoyles afraid of poison? Of course not! What a joke that was!


    These green dragons were uneducated peasants from a rural ne, after all. They had obviously never seen an animated construct like a gargoyle in their life. As such, they chose an utterly erroneous method of dealing with them.


    On the battlefield, a price had to be paid for every mistake made!


    Green and gray chains suddenly shot out of the thick poison mist.


    The green dragons were caught entirely unaware due to the short distance. Three of the green dragons were immediately wrapped up in a web of chains.


    The other four dragons managed to return to higher altitudes with a few beats of their wings, but the three dragons could not fly any higher, no matter how they tried. During this time, the horde of gargoyles had jumped onto them and instantly covered the three dragons.


    The green dragons might have uncontested flying abilities, but even they could not remain in the air when their wings were wrapped in chains, and a swarm of stone weights grabbed onto their bodies. The three dragons cried out in horror as they crashed from the skies.


    Dong. Dong. Dong.


    Three distinct thuds could be heard as three massive craters appeared on the ins below.


    The sound of the dragons fighting with the gargoyles could be heard before the massive pir of dust had even dispersed.


    Emerald Dragon Iritina flew into a rage when she saw this. She roared and prepared to charge onto the battlefield to save her subordinates, but Mary stopped her.


    ¡°Those three subordinates of yours are finished! Even you cannot save them now,¡± Mary said coldly, ¡°If I were you, I would hurry to notify the remaining idiots to stop fighting with those gargoyles! Otherwise, the rest of them will probably die in the same ce!¡±


    Iritina was livid when she heard this. She beat her wings, fully intent on giving Mary a furious scolding.


    However, in that one moment of dy, the other four dragons had dived down to the ground as well, simply because they saw that theirpanions were trapped.

 Chapter 1008 - Bitter Battle Against the Gargoyles

    Chapter 1008 Bitter Battle Against the Gargoyles


    A flight of three Second Grade and four First Grade green dragons were exterminated silently, just like that!


    In a small ne, a flight of dragons like this would have been enough to rob the entire ne before taking over a kingdom as their personal hunting grounds. Yet, a force of nature like this had been extinguished without a hup by a pack of gargoyles during a civil war between two ns.


    Of course, as apex predators, the seven dragons were not so easily wiped out.


    The gargoyles paid the price of ny-eight ¡®fresh¡¯ lives, all of them torn, bitten, or tackled to death by the desperate green dragons, turned into massive pieces of stone scattered across the ground.


    The remaining hundred or so gargoyles once again rose to the skies after piling on the dragonflight to death with their sheer numbers alone. They started to move in the direction of the main battlefield. If these stone monsters with incredible magical and physical resistance were allowed to break onto the battlefield, the already weakened army of the Crimson n would probably fall apart in an instant.


    Thus, under themands of the higher-ups, the two Motherships rushed towards the gargoyles, escorted by over a hundred goblin skyships and thousands of eyeball machines.


    The first toe into contact with the enemy was naturally the shocking number of eyeball fighter machines.


    Even the previously ever-sessful eyeball machines couldn¡¯t do anything when faced with these animated stone gargoyles. The gargoyles simply had no weak spots or organs throughout their bodies.


    The thousands of eyeballs were like buzzing flies, quickly weaving between the gargoyles while firing Scalding Rays all over the statues.


    Unfortunately, the gargoyles had no flesh and no weakness. The Scalding Rays could not scrape off a single piece of rock from their bodies and only left imperceptible tiny dots instead.


    Many of the eyeball machines were turned into little fireballs from a single swipe of a gargoyle¡¯s sturdy ws and stone wings due to being too close. Their scatteredponents rained down from the skies.


    Any thoughts of going head-to-head with the fierce gargoyles were unwise. The Mothership and goblin skyships took full advantage of the gargoyles¡¯ slow speed to hover outside their range while bombarding them with their magic energy cannons.


    Magic energy fireballs the size of human heads erupted amid the gargoyles, disorienting them and causing them to fall toward the ground. Stone dust also started king off their bodies from the impact of the attacks.


    However, the magical resistances of these gargoyles were truly shockingly high!


    They managed to stabilize themselves after falling for only ten meters. They then pped their stone wings and once again flew up into the sky.


    Moreover, perhaps realizing that the enemy¡¯s weapon couldn¡¯t hurt them, the gargoyles stopped flying in a tight formation. Instead, they split up into a dozen different groups and spread out like a giant, lunging at the two Motherships from several different angles.


    If they were able to board the Motherships, a brutal melee would probably break out again!


    The Motherships slowly retreated while mobilizing the magical machines on board. Arge group of Shield Defenders charged onto the deck and got into formation, standing by in wait for a possible enemy boarding.


    Adept Locke, who was aboard one of the skyships, was also fighting with all he had. Under his instructions, his personal magical machine, now at Version III, transformed into a sniper. An extremely long magic energy cannon extended from within its body and aimed explicitly for the base of the gargoyles¡¯ wings.


    Unfortunately, all three shots it fired aplished nothing other than sting some dust off of the statues.


    The gargoyles weren¡¯t idiots either. Seeing that the enemy was attacking their only weakness, they quickly switched their direction of flight, using either their bodies or ws to block any iing fireballs.


    The speed of the gargoyles shouldn¡¯t have allowed them to catch up to the skyships, but when they were so spread out, the room for the skyships to moved gradually decreased.


    The gargoyles had visibly boarded three or four goblin skyships at the edge of the battlefield. They quickly exploded into giant fireballs after an intense and grueling battle.


    Naturally, no adept, goblin, or apprentice aboard those skyships could survive such an explosion. Yet, the gargoyles emerged from the mes. Their entire bodies were now ck from the smoke and fire. They continued to join the ranks of theirrades in exterminating the Crimson n¡¯s aerial forces.


    Neither the goblin rifles and their metal bullets, nor the magic energy cannons and their fireballs could inflict sufficient damage upon the gargoyles. The entire air force could only retreat as they fought, chased across the whole sky by the hundred gargoyles. It was a chaotic scene, indeed.


    Magic Archer Sandor shot out an arrow from her skyship, sting a gargoyle and forcing it to tumble through the air several times before it stopped. It temporarily spared her ship from being boarded by the animated creature. However, seven or eight other gargoyles still slowly approached her vessel.


    If any of them were to break into the ship, she would have no choice but to have the vessel self-destruct while she fled.


    ¡°Little Locke, aren¡¯t you always boasting about being the smartest? Hurry up and think of something. Otherwise, we are all going to die here!¡± Sandor continued to fire explosive arrows, knocking back the gargoyles and preventing them from boarding. She screamed at Adept Locke, who was on a nearby ship, as she fought.


    ¡°What idea could I possibly have? Our weapons and attacks can¡¯t even hurt the gargoyles. Am I supposed to try biting them with my teeth?¡± Adept Locke was sweating beads now. He continued to givemands to his magical machine while thinking as quickly as he could.


    ¡°Hurry up...hurry up and think of something with your smart little brain, or I¡¯m gonna ditch this fleet faster than you all! If we can¡¯t kill them, can¡¯t we just stall?¡±


    ¡°Stall, stall...yes, stall them!¡± Reminded by Sandor¡¯s panicked words, Locke¡¯s green eyes suddenly gleamed with light, ¡°Mocha, stop using the sniping cannon. Use the alloy webs instead.¡±


    Upon receiving its master¡¯s orders, the transforming magical machine known as Mocha creaked and turned into an odduncher. It aimed at one of the gargoyles and fired a fist-sized metal ball at the monstrosity.


    The metal ball was still sailing through midair when it broke apart, turning into a three-meter-wide alloy web that thoroughly wrapped up the gargoyle.


    The gargoyles¡¯ bodies were immovable even with the fiercest of fireballs. How could they be afraid of an alloy web that was no thicker than a single finger? However, contrary to everyone¡¯s expectations, once the gargoyle¡¯s wings and body had been entangled in the web, its body started spinning uncontrobly and crashing to the ground, even after it managed to struggle out and tear up most of the web.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    A massive pir of dust rose from the ground. The gargoyle¡¯s body created a one-meter deep crater when it smashed into the ground. It had to struggle for a long time just to get up from the hole. Though most of the alloy web in front of its body had been shredded to pieces, its wings were still entangled in the mess of steel threads. It had an incredibly difficult time reaching back to tear off the alloy threads with its clumsy and stubby limbs.


    The gargoyle remained grounded even after fumbling about for a long, long time.


    ¡°Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god! You¡¯re the best, Little Locke! This idea of yours is brilliant,¡± Sandor couldn¡¯t help but start cheering out loud, ¡°I would give you a big, warm kiss if you were beside me now.¡±


    ¡°......¡± Locke¡¯s face blushed all of a sudden, and he quickly hid his embarrassment with the heat of battle.


    Little Locke started reporting his n to the Crimson leaders in the Mothership as he continued to fight.


    In just fifteen minutes, the small factory in the Motherships had managed to rush production on a surprising number of alloy webs.


    All of the goblin skyships stopped their pointless attacks. Instead, they started tossing out alloy webs, alloy chain hammers, and alloy threads. In the blink of an eye, all one-hundred of the gargoyles were wrapped up and tightly bound in metal chains and webs of all sizes.


    They began to crash down from the skies, smashing massive craters into the ground as theynded.


    Naturally, the Fabres n witnessed this ridiculous scene unfold. The Third Grade adepts abord the floating wooden ship couldn¡¯t help but frown in unison.


    Creating these powerful, magically and physically resistant gargoyles had spent much of the n¡¯s resources. They had hoped to turn them into heavy aerial infantry that could rule the skies. If the enemy could restrain them with such a cost-effective method, then the n¡¯s efforts wouldpletely go to waste.


    In particr, the young Third Grade witch with the golden headband, who was directing the gargoyles in battle, was not looking good. Her face shed green and white, furious at the clumsy performance of her subordinates.


    The other adepts could stand by andugh, but as themander of the gargoyles, she had to do her best to save her useless underlings.


    An instruction was sent out through her invisible mental waves, and an elite party of adepts on the backlines charged onto the battlefield. They headed straight for the grounded gargoyles that were clumsily climbing around on the ground. It seemed like they intended to free the gargoyles from the webs.


    Naturally, the Crimson forces in the sky could not allow them to do as they wished!


    Arge group of eyeball machines swarmed forward, drowning the adepts with a violent rain of Scalding Rays. Even more magical machinesunched out of the Mothership and the goblin skyships. These machines lunged wildly at the rescue team the moment theynded, absolutely refusing to let them get close to where the gargoyles had crashed.


    Thus, a new battlefield appeared on the nk, which quickly intensified and boiled over!


    At the same time, some surprising changes had also appeared on the main battlefield.


    The Frost Giant Army and the Modified Beast Army were starting to falter in the face of the Crimson n¡¯s offense. They were slowly beginning to retreat.

 Chapter 1009 - Prelude to the Final Battle

    Chapter 1009 Prelude to the Final Battle


    The ones that defeated the two mighty subordinate armies of the Fabres n were none other than the inconspicuous self-destructing machines of the Crimson n.


    These self-destructing machines were often the size of a human head and marched along with the magical machines. When the battle broke out, they swarmed forward, chittering and screeching as they rushed to where the enemies were the most crowded before exploding violently.


    Their main lethality came from their modified magic energy explosives and the numerous armor-prating shells hidden within them. They unleashed a devastating and indiscriminate attack when they blew up.


    They might seem small, but their numbers were unbelievable. Even after half of them had been destroyed by spells and frost magic, the remainder of them still managed to self-destruct amid the ranks of the frost giants and the modified tigers.


    One or two self-destructing machines might not be much, but when there was an entire army of them, even the two powerful subordinate armies started suffering damage to their lower bodies. Most of the Frost Giants¡¯ hairy legs were injured from the explosions, while the modified beasts were mostly wounded in the lower abdomen, where the golden scales did not reach.


    These small injuries didn¡¯t seem like much, but when they umted, they began to hinder the attacks and movements of the enemy severely. A Frost Giant shambling on one leg or magical tiger that asionally paused to lick its wounds were both prime targets for the goblin chariots on the battlefield.


    As courageous as the two subordinate armies were, there was no avoiding their rapid exhaustion in such a bloody battle!


    Seeing how the frontline was about to descend into a wasteful tug-of-war that would expend much of their invested resources, the seven Third Grade adepts of the Fabres n started to be concerned.


    The Fabres n was indeed several dozen times more powerful than the Crimson n, with iparable advantages in both resources and number of adepts. However, the bigger the organization, the more power was needed.


    These subordinate armies were all aces that the Fabres n had hidden across their lesser nes. They were the main military force meant to be used to defend the assets of the n. If they suffered excessively heavy losses in a short amount of time and failed to replenish their numbers quickly enough, there would be an unpredictably severe effect across the lesser nes owned by the Fabres n.


    For the first time, the seven Third Grade adepts of the Fabres n couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by the Crimson n. They had only risen to power a hundred years ago, yet they could survive in a battle against the Fabres n and their thousands of years of umtion until this moment. It was more than enough evidence of the effective management of the Crimson n, as well as their surprising military potential.


    Moreover, even though the war had intensified to such an extent, the Crimson n had yet to send their golem dragon onto the battlefield. It fully demonstrated that the enemy was not yet on theirst legs and that they were not desperate. It also indirectly reflected the Crimson n¡¯s terrifying potential for war.


    Faced with such an opponent, the Fabres n adepts had no option left but to put aside their arrogance and to show the will and courage to fight a bloody battle.


    The seven Third Grade adepts looked at each other and silently started sorting out their equipment. They flew out of the flying wooden ship and headed towards the bloody battlefield. Squads of elite adepts also emerged from their hiding spots behind them, gathering into a rumbling torrent as they rushed towards the battlefield.


    Faced with the hundreds and thousands of Fabres adepts, the Crimson n also started to concentrate their military forces and assigning them to their various positions. In the distance, the magical golem dragon in Pinecone City could also be seen moving towards the battlefield with rumbling steps as a torrent of steam pouring from its mouth.


    The three Motherships slowly lowered their altitude and hovered above the n¡¯s formation, shielding them from any aerial threats. Over four hundred goblin chariots grouped up into four cannon formations on the ground, still incessantly bombarding the enemies marching towards them.


    The number of magical machinesing from the chariots, the Motherships, and from Pinecone City now numbered 1,262. All of them stood in front of the goblin chariots, forming a tight¨Cif haphazard¨Cdefensive line at the very front.


    Any creature that wished to assault their defensive line would have to endure the firepower of hundreds of magic energy cannons, along with sniping fire from the giant energy cannons above.


    That did not include the 763 magical machines and 326 Brutalblood goblin machinist-sorcerers that were still fighting on the battlefield.


    The two great ns were desperately concentrating their forces at the frontline but did not cast them into battle yet. Instead, they gathered their soldiers at the edge of the battlefield with the intent of forming an overwhelming force sufficient enough to crush the enemy¡¯s line of defense in a single strike.


    All manner of adept forces started to appear after a while, each one dressed in their own unique fashion and equipped in their own particr way.


    There was cavalry riding upon ferocious beasts, wearing magic resistant armor while wielding thunder tridents crackling with lightning. There were archers with muscr bodies, carrying glowing runic longbows of strange design upon their backs. There were even bird-people who had wings growing out of their backs, dressed in leather armor and holding magic wands in their hands.


    All of these soldiers radiated magical aura, and even the weakest of them was at the level of an advanced apprentice. In a small n, these people would be the next generation forces that the n would cultivate with all their strength. Yet, the Fabres n had chosen to train them into a strange ¡®army¡¯ of sorts.


    Indeed, the Fabres n had trained these soldiers in the fashion of worldly armies while equipping them with the corresponding magical equipment. Sometimes, when an apprentice-level ¡®warrior¡¯bined his power with that of magical equipment, he could unleash terrifyingbat prowess equal to that of a proper adept.


    That was perhaps the real reason the Fabres n had put in so much effort into training them!


    It was important to note that sessfully cultivating an official adept in the World of Adepts required such a tremendous amount of time and resources that it could topple an ordinary adept n. However, if this time and these resources were invested in adept apprentices who had no hopes of advancement, it was easy to obtain a sizeable, simple fighting force quickly.


    However,pared to official adepts, these apprentice ¡®warriors¡¯ only had thebat prowess to match. They didn¡¯t have many hopes of advancement and could not be a source of high-grade adepts for the n. As such, mostrge adept ns still focused on cultivating proper adepts, onlyplementing the n¡¯s primary military force by training such ¡®adept forces.¡¯


    The Crimson n had risen to power far, far too recently, after all. They hadn¡¯t had sufficient time, energy, or resources to train and create a voodoo beast army, a subordinate army, or an adept force belonging solely to the n. Only the newly founded Brutalblood Army was somewhat like an adept force, while the dragons of Lance were slightly simr to a subordinate army.


    As for a voodoo beast army? Not a shadow of such a force could even be seen within the Crimson n!


    At this point in the war, both parties were alreadymitting every single force they had to the battle. The conflict started to escte in tension, slowly turning into the final showdown between the Fabres n and the Crimson n.


    Behind the Crimson n¡¯s forces was theirst remaining city¨C Pinecone City.


    If the Crimson n lost the war, all the territories, resource sites, and workforce they had painstakingly gathered over the years in Ailovis would be destroyed in a single night. Though they still had a n tower they could retreat to, doing so would mean the reputation that they had built up over the years would be gone without a trace.


    Thepetition in the World of Adepts was exceedingly cruel and practical!


    Once the Crimson n was reduced to a weakling that anyone could bully, all the enemies they had made in the past would gather together to devour what resources they had left. They would never give the Crimson n a single chance at rising to power again.


    Meanwhile, the core of the Crimson n remaining in White Tower would also have to survive a bloody storm just as brutal as the one in the central region if they wanted to grow firmly under the rule of the Northern Witches.


    The presence of a powerful mastermind could faintly be felt behind the scenes of the tumultuous storm that the Crimson n was currently facing!


    That the Crimson n could rule over a region of their own was proof of their powerful vitality and resilience. Though tension and conflicts over certain things might arise with the veteran ns, all-out war seeking to uproot the very foundations of a n rarely happened under ordinary circumstances.


    Though the Fabres n could conquer the entirety of Ailovis after they exterminated the Crimson n, it wasn¡¯t exactly worth the price. The number of adepts and soldiers they had lost since the start of the battle was already pushing towards their limits.


    If this series of ceaseless casualties were to continue, even the great and powerful Fabres n would face the possibility of a period of weakness.


    It was precisely because they hoped to prevent that from happening that the seven Third Grade Fabres adepts had chosen to set foot upon the battlefield personally. They wanted to crush thest resistance of the Crimson n with a violent and unstoppable assault to end this long and difficult adept war as soon as they could.


    The seven Third Grade adepts stood in a row, each using their abilities to hover above their forces. Their ferocious aura gathered into a formless will, heavily pressing down upon the Crimson n¡¯s forces.


    Meanwhile, on the side of the Crimson n, only Mary and Oliven were flying in the air, ring at the enemy. There were no other Third Grade adepts. Neither their aura nor numbers could evene close to that of the Fabres n.


    ¡°You must be Adept Mary.¡± The leader of the Fabres n adepts was a Third Grade adept named Zam. He stepped forward and smiled as he looked at the crimson adept hovering in the air with her wings of leather, ¡°All the forces that your Crimson n can muster are already here. If you lose, you will lose everything. Not only will you have no n and no resources, but even you personally will not be able to remain in thisnd. So...surrender!


    ¡°As long as you are willing to surrender, I will ask Lord Den to treat you all as best as we can. When that happens, you will remain respected adepts, free to walk under the skies. Why not take my offer?¡±


    ¡°Trying to get me to surrender?¡± The pretty Mary started chuckling loudly.


    ¡°What¡¯s so funny?¡± A female adept from the Fabres n stood forward and said, ¡°Stop dreaming of resisting us. Otherwise, you will lose everything when you lose the war. Not even your souls will rest in peace when that happens!¡±


    ¡°Hahaha! That¡¯s where you are wrong! You aren¡¯t speaking to the right people!¡± Mary continued tough, ¡°The Crimson n is not mine. It¡¯s his. If you want to ask us to surrender, you had better talk to him!¡±


    As Mary finished speaking, a blinding pir of fire sted into the skies above a Mothership. A majestic and towering figure strode out from within.

 Chapter 1010 - Legendary Fire Adept

    Chapter 1010 Legendary Fire Adept


    How much power did Greem¡¯s name hold in the Crimson n?


    It wasn¡¯t usually too obvious, but the power of his name was put on full disy upon a n battlefield like this one.


    The Crimson n was founded by Greem, to begin with. He, the legendary fire adept who rose to power in such a miraculous fashion, had deeply etched the name of the Crimson n in the hearts of every one of its members.


    The Crimson n was Greem, and only Greem could truly represent the Crimson n!


    It didn¡¯t matter how badly suppressed by the enemy the Crimson n had been. It didn¡¯t matter how horribly they had been beaten. It didn¡¯t matter how many concessions they had made and how many resource sites and territories they had lost. When Greem appeared before everyone with his iconic body of mes, the emotions of the Crimson n members instantly ignited.


    A thunderous wave of cheering soared into the skies.


    Almost as if resonating with everyone¡¯s emotions, zing fire cascaded outwards from Greem¡¯s burning figure, gathering into a luxurious crimson armor that covered his towering body.


    Greem¡¯s familiar and powerful voice boomed across the sky.


    ¡°Everybody, I am back!¡±


    This simple sentence caused the entire battlefield to erupt.


    The goblin machinist-sorcerers bathing in blood and fire on the frontlines, the goblin cannoneers firing away at the turrets on the goblin chariots, and the n adepts gathering at the frontlines preparing for the ughter toe; each and every one of them flew into a frenzy. Their eyes turned red, and they started shouting the name of the legendary fire adept with all their might.


    It wasn¡¯t just them. The apuse was thundering within themand hall of the Motherships as cheers filled the rooms. In particr, Crimson leaders andmanders Gargamel and Meryl were having tears well-up their eyes and streak down their faces. They, too, started shouting with all they had.


    It had been such a hard and bitter effort just hanging on!


    Their past few months of painstaking effort, of staying at the very frontlines night and day, of enduring countless rumors and gossip behind their backs, and of shouldering such unimaginable pressure¨C what had it all been for? For the sake of awaiting their master¡¯s return, for the sake of preserving the Crimson n¡¯s power, and for the very sake of returning a still-intact Crimson n back to the hands of Greem.


    When they saw that dear, familiar pir of mes and that majestic figure standing in the sky, all their humiliation, frustration, and effort turned into warm tears and burst out of their eyes. Gargamel and Meryl could only express their delight and excitement with the most primal and intense cheering that they could muster.


    Now that Lord Greem was back, they no longer had to bear such a heavy burden!


    Even if Greem were alone and the enemy numbered in the tens of thousands, the hearts of the Crimson adepts still settled in an instant. They believed...no, they firmly believed that even in the most desperate of situations, even in the most difficult of battlefields, the legendary fire adept Lord Greem would undoubtedly lead them towards victory!


    Greem stood high in the sky with overwhelming fire gathered around his body. His powerful and sensitive Spirit perfectly picked up on the intense conviction from the members of the Crimson n. From adepts to apprentices to the ordinary goblins, everyone was filled with unwavering trust and admiration for him.


    This...was clearly the source of the power of faith!


    This power didn¡¯t usually manifest easily, which is why Greem hadn¡¯t realized its existence, even when tens of thousands of such fine threads were wrapped around him. However, today, when the n was faced with a crisis, all of the emotions hidden within the hearts of the n members had been ignited and brought forth. That was why Greem could very clearly sense surges of a profound and unusual power being very remotely projected onto his person through the mysterious narws when he stood forward.


    It mysteriously caused his majestic figure in the sky to be even more focused and substantial in presence.


    The effect of this in the eyes of the enemy was as if the legendary fire adept was resonating with the world itself, even as he walked towards them. His entire being, from his physical presence to his spiritual presence, pressed towards them with a terrifying aura as if he had the very power of the world in tow.


    It caused the members of the Fabres n to feel an inexplicable pressure within their hearts and minds. The will to battle that they had just managed to muster earlier couldn¡¯t help but start wavering and trembling!


    Naturally, the ordinary adepts and warriors did not feel this change too sensitively.


    They only faintly sensed the aura of the fire adept growing stronger and his figure growingrger, while realizing that they had no chance of defeating this opponent. It was a vague and peculiar sensation to have, but it was directly etched within their souls and minds, causing them to believe firmly in this feeling as if it were a fact itself.


    When the actual fight broke out, the ordinary warriors and adepts probably wouldn¡¯t even have the courage to swing their weapons or cast their spells at Greem.


    The morale and will of the Fabres forces instantly faltered and fell to a low!


    ¡°Dammit! That is the power of thews! The fire adept actually managed to move the narws.¡±


    ¡°How is this possible? I am not hallucinating, am I?¡±


    ¡°Bastard! Isn¡¯t he only Third Grade?¡±


    The others might not understand what was happening, but the seven Third Grade Fabres adepts at the frontline felt everything and understood most perfectly what was happening.


    The damned fire adept was actuallypatible with the consciousness of the nar origin at this moment. He had managed to move a trace of the narws¡¯ power, etching within the souls of their forces the thought of defeat.


    ording to what they knew, this should be a power exclusive only to those old, peak Fourth Grade monsters!


    The power of the principles was a strange and mysterious force produced when the principles of the world were functioning.


    In contrast, the power ofws was only an extension and manifestation of the power of principles. The power ofws was like human skin. The driving forces producing all the power were the bones, tendons, and muscles hidden beneath the skin, but the only thing that people could ever see was the skin thaty above these organs.


    Only the powers of principles could represent the foundational power behind the function and structure of the nar worlds.


    The principles of the world were always hidden from the senses of the lifeforms inhabiting it. nar lifeforms would never have any chance of making contact with the principles without doing so through the manifestation that was the narws.


    As such, to master the power of principles, one would first have to understand and master the power ofws.


    It was only after thoroughlyprehending the power of the narws that an individual adept¨Cone of hundreds of millions of lifeforms in a nar world¨Ccould hope to take a step forward and make contact with that profound and mysterious force that represented the very foundational principles of the world itself!


    What the legendary fire adept was currently doing was borrowing the sudden explosion of belief from his n members to move a trace of the power of narws.


    It was somewhat ¡®cheating,¡¯ but it still undoubtedly punished the Fabres n and dampened their morale and will to fight. Should the Fabres n show even the slightest of disadvantage upon the battlefield, there was a chance that the ¡®seed of failure¡¯ sowed deep in the hearts of their n members could be detonated, thereby causing unpredictable risk to the campaign.


    Faced with this situation where only victory was allowed, the seven Third Grade adepts could not help but start cursing in their minds.


    The adepts had tough and resilient minds. They could not possibly be too adversely affected by this ¡®seed of failure,¡¯ but the effect on the apprentice-level adept force and the subordinate armies would be immense. Should they lose some portion of the battle, it was very likely that these forces would start doing unbelievable things from the effect of defeat and their defeated emotions.


    For instance: howling, causing chaos, thrashing about randomly, or even fleeing immediately.


    Moreover, all of these actions could further magnify the pessimistic outlook of the other warriors, leading to even more severe consequences!


    ¡°Hmph! A parlor trick! They don¡¯t have enough high-grade adepts. We will use our numbers to...¡± Adept Zam could feel himself panic slightly. He hastily shouted to bolster the morale of their forces. However, before he could even finish, changes started urring behind the lines of the Crimson n.


    Thunderous dragon roars could be heard from Pinecone City as eight dragons of various colors took to the skies and rushed towards the battlefield.


    In the lead was Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms and Emerald Dragon Iritina, with several First and Second Grade subordinates they had just recruited from Lance following behind them.


    At the same time as the dragons appeared, a massive portal appeared behind the goblin chariots, and a shocking number of magical machines swarmed out of it. In the lead was Split-Brain Gru, standing at four meters tall.


    These subordinate forces of the Crimson n were clearly very disingenuous people.


    They had ignored all the orders of the n when Mary, Gargamel, and Meryl headed it. However, now that Greem had returned, they immediately arrived to reinforce the n¡¯s forces, even without any words of threat from the fire adept himself.


    This snobbish, insincere behavior nearly made Mary fly into a fury on the spot. She had to breathe long and hard with all she could to suppress her anger. Otherwise, she might not have resisted the impulse to rush forward and give the dragons and Gru a wicked scolding.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it.


    Greem waved his hand and released the Third Grade elementium magical machine and Spirit of Pestilence Remi. The obedient old poison witch also stood silently behind Remi.


    Spatial flux shimmered within the Mothership. A momentter, Alice appeared on the deck with staff in hand and eight Fate Witches behind her.


    Even the Fate Witches were here to help the battle!


    The hearts of the seven Third Grade adepts of the Fabres n sank even further at the sight of this. Adept Zam also fell silent in an instant.


    Dammit! Their n had still held the advantage in quantity and quality of adepts earlier, but in the blink of an eye, they had suddenly be the weaker party.


    That...that was too unimaginable, was it not?


    The high-grade adepts of both parties were all gathered now. They stood off against each other from across hundreds of meters, their burning gazes sweeping across the enemy. The shock and impact on the face of the Fabres adepts could not be wiped away.


    Naturally, at the very front of the Fabres n were the seven Third Grade adepts. Every one of them was a veteran adept that had made their name a long time ago. They were far superior to the average Third Grade adept in both power and magical equipment.


    Meanwhile, the Crimson n had Legendary Fire Adept Greem, Bloody Queen Mary, Fate Witch Alice, Magic-Breaking Assassin Oliven, Thunder Dragon Arms, Emerald Dragon Iritina, the elementium magical machine, Spirit of Pestilence Remi, and the old poison witch.


    Surprisingly, the number of Third Grade adepts on the Crimson n¡¯s side was superior to that of the invading Fabres n!

 Chapter 1011 - Declan

    Chapter 1011 Den


    The already tense and murderous battlefield erupted in an instant!


    The ground rumbled as the giant and majestic body of the magical golem dragon approached, one step at a time.


    Complex expressions appeared on the faces of the Fabres adepts: frustration, regret, and even annoyance, but never fear.


    Greem¡¯s eyes swept across the battlefield and instantly took in the expressions of the tens of thousands of creatures there. He realized something and spoke out loud, ¡°Lord Den, why not show yourself and let us meet if you are already here?¡±


    The seven Third Grade Fabres adepts paused for a moment when they heard this. An expression of disbelief then appeared on their faces. Adept Zam¡¯s face turned dark as he asked with a chilling tone, ¡°How did you know that Lord Den had already arrived?¡±


    No wonder Zam was shocked and stunned by Greem¡¯s words. Even he had only received news of Adept Den¡¯s arrival seven minutes ago. He couldn¡¯t help but be surprised when Greem so quickly revealed the truth.


    Greem smiled but did not answer the question.


    Just as Zam intended to continue his threats, a rough and booming voice rang out on the battlefield.


    ¡°There¡¯s nothing strange about it! They have a Fourth Grade golem in their army, and you all remain as fearless as before. Obviously, that¡¯s because this old man is here. Is there even a need to guess how he figured it out? Hmph! Bunch of idiots.¡±


    A figure of average height appeared on the wooden ship. The person did not cast any spells or rely on any items as he walked into the sky above the battlefield, step by step.


    He was a muscr middle-aged man with a stout stature. He had a full beard on his face, with an almostpletely bald head. There were only three braids of interweaving ck and white running down the back of his head. He was not dressed in the robes that most adepts typically wore. Instead, he wore old and ancient-looking gray leather armor. Not a single trace of magical equipment could be seen on his entire person.


    He looked to be only forty to fifty years of age, but that extraordinarily concentrated and overwhelming elementium flux around his body signaled his true identity. The power he radiated was extremely strange. It was formed from the refinement and concentration of a mix between extreme physical strength and elementium energy. It was firm, yet contained, all while possessing the activity and impulsiveness unique to wind elementium.


    In particr, when the middle-aged man looked across the sky at Greem, Greem felt the fires around him stall for a fleeting instant and be tamer and docile.


    Greem narrowed his eyes to relieve the pain brought about by the excessively bright light that the opponent¡¯s aura gave off. The Chip was working at full capacity, but all of the scans only revealed extremely chaotic and nonsensical numbers. The light seen through his elementium sight was also useless, as it was almost like staring into the Sun at close distance.


    It was incredibly fortunate that his eyes didn¡¯t go blind from the piercing light.


    Greem immediately shut down most of the Chip¡¯s probing abilities before he could get used to that constant flux of power that the enemy was radiating. Otherwise, the only thing he would see in his field of vision would always be a blinding blood-red light.


    ¡°You are Greem? Hmm? Didn¡¯t they say that you are only a Third Grade fire adept that had only recently advanced? Why do you have the power of an Advanced Third Grade already?¡± The middle-aged man nced at Greem in confusion, a trace of surprise in his eyes.


    Even though Beginner Third Grade and Advanced Third Grade were both gnats that could be squished to death with a single finger in his eyes, Greem¡¯s ability to advance by two minor grades in such a short timespan was sufficient proof of his potential.


    Provoking such a talented enemy for the n with no ¡®proper¡¯ reason was such a terrible idea that even Fourth Grade Body-Refining Adept Den couldn¡¯t help but start regretting his decision.


    Damned hag! I knew she had no good introductions to make! It¡¯s about time to make that hag pay a price once I kill this quickly improving Third Grade fire adept.


    With a trace of a foul mood in his heart, murderous intent started to burst forth from his gaze towards Greem.


    The tiny Crimson n had never been enough to catch his gaze, but he definitely could not allow this Third Grade fire adept to escape. If he managed to escape and advanced to Fourth Grade in the future, then the Fabres n would face a cmity!


    Perhaps sensing the terrifying pressureing from the Fourth Grade adept, Greem¡¯s body started to hover backward slightly. The Fourth Grade magical golem dragon of the Crimson n hastened its steps, rumbling to the frontlines and appearing in front of Greem.


    ¡°This is what you are counting on? A metal golem with the power of a Fourth Grade?¡± Den stared coldly, not stopping the magical golem dragon from reaching Greem. At any rate, he had already firmly locked onto Greem¡¯s mental flux; he wasn¡¯t concerned about Greem taking the opportunity to flee. He very charismatically waited for the enemy to make theirbat preparations.


    ¡°Brat, let me tell you a secret. If and when you truly have the opportunity to advance to Fourth Grade, you will naturally know that even the most powerful of auxiliary forces cannotpare to one¡¯s own strength! Just like this...break!¡±


    At this, Adept Den shouted loudly, and his not particrly muscr right arm silently expanded to twice its original size, punching towards the gigantic golem dragon.


    The fist wasn¡¯t of astronomical size, nor did the punch itself appear to be very fast or ferocious. However, driven by the iparable and seemingly divine strength behind it, the punch possessed tremendous power.


    The initially formless and shapeless wind elementium in the air waspressed around the punch by tremendous strength as the fist shot forward, gathering into a semi-translucent projection of a fist. As Den shouted and punched forward, the fist projection glowed with blinding light and shot towards the golem dragon¡¯s metallic head.


    A deafening and inexplicable screech rang throughout the battlefield.


    The fist projection flew across the air rapidly, all while absorbing the wandering wind elementium in the surroundings into itself like a whale taking in water. When the fist smashed through the air and arrived at the magical golem dragon, the mighty power contained within the blow had risen to a level where even Greem was terrified.


    1100 points.


    A casual and straightforward fist from Den had over 1100 points of power!


    The magical golem dragon was indeed a Fourth Grade war machine. The magical goblins operating it from within had also managed to achieve perfectpatibility with it over all these years.


    The metal shell on the dragon¡¯s back flipped over, revealing a series of magic energy cannons within. A barrage of cannon fire started to bombard the approaching fist. However, the fist projection had far more concentrated power. It shattered the countless energy fireballs and arrived in front of the magical golem dragon.


    The golem dragon opened itsrge mouth, and a gigantic energy pir, as thick as a well, cut through the sky and sted against the fist. Finally, it managed to destroy the fist when it was just five meters away.


    The scattered tide of energy ravaged the air and created a halo-shaped pir of dust that extended thirty-four meters into the sky, pushing everything away.


    Where the massive pir of dust pushed across, even the magical machines could not stand still. Despite weighing several tons, they were blown off the ground and sted several hundred meters away. Even the goblin chariots were caught in the st and were swept into the distance.


    For a moment, the Crimson n¡¯s entire formation descended into chaos!


    However, such a shockwave did not spare the Fabres forces either.


    The Fabres adept forces erected massive barriers of light in the face of this violent energy tide and protected themselves within. However, judging from the flickering light of the wall, they were only barely hanging on.


    Meanwhile, the subordinate armies, who were not protected by any sort of magical barrier,unched into the sky, screaming before they were mmed heavily into the ground once again. If it weren¡¯t for their sturdy physiques, the shockwave alone would have killed many of them.


    It wasn¡¯t just the Crimson n. Even the Fabres n was scrambling to deal with the shockwave!


    ¡°Hmm? This metal golem is pretty interesting. Well then, let me show you the true power of a Fourth Grade!¡± Having said that, Den curled a single finger and flicked it. The nail-sized ball ofpressed wind then shot towards Greem like a speeding bullet.


    Greem had now flown onto the head of the golem dragon. He had justnded on the small tform between the curved horns when he felt danger approaching.


    In a single breath, a series of Inferno Shields and two Lava Shields shot out of his body and appeared in front of him.


    Pupupu!


    After a series of frightening thuds, four of the Inferno Shields were sted into shreds and scattered into the air as sparks. A small hole had also bored through the Lava Shield made of magma andva.


    Finally, the bullet ofpressed wind dissipated along with the fifth Inferno Shield, sparing Greem the humiliation of being injured at the very start of the fight.


    Greem felt a chill run down his back when he looked at thest three Inferno Shields in front of him. There was no longer any concealing the shock on his face and in his heart.


    Seemingly as if it had sensed Greem¡¯s intentions, the magical golem dragon roared, and a nearly transparent forcefield appeared from within its body to shield both itself and Greem.


    Greem stood firmly on the tform and lifted his head to look at Den, who was charging down at him. Several pieces of magical equipment radiating powerful auras slowly began to appear on Greem.


    Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, the magical crown Burning Sun, the magical armband Emblem of Fire, the belt The Fearless, the Boots of Ash, the pendant Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath, the Ghost Scepter, and the Holy Temple Ring.


    He had obtained the Ghost Scepter from Psionic Benija. It allowed the owner to turn their body into an ethereal form, thereby avoiding physical damage from the real world.


    The Holy Temple Ring was from a Third Grade Holy Knight. It could strengthen the wearer¡¯s mental will, allowing them to be immune to all elementium magical damage for five seconds.


    Greem had also obtained a series of other equipment, but no matter how he looked at them, only a few of the pieces were useful to him. One of these pieces of equipment came from the hunter adepts and the other from a holy knight. When added together, the pieces allowed Greem to avoid any single instance of lethal damage perfectly.

 Chapter 1012 - Clash of Blood and Steel

    Chapter 1012 sh of Blood and Steel


    The adept forces and subordinate armies that had just been fighting valorously were now all retreating as fast as they could into the distance.


    Neither the Third Grades of the Crimson n nor the Fabres n dared to remain on the battlefield for a moment longer. They quicklymanded the retreat of their armies, leaving ample space for the two terrifying Fourth Grade powerhouses.


    The Fourth Grade magical golem dragon could not be considered a true force to be reckoned with in the eyes of the Fabres adepts in any regard. However, it clearly exhibited tremendous power beyond its actual grade under the mysterious control of that legendary fire adept.


    As both Den and the magical golem dragon¡¯s preferred style ofbat was direct confrontation, waves of dust storms, blown up by the terrifying shockwaves, engulfed the retreating forces before they managed toplete their retreat.


    Standing in front of the sixty-meter-tall and hundred-meter-long golem dragon, Body-Refining Adept Den looked like a sesame seed beside a watermelon. It was hard to see him if one didn¡¯t look carefully.


    Even though he was several dozen times smaller than the magical golem dragon, it was clear that the dragon was the one at a disadvantage through the fists and blows they exchanged.


    Greem now stood above the golem dragon¡¯s head, already taking over all control authority over the dragon from Magical Goblin Gonga. He did not hide within the golem dragon¡¯s body; Greem chose to fight alongside it,shing at Den wildly and furiously.


    One of the dragon¡¯s monstrouslyrge metal leg smashed and stomped towards the enemy, inciting howling winds as it did so. Hundreds of magic energy cannons loaded on its back bombed without stop, steadily wearing away at Den¡¯s defensive forcefield.


    Of course, Den was not so foolish as to sh with such a massive metal golem head-on. Instead, he stepped into the air and started to weave between the thick metal legs with his much more agile body. He asionally stopped here and there,unching a few blows at specific areas of the golem.


    Every time Den¡¯s outline paused was when he traded blows with the golem dragon!


    Den¡¯s incredibly viciouspressed-wind shots allowed him to knock the golem dragon around without even touching the machine. Meanwhile, the golem dragon would take the opportunity to drown Den in a torrent of magic energy beams.


    After a few exchanges, Greem figured out that Den¡¯s elemental affinity was for the wind elementium. However, instead of bing an elementium adept, he had chosen to use some unique magical technique tobine wind elementium with his body-refining magic.


    Other elementium adepts needed handsigns, chants, and suitable magical materials when they cast spells. However, every single move from Den was basically a tremendously powerful single-target spell. His attacks didn¡¯t just possess iparably powerful physical force. They possessed terrifying elementium damage as well.


    More importantly, where and when he put his mind and will was where and when the attacknded. He did not require a buffer time to gather magic and shape spells as elementium adepts did.


    As such, Den would be able to instantly close-in on an ordinary elementium adept if they did not have any means of creating distance. When that happened, they would probably die before they could even cast a singlerge-scale spell!


    Den might not have muscles asrge or well-shaped as the low-grade body refining adepts, but every single punch and kick he used carried horrifying might in them.


    Greem¡¯s scan revealed that even a basic attack from Den, unenhanced by any magic, could achieve damage of over a 1,000 points. The battle techniques that required a brief period of activation would reach 1,600-1,700 points of power. Greem couldn¡¯t endure a single one of these attacks.


    Under Greem¡¯smand, the hundreds of magic energy cannons tracked Den as best as they could and constantly unleashing their firepower. The two giant magic energy cannons and the golem dragon¡¯s beam were on standby, prepared to unleash a violent st whenever the enemy was to pause for even a moment.


    Even Den¡¯s forcefield would shatter on the spot if the two giant magic energy cannons hit it. Thus, after experiencing the shocking might of the giant cannon once, Den became incredibly careful. He was scared that he might be hit by all three of the golem dragon¡¯s most powerful beams and end up badly injured. After a few tries, Den resentfully realized that the reason Greem was hiding on the tform on the dragon¡¯s head was to bait him into attacking.


    If he wanted to attack Greem, then he would unavoidably have to expose himself above the magical golem dragon. When that happened, he would be well within the range of fire for both the giant magic energy cannons and the dragon¡¯s energy beam. One slight misstep and even he would be buried beneath the concentrated fire.


    Having understood Greem¡¯s n, Den gave up on all thoughts of ending the battle swiftly. Instead, he focused on circling the golem dragon to look for weak spots on its metal body. In particr, he was paying great attention to select regions on the mechanical dragon¡¯s form: the exhaust ports, the venttors, and other simr ces.


    The dragon¡¯s shell was truly very hard, but Den did not believe that its insides were as firmly solid and without weakness.


    For the sake of discovering these ces, Den swept every single part of the golem dragon¡¯s body with shockwaves from his punches. Plenty of fist-marked dents appeared all over the golem dragon¡¯s body. Den also destroyed many of its magic energy cannons.


    Soon, Den discovered an entryway in the abdomen of the golem dragon. The entryway was covered in fiveyers of special metal tes, for a total thickness of two meters.


    Without any hesitation, Den endured the rain of cannon fire and the fire adept¡¯s powerful spells to charge up to the metal tes. He then started pummelling it with punch after punch.


    Even the super-alloy that had been refined multiple times with secret arcane techniques could not endure the force of Den¡¯s fist. The first te was quickly smashed and twisted, revealing the second te beneath.


    Naturally, Greem would not allow the enemy to so easily break into the dragon¡¯s body. As such, the dragon¡¯s head curved. It opened its mouth, and a frighteningly thick pir of energy swept towards Den. Greem also took this opportunity to chant and cast his spells, sending a massive ball of fire crashing towards the body-refining adept.


    Faced with the enemy¡¯s coordinated attacks, Den quickly reacted. He dodged the dragon¡¯s energy attack and chose to simply endure Greem¡¯s Lava Spray, such that he could continue attacking the metal te. Yet, to his surprise, strange light energy was mixed within Greem¡¯s vicious fire attack. The light energy prated his defensive forcefield and left a small scorch mark the size of an egg on the left hand he had used to block with.


    Even Den was surprised at this unexpected situation!


    Having decided to start a war against the Crimson n, Den had naturally conducted a very detailed investigation on this legendary fire adept.


    To be extremely safe, Den had even made the extra effort to purchase a Pendant of Fire Resistance along with Potions of Fire Resistance. With such preparations, he was confident that the Third Grade fire adept would not be able to inflict any damage on him through his fire resistance, no matter what spells he had cast.


    However, the situation here was simply too strange. The Lava Spray he had cast was a reasonably powerful spell even among Third Grade spells. However, that was only rtive to Third Grade adepts. That amount of fire damage should not have broken through Den¡¯s defensive forcefield.


    Den dodged the barrage of energy beams and looked down at his hand to examine the scorch mark. He couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    Light-attribute energy damage!


    Moreover, the energy was extraordinarily pure and possessed a strange pration effect not possessed by other elementium magic.


    Den frowned and thought about the situation as he quickly circted the magical energy in his body.


    As magic flowed through his left hand, the strange burn mark began to heal and quickly disappeared without a trace.


    For a body-refining adept like himself, his control and refinement over his body had already reached a peak. He did not require any healing spells. All he needed was to expend a little bit of energy, and he could recover most damage sustained by his body.


    Of course, energy healing of this manner could not help with lost limbs. It could only heal lighter surface wounds. As such, Den had also prepared plenty of healing wands and potions.


    Metallic creaking rang out as the sound of spinning gears could be heard from the entryway where Den had attempted to break into. The exposed secondyer was quickly shrinking, covered by metal walls sliding in from both sides.


    In Den¡¯s moment of hesitation, the entryway had vanishedpletely.


    The Fourth Grade body-refining adept let out a roar of anger. He evaded most of the attacks from the cannons and arrived at the dragon¡¯s thick metal leg, upon which he started attacking aggressively.


    His fists left twenty-centimeter-deep craters on the metal. Even the super-alloy could not defend against Den¡¯s fists of flesh. They copsed inwards, the shape of Den¡¯s fist left in the metal.


    Den spun around the leg and attacked it wildly, intent on disposing of the dragon¡¯s mobility first.


    Unfortunately, despite trying for a long time, he had no choice but to give up in the end.


    The golem dragon¡¯s body was simply too tough. Even if he were to punch it a hundred times, the best he could do was wear off a thinyer of metal. It was a seven-meter-thick leg. He would need at least an hour of continuous attacks to be able to break it.


    The enemy would not give him such plentiful time to do as he wished!


    From the moment he approached the golem dragon, his defensive forcefield had been trembling unstoppably from the constant barrage of the cannons. These attacks might not be able to break through his forcefield, but they drained his stamina quite substantially.


    Den had to back away every so often after fighting the golem dragon at close range so that his forcefield had a buffer time to recover.

 Chapter 1013 - The Power of the Holy Light

    Chapter 1013 The Power of the Holy Light


    The battle was still raging on!


    The armies finally stopped after retreating ten kilometers. They started to turn back and look upon the dusty battlefield in the distance.


    Wave after wave of violent magical energies shook the air itself, the result of the purest and most concentrated of magic attacks. One or two thick beams of energy asionally swept across the horizon, shredding all the clouds in the sky to reveal its strangely crimson color.


    Shock and disbelief appeared on the faces of Zam and the other six Fabres adepts as they sensed the intensity of the energy spreading from the distance.


    That legendary fire adept was actually fighting Lord Den to a standstill through the use of a Fourth Grade magical machine. How could they not be shocked and terrified by this!?


    Magical machines were machines, after all. Their massive size might provide them with superior strength, but there was no working around a machine¡¯s natural disadvantage of being slow and clumsy. Everyone here should be able to avoid a magical machine¡¯s range of attack with some minor technique up their sleeve, before going on to slowly wear down a machine¡¯s defense.


    That was why the Third Grade Fabres adepts did not think of the Fourth Grade magical machine as that much of a threat!


    However, judging from the battle in the distance, Lord Den did not have too obvious of an advantage in this fight. Everyone was surprised at how powerful the Third Grade adept was.


    Of course, if the Fabres n had performed a more in-depth investigation and uncovered the past results of the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon in battle, they wouldn¡¯t be so surprised. After all, the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon had fought against a Fourth Grade dragon in Lance.


    ¡°Zam, Lord Den should be able to win, shouldn¡¯t he?¡± A male adept asked worriedly.


    ¡°There¡¯s no doubt about that. Lord Den will win!¡± Conviction appeared on Adept Zam¡¯s face.


    The Third Grade adepts instantly calmed down slightly upon hearing this.


    In truth, at this point in the war, the Fabres no longer had absolute control of the battlefield anymore, even with their massive financial and military reserves. Before Fourth Grade adepts had appeared on the battlefield, this war had been at the level of a typical adept war. Victory and defeat were verymon oues for anyone.


    However, now that the war involved Fourth Grades, the entire situation was spinning out of control!


    If Den did not manage to put down thisbination of the Fourth Grade golem dragon and the Third Grade legendary fire adept, then everything they had worked for up to this point would have been for naught.


    So what if they had managed to conquer so many of the Crimson n¡¯s territories and resources? So what if they had several times the number of low and intermediate-grade adeptspared to their opponents? Nothing mattered if they could not take down the Fourth Grade golem dragon and the Third Grade fire adept!


    The true measure of these two n¡¯s strength wasn¡¯t in some tiny and trivial numbers, but the personal prowess of the adepts that stood at the peak of the n.


    If and when a Fourth Grade adept wanted to establish his n or build his kingdom, there would be plenty of organizations and human nations who would fight for the chance to join them. The Fourth Grade adept wouldn¡¯t even need to worry about the trivial administrative tasks; someone would volunteer to do it for them.


    No organization or force in the World of Adepts dared to go against the will of a Fourth Grade adept.


    The only one who could interfere or intervene with the will of a Fourth Grade adept was another Fourth Grade adept or a military force equal to them!


    The Fourth Grade golem dragon of the Crimson n had never experienced live pressure testing inbat in the World of adepts, after all. As such, it had not yet been epted by the various adept ns of Zhentarim as a genuine Fourth Grade. Thus, when the fires of war finally reached the Crimson n¡¯snd of origin, the most potent forces of the two ns finally shed!


    The Fourth Grade magical golem dragon was notplete without Greem.


    It might be able to endure the quick and vicious attacks of a Fourth Grade dragon or ravage a battlefield uncontested. However, it could not stop a powerful Fourth Grade body-refining adept from sneaking in through the gaps in its body and taking it apart from the inside.


    Greem¡¯s presencepensated for its only weakness!


    With Greem controlling the giant magic energy cannons and the energy beam along with his own powerful fire spells and holy light damage, Fourth Grade Den was tremendously restricted in his movements and actions. He could no longer move around as he pleased.


    The golem dragon¡¯s body was also sufficiently hard and tough. It didn¡¯t just manifest in the actual hardness of the super-alloy, but in the assimtion of the magical energy from within its body.


    Without the infusion of magical energy, the super-alloy alone wouldn¡¯t be hard enough to endure the violent Strength of a Fourth Grade body-refining adept. It was because magic energy had seeped into every corner and inch of the magical golem dragon¡¯s body that much of the force from Den¡¯s vicious strikes was neutralized.


    Only the remaining impact could affect the golem dragon¡¯s body, leaving behind fearsome dents in the metal. Otherwise, the magical golem dragon would not have been able to stop Den from taking it apart and boring straight through, even if its metal body was ten times as thick and substantial.


    His offense having been thwarted, Den¡¯s defenses also started to show holes in them!


    Even though they were both Fourth Grade, Den was far, far smaller than the magical golem dragon. As such, the golem dragon¡¯s base Strength was a lot higher than Den¡¯s. That said, with its clumsy size and unbearable speed, it required incredible coordination to hit Den with its metal legs or its vicious head.


    Fortunately, Greem relied on the giant magic energy cannons to make up for the golem dragon¡¯s defensive weakness. He chased Den around with the thick energy beams, forcing him to run and circle around with no time to break through the golem dragon¡¯s defenses.


    After several attempts, Greem stopped using his fire spells altogether. Instead, he converted all his fire energy into corresponding ¡®holy light¡¯ power through Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring. He then used the speed and pration ability of the pure light energy to bully the Fourth Grade adept.


    Light could not be stopped!


    It could prate the defensive forcefield formed by a Fourth Grade adept¡¯s tremendous personal strength, directly inflicting a strange magical effect on his body akin to a burn. Den had never even heard of such an attack.


    He was remarkably unused to dealing with it, especially given his preference for head-on confrontations.


    Since the golem dragon¡¯s body was imprable and its legs could not be broken, Den gave up on this pointless strategy and focused on taking down the Third Grade fire adept.


    There was no doubt that the legendary fire adept was the weakest link in this chain. It was also the only weakness that Den could hope to exploit!


    He didn¡¯t believe that a Third Grade fire adept would be able to defend against the wild melee attacks of a Fourth Grade body-refining adept with just the protection of a defensive forcefield from the golem dragon.


    Of course, this change in target also meant that Den now had to face the attacks of all three energy beams at once. However, his defensive forcefield was durable enough that a single hit would only cause it to tremble violently. It was only at risk of shattering when two beams hit him simultaneously.


    Once Den lost his defensive forcefield, he would have to quickly avoid all the other iing attacks and adjust the energy cirction within his body to resummon the forcefield.


    Den would have to endure hundreds of rounds of continuous fire from the smaller magic energy cannons throughout this process, as well as the incredibly unusual light energy attacks of the wicked fire adept. Thus, even though the magical golem dragon was now covered in dents all over its body, three to five visible injuries could also be seen on Den¡¯s body.


    The most severe of the injuries was located beneath his right rib.


    It was a terrifying wound that had been left behind by the third energy beam grazing his body after the first two beams had shattered his forcefield. That one attack had shaved away a bowl-sized piece of flesh from Den¡¯s body. The exposed flesh had crystallizedpletely, with traces of magical energy still lingering on it.


    Healing this wound had caused Den to lose even more of his stamina. After neutralizing the magical energy that remained in his injury with his powers, the flesh and muscles near the wound could finally squirm and mesh together once again under the effect of his formidable Physique, uninterrupted by any foreign force.


    The other injuries were all inflicted by that Third Grade fire adept and his light energy. To save stamina, Den did not waste any power to heal these wounds. Instead, he relied on his 46 points of Physique to let them heal on their own.


    It was 46 points of Physique. What a horrifyingly powerful body!


    Take themon beast of the ck Forest¨C the Hairy Rhinoceros. Even that beast, which was known for its defense, only had 7 points of Physique. An ordinary dragon mostly had between 11 to 25 points of Physique.


    The effect of extremely high Physique was astounding defensive power and impressive regeneration.


    With Den¡¯s 46 points of Physique, he could stand there and let the enemy attack him all they wanted to; any weapon below Third Grade would not even be able to leave a scratch. He could put his hand into the mouth of a First Grade dragon, and no matter what they did, they would not be able to cause any serious injuries.


    Of course, to achieve this tremendous defensive effect, Den still needed to have plenty of stamina and excellent elementium powers.


    After all, his defensive forcefield was formed out of extreme life force and wind elementium energy.


    Neither could be missing from the equation!


    Unfortunately, such a dominant defense seemed to have no effect on that strange light energy at all. Beam after beam of fast and fearsome holy lightnded on Den¡¯s body, leaving imprints that resembled horrible burn marks.


    If Den did not dodge in time, the pure, holy light could even prate his body to purify and neutralize his precious magic energy.


    Den¡¯s precious magic energy was the driving source of his prowess in battle!

 Chapter 1014 - On the Stage and Behind the Scenes

    Chapter 1014 On the Stage and Behind the Scenes


    Zhentarim. Kerslin Castle.


    A varied group of adepts was gathered in a quiet and mysterious room. Their eyes were fixed upon the radiant magical mirror on the meeting table. The images within the mirror shifted and morphed as it radiated magic energy. On disy was the earthshaking adept n war taking ce outside of Pinecone City.


    These adepts chattered amongst themselves in boredom while the Crimson n¡¯s magical machine army and the Fabres n¡¯s subordinate armies tore each other to bloody pieces, as if the dozens of lives being lost on the battlefield wasn¡¯t even worthy of their attention.


    It wasn¡¯t until the most powerful forces of both n appeared, and the battle between the Fourth Grade body-refining adept and the Fourth Grade magical golem controlled by the Third Grade fire adept, that these fire adepts finally pulled themselves together and seriously paid attention to the battle.


    ¡°It¡¯s said that the Crimson n has been hoarding a Goblin ne full of metal reserves. It seems like that¡¯s true.¡± A male adept with a grim face spoke out in admiration as he watched the hill-sized metal golem, ¡°Otherwise, they wouldn¡¯t be able to find this much magical alloy, even if they were to empty the entire Ailovis region!¡±


    ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought that a Third Grade adept couldst this long at Den¡¯s hands? Den¡¯s stepped on a nail this time.¡± A middle-aged female adept with a veil on her faceughed at Den¡¯s misfortune.


    The other adepts also voiced their opinions and assessment of the battlefield in the distance, but most of them were criticisms and mocking words directed at Den.


    As the battle started to increase in intensity, and both parties started to use some of the more impressive techniques up their sleeves, these adepts finally began to assess the Third Grade fire adept seriously.


    ¡°Can anyone tell what magic it is that the kid is using? Why can his attack prate Den¡¯s defensive forcefield? It isn¡¯t very logical,¡± someone finally asked.


    An elderly adept wearing tortoise-shell sses who looked like the schrly type brooded for a moment before speaking, ¡°This must be some sort of extremely pure light elementium! It is precisely because it¡¯s too pure that the forcefield has ignored it. It is being treated as naturally-urring magical elementium and, therefore, not isted outside of the forcefield.¡±


    The other adepts took a better look at what was happening, and all agreed with the elderly adept¡¯s analysis.


    Light elementium. It was an extremely niche and unusual natural energy. It was understandable that the forcefield would treat it as background elementium.


    If Den knew that the Third Grade fire adept had such a technique, he would definitely have found a way to mitigate light energy damage. He wouldn¡¯t so passively endure the Third Grade adept¡¯s constant attacks.


    Moreover, the Third Grade fire adept¡¯s attacks seemed to be a bit too powerful!


    ¡°Is that Greem kid really a Third Grade adept? Why is his offensive power so shockingly high? I made a rough calction. His base attack power has already reached nine hundred points, and that is a constant output. That seems like it¡¯s beyond the range of a Third Grade elementium adept.¡± One of the adepts couldn¡¯t help but frown andment.


    ¡°Indeed, the base attack power of most Third Grade adepts should only be around four hundred points. Even those with elementium specialization can only increase it by another hundred points or so. How did he manage to raise it to nine hundred points? Doesn¡¯t that make him almost equal to us Fourth Grade adepts?¡± Someone immediately chimed in.


    ¡°It might be the equipment he¡¯s wearing! Some of the things he¡¯s wearing look very suspicious,¡± someone else mused.


    ¡°You guys, look carefully at that ring on his right pinky finger.¡± Finally, someone seemed to have discovered something.


    The point of view of the magical mirror was from top-down. At this moment, Greem was standing high on the golem dragon¡¯s head, quickly weaving signs with his hands and chanting spells to guide a beam of white light shooting towards Den.


    A mysterious ring with a strange and ancient design on his exposed right hand flickered with an intense magical aura. The adepts could very clearly see that the magical halo radiated by the ring was purple.


    ¡°A Fourth Grade magic ring.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s Fourth Grade.¡±


    All the adepts let out a gasp of surprise.


    It wouldn¡¯t be strange if a Fourth Grade adept owned a Fourth Grade magic ring. However, when the Fourth Grade ring was in the hands of a Third Grade adept, they couldn¡¯t help but be amazed.


    Everyone here knew the difficulty of crafting Fourth Grade magical equipment.


    The dozen adepts here might be Fourth Grade, but the amount of Fourth Grade magical equipment they each possessed could be counted on a single hand. It couldn¡¯t be helped. Crafting magical equipment that was perfectlypatible with their soul origin and affinity was simply far tooplicated.


    Moreover, Fourth Grade magical equipment would never be so easily given away!


    Consequently, even though almost every single high-grade adept was a qualified master alchemist, high-grade magical equipment was still in incredibly short supply. Naturally, the Fourth Grade adepts were feeling all sorts of emotions now that they had discovered a Fourth Grade magical ring in the hands of a Third Grade adept.


    ¡°It seems like he got this ring from a foreign ne, and it allows him to convert his magic energy into pure light energy,¡± the old schr adept couldn¡¯t help but borate.


    ¡°Apart from conversion, I believe that the ring can also enhance his spells with additional light damage. Otherwise, his base attack power can¡¯t be that high,¡± another adept added.


    Everyone here was a Fourth Grade adept. They were knowledgeable arcanists with iparable wisdom. One by one, they gave their analysis and quickly estimated the strange attributes and effects of the Fourth Grade ring to astounding uracy.


    The few hundred points of additional damage provided by the magical ring wasn¡¯t much in the eyes of these adepts. However, the ability to convert magic energy into high-pration light energy was incredibly useful. Used at the right time, it could injure an enemy severely at a critical moment in a battle.


    Greed appeared in the eyes of several of the adepts as they continued to observe the fight.


    However, at this moment, someone finally interrupted, ¡°It seems like the destruction of the Crimson n won¡¯t being to pass. Given so...with what kind of attitude should we be treating this fire adept from now on?¡±


    For a moment, the adepts fell silent.


    After a long pause, someone finally spoke.


    It was an old adept whose beard and hair had all turned white. Judging from the respect given by the other adepts, he was the one with the most authority and was the most senior of them all.


    Freed, Fourth Grade Adept, Chairman of the Zhentarim Association.


    ¡°We will decide based on the result of the fight! If Den wins, we will chase both the fire adept and his Crimson n out of Zhentarim. If it¡¯s a draw, we will hand over the entirety of Ailovis to him.¡±


    ¡°And if he wins?¡± Someone couldn¡¯t help but pursue the question.


    ¡°Is that possible?¡± Freed said casually, ¡°Don¡¯t forget, Den advanced over seven hundred years ago. There¡¯s no way he will be defeated.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m just saying if...¡±


    ¡°If that fire adept really manages to defeat Den, I suggest we give him the status and authority of a Fourth Grade adept while recruiting him into the Association.¡±


    ¡°No, I object.¡± A sinister and dry male voice rang out.


    The adepts turned to look and realized that it was Molten Fire City Lord Alfred that had spoken up.


    ¡°Why, Alfred? Do you bear a grudge against the kid as well?¡± Someone asked in surprise.


    ¡°Hmph! There was an otherworldly beast invasion in my Molten Fire City a few dozen years ago. This fire adept participated in the extermination as outside help, and I didn¡¯t know much about the brat back then. Now, it seems like that beast invasion from before was his handiwork. If he wants to join the Association, we will have to settle that score first!¡± Alfred grunted unamusedly and gave a few words of exnation.


    ¡°Then, does anyone else object to the fire adept joining the Association?¡± Chairman Freed started to look around the room.


    ¡°I object as well!¡± It was the elderly schr adept who spoke this time.


    ¡°Matthew, I didn¡¯t expect it to be you.¡± Freed couldn¡¯t help but pause for a moment.


    ¡°I am not objecting on my own behalf, but on behalf of the Sarubo n. They gave me quite a lot of resources, so I have no choice but to step forward and object for them!¡± Adept Matthew did not hide anything and simply exined everything with a smile on his face.


    ¡°Very well, since people are opposed to it, then the matter of recruiting the fire adept into the Association will be put aside for the moment. We will see if he can advance to Fourth Grade first.¡±


    While the adepts engaged in their discussion, some unexpected changes urred in the image within the magical mirror.


    ............


    The battle outside Pinecone City was still going on.


    An exceptionally handsome hunting eagle was soaring high above the skies, hidden above the thickyers of clouds.


    Beneath the eagles was the battlefield where the two Fourth Grades were fighting viciously.


    If the hunting eagle were an ordinary magical creature, it would already have fled far away upon sensing the waves of horrifying magical flux. It would not stay in such a dangerous ce.


    The hunting eagle sped a magical crystal between its two sharp ws, pointing it straight down at the battlefield. Under its gaze, this three-hour-long battle was finally nearing its conclusion.


    Adept Den was actually on the verge of being defeated!


    Indeed, faced with the powerfulbination of the Third Grade fire adept and the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon, Fourth Grade Body-Refining Adept Den was running out of steam to continue the fight. The main reason for his extreme exhaustion was that strange white light being that the legendary fire adept kept shooting out.


    Every time Den was hit by the white light, his flesh would be burned while a portion of his magic energy was also burned away.


    Den had attempted to take Greem out several times, but the Chip¡¯s support systems always captured his movements. Greem would then gather the three energy beams and st them at Den. Even with his outstanding Physique, Den could not endure energy attacks of such intensity and constantly had to back off with injuries.


    For the sake of healing these injuries, Den had no choice but to expend a significant amount of his magic energy.

 Chapter 1015 - Fabres Defeated

    Chapter 1015 Fabres Defeated


    In all his time as a Fourth Grade, Den had honestly never found himself in such a situation where his stamina had been nearly exhausted by the enemy.


    He was a body-refining adept, after all!


    His trained body of flesh and bone had already been refined into a formidable existenceparable to magical equipment.


    Incredibly powerful physical defense and unimaginable regenerative powers made Den one of the most challenging body-refining adepts in Zhentarim to deal with. How could his stamina be exhausted? Such a suggestion was usually no more than a joke.


    However, such a ridiculous thing had happened today!


    After finishing all the healing potions he owned, using up all the spells in the healing wands, and exhausting all the magic energy in his body, Den was finally worn out.


    However, the Third Grade fire adept and the Fourth Grade golem dragon he piloted were both still as vigorous as ever. It almost seemed like there was an unending supply of magic energy supporting them inbat.


    That was what Den simply couldn¡¯tprehend.


    To his understanding, any metallic magical machine required magic energy to function. If they ran out of magical power, the magical machines would turn into unmoving piles of metal and lose allbat ability.


    Thus, even though most adept ns had metallic golems of their own, the golems were only used to defend adept towers, mystic realms, and other vital facilities. The cost of operating these golems anywhere beyond an adept tower would be enough to cause most adepts to go bankrupt.


    Meanwhile, this colossus dragon in front of him was huge and bulky. It had to be continually consuming a shockingly high amount of magical energy. How was it that the Crimson n was keeping it running? They couldn¡¯t possibly have filled the entirety of the dragon¡¯s insides with magic crystals, could they!


    It had been a battle of such intensity, firing hundreds of magic energy cannons without stopping along with three fearsome giant magic energy cannons; all of that had to be supported by a mountain of magic energy. Yet, even though Den¨Ca Fourth Grade body-refining adept¨Chad beenpletely exhausted, this magical golem dragon was still as mighty as before.


    It...it was unthinkable!


    Halfway through the battle, when Den finally realized he could wear out the golem dragon¡¯s energy supply, his own reserves had already been depleted to a concerning level. As such, he had no choice but to take the risk of attacking the Third Grade fire adept.


    Unfortunately, the fire adept always seemed to be able to assess and predict his intentions in battle.


    Every time he advanced to a position where he could attack the fire adept, three thick energy beams would already be waiting for him. Den had to dodge with all his power to avoid being hit by them. That often meant giving up on the opportunity to attack.


    With an endless supply of magic energy at his fingertips, the Third Grade fire adept could freely bombard any location where Den could threaten him, drowning the body-refining adept in an endless sea of cannon fire.


    Dripping water can cut stone, and even rope can fell a tree.


    Den had ignored this barrage of cannon fire initially, then started to avoid them as best he could when his strength began to falter. When all of his energy was exhausted, he could only clumsily stumble around to dodge the energy beams. He finally realized that his biggest mistake was not destroying these smaller cannons as soon as possible!


    By the end of the battle, with his depleted energy supply, there was no way he could take apart these cannons while they were protected by the three primary energy beams and the fire adept¡¯s strange magic.


    As Den¡¯s energy reserves ran out, the role of both parties in the battle started to undergo some interesting changes!


    At the start of the battle, Den had been the hunter with the absolute advantage. His only point of concern had been how to deal with the prickly boar he was fighting against. His choice was to circle repeatedly in an attempt to find a weakness to exploit.


    At the end of the battle, Den¡¯s stamina was running out. He could no longer charge and dash as ferociously as before, nor move around while dodging as quickly as before. Meanwhile, Greem and the golem dragon became exceedingly active near the conclusion of the battle. They started to chase after Den, desperately trading blows with him to further increase his exhaustion.


    At this point, Den had be the prey, and Greem and the golem dragon the hunters. Their positions had been reversed!


    It was the ridiculous scene that the eagle flying above the sky was witnessing. Of course, everything that the eagle saw was transmitted back to Kerslin Castle, shocking all of the scrying Fourth Grade adepts.


    ¡°What a humiliation.¡±


    ¡°Failure.¡±


    ¡°Den¡¯s making us all look like fools.¡±


    The furious and angry shouts were so loud they almost threatened to shatter the magical barriers around the room and shake the castle itself.


    However, after a brief period of fury, the Fourth Grade adepts remembered Den¡¯s current situation. They couldn¡¯t help but feel immense sympathy for him.


    The dominating move to exterminate the Crimson n was most certainly not Den¡¯s own idea. Instead, it was an order given out by the Great Adept of the Fabres n from the realms beyond. It was said that the ancestor of the Fabres n had only given such an order at the request of another Great Adept.


    Obviously, this order had now put Den in a horrible situation.


    If he retreated from the battlefield in defeat, then the Third Grade adept would most definitely drive the Fourth Grade golem dragon towards the Fabres forces and ughter the lot of them. The high-grade adepts might be able to escape sessfully, but the majority of their adept forces and the subordinate army would be done for.


    It would be a vicious strike that was enough to inflict a terrible blow to the Fabres n, even with their wealth and prosperity!


    Chairman Freed¡¯s voice immediately rang out in the room.


    ¡°Elder Nics, your n¡¯s territory is the closest to Ailovis. Send a party to rescue the elites of the Fabres n. Remember, do not incite any more conflict or cause any more confrontations with that fire adept. Saving people is the priority!¡±


    ¡°Ker, inform Laurent of Rhein City to immediately contact the Crimson n. Tell them that the Association has approved of their rule over Ailovis. This n war has also ended in the defeat of the Fabres n. All the losses that the Crimson n has suffered during the war will bepensated ten times over¨Ceven a hundred times¨Cby the Fabres n, and request that they do not ughter the Fabres adepts and apprentices recklessly.¡±


    ¡°They are free to do as they please with the worldly soldiers and subordinate armies!¡±


    A series of orders were quickly ryed. Several adepts nodded, and their bodies exploded into ck mist, vanishing from the room.


    As it turned out, their bodies in Kerslin Castle were illusions formed out of projection spells. Their actual persons were still in their own rooms in their adept towers.


    In the blink of an eye, most of the Fourth Grade adepts in the room had disappeared. Only Chairman Freed and Elder Mirva remained. There was a heavy frown on the Chairman¡¯s face. They had attended the meeting in person.


    ¡°What do you think about what happened today?¡± Chairman Freed suddenly said.


    ¡°If my estimation is not wrong, that fire adept known as Greem has over a forty percent chance to advance to Fourth Grade. A person like this...we should try and recruit and get on our side!¡± Elder Mirva thought for a moment before replying.


    ¡°But Matthew and Alfred...¡± Freed couldn¡¯t help but brood.


    ¡°Hmph! Their opinions mean nothing! I heard that the Crimson n¡¯s development in the Northern Lands has not been going well. Even though they have made allies out of the Fate Witches, they are not wee by the other witch branches. They also broke out into a war with the Coldwinter Witches not long ago; it¡¯s said that the Coldwinter Witches were the ones who lost. It¡¯s truly unbelievable!¡±


    ¡°Oh, there was such a thing?¡± As the Chairman of the Zhentarim Association, Freed controlled the adept forces in the entirety of the continent¡¯s Central Region. The daily tasks he had to manage had taken up most of his time. Naturally, he could not pay any extra attention to the conflicts between the witch branches of the Northern Lands.


    That said, since this matter concerned the Crimson n, he had no choice but to find out more.


    ¡°Send some people to perform an in-depth investigation of the rtion between Greem and the Fate Witches. If he isn¡¯t a spy nted by the Northern Lands in the Central Region, we can consider recruiting him into the Association. Cough. It¡¯s been over two hundred years since we had a new face in the Zhentarim Association, hasn¡¯t it? It¡¯s about time for us to inject some fresh blood into the system.¡±


    As the two higher-ups of the Zhentarim Association left the room, the ce once again returned to ghostly silence.


    How could the adepts and apprentices of the Fabres n possibly know that their fates had already been decided by several Fourth Grade adepts tens of thousands of kilometers away, in a matter of a few sentences?


    ............


    When Adept Den¡¯s stamina reached an incredibly dangerous level, he finally abandoned all his dignity and glory as a Fourth Grade adept. He turned to flee.


    The tens of thousands of adepts, apprentices, warriors, and soldiers who witnessed this scene were stunned.


    By the time they realized something was wrong, the overjoyed Crimson adepts were already charging over at the lead of their magical machine army.


    The same two armies, the same vicious warriors, but when the position of attacker and defender switched about, their mentalities changed entirely.


    The Fabres n were the ones on the offense earlier, while the Crimson n had been on the defense. Now the Crimson n were the ones on offense, and the Fabres Caln were the ones on defense!


    When the gigantic golem dragon stormed forward with an army of magical machines in tow, the adepts of the Fabres n had yet to break free from their utter shock and horror. By the time they understood the situation, a torrent of magic energy fireballs and the energy beams of the golem dragon had already fallen on their position.


    Adepts and apprentices alike were blown to bloody bits in the earthshaking tide of magic energy. Pieces of flesh and bone sttered everywhere.


    The adept force that had lost their will to resist weakly retaliated with two volleys of attacks before quickly abandoning the formation and fleeing into the distance. The subordinate armies and the worldly soldiers were all left behind to intercept the pursuers from the Crimson n.


    Thus, a chaotic melee broke out as one party chased after the other, spreading the mes of war to further and further territories.


    At the same time, news of the Fabres n¡¯s defeat spread in every direction like a gue.

 Chapter 1016 - The Situation Changes

    Chapter 1016 The Situation Changes


    The Fabres n had been defeated!


    The pursuit on the battlefield continued, but news was already spreading out like a gue.


    Every person and organization that heard of this news couldn¡¯t believe their ears and scrambled to confirm the validity of it. By the time they obtained confirmation through their various means, time was no longer in their hands.


    Ailovis was now a chaotic battlefield, as well as a giant vortex. It was dragging all the adept organizations and forces around it into the fray of battle.


    The Crimson n¡¯s rampant expansion and invasions over the years had driven away all the adept organizations in Ailovis. When the n war broke out, these defeated forces and opportunists came out of the cracks, spurred by the might of the Fabres n. They became supporters of the Fabres n, shouting in favor of them and traveling everywhere to get former Crimson forces to surrender.


    The Fabres n was not opposed to this uninvited ¡®alliance¡¯ either.


    After all, the Fabres forces needed to be concentrated in a single ce before they defeated the Crimson n. They could not afford to send soldiers all over Ailovis to maintain order. As such, the Fabres adepts chose to simply turn a blind eye to these scavenging vultures trying to make some profit by raiding resource sites while the two adept ns fought.


    At any rate, once the Crimson n was defeated, ownership of all the territories and resource sites they had obtained would be transferred to the Fabres n without exception. A few people taking a little advantage of the situation to gather some resources while the war was going on wouldn¡¯t hurt their final profits too much.


    Thus, while the Fabres forces were having their final showdown against the Crimson n outside Pinecone City, the adept organizations and ns that had reached their dirty hands into Ailovis were enjoying the feast of their lives, freely exploiting and raiding everything that once belonged to the Crimson n.


    Perhaps the name of the Fabres n had given them the illusion of inevitability. Still, it caused them to abandon their much-required cautiousness, and they did not pay close attention to the final battle that would decide the fate of Ailovis.


    Consequently, Fourth Grade Adept Den abandoned the battlefield and fled while the Fabres elite forces left behind the voodoo beast army, the modified beast army, the subordinate armies, and the other soldiers to retreat; the battlefield rapidly spread outwards in every direction.


    A top-tier adept could instantly decide the oue of the battlefield!


    Even though the elites of the Fabres n were still present, and even though the Fabres n¡¯s overall military strength was still several times that of the Crimson n¡¯s, all of it became an illusory bubble when their greatest fighting force was defeated. Everyone began to flee.


    The adepts that owned magical flying beasts summoned their steeds and escaped the battlefield as quickly as they could. The rest of the elites took out the best of their abilities to escape pursuit as well; they no longer tried to fight against the Crimson forces and instead started running to the border of Ailovis.


    Naturally, the subordinate forces had no such discipline or ability. They were quickly routed after a few assaults by the Crimson magical machines.


    These individuals had been recruited from all sorts of ces and had many peculiar abilities. Some summoned magical beast as their mounts to run, while some turned into ravens, deer, and rats to hide. Some used their innate abilities to hide in towns or viges while others simply crouched down and surrendered.


    Faced with this swarm of ants that had just had their nests destroyed, the Crimson n decided not to spread their forces to capture them all. Instead, they concentrated their soldiers and chased after the few, stillposed, elites of the Fabres n.


    If someone were to look down upon Ailovis from high in the sky, they would find that the Fabres elites were fighting as they fled, trying their best to reach the border. Meanwhile, the main forces of the Crimson n were using the Motherships, goblin chariots, and other vehicles to travel to important mountain passes to intercept the enemy.


    As the two parties engaged in the chase, the battlefield spread to every corner of Ailovis.


    While the web of war was cast across the entire region of Ailovis, all of the opportunists and fence-sitters that did not belong to the Fabres n-those only here to a profit and scavenge for goods-found themselves in trouble. By the time they realized something was wrong and tried to leave, all the principal roads and mountain passes around them had be fiercely contested regions that the Fabres n and Crimson n were viciously fighting over.


    Meanwhile, these fence-sitters were like pathetic bugs caught between two raging elephants. They no longer had the chance to escape and survive unscathed!


    These opportunists had brazenly trespassed into Crimson n territory its and resource sites, chasing away or imprisoning the adepts and apprentices that the Crimson n had stationed here before rampantly robbing the ces of their resources and wealth.


    However, while they were enjoying this rare and sumptuous feast in high spirits, the situation around them took a terrible turn. The entire region of Ailovis had be a bloody battlefield where one n chased after the other.


    These small adept organizations and forces that had ced the wrong bets were caught in-between now. They were as anxious as ants on a hot pan, desperately searching for the opportunity to escape.


    Unfortunately, these two ns had gone berserk in their attempts to chase and escape. No one had the time to investigate the validity and actual factions of these ¡®allied¡¯ forces. Any outside force with no clear affiliation had only one oue if they ran into the two ns- death!


    Several parties sent out by the surrounding small adept organizations were murdered and exterminated by the two ns.


    Of course, the leaders of some of these organizations were smart enough to save themselves. They immediately let out the imprisoned Crimson adepts and apprentices and treated them to good food and service while promising grandpensations to the Crimson n. In doing so, they barely managed to whitewash themselves into ¡®allies¡¯ of the Crimson n.


    What could you say? These fence-sitters and opportunists were just that shameless!


    After covering for themselves, they quickly waved their gs and joined the Crimson n, bing the most passionate group of people chasing after the Fabres n.


    While the forces of the two powerful ns engaged in difficult battles all across Ailovis, all sorts of ridiculous and unimagine stories of betrayal and loyalty urred all over the ce.


    ............


    Stoneshard Valley.


    It was a winding valley caught between two towering mountains and one of the key passes of Ailovis, controlling the southwest border.


    It used to be a fortress territory where the Crimson n had stationed forces, but when the n war broke out, the garrison was recalled, and this ce became an abandoned fortress.


    It was noon when the blue skies suddenly burst with activity.


    A silver Mothership arrived carrying several hundred magical machines, with the full intent of taking back control of the fortress.


    However, just as the four hundred magical machines charged down the ship and got into formation to assault the fortress, a gray g rose from the tallest stone tower of the fortress.


    The sigil of a bloody spear had been embroidered on the g with golden thread. This sigil represented a famous name in Zhentarim- the Dener n.


    The one leading the Crimson magical machines was Second Grade Blood Knight Soros. He saw the Dener n¡¯s banner waving above the fortress and immediately called for the forces to stop. He started to evaluate the location.


    Perhaps discovering the arrival of the Crimson n¡¯s magical machine army, the gates of the outpost opened, and a party of adept forces emerged on magical steeds. The one in the lead was a man. His face was filled with messy cuts and plenty of stitches. At first nce, it almost looked like his face had been diced up and bound together with cured and simple rope.


    Soros¡¯ heart sank.


    The ¡®monster¡¯ leading the Dener forces was a Third Grade adept.


    The scar-faced adept rode up to the Crimson magical machines and looked down upon Soros on his horse. Even as a vampire, Soros felt a chill run down his spine when the adept stared at him with his murky, pupil-less eyeballs.


    ¡°I am Gallow of the Dener n. In ordance with Lord Ker¡¯s orders, I am here to make an announcement. Your war with the Fabres n cannot cross the borders. It must be restricted to the Ailovis region. If any side is to break this rule, we of the Dener n have the right to correct them!¡±


    Soros¡¯ crimson eyes flickered as he protested, ¡°Sir, this valley is our n¡¯s asset to begin with.¡±


    ¡°No longer!¡± Scarface adept Gallow coldly said, ¡°For the sake of supervising and enforcing this rule, we have temporarily confiscated this valley and outpost. Naturally, we will return it to you once the war resolves. You may leave now!¡±


    As Adept Gallow explicitly threatened Soros, the hundreds of n soldiers behind him slowly pushed forward. Judging from the aura and energy intensity they were radiating, this was an adept force with powerful fighting ability.


    None of them might be an actual adept, but strengthened by their magical steeds and their mysterious armor, they could exhibit fighting power equal to an adept. Moreover, the ones leading the force were a Third Grade adept and five Second Grade adepts. An army with this much power would have no problem tearing through the Crimson n¡¯s four hundred magical machines!


    Soros¡¯ face twitched a few times, but after some quick thinking, he finally waved his hand and signaled for the magical machines to retreat several hundred meters away. He then quickly contacted the Crimson leadership. However, just as they were waiting for orders from above, arge army of defeated Fabres forces swarmed from a distance.


    Soros was about to lead the machines to intercept them, but the Dener n¡¯s squad of magical steeds stood in front of them and blocked their path forward.


    ¡°Lord Gallow, what does this mean?¡± Soros couldn¡¯t help but scowl.


    ¡°Exercising our duty to supervise the battlefield. You are free to do as you please.¡±


    Soros¡¯ nose almost went crooked from anger when he heard the opponent¡¯s casual and rxed answer.


    ¡°Alright, you got us!¡±

 Chapter 1017 - Sweet Sleep

    Chapter 1017 Sweet Sleep


    Pinecone City. Mothership.


    Gargamel shut off themunication furiously, stood up, and left themand hall. He walked through a long metal corridor and arrived in front of the entrance of a secret room.


    Deng. Deng. Deng.


    After a few light knocks, the metallic doors opened, sliding silently into the walls.


    Greem was naked from the waist up in the room, Mary and Alice carefully treating the wounds on his body.


    ¡°What matter do you have to report now? Do you not know that the n leader is currently receiving treatment?¡± Mary frowned and reprimanded with a scowl on her face.


    Gargamel smiled awkwardly.


    ¡°Speak, what has happened?¡± Greem asked. He could discern many things from Gargamel¡¯s expression.


    ¡°All the magical machine squads we sent to the border regions have been intercepted.¡±


    ¡°What? Who dares stand in our way with these circumstances? Who is it? Tell me who is it! I¡¯ll go and tear them apart right now!¡± Mary¡¯s crimson eyes lit up upon hearing this. She seemed incredibly eager to go.


    ¡°In the southwest is the Bloody Spear Army of the Dener n, in the northwest is the White Ghost Army of the Entom n, and in the south is the Swamp Flying Dragon Army of the Banda n. More armies of other ns are appearing in the other directions as well, and the magical machine squads we sent on pursuit have been intercepted.¡±


    ¡°Only intercepted and sent back, correct? No direct conflict?¡± Greem frowned and followed with a question.


    ¡°No!¡± Gargamel shook his head and said, ¡°All interfering adept ns have imed that they are acting on orders of the Association and are responsible for supervising the battlefield and potential vitions. They did not directly attack our n¡¯s forces.¡±


    Greem thought for a moment and turned to look at Alice.


    A look appeared on Alice¡¯s gentle, pretty face that said she had already anticipated this. She exined to Greem softly, ¡°The fact that they didn¡¯t initiate a fight means that the Association leaders don¡¯t want to go to war yet. Intercepting our forces and sending them back is telling us that there¡¯s a boundary to our war that we must not cross. Judging by the implication, the Association has tacitly consented to our rule over the Ailovis region, but we are not allowed to spread the fires of war beyond the region.¡±


    ¡°They say ¡®wage war¡¯ on us, and they wage war on us; they say ¡®stop fighting,¡¯ and we have to stop fighting? Hmph! Those old bastards. Don¡¯t they just like to manage everything?¡± Mary¡¯s temper was still as fiery as ever, and it was written all over her face.


    Greem sighed and turned to speak to Gargamel, ¡°Notify all n adepts that our main target of pursuit is still the Fabres n, but we can loosen our chase on the enemies outside of the Fabres n! However, execute all enemies that remain within Ailovis and refuse to surrender by nighttime!¡±


    ¡°Yes, sir!¡±


    Gargamel bowed and acknowledged the order. He was about to step out of the room to ry the instructions, but Greem stopped him.


    ¡°I have already heard Mary speak about everything that has happened in the n recently. You...have done well. You lived up to my expectations!¡±


    ¡°It is only my duty! It is not worthy of my lord¡¯s praise.¡± An unconceble smile appeared on Gargamel¡¯s old and sinister face when he heard Greem¡¯s praise.


    ¡°This time, I also got my hands on some valuable items from the other world. These will be your rewards then!¡±


    Greem took out three strange vials of purple potions from his storage ring and put them in Gargamel¡¯s hands.


    ¡°Three potions. One of them is a bloodline re-creation potion, while the other two are bloodline purification potions. You might be advanced First Grade now, but you¡¯re still a long way from peak First Grade. With this bloodline re-creation potion, you can obtain the bloodline of the Giant ck Mamba. I believe they are also venomous and of the poison attribute, which makes for a decent match with your adept affinities.¡±


    ¡°More importantly, once you turn into a bloodline adept, your lifespan should be extended to some degree. Once you use the two bloodline purification potions, it should be enough for you to advance to Second Grade!¡±


    Greem continued to ramble on and warn Gargamel about many other things he needed to be cautious about while using the potion. However, Gargamel waspletely stunned now as if he had just been sted with a bolt of lightning. He could onlyugh foolishly while holding the three potions in his arms.


    No one might know about his situation, but Gargamel clearly knew that he only had eleven years of life left!


    Ever since he became Greem¡¯s majordomo in Zhentarim, he had been working day and night for the sake of the Crimson n and had almost abandoned his own practice as a potions master. He did not have excellent talent. Bing a First Grade adept was already the fortune of his lifetime. As such, he had never hoped to advance to Second Grade.


    The reason he still worked so hard for Greem and for the Crimson n wasn¡¯t for his own benefit, but for the sake of his family. He hoped that Greem would treat Eva and his daughter Emelia well on ount of his loyal service.


    Yet now, close to the end of his life, a massive gift had crashed down onto his head from the skies above. Not only would he be able to continue living, but he would also be able to enjoy an even better, healthier life. It...it was incredible news that had shattered his mental state, leaving him reeling and dizzy with disbelief. He had no idea if what was happening in front of him was real or simply a dream.


    Greem shook his head unamusedly when he saw Gargamel bite the back of his hand and jump up from the pain.


    ¡°I guess I¡¯ll go ry the orders! I see Gargamel¡¯s gone mad.¡±


    Gargamel immediately snapped back to reality when he heard Mary speak. He hugged the three potions tightly, almost as if he was hugging the most important thing in his life.


    ¡°I¡¯ll go...I¡¯ll go. I¡¯ll go now.¡±


    He rushed out of the room.


    When the door finally closed again, Mary turned and smiled at Greem.


    ¡°Seems like you got quite a haul from your trip to the other world. You even prepared a present for that silly adept. What about mine?¡± Mary shed her incisors while she spoke, as if she would bite down on Greem if he said he had no presents.


    Mary was a Third Grade vampire adept now. Even Greem would suffer a heavy loss to his spirits if she got to sink her fangs into him.


    ¡°Don¡¯t...we can talk with our actions. No need to use our mouths! You just want presents, don¡¯t you? I have them...I do.¡±


    Greem hastily took out some tightly sealed y jars from his storage ring and passed them to Mary.


    Mary grabbed the jars and looked at them. The mud seals on the jars were carved full of mysterious runes, while the pots themselves, though of seemingly crude handiwork, had a pretty, otherworldly aesthetic. The y jars were handmade by someone. Due to the haste in making them, their shapes were uneven, and much of the color had faded from their patterns.


    Mary shook the jars. It was obvious that there was some sort of viscous liquid inside. Her ruby eyes couldn¡¯t help but light up. She pierced the mud seal with her sharp finger and dabbed a little of red substance for a taste. She almost screamed from delight.


    ¡°Third Grade; this is refined blood from a Third Grade creature! Are you sure you want to give me all this?¡± Mary was so excited that her eyes gleamed.


    Greem nodded his head.


    If it wasn¡¯t for Mary, he wouldn¡¯t have needed to spend so much effort to draw a bunch of Third Grade Gold Knights into a trap. That earthshaking battle had caused Greem, Tess, and Italil to be severely injured.


    However, the holy knights had ended up in a far worse position!


    First, they were struck by the magic traps that the witches had hidden beneath the swamp. Then, while they were confused by the traps, the three adepts had worked together to take them down, one by one. Under their ferocious and reckless attacks, the seven Third Grade Gold Knights were killed in the Poison Swamps.


    The blood of the Gold Knights was extracted, refined, and sealed in these jars. It was all done by Witch Tess. Greem then took away the holy light souls, leaving the witches only with their tattered corpses.


    There were people among the Deceit Witches who excelled at creating voodoo beasts and zombie golems. This number of high-quality holy knight corpses was enough for them to create a terrifying squad of voodoo beasts.


    With the protection of such voodoo beasts, they would be more confident in their safety.


    Their chances of survival in Henvic would be reasonably good as long as they didn¡¯t run into the two Fourth Grade Holy Knights!


    As for whether and how they would be rescued? That was the concern of the Deceit Witches, and Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered. Greem had immediately said his farewells with Witch Italil upon returning to the World of Adepts.


    Greem quickly exined everything that had happened to Mary and Alice in a few sentences.


    Mary immediately and happily went to look for another room to enjoy her snack, leaving Greem and Alice alone.


    Once they were the only two people left, Greemughed maliciously and patted his own thighs. Alice rolled her eyes at him unamusedly, before blushing and sitting onto hisp.


    Greem embraced Alice and put her face into her silky long hair, taking in the light fragrance of her body. He then let out a long sigh, steeped in exhaustion and fatigue.


    Over the past five years, Greem had been running around the other world and had never gotten proper time to rest and sleep. He had been on alert or fighting with people for every moment in his life. He hadn¡¯t even dared to fall asleep while trapped in the volcano. He had instead reced sleep with meditation.


    There had been constant fighting and unending injuries. Even though most of Greem¡¯s wounds had healed, the umted fatigue had been etched deep in his Spirit and soul.


    Moreover, once he returned home, he had to engage in a battle against a Fourth Grade adept without the time to stop and rest.


    Even a person forged of metal could not endure such arduous strain!


    As such, after burying his face in Alice¡¯s hair and semi-consciously muttering something to her, Greem fell into sweet, sweet sleep.


    He fell into an exceedingly deep slumber, and an exceedingly sweet one at that; it was almost as if he had returned to his mother¡¯s womb. It was calm, quiet, peaceful, and without worry.

 Chapter 1018 - Fourth Grade Force

    <strong>Chapter 1018 Fourth Grade Force</strong>


    The war between the two ns concluded after half a year.


    One side was arge n led by a Fourth Grade adept, while the other was a quickly rising n. Yet, the result of the war was entirely beyond everyone¡¯s expectations. It was the Crimson n that had managed to defend against the Fabres n¡¯s repeated assaults, finally obtaining the ultimate victory outside of Pinecone City in a battle between the most powerful adepts of their corresponding sides.


    The Crimson n didn¡¯t currently have a Fourth Grade adept. However, thebination of the Third Grade adept and the Fourth Grade magical machine golem dragon was already as mighty as an ordinary Fourth Grade adept.


    Moreover, many experienced adepts estimated that the legendary fire adept and founder of the Crimson n had a very high chance of advancing to Fourth Grade. It was undoubtedly incredible information with tremendous implications!


    Fourth Grade.


    For most nar worlds, this was already the highest limit of power that the ne could contain. Any further increase in power would cause the individual to be restrained and rejected by the nar world. In the end, anyone with excessive power would have no choice but to head to the realms beyond to look for a new ce of shelter.


    Thus, Fourth Grades were the uncontested emperors within a ne and the so-called ¡®deities¡¯ in the eyes of mortals!


    When you were only a Third Grade adept, you would have to work hard andbor tirelessly day and night just to create an organization that belonged to yourself. However, once you advanced to Fourth Grade, you no longer needed to put in any effort or hard work. Plenty of adept organizations and forces would throw themselves at your feet, crying and begging to be your subordinates.


    It was the difference between Third Grade and Fourth Grade!


    However, this one step between Third Grade and Fourth Grade was an exceptionally difficult step to take.


    The unique adept cultivation system in the World of Adepts allowed anyone to join an adept tower to study as long as they had an adept talent. However, depending on the extent of their talent, over eighty percent of adept apprentices were kept outside the threshold of an adept.


    Advancing to be an adept was sixty percent talent and forty percent luck!


    Once an apprentice advanced to be an adept, they would instantly transform from a chicken into a phoenix. They would suddenly rise to a position of power and rule above all else, bing one of the true masters of the World of Adepts. However, this was only rtive to the kingdom of mortal humans. Amongst the adepts, First Grade adepts were still cannon fodder and individuals to be exploited.


    Adepts with ambition would fight and struggle at the lowest level of the various adept ns, organizations, and forces, scheming and shing with each other over small amounts of resources.


    Thepetition and risk of elimination in the World of Adepts were even more intense, more savage, and carried more profound implications than the schemes and plots between human nobles!


    The fall of a single adept could result in the copse of an entire noble family! The rise of an individual adept could mean the creation of a glorious human kingdom!


    The constant fluctuations of power in human kingdoms and the change in dynasties might seem like a natural result of the development of history. However, at its core, these changes in history were no more than an extension of the changing power dynamics among the adepts.


    Before the Crimson n rose to power, there were seven adept ns and organizations of various sizes in the Ailovis region, along with a hundred noble territories. Five human kingdoms also had legaciessting for several hundreds of years.


    These various noble territories and the five human kingdoms all belonged to different adept ns and organizations. These were the ces that the adept forces scoured for resources and new blood.


    However, with the conclusion of the war between the Crimson n and the Fabres n, the human kingdoms and noble territories of Ailovis experienced a thorough rearrangement and reforging. Countless noble families that had picked the wrong side during the war were toppled and purged, reced by lower nobles who had stood unquestioningly by the Crimson n¡¯s side, taking over stretch after stretch of vast and fertilend.


    There were no longer any other adept ns or organizations throughout Ailovis. There was only one voice now; that of the rising sun known as the Crimson n. Under such a situation, all the noble territories in Ailovis were like shattered bones and minced meat. They were gathered together by a powerful will and started to be rearranged, concentrated, and strengthened.


    With Fire Throne and Pinecone City at the center, the shape of a vast human kingdom slowly started to form.


    ............


    No actual conflicts happened at the borders.


    Faced with the fresh elites of the variousrge ns, the higher-ups of the Crimson n managed to retain a cool head despite their victory. They did not attempt to challenge the current order of Zhentarim.


    Arge group of the main adept forces of the Fabres n managed to escape Ailovis thanks to the interference of these foreign forces. However, sixty percent of their lower-level forces had still been abandoned on the battlefield. Some of them were exterminated by the Crimson n, while the others were selectively captured and imprisoned.


    The Frost Giant army might have been iparably ferocious while on the offense, but when they were on the run, their massive size and slow speed made them the main targets for the Crimson n. Nearly forty percent of the Frost Giants died in their attempt to flee. The rest of them had no choice but to surrender under the lead of the two Frost Giant Mages. They were kept in a valley and put under the strict surveince of the Crimson n.


    Meanwhile, the modified beast army had incredible speed and was able to escape quickly. Unfortunately, they were not familiar with the local geography. Without the guidance of the Fabres adepts, they thrashed about the vast territories of Ailovis like lost flies, unsure of where to escape.


    Once the Crimson n cut off all their paths to the outside world, they became birds in a cage. There was nowhere to run.


    The Crimson n had initially intended to make some of the modified beasts submit so that they could conduct research on them. Unfortunately, these beastscked theplete intelligence and consciousness that the Frost Giants possessed. Thebat orders etched deep in their souls made them only obey themands of certain adepts. There was no way of making them submit at all.


    A Mothership carrying an army of magical machines caught up and thoroughly exterminated everyst one of them in a remote in in the wild.


    The unique pack of gargoyles had protected the Fabres n¡¯s flying wooden ship and escorted it out of the Ailovis region. The Crimson n had attempted to intercept the gargoyles and take them during this process, but they were foiled by the Third Grade adepts of the Fabres n.


    This unprecedented defeatsted for five consecutive days and affected the entirety of Ailovis.


    For a moment, Ailovis was turned into a massive ruin of war. Ravaged cities, castles, and vis could be seen everywhere, along with oddly shaped corpses, rising smoke, and defilednds.


    After exterminating or capturing all Fabres soldiers that remained in the region, the Crimson n spent another two weeks cleaning up the modified beasts and voodoo beasts that had escaped into more remote viges and rural areas.


    It wasn¡¯t until the thirteenth day of the ninth month that the fighting in Ailovis finally stopped.


    This war between the Fabres n and the Crimson n ended with the total victory of the Crimson n!


    However, the price of victory had also been crushing!


    Due to the reckless fighting and destruction unleashed by both parties during the war, over seven resource sites had been destroyed, along with a dozen human cities, several hundred castles and vis, and several tens of thousands of tons of food. ording to iplete counts after the war, over 210,000 civilians had died during the war as well.


    A difference in perspective would cause one to perceive the war with a different attitude.


    If you were an ordinary civilian, this war would only bring about endless pain and agonizing memories to you and your family. However, if you were a Crimson adept that survived the war, you could now party to your delight.


    That was because they had won the war!


    Even though the Crimson n had suffered colossal losses during this war, the tangible and intangible benefits of obtaining victory were immeasurable.


    Disregarding everything else, just the Zhentarim Association¡¯s acknowledgment of the Crimson n¡¯s rule was invaluable!


    From now on, Ailovis would be the Crimson ns private asset. Every resource, territory, civilian, woods, and ore reserve found within thesends belonged to the Crimson n. It was rare, even for the central region.


    There were a total of thirty-one areas of human activity of various sizes in Zhentarim. These thirty-one areas were categorized as individual regions. Each region had a border of sorts that separated them.


    Hundreds and thousands of powerful adept ns and organizations lived upon this vastnd. They were spread across these thirty-one regions,peting and fighting, all while co-existing with each other.


    Despite the number of ns and organizations, only Fourth Grade forces could im an entire region for themselves.


    These so-called Fourth Grade forces referred to an organization that possessed a Fourth Grade adept!


    That was the most crucial prerequisite for a n or organizationying im to a region of their own. A force that had not been acknowledged by others would not be able to maintain a long and stable rule, even if they managed to drive away allpetitors with sheer force.


    The Crimson n was the best example.


    Before this war, they had no Fourth Grade adept. They had only owned a Fourth Grade war machine that had not yet been pressure-tested in a live adept war. As such, the n¡¯s ruling position was not acknowledged by the people of Zhentarim. It wasn¡¯t strange that an adept war like this had broken out.


    Now that the Zhentarim Association had recognized the Crimson n¡¯s rule over the entirety of Ailovis, it was an indirect acknowledgment of the Crimson n¡¯s status as a Fourth Grade force.


    The weight of such status was earth shaking in the Central Region!


    It was important to note that there were no more than fourteen Fourth Grades throughout Zhentarim. Moreover, no new Fourth Grade had appeared in Zhentarim for several centuries now.


    ording to the research of the more curious busybodies, there were only three adepts among the many Third Grades who had a significant chance of advancing to Fourth Grade.

 Chapter 1019 - Clan Banquet

    Chapter 1019 n Banquet


    Fire Throne.


    An exceptionally luxurious and massive celebratory banquet was being held in theva hall.


    Hundreds of official adepts belonging to the Crimson n were gathered here, all cheer and smiles, toasting and celebrating as they awaited the arrival of the n higher-ups.


    The first to arrive was naturally Goblin Sage Snox, who possessed the most resources and connections within the n.


    Along with him came themander of the Brutalblood Army, Drusi La Salle.


    Upon arrival, they headed straight to a corner of the hall where they found the leader of the magical goblins, Dean Gonga, as well as Princess Vanessa. They quickly engaged in a lively conversation.


    If Second Grade Tigule were also here with them, all five leaders of the Crimson n¡¯s goblin faction would be gathered in one ce!


    Their discussion mostly revolved around the losses of the goblin faction in the war, how the various goblin merchant groups were to profit from therge-scale reconstruction of buildings in the n¡¯s territory after the war, and other responses to challenges and opportunities from the outside world.


    That said, privately, most of their attention was still fixed upon the potential rewards from the n!


    Through their discreet methods, these goblin leaders already knew that Crimson Majordomo Adept Gargamel, the one who worked the hardest during the war, had already been rewarded by the n leader.


    Bloodline recreation potion and bloodline purification potions of a serpentine adept!


    With these potions, Gargamel would have an eighty percent chance of sessfully advancing to Second Grade and converting his bloodline talent into that of a noble serpentine bloodline, regardless of how terrible his innate talent was.


    It was no doubt a rebirth for Gargamel, whose lifespan had almost been exhausted already. It would extend his life by another one to two hundred years. The implications behind this caused the goblin leaders to be incredibly envious. Yet, such a reward was something they could only hope for but never actually obtain.


    After all, Gargamel had worked tirelessly for the Crimson n over the past few decades. His contribution was also evident for all to see, a ledger that could not be wiped out by any means. Meanwhile, the other figure of authority in the Crimson n, Adept Meryl, was the n leader¡¯s disciple, to begin with. She had also worked hard and remained ever loyal to her teacher. Thus, she had obtained the powerful bloodline of a fire dragon.


    Naturally, the reason the two of them had been forcefully promoted and strengthened by the n leader in this manner had much to do with their identities, contributions, and loyalty. Regardless of how envious or jealous the other adepts were, they could only look on helplessly with no means ofpeting with them.


    In all honesty, it was also tough to construct a healthy, stable, and long-term system of operation around a core adept who could die at any time due to the exhaustion of their lifespan.


    Extending Gargamel and Meryl¡¯s life would effectively bring stability to the core authority of the Crimson n.


    Increasing their grades and improving their power prevented the awkward situation of the core adepts only being First Grade while issuing orders to powerful Second and Third Grade fighters. As authority figures of the n, Second Grade would suffice. If they were forcefully strengthened to Third Grade, it would be an enormous waste ofbat power and resources.


    Of course, Greem had not thought so far into the future nor considered the issue so deeply when he decided to promote his subordinates. The hundreds of years of experience and his vision as a ruler allowed him to handle such matters with ease.


    Moreover, the Crimson n had been created with his own two hands. He represented uncontested authority within the n. There was no need to think so intensely about every single one of his decisions. He could do anything he wished to do, and it would not end poorly.


    After all, what determined the might of a n was its top-tier fighting force. The quantity and quality of low and intermediate-grade adepts were only the garnish on top.


    Even if Greem were to leave the Crimson n, he would still be a feared and respected Third Grade legendary fire adept wherever he went. If he wanted to establish a new n or organization, he would only need to express that desire, and he would easily obtain support exceeding hundreds of years of umtion for low-grade adepts.


    Meanwhile, if Greem were to leave the Crimson n, the n¡¯s power and status would fall in an instant. Even with two other Third Grades, the group would have trouble reaching its current scale and might.


    The effect of a powerful Third Grade adept was something that could not be matched by multiple adepts of the same grade!


    That was the main reason why Greem was revered with the title of ¡®Legendary¡¯ in Zhentarim.


    After spending some time envying Gargamel, the goblins couldn¡¯t help but start reflecting on the currently hidden threats within the goblin faction.


    Much like Gargamel, and with the exception of Princess Vanessa who now possessed the body of a mechanical adept, these goblins all faced the same problem¨C their short lifespan as goblins.


    On average, the lifespan of a goblin was only half that of humans!


    Even though they had been living in luxury over the past few decades and devoured many rare adept resources, they could not change the limits of their lowly goblin bloodline on a fundamental level.


    Goblin Sage Snox was doing a bit better than the others. He now walked the path of adept advancement, and as a First Grade goblin adept, he had a lifespan of over a hundred years. In addition to that, all the magical rituals he had conducted had allowed him to maximize his lifespan. Still, even that had only barely given him one hundred and seventy years to live.


    After all these years of aging, he only had twenty years left.


    Twenty years. It might sound long, but it was a blink of the eye from the perspective of adepts.


    As such, Snox had been searching for resources or methods that could fundamentally change his lifespan limit over the past few years. The bloodline recreation potions that had appeared in the n were undoubtedly the safest and most reliable means of doing so.


    Even though Snox prided himself as one of the ¡®veterans¡¯ of the Crimson n, the difference between him and Greem had only increased throughout the years as Greem continued to improve relentlessly. Snox now had great difficulty joining the decision-makers of the n in their deliberations and meetings. Most of the time, it was incredibly difficult for him even to get an audience with Greem.


    The other goblin leaders were facing a simr situation as Snox.


    Commander of the goblin machinist-sorcererposed Brutalblood Army, Drusi La Salle, was now forty-eight years old. Converted into human years, he was an elderly man at the ripe age of a hundred years.


    Magical Goblin Leader Dean Gonga was seventy-three years old this year and had far exceeded the lifespan limit of an ordinary goblin. However, no one knew how much longer his magic-infused body would be able to support him.


    Goblin War God Tigule was forty-five years old now. He was almost the youngest among the goblin higher-ups. With his status and position, extending his life for another ten to twenty years would not be a significant problem. However, even if he were to use the best and most costly life extension ceremonies, he would not be able to live for more than another hundred years.


    Consequently, the extension of his life was also a major point of concern for him!


    While the goblin leaders whispered amongst themselves in a corner of the hall,motion stirred at the entrance.


    The rising star of the Crimson n, core adept Meryl, had stepped into the hall surrounded by a group of adepts.


    Having experienced the nourishment of her new bloodline and the war over the past few years, Meryl had left her aura of gentle elegance in the past. She now appeared much more dignified and intimidating.


    The dragonskin armor she wore had been treated and tailored with meticulous care. It fit her youthful and fiery figurepletely, showing the beauty of her curves and her perfect body. The ferocious and savage aura of the fire dragon¡¯s bloodline had caused her form to be even more explosive and seductive.


    If it wasn¡¯t because of how well they knew her, Snox and the other goblins might have even mistaken her for another person.


    When Meryl strode into theva hall with her chest held high, the temperature within the room very noticeably increased by five degrees.


    It was important to note that this was an undergroundva hall over two hundred meters below ground. A fearsome and roiling sea ofvay right beneath the floorboards where they stood. As the Crimson n leader was a legendary fire adept, the temperature in the hall was maintained around sixty to seventy degrees Celsius to match the attribute for which the n was known.


    Ordinary humans could not survive here at all. Even weaker individuals like Snox and Gonga could only move about freely in this ce with the use of Fire Resistance Pendants and Rings of Cooling.


    Though most of the other adepts didn¡¯t enjoy such a warm environment smelling of sulfur, they were First Grade adepts; enduring such temperatures was still nothing for them.


    Obviously, Meryl¡¯s bloodline was perfectlypatible with the environment here now that she had be a fire dragon adept. Thepatibility of her aura had stimted the fire elementium in the hall, causing it to be more lively and active.


    Snox and the others could see faint hints of sweat on the faces of the adepts around Meryl, despite the smiles on their faces. It was clear that they were having trouble enduring the fire energy that Meryl was radiating.


    It was impressive of them to not show any difort on their faces despite how unbearable it was.


    With the Crimson n¡¯s victory once again, the influence and size of the n were due for yet another round of explosive growth. At this time, anyone that could obtain the favor of the n¡¯s leadership would be able to get the best positions and jobs. It would certainly allow them to gain more power and influence quickly.


    As such, no adept was willing to leave Meryl¡¯s side, even though they were already screaming in agony on the inside.


    While everyone was gathered around Meryl and talking to each other, another wave ofmotion came from the entrance of the hall. Several Second Grades of the n started to walk into the room.


    The tall and ferocious Dragonborn Zacha. Tigule, who only reached up to Zacha¡¯s calf. Bug Adept Billis, who was always wrapped in a thick and heavy cloak. The two blood knights, Soros and Windsor. The three blood elves: Isa, Lilia, and Spa. There was also Split-Brain Gru, who had remained in the n after the war concluded.


    Their arrival caused the atmosphere of the banquet to be even more lively than before.


    Familiar adepts greeted each other, clinking cups as they toasted drinks. The entire banquet hall was filled withughter, conversation, and praise for the great n leader.


    Yet, in this joyous moment, the entrance suddenly fell silent. Everyone turned their heads to look at an adept striding into the hall.


    As they sensed the mysterious and unusual changes that had urred to the adept, a fire zed in their hearts, and their eyes gleamed with desire.


    Gargamel.

 Chapter 1020 - Clan Welfare

    Chapter 1020 n Welfare


    Gargamel walked into the hall with thepany of Forest Spirit Eva and and Mystique Emelia.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for the apaniment of the two women, no one would believe that this middle-aged adept was that famous Crimson Majordomo Gargamel.


    In the past, Gargamel had skin as wrinkled as ancient bark, dark circles around his eyes, a hooked nose, and only a fuzzy ring of hair on his bald head. The first impression he gave off was that he was sinister and sly.


    However, the Gargamel of the present stood straight, without any trace of a hunched back. His skin had also turned smooth and young again, though with a slight shade to it. Tiny jade-green scales that had yet to grow fully could faintly be seen on his skin.


    If Gargamel used to look like an elderly in his twilight years, then he now looked like a handsome, robust, middle-aged adept brimming with life and vigor.


    Everyone could clearly see that apart from the fine scales showing on his face and neck, Gargamel also had a pair of turquoise reptilian pupils in his eyes. A sinister and vicious aura radiated whenever his eyes darted about the room, causing every adept looking at him to feel their hearts tremble ever so slightly.


    Gargamel¡¯s aura was still that of a First Grade.


    However, it had already increased from advanced First Grade to peak First Grade. He was only one step away from Second Grade now. It had only been twelve days since the n leader rewarded him with the potions, and he had already manifested some of the representational traits of his serpentine bloodline, as well as advance by a minor grade. It was proof that hispatibility with the bloodline was reasonably high.


    Fire Dragon Adept Meryl, another core member of the Crimson n, was the first to walk up to Gargamel upon his arrival. The other adepts knew well enough not to approach them at this moment. Instead, they scattered into the surroundings and gave the two core adepts the space to talk amongst themselves.


    However, judging from their slightly twitching ears, they were very concerned about what the two core adepts were discussing.


    ¡°Congrattions, Gargamel. It seems like our n will soon have yet another Second Grade core fighting force!¡± Meryl raised her ss and toasted to Gargamel with joy and excitement written on her face.


    Gargamel hastily picked up a ss of wine from a servant¡¯s tray nearby and finished everything in a single gulp. He then smiled and nodded, ¡°Thank you, Lady Meryl, for your concern. My current condition is excellent, but this is all but a gift from our n leader!¡±


    ¡°Indeed, indeed. We must work more closely together in the future if we have the opportunity!¡±


    The two congratted each other with fake smiles on their faces. The two women apanying them couldn¡¯t help but roll their eyes over and over again.


    The Crimson n had now very clearly split into the two different branches in the Northern Lands and Zhentarim. They were not only located in different ces but faced different enemies, different environments, and took different paths of development.


    As part of the Crimson n, both of these branches should be aiding and reinforcing each other. However, as the Crimson n gradually grew stronger, thepetition between the two branches would only be more and more prominent.


    Greem¡¯s original intention was to avoid putting all his eggs in one basket and losing it all in a single fight.


    However, at this point, no one knew if the Crimson n¡¯s development henceforth should be centered around the Northern Lands or Zhentarim. Debates on this had already urred countless times within the n. Both regions had their advantages and disadvantages, making it difficult to decide which was superior.


    However, with the eruption of war at the Zhentarim branch, they had once again be the focus around which the n¡¯s authority and resources revolved; it unavoidably stole some of the limelight from the Northern Lands. Moreover, with their victory in the adept war, the Zhentarim branch would be greeting an unprecedented tide of development. In doing so, they would indirectly suppress the growth of the Northern Lands branch to some extent.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine that most of the Crimson n¡¯s resources and human resources would be invested in the Ailovis region for the next ten to twenty years. That indirectly strengthened the authority and power in Gargamel¡¯s hands.


    Supposedly, both branches belonged to the same n, and there should be no reason for hard feelings. However, for the more opportunistic neutral factions within the n, investing in Gargamel¡¯s faction at the moment would undoubtedly yield higher returns than Meryl¡¯s faction.


    That was the difference!


    If Meryl and Gargamel had some degree ofradeship between them, all of that insignificant rtionship had now be smoke in the past. They were having a lively conversation when they were together, but thepetition and contest of ability behind the scenes had never stopped.


    While the two of them were talking, the gates of the adept tower slowly opened. The Third Grade adepts that truly represented the foundation of the Crimson n¡¯s power walked out and appeared in front of everyone.


    Naturally, at the very front was Greem, dressed in arge red robe.


    Compared to before, the overwhelming fire aura that Greem radiated was much more contained now. His dark red hair had also returned to its original ck. Greem¡¯s tall and muscr body caused him to emanate a suffocating sense of power. Most of the First and Second Grade adepts in the hall had to avert their eyes to ease the pain when they looked upon the translucent barrier of mes around him.


    Now that he was close to peak Third Grade, Greem was like a mobile, humanoid volcano. Though the violent and contained fire energies in his body didn¡¯t erupt furiously, he could still inspire fear in every living thing around him. It was a fear that came from the depths of one¡¯s soul.


    It wasn¡¯t quite fear, nor cowardice. It was merely the instinctual reaction of a weak animal sensing an unknown danger.


    With Greem¡¯s current spiritual pressure and the fire forcefield that lingered around him, any apprentice adept that came within a hundred meters of him would face unpredictable danger. As for mortals? They had best stay as far away as they could if they didn¡¯t have the courage to jump into a sea ofva.


    Even the adepts could not stare at him directly. They could only nce at the translucent mes around Greem out of the corner of their eyes. If they stared at the fire too long, their eyes could be scalded.


    Only the few Second Grade adeps in the room could barely shield their eyes with magical energy and look directly at Greem. However, all they could see was a human-shaped ze burning furiously. They could not see through the forcefield of fire to look upon Greem¡¯s face.


    When Greem appeared, all the adepts in theva hall immediately stopped their conversation and socializing. They turned towards him, ced their hands on their chest, and bowed.


    ¡°Hail, n Leader.¡±


    ¡°Hail, n Leader.¡±


    Greetings rang out throughout the hall; the passion and admiration behind the words were clear and distinct.


    Frankly, the reason the Crimson n could develop to its current scale could all be attributed to Greem. Even though little things added up and the lower-level adepts contributed to the n, what decided the status and position of an adept force was ultimately the power of the adept that stood at the center of the n¡¯s authority.


    Without Greem, the Crimson n would not have won the war, regardless of how many Third Grades they possessed. They would have been picked apart one by one by the Fourth Grade body-refining adept, and the n would have been captured in one fell swoop. Without Greem¡¯s coordination andmands, the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon would have had trouble stopping Adept Den from breaking into its gaps alone.


    It was Greem¡¯s existence that concealed the golem dragon¡¯s weakness of slow movements and attacks. It was his presence that allowed them to force the Fourth Grade body-refining adept into a disadvantageous situation to y a game of endurance and exhaustion.


    Naturally, the result of such an exchange was incredibly tragic for Den!


    In all honesty, the endless supply of magical energy from the magic generator furnace inside the golem dragon was ult knowledge beyond theprehension and understanding of an ordinary adept. It was only in the highest archives of the Silver Union that one might perhaps be able to find simr perpetual magical machines.


    It was only with such a thing that Greem could fully unleash the advantage of owning a Goblin ne and its massive reserves of metal ore!


    Without the magic generator furnaces, the Crimson n would not have enough resources to support such a massive army of magical machines, let alone bring to life these war machines that should only exist on paper. If the Crimson n were to lose therge number of magical machines that functioned as the base level fighters of the n, it would instantly be reduced to its weak, former self.


    The n only had less than a hundred n adepts. It was not enough number or power to prop up a Fourth Grade organization. If it weren¡¯t for the significant number of magical machines and goblin machinist-sorcerers charging at the frontlines in ce of the n adepts, this number of adepts would notst more than two or three wars.


    One could frankly im that it was the shocking number of magical machines that was holding the lines for the Crimson n! They were the ones who forged this mighty ¡¯empire¡¯ for the n!


    Following closely behind Greem were Fate Witch Alice, Bloody Queen Mary, Magic-Breaking Assassin Oliven, Spirit of Pestilence Remi, Arms, and Iritina. The elementium magical machine and the old poison witch were only Third Grade magical constructs and could not be listed as official adepts of the Crimson n.


    As the Crimson adepts looked upon the various Third Grade adepts of the n and the foreign elders that represented its future, they once again felt the bright and vast future that awaited them. Everyone smiled.


    ¡°For the n. For the future. For our ambitions!¡±


    With his current lifeform grade, Greem didn¡¯t have much to talk about with these small fries before him. After toasting three drinks to the n, Greem immediately returned to the higher levels of the tower.


    However, Alice and Mary did not leave. Instead, they started announcing the internal rewards that would be given to the n adepts who had performed the best and made the most contributions during the war.


    Serpentine bloodline recreation potion, bloodline purification potion, Mask of Petrification, Grail of Purification, Armor of Invigoration, Mechanical Heart, Abyssal Staff, Philosopher¡¯s Stone...


    A series of unfamiliar and strange names were announced. Even though no one knew their specific effects yet, the fact that they were Third Grade items alone was enough to drive the Crimson adepts insane.


    Apart from the Third Grade items that made the adepts writhe in excitement, the n was also offering plenty of First and Second Grade items, spanning everything from magical equipment to potions, scrolls, wands, and even knowledge. All of these were up for n members to redeem with their points.


    They only needed to exchange the contribution points they had obtained through the war, and they would be able to purchase the high-grade items that they pined for.

 Chapter 1021 - Wild Redeeming

    Chapter 1021 Wild Redeeming


    ¡°That serpentine-bloodline recreation potion and purification potion are mine. I must get them!¡±


    Snox shouted the moment he saw this item on the list.


    Unfortunately, Dean Gonga standing beside him was much calmer.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be so sure yet. I have a feeling that you have a good chance of getting the bloodline recreation potion. As for the bloodline purification potion, I suggest you give up on that! Haven¡¯t you seen those two people¡¯s expressions?¡± Gonga pursed his lips in the direction of Gargamel and Meryl.


    Gargamel and Meryl both currently walked the path of a bloodline adept. Why would they give up on such high-grade purification potions?! Thus, the moment Lady Mary announced the list of items avable for redemption, the two of them immediately started gathering their subordinates to try their best to gather as many contribution points as they could.


    Indeed, private trading of personal contribution points was allowed as well!


    While a single person might not be able to redeem a high-grade item that required a tremendous number of contribution points, a dozen adepts with all their points put together could easily redeem it.


    However, most Crimson adepts had only obtained their contribution points through trials and tribtions of life and death. Naturally, they would hope to use the contribution points for themselves. Moreover, each of them had an item they personally wanted. Why would any of them ever be willing to just give their points away?


    Even significant authorities such as Gargamel and Meryl had to mobilize many of their subordinates and promise countless favors just to barely pool together enough points to redeem a Third Grade item. Meryl acted quickly and was one step ahead of Gargamel. She sessfully obtained that only vial of bloodline purification potion.


    Gargamel could only sigh in disappointment. The frustration in his heart was indescribable!


    In Gargamel¡¯s moment of disappointment and hesitation, Goblin Sage Snox had also redeemed the serpentine-bloodline recreation potion and was leaping up and down in excitement. Gonga and Drusi could only shake their heads and groan at the sight of this.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Even though they were leaders of the goblin faction as well, the scale and speed at which they could gather and mobilize wealth were far, far inferior to Snox.


    With the incredible tool that was the Goblin General Chamber of Commerce in his hands, Snox could easily extend his reach and influence into the other goblin factions. The astonishing amount of wealth he could umte was iparable.


    Not long after, Princess Vanessa also redeemed the Third Grade mechanical heart.


    Currently, Princess Vanessa remained the princess of the goblins in public while also leading the Magic Energy Association in the shadows. It allowed her to pull together a decently-sized force within the goblin faction. In addition to the immense wealth of the goblin royalty, she had no problem redeeming a Third Grade item.


    Moreover, Vanessa was currently walking the path of a mechanical adept. The mechanical heart taken from Third Grade Mechanical Adept de Princess Katherine fitted her perfectly. With this mechanical heart, Vanessa¡¯s way to Second Grade would smooth sailings. Advancement would not be a problem as long as her attributes reached the necessary levels.


    As for whether she could be a Third Grade? That would depend on her potential and whether her soul affinity waspatible with this heart.


    As the items on the list were redeemed one by one, the Crimson adepts who had clear targets in mind started to be anxious. They stopped hiding and hesitating, hastily taking out all sorts of rare resources and treasures they had collected to exchange for theirpanions¡¯ contribution points.


    For a moment, the banquet hall where people had just been drinking and eating suddenly became a small treasure auction. All sorts of unusual wealth and resources started to appear, and the crowd¡¯s passion boiled to a peak once again.


    Spring of Regeneration, Lionseye Gem, Robe of Shapeshifting, Bracers of Binding, Unicorn Ne, Boots of Dodging, Dawnlight Crystal, Mermaid¡¯s Tear, Dragonmarrow Stone, Banshee Grass, Ghosthaunt que...


    A series of rare and valuable treasures appeared one after another. One of them was even a Third Grade item, whose owner was apletely inconspicuous First Grade adept.


    It demonstrated that every individual who became an adept had a rough, unknown, and unimaginable story behind them.


    Naturally, the fortunate ones among them would obtain rewards beyond the average person. If it weren¡¯t for how attractive the n¡¯s list of items was, they would probably continue hiding these items deep in their pouches until they found the perfect opportunity to sell them.


    The Spring of Regeneration was a rare Third Grade adept material. It was also a core material in several high-grade life extension ceremonies. As such, the crowd fought over it the instant it appeared.


    The Robe of Shapeshifting appeared only to be a First Grade item, but it gave the wearer the mysterious ability to shapeshift. It was one of the best treasures for which to explore the woods and travel through the ck Forest.


    Meanwhile, the Unicorn Ne could increase the wearer¡¯s mental resistance, reducing the effect of charming, hypnosis, and other simr mental magic on the user. It was a Second Grade item.


    The Ghosthaunt que was also a Second Grade item, allowing the owner to see spiritual lifeforms. The que could also function as a medium by which to host high-grade spiritual beings. It was an excellent magical item for cultivating ghosts, vengeful spirits, and other simr familiars.


    ......


    Apart from the adepts, the foreign forces of the Crimson n also excitedly joined in the ranks of the treasure-seekers.


    Dragonborn Zacha immediately bought the Third Grade Armor of Invigoration with therge number of contribution points he had amassed over the years. He fought like a berserker warrior to begin with, and he already possessed a lightning spear and the Frost Mallet. He was only missing a high-quality armor.


    The Armor of Invigoration.


    +5 Physique, +2 Strength, +55 base magical resistance, +100% base regeneration. 800 points of physical defense.


    Abilities: Invigorate. Increases base regeneration by 600% for a short time.


    With the Armor of Invigoration, Zacha would be a cockroach that could not be killed. With his powerful Physique and the armor¡¯s incredible defenses, he would be able to endure two to three attacks even if he was fighting against a Third Grade opponent. If he activated Invigorate, he was practically immortal for the seven-minute duration that the abilitysted.


    It was already an incredible life-saving ability in battle, where time was of the essence!


    Meanwhile, Split-Brain Gru, the other rich person keeping a low profile, decided to redeem the Abyssal Staff after some thought. With this item, he would be able to summon some abyssal magical creatures or demons every so often. It would make for a reasonably interesting toy.


    Meanwhile, Arms and Iritina became collectors of all sorts of treasures.


    The couple sessfully obtained the Third Grade Grail of Purification by pooling their contribution points together.


    It was a Third Grade holy item that Greem had taken from the holy knights. It possessed the powerful ability to cleanse darkness and purify evil.


    One could say that Greem had returned from Henvic with his hands full of treasure.


    He had wiped out three holy knight bases in a row, killed four hunter adepts, and found a shocking volume of treasures in their storage rings. The items he put out as rewards for the n members to redeem were things he couldn¡¯t use or didn¡¯t care about. He had carefully put away all the valuable stuff.


    Greem gave Alice a book as a souvenir.


    The book was a strange tome that only casters capable of divination could use. The caster could sacrifice a divination spell to the tome in exchange for a random cantrip. Of course, most of the time, the cantrip would be an utterly useless low-grade spell. asionally, somepletely unseen and foreign spell could appear.


    If one wanted to obtain good spells through the tome, they would need not only a sturdy determination but also extraordinary luck.


    From Greem¡¯s perspective, Alice¡¯s luck had always been decent!


    He couldn¡¯t y favorites either, so he gave Mary a Third Grade dagger.


    Stinger.


    +4 Agility, +1 Physique, +1 Spirit, +40% attack speed.


    Possesses armor-breaking and rending effect.


    Abilities: Concentrated Strike. Concentrates all of the user¡¯s strength on a single point, inflicting the most extreme pain to the enemy.


    Mary had walked the path of an agile assassin ever since she became a Third Grade vampire adept. However, most of the time, she preferred to fight like a berserk assassin to maximize the damage inflicted on the enemy, trading wound for wound. With this Third Grade Stinger, Mary had an additional means to deal with the sturdier opponents she couldn¡¯t deal with before. She would have a much easier time cracking their defenses.


    Though Mary and Alice remained in theva hall to host the redemption of items, Greem had already returned to the higher levels of the tower and started examining the collection he had brought back from Henvic ne.


    Ever since Greem had absorbed the holy light souls, his Spirit had increased to 37 points. He had brought back another soul-gathering crystal with him this time, and the number of souls within it far surpassed the previous one. There were as many as four Third Grade holy knight souls in this crystal alone.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Near the end of the battle at the Poison Swamps, those stubborn Gold Knights had all fought with the determination to take an enemy to the grave with them. As a result, it was hard to control the rhythm of battle, resulting in three of the Gold Knights¡¯ souls dispersing without a trace.


    However, the Chip had already performed its calctions. The holy lights in the crystal alone were enough to push Greem¡¯s Spirit to the 39-point limit. There would no longer be any meaning in absorbing these souls once he reached Fourth Grade!


    Thest time Greem absorbed a Third Grade Gold Knight¡¯s soul in Henvic ne, it had taken him five years. Now, there were four of them in the crystal. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how difficult it would be to absorb them all.


    However, Greem was not bothered by this challenging task.

 Chapter 1022 - Crimson Dynasty

    Chapter 1022 Crimson Dynasty


    Fire Throne. Fifth level.


    Inside an incredibly protected secret room.


    Greem stood before an alchemy tform, silently examining the starbeast corpse lying in front of him.


    The corpse was sealed in a kind of semi-translucent amber. It was a strange speciespletely unlike any nar creature. Its appearance was difficult to describe. At the very least, Greem had never seen anything simr in any of the nes.


    In conclusion, the starbeast was like a mess of rotten meat that had grown haphazardly. It had no extended appendages or joints, nor any fixed skeletal structure. It didn¡¯t even have defined flesh organs of any kind. Its entire body was covered in a ck, hardyer of a substance that gleamed with specks of crystal light.


    In all seriousness, this should be a young starbeast!


    Even a youngling starbeast had the might of a Second Grade. It was more than enough proof of the dangers and terrors of the realms beyond.


    ¡®Starbeast¡¯ was a generic name epassing many species. Any creature that could freely travel and survive in the endless sea of stars could be called a starbeast.


    The difference between starbeasts could be significant, as well. They could be as different as heaven and earth, and iparable in the slightest.


    Some starbeasts were as small as mastiffs, while others were the size of hills. Some were even asrge as a continent. Their power was often directly rted to their size. However, the most frightening aspect of their existence was the chaos energy they carried within themselves.


    It was important to note that the elementium energy within a nar world was orderly, gentle, and tame.


    The narws were the main contributing factor to this.


    Outside of a ne was a terrifying and boundless sea of stars. An infinite amount of violent magical energy surged and rippled through the gxies. Such magical energy was chaotic, violent, and disorderly¨C dangerous to most nar creatures.


    The nar worlds isted themselves from outside space through the ne barrier, alsomonly known as the world membrane. It was how the life and substances within the nes were protected. Through the world membrane, a nar world could disassemble the chaos energy seeping into the world using the power of principles. It would break down the energy into the basic elementium that nar creatures could absorb: earth, fire, water, wind, and the like. These elementium particles would then form the fundamental elementium environment of the nar worlds.


    As such, creatures living in nar worlds were actually all protected by the narws. The magical energy they absorbed was also an energy that had been tamed and filtered. Even though directly using chaos energy would greatly amplify the power of spells, chaos energy itself was no less than a lethal poison to most nar creatures.


    If chaos energy entered one¡¯s body, it would destroy the elementium bnce within and cause the copse of the entire energy cirction system. The frail body of the human adepts could not endure such a system copse.


    That was why low-grade adepts faced certain death in leaving the ne and traveling the gxies!


    It wasn¡¯t until they advanced to the higher grades and possessed powerful bodies or abilities to deal with chaos energy that they had the right to traverse the sea of stars in search of the mysterious worlds hiding behind the endless spacestorms.


    Space was violent and dangerous. Yet, it still had its fair share of native creatures.


    They were naturally adapted to the existence of the energy tides and could directly absorb chaos energy for their use. Thus, they were called starbeasts.


    Starbeasts had a favorite pastime¨C traveling through the endless space in search of nar worlds they could invade. Once they found a target, they would tear open the ne¡¯s barrier and break-in for a feast.


    The chaos energy from space that they brought in with their breach would cause horrifying and irreparable damage to the world.


    Countless nar worlds throughout history had withered from the damage caused by rampaging starbeasts. When the narws were damaged, and the ne consciousness severely wounded, a nar world would lose its ability to repair its barrier.


    The constant energy storms that continued to pour into the ne would destroy all of the weak lifeforms and substances, killing over ny percent of intelligent life in the world. Only truly powerful individuals or species had a chance of escaping a broken world like this.


    They would be space nomads or search for a new world to call home. From this perspective, almost all starbeasts were the mortal enemies of nar creatures!


    A violent battle to the death was inevitable if they were to meet.


    This corpse of a young starbeast was very likely a spoil of war that those hunter adepts had obtained in the realms beyond. Truthfully, every starbeast body was a massive treasury of resources.


    Their skin and hair could be used to forge the best magic-resistant equipment, while their flesh was the favorite source of nutrition for body-refining adepts. The most precious attribute of the starbeasts was their natural Physique of Chaos, which was a mighty bloodline of its own.


    Far too many ancient adepts had craved the Chaos Physique of the starbeasts. The adepts either ate the flesh raw, injected the blood into their bodies, or attempted to extract their bloodline powers. Adepts had tried every method possible in their pursuit of turning their bodies into that unique Physique that did not fear the chaos energy of space.


    Unfortunately, far too few seeded in the end!


    Even though some Great Adepts had seeded in converting their bodies into the Chaos Physique, the side-effects had been tremendous.


    The starbeasts were powerful and savagepared to nar creatures. However, they mostly survived by instinct alone. They had iparable physical power and incredibly powerful innate abilities butcked in intelligence and wisdom.


    Those who forcefully converted their bodies into the Chaos Physique also experienced a regression in their intelligence. They turned into cruel and evil creatures, just like starbeasts. The secretbs they created in the realms beyond space were abandoned and became ruins whereter generations would explore, adventure, and search.


    Ordinary means of bloodline extraction was practically useless on starbeasts.


    As such, even for the three major adept organizations, research on starbeast bloodlines was the highest and most ssified of information. It was not something that would easily be leaked to the outside world.


    ording to some questionable rumors, the Adept¡¯s Association was already ahead of everyone else when it came to starbeast-bloodline research. It seemed like they had already sessfully created a series of chaos adepts. However, they wouldn¡¯t quickly reveal such a trump card to the outside world; no sign of these chaos adepts had been seen, apart from some rumors spread around the continent.


    Greem might have the Sourcestealer, but he had no idea whether it would work on a starbeast. He also couldn¡¯t use his only starbeast corpse for a Sourcestealing experiment. Thus, for the next few days, he shut himself in this secretboratory, finding all sorts of ways to extract the muscle and tissue of the starbeast for initial experiments while using the results of those experiments to adjust and cultivate new Sourcestealers.


    Such experiments often spanned a long time and consumed a tremendous amount of resources!


    If Greem were alone, he would have to run all over the World of Adepts in search of the materials and resources he required for his experiments. However, with the quickly rising tform that was the Crimson n, he only needed to give an order for thousands of adepts, apprentices, and goblins to go out in search of what he required.


    Thus, he could concentrate his time and effort on his experiments and studies without worrying about more trivial tasks.


    The Crimson n also had plenty of things to do at the moment and was in a period of rapid development and growth.


    Greem didn¡¯t need to even show himself. As long as the Crimson adepts knew that the legendary fire adept that they most respected and admired remained in their tower, they would find inexhaustible energy within themselves and be able to work with all their spirit.


    Greem was like the backbone of the Crimson n. As long as he remained in the n, he would be an irreceable guarantee and assurance to the n members, even if he did nothing at all!


    After all, it was widely rumored throughout Zhentarim that Greem, the legendary fire adept, had been listed by the various leaders of the other ns as the Third Grade that was most likely to advance to Fourth Grade. Under the effects of such a psychological expectation, any adept or organization that dared to go against the Crimson n would be perceived as mad. They would be foolish individuals who had no concept of a cost-benefit analysis.


    The Fabres adepts that retreated to their n territories also dejectedly acknowledged their defeat.


    The Fabres n had to offer incrediblepensation as a ransom for their captured n adepts and elite forces before they could mend the rift and hostility between them.


    Twenty-one million magical crystals.


    An enormous number of magical materials and adept resources.


    All Crimson nobles that defected to the Fabres n.


    The reconstruction of a dozen Crimson cities and over a hundred castles and vis.


    More than a hundred thousand otherworldly ves.


    A massive number of low-grade magical equipment, scrolls, potions, wands, and other alchemical items.


    ......


    With thispensation, the Crimson n couldpletely rebuild the Ailovis Region and turn it into a worldly n territory belonging to themselves. The noble territories and human kingdoms of the past had been ravaged thoroughly. It was the best opportunity to merge them and create a massive, united human kingdom.


    The Crimson Dynasty!


    This human kingdom,pletely subordinate to the Crimson n, would be called the Crimson Dynasty. The king ced upon the throne would be known as Baderhorn Crimson, Adept Gargamel¡¯sst living rtive that he had scraped out from his hometown.


    Due to their excellent performance in thest n war, the human nobles that remained staunch in their support of the Crimson n were all promoted. Count Thomas was now Duke Thomas and owned a vast territory stretching several thousands of square kilometers.


    No Crimson adept stood alone. All of them had ns and families of various sizes behind their backs that needed support. Now that there was a vast kingdom for them to reside in, they excitedly brought their rtives and kin over, creating new noble families with their own legacy territories within the Crimson Dynasty.

 Chapter 1023 - Crimson Power

    Chapter 1023 Crimson Power


    As one of the indirect beneficiaries of the war on the other ne, Alice sessfully advanced to Third Grade on the fifth day of Greem¡¯s return to the World of Adepts. She was now a high-grade adept.


    Alice had decisively won in her battle against First Witch of Fate Maysa. Naturally, she had obtained a tremendous amount of Fate power feedback. Meanwhile, having helped the Crimson n defeat the vastly superior Fabres n had also allowed her to gain elementary proficiency over the veins of the world¡¯s development. Thus, it wasn¡¯t at all surprising that she had advanced so quickly.


    This improvement allowed her to catch up and surpass Mary and Oliven, bing the second most powerful authority figure within the Crimson n, second only to Greem.


    However, Mary had obtained arge amount of high-quality blood from powerful individuals. As long as she sessfully absorbed and assimted the blood into her power, she should quickly advance by one to two minor grades. As such, it wasn¡¯t entirely obvious who would hold the seat of second-inmand within the Crimson n yet.


    While the three leaders of the Crimson n were chasing after each other and trying their best to improve themselves, most of the other Crimson adepts were also desperately following in the steps of the n.


    In the twelve years that came after the victory over the Fabres n and the domination of the Ailovis Region, many of the Crimson adepts slowly started advancing into Second Grade adepts due to the tremendous amount of adept resources and the guidance sent their way.


    What used to be a pathetic squad of no more than a few adepts had now developed into an impressive and intimidating army.


    Peak Second Grade: Blood Knight Soros.


    Advanced Second Grade: Dragonborn Zacha, Goblin Tigule, Split Brain Gru, Bug Adept Billis.


    Intermediate Second Grade: Blood Knight Windsor, Blood Elf Mage Isa, Blood Elf Magic Archer Lilia, Blood Elf Shapeshifter Spa, Berserk Witch Sofia


    Beginner Second Grade: Fire Dragon Adept Meryl, Poison Adept Gargamel, Mystique Emelia, Old Fox Vanlier, Brutalblood Commander Drusi La Salle, Half-Serpent Goblin Snox, Goblin Magical Mechanic Locke, Magical Goblin Leader Gonga, Mechanical Princess Vanessa, Icdy Snowlotus.


    Vanlier should not have had the talent or power to be one of the n¡¯s Second Grades. However, out of consideration for his dedicated service to the n and its development, Mary used her powers as his blood master and forcibly promoted him into a Second Grade vampire.


    At the same time, Peak Second Grade Blood Knight Soros was also promoted in the same fashion.


    He was a talented individual to begin with, and perhaps the one individual among the vampires whose consciousness and vampire bloodline was bestbined. To increase the number of capable subordinates beside her, Mary exhausted much of her origin blood to promote Soros from Peak Second Grade to Beginner Third Grade.


    Mary even had to take a long, six-month sleep due to this!


    The Crimson n could be considered as having plenty of adepts of Second Grade and below now.


    Even the veterans like Wind Adept Deserra, Medusa Dana, Manticore Charon, and the others had all reached Peak or Advanced First Grade. They were getting closer and closer to Second Grade.


    There were also plenty of new faces among the First Grade adepts.


    In this group of over one hundred and twenty adepts, ten percent were vampires, twenty percent were goblin magical-mechanics, and the rest were all human adepts. Of course, apart from the official adepts, there were also over two hundred and seventy goblin machinist-sorcerers in the n.


    They might not have the long lives and vast knowledge of real adepts, but they had violentbat prowessparable to an average First Grade adept. To be fair and equal, the Crimson n provided them with the treatment and status of official adepts.


    Apart from the goblin machinist-sorcerers, there was also a group of people within the Crimson n with rtively unique status. They were the magical goblins!


    They numbered between seventy to ny individuals and were goblin engineers and technicians that spent their days working inside the magical golem dragon. Due to long-term exposure to the magical energy emitted from the golem dragon, they had be fundamentally different from ordinary goblins. Still, they couldn¡¯t quite be considered a subspecies or different race yet.


    Compared to an ordinary goblin, they were more rash and violent. They were also bigger and had greater strength. Visible magical patterns had even appeared on their green bodies.


    These magical patterns had the unique effect of providing them with an enhancement simr to a Berserking Spell.


    In a fair duel, a magical goblin could easily defeat three to five ordinary goblins.


    One day, these magical goblins might split off from the goblin faction and be a faction of magical creatures that was entirely different from the goblins.


    ............


    Year 32,902 of the Era of Adepts. The seventh day of the sixth month of the year.


    Gargamel walked down a vast and empty corridor alone. The starlight stone embedded on both sides of the hall lit up one by one, illuminating his path.


    Finally, at the end of the long corridor, what appeared before him was the incredibly familiar Molten Hall. At the entrance of the Molten Hall, two incredibly massive magical machines walked out of the holes in the stone wall with heavy steps. They stared at Gargamel with the weirdpound eyes on their heads.


    Lights of various colors flickered in the eyes of the machines, seemingly confirming Gargamel¡¯s identity.


    ¡°Wee to Fire Throne, Sir Gargamel. Lord Greem wishes for you to wait at the third level of the tower for now. He will meet you once he finishes with his experiment.¡± The massive magical machine said with a strange metallic voice. It then returned to the hole in the wall and stopped moving entirely.


    A party of slightly smaller magical machines led Gargamel through the Molten Hall. They formed a neat line, escorted Gargamel to the entrance of Fire Throne, and turned to leave. Waiting here for him were two beautiful and curvaceous subi.


    Ever since Greem returned from the otherworld he had been in, and beaten the Fourth Grade body-refining adept in a mighty show of force, the Crimson n had entered a phase of rapid development. Fire Throne might be a decent tower, but it was a small tower after all. It could not host all the members of the Crimson n, whose number had swelled to several times their former size.


    As such, by order of the n leader, a new,rge adept¡¯s tower was constructed in the core region of Ailovis. All the n members were also relocated to that tower. Fire Throne, the origin of the n, then became Greem¡¯s personal space, no longer opened to the outside world.


    Both Gargamel and Meryl almost entirely managed daily matters.


    When they ran into some issue where a decision was difficult, they would report to Lady Mary or Lady Alice to ask for their opinions.


    It was only when it came to important matters that would affect the very fate of the Crimson n that they woulde to Fire Throne to take an audience to their n leader so that he could make the final decision.


    The reason Gargamel had hurried here today was that the incident at hand was a significant event that involved a Fourth Grade adept. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t ever dare disturb the lord n leader.


    ¡°Hehe, what a young and handsome man. Amy¡¯s overjoyed to be able to serve you!¡± The eyes of one of the two subi flickered as she smiled sweetly at Gargamel, like a girl with a crush.


    Having consumed the bloodline-purification potion two times over the years, Gargamel¡¯s serpentine bloodline had be increasingly pure and was manifesting more prominently. At this point, he no longer looked like a human adept. Instead, he was a powerful bloodline adept with a serpentine head.


    If Gargamel were to take off his robe, one would see that he had dark green scales all over his body. These scales were smooth but gleamed with a radiance that hinted at the potent magical power it contained. It could defend against attacks from First Grade magical weapons while also possessing tremendous magic resistance.


    Meanwhile, his hands and legs had devolved to various extents. They looked like branches that had lost all nourishment from the tree, skinny and withered. From a distance, they almost looked like slender chicken ws.


    However, the overwhelming serpentine bloodline within him caused him to brim with life. His intimidating jade green eyes exuded an oppressive aura of cruelty and viciousness whenever they blinked.


    Gargamel had now reached Advanced Second Grade. For the two First Grade subi before him, he was as fearsome and vicious as a monster.


    Gargamel looked at the subi unting her natural Charm ability and hissed, ¡°Little girl, as long as you aren¡¯t worried that I¡¯ll eat you out of some sudden hunger, you are free to visit me tonight. Kehkehkehe.¡±


    There was no need to put on a vicious expression. Gargamel¡¯s terrifying appearance and sinister aura alone were enough to scare the subi pale. She fell silent and didn¡¯t dare to probe any further.


    The other subus had clearly been around longer and knew the rules better. She gently said, ¡°Lord Gargamel, the master is still working in theboratory. You can wait in the hall on the third level first. Please follow me!¡±


    The subi led Gargamel towards a floating disc that would lead to the third level.


    The floating stone disc was made out of red ochre found in the Eisent Region. There were plenty of strange magical patterns on the stone, even without any magical treatments or processing.


    The three people got onto the disc. The subi touched the disc somewhere, and powerful magical energy surged into it. The red-ochre floating disc turned translucent and glowed with a faint magical radiance.


    It then slowly took flight, carrying the three people to the upper levels of the tower.


    Gargamel¡¯s eyes gleamed when he passed by the second level.


    Tremendous changes had been made to the floor. Several semi-translucent magical barriers separated this floor of the tower into a dozen massive living areas. Each living area contained strange creatures of odd appearances, and the areas they lived in each had a unique environment.


    Hot and dry deserts, snowy ins, ming volcanoes, dark and humid swamps; there were all sorts of environments, each tailored with care and finesse. It was evident that the creator had spent a lot on the project and possessed a tremendous understanding of the arcane arts.


    The n leader¡¯s power had increased yet again!

 Chapter 1024 - The Association’s Open Conspiracy

    Chapter 1024 The Association¡¯s Open Conspiracy


    Gargamel waited in Fire Throne for two whole days before he was granted an audience with Greem.


    Greem¡¯s entire body was now engulfed in ayer of formless fire as if he was continually burning.


    Even though he was already trying his best to contain the radiating fire energy, the temperature in the meeting room still rose exponentially the moment he entered. If Gargamel were still the First Grade adept from before, he would probably be half-cooked now.


    Even after obtaining the serpentine bloodline, a powerful Physique, and excellent magical resistance, Gargamel still felt extremely ufortable in the scorching environment that was nearly as hot as the inside of a volcano. When Greem cast his firm gaze upon Gargamel, green smoke started to rise from Gargamel¡¯s scaled body.


    ¡°I am sorry. My Spirit has been improving a little too quicklytely. My control over the fire energies has decreased correspondingly.¡± Seeing that his gaze had almost ignited Gargamel¡¯s body, Greem had no choice but to turn his head elsewhere.


    Not a single item made of wood or metal could be seen in the hall now. Even the only set of table and chairs were carved out of extremely heat-resistant obsidian.


    Spirit improving too quickly, energy control decreasing; it was probably the first time Gargamel had heard of such aint since he became an adept.


    Adepts would only everin about their Spirit developing too slowly. No one has everined about their Spirit improving too quickly


    Perhaps this was where their n leader differed from the rest!


    Gargamel winced at thement and thought to himself.


    ¡°What significant event has happened in the n that demands you make a special trip here? I remember everything was peaceful thest time you contacted me!¡± Greem spoke idly, seemingly having lost all interest in matters unrted to magic.


    ¡°Lord n Leader, it has already been one year since ourstmunication,¡± Gargamel said with a weak and bitter smile on his face.


    ¡°It¡¯s been a year? Time is passing quite fast!¡± Greem mumbled before continuing, ¡°Alright, tell me your purpose ining here!¡±


    ¡°Yes, n Leader!¡± Gargamel hesitated for a moment, ¡°Chairman Freed of the Zhentarim Association wishes to see you!¡±


    ¡°Who? Freed? The Association¡¯s Chairman; why does he want to see me?¡±


    Gargamel hurriedly bowed and exined, ¡°My lord, the reason we were able to calm the chaos in Ailovis so quickly was due in no small part to Chairman Freed behind the scenes. The reason he expressed his intention to meet you through the Goblin Chamber of Commerce is very likely...¡±


    ¡°Very likely to be what?¡±


    ¡°Very likely to force you, my lord, to make a decision.¡±


    ¡°To choose between Zhentarim and the Northern Lands?¡±


    ¡°Yes, n leader. The old fogeys of Zhentarim have always been extremely cautious and on guard from the permeation of influence from the three major forces. The rtionship between our Crimson n and the Fate Witches is not something that can be concealed either. Therefore...¡±


    ¡°Therefore, he wants to see me, assess my character, and attempt to pull me into that little circle of theirs?¡±


    ¡°Yes, my lord. Judging from the information we have currently obtained, this is the only exnation!¡±


    ¡°Which is to say that all the welfare and benefits they provided us before this was only bait? Once we swallowed the entirety of Ailovis, we would have swallowed the bait. They are certain we won¡¯t be willing to spit out such arge piece of fatty meat, which is why they are pushing us to a decision at this time.¡± Greem analyzed with a calm tone, but theyer of transparent mes around him was anything but calm.


    The temperature in the room rose even further!


    Gargamel licked his chapped lips and lowered his head in silence.


    He could only offer what information he knew on such matters that could decide the future direction of the n. The n leader¡¯s choice was not something he could interfere with.


    The height at which an adept stood would cause them to view the same problem from entirely different angles and perspectives. As such, Gargamel didn¡¯t dare influence the n leader¡¯s decision with his shallow viewpoints. He would simply have to keep marching forward in the footsteps of the n leader!


    After fifteen minutes of silence, Greem finally spoke. ¡°Go and give them their reply. I will see Chairman Freed. Let them arrange the location of our meeting. However, the time of the meeting has to be at least half a year in the future. I cannot leave and go to the outside world in my current condition!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    Gargamel acknowledged the order and left without hesitation.


    Once the meeting hall returned to silence, a blurry silhouette of a woman abruptly appeared at Greem¡¯s side.


    ¡°You¡¯ve made up your mind?¡± Alice¡¯s gentle and peaceful voice came from the form.


    ¡°Mm!¡±


    ¡°This isn¡¯t bad for us either. The Northern Lands might look peaceful on the surface, but in truth, they are extremely xenophobic. The other witch branches will always hinder the n¡¯s development here. Zhentarim is much better in this respect. They are not united into a single entity, making it a much better ce for a new n to grow rapidly.¡±


    ¡°Speaking of that, those old folks aren¡¯t gonna pull any dirty tricks on me, are they?¡±


    ¡°......¡± Alice couldn¡¯t help but fall speechless for a moment, ¡°What are you thinking?! Not only are there no downsides to this meeting, but you might also find yourself some unexpected gains. That said, they won¡¯t be so easily obtained. You will have to judge the situation yourself!¡±


    ¡°Gains?¡±


    ¡°Alright, stop asking any more. You know how it goes. Divinations are not things that should be revealed, or unpredictable branches will appear along the flow of Fate.¡±


    Greem nodded silently.


    He had worked with Alice for such a long time now that he did have a decent understanding of Fate as well.


    It was because Alice had told Greem certain things ahead of his trip to Henvic that his journey to other world had been so tumultuous, dangerous, and lethal.


    Fate would always remain unknown and unpredictable!


    Even the Witches of Fate, who were capable of controlling Fate, could not make it proceed precisely along the path they hadid out. Take a wooden bowl covering some cheese, for example. Alice would be able to know exactly how many pieces of cheese were covered by the bowl through Fate Sense. However, if she attempted to influence any individual or thing within that fate ording to this defined result, then unexpected changes would happen to what was once certain.


    Perhaps a cat would break in from outside and knock the bowl over. Maybe the cheese would be stolen by a mouse. The temperature could rise, and the cheese would melt. Too many idents, too many variables, and anything that happened could alter what was once a destined result.


    That was the fundamental reason why most people capable of manipting Fate chose to remain silent!


    There were often powerful people whoughed at Fate users, calling them useless bystanders with no power to their name. Most of the time, even if they were capable of seeing through and past Fate itself, they would still be trapped by thews of Fate and fail to do anything.


    It was like ying pokers with God himself on a daily basis. Even if you could win regrly, a single loss would ce you in the most damned of hells.


    Wiser individuals chose to be careful with their words, not disrupting the flow of the river of Fate. In doing so, they barely managed to save themselves. Meanwhile, those who were far too lively or confident in their power would eventually receive the bacsh of Fate and die, their souls disintegrated and destroyed.


    Greem knew of the dangers behind this as well. As such, he did not force Alice to challenge thews of Fate, nor did he ever dream of obtaining any benefits through the powers of Fate.


    It was the main reason why Alice¡¯s power remained so strong throughout the years!


    After exchanging a few more words, Alice¡¯s projected silhouette started to fade slowly.


    Greem also returned to theboratory on the fifth floor in a flicker of fire.


    The massive elementium magical machine stood silently in the corner of the hall, the smooth lines of its body forged of super-alloys gleaming with a dark and ghostly blue.


    After prolonged and repeated repairs, he had finally fixed the damage it received in Henvic. Greem even used some magical memory metals that had just been sessfully refined during the repairs.


    The Goblin Research Institute, based in White Tower, had finally managed to produce some decent products after spending a massive amount of Greem¡¯s magical crystals and resources. The magical memory metal was one of these.


    This unique metal, which could only be refined in aboratory, possessed an unusual memory function. Once it was molded to a particr shape, it would be able to memorize that form. Even if it was prated, shattered, shredded, or distorted in battle, the memory metal would be able to restore itself into its original shape, given sufficient energy stimtion.


    With the magical memory metal and the elementium magical machine¡¯s own miniature magic generator furnace, Greem would no longer have to worry about the machine sustaining damage in battle. As long as it had enough time and the generator furnace remained intact, it would be able to recover to its original state with its peakbat prowess.


    When the Goblin Research Institute had revealed this product of theirs, Greem had used his authority as the n leader to get his hands on the metal and immediately upgraded the elementium magical machine.


    As for the magical golem dragon? By god, should a massive mountain of metal like itself be outfitted entirely with the expensive memory metal, it would burn away the magical crystals of the n like a madman. Greem only authorized the use of this magical memory metal on some coreponents of the golem dragon. Otherwise, even if he had an actual mountain of magical crystals, those goblins would have been able to spend it all away.


    With the current manpower and financial situation of the Goblin Research Institute, they could produce around two and a half kilograms of magical memory metal a day. The price of manufacturing was approximately 1,700 magical crystals.


    After ensuring a supply for the n¡¯s internal use, there were still about ten kilograms avable for sale to the public every month. That said, their selling price to the public was counted in grams. Every gram was priced at twenty magical crystals.


    Greem had been hiding in Fire Throne for the past few years, secretly absorbing all those holy light souls. Consequently, his Spirit had been rising rapidly. Even so, it still took him fifteen years to increase his Spirit from 27 points to 29 points. He was only one step away from peak Third Grade now.


    The rapid increase in his Spirit had caused his control over his powers to decrease.


    That was why he had given himself a six-month buffer before the meeting with the Association to stabilize his unstable spiritual condition.

 Chapter 1025 - Intimidation

    Chapter 1025 Intimidation


    Half a yearter.


    A small flying ship stopped above Fire Throne for a brief moment before quietly leaving half an hourter.


    Inside the cabin, Greem was engaged in a casual conversation with a middle-aged adept in a white robe.


    The man who came to fetch him was someone familiar to him. It was Laurent, Third Grade adept and leader of the Zhentarim Association¡¯s Disciplinary Corps.


    ¡°Sir Greem, you haven¡¯t been to Kerslin Castle since you became an adept, have you?¡± Compared to thest time they met, Laurent had a broad smile on his face and was as pleasant as a kindly elder.


    However, Greem knew very well that Laurent¡¯s hands had to be stained with the blood of adepts. He was the leader of the Disciplinary Corps, after all. Naturally, he wouldn¡¯t usually be so friendly and easy to talk to.


    Moreover, theirst meeting in Rhein hadn¡¯t exactly been pleasant. His attitude now was likely an attempt to ease the tension between them and to mend their rtionship.


    If he was willing to make peace, then Greem was perfectly ready to respond in kind. He also put on a gentle smile.


    ¡°Indeed. I have been so busy after advancing to an adept. It¡¯s either running around searching for knowledge or dashing about looking for resources. Don¡¯t even talk about the three major forces; I haven¡¯t even been to half of Zhentarim¡¯s regions! It¡¯s a real shame.¡±


    ¡°Then you should take a proper tour around Kerslin Castle when you arrive. They produce some of the best magic wands and magical ves there. If you don¡¯t mind me, Sir Greem, I can personally apany you on tour.¡±


    If Adept Laurent¡¯s attitude before this was mere etiquette, then what he said now was an attempt at currying favor. Greem might not know why Laurent was willing to lower himself as such, but he still had to express sufficient gratitude.


    Perhaps sensing Greem easing up in his attitude, Laurent pressed closer to him and chuckled, ¡°Sir Greem, you are going to be running into some old friends on your trip to Kerslin Castle this time. You had best prepare yourself, I¡¯d say.¡±


    Having said that, he steered the conversation to lighter grounds and started talking about exciting things happening all over Zhentarim.


    As Greem responded half-heartedly to Adept Laurent and his naturally sociable antics, he silently pondered the words ¡®old friends¡¯ inside his head.


    At their level, any adept below Third Grade could no longer be referred to as a friend. Laurent was hinting that he would likely ¡®run into¡¯ certain familiar Third Grade adepts at Kerslin Castle.


    Who could it be?


    Greem quickly ran through all the Third Grade adepts he knew in his mind. In the end, the Chip only projected one image.


    A purple mist so dense that it was impossible to see through it.


    It¡¯s her.


    ............


    Kerslin Castle.


    Kerslin Castle was located in the center of Zhentarim. It did not belong to any adept n or organization and waspletely independent neutral ground.


    That was because the headquarters of the Zhentarim Association was located here.


    Allnd within five hundred square kilometers with Kerslin Castle at its heart was the private property of the Association. It was jointly managed by all fourteen Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim. They had their own independent adept squads and adept cultivation system. It could be considered the only joint force of Zhentarim that possessed the right to supervise, enforce, and punish others.


    By the time the flying ship slowlynded on a parking spot near Kerslin Castle, a group of individuals dressed in brightly-colored adept robes was already waiting here.


    Greem walked down the wooden nk in thepany of Adept Laurent.


    ¡°Boss, you are finally back, and this must be the famous legendary fire adept, Lord Greem!¡± It was a muscr and big man that walked forward to greet them. He had a fierce-looking face, a slightly balding head, and a loud voice, giving off the impression that his entire body was brimming with explosive power.


    ¡°Come,e; let me introduce. This is my assistant, Tito. He¡¯s a Third Grade body-refining adept. Tito, this is the Lord Greem that you¡¯ve wanted to meet for so long!¡± Laurent introduced the two of them with a big smile on his face. For some reason, he pronounced the words ¡®Third Grade body-refining adept¡¯ especially hard, as if he was trying to hint at something.


    ¡°Hehehe, we body-refining adepts have a bunch of pent-up grievances over all these years thanks to you, Lord Greem! How about it? Let¡¯s shake hands since it¡¯s the first time we are meeting!¡± The muscr Tito greeted while extending his massive right hand, but he was chuckling coldly with a malicious expression in his face.


    There was no such etiquette as a handshake amongst the adepts.


    There were all sorts of magic and spells out there. Who knew whether the adept they met would have some sort of ability to trigger curses or poison through bodily contact. As such, most adepts greeted each other by cing their hands on their chests. They very rarely ever made physical contact with one another.


    Obviously, in doing this, Tito was expressing his intent to have a showdown!


    The adepts that gathered around them all had smiles on their faces. It seemed like they were all waiting for the result of their confrontation.


    Greem was slightly surprised. He looked at Tito¡¯s coarse and thick hands that seemed as powerful as an iron vise. His elementium sight could see terrifying amounts of magical energy gathering in his right hand.


    To make an elementium adept like himself face off against a body-refining adept in a show of Strength! It seemed like this was an opening gambit by the opponent to take him down a notch!


    Greem smiled and extended his right hand as if he had no idea what was happening. He gripped Tito¡¯s hand firmly.


    Greem¡¯s base Strength was now at 20 points. In addition to the 5 points provided by Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring and the 2 points from the Fire Throne set, he now had 27 points of Strength. This number might not be enough for him to beat a Third Grade body-refining adept in a fist-fight, but a simple handshake would be no problem.


    Moreover, as a Third Grade fire adept, the fire forcefield shrouding his body was not something that an average person could bear either.


    Thus, when Greem and Tito gripped each other¡¯s hands, their faces instantly turned dark.


    Greem felt like he had put his right hand into a blender. An iparably violent force quickly crushed Greem¡¯s 27 points of Strength. For the next thirty seconds, this tremendous force was like a continually stirring blender, crushing and devastating Greem¡¯s frail finger bones and flesh in all sorts of different ways.


    There was no need to scan with his Chip. From the intense pain shooting through his arm, Greem could tell that most of his bones in his hand were now fractured. The flesh and tendons acting as a buffer to his bones had also been crushed into a bloody, pulpy mess now.


    Surprisingly, despite the tremendous force that Tito was exerting, the skin on Greem¡¯s right hand was still perfectly untouched. It made it look like everything was perfectly normal, even though the internals were already crushed and destroyed beyond recognition.


    However, Greem was not the kind of person who would sit by without retaliating!


    The translucent fire forcefield wrapped around his right hand had increased to a speechless degree. While Tito was overwhelming him with Strength, Greem¡¯s fire forcefield had already seeped into Tito¡¯s skin, cooking, burning, and reducing to cinders his right hand in an unimaginable fashion.


    Of course, for the sake of maintaining etiquette in their appearances, Greem also made sure not to hurt Tito¡¯s skin in the slightest. However, the flesh, tendons, and blood vessels beneath the surface were quickly turning from red to dark red from the vicious heat, before turning into dark purple-ck.


    Their hands were still firmly gripped with pleasant smiles fixed on their faces.


    However, one of their right hands was creaking and cracking with the sound of breaking finger bones, while the other person¡¯s right hand was rapidly turning ck while giving off a faint smell of cooked meat.


    Both of them were bracing with all they had, while still having to maintain surface friendliness in their behavior. As such, their expressions gradually started to distort and turn weird.


    ¡°Alright, alright. Don¡¯t be so passionate when it¡¯s the first time you¡¯re meeting. I still have to bring Lord Greem on a tour around the entire castle. Stop now, won¡¯t you!¡± Laurent, who had been watching the whole thing from the side with a smile on his face, stepped forward to wrap up the showdown.


    Greem was the Association¡¯s guest, after all. Preparing an opening gambit for him that didn¡¯t really hurt anyone¡¯s feelings or reputation was no problem. However, if they were to crush his right hand upon arrival, it would appear as if the Association was far too severe and underhanded.


    Both adeptsughed awkwardly and let go of their opponent¡¯s hand.


    Greem subtly slipped his right hand into his robe and turned to nod at the other Third Grade adepts around them.


    ¡°How is it? How¡¯s the fire adept¡¯s Strength?¡± Laurent secretly sent a voice transmission to Tito without betraying any expression on his face.


    ¡°His Strength is at 27 points. That¡¯s incredibly high for an elementium adept. I wrecked his right hand. He won¡¯t be able to recoverpletely and use his hand without three to five days of rest.¡±


    ¡°Haha! Buddy, great jo...¡±


    ¡°But my right hand¡¯s wrecked as well!¡±


    ¡°Er...¡±


    ¡°That guy¡¯s fire is overbearing. It almost cooked all of the flesh and bones in my hand.¡±


    ¡°Alright, then. Go back and treat your wounds. I¡¯ll show him around!¡±


    Naturally, knowledge of such a thing happening upon meeting couldn¡¯t be allowed to get out. It was only spread amongst a tiny circle consisting of the Association¡¯s higher-ups.


    ording to Tito¡¯s estimation, this legendary fire adept had 27 points of Strength and 24 points of Physique. That was undoubtedly far too high for an elementium adept.


    After all, elementium adepts relied on their Spirit. Wastingrge amounts of time on Physique and Strength was undoubtedly a colossal waste of resources.


    An ordinary Third Grade elementium adept would be able to deal with most dangerous environments with more than 10 points of Strength and Physique. Only top-tier adepts cultivated by the major forces would be able to raise all of their secondary attributes to such heights, due to their plentiful resources and efficient cultivation system.


    It wasn¡¯t surprising that someone like Greem could defend against the violent power of a Fourth Grade adept and exhaust all of his stamina. Even though he was clearly an elementium adept, he had a powerful Physique that did not lose to bloodline adepts.


    Of course, the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon was still the main determining factor in his victory.


    That said, if Greem wasn¡¯t sustained by such an unbelievable Physique, he would not be able to control the golem dragon and keep fighting for such an extended period!


    After greeting all the Association adepts who had speciallye here to receive him, Greem walked into the Kerslin Castle he had heard so much about while in Launrent¡¯spany.

 Chapter 1026 - Animated Castle

    Chapter 1026 Animated Castle


    Kerslin Castle was a castle in name, but in truth, it was a massive living area stretching for thousands of kilometers.


    Many beautiful vis and exquisite mansions were everywhere.


    Farmers in linen garments could be seen everywhere, with their heads lowered as they worked in the fields. Happy and satisfied smiles could also be seen on the faces of the cart-drivers as they rode down the road with their wagons full of cargo.


    It was and that had not experienced the fires of war in several thousand years after all. Any adept n war that broke out would make sure to steer clear of Kerslin Castle, making sure that they would not affect the civilians of thisnd. Most of the time, life here was bliss!


    The ck carriage that Greem and Laurent rode appeared to have the insignia of the Zhentarim Association. As such, all carts and carriages along the way moved aside and let them pass by before returning to the road.


    The pedestrians that saw the ck carriage bowed and paid their respects and admiration, with reverence written all over their faces.


    Judging from the longbows on their backs and the longswords at their waists, these were mercenaries that made a living through adventure. Some apprentice adepts in gray robes could also be seen amongst these mercenaries, holding magic tomes or short wands in their hands.


    They walked together in groups of three to five other apprentices, signs of battle all over their faces, bodies, and hands. The bags and pouches on them appeared to be full to the point of bursting. It seemed they hade back with plenty of loot.


    Their destination was the scattered cities on the outskirts of Kerslin Castle.


    Plenty of arcane shops and some small adept towers were waiting there for their business.


    Even though Greem and Laurent had many means by which to travel to the massive castle in the distance instantly, they did not do so. Now that they were here, they could only sit in the ck carriage and slowly proceed at the speed of ordinary people.


    Qiu!


    A strange screech suddenly came from the skies above.


    Greem pulled apart the curtains and looked outside, only to see three exceedingly strong and handsome two-headed eagles cutting through the sky. Sitting on the back of the eagles were several adepts in ck or white robes.


    They appeared to be supervising adepts sent out from the central castle on patrol. They were continually bending over to look at everything beneath them. When they saw the strange ck carriage, they couldn¡¯t help but have their eagles circle in the sky.


    However, after taking out a translucent crystal and exchanging a few words with the headquarters, their queries were solved. They turned the eagles about and flew in another direction.


    ¡°Those are the enforcer adepts from the supervising division! They are in charge of monitoring all movements around Kerslin Castle.¡± Upon hearing that strange screech, Laurent didn¡¯t even need to look out to know who it was. He quickly exined the identities of the adepts to Greem.


    Greem nodded wordlessly.


    He had already seen it clearly when the adepts soared past him on their eagles. All of them had the symbol of an open eye on their chest. That should be the emblem of the supervising division.


    The environment here was undoubtedly very well protected.


    Apart from the few human cities, viges, and settlements, thend was simply vast stretches of cultivated fields and massive forests that filled the spaces in-between. However,pared to the ck Forest, the woods here had been cleaned up already. There were only some small animals like wolves, foxes, goats, or rabbits. Large and ferocious beasts rarely appeared here, let alone those terrifying magical creatures.


    From this aspect, the rise of the adepts had truly brought shelter and peace for the humans of their world.


    The people that lived in such a peaceful and quiet environment were undoubtedly happy and content!


    The steed pulling the ck carriage along appeared to be some sort of magical beast. It was tame and silent while also being incredibly fast. It brought Greem and Laurent through the dark green forest, drove on a stone bridge built over a small stream, and passed by several vis and mansions before finally gently drawing close to a towering castle standing upon a tiny hill.


    Tall walls surrounded the castle along with a moat, the water of which was as clear as a mirror.


    When they passed by the gates of the outer wall, the ck-armored guards stationed there simply took a look at the carriage and let it pass through.


    Past the walls was arge, gray za. There were massive stone buildings everywhere, while the main structure of the castle faced the entrance. It appeared towering and intimidating, like a gigantic beast lying in slumber.


    No mercenaries or apprentice adepts could be seen here now. Those who walked in and out of the area were all Association adepts in a standard uniform with various strange emblems and badges on their chests. Most of these were First Grade adepts. There were also quite a few Second Grade adepts, but there were hardly any Third Grade adepts.


    When Laurent apanied Greem off the ck carriage, the Association adepts that saw them hastily hurried forward to give their greetings.


    Greem lingered at the massive gates of the castle for a short moment, taking a good look at this gigantic five-story building made entirely out of stone. Greem¡¯s heart trembled slightly.


    The entire structure of the castle was built with a strange, light golden stone, a material unknown to Greem. In his senses, these golden stones contained traces of sophisticated magical aura. It was like a river flowed within the stones, sketching an exceptionallyrge magical array through the multiple streams of strange surging magic.


    Every inch of space here seemed immersed in an indescribable and mysterious force.


    It was unlike any elementium energy. Yet, it wasn¡¯t pure magic energy either. Instead, it was a strange energy that existed entirely independent of the current system of magic in the World of Adepts.


    The strange energy suppressed Greem, and his spiritual senses were restricted to within three meters of himself. It caused Greem to be incredibly ufortable, as he typically relied heavily on his spiritual senses. Fortunately, his eyes were not affected; looking at things normally was not a problem.


    Upon entering the hall of the castle, Greem suddenly felt as if he had entered another ne!


    ¡°Don¡¯t be surprised. This is the defensive mechanism of Kerslin Castle. All foreign adepts will be suppressed when theye here. It will be better after a while.¡± Laurent exined simply with a smile on his face.


    However, Greem¡¯s questions were not answered even after listening to Laurent¡¯s exnation. Rather, he became even more confused.


    Not a single magical rune or pattern could be seen on the surface of the castle through his powerful Elementium Sight. Yet, the castle could still freely guide the magic energy to traverse through the stone of the walls. Most importantly of all, Greem could faintly sense an elementium rhythm unique to lifeforms in the mysterious energy around him.


    ¡°An alchemical lifeform. You¡¯ve animated the entirety of Kerslin Castle?¡± Greem let out a muffled gasp.


    Upon hearing Greem¡¯s words, Laurent¡¯s mouth grew wider and wider in shock. He answered with a question, his tone one of utter disbelief, ¡°How...how do you know?¡±


    In all honesty, the fact that Kerslin Castle had been awakened into an alchemical lifeform two thousand years ago was something that had gonepletely unnoticed by the ordinary Association adepts. Only certain higher-ups within the Association knew some details about it.


    There had been plenty of high-grade adepts that had stepped into Kerslin Castle over the past thousands of years. However, there had never been any of them who could assess the condition of Kerslin Castle upon entering as Greem just had. It was no wonder that Laurent was surprised!


    What Laurent didn¡¯t know was that Greem was even more shocked and stunned at the moment.


    This ce was not an ordinary noble¡¯s castle, after all! It was a massive structure several square kilometers in size, which contained tons of massive stones. To animate a gigantic structure such as this and make it awaken to thought and intelligence akin to that of humans¨C this was far beyond Greem¡¯s expectations.


    He had been slightly suspicious even after seeing the conclusion provided by the Chip¡¯s scan and analysis, but he was certain of the truth when he saw Laurent¡¯s expression.


    What a bold move, what a strange trick; those Fourth Grade adepts truly couldn¡¯t be underestimated!


    Perhaps because the identity of the castle had been seen through, the calm and mysterious energy around Greem suddenly started resonating. The energy then spoke with a humming voice that only Greem could hear, ¡°Wee, human adept. You are the 3,276th visitor I have had since my consciousness was born. Yet, you are also the only person who managed to see through my identity. I seem to smell the scent of apatriot simr to myself on you!¡±


    The voice was deep and morous, almost like the sound that would be created from the vibrations of two stones rubbing against each other.


    ¡°Setting aside any external factors, I like you very much, human adept. To express my favor, I have decided to give you First ss status authority. Said directive has been opposed by 27 people and approved by 0 people. Kerslin¡¯s directive has been rejected. Kerslin has decided to give you Second ss status authority. There are 119 people opposed, 0 people have approved. However, Second ss status authority bestowal is within Kerslin¡¯s autonomy. Opposition ineffective. Directive will be executed immediately!¡±


    The mysterious energy surrounding Greem started to boil like water as this strange animated lifeform spoke to itself.


    [Beep. Detecting foreign energy connection. Said connection is an open, no-attribute energy channel. No Spirit attachments or safety hazards have been detected upon examination. Requesting instructions from host. Connect?]


    ¡°Connect!¡±


    Upon sending the order to connect, Greem¡¯s Spirit that had been suppressed within three meters of himself abruptly loosened. His spiritual senses could once again freely take in everything within a hundred meters of himself.


    There was also some scattered information contained within the strange energy. Some of this information seemed to contain the internal magical messages of the Association.


    ¡°...has Kerslin gone mad? Why is he giving an outsider Third ss status authority?¡±


    ¡°I am making an emergency call to Master Klinsmann. He will give us an exnation.¡±


    ¡°Stop using the low-density channel already. That guy already has Third ss authority. He might be able to hear what we are saying.¡±


    ¡°Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! If that¡¯s the case, then that bastard¡¯s authority is already higher than my own!¡±

 Chapter 1027 - Stealing Information

    Chapter 1027 Stealing Information


    This sudden action from Kerslin not only caught the Association by surprise but Greem as well. He had a confused expression stuck on his face.


    He was apatriot simr to it? That Kerslin could sense the Chip¡¯s existence?


    Greem suddenly started panicking when he heard the various frustrated shouts from around him. He couldn¡¯t help but cut off the mental connection with this strange lifeform.


    [Detecting unknown data source. Given the current Second ss authority, host can immediately browse, read, and download some of the public content and information. Requesting instructions from host. Copy information?]


    While Greem was panicking, the Chip suddenly spoke up, and his attention immediately snapped back to focus.


    Unknown data source? Public content and data?


    The data source couldn¡¯t be referring to the Zhentarim Association¡¯s internal database, could it?


    ¡°Immediately download all data and copy all information. Move faster.¡±


    Greem knew very well that the consequences of this little ¡®incident¡¯ could vary tremendously based on the Association¡¯s reaction. Once the old fogeys behind the Association reacted to what was happening, they would most definitely seal off this breach in their database. As such, any information he could steal from it before they could react would be a win for him.


    Greem could sense his mind empty the moment he gave the order. Much of his Spirit silently flowed into the Chip, turning into a mysterious power that sustained the Chip as it went into overdrive.


    The Chip had now connected with the mysterious data source in the distance. It started using its newly obtained Second ss authority to copy and download all sorts of data and information wildly. Although most of the information was basic knowledge that was avable to all adepts belonging to the Zhentarim Association, there was simply far too much information that spanned many aspects of the magical system.


    There were six sses of authorities in total: Special ss, First ss, Second ss, Third ss, Fourth ss, and Fifth ss.


    Chairman Freed was the only person to have Special ss authority, while First ss authority belonged to all Fourth Grade adepts of the Association. Second ss was for internal Third Grade adepts, Third ss for Second Grades, Fourth ss for First Grades, and Fifth ss for apprentices.


    With this level of authority, Greem, as an outsider, could enjoy as much power as Laurent, despite having just stepped into the Zhentarim Association. He could freely browse the Association¡¯s data library; it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.


    Thus, while Greem started touring inside of the castle with Laurent¡¯spany, he also supported the Chip¡¯s incredible demand for spiritual energy with all he had.


    Finally, eighty-five seconds after Greem obtained Second ss authority, a cold and elderly voice suddenly appeared in his mind.


    ¡°It¡¯s about time you stop, kid! Hmph! Such a short time here, yet such a big problem hase up for me to deal with.¡±


    As the voice rang out, the Chip¡¯s mental connection with the data source was abruptly severed. A powerful mental bacsh struck at Greem and dazed him for an instant.


    Greem suddenly braced himself against the wall while he was walking with Laurent through a quiet tunnel. He grabbed his throbbing head and tried to collect himself. It took several minutes from him to recover from the mental shockwave. The first thing he saw was Laurent¡¯s sinister and malicious smile.


    ¡°That voice from earlier...¡± Greem moaned and asked.


    ¡°That was Chairman Freed!¡± Laurentughed, ¡°You used your authority to go peek at the Association¡¯s information, didn¡¯t you? That is the result of the Association¡¯s umtion over thousands of years. The chairman won¡¯t let an outsider like you browse through the information like that, so it¡¯s only natural that he has to make you suffer a little bit!¡±


    No wonder Laurent wasughing in such a rxed and unconcerned fashion. After all, it had barely been a minute between Greem obtained the Second ss authority and being kicked out by the chairman. What could he have done with this amount of time? He probably hadn¡¯t even managed to read through the Table of Contents for the Association¡¯s more ssified information!


    Chairman Freed held the same belief.


    If only they knew that Greem had a potent Chip in his mind that excelled at data calctions and storage, they wouldn¡¯t be so rxed now.


    Greem silentlymunicated with the Chip as he rubbed his head and groaned in pain.


    What the Chip had just connected to earlier was actually the mental world of Kerslin. The Association had spent so much to awaken an entire castle into an independent consciousness. Naturally, they would want to strengthen it as much as possible so that it could serve as their hidden trump card.


    If the castle werepared to an adept tower, then there was no doubt that Kerslin was the tower spirit.


    Almost all the information andmunications within the Association were conducted through the massive alchemical lifeform consciousness that was Kerslin. Thus, the Chip had begun hastily copying and downloading data and information to the limits of its authority the moment it entered this vast and boundless consciousness space.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s calctions, it had only managed to download and copy 3.5% of all the information. It might sound like very little, but considering that this was the sum of all the information and knowledge that the Zhentarim Association had gathered in the thousands of years since its establishment, 3.5% was already an insane number!


    While Greem rubbed his head and feigned agony, Laurent looked up into the empty air and focused, as if he was listening to something.


    He then turned and smiled at Greem.


    ¡°Follow me. Lord Freed wishes to see you!¡±


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled. The pained expression on his face instantly disappeared, reced with one of solemnity.


    Fourth Grade adept. That was a Fourth Grade adept! Now, that Fourth Grade adept wanted to see him.


    Even though Greem had already crossed swords with a Fourth Grade adept, he still felt fear every time he recalled that feeling of having his Spirit suppressed.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s uneasiness, Adept Laurent consoled him, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, the chairman won¡¯t be putting you on the spot. This was started by Kerslin, after all. The chairman won¡¯t vent his anger on you over this incident!¡±


    Greem smiled without a word and started walking to the upper levels of the castle under Laurent¡¯s lead.


    Having been distracted by the whole incident from earlier, Greem hadn¡¯t paid much attention to the internal design of the castle. Now that he had calmed down, he could take a better look. An unusual sense of familiarity mysteriously arose within him.


    This familiar passage, these familiar walls, these familiar stone doors...


    ¡°What does this ce have to do with the Winds of Freedom?¡± Greem suddenly asked.


    Laurent was still leading at the front. He chuckled and replied without turning back, ¡°You finally realized! The Winds of Freedom is actually a Spiritual Illusion Realm created by Kerslin. Most of the buildings there are consciousness projections of Kerslin Castle. If you have been spending some time in the Winds of Freedom, you will naturally feel an odd sense of familiarity towards this castle!¡±


    So that¡¯s what it was! Greem nodded his head silently.


    ............


    Greem finally met the legendary Association chairman in a secret room at one of the upper levels of the castle.


    It was an old adept whose eyebrows, beard, and hair had all turned white. He wore a white adept¡¯s robe on his person, along with a pointed adept¡¯s hat. He had all sorts of magical rings on all ten of his fingers; powerful and radiant magical aura could be sensed all over his body where magical essories could be worn.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but fall utterly speechless.


    His Elementium Sight distinctly showed that the chairman had a total of twenty-seven concentrated sources of magical flux on his person. All of these sources of magic were magical items of Third Grade and above. With the number of magical weapons he had, the chairman would be able to wipe out most of his opponents just by releasing each of his magical weapons once.


    Ignoring the individual prowess of the chairman, the value of these magical items alone was beyond the ability of an ordinary Fourth Grade adept.


    An absolute tycoon. The chairman was the most affluent man that Greem had ever seen!


    Greem might have been slightly proud of his own magical equipment. However,pared to the chairman, he couldn¡¯t help but feel somewhat ashamed at the inferiority of his magic items.


    ¡°You are Greem?¡± Chairman Freed narrowed his eyes and took a good look at Greem. After a while, he finally nodded and said, ¡°Not bad, not bad all. You are just as excellent as they make you out to be. If I¡¯m not mistaken, your Spirit has reached 39 points, hasn¡¯t it?¡±


    Greem knew that his spiritual condition could not be concealed. As such, he simply nodded and acknowledged it.


    Laurent, who had apanied him here, lifted his head in surprise. There was a trace of shock in his eyes when he looked at Greem.


    Thest time he had met Greem at Rhein City, Greem had been no more than a Second Grade junior. Yet, after just mere decades, he...he had exceeded Laurent himself. That...that was too unbelievable!


    Thirty-nine points of Spirit. It had been four to five hundred years since Laurent had advanced to Third Grade, yet he had only managed to increase his Spirit to 37 points. That might sound close to peak Third Grade, but Laurent knew his own condition. The closer his Spirit got to the summit of Third Grade, the slower the progression of his meditation.


    It was the main reason why Third Grade adepts start adventuring everywhere once they sensed their meditation bing fruitless in improving their powers. They hoped to have their Spirit increase by the stimtion of danger and the risk of death, while also hoping to find unusual treasures or magical methods to aid the increase of their Spirit.


    After all, meditating for decades while failing to sense any trace of progress was incredible torture to a person¡¯s spirit. No ordinary person would be able to bear it!


    However, this legendary fire adept had somehow managed to cross the threshold of Second to Third Grade in less than a hundred years. Did he genuinely have such stunning talent and potential, or did he possess some sort of strange treasure?


    Laurent¡¯s mind was disrupted and started to wander aimlessly. He tuned out of the conversation between Greem and the chairman entirely.


    ¡°My lord, I heard you wished to see me. Is there anything that you want to ask of me?¡± Greem hesitated for a moment but finally chose to be straightforward.


    The two of them were on entirely different levels of existence. The manner and perspective by which they looked at issues werepletely different from each other. As such, Greem didn¡¯t dare to y any tricks in front of this honorable and powerful Fourth Grade adept.


    A strange smile appeared on Adept Freed¡¯s face when he heard Greem¡¯s question. He chuckled slightly and asked, ¡°Have you ever heard of...origin substances?¡±

 Chapter 1028 - Temptation

    Chapter 1028 Temptation


    ¡°Origin substance.¡±


    Greem spoke the name out loud in his heart. He did not say anything, but his gleaming eyes betrayed his thoughts.


    Of course, he knew what origin substances were.


    It was a scarce and valuable item, a top-ss resource that typically belonged exclusively to Fourth Grade adepts.


    More concretely, origin substances were a strange resource created under unique circumstances, when narws manifested andbined with materials in the world.


    Ordinarily, nar origins were hidden behind the narw and the frame of the world. They were a part of the continuously flowingws of the world, impossible to capture by any means.


    When a nar world has been heavily injured and was incapable of maintaining its stability andpleteness, spacestorms could break through the world membrane and destroy the interior of the ne. It was only then that a portion of the nar origin would scatter due to the shattering of the ne¡¯sw system. The reason that starbeasts liked to invade nar worlds so much was mainly out of their desire to devour these delicious nar origins.


    Starbeasts could iste and devour nar origins by tearing apart ne barriers and destroying the bnce of the world.


    That was the natural course of growth and development for a starbeast!


    As such, it wasn¡¯t hard to see why starbeasts were known as enemies of nar worlds and mortal opponents of all living beings.


    Very few ancient adepts of the past had managed to step past the level of the narws. The main reason for that was due to the intangible nature of thesews, which made them nigh-impossible to grasp orprehend. One could only rely on a shocking amount of talent and luck while spending an incredible amount of time to experience and understand thews slowly.


    It was the most challenging process toplete!


    Should a person be stuck on theprehension of narws, their only conclusion would be hundreds of years of stagnation, culminating in a resentful death when their lifespan invariably came to an end. It was the same for everyone, even if you were incredibly talented and iparably powerful.


    Innumerable geniuses and prodigies had been stuck at the peak of Fourth Grade in this manner over the hundreds of thousands of years in the World of Adepts¡¯ history. They became meteors that flickered through the sky, shining only for a brief moment, simply because they could not master the power ofws.


    Many among the adepts were wise and intelligent people. They exhausted their wits and tried everything to solve this daunting problem. Finally, brave adepts who dared venture into damaged and broken nes unexpectedly found the strange resources that were origin substances. They analyzed and figured out the mechanisms behind their formation.


    From then on, some powerful adepts also began to intentionally destroy nes in hopes of inducing the formation of such origin substances. The appearance ofrge numbers of these substances made it a hundred times easier for modern adepts to experience andprehend the narws, aspared to the ancient adepts.


    This resulted in there being ten times as many Great Adepts as the ancient times.


    However, the act of destroying a mature nar world and indirectly killing the tens of billions of lifeforms within, all for the sake of some origin substances, was simply too evil. The more the adeptsmitted such atrocities, the more they became hated and despised by other races.


    The adepts were ssified as an evil faction in the records of many nar worlds, alongside the demons of the World of Abyss and the Scourge Lords of the World of Disasters. It also had much to do with the fact that adepts often freely engaged in the use of blood rituals wherever they went.


    With the increased number of Great Adepts appearing in recent years, attempts were made to improve the adepts¡¯ image throughout the universe. Rules were set forbidding the intentional destruction of a ne for the sake of harvesting origin substances. That caused the supply of origin substances to shrink dramatically in the past few thousand years.


    In the World of Adepts, origin substances of any attribute or nature were ssified as Fourth Grade items and sold at a breathtaking price.


    It was precisely the rarity of origin substances that made them top-ss resources fought over by the Fourth Grade adepts alone. Ordinary Third Grade adepts had no means by which to obtain any of them.


    Greem¡¯s heart couldn¡¯t help but start beating furiously when he heard Adept Freed abruptly mention origin substances. He had a strange feeling in his heart.


    ¡°It seems like you already know what origin substances are. Then I¡¯ll skip over the exnation of their function.¡± A smile with a trace of slyness appeared on Adept Freed¡¯s face. ¡°Well then, Sir Greem, are you interested in obtaining some origin substances?¡±


    ¡°Lord Freed, if you have something to say, you can be direct about it! As long as it is within my ability, I will not decline!¡±


    ¡°Good, good, good.¡± A wide smile immediately appeared on Freed¡¯s face when he heard Greem¡¯s answer. ¡°It¡¯s been a long time since we have had a new Fourth Grade adept in our Zhentarim. As such, the Association intends to gather the most famous Third Grade adepts of the central region together for a fair tournament, from which we will choose a winner!¡±


    At this point, Adept Freed paused for an instant before narrowing his eyes and continuing. ¡°The reward for the winner is admission into the Association with the privileges and benefits of a Fourth Grade adept, as well as five hundred Siths of origin substance.¡±


    Greem¡¯s heart stopped momentarily and only resumed beating after a long, long pause.


    Sith was the unit measurement for origin substance.


    Origin substances were unique in nature. They had no weight nor volume and could attach themselves to any material. They could only be absorbed with non-elemental crystals to ensure that theirw attributes were not ¡®polluted¡¯ by ne substances.


    Origin substances were always in short supply in auctions and private transactions between high-grade adepts.


    However, origin substances that were offered up in auctions and trades were mostly inferior ones that had been polluted by ne substances. Thew attributes within the substance had already been corroded and fouled by the elementium in the environment. Truly high-grade origin substances only ever existed in the private collections of high-grade adepts, hidden away from prying eyes. They were never shown to the public.


    What Freed was currently talking about had to be referring to those high-grade origin substances!


    To Greem¡¯s understanding, five hundred Siths of origin substance wasn¡¯t a lot at all.


    ording to calctions done in the past, the amount of origin substance required for a Fourth Grade adept to experience and master the narws was dependent on individual talent and potential. Those who were extremely talented would only need seven thousand Siths of origin substance, while the less fortunate ones might need to use anywhere between twenty to fifty thousand Siths.


    The total amount of origin substance that adepts could harvest by forcibly destroying a small ne was no more than ten thousand Siths!


    As such, the cost of cultivating a Great Adept that had stepped past Fourth Grade was shockingly high. It was beyond what an ordinary adept n could bear.


    Five hundred Siths might be far from enough to raise a Fourth Grade adept to Fifth Grade, but it would be enough for a peak Third Grade adept to sessfully cross the threshold and be one of those influential Fourth Grades of the world!


    Greem was confident that he would be able to advance to Fourth Grade in one to two hundred years, even without the origin substance. However, the time it would take for him to advance would be shortened by an unimaginable extent if he could get his hands of these origin substances.


    The temptation of five hundred Siths of origin substance was iparably massive to him!


    Tournament...origin substance.


    Greem listened to every word that Freed said and pondered every one of them. He had suspicions about the motives of the Association.


    The Fourth Grade adepts of the Association most definitely had reserves of origin substances, though they may havee in varying amounts. That was their guarantee of advancing to Fifth Grade. It was too little, even if they were to use them all for themselves. Why would they ever have the kindness to offer up the origin substances they had gone to such lengths to obtain as a prize for their juniors?


    It was not in line with the selfish nature of the adepts!


    The Association had to be hiding a conspiracy behind this tournament they were organizing. However, Greem had no way of figuring out their intentions and secrets with his current status and identity.


    ¡°Who will be participating in this tournament?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    ¡°There were only three veteran Third Grade adepts scheduled to participate: Gallow of the Dener n, Dante of the Annemdor Academy, and Sanazar of the Sarubo n. Given your excellent performance in thest adept n war, many of the elders in the Association suggested you be added to the list of participants. How about it, kid? Are you willing to join this tournament?¡±


    At this moment, even the Chip, with all itsputation abilities, could not calcte all of the benefits and risks of the tournament. Greem could only rely on his own analysis and judgment.


    There was undoubtedly danger behind this.


    However, the presence of danger signaled opportunity as well.


    For the prepared, the danger would be an opportunity. It would be a chance to shatter the norm and surpass the enemy. However, for the unprepared, danger would only be danger. It would only push one into a perilous situation where both retreat and advance were untenable choices.


    The reason Greem hade here in the first ce was because of Alice¡¯s attitude about the meeting.


    He faintly understood something when he recalled the vague hints Alice had given him before he embarked on this journey.


    Greem lifted his head and met Freed¡¯s gaze. He nodded solemnly.


    ¡°Lord Freed, I am willing to participate in this tournament!¡±


    ¡°Good, very good.¡± Adept Freed nodded in satisfaction and turned to give orders. ¡°Laurent, you have heard Greem¡¯s reply. Go and make the necessary arrangements now!¡±


    ¡°Yes, my lord!¡± Laurent nced at Greem with aplicated expression on his face. He then turned and left.


    ¡°Very well. Stay here and rest in Kerslin Castle in the meantime. The Association will make a public announcement to notify all adept ns and organizations of this tournament. They will be invited to send representatives to participate in this event. Thepetition is estimated to start in three months. This way, even the adept ns in the most rural of regions will have the opportunity to attend!¡±


    Chairman Freed continued exining a series of other matters before finally waving his hand and allowing Greem to leave.


    Once Greem¡¯s silhouette had vanished from the room, Chairman Freed stroked his beard and smiled silently.


    Lights flickered in the room, and the profiles of two adepts, one male and one female, appeared.


    ¡°How is it? You two have seen Greem as well now. What do you think about him?¡± Freed asked, not surprised by their appearance at all.


    ¡°His bodily attributes are strange. They are a little too high.¡± The male adept that just appeared had a skinny build. He was also an elderly adept, but though he looked old, he also seemed to be vigorous and full of energy. It was Vice-Chairman Adept Mirva.


    The female adept was Fourth Grade Adept Ker, current n leader of the Dener n. Scarface Adept Gallow, who would be participating in the tournament, was a member of her n.


    ¡°Apart from his bodily attributes, I also observed some issues with his soul flux. It seems as if something strange is mixed with his soul,¡± Adept Ker said coldly.


    Chairman Freed and Vice-Chairman Mirva thought for a moment and couldn¡¯t help but nod in agreement.


    Indeed, there was a trace of something unusual and utterly inhuman inside the kid¡¯s soul. It was truly very mysterious.


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter how strange his soul is, as long as it doesn¡¯t affect the tournament. Don¡¯t forget that it is only thirty years until that time again. If we do not find a scapegoat in time, one of us here will be the ones to get it!¡± Adept Freed gritted his teeth and squeezed out these cold words from his mouth.


    The other two adepts frowned but nodded silently.

 Chapter 1029 - The Competition

    Chapter 1029 The Competition


    Greem had nothing else to do, so he silently took up residence in Kerslin Castle.


    The injury to his right hand wasn¡¯t too severe, and it had mostly healed after three days.


    At any rate, going through and organizing the vast amounts of information and data he had stolen from the Association¡¯s database was going to take up much of his time. Fortunately, he had the Chip as an assistant. The Chip ran the statistics while he browsed through the data in greater detail. Even so, it still took him more than two weeks to finish dealing with all the information.


    Fundamental magical knowledge and experiment results took up more than eighty-seven percent of the stolen data. The rest of the data included the structure of the Association, the list of members in each division, the annual resource allocation, and detailed information on five lesser nes.


    Greem couldn¡¯t possibly grasp the entirety of the Association¡¯s operations through this information. However, looking from a limited perspective and gaining a partial understanding of the Association was even more significant.


    Both the Winds of Freedom and the lesser nes that served as adept training bases left a deep impression on Greem.


    ording to the data, the Association would secretly select a group of elite First and Second Grade adepts to venture to a lesser ne known as Underdeep. They would tame a hybrid dragon known as the Grayshadow Dragon there.


    With the Grayshadow Dragon as theirpanion contracted beast, these adepts¡¯ Physiques would improve rapidly. The Grayshadows could also increase the might of their innate powers by borrowing from the human adept¡¯s powerful Spirit. As such, a Second Grade Grayshadow dragon fighting alongside a Second Grade adept could disy power equal to the average Third Grade adept.


    As the hidden trump card of the Association, this troop of flying dragon adepts already numbered over a hundred. The ordinary members were mostly First Grade elite adepts apanied by First Grade Grayshadow dragons, withbat prowess matching that of a Second Grade adept. The captains and leaders were Second Grade elite adepts apanied by Second Grade Grayshadow dragons, who were as powerful as Third Grade adepts.


    This adept troop might only number a hundred, but they could unleash devastating power in battle equal to three or four hundred adepts of the same grade. Such a powerful army was kept hidden from the rest of the world because they remained stationed in various lesser nes of the Association.


    If the Fabres n had been able to unleash an elite army of such scale and power during thest war, the Crimson n would have been reduced to dust, even with the protection of the Fourth Grade magical golem dragon.


    After all, there was only one Fourth Grade magical golem dragon. It could only protect and guard over a minimal area. Should an elite army with such flexible tactics and incredible prowess break through a n¡¯s frontline, it would be over. Even Third Grade adepts would not have any chance of retaliating, let alone the low and intermediate-grade adepts whocked sufficient means of saving themselves.


    Apart from the flying dragon adept army, the Zhentarim Association had also secretly created multiple other trump cards, such as the Shadow Army and a voodoo beast army. Naturally, the targets of these armies were not the weak and disunited adept ns of Zhentarim, but the three major forces that held malicious intent towards Zhentarim.


    Why was it that the three major adept forces had never extended their reach to the central region in the past tens of thousands of years? The weak and scattered ns of Zhentarim could not defend against the forceful invasion of any one of the three adept forces.


    It was because the Fourth Grade adepts of the central region had joined hands and established the loose, yet united, Association. They had managed to assemble the power of fourteen Fourth Grade adepts, gather the scattered resources of the hundreds and thousands of local Zhentarim forces, and secretly construct several incredibly powerful elite adept armies.


    Command of these armies rested in Chairman Freed¡¯s hands. However, the remaining thirteen Fourth Grade adepts would have the authority tomand this army if at least three of them joined hands.


    In all honesty, Greem had always held some slight disdain in his heart for the Zhentarim Association before he saw all these hidden cards. He had believed them to be a bunch of frogs stuck in a well, capable only of fighting over power and influence, with no ambitions to speak of. He believed them to have lost the ferocious and adventurous spirit that all adepts should possess.


    However, upon silently reading about these unknown trump cards of the Association, Greem couldn¡¯t help but break into a cold sweat.


    Somewhere along the road, Greem had gotten faintly arrogant.


    He had looked down upon his Third Grade opponents and regarded the Fourth Grade adepts with disdain. He felt like he could walk through the Central Region uncontested with his current power. Even if he were to cause tremendous trouble, he would have no worries. He could simply rely on the wealth and power of the Crimson n, retreat to the n territories, and defend there.


    But now...


    For the first time, upon seeing the Association¡¯s trump cards and thinking about the Crimson n¡¯s own umtion, Greem felt the terror and power of a major adept organization!


    What upset him, even more, was the fact that the powerful Zhentarim Association could not be considered an actual major organization in the World of Adepts. Compared to the Silver Union, the Northern Witches, and the Adept¡¯s Association, the Zhentarim Association was just a minor local organization of no repute and might. They could not even bepared to the former three.


    To better prepare for the uing tournament, Greem also started browsing for information on his three opponents in the database.


    [Gallow. Male. Belongs to the Dener n. Third Grade bloodline adept. Bloodline source is said to be a certain terrifying Fallen Emperor. Excels at meleebat. No lethal weaknesses on his body.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 39 | Physique 34 | Agility 17 | Spirit 21


    Magical Equipment: Third Grade longsword. Name unknown. Effect unknown.


    [Dante. Male. Belongs to the Annemdor Academy. Third Grade elementium adept.


    Proficient atmunicating with spirits and canmand spirits to do battle.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 13 | Physique 21 | Agility 11 | Spirit 39 Magical Equipment: Wraith Staff (Third Grade), Ne of Death (Third Grade), Rituals of the Dark Arts (Third Grade).


    [Sanazar. Female. Belongs to the Sarubo n. Third Grade bloodline adept.


    Bloodline source is the powerful Flying Venom Dragon, a poison hybrid dragon.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 25 (33) | Physique 39 (39) | Agility 22 (26) | Spirit 32 (37) Note: Attributes in brackets refer to attributes after transformation.


    Magical Equipment: Tempest Heart (Third Grade), Bramblethorn Armor (Third Grade).


    [Greem. Male. Belongs to the Crimson n. Third Grade elementium adept (fire specialization).


    Capable of manipting and using fire magic.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 20 | Physique 22 | Agility 12 | Spirit 39 Magical Equipment: Fire Throne five-set piece (Second Grade magical equipment individually, Third Grade as a set), unknown magical ring (Fourth Grade?).]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel a subtle fear when he read the Association data that the Chip had projected into his mind.


    He had always believed himself to be reasonably powerful. At the very least, he thought himself to be uncontested amongst the Third Grade adepts of Zhentarim, standing an entire shoulder above the rest of thepetition.


    However, after looking through everyone¡¯s information, Greem was shocked to find that his base power could only rank third among the four adepts. If they were to set aside all magical equipment, he would probably be the weakest of the four.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel his head spin when he looked at the terrifying bodily attributes of Gallow, the man known as the Scarface Adept. How many seconds would his defensive magicst if he ran into such a machine of violence in a small tournament arena?


    Fortunately, Greem also had many secret hidden trump cards of his own.


    From start to finish, Greem was not a warrior adept that liked to charge at the frontlines and fight with his bare hands. In all of his previous battles, he preferred to have his magical golem stand in the front while he stayed in the back. He would unleash the tremendous firepower of an elementium adept, showering the enemy with a wild bombardment of fire and mes.


    Moreover, Greem now had the elementium magical machine when it came down to a contest of brute force, and Remi the Spirit of Pestilence and his gue creatures when it came down to a game of numbers. When it came down to sheer firepower, Greem himself was a fire adept, best known as the most lethal force on the battlefield. With all these conditions piled together, his enemies would not even be able to stand on their feet if they weren¡¯t powerful enough.


    After thoroughly researching the Scarface Adept, Greem turned his attention to Dante, the Medium.


    Greem was a little fearful of this alternative elementium adept.


    It was said that this Adept Dante had wholly turned himself into a spiritual being for the sake of strengthening hisbat power. In doing so, he could avoid over ny-percent of physical damage while fighting.


    Hisbat style was simr to Greem¡¯s, only that his minions consisted of powerful spirits. These undead creatures feared neither sword nor de. They were immune to physical attacks, and all possessed strange and unimaginable abilities.


    If Greem were to fight with Dante, it would be a ground shattering battle of flying wraiths and dancing mes!


    It was exciting to just think about it.


    Meanwhile, Sanazar was an old acquaintance of Greem¡¯s.


    Back when Greem and Sanazar were on good terms, Greem had no means of obtaining any information on her due to the massive difference between their status and power.


    Sanazar constantly hid in her cloud of purple mist. Greem didn¡¯t even know what she looked like, despite having known her for so long. What he knew about her wasn¡¯t even as detailed as the investigation of the Association.


    Flying Venom Dragon.


    It was a powerful magical creature that was incredibly difficult to deal with!


    They had the robust body and magical resistance of the dragons, while their every attack contained terrifying poison. Moreover, when these dragons flew into a rage and engaged in a brutal fight, they were still a force to be reckoned with.


    Greem still had a clear impression of Sanazar from back when she fought with the Third Grade dragon knight. If he were to fight with Sanazar, blocking her rapid and vicious assault would be the key to victory!


    Moreover, there was no way that Sanazar had not improved and grown stronger over the years.


    Should Greem take the Association¡¯s information for granted, Sanazar would be able to instantly turn the table by unleashing an ability outside the data.


    As such, the information stolen from the Association could only serve as a base reference for Greem¡¯s preparation. He could not trust it fully and still needed to prepare more strategies and tactics to prevent an upset.


    Moreover, this information could hardly be considered ssified.


    If he could get his hands on it, his opponents would naturally be able to do the same.


    Information about himself was probably being very carefully analyzed by his opponents as well. If they were to sharpen their strategies against him, the situation would not look so good.

 Chapter 1030 - Conspiracy and Unease

    Chapter 1030 Conspiracy and Unease


    Kerslin Castle. The lowest level of a well-guarded arcane hall.


    A massive ball of light a hundred meters in diameter floated in the center of the hall, maintaining a tight connection to the thousands of mysterious arrays around it through countless beautiful silver light ribbons.


    The light ribbons were not pure energy streams. If anyone were fortunate enough to be able to capture a strip of the light and magnify it tens of thousands of times, they would find that the so-called light ribbons were actually a stream consisting of innumerable tiny and interconnected runes.


    Every tiny spark was a miniature runic light array.


    There were thousands of these light ribbons, each of them shining with countless tiny sparks. These ribbons were entangled and connected, forming an evenrger and moreplex system of runic light arrays.


    A pair of strange and indifferent eyes silently observed the operation of the entire runic array system from within the ball of light. The frail and lean body of an old, bald adept floated behind the ball of light.


    While the entire array system ran in a perfect and self-consistent manner, a beam of radiant light prated the countless stone walls surrounding it. The light passed by the hundreds and thousands of defensive arrays and pierced into the head of the sleeping old man within.


    ¡°Yuri, wake up. Hurry up and wake up.¡±


    The voice was unusually loud, sending shockwaves through the air and causing the light ribbons to tremble and distort. However, all of this disturbance vanished as the pair of indifferent eyes red at the light ribbons. They returned to normal without any disruption to the operation of the arrays.


    Finally, roused by the booming voice, the old and lean adept slowly opened his eyes.


    ¡°Dammit! Which bastard is it that hase to disturb my sleep this time? Don¡¯t you know...er, Lord Freed, it¡¯s you?¡±


    The old adept was still somewhat drowsy from having just woken up. He grumbled aloud while connecting with the mental consciousness that had reached out to him. His ¡®weak¡¯ Spirit made slight contact with the consciousness, and he instantly recognized the owner of that unique mental flux. Thus, he hastily stopped himself and put on a smile instead.


    ¡°Yuri, you promised me that the animated Kerslin would be entirely under our control. What happened with the transgressive act of conferring authority without approval from two days ago? Why did it suddenly go out of control?¡±


    ¡°So, that¡¯s what you¡¯re here for?¡± Yuri was a Third Grade adept and a mean character who could shake the skies and move the earth with a single stomp of his leg. However, in front of a furious Fourth Grade adept who hade to demand an exnation, he could only bow his head and hurriedly exin. ¡°This was a small mistake I made when setting up the rules on conferring authority.¡±


    ¡°What mistake?¡± The booming voice pursued, his tone full of dissatisfaction.


    ¡°When I confirmed the rules for Kerslin¡¯s operation, it was established that all Third Grade adepts of the Association would have Second ss authority.¡±


    ¡°I know. This rule was unanimously agreed upon by all Fourth Grade adepts. Is there a problem with that rule? That kid is not an Association member at the moment!¡±


    ¡°The problem is that Kerslin sensed the aura of a patriot¡¯ on him. That was why Kerslin considered him an ally, and the authority conference system was triggered!¡±


    ¡°Apatriot? You mean to say...that the kid also has some sort of animated lifeform on his person?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± the old adept quickly continued. ¡°Of course, it could also just be simr to an animated lifeform!¡±


    The booming voice fell silent for a moment before speaking, ¡°That might be a possibility. ording to the data obtained from investigations, Greem has Soul Equipment bound to his person. I¡¯ve heard that he has managed to cultivate the Soul Equipment into a pseudo-contracted spirit with its own consciousness. Could that be what Kerslin sensed?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s possible, but we can¡¯t be sure. We can only confirm by capturing that kid and examining him thoroughly. Chairman, do you think we should?¡±


    ¡°Forget it! We can¡¯t touch that kid for the moment.¡± After a long break, the loud voice let out a long sigh. ¡°We are holding a tournament soon. That kid is the protagonist we have gone to great lengths to prepare. We can¡¯t make a move on him without a proper reason. So, just keep a closer eye on Kerslin and make sure no more security loopholes show up again!¡±


    ¡°Yes, Mr. Chairman, as you wish!¡±


    ¡°Mm. That will be it!¡±


    The loud voice faded away, and that one bright ribbon of light vanished in an instant.


    ¡°Apatriot? Hehehe. It can¡¯t be as simple as a contracted spirit. I¡¯ve heard stories about this kid. He is able to pilot a giant, hundred-meter tall war golem and is even hiding a monster in another ne that is capable of assimting magical metals. If I can dig out all of his secrets, it will be incredibly beneficial for gaining more control over Kerslin.¡±


    The old adept couldn¡¯t help but start mumbling to himself once he was the only person left in the arcane hall.


    ¡°However, that brat is currently the Association¡¯s sweetheart. They are still hoping for him to be their scapegoat! Touching him right now would be...¡±


    After thinking for a long time, Third Grade Yuri finally decided he wasn¡¯t brave enough to go against the will of the great Fourth Grade adepts. He could only grit his teeth and instill this information about Greem in his mind as best as he could. Finally, he then fell asleep once again, his mental consciousness merging with the giant ball of light.


    ............


    Kerslin Castle. Inside a strange room.


    Sanazar casually turned off the long-rangedmunication crystal on the wooden table before her and fell into a long period of silence.


    Someone knocked on the room¡¯s wooden door while the fires of fury were zing furiously in her heart.


    Sanazar opened the door and was shocked to find two powerful adepts in some apparel of strange design standing right outside, smiling at her.


    ¡°Gallow, Dante, why are the two of you here?¡± Sanazar¡¯s voice was a little sharp. She was still hidden in her purple mist.


    ¡°Why aren¡¯t you weing us? Won¡¯t you even let us into your room?¡± Scarface Adept Gallow¡¯s appearance was simply too horrifying. When he smiled, the numerous stitches and gashes on his face began squirming in unison. That tremendous visual impact was not something that the ordinary person could endure.


    After a moment of hesitation, Sanazar finally stepped aside and let her twopetitors walk into her room.


    She closed the door and reactivated the defensive arrays before speaking in a tone of mild annoyance, ¡°Speak, why did the two of youe all this way here to look for me?¡±


    Scarface Adept Gallow took a look at the inside of the room before turning around and facing Sanazar. His two-meter tall physique and his horrifying face gave him an incredibly oppressive presence.


    ¡°Sanazar, how much do you know about the tournament this time?¡±


    Adept Dante, whose silhouette was somewhat faint and blurry, also stared at the purple mist with interest.


    Sanazar wasn¡¯t in a hurry to answer. Instead, she stared at Gallow coldly and responded with her own question, ¡°How much you know about it?¡±


    Gallow smiled, shing his teeth. ¡°I don¡¯t know much, but it¡¯s more than enough.¡±


    Sanazarughed coldly, ¡°You are Lady Ker¡¯s most hopeful subordinate for Fourth Grade advancement. Wouldn¡¯t she make sure to look out for you?¡±


    The smile on Gallow¡¯s face became even more ¡®brilliant.¡¯


    ¡°Her Ladyship has indeed looked out for me, but...¡±


    ¡°Was Lady Ker¡¯s care not to your liking?¡±


    ¡°Hmph.¡±


    Sanazar turned and looked at Dante, but he also hastily waved his hands and said, ¡°Don¡¯t look at me. I¡¯ve been strictly warned as well.¡±


    Sanazar nodded her head in understanding and said in a dejected tone, ¡°It seems like the information the three of us have obtained matches. The winner of this tournament has been inofficially decided. It has to be Greem!¡±


    ¡°Mm!¡± A bitter smile appeared on Adept Dante¡¯s blurry face, ¡°I have also been warned. I can do whatever I want if I¡¯m fighting the two of you, but I have to lose if I run into that Greem!¡±


    ¡°The ¡®care¡¯ I received is simr to that!¡± Gallow also chimed in with resentment and anger on his face.


    ¡°That brat has just offended Lord Den. There is no way that the Association will turn around and support him all of a sudden. Therefore, I suspect that the Association is intentionally helping Greem be a Fourth Grade Association Adept as quickly as possible! Do the two of you have any insider information to share with regards to this?¡± Sanazar stared at her two panions.¡¯


    Dante shrugged and put on an expression like he knew absolutely nothing.


    Only Gallow lowered his head in silence, as if he was thinking about something.


    After a long while, he finally raised his scary scarface that had been torn apart and stitched together. He spoke in a soft voice, ¡°The Association is facing some trouble currently. The Great Adepts of the realms beyond have requested that all of the major forces choose a Fourth Grade to go on a mission. I¡¯ve heard that it is fairly dangerous.¡±


    ¡°Then it¡¯s pretty obvious what their intent is. This tournament is a trap. What the Association wishes to give away isn¡¯t the origin substance, but the identity of an Association adept. The four of us have already reached peak Third Grade. It doesn¡¯t matter which of us gets the origin substance. It will allow us to have an incredibly high chance of advancing to Fourth Grade and maybe master some powers of principles ahead of time.¡± At this point, even the typically calm and collected Sanazar started sounding frustrated.


    ¡°Perhaps we can try to fight for it? After all, a mission assigned from the realms beyond might be dangerous, but it not mean certain death! Moreover,¡± Adept Dante¡¯s voice suddenly fell softer, ¡°when ites to talent and potential, both of you are superior to me. Your chance of advancing to Fourth Grade is also higher than mine.¡±


    ¡°What does potential and talent count for?¡± Scarface Gallow spoke out coldly, ¡°When has there ever been an advancement that hasn¡¯t been a struggle of life and death!? Were the current Fourth Grades of the Association all the most potent Third Grades of their time before their advancements? Hmph! There will always be a limit to individual effort! What truly determines our fate is damned luck!¡±


    The three adepts couldn¡¯t help but fall silent in dejection at this point in the conversation.


    If they were to walk out of their towers, every one of them would still be prodigies envied by the entire world. However, they knew their own conditions and situations the best. Their past glory meant nothing for their advancement towards Fourth Grade. No one among the three of them had more than fifty percent chance of sessfully advancing.


    Advancement was a gamble!


    Win, and they would naturally jump to the next level, bing top-tier adepts in the World of Adepts no longer constrained or limited by any force or individual. However, if they lost the gamble? There were far too many losers who simply retreated in low-spirits, forever caught in their setback, and being reduced to an irrelevant character in the world.


    Just flip through the historical chronicles of Zhentarim! Where were all the prodigies and geniuses that had popped up throughout the years now? In the end, these fourteen winners were the only ones who would be remembered by history!


    Perhaps this was the deep darkness hiding behind the brilliant halo of glory that belonged to the adepts.


    ¡°I don¡¯t care what you two think. Either way, I will be fighting for that origin substance!¡± Scarface Gallow smiled viciously and left promptly after leaving behind this onest statement.


    Adept Dante sighed once again, but could only say his farewells and leave with a heavy heart.

 Chapter 1031 - Spirits Soar

    Chapter 1031 Spirits Soar


    Mary arrived at Kerslin Castle seven dayster, apanied by Meryl and Emelia.


    She startedining the moment she saw Greem.


    ¡°Why do things keep happenings? Things have only just been getting stable for thest ten years, and now a tournament like this suddenly pops up? Do those old fools have nothing better to do than to give out free resources to you?¡±


    Greem smiled and interrupted Mary¡¯s rant. If these words were to fall into the ears of those Fourth Grade adepts, trouble would being her way.


    ¡°Why are you so angry if you already know that their intention is to give me resources?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Don¡¯t let your guard down. I heard all sorts of things on my way here. None of those three opponents of yours are pushovers. Every one of them is the best of the best among Third Grade adepts!¡± Mary said concernedly.


    ¡°Yes, Teacher, you must be careful! I keep having a feeling that there¡¯s a conspiracy behind the Association¡¯s invitation!¡± Meryl was also frowning. She was behaving more and more like the fire dragon adept that she was now. Every word that came out of her mouth and every action that she made usually carried a trace of unquestionable confidence.


    It was only when she was in front of Greem that she would betray such a troubled look.


    Emelia typically got along very well with Mary and Meryl. Naturally, upon hearing that there was a show to be had, she had rushed over with the two of them as quickly as she could. She couldn¡¯t help but start chuckling when she saw the rare expressions of concern on their faces.


    ¡°I think the two of you are overthinking. Our n leader has always been brilliant and cautious. There is no way he would readily agree to participate in the tournament if there was actual danger.¡±


    Mary shot Greem a mean nce.


    ¡°This guy isn¡¯t as smart as you think he is! Alice must have given him some sort of hint, which is why he bet it all and agreed to the tournament.¡±


    ¡°Lady Alice is the leader of the Witches of Fate, after all! If even she thinks Teacher is favored...ow!¡± Meryl couldn¡¯t help but cry out in pain. Mary had pinched her hard before she could even finish speaking.


    ¡°Hmph! If Alice is really that powerful, why is she so scared of even leaving the Tower of Fate? Last time..st time, she said that a trip to Henvic ne would be incredibly useful for Greem, and what happened? Greem almost died in there!¡±


    ¡°But...but teacher came back sessfully in the end, didn¡¯t he? And he brought back all sorts of useful things with him!¡±


    ¡°Things he got with his life on the line!¡± Mary had a disgruntled look on her face, ¡°Alice might be good at what she does. She can help you find where there¡¯s treasure and where there¡¯s something you badly need. But the one thing she can¡¯t tell you is what¡¯s sitting in wait right beside the treasure! Think about it! If a human warrior listened to the old witch¡¯s words and went into the promised treasure vault only to find a dragon...a dragon could indeed be considered a moving treasure box, but would the warrior be alive to enjoy the bounty?¡±


    Meryl and Emelia looked at each other in shock. They never expected the typically brash and impulsive Lady Mary to spout such words of wisdom.


    Indeed, most Fate Witches had this problem to some varying extents!


    It was true that they could help people find the most efficient path to walk upon. However, they always, always¨Cintentionally or not¨Cignored the risks of walking down the shortcut. Moving ording to the instructions of the Fate Witches would always yield tremendous bounties. However, any danger encountered along the way would most certainly be incredibly dangerous as well.


    After all, risk and reward always came hand in hand!


    ¡°If the n leader is in so much danger, why isn¡¯t Lady Alice here in person?¡± Emelia asked.


    Meryl shook her head slightly. ¡°This is Zhentarim. They are still very vignt of the three major forces. They won¡¯t be weing of Lady Alice.¡±


    ¡°Teacher, will your life be in any danger throughout this tournament?¡± Meryl asked in a soft voice, ¡°I have already mobilized all my forces to look for information, but we have nothing. The tournament by the Association this time is very sudden, while the Association adepts we can get in contact with are too low-level to know anything.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Meryl. I¡¯m still fairly confident about the tournament this time.¡±


    ¡°Speaking of which, Teacher, this is the information that we have managed to obtain on your three opponents. Take a look at it when you have the chance!¡± Having said that, Meryl took out a piece of parchment and passed it to Greem.


    Greem took the parchment and gave it a look. Gallow, Dante, and Sanazar¡¯s personal information were recorded there. Though it wasn¡¯t as detailed as the information on the Association¡¯s database, it still gave a basic idea of the three fighter¡¯s capabilities and their style ofbat.


    ¡°How is it? You might be running into an old friend this time. Are you feeling anything special?¡± Mary stared at Greem with a sadistic smile on her face.


    There was a time when Sanazar had been synonymous with a powerful adept in their eyes. The two of them knew very well how strong she was.


    Yet, at this point, Greem had grown from an insignificant First Grade adept to a powerful adept who could stand shoulder to shoulder with her. An outsider could not adequately describe theplex and intricate shift in his feelings.


    At the very least, Greem felt his own emotions surge and soar uncontrobly at the thought of getting to fight with Sanazar.


    As for Sanazar? It would probably take a long time to write out everything she was feeling right now!


    ............


    Regardless of how Greem and Sanazar felt, Kerslin Castle had now be the center of a massive whirlpool.


    The tournament announced ten days earlier had sent tremors throughout Zhentarim.


    It was important to note that it had been hundreds of years since there had been a new Fourth Grade adept in the Central Region. Judging by the nature of the Association¡¯s tournament, this wasn¡¯t a selection amongst all Third Grade adepts, but one with four predetermined candidates.


    Scarface Adept Gallow, Medium Adept Dante, Flying Venom Dragon Sanazar, and the legendary Fire Adept Greem, who had just recently risen to power.


    In all seriousness, all four of them were true powerhouses at the peak of Third Grade. Advancing to Fourth Grade was a certainty once they obtained the origin substance awarded by the Association.


    The birth of every Fourth Grade adept would substantially change the regional power structure where their organization resided, often resulting in a wave of changes throughout thend.


    Consequently, every adept n and organization that heard the news of the tournament sent their representatives to Kerslin as quickly as they could. Watching thepetition was only one aspect of it. More importantly, they needed to know who the new Fourth Grade adept candidate would be the moment it happened.


    After all, being able to maintain an excellent personal rtionship with a Fourth Grade adept ahead of time was an incredibly valuable thing for most small and medium adept ns!


    A flying ship headed towards Kerslin Castle. It was packed full of n representatives and authorities from all over Zhentarim. Amongst them were a few adepts who wore the emblem of the Sarubo n on their chests.


    ¡°I honestly never expected that that kid could be so incredible. To think that he can now stand shoulder to shoulder with Lady Sanazar!¡± It was Adept F¨¹gen of the Sarubo n who spoke. Naturally, the ¡®kid¡¯ he kept mentioning was Greem, the traitor who was a taboo subject for most people in the n.


    ¡°Lord F¨¹gen, you had better stop mentioning him so much! This ce isn¡¯t the n headquarters. If someone hears you...¡± Adept Keoghan warned worriedly. He was still as cautious as ever before.


    ¡°What are you so scared of!¡± Adept F¨¹gen looked furious. ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter how fast he¡¯s climbed thedder. He still has to stand behind our Lady Sanazar. Have you not heard of the rankings that the adepts have put together? Our Lady Sanazar is ranked second, while that guy is only ranked third. Hmph! Traitor!¡±


    This ranking was also something that only recently appeared.


    To most people¡¯s understanding, there weren¡¯t very many characters who could reach peak Third Grade, to begin with. As such, Gallow, Sanazar, and Dante were the absolute elites among the Third Grade adepts and firmly took up the top three positions.


    Unfortunately, with the meteoric rise of this legendary fire adept, three powerhouses became four powerhouses, and the poor medium adept was forced out of the top three and fell to the fourth rank. This ranking reflected the most likely candidate to take the victory in this tournament.


    One had to admit that Scarface Gallow, who represented the Dener n and led the elite Bloody Spear Army, held as much of a reputation throughout Zhentarim as Greem did. It was only because Greem had defeated Fourth Grade Body-Refining Adept Den with the aid of a Fourth Grade war machine that he had managed to take away Gallow¡¯s fame and spotlight.


    However, there was no room for the fire adept to cheat in this tournament. He was ranked third by the more free-spirited adepts after they hadpiled all the essential information on the participants.


    Naturally, ranked in first was Scarface Gallow, who had established his reputation for several hundreds of years now!


    He was a powerful adept who had spent his years in foreign nes, and who had personally killed an otherworldly Fallen Emperor. These Fallen Emperors might notpare to the adepts of the World of Adepts, but they were still powerful Fourth Grade undead beings.


    It was this incredibly fortunate and coincidental ying of a Fallen Emperor that bestowed upon Adept Gallow an incredibly powerful Undying Body. Over seventy percent of his power came from this Undying Body of his.


    Ranked second was the Tyrant Adept, Sanazar of the Sarubo n.


    She had inherited the strange bloodline of the Flying Venom Dragon and could transform into a mighty dragon during battle. She not only had incredible Physique and excellent magical resistance but fearsome poison as well.


    As such, an ordinary Third Grade adept was hardly the opponent of Sanazar after her transformation.


    In third was Legendary Fire Adept Greem, a unique existence whose legendary tales were endless.


    It was his miraculous rise that had set several unreachable records within the Central Region.


    It was said that this Adept Greem had only taken two hundred years to attain his current power since his advancement to First Grade!


    Two hundred years might be a long time for ordinary humans, but it was hardly anything for adepts.


    Two hundred years. That much time was perhaps only enough for an ordinary adept to reach advanced First Grade, yet Adept Greem had climbed to the peak of Third Grade.

 Chapter 1032 - Am’s Feelings

    Chapter 1032 Am¡¯s Feelings


    While F¨¹gen and Keoghan whispered to each other, a young adept standing near their side was staring into space.


    The young adept stood there in a daze, as if the name repeatedly mentioned by the two adepts had touched on some memories of his. His face was full of confusion and frustration. Who knew what he was thinking about?


    ¡°Am...Am.¡± Adept F¨¹gen had to call his name twice before he snapped back to reality.


    ¡°Oh, Lord F¨¹gen, you called for me? I was thinking about something a little too hard there.¡± The young Adept Am smiled and hurriedly bowed before Adept F¨¹gen.


    ¡°It¡¯s nothing much. I just wanted to remind you of something. I heard that Meryl, the girl who advanced alongside you, has also arrived at Kerslin Castle. There¡¯s a possibility that you will run into them there. You must be mentally prepared. Dammit! Even that girl¡¯s advanced to Second Grade. What¡¯s going on with this world.¡±


    Am¡¯s body trembled when he heard this, and he quickly lowered his head and acknowledged F¨¹gen¡¯s advice.


    Adept Keoghan and Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s gaze lingered on him for a moment before moving away, but there was a trace of pity and cautiousness in the depths of their eyes.


    Am was once the senior to the now-famous Fire Dragon Adept Mery. Both of them had been apprentice adepts personally taught by Greem. However, the path of development they each took had diverged tremendously.


    Meryl had been an ordinary female apprentice with average talent. Advancing to First Grade was already an incredible fortune for her that had probably taken up most of her luck for the rest of her life. Inparison, Am definitely had far more potential for development after advancing to First Grade.


    With Meryl¡¯s disappointing talent, reaching intermediate First Grade by the end of her lifespan would already have been amendable feat. Meanwhile, Am had the potential to reach advanced First Grade. If he was slightly more fortunate and could improve his powers to peak First Grade before the end of his lifespan, he would have one chance at advancing to Second Grade.


    Thus, Am¡¯s development should have been far superior to Meryl from every aspect!


    Unfortunately, the path of one¡¯s life would not always peacefully follow the predicted trajectory.


    Naturally, being able to advance to First Grade, Meryl¡¯s heart was filled with gratitude towards her teacher. As such, she defended Greem at every turn and juncture, disying tremendous loyalty to her teacher. Even when a rift appeared between Greem and the Sarubo leadership, she chose to stand by her teacher¡¯s side without any hesitation.


    Meanwhile, Am...chose a different path.


    Tempted by Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s words and promises, Am didn¡¯t look favorably upon Greem¡¯s decision to secede from the Sarubo n. He had willingly be a spy and a sellout. It was his betrayal that caused insider information of Fire Throne to flow into the hands of Adept F¨¹gen.


    The first crisis of extermination that Fire Throne had faced was when a Third Grade vampire led his n members to attack the tower.


    Greem¡¯s faction should not have had any chance of surviving under those circumstances.


    Am took advantage of that crisis to officially leave Greem¡¯s faction, return to the Sarubo n, receive Adept F¨¹gen¡¯s reward, and be his disciple.


    However, the changes that followed were entirely beyond everyone¡¯s expectations.


    Not only did Greem¡¯s faction survive, but they even managed to obtain more power through the multiple crises they had to deal with.


    They ughtered the vampire n, beat back the allied army of five adept ns, and Greem himself even killed the Third Grade Adept Yurga in a fair duel. Recently, the Crimson n had thwarted the invasion of the Fabres n, one of the five mega-ns in Zhentarim. Am¡¯s former teacher, Greem, even disyed his powerful might and forced the Fourth Grade body-refining adept, Den, to run away.


    This series of events was stunning and mind-boggling news!


    Am even heard that Greem had ¡®wasted¡¯ an incredibly precious fire dragon¡¯s bloodline on Meryl as a reward for her continuous loyalty and diligence.


    When Am heard news of this, his heart was rent in two!


    He shut himself in his room, smashing and thrashing every single object there, including the limited edition alchemical tform he had purchased at high cost.


    In his crazed state, Am even summoned several of the female apprentices he was training and ravaged them for three days and nights before he managed to calm down. Of course, after the whole matter, Am spent another sum of resources to conceal the mattere of his outburst.


    However, from that day onwards, his heart had been upended.


    It was important to note that back when he was an apprentice adept, he was the only one among Greem¡¯s five apprentices who possessed fire as his primary attribute. If¨CAm had fantasized over and over again¨Cif he had still at Greem¡¯s side, could there have been anyone else besides him who would have inherited the legendary fire adept¡¯s powerful fire techniques?


    It was these impractical delusions that tortured Am at the very core of his being.


    He thought about it day and night, so much so that it was almost as if he had been possessed!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped! He couldn¡¯t avoid thinking about it.


    His identity and what he has done was well-known throughout the n. As such, whenever something happened in the distant Crimson n, the members of the Sarubo n would look at him with a weird look in their eyes.


    He hated this expression to death!


    He needed no pity, nor did he want to see others rejoicing at his circumstances. Most of all, he did not want to hear anything regarding the Crimson n.


    Unfortunately, the feats of the Crimson n were simply too shocking and unbelievable!


    When the Fabres n marched out in full force and invaded the Crimson n¡¯s territory without opposition, all of the Sarubo adepts had gone to praise Am for his excellent foresight in escaping that terrifying death trap ahead of time.


    Am had even rejoiced over his decision for a while.


    However, when the legendary fire adept forced the Fourth Grade adept to flee upon his appearance and ughtered the Fabres army, all of the Sarubo n adepts fell silent. The looks they gave Am returned to the usual as if they were looking at the biggest, most foolish idiot in the world.


    During that time, Am also lost an incredible amount of weight.


    In all honesty, when he heard that the legendary fire adept was making history once again in being selected as one of the Third Grades for the Association¡¯s tournament, Am was incredibly calm.


    Adept F¨¹gen and Adept Keoghan had no intention of bringing Am along on their trip to Kerslin Castle. However, for some unknown reason, Am had actively requested that his teacher bring him along.


    Even Am couldn¡¯t exin why he wanted toe.


    He no longer wanted to dwell on the rights and wrongs of his choice in the past.


    All he wanted to do now was see his former teacher and his oldpanions with his own two eyes. As for why he wanted to see them, what he would do after seeing them, Am had absolutely no clue.


    ............


    Five dayster, the flying ship finally arrived at Kerslin Castle.


    As the dense crowd of people walked down the flying ship, the first thing that came into view was a massive and beautiful za. The za was tiled with moonwhite stone that glowed brilliantly in the warm sun. If this were nighttime, then after having absorbed an entire day¡¯s worth of light elementium, the moonwhite stone would emanate a soft and faint light, making the ce even more beautiful and unreal.


    An iparable giant statue stood at the center of the za. It was in the liking of an old adept dressed in an adept¡¯s robe, standing at over a hundred meters tall. The statue of the adept was carved out of arge stone. Every single detail, from the eyes and the brows to the skin and the robe itself, was life-like and realistic. It was the peak of craftsmanship.


    Anyone would have thought that this was a living adept at first look, an adept carefully assessing every outsider that came to Kerslin Castle.


    ¡°This is Adept Csanad, first Chairman of the Zhentarim Association.¡± Adept Keoghan lifted his head to look at the statue andmented.


    Of course, Keoghan and Am knew that Adept F¨¹gen wasn¡¯tmenting the deeds and aplishments of this Chairman Csanad, but his regrets. Regardless of how talented Chairman Csanad was, he had never managed to cross the threshold of Fourth Grade to be a Great Adept.


    As such, he was fated never to achieve immortality, dying of old age in Kerslin Castle at 1,173 years of age.


    However, this was Kerslin Castle. If Adept F¨¹gen were to express thismentation of his out loud, it would be considered offensive to the Association. He could only express his feelings through a simple sentence like that.


    ¡°The fire dragon adept. It¡¯s the fire dragon adept...¡±


    Suddenly, amotion spread out amongst the adepts who were enjoying the scenery of Kerslin Castle. Gasps and cries rang out throughout the za.


    Fire Dragon Adept Meryl?


    Adept Keoghan and the two others were stunned for a moment. They quickly turned their heads in the direction where the voices wereing from.


    Two young and spirited female adepts walked side by side near a stone arch on the west side of the za. They were greeting a group of adepts that had just walked down from a flying ship.


    Over the past decade, as the Crimson n was subtly acknowledged as a Fourth Grade force, more and more adept ns became willing to form alliances with them. In particr, small and mid-sized ns thatcked in power were ready to lean towards a rising group like the Crimson n in hopes of borrowing their strength to fend off advances by their enemies.


    As such, as one of the authority figures of the Crimson n, Meryl had to maintain intimate connections with the allies of the n, even if she was thousands of kilometers away from headquarters.


    Now was such a case. A few allies of the Crimson n hade to Kerslin Castle in support of them today. Thus, Meryl hade here to wee them.


    Apart from the n allies, Meryl and Emelia also greeted the other adepts that stepped forward to greet them. When the two pretty female adepts stood side by side, it was truly a very refreshing sight to take in.


    Meryl would not have been considered a top beauty in the past. At the very best, she had been a gentle and demure woman.


    However, nourished by the fire dragon¡¯s bloodline, Meryl¡¯s figure had be increasingly slender and pretty. Her smooth skin radiated with an overwhelming energy aura, giving off a sense of tremendous power.


    Worldly beauty had no value to adepts. Uncontested strength was the only beauty that they acknowledged!


    Am looked upon the pretty, smiling figure in the distance through the crowd, his heart once again torn in two.

 Chapter 1033 - Bluesea Plane

    Chapter 1033 Bluesea ne


    Kerslin Castle appeared to be exceptionally eye-catching with all its decorations.


    Countless stone tiles of uniform shape and size paved the main path leading to the castle. The path led upwards, winding around until it reached the massivepiszuli gate of the main castle. On either side of the road were a series of shops and small fountain zas. Every region was distinctly unique, making for a varied and colorful splendor.


    There was great variety in the style of architecture around Kerslin Castle. There were domed buildings, pointed roofs, t roofs, murals, and stained ss walls and windows. The entirety of Kerslin Castle had been revamped to wee the representatives of adept nsing from all over Zhentarim and was refreshing to view.


    The adepts that had rushed here for the event also came in all sorts of strange and distinct vehicles.


    Apart from the public flying ships, some adepts came on wyverns, griffins, Socrates Condors, two-headed chimeras, and other winged beasts. The adepts with more unusual tastes slowly arrived on Berserk Elephants, Armored Tyrant Bears, Moraq Goats, Magiw Lizards, and other strange creatures.


    These apanying magical beasts and creatures could not be brought into Kerslin Castle and had to be left in therge stables outside the za. The people diligently receiving the adepts here were all elite apprentices cultivated by the Association. Not only were they dressed well and had proper etiquette, but they were also impressively powerful.


    With their abilities, they would be treasured prodigies in any of the small ns, shielded from any kind of danger. Here, however, they had to lower themselves to do the work usually left to ordinary ves.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. There were far too many adeptsing into Kerslin Castle during this time. All of the adepts were of different grades as well. If mortal ves were the ones working the reception for the Second and Third Grade adepts, they would have to be reced with a new group of ves every thirty minutes.


    After all, most high-grade adepts had twisted and unusual personalities. An ordinary mortal would not be able to endure their elementium radiation if they didn¡¯t actively hold back their overwhelming magical energies.


    Most foreign adepts had no right to enter Kerslin Castle. They could only find a ce of shelter near the castle and await the day of the tournament.


    Many impressively constructed flying ships descended in the port daily. Adepts dressed in uniform robes with uniform emblems on their chests would then ride towards the main castle on ck carriages under the lead of Association adepts.


    These were all famousrge ns and organizations in Zhentarim. Naturally, they wouldn¡¯t have to lower themselves and stay outside the main castle. Moreover, they were obviously reasonably familiar with the Association adepts. They immediately gathered together with the Association adepts upon arrival and hid in their rooms to whisper gossip and rumors.


    No outsiders had no idea what the Association leadership was thinking about ining up with this tournament.


    However, if the most powerful person were to be selected at the end of the tournament to advance to Fourth Grade, then the quicker the news, the more initiative they would have in the political changes that would follow.


    Of course, such an initiative meant hardly anything to Fourth Grade adepts, but it could decide the rise or fall of those small and mid-sized ns. It was only natural for them to be nervous about the whole affair!


    Of course, the selection of the strongest Third Grade within the Association this time had also attracted the attention of the other three major forces.


    It was said that the three forces had already sent out undercover observers to witness the entire tournament in hopes of indirectly gaining insight into Zhentarim¡¯s development over the recent years.


    The battlefield for the tournament was set to be in a lesser ne known as Bluesea.


    The four peak Third Grade powerhouses would be split into two groups. They would be teleported to different regions in the Bluesea ne, where they would engage in a fifteen-day-long battle. The two participants would each have half of a fixed teleportation crystal on their person. They would be able to sessfully return to Kerslin Castle after obtaining their opponent¡¯s half of the teleportation crystal.


    The people to sessfully return to Kerslin Castle would be the winners of the preliminary.


    If neitherpetitor could obtain the other person¡¯s teleportation crystal, then it would be considered a loss for both of them, and they would both be eliminated.


    The finals would be held fifteen days after the first preliminary with the same rules and win conditions. The one to obtain aplete teleportation crystal and return would be ruled as the victor.


    These rules meant that the person who wished to be the strongest Third Grade of Zhentarim had to defeat twopetitors in session in a span of thirty days. It was both a test of power as well as a test of determination.


    Of course, if any person could dispatch their opponent in a single day and return to Kerslin Castle, they would have not only fourteen days to rest, but also the opportunity to watch their next opponent fight. It would be incredibly helpful to know more about their opponent before going into the finals.


    That said, while that might sound like a brilliant idea, it wasn¡¯t exactly the most practical.


    After all, the adepts that had been chosen for this tournament were all peak Third Grade veterans that had fought in hundreds of battles. They were incredibly experienced. None of them should be able to defeat their opponent easily.


    ............


    Bluesea ne.


    It was a small ne with a vastndmass and a wealth of biological and ore resources.


    Ever since it became a lesser ne of the Zhentarim Association, the most powerful individuals among the natives had already been captured or killed. The survivors were then reduced to ves and ore miners beneath the Association, spending their days working in all sorts of ntations and lightless mines.


    Today, this ce became the battlefield of four Third Grade adepts from another world.


    A radiant beam of light shone in a dense forest near the west coast.


    A towering figure then walked out of the gleaming door of light before proceeding to frown and look at the alien world.


    Greem immediately felt an overwhelming sense of hostility crushing down upon him the moment he stepped out of the portal.


    The tremendous magical energy aura on his person rapidly fell as a result of the potent suppression from the nar consciousness. In the blink of an eye, he had been reduced to the level of a beginner Second Grade.


    It was like stuffing an elephant into a boot. Greem fell his entire body cry out in pain and rebellion at having to be in such a cramped and stuffy nar world, even if he had yet to run into an enemy yet.


    ¡°It seems like the first round in this battle will revolve around the nar suppression. Whoever can adapt to the nar environment first will be able to unleash more power.¡±


    ¡°Chip, begin analysis of the narws here!¡±


    [Beep. Mission received. Time until the analysis ispleted: 11 hours, 29 minutes, 31 seconds.]


    Eleven hours...hmm. I¡¯ll take this time to look for my opponent!


    Then again, who was my opponent?


    Greem and the three other adepts had stepped into the portal at Kerslin Castle at the same time. However, they were teleported to different regions in pairs of two. As such, at this moment, Greem had no idea who his first opponent was.


    [Beep. Detecting unknown energy fluctuation.]


    While Greem was thinking in silence, the Chip let out a series of notifications. Seven lifeforms containing a strange energy flux were then projected into his vision.


    Greem lifted his head, his gaze cutting through the canopy andnding on an eagle circling in the blue skies above.


    The eagle glowed with a bright red light in Greem¡¯s Elementium Sight. It was a voodoo beast that had undergone modification.


    Greem nced around him and looked in several other directions, discovering the same red light on several deer, squirrels, and snakes.


    It seemed like these were modified beasts that the Associations had left ahead of time to monitor the entire battle.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the hundreds and thousands of adepts in Kerslin Castle who were currently watching their every move and action through the eyes of these voodoo beasts.


    He had best be more subtle with the secrets he didn¡¯t want to expose!


    A naughty smirk suddenly appeared on Greem¡¯s face. He raised his right hand in the shape of a pistol and made a firing motion at a squirrel hiding in a bush a hundred meters away.


    Pa!


    As Greem moved his lips slightly, the squirrel hiding in the leaves suddenly ignited into a small fireball, quickly burning to nothing in the blink of an eye.


    Greem smiled and turned his finger towards a deer hiding in a bush a hundred and twenty meters away.


    Pa!


    Yet another dubbing from Greem¡¯s mouth as mes erupted out of the deer¡¯s orifices. It struggled away but copsed after five steps, where it turned into a pile of ashes.


    Seemingly intimidated by Greem¡¯s unbridled actions, the other creatures glowing with red light started to run into the distance desperately. Unfortunately, no matter how fast they ran, they could not be faster than the sound effectsing out of Greem¡¯s mouth. Pa! Pa! Pa! A few more shots resulted in the extermination of five of the seven red lights.


    The eagle was the fastest of them all. It had already flown one and a half kilometers away. As such, Greem did not kill it. After all, this was the means by which the Association monitored them. It wouldn¡¯t be right to kill them all. He only needed to draw a boundary and chase them all some distance away from him.


    After chasing away the eagle, Greem¡¯s gaze turned to the base of an ancient tree.


    A mole glowing with a red light was hiding underground there, relying on the cover of the earth to avoid having to run away.


    It seemed like the Association adepts controlling the voodoo beasts had yet to figure out how Greem discovered the creatures. They were still trying to rely on the cover of the earth to avoid Greem¡¯s hunt.


    Greem chuckled. His right hand formed a fist and punched downwards.


    A hundred meters away, an area twenty meters around the ancient tree abruptly copsed as if an invisible fist had crashed down there. A massive crater two meters deep formed. All the trees, branches, vines, and bushes in the area were reduced to ashes by the invisible mes.


    The red dot of light also vanished from Greem¡¯s Elementium Sight.


    It was just an ordinary creature with transnted magical eyes. Naturally, there was no way it could have survived a casual attack from Greem.


    After blinding all the ¡®eyes¡¯ monitoring him within a thousand meters, Greem finally took out a strange ck crystal from his pouch.


    The crystal was only the size of a fist, filled with a shimmering ck mist, obscuring any content within it.


    The ck crystal started shaking when it was taken out as if it wanted to leave Greem¡¯s grasp and fly in a particr direction northeast.


    It seemed like that was the location of the other teleportation crystal.

 Chapter 1034 - Direct Challenge

    Chapter 1034 Direct Challenge


    ¡°Teacher was so cool just now.¡±


    Even the usuallyposed fire dragon adept had turned into an obsessed fan before her teacher, excitedly cheering for him.


    Mary, Meryl, Emelia, and a few representatives of their allied ns, as core members of the Crimson n and close acquaintances of Greem, had a suite of their own from which to watch the battle under more private conditions.


    The massive screen in front of them had been split into over a hundred smaller screens. Different angles of the four participant¡¯s actions were projected onto each one.


    It was obvious that the Association¡¯s degree of monitoring throughout the battlefield was pervasive and everywhere!


    Even so, as the four powerhouses stepped onto the battlefield, the screens of light started to go dark, one by one.


    Those who could participate in this tournament were indeed the best among the Third Grades. Naturally, they would not allow the monitoring beasts left behind by the Association to get too close to themselves. Every one of them struck out and blinded the ¡®eyes¡¯ that were too obvious or close.


    However, the Association had predicted this.


    The dark screens quickly lit up once again, showing another angle from a different beast¡¯s eyes, quickly approaching the participants from a distance. Although they could not observe the participants in as close a range as before, a remote observation still allowed the viewers to have a grasp of what they were doing.


    Greem had now turned into a massive fireball, traveling through the green forest with a long trailing tail of smoke and fire. In the past, doing so would have ignited everything along the way, leaving a ringly obvious path of mes behind him.


    However, Greem¡¯s control over the mes had improved significantly now.


    The fireball he had turned into was like an illusory image. It glowed with a smoking yellow me, but no change in temperature could be felt in the air. All of the fire¡¯s energy had gathered at the core of the fireball without a trace of energy seeping out into the surroundings. This way, opponents that located enemies through elementium changes would not be able to discover Greem unless they saw the fireball with their own eyes.


    Greem did not choose to fly in the sky brazenly, but instead subtly approached his opponent as a fireball. After all, his power was still suppressed due to the interference of the nar consciousness. Moreover, he still had no clue who his opponent was.


    Under such conditions, there was no means to decide on abat strategy.


    Greem¡¯s first decision upon entering the battlefield was to covertly approach the enemy and determine their identity before deciding on his strategy.


    Fifty kilometers was nothing to him. He traversed the entire distance in just thirty minutes.


    The teleportation crystal he had with him could only give the vague direction of the opponent¡¯s location, but could not indicate how far away they were. As such, Greem was not concerned about the enemy setting a trap for him.


    After all, at this moment, while everyone was still under the effects of nar suppression and remained incapable of unleashing their full power, it would be incredibly difficult to kill one another. Consequently, this phase of the battle would revolve around the investigation of power levels and a search for weaknesses.


    There was a silent valley in the depths of the forest.


    The once lively and lush forest was now exceptionally dead and silent. Not a single sound could be heard.


    Towering arbor trees crowded together, while the empty spaces were filled with leaves, branches, and winding vines. At the roots of the trees were a mess of bushes and brambles. Ordinary people would have trouble walking in such an environment unless they cut down all the shrubs and vines.


    A strange ball of fire abruptly charged out of the woods in this humid environment, descending upon the valley.


    It stopped in midair.


    A pair of lively eyes appeared in the zing mes, carefully and cautiously examining everything within the valley.


    Soon, the eyes found something.


    The fireball flickered and appeared in a clearing amidst the trees.


    The eyes in the fire stared unflinchingly at a single drop of green liquid hanging from a bramble branch.


    As the winds of the mountain blew across, the branch swayed slightly, and the green liquid slowly evaporated.


    As green mist took to the air, the greenery around the area rapidly started withering.


    It seemed like his first opponent was his old friend¨C Sanazar!


    Greem had basically identified his opponent the moment he saw the drop of poison. The Chip in his mind started running at full speed, constructing all sorts ofbat ns revolving around the Third Grade Flying Venom Dragon.


    Sanazar¡¯s personal attributes, temperament,bat habits, equipment; all the information flowed through Greem¡¯s mind and was pieced together to form an increasingly coherent model of an individual.


    When Sanazar¡¯s model waspleted, Greem abruptly increased the size of his body, transforming into a ten-meter tall me giant. He took to the skies.


    An earthshaking roar then rumbled across the boundless sea of trees.


    ¡°Sa...na...zar!¡±


    The voice boomed like a bell and struck like thunder. The forest trembled in fright as birds scattered in a panic, while leaves fell to the ground like snow in winter.


    There were no schemes or conspiracies, plots, or traps. Greem challenged the proud Third Grade adept to a battle in the most direct and straightforward fashion.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s ferocious will for battle, a purple mist slowly rose into the air in the forest fifteen kilometers away, standing off against the fire giant from a distance.


    Sanazar was an incredibly proud and narcissistic person. She was brash and rough with her actions and rarely considered the consequences when shemitted to doing something. It was the main reason why Greem had parted with the Sarubo n on such bad terms!


    It was precisely because of his understanding of Sanazar¡¯s personality that Greem skipped the unnecessary stages of probing and warming up. He went straight to provoking Sanazar in the most boorish manner possible.


    Sanazar was a veteran Third Grade adept. She had practically watched as Greem grew from a mere First Grade adept to his current level, equal to herself.


    In all honesty, this was unbearable to her!


    Regardless of how wildly spread Greem¡¯s title of the legendary fire adept was, in Sanazar¡¯s heart, he was still that subservient ¡®small fry¡¯ bowing before her. Even though she logically knew this to be incorrect, her feelings did not allow her to view the fire adept¡¯s status objectively.


    So, when faced with a challenge from this ¡®ant,¡¯ Sanazar answered without hesitation, even though she was still experiencing nar suppression.


    Sanazar was 1.72 meters tall, but she showed no fear on her face as she looked at the towering giant in the distance.


    She could sense it very clearly.


    The fire giant might look fearsome, but the intensity of the mes that made up its body was insignificant.


    It was obvious that Greem also suffered from nar suppression.


    Reducing unnecessary energy consumption was the correct choice under such circumstances. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how much fire energy Greem was expending by having forcibly gathered so much fire and increasing the size of his body to this extent.


    At Third Grade, an adept¡¯s magic resistance had already reached a shocking level. Therge area-of-effect spellsmonly used in the past became much weaker at threatening an enemypared to the more concentrated single-target spells.


    As for using arge elementium body to intimidate the opponent? A tactic like that might be useful against low-grade adepts, but it was undoubtedly no more than an empty threat against Third Grade opponents.


    ¡°Brat, you have not experienced a high-grade battle like this, have you? Today, I will let you know the power of a real Third Grade powerhouse.¡± Sanazar¡¯s somewhat hoarse and sharp voice rang out of the purple mist, quickly turning into a bestial howl or roar of sorts.


    The purple mist continued to radiate and spread, quickly engulfing a circumference of a hundred meters around her.


    There seemed to be a massive creature roaring and struggling at the center of the mist. asionally, a muscr and slender tail, or a powerful scaled w, would brush past the edge of the fog. However, they remained obscured, and what was happening within still could not be discerned.


    Greem let out a snort and proceeded to gather a Magma Fireball, which he threw at the purple mist. A blinding pair of ghostly green eyes lit up within the mist, and a deafening roar filled the air.


    Violent wind surged outwards as a massive silhouette charged out of the purple mist. It smashed the Magma Fireball to pieces with a single swipe of its w before lunging at Greem, still engulfed in specks of fire and sparks.


    The opponent might be fast, but Greem had captured all of its movements with his dynamic vision.


    The Flying Venom Dragon that Sanazar had transformed into was still as ugly and vicious as ever before. It had none of the majesty of ordinary dragons, nor the clearly defined angles of pure-blood dragons. Instead, it looked like a green dragon that had been skinned and covered in mucus and dark spots instead.


    However, the Flying Venom Dragon was still a dragon. It had the overwhelming aura of the dragons, as well as their formidable Physique.


    As the Flying Venom Dragon pped its webbed wings, its colossal, twenty-meter long body turned into a bolt of lightning. As it lunged at Greem with vicious fangs and ws, the overwhelmingly cruel aura that assaulted him almost felt suffocating.


    Greem raised his hand, andyers of Inferno Shields appeared between him and the Flying Venom Dragon.


    The dragon opened its mouth and spat a glob of green poison out, eroding through five of the Inferno Shields before vanishing as light green mist. The Flying Venom Dragon¡¯s momentum did not decrease. Instead, it used its powerful body to crush the three remaining Inferno Shields and ran straight into thest two Lava Shields.


    Dong!


    An earth rending explosion rang out as the two giant creatures collided. They rolled across the forest, leaving a wide path in their wake as they wrestled and tore at each other.


    To maximize his closebat ability, Greem gave up on the Body of mes, which gave him tremendous firepower. Instead, he transformed into the me Fiend, which had a powerful Physique.


    Chapter Notes:


    Editor Ryu: If you¡¯re enjoying Age of Adepts, now is a great time to stop by our Patreon and consider supporting this fine series! Patreon is mine and Eris¡¯ sole form of ie for working on this series, and everyone who supports us through Patreon helps ensure the continued trantion and release of AoA. The AoA Patreon has contribution tiers that give you ess to advance chapters of the series (fully tranted and edited) up to 15 chapters ahead of the GT releases. Thanks for your readership, and we hope to have your patronage as well.


    For those who would like to kick in a couple of bucks and aren¡¯t looking for advance chapters, we also have a Ko-Fi for one time donations and support. It doesn¡¯t see much use (hell, if you have a few bucks, you might as well be a Patron and get a few extra chapters ahead), but people still asionally help us through that, and every bit of support helps.


    As always, more than anything, thank you everyone for your continued readership and support of Age of Adepts!


    -Ryu

 Chapter 1035 - War of Monsters

    Chapter 1035 War of Monsters


    What did it look like when two terrifying monsters fought?


    Only the adepts watching through the screens in the safety of Kerslin Castle could tell you from experience.


    Adepts had always maintained wisdom andposure as their motto. However, all the observing adepts were now balling their hands into fists, gritting their teeth and trembling as they watched this monumental fight.


    This one incredible fight between the me Fiend and the Flying Venom Dragon was already more than worth the ticket to fly here!


    Battles between ordinary adepts were no more than ying house whenpared to these two monsters fighting against each other. When they fought, every attack was either a rain of meteors that spanned an area of over a kilometer or a wild bash with a twenty-meter-tall tree picked up from beside the assant.


    It was almost as if the earth itself had been upended in the forest. The ground quaked intensely, sending massive pirs of dust and smoke into the air and obscuring the two gigantic creatures tussling below.


    Before the dust pir could spread out, a bright green halo of poison spread out from the center of the battlefield, instantly engulfing all of the nearby woods.


    The three eagles controlled by the Association flew high above in the skies. When they looked down, they could clearly see a green poison halo spread throughout the forest.


    All life withered and died where the poison traveled.


    All substances, be they towering trees, the resilient vines winding around them, or the bushes and brambles thaty scattered all over the forest withered the instant they came into contact with the halo. They turned into pools of green liquid glowing with intense radioactive light.


    The might of the Flying Venom Dragon¡¯s fearsome poison was capable of eroding even a massive golem entirely made out of metal, let alone these forests unprotected by any form of magic.


    The adepts watching the screens were all horrified.


    However, before they could let out a gasp, there was a loud explosion. A massive halo of fire erupted after the halo of poison, engulfing the dusty battlefield in a vast sea of fire.


    The poison shed with the fire, neutralizing each other as best as they could. The forest had been entirely destroyed. Not even the smallest of lifeforms could be seen in the vicinity, nor a single nt.


    ¡°This...this is...the power of the strongest Third Grades?¡± A young adept who was watching the fight alongside his n members stuttered, his entire being in shock and terror.


    The other adepts did not speak.


    Only the Second Grade adept in their n spoke in a solemn voice, ¡°This is hardly them at their strongest. They are still enduring nar suppression right now. It should only be around half of their actual power, I believe?¡±


    The other adepts were terrified and shocked into silence.


    They continued to watch the screen as the two titans rolled over and razed an entire cliff to the ground. It was a tall cliff, standing at over thirty or forty meters and peeking out of the forest itself. Towering trees snapped and fell over wherever they went, either turning into ashes or a poison swamp. Large swathes of greenery disappeared in the blink of an eye.


    Such terrifying might was only half of their actual power? Then how did they look like when they fought with all they had?


    As low and intermediate-grade adepts, they did not have the necessary experience and worldview to understand or analyze the battle happening in front of them. As such, they could only assess the action based on the visuals and intensity of the fighting. However, such an extreme and massive battle would not fool the eyes of the high-grade adepts of Kerslin. Their method of assessing the fight was very different from an ordinary adept.


    ¡°Hasn¡¯t Greem always been a smart person? Why is he so unwise today? To engage a bloodline adept like Sanazar in an up-front fight...¡± A Third Grade adept of the Association smirked, disdain written all over his face.


    ¡°Truly. He¡¯s an elementium adept, and instead of using his fire spells, he¡¯s fighting with his bare hands. Hmph! I think he¡¯s gone mad!¡± Someone beside quickly piped up in agreement.


    ¡°He¡¯s not scheming anything, is he? Why do I feel like Sanazar hasn¡¯t gotten the upper hand yet?¡± Finally, someone voiced their doubts.


    ¡°Hm? Something¡¯s wrong. The fire adept¡¯s offensive power is a little unusual!¡±


    ¡°You just noticed it? I¡¯ve realized his base damage has been a little too high for a while now. Have you guys discovered it? His fire magic is apanied with a trace of white light every time he attacks. What is that?¡±


    ¡°That seems like...like light elementium!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s strange. Doesn¡¯t Greem have fire specialization?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s nothing to gawk at. It might be some ability from his equipment!¡±


    ......


    The Association adepts might be cruel with their words, but between all of them, they analyzed everything happening on the battlefield with perfect rity.


    While they calmly examined the battle, several Fourth Grade adepts gathered in an arcane hall in the higher levels of Kerslin Castle were also calmly observing the fight through the light projection.


    ¡°Sanazar¡¯s a little impulsive.¡±


    ¡°Yes, she still has too much confidence in her venom dragon¡¯s body. She¡¯spletely forgotten that her opponent has two items in his possession that counter her and her abilities.¡±


    ¡°Oh? What else is there apart from that strange ring?¡±


    ¡°Through some of my more secretive channels, I recently learned that the kid had upgraded his Soul Equipment to Third Grade, allowing it to manifest as the Spirit of Pestilence. Do you think he fears Sanazar¡¯s poison with the Spirit of Pestilence protecting him?¡±


    ¡°I still think that the key to victory lies with the ring. There is simply no solution to that pure light elementium that can ignore both physical and magical defenses. Without the appropriate means to defend against it, the light elementium alone would be enough to wear Sanazar down.¡±


    ¡°Ker, you couldn¡¯t have forgotten to prepare Gallow any equipment to defend against the light elementium, could you? In my opinion, Sanazar probably can¡¯t defeat Greem.¡±


    ¡°Nics, you seemed to have forgotten the decision we made together. All fourteen adepts of the Association agreed that we would raise Greem to Fourth Grade and recruit him into the Association such that he can rece us in...¡ª well, since we have already decided to let him win, why would I go to the extra effort of making Gallow more well-prepared?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! I just don¡¯t want that brat to get too arrogant. It wouldn¡¯t bete for Gallow to give him a thorough beating before conceding!¡±


    ¡°......¡± Adept Ker fell silent for a moment before finally speaking, ¡°I understand Gallow¡¯s personality. He is prideful. I am afraid he won¡¯t hold back. If I do give him Purpleblood, he would probably fight Greem with all he had. When that happens, the situation will no longer be in my control.¡±


    Apart from Greem and Sanazar¡¯s battle, the fight in another region of Bluesea ne was also being projected onto their screen. Scarface Gallow and Medium Adept Dante had also met up and were now engaged in a chase across a vast in.


    Both of them were peak Third Grade adepts, but judging by the situation, Scarface Gallow had the absolute advantage and was chasing Medium Adept Dante all over the ce. Dante could only rely on the Third Grade spirit he had summoned to secretly and sinisterly ambush Gallow to relieve the tremendous pressure he was enduring.


    Dante was truly a fearsome medium. The Third Grade spirit he had summoned flew all over the ce, hiding in all sorts of locations and making it impossible to guard against. If Gallow hadn¡¯t turned his body into the unusual Immortal Body, he would already have died to the countless assassination attempts by the spirit.


    However, the strongest move of Dante¡¯s Third Grade spirit was undoubtedly ¡®Possess¡¯!


    It allowed the spirit to charge into an opponent¡¯s body and take control of them for a brief moment. It might be an incredibly brief instant, but even that one instant would be lethal in a battle between Third Grades.


    The vicious pierce wounds on Gallow¡¯s forehead and chest were the two most significant pieces of evidence of this!


    Scarface Gallow lived up to his name as an undying monster. Even after his heart and forehead had tworge holes pierced into them, he could still chase after the enemy with his sword in hand. The magical sword in his hand also seemed to have some sort of strange power. It caused a portion of Dante¡¯s intangible body to vanish permanently wherever it made contact.


    Supposedly, Dante¡¯s intangible body could recover from any physical damage just by going ethereal. However, when faced with Gallow¡¯s unusual sword, the parts of his body that were cut off could not regenerate again.


    After this happened twice, Dante did not dare to touch the magical sword again!


    If he couldn¡¯t win in a direct confrontation, then he would make it a chase.


    Dante took full advantage of his rapid movements and dragged Gallow in a circle around the massive field. At any rate, there was still plenty of time remaining for the battle. He could freely exhaust Gallow¡¯s stamina and retaliate once he copsed from exertion.


    It was the mostmon tactic that elementium adepts employed against powerful bloodline adepts!


    While Scarface Gallow and Medium Dante were busy with their chase, tens of thousands of kilometers away in the depths of the forest, Greem and Sanazar¡¯s battle raged on.


    Compared to the massive gulf in power between Gallow and Dante, Greem¡¯s and Sanazar¡¯s strength was nearly equal. The only difference came in the form of meleebat techniques.


    As the two of them tussled with each other, Greem suffered from having a less resilient body. His closebat attacks also inflicted far less damage than Sanazar¡¯s poison fangs and ws.


    Fortunately, with the aid of the Chip¡¯sbat assistance system, he was able to dodge several violent strikes from Sanazar, while giving her a beating with the holy light damage from Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring.


    When the two of them finally broke apart after a particrly violent exchange, the first round of the battle finally came to its end.


    Greem leaped a kilometer away with Fire Teleportation. He looked at the badly burned Flying Venom Dragon before gritting his teeth and turning to treat the wounds on his body.


    The bright yellow mes around him had now been stained with ayer of green. Even Greem¡¯s own body was now covered in patches of ck, purple, and green. Sickly-green liquid flowed out of dark sores on his skin, leaving a deathly pungent odor in the air.

 Chapter 1036 - A Bloody Battle

    Chapter 1036 A Bloody Battle


    Greem stood up with some difficulty.


    At this moment, he didn¡¯t dare to change back from his me Fiend form at all. Otherwise, the severe physical damage he had suffered would instantly overwhelm his human body.


    A purple abyssal me rose from Greem¡¯s indigo w, which he pressed against the basin-sized wound on his chest. A muffled explosion rang out as the fire erupted. Surging mes ignited all over his body once again, driving away the poison energies lingering on the seventeen wounds all over his body.


    If he had enough time, he could be more gentle and thorough with this maneuver. However, with the enemy right in front of him, he had to recover as soon as possible. Such a rough and crude method of treatment was his only choice.


    After the poison had been driven out, Greem could finally put his twenty-two points of Physique to use. Not only did the small tears on his skin start mending, but the two wounds on his chest and below his ribs that nearly went straight through his body started healing. Numerous flesh tendrils grew around the injuries, wildly meshing together and pulling the wounds closed.


    Regardless of the condition of his internal organs, at least the wounds on the surface had all healed. There were no weaknesses in his defense.


    Meanwhile, the parts where his ribs had snapped in half were pulled back to their original positions by the muscle fibers as they tightened and pulled. Even though the fractures were still there, they were not a big issue for the moment with theyers of flesh, tendons, and muscle over them.


    Greem channeled his magical powers as sweat ran down his entire body, stimting the cells and tissues to regenerate at a rapid pace. He had managed to patch together most of the injuries on his person.


    In just five minutes, Greem had managed to deal with all his wounds. mes erupted from all over his body once again, as if he was perfectly unharmed.


    At least it looked like that!


    If Greem¡¯s 22 points of Physique were already impressive, then Sanazar¡¯s 39 points could only be more astounding. After the bloody battle from earlier, the surface of Sanazar¡¯s body had already been reduced to crisp ashes.


    However, as her bloodline powers surged through her body, she simply shook her form, and the thoroughly carbonized skin fell off to reveal the wildly growing flesh beneath.


    Halfway through Greem¡¯s own treatment, Sanazar had alreadypleted her healing. All the burns on the surface of her body had vanished, once again covered by the revulsive slime that she secreted from her body.


    Healing one¡¯s wounds with magical powers alone; it was an ability unique to high-grade adepts!


    As long as they still had stamina left, they could endlessly heal, heal, and heal some more. It allowed these adepts to maintain their peakbat prowess perpetually.


    As a bloodline adept, Sanazar¡¯s speed at healing her body was superior to Greem. In addition to her vastly superior magic and physical resistance, she had clearly obtained the advantage after the first round of battle.


    After healing her body, Sanazar roared and lunged at Greem without any hesitation. Meanwhile, Greem was not done with his treatment yet. As such, he could only dodge the iing attacks while hastening his healing.


    The second battle between the two adepts immediately broke out.


    The many adepts gathered before the magical screens couldn¡¯t help but focus on the battle once more as the two titans on the screen shed again. In particr, those adepts of different factions silently began to cheer for the fighter they favored.


    ¡°Lady Mary. Teacher...Teacher, he...¡± Meryl couldn¡¯t help but start worrying for her teacher at this moment. ¡°Teacher is an elementium adept. Why is he giving up his advantage and engaging that slimy catfish in a close fight?¡±


    Mary couldn¡¯t help but frown as well. It seemed like she had the same question.


    Rather, it was Emelia, who was hiding by their side, happily eating golden peaches while ncing at the screen absent-mindedly, that couldn¡¯t help but pout and said, ¡°Of course it¡¯s to wear the opponent down!¡±


    ¡°Wear her down?¡± Meryl couldn¡¯t help but repeatedly mutter to herself.


    ¡°If it wasn¡¯t to exhaust the opponent¡¯s energy reserves earlier and faster, do you think our n leader would run up for a beating?¡± Emelia, with her strange origins and unusual personality, clearly had a thorough and deep understanding of most things that others could notprehend. She had always functioned as the ¡®advisor¡¯ and ¡®strategist,¡¯ even amongst this group of female adepts that she was close with.


    Mary wasn¡¯t as gentle as Meryl. She pinched Emelia by her soft and slender waist and threatened, ¡°Hurry up and tell us what you can tell! Stop holding back and being such a tease! You leave me hanging again, and I¡¯ll bite you.¡±


    ¡°Ayaya.¡± The poor girl winced in pain. She had no choice but to roll her eyes and reveal her thoughts as quickly as possible.


    ¡°The n leader issued a challenge the moment he stepped onto the battlefield. It¡¯s obvious that he wants to deal with the first opponent quickly.¡±


    ¡°This...we all know this!¡±


    ¡°What do you know...ow!¡± Emelia cried out in pain again. ¡°Alright, let¡¯s talk about this from a different perspective. If it were you, how would you deal with a Third Grade opponent who was as powerful as yourself?¡±


    ¡°Fight! Of course, I would fight intensely and without stop.¡±


    ¡°Right? As you¡¯ve seen, these Third Grade monsters all have ridiculous defense and regeneration. It¡¯s nearly impossible to defeat them in a single blow. Unless our n leader is a Fourth Grade and can rely on an absolute power advantage to crush them, his only choice is to fight an honest battle of attrition.¡±


    ¡°Can¡¯t he use technique to beat the opponent?¡±


    ¡°Heh, silly girl, do you think these Third Grades are all idiots? Once they realize they are at a disadvantage in a fight, they will either change tactics or change battlefields. There is no way they would allow the enemy an opportunity to suppress them for extended periods. If our n leader uses gueri tactics and takes full advantage of his elementium might, do you think this slimy catfish will keep fighting with him? She¡¯s sure to run while fighting. There¡¯s no way she lets our n leader have the advantage on the battlefield for too long.¡±


    Emelia put on a sly smile.


    ¡°When that happens, it¡¯s sure to be a messy fight all over the ce. One of them will be chasing the other, and the next moment the other person will be doing the chasing instead. No one would be able to gain theplete upper hand. If that were the case, then with the regenerative powers of Third Grade adepts, the fight would easily drag on for weeks and months. The n leader probably doesn¡¯t want that situation to ur, which is why he is intentionally betraying his weakness and keeping that woman fighting.¡±


    At this point, both Mary and Meryl understood the situation.


    They both knew very well what trump cards Greem had hidden up his sleeves. The elementium magical machine would probably have appeared if he were intent on fighting with all his might.


    The fact that he was holding back on these trump cards probably had something to do with his current strategy.


    In all of his past battles, the elementium magical machine was always the one charging at the forefront and wearing down the enemy¡¯s reserves. It wasn¡¯t until the enemy was exhausted that Greem would take over. However, this time Greem was treating himself as the cannon fodder and saving the elementium magical machine as the final trump card to seal the deal.


    This decision and strategy were clearly beyond everyone¡¯s expectations!


    Still, could this really fool his opponent?


    Sanazar was impulsive and rash, but not foolish. Even if she couldn¡¯t glean it clearly, she could still figure out the outlines of Greem¡¯s n. That said, she got to have the advantage for free here. She might as well take it.


    Who knew who was going to be the one to be shocked when both sides started revealing their hands!


    ............


    Compared to the gossiping on the Crimson n¡¯s side, the Sarubo n¡¯s party was a bit more lively and in higher spirits.


    Every time the lithe and hideous dragon charged into the me Fiend¡¯s Burning Domain and engaged him in another earthshaking round of fighting, the Sarubo n adepts raised their fists and cheer.


    ¡°Bite his throat!¡±


    ¡°Dodge the fireball...ah, what a shame.¡±


    ¡°Careful of his me whip!¡±


    ......


    As if they were involved in the fight itself, Second Grade F¨¹gen as well as First Grade Keoghan and Am all trembled nervously and shouted through their teeth.


    Almost as if their cheering had an effect, Sanazar maintained the upper hand on the screen, injuring the me Fiend all over and covering him in blood. Inparison, the damage she had received was far lighterpared to Greem.


    Though it wasn¡¯t enough to form a decisive advantage, it slowly tilted the scales in Sanazar¡¯s favor.


    It was already the fourth round of exchanges between the two of them!


    Sanazar seemed to have seen the advantage present, as well as the chance at victory. As such, she refused to back off even as she suffered from severe fire damage. She no longer gave Greem any opportunity to step out of the battlefield to heal himself.


    Both parties were inflicting damage on their opponent at every moment, while also enduring unimaginable attacks themselves. However, as long as the enemy received a heavier blow, then it would be considered a small victory!


    With Sanazar¡¯s 39 points of Physique, any attacks below 300 points of power could not even break her skin. Only attacks above 500 could leave behind a visible mark.


    However, damage of this level did not count for much.


    If the opponent¡¯s attacks were slightly slower, then they would not even be able to inflict damage faster than Sanazar¡¯s body could heal.


    A Vicious FIreball of shocking power exploded on Sanazar¡¯s body. The surging mes left a burn the size of a bowl on her body. However, when the shockwave faded, the burned area started to heal and vanish at a visible rate.


    Perhaps that wound would be entirely gone by the time the fire energy faded entirely!


    With her powerful Physique and tremendous resilience, Sanazar had the ability to drag the enemy into a bloody battle like this.

 Chapter 1037 - Magical Pod

    Chapter 1037 Magical Pod


    Greem and Sanazar¡¯s battle thoroughly destroyed the forest.


    In the next three days, the power of the two adepts slowly rose to a peak before gradually descending. In particr, there were two points in time where their tremendous power was put on full disy.


    The first was ten hours after the start of the battle. Greem, who was being overwhelmed by Sanazar¡¯s tremendous Strength and Physique, suddenly erupted with shocking power. For a while, he was able to perfectly match Sanazar in pure physical Strength.


    Since then, it had be Greem¡¯s turn to beat down on Sanazar. It was a ridiculous sight.


    He had incredible Strength equal to Sanazar¡¯s own, iparably powerful fire magic, and that indefensible and fearsome holy light. All of those allowed Greem to fight like a madman, suppressing Sanazar beneath him and leaving her scrambling to stay in the fight.


    Fortunately, this situation onlysted for eight hours.


    Eighteen hours after their fight started, Sanazar¡¯s power suddenly spiked as well. She managed to defend against Greem¡¯s wild assault and turn the disadvantageous situation back to the delicate bnce from earlier.


    These two moments were naturally the instants they respectively analyzed the narws and broke free of the nar suppression. Through this time difference, some people who paid more attention could naturally figure out certain secrets about the two adepts that they would rather keep hidden.


    Both of them were supposed to be peak Third Grade adepts. Even with the difference in the elementium and bloodline systems, their abilities should still be nearly the same. Yet, Greem had somehow managed to eliminate the influence of nar suppression a whole eight hours before Sanazar was able to do so. The information revealed by this number was already enough to draw the attention of certain people.


    Even though the nar suppression still affected them, it was negligible now.


    The terrifying destructive power unleashed by these two Third Grade adepts who were able to fight with all they had was put on full disy in this battle.


    In the entire twenty-seven hour duration of their wild battle, every piece of the green forest within fifty kilometers of them was ravaged and stripped of all life.


    Greenery faded and lives were extinguished wherever they went. Craters and burn marks of varying severity littered the scorched ground. Moreover, the bottom of these craters were all filled with either scorched cracks or glowing green liquid.


    Looking from high above, a dark blight had appeared in the center of the vast forest. Dark red magma that had yet to cool down could be seen everywhere, along with the blindingly bright green liquid, turning the ce into a death zone where no life could approach.


    Finally, after twenty-seven hours of bitter fighting, both adepts felt worn out. They had no choice but to stop the battle and treat their wounds instead.


    After all, they only wanted to determine a victor, not kill their opponent. There was no need to push the opponent over the edge. Moreover, if their condition deteriorated too severely, they would not be able to fend off the opponent¡¯sst gambit. As such, they both decided to hold back at the right moment and recover to a safe threshold before they continued fighting.


    If the bloody fighting had been a direct confrontation, then the next contest came in the form of their regenerative abilities.


    Whoever could recover faster would have the initiative in the next battle. Whoever was slower at healing wouldck the confidence and capital to fight; their opponent would bitterly suppress them.


    However, the two adepts could not truly let their opponents calmly recover, even during this period of rest.


    Greem casually opened a megate, summoning hundreds of fire creatures from the Fire Elementium ne to lunge at Sanazar, who was treating herself a kilometer away from him.


    Greem had never summoned the megate a single time before this.


    The reason for this was simple. The summoned fire creatures were far too weak. Theycked the ability to interfere in a battle between Third Grade adepts. If he had the time and energy to summon a megate, he might as well cast a Vicious Fireball. That would probably inflict more significant damage on his opponent.


    However, now that it was a period of rest, the advantage of the megate¡¯s ability to relentlessly summon fire creatures could finally manifest.


    Greem didn¡¯t care if these fire creatures could wound Sanazar in any capacity. He would be happy as long as they could somewhat disrupt her recovery.


    After some hesitation, Greem took out the golem talisman and released the elementium magical machine. He thenmanded it to charge at Sanazar as well.


    The elementium magical machine had been seen in public several times after all. There was almost no chance of concealing its existence. That was why Greem had only released it once both his and Sanazar¡¯s power had fallen to their lowest.


    Of course, there was no way Sanazar had not been prepared for this signature Third Grade magical machine that was always at Greem¡¯s side. A cold and sinister smile appeared on her face when she saw the metallic giant rise from the ground.


    ¡°I¡¯ve been waiting for you!¡±


    Sanazar mumbled to herself, before lowering her head and taking out a gray wooden sk from her pouch, which she flung at the charging magical machine. The wooden sh was only the size of a palm. It was inconspicuous and appeared not to be enchanted with any sort of magical protections either. Just as expected, it simply shattered upon the machine¡¯s chest.


    Blue liquid scattered across the ground when the sk shattered. A strange golden pea soaking in the liquid fell at the elementium magical machine¡¯s feet.


    The moment the pea touched the earth, the round, t pod cheered. The six thin leaves beneath the pod curled into a jagged shape, anchoring it firmly to the ground. The roots beneath the leaves pierced into the earth like sharp des, quickly spreading and digging deeper into the ground.


    A golden pea.


    The Chip in Greem¡¯s mind found all information on golden peas in one-thousandths of a second and sent it to him. Greem read through all the information in an instant, and his expression instantly changed.


    ¡°Destroy it! You must not let it take roots!¡±


    Greem roared an order at the elementium magical machine.


    There was actually no need to shout. The moment the magical machine had already lifted its thick metal legs to stomp down on the golden pea was the same moment it received the warning signals from Greem.


    Unfortunately, it was toote!


    An earthshaking explosion rang out. The ground beneath the magical machine split open, and a green nt over five meters in diameter burst forth, entangling the device and pushing it further up into the sky. Like an endless flight of stairs to heaven, the green nt grew without pause, extending even further and longer. In the blink of an eye, it had brought the elementium magical machine above the clouds, causing it to vanish from sight.


    ¡°Dammit! I knew it was a Magical Pod.¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but curse as he watched the thick shoots continue to grow upwards wildly. As the Magical Pod was rising far too quickly, the sound of whistling winds could even be heard close to the nt itself.


    The Magical Pod was both a magical creation and a strange spell of its own.


    Having been soaking in the Springwater of Regeneration, it would grow wildly upon leaving its wooden sk, whisking away all things within ten meters of where itnded. In all seriousness, the Magical Pod had no offensive power. It had only unintentionally blown the elementium magical machine away due to its wild growth.


    When used at the right time, Magical Pods could have the effect of banishing or entangling spells.


    Of course, most of the time, adepts that cultivated Magical Pods used them to save themselves.


    At least, to Greem¡¯s understanding, there was no spell that could instantly ¡®transport¡¯ the caster several hundred kilometers away. However, cultivating a Magical Pod required a hefty amount of Springwater of Regeneration. The price of doing so was costly.


    Magical creations like the Magical Pod could not grow forever either. Its growth was only the result of several dozens of years of umted life force erupting in a single instant. Even a Third Grade adept like Greem would have trouble thoroughly destroying it while it was growing. Moreover, the Magical Pod had already extended several hundred kilometers in just a matter of seconds. Greem would have no chance of retrieving the elementium magical machine even if he spent the effort to destroy the shoot.


    The elementium magical machine would be eliminated from the rest of this battle!


    Damn! Such an excellent means for survival and she used it to deal with his elementium magical machine. Faced with such a wasteful and extravagant method of banishing his elementium magical machine, Greem could only curse. There was nothing he could do.


    After seven seconds, the short lifespan of the Magical Pod came to an end.


    A sound resembling that of burning paper rang out as the gigantic nt instantly turned to ashes, leaving behind only a massive crater and a sky full of scattering ash.


    Meanwhile, the magical machine that had been whisked away was nowhere to be seen. It might have crashed somewhere else several hundreds of kilometers away.


    Cough.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a silent sigh.


    Fame could be a double-edged sword, indeed. With every step he took towards the pinnacle of power, every secret that he possessed no longer remained a secret. He became the target of research and investigation for tens of thousands of adepts. Those who dared participated in this battle of the best probably all had various means meant to counter Greem¡¯s unusual tactics. They were simply waiting for him to reveal his hand!


    What about Remi, his Spirit of Pestilence?


    Greem let out Remi probingly, and Sanazar immediately took out an ancient scroll. The scroll radiated with an overwhelming magical aura.


    Spirit Sealing!


    A Third Grade magical scroll!


    It could temporarily seal a magical creature that existed in a spiritual form, containing them within another dimension.


    The scroll was Third Grade. Naturally, it would have no problem dealing with the beginner Third Grade Remi. After all, Remi was a spiritual creature.


    Greem¡¯s expression froze. He had no choice but to have Remi turn back into a rune and attach it to himself.


    What was his n now? Summon Arms?


    However, Greem rejected his own idea without even attempted to verify its feasibility.


    Summoning otherworldly creatures was a spell, after all. If Sanazar were prepared, a simple wand with Banish would send the thunder dragon all the way back from where he came. When that happened, Greem would have exhausted arge amount of Spirit and magical energy for nothing!

 Chapter 1038 - Wear Down

    Chapter 1038 Wear Down


    Greem was now in an entirely different position than in the past.


    In the past, he had preferred to maintain a low profile. Every time he revealed his unusual abilities, it would be a massive surprise for his enemies. However, with every step he took towards the peak of the World of Adepts, the more well-known his abilities became.


    At this point, the enemies that dared to show themselves before him either believed in their prowess or had made all the necessary preparations to counter his techniques.


    Consequently, every fight from now on would be incredibly brutal and torturous.


    The main reason for that was simple. All of his opponents were high-grade adepts. They were vicious and cunning individuals that had achieved their current positions despite the brutal and intensepetition of the adept system. They had also experienced fortunate encounters, much like those that Greem had. As such, every high-grade adept invariably had some deep secrets unknown to the rest of the world.


    Take Sanazar, for example!


    She was also a prodigy that had grown up in the spotlight. She had been discovered with adept talent at the young age of seven and was then sent to an adept¡¯s tower. She became a pseudo-adept at nine years old and advanced to adepthood at eleven. Her journey was smooth sailing throughout, making her the target of envy of countlesspanions and friends of the same age.


    The Panwood Academy that Sanazar joined at the time was a small adept organization. The strongest individual in the organization was the Second Grade director of the academy. Naturally, he was overjoyed to have obtained a disciple with such talent and, thus, had invested plenty of resources into her development.


    Sanazar was not only a talented individual at the time. She was also an incredibly pretty woman and became the ¡®goddess¡¯ that many young male adepts vied for.


    As a rtively small, isted organization that was hidden away in the ruins of an unknown ancient city, Panwood Academy had very littlemunication with the outside world.


    Yet, it was this peaceful and ordinary adept organization that suddenly had a disastrous incident befall it.


    In a single night, all seven official adepts and thirty-six apprentices of the organization were turned into puddles of pungent poison liquid. Sanazar, the only survivor, had been driven mad. She had also mysteriously advanced to Second Grade.


    It wasn¡¯t that major of an incident, but it still attracted the attention of the Zhentarim Association. An investigation team led by Elder Sarubo hurried to the remains of Panwood Academy. After a series of subtle investigations, they came to a conclusion.


    The cause of Panwood Academy¡¯s destruction was the Second Grade director. He had coveted Sanazar¡¯s beauty and talent and had wanted to turn her into his personal property. Unfortunately, he had faced intense resistance from Sanazar. Since the two of them had fallen out, the director decided to go to the extreme. He used the cruelest of magic to turn Sanazar into the ugly but powerful Flying Venom Dragon.


    However, some issues seemed to have urred during the imntation of the control rune. Sanazar abruptly regained her consciousness and burst out into a berserk fury, ughtering every adept and apprentice in the academy with her newly obtained bloodline.


    As a victim herself, Sanazar¡¯s ¡®crimes¡¯ were naturally pardoned. At the same time, out of pity for her talent and potential, Fourth Grade Adept Sarubo, who was responsible for the investigation, inducted her into his own n.


    Today, Sanazar has be a powerful Third Grade bloodline adept and a pir of the Sarubo n, managing all matters within the n headquarters.


    The experience in her younger years had obviously affected Sanazar¡¯s personality to a high degree. It turned her into an impulsive and rash individual, savage and cruel. However, what she could not tolerate above all else was the terrifying devastation that the Flying Venom Dragon bloodline had done to her appearance!


    The bodies of humans were far too weak, after all. They could not endure the corrosion and modification of a poison bloodline. As such, the once beautiful Sanazar cloaked her own body with purple mist to avoid others looking upon her fearsome and hideous appearance.


    Every transformation into the Flying Venom Dragon was a form of torture upon herself. It would cause her to recall the horrifying event in the past. Sanazar always became exceptionally mad and tyrannical after transforming.


    Of course, she also became unusually powerful.


    The magical equipment she chose for herself was also very specific to her circumstances. They were the Tempest Heart protective talisman and the Bramblethorn Armor.


    The Tempest Heart could increase her base physical damage by thirty-percent while sharpening her ws and teeth into Third Grade magical weapons. However, this came at the cost of her intelligence being reduced by half. The Bramblethorn Armor, on the other hand, could form ayer of thorns on her body, causing all enemies that attacked her to endure fifteen-percent of all damage that they inflicted on her.


    Fortunately, this Bramblethorn Armor could only reflect Greem¡¯s fire damage, but not his holy light damage that could ignore all defenses. Otherwise, Greem would have long since fallen to thebined might of Sanazar and himself.


    After all, Greem only had elementary fire immunity at the moment. He was not protected from light elementium damage.


    Meanwhile, Greem had also left a deep impression on Sanazar during this battle.


    Even though he was clearly an elementium adept, he was able to fight a bloodline adept like herself in a melee to a standstill. It was evidence of Greem¡¯s shockingly formidable attributes. If an elementium adept had a Physique as tough as a body-refining adept or a bloodline adept, then how powerful could they be whenbined with their fearsome elementium magic?


    Greem no longer held back at this point in the battle.


    He quickly switched from his me Fiend¡¯s body to his Body of mes. He no longer tussled with Sanazar at close range and instead started bombarding from afar.


    With the surprising movement of the Body of mes and the phantom-like Fire Teleportation, Greem weaved between the seas of me like a fire spirit, swarming Sanazar with intense fireballs and tides of infernos.


    With the four-hundred points of holy light damage provided by Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, every single one of Greem¡¯s attack had over eight-hundred points of power. That was already close to the offensive power of Fourth Grade adepts. Of course, this inflicted iparable damage on Sanazar.


    The terrifying burn marks left by the fire magic and the scorch marks left by the holy light power caused Sanazar¡¯s ugly body to be covered with scars. Her thirty-nine points of Physique were wildly healing her body, but they were no match for Greem¡¯s insane ability to inflict damage.


    The significantly weakened Sanazar thrashed within the exploding mes, madly chasing after Greem¡¯s flickering Body of mes yet always falling into the traps he set. She would either be smashed into the ground by Meteor Showers from above or sted left and right by me Pirs bursting forth from below.


    Even as they reveled in the pure disy of power, the savage might that Greem disyed after taking off his veil of gentleness struck fear in the hearts of every adept watching the battle.


    A beatdown. An undisputed beatdown!


    Greem relied on his mobile Body of mes to dodge Sanazar¡¯s repeated attempt to lunge at him. He then used vicious fire magic to drown her in a tide of mes.


    It didn¡¯t matter how Sanazar struggled or charged. She could not escape the mes that continued to pursue her as if they were her shadow. She could only furiously roar as she rushed from one sea of fire to another. Everywhere around her, every spot within her vision, was all filled with devastating mes.


    If it weren¡¯t for her bloodline providing her with exceptional Physique and magic resistance, Sanazar would already have been reduced to ashes beneath such powerful fire.


    However, even as badly beaten as she was, Sanazar still charged through the mes stubbornly, searching for that radiant silhouette formed out of bright yellow mes. The flesh on the surface of her body ked off as ash, and new tissue quickly grew again.


    With her fearsome regenerative powers and her enduring bloodline powers, Sanazar was able to remain standing even in the face of Greem¡¯s most brutal attacks.


    It was now a contest of whose powers were more overwhelming and whose stamina couldst longer.


    If Sanazar had greater Physique and could endure until Greem¡¯s Spirit had been exhausted, then she would be the victor. However, if Greem¡¯s fire magic were even more ferocious and exhausted Sanazar¡¯s bloodline powers, it would be a different story. Without her bloodline powers, Sanazar would not be a match for Greem.


    The two adepts finally moved into attrition mode on their third day on Bluesea ne. An unprecedented duel between two of the strongest adepts began.


    It was the Flying Venom Dragon¡¯s thirty-nine points of Physique against the me giant¡¯s thirty-nine points of Spirit.


    The fight should not have been like this!


    With the cautiousness of Third Grade adepts and their variety of magical techniques, this battle should havested for several weeks and been filled with all sorts of traps and schemes.


    However, due to someone intentionally driving the battle in this direction, the fight had deviated from its original course.


    It didn¡¯t matter if this battle was what the audience wanted to watch. Greem was firmly proceeding down this path.


    If he had fought like an elementium adept from the very start, Sanazar would most definitely have begun fleeing while fighting, dragging this battle into a drawn-out affair of constantly probing each other.


    When that happened, Greem would have had an exceedingly hard time finishing the battle in a short time!


    Now, having exhausted most of her stamina, Sanazar could no longer escape from the range of Greem¡¯s fire magic; she could only passively endure the ferocious mes.


    Sanazar roared and struggled with all her might in wave after wave of monstrous fire attacks. Poison halos ravaged the earth over and over as she held on with all she had. Sadly, she had already fallen into Greem¡¯s rhythm. There was nothing she could do to improve her situation apart from struggling in vain.


    Finally, the Flying Venom Dragon reared its neck and roared in the tides of mes. A dense cloud of purple mist erupted around its body, and Sanazar uncontrobly reverted to her human form.

 Chapter 1039 - Victorious Return

    Chapter 1039 Victorious Return


    Sanazar was defeated!


    The countless adepts watching this scene couldn¡¯t help but let out a long and drawn-out sigh.


    It wasn¡¯t that Sanazar was weak. It was simply that her opponent was stronger than her!


    Greem was an opponent with a Physique as tough as a bloodline adept and the terrifying offensive power of an elementium adept. Anyone would hate to run into an enemy like that.


    Greem had already reverted from his Body of mes into his human body. He looked at the apocalyptic scene around him and slowly walked towards the scorched figure lying in the center of the carnage.


    Sanazar had alsopletely reverted back into her human form.


    She was not obscured by any purple mist and appeared to be unusually skinny. Most of her body was also covered in burn marks from the mes. Some traces of her former beauty were visible on her face, but only uneven scars and disgusting sores remained now.


    Bloodline adepts were not actual magical creatures, after all. They might be able to allow themselves to temporarily possess horrifying might rivaling that of powerful magical creatures through bloodline reversion or purification. However, once their bloodline power was exhausted, they would be a mortal once again, exposing their weak and pitiful side.


    With how mighty Sanazar¡¯s Flying Venom Dragon was, the fact that she could fight with Greem for three whole days before exhausting her bloodline powers was already fairly evident of her talent.


    If she hadn¡¯t fought so vigorously and had instead fled the battle to recover her bloodline power, this battle could have gone on for far longer. At the very least, Greem would have had to pay a more substantial price to obtain victory!


    However, Sanazar¡¯s excessively rash and impulsive personality ended up being her downfall. She had paid a costly price for her actions.


    Sanazar struggled and propped herself up from the ground. Her carbonized skin trembled from the movement and ked off as dust and ash, revealing the red and white flesh beneath; it was still steaming with heat.


    ¡°Good...very good.¡± A smile uglier than a ghost appeared on Sanazar¡¯s face. She ignored the injuries on her body as she furiously shouted, ¡°I never expected there would be a time when my eyes would betray me. To think, I was defeated by a person I looked down upon. Defeated! Very well, this belongs to you now.¡±


    After finishing what she had to say, a ck crystal flew from Sanazar¡¯s charred body and hovered in front of Greem, where it slowly rotated on the spot.


    Greem took out the other ck crystal he owned, and the two strange crystals immediately merged, emitting an invisible flux in the air.


    Greem silently vanished from the spot, along with the crystal.


    Once Greem had teleported away, a ck-robed silhouette appeared on the battlefield. The figure slowly walked towards the panting Sanazar. After examining her wounds, the individual sighed before picking her up and vanishing.


    Naturally, the destination of the teleportation crystal was Kerslin Castle.


    When Greem emerged from the teleportation array shrouded in killing intent, the one to greet him was a familiar face¨C Association adept Laurent. Before the two of them could speak, the array behind Greem trembled slightly. A ck-robed adept walked out with Sanazar in his arms.


    Sanazar had already fallen unconscious from exertion, avoiding the awkwardness of another encounter between herself and Greem again.


    Laurent, who was all smiles earlier, immediately bowed respectfully upon seeing the ck-robed figure, ¡°My greetings, Elder Nics!¡±


    The ck-robed adept ignored Laurent entirely. Blinding light shone from his eyes beneath his hood as he stared at Greem coldly. ¡°Good...very good. Here is the toy you left behind. Put it away properly!¡±


    Adept Nics casually threw down a metal doll the size of someone¡¯s palm. A strange red thread had been wrapped all around it. After taking it in his hand and looking at it properly, Greem was shocked to find that the doll was the elementium magical machine he had left in Bluesea ne.


    This elementium magical machine that used to be several meters tall and several dozens of tons heavy had now been turned into a miniature metal toy; Greem was having a hard time epting this sudden change.


    It was obvious that the strange red strings around the doll were some sort of special sealing technique. Greem didn¡¯t dare to break the seal haphazardly without some research first.


    Elder Nics walked away with Sanazar in his arms after throwing the magical machine to Greem.


    Greem finally turned his eyes back to Adept Laurent after Nicspletely vanished from sight.


    Upon seeing Greem¡¯s confused look, Laurent exined with a bitter smile, ¡°Back when Elder Sarubo was still in the Association, he had helped Elder Nics tremendously. Elder Nics was still a First Grade adept back then!¡±


    Greem nodded his head in understanding.


    With tens of thousands of years of history behind the Association, the internal rtions of the various individuals were extremelyplicated. It was not something that an outsider like himself could hope to understand in such a short time. After putting away his elementium magical machine, Greem exchanged a few more words with Laurent before apologetically taking his leave.


    Laurent apanied him all the way to the door of his room. He let out a long sigh when they bid farewell to each other, ¡°I already expected you to have a chance to win, but I didn¡¯t think you would seed in such an overwhelming fashion. Maybe, in the future, even I will be counting on your favor. Speaking of which, you now have twelve days of rest. Make sure to make full use of it!¡±


    Having said that, Laurent turned and left, seemingly upied with all sorts of thoughts and emotions over what he had just witnessed.


    Greem closed his eyes and thought for a moment. He then gave up on thinking about whether there were any hidden implications in Laurent¡¯s words and instead turned to enter his room.


    He immediately ran into several beautiful faces that had been flushed red as tomatoes.


    ¡°Congrattions.¡±


    ¡°I knew it! Teacher, you are the best.¡±


    ¡°Congrattions, n leader.¡±


    The first to greet him were naturally Mary, Meryl, and Emelie. Behind them were seven or eight adepts he wasn¡¯t acquainted with. Naturally, these were adepts from smaller adept organizations that had recently chosen to submit to the Crimson n.


    The Association had set the Ailovis region as the Crimson n¡¯s ring of influence, but the power and authority of the n allowed them to have a voice in the neighboring areas as well.


    It was these small and mid-sized adept organizations that helped the Crimson n project their influence into further regions.


    These ns did not have the ability or power to direct any sort of conversation in their local regions. They could only get closer to the Crimson n and borrow their power to execute their own will. Any adept n or organization in their territory would first have to weigh the intentions of the Crimson n before they waged war against them.


    If their enemies were to invite the intervention of the Crimson n, they would be in big trouble. Even organizations led by Third Grade adepts would not be able to bear the wrath of the Crimson n. They would quickly lose theirnds and resource sites with a single misstep.


    One had to admit that all these ns had a wild and ferocious streak for standing by the Crimson n¡¯s side before Greem had won the tournament. If they had ced the wrong bets, the consequences would have been ugly. It was very likely that they would be ripped up by the roots from the Central Region and exiled from Zhentarim, just as the Crimson n would be.


    As such, the n leaders all became relieved upon seeing Greem¡¯s amazing performance in the first battle. Genuine and heartfelt smiles naturally appeared on their faces.


    If Greem won this battle of the powerhouses and became a Fourth Grade adept, then all these adept organizations would have reaped a reward a hundred times what they had invested. More importantly, the adept organizations they represented would go up by one or two levels in their respective regions, allowing them to be a core force with actual influence.


    That was what they prioritized above all!


    Greem exchanged greetings with the three girls before nodding and acknowledging the representatives of the allied ns with a nod. He then exchanged a few words with the adepts, and they knew well enough to retire for the day.


    After experiencing such a brutal battle, Greem was in great need of treatment. Once all the outsiders had left, Greem peacefullyy down on a stone bed and looked at the fight between the adepts of the other group. The three girls surrounded him and helped him take off his robe, carefully treating the countless horrifying wounds on his body.


    Greem might have won decisively in the battle against Sanazar, but his body had taken a terrible beating as well.


    The three days of mad fighting had left many hidden injuries inside and outside his body. He hadn¡¯t had the time nor opportunity to treat them then. Now was the time to deal with it all. Otherwise, should such hidden injuries umte, they would eventually ovee the limit of Greem¡¯s physical body. He would face the risk of his body breaking down.


    With the three girls helping him, he didn¡¯t need to worry about the treatment. Instead, he could devote his entire attention to the analysis of the battle on the other end.


    The battle between Scarface Gallow and Medium Dante on the boundless in was still raging on.


    Medium Adept Dante possessed three pieces of powerful magical equipment. One was the Wraith Staff, which was a significant factor in allowing him to sessfully summon powerful spiritual beings of various forms from another world.


    The spiritual beings he summoned were not too powerful offensively, but they all had incredible and fearsome abilities. Ordinary adepts would be possessed if they were off-guard for even an instant. When that happened, their lives would be decided by a single thought from Dante.


    However, Dante¡¯s opponent was Scarface Gallow, who possessed the body of an undead. He was practically immune to charming and the effects of other mental magic. As such, the spiritual beings that harbored resentment for living things could only use their fearsome screams and defense-ignoring Soul Touch to attack him.

 Chapter 1040 - Treatment and Appraisal

    Chapter 1040 Treatment and Appraisal


    The sword that Scarface Gallow used was extremely powerful, and its might far exceeded ordinary Third Grade magical equipment.


    After witnessing his battle with Medium Dante, Greem even suspected that it was Fourth Grade magical equipment. Its magical effect was ¡®Devour.¡¯ All substances that came into contact with the sword¨Cbe they tangible or intangible¨Cwould vanish instantly.


    If a living creature¡¯s flesh was devoured in this manner, that portion of tissue would never be able to regrow through natural means. At the very least, it was the case duringbat.


    Such a magical effect countered body-refining adepts and bloodline adepts who were known for their high Physique to arge extent. When this magical sword slowly devoured their resilient bodies, they would be reduced to mere skeletons; it wouldn¡¯t matter what powerful techniques they possessed. It would be of no use if their bodies were gone.


    Dante was at a disadvantage against this sword. After having two of his high-grade spiritual beings consumed by the magical sword, he lost the ability to fight with Gallow directly. He had no choice but to desperately flee and change battlefields, using distance to neutralize Gallow¡¯s wild and unstoppable offense.


    Scarface Gallow¡¯s weakness was fully exposed here.


    He had thirty-nine points of Strength and thirty-nine points of Physique. These attributes gave him unimaginably violent power and a resilient body that was nearly indestructible. His every action unleashed a destructive tide of power. An ordinary Third Grade adept would not be able to fight him face-on.


    However, mobility was Scarface Gallow¡¯s greatest weakness, and one he could notpensate for!


    In truth, his seventeen points of Agility already made him a swift swordsman whose movements were like the wind on the battlefield. Unfortunately, that much Agility counted for nothing before the elementium adepts, who possessed arge number of mobility spells.


    It didn¡¯t matter how powerful he was or how unusual his sword was. He would have to strike his enemy first.


    When Medium Dante made up his mind to y a game of cat-and-mouse against him, Gallow¡¯s weakness was utterly exposed. He chased after Dante for three days and nights without any sleep, but Dante simply refused to engage. Instead, Dante incessantly sent out all sorts of ghosts, voodoo dolls, phantom puppets, and other evil constructs to harass Gallow.


    These things could hardly harm Gallow, but they annoyed him to no ends.


    Whenever Gallow was affected by one of these beings and became possessed for even an instant, Dante would immediately close in and unleash a barrage of attacks. He would strike with his Ne of Death, which was capable of firing a Fingers of Death, while also sending his countless ghosts to rip into Gallow and using the Rituals of Dark Arts.


    All of these attacks focused on Gallow¡¯s soul consciousness. Even with his high Strength and Physique, Gallow had no means of defending himself. He could only endure these assaults with the sheer resilience of his soul.


    In truth, this was the danger in battles between high-grade adepts!


    It might seem like neither side could do anything about the other, but if the enemy caught a single chance to break through your defense, then doom might be right around the corner. The attacks of high-grade adepts were not that easily endured. Enemies that were attacked by Dante¡¯s ghosts and wraiths might look unharmed on the surface, but their most important part¨Ctheir soul origin¨Cwould already be tattered and broken. It would be incredibly difficult to recover without a long period of rest.


    That was the main reason why Medium Dante had be famous!


    Dante freely traversed the boundless ins, constantly releasing evil beings to harass Gallow, while spreading out low-grade ghosts in every direction. On the one hand, these ghosts could search for living beings and consume their flesh to make up for Dante¡¯s Spirit consumption. On the other hand, Dante could also switch positions with any of these ghosts when he was in danger, thereby avoiding any mortal strikes from Gallow.


    Meanwhile, Gallow was suffering. Even though his strength was far superior to Dante, he had no choice but to grit his teeth and bear Dante¡¯s ceaseless attacks, simply because he was too immobile to catch his opponent.


    The two adepts stormed through the ins recklessly. All living creatures died where they passed through, bing the food by which Dante sustained his energy. It included an incredibly unfortunate,rge nomad tribe that happened to be situated in the path of the two adepts¡¯ battle.


    The scale of this nomad tribe was sizeable. It had a poption of over a thousand people, along with over a hundred thousand cows, goats, and horses. Sadly, as Dante and Gallow passed through the tribe, this famous nomad tribe was instantly exterminated.


    Though the Association had intentionally ced the battlefield of the Third Grade adepts in remote locations, this incident was unavoidable. Gallow and Dante had also inflicted irreparable damage upon the environment here.


    It was important to note the impact of their actions. Every swing of Gallow¡¯s de was thebination of violent force and tremendous magical energy. Vicious sword marks stretching for hundreds of meters scarred the ground every time he struck. Meanwhile, Medium Dante¡¯s army of ghosts reaped the region of all life wherever they went.


    Dense energy particles that would not dissipate for a long time toe were left wherever the two peak Third Grade adepts shed with all their power. These particles would slowly seep into the local geography, changing the environment and the elementium energy bnce.


    Two areas where the two Third Grade adepts had fought turned into zones of death. Not only were all traces of life exterminated from these locations, but they would also remain death zones where no life could flourish for the foreseeable future.


    After all, very few creatures could endure the radiation of such powerful energy particles!


    ............


    Greemy on the stone bed,fortably and leisurely enjoying the treatment of the three beautiful adepts while he silently collected data on Scarface Gallow.


    Eighty percent of the hundred screens in front of him were locked onto Gallow, observing his every action from various angles and directions. Meanwhile, Dante¡¯s figure only took up twenty percent of the screens. Moreover, the screens where he appeared were pushed into the corners of the array, utterly ignored.


    That undoubtedly drew Mary¡¯s curiosity.


    ¡°I see you seem to ce more emphasis on Scarface Gallow. Are you sure your next opponent will be him?¡±


    ¡°Of course!¡± Greem turned his face and let Meryl put a peeled Piro fruit in his mouth. He smiled and answered whimsically as he enjoyed the sensation of the refreshing fruit bursting in his mouth.


    ¡°Why? Why do I feel like Dante has a better chance of winning? That Scarface guy can¡¯t catch up to him, while he has an entire army of ghosts to absorb life force and Spirit for him. He is practically in a situation where he cannot lose. Once Scarface¡¯s strength is exhausted, it will be the ghost guy¡¯s turn to retaliate!¡±


    ¡°The situation you are describing is valid, but that is under the presupposition that Scarface has no means of forcing Dante into a direct confrontation.¡±


    ¡°Does he have something like that up his sleeve?¡±


    ¡°Not only does he have such a thing, he certainly has such a situation; most definitely so!¡± Greem raised an eyebrow. ¡°You don¡¯t think that this is the extent of first-ranked Gallow¡¯s abilities, do you? It¡¯s not possible that all his fame came from bullying people with shorter legs than him, could it?¡±


    Emelia, who was concentrating on treating Greem¡¯s injuries, couldn¡¯t help but burst outughing when he heard Greem¡¯s joke. She then yelped in pain. Clearly, Mary had ¡®punished¡¯ her again.


    Emelia was now very different from before.


    After advancing to Second Grade, her appearance had changed massively.


    She still retained a humanoid appearance from the waist up, with a slender body and generous curves¨C a beauty by all standards. However, below her waist had split into countless strange vine-like appendages of various thicknesses. These vines could move and grab onto things ording to her will.


    She crouched at Greem¡¯s side, slicing and splitting open his flesh with her sharp and painted nails before using precise and agile moves to force out the poison remnants and foreign energy hiding in his flesh, tendons, and bones. She then used gentle nt energy to further neutralize anything she could not expel.


    All kinds of strange and unusual metallic equipment were in the small wooden box beside her. It was obvious that these were used for dissection and surgeries.


    Emelie held two incredibly sharp surgical knives in her hands, while the vines beneath her held onto a dozen other surgical tools of various functions. She was able to switch between the various tools and techniques without even lifting her head from her work.


    If she discovered any piece of flesh that waspletely dead, she would cut it off precisely, inflicting only the smallest of wounds on Greem¡¯s body. She would then casually heal the wound with Rejuvenation or Lifebloom. The nt energy stimted Greem¡¯s own recovery, allowing the injuries to heal and close up rapidly.


    Broken ribs needed to be fixed, and dead flesh needed to be cut off. Hidden foreign energy needed to be neutralized, concealed poison needed to be expelled, and damaged organs needed to be healed. All of theseplex and trivial tasks would have taken Greem a dozen days to properly deal with, even with his Physique and the healing potions he possessed.


    However, with a nt-attribute master like Emelia working with all her skill, Greem would be able to recover from all the previous fight¡¯s side-effects in a short amount of time without even lifting a single finger.


    It wasn¡¯t until she had finished all her tasks that Emelia let out a long breath of air. She put all her tools back into her box using the vines and straightened her back, before asking out of curiosity, ¡°n Leader, you still haven¡¯t answered Lady Mary¡¯s question. Why do you favor Scarface Gallow so much?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s because Scarface Gallow¡¯s energy reserves are still above 89%, while Dante¡¯s energy reserves have fallen to 73%.¡± Greem wasn¡¯t bothered by all the flesh that had been cut off his body. He smiled as he exined, ¡°I believe that Scarface Gallow is waiting for Dante¡¯s energy reserves to fall below a certain threshold before finally dealing with him in one swift blow.¡±


    Emelia was shocked.


    Gallow had been chasing Dante for four entire days and nights. He had left his harrowing sword marks across the entire ins. How did he still have 89% of his energy reserves left? That...that was unbelievable!


    Moreover, why did the n leader know these numbers so clearly?


    However, she quickly understood that the n leader wouldn¡¯t provide her with an exnation. After all, it involved the deeper secrets of a high-grade adept. He wouldn¡¯t reveal the truth, even to his most intimate partners.


    As expected, those who could participate in this tournament of powerhouses were all monsters.


    Emelia shook her head and sighed in exasperation.

 Chapter 1041 - Pursuit

    Chapter 1041 Pursuit


    The battle between Scarface Gallow and Medium Dante ended after thirteen whole days.


    Naturally, the victor of the battle was the more dominant Scarface Gallow.


    He instantly learned the results of the other battle from hispanions upon teleporting back from Bluesea, still covered in smoke and grime. In all honesty, Gallow wasn¡¯t at all surprised that Greem was the victor. However, the fact that Greem had taken only three days to take down Sanazar, who was second only to himself, was beyond his expectations.


    Gallow hurried back to his room and quickly browsed through Greem¡¯s battle while letting the n¡¯s healers treat his wounds. After watching the entire fight, he fell silent for a long, long time.


    His power might be superior to Greem, but this much advantage still wasn¡¯t enough to guarantee his victory. Thus, if he wanted to win the uing battle, his only choice was to......


    ording to the Association¡¯s rules, the time allotted for the first battle was fifteen days.


    As such, Gallow only had two days to rest, recuperate, and adjust his equipment. It was barely enough time for him to provide his battered body with a simple treatment.


    Two days quickly passed.


    It was finally the day where the two winners of the first round would fight for the title of strongest.


    Bluesea ne.


    Greem regained his senses as soon as the familiar light of teleportation faded. He quickly summoned Remi.


    His location wasn¡¯t in a forest, likest time, nor a vast in. Instead, he was on a stretch of hills and hignds. Standing atop the hill, Greem could see green fields mixed with yellow wheat in the distance.


    A light yellow windmill slowly turned on the horizon, and a few scarecrows leaned here and there in the wheat fields.


    ¡°Go, Remi. You have ten days. Ten days from now, I hope to see you bring back a sufficiently strong army to help me defeat this powerful enemy. Go,¡± Greem ordered solemnly.


    Remi, who was only slightly taller than one meter, acknowledged the order with the same seriousness. He then immediately turned and flew into the distance.


    Chimney smoke was rising from that ce. There should be a human vige there.


    After sending Remi away, Greem took out his teleportation crystal. His opponent, Scarface Gallow, should be in the northwest, deeper into the hignds.


    Unlike the first round, he did not approach the enemy as soon as possible. Instead, he took out sn elementium golem core and threw it to the ground, summoning a Second Grade wind dragon.


    This wind dragon was one of his earlier works. Unfortunately, at this point, with the gradual increase in his power, the Second Grade golem had lost all chance of shining in battle. However, the reason Greem had summoned the wind dragon today wasn¡¯t to do battle, but to run.


    He jumped onto the wind dragon and found afortable spot on its broad and even back. He whistled, and the wind dragon beat its light green wings, turning into a flicker of green and gray as it shot into the sky and flew southeast.


    Two hourster, Scarface Gallow arrived at the same spot on an exceedingly handsome Nightmare.


    He reined his horse on top of the hill and looked around him. He even sniffed the air several times before finally frowning.


    Two strange energy auras had split up here. One trail was filled with the revolting smell of voodoo poison, while the other, containing dense wind elementium, led upwards into the sky. Of course, the teleportation crystal pointed in the direction of the wind elementium.


    Judging from this, Greem had summoned a wind elementium mount and left this location. The direction he left...was the exact opposite of where Gallow hade from.


    He was fleeing from the battlefield.


    That seemed to be the exact opposite of his strategy from the first round!


    Somewhat confused by Greem¡¯s actions, Scarface Gallow had no other option but to whip his Nightmare and pursue in the direction Greem had fled.


    Nightmares were strange creatures that came from the Abyssal ne.


    Technically, they were categorized as demonic beings. Of all the various voodoo beast mounts, Gallow had chosen a Nightmare as his steed simply because it looked the coolest of them all. It had arge and mighty body of ck and red, a tough spiral horn on its head, four hooves burning with cold mes, spirited eyes, a vigorous tail, and a snout spewing sparks of fire with every breath. Nightmares looked simr to unicorns on the outside, but the nature of their power was the exact opposite.


    Unicorns were of the holy attribute, while Nightmares were of the demonic attribute.


    When a Nightmare stepped upon the ground, their hooves burned with abyssal mes and left a zing trail behind them. From a distance, the red and ck Nightmares were like terrifying monsters that had emerged from your worst dreams. Riding on them was simply too cool.


    Scarface Gallow rapidly traveled through the hills on the back of the Nightmare, leaving behind a broken path burning with ghostly mes. After chasing for an entire day and night, he finally found Greem above a tall cliff.


    Greem stood silently at the top of the cliff, where a strange dragon made entirely out of violent wind vortices crouched by his side.


    He cast a faint smile at Gallow when he saw him appear out of the distance.


    ¡°This is the battlefield you chose for yourself?¡± Gallow looked around him and spoke harshly. ¡°With how powerful you and I are, no battlefield can allow either of us to gain too much of an advantage. Victory will stille down to a matter of our own abilities. You¡ª¡±


    Greem waved at Gallow before he could finish speaking.


    ¡°Bye!¡±


    Having said that, Greem jumped onto his wind dragon and took to the skies, fleeing into the distance without any hesitation.


    ¡°You will stay.¡± Scarface Gallow never expected Greem to turn and run. He hastily shed with his sword and a violent force mixed with overwhelming magical energiesbined into a fearsome sword aura that instantly devoured the entire cliff.


    A massive pir of dust rose into the skies, followed by the rumbling sound of falling rocks and a tremendous shockwave. The fifty-meter tall cliff copsed from a single strike by Gallow, standing in the way of his pursuit.


    Greem weaved a strange shield out of static fire as he ascended higher into the clouds, blocking the shards of stone and dust as he flew towards the horizon.


    One person ran on the ground, while the other flew in the skies. Naturally, it was tough to make up for the difference in their speed.


    By the time Gallow charged out of the dust pir on the Nightmare, Greem and the wind dragon had already turned into an insignificant speck on the horizon.


    All the muscles on Gallow¡¯s face were already dead. Otherwise, one could probably see the veins pop beneath his skin as he gritted his teeth in anger.


    Run? Where to?


    A victor had to be decided between the two of them in this battle.


    Did that guy think that he could obtain victory just by running away?


    His heart filled with anger, Scarface Gallow had no option but to urge his Nightmare to pursue the enemy¡¯s trail.


    This pursuit took ten entire days!


    During these ten days, Gallow practically chased after Greem without stop. The two of them met every five hundred kilometers during this time. Initially, Greem would always let Gallow get closer and wave at him. By the time Gallow¡¯s full fury had been provoked, Greem decided to just flee on sight.


    He would mount his dragon and run without any hesitation the moment Gallow¡¯s aura appeared within sight. He wouldn¡¯t even give him the chance to say anything.


    The ten days of chasing had only stoked the mes of anger within Gallow¡¯s heart. He stubbornly continued the pursuit for ten days and nights without letting the horse stop for a single moment. Only a Nightmare could withstand such torture and torment with its demonic Physique. Any other voodoo beast would have already copsed.


    Ten dayster, Gallow finally caught up with Greem once again.


    This time, Greem did not flee anymore. Instead, he had started a bonfire on a hill, the wind dragon crouched by his side. He was roasting a wild boar, smiling at Gallow as he approached.


    Even though Gallow had fantasized about tearing Greem apart countless times over the past ten days, when Greem finally stopped running, he instead became suspicious and extremely cautious of everything.


    An ordinary person would already be lying on the ground in exhaustion after ten ceaseless days of pursuit. However, this was barely a warm-up for Gallow, who had 34 points of Physique.


    If Greem was doing this to wear down his stamina, then the n was as good as worthless.


    As someone with an undead¡¯s body, Gallow had already forgotten the very idea of exhaustion!


    That said, with how smart and cunning the legendary fire adept was, how could he possibly not know the nature of his body? If he did know, then what was the purpose of leading the both of them on this wild goose chase for ten days and nights?


    Scarface Gallow slowly approached the bonfire with countless questions in mind.


    Two and a half kilometers...two kilometers...one and a half kilometers.


    Even when Gallow came within a kilometer of the camp, Greem still showed no signs of escaping on the wind dragon. Gallow couldn¡¯t help but be even more confused and anxious.


    A thousand meters was not a short distance, but it wasn¡¯trge either. For a Third Grade adept like Gallow, crossing such a distance would take no more than ten seconds. Ten seconds wasn¡¯t enough time for Greem to jump onto the wind dragon and escape Gallow¡¯s attack range.


    The Nightmare slowly closed in on Greem, the distance growing shorter and shorter.


    When Gallow reached within five hundred meters of Greem, he was finally certain that Greem no longer intended to run!


    Gallow slowly dismounted from the Nightmare, leaving it behind as he walked towards the camp.


    The two adepts locked eyes. Blinding sparks flew into the air.


    ¡°Why aren¡¯t you running now? Aren¡¯t you really good at doing that? Run again, why don¡¯t you?¡± The dead muscles on Gallow¡¯s face squirmed in a strange fashion as he put on a vicious expression.


    Greem, who was calmly sitting next to the fire, showed a smile of pity. In an indifferent tone, he said to Scarface Gallow, ¡°The one who should be running today isn¡¯t me, but you.¡±


    Greem¡¯s words had just left his mouth when the sound of ten thousand sprinting beasts came from behind the hill. A gue army swarmed forward like a ck flood, charging straight at the lonesome Scarface Adept.

 Chapter 1042 - Death’s Encirclement

    Chapter 1042 Death¡¯s Encirclement


    The gue army was endless and charged ahead, one after another!


    It was almost as if a portal to another dimension had opened up behind the hill. Countless gue creatures swarmed around the tiny camp and rushed at Scarface Gallow.


    Their average power was only around that of an apprentice; Gallow could never be fazed by such puny might.


    However, what made Gallow¡¯s expression sour wasn¡¯t their might, but their numbers!


    Even ants could bring down an elephant.


    Such inferior andughable ideas could only exist among lower lifeforms. It was a little impractical when it came to the adepts, who prided themselves on being a superior species.


    Ants were ants, after all. Wasn¡¯t a collective of ten thousand ants still only ants?


    Scarface Gallow had held such thoughts in his mind at the start of the battle. In fact, his countless experiences in past wars had deeply verified the truth of this belief. In his mind, his only enemy on this battlefield was the legendary fire adept, Greem.


    These slimy, mutated creatures with sharp ws and fangs that stood between him and his opponent could only indirectly exhaust his strength and stamina. He didn¡¯t believe for a single second that the gue army alone would be able to wear him out and kill him, and there was no way that Greem believed this either.


    Many strange and twisted growls rang out as the hunched, ghoul-like gue beasts jumped out. They shed their fangs as they opened their jaws, their bodies shrouded in green-yellow smoke.


    sh!


    An invisible sword aura swept out in front of Gallow, a meter above the ground. It extended thirty or forty meters into the distance, taking up eighty percent of Gallow¡¯s vision as it cut forward.


    Every gue beast struck by the sword sh silently split into two halves. While their upper bodies continued to growl, their lower halves had already copsed limply to the ground, their filthy organs pouring onto the earth.


    One sh. With one casual sh, Scarface Gallow had exterminated over a hundred of these fearsome gue beasts, dicing the poor creatures right in front of him into mincemeat.


    However, this disy of power was not enough to stop the assault of gue beasts.


    In just five seconds, the horde had already reced theirpanions, the creatures stepping over the vile mush of blood and slime as they continued to lunge at Gallow.


    sh!


    Yet another sh of his sword. With the aid of his ferocious Strength, an overwhelming amount of magical energy radiated outwards through the longsword in the form of a rippling sh. Nothing could stand in the way of the attack!


    The gue creatures that had reached Gallow were sliced to pieces once again, reduced to lifeless piles of flesh and meat.


    Gallow only managed to take two steps forward before being cut off by the gue creatures once more. This time, therge gue army had scattered around him as if they intended to encircle him.


    Gallow showed no fear or unease when faced with tens of thousands of howling creatures. He swung his longsword with every two steps he took, and an invisible, yet tangible, wave shed forward. Its wild power would instantly destroy any gue creature that came into contact with the sword wave before they could attempt to dodge or resist, bing part of the growing mountain of corpses beneath them.


    Gallow was like a sovereign of the undead at the moment, wielding absolute power over life and death as he spread eternal sleep across the entire battlefield, all while leisurely stepping over the corpses as if walking towards his throne.


    The gue creatures that continued to surge forward one after another swarmed from every direction. As long as they stepped within thirty meters of Gallow, their bodies would split apart and be part of the corpse mountain.


    gue creatures swarmed without end and ceaselessly died, causing this mountain of corpses to grow in size and scale swiftly.


    Gallow¡¯s advance started to slow down as well. He was no longer as calm andposed as he had been at the start of the battle!


    There were many times where he had no choice but to pause on the pungent and slimy remains of the gue beasts as he walked forward.


    Finally, when the gue beasts¡¯ numbers reached a certain scale, Scarface Gallow had no choice but to stop. He had to sh several times just to clear out a path forward.


    Countless gue beasts leaped and sprinted forward. Their twitching forms filled the air and the ground. Through the numerous ovepping bodies, Gallow could faintly see the towering figure at the top of the hill and the sinister smile on that person¡¯s face.


    Aooooo!


    Scarface Gallow let out a furious roar, a low growl entirely unlike the sound of a human. He then used all his Strength to agitate the sword in his hands. A terrifyingly powerful and unprecedented sword wave spread outwards, cutting down all the hideous figures along the way as it shed at the adept standing in the distance.


    It was only five hundred meters, but Gallow¡¯s tremendous Strength allowed his attack to reach from this distance.


    However, the enemy seemed prepared!


    Even more gue creatures lunged from around them, using their weak and frail bodies to stand in the way of the destructive sword wave. Where the sword wave passed, flesh crumbled and was sliced to pieces. However, the wild force contained within the wave was also being rapidly exhausted.


    Finally, when the radiant sword wave cut through thest wall of gue beasts and reached the tiny camp, an iron fist radiating dense red light crushed it before its force could erupt.


    The elementium magical machine.


    The elementium magical machine summoned by Greem stood before the camp, using its imprable alloy body and equally destructive strength to crush the sword wave into pieces.


    Gallow¡¯s expression turned once again!


    If he were fighting against the legendary fire adept alone, he would have no fear. In fact, he was confident in being able to instantly crush his opponent¡¯s defenses and body if he got a single chance to get close. However, with the aid of this elementium magical machine, the fire adept¡¯s threat would skyrocket to a level where even he had to be cautious.


    A tank and an elementium artillery. Even as prideful as Gallow was, his head hurt to ponder the might of thisbination should they be allowed to unleash their firepower without inhibition.


    Still, since he had decided to go all out in his fight against Greem, Gallow had naturallye prepared!


    He had all sorts of solutions to Greem¡¯s abilities, be it in the form of magical equipment that reduced fire damage, or artifacts to deal with summoned beings like the metal golem or the otherworldly dragon. Gallow had even prepared quite a few methods to deal with the light elementium damage that he had yet to test.


    However, in his current environment, encircled by tens of thousands of gue beasts, he had other concerns. He could not take his time to wear away at his opponent¡¯s army slowly.


    At this point in the battle, it was difficult for him to keep the gue beasts dozens of meters away from him, even if he swung his sword ceaselessly and cast sword waves everywhere through the air. The encirclement of the gue beasts became smaller and smaller, closer and closer. Sometimes, Gallow even had to use his equally formidable fists to st the gue beasts in front of him into bits right after a sword swing.


    The gue beasts hit by Scarface Gallow¡¯s fists would instantly disintegrate. The force crushed their entire bodies into incredibly tiny bits of meat and bone that sttered outwards along with their blood. The tremendous power behind each bit of flesh and bone caused them to be hazardous projectiles.


    They scattered in every direction like bullets, puncturing all the gue beasts around them in a single instant.


    That said, even an attack like this couldn¡¯t kill enough of the gue beasts. Their bodies that sheltered countless gue viruses continued to charge forward, even with their broken shells. They werepletely unfazed by the ughter urring all around them.


    They were not even fighting at this point. The creatures were just...walking to their deaths!


    They were using their ¡®lives¡¯ and bodies to surround and trap the opponent.


    Their only achievement so far in battle was covering Gallow in blood and pieces from head to toe.


    As for the damage inflicted? gue beasts of this level and ability could not even inflict a small cut on Gallow.


    However, this endless horde of gue beasts had still managed to halt Gallow¡¯s advance.


    Once Gallow was utterly trapped in the encirclement, the actual attack descended on him!


    The elementium magical machine that had been serving as Greem¡¯s shields turned into metal artillery. It held a magic energy cannon half a meter in diameter in its hands, wildly charging it with energy from the magic generator furnace within its body.


    It was a magic energy weapon that had been improved and adjusted by the Goblin Research Academy hundreds of times. Its offensive power was between that of an ordinary magic energy cannon and that of the giant magic energy cannons, but was considerably more portable.


    Its offensive power was over 350 points.


    An attack of this intensity might sound mediocre, but the frequency of this attack was incredibly high. It could fire one shot every seven seconds!


    It was important to note that the magic energy cannons, whose average offensive power was only 120 points, could only fire one shot every three seconds. In contrast, the incredibly powerful giant magic energy cannons could fire a shot every sixty-seven seconds.


    This magic energy-ray cannon could be charged by the elementium magical machine and fire magic energy rays capable of threatening a Third Grade adept. It was already a milestone in the development and improvement!


    Moreover, the elementium magical machine wasn¡¯t the only one who could threaten Gallow on this battlefield. The real protagonist of this iparable encirclement was still the legendary fire adept, Greem.


    When Greem stepped onto the battle and used his unparalleled fire magic to damage Gallow, this tireless adept with an undead body finally retreated.


    He swung his sword desperately as he fell back.


    While he was slicing up the lunging gue beasts, he also had to sh apart the Vicious Fireballs and concentrated magic energy rays shooting at him. He barely had enough hands to do all this.


    There were countless times where he just wanted to turn and run out of this awkward situation where there was no retaliation, but each and every time, he was stopped by the endless swarm of gue beasts.


    For the first time, Scarface Gallow started to worry for himself!

 Chapter 1043 - Conscription

    Chapter 1043 Conscription


    Bluesea ne. Nero City.


    It was a mid-sized city with a poption of merely fifty or sixty thousand.


    As a city popted primarily by humans, the buildings in Nero were mostly built of wood. Though the designs were slightly different than those of the World of Adepts, there was still a sense of familiarity to them.


    It was currently at the time of the day when the sun was at its brightest.


    Countless people walked in and out of this human city beneath the warm light of the sun. Merchants moved ever forward, along with carriages carrying all sorts of cargo.


    Inside a magnificent pce at the center of the city, a beautiful girl in a purplece dress was anxiously speaking with a white-robed female adept.


    ¡°Are you abandoning us, teacher? Why, Teacher Jenna?¡±


    The white-robed adept was a woman who looked reasonably old. Her face waspassionate and kind, but it was now filled with a helpless expression. She wore a strange magical emblem on her chest; the insignia appeared to be that of the Zhentarim Association.


    Moreover, judging by her energy aura, she was only a First Grade adept.


    ¡°Princess Aisa, these few years have been very pleasant for both of us. I also like a disciple as diligent and brilliant as you very much. However, the Association has suddenly sent us the message to make an emergency retreat without any exnation. I have to to go. It cannot be helped!¡± The female adept frowned and exined casually.


    ¡°Could this...could this have something to do with the terrifying gue that broke out in the north?¡± Princess Aisa finally asked in a hoarse voice.


    The female adept fell silent for a moment before finally speaking, ¡°You are not a member of the Association. Supposedly, I shouldn¡¯t reveal any information about this to you.¡±


    ¡°Teacher...Teacher, you are the one who doted on me the most over the past few years and the one who cared the most for me. I...I have always loved you like a mother!¡± Princess Asia became even more agitated.


    ¡°Very well, I will make an exception this time!¡± The white-robed adept gritted her teeth, ¡°ording to the message I received from the Association before this, an adept¡¯s duel has recently been arranged for Gordon Hignds, at the northern border of the dukedom.¡±


    ¡°Gordon Hignds? That¡¯s over five hundred kilometers away from Nero City!¡±


    ¡°Indeed. I also never expected the adept¡¯s duel to spread to Nero City. Unfortunately, judging from the gue that broke out in the north, one of the adepts must have used some taboo magic. To my knowledge, over a dozen cities in the north have gone silent. They must have been......¡±


    The female adept¡¯s voice turned soft and downcast.


    ¡°Teacher, Teacher, are we...supposed to just let those adepts do whatever they want while you are still overseeing this city? Teacher Jenna, Nero City is my only fiefdom! If this city is destroyed, I...I will have nothing!¡± Princess Aisa shook the adept¡¯s shoulder with all her strength asrge beads of tears rolled down her cheek.


    The white-robed adept shook her head helplessly.


    ¡°If I were you, Aisa, I would immediately bring my family and subordinates and escape to the south. Even a minute¡¯s dy will be extremely dangerous. Don¡¯t count on the Association. Even if those reverent adepts were to use some taboo magic, their punishment would onlyeter. A stationed adept like myself has no means to change the decision made by the Association¡¯s leaders.¡±


    The adept¡¯s face suddenly turned pale. She jumped over to the tall,rge paneless window and stared at the northern skies.


    An insignificant ck dot was bobbing up and down in the air.


    ............


    Remi stood a thousand meters above the ground. A massive mountain eagle whose feathers had all fallen off and whose skin was covered in mucus and sores was his mount.


    Remi bent down slightly and looked at the pretty little city below, as neat as a chessboard. A vicious smile appeared on his face as he saw the dense crowd traveling through the city to and fro. As he lightly waved his hand, vast clouds of ck smoke emerged from within his body and charged downwards like a pack of living creatures.


    As the ck clouds descended, they started to rapidly split up and multiply, turning from tiny spores into gue viruses invisible to the naked eye.


    The ck smoke continued to thin and disperse until, gradually, it vanished without a trace. However, countless viruses now floated in the air, spreading to every corner of the small city on gentle breezes.


    The sound of retching and vomiting began to ring out across the city, along with the sound of furniture being knocked over. Soon, the first group of ¡®monsters¡¯ that had fallen victim to the virus and mutated appeared.


    They might have been the hunchbacked elderly or frail teenagers in their past lives, but upon turning into poison zombies, their Strength was greatly amplified, and their movements also became significantly more quick and agile than before. However, the terrifying aspect of these poison zombies were their numbers.


    The zombies crouching on the ground relied on their rapidly growing ws and fangs and their extraordinary agility to charge along roofs and walls. They were hardly bothered when their heads smashed through three-finger-thick wooden nks. They simply shook their heads slightly and continued forward.


    The people¡¯s screams of terror could be heard in every street and building in the city. The sight of poison zombies scaling buildings could be seen everywhere.


    One after another, the unprepared and panicking forms were pinned to the ground by the zombies. Terrifying screams would then ring out, swiftly followed by the sounds of wild beasts chewing on the flesh and bones of their prey.


    The healthier humans survived the first round of gue modification. That was no fortune, but the start to even greater torture. They coughed violently as they stumbled as far as their legs could take them, fearfully avoiding and hiding from the poison zombies.


    The poison zombies¡¯ leaping shapes could be seen everywhere in therge city. The people could only wander aimlessly, as none of them had any idea where would be a safe ce to be.


    Attacked by both the viruses and the poison zombies, the second wave of gue modifications began!


    Remi stood tall in the skies above, looking down at everything happening below with an indifferent expression.


    Suddenly, he turned his head, and his gaze fell upon a delicate and attractive building at the center of the city.


    He could faintly sense elementium flux from that building.


    A white-robed female adept, who was shrouded in ck smoke from head to toe, shouted and charged into the sky.


    Association adept?


    Remi hesitated for a moment when he saw the white-robed adept¡¯s emblem. He then waved his hand and drove out the gue viruses that lingered on her person.


    ¡°Are you the stationed adept here?¡± Remi asked.


    Adept Jenna stared at the ck smoke as it slowly faded away from her. It was only now that she could let go of some of her concerns. When she heard the words of greeting from the ¡®monster¡¯ above her, she carefully manipted the elementium particles to push her to the opponent¡¯s side.


    ¡°Good day. I am the stationed adept sent by the Association to oversee the Nisara Dukedom. Who might you be, sir?¡±


    Adept Jenna secretly looked at the City of Nero below her as she spoke.


    At this moment, the beautiful and peaceful city had now turned into an apocalyptic scene where dens of the virus where everywhere, making for an unbearable view to witness!


    ¡°Since you are an Association adept, you may leave! I wish to borrow the people here!¡±


    ¡°My lord, there are also a few people in the city that I wish to take away with me. What do you think?¡±


    ¡°Are they members of the Association?¡±


    ¡°No. However¡ª¡±


    ¡°Then I will make sure none of them escapes! If you don¡¯t leave now, even you will have to stay here forever.¡±


    Adept Jenna could only shake her head and leave dejectedly after hearing Remi¡¯s somewhat impatient words.


    When she turned to leave, she could very clearly see a pack of hideous and vicious creatures charge out of the pce. Parts of a purplece dress were still attached to the body of one of these monsters.


    At the sight of this, Jenna¡¯sst bit of hesitation waspletely severed. She gritted her teeth and flew into the distance without looking back.


    Seeing that the gue army beneath him had started to achieve a sizeable scale, Spirit of Pestilence Remi used his authority as their master tomand them towards the battlefield in the distant north. He continued to ride the mountain eagle southwest.


    There was another city there, eighty kilometers away.


    It was a ce that he had to go harvest personally.


    Remi also sent newly evolved guebringers to the six or seven human towns and viges along the way, all for the purposes of gathering more troops. It was this small umtion, bit by bit, that allowed Remi to pull together a massive gue army in just ten days.


    ............


    Join out Discord server to chat with fellow readers ¨C> https://discord.gg/6vFZqaT


    While the north of Nisara Dukedom was being ravaged by gues, and the fight raged on in Gordon Hignds, the Zhentarim Association was already in an uproar.


    Even though the Bluesea ne wasn¡¯t considered a particrly important resource ne within the Association, it was a good ce for leisure and holiday. Right now, over one-fifth of the Nisara Dukedom, thergest of the ne, had been invaded by the gue. All surviving civilians had also turned into ugly and hideous gue creatures.


    Was the Association still intent on sitting by and watching the Spirit of Pestilence wreak destruction under such circumstances?


    The Association adepts had split into multiple factions over this matter and were engaged in a passionate argument.


    The more radical called for the Association to punish this damned fire adept who had dared to allow his contracted spirit to freely ughter the people and destroy the Association¡¯s property.


    Some of the others were more conservative. They believed that the Association was the one to ce the battle in that location, and Greem¡¯s actions were a means of magic, making it understandable for him to do whatever he was doing. All they had to do was warn him and have himpensate with some resources at the end of the fight.


    Many sat on the fence, not particrly expressing their opinion towards one or the other. These people were both dissatisfied with the brazen attitude of the Spirit of Pestilence, but also didn¡¯t want to appear too particr about the rules and too much of a miser. Counting the losses of every single nar native would be a little selfish.


    As such, the opinions could not be reconciled, and the various parties quickly came into conflict.


    However, this was the opinion and attitude of the low-grade adepts, after all. Compared to them, the high-grade adepts of the Zhentarim higher-ups appeared to be extremely calm andposed, almost as if they weren¡¯t fazed by the temporary chaos that had spread in this tiny little resource ne.


    On the contrary, some high-grade adepts even unexpectedly praised and acknowledged the legendary fire adept¡¯s unscrupulous behavior.

 Chapter 1044 - The Clash of the Two

    Chapter 1044 The sh of the Two


    Regardless of howplicated the situation was on the outside, there was only bitter fighting on the battlefield.


    That said, the one doing the bitter fighting was Scarface Gallow alone. Greem was as leisurely as he could be.


    He stood above the mountain of corpses with fearsome poison zombies swarming all around him. The zombies might not be all that powerful, but their endless tide kept Scarface Gallow trapped in ce. Even taking a step outwards was incredibly difficult.


    He answered the ceaseless charge of the zombies with merciless butchering and wild ughter!


    One wave of zombies would rush forward, and in the next instant they would be gone, their bodies rolling down the corpse mountain amidst even more growls and waves of sword auras. Their tattered remains became a part of the corpse mountain, causing it to grow further in height and width.


    Gallow was still as ferocious and mighty as when he had started, even after ughtering nearly 600,000 poison zombies. Every punch, kick, sh, and roar brought devastating damage to the poison zombies around him.


    Gallow was a bloodline adept, after all. His vicious power and tremendous Physique were all a blessing from his bloodline. He did not cultivate his body and strength the way body-refining adepts did. As such, while body-refining adepts desired endless stamina above all things, bloodline adepts desired unlimited bloodline power.


    Unfortunately, there was a limit to human effort. Many things could not change simply because of willpower!


    Perhaps having absorbed a lesson from Sanazar¡¯s defeat, Gallow stopped using the more powerful sword techniques that exhausted more of his bloodline powers after a few failed attempts at breaching the encirclement. Instead, he started using more in shes to slowly wear down the number of poison zombies.


    Therge area-of-effect sword waves from earlier might have been quicker and more efficient at exterminating the poison zombies than the regr cuts and shes he was using now, but they required the use of his bloodline powers. With an undead body, Gallow rarely faced the issue of running out of stamina.


    As such, if Gallow didn¡¯t want to end up like Sanazar and suffer defeat after having his bloodline powers exhausted, his best bet out of this situation was to treasure every bit of his bloodline power.


    This was a foreign ne that neither of them was familiar with. The ¡®raw material¡¯ for these newly constructed gue beasts came from the nar natives. Gallow didn¡¯t believe that his opponent could have found an inexhaustible supply of natives to create these gue creatures in just ten days.


    After giving up his impractical thoughts of quickly escaping the encirclement, Gallow epted his reality and started making preparations for a drawn-out battle.


    He would avoid using bloodline powers if he could and use mundane attacks to cut down these poison zombies instead. Once in a while, when sufficient poison zombies had gathered around him, he would use his sword technique to clear the area and reduce their numbers.


    This moderate pace of using his techniques provided him enough time for his bloodline powers to recover.


    Gallow didn¡¯t believe that there was no end to this. The legendary fire adept couldn¡¯t possibly turn all the natives of Bluesea ne into poison zombies, could he?


    Even after giving up on using his sword waves and fighting using only his body andbat instincts, Scarface Gallow was still as fearsome and powerful as ever. It didn¡¯t matter if you were a low-grade poison zombie or an evolved wight. With a single sh from Gallow, you would be cut to pieces. There was no chance of survival at all.


    Moreover, with his Strength and Physique, he could maintain this rate of shing twice a second for several months toe. He did not need to worry about exhausting the bloodline powers within him.


    After watching from the side and realizing that Gallow¡¯s bloodline powers were not wearing out at all, Greem immediately joined the fray with the elementium magical machine.


    The horde of poison zombies might not be able to exhaust his bloodline powers, but a Third Grade legendary fire adept and a Third Grade elementium magical machine should!


    After these two entered the battle, the somewhat dull fighting immediately erupted with vigor once again.


    The elementium magical machine was sufficiently powerful, but that was only rtive to an ordinary Third Grade adept. Since their opponent was Scarface Gallow, who stood at the peak of Third Grade adepts, Greem was worried about letting the magical machine charge forward alone.


    Scarface Gallow might have held back on using his techniques against the poison zombies. However, if it were the elementium magical machine he was facing, he would most definitely use everything within his power to immediately destroy Greem¡¯s strongest aide.


    Thus, the roles werepletely reversed in today¡¯s battle. The elementium magical machine stayed behind and became the cannoneer, raising the magic energy ray cannon and firing shots at Gallow as fast as it could. Meanwhile, mes rose around Greem and turned him into a three-meter-tall me giant. He slowly walked towards Gallow.


    This strange scene not only confused Gallow, but the many adepts gathered in Kerslin Castle as well.


    Shouldn¡¯t an elementium adept...be hiding in the backlines where it was safe to barrage the enemy with spells? Since when did elementium adepts fight at melee range?


    What would happen when a bloodline adept with 39 points of Strength shed with an elementium adept with 39 points of Spirit?


    Everyone couldn¡¯t help but wait with bated breath.


    Almost as if sensing the wild killing intent that had taken over the battlefield, the horde of poison zombies finally stopped their suicidal charge. They gathered around the corpse mountain and raised their head to silently watch the sh between these two powerhouses that represented the apex of Third Grade in the World of Adepts.


    Scarface Gallow was caked in blood. His entire body was covered in ayer of purple-ck liquid, and pungent ck blood constantly dripped from his armor and skin. His feet were also buried beneath a pile of corpses. Every movement he made would send a small avnche of body parts down the mountain.


    He was not wearing any metal armor, nor too many pieces of magical equipment.


    For Gallow, his Physique and magic resistance already provided such extreme defensive power that his body itself could rival the best Third Grade armor avable. Out of confidence in his own body and Strength, Gallow never wore any sort of armor.


    Even the leather armor he currently wore only had some simple magical effects like Levitate and Cleanse. Their defensive power was about as close to zero as possible.


    Perhaps Gallow was only wearing them to hide his terrifying body.


    Now that he was so close to Gallow, Greem finally had a good look at the true appearance of the longsword in his hand.


    It was a fearsome magical longsword containing a strange power!


    The de was nearly half a meter wide, and a slight protrusion ran down the spine, extending all the way from the hilt to the tip of the sword. Who knew what materials Gallow had used to forge this magical sword? The entire de was pitch ck, with all sorts of profound and iprehensible runes carved on it.


    Every time Gallow gripped his magical sword, the runes and carvings on the de would light up, one by one, until it radiated an indescribably scary aura.


    Greem assessed the sword as closely as he could. Judging by its energy radiance, the magical sword was undoubtedly only a Third Grade magical item. However,pared to ordinary Third Grade magical equipment, it was more powerful and carried with it some slight indication that it was bing animated.


    Greem was sure that if Gallow was fortunate enough to advance to Fourth Grade, and continued to cultivate the sword patiently, it would have a chance to advance and became one of the extremely rare Fourth Grade magical items.


    When that happened, Scarface Gallow would have a Fourth Grade magical sword that was perfectlypatible with him. He would be able to square off with veteran Fourth Grade adepts with such a weapon.


    From this perspective, this Third Grade magical sword had more development potential than Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring.


    Of course, this wasn¡¯t saying that the Holy Ring was of inferior quality. Rather, Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring waspletely forged in ordance with the strengths and attributes of a holy knight. Naturally, in the hands of a fire adept like Greem, the Holy Ring could not obtain sufficient nourishment of holy light power. In the hands of an ipatible owner, it did not have a chance to continue growing.


    Join out Discord server to chat with fellow readers ¨C> https://discord.gg/6vFZqaT


    Gallow looked at the me giant standing thirty meters away from him. A stiff smile finally appeared on his stitched face.


    ¡°Good...very good. For the first time, you have won my respect! Regardless of the results of today¡¯s battle, I will acknowledge you as a friend, just for this courage of yours!¡±


    Gallow¡¯s figure trembled. Iparably violent force swept through his whole body like a halo of light. The blood and minced meat covering his body were shaken off by force, diced into a fine mist of blood and blown away into the distance.


    In that one instant, when the blood mist obscured both of their visions, Gallow stomped against the ground with two feet. A pungent wave of blood several dozen meters tall rose into the air. His body charged towards Greem at breakneck speed from the counter-force.


    The strange magical sword let out an unprecedentedly massive sword halo that quickly wrapped around Greem¡¯s body of mes.


    ¡°Die for me!¡±


    An earthshaking battlecry rang out as the ck de of light devoured all of the mes.


    The adepts crowded in front of the screens couldn¡¯t help but be nervous at this sight. In particr, the Crimson adepts, led by Mary and the two other girls, sped their hands in anxiety. Their faces flushed red, and their eyes opened wide as if they could hardly breathe from the anticipation.


    The legendary fire adept couldn¡¯t have been killed by a single strike in one moment of carelessness, could he?


    While everyone held their breath and waited, a wild pir of fire rose into the sky, and Greem¡¯s familiar body of mes appeared once again.

 Chapter 1045 - Origin Fire

    Chapter 1045 Origin Fire


    How could Greem not have been aware of his opponent¡¯s sudden assault with how cautious and careful he was?!


    Greem sted away with his Boots of Ash without hesitation after emerging from the pir of fire. His body had just moved from his prior position when an iparably violent de of light caught the pir of fire and cleaved it into countless sparks.


    Greem¡¯s body of mes stepped upon the uneven pile of corpses and quickly dodged about the battlefield. Two blinding streams of fire spread out around his back like a cape of me. He deftly dodged around in the narrow space with the pushing power of the fire jets, avoiding all of the sword lights that Gallow sent at him.


    If Greem were running with his feet alone, his twelve points of Agility would not have allowed him to escape the shes, even if he were to run as fast as he could.


    However, with the use of his magical powers and his mind, Greem was growing increasingly skilled at controlling the mes. He came up with this new means of movement that waspatible with his skills.


    After creating magma armor with his mes, he could manipte violent fire energy to shoot out of small holes on the back of it, driving his entire body to glide forward explosively.


    Greem had even ordered the Chip to spend a vast amount of time andputing power to design a whole new magma armor for him for this express purpose. The unique aspect of his magma armor wasn¡¯t its defensive protection, but the small holes that were spread all over the middle and surfaceyers.


    Greem could adjust the angle and direction of his glide by changing the path of the jet stream and the hole from which the mes were expelled without moving his body.


    At the moment, Greem¡¯s body moved in a strange fashion. He faced towards Gallow while several dozen streams of red mes of varying thickness, force, and shades of color shot out from all around him.


    He moved through the air quickly and in strange ways that seemed to defy thews of motion. Even as the ck des of light swung all around him and seemingly cut off all paths of escape, Greem remained unfazed and easily dodged the attacks after a few rapid turns.


    Naturally, the berserk Gallow would not give up on this rare chance at a ¡®fair¡¯ duel with Greem. He stomped against the corpse mountain, every step leaving behind a bloody crater as his body rushed toward the fire adept at a shocking speed.


    Extreme Strength was everything!


    Gallow might only have seventeen points of Agility, but his thirty-nine points of ferocious Strength allowed him to have bursts of speed that could rival Mary, who had thirty-seven points of Agility.


    The only difference was the amount of control in their movement. Mary could easily change her trajectory and direction of motion even when moving at such speeds, fluently and without causing a mess. Scarface Gallow, on the other hand, relied on raw strength. He had to exert an even greater burst of strength to barely stop his uncontrolled movement.


    Thus, as Gallow shed and leaped with violent force, the blood, flesh, and strangely-shaped limbs flew everywhere from this massive twenty-meter tall mountain of corpses.


    The two Third Grade adepts started a chase in this horrifying and sinister environment, assaulting each other with wild des of light and torrents of invisible mes.


    Meanwhile, the elementium magical machine stood a kilometer away, bombarding Gallow rapidly with a ray-beam shot every seven seconds. Even though Gallow was moving and running without stop, the magic energy ray beams were always locked onto his back.


    The 350 points of energy intensity might not be able to burn a hole through his body, but they could still leave a small scorch mark the size of a fingernail on his back. More importantly, the elementium magical machine knew how to time its shots to Gallow¡¯s movements. Gallow¡¯s quickly moving body would be interrupted by an attack whenever it was a key moment in catching up to Greem, causing him to lose his best opportunity to attack.


    A single beam would leave a small scorch mark. Two beams, and there would only still be a small scorch mark. However, as these ray beams continued to rain down on Gallow, the small scorch marks started to gather together to be a massive wound that even he could not ignore.


    After all, what rested in Gallow¡¯s chest was not his original heart, but the withered heart of a Fallen Emperor. Gallow might not die if an attack hit that heart, but it would most definitely wear away at his endless supply of death aura.


    He had no choice but to dig his feet into the corpse pile. A terrifying and bloody ditch, one meter deep and two meters wide, was carved into the corpses before he finally managed to stop his insane momentum. It allowed him to dodge the next magic energy beam that was fired at him.


    However, in the one instant that Gallow stopped moving, Greem¡¯s eyes gleamed as ayer of invisible mes immediately engulfed Gallow¡¯s body.


    Gallow, who had thus far remained untouched even after being bombarded a dozen times by Greem¡¯s Vicious Fireballs, let out a grunt. A violent shockwave sted from his body and blew away thisyer of mes.


    It had only been two seconds since the invisible mes surrounded Gallow.


    However, when Scarface Gallow scrambled out of the fire, a good half of his body had already turned ck and charred. It was almost as if the excellent magic resistance that he prided himself on had vanished for that one instant.


    ¡°This...this isn¡¯t holy light?¡±


    An old voice asked in surprise in the higher-up¡¯s room in Kerslin Castle.


    ¡°It¡¯s not holy light! In my opinion, this should be holy fire formed from assimting a portion of holy light power,¡± An equally old voice sighed and said in a low voice, ¡°There is already a semnce to principle fire in his mes now!¡±


    ¡°That said, his control over this principle fire is clearly very limited. As long as he can¡¯t lock onto the position with his vision, this slow-acting fire will have difficulty burning Gallow,¡± A crisp female voice interrupted.


    ¡°Indeed, you might be right. But...can Gallow remain as calm as before after having seen principle fire for the first time?¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    Far away from the musings of the Fourth Grade adepts in the World of Adepts, Scarface Gallow couldn¡¯t help but fall into a state of panic and shock.


    All this while, he had been able to reign undefeated due to his wild Strength and the shocking resistance of his undead body. With these, Gallow could endure attacks from Third Grade elementium adepts and only suffer insignificant damage.


    However, like a warrior who had been hiding beneath his sturdy armor, the sudden disappearance of his protection had destroyed his psychological sense of security, more severely so than the massive wounds that had just been inflicted on his body.


    Gallow wore extremely rare magical equipment on his person. It was the Sun Vine, that was capable of absorbing elementium damage.


    However, theyer of invisible mes from earlier clearly didn¡¯t belong to the realm of light elementium magic, but fire magic.


    Scarface Gallow¡¯s undead body¡¯s fire resistance might not be sufficient to allow him to be immune to fire, but it was pretty close to that. How could his skin have been burned to ashes by the invisible mes?


    That...was simply beyond Gallow¡¯s expectations!


    It was precisely his overconfidence in his magic resistance that caused Gallow to hesitate for half a second at that moment, allowing the invisible mes to engulf him. Those two seconds of fire had sessfully burned away Gallow¡¯s confidence. He no longer dared to let the legendary fire adept attack without restraint.


    Hesitating, and concerned about any more attacks, Gallow no longer pursued as wildly and brazenly as before. He continued chasing after Greem, but constantly dodged and avoided the attacksing from him and the elementium magical machine.


    In doing so, his chances of catching up to Greem decreased considerably!


    ............


    Greem was quickly running away.


    Just now, he had managed to activate the new fire spell that the Chip had simted¨C Origin Fire!


    It was a principle fire thatbined the holy light¡¯s characteristic of ignoring magical resistance and defenses. Greem should only have been able to master this fire after advancing to Fourth Grade.


    However, with the aid of the Fourth Grade Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, he could sessfully unleash the fire after a series ofplicated and inconvenient energy conversions.


    Unfortunately, the instant he sessfully managed to cast Origin Fire, his me Fiend¡¯s Heart withered by a great deal!


    The me Fiend¡¯s Heart was the heart of a Second Grade demon that Greem had transnted earlier in his life, after all.


    The me Fiend¡¯s Heart had provided Greem with endless fire energy over the years, allowing him to trump one powerful enemy after another. However, with every step Greem took towards greater heights, the Second Grade me Fiend¡¯s Heart gradually stopped bing a source of strength. Now, at the peak of Third Grade, it was even dragging down the progression and improvement of his power.


    Take what happened earlier, for instance. The Origin Fire¡¯s demand for fire energy had gone beyond the limits of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart. The sudden torrent of mes that coursed through Greem¡¯s body exceeded the capacity of the me Fiend¡¯s Heart, burning the heart in the bacsh.


    If Greem¡¯s body was a wooden bucket, then the me Fiend¡¯s Heart was the short nk in the bucket, dragging down Greem when he wanted to unleash his power. If the fire energy surging through Greem¡¯s body exceeded a certain level, he would harm his own body even as he injured the opponent.


    It was at this very moment that Greem realized, more than ever, that this body of his was in dire need of changes!


    However, regardless of how concerned and anxious he was about the issue, it was something he had to deal with after the fight. Greem still needed to face the formidable Scarface Gallow with all his strength right now.


    After all, if Gallow were able to hit him with all thirty-nine points of his Strength, no number of elementium shields would guarantee his personal safety.

 Chapter 1046 - A Battle Between High-Grade Adepts

    Chapter 1046 A Battle Between High-Grade Adepts


    A battle between high-grade adepts could no longer bepared to the hunting and fighting of ordinary creatures!


    Battles between ordinary beings were ultimately a contest of raw strength and technique. Meanwhile, a fight between high-grade adepts was apetition of Strength, Agility, Physique, Spirit, skill, and senses.


    During a battle, the massive amounts of magical energy within a high-grade adept¡¯s body would naturally form a defensive forcefield, cutting off all foreign spiritual probes. That said, as long as their body and Spirit still conducted energy exchange and interaction with the external world, the opponent would be able to pick up on their intentions in battle based on the minute energy shifts in the surroundings.


    When both adepts¡¯ Spirits were firmly locked onto each other, the factors that determined the final result of the battle would be massively expanded. It would no longer be purely a matter of base power andbat prowess, but the nature of power, the application of force, and many, many others.


    Some times, even the slightest change in the environment or one¡¯s emotion during battle could affect the final result. Should an adept be forced into a disadvantage during a fight, defeat would be very likely unless they were to turn the tables by some forceful means.


    Though the two days and nights of encirclement by the zombies did not inflict any physical or spiritual damage to Gallow, it had substantially worn away at his will to battle. The sudden appearance of Greem¡¯s Origin Fire during his fight became thest straw that broke the camel¡¯s back.


    At the very least, Gallow¡¯sbat will and desire for victory had beenpletely suppressed!


    Wew!


    The magical sword grazed past Greem¡¯s waist, sending vicious winds rippling through the air. A visible injury appeared on his body where the power of the sword radiated. Greem could not regenerate this wound, no matter how much fire energy he called upon. At the very least, he would not be able to heal this wound while he was still engaged in this fight.


    The magical sword in Scarface Gallow¡¯s hands was scarier than the man himself!


    There was a trace of the principle powers contained within that attack.


    The source of that power was the magical sword!


    While the magical sword was still returning from its previous strike, Greem quickly waved his hands. He was only ten meters away from Gallow. A zing torrent of mes with surprising intensity gathered between his hands and sted towards Gallow¡¯s chest.


    The Chip¡¯s Elementium Sight revealed that there were three high-magic regions on Scarface Gallow¡¯s body, where the energy reaction was shocking. They were his heart, his spine, and his right hand. These regions not only had a shockingly high energy reaction, but even their energy auras were slightly different from the rest of his body.


    The personal information obtained from the Association stated that Gallow had unexpectedly killed a Fallen Emperor in the Undead World. Greem had reason to believe that Gallow had used the body parts of the dead Fallen Emperor to modify his own body.


    Those three high-magic regions should be the body parts he had reced from the Fallen Emperor.


    The heart gave him an endless supply of death energy, while the spine was the real source of his tremendous Physique. As for his right hand...Greem was surprised to find that the energy aura radiating from his right hand was identical to that radiating from the magical sword.


    The sword was growing from his right hand! It wasn¡¯t just simple magical equipment!


    It was this surprising discovery that drove Greem and the elementium magical machine to focus all their attacks on Gallow¡¯s heart.


    However, due to Gallow¡¯s resilient Physique and formidable magic resistance, neither of their attacks had managed to break through Gallow¡¯s skin, let alone wound the organs beneath. Well, that was if there any organs within.


    Scarface Gallow also seemed to have realized their intentions. He started to pay more attention to defending his battered chest during the intense battle.


    Gallow was now cautious of the elementium magical machine¡¯s magic energy rays,pared to his utter disregard at the start of the battle. He would slice every single beam to pieces with his sword, even going to the extent of using other parts of his body to take the shot in ce of his chest and back.


    The magic-energy ray beam was indeed potent. However, the elementium magical machine was firing from a thousand meters away, after all. That significant distance gave Gallow more than enough time to react and deal with the annoying beams.


    Greem had no choice but to throw himself into the fray as well, advancing on Gallow and using his vicious mes to assault the same spot on Gallow¡¯s body repeatedly.


    Greem had always preferred using formed fire spells in battle, be it Vicious Fireball, Molten World, or the improved Scarlet Firestorm. However, in a struggle between high-grade adepts, both fighters were continually moving. These formed spells that required chants, handsigns, and elementium molding became rtively ¡®clumsy¡¯ in such confrontations.


    Greem was either escaping with all he had or pursuing with all the bloodlust he could muster. He never had the time to stop and cast any of these formed spells. By the time he tried and cast a spell, the enemy would already be right in front of him or way beyond the range of his spell; neither of these possibilities was good news for Greem!


    After experiencing several of these battles, Greem finally managed to put together this style ofbat with the help of the Chip.


    Direct maniption of fire elementium!


    Without the molding process of formed spells, he would save a lot of time that would otherwise be spent on casting. It allowed him to inflict fire damage on his opponents more rapidly.


    However, there are always two sides to things.


    Without the constraints of a form, gathering the violent and active fire elementium into a concentrated torrent required more focused spiritual maniption on Greem¡¯s part, along with extraordinary fire affinity. It increased the tax on Greem¡¯s Spirit.


    Moreover, if his Spirit were to weaken for even a slight second during the process of manipting the mes, the fire elementium would sh with each other and neutralize the force of the attack. When that happened, it wouldn¡¯t just be a matter of failing to harm the enemy. Even Greem himself would have to suffer some degree of bacsh from the mes.


    That was why directly manipting fire elementium required extremely high fire affinity, tremendous Spirit, and exceptional fire maniption technique. Failure was guaranteed if any one of these factors was missing. Forcefully attempting to go through with it would only backfire!


    However, since Greem dared to do so, it meant that he was confident in manipting the mes well.


    As Greem moved about in an almost leisurely fashion, his ten fingers waved and flickered rapidly. Wild and ferocious fire energy would be absorbed from the surroundings with every movement he made, gathering around him and turning into a white stream of me. It would then be slowly concentrated into a fearsome torrent as he teleported and danced about the battlefield.


    A firestorm capable of destroying everything shrouded Greem¡¯s body, following him with every step he took and incessantly licking away at Gallow¡¯s body. It didn¡¯t matter how Gallow moved or blocked with his limbs and sword; he could not stop the torrent of fire fromnding on his chest as they slipped around every obstacle like a gentle stream.


    A hole the size of a bowl had been burned into Gallow¡¯s leather armor. The purple-green skin beneath glowed red from the constant heat and only turned redder and hotter as the mes continued to burn.


    When Gallow realized he could not defend against the enemy¡¯s attack, he gave up on the pointless defense and put all his efforts into attacking Greem.


    He brandished his terrifying magical sword and swung it rapidly, sending multiple sword lights andpressed sword auras into the air, ravaging everything around him. Several purple-ck lines appeared in the corpse mountain beneath them as the sword beams cleaved into the bodies.


    The destructive power contained within the shes erupted, sending a hundred walls of ck blood flying into the air at the same time with bits of flesh and bone mixed within the pungent liquid.


    Under such terrible circumstances, Greem had increasingly less space to move.


    Greem had already tried his best to reduce the size of his body. He had gone from a five-meter-tall me giant to a two-meter-tall me humanoid. It was the only way to concentrate his power and avoid being hit by the enemy¡¯s powerful attacks.


    After all, when fighting against an adept as strong as Gallow, a bigger size would only mean making himself a bigger target.


    There was no merit to beingrge either. It was better to be small since it made it easier to control his powers!


    Greem¡¯s red and white body quickly wove about the battlefield, blue light flickering in his zing eyes, capturing every change in the substances and elementium around him.


    Countless haphazard red lines wrapped around each other and shed towards him in his Elementium Sight. ording to the data provided by the Chip, these force threads created by Gallow¡¯s raw Strength all had over 600 points of power. Greem¡¯s magical defenses could not defend against these threads at all.


    Even a single one of these force threads could slice through all of Greem¡¯s defenses and hit his body.


    If it were only a single force thread, Greem would be able to escape with some slight injury. Two threads, and he would risk losing a limb or even being cut in half. Three threads...the Chip revealed that Greem¡¯s life would be in danger if he got caught by three threads. He would have a 46% chance of dying instantly.


    That was already a terrifying number!


    Greem quickly retreated without any hesitation.


    He also manipted the mes and changed their trajectory as he backed off, sting them into the force threads that were winding towards him.


    It was a sh of concentrated energy and loose energy. Thus, the torrent of fire was instantly cut into sparks by the incredibly focused force threads. The threads glowed brighter and brighter in Greem¡¯s Elementium Sight.


    Even Scarface Gallow, with his tremendous Physique, had to stop and rest for a few seconds to calm the boiling energy in his body after unleashing such a violent attack. He then leaped into the air once again, chasing after the force threads and lunging wildly at Greem.


    Greem stared at Gallow through the hundreds of force threads. He was still retreating, constantly gathering more fire to slow down and obstruct the force threads as he did so.


    The two adepts quickly left the corpse mountain behind them, one chasing and one fleeing into the distance.

 Chapter 1047 - Various Factions

    Chapter 1047 Various Factions


    At Greem¡¯s level, any number of auxiliary functions would only remain supplemental. What truly determined victory in battle was the magical techniques of the adepts themselves.


    In all honesty, Scarface Gallow¡¯sbat style was somewhat simr to body-refining adepts, though he was far more powerful and unusual in his attacks.


    After having his body modified heavily, Gallow no longer had so-called ¡®weaknesses¡¯ on his person. He would still be able to live if his body was severely injured, with over 80% of it missing. That said, his heart, spine, and right hand were most crucial to him.


    Though he wouldn¡¯t die if these organs were damaged, he would still suffer a tremendous discount inbat prowess!


    Thus, when Greem and the elementium magical machine focused their attacks on Gallow¡¯s heart, the source of his dead energy, this adept with an undead¡¯s bloodline finally went berserk.


    Scarface Gallow gave up on defending altogether, putting all his strength into attacking instead. Greem immediately felt mountainous pressure crash down upon him.


    Force threads!


    These force threads, created by Gallow¡¯s concentrated Strength and magical energy, shed towards Greem from every direction. Even as powerful andposed as he was, Greem had no choice but to turn and flee. He didn¡¯t even have the courage to turn back.


    They were too firmly concentrated!


    Compared to the formed spells of elementium adepts and Greem¡¯s pyromancy, Gallow¡¯s Strength was undoubtedly richer and more refined.


    The difference between the two of them was like that of a needle and that of an ostrich egg. There was no doubt that the ostrich egg wasrger and contained more power. However, if the needle and the egg were to crash, the egg was sure to be the one to break. Its strength and hardness were simply too dispersedpared to the needle.


    The main reason Gallow was able to refine his Strenght to such an extent was likely due to the magical sword in his hand. At the very least, in Greem¡¯s Elementium Sight, Gallow¡¯s danger indicator was lower than the magic sword in his hand.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s analysis, the magical sword was close to awakening to an independent consciousness, or what people usually knew as an artifact spirit. Should the sword awaken sessfully, it was very likely to advance into Fourth Grade magical equipment immediately, bing even more potent than before.


    However, at the moment, it was only Third Grade magical equipment that could refine its user¡¯s Strength to an extreme!


    As Scarface Gallow pressed forward with all he had, the insignificant red force threads wove into a vast yet inescapable web that descended upon Greem. Greem fled without hesitation, directing his mes to stall and obstruct the movement of the threads as he did so.


    After flying for two hundred meters, the force threads gradually started to falter. They became incapable of maintaining a stable form and energy structure, quickly scattering and disintegrating. The energy tide that radiated from the dispersal of the threads caused a fearsome storm on the battlefield.


    Greem was only grazed slightly by the shockwave of the energy storm, and a good half of his Inferno Shield crackled and shattered into sparks.


    Before Greem could take a breath, Gallow roared and charged ahead, dragging Greem into a melee with a storm of attacks.


    The two adepts that stood at the peak of Third Grade shed with each other in this fashion, causing yet another horrifying energy storm to rise in the battlefield.


    ............


    The battle in the farawaynd raged on.


    The many adepts standing in front of the magical screens were holding their breath, almost watching this high-grade adept battle with a sort reverence.


    The power of the bloodline adepts and the ferocity of elementium adepts were on full disy in this battle.


    Even the Third Grade adepts that were leaders of their own organizations couldn¡¯t stop sweating as they watched the battle unfold. They couldn¡¯t help butpare themselves to the twobatants. They were also subjects of admiration in the regions they came from, elites amongst the adepts.


    However,pared to these two peak Third Grade adepts on the screen, there was nothing praiseworthy about themselves!


    Their past arrogance and disdain for everything weaker than themselves were swept away in an instant, leaving them with only the realization of their ignorance and foolishness.


    Among the many rooms where adepts watched the battle, there was one in which resided two silver-robed adepts.


    They talked amongst themselves with solemn expressions as they watched.


    ¡°How is it? Can you detect the intensity of their attacks?¡±


    Several magical crystals floated in front of one of the silver-robed adepts. The sharp ends of these crystals were pointed at the screen, and all kinds of data and numbers continually appearing on the surface of the crystals. Most of these numbers were glowing with a blinding red color.


    ¡°...760 points...830 points...910 points......¡±


    This silver-robed adept broke out in cold sweat when he saw the jumping red numbers continue to soar and turn a brighter shade of red.


    The two people fighting on the screen were only Third Grade adepts! They might have reached the peak of Third Grade, but they were still Third Grade after all. Yet, somehow, the might of every casual attack they unleashed was approaching the range of Fourth Grade adepts.


    Didn¡¯t that mean that either of these two adepts alone would have enough power to face off against a beginner Fourth Grade adept!? Moreover, the shadow of the principle powers could be seen on both of them.


    It was evidence that these two peak Third Grade adepts both had a frightening potential for development.


    Even without any external assistance, these two adepts were very likely to advance to Fourth Grade within the next century or two.


    After all, principle powers were a miraculous power that only peak Fourth Grade adepts could possess!


    ¡°These two adepts would at least be elites if they were in our Silver Union, wouldn¡¯t they?¡± One of the silver robes couldn¡¯t help but exim.


    ¡°Probably not just elites,¡± the other adept shook his head and said, ¡°Considering the trace of principle power that they already possess, even our core adepts might not be able to defeat them with utter certainty!¡±


    ¡°Core adepts.¡± The silver robe became utterly speechless.


    The adepts were ssified in a strict fashion within the Silver Union based on their abilities.


    Apart from the silver-robed adepts who were responsible for upholding and maintaining order within the Union, several silver-robed adepts were also selected to form an elite squad. Most of these elites were of higher status than even the executors and the punishers.


    Meanwhile, there was also a group of adepts that stood above even the elites. These were individuals with exceptional talent and potential that were selected from thebat adepts, inducted into the inner circle of the Silver Union, and acknowledged as core adepts of the organizations. Each of these individuals was shockingly powerful and formed the core strength that had ensured the Silver Union¡¯s continued stability of the past one hundred thousand years.


    In all frankness, they were Fourth Grade adept reserves and candidates!


    Should any casualty ur among the current Fourth Grades of the Silver Union, an opening would appear within the power structure. The Silver Union would then invest resources and effort into cultivating these core adepts without holding back, such that they could fill the opening within the Union as soon as possible.


    That was the true purpose for the existence of these core adepts!


    The two Second Grade silver robes in the room right now were executors sent by the Silver Union to collect information on Zhentarim. As such, their opinion was fairer and more objective than any of the other observers.


    ............


    Apart from the Silver Union, the Northern Witches and the Adept¡¯s Association had also sent representatives.


    The Northern Witches sent none other than Second Grade Witch Nina.


    As the representative that the Deceit Witches had stationed in Zhentarim, Witch Nina naturally had to have perfectly understood everything about the significant event that was happening here. The reason she was so passionate about her job was that it was the Deceit Witches¡¯ turn to manage the public affairs of the Northern Lands for these hundred years.


    If a witch leader were to ask about major events in Zhentarim during the next witch leader meeting, the entire Deceit Witch branch would suffer shame should there be gaps in the information she was supposed to collect.


    Moreover, she was rtively well acquainted with this legendary fire adept as well.


    After all, she had met him back when he was still a mere First Grade adept. The fire adept had left a deep impression upon her.


    The thought of making the fire adept her man and concubine had even appeared in Nina¡¯s head at one point.


    However, as this Adept Greem became rted to the newly risen Fate Witch leader, Alice, Nina had no choice but to give up on this idea. She had been reasonably upset over this for a long time.


    However, when she once again saw Greem¨Cthis time through a screen¨Che had be a fearsome peak Third Grade existence that she could only look up at.


    If...if this guy was to improve by just a little bit more, wouldn¡¯t he...wouldn¡¯t he be equal to our n leader?


    Witch Nina¡¯s body trembled and her soul quaked at the thought of this.


    Dammit! Had these years of living gone to wastepared to him?!


    Disregarding all theplex emotions that Witch Nina was currently experiencing, a middle-aged adept in a proper adept¡¯s robe and a pointed hat was sitting in another room, staring solemnly at the light screen. His long adept¡¯s staff leaned against the back of his chair.


    As the two peak Third Grade adepts on the screen fought with increasing ferocity and savagery, the expression on the middle-aged adept¡¯s face only turned graver.


    Finally, he took out a crystal-clearmunication crystal and rubbed it with his right hand. He mumbled a few activation chants, and the crystal ball lit up.


    ¡°I need all the information on Legendary Fire Adept Greem. The more detailed, the better, and the faster, the better...yes, put him into our observation and contact list as well. As for his position, put him in front of that Gallow!¡±


    A short momentter, the light from the crystal ball faded.


    The only source of light was the magical water screen in the room, illuminating the dark and solemn expression of the middle-aged adept.

 Chapter 1048 - Surestrike and Origin Fire

    Chapter 1048 Surestrike and Origin Fire


    ¡°Die! ¡±


    Scarface Gallow let out an earthshaking roar and sprinted forward with rumbling steps. ck light gathered on his magical sword but remained inert, seemingly waiting to execute Greem in a single strike.


    Greem¡¯s zing body quickly flickered and moved about swiftly, trying its best to break free of Gallow¡¯s Spiritual focus. He could sense a cold chill swimming around on the surface of his body. That should be the spiritual power that his opponent was projecting onto him with his dull eyes.


    If Greem¡¯s body were to stall for even a single instant, Gallow would be able to lock onto his specific position, and a terrifying strike would follow after!


    Given Gallow¡¯s thirty-nine points of Strength and that strange energy that he had been charging up, Greem had no confidence in escaping unscathed from this attack. He quickly dodged and wove about, not giving his opponent a single opportunity to lock onto his person. Fire energy gathered in his eyes as he moved, turning into two crimson beams that shot towards Gallow.


    Scarface Gallow gritted his teeth and endured these two beams so as not to be thrown off of Greem¡¯s trail.


    When the Scalding Rays swept onto Gallow¡¯s body, they sliced apart his leather armor and revealed the dark-purple skin beneath. Two trails of smoking burns were left on Gallow¡¯s flesh, where the beams had swept past.


    Unfortunately, this was the limit of damage that the Scalding Rays could inflict on Gallow¡¯s body with their six hundred points of power. Breaking through the magic resistance of his defensive forcefield and injuring his organs was impossible without an attack of at least a thousand points.


    Unless Greem could bring the magical golem dragon along with him and st Gallow with one of its cannons, the best he could do was scratch and annoy Gallow slightly.


    While Gallow chased after Greem, the elementium magical machine was striding towards the battlefield. The cannon it held on its shoulder was still firing without stop. Unfortunately, the cannon shots could barely wound the opponent. It was still a little difficult for them to truly injure Gallow.


    The pointless pursuit finally wore out thest of Gallow¡¯s patience.


    The magical sword that had been lying in poise could not remain in this charging state forever. After chasing vainly for an entire kilometer, Gallow let out a ferocious roar. The magical sword in his hand arced forward into the air faster than the eye could see, unleashing an invisible sword aura.


    The so-called sword aura was simply air that had been extremelypressed by berserk strength. Some strange energy of unknown attribute had also been mixed into the air, turning it into the peculiar attack that terrified even Greem¨C the force threads.


    Greem let out a cry at the sight of the sword aura. His entire body erupted, scattering into a cluster of fire that spread out in every direction.


    The sword aura whistled and passed straight through the mes, annihting part of the fire energy as it passed by.


    When Greem once again reformed three hundred meters away, arge portion was clearly missing from his two-meter-tall body. After failing to recover the missing piece after drawing on his fire energy twice, Greem had no choice but to silently ept the reality before him.


    [Beep. Body is 5.17% iplete. Energy loss at 9.36%. Power deterioration 3%. Warning! Should Host¡¯s power deterioration reach 28%, the chance of victory against the opponent will be 0%.]


    The data from the Chip was far more urate than what Greem could conjure. However, what the data revealed only made his head hurt.


    ¡°Explosive me Fireball!¡±


    Without hesitation, Greem fired a series of fire spells at Gallow while there was still some distance between them. The fire spells crossed the hundreds of meters between them and drowned Gallow¡¯s stalling body in vicious and ferocious mes.


    When Gallow roared and stormed out of the explosive mes, scorch marks could already be seen all over his body. The leather armor he wore had also been turned into unrecognizable carbonized ash, barely clinging to his skin.


    ¡°ckme...Execution!¡±


    Gallow once again let out a berserk howl.


    As he screamed, the magical sword in his hand shed down at Greem from a distance.


    Greem was four hundred meters away, but he felt his Body of mes tense and his spiritual world flicker for a fleeting instant. Even though Gallow was still hundreds of meters away, he suddenly and inexplicably felt as if Gallow¡¯s sword would most certainly strike him.


    Without his experience from the Faen ne, Greem would have been hit by the attack in his moment of dizziness. However, having seen a pseudo-artifact longbow with the same unusual attribute in Faen, Greem instantly understood the strange trait that Gallow¡¯s magical sword possessed.


    Dammit! It¡¯s that damned Surestrike!


    With this prior experience, Greem instantly came up with a solution.


    Greem summoned a First Grade fire spirit using a golem core in the blink of an eye and instantly switched positions with it.


    When Gallow¡¯s magical sword shed down, a ck sh mark abruptly appeared on the First Grade fire spirit¡¯s body instead of Greem¡¯s. The violent force erupted, thoroughly destroying the fire spirit¡¯s body and even its golem core.


    Greem was horrified, despite having survived by the skin of his teeth. He no longer dared to allow Scarface Gallow to unleash his attacks freely.


    Greem also roared in a fury. Taking advantage of Gallow¡¯s momentary pause after such a ferocious strike, he locked on firmly to his opponent¡¯s body with both eyes. He used all his power to unleash the strange spell with a trace of the fire principle powers¨C Origin Fire.


    Gallow, whose body was still caught in the downward movement of the sh, did not even have time to straighten his body. Elementium energy reverberated around him as a formless cluster of invisible mes extended out of empty space, quickly engulfing his entire being.


    It was a strange fire that came from the very source of the fire principles. It possessed the peculiar characteristic of being able to ignore all magic resistance.


    Even though it didn¡¯t burn very intensely, or possess any fancy magical effects, it still inflicted maddening damage upon Gallow.


    At this moment, he was no longer a peak Third Grade adept with formidable magic resistance, but an utterly ordinary mortal. Faced with the Origin Fire that had spread to nearly every inch of space from the inside to the outside of his body, Scarface Gallow finally felt Death¡¯s approaching footsteps.


    He had managed to blow away and disperse the Origin Fire attack fromst time before the fires could fully form.


    Even so, he had still suffered fairly grievous burns.


    However, this time, the energy bacsh from ckme Execution had kept him from dispersing the Origin Fire at the very first instance possible. As such, the mere two seconds of burning that came after inflicted the most severe wounds he had endured since the start of this battle.


    The injury from this fire alone had exceeded all of the damage he had suffered over the past dozen days!


    When Gallow once again stumbled out of the mes, his entire person had already turned ck. Every inch of his body, from the inside to the outside, had been burned into charcoal. His skin and muscles cracked unstoppably as steam rose into the air from within his body.


    Gallow stumbled for a few more steps before copsing helplessly to his knees. He could no longer stand under his own strength.


    ¡°No more...no more fighting. I...I surrender!¡±


    Gallow, who now looked more like charcoal than a person, shouted as he took out the teleportation crystal from his storage ring and tossed it to the ground.


    Greem stood silently a few hundred meters away.


    The roiling mes gradually faded from his body, revealing his muscr human form.


    His eyes were shut tight, two streaks of ck blood slowly running down his cheeks.


    It was obvious that those two short seconds of Origin Fire had also been a tremendous burden on himself. The two eyes which he had used to unleash the attack had also suffered a bacsh.


    Though Gallow¡¯s injury was severe, his high Physique allowed him to recover quickly. Seeing that Greem seemed to be out of any ability to continue fighting, Gallow gritted his teeth and started to get up with his scorched and withered body.


    However, just as he began to move, a loud explosion rang out right beside him. A deep crater was sted into the ground nearby by a magic energy beam. It was one meter deep and four to five meters in diameter.


    The elementium magical machine appeared at the edge of the battlefield with heavy steps.


    Gallow let out a silent sigh and gave up all thoughts of continuing the fight.


    If he were in his peak condition, this advanced Third Grade elementium magical machine would be nothing in his eyes. However, now that he and the legendary fire adept were both critically injured, a single advanced Third Grade elementium magical machine was enough to seal the deal.


    Ripples suddenly appeared in an empty space as an elderly-looking adept appeared on the spot.


    Bothpeting adepts were now blind, but they still quickly managed to identify the neer using their spiritual senses.


    Chairman of the Zhentarim Association, Adept Freed!


    ¡°Very good. As expected of peak Third Grade elites selected from the Central Region. Your power matches your status. Well then, the victor of this tournament is settled. It is Greem. The two of you may return with me now!¡±


    Three beams of white light shot out of Freed¡¯s hand, heading for Greem, Gallow, and the elementium magical machine. Greem and Gallow scanned with their Spirits. After confirming the nature of the white light, they simply let it hit them.


    The bodies of the three individuals started to fade when the white light entered their bodies until they finally vanished without a trace.


    After sending away the three individuals, Adept Freed turned and looked southeast. A trace of anger appeared in his calm eyes.


    He extended his hand and made a grabbing motion. Hundreds and thousands of strands of white light quickly gathered before him, where they formed into a strange, one-meter-tall boy with light green skin. The boy was clearly unprepared for this sudden turn of events. He was so scared that he immediately let out a breath of poison at Freed¡¯s face.


    ¡°Hmph! Brat, behave! Believe it or not, if you do as you please again, and I will squeeze you into bits!¡± Adept Freed simply extended a hand and pulled Remi back to him after the Spirit of Pestilence tried to escape under cover of the poison mist. He lifted Remi up to his eyes and threatened viciously.


    Setting the location of the battle at Gordon Hignds was his idea, but even he had never expected that this decision would cause such a terrifying disaster to befall an entire dukedom of Bluesea ne.


    This ne was the property of the Association, after all. Any loss incurred here would be enough to cause Freed¡¯s heart to ache.


    However, this was a ¡®fair¡¯ duel arranged by the Associaton after all. The ability to create a gue army was considered part of an adept¡¯s ability as well. Thus, even after Bluesea ne had been so terribly wrecked, Freed did not intend to pursue the matter. He simply let out his anger with a little warning.


    He was the powerful chairman of the Zhentarim Association. He wouldn¡¯t hold a grudge against a mere Third Grade contracted spirit. Thus, with Remi in hand, Adept Freed returned to Kerslin Castle as well.

 Chapter 1049 - After the Victory

    Chapter 1049 After the Victory


    Kerslin Castle was now a sea of celebration.


    Though Greem was the only victor of the tournament, it didn¡¯t stop the many adepts who had hurried here from all over the region from bing exceptionally excited.


    After all, given the prize announced by the Association, the victor was nearly certain to advance to Fourth Grade!


    Thus, they were not celebrating Greem¡¯s victory in the tournament, but congratting the birth of a new Fourth Grade adept in Zhentarim. Moreover, this would be the birth of a powerful Fourth Grade adept whose very background was shrouded in a legendary mythos.


    It meant that the Zhentarim¡¯s power would increase yet again!


    Disregarding the scheming between the higher-ups of the Association, the increase in Zhentarim¡¯s power only meant more significant influence for the many adepts of the central region. It allowed them to be more confident and demanding when trading with the other three major adept organizations.


    Otherwise, the Central adepts would always be regarded with slightly inferior status whenever dealing with adepts of the three major forces.


    It was amon plight of all Central adepts!


    Naturally, as Greem was the final victor of this tournament, his Crimson n became regarded as a mighty n that would only grow stronger in the future. Many adepts fought to visit the representatives.


    As Greem had been injured in the battle, he was hiding in his room and being carefully treated by Emelia.


    The task of receiving his many visitors fell to Mary and Meryl.


    Mary was handling the situation pretty well. She was a Third Grade adept, after all. She had the status and power to stand in front of the leaders and representatives of the various adept organizations and carry herself with the necessary grace and etiquette. Meanwhile, Meryl was only Second Grade. She had to steel herself and receive one adept after another, many of which were Third Grade themselves.


    The two of them could only graciously refuse any requests for alliances or submission as a subordinate force, exining that such matters could only be decided by the n leader once he emerged from seclusion. It was only then that they sent away their guests. Of course, if there was anyone who offered gifts as a gesture of their goodwill, the two girls happily epted them and made sure to take note of the guest¡¯s n and name.


    Even though most adepts had odd and difficult personalities, and even though it was the Second Grade Meryl who received them, none of the Third Grade adepts dared to put on an attitude towards her.


    Thus, for the next few days, Meryl had the time of her life!


    In just these few days, she had practically be acquainted with all the Third Grade adepts of the Central Region. Moreover, every single one of these big shots had been amicable and polite while talking with her. Disregarding all that, she had also been gifted with all sorts of things. Small essories of First or Second Grade, and even unusual items she had only ever seen in books, were given to her as gifts, almost filling her small storage ring to the brim.


    While Meryl was enjoying herself, Greem was hiding in his room. Hey on a stone bed, silently enjoying the treatment of the green light waves emanating from Emelia¡¯s hands.


    Emelia had the nt attribute affinity. After assimting the soul of that mysterious spore princess, her nt affinity had risen to a shocking degree. The nt attribute was acknowledged by everyone as the most gentle of all healing magic, with the most insignificant side-effects. As the waves of green light waves to heal Greem, the wound to his eyes stabilized.


    As hey on the bed, he could sense traces of cooling life particles seep into his eyes, soothing his nearly charred eyeballs. Greem could finally let go of all his concerns and slowly fall into a deep sleep. The bored Remi sat in the corner of the room, counting his fingers as he guarded the room with the elementium magical machine.


    Emelia was not Mary or Meryl, after all. Even as loyal as she appeared to be, Greem still would not entrust her with his life.


    This napsted for two entire days!


    When Greem woke up from his sleep refreshed, his damaged eyes had already recoveredpletely. They didn¡¯t seem to be injured in the slightest.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Origin Fire was a type of principle fire, after all. The fire principles contained with the mes might be faint and inferior, but they were still not a power that Greem¡¯s frail eyeballs could bear.


    Greem had used his eyes as a guide to ignite the Origin Fire within Gallow¡¯s body remotely. At that moment, his eyes had be the bridge and nexus around which the Origin Fire revolved. A principle fire like this might inflict tremendous damage on the enemy, but it was also an enormous burden on Greem himself, who was not protected by any principle powers whatsoever.


    His overburdened eyes had onlysted two seconds before being burned into scorched crystals by the principle fire. If it weren¡¯t for his Body of mes that made him immune to most fire damage, his body would have caught on fire at that moment.


    Even though Greem had suffered such horrible bacsh, he was still incredibly overjoyed.


    That was because the sessful activation of Origin Fire proved that the portion of fire principles that the Chip had generated was correct. As long as Greem continued walking down this right path, making that one critical step into Fourth Grade would no longer be a dream, but an achievable reality.


    However, this battle had allowed Greem to recognize certain problems with himself: the inferiority of his bloodline, and the fragility of his body!


    Frankly, without the Chip¡¯s aid and all the fortunate encounters he had experienced, Third Grade would have been the limit of his potential. Even a step forward would have been nigh-impossible, given his talent and human bloodline.


    Even with the Chip, and even with origin substances, he would only barely be able to advance to Fourth Grade before exhausting all the potential from his soul origin. He would then lose the drive required to continue improving. Principles. Even if the Chip deciphered all the principle powers of the World of Adepts andid them bare before him, how was he supposed to be a host of evenrger and even more terrifying power with such a frail soul and body?


    What were principles?


    At their core, the principles were a way of utilizing power. With the body as the fulcrum and one¡¯s Spirit as the lever, one could move the principle powers that formed the world¡¯s system with one¡¯s own meager and weak abilities. It would allow a person to possess mysterious power ten times, even a hundred times, superior to before.


    Such power was unattainable through rigorous meditation and cultivation alone!


    Much like the human stomach, one could only take in so much food at any one time. It didn¡¯t matter how delicious or nutritious the food was. If you were full, you would not be able to take another bite.


    A human¡¯s energy system was the same as the stomach. It had limited capacity, digested at a plodding speed, and extraordinarily low energy efficiency. Under such circumstances, humans would never be able topare to wild, magical creatures in a fairpetition.


    One had to admit that humanity¡¯s act of learning magical patterns and carvings from wild magical creatures was indeed a miracle. It was this miracle that allowed humans to take a shortcut and leap above the magical creatures, giving birth to the strange and wicked civilization of the adepts.


    However, regardless of how they evolved and grew, human adepts were still constrained by their inferior bloodline and limited lifespan. They could only remain rulers within their own ne, never able topete against those powerful races that transcended their nes.


    Not until they mastered the principle powers.


    Principle powers were like legendary weapons. In the hands of the human adepts, they allowed adepts to unleash surprising power despite their weak bodies and inferior bloodlines.


    It was the appearance of principle powers that allowed the adepts to stand at the very top of the universal food chain, bing powerful creatures equal in standing to Gods, Dragons, Titans, and the Scourge Lords.


    However, what restrained the adepts¡¯ ability to experience and master the principle powers was none other than their bloodline and talent.


    Take the Titans for example. Almost every single one of them was a powerful creature born from the will of the multiverse.


    The human adepts had to endure repeated selection and bloody elimination just to have a chance at advancing from human to adept through painful meditation and consistent diligence.


    The Titans did not need such a process!


    Even a newborn Titan would be able to breathe magical energy at birth. It was a racial talent etched into their very souls. While human adepts worked day and night at meditation to umte magical power, the Titans could already absorb magical energy as if they were breathing air.


    While human adepts struggled up the advancement system one arduous step at a time, the Titans only needed to search for magical energy as their food, and they would be able to steadily grow in power, bing powerful existences that human adepts could scarcely hope to equal.


    The development of these two races was so utterly different simply because their bloodlines and racial talents were different.


    At this stage of his development, Greem felt the difficulty of advancing as an adept more clearly than ever before.


    Thus, Greem had the strange thought to improve or change his bloodline.


    The starbeast bloodline he had obtained form Henvic ne was undoubtedly one such opportunity!


    Apart from bloodline improvement, Greem also realized that many parts of his body could be further improved.


    Firstly, that Second Grade me Fiend¡¯s Heart was utterly outdated!


    Just like in the battle this time, not only had the Second Grade me Fiend¡¯s heart been no help, but it had also severely affected the use of his powers.


    Removing the heart and recing it was one that was perfectlypatible with his fire powers was the right way to go.


    Secondly, the magical equipment he currently used was the Second Grade Fire Throne set, along with a bunch of mixed items from other nes. Though they could help him unleash greater power in battle, they were ipatible with his innate talents, after all.


    It was only transitional equipment that would be used for a brief while.


    If he wanted to continue growing in power, finding some fire equipment that waspatible with his soul talents was what he should be aiming for.


    After some thought, Greem started devoting time to nning the things he needed to do next and ran through them in his mind sequentially.


    It wasn¡¯t until he had a proper outline that he opened his eyes in relief!

 Chapter 1050 - Mysterious Contract

    Chapter 1050 Mysterious Contract


    Chairman Freed soon met Greem once more inside Kerslin Castle.


    Along with him to meet Greem were three other Fourth Grade adepts. One of them was Elder Nics, who Greem had met before. One of the other two adepts was a middle-aged female adept with decent looks. She was Ker, current n leader of the Dener n that Scarface Gallow belonged to. The other adept was a schrly old man. His face was incredibly wrinkled and showing tremendous signs of age. That was Mirva, Vice-Chairman of the Association.


    Chairman Freed started to softly incant a mysterious and unusual chant, witnessed by the three Fourth Grade adepts. As the chanting rang out,rge clouds of ck smoke emerged from the walls, ground, and ceiling around them, gathering before Greem and forming into a mysterious ck contract with golden letters.


    The material of the contract appeared to be the ck smoke itself, and the golden letters floating above the smoke were aplete blur. It was only when Greem extended his Spirit into the smoke that a contract agreement with terrifying binding power appeared in his mind.


    [Beep. Detecting ancient contract fragment. Host¡¯s soul will be bound by the contract, along with the souls of other parties once host¡¯s soul brand is left on the contract. There is no authority party within said contract. It is a shared soul contract. As long as host does not go against the agreementid out by all contractors, no damage will be inflicted upon the soul.


    [There are three agreements on this ancient contract fragment. They are as follows:


    [One. Said Contract is a shared agreement amongst all Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim. All parties in the contract are not to attack each other or harm each other¡¯s interests. Vition of this agreement will cause one¡¯s soul to degrade.


    [Two. Parties involved in the contract must defend the benefit of all Zhentarim adepts. They must obey the orders of the Zhentarim Association to defend against infiltration and invasion from foreign forces, provided their own safety and benefit is not threatened!


    [Three. Parties joining the contract for the first time must execute an Association mission agreed upon by all contractors. Should the contractor refuse said mission, it will be regarded as a refusal to serve the Zhentarim Association. Said contractor will be jointly expelled by all other contractors!]


    Greem narrowed his eyes and reflected silently about this contract before him. He vaguely started understanding something about the situation.


    In all seriousness, the purpose of this contract was to unite the high-grade (mostly Fourth Grade) adepts of the Central Region against the infiltration and invasion of the other three major forces. At its core, the contract was a good thing for Zhentarim!


    At the very least, the contract¡¯s limitations meant that the various adept battles of the Central Region would never expand to the Fourth Grades. Without the participation of the Fourth Grades, it would be much easier to control the intensity of the adept wars, preventing terrifying death zones and endless wars from appearing in Zhentarim.


    Of course, the Association¡¯s higher-ups weren¡¯t foolish enough to restrict wars across all levels.


    After all, adept battles of a certain intensity would cultivate and filter out more powerful and excellent adepts. It was part of the process of internal elimination andpetition.


    As such, the Association only banned conflicts between Fourth Grade adepts.


    As long aspetition between adepts of Fourth Grade and below did not harm the functioning of the adept cultivation system, the Association would not interfere in any manner. In fact, they were happy to see such minor wars and conflicts happen between the various ns. It was the only way that rising adepts could absorb nutrition from the defeated and slowly walk towards the peak.


    From this perspective, Greem and his Crimson n were beneficiaries of thisissez-faire policy.


    After reading the entire contract, Greem understood it in its entirety.


    The Association¡¯s constraints on Fourth Grade adepts were still extremely loose.


    After all, the reason all the Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim had united and created an Association like this was to gain strength in numbers. They wanted to resist the influence of the three major forces, not to restrict their own freedoms.


    Apart from thepulsory mission upon joining, Greem would naturally gain tremendous influence over the development of Zhentarim upon signing the contract. He would be an elder of the Association, after all. On the other hand, the Association would only ce a few limits on what he could and could not do.


    Every single Fourth Grade Association elder had the right to submit a topic of discussion for their meetings.


    When a significant issue appeared, the chairman would summon the elders for a meeting, and a decision would be made through a majority vote. The Association currently had fourteen Fourth Grade adepts. Apart from Chairman Freed, who had two votes, everyone else had a single vote each.


    Pushing a proposal only required a single vote, but vetoing it required a majority vote.


    As such, as long as the majority of Association elders did not oppose the proposal, a Fourth Grade elder could typically exact his will without any problems.


    That was perhaps the main reason all Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Region were willing to join the Zhentarim Association!


    ¡°I am still a Third Grade at the moment.¡± Greem lifted his head, looking at Chairman Freed, staring at him, and asked with some degree of confusion.


    This contract clearly rted to Fourth Grade adepts. He was only a Third Grade adept at the moment. It was obvious that there was something wrong if the Association was so anxious to have him sign the contract.


    ¡°You will be a Fourth Grade adept very soon!¡± Chairman Freed smiled at him, ¡°I have confidence in you!¡±


    Greem still hesitated.


    Elder Nics, who was standing by the side with a dark expression on his face, said coldly, ¡°What is it? Do you want to reject this contract? I warn you, think carefully about the consequences of rejecting this contract!¡±


    Chairman Freed smiled and waved at Elder Nics.


    ¡°Don¡¯t scare him. I¡¯m sure Sir Greem wille to the wise and correct decision!¡±


    Chairman Freed very obviously emphasized his tone when saying the word ¡®wise.¡¯


    However, Greem felt like smashing a fireball right into his face when he saw his superficial kindly smile.


    It was just good cop, bad cop!


    While Greem was still hesitating, a faint but familiar voice rang out clearly in his mind.


    ¡°Sign it! I¡¯ll exin when youe back.¡±


    It was Alice¡¯s voice.


    When Alice spoke in his mind, Chairman Freed seemed to have realized something was odd. He lifted his head abruptly and looked to the north.


    Greem hesitated no longer. He reached out with his right forefinger and gathered a small yellow me at the very tip, which he pressed onto the mysterious contract. The instant the fire came into contact with the contract, Greem¡¯s name, written in the adept script, mysteriously appeared above it. The entire contract then erupted loudly, scattering into ck mist and dispersing into the surrounding air.


    Greem could sense that the mysterious contract had not vanished, but had simply been stored in the core of Kerslin Castle¡¯s animated consciousness.


    Color finally returned to the faces of the Fourth Grade adepts when they saw Greem sign the contract. Adept Ker and Elder Nics, who were witnesses to the signing of the contract, vanished without a trace after smiling at Greem and congratting him.


    Soon, only Greem, Freed, and Mirva were left in the secret room.


    Greem might not have been a Fourth Grade yet, but judging from how the two adepts smiled at him, they thoroughly treated him like one of their own.


    ¡°Here, for you. This is the reward you deserve!¡±


    Freed tossed an exceptionally well-crafted magical ring to him. Small fire diamonds had been iid onto the surface of the ring to form the emblem of the Zhentarim Association.


    ¡°This is your elder¡¯s ring. You will gain the right to freely enter and exit Kerslin Castle while you wear the ring. At the same time, you will be able tomand the adept forces of the Association to some limited capacity. There is also a small storage space in the ring. The five hundred Siths of origin substance we promised you are already in there.¡±


    Even as calm andposed as Greem typically was, he couldn¡¯t help but start trembling when he caught the ring.


    After all, the power and influence that this ring represented in the Central Region carried tremendous weight. It most certainly held more power than most adept ns. To be brutally honest, once Greem wore the ring, he wouldn¡¯t even need to lift a single finger to destroy an adept n. He would simply need to express his will, and plenty of adept forces would be willing to do the deed for him.


    After all, there were tens of thousands of adept ns in Zhentarim, but only fourteen Fourth Grade adepts.


    It was obvious who held more weight!


    ¡°Don¡¯t be too d yet. Your authority as an elder will remain frozen until you advance to Fourth Grade. Everything here will only officially belong to you once you¡¯ve truly be a Fourth Grade adept. However, I believe that this day wille very soon.¡± A strange smile appeared on Chairman Freed¡¯s face.


    ¡°Also, if I were you, I would teleport back to the Crimson n directly and not emerge until I¡¯ve advanced to Fourth Grade. You should know how much of a temptation these origin substances are to a Third Grade adept. Such temptation can drive countless people to walk down the most dangerous and risky of paths.¡±


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    Gargamel was already standing at the entrance to the teleportation room when the brilliant light of teleportation faded. He bowed respectfully.


    ¡°Wee back, n leader!¡±


    News of what happened had already spread to the Crimson n.


    At this moment, the entire n was boiling with excitement. People were celebrating everywhere. As Crimson Majordomo, there was also tremendous joy and insuppressible excitement to Gargamel¡¯s tone.


    ¡°Alright, alright...stop ying these pointless games. The n leader you were waiting for hasn¡¯t returned yet. It¡¯s us instead!¡±


    Gargamel raised his head when he heard that familiar voice. It was then that he awkwardly realized that only Mary, Meryl, and Emelia were standing in the teleportation array. Greem¡¯s figure was nowhere to be seen.


    ¡°La...Lady Mary, where¡¯s the n leader?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! What do I care? Keep waiting here if that¡¯s what you like to do!¡± Mary became infuriated at the subject and stormed away in a fury.


    ¡°Lord Gargamel, wait here, won¡¯t you!¡± Meryl was clearly in a good mood and chuckled as she left.


    Seeing how confused her father was, Emelia tugged at his sleeves and leaned in to whisper, ¡°The n leader¡¯s gone to the Tower of Fate!¡±


    ¡°Oh? Oh!¡±


    Gargamel eximed for a while before finally understanding.

 Chapter 1051 - The Secret Behind

    Chapter 1051 The Secret Behind


    A major astrology ritual had just ended when Greem arrived at the Tower of Fate.


    Over a hundred witch apprentices walked out of the astrology hall in an orderly fashion under the lead of a dozen Fate Witches, leaving the vast space to the young man and woman.


    These apprentices, who were barely fifteen years old on average, secretly snuck curious looks at the young male adept that had snatched the heart of their leader as they walked away. Even though the fire of gossip zed in their hearts, the strict and solemn hall was no ce for them to start talking amongst each other.


    Once all the apprentices and witches had left the hall and tform, Alice walked towards Greem with light steps. He was waiting at the side.


    Although the ritual had ended, the illumination stones around the hall had not lit up at all. It was dim in the room, but the ceiling above them was translucent, and the dark skies outside could be seen. Countless brilliant and enchanting stars lit up the sky, shining as they radiated pure and profound star power. They resonated with the mysterious array carved on the astrology tform.


    As Alice walked to Greem under this night sky with the spots of starlight cast down by the countless stars, she looked like a goddess descended to earth. Every smile and every frown on her face was so unbelievably charming, every movement and action so unearthly.


    Greem held his breath and silently admired the gorgeous sight. The sublime beauty intoxicated his entire being!


    ¡°¡ªhey, hey, what are you doing? I¡¯ve been talking to you for half a day already. Have you been listening?¡± Alice said gently, a pout and expression of mild anger on her face. However, when Alice¡¯s eyes met with the passionate eyes of the man before her, her white face flushed in an instant.


    Greem pulled Alice lightly into his embrace, and his lips found hers without another word. He happily savored the kiss.


    Oooo.


    After a long while, Alice finally found an opportunity to push Greem away and keep him at a distance. Her face was still flushed, but she spoke up and warned Greem.


    ¡°Stop messing around. This is the astrology tform, and I still have many things I need to talk to you about.¡±


    Greemughed and pulled Alice into his embrace once more.


    ¡°I have many things I want to tell you as well. Why don¡¯t we find a more private ce to talk?¡±


    Alice¡¯s face turned even redder.


    She pressed against his chest with his hand. Her body couldn¡¯t help but start heating up as she felt that strong heartbeat and those firm, warm muscles.


    Alice lifted her head and ran into Greem¡¯s passionately burning gaze. She bit her lips softly and shot him a mean nce. It was then that she waved her hand. Their silhouettes shimmered before vanishing from the spot.


    It was half a dayter that the couple finally concluded their ¡®celebration¡¯ after a long time apart. Theyy upon the soft bed, limbs intertwined, as they started whispering in quiet voices.


    ¡°What¡¯s your n for these origin substances?¡± Alice was still panting a little. When it came to Physique, even ten of her couldn¡¯t match up to Greem.


    ¡°My understanding of the fire principles improved during this battle. Even without the origin substances, I won¡¯t have trouble advancing to Fourth Grade. My advancement would just be dyed for a hundred years.¡± Greem was lying on the bed, letting Alice rest on his chest. He stroked Alice¡¯s silky long hair with one hand while caressing her smooth back with the other. ¡°Mary¡¯s a bloodline adept and doesn¡¯t need origin substances as severely as you do. So, it¡¯s best to leave the origin substances for your advancement to Fourth Grade!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! You¡¯re good at talking!¡± Alice pouted and bit his chest muscle softly with her white teeth. ¡°You know we Fate Witches advance through the power of Fate. What can origin substance do for us? What is it? Are you afraid I¡¯ll get angry if you leave the origin substances to Mary?¡±


    Greem didn¡¯t mind that his ¡®lie¡¯ had been exposed. He simply chuckled. ¡°Both of you are women I love, anyway. It doesn¡¯t matter who gets it in the end!¡±


    Alice flirted with him for a bit more before propping herself up on one side. She pulled Greem¡¯s face towards herself, indifferent to the fact that her chest was exposed to him and said with a serious tone, ¡°Greem, I know you are confident in advancing to Fourth Grade, and I know you want to maximize the utility of the origin substances. However, I must warn you that you have to be the one to use this origin substance. Moreover, you have to act fast!¡±


    Greem very rarely saw Alice with such a solemn expression. He quickly suppressed the trace of lust in his heart and frowned. ¡°Why?¡±


    ¡°Because you only have thirty years left to advance to Fourth Grade!¡±


    ¡°What will happen thirty yearster?¡±


    ¡°A war. An epic war!¡±


    Greem then heard the name of a shocking and vast world that even he would yearn for from Alice¡¯s mouth as she spoke with her sweet yet seemingly sorrowful voice.


    Morrian, a human world led by arcanists, was about to rise from a mid-sized ne to a major ne. Once it seeded, it would only need another ten thousand years of expansion and umtion. After that, it would have a chance of bing a powerful ne that stood at the peak of the multiverse, much like the World of Adepts.


    Unfortunately, Morrian was not as lucky as the World of Adepts!


    Morrian ne¡¯s development and growth had undoubtedly alerted many powerful races of the multiverse. The World of Gods, the Dragon ne, and the Scourge Lords would never allow a new race to appear in the multiverse that couldpete with them for territory and resources.


    Thus, they sent the powerhouses and elites of their races to Morrian and started a wild invasion.


    The arcanists, who held Morrian as their origin ne, had conquered over a hundred lesser nes in the past tens of thousands of years, turning them into outposts that defended the Arcane Empire.


    Countless powerful individuals traveled through the remote gxies, breaking into one lesser nes of the Arcane Empire after another,mitting bloody ughter in each and every one of them. The earth would fall apart, and the sky would shatter. One after another, these lesser nes were destroyed in the fires of war.


    The retreating arcanists could only hole up in Morrian ne, using their floating castles and arcane fortresses to form an imprable defensive line outside the nar barrier.


    In the past tens of thousands of years, the Arcane Empire had raided and enved hundreds of nes of various sizes, taking the resources and treasures they found within to their own ne. They then used those resources to create mysterious constructs that could directly absorb spatial energy for their use.


    With an endless supply of energy, the Arcane Empire became incredibly strong and nearly invincible.


    If the various powerhouses of the multiverse had not united to attack them, the Arcane Empire might truly have had a chance to transcend and be one of the most powerful forces of the multiverse. Unfortunately, the proud Arcane Empire forged by the arcanists and Great Arcanists was torn to pieces by the swarm of enemies before it could grow to its full potential.


    After a few hundred years of war, the defensive perimeter outside Morrian ne had already been torn to pieces. The powerful Arcane Empire had be a withered flower at risk of falling into oblivion at any moment.


    The adepts in the realms beyond also joined this epic war near the middle of the conflict, hoping to obtain valuable information and knowledge from the ruins of the Arcane Empire.


    This terrifying and destructive war still raged on in the depths of space.


    The Arcane Empire might have lost most of its ability to fight back, but the remnants of the Empire were still a formidable force. In contrast, the various races that had participated in the war, now possessing the absolute advantage, had lost all will to fight. They were only scheming and thinking about how they could obtain thergest share of spoils from the war.


    Powerful gods, prideful dragons, and terrifying Scourge Lords sent out the elites of their races and cast them down to Morrian ne. On the one hand, these elites were to induce destruction everywhere, crushing the rest of the mysterious constructs that sustained the arcanists¡¯ ability to fight. On the other hand, they were to steal the resources and higher knowledge that the Arcane Empire had stored across their floating cities.


    Naturally, the World of Adepts did not want to be left behind. They had prepared to send an elite party that would dive deep behind enemy lines to participate in the raiding of resources and knowledge in Morrian ne.


    Such a mission would undoubtedly be hazardous!


    Apart from the fearsome arcanists, the adepts on this mission would also have to deal with fierce ¡®allies¡¯ whose intentions were unknown. Much like robbers dipping their hands into the same pockets, they would be both allies andpetitors with these other forces.


    Though the adept faction might not be the weakest amongst all these forces, they were definitely on the weaker side!


    The Great Adepts of the realms beyond determined that the adepts executing this mission would be of Fourth Grade.


    After all, Fourth Grade was the limit of power that the ne could contain.


    Rather than send a Fifth Grade into the ne and have their power restricted to Fourth Grade, it would be much better to send a group of Fourth Grades. That would prevent waste and inefficiency in allocating military force in the war.


    The adepts of the realms beyond would select ten elite Fourth Grade adepts as the main force of this battle. They would execute the missions assigned by the Great Adepts. Each of the major forces were also to select and send a Fourth Grade adept to serve as scouts for the main party. These few adepts were to confuse and disrupt the enemy¡¯s reconnaissance.


    That meant that the Silver Union, the Northern Witches, the Adept¡¯s Association, and Zhentarim each had to select a Fourth Grade to aplish this infiltration mission arranged by the Great Adepts.


    It was precisely the indescribable risk of this mission that caused all fourteen Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim to be reluctant to participate. In their eyes, this was a mission where one would most certainly die. Thus, after some scheming and nning, the unfortunate ¡®scapegoat¡¯ that was Greem was born!


    After listening to Alice¡¯s exnation, Greem finally understood the true intentions behind this tournament of peak Third Grade adepts.


    He did not start shouting in frustration, nor did he begin cursing and waving his hands. Instead, Greem only frowned. His ck eyes seemed to go deeper as he started to calmly and properly think about the situation.


    Alice caressed his determined face with her hands and couldn¡¯t help but nt a kiss on his face.


    After a long while, she finally said with a hint of infatuation, ¡°Greem, did you know? Yourposure and calm demeanor are what enchants me above all else. Anyone else would undoubtedly have started ming me for making a decision for them. Only you would never lose your calm. Only you would never fail to understand the importance of rational thought!¡±


    ¡°Alright, stop beating around the bush. You sent me down this road on your own initiative. Did you foresee something?¡± Greem opened hisrge hand and pped Alice lightly on her round butt.


    It was smooth and bouncy to the touch. Greem couldn¡¯t help but hover his hand over the area and started touching.


    Alice¡¯s body started boiling again.


    She opened her eyes forcefully and bent down to Greem¡¯s ears, panting softly as she described what she knew.

 Chapter 1052 - Bloodline Replacement

    Chapter 1052 Bloodline Recement


    It was three dayster when Greem finally returned to Fire Throne.


    Just as Chairman Freed had said, it wasn¡¯t advisable for him to move around while he carried 500 Siths of origin substance on his person.


    They were many Third Grade adepts in Zhentarim who had remained stuck at Third Grade for hundreds of years. There were plenty of people who were willing to walk on the razor¡¯s edge if they knew that Greem carried origin substance in his hands¨C the origin substance that could change their fate.


    Greem might be under the care of the Zhentarim Association, but that would not stop these adepts who had nearly gone mad from being unable to advance. Even the Crimson n became extremely cautious during this time. The core members of the n made sure to stay within the n headquarters as much as possible, never leaving the tower unless there was something urgent.


    That was to prevent any crazed adepts from abducting and threatening their n leader!


    Greem was also under pressure to consume these origin substances as soon as possible. He had to advance to Fourth Grade to cut off all the wicked thoughts of those greedy adepts, or the Crimson n would never find a day of peace.


    Thus, Greem shut himself in his room at the top floor upon returning to Fire Throne, cutting off all connection with the outside world.


    Greem sat crossed-legged in his secret room, five crimson crystals floating before him.


    The crystals were the purest of non-elemental diamonds. A sort of strange crimson energy floated within these diamonds.


    When Greem first saw this crimson energy, both the me Fiend¡¯s Heart beating in his chest and the soul origin in the depths of his consciousness trembled with desire. He gulped slightly. A voice surged from all his limbs, organs, every piece of flesh, and every single cell in his body.


    Devour it.


    This voice was soft and scattered initially. However, as Greem continued to stare at the crimson energy, the sound started to gather into a terrifying torrent, thrashing and roaring through his body.


    Unbeknownst to him, his right hand started to quiver and reached forward, slowly grabbing towards the crimson crystal.


    It wasn¡¯t until his right hand entered his field of vision that Greem realized his loss of control. He had to exert tremendous will just to retract his arm forcefully.


    This simple act of shirking his arm back had caused Greem to break out into a sweat, despite being at peak Third Grade. Greem then looked into his mind, only to realize that the Chip¡¯s notifications had filled up the entire mental space.


    [Beep. Warning. Warning. Detecting high-energy origin substance crystal. Requesting instructions from host. Begin the absorption process?


    [Beep. Detecting unusual forcefield flux. Attribute: Unknown. Source: Unknown. Effect: Unknown.


    [Beep. Detecting mental confusion in host¡¯s condition. Requesting instructions from host. Commence mental interference?]


    ......


    A series of warnings had been issued, all of them glowing with blinding red light. Unfortunately, all of Greem¡¯s attention had been absorbed by the crimson energy just now, making him utterly oblivious to the Chip¡¯s messages. Now that he had managed to get ahold of himself, he could finally reflect on the situation. A cold sweat broke out on his back uncontrobly.


    That crimson energy should be origin substance, then!


    ording to the adepts, origin substances were portions of nar origin that had dispersed from within a ne. It could be said to be the ¡®blood¡¯ that sustained a ne¡¯s growth¨C that which allowed a ne to cultivate new life and substance. Under ordinary circumstances, the nar origin would remain within the ne, flowing incessantly as the ne system functioned without error.


    It was only when the ne system had been damaged, and the principle powers began dissipating, that the ne origin would manifest as these strange objects that were somewhere in-between material and immaterial. These incredibly pure, non-elemental diamond crystals that had absorbed and captured nar origin within them were the origin substances that the adepts referred to.


    Of course, the nar origin would naturally assimte with ne substances even without being captured. In doing so, ¡®corrupted¡¯ origin substance would be born.


    The most valuable parts of these origin substances were thew shards contained within them.


    Any lifeform that absorbed these origin substances would have a chance of mastering a portion of the narws. That would undoubtedly be a massive aid in understanding the lower principles of the world.


    The world principles and the nar principles always functioned secretly beyond the senses of a ne¡¯s lifeforms. Without the help of these materializedw shards, individuals with inferior talent and affinity with the world would never have a chance ofing into contact with the truth of the world.


    ording to the rules by which the world functioned, it should not be possible for powerful individuals that exceeded the narws and principles to be born within the nes. However, there would always be errors in any system; few or many,rge or small. When these errors could not be corrected, terrifying unearthly beings like the adepts, the gods, and the Scourge Lords woulde into existence.


    The reason the World of Adepts could create so many high-grade adepts and Great Adepts was undoubtedly because the adepts had taken full advantage of the system. They had ingeniously used the origin substances as a means to cross the threshold of principles!


    The source of these origin substances was obvious. They had to havee from hostile nes or nes they had forcefully enved and conquered.


    Many powerful adepts emerged from the World of Adepts and conquered countless other foreign nes.


    Only nes with truly valuable resources would be preserved, serving as an endless source of supplies and ves for the adepts. nes thatcked resources or resisted too strongly would be selectively destroyed for the artificial manufacturing of origin substances.


    Such behavior had been incrediblymon during the early stages of the World of Adepts¡¯ rise. It was only to avoid the attention of the peacekeepers of the multiverse¨Cthe Titans¨Cthat the adepts had recently started reining in their ruthless behavior of destroying nes to create origin substances.


    Unfortunately, despite their restraint, the adepts had already been ssified as an evil faction alongside the Scourge Lords, the Abyssal Demons, and the Mind yers. They were hated and despised by all across the universe.


    The adepts were naturally a chaotic and evil race.


    It was said that many factions had sprouted among the adepts in the realms beyond. Some aided the Scourge Lords in their rampant destruction and ravaging of other worlds. Others helped the Titans fight against the Scourge Lords and Abyssal Demons. However, most adepts remained neutral, hiding in the mystic realms they had created, and living a hermit life of research and learning.


    It was precisely the restraint in the adepts¡¯ actions in recent years that caused origin substances to be increasingly rare and in-demand amongst the adepts.


    Under ordinary circumstances, they would only be traded between Great Adepts.


    Only Fourth Grade adepts who were descendants or good friends of Great Adepts had a chance of obtaining some origin substances. As such, these items were top-tier resources, even in the private collections of Fourth Grade adepts, easily one their three most valuable possessions. They weren¡¯t often put up for trade.


    As such, if it weren¡¯t to avoid being selected to carry out a suicide mission, the fourteen Fourth Grade adepts of the Zhentarim Association would never have been willing to open their coffers and put together five hundred Siths of origin substance for someone else!


    ¡°Chip, search for the method of utilizing origin substances!¡±


    [Beep. Found 12,682 items and information rted to origin substances in the data library. After filtering and selection, 961 sources of information rting to host¡¯s current grade and requirements have been found. Said information is as follows......]


    A waterfall of information surged into Greem¡¯s mind. He closed his eyes and started to rapidly make sense of this information that had already been organized by the Chip. Finally, he came to several conclusions.


    There were three general methods of using origin substances.


    The first was to swallow the origin substance and pray that you could decipher some information on thews that could be of use to yourself.


    It was the method that most adepts would choose!


    The second was to seal the origin substance within your body with magic. You would then go into deep meditation and slowly assimte the origin substance with your organs. In doing so, you could strengthen an organ and create a unique one that waspletelypatible with your origin attribute.


    The third method was simr to the second. However, instead of assimting the origin substance with your organ, you would absorb it with powerful magical equipment of your choice. This method would not only allow the magical equipment to bepatible with your soul origin, but would also enable the equipment to gain strange principle traits.


    Greem suspected that Scarface Gallow¡¯s magical sword had gained its strange characteristics through such a method.


    However, in order to do these, Greem had to modify his bloodline talent first. It wasn¡¯t until he had a powerful bloodline that he could maximize the effects of the principle powers bestowed by the origin substances.


    Having understood this, Greem put away the five origin substance crystals without any hesitation. Instead, he took out a deep blue crystal and plunged it into his chest.


    The blue crystal was about the size of his palm. It was shaped like a rhombus diamond, and a viscous liquid was contained within it. The liquid glowed with an intense energy radiance.


    A slight cracking sound could be heard as webs of cracks appeared on the surface of the crystal. Not a trace of blood dripped from Greem¡¯s wound. Instead, the muscles around the injury squirmed and started contracting. New tendrils of flesh began growing around the crystal until they had fully enveloped it.


    These tendrils of flesh squirmed like tiny serpents, extending into the cracks in the crystals. Countless small flesh shoots continued to grow inside the crystal, slowly creeping towards that drop of liquid at its heart.


    When the flesh came into contact with the fluid, Greem¡¯s body jerked forward. He fell to the ground uncontrobly and started howling in agony.


    Apart from Greem¡¯s animalistic howls and screams, only a bone-chilling sucking sound could be heard within the room!


    Everyone was born with their bloodline. The bloodline was woven into the body, Spirit, and even the soul. It could be said to be the most fundamental aspect of humans, making it very hard to change or modify.


    However, after several hundreds of thousands of times researching and exploring, the insane adepts had finally managed toe up with several techniques and methods of changing and recing one¡¯s origin bloodline. It became one method by which the adepts could strengthen themselves and expand their future possibilities.


    That said, regardless of how much they improved on these techniques, bloodline recement would always remain as an option reserved for a minority of adepts.


    After all, the terrifying bacsh and intense pain of bloodline recement was not something that an ordinary adept could ever endure!

 Chapter 1053 - Price of a Life

    Chapter 1053 Price of a Life


    Bloodline recement couldn¡¯t bepleted in a single session. The entire process couldst for several months.


    The drop of liquid preserved in the blue crystal was something that Greem had procured using the Sourcestealer. First, he had the Sourcestealer devour the starbeast¡¯s corpse. He then extracted theplete bloodline power from the Sourcestealer¡¯s body and subjected the blood to a series of refinements and purifications. The end result was this measly drop of ¡®blood.¡¯


    Starbeasts mostly had Chaos Physiques. The energy they absorbed was violent magical energy that had not been filtered or purified in any manner. As such, starbeasts were often very different from nar creatures in various aspects.


    His flesh and muscles had wholly enveloped the shattered crystal in Greem¡¯s chest. At this moment, traces of blue and ck mist evaporated from the liquid, promptly absorbed by the delicate flesh tendrils wrapped around the crystal.


    This mist would gradually be delivered to every corner of Greem¡¯s body, where it would undergo a mysterious and delicate energy exchange with blood, tendons, veins, and organs.


    Mysterious energy seeped into Greem¡¯s organs and flesh, triggering unknown changes in his body. This process of metamorphosis wasn¡¯t as peaceful as it appeared on Greem¡¯s face.


    Greemy on the floor, a trace of agony shing across his youthful face every once in a while. A certain part of his body would also twitch violently and abruptly.


    However, regardless of how intense the pain was, Greem refused to stop the bloodline recement. Instead, he subtly observed the progress of the process through the Chip¡¯s fine and detailed sensing abilities.


    A set of crimson words projected onto a screen in the depths of his mind.


    [......21%...22%...23%......]


    At times, the number on the screen would not move for days on end, while at other times, the number would change rapidly in a matter of minutes. Every change in the numbers meant that a tremendous shift was urring inside Greem¡¯s body. These changes were often apanied by unforgettable pain and agony.


    It was evident from Greem¡¯s mental state! He frequently switched from a state of perfect consciousness to a state of faint awareness, over and over again.


    The Crimson n also kept a low profile while Greem was in seclusion.


    Most of the administrative matters of the Ailovis Region were left to the nobles of the Crimson Dynasty. Apart from the few Crimson adepts who were stationed at the various resource sites, the rest of them retreated back to the n headquarters and rarely showed themselves in public.


    It wasn¡¯t just the Crimson n members who were waiting excitedly for the birth of a new Fourth Grade adept. Countless ns and organizations across the entirety of Zhentarim were silently awaiting the final results.


    The adepts and organizations that had offended or attacked the Crimson n in the past were like ants on a hot pan. They were incredibly frustrated and anxious, but there was simply nothing they could do. Should Greem seed at advancing to Fourth Grade, the Crimson n would not even need to lift a finger to crush them. Bootlickers and opportunists would swarm at them, hoping to use their heads to gain favor with the Crimson n.


    When that happened, there would no longer be a ce for them in the Central Region!


    Though every region in the World of Adepts had rules andws about internal conflict and murder between adepts, these rules could only apply to the low and intermediate-grade adepts. No rule orw could apply to Fourth Grade adepts, who stood at the peak of the World of Adepts. Only Fourth Grade adepts or a military force equal to Fourth Grade could serve as a deterrent against these adepts.


    However, Greem was in a unique situation at the moment. He was the ¡®rising star¡¯ of the Association. No Fourth Grade adept in the Association would ever shake him down just for some insignificant amount of resources!


    One could even go so far as to say that Greem was currently the precious ¡®sweetheart¡¯ of all the Association Fourth Grades. They couldn¡¯t wait for him to advance quicker. Why would they find trouble with him now?


    To the contrary, to prevent the more foolish adepts from interrupting Greem¡¯s advancement, the Association even secretly sent out two troops of elite adepts to the border of Ailovis. On the one hand, they were to protect Greem. On the other, they were to monitor and oversee his progress secretly.


    On the second day of Greem¡¯s seclusion, the Crimson n¡¯s leadership, represented by Gargamel and Meryl, secretly arrived at Kerslin Castle and met with Vice-Chairman Mirva.


    The purpose of their visit was simple. One word¨C extortion!


    It wasn¡¯t really extortion. After all, the Association was the one that schemed and plotted to put Greem into this predicament in the first ce.


    If Greem didn¡¯t know the cause-and-effect behind the whole affair, the Association would have used the conditions of the contract to force Greem into epting that damned mission once he had advanced to Fourth Grade. When that happened, Greem would have been caught by surprise. Yet, he would have no choice but to ept reality and step upon a path of death and reckoning.


    In doing so, the Association would have been able to deal with the crisis at the smallest possible cost to themselves!


    Unfortunately for them, Greem now knew the conspiracy behind the scenes.


    The Association could no longer pretend to be ignorant and hope for him to swallow such a dangerous fruit so easily. He would not just roll over and bear all the danger and loss upon his shoulders.


    If the Association upset Greem, he could choose to bid his time and refuse to advance until the event had passed. Though he might end up being severely punished by the Association in such a scenario, they would have no choice but to select one of the current fourteen Fourth Grade adepts to go on the suicide mission.


    The Zhentarim Association was unlike the three other major forces, after all. It was only a loose union of adepts of different factions. Therefore, itcked strict internal discipline or binding power. If they attempted to choose one amongst themselves for the suicide mission, the Association would be at high risk of breaking apart. All the Fourth Grade adepts would decide to resign from the Zhentarim Association.


    That was the leverage by which Gargamel and Meryl intended to use to negotiate with the Association.


    They wanted the horse to run, yet they also wanted the horse not to eat. How could such a profitable thing be possible?!


    Having received Greem¡¯s instructions and orders, Gargamel came forth with all his unreasonable diplomatic prowess. He immediately made impossible demands of Vice-Chairman Mirva, listing one outrageous request after another, each one causing Mirva¡¯s beard to puff up in a fury. They wanted resources, territory, civilians, treasure, and knowledge.


    Gargamel listed practically everything he could think of as a request and put them on a long, long list; he made sure to put down a massive number at the end of each item. He then proceeded to argue and negotiate with Mirva with all he had.


    Fourth Grade adept? What¡¯s that? Does that have anything to do with my request?


    One had to admit that the loyal and dedicated Gargamel lived up to his name as the Crimson Majordomo. To think he would dare to throw a tantrum before a furious Fourth Grade adept over an insignificant amount of resources.


    Adept Laurent, who was stuck in between the two of them, felt his head swell in pain. He spent most of the session consoling Gargamel, then immediately turned over to console Mirva instead. He would put out their ring tempers with much difficulty, and they would quickly erupt the moment a new proposal was raised.


    It was a Second Grade adept arguing with a Fourth Grade adept with flushed, red faces, while a Third Grade adept tried his best to diffuse the tension. The muscles on Meryl¡¯s face twitched uncontrobly. She was trying her hardest not tough out loud. There were many times when she found this scene incredibly ridiculous and hrious, but after some thought, she would always find it to be a most understandable situation!


    Having understood the actual circumstances revolving around the entire affair, Meryl knew very well that Vice-Chairman Mirva was actually very delighted, despite how angry and furious he appeared to be at the moment.


    After all, losing some resources was much better than the Association breaking up over having to elect one of their own for a suicide mission!


    As such, regardless of how outrageous Gargamel¡¯s demands were, Mirva was only ¡®angry, angry, and angry.¡¯


    After all, as a Fourth Grade adept, Mirva could not possibly have been consoled by his Third Grade subordinate if he had been truly angered. He simply had to drop a spell, and the whole world would return to silence. An ant of a Second Grade adept would not have the chance to disy such insolence before him.


    His anger was only a deration of sorts!


    It was warning Gargamel not to overstep his boundaries while acknowledging that the Association was at fault. As for where the limity? That was something that a ¡®hooligan¡¯ like Gargamel had to probe for slowly.


    With neither party wanting to break out into an actual conflict, the so-called ¡®negotiations¡¯ ended up looking more like a pstick show!


    After a loud and passionate discussion thatsted for an entire day, the two parties finally arrived at a basic agreement on a series of resources, items, and knowledge.


    When Meryl and the extremely parched Gargamel were eventually escorted to the Association¡¯s treasury by Laurent, the anger on Mirva¡¯s face slowly faded away.


    ¡°They asked for quite a lot this time. It¡¯s a little too greedy of them!¡± Mirva coldly said to the empty air. It was a mystery who he was speaking to.


    ¡°It¡¯s good greed, fantastic greed, I would say. if they weren¡¯t that greedy, I would think that the Association is in trouble!¡± Chairman Freed¡¯s projection silently appeared behind Mirva.


    ¡°It¡¯s not a small amount that we are going to lose this time. It¡¯s a hefty sum of resources and materials. Their appetite is enormous!¡± Mirva was still a little resentful.


    ¡°Are those resources and materials worth the price of a Fourth Grade adept?¡± Freed smiled and asked in return.


    Mirva fell silent.


    Soon, even thatst bit of resentment faded away.


    Mirva gritted his teeth. He will just treat those resources as the price for Greem¡¯s life, then!


    ............


    The massive injection of resources, materials, treasures, and knowledge into the Crimson n allowed the n¡¯s foundations to be even more secure.


    The majority of Crimson adepts had no means of finding out about the crisis that hung above the head of their n leader. They were indulging in the joy of the n¡¯s grand ¡®harvest.¡¯


    Their n leader was almost about to advance to Fourth Grade. How were they, the n members, supposed to keep up if they were left too far behind by their leader? As such, even without the encouragement and agitation of the higher-ups, a frenzied trend for improvement and advancement swept over the Crimson adepts.


    With the plentiful resources in the n¡¯s possession, the more talented n adepts obtained an even more significant investment of resources. More and more individuals started growing in power.


    However, most of these adepts only improved by minor grades. The people who advanced from First to Second Grade and Second to Third Grade were still in the extreme minority.


    Among all these striving adepts, one lonely and abject fellow stood out more conspicuously than any other!

 Chapter 1054 - Chaos Physique

    Chapter 1054 Chaos Physique


    Billis walked through the corridor, quiet and alone.


    As the n had just obtained a tremendous victory, the jovial mood of celebration was everywhere within the tower.


    Billis slowly walked down the wide and brightly lit stone corridor. The hood hanging over his face blocked off the light from the illumination stones wherever he walked, casting a shadow to the ground. Like a silent ghost, he wandered through the tower.


    Billis turned a corner and ran into five apprentices who were chattering amongst themselves with heavy piles of books in their hands.


    Upon seeing Billis¡¯ iconic ck robe and his weird slithering movement, the five apprentices hurriedly made way, bowing with their backs against the wall.


    ¡°Greetings, Lord Billis.¡±


    Billis¡¯ countless blood-red eyes beneath the hood swept past the apprentices, and he simply walked past as if he had not even seen them.


    The edge of his ck robe swayed, and a strange crackling sound could be heard as he moved. Countless ck limbs could be seen moving at a fast yet uniform pace at the bottom of his robe. asionally, several ck things would fall out from Billis¡¯ robe. These things would turn over, revealing themselves to be ck beetles the size of human fists. They would screech and catch up to Billis, diving into his ck robe and vanishing without a trace again.


    The adept apprentices didn¡¯t dare imagine how many more simr insects Billis was hiding under that squirming and contorting robe of his. Could the scariest adept of their n, Lord Billis, spend all his time with tens of thousands of insects on his person?


    The apprentices finally let out a long breath of relief and went back to talking andughing once Billis¡¯ terrifying hooded figure had vanished at the end of the corridor.


    Billis silently returned to his room on the seventh floor and stepped into the dark, cold room.


    As a Second Grade core adept of the n, Billis could easily have a much finer andfortable room to himself. However, his instincts as a bug adept were changing him. He hated the light, and he hated life more and more than ever before. It was why he had chosen this damp and sinister ce as his room.


    Barely any furniture could be seen in the massive room. There was only a small magical altar at the corner of the hall. The smooth and white stone tform had long since been stained red, caked withyer uponyer of purplish-ck bloodstains.


    Judging from the thickness and color of the stains, the blood hade from many different victims over a long period of time.


    One could smell a nearly suffocating stench of blood upon entering the hall!


    An ordinary person would not even be able to breathe in such an environment. However, with the unusual sensory organs of a bug adept, this scent in the air couldn¡¯t be any more fragrant or fresh.


    A massive mirror had also been ced on a wall of the room.


    Billis promptly walked in front of the mirror upon returning to his room.


    His hood was raised, revealing the mess of crimson eyes on his face. Billis took a look at the robe on his body, reflected in the mirror. After a moment¡¯s hesitation, he finally reached forward and pulled it away.


    The robe split apart in the middle, revealing the horrifying and unsightly figure beneath.


    The body of a beetle, smooth, ck, and gleaming with a chilling light. Rows of short but sharp limbs, reaching all the way to his abdomen. He was like an upright ck beetle from the waist up. Meanwhile, bumps could be seen all over the lower half of his body, arge abdomen filled with all sorts of pungent and filthy liquids.


    Severalrvae could be clearly seen floating in yellow and green liquid through the semi-translucent abdominal cavity.


    Not a single trace of humanity could be seen on Billis¡¯ body now, top to bottom, inside out. His thought process, likes, dislikes, habits, and behavioral patterns were nowpletely distinct from most humans and adepts.


    Undoubtedly, this was the main reason why he always kept his form covered with a ck robe and why he hardly ever interacted with others!


    It wasn¡¯t just the other adepts who couldn¡¯t tell his identity now. Even Billis himself had no idea whether he was man...or bug.


    Many bloodline adepts had bloodline manifestations that turned them into monsters that resembled no human nor creature. However, very few adepts ever had their bloodline manifest to such a thorough degree as Billis.


    Within the n, there were a few other adepts who also walked the path of a bloodline adept. That included Bloody Queen Mary, Mystique Emelia, Fire Dragon Adept Meryl, and Poison Adept Gargamel. Their bloodline manifestations only disyed in parts of their bodies. Most of their bodies still retained pronounced humanoid features.


    It made them more readily epted by theirpanions and assimted within the n.


    However, individuals like Billis that had wholly transformed into ¡®monsters¡¯ were often not only rejected, but also lost in their own existential crisis.


    There were many times when Billis would wake up in the dead of night, confused and disoriented.


    Where was he? Who was he? What kind of monster was he?


    These troubles and frustrations tortured Billis for many decades until, finally, the human Billis vanished from his mind without a trace.


    Without the restraint of hisst trace of humanity, Billis could finally embrace his existence and be a true ¡®bug adept¡¯!


    However, he quickly discovered a terrifying problem.


    Without the aid of human Billis, he had lost all ability to advance and improve. It didn¡¯t matter how much he ughtered. The most he could do was absorb more life essence to create more vicious swarms. His grade remained unmoved. He could not continue improving the essence of his life.


    Queen Bug. The limit of the Queen Bug that Billis had absorbed was only Third Grade. It had only achieved its current height after being assimted by Acteon, and then Billis.


    However, the Queen Bug¡¯s separation from Acteon had damaged her soul origin, causing it to now be stuck at advanced Second Grade without any improvement.


    The Crimson n had weathered so many disasters. Billis had also chosen to walk the path of evolution through ughter, bing the much-feared bug adept on the battlefields of war. Sadly, fame was only empty glory. It could not help Billis improve at all.


    Thus, Billis gradually had lost interest in ughter over these years. Instead, he started wandering thends, searching for a way to deal with his current problem.


    Bloodline modification?


    Billis had always been on the frontlines of every battle. He had seldom settled down to conduct any form of research. As such, he couldn¡¯t possibly go far on the path of bloodline modification, even if he were to start cramming the required knowledge.


    Bloodline recement?


    Some fairly valuable bloodline re-creation potions had appeared in the n. However, after thorough reflection, Billis chose to give up on these. Serpentine bloodline, pseudo-dragon bloodline¨C these might all sound nice, but they weren¡¯t suitable for Billis.


    If Billis chose to go for bloodline recement, it would mean that all the effort he had put in so far would have been in vain. He would have to cultivate an entirely different bloodline power from scratch once again. Moreover, the Queen Bug he had assimted was now the actual owner of this body. Why would it ever conduct such an act of ¡®suicide?¡¯


    After much thought, and failing toe to a solution, Billis had no choice but to silentlymunicate with the tower spirit and submit a request for an audience with the n leader.


    ............


    Fire Throne. A secret room on the very top floor.


    After three months of seclusion, Greem had finallypleted the difficult process of bloodline modification.


    ¡°Chip, conduct a deep scan on me!¡±


    [Beep. Mission epted. Deep scan starting!]


    A series of gentle electronic sounds rang out as the Chip went to work. With its robust scanning and analysis abilities, the Chip quickly put together Greem¡¯s actual power at the moment.


    [Greem. Male. Third Grade Elementium Adept (Fire Specialization). Chaos Physique (Excellent Magic Resistance).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 24 (+5) | Physique 27 (+2) | Agility 16 | Spirit 39.


    Bloodline Talent: Energy ckhole.


    One had to admit that powerful chaos creatures like the starbeasts were truly living treasure troves. The bloodline abilities they possessed were incredibly potent. After recing his human bloodline with a starbeast bloodline, Greem had obtained the Chaos Physique, allowing him to absorb magical energy from the chaos of space directly.


    Space was no longer a dangerous realm of hazards for him now. Instead, it was his home-field. As long as Greem wasn¡¯t caught at the center of a terrifying energy storm, he would be able to move freely through space.


    The bloodline talent Energy ckhole also had something to do with the innate abilities of the starbeasts.


    In a moment of crisis, Greem could use Energy ckhole to convert all magical energy within ten meters of himself into chaos energy, which he could absorb for his own use. The duration of this effect was five seconds.


    To Greem¡¯s knowledge, almost all casters hated chaos energy with a passion.


    That was because chaos energy was violent and disorderly, incapable of being shaped into spells or magic. As such, Energy ckhole could be used to shield Greem from a single lethal spell.


    Greem would only need to use Energy ckhole when the attack was about to hit him, and the orderly magical energy of the spell would be converted into wild chaos energy. Naturally, the enemy¡¯s spell would fall apart on a structural level and be neutralized!


    Moreover, the Chaos Physique also provided Greem with magic resistance far surpassing that of an ordinary adept.


    Greem had the Chip perform some estimations. Even though he was currently only at the peak of Third Grade, his magic resistance could already rival some Fourth Grade elementium adepts.


    Moreover, if the battlefield was located in the depths of the gxy, where energy storms rampaged without stop, Greem would be able to gain an advantage with his Chaos Physique!


    After all, adepts born within material nes could not absorb the wild magic energy directly from space as Greem could. Greem could actively and passively absorb a certain degree of magic elementium energy in areas of chaotic magic energy.


    It was undoubtedly a tremendous enhancement to his abilities!

 Chapter 1055 - The Secession Plan

    Chapter 1055 The Secession n


    Greem only read the request from Billis for an audience a monthter.


    He had been busy with the matter of his bloodline recement and hadpletely cut off all connection to the outside world. It wasn¡¯t until his bloodline reconstruction was sessful and he emerged to nurse his body and Spirit that he saw the list of requests for an audience presented by the tower spirit.


    Any small changes to one¡¯s bloodline was a significant affair, let alone a thorough bloodline recement like Greem had just undergone. As the bnce between his soul and his old bloodline had been shattered, Greem¡¯s power had fallen to the bottom of the valley. He urgently needed to construct a power system with his new bloodline as the core.


    It was going to be a long and challenging journey!


    As such, Greem started nursing his body as best as he could once he emerged from the room.


    He had already established several important phases in his mind for the seclusion this time.


    Naturally, the first phase was the recement of his human bloodline with the starbeast¡¯s bloodline. That allowed him to gain new bloodline talents.


    The second phase was to construct some vital energy organs based on his new bloodline talents to rece the ¡®outdated¡¯ organs of his current body. The utmost priority of these organs was the me Fiend¡¯s Heart.


    The me Fiend¡¯s Heart was no longer beneficial to Greem and often ended up as a burden in battle. Modifying the Heart into a true ¡®heart of me¡¯ was an absolute priority!


    The third and final phase was the most crucial part of this seclusion. That was to use the origin substance to experience and master the principle powers, such that Greem might advance to Fourth Grade.


    Of these three phases that Greem had established, the first two were to strengthen his foundations. He had to streamline and optimize all of his power systems rting to bloodline and magic prior to his advancement to ensure that these inefficiencies would not affect his future advancement past Fourth Grade.


    Now, Greem had sessfully reced his bloodline with a starbeast bloodline. He had obtained the Chaos Physique and a reasonably potent bloodline talent. In doing so, he had sessfully achieved his goals for the first phase.


    However, before he began the second phase, he still had to allow his body, his new bloodline, and his soul to be amodated with each other. He could then construct a new power system from the foundations. Thus, in the downtime between the two phases, Greem took the opportunity to learn more about the n¡¯s internal affairs.


    Many of the summarized reports presented by the tower spirit were routine work reports from the core members of the n; Greem didn¡¯t need to interfere in these affairs. He only needed to have a basic understanding to be able to grasp the general trend of the n¡¯s development.


    There weren¡¯t very many things in these reports that genuinely required Greem¡¯s approval or instructions, but there were always a few.


    For instance, Meryl had submitted an extremely ssified report from the White Tower in the Northern Lands that required urgent instructions from Greem. The Magic Energy Association, the underground organization established by Princess Vanessa, was starting to show signs of breaking from the Crimson n¡¯s control.


    Reports from moles nted in the Magic Energy Association revealed that the past four decades of development had allowed the Magic Energy Association to grow significantly. The Association was now a major force with over a hundred core members and nearly a thousand subordinates. Moreover, the Magic Energy Association had been showing signs of unrest recently. A shocking ¡®Secession n¡¯ was brewing within the organization!


    This Secession n¡¯s central idea was to liberate the Goblin ne from the Crimson n¡¯s reign, thereby allowing the goblins to be the rulers of their ne once again.


    The elementary stages of their n were to gather and organize the knowledge, system, and alchemical achievements of the World of Adepts, slowly siphoning and smuggling them to the Goblin ne. Once the higher-ups of the Magic Energy Association believed they had collected sufficient materials, the core members would employ ¡®suicidal¡¯ offensives to simultaneously destroy all teleportation arrays that connected the Goblin ne and the Crimson n.


    Once the connection between the two worlds had been severed, they would have regained their ¡®freedom¡¯!


    When that happened, the newly independent Goblin Empire would rely on the alchemical knowledge that the World of Adepts had umted for several hundreds of thousands of years as a foundation to walk down a path of magic energy development that suited the goblins.


    This way, the goblins might be able to be a new major contender of the multiverse, rising amongst all the other nes!


    Greem almost choked fromughing when he first read Meryl¡¯s summary report on the Magic Energy Association. However, after some serious consideration, he couldn¡¯t help but be somewhat impressed at the ingenuity of these little creatures.


    Vanessa had never abandoned her identity as the princess of the goblins. She was always, constantly nning and scheming for the independence and rise of the goblin race. Their n might sound somewhat feasible and practical, but in truth, it was no more than ridiculous andughable.


    Any random core adept of the Crimson n could easily crush this ¡®Secession n¡¯ they had been organizing for the past fifty years, let alone n Leader Greem himself.


    Setting aside everything else, even their n to destroy the teleportation arrays, which they viewed as the key to their independence, was incredibly hrious.


    Destroying the teleportation arrays would sever the Crimson n¡¯s connection to the Goblin ne? That was such a childishlyughable thought!


    To prevent such a situation from happening, the leaders of the n had already secretly buried special Locating Stones in five discreet ces in the Goblin ne. Even if the Magic Energy Association¡¯s n seeded, the Crimson adepts would still be able to calcte the world coordinates of the Goblin ne through those Locating Stones.


    When that happened, it would be a breeze to open a portal and invade with an elite group of adepts.


    Moreover, the goblins¡¯ worldview and perception of the universe were still too lowly. They had absolutely no concept of the intensity and bloodiness of development and evolution throughout the multiverse!


    Goblins. Even a species as lowly and humble as them dared to dream of standing at the top of the universe?


    Should Princess Vanessa learn of the fate of Morrian ne, she might never dream of such a thing again.


    The Morrian ne was a powerful and prosperous empire of arcanists who possessed an arcane systemparable to even the adepts. Such a dominant race was attacked by an alliance of all the existing significant forces when they wanted to rise to be a major contender themselves, for seemingly no reason at all.


    If one wanted to be an apex predator in this cruel and bloody universe, they would have to have the sharp ws and fangs required to deter their enemies. Otherwise, your battlecries would not only fail to intimidate, but they would even draw packs of carnivores upon yourself.


    You might be sufficiently powerful in your own eyes, having conquered one weakling after another. However, in the eyes of real apex predators, your plump and growing flesh would only be delicious dishes.


    Without the power to protect yourself, it would be much better to continue hiding in your pungent and dirty swamp and living out your isted, idyllic life, rather than expose yourself to the sights of these apex predators.


    With the size of the multiverse and the vastness of the endless sea of stars, the predators would have a hard time finding a single ne to invade and enve, regardless of how powerful they were.


    In truth, this was a paradox for the development of all nar worlds!


    If the nar worlds chose to remain isted from the rest of the universe, they could avoid being discovered by potential predators. Yet, at the same time, it would be incredibly difficult for those civilizations to continue growing in power. After all, the resources in an isted nar world were finite. Though there was always a natural cirction of resources, the total amount of nar origin would remain the same. The number of lifeforms and substances that it could create would stay the same as well.


    Why was the World of Adepts so powerful?


    That was because the adepts stepped out of their ne and invaded countless other lesser nes, bringing back the resources and lives they found back to the World of Adepts. In doing so, the nar origin of the World of Adepts subtly grew and strengthened without stop. The World of Adepts could then create more substances and lifeforms, allowing all beings living within the ne to grow stronger and stronger.


    Why was it that adepts looked down on the natives of lesser nes so much? It wasn¡¯t just out of a psychological sense of superiority. Beings of the World of Adepts were superior to other nar natives in their biological construction and the quality of their souls.


    The nar origin created all substances and lifeforms in a world. The empowered creatures of the ne would then bring back spoils from other worlds, indirectly nourishing the nar origin.


    It was a fundamental principle in the development of a ne!


    Without a powerful force interfering in this process, any ne would be able to be improved from its core through umtion over a long period of time.


    However, for a ne to develop, the beings within would have to step out of their world to wage war, invade other worlds, to enve other people, or to engage in trade. They had to use all sorts of methods to find opportunities to strengthen their origin world.


    However, once one stepped out of their ne and lit the fire of civilization for all to see, they would have exposed themselves in the blinding darkness. When that happened, would they be a predator that continued growing by devouring other nes? Or would they attract an even more powerful predator towards yourself and end up as prey instead?


    It was utterly unknown!


    As such, the rise of a nar civilization not only depended on formidable military strength, but incredible fortune as well. In fact, there were many times when luck was a more important factor than sheer might!


    Greem was now at the peak of Third Grade. He stood before the threshold of this nar world¡¯s peak of power. He could see more aspects and faces of the universe, the more realistic elements, and the more brutal aspects. Princess Vanessa, on the other hand, was no more than an advanced First Grade mechanical adept.


    The World of Adepts that she saw was only the very surface. There was no way she could evere into contact with the more profound reasons that determined the status of the adept¡¯s faction in the multiverse.


    The more Greem understood about Princess Vanessa¡¯s Secession n, the more he pitied her! He had to admit that Vanessa was an ambitious individual with great dreams. Unfortunately, she did not have the power required for her aspirations.


    The higher her dreams, the more severe the damage she would inflict upon her own race.


    If one were to be brutally honest, she would be destroyed and fall into despair with her dreams in her arms, dragging the entire goblin race, and even the entire Goblin ne, down into the abyss alongside her.


    It was not something that could be changed by an individual¡¯s ¡®dreams¡¯ and ¡®willpower¡¯!

 Chapter 1056 - The Bug Adept’s Frustration

    Chapter 1056 The Bug Adept¡¯s Frustration


    The first person that Greem met for an audience aftering out of seclusion was Goblin ¡®God of War¡¯ Tigule.


    When Tigule read theprehensive and detailed report, fine beads of cold sweat couldn¡¯t help but appear on his forehead. His one and a half meter tall body also started trembling uncontrobly.


    In the end, Tigule was only an advanced First Grade goblin. He could only unleash the might of a Second Grade while piloting a magical machine. As such, a terror gripped his entire being from the depths of his soul when he stood before Greem and endured his cold and emotionless gaze.


    The past few decades had been enough to create a rift between Tigule and Vanessa, causing them to walk down two very different paths. At the very least, Tigule¡¯s name very rarely appeared in the Magic Energy Association observation reports submitted by Meryl.


    That was the main reason that Greem had summoned Tigule.


    After reading through the entire report, Tigule almost seemed to have aged by a few decades. His spirit, will, and energy utterly had copsed.


    ¡°My lord...these actions of Vanessa do not represent the goblin race. I...I......¡± Tigule still stood in front of Greem. He was desperate to exin his stance, but he could no longer formte words in his mouth. He didn¡¯t even know what he was saying anymore.


    ¡°This is a massive operation and a considerable movement. Vanessa could not have aplished this alone. She must have had to sway sufficiently influential and powerful individuals amongst the goblins to her side. How do you think I should deal with these people?¡± Greem stared coldly at Tigule. He was dressed in a red robe, and his face was oddly pale.


    ¡°My lord, my lord. You must not doubt the loyalty of us goblins! Yourpassion and benevolence over the years have already won the admiration and trust of the goblins. I dare say that most of us are on your side, with the exception of a few stubborn conservatives.¡±


    ¡°Stubborn conservatives? Which is to say, you know of these people as well?¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    It was a simple word, but Tigule hesitated tremendously before he spoke.


    ¡°This Magic Energy Association had already been active for a while by the time I received this report. They are now actively pushing towards that ¡®Secession n.¡¯ Tell me, how should I deal with this group of individuals?¡± Greem spoke as if it was no big deal, but Tigule¡¯s heart was thumping loudly with every word.


    How could Tigule not know of the adepts¡¯ hatred and cruelty towards traitors after all these years of mingling amongst them?! As much as he still wanted to protect Vanessa at the moment, he would have to consider whether he would drag the entire goblin race into an abyss of demise.


    Moreover, though Tigule did not approve of Vanessa¡¯s decision, he did not actively stop her actions either. The unspeakable reason for that was simple. Deep in his subconscious, Tigule might just be hoping for Vanessa¡¯s operation to seed.


    In the past few decades of the Magic Energy Association¡¯s development, Vanessa hade into contact with and convinced many vital individuals in the goblin faction. These individuals either joined her side or ignored her call for action. In the end, it was only a tiny minority that actively sourced the Crimson n¡¯s higher-ups with information.


    These people who stood on the sidelines and watched probably had simr thoughts as Tigule deep in their hearts.


    They didn¡¯t want to get involved, but they would be happy to see the n seed. Such a line of thought was dangerous!


    If the Crimson n were to pursue the issue, a great purge of the goblins would be unavoidable. Should the n raise their butcher¡¯s knife against the goblins, the few n branches and factions that were in opposition to them would most certainly jump forth and aggravate the situation, causing the affair to rise in severity and intensity.


    If such a thing were to happen, the goblin race was likely to never recover from the aftermath. Their race would forever be relegated to a second-rate faction within the n. Obviously, this was not a fate that Tigule could ept.


    Faced with the n leader¡¯s pressing questions, Tigule could only grit his teeth with determination and make a vow, ¡°My lord, rest assured! Leave this affair to me. I...I will deal with this problem to your satisfaction.¡±


    At this point, Tigule hoped to obtain as much authority in dealing with this issue as he could, regardless of how hopeless it seemed.


    It was only when he had the authority in his hands that he could selectively prune away the ¡®bad goblins¡¯ and keep the other factions at bay. It was the only way to prevent the affair from growing in scale and ultimately resulting in the oppression of the entire goblin faction.


    Greem took a look at Tigule. Finally, he spoke, ¡°You are a veteran that has followed me for several decades now. I have this much trust in you, at least. I will leave this matter in your hands. Remember to summon Snox, Locke, and Drusi once this meeting is over. Deal with this problem as quickly as you can and in the shortest time possible.¡±


    ¡°I understand, my lord! I will deal with it.¡±


    After promising to manage the issue satisfactorily, Tigule respectfully bowed and exited the room.


    Once Tigule had left, shadows flickered in the meeting hall. A green nt that had been ced in a corner of the room shifted into Snox¡¯s likeness after some shifting and twisting.


    ¡°You heard everything Tigule said earlier, didn¡¯t you? He will lead the matter of dealing with the Magic Energy Association. However, I ask you to keep a good eye on him for me. Make sure he does not overstep his boundaries. If he tries anything funny,¡± Greem took out the golem talisman to summon the elementium magical machine and tossed it to Snox, ¡°You must stop him! If this ends well, I will help you resolve this bloodline conflict of yours.¡±


    Snox¡¯s innate potential was notparable to a human¡¯s, after all. Even though he had also ingested the bloodline reconstruction potion of a serpentine bloodline, his ability to absorb and manifest the bloodline power was far inferior to Gargamel¡¯s. At the moment, Snox was not only unable to disy a serpentine head, but he also could not even manifest the scales properly. The green scales on his body grew in scarce patches, here and there, looking nothing like the scales of a snake.


    Snox caught the talisman, passion and excitement written all over his little green face. He patted himself loudly on the chest. ¡°Rest assured, master! Those short-sighted fools won¡¯t be able to cause much trouble while I¡¯m around.¡±


    ¡°Mm. Go!¡±


    Snox¡¯s heart had been feeling fairly empty, having been unable toe into contact with Greem for such a long time. He simply didn¡¯t feel secure in his position. Now that Greem was throwing a bone his way, his spirit was bolstered and invigorated. He was so excited that even his beady little eyes seemed to be glowing with energy.


    Once Snox marched away excitedly, Greem hesitated for a moment and finally agreed to an audience with Billis.


    Seven minutes after he sent out the message, Billis arrived in a hurry at the top floor to meet his hermit-like n leader.


    ¡°You wanted to see me? Speak, what is the matter?¡± Greem yawned softly, seemingly tired and without energy.


    The bloodline recement from earlier had exhausted far too much of his Spirit and willpower. Moreover, his power was also continuously being exhausted while the new bloodline assimted with his flesh and soul on the most fundamental level. At this moment, there was no doubt that Greem needed rest and nourishment above all else.


    In all honesty, if it wasn¡¯t for the fact that Billis had followed him for so long and had been one of the most capable members of the Crimson n during its infancy, Greem might not even have agreed to an audience with this advanced Second Grade small fry. That was particrly the case with his current status and position.


    ¡°My lord, I...I can no longer advance down the path of my evolution.¡± The bug adept, having waited several months before being granted an audience, knew how precious time was to him. He cut no corners and went straight to the heart of the problem.


    ¡°Oh?¡± Greem paused for a moment when he heard this. It was then that he straightened his body, blue light gleaming in his ck eyes. He started to take a serious ¡®assessment¡¯ of the bug adept before him.


    Even though the bloodline assimtion currently happening within him took up much of his Spirit, and even though Billis was enveloped in ayer of forcefield, the massive gulf in Spirits allowed the Chip¡¯s scans to prate the instinctual defenses.


    While Billis shivered beneath Greem¡¯s magical gaze, Greem had already received the data he required.


    [Billis. Advanced Second Grade. Profession: Bloodline Adept.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 7 | Physique 2 | Agility 7 | Spirit 27.]


    One had to admit, as a summoner adept that relied on his insects to fight, Billiscked the opportunity topete on the battlefield personally. He rarely had the chance to refine and train his own body. Thus, his bodily attributes could be said to be utterly pathetic whenpared to other Second Grade adepts!


    However, these low attribute scores were not a big issue. With sufficient time and resources, obtaining decent attributes was hardly a problem. On the contrary, what limited Billis¡¯ evolution upwards wasn¡¯t his body¨C it was the Queen Bug.


    From the very start, the Queen Bug that Acteon had obtained through some unknown means had a limit of its own. The limit of its potential was Third Grade. The decision to switch hosts and separate from Acteon to reassimte with Billis further exhausted its potential for evolution.


    Consequently, when Bug Adept Billis reached advanced Second Grade, he could feel the decline in the speed of his improvement. In fact, it almost seemed like it wouldn¡¯t budge at all.


    The reason Billis was in such a hurry to see Greem was naturally to obtain his help in finding a new direction, such that he could continue evolving.


    The same problem existed for all bloodline adepts to varying degrees of severity.


    The exhaustion of evolution potential would mean that their adept path hade to an end. They would not be able to improve by a single step, even if they were to waste hundreds of years meditating. That kind of despair, which was etched deep in one¡¯s soul, was the most torturous of them all.


    With Billis¡¯ potential, he would have required three to four centuries of development before he would have run into the limit of his potential. He would have been in thetter half of his lifespan by then. However, as he followed behind Greem¡¯s meteoric steps and became one of the most capable members of the Crimson n, he managed to run into this wall much more prematurely, in a mere hundred years¡¯ time.


    It was an unfortunate event, but an incredible blessing of sorts, as well!


    Whether this would end up being a fortune for Billis would be up to his luck now.

 Chapter 1057 - Bloodline Database

    <strong>Chapter 1057 Bloodline Database</strong>


    Yet another problem of bloodline limit!


    Greem propped up his chin with his hand. He silentlymented as he took a good look at Billis.


    Bloodline adepts were at a tremendous advantage in the first half of an adept¡¯s journey. They were more powerful inbat and did not have to so rigorously gather and obtain arcane knowledge as the other adepts had to. Among adepts of the same grade, bloodline adepts had the advantages of both body-refining adepts and elementium adepts, without any of their weaknesses. They were always formidablebatants.


    However, should they run into their bloodline limit, they would face down a problem with no solution!


    The nature of bloodline adepts was to draw upon and achieve the terrifying power of powerful ancient creatures by repeatedly refining their bloodline. Though there were many adepts with various bloodlines out there, not every creature in existence could continue evolving and improving without limit.


    Most bloodline adepts could only try their best to approach the fearsome might of ancient magical creatures, often falling short due to pollution and impurities in their bloodline.


    With tens of thousands of years between them, the adepts of the present could only manifest a portion of their origin creature¡¯s ability. The bloodline of a person who was able to reach Fourth or Fifth Grade with the bloodline of a Sixth Grade ancient creature would be considered extremely pure already.


    There were only two ways if the adept wanted to fully obtain that ancient magical creature¡¯s power and reach its peak of Sixth Grade. They could either travel the worlds in search of pureblood descendants of that magical creature, or they could hide in their magicalboratories, spending day after day attempting to refine their bloodline and gic makeup further.


    There were no other options for improving further!


    Changing one¡¯s bloodline? Sure, but that would only pose a more significant problem. If you attempted to rece your bloodline with a superior one, the bacsh and corruption between the two different bloodlines would be a massive issue that you would have to resolve as quickly as possible.


    Past records of the World of Adepts showed that the first bloodline recement would not have affected an adept¡¯s origin power too severely. However, the difficulty of bloodline recement would increase exponentially from the second time onwards. The bacsh was so severe that it would even damage the soul origin.


    Moreover, even in the present era, the adepts had yet to discover a ¡®perfect¡¯ method of bloodline recement. Every time an adept conducted a bloodline recement, the remnants of the old bloodline would always cause severe ¡®pollution¡¯ in the new one. That would affect the absorption of the new bloodline with the host¡¯s body and soul.


    The more often bloodline recement was done, the more ¡®pollutants¡¯ would be left behind.


    Should the umted factors of instability exceed the physical limits of the body, the body itself would copse and disintegrate.


    It was precisely the immense difficulty of bloodline recement that pushed so many adepts towards thepromise of bloodline modification instead. Instead of entirely recing their bloodline, they would extract powerful abilities from certain desired bloodlines and weave it into their own in a patchwork fashion. In doing so, they created a sort of ¡®mixed¡¯ bloodline.


    Such bloodline modifications did indeed have lower risks and difficulty, but they also resulted in more severe bloodline pollution!


    Ambitious individuals determined to rise to greater heights would never employ such a method to improve themselves. After all, a corrupted bloodline would make advancement much more difficult. If the corruption exceeded a certain degree, the consequences would be severe. Losing the chance to advance was only the least of it. The most severe cases of corruption often turned the adepts into inhuman monsters, unable tomunicate and socialize with other adepts.


    The number of bloodline adepts was rising steadily within the Crimson n with every passing day.


    Their grades were still low, and there was still a long way before any of them even came into contact with their bloodline limits. None of them currently faced any pressing issues. However, bloodline adepts of higher grades would probably be staring this problem in the face. These were people like Billis and Mary.


    If the n could note up with an effective solution to this issue, these high-grade adepts were likely to leave and break away from the n. They would find ways to join the three major adept organizations for the sake of their future advancement.


    After all, the three major adept organizations might just have the solution to a problem that an individual adept n could not solve.


    Thus, when Billis brought up this topic, Greem finally realized how much the Crimson n¡¯s research on bloodline wasgging. Theycked in both materials and knowledge.


    If this situation were allowed to persist, the trouble that the bloodline limit posed to the n¡¯s power would be increasingly evident as more and more n adepts advance to higher grades.


    It was time to establish a bloodline research office. Some projects rted to bloodline also had to be put into motion as soon as possible, and Greem had to find ways to expand the n¡¯s bloodline material inventory.


    After pacifying Billis with a few words, Greem collected arge amount of insect blood, carapace, and muscle fiber from his body. In the end, when Greem brought up the idea of helping him think of a way to resolve the bloodline limit, Billis even gritted his teeth and offered up a drop of origin blood from the Queen Bug itself.


    If it hadn¡¯t been because Billis truly couldn¡¯t resolve his bloodline limit, it would be impossible to obtain such samples and data, even if Billis were killed. After all, Billis was a powerful intermediate-grade adept in his own right now. Exposing his most private data and secrets to another adept was an extraordinarily bold and risky move.


    If Greem had any ill-intent towards him, he would be able to gain total control over him with all the materials he had collected.


    After sending Billis away, Greem brooded in silence for a moment. Finally, he gave the Chip a new mission.


    ¡°Chip, prepare to construct the n¡¯s bloodline database given the data and information that we currently possess.¡±


    [Beep. Mission epted. Data library being constructed andpleted.]


    After a long, noisy sequence of searching and organizing data, a preliminary version of the bloodline database¡¯s table of contents projected into Greem¡¯s mind.


    [Beep. Data library constructed. Currently, the data library has gathered, organized, andpleted documentation on the following unique branches of bloodline systems: Dragon Bloodline, Vampire Bloodline, Starbeast Bloodline, Mechanical Adept Bloodline, Mutated Insect Bloodline, Giant Serpent Bloodline, Elf Bloodline, Orc Bloodline, Holy Light Bloodline, Sporelok Bloodline......]


    Greem slowly looked through this preliminary version of the data library and couldn¡¯t help but be surprised.


    He always found ways of collecting and organizing knowledge on the arcane, on magical creatures, and on native resources, in every region and ne he traveled to. Somehow, in the past two hundred years, he hade into contact and documented so many unique bloodlines.


    The Chip evenbeled the degree ofpletion for the information collected on each unique bloodline.


    Whenever a bloodline information¡¯s degree ofpletion reached 100%, it would mean that that bloodline no longer held any secrets for Greem. With sufficient materials and experimental subjects, Greem would be able to conduct bloodline modifications and modtions on that bloodline easily.


    In some extreme cases, Greem might even be able to create some ¡®artificial bloodlines¡¯!


    These artificial bloodlines might be artificially constructed, but with the fine and detailed operations of the Chip, the host of the artificial bloodline would still have power and ability equal to the actual bloodline. The only drawback would be the intensity of the operation itself. The process would cause the host of the artificial bloodline to experience a ¡®small¡¯ loss in lifespan and future potential.


    However, for most low-grade adepts, a little loss in their life force was nothing, as long as they could obtain greater innate abilities and more power inbat!


    Greem fell into silence when he looked at the catalog of bloodlines.


    Of all the unique bloodlines, only the holy light bloodline and the elf bloodline had a higher degree ofpletion.


    Greem estimated that this was rted to the grade of holy knights and elves he had ughtered and gathered.


    Take the holy light bloodline, for example. Greem had killed dozens of Third Grade Gold Knights in the Henvic ne while robbing the grave and remains of a Fourth Grade Holy Knight. He had managed to gather the essential data on all levels of holy knights, from First to Fourth Grade.


    If he had the opportunity to adequately research the remains of the Fourth Grade holy knight in his storage ring, he should have no problem reaching 100%pletion for the information on the holy light bloodline.


    Meanwhile, the elf bloodline¡¯s high degree ofpletion was purely due to his wild ughter in Lance!


    For the sake of helping Alice obtain the pseudo-artifact, Staff of Divination, Greem and his party had ughtered tens of thousands of elves, spanning every single profession of their race. If it weren¡¯t due to hisck of information on Fourth Grade elves, the elf bloodlinepletion rate would also be shockingly high.


    Apart from these two bloodlines, his data library¡¯spletion of the giant serpent bloodline and the vampire bloodline was also nearly at 50%.


    Greem had killed two serpentine adepts as of now and had obtained the valuable serpentine bloodline recreation potions and the bloodline purification potions. It was due to this that the serpentine bloodline¡¯spletion rate was so high.


    Meanwhile, the vampire bloodline wasrgelyplete due to Mary.


    After all these years with Mary, Greem had plenty of research on vampires of First to Third Grade. Yet, that had only barely been enough to achieve 50%pletion on the data library.


    Mary was now a pureblood vampire. Given the current circumstances, advancing to Fourth Grade shouldn¡¯t be difficult for her. However, she had no idea what her path after Fourth Grade looked like. Without Greem¡¯s help, it would be nearly impossible for Mary to find her own way, given her talent as an adept and a vampire!


    Moreover, Greem himself had now turned into a bloodline adept. His bloodline was a very rare and valuable one¨C the starbeast bloodline.


    The advantage of this bloodline was its unique Chaos Physique, which allowed Greem to directly absorb a portion of chaotic magic energy for his own use. Moreover, in the records of the World of Adepts, starbeasts were powerful chaos creatures that could reach up to Eighth Grade.


    Even if the starbeast bloodline that Greem had assimted were slightly inferior, he would not face the bloodline limit until he reached Seventh Grade.


    As such, Greem now walked two paths: that of a bloodline adept, and that of an elementium adept.


    The path of a bloodline adept would provide him with a sturdy body and formidable bloodline abilities. In contrast, the path of an elementium adept allowed him to possess unparalleled elementium might.


    Both of these paths were worth a lifetime of investment and cultivation for an adept. Now that Greem wanted to walk down both tracks, the number of rare resources he would have to expend and the knowledge he would have to gather would be, at the very minimum, twice that of his peers.


    This tremendous amount of resources and knowledge required would be enough to cause a headache for most adepts!

 Chapter 1058 - Method of Improving Bloodlines

    <strong>Chapter 1058 Method of Improving Bloodlines</strong>


    The methods by which elementium adepts and bloodline adepts improved were entirely different.


    Elementium adepts almost never considered refining their physical body. Instead, they prioritized the collection of elementium magic knowledge and the construction of spell models. They were more concerned about the affinity and harmony between their Spirit and magical elementium.


    Elementium adepts believed that they only needed to maintain their physical attributes at a sufficiently useful level.


    They would also find ways to improve and adapt their bodies, but it would be sufficient for their Physique to be able to resist the harsh environments of the various nes out there. The rest of their resources were mostly assigned to the improvement and cultivation of their Spirit.


    Of course, the collection of magical equipment, tools, and spells models was also necessary!


    Moreover, the conversion of collected magical knowledge into power, the understanding and improvement of spell models, the cultivation of Spirit, and the crafting of magical equipment were activities that demanded a considerable amount of resources and time.


    As such, adepts never had enough time!


    On the other hand, bloodline adepts focused on the assimtion of body, soul, and bloodline into their cultivation.


    They would find ways to improve their Physique in order to create a ripple effect and magnify the Physique enhancements bestowed by their bloodline. They would also use unique magical means to continuously refine their bloodline to manifest even more powers from their bloodline origin.


    It was the mostmon way in which bloodline adepts cultivated their power!


    Many bloodline adepts enjoyed devouring the bloodline of their own kind, using it as nourishment to further propel and increase their bloodline powers. This method was considered taboo, but it was difficult to restrict adepts from employing this method.


    As such, bloodline adept ns would often keep a very close eye on every member of their n. They even had special magical techniques to check if any n members have ever devoured the bloodline of their own kind. Anyone found to havemitted this taboo would either be executed or have their bloodline talent confiscated and taken away from them.


    The main ingredient of the two serpentine bloodline recreation potions that Greem had obtained was the origin blood of a serpentine adept. Naturally, the source of such origin blood came from those who were punished and executed by their n!


    Greem was now both a bloodline adept and an elementium adept. He would have to refine his body while also continuing his studies of magical knowledge and spell models. Naturally, he would have to exhaust twice the amount of time and resources as his peers of the same grade.


    Without arge and reliable force to help him collect resources and knowledge, he would not be able to aplish such a colossal task, even if he were to expend his lifespan.


    Greem had the starbeast bloodline now. He could directly absorb chaotic magical energy.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s feedback, Greem would have to frequently devour ¡®nutritious food¡¯ to nourish his starbeast bloodline. For starbeasts, the so-called ¡®nutritious food¡¯ would be chaos energy, Hearts of Elementium, origin substance, or the flesh of other starbeasts.


    These things were either incredibly rare or tremendously valuable. It was very difficult to get one¡¯s hands on any of these items!


    Meanwhile, Greem could tackle his studies of an elementium adept with the Chip¡¯s aid. He did not need to waste additional time to learn and practice new magical knowledge slowly. The Chip had also already been responsible for analyzing the spell models. It would transfer the information into Greem¡¯s consciousness upon thepletion of its analysis, saving him plenty of time that would otherwise have been spent on training and understanding.


    The reasons Greem could advance five times as fast as other elementium adepts were directly rted to the Chip¡¯s aid.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel his head hurt when he heard the Chip list all these valuable resources.


    ¡°Chip, aren¡¯t there any simpler methods of improving my starbeast bloodline?¡±


    Greem only had a small reserve of origin substance in his possession that could serve as sone of the ¡®nourishment¡¯ that the Chip had mentioned. Moreover, these origin substances were meant to strengthen his soul origin and increase his understanding of thews. He could not use them to nourish his bloodline. Greem could only ce his hopes in the Chip to find an easier, cheaper, and more avable resource.


    [Beep. Detecting one substitute for improving the starbeast bloodline.]


    ¡°What is it?¡± Greem asked with joy and surprise in his voice.


    ¡°Chaotic magical energy. The host can use the magic generator furnace to connect to the space beyond the nes and absorb unmodted magical energy. In sufficient amounts, the chaotic magical energy can serve as a substitute to chaos energy.]


    ¡°How effective will this be?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    [Beep. ording to simtions and calctions, after absorbing chaotic magical energy for 4 hours a day for an entire month, the host will be able to improve the quality of the starbeast bloodline by 1%, and the quality of the Chaos Physique by 2.7%.]


    ¡°Only four hours a day? Why only four hours? Can¡¯t we extend the absorption time and hasten the rate of improvement?¡±


    [Beep. Host may have Chaos Physique, but continuously absorbing chaotic magical energy for four hours will also cause the body to umte a certain amount of elementium damage. As such, Host has to rest sufficiently for the body to heal and absorb the energy. Four hours a day is the most efficient time calcted!]


    So that¡¯s how it was!


    Greem brooded in silence for a brief moment before asking again.


    ¡°What will happen after one hundred months, when the starbeast bloodline has been improved by 100%?¡±


    [Quality of the starbeast bloodline will advance, and Host will obtain a new bloodline talent!]


    Greem drew in a breath of cold air. Finally, for the first time ever, he understood the power of bloodline adepts.


    If the advancement in the quality of their bloodline was always apanied by the appearance of a new bloodline ability, didn¡¯t that mean that bloodline adepts would obtain several powerful offensive options out of thin air that didn¡¯t require the use of their Spirit? No wonder bloodline adepts were always able to unleash powerful spells that required no chants or handsigns, despite how little time they spent on researching elementium magic.


    They weren¡¯t using spells, but their bloodline powers!


    A hundred months was no more than ten years. To be able to obtain a powerful bloodline ability out of nowhere in just ten years was exceptionally worth it, no matter how he looked at it.


    Greem had already obtained a bloodline ability known as Energy ckhole when he first acquired the starbeast bloodline. The Chip¡¯s evaluation of that ability was reasonably high as well. If he could obtain another bloodline ability in ten years, it was sure to be at least as powerful as Energy ckhole.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but lick his chapped lips at the thought of this. He started to look forward to when his bloodline would advance.


    Ten years might be a long time for an ordinary mortal, but it was only a small journey for Greem!


    At the very least, Greem already nned to spend over twenty years in seclusion toplete his advancement this time.


    ............


    Northern Lands, White Tower.


    Vanessa, who had dressed herself up as a young human girl, slowly walked down the corridor with arge stack of magical tomes in her arms. She smiled and nodded at all the adepts and apprentices she ran into along the way.


    As one of the fairly well-known mechanical witches of White Tower, Vanessa had taken on several lectures for the apprentices. She was in charge of ¡®The Origin of Mechanical Magic¡¯ and ¡®Research on Magical Energy Substitutes.¡¯


    After thirty years of hard work, Vanessa had also cultivated several qualified adepts. She was gentle and far more approachable than most other adepts, making him a lecturer admired and respected by most adept apprentices.


    As such, most adepts and apprentices in White Tower looked past her identity as the goblin princess and fully treated her as a human adept.


    Vanessa had a gentle and pleasant smile on her face, which was forged from a unique magical alloy. She kept the smile on her face until she disappeared into her room.


    As the doors of her room close shut, the sweet smile on her face faded without a trace. It became the cold, expressionless metal face that she always had.


    Two goblin machinist sorcerers wearing the uniform of the Brutalblood Army were waiting for her inside her room.


    The two machinist sorcerer hastily walked forward when they saw Vanessa return. They leaned to her ear and started whispering.


    ¡°What? You said Greem personally summoned Tigule for an audience?¡±


    ¡°Yes, princess. My man saw it with his own eyes. Fire Throne might be on lockdown, but anyone that enters or exits Fire Throne will have to pass by Pinecone City. That is why I arranged men in Pinecone City a long time ago. My subordinate personally saw Lord Tigule pass by Pinecone City to Fire Throne. He stayed there for half a day before leaving.¡±


    ¡°Who else did Greem summon for an audience apart from Greem?¡±


    ¡°Greem met with Snox before Tigule, but Snox has not been seen leaving Fire Throne yet. Bug Adept Billis also had an audience after Lord Tigule left!¡±


    ¡°What is he thinking about? Shouldn¡¯t he be busy absorbing the origin substance right now? Why would he have time to have an audience with Snox, Tigule, and Billis? If I¡¯m not wrong, it has already been over twenty years since hest had an audience with them!¡±


    ¡°Yes. It is because we cannot determine his intentions in summoning Lord Tigule that our master has asked us toe here to ask you what to do next. Should we put our n on hold and decide after we have ascertained his intentions?¡± The two goblin machinists sorcerers couldn¡¯t help but further lower their voice when they spoke of the ¡®n.¡¯ They even looked around them, seemingly nervous and in a panic.


    ¡°No, the n cannot be put on hold. It must continue forward. I have alreadypleted my arrangements in White Tower. Once we destroy that teleportation array, the people you have nted in the City of Machines must act as soon as possible. Apart from wind Adept Deserra, the rest of the stationed adepts in the City of Machines will not be much of a problem. You only need to keep them upied while having others destroy the teleportation array, and our n will have seeded.¡±


    ¡°But...but Lord Gonga, Lord Locke, and the others are all still in the World of Adepts! Should we destroy the teleportation arrays, they won¡¯t be able to return to the Goblin ne any more!¡±


    ¡°Hmph, those traitors. They no longer think of themselves as goblins anymore. Why should we give them any consideration? Leave them here in the Crimson n to bear the brunt of their fury!¡±


    Only these few influential individuals had risen to power in the goblin faction in the past hundred years of the adepts¡¯ rule. Abandoning them in the World of Adepts would thoroughly break the hearts of all the goblins.


    However, the reality was as the princess had said. These people no longer thought of themselves as part of the goblins. If they were involved in this n, it was possible that this great operation that they had nned for several decades would be exposed.


    At the thought of this, the two goblin machinist-sorcerers looked at each other and let out a helpless sigh.

 Chapter 1059 - A Goblin’s Ambition

    Chapter 1059 A Goblin¡¯s Ambition


    While the three goblins conspired, a loud ttering rang out. Somone was fiercely pounding on the doors to the room.


    The three goblins shivered in shock and looked at each other.


    Vanessa was the owner of the room. Naturally, this meant that she had the highest authority over the ce. She waved her hand; a barrier of light appeared in front of her, projecting the scene urring beyond the doors.


    Vanessa¡¯s red mechanical eye shone brightly when she saw the familiar towering silhouette on the screen, but the light quickly faded away.


    The looming figure standing outside the door was none other than Tigule¡¯s Goblin Shredder.


    The two goblin machinist-sorcerers looked at each other in fear. They had a feeling that things were slowly going downhill, rapidly heading towards a ce where they had no control. They had just been talking about Tigule, and he was already breaking down their doors. Moreover, he was in fullbat outfit.


    Could it possibly be a coincidence?


    Tigule must have rushed here immediately after leaving Fire Throne. Otherwise, there was no way he would have arrived so quickly.


    Princess Vanessa scolded the two messengers when she saw the nervous expressions they had on their faces. She then waved her hand and sent them away.


    There were several goblin teleportation devices leading to different regions in a secret room hidden in her quarters. It could allow the goblins to freely and secretlye and go while avoiding the detection of the tower.


    Once the two goblin machinist-sorcerers had vanished into the teleportation devices, Vanessa calmed herself down. It was then that she strode towards the door and dispelled all the magical protections around her quarters.


    The doors opened wide.


    Tigule roughly sted through the alloy doors with the Goblin Shredder, breaking into the room with rumbling steps. A dozen magical machines in fullbat gear followed behind him.


    ¡°Tigule, this is my personal quarters. You...you have no right to freely enter in this manner!¡± Blinding red light shone in Vanessa¡¯s mechanical eye as she shouted. She opened her arms wide and stood before the magical machine.


    The Goblin Shredder ignored Vanessa¡¯s words. Instead, it lifted its legs and strode right over her head. It slowly bashed down the doors to the four or five secret rooms, until it found the goblin teleportation devices.


    The principles by which the goblin teleportation devices operated were not of the same system as the adepts¡¯ teleportation arrays, which was what allowed them to escape detection from the tower. Vanessa would only require a single teleportation device if it were for the sake of her own convenience in traveling.


    However, there were five expensive teleportation devices in her room. To say that she was using them for convenience in travel would be far too terrible an excuse. It might work for the more ignorant, but it was far from sufficient to deceive Tigule.


    The Goblin Shredder abruptly froze on the spot when it saw the five teleportation devices. Vanessa, who had been following behind the Shredder, also fell silent.


    After a long pause, the Goblin Shredder stood up straight and waved its hand silently.


    The dozen powerful magical machines that had broken into the room slowly retreated and shut the doors back in ce. The machines did not leave immediately. Instead, they stood guard over the entrance of the room inbat mode.


    After a long time, the Goblin Shredder finally turned around, its vicious and terrifying metal frame facing towards the cute and petite Princess Vanessa.


    ¡°It¡¯s been a while, Vanessa,¡± Tigule¡¯s deep and tired voice rang out from within the vicious machine, ¡°Can you exin why all these goblin teleportation devices are here?¡±


    Princess Vanessa¡¯s fully metallic body remained stationary. There was not a trace of an expression on her smooth and perfect face.


    Clearly, she refused to answer Tigule¡¯s question.


    ¡°What exactly are you trying to do?¡± Tigule¡¯s tone was furious yet powerless at the same time, filled with unconceble anxiety.


    Vanessa finally replied to the question of her admirer.


    ¡°Helping the goblins rise to power once again!¡±


    ¡°With what? With the mercy and charity of the adepts? The magical crystals you are using belong to the adepts, the knowledge you have obtained belongs to the adepts, even the room you are living in belongs to the adepts. Every single thing you own belongs to the adepts.


    ¡°What exactly do you intend to rely upon to fight against the adepts? Three hundred million goblin lives?¡± The anger burning in Tigule¡¯s heart only grew with every word he spoke. His tone was turning sharper, and he was practically shouting by the end of it.


    ¡°But everything you just mentioned once belonged to us! The adepts took everything away from us, then tossed the unwanted remains back to us, as rewards for our ¡®loyalty¡¯ and ¡®diligence.¡¯ That isn¡¯t fair! I want to take back everything that once belonged to us now.¡± Finally, Vanessa started shouting back in Tigule¡¯s face.


    She balled her fists and screamed loudly, revealing her true thoughts for the first time in her life.


    ¡°As expected, that is what you were thinking.¡± Tigule was no longer as furious when Vanessa finally bared her heart, ¡°Then, do you know why I¡¯m here today?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s that tyrant. That evil adept that took away everything from us sent you here.¡±


    ¡°Indeed, everything you have said might be true. But...so what? You have already been living in the World of Adepts for several decades now. You should have witnessed and experienced the power of the adepts. Do you think that we could have continued surviving untouched, even if Lord Greem hadn¡¯t invaded and enved the Goblin ne?¡±


    Vanessa, who had been shouting with all she had earlier, suddenly stopped talking. She chose to respond withplete silence.


    She was no longer the insignificant and ignorant goblin princess of the past. She was a mechanical adept that had witnessed the world beyond her well. Through the massive number of magical tomes she had read, and through all she had personally seen, Vanessa understood very clearly how backward and isted the Goblin ne had been.


    Even though she was reluctant to admit it, the civilization she had experienced over the years did not allow her to gloss over the problems that once existed in the Goblin ne.


    Compared to the World of Adepts,pared to the tens of thousands of lesser nes enved by the World of Adepts, the Goblin ne was simply far too weak and primitive!


    The only advantage that the Goblin ne could im to possess was its shocking amount of metal resources.


    Meanwhile, the goblins were simply a weak race that kept guard over the treasure hoard without the power to im its ownership.


    It wouldn¡¯t even take the World of Adepts to conquer the Goblin ne. The goblins would not have been able to escape their fate of being enved and ughtered had they run into any other nar world with some degree of power.


    Moreover, while their metal resources could be considered rare resources, the goblins themselves were barely qualified as abor force. They might not even have the qualifications to serve as ves.


    As such, the fact that the Goblin n had run into Greem and the Crimson n could be considered fortunate for them. At the very least, the Crimson n had not employed the most barbaric and cruel way possible in taking over the Goblin ne. They did not enve all the goblins and reduce them to mere miners.


    It was probably the greatest fortune in all of their misfortunes!


    However, Vanessa was the princess of the goblins. She could never rid herself of that damned and heavy tag. As the only noble princess of the goblin royalty, Vanessa was constantly dreaming of the glory and brilliance of the Goblin Empire rising by her hands once again.


    These wild dreams forced her to push towards that unspeakable ¡®Secession n¡¯ slowly, one doomed step at a time!


    Vanessa had always believed her actions to be sessful and covert in the past.


    However, when Tigule, who waspletely uninvolved in the affair, appeared before her, she had a sudden and shocking realization. None of her actions in the past had ever escaped the grasp of the adepts.


    How much did the adepts know? How many core members of the Magic Energy Association had already been exposed? Could the Secession n still be carried out?


    While Vanessa was caught up in her state of panic and loss, the cockpit of the Goblin Shredder opened up. Tigule jumped out in his tightsuit, grabbed her by the shoulders, and shook her gently, ¡°Wake up, Vanessa. Your n, your people. Everything is within the grasp of the Crimson n. It doesn¡¯t matter how good your intentions are; your reckless actions will never bring about a happy future for the goblin race. You will only be leading even more goblins into the abyss with you. Turn back, Vanessa. As long as you are willing to give up on these delusions, I...I can protect you with my life on the line. I can ensure you stay alive.¡±


    Vanessa might be a lot more petite than Tigule, but her ¡®weakness¡¯ was only on the surface. In the end, Vanessa possessed the power of an advanced First Grade mechanical witch. Dealing with the intermediate First Grade Tigule at such a close distance was no problem at all.


    Tigule might be able to fight as an advanced Second Grade while hiding inside the Goblin Shredder. However, now that he had emerged from his armor, he was no more than a slightly stronger goblin pilot!


    Red light glowed brightly in Vanessa¡¯s strange mechanical eyes.


    ............


    One of the higher floors of White Tower.


    Meryl was seated in her chair in a bright,rge arcane hall, silently listening to Vanlier¡¯s report.


    Snox was rubbing his hands together in the corner of the hall, excitement written all over his face.


    ¡°You mean...Tigule led his men into Vanessa¡¯s room, then had them exit the room while he remained inside her room alone?¡± An intimidating light glowed in Meryl¡¯s red eyes as she asked with a cold and cutting voice.


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s nothing strange in Vanessa¡¯s room, is there?¡±


    ¡°We have been keeping a very close eye on her recently. Even though she has not made any contact with any members of the Magic Energy Association, the Association has be increasingly active.


    As such, I suspect that there is some sort of strange device in her room that allows her to maintain contact with the outside world.¡± Vanlier had be sharper and more capable after all these years serving as Meryl¡¯s aide.


    ¡°Mydy, if I¡¯m not wrong, Vanessa might be hiding some goblin teleportation devices in her room.¡±


    ¡°Teleportation devices? What are they capable of?¡± Meryl couldn¡¯t help but frown deeply when she heard the word ¡®teleportation.¡¯


    ¡°Those devices only work for goblins. They allow them to do short-distance point-to-point teleportation. They cannot teleportat more than fifty kilometers away.¡±


    ¡°Teleporting goblins?¡± Meryl¡¯s eyes grew wide. She immediately stood up and gave an order, ¡°Go. Immediately detain Vanessa. If she dares resist, then kill her!¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±

 Chapter 1060 - Rebellion Rises

    <strong>Chapter 1060 Rebellion Rises</strong>


    When Vanlier and Snox arrived at the doors to Vanessa¡¯s room with arge group of subordinates in tow, they were stopped by the magical-machine squad standing guard there.


    The goblin captain of the squad was firm and rough in his attitude. He refused to let the adepts enter without Tigule¡¯s orders. After a few failed attempts at negotiating, Snox almost blew up in anger.


    It was fortunate that Vanlier was an old fox well-versed in dealing with such matters. He extended an arm and held Snox back, who was about to order a charge. He then shed a sinister smile at the goblin captain and said, ¡°We are here on the orders of Tower Master Meryl. Even Lord Tigule has no right to stop us. Since you keep mentioning your superior¡¯s orders, why don¡¯t you contact Lord Tigule now and see what he says?¡±


    The goblin captain hesitated for a moment, but he had no choice but to take out amunication device shaped like a ck button. He started calling out for Tigule over and over again. Unfortunately, regardless of how he shouted, only static feedback came from the device.


    Such a situation had never happened before.


    A cold sweat broke out over the goblin captain¡¯s forehead.


    ¡°Make way! All of you make way. Vanessa has been involved in a rebellion. If any of you dare stop us anymore, you will be considered as conspirators as well. I have the n leader¡¯s orders here with me. There will be no mercy!¡± Snox leaped into the air anxiously, waving his hand as he released the Third Grade elementium magical machine from the golem talisman.


    A deep, muffled boom rang out.


    Even the tough floor, which had been reinforced multiple times with magic, could not endure the mountainous weight of the elementium magical machine. A small crater appeared where it was summoned, cracks running across the floor.


    ¡°An elementium magical machine. It¡¯s the n leader¡¯s elementium magical machine!¡±


    The goblin¡¯s screams of surprise filled the corridors as the elementium magical machine slowly straightened itself.


    Those metal legs as thick as pirs, that towering figure that almost scraped against the ceiling, that overwhelming aura of heat; the goblins in the magical machines couldn¡¯t help but gulp anxiously at the sight of the monster before them.


    God, the magical machines they were piloting were like little rabbits in front of a lion right now. What else could they do besides shiver in fright?!


    The elementium magical machine was a Third Grade construct personally created by the n leader. Every single person in the n knew this. As such, the magical-machine squad could only step aside obediently when they saw the elementium magical machine appear. They no longer dared to stand in Snox¡¯s way.


    ¡°Charge! Smash those doors for me!¡±


    Snox was indescribably excited at being able tomand such a high-grade magical construct for the first time in his life. The elementium magical machine roared and lowered its body. The metal tes on its back opened, revealing several dozen propellers glowing with a ghostly blue light. Jets of zing mes then shot out of the propellers, extending for a dozen meters behind the machine.


    The next second, the elementium magical machine¡¯s massive body glided forward at surprising speed,nding a vicious punch on the alloy doors of the room.


    ¡°Not good.¡±


    Snox instantly realized that things were going to get dangerous. He quickly squatted down and sped his ears with his hands. The next second, an earthshaking explosion rang out in the narrow corridor of the tower.


    The terrifying sonic shockwave instantly concussed every goblin and vampire present. Purple trails of blood flowed down their eyes, ears, and noses.


    The violent force sted the twenty-centimeter-thick alloy doors into pieces and sent them flying into the room. The elementium magical machine stepped past the pulverized floor beneath it and strode into the roompletely unfazed.


    Goddammit! That was a bit too powerful, wasn¡¯t it!?


    Snox muttered to himself as he got up from the ground as quickly as he could. He rushed into the room along with the elementium magical machine.


    The inside of the room was already in chaos.


    Arge piece of the door had swept through the living hall and crashed against the stone wall, leaving the insides of the ce a mess.


    However, not a single person could be seen in the living hall. There was only a massive magical machine standing silently in the corner of the hall.


    A magical machine?


    ¡°This is our leader¡¯s magical machine, but where¡¯s our leader?¡± The goblin captain couldn¡¯t help but exim in surprise.


    The Goblin Shredder¡¯s cockpit was open, but no one was inside.


    There was a pool of purple blood on the floor in the middle of the room.


    Blood. Whose blood? Vanessa¡¯s, or Tigule¡¯s?


    No, Vanessa was a mechanical adept now. She should not have any more blood in her body. Then......


    Vanlier and Snox exchanged a look. They knew things were bad.


    Vanlier waved his hand and shouted, ¡°Search.¡± A dozen agile vampires immediately leaped forward and started scouring the room.


    Soon, Vanlier and the others appeared at the five goblin teleportation devices. They stared at the damned tools with frowns on their faces.


    The goblin engineers in their party stepped forward the examine the devices. Soon, they came to a conclusion.


    The five goblin teleportation devices each pointed in a different direction around White Tower. The device pointing towards the southwest seemed to have been used recently.


    Southwest? There seemed to be a major settlement of White Tower civilians ten kilometers away there.


    It seemed like Princess Vanessa had secretly set up a teleportation point there for the sake of secretmunications with members of the Magic Energy Association. No wonder the people that Vanlier sent to monitor Vanessa did not pick up on any abnormalities.


    ¡°Hmph! As I expected. How sly. Chase them!¡±


    However, before they could even walk out of the room, the tower trembled slightly as a loud explosion could be heard down the corridor. Panicked screams erupted from the outside.


    Vanlier and Snox looked at each other and shouted at the same time, ¡°The teleportation array!¡±


    Snox anxiously ran out to see what had happened, but Vanlier stopped him.


    ¡°Why are you stopping me? Let me go and see what has happened,¡± Snox cried out in confusion.


    Meanwhile, Vanlier appeared to bepletely calm andposed at this moment. He shook his head and Snox and said, ¡°We guessed wrong. We thought they would start running the moment their n was exposed. But now, it seems like...not only did choose not to run, they¡¯ve decided to push forward with their n. As such, our current priority isn¡¯t capturing Vanessa, but¡ª¡±


    ¡°To protect the teleportation arrays!¡± Snox immediately snapped back to his senses after being reminded by the old fox, ¡°Since the teleportation array here has been blown up, then their next target has to be the teleportation array in the City of Machines.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about the White Tower. Vanessa doesn¡¯t have the authority to touch the teleportation array on the higher floors. She could only destroy the public teleportation array at the za. You must hurry to the City of Machines immediately and help Lord Deserra defend the teleportation array there. That array will be the key to this conflict! I will hurry over and help you once I¡¯ve dealt with the things here.¡±


    ¡°Understood, leave the City of Machines to me!¡±


    Snox nodded in understanding and unsummoned the elementium magical machine. He then brought his trusted subordinates along with him and hurried to the teleportation array on the eleventh floor, guided by a vampire adept.


    A short momentter, a white light shed as Snox appeared in the City of Machine¡¯s public teleportation array along with twenty of his subordinates.


    After recovering from the daze of long-ranged teleportation, Snox heard wild and concentrated gunfire around the array, along with the sound of zipping energy beams. He then heard a shout from a familiar voice.


    ¡°Get down.¡±


    It was Wind Adept Deserra¡¯s voice.


    Snox was a veteran of the Crimson n, and he was familiar with Wind Adept Deserra. As such, he crouched down without hesitation when he heard Deserra¡¯s voice.


    Ci! Ci! Ci!


    Pupupu!


    A barrage of energy beams shot towards his location. Many of Snox¡¯s subordinates had yet to recover from the teleportation daze due to their lower Physique and were instantly riddled with holes.


    ¡°Dammit! Something happened here, just as we expected!¡±


    Snox cursed furiously and summoned the Third Grade elementium magical machine.


    A loud thud rang out as the hulking machine appeared, instantly shielding Snox and his surviving subordinates from a barrage of attacksing from the distance.


    ¡°Attack...attack! Kill those enemies!¡±


    As Snox roared, the elementium magical machine slowly stretched its body. It couldn¡¯t be any less bothered by the series of attacks crackling against its metal form. Suddenly, countless metal tes on the magical machine¡¯s chest and arms flipped open, revealing the arsenal of energy cannons hidden beneath.


    The next second, a hundred blinding red lights shot forward, instantly enveloping the magical machine squad in the distance.


    A series of energy fireballs erupted, drowning the enemy¡¯s forces in an instant.


    The elementium magical machine then retracted its arms and unleashed its propellers instead. It turned into a meteor as it charged straight into the sea of fire. It waved its metal fists about, crushing a magical machine with a single punch and instantly turning the goblin pilot inside into meat paste. The other fist punched another magical machine¡¯s head right into its chest. Electrical sparks crackled into the air as purple blood flowed out from between the cracks of the device.


    The elementium magical machine¡¯s energy cannon barrage might be shockingly powerful, but its firepower was nothingpared to its prowess in meleebat. The magical machine that had now surrounded it might not die from a barrage of energy beams, but they would not survive a punch from the elementium magical machine.


    For a moment, the elementium magical machine stood guard at the metal doors leading to the teleportation array, fighting outnumbered a hundred to one. It was absolutely beating down on the one hundred magical machines, leaving them helpless to its fury. The series of attacks thatnded on the elementium magical machine was either blocked by its energy shield or simply had no effect on its indestructible alloy body. None of the machines could inflict any substantial damage on the elementium magical machine.


    ¡°Its body is made of magic resistant alloy. Stop using magic energy attacks. Charge forward; go, go, go! Engage it in closebat!¡± A captain among the rebels seemed to be reasonably knowledgeable. He identified the reason for the elementium magical machine¡¯s invincibility from the light of the metal and immediately ordered a change in tactics.


    Deserra, who was contained near the teleportation arrays by the rebels, reacted when he heard the enemy¡¯s words. His eyes turnedpletely white as an iparably violent storm enveloped his body.

 Chapter 1061 - The Elementium Magical Machine in Combat

    <strong>Chapter 1061 The Elementium Magical Machine in Combat</strong>


    Goblin ne, City of Machines.


    As the majestic capital of steel that had concentrated the most powerful fighting force avable throughout the Goblin ne, the City of Machines had an enviable amount of wealth and a shocking number of magical machines.


    Ever since the unique professions of magical mechanics, machinist sorcerers, and machine pilots were founded, anyone who thought something of themselves hade to the City of Machines in hopes of finding a way to get stronger.


    The three major financial groups and two main trade unions of the Goblin ne had even moved their headquarters here to tighten their connection with the World of Adepts. In doing so, the City of Machines became a massive city thatbined all the wealth and talent of the Goblin ne.


    There were over a dozen steel refineries and nearly a hundred magical machine factories located on the outskirts of the City of Machines.


    If there were sufficient resources and the factories were operated at full capacity, the City of Machines could produce as many as four thousand magical machines in a single day!


    Unfortunately, lower-end magical machines consumed too much magic energy while having limitedbat prowess. As such, the financial groups, trade unions, and research academy of the City of Machines ced more emphasis on the research and innovation of high-qualitybat magical machines.


    If the magical machine research in the World of Adepts prioritized the creation of heavy war-machines and powerful magic energy weapons, then the research in the City of Machines was more focused on the improvement and optimization of lower-tier magical machines.


    After generations of work from the thousands of researchers in the City of Machines, the goblins had finally seeded in creating the second-generationbat magical machines.


    The so-called second-generation magical machines were actually magical machines that possessed power simr to that of a Second Grade!


    Greem had also created Second Grade magical machines in the past, such as the Goblin Shredder that Tigule piloted. However, these Second Grade magical machines crafted by adepts contained far too much magical alloy. They also employed too much magical knowledge and too many techniques, making it impossible to mass-produce.


    These second-generation machines forged by the City of Machines did not use suchplicated and profound techniques in their creation. They were able to disy pseudo-Second Grade power purely through thebination of ordinary metals and magical energy.


    As such, they could be mass-produced!


    Though the production of the few coreponents couldn¡¯t bepared to the first-generation machines, these second-generation machines were a lot cheaper and easier to manufacturepared to the machines handcrafted by the adepts.


    It should have been incredibly good news for the Crimson n.


    Unfortunately, before the Crimson n could enjoy the benefits of this innovation, they were engulfed by this ¡®rebellion¡¯ of goblins.


    Supposedly, as the leader of the Crimson adepts stationed in the Goblin ne, Deserra was supposed to lead his subordinates in defense of the central tower and await reinforcements from the n.


    However, arge army of magical machines had appeared out of nowhere. These machines surrounded and sieged the adept¡¯s tower,unching reckless charges over and over.


    Compared to the three hundred thousand goblins in the City of Machines, those involved in the rebellion were only a minority.


    However, the goblins had the odd mentality of not turning against their own kind. Those who were ignorant of the circumstances chose to remain neutral and witness the events as they unfolded. The goblins involved in the rebellion had to have the support of the major financial groups and trade unions. Not only did these goblins possess a tremendous number of magical machines, but they also had proper strategicmand and excellent magic energy weapons.


    There were at least three hundred second-generation machines in the army of magical robots assaulting the central tower.


    It was their tremendous destructive tower that allowed them to breach the central tower after a brief two-hour siege!


    Deserra, who had barely escaped from the assault, was only First Grade. Faced with the horde of magical machines, among which contained the fearsome second-generation, he could only retreat as he fought until he was finally backed up against the edge of the teleportation array.


    In all honesty, if Snox had been just fifteen minuteste, the goblins would have blown up the teleportation array. This City of Machines that the Crimson n had devoted so much effort into constructing would have changed hands then.


    The First Grade Deserra might not be able to deal with this swarm of magical machines, but the Third Grade elementium magical machine could dispose of them with ease.


    Shielding the adepts and apprentices behind itself, the elementium magical machine charged towards the enemies at the massive metal door. Fighting one against a hundred, it forcefully threw the enemy¡¯s ranks into disarray. The cannons reaching out from all over its body constantly bombarded everything in sight, all while it swung its giant metal fists about and rampaged amongst the machines. Cannon fire filled the air wherever it went, the sound of ringing metal resonating without stop.


    From a distance, one could see the thin yet lethal energy beams, the massive and destructive magic energy fireballs, and the fearsome energy shockwaves rippling outwards. The entrance to the room quickly turned into a terrifying sea of violent energy.


    A rain of metal shards would pour down wherever the elementium magical machine appeared. A trail of shattered magical machine debris and tattered goblin corpsesy in the wake of the elementium magical machine¡¯s charge.


    The elementium magical machine might be uncontested, but it was still fighting a difficult battle!


    The ratio of second-generation magical machines in the rebel¡¯s army was reasonably high.


    The elementium magical machine could easily destroy one of those conventional machines with a single punch, or two to three of them with a single barrage. However, when it was surrounded by row after row of second-generation machines, things stopped being so straightforward.


    More and more damage slowly umted on the elementium magical machine¡¯s body.


    However, the elementium magical machine was a Third Grade construct that Greem had devoted himself to creating. He had even mixed inrge amounts of magical memory alloy when hest repaired the machine. All sorts of cracks and dents had appeared on the elementium magical machine¡¯s body as the second-generation machines smashed, punched, and bombarded it with cannons.


    However, as the battle progressed and the elementium magical machine¡¯s plentiful magical supply circted through its body, these minor injuries quickly healed at a rate visible to the naked eye. Dented metal creaked and reformed, returning to its once wless state. Bent and twisted metal spikes moved and extended back to their former positions.


    As long as the rate at which the enemy inflicted damage did not exceed the pace at which the elementium magical machine self-repaired, and as long as the miniature magic generator furnace inside the elementium magical machine continued functioning, then it would remain as an unstoppable metal beast. It would firmly guard the metal door that led to the internar teleportation array.


    The remains of the magical machines that the elementium magical machine had smashed to pieces had gathered into a small hill by now. The elementium magical machine stood at the top of this hill, taking down every single machine that approached it with furious cannon fire and violent fists. It endured five to six punches every moment, along with hundreds of beam attacks from various magic energy weapons.


    It was as dazzling as a disy of fireworks, and certainly just as loud.


    The majesty of the elementium magical machine while it fought inspired zeal and courage in all who watched it. Deserra wanted nothing more than to charge forward at this moment and fight by its very side.


    However, when he saw the destructive energy explosions all around the elementium magical machine and the powerful machines that were blown away one after another, Deserra shook his head and cast these impractical thoughts out of his head. He gritted his teeth and unleashed hisrgest and most destructive wind magic upon the enemies.


    The elementium magical machine might have stopped the main force of the enemy, but how could it, a single fighter, perfectly defend such a wide entrance? asionally, a few machines would make it past the machine¡¯s defensive perimeter and rush towards the teleportation array.


    It would then be Deserra and Snox¡¯s turn to fight, along with the rest of the adepts!


    Deserra had been stationed in the Goblin ne for all these years and had not participated in the various n wars that had broken out. As such, hecked experience and training.


    However, as a direct disciple of Meryl, he received a sizable number of resources from the n that were far above that of the average adept.


    As he started to unleash his elementium magic without restraint, the magical machines were sted to the ground by wild pirs of lightning descending from the skies. The rebels could only get their hands on a limited amount of magical alloy. As such, the magical machines they had at theirmand were often not very resistant to magic.


    The few stationed adepts and dozen apprentices alone were enough to wipe out most of the magical machines that made it past the elementium magical machine.


    However, when second-generations started appearing among these machines, the inner perimeter propped up by Deserra and the others began to falter.


    The sharp-eyed Snox also spotted Princess Vanessa¡¯s figure among the rebels that were gathering in the distance. Standing beside her were many other influential goblins, including the leader of the ckwater Magnate, the Chairman of the Musen Merchant Group, and the Chairman of the Risk Investment Company.


    They gathered around the princess, pointing here and there at the battlefield as if arguing or debating about something.


    ¡°Des, something seems wrong!¡± Snox had a terrifyingly powerful magic-energy ray gun in his hand. He secretly snuck to Deserra¡¯s side and spoke, even as he continued to shoot frost rays to turn the magical machines into blocks of ice, ¡°I know those guys. They might have been able to put together an army behind our backs, but their forces shouldn¡¯t be such an elite army with such terrifying power. I suspect that a third party is involved in their rebellion!¡±


    ¡°You mean,¡± Deserra paused for a moment, but his eyes quickly lit up, ¡°That big ol¡¯ brain has extended his hands into this affair?¡±


    ¡°Only he can manufacture such arge number of second-generation machines and transport them here to the Goblin ne without our notice. The other goblin leaders have all been under the n¡¯s scrutiny. They could not have been capable of such a feat.¡±

 Chapter 1062 - Crushed

    <strong>Chapter 1062 Crushed</strong>


    World of Adepts, White Tower.


    Arge group of Crimson adepts gathered together and started putting down the scattered sparks of rebellion rising around the tower.


    This territory was directly under the Crimson n¡¯s control, after all. Regardless of how well-hidden the Magic Energy Association was or how much military power they had umted, they could not possiblypare to the elites of the n. After leaving the mission of pursuing and exterminating the remnants of the rebel forces, Meryl used her personal connections to call Mary and Emelia over to the Northern Lands. They then apanied her to the zing battlefield on the Goblin ne.


    Now that Mary¨Cthe Blood Queen herself¨Chad arrived, the vampire army subordinate to her was fully present as well.


    As blinding light shone in the teleportation array, this powerful group of reinforcements quickly teleported to the City of Machines. There were over thirty adepts, and not one of them was weaker than advanced First Grade.


    The light from the teleportation had yet to fade awaypletely, yet Mary had already recovered from her teleportation daze.


    A sweet smile appeared on her pretty face when she saw the brutal and bloody fighting nearby. Her figure flickered and she appeared beside Deserra and Snox, who were barely hanging on at this point. Crimson light shed as the three magical machines that had been fervently assaulting the two of them were instantly cut into pieces, scattered across the floor as loose metalponents.


    Deserra and Snox looked at each other in shock.


    They clearly saw how clean and smooth the surface of the cuts inflicted on the three magical machines had been. It was almost as if they had been diced to pieces by countlessser beams in a single moment. One of these three magical machines had been a second-generation device.


    Deserra and Snox had been scrambling and been forced back by that machine. The next second, that very machine had been butchered and fragmented. The two of them could not believe their eyes, having witnessed such a massive gulf inbat prowess.


    However, this was only the prologue to a grand banquet of ughter!


    Distinct whistling sounds shot through the air. Crimson silhouettes appeared one after another. Deserra and Snox gasped in surprise at the scene that unfolded before their eyes.


    One vampire after another turned into a crimson shape, quickly weaving and flickering through the battlefield.


    Their targets were not the magical machines, but the goblin technicians and pilots controlling the devices from within. After all, vampires were known for their ability to regenerate and their rapid rate of attack. Engaging the magical machines in a frontal assault was not their strength.


    These vampires might not be able to deal with the magical machines directly, but it didn¡¯t mean that the other adepts could not.


    A strange and wild dragon¡¯s roar abruptly rang out in the hall.


    Adept Meryl sprinted forward, her entire body quickly engulfed by a halo of mes, distorting and twisting until she transformed into a lithe, seventeen-meter-long fire dragon.


    She lowered her slender and thick neck, her zing gaze sweeping through the entire battlefield. Without a single word, she opened her mouth and let out a viscous breath of fire. The fire breath was thirty meters long, cast out into a massive fan as Meryl shook her head. It instantly engulfed the first dozen magical machines standing before her.


    The fire dragon¡¯s breath was, in truth, an extremely hot pir of mes created by thebination of fire elementium and a strange liquid secreted within the dragon¡¯s body. It possessed iparable viscosity and heat.


    The dozen magical machines could not escape or put out the sticky mes no matter how they struggled. After thrashing around the sea of fire fruitlessly, they eventually copsed to the ground helplessly. Their gleaming metal bodies started to soften in the zing mes before turning into a glistening liquid that pooled on the ground beneath them.


    Meryl didn¡¯t just have potent breath. She had formidable melee prowess as well.


    The fire dragon roared and lifted her head slightly. Her scaled dragon wings shook, her hind legs stomped against the ground fiercely, and she thundered wildly into the ranks of magical machines, the horns on her head swinging as her most vicious weapons.


    Emelia, who had arrived in the City of Machines along with Meryl, was not to be left behind either. She let out a battlecry, and the soft and thin vines beneath her waist started to grow and expand rapidly. They split up into many thicker, denser tentacle-like appendages.


    Her two arms also started to grow and split off into strange, thorned, whip-like appendages that resembled bramble branches. Her long hair and her green robe also started to twist and grow, entangling with each other into an armor of brambles with little yellow flowers growing on the surface.


    It was the true form of Mystique Emelia!


    Her nt-like features now covered in strange patterns, Emelia giggled and charged into battle. The bramble whips that her arms had turned intoshed about wildly in the struggle. Even the magical machines were blown away like weightless feathers by a single strike, disassembling into brokenponents before theynded.


    The appendages beneath Emelia¡¯s waist continued to grow and twist without stopping. They viciously stabbed between the gaps in the magical machine¡¯s armor, all while moving her own body forward.


    Her lively and peculiar tentacles also seemed to have an exceedingly unusual capacity for growth. They would pierce into a magical machine¡¯s body from a single spot before splitting into a dozen or even a few dozen vines of various lengths as they emerged from all over the machine.


    Naturally, all the internalponents and pieces of the magical machines were thoroughly destroyed in this process of growth.


    The magical machines would struggle wildly for a brief moment before powering down with a sudden snap, like golems that had their core abruptly taken out of them.


    Two blood knights and three blood elves hade along on this excursion. In particr, Soros had already been promoted to Third Grade by Mary. They gathered into formation and covered each other as they charged into the rebel¡¯s ranks. Almost instantly, they started to push back the enemy line, step by step.


    Deserra and Snox, who had almost despaired, could finally let out a breath of relief.


    They watched enviably as the terrifying fire dragon ravaged the army of magical machines, all while quickly treating their own injuries. One could only imagine how hot their hearts zed at the moment.


    Deserra had spent all these years stationed in the Goblin ne, barely improving despite the time that had passed. He was happy to see his teacher devastate the battlefield in all her glory and might, but he couldn¡¯t help but feel a little downcast.


    Perhaps, peace was an adept¡¯s greatest enemy.


    The life he had led up to now had undoubtedly been far too peaceful!


    Snox, on the other hand, was utterly green with envy.


    He had bought the serpentine bloodline recreation potion and consumed it.


    Unfortunately, his innate talent did not seem particrlypatible with this bloodline. Apart from extending his lifespan slightly, the bloodline modification had not been particrly beneficial.


    It wasn¡¯t just the bloodline talents that he failed to inherit. He couldn¡¯t even fully inherit the ancestral manifestations that would have enhanced his body.


    If Snox were to take off his clothes, one would be surprised to find clusters of hard skin resembling snake scales all over his body. Unfortunately, these ¡®scales¡¯ were scatted all over the ce and could not form a protectiveyer of armor.


    Thus, one could see how lowly Snox¡¯s original goblin bloodline was. Otherwise, such a state of semi-manifestation would never ur.


    His bloodline modification turned him into an unfinished product, while Meryl¡¯s bloodline modification let her dominate the battlefield.


    Snox could only watch the majestic Fire Dragon Adept Meryl and the unique figure of Mystique Emelia with gleaming green eyes. He had no other way to express his feelings other than pure, unfiltered envy.


    The arrival of the Crimson elites almost instantly reversed the scales of battle.


    It didn¡¯t matter how the goblin nobles andmanders roared or shouted. The only thing they could do was hasten the speed at which the magical machine army was torn apart.


    The goblins were at aplete disadvantage due to theirck of a high-grade fighting force!


    Meanwhile, the Crimson n had the Third Grade elementium magical machine and a Second Grade fire dragon absorbing all the damage on the frontline. Meanwhile, the vampires wreaked destruction as Mystique Emelia healed their allies. The green healing beams she fired were fairly effective at healing all living creatures.


    As for the strongest person in their crew? Bloody Queen Mary. Her hips swayed as she walked through the battlefield, casually moving towards the leaders of the rebels.


    Any magical machine that charged forward to intercept her would burst into four or five pieces after a sh of crimson light, scattering to the ground as metal parts.


    The Third Grade equipment, Stinger, which she had just recently obtained, was undoubtedly verypatible with her bloodline talents. It increased her offensive power tremendously, making her a much more formidable threat!


    Perhaps sensing the aura of defeat, the goblin nobles and leaders that had gathered around Vanessa started to retreat and silently sneak away. Their escape undoubtedly caused the rebellion¡¯s offensive to decrease in fervor and momentum quickly.


    Finally, when Mary arrived in front of Vanessa, there were hardly any rebels left behind her.


    Even in this terrible predicament, Vanessa kept her head held high, unconceble determination and resolution written all over her perfect, delicate face forged of metal.


    ¡°Girl, you caused us quite some trouble! Tell me, where is Tigule now?¡± Mary stood proudly before Vanessa, staring down as only a predator would at its prey.


    Just an advanced First Grade mechanical adept!


    With Mary¡¯s Agility, she could slice Vanessa to pieces before she even lifted her hand. It didn¡¯t matter what aces Vanessa had hidden up her sleeve.


    No scheme nor tactic would be of use in the face of such a massive gap in power.


    If Vanessa wanted to fight against Mary, she should probably try again once she had reached Third Grade!


    Mary had no interest in the tragedies and agonies of the inner world of a character as insignificant as an ant. If she hadn¡¯t wanted to know Tigule¡¯s location, Vanessa would already be resting in pieces.


    ¡°As expected, we failed!¡± Red light flickered in Vanessa¡¯s mechanical eyes. She said furiously, ¡°This damned world! Why is it so cruel to us! I hate you people! I hate this world even more. Since this world will not let us goblins rise to power, then...die with me, you all!¡±


    As Vanessa screamed with all her strength, the red light in her eyes flickered even faster. The metal skin of her body also turned a blinding scarlet, as if it were about to explode.

 Chapter 1063 - Mastermind

    <strong>Chapter 1063 Mastermind</strong>


    Time instantly stopped!


    The mechanical heart beating in Vanessa¡¯s chest wildly pulsated and put out energy beyond her control. Violent and ferocious magical energy gathered quickly in her cold, stiff metal body. In the blink of an eye, it had reached the threshold of self-destruction.


    There were unconceble hatred and wild madness in Vanessa¡¯s eyes.


    Even though the project she had been nning for forty years had been shattered, she would be able to make that evil adept who dared to invade the Goblin ne feel a trace of regret by killing this wicked woman before her.


    It wouldn¡¯t be much regret, and it didn¡¯t need to be. Vanessa would be happy as long as that demon-like man could feel a trace of regret!


    Sadly, while wild light flickered in her eyes, the entire world paused for a moment beyond the senses of her consciousness.


    In truth, the world did not stop, and neither did the universe pause.


    The only real change happened to that wicked woman¡¯s speed!


    When a person was thinking and moving at ten times¨Ca hundred times¨Cthe speed of everyone else, then everything within their senses would feel slow and unmoving.


    When the Third Grade mechanical heart in Vanessa¡¯s chest suddenly went berserk and was on the edge of exploding, Mary abruptly went into her hypersensitive state.


    In this state, everything around her suddenly became silent and frozen. Each person and everything within her vision moved in an extremely slow and distorted flow of time. Under such conditions, even the air itself suddenly became thick and sluggish. Mary would have to exhaust far more energy than usual while moving through the air in this state.


    The only person who could move within this ¡®static world¡¯ was probably Mary alone.


    Like a beautiful, nobledy walking through her garden, Mary elegantly stepped in front of Vanessa. She bent down and looked at Vanessa¡¯s face, twisted with anger. She extended a finger and lightly tapped the princess¡¯s heart, which was boiling and glowing red with heat as if there was a miniature sun contained within. Mary smiled.


    The next second, a small and delicate dagger appeared in Mary¡¯s hand, swiftly stabbing into the small gap in Vanessa¡¯s metallic body.


    The golden dagger shed.


    In just two seconds, Mary had managed to slice open and disassemble every single metallicponent and connective node beneath Vanessa¡¯s neck. It was as graceful as the movements of a skilled pianist ying the most beautiful song. The golden dagger then lightly picked and took out the still-beating mechanical heart.


    It was at this moment that Mary finally withdrew from her hypersensitive state.


    Without anyone realizing what had happened, Mary had appeared before Vanessa like a goddess. She grasped Vanessa¡¯s head in one hand, and in the other, she had a strange metallic heart bnced upon her dagger. Vanessa¡¯s metallic body copsed to the ground and scattered like loose sand.


    ¡°¡ªall!¡±


    Vanessa did not seem to have noticed the abnormality around her and was still screaming out loud. However, when thest note dragged on for far too long, and the expected explosion still did not happen, Vanessa couldn¡¯t help but fall silent and look around her in shock.


    It was then that she realized, to her horror, that her body had been reduced to unrecognizable metal parts. Only her head was still suspended in the air in the enemy¡¯s hand.


    No, no, no. She still had a heart, a mechanical heart with Third Grade energy, now being toyed within in the hands of the opponent.


    As for the self-destruction? Without the body¡¯s support and the control of her consciousness, Vanessa could not control the heart remotely. She had only obtained it a year ago and was notpatible enough with it. As such, this mechanical heart, which had reached the threshold of self-destruction, was freely exposed to Mary¡¯s nearly whimsical toying.


    The energy within it quickly leaked out like a deted tire, and the heart started to wither and shrivel visibly.


    ¡°Girl, how far have you gone down the adept¡¯s path? You would try to pull such a trick before a high-grade adept with your power? Hmph! Remember, power is the only truth amongst adepts. If I don¡¯t want you to die, then you will never hope to die!¡± After lifting Vanessa¡¯s head to her eyes and berating her, Mary tossed her above to Deserra.


    ¡°I¡¯ll leave the girl to you. Make sure to interrogate her and find out everything she knows.¡±


    Deserra caught Vanessa¡¯s head, and a vicious smile appeared on his face. He said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Lady Mary. I will make sure to extract everything in her mind!¡±


    The losses inflicted by the goblin rebellion on the City of Machines were far too severe. It had ruined his reputation as the stationed adept. As such, there was no way Deserra would let the mastermind off easy now that he had her in his hands.


    In all seriousness, this goblin rebellion had been more of a nuisance than an actual threat.


    The goblins did not have sufficient power to actually resist or break free from the Crimson n¡¯s rule. Their Secession n was fated to fail and would only draw the anger and ire of the Crimson higher-ups.


    The reason the situation had devolved to this state was undoubtedly due to a much more well-hidden mastermind behind the scenes. Everyone knew who this ¡®mastermind¡¯ was. They simplycked the evidence to use him at this point.


    Having lost Vanessa, and with the other goblin nobles having fled, the Crimson adepts defeated the rebellion¡¯s magical machine army in the blink of an eye.


    At this moment, the state of the battle couldn¡¯t be any more obvious. The ¡®neutral factions¡¯ hiding in the City of Machines could no longer sit still. They quickly emerged to maintain order and attack the rebels.


    For a moment, the fires of war were everywhere throughout the City of Machines as magical machines belonging to both sides fought to the death in various districts and regions.


    Meanwhile, Mary led the vampires forward and retook control of the central tower.


    A short momentter, a massive projection of a woman appeared in the skies above the City of Machines. It was Mary, with a sweet smile on her face.


    ¡°Citizens of the City of Machines. Due to reasons that everyone understands, military rule and a temporary curfew will be imposed in the city. From this moment onwards, anyone that remains on the street will be our enemy. They will be attacked by the adept guards. All goblins must remain in their rooms and drive away any suspicious individuals until the rebel forces have been thoroughly rooted out. Anyone that fails to follow these orders shall be regarded as conspirators of the rebels and will be attacked by the adepts.¡±


    As Mary spoke to the entire city, the fires of war in the streets were quickly extinguished. Almost every single adept got onto their hawkstriders and hurried back to their homes. That undoubtedly made the outsiders and rebels amongst them stand out conspicuously.


    The three dozen vampire adepts flying above the city immediately knew their targets. They pursed their lips, screamed, and dove downwards.


    A new battle quickly erupted!


    Mary silently waited for news from Deserra in the central tower.


    Soon, Deserra and Snox walked in with solemn expressions.


    ¡°How is it? What did you find?¡± Mary asked.


    ¡°Lady Mary, even though we do not have direct evidence, the memory fragments extracted from Vanessa¡¯s soul reveal that that thing has indeed participated in the goblin rebellion. Therge numbers of second-generation machines in the rebel army are reinforcements sent by that thing!¡± Deserra said as he gritted his teeth.


    ¡°Moreover, we have captured a few of the leaders of the rebellion. We have discovered signs of mental intrusion on all of them,¡± Snox added.


    Mary tapped the table with her slender fingers. Her crimson eyes appeared to be rooted in thought. Finally, she spoke.


    ¡°The purpose? Can someone tell me what his purpose is? Is it to rely on these incapable goblin rebels to overthrow the Crimson n¡¯s rule? I¡¯m sure that fellow isn¡¯t so foolish, is he?! What exactly is he nning by spending so much effort to aid these goblin rebels? Is he not afraid of infuriating Greem? Is he not afraid Greem will confront him?¡±


    ¡°Mydy...¡± Deserra hesitated for a moment, but finally decided to speak the truth as it was. ¡°I checked our inventory earlier. The losses of the central tower aren¡¯t severe, but the sixty tons of Queyras alloy stored in our treasury...have vanished!¡±


    Mary¡¯s finger stopped in mid-air.


    As one of the real leaders of the Crimson n, Mary knew quite well that the Queyras alloy was a core resource of the n, used to forge the magic generator furnaces. Every magic generator furnace was a battleship or an army of high-grade magical machines for the n.


    They were of utmost importance to the Crimson n!


    ¡°Good, very good. It seems like that guy has made up his mind to challenge the n¡¯s bottom line. Good. That is simply delightful. I want to see how far he wants to take this!¡±


    The vampire adepts quickly exterminated the rebels in the City of Machines.


    Meanwhile, Deserra also took the opportunity to deal with conservative factions among the goblins, taking back into his hands full control of the magical machine military of the City of Machines.


    Mary left Soros and the vampires in the City of Machines to help Deserra maintain control. She returned to the World of Adepts and quickly found Greem in Fire Throne.


    Naturally, no one knew what went down between the two of them.


    However, when the furious Mary ryed news of what had happened to Greem, nothing else seemed to ur next. It was like a massive stone had been thrown into an ocean, only for it to sink silently.


    After leaving Fire Throne, Mary returned to the Crimson n¡¯s new headquarters and stopped speaking about the matter entirely. Greem remained hidden in Fire Throne, secluded in his room.


    The entire n took no further action after quelling the rebellion as if they had no intention of pursuing the real mastermind.


    As such, the days passed, just like that.

 Chapter 1064 - Fire State

    <strong>Chapter 1064 Fire State</strong>


    After the Crimson n¡¯s headquarters tower was constructed, Fire Throne became Greem¡¯s personal adept¡¯s tower.


    Not a single living person could be found in the tower apart from Greem himself.


    His seclusionsted for twenty-one long years.


    During this time, Greem spent one yearpleting the recement of his bloodline with the starbeast bloodline, and another six months adjusting the condition of his body. Once he hadpletely assimted the starbeast bloodline, he carefully removed the me Fiend¡¯s Heart in his chest as well as all the me Fiend transformation tattoos on his body. He then constructed a ¡®Heart of mes¡¯ in his heart using his fire powers.


    For seven years, Greem soaked in an energy pool, wildly devouring ferocious fire energy to nourish the Heart of mes.


    This Heart of mes took seven years of Greem¡¯s time to develop fully!


    With this Heart of mes that was perfectlypatible with his adept talent, Greem would not need to worry about running out of magical energy, even after advancing to Fourth Grade. Greem would never face ack of power as long as his Heart of mes was not damaged, even if he entered low-magic or no-magic nes.


    Afterpleting his Heart of mes, Greem could finally let go of all his concerns and focus solely on advancing to Fourth Grade!


    To prevent interruption from the outside world, Fire Throne¡¯s exterior was protected by the Crimson n and the magical golem dragon. There were also many magical machines and magical golems protecting Greem on the inside. He had sealed off Fire Throne from the outside, cutting off the teleportation array and severing all connection with the outside world.


    In the blink of an eye, thirteen years passed!


    The Crimson n leadership could not contact Greem during this time, nor could Mary or Alice. No one had any idea about his recent condition.


    Until......


    Today was the selection contest for the newest generation of young pseudo-adepts in the Crimson Academy.


    Apprentices that had ambitions of joining the Crimson n gathered at Namulith to demonstrate their abilities in the hopes of being selected by Crimson adepts to be members of the n.


    The form of the selection was arena dueling.


    Apprentices that had drawn the same number would walk onto the arena and fight with all their strength to defeat their opponent. The various core adepts and stationed adepts of the Crimson n¡¯s many headquarters were seated on a tall stone tform to the side of the arena.


    Apprentices who won five duels in a row would be official members of the Crimson n, assigned as disciples of the various core adepts. Even the defeated apprentices could be foreign disciples if they caught the fancy of any of the Crimson adepts. They would attend sses as guest-students.


    As such, every single apprentice that stepped onto the arena would try their very best, regardless of victory or defeat. They wanted to demonstrate their talent in the arcane arts to the fullest extent.


    Yet, while the selection contest was well on its way, one of the apprentices turned back and saw something. He pointed at the distant horizon and let out a cry of surprise.


    ¡°What...what is happening there?¡±


    Everyone turned back and was shocked to find that the entire horizon had turned bright scarlet, as if the skies had suddenly caught on fire. Fire could be seen everywhere, along with burning clouds.


    The adepts of the Crimson n quickly took to the skies, using their magical techniques to see what was happening in the distance. Unfortunately, neither divination wands nor magic spirit scouts could obtain any more information.


    Was this some significant energy leakage from an adept¡¯s tower, or did something terrifying happen?


    A core adept from the n headquarters suddenly let out a surprised cry while everyone was talking amongst themselves.


    ¡°It¡¯s Fire Throne. That direction is where Fire Throne lies!¡±


    The other adepts instantly understood what was happening when they heard this.


    Indeed. One hundred and fifty kilometers away in that direction was the origin of the n¨C the location of Fire Throne.


    However, with the sealing off of Fire Throne and the repeated warnings of the higher-ups, no n adept dared to even approach the area. Fire Throne had be a taboo topic in conversations among the adepts. No Crimson adept dared to talk about the tower publicly.


    After a few decades, people gradually ¡®forgot¡¯ and ¡®ignored¡¯ the existence of Fire Throne!


    However, with the appearance of the ming clouds in the air, an unstoppablemotion spread throughout the adepts.


    Could there finally be news from that n leader of theirs?


    While the adepts talked passionately amongst themselves, two streaks of light cut across the sky. A faint, slender silhouette could also be seen flying ahead of them.


    ¡°It¡¯s Lady Meryl and Lord Gargamel,¡± One of the adepts shouted out loud.


    The other adepts nodded their heads as well.


    The red streak of light was radiating dense fire elementium aura and a fearsome dragon¡¯s aura of might. It was an aura unique to Lady Meryl. Meanwhile, the green streak of light was filled with the terrifying smell of curses. It was most certainly Lord Gargamel.


    As for the faint shape flying at the very front? The adepts all looked at each other with a strangely knowing smile on all their faces.


    There was no one in the Crimson n that didn¡¯t know that the shockingly beautiful yet vicious Lady Mary was the ¡®partner¡¯ of their n leader, Lord Greem. It was only natural that Lady Mary was in such a hurry! Such a major event had happened after so many years of silence in Fire Throne!


    Could the n leader have emerged from his seclusion?


    Everyone knew that the n leader had gone into seclusion to advance to Fourth Grade. If he was emerging from his istion, could it be...?


    For a moment, the other adepts all looked at each other, a fire burning within their hearts.


    The Crimson n had been firmly guarding the Ailovis Region over the past few decades, never taking a single expansionist military action against the neighboringnds.


    Why?


    Because they were all waiting for news from their n leader!


    Even though the n was acknowledged as a Fourth Grade force by the world twenty years ago, theck of a proper Fourth Grade adept in the group caused the n members to remain not fully confident in their strength.


    Now that there was movement from the n leader, it could mean that a massive change was going to ur in the n. These changes could mean arge influx of resources and magical crystals for these adepts and apprentices at the very base level of the n.


    ............


    Mary was the first to arrive at Fire Throne.


    Mary looked down from mid-air. She could see traces of crimson aura radiating from the ground around Fire Cave into the air.


    The ground where the crimson aura lingered was slowly being roasted. Moisture evaporated from the earth, and cracks were starting to appear in the dirt. The nts growing in the area were also rapidly withering and shriveling, twisting in agony as they did so.


    Mary could feel how difficult it was to breathe while she was in this dense cloud of fire.


    The surrounding air appeared to have been heated by the aura. When it entered her lungs, it felt like her internal organs were being burned and scorched.


    While Mary observed all this was a frown on her face, a wild gust of wind descended. Meryl arrived at Mary¡¯s side in dragon form, her wings beating furiously as she came to a stop.


    ¡°Lady Mary, is Teacher finallying out?¡± Meryl impatiently asked upon arriving.


    Mary shook her head in frustration.


    ¡°I can¡¯t establish for the moment. The fire elementium aura down there is far too dense. It¡¯s enough to distort any magical probe. Even I can¡¯t contact that guy!¡± Mary¡¯s voice was filled with anger when she said that guy!


    He had said he would go into seclusion to advance to Fourth Grade, but he never mentioned that his istion wouldst this long.


    Even though there was more than enough food in Fire Throne, along with plenty of elementium servants, the long period withoutmunication still made Mary extremely worried. If it weren¡¯t for Alice stopping her, Mary would probably have been unable to resist the urge to charge inside and check on that guy¡¯s condition!


    While the two of them were talking to each other and discussing whether they should enter Fire Throne to investigate, they smelled a pungent odor in the air. Gargamel had arrived.


    ¡°Lady Mary, is the n lea¡ª¡±


    ¡°Alright, enough. Stop asking. Even I have no idea how that guy is doing! However, judging from all this fire aura, he probably seeded in his advancement. The question is, why make all thismotion?¡±


    Mary¡¯s resentful voice had just finished when Greem¡¯s crisp and bold voice rang out in the air.


    ¡°You think I made these clouds of fire? Hmph! Even I can¡¯t help it right now.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s Teacher.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s the n leader.¡±


    Meryl and Gargamel couldn¡¯t help but cry out in joy when they heard this voice.


    ¡°Alright, the three of you don¡¯t need to be worried anymore. Since you are already here,e in and take a look!¡±


    Greem had just finished speaking when the three of them felt the crimson aura quickly gathering around them. The aura enveloped their bodies tightly. The next second, lights flickered as they instantly appeared in arge and vast hall without any preparation whatsoever.


    There was nothing in the hall. There was only a zing humanoid standing in the center at over a hundred meters in height. Terrifying and blinding light shone from the fire humanoid¡¯s chest, illuminating the entire hall in red light.


    ¡°Tea...teacher.¡±


    Meryl had already reverted into her human form. She stood at the feet of the hundred-meter-tall giant. Meryl could hardly see the giant¡¯splete appearance, even when she lifted her head. She hesitated for a moment and called out for her teacher when she sensed the familiar soul flux within the me giant.


    ¡°It can¡¯t be helped. The current state of my body is a little special. I can¡¯t return to my human form for the time being. So...you guys will just have to deal with me like this!¡±


    The fire giant opened its mouth, and the thunderous sound of a rumbling fire rang out throughout the hall.


    The temperature in the hall rose abruptly and exponentially, instantly reaching intolerable temperatures.

 Chapter 1065 - Heart of Principles

    <h4>Chapter 1065 Heart of Principles</h4>


    Inside the hall.


    Blinding crimson light shone from the zing fire in the giant¡¯s chest, roasting the hall and turning it bright red.


    If not for theyer of light emanating from the tens of thousands of runes carved into the hall¡¯s walls, ceiling, and the floor that blocked the heat and light, the room would already be melting like a candle.


    The traces of crimson aura that Mary and the others had seen on the outside were, in fact, emitted from this hall. Greem had tremendous trouble restraining this sudden, newfound power of his!


    Gargamel felt like a beached whale in this room, breathing in the scorching air. He had to tear apart several Scrolls of Fire Resistance to feel slightly more limated. On the other hand, Meryl was veryfortable in this environment. She took deep breaths of the dense fire elementium. A bright halo of fire had gathered around her, and she appeared to be much more lively than before.


    Mary might not like the dry and warm environment either, but her magic resistance as a Third Grade adept allowed her to endure the corrosion of the fire elementium.


    ¡°Master, master, are...are you Fourth Grade now?¡± As ufortable as he felt, Gargamel still screeched and asked this crucial question.


    Mary and Meryl¡¯s ears straightened as well.


    ¡°Mm,¡± Greem hesitated for a moment and said, ¡°ording to the adept¡¯s definition of a Fourth Grade, I should indeed be considered a Fourth Grade now!¡±


    It was a simple sentence, but its effect was like thunder in bright daylight. Gargamel and Meryl were stunned, confused, and unsure of how to respond.


    Fourth Grade. The Crimson n finally had their own Fourth Grade!


    Such a joyous event was enough to drive them mad with happiness, which is why they failed to notice the hesitation and doubt in Greem¡¯s voice earlier.


    The excessive flux in emotion caused the poison halo that Gargamel had gathered around him to be unstable. Some of the crimson aura seeped into the halo during this time, scalding his scales upon contact.


    ¡°Wonderful, this is great ne...owowowow. That¡¯s a good burn...congrattions...ouch...¡± Gargamel might be beginner Second Grade now, but he still winced in pain just from being within Greem¡¯s now incredibly enhanced Burning Domain. He couldn¡¯t even finish speaking his congrattions.


    ¡°Gargamel, your innate elementium attribute is ill-suited for this environment. I will send the three of you out now! I will leave the logistics and internal affairs of the n to the two of you. Try your best to obtain as many resources and territories for the n members. I believe that at this moment, no one will dare step in your way!¡±


    Gargamel and Meryl¡¯s eyes instantly lit up when they heard Greem¡¯s instructions.


    The n leader had given them the right to dere war.


    There were hundreds of adept ns in Zhentarim. As long as they avoided the more difficult targets, as long as no Fourth Grades were involved, they should have an easy time taking down some of the less powerful ns.


    There were almost no adept organizations in Zhentarim that could fight the Crimson n head-on, given the massive military force they had umted over the years. It was only due to Greem being at a critical moment of his advancement that the n had no choice but to restrain the n members and prevent them from stirring up any conflicts.


    However, now that Greem had advanced to Fourth Grade, the shackles around the Crimson n¡¯s neck had vanished. It was time for them to move and make some ¡®proper¡¯ acquisitions for the n!


    Greem waved his hand, and there was a sh of red light. Gargamel and Meryl were ¡®banished¡¯ from the hall by the fire elementium.


    Only Mary and Greem remained. It was at this moment that Mary beat her wings and circled around the me giant. Faced with the hundred-meter tall fire giant, Mary was like a sesame seed ced beside a watermelon. She was iparably tiny.


    Mary was a feisty girl too. She bit her lips and hesitated for a moment when she approached Greem¡¯s waist. She got even closer out of curiosity, seemingly intent on seeing what was inside that blinding red light.


    ¡°Girl, what are you doing?¡±


    Greem¡¯s flustered voice suddenly rang out in the hall. An Inferno Shield suddenly appeared in front of Mary.


    ¡°Tch! What¡¯s there to be shy about? I just want to see whether ¡®that thing¡¯ is still there now that your body¡¯s gotten so big.¡± The light of curiosity flickered in Mary¡¯s ruby-like eyes as if this was what she should be doing.


    ¡°......¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but choke up before saying, ¡°You are already a high-grade adept. There¡¯s no way you wouldn¡¯t know that magnified bodies are thebination of personal consciousness projection and magical elementium. Of course...of course that thing¡¯s there!¡±


    Mary rolled her eyes and replied with disdain all over her face, ¡°Projecting ¡®that ce¡¯ probably exhausts more of your energy, doesn¡¯t it!? To think you would project this thing when it¡¯s utterly useless inbat, just for your vanity as a man. Tch! I thought you would be more rational and practical than that!¡±


    ¡°You...you...you...¡± It had been so many years since Greem had seen Mary. He had kept her here, expecting them to exchange sweet words of romance. Who would have expected her to tease and ¡®humiliate¡¯ him so? Greem¡¯s temper couldn¡¯t help but re.


    The fire energy radiating from the hall intensified as his mood became enmed.


    The dense fire elementium within two kilometers of Fire Cave started to gather intorger clouds of fire, and Meteor Showers begin to rain down on thend. Fireballs crashed downwards, scarring the air with their long tails of smoke and ash.


    They would explode wherever theynd, spilling hot mes onto the surroundings and purging everything from existence.


    The ground was burning, the green was fading, and even the tough rocks were melting into liquid beneath the fire, gathering into a slow stream ofva.


    For a moment, it was almost as if the entire world had been plunged into an apocalypse!


    And all this had happened due to the flirting between a pair of young adepts.


    Mary finally stopped fooling about in the hall. She asked Greem a question with a serious expression on her face.


    ¡°Why do I feel like you were being vague when you said you advanced to Fourth Grade earlier. Did something unexpected happen?¡±


    ¡°Something did happen, but the effects are not tremendous. Even if Freed and the others were toe here now, they would have to acknowledge that I am a true Fourth Grade adept.¡±


    ¡°What exactly happened, then? Is it not convenient for you to tell me?¡± Mary asked curiously.


    She was advanced Third Grade now and only a step away from peak Third Grade. As such, she was particrly interested in the topic of Fourth Grade.


    ¡°I can talk about it. My Burning Domain already engulfs this ce. Nothing from the outside world can detect or sense what is happening in this hall. Even the powers of Fate cannot reach us.¡± Having said that, Greem hesitated for a moment, ¡°My condition right now is a little special. It¡¯s hard to exin in just a few sentences. More specifically, my advancement this time wasn¡¯tplete. All the origin substance was absorbed and assimted by my Heart of mes.


    ¡°As such, in reality, the one that advanced this time is my Heart of mes. I, on the other hand, remain a bit short of Fourth Grade!¡±


    ¡°The Heart of mes advanced?¡± Mary didn¡¯t fully understand. Her confusion could be seen on her face. She beat her wings and rose to Greem¡¯s chest to look at the heart. She couldn¡¯t help but gasp in surprise when she felt the overwhelming yet strangely tame power coursing within the mes. ¡°Then what is it now?¡±


    ¡°The Heart of Principles!¡± Greem seemed to have been reflecting on this question for a very, very long time. As such, he was able to answer without any hesitation.


    ¡°Heart of Principles? Then, it won¡¯t...it won¡¯t disobey you, will it?¡± Mary asked worryingly.


    ¡°Hahaha...you underestimate my power. Such a situation will never happen. It is part of me now. How could it ever go against me?!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s good. Then what are you worried about? As long as you can unleash the power of a Fourth Grade, none of the old fogeys of Zhentarim will dare to bully us! Speaking of which, when is this massive body of yours going to return to normal? I...I miss you!¡±


    ¡°Er...there¡¯s a way around this!¡±


    Greem smiled as a redser shot out of his eyes, forming a body of fire beside Mary. By the time the mes cooled down and extinguished, a person who looked just like Greem appeared with a smile on his face.


    It had been difficult for Greem to create fire clones of himself while he was at Third Grade. However, after advancing to Fourth Grade, creating a fire clone was as easy as eating beans.


    Moreover, if one were to approach the clone, they would be shocked to find that this mild-mannered ¡®Greem¡¯ had the might of a beginner Third Grade.


    The smile on Mary¡¯s face turned wider, and the trace of desire in her eyes was more obvious now. She reached out and caressed Greem¡¯s familiar face. The next second, scarlet light flickered as Greem¡¯s body was sliced to pieces by a sharp golden dagger.


    ¡°Keep this in your mind, Greem. The only person that gets to climb onto my bed is your actual person. You send another clone to trick me...believe it or not, I will chop you along with that useless little fellow of yours!¡±


    Having said that, Mary lifted her head and instantly vanished from the hall.


    Er...alright, that¡¯s the Mary I know!


    The fire giant chuckled slightly and waved his hand to seal off the hall once more.


    The violent, swarming fire once again veiled his towering body.

 Chapter 1066 - Greem’s New Power

    <h4>Chapter 1066 Greem¡¯s New Power</h4>


    Almost eighty percent of the benefits from the advancement had been absorbed by the Heart of mes, thereby allowing it to evolve into the Heart of Principles. It could be said that the principle aura flowing and radiating from Greem¡¯s body came entirely from the Heart of Principles.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s data feedback, Greem¡¯s analysis and understanding of the fire principles were only at 48%. That already included all of Greem¡¯s knowledge and experience of the power of fire over the past two hundred years, as well as the fire energy he had gathered by traveling through dozens of nes, regions, and other worlds.


    If he wanted the Chip to continue analyzing the fire principles, he would have to keep gathering knowledge or items rted to fire from the other worlds and the realms beyond. It was the only way topensate for hisck of knowledge.


    In truth, being able to decipher 30% of the fire principles with Greem¡¯s personal stockpile of fire knowledge and energy was already extremely fortunate. The other 18% of progress hade from the knowledge reserves he stole from the Zhentarim Association.


    It might look as if Greem had only deciphered half of the fire principles, but the indirect benefits of having aplished this were immense. No powerful spell or magical equipment could rival the effects of having deciphered 48% of the fire principles.


    Every 10% of progress he made in the fire principles would bestow Greem with some unusual magical effects.


    For instance, at 10% analysis, Greem obtained increased fire spellcasting range.


    At 20%, Greem obtained increased fire effectiveness.


    At 30%, he obtained fire pration.


    At 40%, his mes could turn invisible.


    In particr, the increased fire spellcasting range allowed Greem¡¯s casting range to increase from three thousand meters to five thousand meters. None of Greem¡¯s fire spells would weaken due to distance as long as the target was within five thousand meters.


    Increased fire effectiveness increased the intensity of Greem¡¯s fire spells.


    The Chip performed a simple calction and estimated the power of the spells to have increased by approximately 21%.


    In addition to the 30% bonus provided by Greem¡¯s Fire Specialization, Greem¡¯s fireballs were 50% more potent than the average elementium adept of the same grade.


    Fire pration was also an extremely practical magical effect.


    With the increase in grade and the increased amount of magical equipment avable, the damage that elementium spells could inflict on opponents would be greatly reduced. In particr, some individuals with rare bloodlines could even be somewhat immune to low-grade elementium damage. It allowed them to look down upon all elementium adepts.


    Fire pration meant that even enemies who had elementary fire immunity would not be able to go unscathed when hit by Greem¡¯s fire spells.


    It could be said that elementium damage reduction and elementium pration were the focus of conflicts between high-grade adepts. Almost all the equipment and spells that high-grade adepts chose revolved around these two factors.


    Without fire pration, Greem would be in an awkward position against other Fourth Grade adepts. He would not be able to injure them effectively.


    During the battle against Body-Refining Adept Den, Greem had been clever enough to use Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring¡¯s special effect of ignoring magic resistance and defense to its fullest extent. Now, even without Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, Greem could rely on his own power. He could leave a deep and impressionable memory on any Fourth Grade opponent.


    The ability to turn his fires invisible was also a strong effect that made Greem significantly more dangerous than he previously was!


    Any fire spells that Greem cast with his abilities would have the miraculous ability to turn invisible. They could not be detected by sight nor passive spiritual senses until the power of the spell erupted.


    That meant any enemy without elementium sight or simr active sensing abilities would be unable to ¡®see¡¯ Greem¡¯s fire spell.


    If one were to think about it seriously, this magical effect was incredible!


    One couldn¡¯t forget that Body of mes was a fire spell as well.


    If Greem converted his own body into the Body of mes in battle, most low-grade adepts would not even be able to track him with their passive spiritual senses. Moreover, the inability to see the trail of Greem¡¯s fire spells also made it much more difficult for adepts of the same grade to dodge or counterattack.


    These deciphered fire principles were already part of Greem¡¯s power. Thus, even a small fireball that Greem casually threw out could be enhanced with all four of these magical effects. Furthermore, these effects would not increase the cast time or exhaust any additional Spirit. In essence, they magnified the power of Greem¡¯s fire spells several times at no cost at all.


    Consequently, Greem fully understood why high-grade adepts sought after the power of the principles so fervently.


    Gaining the principle powers was like gaining Midas¡¯ hand. It allowed the might of an adept¡¯s elementium magic to increase explosively. Who would be able to turn down such an abrupt increase in power!?


    Apart from the magical effects provided by the Heart of Principles, the advancement also increased Greem¡¯s Spirit. Greem¡¯s Spirit arrived at 40 points after breaking through the 39 point threshold. This fortieth point of Spirit was asrge as the total amount of Spirit from the previous 39 points.


    Moreover, every point increase after this 40th point would be equal to the sum of all the Spirit before it!


    That was why the high-grade adepts had such a difficult time improving. It was nearly impossible to find shortcuts for improvement as they had in the past.


    The minor grades of Fourth Grade were split into Beginner (40-42), Intermediate (43-45), Advanced (46-48), and Peak (49).


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, every point increase after Fourth Grade required hundreds of years of deep meditation, as well as many trials and tribtions with one¡¯s life on the line. Those old Fourth Grade monsters that had made their names hundreds of years ago would have incredible trouble making it past the beginner phase without special techniques up their sleeves.


    Even among the fourteen Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim, there were still three of them who were at beginner Fourth Grade. Seven of them had managed to reached intermediate grade. The only advanced Fourth Grades were Chairman Freed, Vice-Chairman Mirva, Adept Ker, and Elder Nics.


    As for the peak Fourth Grade? Unfortunately, no adept of such power had appeared in Zhentarim for six hundred years already!


    ording to the information Greem had stolen from the Zhentarim Association, Greem¡¯s advancement was highly unusual. In all seriousness, the Heart of Principles that he now possessed should be something that was only possible when a Fourth Grade adept advanced to be a Great Adept. Clearly, he should not possess the Heart of Principles at his current grade.


    Such a vast and terrifying power naturally required an incredibly strong body to host it.


    That was why Greem had be sorge. He had been forcibly gigantified by the Heart of Principles!


    His only recourse now was to understand and analyze the fire principles to the best of his abilities, then use the power of thews to reshape a stronger body. It was the only way to return to his normal form. Otherwise, he would have to maintain his giant shape to temporarily contain the excessive and pure fire energy within him.


    The burning world that Mary and the others had seen when they arrived was a phenomenon created from the excessive power that Greem could not control.


    It was also proof of the tremendous power and danger of any adept advancing to Fourth Grade. Any strange thing could happen around them. Even unintentional magical energy leakage from their bodies could inflict irreversible damage to thend, turning the ce into a death zone where no life could exist.


    These examples allowed one to understand why most nar worlds had set the limit of power to Fourth Grade. That was because the power of Fourth Grades could already severely affect the bnce ofws within the ne.


    Should a Fourth Grade adept start ughtering and destroying recklessly, they would cause excessive damage to thew systems within a nar world.


    Meanwhile, a Fifth Grade adept would be able to bring about irreparable principle damage to a ne¡¯s system.


    That was clearly something that no nar consciousness could tolerate!


    For the sake of their longevity and development, a nar consciousness would find ways to banish the excessively powerful individuals from within them. The choices of these influential individuals in response to this also resulted in the appearance of different power systems.


    The Great Adepts chose to leave the World of Adepts and create new worlds in the realms beyond.


    The gods chose to remain, wandering outside the ne¡¯s systems while continuing to exist within the nar world through their god kingdoms.


    The Scourge Lords chose to fight back against the nar consciousness, resulting in a bloody purge of life from the World of Disasters and causing the world itself to break apart. If it weren¡¯t for the Scourge Lords constantly going out to hunt other nes for resources and life forms to maintain the existence of the World of Disasters, it would have already fallen apart.


    Meanwhile, the Titans were a powerful race that treated space as their home and the individual nes as dens in which they could rest. The smaller nar consciousnesses were nothing to the Titans. Naturally, they were unable to banish the Titans using the meager power of their systems.


    To the Titans, nar worlds were only tools and toys. They did not possess the power to resist the Titans!


    The Titans also carried the will of the multiverse upon their shoulders. They traveled the universe, responsible for exterminating any powerful creature that threatened the bnce of the multiverse. Their conflicts against the Scourge Lords had be the one constant, unchanging theme in the past hundreds of thousands of years!


    The powerful forces that were born in the various nar worlds were naturally opposed to the Scourge Lords. Still, many strange factions emerged from these assorted races and powers. Some aided the Scourge Lords in their destruction. Others helped the Titans in their war against the Scourge Lords, while many more preferred to remain neutral and support whichever side held the upper hand.


    In this way, aplicated power system and universal politics had emerged, making for this brilliant, yet incredibly dangerous, world!

 Chapter 1067 - The Brain Monster’s Choice

    <h4>Chapter 1067 The Brain Monster¡¯s Choice</h4>


    Lance, the Capital of Eternity.


    A conversation was happening in a big hall inside the Capital of Eternity¡¯s fortress.


    ¡°Judging from the information we have gathered, Greem appears to havepleted his advancement and is in the process of stabilizing his mental consciousness. What do you think? Should we take this opportunity to do something?¡± It was Split-Brain Gru who was speaking. The squidlike brain contained in the chest cavity of the massive machine betrayed an expression of helplessness and frustration.


    The gigantic brain floating in the murky liquid behind the semi-translucent crystal ss squirmed slowly. The light of thought flickered all over the grooved surface of the brain.


    The hall, made of a special magical alloy, was filled with a rising and falling tide of Spirit while the giant brain was engaged in thought. No one could hope to obtain any valuable information from the hall through magical means while this strange tide was present.


    This mental barrier was meant to deal with Alice!


    Even though Gazlowe had significantly benefitted from his cooperation with Alicest time, it had also made him thoroughly cautious of her existence.


    Even a Third Grade monster like Gazlowe could not do much against a person like her, capable of peeking everywhere through the powers of Fate. After all, every individual had their secrets. No one wanted a pair of curious eyes looking at them without their knowledge.


    Perhaps it was his more sensitive spiritual senses, or maybe it was merely paranoia, but Gazlowe had been feeling a strange power around him for the past few years. There was no way to get rid of that power, and it felt like it was probing and examining him from every angle and every perspective.


    Yet, Gazlowe simply could not detect the origin or even the actual presence of this strange feeling.


    In all honesty, this feeling was terrible!


    Tortured by this ufortable feeling, the brain monster had started experiencing nightmares. Gazlowe, the brain monster whose forte was toying with the souls, memories, and thoughts of his enemies, was experiencing nightmares.


    It was almost unbelievable. With how much control the brain monster had over its mind, the fact that it would even dream as low-grade lifeforms would and the fact that these dreams would be ¡®nightmares¡¯ was unimaginable!


    Regardless of how impossible it was, now that it had happened, there had to be an exnation.


    Brain Monster Gazlowe realized that some powerful individual had set their sights on him. Moreover, this powerful individual also possessed strange abilities simr to Alice¡¯s abilities.


    The brain monster wasn¡¯t foolish.


    He extracted the corresponding information from his mind andpared it with the vague sensation he had been feeling. In doing so, he quickly understood that the person peeking at him from the shadows was none other than Maysa, the First Witch of Fate, and Alice¡¯s greatest opponent in the World of Adepts.


    If only there were a god who would take mercy on him! He wasn¡¯t even a friend or subordinate to Alice!


    His rtionship with Alice was only one of mutual benefit. How did he attract the attention of that terrifying First Witch of Fate?


    Gazlowe had wanted to have a proper talk with that Witch Maysa countless times after learning that she was looking at him. Unfortunately, he could not discover the means and methods by which Maysa was scrying on him. As such, despite his intentions, the brain monster simply had no means ofmunicating with Maysa.


    Over the past few years, Gazlowe¡¯s only choice was to protect himself firmly in this extremely exhausting fashion. It was the only way he could avoid that annoying gaze that he could do nothing about.


    Today, when faced with Split-Brain Gru¡¯s concerned and worried question, the brain monster¡¯s hill-like brain squirmed slightly. He then used his mental powers to establish a connection with Gru.


    ¡°Prepare for war!¡±


    Split-Brain Gru was stunned for a second and replied in shock, ¡°What? What did you say?¡±


    ¡°I said, prepare for war! Isn¡¯t this what you always wanted?¡±


    ¡°What are you talking about? Why is it that I can¡¯t understand what you are talking about the more you speak?!¡± Split-Brain Gru spread his palms, confusion written all over his face.


    ¡°There¡¯s no more need to hide. I have been sensing a different mental consciousness that does not belong to either of us on you these past few years. Your actions have be increasingly reckless under the guidance of this foreign mental consciousness.¡± The brain monster¡¯s giant ¡®body¡¯ floated in the liquid, but a dominant mental power had already enveloped the hall. Over a hundred Second Grade magical machine warriors stepped through the entrance, pinning Gru and his dozen magical machine guards to a corner of the room.


    ¡°Main brain, have you gone mad? You...¡± At this point, Gru¡¯s voice suddenly changed, turning into a sweet and crisp female voice, ¡°...haha, I didn¡¯t think a brain monster like you could detect my mental consciousness. Hey, little brain monster. If you¡¯ve long since discovered my existence, why didn¡¯t you exterminate the mental consciousness while it was still weak? Why did you watch and let it grow in strength?¡±


    ¡°You must be Lady Maysa! I¡¯ve been looking forward to meeting you. I am thrilled to be able to speak with a person as important as yourself.¡± Gazlowe appeared to possess an entire capital and hundreds of thousands of magical machines, but he still had to lower himself before a terrifyingly powerful and scheming witch as Maysa.


    Unfortunately, Maysa clearly had no intention of epting the ttery.


    ¡°Haha, you are no more than a Third Grade mutated brain monster, and you wish to speak to my actual self? Do you think that you, a Third Grade brain monster, is worth the Great Lady Maysa¡¯s time? To ceaseless scry on you? Hahaha, dream on. I, the one speaking to you, am only Lady Maysa¡¯s 1376th Fate clone. My mission is to guide you towards conflict against Greem. Unfortunately, your performance has been far too terrible!¡±


    Gazlowe¡¯s mind trembled silently.


    ¡°Why? You shouldn¡¯t have to tell me these things? If you are directly telling me this, doesn¡¯t it mean that...?¡±


    ¡°Indeed, the only reason I¡¯m telling the truth is that there is no more need for my presence here. Sixty-seven seconds from now, Greem will step into this hall. I am sure you understand perfectly what his arrival means for you. Submit or resist? I very much look forward to your choice.¡±


    As thest word lingered in the room, the mental consciousness that had been manipting Split-Brain Gru suddenly dispersed without a trace. Meanwhile, Gru shuddered as if he had just woken up from some terrifying dream. He regained his own consciousness.


    ¡°Main brain, what happened earlier? Why did I suddenly lose consciousness?¡± Split-Brain Gru shouted in a panic.


    ¡°Shut up, you fool. If it weren¡¯t for you foolishly intervening in the matter over at the Goblin ne, there would still be room for negotiation with the fire adept. What now? He¡¯s about to arrive already. What should we do? Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! Sixty-seven seconds. What can I do in such a short amount of time?¡±


    Communication through consciousness was incredibly fast. Gazlowe and Gru were able to exchange thoughts hundreds and thousands of times in the matter of an instant. Gru immediately understood the situation they were facing.


    Split-Brain Gru had ¡®silently¡¯ encouraged and manipted the fools of the Magic Energy Association while Greem was in seclusion and incapable of being involved with n affairs. The Magic Energy Association wanted freedom and independence, while Gru wanted the Queyras alloy stored inside the central tower of the City of Machines.


    Given the Crimson n¡¯s cautiousness of the brain monster and the Capital of Eternity, not a single trace of Queyras alloy was allowed to fall into their hands. As such, Split-Brain Gru pulled a small trick and aided the goblins in one pivotal moment, thereby quickly achieving his own goals.


    Perhaps Gru might have thought of his achievement as a perfect operation owing to his ingenuity earlier. However, he now knew that what he believed to be his autonomous self had only been a puppet for the opponent to draw by the strings.


    It had been the inception of an idea, the guidance of the train of thought. The fact that these familiar mental techniques that Gru so often used had been used on himself made him indescribably furious and frustrated.


    Deep in his heart, Gru had already cursed and insulted every single female ancestor and rtive belonging to that damned First Witch of Fate. However, this could not help them deal with the crisis that was about to descend.


    The fire adept was arriving soon!


    The fact that his first destination upon advancing to Fourth Grade was the Capital of Eternity in Lance was evidence of his utmost anger and cautiousness for the brain monster. There was no doubt that Gru yed arge part in this result!


    ¡°Seal the teleportation array. Hurry up and seal the teleportation array! As long as the fire adept can¡¯t teleport over, we will have more time to think ande up with a response,¡± Gru screamed wildly.


    ¡°It¡¯s toote! That damned woman counted the time perfectly. The fire adept had already appeared in our teleportation array when she told us all this!¡±


    Given Gazlowe¡¯s control over the entire Capital of Eternity, he would never miss a detail concerning a ce as important as the internar teleportation array.


    The Capital of Eternity¡¯s teleportation array was always open to the Crimson n while they were still allies on paper.


    As such, while Gazlowe had been speaking with Maysa¡¯s clone, a familiar silhouette had already appeared in the teleportation array at the top of the steel fortress. While the two brains panicked, that man slowly walked towards the hall down the winding metal corridors.


    ¡°Guards...guards, we must hurry and mobilize all the guards to stall the fire adept.¡± Gru shouted with all he had.


    ¡°I have already handed all authority over the Capital of Eternity to you. Go and stop the fire adept. I still need some time here to activate fully. You must stall him!¡±


    ¡°Understood. Leave it to me, Main brain!¡±


    Perhaps the damned¡¯s Fate clone was still affecting Gru¡¯s mind, causing him to feel genuine hatred and malice for Greem. As such, encouraged by the Main brain, Gru took over all authority of the Capital of Eternity without any hesitation. He used his mental connection to mobilize the magical machines as he strode out of the hall.


    An unusual battle quickly erupted the moment he stepped out of the hall!

 Chapter 1068 - Devastated

    <strong>Chapter 1068 Devastated</strong>


    Greem casually walked down a metal bridge hanging between the steel fortresses.


    A howling gust of wind blew across the bridge, causing his robes to ruffle and billow loudly. It revealed the dark-red fire dragon armor he wore underneath.


    The bridge was five-meters-wide, firm, and secure enough for an army of magical machines to quickly march across.


    There were one-meter-tall railings on the side of the bridges. Looking down from above at the edge of the bridge, you could see countless dots of uneven height below. There were strange buildings that were almost steampunk in fashion, packed together so tightly they were almost like a pack of marching ants.


    The Capital of Eternity relied on its imprable steel fortresses and terrifying magic energy cannons to repel the hordes of dragon lords that came to conquer it. It had managed to establish itself as an unconquerable city of steel in Lance, where dragon lords ruled everywhere, and it did so through sheer power.


    As long as you could demonstrate uncontested power in any ne, you would always have an endless horde of admirers and followers.


    When the Capital of Eternity proved its power through blood and iron, the nar natives that had been deeply oppressed by the dragons couldn¡¯t have been happier to change banners and join the Capital of Eternity. It allowed the influence and fame of the Capital to spread throughout Lance rapidly.


    Thus, just as Greem saw right now, the Capital of Eternity was not only home to the tens of thousands of magical machines, but these hundreds of thousands of natives as well. They were like weeds, bushes, or vines growing on the outside of the Capital of Eternity, getting by through donations and whatever leftovers they could scrap together.


    Anyone that wanted a good livelihood or for their tribe to rise to power would have to join the Capital of Eternity, bing part of Gru¡¯s subordinate army.


    It was through this method that Split-Brain Gru had managed to put together a massive native army of various races and abilities with a minimal amount of resources.


    Now, with a single order from Gru, the entire Capital sprung into action. Squads of magical machines and native warriors swarmed out of the buildings scattered throughout the steel fortress, rushing wildly at the ck-haired, ck-eyed adept standing upon the bridge.


    Having advanced past the elementary phase of an elementium adept and raising his power to the level of principles, the strange characteristics caused by radiating elementium or projected power were slowly fading from Greem¡¯s appearance. The current Greem was the closest to the original state of his soul.


    The elementium sediments in his once long, crimson hair had faded away, revealing his actual hair, smooth and brilliantly ck. Fire elementium no longer radiated from his person, causing his eyes to turn ck once more. Only small sparks of tiny red dots were faintly visible at the edge of his pupils.


    If anyone were to magnify these red dots, they would be shocked to find that these dots were strange symbols burning with minuscule mes. Moreover, these microscopic runes constantly fluctuated with every change in Greem¡¯s own psychology and emotion.


    Greem slowly walked across the long metal bridge, traveling from a towering metal fortress to the tower of steel on the other end.


    Though there were plenty of metal fortresses here, and the metal bridges were asmon as a spider¡¯s web in a forgotten cer, Greem could not be lost as he had already been here once before. He made straight for the core of the Capital of Eternity¨C the steel hall in which Brain Monster Gazlowe was hiding.


    In all seriousness, Greem was only here today to reminisce about the past with Gazlowe!


    Though he had done many things to upset Greem in the past, that was all in the past. With his advancement, Greem¡¯s perspective and angle of looking at things had changed entirely.


    Gazlowe was a rtively ambitious and insane goblin. The fact that he could turn himself into his current state was more than enough proof of his talent and intelligence. He was a Third Grade brain monster who possessed an imprable capital all to himself. Even Greem himself would be reluctant to remain as the servant of an adept if he was in Gazlowe¡¯s position.


    As such, Greem truly did understand all of Gazlowe¡¯s restlessness and rebelliousness.


    However, understanding didn¡¯t mean eptance!


    The past Greem definitely did not have the absolute power required to suppress the Third Grade brain monster, let alone make him submit.


    The two of them had only chosen to beat around the bush out of consideration for the mutual benefit they could obtain from their ¡®cooperation.¡¯ During this time, the Third Grade brain monster had done many things to harm the Crimson n interests.


    Naturally, Greem knew of all his deeds, but he chose to endure them in silence. He did not want to exile this Third Grade brain monster from the n simply because he did not want them to lose Lance and all its dragon resources.


    However, Greem was a Fourth Grade adept now. The power bnce between the two of them was utterly shattered. Whatever he could tolerate in the past, the Greem of the present could no longer endure.


    He had only one purpose ining here¨C to fold the Third Grade Brain Monster into the n¡¯s control once and for all. If the brain monster was foolish enough not to understand the circumstances, Greem didn¡¯t mind putting on a small disy of his new powers.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but open his mouth slightly in shock when he heard the ringing sirens in the skies of the Capital of Eternity. He saw the army of magical machines and native warriors lunging out of the fortresses and barracks.


    He had expected the Third Grade brain monster to resist, but he didn¡¯t expect the opposition to be so intense.


    It wasplete and utter hostility!


    It didn¡¯t matter what the Third Grade brain monster was thinking about now. He was so sure he could force Greem into a retreat that he didn¡¯t even leave any room for negotiations. Did he believe that Greem didn¡¯t dare to kill him?


    Greem¡¯s eyes couldn¡¯t help but narrow at this thought.


    He had a feeling that things weren¡¯t so simple. It was as if there was an invisible hand pushing and manipting something behind the scenes. Otherwise, given Gazlowe¡¯s cowardly and fearful personality, he would never be so absolute and decisive in his actions!


    However, these doubts could only be answered after he dealt with this matter. Right now, Greem had to deal with the tens of thousands of enemies swarming onto the bridge.


    He would probably have to first exterminate these annoying gnats before he could see Gazlowe.


    Ga! Ga! Ga!


    A series of deafening screeches rang out. The first to arrive was not the magical machines spread all across the city, but a squad of one hundred and seventy harpies.


    There were both male and female harpies. All of them had humanoid bodies, with the wings and ws of eagles. They werepletely naked, save for some thick gray feathers growing at the edges of their limbs. Wings reced their arms, and they had two wed feet holding onto three-meter-long spears.


    These spears were made of wood and their tips were sharpened.


    These harpies held the wooden spears tight and pped their wings with all their strength as they charged at Greem.


    Greem¡¯s ck eyes swept past all of them, unconceble scorn in his gaze for these creatures.


    Just a bunch of small fry at no more than apprentice level. There was not a single adept-level individual in such arge group. Even weaklings like these dared tounch an assault at a Fourth Grade adept?


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to even lift a finger against such trash. He silently activated his Burning Domain.


    As a crimson shadow dome enveloped a one-kilometer radius around Greem, all the harpies and native warriors following behind them screamed in horror as they were quickly burned and turned to dust. Meanwhile, the bridge and steel buildings that were now cloaked beneath the crimson dome rapidly became red from the shocking heat of the invisible mes. The surface of the buildings and the bridge even started melting.


    The appearance of the Burning Domain instantly dissuaded any of the native creatures from continuing their assault on Greem. Without tremendous magic resistance of at least Second Grade or above or any sort of defense against fire, any being that entered the Burning Domain would have to suffer 210 points of fire damage per second.


    Don¡¯t mention these naked, unarmored natives. Even among Second Grade adepts, armed with aplete set of resistance equipment, there weren¡¯t very many individuals who could endure such continuous burning.


    In the blink of an eye, the aggressive momentum of the soldiers was put to a halt.


    One nar native after native screamed madly and charged into the crimson dome, only to be reduced to ashes. It didn¡¯t matter whether it was just an ordinary soldier or famed warrior among the natives. Anyone that walked into the crimson dome would unavoidably burn to dust after a few steps.


    After witnessing this scene repeat over and over again, the natives were finally wholly terrified.


    They gathered near the crimson dome, watching on with looks of horror as the dome slowly approached them. They had already lost the courage to attack and were now gathering into a big ball of flesh before the barrier, desperately trying to retreat.


    The asional, unfortunate native would be knocked into the dome by the crowd. Countless mes would spew out of their bodies before they could turn and run, turning to ash in front of everyone¡¯s eyes.


    The natives were finally afraid!


    They might be brave, but they weren¡¯t foolish. They might not fear death, but that did not mean they were willing to die for no reason.


    Thus, when one horrified nar native let out a scream and turned to run, all the other natives couldn¡¯t help but scatter and flee as well.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The ¡®demon¡¯ the group faced was far too scary, and they were far too weak.


    It wasn¡¯t even a matter of hurting the ¡®demon.¡¯ They were so many, yet they didn¡¯t even dare to face him!


    Greem continued strolling down the metal bridge, unfazed. The crimson dome he had erected was like a shepherd dog, terrifying the natives and making them flee like cows and sheep.


    At this moment, a group of natives that were halfway across the bridge was riddled with holes by a barrage of bullets and energy beams. The next second, squads of magical machines in tight formation stepped across the corpses and moaning injured with perfectly coordinated steps as they slowly pressed towards Greem.

 Chapter 1069 - Powerful Greem

    <strong>Chapter 1069 Powerful Greem</strong>


    Individually, all of these magical machines were only First Grade.


    The surfaces of their bodies started burning the moment they stepped into the crimson dome, turning bright-red from the heat as the metal began to soften and melt.


    However, their armor¡¯s topyer of magical alloy tes provided them with a certain degree of elementium resistance. Their twenty-centimeter-thick metal armor further ensured that they couldst longer than ordinary lifeforms in the Burning Domain, even if they were not immune to the heat.


    They rapidly approached Greem during this time, concentrating their bullets and energy beams, drowning him in a barrage of attacks.


    Greem¡¯s steps did not stop.


    He continued to walk forward casually, reaching out with one finger and quickly drawing fire rune after fire rune in the air. Each rune vanished rapidly the moment it was finished, turning into thick and solid Lava Shields that revolved around Greem.


    The wild barrage of bullets sentva spilling everywhere when they crashed against the shields.


    A single Lava Shield was half a meter thick, two meters tall, and one meter wide, but shattered after just seven seconds from the concentrated fire of all the magical machines. However, regardless of how intensely the magical machines went on the offense, they could not be as rxed andfortable as Greem simply drawing runes with his fingers.


    It didn¡¯t matter how much the magical machines continued unleashing their firepower with their melting bodies; they still could not catch up with the speed at which Greem replenished his Lava Shields.


    To the contrary, as the barrage went on, the Lava Shields around Greem only increased in number. They were gathered together like a massive wall and had almostpletely obscured his figure.


    After shielding himself from the magical machine attacks, it was Greem¡¯s turn to act. He was not a man to stand by without retaliating.


    The fire runes he was drawing suddenly changed and quickly outlined an unusuallyrge door of fire in the space in front of him. As the fire runes slowly merged with the door, the megate opened, and a horde of fire creatures swarmed forth from within.


    Greem was a Fourth Grade adept now. Every single fire spell he cast contained a trace of the principle powers. Most of the fire creatures summoned from the Fire Elementium ne in this manner were First Grade creatures, with even a few rare Second Grade monsters.


    Elite fire elementals, fire giants, zefire mespirits, magma hounds, magma beasts, fire crows.


    Strange fire creatures of all shapes and sizes quickly appeared and shed with the magical machines.


    The two armies started tearing into each other in a ferocious show of force upon the narrow bridge.


    After finishing all this, Greem smiled as his silhouette flickered, only to reappear on the other end of the bridge.


    Over a hundred magical machines were gathered here, wildly shooting at the fire creatures from a hundred meters away.


    A sudden ring of fire erupted as Greem appeared amid the magical machines.


    The halo of fire that engulfed these machines possessed two strange characteristics¨C Explosion and Impact. It instantly blew away nearly half of the magical machines, causing them to fall off the bridge as meteors enveloped in mes.


    It was at least three hundred meters away from the ground.


    Given the weight of the machines, they would be utterly destroyed when they crashed.


    The magical machines that were fortunate enough to survive the shockwave were not in any better condition.


    There were still plenty of Lava Shields revolving around Greem. These shields crashed against the bodies of the magical machines, causing hotva and fire to wash against their metal bodies. These poor constructs only managed to open fire for five seconds before turning into liquid metal, like candles tossed into an open me.


    The Burning Domain was everywhere.


    Without the protection of magical shields, the internal runic and energy systems of the magical machines were exposed to the wild mes, even if their metal bodies were imprable. When their circuits and control core had been melted and destroyed, they lost all their ability to fight.


    Greem continued to teleport in the same fashion, over and over again.


    Every time he appeared among the magical machine army, he would use the terrifying might of his fire to reduce the machines into useless piles of metal.


    These magical machines that had once helped the Crimson n conquer countless enemies seemed to have lost their past sharpness and power when facing this fearsome fire adept. They were now patheticmbs to the ughter.


    The difference in power was simply too vast, so much so that it could not bepensated for with numbers or space!


    Half an hourter, Greem stepped onto thest metal bridge on his journey.


    At the end of the bridge was arge metal tform. As many as five hundred unusual magical machines were arranged in perfect formation upon it. Split-Brain Gru was hidden amongst these machines, connecting himself with them using several energy chains.


    Greem stopped and took a good look at these strange magical machines.


    They were strange, as all of these machines were encased in ayer of a nearly-translucent energy barrier. This barrier seemed to protect them from every angle. The barrier also appeared to have strange magic energy characteristics that enabled them to iste the Greem¡¯s spiritual probes as well as the Chip¡¯s scan.


    It was an extremely unusual situation!


    If Greem could not deal with these magical machines fast enough, he would have trouble killing the advanced Second Grade Split-Brain Gru.


    After all, any adept would frown at the thought of having to fight against five hundred magical machines.


    Moreover, if the Chip¡¯s scans were not incorrect, then all five hundred of these magical machines were probably the enhanced second-generation machines. In other words, they were Second Grade magical machines!


    If Greem had such a force in his hands, the Crimson n would immediately gain an extremely formidable ace. Unfortunately, since the foolish Gru had chosen to fight back, the possibility of this ace remaining untouched was very much close to zero.


    For the first time, there was a trace of sinister killing intent in Greem¡¯s eyes when he looked across the bridge at Gru, who was hiding behind the magical machines!


    In all the previous battles, he had been fighting with a rxed attitude, one of toying around and testing his abilities.


    However, at this moment, he really wanted to kill!


    Behind that metal tform was the steel hall where Third Grade Brain Monster Gazlowe was hiding.


    Currently, the hall appeared to bepletely silent, as if the creature within had not realized what was happening.


    Energy light shimmered over the tightly shut metal doors, alongside a mental barrier that covered the entire structure. Greem¡¯s spiritual senses could not prate these defenses.


    A coward would always remain a coward!


    Gazlowe didn¡¯t dare step onto the battlefield himself, so he sent these magical machines and his split-brain, Gru. If Gru could stop Greem in his tracks, he would dly ept the victory and be the winner in this scenario. He would utterly break free of the reign of the Crimson n and obtain true freedom.


    However, if Gru were to be defeated, Greem wondered if Gazlowe had the courage and decisiveness to face him himself. Brain monsters might be incredibly intelligent and knowledgeable, but these traits had nothing to do with courage.


    They were also one of the most cowardly creatures in the universe, quickly bowing before and submitting to beings more powerful than themselves!


    Indeed, cowardly. It was thebel that Greem had always applied to Gazlowe in his mind.


    If he wasn¡¯t cowardly, how could he ever have been threatened by Greem and submit while Greem was still a Second Grade adept? If he wasn¡¯t cowardly, why was it that he only ever dared to n useless schemes behind the scenes, never daring to honestly confront Greem? If he wasn¡¯t cowardly, why would he have given up on the powerfulbination of a Third Grade brain monster leading five hundred Second Grade magical machines? Instead, he chose to have advanced Second Grade Split-Brain Grumand instead.


    As such, Greem boldlyughed when he saw the army of magical machine lying in wait, when he saw the fearful Gru, and when he saw the tightly shut doors behind them. His trademark mes finally rose on his body.


    The battle was intense but uneventful!


    Thebination of a Second Grade split-brain and five hundred Second Grade magical machines was a sufficiently terrifying force for most adepts. Gru¡¯s energy chains connected the magical machines and allowed them to have a practically limitless amount of energy while sustaining their magic energy shields for extended periods.


    It became exceedingly difficult for Greem to quickly dispose of the machines due to the magic energy shields.


    Greem often had no choice but to use some strange techniques and engage them in meleebat instead.


    Would magical machines be afraid of meleebat? In all honesty, the whole reason they were created was to charge at the enemy, to fight at the very frontlines, and to crush the enemy¡¯s defenses.


    Unfortunately, despite how powerful these machines were, theycked a sufficiently qualifiedmander.


    After failing to break through the defensive line of the magical machines several times, Greem changed his tactics.


    He sealed off the bridge with a massive megate, upying the fire creatures with a constant stream of fire creatures. Greem himself stood on the bridge and gazed at Gru from five hundred meters away.


    As magical power flowed through his eyes, Split-Brain Gru suddenly let out a cry of surprise. Despite being protected byyer uponyer of magical machines, his tall metal body silently ignited.


    If it weren¡¯t for how much magical alloy had been used in forging Gru¡¯s metallic frame, this sudden burst of fire would have severely damaged his body.


    Gru let out a panicked cry. An overwhelming wave of mental power swept across his body as he attempted to extinguish these unusual mes.


    Unfortunately, his Second Grade mental powers were no match for Greem¡¯s Fourth Grade mes. Not only did the fire not extinguish, but it also started to burn brighter and higher.


    In the blink of an eye, Split-Brain Gru was consumed by the devouring mes!

 Chapter 1070 - A Disingenuous Conversation

    <strong>Chapter 1070 A Disingenuous Conversation</strong>


    Thebination of Second Grade Split-Brain Gru with five hundred Second Grade magical machine warriors onlysted thirty minutes in front of Greem.


    Thirty minutester, Greem sted down the metal doors leading to the hall. He strode into the room, dragging Gru¡¯s badly charred corpse behind him.


    The steel hall was nearly a thousand square meters in size, but most of that space was taken up by Gazlowe¡¯s big, ugly brain. Compared to thest time they met, Gazlowe¡¯s brain had increased by at least one-third in size.


    That also meant that Gazlowe¡¯s powers had increased considerably!


    Unfortunately, the aura radiating from the brain was only at the level of a Third Grade.


    Moreover, he was facing a well-prepared Greem. Though Gazlowe¡¯s mental powers were fairly unusual and subtle in their applications, it was still incredibly hard to take down a Fourth Grade fire adept.


    Having considered all the advantages and disadvantages, Gazlowe made up his mind the moment Greem stepped into the hall.


    A small white g was wrapped in the grasp of one of the brain stems beneath Gazlowe¡¯s massive brain. It was lightly waving the g at Greem through the translucent crystal ss.


    [Beep. Detecting data connection request. Requesting instructions from Host. Authorize request?]


    Negotiations now that he had lost?


    Greem¡¯s heart was filled with disdain, but he still chose to ept the mental connection from Gazlowe.


    Gazlowe¡¯s strange, sharp voice rang in Greem¡¯s mind the moment the connection was established.


    ¡°Lord Greem, I am innocent! All of those things were done by my split-brain, Gru. I was in a deep slumber previously and rxed my control over Gru slightly. That was how he was ¡®misguided¡¯ by someone else.¡±


    Greem listened silently, his eyes narrowing into smiling arcs.


    The more mysterious Greem¡¯s attitude was, the more concerned Gazlowe became.


    ¡°Lord Greem, you must see the truth! I...I am truly innocent! If...if you don¡¯t believe me, you can examine Gru¡¯s brain. He...he appeared to have been enchanted by a witch known as Maysa.¡±


    Witch Maysa?


    Greem believed that Gazlowe wasn¡¯t entirely lying when he heard this name. However, Gazlowe mentioned examining Gru¡¯s brain. That meant that he would have to dissect the brain thoroughly. Only the two of them could fully understand what this truly implied.


    Split-Brain Gru could do something behind the main brain¡¯s back without his knowledge?


    Greem might have been tricked by this ¡®lie¡¯ if he was still a beginner apprentice. However, the more he understood about brain monsters, the more heughable Greem found the lie he had just been fed.


    Split-Brain Gru might appear to have an independent consciousness and thought, with a personality very distinct from the main brain, but the two brains were connected to each other. Even across vast distances, in entirely different nes, there was an inseverable, intangible connection between the two of them.


    The main brain was the primary stem, and the split-brain was only a branch that was created for ease of movement and activity.


    If the split-brain died, the main brain would have only lost a capable puppet on strings. It wouldn¡¯t suffer any loss personally. However, if the main brain died, the consciousness of all split-brains would be exterminated in a single instant. Not one of them would survive.


    It was the existence of this trait that ensured that split-brains would never do anything to hurt the main brain.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but choke up with anger when he heard Gazlowe use such a terrible lie as an excuse so that he could live. However, just as Gazlowe expected, Greem held no actual killing intent towards him. Greem only wanted to take this opportunity to give him a stern warning.


    After all, he was a Third Grade brain monster. hH was a Third Grade brain monster capable of controlling a massive capital of steel. No one could bear to kill him!


    All Gazlowe required at the moment was an excuse with which he could fool the outside world.


    As long as Greem didn¡¯t intend to kill him, he would ept the excuse, regardless of how terrible it actually was.


    Greem was thinking silently.


    He couldn¡¯t help but feel a fire ze in his heart when he saw Gazlowe¡¯s submissive waving of the g. It only got worse when he sensed how cautious and careful the mental appendage had been when establishing the connection.


    Gazlowe might seem fearful and submissive, but Greem knew very well that he had calcted all this. He knew Gazlowe was just waiting for him to y his part in this facade!


    All of his atrocities in the past could just be looked over with Gru¡¯s sacrifice.


    This plotting mind, this little trickery and pulling of the strings, was what disgusted and infuriated Greem the most!


    Greem was deep in thought when his gaze ¡®unintentionally¡¯nded on Gazlowe¡¯s massive brain.


    As dense fire elementium gathered around his eyes, two red dots appeared on the soft, jelly-like gray brain matter. Two small fires quickly ignited.


    The fires were small, but they had the strange power of piercing straight to the soul!


    Gazlowe¡¯s mental flux trembled as his mental appendages started to curl. However, he sensed no dangering from the aura that Greem was radiating.


    He could not understand the intentions behind Greem¡¯s actions in the slightest. He could only put out a mental barrier in an attempt to shield himself from the power projecting from Greem¡¯s eyes. Meanwhile, he sent a fawning message to Greem, ¡°Lord Greem, Lord Greem, your power is too immense. Could you restrain it a little bit? This humble one, this humble one...can hardly endure your power any longer!¡±


    Unfortunately, Greem seemed far too deep in thought. His gaze started to wander about. The two red dots fixed on Gazlowe¡¯s brain also started to roam all over.


    The fire elementium power gathered in the red dots was far too intense. They sizzled when theynded on Gazlowe¡¯s brain, easily leaving deep scorch marks upon the brain matter. These marks were all one meter deep and half a meter in width. All the brain matter along the path of the red dots was charred ck, devoid of all life force.


    Gazlowe was also screaming in agony from the burning sensation that pierced straight to his soul. He was suffering immensely, but there was no one he could speak to. The mental barrier he had put up couldn¡¯t stop the fire elementium either, for some reason.


    It was almost...almost as if Greem wasn¡¯t actually projecting the fire energy with his vision. Instead, he was directly gathering the fire elementium on Gazlowe¡¯s brain through some method unknown to Gazlowe, resulting in this effect simr to that of scorching fire.


    It appeared to be some sort of strange principle power!


    Could Greem have mastered and grasped a certain fire principle right after he advanced to Fourth Grade? That was unbelievable!


    The red dots continued wandering all over the brain.


    Messy, crisscrossing scorch marks akin to the random sketching of a child were left behind as the red dots moved. Gazlowe shuddered and shivered from the pain as wave after wave of mental ripples radiating outwards from his wrinkled brain.


    Gazlowe¡¯s cries for mercy became louder and louder.


    After seven minutes, Greem seemed to have woken up from his deep brooding. His unfocused eyes suddenly became concentrated and animated once more.


    ¡°Ah...look at this. I was just thinking about the whole Witch Maysa affair, and I zoned out. To think, I unintentionally hurt your whole body. You wouldn¡¯t me me for this, would you?¡± Greem¡¯s expression was lively and greatly exaggerated. His tone was sincere, but his eyes were filled with malice and ridicule. Anyone could see the very intentional facade he was putting on.


    However, just as Greem didn¡¯t want to tear down Gazlowe¡¯s lies, Gazlowe didn¡¯t want to shred thisyer of a facade that the two of them were keeping up. Faced with Greem¡¯s sincere ¡®apologetic¡¯ attitude, Gazlowe once again demonstrated his ¡®generosity.¡¯


    ¡°It¡¯s nothing, nothing at all. Lord Greem, this couldn¡¯t possibly be your fault. It is only...only my body that iscking in training, which is why I couldn¡¯t endure that slightly ¡®hot¡¯ power of yours!¡±


    ¡°I see, so that¡¯s how it was! It seems I was overthinking the issue. Still, Gazlowe, you can¡¯t just focus on expanding your mind and neglect improving your brain¡¯s elementium defenses! That isn¡¯t good. It makes you very likely to get injured on ident, you know.¡±


    Gazlowe felt as bitter as he could be when he heard Greem¡¯s mocking response, but there was no one he could tell it to.


    His elementium defenses were weak? His Physique was frail?


    In all honesty, even a Second Grade dragon couldn¡¯tpare to Gazlowe¡¯s elementium defenses! His mental powers could put up a special distorted space around his brain. Ordinary elementium magic and physical attacks could almost never reach his brain through this defense as long as his mental powers were not exhausted.


    Only a strange technique simr to what Greem had used that contained a trace of the principle powers could have injured him so terribly. No other person could have survived the thousands of magic energy cannons installed in the Capital of Eternity. No other person could have shredded through tens of thousands of magical machines and hundreds of Second Grade machines. No other person could be unfazed in front of the dominant mental attacks of a Third Grade brain monster.


    Talk not about injuring Gazlowe himself. There were probably less than five beings throughout Lance who could even get to Gazlowe with their own power.


    As such, Gazlowe¡¯s only response to Greem¡¯s extremely malicious ridicule was silence. He could only swallow all his broken teeth and blood, lower his head, acknowledge his faults, and demonstrate his humility and servility.


    The burning from earlier might have hurt Gazlowe badly, but it did not inflict substantial damage on him. His brain was far toorge, after all. That amount of loss to his brain matter was nothing at all.


    This whole performance had only been a show of attitude and intentions!


    Greem had expressed what he felt, and Gazlowe had acknowledged these feelings.


    It was a happy ending, and both of them were a loving family once again.


    However, a new fire control-rune was unavoidable!


    Gazlowe thought for a long while before finally and reluctantly releasing his mental defenses. He let Greem leave his brand on his soul origin.


    The soul brand from before had been left there when Greem was Second Grade, after all. Gazlowe had already done away with the brand through some means long ago. The new fire control-rune might not be able to guarantee absolute loyalty from Gazlowe, but it was still an effective, short-term means of binding him to Greem¡¯s service.


    For the sake of his own life, Gazlowe had no choice but to grit his teeth and endure it!

 Chapter 1071 - Banquet Celebration

    <h4>Chapter 1071 Banquet Celebration</h4>


    Greem has sessfully advanced to Fourth Grade.


    Even though no one intentionally spread the news, this information still dispersed throughout Zhentarim like a gue.


    For a moment, the Crimson n¡¯s status rose uncontrobly, its position within Zhentarim slowly improving. The low and intermediate-grade adepts that came to join the n, as well as worldly merchant groups and nobles, were endless. They nearly wore down the hinges of the Crimson n¡¯s door.


    The n higher-ups also took the opportunity to start several adept wars, as hinted at by Greem. In doing so, they obtained several territories around Ailovis that were rich in resources. Not only did the Zhentarim Associationpletely ignore this aggressive expansion by the Crimson n, they even sent representatives led by Vice-Chairman Adept Mirva to congratte the Crimson n.


    The Crimson Wing.


    Ever since the Crimson n rose to power, they had built thisrge adept¡¯s tower in the very heart of Ailovis. Naturally, the grand celebration they hosted in honor of their n master¡¯s advancement to Fourth Grade could only be held here.


    Adept ns and organizations all over Zhentarim sent out representatives of their own to Ailovis to congratte the birth of the new Fourth Grade adept in Zhentarim. Meanwhile, the adept ns who were standing right in front of the Crimson n¡¯s eager de sent out the powerhouses of their ns to begin constructive, though difficult, ¡®negotiations¡¯ with the Crimson n¡¯s leaders.


    They either became subordinate forces to the Crimson n, traded resource sites and treasures for a temporary truce, or invited the Crimson n to cooperate in the development of a lesser ne. To avoid being yet another sacrificial victim to the prodigious rise of the Crimson n, these other ns had no choice but to grit their teeth and offer humiliating ¡®terms of cooperation.¡¯ It was only through this method that they could protect the foundations of their group and prevent it from being devoured by the Crimson n.


    The Third Grade n leaders that arrived even had to lower themselves in front of Second Grade Gargamel and Meryl. They didn¡¯t dare to offend these two individuals, who held much of the authority of the Crimson n.


    If their attitude was unsatisfactory, or the resources, treasures, and lesser nes they offered were too little for the Crimson n¡¯s appetite, what awaited them would be an unending army of magical machines marching through theirnds.


    In all honesty, some adept ns were unfortunate even in this regard. It didn¡¯t matter how humble or cooperative they were. If they possessed something that the Crimson n desired above all else, then they would undoubtedly be the first sacrifices in the next wave of expansion.


    It was not something that could be decided by their attitudes or efforts. Their fate was determined based on the Crimson n¡¯s own needs and their ns for short and long term development!


    The appearance of a Fourth Grade adept would necessarily bring about a change and shift in political circumstances, regardless of which region of the World of Adepts this Fourth Grade adept had appeared.


    Greem had been a famous legendary fire adept even before advancement, and he had been the most powerful Third Grade adept of Zhentarim, acknowledged by all. Now that someone like him had advanced to Fourth Grade, his glory and power would probably overshadow even the veteran Fourth Grades.


    At the very least, Zhentarim would experience unprecedented political turbulence for the next hundred years. Adept ns and organizations that were protected by Fourth Grade adepts were not in much danger, but those without protection would experience a crisis of survival far harsher than ever before.


    The big fish would eat the small fish, the little fish would eat the shrimp, while the shrimp would have to eat the dirt.


    When a new Fourth Grade arose in the Central Region, they would most certainly obtain a spacerge enough for them in the crowded realm of Zhentarim. The shing andpression between the territories of therger ns would always first affect the weaker organizations that existed in the gaps between them.


    When this happened, every single group would have to keep their eyes open, making or breaking alliances as they saw fit. They had to both protect their adept legacy that had existed for the past hundred years, while also trying to tear off pieces of flesh from the others to further develop themselves.


    For the foreseeable future, Zhentarim would be engulfed in conflict. It would be trapped in a fearsome tide of war, disagreements, and mutual consumption.


    It was only a battle for survival as harsh and heartless as this one that could eliminate the irrelevant and hopeless adept legacies. It would allow the strong adepts to be stronger and therge adept ns to further stretch and expand.


    As the source of this turbulence, the Crimson celebration was undoubtedly the best ce to make and unmake alliances. Manyrge and intermediate forces who smelled the blood in the water hurried to the Crimson Wing, along with many smaller organizations desperate to protect themselves. They were all here to look for the so-called ¡®opportunity!¡¯


    An adept¡¯s celebration was far less grandiose and luxurious as a worldly banquet, but they often had an iparable sense of ¡®humble extravagance.¡¯


    The banquet hall was a wide hall of over ten thousand square meters.


    There was arge fountain of delicate design in the center of the hall. The best musicians of the sea folk were ying their hearts out, apanied by the singing of a deep-sea mermaid.


    Their instruments were made from strange sea objects, such as shells, corals, and seaweed; each had their own uniquely beautiful sound. The mermaid was an unparalleled beauty with a pretty face. She had the body of a human female and a golden fishtail.


    She wore a diamond tiara on her head, with two strands of long, wet hair flowing down her smooth face to cover her chest. Her two-meter-long tail was wrapped around a rock protruding from the water as her beautiful voice spread through the hall.


    That wonderful singing almost felt like it could reach one¡¯s very soul and sway one¡¯s heart at the very core.


    Deep sea mermaids were a species with innate principle powers. Their singing voices naturally carried a slight seduction effect in them. Creatures who heard their singing would unknowingly be absorbed in the music, incapable of freeing themselves from its grip regardless of whether they understood the lyrics.


    However, just as they were powerful because of the trace of principle power they possessed, their fall was also for the same reason.


    The deep-sea mermaids became nobles and monarchs of the deep-sea world with this unusual talent of theirs. However, this ability of theirs made them the best singers that adepts enjoyed hunting and adding to their collections.


    However, most adepts hunted them for their mermaid blood and tears. These ingredients allowed them to enchant their magical equipment with a powerful illusion spell. Only adept ns of great wealth could look past their value as magical ingredients and extravagantly train them as singers instead.


    Greem even borrowed the five elementium fairies from Alice for the sake of this banquet. They served as waitresses during the event.


    The appearance of elementium fairies was so unique that all adepts recognized them at first sight.


    They beat their thin, nearly translucent wings and pinched their tiny, match-like wands as they flew about the banquet. They were continually waving their hands and casting brilliant and pretty stardust into the air.


    Adepts who were caught by the stardust quickly found that they had been enchanted with multiple beneficial spells. For instance, Replenish Stamina, Energized, and Unending Stream either increased stamina or aided with the regeneration of strength and energy. All of them were incredibly practical magical spells.


    It was important to note that most adepts easily spent weeks in theirbs when they began significant projects. During this time, they could not move, nor did they have the time to eat and drink. They could only sustain themselves with magical potions. The exhaustion of stamina and Spirit in doing so was massive.


    If they had such an elementium fairy in their ownbs, the difficulty and amount of work they would have to deal with would be reduced drastically. They would have a much easier time.


    Most of the adepts looked at these little fairies with envy and desire in their eyes.


    Some adepts who were interested in these fairies even waved their hands and asked for some wine or dessert. The fairies only needed to wave their wands. A small shower of lights would fly out, and what the adepts wanted would automatically fly towards them.


    Apart from the elementium fairies, there were also many handsome or pretty apprentices in the banquet hall, waiting on the adepts in formal attire. There were many forest elves, blood elves, grass elves, and subi amongst these waiters.


    Meanwhile, the Crimson adepts wore all sorts of different clothes, depending on their professions and preferences. However, they all wore a n emblem with the symbol of a burning fist on their chest. Magical aura lingered on these emblems, a visible sign that they had been enchanted with some powerful magic.


    For the sake of this grand celebration of the n, the Gargamel Faction, the Meryl Faction, and even the Goblin Faction went all out. All of them were putting their all into serving the adepts at the banquet. A strange fellow that appeared quite simr to Split-Brain Gru was among them. It was a giant, squid-like brain inside a metal shell protected by ayer of ss.


    He wasn¡¯t Gru, but Sock, a new split-brain that Gazlowe had only just created recently.


    Meanwhile, Gru was announced to the n as having been executed internally due to his part in instigating Princess Vanessa¡¯s rebellion, having been tempted by a foreign influence.


    After removing this bad apple, the rtionship of the Capital of Eternity with the n became tighter and more intimate!


    As the one thousand adepts waited in silence, the protagonist of the banquet finally entered the room, apanied by the veteran Fourth Grade Vice-Chairman of the Zhentarim Association, Adept Mirva.


    It had been some days since the publicst saw this legendary fire adept. His appearance had changed ever so slightly.


    His long ck hair ran down his back, tied together with a golden ring. He had ck eyes, white skin, and a young and handsome face, as well as a tall and muscr body.


    Even without the intangible spotlight of being a Fourth Grade adept, Greem was still an extremely charismatic young adept whose very presence would draw eyes upon himself!

 Chapter 1072 - Elder’s Ring of Authority

    Chapter 1072 Elder¡¯s Ring of Authority


    The atmosphere of the entire banquet hall reached a peak in an instant!


    Every adept present ceased their conversation and looked towards this powerful fire adept of legend with passionate eyes. It was almost as if they hoped to discover on Greem¡¯s tall and muscr body the secrets to his tremendous power and rapid advancement.


    However, when Greem stepped into the hall, his seemingly ordinary ck eyes slowly swept across the entire ce. Every adept who crossed eyes with him felt a strange stinging sensation on their skin, and their whole body felt extremely hot all of a sudden. It wasn¡¯t until they ced their hands on their chests, lowered their heads, and paid their respects that the burning sensation quickly faded away.


    Ordinary adepts might not realize anything and still be confused by the sudden appearance and disappearance of the unusual sensation. However, the faces of the high-grade adepts turned slightly. They no longer dared to stare at Greem as brazenly as before.


    Their spiritual senses had very clearly picked up on what happened earlier.


    During that one instant when their eyes met, the fire adept had projected some strange power into their bodies. If they had locked eyes for slightly longer, this peculiar power could have turned into a terrifying fire spell at any time.


    It was nothing much if it was a single adept that felt this. However, every adept present at the banquet had felt the fire adept¡¯s suppression. If this feeling was not an illusion, then Adept Greem¡¯s power was genuinely shocking and fearsome.


    If they were not mistaken, it should be some sort of unusualw power!


    Law powers were not something they could defend or shield against with their low-grade magical defenses and elementium barriers. That meant the legendary fire adept didn¡¯t even have to lift a single finger to kill any of them. He only needed to stare at them.


    Adepts had always admired knowledge and power!


    And the only reason they valued knowledge was for their pursuit of ever greater power!


    When faced with a powerful adept that they could never match up to, the only thing they could do was bow and pay their respects, offering up deep reverence and humility before him.


    Mirva apanied Greem to the center of the hall. Along the way, he greeted many of the Third Grade adepts in the crowd. He would even point at and introduce to Greem to the n leaders he was more familiar with.


    Greem only smiled politely at Mirva¡¯s warmth and passion.


    However, Meryl, who followed closely behind Greem, was memorizing each and every action of Vice-Chairman Mirva¡¯s. Who he nodded towards, who he greeted, who he introduced¨C Meryl made sure to memorize every single one of them with the power of her Spirit.


    As a Fourth Grade adept and leader of the n, Greem had no need to keep an eye out for these Third Grade ¡®juniors¡¯ of his. However, as a Crimson leader, Meryl was in charge of nning the next series of n expansions. Naturally, she had to start nning way ahead of time.


    The n had already done a thorough investigation of their targets and ensured that the major adept ns, as well as those with Fourth Grade adepts, would not be involved in their conflicts.


    Even so, one could never be too careful.


    Who knew if those Fourth Grade adepts would have some mysterious, unknown rtionships with any of those minor ns and organizations? If they dragged such a n into a war, it was very likely that the n would face intervention by a Fourth Grade adept.


    The ¡®performance¡¯ that Vice-Chairman Mirva was putting on today was very likely a subtle hint for the Crimson n. He was pointing out all the adept ns that had some degree of connection or rtions with himself. Meryl, who was now well-versed in such interpersonal matters, caught onto Mirva¡¯s intentions. She immediately memorized all these adepts, as well as the emblems of their ns.


    Later, she would personally remove these ns from the list of the Crimson n¡¯s targets.


    This action was a form of respect and acknowledgment of a Fourth Grade adept¡¯s power!


    ¡°Kid, this advancement celebration of yours is far grander and extravagant than my own. Look, look. Even the storm giants of the Emerald Hills are here for the assion,¡± Mirva exined with a smile on his face.


    Greem paused for a moment when he heard Mirva¡¯s words.


    He couldn¡¯t help but turn and look in the direction where Mirva was looking. Five unusual Storm Giants stood in a corner of the hall, silently staring at him.


    There were both males and females among the five giants. Every one of them was three to four meters tall. Even though they hadrge adept¡¯s robes draped over their bodies, their exposed hands, feet, and heads were all bright blue. Tiny vortices could faintly be seen beneath their translucent skin, crashing against each other and asionally letting out blue lightning that crackled across their entire body.


    The leader of the group was Third Grade, while the rest of them were First and Second Grade.


    They obviously couldn¡¯t get along with the other adepts. They stood in the corner on their own, barely talking to any other people.


    The Third Grade Storm Giant in the lead put his hand on his chest and bowed when he saw Greem¡¯s gaze directed at them. The other younger Giants behind followed his example and bowed as well.


    There was a Second Grade female Giant amongst them, the only one in the group. Even though the color of her skin and her size were somewhat unusual, her facial features were almost the same as any other human. In fact, she was extremely handsome and pretty. Perhaps it was the courage of youth, but she curiously snuck a look at Greem when she bowed.


    However, she couldn¡¯t help but cry out in surprise when her eyes met Greem¡¯s. The sky-blue storm energy within her body suddenly turned dark red, and her aura became chaotic and disorderly.


    The leader¡¯s expression turned as he hastily pulled at hispanion. He made her lower her head and avoid Greem¡¯s eyes, preventing the fire energy within her body from igniting.


    Such unintentional energy radiation would not kill a Second Grade Storm Giant. That said, a little embarrassment was unavoidable.


    The main reason Greem was still spending most of his time isted in Fire Throne was because of his overwhelming power. As one of the most powerful individuals in the World of Adepts at the moment, he could inflict irreversible damage on low-grade adepts if he did not carefully rein in his fearsome fire energy.


    To avoid tragedy, there were very few people who were allowed to stay by Greem¡¯s side for extended periods, even among the core members of the n. Even when he slept with the peak Third Grade Mary, Greem had to be extremely cautious. Otherwise, a slight moment of inattention could result in tragedy.


    Greem was only curious when it came to these Storm Giants.


    Back then, when he had yet to achieve his current status, he had obtained a pseudo-adept level Storm Core. It was with that core that he made a magical golem that helped him deal with crisis after crisis. As such, Greem couldn¡¯t help but take a few curious nces at these Storm Giants when Mirva mentioned their presence.


    If he didn¡¯t remember incorrectly, these Storm Giants seemed to have an incredibly powerful storm altar in the Storm Kingdom. If there was an opportunity, Greem really wanted to appraise and examine this altar up close.


    After all, a storm altar was the same kind of magical creation as a fire altar. If, with this storm altar, the Storm Giants could establish a massive kingdom where even the adepts only dared to befriend but not invade, then there was undoubtedly something mysterious and profound about that altar.


    In all honesty, Greem hoped to enhance the fire altar in Fire Throne through understanding these mysteries.


    If he could extend his fire altar to the depths of the Fire Elementium ne, he might be able to recruit a group of powerful fire creatures for his purposes.


    After all, the megate was a temporary construction and could only summon weak, minor fire creatures to serve as fodder. If Greem could anchor the megate, he could dedicate time and effort to recruiting and training a group of Fire Lords. In doing so, the summoning fire spell megate would immediately rise in power to be one of Greem¡¯s hidden aces.


    When the two of them reached the center of the hall, Greem extended his hand. Naturally, Vice-Chairman Mirva stepped forward in front of him as he was supposed to do.


    ¡°Adepts from all over Zhentarim. Today, we are very proud to gather here to celebrate Adept Greem¡¯s sessful advancement to Fourth Grade. I shall also represent Chairman Freed in extending an official invitation to Sir Greem to join the Zhentarim Association. He shall also be bestowed with the status and authority of an Association Elder!¡±


    Vice-Chairman Mirva took out a short ck wand from his storage ring and waved it in Greem¡¯s direction. Three secondster, an unusual beam of green light shot in from outside the hall,nding right on the elder¡¯s ring on Greem¡¯s right hand.


    As the green light continued shining, a series of light projections appeared above the ring. Runes flickered as well, as if establishing some sort of special connection with somece in the distance. After a short moment, the green light faded, and the Elder¡¯s Ring of Authority finally revealed in its true form.


    Apart from being a massive storage ring, there was also an incredibly powerful spatial magic inscribed upon the ring¨C Soul Return.


    Greem could hide an organ of his in a safe and hidden ce somewhere ahead of time using the ring. If he suffered a lethal attack in the outside world, and his soul was on the verge of dissipating, he could draw upon the power of the ring to project a portion of his soul back to that organ.


    Though losing most of his soul and body was unavoidable, the soul that projected back to his organ would still have a chance to regrow to its former peak.


    As such, Soul Return was a very decent means of self-preservation!


    At the very least, when it was between death and losing most of their power, there was no adept who would choose the former.


    Apart from Soul Return, the Elder¡¯s Ring of Authority also bestowed Greem with the status of an elder, equal to the other Fourth Grade adepts. With this authority, Greem could mobilize the Association¡¯s resources and adept forces to a limited capacity.


    Moreover, Greem also had the right to intervene and interfere in most affairs in Zhentarim.


    As long as his actions did not affect the other Fourth Grade adepts or seriously damage the order in Zhentarim, he could freely extend his influence throughout the area.


    ¡°Congrattions, Elder Greem! From now on, we are family.¡±


    Mirva¡¯s old face was filled with smiles as he ¡®sincerely¡¯ congratted Greem.


    Greem could only respond in kind.

 Chapter 1073 - Negotiations

    <strong>Chapter 1073 Negotiations</strong>


    The two of them went into a secret room and began the actual negotiations after showing themselves at the banquet.


    Mirva¡¯s true intention ining here was to inform Greem of hispulsory mission for the Zhentarim Association, which was the mission to exterminate the Arcane Empire that would be in seven years.


    Of course, to console Greem, Mirva had officially announced his status and authority as an elder after advancing to Fourth Grade. He also revealed the incredibly long list of resources that the Crimson n would be receiving.


    Furthermore, Mirva also made no mention of the Crimson n¡¯s recent expansionist actions.


    After all, the death rate for thispulsory mission was extraordinarily high. It was a nearly lethal mission. Who would be willing to risk their lives for Zhentarim without receiving something in return!?


    ¡°¡ª...all the way to the west with the Tarim River as the boundary. You are only allowed to expand to ckwood in the south. If you push another two hundred and fifty kilometers to the east, yournd will be bordering Elder Musso¡¯s worldly territory. To ensure there won¡¯t be any conflict, there needs to be a hundred-kilometer wide buffer where neither n is allowed to station their forces. As for the ck Forest to the north, you are free to expand as you wish. Any and allnd you take will be considered the territory of the Crimson n. If you require citizens or ves, the Association is more than willing to trade with you at a greatly discounted price.¡±


    Gargamel and Meryl stood behind Greem during these negotiations. They couldn¡¯t help but look at each other upon hearing this, and they saw the unconceble surprise in each others¡¯ eyes.


    If they were to expand ording to Vice-Chairman Mirva¡¯s description, didn¡¯t it mean that the Crimson n¡¯s territory would expand to twice its current size? The total amount ofnd belonging to the n would almost span two entire regions. Such generous treatment was rare for even the other Fourth Grade adepts.


    Moreover, the Crimson n bordered the ck Forest. They could expand indefinitely in that direction.


    For any other n, sending n adepts and apprentices into the dangerous ck Forest to expand the n¡¯s territory was undoubtedly a risk. However, for the Crimson n, who possessed arge army of magical machines, the citizens they required to fill theirnds and the ves they needed to dig the mines and gather the resources were a bigger problem.


    Greem narrowed his eyes as he listened to Mirva speak. He had a smile on his face, but he said nothing in response.


    Even the experienced and cunning Mirva couldn¡¯t help but be impressed at Greem¡¯s show of restraint.


    He was able to see the hidden danger present in great wealth and able to see the breeding opportunity present in great danger.


    Everyone harbored simr thoughts with regards to such scenarios, but who, when it truly came down to it, could remain untempted by shiny treasures and brilliant resources? Who could view their own life and death with objective rationality?


    Greem was barely over two hundred years old at the moment. For a Fourth Grade adept, he was practically a baby still mumbling incoherently. Despite this, Mirva had always sensed Greem¡¯s calm,posed manner of behavior in the few times he had interacted with him, as well as a mean courage and decisiveness in taking risks.


    Moreover, Greem demonstrated extremely high affinity with the firews upon advancing to Fourth Grade. Should he survive this crisis and grow further in power, there would hardly be any adepts throughout Zhentarim who could be a match for him!


    That said, even given this to be the case, Mirva would sooner give up on that dangerouspulsory mission than seize upon the opportunity if he was in Greem¡¯s shoes.


    After all, advancing to Fourth Grade meant being able to enjoy nearly a thousand years of extravagance and enjoyment. Disregarding all the other ces in the World of Adepts, Fourth Grade adepts were practically uncontested emperors within Zhentarim. They already stood at the peak of the pyramid. They had reached the upper limit of strength that the World of Adepts could possibly contain. They represented ultimate power amongst the adepts.


    As long as they could survive in peace, then influence, resources, knowledge, status, beauties...anything they wanted would alle their way. They couldn¡¯t stop it even if they wanted to.


    Which adept would ever give up on such a life of luxury and enjoyment to participate in a terrifying mission to exterminate the Arcane Empire?


    Mirva was not unacquainted with the name of the Arcane Empire.


    In all seriousness, the arcanists were also a group of casters simr to the adepts.


    However, the magical power that the adepts used was more simr to chaos energy. It was chaotic, yet powerful.


    Moreover, adepts were very utilitarian in their pursuit of knowledge and often unscrupulous in the means by which they obtained what they wanted. Many adepts were willing to conduct all sorts of evil modifications to their own body, bloodline, and soul, just to further enhance theirbat powers. In doing so, high-grade adepts slowly deviated from the path of a ¡®human¡¯ and slowly left their original species behind them.


    The arcanists, on the other hand, were a group of incredibly disciplined and powerful spellcasters.


    They treated knowledge with much more rigor and strictness, while also making it more essible to themon folk.


    Adepts only pursued their power for their own wellbeing. That was why there were often cruel and bloody methods used in raising and selectingter generations of adepts. Meanwhile, the arcanists were continuously refining and breaking down higher-grade knowledge and trying their best to assimte these profound pieces of understanding into moremon, lower-level applications.


    The adepts prioritized individuality, believing that obtaining a single high-grade adept at the cost of a hundred low-grade adepts was worth it. After all, the fundamental power of an individual high-grade adept was not something that a hundred low-grade adepts could ever hope to match!


    On the other hand, the arcanists spent a lot of effort and time on universalizing knowledge throughout their Empire.


    In doing so, even children with no magical talent would obtain some resources, allowing them to step upon the path of using lower-grade arcane magic. If they had no magic power, they could draw upon the power of a magic crystal. If they had no arcane energy, they could draw upon an arcane pool. If they had no spellcasting ability, they could draw upon the spell pools. If their bodies were as frail as ordinary humans, they could construct arcane towers to protect themselves.


    In the World of Adepts, those who could be adepts were only the extreme minority that stood at the peak of humanity. Meanwhile, in the Arcane Empire, you would have no problem bing an ordinary arcanist as long as you were diligent and were not too untalented.


    It was this attitude of the arcanists that allowed the Arcane Empire to rise to great power in such a short time.


    Unfortunately, the rise of the Arcane Empire attracted intervention from many powerful tribes and races!


    Based on what Mirva knew, the Scourge Lords, Titans, World of Gods, Starbeasts, Gxy Wanderers, the World of Darkness, and the World of Phantoms were all involved in this one mission.


    The adept¡¯s faction could be considered one of the weakest forces amongst all those who had their eyes set upon the resources and knowledge of the Arcane Empire.


    And in this great feast to devour the Arcane Empire, the weakest participants themselves would be prey for the other predators. As such, Mirva dispelled all thoughts of participating in the mission upon hearing of the specifics. He gave up, despite the potential resources and knowledge he could find.


    Supposedly, a mission like this that involved the extermination of a major ne was the easiest way to obtain origin substances.


    Unfortunately, the excessivelyrge and terrifying line-up of hunters had terrified the Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim, which was what drove them to theughable scenario of hastening the birth of a Fourth Grade adept as a scapegoat.


    In all honesty, the Zhentarim Association led by Freed and Mirva had truly paid a heavy price for Greem¡¯s service and to ensure he would not go back on his word.


    With the presence of the contract they signed earlier, the Zhentarim Association wasn¡¯t afraid of Greem disobeying the terms. However, in the hopes of not inflicting too much strain on their rtionship with Greem¨Cnow a Fourth Grade adept¨Cthey had to offer up some resources to ¡®trick¡¯ him onto the frontlines.


    Greem put down the long list of resources and thought for a moment. Finally, he said, ¡°I am very satisfied with the resources listed here. However, I wish to name a few more things.¡±


    ¡°What? What else do you need?¡± Mirva¡¯s heart was suspended for a second, fearful that Greem might make an unreasonable demand. The Zhentarim might have some resources, but those were the umtions of a dozen Fourth Grade adepts over hundreds of years. It would break their hearts to lose all of it.


    ¡°Queyras alloy, Life Stock Solution, spacestones, and starsand.¡± Greem read each and every name very slowly, his pair of ck eyes staring unflinchingly at Mirva.


    Mirva¡¯s brow jumped with every item Greem listed. The corner of his mouth even started twitching when Greem mentioned starsand.


    Queyras alloy was a necessary ingredient in forging magic generator furnaces. The Crimson n required a consistent and stable supply of Queyras metal if they wanted to expand their magical machine army.


    The use of Life Stock Solution was universal. Whether for the creation of high-grade life potions or high-grade life-extension ceremonies, Life Stock Solution would always be one of the core ingredients. Unfortunately, it was said that Life Stock Solution could only be produced in the Holy Trees of Life that belonged to the elves.


    Sadly, no elves could be found in the two lesser nes that the Crimson n currently possessed.


    Spacestones, on the other hand, were core materials used for establishing internar teleportation arrays. It was a strategic resource that most adept ns and organizations had to stockpile in preparation for war.


    Starsand was not a resource that could be found inside a ne. Starsand came from the realms beyond.


    When a ne was ruined, most of the nar substances within would be destroyed and blown away by the endless spacestorms. Only a minimal amount of the hardest and toughest materials inside the ne could be preserved. These materials were typically known as starsand.


    They were the main ingredient used to forge top-ss magical equipment, as well as an undying body!


    It was said that one method for body-refining adepts to advance from Fourth Grade to Fifth Grade was to assimte and refine a ration of starsand into their own bones, thereby allowing them to be immortal and indestructible beings.


    As such, the value of starsand was no less valuable than origin substances in the eyes of Fourth Grade body-refining adepts!


    Greem kept a close eye on Mirva as he recited all the resources he wanted. Once he was certain that his request had reached the psychological bottom line of Mirva and the Zhentarim Association, he immediately shut his mouth.


    Mirva took out his handkerchief and wiped away the beads of sweat on his head in an exaggerated motion. He had an awkward and forced smile on his face as he did so.


    ¡°Queyras alloy. Molten Fire City is the only ce that has a stable output of this stuff. If you really want it, I can serve as an intermediary and help you arrange a meeting with Alfred. That said, you should know that I can¡¯t guarantee sessful negotiations. After all, there seems to be some sort of disagreement between you and Alfred.


    ¡°As for the Life Stock Solution, the Association still has some spare stock of it. We can provide you with two and a half kilograms of the solution. That should be enough for your personal use.


    ¡°Spacestones are very highly demanded even within the Association. At the very best, if I were to put my reputation on the line, I could help you find two pieces of spacestone, and it is going to be very costly.


    ¡°As for starsand? No one can get you this stuff. Otherwise, Den wouldn¡¯t have been beaten at your hands.¡±


    Even though the offer didn¡¯t fully reach Greem¡¯s expectations, he was more than happy with what Vice-Chairman Mirva had promised him.

 Chapter 1074 - Camp Exodar

    <h4>Chapter 1074 Camp Exodar</h4>


    Beyond the realms.


    For most adepts, the ce beyond the realms was twisted and unusual.


    If the nar worlds were like lone inds lost in a vast sea, then what filled up the space between them were endless energy tides. This magical energy that filled the space of the void was not calm and peaceful. Instead, it was uneven and chaotic, ebbing and flowing, like the tides of the ocean.


    The magical energy could even gather into massive energy storms stretching for millions of kilometers in some ces.


    The areas ravaged by these spacestorms were incredibly dangerous. The energy intensity was tens, even hundreds, of thousands of points in power. Ordinary substances would be broken down into microscopic particles by the energy tides in an instant, even if they were the hardest of metals. These tiny particles would then be scattered to random corners of the multiverse.


    However, there had always been some great and mighty adepts who could find a thread of survival in such danger. These adepts went on to establish firm and well-defended bases in the eyes of these spacestorms.


    Adepts who have never wandered beyond the realms would assume such ces to be extremely crowded and starved of resources. However, should they ever have the opportunity to visit such a camp, they would be shocked to find that this was practically a new world of its own. A world brimming with life and energy.


    The Great Adepts that ventured forth from the World of Adepts had founded more than one such locations throughout the multiverse, but Camp Exodar was undoubtedly thergest and most well-known of them all.


    In the eye of a massive three-million-kilometer-wide spacestorm, there was a zone of peace and quiet approximately ten thousand kilometers across. Although it was not as safe as the inside of a nar world, it was still much better than the fearsome energy tides ravaging the outside.


    Moreover, the eye of this storm wasn¡¯t empty, either.


    Barren and uncultivated rock masses floated amidst the distorted space. These rocks varied in size. Some were asrge as an entire kingdom, while the smaller ones could still host a human city with a poption of twenty to thirty thousand.


    Most of these rocks were unpopted. Dirt, trees, fields, swampskes, and of course, adept bases, could only be found on a few sufficientlyrge stones in the core area.


    Substantial magical barriers had been erected around these rocks, blocking out the space energy. It was the only that the fragile ecology of the rocks could be preserved.


    Meanwhile, the unpopted rocks were exposed to the energy tide. The loose dirt and fragile nts had all been blown away by the spacestorm, leaving behind only the toughest of metal ores and stones that could resist the erosion.


    They floated lonesomely in the darkness, their carved, colossal structures only revealed for the briefest of seconds when the spacestorms blew across and sent sparks into space.


    Exodar was both the name of this storm and the name of the massive adept¡¯s camp on the rock in the center.


    Approximately 110,000 people lived in Camp Exodar. Only 3,000 of these people were adepts, while the rest were ves and servants that they had captured from all over the universe.


    It was important to note that one would have to be at least Second Grade or above to survive in Camp Exodar without any worries. As such, while three thousand adepts might sound like a small number, it was, in truth, an exceedingly powerful force of adepts.


    Second Grade adepts were the backbone of the military force in the World of Adepts, while Third Grades were crucial to the ns, and Fourth Grades were nuclear deterrents. However, here in this twisted, strange ce where energy tides were the only constant, Second Grades were practically babies wailing for help, and Third Grades were barely at the level of new recruits. Only Fourth Grade adepts could qualify as proper cannon fodder.


    It was the world of the Great Adepts, a camp they specially created to train and cultivate rookie adepts who had just stepped out of their homeworld.


    Space was unlike inside the ne. The way in whichbat was conducted and the means with which people fought were all starkly different.


    Just like a muscr man could be uncontested onnd, yet helpless in water and easily drowned by even the weakest of people, so were things in the realms beyond.


    This ce was incredibly dangerous!


    Hidden energy tides that could elude detection, fearsome space ckholes, seemingly inconspicuous regions of no magic, and locations where gxy wanderers roamed were terrifying ces and extremely dangerous, even for Fourth Grade adepts. One could easily wind up dead should they ever enter these ces.


    Camp Exodar was located above thergest floating rock in the eye of the storm.


    The entire rock was over seven thousand square kilometers in area. It was alreadyparable to the continentalndmass of certain nes.


    Not only was there soft soil above the rock, but also living grass, freshkes and rivers, and even mountain ranges, valleys, and basins. This most famous adept camp in the universe was located upon a vast in on the rock.


    The first thing one would notice when they set foot near the camp was the series of adept¡¯s tower looming above them.


    Some were towers of shadow shrouded in strange ck smoke. Some were bright blue towers crackling withyers of electricity, while others were blizzard towers cloaked in wind and frost. Of course, the majority of them were still your ordinary towers of knowledge!


    Here in Camp Exodar, only adepts above Fourth Grade were allowed to construct their own tower.


    As such, in Camp Exodar, every tower meant the presence of a Great Adept.


    The towers stood like a forest, side by side. Even a rough count would yield a total of two to three hundred towers!


    As for Adepts of Fourth Grade and below? They either resided in the towers of a Great Adept, or they developed a small territory of their own. If they did neither of these things, then their only option was to camp out in the wild.


    Due to the unique environment of the realms beyond, ordinary creatures could not even survive here.


    Those who could remain in Camp Exodar were either powerful individuals from lesser nes or of a race with unusual abilities. Though the adepts were the rulers and administrators of thisnd, the weaker Second and Third Grade adepts still had to be extremely careful while they were here. They did not want to be targets of these foreign wanderers.


    Greem arrived at this ce three years prior to thepulsory mission.


    Based on what he knew, the Great Adepts had seven other camps simr to this one throughout the gxy. The administrators of these camps were all Seventh Grade adepts. Meanwhile, Eight and Ninth Grade Great Adepts who could genuinely represent the adept faction all had mystic realms of their own. They would never be cramped in such a crude and barren space with all the other adepts.


    When Greem arrived at Camp Exodar through the special long-ranged teleportation array in Kerslin Castle, he was stunned by apletely distinct environment.


    The wealth of resources here, the diversity of races, the variety of threats and danger had all exceeded his imagination.


    If the inside of a ne depicted a mature and enjoyable way of living, then this ce represented a primal and undeveloped livelihood. Of course, the Second and Third Grade adepts were the primal ones. Fourth Grade adepts like himself already had sufficient status and qualification to reside within the towers.


    As the strongest alliance of ns outside of the three major forces in the World of Adepts, the Zhentarim Association had its own tower in Camp Exodar. The host of this tower was Fifth Grade Adept Sainz, who had stepped out of the World of Adepts 1,300 years ago.


    As an adept of Zhentarim, he had lived in this tower since he stepped into the realms beyond. He received and kept an eye over all the weak little adepts that came out here to experience life in space.


    Of course, Sainz was not the strongest among all the adepts from the Zhentarim Association.


    Quite the contrary, he was the weakest of all Great Adepts from Zhentarim.


    In the past few millennia, a total of five Great Adepts had emerged from Zhentarim to the realms beyond. As their powers continued to improve, they left this barren and crowded region behind to secure hidden shelters for themselves in other ces.


    Only Sainz remained stuck at Fifth Grade despite a thousand years passing by. His power had not increased substantially, either. As such, he had no choice but to remain in Camp Exodar, serving as the protector of rookie Zhentarim adepts.


    ............


    The dizziness from the internar teleportation did not fade for a long time.


    It wasn¡¯t until seven minutester that Greem managed to suppress the frustration and difort in his mind with the help of the Chip. He opened his eyes and took a slow look at the crude teleportation array he had arrived in.


    There was a skinny and withered old man who appeared before Greem. He wore a dirty old robe, the original color of which was long since indistinguishable. He had short ck-and-white hair, so messy it looked like a tangled bush.


    The old man¡¯s face was filled with wrinkles, with a tall, red nose that curved down at an odd angle. If it wasn¡¯t for the terrifying and constrained energy aura he radiated, Greem would have easily mistaken him for a low-grade adept barely just trying to get.


    When Greem walked out of the teleportation array in a daze, the old adept lifted his nose and sniffed. He then cursed furiously.


    ¡°Freed, that damned bastard. He¡¯s getting better at brushing me off. I wanted him to send over a more experienced adept, and he gave me a newly advanced brat. Hmph! It seems like he doesn¡¯t want the next hundred years of resources.¡±


    Obviously, this was the first time Greem had met a legendary Great Adept in person. He hastily bowed and greeted him, while trying to introduce himself, ¡°You must be Lord Sainz? I am¡ª¡±


    ¡°Alright, alright, no need for the rubbish. I don¡¯t know how that brat Freed tricked you intoing here, but you had better surrender to your fate now that you¡¯re here. Go to Room 706. That will be your room for the moment. Look for a fellow called Martin if there¡¯s anything you don¡¯t understand. Don¡¯te and bother me no more.¡±


    Having said that, this scruffy old man walked away in a fury before Greem could ask anything.


    However, he continued to mumble to himself even as he walked away, ¡°Weird, how weird. This newly advanced brat must have a pretty decent Physique. He managed to get over the teleportation daze so quickly. Hopefully, he can survive until the mission starts.¡±


    The old man turned the corner and vanished from Greem¡¯s sight in the blink of an eye.


    Greem was speechless. He lifted his right arm and let it slump down helplessly after holding it in the air for a good while.


    As expected of the realms beyond! Not only was the environment unusual, but even the adepts were also oddballs!


    Greem suddenly felt his head hurt at the thought of this.

 Chapter 1075 - First Venture into the Realms Beyond.

    <strong>Chapter 1075 First Venture into the Realms Beyond.</strong>


    He was amander and a tyrant that ruled over his ownnd in the World of Adepts.


    Yet, upon arriving at the realms beyond, Greem had instantly be apletely clueless rookie. He couldn¡¯t quite get used to this sudden shift in mentality.


    It almost felt like he had returned to his time as an apprentice, shuddering as he stepped into the tower, and being unsure of what to do or where to go.


    After a moment¡¯s hesitation, Greem finally recalled the name that the old adept had left behind before he left.


    Martin. He had better look for him first to understand more about this Camp Exodar!


    The tower that the Zhentarim Association had constructed here was of incredible quality. It had seventeen levels in total, enough for as many as three hundred adepts to reside within it.


    Unfortunately, only thirty to forty adepts were living in the tower at the moment. Moreover, these adepts spent most of their time huddled in the library, thebs, or their rooms. It felt like the ce was unpopted when Greem walked down the wide and bright corridors. He couldn¡¯t see a single person anywhere.


    Finally, while Greem was randomly wandering through the halls, he somehow managed to trigger the defensive system of the tower.


    He was stopped at a stone door that required a magical password for passage.


    Countless tiny holes appeared on the smooth wall to his side, and beams of red light shone upon Greem¡¯s face. A translucent human face made out of light projections appeared in front of him.


    ¡°Foreign adept, state your identity immediately! You will be forcibly expelled from this tower if you do not have an invitation from an adept in the tower. If you resist, this tower spirit will immediately retaliate. Speak; who are you?¡±


    The human face was translucent, but its eyebrows and facial features were quite simr to Adept Sainz¡¯s appearance. Even the sharp and impatient voice was like a copy of Adept Sainz.


    ¡°You must be the tower spirit here! I was about to look for you to ask a question. I just teleported over from Zhentarim, and Lord Sainz had me look for an adept called Martin. Do you know¡ª¡±


    ¡°Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! That old fool! Why did he not record such an important matter in the control core? This is ssic Sainz irresponsibility! I mustin about him to Lady Jima. Very well. I have confirmed your identity. This is your identity te. Keep it well. You must have it on your person while you are traveling within the tower. As for the Martin you mentioned, he lives on the seventh level. I will be teleporting you over now.¡±


    A milky-white halo descended from above and engulfed Greem¡¯s body before he could respond.


    The next second, lights flickered, and Greem appeared in a long stone corridor. A metal door stood before him, shut tight and protected by an energy barrier, cutting off any possibility of spiritual probing.


    Greem lowered his head. There was now a golden wood te carved with all sorts of strange runes in his hand.


    It must be the identity te that the tower spirit mentioned!


    Greem shook his head slowly. Clearly, he was somewhat disappointed in the atmosphere and attitude towards adepts here.


    After a moment of hesitation, he stepped forward and extended a hand to touch the energy barrier on the surface of the door.


    A visible ripple appeared on the barrier of light. It seemed to perform a quick scan of Greem¡¯s aura before spreading rapidly to the surroundings.


    A short momentter, the metal door in front of him opened, and the energy barrier dissipated. A tall and handsome male adept grumbled as he stepped out from the room.


    ¡°Always bothering me at the most crucial moment of my experiments. Really, I say...hm? You are?¡± The male adept lifted his head and looked at the unfamiliar Greem.


    Greem quickly sensed with his Spirit, even though the adept was protected by an invisible energy forcefield that shielded him from all spiritual probes. However, the Chip still managed to rapidly estimate the adept¡¯s approximate power based on the degree of spatial distortion caused by his energy forcefield.


    Fourth Grade. This male adept was a Fourth Grade too!


    ¡°You must be Sir Martin! I am Greem. I just arrived in this tower today.¡±


    ¡°Greem. The fellow that got rmended here by the Zhentarim Association to carry out that dead man¡¯s missi¡ª¡± Adept Martin was clearly a very forward person as well. He only realized the inappropriateness of his remark halfway through and quickly stopped himself. ¡°Wee, wee. Is there anything I can do for you?¡±


    ¡°I just arrived at this tower. May I know what are the rules here? I will have to trouble Sir Martin to give me an introduction.¡±


    ¡°This is no problem. You don¡¯t have to call me ¡®sir¡¯ either. Just call me by my name! In a ce like this, beyond the nar realms, the only one you can rely on is yourself. As long as you are capable, no one will dare to mess with you.¡± Adept Martin was truly a very straightforward man. ¡°Your room has been arranged, hasn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°706!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s fairly close to where we are now. Come, I¡¯ll lead you there!¡±


    The two adepts walked down the corridor, took a few turns, and finally arrived at a metal door.


    The defensive array carved onto the door had not been activated, indicating that no one had taken up residence here yet.


    A strange cat¡¯s head with magical gemstones for eyes had been carved onto the center of the door. It had eyes, nose, mouth, whiskers, and was almost life-like in appearance.


    ¡°Pass your identity te to it. This will be your room from now on!¡±


    Greem took out his identity te and put it into the cat¡¯s mouth after hearing Adept Martin¡¯s words. The cat opened its ruby eyes and scanned Greem.


    The cat¡¯s head mysteriously vanished once Greem retrieved his identity te.


    The door then swung open, and a series of odd passwords and scattered bits of information suddenly appeared in his mind.


    [Beep. Detecting a set of non-conscious data streams. Initial estimates suggest that the data is authority codes for the magical room. Requesting instructions from the host. Receive data?]


    ¡°Receive!¡±


    Greem gave his order, and the Chip rapidly saved the codes to the room. Should Greem have any needs in the future, he only needed to think, and the Chip would be able to help him control everything inside the room.


    Moreover, the presence of the Chip also allowed Greem to rapidly find any inappropriate or undesirable elements in the room¡¯s defensive array and deal with it. That would save Greem plenty of time.


    ¡°Very well, then. Settle down here for the moment! If there¡¯s anything you need, you can talk to the tower spirit directly through the identity te. The tower spirit is actually a soul clone of the first master of the tower. It¡¯s got a nasty mouth, but it¡¯s usually quite kind.¡±


    ¡°Also, since you¡¯ve just arrived, you can take a tour around the camp. You should be able to find quite a lot of rare items you won¡¯t be able to find inside the material nes. That said, they are quite expensive.¡±


    ¡°The currency here is still the same. Magical crystals are the most widely epted coin.¡±


    ¡°That said, you still have to be a little careful. Since you are a rookie, you had best not step out of the camp unless there¡¯s something urgent. Only think of adventuring once you¡¯vepletely adapted to the environment here. Otherwise¡ª¡±


    Martin suddenly lowered his voice.


    ¡°¡ªbe careful. There might not be much danger inside the camp, but there are always hunters of other races. They like hiding in the camp under the guise of wanderers, but they will immediately turn on you once they¡¯ve lured you into the wilderness where there¡¯s no one else. You must be careful!¡±


    Adept Martin rambled on, listing out all the things to look out for in Camp Exodar. It wasn¡¯t until Greem reminded him of his magical experiment that he let out a gasp of realization and fled back to his room.


    Greem took a tour around his room alone once Martin had left.


    The room was approximately three thousand square feet in size. It had a living room, bedroom, study, storeroom, showroom, material storage room, a small magicalb, a small alchemyb, and a magic practice range.


    It was a top-ss adept¡¯s tower, after all. The living conditions of a Fourth Grade adept¡¯s room would not be too shabby.


    However, the daily cost of living in a room like this was three hundred magical crystals.


    High-Grade adepts with no background would not be able to sustain such tremendous spending for extended periods. However, a Fourth Grade adept like Greem, who was supported by the assets of an entire n, would never be bothered by such a small expenditure.


    The realms beyond were both a dangerous ce and a treasure trove with unlimited resources.


    The spacestorm raging on outside the tower was like the mouth of a ferocious beast. No man nor thing could escape under their own power if they were caught within its jaws. Even a nar world hosting billions of lives would be shredded to pieces and turned into dust if the storm caught it.


    Most of the substance within the ne would be destroyed by the endless energy tides, ground into fine dust, and scattered across space. Only substances or items with unusual power could escape the copse of their ne, traveling through millions of kilometers of energy tides to arrive here in the peaceful eye of the storm.


    In conclusion, what could survive a ne being torn to shreds by a spacestorm was the essence of the essence. It was naturally shockingly valuable.


    As such, one would always find valuable treasures hardly found in the outside world if they have been staying in the eye of the storm for a while!


    However, to forge a living here, one would have to possess incredible Physique and power. To find treasure, one would have to be able to resist the corrosion of space energy and beat back any greedypetitors who had their eyes set on their prize.


    Greem¡¯s vision had been limited to the World of Adepts in the past. He had only heard stories of the realms beyond but never had the power to set out to explore.


    He could take this opportunity of executing the mission to extend the Crimson n¡¯s influence into this strange outer space, where everything was twisted and distorted.


    However, at the moment, the Crimson ncked sufficiently strong individuals who could be stationed in Camp Exodar.


    Snox had expanded the Goblin Chamber of Commerce to a great degree in the World of Adepts, with many members and widespread influence. However, not a single candidate could be found in the Goblin Chamber of Commerce who could be stationed here.


    Ordinary Second Grades would have trouble even surviving here, let alone expanding the n¡¯s business.


    Amongst the Third Grade adepts of the n, Oliven¡¯s status was a little unique, making her ill-suited for such public affairs. Mary walked the path of a blood queen. Blood was what grew her power, as was conflict and war. She was not suited for a stationed position in thisnd. Alice, on the other hand, was engaged in a deathmatch with Witch Maysa. She hardly even dared to take a single step out of the Tower of Fate on normal asions. How could she ever appear here in the realms beyond?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but fall into silent brooding when the thought of theck of Third Grade adepts within the n.

 Chapter 1076 - Help Me With Something Small

    <strong>Chapter 1076 Help Me With Something Small</strong>


    Time flew by quickly.


    In the blink of an eye, it had been three months since Greem arrived at Camp Exodar.


    Today he was sitting in front of a wooden table, carefully examining a strange metal shining with magical blight with the help of amp. Just then, a magical message from outside startled him.


    It was from Martin.


    Greem epted the message from Martin while continuing his deep scans on the meteorite he had just collected from the Camp.


    Meteorites could be found in most nar worlds; they were a somewhatmon adept resource. However, the piece of meteorite that Greem had found was very different from the usual kind. It seemed to have undergone some unknown mutations, having been soaked in the magical energy tides a long time. Even the data obtained by the Chip was unusually chaotic and random.


    ¡°Greem, are you busy over on your end? If you¡¯re not, could you help me with something small?¡±


    ¡°What kind of help are you talking about?¡±


    ¡°A descendant from my n found a batch of Ysera¡¯s Seed in the wild. A group of gxy wanderers intercepted the party while they were harvesting the seeds. They just sent me a request for help, but I have to do second modtions on my Purplegold Potion in an hour¡¯s time. So......¡±


    ¡°So you want me to go bring them back?¡±


    ¡°Yes. Don¡¯t worry. I won¡¯t let you do it for nothing. You can have one-third of the Ysera¡¯s Seeds they retrieved.¡±


    ¡°How should I deal with the gxy wanderers?¡±


    ¡°If it¡¯s not too much trouble, just kill them all. It¡¯s better than having to keep looking at their faces day after day after capturing them!¡±


    Greem licked his lips.


    Ysera¡¯s Seeds were the main ingredient in brewing Whispered Pact Potions. Those potions gave adepts the ability to cast spells in silence. It was a very practical potion that could be used in many scenarios.


    A Ysera¡¯s Seed could quickly sell for three to four thousand magical crystals in the World of Adepts. A sessful Whispered Pact Potion could even go for twenty to thirty thousand magical crystals.


    As such, even Greem was moved by the offer when he heard it.


    ¡°Alright. I don¡¯t have anything particrly urgent at hand anyway. I¡¯ll take the trip for you! Send the coordinates of their location to me.¡±


    A short momentter, a fireball erupted as Greem vanished from the spot.


    Sparks flickered in the skies above the tower. Greem gathered the mes to form his body, quickly identified the cardinal directions, and immediately sped to a certain location inside the Camp.


    There was a teleportation array there that led straight to the edge of the storm¡¯s eye. It would save Greem quite a lot of travel time.


    Small markets and settlementsposed ofrge, colorful tents were everywhere between the forest of towers. All sorts of otherworldly beings of various forms and races were walking in and out of these tents.


    Quite a few people lifted their heads and looked when the fireball that Greem had turned into flew across the sky. They pointed in curiosity, mumbling something to one another.


    The so-called Camp Exodar was, in fact, made up of these hundreds and thousands of small markets, settlements, and the array of adept¡¯s towers. The market that Greem was heading to was created by the Zhentarim Association. As such, the number of adepts in the market was far higher than the others.


    Afternding near the entrance to the market, Greem reverted from fire into his human form and walked into the crowd.


    As a public market, there was quite a lot traffic here.


    There were elementium adept in robes holding staffs, body-refining adepts wearing enchanted armor and carryingrge swords on their backs, as well as bloodline depts with all their strange manifested characteristics. Mixed among them were otherworldly creatures of odd shapes and sizes.


    It was apparent that the rtionship between the otherworlders and the adepts was reasonably harmonious. It seemed like everyone had formedbat parties of different races and professions.


    Most of these people were Third Grade, with very few Second Grades among them. Even the asional Second Grade was extraordinarily powerful or possessed incredible racial talents.


    Greem had already been here for three months.


    He had seen and heard far too many unusual and unfamiliar things. Thus, he was used to the sight of all this and couldn¡¯t be bothered.


    These ¡®little fellows¡¯ were very surprised to see Greem arrive. They hurriedly moved aside from the road, cing their hands on their chest and offering their greetings.


    Greem walked past them, nodding at the few Third Grade adepts he was acquainted with. He arrived at arge leather tent.


    A muscr man with rough features and an axe on his back stood guard at the tent. He hastily walked forward to greet Greem when he saw him walk over.


    ¡°Lord Greem, where do you intend to go?¡±


    ¡°Exit Five. Put the fee on Lord Martin¡¯s tab!¡±


    ¡°Alright, I will connect you immediately.¡±


    A short momentter, a white light shed, and Greem arrived at the edge of the eye of the storm.


    Exit Five was in the asteroid region.


    The rock upon which the teleportation array was located was the size of a football field. All sorts of ck stones of numerous sizes floated around the area.


    There was an elderly Fourth Grade adept stationed at the teleportation array, seated in front of a small table. He was reading an ancient tome while casually sipping tea.


    He looked back when he heard themotion from the array. He said nothing when he saw Greem and the adept¡¯s tower¡¯s emblem on his chest and continued to read his book.


    There was a ten-meter-tall metal golem standing behind him. Thepound eyes on the golem¡¯s head emitted a series of red lights that shone onto Greem¡¯s body. After confirming Greem¡¯s identity, it came out of alert mode and retreated back into the stone wall where it had walked out from.


    It was evident that this was a Fourth Grade golem master from the Silver Union.


    Greem had no time to make small talk with this colleague of his. He took two steps out of the array and immediately vanished in a st of mes.


    At the same time, mes ignited on a small rock in the darkness. Greem¡¯s body reappeared on the distant horizon.


    Two secondster, a cluster of mes rose, and Greem teleported away once more.


    Greem was moving at an incredible pace with the fast and convenient Fire Teleportation.


    Once he had left Teleportation Array Five, the Fourth Grade golem master lifted his head and looked at his quickly disappearing silhouette. He couldn¡¯t help but mumble to himself, ¡°That should be Greem, the newly advanced kid from Zhentarim. It hasn¡¯t been ten years since his advancement, yet he¡¯s already venturing out into the realms beyond? Heh, quite bold!¡±


    Greem was oblivious to these words. He was still teleporting through the dark and twisted space.


    Leaving Camp Exodar meant losing the shelter of the protective barrier.


    Naturally, there was no natural light source in space.


    There were only tumultuous magic energy tides and the endless darkness in this vast space.


    It was only when the magical tides washed against the floating rocks that sparks would ignite, illuminating a small area for a short time. As such, physical sight was an outdated method of seeing in this region. The only way to know what was in the endless darkness was by using one¡¯s powerful spiritual senses.


    However, the magic energy tides here ebbed and flowed, always in turbulence and chaos. They would often warp and disperse any spiritual appendages that were extended outwards. An adept who could easily sense everything within a few kilometers in a nar world could only sense up to a few hundred meters here.


    The terrifying thing while exploring beyond the material realms wasn¡¯t running into powerful alien creatures, but losing one¡¯s direction and getting lost in the void.


    Greem quickly flew through the empty space.


    The pervasive tides wrapped around him, blew against his body, and continuously inflicted 210 points of energy damage against him.


    The Chip¡¯s notifications constantly updated in Greem¡¯s flickering ck eyes as well.


    [Host body has been corroded by space energy, of which 17% of said energy has been converted into magical energy, 41% has been isted, 36% is being resisted, and 7% is inflicting minor damage on the body. Host body is regenerating.]


    Greem was not an actual starbeast, after all.


    He might have assimted starbeast bloodline and now possessed the ability to absorb the chaotic energy of space, but this process of absorption was apanied by minor physical damage. Greem¡¯s Physique was now at 33 points. Such minor injuries were easily healed with a bit of magical energy. As such, there were no visible wounds at all.


    Of course, if Greem had no Chaos Physique, he would not be able to absorb the chaos energy of space. He would eventually be exhausted of all his power if he remained in this harsh environment for too long. Now that he had starbeast bloodline, he could absorb the chaos energy to replenish his reserves.


    In doing so, he possessed the ability to survive in space!


    As long as he didn¡¯t venture into the regions where the magical tides raged like a storm or fought at high intensity for an extended period, he would be able to survive in space, even without any supplies.


    The darkness slowly expanded in front of Greem¡¯s eyes as he leaped from rock to rock. He was gradually getting further away from the central continent.


    After three hours traveling through the darkness and crossing over five thousand kilometers, Greem finally arrived at the region where the incident had urred.


    It was arge rock floating alone in the darkness. The closest rock was over a hundred kilometers away, making this one stand out in particr.


    At this moment, two groups of fighters from different factions were battling on the surface of the rock. Bright shes of magic illuminated half the sky, even from a distance away.


    When Greem appeared above the rock in a fiery burst of mes, both parties stopped their fighting and looked up at him.


    ¡°It¡¯s an adept. It¡¯s the human¡¯s Fourth Grade adept. Retreat!¡± One side started shouting in a panic.


    ¡°It¡¯s our people. Everyone, push forward. Don¡¯t let them leave!¡± The other side also shouted after some cheering.


    The battlefield instantly approached its climax!

 Chapter 1077 - Galaxy Wanderers

    <strong>Chapter 1077 Gxy Wanderers</strong>


    The two parties in conflict were the adepts, who were mostly human, and the gxy wanderers.


    These wanderers were humanoids that were over three meters tall. They had violet skin with fancy, iprehensible magical patterns on their bodies. Strange des of light extended from their arms, each of them over a meter long.


    These strange light swords were used to both strike and parry.


    They were unusually terrifying when used to strike an enemy. Ordinary magical shields could not endure more than a few strikes from the glowing des. Only higher-grade defensive magic couldst for a slightly longer duration. These swords of light could even quickly turn into shields of light when the gxy wanderers needed to defend themselves. The shields were broad and covered most of their body.


    At least half of the adept¡¯s spells would be deflected by the shields, with another portion of the spells dissipating into the air. There were very few spells that could threaten the wanderers.


    There were as many as eleven gxy wanderers in this group. Their grades varied, with half of them being Second Grade and the other half being Third Grade. Meanwhile, the adepts only had five people. Two of them were Third Grade, while the other three were Second Grade. They were at a disadvantage in both numbers and might.


    Fortunately, thebination of professions in the adept party was efficient, and their spells were quite appropriate for the situation.


    In particr, the Third Grade nt adept had summoned arge stretch of magical vines, thereby establishing a sort of defensive perimeter against the gxy wanderers. It helped them fend off their attacks.


    The gxy wanderers were much more powerful than the adepts, but if they were to charge too far forward into the forest of vines, they would easily be restrained. When that happened, the adepts only had to concentrate their fire, and even the Third Grade gxy wanderers would not escape unscathed.


    Thus, due to their overly cautious assault, the adepts managed to hold out until Greem arrived.


    This ce was human-adept territory, after all. If they had managed to kill these adepts cleanly, they could have escaped without leaving any clues. The human adepts would have had incredible trouble finding them in the vast void of space after that.


    However, with Greem¡¯s arrival, the tables instantly turned.


    A gray-robed adept with a golden bow on his back shouted loudly, ¡°Push on, everybody. Don¡¯t let a single one of them leave!¡±


    He put away his defensive wand and picked up his wooden bow instead. Several arrows immediately shot at the fleeing wanderers.


    Strangely enough, even though his bow and arrows appeared to be very ordinary and were seemingly not enchanted with any magical patterns, they found their marks with perfect uracy. The wooden arrows would mysteriously pass through the wanderer¡¯s light shields and hit their bodies as if the shields didn¡¯t exist at all.


    Moreover, every wanderer hit by the arrows, whether Second or Third Grade, would be dazed for one to three seconds. That dy immediately caused them to lose their best opportunity to escape.


    The other adepts also hastily switched their magical weapons and started using area-of-effect restraining spells to slow down as many enemies as they could.


    Greem stood silently in the air, his gaze quickly sweeping across all these adepts. He silently praised their courage and experience while gathering fireballs and firing them at the fleeing wanderers.


    These gxy wanderers had appeared incredibly organized to the adepts. They had an unstoppable offense and a formidable defense. However, all of this did not matter before Greem, who had mastered four distinctws of fire. They ignited upon contact, frail as paper people.


    The fireballs that Greem fired might not seem all that unusual, but it was an unprecedented terror for the gxy wanderers. Even the Third Grade wanderers could not do much against the attacks. The fireballs rapidly switched states upon contact, turning the victim into a zing human torch.


    It was almost as if...as if the energy in the enemy¡¯s body had been directly ignited by Greem, causing them tobust from within.


    The wildly growing magical vines caught a Second Grade wanderer who very much resembled a blue ape. He was trying his best to cut off the vines when a massive fireball crashed onto him and instantly ignited his entire body.


    The wanderer only managed to let out two screams of agony before turning to dust in the zing fire, his soul and body cast to the void.


    Upon seeing their people sniped down one after another by the Fourth Grade adept, one of the Third Grade gxy wanderers let out a feral roar. He stepped into the air, putting up a shield with his left arm and brandishing his sword with his right hand. The wanderer sliced through several Explosive Fireballs as he charged straight at Greem.


    Greem did not move.


    His right hand continued to draw fire runes in the air, gathering Vicious Fireballs in the air and firing them at the fleeing wanderers. His ck eyes silently stared at the Third Grade wanderer hiding behind his translucent shield of light.


    The wanderer had just smashed through another fireball, scattering it into harmless sparks. Before the sparks could disperse into the void, a strange power guided them together once more, enveloping the wanderer from every direction.


    The Third Grade wanderer was stunned for a brief instant but immediately started moving to avoid the sparks. However, he simply could not escape the crimson aura that had gathered around him. When the fire elementium had umted to a certain threshold, a muffled explosion rang out as the wanderer burst into me, just like the rest of his kind.


    Supposedly, the wanderers¡¯ magic resistance should have allowed them to freely traverse even the tamer magical tides without any damage. However, this wanderer¡¯s skin was instantly carbonized in a single burst of mes. It was a horrendous sight to behold.


    It was almost as if his prided magic resistance had abruptly vanished when the fires ignited around him. His tough, shark-like skin could not protect him in the slightest.


    Third Grade wanderers had quite the resilient life force, indeed. Even after thew fires had ignited all the magical energy both inside and outside his body, he still raised his light sword and lunged at Greem.


    A severe light gleamed in Greem¡¯s ck eyes.


    He finally stopped firing Vicious Fireballs with his right hand. Instead, he turned towards the Third Grade wanderer and made a grabbing motion with his hands.


    Wild fire elementium quickly gathered, and a massive hand of me appeared in the air, seizing the gxy wanderer. The wanderer¡¯s entire body crackled as the hand tightened its grip. Five secondster, finally unable to endure the zingw fires from within and without, the wanderer let out a long breath of mes as his body started to wither and char.


    The battlefield finally returned to peace a few momentster.


    Only three of the eleven gxy wanderers had managed to escape. The others had either been captured or reduced to ash, never to leave this ce again.


    The gray-robed adept with the bow hastily flew over and bowed to Greem.


    ¡°You must be Lord Greem! I had already received Lord Martin¡¯s message prior to this. We cannot be more grateful for your lordship¡¯s timely assistance.¡±


    The other four adepts also flew over after quicklybing over the battlefield. There were three male adepts and one female. All of them looked at Greem with looks of envy as they bowed and offered their greetings.


    ¡°You¡¯ve got the things, haven¡¯t you? If you¡¯ve harvested them, I will bring you back with me now,¡± Greem casually asked.


    ¡°I¡¯m afraid you will have to wait here for a little longer.¡± The man in the gray robes let out an awkward, bitterugh. ¡°We were surrounded by the gxy wanderers shortly after we found the Ysera¡¯s Seed. The harvesting isn¡¯tplete yet.¡±


    ¡°Then hurry up and get on it. I will protect you for a little while longer.¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    With a Fourth Grade adept at their backs, the adepts finally had the confidence to harvest the seeds boldly.


    The nt adept flew back to the floating stone and dove into a dark cave to continue harvesting the Ysera¡¯s Seed that had somehow ended up in this ce. The other adepts were either on guard duty or skinning the corpses of the dead wanderers.


    Greem watched as they worked. Eventually, he couldn¡¯t help but move a rtively undamaged corpse towards himself out of curiosity. He had the Chip perform a thorough scan of the wanderer¡¯s body.


    Admittedly, though these gxy wanderers appeared humanoid, their internal construction revealed an evolutionary pathpletely different from humans. They had no respiratory organs nor waste organs. That unusual ¡®stomach¡¯ of theirs seemed to be able to digest anything.


    From animals and nts to dirt and sand and even hard metal ores, they could grind it to dust and absorb all nutrition present in the substance. They would then regurgitate the waste that could not be digested.


    Their bones were not dense and tough like nar creatures. Rather, the bones resembled beehives, where the internal structure was filled with plenty of air bubbles and cavities. Every tiny air bubble and cavity was a small magic-storage organ. Chaotic magic energy could be stored and released in these air bubbles and holes.


    A strange organ also grew near their wrists. This organ was able to convert the magic energy in their bodies into a peculiar form of light elementium. The state and structure of the light elementium were molded entirely with the gxy wanderers¡¯ Spirit.


    After conducting a deep scan with the Chip, these gxy wanderers no longer held any secrets for Greem. The Chip estimated that the most valuable part of these gxy wanderers had to be this parasitic organ growing on their wrists, along with their skin.


    If the parasitic organs were removed and taken back for research, Greem might be able to figure out the principle behind the production of that odd light elementium. Meanwhile, their skin had decent magic resistance. There was value in using their flesh to craft armor.


    Magic resistant armor was useless for Greem. Instead, it was this parasitic organ that drew his interest. He casually severed one of the wanderer¡¯s arm and put it into his storage device. He then returned the rest of the body to the adepts.


    This ce was over three hours of flight distance away from Camp Exodar. It was still in the core region of the storm¡¯s eye and was at least five thousand kilometers away from the outer storm region.


    Supposedly, this adept party should have gone to the edge of the storm if they wanted to have valuable findings.


    However, given their abilities, it would be far too difficult to protect themselves if they were too close to the storm region. They could only scavenge near Camp Exodar in this manner, hoping to find strange items that had somehow made their way into the core region.


    Ordinary resources like Ysera¡¯s Seed could not make them rich overnight, but if they got incredibly lucky, they might find things like starsand, star cores, origin substances, or spacestones. Such findings would be enough for these Second and Third Grade adepts to return to the World of Adepts and live a luxurious life for hundreds of years.


    It was a far simpler and quicker way to umte wealth, as opposed to working n missions or being stationed inside some lesser ne!

 Chapter 1078 - Focusing Crystal

    <h4>Chapter 1078 Focusing Crystal</h4>


    With Greem ensuring their safety, the adepts were able to be much more efficient.


    Just forty-five minutester, the nt adept managed to harvest all of the Ysera¡¯s Seeds inside the cave.


    The leader of the party immediately ryed the news to Greem.


    Greem nodded silently and said, ¡°Have them gather up, then. We are returning immediately!¡±


    ¡°Yes, sir!¡±


    The other adepts anxiously gathered around Greem after receiving the instructions from their leader.


    Before they could understand Greem¡¯s intentions in having them group up, sparks of fire elementium gathered around them like countless fireflies. The fire elementium quickly assembled into a massive fire array. mes zed within the magical array, but none of the adepts felt the slightest bit of heat even when the fires licked them.


    While everyone was confused and stunned, their surroundings flickered. It felt like they had fallen into a bottomless abyss. No one could tell which direction they were falling in.


    Fortunately, this inexplicable dizziness didn¡¯tst long.


    Two or three secondster, the fire array silently dispersed. The adepts immediately sped their heads and started retching from the difort. The two Third Grade adepts were the fastest at recovering. They quickly suppressed their squirming stomach and disoriented minds. It was then that they discovered, to their shock, that the Fourth Grade fire adept had instantly teleported them all the way to Teleportation Array Five.


    From a distance, they could see the floating rocks in the region, all of different shapes and sizes. Meanwhile, not far in front of them, the distinctive light of a teleportation array shone from a massive rock, illuminating most of the area nearby. The Silver Union golem master who guarded the array looked up in surprise at these sudden guests.


    The surprise on his face finally turned into a smile when he saw the young and intimidating fire adept standing in the middle of the group.


    ¡°So you went to rescue these kids from Martin¡¯s n. I was wondering why you were in such a hurry! You must be the newly advanced legendary fire adept, Greem from Zhentarim, aren¡¯t you? Just as the rumors say, you are truly young and bold indeed.


    ¡°I will be stationed here for the next six months. I can¡¯t leave at all. If you still have time after six months, why don¡¯t youe to the Silver Union¡¯s tower for a chat? I¡¯ve heard that the magical machines you create are very refined and shockingly powerful. Perhaps we can trade our insights in this craft, eh?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, you are?¡± Greem asked with some hesitation.


    ¡°Haha! I¡¯ve quite forgotten to introduce myself. My name is Dous, a golem master. In that respect, you could say I am quite simr to yourself!¡±


    At the level of Fourth Grade, there were very few remaining of the adepts who relied on luck and the pure umtion and support of their n to achieve their status. Every single Fourth Grade adept was a fearsome individual in their own right, with all sorts of unusual techniques and terrifying powers.


    As such, there was no reason for Greem to reject this ¡®friendship¡¯ that was actively being extended towards him by a Fourth Grade golem master.


    They exchanged a few more polite words before Greem led the other adepts into the teleportation array.


    Soon, they were back at the adept¡¯s tower.


    The other adepts quickly bid farewell to Greem once they entered the tower. They hurried away to give their report to Lord Martin. Greem immediately returned to his room as well.


    Naturally, the resources that Martin had promised would be delivered to his hands without any mistake after this.


    There was no adept who would risk damaging their reputation for such small change.


    Greem immediately went to the alchemyb upon reaching his room. He took out the magical box in which he had stored the gxy wanderer¡¯s arm.


    All sorts of magical arrays had been carved on top of the box, sealing and isting the flow of most magical power. It ensured that the power contained within the magical materials would not be lost due to the flow of time. However, to ensure the condition of the arm, Greem felt like it was better to decipher the secret behind the parasitic organ as soon as possible.


    Greem carefully ced the arm on a smooth, ck marble tform.


    He then adjusted the intensity of the illuminating stones before using the Chip to conduct a deep scan to figure out the secrets of this unusual organ.


    Blue light flickered deep in Greem¡¯s ck eyes as lights of the entire spectrum shone at surprising frequency. The gxy wanderer¡¯s arms slowly turned translucent under these lights, revealing the flesh, tendons, and bones beneath.


    Greem pressed the arm with his fingers. The skin was rough and tough, as if there was a special protectiveyer on the surface. A small orange me sizzled and appeared at the tip of his finger. The skin that was burned by the fire remained the same violet color without any sign of burning or withering.


    Greem let out a soft exmation of surprise. The fire elementium gathered in the small me became even more intense.


    The orange me quickly turned crimson, and the energy intensity rose from 70 points to 200 points.


    Unfortunately, the skin still appeared utterly unchanged.


    Greem didn¡¯t give up. Even more fire elementium continued to gather at his fingertip.


    The small me slowly concentrated, bing smaller than before. However, the intensity of the energy within had quickly risen from 200 points to 300 points. The color of the fire was also starting to turn white.


    It was only now that the gxy wanderer¡¯s skin started to change somewhat. A small ck burn-mark appeared where the fire was burning.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but nod his head and let out a soft sight at this point.


    No wonder the adepts had so much trouble when they were fighting against these wanderers.


    The wanderers might seem so ill-equipped that they were practically naked, but their bodies alone were alreadyparable to an excellent Second Grade enchanted armor.


    With magic resistance of this level, the elementium magic of those Second Grade adepts would barely inflict any damage. Only the powerful physical attacks of body-refining adepts and bloodline adepts could pose a certain degree of threat to these wanderers.


    Of course, the magic-resistant skin of these gxy wanderers was probably terribly inferiorpared to all the other gxy creatures out there. How were they supposed to wander through the gxy and all its magical tides if they didn¡¯t have at least such magic resistance!


    Afterpleting his examination of the skin, Greem used a silver scalpel enchanted with Sharpness, Armor Piercing, and Harden to slice open the skin. He started to examine the flesh and tendons within.


    As expected, even though these ¡®gxies¡¯ resembled apes from the material nes, the fundamental substance of their bodies was radically different from your ordinary creature.


    Their flesh was hard and rough, withrge individual particles that were visible to the naked eye. If it wasn¡¯t because he was dissecting the wanderer¡¯s arm right now, Greem might have thought that these were pieces of ck charcoal and junk.


    The operation scalpel let out an ear-grinding screeching sound when it tried to cut through these pieces of ¡®flesh.¡¯ It was almost as if it was trying to cut apart rock. No, that wasn¡¯t right. With how sharp this scalpel was, even slicing metal and rock wouldn¡¯t be this difficult.


    It fully demonstrated that the fundamental substance that made up the bodies of these gxy wanderers likely originated somewhere deep in space.


    The wanderers would devour anything they found. Even metal ores remaining from a disintegrating ne could be a delicious meal for them. They would absorb most of the essence of these ores, converting them into this nightmarish, flesh-like substance.


    Given the nature of their flesh, the gxy wanderer¡¯s probably also had shockingly high resistance to physical attacks!


    As expected, there were no weaklings among the races that survived in the depths of space.


    With how potent the gxy wanderers were, an adept of the same grade probably had less than a forty percent chance of beating them in a battle.


    After examining the skin, the tendons, and the bones, Greem sliced apart theyers of flesh with much difficulty, finally revealing the parasitic organ that sat at the wrist of the arm.


    Having lost the protection of the flesh and the magic-resistant skin, the internal construction of the parasitic organ was fully disyed before Greem¡¯s mind.


    It should be some sort of strange organ that the gxy wanderers had evolved after adapting to the outer space environment. It was a strange mass of fibrous tissue,yers of flesh wrapped around a light-blue crystal fixing it in ce.


    The fearsome light des that the gxy wanderers were capable of unleashing came from these cerulean crystals.


    The light-blue crystal wasn¡¯t an energy organ. Instead, it was an unusual construction of flesh that seemed to magnify Spirit.


    Greem carefully severed the dozens of tendons attached to the surface of the crystal before extracting it from the arm with the scalpel.


    ¡°Chip, what is this?¡±


    Lights of a thousand different colors shone out of Greem¡¯s eyes andnded on the blue crystals. They scanned for several minutes before finally fading away.


    [Beep. Discovering unknown focusing crystal. Crystal toughness: 310 points. Magnification magnitude: 1.72x. State of focused energy: Unknown. Attribute of focused energy: No attributes. Attached elemental effects: None.]


    A focusing crystal? Magnification magnitude?


    Could these crystals have the ability to magnify the intensity of spells?


    With questions in his mind, Greem gripped the blue crystal in his hand and started to pour fire energy into it.


    Once the gathered fire elementium exceeded a certain threshold, a soft crackle rang out, and a small me was lit.


    Greem looked at the small fire flickering on the surface of the blue crystal, his mind full of questions and doubts.


    The data projected by the Chip was unambiguous. The fire energy in the me was the exact same as the energy he had projected into the crystal. There was no magnification effect at all.


    Could the Chip¡¯s scans have been incorrect?


    A thought appeared in his Greem¡¯s mind as he pondered the mystery. He couldn¡¯t help but slowly pour in a bit of his Spirit into the crystal at the same time as he poured in fire energy.


    A loud explosion rang out. The small me suddenly swelled into a magical fireball the size of a human head, almost as if gasoline had been poured onto a bonfire. The fireball hovered before Greem, slowly spinning around as it burned.

 Chapter 1079 - Exchange

    <strong>Chapter 1079 Exchange</strong>


    The focusing crystal magnified Spirit.


    It was a little unexpected, but this discovery surprised Greem pleasantly.


    The upper limit for his Spirit had been increased to 49 points with his advancement to Fourth Grade. He wouldn¡¯t need to be concerned about his Spirit being stuck at a threshold for the next thousand years.


    Correspondingly, the speed at which his Spirit increased was tremendously slow now!


    Even with the Chip¡¯s aid, the past few years of diligent meditation had not increased his Spirit by even 0.1 points. For the foreseeable future, Greem would remain stuck at the level of a beginner Fourth Grade. He would require at least two to three hundred years before he could advance to the next minor grade.


    It was now that he truly understood why some of the Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim were still tragically stuck at the beginner level. They had either exhausted all of their potential, or their meditation now had absolutely no effect. Otherwise, there was no reason why they would allow such a state of stagnation to persist for such a long time!


    Given the slow improvement of Spirit, wouldn¡¯t the ability to magnify the effects of Spirit with the aid of a tool be an alternative method of bing more powerful?


    After realizing this, Greem immediately started to delve into research on this focusing crystal.


    Firstly, the crystal was not a product of nature. It was a biological crystal that naturally formed in the bodies of those gxy wanderers after their tens of thousands of years of evolution in space. That meant every focusing crystal could only be harvested from the bodies of gxy wanderers. They were not a resource that could be discovered elsewhere.


    Secondly, every single crystal had its own magnification frequency and spectrum.


    In other words, the focusing crystal that Greem had obtained had its upper limit of magnification.


    It was obtained from the body of a beginner Third Grade gxy wanderer. As such, beginner Third Grade Spirit was the upper limit of what it could magnify. If Greem were to pour his Fourth Grade Spirit into this crystal, it would instantly shatter once the Spirit exceeded the crystal¡¯s capacity. Of course, it would be no problem if Greem limited his Spirit to the level of a Third Grade and below.


    As such, if Greem wanted to obtain a focusing crystal that could be of practical use to himself, he would have to devise methods to hunt down Fourth Grade gxy wanderers. Moreover, the higher the grade of the gxy wanderer, the better.


    That was a challenging task!


    Ever since he discovered the purpose and limits of the focusing crystal, Greem¡¯s mood had been taken on a rollercoaster ride. Up and down, down and up, without stop. First unrestrained joy, then disappointment, then a trace of unwillingness to just give up without trying.


    Could this focusing crystal only be used by Third Grade adepts?


    Refusing to let this opportunity slip past, Greem immediately gave the Chip an order.


    ¡°Chip, search for ways and methods to strengthen this crystal. Furthermore, search if other adepts have discovered this special application of the focusing crystal.¡±


    [Beep. Mission has been constructed. Searching database.


    [Beep. The Spirit magnification effect of focusing crystals has been recorded in adept tomes since a long time ago. However, ording to the records, adepts are unable to utilize this ability directly.]


    ¡°Why?¡±


    [The focusing crystals are a type of biological crystal. They have been attuned to the host¡¯s Spirit frequency and band wave during the process of their formation. Other creatures are unable to utilize the crystals even if they obtain them.]


    ¡°You mean to say that the reason I seeded in using the crystals is because of you tuning my Spirit frequency and band wave to match the crystal?¡±


    [Yes!]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help fall silent in thought.


    No wonder the adepts paid more attention to keeping the gxy wanderers¡¯ skin intact while they were looting their corpses, as opposed to these focusing crystals. After all, not every adept could do what Greem could do. Not every adept could freely adjust and change the frequency of their Spirit with the help of a chip.


    If that was the case, he might have a chance of obtaining one or two focusing crystals from the more powerful adepts that he could put to use, especially if he put out the word that he was collecting them.


    He might not be able to kill those Fourth Grade gxy wanderers, but it didn¡¯t mean that the Great Adepts couldn¡¯t do it.


    At any rate, the focusing crystals were useless in their hands.


    Surely, they would be more than happy to trade it for some more practical resources. However, spreading the news like that was very likely to draw unnecessary trouble towards himself.


    The Great Adepts weren¡¯t fools either. If they discovered Greem was in a rush to collect focusing crystals, they could easily deduce that he had a way of utilizing them. When that happened, there would be trouble if the Great Adepts came knocking on his door!


    Greem hesitated for a moment at this thought. He then tried to contact Adept Martin.


    A short momentter, a magical message arrived.


    ¡°Greem, your share of the seeds has been prepared. I will have people send it to you shortly.¡±


    ¡°No worries, Martin. You can have my share. However, I would like for you to help me put out a purchase request.¡±


    ¡°What for?¡±


    ¡°One of those light blue crystals inside the gxy wanderers, from the body of a Fourth Grade gxy wanderer. The higher the quality, the better!¡±


    ¡°Oh, you must have noticed the unusual effect of that crystal! Let me tell you, Greem, that thing can only be used by the gxy wanderers. We adepts don¡¯t have any use for it at all. Collecting these crystals is just gonna be a waste of resources for you.¡±


    ¡°Do me a favor! I have a feeling there¡¯s some sort of secret contained inside them. I want a higher-grade crystal for an experiment.¡±


    ¡°Well, I can certainly get you one. That said, even though they aren¡¯t suitable for adept use, you¡¯re still asking for a Fourth Grade item. You will have to pay a hefty price for it. Moreover, the Great Adepts are probably the only ones who will have a Fourth Grade crystal. They won¡¯t even take a look in your direction if you are trying to purchase with magical crystals. Here in Camp Exodar, most items above Fourth Grade are traded on a barter system. You will probably have trouble obtaining a Fourth Grade crystal if you can¡¯t offer them something they are interested in!¡±


    He needed a Fourth Grade item, and something even Great Adepts would be interested in!


    Greem thought for a moment before finally speaking again.


    ¡°I have a perfectly preserved body of an otherworldly Fourth Grade holy knight with me.¡±


    ¡°The body of a Fourth Grade knight? That¡¯s not worth much, at least in the eyes of the Great Adepts. The Great Adepts hunt plenty of Fourth Grade creatures. Perhaps they might be slightly interested if your holy knight was still living. But a dead corpse? Hmm......¡±


    ¡°I have some Empowered Magic Essence on hand!¡±


    ¡°Empowered Magic Essence is a Third Grade item at the very best.¡±


    ¡°The materials used to make these are a little special. Consumed in sufficient quantities, they can even allow an ordinary person to gain elementium affinities.¡±


    ¡°What? How is this possible? Has the effect been verified?¡±


    ¡°Without a doubt!¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    Perhaps shocked by this news, Adept Martin only replied after a long pause.


    ¡°Greem, I have already put out news of your offer. There¡¯s a Great Adept who wishes to speak with you right now. I¡ª¡± Before Martin could finish, his magical message was cut off by another strange voice.


    It sounded like that Adept Sainz.


    ¡°Kid, I heard from Martin you have something unusual in your hands? Those Empowered Magic Essences of yours can actually bestow ordinary people with magical power?¡±


    ¡°Indeed, Lord Sainz. The method I used to extract this batch of Empowered Magic Essence is slightly differentpared to how the other adepts do it. That is why it has this unique effect. An ordinary person would be able to obtain an elementium affinity if they consumed fifty grams of this Empowered Magic Essence for ten consecutive days.¡±


    ¡°Good...good...good...simply brilliant.¡± Adept Sainz was obviously beyond overjoyed on the other end of themunication, ¡°Tell me, how do you intend to trade for this Empowered Magic Essence? I can pay five million magical crystals. That should be a fair price, isn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°Er...Lord Sainz, in truth, I would rather trade them for a gxy wanderer¡¯s crystal!¡±


    ¡°What are you collecting those things for? Many adepts have already tried putting them to use, but those crystals have already beenpletely attuned to the gxy wanderers themselves. No one other than the gxy wanderers themselves can use them.¡±


    ¡°I wish to research the principles behind their formation and see if it is possible to artificially cultivate focusing crystals of my own.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Why do I care what you are using the crystals for? Prepare the Empowered Magic Essence for me. I will be back soon. I know perfectly who amongst those old geezers has those focusing crystals here in Camp Exodar. If I find out that your Empowered Magic Essence doesn¡¯t have the effect you im it possesses after this trade, kid, you will be in big trouble.¡±


    Martin¡¯s voice once again rang in Greem¡¯s ears after Great Adept Sainz cut offmunications.


    ¡°Congrattions, Greem! You found a good buyer this time!¡±


    ¡°Why is Lord Sainz in such a hurry to obtain these Empowered Magic Essence? Could it be...?¡±


    ¡°Heheh, do I even need to exin it? It¡¯s already been 1,300 years since Lord Sainz left the World of Adepts. The bloodline he left behind in Zhentarim has since waned and fallen from grace. Even though the Zhentarim Association keeps an eye out for them and makes sure that his bloodline isn¡¯t broken, not a single adept has appeared amongst his descendants for the past three hundred years.


    ¡°At the rate at which this is going, the status of that adept n will be revoked in another hundred years. They will be reduced to ordinary, worldly nobles. Lord Sainz has plenty of resources and magical crystals on hand, yet he can¡¯t find a single apprentice adept in his entire n. Of course, he¡¯s in a hurry!¡±


    Greem drew in a breath of cold air.


    That was the real reason why so many adept ns fell from grace in the World of Adepts!


    They might have a Great Adept for an ancestor looking over them from the realms beyond and ensuring that the n¡¯s development would proceed without a hitch. However, the lineage of the n¡¯s bloodline would regress over time, until they became an ordinary, non-magical n.


    This phenomenon of the weakening and regression bloodline was a problem with no solution!


    After all, the birth rate of adepts rapidly decreased with their increase in grade.


    Both male and female adepts had too overwhelming a life force. It was incredibly disadvantageous for procreation.


    If one partner were far too weak, then the terrifying radiation from the other person¡¯s life essence would be enough to kill any and all unqualified ovaries or sperm. If both partners were powerful, then the life essence would inherit their power as well. The life essence of the two partners was very likely to treat each other as hostile entities and engage in a deathmatch for the dominant position in the new lifeform.


    Moreover, this was all instinct. It was not something that the adepts themselves had any control over!


    As such, when adepts attempted to have offsprings, luck was the only thing they could rely on. Ungodly luck!

 Chapter 1080 - Great Adept’s Messenger

    <h4>Chapter 1080 Great Adept¡¯s Messenger</h4>


    The Empowered Magic Essence was vastly inferior to Breeding Flowers when it came to effect alone.


    After all, Breeding Flowers were the optimal solution to the adept¡¯s problem of procreation. Empowered Magic Essence was, at the very best, a sort of stop-gap, an improvisational measure to make up for what couldn¡¯t be achieved.


    That said, Breeding Flowers were Sixth Grade items, while Greem¡¯s Empowered Magic Essence was only a Fourth Grade item. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine which was harder to obtain.


    If a Breeding Flower were to appear in Camp Exodar someday, the Sixth Grade adepts would probably be the first to get their hands all over it. Sainz would never even have the opportunity to see the flower.


    Moreover, if Greem¡¯s Empowered Magic Essence could indeed provide ordinary mortals with elementium affinity just as he imed, then it would quickly be a much-demanded resource. When that happened, Sainz would not ever be able to obtain Empowered Magic Essence at such a low cost.


    As such, just half a dayter, Sainz traded an advanced Fourth Grade focusing crystal with Greem for one person¡¯s worth of Magic Empowered Essence. As for its effects? He would be testing it on a suitable descendant in his n.


    After all, Sainzcked no resources, knowledge, or magic. It was only unfortunate that his bloodline had regressed to a state where even apprentice adepts could not be found after two thousand years.


    He couldn¡¯t help but sigh in exasperation every time he thought about this. Yet, there was nothing he could do!


    The Empowered Magic Essence had now provided his n with a chance to rise to power once more.


    Greem rushed excitedly into his alchemyb once Sainz had left.


    After a series of scans from the Chip, it was confirmed that the quality and magnification capacity of this Fourth Grade focusing crystal was far above that of the Third Grade crystal.


    [Beep. Discovered one Fourth-Grade focusing crystal. Crystal toughness: 450 points. Magnification magnitude: 2.57x. State of focused energy: To be determined. Attribute of focused energy: No attributes. Attached elemental effects: Ssh damage.]


    A magnification magnitude of almost three times. Greem could increase the might of his spells by 2.57 times when he poured his Spirit into his fire spells through the focusing crystal. Moreover, the tremendous amount of Spirit mixed into the spell would cause it to gain a unique Ssh effect.


    Much like a soundwave, the spell would ripple and spread outwards upon impact, like a bursting water balloon. Although this sshing would take away part of the attack¡¯s power, it was a decent method for dealing with hordes of enemies.


    Offensive power magnified by 2.57 times?


    Elementium adepts were already known for their fearsome offensive power, while fire adepts were acknowledged as the most destructive among all elementium adepts. If Greem¡¯s offensive power was magnified by 2.57 times, his spells would be horrifyingly powerful.


    With such tremendous firepower and the four fire principles he had mastered...


    Even Greem himself couldn¡¯t help but start shivering in uncontroble excitement, let alone his enemies. For some reason, he couldn¡¯t help but start looking forward slightly to that uing ¡®mission of death.¡¯


    The effect of the focusing crystal might have been verified. However, if he was to use it in its current form, he would likely be the focus of his enemies in battle. Thus, Greem spent some more effort and very ingeniously embedded the crystal into the Burning Suncrown.


    Greem would not usually run about with such a magical crown of such ornate and delicate design. He would only equip the Fire Throne set inbat. When he equipped the Burning Suncrown, the focusing crystal would be right upon his forehead. It was the most convenient position for him to unleash his Spirit.


    The realms beyond might be incredibly dangerous, but they were also the best ce to further train and refine an adept¡¯s power.


    As such, the World of Adepts had never severed its intimate rtionships with all the adept camps in space.


    Large ns and organizations could send groups of adepts to nar battlefields or space battlefields and have them rapidly grow amid fire and war. It might cause many casualties among the low-level adepts, but as long as a single one of these adepts could survive and improve upon the corpses of others, it would be worth it.


    They would bring about returns ten times, a hundred times, as massive as what the n had initially invested.


    The Crimson n did not have the conditions to send their adepts to the realms beyond before this. They could only send their adepts to the more dangerous nar battlefields for training. Now that Greem hade here as a pioneer, he slowly figured out the situation in the realms beyond. He started to have thoughts and ns to expand the n¡¯s influence into the realms beyond.


    Of course, this would alle after. Greem¡¯s key concern at the moment was surviving that terrifying mission of death!


    While Greem quietly made all sorts of preparations in the tower in anticipation of the mission, some unexpected ¡®guests¡¯ arrived to disturb his peace.


    ¡°Great Adept Anrimus? What did he send you here for?¡±


    Greem stared at this strange Fourth Grade adeptposed of two heads sharing a single body. It was a male and a female, both with very cold and austere expressions on their faces. He wasn¡¯t quite sure how to respond.


    In all honesty, most adepts would be mutated to some degree when they reached the higher grades. However, very few of them would mutate in such a severe fashion.


    ¡°Lord Anrimus heard you have a sort of Empowered Magic Essence in your hands that can provide ordinary people with elementium affinity. He specially sent us siblings to make a trade with you. This is what we brought with us. Take a look first!¡± The male head was the one who spoke. He referred to himself as the elder sibling. He had a stern face and a mean look to his eyes. The female head wasn¡¯t ugly, either. On the contrary, she had quite a pretty appearance.


    Unfortunately, despite the two heads and two consciousnesses, it seemed like only one of them could control the body at any one time.


    While the brother spoke, the sister had her eyes closed. Her head hung limply to the side, seemingly in a state of deep sleep.


    As the two-headed adept waved their hand, three items of unusual design floated before Greem.


    Greem¡¯s gaze lingered on the two-headed adept for a long time before finally shifting towards the first item.


    There was a strange seed he had never seen before.


    It was the size of an egg, while its surface was covered with strange magical patterns asionally fading and appearing.


    Natural magical patterns?


    ording to what Greem knew, lifeforms that possessed natural magical patterns all possessed unusual and unique effects!


    Greem alone would never be able to memorize the hundreds of thousands of species of magical nts in the Adept¡¯s Handbook, no matter how good of a memory he had. However, with the Chip¡¯s aid, he was able to search the Chip¡¯s database for the identity of the seed based on its shape, color, and unique aura. Soon, the Chip disyed its results.


    A Sun Flowervine Seed.


    When nted in a room and grown to maturity, Sun Flowervines could absorb magical power and release a strange fragrance that could bolster the effects of meditation.


    It was said to be effective even for Fourth Grade adepts.


    That alone made it a decent support resource for adepts!


    As such, the Chip rated the seed as a Third Grade item that could be somewhat considered Fourth Grade in its effect.


    The second item was a memory crystal.


    Greem picked it up and lifted it to his forehead. His Spirit moved, and he sensed the information contained within.


    It was a Fourth Grade fire spell that was contained within the memory crystal¨C Torrential mes.


    It could gather fire energy into a single beam of fire that would assault and flood the enemy from any angle. Its power was around 1400 to 1600 points.


    Out of considerations of confidentiality, only the first half of the information within was revealed. The other information rting to the actual casting, chants, and spiritual movements were all sealed with magic.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and put the crystal back into the air. He turned to look at the third item.


    It was an actual fire coral staff.


    Its dark-red head, its body, drawn full of strange patterns, and the warm heat pressing against Greem¡¯s face all pointed towards its real identity.


    A Fourth Grade fire staff!


    It could enhance Greem¡¯s fire damage by seven percent.


    Seven percent might not seem like much, but with the improvement in Greem¡¯s magical abilities, any percentage increase often meant over a hundred point increase in energy damage.


    As such, a seven-percent fire damage enhancement was already very impressive for the Fourth Grade Greem!


    Greem slowly looked at the three Fourth Grade items before him. He couldn¡¯t say he wasn¡¯t moved, but it wasn¡¯t as if he had to make this trade.


    If Greem brought the fire coral staff along with him to battle, it would mean that he hadpletely given up on meleebat. He would be fixing his position as one of a spellcaster.


    That was truly a significant waste of his potential, given his great Physique and decent Strength!


    He didn¡¯t really have to have the Fourth Grade fire spell either.


    The first thing that the Chip had been busy with since Greem¡¯s advancement to Fourth Grade was the calction and improvement of the Third Grade spells he currently possessed.


    Currently, the Third Grade Vicious Fireball had been upgraded to the Fourth Grade zing Fireball.


    The Third Grade megate had been improved to the Fourth Grade Molten Fire Gate.


    The Third Grade Meteor Swarm had been upgraded to the Fourth Grade Meteorite Bombardment.


    The Third Grade Magma Armor had been upgraded to the Fourth Grade ze Form.


    Apart from these spells, Fire Teleportation had also been improved and optimized by a certain degree.


    It allowed Greem¡¯s offensive power to increase exponentially, from the 400-500 base damage to the current 700-900 base damage. In addition to all the magical equipment he was wearing and his fire specialization, a tiny fireball from Greem would have around 1300-1500 points of power.


    Of course, if he were tobine all this with the focusing crystal he had just obtained, the upper limit of his damage reached a shocking 3900 points.


    It was far too shocking for a Fourth Grade adept who had just advanced not ten years ago!


    It was all these factors that made these three Fourth Grade items not as appealing to Greem.


    Greem¡¯s hesitation and dissatisfaction fell on the eyes of the two-headed adept as well. He couldn¡¯t help but be slightly surprised at this.


    Great Adept Anrimus was a Sixth Great Adept from the Adept¡¯s Association. To think that the things he offered would be rejected by a mere Fourth Grade adept. It was unbelievable!


    As the Great Adept¡¯s messenger, he could not afford to lose face in this manner.

 Chapter 1081 - Oath Contract

    <strong>Chapter 1081 Oath Contract</strong>


    The male head opened his mouth as if he was about to say something. However, he was interrupted by his sister¡¯s head, which had abruptly opened her eyes and shoved him to the side.


    The eyes of the male head shut after losing control over the body. The expressions faded from his face as if he had suddenly fallen into a deep slumber. The sister¡¯s head moved to the center of the neck and opened her eyes to take a good look at Greem.


    ¡°You must be Greem! My brother was a little rude earlier. He did not properly introduce ourselves. My brother¡¯s name is Mangus, and I am Cherisha. We are also participants in the uing Arcane Empire Extermination mission!¡± The sister¡¯s voice was soft and gentle. Obviously, she had a much more friendly personalitypared to her brother.


    ¡°Oh?¡± Greem lifted an eyebrow. The look he was giving the two-headed adept turned much friendlier.


    ¡°As I¡¯m sure you know, we who have been chosen for this mission are practically cannon fodder. Once we enter the Arcane Empire, there won¡¯t be manypanions around us that we can trust, let alone the actual danger that those Great Arcanists will pose to us. Therefore...¡±


    ¡°You wish to establish an alliance ahead of the mission?¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡± Cherisha smiled casually. ¡°Rather than sit by idly and wait for Fate¡¯s arrangement, why don¡¯t we form an alliance? It will allow us to defend ourselves better. At the very least, we should be able to intimidate the monsters from the World of Disasters. Otherwise, they might just treat us as prey, along with the rest of the Arcane Empire!¡±


    Greem gave the proposal some thought. He couldn¡¯t help but be moved by the suggestion.


    Even though they were all Fourth Grade adepts now, they were still as frail as strawmen whenpared to those veteran monsters that had advanced thousands of years ago. In particr, the adepts would not be in an advantageous situation when fighting against the arcanists, who had all the benefits of fighting on their homeground.


    Under such circumstances, if they were able to form an alliance, they would at least be able to ensure that they didn¡¯t exhaust what little might they had in a pointless internal conflict.


    ¡°I agree with your suggestion in principle, but how are we supposed to make this alliance? Ordinary magical contracts probably can¡¯t restrain Fourth Grade adepts all that well anymore, can they?¡±


    ¡°Oath contracts. You have heard of them, haven¡¯t you?¡±


    ¡°I have. They seem to be a sort of spell where every adept involved in the oath would cast a curse of their own. In doing so, those who betray the oath will have to endure thebined curse bacsh from multiple other adepts.¡±


    ¡°Indeed! This is the draft of the contract we have written up. If you decide it is appropriate, you can join the oath and leave your own curse on it.¡±


    Cherisha waved her hand, and a strange stone tablet made of an unknown ck material appeared out of thin air. A magical contract with exceedingly incredible binding power was written on the gue in the adeptnguage.


    The magical emblems of three adepts were etched into a corner of the tablet.


    One belonged to Mangus, another to Cherisha, and thest to one Adept Holly of the Silver Union.


    Greem sensed the aura of curse magic and poison upon these names.


    It seemed like only his and the Northern Witches¡¯ representative¡¯s emblems were missing from the tablet.


    Greem¡¯s eyes quickly swept through the tablet, storing and containing its contents within his mind.


    While he closed his eyes and pretended to consider the terms of the contract, the Chip had already analyzed every single use. It confirmed that this was a magical contract restricting any sort of internal conflict in hopes of repelling the enemy. It also confirmed that there were no hidden usal loopholes or magical traps contained within the contract.


    Soon, Greem opened his eyes and smiled as he drew several fire runes in the air. These runes did not dissipate. Instead, they gathered together, colliding and forming into aplex and unusual runic array.


    The strange runes enveloped his magical emblem and floated in front of the stone tablet under his control. They rapidly merged into the surface of the ck stone. The next second, Greem¡¯s name appeared on the stone tablet.


    ¡°What an borate andplicated runic array! You didn¡¯t use a curse spell?¡± Cherisha let out a gasp of surprise.


    ¡°My research into curses is minimal at best, and I can¡¯t produce any cursed item powerful enough to restrict a Fourth Grade adept. A fire array is the best recement I cane up with. It only contains a single fire attack from me!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s fine. It is only a way to maintain trust between all of us, after all. As long as no one is feeling suicidal, I don¡¯t think anyone would be foolish enough to tear up an oath contract as beneficial as this!¡± Cherisha smiled as ifpletely unbothered by Greem¡¯s addition to the curses.


    However, if she could see through the runic array and realize that that one attack would inflict over 3700 points of damage, she would not be as rxed as she currently was.


    Three thousand seven hundred points. Such a powerful fire attack was enough to kill Fourth Grade adepts below intermediate-grade instantly. Even bloodline adepts or body refining-adepts, who were famed for their Physique, would be severely injured if they were unprepared for such an attack.


    After all, most beginner Fourth Grade adepts had a base damage of anywhere between 1100 to 2000 points, while intermediate Fourth Grades had base damage between 2000 to 3000 points. Greem¡¯s most potent attack could reach 3900 points. That could already rival advanced Fourth Grade adepts at their peak.


    However, he was only a beginner Fourth Grade adept that had just advanced no more than ten years ago!


    Now that Greem had signed the oath contract, the two adepts were allies. Naturally, their interaction became much more rxed and familiar.


    ¡°We were the ones that volunteered for this errand for Great Adept Anrimus. Because of that, we will need you to help us conceal the actual specifics of this trade. How about this? If you are not satisfied with the items that Lord Anrimus has offered, I have a Seven Hearts Herb with me that I can throw in as part of the deal as well.¡± Adept Cherisha was clearly well-versed in social interactions. Greem had no proper reason to reject her request.


    After some hesitation, Greem finally traded a single person¡¯s portion of Empowered Magic Essence for that Fourth Grade fire coral staff and the Seven Hearts Herb.


    Seven Hearts Herb was also an item that could barely be considered a Fourth Grade adept¡¯s resource.


    When an adept¡¯s body suffered severe damage along the lines of a severed limb, they could reattach that limb with the Seven Hearts Herb without suffering any loss to theirbat power.


    Making a new ally andpleting the Great Adept¡¯s mission in the process made Adept Cherisha very d. She couldn¡¯t help but show a smile on her face.


    She left in a happy mood after exchanging contacts with Greem.


    Once the room had returned to silence, Greem silently said to himself, ¡°Chip, what is the progress on their data analysis?¡±


    [Beep. Target creature is protected by a powerful life forcefield. Chip probes and deep scans have all been prevented. Based on analysis of the method and degree of distortion to the life forcefield, the two-headed adept should be an elementium adept that barely forcibly advanced after a semi-assimtion of souls.]


    ¡°A semi-assimtion of souls?¡±


    [Neither of their souls alone was powerful enough to advance to Fourth Grade. For the sake of advancement, they had no choice but to assimte a portion of their souls and bodies. In doing so, they are barely able to continue existing in the form of a two-headed adept.]


    ¡°And their power?¡±


    [Individually, they are only at peak Third Grade, while thebined form is at the level of a beginner Fourth Grade.]


    ¡°Which is to say that their usualbat prowess is below Fourth Grade. They can only achieve the might of a beginner Fourth Grade by using magical means tobine their powers. No wonder they are in such a hurry to make allies. It was because they were the weakest among all the participants! With how vulnerable they are, they would probably have been the first to be eliminated in the mission if it wasn¡¯t for that oath contract!¡±


    Greem put away the Seven Hearts Herb and properly examined the fire coral staff. After ensuring that there were no suspicious marks left on the item, he put it away into his Elder¡¯s Ring.


    The reason he had chosen the staff was that it was morepatible with the image he wished to portray to others.


    Since he was to form a party with others, then he would designate himself as an elementium adept only capable of using fire magic from a distance. Taking the staff would help establish this designation of his. He could then use this as an excuse to avoid the more dangerous melee fighting.


    After all, hiding a portion of his abilities while joining a group of unfamiliar adepts was not a bad idea!


    ............


    Outside the tower.


    The two-headed adept sibling pair flew across the sky,municating with each other using magic as they did so.


    ¡°What did you think about that legendary fire adept¡¯s power?¡± It was the elder brother Mangus who spoke first.


    ¡°He is more powerful than us. More importantly, he doesn¡¯t seem to care whether there is an alliance!¡± Cherisha calmly analyzed.


    ¡°This might have something to do with how he has had a smooth journey of development so far. Otherwise, how does he expect to match thepetitors from the other nes on such a dangerous mission? Speaking of which, what do you think about the Northern Witch. Do we still need to make contact with her?¡±


    ¡°Judging from what information we have, the Northern Lands are sending a Fourth Grade Dark Witch on this mission. She will also be the only intermediate Fourth Grade among us all. Do you really think she will ept the terms of our alliance, given how arrogant and prideful the Witches are?¡±


    Mangus couldn¡¯t help but curse in silence in response to his sister¡¯s questions.


    ¡°Those damned lunatics. I hope she runs into those disaster creatures the moment she enters the ne!¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know if she will run into those disaster creatures, but one thing is for sure. We will most definitely run into those disaster creatures. That¡¯s because we are probably the greatest treasure trove in their eyes for this mission!¡±


    Mangus couldn¡¯t help but let out a soft sigh before falling silent.


    The stronger individuals would never be in a hurry to aplish their objectives on a mission as dangerous as this. Instead, they would first eliminate their weaker petitors.¡¯ No matter how you looked at it, this party of rookie Fourth Grades sent out by the adept faction was the belly of the fish, the juiciest and easiest target of them all.


    And as the belly of the belly, they were naturally going to be the target of many powerful enemies.


    No wonder these siblings were so anxious and worried!

 Chapter 1082 - The Path Forward

    <h4>Chapter 1082 The Path Forward</h4>


    As the mission approached, Greem started toe into contact with more people and more information on them.


    The battle at the frontlines grew more intense with every passing day.


    The major factions were all fighting on their own, letting a bloody battle unfold at the nar barrier of Morrian as they fought against the arcanists.


    It was said that the battles there clouded the skies and blotted out the sun. Rivers of blood formed from the bodies in that war, and the world itself teetered on the brink of copse.


    The adept faction was undoubtedly one of the weaker camps among all the invaders.


    When the Scourge Lords used their overwhelming power to knock down the arcane towers of the Great Arcanists and tear a massive gash in Morrian¡¯s nar barrier, a horde of disaster creatures and starbeasts swarmed into the ne. These monsters charged wildly towards the gigantic floating cities waiting below.


    At the same time, barriers of light massive enough to cover entire cities arose from the floating cities, keeping out the disaster creatures and starbeasts. The arcane towers and watchtowers stationed all over the ne fired off beams of brilliant arcane magic, destroying the massive, ugly bodies of their enemies.


    For a moment, corpses rained from the sky, and blood poured like a perpetual waterfall. It was a horrifying scene to behold, apanied by the shockwaves of magical tides!


    However, most of the casualties of the battlefield were low-Grade disaster creatures forcibly spawned by the Scourge Lords. The Scourge Lords would hardly feel a thing no matter how many of these creatures were to die. On the contrary, the Scourge Lords took full advantage of the space that had been created by the horde of disaster creatures. They hastened their offense against the arcane towers of the Great Arcanists.


    With the massive bodies of the Scourge Lords that easily spanned kilometers in width, they had incredible trouble forcing their way into Morrian ne, even without the obstruction of the Great Arcanists. As such, they focused their efforts on tearing the nar barrier of Morrian. In doing so, they could allow more of their subordinates to rush into the world to harvest the lives and souls of its residents.


    They crouched upon the gap of the nar barrier, trying their best to stop the opening from healing while absorbing the clouds of light golden soul silhouettes rising from below.


    ording to the narws, the souls of all living creatures that died in the ne would be reassimted into the mother river of souls. There, they would repeat the cycle of rebirth as new life was born within the ne once more.


    However, at this moment, the Scourge Lords were like parasites leeching upon Morrian ne. They had shattered the ecosystem within the ne and were desperately absorbing the souls of every arcanist and nar native that died on the battlefield.


    The Morrian ne, having lost¨Cand still losing¨Cmany of its residents, was starting to stall in its operation like an aging machine without the lubrication of souls.


    Within the Arcane Empire, two Arcane Emperors (Eighth Grade), seven Great Arcanists (Seventh Grade), ny-eight arcanists (Fifth to Sixth Grade) and thousands of arcane schrs (First to Fourth Grade) were rushing to the gap in the nar barrier, rising in flying arcane towers and levitating cities.


    During this process, they continued to battle with the disaster creatures and starbeasts that had breached their ne, turning tens of thousands of kilometers ofnd into a fearsome war zone of death and destruction.


    The reckless actions of the Scourge Lords had drawn away nearly seventy percent of the Arcane Empire¡¯s defense. The other invading factions had no choice but to hasten their own invasion. Some of them even started to organize small groups of elite forces to breach Morrian and obtain their long-awaited resources, knowledge, and treasures before the rest of theirpetitors.


    ............


    There was a tall cliff on the western coast of Morrian ne.


    A hundred-meter-wide ck hole was slowly closing in the skies above. Sixteen hazy outlines were struggling beneath the hole, trying their best to break through the nar barrier as quickly as they could.


    ¡°Go now! Go and do your duty ording to what has been assigned to you. I will give you the reward you deserve when you return sessfully!¡±


    An unusually loud and stern voice rang throughout thends. The sixteen adepts finally seeded in breaking through the nar barrier, allowing their bodies to manifest in Morrian slowly.


    Greem was among these sixteen adepts. He endured the dizziness in his mind and tried his best to resist the overwhelming nar bacsh descending upon him. Finally, he managed to stabilize himself.


    While he stood upon a rock with his hand on his forehead, five of his fifteenpanions had also managed to recover. They stood up straight and started to evaluate this utterly alien nar world.


    The first few to recover looked at each other, secretly surprised by each other¡¯s capabilities. When their gazesnded upon the figures that were still lying or crouching on the ground, a trace of disdain unavoidably surfaced in their eyes.


    In particr, when the two-headed adept, Mangus, spat out a mouthful of blood from the tremendous nar bacsh, someone in the group even started tough maliciously.


    Greem reached out with his right hand, and the fire coral staff leaped out of the Elder¡¯s Ring into his hand.


    He tapped the ground with his staff, and a halo of mes rose into the air around the pale two-headed adept.


    With the fires temporarily isting him from the suppression of the nar consciousness, the two-headed adept was immediately able to break free of their dizzied state. He quickly took out several potions and drank them.


    He was finally able to resist the troublesome nar suppression with the aid of the potions.


    ¡°Thank you!¡± Mangus, having caught a break, was able to nod at Greem and express his thanks.


    ¡°We arepanions. This is only something I ought to do.¡± Greem replied with a smile.


    A total of sixteen Fourth Grade adepts had traveled here this time. Twelve of these adepts were the main force, split into Group One and Group Two, each in charge of a different mission. Meanwhile, Greem and the three other adepts were Group Three. They were in charge of ughter and mass-murder to distract the enemy and cover the tracks of the elite parties.


    As for what Group One and Group Two¡¯s missions were, none of them in Group Three had any idea!


    Due to the difference in power and mission objectives, the leaders of Group One and Two gathered upon arrival. They took out a map and started to mumble and discuss amongst themselves.


    Meanwhile, Greem, the two-headed adept, Adept Holly, and the sinister-looking Dark Witch were left alone in a corner. They watched as the elite adepts took out magic wands and crystals to examine the spatial environment around them,pletely unsure as to what they should be doing.


    One of the two leaders of the elite groups lifted his head from the discussion and looked at Greem and the others. He pointed a finger at Greem and said, ¡°Hey, you...yes, you. Come here and discuss the path that your group will be taking!¡±


    The adept was rude and arrogant in his behavior, but there was an unquestioning and powerful aura in every moment he made.


    Greem frowned but did not say anything in opposal. He silently walked over instead.


    ¡°ording to what information we have obtained, our current location is here.¡± The leader tapped at a single point on the three-dimensional map hovering above the scroll, leaving a tiny red dot in the air.


    Greem looked at the map. Blue light flickered in his eyes as the entire map was quickly etched in his mind.


    Overall, Morrian ne could be split into six continents of mediocre size. A massive sea filled the space between all six continents. They were currently on the west coast of the Kentos Continent, with the Gemstone Sea behind them and the Arcane Empire¡¯s territory ahead of them.


    ¡°You and yourpanions are responsible for our cover. You must make a bigmotion on the path you travel through. Take this path forward once you leave and attack as many cities and arcane towers of the Arcane Empire along the way as you can. Of course, if you have the opportunity, deal with this floating city along the way!¡±


    The leader moved his hand across the map, and a ring red line pierced through the Kentos Continent and ended on the other end of the continent.


    Greem hesitated for a moment before bending over slightly and asked in a soft voice, ¡°Sir, would you know the approximate current locations of the disaster creatures that broke into the ne a while ago?¡±


    The leader was a body-refining adept with rough facial features and arge scar running down his right cheek. He lifted his head and nced at Greem. He finally showed his teeth as his mouth broke into a wicked smile.


    ¡°On ount of you being the strongest amongst them, I will do you a favor and tell you! Here.¡±


    Greem looked at therge circle that the adept had casually drawn on the map, and his face slightly turned colors.


    Though the path of attack that had been designated for them did not coincide with therge red circle, there was only three thousand kilometers distance where the path was closest to the circle. It might be a tremendous distance for mortals, but for those monstrous disaster creatures and starbeasts, it was only a matter of hours.


    That meant that there was a possibility that they would run into those savagepetitors along the way.


    Both of them had entered Morrian for the Arcane Empire¡¯s precious resources, treasures, and arcane knowledge. Of course, the opponent was probably focused primarily on the nar origin and the wild ughter that would be found here.


    Still, under such circumstances, there would be no such thing as a genial meeting if they ran into each other. A bloody fight would be unavoidable!


    Greem¡¯s face changed colors several times, but in the end, he nodded silently.


    Non-elite Fourth Grades like themselves were the least valued forces in the adept faction.


    If a fight were to break out between them and the disaster creatures, they would most definitely be the ones to suffer.


    While the twelve adepts concluded their discussion, a mountainous wave of bestial roaring came from the distance.


    Thousands of magical beasts rushed out of the forest under the lead of a rhinoceros, surging towards the adepts¡¯ location. Greem lifted his head and looked. From a distance, he could see the appearance of every single beast, their eyes crimson, foam frothing at their mouths, as if they had gone utterly berserk.


    ¡°Hmph! This must be thest crazed throes of the nar consciousness. To think it would send a horde of First and Second Grade magical beasts tomit suicide here. Let¡¯s go now. Kill them all, and then we can get on our journey.¡±


    The next second, a storm of spells devoured this stampede of magical beasts!

 Chapter 1083 - The First Target

    <strong>Chapter 1083 The First Target</strong>


    The invasion of many powerful forces led to severe turmoil throughout Morrian ne.


    This turmoil that embroiled the entirety of the nar world might only be a crisis for the almighty arcanists, but it was an apocalypse for themon man.


    Over the past ten thousand years, the arcanists had built a convenient and effective system of training new arcanists within Morrian ne. It was a system that was intimately connected to ordinary people. This system clearly distinguished the arcanists and adepts as two separate factions of casters.


    A Great Adept had once made a fair evaluation of most existing caster systems in an adept tome that Greem had once read.


    During the early stages of their evolution, humans could only choose to approach the iprehensible forces of nature with caution and reverence. This attitude towards supernatural powers continued to evolve over time. In the end, those who revered the elements as equals became shamans, those who bowed down before the elements became clerics, and those who enved the elements became arcanists.


    From this perspective, there was a certain upromising aspect to the arcane arts.


    Perhaps this was also a general characteristic of all arcanists!


    As one of the casters, an adept¡¯s research was often far too bloody and taboo. They ventured into the realm of body modification and often employed violence in their schrly pursuits. For the adepts, any means were justified as long as they could obtain their desired results. Their purpose in researching magic wasn¡¯t a search for the truth of the universe or the origin of magic itself. Typically, adepts only wanted to obtain more power or solve a difficult problem at hand.


    As such, the casters of most other nes viewed adepts as strange sorcerers or evil mages.


    Meanwhile, the arcanists were known as eternal pursuers of the truth of the world and the origin of magic!


    The arcanists created arcane towers that could traverse the earth and the skies, as well as massive floating cities that could be used as aerial fortresses. All these inventions of theirs were created based on their beliefs and the unique characteristics of their magic system. The massive Arcane Empire was built around this entire practice.


    The Arcane Empire divided every single continent into provinces of different sizes, with arge floating city at the center of every province. Most of these floating cities were constructed above leyline nodes. They could rely on the natural magical tides to attract elementium and thereby create elementium pools with endless energy.


    Floating cities constructing in this manner might be able to float several thousand kilometers above the ground, but they had trouble moving about freely. These cities would lose their energy supply once they left their leyline nodes. They would then have to rely on the energy stored in their energy pools to sustain their flight.


    If the floating city couldn¡¯t reach the next leyline node before it ran out of energy, what awaited it would be a massive cmity!


    It was precisely this immobile characteristic of the floating cities that pushed the arcanists to create the more agile and mobile arcane towers.


    With arcane towers, the arcanists could venture in and out of spacestorms unharmed. They could dive thousands of meters to the depths of the sea to explore ruins or dig deep into the¡¯s core in search of resources and treasures. It was thanks to the protection of the arcane tower that arcanists, who were as frail as ordinary people, were able to travel anywhere they liked and do anything they wanted.


    The arcanists even developed the fearsome pseudo-nar fortresses to fulfill their needs for nar warfare. They modified pseudo-nes stretching for dozens of kilometers into an actual fortress of war, outfitting them with a massive arsenal of weapons and using them to blow apart the protective nar barriers of lesser nes.


    Based on all the times that the adepts had crossed swords with the Arcane Empire, even the Eighth Grade Arcane Emperors were themselves barely at the level of a Third Grade adept.


    The arcanists prioritized the research and universalization of arcane knowledge. They rarely spent significant amounts of resources on improving and modifying themselves as the adepts did. Their true powers could only be unleashed with the aid of a series of arcane facilities, including arcane towers, elementium pools, magic pools, and spell pools.


    Strip the arcanists of these things, and they were as fragile as eggshells!


    ............


    Three dayster, in the early hours of the morning.


    Greem and his party traveled on a gray road.


    As they had all concealed their appearance and clothes with magic, they looked no different from the nar natives in the eyes of onlookers.


    The road had been packed with fleeing refugees along the way, carrying bags and packages of various sizes with them. They all originated from the southeast and were aimlessly traveling down this long road. No one seemed to know what direction they should be fleeing in.


    As Greem and his party were heading in thepletely opposite direction, there many warm-hearted people along the way who tried to persuade them to turn around and avoid marching towards therge capitals and floating cities. It was said that those locations were where the fighting was most intense and where the casualties were the heaviest!


    Greem smiled and rejected the advice, bringing his threepanions along the road as they approached their first target.


    The first target designated by the main party was a small city protected by an arcane tower.


    ¡°Since the leader designated you as the party leader, Lord Greem, how do you intend to assign our positions in the uing fight?¡± It had been a boring journey. The Dark Witch, who had been silent throughout it, could no longer resist the urge to speak.


    A sour stench of rot spread through the air the moment she started speaking.


    Upon hearing her mention mission assignments, Adept Mangus and Adept Holly from the Silver Union couldn¡¯t help but lift their heads and look at Greem as well.


    The Dark Witch was called Shani. She was a powerful intermediate Fourth Grade adept.


    Her appearance and figure were excellent, making her an exceptional beauty from the outside. She was also unusually slender and tall. However, she was incredibly cold and arrogant as well, rarely ever interacting with any other member of the party.


    It wasn¡¯t just the male adepts like Greem and Holly. Even Cherisha couldn¡¯t start a conversation with her.


    Adept Holly had inherited the tradition of the Silver Union. He was a powerful golem master himself.


    The magical golem he controlled was an unusual starlight armored suit. It could be remotely controlled or equipped onto his person. It was a golem of surprising power.


    Adept Holly himself was a short adept of only 1.6 or 1.7 meters in height. He appeared to be slightly skinny and frail, with an average appearance and short brown hair.


    Greem and the others were supposedly a party, but there was no actual hierarchical rtionship between them. Moreover, everyone¡¯s power was approximately at the same level. As such, apart from the two-headed adept, who had no qualms calling Greem¡¯ leader¡¯, there was unresolved tension from the other two adepts. They were both upset with the title of party leader that had just been given to Greem.


    As such, Dark Witch Shani chose to be the first to create trouble when the looming arcane tower appeared on the horizon!


    ¡°You¡¯ve all seen it as it is. The war hasn¡¯t spread here yet, and the arcane tower only has some of the most basic arcane defenses activated.¡± Greem brought the others to a clearing by the roadside. They peered silently at the arcane tower through the canopy of the swaying trees.


    ¡°If we are fast enough, we could breach the tower before the arcanists can activate their most potent defenses. Once we are inside, those weaklings will be nothing to us!¡±


    ¡°You mean for us to...breach the tower by force?¡± Adept Holly¡¯s face couldn¡¯t help but turn dark at the suggestion.


    He, the golem master, was the only adept of the four of them that was suited for a task like this¨C to charge and breach enemy lines. If they were to execute the n ording to what Greem had just mentioned, he would probably have to take on the most tiring and challenging part of the work!


    ¡°A forceful breach is not a good idea!¡± Greem shook his head and said, ¡°This tower is small and not much of a threat to the few of us. However, taking it by force will exhaust us substantially. We still have many targets to attack on this mission. We can¡¯t be wasting our strength in such an inconsequential ce!¡±


    The color in Adept Holly¡¯s face looked better when he heard this.


    ¡°Then why don¡¯t you tell us what we should do?¡± Dark Witch Shani still had an ice-cold expression on her face.


    ¡°We can create some small trouble in the city, something of the likes of a refugee riot, to draw out the arcanists from the tower to suppress themotion. This way, we canunch our attacks during the chaos.¡±


    Everyone lowered their heads and thought for a moment. Though they were still full of doubts and dissatisfaction towards Greem, the strategy he had just suggested was indeed the most suitable n for their current situation.


    Everyone nodded their heads in agreement.


    ¡°There might be arcane facilities monitoring the entire city in the arcane tower. The enemy might very easily detect spillover magical flux in the city; it¡¯s best if we do not use any spells. If anyone has any innate abilities suited for this situation, now would be a good time to use them.¡± Greem brooded for a moment and patched up some of the potential gaps in their ns.


    ¡°Let me do it!¡± Adept Mangus couldn¡¯t help but betray a wicked smile, ¡°My sister is more proficient in mind magic. She also has some unique mind powers. We won¡¯t alert the arcanists at all.¡±


    ¡°Good. Once we enter the city, Mangus, you will be in charge of agitating the refugees and citizens into a riot. It would be best if you could send some of them to surround the arcane tower. Holly, you and Shani lie in ambush near the entrance of the arcane tower and wait for my signal. Charge straight into the arcane tower once you receive my signal. Remember, you absolutely must destroy their elementium pool first!¡±


    ¡°I understand!¡±


    ¡°Mm!¡±


    Those who could stand here in Morrian ne were all powerful individuals among the adepts who had survived through tens of thousands of bloody wars. They did not require excessively specific ns and strategies for a mission like this. They only needed to know the rough outline of the operation, and they would naturally know what to do.


    ¡°Let¡¯s enter the city, then!¡±


    Greem lifted his head and smiled. He took onest look at that looming arcane tower. It was then that he drew up his hood, tightened his cloak, and walked out of the clearing into the bustling mass of people as they headed towards the human city in the distance.

 Chapter 1084 - Lure

    <strong>Chapter 1084 Lure</strong>


    This ce was only a small city in another world.


    However, it didn¡¯t appear much different from human cities of the World of Adepts in Greem¡¯s spiritual senses. If one had to pick out something different, it would undoubtedly be the unusual architecture and facilities that were in the style of the arcanists¡¯ society.


    There were wide, smooth roads, orderly shops, civilians in bright and colorful clothes, a clean and beautiful environment, as well as small gardens and parks everywhere.


    Greem had been in dozens of different nes, and even he had to admit that the civilians of the Arcane Empire were the humans with the most privileges and the highest standard of living.


    He couldn¡¯t see a single arcanist in the streets, but the personality and character of the Arcane Empire still manifested everywhere.


    For instance, the tall streetmps were lining the side of the streets.


    Even the most wealthy and extravagant cities of the World of Adepts only used the cheapest of illumination stones as the light source for their streetmps. Yet here in Morrian ne, an arcane crystal with excellent magical conductivity could be found in each and everymp.


    Arcane fountains, arcane zas, arcane gardens, arcane libraries. In front of several stores, Greem even saw ordinary people ordering arcane golems to move cargo.


    Metallic golems cost upwards of over a thousand magical crystals in the World of Adepts. Only adepts would have the ability to own golems like these!


    Though the turmoil of the nar world had unavoidably spread to this city as well, life here was still rtively peaceful and stablepared to the rest of the world. After all, even those ferocious otherworldly monsters would have trouble wreaking havoc in this ce while the arcane tower protected them.


    Greem took off his thick traveler¡¯s cloak upon arriving in the city. He removed his hood and revealed his handsome face, smiling and looking around as he mixed in with the crowd.


    The poption of this city was fairly small.


    Even with all the refugees that had arrived in the past few months, there were only fifty thousand people in the city.


    Moreover, the city had plenty of refugee shelters that were in perfect condition. There weren¡¯t very many homeless people in the streets at all.; the city was still orderly.


    However, with his pervasive spiritual senses, Greem could sense that the two-headed adept was now taken over by Cherisha and that she had sessfully made her way into the shelter where the refugees gathered. Meanwhile, Adept Holly and Witch Shani were hiding in a noble¡¯s mansion just two hundred meters away from the arcane tower. They were staring at its entrance from a distance.


    This arcane tower was sixty meters tall and was divided into nine surface levels and two underground levels. It glowed with a faint arcane radiance. The entire tower shone brilliantly and colorfully, even in the middle of the day.


    Within Greem¡¯s powerful Elementium Sight, the arcane tower also appeared to be connected with all the arcane facilities in the city. Several well-hidden energy circuits connected all the facilities to the tower.


    It seemed like all the arcane facilities in the city were supported by the tower¡¯s elementium pool!


    Such a design and consideration for themon people were no problem during times of peace. However, there was no doubt that these energy circuits would be the arcane tower¡¯s highest security risk when war broke out.


    It seemed like the arcanists had been staying infort for far too long. They had forgotten the taste of danger!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and sigh softly.


    ............


    Rian Province, Arcane Tower Four.


    ¡°Tower Master, more and more refugees have been swarming in from the north. Merkin City has reached its capacity. I think...we should send the refugees further north.¡± The one speaking was the young and capable Riant, one of the three Third Ring arcanists of Arcane Tower Four.


    He was a young man with stiff, brown hair, and he was one of the current masters of this arcane tower.


    ording to the basic configuration of the Arcane Empire, a facility like Arcane Tower Four required the presence of at least one Fourth Ring arcanist. However, with the esction of the war outside the nar barrier, human resources were bing increasingly scarce. After multiple drafts, only three Third Ring arcanists remained stationed in Arcane Tower Four.


    The invasion of otherworldly creatures that had recently urred in the south had caused tensions and anxiety to rise here.


    Though the terrifying disaster creatures had yet to invade deeply into the Arcane Empire, therge numbers of refugees fleeing this way had already thrown cities all over the Empire into disarray. Everyone was requesting aid from the leaders of the Empire.


    ¡°Riant, do you think we could organize arge-scale migration with all the chaos in the Empire right now?¡± The tower master was an old man whose hair had gone white. He had an ancient pair of tortoise-shell sses sitting on the bridge of his nose. The wrinkles on his face piled together as he spoke bitterly and helplessly, ¡°Moreover, we can protect the people from the disaster creatures with the arcane facilities and the arcane tower while they remain in the city. If the migration party runs into those monsters on their journey...¡±


    He did not continue speaking, but the other arcanists present could easily imagine the scene of carnage that would ur. Their faces turned dark at the very thought of it.


    ¡°Tower master, I¡¯ve discovered abnormal magical fluctuations on the west coast of the continent in my past few days of observing the stars. I¡¯m worried that it might be those otherworldly invaders slipping into the ne. I suggest we send a scouting party to investigate. If the enemy really intends to invade from that location, we can notify Reisin Garden and have the floating city mobilize their forces. At the very least, it would prevent the tragedy of Gan Province. It could save Rian from being conquered by the enemy and the loss of millions of civilian lives.¡± It was Arcanist Sors who spoke up now. He was the most proficient at astrology in Arcane Tower Four.


    Everything he said caused the faces of hispanions to turn even paler.


    ¡°Gan Province has already been conquered by the enemy. It is now a battlefield where our arcane golems are fiercely fighting against those otherworldly monsters. If...if what Sors said is true, then I¡¯m afraid our Rian Province will also be in danger now!¡± The tower master let out a sorrowful sigh.


    ¡°It¡¯s best if we don¡¯te to conclusions so early. After all, the nar world is in intense turmoil right now. It¡¯s possible that it was just some turbulence from the magical tides. We should send a scouting party to investigate as soon as possible.¡±


    ¡°Since the two of you think there is a need for that, then we will send Squad Thirteen!¡±


    ¡°I agree!¡±


    ¡°I also agree!¡±


    While the three Third Ring arcanists solemnly discussed the current circumstances surrounding the Empire, the arcane crystal on the table before them suddenly glowed red and started shing.


    An emergency. It was an alert message that urred when the arcane tower detected an incident.


    The gaze of the old tower master suddenly turned sharp. He pressed the arcane crystal, and the troubled voice of a man came ringing from within.


    ¡°Lord Dous, Lord Dous, this isn¡¯t good. It¡¯s terrible. The refugees have revolted!¡±


    Refugees? Revolted?


    This sentence that came out of nowhere confused the three arcanistspletely.


    However, the situation would not be too difficult as long as it wasn¡¯t an invasion by otherworldly creatures.


    The three arcanists were not particrly worried when hearing the report. They contacted the arcanist stationed in the monitoring room and quickly understood the cause-and-effect of everything.


    Perhaps out of fear or an issue with the rations, a violent conflict had broken out between the civilians of the city and the refugees. It had quickly snowballed to the level of a riot.


    The refugees were incredibly furious and were wildly beating people and robbing stores as they marched down the street. It seemed like they were making their way towards the arcane tower.


    ¡°Bastards! These people! Do they not know how much pressure the Arcane Empire is enduring in this war? To think...to think they would choose toe out and cause trouble at this moment!¡±


    ¡°It seems like we need to respond with harsher methods. Exile them from the city as soon as possible. We cannot have them shake the faith of the civilians and cause even greater panic.¡±


    ¡°Let me go! I will lead a squad of arcane golems and chase them back to the shelters!¡±


    ¡°Very well. We will act separately then. We can¡¯t let their chaos spread through the city.¡±


    The gates to the arcane tower opened under themand of the arcanists. The translucent barrier flickered a few times and slowly vanished. Squads of tall and ferocious arcane golems marched out in an orderly fashion under themand of a dozen arcanists. They immediately walked into the wide arcane za in the city.


    Meanwhile, Adept Holly and Dark Witch Shani, who had been waiting for this opportunity in the dark, also received a magical message from Greem.


    ¡°Now! Remember to destroy the elementium pool first.¡±


    ¡°Hehehe. There has to be quite a lot of treasure in this arcane tower. Whoever grabs it first gets to keep it. Don¡¯t get jealous of me after this,¡± Adept Holly cackled and charged forward without any hesitation.


    Meanwhile, Witch Shani abruptly vanished from the spot without a trace.


    A massive, earth-shaking explosion rang out.


    Adept Holly strode out of the shadows and appeared in front of the arcane za. Mysterious star substance surged out of thin air around him, forming into pieces of gleaming blue metal that quickly attached to his body.


    Adept Holly¡¯s body grew taller and bigger with every step he took.


    He was a massive metal golem by the time he arrived in front of the arcane golems. He was six meters tall, his entire body covered in thick and heavy armor.


    Adept Hollyughed and fought his way into the ranks of the arcane golems under the horrified gazes of the arcanists.

 Chapter 1085 - Devastation

    <h4>Chapter 1085 Devastation</h4>


    The metal giant that Adept Holly had turned into possessed impressive might that far surpassed these arcane golems.


    The arcane golems that only reached his waist were so frail and fragile in front of him.


    Loud metallic snapping and crackling rang out as the metal giant charged like a stampeding bull through a china store. It immediately pierced through the army of arcane golems, its domineering figure appearing in front of the arcanists. The metal giant had knocked the arcane golems all over the ce,rge web-like cracks covering their rune-carved bodies.


    ¡°Little brats, make way!¡±


    Adept Holly was hidden well within the astral construct. He extended a giant metallic hand, and countless blinding starlight descended from the skies, wildly ravaging the shocked and terrified arcanists.


    These dozen arcanists were of various grades. Some were young, and some were old. Some were male, while others were female. Without a single exception, every one of them was draped in fine and ornate arcane robes.


    As the violent starlight crashed down upon them,yers of dense and thick arcane light shimmered around their bodies, desperately protecting them against this fearsome power.


    If they were all Fourth Ring arcanists and enhanced by energy from the arcane tower, they just might have been able to defend against Adept Holly¡¯s attack. Unfortunately, the most powerful one present in the group was only a Third Ring arcanist!


    The arcanists¡¯ energy forcefields slowly shattered, one by one, beneath the splendorous beams of starlight. As the vicious starlight seeped into their bodies, they turned into human sculptures devoid of all life before even their human forms started to copse and disintegrate, turning into scattered sparks.


    Not a single piece of flesh or blood remained of any arcanist that died in this manner. Their existence had been thoroughly deleted.


    The arcanists erupted, one after another, like blooming fireworks. No one could have expected that even death could look so beautiful!


    The eyes of young Arcanist Riant reddened as he saw hispanions die one by one around him in such an unusual fashion. Insuppressible anger and rage filled his chest.


    He was a Third Ring arcanist, after all. He had much better equipment than his First and Second Ringpanions. Moreover, the arcane tower had instantly applied an arcane shield around him. It had saved him from following in hispanions¡¯ footsteps and washing into exploding fireworks by that enchantingly blinding starlight.


    Riant furiously poured magical energy into the arcane shield to defend against the corrosion of the starlight, all while rapidly establishing a connection with the spell pool inside the tower. A rapid series of chants came out of his mouth. Several blinding beams of arcane light flowed out of his hands, shooting towards the towering metal giant.


    Unfortunately, his meager power was nothing to a Fourth Grade golem master. He had only one second of brilliance before he was crushed to mincemeat beneath a giant metal foot.


    There was a muffled squish. After stomping a Third Ring arcanist to death, Adept Holly promptly rushed towards the entrance of the arcane tower. He smashed through the arcane barriers while the metal gates had yet to shut, and the tower¡¯s primary barriers not yet activated. Thus, he stepped into the tower.


    A slender, shadowy silhouette appeared momentarily at the gates from the energy turbulence caused by the shattered arcane barrier. The shadowsted for less than a second. It cackled sinisterly and melded into the air once more, vanishing without a trace.


    ¡°Alert...alert...alert.


    ¡°Invaders have entered the arcane tower. All defensive systems activate.


    ¡°All members of Arcane Tower Four, return to your positions. Defensive retaliation system will be activated in three seconds. Three...two...one.


    ¡°Defensive retaliation system has been activated.


    ¡°Primary barriers activating now. All entrances and exit on the first and second level have been sealed. Target creature is locked on.


    ¡°Beep. Beep. Beep. Emergency alert. A second invader has been detected. Invader has breached the second level.


    ¡°Passageways on the third, fourth, and fifth level of the tower have been sealed. Arcane guards are mobilizing.


    ¡°Warning. Warning. Target Creature One is heading to Basement Level One. Initial estimates suggest invader¡¯s target to be the elementium pool in the energy room. Enemy action categorized as a ss One Threat. Requesting immediate interception by tower arcanists.


    ¡°......¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    The elderly Third Ring arcanist couldn¡¯t help but lift his head and sigh sorrowfully during the ring rms from the tower spirit.


    There was no need to probe the enemy. The fundamental strength of the enemy could be deduced from how fast and barbaric the enemy was in their assault.


    It was a terrifying enemy, more than a match for low-grade arcanists like themselves!


    If there were a Fourth Ring arcanist stationed in this arcane tower, those evil adepts that had broken into the ne would never dare to be so reckless. However, with the continued war, all the high-grade arcanists had been mobilized to the nar battlefield or Gan Province to wage war.


    All this mobilization had left Arcane Tower Four weak and vulnerable. To think, the enemy had managed to prate so deep into the tower in just six minutes.


    How...how could this not make his heart ache!?


    As the current master of the arcane tower, the old man¡¯s duty was to maintain the regional peace and protect these arcane schrs and arcane apprentices that had been with him for so many years.


    As such, faced with such a determined and unstoppable enemy, the tower master had only one choice. His heart bled as he pressed the arcane crystal in front of him.


    ¡°All arcanists of Arcane Tower Four. When you hear this message, evacuate the arcane tower immediately, regardless of whether you are in your station or fighting against the enemy. I have authorized the tower spirit to activate the emergency exits. You must flee the arcane tower as quickly as possible. The...the enemies that have invaded today are too powerful for us to resist. Your only mission now is to protect yourself and make it to...ah¡ª¡±


    While the arcanists of the arcane tower were listening to the tower master¡¯s broadcast with bloodshot eyes, his words suddenly stopped. They were instead quickly reced by a suppressed grunt of agony.


    A cold and elegant female voice then reced the elderly tower master¡¯s, arrogantly reverberating between the walls of the arcane tower.


    ¡°Run...run, puny arcanists! This little ship is about to sink. You lot had better escape as quickly as you can. That said, I still want to y a little game with you before you flee. Let¡¯s see which of you is truly fortunate enough to escape this arcane tower. As long as you leave this ce, I will generously let you live; you have my word that I will not pursue you. But for those of you that remain in the tower......your lives and souls will forever remain here. Hahaha! Well now, let the game begin!¡±


    Dark, indiscernible shadows appeared all over the arcane tower as Dark Witch Shani¡¯s crazed, piercingughter rang out. These shadows quickly distorted and morphed when they arose, turning into dark, slender, and feminine shadows.


    These shadows looked very simr to Dark Witch Shani¡¯s own profile. It seemed like they were some of her many shadow clones.


    These shadow clones all seemed to possess a trace of consciousness of their own. Theyughed sinisterly upon forming and started wandering the tower, searching for the hiding arcanists.


    Meanwhile, the old tower master was now lying on the ground in the central control hall of the arcane tower, a gaping hole in his chest. The heart in his hollowed-out chest had vanishedpletely.


    Dark Witch Shani stood at the control crystal. Her mouth was slightly agape as tendrils of faint, ck smoke slowly came out and merged with the crystal. Inbination with the passwords and means of control that she had seeded in retrieving from the tower master¡¯s mind, Shani had managed to use her powers to erode the crystal. She had managed to suppress the tower spirit somewhat and was slowly starting to take over control of the arcane tower.


    A semi-translucent projection of the tower appeared above the control crystal. Every hidden room, hidden passage, warehouse, and storage facilities were fully disyed. Even the arcanists and arcane apprentices in the tower were indicated with red dots of various brightness.


    Shaniughed sinisterly.


    Whenever she pointed at a ce in the tower, the scene taking ce in that location would be magnified and projected in front of her. It showed the arcanists panicking as they tried to dodge the attacks from their own arcane golems. The magical doors that had always granted them free ess seemed to have malfunctioned as well, leaving them isted and trapped in individual rooms of their own.


    Shani reveled in the crazed expressions of the arcanists as she pointed with her finger and sent clusters of dark energy through the tower.


    A shadow assassin simr to Shani in appearance quickly formed wherever the dark energy traveled!


    The panicked and terrified cries of the arcanists soon filled the entire tower.


    ............


    Greem casually strolled through the arcane tower.


    The four adepts had already broken in. They were scattered throughout the different levels, ughtering, or simply scouring for treasure. Everyone was doing what they enjoyed the most.


    Dark Witch Shani had taken over the central control hall and seemed to be having plenty of fun in there.


    Adept Holly had been studying and researching something in the energy room in the basement after knocking down thest arcane golem.


    Two-headed Adept Mangus was cooped up in the warehouses looting all he could.


    Meanwhile, Greem turned corner after corner, walked through door after door, and finally arrived at the knowledge hall in the arcane tower. A trail of magical doors had a human imprint burned through them from where he passed through.


    This ce was only a small arcane tower in a rural province, after all. Their magical doors only had ordinary magic resistance and couldn¡¯t possibly stop a Fourth Grade elementium adept.


    Thus, Greem broke into the knowledge hall and started using the Chip¡¯s rapid scan and copy functions to quickly record the contents of every single book into his mind.


    Aprehensive and organized system of the arcane arts was rapidly forming in the depths of his mind.

 Chapter 1086 - The Weakness of the Floating Cities

    <h4>Chapter 1086 The Weakness of the Floating Cities</h4>


    Reisin Garden, a floating city.


    As thergest floating city in Rian Province, Reisin Garden was the ideal holiday resort for all arcanists.


    The Reisin Garden floating city hovered above the Crystal Lake, beyond the clouds. Below the city was the vast and boundless Flowertalk ins, where one¡¯s eyes would get tired just looking at the sheer space. It didn¡¯t matter which corner of the Flowertalk ins you were in. When the skies were clear, and the white clouds could no longer conceal the massive body of the floating city, you would be able to witness its sacred and beautiful outline.


    It was currently the time of the day where the sun was at its brightest.


    Sunlight spread a gentle warmth throughout the floating city through the arcane barriers.


    It had magnificent gardens, pristine white arcane zas, beautiful fountains that were the very epitome of arcane civilization, proportionate, unique, and elegant architecture, as well as arcane casters with books in hands that lingered around the gardens, marble paths, and fountains.


    Anyone would instantly feel peace and calm at the sight of all this. They would feel the dense, mature academic atmosphere of the arcanists¨C ¡®to pursue knowledge, to yearn for the truth.¡¯


    From a certain perspective, the arcanists were truly pursuers of knowledge and practitioners of truth!


    At this moment, several high-grade arcanists were sitting solemnly before a long table in the central hall of Reisen Garden. Sorrow, frustration, and anger were written all over their faces. They were all dressed in light-blue arcane-robes with golden threads drawing all sorts of mysterious magical runes on the fabric.


    Every single arcanist that could sit at this table was, without exception, a high-grade arcanist of at least Third Ring and above.


    A pretty female arcanist with a golden headband sat at the head of the table. She had an arcane emblem on her chest in the symbol of an open scroll. Five miniature quill pens rested above the emblem, representing the arcanist¡¯s profession and grade.


    The open scroll meant that she was a schr primarily focused on academic research, while the five pens meant that she had attained the Fifth Ring.


    Much like the World of Adepts, the upper limit of power in Morrian ne was also the peak of Fourth Grade.


    As such, Fifth Ring arcanists like herself could only avoid bacsh from the ne while she remained within the arcane barriers. Once she left the floating city and lost the protection of the barrier, most of her power would be suppressed, leaving her at the level of a Fourth Grade.


    Fortunately, she would still retain her superior energy application methods andbat techniques. That made her remain more potent than most Fourth Ring arcanists.


    It was also an important reason why the Great Arcanists were willing to enter the ne, even if they knew how dangerous it was to do so!


    Great Arcanist Fre looked around her and cleared her throat. It was then that she announced the main reason for the meeting in her somewhat hoarse voice.


    ¡°We havepletely lost all contact with Arcane Towers Four, Seven, and Nine.¡±


    Cries of surprise rang out throughout the table the moment Fre¡¯s words came out of her mouth.


    Several arcane towers on the outskirts of Rian Province had gone offline during this moment of crisis for the Arcane Empire. It...it couldn¡¯t help but cause the arcanists present at the meeting to have a bad premonition of what was toe!


    ¡°What are the astrologists doing? The floating city has been providing them with so many resources and so much wealth on an annual basis, and they still couldn¡¯t predict such a significant incident on the outskirts?¡± A Fourth Ring arcanist furiously mmed his hand against the table.


    ¡°Indeed, indeed. Did Noyan not recently im himself to be a master of divination? How did he not divine the enemy approaching us? Do we really have no clue who it is exactly that is attacking us?¡± Someone immediately stepped forward and voiced his agreement.


    A bald female arcanist in a purple robe decorated with astral images opened her eyes and coldly answered her colleague¡¯s demands, ¡°The Empire¡¯s centralmand has already given out orders. All high-grade astrologists were to head out to Gan Province to aid in the war. Meanwhile, the astrology apprentices that remain behind cannot deal with the bacsh from all the nar turmoil. The astrology tform has not been activated in the past few weeks.¡±


    ¡°We can understand being unable to predict the enemy¡¯s invasion. After all, the ne¡¯s river of Fate has already been stirred into a total mess by all the otherworldly beings that have invaded. No one can hope to see anything in all this fog. That said, the enemy has now invaded Rian Province and taken down three arcane towers. Are...are you still unable to see anything even under these circumstances?¡± Fifth Ring Fre was the one to speak this time.


    The bald arcanist was only at the Third Ring, but her noble status as an astrologist allowed her to speak with Fre as an equal.


    Upon hearing Fre¡¯s question, she closed her eyes in pain and started to speak with much difficulty, ¡°The enemy is split into three parties! An exceedingly mysterious power cloaks two of those parties. Our eyes of Fate cannot even approach them in the slightest.¡±


    ¡°And the other party? Who are they?¡±


    ¡°Adepts. They are evil adepts from the World of Adepts!¡±


    The sound of everyone inhaling immediately rang out across the table.


    The invaders were only adepts, which made them much easier to deal withpared to the rest of the otherworldly opponents.


    However, that was only in rtion to Reisen Garden during the peak of the Arcane Empire. The arcanists of Reisin Garden then would have had the power required to face off against the evil adepts. However, now that most of the Great Arcanists who were proficient in fighting had been drafted to the frontlines, there weren¡¯t very manybatants left. The only Fifth Ring Great Arcanist remaining here was a schr.


    Under such circumstances, the conditions did not look good for Reisin Graden, even if the enemies were not the strongest of adepts.


    After all, if the enemy had the confidence to sneak into the ne, then they were surely an elite group of high-grade adepts. They would be proficient in ughter, gues, curses, and ambushes. The floating city would have incredible trouble putting together a group of arcanists that could defeat them!


    With the floating city and all its powerful arcane facilities behind them, the arcanists might stand a chance. However, away from the floating city and away from their arcane towers, the arcanists were not the opponents of the evil adepts, even if they were all at the same grade and had equipment of simr power. After all, the evil adepts specialized inbat and murder.


    It was an iron truth that the arcanists had verified with the lives and blood of countless of their own!


    ¡°Can we determine their intentions?¡± Even the Fifth Ring Great Arcanist felt her scalp buzz at the mention of the name of the adepts. She couldn¡¯t help but move the discussion forward.


    ¡°The other two parties cannot be tracked, so we cannot determine anything about their intentions. Meanwhile, the remaining party is formed by four Fourth Grade adepts. They have been ughtering everything in their path towards us!¡±


    ¡°The floating city. Their target is the floating city?¡± Fre could barely believe her ears.


    This ce was the central control of Rian Province. It was Reisin Garden Floating City!


    Had the evil adepts already be so brazen and fearless in their actions? To think they would dare to invade a mighty floating city with just four Fourth Grade adepts!


    It was simply too unbelievable!


    ¡°Keep a constant eye out for these adepts¡¯ position. Report to me if there are any movements at all. Furthermore, notify all arcane towers across the province: There is no need to be concerned about the energy reserves of the elementium pools any longer. Immediately go into the highest alert. The evil adepts must not be allowed to breach the arcane towers so easily again.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Additionally, all arcane security squads are to mobilize immediately. They are to find the evil adepts as soon as possible and exterminate them on the outskirts of Flowertalk ins. The three floating cities of Rian Province are responsible for seventeen percent of the arcane energy supply on the battlefield outside the ne. We must not allow the evil adepts to destroy our energy system!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    Rian Province had three floating cities, and the enemy sent three parties of powerful adepts. The arcanists would never believe that there wasn¡¯t a connection between these two factors.


    The hearts of all the arcanists couldn¡¯t help but turn heavy.


    They had a feeling that these three adept parties were headed straight for the logistical energy supply of the Arcane Empire.


    Once they stopped the energy transfer from the floating cities here, the Great Arcanists fighting against those powerful enemies beyond the nar barrier would lose their energy supply. When that happened, the Arcane Empire would no longer be able to stop all those evil creatures from invading Morrian!


    While the arcanists were engaged in discussion, the entire floating city lightly trembled. A massive energy pir rose from above the arcane tower at the center of the city. The column of energy pierced the skies and beamed towards a ce beyond the nar barrier.


    A massive floating fortress could also be found there, guiding the torrent of energy into its own dried-up elementium pool. The energy reserves of the floating fortress started to fill up at a visible rate.


    Just two thousand kilometers away from the floating fortress was a space battlefield where flesh and blood were intertwined and where the distinction between life and death was nearly non-existent.


    The hordes of strange monsters constantly shed with the stubborn walls of the floating fortress. Energy pirs radiating destructive auras swept across the entire battlefield. Tens of thousands of creatures died wherever the pirs passed by, their flesh burned and carbonized to ash.


    However, fighting in such a manner demanded a tremendous amount of energy from the fortress.


    Every so often, a floating fortress the size of a tiny continent would retreat from the battlefield and descend close to the nar barrier of Morrian. They would then anchor their position and connect with a floating city within the ne and begin long-distance energy refueling.


    Three floating cities hovered above leyline nodes across the vast continent of Kentos. They were taking on the task of concentrating and redirecting the arcane energy to the floating fortresses above.


    Once the charging process waspleted, the floating cities would fall into a short period of energy exhaustion. It was also the time where they were most vulnerable to enemy invasions.


    To prevent the floating cities from being attacked by the evil adepts, tall arcane towers rumbled and flew away from Reisin Garden, heading somewhere toward the distant horizon.

 Chapter 1087 - Cooperation

    <h4>Chapter 1087 Cooperation</h4>


    Origin of Magic, On the Birth of the First Magic Elementium Particle, Magical Characteristics of Single-Reversed Sillin Particles under Heavy Maism. Magical Material Studies, Research on Conductive Magical Materials, The Past and Present of Arcanists, A Guide to Arcane Tower Construction. Basic Applications of Anti-Gravity Barriers within Floating Rings, The Energy Cooldown Problem in Compound Arcane Spells......


    After sessfully robbing the arcane tower, everyone in Greem¡¯s party obtained spoils that they were satisfied with.


    Naturally, the party members kept their findings to themselves. No one would reveal what they had obtained.


    Greem¡¯s loot was a mountain of basic arcane tomes, along with the journals, diaries, and notes of many arcanists.


    With this literature, the arcane knowledge branch that had diverted from the adept¡¯s main knowledge system would have enough necessary data. It gave him the fundamental materials and data he needed for the deduction of higher-grade arcane spells.


    At the moment, Greem¡¯s primary interest in the arcane knowledge system was still the floating rings that the arcanists had developed.


    One could frankly im that the invention of the floating rings was the decisive factor behind the arcanists¡¯ ability to create flying towers and cities. The so-called floating cities were only ordinary human cities carried upon massive floating rings!


    Naturally, with the wealth of knowledge that Greem had managed to amass, he could imagine that the arcanists had employed an advanced technique to enhance the simple Anti-Gravity Barrier and assimte it into their architecture. That said, though he could understand the principles behind it, actually attempting to reverse-engineer the technology and apply it would take the Chip at least a hundred years of calctions.


    Of course, the floating rings of the arcanists did note into existence from the spark of ingenuity from just one or two geniuses. It was the product of research and failure, and then more research and failure over thousands of years and hundreds of generations of arcanists.


    It was after yet more hundreds of years of constant improvement and refinement before the floating rings became an epochal invention that could carry buildings and entire cities into the skies!


    In terms of the level of the knowledge system and the maturity of the civilization, the World of Adepts was head and shoulders above the Arcane Empire.


    However, why was it that the World of Adepts did not invent these magical flying buildings, while the Arcane Empire managed to do so? The main reason was because of the difference in ideals between the leaders of the two factions!


    Perhaps the adepts¡¯ system of development had gone down a deviant path, or maybe the tens of thousands of years of fighting against powerful creatures had caused the adepts to lose their original ideals. The adepts no longer believed in the pursuit of the origin of magic and the uncovering of the truth of the world as their primary ideal. No, their only goal was survival.


    In a world where the war between the Scourge Lords and the Titans raged on without end, lesser powers like the World of Adepts, the World of Gods, and the Kingdom of Dragons could only desperately empower themselves to avoid bing a sacrificial pawn in the tides of war.


    As such, the World of Adepts prioritized the survival and power of the individual when they cultivated new adepts. In contrast, the universalization and derivation of adept magicgged behind considerably.


    In all seriousness, no adept would ever spend hundreds of years researching a knowledge system that waspletely unrted to their own abilities. If they had any resources, they would invest it in the improvement of their Physique or Spirit, or in the research of methods to improve theirbat power.


    As for the applications of magic for the civilians and the peasants? It wasn¡¯t as if these instances never urred, but they were only small sparks by individual adepts in a massive world. They would never gather into a wildfirerge enough to thoroughly change the lives of themon folk of the World of Adepts.


    Thus, the adepts pursued only greater heights in magic. The width and breadth of their magic were inferior to that of the Arcane Empire!


    The floating cities created by the Silver Union? The technology and techniques used in building those floating cities came entirely from the unusual and powerful magic of the Great Adepts. It wasn¡¯t due to some profound technological breakthrough.


    Techniques and abilities like that would not benefit ordinary adepts in any manner!


    Apart from the floating rings, Greem was also reasonably interested in the Arcane Empire¡¯s energy system.


    Resources and energy were two necessary and eternal requirements for the rise of any major force!


    The energy supply system of the Arcane Empire relied primarily on the elementium pools.


    The arcanists still firmly believed that the origin of magic¡¯s power came from the four fundamental elements¨C earth, fire, water, and wind.


    They used the changes in the magical tides in space to draw in magical elementium into their elementium pools, where the energy was sorted. This energy could then be used to support their arcane research and the operation of all their arcane facilities. It was only when the magical elementium in the pools had been modted and tamed that it could be transferred to the magic pools. These magic pools could then serve as a source of power that reced the arcanists¡¯ own arcane energy.


    An arcanist wasn¡¯t powerful because of the arcane energy they had umted through their own power. Rather, they were powerful because a magic pool with near-infinite energy supported them. As such, the arcanists only needed to focus on the research of arcane knowledge. They no longer needed to meditate diligently day after day to umte energy, as the adepts did.


    It indirectly resulted in the individual arcanist bing weak and incredibly reliant upon arcane facilities!


    The more Greem understood about the Arcane Empire, the more he sympathized with the civilization.


    From a certain standpoint, arcanists were just ¡®adepts¡¯ that had walked down a different path. It was only a difference in the environment of the ne they were born in and their view towards the universe that drove them down two entirely distinct paths of development.


    The adepts prioritized individual might, while the arcanists prioritized the strength of the whole!


    There wasn¡¯t a clear superior path between the two, nor was there a correct or an incorrect one. In the end, it was only a matter of Fate.


    Given the current circumstances, the World of Adepts would continue to thrive and grow stronger. At the same time, the Arcane Empire faced an existential threat, teetering on the brink of destruction at any moment.


    ............


    Inside a valley forest near Metso City.


    Greem hid himself using the tall trees and looked at a diminutive ck dot on the distant horizon through the gaps in the canopy.


    The ck dot was tiny but distinct.


    It glided along the clouds, moving slowly as it flew. Several bright beams of arcane light descended from the ck dot, sweeping the ground over and over again. It was apound arcane-magic thatbined the effects of Scan and Life Sense. Any lifeform with body heat, flesh, and a soul would not escape the scan.


    This arcane tower had been wandering near this area and scanning continuously since it appeared over the horizon. It was as if it was searching for something.


    Hundreds of tiny arcane golems patrolled around the arcane tower.


    They looked simr to the eyeballbat machines of the goblins. These arcane golems were also a sort of miniature armed aerial unit. Every time the arcane tower detected something on the ground, the arcane golems would dive downwards and bombard the area where the signal had been detected with fearsome energy beams.


    It didn¡¯t matter if it was a deer hiding in the bushes or a fat mole digging below ground. Nothing could escape the arcane tower¡¯s scan, and nothing could escape the barrage of energy beams.


    ¡°These fellows are trying to drive us out of hiding!¡± Mangus slowly walked to Greem¡¯s side. He nced at the arcane tower in the distance and smiled wickedly, ¡°It seems like we didn¡¯t give them enough of a punishmentst time!¡±


    ¡°This time is different from thest time!¡±Greem shook his head and said, ¡°Judging from the appearance, these are security arcane-towers direct from a floating city. They are much more potent than those local arcane towers. Moreover, if I am not wrong, there is most certainly a Fourth Ring arcanist stationed within that tower.¡±


    Adept Holly also came over when he heard the two adepts talking between themselves.


    ¡°So what if there¡¯s a Fourth Ring arcanist? They might im to be of the same level as a Fourth Grade adept, but it¡¯s not as if we don¡¯t know their actualbat capabilities. Every one of them is extremely weak in person!¡±


    ¡°That might be the case, but while protected by an arcane tower, they are still a very formidable force. At the very least, who amongst us could confidently say they could defeat an arcane tower controlled by a Fourth Ring arcanist?¡± Greem shook his head.


    ¡°In my opinion, knocking this arcane tower out of the sky should not be a problem if we work together.¡± Adept Holly licked his lips. He appeared somewhat excited and restless.


    ¡°What do we want to knock down the tower for? That will be prodding the ho¡¯s nest. There must still be other arcane towers in the surrounding areas searching for our tracks. It will be a little challenging to get away if they locate us!¡± Mangus obviously didn¡¯t want a direct confrontation. After all, he was the weakest of the four of them.


    Adept Holly didn¡¯t really care for Mangus¡¯ opinion. Instead, his gaze shifted to Greem.


    Seeing that Greem wasn¡¯t too interested in his proposal, Holly could only attempt to sway him with the promise of a reward.


    ¡°There is something that I really need in the energy room of the arcane tower. Because of that, I don¡¯t want to let go of any arcane towers we run across. However, it will be tough to take down an entire arcane tower alone. That is why I hope to have your assistance! Don¡¯t worry; I won¡¯t touch a single thing in the arcane tower apart from those things in the energy room. The rest is all yours.¡±


    ¡°Why don¡¯t you discuss this with Shani?¡± Greem smiled.


    ¡°That witch,¡± Holly¡¯s face turned into a frown, ¡°I can¡¯t convince her at all. She doesn¡¯t care about any sort of reward or treasure in the slightest. Hmph! Who knows what she is trying to obtain in volunteering for this mission?¡±


    ¡°Volunteering?¡± Greem was stunned for a moment and followed with a question, ¡°Witch Shani volunteered for this mission of her own volition?¡±


    ¡°Yeah! You people in Zhentarim definitely won¡¯t be able to find out such secrets. We of the Silver Union were only able to obtain this information because we have our means in the Northern Lands!¡±


    Greem had an idea. He lowered his head and thought for a moment. Finally, he spoke.


    ¡°You want me to help you? Sure. I won¡¯t take anything extra once the raid is done either. We will still split the loot equally, just as we have been doing.¡±


    ¡°Then what do you want?¡±


    ¡°I want a favor from you! When I need your help, I hope you can help me deal with someone without putting yourself at any risk, of course.¡±


    ¡°Who?¡±


    ¡°We will keep that a secret for the moment. At any rate, it won¡¯t jeopardize this mission nor put you in any danger. How about it? Do we have a deal?¡± Greem smiled faintly.


    It was Adept Holly¡¯s turn to frown and think now.


    Finally, after a long pause, he solemnly nodded his head and agreed to the terms!

 Chapter 1088 - Security Arcane Tower

    Chapter 1088 Security Arcane Tower


    A massive arcane tower was flying through the skies!


    It was something unimaginable in the World of Adepts.


    A standard small adept¡¯s tower typically had five to seven surface levels and two basement levels. Every level was around eight meters tall. When necessary, they could even be expanded up to twenty-five meters tall.


    Adept¡¯s towers were forged of unique stone materials that were further reinforced with magical runes. Mithril, tinum, magical gemstones, and other adept resources were used in many core areas. In addition to the necessary magical golems and facilities, an adept¡¯s tower easily weighed over four hundred tons.


    To lift such a heavy and massive object into the air and allow it to move and fly around freely was unimaginably difficult. Just the thought of such a colossal task would leave one speechless.


    However, such a miracle was presenting itself before Greem and the other adepts. They had no choice but to believe that this was reality.


    The arcane tower currently flying in the skies was visibly different in appearance to thest one they had conquered.


    There was a broad, t stone base, the silver body of the tower that slowly rose from the bottom, and the glowing arcane rings that surrounded the tower itself. It was obviously a small security tower specialized for aerialbat.


    Unlike an ordinary arcane tower, this security tower was devoid of most living and research facilities. Instead, a tremendous amount of lightning towers, me towers, storm towers, and tidal towers had been added within. These strange elementium towers, one-meter in diameter and five meters in height, were scattered all over the security tower.


    Whenever the arcane rings rose from the bottom of the tower to the very top, a blinding radiance would radiate from these elementium towers.


    The security tower had been hovering above a quiet and unpopted valley. It used its strange lightwaves to scan thend below when it detected a weak magical fluctuation in the forest five kilometers away.


    Like a hound that had smelled blood, light shimmered on the tower¡¯s wall. It quickly flew to the location of the signal, leaving behind a trail of light.


    The arcanist in the second level of the security tower in charge of scanning activated the arcane crystal with experienced movements. He began to search for the source of the abnormal flux.


    He subconsciously believed the magical flux to be an aftershock from a fight between magical creatures. However, the moment he activated the arcane crystal, a crimson spot of light abruptly appeared in the air, taking up all of his vision.


    ¡°Enemy assault.¡±


    The arcanist¡¯s panicked roar instantly rang out throughout the security tower. In the next second, the arcane barrier around the security tower thickened by over three times.


    The tower¡¯s defense had just been adjusted to the highest level when a colossal metallic figure crashed into the barrier.


    A deep, muffled boom rang out.


    The security tower trembled violently and spun as it fell backward through the air.


    A human-shaped dent appeared on the five-meter-thick arcane barrier. Cracks could be seen at the bottom of that dent. Pieces of arcane light peeled off from the barrier, scattering into the air and slowly dissipating away.


    The astral construct in which Holly was hiding was also quickly falling backward. He had been stunned by that reckless charge from earlier as well, and stars were flying in front of his eyes.


    While the security tower and the metallic golem were knocked away from each other on impact, the small elementium towers on the surface of the security tower started charging up magical energy for the four elements.


    The next second, countless lightning bolts, swerving fireballs, giant boulders, and clusters of frost enveloped the astral construct even as it continued to spin wildly across the sky. These elementium attacks turned into a torrent of arcane magic, repeatedly assaulting every part of the construct¡¯s body.


    The astral construct that Adept Holly was piloting was also rapidly melting away from the attacks.


    It was a primary characteristic of the arcanists¡¯ attacks!


    They did not like to chant spells as the adepts did, nor use powerful high-grade magic to overwhelm and kill the enemy. Instead, they preferred topound arge number of weaker, smaller spells to prate the opponent¡¯s defense.


    It wasn¡¯t a particrly fancy method of attack, but it was just as terrifying!


    After all, there were over a hundred elementium towers scattered all over the security tower. The arcane torrent formed from thebined might of all these elementium towers was definitely not something an ordinary person could hope to survive.


    Adept Holly was slightly surprised at this. He started to move and dodge in the air rapidly, all while mentally requesting help from Greem.


    Holly raised his hands, and beams of starlight fell from the sky, quickly assimting with the astral construct. The astral construct that had been somewhat worn down by the attacks thickened once again.


    Meanwhile, the security tower had just stabilized itself and was about to turn around to pursue the astral construct. A loud explosion rang out as a series of zing Fireballs erupted against the security tower.


    The vicious me shockwaves knocked the security tower around, making it difficult for the tower to stabilize itself. Seven or eight arcane guards that had been circling the security tower were caught in the sea of mes. They were blown to countless tiny pieces and fell from the skies as a rain of broken parts.


    ¡°Enemy assault...enemy assault. Discovered second target!¡±


    The tower spirit of the security tower quickly locked onto the new opponent, revealing the two enemies to the arcanists of the tower.


    No one knew when, but a gigantic me giant had appeared in the forest below.


    It was this giant that had flung a series of fireballs and bombarded the security tower while it was trying to pursue the other enemy.


    ¡°Dammit! Just as we expected! Those adepts are here. Hurry up and contact Security Towers 27 and 35 to hurry over!¡± The Fourth Ring arcanist stationed in Security Tower 22 started shouting upon seeing the two fearsome adepts appear one after another.


    ¡°We have sent the message. The security towers are on the way. Estimated time until arrival is 127 nasos.¡±


    Naso was a unit of time in the Arcane Empire that tranted to approximately thirty-two minutes!


    A trace of joy finally appeared on the face of the Fourth Ring arcanist when he heard his subordinate¡¯s reply.


    The enemy might be powerful, but the sturdy security tower protected them. They should have no problem defending for 127 nasos. As such, the Fourth Ring arcanist¡¯s concern wasn¡¯t whether the security tower could hold out, but whether they could keep the enemy upied here until theirpanions arrived.


    The Fourth Ring arcanist quickly looked at the two adepts that had appeared and chose the fire giant as their target without any hesitation.


    That astral construct could summon starlight to repair its damage. An enemy like that could not be defeated quickly. Meanwhile, the fire giant was over a dozen meters tall. Even the tall, ancient trees only reached its waist while it stood in the forest.


    However, the Fourth Ring arcanist felt no fear of this massive creature.


    Elementiumized body, gigantified body. These were not techniques unique to the adepts. Almost every single high-grade caster could master such abilities. That said, very rarely did people use these abilities in battles against enemies of the same level.


    There was a simple reason for that. A gigantified body might seem majestic and domineering, but without arge amount of elementium energy to sustain that form, it was no more than cotton candy. A few attacks would break the body, making it a wholly unintimidating paper tiger.


    Moreover, one¡¯s defense would also be stretched thin due to the massive increase in size. There would be weaknesses and gaps all over the ce.


    Gigantification might be incredibly effective when used to crush weaker nar natives, but it was little more than arrogance against a Fourth Ring arcanist protected by a security tower!


    The Fourth Ring arcanist instantly assumed the opponent to be an inexperienced rookie. He smiled wickedly and drove the security tower straight at the me giant. Meanwhile, the arcane guards around the tower swarmed at the astral construct in an attempt to stall it.


    The Fourth Ring arcanist intended to defeat the adepts one by one, starting from the weakest first!


    Greem stood tall above the forest.


    zing fire shrouded his massive body, and rivers of mes coiled around him. Every tree within a kilometer of himself had ignited the moment he appeared, and the fire quickly spread outwards.


    Fire burning upon mes, mes growing upon fire!


    Every substance within sight was quickly ignited.


    A strange Heart of Principles beat fiercely and rhythmically inside the fire giant¡¯s thick and firm chest. A golden fire of surprising heat would spew forth every time it pumped, and tiny golden vortices of me would be left behind in core locations all over the giant¡¯s body where the golden fire spread.


    These golden me vortices were like miniature elementium portals. They directly connected to the Fire Elementium ne and drew an endless supply of fire energy from there to replenish the consumed energy. There were over a hundred of these elementium channels simultaneously refreshing Greem¡¯s body with fire energy. It left him with no possibility of ever running out!


    A very human smile appeared on Greem¡¯s fiery face as he looked at the approaching tower. He lifted his left hand, creating a massive Lava Shield over it. He then raised his right hand, causing the fire coral staff to manifest in his grasp.


    The first was naturally a magical creation, while thetter was magical equipment that had been converted into an energy form: half material and half ethereal.


    It was a new way of using magical equipment that Greem had recently discovered.


    After all, most magical equipment was crafted with an adept¡¯s human form in mind. Upon elementiumization and gigantification, the original staff would be as tiny as a beanstalk. Even pinching it with his fingers would be difficult.


    However, if he ced the magical equipment inside his gigantified elementium body and supplied it with a constant amount of fire energy, he could materialize energy equipment of the right proportion, with all its original traits.


    As Greem¡¯s Heart of Principles operated at full capacity, the Fire Throne Set and Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring also started to appear on his colossal body.


    Greem looked at the approaching tower and chuckled. He lifted his staff, and a massive meteor crashed down from the skies, swerving unnaturally towards the enemy.

 Chapter 1089 - Adept’s Cunning

    <h4>Chapter 1089 Adept¡¯s Cunning</h4>


    Meteor Bombardment!


    It was one of the few single-target Fourth Grade spells that the Chip had managed to produce after Greem¡¯s advancement to Fourth Grade.


    The meteor formed by magic was over five meters in diameter. It had a gray stone exterior enveloped in fierce and violent magical mes. Through the cracks in the stone, you could vaguely see the slowly flowingva within.


    Even the Fourth Ring arcanist in the tower couldn¡¯t help but lift his head and look at the approaching fireball with a solemn expression as this terrifying meteor crashed down towards the security tower.


    Several semi-translucent force shields appeared in the trajectory of the meteor, and every one of them was crushed to pieces. Even though the barriers couldn¡¯t thoroughly stop the meteor, they had effectively neutralized the fearsome kic energy behind the meteor¡¯s crash.


    Then, as a half-meter thick lightning bolt sted against the meteor, the rock finally exploded, turning into a massive cloud of fire. Endless amounts ofva and fire sshed across the sky.


    Everything in their way ignited and started burning. Blistering heat and waves of fire appeared wherever the cloud of fire was.


    Having sessfully defended against the enemy¡¯s attack, the security tower soared through the mes, all while gathering a fearsome torrent of arcane magic and unleashing it upon the fire giant.


    The security tower had elementium towers of four elements. As long as the enemy was not wholly immune to all elements, they would be able to find the attribute that the enemy was most vulnerable to and unleash a devastating attack upon them.


    As such, when dealing with the Fourth Grade fire adept, the security tower¡¯s elementium attacks were primarily based around the water element. Lightning bolts and harsh gales were used as secondary attacks. Rapid and ferocious spells repeatedly ravaged the giant.


    Naturally, with how big Greem¡¯s body was, he was much less agile than usual. He lifted theva shield to block most of the arcane attacks. Meanwhile, his other arm waved the fire coral staff and retaliated with a barrage of zing Fireballs.


    With over two thousand meters between the twobatants, they viciously assaulted each other with spells as they rapidly approached each other.


    A violent and ferocious arcane torrent crashed against theva shield, shattering the magma on the surface and sendingva sshing across the ground. If the fire giant had not been supplying the shield with a constant stream of pure fire energy to repair its surface, he would already be defenseless now.


    The asional arcane spell wouldnd on the fire giant¡¯s body, leaving a small, dark spot on its crimson body. However, as the overwhelming energy surged through the fire giant¡¯s body, the dark spots would quickly vanish before they could cover a significant area.


    The Fourth Ring arcanist couldn¡¯t help but draw in a cold breath of air at the sight of this.


    He was a high-grade arcanist himself. Naturally, he knew how terrifying the security tower was when it was firing at full capacity! If he were the one on the receiving end of its attack, he would barelyst for seven to eight seconds, even with his most potent defenses.


    An individual¡¯s might was limited, after all!


    How could an individual confront a gigantic security tower alone? It was impossible unless it wasn¡¯t a human that was doing the fighting, but...a monster!


    It was a stubborn and ingrained belief that had been etched into the souls of every arcanist. They had, at a very young age, understood the meager power of the individual and the might of the collective.


    However, on this tiny, irrelevant battlefield, he had personally witnessed a fearsome Fourth Grade adept directly confronting a security tower. Moreover, that adept was not yielding a single inch!


    How was this possible?


    ¡°Fine. Your elementium magic might indeed be terrifying. Now let me see if your body is as formidable as your magic.¡±


    The Fourth Ring arcanist screamed wildly in his heart as he drove the security tower fearlessly at the opponent.


    Upon seeing this, Greem let out an earthshaking roar and tossed aside his staff. He lifted hisva shield with both hands and started sprinting towards the security tower.


    ¡°Dammit! It is the barest of provocations! Hmph! Victory or defeat, your courage is admirable. Still, it¡¯s better if you just die.¡±


    The veins on the temples of the Fourth Ring arcanist swelled in anger. His body leaned forward as he grabbed the arcane crystal firmly with both hands. The security tower descended a little more and started spinning with its thick and sturdy base pointed towards the enemy.


    On one side was a stone tower built of tough rock, and on the other, you had a fire giant of elementium mes. Both the giant and the tower were of approximately the same size. The two colossal entities crashed towards each other.


    Every spectator and participant of the battle watched with wide-open eyes and beating hearts, gazing intently at the two approaching figures.


    Magnus, who had been hiding near the battlefield, hastily added more elementium shields around him in preparation for the massive collision that was about to ur. On the other side of the battlefield, a pair of confused eyes appeared in the shadow of a towering thousand-year-old tree. The eyes stared unblinkingly at the charging giant.


    That¡¯s not right! Judging from the information that they had collected from all over, Greem was an exceptionally cunning and sinister individual. Why would hemit to such a ¡®foolish¡¯ and ¡®impulsive¡¯ act?


    Regardless of the thoughts of the spectators, the two gigantic constructs, one made of mes and the other of rock, finally shed!


    However, a small incident seemed to have urred at the instant of collision.


    An ordinary person might not even be able to figure out what had happened during that tiny moment in time. However, everyone here was a Fourth Grade powerhouse. They had all perfectly seen what went down.


    Greem had cheated!


    One second before shing with the security tower, the sprinting fire giant¡¯s silhouette had flickered and appeared behind the tower. Thus, when the fire giant reappeared out of thin air, it was no longer a mutual impact. Instead, it was the fire giant tackling the security tower from behind.


    ¡°You cheat...¡± The movement had been far too instantaneous. The Fourth Ring arcanist only managed to mutter half a sentence before the tower was blown away as if a hill had struck it.


    It was such a tremendous and violent force. It didn¡¯t matter how the Fourth Ring arcanist tried to control the tower; he still could not undo theplete loss of control of the tower¡¯s motion!


    An earthshaking thud rang out. The security tower crashed through countless trees and cliffs, razing a wide path through the forest like a rampaging tank.


    A pir of dust rose to the sky along with a loud rumbling sound, both of which started to spread outwards in every direction. Dirt and pebbles flew across the air, with broken logs, roots, grass, and panicking insects mixed within.


    A few thousand meters away, Adept Holly quickly dealt with thest arcane guard with his astral construct. He turned to look at the grounded security tower, a wicked smile of approval uncontrobly appearing on his face.


    Indeed! That was a trick that adepts should be using!


    The arcanists were like babies walking out of a kindergarten when it came to fighting techniques. They were far too rigid and stiff. An adept who didn¡¯t know how to fully utilize their advantage had no right to set foot upon the nar battlefields.


    It was only now that Adept Holly started having confidence in this fire adept known as Greem!


    The eyes floating in the shadows of the ancient tree couldn¡¯t help but betray a trace of disappointment. Her eyes gleamed with a cold light when she looked at the fire giant, the way a tiger looked upon a prey.


    If the fire adept had been foolish enough to crash directly with the security tower back then, if he had revealed any sort of weakness in defense, then she would take the opportunity to strike and murder him on the spot.


    However, now that the fire adept had sessfully tricked the arcanist, her chance to strike was gone. The eyes in the darkness blinked a few times before slowly vanishing into thin air.


    Meanwhile, Mangus was relieved after personally witnessing the legendary fire adept¡¯s power. He started thinking about ways to establish a rtionship with Greem better.


    The most direct option was to aid him in battle!


    Having made up his mind, Mangus defaulted on his pessimistic, non-confrontational attitude. He strode out of the forest and rushed towards where the security tower had crashed.


    Greem couldn¡¯t care less what his spectators were thinking. He would never let go of such an excellent opportunity of attack, after creating it himself with the use of Fire Teleportation. He immediately unleashed a furious storm of spells into the dust pir.


    The trembling security tower attempted several times to remove itself from the earth, but it was always blown back into the ditch by the meteors crashing down from above.


    Arcane radiance shimmered around the tower,yering over each other like fish scales to defend against the fire adept¡¯s manic and ferocious attacks. However, it was exceedingly difficult for the tower to escape the opponent¡¯s attacks and rise back into the sky.


    While the security tower was enduring the meteors and slowly gaining altitude, Mangus arrived below the structure.


    He looked at the security tower and saw it shrouded in me, its arcane barriers trembling without stopping. Mangus let out a roar without any hesitation and unleashed his true power.


    As the earthshaking roar rang out, Mangus¡¯ body started to swell and grow at a rapid pace. The sound of cracking bones could be heard as Mangus turned into an unusual five-meter-tall, two-headed adepts.


    Meanwhile, a sort of change seemed to have ovee the two-headed adept, whose body could only amodate one consciousness at any one time. The two suddenly became fearless and powerful.


    Both heads opened their eyes simultaneously.

 Chapter 1090 - Terrifying Adept

    <h4>Chapter 1090 Terrifying Adept</h4>


    Naturally, as someone capable of reaching the Fourth Grade, Mangus was powerful in his own way!


    As the weakest person in the party, he typically kept a low and humble profile, rarely ever getting into an argument with anyone. However, when he transformed into a true two-headed adept and both Mangus¡¯ and Cherisha¡¯s consciousnesses were highly blended, an overwhelming and barbaric aura burst forth from their body.


    ¡°Come down, you!¡±


    A strange voice that was a mix of both male and female rang out in the air. The two-headed adept¡¯s hands moved together and grabbed at the security tower. The security tower abruptly trembled above them, just a hundred meters in the air. Two strange and massive w marks mysteriously appeared on its sturdy walls. Pieces of stone and debris fell off from the walls like an avnche.


    Pulled by this unusual force, the security tower was unable to resist any longer against the cooperation of two Fourth Grade adepts. It once again trembled and crashed towards the ground.


    While the legendary fire adept and the two-headed adept worked together to take down the security tower, two ck dots appeared on the distant horizon, quickly approaching their location.


    ¡°Holly, go dy them for fifteen minutes! Two-Heads and I will finish this first,¡± Greem shouted after he turned back and looked.


    Finish a security tower guarded by a Fourth Ring arcanist in fifteen minutes?


    It was hard to believe such a im, but Holly sensed a trace of self-confidence in Greem¡¯sposed and determined words.


    He was the one that wanted this battle, after all. It only made sense that he should be the one to shoulder the hardest and most challenging part of it. As such, Adept Holly made no attempts to shirk the task he had been assigned. Instead, he turned and immediately charged at the direction of the two ck points.


    Several dozens of kilometers was a matter of a few seconds for everyone on this battlefield.


    The two reinforcing security towers hastened their speed when they saw the damage that had been done to the first tower. They seemed eager to rush to its aid.


    The astral construct that Holly piloted also began to get closer and closer to them.


    When the two parties were two thousand meters apart, the elementium towers on the two security towers lit up simultaneously. All sorts of violent magic then started to bombard the astral construct ceaselessly.


    Holly¡¯s vision trembled violently, and he could smell blood from his mouth when he cackled. However, he couldn¡¯t be bothered by such a st injury like this. He continued to charge forward recklessly.


    Finally, when the security towers were only a thousand meters away, Adept Holly roared and struck.


    He lifted both hands as a brilliant beam of starlight crashed down from the skies,nding right upon one of the security towers. A profound a mysterious array made of starlight appeared out of thin air. Countless strange appendages wrapped around the tower, trying to drag it into the void.


    Obviously, the security tower would not just take it lying down. It furiously attacked the appendages and the starlight array with its elementium towers. It greatly slowed down the appendages and made it difficult for them to pull down the tower. Even the starlight array itself flickered as if it was about to be sted away by the attacks.


    It was an unusual banishment spell!


    Should the security tower be dragged into the void, its connection to its current location would be severed. The starlight array would then throw the tower to a random corner of the ne.


    When that happened, it would not be able to return to this battlefield without a few days of travel.


    It was an indirect manner of banishing the security tower from this fight.


    Unfortunately, Adept Holly alone was not powerful enough to banish a security tower as massive as this. That was why he had activated Starlight Banishment the moment the fight began. Holly wasn¡¯t blindly hoping to actually banish the tower. Instead, he was mainly hoping to temporarily restrain one of his targets using the spell.


    Otherwise, if both the security towers were tobine forces, even a Fourth Grade golem master like himself would fold from the pressure!


    Seeing that the security tower was still resisting the starlight array, a wicked smile appeared on Adept Holly¡¯s face. He leaped forward, an enchanting trail of light streaking behind the astral construct as he rushed at the other tower.


    The battle instantly reached its peak!


    Taking full advantage of what little time that Adept Holly had managed to buy, Greem and the two-headed adept started to beat down on the security tower beneath them wildly.


    At their level, almost every single attack was apound attack of many effects.


    From physical damage, to elementium damage, to all sorts of unusual magical effects, onlypound attacks of this kind could prate the defenses of a Fourth Grade enemy and inflict severe andsting damage!


    The security tower shook violently, endlessly unleashing violent arcane shockwaves in the hopes of blowing away the two enemies at its sides. Unfortunately, these two enemies seemed to have gone mad. Theypletely ignored the ¡®insignificant¡¯ damage to their bodies and focused intently on attacking the tower itself.


    As for the arcane barrier around the tower? That had long since been destroyed when it was sent crashing to the ground by the two adepts!


    They were two adepts, one with an elementium body and one with a body of flesh and blood. Both of them used their powerful magical abilities to beat down on the sturdy walls of the security tower. The security tower continued to have its elementium towers unleash a barrage of elementium attacks, all while powerful and savage arcane magic came shooting out of the tower itself.


    Obviously, the Fourth Ring arcanist had also sensed the impending danger to himself. He no longer limited himself to controlling the tower and started to fight with his own powers as well.


    Greem and the two-headed adept could endure the barrage of low-grade elementium attacks with their formidable Physique. However, they would have to choose between defense and offense when faced with the arcane spells of their Fourth Ring opponent.


    The savage arcane spells ravaged the two-headed adept¡¯s body. They prated their defensive forcefield and left increasingly ring wounds on their body.


    From a distance, it looked as if the two-headed adept¡¯s body was covered in ck burn marks, blue frost marks, the amber-colored signs of earth elementium, and the messy, crisscrossing cuts from wind des.


    However, their tough Physique caused the wounds to heal rapidly. The dead muscles dried up and peeled off, revealing the newly-grown flesh and skin beneath. Even the more terrifying wounds were healing at a rate visible to the naked eye!


    Meanwhile, the fire giant that Greem had turned into had also been receiving an equal amount of damage. However, his strange body of mes seemed to allow him to ignore the damage. A red burst of fire would roll across his body every so often, and the wounds would vanish mysteriously.


    It was because of how ferocious Greem and the two-headed adept were that they were able to keep the tower against the ground with their rtively ¡®smaller¡¯ sizes and send rocks flying across the air.


    Six minutes quickly passed by. Even though the tower had been utterly defaced by the ¡®beatdown¡¯, it still continued to struggle to get up without any intentions of giving up resistance.


    Pressured by time, Greem had no ns of letting the fight drag on. He shouted out loud.


    ¡°Keep that thing pinned for me!¡±


    The two-headed adept roared in reply,shing out with two iron fists and suppressing the tower¡¯s attempt at retaliation.


    Greem took this opportunity to take a deep breath. He then bent forward and spewed forth a golden stream of fire that was one meter in diameter.


    These golden mes were endless and scorched the stone exterior of the tower without stopping.


    Even the firm steelrock, infused with arcane energy, could not endure this golden fire. The surface of the rock started to dry and crack, before turning red, then scalding hot, and finally softening and turning into moltenva.


    A river of redva flowed down from the walls of the tower. A one-meter wide hole had been charred into the stone and was slowly extending into the inside of the building as the golden mes burned.


    The Fourth Ring arcanist, who was witnessing all this through the monitory crystal, was thoroughly shocked. He then redoubled his efforts on piloting the security tower in an attempt to break free from the pin. Even if the tower could not take to the skies, adjusting the tower¡¯s position and preventing the fire giant¡¯s attack from being concentrated on a single area was better than nothing.


    However, having seen the hope of sess, the two-headed adept would not let him do as he wished!


    The previously cowardly and passive two-headed adept was exceedingly brave and barbaric at the moment. They used their own body of flesh and blood to pin down the tower and keep it from moving at all.


    The crater grew deeper and deeper. Finally, a loud roaring rang out as the golden mes burned through the tower, sending the heat and fire right inside.


    The wild, ferocious golden mes freely surged within the interior of the tower. All things unprotected by arcane power in its path burned and melted from the heat. The tip of the fire melted through countless arcane and metal doors under the guide of Greem¡¯s powerful spiritual consciousness. It wildly reached towards the location of the Fourth Ring arcanist.


    Meanwhile, the other arcanists had been turned into screaming human torches from the extreme heat the moment the tower was breached.


    So what if you were a Third Ring arcanist?


    Against the violent attack of a Fourth Grade legendary fire adept, they could only survive for a few seconds longer than the low-grade arcanists!


    They might be royalty to the civilians of the Arcane Empire, enjoying lives more respected and more luxurious than human emperors. Unfortunately, they were still no more than ants before a Fourth Grade adept from another world.


    So what if you were a little stronger? You were still an ant!


    What could their brilliant minds and unparalleled arcane knowledge count for beneath the might of ferocious adept magic?


    Since the security tower had been breached, there was no longer any meaning for the Fourth Ring arcanist to continue hiding inside!


    An arcane flux, more powerful than any before, swept across the battlefield.


    While this energy paralyzed the two adepts for the briefest of moments, the Fourth Ring arcanist flew out of the tower. He was d inyer afteryer of arcane light as he desperately flew towards the two security towers in the distance. He did not so much as even looked back.


    Unfortunately, how could he, having lost all his will to battle, ever escape the grasp of the adepts?!


    Arge hand reached out from the side and grabbed the Fourth Ring arcanist. A loud voice then started bellowing in wickedughter.


    ¡°Run? Have you asked me for permission yet?¡±


    The next moment, the two-headed adept stuffed the arcanist into their wide mouth and bit down viciously,pletely ignoring all the arcane spells that were being shot down its throat.


    A strange, muffled sound rang out. The Fourth Ring arcanist¡¯s arcane shields were crushed to pieces, and his neck was forcefully bitten off.


    Of course, his attacks came to a silent end.

 Chapter 1091 - Plan of Retreat

    <h4>Chapter 1091 n of Retreat</h4>


    The entire battlefield was silent!


    The arcanists had long since stopped considering the adepts as one of their kind. Instead, they regarded adepts as cruel, evil creatures, much like the disaster creatures and starbeasts. However, when they witnessed a giant two-headed adept bite off theirpanion¡¯s head and chew it bite by bite with their own eyes, it waspletely different! Their hearts trembled and shivered in fright!


    As such, when the me giant, the two-headed adept, and the terrifying adept in the astral construct surrounded them, the arcanists¡¯ spirits broke down.


    The arcane tower that was fighting against Adept Holly unleashed a violent arcane attack, forcefully repelling the astral construct. It then fired a guiding bolt at its panion¡¯ to drag it out of the starlight array. The two towers turned and flew into the distance without ever turning back.


    They had retreated.


    These arcanists had retreated without a fight! Intimidated by the evil adepts, they had fled!


    The two-headed adept couldn¡¯t help but spit at the sight of the fleeing silhouette of the enemy. He spoke, disdain thick in his voice, ¡°Hmph! Eggshells that have never seen the battlefield.¡±


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh as he looked upon the enemy¡¯s slowly vanishing figure.


    The arcanists¡¯ fighting spirit was simply too weak!


    Perhaps those old schrs and antiques with their vast knowledge held higher positions and authority within the Arcane Empire in the realm of academics.


    With the arcane towers, floating cities, pseudo-nar fortresses, and the arcane guards, the arcanists didn¡¯t personally need to do anything at all. Of course, this meant that they would never run onto the frontlines of the battlefield to do battle like a barbaric warrior.


    In their understanding, the so-called war was hiding leisurely in the safe and secure backlines, pressing crystal buttons tomand their cannons (pseudo-nar fortresses) and their cannon fodder (arcane guards) to tear at the enemy¡¯s ranks viciously.


    Meanwhile, they simply had to throw massive arcane spells at the enemy while under the protection of arcane barriers.


    War was an art form, and all they needed to do was to crush every single opponent with their overwhelming knowledge!


    It was the influence of such a belief that caused the arcanists to be such weak and cowardly people, who were constantly scared for their own lives. When the battlefield got too bloody, they would turn and flee without hesitation.


    In truth, if they had been a little more rational and a little more determined, they would have seen that defeating or stalling the attacks of three evil adepts was more than likely with the cooperation of two arcane towers. Unfortunately, even though their security towers had not been broken, the hearts of the arcanists themselves had been bent and shattered.


    Those useless fools.


    Adept Holly clicked his tongue in disdain as he turned towards the broken and battered tower. He smashed open a hole with his hard astral hand and flew into it.


    A short momentter, he emerged from within and tossed arge knowledge crystal at Greem. Judging by his smiling expression, his harvest had been bountiful.


    Now that the battle was over, the three adepts gathered in front of the security tower once again.


    The two-headed adept had already reverted from his transformed state. His aura was weak, and his body was covered in wounds. There was arge hole the size of a fist near his stomach, and his blood had spilled across the ground.


    Even so, Mangus still appeared as excited and joyful as ever.


    A dull thud sounded as Mangus dropped the Fourth Ring arcanist¡¯s tattered body to the ground. Blood flowed like a river from the headless neck, quickly staining the earth a crimson red.


    Greem looked at the corpse and saw no spatial equipment resembling a storage device on its body. Thus, he looked away and made no mention of the issue. Adept Holly seemed to have discovered this peculiarity as well. However, seeing that Mangus had contributed significantly to the battle earlier, he decided to let it slide.


    The three adepts cleaned up the battlefield hastily and hurried into the forest towards their next target before new enemies could appear.


    ............


    Floating City Reisin Garden.


    Great Arcanist Fre could no longer suppress her fury. She almost wanted to tear apart the roof of this arcane hall.


    She roared angrily, mming the rectangr obsidian table over and over again. Her sharp and pointed reprimands caused the two Fourth Ring arcanists to bend their heads down in shame.


    After shouting sternly for the arcane guards to take the two arcanists away, Fre looked around the hall as the anger faded from her face. Instead, it was reced by sorrow and frustration that seemed toe from the depths of her soul.


    After thinking and organizing the words in her mind, Fre finally spoke.


    ¡°I have received orders to retreat sent down from centralmand. This order was personally issued by His Majesty Garcia, co-signed by eleven Seventh Ring Great Arcanists.¡±


    The faces of the arcanists flushed white when they heard the word ¡®retreat.¡¯ In this one hundred and twenty-seven-year long defensive war, they had listened to the countless pieces of bad news. They all knew how difficult it had been for the Arcane Empire.


    But...the word ¡®retreat¡¯ still terrified them!


    Morrian ne was the arcanist origin ne. Now that the enemy had arrived at their doors, where could they retreat to? Were they supposed to abandon their origin ne and flee into a lesser ne to live the life of a vagrant mutt?


    ¡°Why is the order only from His Majesty Garcia? What about His Majesty Newman?¡± An elderly Fourth Ring arcanist stood up with some difficulty and stared at Fre as she asked.


    Garcia and Newman were the two emperors of the Arcane Empire that held absolute authority in their hands. However, the citizens of the Arcane Empire preferred to refer to them as Administrator Garcia and Arbiter Newman.


    In truth, the Arcane Empire was a parliamentary republic. Arcane Emperor was more of a title of honor, not an actual reference to the Arcane Empire¡¯s governmental model.


    The muscles on Fre¡¯s faces twitched when she heard the elderly arcanist¡¯s question. Finally, she replied.


    ¡°A division has urred between the leaders of the Empire. His Majesty Newman does not agree with His Majesty Garcia¡¯s viewpoint. He believes that the Empire can persist in this war. Thus......¡±


    ¡°Thus, His Majesty Garcia advocates for a full retreat, while His Majesty Newman advocates for a stand to the very end. What about the Great Arcanists?¡±


    ¡°The Great Arcanists have also split into two factions. One faction believes that Morrian ne is doomed and that we must move the core of the Empire¡¯s forces out of the ne before the defensive line copses. Meanwhile, the other faction believes we can make a total retreat into the ne and use the floating cities and arcane towers to obliterate every enemy that dares to enter our realm. After all, once the enemy enters the ne, even the strongest of them will not be more powerful than the peak of Fourth Grade. We will have the home-field advantage. It is entirely possible to wipe out all of the enemy¡¯s elites within the ne with minimal effort.¡±


    ¡°That would be using the nar world itself as the battlefield. If the war was to ur in this manner, even if we were to win, there would not be much left of Morrian ne!¡±


    Fre fell silent.


    It wasn¡¯t as if the Arcane Empire had never invaded other nar worlds. Naturally, they knew how much damage would be inflicted upon ordinary mortals once the terrifying invaders had entered the ne. Blood would flow like rivers, and lives would be worthless. These words weren¡¯t even enough to describe the horrors of a nar war.


    Barely one out of every hundred mortals would be fortunate enough to survive a nar war.


    Moreover, the Arcane Empire wasn¡¯t facing a single enemy this time. It was a massive conglomerate that hadbined several of the most powerful races of the multiverse. There was almost no chance for the Arcane Empire to survive this ¡®cmity.¡¯


    The more they reflected on the issue, the more the arcanists felt their souls being torn into two halves.


    They also wanted to stand behind with His Majesty Newman for ast stand against those otherworldly monsters, in hopes of a chance of survival amidst the endless carnage. However, their rationality as arcanists told them that this would only be a dead end. It would instead cause the entirety of the Arcane Empire to be caught within the enemy¡¯s grasp, and never again would they have a chance to return to their former glory.


    As such, the hearts of all the arcanists in Reisin Garden bled as they listened silently to Fre describing the split that had urred between the higher-ups of the Empire. It felt like their hearts were being torn into two pieces.


    ¡°What do you think then, mydy?¡± Another arcanist stood forward.


    ¡°At the moment, the Empire¡¯s defensive line outside the barrier is still holding steady. Apart from a few rats that have broken into our world, there is only that horde of disaster creatures and a few individual starbeasts. Also, news of the Empire¡¯s retreat must not be leaked prematurely.


    ¡°Remember, the Empire¡¯s leadership will only provide us with a limited amount of time and quota. Every arcanist of Third Ring and above can bring two people with them, while arcanists of Second Ring and below can only bring one person along. Apart from that, the Empire has also provided our Reisin Garden with a transfer quota of two hundred people. When you go back, properly choose amongst your apprentices. Report the especially talented young ones to me, and I will consider cing them on the list of transfers.


    ¡°I repeat, news of the Empire¡¯s retreat remains a matter of high confidentiality. Every arcanist in this meeting must maintain silence. At the very least, I do not wish to see leakage of this news, causing chaos in the floating city before the n of retreat begins. Do you hear me?¡± In thest sentence, Fre¡¯s tone turned cold and harsh. The intimidating aura of a Great Arcanist instantly engulfed the arcane hall.


    ¡°Understood!¡± Every single arcanist stood straight and nodded in understanding.


    ¡°Remember, anyone that leaks this information will have their name removed from the transfer list. Do not me me for being heartless when that happens!¡± After warning her subordinates once more, Fre¡¯s expression rxed. She waved her hand lethargically and said, ¡°Go down and make your preparations then!¡±


    Fre let out a silent sigh as she watched the arcanists leave. She turned and returned to her room.

 Chapter 1092 - Maple Forest Town

    <h4>Chapter 1092 Maple Forest Town</h4>


    Lucia carried a thick stack of books in her arms as she hastily passed through the arcane hall, squeezed through the busy corridor, and entered the arcane academy.


    Not far in front of her was the knowledge hall where her daily lectures were. The lecturer today was Second Grade Sir Brown, who she respected and admired most of all. Of course, this only made her want to attend the lecture even more.


    Yet, at this moment, she was stopped by an apprentice that charged out from nowhere.


    It was a young, handsome nobleman. He looked to be only fifteen or sixteen, but he wore a well-tailored arcanist¡¯s robe on his person, with delicate patterns woven into the fabric with golden runic threads.


    ording to thews of the Arcane Empire, schrs who had yet to request a grade evaluation at the Arcane Assessment Office were strictly not allowed to wear the robe of an official arcanist. However, even though the teenager¡¯s aura was that of an apprentice, he was brazenly breaking the rules and wearing an arcanist¡¯s robe.


    It was a serious crime. If he were to be caught by the enforcers, he would have his status as an apprentice revoked!


    Meanwhile, a dozen other teenagers followed behind the nobleman. Judging from how they were dressed, they were also students of the arcane academy.


    ¡°Soren, you¡¯re breaking the rules again!¡± Lucia was slightly surprised when she was stopped. She couldn¡¯t help but frown and say, ¡°Better be careful not to lose your apprentice status if you get caught by the academy¡¯s enforcers. Don¡¯t think you can do whatever you want just because you have a Third Ring grandfather in the academy.¡±


    The apprentice known as Soren had a prideful expression on his face. He waved his hand and had his ¡®followers¡¯ back away. He then let his gaze brazenly settle upon Lucia¡¯s pretty and youthful face.


    ¡°Lucia, I will ask you onest time today; are you willing to be my lover?!¡±


    A trace of anger shed across Lucia¡¯s beautiful face. Her intelligent blue eyes stared into his eyes as she firmly replied, ¡°Soren, you¡¯ve harassed me many times already! My reply is still the same! You can stop dreaming about it forever now! My life belongs to the arcane arts. My soul belongs to the arcane arts. I have no interest in anything other than the arcane arts!¡±


    There was an unprecedented determination to the young girl¡¯s words. A sense of maturity and stubbornness utterly ipatible with her youth could be heard behind every word.


    ¡°You...you probably don¡¯t know yet, do you?!¡± Lucia¡¯s resoluteness had obviously angered Soren. He took a look around him. When he confirmed that no one could overhear their conversation, he stepped forward and leaned by Lucia¡¯s ears to speak, ¡°The Empire is already nning to abandon this war. They are organizing a retreat now.¡±


    The young girl¡¯s body shuddered.


    ¡°The quota for the retreat that the Empire can provide is limited. Even my grandfather can only bring two people with him. I am most certainly taking up one of that quota. If you are willing to be my lover, I can beg my grandfather to bring you along.¡±


    Lucia¡¯s face instantly flushed white.


    Even though she didn¡¯t want to acknowledge the truth of what Soren was saying, it was very likely that this information was urate, given the status of Soren¡¯s grandfather as a Third Ring arcanist. If this information was true, didn¡¯t it mean that the Empire had abandoned all of its civilians and low-grade arcanists and were nning a secret escape?!


    Lucia¡¯s grip over the thick tomes in her arms had unknowingly tightened so much so that her knuckles protruded and the blood had faded from the skin. However, after lowering her head slightly, she immediately lifted it once again. She stared into Soren¡¯s eyes and spoke with deadly resolution. ¡°There¡¯s no need to think about it, Soren. I wouldn¡¯t agree to your request even if the world were to end tomorrow. From the day I stepped into the arcane academy, I have already made up my mind. I will dedicate everything to the worthy cause of the arcane arts. You can let go of your delusions already!¡±


    Soren seemed to have been angered as well. He replied with a simrly determined and cruel voice, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, I won¡¯t continue to bother you. It will be another month until the retreat. I believe you will ¡®seriously¡¯ consider this issue. You know where I live. As long as you cane and apany me for a night before the order for the retreat is given, I can bring you along with me. Otherwise, you can just wait here to die along with the floating city!¡±


    Sorenughed out loud and walked away, leaving the pale-faced Lucia fixed to the spot.


    ............


    Maple Forest Town.


    This ce was apletely insignificant human town.


    The town was located near a valley, surrounded by a lush forest of yellow and green.


    As it was close to the mountains, the mist was thick and heavy. It was hard to see the red disc in the gray sky, even if it was noon.


    Greem stood near the entrance of the town. He looked around him and discovered no signs of arcane energy. He nodded in satisfaction.


    ¡°We will rest here for tonight, then! The closest human city from this town is fifty-five kilometers away. There are no arcane buildings nearby either. It¡¯s the best ce for us to rest.¡±


    The other three adepts had no opinions on the matter. They shrugged and walked into the town.


    The two had maybe a hundred or so families. The one-hundred tattered, old wooden houses were spread across the town in an orderly fashion, outlining three streets and a central za.


    It was now sunset. The residents of the town had all started their hearth fires and were preparing dinner.


    The smoke from their chimneys mixed with the light evening mist, causing the town to appear even dimmer.


    The town residents couldn¡¯t help but be curious when they saw Greem and the three others walk in with their unusual clothes. They emerged from their houses, their kitchens, and their cowsheds, pointing and nodding at the adepts. They seemed to have taken them for wandering adventurers.


    Dark Witch Shana obviously didn¡¯t like being surrounded and watched by people as if she were an attraction. She let out a cold grunt and prepared to strike. However, Greem put out his hand and stopped her.


    ¡°We are adepts, not monsters. It¡¯s best to avoid unnecessary ughter as much as possible!¡± Greem calmly said as he turned and looked at Mangus. ¡°Mangus, we¡¯ll leave it to you!¡±


    ¡°No problem!¡± Mangus chuckled and quickly handed over control of the body to Cherisha.


    Cherisha¡¯s head shifted to the middle of the neck, and her eyes instantly opened wide.


    Mangus excelled at fighting, while Cherisha excelled at mental magic.


    As Cherisha opened her eyes and snapped her fingers, all the town residents closed their eyes in an instant. They remained standing where they were and starting snoring in their sleep.


    ¡°That¡¯s good enough. Everyone¡¯s been hypnotized now. They won¡¯t wake up until we leave tomorrow, and they won¡¯t remember us either.¡± Cherisha smiled.


    Mental magic was her specialty, and she was the absolute authority of this field in this group!


    ¡°Let¡¯s go. Let¡¯s find a ce to settle down. I haven¡¯t had a bath in days. I feel like mold¡¯s starting to grow on me!¡± Adept Holly nodded in satisfaction and walked ahead of everyone to the biggest and most extravagant building in the town.


    The building that Adept Holly had chosen appeared to belong to a local noble. Not only was the house clean and tidy, but even the maids and servants inside the house wore better clothes than the other residents of the town.


    Cherisha snapped her finger once again when they reached the door of the house.


    This time, everyone inside the house stopped snoring. However, they were still trapped in their dreams. They sleepwalked over to her and lined up in two tidy rows before the adepts. There was a fairly attractive middle-aged noblewoman in the group, along with two well-dressed nobledies.


    ¡°We are hungry. Start preparing dinner immediately! Also, prepare more hot water. We want a good bath once we are done with our meal. Make sure to tidy up the bedrooms. I want clean sheets for everything.¡±


    As Cherisha gave out her instructions, these people, with their eyes shut and wandering in their dreams, immediately began getting to work. They quickly made all the arrangements necessary for the dining hall.


    In truth, with the incredible Physique of the four adepts, they would not die of thirst or starvation even without food for several years. However, as human adepts, eating was still a rare pleasure and instance of rxation for them. As such, under Cherisha¡¯s arrangement, the four adepts each took up a side of the dining table. They put on their napkins, picked up their knife and fork, andmenced enjoying this wondrous dinner in another world.


    Maple Forest Town was only an extremely rural town in Rian Province. Of course, this meant that the food wasn¡¯t all that amazing either. However, it was enough that the four Fourth Grade adepts could politely and elegantly have a bountiful dinner together in apletely foreign ne. There was no need for any fancy food to set the mood.


    Cherisha chased away all the ugly and foolish servants. The only ones allowed inside the dining hall to serve the adepts were the noblewoman and her two young daughters.


    Fortunately, these adepts all had a reputation to maintain and no unusual preferences. The dinner ended with amicable, friendly interactions.


    During the meal, Greem repeatedly lifted his winess at Dark Witch Shana, but he was always ignored.


    The Dark Witch had not shown herself in the battlest time at all. She had only appeared once the fight had ended.


    Any other leader of a party would have been enraged by such selfish behavior.


    However, Greem seemed unbothered. Not only did he show no anger, he even seemed somewhat interested in her now. It caused Cherisha to lower her head tough in secret and Adept Holly to give him a few thumbs-ups. He also managed to make Dark Witch Shana angry.


    However, Greem couldn¡¯t care less about her cold attitude and her brimming anger. Instead, he started to flirt more brazenly and boldly than before.


    ¡°I am done!¡± Dark Witch Shana pushed aside the food that she had hardly touched and stood up. She pointed at the noblewoman. ¡°You! Bring me to wash myself!¡±


    Having said that, she lifted her head pridefully and left the dining hall.


    A very well-hidden smile finally appeared on Greem¡¯s face when he looked at the witch¡¯s slender figure leave.

 Chapter 1093 - Ghosts and Shadows

    <h4>Chapter 1093 Ghosts and Shadows</h4>


    This Dark Witch clearly had hostile intentions towards him!


    Moreover, if Greem wasn¡¯t wrong, her main objective in participating in this mission was none other than to kill him.


    Greem had only been suspicious of this possibility initially, but his opinion had changed after thest battle. Even though the Dark Witch had not shown herself during the battle at all, Greem had distinctly picked up on her restrained, but intense, killing intent.


    Perhaps even Dark Witch Shani would never know that the reason Greem had ced himself in the danger of battle was to tease out and gauge her true intentions.


    In that one instant where Greem was in danger, her unconceble and overwhelming killing intent was like a volcano in the dead of night. No one could ignore it even if they wanted to.


    Thus, Greem didn¡¯t mind taking a little detour.


    He brought the party to Maple Forest Town with the intent of using the rural and remote geography to deal with some private matters!


    At the thought of this, Greem lightly pushed away his dinner tray. He smiled as he said, ¡°I¡¯m finished with dinner. Gentlemen, take your time! I want to go and take a rest.¡±


    Cherisha smiled.


    ¡°Should I lend you these two servants of mine for a night? They might not have much in the way of magical talent, but they are still decently pretty!¡±


    As she spoke, the twin noble sisters walked to Greem¡¯s side and simultaneously smiled sweetly at him.


    However, their eyes were shut tight even when they smiled, making for an uncannily ufortable sight.


    Greem shook his head lightly and said as he left, ¡°I hate toys.¡±


    Cherisha let out a sigh and said with a helpless tone to herself, ¡°You¡¯re right. These toys might look nice, but they are so fragile, like bubbles in the wind...cough. Speaking of which, Sir Holly, are you interested in taking one of them with you?¡±


    Adept Holly frowned and replied meanly, ¡°Cherisha, stop with your boring antics. Everyone knows these people have already be your puppets. Bringing them into our rooms is basically having you...hmph! Don¡¯t bother me. We are just business acquaintances. No one would want to be associated with a monster like you if we were not in this ne!¡±


    Adept Holly also furiously pushed aside his dinner tray and went to the second floor to look for a room to rest.


    Cherisha was the only one left in the dining room once everyone had left. It was then that a sinister and vicious expression appeared on her face. She mumbled to herself as she furiously sliced at themb ribs in front of her. Judging from her expression, she was treating the food as someone she hated and despised.


    A dozen servants worked busily in the kitchen, the living room, and the dining room, sending a steady stream of food to the table and serving her devotedly as if she was an emperor.


    However, it didn¡¯t matter how hard they worked or how busy they were; their shut eyes never opened once!


    Upon reaching the second floor, two corridors stretched out in front of Greem, one to the left and one to the right.


    The corridor to the left was dark and lightless, while the corridor to the right was brightly lit, with every corner clearly illuminated.


    Greem could tell that Dark Witch Shani had gone to the second room to the left by tracing the nearly imperceptible energy aura in the air. She was also the one that put out the candles in the left corridor. Obviously, she didn¡¯t like being disturbed by whoever came after her.


    Greem turned to the left without any hesitation. He went to the room on the other side of the second room, lightly pushed open the door, and entered.


    This ce was the house of a small noble down in a rural area. The decorations and furniture of the house couldn¡¯t be all that ssy.


    Simple tables, a luxurious bed, and furniture of vulgar tastes befitting that of the upstart rich.


    Greem strode into the room, took a look around him, andy down on the bed. He shut his eyes and went to rest.


    The night winds were particrly strong due to the town¡¯s proximity to the mountains.


    The gale screeched in the night, tearing apart the mist and causing it to shroud the town in a veil of white. The whole ce appeared all the more silent and deste.


    The residents of the town would not typically have gone to sleep so early in the past, which would have filled the ce with a bit of more life.


    However, today, the entire town had fallen into darkness, apart from a small two-story house. Warmth and life could hardly be felt in the town, striking fear into the hearts of any who might wander across it at this time.


    Meanwhile, a dark cluster of shadow levitated in the center of a wooden house at the edge of the town. The shadow was slowly growing in size.


    When the shadow first appeared, it was only the size of a thumb. However, as time passed, the shadow started to growrger as well. It then caved inwards, forming a strange shadow portal that was two meters in diameter.


    Upon seeing the strange vortex spinning counter-clockwise in the shadow, and the oppressive aura of darkness seeping out from the depths of the portal, one couldn¡¯t help but wonder what terrifying ce the entrance would lead toward!


    As the aura of darkness grew heavier in the wooden house, the ce started to appear darker and murkier.


    Finally, as the shadows gathered together, a panther-like creature formed out of thin air.


    The creature had smooth skin and felt almost unreal. Traces of ck mist continued to dissipate where the creature¡¯s body touched the air. It was as if this creature of darkness was formed of immaterial shadows to begin with.


    All of a sudden, two dark red lights glowed in the creature¡¯s eyes, causing the light in the wooden house to dim even further.


    Shadow Panther. It was a typical shadow creature. They usually existed only in the Shadow World, and it was hard to see them in a nar world.


    Their power was only at the level of beginner Second Grade, but their strange and unexpected ability to travel between shadows made them a formidable foe. Even advanced Second Grade adepts did not wish to face them in battle.


    Even more terrifying was the fact that these shadow panthers lived in packs!


    The shadow portal did not stop after the first panther appeared. Instead, it continued to spew dense dark energy. Soon, the second shadow panther formed, then the third and the fourth.


    The wooden house wasn¡¯t big at all. In fact, it was somewhat cramped for these shadow panthers that were each individually the size of a tiger.


    When theter shadow panthers materialized, conflicts started to break out amongst themselves. A few of the panthers started growling and intimidating each other. Fortunately, they also knew their ce. They all tried their best to restrain their power, not letting the shadow aura spread anywhere out of the house.


    When ten panthers appeared, the spinning of the portal started to slow. The vortex trembled slightly and spat out a humanoid shadow creature.


    A panic broke out within the panther pack when the humanoid shadow creature appeared.


    The shadow panthers could no longer care for personal space. They squeezed together and made enough space for the humanoid creature.


    No eyes or features could be seen on the humanoid shadow creature¡¯s face. It was only ck. When the creature stood in the house, the shadow substance in the air around him bubbled like boiling water and soon formed a strange armor as shiny and solid as ck diamond.


    Unlike the shadow panthers, whose bodies were somewhere between immateriality and materiality, the humanoid appeared to be fully solid. In fact, his body was tougher than most steel that could be found in a material ne.


    More importantly, when this humanoid shadow creature opened his eyes, it wasn¡¯t the light of chaos and confusion, but the light of intelligence and brilliance.


    It was a light that only intelligent creatures possessed!


    The humanoid shadow creature strode to the simple wooden window the moment he materialized. He stared through the narrow window at the brightly lit building in the darkness.


    His target was there, but his master¡¯s orders were to remain in hiding.


    This humanoid shadow creature grabbed his long, thin de out of the shadows and plunged it into the ground. He started to wait in silence.


    The energy aura he radiated was Third Grade now!


    Maple Town Forest was silent and brooding in the darkness.


    However, over a hundred other shadow portals simr to this one were opening in countless hidden ces across town. Moreover, the entrances were still operating, sending over a shadow army of shocking proportions from the Shadow World.


    The weakest of these shadow creatures were still Second Grade. They all cautiously and carefully went into hiding all across town, quietly waiting for their master¡¯s orders. As time passed, the Third Grade elites in the shadow army started to grow in number.


    In fact, fearsome spirit shadows of Fourth Grade even appeared from one or two of these portals.


    These spirit shadows were once tragic undead creatures. However, after ending up in the Shadow World for some reason, they were forcefully modified by the nearly solid shadow substance and turned into these unusual creatures that were half-undead, half-shadow.


    The town at night was still as silent as before.


    However, an impending storm of death was hidden beneath this silence!


    Countless shadowy eyes peeked in and out of the darkness as a terrifying killing intent filled the town. It was almost as if the vige itself had been moved into the Shadow World. Not only did moonlight not shine down from above, but the only lights in town turned dark and dim, like will-o-wisps from a dead man¡¯s body.


    Not only did they give off no warmth at all, they even caused one to feel a chill from their very bones!


    Adept Holly stepped on the creaking stairs and arrived on the second floor. He looked at the two paths before him and shook his head with a bitter smile. Finally, he walked to the right, found the closest room, and shut the door firmly behind him.


    ¡°Dammit! This is the bad thing about going out on errands. It¡¯s hard just to find a ce to sleep in peace. Hmph! I don¡¯t care who you are. You can do as you please, but if you disturb me, I won¡¯t hold back!¡±


    Holly shouted at the roof before throwing himself into bed.


    Cherisha, who was still enjoying her feast in the dining hall, suddenly shivered. She felt a mysterious chill throughout her body.


    ¡°Hurry, hurry, hurry...why do you have to be in such a hurry? Can¡¯t I just eat in peace!¡±


    Cherisha mumbled through her mouth full of food as she waved a hand and put out the candle on the table.


    As thest light in town vanished into the darkness, the wholend came to life.

 Chapter 1094 - Clash of Powers

    <h4>Chapter 1094 sh of Powers</h4>


    Greem silently opened his eyes.


    The zing hot heart in his body was still beating firmly and rhythmically, sending surges of pure golden fire all over his body. This golden fire was entirely different from the fire energy of the past. Apart from a vicious and violent destructive energy, the fire also contained a subtle trace of unusual power.


    Greem¡¯s mental consciousness was like a baby chick that had just emerged from its shell. It extended out of his body and stretched out of the house in every direction, sustained by his powerful Spirit.


    The entire town was now a world of darkness!


    It was not just a description; it was the cold, objective reality.


    No one knew when, but dense shadow energy had spread to every corner of the small town, and it was still spreading and growing in power.


    At this moment, Maple Forest Town had already been dragged into an interspatialyer of the Shadow World. It was now an unusual pseudo-shadow domain.


    In this domain, all shadow creatures and dark magic would be at their strongest, unaffected by suppression or interference from the Morrian ne.


    It was impossible to achieve such a monumental effect with the power of a single intermediate Fourth Grade Dark Witch unless, of course, she was supported by the origin tower of the Dark Witches.


    Powerful and permeating shadow energy flowed freely through the town. It was like clusters of shadows of various intensities, almost filling up the entirety of the vige apart from the positions of the four adepts.


    Every Fourth Grade adept was a powerful and fearsome entity!


    The shadow energy had intentionally avoided the locations of the adepts while the pseudo-shadow domain was forming, prioritizing taking over the other spaces.


    The shadow energy didn¡¯t dare to enter Greem¡¯s room out of fear of alerting him prematurely.


    Meanwhile, a wall of astral power protected Adept Holly¡¯s room, making it exceedingly difficult for any shadow energy to seep in unnoticed.


    Only Cherisha, who was seated in the dining hall on the first floor, was exposed to the shadow energy. However, ayer of soft but iparably resilient mental shielding radiated around her body, firmly keeping the shadow energy away from herself.


    As for Dark Witch Shani¡¯s room? In all honesty, the source of the dark power in the town probably came from here. The shadow vortices on the outskirts of town were, in the end, no more than a natural phenomenon caused by the gathering of all this shadow energy.


    Clusters, clouds, andyers of shadow energy roamed the lightless skies of the town like wild sharks hiding beneath the water. They circled Greem¡¯s room wildly but dared not take a single step inside.


    When Adept Holly and the two-headed adept both indicated their non-involvement in this internal conflict by their own means, a formless battle immediately began!


    Greem became excessively excited and restless at the thought of the uing deathmatch against an adept of the same grade. However, not only did these emotions not affect his rationality, they allowed him to remain in a sort of ¡®furiousposure.¡¯


    The strange power flowing through his golden mes merged with his Spirit, causing even his mental consciousness to burn passionately.


    Supported by the fire energy, countless spiritual appendages rushed out of the room andshed at the shadow energy around them.


    Two formless and shapeless powers shed in the air, tearing into one another.


    An indescribable sizzling resounded in the air when the incredibly corrosive shadow powers came into contact with the spiritual appendage¡¯s strange burning abilities. Two forces of entirely different natures shed, destroyed, devoured, and neutralized each other with wild insanity.


    Even space itself was being ravaged by the two powers. It sizzled and boiled like water close to its boiling point!


    The shadow energy relied on the hundreds of shadow vortices spread across town for its power. After the past few hours of preparation, the amount of shadow energy was at an absolute advantagepared to the opponent. There was no need for any human interference. Upon sensing the existence of a different energy, all the shadow power in the domain started to rush towards Greem¡¯s location wildly.


    Greem was relying entirely on himself in his confrontation against an entire pseudo-shadow domain.


    His massive Spirit dissipated into the air, turning into thousands of spiritual appendages that quickly and effectively crushed any shadow power that dared to reach within the range of his spiritual senses. When the spiritual threads¨Cburned red by the powers of the firews¨Cshed with the shadow energy, shockwaves spread through the air. These two energies relied on different attributes and characteristics to crush and neutralize their enemy.


    In general, the firew powers that Greem had mastered were obviously much, much more potent than these autonomous shadow energy attacks that were not under Dark Witch Shani¡¯s direct control. Almost every strand and thread of fire energy could only be extinguished by ten times the amount of shadow energy.


    If it weren¡¯t for the existence of the pseudo-shadow domain, Dark Witch Shani would have already lost in this first encounter of Spirit!


    Dark Witch Shani¡¯s room was pitch ck.


    It was like the ink of a thousand squids had flooded the entire ce. It was so dark that there was no light at all. No spiritual energy could hope to enter this ce and probe for information.


    Meanwhile, Dark Witch Shani was like a ck widow spider lying in the center of her web. She had a perfect grasp of everything happening within the pseudo-shadow domain through the feedback from strands of shadow energy.


    In all honesty, she had never treated this so-called legendary fire adept as a legitimate threat before this attack began.


    The legendary fire adept. What aughable nickname!


    Was Greem such a foolish person? Did he have no idea why his enemies were so willing to spread this title of his? What for, if not to invite death upon him?


    All adepts were prideful people, with extraordinarily twisted and distorted egos!


    The title of the legendary fire adept would not win their respect at all. Instead, it would naturally provoke hostility and poke at their sensitive egos.


    As a conservative member of the Northern Witches, Shani hated nothing more than prideful and arrogant male adepts!


    In particr, when Shani heard that this male adept had taken advantage of the rise of the Fate branch to capture the heart of the young and naive Witch of Fate, her hatred and hostility for Greem were amplified even further.


    That was why Shani had dly epted this mission when that powerful will had descended upon her.


    She hadn¡¯te to Morrian ne to sabotage the Arcane Empire. She came to dispose of that legendary fire adept properly.


    Shani had not participated in that battle from a few days ago, but she had not left either.


    She was looking for an opportunity. An opportunity to kill Greem in a single strike!


    Unfortunately, the forces sent by the Arcane Empire were still too weak. They could not truly threaten Fourth Grade adepts. As such, Shani had no choice but to remain in hiding, working alongside the party itself.


    What she never expected was for the legendary adept to bring the party to this remote region after he had picked up on her bare killing intent instead of fleeing immediately. It seemed like he intended to resolve their ¡®little disagreement¡¯ here.


    Naturally, Shani couldn¡¯t be happier. She wouldn¡¯t pass up on this opportunity either. She had immediately used the Orb of Shadows to project a portion of the Dark Witch¡¯s origin tower to this vige, with herself as the coordinate.


    Shani was currently like a bridge. She projected the power of the origin tower onto the town endlessly and used that power to summon wave after wave of elite shadow armies.


    This power did not belong to Shani. Rather, it was a subordinate force that the Dark Witches had been cultivating and raising in the Shadow World. The fact that Shani could freely mobilize this army undoubtedly reflected the Dark Witches¡¯ attitude on the matter of killing Greem.


    As she drew upon the shadow energy to surround the legendary fire adept, Shanimunicated with the origin tower, hoping to drag this pseudo-shadow domain even further into the Shadow World.


    However, the state of the battle caused her to frown in confusion the moment it began.


    The legendary fire adept¡¯s power was too unusual. How...how was it that even the spiritual appendages he extended outwards carried with them a trace of fire energy? How exactly had he achieved this feat?


    Had he not just advanced to Fourth Grade, ording to the information She sent? Why did he have such mastery over the firews?


    It was important to note that even with Shani¡¯s incredible talent, she had only barely grasped the shadowws despite six hundred years passing by since her advancement to Fourth Grade. There was still a long way to go before she could master the use of this power.


    However, it had only been a dozen years since Greem had advanced to Fourth Grade.


    This strange discovery caused the hatred in Shani¡¯s heart to grow even more significant.


    If the shadow energy could not prate his domain, then something more substantial should be able to do the job!


    Under Shani¡¯smand, the shadow army that had been lying in wait in the town finally moved!


    It was like dark ck ink had been poured into ck water. Packs of shadow panthers leaped out of hidden corners, stepping through the air and jumping across the buildings as they quickly surrounded the room where Greem resided.


    The more intelligent high-grade shadow creatures quickly gathered in the meantime, forming squads of shadow warriors and marching in an orderly fashion towards the burning sun in their shadow world.


    Indeed, in the eyes of all the shadow creatures, it was like an overwhelming, oppressive, and proud sun was hidden within that shabby house.


    Golden threads of light prated the floorboards and the ink-ck shadow domain, shining upon the swarming packs of shadow panthers. It didn¡¯t even take three seconds for a Second Grade shadow panther to disintegrate under the golden sunlight, reduced to unconscious shadow energy once again.


    Rather than the shadow panthers desperately attacking their target, it was more like the shadow panthers casting themselves into the me like suicidal moths.


    If the legendary fire adept were only a small candle me, it would be devoured by the darkness eventually, with the endless hordes of shadow creatures. However, if that legendary fire adept was not a candle, but a wildfire zing across an empty in, then what awaited the shadow creatures was not victory, but......


    Dark Witch Shani¡¯s heart suddenly sank!

 Chapter 1095 - Battle in Darkness

    <h4>Chapter 1095 Battle in Darkness</h4>


    If Greem and Shani¡¯s battle was still a battle in the shadows before, then with the appearance of the shadow army, the fight quickly escted into an actual war.


    Naturally, war had its own unique characteristics and traits!


    A proud, massive red sun rose from the wooden house, endless light and heat shining from within burning and roasting all of the space nearby. Unfortunately, the entire town had been converted into a pseudo-shadow domain. Even such great heat and light were constrained within a hundred meters of the sun, unable to travel any further.


    This ten-meter-wide fireball could only illuminate a hundred-meter space around it. It was still a lightless world of darkness a hundred meters away.


    Shani, who was hiding in the core of the darkness, lifted her head. With her extraordinary vision, she saw through the blinding heat and peeked at what was happening within the fireball.


    The legendary fire adept stood in the air, holding a crimson fire-coral staff in his hand. A magical crown of strange design had appeared on his head, and red light flickered on his waist, arms, neck, and feet, creating a crimson barrier around himself.


    He wore all sorts of unusual and unique rings on his fingers, each radiating a drastically different and unfamiliar energy aura.


    The legendary fire adept himself was radiating fearsome heat and light from head to toe. An imposing sort of golden fire wrapped around his body.


    The interference of such a tremendous aura prevented Shani from seeing Greem¡¯s face clearly, despite her prowess and spiritual senses. The spiritual appendage she had silently extended into the domain of heat and light sizzled and burned to ashes almost instantly.


    Dammit! How was she supposed to lock onto her target without being able to extend her Spirit?


    Dark Witch Shani let out a roar of anger. She immediatelymanded the shadow army tounch a reckless charge at the fireball.


    A single order was given, and a thousand ghostly eyes flickered in the shadows.


    Hundreds and thousands of shadow panthers leaped out of their hiding spots, jumping and striding through the air as they lunged at their target.


    Greem took a quick look at the battlefield, and a soft smile appeared on his handsome, zing face.


    Low and rapid chanting could be heard. A dozen appendages of fire fifty-meters-long and a meter in width suddenly reached out from the ball of light. They began tosh about in the air like the tentacles of an octopus.


    All the shadow panthers that entered the hundred-meter diameter were knocked away by the tentacles before they could even enter the Burning Domain.


    The violent fire energy contained within the fire appendages spread through the bodies of the shadow panthers upon impact, causing the feline monsters to ignite into pretty fireworks as they sailed through the air.


    A Second Grade shadow panther could be considered a cmity in a small human kingdom. Yet, they were no more than cannon fodder that relied on their numbers in a Fourth Grade battlefield like this one.


    Typically, the shadow panthers would be able to rely on Shadow Teleportation to travel to their enemies¡¯ shadows. That gave them the absolute advantage in both offense and avoiding attacks. Today, they had run into their most terrifying predator!


    Where were they supposed to find a shadow in which they could hide and reside when all was illuminated by this giant ball of light?


    These shadow panthers that charged forth from every direction were forced to reveal themselves, no matter how powerful each one of them was. This temporary pause in their Shadow Teleportation spelled their doom.


    Those one dozen fire tentacles were not for show. They possessed iprehensible power and near unbelievable intelligence. Any shadow panther that appeared within their range of attack would be whipped into sparks and fire before they could get any closer.


    Despite the sheer number of shadow panthers prating from every angle, the tentacles intercepted every single one of them. They couldn¡¯t even touch the edge of the ball of light. This obviously caused Shani to be increasingly frustrated and impatient behind the scenes.


    This ce wasn¡¯t the World of Adepts, after all. It was the Morrian ne where the arcanists reigned supreme.


    Shani required the power of the Orb of Shadows and the aid of the Dark Witches¡¯ origin tower to be able to drag this town into the boundary between the Shadow World and the material ne. Naturally, the cost of doing so was an extreme exertion on the shadow power reserves of the origin tower.


    If Shani didn¡¯t want to weaken the strength of the entire Dark Witch branch, quickly ending the battle was her wisest course of action!


    However, it was only at this moment that she truly experienced how troublesome an opponent Greem was.


    Even the entire army of shadow panthers could not get close to him. This...this was simply far too unexpected!


    With hatred and fury rising in her heart, Shani gave her orders. An army formed from Third Grade shadow warriors marched toward the ball of light. Two strange spirit shadows started to fire shadow arrows at the ball of light from behind the army.


    Although the fire tentacles intercepted most of these shadow arrows, a few of them still made their way through the defense andnded on the ball of light. These shadow arrows erupted upon contact. They then started to corrupt everything around them into shadow energy, and the darkness spread like ink.


    Fire and darkness were two opposing yetplementary powers to begin with!


    As such, the appearance of the shadow energy triggered continuous shockwaves and damage within the fireball.


    With this shadow energy as a stepping stone, the obstructed shadow panthers could immediately use their innate Shadow Teleportation ability to prate the defensive line of fire tentacles. They could directly appear at the edge of the fireball now.


    However, as Second Grade creatures who could not even withstand a single strike from the fire tentacles, they could not possibly resist the effects of the Burning Domain. The shadow panthers that did leap into the fireball exploded into ck mists before they understood what happened.


    If it were only a few shadow panthers, these ck mists would have rapidly dissolved and vanished in the endless heat and light. However, it was an infinite horde of shadow panthers that exploded within the ball. Theyer uponyer of ck mists continued to appear even as they dissipated in the light.


    As a result, a visiblyrge dark spot appeared on the red and white fireball.


    Moreover, as more and more shadow panthers added their bodies to the count, the dark spot began to show signs of growingrger!


    This phenomenon caused Greem to frown.


    He was currently protected by threeyers of fire.


    The innermostyer was a burning fireballposed mostly of the golden fire. That was Greem¡¯s melee defense.


    The secondyer was the ball of light formed by the radiation of the first fireball and the Burning Domain itself.


    Last of all were the fire tentacles created by his spells. They were all controlled by the Chip and would not provide the enemy with any openings.


    However, Greem was fighting alone against an entire pseudo-shadow domain, after all.


    Faced with the full force of the enemy, his seemingly invincible defense was still prated.


    Greem showed no signs of panic against the enemy¡¯sprehensive attack from every angle.


    In all seriousness, it was only the prequel leading up to the actual battle!


    Even if they could pry open his defenses, the best the shadow army could do was cause him to exert more effort than necessary. They could not even injure his actual person. Thus, the Fourth Grade Dark Witch would have to strike if she wanted to kill him.


    After all, the enemy of a Fourth Grade adept could only be another Fourth Grade!


    This chaotic attack and endless horde of shadow creatures were only cannon fodder meant to develop a slight advantage for the Fourth Grade Dark Witch.


    They could never hope to be the protagonists of a battle between Fourth Grades!


    Despite how many shadow panthers hurled themselves at his fireball, over sixty percent of Greem¡¯s attention was still fixed on the two annoying Fourth Grade spirit shadows. Another thirty percent was hung up on Dark Witch Shani, who had yet to make her appearance. Only the remaining ten percent was used to deal with the shadow creatures.


    She wanted to suppress him with numbers?


    Greem chuckled inside his golden fireball. He lifted his fire coral staff, and a giant, majestic megate formed behind him.


    In any other situation, Greem would only need to exert a tiny amount of fire energy to summon a megate like this. After all, countless fire elementium particles in the air could be gathered for his use, thereby reducing the strain on his energy reserves.


    However, in a pseudo-shadow domain like this, all other elementium powers aside from shadow energy had been banished. As such, a spell like the megate would have to be sustained almost entirely by Greem¡¯s own fire energy.


    If it weren¡¯t for the unusual Heart of Principles in his body, he would never be able to afford such exhaustion!


    However, with the Heart of Principles endlessly supplying him with powerful golden fire energy, Greem could easily summon a massive megate.


    The doors of the megate hurled open. Countless fire creatures swarmed out from within. They roared and charged at the shadow creatures outside the fireball.


    Compared to the well-trained shadow army elites of the Dark Witches, these fire creatures were far weaker and inexperienced. There were very few high-grade fire creatures, and in fact, most of them were First Grade.


    Trying to fight back against the elite shadow army with such numbers and inferior quality was no more than a pipe dream.


    However, Greem had never ced much hope on these cannon fodders. He only needed them to dy those annoying panthers for a brief moment. This way, he could spare some effort and focus on dealing with the two Fourth Grade spirit shadows instead.


    After all, these two spirit shadows were the only ones who could threaten the defensive perimeter!

 Chapter 1096 - Exterminating the Spirit Shadows

    <h4>Chapter 1096 Exterminating the Spirit Shadows</h4>


    With the fire creatures staving off the shadow army¡¯s pursuit, Greem could finally free himself to deal with the two ¡®cowardly¡¯ and ¡®despicable¡¯ spirit shadows.


    Despite being Fourth Grade creatures, neither of these two spirit shadows had the attitude or manner of an individual of that power. They hid behind the Third Grade shadow warriors, only using their shadow arrows to attack the ball of light to tear open a path for the weaker shadow beings.


    They didn¡¯t dare take even a single step towards the ball of light themselves!


    If they believed they were safe as long as they kept their distance, they would have underestimated Greem¡¯s abilities. After all, the legendary fire adept was known for the ferocity of his elementium attacks!


    Greem chuckled within the fireball. The golden fire within his body started to gather rapidly.


    It was as if a jet of golden fire were shooting out of his zing eyes. His long, ck hair was scattered across his shoulders, flickers of fire dancing and leaping upon them. His entire body was engulfed by violent and ferocious mes, constantly radiating terrifying heat and light.


    ¡°My fury as my power, zing Light!¡±


    Greem loudly shouted the activation chant for the spell as two blinding red lights appeared in his burning eyes. The two lights gathered into two fearsome beams of zing Light. They cut across the skies, piercing through the formation of shadow creatures andnding upon one of the Fourth Grade spirit shadows.


    Aaaaaah!


    A tragic, sky rending howl rang out in the air.


    A thick, nearly solidyer of chilling death aura appeared around the Fourth Grade spirit shadow, desperately shielding it from the zing Light as it fled into the distance.


    Unfortunately, it didn¡¯t matter how fast it could run! There was no way it could be faster than Greem¡¯s gaze!


    Greem stood upright like a mountain, mighty as a god of fire. His zing eyes slightly adjusted their angle and direction as the spirit shadow fled. Regardless of where the spirit shadow withdrew, the two beams of zing Light remained fix upon it.


    The death aura surging out of the Fourth Grade spirit shadow¡¯s body shed with the red beam endlessly. The two energies devoured and neutralized each other wildly. However, judging by the current situation, it was evident that the red beams firing from Greem¡¯s eyes were slightly stronger. They destroyed the spirit shadow¡¯s body even as they fought against the death aura. Bit by bit, they reached into the core of darkness in the spirit shadow¡¯s body.


    The core of darkness was where the soul consciousness of the spirit shadow resided.


    Should the core be destroyed, the spirit shadow would perish as well, even if it was a Fourth Grade entity!


    As such, the Fourth Grade spirit shadow was terrified and fled as hard as it could.


    Shadow Teleportation, Shadowstalk, Shadow Substitution, Shadow Clone. It used a series of dark magics, either teleporting it to another region, swapping positions with another shadow creature, or dividing itself into a few dozen clones that looked the same as itself.


    However, it didn¡¯t matter what it attempted; the two beams of zing Lights seemed to be locked on to it. They remained fixed on its body no matter where it went.


    In truth, the death aura was the spirit shadow¡¯s body, while the core of darkness was where its soul resided.


    Thus, as the death aura rapidly evaporated, the spirit shadow¡¯s body started to shrink as well. Soon, the death aura was no longer enough to cover the ck, crystalline core.


    When the zing Lights finally shone upon the core of darkness, the Fourth Grade spirit shadow immediately stopped fleeing. Its entire body started to twist and distorted maniacally as its form flickered and cycled through the appearance of the countless creatures it had devoured in the past. Finally, the crisp sound of shattering ss could be heard; two small holes had been burned into the core of darkness. Countless pale and tragic souls escaped from within the nucleus, circling the spirit shadow briefly before dissipating into the air.


    [Target creature has been eliminated. Requesting permission to undo target lock!] The Chip¡¯s notification rang out in Greem¡¯s mind.


    ¡°Undo target lock!¡±


    [Understood!]


    It was nearly impossible for Greem alone to maintain target lock on a Fourth Grade spirit shadow with multiple mobility spells from a distance of two thousand meters away. However, with the Chip¡¯s help, he could burn a Fourth Grade spirit shadow alive with the golden mes without so much as taking a single step.


    This mighty disy of power had undoubtedly intimidated all of his opponents.


    The other remaining Fourth Grade spirit shadow was scared out of its wits. It didn¡¯t dare approach the ball of light now. Instead, it screamed fearfully and fled into the darkness in the distance.


    A Fourth Grade creature. That was a Fourth Grade creature!


    Even though Fourth Grade creatures could not possibly be as powerful as an actual Fourth Grade adept, it was still a Fourth Grade creature after all. Though most Fourth Grade adepts could suppress and defeat a Fourth Grade creature in a duel, it was challenging to inflict a killing blow.


    After all, Fourth Grade creatures still had a fundamental level of power!


    They might be inferior to a Fourth Grade adept when it came to knowledge reserves, knowledge application, and the use of magical equipment, but they also had unique, innate abilities of their own. These abilities were no weaker than those of a Fourth Grade adept.


    However, a fearsome Fourth Grade spirit shadow had been burned alive by that legendary fire adept without being able to disy much of its power. It...it was unbelievable!


    In doing so, the legendary fire adept had struck fear into the hearts of all high-grade shadow creatures present on this battlefield. They stared at the blinding ball of light with horror and surprise. Of course, they could not see anything within the ball of light.


    For some reason, all of the shadow creatures¡¯ attacks weakened slightly. They were all trying their best not to stand out amidst the entire army.


    Unfortunately, it didn¡¯t matter how they hid or disguised themselves. Beams of zing Light still shot out of the ball of light, reducing seven or eight Third Grade shadow warriors into ash.


    Greem¡¯s actions filled Dark Witch Shani¡¯s heart with anger and heartbreak.


    While cultivating a high-grade shadow creature wasn¡¯t as difficult as developing a high-grade adept, the resources and rare materials consumed in the process cost a shocking amount. Each and every one of the shadow creatures that the legendary fire adept so brazenly ughtered was an elite subordinate that the Dark Witches had invested greatly in.


    Now, they were all being wasted in vain on this other ne without bringing any objective benefit to the n at all. It...it was an unforgivable waste of resources!


    Dark Witch Shani might not be criticized for such wasteful use of n property if she were the leader of the Dark Witches. Sadly, she was not the leader.


    At the very best, she was a high-grade witch sent out by the Dark Witches on an internar bounty hunting mission. The leader had only authorized partial use of the origin tower¡¯s powers and limited mobilization of the n¡¯s private militia.


    That did not include or allow for heavy losses on the militia¡¯s part!


    Shani could almost already see herself being used and criticized by all the n elders during the next n meeting as she watched the high-grade shadows turn to dust beneath the red beams of light.


    Those bastards would most definitely force her topensate for this ¡®mistake¡¯ with her own resources!


    That was a given!


    Shani¡¯s heart bed unstoppably. She could no longer sit behind the lines now. She hastily summoned the surviving spirit shadow to her side and had the spirit shadow rece her as the conduit for the origin tower. She personally descended upon the frontlines furiously, enveloped by a tide of darkness and shadows.


    Dark Witch Shani had finally shown herself!


    A smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face inside the fireball. He quickly adjusted his condition.


    A fireball and a ball of darkness. The two powerful adepts of entirely different attributes faced off in the air, their eyes fixed upon each other.


    [Beep. Locked on to target¡¯s position.


    [Target creature¡¯s attribute is darkness. Target possesses various short-ranged mobility spells, including Shadowstalk and Shadow Teleportation. Possibility of maintaining lock-on to the enemy¡¯s position inside the pseudo-shadow domain is no more than 23%/


    [Dynamic trajectory estimation and calction online. Lock-on possibility increased to 46%.


    [Elementium Sight assistance system online. Lock-on possibility increased to 62%.


    [Spatial node distribution scanplete. Lock-on possibility increased to 71%.


    [Warning. Said possibility is the most optimal result given host¡¯s current abilities. Unless host can break the pseudo-shadow domain, the ability to maintain lock-on will be perpetually affected by external factors!


    So, 71%. That is enough!


    Greem¡¯s eyes flickered slightly.


    It was important to note that he was now fighting an intermediate Fourth Grade Dark Witch that had advanced several hundreds of years ago. The fact that the Chip could increase his lock-on possibility to 71% within the pseudo-shadow domain that the enemy had so carefullyid out was already unimaginable.


    The real key to victory in this battle between Fourth Grade adepts was whether they could sessfully unleash the might of their spells on their enemy.


    Due to the existence of defensive forcefields, mobility spells, defensive spells, and the environment itself, maintaining a perpetual lock on the opponent¡¯s position and ensuring a hundred percent uracy on all spells was nearly impossible.


    Being unable to lock onto the opponent meant a high possibility that your spell would miss. That was not just a waste of precious magic power, but a waste of the opportunity to attack. It would be simply unforgivable!


    With the Chip¡¯s aid, Greem¡¯s possibility of maintaining a lock-on to Shani¡¯s position was at 71%. It was a terrifying number. In contrast, the Dark Witch¡¯s chance of sessfully locking onto Greem was no more than 30%.


    This difference in numbers would affect theirbat effectiveness so drastically that it was almost unimaginable!


    ¡°Sadly, you Dark Witches still chose to make enemies out of me in the end. I will give you this one opportunity today, then. Let us see if you will be the one to die, or I will be the one to live!¡± Greem chuckled sinisterly, his thunderous voice causing the very domain itself to rumble and shake.


    Shaniughed coldly in her shadows.


    ¡°It¡¯s not your ce to decide how we Dark Witches choose. Stay here forever, won¡¯t you!¡±


    As Shani let out her battlecry, the dark energy within the entire pseudo-shadow domain came to life. The darkness lunged desperately towards Greem from every direction.


    The true battle had finally begun!

 Chapter 1097 - Whack-A-Mole

    <strong>Chapter 1097 Whack-A-Mole</strong>


    Greem looked at the overwhelming dark energy around him.


    He knew very well that this wasn¡¯t the power of the Dark Witch across from him.


    It was impossible for her to have turned this entire space into a pseudo-shadow domain without the aid of an adept¡¯s tower. However, there was no doubt that the Dark Witch would still enjoy a tremendous boost to herbat power in this domain.


    That said, what would decide the oue of this battle was still the fundamental power of both parties, as well as theirbat techniques.


    There was no doubt that the Dark Witch held a tremendous advantage in this regard!


    Five hundred long years of fighting had allowed her to umte plenty of experience inbat that rookies could not hope to match. That was the real reason why she had been able to maintain her esteemed status amongst the Dark Witches.


    As Dark Witch Shani slowly walked through the air towards Greem, her entire body, her heartbeat, and even her breathing resonated intensely with the pseudo-shadow domain.


    At this moment, her body and consciousness vanished without a trace. They had wholly assimted into that endless, soaring darkness.


    ¡°Dammit! Just as I expected, there¡¯s no easy opponent among Fourth Grade adepts!¡±


    Greem cursed in his mind while he detonated the fire tentacles without any hesitation.


    The explosion blew the surrounding shadow creatures to pieces. The fire shockwave that came after then pushed back against the approaching dark energy like a vicious wave.


    As the fire shockwave spread outwards, the fire energy and shadow energy shed in the center of town, entangling with and tearing into each other.


    Dark Witch Shani, who had just merged with the pseudo-shadow domain, was forcefully pushed out of her resonance by the sh of energies before she could assume full control of the domain.


    The damned legendary fire adept quickly approached with an endless sea of fire the moment her slender figure emerged from the darkness.


    ¡°Bastard! How did he know how to deal with the power of a domain?¡±


    Shani cursed furiously as she waved her hand and summoned a hundred shadow arrows to intercept her opponent.


    The pseudo-shadow domain was sustained by the power of the origin tower, after all. It was not part of her abilities. As such, Shani¡¯spatibility with the domain was not very high. It was why she was so quickly forced out of resonance by an energy shockwave that epassed the entire domain.


    In all honesty, Shani couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by the fire adept¡¯s ability to do this!


    Shani flickered and disappeared into the endless shadows as she looked at the charging fire adept.


    The next second, a zing Fireball devoured her previous location.


    ............


    ¡°Dammit! She got away again!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but curse as he sensed theck of life aura in the air.


    For a long time, Greem¡¯s favorite strategy in adept battles had been to recklessly spread fire and create a sea of mes, creating a battlefield in which he could freely move around.


    However, now that he was trapped in a pseudo-shadow domain, he could finally taste the anguish of entering someone else¡¯s home field!


    The Dark Witch had the space to teleport endlessly within this pseudo-shadow domain. All it took was a single thought, and she could appear anywhere in the domain.


    This advantage would allow her to ambush Greem freely without serious repercussions. When Greem wanted to retaliate, she would already be long gone, vanishing to a different region in the shadows.


    Greem could not unleash his power to its fullest potential in this domain space. If it weren¡¯t for the Chip barely being able to track the location of the Dark Witch, Greem would already be stuck in an awkward position with no ability to counter at all.


    Blue light flickered deep in Greem¡¯s eyes as he looked at the vanishing Dark Witch. The lightless world before his eyes suddenly turned into a straightforward world of gray and white. Dark grey clusters of energy flowed everywhere within his vision.


    Meanwhile, a single trail of dissipating red traces could be faintly seen in this world of gray.


    Greem forced back the approaching shadow energy without any hesitation and quickly followed the direction of the red trail.


    A thousand meters away, Dark Witch Shani had just emerged from the Shadow World and was drawing upon her shadow energy to search for the legendary adept¡¯s location.


    However, before she could obtain feedback from the domain space, a violent zing Fireball rumbled through the air and shot towards her in an elegant curve.


    The unprepared Dark Witch hastily blocked the explosive impact of the fireball, only to realize that the legendary fire adept was almost upon her.


    ¡°Dammit! How did he find me?¡±


    Filled with resentment, Shani had no other choice but to dive into space again. She leaped from one dark node to another and quickly emerged at the other end of the domain.


    She had learned her lesson from the previous encounter. This time, she did not invest all of her Spirit into her management of the domain.


    As expected, just three seconds after she emerged from the dark node, the male adept charged towards her with boundless might.


    At this point, Dark Witch Shani was certain that the fire adept had somehow locked on to her position!


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! What was the point of this pseudo-shadow domain that she had gone to such great lengths to create if she did not have the home-field advantage? She couldn¡¯t just run all over the area and let the fire adept chase her like it was a game of whack-a-mole, could she?


    Unwilling to give up, Shani tried to teleport a few more times before she finally gave up.


    That bastard. He actually had the means to track her location in this pseudo-shadow domain!


    It was nearly unimaginable, but given all the unusual and bizarre variety of spells avable in the adept¡¯s magic system, Shani had no choice but to ept her situation.


    After emerging from another dark node, Shani decided not to hide any longer. Instead, she quickly gathered shadow energy and prepared for a serious battle.


    Shani was a Dark Witch that had advanced five hundred years ago. She had not achieved her current position through lies and deceit. Her title as ¡®Nightraven Shani¡¯ was not in vain!


    Shani sensed themotion and shockwaves in the shadow energy around her and quickly determined the angle and direction in which the legendary fire adept was approaching.


    A rapid chant came out of her mouth. Endless shadow energy that had been flowing around her suddenly gathered together, forming into a massive core of darkness. Seven or eight massive tentacles of shadow reached out of the center and startedshing about aimlessly in the air. Every one of these tentacles was as tall as an entire building.


    When the legendary fire adept descended in a giant fireball, all of the shadow tentacles reached towards him and bound him to the spot as if they were a giant octopus.


    A series of miniature energy explosions erupted the moment the shadow tentacles came into contact with the giant fireball.


    The heat and light of the fireball dissolved the shadow tentacles incessantly, causing them to go limp like melting ice. However, the surging shadow energy around the massive core of darkness allowed it to create even more tentacles to bind Greem to the spot.


    Taking full advantage of this opportunity, the Second and Third Grade shadow creatures stepped upon the tentacles and charged out of the darkness to attack Greem¡¯s fireball.


    Every bit of shadow energy that prated and attacked the ball of light would cause it to tremble unstoppably. Greem could sense the frequency and intensity of the fireball¡¯s shaking.


    zing Fireballs shot out of Greem¡¯s hand like a restless cannon. Every single fireball could exterminate a Second Grade shadow creature and significantly injure a Third Grade one. Even the shadow warriors had to defend with all their might to avoid being consumed by the violent mes.


    No shadow creature could continue maintaining their projection in a different ne once their core of darkness had been destroyed.


    After mastering the firews, the pration power of Greem¡¯s fire was one of the best even amongst elementium adepts!


    The actual bodies of the shadow creatures in the Shadow World would suddenly ignite and turn to ashes when they died at Greem¡¯s hands. Of course, Shani was invested in this battle and still did not know of this situation. Otherwise, her heart would be aching a lot more than it currently was.


    Why were shadow creatures so challenging to deal with?


    Precisely because they excelled at using shadow energy to project their power.


    While their projection was fighting recklessly and sacrificing themselves in another ne, their actual person would remain unharmed within the Shadow World. Even if their shadow projection died in the line of battle, all they had to do was exert a portion of their Spirit to project their body once again.


    It was this unique characteristic of shadow creatures that turned them into terrifying existences that no material creatures were willing to fight, despite their almost non-existent defenses.


    However, they had met their bane in Greem!


    The application of the potent firews caused the dead shadow creatures to bring back a portion of the fire energy when their consciousness returned to the Shadow World. In doing so, their core of darkness, the true form of their consciousness that resided in the Shadow World, would instantly be engulfed in mes.


    That was the terrifying part of a principle adept!


    They used the lever of the principles to move entire power systems and could often inflict devastating damage upon the enemy with minimal power. Moreover, an attack that utilized the power ofws was nearly indefensible.


    Unless you had simrw powers to protect yourself, your only option was to endure the attack!


    The Dark Witches had not discovered that Greem had mastered a portion of the firews before this mission. That would shape up to be a massive w in their nning. At this point in the battle, they could only swallow their teeth and cry as they suffered a tremendous, unexpected loss.

 Chapter 1098 - Domain Characteristic

    <strong>Chapter 1098 Domain Characteristic</strong>


    Shani quickly realized something was wrong as she engaged in a melee fight with Greem.


    The number of shadow creatures in the pseudo-shadow domain was rapidly dwindling from her spiritual senses.


    It was a situation that supposedly should not happen.


    With the origin tower¡¯s assistance from afar and the Fourth Grade spirit shadow as a conduit for all that power, these shadow creatures should be able to swarm endlessly, drowning the entire battlefield with their fearsome numbers and fearless fighting.


    It had barely been minutes since the battle started. The only reason the number of shadow creatures in the pseudo-shadow domain would be decreasing would be if the origin tower severed the portal that connected to the Shadow World. The number of shadow creatures was decreasing so quickly now that they were almost decimated by the enemy.


    Dammit! What were her sisters doing in the tower? Did something go wrong along the way?


    Shani became doubtful and suspicious.


    How could she ever know what was truly happen far away in the Dark Witches¡¯ origin tower in the Northern Lands of the World of Adepts? Her leader, Circe, was already jumping around furiously and coughing up blood from sheer anger.


    The shadow army that the Dark Witches had gone to great lengths to cultivate had mysteriously been exterminated without a trace. As the shadow creatures projected their shadow powers to that distant Morrian ne, their real bodies in the Shadow Valley had burst into mes and turned to ashes, one after another.


    This terrifying discovery left Circe with no choice but to order the severing of the soul portal to Morrian. That allowed them to save the remaining twenty percent of shadow creatures, barely.


    Circe couldn¡¯t even cry at the sight of the mangled, thinned-out numbers of the shadow army and the severely crippled force of high-grade shadow creatures. She could angrily curse the bastards that had fed her inurate information about the enemy.


    The Dark Witches¡¯ decisiveness might have saved thest traces of the shadow army, but it also plunged Shani into a difficult situation while she fought on the frontlines.


    The pseudo-shadow domain trembled silently.


    After the soul portal had been shut off, the Fourth Grade spirit shadow that had been serving as the conduit for the origin tower¡¯s power dissipated without a trace. Due to theck of a soul coordinate, the origin tower lost the ability to continue projecting its power.


    The pseudo-shadow domain teetered on the brink of instability!


    It was important to note that a portion of Shani¡¯s mental consciousness was currently joined with the pseudo-shadow domain itself. If she could not retract her mental consciousness before the pseudo-shadow domain copsed, it was very likely her soul would suffer tremendous damage.


    As such, Shani was terrified when she sensed the pseudo-shadow domain tremble as its power faded. She could no longer care for the battle against Greem. Instead, she fled from the battlefield and hurried towards the shadow core of the domain.


    Unfortunately, Greem had picked up on the abnormality of the pseudo-shadow domain as well. He would never let her leave so easily. Thus, he instantly chased after her, refusing to give her any chance to regain control of the shadow core.


    ............


    Inside the endless space of darkness.


    Greem strode forward, scarlet light shining from the fire-coral staff in his right hand as it relentlessly fired fireballs into the surroundings to st away the shadow energy.


    Dark Witch Shani¡¯s elementium aura flickered in front of him, providing him with a clear trail to follow.


    Greem¡¯s face turned when he sensed that elementium aura enter a dark node. He took a step back and raised the staff in his hand. A brilliant, red wall of fire quickly appeared in front of him.


    The next second, several hundred shadow arrows shot from every direction, causing the fire barrier to tremble relentlessly.


    However, as Greem poured his powerful fire energy into the barrier, the thin but resilient defense managed to survive the fearsome trap that Shani hadid down for him.


    After that ferocious barrage, the shadow energy flowing around him had significantly thinned and weakened. The suppression over Greem¡¯s fire energy was reduced considerably.


    Greem coughed lightly as he walked out of the radius of the explosion, where the energy aura was still in chaos. Blue light flickered in his eyes as he assessed his surroundings.


    Unfortunately, the explosion from earlier had wiped out all residual elementium in the air. Greem could no longer track Shani based on her elementium aura alone.


    ¡°Chip, can you lock on to her elementium aura?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    [Beep. Surrounding elementium aura has been thoroughly disrupted. Target lock-on impossible.]


    ¡°Are there any other ways to catch up to her?¡±


    [Beep. After analysis of the current circumstances, chances of the Dark Witch heading to the shadow core are over 97%. Currently calcting and simting the location of the shadow core.


    [Beep. Locked on to the shadow core¡¯s location. Requesting that host move in ordance with the directions.]


    A translucent, light blue arrow was then projected onto Greem¡¯s vision.


    Greem flew forward without any hesitation.


    The illusory arrow constantly shifted directions, guiding Greem forward on the correct path.


    That didn¡¯t mean that the shadow core itself was moving. Rather, this was simply the result of a strange characteristic of the pseudo-shadow domain.


    The pseudo-shadow domain had engulfed the entirety of Maple Forest Town, along with thousands of square meters ofnd in the vicinity. Such arge area was more than enough as a battlefield for ordinary mortals. Unfortunately, it was far too small for two Fourth Grade adepts.


    Both of the adepts could exit the battlefield with a single teleportation spell.


    Thus, an unusual spatial characteristic known as Mythals had been added to the domain to trap Greem within. The effect of the Mythal prevented Greem from ever escaping the pseudo-shadow domain no matter what he did.


    Even if you were to close your eyes and run forward in the pseudo-shadow domain, you would only be running about in a strange curve. One¡¯s sense of space and time in the field was disoriented. It could lead a person to circle within the domain endlessly without any knowledge of this urrence.


    The true terror of this domain characteristic was the fact that it didn¡¯t influence your sight, hearing, sense, or taste, but your very soul consciousness. Even if you were to circle around the town for ten thousand years, you would never realize that you were not walking in a straight line, but a curved line instead.


    When Greem followed the Chip¡¯s instruction to change his direction of travel continuously, his body started to actually proceed in a straight line, heading straight for Shani¡¯s room.


    Indeed, the shadow core had not been hidden at all. It was simplyid out within Shani¡¯s room. Greem had only overlooked its existence due to the unusual characteristic of this domain. Of course, there was even less possibility he would have made his way here.


    Blue light flickered in Greem¡¯s eyes.


    The Chip projected two entirely different visions of the world in each individual eye using its powerful calction abilities.


    In Greem¡¯s left eye, it looked as if he was standing in an empty space of darkness, walking about randomly like a blind man. Meanwhile, his right eye showed himself standing in the stone za of the town, the tragic destruction caused by his fire magic all around him.


    One in his left eye and one in his right. One false and one true. If it weren¡¯t for the Chip being unaffected by the domain¡¯s powers, Greem would probably have had to defend against the attacks of the Dark Witch passively.


    Greem walked along the scorched stone road towards a wooden building looming in the endless darkness. It was the only building that remained intact in Maple Forest Town.


    Greem arrived at the small building after passing through the street. The thick doors of the house were wide open, and he could faintly sense Dark Witch Shani¡¯s life aura above him.


    It seemed like Shani had hastily swung these doors apart when she returned.


    Greem strode forward into the room. The stairs stretching to the second floory right in front of him, in the hall of the first floor. The doors to the dining hall were also open to his left. Adept Cherisha was sitting on her chair worriedly, tilting her head constantly to try and listen and sense for the changes in elementium aura around her.


    There were only twenty meters between them, yet somehow Adept Cherisha had not detected Greem¡¯s presence at all.


    Twenty meters. That was practically like breathing distance for Fourth Grade adepts!


    Perhaps because there was a trace of power contained within Greem¡¯s gaze, Adept Cherisha¡¯s body trembled abruptly. She turned her head in confusion and looked at Greem¡¯s position. She looked all around the empty hall but saw no abnormality or any traces of Greem¡¯s figure.


    As such, she could only consider her sensation an oversensitivity of sorts.


    In truth, with how powerful Cherisha and Mangus were, this dining hall would not be able to trap them in the slightest.


    However, out of fear of Shani¡¯s ¡®savagery,¡¯ they didn¡¯t dare to extend their powers anywhere out of the dining hall.


    After all, at this moment, the entire Maple Forest Town was the battlefield of the Dark Witch and the legendary fire adept. It was very likely that some unexpected variance would be introduced if they recklessly extended their powers beyond the dining hall.


    In all honesty, even Adept Holly didn¡¯t want to engage in a head-on conflict against Shani, if possible. That was why he locked himself in his room and contained his power. He was expressing his intent to remain uninvolved with his actions.


    Of course, Adept Holly and the two-headed adept were not helplessly waiting for their deaths either. Instead, they were simply using their powers to defend their own little regions.


    If the Dark Witch dared to extend her shadow powers towards them, they had their own means of self-defense. However, if she ever did that, her hopes of a duel against the legendary fire adept would be dashed.


    As such, even though Greem and Shani were tearing the town apart, it was perfectly peaceful in the dining hall and Adept Holly¡¯s room. Neither of them had detected any abnormalities.


    Greem smiled. He did not disturb the two-headed adept¡¯s ¡®neutrality.¡¯ Instead, he stepped upon the stairs leading to the second floor.

 Chapter 1099 - Shadow Diamond

    <h4>Chapter 1099 Shadow Diamond</h4>


    The corridor was dark and silent.


    The somewhat old wooden floorboards creaked beneath his feet.


    A thick, suffocating shadow aura masked the air.


    The closer Greem got to the shadow core, the more suppressed the mes around him became. They could only extend fifty centimeters out of his body, barely enough to protect his body and his clothes.


    The corridor in front of Greem was like a haunted house in his double vision of material and immaterial. Traces, strands of nearly solid shadow energy dissipated from the second room to the left, slowly but surely dancing across the corridor.


    The aura was so thick that these shadows were showing signs ofing to life.


    They wandered and squirmed down the narrow corridor in clusters of darkness, continually twisting and morphing into all sorts of unusual shapes. From a distance, these shadows look like horrifying demons awaiting their prey with bared fangs.


    Greem had just stepped into the corridor, into the swarming darkness, when the closest shadow to him immediately transformed into arge mouth with vicious fangs. The mouth bit furiously at him.


    Greem let out a furious grunt. His right hand shot forward, enveloped in mes, and pierced straight into the mouth. It didn¡¯t matter how the shadow bit or tore; it simply could not prate the fire to injure him in the slightest. Greem¡¯s hand probed around therge mouth. When he finally retracted his arm, there was a dark, gleaming crystal in his palm.


    Having lost the ck crystal, the mouth quickly dissipated, roaring and howling ferociously as it did so.


    Greem lifted the ck crystal to his eyes as the Chip quickly projected its information.


    [Substance Name: Shadow Shard


    Substance Category: Dark Energy Crystal


    Item Grade: First Grade


    [Item Applications: Enchantment (Used to enchant weapons with shadow damage). Alchemy (Basic material for dark attribute magical equipment). Potion-Brewing (Necessary material for anti-shadow-damage potions). Summoning (Basic material for summoning shadow creatures).


    [Special Applications: Used to synthesize Shadow Crystals (100 Shadow Shards can be converted into a single Shadow Crystal).]


    ......


    A series of broader applications for the Shadow Shard was listed below, but Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to read it any longer. It was just a First Grade adept material. It wasn¡¯t worth his time at all.


    He casually tossed the Shadow Shard into his storage ring and prepared to move forward.


    Perhaps sensing the might of the enemy, these natural clusters of shadow rapidly gathered together. They formed a single strange shadow creature the size of a dwarf, but with vague, indistinguishable facial features.


    The moment the creature formed, a dangerous and unpredictable aura radiated from its body.


    The Chip¡¯s warning red out in Greem¡¯s mind instantly.


    [Beep. Detecting the biological flux of a Fourth Grade shadow creature. Initial analysis suggests the creature is a shadow assassin. Threat level to host has reached Dangerous. Advising host to remain cautious!]


    So fast?


    Greem paused for a moment. His gaze couldn¡¯t help but fall on the door behind the shadow creature.


    Dark Witch Shani couldn¡¯t have spawned a Fourth Grade shadow creature in such a short time, even if she was the literal God of Adepts herself. Unless...there was some unusually powerful shadow treasure in the shadow core. Otherwise, it would be impossible to achieve such a feat through the might of a single adept.


    If she did possess such a powerful artifact, why did she not just use it against him? Could it be that the item has some sort of restriction, or that it was no more than a support item?


    Greem nced at the quickly forming creature while his mind rapidly analyzed and assessed what secrets lied beyond the door.


    He was about to fight the Fourth Grade Dark Witch momentarily. The best way to gain an advantage on the battlefield was to figure out her trump card before it even began. It was something that a high-grade adept should do prior to every battle!


    However, Greem didn¡¯t have much time left to think or analyze.


    The strange energy flux from the shadow core in the room was getting increasingly intense and distinct.


    It didn¡¯t matter if Shani was brewing some powerful attack or summoning some terrifying creature. Greem had no obligation to idle around like a gentleman and wait for her to be done. At this moment, there was only one thing he needed to do. Regardless of who stood before him, Greem would have to eliminate them with the momentum of lightning and immediately interrupt the Dark Witch¡¯s action.


    At the thought of this, Greem stepped forward without any hesitation. The Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath pendant on his neck glowed as an overwhelmingly oppressive stream of fire emerged from his mouth, rushing down the dark corridor in the shape of a fan.


    Of course, the Fourth Grade shadow assassin was well within the range of this attack.


    When the breath of fire burst through the barrier of darkness and approached the shadow assassin, it vanished instantly.


    Indeed. It had vanished, not teleported.


    Greem had fought against all sorts of shadow creatures in the battle from earlier. These shadow creatures might excel at shadow magic and possess some strange shadow powers, but their every movement was apanied by weak, nearly imperceptible traces of elementium flux.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Chip, even Greem himself would not be able to capture Shadow Teleportations and Shadowstalk of this level.


    However, when the shadow assassin disappeared, Greem could not pick up on any elementium flux, no matter how he tried. It was almost as if it had just blended into the background, making it impossible for anyone to track it based on changes in the elementium flux.


    The fire dragon¡¯s breath pierced through the ck afterimage that the shadow assassin had left behind and ignited the entirety of the corridor.


    However, the shadow assassin was nowhere to be seen nor sensed.


    Just as Greem¡¯s fire breath came to an end and his Spirit was in a momentary state of recovery, a short ck figure slid out of the space behind him without a sound. The two ck daggers in its hands stabbed towards Greem¡¯s heart without stirring the air in the slightest.


    As a Fourth Grade fire adept, there was no way that Greem could not have picked up on the abnormality behind him.


    However, while the assassin¡¯s movements appeared light as a feather, they were as fast as lightning in the eyes of an objective observer. Moreover, though the daggers were dark, lightless, and void of any elementium aura, they gave off the impression of lethal weapons.


    Greem¡¯s mind turned in the face of the shadow assassin. The fire coral staff in his hand gleamed, and yet no defensive magic had been cast. Instead, he chose...offense.


    The two pitch-ck daggers pierced the barrier of mes and the armor of magma, diving straight into Greem¡¯s back. The des wove between his flesh and moved through the fire, swiftly slicing and cutting to inflict as much damage to Greem as possible.


    Greem endured the terrifying agony and instantly hit the shadow assassin¡¯s body with a red beam of light.


    The next second, dense fire elementium in the air gathered into nearly solid chains of fire, firmly binding the shadow assassin to Greem himself.


    me Shackles!


    Binding fire magic.


    It could bind the enemy to the caster, forcing them to endure three times the constant fire damage of the spell if they attempted to flee.


    The shadow assassin could not be bothered to attack Greem any longer at the sight of this. It flickered, attempting to flee from Greem¡¯s side. Unfortunately, before its ck body could merge into the darkness, the me Shackles on its body dragged it back out again.


    It tried to teleport another two times. Failing to do so, it started to wave its daggers furiously in an attempt to sever the me Shackles.


    However, this was enough of a buffer for Greem to lock on to its soul flux and elementium aura thoroughly.


    Greem reached out with his left hand and cuffed the shadow assassin on the neck. Violent golden fire immediately flowed along his arm and onto the assassin¡¯s body. The shadow assassin started howling and iling about violently, slicing up Greem¡¯s arm badly.


    However, regardless of how badly wounded he was, Greem did not loosen his grip at all. The golden fire continued to surge into the assassin¡¯s body without end.


    Finally, eleven secondster, the shadow assassin could no longer endure the effects of thew fire. It exploded with a loud bang and turned into scattered ck mist. A dark ck gemstone fell out of the fog, and Greem caught it in his hands.


    A Shadow Diamond. A Fourth Grade Shadow Diamond!


    Greem couldn¡¯t be as calm as before now.


    After all, a Fourth Grade Shadow Diamond was very rare, even in the World of Adepts.


    A Shadow Shard was only a First Grade adept material, and a hundred Shadow Shards could be synthesized into a Second Grade Shadow Crystal. A hundred Second Grade Shadow Crystals could be synthesized into a Third Grade Shadow Stone. Finally, a hundred Third Grade Shadow Stones were required to synthesize a Fourth Grade Shadow Diamond such as this.


    It was said that a Shadow Diamond was already a top-grade adept material!


    If Adept Holly got his hands on a Shadow Diamond, he might be able to create a shadow puppet that could freely travel between the material ne and the Shadow World. It would be a Fourth Grade dark-attribute metal golem that could hide in its master¡¯s shadow and protect them at all times.


    If the Shadow Diamond fell into the hands of a summoner, they could use it to summon a Fourth Grade shadow dragon. A shadow dragon was a monstrous creature with a pitch-ck body, sharp fangs, and wings of darkness. They had a fearsome shadow breath and were an unusual species that was somewhere between a dragon and a shadow creature.


    If the Shadow Diamond fell into the hands of a high-grade alchemist, they could easily forge a Shadow Staff capable of summoning an entire shadow army. Of course, the power of the army would directly corrte to the alchemist¡¯s skill.


    ......


    The Chip immediately provided Greem with hundreds of logical suggestions to maximize the utility of the Shadow Diamond. However, this was not the time to discuss the matter. After all, there was still a terrifying Dark Witch to deal with.


    Greem put the Shadow Diamond away happily and took out a purple healing potion. He flicked off the cork and drank the contents of the vial in a single gulp. Once the massive gash on his back had healed under the effects of the potion and his own impressive Physique, he stepped forward and pushed apart the wooden door.


    There was boundless darkness before him!

 Chapter 1100 - Orb of Shadows

    <h4>Chapter 1100 Orb of Shadows</h4>


    There was a stretch of boundless darkness behind the wooden door.


    If Greem hadn¡¯t known very clearly that he was standing at the entrance to an ordinary bedroom in an ordinary wooden house in an ordinary town, he might have suspected that he had arrived in the vast and wide Shadow World.


    A massive cluster of shadows squirmed ferociously in the darkness.


    An instinctual disgust came from the very depths of Greem¡¯s heart when he set his sights upon this shadow.


    Hostility. Brazen hostility!


    When Greem¡¯s aura appeared in this unusual space, ring hostility emanated from the depths of the shadow. Moreover, the shadow had etched that hostility directly in Greem¡¯s mind.


    An ordinary adept would have trouble seeing what trulyy within the shadow through all the distorted space and darkness.


    However, blue flickered in Greem¡¯s eyes, and he saw everything in just mere seconds.


    The Chip¡¯s powerful abilities of Elementium Sight, Distant Sight, Remote Sensing, and Dynamic Movement Capture allowed Greem to see through the defensive forcefield. He could see everything happening within the shadow.


    Dark Witch Shani was standing within the shadow,pletely naked. A strange ck stone floated in front of her, spewing out a tremendous amount of shadow energy.


    A portion of this shadow energy was absorbed by Shani and turned into profound and mysterious patterns that appeared on her body. The various strange arrays around her consumed the remaining portion before being converted into powerful shadow energy used to sustain the pseudo-shadow domain.


    Greem¡¯s eyes swept across Shani¡¯s naked body. He ignored the bountiful bosom and her panicked, furious gaze. Instead, his eyesnded on the magical patterns that were manifesting on her body.


    Shani¡¯s body was white and smooth. She had a thin waist, a prominent chest, and full hips. She was everything that a beautiful woman should be. However, at this moment, strange, twisted ck patterns had appeared on her toes and were extending upwards as more shadow energy merged with her body.


    These patterns looked roughly like vines at a nce. However, Greem¡¯s eyes focused on the patterns. As the Chip scanned, extracted, and magnified the image, the details of the designs were revealed.


    They were not patterns at all, but unusual runes formed ofplicated strands of magical lines.


    Therge number of runes that the Chip had managed to identify revealed the intent behind these lines. Using the endless shadow energy in this strange ck stone, and her own body as a medium, Shani was risking her life to project the entirety of the Dark Witch¡¯s origin tower.


    Should she seed in her projection, she would temporarily possess offensive and defensive power equal to the origin tower while she remained in the pseudo-shadow domain. It would all be over when that happened. There would be nothing Greem could do. Even if he were to join hands with the other two Fourth Grade adepts, they still wouldn¡¯t be able to fight against an adept with the might of an origin tower!


    That might seem like an insane idea, but judging from the magical patterns that had already reached to Shani¡¯s chest, she might have seeded if she only had a few more minutes.


    Greem was pleasantly surprised upon learning all this, but also somewhat terrified at the possibility at what could havee to pass!


    It was fortunate that he knew the urgency of the situation during the fight in the corridor earlier. It was precisely because of how urgent he believed the situation to be that he had given up on a more conventional method of fighting and instead used himself as bait to lure the shadow assassin towards him. At the cost of injuring himself, he had quickly exterminated the Fourth Grade shadow assassin while it was restrained.


    Otherwise, given how sly and bothersome the Fourth Grade shadow assassin was, it just might have been able to dy until the origin tower had been projected in its entirety.


    Dark Witch Shani might seem vulnerable at the moment, having lost the protection of her Fourth Grade shadow assassin. However, she was still protected by a powerful defensive forcefield.


    This forcefield wasn¡¯t formed from her own power. It was created by the stone that was churning out a tremendous amount of shadow energy.


    In Greem¡¯s memory, items that could naturally form a defensive forcefield were all of a very high-grade and quality. At the very least, they would be one or two grades higher than Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring.


    Combined with the strange ck stone¡¯s unique appearance and attribute, a name immediately appeared in Greem¡¯s mind.


    Orb of Shadows!


    The reason Greem remembered this name was because the Orb of Shadows was a famous Fifth Grade treasure!


    A Fifth Grade treasure that served a purely auxiliary purpose!


    It was just an ordinary Fifth Grade material for adepts of other attributes, but for most shadow creatures, it was a genuine artifact.


    The owner of the Orb of Shadows could establish a connection with the Shadow World at any time and use the Orb as a conduit to the Shadow World to summon endless shadow energy. The owner of the orb could ignore all restrictions of dark magic and freely manipte shadow energy.


    The simplest example was the mostmon shadow technique¨C Shadow Teleportation. This ability required the target creature to be near a shadow to be able to be used. It was impossible to use Shadow Teleportation without a shadow.


    As such, most adepts would rapidly release multiple illumination spells around them when confronting a shadow creature. It would dispel the darkness around them and prevent the shadow creatures from emerging from the shadows below.


    However, that strategy would be utterly useless against someone in possession of an Orb of Shadows!


    The owner of the Orb of Shadows could freely traverse anywhere, unaffected by external conditions, even if it was bright as day and there were no shadows to be seen at all.


    In addition, the cooldown of most shadow abilities would also be greatly shortened. Having the Orb of Shadows was equivalent to having the ability to be continuously hidden in the shadows. It was the perfect treasure for most shadow creatures!


    When Greem saw the magical patterns on Shani¡¯s body slowly reach past her breasts and extend towards her neck, he knew he could dy no longer. Should Shani truly be able to call down the power of the origin tower upon herself, he would not stand a chance.


    Greem transformed without hesitation.


    His body swelled and increased in size, and his mental consciousness roared ferociously. An endless amount of golden fire surged out of the Heart of Principles, melding with the redva that was rising out of thin air, transforming him into a ten-meter-tall fire giant.


    The magical equipment that Greem possessed also manifested in semi-energy form, one by one, as the golden fire poured into them.


    The Fire Throne set was Third Grade magical equipment that Greem had tailored for his own use. It might not be able to keep up with him now, but it still had its applications when manifested in this manner. The only equipment that could genuinely help Greem was the Fourth Grade Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring and the fire coral staff.


    All the other magical equipment would melt from the excessive infusion of power from the golden fire before they could even manifest as energy equipment.


    Greem was a Fourth Grade legendary fire adept now, after all. Second Grade and Third Grade equipment could be used as a ything asionally, but they would not survive Greem¡¯s destructive powers on an actual battlefield.


    ¡°You...you can see me?¡±


    It was at this moment that Dark Witch Shani seemed to have realized this fact. She mped her legs shut in embarrassment, one hand moving to cover her chest and the other to cover her crotch. Two red blushes appeared on her pretty face.


    Sadly, her hands were far too smallpared to the area she was trying to cover.


    This state of semi-exposure and her expression of embarrassment and anger only made her all the more enchanting!


    Greemughed wildly with his booming voice, ¡°Save the theatrics! An old witch like yourself putting on a show like a maiden when you¡¯re hundreds of years old? Are you trying to make me die of disgust, or are you just trying to buy yourself time? Didn¡¯t you want my life so badly? Let¡¯s see who will be taking whose life now!¡±


    The deafening roar of zing fire rang out as Greem pointed with his staff. A massive hundred-meter-wide pir of golden fire erupted with the dark core at the center of the explosion.


    The violent and vicious golden mes shed with the dark shadow energy, causing an energy explosion that ravaged the entire space. The two energies of different attributes fought, tussled, devoured, and destroyed each other.


    A wall of fire rose in front of Greem, barely blocking the energy waves that washed towards him.


    Meanwhile, Dark Witch Shani was obviously upied with the ritual and unable to act in any manner. She could only watch as the golden fires forcefully shed against the Orb of Shadow¡¯s barrier. Ripples ran across the semi-translucent shadow barrier, causing some of the energy within to go on a rampage.


    Shani¡¯s facade of purity immediately vanished. All embarrassment and shyness faded from her face as her eyes glowed with a cold and sinister light.


    ¡°How is this possible? You...you are just a newly advanced Fourth Grade. How could you possibly threaten the defenses of the Orb of Shadows with your power?¡± Shani screamed wildly, a trace of madness and viciousness in her expression.


    It was no wonder that she was bewildered. The might of Greem¡¯s attack was truly abnormal!


    Shani¡¯s calctions had been inurate, and she had made two irredeemable mistakes in a row.


    Firstly, she had believed that the Fourth Grade shadow assassin summoned with the aid of the Orb of Shadows could buy her enough time toplete her ritual. That was why she had not canceled the ceremony when she sensed Greem¡¯s arrival.


    Secondly, she believed that she could havested until the ritual¡¯spletion with the forcefield of the Orb of Shadows after the shadow assassin had been defeated. After all, the ritual only took three minutes toplete.


    Unfortunately, Greem did not give her that opportunity at all.

 Chapter 1101 - Bountiful Harvest

    <h4>Chapter 1101 Bountiful Harvest</h4>


    There was a hidden cave deep in the mountains.


    It was dark and deep.


    A fearsome, solemn, and sinister aura lingered in the air.


    Suddenly, a dark light shone in the absolute darkness, temporarily illuminating all hundred square meters of this underground cave.


    Most of the cave was empty, with the exception of a stone pond that had been dug up at the very center. Viscous and pungent ck liquid rippled within the pond.


    A strange sloshing could be heard as an ashen female face emerged from the ck liquid, followed by her pale body and disheveled hair.


    This woman abruptly opened her eyes upon rising above the water, revealing a pair of brown eyes filled with endless hatred and anger. Judging from her appearance, it was Dark Witch Shani.


    ¡°Good, very good. Greem, I¡¯ve remembered your name. This grudge of ours is will never end. You shall never find peace for eternity!¡±


    After cursing furiously to vent her anger, Shani finally stood up in the pond. This newly formed body was weak and frail. She couldn¡¯t help but shiver in the cold and damp air of the cave.


    Her previous body had already been destroyed at the hands of the legendary fire adept. This body was just recently formed from the soul energy pool. It had zero magic resistance and was as frail as the body of an ordinary human girl. That was why Shani could not even endure the chill winds of the cave.


    However, this was not the focus of her attention.


    Shani lowered her head and looked at her bare chest. Her eyes opened wide in surprise.


    Where was the Orb of Shadows? Did she not bring it back with her when her soul escaped after her ¡®death¡¯?


    Shani looked all over herself and found no trace of the Orb of Shadows. It was at this point that she finally blew up. It didn¡¯t matter if she lost all of her other equipment and items, but the Orb of Shadows was the origin ¡®magical equipment¡¯ much treasured by the Dark Witches.


    Shani couldn¡¯t help but shiver at the thought of having lost the Orb of Shadows. She didn¡¯t dare imagine what awaited her upon returning to the n.


    ¡°Greem...I hate you!¡±


    An angry scream reverberated throughout the dark underground cave, echoing over and over again.


    ............


    ¡°Hmm? Wasn¡¯t she a Fourth Grade witch? Why were her resistances so weak? Even the shadow assassinsted for a dozen seconds. How did she get done-in in less than five seconds?¡±


    Greem clicked his tongue and eximed as he quickly swept through the battlefield.


    Obviously, the first thing he made sure to get his hands on was the Orb of Shadows. Dark Witch Shani had turned to ash almost instantly beneath the golden fires once the defensive forcefield had shattered.


    Naturally, the Orb of Shadows was left behind!


    Even though Greem was already a Fourth Grade adept, he could still feel a stinging pain in his palm when he held the Fifth Grade Orb of Shadows in his hands.


    It was because he had sufficiently high Physique and magic resistance to endure the corrosion of the pure shadow energy radiating from the Orb of Shadows. A Third Grade adept¡¯s arm would probably have been corrupted into shadow substance if they held the Orb of Shadows in this manner!


    The massive dark core had quickly copsed and disintegrated with Shani¡¯s death and the Orb of Shadow¡¯s change of ownership. The pseudo-shadow domain engulfing Maple Forest Town also began to disperse slowly.


    Without the Origin Tower of Darkness to guide and pull the nes together, the natural repulsion between Morrian ne and the Shadow World would force them apart. However, as an area that had once ovepped nes, a portion of shadow energy would still be left behind in the town.


    It would take a long time for the chaotic narws here to fully repair themselves.


    Moreover, with the disappearance of the pseudo-shadow domain, thews of Morrian ne finally regained control of thend. The domain power that had been hanging over Adept Holly¡¯s and the two-headed adept¡¯s head dissipated.


    Adept Holly and Cherisha slowly extended their spiritual senses. They immediately knew of the result of the battle when they came into contact with Greem¡¯s mental consciousness.


    Greem was still present, while Dark Witch Shani¡¯s aura had vanished without a trace. Could the result of the battle be any clearer?


    ¡°Congrattions, Sir Greem!¡± Adept Holly was the first to send a magical message to Greem.


    ¡°I knew that sinister woman could never be your match, Sir Greem. Congrattions, indeed!¡± Naturally, Cherisha also made simr tteringments.


    Even though the two adepts were making light of the situation, their hearts were in tremendous turmoil.


    Who was Shani? An intermediated Fourth Grade Dark Witch that had advanced five hundred years ago!


    Her powers were already frightening, not to mention all the preparations she had made in advance of this battle. The two adepts had both witnessed all of her preparationsst night. If they were in Greem¡¯s position, they would be thoroughly dead even if they had ten lives to spare.


    Yet, after one night¡¯s sleep, the Dark Witch had vanished, and only the legendary fire adept was left. The implication behind this was obvious. Even the prideful Adept Holly couldn¡¯t help but lower his head to demonstrate his goodwill towards Greem.


    After all, in the World of Adepts, powerful individual ability was the fundamental guarantee for influence and wealth!


    The so-called influence and wealth were nothing but papier-mache without the backing of power.


    Greem continued to assess the precious ¡®heritage¡¯ left behind by the Dark Witch, even as he dealt with the pleasantries of the two ¡®passionate adepts.¡¯


    Through this battle, Greem had obtained a Fifth Grade Orb of Shadows, a Fourth Grade Shadow Diamond, two pieces of equipment, and one piece of magical equipment from the Dark Witch, all of which he had picked out of Shani¡¯s ashes upon her death.


    Unfortunately, all the other magical equipment had been thoroughly destroyed, clearly unable to endure Greem¡¯s violent attacks.


    ¡°Chip, is Shani actually dead?¡± Greem pinched a magical earring in front of his eyes and frowned.


    [Beep. Detecting no soul aura remnants in current location. Initial calctions suggest opponent has been reborn in a different region through the use of a soul energy pool!]


    Greem was not at all surprised by the Chip¡¯s reply.


    The Dark Witches¡¯ most significant unique trait was their immortal soul. However, this ¡®immortality¡¯ wasn¡¯t true immortality, but a gimmick realized through the use of soul energy pools.


    The Dark Witches left their soul brands in a soul energy pool in a safe area before they went on excursions. In doing so, they could use their special shadow magic and have their soul escape back to the soul energy pool when they faced a mortal threat.


    It would only take a few weeks for their bodies to reform, and they would be reborn in a new body.


    The only question now was whether Dark Witch Shani¡¯s soul had escaped back to the World of Adepts, or was being reborn somewhere in Morrian ne. If it were thetter, then Greem would have to remain on guard for sudden ambushes for the rest of the journey.


    In all honesty, a hidden and determined Fourth Grade Dark Witch was still a formidable threat towards Greem, even without any equipment or tools.


    Greem chuckled coldly to himself as he imagined Shani¡¯s frustrated appearance. Meanwhile, he was also analyzing the three times in his hands with the Chip¡¯s help.


    Two pieces of Fourth Grade magical equipment and one enchanted tool.


    As expected of a core member of the Dark Witches, the quality and quantity of equipment on Shani¡¯s person was significantly superior to the lone-wolf adepts of Zhentarim. However, all of this wealth now benefitted Greem instead.


    [Item Name: Shadow¡¯s Breathing


    Item Categorization: Magical Earring


    Item Attribute: Dark


    Item Grade: Fourth Grade


    Basic Attributes: +3 Agility | +2 Spirit | +2 Physique


    [Item Unique Effect: Holder is able to freely enter and travel through regions with shadow energy, unaffected by any magical barriers. While the holder is within shadows, their injures will continually be healed, and they will be shielded from divination probes.


    [Item Abilities: Shadow Assault (Form a lightless dagger to attack the target of choice continuously. Duration: 75 seconds. Offensive Power: 300 points. Cooldown: 40 seconds.)]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but lick his lips when he read the description for the magical earring. He silently cheered for the ability contained within it.


    Shadow Assault was an excellent means to deal with an enemy. All you had to do was cast it at an enemy. A dagger formed from shadow energy would persistently attack the target, never stopping until it is destroyed or its duration is over. The 300 points of offensive power weren¡¯t very high. It was barely harassment against a Fourth Grade enemy. However, it was more than enough to deal with Third Grade enemies that Greem himself couldn¡¯t be bothered to deal with.


    Moreover, the duration of Shadow Assault was seventy-five seconds, while the cooldown was forty seconds. That meant Greem could summon a free beginner Third Grade assassin every forty seconds. It was a decent effect.


    Unfortunately, the attribute of the earring was notpatible with Greem. He would have to look for dark adepts to recharge the equipment whenever the shadow energy within was depleted. However, Greem now had the Orb of Shadows in his possession. Why would he be worried about ack of shadow energy?


    Greem put away the first item in satisfaction and carefully started appraising the second item.


    [Item Name: Ring of Shadows


    Item Categorization: Magical Ring


    Item Attribute: Dark


    Item Grade: Fourth Grade


    Basic Attributes: +2 Agility | +1 Spirit | +1 Physique


    [Item Unique Effect: Duration of all dark curses doubled. All shadow damage doubled.


    [Item Abilities: Shadow Summon (Summon a beginner Fourth Grade spirit shadow assassin.)]


    Yet another piece of Fourth Grade magical equipment of decent quality that was also tremendouslypatible with Shani¡¯s own attribute.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how much thought Shani had put into the crafting of these two pieces of origin magical-equipment. Unfortunately, they had both now be Greem¡¯s spoils of war!

 Chapter 1102 - The Strange Spirit Town

    <h4>Chapter 1102 The Strange Spirit Town</h4>


    Thest remaining enchanted item was a Tablet of Fate.


    By cing it on your person, the tablet would turn warm when it sensed danger, alerting the holder of what was toe. It was a decent warning tool.


    As the item involved the profound and mysterious power of Fate, it was tough to assess its grade. However, given the intensity of the Fate power emanating from the tablet, the Chip categorized it as a Third Grade item.


    It could reliably give out warnings when it concerned Third Grade creatures or items. Anything above Third Grade, and it could only provide a vague warning about a threat.


    Unlike the other two pieces of Fourth Grade equipment, this Tablet of Fate was not an origin item. As such, Greem could use it directly. He ced the tablet into a pocket on his chest.


    By the time he finished looking through the battlefield, the town was already bathed in the golden light of dawn.


    Warm and gentle sunlight shone through the wooden windows on each end of the corridor, driving out thest trace of shadow in the air.


    Due to the intense battle from earlier, the house had nearly been torn apart. The rooms to Greem¡¯s sides had already been burned to a husk by the violent mes. The surviving foundations and burnt, scattered furniture were the only remnants of the rooms.


    Greem pushed apart the remaining half of the scorched-ck door and walked into a burned corridor. The entrance of the room on the other side creaked open as Adept Holly walked out, stretching his body as he did so.


    ¡°Truly a beautiful morning! Congrattions, Sir Greem.¡±


    Adept Holly behaved as if the scarred battlefield before him did not exist at all. He greeted Greem with a big smile on his face.


    Naturally, Greem returned the greeting courteously.


    The two exchanged a few meaningless words and walked down the half-copsed stairs.


    Cherisha was waiting for them in the hall on the first floor.


    The three of them did not mention the battle that happenedst night, as if there was a tacit agreement between them. They couldn¡¯t care less about the hellish sight around them either, and none of them even asked about what happened to Shani.


    While the three of them were having a conversation, a trembling and frightened voice came from beside them.


    ¡°Save me...please, save me.¡±


    The three adepts looked over. The middle-aged nobledy of the house had reached out with her withered, burned hands, shambling as she walked towards them.


    Greem frowned slightly.


    Given the intensity of his battle with Shanist night, the entire Maple Forest Town had already been razed to the ground; no civilians in this house could be alive. Moreover, Greem could very clearly see that the nobledy¡¯s body was almost ghostly in nature. Her clothes and her flesh were all semi-translucent under the golden sunlight.


    This form, this aura resembled that of a ghost.


    Greem had yet to finish his thought when the twin sisters floated out from the dining hall in the same unusual fashion. Their faces were covered in blood, and they too cried for help. The form of their bodies was the same as their mother¡¯s.


    ¡°It seems like their souls were bound to thend upon death, and the corrosion of the dense shadow energy has transformed them into this unusual spirit form.¡± Adept Holly couldn¡¯t help but click his tongue in wonder. ¡°There¡¯s no need to care about them. They are now ghosts of the earthbound kind. It¡¯s difficult to kill them while they remain on thisnd.¡±


    While Holly was speaking, the nobledy seemed to have gone berserk. She lunged, her dirty, scorched hands passing straight through his body without touching anything.


    Adept Holly¡¯s expression instantly changed into one of fury. He had just been provoked by a low-grade spirit.


    ¡°Damned bastard. You can¡¯t read the situation at all. It seems like you won¡¯t know what fear is if I don¡¯t give you a little lesson!¡± Adept Holly cursed angrily and lifted his hand. A brilliant beam of starlightnded on the nobledy¡¯s body.


    The so-called spirits did not fear physical attacks, but could still be wounded by elementium magic.


    The nobledy could not run far. She screamed as she melted into a ck puddle beneath the starlight. The pool then quickly evaporated into nothingness.


    However, before Greem and the others could shift their eyes away, a white light shed in the corner of the hall. The nobledy had appeared once again out of thin air. She seemed to understand the might of the adepts now. She cried out in terror and hid in her corner.


    The twin sisters also screamed and raw away.


    Seemingly affected by some sort of movement, countless white figures emerged from all over the copsed house. These spirits started to wander about aimlessly.


    Judging from their appearance, they were the servants, maids, cooks, and guards of the noble mansion.


    They seemed to have yet to realize they were dead. They were still wearing the clothes they had worn while they were alive, working busily in the house ording to their daily routine.


    It wasn¡¯t until the three adepts walked out of the house that they discovered that the entire town had ¡®woken up¡¯!


    Translucent spirits were diligently working like usual in the burned and copsed ruins of their houses. There were those who were sweating as they unloaded cargo from their carriages, those who put on their aprons and started to make breakfast, those who yawned and stretched their backs as they opened shop. Even more of them were wandering the streets, smiling as they greeted each other as if everything was just as pleasant as usual.


    When they saw the adepts, they all silently hid in the distance, sneaking looks from the corners of the road or through the cracks in their doors. They seemed to have taken the three adepts for unusual guests that had broken into their town.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡±


    Greem took onest look at the town before shaking his head, sighing and walking away.


    There were far, far too many secrets in a ne. Even with their power and wisdom, the adepts might not be able to understand every unknown in the world. The battle between him and Dark Witch Shani had clearly, forcefully turned this human town into a spirit town due to some sort of coincidence.


    If this were any other time, Greem might have remained here out of interest to research the wonders of the spirits and the principle behind the formation of the spirit town. Unfortunately, this was a dangerous otherworld, and he also had a mission to bear. He had no choice but to leave.


    ............


    Reisin Garden, floating city.


    Lucia was walking alone down a small, moon-white path.


    Usually, this should be the time when the arcane apprentices were studying and doing their research with all they had. It should be a crucial moment for them to work hard to try and pass the arcane test.


    Usually, this arcane garden would be full of arcane apprentices walking to and fro.


    They would be hiding their faces behind their books, lying on the jade-white fences as they memorizedplex and difficult chants, walking around the arcane fountain in circles as they memorized headache-inducing forms, or simply running to the spell pools to finish their daily missions.


    However, such a scene could no longer be seen!


    Ever since that damned n of retreat had quickly and subtly spread throughout the floating city, the entire arcane academy had been thrown into chaos. It made the whole city feel unsettling and unfamiliar.


    The silhouettes of apprentices that could be seen in the arcane academy decreased day by day.


    Lucia had not seen a single apprentice even though she had been walking for the better part of the day. Even the asional apprentice she saw would look like herself, walking hastily with books in hand, sorrow and worry written all over their faces.


    Lucia quickly walked through an arcane hall, down a quiet corridor, and into the open-air knowledge hall.


    This ce was where arcane apprentices like herself could attend the public lectures of the arcanists.


    The knowledge hall appeared not to have a roof, but there was, in fact, a transparent arcane barrier above the hall. When it rained, Lucia would enjoy the raindrops sshing against the barrier and sliding off the dome as she listened to the arcanists exin the various arcane forms and principles in great detail. That feeling of having the truth of the world slowly unmasked in front of her was simply wondrous.


    Today¡¯s public lecture would be given by Second Grade Arcanist Sir Brown. It was a lecture on the history of the development of the Arcane Empire.


    Lectures like these were Lucia¡¯s favorite. That was why she insisted oning here even though she knew the situation now was terrible.


    There were still fifteen minutes until the lecture, and only three or four people were seated in the knowledge hall, which could host an audience of a thousand. They were all very young. Much like Lucia, they were all apprentices who loved the arcane arts from the depths of their hearts.


    Not long after Lucia found a seat on the front row, Arcanist Brown walked into the hall with his short figure, balding head, and gold-trimmed tortoise-shell sses.


    Arcanist Brown let out an imperceptible sigh when he saw the sparse audience. He quickly adjusted his mood and stepped onto the podium, where he described the history of the Arcane Empire with his deep and low voice.


    The arcane apprentices had already learned about this history countless times through books and recording crystals. However, when an actual arcanist used his confident and deep voice to describe the histories once again and even show them evidence with valuable recordings from the past, it waspletely different. The passion of the few arcane apprentices present at the lecture was ignited once more.


    They listened with flushed faces, their blood boiling so hot that they wanted nothing better than to die in ce of those courageous and ingenious arcanists, all so they could leave their names in the annals of that glorious history.


    The five-hour-long public lecture quickly came to an end.


    Arcanist Brown announced the end of the lecture with his deep voice, before lowering his head to slowly and carefully pack away the arcane tools he had brought with him.


    Lucia did not leave. Instead, she slowly approached the podium.


    The other arcane apprentices also walked over in silence.


    ¡°Professor, has the Arcane Empire truly abandoned us?¡±


    Everyone fell silent for a moment until a male apprentice blurted out the question. His face was flushed red.


    Arcanist Brown¡¯s hand trembled slightly. He did not raise his head or speak.


    ¡°Professor, thank you for your guidance all this time. My family has already been asking me to go home. Here...it¡¯s no longer a safe ce here. I...¡± The male apprentice continued talking without aim. In the end, even he didn¡¯t know what he was talking about.


    Finally, he stopped speaking and bowed deeply to Arcanist Brown before turning and running away as fast as he could. The other arcane apprentices also sighed and bowed before leaving.


    ¡°Professor, I won¡¯t leave. I still want to continue studying the arcane arts with you!¡± Lucia bit her lips firmly, so hard that she almost started bleeding.


    It was now that Arcanist Brown finally lifted his head. There were droplets on his sses.


    ¡°Leave, Lucia! The great tree that is the Arcane Empire is about to fall. What you most need to do now is to flee as far as you can. This way...you might be able to leave a seed of the arcane for Morrian ne in the future. Leave. Listen to me, Lucia. Leave.¡±


    At the final word, the aging arcanist finally broke down and cried like a child.

 Chapter 1103 - Battle for the Empire

    <h4>Chapter 1103 Battle for the Empire</h4>


    An arcane security tower quickly flew across a vast in of golden wheat below an overcast sky.


    Rolling ck smoke rose to the sky at the edge of the in. Rumbling roars and shouting could be heard without end.


    From a distance, massive, strange creatures the size of hills thrashed about on a rampage. Fighting against them were giant arcane golems forged of a clear blue crystal, each of them standing at over a hundred meters tall.


    The struggle on the ground shook the heavens, but the skies were not empty either. They were filled with strange creatures with eagle wings and circling security towers that fought against each other.


    Above the security towers, a vicious starbeast charged at a floating city of enormous size. It roared furiously as a torrent of arcane spells and cannon fire bombarded its body as it wildly continued to destroy and massacre everything in its sight.


    This starbeast was of exceptional size. It was practically the size of a human city.


    Its massive body was covered in ck scales, with hundreds of thick, jointed legs beneath it. The starbeast might look bloated and ugly, but it had agility disproportionate to its size.


    It twisted its body and roared as it thundered forward rapidly.


    The barrage of cannon fire from the floating fortresses and security towers left mes zing on its body, along with many deep gouges. These were often several meters deep and dozens of meters wide. The wounds would be enough to kill any ordinary creature, but on a massive monster like this that measured several kilometers in length, they were no more than a scratch. They could not harm its life origin in the slightest.


    However, such concentrated arcane attacks still inflicted tremendous suffering on the starbeast.


    It reared its head and let out all sorts of earthshaking screeches. It raised its giant w. With a single swipe, it caused blocks of tall arcane buildings to copse in a massive pir of dust. No human or building could survive intact in front of its long, sharp ws.


    Even the barriers of the arcane towers creaked, distorted, and crackled with energy explosions whenever swept by the starbeast¡¯s dozen-meter-long legs.


    If the arcane towers could not avoid the starbeast in time and were hit by even more of its legs, they would explode in a thunderous explosion.


    If even actual arcane towers were so fragile, it was only worse for the more simplified security towers.


    To deal with this fearsome starbeast that had entered their floating city, many arcanists charged out of their arcane towers and floating fortresses in mighty arcane golems. They surrounded the starbeast and began attacking with all their might.


    The parasites that lived on the surface of the starbeast¡¯s body also swarmed forward to fight against the arcanists and the golems under the starbeast¡¯smand.


    The powerful starbeast unleashed thick energy beams of various colors from its mouth, carvingrge swathes of death zones onto the surface of the floating city. Meanwhile, it twisted with its body and crawled towards the majestic hall at the center of the city.


    Buildings copsed, and the ground cracked wherever it went.


    Moreover, when the purple blood from its woundsnded on the ground, it would quickly gather into vicious and wild Bloodthirsters. These creatures were ferocious and powerful, almost as powerful as Second Ring arcanists.


    A Second Ring arcanist was considered a well-respected schr, even in the Arcane Empire! However, for this gigantic beast, a single drop from its bodybined with substance from the material ne was enough to form a fearsome Second Grade monster.


    It was evidence of the power and terror of a starbeast!


    And this was only a Sixth Grade starbeast!


    If this was outside the nar barrier, the massive Arcane Empire could have relied on theirrge number of Great Arcanists and their immeasurably mighty pseudo-nar fortresses to tear this monster to pieces. However, now that this Sixth Grade starbeast had broken into the ne, it was apletely different matter. Its offensive power might have been suppressed to the peak of Fourth Grade, but its massive size and incredible Physique made it an undying monstrosity.


    Even the two Eighth Grade Arcane Emperors were hesitant to strike against such a massive creature.


    Naturally, with their power, they would have no problem killing this starbeast.


    However, it was precisely because of how overwhelming their power was, that even the slightest of shockwaves generated by their attacks would inflict even more horrendous damage to the nar world and the floating city!


    It was this reason that caused the Great Arcanists to be hesitant in their movements. They were helpless in this situation.


    The starbeasts could ignore the tremendous damage dealt to the nar world by its reckless fighting, but they could not do the same!


    After all, Morrian ne belonged to the Arcane Empire. It belonged to the arcanists and Great Arcanists. If they destroyed their own home with their reckless attack, what where they supposed to use to fend off those powerful enemies waiting outside the ne barrier?


    ............


    Truth¡¯s Light. A floating city.


    As thergest and most powerful floating city in the Arcane Empire, Truth¡¯s Light had a pivotal function in Morrian ne.


    At the center of Truth¡¯s Light stood arge, majestic arcane pce of ornate design. There were ten levels to this pce. Every level was over a hundred meters in height. Scattered all over its broad and t tforms were arcane academies, public libraries, arcane research centers, academic promotion centers, observatories, arcaneboratories, and a significant number of golem workshops.


    Administrator Garcia, one of the only two Arcane Emperors of the Arcane Empire, had turned Truth¡¯s Light into the Arcane Empire¡¯s one and only center for economics and politics.


    Unfortunately, in this great crisis, Truth¡¯s Light had also be the main target of the many foreign enemies. The two Arcane Emperors were fending off the waves of powerful opponents outside the ne barrier. Meanwhile, a Sixth Grade star devourer had entered Morrian ne and was brazenly attacking Truth¡¯s Light.


    It seemed like its intention was to break into the floating city¡¯s control center and cause Truth¡¯s Light to crash from the sky. With the scale and size of Truth¡¯s Light, it would not be able to take off into the skies again for the next hundred years if it crashed to the ground.


    Moreover, if Truth¡¯s Light were to crash, the pseudo-nar fortresses outside the ne¡¯s barrier would lose their energy supply. When that happened, the frontline that was relying on the pseudo-nar fortresses to hold back the enemy would be at risk of an instantaneous copse.


    The arcanists had to exterminate this star devourer regardless of the cost. They had to stop the enemy¡¯s ns!


    There were three Sixth Grade Great Arcanists gathered in the arcane pce, furiously debating amongst themselves.


    ¡°Activate the Light of Annihtion. We must activate the Light of Annihtion. Otherwise, what are we supposed to use to stop the star devourer once it breaks into the control center?¡±


    ¡°No! The Light of Annihtion is too powerful. It will burn out the energy core. Do we still have the resources to fix the energy core once it¡¯s damaged?¡±


    ¡°What should we do then? Watch as our citizens die before our eyes? Watch as our home is ravaged and torn to pieces? We can¡¯t do this. We can¡¯t do that. Why not just let this old man charge out there and fight to the death against that giant beast! I don¡¯t believe a Sixth Ring Great Arcanist¡¯s self-destruction wouldn¡¯t be enough to kill it.¡±


    The three arcanists continued to argue furiously, but no one was capable of convincing the others. The atmosphere of the hall was filled with frustration and urgency.


    The star devourer had moved forward by another hundred meters while they were arguing.


    Every building in its way had been knocked down and crushed to pieces, and every living person in them ughtered and killed. The energy pir it fired from its mouth had shot down an arcane tower from the sky, causing it to crash into the city as thick, ck smoke continued to rise into the air.


    ¡°No. I cannot wait any longer; I will go hold back that star devourer. You two just keep talking!¡± The oldest arcanist of the three tapped the marble floor loudly with his walking stick, his eyes red with frustration.


    At this moment, an unusually gentle voice rang out in the hall.


    ¡°Nigel, you are still as impatient as ever. You don¡¯t have to go. Leave this wicked fellow to me!¡±


    As the gentle voice sounded in the air, arge arcane array suddenly lit up in the center of the hall. Countless mysterious runes and arcane light shone in the sky, outlining the silhouette of a majestic arcanist.


    The arcanists looked like an old man in a simple arcane robe. He had a bright white arcane staff in his hand and a stern and handsome face. It was like there were two blinding, miniature suns glowing in the depths of his eyes beneath his white eyebrows.


    He looked like an extraordinarily ordinary arcanist!


    If there was anything that set this man apart from the average arcanist, it would be that arcane crown upon his head. Visible waves of arcane flux radiated from the crown, faintly maintaining an intimate connection with this floating city and the entire ne itself.


    However, the arcanist seemed to be glowing with bright arcane light. It seemed like this wasn¡¯t a human¡¯s body, but a humanoid projection formed of arcane energy.


    The three Great Arcanists hurriedly bowed and paid their respects when they saw the projection.


    ¡°You are the pursuer of the arcane truth. You guide us on our path forward. We¡ª¡±


    ¡°Alright, alright. Look at what time it is, and you people still want to repeat these meaningless and pointless greetings. Protect the arcane pce. I will go deal with that creature.¡±


    Having said that, the humanoid projection flickered and appeared above the arcane pce.

 Chapter 1104 - Chaotic Battlefield

    <h4>Chapter 1104 Chaotic Battlefield</h4>


    As arge and powerful beam of energy from the energy core connected with the humanoid projection, the energy aura from the projection began to rise in intensity and power.


    ¡°Energy Spear, Arcane Phantom, Filiast...Truth¡¯s Light!¡±


    As the projection shouted, a three-meter-thick beam of white light shot out of his hand andnded on the star devourer¡¯s head.


    Strangely enough, while other energy beams and arcane sts would be distorted, refracted, or dissipated by the star devourer¡¯s defensive forcefield, this did not happen to the white beam. It was almost as if it did not belong to any elementium attribute. It ignored the star devourer¡¯s defensive forcefield and its tough scales, and instead pierced straight into the star devourer¡¯s head without any difficulty.


    The star devourer that had been marching forward with unstoppable momentum stopped almost immediately. A massive hole erupted from its forehead, and a tall pir of pungent blood spewed forth like an active volcano.


    The star devourer lifted its head and let out an earthshaking roar upon receiving this grievous wound. Its ghostly green eyes that were over a dozen meters in diameter quickly locked onto the strange human projection hovering a few kilometers above the arcane pce.


    One of the two Arcane Emperors of the Arcane Empire. It was the terrifying Administrator Garcia!


    No, it wasn¡¯t him. It was just one of his energy clones.


    Though the star devourer instantly recognized his identity, it was facing off against an Eighth Grade Arcane Emperor. A clone of his, at least. Even a starbeast, widely feared as the most frightening creature in the world, had to step back.


    After all, the massive difference in power between the two of them couldn¡¯t be any more obvious.


    The star devourer would not be afraid no matter how many ordinary Great Arcanists appeared in front of it. That was because, constrained by the narws, the limit of their arcane attacks was the peak of Fourth Grade. Attacks of this level could kill most creatures, but they were not lethal to a space creature like the star devourer.


    It was precisely because it understood this that the star devourer had so brazenly charged into Morrian ne and invaded this floating city.


    Unfortunately, its luck was terrible.


    Who would have expected Arcane Emperor Garcia, who was busy fighting in space, to divert a portion of his powers at this key moment and project it back into the ne as an energy clone? That was obviously beyond the star devourer¡¯s expectations.


    Other people might not be able to kill the star devourer, but an Arcane Emperor like Garcia most certainly could!


    Using the narws he had mastered, and taking advantage of the powerful arcane energy provided by the floating city¡¯s energy core, Garcia had instantly weaved a tight arcane web around the starbeast. This web allowed him to temporarily cut off the energy limits imposed by the narws. In doing so, his attacks would no longer be limited at the peak of Fourth Grade.


    The next moment, that non-elemental beam of energy formed from tens of thousands of arcane spears prated the star devourer¡¯s defenses and created a massive gaping hole on its head. Moreover, as a sea of arcane energy surged into the wound, the star devourer¡¯s flesh, tendons, and bones were blown to pieces.


    Aooooo!


    The star devourer raised its head, reared its neck, and let out a deafening roar.


    All the arcanists who were bathing in blood above the floating city had to sp their ears. They started to crash from the skies as well. Purple-ck blood trickled out of their eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. Their minds had been shaken considerably, causing them to lose any ability to fight instantly.


    However, this roar was the star devourer¡¯s final act of madness!


    After the roar, the star devourer¡¯s colossal body began to explode and fall to pieces. A horrifying amount of blood sshed and poured onto the city. Its serpentine head also fell limply to the ground, crushing a small arcane tower into rubble.


    The Bloodthirsters that had formed out of its blood also fell apart at the same instant. They copsed into pools of blood and some pungent, ck, mysterious substance.


    Sensing the death of the Sixth Grade star devourer, the strange creatures that were fighting in the skies above the floating city quickly scattered. Naturally, the arcanists would not let them off easy. They sent outrge groups of security towers to chase after the bird creatures and shoot them down.


    Both parties continued fighting even as the retreat went on.


    Soon, the fires of war reached the nearby human cities and viges!


    These scattered otherworldly beasts might not be the match of the arcanists, but they were a cmity upon the human settlements that were unprotected by arcane powers.


    Any single Second Grade beast could easily destroy an entire human town. Meanwhile, even human cities protected by low-grade arcanists and arcane apprentices were not safe. Should a vast horde of these monsters invade, a city would be reduced to ruins, even if they arcanists managed to drive out the enemies.


    The number of citizens that died to the invasion of disaster creatures and starbeasts was innumerable. Only rural regions farther away from the floating cities had a chance of living in peace.


    However, as more and more holes appeared in the nar barrier, more and more powerful monsters and enemies entered the ne. There were very few regions left in Morrian ne that were still at peace.


    Truly, there were no uncracked eggs in an overturned nest!


    Morrian ne faced an invasion by so many powerful races, and trying to stay intact in this apocalypse was now an impractical delusion.


    Dying while standing, or dying while seated. This was no longer a question. It was simply destined Fate!


    ............


    Rian Province.


    Three hundred kilometers to the west of Reisin Garden, next to a small vige by a mountain and a stream.


    Greem¡¯s body was d in ayer of golden mes, invisible for most people. He silently watched a pack of otherworldly beasts overrun the vige in front of him.


    The vige was not big. It only had a poption of sixty to seventy people. Most of the buildings were old, wooden houses. Green vines and nts had grown all over these houses, making for rather peaceful scenery.


    However, a pack of otherworldly beasts had taken over the ce. They were wildly ughtering the unarmed vigers.


    These beasts had the wings of eagles, the head of a serpent, and the body of a lion. Their whole body reeked of the revulsive smell of bloodline reconciling agent!


    There were about seventeen of these creatures, each of them around First or Second Grade.


    Naturally, there was no way that these creatures were elites of the World of Disasters. At the very best, they were cannon fodder and errandckeys. However, these creatures were already terrifying, invincible demons to the civilians of the vige.


    ¡°What do we do? Circle around, or kill them all?¡± Adept Holly, who had consumed a Potion of Invisibility, asked nonchntly.


    ¡°Kill them all!¡± Also invisible using her mental powers, Cherisha suggested with a cold, gleaming light in her eyes, ¡°Those disaster creatures are ourpetitors as well. It¡¯s best if we can weaken them, even by a little!¡±


    Adept Holly snorted at Cherisha¡¯s suggestion.


    It was important to note that she and her brother had been keeping a low profile since the start of the battle. They had seldom provoked a fight. Now they were going the opposite way instead! To think they would dare to poke the ho¡¯s nest of disaster creatures!


    Was the two-headed adept so benevolent as to want to help the natives of Morrian ne?


    Of course not.


    The reason Cherisha had given such a suggestion was because she had seen through what Greem was thinking. She was merely suggesting what coincided with his thoughts. Cherisha had been retaining control over the body. It had been a long time since Mangus was the conscious personality.


    The implications behind this were...interesting!


    ¡°We havepleted most of the mission tasks handed out by the main party. We have attacked seven of the ten target locations. Reisin Garden should not be much further from here.¡± Greem paused for a moment here. ¡°At this point, I think it¡¯s best for us to take a rest first. If we kill these beasts, we might be able to obtain some information on the disaster creatures from their minds.¡±


    ¡°Leave it to me!¡± Cherisha immediately became overjoyed when she saw that Greem had epted her suggestion. ¡°You two go look for a ce to rest. Leave these little critters to me!¡±


    Greem agreed with a soft grunt. He was the first to dispel his mes and reveal himself as he walked towards the vige. Adept Holly shrugged and revealed himself as well, following closely behind Greem.


    After the battle of Maple Forest Town, both Holly and Cherisha had acknowledged Greem¡¯s power and status as the team leader. They became very obedient after that.


    However, Adept Holly was only respectful. He did not behave like Cherisha, desperately trying to earn the good graces of Greem.


    The beasts immediately sensed the presence of the two adepts when they revealed themselves. They looked at the human figures from a distance. They then screeched and took to the skies, anguished humans still clinging to the tips of the metal spears in their hands.


    ¡°Human...flesh...death.¡±


    These otherworldly beasts muttered some strange, meaningless phrases as they pped their wings and dived from above. They were charging ferociously at the two adepts.


    However, before they could arrive in front of them, an invisible mental wave brushed across the sky. These beasts quickly halted their movement and ran into each other instead.


    For a moment, countless green and gray feathers filled the air as the bloodied and contorted bodies of the beasts crashed to the ground.


    The First Grade beasts had snapped their necks and crushed their organs on impact. Not one of them got up from the ground again. The only four Second Grade beasts struggled to get up and remained stunned on the spot even when they did. They had lost all their ferocity and courage from before.


    Greem and Holly walked past and across the ck pools of blood and entered the vige.


    Meanwhile, Cherisha appeared beside the four surviving beasts. Crimson light glowed in her eyes as she stabbed her fingers into their foreheads.


    A short moment and a few chantster, Cherisha withdrew her fingers. The four beasts copsed to the ground, pungent purple blood flowing out of the holes in their heads.

 Chapter 1105 - One Night in a Village

    <h4>Chapter 1105 One Night in a Vige</h4>


    A Sixth Grade star devourer had died in battle.


    The mutated beast army sent by the Scourge Lords had been routed.


    Arcane Emperor Garcia¡¯s clone appeared in the floating city Truth¡¯s Light.


    This series of information caused Greem to frown.


    The main reason why ordinary Fourth Grade adepts were so reluctant to participate in this otherworldly war was due to how difficult it was to grasp the power levels of the participants.


    Supposedly, very few people within the ne should be able to threaten the lives of Greem¡¯s party. They were a group of Fourth Grade adepts, after all. However, as the various major factions continued to extend their influence into Morrian ne, the intensity and level of the war also rose exponentially.


    Greem and his party members might be Fourth Grade adepts and seem like the dominant predators within a material ne. However, they would not end up much better than the losing arcanists if they acted brazenly and ran into powerful beings who had descended into the ne.


    As such, Greem and the others had maintained a low profile since entering Morrian ne.


    If it weren¡¯t for the damned ¡®assault¡¯ missions handed down by the main party, they probably wouldn¡¯t have wanted to participate in even one unnecessary battle.


    That was especially the case now that they heard even a Sixth Grade star devourer had died inside the ne. They were only more concerned now.


    ¡°The origins of these mutated beasts...?¡± Greem remained silent for a while before asking softly.


    ¡°They belong to a powerful disaster creature known as the Lord of Eternal Night. They are his eyes and ears. Our impromptu operation this time might have prodded the ho¡¯s nest!¡± There was no longer a smile on Cherisha¡¯s face. Her expression was solemn.


    ¡°What grade is this Lord of Eternal Night fellow?¡± Adept Holly asked worriedly.


    ¡°Sixth Grade. He¡¯s a Sixth Grade as well!¡± Cherisha clicked her tongue and sighed for their collective misfortune. ¡°However, we don¡¯t need to be too worried either. The Lord of Eternal Night himself is still fighting with the Arcane Empire beyond the nar barriers. He only has a Fourth Grade clone created through corruption and modification inside Morrian ne. He¡¯s not quite a lethal threat to us yet!¡±


    Adept Holly finally let out a breath of relief upon hearing this.


    These disaster creatures were the very definition of chaos and savagery. Their soul origins had already been corrupted and strengthened by the will of the World of Disasters. They were now the Scourge Lord¡¯s cannon fodder, used for excursions and invasions.


    There was no possibility of interaction or cooperation with these creatures!


    ¡°Do you know why they¡¯ve appeared in the ne?¡± Greem frowned as he tried toe up with an answer himself.


    ¡°They had initially been gathered in an army to conquer Truth¡¯s Light, but they were routed by the Arcane Empire instead. Consequently, the low-grade Scourge Lords scattered to look for whatever targets interested them. Though I can¡¯t extract aplete line of attack from the minds of the beasts, judging from the path they have been taking, our targets coincide!¡± Cherisha spoke with her face full of worry.


    ¡°The floating city of Reisin Garden?¡± Greem fell into silent contemtion.


    Of course. That was the only ce in this region that could have attracted the disaster creatures here.


    Didn¡¯t they risk their lives and cross the nar barrier precisely to ughter and harvest life energy and souls? Where else would the quantity of life energy and souls be higher than the floating garden, where all the arcane apprentices and arcanists were gathered?


    Adept Holly¡¯s mind immediately started turning quickly after breaking free of the panic from earlier.


    ¡°You two......do you think we have a chance of killing the Fourth Grade disaster creature if we all work together? I heard that star beasts and disaster creatures excel at absorbing nar origins. They have already been on the ne for such a long time. They just might have managed to get their hands on some origin substance.¡±


    Both Greem and Cherisha¡¯s eyes gleamed when they heard the word ¡®origin substance.¡¯


    In all seriousness, origin substances were incredibly important and significant to all Fourth Grade adepts.


    If Greem could get his hands on origin substances, he could analyze the firews much more rapidly than he was currently able to. Meanwhile, for Cherisha, origin substance could increase thepatibility of her and her brother¡¯s souls. It would allow them to more quickly break free of their awkward situation where they could not simultaneously control the body.


    ¡°These minor Scourge Lords are probably constantly surrounded by a shocking number of mutated beasts. Trying to kill them is a little......¡± Cherisha was undoubtedly the weakest amongst the three. As such, she yed coy and looked towards Greem instead.


    ¡°I think we can try!¡± Greem thought for a moment and said, ¡°Disaster creatures are distrustful beings. At the level of minor Scourge Lords, infighting is often more savage and frequent than battles against foreign enemies. That¡¯s why Fourth Grade minor Scourge Lords always work alone. In that regard, we will have the advantage in numbers of Fourth Grades.¡±


    Cherisha¡¯s eyes couldn¡¯t help but light up when she heard this.


    ¡°Moreover, his target coincides with our own. Conflict will certainly break out between us eventually. Rather than be forced into an encounter, why not take the initiative? We will find the Fourth Grade clone of the Lord of Eternal Night and kill it.¡±


    ¡°Very well! That is solid reasoning.¡±Adept Holly chuckled. ¡°We have all signed an Oath Contract after all. Unity is on our side. With the might of three Fourth Grade adepts joined together, we might just be able to deal with that savage beast?¡±


    Adept Holly looked at Cherisha, and the two-headed adept quickly nodded and made known her position.


    ¡°I will defer to you two. Three against one, I believe our chances of victory are higher than the opponent¡¯s.¡±


    Adept Holly nodded in satisfaction.


    The three adepts finally split up once night fell.


    Greem walked down the dirty yellow road of the vige and found a rtively clean wooden house. He stepped over the tattered fence and pushed open the damaged door of the house.


    Creak.


    The wooden house opened, revealing the messyyout within.


    The people who originally lived here didn¡¯t seem wealthy at all. The furniture inside the house was simple and worn-out. The invasion of the beasts from earlier had only made things even messier. Most of the furniture had been smashed to pieces.


    Greem shook his head slightly.


    Because of his human habits all this time, he preferred things that were neat and tidy. A scene like this could not inspire any pleasure in him at all.


    He extended a finger, and a faint red light appeared at his fingertips. Under the effects of magic, the scattered furniture slowly rose from the ground and returned to their original positions as if being moved by an invisible hand.


    Greem let out a silent snort. His glowing finger quickly moved across the air, drawing a golden magical rune. As the rune floated across the sky, it turned into a strange gust of wind that blew over the room. All of the dirt, dust, and rubble vanished in an instant.


    The wooden house turned brilliant, pretty, and orderly immediately, almost like a magical cottage from a fairy tale.


    Greem quickly cleaned out all the rooms in the house. After choosing the ces for sleep and experiments, he started to make some simple arrangements.


    He released five First Grade wind spirits and had them hover around the vige as surveince. He then released two Second Grade stone golems to serve as bodyguards in front of the wooden house. It was then that Greem finally settled down in his room and began his daily meditation.


    As a caster, meditation was still the most important means by which he could refine and increase his Spirit!


    However,pared to the lower grades, meditation only provided him with minimal progress. It would often take years of diligent meditation just for a tiny improvement in Spirit. That was why most adepts would resort to external items to improve the effects of their meditation at this stage.


    Otherwise, the unmoving limit of their Spirit would be enough to drive even the most resilient adept insane!


    Night quickly fell.


    Five First Grade wind spirits floated a hundred meters in the sky, monitoring for all movement around them as well as everything happening in the vige below.


    Their existence was insignificant and well-hidden, but they could not escape the senses of the other two adepts.


    Cherisha and Holly could sense Greem¡¯s aura on the wind spirits. They were also sufficiently far away from their own houses. As such, the two adepts simply ignored them.


    The three adepts might be in the same party and bound by an Oath Contract, but no adept would ever ce their safety in the hands of another adept.


    Adept Holly chose the biggest wooden house in the vige. He then took out a strange magical cube from his storage device and threw it to the ground. A dozen ornate humanoid golems climbed out of it.


    They appeared to be both male and female golems. They were dressed like singers, maids, servants, and cooks. These golems quickly went to work. The servants cleaned the room, taking sets of clean furniture out of the cube to rece the old wooden ones in the house. The maids pushed out delicate dining trays and set out all-new silverware in front of Adept Holly.


    Apart from these service golems, Adept Holly also took out a piece of silver and threw it to the ground. There was a strange metallic clicking as the silver turned into a metallic statue flowing with silver light.


    This magical statue was only three meters tall. It had a shield in its left hand and a longsword in its right, looking like a metal knight. A pair of glowing red eyes shone beneath the visor, making it appear much more intelligent than the average magical statue.


    The aura it radiated was at peak Third Grade, making it much more powerful than even the elementium golem Grem had personally crafted.


    With the protection of this metal knight, Adept Holly could finally rx and enjoy this bountiful feast in another world as he enjoyed the music and dancing of the golem singers.

 Chapter 1106 - Slaughter of the Crimson Moon

    <h4>Chapter 1106 ughter of the Crimson Moon</h4>


    Compared to Adept Holly¡¯s extravagance, Cherisha was far more straightforward and humbler in her approach.


    She did not have a mighty golem to stand guard, nor free servants to serve her. No. Cherisha worked by herself and spent an entire hour just to tidy up the small house where she would be staying.


    After she was done with the cleaning up, Cherisha stood at the center of the room. She took out a green ball the size of a rock and threw it at the ground. It transformed into a green liquid and seeped into the ground.


    An incredibly thin and nearly imperceptible green barrier enveloped the house, isting it from the world outside. All sorts of strange hallucinatory runes flickered on the barrier, continually spreading mental illusions to misguide any prying eyes.


    From above in the sky, the five wind spirits could not see anything in Adept Holly¡¯s house. It was merely a stretch of white. Meanwhile, Adept Cherisha¡¯s house was fully exposed and unconcealed. The wind spirits could see her every action through the wooden cracks.


    However, it was precisely how clearly the wind spirits saw that Greem couldn¡¯t help but suspect it was all an illusion. After all, Cherisha was very proficient with mental powers!


    The sky slowly darkened, and the tapestry of beautiful, flickering stars appeared.


    However, an unusual red color hung in the night sky, causing the moon¡¯s light to shine a disturbing shade of crimson.


    A crimson moon. That was a bad omen in any ne. It was the instinctual expression of a nar consciousness¡¯ emotions!


    It often meant that a terrifying incident might happen somewhere in this world on this peaceful and quiet night, a bloody event that could trigger the reaction of the nar consciousness. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how terrifying it was.


    Greem looked at the crimson moon for a while before shutting his wooden windows lightly and returning to his table.


    He was not good at divination.


    If Alice were by his side, she would definitely be able to describe what was happening in the distance based on such an obvious nar omen. Unfortunately, Greem sensed nothing apart from a frustrating aura of ughter in his heart.


    Perhaps another wave of invasion had urred somewhere in Morrian ne. It was the only exnation for a massacre of sufficient scale to anger the ne itself. Who was invading the Arcane Empire? The Scourge Lords, or the World of Gods? Or perhaps the Abyssal Demons?


    Too many possibilities, too many conjectures. It made Greem particrly frustrated.


    The threat of the Great Witch Maysa, the unpredictable trajectory of Fate, the dangerous environment around him, and the uncontroble developments of the war. All of it weighed upon Greem¡¯s shoulders, causing him to feel tremendous pressure. It made him upset.


    Any other adept might have changed under such incredible pressure. They would probably either have be twisted perverts or hedonists that only sought physical pleasure!


    However, Greem only made himself even calmer and moreposed in the face of such pressure. He started improving at a pace iprehensible by the average person, using every means and resources at hismand to strengthen himself.


    After all, power meant everything in the World of Adepts!


    He would only be truly safe if he had absolute power. He would only have time to slow down and enjoy life if he had unquestionable strength!


    Thus, even after all he had done, Greem¡¯s pursuit was still the same¨C to live.


    In the past, while he was still an adept apprentice, the enemy desired only his body and his soul. With every improvement and growth he experienced, his past enemies had scattered. However, new enemies continued to appear.


    Now he had achieved shocking achievements unimaginable by any other, but he had also created some incredibly difficult opponents for himself. Everything that his enemies sought, he could not afford to pay. Should he ever fall into the enemies¡¯ trap without a way to break free, he would not end up much better than when he was an apprentice.


    It was the tragedy of being an adept!


    Most of the time, it wasn¡¯t the adepts that chose the life they wanted. It was life that forced them, pushed them to choose. Should their feet slow down for even a little, they just might face a terrifying scene that they did not wish to see.


    Just as Fate gifted them with power, Fate had also forced them onto a twisted path where death awaited those who did not progress. The hand of Fate toyed with them andshed at them. A slight moment of hesitation would be the moment where one¡¯s legendary life came to an end!


    Greem not only had to adapt and endure a life like this, but he also had to find a way to surpass it. It was only when he was too powerful for Fate¡¯s hand to toy with that he could truly take control of his own life.


    ............


    The night was dark and silent.


    A bloody, crimson moon hung in the sky.


    The moonlight cast towards the ground was filled with an unbearable stench of blood.


    Sytance Illhoof stood proudly upon a towering cliff, looking down at the world in front of him with the arrogance of an emperor.


    He took in the bloody smell of the air indulgently, relishing in the dense aura of ughter. He could see through the narws, catching a glimpse of the tortured souls of prey, or even hear theirst tragic cry before death.


    Life was a resource as well, and the soul of every nar creature was a history not so easily wiped away!


    However, all of these souls had now be Sytance Illhoof¡¯s personal possession.


    As the great Lord of Eternal Night, bringing such great wealth back to the World of Disasters would be enough for him to win the favor of the world consciousness. It would be enough for his grade to improve by just that little bit once again.


    The tens of thousands of mutated beasts scattered across the Kentos Continent had invaded cities and ruined viges along their path of advance. They had harvested an uncountable amount of life energy and number of souls for Sytance Illhoof. Unfortunately, there were far too few high-quality souls within this bounty.


    As such, under the orders of Sytance Illhoof, the mutated beasts scattered across thend had begun to gather. They had one target in sight: Reisin Garden, the great arcanist city floating high in the center of the continent.


    Reisin Graden was a target that Sytance Illhoof had decided upon a while ago. He had even fought a few brutal battles with other minor Scourge Lords over this. After tasting the savage and unrelenting attacks of the Lord of Eternal Night, those weaklings had no choice but to swallow their pride and go a different way. Their targets were the other two floating cities.


    The beautiful and delicate floating city of Reisin Garden became Sytance Illhoof¡¯s ideal target for invasion and ughter!


    The army of mutated beasts was still butchering and raiding wildly in the night.


    The life and soul aura that drifted towards Sytance through the narws continued to merge with his body. It was a rxing and pleasant sensation, until his enjoyment was interrupted by some wicked intruders.


    Sytance Illhoof straightened his body and sniffed the night wind pressing into his face. He picked up on a smell that did not belong to the disaster creatures.


    A trace of order and cautiousness mixed into the chaos and evil. A hint of cunning blended intoposure and experience.


    Dammit! It was the smell of adepts!


    To think some adepts had broken into his hunting grounds and even ughtered some of his subordinates!


    An evil and cruel aura rose from Sytance Illhoof¡¯srge and hideous body.


    He kicked with all four of his hooves, leaped down the cliff, and started sprinting wildly towards the west.


    The cold night winds howled past him.


    Sytance ran beneath the moonlight with the stance of a horse, traveling at a speed that eclipsed even the flying creatures in the sky.


    Fields of wheat, forests, and rivers rushed past beneath his feet.


    He passed by many human viges and towns along the way. These human settlements were always filled with cries of terror, the light of fires, and, of course, the shapes of murderous beasts tearing apart the humans.


    Sytance ignored all of this. Every bound and leap he made caused him to travel a hundred meters. One human settlement after another was left behind as he stubbornly bounded towards the west.


    The mutated beasts that ughtered in these viges hastened their massacre upon sensing Illhoof¡¯s aura. They rushed out of the towns and followed after their leader, wildly advancing towards some unknown location in the distance.


    A small pack of mutated beasts quickly formed in this manner under the night sky!


    Illhoof leaped onto a small hill and finally stopped. He nced at the pitch-ck human vige in the distance with a sinister and cruel light in his eyes.


    He could faintly sense three soul auras of various strengths in the vige. He could also smell elementium lifeforms around the area.


    If the enemy were too weak, Illhoof wouldn¡¯t have bothered to travel so far just to warn his enemies.


    He could sense it. The aura of the adepts hidden in this vige had reached a level where even he had to be cautious. As such, before his final hunt, Illhoof needed to cull all possible factors of instability around him.


    These fragile adepts were undoubtedly some of the most annoying insects. They weren¡¯t just annoying; they were downright detestable!


    Their auras might have reached the limit of power that could be contained by the ne, but Illhoof did not regard them as actual opponents out of the usual contempt his kind harbored for adepts.


    After all, an adept was a profession often taken up by intelligent species with inferior talents and potential.


    They either had frail bodies or weak Spirits. There was always a massive, scornful weakness to their person. A race like this, a foundation like this- even if they managed to strengthen their soul to Fourth Grade, they were still prey in the eyes of the great Sytance Illhoof.


    Sytance Illhoof already had easier prey at hand. He had lost all interest in hunting and ughtering these barbed prey.


    However, Illhoof didn¡¯t want his moment of passion¡¯ to cause the adepts to get any ideas. He didn¡¯t want them to interrupt the banquet of blood and flesh that was toe. A warning and a show of force were required!


    If these interlopers were too weak, Illhoof didn¡¯t mind having a few adepts as appetizers before the feast. After all, those who could be Fourth Grade adepts had quite delicious souls!

 Chapter 1107 - Crush the Weak

    <h4>Chapter 1107 Crush the Weak</h4>


    Just as expected, Illhoof¡¯s arrival alerted Greem and the others.


    After all, they were all at Fourth Grade. They were the most powerful people within the material nes. Though there might be some variance in power between them, they had all put in incredible amounts of preparation into their personal defenses.


    Greem, Holly, and Cherisha all sensed it when Illhoof appeared on the distant hill. They woke up from their sleep or meditation, their mental consciousness active once again.


    No one knew when, but Greem had appeared in the air above the wooden house. He evaluated the ferocious monster standing atop the hill from a distance, nervous yet excited.


    Disaster creatures were exceptionally terrifying opponents, even for a major ne like the World of Adepts. In particr, Scourge Lords that had lived for thousands, or tens of thousands, of years were all-powerful existences that were nar cmities.


    Countless nar worlds thatcked the strength to defend themselves had their residents ughtered and all their rare resources robbed from theirnds. Even the nar origin required to maintain a world¡¯s stability and development was extracted, leaving the nar world to copse, disintegrate, and turn into ¡®waste¡¯ drifting through the endless space.


    If adepts were leeches parasitizing the nar worlds, then the disaster creatures were army ants that ate and devoured everything in their way. Where they went, nes copsed and species went extinct. Only the shattered remains of nar continents would slip into the space storms, where they would be home for gxy wanderers.


    Both parties were at the top of the food chain, but the difference in power and status was astronomical!


    In strength alone, the adepts were jackals, while the Scourge Lords were tigers, rulers of an entire mountain.


    It was precisely because of this that Illhoof dared to approach the adepts so brazenly.


    As expected, Illhoof was wildly different from an ordinary ne creature in Greem¡¯s magical sight.


    Illhoof wasn¡¯t all thatrge in size. He was only three meters tall.


    That was already somewhat ¡®petite¡¯ for Scourge Lords, who easily measured several kilometers in height.


    However, considering that he was only a clone of a Sixth Grade Scourge Lord, choosing a smaller and more agile body for a nar invasion was probably the more optimal choice.


    Illhoof¡¯s body resembled that of a mastiff. He had an aerodynamic body, four powerful limbs, and sharp ws at the end of each limb. However, Illhoof¡¯s most prominent feature was his head.


    Or rather, hisck of a head.


    From the neck up, his head split off in four pieces, like the petals of a blooming flower. The edges of these ¡®petals¡¯ were filled with sharp teeth. A thick tentacle emerged from the center of the ¡®flower,¡¯ and a strange eyeball attached at the end of the tentacle was looking around.


    The terrifying Illhoof stood at the top of the hill, his hind legs slightly bent and his body upright. The four petal mouthpieces were trembling in the direction of the adepts, while the eyestalk in the center twisted and gazed at them.


    There was no greeting or even a deration of battle. Illhoof simply straightened his body and let out a strange screech. Tens of thousands of creatures thundered from behind the hill as an army of mutated beasts swarmed at the adepts.


    Scourge Lords truly had a unique way of greeting people!


    To think he would start the battle without a single word.


    If they could survive the attacks of his subordinates, they would have naturally won the qualifications to speak to him as an equal. If they couldn¡¯t survive...well, weaklings had no right to negotiate or even a voice!


    Greem¡¯s eyes swept across the battlefield and quickly scanned all of the approaching beasts.


    There was a great variety of these mutated beasts, each with unusual appearances. You could find creatures of any kind. There were eagles with the heads of lions among them, tigers with the bodies of deer and the ws of wolves, and many, many more. However, the majority of them were still ugly creatures that appear simply to be an amalgamation of flesh, where no single feature could be distinguished.


    It was evident that these were mutated beasts whose life origins had been corrupted by the Scourge Lords¡¯ twisted power. They could no longer regain their former appearance or consciousness.


    A single word from the Scourge Lords, and these corrupted creatures would swarm and tear apart any enemy like irrational madmen.


    The grades of these creatures ranged from First to Third Grade, but there was no hierarchy amongst them.


    They had no formation, and they made no distinction between each of them. The group simply gathered together as a horde and roared as they charged the adepts.


    Greem and Holly exchanged a look and instantly understood each other¡¯s intentions. They also began to fight without any hesitation!


    As the most powerful elementium adept among the three of them, Greem¡¯s two-meter-tall body swelled to ten meters in the blink of an eye. He stood firmly on the ground with both feet, red mes smoldering around his body. Piece after piece of magical equipment started to appear around him in energy form.


    Demonic Wall of Fire!


    Meteor Shower!


    Firestorm!


    Even as his body was elementiumizing, Greem waved his fire coral staff lightly, and three powerful area-of-effect fire spells had been cast onto the battlefield.


    The Demonic Wall of Fire erected a ten-meter-long and three-meter-thick wall of mes in front of the mutated beasts. Any creature that charged into the wall would have to endure nine hundred points of fire damage per second. The Third Grade mutated monsters might be able to survive this with their formidable Physique, but the First and Second Grade weaklings were finished. All of their magical elementium would ignite the moment their bodies came into contact with the fire.


    They would turn into ashes in less than three seconds.


    On the other hand, Meteor Shower caused a rain of meteors to crash down from the skies, creating a giant sea of mes wherever theynded. Shards of magma were also sent sshing upon impact. Meanwhile, Firestorm was a series of me shockwaves that inflicted seven hundred points of fire damage to any creature unfortunate enough to be swept up in its radius.


    There were five shockwaves in total, the fire damage of which stacked upon each other.


    Thispound series of attacks that came from the ground and the skies would not be sufficient against a Fourth Grade enemy. However, when used against a horde of low-grade creatures, it was as if a giant furnace had been created on the frontlines of the battlefield. Anyone that dared to enter that furnace would be instantly turned to dust before thebined might of three fire spells. They wouldn¡¯t even have the chance to cry out in pain.


    It was Greem¡¯s first time fighting against a Scourge Lord. As such, he did not reveal all of his abilities.


    Of the four significant magical fire effects that he had obtained, Greem only used the increased fire spellcasting range and increased fire effectiveness. Meanwhile, he also made sure to keep his trump card, the magnification crystal, properly hidden. He would not use it unless it was a crucial point in the battle.


    Even so, as a Fourth Grade legendary fire adept, Greem¡¯s terrifyingly destructive powers still put the other two adepts to shame. So fearsome were his attacks that it almost made Holly and Cherisha¡¯s attacks look like lukewarm water.


    Greem exterminated the three hundred mutated beasts sprinting at the forefront in the blink of an eye. Meanwhile, Adept Holly quickly donned his astral armor amidst a beam of blinding starlight. He charged right into the middle of the mutated beasts and ughtered them without any resistance.


    The astral armor that Adept Holly wore was unusual. Every single punch and kick he used was far, far more powerful than what an ordinary metal golem should be capable of. Whenever he punched a mutated beast, strange starlight power would jump and leap across the bodies of other surrounding creatures, instantly causing them to explode into a mess of blood and flesh.


    Meanwhile, due to the projection of starlight around Adept Holly, any creature that approached him would be stunned and lose all control of their body. The slightest dy in their movements would be more than enough for Holly to punch them to pieces with his ferocious metal fists.


    It didn¡¯t matter if they were First, Second, or Third Grade. There was only one fate awaiting the mutated beasts that tried to attack Adept Holly¨C death.


    For a moment, Adept Holly was unstoppable, rampaging uncontested amongst the enemies while d in his unusual armor.


    However, it didn¡¯t matter how fast he punched or kicked. He would never be faster than Greem, who ughtered scores of beasts with a single spell.


    Meanwhile, Cherisha showed no signs of releasing Mangus and transforming into their true two-headed form. Instead, she used her strange, powerful mental magic to enchant the mutated beasts, causing them to turn on one another.


    These mutated beasts might have once been incredibly powerful monsters in their native nes, but they were as weak as sheep before these Fourth Grade adepts, who stood at the peak of the material nes.


    With Adept Holly serving as an invincible tank for him, Greem did not need to worry about defense at all. Instead, he focused solely on being the destructive cannon that he was.


    He turned into a ten-meter-tall fire giant and stood at the center of the vige, asionally tossing a fire spell at the frontlines to halt the mutated beasts¡¯ wild advance. The monsters would thrash in his mes like blind men, unable to find a way out and eventually crumpling to the ground as they whined in agony and burned to a crisp.


    Greem¡¯s attack did not stop, but most of his attention was still focused on Illhoof, who remained on top of the hill.


    Even when the battle was at its most intense, Greem still had one or two powerful fire spells readied and prepared. If Illhoof tried anything weird, he would hurl these spells at him without any hesitation.


    Sytance Illhoof stood firmly at the top of the hill, looking down at the battlefield in silence.


    His subordinates might be getting torn apart by the enemy and ughtered by the hundreds, but he felt nothing at all.


    Mere insignificant corrupted beings. He wouldn¡¯t even bat an eye no matter how many of them died.


    As long as he could take down that floating city, he could have asrge a mutated beast army as he wanted. Numbers were not a problem.


    The only thing he cared about now was how powerful these three adepts were.

 Chapter 1108 - Clash of the Powerful

    <h4>Chapter 1108 sh of the Powerful</h4>


    In all honesty, if all three adepts were as ferocious as the fire adept, Illhoof would have turned tail and ran without any hesitation. He would rather lose his entire mutated beast army here than risk the death of this clone of his.


    Correspondingly, if all three adepts here were as weak as that weird two-headed adept, Illhoof would charge forth without any hesitation.


    He would never give up on such high-quality prey!


    Unfortunately, the opponent¡¯s group was too strange. Some of them were powerful, and some of them were weak. That made Illhoof somewhat upset.


    The weak were the perfect prey, but the strong were simply too difficult an opponent.


    Illhoof¡¯s lotus-shaped mouth opened wide as he bent down on all fours. The next instant, his entire body vanished from the spot.


    Invisibility, teleportation...or some other unusual ability?


    Greem and the others were shocked at what they just saw.


    It didn¡¯t matter how many of these mutated beasts there were. The best they could do was force the adepts into a retreat. They had no chance of killing them. The only thing that could threaten the lives of the three Fourth Grade adepts was the bizarre-looking Scourge Lord, Illhoof.


    The three adepts immediately went on high alert the moment Illhoof vanished from sight. They were careful of an ambush from him.


    Greem looked around him, and instantly his magical vision allowed him to spot a faint silhouette quickly moving through the ground.


    ¡°He¡¯s underground. Cherisha, dodge!¡±


    Greem shouted loudly and hurled the Meteor Bombardment he had been preparing towards Cherisha¡¯s feet.


    Cherisha was the weakest of the three of them. As such, she had long since prepared herself to be the target of any attacks. Upon hearing Greem¡¯s cry, she quickly took to the air and shifted her bright yellow magic shield to her feet. At the same time, Greem¡¯s zing meteor crashed into the quiet ground with the force of a thousand hammers.


    Just as Cherisha¡¯s feet left the ground, the t earth suddenly bubbled like mud in a swamp. Four vicious mouthpieces abruptly mped shut above the ground, the sharp teeth shed with each other and causing sparks to fly.


    Cherisha had barely dodged the enemy¡¯s underground ambush with millimeters to spare.


    Only the upper half of Illhoof¡¯s body was visible. His only eye re at Cherisha viciously before turning towards Greem, a mean gleam shing within.


    At that moment, the crashing meteor was very close to Illhoof already.


    Extreme heat engulfed the surrounding space before the violent meteor had even arrived. Traces of white smoke rose from the ground, and the earth itself started to melt and show signs of turning into magma.


    Illhoof smiled wickedly before turning and diving into the earth again.


    A dirt-yellow radiance flickered over the ground as the earth instantly became harder than stone.


    Boom!


    A loud explosion sounded as the meteor crashed into the ground. A half-meter deep crater was carved into thend, the bottom of which was filled with fine cracks. me shockwaves and streams of fire of extreme heat spread outwards in a ring, sting away all substances at terrifying speed.


    Cherisha, who had just taken off the ground, was clearly too close to the point of impact. The mes immediately engulfed her. The multiple magical defenses around her crackled as they erupted into sparks. The horrifying mes instantly scorched her feet and turned them ck.


    Cherisha cried out in shock and escaped from the mes. She no longer dared tond after she got back in the sky.


    After stabilizing herself in the air, Cherisha took out multiple vials of potions and started to drink them as fast as she could. The wounds to her lower body started healing at a visible rate.


    The me giant that Greem had turned into was extremely tall. Naturally, by looking down from above, his field of vision was much wider than the average person.


    Blue light flickered deep in his ck eyes as he looked around him to search for Illhoof¡¯s location.


    Illhoof had managed to neutralize his violent attack from earlierpletely.


    A simple halo of earth elementium had blocked a Meteor Bombardment with 1,600 points of power. The friendly fire inflicted on Cherisha was greater than the damage that Illhoof had sustained.


    Moreover, Illhoof had vanished once more. Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but go on alert now.


    Just as expected, yellow ripples appeared beneath his feet as the earth turned into soft sand, trapping his smoldering legs. Illhoof quickly tunneled out of the ground some distance away. He opened his lotus-shaped mouth and fired a dense clump of dust mist towards Greem.


    To think his specialty was earth elementium!


    That was clearly out of Greem¡¯s expectations.


    Thebined effect of the Quicksand Trap and the Halo of Gravity caused his giant me body to sink into the ground slowly. The mist that Illhoof had fired at Greem contained a terrifying amount of earth energy and was aimed at his heart.


    Obviously, Illhoof had also picked up on the power of the Heart of Principles in Greem¡¯s chest!


    Greem¡¯s body was immobilized; he could not escape this attack. As such, he raised his arms and created two one-meter-thick Lava Shields in front of himself.


    Pu!


    The yellow mist crashed against the Lava Shields, instantly putting out the red mes. The surface of the Lava Shields quickly solidified and turned to rock before crumbling as dust.


    The two Lava Shields that could have defended against a total of two thousand points of elementium damage couldn¡¯t evenst more than three seconds beneath the mist. They were quickly sted into bits of stone.


    Just as the Lava Shields were destroyed, an even purer beam of earth energy pierced through the explosion andnded on Greem¡¯s extended left arm.


    A strange petrification power quickly corrupted Greem¡¯s arm, causing him to lose all control over it.


    [Beep. Attacked by a Petrification Beam. Energy intensity is 2,100 points.


    [Chaos Physique activated. Absorbing 270 points of earth elementium.


    [Burning Domain magical effect activated. Neutralizing 240 points of earth elementium damage.


    [Body of mes elementium defenses activated. Ignoring 650 points of earth elementium damage.


    [Magic resistance countering 410 points of earth elementium damage.]


    ......


    A series of notifications from the Chip instantly filled Greem¡¯s vision. Under the effects of multiple spells and his own Physique, the petrification power that had invaded Greem¡¯s body was greatly weakened. However, the powerful attacks of a Fourth Grade minor Scourge Lord were not to be scoffed at. Even after the series of resistances, Greem¡¯s body still had to endure nearly five hundred points of elementium damage.


    Moreover, these five hundred points of petrification power were true damage after all resistances had been applied. Greem could only endure this damage with his 31 points of Physique.


    The yellow petrification powers of the beam shed wildly with the red fire energy, turning the arm into a battlefield of its own. Patches of yellow and red appeared all over the limb as the energies fought for dominance.


    Greem let out a pained cry and let out a breath of invisible golden mes from his mouth. mes surged around him, and multiple me shockwaves ravaged outwards around him.


    Illhoof cackled and stomped the ground with his two front feet. A thick and firm earth wall rose in front of him.


    By the time the me shockwaves tore the earth wall apart, Illhoof had already disappeared.


    When he appeared once more, he was thirty meters behind Greem. His mouth trembled, and the ground beneath them started to shake as if there was a massive earthquake. Several thick earth spikes rose from the earth and stabbed towards Greem from every direction.


    Seeing that this attack was even more potent than thest one, Greem didn¡¯t dare hold back. He beat his chest with one arm, and an unprecedentedly powerful me shockwave burst forth, ripping the earth spikes to shreds.


    By the time the two zing Fireballs he firednded at Illhoof¡¯s former position, the Scourge Lord was already gone from sight.


    After multiple failed attacks and almost being wounded at Illhoof¡¯s hands, Greem¡¯s anger and frustration had reached its peak. He lifted his feet and stomped. The earth beneath him instantly shattered as redva started to spew forth, turning the area around him into a massive pool ofva.


    Heatwaves began to spread outwards from his Body of mes, causing the temperature to rise from two thousand degrees to seven thousand degrees. An egg-shaped dome that covered over three hundred square meters enveloped him, the inside of which was filled with terrifying golden mes.


    Havingpleted his defenses, fires burned in Greem¡¯s eyes, turning them into two miniature suns as he looked at the ground around him. The two beams of fire from his eyes left behind clear scorch marks in the ground where he looked. Where his gaze lingered, the earth melted, the stone softened, and a small pool ofva was quickly created.


    Adept Holly, who was still battling with the mutated beasts, snuck a look at the battlefield over there. The muscles in his face couldn¡¯t help but start twitching violently.


    ¡°Monsters. Monsters...all of them, monsters!¡±


    After advancing to Fourth Grade, Adept Holly had be very formidable and powerful due to his unusual astral senses and incredible astral construct. He might not be invincible among Fourth Grades, but he was undoubtedly a well-known rookie among beginner Fourth Grade adepts.


    However, today, on this otherworldly nar battlefield, he finally knew what an actual Fourth Grade adept was meant to look like.


    Dammit! Those two bastards had already raised the intensity of the battle to such a degree, even though the fight had just barely started.


    At this point, the attacks that Illhoof and Greem were exchanging easily reached two thousand points ofpound elementium damage. Even with the toughness and magic resistance of his astral armor, Adept Holly would have a hard time against such attacks.


    How was he supposed to join a battle like this?

 Chapter 1109 - New Agreement

    <h4>Chapter 1109 New Agreement</h4>


    If Adept Holly was merely fearful, then Cherisha was despairing!


    Though she and Mangus had managed to advance to Fourth Grade bybining both their powers, their existence was still incredibly wed.


    Currently, they could only be considered a qualified Fourth Grade adept while they were in their transformed awakened state. Most of the time, they were only in a transitory state somewhere between Third and Fourth Grade.


    They could simply crush any Third Grade adepts by transforming into the two-headed adept. However, against an actual Fourth Grade, they would be as frail as rotten meat. All their opponent had to do was dy until their transformation was over.


    Moreover, their most significant problem at the moment was insufficient defense!


    Both their Physique and magic resistance were significantly behind that of an ordinary Fourth Grade. They also had no powerful defensive magic, which made them even more vulnerable targets.


    There wasn¡¯t even a need to consider joining a battle between Fourth Grades! Even the ¡®tiny¡¯ me shockwave from Greem¡¯s reinforcing meteor had managed to break through their physical defenses and resulted in friendly fire. That alone was more than enough evidence of their weakness.


    The defenses created by thebined power of Cherisha and Mangus could barely defend against elementium damage of 1,200 points. They had to endure all remaining spillover damage.


    Greem¡¯s 31 points of Physique allowed him to endure an entire attack from Illhoof with only minor injuries to himself. Meanwhile, Cherisha and Mangus¡¯ Physique was only at 26 points. This amount, as well as their magic resistance, put them at risk of grievous wounds if Illhoof hit them even a single time.


    After seeing the battle rise in intensity, Cherisha had no choice. As reluctant as she was, she still had to summon her brother¡¯s soul and transform into theirplete form¨C the vicious and powerful two-headed adept.


    Faced with the aggressive Fourth Grade Scourge Lord, Greem, Holly, and Cherisha all arrived at the same conclusion. They had to fight with their strongest aspects!


    One had to admit that Illhoof¡¯s mastery of elementium and body coordination was far superior to the adepts.


    The adepts were more like maniptors of elementium.


    They connected themselves to elementium using their innate talents and affinities, allowing them to control the powers of the elementium freely. However, an adept was still an adept, and elementium was still elementium. They were distinct entities of their own.


    Illhoof, on the other hand, was altogether different. It was almost as if he had assimted deeply with the earth elementium itself.


    When he attacked with magic, he needed no chants or handsigns. The elementium moved by his every will and thought. Even a seemingly weak earth elementium technique could block or neutralize a powerful fire spell from Greem.


    Moreover, he was incredibly proficient with the use of petrification beams and the transmutation between earth and stone.


    It was like Illhoof himself was an earth elemental. He was able to travel freely through the ground and smoothly shape the earth to attack his enemies.


    It was this unusual ability of his that gave Greem such trouble!


    Illhoof seemed to have acknowledged him as the strongest person among the three adepts. The majority of his attacks were targeted at Greem.


    With his ability to travel through the ground, he could conjure the earth and stone to block Greem¡¯s attacks at any time. He would also regrly emerged from the ground around Greem, using a wild barrage of Earth Spikes, Rce Forest, Earthquake, and other earth spells to attack him.


    If and when Greem showed any weakness, Illhoof would fire a fearsome Petrification Beam from his eye.


    This Petrification Beam had the strange effect of ignoring all physical defenses. Greem had to be extremely cautious. Otherwise, the powers of petrification would invade his body and inflict damage on him.


    Meanwhile, Illhoof was extremely apprehensive of Greem¡¯s Burning Domain.


    He wasn¡¯t concerned about its lingering burning effects, but its ability to help Greem lock on to his position.


    Illhoof had secretly given the might of Greem¡¯s elementium fires a taste during the back and forth.


    Terrifying. Absolutely terrifying!


    To think, the tiny fireballs from a weak fire adept who had just advanced to Fourth Grade and had yet to stabilize his Spirit could hurt so much. It was beyond Illhoof¡¯s expectations!


    It was important to note that for powerful creatures like themselves who traveled deep in space, excellent elementium resistance was a necessary trait for survival.


    Yet, even with his magic resistant skin and exceptional Physique, Illhoof had winced at pain from Greem¡¯s fireball. That clearly meant that there was something unusual mixed in with his fireball spells.


    The only thing that could threaten a Fourth Grade Minor Scourge Lord like himself to this extent had to be the power of principles!


    A newly advanced Fourth Grade fire adept who had mastery over some firews.


    Illhoof became extremely careful when fighting against Greem after recognizing him as such.


    Meanwhile, of the three human adepts, the two-headed adept was utterly useless. They would have trouble dealing with the mutated beasts, let alone joining this battle between Fourth Grades. Meanwhile, though the adept hiding in the strange armor did not have offensive power as terrifying as the fire adept, he was a tough opponent as well.


    His unusual astral magic could destroy the structure of spells.


    Any spells that approached him would have their model and structure washed apart by the starlight, reduced to a scattered torrent of elementium. It effectively halved the power of any spell. The armor he wore also had decent physical defense.


    Illhoof estimated that he needed to use 50% of his abilities to deal with the armored adept. Meanwhile, killing the fire adept would require him to use 80% of his power. He would also have to suffer the adept¡¯s desperate death throes.


    Of course, he only needed 20% power to crush the two-headed adept!


    Illhoof quickly assessed his enemies¡¯ strength even as he fought.


    He had to admit, even with the aid of the mutated beasts, killing these three adepts would be extremely difficult. At this rate, the investment would ultimately not be worth the returns.


    After continuing his wild attacks for a little while longer, Illhoof flickered and returned to the hill in the distance. He roared, and the mutated beasts stopped their offense as well, retreating to the hill as a dark, ck swarm.


    ¡°Human adepts, your power has been acknowledged by I, Lord Illhoof. There is no point to this battle. We will just be wasting our strength to no avail. How about this? Let¡¯s cooperate!¡± Illhoof¡¯s lotus-shaped mouthpieces moved as he stood on the hill, and he simted a strange screeching voice using his Spirit.


    Cooperate?


    The three adepts, who were all injured to some degree, exchanged looks. Clearly, they had no idea what was happening.


    Greem strode forward with his giant body. He stared at Illhoof and shouted with his booming voice, ¡°May we know what your ¡®cooperation¡¯ refers to?¡±


    The other two adepts slowly backed behind Greem as well and got into formation.


    However, the three adepts¡¯ powers were non-synergistic and even detrimental to the others¡¯ abilities. They could hardly trust each other, either. Therefore, even in formation, they kept a safe distance of two hundred meters between each of them. No one dared to step within the range of an another adept easily.


    It was amon sight among high-grade adepts in battle. It was nothing out of the ordinary.


    ¡°Since you¡¯vee here, you are probably aiming for that floating city as well, aren¡¯t you?¡± Illhoof continued.


    Greem and the others looked at each other. Holly and the two-headed adept said nothing and seemed to be deferring to Greem entirely.


    In truth, there was no need to keep their objective any secret.


    After all, they were otherworldly adepts that had snuck into Morrian ne during this time of crisis. Saying that they had no ill intentions when they were silently approaching Reisin Garden would be an insult to Illhoof¡¯s intelligence.


    Upon seeing Greem nod silently, Illhoof¡¯s mouth started to vibrate even more intensely.


    ¡°Since our targets are the same, and since neither of us can exterminate the other, why don¡¯t we work together!¡± Illhoof pointed his ugly mouth towards Greem. ¡°What I need are the lives and souls of the people in the floating city. You lot shouldn¡¯t need these, do you?!¡±


    ¡°And what I need are the rare resources and high-grade knowledge of the Arcane Empire stored within the city. If you don¡¯t mind, I am very interested in the energy core as well.¡± Greem fell silent for a moment but quickly exined his objectives as well.


    Illhoof expressed no objections or dissatisfactions.


    ¡°I want to obtain the secrets to creating high-grade arcane golems.¡± Adept Holly also cautiously mentioned what he wanted.


    He actually wanted much more than that, but speaking up brazenly in this situation and provoking the Scourge Lord was not a wise idea. In cooperation like this, what one could potentially obtain was directly rted to their ability.


    He had managed to produce power enough to make Illhoof fearful in the battle earlier. Naturally, this meant that he could not raise any requests.


    ¡°I also want¡ª¡± The two-headed adept was happy to see how things had turned out. They opened their mouth, but a chilling and fearsome Spirit instantly engulfed them. They were smart enough to shut up immediately.


    Illhoof did not regard them as a threat at all. Their power was simply too insignificant. That they could even be part of this coboration was entirely thanks to the other two adepts.


    Naturally, an inconsequentialponent like themselves had no right to make any requests.


    At any rate, the floating city wasrge enough. They could find plenty of leftover loot even after everyone was done.


    After all, in the eyes of a disaster creature like Illhoof, everything rested on power.


    If you had no power, then you were prey!


    ¡°It seems like there is room for cooperation between us. The floating city is not easily invaded anyway. There is still a Great Arcanist there. Why don¡¯t we work together to kill that arcanist? The body and soul will be mine, while the rest of their equipment belongs to you. How about it?¡± Illhoof¡¯s suggestion was overbearing and left no room for questions, but it still incited the adepts¡¯ interest.


    A Great Arcanist?


    That had not been mentioned in the mission report provided by the main party. Was that an oversight, or intentional?


    Greem smiled sinisterly and nodded for the party.

 Chapter 1110 - Their Respective Resolutions

    <strong>Chapter 1110 Their Respective Resolutions</strong>


    Floating City Reisin Garden.


    The situation had be increasingly dire.


    News from the north revealed that a starbeast had attacked Truth¡¯s Light.


    Though they had managed to dispose of the enemy thanks to the Arcane Emperor¡¯s clone, the scattered invaders had still inflicted unimaginable losses and cmity onto the Arcane Empire.


    Rural viges and cities fell one after another. Human settlement after human settlement was ughtered and put to the torch. Morrian didn¡¯t have much time left.


    Naturally, the higher-ups of the Arcane Empire knew everything about the disasters that Morrian ne was facing. However, when the news reached the middle management, the information was a lot simpler and iplete. By the time it reached your average arcanist, the information was already too unclear to be fully trusted.


    The ordinary citizens at the lowest levels had already been abandoned. Of course, this meant that they had no idea what disaster had befallen them.


    Arge-scale selection of arcane apprentices arrived just like this.


    The deadline for selecting the apprentices had not approached yet. In the meantime, floating cities all over the world sent outpulsory orders to their subordinate regions to send their most excellent apprentices for the selection toe.


    Large groups of talented children were chosen and sent to the floating cities. It allowed the cities to be vibrant with life again, even in the face of war and danger.


    The Empire was retreating; that news was no longer a secret. Instead, it had be a fiercely debated topic amongst arcanists and apprentices.


    Most arcanists were on the list of retreating personnel, but the number of apprentices was significantly smaller.


    As the arcane center of the Rian Province on the Kentos Continent, Reisin Garden was home to over thirty thousand arcane apprentices. In addition to the newly arriving apprentices, the number was pushing fifty thousand.


    However, the information leaked from above showed that the Arcane Empire could only take on a maximum of four thousand apprentices from Reisin Garden.


    After all, the entirety of the Arcane Empire spanned seven continents, over twenty provinces, and seventy-six floating cities. Even if every floating city were to select four thousand apprentices, that would make for a massive total of three hundred thousand apprentices.


    Moreover, apart from the future generation, each floating city still had to bring with them arge number of arcanists, arcane equipment, facilities, resources, materials, and rations.


    In all honesty, the Arcane Empire had to grit their teeth and abandon the arcanists with no future potential for development to put together this quota of four thousand apprentices.


    However, those at the bottom of society would never be able to understand the painstaking lengths that their leaders had gone to in nning all this. They could only stubbornlypare the numbers.


    Fifty thousand against four thousand.


    The difference in number was so vast!


    If these units were the number of gold coins, it would be enough of a difference to shock a person. However, when these units were human lives, the value was so incrediblyrge that it was inestimable.


    These days, everyone in Reisin Graden was in a state of panic. All the arcanists were busy with the logistics of transferring and moving resources, resulting in most arcane organizations and facilities being put on hold. The confused arcane apprentices either asked about the list of retreating personnel or¨Cknowing well enough that they had no chance of making the list¨Csilently packed their baggage and returned home.


    Even though they had no means of knowing how the war was progressing on the frontlines, or what the higher-ups¡¯ ns were, they could all see with their own eyes the direness of the Empire¡¯s circumstances.


    There had already been six or seven terrifying cases of floating cities being attacked by invaders within the Arcane Empire. Even though most of the attacks were repelled and the enemies defeated, two of the floating cities had fallen in battle. They crashed from the skies amidst the howling of tens of thousands of lives.


    Floating city crashing. Such incidents had rarely urred in the ten thousand-year history of the Arcane Empire. As such, the confidence of the citizens was greatly shaken.


    The floating cities were no longer eternal gardens in the sky. They were no longer the absolute safe harbor that they had always been in the hearts of all citizens of the Arcane Empire. News from all over the world also indicated thatrge cities and floating cities were often the final targets of the invading monsters.


    As the sun set on the Arcane Empire, staying within a floating city no longer provided any sense of safety. Instead, it only inspired more worry and concern.


    Several ns of arcanists who did not qualify for the retreat found a different path forward. They forged new shelters in the most remote and hidden locations on each continent, preparing themselves for the apocalypse that was toe.


    Even the arcane apprentices that did not make the list were in a hurry to return home. They wanted to obtain the best location in these safe shelters for themselves and their families as soon as possible. These apprentices were also trying their best to recruit unassociated high-grade apprentices to strengthen the n they were joining and to obtain a greater voice in these shelters.


    As a beauty who was known as an advanced apprentice in both alchemy and golem creation, Lucia naturally found herself the recipient of many offers. Unfortunately, Lucia was not moved by any of these offers. She rejected everyone firmly and lived life as she always had, spending her days busy in the arcaneboratories, the libraries, and the academy.


    On this day, Lucia walked down the familiar white path with a stack of arcane tomes in her arms. Several apprentices walked past her in a hurry. There were no longer any smiles on anyone¡¯s faces. There were no young forms to be seen on the soft beaches or the beautiful fountains. The entire floating city had been engulfed in a downcast atmosphere of pain and despair.


    Lucia walked forward silently with her head bent down.


    It wasn¡¯t until a familiar sleeve appeared in her vision, along with a pair of fine arcane boots, that she stopped in her tracks. She looked up in surprise.


    In front of her was the handsome young apprentice, Soren.


    His forehead was locked into a frown, and his face was pale as if he was being mentally tortured by something.


    ¡°Soren, you...haven¡¯t left?¡± Lucia sped her mouth in shock.


    Soren¡¯s looked at Lucia¡¯s bright and pretty eyes. He opened his dry mouth several times before finally speaking.


    ¡°My grandfather has decided to retreat today.¡±


    ¡°Congrattions! I am happy for you.¡± A sincere smile appeared on Lucia¡¯s face.


    Soren looked at Lucia¡¯s face carefully, pain in his eyes. He could not find the slightest facade or mockery in her smile.


    ¡°My grandfather is calling me to leave already. I just want to ask you onest time. You...are you sure you don¡¯t want toe with me?¡±


    Lucia slowly stopped smiling and shook her head solemnly.


    ¡°Lucia, I...I take back what I said before. I won¡¯t use this quota to force you to do anything. You...you will be free. Come with me. I won¡¯t make you do anything you don¡¯t want to do. I just want you toe with me. Is that okay?¡± Soren said with much difficulty. His face was twisted in pain. It was obvious that it had taken tremendous resolution to arrive at this decision.


    Lucia was stunned for a second. She then smiled beautifully.


    She took a step forward, caressed Soren¡¯s face, and willingly offered her first kiss.


    Just as Soren was overwhelmed with joy and tried to embrace her, Lucia took a firm step back and escaped his arms.


    ¡°Leave, Soren!¡± Lucia¡¯s little face was blushing from the kiss. It was an enchanting sight, ¡°This kiss will be my farewell gift. We might not be able to see each other ever again, so...I hope you leave without any lingering attachments. I hope you continue to work hard for the future of the Empire and the legacy of the arcane civilization!¡±


    ¡°No...Lucia, I...I can¡¯t leave you here!¡± Soren clearly couldn¡¯t ept the reality before him, having fallen from a mountain of bliss to the depths of the abyss. Even his voice was hoarse.


    ¡°I won¡¯t leave!¡± The embarrassment faded from Lucia¡¯s face as her eyes took on an unusual and sacred light, ¡°My life belongs to the arcane! Even if death is staring at me the very next moment, I will not stop moving forward. That was my oath when I chose to be an arcane apprentice. It is also my lifelong pursuit. Even without this cmity, we were destined not to be together! I hope you can understand me.¡±


    Soren¡¯s expression was pained and sorrowful.


    After a long pause, he finally stepped aside.


    Lucia stared at him deeply and hurried back on her way.


    Tears rolled down Soren¡¯s cheek as he watched that beautiful yet determined figure disappear into the distance. It felt like a thousand knives in his heart.


    An old arcanist had appeared beside Soren some time ago. He silently looked in the direction Lucia had disappeared, unconceble loneliness and agony in his gaze.


    ¡°She is a good girl. Unfortunately, she does not belong to you!¡± The old man said casually in a mncholy tone, ¡°If I had no attachments like her, I might have made the same choice. Sadly...¡±


    The old man lowered his head and brooded in silence for a moment. Once he had recovered from his emotions, he lifted his head once again.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go, Soren! There is no more hope here. The task of rebuilding a new Arcane Empire in a different world is not an easy one either. Your future does not lie here, but far away elsewhere. The glory of the arcane, the honor of the family. We are old now. You will have to be the one to pass on and carry forward this legacy of ours. So, get your spirits together and grit your teeth. Live strong, for the Arcane Empire, for the Jonas household.¡±


    Soren¡¯s body trembled slightly.


    After a long pause, he finally wiped away his tears. He turned towards his grandfather and nodded, ¡°I understand. Let¡¯s go, granddad.¡±


    Then, the two of them vanished in a sh of white light.

 Chapter 1111 - Invading the Floating City

    Chapter 1111 Invading the Floating City


    The most significant change after the Scourge Lord and the adepts joined forces was the eleration of their advance.


    ording to certain sources, the World of Gods, the World of Abyss, the Gold Titans, the Star Alliance, and several other powerful factions had breached Morrian ne now. Every additional day spent in Morrian was a tremendous risk.


    They certainly wouldn¡¯t be the only ones to have set their sights on arge and bountiful target like the floating city. Moreover, attacking Reisin Garden was the most critical mission among those handed down by the main party.


    Seven days after forming an alliance with Illhoof, Greem¡¯s party arrived at the floating city.


    It was quite different nowpared to its normal state.


    There were far fewer of those looming arcane towers. Even the security towers that were necessary for defense had been cut down by a significant amount.


    Countless refugees from all over the world had gathered below the colossal floating city in the golden ins. The refugees were trying their best to get onto floating discs, which would bring them into the safety of the floating city¡¯s walls.


    Large groups of arcanists and arcane apprentices were shouting, givingmands torge arcane golems to maintain the order here. There were also long lines of carriages in this crowd, transporting badly needed materials and resources to the floating city.


    While Greem, Holly, and Cherisha climbed onto a hill and watched from a distance, the vast horde mutated beasts swarmed past the hill and down the ins.


    The crowd gathered below the floating city was instantly thrown into a panic.


    Countless civilians screamed in terror as they desperately scattered in every direction. The frightened horses started to thrash about in the crowd, sowing even more chaos.


    Several floating discs that were loading resources and civilians hastily took to the air, shaking as they flew towards the floating city. There were still many people holding onto the edges of the floating discs, screaming and crying for help.


    Finally, when the floating discs were high in the air, the people on the edges ran out of strength. They screamed in terror as they fell from the sky.


    The arcanists and apprentices who remained on the ground to maintain order had nowhere to run now. They could onlymand the arcane golems to form a circle, protecting themselves and some of the refugee civilians.


    From his vantage point, Greem could clearly see that the natives were like a nest of ants whose home had just been torn apart. Meanwhile, a ck tide quickly approached them.


    There were all sorts of creatures among the mutated beats, each one more ferocious and violent than the previous one.


    A clear line of blood was drawn on the battlefield the instant the two parties came into contact with each other.


    It was right beneath the floating city. Consequently, the number of apprentices who had mastered basic arcane magic was drastically higher in numberpared to the neighboring regions. A rain of energy balls fell from the sky and into the army of mutated beasts, dismembering countless creatures and sending flesh into the air.


    However, this number of elementium attacks could never stop the assault of the mutated beast horde.


    They were like tiny bubbles that appeared on top of massive waves. Before the crowd could even cheer in celebration, the vicious beasts had surged into their midst, teaching these arcane rookies a proper lesson with their savage bites and sharp ws.


    Creaaak!


    Several three-meter-tall arcane golems strode ahead with heavy steps. They parted the crowd and appeared in front of the mutated beasts. These golems were not metal constructs made of many tinyponents. Instead, they were animated arcane creations.


    There weren¡¯t very many metal parts on them. Their entire bodies wereposed of surges of arcane energy, and there were only a few thin metal rings in some key locations. These rings were what restrained the arcane power and gave them their humanoid form.


    This structure gave the arcane golems greatly reduced physical offense and defensepared to other golems. However, it also bestowed them with the ability to cast spells.


    As they marched forward, they raised their arms and fired energy bolts of eighty to ny points of power. Attacks of this intensity were about equal to that of a First Grade adept, but they were far more rapid. The arcane golems could fire an energy bolt every two seconds.


    Faced with these ignorant arcane golems, the pack leaders among the mutated beasts instantly went berserk. They endured the energy bolts and charged into the crowd, where they went wild with their attacks.


    This group of two dozen arcane golems was torn apart in less than five minutes.


    The arcanists quickly rose into the air when they saw the situation turn south. They wanted to escape to the floating city before the mutated beasts could surround them.


    Unfortunately, they were a little too slow!


    There wererge groups of flying creatures among the mutated beasts. They either had insect wings or bird wings. Either way, they beat their wings and quickly surrounded the arcanists when they saw them trying to escape.


    Several brilliant shes of arcane light flickered, and a dozen of these beasts crashed to the ground. However, the arcanists could not break through the encirclement either. In the end, their shields were broken, and they were torn to pieces as the mutated beasts fought amongst themselves for their flesh. Only tattered remains were left behind.


    It wasn¡¯t until now that the floating city finally reacted.


    A dozen security towers circled the clouds and descended rapidly, unleashing a terrifying torrent of arcane power at the areas where the beasts were most concentrated.


    Naturally, the mutated beasts were not going to take this lying down. Large packs of flying monsters took to the air, quickly engaging with the security towers.


    Individually, the arcanists might be incredibly frail andcked the ability to confront the mutated beasts in person. However, once they were in their security towers and supported by a whole host of arcane facilities, their power would be amplified by over ten times.


    These dozen security towers weren¡¯t managed by many high-grade adepts, but their firm structures and plentiful arcane energy allowed them to fight the mutated beasts to a standstill. It was an intense battle.


    For a moment, all sorts of arcane beams swept across the horizon, and corpses fell like raindrops.


    Illhoof, who was hiding among the beasts, might not care for the deaths of his minions, but he could not let their sacrifice go to vain.


    While the security towers were fearlessly ughtering the beasts, the earth quaked, and the ground split. Three dozen-meter-tall stone golems emerged from below.


    These stone golems raised their heads and arms immediately. A massive boulder appeared between their palms. They waved their arms, and the boulders howled as they flew across the air at the security towers.


    One of the security towers did not dodge in time and was hit by three boulders at once. It immediately faltered and crashed from the sky.


    The moment itnded on the ground, the mutated beasts that had been on the receiving end of the bombardment roared and swarmed forward, quickly drowning it in a tide of monsters.


    That seemingly provoked the other security towers. Four of them descended and started attacking the hill of mutated beasts in an attempt to save theirpanion. Meanwhile, the rest of them unleashed quick lightning chains at the three stone golems.


    These three golems were all at the peak of Second Grade. Naturally, they were not so easily destroyed by chain lightning. The stone on the surface of their bodies was scorched ck by the lightning, and pieces of it hade crumbling off. However, a yellow elementium halo flickered around them as arge amount of earth elementium flowed from their feet to the damaged parts. The earth elementium quickly solidified into new stone.


    Thus, the three stone-golems were able to survive the attacks of the security towers.


    The security towers¡¯ actions became more frantic at the sight of this. They stopped in midair, contacted the floating city, andmenced channeling the power of actual arcane towers to attack the golems.


    Obviously, Illhoof would never let such a good opportunity pass him by.


    He suddenly emerged from the ground below the security tower. Illhoof lifted his head and roared as a giant yellow halo engulfed the four towers.


    Halo of Gravity!


    A Halo of Gravity released by a Fourth Grade Minor Scourge Lord!


    The four security towers immediately started shaking and descending towards the ground.


    The arcanists inside these towers hastily directed even more energy to the floating ring at the base of the tower. In doing so, they barely managed to resist the pull of gravity and remain flying in the air.


    The arcanists were in a panic when they discovered the Fourth Grade Scourge Lord. The towers trembled as they attempted to break free of the Gravity Halo while firing a barrage of arcane attacks at the Scourge Lord.


    Just as the security towers began resisting the influence of the Halo of Gravity, several dark-red zing Fireballs cut across the sky and sted against their walls.


    The security towers could no longer maintain stability. ck smoke rose from the towers as they spun wildly in the air and crashed to the ground.


    A few thousand meters away, Greem¡¯s giant body strode onto the battlefield with heavy steps and endless mes. His violent fireballs shot the security towers out of the sky before they could escape his range.


    The two surviving security towers turned to flee towards the floating city when they recognized their defeat. However, they were intercepted by a mysterious humanoid d in silver armor. With just a single punch for each of them, the towers were sent hurling back towards the ground.


    Now that they had been grounded, these security towers would not be able to break free of the mutated beasts ever again.


    Illhoof nodded in satisfaction when he saw his ¡®allies¡¯ put in work without pulling anything funny.


    He was here to harvest the lives and souls in the floating city. How could he be trapped on the ground?


    Illhoof stood on the ground. For the first time, he began drawing upon the full extent of his earth powers. His vicious mouth opened as all the earth elementium around him started to gather rapidly.


    The next second, thick pirs of stone rose from the ground, quickly pushing Illhoof towards the sky.


    The beasts that could fly also pped their wings and hurried towards the clouds along the stone pirs. Even more of the mutated beasts leaped forward, clinging to the pirs with their sharp ws as they raced towards the floating city.


    The terrifying siege had only just begun!

 Chapter 1112 - Breaking Through

    Chapter 1112 Breaking Through


    By the time the mutated beasts appeared above the floating city, the arcanists had alreadypleted their preparations.


    Rows of arcane golems formed up in tight formation and stood in front of the arcanists.


    These golems were of many different models and covered mostbat positions in battle.


    At the forefront was a row of exceptionallyrge and bulky arcane golems.


    Each of them was ten meters tall.


    Compared to the other golems, they werepletely covered in metal and seemed extremely tough and sturdy. Various strange magical patterns and arcane runes had been etched onto the surface of their metal bodies. Surging arcane energies shone from the cracks between their armor, forming an arcane barrier around themselves.


    Their metallic toughness and excellent conductivity from the magical silver used in their construction made them powerful war golems with tremendous physical and magical prowess. Their weapons were their heavy metal fists and their two-meter-thick legs.


    When they stood in a row and charged at the enemy, the entire city would tremble and shake.


    Behind the war-golems stood several rows of three-meter tall golems that looked like metal knights. They were like human knights d in full steel armor, each holding two steel longswords with des that measured up to a meter and a half in their hands.


    They followed tightly behind the war golems, moving their swords with elegance and grave. It was obvious that they were the skirmishers.


    Behind the metal knights was a vast army of ordinary arcane golems.


    They might be weaker in meleebat, but they all possessed the ability to fire energy bolts. Consequently, they took on the role of long-ranged fire within the army.


    Meanwhile, the human arcanists had all hidden themselves in their arcane towers, controlling their powerful arcane facilities from within and gathering thunderous lightning storms above the battlefield.


    Arcane apprentices had no ce on a battlefield like this. They had been sent to the inner circle of the floating city, where they would be better protected.


    Initially, the mutated beasts that came to the floating city were stragglers, rushing in few and scattered numbers. They could not break through the arcane golems¡¯ sturdy perimeter at all. The beasts would charge forward, and before they could even reach the first row of golems, they would be sted to pieces by a barrage of energy bolts.


    However, as time went on, more and more mutated beasts arrived at the floating city along the stone pirs. Even the skies began to be blotted out by screeching red and ck creatures.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    Illhoof appeared at the golems¡¯ perimeter in all his might and fury. He looked at the golem army in front of him and raised his body. His petal-like mouthpieces trembled rapidly.


    Like a warrior sounding the war horn, the gathering horde of mutated beasts instantly roared and charged the defensive line.


    The lightning storm that had been brewing on the frontlines immediately struck. Thick bolts of lightning crashed down from above, electrocuting the beasts and sting the life out of their bodies.


    However, the mutated beasts did not fear death. They sprinted through the storm like a flood bursting through a dam. They ran headfirst into the first row of war golems.


    The iron giants remained fixated, kicking with their legs and punching with their fists. They forcefully sliced the ck tide into strands of thinner ck lines. The mutated beasts that made it past the war golems immediately engaged the metal guardians.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Rumble!


    Crack, crack, crack!


    All sorts of strange noises weaved together on the frontlines of battle. It was deafening, and the smell of blood quickly filled the air.


    Another muffled explosion rang out as Greem emerged from a cluster of mes. He ignored the mutated beasts around him that he had identally scorched to ashes. Instead, he focused and evaluated the entire battlefield from afar.


    The battle was still currently focused around the outer ring.


    Therge groups of arcanists sent out by the floating city had managed to forcefully keep the mutated beasts at bay with the help of their arcane towers and golems. The bloody battlefield was everywhere, as was the lingering threat of death from all the zipping energy bolts. In contrast, the inner circle of the floating city was oddly quiet.


    ¡°How is it? We break into the inner circle for a ughter first and take the opportunity to loot?¡± Adept Holly had just stepped onto the floating city a few hundred meters away from Greem.


    Meanwhile, Cherisha had also arrived. She had turned invisible through some unknown means and was secretly looking at the battlefield.


    ¡°The arcanists¡¯ defensive line can only stop the mutated beasts. It cannot stop us. However, we have absolutely no knowledge of what is inside the inner ring. Brazenly breaking in like this makes us susceptible to traps and ambushes.¡± Greem thought for a moment and rejected Adept Holly¡¯s suggestion.


    ¡°Then you mean to...?¡± Adept Holly paused in confusion.


    ¡°Help Illhoof pave a way through the defensive line and let some of the mutated beasts enter the inner ring. We will sneak in during the chaos after that. With the mutated beasts to draw attention away from us, the chances of walking into an ambush will be much lower!¡±


    ¡°Very well, as you say!¡±


    After a simple discussion, the two fearless adepts immediately began their operation.


    Adept Holly was in a far better positionpared to Greem when it came to prating and piercing enemy lines, thanks to his astral armor.


    He joined the horde of mutated beasts as they swarmed forward. The lightning bolts crashing down from above were diffused into scattered electric energy by the starlight around him before they could even reach him.


    He raised his hands when he was a hundred meters away from the war golems. A half-meter-wide pir of light formed between his palms and shot towards a golem.


    Strangely enough, this pir of light pierced straight through the golem¡¯s arcane barrier and projected onto its broad metal chest.


    Hmm? What light spectrum was this? Why couldn¡¯t he sense any energy aura from it? What damage could a beam of light like this do without any energy?


    While Greem was confused about the nature of the light, traces of starlight suddenly emerged from the pir. This starlight quickly started eating away at the war golem¡¯s metal body. Who knew what energy substance this starlight wasposed of? To think, it had such an exceedingly powerful corrosive effect against metal.


    The metal on the war golem¡¯s chest melted like powder, peeling offyer byyer.


    A small dent quickly appeared!


    The arcanist that had been controlling this war golem from his tower in the distance immediately reacted. He made the war golem move away in an attempt to dodge the pir of light.


    However, the war golem was too big. Its movement speed could notpare to the rate at which Adept Holly could shift the light. As the starlight rapidly continued to corrode the metal, the dent widened and threatened to pierce through the golem¡¯s chest.


    Beneath its chest was its most importantponent¨C the energy core.


    Should the arcane energy core be damaged, the war golem would be instantly reduced to a useless pile of metal, even though it had not sustained any other damage.


    Seeing the urgency of the situation, a bright light shed from one of the towers in the distance. Violent chain lightning cut across the battlefield towards Adept Holly.


    Greem frowned and extended a finger. Ferocious fire elementium quickly gathered around Adept Holly, attempting to form into a Lava Shield to protect him from the lightning.


    However, due to the starlight from Adept Holly¡¯s astral armor, the Lava Shield scattered into loose mes before it could properly form.


    Adept Holly¡¯s starlight appeared to make no distinctions. Even allied buffs were dispelled.


    Just as Greem expected Adept Holly to have to endure this violent st of lightning, a thick pir of stone rose from the ground right in the trajectory of the chain lightning.


    !


    A loud explosion sounded out as the intense electricity turned the pir red-white with heat. The powerful energy from the chain lightning st then shattered the stone to pieces.


    It was Illhoof. He was the one who summoned the stone pir to deflect the lightning!


    Greem¡¯s zing eyes swept towards Illhoof as he emerged from the midst of the mutated beasts. He roared viciously, ¡°Attack, attack...keep attacking! You focus only on attacking that big guy. I will help you defend any attacks thate your way. As long as you can take down that golem, I will reward you ordingly!¡±


    ¡°You mean it? Just watch, then!¡± Adept Holly was overjoyed to hear that. The thick pir of light between his palms grew even more powerful.


    Greem chuckled coldly and continued to walk forward.


    As he advanced, crimson zing Fireballs continued to shoot out of his hands.


    These fireballs were clearly different from an ordinary magical fireball. Every one of them contained the powerful and unusual might of firews. Even the non-living arcane golems felt a strange ¡®agony¡¯ when a fireball hit them.


    The metal rings on the First Grade arcane golems would melt instantly if these fireballs hit them. Thus, Greem¡¯s zing Fireballs exploded within the formation of the arcane golems, sting one arcane golem after another to the ground. He swept through everything like an autumn breeze through fallen leaves.


    Even the Second Grade metal guardians could not endure more than two or three of these zing Fireballs.


    Under Greem¡¯s merciless barrage, a path of fire piercing through the golem¡¯s defensive line quickly appeared!


    While the arcanists scrambled to mobilize arcane golems from other regions to fill in this breach, the ten-meter-tall war golem suddenly creaked. A series of explosions rang out within its body as countlessponents started to fall away.


    It stumbled forward with its massive body and finally copsed face-first to the ground.


    When its heavy body fell, it even managed to crush the ground beneath it, which had been strengthened and enhanced with several hundred arcane techniques.


    With the fall of this war golem, a path to the inner circle had been opened on the battlefield, which measured several kilometers in length. Countless mutated beasts stepped across its remains and sprinted through the path of mes as they charged unstoppably towards the inner circle.


    The defensive line had been breached!

 Chapter 1113 - Festering Battlefield

    Chapter 1113 Festering Battlefield


    The defensive line had been breached!


    It wasn¡¯t just a gap in the defensive line for the floating city, but a total loss of control over the battlefield.


    Today¡¯s battle wasn¡¯t a siege in the typical sense, but a ughter party with the total annihtion of all living enemies as the ultimate goal.


    The mutated beasts that were in a rush to make it past the defensive line were like a pack of hungry wolves. They had no time or effort to waste fighting with shepherd hounds. They would swarm forward the moment they found the hole in the sheep¡¯s pen. They were eager to unleash their savagery and cruelty on the trembling sheep.


    Who were the sheep, you ask?


    Naturally, they were the arcane apprentices in the inner circle who were plenty in number yetcked the power required to defend themselves!


    The mutated beasts that had prated the defensive line still had to make it past the arcane towers.


    If they were slightly more rational creatures, they would slowly take down these arcane towers scattered along their path to reduce their casualties. However, these mutated beasts clearly could not be judged by ordinary reason.


    They had no thoughts of conquering the city or nting their g on enemy ground. The only thoughts that filled their minds were bloody ughter and delicious souls. The mutated beasts swarmed mindlessly, leaving behind a narrow path of blood and flesh between the arcane towers that stretched all the way towards the inner circle of the floating city.


    Once they were in the inner circle, the creatures no longer had any thoughts of fighting against the cold and lifeless towers. Instead, they charged into the arcane facilities, using their terrifying numbers and formidable strength to furiously ughter the low-grade arcanists and apprentices, to harvest their lives and souls.


    Greem and the two others had no interest in helping Illhoof fight any longer. They followed the tide of monsters into the inner circle and started to gather loot freely.


    No one would group up at this moment. It would only shorten the amount of time they had to scour for resources and knowledge.


    Thus, the three adepts naturally went their own ways!


    Greem reverted from his me giant form and became human once more. He turned himself invisible with his golden fire and leisurely followed a pack of mutated beasts as they advanced towards the inner circle.


    He saw several arcane facilities of unique design along the way and sensed a significant number of arcanists in these buildings. However, Greem simply ignored these buildings as if they didn¡¯t exist. He was moving straight towards the massive pce in the inner circle of the floating city.


    Since Greem was already here in the arcanists¡¯ world, it would be a waste to all the times he had risked his life if he didn¡¯t gather as much knowledge and resources as he could. Where was it most likely for the most advanced arcane knowledge to be stored in the floating city?


    Obviously, it was the arcane pce that was the very heart of the city!


    With the invisibility provided by thew fire, Greem managed to break through the tight perimeter of arcane towers. He passed by several buildings that resembledboratories and libraries. He even had the time to stop at certain points to watch as groups of arcanistsmanded armies of arcane golems to hurry towards the frontline.


    These arcane golems were all very new.


    Greem even saw signs of rushed production on these golems.


    It was apparent that the floating city¡¯s defenses had been squeezed to a limit of sorts. It was undoubtedly running beyond capacity. That was good news for Greem.


    This overload of the floating city¡¯s defenses did not appear to be a facade, so it was unlikely he would run into any lethal traps set out by the enemy in the battles toe.


    That was also the only concern he truly had!


    ............


    The buildings were being razed, one after another.


    The skies were filled with strange creatures with ck feather wings and the heads of alligators.


    They screeched as they wove between the colorful energy beams fired by the arcane towers.


    When they saw an arcanist or an apprentice, they screeched and dove down to grab them into the air. The creatures would then fight amongst themselves and tear the enemy to ribbons of flesh while they were alive before devouring all of it.


    Meanwhile, all sorts of mutated beasts were roaming the streets. A massive horde of monster could be found outside every single building. They broke into the premises after shredding the arcane guards to pieces. Shortly after, heartrending screams of terrors would emanate from within.


    However, these screams often ended swiftly and were reced by a horrifying crunching sound.


    Greem casually walked through these scenes of murder and massacre.


    He could clearly see spots of translucent blue light float into the sky from all over the city. These ghostly blue lights circled in the air and slowly drifted towards Illhoof¡¯s position.


    Greem didn¡¯t know what means Illhoof had used to do so, but he had somehow managed to intercept these souls in their path back to the river of souls. However, Greem had a vague idea. It most certainly had something to do with the power of the principles. Greem could not imagine any spell or magic otherwise that would have such ability, enough to disrupt the functioning of a ne¡¯sws over an entire region.


    ording to their agreement, the harvested life energy and souls belonged to Illhoof. As such, Greem only observed in silence. He did not try to intercept any of the arcanist souls.


    Adept Holly and Cherisha had already scattered!


    Those who weren¡¯t busy hunting for resources and treasure now were fools.


    They might have formed a party, but no one was willing to follow behind another person and take their leftovers, especially in the treasure-filled floating city. As such, Greem was not surprised by their disappearance.


    However, Greem knew very well that their actions were not wise.


    After all, at this moment, there was still a Fifth Ring Great Arcanist remaining in the floating city. What Greem was truly fearful of wasn¡¯t the Great Arcanist known as Fre. No, he was afraid of another terrifying enemy¨C the minor Scourge Lord, Illhoof!


    Their positions had changed drastically after helping each other break into the floating city.


    Illhoof¡¯s talk of uniting their powers against the Fifth Ring Great Arcanist could be true or false.


    Perhaps in his eyes, the scattered Fourth Grade adepts were easier preypared to a Fifth Ring Great Arcanist!


    Greem maintained his invisibility after splitting up with Adept Holly and Cherisha. He roamed the battlefield but did not collect any resources or treasures. His goal was to conceal his position from Illhoof to prevent him from having any ideas.


    At a crossroads leading to the arcane pce.


    Three Fourth Ring arcanists stood here in a triangle formation, surrounded by a circle of unusual arcane golems. They were defending this spot. Several hundred mutated beasts viciously charged at them, wave after wave.


    The thick piles of corpses that had gathered around them were more than enough proof of the intensity of the fight.


    The three arcanists were gathered around a spell pool that measured ten meters wide. The walls of the pool were made of white granite, and pure arcane energy rested within it. Various strange patterns and arcane runes were drawn on the walls of the spell pool. These runes resonated with the arcane energy within the pool every so often, causing it to shine with blinding radiance.


    One had to admit that the spell pools were one of the greatest inventions of the Arcane Empire!


    These spell pools might look inconspicuous, but they were the most importantponent of the floating cities¡¯ security.


    When the tens of thousands of arcanists and apprentices in the city had free time, they woulde here to the spell pool to meditate and store arcane spell models that they had formed with their Spirit in the pool. This way, they could draw on the arcane models they had stored in the spell pools through the arcane web at any time.


    Moreover, they could also make an overdraft of arcane spell models to an extent based on their authority!


    That meant any arcanist that stepped onto the battlefield while remaining connected to the arcane web could unleash high-grade spells at minimal Spirit cost. Moreover, these spells were instantly cast.


    The three arcanists with their backs turned to the spell pool were able to unleash a barrage of fast and terrifying high-grade spells with a single wave of their staffs. It was this bottomless supply of high-grade arcane magic that allowed the arcane golems to fend off the hundreds of mutated beasts despite their inferior numbers.


    However, when the fighting was at its most intense and ferocious, the floating city trembled lightly. The arcane barriers on all the essential arcane towers and facilities flickered slightly and mysteriously vanished.


    A loud cracking sound could be heard as a long crack also appeared on the spell pool that the three Fourth Ring arcanist had been defending. A torrent of arcane energy spewed forth from the break, creating a beautiful, magical rainbow above the pool.


    They weren¡¯t the only ce where an incident had urred. Every single arcane tower and spell pool throughout the city had malfunctioned at the same instant.


    This terrifying sight instantly caused the Fourth Ring arcanists¡¯ expressions to change. One of them even cried out in surprise.


    ¡°Dammit! Something must have happened to the energy core!¡±


    The energy core was the heart of the floating city. Should anything ever happen to it, the arcane energy supply throughout the floating city would be cut off.


    A small incident would result in the current situation, where all the arcane facilities powered down due to theck of energy. With a severe event, the floating city would lose its ability to fly. It would crash to the ground, just like the other floating cities that had fallen.


    Consequently, the arcanists couldn¡¯t help but start panicking when they sensed the arcane barriers vanish.


    How were they supposed to fight against this endless horde of enemies without arcane barriers, spell pools, and magic pools?


    While they were stunned by what had happened, several violent earth spikes emerged from below, striking at them with the force of a storm.

 Chapter 1114 - The Arcanists Weakness

    Chapter 1114 The Arcanists¡¯ Weakness


    A wide stretch of earth spikes rose from the ground, quickly covering the entire area where the three Fourth Ring arcanists stood.


    The long, tragic scream of an arcanist could be heard within all the dust and smoke.


    When it all settled, only two arcanists remained untouched around the ravaged spell pool. A thick earth spike had pierced through the body of the other arcanist, leaving him hanging limply in the air.


    The radiance of arcane shields shimmered around the two other adepts. Their shields had just withstood a tremendous beating from the ferocious attack from earlier and were, consequently, dimmer. It almost felt like they were on the verge of breaking.


    The Fourth Ring arcanist hanging on the earth spike did not have a very trained and refined body. His Physique was speechlessly low. That was why he was already on the brink of death before hispanions could save him.


    It was the consequence of arcanists focusing too much on the umtion of arcane knowledge while ignoring their Physique.


    If it were adepts in their ce, they would never be so easily killed by Illhoof, even if they were only Third Grade.


    The earth nearby shimmered, and Illhoof emerged from the ground as if it was water. Large patches of scorch marks could be seen on his dark scales, seemingly as if he had just walked out of a terrifying energy explosion.


    The two remaining adepts immediately understood what had happened when they saw Illhoof¡¯s condition and the manner in which he appeared.


    ¡°You...you destroyed the underground energy core.¡±


    They yelled furiously and waved the arcane staffs in their hands before pointing them at Illhoof.


    Strangely enough, nothing happened apart from a coincidental breeze of cold air.


    No energy beams, no energy bolts, nor even a trace of arcane energy appeared.


    The faces of the two Fourth Ring arcanists soured again. It was then that they remembered that the explosion of the energy core had also caused the spell pool to be defunct.


    The arcanists had been far too used to relying on arcane facilities in battle over the thousands of years.


    If they ran out of arcane energy, they could draw from the energy pool. If they ran out of spells, they could draw from the spell pool.


    It didn¡¯t matter who the enemy was. As long as the arcanists still had functioning arcane facilities supporting them from behind, they would be able to torture the enemy to death with an endless barrage of spells.


    However, now that their spell pools and energy pools had been destroyed, these arcanists were at a loss!


    While the two arcanists hesitated, Illhoof¡¯s figure flickered and appeared beside one of them.


    Dirt-yellow mist ate through the arcane shield, and a Petrification Beam hit the arcanist. Illhoof then quickly backed off, dodging the arcanist¡¯s desperate torrent of arcane spells.


    The arcanist was still roaring in anger, waving his staff and trying to chase after Illhoof.


    Unfortunately, as the powers of petrification spread through his body, he was paralyzed and turned into a human statue in less than three seconds.


    That was also the consequence of the arcanist¡¯s frail Physique.


    If he had slightly higher Physique and slightly higher magic resistance, he could have dyed the petrification power and bought some time for him to escape and save himself.


    But now......


    Thest remaining Fourth Ring arcanist had lost his confidence against such a stealthy Scourge Lord. If the energy core were untouched, he would be supported by an endless amount of arcane energy and spells, as well as a powerful personal barrier. He would not be afraid of facing off against an enemy of the same grade.


    Unfortunately, there was no if in this world.


    After losing the external support of the arcane facilities, the arcanist¡¯sck ofbat techniques, Physique, andbat will were all exposed, one by one.


    The vicious Illhoof tore the body of the arcanist off the earth spike and started tearing into the flesh, bite by bite. He then pulled out a ghostly blue soul from within the corpse with a strong sniff and inhaled it as if it were a drug. He let out an unusual sigh of satisfaction.


    Those who died at Illhoof¡¯s hands would not just be his food. Even their souls would not find resting peace.


    At the sight of this, the will of the final arcanist quickly copsed.


    He took out a bunch of strange arcane tools and threw them towards Illhoof. It was then that he started to chant the words for his teleportation spell with a shaky, crying voice.


    Without the support of the spell pool, all of the instant cast spells once avable to him were no longer usable. He had to rely on his own power to cast spells now. A portal that would have taken him a wave of his hand to open now took him seven entire seconds to finishing conjuring.


    However, Illhoof already thought of the arcanist as a sumptuous meal on his te. He would never let the arcanist escape like this.


    He stood up tall, and his hideous mouthpieces began to vibrate rapidly in the direction of the portal. A strange spatial rippling spread out the portal, and the ck, mirror-like opening started shaking uncontrobly.


    The arcanist was shocked and hastily invested even more of his Spirit into the portal. He barely managed to stop it from being dispelled.


    Meanwhile, all sorts of things were springing up from the pile of arcane tools he had thrown at Illhoof. Ornate silver statues that could transform into arcane golems, arcane scrolls that unleashed their power in a sh of silver light, strange fruits that quickly turned into mental shockwaves......


    Either way, this pile of assorted arcane tools sessfully dyed Illhoof for three seconds. The arcanist himself was fortunate enough to escape and return to an arcane tower elsewhere.


    Illhoof felt much more invigorated after killing two Fourth Ring arcanists and devouring their flesh and souls. He even recovered slightly from the intense energy shock he had suffered earlier.


    Thus, under his orders, a vast horde of mutated beasts charged past the tattered spell pool and lunged at the arcane pce beyond it.


    He could sense the aura of the Fifth Ring Great Arcanist there!


    ............


    After secretly watching Illhoof¡¯s battle with the arcanists from aside, Greem was disturbed and concerned.


    When it came to Physique andbat ability alone, Illhoof was far superior to him.


    Defeating an opponent like this was nearly impossible, even if he were to use all of his abilities. On the contrary, he risked a 39% chance of dying in battle.


    However, if Greem were intent on escaping, Illhoof would have difficulty stopping him.


    The information that the Chip had collected from the aftershocks of the battle appeared to be so concerningly high.


    [Illhoof. Minor Scourge Lord.


    Advanced Fourth Grade. Earth attribute affinity.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 31 | Physique 46 | Agility 36 | Spirit 42.


    Skills: All intermediate and advanced earth spells. Earth Mist Corrosion (Fourth Grade), Petrification Beam (Fourth Grade), Halo of Gravity (Fourth Grade).


    [Arcanist.


    Fourth Ring. Affinity unknown.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 8 | Physique 14 | Agility 6 | Spirit 42.


    Basic Abilities: Arcane Mastery, Golem Creation, Arcane Affinity.]


    The difference in fundamental attributes was like heaven and earth.


    With such a difference in attributes, it was not a surprise that the arcanists were as frail as paper in front of Illhoof, having lost the support of their arcane facilities.


    Greem disapproved of alternative spellcasters who relied excessively on the use of external items, like the arcanists.


    As spellcasters, magic research and experimentation were necessary. However, one could not give up the refinement of the physical body and the training of battle consciousness solely for the sake of research.


    All adepts in the World of Adepts had to ce the improvement of theirbat power as their first and highest priority. It was only when they were powerful enough to guarantee their safety that they would divert some of their attention and resources to research that interested them. After all, what was the point of researching if you were dead?


    That was why it was often said that these arcanists of Morrian ne were far more thorough in their belief of pursuing the ultimate truth whenpared to the adepts. Sadly, while they were exceptional at research, they were terrible at protecting themselves. That was why not a single champion powerful enough to save the Arcane Empire could be found in such a moment of crisis.


    Greem could only express his deepest sympathy for their fate.


    After all, the multiverse was a violent world of conflicts. Trying to crush the enemy by steadily scaling the technological tree and obtaining overwhelming technical prowess might be a good idea, but it was not viable or practical in the least!


    They were unlike the adepts, who held practicality above idealism, and individual might above collective good. The adepts had concentrated the vast majority of resources in the hands of very few adepts. In doing so, they had managed to create several extremely powerful entities that terrified their enemies. It was the only way to keep their enemies¡¯ thoughts of invasion in check, providing their own faction and sessors with the opportunity to grow and develop.


    The reason the World of Adepts could remain standing in this universe filled with powerful races had everything to do with their three Ninth Grade Great Adepts!


    Sadly, the Arcane Empire¡¯s Arcane Emperors had only reached Eighth Grade.


    It was not enough power to scare away their cruel and greedy enemies!


    Greem slowly stepped forward. He jumped into the ruined spell pool and had the Chip scan all of the strange runes carved on the walls. After confirming that he had not left anything behind, he emerged from the pool. He took a look at the arcane pce in the distance before turning and walking in a different direction.


    There were far too many ces worth visiting in the floating city. There was no need for him to go to the same site as Illhoof. If he wasn¡¯t wrong, Illhoof was heading for the Fifth Ring Great Arcanist.


    Even though they had agreed on the distribution of spoils after killing the Fifth Ring arcanist, such an agreement was ridiculous to begin with.


    If the three adepts really helped Illhoof defeat the Fifth Ring Great Arcanist, what came next would not be the splitting of spoils, but the start of a new battle.


    After all, no one liked to spit out meat they had already put in their mouth!

 Chapter 1115 - A New Enemy

    Chapter 1115 A New Enemy


    Floating City Reisin Garden.


    The fires of war had already spread to every corner of the city.


    However, while the mutated beasts were tied up with the arcanists, two unusual figures slowly appeared in the sky.


    One was a tall and muscr man with a wolf¡¯s head who had short, bristly hair all over his body. The other was a fox girl with a petite and pretty figure. She had a red, bushy tail behind her back, making for an eye-catching sight.


    ¡°Hehehe. Who would¡¯ve thought this ce would have been invaded by the mutated beasts already? We were only slightlyte to the party. What now, Rose? Where do we go first?¡± The werewolf was the one who spoke first.


    He looked around the loud battlefield with fierce red eyes as he spoke. His vicious and barbaric manner of being was clear for all to see.


    ¡°What is it? Are you afraid? Didn¡¯t we already hear about it before we came here? The invader is that bastard Illhoof. Given the way he always does things, he¡¯s most certainly doing this alone. All we have to do is track him down and wait until the most intense moment in his battle with the Great Arcanist to......¡± The fox girl had a fox¡¯s head and a sharp tongue. Yet, despite how vicious her words seemed to be, there was an indescribable seductiveness and softness to her big, lively eyes.


    A jasper in the shape of a crescent moony on her head, glowing with an unusual light.


    ¡°Me? Afraid of Illhoof? Hmph! If that bastard weren¡¯t so good at running away, I would have snapped his neck in half thest time. Just wait and see! Watch how I wipe the floor with that bastard that loves tunneling underground.¡± The werewolf lifted his snout and took a big sniff of the air. An odd expression appeared on his hairy face. ¡°No, something¡¯s wrong. Why do I also smell the stench of those evil adepts here?! Dammit! Could Illhoof have joined hands with the adepts?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe. Illhoof would never sincerely work together with anyone. In my opinion, he probably tricked a few adepts into helping him somehow. He¡¯s probably waiting for the invasion to conclude before devouring all those adepts. Typical of him!¡± The fox girl pouted in disdain.


    ¡°Then who do we kill first? Illhoof, or the adepts?¡± The muscles on the werewolf¡¯s body seemed to swell at the mention of murder. Even the size of his body seemed slightlyrger than before.


    ¡°Kill the adepts first to prevent them from stirring any trouble when we fight with Illhoof!¡± The fox girl was clearly not a kind person. She came to a decision almost immediately.


    ¡°Follow me. I have already locked on to the smell of one of the adepts!¡± The werewolf bared his sharp teeth and licked his lips before charging down towards the city.


    Meanwhile, the fox girl waved her tail, and her entire body mysteriously turned translucent. She followed after herpanion as an odd shadow while they rushed towards a certain building in the floating city.


    Their target was Adept Holly.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Ever since they entered the inner circle of the floating city, both Greem and Cherisha had remained invisible. They had also concealed their auras entirely. It was no wonder that the two powerful beastmen had found Holly almost immediately.


    Holly was currently attacking a golem factory. It seemed to be technologically advanced. Over a hundred half-finished arcane golemsy on top of dozens of rows of crystal tforms. Each crystal tform was a small control tform of its own. It allowed for up to three arcane apprentices to work on a golem at any one time.


    The apprentices¡¯ mission was to etch the necessary arcane runes onto the metalponents of the arcane golems.


    Depending on the arcane apprentices¡¯ proficiency, the golem factory could produce ten to fifteen standard Moya-Ibat golems, or twenty to twenty-five Sofia-III general-use golems. These golems were all considered the public property of the floating city¡¯s Arcanist Association.


    Unfortunately, due to the malfunctioning of the energy core, this golem factory had lost all arcane energy supply and could not continue operating.


    When Adept Holly found this ce and tried to break in, he was stopped by the arcane guards here. Although there were also five arcanists and over seventy arcane apprentices in the factory, they were no threat to the three-meter-tall astral construct. They attacked with all their strength, but the arcanists could not inflict any damage at all.


    Just as Adept Holly took down the few high-grade golems at the factory¡¯s entrance and prepared to enter, he stopped and turned back to see who wasing.


    A vicious wolf¡¯s head was quickly growing in his vision, apanied by ten terrifying ws glowing with a cold and dangerous light.


    ¡°An enemy.¡±


    Before Adept Holly could finish the thought, his armor started creaking from the grip of the ten ws. Meanwhile, the werewolf¡¯srge mouth opened wide and bit at Adept Holly¡¯s slender neck.


    Saliva dripped from the werewolf¡¯s fanged mouth. It was a pungent, sour smell.


    The sudden attack caught Holly by surprise.


    He was a golem master with golem creation as his professional skill, after all. Even though he also possessed powerful melee fighting skills and ranged attacks, he was still inferior to someone with an actual fighting profession.


    Moreover, this werewolf was a little too ferocious!


    It had only been a mere three seconds from when Adept Holly¡¯s security array was triggered to when he turned around, but the werewolf had already crossed five hundred meters of distance and appeared in front of him.


    Moreover, he showed no signs of negotiating at all. He was going straight for the kill.


    Therge amounts of astral substance that formed Holly¡¯s astral armor did not excel at physical defense. Instead, it was best at magic defense and disruption. The thick metal armor quickly started to contort under the ferocious bite of the werewolf. It almost seemed like he would be able to prate with a single bite.


    His ten ws had also dug deep into the armor. As the ws tore into the metal, ten terrifying scratch marks were left on its surface.


    The panic and terror in Holly¡¯s heart reached a peak as he felt the intense pain from his body and the absolute strength of the opponent.


    As he let out an ear-piercing scream, an overwhelming beam of starlight fell from the sky, enveloping both him and the werewolf.


    The murderous starlight surrounded the werewolf¡¯s lithe and muscr body. It ignored the werewolf¡¯s hair and violent strength, prating straight into his body.


    As the starlight continued to surge into his body, the werewolf couldn¡¯t help but let out a grunt. Silver starlight flickered between his ck hairs as the strength of his attack faltered.


    ¡°Die!¡±


    The terrified Adept Holly punched forward with both hands, but the werewolf dodged both of his attacks. The werewolf kicked the astral armor with his thick legs, knocking Holly away from him.


    Adept Holly crashed into a stone wall and left a deep crater. He fell to the ground and rolled several times beforeing to a stop. The hole in the wall was deep, and all the stone at the site of impact had turned to dust. Cracks ran along the entire length of the wall.


    Adept Holly struggled to get up from the ground, breathing heavily as he did so. Blood flowed out from the bite wound and deep w marks. However, the astral armor¡¯s damage was also quickly healing as starlight shone upon him.


    After a quick chant, Adept Holly began to gather a cluster of white starlight between his palms. Moreover, as the amount of starlight increased, the energy aura started to intensify as well. Adept Holly ignored everything else and kept his eyes fixed on that fearsome werewolf.


    The werewolf had backed away with an elegant leap,nding a hundred meters away from Holly. He was crouching on the ground, the front of his body bowed low and the back of his body arched high, his two hind legs prepared to jump at any time. Judging from his stance, he could lunge at Adept Holly at any time.


    However, when the werewolf¡¯s fierce gazended on the starlight between Adept Holly¡¯s hands, his red eyes couldn¡¯t help but shrink. There was a trace of frustration and fear in his eyes.


    The starlight in his opponent¡¯s hands was far too strange. It had the scary ability to ignore all physical and magical defenses. Adept Holly appeared to be the one who had lost the exchange from earlier. After all, Holly had suffered tremendous damage, even while hidden in the astral armor, while the werewolf was untouched.


    However, the werewolf was the only one that knew the truth.


    It had only been three seconds, but that sinister and terrifying starlight had inflicted fairly terrible injuries to his internal organs. He had backed off, seemingly to adjust his stance, but he was also buying time for his body to heal.


    After all, the physical regeneration abilities of werewolves were exceedingly fearsome as well!


    ¡°A werewolf? A believer of the Beast God.¡± Adept Holly quickly identified the opponent at a single nce. He took a step back at the same time as he recognized the enemy. The starlight in his hands turned into a beautiful halo and spread outwards.


    Just as expected, a petite figure suddenly appeared twenty meters to the right behind him, where the starlight had spread.


    ¡°Dammit! The enemy did have apanion!¡± Adept Holly cursed with his bloodied mouth and waved with his hand. A cluster of brilliant starlight crashed from the sky at the new enemy.


    ¡°Hehehe, you adepts sure have a lot of tricks!¡± Naturally, the fox girl was frustrated, having failed at her ambush. She revealed her pretty figure and threw Adept Holly a sultry nce. She lifted her slender hand and erected a crimson barrier that shielded her from the starlight.


    Her tail moved slightly. It looked seductive, but in truth, she had secretly fired a dozen inconspicuous, fine hairs from her tail.


    If Holly was seduced by her appearance and let down his guard, he might just be badly injured by the foxtail needles.

 Chapter 1116 - A New Battle

    <strong>Chapter 1116 A New Battle</strong>


    If it were anyone else, they might have fallen prey to the fox girl¡¯s Natural Charm.


    However, since Adept Holly had the courage to participate in this mission, he naturally had the skills to back it up as well.


    Moreover, defending one¡¯s mental consciousness was a priority for all adepts!


    Adept Holly let out a grunt and endured the fox girl¡¯s Natural Charm with the aid of his Soul Brooch. His mental consciousness swept around him as he picked up the opponent¡¯s subtle movement.


    Adept Holly raised his arm and covered his face.


    Pupupu!


    A series of strange sounds rang out. The dozen seemingly soft and weightless fox hairs had pierced straight into the astral armor, embedding themselves deep inside.


    Adept Holly was horrified.


    It was important to note that his astral armor wasposed of concentrated, solidified astral substance, gathered by his will. Astral substance excelled at magic disruption, to begin with. It was not exceptional when it came to physical defense. However, as a substance from space, the structural toughness of the material was still far superior to that of most metals that could be found in the material nes.


    The fact that the opponent¡¯s fox hairs could prate the exceedingly hard astral armor was more than enough proof that the hairs were incredibly powerful. Their prative effect was equal to high-grade enchanted weapons.


    Adept Holly slowly shifted positions, even as he kept his guard up. He was trying to avoid being caught in a pincer attack between the two beastmen. He raised his right arm and waved it over his left arm that had been hit by the fox hairs.


    The fox hairs instantly turned to dust under the corrosion of silver starlight, falling to the ground and drifting to the wind.


    At the same moment, the werewolf elerated his regeneration and was eager to fight again.


    ¡°Please...the two of you, slow down.¡± Adept Holly hurriedly gathered starlight to protect himself when he saw his opponents¡¯ movements. He shouted loudly, ¡°There¡¯s no resentment between us, is there? There¡¯s no need to fight with our lives on the line!¡±


    ¡°Kehkehkeh. There are two of us and one of you. We are all Fourth Grade. You sure you can escape from us?¡± The werewolf cackled coldly. Judging from his tone, not only was he not ashamed that they were relying on numbers, he was, in fact, proud of it.


    ¡°Hmph! Don¡¯t get too arrogant. I did note here alone, either. I havepanions here, as well. Once I call mypanions over, the battle will only grow in scale and proportion, to absolutely no one¡¯s benefit!¡± Adept Holly continued speaking, still cautious of his two opponents, ¡°We are all here to loot resources and treasures. There¡¯s no need to engage in a deathmatch while there¡¯s still so much lying around for us to pick up.¡±


    ¡°There is some truth to what you said.¡± The foxgirl lifted her head, seemingly moved by the suggestion.


    ¡°Indeed, indeed. This is the biggest golem factory on the floating city. I have already dealt with the arcane guards inside, and I can offer it to you two. That should be enough, isn¡¯t it?!¡± Upon seeing the werewolf continue approaching as viciously as before, Adept Holly gritted his teeth and threatened, ¡°Don¡¯t you forget, I am still a Fourth Grade adept. Force me into a corner, and I will still have the ability to drag one of you along with me. Neither of you would want that, will you?¡±


    ¡°True, true. What you say is very true, indeed. You may leave now!¡± The foxgirl continued nodding with a smile on her face, but her eyes were filled with disdain and mockery.


    ¡°What do you mean? Don¡¯t you force me.¡± Adept Holly became even more vignt when he saw the hostility in the foxgirl¡¯s eyes. Endless starlight surged around his armor, causing it to be even thicker than before.


    However, while he was controlling the starlight, unexpected dizziness overtook him. His vision faded to ck for a moment, and he almost fell to the ground.


    ¡°I¡¯m hit? When did they get me? Right, the wolf¡¯s ws from earlier.¡± Adept Holly instantly understood everything. He looked up at the werewolf¡¯s ws and fangs.


    As expected, traces of ck mist coiled around his ws and fangs. It was obvious that they were poisoned.


    ¡°Hehe. Now you know why we were willing to talk with you all this while! We were waiting for the poison to take effect! Now, copse.¡±


    As the foxgirl gave the signal, the werewolf lunged ferociously. He turned into a sh of ck lightning and instantly appeared beside Adept Holly.


    He had learned his lesson this time. He did not try to sh with Adept Holly directly and instead started running circles around him. He avoided the starlight fired from Holly¡¯s palm and those crashing from above, all while leaving deep w marks on Holly¡¯s armor with his sharp ws.


    Meanwhile, the foxgirl flickered in and out of the battlefield around them.


    Every time she appeared, she would seductively throw a kiss or a wink at Adept Holly. Then, she would giggle and disappear before Holly could retaliate.


    It wasn¡¯t her being flirtatious on the battlefield. Rather, it was merely the innate ability of a foxgirl.


    The constant use of Charm Human and her own Natural Charm put Adept Holly at a decent risk of being charmed, even with his Soul Brooch. With Adept Holly¡¯s mental resilience, the foxgirl could only charm him for two to three seconds at any time, even with all her power.


    Two to three seconds might seem insignificant, but they could also be lethal to him.


    After all, he was fighting against a werewolf right now. Every time he was charmed, the starlight he had gathered would disperse, and the thickness of his astral armor would be affected. It naturally affected his performance in battle.


    Disrupted by the foxgirl, Adept Holly¡¯s few attempts at a ferocious retaliation were all interrupted before he couldmit to them!


    Seeing as death and defeat were right in front of him, Adept Holly did not dare to hang in any longer. He turned and tried to flee.


    Unfortunately, before he could even take two steps, the werewolf appeared in front of him in a sh, firmly cutting off his path of escape. Meanwhile, the foxgirl showed up behind him, still giggling to herself. A scarlet mist appeared with a wave of her tail and sealed off that path as well.


    ¡°Screw you then!¡±


    Adept Holly did not hesitate now that death was staring him in the face. He roared, raised his arms, and lunged at the werewolf.


    Boom!


    There was a loud explosion. The astral armor, which contained such intense starlight, shot out in every direction, causing a mushroom cloud to appear.


    The violent force of the explosion left a bottomless, hundred-meter-wide pit in the stone ground of the floating city. The endless starlight instantly filled the air, destroying all the dirt, stone, grass, and metal pieces in the surrounding area.


    The golem factory, which was closest to the explosion, had almost entirely copsed. The arcanists and arcane apprentices hiding within were also killed instantly by the falling starlight.


    A short momentter, when the starlight¡¯s power had weakened, the werewolf and the foxgirl appeared at the edge of the pit. They started whispering to each other.


    ¡°Is he dead?¡±


    ¡°No!¡±


    ¡°Dammit! I knew he wouldn¡¯t be so valiant as to sacrifice himself. Where did he run off to?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry; my wolf poison is still circting in his body. I know exactly where he is. Come. Follow me!¡±


    The two figures quickly vanished from the spot.


    ............


    Adept Holly burst out of thin air at the back of a building a kilometer away, covered in blood.


    He rolled across the ground when he appeared, desperately taking out all sorts of potions from his pouch and drinking them as he did so.


    He coughed violently as he drank them.


    Purple pieces of flesh and broken organs flew out as he coughed.


    Two clear ck bite marks could be seen on his neck.


    The flesh around the wounds had festered and swollen.


    If it weren¡¯t for his silver adept¡¯s robe, it would have been easy to mistake him for the two-headed adept.


    ¡°Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! Those two bastards! They could¡¯ve gone after anyone! Why me? Cough! Cough! Cough! Greem, Cherisha, you all deserve to die! Not a single one of you showed yourself even after I sent out a help signal. Dammit! With even just one of you arriving, those two bastards wouldn¡¯t so arrogantly encircle me. Bastards, you all deserve to die.¡±


    The werewolf¡¯s poison was unusual. Ordinary antidotes were ineffective against it.


    If this was a safe ce, Adept Holly could set down aboratory, and he just might be able to concoct a potion that could temporarily neutralize the poison. Unfortunately, this was an otherworldly battlefield where the killing did not stop. There was not a single quiet ce around him, no matter how he looked.


    Taking his time to analyze the wolf poison in such an environment and finding a way to neutralize it was impossible!


    Moreover, two familiar energy auras were quickly approaching him in his faint spiritual senses. They would catch up in another seven or eight seconds.


    Just as Adept Holly¡¯s heart turned cold, and despair overtook his mind, arge shadow engulfed him.


    By the time the foxgirl and the werewolf arrived, they saw no signs of the human adept except for all the blood on the ground.


    ¡°Dammit! Where¡¯s the adept?¡± The foxgirl¡¯s eyes were slightly red. She looked around with careful and vicious eyes.


    ¡°He was still here earlier. I do not sense the aura of spatial teleportation!¡± The werewolfnded on the ground and lifted his snout to sniff, ¡°Hang on. I smell the strange stench of shadow power. The adept was taken away by a shadow creature!¡±


    ¡°Dammit! Which bastard dares to snatch the prey from our jaws? Chase them. We will catch them at all costs!¡±


    The next second, the two beastmen vanished from the spot.

 Chapter 1117 - The Chaotic Battlefield

    Chapter 1117 The Chaotic Battlefield


    By the time peace returned to the ce, some mysterious footsteps rang out.


    Though there was no man or shadow to be seen, a clear set of footprints appeared in the bloodstains on the floor.


    The footsteps continued to appear, only stopping in front of the ce where Adept Holly had disappeared.


    A short momentter, the golden mes that shrouded his body dispersed, and Greem¡¯s youthful body appeared.


    He was wearing a red adept¡¯s robe with a dark ck cloak draped over it. The hood was drawn over his head to obscure his face, and only a few stray strands of his ck hair were showing.


    Greem examined the ce with his zing eyes and quickly confirmed the energy auras of everyone involved here.


    Holly, a werewolf, a foxgirl, and...Dark Witch Shani!


    Just as expected, Shani had not died. Instead, she had chosen to revive in this foreign ne. As an intermediate Fourth Grade Dark Witch, her appearance undoubtedly put Greem on alert.


    It seemed like this trip to the floating city wouldn¡¯t go as smoothly as he expected!


    His old enemy had appeared once more, along with two unknown believers of the Beast God. Add to the equation the minor Scourge Lord Illhoof, and over five otherworldly powerhouses were roaming this floating city at the moment, all searching for their own prey and their own hunting grounds.


    Adept Holly might be powerful, but he had obviously been blinded by greed.


    In such a situation, putting in the work to search for resources was far less profitable than robbing prey who already had their hands full of loot!


    It was precisely because he failed to understand this that he had been kicked off the list ofpetitors the moment the fighting started. Judging from the aura at the scene, Adept Holly had probably fallen into Shani¡¯s hands.


    As for Shani¡¯s purpose in doing so? Greem had a decent idea.


    Having been defeated once, Shani had lost all her magical equipment. Her newly created body could not reach the standards of a Fourth Grade in a short period either. It all meant that herbat prowess was drastically reduced.


    Consequently, Shani did not dare confront Greem at the moment.


    If she did run into Greem, it wasn¡¯t a matter of her chasing after Greem, but whether Greem would be willing to let her go.


    For the sake of killing Greem andpleting her mission, Shani had to take some risks to recruit people to her side.


    Cherisha was too useless. Recruiting her would bring no benefit to Shani at all. That was why Shani had her sights set on the poor Adept Holly instead.


    Though there was an Oath Contract between Greem and Holly, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what choice Holly would make when his life was in the hands of another person.


    It seemed like Shani and Holly would be his enemies the next time they met!


    Greem lowered his head and thought in silence. All of a sudden, he lifted his head and looked into the distance. A cluster of golden mes quickly spread across his entire body, causing him to vanish into thin air once more.


    A strange, fiery explosion sounded out.


    Arge and muscr figure abruptly appeared in the sky. He looked down at the burning fires all across the floating city and let out some deafeningughter.


    It was a fearsome abyssal demon.


    He wore thick, spiked copper armor on his body. The armor itself was covered all over in massive sh marks that ruined the patterns on the armor itself. The scores on it were of varying depth and from different times. Some appeared recent, while others could have been left on the armor hundreds of years ago.


    While the demonughed brazenly in the sky, his muscles started to swell and grow in size, filling the ancient copper armor and causing it to appearedrger than it should be. His violet skin was covered in all sorts of twisted magical runes, and his muscles were so firm they seemed almost like refined ingots of iron.


    The demon¡¯s appearance was savage and terrifying. His mouth jutted forward, resembling that of an ape or a dragonborn. A pair of tattered, crimson leather wings beat slightly behind his back. These wings were covered in sharp hooks.


    Every time he opened his fanged mouth, a breath of semi-translucent sulfuric mes would burst forth, filling the air with the pungent smell of sulfur.


    A Fourth Grade Great Demon.


    Greem hid in the shadows with the invisibility from his mes and quietly observed this uninvited guest.


    It was apparent that the mutated beasts¡¯ war invasion of the floating city had drawn out all the otherworldly invaders hiding nearby. It caused the battle to be even more unpredictable. It was hard to tell where things were heading with all these variables.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it either!


    While the Abyssal Great Demon beat his tattered demon wings and flew to some battlefield in the distance, a sh of light cut through the sky. Greem¡¯s attention was drawn away once more.


    It was a strange, pale-white fire. Inside the mes was a skeleton formed of jade-white bones.


    An indescribable chill crept up Greem¡¯s heart when he saw those bones that were as white as jade, those magical gemstones that were set in the jaw as teeth, and those unusual mes burning behind those ruby eyes.


    A lich. A Fourth Grade lich!


    A monster like this would be enough to rule over aplete small-sized ne of the undead!


    This lich hid within the chilling death mes as he cut across the sky above Greem¡¯s head. When it passed by, its cold, merciless, and evil soul flux swept past Greem¡¯s hiding spot and stopped for that one fleeting instant.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s soul aura, which was no weaker than his own, the lich chose not to engage in a fight. Instead, he simply cackled coldly and flew away.


    That was the difference between casters and warriors!


    Arrogant beings like demons, disaster creatures, and starbeasts would often charge forth and fight the moment they sensed an enemy¡¯s existence. They knew their power. As for whether they could win? That was a different matter entirely.


    Meanwhile, casters like liches and adepts were more rational and cunning in their approach.


    They would often choose to avoid fighting when they ran into enemies of the same grade. They were more inclined to attack opponents who were slightly weaker than themselves.


    It was only when the enemy betrayed a ring weakness that they would risk their own lives to attack. Moreover, they were a group of people who would escape without any hesitation if they sensed any threat to their lives.


    That was why the lich had behaved in that manner earlier. He had sensed the strange flux of the principle fires around Greem. After some evaluation, he confirmed that he could not defeat Greem quickly. As such, he flew away without any hesitation.


    Through this, Greem could deduce that the lich had also mastered certain principle powers.


    That was why the lich had managed to see through Greem¡¯s invisibility from the principle fires, while the Great Demon, as powerful as he was, had not managed even to detect Greem¡¯s presence.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown when he saw the terrifying beings that were appearing one after another.


    This pond was getting murkier by the minute.


    The number of predators that had joined the fray was only increasing.


    Under such circumstances, the difficulty of obtaining what he wanted had increased exponentially!


    When it was just Illhoof and the three of them, Greem had confidence in holding the advantage above everyone else. He could obtain whatever he wanted. However, given the situation, even getting any sort of loot woulde at a great cost to himself!


    In particr, the Dark Witch was a hidden time bomb.


    If she were insistent on bothering him, it would be near impossible to obtain any decent spoils from the floating city!


    However, after some thought, Greem¡¯s frustration was quickly reced with pride.


    Disaster creatures, Beast God believers, demons, liches. Which one of these was not a powerful individual who had established their reputation within their nes hundreds of years ago? Which of them had not achieved what they had after hundreds upon hundreds of years of cultivation? It had only been two hundred years since his own birth, yet he was not that much weaker than all of them.


    Greem even had plenty of confidence in defeating a few of these opponents.


    It was sufficient proof that Greem¡¯s potential far surpassed any of them!


    Faced with all these terrifyingpetitors, Greem did not need to feel dejected. Instead, he should be proud of his achievements.


    As he silently consoled himself, Greem remained invisible and headed towards the inner circle.


    One had to admit that the floating city was unusuallyrge.


    The arcanists had indeed moved a massive city into the skies.


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by this nearly miraculous feat.


    In all honesty, if Greem had not been born in the World of Adepts back then, but had instead been born in the Arcane Empire, he would probably be a Great Arcanist by now!


    After all, the Arcane Empire¡¯s standard for advancement was each individual¡¯s level of arcane knowledge. It was different from the adept¡¯s Grade system, which set a firm threshold and standard for each grade. Consequently, the arcanists of the Arcane empire very rarely trained their bodies. Even their Spirits were far weaker than adepts of the same grade.


    If these arcanists were separated from their arcane towers and their arcane facilities, they would be as helpless as rabbits in front of the adepts!


    Greem hid his figure and roamed the empty streets.


    Some mutated beasts sprinted past him and smashed through many of the stores along the way. Whenever they found an arcanist defending an arcane facility, they would screech, calling more allies to their location to encircle the arcanist.


    It caused mes to appear all over the floating city, along with the sounds of fighting and the noise of crumbling buildings.


    It was at this moment that Greem finally saw the Great Demon again.


    The Great Demon was currently fighting against two arcane towers.


    He could faintly sense the life auras of two Fourth Ring arcanists in these towers.

 Chapter 1118 - A Terrifying Enemy

    Chapter 1118 A Terrifying Enemy


    The battle was surprisingly savage and exceptionally bloody!


    The Great Demon was like a frenzied boar. He ignored the barrage of arcane attacks from the towers entirely and demolished pce after pce amidst the colorful torrent of magic.


    The arcane apprentices hiding in these buildings scattered in horror while under the effects of the Halo of Fear. One by one, they were cut down by the Great Demon with his massive executioner¡¯s de. At the height of his excitement, the Great Demon picked up arcane apprentices and tossed them into his mouth. His sharp teeth snapped together, and the screaming woulde to a sudden end, reced by the crunching of bones and flesh.


    The eyes of a Fourth Ring arcanist hiding in an arcane tower turned red when he saw this. He drove his arcane tower down from the sky, charging at the Great Demon while drowning him with ferocious torrents of arcane magic. However, before he could finish his attack and return to the skies, the Great Demon appeared behind the tower with a long bang. He swung his massive sword against the arcane barrier of the tower.


    The arcane tower was forcefully struck down from the sky by the immense strength of the demon, trembling as it crashed to the ground.


    The arcane tower did not suffer any damage from the fall; it could still attack as ferociously as before. However, it had lost its original mobility and agility. It could only remain rooted to the ground, barely hanging on with its rippling arcane barrier.


    It caused Greem to frown as he observed everything from the shadows.


    He had been impressed by these arcane towers and envious of the arcanists for possessing such a powerful structure. However, from the looks of it, these arcane towers had their ws and weaknesses.


    Firstly, they were not heavy enough.


    The adepts had their adept towers, and the arcanists had their arcane towers. Compared to the adept towers, the arcane towers could fly and, therefore, freely move. In this aspect, they were far superior to adept towers.


    However, it was for the sake of being able to fly that the arcane towers had their weight significantly reduced during construction.


    Adept towers often used unique magical materials in their construction, ensuring both physical and magical defense. In particr, steelrock, the mostmon material used in adept towers, greatly increased their physical defense. Correspondingly, it made the towers incredibly heavy as well.


    Meanwhile, arcane towers were made almost entirely out of lighter materials. Specifically, it was a collection of special arcane alloys.


    These alloys were sufficiently light while maintaining an eptable level of physical and magical defense.


    It caused arcane towers to be a hundred times lighter than adept towers of the same size.


    It was for this reason that the arcane tower had faltered in a direct sh against a massive behemoth like the Great Demon. It was also why this strange scene of a five-meter tall Great Demon chasing after a hundred-meter tall arcane tower with a sword in hand came to be.


    The Great Demon was not foolish.


    He used the unique Pinpoint Teleportation of all demonic creatures to avoid the ferocious attacks of the arcane towers, appearing unexpectedly beside them instead. He then used his own brutal attacks to beat the towers into submission.


    However, such a method ofbat was only possible for someone as sturdy and resilient as the Great Demon.


    His powerful and distorted forcefield, his unreasonably magic resistant skin, and his exceptional Physique as a demon; if any one of these had been missing, he would already have been blown to pieces by the fierce attacks of the two arcane towers.


    It was his ability to rely on his toughness that let the Great Demon continue fighting as fiercely as before, even when his body was already tattered from all the arcane attacks. Hisbat prowess was not affected by his injuries. On the contrary, he had managed to force both arcane towers to the ground, where they would not be able to return to the skies without the aid of their allies.


    The battle between the demon and the towers had been going on for a long time. Their battlefield spanned several kilometers as the demon chased after the towers.


    All arcane buildings along their way were destroyed, and all intermediate-grade arcanists and arcane apprentices inside these buildings were ughtered. Meanwhile, the Great Demon was injured, but not dead. He was still as lively as ever, wildly fighting against the two arcane towers.


    Greem hid nearby, taking the opportunity to gather necessary information on the Great Demon.


    [Great Demon.


    Intermediate Fourth Grade. Demonic creature.


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 43 | Physique 45 | Agility 27 | Spirit 31.


    Combat Skills: Pinpoint Teleportation, Halo of Fear, Sinister Strike, Savage Body.]


    In particr, Pinpoint Teleportation allowed the Great Demon to freely teleport to any location within his vision, as long as the location was not shielded by a barrier of any sort. The effect of the teleportation was far superior to the Fire Teleportation used by low-grade demons.


    Meanwhile, the Halo of Fear was an area-of-effect spell that resembled a domain. It caused every creature within the range of the halo to feel fear towards the Great Demon from the depths of their heart, making them incapable of confronting the Great Demon, much less fighting against him.


    Evil Strike, on the other hand, was a racial ability avable to all demonic creatures. It allowed the demon¡¯s attacks to possess the corrosion and corruption effects of hellfire. Any individual the demon attacked would not be able to heal their wounds so long as they didn¡¯t dispel this sinister effect.


    Savage Body was an even more fearsome spell.


    It gave the Great Demon the strange ability to be stronger the more injured he was.


    Consequently, you could not let down your guard when fighting against the Great Demon, not until you lopped off his head. Otherwise, it was easy for the Great Demon to turn the tables once backed into a corner!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but click his tongue in wonder as he appraised the Great Demon¡¯sbat techniques.


    Even though he once possessed the ability to transform into a me Fiend, Abyssal me Fiends were still only intermediate demonic creatures. Meanwhile, the Great Demon before him was a real blue powerhouse of the Abyssal World.


    Greem would benefit greatly if he could defeat this demon and bring his body back with him.


    However, the feedback from the Chip made Greem cast away any such thoughts.


    The Great Demon¡¯s body might seem battered and broken, but his life energy aura remained above 87%. His injuries and wounds were more of a sort of disguise and bait to tempt the enemies hiding in the shadows to attack him.


    Faced with such a ferocious fighter that relied on his sheer toughness to crush his enemies, Greem could only shake his head and slip away from the battle.


    However, though he could discern the Great Demon¡¯s actual condition, this wasn¡¯t necessarily the case for other invaders.


    Greem had only taken a few steps away when the werewolf and the foxgirl charged at the Great Demon without hesitation.


    Greem immediately hesitated. Should he stay and watch for any opportunities to intervene, or should he simply leave?


    Just then, a sinister and chilling aura of death erupted somewhere in the distance. Mixed within that aura of death were Mangus¡¯ panicked roar and Cherisha¡¯s scream.


    Mm? Was the lich fighting against the two-headed adept?


    Greem hesitated for a brief moment but chose to make his way to the other battlefield to see what was happening.


    The floating city was now a chaotic swamp of endless fighting that engulfed all the invaders and all the arcanists.


    The arcanists wanted to rely on their geographical advantage to beat back the enemies. In contrast, the invaders wanted to take advantage of the chaos to obtain as much loot as possible.


    Any small battle on the floating city could potentially catch the attention of even more predators, causing the fighting to grow in intensity and scale. Like a snowball rolling down a hill, things were slowly scaling out of control.


    Mangus and Cherisha were undoubtedly the weakest among all these bloodthirsty predators. It made them most likely to be prey for all the others.


    As such, the lich hadunched a ferocious attack at the siblings upon sensing their aura. There was no hesitation at all.


    Liches were terrifying magical creatures!


    They were not products of nature. Rather, they were once powerful spellcasters that had turned themselves into liches using special rituals in an attempt to continue living despite their lifespaning to an end.


    At their core, liches were undead creatures. They had near undying bodies and immortal souls.


    However, this was only a rumor spread by mortals with no actual knowledge of the ult!


    Liches could not achieve true immortality. Even as undead, there was a limit to their lifespans. However, ordinary liches could still live for thousands of years, while demi-god liches (Fifth Grade) could easily live up to tens of thousands of years. Such an incredible lifespan could indeed be considered immortality to mortals, who barely had a hundred years to live.


    However,pared to other supernatural creatures, liches only had slightly longer lifespans. At the end of their lives, their souls would slowly rot with the passage of time until they turned into dust.


    It was precisely because the liches were an unusual existence between life and death that most of their attacks were death magic.


    Finger of Death!


    Promation of Death!


    Heartstopper!


    Array of Death!


    Power Word: Death!


    Dust to Dust!


    Disintegrate!


    Soulbind!


    Horrid Wilting!


    ......


    It was the overwhelming options of death magic that reduced most lifeforms to shivering rabbits in front of the liches. There was no fighting against a lich without a sufficiently powerful soul or equipment that defended against death magic.


    The two-headed adept was in a terrible condition!


    Mangus and Cherisha naturally had no thoughts of holding back against a powerful lich. They had transformed into their strongest state almost immediately. Mangus¡¯ elementium magic and Cherisha¡¯s mental powers amplified each other¡¯s abilities, while also allowing them to cast multiple spells at the same time. As such, an ordinary Fourth Grade adept might just be beaten back while they were in this peak condition.


    Unfortunately, they were fighting against an incredibly powerful veteran lich.


    All the spells they fired were ignored or resisted by the lich when they crashed against his jade-white skeleton. Meanwhile, the lich¡¯s storm of death magic had them coughing up blood as their life force quickly drained away.


    If it weren¡¯t for their magic resistance increasing significantly after their souls had merged, the lich would have destroyed their souls with the first round of attacks!

 Chapter 1119 - Lich Kanganas

    Chapter 1119 Lich Kanganas


    ¡°Vortex of Fangs!¡±


    ¡°Soulstorm!¡±


    The two-headed adept formed by the assimtion of the siblings was capable of firing two spells of entirely different natures every time they cast. An ordinary opponent would probably have a hard time defending against the sheer number of spells.


    Unfortunately, they were fighting against a fearsome lich, whose kind was known for their immense magic resistance.


    The lich simply ignored ordinary Second Grade spells. Only spells of Third Grade and above could threaten and inflict some damage on him. Having only recently advanced, Mangus and Cherisha had trouble casting Fourth Grade spells without some time to prepare and chant the spells. As such, they relied entirely on powerful Third Grade spells inbat.


    These Third Grade spells were barely effective against the lich. The lich ignored half of the elementium powers of the spells, and the remaining half still had to be reduced by his magic resistance. What remained of the spells¡¯ power could only inflict slight damage to the lich.


    Moreover, the siblings had to avoid using all sorts of spells rted to poison, hypnosis, paralysis, petrification, disease, death, and undead. That was because the lich was simply immune to all such spells!


    There were barely any spells that could affect the lich, especially with all the damage immunity that he also possessed.


    On the other hand, any simple death magic fired from the lich¡¯s hands was more than enough to wound the siblings!


    Death magic ignored physical and magical resistance and affected the soul directly. The only resistance against death magic was having a resilient soul.


    Moreover, enduring even a single death spell meant a significant loss of lifeforce and incredible agony upon the soul!


    It might look like Mangus and Cherisha had the advantage in numbers, but they were the ones who were being beaten down.


    In the end, the siblings discovered some method of defending against the lich¡¯s death magic. That was to simply grab someone else as a shield.


    All death magic was either in the form of beams or halos. As long as the siblings could find an arcane apprentice and throw him in the trajectory of the spell, they could trigger its effect before it hit them.


    Trading the life of an arcane apprentice for a death spell fired by the lich was the most cost-effective course of action for the two-headed adept.


    However, the lich was a cunning and intelligent being as well. Such a simple trick would never thwart him. After a Banshee¡¯s Wail, there was no longer an arcane apprentice alive within a kilometer for the siblings to use as a shield.


    They could only retreat as they fought, hoping that the lich would leave to find an easier target with time.


    Unfortunately, ferocious beasts and powerful individuals were everywhere in the floating city right now. No matter how you counted it, the two-headed siblings were undoubtedly the weakest of them all. Thus, the lich pursued stubbornly no matter how they dodged and ran. It seemed he would never stop until they were dead.


    Mangus and Cherisha were finally scared now!


    ¡°Lord Greem, we know you are nearby. Come out and save us!¡± Cherisha screamed for help, ¡°As long as you can keep us alive, we...we will be willing to listen to your every instruction! All the loot we found on this mission will be yours!¡±


    Terror and fear were written all over the siblings¡¯ faces.


    Mangus was somewhat upset about her sister¡¯s promise. He believed there was still room for negotiation. However, faced with a vicious, unbending lich, he had no choice but to shut his mouth and let his sister do the talking.


    ¡°You mean it?¡± Greem¡¯s familiar, crisp voice suddenly rang out in the battlefield.


    ¡°We mean it, we do. We are all party members that came here together. How could these siblings ever lie to you?¡± Upon hearing Greem¡¯s voice, hope once again burst forth from Cherisha¡¯s eyes.


    This trip to another world was still too dangerous. They simply didn¡¯t have the ability to survive until the very end. Cherisha put away all thoughts of making a profit as early as she could. She started to recognize the reality of their situation and began to think rationally once more.


    ¡°Hehehe.¡±


    A muffledugh sounded as arge cluster of fire suddenly ignited in midair, surging towards the Fourth Grade lich like a wandering cloud.


    Greem and Cherisha had been talking in themon tongue of the World of Adepts. Naturally, the lich could not understand their conversation. However, as an evil creature, he had already prepared himself for a battle when he sensed Greem¡¯s unusual aura approach.


    When the cloud of mes appeared, the lich simplyughed sinisterly. He lifted a finger, and the second joint on the small finger of his left hand glowed brightly. A fearsome Iceghost carved out of Eternal Ice was summoned out of nowhere.


    Iceghost. A Fourth Grade golem creature.


    It was an unusually powerful ice-attribute undead creature. It could not form naturally in a material ne and was an artificial creation of liches in theirboratories. They were the most loyal servants of the liches, charging at enemies and fighting on the frontlines without any hesitation.


    That was why the lich had summoned the Iceghost to engage with Mangus and Cherisha when Greem appeared. He, on the other hand, turned around and shed with the cloud of fire.


    His jade-white skeleton was immune to almost all elementium attacks below Third Grade. As such, the lich did not have the same consciousness as other spellcasters. He charged into the cloud of fire with his body as a shield and immediately let out a fearsome Banshee¡¯s Wail.


    The high-pitched scream quickly enveloped the cloud of fire. Soundwaves powerful enough to tear the soul apart quickly spread through the air, causing ripples to appear.


    A Fourth Grade Banshee¡¯s Wail like this was enough to kill any opponent whose soul was too weak. Even Fourth Grade opponents would be injured if they weren¡¯t careful.


    The cloud of fire trembled as the skies shook.


    Greem was instantly forced to reveal himself within the mes by this attack.


    He held his fire coral staff in his hand, the Burning Suncrown on his head, the Fire Dragon¡¯s Breath on his neck, the Emblem of Fire on his arm, the Fearless on his waist, Ash on his feet, and all sorts of strange magical rings on all of his fingers.


    However, none of these items could conceal Greem¡¯s unique aura.


    Greem was not a pure body-refining adept and did not possess muscles that were as hard as iron. However, his two-meter height and his perfectly proportioned body gave him a perfect appearance.


    He had firm muscles, crimson and radiant skin, and long ck hair flowing down his back, waving slightly in the breeze. In addition to the crimson light glowing in the depths of his ck eyes, Greem¡¯s entire person radiated with the wickedness, mystery, and wisdom that was the very definition of an adept.


    ¡°Beginner Fourth Grade. Unbelievable!¡± The lich couldn¡¯t help but be impressed, ¡°You must be a prodigy of a major adept organization. How else could you have mastered some of the firews while you are still beginner Fourth Grade!¡±


    The lich had assumed Greem to be a veteran Fourth Grade adept when he first sensed Greem¡¯s fire aura. Now, upon seeing Greem¡¯s youthful face and sensing his unstabilized mental flux, the lich could not help but open his mouth wide in surprise.


    ¡°O¡¯ respected lich, how may I refer to you?¡± Greem was not in a hurry to fight. Instead, he tapped his fire coral staff and put up a dome-shaped Inferno Shield around himself. He then casually greeted the opponent.


    ¡°Kanganas. And you?¡± The lich replied coldly.


    ¡°Sir Kanganas, Greem greets you!¡± Greem smiled and said, ¡°There is so much prey here in this city. Why do you have to be so fixated on us adepts? Why don¡¯t¡ª¡±


    ¡°Kehkehkehe, you want to snatch the prey away from my jaws just by working your mouth? Let¡¯s see if you have the ability to back it up!¡± As expected of someone from an evil faction, the lich did even not bother to listen to Greem speak. He lifted his hand and fired a green beam at the Inferno Shield.


    Disintegrate!


    The Inferno Shield, which had five hundred points of physical defense and seven hundred points of elementium defense, disintegrated in an instant.


    The next second, four to five evil curses of various colors shot towards Greem, entering into his body one after another.


    Liches were indeed the strongest users of evil magic. Every single one of Kanganas¡¯ curses possessed fearsome magic pration. Otherwise, they would never be able to prate the Burning Domain and Greem¡¯s forcefield to affect him directly.


    Hysteresis!


    Unnerve!


    Decrepify!


    Agonize!


    Forgetfulness!


    A total of five curses, each of which managed to activate.


    The Curse of Hysteresis could significantly reduce Greem¡¯s movement speed.


    The Unnerving Curse could greatly weaken Greem¡¯s fighting will.


    The Curse of Decrepification could slightly reduce Greem¡¯s bodily attributes.


    The Curse of Agony would cause Greem to endure twice as much damage.


    The Curse of Forgetfulness would cause Greem to forget some of his spells randomly.


    After all the curses had taken effect, the fearsome Lich Kanganas waved his bone hand. A barrage of bone spears immediately fired at Greem from every direction. A pale-white undead me burned at the tip of all these spears.


    Any being that came into contact with these mes would have their souls frozen, causing their minds to turn much slower than usual!


    Afterpleting all these attacks, Lich Kanganas silently crushed his right little finger, sacrificing his body to fire a terrifying Finger of Death at the immobile Greem.


    The Finger of Death was terrifying death magic, to begin with. Now that Kanganas had enhanced its magic pration with a sacrifice, it became shockingly lethal.


    The lich had struck out so ferociously and viciously without any hesitation. Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but be horrified and surprised.


    At the sight of the rain of bone spears and the Finger of Death hidden amongst the barrage of spears, Greem let out a wild roar. His counter-attack had begun.

 Chapter 1120 - A Wild Battle

    <h4>Chapter 1120 A Wild Battle</h4>


    ¡°Crimson Lotus¡¯ Rain of Fire...Scorching mes!¡±


    Greem shouted out several short incantations, summoning surging mes around him that surged at the lich.


    The mes were golden yellow, with a trace of unusual power within them.


    The golden fires and the death energy around Lich Kanganas¡¯ body shed together and neutralized each other ferociously upon contact.


    The golden mes and the pale white energy were entangled with each other, devouring and destroying the opposing power as they shed.


    When the golden fire appeared, all the curses that Kanganas had applied to Greem evaporated like snow under a zing sun. What traces remained of the curses could no longer affect or disrupt Greem as they had before.


    The sources and owners of these two contrasting powers were casting their own terrifying spells as quickly as they could. They were both trying to pave the way to victory with all their might.


    Individuals as powerful as Greem and the lich could unleash all sorts of powerful spells without incantations. However, when their opponent was an enemy of the same grade, it was best to fire a spell after a series of incantations. That was the only way to pose a threat to the opponent.


    Instant-cast spells were mostly used to interrupt or disrupt the opponent¡¯s chanting or spellcasting.


    Liches would often turn every part of their body into fearsome spell sequencing devices through a series of mad and cruel modifications. Their method of casting was entirely different from an ordinary spellcaster.


    As such, when Kanganas sensed the terror of the golden mes, he immediately hastened his spellcasting without hesitation.


    His fearsome skull stared straight at Greem as the adept walked across the sky with mes beneath his feet. The soulfire burning behind the rubies in the lich¡¯s eye sockets pulsated rapidly. Meanwhile, his jaw also started trembling, letting out an unusual crackling sound.


    It wasn¡¯t Kanganas trembling in fright. Rather, it was the unique spellcasting method of the liches.


    Magical gemstones of various colors and functions had been embedded into his jaw. By clicking together his ¡®teeth,¡¯ he could activate these magical gemstones in a specific sequence.


    As there was no need to chant any incantations, the terrifying spells stored within these gemstones could be simply molded into a powerful spell sequence based on the lich¡¯s will.


    Why were liches considered one of the most powerful and savage magical creatures in nearly every single material ne? It was precisely because of this unique spellcasting method of theirs!


    A spell sequence like this was usually abination of anti-magic magic, offensive elementium magic,pound curses, and death magic.


    In particr, the anti-magic was used to break an opponent¡¯s magical defense. The offensive elementium magic was to inflict elementium damage and trigger the opponent¡¯sst line of defense. Thepound curses would then weaken the opponent¡¯s elementium resistance. All of these factors worked in service of the death magic, which was the real, lethal core of the entire sequence.


    Fearsome and targeted spell sequences like this had helped Kanganas defeat and kill countless enemies that had challenged him in the past. However, this same trick was far from enough to defeat Greem, who possessed a mastery over some of the firews.


    The surging mes abruptly shrank together, forming a golden shield between Greem and Kanganas.


    The shield was not veryrge nor heavy. However, it appeared to be unusually dense and sturdy due to the existence of the golden mes.


    The sequence of spells crashed onto the golden shield. The anti-magic caused the elementium particles to lose their established order and destroyed the spell model. Unfortunately, the firews contained within the mes was power of a higher order; the destruction caused by the anti-magic was not thorough.


    Though the golden shield had been disrupted and damaged by the anti-magic, the fire elementium particles remained in a rtively stable position. Thisyer of defense greatly affected the rest of the spell sequence. The fearsome Bone Lance, the crimson Berserking Curse, and the frightening Energy Drain were all prematurely triggered. A purple halo of death bloomed in front of the tattered golden shield.


    While defending against the lich¡¯s attack, Greem waved his staff as arge Magma Fireball, half the size of a human¡¯s head, fired at the lich.


    In truth, a Fourth Grade zing Fireball had more elementium offensive powerpared to the Second Grade Magma Fireball. Unfortunately, the lich¡¯s elementium was simply too high. Physical damage was far more effective against himpared to elementium damage.


    That was why Greem had no choice but to use a Second Grade Magma Fireball instead!


    Even the Second Grade Magma Fireball was incredibly powerful when fired from Greem¡¯s hands.


    The massive fireball formed of magma and fire was filled with liquidva at a shocking temperature. Endless heat and light spilled forth from the cracks in the magma, causing the air to be unbearably hot.


    Moreover, Greem was firing over a hundred of these Magma Fireballs.


    One fireball after another.


    The previous fireball had just fired, and the next one¡¯s shape could already be seen forming in his palm.


    They crashed against the Bone Wall that the lich had erected, creating a rain of fire that ignited the bones and caused them to crackle loudly. The skulls that formed the Bone Wall burned crimson from the hot mes. They struggled desperately to escape the Bone Wall, to no avail.


    This twenty-meter-wide, one-meter-thick Bone Wall copsed loudly after just five seconds, reduced to shards of bone on the ground. A new Bone Wall blocked the fireballs that came after.


    Lich Kanganas finally managed toplete another spell sequence with several Bone Walls shielding him.


    As Kanganas sacrificed the seventh rib on the right of his body, a group of banshees was summoned. They screeched and charged into the sky.


    These banshees might be no more than Third Grade, but their ear-piercing screams were a significant disruption to human spellcasters!


    After releasing these banshees, Kanganas extended his right hand quickly made several motions in the air. He drew evil runes that glowed with a ghostly green light. However, before the evil runes could gather together to form a terrifying death spell, the soulfire that Kanganas hid behind his ruby eyes trembled abruptly. He hastily abandoned this nearly-formed spell and quickly teleported a hundred meters away.


    As his shining body appeared in the air once more, a fearsome fire spell erupted at his original location.


    Doomsday Volcano!


    The scorched earth quickly swelled and cracked apart. Countless streams of fire burst forth, along with scalding redva that quickly turned its surroundings into a world of magma.


    If Kanganas had not escaped in time, he would have had to endure theplete might of this Doomsday Volcano. Now, he only had to take the warm heat waves.


    With his magic resistance as a Fourth Grade lich, the streams of fire that reached six to seven thousand degrees were no more than a spring breeze. However, for most nar creatures, this ¡®breeze¡¯ would be enough to melt metal and turn volcanic rock into liquidva.


    Kanganas, whose spellcasting had been interrupted, would not take the attack lying down. He rapidly activated a spell ring on his left ring finger, firing a poisoned bone spear at Greem.


    It was not an ordinary poisoned bone spear. Instead, it was a strange bone spear that reeked of death, with the ability to ignore all physical defenses. Moreover, there were rot spores at the tip of the spear. Should the sporese into contact with flesh, they would be able to spread immediately.


    Greem¡¯s face turned at the sight of such a terrifying bone spear. His body erupted into mes as he used me Teleportation to escape, even though he was in the midst of preparing his next spell.


    Thus, the two spellcasters whose spellcasting ability was amongst the best in the material nes continued to attack each other ferociously, all while avoiding the opponent¡¯s attacks in time. They struck wildly, trading hits as they dodged and wove across the sky. Both air and ground for several kilometers had be their battlefield.


    Several arcanists had driven their arcanist towers over during this fight, attempting to take advantage of the conflict. However, they were beaten back by thebined effort of the two spellcasters who were now heavily invested in their fight against each other. It couldn¡¯t be helped. It didn¡¯t matter how stupid Greem and Kanganas were; they wouldn¡¯t be dumb enough to be engaging in a fight between lions and let the harmless rabbit bite them in the ass.


    After several attempts, the arcanists could only hide as far away as they could and watch silently as the two invaders fought in the floating city.


    Such a strange battle wasn¡¯t the only one urring in the floating city. Fearsome energy fluctuations had erupted in three or four other locations as well. The most obvious of them was the fierce battle between the Minor Scourge Lord Illhoof and the Fifth Ring Great Arcanist.


    One could truthfully im that the energy flux radiating from that fight had greatly exceeded the level of Fourth Grades. It meant that the Sixth Grade Lord of Eternal Night behind Illhoof had already projected part of his powers into the ne.


    Anyone who was slightly weaker didn¡¯t even dare participate in this battle. In fact, they weren¡¯t even able to witness from the sidelines. They were expelled by the overwhelming power and could only wander around the arcane pce helplessly.


    In doing so, the chances of friction and conflict increased all the more!


    Illhoof had already thoroughly destroyed the energy core hidden deep in the stone foundation of the floating city. Moreover, as the powerful individuals of all these foreign nes continued to unleash havoc upon the city, things only became even more broken and ravaged.


    The fighting of these individuals had destroyed vast stretches of arcane buildings, and the city itself was slowly losing its flight ability!


    The Reisin Garden that had once stood proud amongst the clouds was now like a broken vase. It was no longer able to maintain its stability and altitude. Instead, it passed through the clouds, slowly crashing towards the ins at an odd, tilted angle.

 Chapter 1121 - The Origin and Destruction of Life

    <h4>Chapter 1121 The Origin and Destruction of Life</h4>


    The floating city was crashing.


    There wasn¡¯t much time left for the invaders to scour the city and look for resources and treasures.


    As such, the fighting on the floating city increased in intensity!


    Meanwhile, in the inner circle of the floating city, in an arcane academy seven kilometers away from the arcane pce, an unprecedented lecture was going on.


    It was the same knowledge hall and the same two figures.


    Lucia was seated solemnly in the first row of the knowledge hall, seriously and attentively listening to Sir Brown¡¯s teachings.


    Today, Sir Brown was lecturing on the theory of life¡¯s origin. He was discussing his opinions and views on the subject, along with the theories proposed by other schrs.


    The broad knowledge hall was empty. There was only him and Lucia. Yet, his gentle and warm voice reverberated throughout the room, so loud that even the apocalyptic elementium explosions urring outside could not stifle his voice.


    ¡°The different nes have different theories and opinions on the origin of life.


    ¡°In the world ruled by the gods, the unified acknowledged exnation is that life was created by the gods. Everything in the world, every life in the material nes, was created by the mixture of a god¡¯s body or blood with substance from a material ne.


    ¡°These liars that profit on faith have managed to trick many people into bing their believers through this theory, but it is a theory that cannot be fully justified. At the very least, they can¡¯t exin how they, the gods, came to be.¡±


    Sir Brown couldn¡¯t help but startughing at this point in the lecture.


    Meanwhile, through the semi-translucent crystal wall behind him, another arcane tower could be seen crashing through the ground, causing a shocking explosion on the surface of the city.


    The tremors quickly reached the arcane academy, causing all the nearby buildings to sway and shake as well. Even the knowledge hall trembled slightly, endless dust and loose pieces of porcin crumbling from the ornate dome above them.


    However, the two people in the hall were not bothered by any of this. They were stillmitted to the lecture, one giving the speech as best as he could, and the other listening in as attentively as possible.


    ¡°¡ªmost nar creatures live their entire lives in ignorance, never realizing that they are within a sealed space protected by a nar barrier. It is only when high-grade individuals who have awakened to self-awareness realize this problem that they would begin searching for answers.


    ¡°And their answers lie in space.


    ¡°The material nes are not all that material after all, and the void is not truly void after all.


    ¡°Every nar world is pieced together by various unusual substances that have been whisked together by the spacestorms. These substances are all cold and lifeless, without any trace of intelligence and certainly home to no nt or animal life. However, as the nar barrier slowly forms and envelops the entire world, the ne will be isted from the terrifying and fearsome spacestorms outside. Then, in less than a hundred years, a seed of life will form out of nothing within the barrier.¡±


    Arcanist Brown couldn¡¯t help but lift his head and look to the skies above. His tone was filled with respect and yearning for the wondrous space beyond his own world.


    ¡°The Empire¡¯s research on nar life has existed for thousands of years now. During this time, those Great Arcanists who possess enough power to destroy worlds have even created primeval nes of their own. They then spent hundreds of years observing the process of lifeformsing into existence out of absolutely nothing.


    ¡°Then, where did the first life in the nee from?¡±Lucia couldn¡¯t help but open her eyes wide. She licked her lips slightly and asked hurriedly.


    ¡°From beyond the nes, from the endless void of space.¡± Arcanist Brown couldn¡¯t help but sigh.


    ¡°Beyond the nes? The endless void of space?¡± Lucia couldn¡¯t help but repeat to herself.


    ¡°Indeed, the Great Arcanists were in just as much disbelief as you are! To think that the first source of nar life came from beyond the material nes.¡± Brown¡¯s tone quickly returned to normal. ¡°The Great Arcanists conducted all sorts of investigations aftering to this conclusion. They then realized that most nar creatures that could be found in a material ne were 87% simr in nature. Though some of these lifeforms had their bodies and skeletal structure changed by the different environments of the different nes they were born in, at their very core, they were all born of the same origin of life.¡±


    Rumbling explosions continued to ring out beyond the knowledge hall. The constant rain of fire from above had ignited many of the academy¡¯s buildings, causing them to melt like wax.


    The entire city was silently burning to ashes.


    A towering me giant could be seen roaring on the distant horizon. Endless mes were cast to the sky with his every move and action. It seemed like he was fighting against a powerful enemy.


    The arcane barrier around the knowledge hall had yet to disperse. It barely kept out the horrifying heat waves.


    However, the arcane arrays carved on the thick pirs around the hall had been damaged by the earlier earthquakes. Some of these strange fires had managed to seep through the cracks in the barrier, causing the temperature in the hall to slowly rise.


    The buildings around the hall had all copsed and melted, one after another. Only the barrier around the knowledge hall was barely functional due to Arcanist Brown¡¯s presence. However, judging from the harsh and frightening environment around them, the barrier would notst for much longer.


    ¡°Since the Great Arcanists realized that life originated from beyond the material nes, did they not attempt to search for the true origin of all life?¡± Lucia asked hastily, her face flushed bright red.


    ¡°Space beyond the nes is savage and ferocious, so much so that those who have not experienced it themselves will not be able to understand. It is for the sake of searching for the arcane secrets deep in space and for the sake of finding the source of all nar life that the Great Arcanists had created the iparably powerful pseudo-nar fortresses. These fortresses followed along a fixed trajectory, conquering every ne they encountered along the way.


    ¡°Prior to this crisis, the Arcane Empire had discovered and conquered a total of 2,317 nes. All of these nes were turned into lesser nes and resource nes for our homeworld.


    ¡°Some Great Arcanists believe to this day that if we are able to travel to every nar world and project the influence and power of the Arcane Empire to every corner of the universe, that no secret will remain a secret in our eyes. The entire multiverse will be like an arcane garden in our backyards, free for us to take what we wish.¡±


    ¡°This...professor, doesn¡¯t such a philosophy depart from our original starting point? If we proceed in this fashion, then what sets us apart from those disaster creatures?¡± Pain and struggle appeared on Lucia¡¯s face, and she shook her head in frustration.


    ¡°Young Lucia, do you think that everyone is like you? Do you think everyone can maintain that innocent ideal of theirs forever? Uncover the origin of the nes, discover the truth of the universe! Everyone can hold on to such ideals when they first start on their arcane journey. However, as our power grows in scale and magnitude, as the knowledge we amass grows in amount and depth, we be able to destroy a ne and annihte a world with a wave of our hands. When that happens, do you think we will still be able to calmly pursuit our ideals without being swayed?¡± Brown let out a sorrowful sigh.


    ¡°After countless years of investigations and hypotheses by countless arcanists, the elders of the arcane empire firmly believe that this multiverse we live in might not be the only multiverse, nor all that exists out there. There might be other sanctuaries of life beyond our own multiverse. Moreover, for the sake of maintaining the activity and cirction of life within their worlds, there exists a strange exchange of substances and lifeforms between these different multiverses.


    ¡°Exchanges are happening between the multiverses. Within each individual multiverse, there is also necessarily a subtle, yet certain, exchange of substance and lifeforms between the material ne.¡±


    Lucia couldn¡¯t help but open her mouth wide in shock when she heard this. She muttered, ¡°If...if such an exchange truly exists, then who or what is the first driving force? Could...could there be an ultimate lifeform in the multiverse that watches over and governs everything within the multiverse?¡±


    ¡°Young Lucia, you should already know that when a nar world¡¯s lifeform grows and flourishes, a vague nar consciousness will be born. This nar consciousness acts on instinct and will manipte the narws, allowing the entire ne to run ording to certainws and rules.¡±


    ¡°Then, our Morrian ne also has a nar consciousness?¡± Lucia opened her eyes wide in curiosity.


    ¡°Of course it has. You, me, and any life or substance on Morrian ne is part of the great nar consciousness. If you are fortunate enough to advance to be a First Ring arcanist, you will be able toe into contact with the great nar consciousness for a brief instant at the moment of advancement.¡± Brown looked at this smart and eager student of his with endearing eyes.


    Though the two of them were not disciple and mentor, he had acknowledged the two of them as such in the depths of his heart. He was now teaching her and passing down his legacy as if she was his disciple.


    Lucia frowned and thought deeply.


    She couldn¡¯t imagine what it was like for such a massive ne to have developed a consciousness of its own. Would it feel the same way as a human or any ordinary lifeform? Would it feel emotions or pain? How did it then control the lifeforms that lived in the ne?


    The rumbling of the elementium explosions from outside the hall was even louder now.


    The battle that the me giant was engaged in was slightly approaching the knowledge hall. The walls around the building had already turned bright red from the intense heat. The domed ceiling above them had started to soften, causing red drops ofva to drip down on them.


    Arcanist Brown waved his hand, and a tall golem standing to the side walked over, using itsrge body and full arms to shield them from the crumbling ceiling.


    The temperature in the hall was even more unbearable now!


    At this moment, the floating city was halfway down the sky. The city itself was tilted at a forty-five-degree angle. Most of the surface of the city was already crumbling or burning.


    The horizon appeared to be nted when looking out of the crystal walls.


    mes were everywhere, as was fighting and carnage. It was an apocalypsee to life.


    They did not have much time left!

 Chapter 1122 - Library

    Chapter 1122 Library


    Despite their situation, Brown and Lucia had thoroughly looked past life and death. Lucia was still asking questions, and Brown was still answering her. The two of them were simply immersed in the joy of being able to receive and pass on knowledge inside this tiny and straightforward ¡®safe¡¯ space.


    The world might end the very next second, and they themselves might turn into dust, but at this moment, they were both hanging on with their humble yet stubborn beliefs and ideals.


    It was a conviction they hadmitted themselves to on the first day they came into contact with arcane knowledge. They were willing to sacrifice everything for this conviction, even their lives.


    It was perhaps the fundamental reason why the Arcane Empire was able to rise to prominence in just a mere ten thousand years, bing a dominant force in the multiverse that could not be ignored by the other factions!


    The anticipation and thirst in Lucia¡¯s eyes grew even stronger after she listened to Arcanist Brown¡¯s exnations.


    Just as she was about to open her mouth and ask more questions, a loud explosion rang out. The arcane barrier around the knowledge hall could no longer endure the terrifying mes. It exploded into a flurry of sparks and mes.


    The boiling heatwave surged into the hall, along with an endless amount of mes.


    Lucia felt like she had been thrown into a volcano. Unbelievable heat permeated the scalding air. Her clothes, hair, skin, blood, and even her bones were quickly withering from the heat. It almost seemed like she was going to be turned into dust instantly.


    She turned her head with all her strength and looked towards a certain location outside the hall.


    A massive me giant stood tall as he strode into the knowledge hall.


    What a looming and towering me giant this was!


    A body shrouded in mes, the sight of fire fairies fluttering joyously everywhere around him, the burning sensation of scorching mes that never ended. The giant¡¯s hulking figure radiated endless heat and light. Even a nce from the me giant was enough to blind Lucia and cause her body to melt like a candle.


    It wasn¡¯t just her. Even the Second Ring Brown could not endure the might of the me giant at such a close distance. His clothes were the first things that ignited. Blisters began appearing all over his face, his hands, and his skin, miring him in extreme agony.


    If he were an ordinary person, he might have turned to dust the moment the Burning Domain engulfed him. However, his powers as a Second Ring arcanist allowed him to struggle for another dozen seconds in the Burning Domain, suffering immeasurable torment in the process.


    However, despite his agony, Brown chose not to protect himself. Instead, he poured all of his arcane energy into the barrier around Lucia. He quickly turned to ashes beneath the zing fire, reduced to a horrifying burnt corpse.


    Unfortunately, even all of the powers of a Second Ring arcanist could not allow another person to survive inside Greem¡¯s Burning Domain. Lucia, who had been protected by Brown¡¯s sacrifice, only lived a few seconds longer than he had. The powers of the arcane barrier were quickly exhausted after his death, and Lucia followed in his steps.


    ¡°Power. So this is the power they speak about!¡± Lucia¡¯s eyes had already beenpletely burned. She faced towards the me giant aimlessly as she muttered to herself.


    At the moment the arcane barrier was burned through, her body was instantly turned to ashes. Even her soul was slowly being consumed by the strange mes.


    In the final moment before her soul waspletely extinguished, a loud and unfamiliar voice suddenly rang out in the depths of her soul.


    ¡°Mm? What a pure soul.¡±


    A strange portal seemed to appear within the mes abruptly. Lucia¡¯s soul was uncontrobly sucked into the portal, and all her sensations ceased right then and there.


    Greem weighed the Orb of Shadows in his hands. He nodded in satisfaction when he sensed the weak soul standing still within and put the orb away.


    That was a bizarre moment for Greem. He had only casually killed two insignificant people, but the Chip had somehow sensed an aura projected by the nar consciousness on one of them. Moreover, that person was the weaker of the two. They had most likely just been an arcane apprentice.


    Supposedly, an individual like that should not have been able to draw the attention of the nar consciousness. Yet, when Greem waved his hand and turned them into dust, the Chip had very firmly sensed the nar consciousness stir, ever so slightly.


    It was a strange, indescribable feeling!


    It was like Morrian ne¡¯s nar consciousness had been silently paying attention to this weak arcane apprentice all along. When Greem unintentionally killed them, he had drawn the ire and hatred of the nar consciousness.


    Out of curiosity, Greem had taken out the Fifth Grade Orb of Shadows and used its shadow powers to trap the soul within.


    Having done all this, Greem shook his body and slowly reverted out of his me giant state.


    There had not been a conclusion to his battle with Lich Kanganas.


    When the terrifying fighting between Illhoof and the Fifth Ring Great Arcanist broke out at the arcane pce, Lich Kanganas finally gave up on his battle against Greem. Instead, he turned and hurried towards a battlefield in the distance with his Fourth Grade Iceghost in tow.


    It seemed like the lich intended to be the fisherman and wanted to find a battlefield where he could take advantage of the situation to profit greatly.


    Greem might not be afraid of this lich in the slightest, but out of consideration of his own abilities, he decided to just look for loot on the outskirts of the inner circle. Meanwhile, Mangus and Cherisha had endured fairly heavy injuries in the fight against the Iceghost. They had no choice but to find somece else to treat their wounds.


    As such, Greem decided to remain in this arcane academy and roam around.


    After passing through several copsed corridors and turning a few corners, Greem found a ck wooden door at the end of a hallway. It was a door that faintly radiated elementium flux.


    Greem pushed the door with his hand, but it did not budge.


    A strange human face carved out of copper was attached to the ck wooden door. Yellow light flickered, and the human face opened its eyes.


    ¡°Password...password. This is the secret library of Dorndale Arcane Academy. Outsiders are not allowed. Please provide the password if you wish to enter!¡±


    A sharp look of impatience appeared in Greem¡¯s eyes as he listened to the strange mechanical voice. Golden mes surged forth, burning arge hole in the wooden door, enough for him to pass through.


    It was just an arcane door. It couldn¡¯t possibly stop a Fourth Grade adept from breaking and entering.


    [Beep. Detecting unusual alert message.] The Chip quickly provided feedback.


    Obviously, Greem¡¯s forceful entry had triggered some sort of defense mechanism in the library. Under ordinary circumstances,rge armies of arcanists would be marching over to arrest him already.


    Sadly, at this moment, the floating city was an absolute mess.


    Even the arcane pce at the very center of the city was under attack by Illhoof. Any arcanist with the ability to fight would be doing something else. No one would be here in such a rural ce to find trouble with Greem.


    As such, Greem ignored the rms and stepped into the library. He silently looked around him at everything.


    It was an extensive and brightly lit library. Golden bookshelves with row upon row of books were everywhere. These books were all thick tomes that glowed with a faint arcane light. Judging from the ornate design of their covers and the soft arcane light they radiated, these tomes were not ordinary books.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown at the sight of all this.


    Seals. Too many seals!


    Clearly, all of the arcane tomes had been sealed to prevent anyone from reading them without being authorized to do so. They were all protected under their own powerful, individual, and independent arcane arrays.


    Even though arcane energy supply had been cut off throughout the floating city, these arrays were still untouched. This library was most certainly powered by a small elementium pool beneath the ground.


    However, Greem had no interest in destroying that elementium pool.


    He slowly browsed the titles of these books, shelf by shelf. Whenever he found a tome he was interested in, he would fire two red beams from his eyes and forcefully shatter the arcane array. He would then reach into the shelf, grab the book, and put them in his Elder¡¯s Ring.


    Due to the urgency of the situation, Greem had no time to slowly decipher every arcane array. As such, he had to deal with the seals in the most clumsy way possible.


    Of course, if Greem did not care for the damage to the tomes, he could have tossed out a Scarlet Firestorm, and most of the arrays would burn to a crisp. However, in the same vein, most of the arcane tomes would be damaged as well.


    With all the elementium explosions that could be heard outside and all the intense tremors that spread through the city, it was easy to imagine how chaotic and devastated the city was.


    Greem had given up his ns on all the other things. He started to concentrate solely on scouring and collecting the arcane tomes here.


    In contrast to Greem¡¯s casual stroll, two unusual figures hurried to the arcane academy by tracking the fire aura he had left in the air. They soon arrived at thepletely copsed and molten knowledge hall.


    In the ce of the hall was a terrifying pool ofva. All of the stone in the walls, pirs, and the debris had vanished. Only fearsome, bubbling, liquidva could be seen.


    ¡°I have already sensed that bastard¡¯s aura. He¡¯s inside a secret room not far behind us. Let¡¯s go and kill him!¡± The one who was speaking was a mysterious ck shadow standing at the front.


    Even though it was still bright outside, no amount of light could dispel the shadows over this person¡¯s body. One could only faintly make out that it was a woman, and an unusually powerful woman at that.


    Meanwhile, the individual following behind had anger and dejectedness written all over his face. Yet, he obviously couldn¡¯t do anything to the person in front of him.


    ¡°You will keep your word? I help you kill Greem, and you will let me free?¡± Judging by the voice, it was Adept Holly who had disappeared from the battlefield prior to this.


    At this moment, he was in a silver adept¡¯s robe. However, a strange ck rune had been branded onto his exposed forehead, throbbing with an unusual magical flux.


    ¡°Hehehe. A Seed of Darkness has already been nted in you. Ordinary magic cannot dispel that Seed. As long as you obediently help me kill Greem, I swear in the name of Origin Darkness to remove the restriction on your person.¡± Naturally, the shadowy figure was the newly revived Dark Witch Shani.


    Even though she had revived, and her powers had returned to Fourth Grade, all of her magical equipment had been lost to Greem¡¯s hands. As such, she could only try her best to find aplices to deal with that damned fire adept. Otherwise, she no longer had confidence in killing Greem alone.

 Chapter 1123 - Beat at Every Point

    Chapter 1123 Beat at Every Point


    ¡°But I¡¯m still bound by an Oath Contract. If......¡±


    Adept Holly was still hesitating.


    After all the difficulties he had been through, Holly had finally realized the terrifying might of that legendary fire adept. In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for his life being in the hands of another, he would never want to make an enemy out of Greem.


    Before Adept Holly could finish speaking, he abruptly bent over and started coughing violently. A fountain of purple and ck blood came spewing forth from his mouth. The blood appeared to be thick and viscous when it hit the floor, almost as if there were arge number of broken organ pieces and tissues mixed within.


    His adept¡¯s robe swayed as he convulsed, revealing his shockingly tattered body covered in wounds.


    The werewolf and the foxgirl had left him with injuries that could not be healed in a short amount of time. Now that he was also beholden to Shani¡¯s power, his condition was incredibly weak and pathetic.


    Sadly, his life or death did not seem to be a concern of Dark Witch Shani.


    Shani furiously argued when she heard Adept Holly¡¯s mumbling. ¡°Holly, you are a Fourth Grade adept that advanced a hundred years ago. Are you really unable to survive a little bacsh from an Oath Contract? Here you go; with this Life Talisman, you won¡¯t have to worry about the Oath Contract any longer!¡±


    Shani took out a cross-shaped copper figure and tossed it to Holly.


    Holly quickly caught the figure and carefully put in on his neck, close against his chest.


    After being taken captive by Shani, his storage ring had also fallen into her hands. Most of the magical equipment he carried with him also, naturally, became her spoils. Shani also managed to arm herself once again by robbing Holly.


    Though their attributes were notpatible, they would have to do. Shani had absolutely no possessions to her name, after all. Naturally, she had no right to be picky.


    A few simple modifications to make the equipment barely functional would do!


    In fact, the Life Talisman that Shani had passed to him was Holly¡¯s talisman, to begin with. She had simply returned it to its ¡®rightful owner.¡¯


    ¡°Let¡¯s go! That Greem seems to be busy with something right now. It¡¯s the perfect time for us to strike in unison. I will strike first, and you will follow up with all you have. Tear him a nasty one. If everything works out well, I will return your freedom to you! If you still have this attitude when the fighting starts...hmph! You know how it will end for you!¡±


    Adept Holly became dejected when he heard Shani¡¯s threat.


    His condition was already as terrible as it could be. Thebination of external and internal wounds was on the brink of causing his body to fall apart. If it weren¡¯t for all the magical potions he had consumed and all the magical equipment he was using, he would likely already be dead.


    His body was like a rundown hut; it was barely standing. If the Seed of Darkness that Shani imnted in his body started causing problems again, it would be lethal for him. As reluctant as he was, Holly¡¯s only choice was to obey Shani¡¯s instructions.


    ............


    Inside the library.


    Greem quickly broke through one arcane array after another, putting multiple arcane tomes into his Elder¡¯s Ring.


    While he eagerly collected the books, the Fire Eyes he had set up outside ahead of time seemed to have picked up something unusual. Several moving images were projected into Greem¡¯s mind.


    Holly and Shani.


    It seemed like they hade for him after all.


    A trace of killing intent appeared on Greem¡¯s face when he saw the newly revived Dark Witch Shani.


    Her foolishness and stubbornness had clearly angered him deeply.


    This time, if he had the opportunity, he would not let Shani¡¯s soul return to the soul energy pool again.


    Greem didn¡¯t know when it had happened, but the vast library had suddenly turned dim.


    Several ck vortices abruptly appeared in various corners of the library, slowly roaming.


    Where they went, it was as if the light itself was sucked away, causing the space to turn darker and dimmer.


    The arcane crystals embedded in the hall had initially been projecting bright and gentle light that illuminated the entire library. However, all of these crystals had turned lightless as the ck vortices wrapped around them.


    Greem had barely gone through one-hundredth of the entire library. He looked at the remaining tomes and frowned. In the end, he gave up on them all. It was such a shame.


    The enemy had already arrived. The searching for loot had to stop.


    In a while, this ce would be a battlefield for multiple Fourth Grade adepts. Not many tomes would be able to survive the carnage!


    Greem¡¯s hatred for Shani grew exponentially at the thought of this.


    In just a dozen seconds, the once bright library had turnedpletely dark, filled with a strange, thick shadow substance.


    This strange substance pressed against Greem from every direction,shing wildly like tens of thousands of monsters and ghosts.


    ¡°Hmph! Show yourself if you¡¯vee! What¡¯s the point in all these theatrics?¡±


    Greem let out a snort and lifted his right hand. A cluster of blindingly bright golden mes slowly rose from his palm, illuminating a few dozen meters around him.


    When it entered his area, the shadow substance let out a strange sizzling sound resembling that of a fish dropped into boiling oil. Screeching could be heard from the shadows as the material quickly retreated beyond the reach of the golden fire¡¯s light.


    Judging from the behavior of the substance, these were many individual lifeforms!


    Perhaps sensing that Greem had already prepared himself forbat, Dark Witch Shani simply chose to reveal her tall and slender body at the edge of the light. Her dark, ck eyes stared unflinchingly at Greem, indescribable hatred contained within them.


    ¡°Good...simply too good. I truly never expected that a rookie that only advanced twenty to thirty years ago could beat me so badly. Me, Dark Witch Shani! You are very good. Today, I will wash away the hatred between us with your blood!¡±


    Her voicended, and all the shadows in the library went berserk.


    Countless shadow arrows appeared out of thin air and shot towards Greem like heavy rain.


    The golden fire floating above Greem¡¯s palm released a blinding halo of light that burned away all the shadow arrows. However, there was still far too little power ofws contained within that small me. It could not fend off a shadow assault of such magnitude.


    The shadow arrows that exploded on contact with the light turned into ck ink, quickly eroding the bright dome and forcing it to retract. The shadow arrows that managed to prate deeper almost came into contact with Greem¡¯s defensive forcefield.


    Greem did not panic at all in the face of this overwhelming offense.


    He casually waved his hand and cast out several waves of fire that burned the shadows around him to a crisp. He then took out an unusual ck stone.


    Strangely enough, as the ck stone appeared, all the shadow substance in the hall abruptly halted. All the shadow arrows exploded out of nowhere, reduced to chaotic, unordered shadow substance.


    ¡°The Orb of Shadows. You...how could you possibly be able to control the power of the Orb of Shadows?¡±


    Dark Witch Shani couldn¡¯t help but scream out in surprise when she saw the scene before her and felt the shadow powers break free of her authority.


    To her understanding, a dark sacred relic like the Orb of Shadows would only obey the will of the Dark Witches. An outsider could not possibly control it.


    Unfortunately, she did not know, nor could she understand, the power of the Chip in Greem¡¯s mind.


    It didn¡¯t matter what power or attribute an item possessed. The Chip would always find a way to manipte and use it!


    Power was power. There was no elementium power in the world that belonged solely to an individual or a group.


    Except for divine power, of course.


    With the assistance of the Chip, Greem could use the Orb of Shadows for himself. Though he couldn¡¯t use it as proficiently or as easily as the Dark Witches, merely controlling the power inside was still well within his ability.


    Greem didn¡¯t have to do anything against Shani¡¯s attacks. All he had to do was use the Orb of Shadows to dispel Shani¡¯s control over the surrounding shadows. With a single order from Greem, all of the shadow substance in the library surged towards the Orb of Shadows, like birds returned to their nest. The library once again returned to its normal state.


    Cutting the river at its source.


    Without the endless shadow substance, Dark Witch Shani was like a fish stranded on the shore. Not only did she lose the cover by which she could hide herself, but she also could not even cast most of her spells.


    Dark Witches were an unusual upation that was somewhere in-between a caster and an assassin. Now that Shani had been forced out of her shadows, she was far less dangerous and far less of a threat.


    Shani let out a scream as thick ck smoke appeared around her once again, attempting to engulf her figure.


    Unfortunately, Greem simply lifted the Orb of Shadows and waved it at her. The ck smoke was instantly sucked away, leaving Shani exposed once more while she was trying to escape.


    ¡°Bastard...you ought to die!¡±


    Shani screamed wildly, but she could only rely on the shadow substance within her to summon a Fourth Grade shadow dragon andmanded it to attack Greem with all it had.


    Unfortunately, even though shadow dragons had Physique and Strength that could rival ordinary dragons, there was simply too much shadow substance within their bodies. As long as there was shadow substance, the dragon could not escape the control and restrictions of the Orb of Shadows.


    Greem stood proudly with the Orb in his hands.


    Before the shadow dragon could reach him, the shadow powers from the Orb had already bound the dragon and restrained it entirely. Deep-ck shadow powers stretched across the dragon¡¯s body, turning into solid ck chains and keeping it immobilized.


    ¡°Holly, if you don¡¯t strike now, I will activate the Seed of Darkness!¡±


    With the Orb of Shadows in Greem¡¯s hands, none of Shani¡¯s attacks were effective against Greem. As such, she could only resentfully cast all her hopes on Adept Holly.


    As she shouted, the doors to the library split apart with a loud thud. A three-meter-tall giant humanoid in strange silver armor charged into the room.

 Chapter 1124 - Desperate Shani

    Chapter 1124 Desperate Shani


    Greem lifted an eyebrow when he saw Adept Holly suddenly break into the room. There was no sense of desperation on his face. On the contrary, there was a genuine, heartfelt joy.


    Adept Holly roared as his massive astral construct lunged at Greem with lightning speed, propelled by several beams of starlight. Meanwhile, Witch Shani stepped back and started making gestures in the air as she preparedrge-scale dark magic.


    However, as Adept Holly lunged forward, he suddenly turned in mid-air. His steel fist punched towards Shani¡¯s chest, engulfed in blinding starlight.


    This sudden and unexpected twist caught Shani entirely by surprise!


    The sinister smile on her face had yet to fade and was instantly reced by a look of horror and shock.


    Usually, Dark Witches like herself specialized in Agility and Spirit. There was almost no chance they would ever be caught in an ambush by the enemy. Even a strike at close range could not be faster or more subtle than a single thought of hers to teleport away.


    However, at this moment, she had been fullymitted to her spell and could not break her concentration. Moreover, all the shadow substance in the hall had been sucked away by the Orb of Shadows. Trying to dodge this attack with Shadow Teleportation was impossible under such circumstances.


    Shani almost went mad with anger.


    She forcefully stopped the spell she was channeling and raised her body with her incredible Agility, without pausing to quell the magic backflow that had resulted from the canction of the spell. In doing so, the punch just barely missed her chest and crashed into her stomach instead.


    The wild, ferocious force and that fearsome starlight power instantly turned into a single surge of energy that prated through her abdomen. The iron fist reached through her body, and a purple fountain of blood sttered everywhere.


    Shani let out a cry of agony. Her entire body abruptly erupted into ck mist, shooting to a corner of the hall where it reformed into her battered and broken body.


    Shani stumbled backward when she reappeared. She sped the gaping hole in her stomach with both hands, but the purple-ck blood and flesh continued to ooze through her fingers, slowly dripping to the ground and forming a murky pool beneath her feet.


    Of course, if it had just been an ordinary punch with only physical force behind it, Shani would still be able to fight despite the severe injury. She could quickly recover from severed limbs and missing body parts with the high-grade potions and equipment she had taken from Holly.


    However, what truly threatened her was the endless starlight power contained within the punch.


    Its unusual and wicked power was like countless needles stabbing into her body. It was quickly consuming her tendons, flesh, and organs. Affected by this starlight power, Shani had already lost control over her damaged body parts. She could not channel any energy through them either.


    Shani coughed as she limped forward. A fountain of blood continued to pour from her mouth. She could feel her strength fade away from her rapidly.


    ¡°W...why? Are...are you not afraid that...I will activate the Seed of Darkness...in you?¡± It was a simple sentence, but Shani paused again and again, having to stop to cough up the blood in her throat.


    Holly stood in his ce, slowly pulling his fist back towards himself. His merryughter rang out from the astral construct, mixed with the boundless hatred he now held for Shani.


    ¡°Of course, I am! Of course, I am afraid! But Sir Greem has already assured me that your Seed of Darkness will never be activated while he¡¯s around. Hehehe, tell me, do I still need to be afraid of you when I have his word?¡±


    ¡°Bull...shit. The Orb of Shadows is the sacred origin treasure of us Dark Witches. Only we know how to control and use its powers. It hasn¡¯t even been a month since that bastard got his hands on the Orb. He...¡± Blood spilled forth from both of Shani¡¯s gaping ¡®mouths.¡¯ She had a vicious and ugly expression on her face, one of utter disbelief.


    However, while she was screaming with all she had, a ck, radiant halo descended from above. The halo was filled with a strange energy and enveloped the astral construct. It was shadow power.


    ¡°Dark Sanctuary.¡±


    Shani¡¯s screaming came to a halt as she repeatedly mumbled the name of this spell to herself.


    With the protection of Dark Sanctuary, Shani would not be able to remotely control the Seed of Darkness in Adept Holly¡¯s body at all. It was impossible to reestablish a connection with the Seed of Darkness without breaking this Dark Sanctuary.


    It was not possible to iste shadow power with elementium of any other attribute, but shadow power itself could achieve this feat!


    As such, when the badly bruised Shani saw this seemingly flimsy halo of shadows, her entire mental state copsed into despair.


    Her stuff neck slowly turned towards the young fire adept who was smiling coldly and giddily at her with the Orb in his hand. Mockery was written all over his face, and disdain was deep in his eyes.


    ¡°Just a few unimpressive dark spells. It wasn¡¯t so hard to learn them after all. Please, Lady Shani, do tell me if there is anything dissatisfactory about this Dark Sanctuary of mine!¡±


    Shani¡¯s face instantly flushed wide as endless anger appeared in her eyes.


    Dark Sanctuary? An unimpressive spell? Damned bastard! Dark Sanctuary was a Fourth Grade support shadow spell. Even Shani herself couldn¡¯t cast it with such ease and speed!


    Was he really a fire adept with elementium specialization? How...how exactly did he do it?


    The smile on Greem¡¯s face did not fade in front of Shani¡¯s furious gaze. Instead, his smile became even brighter and gentler.


    Due to his fire specialization, he should not have been able to use any shadow spells!


    However, ever since Greem obtained the Orb of Shadows, he had ordered the Chip to rapidly analyze the dozen shadow spells in its data library.


    After all these years of wandering the World of Adepts, Greem had traveled to the Silver Union, the Northern Lands, and most provinces in Zhentarim. The Chip had a catalog of over four hundred spells of the various attributes in its library.


    That said, due to his specialization, Greem had not been able to use any spells other than those of the fire attribute. These spells in the data library were mostly used as samples and reference for the modification and optimization of his own fire spells.


    Now that he had the Orb of Shadows, it was as if he possessed an adept with endless shadow power subordinate to himself. Greem only had to have the Chip construct the models of shadow, then direct the Orb¡¯s powers into these models, and he would be able to cast shadow spells.


    During this spellcasting process, the Orb of Shadows acted as the source of power, while the Chip in his mind manipted the power. Greem only had to watch the entire process from the sidelines.


    It was the method he had invented to use the Orb of Shadows for himself!


    However, Greem made sure to put on a show of casting the spell itself, so that no one could see what he was really doing.


    At this moment, Greem was unusually mysterious in the eyes of Holly and Shani. He had achieved the impossible! He had managed to cast spells beyond his elementium attribute!


    Shani¡¯s heart was in despair at the current situation, while Adept Holly simply justified Greem¡¯s abilities as part of his unusual elementium talents. None of them suspected anything.


    Greem alone was difficult enough to deal with, now that he had the Orb of Shadows. With Holly joining the fray with a burning hatred for her, Shani immediately knew that her assassination was doomed. She prepared to escape once more without any hesitation.


    Since she couldn¡¯t use Shadow Teleportation, Shani¡¯s entire body instead erupted into ck mist and shot towards the only exit of the library.


    As Shani escaped, she also used all the shadow power within her body to form ck, solid shadow arrows and fired them at the other two adepts. She was hoping the barrage of arrows could dy them.


    Adept Holly panicked at the sight of this. He endured the barrage of arrows and charged at the exit, attempting to intercept Shani before she could escape. Meanwhile, the legendary fire adept remained rooted in ce without moving a single inch. There was only mockery on his face as he looked at the fleeing Shani.


    Shani¡¯s heart trembled when she picked up on the fire adept¡¯s behavior. An ominous feeling arose in her heart.


    Dammit, the fire adept must have prepared something for this scenario. What could it be?


    Just then, Shani abruptly stopped in front of the wooden doors. The ck mist gathered, and she materialized once more, but she did not take a single step forward.


    There, with the light shining behind them, stood a towering and ferocious figure.


    Shani¡¯s heart sank into the abyss when she saw that unusually familiar figure and the aura she was all so acquainted with. It seemed so difficult for her frozen heart to beat even once.


    ¡°Mangus...Cherisha.¡±


    Shani spat out these two names with difficulty. She finally knew what the legendary fire adept¡¯sst trick was.


    The cowardly two-headed siblings!


    Even though Shani regarded the siblings with disdain, they were a proper Fourth Grade adept after their transformation. In an actual fight in her peak condition, Shani had confidence in defeating and killing these barely-Fourth Grade siblings in just five minutes.


    But now...


    Shani despaired, sensing the nearly empty supply of blood and shadow power within herself, and sensing Adept Holly, who was quickly approaching with all his might and power.


    Unless the God of Adepts himself descended at this very moment, she could not possibly make it past Mangus and Cherisha before Adept Holly reached her.


    A violent surge of power exploded before the wooden door once again!


    Caught in a pincer attack between Holly and the siblings, Shani was finally crushed into ck mist once again. However, this time, Greem waved the Orb of Shadows before she could escape elsewhere and rematerialize. A giant shadow hand wrapped around the mist and trapped it firmly.

 Chapter 1125 - Shani Falls

    Chapter 1125 Shani Falls


    ¡°Let me go.¡±


    ¡°Greem, Holly, Cherisha, don¡¯t you forget. I came here to Morrian with all of you. If I die here, my n leader won¡¯t let this issue slide.


    ¡°If you don¡¯t want to be perpetually pestered by the Dark Witches, you will let me go now!


    ¡°I¡¯ve given up on this mission! I promise never to harass you again.¡±


    As expected of the Northern Witches. Being the sole rulers of the Northern Lands, they were a unique group of adepts, far more unreasonable and demanding than any of their counterparts. Even in this moment of life and death, Shani¡¯s tone had not softened at all. In fact, she was vaguely threatening the three of them, as if she would continue fighting at the drop of a hat.


    ¡°Why don¡¯t we...just force her to make an origin oath and let her go?¡± Cherisha hesitated before speaking.


    Out of fear and respect for Greem¡¯s power, the two siblings had no choice but to participate in encircling Shani. However, now that they were deciding Shani¡¯s fate, they behaved as cautious and careful as before.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. They were not in any way core members of the Adept¡¯s Association. They were often brushed off and pushed around by the higher-ups of the Association. Otherwise, they would never have been arranged to participate in such an extremely dangerous otherworldly battlefield.


    It was only natural they became apprehensive at the thought of the infamous Dark Witches of the Northern Lands.


    ¡°Hmph! In my opinion, we should destroy her body one more time and make her revive all naked again! This way, she will need at least fifteen days of recovery. She won¡¯t be able to disrupt our operation again.¡± Adept Holly cursed angrily.


    His tone was fierce, but it was obvious that he didn¡¯t dare to offend the Dark Witches too much either.


    Since ancient times, the Northern Witches had always been the most united and protective of their members!


    Moreover, they were also exceptionally unreasonable among adepts!


    If one offended the Dark Witches, they would ambush you and assassinate you over and over without regard for their own lives. Not only were they incredibly proficient at shadow magic, but their soul energy pools could revive them over and over, allowing them to fight with reckless abandon. Anyone would hate to make an enemy out of a group of fearless, undying shadow assassins.


    ¡°Kehkehkehe. It seems like you know what¡¯s good for you! I admit defeat on this mission. I promise before we return to the World of Adepts¡ª¡± Perhaps sensing the reluctance in the two adepts, Shani¡¯s tone was just as unrestrained as ever before, even though her physical body was now firmly restrained by the shadow hand.


    However, before she could finish speaking, the shadow hand that Greem had created with the Orb of Shadows clutched tight, crushing her materialized body into mincemeat.


    Shani¡¯s voice came to a halt.


    Even Holly and Cherisha couldn¡¯t help but lift an eyebrow at the sight of this. Their eyes were filled with a conflicted look, one of both glee and worry.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it!


    Greem tossed the Orb of Shadows lightly in his hand and waved it at the flesh all over the room. Infinite shadow power appeared out of thin air and broke down the flesh into nothing.


    Greem opened his palm, and a pitch-ck light shed from the Orb. Countless swaying, ck chains reached out from within, shooting into the space around them like sharp arrows.


    A cry of agony could be heard in the air. It was a familiar voice.


    A brief momentter, the ck chains slowly retracted, dragging a restrained soul out of the air. Judging from its appearance, it was Dark Witch Shani, who had once again lost her physical body.


    If Shani was only scared before this, then this time she was genuinely terrified!


    The reason the Dark Witches were so fearless in the face of death was due to that unique revival method of theirs.


    It didn¡¯t matter how many times they were killed; their souls could always escape to the prepared soul energy pools via their unique technique. Then, after a few weeks of recovery, they would be able to rematerialize their bodies.


    It was this undying trait of theirs that made the Dark Witches the most difficult opponents amongst the Northern Witches!


    However, Greem had managed to use the distinctive characteristics of the Orb of Shadows to forcefully drag her soul out of the air before it could escape to her soul energy pool. If anything else were to happen to Shani¡¯s soul, she would be truly dead. There would be no chance of revival for her.


    The circumstances were beyond her abilities!


    She had no choice but to lower herself now.


    Just as Shani¡¯s soul trembled in a desperate attempt to negotiate with Greem, he simply put his lips together and blew. A translucent golden fire gently washed over Shani¡¯s soul, instantly burning holes in it until it finally dissipated into the air.


    A tragic scream could still be heard echoing in the ears of the three adepts.


    Adept Holly and the two-headed siblings opened their eyes wide in shock. They had to grit their teeth to stop themselves from crying out in surprise.


    They were truly shocked and slightly terrified, as well.


    That had been an actual, proper Fourth Grade Dark Witch!


    And he chose to kill her without any further thought?


    After all, in Central Zhentarim, any Fourth Grade adept could be a powerhouse that ruled over an entire province. A Fourth Grade adept alone would be enough to prop up a massive human empire and a longsting major adept n.


    The other three major organizations were far more strict in their management of Fourth Grade adepts. However, at the core of the matter, every Fourth Grade adept was the most precious asset of a significant organization. No one was willing to let them go to waste like cannon fodder.


    But now.


    Right before their eyes.


    An intermediate Fourth Grade Dark Witch, a Dark Witch whose name was established even in the Northern Lands where talent was found everywhere, a Dark Witch of such repute, had been killed with the ease of killing a dog or a chicken. Even thest remnants of her soul had been thoroughly extinguished.


    Just imagine, what kind of mental impact could such an extreme psychological blow have had on the two adepts?


    At the very least, even Adept Holly, who had hated Shani with a passion before this, turned pale at the sight of her death. An indescribable feeling of sympathy for someone whose position he could have been in rose in his heart!


    When the two adepts once again looked at Greem, their eyes were filled with respect and fear.


    ¡°No need to worry,¡± Greem chuckled and said, ¡°The reason they sent Shani out to this foreign ne to kill me is to avoid any sort of divination. Once we return, we just have to make sure our ounts of the events are the same. We just have to insist that Shani died during a fight against an otherworldly creature. The Dark Witches won¡¯t be able to disprove us or verify the truth of our words when it all happened so far away.¡±


    Greem continued when he saw how pale the two adepts were, ¡°Moreover, Morrian ne is about to experience total destruction. Everything here will return to chaos and nothingness with the disintegration of the nar consciousness. Will you two still be worried about some great diviner making the trip here just to search for the truth behind Shani¡¯s death? This ne probably won¡¯t even exist by then.¡±


    The two adepts¡¯ expressions finally turned better when they heard this.


    Of course, it was simply them persuading themselves that the situation wasn¡¯t all that terrible!


    After all, given how unreasonable the Dark Witches were, they probably had no intention of letting them go unscathed from the moment they sensed Shani¡¯s death. That said, now that she was already dead, what could they do? Hope for Greem to take full responsibility for the matter?


    They were still in a foreign ne. Moreover, one of them was weaker than the average adept, and the other was grievously injured. Neither of them could risk infuriating Greem. If they did do so and Greem decided to kill them to seal their mouths......


    Perhaps it was because they realized this that Adept Holly and the two-headed siblings all put on smiling faces and started cursing about how shameless and sinister Shani had been. From how angry they appeared to be, you would think they wanted to tear her apart and burn her to ashes all over again if she appeared in front of them once more.


    That said, no one really knew what they were thinking on the inside!


    ¡°Since you two have no objections, we will deal with the matter as such! We will say Shani died in the battle against Scourge Lord Illhoof. Speaking of which, I was wondering why Shani¡¯s equipment looked so familiar. I assume it must be yours, Holly! If that¡¯s the case, then you should have it back!¡±


    Adept Holly retrieved the equipment scattered all over the ground with a bitter face.


    The equipment was all his, but, at this moment, he could find no cause for joy!


    Greem looked around the library after dealing with the matter with Shani. He couldn¡¯t help but let out a silent sigh.


    The battle from earlier might have been brief and small in scale, but it had still brought about destructive damage to the library.


    It was like a ss-ten typhoon had ravaged the library. All the furniture and shelves were in disarray. The arcane barriers that protected the tomes had now lost all their arcane radiance, and the tomes themselves had been eroded to dust by the wild shadow powers.


    With how utterly destroyed the ce was, there was no longer much meaning in searching this location.


    Boom!


    All of a sudden, a loud explosion could be heard from above the library. Plenty of dust and debris came cascading from the ceiling above.


    ¡°Ah...Fre, you despicable fool. You only dare to fight me because of that arcane barrier around you. How dare you injure me. Just you wait. Once my actual body projects power down onto this ne, I will devour you in a single bite.¡±


    Illhoof¡¯s strange hissing voice rang out in the air, sharp and high-pitched. It hurt just to hear him.


    Judging by his tone, it seemed like Illhoof had suffered a little defeat at the hands of the Fifth Ring arcanist!


    ¡°Let¡¯s go and take a look. We might just be able to benefit from this!¡± Greem chuckled, a cold light piercing through his eyes.


    ¡°Gr...Lord Greem, you see, the er...Seed of Darkness in me?¡± Holly hesitated for a moment but finally put forth the right attitude.


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to worry; the Seed of Darkness is dormant at the moment. It won¡¯t affect you all that much. Moreover, I haven¡¯t fully grasped the powers of the Orb of Darkness. It is going to be a little difficult for me to get rid of the Seed of Darkness in the short term. Don¡¯t worry about it. Once I figure out how it works in a few days, removing the Seed of Darkness will be an easy matter.¡±


    Greem stepped out of the library ahead of everyone else.


    The two-headed siblings followed closely after.


    Adept Holly remained stunned on the spot. Several different expressions flickered on his face. All of a sudden, he shivered, only then realizing that the other two had already left. Adept Holly quickly followed in their footsteps.

 Chapter 1126 - Ultra-Grade Battlefield

    Chapter 1126 Ultra-Grade Battlefield


    The battle in the sky was utter chaos at this point.


    In general, the fighting was mostly between the arcanists and the otherworldly invaders.


    However, who among these invaders¨Cwho were powerful enough to set foot on this foreign ne¨Cwas not a bloodthirsty predator in their own right?


    Whenever any of the invaders became weakened for whatever reason, they instantly became ideal prey in the eyes of the other invaders.


    Every single invader was keeping an eye out on their otherpetitors as they fought viciously against the arcanists.


    Whenever an invader slipped up or got caught in the arcane barrage of the arcanists, countless bloodthirsty predators would descend upon them. The battles and conflicts that resulted from this were even wilder and more savage than the assault on the arcanists.


    Greem saw all sorts of creatures and beings on this colorful battlefield. Ferocious disaster creatures of unusual size, powerful starbeasts with odd appearances utterly unlike those of any material creature, believers of the World of Gods, sinister liches of the Great Pan-Universe Alliance of Liches, elementium lords from the elementium worlds, merfolk, archons, underminers, ironforged......


    These invaders from all over the universe summoned even more creatures as they fought: wild beasts, fierce magical creatures, alchemical constructs, magical creations, and even elementium lifeforms.


    Otherworldly creatures of all shapes and sizes could be seen everywhere atop the slowly crashing floating city. They all belonged to different factions, but they were all fighting ferociously across the chaotic city. It was hard to discern to whom each of the summoned creatures belonged now.


    Lich Kanganas had opened a portal of the undead, summoning an entire army of skeletons from his personal skeletal ne. These undead were rampaging through the city unfettered. The prideful elementium lords were not to be outdone either. They all summoned elementium portals of their own, bringing forth hordes of elementium creatures into this foreign ne.


    With these two forces of nature devastating the area, the other invaders had no choice but to head elsewhere, as much as they wanted a slice of the pie as well. Otherwise, they would be in deep trouble if they got caught in the crossfire!


    Even more otherworldly powerhouses were prowling the ravaged battlefield, searching everywhere for prey they could sink their fangs into.


    Greem and the other two adepts were among these individuals, hunting for a bounty.


    ............


    The floating city.


    Above the ruins of the arcane pce.


    This ce was the main battlefield now, and the ones fighting were Illhoof and ady in green robes with a gold circlet on her head.


    This once majestic and towering arcane pce had been the absolute core of the floating city.


    Unfortunately, the shockwaves from the battle between the two powerful individuals had thoroughly destroyed everything. All the arcane buildings had been reduced to rubble, and all the low-grade adepts had lost their lives. The only things left were four unusual stone pirs, each standing over thirty meters tall and two meters thick.


    These four pirs were arranged in a square, each of them a corner of an arcane altar. Together, they sustained a semi-translucent elementium dome that firmly protected the altar. It didn¡¯t matter how intense the fighting was; none of the shockwaves could shake it at all.


    An unusual rune glowing with a faint yellow light was slowly spinning above the altar. The elementium flux emanating from the rune was defined, seemingly resonating with some remote ce far away from the city.


    Illhoof stood above the ground, his four limbs firmly rooted to the earth like pirs of stone as he continuously extracted earth elementium from the ground.


    A massive ball of earth measuring ten meters in diameter enveloped him, blocking any and all attacks fired at him.


    The ball of earth mended itself whenever it was damaged, sustained by Illhoof¡¯s incredible supply of earth elementium. There was no concern about it being broken down by the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    Even while he was on the defense, Illhoof continued to summon thick earth spears and fired them at thedy standing proudly above the altar. The earth spears would shatter into a rain of pebbles upon contact with the elementium barrier around the altar. A loud explosion would ur every time this happened.


    Every one of Illhoof¡¯s attacks was utterly horrifying. They caused massive clouds of dust to rise into the air and ripples to spread across the elementium barrier.


    Thedy in the green robe was more than an equal match. Two arcane crystals, half the size of human heads, hovered around her. Whenever she flicked her fingers, blinding, violent lightning crackled forth from the crystals. The lightning split Illhoof¡¯s protective earth dome apart, sending rocks flying in every direction.


    A scorched patch of skin could vaguely be seen on Illhoof¡¯s neck. It seemed like he had been injured at the hands of the arcanist.


    Greem stopped at a distance with Holly and the siblings. They observed the fighting from afar.


    They were Fourth Grade as well, just as the two terrifying individuals on the battlefield were. However, the difference in power couldn¡¯t be any clearer uponparison. In fact, they were hardly evenparable!


    The energy intensity of the battlefield had reached over two thousand points in Greem¡¯s Elementium Sight. That was only the energy reaction caused by the shockwaves radiating from their attacks. The offensive power of their actual attacks was probably over five thousand points.


    Five thousand points.


    Attacks of such power would be enough to instantly kill any one of the three adepts, including Greem!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help butment how simple the fighting between ultra-grade individuals was while he watched from the sidelines. The attacks of both fighters were just so direct and straightforward. There were no fancy attacks or unnecessary,rge area-of-effect spells.


    Illhoof used the same two spells, the earth dome for defense and the earth spears for an offense. Though the earth spears were shockingly powerful, the pattern of attack was dull and nd. Meanwhile, thedy in the green robe finally settled on electric magic after trying several different elementium attacks on Illhoof and confirming that lightning was the most effective. She then simply bombarded Illhoof with lightning bolts, over and over again.


    It wasn¡¯t that the two of them didn¡¯t have more fancy or boraterge-scale magic. Instead, it was because they knew that unconcentrated power was no threat at all to their opponent. Only highly concentrated energy could inflict damage to the enemy.


    That was why their means of offense and defense were so simple and direct.


    That was because the energy intensity of every single spell was horrifyingly high!


    Combat technique, fighting technique, casting technique; these were all crucial factors inbat often touted by individuals of lower grades. However, these were all overshadowed by the terrifying power of ultra-grade individuals.


    It didn¡¯t matter what strategy you used or what style ofbat you employed. A little candle me with five thousand points of intensity would turn you to ashes in the blink of an eye.


    Dodging your opponent¡¯s attacks through movement? Prating through the gap in your enemy¡¯s defenses with superior Agility?


    It was important to note that despite the number of otherworldly invaders on this floating city, hardly any of them could even approach Illhoof or the arcanist in terms of bodily attributes. Not to mention actually surpassing them and obtaining a sizeable advantage on the battlefield!


    If Greem were to intervene in an ultra-grade battle like this without a n, even surviving would be a matter of luck. How was he supposed to force his opponents to reveal weakness and look for a chance of victory?


    The green-robeddy was obviously the Fifth Ring arcanist of the floating city, Arcanist Fre. It wasn¡¯t a surprise that she possessed such overwhelming power. Meanwhile, Scourge Lord Illhoof also demonstrated incredible might far beyond that of what he had shown when he fought against Greem and the others. Somehow, he had be so ferocious and terrifying all of a sudden. He was able to square off against a Fifth Ring arcanist without yielding a single step.


    Greem could sense a distinct aura of power from him.


    It seemed like the Sixth Grade Lord of Eternal Night behind Illhoof had projected a portion of his power to him. There was no other exnation for why Illhoof had be so powerful!


    A Sixth Grade was a Sixth Grade, after all. Even if he was still controlling the same body and the same earth elementium, the consciousness of a Sixth Grade Scourge Lord was enough to amplify Illhoof¡¯s powers by several factors. It was like he was an entirely different person altogether.


    It was, perhaps, why ultra-grade powerhouses were so powerful!


    Greem, Holly, and the siblings subtly concealed their auras as they secretly watched the battle from the side.


    Several other equally unusual and powerful soul auras were hiding around this battlefield. It seemed like these beings were also secretly observing the fight, just like them.


    Meanwhile, the god believers were fighting with Lich Kanganas in a different area. It was a violent battle as well, with endless energy tremors spreading through the air.


    Greem faintly sensed the unique flux of an artifact in the energy aura.


    These so-called artifacts were, in truth, Fifth Grade items or magical equipment!


    The Orb of Shadows in Greem¡¯s hands could be considered a support-type artifact.


    Meanwhile, as the new leader of the Witches of Fate, Alice had plenty of artifacts in her possession. The Staff of Divination had been sealed and damaged. At the very best, it was considered a pseudo-artifact. Apart from the Staff of Divination, Alice still had the Cards of Fate, the Hourss of Time, the Witch¡¯s Mask, and the Mercury essories, all of which were Fate equipment. They were incredible magical items that were as powerful as artifacts.


    Moreover, they were custom equipment for the Witches of Fate!


    It was the reason why Alice could speak with equal authority with the other Fourth Grade witch leaders as a Third Grade herself!


    It was precisely because of how familiar he was with artifacts that Greem was so sensitive to their uniquew aura.


    After a simple evaluation of the situation, Greem determined that he did not have the ability to benefit from this battlefield at all, not while all these greedy wolves were looking on from the sidelines as well. He quietly notified his twopanions, and the three of them snuck away to another battlefield.


    A kilometer and a half away, Lich Kanganasmanded a massive undead army in an encirclement against a group of god believers.


    These believers wereposed of three spiritualists and five temr knights. The aura radiating from their persons was pure and strange. It was a power utterly distinct from the power system of the adepts.


    Greem snuck close to the battle, secretly scanning for the opponents¡¯ bodily attributes and the intensity of their power. The Chip¡¯s feedback caused him to fall silent in thought.

 Chapter 1127 - Libram of Wisdom

    Chapter 1127 Libram of Wisdom


    ording to the strict power system of the World of Adepts, these believers did not even qualify for Fourth Grade. The bloodline aura radiating from their bodies was not only thin but extremely weak as well.


    The three spiritualists themselves were barely at the level of First Grade adepts, while the other five temr knights were onlyparable to Second Grade body-refining adepts. Coming to an otherworldly battlefield with such weak power was usually suicidal.


    However, as these believers prayed devotedly, they somehow managed to summon several brilliant divine halos with the aid of the items in their hands. These halos stacked on their bodies,yer afteryer, perfectly assimting with their own power and causing their energy aura to increase, grade by grade.


    Before receiving the effects of the divine halos, the believers had practically been chicken to the ughter. However, when the divine halos appeared around them, each and every one of them became mighty and ferocious. They were fearless, even when surrounded by hundreds and thousands of high-grade undead.


    Blinding light radiated from the five temr knights as they formed a loose perimeter and cut down the undead with their shining longswords.


    Two spiritualists in ornate robes stood behind them, holding holy tomes in their hands and using their power to erect a Holy Ward that enveloped an area of several hundreds of meters. White light appeared on the bodies of all undead that entered the Holy Ward. The fearsome sizzling sound of corrosion could be heard from the skeletons, almost as if they were being soaked in pure holy water.


    A so-called undead was the corpse of an intelligent creature brought to life once more through the use of magic. Most of them had already lost all their former intelligence. The only thing left was their instincts for murder and obedience to the spellcaster that raised them from the dead.


    As such, most undead magic was created with negative energy at its core.


    When the negative energy in the undead corpses was neutralized and purified by the holy energy in the Holy Ward, the evil cores naturally dispersed without any difficulty.


    The low and intermediate-grade undead fell to the ground like rotten wood upon entering the Holy Ward. Their shriveled bodies quickly turned into puddles of ck liquid, which was then purified by the Holy Ward as well. Only high-grade undead could endure the purification by the holy energy with their tough flesh and dense death energy.


    Lich Kanganas was one of the seven kings of the Skeletal ne; his undead army was not so easily beaten.


    A massive skeletal creature stood at the back of the army. It seemed to have been a humanoid in life and stood at over twenty meters tall, its entire body made of dark, ck bones.


    A small tform pieced together with white bones could be seen on the giant¡¯s back. A throne of bones sat atop the tform, made of countless skulls.


    Kanganas sat upon this throne, tapping the armrest with one hand while resting his head on the other. He watched the blooding carnage before him with casual disinterest.


    Meanwhile, five lesser liches stood around the skeleton giant. They wore human-skin robes and skeleton crowns while holding bone staffs in their hands. Each of them stood in a core node of the pentagon array beneath them, endlessly summoning even more undead subordinates of greater power from the Skeletal ne.


    In Kanganas¡¯ eyes, the five temr knights and the two archbishops were not a threat at all. The only one he was wary of was the young man hiding behind all of them. He was the one who held the Libram of Wisdom in his hands and was reading through its contents.


    The young man¡¯s appearance was mundane, and his figure was just as frail as a mortal¡¯s. However, ayer of golden light as thick as armor shimmered around him. All evil and corruption were purified when they came into contact with this golden light. It radiated a powerful, pure, and holy power.


    As he quickly flipped through the pages of the Libram of Wisdom, the golden light around the believers grew thicker and thicker. It was almost as if countless tiny angels with wings on their backs were flying and circling in the air enveloped by the radiating light, singing praises to the gods with their cheerful voices.


    All evil within the radius of the holy light melted like snow under the sun.


    Even from several kilometers away, Greem¡¯s eyes were fixed dead upon the Libram of Wisdom that the young man held in his hands. He could clearly see traces of unusualw powers foreign to Morrian ne contained within the holy light of the Libram of Wisdom.


    The ability to extend thew powers of a foreign ne despite the suppression of Morrian ne¡¯s nar consciousness! Nothing other than an artifact could aplish such a feat!


    [Beep. Detecting unusual power aura. After analysis, said power belongs to the faith system. Judging by the attribute and characteristics of the power, initial estimates suggest the item is a token of a God of Wisdom.


    [Token Form: Libram.


    Token Attribute: Knowledge.


    Token Grade: Fifth Grade (Artifact).


    Token Purpose: Enlightenment.


    Token Description: This item contains a God of Wisdom¡¯s views and opinions on nes, space, knowledge, and power.]


    As the Libram of Wisdom was enveloped by tremendous holy power, the Chip could not obtain too much information from a long-range scan. However, judging from the aura radiating from the Libram, it was most certainly an incredibly powerful artifact of the knowledge attribute.


    That also meant that the young man with golden hair was most likely an important believer of a God of Wisdom from another ne. He might even be a son or avatar of the god himself. Otherwise, that god would never have entrusted him with such a precious and vital artifact, nor allow him to bring it to a foreign ne.


    ¡°A God of Wisdom?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but mumble to himself.


    Gods of Wisdom were often known as Gods of Knowledge as well. These gods did not have manybat skills and were not often favored bybatants and fighters. Consequently, it took an exceptional amount of time and effort for Gods of Wisdom to be born,pared to the average god.


    In fact, many Gods of Wisdom became prey to other evil gods or demi-gods during the process of their growth, due to theirck of fighting skills.


    It was all these factors that caused there to be very few known Gods of Wisdom in the World of Gods. Moreover, those that existed had very weak divinity, only limited to Fifth or Sixth Grade. There were hardly any Gods of Wisdom above Sixth Grade.


    Greem licked his lips.


    If it were any other artifact, he would have given up all thoughts of obtaining it, considering the difficulty of such a task!


    After all, most artifacts had strict conditions for usage. It was difficult tomand the artifacts even after getting your hands on them.


    However, this was the artifact of s God of Wisdom. Objects of this sort were incredibly powerful and could be used by anyone who was a spellcaster themselves!


    Lich Kanganas might look ugly, but he was still a true spellcaster.


    No wonder he had given up on all other prey and focused entirely on devouring these bold believers of the God of Wisdom. He had even summoned the undead army of his Skeletal ne for this very purpose.


    However, Lich Kanganas¡¯ battle against the believers wasn¡¯t going very well either.


    After all, Gods of Wisdom belonged to the pantheon of order. They possessed incredibly pure holy power. The attribute of their abilities was a good counter to undead magic.


    Moreover, since the god was willing to bestow his artifact on his followers, he had most certainly left a divine brand on the artifact. Should its owner die and the object itself change hands, the divine brand would bring it back to the God of Wisdom. It didn¡¯t matter where the artifact was located. The god would be able to open a channel of faith through the divine brand and guide the artifact and the believer¡¯s soul back to him.


    The only one that could break this process was another artifact or another god!


    It was these harsh conditions of obtaining a god¡¯s artifact and the threat of infuriating a god that kept many evildoers at bay.


    However, Greem was not one to be intimidated.


    He came up with a simple and feasible n of action almost immediately and secretly contacted a few ¡®old friends¡¯!


    ............


    ¡°Lord Mietzel, that evil lich is way too difficult to deal with! Don¡¯t you think...we should head in a different direction and avoid him?¡±


    After an hour of endless ughter, plenty of undead had been purified, but the numbers of the undead around them did not seem to decrease. In fact, with the constant summoning of the lich¡¯s array, more and more powerful undead were appearing among the ranks of the undead army.


    First Grade ck knights were hardly seen now. Even a high number of Second Grade vampires and Third Grade death knights had been purified. Apart from these, there was also an incredible number of ghouls, abominations, and wraiths.


    These creatures were far weaker, but it was very exhausting to purify them in such high numbers.


    As such, Antonio, one of the two archbishops responsible for Mietzel¡¯s safety, couldn¡¯t help but speak up at the sight of the endless undead.


    The young man who was flipping through the Libram of Wisdom finally lifted his head.


    ¡°Everyone¡¯s tired? Let¡¯s turn around then! But be careful. That lich won¡¯t let us leave so easily. Moreover, the Libram has just warned me that a new enemy has set their sights on us. Something unexpected might happen soon!¡±


    The young man known as Mietzel had curly golden hair, and the calm light of wisdom glowed in his jade-green eyes. He might be surrounded by countless undead, but there was no fear nor worry on his face.


    ¡°A new enemy? My lord, did the Libram specify the identity of the new enemy?¡± The other archbishop, Rousseau, couldn¡¯t help but interrupt.


    The young man smiled.


    ¡°You two should know that it¡¯s somewhat difficult for father to channel his divine power into this Morrian ne. The Libram can only vaguely warn me of a new enemy. It¡¯s hard to obtain any more specific information other than that. Haha! If the Libram could aplish such a feat, then my father could probably switch to being a God of Divinations!¡±


    The two archbishops didn¡¯t find the young man¡¯s joke all that funny. They quickly spoke up and warned him, ¡°My lord, it¡¯s best not to make such jokes again. You might think of them as jokes, butments on the divinity of the gods involve the order amongst the gods. Should such words get to the ears of the corresponding gods, it would be¡ª¡±


    ¡°Alright, alright. It is a foreign ne, after all. Do you really think those gods have nothing better to do than listen in on us while we are so far away?¡± Upon seeing the stubborn faces of his two ¡®bodyguards,¡¯ the young man could only shake his head and say, ¡°Very well, I¡¯ll listen to you. I won¡¯t make jokes like that again!¡±

 Chapter 1128 - Detect Evil

    Chapter 1128 Detect Evil


    The battle was as intense as ever.


    However, the young man and the two archbishops of the Church of the Omniscient Eye were still rxed.


    It was simple. They were powerful enough to escape unscathed!


    Their purpose in breaking into Morrian ne was none other than to collect the high-grade arcane knowledge of the Arcane Empire that even the gods themselves envied.


    Hierro, the God of Wisdom, ruled over the divinity of knowledge and learning. Any knowledge brought back from a foreign ne would increase his divine power, not to mention a civilization asrge as the Arcane Empire with as unique of a knowledge system as theirs.


    If Hierro could take all of the Arcane Empire¡¯s experience, he would have the chance to shake off his identity as a vassal god to the God of Order and Justice. He could instantly advance to be the God of Omniscience, an Eighth Grade deity in his own right.


    It was only then that he would have the power and qualifications to start a pantheon of his own!


    However, all this was only a fantasy.


    It didn¡¯t matter how badly beaten the Arcane Empire was; two Eighth Grade Arcane Emperors still supported them. There was no way the entire Empire would fall into the hands of a mere Fifth Grade God of Wisdom.


    As such, Hierro only sent out his most trusted son, Mietzel, to collect as much of the Arcane Empire¡¯s knowledge as possible.


    The believers had waged war against the evil lich out of their distaste for him.


    However, upon realizing that they had no means of quickly exterminating the lich, the two archbishops instead wanted to abandon the battlefield and head elsewhere to search for loot.


    Just as they gathered their divine power and prepared to break through the encirclement of undead, two unusual figures charged onto the battlefield.


    An unexpected change?


    All the members of the Church of the Omniscient Eye stopped and looked at the two individuals that had just appeared.


    They were not allies. Instead, they seemed to opponents.


    One was an evil adept in yellow leather armor with two heads, one male and one female. The other was a muscr holy knight wearing mysterious runic armor and brandishing a holy sword in his hand.


    The two of them appeared to be surprised by the battle urring here when they arrived. They stopped their fighting and started to evaluate the battlefield carefully.


    ¡°An adept and a holy knight! They have different beliefs, distinct attributes of power, and opposing factions. It¡¯s not a surprise they are fighting against each other.¡± The eldest Archbishop Antonio identified the two neers with a single nce and softly exined them to the young Mietzel.


    As one of the more infamously powerful factions in the multiverse, the Adepts had always been regarded as an evil faction. Meanwhile, holy knights could be considered as part of the faction of order due to the Holy Light they wielded.


    However, holy knights were stubborn zealots that refused to give up their ideals. They regarded all other powers apart from the Holy Light as false gods and devils, often making them oppose believers of the pantheon of order.


    Still, where evil powers existed, the holy knights knew well enough to set aside their differences and unite with the god believers!


    Lich Kanganas looked down at the two-headed adept from above his throne, cackling sinisterly as he spoke, ¡°Isn¡¯t this the tiny adept that slipped away from my fingersst time? What¡¯s happened? Was your luck so terrible that you ran into a turtle shell this time?¡±


    Holy knights always donned an entire set of holy armor. It bestowed them with a sacred light barrier of shocking defensive power. They were the most resilient profession, even amongst other warriors and knights.


    It was no wonder that the lich would mock them as ¡®turtle shells¡¯!


    Greem, who was dressed as a holy knight, stepped forward and shouted loudly, ¡°Blessed be the Holy Light! You evil and foul creatures, kneel before the great Holy Light and repent your sins. Or I, Greem, will exterminate you all in the name of the Holy Light!¡±


    Everyone on the battlefield felt their brains short-circuit when they saw the prideful Greem with that righteous expression on his face. It all felt so ridiculous.


    Come on! It was obvious that the evil factions were the ones with the upper hand here. The forces of justice were the ones being pushed back! To think one would dare to insult everyone alone, making enemies out of both the lich and the adept. This...how blindingly devout to their beliefs did they have to be to do such a thing?


    The knights and archbishops of the Church of the Omniscient Eye were stunned at the stupidity of the holy knight. Even Mietzel couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    Dammit, even I don¡¯t dare to be so arrogant when my dad¡¯s an actual god. Where did this brainless musclehead find the courage to be so reckless? Are holy knights always so suicidal?


    Four parties had appeared on this battlefield now, each representing a faction of their own.


    They could still vaguely be split into two opposing camps of contrasting attributes. There was the faction of evil¨C the lich and the adept. Then there was the faction of order¨C the believers of the God of Wisdom and the holy knight.


    Even though different factions within the same camp still often fought against each other, they had to maintain a united front against the opposing camp in a situation like this. At the very least, internal conflict was undesirable until the enemy was defeated.


    ¡°My lord, can you confirm this holy knight¡¯s identity?¡± Archbishop Rosseau leaned by Mietzel¡¯s ear and whispered.


    ¡°Let me try.¡± Mietzel was young, but as someone chosen to be a wielder of the Libram, he had naturally possessed incredible power from birth.


    The Libram of Wisdom in his hands flipped open on its own ord. When it finally stopped on a particr page, a golden circle of light rippled outwards.


    Undead fell where the golden halo traveled. Only intermediate and high-grade undead could survive, screaming as they fled from the region engulfed by the golden light.


    Like a divine spell whose power had overflowed, the golden halo quickly washed over the two-headed adept, the evil lich, and the holy knight.


    The two-headed adept let out a grunt, putting out a thin but firm mental barrier to protect themselves, letting the golden halo naturally part in front of them.


    Meanwhile, Lich Kanganas did not fear power of this level at all. He let the golden light wash over his body. The pure holy power shed with the evil aura on his jade-white skeleton, neutralizing each other and causing no harm to him at all.


    However, the skeleton giant beneath Kanganas seemed to have been angered by the golden light. He lifted his head and let out a voiceless roar, summoning a tide of death energy to resist the holy power.


    Greem stared at Mietzel angrily. He then let out a grunt, raised his holy sword, and shouted.


    ¡°Light¡¯s Haven!¡±


    As he shouted, shimmering holy light flowed from the longsword, protecting him firmly in ayer of radiant holy light. It didn¡¯t matter how the golden ripples washed over the barrier; they could not do anything to the holy light.


    The two distinct powers only needed to sh slightly, and the owners of the forces instantly knew the attributes of the opponent¡¯s power.


    ¡°It is indeed the power of Holy Light!¡±


    The believers of the Omniscient Eye let down their guard after confirming Greem¡¯s identity. They nodded at Greem with an apologetic look in their eyes for that ¡®misfire¡¯ from earlier.


    Archbishop Antonio even extended an invitation to Greem to exterminate the evil in front of them. The other believers did not raise any objections.


    That was because the infamous ¡®temper¡¯ of the holy knights had misled them.


    A holy knight¡¯s belief in the Holy Light dictated that they strike out against evil wherever it was. However, they also held the knight¡¯s code of not actively attacking any non-evil creatures.


    Many young and immature holy knights had been tricked into fighting evil creatures, only to fall to a hidden dagger to the back.


    Even so, the holy knights still firmly upheld their ideals and beliefs, never regretting it, even if they paid with their lives.


    The believers of the Omniscient Eye couldn¡¯t be more eager to pull Greem over to their side. They wanted to use him as a scapegoat to fend off the attacks from the two evil beings in front of them.


    Greem strode forward without hesitation after obtaining the invitation of the god believers.


    White holy light flickered in his hands as he walked forth, turning into white beams thatnded on the temr knights of the Church.


    Detect Evil!


    This holy spell was usually used to identify the nature of an unknown creature. It did not inflict any damage to an opponent.


    Evil creatures would glow a bright red beneath the holy light. The more evil the creature, the brighter the light. Meanwhile, beings of order would release white light, while neutral creatures would glow green.


    Casting Detect Evil on believers of the God of Wisdom was an act of offense in itself. Anger appeared on the faces of the temr knights.


    Hurling Detect Evils everywhere they went. It was probably one of the most hated habits of the holy knights!


    The believers of the Omniscient Eye gritted their teeth and said nothing.


    This bastard! There¡¯s no respect at all! Our equipment, our spells, the way we are dressed. It¡¯s all so obvious! Still, he has to cast Detect Evil over and over again! What a stubborn fool.


    Shua! Shua! Shua!


    The holy lightnded on the temr knights and detected no problem at all.


    Thus, the holy light then bent and shone towards the three spiritualists instead.


    Tolerate, tolerate, tolerate; we will trick this brat into running at the lich and the adept after this!


    The spiritualists cursed angrily in their minds, all while putting on an awkward but not impolite smile.


    However, just as the holy lightnded on Mietzel, the milky-white light suddenly turned into a blinding red light.


    Blindingly red, ringly red, shockingly red.


    ¡°Evil...evil creatures must be cleansed!¡±


    Greem shouted out loud. Pure and powerful holy light erupted from this sword as he swung at the utterly surprised Mietzel.

 Chapter 1129 - The Battle Erupts

    <h4>Chapter 1129 The Battle Erupts</h4>


    Mietzel was evil?


    How could that be possible?


    You would know that wasn¡¯t possible even if you were thinking with your feet!


    Even though the two archbishops and the five temr knights were not bothered by the assessment that Mietzel was evil, their hearts still dropped for a moment when they saw the blinding red light. Their minds stalled for an instant.


    However, they immediately realized that something was wrong!


    Detect Evil was amon holy spell. Everyone here was capable of using it proficiently. Naturally, this meant they were well-acquainted with its effect. The core of a divine spell should be pure positive energy. No magic elementium could be mixed in with the spell. Why was it then they could sense traces of fire elementium in that blinding red light?


    No! Something was wrong with the spell!


    Their minds quickly returned, but by the time they realized something was wrong, the towering holy knight was already swinging his glowing sword down on Mietzel.


    The thinyer of holy light around the sword suddenly copsed as the sword was swinging down. Terrifying golden mes surged forth from within like a ferocious tide, instantly engulfing everyone in a sea of fire.


    Unprepared. Truly unprepared!


    Even though the believers of the God of Wisdom had already been on guard against this unfamiliar holy knight, they had never expected him to strike so viciously upon meeting. Moreover, it was such a ferocious and brutal attack.


    There was an unusual trace of gold in the pir of fire that caused the mes to inflict unspeakable agony. Both the temr knights in their armor and the archbishops in their soft robes couldn¡¯t help but turn pale at the sight of the wild mes.


    The divine halo around them crackled as the golden mes burned. One by one, the halos broke down.


    The fire burned through one defensiveyer after another. In the blink of an eye, it threatened to burn their actual bodies!


    ¡°Dammit! It¡¯s an impostor. Kill him!¡±


    ¡°Protect the lord!¡±


    The panicked shouting and scrambling caused this organized party to fall into chaos instantly. Some of them hastily added more divine shields around them. Others lunged recklessly at Greem while some looked around them cautiously.


    The temr knights were no weaker than Fourth Grades under the effects of all these divine halos. Greem had no interest in testing how sharp their des were with his own body. Thus, after disrupting their ranks with a Scarlet Firestorm, he stomped the ground with both feet. A terrifying Doomsday Volcano erupted beneath them all.


    The earth abruptly shattered from the violent force of the mes bursting from below. A loud rumbling rang out as the shape of the volcano started to form, an endless river ofva and scorching fire spewing forth from the crater.


    The temr knights had just rushed up to Greem when they were blown away instantly by the shockwave and the heat. All the divine shields around them turned red from the mes, almost as if they were on the brink of melting. Even their holy armor became boiling hot despite the divine shields¡¯ protection. All of their exposed hair was burned to a crisp, and even their skin began to dry and crack.


    Naturally, as temr knights selected to protect the son of god, all of them were highly capable!


    Even as they were blown into the air by the pirs of mes, and even as their bodies burned with an unnatural heat as if they would be devoured by fire at the very next moment, they still calmly chanted their prayers.


    ¡°Divine Blessing!¡±


    ¡°Valor!¡±


    ¡°Invigorate!¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    Several divine halos emerged from their bodies as they shouted, forcing back the fire and protecting themselves.


    However, it didn¡¯t matter how courageous or fearless they were. They had been blown into the sky by the eruption and werending in separate locations due to the flow of theva around them.


    Naturally, their formation was shattered!


    The only ones that had a consistent response in all this chaos were the two archbishops and the young man they were protecting.


    Theybined their forces and created a nearly solid divine shield in front of them, shielding them from the flood of fire andva. Even though they were still knocked around by the force of the torrent, they were not separated by the mes as the temr knights had been.


    The young Mietzel red at the towering, zing figure of Greem from within his barrier. The pages of the Libram of Wisdom in his hand flipped ording to his will, finally stopping on a particr page.


    ¡°Sword of Judgment!¡±


    As Mietzel¡¯s somewhat frustrated voice rang out, a mysterious sword of light of concentrated divine power quickly appeared in front of him. On thest syble of the word, the mysterious sword glowed with a powerful light. It instantly cut across a hundred meters, piercing through Greem¡¯s body of fire and sinking deep into the ground behind.


    Greem¡¯s eyes froze for a moment. He lifted his head and looked at the small hole in his fire barrier. He looked down and examined the hole in his body. A sense of horror crept through him.


    A terrifying, peak Fourth Grade single target divine spell.


    The power of the sword was condensed and concentrated, with an intensity of over six thousand points!


    If it weren¡¯t an attack of this intensity, it would never have been able to shatter all sevenyers of Greem¡¯s fire defenses in a single strike and proceed to tear a gaping hole in his body. If the Chip had not told him to shift his body slightly to the left, the Sword of Judgment would have shattered his Heart of Principles, causing him to regress to Third Grade.


    If such a thing were to happen on this chaotic and violent otherworldly battlefield, then Greem would meet his tragic end!


    There was no time to think. Greem erupted into mes immediately, avoiding the next two attacks that shot towards him.


    The two archbishops had also started retaliating after stabilizing their defenses.


    However, they were unleashing divine spells with their own power, while Mietzel was summoning divine magic through the use of the Libram. Naturally, the might of their spells and their spellcasting speed was utterly iparable.


    Holy Judgement!


    Seal of Wisdom!


    They were two single-target Fourth Grade divine spells. One had an offensive power of 2,100 points, while the other had an attack power of 1,700 points. If they had managed to hit their target, the umted holy damage would be enough to injure Greem.


    The archbishops did not give up after seeing Greem dodge their first attacks with Fire Teleportation. The prayers and praises they sang to the God of Wisdom continued, and they were soon prepared to fire their next round of divine spells.


    However, at this moment, a terrifying barrage descended from a distance!


    Hymn of Death!


    Wind Vortex!


    Soul st!


    The first spell was cast by Lich Kanganas, while the other two were from Mangus and Cherisha!


    The three proper Fourth Grade spells immediately destroyed the divine shields, causing a violent elementium storm to form in between the believers of the Omniscient Eye.


    In particr, Lich Kanganas¡¯ attack contained a wild shockwave of death energy. A sinister, cackling skull formed above anyone touched by the death energy. The skull would then shatter into gray mist and seep into the victim¡¯s body.


    The victims of the spell would feel their life force rapidly drained away from their bodies until only half was left.


    It wasn¡¯t a lethal attack, but it significantly exhausted the stamina of its victims!


    The faces of the two archbishops turned pale as their life force drained away.


    Mietzel, the son of the God of Wisdom, did not escape from the skull either.


    However, when the gray mist entered his body, the Libram of Wisdom in his hands suddenly glowed brilliantly. A golden vortex appeared above the Libram out of nowhere, forcefully dragging the gray mist out of Mietzel¡¯s body and absorbing it into the vortex.


    Mietzel lifted his head when the golden vortex finally vanished. His face was pale, and there was unconceble terror and rage in his gaze towards Lich Kanganas.


    His face hadn¡¯t turned pale due to any damage he had sustained. Rather, he had simply been shocked by the lich¡¯s attack.


    Almost everyone at their level had their own iprehensible and unusual attacks that could inflict actual damage on their opponents.


    Any tiny mistake, and you could fall at your opponent¡¯s hands.


    The Sword of Judgment that Mietzel had summoned and Lich Kanganas¡¯ Hymn of Death were both high-grade spells of this nature. However, while Mietzel had only been able to summon the Sword of Judgement through the artifact in his hands, Lich Kanganas had achieved his fearsome attack with his own exceptional spellcasting technique and overwhelming death powers.


    The two of them might seem equal in power, but there was a clear and distinct difference!


    A loud explosion rang out as Greem reappeared a kilometer away from the battlefield.


    The gaping hole was still there, even after he reformed his body. The terrifying divine power that had attached itself to the wound was still corroding his body.


    The Sword of Judgment was not Mietzel¡¯s own power. It was a powerful spell that had been sealed inside the Fifth Grade Libram of Wisdom. It vaguely contained a trace of the God of Wisdom¡¯s terrifying powers.


    [Beep. Detecting a high-energy foreign substance in the host¡¯s body. The substance is currently destroying the host. The substance possesses powerful assimtion and infection powers. Rmend that the host dispel the substance as soon as possible.]


    ¡°How can I dispel it?¡±


    [Beep. Methods of dispelling are as follows:


    1. Disperse the energy body and abandon infected parts. Note: This option will cause the host to lose 7% of the remaining fire energy. This fire energy cannot be replenished for the remainder of the fight.


    2. Draw upon the Heart of Principles and use the principle mes to neutralize the Divine Power of Wisdom. Estimates suggest that this will cause the Heart of Principles fire output to be reduced by 28% for the next thirteen minutes.


    3. Use the powers of the Orb of Shadows to wash away the Divine Power of Wisdom. Note: This option will require the host to endure the effects of shadow shockwaves.]

 Chapter 1130 - Lies and Deception

    <h4>Chapter 1130 Lies and Deception</h4>


    The three different options each had their benefits and problems.


    Greem chose the first option with almost zero hesitation.


    He still had big ns for the Orb of Shadows, and it wasn¡¯t wise to reveal it so early. They were also in the midst of a ferocious battle where thirteen minutes of weakness was not eptable. Greem could only choose the first option.


    Temporarily losing 7% of his fire powers wasn¡¯t the best oue, but it was eptable given the current circumstances!


    Another loud, fiery explosion rang out as Greem¡¯s entire body turned into mes once again.


    Much like before, most of the golden mes scattered everywhere before being gathered together by an unknown force. Unlike before, 7% of the mes did not disperse, but instead silently burned without moving.


    When Greem once again rematerialized, the divine aura had utterly vanished from his body!


    Lich Kanganas and Mietzel, both of whom were still engaged in a deadly duel, couldn¡¯t help but turn their heads and look at Greem. They were all surprised and shocked by Greem¡¯s subtle control over his elementiumized body.


    In particr, Mietzel frowned deeply. He had a feeling that things were turning south.


    He knew his own situation best, after all. The Sword of Judgment he had used earlier was not a spell that could be cast without cost. The entire Libram of Wisdom contained only two high-grade spells, one for offense and one for defense. Both of these spells had been imprinted in the Libram by the God of Wisdom Hierro himself.


    These two high-grade divine spells were also Mietzel¡¯s greatest guarantee of surviving this trip to Morrian ne!


    Once fired, the spells required a three-hour cooldown to gather divine power once again.


    Mietzel¡¯s only ace for the next three hours was that divine defensive spell. The Sword of Judgment was now stuck in a low cooldown period.


    Even though Mietzel could unleash many other Fourth Grade divine spells with the Libram of Wisdom, he only had two of these peak Fourth Grade spells. Every spell used would be one consumed. If the Sword of Judgment had been able to exterminate the fiery fiend in a single strike, it might have been able to intimidate the rest of the opponents.


    However, the fiend had not only survived, but he had survived his hidden ace with such an ¡®insignificant¡¯ cost. How could Mietzel not be furious and terrified?


    Greem¡¯s disruption sessfully scattered the members of the Omniscient Eye.


    Under Lich Kanganas¡¯mand, a massive horde of high-grade undead swarmed forward and kept the five temr knights away from the center of the battle. Meanwhile, Kanganas attempted to intercept the three fleeing spiritualists under the escort of his royal guard. A real battle between Fourth Grades had begun.


    Divine magic filled the air, just as death energy rushed forward!


    The battle between the spiritualists and the lich filled the entire battlefield with violent and chaotic energy shockwaves. All creatures with insufficient magical or physical resistance were broken down and disintegrated by the energy vortices, reduced to mere bones before they fell from the skies.


    The two-headed siblings only managed to fire two barrages of spells at Mietzel before they were surrounded by severalrge and ferocious undead. It was almost as if the undead were trying to warn them away from the battle.


    Greem grunted and appeared beside the siblings with Fire Teleportation. His body swelled rapidly as he once again transformed into the me giant. As he waved his hand, a five-meter-tall astral construct quickly flew over from a distance. It crashed into the ground loudly, sending all the nearby undead flying a hundred meters away, along with several tons of dirt from the field.


    The appearance of the three Fourth Grade adepts immediately stunned the two parties inbat.


    Greem had secretly sent a voice transmission to the lich to discuss the matter of attacking the god believers prior to his attack. However, it was apparent that Lich Kanganas wanted to keep Greem and the two-headed adept away from the battlefield after Greem¡¯s ambush. He wanted the Libram of Wisdom all for himself.


    Indeed, it wasn¡¯t just Greem who had his sights set on the Libram of Wisdom. Lich Kanganas was also greatly moved by that Fifth Grade artifact.


    However, now that Greem had summoned Adept Holly, any thoughts of taking advantage of the adepts faded from his mind instantly.


    As prideful and arrogant as he was, Lich Kanganas did not dare to face three Fourth Grade adepts all at once.


    It was especially so when these three adepts were clearly allied and cooperative with each other. It significantly amplified theirbat prowess, so much so that even the evil lich didn¡¯t dare to start a fight so simply.


    The believers of the Omniscient Eye were greater in number, but they were weaklings who were only able to fight through the power of divine halos. Their bodily attributes might be a hundred times better than the average mortal, but they were still nothing more than ants beneath the eyes of a Fourth Grade lich.


    If they were separated from the divine halos around them, Lich Kanganas would be able to ughter them as easily as if they were chickens under his culling de!


    It was this confidence that prompted Lich Kanganas to leave his undead army behind to dy the temr knights, while he himself focused on the god¡¯s son. The two archbishops were of no concern either. In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for the Libram of Wisdom, Kanganas would be able to endure their attacks and charge to their sides before using his death magic to turn them into piles of bones.


    The magic resistance of a Fourth Grade lich was no small matter! How could it possibly be prated by ordinary spells or divine magic?


    Now that Greem had revealed his true limits, Lich Kanganas had no choice but to ept the reality¨C the reality that the three adepts now formed a powerful force that even he could not ignore.


    The presence of these adepts was more than enough to turn the battle against him!


    ¡°Adept, does our agreement still stand?¡± Kanganas¡¯ tone even softened, as he proactively attempted to negotiate with Greem.


    Poor lich! The evil liches were terrifying individuals who had always crushed everyone around them wherever they went, enemy or ¡®ally.¡¯ When had they ever actively approached their prey for negotiations?!


    ¡°Of course, it does!¡± Greem chuckled, and a smile appeared on his fiery face. ¡°Let¡¯s work together to take down these religious hacks. The spoils will belong to whoever gets their hands on it in the end. What is it, sir? Could you be afraid of being at a disadvantage despite all the undead you have on your side?¡±


    ¡°Very well. It is settled!¡± The soulfire hidden behind Lich Kanganas¡¯ ruby eyes subtly scanned the three adepts. He couldn¡¯t help but startughing sinisterly and coldly when he sensed Greem¡¯s beginner Fourth Grade aura.


    Beginner Fourth Grade. It didn¡¯t matter how talented Greem was to have grasped some of the firews at beginner Fourth Grade; he would not be able to harness the power of the Fifth Grade Libram of Wisdom. An artifact with an owner could only be bound and sealed with the power of a Fifth Grade, be that a person or another artifact.


    As such, Lich Kanganas epted Greem¡¯s offer without any hesitation!


    The joining of forces between the two evil factions immediately put the scattered believers on the back foot.


    This ce was another world, after all, not the origin ne they had been born on.


    Though the Libram of Wisdom could continuously project divine power across billions and billions of kilometers from its origin ne, it was extremely costly to do so.


    The God of Wisdom might be able to sustain such expenditure of power if he was a higher god.


    Unfortunately, God of Wisdom Hierro was only an inferior Fifth Grade deity.


    Mietzel, the son of Hierro, might be able to hang on with the blessing of the Libram of Wisdom. Divine halo after divine halo formed around him into thick and firm divine shields that kept the enemies¡¯ spells and magic at bay. Meanwhile, the two archbishops did not have such a powerful tool at their disposal. After several waves of ferocious attacks, they buckled.


    The divine shield around Archbishop Rousseau was the first to shatter. Several terrifying attacks struck him and instantly killed him.


    Lich Kanganas¡¯ death energy first corroded the archbishop¡¯s body, the gray mist sizzling as it ate away at the flesh until everything was gray.


    The flesh wilted and rotted away, just as the bones calcified in the blink of an eye.


    Archbishop Rousseau, who held the title of the Divine Guardian, was eroded into a gray, colorless skeleton in less than three seconds. All his flesh, tendons, and organs had vanished without a trace. Several other terrifying attacks then arrived, shattering Rousseau¡¯s bones into dust and sending the powder into the air.


    ¡°Rousseau!¡± Anthony screamed in sorrow. There was only a thinyer of divine shield around him as well. It trembled and rippled incessantly beneath the opponents¡¯ attacks, obviously on the verge of breaking as well.


    ¡°My lord, please run! I,¡± Anthony¡¯s eyes were bright red now. It was obvious he had prepared himself for death, ¡°I will buy time for you with all of my ability!¡±


    Having said that, Anthony gave up all meaningless resistance. He lifted his hands before his chest, palms facing up as he devotedly began to sing a mysterious prayer in anguage that Greem and the others could not understand.


    When the prayer rang out, the Fourth Grades in the battle couldn¡¯t help but be lulled into rxation. Their consciousness faltered temporarily. Their attacks stopped as they became enamored by the low and lingering sound of the prayer, almost as if they had forgotten the battle itself.


    Meanwhile, trails of blood flowed down from Anthony¡¯s mouth and nose, even as he continued to sing. Two streaks of ck blood could also be seen racing down from his eyes. Even so, he did not stop singing. Instead, he continued his prayers in a tragic, sorrowful manner.


    Meanwhile, Mietzel turned and ran without looking back the moment Anthony¡¯s prayer began. He had no intention of helping Anthony attack the enemies at all.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The Prayer of God¡¯s Praise was a suicidal ability, meant to drag the enemy to the grave along with the caster.


    Should Mietzel attack any of the enemies, he would awaken them from the illusion and cause Anthony¡¯s sacrifice to have been in vain.


    Mietzel had just flown a thousand meters away when a light flickered around Lich Kanganas. He had managed to escape from the illusion. He was a lich, after all, and had much higher magic resistance than the adepts. Breaking free of the illusion¡¯s control was not difficult at all.


    Kanganas looked at the three hypnotized adepts whose defenses were still fully functional and instantly made up his mind. His figure flickered as he chased after the god¡¯s son.


    Once Kanganas had left, Greem abruptly opened his eyes......

 Chapter 1131 - Conflict of Interest

    <h4>Chapter 1131 Conflict of Interest</h4>


    With the aid of the Chip, there was nearly no chance of Greem being controlled through charms or hypnosis.


    As such, he had been calmly observing the lich¡¯s each and every action from the start.


    If Kanganas had decided to abandon the god¡¯s son and instead target the adepts, Greem didn¡¯t mind surprising him with a savage assault.


    Now that Kanganas had chased after the god¡¯s son, Greem had no more need to keep up his disguise. He hurled a Magma Fireball at Anthony before rising to the air without hesitation and chased in the direction that the god¡¯s son had fled.


    The explosive power of the Magma Fireball was clearly not enough to kill an archbishop of the Omniscient Eye. However, as Anthony coughed up blood from the me shockwaves, Holly and Mangus awoke from their bewitched mental state.


    With the two of them staying behind, there was no chance for Anthony or the temr knights to escape.


    In the end, these believers were merely ordinary mortals. They had only been able to disy incredible power through the support of the divine halos. Now that their divine power had reached its limits, two Fourth Grade adepts were more than enough to bury them eternally upon these foreignnds.


    Greem traveled through the sky rapidly.


    To avoid rming the lich, Greem did not choose to use the shy Fire Teleportation. Instead, he enveloped his body with golden mes and turned invisible as he flew.


    The floating city would crash into the ground in less than half an hour. When that happened, everything on the floating city would be destroyed in a violent impact.


    There wasn¡¯t much time left for Greem and the others!


    The god¡¯s son, known as Mietzel, flew through the air quickly. So quickly, in fact, that sparks had appeared on the divine shield around him due to friction against the air and the scattered energy in the air. Meanwhile, Kanganas pursued tightly from behind, having turned into a cloud of death energy.


    Two meteors, one white and one gray, cut across the horizon at blinding speed. Naturally, this pursuit drew the attention of the other predators.


    Gaha!


    Ear-piercingughter rang out as two individuals of unusual appearance rose into the skies on a ferocious two-headed eagle. Theyughed brazenly as they charged at Mietzel.


    ¡°Stay, human.¡±


    These two individuals had humanoid forms and wore gray robes. They had arge mouth, a long nose with fleshy tendrils, and ears. Yet, strangely enough, neither of them had eyes.


    Underminers. These two were underminers from an unknown ne!


    Perhaps their intention on intercepting Mietzel was to take advantage of his unfortunate situation. However, they were kicking a steel te.


    Mietzel, who was already furious at being pursued by a lich, opened the Libram of Wisdom without hesitation. As the pages rustled and flipped, two blinding spears of light shot forth in the blink of an eye.


    The two underminers couldn¡¯t even finish their lines. The spears of light prated their forcefields, their bodies, and the eagle beneath their bodies. They crashed from the sky, screaming tragically as they did so.


    The Libram of Wisdom in Mietzel¡¯s hands was simply too powerful.


    Even though they were Fourth Grades as well, the two underminers were shot down in a single attack.


    However, this brief dy with his actions allowed Kanganas to catch up with him. The lich cackled coldly as he formed over a hundred bone arrows around him and fired them towards Mietzel.


    It might look like Mietzel had an incredibly easy time dealing with the two underminers, but he could not deal with the vicious lich at all, not with the lich¡¯s immunity to all low and intermediate-grade magic.


    Mietzel could only scream at the sight of the hundred arrows. He quickly poured his divine power into the Libram of Wisdom, forming a thin but incredibly resilient divine shield to survive this wild barrage.


    Meanwhile, Lich Kanganas took advantage of Mietzel¡¯s diverted attention to seal off his path of escape. He then chuckled coldly and approached the god¡¯s son.


    ¡°Kanganas, don¡¯t you back me into a corner. Once my father knows it¡¯s you who killed me, he will bring all his forces to destroy your Skeletal ne.¡± Mietzel obviously knew Lich Kanganas fairly well. He immediately started threatening the lich when he saw him seal off his path of escape.


    However, his threats felt empty and hollow, no matter how he spun it!


    ¡°Kehkehkehe. As long as I trap your soul and kill all the people you brought with you, nothing will happen. How is your beloved father supposed to find you then? Don¡¯t forget that this is Morrian ne. There are so many ultra-grade powerhouses fighting here that the lines of Fate are already a mess. Hehehe. Even if your father had a divination divinity and a massive amount of divine power, he would not be able to divine anything from this world. Not to mention, from what I know, your father Hierro has no divination ability to speak of!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t dream of obtaining the Libram of Wisdom!¡± Terror appeared even more obviously on Mietzel¡¯s face upon hearing this. ¡°Father has already left his divine brand on the Libram. There is no way you can keep it with you, and anyone who touches the Libram of Wisdom will be sensed by my father and pursued to their deaths!¡±


    ¡°What a pity then! It seems like I can only harvest your soul. Kehkehkeh, the Fourth Grade soul of a god¡¯s son. Not a bad harvest indeed!¡±


    The evil liches were proficient at toying with souls. Their favorite activity was inserting powerful souls into various magical items, such as the Ghost Lamps of Ruination, the Howling Thrones, or the Screaming Crystals. They would then spend hundreds and thousands of years to break down these souls.


    The tragic cries and ceaseless begging of the poor souls might be torture and an annoyance to the average person. However, for the naturally evil liches, these screams of terrors were the most beautiful and moving music in the universe.


    As such, death was not the end of any life that fell at the hands of a lich. Instead, it was the beginning of an even longer, even more painful journey for their soul!


    As much as Mietzel was a match for Kanganas¡¯ power, he couldn¡¯t help but feel a genuine fear in the depths of his heart when his eyes met Kanganas¡¯ cold, evil, and bloody-red soulfire.


    Halo of Fear!


    It was a natural aura around all high-grade evil creatures. It instilled fear in all lifeforms that could see them or sense their presence. An instinctual desire to run would rise within them.


    Supposedly, someone of Mietzel¡¯s level should not have been affected by a lich of the same grade. Unfortunately, it was because he was too rational and knew too much about the liches that he had been terrified by the fate of defeat he had imagined for himself.


    Since ancient times, those who overthought had never been suited to be warriors!


    They could not understand the pleasure of battle, nor did they believe in miracles. They believed blindly and firmly in statistics, results, and conclusions they extrapted from their own knowledge.


    Rationally deducing that he was not a match for the lich, Mietzel became so terrified that he gave up all desire to fight. His only thought now was to escape this situation of certain defeat!


    He was already weaker than Kanganas, to begin with. Now that he was further gripped by fear, the scales of the battle only tipped further away from him.


    Several Fourth Grade spells crashed against Lich Kanganas¡¯ jade-white skeleton, to no avail. None of them could hurt him whatsoever. Mietzel then gave up on offense entirely, dedicating all his divine magic to increases his defenses and escape.


    In doing so, Lich Kanganas was free to be more brazen and ferocious with his assault!


    If it wasn¡¯t for the Libram of Wisdom, Kanganas might have already taken Mietzel down.


    Unfortunately, it was a Fifth Grade artifact after all. It helped Mietzel weather the ferocious storm of attacks from the lich, saving him from certain death again and again. Even so, Mietzel was coughing up blood from all the death magic he had been hit with. His life force was rapidly draining away.


    Awkward. It was extremely awkward!


    Lich Kanganas realized his awkward situation. Even if he were to exhaust all his magic power and cast all his spells, the best he could do was beat Mietzel within an inch of his life. Without a means to seal the Libram of Wisdom, his chances of killing Mietzel was infinitely close to zero.


    He was a Fourth Grade, after all, and assisted by a Fifth Grade artifact. In truth, his overall power was superior to Kanganas.


    However, Mietzel had clearly been too sheltered before this. He had never experienced such a bloody and cruel battlefield. His performance inbat had been greatly affected by his fear. If he could realize his circumstances in time and fight Kanganas more actively and courageously, the lich might just retreat under the threat of mutual defeat to search for easier prey.


    Unfortunately, his overly rational thought process and his blind faith in his own deductions pushed Mietzel towards the seemingly safer but truthfully more dangerous approach inbat!


    Mietzel had no idea that the lich was silently negotiating with someone else even as they were fighting.


    ¡°Help me take down this bastard. I only want the Libram of Wisdom. You can have everything else.¡±


    ¡°Hehehe, Sir Kanganas, as you know, I am only a fire adept. For what purpose would I want his body and soul? I can¡¯t change professions and be an undead adept, can I?¡±


    ¡°What is it that you want then? If nothing else, I canpensate you with some more resources. All excellent loot I collected from the Arcane Empire. Aren¡¯t you here in Morrian for that to begin with?¡±


    ¡°What about the other way around then? I willpensate you with resources, and you give me the Libram of Wisdom?¡±


    ¡°Kehkehkehe. Don¡¯t get greedy, brat! That¡¯s a Fifth Grade artifact. You sure you can seal it? If you mess up even slightly, there is no doubt that Hierro will recall his artifact.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry about whether I can seal the artifact. All I ask is for you to give me a chance. I will only try one time! If I don¡¯t seed, I will give up on everything here. It will all be yours.¡±


    Kanganas was moved by the proposition and couldn¡¯t help but start thinking about what to do.


    ¡°Very well, I ept your conditions. Help me take down Mietzel!¡±


    As soon as Kanganas finished speaking, the state of the battle instantly changed.

 Chapter 1132 - Greem’s Prowess

    <h4>Chapter 1132 Greem¡¯s Prowess</h4>


    How powerful had he be, exactly?


    It was a question that Greem had always had in his mind since a long time ago.


    The enemies he had faced in the past had always relied on strategies or negotiations or guerri tactics, leaving Greem with no opportunity to unleash the full extent of his powers. Moreover, his powers were always in a dynamic state of change and rapid improvement. He stillcked a standard forparison of sufficient substance. Thus, he could not urately weigh or assess his actualbat prowess in detail.


    Today, God¡¯s Son Mietzel had be the whetting stone by which Greem could prove himself.


    Once the lich transmitted his intent to cooperate to Greem¡¯s mind, he unleashed his most ferocious and unrelenting attack without any hesitation.


    Countless dark red spots suddenly appeared on the battlefield. An endless spout of fire energy surged forth from these spots. The fire energy did not disperse. Instead, it gathered wildly around Greem, manifesting in the form of a fearsome me giant that stood over a dozen meters tall.


    In truth, every single higher-being was capable of realizing the gigantification of their bodies through the concentration of energy. However, without a powerful and constant supply of energy to sustain this form, the gigantification would only be a waste of power and a weakening of one¡¯s defenses. It hardly ever brought about any benefit tobat.


    Most higher beings would choose a body of appropriate size to host their consciousness. A suitable body was one that could maintain a dynamic energy bnce while maximizing the owner¡¯sbat ability.


    Lich Kanganas¡¯ first thought upon seeing Greem gigantify his body was scorn. He looked down on Greem as foolish and arrogant, utterly ignorant of the fact that an appropriate size was the best way to maximize one¡¯s powers. However, when his sharp spiritual senses detected the wildly beating Heart of Principles in Greem¡¯s chest, he had no choice but to change his mind.


    A Heart of Principles of such power indeed required a massive body as a host.


    Kanganas could sense the fist-sized heart beating madly, continually pumping out an overwhelming and terrifying amount of fire energy. If Greem¡¯s manifested body were too small, this amount of fire energy would be a burden on his body.


    ¡°Fire...fire, I need more fire!¡±


    The tall, fierce me giant raised his head and let out a deafening roar upon appearing. He then waved his hand and cast out a halo of me that engulfed an area of over a thousand meters. The halo was sorge that it epassed the entire battlefield, catching Mietzel, Kanganas, and the dozenrge buildings around them in its fury.


    Where the halo of me passed by, houses copsed, and the earth cracked. A raging sea of fire devoured everything under the heavens.


    The wild and untamed mes licked away at the bodies of the two Fourth Grades furiously. It burned through their defensive forcefields, burned through their magical shields, andshed at their actual bodies.


    Kanganas was not much affected by this. He had the body of a lich, after all. He was unburdened by frail, useless flesh and tendons. What remained of his body was a skeleton, most of the bones of which had been turned into unusual magical weapons. He was not at all afraid of such an unconcentrated energy attack.


    However, Mietzel was still a human of flesh and blood.


    If you took away his divine halo and divine powers, his body was incredibly frail inparison to a Fourth Grade lich.


    When the fires brimming with the power ofws burned Mietzel, he screamed out loud. He had no choice but to activate the only remaining divine spell sealed within the Libram of Wisdom.


    Hierro¡¯s Blessing!


    Shimmering divine power flowed across Mietzel¡¯s tall and slender body, shielding him from all attacks from the outside. Even the wounds he had sustained prior to this quickly vanished in radiant light.


    Lich Kanganas waved the small bone staff in his hand. Three death arrows fired at Mietzel but were instantly dissolved by the divine light around him. They had no effect at all.


    Dammit. What powerful defensive ability.


    Still, above all else, the most annoying thing about this divine spell was the fact that it had restored Mietzel to his peak condition.


    An immovable, restored Mietzel.


    Even the cold and heartless Lich Kanganas couldn¡¯t help but feel his skull hurt at the sight of this.


    ¡°This divine spell is exhaustible. Our attacks might not be able to break it, but they can run down the divine power required to sustain it!¡± While Kanganas hesitated, unsure of whether to continue his offense or to resort to harassment to buy time, Greem¡¯s deafening voice boomed once again.


    The next second, a two-meter-thick me shockwave cut across the hundred-meter distance and washed over the Mietzel¡¯s unmoving body. The violent mes shed with the brilliant divine power, causing wave after wave of energy storms to emanate from the center of the conflict.


    Lich Kanganas had not been paying close attention to the subtle energy changes around Mietzel during his probing attacks earlier. Now, upon seeing Greem¡¯s spell sh with Mietzel¡¯s shield, he finally picked up on them.


    The energy of the indestructible divine radiance had indeed weakened slightly after Greem¡¯s attack. That meant the two of them could exhaust this divine spell entirely by neutralizing all of its energy.


    Kanganas was immediately invigorated by the hope of victory. He roamed around Mietzel, desperately trading shockwaves of death energy for divine spells against Mietzel. Meanwhile, having had his ability seen through by Greem, Mietzel would not sit still and wait for his death. He started to try his best to break through the enclosure.


    Unfortunately, the massive me giant Greem had transformed into was standing right on the perimeter. It didn¡¯t matter which direction Mietzel ran in, Greem would always appear in his path and knock him back with hisrge, zing hand.


    With the lich and the adept sealing his path of exit, Mietzel could not break through at all, no matter how hard he tried. Again and again, he was repelled. The divine defensive spell around him was gradually turning dimmer from the attacks of the two casters.


    While this spell was still active, neither Kanganas nor Greem could do anything to Mietzel. However, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine Mietzel¡¯s fate the moment the defensive spell was exhausted.


    At this point, Mietzel had given up on all thoughts of escaping. He started to use thest remaining time afforded him by his shield to attack Kanganas and Greem with all he had.


    Every one of his attacks shook the earth and sent tremors through the air. They were all powerful and destructive.


    Divine spells of surprising offensive power spilled forth from the Libram of Wisdom without end, engulfing an area of a thousand meters in the terrifying light of divine radiance. Kanganas and Greem were knocked around by the divine light. They had to dodge, all while gritting their teeth and retaliating with all they had.


    Gray death magic, ck negative curses, pale bone spears, and Greem¡¯s ferocious storm of me shockwaves. All of these attacks mingled together, shed together, neutralized each other, ravaged the battlefield, and turned it into a death zone where no other living being could hope to survive.


    Holly and the two-headed siblings stopped a thousand meters away from the battlefield. They looked upon this hell-like battlefield with horror. There was no concealing the shock and fear in their hearts.


    Naturally, having fought all the way here alongside Greem, they were all well-acquainted with Greem¡¯s might.


    However, they were still shocked to see Greem¡¯s might at his peak, when he was fighting without holding anything back.


    They had some idea of Greem¡¯s prowess, but they had no idea that he was already powerful enough to be equal to a lich and a god¡¯s son!


    Disregarding everything else, Lich Kanganas alone, despite being intermediate Fourth Grade, was more than a match for most Fourth Grades. That was because of his skeleton, which rendered him immune to most low and intermediate-grade spells. It was the same for Mietzel. The presence of the Libram of Wisdom allowed him to fight even advanced Fourth Grade powerhouses on equal ground.


    Yet, a god¡¯s son of such power had actually been forced to death¡¯s door by thebined power of Greem and a lich.


    It caused the two adepts to further dismiss and dispel any past or future thoughts of making an enemy out of Greem!


    The terrifyingmotion caused by the three individuals had naturally drawn many opportunistic predators towards them. However, when they saw Lich Kanganas on the battlefield, they quickly cast away all thoughts of intervening in the affair. All of these individuals hurried away as quickly as they could.


    Mietzel might not be all that well-known as a god¡¯s son, and Greem had no reputation to speak of, but Lich Kanganas was infamous as an ace of the Alliance of Liches. He was a horrifyingly formidable as an opponent.


    To avoid attracting unnecessary trouble, all those who believed themselves too weak to antagonize the Alliance of Liches had no choice but to give up on this battlefield and turn elsewhere to find easy pickings.


    There were over seven or eight such battlefields on the slowly crashing city.


    As such, there was no need for them to be concerned that there was no prey to be found!


    ¡°The floating city is about to crash!¡±


    No one knew who it was that shouted out loud, but these words caused the otherworldly invaders to realize the unfavorable conditions of their fight immediately.


    However, they were all incredibly invested in their battles and were all nearly at the key moment where victory and defeat would be decided. Even if the floating city were to break down and disintegrate in the very next moment, they would fight on until the end.


    The divine radiance around Mietzel was already dim and nearly lightless. Yet, he continued to attack his two enemies with all his power, silently waiting for his opportunity to arrive.


    Finally, as he hung on desperately to thest vestiges of hope, the floating city crashed onto the in.

 Chapter 1133 - Intercepted

    <h4>Chapter 1133 Intercepted</h4>


    How terrifying was the sight of a massive floating city crashing to the ground?


    It was hard to imagine such a thing with the mind alone!


    The floating city was like a small, flying continent. Its foundation was tens of thousands of tons of dense, solid rock etched with a countless number of arcane arrays and anti-gravity barriers. There was also ayer of ck dirt above the stone, over thirty meters thick. Built upon this earth were the arcane buildings of the floating city.


    When the energy core of the floating city was destroyed, the arcane arrays and anti-gravity barriers on the stone foundation lost their functions. The entire floating city then slowly crashed down towards the ins below at a tilted angle, like a sinking ship in the middle of the sea.


    A continuous series of rumbling explosions rang out.


    The entire floating city quaked and trembled.


    An iparably violent force spread out from the point of impact, causing most of the foundation¨Cnow unprotected by any arcane power¨Cto shatter and disintegrate into debris.


    Without any resistance, the floating city started to disintegrate the moment it hit the ground!


    The in beneath it suffered an unprecedented cmity. All the ground within twenty-five kilometers had been smashed into a crater. Even the broad and beautifulke nearby had been wiped away by the rain of dirt, stone, and indiscernible debris pouring from the sky.


    The earth sank, and the ground split apart. Countless pirs of dust rose to the air, engulfing every piece ofnd within fifty kilometers in a sea of dust and ashes.


    Most of the arcane buildings on the floating city had already been reduced to rubble and ruins by the invaders. Now, with the shattering of the city¡¯s foundation and the ceaseless explosions, all of the debris broke down into smaller pieces of waste, scattering in every direction.


    An ordinary person could not even survive in such a destructive disaster. However, these otherworldly invaders from all these different nes were still fighting ferociously amidst the apocalypse.


    Mietzel despaired!


    He put up a divine shield with what power he had left, protecting himself from the barrage of stone and dirt, and quickly escaped in the screen of dust created by the crash.


    The fearsome lich pursued closely after him, shrouded in a denseyer of death energy. Meanwhile, the terrifying fire adept had vanished from sight for a while now. It was likely he had been stalled by the savage and harsh conditions of the environment.


    Though there was one less enemy now, Mietzel still had no confidence in fighting against the lich.


    However, just as he gritted his teeth and fled with all his power, bright crimson light glowed from the dust in front of him. A scorching wave of heat then pressed towards his face.


    Dammit! That fire adept caught up as well.


    Mietzel turned without any hesitation, switching to a different direction where the energy flux was most intense.


    Death was almost inevitable in his current circumstances. His only way out was to reach the radiation zone created by the massive explosion of the floating city. He could rely on the intense radiation there to veil him from his enemy¡¯s spiritual senses, then proceed to find a way to flee.


    This path of escape was most definitely incredibly dangerous, but Mietzel had no other choice for the sake of survival!


    A fierce wind whistled.


    A piece of the city the size of a ser field whizzed by before Mietzel¡¯s eyes, fragments of buildings still attached to the earth along with a group of horrified arcane apprentices.


    The piece didn¡¯t fly very far before it was shattered by a series of flying rocks and broken up into many smaller pieces. The few surviving apprentices on that rock were shredded to blood mist by the energy shockwaves before they could even cry out in surprise.


    A series of explosions could be heard emanating from deep underground.


    Those were therge-scale explosions resulting from the energy core¡¯s destruction. These bursts happened throughout the entire foundation, blowing up the floating city into countless shattered zones of chaos. In fact, some secrets rooms and treasuries usually hidden underground had been revealed by these explosions, causingrge-scale looting and fighting to begin once more.


    Mietzel ran away desperately.


    After casting all sorts of divine halos on himself, he became light as a swallow and agile as a fox. He sprinted through the flying rocks and broken buildings as if he had wings, constantly changing directions as he ran.


    He kicked against a shattered piece of ground, avoided several massive boulders shooting towards him, and leaped right into a massive rift in the earth.


    Five minutester, he appeared from another rift several kilometers away from he had vanished. He looked around him and hastily turned invisible before walking into a gray pir of dust and fleeing as far away as he could.


    However, just as he reached the edge of the ruins, his footsteps stopped. He looked silently ahead of him.


    A towering figure d in bright red mes was sitting, crossed-legged, on the only patch of green left in the area. He had been silently waiting for Mietzel¡¯s arrival.


    The mes burned and swayed softly, but the patch of green beneath the me giant remainedpletely intact. It had not been ignited or scorched. It was almost as if the rustling mes did not exist at all.


    ¡°Hand over the Libram of Wisdom, and you can leave alive! Otherwise...die!¡±


    Greem opened his eyes, a terrifying red light ring from his zing eyes.


    A twisted smile appeared on Mietzel¡¯s young and handsome face. With a severe tone, he replied, ¡°Do you think I will believe you? You bunch of shameless, despicable, evil, and cunning adepts. I will never believe a single word spoken by you people.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to believe me. You just have to believe in your own judgment!¡± Greem smiled casually. ¡°Leave the Libram of Wisdom behind, and you can leave from either my right or my left. I will most certainly not stop you. In fact, I will even offer you valuable information for free: there¡¯s a lich on the left and none on the right.¡±


    Mietzel, who was already exhausted and whose divine power was at its limits, looked around him with feigned toughness. He could see very clearly that the only thing standing between him and safety was this fire adept. As long as he could escape the ruins of the floating city, his survival was basically guaranteed.


    He might not be able to beat the lich, but he was slightly faster than the undead. His chances of sessfully escaping would increase tremendously when he got out into the open field.


    After proper consideration, Mietzel stepped away and lightly ced the Libram of Wisdom on the ground. He then set a simple seal upon the Libram before carefully walking around Greem and escaping into the distance.


    The direction he chose to head in was the left!


    Greem¡¯s expression did not change. It wasn¡¯t until Mietzel¡¯s figure hadpletely vanished into the dust cloud that he stood up and walked towards the Libram.


    The Libram of Wisdomy silently on the scorched earth. A rune hovered above the copper cover of the book, still glowing with a faint, sacred light.


    ¡°Hmph! ying these tricks even when death is imminent.¡± Greem exhaled air from his nose in disdain. Blue light flickered in his eyes, instantly analyzing the magic that Mietzel had left on the book.


    The Libram of Wisdom had an owner. It was the origin artifact that the God of Wisdom had made for himself. The Libram was still branded with his divine rune. Naturally, he had handed the artifact to his son, hoping that the might of the Fifth Grade artifact could further protect Mietzel.


    Meanwhile, as the temporary owner of the artifact, Mietzel had the means to bind the object to his soul. This way, even if he was billions of kilometers away, he needed only trigger the divine rune, and the Libram of Wisdom would instantly return to him.


    It seemed like Mietzel had been trying to trick Greem into an empty deal by taking advantage of Greem¡¯s unfamiliarity with the artifact.


    Moreover, Greem discovered a terrifying, activated, and primed divine spell within the Libram of Wisdom with the help of the Chip¡¯s scan. Should Greem undo the seal, the Libram of Wisdom would instantly attack him.


    When that happened, he would have to focus on defending himself, and would not be able to stop the Libram of Wisdom from leaving.


    Greem chuckled at this setup as he reached for the Libram of Wisdom.


    However, at that moment, a ck figure rushed out from the dust cloud. Two human, yet beast-like, ws cut through the air, manifesting as a series of green ws that shed at Greem like a violent storm.


    A red figure swayed mysteriously beside the ck figure, blowing a pungent, purple breath of poison at Greem.


    Greem seemed to have detected their presence a while ago. His body erupted immediately and flickered a few dozen meters away, where he rematerialized in his human form. When he finally stood firm on the ground, two figures, one ck and one red, reced him at his former position.


    The ck figure was the werewolf from earlier, and the red figure was the foxgirl.


    It was obvious that the two of them had not had a sessful hunt inside the city. All sorts of wounds and scars could be seen on their bodies. The fact that they could not use their energy to rapidly heal their bodies despite their power was evidence of the severity of their wounds.


    However, they were two against one. Both of them stared at Greem with fierce eyes, as if they could easily take him down at any moment.


    The werewolf with the short, bristly ck hair bent down slightly, inch-long ws protruding from his hands. He waved and growled at Greem, revealing his sharp teeth inside his jaw.


    Meanwhile, the foxgirl narrowed her eyes, looking curiously at the Libram of Wisdom close to her feet.


    She might not recognize the Libram of Wisdom, but the uniquew flux of a Fifth Grade artifact and its unusual energy aura informed her of its nature.


    ¡°Tsk, tsk, tsk. You naughty fellow. To think you wouldn¡¯t know how to treasure an artifact and leave it lying on the ground like that. Why don¡¯t I keep it safe for you?¡±


    Rose, the foxgirl, giggled as she reached for the Libram of Wisdom with her slender hand without any hesitation whatsoever.

 Chapter 1134 - Artifact Obtained

    Chapter 1134 Artifact Obtained


    The small, temporary seal Mietzel had left behind could not stop the foxgirl¡¯s slender hand at all.


    There was a slight pop as the seal broke apart.


    The Libram of Wisdom turned into a ball of white light and instantly started to fly away.


    Rose, the foxgirl, covered her mouth as sheughed. Her bright red tail waved as several dozen translucent threads wrapped around the Libram and dragged it to her.


    ¡°An artifact. This is an artifact! And to think you would¡ª¡±


    She could not finish her words. The smile on her pretty face vanished, reced with one of utter terror and fear. Her tail, which was wrapped around the Libram, swung outwards in an attempt to hurl the artifact into the distance.


    But it was toote!


    Before she could react, a fearsome, blinding de of light suddenly appeared above the Libram of Wisdom and dove into Rose¡¯s voluptuous body.


    The next second, the foxgirl let out a deafening scream as the de of light cleaved her entire body in half. The warm blood inside her, as well as the shards of her organs, were all vaporized by the violent divine power. All that was left were her two scorched legs falling limply to the ground.


    The werewolf, who had been watching Greem closely the whole time, turned back at themotion only to witness the horrifying sight of Rose being torn apart by the Sword of Judgment hidden within the Libram of Wisdom.


    ¡°Rose!¡±


    The werewolf couldn¡¯t help but let out a howl of shock and fury. He turned quickly, his sharp w shing at the hovering Libam and smashing it back into the ground.


    A milky-white, holy light radiated from the Libram of Wisdom the moment it crashed into the ground. It shook violently against the earth as if someone in the distance was trying to summon it.


    The werewolf¡¯s eyes were wide with anger at the sight of Rose¡¯s death.


    Rose had not just been an ordinary partner for him, but a lover whose life was intertwined with his.


    As such, the werewolf was furious when he saw Rose¡¯s ¡®murderer¡¯ attempting to escape. He lunged forward, using both of his ws to press the Libram to the ground as he bent down and opened his mouth in an attempt to devour the Libram whole.


    However, just as he was about toplete this action, a vicious wind whistled around him. A surge of unusual golden mes had wrapped around his body.


    The werewolf turned his head around, extreme terror appearing in his crimson eyes.


    Unfortunately, the golden mes had already burned through his defensive forcefield before he could take any further action. Half of his body had been ignited with fire.


    The werewolf immediately let out a tragic and horrifying scream. He could no longer care about suppressing the Libram of Wisdom. His silhouette flickered as he teleported a thousand meters away, escaping from the rest of the golden mes that were surging towards him. It was then that he attempted to put out the mes already burning on him.


    However, what terrified him was the fact that his poison wolfblood energy could only suppress the spread of the golden fire. It could not extinguish the mes at all.


    It was almost...almost as if the golden mes had a life of their own!


    ¡°Firews...goddammit! These are firews!¡±


    As a high-grade believer of the Beast God, the werewolf naturally knew the terror ofw powers.


    A me containing the power of principles could only be neutralized by an exorbitant amount of elementium energy or aw power of a different nature. There were no other solutions apart from these two!


    Unfortunately, neither of these options were avable to him at the moment.


    As reluctant and hateful as he felt, the werewolf had no choice but to drag his burning, crackling body into the distance.


    Greem did not bother chasing after the werewolf. Instead, he teleported to the Libram of Wisdom and opened his palm. The strange, pitch-ck orb in his palm let out an incredible amount of shadow substance, instantly enveloping everything within a hundred meters into a world of shadows.


    Under the powerful restrictive effects of the Orb of Shadows, the unrelenting Libram of Wisdom finally fell silent. It was slowly dragged into the darkness by shadow chains extending out of the air.


    After five minutes, Greem finally managed to seal the Libram of Wisdom within the Orb of Shadows.


    The Fifth Grade Orb of Shadows was the only thing he had on him that could suppress the divine runes on the Fifth Grade Libram of Wisdom. Otherwise, he would have had to watch as the Libram of Wisdom slipped from between his fingers, without being able to stop it in any manner at all.


    Fortunately, this was Morrian ne, where the narws were in chaos and flux. Even the God of Wisdom Hierro could not entirely grasp the condition of the artifact through the channels of faith while he was far away in the World of Gods. Otherwise, Greem would not have had such an easy time sealing the Libram of Wisdom.


    Even so, when Greem wiped away the sweat on his forehead, let out a breath of air and put away the Orb of Shadows, he heard a mighty voice ring in his mind.


    ¡°Shadow power? Who are you, and why have you sealed my artifact with shadow power? Where is Mietzel?¡±


    Greem was surprised, and the golden mes on his body erupted wildly, firmly protecting him within.


    His overwhelming spiritual senses and Burning Domain instantly spread out in a kilometer¡¯s radius around him, yet he could not detect the person who was speaking to him.


    [Beep. Detecting unusual faith channel. Channel medium: Libram of Wisdom. Condition: Sealed.]


    Upon listening to the Chip¡¯s feedback, Greem realized that the one conveying information to his mind was none other than the Libram of Wisdom he had just sealed. The only person who could directly speak to him through the Libram of Wisdom couldn¡¯t be anyone else than the God of Wisdom Hierro.


    He was a powerful god, after all, and Greem had no interest in making a spiritual acquaintance out of such a mighty individual. Greem drew several fire runes in the air and sealed the Orb of Shadows as well.


    He had used the Orb of Shadows¡¯ power to seal the Libram of Wisdom, and now he was sealing the Orb of Shadows with the power of the firews. With this doubleyer of seals, the God of Wisdom Hierro shouldn¡¯t be able to project any of his power here!


    Just as expected, as the fire runes spun around the Orb of Shadows and sealed it as a fiery magma ball, the God of Wisdom¡¯s voice turned softer and more intermittent.


    ¡°You must be an adept from the World of Adepts! Since you can control the Orb of Shadows, you must be someone from the Dark Witches?¡±


    Greem did not reply to any of the god¡¯s questions.


    The channel of faith was an unusual way by which the gods collected the power of faith and transmitted their divine power. With his current knowledge reserves and abilities, Greem had no way ofpletely sealing off the Libram of Wisdom and its channel of faith. His only option was to cut off the power that the God of Wisdom was transmitting through the Libram.


    Consequently, the Libram of Wisdom had be a simple ¡®telephone.¡¯ God of Wisdom Hierro could only continually harass Greem verbally, without any means to take proper action.


    ¡°I don¡¯t care what you did to Mietzel. As long as you release the seal of darkness on the Libram of Wisdom, I can look past all of your transgressions.


    ¡°...O, adept who walks in darkness, give up your pointless resistance! My divine rune has been etched upon the Libram of Wisdom. You will not be able to use its power without my permission. Rather than a useless artiact, why don¡¯t you return it to me, and I can offer you a powerful pseudo-artifact (Fourth Grade) in its ce?¡±


    Greem ignored the God of Wisdom¡¯s words.


    At any rate, he had already sealed the Libram of Wisdom. Hierro could note over, and as talkative as he was, Greem had already made up his mind to not engage in a conversation.


    It was obviously the first time Hierro had met such a difficult person to deal with. If it were any other ne, he would have projected his divine power without hesitation just to kill this bastard that had murdered Mietzel and sealed his Libram.


    Unfortunately, there was simply no way he could project his power into Morrian ne at the moment!


    ¡°Tell me, what is it exactly that you want? Pseudo-artifacts, divine power crystals, resource nes, otherworldly beauties? As long as you return the Libram of Wisdom, I will open my treasury and offer you anything within. How about it?¡±


    It was clear that the Libram of Wisdom was incredibly important to Hierro. He was even willing to let go of the grudge of his murdered son to negotiate with his killer.


    However, Greem ignored his offer and bent down to search the corpse of the foxgirl. He found a strange earring on her body, still radiating traces of space energy.


    It should be her storage equipment!


    That said, the way in which storage equipment was used in the World of Gods was different from the adepts. Greem would have to take it back and do some research before he could find a way to break its seal.


    Just as Greem tidied up the battlefield, the dust cloud in the distance parted. A towering, jade-white figure slowly emerged from within.


    It was Lich Kanganas.


    He held a limp body in his hand. Judging from the appearance and the clothes, it was the god¡¯s son, Mietzel. All signs of life and soul aura had faded from his body, and it was obvious he was thoroughly dead.


    ¡°The Libram of Wisdom is not with him!¡±


    Kanganas stopped a thousand meters away from Greem. His powerful, glowing soulfire pierced through his ruby eyes and stared at Greem.


    His tone was uncertain and unclear, as if he was exining something while questioning at the same time.


    ¡°Don¡¯t look at me. I didn¡¯t manage to get the Libram of Wisdom either. I was ambushed by two believers of the Beast God earlier. It took me a lot just to chase them away!¡± Greem raised his palms with a look of frustration on his face, clearly not admitting to Kanganas¡¯ silent usation.


    Kanganas¡¯ soulfire subtly swept past the foxgirl¡¯s corpse. He couldn¡¯t help but be surprised.


    It¡¯s the foxgirl. Then where was the other one? The werewolf?


    Kanganas couldn¡¯t help but start thinking to himself.

 Chapter 1135 - Equal Status

    Chapter 1135 Equal Status


    The atmosphere instantly turned solemn and awkward with Lich Kanganas¡¯ arrival.


    Neither of them was a good person to begin with. The only reason the alliance had been formed was due to an agreement of interests. Now that the matter had settled, the deeper conflicts behind it finally surfaced.


    Kanganas¡¯ cold, chilling gaze slithered around Greem¡¯s body, over and over, as if he was assessing how much he could trust Greem¡¯s words while at the same time wondering if he should start another battle.


    If Greem were just an ordinary Fourth Grade adept, Kanganas would have started the battle without any hesitation. After all, adepts had the best Physique among all spellcasters. They were the best candidates for making undead servants.


    However, after the battle earlier, Kanganas had a basic understanding of Greem¡¯s terrifying power. He was genuinely pondering if he should fight Greem.


    Given his current equipment, power, and theck of his undead army, taking down the fire adept would be somewhat difficult. The mes that the fire adepts controlled and used were very unusual. They contained many strangew powers, making it exceedingly difficult to deal with the fire.


    If the other two adepts were toe over and help, they just might be able to turn the tables against him.


    When that happened, it wouldn¡¯t be a matter of whether Kanganas wanted to fight, but whether the three adepts were willing to let him leave!


    The smile on Greem¡¯s face was unchanging even as he silently sensed the powerful spiritual pressure emanating from the lich¡¯s soulfire. However, the air around him had already started distorting slightly. Layers of translucent mes had spread across his entire body. All it would take was a single thought, and they would turn into a ferocious, violent tide of zing mes.


    During this moment of ring tension, the lich took a step back and dispelled the overwhelming spiritual pressure he was unleashing.


    ¡°Let¡¯s properly reacquaint ourselves, shall we?! I am Kanganas, a member of the Great Pan-Universe Alliance of Liches, intermediate Fourth Grade, now residing in the Skeletal ne. Proficient in potion brewing and undead modifications.¡± Lich Kanganas bowed elegantly and introduced himself once again.


    This action of his indicated very clearly that he now regarded Greem as a ¡®client¡¯ or panion¡¯ of equal status.


    It was somewhat unexpected, but Greem returned the gesture with a smile.


    ¡°I am Greem, a new elder of the Zhentarim Association in the World of Adepts. Beginner Fourth Grade. I own a human kingdom known as the Crimson Dynasty, and I typically reside in my Fire Throne adept tower. As for what I¡¯m proficient in...that would be golem creation and magical pattern carving!¡±


    ¡°Your power has won my respect. You have the qualifications to be my ¡®friend¡¯. Here is my contact. Perhaps we might have much-needed goods we could exchange with each other after this war is over. If you have any particrly excellent goods in your hands, I am confident that my treasury will be able to offer a satisfactory item in exchange!¡±


    Having said that, the lich raised his right hand. The jade-white ring finger abruptly broke off and flew towards Greem under the guidance of an unknown power.


    Greem still had a smile on his face. An unusual blue light flickered briefly in his ck eyes, quickly scanning the fingerbone and making sure there were no offensive spells, curse spells, or magical traps contained within. It was only then that he grabbed the fingerbone with his hand.


    [Beep. Detecting unusual spiritual brand. Energy aura matches that of the lich. It can be used for ultra-long-range spiritualmunication. No unusual attachments.]


    Greem toyed with the bone for a moment. After the Chip ensured that there were no hidden risks, he put it in his pouch and took out a fire crystal.


    Greem¡¯s finger started moving through the air, creating zing fire runes that rapidly spun around the fire crystal. When all the runes werepleted, they glowed with a bright red light. These fire runes had formed a three-dimensional fire array ording to some profound principle and slowly entered the crystal.


    ¡°This is my contact. I look forward very much to the next time we meet!¡±


    Lich Kanganas took the newly enchanted fire crystal, gave Greem a deep look, and finally turned to leave.


    When the lich¡¯s chilling aura vanished from his spiritual senses, Greem¡¯s Spirit finally rxed. He let out a long breath of air.


    One had to admit; you had to be incredibly careful when dealing with these ancient relics. Even a slight moment of carelessness couldnd you in a horrible fate. They had only been talking for fifteen minutes, yet Greem already felt his Spirit on the verge of fatigue.


    Not to mention, he had been fighting, running, and moving ceaselessly for the past two days and nights. That contributed to his lethargy as well. Even though his forty points of Spirit allowed him to go weeks without sleep, the fatigue to his Spirit would continue to umte and pile up.


    He was likely to make a misjudgment or a mistake if he was put in a dangerous situation in his current condition. It was time to find a ce to have some proper rest!


    Greem sent out several messages.


    A short momentter, Adept Holly and the two-headed siblings hurried over and met up with him.


    The three adepts didn¡¯t dare stay too long in the ruins of the floating city. They decided on a direction and hastily left the area.


    ............


    Morrian ne¡¯s sky had turned blood red.


    The ne trembled, and thews were in chaos.


    Endless fires and fearsome spacestorms ravaged thend on every piece of ground below the vast skies that stretched on for millions and millions of kilometers. The closer the regions were to a floating city or a famous arcane tower, the more obvious the destruction and the more damaged the environment.


    Nearly one-third of the floating cities in the ne had crashed to the ground as ming fireballs. Another half had been invaded and brutalized by otherworldly invaders, their inhabitants ughtered, leaving only floating wastnds drifting through the air.


    Less than one-tenth of the citizens of these floating cities had survived the cmity.


    Without the support of the system of arcane energy from the floating cities, the arcane fortresses outside the nar barrier stopped functioning as well.


    The arcane war finally came to an end after a hundred and seventeen years. The Arcane Empire had been defeated!


    With this, the homnd of the Arcane Empire, Morrian ne, would be invaded by countless otherworldly races. These invaders would rush all over without end, brazenly ughtering people and raiding for loot and ves.


    That included powerful individual beings like the disaster creatures, the starbeasts, various space creatures, and the elementium lords, as well as intelligent races such as the adepts, the underminers, the ironforged, and the shadow creatures.


    The former hade to the ne for a feast. They had ughtered without worry or care, just to taste fresh meat as well as collect some delicious nar origin substance along the way. Thetter was more concerned with the knowledge and civilization of the Arcane Empire, as well as rare resources and materials that were harder to find outside of Morrian ne.


    The reason they were so audacious in their actions was that Morrian ne had quickly begun falling apart over the past week.


    With the Arcane Empire¡¯s defeat, countless rifts of various sizes had been torn into the firm nar barrier of Morrian ne by the invading forces. The vicious spacestorm outside the barrier had thus descended into the ne, disintegrating everything within into tiny, invisible particles and scattering them into every corner of the ne.


    Greem and the other two adepts avoided the hotspots. They walked between tall mountains and deep valleys. It was apocalypse wherever they looked.


    Large and small rifts could be seen in the sky. Some unusual creatures of unnatural size were crawling in through these rifts, pping their wings and screeching as they charged all over the ne.


    Greem and the other two adepts might have hidden themselves very well, but they failed to escape the unusual senses of these exotic creatures. They screeched as they dove down, trying to turn the adepts into their food.


    Unfortunately, they came, and they stayed forever!


    The three adepts each used their magic and brutally massacred these otherworldly creatures. It was only then that the monsters realized the terror of these beings. A short momentter, an otherworldly powerhouse appeared in front of the three adepts, riding on the back of a flying dragon.


    ¡°Adepts? It seems like you people are an assault party that snuck into the ne ahead of everyone else! You must have a lot of loot if you¡¯ve been able to survive so long. Hurry up and hand over all your spoils. This way, I, the great Lord Valkbar, might just let you live. Otherwise......¡±


    Greem looked at the sky and evaluated the enemy when he heard his arrogant words.


    This ¡®Lord Valkbar¡¯ and his kind were strange humanoid creatures that resembled bone fiends. Their lower halves were fused as one with the dragons beneath them, while their upper halves were pale-white armor of bones. A series of hard bone spikes ran down their spines from the top of their heads. Each was a meter long, with wisps of ck smoke trailing from the ends of the spikes. It seemed like these spikes had some sort of unusual power.


    They had no nose and no ears, only a terrifying mouth and countlesspound eyes all over their faces. Their four armored arms were slender, and each held glowing bone spears in their grasp.


    ¡°Do you know what race they are?¡± Greem asked in a soft voice.


    Adept Holly and the siblings shook their heads.


    Their efforts in the past had mostly been focused in theirbs on magic research. They did not know much about the boundless gxy and the innumerable foreign creatures living throughout it. As such, they couldn¡¯t figure out the opponent¡¯s race orbat abilities in this sudden encounter.


    Lord Valkbar became furious when he saw his ¡®prey¡¯ whispering in front of him as if taking him as a non-existent threat. He waved his hand, and the flight of dragons dove at the three adepts.


    A battle broke out just like that!

 Chapter 1136 - Might of the Fire Adept

    <strong>Chapter 1136 Might of the Fire Adept</strong>


    The creatures that dove down were unusual creatures that resembled dragons.


    They were somewhat simr to swamp dragons or wild poison dragons in their size and means of attack. They had simrly muscr bodies, were five meters long, and were covered in small, gray scales. They had powerful wings as well, along with firm hind legs, sharp ws, and a jaw full of sharp teeth.


    Apart from those, their ws, teeth, and club-shaped tails were all shrouded in a ck mist as if they contained deadly poison within.


    When vicious and powerful beasts like these descended from high above, their sheer force and biting strength were enough to tear through any mortal army. Their poison only made them even more deadly. Even a person with supernatural powers might fall prey to the poison if they were wounded even slightly by their ws.


    Unfortunately, they had not picked an appropriate opponent for themselves today!


    The two-headed siblings cackled in their two distinct voices, one low and one crisp, as they watched the dragons dive. They actively transformed into their awakened state and charged ahead with elementium magic in one hand and mental magic in the other.


    One dragon after another screeched in agony as their bodies were blown to pieces by the violent spells. Meanwhile, as Cherisha¡¯s Mind st spread across the sky, many of the dragons were dazed and started to crash towards the ground.


    For a moment, the flight had been thrown into utter chaos.


    Greem clearly sensed through the Chip that these dragons were merely a pack of Second Grade creatures. Even the otherworldly individual that had approached them was not much more formidable of an enemy. His energy aura was only that of a Third Grade. Though his offense and defense might be slightly improved through his assimtion with the dragon he rode, it was arrogant to imagine threatening or attacking three Fourth Grade adepts!


    There was no need to mention Greem or Holly. Even the two-headed siblings, the ¡®fish¡¯s belly¡¯ of the party, quickly managed to ughter the dragons alone.


    The otherworldly creature who had assimted with a Third Grade dragon roared when he saw his prey act so arrogantly. He charged down at them.


    He only made it halfway before a fierce elementium spell from Mangus injured him. When he finally approached the adepts after enduring all the elementium attacks, he was turned around by a simple mental illusion from Cherisha. He started circling the sky, chasing after a non-existent illusory phantom.


    While the siblings were toying with their opponent, a pack of powerful flying creatures with ck scales and red wings emerged from a massive rift in the sky nearby. Many more individuals who looked like the opponent they were fighting sat atop these flying creatures.


    Their gaze naturally fell upon this battlefield when they appeared. The leaders of the group flew into a rage and hurried over with all their followers in tow.


    Greem looked over and quickly estimated the might of the enemy.


    Most of these were small fry of Second or Third Grade. Only the leader was a Fourth Grade powerhouse, whose unusual energy flux was significant enough to detect even from a distance.


    ¡°Damned adepts! How dare you ughter our Daimas. All of you will have to die here today.¡±


    Perhaps these aliens were all too arrogant, or maybe they allcked a nerve in their brain, but they charged forward like berserk boars, even though it was evident that Greem and his party were the superior side in the conflict.


    Greem frowned slightly.


    In all honesty, he did not want to fight this battle at all.


    It was a meaningless fight driven by emotions. There was no substantial loot to be obtained here, even if they were to kill all of these arrogant fools.


    Truthfully, these otherworldly creatures were no different than savage magical creatures in the eyes of the adepts. They did not deserve to be called an intelligent race.


    Secondly, Morrian ne had now been plunged into absolute chaos. Unusual creatures and powerful individuals from all over the universe of many varying factions were all appearing in the ne. Being too conspicuous at this time was likely to draw the attention of the truly powerful.


    If those people set their sights on the party, their journey back home would be fraught with disaster!


    A slight misstep might put them under an unnecessary risk of death.


    Greem¡¯s eyes grew cold and severe as he watched the descending flight of ¡®dragons.¡¯ He snorted as a crimson elementium barrier emerged from his body, instantly engulfing an area of a thousand meters around him.


    Burning Domain.


    This elementium technique that Greem had mastered since First Grade had evolved from the mere Ring of Fire to the Ring of mes and finally to its current form¨C the Burning Domain. Naturally, the might of the barrier had improved exponentially as well.


    There was almost no discrepancy in the intensity of the energy within the Burning Domain.


    All enemies within the Domain would suffer direct burning from the elementium mes, with over two hundred points of damage per second.


    Two hundred points per second.


    This amount of elementium damage was merely a warmup for Fourth Grade powerhouses. That was why Greem had seldom used Burning Domain in recent times. Rather than maintain the Burning Domain, his time would be better spent firing another zing Fireball.


    However, when faced with arge number of low-grade magical creatures, the Burning Domain was able to turn the tides of battle instantly.


    Everything caught in the faint red elementium barrier started burning.


    The ground burned, the rocks burned, the earth burned. Even the air itself began to burn.


    Red mes engulfed the dragons caught in the domain, their bodies crackling violently as the fires danced. It didn¡¯t matter how they beat their wings or how low they flew; they could not escape the constant scorching of the elementium mes.


    These unusual dragon-like creatures might have some magic resistance, but their scales and skin were as thin as paper before a fire adept as powerful as Greem. He had mastered four firews, after all.


    All the dragons in the Burning Domain flew about aimlessly like blind beasts, desperately attempting to escape somehow. Many of the dragons even fell from the sky as they crashed into their ownpanions.


    The dragons who were at the edge of the Burning Domain could still manage to escape, thanks to their tough bodies. That said, even if they survived, their bodies were now covered in blisters and patches of scorch marks. The rest of the flying dragons howled in vain for a dozen seconds in the Burning Domain before turning into fireballs and crashing to the ground.


    Pupupu!


    These burnt creatures plummeted from the sky like dumplings into water, smashing deep craters into the ground upon impact. They could only let out cries of pain on the verge of death, their bodies scorched, and their wings tattered. They could not escape the endless elementium mes.


    Finally, their heads fell limply to the ground as what remained of their bodies slowly burned down into unrecognizable corpses.


    The dragons in the distance abruptly stopped their advance.


    The scene they had just witnessed was simply too terrifying. Moreover, due to how fast they had stopped their advance, several of the dragons in the back were forced to circle around to avoid crashing into their allies.


    For a moment, the dragons had been thrown into disarray!


    The Fourth Grade leader of the group stopped in front of the Burning Domain, his gaze piercing through the elementium barrier andnding on Greem.


    Greem¡¯s human body was now only mes. However, he did not increase his size but instead remained at his two-meter height. His scorching gaze matched that of the Fourth Grade enemy. When their eyes met, blinding sparks appeared in the air.


    It was the might of a Fourth Grade adept!


    Every action of theirs, even just a simple gaze, could project or draw upon the elementium in the air to cause unusual magical effects.


    The Fourth Grade enemy was forced to shift his gaze after staring into Greem¡¯s eyes for a mere dozen seconds. He then suppressed the slowly rising heat he felt in his body.


    Powerful opponents from the World of Adepts. It was difficult for their group to fight these enemies head-on!


    He immediately understood the difference in power between the two parties and instantly quelled all thoughts of a fight.


    ¡°A misunderstanding, a misunderstanding. It seems like today is just a misunderstanding! So d to meet you all from the World of Adepts. I, Naiguta, greet you!¡± The Fourth Grade leader with the odd appearance put on a terrifying but ¡®well-meaning¡¯ smile as he spoke the unfamiliarnguage of the adepts.


    Greem looked around at the scorched corpses within the Burning Domain and at the Third Grade fellow that had been beaten half to death by the siblings. It was such a terrible scene, and the opponent had described it as just a ¡®misunderstanding.¡¯ Greem couldn¡¯t help but smile.


    ¡°If it¡¯s a misunderstanding, then you, sir, are free to leave now!¡±


    His tone was not exactly friendly, and the Fourth Grade leader¡¯s expression turned dark. However, he showed no inclination to resume the conflict.


    Finally, he shouted, and the entire flight of dragons beat their wings and flew into the distance. The wild gusts caused by the beating wings of hundreds and thousands of dragons at the same time instantly caused a fierce storm on the spot.


    However, as ferocious and barbaric as these dragons were, none of them dared take a single step into the Burning Domain. They quietly flew around the elementium barrier into the distance.


    Once the flying dragons and their riders left, Greem dispelled the Burning Domain. The golden mes around him returned to his body, revealing his young and handsome face.


    Adept Holly couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh of envy.


    He was a Fourth Grade and possessed formidable powers. When it came to controlling the battlefield, however, he was inferior to elementium adepts. In particr, individuals like Greem, who had broken through the limits of elementium and peeked into the realm ofws, were always so mysterious. Every one of their actions carried a shadow of the powers of the principles.


    This mastery of the principles was a result of innate talent. It was not something that could be easily achieved through effort.


    Of course, invaluable treasures like the nar origin substances were an exception!

 Chapter 1137 - The Passing of a Plane

    <h4>Chapter 1137 The Passing of a ne</h4>


    The skies were dark.


    There was not a single cloud in the blood-red sky. No, in their ce were numerous terrifying rifts.


    These rifts were of every size.


    The smaller ones were only several meters in length, slowly drifting through the air.


    Meanwhile, therger ones were several kilometers long, spanning the horizon like a nasty gash in the sky. They were the color of blood as well.


    Spacestorms entered from the rifts, causing severe and irreversible damage to the ecosystem of the ne.


    All life was extinguished under the rifts, and the material substance of the ne was continually being stolen.


    The once lush greenery that filled every inch of thend of Morrian ne had vanished without a trace. All nt life had been shredded to ribbons by the spacestorm, carried away to the ends of the universe. The animals and beasts with sharper senses had already fled to regions that were still untouched by the spacestorms.


    Once the green nts had disappeared, the exposed dirt was also blown away by the storm, stripping the earth, the mountains, and the hills bare and revealing the rocky foundations below. However, at the peak of these spacestorms, the energy tides assaulted the rocks, causing countless sparks to appear.


    The rockyers were then quickly and visibly shaved away by the storm,yer byyer. The substance that broke off was pulverized, ground, and eroded by the fearsome energy of space, reduced to nearly invisible microscopic particles before being scattered all over the ne.


    Such a scene was amon sight in Morrian ne.


    They were mostly concentrated in the core regions of the Arcane Empire. However, the border regions were only in slightly better condition!


    Greem was sure that the origin of the Morrian ne had been badly damaged. Otherwise, the powers of the narws would let the origin to mend the rifts in the nar barrier instinctually. The ne would never allow the spacestorms to ravage its body freely.


    As for who the culprit was? That was no longer an important question. It might be the disaster lords, it might be the powerful starbeasts, or it might even be the result of a united force. However, the fact that the damage had been inflicted so quickly and so thoroughly that it caused the nar origin to instantly lose all control over its world made Greem suspicious. He believed that it could have been the work of the arcanists, who were now in a hurry to abandon the ¡®ship¡¯ and flee their homeworld.


    Morrian ne was their origin ne. It was mother and homeworld to the arcanists. Typically, they would never do such an atrocious thing as sabotage their origin ne. However, considering the hordes of enemies knocking at the castle gates, Morrian ne was doomed. It would be better to extract everything from the nar origin and leave nothing for their enemies.


    It was a sinister assumption for Greem to make of the arcanists, but it might very well be the truth of the apocalypse that had now befallen this world!


    Having lost most of its ne origin, Morrian ne was on itsst leg. It could no longer care for the generations of living creatures within it or the countless substances that made up its material world.


    This was a world on the verge of death!


    The rules of the world had already been thrown into utter chaos and imbnce.


    There was no clear day or night. The sky was simply an eternal, chaotic crimson.


    The nar barrier had started to thin and be weaker. The crimson color of the sky was a phenomenon caused by the energy tides seeping into the world.


    Wild spacestorms raged everywhere on the ground. Ordinary creatures and substances could not endure such intense energy corrosion. They had either died, migrated, or simply remained where they were, waiting for their death. None of them had a way out of this predicament.


    Where were these magical creatures and beasts supposed to flee when it was the entire nar barrier that had copsed?


    At this moment, the environment of the ne had turned extremely harsh. Fearsome energy radiation covered every corner of the world. Lifeforms without magic resistance would die in another one to three days. Only high-grade creatures with a more resilient life force could survive for a little longer.


    Unfortunately, with the increasing damage to the nar barrier, the energy radiation inside the ne would only increase in intensity, until, finally, the strength of the radioactivity was the same as space itself. Throughout this process, billions of lives in Morrian ne would be lost. Only individuals of exceptional power could travel the infinite space by virtue of their physical resilience and find a new ne for shelter.


    Moreover, for the original inhabitants of those nes, these refugees were no different than evil invaders.


    It was difficult to find a new life without blood and fire, war and ughter!


    At the same time as the death of Morrian ne, arge group of otherworldly invaders had broken in and were wildly robbing and looting. They searched and looked for resources, materials, knowledge, and valuable ves. Their brazen actions only hastened the passing of Morrian ne.


    There was no doubt that the lives of the inhabitants of the ne were the most tragic and helpless during this tragedy!


    They could do nothing but hide and try their best to dy their inevitable deaths.


    Unfortunately, like a slowly sinking ship, there was simply no escape, no matter how they struggled. They could only close their eyes and wait for the moment, the day, that they would finally die.


    Everyone¡¯s hearts were heavy as they walked in this dying ne.


    Greem and the two others could not help but reflect on their own world. If their origin ne¨Cif the World of Adepts¨Cwere to suffer such a cmity, where would they go?


    Even though the destruction of their origin ne didn¡¯t mean that the adepts would all be exterminated, the loss of their homeworld would scatter the adepts across the universe. They would no longer be a core that could gather andbine the powers of all adepts in the universe.


    When that happened, the adepts would lose their source of fresh blood, and all the survivors would end up being measly ve owners or conquerors of foreign nes. In another thousand years, the adepts¡¯ legacy would vanish as the survivors assimted with the natives of whichever ne they found themselves residing.


    When that happened, the group known as the Adepts would silently disappear from the boundless sea of gxies!


    The three adepts headed east after emerging from the in. They then headed north after passing through the Crehen Mountains. Their destination was the pre-determined Evac Point One. The Emerald Hills.


    The Emerald Hills of Morrian ne was also an exceedingly famous tourist area.


    While the adepts traveled, they avoided all areas with concentrated poptions and numerous spatial rifts.


    In all honesty, they had already made more than a sufficient profit on this trip. None of them wanted to run into any more otherworldly creatures. Sadly, with the continuous crumbling of the world, and the copse of the narws, the suppression imposed on the invaders decreased by the day.


    As such, the number of invaders seeking to take advantage of the circumstances only continued to increase!


    Naturally, some of these neers were ignorant fools.


    The adepts had to fight their way out of some situations, even as they continued to march forward.


    If it weren¡¯t for the overwhelming might of the party and their teamwork, this trip to the evacuation point might have been more dangerous andplicated than the mission itself.


    The three adepts¡¯ emotions were those of sorrow, sadness, and an indescribable gloom during the journey.


    Greem had been confused by the presence of these emotions, and he only realized what was happening after receiving a notification from the Chip.


    These emotions did note from them. Rather, they were emotions projected by the dying nar consciousness that had afflicted their very souls. As they were all currently enveloped by the nar consciousness, this affliction of emotions was subtle and unnoticed.


    The Morrian ne did not wish to die either. It had its own fear and unwillingness.


    As it slowly headed towards death, it struggled and screamed for help with all it had. It projected the feeling of despair and the madness of awaiting death outwards, afflicting the souls of every living being present within it.


    It was sinking, and it was despairing.


    And it dragged all living beings to sink and fall into despair along with it.


    The surviving inhabitants of the ne charged out of their shelters as if possessed, wildly attacking all the invaders with no regard for the massive gulf in power. It indirectly hastened the death of the nar consciousness.


    Since the day of defeat, the systematic arcane power of Morrian ne quickly faded away.


    Large groups of arcanists vanished from Morrian ne, migrating to some unknown ce. However, in the process, they had left behind an innumerable amount of low-grade arcanists and apprentices.


    All the refugees swarmed towards the regions where the light of the arcane tower still shone. The remaining arcanists were crowded in a small living area, using what remained of the arcane energies to repel the increasingly hostile environment and the terrifying otherworldly creatures.


    The weaker humans quickly died because of radiation, starvation, or infighting. Scenes of deceit, betrayal, and dark despair yed out in all the shelters.


    The actors of these ys put on a ster performance, perfectly exemplifying the despair and madness inherent of human nature in the course of awaiting death. It was a depressing reality and one that made a person sigh in helplessness.


    With the powerful elementium resistance of Fourth Grade adepts, Greem and the two others were barely affected by the ¡®insignificant¡¯ changes to the environment. However, all the small viges along the way were not void of life.


    On the contrary, they only found human corpses in barren wastnds.


    These bodies were always malnourished and deprived of food. It was obvious that they¡¯d had no choice but to flee their shelters out of starvation to search for food, only to die to the overwhelming energy radiation on the outside.


    It had barely been two weeks, yet the entire Morrian ne was on death¡¯s door. Every living being inside the ne was also drawing theirst breath!


    Greem¡¯s spirits were downcast as he walked in a world like this.

 Chapter 1138 - Party Disagreement

    Chapter 1138 Party Disagreement


    Emerald Hill.


    This ce was once a beautiful tourist spot in Morrian ne.


    Its soil contained an unusual mineral particle that would glow jade-green, blue, and many other different colors under sunlight. These colors would even shift and swirl under the moonlight, making it seem as if the earth was made up of pieces of gemstones that flowed like a liquid in the night.


    That was how this ce won the name of Emerald Hill!


    However, the former beauty had nowpletely vanished. Emerald Hill was now a bald, empty hill. The rocky hillside had no soil or vegetation; its stone foundation was exposed to the air, cold and unfeeling beneath the moonlight.


    A small campfire burned in a small camp at the top of the hill. Seven hooded figures huddled together, seemingly waiting for something.


    It had been thirteen days since the Day of Ruination. Morrian ne was bing increasingly unstable, and more and more otherworldly creatures were appearing in higher frequency. Trying to find an undisrupted ce under such conditions was extremely difficult.


    Especially since the nar barrier was starting to disintegrate with the ruination of the ne world. Thousands of tons of material substance from regions closest to the spatial rifts were whisked away by the spacestorm and scattered deep into space.


    Moreover, these losses were continually happening. As long as the rifts remained open, the material substance of Morrian ne would continue to be lost to space, leaving only the most hardened and toughest essence substances of the ne.


    Of course, the living creatures whisked into space had no nope of survival!


    ¡°Captain Roy, how long are we supposed to wait?¡± An adept in ck robes lifted her head and asked softly, her tone filled with dissatisfaction.


    The adept¡¯s hood slid off her head as she spoke, revealing her white and smooth chin. There was a beauty mark on the corner of her mouth, giving her an exceptional sense of charm.


    ¡°Indeed, Captain. The members of that party might all be dead now. Otherwise, they should have already arrived by now!¡± Another adept chimed in with the same upset tone.


    ¡°There¡¯s nothing toin about!¡± The captain of the party wore a gold headband on his head. He had a deep w mark on his left cheek, with gray mist still rising from the wound. It made him look unusually cold and cruel. ¡°We agreed to wait here for three days before we separated. It¡¯s only been two days now. Just a day more, and we can leave. Why the hurry?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re not wrong, but this ne,¡± The female adept¡¯s voice was low, but her tone was filled with worry, ¡°I can already hear constant explosionsing from the skies these past few days. It means Morrian ne¡¯s nar barrier won¡¯tst for much longer. Once the nar barrier shatters, the ultra-long range internar teleportation array we brought with us will be affected by the spacestorms. When that happens......¡±


    She did not finish her words, but the suggestion was more than enough to provoke the imagination of herpanions.


    As elite Fourth Grades selected from their respective factions, the two parties had already sessfullypleted their missions and returned to the evacuation point. Unfortunately, of the twelve people that had set off, only seven had managed to return.


    Five elite Fourth Grade adepts had died in Morrian ne over the past fifty-three days. A casualty rate of nearly 50%. It was a testament to the danger and terror of the mission they had to carry out!


    Meanwhile, Group Three¨Cwhich was meant as a diversionary force¨Chad only four members, all of whom were newly advanced or inexperienced adepts of the various major factions. Given their power and ability to adapt, their chances of surviving such dangerous missions were fairly low.


    That was why the groups of the elite had been secretly guessing at the number of survivors in Group Three, even as they gathered here and waited for them to return.


    The weak two-headed adept was most certainly dead, and the golem master esoteric adept also had a high chance of dying. After all, the two of them were only good at fighting but not fleeing. Their chances of a sessful escape when surrounded by enemies were nearly zero.


    The somewhat famous fire adept was reasonably powerful, but the more you stood out on such a dangerous battlefield, the quicker you died. Therefore, his chances of sessfully leaving afterpleting his mission weren¡¯t very high either.


    On the contrary, the Dark Witch was an intermediate Fourth Grade, and her magic was inclined towards mobility and ambush. People like her were most suited to an otherworldly battlefield. She could advance and retreat, fight and flee as she wished. Her powers would certainly improve immensely if she survived this battlefield.


    However, while the adepts were waiting in silence, three towering figures appeared on the distant, winding road. The three figures were quickly approaching the camp.


    The adepts around the campfire were on alert now. Shuffling sounds could be heard under their robes as they grabbed their wands, scrolls, magical equipment, and treasures in their hands. They were prepared to strike at any time.


    The female adept stood up and took a good look at the approaching individuals. She couldn¡¯t help but let out a gasp of surprise.


    ¡°Mm? It¡¯s Group Three! They...they¡¯ve returned with three people.¡±


    It was a simple sentence, but it couldn¡¯t help but make the other adepts frown.


    Soon, Greem, Holly, and the siblings managed to scale the stony hill and meet up with the other adepts.


    ¡°Three people,¡± the leader of the group mumbled under his breath. The wound on his cheek started twitching, making him appear all the more ferocious.


    ¡°Sir Roy, we have returned!¡± Greem and the other seemed to have detected the hostility and coldness in the gaze of the other adepts. As such, Greem took the initiative to greet the leader.


    ¡°Greem, where is Shani?¡± One of the adepts in the group of seven stood up. She took off her hood and questioned coldly.


    It was a female adept whose entire body was shrouded in a chilling aura. Her eyebrows were thin and delicate, carrying with them a trace of resolved, murderous intent.


    Judging from her appearance and the n emblem she wore on her chest, she was a Coldwinter Witch!


    Coldwinter Witches were a branch of the Northern Witches. Though they were a different n from the Dark Witches, they were still a subordinate n to the great Witch Queen. The Northern Witches were a united group of people, especially against outsiders. They were a group of women with a united front and were extremely difficult to deal with.


    Greem lowered his eyes, a faint trace of sorrow appearing on his face.


    ¡°Lady Shani has very unfortunately fallen in battle against an otherworldly creature!¡±


    ¡°Bullshit! You are lying! Who in this ne could corner Shani and kill her with her powers? The Dark Witches are famous for never dying!¡± The Coldwinter Witch roared angrily and inplete distrust of Greem¡¯s words.


    Greem¡¯s expression didn¡¯t change. He lifted an eyebrow and softly exined.


    ¡°Arcanists of this ne certainly cannot, but those otherworldly creatures can. Shani died at the hands of a powerful enemy with an artifact. His name was Mietzel, the son of the God of Wisdom Hierro. If you don¡¯t believe the truth of my words, you are free to find a diviner to verify it.¡±


    An artifact. A god¡¯s son. The God of Wisdom.


    This high-impact information caused all the adepts to frown uncontrobly.


    The Dark Witches all had soul energy pools that could preserve their soulbrands. It allowed them to run about the battlefield brazenly, making theirbat style incredibly barbaric and aggressive. Even if they died in the line of battle, they could revive through the soul energy pool andpletely reforge an energy body.


    It was what made the Dark Witches such difficult opponents!


    However, if a Dark Witch ran into an enemy with an artifact, the enemy could undoubtedly use the higher-grade properties of the artifact to trap and exterminate their soul. It made sense for Greem to exin Shani¡¯s death in this manner.


    A scrawny old adept stood forth and demanded with a wicked smile on his face, ¡°If even Witch Shani died in battle, how did the three of you escape alive? Could it be that all of you just cooped up somewhere safe without aplishing your missions?¡±


    ¡°Indeed, that must be the cast. I knew this ragtag bunch was unreliable.¡± The other wounded adepts also started making a fuss and closed in on the three adepts threateningly.


    ¡°Hand over your mission crystals. I need to examine them!¡±


    The leader also became suspicious of Greem and the two others when he heard the words of hispanion. He demanded the mission crystals.


    The mission crystals were an item passed down by their superiors before the group departed. They could record brief images of the party conducting their missions and were often kept by the party leader.


    These items contained the aura of higher-grade adepts, and there were no ways of altering its contents. Therefore, it was the most direct evidence of a party aplishing its mission.


    Greem was shocked for a moment, and his expression turned dark.


    ¡°Examining mission crystals is something that should be done by our superiors. Are you not overstepping your bounds by making me hand over the mission crystal!?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Who knows if you have finished your mission if you don¡¯t hand over your mission crystal. I am the leader of this group as appointed by the Great Adepts. Everything I say here is of absolute authority. Now hand over your mission crystals!¡± The adept with the gold headband coldly replied.


    Greem red at him coldly for a brief moment before nodding his head slowly. He took out a magical crystal the size of a fist and passed it over.


    Holly and the siblings hesitated for a moment before handing over their mission crystals as well.


    The leader took the crystals. He first verified their authenticity before lifting them to his eyes and reaching in with his Spirit to examine the images within.

 Chapter 1139 - A Terrifying Incident

    Chapter 1139 A Terrifying Incident


    After a long pause, Adept Roy put down the mission crystal and looked at Greem with puzzled eyes.


    ¡°They have finished all the missions assigned to them and even assaulted a floating city. The images recorded in the crystal prove that they have indeed gone to the core area of the floating city and even retrieved valuable information!¡±


    There weren¡¯t too many images of battle recorded in the mission crystals. Greem had only used it to record some brief scenes ofbat. In particr, there was the scene of Illhoof fighting against the Fifth Grade Great Arcanist in the arcane pce at the center of Reisin Graden.


    Anyone who viewed the images would be able to estimate Greem¡¯s position from the angle and distance from which the images had been recorded.


    ¡°I don¡¯t believe it. I can¡¯t believe it. How could they have entered and left the floating city unharmed with their ability? They must have cheated somehow.¡± The Coldwinter Witch was still pursuing the question.


    Her gaze quicklynded on the weakest of the three of them¨C Mangus.


    ¡°Speak, Mangus, how did Shani die?¡±


    Mangus¡¯ eyebrow twitched. He lifted his head and said coldly, ¡°You will have to ask Witch Shani yourself! We were a proper party, and still, she chose to work alone, simply because she¡¯s powerful. Otherwise, she would never have been surrounded by enemies and killed alone!¡±


    The Coldwinter Witch¡¯s face turned dark.


    However, before she could press the issue, Adept Holly spoke up angrily as well.


    ¡°Witch Shani died at the hands of the son of the God of Wisdom. I can attest to that as well. Moreover, we have already avenged her. We killed most of the believers of the God of Wisdom there! Even the god¡¯s son has died!¡±


    ¡°Oh?¡± Adept Roy¡¯s gaze sharpened as he turned towards Greem. ¡°You people killed the god¡¯s son?¡±


    Greem shook his head lightly and replied with a bitter smile, ¡°How could we beat him with our power? He has an artifact. The one that killed him was a lich. His name was Kanganas, and it seemed like he belonged to some unusual organization known as the Great Pan-Universe Alliance of Liches.¡±


    ¡°Lich Kanganas. He came to Morrian ne as well!¡± Adept Roy seemed to know something about Kanganas. His expression turned solemn upon hearing his name, as if he was incredibly wary of the lich. ¡°You are truly lucky to have survived after meeting Kanganas. Be careful the next time you meet that guy. He¡¯s infamous for his cruelty and cunning. His favorite hobby is collecting the corpses of powerful casters!¡±


    Adept Holly and Mangus exchanged a look when they saw Adept Roy warn them so solemnly. They couldn¡¯t help but be exasperated.


    A cruel lich? It seemed like the lich had been on rtively equal and amicable terms with Greem, almost as if they appreciated each other¡¯s powers.


    It seemed like Greem indeed hid his true abilities well. Even the elite adepts here had not realized his actual power and facade. They couldn¡¯t afford to offend someone like him!


    Holly and Mangus had long since been won over by Greem¡¯s power during this journey. They started to obey by Greem¡¯s instructions throughout unknowingly.


    They weren¡¯t too worried about offending the Dark Witches over this matter. The three of them belonged to different adept organizations, after all. The Northern Witches might be powerful, but they could not easily do anything to any of them. Moreover, offending a rising star with seemingly no limits for a dead adept was a foolish decision that neither of them was stupid enough to make.


    After all, this Greem was a powerful man who could even talk with a lich as an equal! Others might not know all these subtleties, but the two of them had personally witnessed Greem¡¯s unparalleled might as a fire adept. Naturally, they knew what to say and what not to say.


    Fourth Grade adepts might be the pinnacle of power in the World of Adepts, but even Fourth Grade adepts were divided into different levels by their power. The legendary fire adept had far surpassed them. He was now a fearsome individual that they could only look up to from a distance.


    Thus, it didn¡¯t matter what the others thought. Holly and Mangus had both made up their minds. They would never make an enemy out of Greem for the rest of their lives!


    Since the mission crystal had been examined, there was nothing to criticize about Greem¡¯s party.


    Though the Coldwinter Witch was still upset about this, she could not do anything without substantial evidence.


    In the end, why did Dark Witch Shani participate in this nar war? What were her true intentions? And what happened between them?


    The Coldwinter Witch had no answers to these questions. She was only trying to uncover the truth out of her routine defense of the united benefit of the Northern Witches.


    Since she could not procure anything from the situation, she ceased her pursuit. Instead, she intended to inform the Witch Council of what had happened here once she had returned to her station beyond the World of Adepts. It would be the Council¡¯s problem to deal with then!


    The death of a Fourth Grade Dark Witch in a foreign ne would certainly cause waves among the Northern Witches. However, as a Fourth Grade witch stationed in the realms beyond, these things did not really concern her.


    ¡°Since everyone¡¯s already arrived, we shallmence teleportation now! The war here has already escted in scale and intensity. We could run into ultra-grade powerhouses at any moment. It is no longer safe to remain here. If nobody else has any concerns, thene closer, please!¡±


    Adept Roy¨Cwho no longer wanted to remain in this ruined ne¨Cstood forward. Seeing no objections, he took out a strange seed and tossed it onto the rocky surface before him.


    This seed was not a seed of an ordinary nt. Instead, it was the seed of a magical nt that had been specially cultivated and sealed for future use. With the breaking of the seal, tender leaves began to spread out and expand in an almost human-like fashion. The equally tender roots pierced the stone like sharp daggers, quickly spreading and growing through the hill.


    In less than a few minutes, the nt had grown into a massive forest. Strange, profound runes flowed on the green vines that now crawled all over the hill. The manyplicated, winding roots formed a giant magical array underground.


    Adept Roy stood at the center of the magical array, violent and ferocious magic energy pouring from his body into the array beneath him. Chains of runes and threads of energy appeared in the air as the energy aura grew in intensity. Soon, the power was blindingly bright.


    ¡°Come in, all of you! The teleportation will begin soon!¡±


    The other nine adepts stepped onto the roots of the magical nt without any hesitation when they heard Adept Roy¡¯s orders. They each found a ce to sit, closed their eyes, and waited for the teleportation tomence.


    Greem, Holly, and Mangus had be slightly more acquainted during their trip. As such, they stood somewhat closer to each other than the other adepts. In particr, Mangus stood right by Greem, as if he was subordinate to him and looking for his protection.


    Greem knew that the siblings were weak and would probably face some difficulty with such intense internar teleportation. As such, he did not pay it much heed.


    The blinding runic array soon flooded the hill, turning it into a sea of light. All ten adepts were engulfed in the light as a portal was torn open.


    Due to the damage to Morrian ne, the dying nar consciousness no longer had the power to suppress internar teleportation of this sort. It made the difficulty of tearing space apart far easier than when they broke into the ne.


    When a ck hole had been torn into space, an energy storm surged out from within the rift, assaulting the adepts. Activating an elementium shield at this moment was not a good idea. Doing so would throw the spatial energy into chaos, causing unpredictable and terrifying consequences.


    The adepts could only close their eyes and endure, using their refined physical bodies and magic resistance to survive the corrosion of space energy. Everybody could feel their bodies mysteriously lengthening, contorting, and twisting. Gradually, they started to lose all sense of space.


    Even with the countless improvements that the adepts had made to internar teleportation arrays, it was still difficult to minimize the danger during the process. Only high-grade adepts whose bodies had been greatly modified could endure such fearsome spatial change. An ordinary, low-grade adept would be torn to pieces by the violently shifting spatial powers.


    The duration of the teleportation felt different for each adept.


    Some adepts would only feel a slight daze, and the teleportation would be over when they opened their eyes. Their experience of the teleportation was only a brief moment. Meanwhile, some adepts with powerful Spirits could maintain sharp consciousness throughout the teleportation process. Teleportation for these adepts could be dozens of seconds, several minutes, or even fifteen minutes.


    It was hard to tell who was right about the passage of time during teleportation!


    Just as the energy in the array bubbled to a peak, Mangus suddenly opened his eyes. His eyes turned white, and his face suddenly contorted into one of pain and struggle.


    ¡°Get out...this...this is my body.¡±


    He screamed furiously as if fighting or resisting against some unknown force.


    In the end, he even roared and summoned the sleeping Cherisha to transform into their two-headedbat state.


    Roar!


    He roared unintelligibly, but his body suddenly trembled and calmed down.


    Both Mangus and Cherisha¡¯s heads turned towards Greem and looked at him. Mangusughed coldly and said, ¡°Brat, we meet again! I hope you like this present.¡±


    Having said that, he lunged towards Greem. His entire body turned crimson as if he had drawn upon all of his powers in a single instant. Then, without any hesitation, he self-destructed!

 Chapter 1140 - A Difficult Trip Back

    Chapter 1140 A Difficult Trip Back


    It¡¯s Maysa.


    The First Witch of Fate who keeps fighting with Alice!


    How...how did she do this?


    Greem was furious and surprised, but there was no denying that he now faced one of the greatest crises in his life.


    The enemy¡¯s timing for this attack was incredibly well-timed. It was the most crucial moment in the internar teleportation.


    Greem could only see crimson blood in front of him. He could faintly hear Adept Roy¡¯s roars of anger, but his entire body was caught between the spatial energy and the violent, chaotic blood from Mangus¡¯ self-destruction.


    It was almost as if he had been caught in an invisible energy storm. He could only hear loud rumbling all around him. His defensive forcefield was under great strain and shattered almost instantly. Before he could cough up blood, the vicious energy pressing against him forced the blood down his throat.


    Greem couldn¡¯t worry about the now-disturbed teleportation. His entire body immediately turned into its energy state as he transformed into a fearsome me giant.


    Faced with the overwhelming tide of energy all around him, Greem knew he would not survive unscathed today. He instantly put away all his most crucial storage rings into the Heart of Principles. He then gathered his raging fire energy and charged at the energy tide.


    It was an explosion from the self-destruction of a newly advanced Fourth Grade adept. As weak as he was in life, the power of the st was still incredibly lethal.


    Two energies of iparable power shed,pressed, and neutralized each other, all within this narrow space.


    The shockwaves from the sh had nowhere to go and bounced within the space, repeatedly smashing Greem¡¯s body of mes and causing him to shrink and erupt, over and over again.


    Greem endured this extreme test of power and roared with all his might. He drew upon an immeasurable amount of pure fire energy from the Heart of Principles andid down numerousyers of fire defenses around his body. A shield would appear the moment the previous shield was shattered. He forcefully protected himself against the corrosion and impact of the energy tide with his deep magic reserves.


    It seemed like Great Witch Maysa was determined to st Greem out of the teleportation space.


    If that happened, Greem would either be torn to shreds by the spacestorms or be teleported to an unknown region by the chaotic space energy; neither option was desirable for Greem!


    As such, Greem resisted with all his power. He refused to take a single step back, even if he had to endure an unimaginable torrent of energy. He refused to believe that Great Witch Maysa dared to push him towards death at the risk of killing everyone else in the party.


    He endured, and he tolerated the pain. It would be worth it as long as he could stay inside the array until the teleportationpleted!


    After a dozen seconds, a light flickered before his eyes. It seemed they had arrived at their destination.


    At that moment, the energy tide that had been bouncing around him seemed to have been channeled away by a different, powerful force. It caused Greem¡¯s body to lose all tension, and he copsed to the ground before everyone else, panting in exhaustion.


    He had reverted from his me giant form. His entire body was covered in wounds caused by the chaotic energy, and his Spirit had be extremely weakened. He didn¡¯t even have the strength to stand up now.


    ¡°What happened? Why did someone die during the teleportation?¡± An overwhelming will descended on the spot, causing all the adepts in the teleportation array to hunch over from the pressure. They almost fell t on the ground.


    Apart from Greem, Adept Roy also suffered incredibly during the teleportation process.


    He was in charge of managing the teleportation itself and was like the helmsman of the ship. This sudden incident and violent eruption of energy had brought about immense pressure on him as well.


    Adept Roy let out a furious roar once the teleportation waspleted. He, too, copsed to the ground, his robe soaked in sweat. He waspletely worn out. Even when faced with questions from his superior, he could not speak at all, no matter how much he tried to muster his strength.


    The powerful will circled the teleportation array and picked up on the strange traces of energy aura that had yet to dissipate.


    ¡°Fate...this is the smell of Fate! Dammit! That bitch Maysa has stuck her hand into my affairs again.¡±


    Soon, the terrifying will arrived above Greem.


    ¡°Kid, who are you? Why did Maysaunch a targeted attack at you? Hmph! Fortunately, the teleportationpleted in time, or the entire party would have had to die along with you.¡±


    Greem coughed violently and spat out all the blood that had been forced back down his throat.


    Unavoidably, his entire body had now been invaded by violent blood energy and the incredibly unusual space energy. It was now extraordinarily frail and in shambles. It was fortunate that he had managed to protect himself promptly and protected the energy from seeping into his Heart of Principles. Otherwise, it would have been a tremendous loss for him.


    Even so, his injuries were severe!


    He could sense the signs of energy invasion throughout his body and even his soul. It was frightening for an elementium adept like himself. If he could not dispel the foreign energy, he would never be able to advance to be a principle adept.


    Greem struggled for half a day before being able to sit upright. He then opened his mouth and started speaking.


    ¡°My lord, I am Greem, a newly advanced Fourth Grade from Zhentarim.¡±


    ¡°Of course, I know that. I know perfectly where you¡¯re from. What I¡¯m asking is, what is your rtionship with Maysa?¡±


    ¡°My lord, I am not rted to Great Witch Maysa in any manner. However, I am somewhat associated with the Witch of Fate, Alice,¡± Greem said with a few pauses along the way.


    ¡°Oh? A new Witch of Fate? You guys didn¡¯t work together and kill Maysa¡¯s Fate Clone, did you?¡± This mysterious individual seemed fairly interested in the topic, and his tone turned slightly friendlier.


    ¡°My lord is wise. I won¡¯t describe the exact proceedings, but Alice and I were associated before everything happened. We then somehow found ourselves in the Battle of Fate, and then¡ª¡±


    ¡°Then Alice became the leader of the Fate Witches? Hehehe. It seems like the nar consciousness can no longer tolerate that bitch¡¯s brazen actions. To think that it would cut off her hands like this. Alright, I understand why you were attacked by that bitch now.


    ¡°Hehehe. It seems like you are pretty favored by the nar consciousness, brat. To think you survived an attack like that! Mm? The blessing of the Witch of Fate. Speak honestly, are you lovers with that Alice? Why else would she be willing to ce such an important blessing on your soul?!¡±


    ¡°The blessing of the Witch of Fate?¡± Greem lifted his head with some difficulty, a look of confusion on his face.


    ¡°You don¡¯t know, do you, kid? Your soul is protected by ayer of Fate power! It doesn¡¯t matter where you go or where you are. Your luck will be hundreds of times stronger than the average person. No wonder you survived an attack like this.¡±


    ¡°My lord, are blessings like this very valuable?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Do you really not know? Anything associated with Fate or fortune is an invaluable treasure. Even if that little girl has the might of a peak Fourth Grade, she would have to sacrifice half of her lifespan to achieve such a feat!¡± The will sighed in exasperation.


    ¡°And if she was Third Grade?¡± Greem¡¯s body tensed up as he quickly followed up with a question.


    ¡°Hehehe. If she were only Third Grade, she would have to pay with at least eighty percent of her life.¡±


    Greem¡¯s face instantly flushed white, and his body crumpled to the ground again.


    ¡°It seems like there¡¯s a story between you two. I couldn¡¯t be any less bothered with it. All I know is that this operation was under my authority. If anyone reaches their dirty hand into my things, I will chop them off without any hesitation.¡±


    These words were clearly not meant for Greem and the others. Instead, they were transmitted to a distant location by way of some powerfulws. A furious and unfeeling snort of disdain was the only reply.


    ¡°Very well, the rest of you survivors can go rest now! Roy,e to my office to give me a report in person.¡±


    Having said that, the powerful will disappeared in an instant. The adepts could finally move and breathe freely.


    ¡°You all heard what the Lord said. Return to your shelters to rest!¡± As expected of a powerful adept, even amongst the elites, Adept Roy had recovered some of his stamina and energy in just that short period. He could move as usual again.


    He shot Greem a cold look. He felt nothing amicable towards this person who almost killed him. That said, since his lordship did not seem to assign any me on Greem, he thought it best not to do anything as well.


    He let out a muffled grunt and turned to walk elsewhere.


    Greem shook his head and smiled bitterly. He rejected Adept Holly¡¯s helping hand and stood in front of the dark red stain that had been left behind by the siblings¡¯ death. He then slowly returned to the Association tower in Exodar Camp.


    Greem stayed in Exodar Camp for only three days. After turning in all rted missions and iming the rewards, he returned to the World of Adepts immediately.


    His first stop was naturally the awakened castle. It was the only internar teleportation array in the center of the continent.


    The group waiting outside the array to wee him was a very grand showing. There were six Fourth Grade adepts in total. They naturally included Chairman Freed, Vice-Chairman Mirva, Adept Ker, Elder Nics, Elder Matthew, and Elder Mornashen Gaia, who possessed a Titan bloodline.


    The other Fourth Grade adepts or elders were either too busy with experiments or stationed in the realms beyond. Otherwise, the weing party would only be grander and greater in scale.

 Chapter 1141 - Everyones Concerns

    Chapter 1141 Everyone¡¯s Concerns


    Greem¡¯s sessful return sent a fairlyrgemotion through Zhentarim.


    The whispered certainties in the shadows that Greem would fall during this mission vanished instantly, reced by rumors that Greem would soon be the most powerful adept of the Central Region.


    In all honesty, the majority of Fourth Grade adepts that came to wee Greem had more deep-seated tensions and conflicts with him. However, at their level, the possibility of a direct confrontation was minimal. Most of their disputes were resolved by way of schemes behind the scenes.


    Greem walked out of the teleportation array, stopping to cough in his hand before smiling and walking towards the crowd.


    The first to greet him was, naturally, Chairman Freed.


    The old fox narrowed his eyes and took a good look at Greem. He couldn¡¯t help but betray surprise on his face.


    ¡°Good work, Elder Greem!¡±


    Greem covered his mouth and coughed a few more times. It took him a while to catch his breath. He then put on a bitter smile and said, ¡°I was caught unaware by the enemy, and my soul¡¯s been injured slightly. It seems like I will have to find somewhere peaceful and quiet to recover. It might take me a hundred years before I¡¯ve recovered.¡±


    He coughed violently after saying that.


    Chairman Freed and the other elders exchanged looks. He then smiled and continued, ¡°Elder Greem, your sacrifices this time were for the sake of the Association. Naturally, the Association won¡¯t abandon you in your time of need. Here is thepensation that the Association is giving you after our discussion. I hope Elder Greem can forget all of our past misgivings and be a true member of the Association.¡±


    Greem took a look around him and epted the storage ring that Chairman Freed had passed to him. He greeted the rest of the adepts before using the teleportation array behind him to return to Fire Throne.


    Once Greem¡¯s frail and weak figure had vanished in the array, the other adepts put away their smiles and put on solemn and stern expressions.


    ¡°How was it? Is it true that he is injured?¡± Chairman Freed was the one who asked the question.


    ¡°We have verified the news from Exodar Camp. Greem was attacked by the self-destruction of a Fourth Grade adept from the Adept¡¯s Association while they were returning. It was apparently an incredibly dangerous situation,¡± Vice-Chairman Mirva replied.


    ¡°The Adept¡¯s Association? There might be trouble now,¡± Adept Ker mumbled to herself.


    The Adept¡¯s Association was one of the three major adept forces of the World of Adepts. Now, one of their personnel had died on the way home without any proper reason. Even though it was a self-destruct initiated by the adept themselves, the Adept¡¯s Association would certainly not ept that truth. An investigation was almost certain. It might even affect the ¡®harmony¡¯ between Zhentarim and the Adept¡¯s Association.


    This matter concerned Fourth Grade adepts and was not a trivial or trifling issue!


    ¡°That¡¯s not the only problem!¡± Vice-Chairman Mirva sighed again. ¡°I heard that the Dark Witch in their party also died in the other world. It might have something to do with Greem as well. I¡¯m worried that the Northern Witches might start stirring trouble on their end as well.¡±


    The Northern Witches.


    All the adepts frowned at the mention of that infamous name. They couldn¡¯t help but disy bitter smiles.


    They had believed that recruiting the legendary fire adept to the Association would make him a scapegoat for them all. Now, it seems like they were the ones that were going to be the scapegoats that had to manage all the risks and troubles he was bringing with him!


    Why didn¡¯t that damned fire adept just die in that other world? If he had just died, none of these problems and troubles would even exist. It would have been so much easier!


    Everyone daydreamed in silence, frowning or sighing in frustration.


    ¡°Alright, alright. Did none of you hear my question?¡± Chairman Freed had a deeper frown than any of them. ¡°What I asked was whether he was actually injured?¡±


    ¡°He should be truly injured,¡± Adept Ker nodded and replied. ¡°I can sense that the damage to his Spirit is fairly severe. The only question is whether his soul itself has been injured. If it has been damaged, his advancement in the future will be......¡±


    Adept Ker did not finish her sentence, but everyone knew what she meant.


    What was most important for an adept?


    The soul, the soul, and the soul.


    The physical body could be modified, improved, and even turned into energy. These changes each had their benefits and problems, but they would not stop an adept¡¯s advancement to a higher grade.


    Only the soul origin was something that the adepts could never ever touch!


    Any changes to the soul would bring about unpredictable and irreversible effects to the adept.


    Should the adept damage his soul origin in battle, his foundations for advancement in the future would be affected. Should he fail to mend these wounds, he would not even be able to improve his powers by even a tiny bit.


    ¡°He¡¯s hurt his soul origin!¡± Elder Mornashen Gaia of the Gold n was the one to speak up this time. His three-meter-tall physique stood out above the rest, and his light golden skin radiated a powerful energy aura. ¡°I can sense the weakness of his soul. It is not a facade. Given his injuries, a hundred years of solitude is a very optimistic way to put it! In my opinion, he won¡¯t be able to heal his wounds without another two or three hundred years. During these two to three hundred years, he...will probably have trouble even maintaining his power as a beginner Fourth Grade.¡±


    The other adepts did not have any objections to Gaia¡¯s opinion.


    After all, among all the Fourth Grade adepts of Central Zhentarim, Mornashen Gaia was undoubtedly one of the most powerful of them all. His n possessed a trace of the powerful bloodline of the ancient titans. When he transformed into the Gold Titan, he could unleash iparable might with every action he took.


    In terms ofbat power alone, Mornashen Gaia was the most powerful adept among all Association adepts!


    Even the sly and cunning Chairman Freed could notpare to him in that regard.


    As such, everyone believed firmly in his judgment.


    ¡°It¡¯s good that he¡¯s injured...very good.¡± A smile finally appeared on Elder Nics¡¯ face. ¡°This way, we of Zhentarim can still rx for a few years. Otherwise, had the legendary adept returned entirely victorious, he would probably start some incredible trouble in Zhentarim!¡±


    Elder Nics and Elder Matthew looked at each other, much more rxed than before.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The two of them had been the ones causing all the trouble for the legendary fire adept before Greem¡¯s rise to power. Be it the invasion of the five ns or the deration of war from the Fabres n, there were always signs of their shadows working behind the scenes.


    They had never truly perceived the fire adept or his Crimson n as a threat prior to this. However, with Greem¡¯s gradual improvements, both of them started to feel the immense pressure weighing down on them.


    Should Greem sessfully rise to power in Zhentarim, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine where his spear would turn. Surely, he would deal with all the people with whom he had ¡®grudges¡¯ and ¡®disagreements.¡¯ If that happened, the two of them would most likely be pushed to the frontline of the conflict against the fire adept.


    That was something that neither of them ever hoped to happen!


    They had already heard that the adept faction had sent out a total of sixteen adepts to that foreign ne. Yet, only ten¨Cno, nine¨Cof them had sessfully returned. It was a death rate of over fifty percent. That must mean that the survivors were all elites and powerful fighters amongst Fourth Grades.


    They had no confidence in defeating this powerful fire adept who had survived the trials of blood and fire, life and death!


    ............


    Greem¡¯s return instantly invigorated the entire Crimson n.


    The Crimson n had gone into a period of low-profile waiting during Greem¡¯s departure.


    It had indeed been a very, very short time since the rise of the Crimson n, after all. So quick, that they had yet to construct an effective and efficient system of cultivating adepts. Most of the new generation adepts were still stuck at First Grade. Those who had managed to make it to Second Grade could be counted with two hands.


    The only ones that could prop up the Crimson n were still the veteran core adepts that had been following Greem all along.


    When news of Greem¡¯s return to the n reached the people, all the core adepts put away their work and returned to the n headquarters regardless of where they were or what they were working on. They awaited an audience with the n leader.


    Pinecone City.


    With the rise of the Crimson n, the tiny Pinecone Town had expanded over and over again. Its poption and the scale of its trade was almostparable to arge city now.


    The n had also moved most of its core operations to the Crimson Wing. Fire Throne and the surrounding five kilometers were now Greem¡¯s private abode and shelter. Ordinarily, without an audience from Greem, anyone that entered this area would be faced with attacks from terrifying fire creatures and powerful magical machines.


    For a moment, Fire Throne, which had been sealed for over twenty years, was once again open to the public. A giant pir of me stood stall in the depths of the primal forest, once again disying its overwhelming might and power.


    The number of Crimson leaders gathered at Pinecone City increased by the day. Amongst them were:


    Majordomo of the n headquarters, Adept Gargamel.


    Manager of the northern branch, Adept Meryl.


    Knight Leader of the vampires, Soros.


    Blood-elf Leader of the vampires, Isa.


    Manager of the Capital of Eternity in Lance, Split-Brain Sock.


    Chairman of the Goblin General Chamber of Commerce, Snox.


    Commander of the Brutalblood Army, Drusi.


    Leader of the magical goblins and Dean of the Goblin Research Institute, Gonga.


    Head of the assassins, Bug Adept Billis.


    Stationed adept of the Goblin ne, Adept Deserra.


    There were also several core members of the n: Dragonborn Zacha, Goblin Shredder Tigule, Medusa Dana, Manticore Charon, and many others.


    When all these members had arrived, Fire Throne was finally opened for them!

 Chapter 1142 - Crimson Conference

    Chapter 1142 Crimson Conference


    The leaders of the Crimson n got onto a small flying ship and traveled through one hundred kilometers of forest.


    They passed through the winding tunnels of Fire Cave and entered Magma Hall, where they finally arrived at Fire Throne. It was guarded byrge numbers of fire creatures and high-grade magical machines.


    Greem met them in the magical hall on the second level of the tower.


    The massive hall was about ten thousand square meters in size, with arge obsidian long table in the center. Intricate stone chairs were arranged on each side of the table. At one end were three tall seats, arranged in a triangle. Naturally, seated at the very front was the mysterious legendary fire adept who had forged this Crimson n with his own two hands¨C Lord Greem.


    Two equally tall chairs were arranged behind him to his left and right.


    Seated on the left was Bloody Queen Lady Mary, who held the most authority of the n. Sitting on the right was Lady Alice, the mysterious leader of the Fate Witches, who was rarely seen by the rest of the n members.


    The three of them were undoubtedly the true heart of the Crimson n!


    It had been a long time since they had met. The n members first bowed before the three leaders of the n before carefully taking their respective seats. Their eyes were all stealing nces at this mysterious yet powerful n leader.


    Greem was wearing a bright-red robe today. Plenty of magical runes and patterns glowed on his intricate and extravagant gown as the radiant aura of fire danced around it. His entire body was covered by the loose cloth, revealing only his slightly pale face.


    Greem was a handsome man. His ck hair had been tied up with an intricate band. His eyes were deep, and his nose was tall. His thin lips were pressed together tightly, a trace of coldness at the corners of his mouth.


    After the countless trials of blood and fire, all the childishness and immaturity had been washed away from him. The only thing left was a mysterious, contained aura of wisdom and power.


    However, Greem¡¯s face was oddly pale today. It was different from his usual appearance when his skin was filled with vigor and the overwhelming aura of life. He looked like someone who had only just recovered from a terrible sickness.


    The n members couldn¡¯t help but start asking questions in their minds when they saw this.


    Could the rumors that the n leader had returned with grievous injuries be true?


    Greem put his fist over his mouth and coughed softly when he saw that everyone was seated. He then lifted his head and looked at his subordinates. His gaze finallynded on Gargamel, who was seated in the first position to the left of the table.


    ¡°Now that everyone is here...Gargamel, you shall begin with a report on the n headquarters for the past few years!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡± Gargamel hurriedly stood up and bowed. With a nod of acknowledgment from Greem, he took out a stack of thick checkbooks and started reading their contents.


    ¡°At the moment, the n only has direct control of Ailovis in Zhentarim. The other regions we indirectly control through subordinate ns and organizations include the Crimson Cloud Mesa, the Silent Pastures, Crow¡¯s Ravine, Hunter¡¯s Shore, Mena Lake, and several others.


    ¡°The Crimson Dynasty¡¯s territories have expanded another one hundred and fifty kilometers to the northwest and are now bordering the outer territories of the Dener n. The Third Magical Machine Army has marched north and is two hundred kilometers deep in the ck Forest. They are currently establishing a forward base there. Given the informationst ryed to us, the attacks and assaults organized by the magical creature lords have intensified. A war is expected to break out soon. Themander has already requested reinforcements from high-grade adepts from the n headquarters.


    ¡°Ailovis is nowpletely controlled by the n. At the moment, we have 7 First ss resource sites, 22 Second ss resource sites, and 106 Third ss resource sites.


    ¡°There are now 97 adepts in the n headquarters: 5 are Third Grade, 26 are Second Grade, and 66 of whom are First Grade.


    ¡°As for the n¡¯s resource ie, we have had total revenue of 2,179,780 magical crystals, and expenditure of 1,463,600 magical crystals. The specific list of resources is as such......¡±


    One by one, category by category, item by item; Gargamel listed all the n matters of concern to the people at the meeting in a simple and straightforward fashion. However, he did not announce the moreprehensive details.


    After all, these details involved many core affairs of the Crimson n and could only be addressed in a personal meeting with the leaders!


    It was Fire Dragon Adept Meryl¡¯s turn to report after Gargamel. She was the leader of the northern branch, after all.


    The Crimson n¡¯s development in the Northern Lands was not going too well. They were seemingly being oppressed and bullied by the various witch factions. The ns who were most obviously doing so were the Dark Witches and the Deceit Witches.


    That made it very difficult for the Crimson n to extend their influence anywhere out of Icewind!


    However, since White Tower bordered the ck Forest, there was plenty ofnd and an abundance of resources. Even if they were forced to stay within their territory, the n could still secure a considerable amount of resource ie from the area.


    Apart from the direct territories in the World of Adepts, the Crimson n also possessed two lesser nes of great wealth and resources. Wind Adept Deserra and Split-Brain Sock, who represented the Goblin ne and Lance respectively, also gave a simple report of the situations in their domains.


    During the time Greem had been gone, the magical alloy stockpile in the Goblin ne had reached 670,000 tons in weight. It was more than enough alloy to manufacture another twenty to thirty thousand magical machines, twelve Motherships, or two magical golem dragons.


    However, Greem¡¯s stockpile of Queyras alloy was almost entirely exhausted. These alloys and metals could only be stored for future use until he got his hands on more Queyras alloy.


    Meanwhile, with the Third Grade brain monster being the master of the Capital of Eternity in Lance, the base was a city of steel that would never fall to enemy assaults.


    The dragon lords had already suffered enough from their attempts at invasion, but could not defeat all the magical machines. As such, they chose to distance themselves from the invaders as much as possible.


    Many of the dragon lords migrated further away, forming small alliances along the way. That made it difficult for the Crimson n¡¯s hunting parties to find any prey and reduced their profits significantly.


    However, over the past two decades, the Capital of Eternity still managed to hunt eleven dragons, five of which were sold, and six that were still imprisoned in Crimson Wing awaiting magical modification or taming.


    Once these ¡®leaders¡¯ of the various branches were done with their reports, it was the subordinate force¡¯s turn to report.


    Gonga, leader of the magical goblins and Dean of the Goblin Research Institute, was the most excited. He practically shouted out the three most important pieces of news he had.


    Firstly, the Goblin Research Institute had seeded in inventing a true magic energy amplifier.


    This device had been the most significant roadblock holding back the Crimson n from constructing the Thunder God Titan.


    The so-called magic energy amplifier was simply a magic-mechanical version of an elementium energy resonator. It could allow the elementium energy flowing in the magical machine to form resonance with wandering elementium in the surroundings. In doing so, it could amplify the effect of magic energy attacks.


    The sess of the Goblin Research Institute had much to do with the focusing crystal that Greem discovered prior to this. However, Gonga revealed that this sess had only been verified in theboratories. It would take a long period of experimentation and refinement before it could be perfected and applied to the Sixth Grade Thunder God Titan.


    The second piece of information was the magical machine exoskeletonbat assistance system.


    The adepts could use magical equipment to assist them inbat. Meanwhile, the goblins had no elementium affinity and could not use elementium attacks even with the aid of a magical machine.


    However, the newborn magical goblins were somewhere in between. They might not have elementium affinity, but they could use their natural magical patterns to obtain some control over magic energy.


    To enhance the power of these magical goblins, Dean Gonga had invested considerable resources and created this exoskeletonbat assistance system. These devices were like magic-mechanical equipment. They could be equipped on the bodies of magical goblins and used to assist them in unleashing elementium attacks.


    Greem was highly interested in this topic when he heard it.


    If these magic-mechanical exoskeletons were modified for a human adept¡¯s size and elementium affinity, it might just be beneficial for human adepts as well!


    Greem immediately ordered Gargamel to assign some adepts and apprentices to work with Dean Gonga. He wanted to figure out if the magic-mechanical exoskeleton¡¯s function was universal.


    Thirdly, the blueprint of the Thunder God Titan was almostplete.


    Dean Gonga excitedly requested Greem¡¯s permission to construct the prototype and to begin experimentation.


    Thunder God Titan was a powerful war machine that could theoretically reach the levels of Sixth Grade. The number of high-grade materials and rare resources consumed in constructing such a device was astronomical, not including the countless number of technical problems waiting to be solved.


    In all honesty, the energy core of a single Thunder God Titan would require three to five magic generator furnaces to power it. For the Titan to fight at full efficiency, Greem would have to make another mega magic-generator furnace.


    Greem gave Gonga¡¯s request some thought after hearing it. He then took out a knowledge crystal from his storage ring and slid it across the table to the old goblin.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be in a hurry to construct the Titan. We can talk about it once you have digested the knowledge in that crystal!¡±


    ¡°n leader, what...what is this?¡± Dean Gonga lifted the crystal in confusion.


    ¡°The fundamental theory of the Arcane Empire¡¯s energy core,¡± Greem calmly said. ¡°When ites to the advanced application of basic energy, the Arcane Empire¡¯s knowledge is the most well-established and effective above them all. I believe that your mastery and application of magic energy will improve by leaps and bounds once you understand their arcane theories!¡±


    The next second, every single adept in the room looked at the crystal with passionate, gleaming eyes.

 Chapter 1143 - Ruling Rights

    Chapter 1143 Ruling Rights


    ¡°n leader, what happened to the Arcane Empire in the end?¡±


    Everyone now knew that the n leader had been sent to the battlefield of the Arcane Empire; they were all very interested in the topic.


    ¡°The Arcane Empire has fallen apart. It no longer exists!¡± Greem coughed into his hand, shook his head, and sighed. ¡°Such a massive empire, only slightly weaker than the World of Adepts, reduced to dust just like that. Even if some remnants of the Arcane Empire managed to escape into hiding, they wouldn¡¯t be showing themselves for a thousand years, at least.¡±


    The adepts here were knowledgeable individuals as well. They had all heard of this Arcane Empire through their own channels of information. The shock and indescribable emotion of loss that they all felt was tremendous when they listened to their n leader describe the fall of a massive empire in such a casual tone.


    The World of Adepts wasposed of arge group of spellcasters, very much like the Arcane Empire.


    The only difference was that the World of Adepts¡¯ period of development and growth coincided with the period of peace in the universe. It was a rare era of peace that hade about after the colossal war between the World of Disasters and the Titans, which had rippling effects across the entire universe. It was because of this that the World of Adepts and the World of Gods could develop so rapidly and survive their period of weakness to give birth to their respective Ninth Grade powerhouses.


    If it weren¡¯t for the protection of these Ninth Grade Great Adepts, the World of Adepts would never have been able to develop peacefully.


    As a Fourth Grade adept, Greem had begun toe into contact with the more well-hidden secrets of the world. His understanding of the changes in the multiverse had significantly expanded.


    In all seriousness, the multiverse they lived in was a ssic high-magic world!


    Meanwhile, the two species that were the greatest driving forces of change in the multiverse were the Scourge Lords and the Titans.


    The Scourge Lords were the evil faction, while the Titans were a dominant species born from the will and consciousness of the multiverse.


    The Scourge Lords hunted nar worlds as prey and devoured their nar origin for sustenance. They were thergest, most malignant tumor in the world. Moreover, they were a tumor that spread. When the Scourge Lords moved out in high numbers, it was a cmity for the billions upon billions of nar worlds in the universe.


    As such, as the will of the universe personified, the Titans were naturally born with powerful physical strength and the vicious purification power of lightning. Their only purpose in life was to search the universe to exterminate the Scourge Lords.


    Whenever war broke out between the Scourge Lords and the Titans, it inflicted severe damage to both of their forces.


    The Titans would retreat deep into the universe to rest and recover, and the Scourge Lords would have to do the same in their World of Disasters. This period was the best development time for the innumerable civilizations in the universe.


    Once the Scourge Lords had recovered their Spirits, recovered from their physical injuries, and slowly woke up from their ten thousand year slumber, the entire universe would once again be plunged into an unending war. When that happened, the Titans would gather once more and emerge to search for the Scourge Lords.


    However, the two factions could not fight alone. They would always find subordinate species and organizations to join their cause, starting one terrifying nar war after another in every corner of the universe.


    When that happened, the major civilizations of the universe were forced to choose a side. Either help the Titans beat the Scourge Lords, or aid the Scourge Lords in their conquest of the universe.


    Either option would trigger rapid change in the politics of the universe and lead to changes in the power bnce.


    Some powerful civilizations had been exterminated shortly after their meteoric rise, simply because they had been dragged into a war beyond their limits. Some species had rapidly risen to be a significant powerhouse simply because they chose the right side of the conflict and steadily grew in power.


    The entire multiverse slowly moved forward to the beat of the eternal war!


    The Scourge Lords and the Titans would step off the stage when both sides were grievously wounded, leaving the other civilizations an excellent time for peaceful development. Once they had recovered and stepped out from their hiding spots, the multiverse would be ravaged by the mes of war again.


    The newly grown wild grass would either be burned down to ashes or survive to be stronger until the next cycle descended upon them.


    During a ¡®period of peace,¡¯ every civilization would fight with all they had to increase their power in hopes of facing the uing war in their best condition!


    The World of Adepts was fortunate. Their rise to power urred during the ¡®Golden Age of Development¡¯ for the universe.


    Now, after such a long time of peace and quiet, the Scourge Lords were stirring once again.


    The first ones to move were always the weaker Scourge Lords.


    They were either Sixth or Seventh Grade, but they started causing trouble in the universe. They incited wars everywhere, invading still developing worlds to siphon their nar origin and regain their powers as quickly as possible.


    Their awakening also meant that the stronger Scourge Lords were about to wake as well.


    Once the World of Disasters was fully active and a real menace to the universe, the Titans would emerge for their deathmatch once more!


    It was due to his understanding of the universe¡¯s story that Greem could not help but have his ownmentations.


    The Arcane Empire might not have been weak, but the timing of its rise to power was not the best. That was why they became the first targets of the Scourge Lords.


    The participation of the adepts was mostly inconsequential. They were only hoping to steal some leftovers with the Scourge Lords serving as the spearheads of the conflict!


    If the newly awakened Scourge Lords were terrifying jackals, then the adepts were a pack of vultures. There was cooperation between them, but also conflict. It was aplicated rtionship they shared.


    Of course, such a broad perspective of the universe was only avable to Greem after his advancement to Fourth Grade. People like Mary still had their views constrained within the World of Adepts. They could not see through to the true reasons behind the Arcane Empire¡¯s fall.


    However, Greem had neither the responsibility nor the mood to correct their worldview.


    After a few simple sentencesmenting the fall of a great civilization, Greem turned his attention back to the internal affairs of the n.


    The next ones to step forward for a report were the goblins, represented by Snox.


    After the goblin rebellion, the Crimson n had properly assimted and organized the goblins. They were now separated into two major groups. The Goblin Chamber of Commerce was responsible for trade and smuggling. The Military Faction wasposed of the goblin adepts, goblin machinist-sorcerers, and the new magical goblins.


    Due to his weakbat power, Snox had be the new Chairman of the Chamber of Commerce, responsible for all goblin trade and smuggling activities.


    With his agile mind, slippery methods, and the weight of the Crimson n¡¯s treasury behind him, Snox had expanded the services of the Chamber of Commerce to every corner of the World of Adept. The short, busy silhouettes of the goblins could be seen in every area ruled by the adepts: from the Silver Union in the west, to the Adept¡¯s Association in the east, the Northern Witches in the north, and Zhentarim at the center of the continent.


    What propelled their growth outwards was the name of Greem, the legendary Fourth Grade adept, and the infamous reputation of the Crimson n.


    Of course, this process also involved the hard work and lives of countless generations of goblins!


    It was important to note that the local authorities and organizations managed every region. These organizations might not dare touch the businesses of the major adept organizations, but they had no such concerns when it came to the weaker and smaller trade groups.


    The goblin traders had faced plenty of harassment from the local organizations when they traveled. The weaker organizations might not be a match for the goblin traders, protected by their magical machines, but the more prominent and sizeable organizations had more than enough means by which to rob the merchants of their goods.


    Over the past hundred years, over seventy goblin merchant groups had been exterminated in the World of Adepts for various reasons. Billis, the head of the assassination department, traveled the continent to investigate these incidents and exact proper punishment on their enemies.


    These activities were uncontested in Zhentarim, but it became much more difficult in the regions ruled by the three major organizations.


    After all, Greem¡¯s reputation was only well-known in Zhentarim. Only a few people outside of the central continent knew of his name.


    Greem did not speak much or attempt to intervene as he listened to his subordinates report on their affairs. He only asked a few questions when it came to topics that interested him.


    Once everyone was done with their reports, Greem coughed lightly, and the hall fell silent in an instant.


    Greem looked around him at those familiar faces and finally spoke.


    He lifted his head and released two glowing white orbs, letting them float in front of him.


    ¡°Judging from the reports I have received from you, I can tell that everyone has worked hard. Therefore, it is now time for your rewards. These are the coordinates of the two lesser nes I just obtained from the Zhentarim Association. Both of them are small nes and rtively well developed.¡±


    The eyes of the Crimson adepts glowed when they heard Greem¡¯s words. Their gazes at the balls of light were burning with passion now.


    Greem smiled casually.


    ¡°We can discuss amongst ourselves now. Which two factions in the n should obtain the ruling rights for these two lesser nes?¡±

 Chapter 1144 - Wedding Ceremony

    <h4>Chapter 1144 Wedding Ceremony</h4>


    Ruling rights.


    Was the n willing to give out ruling rights over lesser nes?


    The gaze of every Crimson adept present burned hot with desire.


    The Crimson n currently had two lesser nes. One was the Goblin ne, which provided the n with a tremendous amount of metal ores. The other was Lance, the genuine dragon ne that gave the n all the dragon resources it needed.


    The n leader¡¯s intention seemed to be to transfer all ruling rights over these two new nes to two factions within the n. The n itself would not be responsible for managing or developing these nes. How...how could this not cause the more ambitious members of the n to be wild with excitement?


    Greem ignored the expressions of wild delight on his n members¡¯ faces and continued speaking.


    ¡°Seawoods ne. The ne is over four million square kilometersrge, with two continents in total, the rest of which is sea. The two continents have a total size of 1.6 million square kilometers, with vast stretches of primal forests andrge groups of natives living within. Magic concentration is average, narws are basicallyplete, and the magical resources are fairly ordinary. Initial estimates suggest that an annual ie of eight hundred thousand magical crystals from the ne is possible after proper development.¡±


    ¡°And the powerhouses of the ne? They haven¡¯t already been exterminated, have they?¡± Even Mary, who was behind Greem, couldn¡¯t help but straighten her body and express a trace of interest.


    ¡°There aren¡¯t many Fourth Grade creatures in Seawoods. The dominant species are the forest trolls, who are revered by several other tribes. It is said that the king of the trolls is Fourth Grade!¡±


    ¡°Then I¡¯ll take it! As the representative of the vampires, I will dedicate my all to the development and excavation of Seawoods ne!¡±


    ¡°Certainly. Ruling rights over Seawoods ne belongs to you vampires, but you will have to pay the n four hundred thousand magical crystals on an annual basis for the rights.¡±


    ¡°No problem! If I can¡¯t find any adept resources there, I will capture those trolls and selling them as ves!¡± Mary shot Greem a mean nce as she spoke.


    Greem simply smiled and waved with his hand. The milky-white light representing the coordinates of Seawoods flew into Mary¡¯s hands.


    The vampires in the hall, led by Mary, all smiled happily.


    The vampires were very different from ordinary adepts, after all.


    Now that they had a lesser ne that belonged solely to the vampires, they could freely change the environment within into one that suited thempletely. It would make it much easier to raise bloodkin descendants in the future.


    ¡°The Mountain ne. It is 1.8 million square kilometers. The only elementium within the ne is earth elementium. We suspect it is a small ne that split off from the Earth Elementium ne. There are no seas, forests, nor lifeforms in the ne. The entire world consists of scattered mountains and hills. However, probes indicate that there is an intense earth elementium aura beneath the hills. There should be a plentiful reserve of magical ores to be excavated underground. Anyone who wishes to obtain the ruling rights for this ne will have to pay the n an annual fee of two hundred thousand magical crystals!¡±


    After a simple introduction of the lesser ne, Greem looked around the room and asked softly.


    ¡°Is there any faction that wishes to obtain this ne?¡±


    Mono-elementium of earth. Magical ores.


    The members of the Goblin General Chamber of Commerce, led by Snox, exchanged a few looks and expressed tremendous interest in the ne.


    Excavation of ores was the greatest strength of the goblins. They were the most suited for the job.


    Thus, Greem nodded and tossed the second ball of light to Snox.


    Apart from the two lesser nes, Greem lifted his head and released over three dozen unusual items hovering within red bubbles. These were all otherworldly resources and unique treasures he had obtained on his journey.


    Of course, he had already put all the truly valuable items into his personal collection. Everything he disyed here was a resource he would not use himself. The addition of these things allowed the n¡¯s list of redeemable items to improve tremendously.


    ¡°Basic Arcane Theories.¡±


    ¡°Analysis of Spatial Energy.¡±


    ¡°Studies on Mutated Creatures.¡±


    ¡°Encyclopedia of Starbeasts.¡±


    ¡°Secrets of the Gods.¡±


    ¡°Memoirs of Space Travel.¡±


    Arcane Golem Core Component.


    Unstable Arcane Crystals.


    Arcane Bracelet (Recover half of all expended magic on a sessful spell. Note: Only arcanists can use this item).


    Mask of Misfortune (Owner of the mask can target an enemy and inflict a curse of -1 Luck).


    Crimson Scythe (+2 Strength, converts 20% of damage into user¡¯s own life force with every attack).


    Crystal Staff (+2 Spirit, +2 Magic Regeneration).


    Talisman of Enve Dead (Enve a wild undead of lower grade than yourself. A maximum of three undead may be enved).


    Alchemy sk (Forcefully extract no more than a hundred grams of magical alloy per day).


    Golden Feather (Feather of the holy creature, Condor of Light. Can be used to create a holy item).


    Dragon Shield (Defensive shield forged with the scale of a pureblood dragon. +20 Magic Resistance).


    ......


    ......


    All sorts of treasures floated before the n members, their barriers radiating an enticing magical light.


    In particr, some of these treasures glowed with a different light on the outside.


    After analysis, the n members could tell that these items were Third Grade treasures. Such things were always in short supply for the Crimson adepts.


    Every Third Grade adept of the n was looking at those treasures with passionate eyes.


    ¡°Gargamel, you store these items first. Put them in the n treasury. Once we¡¯ve appraised their actual value, you can put them into the list of items to be redeemed. All n members are free to redeem any of them!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    Gargamel acknowledged his orders and indicated for Emelia to put away the items.


    Once this was all done, Greem fell silent for a moment before speaking again.


    ¡°This journey out of the World of Adepts has let me take the first step towards understanding the endless gxy. I believe that the Crimson n has a need to send a group of personnel to space and participate in the search for resources out there.¡±


    Greem¡¯s eyes turned towards split-brain Sock.


    ¡°Sock, go back and inform Gazlowe that he will be responsible for the security of this camp to be established!¡±


    ¡°Snox,¡± Greem looked at Snox now. ¡°You will be responsible for constructing themercial and financial model of this camp in space.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Now then, what else do you have to report?¡±


    ¡°n leader...I have something I need to report!¡±


    Greem paused for a moment and turned. It was Dean Gonga who had spoke up.


    ¡°What is it, Gonga?¡±


    ¡°Yes. n leader, we...our research has reached a critical point. We might...we might be in dire need of a batch of magic generator furnaces!¡± Gonga stuttered as he spoke, rubbing his hands anxiously as he did so.


    Sock became worried when he heard Gonga¡¯s request.


    ¡°n leader, we of the Capital of Eternity require magic generator furnaces very much as well! The factories there have been inactive for a very long time.¡±


    Greem frowned slightly.


    Ever since the Queyras alloy from Molten Fire City was used to make the magic generator furnaces, there wasn¡¯t much left. Now that two of his important subordinates were making the same request of him, he wasn¡¯t quite sure what to do.


    He had obtained plenty of resources and treasures during hisst trip to Morrian ne, but Queyras alloy was the one resource that he had not gotten his hands on.


    ¡°I understand! I will try and solve this problem as quickly as possible!¡±


    Having gained the promise of the n leader, Gonga and Sock did not pursue the issue and sat down quietly.


    ¡°Since none of you have any more reports, I will make a major announcement of my own!¡±


    At this point, Greem looked around him and smiled.


    ¡°I have decided to hold a grand banquet to announce Alice and Mary as my partners for life!¡±


    ¡°Ah!¡±


    ¡°Ah!¡±


    Two cries of joy and embarrassment came from behind Greem when he finished his sentence.


    The entire hall then instantly bubbled with excitement.


    Several dozen voices rang out at the same time, the congrattions filling the entire room. All the n adepts rejoiced with the twodies and celebrated with the n leader.


    Emelia and Meryl rushed over to Alice and Mary¡¯s sides, grabbing their arms and giggling amongst themselves.


    Ordinary people in the World of Adepts might hold official wedding ceremonies.


    However, for the near god-like adepts, a partnership was simply a matter of preference. They could stay together as long as they loved each other, and they could separate whenever their feelings had faded. There was no reason to bind two individuals with a pointless ceremony as the mortals did.


    However, out of habit, Greem still wanted to give his two women a proper title. That was why he decided to confirm their identities as his partners through such an announcement.


    It was undoubtedly very unusual for an adept. In fact, it was almost certainly unique.


    However, Greem didn¡¯t mind.


    All that mattered was that he was happy, and the two girls were happy!


    Alice and Mary, now surrounded by everyone, might not be all embarrassed like a mortal girl would, but they were blushed bright red. The nces they shot at Greem were both shy, furious, and colored with a tinge of happiness.


    They were happy that Greem had publicly announced his feelings, but angry that he had not discussed such an important matter with them before the announcement.


    Mary didn¡¯t quite mind. She had always been Greem¡¯s partner and never sought to conceal this fact in front of other people. However, Alice¡¯s identity was unique. Her rtionship and marriage would affect politics amongst the Northern Witches, which would make things quite difficult.


    However, since Greem had already decided to make this announcement, it was obvious that he no longer wanted to let Alice and him continue to hesitate on the decision.


    After somemotion, the n members all finally left Fire Throne in high spirits.


    Greem had just managed to stand up when Alice and Mary stopped him.


    ¡°Greem, this...this decision of yours is too rash!¡± Alice blushed as sheined. ¡°Mary might not have any problems, but with my status amongst the Northern Witches; either way, you¡¯re too rash!¡±


    ¡°What do you mean I might not have any problems?! He didn¡¯t ask for my opinion either, alright? Hmph! It¡¯s not like I absolutely have to marry him!¡± Mary was obviously thrilled, but she still tried to put on a front.


    Greem grabbed both of their slender hands and spoke solemnly to the two of them.


    ¡°I know this was very sudden. But if I don¡¯t force myself to make this decision, I might never be able to find a solution to so many problems that face us! There will be a lot of troubleing to me soon. Not only from the Dark Witches, but perhaps the Adept¡¯s Association as well. Because of that, I hope you two can weather the storm with me. Will...you?¡±


    Alice was still hesitant, but when she saw Greem¡¯s resolution, she could only nod her head along with Mary!

 Chapter 1145 - Spreading Ripples

    <h4>Chapter 1145 Spreading Ripples</h4>


    World of Adepts. The territory of the Northern Witches.


    Neo Valley.


    Thend where the origin tower of the Dark Witches was located¨C where the ck Mystery could be found.


    Everything inside the valley was still as dark and sinister as before. All creatures and nts were engulfed by a faintly dim shadow, gray and lifeless.


    Meanwhile, a heated argument was transpiring in the looming tower above.


    Three ck silhouettes coldly faced each other in a dark and lightless room. It seemed almost as if a fight would break out at any time.


    ¡°Circe, you might be the leader of the n, but it does not mean that you hold all authority within it!¡± An unusually old and hoarse voice came from the shadow on the left. ¡°What exactly happened to Shani? Where is the Orb of Shadows? These things...you have to give us an exnation, or us sisters of the Shadow will never obey the orders of headquarters again!¡±


    An equally raspy voice rang out from the figure on the right as well.


    ¡°She¡¯s right, Circe. We lost a Fourth Grade sister, just like that. You at least have to give us an exnation!¡±


    The individual standing between the two was tall and slender, but her tone was cold and harsh.


    ¡°Elders, I was the one that gave Shani the order. I was also the one that made her participate in the mission in the Arcane Empire. Just ask me if you have any questions!¡±


    The two aged Dark Witch elders couldn¡¯t help but soften their tone when they saw Circe¡¯s response.


    Finally, the Shadow elder on the left spoke once again.


    ¡°You are our leader. Naturally, that means you have the right to mobilize all resources and witches in ck Mystery. However, what we want to know is how Shani could have died in Morrian ne with her powers? Did you really send her on a simple infiltration mission?¡±


    Circe fell silent for a moment.


    ¡°I sent Shani on this mission publicly to infiltrate the Arcane Empire, but in truth...it was to take advantage of the chaos to assassinate one of the participants of the mission.¡±


    ¡°Who?¡±


    ¡°Greem, a Fourth Grade fire adept from Zhentarim!¡±


    The two witch elders exchanged looks and nodded in silence. It was obvious that they were not unacquainted with Greem¡¯s name.


    ¡°Greem is only a newly advanced fire adept. Shani was already intermediate Fourth Grade. She even has the Orb of Shadows, which you handed to her. How could she have still failed her mission? Did she die at the hands of the arcanists, or did she die at the hands of Greem?¡±


    Circe was quiet again. After a momentary pause, she spoke in a dejected tone, ¡°Morrian ne ispletely ruined now. Even if we sent Sage Elsa to Morrian to search for the cause of Shani¡¯s death, we wouldn¡¯t be able to find anything.¡±


    ¡°Then, are we supposed to let Shani die in vain? Moreover, the loss of the Orb of Shadows is incredibly detrimental to the assimtion of ck Mystery with the Realm of Shadows. What do you intend to do?¡±


    ¡°Shani¡¯s death is most certainly rted to Greem. I will exact vengeance on him. The Orb of Shadows is also definitely in his hands. I will take it back when I hunt him down!¡± Circe coldly replied.


    ¡°With what justification? Don¡¯t you forget, Greem is now an elder of the Zhentarim Association. It will be difficult for us to do anything to him without substantial evidence. You don¡¯t want to start a war between the Zhentarim Association and the Dark Witches, do you?¡± The elder from the shadows interrupted her.


    ¡°Let¡¯s search for evidence first then!¡± The other elder said. ¡°Wasn¡¯t there an adept from the Silver Union in their party that came back alive? We will start with him and see if we can find direct evidence of Greem killing Shani. With that evidence, we would be able to raise a proposal at the Witch Council to mobilize all of the Northern Witches¡¯ power to kill Greem. When that happens, even the old foxes of Zhentarim Association won¡¯t dare to stand up against the Northern Witches, will they?¡±


    ¡°I understand! I will arrange for someone to make contact with the Silver Union adept.¡± Circe thought for a moment and nodded her head in agreement.


    ¡°That said, you were too rash with your actions this time!¡± The witch elder couldn¡¯t help but vent her frustrations. ¡°To think you would send out a sister without proper knowledge of the opponent¡¯s power, and even lose the n¡¯s sacred artifact in the process. If you do not retrieve the Orb of Shadows by the next n meeting, I will personally propose to Lady Malvina that you be stripped of your status as leader!¡±


    ¡°Seconded! I agree with Elder Ekador. Circe, you¡¯ve stayed in the position of n leader for too long. It¡¯s time for a change of leadership. Otherwise, wouldn¡¯t the entire headquarters of Dark Witches be bent to the will of the Ankharas alone?¡±


    As a Fourth Grade Dark Witch and leader of the Dark Witches, Circe naturally possessed the highest authority over the witches and resources of the branch.


    Meanwhile, Shadow Elder udina was the leader of the assassination group. The adepts of the group were all elites selected from headquarters, experts at assassinations and ambushes. As the leader of Shadow, udina¡¯s authority was no less than Circe¡¯s own.


    Meanwhile, Beast Elder Ekador was responsible for the creation of shadow servants. Her job was to create a powerful shadow army for the Dark Witches. Naturally, this gave her tremendous authority as well.


    The dead Shani had been the Elder of Magic. She was responsible for research in shadow magic and the cultivation of new witches. As Shani had also been born into the Ankhara family and was a descendant of Circe¡¯s family, she obeyed every order from her n leader. It was what led to this unexpected disaster.


    Meanwhile, the Lady Malvina that Elder Ekador had mentioned was a Sixth Grade Dark Witch. As she usually stayed somewhere in space, she could only manage the affairs of the Dark Witches remotely through a n meeting held every hundred years.


    Circe¡¯s face turned dark when she heard the naked threats of the two elders. However, there was nothing she could do about it.


    As all of them were Fourth Grades, she did not have that much authority over them, even as the leader of the n and the Dark Witches. The death of a Fourth Grade witch could be a major or minor event depending on how you spun it. Still, Circe would not be too affected by this incident, even if it was raised during the n meeting.


    However, the Orb of Shadows was different!


    The Fifth Grade Orb of Shadows was a sacred artifact personally handed down by the Great Witch of the n. It was irreceably important to the Dark Witches. Should the orb be lost by her hands, Circe would no longer be able to maintain her status as a n leader, no matter how much Lady Malvina favored her.


    The next n meeting would be held in seven years. Circe only had seven years left to deal with this troublesome affair!


    ¡°I understand what I have to do. Don¡¯t worry. All the problems will be solved before the meeting!¡±


    Having said that, Circe turned into ck mist and merged into the shadows, vanishing from the room without a trace.


    The two witch elders looked at each other and sighed before leaving as well.


    ............


    The World of Adepts. The east coast of the continent.


    It was where the great Adept¡¯s Association could be found. It was the idealnd for tens of thousands of adepts.


    There was a forest of adept towers here, along with wealthy and vast adept kingdoms, plenty of adepts, and an innumerable amount of adept resources.


    Compared to the other organizations, the Adept¡¯s Association could be considered the only true adept¡¯s organization in the World of Adepts. The Silver Union was more like a federation of esoteric adepts and mechanical adepts with a talent for business. The Northern Witches were more of a witch organization with the legacy of an ancient bloodline, unweing to other adepts.


    The Zhentarim Association, on the other hand, was too loose to be an effective organization. They had no actual authority over their high-grade adepts. It could barely be considered a second-rate organization and was not at the level of the three major organizations.


    The most famousndmarks of the Adept¡¯s Association were their Seven-Ring Towers.


    Seven top-tier towers constructed ording to a mysterious array, connected through numerous altars and smaller buildings to form an unusuallyrge system of arrays.


    With the towers serving as nodes in the array and the vastnd between them as the base, it was a colossal project of unbelievable proportions. Only the Great Adepts, with their unbound worldview, broad strokes, and destructive power could achieve such a feat.


    At the moment, an unfamiliar hearing was underway in a hall in one of those Seven-Ring Towers.


    Speaker Lawyes sat behind an old redwood roundtable. He listened to an adept report on the investigation of Adept Mangus¡¯ death, all while asking questions on details that interested him in a calm andposed voice.


    Speaker Lawyes was a Fourth Grade adept as well. His face was covered in wrinkles, and his hair was white. The ck-framed sses he wore above his nose gave him the ir of elegance, wisdom, and knowledge that all high-grade adepts possessed.


    On the other end of the hall sitting behind tall wooden grates were a few dozen nervous adepts waiting for the Speaker¡¯s final decision.


    ¡°You mean to say that Adept Mangus is dead beyond doubt, with not even a single shard of his soul being recoverable?¡± Speaker Lawyes slowly asked of the Third Grade adept sent out on the investigation.


    ¡°Yes, your honor.¡±


    ¡°How, exactly, did he die?¡±


    ¡°I have personally visited some of the adepts who returned with Lord Mangus. ording to them, Lord Mangus was perfectly normal prior to the return from Morrian ne. However, he suddenly went insane during the teleportation and seemed to attempt to kill one of theirpanions through self-destruction. More than three Fourth Grade adepts have verified this.¡±


    ¡°Who was it that he attempted to kill?¡±


    ¡°A newly advanced adept named Greem. He belongs to the Zhentarim Association and was assigned to the same party as Lord Mangus.¡±


    ¡°Was there a grudge between them?¡±


    ¡°ording to our investigations, no! Moreover, judging from the information that we have, Lord Mangus seemed to have signed an oath contract with all hispanions. If there were a grudge between the two of them, they would not have made a contract like that.¡± The Third Grade adept had clearly fulfilled his duty. The information he had gathered wasprehensive, detailed, and irrefutable.

 Chapter 1146 - Seed of Fate

    Chapter 1146 Seed of Fate


    ¡°What was the conclusion of your investigation then? Was it something that Mangus brought on himself, or was he the victim of unexpected malicious intent?¡± Speaker Lawyes pushed his sses upwards and frowned as he asked.


    The adepts listening in the seats could no longer sit still when they heard the Speaker¡¯s words. They stood up and protested, ¡°Our Lord Mangus was most certainly an innocent victim. Sir Speaker, there must be justice for him!¡±


    Speaker Lawyes¡¯ face turned dark when he looked at the chaoticmotion from the audience. He exhaled loudly from his nose, and an overwhelming aura of might pressed down from above.


    ¡°I hope no one interrupts me again during the investigation trial! If anyone is unable to stay silent, I will personally escort them out of the room. Hmph.¡±


    The adepts from the same n as Mangus and Cherisha sat down quietly when they felt the terrifying aura of the Fourth Grade Speaker. They suppressed their emotions and patiently listened to the rest of the trial.


    The Third Grade adept sent by the Association on the investigation gulped and spoke up with some difficulty, ¡°We have no means of obtaining any information on the things that happened in Morrian ne. We are currently requesting permission from the leaders of the Association to conduct a direct investigation on Adept Greem. However, given his status as a Zhentarim Association Elder, we cannot easily approach him without direct evidence.¡±


    ¡°What about circumstantial evidence, then?¡±


    ¡°About that...we do seem to have some circumstantial evidence!¡± The Third Grade adept stuttered a little as he replied.


    ¡°What is it?¡± The Fourth Grade Speaker pursued the issue.


    ¡°Seventh Grade Great Adept Lord Erlendwald, who¡¯s responsible for the Arcane Empire mission, was also present at the time of the crime. Judging from his manner of speech, it seemed as if he knew who the mastermind behind Lord Mangus¡¯ death was. However, at our level, we can¡¯t really......¡±


    Seventh Grade Great Adept.


    Even if Lord Erlendwald did know anything, there would probably be no one in the Adept¡¯s Association who would dare to approach him with their questions! No wonder the Third Grade adept in charge of the investigation was so hesitant when speaking.


    ¡°Alright, I have a basic understanding of everything that transpired.¡± Having said that, Speaker Lawyes lifted his head and looked at the adepts from Mangus¡¯ n. They looked anxious and impatient, but Lawyes coldly said. ¡°With regards to your n for revenge, this Speaker will now officially issue a rejection. I will continue to report on this case to the higher-ups of the Association and have them send adepts of higher grades to contact the two survivors of the victim¡¯s party. Before this, this Speaker will note to a conclusion on the cause of Adept Mangus¡¯ death.¡±


    These adepts could only dejectedly ept reality as Speaker Lawyes nced down at them with his cold and authoritative stare.


    ¡°Very well, you may all leave now! The next case on trial is Adept Hannah¡¯s death by curse. The defendant and investigators may enter now!¡±


    The adepts walked out in an orderly fashion, and a new group of adepts walked in. A different story had begun in the adjudication hall.


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    Once the Crimson adepts had left the tower, it was once again a world shared only by Greem, Alice, and Mary.


    Alice still had the same casual smile on her face, but the anxiety in her eyes betrayed her concern.


    ¡°Your soul origin...how is it? Is the injury serious?¡±


    Mary fell silent and looked upon Greem with eyes of concern as well.


    Greem had alreadypleted the elementiumization of his body and Spirit. Any damage should theoretically be recoverable through the replenishment or recement of elementium energy. Severe,sting injuries should no longer ur to his person. If they did happen, it could only mean that the damage had already reached his soul origin. The symptoms of injury he disyed were only a projection of the damage to his soul consciousness!


    Injuries of this type were tough to heal.


    ¡°My soul origin was damaged by the self-destruction from that Adept¡¯s Association guy. It will probably require a long rest for it to recover.¡± After a simple exnation of his injury, Greem curiously asked of Alice, ¡°Rather than my injury, I¡¯m more interested in how Great Witch Maysa was able to control that adept! Could it be...is Great Witch Maysa capable of possessing any Fourth Grade adept she wishes?¡±


    Horror and fear appeared on Mary¡¯s face as well.


    Compared to adepts living inside a ne, Great Adepts could already be considered apletely different and highly unusual species. Due to extreme mutations or modifications, Great Adepts were starkly different from ordinary adepts, be it in terms of appearance, bloodline, or the nature of their souls.


    That was why even someone as fearless as Mary couldn¡¯t help but respect and revere the Great Adepts!


    A Great Witch who could freely manipte the life and death of a Fourth Grade adept. That was an absolutely terrifying thought.


    ¡°You overestimate Maysa¡¯s powers!¡± Alice chuckled. ¡°She¡¯s not that powerful that she would be able to control a Fourth Grade adept from an entirely different ne. The reason she could control that adept and make him self-destruct was because of the Seed of Fate she nted hundreds of years ago.¡±


    ¡°Seed of Fate? Hundreds of years ago?¡± Greem shouted in disbelief.


    ¡°A Fate Witch is an extremely unique adept profession. We abandon all our offensive and defensive magic, concentrating all our power solely on divination and sensing Fate¡¯s flow. However, this does not mean that Fate Witches have no offensive capabilities. Rather, our means of attack is simply too strange and unbelievable!


    ¡°Our mostmon means of offense is to manipte Fate and use its power to destroy our enemies.


    ¡°The method they use to manipte Fate is to nt Seeds of Fate with their soul brand in key characters who will affect critical turning points in the flow of the river.¡±


    ¡°This means that Great Witch Maysa had already nted a Seed of Fate branded with a weak soul consciousness in Mangus¡¯ mind while he was still a mere mortal. However, the Seed of Fate did not devour his soul consciousness as he grew and instead simplyy dormant in the depths of his soul.


    ¡°When Maysa deems it necessary, she can activate the Seed at any time and temporarily take control of everything at the Fate node. However, the more powerful the Fate node, the weaker her control and the shorter the time she can do anything. That is why she chose self-destruction, a process that cannot be stopped or reversed once begun!¡±


    ¡°nting her soul consciousness as a seed in another person. Can the victim never realize that there¡¯s such a seed in themselves?¡± Mary asked in shock.


    ¡°If the Seed of Fate is activated, it would naturally be detected by the adept it is a parasite to. However, Maysa is powerful precisely because she can keep the Seed of Fate sealed and dormant throughout. Without any activity from the seed, the host will not even realize its presence! It is only at the moment of activation that the Seed of Fate will erupt with its full power and takeplete control of the host.¡± Alice couldn¡¯t help but sigh.


    ¡°You mean, this dormant Seed of Fate cannot be detected by any means. Even you cannot detect its presence. Every single person around us could suddenly be our enemy at a terrifying and vital moment?¡± Greem asked, gritting his teeth in anger as he did so.


    It was no wonder he was so furious. He had invested quite a lot of resources and effort into Mangus and Cherisha during the mission in the Arcane Empire. He had been hoping to find a perfect window into the Adept¡¯s Association through his acquaintance with them. It would have allowed him to make connections with a major adept organization.


    And this was what he got in return! Constantly protecting them, helping them survive multiple crises, and all he got in return was a terrifying explosion!


    If it weren¡¯t for his power that allowed him to survive that explosion, things would have turned out very differently.


    ¡°The Seed of Fate is not entirely undetectable. It only requires the victim topletely let down all of their mental defenses for an examination. Do you think I have the time and authority to make everyone around us lower their mental defenses for an investigation?¡± Alice couldn¡¯t help but put on a bitter smile.


    ¡°So, we have no ability to defend against Maysa¡¯s attacks at all? I mean, we can¡¯t always be on guard against everybody around us with everything we do from now on, can we?¡± Greem¡¯s expression was solemn.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry!¡± Alice consoled him. ¡°Such a technique is a great strain even on a Great Witch. If the power of the Fate node in which the seed is nted is too weak, it will not be able to threaten us at all. On the other hand, if it is nted in an incredibly powerful adept, the chances of her being discovered are fairly high as well. The Adept Mangus who attacked you must have been a pseudo-Fourth Grade that had not perfectlypleted his advancement. Otherwise, the Seed of Fate would not have been able to achieve that level of control over him.¡±


    Greem rxed slightly after listening to Alice¡¯s exnation.


    ¡°Alright, alright, let¡¯s stop talking about such depressing things. Speaking of which, Greem, you didn¡¯t only just get those scattered bits and pieces of trash on your journey this time, did you?¡± Mary couldn¡¯t help but be excited at the mention of treasure. Curiosity and excitement were written all over her face.


    Those were precious arcane tomes and magical equipment that couldn¡¯t be found in the World of Adepts. Yet, in Mary¡¯s eyes, they had be pieces of trash and garbage. Greem was speechless.


    Greem had indeed made quite a haul from his trip to the Arcane Empire. He wanted to show it off to his two partners as well.


    Greem chuckled and revealed the real treasures he had obtained!


    A dozen crimson bubbles appeared in the hall, each containing a mysterious object. From books, to materials, to treasures, to weapons, there were all sorts of items of every type.


    Several of them even radiated significant energy auras.


    They were elementium auras unique to Fourth Grade items.


    Two crimson bubbles, in particr, were shining with a unique light, even above that of the Fourth Grade items. They gave off an oppressive feeling.


    ¡°Artifacts. Those are artifacts!¡± Alice shouted in surprise, her mouth slightly agape in awe.

 Chapter 1147 - Heir of the Plane

    Chapter 1147 Heir of the ne


    The artifacts that Alice referred to were ultra-grade items.


    In other words, powerful magical equipment beyond Fourth Grade.


    Their powers were already beyond the limit of the material nes. Consequently, it was difficult to forge them within a material ne. Typically, they could only be created or crafted by gods or Great Adepts through particr methods.


    Naturally, such an item could not possibly appear in the hands of mortal beings!


    Alice was in a slightly better position when it came to ultra-grade items. At the very least, the Cards of Fate and the Hourss of Time that she owned were both powerful equipment of this kind. Meanwhile, Mary was utterly new to this. She had never seen an item of such power.


    Driven by uncontroble desire, she slowly walked towards the two crimson bubbles with wide-open eyes. They almost appeared zed over as she reached towards the bubbles and attempted to grab them with her hands.


    However, she was stopped by another pair of hands before she could reach the items.


    Mary couldn¡¯t help but re angrily at Alice, who had stopped her. However, when her eyes met Alice¡¯s blindingly brilliant eyes, she shivered and recovered from her trance.


    ¡°I...what happened just now?¡±


    Alice smiled, her pretty, silk-like hair spread behind her shoulders. Her expression was unusually gentle, soft, and her entire person radiated mystery and enchantment.


    ¡°You were charmed! These are artifacts. Artifacts with owners. That¡¯s why they will be trying their very best to escape, going so far as to charm you and attempt to borrow your power to escape.¡±


    ¡°I was charmed? How...how could this be possible! How could I have been charmed by a mere item with no sentience or consciousness of its own? Are you lying to me?¡± Mary was in disbelief as she looked at Alice with suspicious eyes. Finally, she turned to look at Greem.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be surprised or disbelieve, Mary! These are artifacts, sacred items, legendary ultra-grade items. It¡¯s not surprising at all that they have such incredible power,¡± Greem smiled bitterly. ¡°You should know that I have been constantly harassed and corrupted by these artifacts ever since I got my hands on them. I¡¯ve had a much harder time than you!¡±


    Alice¡¯s bright eyes swept past the two artifacts, and she couldn¡¯t help but sigh.


    ¡°The Orb of Shadows. I truly didn¡¯t expect that the Dark Witches¡¯ Orb of Shadows would fall into your hands. They are probably scrambling around right now! Speaking of which, what¡¯s that other tome-like artifact? Why can I feel a faint divine aura from it?¡±


    Since both the girls were interested, Greem described everything that happened in Morrian ne without concealing anything. The oath contract, party members, the internal conflict, Shani¡¯s death, obtaining the Orb of Shadows. He spoke of Illhoof, the floating city, the lich, the believers of the God of Wisdom, and the believers of the Beast God.


    This series of mysterious affairs and terrifying battles frightened the two girls as they listened. They could finally take a deep breath when Greem finished describing the incident that had transpired during the teleportation. They couldn¡¯t help but be relieved that Greem hade back safely.


    The mission to the Arcane Empire was indeed a mission of death that even Fourth Grade adepts sought to avoid. The death rate was shockingly high. In all seriousness, had Greem not be in his party, the death rate would have been as high as seventy percent.


    Perhaps only Dark Witch Shani could have survived due to her unusual profession abilities. The other two would have had no chance of escaping the moment any of those formidable otherworldly powerhouses intercepted them.


    Those who died in a foreign ne would not only have their corpse and equipment turned over to the enemy as spoils of war. Even their tattered souls would not escape a fate of imprisonment, bing a toy or curiosity for the enemy.


    In particr, unfortunate victims whose soulsnded in the hands of liches would suffer perpetual torture. Neither death nor life was possible for them, only a thousand years of pain until their souls were finally worn away!


    Alice might have the power to sense Fate, but she could not urately predict anything that was happening to Greem while he was in Morrian ne, where the narws were in utter chaos. Alice¡¯s eyebrows scrunched together when she finished listening to Greem¡¯s story. It seemed like she was deep in thought.


    ¡°That Shani bitch deserved to die!¡± Mary shouted angrily. ¡°Dying once at your hands wasn¡¯t enough for her, apparently. To think she would run over and die again. Hmph! Thank god she died, or I would find a way to kill her if she had returned!¡±


    Even after reaching peak Third Grade, Mary still retained her brash, impulsive personality. For Mary, action would alwayse faster than thought.


    However, Greem could still pick up on her love and concern for him in her words!


    Greem rubbed Mary lovingly on her stubborn head, ignoring her bared fangs and threats.


    Alice ignored their flirting and seemed to be engulfed in her thoughts still.


    ¡°What is it? Will there be trouble?¡± Greem turned and asked.


    ¡°Mm, big trouble!¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry, regardless of how big the trouble will be. I will deal with everything. I am already sick of ying games with those bastards. If they still don¡¯t know when to stop, I will chop off all the hands that they stick out of line!¡± Greem might be injured, but his fiery personality was still as fierce as before.


    There was a trace of unquestionable dominance in his tone as he spoke! It was a note of confidence that had not been there before this.


    ¡°I¡¯m not afraid of actions taken on the surface either! As long as I¡¯m around, the Dark Witches will not be able to work around me and push the Northern Witches towards war against you. After all, all the actions they have taken have been in the shadows. They have no direct evidence to prove that you killed Shani, either. However, what I¡¯m worried about is private action taken against you or members of the n. Even I can¡¯t stop them from moving behind the scenes!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Let theme!¡± Greem¡¯s eyes turned red as me. ¡°For every Crimson adept they dare kill, I will kill two Dark Witches. At any rate, the only ones I truly care about in the n are the two of you. As long as nothing happens to the two of you, I am more than willing to duke it out against them, a life for a life.¡±


    Alice and Mary were both moved and concerned when they heard Greem¡¯s unusual profession of love. They couldn¡¯t help but lean on Greem¡¯s shoulder, silently nning and scheming for his future.


    ¡°Greem, you still aren¡¯t vicious enough in the way you handle things. If I were in your position, I would have killed Mangus and Holly during the trip back. That would have eliminated all witnesses and potential ws in their testaments. Hmph! If that had happened, we¡¯d see how the Dark Witches could have ever investigated the cause of Shani¡¯s death.¡± Mary was the one to speak now.


    As expected, her thoughts still centered around killing and fighting.


    That said, after proper considerations, her words did make sense!


    ¡°It¡¯s fine to have let them go! If Adept Holly and Adept Mangus had both died at the same time in the other world, the organizations behind them would undoubtedly set out for an investigation. It would be a whole new set of problems to deal with then. Holly owes you a life debt now. I¡¯m sure he knows very well how he should react to any probes!¡± Alice regained herposure and slowly analyzed the situation for all of them.


    ¡°Oh right, there¡¯s actually something here that I need you to take a look at. I have a feeling that this thing is unique, but I can¡¯t tell why that¡¯s the case. Take a look for me!¡± Greem suddenly remembered something and looked towards Alice. He patted her on her waist, and his hand started roaming around her body.


    Alice hurriedly grabbed his naughty hand and blushed as she replied, ¡°What¡¯s this thing that even you have no idea about?¡±


    ¡°Her!¡±


    Greem lifted his hand and tapped the Orb of Shadows lightly.


    The Orb trembled, spewing out dense shadow substance and flooding the entire hall, turning it dark and lightless. A strange silhouette appeared above the Orb, bound by shadow energy. The shape resembled that of a young girl, who was silently floating with her eyes shut.


    A soul projection...an incredibly frail soul projection!


    Alice straightened her back the instant she saw the soul. The light of surprise and joy burst forth from her eyes.


    ¡°Heir of a ne. Greem, why...why do you have the heir of a ne in your hands?¡±


    ¡°Heir of a ne?¡±


    Greem instantly knew that this soul was unique when he saw Alice¡¯s overjoyed expression. However, he had never heard of the term ¡®heir of the ne.¡¯ That said, it was definitely something amazing.


    After listening to Alice¡¯s exnation, Greem finally understood what the heir of a ne was.


    The so-called heir of a ne was also known as a child of Fate. They were individuals whose soul and bloodline was the mostpatible with the nar consciousness. Their birth ultimately inherited the will of the nar consciousness. They were a means by which the nar consciousness could directly intervene in the affairs of the ne.


    Typically, when a nar consciousness sensed danger arriving, they would push the narws towards the birth of an individual whose body, soul, and bloodline were incrediblypatible with the highestw of the ne. They would then cast their attention on this individual, guiding them down a supernatural path of glory and power.


    This individual favored by the ne would have everything go their way upon birth. The heroes they met would bow in respect, the beggars they showed kindness to would end up being ministers fallen from grace, the bushes they randomly walked into would somehow contain an artifact, and thend they tilled would have treasure buried beneath.


    When these heirs grew to power, they would naturally inherit the will of the nar consciousness and push the ne¡¯s development in its desired direction!


    Unfortunately, the heir of Morrian ne had not been able to develop sufficiently. She had died because of the fall of the Arcane Empire before maturity. At the very best, she was only a half-finished product.


    Meanwhile, Greem had known nothing of ne heirs when he captured this soul. He had only perceived that this one was unusually pure and clean, unlike the typical human soul.


    Thus, the soul of this arcane apprentice known as Lucia had somehow wandered to the distant World of Adepts and fallen into Alice¡¯s hands!

 Chapter 1148 - Time to Move

    Chapter 1148 Time to Move


    World of Adepts. The Skettis Region.


    Molten Fire City.


    Inside a hidden room of the adept tower.


    The lord of the city, Adept Alfred, sat on a stone chair, dressed in a long purple robe. He silently looked at the young adept standing proudly in front of him and asked curiously, ¡°Sir Greem, we don¡¯t seem to be acquainted in any fashion, do we? What is your purpose in this sudden visit today?¡±


    Greem was wearing his crimson robe and holding the long fire-coral staff in his hand. He smiled as he met Alfred¡¯s gaze, calmly speaking, ¡°My main purpose here today is to clear up all of our past grudges and misunderstandings. To express my sincerity, I have specially prepared some gifts for you!¡±


    Greem took out an item from his storage ring and gave it a light push. The item slowly floated towards Alfred.


    Alfred hesitated for a moment, but finally picked up the item and toyed with it.


    A knowledge crystal.


    Alfred nced at Greem and reached into the crystal with a trace of his Spirit. Upon sensing its contents, his body snapped straight up in surprise.


    What were these?


    Basic Arcane Theories, Discussions and Applications on Anti-Gravity Barriers, Floating Ring Construction Manual.


    It was aplete and self-consistent series of arcane theories that systematically introduced the floating ring, from its design to its construction and all the precautions necessary throughout the process. With all of this, Alfred could directly apply the knowledge to his adept tower with some slight modifications.


    As a Fourth Grade adept, there was no way that Alfred did not understand the value of this knowledge crystal!


    Ever since the ancient times, plenty of geniuses in the World of Adepts had hoped to construct a miraculous device that could allow their adept towers to move. Unfortunately, there were far too many problems that stood in their way.


    Firstly, the energy source of the adept tower came from the elementium altar. The tower required an endless supply of elementium energy from the elementium nes. Should the position of an adept tower shift, the spatial coordinates of the elementium altars would shift as well. That would naturally sever the connection between the tower and the elementium nes.


    How could they anchor the spatial coordinates of the tower to the elementium ne while the tower was in motion? It was one of the problems that countless talented adepts could never solve, no matter how they tried.


    Secondly, for the adept tower to be able to fly, the tower¡¯s weight had to be reduced.


    Thus, the ability to maintain a bnce between the tower¡¯s defensive properties and the tower¡¯s weight by finding a new construction material became the key to this problem!


    All these difficult problems continued to gue the adepts who sought to modify their towers. Now, with this sophisticated andplete system in hand,pleting these modifications were no longer just a dream.


    ¡°What do you mean by this, Sir Greem? The contents of this knowledge crystal alone are invaluable. Why would you be willing to hand them over to me easily?¡± When Alfred once again lifted his head to look at Greem, his eyes were no longer cold and cutting, but contained a trace of warmth and curiosity.


    ¡°I understand that my rash decisions in the past resulted in some ¡®misunderstandings¡¯ and rifts between the two of us. The reason I made this trip was to resolve them. I hope you are satisfied with my gift.¡± Greem smiled as he exined.


    He ced extra emphasis on the word ¡®misunderstanding¡¯ when he spoke.


    Alfred looked at Greem silently. After a long pause, he finally smiled.


    ¡°Since it was all a misunderstanding, let us put it behind us! From now on, you, Sir Greem, are one of the esteemed guests of our Molten Fire City. I, Alfred, will always wee you!¡±


    Greem let out a breath of relief in his mind. The smile on his face was bigger now.


    With the gift as a conversation starter, the two enemies-turned-friends delved deep into their discussions. They excitedly talked in detail about the future cooperation between their two organizations.


    The Crimson n required the many rare ore resources of Molten Fire City, and Molten Fire City was also interested in the dragon resources and magical machines of the Crimson n.


    With how beneficial their cooperation would be, the two leaders quickly agreed to a strategic alliance.


    The details would be left to their subordinates to negotiate andy out slowly.


    Once all this was done, the fire clone that Greem had projected over to the hall scattered into sparks and dissipated into the air. Molten Fire City Lord Alfred continued to caress the knowledge crystal as he stared at the spot that Greem had vanished from. Aplicated light gleamed in his eyes.


    It had only been a few years. That little fellow who would shiver nervously when speaking in front of him could now stand in front of him as an equal. Moreover, even something he casually took out from his collection was enough to startle a veteran adept like himself. It was evident that his treasury was filled to the brim with valuables of exquisite quality.


    Alfred couldn¡¯t help but reflect on the passing of time even after Greem had left. His entire being was immersed n a state of disbelief at everything that had just happened!


    There was no underestimating that kid.


    Perhapsing to a truce with him now would be the best path forward for Molten Fire City¡¯s continued development.


    Alfred thought to himself in silence and finally came to a decision.


    ............


    One could, frankly, im that Greem was the soul and pir of the Crimson n!


    When Greem had been on a journey to another world, the entire Crimson n had no choice but to maintain a low profile, quietly waiting for his return. Once Greem returned, the Crimson n seemed to change entirely. They were active once more, aggressive in their expansions, and ceaseless in the further extension of their influence.


    Mary led arge group of her vampires and left for Seawoods ne.


    Even though the Zhentarim Association had developed the ne slightly, their rule was still far from stable, and the environment was still as chaotic as ever. The vampire faction still had to work hard to establish a firm and stable ruling structure in Seawoods, such that they could finally excavate the resources of the ne.


    There was: reconstructing a forward base, establishing an internar teleportation array, investigating the environment and distribution of resources in the ne, making contact with the nar natives, intimidating and making an example out of ambitious ves, and building up an efficient resource collection system.


    These minute tasks all required careful nning and constant revisions. Otherwise, a simple mistake could lead to severe consequences.


    However, the vampires led by Mary were more powerful than the empire of trolls in Seawoods ne. Be it through violent oppression or gentle negotiations, making the trolls submit was only a matter of time.


    As such, Greem did not interfere too much in Mary¡¯s actions and let her deal with the situation as she pleased.


    Meanwhile, Snox had already sent a vanguard of three hundred goblins into the Mountain ne. They were during preliminary mapping and geological investigations. It was estimated that it would take them a month to figure out the distribution of resources in the lesser ne.


    When that happened, the goblin miners and equipment could be mobilized, and they could immediately begin the excavation of ores.


    However, even though there weren¡¯t many living creatures in the Moutain ne, there were still a few extremely territorial earth elementals. Even the goblins had to be assigned sufficient military power for this expedition!


    ............


    Seawoods ne.


    In a primal forest that had yet to be excavated.


    The dense sea of trees covered the earth. From a distance, it looked as if the entire world was simply a canvas of green.


    A strange ck spot slowly moved through the air in a clearing in the woods.


    Finally, as the spatial energy continued to reverberate, the singrity stretched and expanded until, atst, it was a three-meter-long spatial rift.


    Pupupu!


    Silhouettes flickered through the rift as a dozen lithe figures appeared from within and stabilized their presence.


    After adapting to the teleportation fatigue, they could finally move freely and begin their unusual exploration in this foreign ne.


    As a peak Third Grade, Mary was the first to adjust to the teleportation fatigue here.


    However, for the same reason, Mary also suffered the highest amount of pressure from the ne!


    Mary moved her body and beat her wings, slowly rising above the canopy.


    Unfortunately, she could see no color other than green no matter where she looked.


    The trolls were unlike humans.


    Humans liked to cut down trees and cultivate farms to form settlements of their own. Meanwhile, the trolls preferred a simple and more natural state of life. They wore leaves and hides as clothes, subsisting on fruit and prey, living in treehouses or valleys. It was hard to discover their presence without careful searching.


    It seemed like the first thing to do here was to extend their surveince and discover the settlements of the trolls.


    There was no doubt they required a tremendous number of cheap ves if they wanted to excavate Seawoods ne.


    If they brought all the manpower they required from another ne, the exorbitant teleportation fees alone would overshadow the profit brought along by the meager resources of this ne. To save on cost, they would have to find ways to capture the natives to work as ves.


    After some simple nning, Mary turned andnded on the ground.


    Her vampire subordinates had finally started getting over the teleportation fatigue. They were moving around and getting used to the narws here.


    ¡°Vanlier, have a few of your subordinates establish a small camp here. Stabilize the rift and prepare for the reinforcements.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Soros, head there. Vanlier, there. Lilia, there. Spa, there. You have three days to search as far as you can. Immediately return for a report once you discover the trolls¡¯ tracks. Very well, you may leave now!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    The vampires acknowledged their orders and headed out, each flying in their respective direction with one or two other subordinates following after them.


    Both the blood knights and the blood elves were at Second or Third Grade. They might be suffering from nar suppression, but their base power was still present. A scout of this level was no danger, given their strength.


    In just three days, the vampires would be able to scout as far as five hundred kilometers with their speed.


    There should be no problem discovering the trolls after covering so much ground!

 Chapter 1149 - The Mountain Plane

    Chapter 1149 The Mountain ne


    The Mountain ne.


    It was a nd world, with only rising and falling stretches of mountains, and mountains alone.


    There were no ins of grass to be seen, nor green stretches of forests or flowing rivers.


    The Mountain ne lived up to its name.


    The entire ne was a strange world made entirely out of loose back dirt and tough gray stone. Even the air was filled with an odd chalky smell.


    There was no water, no clean air, and no vegetation. Naturally, there was no way that any living creatures could be born in such a ce.


    As such, it was a cold and lonely world!


    A small camp of goblins was busy constructing buildings at the foot of a mountain.


    A hundred magical machines chugged away as they ttened the ground, releasing a copious amount of steam as they did so. A dozen goblins dressed like engineers stood atop a rock, pointing at their surroundings. It seemed like they were discussing theyout of the camp and the distribution of buildings.


    A few dozen magical machines patrolled outside the construction site, holding magic energy beam rifles in their arms as they looked out for any motion around them.


    A strange magic-mechanical construct at the center of the camp had erected an elementium barrier, keeping out the polluted air and filling the inside of the camp with fresh,pressed air.


    In the corner of the camp was where the flying ships were ced.


    They started a dozen goblin flying ships shaped like cigars. Their propellers spun and sent an engineer and several other pilots into the air, slowly flying into the distance.


    As they had yet to adapt to the air here, all the goblins wore oxygen masks to prevent them from taking in the dense earth elementium in the air and petrifying themselves.


    The flying ships slowly cruised across the sky. Engineer Justin Osik moved a wooden crate to the edge of the vessel. He climbed onto it and used his somewhat old XLight-II telescope to look down at the mountains.


    As a qualified veteran geologist, Justin Osik did not need tond on the mountains to determine their oreposition. All he had to do was look at the exposedyers of rock.


    However, most of the time, the surface of a mountain was covered in a thickyer of dust.


    When that happened, Justin Osik would order the flying ships to go lower and use the winds from the propellers to blow away the dust so that he could examine theposition of the rocks.


    However, these actions undoubtedly put the ships in some danger.


    After the seventh time that they descended to a lower altitude, over fifty kilometers away from the camp, the goblin warrior in charge of sounding the rms shouted out loud.


    ¡°Enemy assault...enemy assault. Hurry up and dodge!¡±


    The goblin ship perfectly flew to the side under the precise controls of the pilot, avoiding a massive boulder hurled from the ground. Justin, who was standing on the wooden crate, hastily grabbed onto the metal chains above him with both hands. He barely avoided being thrown off the ne by its rapid movement.


    Once the flying ship had regained altitude, Justin picked up his telescope and looked around the ground. Finally, he discovered the enemy.


    A three-meter-tall stone elemental climbed out of arge rift in the mountain. It waved its stony hands angrily at the goblins.


    Almost as if a war horn had been blown, over three dozen First Grade stone elementals started to climb out of the kilometer-long rift. They growled deeply as they gathered rocks the size of washbasins and hurled them into the air.


    As the goblin ships were already a hundred meters above the mountain, the rocks could not reach them at all. They simply fell to the ground limply after traveling some distance.


    ¡°These damned rock people.¡± The goblin captain in charge of the ship¡¯s safety was furious now. He lifted his magic energy rifle and prepared to retaliate. However, Justin stopped him before he could fire.


    ¡°Don¡¯t waste any firepower on them!¡± Justin shouted as loud as he could. The howling winds at their altitude made it hard for them to be heard. ¡°Tell the captain to fly west along this valley. There might be something good there.¡±


    A short momentter, the flying ships trembled and slowly adjusted their trajectory, flying in the direction Justin had directed them.


    The stone elementals pursued furiously for a while before disinterestedly returning to their home.


    After this exploration, the goblins understood that the mountain range beneath them was the home to earth and stone elementals.


    They either hid in the cracks in the rocks, lived in natural caves, or even justid out there in the sun. As there were only dirt and rocks here, it was incredibly hard to spot these elementals amidst all the stones and rocks.


    It was only when the outsiders invaded their ¡®territory¡¯ that these irritable creatures wouldzily emerge from their homes and use their fists and boulders to chase the enemy away. Their boulders could be hurled as high as sixty meters away. It was quite a threat to the goblin ships.


    Fortunately, they were incredibly territorial. Regardless of how furious the elementals were, they would never easily set foot in the territory of another family of stone elementals.


    That gave the goblins ships the chance to escape with their superior speed and high altitude!


    Justin had no choice but to order the flying ships to maintain an altitude of around eighty meters above the mountains. He crouched on the edge of the ship, slowly observing the rockyers. Whenever Justin found something interesting, he would order the goblin warriors to fire at the rocks. He could then judge the distribution of ores based on the reflection of light from the shattered stones.


    Finally, a hundred and fifty-eight kilometers away from the forward base, Justin found something unusual.


    The flying ships circled three times. After looking around and confirming that there were no elementals, the goblins carefullynded on the ground.


    Five members of the Seventh Goblin Squadnded heavily on the ground, now suited up in magical-machinebat exoskeletons. They all held magic energy rifles in their hands.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    The wide metallic feet of their machines left deep imprints on the ground when they walked.


    Dust rose from the ground, causing the members of the squad to cough violently.


    ¡°God bloody dammit, the environment here is horrible!¡± Captain Taz quickly put the mask on his face. His muffled voice came from behind the mask, ¡°Hurry up...take control of the high ground here. Beta, take the magic energy cannon the to high ground. Jena, establish firing points around the ships. Hansen, you and I will guard Sir Justin.¡±


    ¡°Understood, cap!¡±


    ¡°Leave it to me.¡±


    ¡°Yessir!¡±


    His subordinates acknowledged their orders and hurried to their respective positions.


    Justin, who climbed down the ship from a rope with some difficulty, was holding several things in his hands. He had a pickaxe and a magic energy spectrometer given out by the geology headquarters. He looked around as he stood in the shadow of the ship and decided on a direction.


    ¡°Over there!¡±


    The three-person party headed out without any hesitation!


    It was a nervous journey the whole way.


    These goblins were only half a meter tall; they were like ants to the gigantic stone elementals. It wouldn¡¯t even be a fight. All the stone elementals had to do was step on them, and most goblins would be dead.


    As such, the two goblins in charge of protecting Justin made sure to cover him in front and behind. They piloted their two-meter-tall magical machines and slowly walked through this uneven terrain.


    Geologist Justin quickly forgot the danger of the ce. He asionally lifted his pickaxe and broke off pieces of the rock before scanning them with the spectrometer. There were many times when he would rush forward joyously when he found something unusual. He would then mine with his pickaxe fervently as if he hadpletely forgotten they were in a dangerous new world.


    The two bodyguards could only follow behind with all their effort with a leader who was as indulgent in his work as this. The magic energy rifles in their hands were always pointed at the ces where danger was most likely to appear.


    As he made his examinations, Justin¡¯s joyous cheering became louder and louder.


    The howling of the spectrometer might be iprehensible to others, but he could identify the many rare metals that made up theposition of the rocks here. Moreover, the ratio of precious metals only increased as they advanced.


    Justin was sure that an invaluable vein of metal could be found nearby!


    Finally, he stopped in front of an unusual mountain. He raised his pickaxe and started beating down on a massive boulder that was five meters tall.


    As the surface rocks of the boulder peeled off, a purple gemstone the size of a fist could be seen within. Several grains of metal glowing with silver light could be seen around the gem.


    Purple agate and star ore.


    The three goblins couldn¡¯t help but be overjoyed at the sight of this. They almost wanted to dance on the spot.


    However, just as they rejoiced, the mountain in front of them started trembling and shaking. Rocks the size of wheels fell from above like a tumultuous downpour, turning everything within five kilometers into a mess of dust and rubble.


    The three goblins couldn¡¯t be bothered to celebrate any longer. They cried out in terror and fled towards the outside.


    They finally looked back when they were several hundred meters away. To their horror, the massive mountain had now turned into a towering stone giant, slowly climbing out of the earth.


    All sorts of pretty gemstones and valuable metal ores could be seen all over its massive body.


    ¡°Dammit, dammit, dammit! Go back to the camp, quick! This stone giant is at least Third Grade. We can¡¯t fight against it at all. Retreat, retreat, retreat!¡±


    A short momentter, all the goblins had fled back to their ships. They took to the skies and flew back to camp without turning back. It was then that the stone giant finally managed to stand up. It looked around, trying to find the damned bugs that had just disturbed its sleep.

 Chapter 1150 - Teleportation to Space

    Chapter 1150 Teleportation to Space


    Space. Exodar Camp.


    As usual, the camp was crowded and lively.


    However, as expected of space, even an inconspicuous vendor on the street would be a Second Grade adept. Of course, Second Grade adepts who dared toe to space at their level did not dare to take even a single step out of Exodar Camp.


    It was a simple reason; it was too dangerous out there!


    The danger didn¡¯t juste from the environment. No, the terrifying parts about Exodar Camp were the various unusual species that popted it.


    No one knew what strange powers they had, nor their purpose ining here. Were they here to trade? Were they here to hunt? The frailty of a human adept would be fully exposed should they take a single step out of the camp and lose the protection of the towers!


    Greem wore a ck traveler¡¯s cloak that hid his entire body. He hastily emerged from a tower and looked around him to determine his direction. He did not head towards the center of the market but instead moved to the edge of the camp.


    He passed many crowded ces along the way and saw several otherworldly creatures of strange shapes and sizes. Some of them were gxy wanderers, and others hade from lesser nes ruled by the adepts. They might be rulers over vastnds in their own worlds, or powerful fighters respected by all, but here they were only ordinary members in a massive crowd.


    In fact, most of the time, they would be associated with the term ¡®weak¡¯ for the first time of their life!


    This ce was the adepts¡¯ camp. Naturally, the adepts had the highest status here!


    Ordinarily, no outsider would ever start a conflict against an adept in the camp.


    Even though Greem was hiding his identity, the energy aura he faintly radiated still kept the crowd at bay. Everyone stayed out of his way.


    After passing through the market and the miniature in, Greem quickly arrived at the magic barrier.


    There were two different worlds inside and beyond the barrier.


    One was filled with the smell of grass and flowers and the pleasant chirping of birds. The other raged with wild winds and space vortices.


    There was a vast field of greenery inside and dark empty rocks on the outside.


    The rocks here could survive hundreds and thousands of years of corrosion by the spacestorms without disintegrating. If they were excavated, they would make excellent materials for the construction of adept towers.


    Greem did not hesitate here. He put up a crimson energy shield around him and walked out of the barrier.


    Sparks appeared around his shield the moment he stepped out of the barrier.


    Greem was not surprised by this at all. He pulled his hood tighter over his head and flew into space. Red mes burst forth behind him, propelling him into the distance at incredible speed.


    For the sake of secrecy, Greem had not used the short-range teleportation arrays of Exodar Camp when he arrived. Instead, he spent four days traveling the 1,500-kilometer distance on his own. Finally, he arrived at the edge of the massive stone where Exodar Camp was established.


    Light and order had faded away at this point, reced by vicious energy storms and endless space turbulence.


    Greem stopped at the edge of the rock. He identified the directions before flying even further into the endless darkness.


    Ever since he obtained the starbeast bloodline, these terrifying areas filled with violent space energy were no longer dangerous to him. Instead, it filled him with a sense offort, as if he was right at home.


    He dispelled the energy shield and allowed the ferocious space energy to blow across his body. His Chaos Physique created several tiny energy vortices around him, absorbing all of the turbulent energy.


    A portion of this energy was absorbed by his body to sustain Greem¡¯s elementium consumption. At the same time, the rest was scattered out into space after neutralizing the chaotic power of the spacestorm.


    Other adepts were not only unable to absorb any energy while in space, but even had to use their power to defend themselves. With the Chaos Physique, absorbing the ¡®gentle¡¯ space energy was as natural as breathing for Greem.


    As long as he didn¡¯t cast any major spells, his magic power would not decrease at all, but would instead slowly increase.


    As he flew quickly through the silent darkness, he could asionally see a few massive boulders around.


    Some of these boulders were about a hundred meters in size, while others were asrge as an entire mountain. One couldn¡¯t help but wonder if it had been an individual of tremendous power who had used their supernatural strength to move a whole mountain range into space.


    However, these rocks could only float endlessly in the darkness, silently waiting for the day they were ground down to dust by the ceaseless storms.


    Greem stopped in front of a particrlyrge boulder.


    It was a giant floating stone. It hovered in space like an upside-down pyramid. The rocks on the underside had already been badly eroded by the storm and were filled with countless holes. Meanwhile, what remained of the rocks gleamed with a shining radiance.


    It was obvious that these rocks contained a high amount of rare metals!


    It was these particles of metal that allowed the rock to resist the constant corrosion of space energy. Otherwise, asrge as it was, it would already have shattered into tens of thousands of pieces before being entirely devoured by the space energy.


    This giant rock fulfilled every single one of Greem¡¯s conditions.


    mes erupted as Greem appeared on top of the rtively t surface of the rock.


    The rock was over fifty square kilometers in width on the surface, but, discounting the uneven terrain where humans could not live, there were only about thirty to forty square kilometers that could be used for a camp.


    Greem investigated every single inch of the rock and found the best spot at the center.


    Greemnded here and summoned the Third Grade elementium magical machine. He had it tten and smoothen the ground until it was as smooth as a mirror. Greem then got to work, drawing a vast teleportation array here.


    Even with the Chip¡¯s aid to avoid any errors in the array, and even with Greem¡¯s Chaos Physique allowing him to sustain his power in such a harsh environment, it took him over two weeks to draw this three hundred square-meter-wide array.


    Seventeen dayster.


    When the teleportation array was finally finished, Greem let out a breath of relief. He took out severalrge crates of magical crystals from his storage ring and handed them to the elementium magical machine, while he sat down to meditate and recover.


    After reaching Fourth Grade, this Third Grade elementium magical machine had be of significantly less use to him.


    This elementium magical machine that had helped Greem so much in the past was no help against attacks of thousands of points. It would probably break from a single strike of the enemy. As such, Greem had not even wanted to summon it for thest few battles he had participated in.


    It wasn¡¯t just the elementium magical machine. Even the Fire Throne set, which Greem had personally crafted, was now on the verge of elimination. It was the first set of magical equipment he would rece, given the opportunity.


    The trip to the Arcane Empire had allowed Greem to obtain some reasonably decent Fourth Grade equipment. Though the attributes of this equipment were notpatible with Greem¡¯s fire attribute, they could still be of some use after modification.


    This period of changing his Third Grade equipment with Fourth Grade equipment gave Greem some trouble. He was having difficulty finding stuff that suited him.


    As he continued to think about his future ns for equipment, Greem ordered the elementium magical machine to ce the magical crystals into the magic nodes of the array. Due to theck of a stable energy supply, Greem could only extravagantly use magical crystals to sustain the teleportation array¡¯s energy consumption.


    The rest of the job took over two days to finish.


    Once everything was done, Greem took to the air and used his Spirit to activate the energy in the array.


    The nodes across the array started to light up, one by one. An overwhelming surge of magic energy began to flow through the circuits, causing all the nodes, cores, and lines along the way to turn bright white.


    A massive energy barrier appeared, keeping out the space energy and protecting the more vulnerable circuits and nodes in the array. The surging space energy started to gather above the array, forming a ck singrity the size of a fist.


    As the energy continued to gather, the singrity began to copse inwards, forming a small ck hole that proceeded to tear open a rift in the air. This spatial rift was ten meters in length and one meter wide.


    The rift slowly crawled and cracked open above the array, like an ugly centipede.


    Greem spent tremendous effort to stabilize the spatial rift and allowed it to continue growing in size!


    Greem stabilized the spatial rift from above, while the elementium magical machine continued to work below.


    The teleportation array required a colossal amount of magic energy at every moment. As such, the magical crystals in the nodes of the array had to be reced every fifteen minutes. Thisplicated task undoubtedly fell on the shoulders of the elementium magical machine.


    The number of magical crystals being consumed every minute for the activation of a massive array like this was shocking. At the very least, an ordinary adept would not be able to tolerate such a tremendous expense!


    When the rift above the array finally grewrge and wide enough, Greem sent an unusual signal into the distance through a special mental connection.


    Soon, the rift started to tremble and shake.


    The smooth ne of space started to bulge outwards as if something humongous was trying to pass through the spatial rift and emerge here.


    The bulge in space grewrger andrger until, finally, the spatial barrier shattered.


    An unusual metal head reached out from within.

 Chapter 1151 - The New Capital of Steel

    Chapter 1151 The New Capital of Steel


    Gazlowe practically used up all his power to emerge from the spatial rift.


    What came after was an endless stream of metal, seemingly without end.


    Under Gazlowe¡¯s control, all this magical alloy continued to swarm from the rift and started to gather around the camp area selected by Greem. The metal quickly started assembling into unusual metal buildings.


    The magical alloy continued emerging from the rift.


    Some of the metal pieces joined with the existing buildings and rose into the air, turning into looming factories. Others dug into the ground and started creating underground bases.


    In just half an hour, a fearsome city forged of steel had appeared before Greem!


    Greem took a look at the giant brain floating before him. He couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh, ¡°Every time I see you freely shaping and molding magical alloys like mud, I can¡¯t help but marvel at the wonders and mysteries of the multiverse. If I provided you with an endless supply of energy and metal, I am certain you would be the ultimate ruler of the multiverse!¡±


    The monstrous brain trembled slightly and replied with a mental message.


    ¡°Rule the multiverse? Only immature brats who have yet to take a step out of their homeworld would have such thoughts. When they finally see the might of the Titans and the horror of the Scourge Lords, they would probably be embarrassed by their simple minds!¡±


    ¡°Tell me, what gave you all this courage all of a sudden?¡± Greem smiled and said, ¡°I thought you would only send your split-brain, Sock, over. I didn¡¯t think you would be here in person.¡±


    ¡°I am learning from you, my lord!¡±


    ¡°Learning from me?¡±


    ¡°Yes! When we first met, I believe you were only a First Grade adept, weren¡¯t you?¡± Gazlowe couldn¡¯t help but pause for a moment at the mention of this, seemingly recalling a distant past. However, he quickly recovered.


    ¡°When I joined your faction, you were already a Second Grade adept. And I...was a Third Grade brain monster. This difference in power let me see a chance to break free of your control. However, even though I hardly let a single opportunity slip past me, the rate at which your power improved far exceeded my expectations.


    ¡°When you reached Third Grade, I still refused to acknowledge your authority. I still had hope of sess in my heart! However, a while ago, I heard that you advanced to be a Fourth Grade adept. It was then that I realized for the first time that I might never be able to break free of your control, and everything that caused this was my own conservative, fearful stance.


    ¡°There were so many opportunities in front of me. Yet, every time something even remotely threatened my actual being, I would instinctively choose to step back and give way. It was my personality that left me with no paths of escape. As such, I n to take a risk and chase after you. At the very least, I can¡¯t let you leave me stranded in the dust!¡±


    ¡°This is space, beyond the realms!¡± Greem looked at the brain monster with a look of surprise. ¡°The risk you will have to endure here is far higher than what you would face inside a material ne. Are you sure it¡¯s fine to ce your actual brain here?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, master! I have already sealed a portion of my brain in the Capital of Eternity. If my actual body is destroyed, that split-brain will naturally grow and be a new ¡®me¡¯.¡±


    A brain monster was a monster, after all. It was an unusual lifeform iparable to humans, with its own method of recovery and resurrection!


    Greem did not ask any more questions. Instead, he silently observed this new capital of steel rise from the ground before his very eyes.


    Due to the nature of space, ordinary creatures could not survive here.


    Even Second or Third Grade beings were no more than cannon fodder.


    As such, when Greem wanted to establish a base in space, his first thought was to recruit Gazlowe for the task.


    Only the brain monster, with his mega magic-generator furnace, could so quickly construct a shelter out of nothing with his endless supply of magic energy and Greem¡¯s stockpile of magical alloys.


    The magical alloys used to construct the first foundations of the steel capital were more than enough. What came from the spatial rift after were various sorts of resources and materials.


    After all, it didn¡¯t matter how powerful the brain monster was; he couldn¡¯t convert magical alloy into food or magical machines.


    Greem used his authority as the n leader to relocate a good half of the n¡¯s resources here and started making warehouses beneath the capital.


    After two hours of constant operation, the teleportation array finally deactivated.


    It had beenpletely exhausted!


    The magical nodes on the array shattered, one after another, causing considerable quakes to ripple across space and dissipate.


    During the final moments of the portal, a hundred high-grade magical machine warriors emerged from the portal and lined up neatly in the za at the entrance to the city.


    It was a personal magical machine guard that Gazlowe had made for himself. Even an ordinary machine had the might of an intermediate Second Grade. Meanwhile, the five magical machine captains of the army were all at beginner Third Grade.


    ¡°Master, the Capital of Steel has been constructed. I will begin the activation immediately!¡±


    Gazlowe informed Greem and floated into the Capital of Steel under the protection of the hundred magical machines.


    As the brain monster entered the Capital of Steel with his mega magic generator furnace, the massive lifeless lump of steel immediately came to life.


    Countless metal refineries and workshops began operation.


    The rubble dug from underground was transported to ore crushing workshops, where they were reduced to smaller, fist-sized ores. They were then sent to the ore filtering center, where ore particles with metalposition would be selected and sent for smelting. The useless pieces of ore werepressed into stone bricks and used for the construction of buildings outside of the Capital of Steel.


    In just half an hour, the first batch of metals had been refined into ingots and was sent to the metal warehouses on conveyor belts.


    Greem also received an inventory from Gazlowe.


    One had to admit that there were no useless metals in the ores found in space!


    Even a seemingly insignificant rock could be broken down and refined into as many as thirty-seven rare metals and one hundred and sixty-four magical alloys, all of which possessed unknown magical features!


    That was predictable.


    After all, ordinary material substances from ruined nes would already have been eroded by the vicious energy tides in space. Only the true essence of the material nes could survive the spacestorms and be blown into this peaceful eye of the storm.


    Moreover, after spending such a long time in the eye of a spacestorm, they would naturally have been transformed.


    Even an ordinary piece of metal would have turned into a rare magical alloy after such a long time exposed to space energy!


    Forging ordinary magical machines with such rare metals would be a waste.


    The newly refined metals were stored in the warehouse. Gazlowe instead ced the conventional alloys he had brought from the Capital of Eternity onto the production line and started churning out batch after batch of magical machines.


    The first batch of machines to walk down from the conveyor belt was three hundred construction machines. They were the arms with which Gazlowe would manage everything in the Capital of Steel.


    With the addition of these machines, the Capital could finally be put to full use.


    All the factories, refineries, conveyor belts, and all the workshops began operating at full capacity.


    The loud rumbling of metal instantly filled thend.


    It was a region ruled by human adepts, after all!


    Five hours after the appearance of the Capital of Steel, a standard party of adepts appeared in the shadows near the rock.


    They were d in energy shields of various colors, the shields flickering amidst the ¡®gentle¡¯ energy tide.


    The Fourth Grade adept in the lead took off his hood and frowned as he looked upon the happenings above the rock. He couldn¡¯t help but take out a magical crystal andmunicate with headquarters.


    ¡°My lord, are they foreigners?¡± A Third Grade woman in white robes standing behind him asked.


    A small, jade-white staff was stuck to her belt, gleaming with pretty snowkes.


    ¡°Mm. Seems like it.¡± The Fourth Grade adept frowned and replied. ¡°I seem to have heard of these metal lifeforms somewhere. They feed on metal and roam the gxy in search of metal ore veins.¡±


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter if it¡¯s a metal lifeform. It¡¯s infringed upon the territory of us adepts. We just have to expel it from thisnd!¡± Another Third Grade body-refining adept shouted out arrogantly.


    The other five Second Grade adepts in the party looked around them at this shocking sight, not daring to participate in the discussion between the high-grade adepts.


    While the adepts were still talking amongst themselves, a red sh erupted above the rock. An obscure silhouette appeared not far in front of them.


    The members of the party immediately prepared themselves for battle.


    Lights flickered around the Fourth Grade adept as seven energy shields of various attributes enveloped him.


    However, when they saw the unusual man standing in mes with the golden te in his hands, they let out a breath of relief.


    The leader of the group was a Fourth Grade man. His face was tan and long, without any particr features of note.


    When he saw the wooden te in Greem¡¯s hands, he took out a magic wand and waved it over the te. The image of a burning first appeared on the te, along with a long series of golden runes.


    ¡°Greem. Fourth Grade Fire Adept. Zhentarim Association Elder. Leader of the Crimson n.¡±


    The adept mumbled as he read the runes. The look in his eyes shifted as he read.


    ¡°So, you are Adept Greem!¡±


    The members of the entire party reacted oddly at the mention of Greem¡¯s name.

 Chapter 1152 - Arguments

    Chapter 1152 Arguments


    ¡°Is there any problem?¡±


    Even Greem didn¡¯t know what was happening when he saw the weird expressions on the faces of the adepts.


    ¡°It¡¯s...it¡¯s nothing.¡± The male adept hurriedly concealed his loss ofposure with an awkward smile. He then shifted the topic. ¡°We are Squad Fifty-Three from Exodar Camp, in charge of patrolling this area. May we know what you, sir, are doing here?¡±


    Greem smiled leisurely.


    ¡°Building a base!¡±


    ¡°Building a base?¡±


    ¡°My n wishes to participate in trade beyond the realms, so we need to establish a suitable n outpost here. Are there any special rules from the camp that forbids such actions?¡±


    The male adept¡¯s face froze. He hesitated for a moment and said, ¡°I don¡¯t believe so! That said, most adept ns would try and establish their outpost inside Exodar Camp on their first venture to the realms beyond. Building an outpost outside of the camp like you are doing probably won¡¯t be too safe, will it?¡±


    While they were speaking, the Third Grade female adept behind the Fourth Grade adept let out a gasp of surprise. She said in a soft voice, ¡°Sir, look.¡±


    The male adept paused for a moment and looked down. It was only then that he realized that an unusual transformation had urred to the steel city in the short time he was talking with the fire adept.


    Several fortresses forged from metal had been erected around the city. Cannons lined the outside of the fortifications, their ghostly-blue metallic bodies gleaming with an intimidating light. Armies of magical machines marched out of the halls in the city and stationed themselves in the fortresses.


    They were stationary magic energy cannons and mobile magical machines. The Capital of Steel had be a hedgehog armed to the teeth, baring its fearsome defensive power at any enemy that dared to challenge it.


    The male adept couldn¡¯t help but nod at this sight.


    ¡°It seems like you have absolute confidence in your outpost, having built it here, sir. ording to the rules of Camp Exodar, any adept ns that wish to join the camp will have to submit an application to Lord Caelf and wait for approval. However, considering that your outpost is located outside of the camp, there is no need to abide by the rules. I will make a report on your behalf once I return!¡±


    Greem was d to see how cooperative the adept was.


    The two of them exchanged a few more words mid-air before bidding each other farewell and heading in their own directions.


    The patrol party returned to the camp and reported everything they had seen. Naturally, this caused a fairlyrgemotion in the camp. However, Greem ignored all of this and remained in the Capital of Steel to reinforce the defenses.


    Greem might have been improving rapidly, but he had made many enemies, both in the shadows and in public.


    If those people knew that Greem had established a base in space, they would undoubtedly rush over to make trouble. As such, Greem focused on the possibility of defeat above all else. His first and most important request of Gazlowe was to make sure that the Capital of Steel was impregnable.


    He had a feeling that the Crimson n would not be able to do proper business without first fending off several waves of enemies.


    And he was waiting here for those enemies to walk into the trap!


    ............


    Werning.


    Location of the Northern Witches¡¯ Witch Council.


    Eight witch leaders were seated in a scattered fashion on both sides of the long table in the hall. Dark Witch Leader Circe was giving a passionate deration of war.


    ¡°¡ªShani¡¯s death was a result of the male adepts¡¯ conspiracy. We must move for action immediately and assert pressure on the Zhentarim Association to hand over the ringleader Greem.¡±


    Everyone had already heard of Dark Witch Shani¡¯s death.


    However, when they heard Circe associate Shani¡¯s death to the legendary fire adept, Greem, everyone turned and looked at Alice, who was sitting quietly in ce with a smile on her face.


    Dark Witch Circe bent down and pressed both her hands on the table, pressuring Alice with her vicious and intimidating aura, ring angrily at the girl as she did so.


    ¡°Alice, your rtionship with Greem is more than intimate. Do you still intend to shelter him under these conditions and work against all of us witches?¡±


    Alice smiled and said, ¡°That¡¯s a little harsh, isn¡¯t it, sister? If he is indeed guilty, why would I ever cover for him?¡±


    ¡°Very well, then. I propose¡ª¡± Circe exhaled a breath of air from her nose, believing that Alice had finallypromised.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be in a rush, Sister Circe, I still have a few questions for you.¡± Alice interrupted Circe¡¯s speech, causing her face to turn dark.


    ¡°What questions do you have? Ask away!¡±


    ¡°We are all saddened by the news of Shani¡¯s death. However, since you want tounch a war against the outside world in the name of vengeance, we will need some evidence. After all, you are tying all of the witches to your bandwagon with this war!¡±


    ¡°Shani died in Morrian ne. What evidence do you expect me to produce?¡± Circe was furious. Her hands trembled lightly as dark mist rose around her, engulfing over half of the meeting hall.


    ¡°Then you have no evidence. You can¡¯t provide any evidence, and you want to use the full force of the Northern Witches against Greem and the Zhentarim Association. Don¡¯t you think you are a little overbearing with this demand?¡± The angrier Circe became, the more rxed Alice seemed to be. Her bright eyes unflinchingly stared back into Circe¡¯s own.


    Seeing as the sparks between the two witch leaders was growing in intensity, Khesuna, the alwaysposed leader of the Death Witches, couldn¡¯t help but interrupt. ¡°Circe, do you not have any evidence at all? If Greem were alone, it would be fine for us just to kill him on a whim. We Northern Witches have never been afraid of anyone. However, he is now an elder of the Zhentarim Association. If you can¡¯t produce any evidence, how do you expect us to apply any pressure to the Association?¡±


    Alice took the opportunity to speak, now that someone had taken her side.


    ¡°Sister, don¡¯t you forget how you promised me during thest witch council never toy a finger on Greem again. What exactly is this whole affair about Shani¡¯s death? Why are you so certain that Greem was the one that killed Shani? Could it be...that you did something behind the scenes?¡±


    Circe¡¯s entire body started trembling now.


    It was not fear; it was anger and fury at an extreme.


    Shani had participated in the Arcane Empire mission under her direct orders. It was equivalent to her personally sending a vital member of the n to her grave.


    Moreover, the matter of Shani¡¯s death was a minor one. The more pressing issue was the loss of the Orb of Shadows!


    However, these things concerned the reputation of the Dark Witches and many shady dealings. How was she supposed to talk about these things in front of the other witch leaders?


    ¡°Alice, don¡¯t you forget that you yourself are a Northern Witch! Are you not afraid of rumors behind your back? Why do you keep speaking in defense of a male adept like this?¡± Circe gritted her teeth and restrained her anger, choosing to retaliate with an insult instead.


    ¡°Naturally, I would not stand by his side if he was merely an outsider. But sister, the person you are trying to deal with is my husband now!¡± Alice¡¯s face flushed red with embarrassment.


    Alice was filled with joy, but the other witch leaders were shocked and surprised.


    ¡°Alice, you can¡¯t be saying things like these. What is all this husband business. What nonsense are you speaking?¡± Death Witch Khesuna red at her, and a violent aura of death instantly filled the hall.


    ¡°Sister Khesuna, this is not nonsense. I have already decided to be husband and wife with Greem. The official ceremony will be held soon. I hope for your blessing at that time!¡± Alice¡¯s smile faded as she replied with a serious expression.


    Dead silence. Absolute silence.


    The entire hall immediately became solemn as the witches frowned in frustration.


    ¡°Alice, give it some proper thought, won¡¯t you?! ording to the traditions of the Northern Witches, there has never been a high-grade witch, let alone a witch leader, who has had a marriage with a male adept!¡± Khesuna warned with a stern tone.


    ¡°Sister, you mean to say that the witch council will never let such a thing happen?¡±


    ¡°We aren¡¯t so absolute in our ruling. After all, the witch council has no specific rules orws that bind us. That said, to maintain the independence and purity of the Northern Witches, it is an unwritten rule for us to never marry a male adept of another organization.¡±


    ¡°The independence of the Northern Witches?¡± Aliceughed coldly, ¡°Never working against each other, never harming each other¡¯s welfare between all the various branches. That is meant to be another unwritten rule of ours, is it not?!¡±


    ¡°Indeed!¡±


    ¡°Then I want to ask a question. Of the thirteen witch branchessting from the ancient times, how many remain? Where is the territory of all the witch branches whose legacies have gone extinct?¡±


    Alice questioned loudly at the top of her voice, and the witch leaders couldn¡¯t help but fall silent.


    ¡°Ever since I, Alice, became the leader of the Fate Witches, how many of you witch leaders here have abided by the principles of independence between the branches and refrained from intervening in the legacy of the Fate Witches? Circe, why did you imprison my grandmother, Endor? Wasn¡¯t it to threaten me and make demands of me?¡± Alice was like a startled cat now. She stood up straight and red at Circe with a vicious look in her eyes.


    Circe let out a breath from her nose.


    ¡°Endor is a witch of our branch. I have my own reasons for dealing with her. I don¡¯t need a brat like yourself to tell me what to do!¡±


    Death Witch Khesuna¡¯s expression turned colder by the minute. Her gaze wandered between Circe and Alice, her eyes filled with dissatisfaction.


    However, as an outsider to the conflict, she could not stop the growing tension between the two witch leaders.


    Alice might only be Third Grade and appear to be the weakest amongst them all.


    However, as weak as she was, she was still a witch leader and possessed equal authority as all of them on the witch council! No one could strip her of her power as a leader, and no one would ever dare to suppress or threaten her with violence. Otherwise, the so-called unity of the Northern Witches against the outside world would be no more than a joke.


    The entire organization that was the Northern Witches would fall apart and break into individual factions caring for their own welfare!


    It was the one thing that Khesuna wished to avoid at all costs.

 Chapter 1153 - Circe Caves

    Chapter 1153 Circe Caves


    ¡°Alice, your usations earlier are severe.¡±


    Khesuna red at her with a dark face.


    ¡°You are using Leader Circe of intervening and interfering in the affairs of your Fate Witches! Do you insist on this usation, or are you willing to take back your words?¡±


    Alice smiled tragically, her beautiful face filled with sorrow and sadness.


    ¡°What is there to avoid talking about? Are all my sisters here unable to see how the Dark Witches oppress us on a regr basis? Or is this the so-called unity in everyone¡¯s mind? To shiver cowardly and remain silent? It doesn¡¯t matter who wins in the conflict between Maysa and I. That is an internal matter of the Fate Witches. But ask yourself! All of you here! Who amongst you have not put me down, in public, or in the shadows?¡±


    ¡°Is this the so-called independence of the witch branches? The neutrality you all like to speak of?¡±


    The witch leaders¡¯ expressions didn¡¯t change when they heard Alice¡¯s sorrowful usations, but none of them stood up in objection.


    They were neither blind nor deaf. Everyone knew what they had been doing behind the scenes, despite the appearance of unity on the surface.


    Now that Alice was bringing everything to light during the council, their expressions were ugly, but there was nothing they could say in defense.


    ¡°Every witch branch had its own eras of prosperity and ruin. No one can ensure that their branch will remain forever powerful. We of the Fate branch had our legacy severed because the Great Witch Maysa continues to siphon the fate power of the World of Adepts, resulting in bacsh from the nar consciousness on the Fate Witches.


    ¡°With the Battle of Fate this time, I was only able to obtain the identity of the leader of the Fate Witches due to intervention from the nar consciousness. Naturally, whates next is a showdown between I and Great Witch Maysa. It has nothing to do with any of you.


    ¡°However, in the short time that I have been trying to rebuild the n, I have faced countless aggressions and suppressive actions from my witch sisters. You might have perfectly eptable reasons for doing so, but ask yourself: if a new seed of your branch were to be suppressed by theirpanions one day in the future, what would you think?


    ¡°We of the Fate branch have never excelled atbat. We require the aid of our sisters to sessfully grow and develop. Yet now, sisters on my side have be aplices of my enemy. What else can I do aside from finding help and allies from the outside world?


    Of all the witch branches, the Deceit Witches, the False Witches, and the Coldwinter Witches all had intervened in the battle of Fate between Alice and Maysa to varying degrees. Their expressions were awkward upon hearing Alice¡¯s speech.


    However, amongst them all, Dark Witch Leader Circe was undoubtedly the most involved in the conflict. She had practically participated personally. As such, her face was dark as the lead. If they weren¡¯t here in the witch council, she would already have jumped at Alice.


    Khesuna, who had fury written all over her face, suddenly sighed. She spoke once more.


    ¡°It is our past negligence. Great Witch Maysa is truly skilled at bending powers to her will. She has dragged us all into this unnecessary conflict. Alice, we are sorry for what you have suffered!¡±


    Alice¡¯s eyes turned red when she heard the kind wordse from Khesuna¡¯s mouth, who had always been cold and vicious to everyone. Tears almost rolled down her cheeks.


    ¡°The unity of the witches cannot be marred!¡± Khesuna stood up and nced at all the witches in the hall with her cold gaze. ¡°The battle between Alice and Great Witch Maysa is an internal matter of the Fate Witches. All other branches are henceforth no longer allowed to be involved in any fashion. I don¡¯t care what dealings you have with Great Witch Maysa behind the scenes, or if you are only obeying the orders of the respective Great Witches of your ns. From now on, no witch is allowed to participate in their battle of Fate.


    ¡°Anyone that breaks this agreement will have made an enemy out of all the witches of the Death branch!


    ¡°Don¡¯t me me, Khesuna, for whates after, should this ever happen again.¡±


    Khesuna red at Circe and walked out of the council ahead of everyone else.


    The other witch leaders looked at each other and frowned. They left with solemn faces.


    When Circe and Alice were the only two people left in the hall, their eyes met each other¡¯s. For a long time, there was only silence.


    ¡°Why? Is Greem so important to you? That you would risk conflict among the witches just to protect him?¡± Suddenly, Circe spoke, her tone morose and filled with endless frustration.


    ¡°Because he has always helped me! Whether it was before I was a witch leader or after, he has always helped with all his might and every fiber of his being! Moreover, as I have said, he will be my husband! If you dare to turn your spears against him, I will publicly and thoroughly split up the Northern Witches.¡±


    After a momentary pause, Alice continued, ¡°You are free to ughter everyst one of us Fate Witches. This way, we can let all the other adept organizations see how united we Northern Witches really are, how we bully and suppress our own sisters.¡±


    Greem was Alice¡¯s ally. Making an enemy out of Greem was making an enemy out of Alice. And making an enemy out of Alice would draw the ire of Khesuna. But how was she supposed to avenge Shani and retrieve the Orb of Shadows if she did not make an enemy out of Greem?


    Circe¡¯s entire silhouette was hidden by a ck shadow substance. A ghostly green light shone in her deep eyes, quivering as if she had gone mad.


    ¡°Alice, the...Orb of Shadows, the origin treasure of us Dark Witches...might have fallen into the hands of Greem. If...if you can make him hand over the Orb, I...I promise...from henceforth, that the Dark Witches will never interfere in your conflict with Maysa again!¡±


    It was obvious that Circe was having a massive internal struggle while she said this.


    ¡°Greem likes to pick up weird stuff everywhere he goes. Even I don¡¯t know if he has the Orb of Shadows in his possession. However, I can try and ask for you! That said,¡± Upon hearing Circe give way, a smile finally appeared on Alice¡¯s face, ¡°the Orb of Shadows is a Fifth Grade artifact. An item of this is not something that you can just pick up on the street. So......¡±


    ¡°I understand. A price has to be paid for it. Just state your demands!¡±


    ¡°I need......¡± Alice chuckled, and her voice turned lower and softer.


    Soon, the only sounds in the hall were the whispers of the two witches.


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    Greem and Alice went into a hidden room and started whispering to each other.


    After a summary of what happened during the witch council, Alice lifted Greem¡¯s right hand and looked into his eyes. She then said, ¡°I agreed to Circe¡¯s conditions without your approval. You won¡¯t me me for this, will you?¡±


    Greemughed and pulled Alice into his arms, stopping her from saying anything else with his lips.


    After a long pause, Greem finally let go of Alice andughed, ¡°That¡¯s your punishment for even suggesting that I would do that.¡±


    Alice blushed. She leaned her head on his shoulder and bit his chest lightly.


    Greem lifted his head, amenting expression on his determined face.


    ¡°Alice, I can put a hand to my heart and say that the only two people I trust in the world are you and Mary. As long as the two of you don¡¯t end up fighting each other, I will never be afraid of anything!¡±


    ¡°I was asking you about the Orb. What are you talking about all this for? Are you trying to warn me indirectly?¡± Alice¡¯s cunning eyes darted around as if she didn¡¯t understand what Greem was trying to say.


    ¡°Haha! Ever since I obtained the Orb of Shadows, I knew I couldn¡¯t hold on to it for long. It is the origin magic equipment of the Dark Witches, after all. They would put their lives on the line just to get it back. That¡¯s why I¡¯m not at all surprised that this would happen. Moreover, with someone as smart and capable as you scheming for me, they will pay a hefty price to take it back.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re a smart one!¡± Alice was all smiles when she heard Greem praising her.


    ¡°That said, I can give up on anything else except for this one single thing. Circe must be able to provide us with something that can replenish your lifeforce. Otherwise, I will not hand over the Orb!¡± Greem grabbed Alice by the shoulder and turned her around. They stared into each other¡¯s eyes, nose to nose.


    ¡°You...you...know about it all?¡± Alice stuttered.


    ¡°What is the Fate blessing you cast on me, exactly? Why would it devour over eighty percent of your lifeforce?¡± Greem pursued the issue.


    ¡°It¡¯s not as much as you make it out to be,¡± Alice didn¡¯t even dare look Greem in the eyes. ¡°It¡¯s...it¡¯s only seventy percent!¡±


    ¡°Alice, I hope you understand. Our rtionship is not one of mutual use. It¡¯s a genuine rtionship with genuine feelings. I am already used to having you and Mary by my side. You are my closest family and my lovers. I don¡¯t want either of you to be in danger, do you hear me?¡±


    The embarrassment on Alice¡¯s face faded away when she heard Greem¡¯s honest words. She looked into his eyes, her own gaze filled with love.


    ¡°I hear you, and I feel it! I won¡¯t ever do something stupid like this again!¡± Alice quickly pecked Greem on the lips and whispered in his ears, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, some of the items I managed to win over from Circe¡¯s collection can replenish lifeforce. In addition to the heir of the ne that you brought back with you, I have confidence in advancing to Fourth Grade very soon.¡±


    ¡°Really?¡± Greem¡¯s eyes opened wide in joyous surprise.


    ¡°I want to reach Fourth Grade as soon as possible as well!¡± Alice leaned into Greem¡¯s chest and sighed. ¡°Fate Witches only get some offensive options once they reach Fourth Grade. Before that, we are just ¡®useless beings¡¯ that require protection. I am sick of those days. It¡¯s about time to let everyone witness the might of the Fate Witches!¡±


    Greemughed heartily at Alice¡¯s bold words. His lips pressed down once again.

 Chapter 1154 - Shadowsteel

    Chapter 1154 Shadowsteel


    Fire Throne. The fifth floor of the tower.


    Inside a secretboratory.


    Greem stood before an intricate alchemy tform, silently examining the Shadow Diamond ced in front of him.


    The Shadow Diamond no longer looked dark and ck as it used to. Instead, it was bright and brilliant like an ordinary crystal.


    However, the light reflecting from the diamond was not only unable to illuminate the room, but it even caused the brightly lit room to appear darker than usual. It was almost as if a veil had been ced over the light source.


    Delicate patterns and lines had been carved on top of the Shadow Diamond. Tiny, intricate designs now covered the entirety of the gem, without any empty spaces at all.


    It was Greem¡¯s handiwork after one month of tireless effort!


    At the moment, this unusual, ¡®half-finished¡¯ product was embedded in the body of a three-meter-tall elementium magical machine. Meanwhile, the Orb of Shadows¨Cthe origin treasure of the Dark Witches¨Cwas floating in the sky. A flood of shadow substance surged forth from the diamond and entered the body of the machine.


    As the shadow substance continued to corrupt the machine, its body began to turn ck and dark. The formerly solid metal body of the machine became translucent as the metal itself became elementiumized by the shadow energy.


    The Third Grade elementium magical machine could hardly help Greem at his current level. As such, out of a desire to recycle outdated equipment, Greem used the Fourth Grade shadow diamond to modify the machine¡¯s original elementium core.


    Apart from an improvement of the core, Greem used the Orb of Shadows to modify the elementium magical machine¡¯s body into an unusual darkshadow metal.


    If he sessfullypleted all these modifications, the elementium magical machine would sessfully be the Shadowsteel unit, a powerful metal golem that could freely move in and out of the shadows.


    All of Greem¡¯s magical machines in the past had possessed imprable metal bodies and horrifying weight. The ground rumbled where they went, almost as if they were weighed down by a powerful gravity barrier.


    Meanwhile, the Shadowsteel magical machine¡¯s darkshadow metal would be powered by the energy of the Shadow Diamond. As long as there were shadows within fifty meters of the Shadowsteel machine, it would be able to hover through the air like a weightless ghost.


    More importantly, despite its massive size and weight, it could easily hide into a shadow the size of a palm without anyone realizing it.


    Out of all of Greem¡¯s past works, the Shadowsteel unit was the machine that excelled the most at assassination.


    In addition to these modifications, Greem also made the necessary adjustments to the elementium magical machine¡¯s equipment. Its robotic arms and legs were reced with sharp metal ws. If he added a few anti-detection talismans and a magical cloak, then the magical machine¡¯s movements would be even more stealthy.


    After confirming the progress of elementiumization on the Shadowsteel unit, Greem nodded in satisfaction.


    Without the Orb of Shadows, Greem would have required a hundred years toplete the shadow elementiumization of the machine. Now, he only needed half a month, and the shadow elementiumization process was 63%plete.


    It would only take another two weeks for this intermediate Fourth Grade Shadowsteel machine to be able to step onto the battlefield and fight on the frontlines!


    Over the past few days, Greem had spent over ten million magical crystals¡¯ worth of resources to construct the n outpost in space. Finally, he had managed to move Gazlowe and his entire Capital of Steel to the outskirts of Exodar Camp.


    The resources consumed in this process wererge enough to bankrupt most adept ns!


    Even the Crimson n, with its two well-developed resource nes and considerable bank of resources, had almost beenpletely exhausted by this.


    Of course, if Greem were willing to auction away the nearlyplete Shadowsteel unit, the n¡¯s losses would be immediately recovered.


    A ghostly assassin that could freely travel between shadows and unleash shadow powers, all while protected by thick metal armor; a machine like that could easily take on a Fourth Grade dragon alone.


    Greem had even added the newly researched memory alloy of the goblins to the Shadowsteel unit during its modification. He also added a small magic energy amplifier.


    The Chip¡¯s technical assessment of the Shadowsteel unit appeared like this in Greem¡¯s mind:


    Target Name: Shadowsteel Magical Machine


    Target Grade: Intermediate Fourth Grade


    Target Bodily Attributes: Strength 38 | Physique 44 | Agility 46 | Spirit 33


    Target Ability Description: Possesses all low and intermediate-grade shadow abilities, as well as most high-grade shadow abilities. Is able to travel through shadow substance freely. Target¡¯s weight is reduced to zero while there is a shadow substance within 50 meters. Possesses personal shadow space. Able to summon three shadow creatures at any time to aid inbat.


    Maximum Jump Distance: 700 meters


    Target Magic Resistance: Basic Elementium Resistance (Excellent), Shadow Elementium Resistance (Exceptional).


    Target Traits: Construct. Darkvision. Magic Immunity (Low, Intermediate). Lowlight Vision. Damage Reduction.


    Special Abilities: Shadow Assimtion (Passive), Light Absorption (Passive), Shadow Healing (Passive), Multi-Strike, Shadow Elementium stwave.


    The Chip¡¯splete assessment put the Shadowsteel unit at intermediate Fourth Grade once it was fully modified. In the right conditions, it would even be able to possess the might of an advanced Fourth Grade!


    After all, the Shadowsteel unit was now different from what it was before. It was no longer a warrior charging at the frontlines, but a mysterious assassin hiding in the shadows.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how Greem¡¯s Fourth Grade opponents would fall prey to the Shadowsteel unit. Whenever they fought with Greem, an intermediate Fourth Grade steel assassin would emerge from their shadow to stab them in their back.


    Afterpleting his work on the Shadowsteel unit, Greem left theboratory and went to another room.


    The decoration here was exceedingly simple.


    There was a stone table, a stone chair, and a thick tome lying silently on the table.


    However, the defenses here were unusually potent.


    Mysterious runes ofplicated and elegant patterns could be seen on all four walls, the ceiling, and the floor. Together, they formed a small space with its own system of operation, utterly separate from the rest of the tower.


    This way, anything that happened inside the room could not be detected through divination or scrying spells!


    It was a magical room that Alice had personally designed for Greem. It was the ¡®prison¡¯ used to trap the Libram of Wisdom.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The Orb of Shadows might be a Fifth Grade artifact, but it did not belong to any one person.


    A simple Fate spell could obscure it from the senses of all the Dark Witches.


    However, the Libram of Wisdom was different. It was an artifact with an actual owner!


    With the endless supply of power from God of Wisdom Hierro, the artifact could escape at any time. Greem had to find a way to cut off the connection between the Libram and its owner and keep it in his hands at all times.


    Greem¡¯s only option had been to ask Alice to construct this small spatial domain cut off from the rest of the world. That was how he had managed to cause the Libram of Wisdom to remain dormant all this while.


    A loud eruption rang out in the room. Greem¡¯s towering figure appeared in a corner with a sh of fire.


    This room was isted from the outside. There were no paths in or out. The only way in was to teleport using fixed spatial coordinates. However, only Greem knew the coordinates of this room. Even Alice and Mary were kept in the dark.


    That stifled any chance of leaked information!


    After entering the room, Greem coughed violently for a while. Finally, he carefully sat down before the stone table and opened the Libram of Wisdom lightly.


    ¡°Gods are omnipotent!¡±


    This simple line was the only thing written on the very first page!


    Gods are omnipotent. Hmph! If the gods were so powerful, why was there still evil and corruption in this world? Hmph! Liars and tricksters.


    Greem remarked in disdain in his mind. He tried to flip to the second page.


    However, regardless of how he rubbed the corner of the page, it was as if all the pages were stuck together. He could not move them at all.


    ¡°Dammit! What is happening? Is the artifact I tried so hard to get my hands on an iplete artifact? Chip, run an analysis.¡± After several failed attempts, Greem could only shut the door and let the Chip out.


    [Beep. Detecting unusual aggregate of faith energy. Analysis suggests that unlocking said faith energy requires the host to either achieve resonance or proceed based on the settings of the faith energy.]


    ¡°Achieve resonance? What does that mean?¡±


    [To be a faithful believer of the God of Wisdom. As long as the host¡¯s mental wave matches the faith energy resonance of the God of Wisdom, the host will be able to read the Libram of Wisdom without any obstruction!]


    ¡°Dammit, you are telling me to convert? We adepts don¡¯t believe in any gods except for ourselves!¡±


    [Self-worship is an alternative faith of sorts! If the host does not intend to convert belief, the host can refer to the book Gulliver¡¯s Self Hypnosis.¡±


    An awkward smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face.


    Gulliver was an adept who called himself ¡®The Arcane Trickster.¡¯ He had a fondness for researching the divine magic of the gods.


    He had dicovered that the believers of the gods did not require too much supernatural knowledge to be able to unleash devastating high-grade divine magic under the blessing of the gods. That made it far easier for god believers to grow in powerpared to the adepts, with far less risk.


    For the sake of obtaining such easy power, Gulliver took an unusual path and developed a method of self-hypnosis. It allowed the user to temporarily disguise themselves as a believer of a god, thereby tricking the god and obtaining the right to use certain divine spells.


    If you could only trick a single god, there would only be so many spells you could obtain on a daily basis.


    However, Gulliver was a genius in his own right. Through his powerful abilities, he was able to cheat as many as a dozen gods simultaneously.


    His magical abilities, in addition to all these free divine spells, allowed him to make a name for himself as an up anding genius. The Gulliver¡¯s Self Hypnosis that he wrote became an interesting book that most high-grade adepts had to read!

 Chapter 1155 - Pollution of Divine Power

    Chapter 1155 Pollution of Divine Power


    Disguising himself as one of the God of Wisdom¡¯s believers?


    This thought had never crossed Greem¡¯s mind.


    If the gods were ssified by their power, God of Wisdom Hierro was a weak, lower god at best. He was barely more powerful than newly crowned gods.


    Meanwhile, as a Fourth Grade adept, Greem was practically a demigod if he were in the World of Gods!


    There was only a small step between a demigod and a god.


    Even though the difference in power between the two was massive, Greem could not lie to himself. He could respect gods, but investing his full devotion to them was something that Greem could never do, even with his life on the line.


    The adepts¡¯ research into gods was extensive. The gods might appear to be high and mighty beings to mortals, but in the eyes of the adepts, the gods were no more than high-energy beings that relied on faith to parasitize their nes.


    The gods and evil that people speak of were simply the external manifestations of supernatural powers!


    The gods used their supernatural powers to fool the mortals. They used the conversion of faith to brainwash their believers, making them repeat those false ¡®truths¡¯ and notions of ¡®justice,¡¯ over and over again. Through this process, the gods obtain the believer¡¯s faith, and the believers received a fragment of the god¡¯s power. It was an insignificant return for their investments.


    The gods even descended to walk amongst mortals with human bodies for the sake of further deceiving their followers and spreading their faith. They would personally establish their own religious organizations with their strict structures of authority. The thoughts of the believers were kept in line with these organizations. They would chant the prayers and words left behind by the ¡®prophets¡¯ tomunicate with their gods and turn themselves into a faith node.


    To prevent the believers from overthinking, the gods would often suppress technological and philosophical advancements in society, often keeping their believers in a state of ignorance.


    In fact, some gods would even intentionally provoke worldly conflicts to stimte an explosion of faith. They would also use the terrifying war to eliminate unqualified believers and bring in new blood.


    Of course, in the worlds ruled by the gods, spellcasters and individuals with supernatural powers were targets of oppression and murder. Adepts, mages, and arcanists were naturally opposed to the gods!


    It was precisely because of how much they understood the gods that having an adept take the knee and worship a god was the greatest humiliation possible!


    ¡°Is there no way I can study the Libram of Wisdom, apart from converting to a believer of Hierro?¡± Greem mumbled dissatisfiedly.


    [Beep. The Libram of Wisdom is a book of faith that contains a record of the divine origin and divine traits of the God of Wisdom. Analyzing its content does not require sight, but Spirit. Adjusting one¡¯s Spirit frequency to match the divine flux of the Libram is the only way to read the book.]


    ¡°If it is just a matter of changing Spirit frequencies and not conversion, I wouldn¡¯t mind doing it. There won¡¯t be any side-effects from this, will there, Chip?¡±


    [Beep. Host¡¯s thoughts will be polluted by the divine power of the Libram of Wisdom after changing Spirit frequencies. Given the strength of the host¡¯s current Spirit, the host¡¯s mind will not be influenced as long as the connection is no longer than 27 minutes and 53 seconds. The host will need to conduct deep meditation for long periods to neutralize the effects of the divine power after reading the Libram.]


    ¡°Influence thoughts? What kind of influence?¡±


    [The influence will make the host ept the divine information contained within the Libram of Wisdom and acknowledge some of the ideals of the God of Wisdom. It would turn the host into a loose believer.]


    Loose believers were not actual believers. They were individuals that agreed with some of a god¡¯s behavior and ideals. Their faith was not strong and was often incredibly flimsy. It rendered them very easy to external influence and conversion to other faiths.


    ¡°Loose believers? That doesn¡¯t seem all that uneptable!¡± Greem rubbed his chin and hesitated slightly.


    [Beep. Bing a loose believer is only the first step of divine power pollution. As the host continues reading the Libram of Wisdom, the degree of faith will continue to deepen. As such, conducting deep meditations after reading sessions to neutralize the effects of the divine power is of utmost importance!]


    ¡°I understand! Chip, when I read the Libram, remember to record and monitor the changes to my Spirit. If I show any signs of having my thoughts being influenced, notify me immediately and interrupt the reading!¡±


    [Beep. Host¡¯s order has been received. Conducting digitization of host¡¯s Spirit. Dynamic real-time monitoring of Spirit has begun.]


    Greem could finally rx with the Chip looking after his back. He put all his attention back on the first page of the Libram.


    Gods are omnipotent!


    These words were written in a foreignnguage that Greem did notprehend in the slightest.


    Supposedly, Greem should not be able to recognize these unusual runes. Strangely enough, when Greem cast his gaze towards the words, their meaning naturally appeared in his mind.


    There was no need to decipher or analyze them. Greem naturally knew what the words meant the moment heid eyes on them!


    Greem wasn¡¯t surprised by this.


    Most high-grade magical tomes had simr effects.


    That was why reading this book did not rely on sight, but Spirit!


    Greem¡¯s eyes gazed upon this short line of words. It was almost as if his Spirit had broken into an unusual illusory realm or had been dragged into a different world. Greem appeared as aplete translucent humanoid in this world. He followed behind a god, personally witnessing how he unleashed his divine power and gathered material substance, using his omnipotent powers to forge a ne out of nothing.


    On the first day, the god used the power of Creation.


    Countless tiny yet real substances swarmed forth from the endless gxy, gathering together.


    On the second day, the god created the nar world.


    The god used his divine power as an adhesive and pieced the particles together to create the continents and the sea upon which the countless lifeforms could live and procreate.


    On the third day, the god isted the world from the spacestorms.


    Once the nar world had been constructed, the god used his divine power and formed a massive bubble to envelop the nar world and shield it from space.


    On the fourth day, the god created light.


    The nar world had formed when the ne¡¯s barrier was created. However, the world was utter darkness, and nothing could be seen. The god dragged stars and suns from the depths of the gxy and ced them in the skies above the ne.


    On the fifth day, the god created life.


    The nar world might be vast and boundless, but it was merely a frail marble in the hands of the great god. The gody above the marble and blew into the ss. Sparks of his divine power scattered across the world, merging with material substance where theynded, giving form to thousands upon thousands of nts and animals.


    On the sixth day, the god created intelligent life.


    The nar world became increasingly lively and colorful with each passing day. The god molded several intelligent species in his image and sent them into the ne.


    These were the leaders of the world as named by the god!


    On the seventh day, the god became the guardian deity of the nar world.


    After aplishing all this, the god went to sleep in hopes of recovering his powers. The humans or elves or beasts (the form of which depended on the reader¡¯s own species) created by the god¡¯s divine power started to walk in the world, spreading civilization and faith where they went.


    As Greem witnessed the seven days of creation by the god, his Spirit frequency gradually becamepatible with the god. He started to understand certain narws that were typically iprehensible to him through this act of creation.


    However, just as Greem became immersed in this divine power that could create worlds and destroy them with a wave of a hand, the entire illusory realm started crumbling due to an unexpected rm.


    [Beep. Warning, warning. Host¡¯s mind has been polluted by foreign energy. Foreign pollution reaching threshold. Awakening Protocol activated.]


    Greem, in his Spirit form, looked around helplessly and could only watch as the entire world rapidly copsed and fell apart. The wondrous gxy popped like a bubble, and the countless stars crashed down from above like fireballs.


    The entire world began to burn in silence.


    Meanwhile, in reality, Greem suddenly sped his head and screamed in agony. His eyes that had lost focus became sharp and full of life once more under a splitting headache.


    Greem took a deep breath and finally broke free of that very real and very strange illusion.


    ¡°Chip, conduct self-examination now. Give me a full report!¡±


    [Beep. Mission epted. Self-examinationmencing.


    [Beep. Beep. Beep. Examinationplete. Report is being produced.]


    Lights flickered before his eyes as a screen appeared in Greem¡¯s mind. His current mental status was quickly disyed.


    [Target Creature: Greem (Host)


    Target Grade: Beginner Fourth Grade


    Target Identity: Demi-Principle Adept (Fire Specialization)


    Target Bodily Attributes: Strength 27 (11) | Physique 32 (14) | Agility 18 (8) | Spirit 41 (29) |


    Target Bloodline: Starbeast Bloodline (Unknown)


    Target Physique: Chaos Physique


    Target Traits: Heart of Principles


    Target Condition: Origin damaged. Soul is currently in a weakened state (all bodily attributes weakened). Mental consciousness polluted by foreign energy. Currently processing foreign mental influence.]


    Ever since his injury from the return trip from Morrian ne, Greem¡¯s soul had been in a weakened state. The most direct effect of this injury was the decrease in all his attributes. If it weren¡¯t for the powerful magical equipment he possessed, he would not even be able to maintain his power at the level of a Fourth Grade adept.


    Now, his mind had been further polluted by the God of Wisdom¡¯s divine power in addition to the pre-existing injury.


    Greem immediately left the room with Fire Teleportation and hurried back to his chambers to meditate.


    When he left, the Libram of Wisdom flipped on its own, silently turning to the second page.

 Chapter 1156 - Infiltrator

    <h4>Chapter 1156 Infiltrator</h4>


    Hierro was the God of Wisdom.


    He might not be a particrly significant god, but he held the secrets of the gods in his hands.


    There was no doubt that the Libram of Wisdom that he had personally created was a powerful artifact.


    After being influenced and charmed by the Libram of Wisdom, Greem had to go into deep meditation to remove the divine power from his Spirit. It was a long and arduous process, but it was very much worth it.


    At the very least, Greem¡¯s Spirit had gone from 40 points to 41 points after reading the first page of the Libram! That was his greatest reward from doing so!


    After advancing to Fourth Grade, increasing Spirit had be very difficult. This fact was well-known to adepts.


    After the multiple bloody battles in Morrian ne and the stimtion of the divine power in the Libram of Wisdom, Greem¡¯s Spirit had finally increased by one point. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine that, in the near future, the Libram of Wisdom would bring about a decent improvement to his Spirit.


    However, Greem¡¯s soul origin was still recovering from his injury. An excessive burden on his Spirit was not conducive to this recovery process.


    With the Chip¡¯s nning, Greem only read the Libram of Wisdom once a month. With the rest of his time, Greem started to organize and optimize the knowledge he had obtained from the Arcane Empire.


    The information on the floating rings that he sold to Molten Fire City Lord Alfred was only the initial version. Obviously, he didn¡¯t want to use such crude, unrefined knowledge for himself. Greem had the Chip continue the optimization of the floating ring technology.


    However,pared to the low-level technology of a floating ring, what attracted Greem¡¯s attention the most out of the Arcane Empire¡¯s knowledge system was their fearsome pseudo-nar fortresses.


    The Arcane Empire had transformed many pseudo-nes into imprable fortresses.


    Every time the Arcane Empireunched an invasion, these pseudo-nes would charge from the frontlines, with floating fortresses serving as their artillery. One could im that most of the hundreds of lesser nes ruled by the Arcane Empire at its peak were conquered by these pseudo-nar fortresses.


    If Greem wanted to replicate the former glory of the Arcane Empire, he would have to conductprehensive and in-depth research into spell pools, magic pools, arcane cores, and the many other gems of the Arcane Empire¡¯s knowledge system.


    It was an exceedinglyrge andplicated knowledge system of apletely different type to the adept¡¯s knowledge. Even with the Chip¡¯s aid, Greem would require a tremendous amount of time to transnt the knowledge into the adepts¡¯ magic system.


    Thus, he was in no real hurry. He continued to mend his injury as he silently waited for news.


    Two weekster, the first good news arrived.


    The Shadowsteel unit in theboratory had beenpleted!


    Greem hurried to the alchemyb immediately upon receiving the news. An unusual magical machine floated in the room in midair, waiting silently with both arms hanging by its side.


    This magical machine was over seven feet tall and made of a dark ck metal that could absorb all iing light. Its body was a thin, metallic frame shrouded by an imprable ck mist.


    At the tip of its long and slender limbs were sharp metal ws, while its dark, sinister head was hidden inside the mist. Only two ghostly lights could be seen shining in its eye sockets.


    It did not walk firmly on the ground like ordinary machines. Instead, it hovered in midair, as if weightless, gliding silently above the ground as it moved.


    Greem was unusually weak during this period of recovery. He could hardly conduct any form ofbat against Fourth Grade enemies. The creation of this intermediate Fourth Grade Shadowsteel magical machine perfectly filled in for Greem¡¯s currently missingbat power.


    With the Shadowsteel machine, Greem had confidence in teaching any invaders a painful lesson, even if he was still significantly weakened at the moment!


    ¡°Shadow Demon, attack me!¡± Greem wanted to test the might of the Shadowsteel machine. He summoned a Lava Shield in front of him.


    Upon receiving Greem¡¯s order, Shadow Demon slowly floated over. Its sharp metal w only pierced lightly, yet a massive hole had been carved out in the Lava Shield despite its seven hundred points of power.


    The retaliatory fire damage from the Lava Shield only caused the mist around Shadow Demon to tremble slightly before dissipating entirely.


    Even though this attack was only a test, Greem had still managed to obtain the data he wanted.


    The base attack power of the Shadow Demon¡¯s ws was 400 points. However, as this was a multi-strike attack, a single assault from the Shadow Demon could inflict as much as 400¡Á6 points of physical damage. In addition to the shadow shockwave that came along with the strike, the Shadow Demon¡¯s total damage was between 2900 to 3200 points.


    It was almost equal to Greem¡¯s offensive power at his peak!


    ¡°Shadow Demon, hide in my shadow!¡± After testing the machine¡¯s offensive power, Greem wanted to test its stealth.


    The Shadow Demon flickered and appeared behind Greem. Its massive body squeezed slightly and disappeared into Greem¡¯s shadow.


    Greem looked down at his feet.


    With how brightly lit the alchemyb was, his shadow had been cornered to a small spot under his feet. It was hard to imagine that such a gigantic magical machine could hide inside his shadow.


    As Greem moved around, his shadow started to stretch and shift around. Yet, he felt no signs of life or energy aura from it.


    Greem casually created a small fireball in his palm and hurled it at the shadow. The ground rumbled, and the shadow was split up by the explosion of light. However, he still couldn¡¯t detect any signs of an energy aura.


    Even when the mes had faded and the shadow appeared beneath his feet again, Greem could not sense anything unusual about it.


    However, as a blue light gleamed in Greem¡¯s ck eyes, he was finally able to see a small cluster of inky darkness roaming in the shadows with his Elementium Sight.


    Moreover, as the master of Shadow Demon, Greem had a trace of a soul connection with the machine. Even without Elementium Sight, he could faintly detect its presence and its approximate location.


    After examining Shadow Demon¡¯s stealth ability from several angles, Grem finally nodded in satisfaction.


    With the protection of the Shadow Demon, his personal safety was once again assured!


    ............


    Inside Fire Cave.


    A small cluster of shadow was slowly moving through the crimson cave.


    It was the only path into Fire Throne and the region where the fire creatures and magical machines were most concentrated. Anyone that wished to infiltrate Fire Throne had to make it past this path.


    Karin was a young witch with brown skin, blue eyes, and a terrific figure. The tight-fitting ck dragon leather armor she wore further emphasized her beauty. ck mist cloaked her body as she slowly moved through the shadows of the magical machines.


    The magical machines in Fire Cave were stationed as guards and defended every corridor and cave. Meanwhile, the fire creatures were patrols and wandered in the winding cave.


    Whenever they found an invader, all of the guards would be alerted, and they would eliminate the enemy with brutal firepower.


    Karin was only a Third Grade Dark Witch, and the tower she was trying to infiltrate was a private tower belonging to the Fourth Grade legendary fire adept.


    Such an action would not be wise in any other situation.


    However, she could not refuse the stern instructions from the n headquarters. She could only grit her teeth andmit to this terrifying, impossible mission!


    She had already done her research on the legendary fire adept Greem before she came here.


    The more she found out, and the more detailed the information she obtained, the more scared she became.


    He was not an ordinary newly advanced Fourth Grade adept!


    His reputation, his results inbat¨C all of it had been written down with the blood of his enemies.


    The terrifying part was that the n had sent her here to infiltrate the tower on an unimaginable task. She was to investigate the whereabouts of a certain thing and steal it¨C the Orb of Shadows. That was what horrified Karin the most and struck her with utter disbelief!


    The Orb of Shadows. Wasn¡¯t that the most important origin treasure of the Dark Witches? How did it fall into the hands of a seemingly unrted legendary fire adept in the center of the continent?


    Were the authorities at n headquarters all useless fools? They lost the Orb of Shadows, and still, they did notunch a war against the aggressor?


    Furiously cursing at the authorities that sent her here, Karin carefully avoided the fire creatures and specifically traveled through the shadows of the magical machines.


    The previous moment, she was hiding beneath the feet of a magical machine, and the next, she was in the shadows of a corridor.


    Perhaps the slight energy flux from Shadowstalking had attracted the fire creature¡¯s attention. A particrlyrge and ferocious zing Guardian stopped in the corridor and red with its smoldering eyes. It looked around in confusion.


    Karin, who was hiding in the shadow of the ceiling, became nervous. Her pretty eyes narrowed and she restrained all killing intent, evaluating the guard with calm,posed eyes.


    zing Guardians were not particrly powerful fire creatures. They only had the strength of advanced First Grades!


    Karin only needed a flick of her finger to kill a zing Guard like this. However, in this environment, any action would alert all of the enemies. Should she touch this zing Guardian, her infiltration mission would fail.


    Karin became frustrated upon thinking about the punishment she would receive in the n for having failed her mission. Even her aura started to be unstable.


    Fortunately, the difference in power between her and the zing Guardian was simply too significant. When dedicating all her strength to hiding, the chances of being discovered was impossibly slim.


    Thus, after discovering nothing out of the ordinary, the zing Guardian casually walked out and continued to stroll in this area where the fire elementium was denser than usual.


    Karin couldn¡¯t help but let out a breath of relief. She continued on her journey!

 Chapter 1157 - An Association Adept Visits

    Chapter 1157 An Association Adept Visits


    Fire Throne.


    Since returning from Morrian ne, Greem had spent his time hiding in his tower, other than that one trip to space.


    His soul was now damaged and crippled. It was the best time for enemies who wished to take vengeance on him!


    Greem would never take a single step out of the tower if he could. He would never give his enemies the chance toy traps or assassinate him.


    Unfortunately, though the tree wishes to rest in silence, the storm never stops!


    On the seventh day after Greem obtained Shadow Demon, a faraway guest shattered the quiet of Fire Throne, forcing Greem to emerge from hisboratory and meet them on the second level of the tower.


    The first person that Greem saw upon entering the meeting hall was the familiar Vice-Chairman Mirva.


    It had been a while since theyst met. This sly and cunning Vice-Chairman appeared older and frailer than before. It was almost as if Greem could see the signs of aging on his body now.


    That was not amon urrence!


    At the level of Fourth Grades, there were all sorts of spells and magic that allowed one to revert to their youthful forms. If the spells didn¡¯t work, one could simply use physical modifications to fix their appearance and figure at their peak condition of beauty and style.


    It was only when a Fourth Grade adept reached the ends of their life and when their magic power and Spirit began to shrivel that these uncontroble signs of aging would emerge.


    Greem had a feeling that Vice-Chairman Mirva would not be able to live more than a hundred more years!


    Greem¡¯s gaze lingered momentarily on Mirva before shifting to the other Fourth Grade adept.


    He could sense that this unfamiliar Fourth Grade adept was the real guest here today. Mirva was only here to apany him.


    ¡°Wee, wee. It¡¯s rare that Vice-Chairman Mirva is willing to visit my humble abode. I am incredibly honored by this visit!¡± Greem greeted Mirva with a big smile on his face and naturally directed the flow of conversation towards the other adept. ¡°I don¡¯t believe I know you. May I know your name?¡±


    This foreign adept clearly didn¡¯t belong to the Zhentarim Association. He wore a purple robe and had a kindly,posed face. He looked like a middle-aged man and wore the unique emblem of the Adept¡¯s Association on his chest.


    The Adept¡¯s Association. Greem¡¯s eyes narrowed. He roughly knew what the man was here for today!


    ¡°You must be the famous legendary fire adept, Sir Greem! Just as everybody says, you¡¯re young, capable, and talented. I am Beluni from the Adept¡¯s Association. I came here today because I have some questions that I need to ask you!¡± A gentle smile appeared on Beluni¡¯s face, but the sharp glint that inadvertently shone in his eyes revealed that he was not a pushover at all.


    ¡°Since the two of you have something to talk about, I won¡¯t be staying here much longer!¡± Mirva was an old fox. Even though he was the one who apanied Beluni over here, he didn¡¯t want to be involved at all. He said his farewells to the two adepts and turned to leave.


    When Greem and Beluni were the only ones left in the room, Beluni spoke once again.


    ¡°Sir Greem, I¡¯ve heard that Adept Mangus of our Association was apanion of yours in Morrian ne and that the two of you returned together. Is this true?¡±


    ¡°Indeed!¡±


    ¡°Which is to say, Adept Mangus was alive before teleporting back from space, yet he abruptly died during the teleportation process. Moreover, his death is rted to you!¡± Beluni continued to ask with a smile, but a sharp edge could be seen gleaming between his words now.


    ¡°He self-destructed, and his purpose in self-destructing was to kill me. I believe you should have been able to figure this out from your investigations with the other returning adepts.¡± Greem calmly replied.


    ¡°Of course, we have done our investigations, and the results are as you say. Judging by the situation, it is certain that Adept Mangus was the one to initiate the attack. No one can entirely me you for his actions. However, what we are more interested in...is why he did it? Did he have a grudge against you, or did he do it because someone controlled his mind? This is the focus of our investigations currently!¡±


    ¡°You must have had some results if you¡¯ve already investigated for so long! You can¡¯t possibly suspect that I charmed Mangus into almost killing me, do you?¡±


    ¡°Of course we don¡¯t suspect you, Sir Greem. However, we must find the true killer behind the scenes. Adept Mangus might not be all that impressive when ites to fighting power or connections, but he was a high-grade adept officially registered with the Adept¡¯s Association. It doesn¡¯t matter who killed him and how. We of the Adept¡¯s Association have the responsibility to investigate the cause and exact punishment!¡±


    ¡°The mastermind in the shadows can freely take control of a Fourth Grade adept. They must certainly be one of those ancient relics enjoying their time in the realms beyond. Are you sure you have the ability to exact punishment against someone like that?¡± Greem narrowed his eyes, not a smile on his face. His tone was solemn and stern.


    ¡°That¡¯s not something for you to worry about!¡± Adept Beluni had a ¡®sincere¡¯ smile on his face. ¡°After all, it¡¯s not like we of the Adept¡¯s Association aren¡¯t backed by Great Adepts of our own. We can manage anything that happens in the World of Adepts and anything that happens outside. We only need to report to our superiors, and people of the corresponding caliber will attend to the task. I only need a name to verify the results of our investigations. I am sure that Sir Greem wouldn¡¯t mind naming the person who wished to kill you, would you?¡±


    Greem gave it a long thought before finally squeezing out that hated name from between his teeth.


    ¡°Maysa!¡±


    Greem was naturally more than happy to deal with Great Witch Maysa with the power of the Adept¡¯s Association. However, this would introduce a significant variable in the conflict between Alice and Maysa. Even Greem couldn¡¯t tell if this would negatively impact Alice in the long run.


    The battle between the Fate Witches was too strange and unusual!


    Great Witch Maysa had an overwhelming advantage over Alice in every aspect.


    However, in all of their previous conflicts in the past, Great Witch Maysa had made mistakes. There were all sorts of loopholes and ws in her death traps, uncharacteristic of her status and power as a Great Witch.


    The reason all this happened was due to her brazen interference and intervention in the flow of the river of Fate. The stronger she was, the more she intervened with Fate, and the more severe the Fate bacsh she would incite.


    Without Alice¡¯s existence, Great Witch Maysa¡¯s control over Fate would not be so severely affected. However, for the sake of keeping Maysa in check, the nar consciousness of the World of Adepts was biased towards Alice in this battle of Fate.


    Whenever these two powerful witches versed in the flow of the river of Fate fought, the trajectory of the future would be thrown into utter chaos.


    In general, Great Witch Maysa was more powerful and had thousands of years of perspective and nning, giving her the crushing advantage in most situations. However, even though Alicecked the ability to make broad arrangements in Fate, she could still disrupt Maysa¡¯s ns and cause destruction.


    Even a gigantic metal golem could malfunction due to a tiny pebble stuck in its coreponents. Alice was just like that. She might not have the power to challenge Maysa over the control of the river of Fate, but she could still create tiny destructions here and there. She could cause Maysa¡¯s ns and constructions to copsepletely due to small, insignificant ¡®idents.¡¯


    She was more than capable of that!


    That was how Alice had managed to survive at the hands of Great Witch Maysa, despite the numerous schemes targeted at her.


    However, this was a double-edged sword!


    Alice¡¯s own intervention in Fate had caused her assistants and allies to suffer a decent bacsh from the ne as well.


    The reason Alice spent most of her time in the Tower of Fate and isting herself from the rest of the world was to avoid the Fate bacsh from involving her friends and family.


    In all honesty, anyone who had bad luck in life would probably die an ugly death if they became too closely associated with Alice! Greem had made many enemies over the years and had been involved in one massive war after another, often thrown into a trial of life and death every few years.


    That was the fundamental reason for all of this!


    Fate was unpredictable.


    Fate was capricious.


    It was precisely because of how unpredictable Fate was that Greem hesitated in revealing Maysa¡¯s name to the Association adept.


    ¡°So, it is her.¡± Adept Beluni wasn¡¯t surprised to hear Maysa¡¯s name. After exchanging a few more words with Greem, he got up and left.


    Once Beluni had departed from Fire Throne, Greem remained in the room for a short moment before returning to the upper levels of the tower.


    The experiment was very sessful!


    Neither the sly and cunning Mirva nor Beluni from the Adept¡¯s Association had discovered Shadow Demon¡¯s existence. Of course, this also had to do with the fact that they were in Greem¡¯s private tower and were intentionally avoiding the use of their Spirit to sense their surroundings.


    However, the fact that the Shadow Demon possessed such outstanding stealth already made Greem overjoyed!


    After returning to hisboratory, Greemmunicated with Gargamel mentally and received more good news.


    The Crimson n had signed a trade agreement with Molten Fire City. From now on, the Crimson n would be able to use dragon blood, dragon bones, dragon crystals, and other high-grade resources to trade for the Queyras alloy produced by Molten Fire City.


    Given the amount agreed upon in the negotiations, Greem estimated that they could construct one magic generator furnace every two months from now on. That also meant that the Crimson n would gain a new mothership every two months.


    It was incredibly significant for the expansion of the Crimson n¡¯s power and influence!


    However, just as Greem concluded hismunications with Gargamel, the spirit of the tower sent him a warning about an intruder.


    A strange ¡®bug¡¯ had entered his tower and was looking for something in the lower levels.

 Chapter 1158 - Thief Captured

    Chapter 1158 Thief Captured


    An adept¡¯s tower.


    In particr, the private tower of a Fourth Grade adept. It was a zone of death with innumerable traps and mechanisms!


    For most adepts, an uninvited visit to the abode of a high-grade adept was no less difficult and dangerous than a venture into a dragon¡¯s den.


    This unidentified ¡®bug¡¯ was clearly no pushover either.


    She had actually managed to make it through Fire Cave and Fire Hall with ease. She had even managed to slip into Fire Throne when Greem opened the gates of the tower for his two visitors.


    The fact that she was able to reach so far already made her much more outstanding than the average adept!


    However, even this intruder probably never expected for theyout and construction of Greem¡¯s tower to be so strange and unusual. The first and second levels of the tower were entirely cut off and isted. There were no paths or entryways that led to the upper levels.


    After breaking into the tower and quickly searching all of the secret spaces on the first and second levels, Karin still couldn¡¯t find any way up. It was then that she knew that she had run into a bastard who had unbelievably ridiculous expectations for his personal safety.


    If there are no paths upwards, then she would dig her own.


    Karin refused to admit defeat. She quickly found a secret room on the second level and stealthily put up a silencing barrier in it. She then started to dig at the ceiling of the room furiously.


    This tower was a standard small-sized tower. Greem was poor back then and couldn¡¯t afford to use the most excellent steelstone in every part of the tower. As such, these bricks made of volcanic rock quickly turned into dust under the destructive power of a Third Grade witch. A hole the size of a fist instantly appeared.


    Unfortunately, Karin could not feel any aura of the towering through this hole. Instead, she hade into contact with a spatial barrier.


    It was then that Karin fully realized that the damned fire adept had not only sealed away the upper levels of the tower, but had even separated the second and third level spatially. The two levels might appear connected, but they belonged to two different dimensions of nar space.


    Anyone who wanted to reach the upper levels of the tower either had to use a fixed-destination teleportation array or a short-distance teleportation spell, as Greem did. However, the use of a short-distance teleportation spell required the specific spatial coordinates of the upper levels, as well as teleportation authority from the tower spirit. Otherwise, there was simply no way in.


    Karin was utterly helpless now!


    She might be adept at Shadowstalking, and she could move anywhere there were shadows. However, this spatial barrier in front of her had sealed off all paths of advance. If she teleported aimlessly, she would be tossed around in the interspatialyers by the spatial turbulence instead of reaching the upper levels.


    After all, the transit hub of all space magics were the interspatialyers¨C the mysterious area between the twoyers of the nar barrier.


    The environment there might be better than space, but it was still a dangerous and lethal environment for an unprepared Third Grade Dark Witch!


    While Karin was panicking and trying to figure out a way to reach the upper levels, her actions were recorded by the tower¡¯s spirit.


    Greem raised an eyebrow as he looked through the monitoring crystal at the damned ¡®thief¡¯ scurrying around his home. He coldly said, ¡°Shadow Demon, bring her back to me!¡±


    Despite saying that, the room remained absolutely silent and quiet.


    However, a strange patch of darkness had vanished from Greem¡¯s shadow.


    ............


    Karin was quickly leaping through the shadows.


    Every time she teleported, she passed through several walls and appeared in an unfamiliar room.


    Karin would hold her breath and hide in the shadows as she assessed the room.


    If there were anything that perked her interest, she would get a little closer and examine it. If there were nothing extraordinary, she would leap away and appear in the shadows of another room.


    As a Dark Witch, the shadows were her world!


    As long as it was a ce unguarded by an energy barrier or a magical dome, she could freely move about like a fish in water, lifting her head above the shadows for a quick look.


    However, this leisurely exploration didn¡¯tst for long!


    As Karin was slowly moving through a vast magical hall, she suddenly turned and looked towards a corner of the room. She could sense a fluctuation in the shadows beneath a pir over there.


    It wasn¡¯t the elementium flux created by an eruption of shadow energy, but the tiny ripples caused by a creature moving through shadow substance. As an elite amongst the Dark Witches, Karin couldn¡¯t be more familiar with such energy ripples.


    Could there be other shadow creatures here?


    Karin couldn¡¯t help but wonder to herself.


    High-Grade adepts would often breed and keep all sorts of ferocious and strange beasts or summoned creatures to protect their property and their safety. It wasn¡¯t out of the question for there to be shadow creatures among these guards.


    Karin couldn¡¯t help but be nervous at these thoughts. She hid in the shadows, silently observing the deep darkness over there.


    She could sense the shadows there to be unusual. It was like a boiling pot of water. The shadow substance there was more active than usual. A massive shadow creature was hiding in the shadows, baring its fangs as if it was about to devour its enemy at any moment.


    Karin held her breath and focused. She silently cast a shadow spell to test the opponent. However, before her spell could fully take effect, her face changed color. Her silhouette flickered as she vanished from the spot.


    Almost at the very same instant, a strange creature several times her size appeared in the depths of the darkness. Several metal ws gleaming with a dark light shed past her original position. Even the dark shadows were sliced to several distinct pieces where the ws passed through. They did not meld together afterward. It wasn¡¯t until that extraordinary power had wholly disappeared that the shadows returned to normal.


    Karin emerged from another shadow, her heart beating wildly. She had managed to identify the opponent in that one terrifying and crucial moment.


    A Shadowsteel statue. Dammit! It¡¯s a Shadowsteel statue!


    These unusual lifeforms that were somewhere between a shadow creature and a construct were not unfamiliar to Karin. After all, these strange creatures existed in the small kingdom that the Dark Witches had built in the Shadow World.


    They possessed the powerful defensive capabilities of metal constructs and the agility of shadow assassins. In actualbat, a Shadowsteel statue could easily fight off two to three Dark Witches of the same grade.


    However, Shadowsteel statues cost way too many resources to create. The Dark Witches only used them to defend important treasures or entrances to mystic realms. They couldn¡¯t afford to use them as cannon fodder in battles.


    As an elite Third Grade witch, Karin had often fought against these shadow creatures to hone her skill. She was more than familiar with their techniques and could fight against them even with her eyes closed.


    Thus, when Karin sensed the shadows around her tremble again, she immediately leaped away without hesitation.


    It was different fromst time. Karin did not use Shadowstalk to leave the shadow she had been hiding in. Moreover, when she leaped away, she stepped lightly on the shadow and cast a spell.


    Shadow Demon was not affected at all by its failed ambushed. It quickly locked onto the direction the Third Grade witch had escaped in and lunged over immediately.


    Strangely enough, when it emerged from the shadow, the initially calm shadow suddenly became thick and viscous. Several unusual chains of shadow surged from all around it, binding Shadow Demon and restricting it to the spot.


    The Dark Witch appeared once more, choosing to retaliate this time.


    A series of shadow arrows crackled as they crashed into the Shadow Demon¡¯s skeleton-like frame. Meanwhile, two incredibly sharp and piercing waves of shadow aura were mixed within the barrage of arrows. They targeted Shadow Demon¡¯s right eye and its spine.


    If Shadow Demon were only Third Grade, it would have suffered tremendously at the vicious counterattack of the witch. However, it was a powerful machine that Greem had devoted an incredible amount of resources and effort into constructing. Naturally, it was not at the same level as an ordinary Shadowsteel statue.


    Shadow Demon struggled only slightly before every piece of the shackles around it shattered and broke into countless pieces.


    Obsidian light gleamed in its eye sockets as it turned into a shadow shockwave and sted against Karin¡¯s body. It opened its palms wide, and four sharp ws cut through the air, slicing towards the witch¡¯s slender figure.


    Dammit! This is a Fourth Grade Shadowsteel statue.


    Karin immediately determined the golem¡¯s grade based on its aura the moment her lightless de shed with its ws.


    Unfortunately, this revtion came toote!


    If she had identified the golem as a Fourth Grade Shadowsteel statue at the very first moment, she wouldn¡¯t have attempted a pointless counterattack. Instead, she would already be on the run.


    As Karin¡¯s de shed with Shadow Demon¡¯s w, the overwhelming force from the golem knocked her away, causing her to cough up blood in the process.


    The witch was blown out of the shadows and crashed into the hard stone floor.


    Before she could break free of her dazed state, another shockwave of shadow sted into her face.


    Karin felt her head turn heavy as her body copsed limply onto the ground.

 Chapter 1159 - Cruelty

    Chapter 1159 Cruelty


    When Karin finally woke up, she was in a strange sealed space.


    It wasn¡¯t a veryrge space. It was only about ten thousand square meters in size.


    However, she could see all sorts of terrain and unusual geography with a single nce.


    There was the rainforest in the southeast, the desert in the southwest, the t pains in the northeast, the hills in the northwest, and the one towering mountain in the center.


    It was a smallnd, but it had all sorts of terrain and geography.


    Judging by the arrangement, this ce was a small arena.


    At this moment, she was lying on top of a small tform on the mountain. A young, handsome, and tall adept hovered silently in the air before here.


    The muscr body, the long hair tied up with a gold band, those ck eyes, that gentle yet wicked smile, and that strikingly red adept¡¯s robe.


    There was no need for an introduction. Karin immediately knew who this was.


    The man standing in front of her was none other than her target for this mission, the terrifying legendary fire adept, Greem!


    An unusual metal golem floated silently behind him.


    The golem had a metal body that resembled a skeleton, with slender limbs and scary metal des attached to the ends of each arm. Its entire body was shrouded in ck mist, obscuring its true form beneath.


    The metal golem seemed to be able to absorb light, as the ce it was hovering in appeared much dimmer than its surroundings. Moreover, whenever Karin¡¯s gazended on the golem, it would somehow be blurry and unclear, making it even more difficult to see its real appearance.


    A Fourth Grade fire adept, and a Fourth Grade Shadowsteel magical machine.


    Karin had initially held out hope of escaping when she saw that she had not been killed immediately.


    However, upon seeing thisbination of powerhouses, all her will to battle was extinguished in an instant. She could no longer muster any thought of resistance or escape!


    ¡°You are a Dark Witch?¡± The young fire adept stood in the air and spoke. His voice was not loud, but strangely enough, it shook the air itself.


    It rumbled across the skies, almost as if it was a st of thunder!


    It was more than enough to demonstrate the young fire adept¡¯s horrifying control over this space.


    Karin had already wiped away all signs of her being a Dark Witch from herself and her equipment. No one could prove that she was a Dark Witch from her appearance. The only circumstantial evidence was the trademark shadow energy within her.


    Oh? He didn¡¯t restrict her magic powers? Was it because he was inexperienced, or was it because he couldn¡¯t be bothered?


    Karin raised her body and looked at the legendary fire adept above her. She shouted loudly, ¡°Just kill me if you want to. No need for the chatter! I won¡¯t answer any of your questions.¡±


    Greem chuckled coldly.


    His boomingughter rolled across thend like thunder again, causing the earth to tremble.


    ¡°Those crazy women from the north are truly so unreliable! You Dark Witches have just promised not to try any more schemes or plots, yet they immediately sent you over. What is it? Circe wanted to test my resolve? See if I dare to kill you? Or do they think a Third Grade witch is more than enough to travel in an out of my tower freely?¡±


    Karin¡¯s face was cold and expressionless, almost as if she had not heard Greem¡¯s questions at all.


    ¡°Your moves are not bad, however. It would be a waste to just kill you like that. How about this? If you y with my Shadow Demon for half a year, I will let you go. How about it?¡±


    Karin lifted her head when she heard Greem¡¯s words. Her eyesnded on the strange magical machine behind him as sheughed coldly, ¡°This is a Shadowsteel statue you just forged recently, isn¡¯t it? What about it? Does it also have some sort of strange learning ability? You want me to help you train its techniques? Hmph! Dream on.¡±


    ¡°Dream on? Well, let¡¯s see about that, shall we? Shadow Demon, kill her!¡±


    As Greem gave the order, ck mist erupted around Shadow Demon, and its massive metallic body vanished from the spot.


    The next second, it appeared in Karin¡¯s shadow like a phantom, its two pairs of metal ws silently stabbing towards four parts of her body.


    Having seen the Shadow Demon¡¯s overwhelming power, Karin knew that she couldn¡¯t defend against these attacks with force. She quickly turned around. Two lightless daggers appeared in her hands, slicing at the ws from the side. She then used the rebound force from the shing des to escape.


    Two figures of wildly differing size, power, and agility began to flicker between the shadows, leaping from one shadow to the next. The sound of shing metal never stopped, yet there was not a single spark from the des.


    Karin¡¯s strength was nothing against the Shadow Demon¡¯s berserk power, and her agility was clearly inferior as well. She could not retaliate at all during the fight. She could only rely on her superior movements and strange shadow magic to slow down Shadow Demon, dodge around it, or use the force from their exchanges to escape. She was only barely surviving.


    After seven minutes of fighting, Karin seemed to have understood something. She stopped abruptly, tossing away her daggers and closing her eyes. She did not avoid the metal ws of the Shadow Demon, as if wishing to die.


    ¡°Stop!¡±


    Greem shouted, and the Shadow Demon¡¯s ws came to a stop right before Karin¡¯s slender, pretty neck. However, the speed and force of the ws had whipped up a gale, and the violent winds cut a four-inch-long wound into Karin¡¯s smooth skin.


    Purple blood instantly soaked Karin¡¯s skin-tight leather armor.


    ¡°Kill me...you bastard, why don¡¯t you kill me, huh?¡± Even though her neck was injured, Karin continued to curse furiously as if she had not noticed at all.


    ¡°Hmph! You Dark Witches are all fearless fools!¡± Greem casually floated above Karin. ¡°That said, there¡¯s no room for your arrogance here. Why don¡¯t you lift your head and look around you!¡±


    Upon hearing Greem¡¯s words, Karin started to look around, and her face instantly turned dark.


    She didn¡¯t know when, but the sky of the world around her had turned pitch ck. A dark and lightless sun hung high in the air, spreading darkness everywhere.


    ¡°The Orb of Shadows,¡± Karin whispered this terrifying name under her breath.


    The reason the Dark Witches were so brave and courageous wasn¡¯t that they felt no fear of death. Rather, it was because of their reliance on their soul energy pools and their unusual shadow magic.


    When they died in battle, it would trigger the shadow magic cast on their souls, guiding them to the soul energy pool they had prepared ahead of time.


    The first condition of bing a Dark Witch was toplete the energy conversion of one¡¯s soul and body. In doing so, a dead Dark Witch would be able to reforge a body in the soul energy pools as long as their soul escaped.


    As the souls of the Dark Witches were filled with shadow energy, they could use the Shadow World as a jumping board to traverse through the nar worlds and return. Most spells could not capture their souls.


    However, the best counter to shadow energy was shadow energy itself!


    When Karin discovered that the entire world had been sealed by the power within the Orb of Shadows, she fell into despair.


    ¡°You...you wouldn¡¯t dare to kill me! I...am the squad leader of Shadow in Zhentarim. The n willunch a bloody war if you kill me!¡± Karin screamed with all she had.


    As she screamed in anger, Shadow Demon moved its ws and pierced her stomach like a balloon. Four sharp ws pierced through her body and appeared behind her waist.


    Karin¡¯s voice came to a stop.


    She lowered her head and looked at the ws with horrified disbelief.


    If she was killed in this ce, her soul would have immense trouble breaking through the barrier ced by the Orb of Shadows to return to her soul energy pool. Could he have expended so many resources just to kill her utterly?


    A wet and muffled sound rang out as the Shadow Demon pulled its ws out of her body.


    Blood spouted out of the fourrge gashes, causing Karin to crumple to the ground. Her small hands clearly couldn¡¯t stop her wounds from bleeding out. Blood was still seeping out from between her fingers, where she was clutching her stomach, slowly gathering into a pool beneath her.


    A cold aura surged through Karin¡¯s body. She could feel death approaching.


    However, right before she died, a ck beam of light shot down from the skies onto her body. Her severely wounded body started to heal beneath this light rapidly.


    Shadow energy gathered around Karin¡¯s injuries, causing them to heal quickly.


    Even more shadow energy surged into Karin¡¯s body, turning into blood in an energy form. This unusual energy blood started to flow through her body. Karin¡¯s lifeforce began to increase at a visible rate.


    In just three minutes, the heavily wounded Third Grade Dark Witch was fully recovered and revitalized.


    ¡°This is my home. You have no say on what is to happen!¡± Greem remained in the air, an expression of apathy on his face. ¡°If you are still feeling disobedient......¡±


    Greem snapped his fingers, and Shadow Demon¡¯s ws pierced through Karin¡¯s body again, this time twisting around and ravaging the organs thoroughly.


    The injury this time was far more severe.


    Karin howled in agony. Bits of her intestines and stomach spewed forth from the cavity in her body along with her blood, causing a terrifying crimson fountain to appear.


    Greem smiled coldly as he sensed Karin¡¯s quickly fading lifeforce.


    When she was on the verge of death, he waved his hand again, and a beam of light shone down from the ck sun onto Karin¡¯s broken body.


    The overwhelming shadow energy surged, and Karin once again climbed up from the ground after a brief moment.


    Her tan skin beneath her torn armor was smooth and wless, with no scars and no signs of an injury.

 Chapter 1160 - Adepts Are Not Humans

    Chapter 1160 Adepts Are Not Humans


    ¡°Bastard, you¡¯re going down!¡±


    Karin suddenly struck out after recovering this time.


    Her lithe and agile figure flickered and appeared behind Greem. Two lightless daggers had appeared in her hands, which she thrust furiously at Greem¡¯s spine.


    Unfortunately, the des had barely reached within three meters of Greem when they crashed into ayer of invisible mes. Her defensive forcefield was nothing before these mes and was burned to nothing in the blink of an eye.


    Wen the mes spread to Karin¡¯s body, she lifted her head and let out a cry of agony.


    It hurt...it hurt so much...so incredibly painful.


    It was almost as if all her magic resistance had vanished without a trace. In that instant, the golden fires burned her soul itself, even as they ravaged her body. The intense pain that shot from the depths of her soul was what thoroughly crushed Karin¡¯s spirit!


    She kneeled before Green in agony, her entire body engulfed by the strange golden fires. The mes crackled as they burned and tortured her.


    Greem finally lifted his hand, and a beam of shadow from above finally extinguished the golden fires. Shadow energy surged into Karin¡¯s body once again.


    After recovering once more, Karin escaped from Greem¡¯s side without any hesitation.


    The golden fires crackling around Greem disappeared from sight when Karin left, bing hidden once again.


    A Fourth Grade fire adept. It was the true might of a Fourth Grade fire adept!


    It was only now that Karin had fully experienced the power of this legendary Fourth Grade fire adept.


    Even if he was badly injured, even if he didn¡¯t lift a single finger, all he needed was his translucent forcefield of mes to defeat her. Her! A powerful Third Grade Dark Witch! The gulf in power between Third and Fourth Grade was so vast that Karin couldn¡¯t help but feel dejected at the very thought of it!


    ¡°That¡¯s your enemy,¡± Greem turned around and smiled coldly, ¡°Don¡¯t get the wrong target again! It¡¯s okay if you don¡¯t want to fight Shadow Demon. You will just have to endure half a year of torture from it instead!


    ¡°Dark Witches don¡¯t fear death? Hmph! Then I will let you experience it as many times as you want.¡±


    Having said that, fire shed around Greem as he disappeared from the space.


    The cold and heartless Shadow Demon lifted its head. Its gazended frostily on Karin.


    The next second, the sharp sound of metal slicing across air could be heard once again.


    ............


    When he emerged from the small interdimensional space, Greem ran into Alice, who had been waiting outside.


    ¡°Aren¡¯t you mean? To think you would be so cruel to such a prettydy. Aren¡¯t you afraid you will make her go insane after six months?¡± Alice looked at the two figures chasing each other in the arena through the dark screen. She couldn¡¯t help but shake her head and sigh.


    ¡°She¡¯s a witch, not ady!¡± Greem corrected Alice. ¡°In all seriousness, adepts beyond Second Grade can no longer be called human.¡±


    ¡°But we can¡¯t forget our origins!¡±


    ¡°I have never forgotten our origins. In fact, I care more about my human origins than most other adepts. However, I can¡¯t keep lying to myself,¡± Greem stared into Alice¡¯s pretty blue eyes and said in a dejected tone, ¡°Adepts are not humans!¡±


    The Non-Human Theory was the theory that Greem had brought up. It was a mainstream belief that had always been active amongst adepts.


    With the increasing growth of the adepts, many high-grade adepts started to reflect on the adept cultivation system¡¯s insufficiencies.


    What were the most decisive factors in the strength of a tribe and species?


    Bloodline, talent, intelligence, ingenuity.


    In truth, all these factors were necessary, and each was just as important as the next one!


    However, the humans that the adepts originated from were hardly excellent in these regards. In fact, they were on the verge of being wholly ssified as an unqualified species.


    Bloodline. The human bloodline. How was it best to put it? If one were being kind, having a human bloodline was akin to having no bloodline at all!


    They didn¡¯t have the strong Physique of the orcs, the Agility of the elves, and certainly not the inborn Strength of the giants. Of all the mostmon species found in the multiverse, it seemed like the humans were one of the few species with no manifested bloodline powers.


    Of course, this didn¡¯te with no perks at all!


    The humans had the most bnced, adaptable bloodline, capable of tolerating the introduction of most other foreign bloodlines.


    However, this was only how humans would describe themselves. The truth was that the human bloodline was far too weak. Any bloodline merging with another race would cause the human bloodline to be devoured and suppressed.


    Consequently, most mixed-race humans would show signs of regressed bloodline inter generations!


    The intelligent races of most higher nes had strictws in ce forbidding their species from procreating with lower creatures like the humans, simply to avoid regressing their bloodline powers.


    Talent. Just as was with their bloodline, the humans had very ordinary talents.


    Even the foolish goblins that were often hunted down by other civilizations were skilled at mechanical engineering. Yet, the humans had nothing at all.


    Of course, if you counted obedience, subservience, and ease of breeding as good points, then humans did indeed have many good points!


    However, there was only one talent that allowed humans across all the nar worlds to rise to power¨C their ability to study!


    Humans did not have sharp ws like wild beasts or wings for flight, as birds did. Humans became used to studying, always learning from species and creatures stronger than themselves.


    The birth of the adepts could be traced to the ancient humans¡¯ relentless studying and examination of the magical patterns found on powerful magical creatures!


    When they carved simr patterns onto their bodies and the ground, they found that these patterns contained power, weak as it was. From then on, their progress could not be stopped, and the Adepts were born!


    It was the problem of the adept¡¯s origin that caused many powerful individuals among the adepts to start considering the matter of bloodline and talents.


    From their perspective, abandoning the wed human species and using the bloodline assimtion techniques researched by the adepts to create a more powerful species that best suited the path of adepts was probably an easier way of pushing the adepts forward and allowing for their continuous prosperity!


    Moreover, this was no longer just a thought or an idea.


    ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, the various adept organizations had already started simr experiments in the lesser nes they ruled.


    There were so many adepts in space. Could they all havee from the World of Adepts?


    Disregarding everything else, even the Third Grade adepts that had gone to Henvic ne to hunt Greem were utterly unknown to him. Greem had not heard of their names in the World of Adepts at all.


    de Princess Katherine, Psionic Benija, Poison Adept Guinevere, and the serpentine adept, Naguta. If these powerful adepts hade from the World of Adepts, Greem should not have failed to find any information on them at all, especially considering his identity and status.


    After a long period of investigation, Greem finally realized the truth.


    It wasn¡¯t that he couldn¡¯t find any information about them in the World of Adepts; it was that they had never been from the World of Adepts!


    If those that walked out of the World of Adepts were pureblood adepts, then these adepts trained with the same cultivation system from the lesser nes would be inferior rag tags.


    The World of Adepts was still the homeworld of the adepts, after all. The major adept organizations still held back with certain experiments and respected certain taboos. However, they became reckless and fearless when performing the same operations in their lesser nes.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the personalities of the adepts cultivated in such extreme environments!


    If the high-grade adepts of the World of Adepts were all perverted and twisted in their own way, that was only rtive to an ordinary human. Meanwhile, these ragtag adepts were not just twisted, but monsters in their own right.


    Before reaching Fourth Grade and venturing to space, Greem had thought like most adepts in the World of Adepts. He had thought of himself as a genius amongst adepts, a protagonist of his own story, a man fated to be a great and powerful adept.


    However, upon stepping out of the World of Adepts, he was shocked to find that the World of Adepts was not the only world of adepts!


    There were hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of lesser nes throughout the gxy continually pumping the adepts with fresh, new blood. Of these people who could step out of their nar worlds and assemble under the g of the Great Adepts, who was not a genius in their own right in their own world?


    Of course, if there was something that distinguished the World of Adepts from these lesser nes, it would be that since the birth of the world, there had been as many as three Ninth Grade Great Adepts that had emerged from the World of Adepts.


    The World of Adepts itself was also a higher ne withplete narws and rich resources.


    It was perhaps the only reason that the World of Adepts stood out amongst the countless nar worlds out there!


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but open her eyes wide in shock when she heard Greem im that adepts were not humans! She anxiously spoke up, ¡°Greem, do you also think that humans are suited as the origin for adepts?¡±


    Greem smiled. He picked up Alice¡¯s slender hand and rubbed it against his own face.


    ¡°Quite the contrary, Alice. I believe the opposite of what the others do. I am confident that humans should be the origin for all adepts! The adepts have already procured more than enough power. There needs to be a harness over this immense force to stop it from going out of control anding to bite back on the adepts.¡±


    ¡°Why would you think so? Are there adepts that would regret the fact that they had too much power? Are the adepts not supposed to pursue power as their only goal?¡± Alice couldn¡¯t help but be confused.


    ¡°Someone faraway contacted me today. They want to make a deal with me. Can you guess who it is?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but rub his nose and smile bitterly.


    Alice knew nothing about this before Greem spoke.


    However, the moment Greem mentioned the issue, the vague information guided Alice, allowing shards of information to surge into her soul by her Fate powers. The iplete image of an unusual creature slowly appeared in her mind.


    ¡°A lich...Lich Kanganas contacted you!¡± Alice couldn¡¯t help but open her mouth wide in shock.

 Chapter 1161 - Clan Framework

    Chapter 1161 n Framework


    The lich had invited Greem to an exploration.


    ording to him, the world he had invited Greem to was a world of ice and frost. There appeared to be an unusually rare frost dragon in there.


    However, Lich Kanganas¡¯ target wasn¡¯t the frost dragon, but the frost artifact that the dragon had hidden deep in its den¨C the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter.


    It was said that the ancient frost giants forged this reliquary. It contained the terrible frost and chill of the Kingdom of Death and could bestow its owner with thews of ice and portions of thews of death.


    Solely judging by its attributes, it was extremelypatible with Kanganas¡¯ origin attributes.


    That was why it was no wonder that Kanganas was recruiting allies everywhere in an attempt to break into this world to obtain the reliquary. The reason he chose Greem was obviously to borrow his iparably powerful mes to neutralize the frost dragon¡¯s home field advantage.


    However, upon knowing that Greem was injured and required time for rest, Kanganas indicated that he wasn¡¯t in a hurry. He still had to invite other party members for the venture. Thus, they agreed to set out in eighty years.


    The injury to Greem¡¯s soul should have been healed by then.


    One had to admit that liches had apletely different perception of timepared to most nar creatures. Eighty years, which was precious in the eyes of others, was no more than an afternoon tea for a lich.


    ¡°A lich¡¯s invitation can make you have such strong thoughts on the nature of humans?¡± Alice seemed to be in a state of slight disbelief. ¡°I have also heard of the name Kanganas. He seems like a fairly terrifying individual. However, as long as you can defend against their death magic, liches aren¡¯t exactly the most difficult opponents to deal with!¡±


    ¡°You might not know this, but creatures like liches, evil gods, and demons used to be the representation of extreme power in my mind. I could only look up in awe and terror at these creatures before I advanced to be an adept. Yet, now...I am fighting by their sides as equals or shing with our wits. I can¡¯t help but feel like all this is a ridiculous dream!¡± Greem sighed andmented.


    Alice¡¯s long, silk-like hair scattered behind her back. Sympathy and understanding appeared on her gentle face as she slowly walked in front of Greem and wrapped her arms around him.


    ¡°It¡¯s not a surprise you would think and feel like that. The speed of your advancement is simply too fast. So fast that even you can¡¯t get used to it! Which of those Fourth Grade adepts out there didn¡¯t manage to obtain their current status and position after three to four hundred years of toiling away? Yet, you have always been fighting, struggling with barely a chance to take a breath.


    ¡°The Crimson n is just like you. It is too youngpared to all other Fourth Grades. So young that it iscking in so many aspects, so young that it cannot match the status and position that it currently holds! Did you know? Ever since the Crimson n became a Fourth Grade organization, how many adepts have stood outside the doors hoping for an audience, how many ns and organizations have wished to join under our g, and how many major forces have tried to form an alliance?¡±


    Greem shook his head at Alice¡¯s question.


    He had been hiding in Fire Throne to heal his wounds all this time while also dealing with the treasures and resources he brought back from the other world. He honestly had not asked a single question about the specifics of the n¡¯s management and had no idea how its development had been proceeding.


    In his mind, the Crimson n would only continue to grow and prosper as long as he, the Fourth Grade adept of the n, sat behind it. No one would dare to start any trouble against them!


    Alice lifted her head and saw Greem¡¯s lost expression. She couldn¡¯t help but start chuckling.


    ¡°Out of fear of your power and position, even your disciples and direct subordinates don¡¯t dare to bother you with such annoying and trivial matters. However, have you ever thought about the Crimson n in its current situation? Its foundation is still far too frail! For instance, all those adepts thate to our n to discuss cooperation and agreements are easily powerful adepts of Second and Third Grade. Meanwhile, your disciple and trusted subordinate are only beginner or intermediate Second Grade. Can you imagine the tremendous amount of mental pressure they have to endure while negotiating with these people, with their inferior power?¡±


    Greem listened closely and started to think in silence.


    Much like Greem, the Crimson n was somewhat bloated now.


    Not in terms of their attitude, but in terms of their power.


    The Crimson n might have Greem, but the Third Grade members that would serve as the backbone of the n had yet to be cultivated despite all this time. At the moment, the only Third Grades of the Crimson n were Alice, Mary, Soros, Oliven, and Brain Monster Gazlowe.


    As the Fate Witches¡¯ leader, Alice naturally couldn¡¯t remain in the Crimson n to manage their affairs. Meanwhile, Mary and Soros were vampires and were busy dealing with Seawoods ne and expanding the Crimson n¡¯s territory.


    Oliven was a dragon devourer and was, at best, a Third Grade houseguest of the n. She wasn¡¯t willing to participate too deeply in the n¡¯s internal affairs. Meanwhile, Brain Monster Gazlowe had been sent to Camp Exodar to establish a base in space.


    With all these assignments, there was not a single Third Grade left in the n that could serve as its spine.


    That also meant that despite being a newly advanced Fourth Grade major n, the Crimson n was being propped up entirely by Second Grade adepts. Though Greem didn¡¯t want to put down Meryl and Gargamel¡¯s effort and achievements, their grades certainly did not hold enough on certain asions.


    It would cause the Crimson n to lose out on many benefits during negotiations unknowingly.


    After all, the n leaders that came over for negotiations and discussions were mostly Third Grade adepts. To have them lower themselves to negotiate with a bunch of Second Grade adepts was demeaning, and they were naturally reluctant to do it. Given the number of resources being negotiated and the nature of their discussions, even a small difference in the benefits obtained would add up to a sizable amount.


    As such, increasing the n¡¯s overall power was a matter of utmost urgency!


    With her fire-dragon bloodline and her status as a disciple, Greem would likely be able to help Meryl advance to Third Grade if he yed favorites and tilted some resources in her favor. However, Third Grade was the limit of her potential. It would be incredibly difficult for her to advance even one grade further.


    Meanwhile, Gargamel¡¯s potential was even worse than Meryl¡¯s. Second Grade was already his limit.


    The more heartless ns wouldn¡¯t even waste any effort on a ¡®hopeless¡¯ adept like Gargamel. For the Fourth Grade organizations, adepts that did not have the potential to reach Third Grade were not even worth cultivating. Moreover, anyone that wanted to be a core adept of Fourth Grade organizations would at least need to have the potential to reach Fourth Grade.


    Of course, having the potential to reach Fourth Grade didn¡¯t mean that they were guaranteed to seed.


    But if they had no potential, then they didn¡¯t even have a chance to seed!


    At this point, as the leader of the Crimson n, Greem had no choice but to start considering the recement candidates for Gargamel. It wasn¡¯t cruelty, nor repaying service with disloyalty, but...practicality.


    Of course, out of his personal feelings, Greem could still find some way to further improve Gargamel¡¯s talents. However, the resources and effort he would invest into Gargamel would be enough for the Crimson n to cultivate two to three adepts of the same level!


    Which choice to take was something that Greem had to mull over and properly consider.


    ¡°Do you think there is still value in cultivating Gargamel?¡± As Greem was seriously considering the question, he couldn¡¯t help but blurt it out loud.


    Alice closed her eyes and thought. She then opened her eyes and stared into Greem¡¯s own ck eyes as she smiled and said, ¡°He¡¯s reached the limit of his potential. He might be loyal and willing to work himself to the bone, but his power is a huge limiting factor! Given his age, he would be an appropriate manager of the n for another two to three hundred years if the Crimson n was still the Third Grade organization it used to be.


    ¡°However, he¡¯s not suited to be the core adept of a Fourth Grade organization.¡±


    ¡°You mean we should rece him?¡± Greem¡¯s eyebrows unknowingly knitted into a frown.


    Alice extended her hands and rubbed Greem¡¯s frowning forehead. She smiled. ¡°Gargamel¡¯s been serving you loyally for over a hundred years. Would you actually be okay with recing him at the drop of a word like that? Moreover, the current situation of the n was forged with Gargamel¡¯s blood and sweat. If you rece him freely with an outsider, there would most certainly be turmoil within the n!¡±


    ¡°Then, you mean...?¡± Greem was a little confused now.


    ¡°There¡¯s definitely a need to rece him! However, our choice of recement has to consider Gargamel¡¯s feelings, as well as the opinions of his subordinates. It has to assuage them and not cause any instability. You understand who I¡¯m talking about now, don¡¯t you?¡±


    ¡°You mean her? She¡¯s just a little brat still, isn¡¯t she? Would she be able to prop up the n¡¯s affairs?¡± Greem instantly understood Alice¡¯s meaning, but he was still hesitating.


    ¡°You...always running about outside and never caring about the n¡¯s internal affairs. It¡¯s no surprise you have no idea how much that kid has improved!¡± Alice pursed her lips and smiled. ¡°You probably still don¡¯t know, do you? That kid is already advanced Second Grade. Also, she¡¯s already a hundred and forty-three years old. She¡¯s not that kid in your mind anymore!¡±


    ¡°Advanced Second Grade. Doesn¡¯t that make her more powerful than Meryl?¡± Greem was shocked.


    ¡°Yeah, the kid¡¯s speed of advancement is no less than yours. Who would¡¯ve thought that a wandering adept like Gargamel could have given birth to such a talented daughter. If you promote Emelia, Gargamel will not only not hate you, but he would be more grateful than ever before.¡±


    ¡°Gargamel and Eva have practically invested all of their efforts and hopes into Emelia. Emelia¡¯s lived up to their expectations as well. Much of the foundation that Gargamel has established in Ailovis over the past years can be attributed to Emelia¡¯s contributions. Even Gargamel¡¯s subordinates trust and believe in her!¡±


    ¡°Emelia¡¯s background is a little strange.¡± Greem still had not made up his mind.


    ¡°What difference does this make? Isn¡¯t it just the assimtion of the soul of a spore princess? Are you actually afraid that the spore people woulde looking for trouble when you are a Fourth Grade adept?¡±


    Greem startedughing at ease when he heard Alice teasing him.


    ¡°Then find a time and call Emelia over. I will bestow her a treasure and confirm her position!¡±


    Alice immediately startedughing.


    ¡°I am real close with the kid! I will go and inform her right now.¡±

 Chapter 1162 - Troll Camp

    Chapter 1162 Troll Camp


    Seawoods ne.


    There was a troll tribe deep in the vast stretches of forest in the mountains.


    The fires of war had just been quenched, and the vampires were hastily clearing up the battlefield.


    Mary beat her wings, hovering in midair and watching the piles of troll corpses gathered on the stone za.


    These trolls were all three meters tall. They had violet skin, thick hair, two fierce tusks, and long, red hair flowing down from their heads. They were all exceedingly strong and muscr. Their hands and feet were long and slender, while the weapons they used were wooden spears and javelins made out of sticks.


    Of course, all of these weapons were tipped with poison!


    It was a sort of paralytic poison extracted from nts. Even a teaspoon of this poison was enough to put down an adolescent Berserk Elephant.


    Unfortunately, poisoned weapons like this were practically harmless to vampires!


    Mary casually threw aside a withered troll corpse and wiped the traces of green blood on her mouth. She then slowly examined this lifeless camp.


    The gashing wounds on her body slowly healed and mended together under the effects of her blood energy.


    For the sake of exterminating these trolls as quickly as possible, Mary and Soros had charged right into the troll camp. They had cut down the statue of the Feathered God in the za in a most humiliating fashion. In doing so, they infuriated the entirety of the tribe.


    All the trolls, be they troll warriors dedicated to battle or ordinary women and children, all emerged from their huts and houses as if they had gone mad. They rushed at the two vampires and attacked in a berserk manner.


    Meanwhile, Mary and Soros stood in the center of the za, enduring wave after wave of attacks from the trolls. Meanwhile, the other vampires had spread out, subtly and quickly killing the trolls that had gotten separated from the others.


    Ordinary vampires were still too frail, after all!


    Their weak bodies couldn¡¯t bear the weight of heavy metal armor. As such, most vampires wore light silk robes and clothes to avoid affecting their agility.


    Naturally, theck of armor meant they could not endure the powerful strikes and attacks from the trolls. To minimize the deaths of her subordinates, Mary had no choice but to take the lead, attracting all of the troll¡¯s attention towards herself and Soros.


    The two of them were Third Grade now. That gave them the unusual power-drain skill, allowing them to obtain part of the enemy¡¯s power and strength by absorbing their blood. It gave them the ability to fight endlessly.


    Even so, the sharp, heavy spears and metal javelins of the trolls still inflicted many injuries and wounds to their bodies that continued to umte.


    The trolls weren¡¯t a difficult opponent because of their strength, but because of their unbelievably resilient lifeforce.


    Even if they lost several limbs or had a hole opened in their stomach, they could continue to attack with all their savagery and vigor until their heads were lopped off.


    In general, adolescent trolls were all qualified warriors, male or female; their bodies had already reached the standard of First Grade creatures. In addition to their reckless fighting style and unbending will that drove them to fight until their deaths, they were no weaker than ordinary Second Grade creatures.


    Even the weaker elderly and children among the trolls had formidable will and skill inbat.


    If they scattered into the forest and waged a gueri war, the vampires would not be able to cleanly exterminate each and every one of them, even if they had ten times their current number. For the sake of dealing with this camp of three hundred trolls, Mary could only use herself as bait, firmly keeping the enemy within the center of the camp.


    The wounds on Mary¡¯s body were innumerable at this point.


    At a nce, terrifying gashes the length of a finger could be seen everywhere on her body. Her skin had also turned purple and green, a sign of the excessive umtion of poison.


    Even so, Mary still used the dagger in her hand to execute the trolls that charged at her.


    Wound for wound, blood for blood!


    Mary¡¯s attacks were always direct and straightforward, but shockingly effective as well.


    Of the 183 adolescent troll warriors and the 133 ordinary trolls, 207 of them had died at the hands of Mary and Soros.


    During this process, the intermediate Second Grade chieftain had managed to pierce Mary through the heart with a spear. However, his attack utterly infuriated the Bloody Queen Mary.


    Mary did not cut off his head nor crush his heart. Instead, she slowly let him bleed out by slicing him with a flurry of attacks, all while moving around with her incredible speed.


    The once-proud troll chieftain had died of pure blood loss!


    Of course, his blood had not gone to waste. Mary had absorbed all of it using her crimson halo before converting it into horrifying blood magic and turning the spells onto the troll warriors.


    Draw Blood, Blood Frenzy, Blood Spear, Boiling Blood, Reverse Bloodflow.


    As a peak Third Grade vampire adept, Mary had already established a series of blood magic thatbined the powers of her blood abilities and the spells of adepts. Each of these spells had terrifying power inbat. Meanwhile, as the blood master of the blood knights and blood elves, Mary could bestow upon her subordinates some of these spells.


    It indirectly enhanced the powers of the vampire adepts!


    If they only fought with a vampire¡¯s instincts, they would always remain vampires despised by the collective group of adepts. However, through their mastery of blood magic, they could proudly proim themselves as blood adepts instead.


    The pursuit was ongoing in the distant forest.


    When the number of trolls in the camp fell below fifty, the survivors finally became scared. They fled towards the forest with all their strength.


    Mary did not participate in the ensuing chase. Instead, she pped her battered wings, hovering above the pile of corpses and absorbing the dense mist of blood that now hung in the air, trying her best to heal her wounds.


    A short momentter, Soros walked over, d in his heavy armor. He kneeled and ced a wicked and terrifying troll head in front of Mary¡¯s eyes.


    It was the head of an old troll!


    His skin had already turned loose and wrinkled from age. The hair had fallen off his head. There was a white animal tusk that pierced his nose, while two gleaming earrings hung on hisrge earlobes.


    The old troll¡¯s eyes were still opened wide, fangs bared in a savage and vicious expression.


    However, the most interesting thing about the troll was theyer of magical light that shrouded its head.


    A troll voodoo doctor!


    The voodoo doctors of the trolls were spellcasters that had mastered some elementium powers.


    However, their mastery of elementium powers extended only to thebination of elementium with herbs and nts to create a unique method of poison brewing.


    The purple and green poison on Mary¡¯s body that had yet to fade was his work.


    After the troll chieftain had died, the sly and cunning voodoo doctor had immediately realized that the trolls would be massacred. He ordered his people to scatter and escape, while he disappeared among their ranks, hoping to escape the pursuit of these fearsome enemies.


    Unfortunately, he had no idea how to hide his elementium powers. Naturally, this meant that he could not evade the senses of the vampires.


    Mary remained here to recover while sending out Third Grade Blood Knight Soros to hunt down the voodoo doctor.


    As expected, Soros had returned with the head of the beginner Second Grade voodoo doctor just fifteen minutester.


    However, after this bloody battle, Soros¡¯ well-crafted armor was heavily dented. Many of the spikes on his armor had also snapped off. The pungent and sticky troll blood covered his entire body,yer afteryer. Even though he was only kneeling on the ground, a pool of blood had already gathered beneath him, pieces of flesh and unknown shards of organs floating on the liquid.


    ¡°Isa, he¡¯s yours! I need to know the location of the troll empire and the distribution of their tribes as soon as possible. Also, I want to know every single powerhouse that exists in their tribes,¡± Mary shouted loudly from midair.


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    A slender figure flew out of the forest and knelt down before Mary.


    Blood Elf Mage Isa stood up and grabbed the head of the voodoo doctor. She leaned forward and kissed the head on its vicious mouth, a trace of madness appearing on her pretty face.


    ¡°Come,e...your blood, your life, your soul...all of it belongs to me! Be one with me, and through this, you shall be reborn.¡±


    As Isa continued to mumble these chilling words, the already dead voodoo doctor suddenly started howling madly. Unconceble terror and fear appeared on its old and ugly face.


    Isa pursed her lips and sucked. Countless sickly green lights appeared from the voodoo doctor¡¯s head, quickly flying into her red lips like birds flying back to their nests.


    ¡°Evil adepts, you will suffer the heavenly punishment of the Feathered God! Even...if I die, I will curse you.¡±


    A strange soul appeared above the voodoo doctor, furiously cursing at the blood elf before him. Unfortunately, he had already lost his ability to protect his soul. He could only howl crazily while being devoured by the enemy.


    Blood Elf Mage Isa began trembling uncontrobly after devouring the beginner Second Grade voodoo doctor. She was only an intermediate Second Grade, after all. A strange poison erupted in her body, staining her white skin a shade of violet.


    However, a dead voodoo doctor didn¡¯t have much power. Isa managed to devour his soul after just six minutes, and with it came a wealth of disjointed memories.

 Chapter 1163 - The Feathered Serpent and the Heir of the Plane

    Chapter 1163 The Feathered Serpent and the Heir of the ne


    ¡°I found it.¡±


    Isa suddenly shouted in joy.


    However, before she could raise her hand and point in the direction of the troll empire, an incredibly thick st of lightning fell from the sky, crashing furiously towards her frail and slender body.


    ¡°Divine lightning!¡±


    Mary screamed and lifted one hand. Endless blood energy surged from her body, turning into a crimson barrier shielding Isa from above. The golden lightning shed with the ruby barrier, causing countless sparks of electricity to crackle outwards. Even space itself began to distort from the intense energy.


    ¡°Hurry up and dodge!¡± Mary kept up the shield with all she had and shouted at Isa.


    Isa finally came to her senses and backed away from the reach of the golden lightning with Soros.


    Mary dispelled the barrier, and the golden lightning instantly crashed onto the stone za.


    A loud, thunderous crack echoed throughout the forest.


    All the stone bs within ten meters of the impact turned into dust and fell downwards into the massive crater that had formed. Even the stones at the edge of the crater had been charred ck as the thick lightning chains spread across them. The air was filled with a strange smell; it was the smell of lightning currents of incredible voltage.


    Isa¡¯s face flushed white with fear as she saw the lightning¡¯s terrifying power. Even her body was trembling slightly.


    ¡°Master, this is...lightning of divine punishment?¡±


    Mary did not reply. Instead, she turned around and hovered in the air. Her gazended deep in the mountains.


    She could sense that this tremendous power of divine punishment hade from there.


    Mary finally spoke up after a slight pause.


    ¡°It seems like the Feathered God these trolls worship is somewhat capable. To think it has already mastered the power of divine punishment! That bastard Greem. There¡¯s been a great mistake in the information we¡¯ve been given. There¡¯s probably a powerful peak Fourth Grade lightning creature over there. If we run into its base with what few people we have, it would most certainly be a suicide mission!¡±


    Peak Fourth Grade.


    Isa and Soros looked at each other. They were shocked and terrified.


    It didn¡¯t matter whether Mary¡¯s guess was right or wrong. A creature of such power was way out of their league. If they were to run into an enemy like that, all the vampires apart from Mary would only have one choice¨C fighting to their deaths.


    The two of them couldn¡¯t help but be nervous!


    ¡°Where¡¯s the old fox? Call him over. Our n forward needs to be revised!¡±


    Upon hearing Mary¡¯s summons, Vanlier appeared from the ranks of vampires, still dressed like an elegant noble. He bowed respectfully before Mary.


    ¡°Old fox, what do you think about what just happened?¡± Mary slowlynded, her crimson-crystal high heels clicking against the stone ground.


    ¡°Master, perhaps the situation isn¡¯t as bad as we think?¡± Vanlier was still as cunning and sly as ever.


    ¡°Oh? What do you mean?¡±


    ¡°Given the habits and animistic faith of the trolls, the Feathered God that they worship is likely no more than a totem god! A totem god like this is a far cry from the faith gods of the World of Gods. They are also known as ¡®false gods.¡¯¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s the difference?¡± Mary frowned and asked.


    She might be a peak Third Grade vampire, but she excelled only at battle and ughter. She seldom took the effort to memorize and organize basic magical knowledge. That was why she often consulted Vanlier when it came to such technical problems. He was more of a vampire schr, after all.


    ¡°Master, totem gods and faith gods walk two entirely different paths. Totem gods more often appear amidst primal tribes and species. These barbaric beings will regrly actively worship powerful creatures to obtain more power for themselves. However, the target of their faith is either some sort of powerful magical creature in the wild, or a hero or king in their tribe.


    ¡°To pray for power, they will carve the target of their faith onto their gs, their totem poles, and other objects, worshipping these idols day and night. Every time theyplete a hunt or win a war, they will perform a ritual sacrifice.


    ¡°As time passes, their faith power will gather on these totem objects, forming what are known as totem gods.


    ¡°You mean, the Feathered God of these trolls does not actually exist? Is it only an amalgamation of their faith power?¡± Mary couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    ¡°Not necessarily!¡± Vanlier frowned and replied, ¡°There are many primal tribes that will worship actual magical creatures that exist in the wild and hail them as their gods. Totem gods like these often have material forms and are incredibly powerful as well!¡±


    ¡°What are the strengths and weaknesses of these totem gods?¡±


    ¡°When ites to strength, it would undoubtedly be the fact that they can physically descend to battle. They are often powerful magical creatures of the native continent, to begin with. With the faith power invested in them, they gain possession of certain fundamental skills unique to the gods. However, they are still very, very far away from being an actual god!¡±


    ¡°And their weaknesses?¡±


    ¡°Their weakness is that they cannot leave the area covered by their totem objects. Should they leave the area covered by the totem faith, they are no more than magical creatures, entirely and utterly iparable to Fifth Grade gods.¡±


    Mary nodded her head silently after hearing all this.


    If the god worshipped by the trolls was only a totem god, then this war could still be won!


    However, before they waged total war against the trolls, it would be best to figure out the target of their faith. If it were only a totem object, then they would face an immaterial spirit in the uing war. If it were an animistic faith, then they would have to fight against a powerful magical creature.


    A magical creature that also possessed certain divine powers!


    ¡°Isa, you¡¯ve absorbed the voodoo doctor¡¯s soul, what have you seen? What kind of creature is this totem god?¡± Mary asked impatiently.


    ¡°Master, it¡¯s a Feathered Serpent!¡± Blood Elf Isa replied with certainty. ¡°This voodoo doctor visited the troll empire once when he was thirteen. He personally witnessed the Feathered God descend during a major ritual sacrifice. ording to his memory, the trolls worship a giant Feathered Serpent.¡±


    ¡°A Feathered Serpent.¡± Mary couldn¡¯t help but brood in silence.


    The Feathered Serpent was not an unfamiliar name for the adepts.


    Feathered Serpents were a type of serpent that grew wings!


    They had the scales and body of a serpent, as well as the head and tail. However, they had a pair of feathered wings on their backs. These wings couldn¡¯t let them fly too high. They only allowed them to glide quickly at lower altitudes.


    Feathered Serpents were often mistaken as dragons in many nes, bing a source of fear for many lower creatures.


    Most Feathered Serpents possessed the lightning attribute, but some variants spat fire or ice.


    Given all the information provided, Mary deduced that the Feathered God worshipped by the troll kingdom was a peak Fourth Grade Lightning Feathered Serpent.


    Of course, this was a Feathered Serpent enhanced with the totemic faith of the trolls.


    If Mary and the vampires could cut off the effects of this faith, the Feathered Serpent would fall to its actual grade level. That said, no one knew what the serpent¡¯s exact grade was!


    After all, only the higher-ups of the troll empire knew the true form of the Feathered God. Voodoo doctors in border tribes like these were lucky to witness the Feathered God even once in their lives.


    The opponent was certainly powerful, but Mary and her vampires were not weak either.


    They were backed by the Crimson n, along with the adepts¡¯ deep and powerful magic system.


    If they were willing to think things through, they had plenty of methods to deal with the false god of a lesser ne¡¯s primal kingdom.


    However, it didn¡¯t matter what kind of faith the trolls held. Cutting down on the foundations of their faith was a necessity!


    Thus, Mary gave an order, and the vampires disappeared into the woods, hurrying towards the closest troll tribe.


    ..................


    World of Adepts, Northern Lands.


    The Tower of Fate.


    An exceptionally grand astrology ceremony had just concluded. The upper levels of the Tower of Fate glimmered with starlight, illuminating the deste wastes of Dragonblight.


    Many powerful magical creatures in Dragonblight were hiding and secretly absorbing the strange energy radiating from the Tower of Fate to further their mutations and evolutions.


    Arge group of astrology apprentices walked out of the hall in an orderly fashion under the lead of several Fate Witches.


    The hall slowly returned to silence.


    Alice stood in the center of the hall. She had her back against the entrance as her hands waved and guided the star power onto the astrology tform. The starlight slowly gathered and formed into a beautiful, naked woman.


    Once the woman¡¯s body had been created, Alice took out a soul-gathering crystal and blew on it. The faint figure of a human girl flew out from the crystal, quickly entering the beautiful body formed out of starlight.


    Once ¡®her¡¯ soul and body merged, an iparably bright pir of light shone from her body,pletely lighting up the hall and even Dragonblight itself.


    An overwhelming surge of Fate power cut across space and entered the body of the girl.


    The next moment, her pretty eyshes moved as she slowly opened her eyes.


    The moment the girl opened her eyes, the entire World of Adepts could feel an overwhelming pulse of Fate power and the instinctual joy that emanated from the very core of the nar consciousness.


    The world trembled as several unusualw ripples spread across space.


    Powerful adepts that had mastered differentws couldn¡¯t help but push open their windows and their doors. They silently observed and sensed this unusual energy aura.


    The Heir of a ne...what was this? Since when did an heir appear in the World of Adepts?


    Was a revolution about toe?


    For a moment, the adepts couldn¡¯t help but murmur and talk amongst themselves. No one was sure of what had happened!

 Chapter 1164 - Fate Coalescence

    <h4>Chapter 1164 Fate Coalescence</h4>


    Lucia woke up dazed and confused.


    The first thing she saw when she opened her eyes was a world full of pretty, floating light ribbons.


    These ribbons of lights danced beneath the dark ceiling, flowing freely in the air like dreams and poetry. Lucia almost thought she was in an entirely illusory world.


    Lucia¡¯s consciousness refused to awaken for a while. She only stared mindlessly at these ribbons with their shifting colors and shapes. A teardrop unknowingly rolled down her cheek.


    That was because she sensed a trace of familiarity in the ribbons of light¨C the feeling of a mother.


    Moreover, as her consciousness slowly surfaced in her mind, that familiar aura slowly faded away like a kind and gentle mother saying goodbye to her child.


    That warmth, that aura, and that feeling lingered around Lucia¡¯s heart. It was unforgettable!


    Morrian ne had been destroyed.


    After a long time, Lucia finally got up from the stone tform. Her gazended on a pretty woman in a purple starry robe.


    She was an incredibly beautifuldy, one whose appearance you would not forget once youid eyes on her!


    She had soft, silk-like silver hair and a gentle, quiet face. However, her bright blue eyes that turned upwards at the corners gave her an unusually mysterious and seductive charm.


    Meanwhile, a tiny and pretty humanoid fairy with a pair of thin, glowing wings sat on her shoulder.


    When Lucia¡¯s eyesnded on it, the fairy tilted her head, put her finger in her mouth, and looked at her with an equal amount of curiosity.


    ¡°Who are you people? Where is this? I...how did Ie back to life?¡± Lucia spoke fluent Morrian when she opened her mouth. Obviously, Alice and Helen couldn¡¯t understand her.


    Alice smiled slightly and lifted one hand. A small star flew out of the ribbons of lights around them and entered Lucia¡¯s body. Some mysterious and unfamiliar knowledge immediately surged into Lucia¡¯s mind.


    ¡°What did you do to me?¡±


    Lucia was also surprised to be hit in the head by a tiny star. She took a few steps back and looked at the woman warily. However, Lucia was shocked the moment she spoke. She realized that what she said wasn¡¯t thenguage she had always spoken, but an entirely newnguage.


    An answer naturally appeared in her heart.


    Thenguage of the Adepts.


    She was speaking thenguage of the adepts! If that was the case, then this ce was the World of Adepts!


    Just as Lucia realized this, an endless river of knowledge fragments suddenly burst forth from the depths of her mind, instantly drowning her weak and frail soul.


    Lucia sped her ears, hugged her head, and squatted down. She lifted her head and let out a howl of agony.


    For an instant, countless figures flickered before her eyes, myriad voices red by her ears, and countless emotions rushed through her heart. Lucia felt like she was going to explode from all the things that were being crammed into her mind. She screamed in pain and despair.


    In her moment of absolute despair and terror, a small and cool hand touched her forehead, instantly dispelling all those weird sensations.


    Lucia regained her peace. She kneeled on the cool stone floor, unfazed by her naked and exposed body. She stared at Alice.


    ¡°Are you willing to be my disciple¡ª¡± Alice gently said.


    Unfortunately, Lucia interrupted her before she could finish speaking.


    ¡°I don¡¯t!¡±


    ¡°¡ªand inherit my...¡± Alice stopped speaking.


    It was her turn to stare at this weak and frail girl.


    ¡°Why?¡±


    ¡°Because I have already sworn that my life will belong only to the arcane! Only the arcane arts are worth my eternal pursuit!¡±


    ¡°But...but I¡¯m the one who saved you!¡±


    ¡°You are free to take my life back if you want to!¡±


    ¡°I saved you! Do...do you not intend to repay me?¡±


    ¡°I can repay you in my own way.¡±


    ¡°What is that?¡±


    ¡°When I avenge the Arcane Empire in the future, you will not be one of my targets of vengeance!¡±


    Alice was utterly speechless.


    She stared straight into Lucia¡¯s firm and determined eyes. She could sense that every word the girl said was genuine, with no lies or hesitation.


    However, these words of truth were a little too crass and direct, weren¡¯t they?


    As expected of the purest soul of a ne. Their unique quirks were so hard for an ordinary person to understand and ept.


    Alice cast away all thoughts of ¡®convincing¡¯ the girl to her side. Instead, she began to negotiate with a different method.


    ¡°I am Alice, leader of the Fate Witches, a branch of the Northern Witches in the World of Adepts. Weren¡¯t you curious why I brought you back to life just now?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s for the Fate power of Morrian ne, isn¡¯t it!¡± Lucia lifted her head and stared at the dancing ribbons with eyes filled with sentiment. ¡°You used my identity to abduct such tremendous Fate power from the Morrian ne. Isn¡¯t it for the nar feedback that the World of Adepts will give you?¡±


    Alice was surprised again.


    Lucia was no more than an arcane apprentice, with the power and talent of an apprentice. She should not have ess to such deep and profound knowledge of the nes. The only exnation for this was that the dying Morrian ne had projected not only its Fate power during the astrology ceremony, but also fragments of knowledge.


    When the dying nar consciousness realized that the cmity was unavoidable, it had generously given away all it owned to the fleeing natives of its world. In this process, there was no doubt that Lucia obtained more than any other person due to her identity as the heir of the ne.


    As such, at this moment, there was no doubt that Lucia¡¯s potential and talent was superior to that of any genius currently in the World of Adepts. The consciousness of the World of Adepts had created such a ¡®monster¡¯ by Alice¡¯s hands. But what for?


    At this moment, it wasn¡¯t just Lucia. Even Alice was confused!


    ¡°As long as you understand!¡± Alice continued to speak calmly, ¡°I brought you back to life to use your identity to ¡®abduct¡¯ a portion of the Morrian ne¡¯s Fate before it is destroyed. Now, I have the Fate power I wanted. As such, you do not need to thank me nor feel like you owe me anything. There are no debts between us!¡±


    She didn¡¯t expect Alice to be so honest in acknowledging her motives, and Lucia was stunned for a moment. Finally, she looked straight at Alice and said, ¡°Thank you!¡±


    ¡°Since you¡¯ve brought me such tremendous benefits, I will naturally not neglect to take care of you. How about this; you can be my disciple in name only, and I will not interfere with whatever you want to do next. You are free to browse the books in my tower and use the resources here. Everything I have here is open to you!¡±


    Now that Alice had already promised her such generous benefits, Lucia thought for a moment and nodded her head in agreement. She wasn¡¯t foolishly stubborn.


    After reaching an agreement, Alice waved her hand once again. A sea of magic energy gathered around Lucia¡¯s body, forming into a pretty purple robe that covered her beautiful figure.


    ¡°Elementium energy materialization.¡± Lucia bit her lips lightly in envy.


    A great deal of mysterious, ancient knowledge and experience had suddenly appeared in her mind, giving her some understanding of the workings of this world. However, due to her bodily limitations, most of this information was too advanced for her. They were not things that she, with her body, could bear with her current grade.


    Thus, having shelter¡ªa ce where she could quietly grow to assume power¡ªwas invaluable to her!


    After all, Alice has already been very clear. Now that Alice had obtained the Fate power she had sought, Lucia had next to no value. At this moment, a mere arcane apprentice like herself had to make ends meet to survive in this other world.


    Alice watched as Helen led the beautiful girl out of the hall before finally turning around to deal with the Fate power that had gathered in the Tower of Fate.


    She could sense that the nar consciousness of the World of Adepts was favoring her and clearly expressing its boundless joy at this new pool of Fate power. Moreover, the nar consciousness also seemed to be paying attention to the girl known as Lucia. It expressed intentions of assimting the girl into the world.


    It was precisely due to these changes in the nar consciousness¡¯ movements that Alice tried her best to keep Lucia at her side. Keeping Lucia with her was equivalent to keeping the nar consciousness¡¯s blessing with her. It was incredibly beneficial for a Fate Witch in many, many aspects.


    However, Alice required more observations and meditations to figure out the true intentions of the nar consciousness. Alice¡¯s main focus for the moment was to deal with the Fate power here first.


    Alice released the limitations on the Tower of Fate, allowing the ribbons of light in the hall to spread out, silently dispersing into the skies of Dragonblight.


    It was almost as if a hole had been poked in the sky. A trace of warm sunlight pierced the constant clouds above Dragonblight. It introduced endless warmth, light, and positivity to the Tower of Fate.


    The entire tower trembled as it basked in the sunlight and reflected its brilliant radiance!


    Along with the light came warmth and an indescribable feeling of enlightenment. Every single individual in the Tower of Fate, apprentice or witch, could feel their Spirit slowly grow in power and their soul consciousness basking in a wonderful and warm sea.


    At the same instant, many witches in the tower advanced instantly. Even more apprentices gained an in-depth experience of the existence of Fate¡¯s powers.


    With this experience, they would only need a bit more time to umte their Spirits; they would have no trouble advancing to be witches.


    Berserk Witch Sofia advanced. Second Grade.


    Icdy Snowlotus advanced. Second Grade.


    Samantha advanced. Second Grade.


    ......


    ......


    Alice, Leader of the Fate Witches, advanced. Fourth Grade!

 Chapter 1165 - Unexpected Surprise

    <h4>Chapter 1165 Unexpected Surprise</h4>


    News of Alice¡¯s advancement to Fourth Grade spread throughout the Northern Lands almost immediately!


    The ordinary civilians did not know the real politics between the witches. Naturally, they celebrated joyously, cheering and rejoicing about the growing power of the Northern Lands.


    However, the witch branches were all stunned and shocked!


    The Fate Witches¡¯ position had been precarious, with multiple internal and external crises despite having restored their legacy. That was because the Battle of Fate had extended far beyond the selection of the Witch of Fate.


    However, this pronounced blessing of Fate had instantly cleared away all the dark clouds hanging above the Fate branch.


    Alice had not only raised herself to Fourth Grade. She had somehow managed to benefit all the Fate Witches and apprentices, allowing everyone to bask in this unexpected benefit.


    From this moment on, the Fate branch could finally be considered to havee to power. They were now firmly established as an organization blessed by fate!


    The witch branches might haveplicated feelings about this, but they still had to maintain their image of unity and friendship. As such, the celebratory parties sent by the witch branches to the Tower of Fate was never-ending. There were so many of them that they practically caused congestion on the road to Dragonblight.


    For a moment, the name of the Fate branch was incredibly well-known. They had be the most popr witch branch amongst the Northern Witches!


    ............


    The Crimson Wing. The Crimson n¡¯s headquarters in Ailovis.


    It was a massive city with a poption of over a hundred thousand. A looming adept tower in the center of the city represented the Crimson n¡¯s uncontested authority in this region.


    At the very least, the Crimson n had grown into a massive titan in Ailovis and the surrounding regions. It was expanding and growing with a liveliness that no other adept n possessed.


    Emelia was nervously and busily dealing with the n mattersing from all over in therge hall in the tower¡¯s seventh level.


    The Crimson n was no longer the tiny force of the past, with its meager, rural territories. Ever since a famous Fourth Grade adept appeared within the n, the number of adepts in the Crimson n, as well as the size of its territory, had been increasing without pause.


    ording to a non-exhaustive census, the Crimson n now controlled three human kingdoms, over one hundred and twenty-seven territories, one hundred and nine resource sites, two hundred and fifteen human cities, and countless viges, mansions, and castles.


    Naturally, the work and effort required to manage such an extensive pool of resources fully were tremendous.


    Typically, these worldly matters were left to Gargamel. However, recently, the n had been preparing for the n leader¡¯s grand wedding ceremony. That left Emelia with no choice but to leave her meditation room and help her father deal with the crushing amount of work.


    Several Crimson adepts stood in front of the full wooden table, taking turns giving their reports to Emelia. Some of them were old men with white hair, while others were strong men with impressive muscles, or skinny, sinister individuals. Of course, there were also young and pretty women among them as well.


    ¡°¡ªat Maple Forest were raided. The party leader, Adept Beth, has served the n for twenty-seven years. There were also seven adept apprentices in the party. When they made camp near Maple Forest, they were attacked by an unknown creature, causing three apprentices to die.


    ¡°They made camp with two other merchant groups. However, nothing happened to the other two merchant groups. Only Beth and her party were knocked unconscious. Investigations after the incident reveal that the three apprentices died of exhausted Spirits. Adept Beth was not in any danger of death, but her Spirit was in a weakened state.¡±


    ¡°Exhausted Spirit?¡± Emelia couldn¡¯t help but frown. ¡°Such an attack is very rare. Did you find out what the party lost in the attack?¡±


    ¡°It has already been investigated. Adept Beth lost the storage bag she always keeps with her. The bag contained the basic resources that the nearby resource sites were supposed to turn over.¡±


    ¡°Was there anything of note among them?¡±


    ¡°Yes! This batch of resources included three hundred grams of Stoneheart herb.¡±


    ¡°Stoneheart herbs?¡± Emelia¡¯s expression turned dark. ¡°Can we determine who the attacker was? Is it the work of those underground creatures, or has some foreign adept entered our territory?¡±


    ¡°We have already triedmunicating with Jameli of the Underground Alliance. They express that this is all a misunderstanding and that they will deal with the matter internally!¡±


    ¡°People from our n have died, and they dare call it a misunderstanding? Those damned underground worms. Serves them right to rot in that dark rock tomb of theirs. No, this matter will not end like this. Tell Jameli that if he doesn¡¯t hand over the culprit, the Crimson n will immediately dere war against the Underground Alliance. Billis has already returned to the n anyway. Have him make a trip underground!¡±


    The other Crimson adepts lowered their heads at the mention of Bug Adept Billis. Their faces flushed white with terror.


    Billis¡¯ terror and savagery were iparable. Even n adepts feared him and trembled at the mention of his name, let alone adepts in enemy factions.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Billis seemed to have exhausted his personal potential over these years and had stopped improving ever since he reached advanced Second Grade. He couldn¡¯t take a single step forward.


    This situation was obviously uneptable to the proud and arrogant Billis. Hoping to find some items or spells that could change or improve his bloodline in these dangerous ces, he began to fervently go out on explorations of ancient ruins or participating in ventures to other worlds.


    Unfortunately, even though he did find many unusual treasures, there wasn¡¯t a single thing that could change his or the Queen Bug¡¯s fates!


    Thus, when he heard that Greem had returned to the n, he immediately returned without any hesitation and had repeatedly requested an audience. Sadly, most of Greem¡¯s attention was caught up in recovering and creating Shadow Demon. He did not have any time at all to deal with this subordinate of his.


    Over the past few days, Billis had be increasingly impatient. Even his insect army had be more savage and cruel than usual.


    Many tragic incidents of wandering travelers being devoured alive by insects had urred near Angui Valley, where Billis resided. If the Crimson n weren¡¯t the absolute authority of the region and had suppressed all these incidents, the civilians and merchant groups would probably already be rioting.


    When Emelia mentioned Billis, all of her subordinates lowered their heads, fearful that they might be sent to him as a messenger.


    As Emelia¡¯s gaze wandered over the adepts to choose a suitable messenger, the hall¡¯s wooden door was pushed open. A pretty, middle-aged nobledy walked in with a smile on her face.


    Anyone who could walk in and out of this ce freely was no stranger.


    The adepts hurriedly bowed and paid their respects to Lady Eva.


    Eva ignored the few of them and rushed excitedly to Emelia¡¯s side.


    ¡°Emmy, good news, good news...guess what news I¡¯ve brought you this time?¡±


    Emelia frowned andined as she looked at Eva with her excited, flushed expression. ¡°Mother, I¡¯m dealing with n matters right now! Why¡¯d you just barge in like this?¡±


    Eva might be a veteran that had been present at the founding of the Crimson n, but her background determined her personality. She did not like being bound by the conventions and etiquette of human adepts. Consequently, she hardly ever interfered in n matters or participated in n wars. She only remained in the n headquarters, managing an adept academy.


    Medusa Dana and Manticore Charon were in a simr position as her. They were both non-humans that had joined the Crimson n and were in an inferior positionpared to the proper human adepts.


    Moreover, it was more difficult for non-humans to advancepared to adepts.


    As such, as more and more Second and Third Grade adepts appeared in the n, the three of them had gradually stepped out of the core management. They could only serve as instructors or managers at ces such as adept academies while enjoying the benefits of the n.


    ¡°Emmy, you can¡¯t me me. It is incredibly good news!¡± Eva was a little embarrassed after being reprimanded by her daughter, but it couldn¡¯t stop her gleeful joy.


    ¡°So, mother, what exactly is it that¡¯s made you so happy?¡± Emelia asked helplessly with a bitter smile.


    She understood her mother well. If she just let her mother go on talking, she wouldn¡¯t get to the heart of an issue, even if she gave her the entire day. Thus, Emelia immediately asked about it.


    ¡°She advanced...she advanced. Lady Alice advanced!¡±


    The Crimson adepts couldn¡¯t help but freeze for a moment when they heard the wordsing out of Eva¡¯s mouth. They could hardly believe their ears.


    Alice advanced? Lady Alice seemed to have been a Third Grade adept, to begin with. Could Lady Eva be talking about advancement to Fourth Grade?


    The adepts looked at each other, surprise and joy on their faces. They couldn¡¯t help but look towards Emelia at the same time.


    ¡°Go...Amel, you are in charge of information. Go and verify this news. I need to know the truth of this news immediately!¡± Emelia roared in a hurry.


    The pretty female adept acknowledged the order and rushed out of the hall.


    Just a momentter, the verification arrived. Witch Alice had advanced to Fourth Grade!


    Even Emelia couldn¡¯t sit still now.


    She paced about the hall excitedly, mumbling as she did so.


    ¡°Sister has already advanced to Fourth Grade...I must go and congratte her...immediately. Speaking of which, what kind of gifts are most appropriate?


    ¡°Kingwell, go to Warehouse Seven and retrieve that pair of elven earrings that were just put in there. Alice should like its design.


    ¡°Corinna, take out all the resources turned over by the resource sites this year ande with me to the Tower of Fate.


    ¡°Mother, call father and have hime back. I am heading out to the Northern Lands now!¡±


    The entire Crimson n bustled with activity amidst the slight chaos and the happy surprise.

 Chapter 1166 - Mary’s Obsession

    <h4>Chapter 1166 Mary¡¯s Obsession</h4>


    Seawoods ne.


    Only half a dayter than the rest of the people in the World of Adepts, Mary and her party had also received news of Alice¡¯s advancement.


    The party stopped immediately and silently awaited orders from Mary.


    Mary stood atop an ancient tree, looking across at the green, boundless sea of trees. A glimmer of unconceble cruelty and impatience flickered in her eyes.


    All this while, Greem had always suppressed her when it came to individual power. That already made Mary incredibly annoyed. If Greem weren¡¯t her lover, Mary would probably already have erupted in anger.


    Now, even Alice had managed to advance to Fourth Grade ahead of her.


    How...was she supposed to feel about that?


    Even though she could rationally ept Alice¡¯s existence for Greem¡¯s sake, the streak ofpetitiveness deep in her heart had never been extinguished. Mary might have looked calm on the surface after hearing this news, but in truth, her heart was already raging with waves of anger and frustration.


    ¡°Master, do you think we should hurry back to attend Lady Alice¡¯s celebration ceremony, or......¡±


    The moment Soros began speaking, Vanlier closed his eyes in agony.


    This clueless idiot......


    As expected, the Soros¡¯ words came out of his mouth, Mary¡¯s crimson, ruby eyes lit up with light.


    ¡°Forward! Hmph! There¡¯s no point in attending a wretched ceremony like that. This time, we are not turning back until we kill that damned Feathered Serpent!¡±


    Having said that, Mary pped her bat wings and dashed ahead, turning into a single crimson line on the horizon. The vampires waiting in the forest below looked at each other and shrugged. They turned into ck and red vampires and quickly chased after Mary.


    As vampires, their mobility was undoubtedly terrifying!


    All vampires could turn themselves into bats and glide rapidly close to the canopy of the trees. As such, the mountainous, uneven terrain of the forests meant nothing to them.


    Moreover, as vampires, they did not have to bring along supplies.


    The beasts that could be found everywhere in the forest were their food.


    In case of emergencies, they could march for seven days and nights without sleep as long as they had a sufficient supply of blood. If they were hungry or exhausted, all they had to do was find a beast and suck some blood; they would be able to maintain their Spirits and stamina at their peak.


    With this tremendous mobility, the party of thirty vampires started to ughter all the troll tribes they could find in Degu Forest. Over five tribes of over two hundred trolls had be the food for the vampires at this point.


    Due to the powerful ability of Embrace, another one hundred trolls had been turned into low-grade blood servants, serving as fodder for the vampires.


    Every time they reached a new camp, most of the troll warriors were utterly ughtered in battle. Only the particrly powerful elites would be Embraced by the blood elves and turned into servants. The weaker children and elderly were all killed as well. Not for pleasure, but to indirectly weaken the foundations of their faith in the ¡®Feathered God.¡¯


    The might of totem gods like the Feathered God tied directly to the number of their believers. The more trolls Mary and her vampires killed, the weaker the Feathered Serpent would be when they finally confronted it.


    It was also the mostmon strategy employed by adepts against the faith gods!


    Mary had specially summoned a helper from the n to deal with the Feathered God. That helper was Remi, the Third Grade Spirit of Pestilence. With Remi¡¯s gue at hand, Mary intentionally let some trolls escape during the next few assaults.


    This way, the trolls would unknowingly spread the lethal gue to even more tribes.


    With the crude voodoo doctor medical system of the troll empire, trying to cure all the infected individuals spread across such arge territory was nothing more than a delusion. Thus, after just twenty days, nearly one-third of the troll empire had been infected by the gue.


    The vampires¡¯ ughter had finally rmed the leaders of the empire as well. An army of over two thousand trolls was sent out to search for the tracks of the invaders.


    Unfortunately, the primitive reconnaissance system of the trolls exposed all of their movements to Mary.


    A terrifying plot scheming the death of the troll army was born!


    ............


    The light in the quiet forest was dim.


    Branches, vines, and bushes grew everywhere. Trying to travel through such an environment was incredibly tricky.


    However, none of this was a problem for the troll hunters!


    Their athletic and muscr bodies could freely travel through the forest without being stopped by any of the thorns or brambles. Their thick skin was covered in a thinyer of moss, allowing them to blend into the scenery.


    In addition to their silent, agile steps, their sensitive noses also allowed them to be the most feared trackers and hunters in Degu Forest.


    Gun¡¯da brushed aside an annoying vine and slowly walked through a bramble bush. The bush grew haphazardly. Its thick, golden branches were covered with sharp, poisoned thorns. An ordinary creature would have been cut and badly grazed just by walking through it.


    However, thanks to his tough skin, Gun¡¯da managed to pass through the bush where the brambles were thickest. The thorns scratched and beat against his toned body, but they could not inflict even a graze.


    Gun¡¯da stopped at a clearing.


    He lifted his nose and sniffed the air. He could smell an odor in the humid, rotten air that did not belong to the forest.


    An outsider.


    Gun¡¯da took out the wooden spear from behind his back and held it in his left hand. He then took out two unusual metal javelins with poison on their tips from his belt. He carefully continued searching in the direction of the smell.


    There were no footsteps on the ground and no signs of the vines and branches having been cut down. The scent lingering in the forest was also incredibly thin. Judging by these clues, the invaders he tracked were also individuals who were extremely skilled at forestbat.


    However, as a troll hunter, he was the ruler of these forests. Not only did Gun¡¯da feel no fear at the uing battle, but he was also excited.


    He slowly walked forward in the forest.


    His alert eyes constantly searched for ces where the enemies could be hiding, but he found nothing. However, his slightly stinging skin clearly indicated that the enemy was observing him through some obscure and mysterious means. Still, he could not pinpoint the enemy¡¯s location.


    Gun¡¯da narrowed his eyes. He was even more careful and alert now.


    He didn¡¯t know when, but the forest had be silent. The chirping of the birds and the cries of the insects had vanished without a trace. The entire world was simply silent.


    Just as Gun¡¯da was feeling confused, a strange popping sound came from the forest¡¯s depths. An unusual being riding on a bizarre creature appeared in front of him.


    Gun¡¯da¡¯s gaze swept over, and his heart froze in shock.


    What a terrifying monster!


    The being who had arrived was a human boy with dark green skin and unusual patterns carved all over his body. He sat atop an unusual, toad-like creature that seemed to have been skinned. His sickly green eyes gazed right at him.


    Behind the boy and sitting on the toad was a frail, skinny, ugly woman that did not have much flesh attached to her bones. She was also staring at him with her deep-green eyes.


    Even though Gun¡¯da didn¡¯t know who they were, their sinister and chilling aura was enough to make known their hostility!


    Gun¡¯da struck without hesitation.


    The two javelins shot towards the two individuals sitting on the toad monster, flickering through the air as two shes of light. Meanwhile, Gun¡¯da gripped his three-meter-long spear and charged forward.


    The ugly woman stood up in response to Gun¡¯da¡¯s attack. She caught the two metal javelins with her hands. The thorns that covered the spears pierced her palm and injected her with a strange poison.


    The woman did not seem to be aware of these wounds on her hands, nor did she seem to fear the poison.


    Instead, she lifted her hands and gripped the javelins tightly. Light-green poison mist shrouded the metal projectiles and sizzled. In just a few seconds, the javelins had beenpletely corroded. The woman tightened her fist, and the javelins shattered into dust.


    Meanwhile, Gun¡¯da¡¯s direct attack had been stopped by the toad monster.


    The toad opened its mouth, and a slimy, flexible tongue shot forth, forcefully keeping Gun¡¯da at a distance of five steps away.


    With this opportunity, the ugly woman waved her hand, and arge cloud of yellow and green poison rolled towards Gun¡¯da.


    Gun¡¯da hurriedly retreated and just barely escaped from it.


    Unfortunately, the poison cloud seemed to be alive and under themand of the ugly woman. It quickly caught up to Gun¡¯da and enveloped him.


    A short momentter, Gun¡¯da stumbled out of the cloud, coughing violently as he did so.


    In just a few seconds, the moss on his skin turned bright red, as if he had been skinned.


    Gun¡¯da had difficulty breathing. It felt like there were thousands of tiny bugs chewing on the insides of his throat and chest. His eyes turned red, and tears flowed down his cheeks. His skin burned in agony as if it was on fire.


    Gun¡¯da didn¡¯t dare remain. He turned and fled with all his strength, all while putting his hands by his mouth and letting out a strange call.


    The loud call spread throughout the forest and reached into the distance.


    Several troll hunters that were dressed in a simr fashion to Gun¡¯da instantly sprinted in his direction upon hearing his cry for help.


    At the same time that they moved out, they used the samemunication method to spread the news that they had found the enemy.

 Chapter 1167 - Plague Trap

    <h4>Chapter 1167 gue Trap</h4>


    Enemy spotted!


    The entire army of trolls still marching thirty-five kilometers away quickened their steps when they received this information.


    Several green figures rushed through the dense forest, sprinting with their bare feet and causing unrest to spread throughout the woods. The forest creatures, predator or prey, scampered back into their homes with their tails between their legs. They trembled and whimpered in fear, not a single one of them daring to peek out for a look.


    With a clear target in sight, the march of the trolls advanced at a shocking speed!


    In just half an hour, themanders of the army had arrived at a clearing. They discovered the troll hunter, who was now shrouded in a cloud of green and yellow smoke.


    The hunter was on hisst legs. He was lying on his back in the clearing, where all the grass had already withered. He was curled up into a ball and coughing violently. The blood that he coughed up caused smoke to rise wherever itnded on the grass below and the bushes nearby.


    The surrounding nts would also wither rapidly aftering into contact with the smoke.


    Themanders couldn¡¯t help but step back at the sight.


    An unusuallyrge and muscr troll emerged from the ranks of the trolls and shouted, ¡°Get Master San¡¯ge here, now!¡±


    The troll warriors turned and headed into the forest upon receiving their orders.


    Not long after, the sound of snapping branches rang out. Master San¡¯ge appeared, so frail and weak for a troll; he seemed almost like an elderly human.


    Compared to the other trolls, Master San¡¯ge was very skinny. His back was hunched, and he leaned on a ck wooden staff taller than himself. All sorts of strange essories hung from the staff, from animal tusks to polished rocks. However, most of these essories were the skulls of living beings that had been shrunk down after soaking in an unknown brew.


    Master San¡¯ge was a Second Grade voodoo doctor. The constant contact with the poisonous substances he worked with had also affected his Physique tremendously. The hide of an animal was draped over his body like a robe, while his exposed chest and face were covered in unusual patterns drawn with violet paint.


    Master San¡¯ge¡¯s gaze was drawn towards the cloud of poison when he appeared.


    ¡°All of you, back off. Be careful not to touch these clouds of smoke. They contain terrifying poison inside.¡±


    ¡°Master San¡¯ge, do you think you can clear the poison?¡± Themander of the squad of trolls here was an exceptionally strong Third Grade hunter. Supposedly, he should be able to give direct orders to the old voodoo doctor, being of a higher grade.


    Unfortunately, spellcasters were extremely rare in the troll empire. Even voodoo doctors that only had meager control over elementium magic and some poison ability were well-respected among trolls. They were weed and greeted by prominent individuals wherever they went.


    Consequently, even a Third Grade troll hunter had to be respectful towards the Second Grade voodoo doctor!


    ¡°I will give it a try!¡± San¡¯ge frowned slightly. ¡°The poison used by the enemy is of an unusual sort we have never seen before. It is not extracted from nt sap or animals, but...it seems like the poison itself is a bunch of extremely tiny and terrifying living creatures.¡±


    ¡°Living creatures? Master, do you mean that all these poison clouds have a life of their own?¡± The trollmanders were shocked to hear this. Their faces were filled with disbelief.


    ¡°Yes! These smoke-like things are, in fact,posed of many, many tiny poison creatures. That¡¯s why it¡¯s tough to deal with them.¡± At this point, San¡¯ge took out a pungent oak branch and lit it on fire. The smoke that rose from the me instantly dispelled the poison cloud and chased it away.


    Master San¡¯ge took this opportunity to bend over the infected troll hunter. He took out some sharp-smelling patches of herbs from the jar hanging from his waist along with a ck scorpion. He put the herbs and the scorpion into his mouth and started chewing.


    The shell of the scorpion shattered as its ck blood spilled everywhere.


    San¡¯ge spat out the strange mixture created from chewing the herbs and the scorpion and dabbed his finger in it. He began drawing a strange pattern on the troll hunter¡¯s forehead. From a distance, this rune appeared like something. There was a circle on the very outside, an upside down triangle on the inside, and an eye-like symbol inside the triangle.


    Strangely enough, when he finished drawing the rune, it glowed with a blinding light. Every line was now brimming with light. It seemed to be emanating an unusual heat, causing the hunter¡¯s skin to sizzle as if it was burning. The rune itself began to sink into his flesh as if to imprint itself upon the troll¡¯s skull.


    Gun¡¯da, the troll hunter, screamed and leaped up from the ground, despite being on death¡¯s door just moments ago. He opened his mouth, and a torrent of poison smoke poured out. Itsted for a dozen seconds before the smoke started to thin and lose its sickly color.


    After another seven or eight seconds, Gun¡¯da shivered and crumpled to the ground, having expelled all the poison in his body.


    Even though his aura was fragile now, his life force was slowly recovering.


    ¡°You saved him.¡±


    ¡°Amazing!¡±


    Joy appeared on the faces of the trollmanders, and they all expressed their gratitude towards San¡¯ge.


    ¡°Take him down for treatment! The damage done to his body by the poison won¡¯t recover for a while. He needs some rest before he can resume fighting!¡± Master San¡¯ge gave a few instructions, and the warriors lifted Gun¡¯da and carried him behind the lines.


    Compared to the joy of the troll leaders, San¡¯ge was not smiling at all.


    It was a terrifying poison he had never seen before. He could sense traces of magic within. If the invaders were able to spread this poison on arge scale, he would not have any means to save the entire troll army.


    However, just as his own concerns upied San¡¯ge, the shouts and cries of troll hunters could be heard in the distance.


    They had managed to catch up to the enemy¡¯s ranks!


    The troll warriors were weaving through the forest in pursuit, letting out all sorts of weird battlecries while sniping the enemies with their precise javelin shots.


    A dozen vampire bats were twisting between the trees in front of them, desperately dodging the terrifying javelin attacks. Unfortunately, no matter how they fled, the number of troll warriors in pursuit all increased.


    Pupupu!


    The javelins shredded the trees, bushes, and the vines to pieces like bolts of ck lightning. Green sap sttered through the air. Several red bats that couldn¡¯t dodge in time were pinned to the trees, still twisting and struggling with all they had.


    Even more javelins and spears flew their way, turning them into unfortunate skewers.


    A crimson cloud of smoke erupted, and the bats returned to their original forms, revealing their actual appearance.


    Green skin, vicious faces, terrifying tusks, and the strange patterns drawn all over their skin.


    The troll warriors started cursing angrily. They could see that these dead bats were their formerpanions. Who knew how the damned enemy had turned them into their ugly, bat-like forms.


    ¡°Chase them...spread out and chase them. We cannot let these invaders escape.¡±


    The trollmander¡¯s furious shout rang throughout the forest and was echoed by the cries of several dozens of trolls.


    The tough, elite troll warriors pursued thest remaining bats closely, quickly advancing into a small basin.


    The cries of the troll warriors could be heard everywhere here.


    Judging from this, the trolls had sessfully cornered the enemy in the basin.


    However, they had no idea that just a few kilometers away on a cliff above the forest, Mary, Soros, Remi, and the vampires were gathered, gazing at the battlefield from a distance.


    ¡°The enemies have walked into the trap! Remi, it¡¯s up to you now.¡± Mary nodded at Remi, and the Spirit of Pestilence smiled cruelly.


    He patted his mount, and the giant poison toad jumped a few paces forward. He stood on top of the toad and extended both arms before letting out a silent howl towards the distant forest.


    A strange soundwave traversed the five-kilometer distance and echoed in the basin.


    Several squads of troll warriors had now spread out in the forest with their javelins held high. They carefully searched the basin for enemies. If there were even the slightest of movements, their javelins and spears would rain down on the area.


    With their strength and precision, no prey could escape their attacks!


    A small squad of troll warriors was searching near the edge of some shrubbery. A little rift opened in the ground where they were walking past, and light-yellow smoke drifted out from below.


    The smoke wasn¡¯t very thick. Mixed with the natural mist of the forest, it was difficult to notice.


    There were over a hundred of these gue spreaders throughout the basin forest, each of them hidden beneath the bushes or the trees.


    There was no wind in the basin.


    The light-yellow poison cloud lingered in the air, not at all obvious initially. However, when the smoke started to thicken, some of the trolls began to notice something was wrong.


    A troll warrior suddenly stabbed with his spear and pierced the bark of an ancient tree in front of him. He retracted his spear, and hanging from the tip was a fat, wriggling worm, still spitting out some strange yellow mist.


    When the troll warrior lifted the worm closer for inspection, he unintentionally inhaled some of the poison mist. He immediately felt his head sink heavily and his limbs go numb and weak.


    ¡°A trap...this is a trap! Retreat, hurry and retreat!¡±


    The next second, the troll warriors¡¯ panicked cries of anger filled the entire forest.


    Sadly, they had realized toote!


    No one knew when, but a massive poison cloud had already enveloped the entire basin.


    The sound of trolls coughing could be heard everywhere.


    ¡°Get out...get out of the basin!¡± The trollmander raised his voice and roared.


    The troll warriors quickly rushed out of the basin under his orders.


    Unfortunately, a poison cloud lingered around every troll warrior after they had escaped the basin. Several warriors who were badly poisoned sped their necks and fell to the ground upon escaping. They wriggled on the ground and screamed in agony.


    The trolls were indeed very resilient with a tough body. Sadly, none of them could survive the frightening poison personallyid out by a Third Grade Spirit of Pestilence.


    For a moment, the forest was filled with screams of pain and silhouettes rolling across the ground in agony.

 Chapter 1168 - Challenge for Glory

    <h4>Chapter 1168 Challenge for Glory</h4>


    A gue of terrifying proportions erupted in the woods!


    Even though there were voodoo doctors in the army to perform treatment, over half of the troll warriors were still infected by the gue spores. They turned into unfortunate victims rolling on the floor in agony as they scratched their bodies with their nails until they were bloody.


    The trolls weren¡¯t idiots.


    They might not be as smart as human adepts, but they were still the rulers of Seawoods ne.


    After many tests, they finally discovered some of the gue cloud¡¯s weaknesses.


    Specifically, it was weak to fire!


    The gue cloud wasn¡¯t an inanimate object. It was an amalgamation of billions upon billions of tiny gue viruses. Even these creatures were afraid of fire.


    After discovering this, the trolls quickly lit several torches and used them to burn away the lingering clouds of poison. As expected, when the mes surged by, the gue clouds would crackle with muffled sounds of explosions.


    Most of the gue clouds were burned to nothing by the mes, but the infected trolls couldn¡¯t just be put to the torch. The trollmander could only gather the infected in a clearing and order the voodoo doctors to rescue as many of them as possible.


    For the sake of saving these torturedpanions of theirs, the two dozen voodoo doctors gathered together and put up arge metal pot in the center of the clearing. They quickly began brewing a potion that could dispel the gue.


    They wore unusual costumes and drew strange patterns on their faces and bodies as they performed an ugly dance around their metal pot, all while throwing their mysterious herbs into the mixture. Steam rose from the bubbling brew, and a suffocating scent spread throughout the forest.


    And who would have known? These seemingly crude, primitive, and backward means of the voodoo doctor had an effect.


    The victims struggling in the clearing unexpectedly calmed down after smelling the mixture. Many of them stopped screamingpletely.


    Mary and Remi, who were watching the trolls¡¯ actions from the shadows, couldn¡¯t help but shake their heads.


    A gue could only be used as an auxiliary in war. It would never be the central axle around which war itself revolved. The main reason was that nar wars were fought for one sole reason¨C to exploit resources, enve the poption, and construct a colony that could continuously supply the n with ¡®fresh blood.¡¯


    In this process, the natives of the world couldn¡¯t bepletely ughtered. On the contrary, as many of them as possible should be preserved and kept alive.


    Imagine if the Crimson n had used a gue or some other magical means to kill all the trolls. In doing so, they would lose tens of thousands of ves with the might of First Grade warriors. When it came torge-scale ntations or the excavation of mines that came after the war, an army of strong and powerful ves was required.


    How else was the Crimson n supposed to run things? Transport arge group of ves into Seawoods ne just to excavate its resources?


    Disregarding the colossal teleportation costs incurred, the harsh environment alone would kill most of those foreign ves.


    In the end, all of it would only be a shocking burden on the n¡¯s finances!


    That was why the adepts would only conduct a precise, surgical attack on the leadership of the native forces when they invaded a foreign ne. They would eliminate the conservatives and leaders among the native troops with the most terrifying and cruel means imaginable, but the foundational framework of the society had to be preserved.


    If the lower ss were all killed in the war, the adept ns would not have the additional resources to reconstruct a system and society that could rule over the world and ensure its stability. The head of the empire must fall, but its body must remain.


    That would make it easier for the adepts to take over and establish a ruling ss that had thorough control over the nar natives, despite only consisting of a select few individuals.


    It was also why the adepts had to strictly control the speed and range of the gues they spread. They could not empty the pond and destroy the world¡¯s order itself.


    There was no doubt that Remi¡¯s gue was incredibly powerful!


    However, this was a different world, after all. The narws here and the manner in which the elementium functioned were all simr but different. Consequently, the infectiousness, lethality, and longevity of the gue viruses were suppressed to various degrees.


    Moreover, the trolls were all robust and resilient individuals. All of them had strong lifeforces and decent magic resistance. Remi¡¯s gue was unable to mutate them into gue creatures.


    In a nar world led by humans, Remi only needed himself. He could easily turn every human he met into a gue servant of his.


    An army born of a single person!


    Remi could even take on an entire ne alone.


    Of course, if all the powerhouses of the ne gathered together, Remi would probably have to pay a heavy price to survive their retaliation. After all, he did not have manybat techniques.


    Thus, the differences in the ne¡¯s system ofws and the power neutered Remi¡¯s terrifying, potentially apocalyptic gue. It turned his gue into a mere ¡®disease¡¯ that could only slowly wear down the trolls¡¯ lifeforce!


    The lethality of the gue was pathetic, but it did seed in weakening the troll army.


    The troll army had already stopped all ns of searching for the invaders. They gathered together and tried their best to save their infectedpanions. With the voodoo doctor¡¯s aid, the sickness of the patients was soon under control. There were no signs that groups of trolls were turning into gue monsters.


    The positions in the battle had suddenly reversed.


    The troll army, despite their absolute numerical advantage, had be the defenders. Meanwhile, the agile and mobile vampires led by two Third Grades became the ones on the offense.


    Every night, Mary took advantage of the cover of darkness to assault the troll camps with her vampires. She hoped to break through the defensive line to execute the voodoo doctors.


    However, the trolls held firm.


    They set up simple camps on the outside and lit bonfires all over, setting defensive points around the fires. Any individual that appeared within their sight would be greeted with a hail of javelins.


    The trolls were not weak at all, individually. In fact, they couldpare to natives of mid-sized nes while they were fighting in forests. They all had the might of a First Grade, with strong bodies, resilient lifeforces, and closebat technique that could rival a First Grade body-refining adept.


    In closebat, they used their strange wooden spears that were as heavy as steel as well as their poisoned darts. In mid to long-ranged fights, they threw their heavy javelins with lethal precision. Overall, the trolls of Seawoods ne had excellent potential as warriors.


    Should they conquer this ne, the Crimson n woulde into possession of a fairly powerful army of ves!


    ............


    Nightfall.


    The entire forest fell into an unusual silence.


    The wind blew, and the branches creaked. The river waterspped against the shore, over and over.


    Who knew how many people were silently moving, hiding, and watching beneath this calm.


    Arge, bright bonfire had been lit on the outskirt of the troll camp.


    At the moment, a trollmander of beginner Third Grade stood alone between two bonfires. He shouted furiously into the dark forest.


    A row of wooden javelins was stuck into the ground in front of him, while fiverge metal darts rattled on his waist.


    In the distant darkness, Mary hid in the thick canopy of an ancient tree. She looked through the swaying branches and examined this bold trollmander. Finally, she couldn¡¯t help but say, ¡°Who knows what that bastard is yelling about?¡±


    Upon arriving in a foreign ne, finding a nar native and taking their knowledge and memory to understand the ne¡¯s basic situation was standard procedure for an adept. It was something that every qualified adept should be able to do.


    Extracting memory fragments andnguage was amon magical technique in the adept¡¯s system!


    Unfortunately, Mary seemed to have no intention of learning the crude and primitivenguage of these natives.


    To Mary, the trollmander, covered all over with red and green paint, appeared no different from a gori beating his chest when he shouted into the forest.


    Intelligent life.


    Hmph! Them?


    ¡°Master, this troll seems to be issuing a challenge for glory.¡± Vanlier, who was promoted to Second Grade by Mary¡¯s grace, exined by her side.


    ¡°Challenge for glory?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s an unusual rule in the Holy Edicts of the troll empire. Any troll noble has the right to issue a challenge for glory at their opponent. This challenge is limited to the two people involved. No one else is to intervene or be seen as challenging the authority of the Feathered God.¡±


    ¡°Oh.¡± Mary was somewhat interested when she heard this. ¡°How is victory decided?¡±


    ¡°The victor takes all, and the loser bes the servant of the opponent!¡±


    ¡°Seems like this troll empire is a society of the survival of the fittest. The ones who can stand on top are undoubtedly the most powerful individuals of their group. They like deciding positions of authority through martial power. No wonder their knowledge system is so pathetic!¡±


    ¡°Indeed, master! Seawoods ne only has primitive and crude hunting techniques. Not evenrge-scale farming or breeding techniques have been invented. No wonder they are unable to reach the heights that an empire civilization should have achieved. Master, seeing as there¡¯s a Third Grade troll here, should we go elsewhere and see if we can break through there instead?¡±


    Mary¡¯s pretty, long eyes narrowed slightly, as if she was considering something.


    Finally, she spoke up.


    ¡°Vanlier, say, if I ept this troll¡¯s challenge, do you think their Feathered God will project its power over?¡± Mary¡¯s eyes had narrowed into a single slit as she said this. Terrifying killing intent shone from her eyes.


    ¡°This...master, the trolls rely on a system of faith worship. Seeing that the trollmander¡¯s power is at Third Grade, he is most certainly a renowned individual in their empire. It is almost certain that he will be able to borrow some degree of the Feathered God¡¯s power. It will be difficult to keep the battle within our control if we engage an opponent like this inbat!¡±


    ¡°So the Feathered God will appear? Hmph! We are gonna cross swords with that pretentious bastard eventually. Rather than fight it in its den, I would rather get to know it here and now. Wait here. I will go and meet that arrogant fool down there!¡±


    Having said that, Mary leaped and flickered towards the battlefield like a crimson phantom!

 Chapter 1169 - The God Takes the Bait

    <h4>Chapter 1169 The God Takes the Bait</h4>


    The trollmander abruptly fell silent when he saw the enemy appear in response to his challenge.


    Countless violet silhouettes stood in silence in the crude camp fifty meters away. They quietly watched the battlefield with seemingly no intention of backing up their leader.


    The trollmander stood between two bonfires, slowly stretching his body.


    He took off the hide that draped over one of his shoulders and revealed his toned physique and the countless scars that covered his body. He was only wearing short, tight leather pants now. His agile and refined muscles moved as his joints cracked in preparation.


    Apart from the scars that told the glory of his battles, his body was also covered with all sorts of strange, colorful patterns. These were unusual tattoosposed of bright winding lines and mysterious runes.


    When the trollmander moved his body and his muscles trembled, a strange magical power lingered around him. The source of the power appeared to be those peculiar tattoos.


    Compared to the three-meter-tall trollmander, Mary appeared somewhat petite, even though she was 1.8 meters tall.


    Mary appeared between the trees and stepped lightly on the ck earth. She now stood before the trollmander, as elegant and seductive as she had always been.


    The light from the bonfire shone on her, coating her with ayer of golden light.


    She had a thin waist, slender figure, long limbs, and folded wings behind her back. The troll could not see Mary clearly when she walked out of the darkness, but this nearly perfect profile was enough to push any male towards irrationality.


    That said, the trollmander was not an inexperienced rookie unversed in the ways of life. Though Mary¡¯s figure was incredibly seductive, he could sense that the woman walking elegantly towards him was giving off a suffocating blood aura.


    This blood aura was so thick that it almost felt solid, and it was only getting denser the closer she got.


    In the trollmander¡¯s eyes, it was as if the enemy was cloaked in an invisible crimson veil that fluttered in the wind. This unusual sight not only added no beauty to the picture, but actually steeped it with a chilling sensation that went right to the bones.


    If the trollmander had even the slightest intelligence, he would understand that this was energy manifestation!


    For some reason, the trollmander felt his throat run dry, and a chill crept down his spine.


    More crucially, his previously raging and boiling battle will felt like it was freezing over!


    The trollmander shivered. He instantly understood that he had been intimidated by his opponent¡¯s terrifying blood aura. That was why that sensation of helplessness had ovee him, even though it was something that should only ever happen to a rookie.


    ¡°Roar!¡±


    The trollmander quickly roared at Mary, who was still strolling towards him. He stared furiously at the opponent with his fierce eyes before bending down and pulling up a javelin from the ground. He hurled it at Mary, and the projectile sted forward like a bolt of lightning.


    His movements were so fast that the javelin had passed through Mary¡¯s heart and disappeared into the depths of the forest while the dirt dislodged by the javelin was still flying through the air.


    ¡°Nice.¡±


    ¡°Lord Ka¡¯no.¡±


    Countless cheers soared into the air, mixed with some whistling in between.


    However, the joyous atmosphere was quickly cut short.


    That was because the enemy had disappeared into the winds.


    What the trollmander had just ¡®killed¡¯ was no more than an afterimage left on the spot!


    ¡°Hmph! Petty tricks. Come out here!¡±


    Frustration was written all over the trollmander¡¯s face. He let out a loud grunt and stomped against the ground with hisrge feet. A visible shockwave rippled outward in every direction.


    Almost instantly, an obscure, crimson figure appeared a dozen meters behind him. Judging by Mary¡¯s position, she had intended to ambush him from his blind spot.


    There was no time to use his javelins at such a close distance. The trollmander reached towards his back and pulled out a spear. Meanwhile, his left hand moved and instantly threw out the metal darts on his waist.


    Mary still had a smile on her face. She casually knocked the darts away with a few swipes from her unusual dagger. Her slender and agile figure quickly circled the trollmander as she dodged his multiple spear thrusts.


    Meanwhile, every time the crimson dagger in her hand flickered, a terrifying wound was left on the trollmander¡¯s body.


    A beatdown. A thorough beatdown!


    The beginner Third Grade trollmander was helpless in front of Mary, the peak Third Grade vampire adept. The fluttering poisoned spear could not even catch up to Mary¡¯s figure, let alone inflict any sort of damage.


    However, the trollmander was not to be looked down upon when he used his full strength.


    The spear in his hand might not be able to catch Mary at all, but as long as he remained on the defensive, he could still pose a tremendous threat to Mary when she approached. Even though his body was all bloody from the cuts Mary inflicted, these wounds were all located on insignificant locations that would not seriously affect him.


    He defended his critical points carefully, giving Mary no chance to attack them at all.


    The troll warriors in the camp could all see that this was a one-sided battle. Their breaths were heavy with anxiety, their eyes were bloodshot, and the wooden spears in their hands creaked from how hard they were gripping.


    Even they were excited and eager to rush intobat. It was only natural that theirmander, who was fighting a bloody battle in front of them, had gone berserk.


    However, the massive gulf in power made all of his efforts and courage fruitless.


    If things proceeded down the current path, Mary would be able to exterminate the trollmander easily. The price she would have to pay in exchange was merely some exhaustion to her blood energy and some slight injuries to herself.


    She could quickly recover all this after the battle was over.


    As such, Mary could kill this seemingly powerful trollmander at no loss to herself!


    The reason for this was the tremendous difference in overall power between the two of them.


    This overall power referred not only to their individual grades, but also their bodily attributes, techniques, bloodline talents, and equipment.


    In this regard, the trollmander was far from qualified. Only hisbat techniques and bodily attributes could barely be regarded as those of a Third Grade.


    In Mary¡¯s opinion, this trollmander had the Strength of a Second Grade, the Physique of a Third Grade, and the Agility and Spirit of a First Grade. Meanwhile, his techniques wereposed solely of closebat attacks.


    These techniques might have been effective against opponents with no supernatural powers. However, against Mary, who possessed extraordinary Agility and unusual blood magic, it was no different than trying to have a boar catch a monkey. The trollmander was led around by the nose and remained helpless in the situation.


    He erupted with his full strength three times and failed to injure Mary at all. On the contrary, he had only made his wounds even more severe. It caused the trollmander to be increasingly insane and wild in his strikes.


    He panted like a clumsy boar chasing after an illusory image. A stinging pain would suddenly appear somewhere on his body, and another gash would be inflicted on him.


    A light cloud of blood energy would linger on the wounds inflicted by Stinger.


    Even with a troll¡¯s impressive regenerative abilities, these wounds would not heal by themselves if they didn¡¯t dispel the foreign energy first.


    After thirty minutes of fighting, the trollmander had only managed to leave a light cut on Mary by using all of his power in a single instant. Meanwhile, he was already covered in blood, making for a horrifying sight.


    The trollmander¡¯s anger was at its limits!


    His blood aura had bubbled to a peak, and even his roars left visible ripples in the air itself.


    Finally, he let out an earthshaking battlecry and pointed his spear at the sky. A ferocious bolt of golden lightning sted down from above,nding right on the spear¡¯s tip.


    Lightning howled as sparks filled the air.


    The blinding shes of electricity enveloped the trollmander and activated the strange magical patterns on his body. All the designs lit up at the same moment, illuminating him and making him appear as a terrifying demon god shrouded in destructive, apocalyptic thunder.


    The trolls watching in the camp fell to their knees and prayed with all their being, weing the descent of the great will.


    Mary originally had confidence in assaulting the trollmander while he was caught up in this ritual of his.


    However, her body was paralyzed by these wandering currents of golden electricity when she approached. If she had not retreated the moment she realized this, the lightning storm that came after would have inflicted terrifying damage.


    Dammit! Just as she expected, the summoning ritual couldn¡¯t be interrupted.


    Mary grumbled angrily and backed up a hundred meters away, watching the trollmander¡¯s transformation in silence.


    The golden lightning roamed all over the trollmander¡¯s body. Where it traveled, what remained of the blood energy on his wounds were devoured without a trace. His damaged body was also quickly healing under the effects of the powerful energy. All of the wounds closed and recovered at a visible pace.


    The trollmander¡¯s muscle swelled again, and his bones stretched, turning him from three meters tall to five meters tall. He was like a terrifying demon god d in lightning armor, with enough might to shake the earth with a single wave of his hand.


    The trollmander lifted his head and roared, releasing the limitless power within his body.


    Once his body had finished transforming, he looked down. His two glowing eyes were fixed on Mary.


    As savage and cruel as Mary was, she couldn¡¯t help but feel her heart tremble when the troll stared at her. The raging battle will in her heart stalled for a brief instant.


    The Feathered God?


    Or just a weak consciousness from the Feathered God?


    As expected of a native totem god from a lower ne. It couldn¡¯t even tell that it had stepped into a trap. Should she say that only the brave or the ignorant were fearless?


    Mary silently mumbled in her mind. An unnoticeable expression of cruelty and amusement finally appeared on her face.


    I¡¯ve been waiting for you for a long time.

 Chapter 1170 - Mary’s Way

    <h4>Chapter 1170 Mary¡¯s Way</h4>


    The descent of the mysterious will had obviously changed the trollmander!


    Apart from his wounds being healed one by one, his power had also increased drastically. He¡¯d only had the Strength of a Second Grade, the Physique of a Third Grade, and the Agility and Spirit of a First Grade. Now, all of those had been raised to Third Grade.


    He had instantly been empowered from beginner Third Grade to peak Third Grade. Just a little more, and he would make it past the threshold of Fourth Grade and advance by an entire major grade.


    However, such an increase in power came at a great cost!


    After this possession was over, the trollmander¡¯s soul would fall into a weakened state that wouldst for several years due to over-exhaustion of his soul origin. During that time, he would fall all the way to Second Grade and not be able to retain his former power.


    In a troll empire where right was dictated by might, his authority and status would be greatly challenged.


    However, for a troll that was about to lose in a challenge for glory, there was no price he wasn¡¯t willing to pay!


    After choosing to summon the god, the trollmander¡¯s power had increased to a level where even Mary had to be extremely cautious. The blinding lightning crackling around the trollmander possessed traces of an unusual holy power. This power had the terrifying ability to destroy and exterminate all foreign energy.


    Moreover, the possessed trollmander could guide this lightning power into his spear, javelins, and darts. They could strike with the power of the golden lightning every time he attacked.


    They posed the greatest threat to Mary!


    Mary still chose to circle around the trollmander in the same fashion as before, only attacking when she discovered a gap in the opponent¡¯s defense. With her extraordinary Agility and the sharp Stinger in her hands, her instantaneous burst of offensive power was more than enough to prate the defenses of most opponents of the same grade.


    Moreover, individuals like the trollmander, who fought without any armor or equipment, relied entirely on themselves. They counted on their tough skin, resilient lifeforce, and shocking regeneration to endure the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    As an adept, Mary had plenty of methods to make an opponent like this suffer.


    Using your own physical body to endure spells and attacks from magical equipment was far too primitive and crude!


    The golden lightning gave the trollmander some capacity to strike at a range, as well as the ability to unleash lightning at close to mid-range. However, these attacks were still insufficient to catch Mary, who roamed the battlefield like a phantom and freely left illusions and afterimages where she traveled.


    However, the intensity of the battle increased by a hundred-fold!


    At the very least, the trollmander now held the absolute majority of initiative inbat. The golden javelins shrouded in lightning would thunder deafeningly wherever theynded.


    When they hit trees, the trees would erupt and fall apart.


    When they struck the ground, the earth would crack, and a ck crater would appear.


    Even if he missed and the javelin simplynded in a clearing, there would be a deafening st that reduced everything within a dozen meters into unrecognizable charcoal.


    Mary¡¯s crimson figure was forced to dodge and weave about in the air. She barely eluded the golden javelins, and still had to try her best to avoid the sparks of lightning that followed in their wake.


    The golden lightning crackling on the wooden javelins had a very annoying sshing effect.


    When the power on the javelins erupted, the golden lightning on the javelins rippled and sshed outwards like a sttering drop of water.


    Mary might be able to dodge the javelins themselves, but she could not wholly avoid these bursts of lightning. Scorch marks quickly appeared on her slender body. Plenty of tiny holes had also been burned into the bat wings on her back, making for a pitiful sight.


    It was evident that she was at a disadvantage now.


    However, the zeal and determination of a hunter still gleamed in her crystal-clear crimson eyes. A hunter who knew her prey was well within grasp.


    Seeing theirmander unleash devastating power and chasing the enemy around with explosive attacks made the blood of the troll warriors boil. Their morale was at a peak, and the spears in their hands mmed into the ground, over and over. It made a sound as if there was a loud, booming war drum beating over and over.


    A vicious aura of danger and death rose into the air!


    Yet, just as the trolls were at the height of their morale, the situation in battle suddenly changed. It was so quick that no one saw iting.


    A fierce howl of the winds rang out as a golden spear flew forward, drowning the crimson figure in a storm of lightning. The trollmander put on a vicious smile and reached for the next javelin, only to grab empty air.


    The trollmander paused for a moment before looking down. It was only then that he realized, to his shock, that he had used up the entire row of javelins.


    There were no more left!


    While he was stunned at this realization, the lightning storm in the distance was suddenly dispelled. A slender figure smelling of blood and iron dashed from within the maelstrom and approached at blinding speed.


    The trollmanderughed brazenly and kicked with his left foot. The spear had been stuck into the ground, kicked into his hand, and immediately stabbed towards the enemy¡¯s stomach.


    He ignored the enemy¡¯s dagger heading straight for his heart.


    Trading wound for wound and blood for blood was the troll¡¯s most favored style of fighting!


    Attack my heart? Then I¡¯ll stab you through your stomach.


    The trolls had shockingly resilient lifeforce anyway. They would survive even if their heart was cut in half. The trollmander made no effort to avoid the enemy¡¯s attack. Instead, he retaliated with all he had.


    Supposedly, at this moment, the enemy should have chosen to dodge. The trollmander could then take advantage of the opponent¡¯s window of weakness as they switched from the offensive to the defensive to inflict damage.


    Contrary to his expectation, the opponent continued to charge forward without any sign of fear.


    A spear was undoubtedly superior to a dagger when it came to length alone.


    A dull thud could be heard as the spear pierced through Mary¡¯s stomach and appeared behind her waist.


    Even so, there was no fear or shock on Mary¡¯s fierce face. In fact, she was still rushing forward with all her momentum.


    Her bloody stomach quickly came into contact with the trollmander¡¯s hands, still gripping his spear.


    At this point, they could feel each other¡¯s breath. Their eyes met.


    The trollmander shivered in fright. For some reason, he felt an omen of death from the depths of his soul. He let out a savage roar, and the wild golden lightning flowed through the spear and surged into the enemy¡¯s body with every intention of shredding her into pieces.


    As the lightning surged forward, themander shook his hands, trying to cast Mary away from his spear.


    However, just as he tightened his muscles and prepared to use his strength, he felt a stinging pain from his heart. He had been struck there simultaneously from his chest and from his back.


    Shadow Clone and Concentrated Strike!


    Shadow Clone was a rune technique that Mary had mastered, while Concentrated Strike was a high-grade ability that Stinger possessed.


    Mary used Concentrated Strike from the front, while her clone had also attacked with all its power from behind.


    Apart from this, Mary had also used her authority as a blood master to draw upon the power of her subordinates to enhance her attack.


    With her reckless, all-out attack, the trollmander¡¯s heart was first pierced, before being shredded into pieces by the surge of blood energy that came after.


    A muffled boom.


    Two spouts of blood burst forth from the wounds on the trollmander¡¯s chest and back. Mixed in the fountain of blood were shards of his heart and several twisted blood vessels.


    As critically injured as he was, the trollmander was still alive. He let out a furious roar and unleashed countless terrifying lightning chains that crackled across the air.


    Mary cried out in surprise. Her body, still hanging from the spear, instantly turned into a mist of blood as she attempted to flee from the lightning storm.


    Unfortunately, as fast as she was, she was still caught by the lightning for a passing second.


    When the mist reformed into Mary a hundred meters away, she couldn¡¯t help but stumble two steps before stabilizing herself.


    The vampires frowned when they saw her appearance now. It was horrible!


    Her pretty figure was almost entirely ck, her skin having been scorched and burnt to char. The hole in her stomach was massive. Only some strands of flesh were still connected, and even her scorched, damaged spine could be seen.


    The electricity had cooked all the flesh around the wound. ck smoke rose from Mary¡¯s body. A suffocating, pungent smell of burnt flesh lingered in the air.


    Everyone had fallen silent.


    In that momentary exchange of attacks, the two peak Third Grade fighters had unleashed their most powerful attacks on each other. The damage inflicted was shocking as well!


    The trollmander lifted his hand, gathered lightning, and pressed it against his chest.


    As the lightning crackled and his flesh sizzled, he managed to seal the hole on his chest through cauterization, stopping the loss of more blood and energy. Meanwhile, he no longer had any spare power to deal with the wound on his back. He could only lean against his spear and look at the stumbling Mary. A cruel and savage expression appeared on his ugly, violet face.


    ¡°Ha...haha...ha,¡± He even stuttered and stopped when heughed. ¡°Trying topete with us trolls in lifeforce! I...will make you die...as unbearably as possible. Even...without a heart, we can still live...rest for a few months, and...it will regrow. Look at you...half of your body is burned. How are...you supposed to live?¡±


    However, the next moment, a shocking scene yed out.


    As a crimson halo rippled across the battlefield, a light popping sound came out of Mary¡¯s burned, tattered body. The scorched skin cracked and peeled off, revealing the tender skin beneath, as well as the tissue and flesh that had yet to fully mend.


    Mary, the vampire, was healing at a visible rate.


    The trollmander was not just simply scared now. No, he simply could not believe his eyes!


    How...how was this possible? Mary was quickly healing by absorbing the blood energy she had taken from the trollmander.


    When she once again recovered her beautiful appearance, she opened her eyes.


    ¡°Such a babbling mouth! You can die now.¡±


    Having said that, Mary lifted her hand at the trollmander. She cast both Boiling Blood and Reversed Bloodflow on the enemy.

 Chapter 1171 - Power Crystal

    <h4>Chapter 1171 Power Crystal</h4>


    The trollmander was dead!


    He had died to his own blood.


    Due to the over-exhaustion of his lightning powers, he had lost the blessing of the Feathered God. Meanwhile, the bloodline power that Mary had injected into his body with the previous attack was the true key to the Reversed Bloodflow in his body.


    The trolls might be able to survive after losing their heart, but when a backflow of blood attacked the brain, even a troll as powerful as himself would die instantly. No troll could possibly survive two of their core organs being destroyed.


    As for the mysterious will that had descended on the trollmander¡¯s body? It dispersed silently without a chance to unleash its power due to the sudden death of its host.


    In truth, Mary had overestimated the Feathered God.


    Given the power demonstrated by the trollmander earlier, he had notpleted a ¡®god summoning¡¯ at all. It was only the inferior ¡®projection¡¯ summoning. The Feathered God had responded to the trollmander¡¯s prayer and projected a part of its power through the channel of faith onto him. In doing so, it had managed toplete a transfer of power.


    Just in terms of the level of power, ¡®descent¡¯ would undoubtedly transfer a moreplete power. It would even bring along a portion of the god¡¯s consciousness. However, ¡®projection¡¯ was only the transfer of power. There was no consciousness involved. Naturally, this meant that projection would not provide the believer with special divine abilities.


    However, the Feathered God seemed to have developed an interest in this battle. It had silently watched Mary¡¯s every action through the channels of faith.


    After all, there were no vampires in Seawoods ne!


    Consequently, Mary¡¯s ability to absorb blood and regenerate had piqued its interest.


    It didn¡¯t really care for the tiny amount of origin power it had lost due to the trollmander.


    Now that Mary had won the challenge for glory, she had won everything that belonged to the opponent. When she dragged the trollmander¡¯s bloody body and his heavy spear into the forest, the entire troll camp remained utterly silent.


    All the troll warriors looked on in silence. They didn¡¯t roar, and they didn¡¯t re up in anger. When they looked at Mary¡¯s slender back, there was a trace of fear and respect in their eyes.


    Troll Commander Ka¡¯no could be considered one of the strongest troll warriors in Seawoods ne. If even he could not defeat that terrifying vampire, who among the remaining warriors could defeat the invaders?


    This challenge for glory instantly shattered the will and morale of the troll army.


    Nightfall.


    Daylight had yet to break, yet the troll army had retreated without a word.


    They had brought along their infectedpanions. It was a tradition of the trolls that they would never easily abandon theirpanions.


    Naturally, Mary couldn¡¯t be happier to see this!


    The trolls had not suffered enough from the gue. Perhaps they believed that the voodoo doctors in the capital could cure the gue or simply believed too strongly in their serpentine god.


    Either way, they brought a group of troll warriors infected with a terrifying gue into the very heart of their empire. Mary and the others could not be happier to see this!


    Mary sent out a group of blood servants to follow after the troll army, while she and her subordinates hid in the forest and examined the trollmander¡¯s corpse.


    With the trolls¡¯ clumsy personalities and muscle-brains, they clearly didn¡¯t realize that the corpse of the trollmander they had left behind wasn¡¯t the only thing they had left for Mary. After all, the body itself contained traces of the Feathered God¡¯s aura.


    Even Mary had a hard time believing that the trolls had so quickly left such a precious spoil of war in her hands.


    She and her most trusted subordinates found a well-hidden spot in the forest and drew a massive array around them. After two days and three nights, they finally managed to extract everyst drop of blood from the trollmander¡¯s body.


    An adept of any other attribute would not have been able to aplish such a feat. After two days and three nights, the body would already have rotted, and the blood would have curdled. All of the essence contained within the blood would also be gone.


    However, all the adepts were vampires that excelled at blood magic. Preserving blood activity and ensuring the essence of its power wasn¡¯t lost was child¡¯s y to them.


    After extracting all the blood, they naturally used the array to further draw out the remnants of the Feathered God¡¯s power.


    As the giant blob of blood above the array started to shrink in size, an unusual fragrance spread through the forest. The eyes of every vampire that smelled this turned red, and saliva trickled down their mouths.


    Even the Second Grade vampires personally promoted by Mary behaved in this manner.


    They looked upon the blood in the air as if they were looking upon their very life and future. Their greedy, thirsty, reckless gazes burned so furiously with desire it almost seemed like their gazes alone could burn everything to ashes.


    They could sense that the blood contained not only incredibly pure blood essence but also a mysterious, indescribable energy. Any vampire here would be able to umte enough energy to advance to Third Grade by devouring the blood.


    Of course, as Mary¡¯s direct subordinates, the still required Mary¡¯s approval to be able to advance.


    It wasn¡¯t just the subordinates. Even Mary had to use most of her Spirit to suppress the instinct thrashing about in her heart when she stared at the blood. It was the only way she could stop herself from lunging forward and feasting.


    However, though the blood could allow any First or Second Grade vampire to advance to Third Grade, it still could not help Mary advance from peak Third Grade to Fourth Grade. At the very best, it would widen and refine Mary¡¯s reserve of blood energy, but it could not cause a qualitative change in her powers.


    Of course, if all of the blood here was the blood of the Feathered God, there was a chance that it could propel Mary to Fourth Grade.


    That was more than enough to demonstrate how difficult it was to advance from Third Grade to Fourth Grade!


    It was important to note that in most nes, creatures below First Grade were considered mortals. Only beings above First Grade were supernatural beings. However, even among supernatural beings, Fourth Grade was a distinct threshold.


    Third Grade could be considered the limit of supernatural creatures, while Fourth Grade was the start of ascension towards godhood.


    In the World of Gods, every god started at the minimum of beginner Fifth Grade. Every creature of Fourth Grade was then known as a demi-god. Once you had advanced to Fourth Grade, half of your body and soul would have be divine.


    Demi-gods of the World of Gods could potentially obtain an immortal soul if they were willing topromise with the nar consciousness and offer up a portion of their souls.


    Demi-gods with immortal souls hardly ever died.


    Even if they were killed by enemies, their souls would reform under the blessing of the nar consciousness with the passage of time. They would then be reborn through a reincarnated body.


    Fourth Grade adepts of the World of Adepts did not have such a premium treatment.


    However, the adepts¡¯ magic system provided them with plenty of means to escape death. For instance: life-concealing magic, soul-escape magic, substitution dolls, and many other techniques. However, these spells could only be used on adepts who were killed by enemies. Should an adept¡¯s origin lifespan be exhausted, they could not be saved no matter what magic they employed.


    Consequently, when Mary sensed that the unusual energy in the blood was crucial to her advancement, she ordered the extraction of the energy at all costs.


    After over twenty days in the forest, the vampires had finally aplished this task.


    When the vampires finally set out again and moved towards the troll empire based on the marks left behind by the blood servants, Mary had in her possession a light blue crystal the size of a bean.


    It was an unusual power crystal. It had lost all blood activity, yet it had a power that could not be rivaled by blood crystals or magical crystals. If Greem were here, he would have been able to tell Mary that this was a strange dual-attribute crystal that contained the powers of lightning and faith.


    The most significant value of the crystal wasn¡¯t the energy contained within, but the fragment of the power of the lightningws!


    Without the existence of the power of faith, the lightningws would not be able to manifest, let alone solidify in such an unusual form. If Mary could bring it back to the World of Adepts, the elementium adepts that practiced lightning magic would be willing to purchase it at the price of a Fourth Grade item.


    In the World of Adepts, a Fourth Grade item¡¯s starting price was around two to three million crystals!


    Mary rubbed the crystal between her fingers. Finally, she resisted the urge to swallow it.


    The power in the crystal was not sufficient for her to advance to Fourth Grade.


    Finding a way to extract even more divine blood from the source of this crystal was her best choice!


    After understanding this, Mary waved her hand and summoned Vanlier. The two of them started discussing their ns.


    As they continued to talk, a grander, more dangerous n quickly began to present itself.


    ............


    World of Adepts, Fire Throne.


    The fifth level of the tower.


    Greem stood in front of a sizeable magical mirror,municating remotely with Alice.


    Alice had been the one to initiate this meeting, which was what surprised Greem.


    Ever since Alice had advanced to Fourth Grade, she and her Fate Witches began to hold more diplomatic weight in the Witch Council.


    For the sake of keeping the Fate Witches within the Northern Witches, all of the witch branches changed their attitude of cold avoidance. They started to express their goodwill towards Alice as much as possible.


    In fact, they didn¡¯t even let Alice reject their proposal to hold a grand advancement celebration in Werning City for her.


    All of the witch leaders would be attending, as well all of the high-grade witches. They intended to celebrate, in high fashion, the return of the Fate branch.


    Naturally, Alice couldn¡¯t reject such an offer!


    Even though she didn¡¯t like to be dragged along like this, she could only ept the idea for the sake of the Fate branch.


    Most of the time, the Fate Witches were like little pets of the nar consciousness.


    They could see, hear, and understand so many secrets of Fate, but its powers controlled them. They could not make any decision freely without consequence.


    Flowing down the river of history, having a grasp over the beat of Fate.


    It might all sound nice, but when you were personally drowning in the river, there weren¡¯t very many things that you could decide with your own will.

 Chapter 1172 - Adept and Arcanist

    <h4>Chapter 1172 Adept and Arcanist</h4>


    ¡°Mary¡¯s in danger?¡±


    Greem asked in surprise.


    Alice let out a sigh through the mirror.


    ¡°You all underestimated those nar natives. They might notpare to the World of Adepts in any regard, but some powerhouse can still be born with all the confluence of variables avable.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s in Seawoods ne?¡±


    ¡°A native god. A totem god described in books!¡±


    Greem was silent for a moment.


    In just an instant, the chip had managed to draw out all the information in the data library rted to a totem god. Greem instantly understood the risks that Mary currently faced.


    A totem god was a regional god, at best. Unlike other gods, they couldn¡¯t ce their god kingdom in the interspatialyers where mortals could not reach. The god kingdom of the totem gods existed on the material ne itself, giving the mortals a chance toe into contact with them.


    Against regional gods like these, the adepts only had to y it safe. They would remain at an advantage as long as they didn¡¯t enter the god kingdom.


    After all, these totem gods might be Fifth Grade beings in their own god kingdoms, but once they exited, they would be subject to the limits of the narws and restricted to Fourth Grade power. It was the main reason gods rarely ever stepped out of their god kingdoms.


    Consequently, adepts did have a set of methods to deal with totem gods like these.


    That was to ughter their believers and weaken their faith foundation. Adepts would set traps on the outside and bait the totem gods out of their kingdoms, where they would then engage them in battle.


    ¡°You mean...Mary intends to go to the Feathered God¡¯s den and fight with it there?¡± Greem¡¯s head hurt.


    ¡°Judging by the current situation, Mary is both lucky and unlucky!¡± Mary let out a sigh. ¡°Fortunately, the Feathered God that Mary is facing just gave birth. Its power has regressed from beginner Fifth Grade to advanced Fourth Grade.¡±


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but lick his lips when he heard this. His mouth felt dry.


    That was because a divine creature whose power had regressed due to giving birth was a great temptation, even for a Fourth Grade adept. An opportunity like this hardly ever came by!


    However, after venturing through the World of Adepts for so many years, Greem knew well that risk always came with opportunity. The more you hoped to gain, the more you risked losing. The two factors were always proportionate.


    ¡°You haven¡¯t mentioned the unfortunate part!¡± Greem calmly asked.


    ¡°The Feathered God seems to be pretending to be weak. When Mary led her subordinates to attack its kingdom and kill its subordinates, it chose to hide its strength and bait them deeper into its territory. At the moment, Mary is leading her vampires to the capital of the troll empire. That is where the den of the Feathered God is located.¡±


    Upon saying this, Alice stole a quick, concerned nce at Greem.


    ¡°I can sense that an intense battle will break out there between the two of them. However, I simply cannot see the specifics of how things will develop. That is the den of the Feathered God, after all; the power of faith obscures it. I cannot see its machinations, nor how things will proceed, even though I have advanced to Fourth Grade.¡±


    ¡°Which means Mary will be in danger?¡± Greem solemnly said.


    ¡°It is a foreign ne. My Fate senses cannot extend that far. However, I can sense that Mary is standing on a very crucial crossroads of Fate. She has one foot in the grave and the other above ground. There are simply too many variables that can affect the future.¡±


    ¡°I will contact Gargamel and Meryl immediately. We will mobilize as much of the Crimson n¡¯s force to help Mary as we can. The magical machine army and the magical golem dragon. I want all of them mobilized. I don¡¯t believe the natives will be able to survive the attacks of the ferocious machines with their bodies made of flesh and bone. Since the Feathered God wants to y dirty, I will just have my troops destroy his entire home!¡± Anger red in Greem¡¯s heart when he heard that Mary would be in danger.


    ¡°Uh, you still don¡¯t understand what I mean,¡± Alice sighed again. ¡°This is both danger and opportunity for Mary! Don¡¯t you want Mary to have a bright future? This venture is her opportunity. If she can grasp it, it will belong to her. If Mary fails to grasp it, or if we were to intervene, what could have belonged to her will slip past her fingers.¡±


    Alice shot another nce at Greem as she said this.


    ¡°Are you...sure you want Mary to always remain as a weak little adept that has to rely on you? Will you take on all the danger for her? Make her give up on all the opportunities shees across and safely grow up under your wing?¡±


    Greem fell silent.


    ¡°Moreover, you can¡¯t forget Mary¡¯s personality! Do you think she will like a life like that? In all honesty, the reason she chose to venture alone and take such a huge risk was that she was clearly affected by news of my advancement. If we were to rob her of her best chance to gain power at this time, she would probably go mad.¡±


    Greem fell silent. He finally made up his mind.


    ¡°Shadow Demon, head to Seawoods ne immediately. Find and protect Lady Mary. Remember: as long as she is in no danger of death, you are not allowed to lift a single finger, regardless of the losses incurred by the vampires. Go.¡±


    A light flux came from the shadow beneath Greem when he gave his order. Everything returned to normal afterward. If it weren¡¯t for the soul connection he had with Shadow Demon, he would not even be able to sense it leaving.


    ¡°This is more than enough preparation on our side!¡± Alice nodded and said, ¡°Mary¡¯s not an idiot either. She will not simply step into the den of that damned serpent without a guarantee of winning. Meanwhile, the opponent is no more than a Fourth Grade Feathered Serpent with ess to some divine powers in the end. Since it is trying to hatch its egg, Mary will have a chance to defeat it, shouldering the risk in the process. It¡¯s just a matter of whether she can grasp that opportunity now!¡±


    Since they had already made ns, Greem decided to force himself to avoid thinking about the things happening in Seawoods ne. He changed the topic of conversation.


    ¡°How did you advance to Fourth Grade this time? Could this have something to do with the ¡®Heir of a ne¡¯ you mentioned previously?¡±


    Alice was all smiles when this topic was brought up.


    ¡°The reason I managed to advance this time was all thanks to you bringing that strange soul back from Morrian ne. I managed to abduct arge amount of Fate power from the dying Morrian ne through that soul. That was how I managed to advance.¡±


    ¡°What happened to the soul?¡±


    ¡°She gave me the powers of Fate, and I gave her a body made of manifested energy. She is in my Tower of Fate now. She has shut herself in my private study and is fervently memorizing all the magical knowledge there.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s an arcane apprentice and the heir of Morrian ne. Are you not worried she will cause some sort of trouble?¡±


    ¡°Let her make as much as trouble as she can!¡± Alice remarked casually. ¡°I am not the one that¡¯s protecting her now. The Fate power of the World of Adepts is. I don¡¯t know what the nar consciousness is nning for her, but it¡¯s obvious that it has its eye on her.¡±


    Greem hesitated for a moment when she saw Alice mention this. Finally, he couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    ¡°Alice, given what you know, what is the fundamental difference between adepts and arcanists? Is it possible we share the same origin?¡±


    Alice simply smiled.


    ¡°We are adepts, not mages or arcanists. Wee from chaos and will return to chaos. Even if all living things perceive us as evil, that will not change our true origin of chaos. Bing an adept means danger, taboo, and the unknown will always apany us.


    ¡°Mages and the arcanists might havee from the same origin as ourselves. However, for the sake of spreading their so-called civilization and passing on their knowledge, they repeatedly removed the chaotic portions of their systems. Everything dangerous and unknown containing the adept arts were removed, leaving behind only spells and arcane arts that can be systematically cast and unleashed.


    ¡°This might increase the universality of magic and allow untalented individuals to be part of the system. However, the adept arts lose an incredible amount of power when doctored in such a fashion, as well as the trace of origin connection they possess with the nar world.


    ¡°Moreover, do you think that what decides the might of a group of spellcasters is the number of its members or the might of their greatest users? Greem, you are already a Fourth Grade adept. You should be able to sense it now. Who has more value? A single Fourth Grade, or ten Third Grades?


    ¡°Take yourself as an example. How many Third Grades are required to be able to match you inbat? Ten? A hundred, two hundred? In your eyes, it probably doesn¡¯t matter how many Third Grade creatures there are. They would never be formidable enough to be your enemy!


    ¡°The extinct Arcane Empire had once forged such a brilliant and beautiful arcane civilization. They were just like us. They were spellcasters with a simr origin. However, in their developmental process, they abandoned the excessively bloody and cruel portions of being primal spellcasters. They organized their primal magic and turned it into a neat little system. They called this civilization. They called it progress. Where are they now?


    ¡°Such a massive empire. Such incredible amounts of resources. If they had not pursued stability and limited their individual powers, then a blood ritual would have been enough for them to instantly create arge group of arcanists at the Great Adept level! If the Arcane Empire had managed to develop a Ninth Grade Great Arcanist, would the Arcane Empire still have been invaded by their enemies and taken apart alive as they had?


    ¡°The arcanists are gentle and elegant. They have vast knowledge yet are kindly and close to themon folk. However, they never train their bodies and Spirits, relying primarily on their arcane facilities inbat and magic. Adepts are heretical and selfish. They never care about whether their means and methods match the values and morals of worldly society. In most cases, adepts can be very cruel to their own kind. They do not reject taboo magic like blood rituals or voodoo poison.


    ¡°It is because of all this that the paths of development for arcanists and adepts differ so much.¡±

 Chapter 1173 - Muri’var, The Troll Capital

    <h4>Chapter 1173 Muri¡¯var, The Troll Capital</h4>


    Seawoods ne. The troll capital.


    Muri¡¯var.


    As the capital of the trolls who ruled over Seawoods ne, Muri¡¯var¡¯s size and magnificence were beyond the imagination of an outsider.


    Muri¡¯var was built on a mountain.


    Truthfully, the entire city was carved out of the mountain itself.


    A gentle slope was dug out of the belly of the mountain at every interval of height, from the foot of the mountain to the peak. Tough, stone buildings were built on these slopes. Steps of stone, carved out of the mountain itself, connected these slopes. Stone totems standing at over two-meters-tall lined these steps, and at the entrance of every step were braziers made of stone.


    Looking up all the way from the bottom, there were as many as a hundred of these sloped stone tforms where settlements and buildings could be seen.


    Even though the mountain appeared to be covered in multipleyers of stone buildings, it did not seem at all crowded or messy from a distance.


    Meanwhile, there was a grand, towering set of steps that led from the bottom of the tower to the peak. An exceptionally magnificent andrge temple could be seen looming at the end of the ten thousand stone steps.


    Every dawn and dusk, all trolls living in Muri¡¯var gathered near these stone steps and knelt down, facing the temple. They would pray for the Feathered God to continue protecting the trolls, to bless them with power, and to allow the Degu Forest to flourish with life.


    However, the trolls had started praying for one more thing over the past few days since the arrival of the foreign invaders. They prayed for the Feathered God to unleash his divine might and protect the trolls from the gue¡¯s infection.


    Awhile ago, the troll army sent to search for the invaders in the forest had retreated in defeat. What came back along with them, apart from the many casualties, was that terrifying gue!


    The trolls, whose living standards remained at a primitive level, had no means of constructing an effective medical system. In addition, they were all strong, healthy individuals that rarely fell sick. Consequently, no more than thirty or forty voodoo doctors were in the troll capital. Moreover, most of these voodoo doctors were at First or Second Grade.


    The higher-ups of the empire and the voodoo doctors recognized the terror of the gue. They ordered the infected to stay in temporary camps beneath the mountain, restricted from entering the capital or returning to their homes. However, it was apparent that this order was not properly obeyed!


    No one knew how or through which vector, but the gue had still spread into the city.


    In just a single night, over half of the twenty-three thousand citizens throughout Muri¡¯var had been infected with this terrifying gue.


    For a moment, pitiful trolls shrouded in yellow poison cloudsy stranded all over the city. They coughed violently, too weak to even get up.


    And this result was already thanks to their strong and resilient bodies!


    If this gue had been released in a human city, it would have been filled with tens of thousands of gue creatures when morning came. The same gue on the trolls only took away their mobility and left them suffering in agony.


    Meanwhile, several muscr and impatient trollmanders were gathered on a stone tform in the temple. They furiously shouted at a frail voodoo doctor leaning on his staff.


    ¡°Ye¡¯ke, are your men able to do this or not? When will you be able to dispel this gue?¡±


    ¡°I can¡¯t tolerate this any longer. Over half of the boys under me have already copsed, and you fools are still sitting on your hands.¡±


    ¡°Hurry up,e up with a solution. My little Zin¡¯ro is still suffering from the gue at home! If anything happens to her, you voodoo doctors won¡¯t get a single piece of your annual contribution from our Zan¡¯gu tribe.¡±


    The only ones that could gather here were the leaders of the various tribes. At the same time, these tribal leaders were also mighty Third Grade troll warriors. Still, they were all helpless against the sudden gue. They could only furiously shout and holler at this leader of the voodoo doctors.


    Ye¡¯ke, Third Grade voodoo doctor and the only Third Grade voodoo doctor throughout the troll empire!


    He was seven hundred years old now.


    He had seen countless disasters and cmities throughout his long life. As such, he had not lost his cool when faced with this fearsome gue, as all the other trolls had. Instead, he remained calm andposed.


    ¡°Silence! All of you bastards, shut up.¡±


    Ye¡¯ke stared at the impatient, angry trolls around him and tapped his staff against the ground. A violent current of air knocked them back and caused them to stumble backward. At the same time, the silhouette of a massive Feathered Serpent appeared behind Ye¡¯ke.


    It was a powerful creature with unusual, feathered wings and golden scales. A ferocious light gleamed in the two emerald-like eyes on its t, full hide as the serpent seemingly red at everyone present.


    The entire room instantly fell silent.


    All the trolls got down on one knee and ced a hand over their chest, respectfully offering their devotion and worship to the Feathered God.


    ¡°The enemy approaches.¡±


    ¡°Due to Ka¡¯no¡¯s inability, a trace of my origin power has fallen in the enemy¡¯s hands.¡±


    ¡°I require that you retrieve it.¡±


    The Feathered God hissed, its unusual voice reverberating in the air and so sharp it could tear the eardrums off of a lesser being.


    The trollmanders couldn¡¯t help but look at each other when they heard the Feathered God¡¯s orders.


    Finally, a troll mustered the courage to speak.


    ¡°O¡¯ Great Feathered God, where are the enemies located, exactly?¡±


    ¡°The west...they are close. I can almost smell the stench they give off. They propelled the gue that has spread throughout Muri¡¯var. The gue cannot be fully cured unless my origin power is retrieved.¡±


    The Feathered God gave clear orders. Naturally, this left no room for the troll leaders to negotiate.


    They hurriedly acknowledged the order and left the voodoo doctor¡¯s ce, hurrying back to their tribes to gather their forces.


    The projection of the Feathered Serpent did not immediately disappear once the troll leaders left. Instead, itmunicated with Ye¡¯ke for a brief moment before dissipating into the air.


    ............


    This ce was an unusual space in Seawoods ne.


    It was no more than a hundred thousand square meters in area.


    However, simr to Muri¡¯var, there were gray and white stone all over this ce. There were also forests of magnificent statues and many, many trees.


    At the center of this unusual space, through a path covered with moss and several tiny swamps, was a massive den built out of huge boulders.


    The air here was humid and warm like tropical forests tended to be.


    A massive, one-meter-tall egg was ced on a small stone tform within a pile of ash-white bones. The Feathered Serpent coiled silently by the egg, caressing it with its tail while blowing golden lightning at it.


    The destructive lightning of the past now appeared to be gentle and soft. It circled the egg, splitting into smaller, thinner spars of electricity that were then slowly devoured by the egg.


    Once it had eaten enough of the golden lightning, a mental fluctuation of satisfaction emanated from within the egg. When that happened, the life inside the egg stopped consuming and instead fell asleep to digest this golden lightning that contained traces of the nar origin¡¯s aura.


    It was only when the egg was asleep that the female Feathered Serpent could rest for a brief moment. She closed her eyes and opened her mouth, waiting for the male Feathered Serpents to feed her. These male Feathered Serpents served as both her servants and her guards.


    The only things in this kingdom of Feathered Serpents were the beasts used as livestock and the Feathered Serpents themselves.


    There were twelve Feathered Serpent guards in total, all of whom were male. They were all at Second or Third Grade. The only female Feathered Serpent was Zuka, the totem god worshipped by the forest trolls.


    After several thousands of years of nourishment from the power of faith, Zuka had managed to grasp an understanding of some divine powers. Her strength had also advanced to beginner Fifth Grade.


    However, out of her instinct as a magical beast, she had still exhausted a phenomenal amount of faith power and divine power to give birth to a descendant. During this process of hatching the egg, her ability had also fallen from beginner Fifth Grade to advanced Fourth Grade. She had to face a long, three-hundred-year period of weakness.


    Zuka, the Feathered God, had to breathe golden lightning for three days and three nights before the life in the egg was finally full. Thus, when it eventually fell asleep, Zuka let out a breath of relief and coiled up at the egg¡¯s side, closing her eyes to rest.


    However, every time she tried to go into deep meditation to recover her powers, her mind would be disturbed by an unusual energy flux, leaving her with no peace.


    ¡°Bastards...these damned invaders! I will tear you to pieces and scatter your ashes!¡±


    Having been roused from her slumber by this strange flux, Zuka became increasingly impatient and angry.


    Her loud and sharp screech instantly filled thend, causing the entire space to tremble.


    All the magical creatures that heard this screech cowered in fright, unable to move on the ground.


    Even the Feathered Serpents lowered themselves out of fear and red their wings, unsure of how they had angered their mistress.


    The life in the egg was also obviously stirred awake. It hissed and let out a mental fluctuation of frustration.


    The furious Zuka hastily cast away her anger and used her gentle lightning to coddle the egg once again.


    Zuka straightened her body and looked through this unusual space. She could see from the temple atop of Muri¡¯var, her gaze directed west.


    ¡°Those damned invaders have obtained a part of my origin power. They are using some unusual methods to attack me with it now. Hmph! When I am finally free to move, I will teach you a lesson!¡±

 Chapter 1174 - Voodoo Ritual

    Chapter 1174 Voodoo Ritual


    Inside a forest somewhere near the troll capital.


    A voodoo ritual was being held in a hidden underground cave.


    The host of the ritual was Remi¡¯s old witch subordinate. Remi himself stood to the side and watched the entire process with Mary.


    The cave wasn¡¯t veryrge, the ground was uneven, and there were some ashes left on the ground from a burnt-out bonfire.


    It might have been the den of a giant carnivorous magical beast in the past. Unfortunately, its home was far too close to the troll capital. Consequently, this ce had obviously been turned into a crude camp for the trolls.


    There were public living areas, rest areas, armories, and many small storerooms below the cave. A party of seven trolls had been stationed here. However, they were now part of the voodoo ritual and could never return to their homes.


    An area had been cleared in the camp, and the bones and skulls of countless beasts and trolls had been piled together as fuel. Their souls and flesh were stripped by the array beneath them and had been reduced to a single sickly-green ghost fire. The me silently licked at an unusual crystal hovering in the air.


    There were far too many tragic souls bound up in the ghost me. They cried and howled and cursed. The array gathered their powerful hatred and resentment and turned it into a terrifying voodoo curse that was directed at the power crystal.


    The power crystal called to something somewhere within the troll capital due to the resonance between the origin of its powers. This incredibly powerful voodoo curse followed the crystal¡¯s unbreakable connection to its source and slowly corrupted it.


    Through the voodoo ritual, Remi could even hear a furious screech reverberating through the principleyers.


    Clearly, the origin of the power had discovered the curse and was expressing its fury.


    Sadly, its anger was not only unable to incite any fear on Remi¡¯s part but even made him increasingly excited.


    Cursing a god¨Cno, cursing a divine creature¨Cwas a profound experience. Any curse adept would be more than proud to talk about such an adventure!


    That was why Remi had epted this ¡®scary¡¯ task without any hesitation when Mary produced the power crystal in front of him. This task was scary because there was no doubt that this ritual would deeply infuriate the Feathered Serpent.


    When she went on a berserk rampage and exacted reckless revenge, nothing would stand in her way. Only a few of the vampire expedition army could escape alive.


    ¡°How is it working? Are you able to spread the gue to that beast?¡± Mary knew nothing about voodoo rituals. She did not understand anything, even after watching for the entire day. She had no choice but to ask patiently.


    Remi rolled his eyes when he heard Mary¡¯s question.


    ¡°Lady Mary, you overestimate our abilities! The opponent is a divine creature! We can¡¯t even cast a mere Weakening Curse on it, let alone a gue. A slight mistake, and this ce just might¡ª¡±


    Just as he spoke, Remi shuddered and turned to look in the direction of the voodoo ritual.


    The dark space above the ritual abruptly distorted and shattered. A blinding bolt of golden lightning shot out from the rift in space.


    The old witch hosting the ritual was caught unaware. She screamed out loud as the st of lightning struck her.


    The clothes on her body instantly turned to ash. Her dirty, messy, short hair stood on end, and her skin was scorched ck. There was even ck smoke rising out of her open mouth.


    Fortunately, the old witch had already been turned into a Third Grade gue creature. A bolt of ¡®divine¡¯ lightning wasn¡¯t enough to kill her.


    As she struggled to get up from the ground, Remi opened his mouth and blew a thick cloud of yellow poison mist at her.


    The poison smoke quickly seeped into the witch¡¯s body, rapidly healing her and undoing the damage done by the lightning strike.


    However, the divine energy left behind by the lightning was not so easily dispelled. The old witch¡¯s aura was unavoidably weakened.


    At the sight of this, there was something different in Mary¡¯s eyes when she once again looked at Remi.


    ¡°You are very smart!¡± Mary calmly said.


    ¡°Thank you for your praise!¡± Remi still had a yful smile on his face, just like always.


    ¡°Earlier, you said that you couldn¡¯t even transmit a curse onto the serpent. What¡¯s the point of continuing this voodoo ritual, then?¡±


    ¡°Lady Mary, the voodoo ritual might not be able to curse the Feathered Serpent, but it can corrupt and affect its mind. Between a smart and sly Feathered God, and a Feathered God driven mad by her own emotions of anger and fury, which would you choose?¡±


    ¡°Obviously, the second one. That creature possesses absolute power against us; we cannot face her head-on. However, should she ever lose control of her power, our chance will have arrived! Are you...sure you have a way to make her lose her rationality?¡± Mary asked doubtfully.


    ¡°If her mind were truly imprable, I wouldn¡¯t be wasting time here.¡± An expression of thought appeared on Remi¡¯s face. ¡°Ever since we built a connection to the Feathered Serpent¡¯s origin through the ritual, I have been somewhat confused. She...doesn¡¯t seem to be as powerful as the trolls describe her to be.¡±


    ¡°Oh? What have you discovered?¡±


    ¡°Either the information was incorrect, or the serpent is currently in a weakened state. Either way, the Feathered Serpent is certainly not at Fifth Grade. It is only a Fourth Grade creature at the moment! Otherwise, the divine punishment from earlier would not have been so trivial!¡±


    ¡°Not Fifth Grade, but Fourth?¡± Mary was pleasantly surprised.


    She did not have Alice¡¯s ability to see through an enemy¡¯s secret with just a tiny hammer and a little piece of bone. Every piece of information about the enemy had to be obtained with blood and life on the battlefield.


    That was why Mary was both happy and surprised to hear Remi¡¯s deduction. She wasn¡¯t sure what to do now.


    If the enemy was indeed Fourth Grade as Remi imed her to be, then Mary and her vampires did have a chance at victory. As a vampire adept from the World of Adepts, she felt no fear in her heart when fighting against an opponent of a lesser ne, even if that opponent was a grade higher than her.


    It was for a simple reason. Mary held the absolute advantage in knowledge, technique, equipment, and experience!


    The nar natives might not know anything about the adepts, but adepts could obtain plenty of information about them through tomes or knowledge crystals. Do away with the effects of nar suppression, and adepts from the World of Adepts were superior to these primitive, lesser-ne natives in every regard.


    Inbat power alone, Mary¡¯s vampire army might not be able to fight against the troll warriors that numbered in the thousands. However, with a ¡®tiny¡¯ gue, Mary had managed to force back that terrifying army of trolls without drawing a single drop of blood.


    Mary and her vampires still felt no fear even as they faced the capital and its thirty thousand trolls. Instead, she was nning with all her might to capture everyst troll. Moreover, their schemes included the totem god hiding behind the scenes¨C the Feathered God.


    What gave her the confidence to do so was the difference in their homeworlds and worldviews.


    As an adept from a major ne, Mary thought of herself as the predator, even if she was weaker than the opponent. It didn¡¯t matter how strong or how ferocious the enemy was; in the end, they were no more than a slightly fatter boar.


    However, while she was scheming the downfall of the Feathered Serpent, Soros stepped into the cave. He had been standing guard outside.


    ¡°Master, there is movement from the capital. A vast army of troll warriors is heading this way. It seems like they are searching for us!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! That damned snake must be in a hurry if she¡¯s sending those trolls after us. Notify all the vampires. Move out. Draw them into the forest and kill everyst one of them!¡± Excitement overtook Mary¡¯s face. ¡°I don¡¯t believe that damned snake can remain peacefully in her den when she loses all these believers!¡±


    ¡°If she can tolerate a loss like this, that would only mean that something serious has truly happened to her. If that happens, then we will fight our away into her den. Let¡¯s go.¡±


    A sharp, whistling gale blew across the cave as Mary left their hiding spot with her vampires in tow.


    Meanwhile, the Third Grade poison witch was still hosting the voodoo ritual. Remi would remain here as well. Any trolls that managed to make it here past the vampire¡¯s defensive line would not be lucky, but incredibly unfortunate.


    After all, they were basically walking into the jaws of death!


    ............


    Seawoods ne. Somewhere in the Degu Forest.


    No one knew when, but arge patch of dark substance had appeared in the skies above a clearing.


    This substance bubbled in the air as if it were liquid, seemingly very active and impatient.


    Finally, the nar space tore open, and pitch-ck shadow substance surged out of the rift, instantly turning the clearing into a realm of darkness.


    Two ghostly lights lit up in the murky shadows of the endless darkness.


    Shadow Demon was a magical machine and was hardly affected by the nar powers. It had broken free of the nar suppression almost instantly.


    ¡°Searching for Lady Mary. Protect her.¡±


    Shadow Demon mumbled to itself in an odd, robotic tone. It quickly locked onto Mary¡¯s position.


    ¡°Northeast. 1350 kilometers.¡±


    With this information in mind, Shadow Demon promptly moved out.


    Unlike other magical machines that either marched on the ground or flew through the air, Shadow Demon traveled in an unusual fashion.


    With its Shadowstalking ability, Shadow Demon would flicker every once in a while, reappearing in a massive shadow cast by a tree in the distance. After half a second, it would disappear once more and appear in a shadow another hundred meters away.


    Through this silent Shadowstalking, Shadow Demon was able to cut across the thousands of kilometers of forest rapidly and approach Mary¡¯s location.

 Chapter 1175 - Darkblood Arrives

    <h4>Chapter 1175 Darkblood Arrives</h4>


    Space, Exodar Camp.


    There was a grand tower looming at the center of the camp.


    The magical light shimmering around the tower was bright and eye-catching, even amidst all the towers in Exodar Camp.


    The door of a privateboratory on the twenty-third floor suddenly burst open. Great Adept Ulnak coughed violently as he rushed out of the room. A cluster of strange smoke could be vaguely seen in the doorway behind him. It was gathering into a humanoid form and surging towards the entrance.


    Ulnak quickly escaped the room and casually shut the door behind him.


    Unfortunately, as fast as he was, traces of smoke still managed to escape. They gathered in the air, seemingly trying to manifest as something again.


    Boom!


    A brightly colored fireball exploded in the center of the smoke, drowning everything in a sea of fire.


    Ulnak still couldn¡¯t rx after the fireball had detonated. He threw two more fireballs and finally chose to stop once he had confirmed that all the smoke was gone.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    A loud explosion rang out behind the door. It seems as if there was a gigantic creature that was trying to escape the room and was furiously attacking everything in sight.


    Ulnak frowned and gave an order in a chilling tone, ¡°Cammpus, conduct a thorough cleanup on Lab Seven.¡±


    Cammpus was the name he had given the tower spirit.


    ¡°Understood, my lord!¡± The tower spirit promptly reacted after receiving the owner¡¯s orders.


    A loud, unusual roaring came from within the room. A short momentter, everything fell silent.


    ¡°Cleanup on Lab Sevenpleted. Berserk magical creation has been exterminated. All machinery and facilities in the room have been destroyed. Recements required. Specific lists of repairs are as follows: requesting permission from the owner to use tower reserves to conduct repairs.¡±


    A list of resources and items reverberated in his mind. Ulnak couldn¡¯t help but feel his head hurt.


    The Cloud Giant Potion he had been working on had failed and cost him a lot of high-grade resources in the process. In addition to the costs of rebuilding a high-gradeboratory, it was a massive loss, even for a Sixth Grade Great Adept.


    Four million and two hundred thousand magical crystals.


    That berserk Sixth Grade experiment had caused him to lose four million and two hundred thousand magical crystals.


    It was practically the equivalent of a Third Grade dragon¡¯s hoard. No wonder Ulnak¡¯s face was so dark right now!


    ¡°Cammpus, clear out Lab Five and prepare a set of Cloud Giant Potion ingredients for me.¡± Ulnak gritted his teeth and prepared to try once more.


    ¡°Lab Five has been cleared out. However, remaining resources are insufficient for a Cloud Giant Potion.¡±


    ¡°What are we missing?¡±


    ¡°Three hundred grams of Ancient Giant spinal cord.¡±


    ¡°Hss.¡± Ulnak felt his teeth hurt now.


    The Cloud Giant Potion he was trying to brew was a Sixth Grade potion. The Ancient Giant spinal cord required as an ingredient was an exceptionally rare resource. Trying to obtain any of it in the short term was nearly impossible.


    The Ancient Giants had been extinct for tens of thousands of years. Trying to get a preserved supply of their spinal cord was incredibly tricky.


    Ulnak had only been fortunate enough to obtain a set of usable spinal cords after stumbling across a small ne that contained a group of creatures with Ancient Giant bloodline. He had to ughter over a hundred pseudo-giants and repeatedly extract and refine their bodies to obtain what he needed.


    Where was he supposed to restock this ingredient now that it was all used up!?


    Just as Ulnak was being bothered with frustration, Cammpus brought him more news.


    ¡°Warning. Warning. Intense energy radiance detected outside of Exodar Camp. Target Location: ...... Adept Kaelf of Inspections sent a query 27 hours ago on intervention from the camp. Currently awaiting your reply!¡±


    Inspections were a department subordinate to Exodar Camp. They were responsible for the security and order around the camp. Kaelf was a Fourth Grade adept and Head of Inspections.


    ¡°Twenty-seven hours ago? It seems like brewing this Cloud Giant Potion has kept me out of the loop.¡± Ulnak smiled viciously. ¡°Cammpus, pull up Kaelf¡¯s report!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    A short momentter, a magical mirror the size of a table was floating in front of Adept Ulnak. All sorts of books, notes, and tiny objects were ced on top of the mirror-table. A parchment written full of pretty runes hovered above the table. It glowed faintly with a red light that indicated it was a matter of great urgency.


    Ulnak tapped the parchment with his right hand, where the Ring of Authority was ced. The parchment unfolded itself and revealed its contents.


    ¡°Mm? A new camp? The Crimson n...a steel city...the Istanal n¡¯s forces.¡±


    After reading through the report presented by Inspections, a vicious expression appeared on Adept Ulnak¡¯s face. He quickly waved his hand and establishedmunications with Kaelf.


    A strange man with golden skin and no hair or eyebrows appeared on the screen. The adept hastily bowed when he saw Adept Ulnak.


    ¡°What is the situation now?¡± Ulnak yawned and asked impatiently.


    ¡°The fighting is still going on.¡±


    ¡°They are still fighting? How is this possible? The Istanal n has plenty of high-grade adepts. How could they still be in a stalemate against a n that only just set foot in space? Have all the high-grade adepts of Istanal n died?¡±


    The golden-skinned adept smiled bitterly at Great Adept Ulnak¡¯s question. The image on the screen changed as the magical mirror turned towards the battlefield in the distance.


    ............


    The battle was raging on!


    As the defenders, the Capital of Steel had demonstrated shocking defensive and offensive power.


    In just one month, the Capital of Steel had expanded to every corner of the floating rock. Its thick metal tes had firmly enveloped the floating rock, and the center had be the core of the city.


    The rock itself was now ted heavily in armor, while tall towers of metal could be seen everywhere. Countless cannons reached out from the fortresses, pointing in every direction in space.


    Meanwhile, a grand, magnificent metal pce stood at the center of all the buildings. Its entrance was open. In fact, it was the only entrance in and out of the rock. An army of ferocious magical machines was in formation in a wide za in front of the pce.


    At the moment, the Capital of Steel was like a metal hedgehog curled into a ball. It hid its weakness underyers of thick metal tes while protecting itself with a forest of magic energy cannons.


    On the opposing side was an army of adepts numbering three thousand.


    They all wore the same emblem on their chest, the emblem of the Darkblood Army of the Istanal n.


    The Darkblood army was the most famous adept force of the Fifth Grade Istanal n.


    All their members were made up of Darkblood adepts from a different ne.


    It was said that these adepts were creations of bloodline synthesis. They were artificial creations. These adepts could not advance through their own power. Their only path forward was even more powerful and advanced bloodline synthesis experiments.


    In all honesty, they were little more than humanoid voodoo beasts with certain abilities unique to the adepts!


    All the Darkblood adepts rode on strange, gigantic owls. They circled the Capital of Steel. They waved their magical staffs every time they dove at the city and unleashed elementium magic of terrifying power.


    They were of varying grades. The leader was a Third Grade Darkblood adept, with over seventy others being Second Grade. The rest still had an average power level of advanced First Grade.


    This party of surprising power had thoroughly blockaded the Capital of Steel. They had formed multiple squadrons and bombarded the city from above.


    Bright shes of fire and colorful elementium explosions could be seen everywhere from their violent magical attacks. The elementium explosions never stopped, engulfing the entire battlefield in fire and fury.


    The Capital of Steel wasn¡¯t sitting by and watching its doom either. A web of cannon fire covered the skies and retaliated against the adepts.


    The Darkblood adepts and the mutated owls they were riding were all protected by magical shields.


    The shields of an ordinary First Grade Darkblood adept could resist about five to seven shots from the magic energy cannons, while the more powerful Second Grade adepts could endure up to fifteen attacks. As long as they didn¡¯t charge into the midst of the cannon fire, or were targeted by multiple cannons, there was no chance of them dying.


    They also employed gueri tactics. They split up into multiple packs and drew the Capital of Steel¡¯s firepower to exhaust its reserve of elementium energy. Should any Darkblood adept¡¯s shield shatter, they would retreat immediately and return once their shields had recovered.


    The Fourth Grade adept of the Istanal n in charge ofmanding the Darkblood army had aprehensive n.


    They had already done their investigations before they came here.


    The Crimson n had not built an adept tower here at all.


    The massive city of steel beneath them was not protected by any adept tower. Naturally, this meant that it could not be supported by a tower¡¯s resources. The more magic energy cannons the enemy revealed and the more frequently they attacked, the greater the exhaustion on their energy reserves.


    How many magical crystals could a ¡®small,¡¯ newly-advanced Fourth Grade n have in reserve!?


    Given the intensity of their firepower, this battle alone would be enough to cripple the Crimson n economically!


    That was why the Darkblood adepts only appeared to be eager to fight while not actuallymitting very much to the battle.

 Chapter 1176 - The Bloody Battle Begins

    <h4>Chapter 1176 The Bloody Battle Begins</h4>


    The ¡®fierce¡¯ and difficult battlested for over twenty hours, and the Darkblood Army only lost around thirty First Grade adepts.


    The Capital of Steel had not been too severely damaged, either. Apart from the first fewyers of metal tes being sted apart, and some of the watchtowers being brought down, it had not suffered any damage. Meanwhile, over a hundred of the First Grade magical machines had been destroyed, while not a single high-grade magical machine of Second Grade and above had been lost.


    These numbers alone were evidence of how gentle the battle had been.


    If this had been a conventional war between adepts, the number of casualties could have easily been ten times the current amount!


    The energy shockwaves produced by the battle had even drawn the patrols of Exodar Camp here. However, upon seeing the emblem on the Darkblood adepts, the patrol decided not to intervene in the battle. Instead, they sent a report up to their authorities.


    This incident involved the Fifth Grade organization, Istanal n. Ordinary patrol adepts had no power or authority to be involved in such a fight. Moreover, this was the border region of the Exodar Camp. Strictly speaking, it wasn¡¯t part of the camp. The patrols could only watch the battle unfold in silence.


    It was precisely because of this that the Fourth Grade adept of the Istanal n was so brazen in starting a war. Otherwise, any adept n that started trouble in Exodar Camp would not escape punishment from the stationed Great Adept, even if they won the battle in the end.


    When the battle finally dragged out past the twenty-hour mark, the Fourth Grade adept of the Istanal n realized something was wrong.


    If...if the Crimson n was really sustaining this city with magical crystals, they would have exhausted everything by now. They would be spitting out blood over their heavy economic losses. Yet, even though the Darkblood adepts had already lost a squadron, the enemy metal fortress¡¯ firepower was still as ferocious as ever before. There were absolutely no signs of ack of energy.


    ¡°Bastards! There must be something strange with their fortress! We can¡¯t drag this out any longer. Zuval, charge into the city with a toon and establish a fortified point.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    Upon hearing the Fourth Grade adept¡¯s order, a Third Grade male Darkblood adept with a sinister expression and a hooked noseughed wickedly. He patted his owl, and five hundred Darkblood adepts dove down at the city.


    ¡°Wenno, you specialize in nt magic. Once Zuval establishes a fortified position, you will summon magical vines and breach this damn rock to its very core.¡±


    ¡°Understood, as you wish!¡±


    Wenno was a Third Grade male adept whose entire body radiated a faint, green light. All sorts of vials and bottles hung from his body. He bowed and acknowledged his order, then waved his hand and led his three hundred direct subordinates down at the city.


    Visit ouric site ReadRead.live


    ¡°Dust, Doria, continue attacking the Capital of Steel with all you have and provide cover for Zuval. Remember, go as hard as you can!¡±


    ¡°Understood! ¡± ¡°Understood!¡±


    Another two Third Grade female Darkblood adepts epted their orders and led their forces out of the sky.


    With the Fourth Grade adept¡¯smands, over two thousand Darkblood adepts joined the fray in a single instant, causing the battle to instantly reached the peak of its intensity.


    At the core of the rock, seven hundred meters deep inside, Gazlowe¡¯srge brain was submerged in a viscous liquid. He was using his incredible mental powers to control everything happening within the city.


    An unusual metal hat of unmistakable goblin design had been ced on his quivering brain.


    The shiny yellow surface indicated that this was an unusual hat forged of bronze.


    The reason it was unusual was because of its size.


    This hat would be small, even for a human. How was it supposed to be ced on the brain monster¡¯s giant brain, which measured well over sixty meters in width, was anyone¡¯s guess! Moreover, the ¡®hat¡¯ seemed to be an amalgamation of many assorted pieces of circlets, bands, screws, and otherponents. The soldering craftwork of the device was also incredibly crude. It looked like a mash-up creation made up on the spot.


    A thought amplifier device. That was what this thing was.


    Obviously, it was one of the many goblin creations produced by the Goblin Research Institute!


    Even Gazlowe had to hand over two Motherships in exchange for this product.


    Yet, this seemingly shoddy device had enhanced Gazlowe¡¯s brainwaves by over three times. It made his mental powers more potent and his reach more prative.


    Under Gazlowe¡¯s control, the entire core region of the rock had been carved out, leaving arge cave that was five thousand meters in diameter. All the magical machine factories, refineries, workshops, and assembly lines had been stuffed in here. Supported by more than sufficient magic energy, these buildings continued to excavate the metal ores of the rock and turn them into magic energy machines and weaponry.


    In the past, Gazlowe would not have been able to support such arge-scale operation on such a massive rock, even with the ultra-magic generator furnace as his power source.


    Now that Greem had sessfully established trade with Molten Fire City, the Crimson n could obtain a steady supply of Queyras alloy. This unusual alloy was only a rare adept resource in the hands of others. In Greem¡¯s hands, it could be turned into an unimaginable source of magic energy.


    Since Gazlowe had so bravely chosen to stand on the frontlines of the n¡¯s expansion into space, Greem naturally would not let him down. Over the past month, the Capital of Steel had been reinforced with five magic generator furnaces.


    With the tremendous amount of energy from all the furnaces, and the constant supply of excellent ores from the boulder, the Capital of Steel had not stopped expanding since the moment it took root.


    All the ores dug out from the rock were sent to the workshops where they were separated, selected, filtered, smelted into metal, refined, synthesized into alloys, and subjected to many other processes. After being turned into the alloys required by the Capital of Steel, they would be used to create legions of magical machines to fill the never-ending ranks of the city¡¯s guardians.


    With energy and metal in hand, the Capital of Steel had the foundation required for ceaseless expansion.


    In all honesty, the Capital of Steel had built countless mechanical eyes and probes in the past few weeks. These machines were sent all over space.


    The probes had visited every floating rock in the area.


    Their locations, theposition of the rocks, the nature of the metals, the number of reserves, and the ratio of rare ores were all precious pieces of information that gathered within Gazlowe¡¯s mind.


    In all seriousness, Gazlowe might have a moreprehensive and thorough understanding of the distribution of the rocks in this area, as well as theirposition, than even the stationed adepts of Exodar Camp.


    If the enemy hadn¡¯t arrived suddenly and so quickly, Gazlowe would probably already be considering where he should be establishing his second base.


    However, Gazlowe had sealed away this thought for the moment. Instead, he focused all his efforts on dealing with these uninvited foes!


    Not only did twenty hours of low-intensity fighting not exhaust the Capital of Steel¡¯s reserve of magic energy, but it even allowed Gazlowe to gain an additional three hundred tons of alloys, four hundred First Grade magical machines, and over two dozen Second Grade machines.


    If it weren¡¯t for the sake of tricking the enemy, Gazlowe would not need to leave the exterior of the Capital of Steel as tattered and bruised as it appeared to be. With all the power he had at hismand, repairing all of the damage sustained by the city so far would not take more than a few minutes.


    When Gazlowe¡¯s pervasive mental powers picked up on the enemy¡¯s grand invasion, he immediately activated the two magic generator furnaces he had kept on standby. They increased the magic energy supplied to the city by an incredible amount.


    A torrent of magic energy surged through the metal pipes and was transported to every corner of the city. The fallen towers and buildings were lifted as if they were liquid metal, then reshaped and reformed.


    The damaged and destroyed cannons were quickly reced with new weapons fresh off the assembly line.


    Of course, all this happened within the Capital of Steel. No one could see this happening from the outside.


    When the armies of Darkblood adepts activated their shields and dove down against the rain of cannon fire, numerous magic energy cannons emerged from the metal towers that had risen from the ground. All of them fired simultaneously.


    The dark space of the gxy instantly turned as bright as day!


    The excessively concentrated and violent magic energy attacks were like a massive web of destruction. They enveloped the Darkblood adepts and rained down upon them.


    The ferocity of the attack, and the surprising intensity of the magic energy, caused the faces of all the adepts to turn white.


    Dammit! What a terrifying attack!


    Just as the heart of the Fourth Grade adept plummeted, a massive cluster of fireworks went off in the center of the battlefield. A horrifying energy tide immediately devoured the first few hundred Darkblood adepts to arrive in the city.


    Beng! Beng! Beng!


    Such concentrated fire could not be defended against, even with defensive shields ten times more powerful than what the adepts had.


    As their magical shields shattered, wild magic energy surged in, devouring the one hundred Darkblood adepts charging at the forefront.


    Energy ripples, elementium explosions, severed limbs, and sttered bodies.


    A hundred First Grade Darkblood adepts and eleven Second Grade Darkblood adepts had be the first sacrifices of the Capital of Steel¡¯s retaliation. Most of the owls beneath the adepts had been riddled with holes and torn up by the energy sts. Their ripped-up bodies and blood fell from the sky like rain.


    Some of the adepts who were the focus of the attacks had been vaporizedpletely. Not a single trace of their existence remained!


    The atmosphere of the battlefield froze over in an instant.

 Chapter 1177 - The Might of Magic Energy

    <h4>Chapter 1177 The Might of Magic Energy</h4>


    Darkblood adepts riding onrge owls continued to dive down.


    The energy beams firing from the Capital of Steel surged into the sky, so densely packed that there was simply no space to dodge.


    The Darkblood adepts¡¯ colorful shields glowed, rippling violently underneath the barrage of energy beams. The color of their shields quickly turned from yellow to red, signaling the shift to extreme danger.


    The shields of many low-grade adepts shattered. Their bodies were wrapped up in the energy storm where they were torn to shreds, cast down from the sky like a rain of blood. At the same time, fearsome spells cascaded from the skies, instantly baptizing all of the city¡¯s buildings in a torrent of destruction.


    ¡°Don¡¯t bother with those buildings. Land now!¡± Zuval, the adept put in charge of the vanguard by the Fourth Grade adept, realized that breaching the enemy¡¯s wild line of fire on their owls was near impossible.


    He let out a battlecry and jumped off of his mount. His entire body turned into a meteor burning with ck mes as he crashed down upon the metal za before the pce at the center of the city.


    As fast as the wind, as fierce as fire.


    The rapid meteor endured hundreds of shots from the energy beams and crashed violently into the edge of the za with immeasurable momentum and power.


    A deep, muffled boom rang out.


    Shockwaves of ck fire spread out from the point of impact, sting countless pieces of shattered metal into the distance. The metal shards shot into the buildings nearby, riddling them with holes.


    A tall and ferocious Darkblood giant stood up from within the pir of dust. It raised its head and let out an intimidating roar. There was in a massive crater that was twenty meters wide and seven meters deep. A one-meter thick metal foundation could be seen at the edge of the hole, distorted and broken from the impact.


    However, as Zuval lifted his head and roared, all the magic energy cannons on the towers near the point of impact turned around. They pointed at this foolish, reckless Third Grade adept.


    Ci! Ci! Ci!


    The next second, countless energy beams crashed against the body of the giant. The destructive magic energy instantly devoured his form.


    Visit ouric site ReadRead.live


    Violent energy, crackling electricity; the entire battlefield was filled with blinding light. Terrifying sizzling sounds could be heard, quickly followed by the pungent smell of burnt flesh.


    The attacks finally paused for a moment, and the light of the energy beams faded away. Everyone could see the giant once again.


    Tragic. Exceptionally tragic.


    The opponent¡¯s five-meter-tall body was now riddled with holes. Fountains of blood wildly spewed forth from the injuries. His crippled limbs were covered in signs of energy devastation. There was frostbite from the frost beams, scorch marks from the lightning sts, and gashes left by the wind magic.


    However, the magic resistance and resilient lifeforce of a Third Grade adept allowed Zuval to endure these attacks and sessfully survive.


    As the Capital of Steel adjusted its magic energy cannons and prepared for the second round of violent attacks, a strange soaring sound came. Over a hundred meteors burning with ck fire crashed into the city, causing massive shockwaves and pirs of dust to rise and spread out.


    The Darkblood Giant forces led by Zuval had sessfullynded on the Capital of Steel!


    However, just as they made a sessfulnding, the magical machines hiding in outposts and fortresses all around the metal za emerged. They began to attack these Darkblood Giants that were scattered all over.


    Thus, a few dozen smaller battlefields of particr intensity immediately appeared on the surface.


    This time, the magical machines, with their surprising numbers, were the ones on the offense. The Darkblood Giants were the ones that had to defend against all the attacks passively. The battle between the two forces instantly covered the Capital of Steel in the mes of war!


    The forces led by Adept Wenno were the second group to arrive on the surface of the Capital of Steel.


    Over three dozen Darkblood Giants, each standing at over five meters tall, formed a tiny circle. Using theirpanion¡¯s body as a shield, the remainder of them were able to survive the barrage of cannon fire. Meanwhile, the other Darkblood Giants charged forward through the rain of fire and shed with the magical machines.


    On one side, you had giants of incredible strength, and on the other, you had a horde of fearless magical machines. The two forces shed on the metal za in a banquet of flesh and blood. Neither side held back as they traded heavy blows in meleebat and inflicted terrifying casualties at every moment!


    While the Darkblood Giants drew the violent firepower of the Capital of Steel, the Darkblood adepts led by Wenno took out green seeds from their magical pouches and threw them into the cracks in the rock beneath them.


    They immediately began chanting an unusual spell, formed runes around them, and cast these runes into the ground.


    A short momentter, the earth quaked as the rock itself rumbled!


    Several terrifying, fiend-like magical vines emerged from the ground, quickly growing in size and length. They twisted together to form an evenrger and more fearsome humanoid creature. The roots of the magical vines were still digging through the rocks below, but the humanoid monster on the surface was growing just as quickly.


    In the blink of an eye, a hundred-meter-tall humanoid nt creature appeared in front of everyone. The nt monster struck at the few towers surrounding it.


    Its method of attack was just as strange as its existence.


    Two giant green hands made of thousands of twisting vines reached forward. The vines at the palm extended forward like a torrent and pierced the tower cannons. The next second, green vines started to grow from within the metal tower, moving about like agile tentacles.


    These vines would be able to prate anywhere where there was space, filling the area with their wildly growing vines and branches. The nts, all twisted together, could whip and pierce any moving objects. They could also entangle and wrap around the cannons entirely before crushing them into scrap metal.


    Even more of the vines were fighting against the magical machines stationed within the metal towers.


    These vines slithered everywhere like snakes, whipping at everything within sight and trying to reduce the magical machines to scrap. Meanwhile, the magical machines fought as hard as they could with their chainsaws and methrowers, causing violent battles to ur all over the towers.


    This massive nt creature might be no more than Third Grade in power, but the amount of pressure it was exerting on the Capital of Steel wasparable to a Fourth Grade adept. With the monster¡¯s resilient life force and the near-endless growth of the vines, the chaos it was inflicting on the city was superior to even that of a Fourth Grade adept.


    If this nt creature were allowed to continue its devastation, the Capital of Steel would no longer be able to organize a retaliation of sufficient scale and organization to repel the enemies!


    Gazlowe instantly activated Magic Generator Furnaces Three and Four, directing power from each of them to the giant magic energy cannons he had been hiding.


    Two massive metal towers, each measuring two hundred meters in diameter, rumbled as they rose from the ground around the za. When they reached two hundred meters high, they stopped growing any further. Instead, they turned around and revealed the thirty-meter-wide cannons at the center.


    When everyone saw the cannons, magic energy of shocking intensity had already been gathering within. Spiral runes lit up along the tower as the horrifying, howling sound of surging energy filled the air.


    ¡°Wenno, dodge.¡±


    A loud voice boomed out in the air. It was the Fourth Grade adept of the Istanal n.


    Third Grade Adept Wenno, who was hiding inside the nt monster, had long since realized that the two cannons had locked on to his position. However, while the giant magic energy cannons were charging up, his ears, mind, and thoughts were all upied by the strange sound created by the charging energy.


    When he finally returned to his senses and tried to dodge in horror and shock, his limbs felt as heavy as lead. It was like he was trying to swim against the current. Even taking a single step was incredibly difficult.


    Spiritual pressure? Spiritual pressure from where?


    With the vast knowledge and experience of a Third Grade adept, Wenno was able to instantly recognize the unusual power that was affecting his body and mind. However, before he could produce the appropriate magical equipment to neutralize the mental power affecting him, the magic energy cannons in the distance trembled. Two energy fireballs that had been concentrated to the limit curved through the air and crashed into the nt monster.


    The vines that were supposed to be as tough as steel were vaporized instantly. The two energy fireballs prated several dozen meters of brambles and thorns, finally crashing onto Wenno¡¯s magical shield.


    A muffled boom.


    A red sun of horrifying heat and brightness rose from within the nt monster, vaporizing everything within a thousand meters in devastating fashion.


    Adept Wenno and all one hundred Darkblood adepts around him were turned to sma without a chance to scream. Their life, soul, and anything that might have been part of them had vanished without a trace.


    The only thing left in the world was the blinding white light and the unbearable waves of heat.


    The power from thebined shots of two giant magic energy cannons was alreadyparable to the all-out attack of a Fourth Grade adept!


    Back then, even the Fourth Grade amethyst dragon, Toril, had to retreat from the giant magic energy cannon. That was even though amethyst dragons were known for their resilience and excellent physical defenses. How could these Darkblood adepts of no more than Second and Third Grade ever survive such destruction?


    Both the Darkblood adepts caught up in the fighting, and the patrolling adepts watching from afar, were horrified. Their faces flushed white, and their hearts beat violently in shock.


    They tried to put themselves in poor Wenno¡¯s position. Could they have survived such a terrifying energy attack? The answer in their hearts frightened them to their very core.

 Chapter 1178 - The Fourth Grade

    <h4>Chapter 1178 The Fourth Grade</h4>


    Wenno died!


    And along with him, one hundred and thirty-two Darkblood adepts.


    There were also over three hundred other adepts that were wounded by the shockwave from the giant magic energy cannons. Among them was Darkblood Giant Zuval, who had been fighting on the frontlines.


    The two magic energy cannons had only fired the one time, and they had killed a Third Grade Darkblood adept while severely injuring the other. The nt monster that had been ravaging the battlefield had also withered and died in an instant. Such a result could be called miraculous, considering there were no Fourth Grade adepts on the Capital of Steel¡¯s side!


    This one attack had also shocked the Fourth Grade adept of the Istanal n to his core!


    As a veteran Fourth Grade adept, he had looked down on the Crimson n for daring to venture into space despite being no more than a newly advanced n. However, that horrifying attack from earlier had caused cold sweat to break out all over his body.


    Thebined power of the two magic energy cannons was alreadyparable to an all-out attack from a Fourth Grade adept. He would be at significant risk of injury if an attack like that struck him. After all, the magic shields that adepts sustained with their power weren¡¯t a match for such a powerful energy attack.


    It was the main reason why most adepts preferred to remain in their private towers!


    While humans could be distracted in battle, magical machines would never be rattled.


    Taking full advantage of the enemy¡¯s distraction and shock, the magic energy cannons had immediately turned and focused on the individuals that had been wounded in the shockwave. Two rounds of concentrated fire took away the lives of another twenty Darkblood adepts.


    The brazen attacks of the Capital of Steel had finally infuriated the Fourth Grade adept.


    He, who had been hiding behind the scenes since the start of the battle, finally stepped up.


    It wasn¡¯t out of cowardice that he hadn¡¯t lifted a finger. Instead, it was because of an unwritten rule in Exodar Camp.


    As long as no Fourth Grade adepts were involved in an outpost in space, any of the battles that urred were only considered ordinary skirmishes and fights. The authorities of Exodar Camp would not intervene.


    However, if adepts of Fourth Grade and above were involved, the chances of intervention by the authorities would increase tremendously.


    For instance, as ferocious at the battle earlier was and as many adepts had died, the patrolling adepts would only watch on from afar. They were content with not doing anything as long as the fight did not affect the necessary order of Exodar Camp.


    However, now that the Fourth Grade adept of Istanal n could not help but join the battle, the fight¡¯s nature had changed drastically.


    Several patrol parties gathered together near the battlefield. They began to discuss whether they should intervene directly. Magical messages were sent over and over to Exodar Camp. Even Lord Kaelf, peak Fourth Grade and Head of Inspections, was stirred by the reports. He hurried to the scene of battle immediately.


    When Sixth Grade Adept Ulnak finally received news of the incident and cast his attention to the battlefield, the fighting had already reached a peak!


    The Fourth Grade adept of the Istanal n was a fearsome body-refining adept. He wore fine yellow leather armor on his body. He didn¡¯t have too many other essories or equipment and appeared rather empty-handed. However, he had a strange ck sword on his back that emitted a concerning aura.


    He was neither handsome nor ugly. His looks were as ordinary as theye.


    However, when he took a step forward and released all of his power, everyone¡¯s expression turned solemn. They could sense the wild, overwhelming force that was radiating through space.


    Even Gazlowe, who was hiding in the heart of the rock, couldn¡¯t help but be nervous. He immediately raised the security alert of the Capital of Steel to its maximum degree!


    Through the sh of their auras, he could already sense the chilling killing intent radiating from the opponent¡¯s very soul.


    It was obvious that the Capital of Steel¡¯s stubborn resistance and devastating retaliation had angered the Fourth Grade adept. He intended to attack with all he had!


    In the previous battles, the battle situation had appeared to be split sixty-forty due to Gazlowe¡¯s intentional show of weakness. The Darkblood Army had a sixty-percent chance of victory, while the Capital of Steel only had a forty-percent chance.


    On the surface, the Darkblood Army had some casualties, but the Capital of Steel was suffering even more.


    However, if you were to perform the calctions, you would be shocked to find that the losses were not even at all, and not in the Darkblood Army¡¯s favor! The losses incurred on the side of the Darkblood Army were actual Darkblood adepts. Meanwhile, the Capital of Steel had lost several metal fortresses, a few more metal towers, and over two thousand magical machines.


    In numbers alone, the Capital of Steel had certainly lost far more than the Darkblood Army.


    However, considering the fact that the goblin factories beneath the city could endlessly forge magical machines at practically no cost, it was apletely different matter. This trade of the lives of adepts for the lives of magical machines was undoubtedly terrible for the Istanal n.


    As the true face of the Capital of Steel was always hidden underground, no one could see the truth of its operations through its thick metal tes and the thousands of meters of rock. That was why the Capital of Steel was able to drag the enemy into its favorite fashion of war¨C a ¡®difficult¡¯ and arduous process of attrition.


    However, when the Fourth Grade adept decided to move, the entire condition of the battlefield change.


    The might of a Fourth Grade adept couldn¡¯t be more evident here.


    The man took out his sword and stepped down from the air. One step at a time, he slowly walked towards the metal hall at the center of the city. With every step, he casually swung his sword at one of the metal buildings.


    Where the shapeless sword aura reached, ck smoke appeared. It didn¡¯t matter how sturdy the buildings were or whether they were forged of rocks or metal. They shattered in an instant and exploded into countless twisted pieces.


    Gazlowe saw all this with his own eyes.


    An inconspicuous line cut across a squadron of magical machines that had just walked off the assembly line and arrived on the surface. The machines instantly fell apart, copsing into countless pieces of metal shards andponents.


    The shapeless sword aura sliced against the ground, creating a hundred-meter-long rift across the rock. When it sliced a tower, the upper half of the tower screeched and copsed to the ground, the surface of the cut itself smooth and clean.


    Meanwhile, all retaliation against the Fourth Grade adept was blocked by a strange, distorted forcefield. It didn¡¯t matter how many energy beams or fireballs there were. As long as they weren¡¯t concentrated together into a single attack, they couldn¡¯t do anything to this body-refining adept.


    If the Capital of Steel wanted to restrain his movements, it would have to rely on a powerful attack from the giant magic energy cannons.


    Without any hesitation, the two massive towers beside the metal hall started spinning once more, revealing the two terrifying cannons.


    Ci! Ci! Ci!


    The strange soaring sound of gathering energy rang out once again. Magic power of tremendous intensity surged through the energy pipes, through the tower, and finally converged on the cannon.


    The energy circuits that spiraled within the cannon lit up sequentially as shocking and violent energy rapidly gathered within. Itpressed, over and over. The energy aura leaking from the barrel spread out like an overwhelming wave. It was a terrifying sight to behold.


    The man with the magical sword smiled wickedly. He stepped against empty air, and his entire person flickered, dodging Gazlowe¡¯s undetectable mental focus.


    As powerful as Gazlowe¡¯s mental powers were, he was still a Third Grade creature after all. Trying to limit the opponent¡¯s movements with spiritual pressure and then sting him with the cannon was a good idea. However, it was practically useless against a Fourth Grade enemy.


    In fact, the moment his shapeless mental appendages emerged from the Capital of Steel, the Fourth Grade adept instantly noticed them. He even managed to figure out Gazlowe¡¯s approximate location based on these mental tendrils.


    However, out of fear of those two fearsome giant cannons, the Fourth Grade adept didn¡¯t dare step inside the city. He couldn¡¯t attack Gazlowe himself if he refused to step into the range of the cannons. The other thing that limited the Fourth Grade adept¡¯s movements was the faint trace of Fourth Grade aura he could sense hiding inside the city.


    Since he dared lead his army here to assault the Crimson n¡¯s outpost, he had naturally done his research. The Crimson n was a Fourth Grade organization protected by a Fourth Grade adept. The legendary fire adept Greem was well-known within Zhentarim.


    It was said that he had been severely injured in an expedition to another world and had even wounded his soul origin.


    That said, a Fourth Grade adept was still a Fourth Grade adept. As powerful as he was, the man with the magical sword could not ignore the terrible threat posed by a Fourth Grade fire adept.


    Blood was still spilling on the battlefield in brutal and unrelenting fashion. However, everyone¡¯s focus was still drawn to the major yers of the battle. Even the Third Grade adepts¡¯ devastating disy of power could not attract even the slightest of their attention.


    After all, everyone beneath Fourth Grade was an ant or fodder. Only Fourth Grade adepts could decide the oue of this war!


    The somewhat more skinny figure of Greem stood inside the core area of the Capital of Steel, beneath the ground. He finally handed over control of the most important magical machine of the Crimson n to Gazlowe.


    Space rippled and trembled violently. When the white light of the sessful teleportation slowly faded away, a vicious magical machine standing several dozen meters tall appeared inside the room.


    The golem dragon; the Crimson n¡¯s only Fourth Grade magical machine and their highest confidence in a war.


    It had finally arrived in space!


    ¡°It is yours tomand now!¡± Greem coughed lightly, a trace of fatigue appearing on his young face, ¡°Protect the Capital of Steel with it and bring nightmares to our enemies!¡±


    As Greem¡¯s voice disappeared into the wind, the terrifying magical machine finally broke free of the constraints of teleportation space. It started to move its gigantic and vicious body slowly.

 Chapter 1179 - Battle Between the Mighty

    <h4>Chapter 1179 Battle Between the Mighty</h4>


    There was no denying that the magical golem dragon would undoubtedly be the ruler of the battlefield when it appeared!


    By the time the man with the magical sword arrived at the entrance to the Capital of Steel¨Cuncontested and untouched¨Cthere was only a path of endless metal parts behind him. It was like the remains of a city in an apocalypse.


    The two giant magic energy cannons had also gone silent. They had been sliced up into countless pieces by the magical sword.


    However, before their destruction, the ferocious barrage of the cannons had inflicted devastating losses to the Darkblood Army. Initial estimates suggested that over one thousand three hundred Darkblood adepts were dead. Following after Adept Wenno, another Third Grade adept had failed to dodge in time and became a sacrifice to the giant magic energy cannon¡¯s final hurrah.


    At this point, the losses suffered by the Istanal n was already painful to see, even for an observer!


    Even so, all their sacrifice had allowed them to sweep away most of the defenses on the surface of the Capital of Steel.


    At this point, the entrance to the Capital of Steel was only defended by a hundred elite magical machines. The guards¡¯ five leaders were Third Grade, while the remainder of the machines were Second Grade.


    With such a loyal and fearless squad of magical machines, an ordinary invader would have had an incredibly difficult time prating the Capital of Steel. However, when the enemy of this squadron was a terrifying Fourth Grade, no one believed that they could firmly defend their post.


    That was the truth, indeed!


    The magic energy barrier put up by five Third Grade magical machines and ny-eight Second Grade magical machines exploded after the Fourth Grade adept¡¯s third attack. Two of the five Third Grade magical machines also started smoking and crackling with electricity after that attack. Meanwhile, their ferocious retaliation could only leave tiny scorch marks on the adept.


    As the man with the magical sword strode forward, these burns healed and vanished at a visible rate The Physique of a Fourth Grade body-refining adept was often far superior to most magical creatures of the same grade. There was very little magical equipment below Fourth Grade that could leave anysting damage.


    However, just as the Fourth Grade adept prepared to slice all the magical machines into pieces, the metal za before him trembled. All the earth and even the two-meter-thick metal tes on the surface started to tremor like waves at sea.


    The earth shattered into pieces as the metal floor was sted into the air. Several terrifying shes of light sliced the ground into pieces and sent them flying in every direction.


    A never-before-seen monster of gigantic proportions was climbing its way out of the hole it had dug.


    Everyone was shocked at the monster¡¯s strange design and unorthodox appearance while the monster was still emerging. However, when it finally climbed out of the hole and set foot on the za with thundering steps, everybody could not help but gulp. They finally experienced the visual impact of a colossal creature looming over an ordinary human.


    Its metal legs, thick as pirs of stone; its body asrge as a hill; that vicious metallic dragon head and those sharp, gleaming teeth. Shock and fear trembled in the hearts of every human that witnessed the majestic figure of the golem dragon.


    A monster like that should not appear in a skirmish between adepts. The bloody and cruel nar battlefields were the only ce where it could properly shine!


    Even though the Fourth Grade adept had already expected the Crimson n to teleport this magical golem dragon to the outpost at the critical juncture of the battle, he still couldn¡¯t help but gulp at the sight of the dragon.


    The pressure it gave off was simply too immense!


    Anyone who had never faced off against the magical golem directly would never be able to feel the anxiety and pressure that came from staring at such a monstrous creature.


    The Fourth Grade adept with the magical sword was the perfect example. He was quite confident in beating the golem dragon with his powerful attacks, especially considering the dragon¡¯sck of Agility. However, even he had to be wholly cautious and focused when facing off against the golem dragon, which was slowly walking towards him now.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The golem dragon was utterly superior to him in Strength and Physique, simply due to its overwhelming size. His only chance at victory was avoiding the dragon¡¯s ferocious attacks and striking at its weaknesses.


    During this time, he could not be grazed even slightly by the golem dragon¡¯s thick metal legs or its sharp teeth and ws. The two giant magic energy cannons turning on its back were also a massive threat to him.


    The pressure that the Fourth Grade adept had to endure in the process of prating the golem dragon¡¯s defenses and breaking the two giant cannons was mountainous.


    Aooooo!


    The golem dragon intimidated every single fighter the moment it appeared!


    It reared its head and let out a deafening roar as it nged and marched towards the Fourth Grade adept. As it charged ahead, countless holes appeared on the side of its body. A barrage of energy beams and fireballs shot forth from within.


    These attacks were not used to deal with the man in the magical sword. Instead, they were aimed at the other Darkblood adepts who were too close to the battlefield.


    Meanwhile, the two giant magic energy cannons on the golem dragon¡¯s back were trained on the Fourth Grade adept. The roaring sound of gathering energy trembled through the air.


    Boom! Boom!


    Two muffled explosions rang out, and two violent energy fireballs shot forth, as fast as lightning, crashing at the location of the Fourth Grade adept.


    Wild, concentrated magical energy exploded immediately!


    The metal floor where the explosion urred rapidly turned fragile and thin under the effects of the light and heat. It shattered like paper and twisted into an unusual shape. Finally, the metal floor broke into many tiny pieces and was blown away in every direction as lethal shrapnel by the energy shockwave.


    Even the two-meter-thick alloy te had been utterly devastated. The magical machines and Darkblood adepts around the explosion were reduced to ash by the shockwave in less than three seconds and cast into an unknown corner of the universe as if they were made of paper.


    The shockwaves from a battle between Fourth Grade powerhouses were not something that low-grade beings like them could survive!


    The magical machines and Darkblood adepts who had been entangled together in mortalbat now started fleeing into the distance, like ants that had suddenly awoken to their survival instincts.


    Thest magic energy cannon that was left hanging from a barely standing metal tower was the only thing dutifully firing away at its enemies. It spread fire and caused even more disorder on the already chaotic battlefield.


    In the blink of an eye, the metal za was empty. The crowd and the fighting had vanished entirely. Only the giant golem dragon and the Fourth Grade adept were left locked in ferociousbat on that ten thousand square meters of metal za.


    Naturally, the golem dragon was superior in terms of Physique and Strength. However, the Fourth Grade adept had the advantage in speed and Agility. Even though the body-refining adept did not excel at Agility, his speed was still shockingpared to a colossal creature like the golem dragon.


    The man held his magical sword in hand, quickly weaving between the legs of the golem dragon and enduring the barrage of energy beams. Whenever he found an opportunity, he swept with his sword and left a horrifying, half-meter gash on the golem dragon¡¯s leg.


    In the battle earlier, a single swing of the adept¡¯s sword was enough to topple a metal tower. Yet, even though the legs of the golem dragon were barely as thick as the towers, he could not cut them down with a single strike. The main difference here was the presence of intense magic energy.


    The metal towers were only metal towers. As thick as their walls were, they could not survive a powerful strike from a Fourth Grade magical sword. Even though the golem dragon was made of the same material, powerful magic energy filled its entire body.


    The magical sword might able to slice apart magical alloy, but in the process of cutting, its power was unavoidably greatly weakened by the magic energy. That was what made every swing of his sword so difficult and tiring!


    The golem dragon was no longer as clumsy and dull as it had been in the past, now that it was under Gazlowe¡¯smand. Even though its movements were still slow, it was always able to attack the adept or defend against his attacks in a timely fashion.


    The Fourth Grade adept would have to strike the golem dragon¡¯s leg in the same ce seven times to have a chance at severing it. However, with all the sweeping strikes, lunges, and energy beams fired from its cannons, it was nearly impossible to aplish such a feat.


    At the very least, the adept would not be able to cut off a limb without paying a heavy price in the process!


    This Fourth Grade battle had undoubtedly attracted the attention of even more people.


    Apart from Sixth Grade Great Adept Ulnak, who was watching everything through the Head of Investigation¡¯s magic mirror from thefort of his tower in camp, many high-grade adepts of Exodar Camp had also hurried over upon catching wind of the battle. Like the patrol adepts, they hid in the distance and watched this fascinating fight between high-grade beings from afar.


    It was important to note that battles between high-grade adepts rarely urred unless there was some incredible grudge between two individuals. However, whenever a fight broke out between Fourth Grades, it would not stop until one of them was lying dead on the ground!


    That was why high-grade fights like these were rare opportunities for them to collect information on other people!


    Even though they remained hidden, the spiritual senses of the Fourth Grade adepts covered the entire battlefield. With all themotion caused by the fighters¡¯ movements, the adepts could estimate their power levels, even without seeing it up close and clearly.


    The man with the magical sword didn¡¯t want to be stalled by such a clumsy magical machine while being witnessed by so many adepts of the same grade.


    As such, he roared loudly as golden light shone from his body. Countless hooks and spikes appeared on the hilt of his sword, digging into his flesh and drinking his blood.


    After feasting on his blood, the power of the sword increased exponentially. With two swings of the sword and two blinding shes of light, the left limbs of the golem dragon were cleanly sliced off in the middle. The golem dragon copsed to the ground with a great rumble.


    The situation on the battlefield had changed in an instant!

 Chapter 1180 - Dejected Retreat

    <h4>Chapter 1180 Dejected Retreat</h4>


    The initially even battle abruptly turned to one side with a burst of power from the magical sword.


    The audience all around the Capital of Steel was suddenly even more interested now. They watched the battle unfold excitedly.


    Of course, they were genuinely impressed by the Fourth Grade adept¡¯s horrifying offensive power. The magical sword, upon awakening, was so sharp that it was a lethal threat to most Fourth Grade adepts.


    That was what impressed the other adepts so much!


    However, they all had simr means of obtaining a temporary burst of power. Naturally, they knew full well the consequences of using such a technique. It was either a period of weakness that came after, some significant side-effects, or the use of some extremely rare resources.


    It didn¡¯t matter which of these it was. The price of using such a powerful burst of power was always incredibly heavy!


    Of course, the result of using such a technique would often be brilliant as well.


    The magical golem dragon started swaying after two of its legs were severed. It could no longer stand firm on its remaining limbs. However, just as the Fourth Grade adept prepared to take the opportunity and destroy it, the golem dragon unleashed its most potent barrage of attacks so far.


    Energy pirs, energy beams, and energy bolts crashed down on the adept like a ferocious torrent.


    Even as powerful as he was, the Fourth Grade adept¡¯s face flushed white. He weaved between the attacks, trying his best to escape the barrage.


    Meanwhile, while the adept was upied with dodging the attacks, the golem dragon bent down. Countless fine white threads emerged from the severed pieces of its limbs and reconnected with its stumps. The threads then pulled, adjusted slightly, and merged the limbs back together.


    By the time the Fourth Grade adept broke through the web of fire and approached the golem dragon, it had already repaired itself. At the same time, the adept seemed to havee out of his ¡®awakened¡¯ state. That said, apart from his slightly paleplexion, the burst of power didn¡¯t seem to have inflicted any severe side-effects on him.


    The adept and the golem shed once again.


    The Fourth Grade adept undoubtedly had the advantage in this battle due to his agile movements. Most of the time, he was the one that had the momentum. On the other hand, the golem dragon was toorge. It was ill-suited to a small-scale skirmish between adepts like this. It was spending most of its time turning around, barely fending off the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    However, the magic energy cannons all over the golem dragon¡¯s body were still a significant threat to the Fourth Grade adept. Should his movements ever be restrained by the golem dragon¡¯s Dtion Field or Static Barrier, the barrage of energy bolts that followed would be unbearable.


    Thus, the battle continued in this painful stalemate.


    In the end, it was the Capital of Steel that shattered the bnce.


    While the golem dragon upied the Fourth Grade adept, the two giant magic energy cannons that had been destroyed by the adept had been repaired under Gazlowe¡¯s control. When the giant magic energy cannons rumbled and rose above ground once more, everyone was stunned for a moment.


    Four giant magic-energy cannons?


    The gaps in the web of cannon fire werepensated with the addition of these two giant cannons. There was even less space for the Fourth Grade adept to dodge now.


    Finally, with the ferocious attacks from the four giant magic-energy cannons, the adept was finally hit by one of their sts.


    Boom!


    The Fourth Grade adept was sted right out of the Capital of Steel and sent hurtling into the endless darkness of space. Most of the clothes he wore had been burned away, and the magical sword in his hands hummed and trembled without stopping.


    He opened his mouth and spat out blood. There was a scorch mark the size of a washbasin on his exposed chest.


    However, even a wound like that was healing at a pace visible to the naked eye.


    While the Fourth Grade adept was expelled from the battlefield, the golem dragon thundered towards the other Darkblood adepts.


    Sizzling magic energy beams, ferocious energy fireballs, sweepingsers, and giant magic energy cannons bombarded the city like artillery. The Darkblood adepts could no longer stand their ground in the Capital of Steel. They were chased out of the city and into space.


    Without a Fourth Grade adept to hold back the magical golem dragon, it was a terrifying war machine forged from the collective efforts of the goblin engineers of Crimson n. It was a devastating monster against ¡®ordinary adepts.¡¯


    Meanwhile, the magical machine guards marched alongside the golem dragon, like troops around a general. They pursued and hunted down the fleeing Darkblood adepts. It wasn¡¯t until all the adepts had left the Capital of Steel and returned to space that they stopped chasing.


    The Fourth Grade adept smiled viciously when he saw his forces being pursued mercilessly by the enemy. He gripped his sword and prepared to charge back intobat.


    However, he immediately stopped just as he was about to move. He turned his head and looked somewhere in space.


    A male adept with golden skin and no hair or eyebrows had appeared there, standing in his way.


    ¡°Kaelf? Are you stopping me?¡± A cruel expression appeared on the Fourth Grade adept¡¯s face. ck smoke rose around him as if he was about to unleash some terrifying power in his anger.


    ¡°Weston, you have lost this war!¡± The golden-skinned adept showed no fear. He returned the re with his own cold gaze.


    ¡°We have not! As long as I¡¯m still here, we have not lost this war.¡± Weston was utterly furious. ¡°Move aside...I will personally tear that giant metal can into pieces. I want to rip that bastard beneath the city into shreds!¡±


    The golden-skinned adept remained rooted on the spot.


    ¡°Weston, this is Exodar Camp, not a territory of the Istanal n. I don¡¯t know why youunched an invasion against the Crimson n, but you have thoroughly lost this war today. I chose not to intervene in the battle earlier because the Istanal n is a well-established force in Exodar Camp. However, at this point, you had better stop. Otherwise......¡±


    Even though he did not finish his sentence, Weston could clearly read the implication of threat and warning behind his words.


    The golden-skinned adept¡¯s intentions were clear.


    As a veteran force that had existed in Exodar Camp for over a thousand years, the Istanal n was a familiar organization. As the Head of Investigations, Kaelf could have chosen to turn a blind eye to the fighting if their invasion had been sessful.


    However, it was obvious that the neers had the advantage now. If Weston, as anxious as he was to turn the fight around, returned to the battlefield, there was no doubt that he would only expand the scale of this ¡®tiny skirmish.¡¯


    When that happened, Kaelf would be put into an awkward position, as the one who was supposedly responsible for the order of the Camp!


    Weston grit his teeth and shouted out loud, ¡°This...is it your intention, or is it his intention?¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s the difference?¡± Kaelf coldly said, ¡°Lord Ulnak has been watching the battle. He requested I tell the Istanal n something. Your n might be connected with that Lady Maysa, but here in Exodar Camp, he does not wish to hear the name of Maysa again! That is Lord Ulnak¡¯s words, as well as Lord Erlenwald¡¯s intentions.¡±


    The true master of Exodar Camp was Seventh Grade Great Adept Erlenwald. Sixth Grade Ulnak was only one of his many disciples, responsible for managing the affairs of the Camp.


    As a Seventh Grade Great Adept, he was of equal standing to Great Witch Maysa. Naturally, he did not wish to see the hands of an outsider reaching into his territory. That was why his disciple Ulnak was so hostile towards anything that had to do with Great Witch Maysa.


    The Istanal n had gathered arge force of adepts and sieged an adept n that had just established itself in space without any priormunications or negotiations. It was a terrible precedent that could easily throw the order of Exodar Camp into chaos if left standing.


    Weston¡¯s expression froze when he heard the names of the two Great Adepts. Finally, he suppressed his anger.


    He lifted his left hand and turned the strange, snake-eye ring on his little finger. He whispered a few instructions into the ring.


    The Darkblood adepts hovering above the Capital of Steel ultimately let out a sigh of relief when they heard his orders. They started to leave this tragic battlefield slowly.


    The high-grade adepts of the Istanal n couldn¡¯t help but be in low spirits after they took a headcount some distance away from the battlefield.


    Of the three thousand Darkblood adepts, only one thousand was left after the two endless days and nights of fighting. Almost every single of the surviving adepts were wounded, many of whom were crippled. Some of them were barely hanging on, having half their body devoured by the ferocious energy attacks.


    It was the most severe damage that the Darkblood Army had suffered since its creation!


    After a short rest in space, the army slowly grouped up and returned to Exodar Camp. The Istanal n had its own adept tower in the Camp. They could only return to their own world through the teleportation array there.


    As the Darkblood Army retreated, the high-grade adepts watching in the darkness left, one after another.


    However, when they returned to Exodar Camp, news of the Istanal n being defeated despiteunching a surprise invasion against a newly established n had spread.


    This newspletely shocked and surprised the ns in Exodar Camp.


    The Istanal n was a veteran force of Exodar Camp, after all. How could they have been defeated at the hands of an unknown, new n?


    Many curious individuals began to investigate and dig into the affair. They quickly discovered all the background information on the ¡®new¡¯ n.


    As expected, there were all sorts of intriguing information within.


    Thus, the surprising name of the Crimson n quickly became known through Exodar Camp.

 Chapter 1181 - Shadow Demon Infiltrates

    <h4>Chapter 1181 Shadow Demon Infiltrates</h4>


    World of Adepts, Fire Throne.


    In the same utterly isted room, Greem was silently reading the Libram of Wisdom.


    He was on the seventh page already.


    Every page he read had brought him indescribable benefits and tremendous gains.


    Unfortunately, the Libram of Wisdom had a master!


    Before he exterminated the God of Wisdom Hierro, he would not be able to fully take ownership of the Libram of Wisdom and uncover all its secrets. Thus, every time he attempted to read the Libram, it was a battle of wits and courage with his Spirit against the artifact.


    If he won, he would be able to decipher plenty of high-grade knowledge fragments regarding the secrets of the nar world through the pages. Of course, the knowledge could also be rted to divine magic, which he was still unable to use.


    If Greem wanted to obtain more knowledge, he would have to continue struggling with the Libram of Wisdom and decipher the corresponding pieces of intelligence he needed. He would then have to slowly piece all these fragments of information into aplete system of knowledge.


    If he failed, he would have to suffer the retaliation of the Libram of Wisdom and endure a certain degree of damage to his mind.


    Fortunately, this was apletely isted space in a different dimension. The Libram of Wisdom¡¯s origin connection with the God of Wisdom had been cut off. The mental bacsh he had to endure was still well within an eptable range.


    Even more fortunately for Greem, he was aided by the Chip.


    Even if all he obtained were iplete fragments of knowledge, the Chip couldpare these fragments with the existing magic systems in the database. In doing so, it would be able to decipher plenty of high-grade mystic knowledge that was useful to Greem.


    Consequently, Greem¡¯s Spirit had been in rapid flux recently.


    Either his Spirit would rise rapidly due to the excessive amounts of knowledge he managed to uncover, or it would be weakened due to mental bacsh from the Libram. In that manner, his Spirit fluctuated violently, causing him to suffer throughout the process.


    However, the stimtion to his Spirit had allowed it to grow even faster than usual.


    At the same time, the unstable fluctuation of his Spirit left Greem wary of leaving Fire Throne. Naturally, there was no way he could emerge and engage another adept in conflict.


    Even when Mary faced danger in another world or when the Capital of Steel was under siege, Greem could only send reinforcements. He could not put himself in danger. After all, with his damaged Spirit, it would already take him a few decades topletely recover.


    It was not advisable for him to sh against any Fourth Grade opponents before that!


    After carefully and solemnly reading through the seventh page of the Libram of Wisdom, Greem felt something stir in his mind. He hurriedly closed the tome and rushed out of the isted dimension. mes flickered over his body the moment he emerged from that space. His entire person suddenly appeared in another room.


    The interior design here was even more straightforward than the room from earlier. The room contained only a single, gray stone chair.


    Beneath the chair was a runic array of sophisticated design.


    Greem sat on the chair without any hesitation and activated the array beneath his feet.


    The entire room turned dark. As the light projected by the array shifted and changed, an image of a different location was disyed.


    It was a magnificent and grand city.


    It was built against the mountain,yer uponyer, all the way from the foot of the mountain to the very peak.


    All the buildings were made out of stone. They were simple and crude, but bold in their own fashion. Meanwhile, at the top of theyers of tforms where the buildings were situated, at the very peak of the mountain, stood a towering, mighty temple. This temple loomed over the city beneath it, as well as the vast stretches of forest all around.


    Shadow Demon, whom Greem¡¯s Spirit was attached to, was now hiding in the canopy of an ancient tree within the forest. It hid itself in the shadow of the tree, watching the troll capital from a distance.


    ¡°Master, I have found Lady Mary. Should I hurry over now?¡± Shadow Demon conveyed a mental note to Greem.


    The two of them were in separate nes. They could only maintain a synchronous flow of time and space through the might of the tower, allowing for simple mentalmunication.


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to go to her now. Go search for the Feathered God immediately!¡± Greem promptly came to a decision.


    Mary was a very petty person at heart. Even if she knew Greem had sent the Shadow Demon to protect her out of care, she would disapprove of Shadow Demon¡¯s appearance. Mary was a blood master with an army of subordinates, after all! She would never be able to ept it if she needed Greem¡¯s help just to take down a mere totem god!


    It was precisely because of how well he understood Mary that Greem had no intention of allowing Shadow Demon to go to her side.


    He would definitely have to help her, but he had his own thoughts and methods as to how he would be doing so!


    Under Greem¡¯s orders, Shadow Demon dove into the darkness and rapidly rushed towards the troll capital through the shadows.


    The battles outside the troll capital were still raging on.


    Mary led her vampires and newly acquired blood servants in a gueri battle against the troll warriors and hunters in the depths of the forest. Plenty of casualties were lifted out of the woods daily, sent back to the capital for treatment.


    Meanwhile, the fearsome gue was still spreading through the city. It had nearly infected half of the civilians in the lower half of the mountain already.


    Greem¡¯s Spirit was attached to the Shadow Demon¡¯s consciousness. He could see the moaning infected lying in their stone houses through Shadow Demon¡¯s eyes when it traveled through the city.


    It didn¡¯t matter if they were young or old, male or female, strong or weak. They could only remain alone in their rooms and await their deaths once they had been affected. The trolls were exceptionally tough and resilient, and it was because of that that they suffered so much more pain and torture.


    Greem even ordered Shadow Demon to sneak into a few rooms such that he could inspect a few of the infected trolls. He couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by Mary.


    Mary might appear to be brash, impatient, and rough in her ns, but she did have a talent for war. Greem discovered that the symptoms of mutations on the infected trolls were synchronous.


    That meant that the war that her vampires were waging against the trolls in the forest outside was only meant as a means of stalling. She was waiting for the gue to worsen all of a sudden. To avoid startling the enemy ahead of time, she had even requested that Remi dy the symptoms on the trolls that had been infected earlier than the others.


    Greem estimated that the gue would erupt in full force three days from now!


    When that happened, most of the trolls would die of the gue. Half of the casualties would turn into horrifying wights and start a bloody ughter in the capital.


    When that happened, Mary would likely lead her vampires and army of wights to invade the Feathered Serpent¡¯s den.


    This strategy indeed maximized her chances of victory!


    Mary¡¯s arrangement in this regard was already more than excellent. Even Greem himself could hardly improve on it. Thus, what he intended to do was to weaken the Feathered God through his powers.


    That would be helping Mary indirectly!


    Shadow Demon hid in the darkness, leaping from shadow to shadow, silently traveling within the troll capital. The higher up the mountain it got, the more excellent the equipment and clothes of the trolls.


    The number of infected trolls also decreased in number as they climbed the mountain.


    In fact, Greem even found plenty of boiling pots brewing some strange green concoction at the higher parts of the mountain. A pungent, herb smell emanated from these brews.


    These primal brews might not be able to kill the gue viruses, but they could effectively halt their activity. It would reduce the gue¡¯s infectiousness and explosiveness!


    Hmph! It seems like these voodoo doctors were fairly capable. It¡¯s time to reduce their numbers!


    Greem murmured to himself and ordered Shadow Demon to leap between the shadows and search for the leaders amongst the voodoo doctors.


    As expected, Greem found an old voodoo doctor leaning on his wooden staff in a small hut at the peak of the mountain.


    The small hut was filled with the smell of blood and herbs. A dozen women had just walked out of the hut as quietly as they could. The severed heads of several magical beastsy in a pile, the blood all drained from within, making for a vicious sight.


    Meanwhile, the bodies of five apesy beside the carnage, their throats sliced open and a hole torn in their chests. Their blood and hearts had been ced above the pile of disembodied heads as a sacrifice to the great Feathered God.


    A bloody spear stood in the center of all the sacrifices, glowing with the prismatic light unique to high-grade weapons.


    The old Voodoo Doctor Ye¡¯ke had just concluded the blood sacrifice that hadsted for one day and one night. He was lying on the ground,pletely exhausted. He took out several pungent herb biscuits from the jar beside him along with several tattooed scorpions and put them in his mouth. He chewed them thoroughly and swallowed.


    Shadow Demon had just entered the hut when the bloody spear trembled out of nowhere. It let out a crisp and clear hum.


    Ye¡¯ke looked around him in surprise. His murky eyeballs scanned the room but found no signs of intruders.


    Was it an error on the divine spear¡¯s part? It wasn¡¯t very likely!


    After all, the bloody spear was a Fourth Grade divine spear personally bestowed by the Feathered God. It possessed unimaginable power. As such, Ye¡¯ke had never dared to ignore its warnings.


    It was said that the invaders could turn into a strange red bat and scout in that form. Could they have arrived here?


    Ye¡¯ke snorted coldly. He pulled a wooden doll from his belt and threw it to the ground. ck smoke rose around him as a giant mosquito appeared.


    The mosquito was the size of a human head. Its stinger and its legs gleamed with a metallic glint unique to metal weapons.


    ¡°Go, kill all foreign lifeforms in this hut!¡±

 Chapter 1182 - Infiltrating Divine Domain

    <h4>Chapter 1182 Infiltrating Divine Domain</h4>


    As the old voodoo doctor mumbled to himself, the mosquito beat its translucent wings and vanished from sight as it rapidly circled the hut.


    In just a few seconds, the mosquito had covered every corner of the hut. Even the dark corners of the room did not escape its notice.


    Unfortunately, it found nothing!


    Ye¡¯ke couldn¡¯t help but be confused as he continued to hear the mosquito¡¯s beating wings.


    Could the divine spear have been mistaken? He had personally raised this mosquito. It excelled at scouting and sensing any life force present in the area. The mosquito would not miss it if there were indeed any enemies nearby.


    These confusing inconsistencies made Ye¡¯ke doubt himself.


    After using a few spells to confirm the results and finding nothing, Ye¡¯ke was finally confident that the bloody spear humming was most likely only a mistake. The mistake could only be regarded as a whim of that unpredictable Fate.


    Ye¡¯ke was relieved. He reached out, grabbed the mosquito, and shook lightly. The mosquito instantly turned back into a wooden doll. Ye¡¯ke put it back on his belt and stood up. He extended his trembling, frail arm and tried to pull out the spear that was stuck in between the sacrifices.


    However, just as he rxed his focus, a strange ck silhouette suddenly emerged from the shadow beneath him. The sharp ws on the shadow¡¯s arms pierced into the left of his waist and the back of his head and quickly twisted.


    An enemy.


    An intense sense of impending death filled Ye¡¯ke¡¯s heart.


    By the time he realized the danger, Shadow Demon¡¯s attacks had alreadynded in full force.


    A surge of shadow energy burst forth from his ws, erupting in Ye¡¯ke¡¯s heart and brain, instantly destroying all of his life force.


    Ye¡¯ke¡¯s body trembled and fell limply to the ground without even a chance of resistance. Shadow Demon carefully held his body.


    It leaned Ye¡¯ke¡¯s corpse against the stone wall and closed his eyes, which were still wide-open with anger. From a distance, it looked as if Ye¡¯ke had only fallen asleep from fatigue. No one would have imagined he had already been assassinated.


    After a simple arrangement of the murder scene, Shadow Demon flickered forward and put the bloody spear in the room into its storage ring. Its silhouette flickered as it traveled through the shadows out of the hut.


    Greem had invested a lot to create the Fourth Grade Shadow Demon.


    The storage ring he had given it was nothingpared to his other investments. Greem had given all the precious dark-attribute equipment he had just obtained to Shadow Demon.


    Ring of Shadows. Shadow¡¯s Breathing.


    Both of these pieces of Fourth Grade equipment were with Shadow Demon.


    Greem even gave Shadow Demon the Orb of Shadows.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. They were going to pick a fight with a native god in its den, after all. They had to use something powerful if they wanted to guarantee victory.


    That said, being able to obtain a piece of Fourth Grade magical equipment just by assassinating an elderly Third Grade was more than worth it!


    The Feathered God will not be able to create any magical equipment more powerful than this. Even this spear, the Bleeding Spear, was Fourth Grade divine equipment that cost the Feathered God over a hundred years of her faith powers to forge.


    It had been ced with Ye¡¯ke to make it more convenient to summon the Feathered God.


    The Feathered God had not emerged from her den in a few thousand years now. Everything that urred in the troll empire was managed solely by Ye¡¯ke and the other leaders. It was only when the trolls ran into severe troubles that they would pray to the Feathered God for power.


    This Fourth Grade divine equipment was used as a channel to project her power.


    The Bleeding Spear allowed the Feathered God to project her power to any ce beyond her den perfectly. This way, she could propel her power to any corner of the troll empire without leaving the safety of her shelter.


    Of course, the pre-condition to that was that the Bleeding Spear had to be in the hands of the trolls.


    Now that the Bleeding Spear had fallen into the hands of Shadow Demon, the Feathered God wouldck a tool with which to unleash her power.


    It was a good thing for Greem, who was intent on starting trouble against the Feathered God!


    Shadow Demon turned into a cluster of shadows, leaping from shadow to shadow. At times, he would be inside the shadow of a stone pir; at other times, he would be hiding in the shadow of a patrolling troll; sometimes, he would even be inside the flickering shades of a torch.


    It didn¡¯t matter how small the shadows were; Shadow Demon would always be able to hide within.


    Looking from within shadow space, the world appeared to be twisted and distorted. It was apletely different visual sensationpared to the human sight that Greem was so used to. It was something that Greem couldn¡¯t get used to as a human. However, this was home for Shadow Demon. It navigated the shadows as freely as a fish swam through water.


    There were many times where Shadow Demon would choose to hide in the shadow of a patrolling soldier. You could see two ck feet walking above your head through an obscure, gray veil, and you could see the constantly swaying world from between two legs.


    The sight of this, the sensation of all this, made Greem feel dizzy!


    Shadow Demon¡¯s talent for controlling shadow powers was obviously far superiorpared to Greem.


    As such, Greem wasn¡¯t as foolish as to personally takemand of Shadow Demon¡¯s body. He was simply giving out general orders every once in a while.


    This time, Shadow Demon was infiltrating the magnificent temple sitting atop the city.


    Here, the patrols were no longer ordinary troll warriors or troll hunters. The only ones that could set foot in the temple and protect the Feathered God in its sacred domain were carefully selected elite Second Grade trolls.


    However, even they only patrolled the border of the temple. None of them dared take a single step into the temple.


    Thus, when Shadow Demon finally emerged from the shadow of a temple guard, he leaped right into the giant shadow cast by a thick stone pir of the temple.


    Through the shadow, Greem and Shadow Demon could extend their spiritual senses into the hall.


    The hall was empty. Not a single person could be seen.


    However, arge tform was ced at the center of the hall. The statue of a massive, life-like Feathered Serpent stood there.


    Sinister scales, red feathered wings, a long and slender tail, terrifying fangs, and a chilling, gleaming pair of eyes.


    Even though it was only a stone statue, Greem could sense a trace of soul aura on it, one unique to high-grade lifeforms. A faint mental flux engulfed every inch of space in this hall. There was no room for anyone to sneak around.


    If Greem and Shadow Demon¡¯s auras hadn¡¯t mergedpletely with the shadow of the stone pir, they would not have escaped the spiritual senses of that statue.


    At this point, Greem didn¡¯t dare expose even a trace of his aura. He could only borrow Shadow Demon¡¯s ability to sense everything happening within the hall passively.


    The Feathered God was not here, but a spatial singrity to her den certainly existed here.


    Don¡¯t ask why Greem knew this. It was because Alice told him.


    And how did Alice know about this? Heheh! In all honesty, ever since Alice advanced to Fourth Grade, this native god of an inferior ne no longer had any secrets in front of her. If she wanted to, Alice could even peek at her ¡®gracing¡¯ her male Feathered Serpent guards with her ¡®presence.¡¯


    Witches of Fate might not amount to much in battle, but they were horrifyingly powerful when it came to certain unusual domains!


    ording to Alice¡¯s description, that singrity existed inside the statue of the Feathered God.


    The inside of the statue was empty. There was plenty of space for a singrity the size of a finger.


    It would have been exceptionally difficult to sneak into the Feathered God¡¯s den while avoiding the detection of the mental consciousness attached to the statue if it were Greem alone.


    It was nearly impossible.


    However, with Shadow Demon¡¯s help, this was as easy as breathing.


    Greem gave an order, and the Orb of Shadows inside Shadow Demon trembled slightly.


    An insignificant tremor appeared in every shadow inside the temple. It was a negligible surge of power, but it did not escape the Feathered God¡¯s notice.


    The Feathered God¡¯s mental consciousness was projected into the temple at the same instant the shadow powers rippled.


    The eyes of the statue lit up as an overwhelming consciousness descended on the temple. The consciousness quickly calmed down the flux in the shadows.


    Mm? The doing of an enemy? Ormotion in the Shadow World that spread over here?


    The Feathered God¡¯s consciousness formed a delicate web and swept the temple in an attempt to quell her questions. However, she found nothing out of the ordinary.


    No enemies. Something must have happened in the Shadow World then. Somethingrge enough to affect the material world!


    In the past, the cautious Feathered God would most certainly have attempted to extend her Spirit into the Shadow World to search for the cause of the tremor in the shadow powers. However, the extended exhaustion of her Spirit and stamina had caused her to be less diligent.


    Moreover, her temporary absence had caused the little life inside the egg to throw a tantrum again.


    The Feathered God was frustrated once more. She had no time to investigate the reasons behind the tremor in the shadows. She turned and returned her consciousness to her den.


    She had no idea that in the instant her consciousness was projected to the statue through the singrity, an enemy skilled at stealth had brazenly slipped back into her den.


    Just as the Feathered God possessed the statue to search for an enemy, Shadow Demon had arrived in that unusual divine domain with Greem¡¯s mental consciousness in tow.

 Chapter 1183 - Assassinating the Feathered God

    <h4>Chapter 1183 Assassinating the Feathered God</h4>


    Divine domains were not the same as god kingdoms!


    God kingdoms were the homes of gods. They were divine spaces forged by the deities of the World of Gods using their divine power. Every de of grass and every pebble in a god kingdom was made out of the purest divine power.


    Even the citizens of the god kingdoms were formed of the souls of the most religious believers. Their souls were given new form through the omnipotent divine powers of their gods.


    It was because of this intimate connection that the gods used their god kingdoms as an extension of their will and power.


    In all honesty, a god kingdom was the true body of a god. It was an imprable fortress used to protect their soul.


    Divine domains, on the other hand, were far inferior!


    Some gods had insufficient divine power to create an independent divine space. For the sake of their reputation, they skimmed on the process and stole a nar space from a material world. They then used their divine power to iste that space from its original world.


    Other, ¡®poorer¡¯ godscked the ability to imbue a space with their divine power thoroughly. They could only use their divine powers to mark a territory as their own.


    These spaces were disdainfully referred to by the adepts as ¡®divine domains.¡¯


    This divine domain created by the Feathered God was one of the worst divine domains out there!


    It was not fully imbued with divine power, nor popted by divine citizens. Itcked a Pool of Rebirth, a temple, angels, or messengers of any sort. The entire divine domain appeared just like another tropical forest in Seawoods ne. There wasn¡¯t a single sign of any divine modifications.


    If Greem had not just passed through a singrity, he would have believed he¡¯d fallen into a trap and been hurled into some corner of Seawoods ne by the Feathered God.


    The nature of the space here was the same as the outside world. As such, Shadow Demon did not need to spend time getting used to the spatialws here.


    Shadow Demon turned into a cluster of shadows once again. It merged into the shadows around him and slowly made its way to the heart of the divine domain.


    A squad of male Feathered Serpents with defined scales and crackling lightning flowing through their bodies slithered down a winding path in the forest.


    The terrifying aura of a massive carnivorous beast could be sensed along the region they were patrolling. The skeletons and feces of wild animals were everywhere as well. However, it was evident that these beasts feared the Feathered Serpent guards above all else. They scurried into the distance when they sensed the overwhelming lightning energy in the air. Not one of them dared approach the patrol.


    This forest wasn¡¯t exactly massive, but it wasn¡¯t small either.


    The wild beasts living here were all prey that had been caught by the trolls. They were meant as a sacrifice for the Feathered God. As the totem god of the trolls, the Feathered God only needed to feast once a year. However, the amount she ate every year was shocking.


    Consequently, the trolls had no choice but to capture all therge beasts they could find in Degu Forest and rear them within the divine domain. They were morsels of food for the Feathered God to enjoy when she wished.


    The divine domain was a tropical forest all about, home to countless beasts and birds. Meanwhile, an open-air temple whose design resembled that of the trolls stood at the heart of the domain.


    There were even more Feathered Serpent guards here. There was practically a serpent standing guard every few steps. Without any exception, they were all male serpents. Not one of them was female, and not one of them was of another race.


    These Feathered Serpents were more than enough to fend off an ordinary intruder. However, they were basically ants for Shadow Demon, who possessed incredible powers.


    Shadow Demon leaped from shadow to shadow, brazenly following the Feathered Serpents as they patrolled the temple.


    Long tunnels built out of heavy, giant boulders were everywhere. These tunnels were all lined with two Feathered Serpent statues at the entrance. Moreover, it was obvious that these things were not taken care of or maintained in any fashion. Clusters of weeds and vines devoured both the tunnels and the statues.


    Beasts were beasts, in the end. Even if they had be divine creatures because of the power of faith, their instincts as beasts could not be quelled.


    The divine domain was like a giant menagerie. There wasn¡¯t any of the elegance or beauty of the god kingdoms. There was no intimidation or holiness. Even the air was filled with the pungent, beastly smell of animals.


    The home of the Feathered God was obviously somece where an ordinary Feathered Serpent could not set foot.


    Shadow Demon emerged from a Feathered Serpent¡¯s shadow and dove into the shadow of a tunnel. It then cautiously traveled inwards to where the stench was the strongest.


    It was an open-air temple built out of rocks.


    Green rocks that were one meter tall and three meters wide were piled together, creating a ten thousand square meter vast space within. A stone tform stood at the end of the tunnel. The skeletons and remains of all sorts of animals were piled above the tform.


    Arge egg, as white as jade, stood silently in the middle of the skeletons.


    The Feathered God, with her white wings and light green scales, was coiled up around the egg. She used her slender tail and thick wings to cover the egg, asionally breathing lightning towards it.


    Shadow Demon did not approach the tform. Instead, it remained hidden in the shadow of a pir, silently observing the Feathered God on the tform.


    At this point, both Greem and Shadow Demon had shut off all their active sensory abilities. They were only using their passive sensory skills. Moreover, they narrowed their eyes and only nced at the Feathered God with the corner of their eyes. They didn¡¯t dare to stare directly at the Feathered Serpent.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Divine creatures were always incredibly cautious!


    Whenever danger was about to befall them, their divine powers would warn them of the impending crisis through various means. The more powerful divine creatures could even use their divine powers to learn of the origin of the danger and some faint clues about how things were going to unfold.


    Divine beings with the ability of divination were even more terrifying.


    Even if the enemy were only scheming and nning without putting anything into action, they would know. The moment any thought of hostility appeared in the mind of an enemy, they would receive a warning from the world and understand everything that could happen to them in the future.


    Fortunately, the Feathered Serpent before themcked the ability to divine the future or Fate. Otherwise, she would never have allowed a ¡®mortal¡¯ to infiltrate her kingdom and observe her at such a close distance.


    Assassinating a god, even a native totem god, was not an easy matter!


    Even the slightest breeze could trigger a response from their divine power.


    This ce was her divine domain, after all. It was the best-suited ce for her to unleash her powers. If she had time to prepare herself, the divine domain would be as significant to the Feathered God as an adept tower was to an adept.


    Under Greem¡¯s guidance, Shadow Demon remained patient. It hid in the darkness, slowly releasing the power of the Orb of Shadows within its body.


    The Feathered God was only Fourth Grade at the moment, while the Orb of Shadows was a Fifth Grade artifact.


    Just in terms of their power tier, the Orb of Shadows was far superior to the Feathered God¡¯s lightning powers.


    Thus, while the Feathered God was coaxing her egg, Shadow Demon was using its shadow powers to slowly but surely corrupt this space. This corruption was slow and trivial. Each step along the way was so small that it could not possibly attract the attention of anyone.


    However, when these changes continued without pause, the shadows in the temple became indirectly empowered.


    Darkness was everywhere. That also made shadow substance the most capable of spreading out of any other energy substance!


    When one became used to the darkness, that was when the shadow powers became able to seep into hearts and minds.


    Shadow Demon was like a hunter spider that excelled at weaving a web of darkness. It slowly and quietly spread its shadow powers. Meanwhile, it hid deep in the dark, observing its prey without a single sound.


    It was waiting...for an opportunity, for the moment the Feathered God became distracted for even a single second.


    This opportunity would arrive soon because Mary¡¯s invasion was about to begin!


    It was hard to keep track of the flow of time in a divine domain.


    Three days quickly passed by.


    Due to istion from the outside world, Greem and Shadow Demon had no idea about outside events. However, they could figure it out based on the reactions of the Feathered God.


    Sometime on the third day, the Feathered God suddenly opened her eyes. She reared her neck and let out a screech that trembled throughout the divine domain.


    Her scream was filled with anger, hatred, and a sort of berserk rage at having experienced humiliation!


    The Feathered God could sense many of her faith nodes slowly being extinguished from her already sparsework of faith. She sensed the pained howlsing from the hearts of the troll believers and the despair they felt when their prayers fell upon empty ears. These emotions surged into the Feathered God¡¯s mind, making her more furious than ever before.


    ughter...she wanted to tear those invaders apart. She wanted to......


    The Feathered God screeched, and the Feathered Serpents gathered, preparing for an incursion against the enemies. The beasts in the divine domain shuddered in fright. They returned to their dens and dared not show themselves again.


    However, before the Feathered God could even express her fury, the temple turned dark as a shocking storm of darkness engulfed her.

 Chapter 1184 - End of the Road

    <h4>Chapter 1184 End of the Road</h4>


    Enemies?


    An unknown enemy had somehow managed to sneak into her chambers and assaulted her before she realized it.


    Such an unbelievable thing had actually happened to her.


    The shock and horror at being attacked overwhelmed the Feathered God¡¯s anger. She was at aplete loss at what to do!


    In Seawoods, she was the god, the indisputable ruler of the ne.


    There had never been a creature bold enough to challenge her authority and might, let alone someone that dared to bare their fangs at her.


    The long peace and serenity she enjoyed had turned her into a frog in a well. She had believed herself to be an almighty ruler that could have every being act by her will with a single order!


    She could never have known that the adepts ssified even actual gods into various tiers. An iplete being like herself that was only somewhere between a demigod and a true god was no more than a walking source of materials for adepts.


    The ssification, dissection, and research on gods, their divine authorities, and the nature of their divine power were very thorough in the adept¡¯s knowledge system. Consequently, an arrogant native god like the Feathered God was no more than a slightly more powerful divine creature in the eyes of high-grade adepts.


    Divine creatures were still creatures in the end!


    Destroy their souls, and they would still die.


    It was because of how well he understood divine creatures that Greem did not hold any respect for the Feathered God. He did not hold back at all. He ordered Shadow Demon to strike with its most powerfulbination the moment it attacked.


    Shadow Summon, Shadow Assault, Infinite Shadow Arrows, and Piercing Thrust.


    Shadow Summon was an ability of the Fourth Grade Ring of Shadows. It summoned a Fourth Grade shadow assassin.


    Shadow Assault was the ability of the Fourth Grade Shadow¡¯s Breathing. It would create a lightless dagger that would autonomously attack the enemy.


    Meanwhile, Infinite Shadow Arrows was a spell cast by the Fifth Grade Orb of Shadows.


    Piercing Thrust was the only attackunched by Shadow Demon itself.


    Even the Feathered God could not endure so many high-grade spells, despite her divine Physique. In just an instant, she was severely injured by the torrent of shadow spells!


    However, even such a ferocious attack could not kill her.


    The Feathered God could no longer care for anything that was happening beyond the divine domain. She straightened her battered body, and destructive lightning rained down upon the temple.


    Wild and ferocious lightning storms crackled around her body, sizzling when they made contact with Shadow Demon. Bright shes of electricity and ear-piercing crackling sounds could be heard everywhere.


    However, these surges of electricity that could reduce an ordinary Fourth Grade creature to ashes seemed weak when theynded on Shadow Demon. Its fully metallic body gave it incredible resistance to elementium magic.


    Shadow Demon¡¯s body might be glowing bright from all the electricity running about, but it did not stop it from continuing its wild shes. In the blink of an eye, Shadow Demon¡¯s ws had ripped through the Feathered God¡¯s form seven times, almost ripping a hole through her body with each strike.


    Dammit! A high-grade magical statue.


    The Feathered God was arrogant, but she wasn¡¯t foolish.


    She instantly recognized Shadow Demon¡¯s true form and understood that her lightning powers would not work against the construct. Physicalbat was the best option against a tin can with a magic-resistant body.


    The Feathered God screeched and called for her guards. She lunged forth, using her sharp fangs and powerful tail to attack the enemy.


    While the divine domain was thrown into chaos, spatial fluctuations appeared near the entrance of the space.


    A swarm of wights charged forward, immediately engaging the Feathered Serpents. Mary and her vampires took full opportunity of the chaos created by the wights to break in.


    After trading wound for wound and blow for blow with the Feathered God, Shadow Demon flickered and escaped the battle. It had inflicted sufficiently heavy injuries to the totem god. Its figure instantly vanished into the endless darkness.


    The badly injured Feathered God shivered in fright. She thought the enemy was preparing tounch another frightening assault at her. She hurriedly gathered a lightning storm and protected herself, while furiously sting away the shadow assassin and the shadow dagger as she did so.


    The Feathered God did not sense the enemy¡¯s presence even after she had dealt with its two assistants.


    She listened as the fighting outside the temple grew in intensity. Her reptilian eyes focused as she turned around to help.


    However, the moment the thought appeared in her mind, a bolt of darkness shot out of the shadow of a pir. It was aimed straight at the defenseless egg.


    Bastard!


    The Feathered God hastily shielded the egg with her own body and let out a breath of lightning that shredded the shadow bolt to pieces. She then red her wings and destroyed the pir with devastating lightning.


    Unfortunately, her lightning st did not achieve anything!


    ¡°Bastard! You bastard! Come out and fight me if you¡¯re that powerful.¡± The Feathered God was enraged and no longer tried to save her lightning powers. Bolts of raging lightning crashed down from the sky, shattering every pir in the temple into pebbles and rubble.


    Lightning glowed brightly around the Feathered God, illuminating the ce so bright it looked as if it was noon. She was not giving the enemy any chances to leap to her side anymore.


    However, using lightning powers to such a degree was extremely exhausting, even with the Feathered God¡¯s Physique and strength!


    That said, she could not hold back when there was such a powerful enemy at hand.


    Without the Feathered God¡¯s aid, the hundreds of Feathered Serpents in the divine domain could not fend off the horde of ten thousand wights, even if they were all elites. Moreover, the terrifying vampires were always hiding among the wights and ambushing the Feathered Serpents.


    Outnumbered and outmaneuvered, the number of Feathered Serpents were quickly running low.


    Mary and Vanlier fought side by side in a corner of the divine domain. They were slightly nervous as they observed the battle unfold.


    In all honesty, this was the first time in their lives they had ever broken into the kingdom of a ¡®god.¡¯ They would be lying to themselves if they said they weren¡¯t nervous.


    However, they had already nned for the worst. There were already multiple ns for escape that would sacrifice the other vampires without any hesitation. However, the situation was developing in a direction favorable to them.


    The enemy was already at her door, and the Feathered God still remained in her temple, allowing her guards to be ughtered at will. What was happening? Could she have gone mad? Crazy? Or was there something she couldn¡¯t abandon inside the temple?


    Old Vanlier¡¯s eyes rolled around as his mind churned. It was obvious that he was also unnerved by how strangely well the fight was going for them.


    Only Remi and his old poison hag appeared to be at ease as they stood behind the two vampires.


    Remi already knew about everything the moment Greem¡¯s consciousness arrived at Seawoods ne, due to the connection between their souls. However, Greem had ordered him to keep his mouth shut. So, he had to pretend like he knew nothing.


    After an entire day and night of fighting, the one hundred Feathered Serpents finally fell to the wights. After a satisfying feast of blood, Second Grade Blood Elf Mage Isa advanced to Third Grade. She let out a resounding screech of satisfaction when she did so.


    As their blood master, Mary had no reason to stop one of her subordinates from advancing to Third Grade.


    As her subordinates grew in power, traces of pure blood energy gathered around Mary, causing her powers to grow ever closer to that threshold.


    A boiling aura rolled through Mary¡¯s heart, causing her ruby eyes to turn even redder than usual.


    Mary beat her delicate leather wings and rose into the air. She pointed at the temple in the distance and shouted.


    ¡°The aura of blood! The aura of life. Attack!¡±


    Blood Frenzy.


    As Mary worked her magic, all the wights and blood servants lifted their heads and howled. They charged at the temple recklessly. For a moment, silhouettes could be seen everywhere in the divine domain- on the ground, above the tree canopy, and on the cliffs.


    Even the vampires with their own wills felt their blood boil. Their fangs protruded more than usual. They pped their wings and followed after the cannon fodder, quickly advancing towards the temple.


    Upon sensing the approach of the wights and vampires, Shadow Demon opened its mouth and sucked all of the shadow substance in the temple into its body. It then silently vanished into the shadows.


    The Feathered God was stunned for a moment.


    Before she could understand why the mysterious enemy had fled, the tunnels rumbled as an army of strange creatures entered the temple. They swarmed towards her like a constant wave.


    Dammit! A mysterious Fourth Grade enemy had already screwed her over! Now, a bunch of weaklings was trying to look for easy pickings while she was weakened.


    The enraged Feathered God opened her tattered wings and hovered above the egg. Lightning surged around her as an apocalyptic storm of lightning and thunder instantly reduced the wights and blood servants into ashes.


    Such destructive might not only failed to stop the enemy but also only made them rush even faster and ferociously at her. Their crazed breaths, their vicious mouths, and their ugly silhouettes.


    The Feathered God beat her wings without any hesitation, unleashing several waves of lightning sts, exterminating wave after wave of enemies.


    Finally, as the cannon fodder started to thin out, the Feathered God saw many pairs of crimson eyes in the darkness. She finally saw the vampires, all smiling wickedly at her.


    End of the road!


    At this point, there was no longer any turning back. It was a fight to the death!


    There was no need for any orders. All of the vampires charged forward, aiding Mary, Soros, Remi, and the old poison witch in their fight against the wholly exhausted Feathered God.

 Chapter 1185 - Intercepted

    <h4>Chapter 1185 Intercepted</h4>


    Shadow Demon silently snuck away.


    By the time it left, Mary and her vampires already held the absolute advantage in battle.


    Even though the vampires were suffering heavy losses as well, taking down the Feathered God would give Mary a chance at reaching Fourth Grade and also allow the several veterans at Second Grade to advance.


    Thus, Shadow Demon silently left after aplishing its objective, departing right at the eve of the major battle that was toe.


    Some more attentive vampires might wonder why the Feathered God was badly injured even before their arrival. However, which vampire could keep calm and attempt to find the truth with all the blood being shed around them?


    Shadow Demon was quickly weaving through the shadows like a fish in a vast ocean, free and unbound.


    It managed to cross a thousand kilometers in half a day.


    However, when it arrived at the singrity where it would retreat from Seawoods ne, it suddenly stopped and went into hiding.


    The bright sun shone in the sky.


    A warm breeze caressed the trees.


    The trees swayed in the wind like green waves, rustling as they did so.


    A cluster of ck smoke was present at the tiny singrity ahead. It was so conspicuous that it would be hard to ignore it.


    It might look like ordinary smoke to an outsider, but that smoke represented an extreme danger to Shadow Demon and Greem.


    The aura emanating from the smoke was very familiar.


    Shadow Demon could even see the tall and slender finger at the heart of the coiling shadow substance.


    As expected: y nice, and you would be bullied. Ever since they found out about the injury to Greem¡¯s soul origin, these enemies had been sprouting out again and again.


    Greem was resentful, but Shadow Demon still emerged from the shadow beneath a tree. It red at the smoke before resentfully speaking, ¡°I am very honored to see you here, respected n Leader Circe!¡±


    The smoke did not scatter. Instead, it gathered together and formed a strange ck armor around the body of the witch that had now appeared.


    Blinding sunlight cascaded from above, shining on her shadow-d body.


    It didn¡¯t matter how bright the sun was; her silhouette was still faint and obscure. Greem couldn¡¯t clearly see her brows or her skin. All he could see was a slender profile.


    ¡°You¡¯ve improved again!¡± Witch Circe sighed from the darkness. ¡°It¡¯s only been such a short while, yet your Spirit has increased again. It seems like we really have underestimated you! You...honestly, have the most talent of all the people I have ever met in my seven hundred years of being a Dark Witch!¡±


    A smile appeared on Shadow Demon¡¯s cold metal face. It looked around before its gaze returned to the Dark Witch.


    ¡°n Leader Circe, you snuck into this ne and intercepted me, just to make thesements? Where are your subordinates? Why don¡¯t you have theme out as well.¡±


    Circe¡¯sugh was cold and distant.


    ¡°Enough, legendary fire adept, Sir Greem. There¡¯s no need to try and probe me. There is only you and I here today and not a single other Dark Witch!¡±


    ¡°Oh?¡± Shadow Demon¡¯s eyes rolled around. Obviously, Greem¡¯t didn¡¯t fully believe her words.


    ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought that you would run around with the Orb of Shadows even though you know it¡¯s a sacred artifact that the Dark Witches are determined to retake. If you had just stayed quietly in your tower, we might not be able to do anything, but now...¡± Having said that, Circe extended her arms. Two shadow daggers slowly appeared in the air. ¡°Hand over the Orb of Shadows, and I¡¯ll let you go. Otherwise......¡±


    Shadow Demon smiled. The des on its ws shed together and caused several sparks.


    ¡°Call out your subordinates, won¡¯t you! Save us all some trouble.¡±


    ¡°As I said, there¡¯s no need to probe any further! I am Circe, leader of the Dark Witches. I don¡¯t need any help to fight against a Fourth Grade rookie like yourself!¡±


    ¡°Hehehe! You are worried that Alice will be able to sense it if you brought more people along, aren¡¯t you?¡± Shadow Demon still had a teasing expression on its face. ¡°You Dark Witches never change. Even though you¡¯ve already signed an agreement with Alice, you stille here and cause trouble. Aren¡¯t you worried that I will destroy this Orb of Shadows out of anger?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! The Orb of Shadows is a sacred shadow artifact. As long as the Shadow World exists, it will never be destroyed. Destroy it today, and it will reform in the Shadow World in less than a hundred years. Ignorant man.¡±


    ¡°Hehehe. I might be ignorant, but I know this. If the Orb of Shadows is to reform, do you think it will still fall into the hands of you Dark Witches? Without the Orb of Shadows, can your Shadow Expansion n still proceed smoothly?¡±


    Circe¡¯s eyes glowed in the shadows.


    ¡°Good. Simply amazing. To think even an outsider like you knows so much about us Dark Witches! Today I¡¯ll see if this shadow puppet of yours can escape my pursuit.¡±


    Having said that, the two individuals vanished simultaneously, reappearing in another shadow a hundred meters away.


    There were no battlecries or probing of each others¡¯ abilities. There were only two vague silhouettes leaping from shadow to shadow, shing with their des and daggers as they attacked each other. Despite how often they were parrying each other¡¯s attacks, there were no sounds from the shing metal.


    The same techniques and simr abilities were disyed as the two masters of darkness chased after each other in close quarters. An incredibly dangerous melee was unfolding.


    The ws shed continuously with the daggers.


    Sinister, unusual shadow energy would disperse as quickly as it appeared. As the two fighters continued to unleash their abilities, more and more attacks begannding on their opponents, always inflicting some degree of damage in the process.


    The greatest strength of shadow energy was its ability to ignore defense and its incredible corrosive power.


    However, when both fighters were experts at using shadows, these advantages no longer existed. On the contrary, physical attacks were what inflicted the most damage now.


    There was no doubt that Shadow Demon held the absolute advantage in this!


    In the blink of an eye, the two of them had traded over a thousand strikes. They both realized how difficult of an opponent they were up against. They each leaped towards a different shadow, standing still as they stared coldly at each other.


    Circe and Shadow Demon took full advantage of this breathing room. Shadow energy quickly gathered around them and healed their wounds.


    Both of them were rulers of the shadows. They both had tremendous resistance against shadow damage.


    Shadow Demon was also a magical machine, making it immune to some physical attacks. Its physical defense was incredibly formidable. It was also protected by the Orb of Shadows, rendering all shadow magic ineffective against it.


    The fact that Circe could still be on equal standing against Shadow Demon despite these advantages was more than enough evidence of her own tremendous mastery over shadow magic.


    Shadow Demon had been fighting by its instincts all along. Greem might have an abundant wealth ofbat experience, but in this environment of shadows, where everything flickered by so fast without any sound, he could not see any of Circe¡¯s movements at all. Naturally, he could not instruct Shadow Demon on how to fight within the shadows!


    As they were thinking about their next step, Shadow Demon felt something unusual beneath it. It looked down, only to realize several strands of gray smoke were radiating from the shadow beneath it. They silently circled and wrapped around its legs like a rope.


    Rope?


    The thought had just entered Greem¡¯s mind when the gray smoke turned solid and firmly bound Shadow Demon¡¯s legs.


    At the same time, Circe screeched, and five unusual runes glowing with purple and ck light appeared behind her. As Circe raised her daggers, the five runes rushed into her weapons, causing them to glow with blinding light.


    ¡°Seal of Darkness: Annihtion!¡±


    The three pieces of magical equipment on Circe¡¯s body glowed at the same time, quickly projecting power onto her.


    Circe¡¯s face flushed white as her right hand vanished into thin air along with the dagger she was holding.


    Naturally, with how bold Circe¡¯s movements had been, Shadow Demon had noticed what she was doing.


    However, by the time it drew upon the Orb of Shadows¡¯ power to absorb the shadow energy of the ropes and turn them back into smoke, it was already toote!


    A pair of daggers emerged from empty air and stabbed into Shadow Demon back. They sunk all the way to the hilt.


    At the same time, surging shadow energy flooded into Shadow Demon¡¯s body, exploding and producing a bloody hole the size of a fist.


    There was no blood.


    Shadow substance, as thick as ck goo, flowed out from the gash, mixed with several glowing pieces of metal. Through the hole, one could see the fine mechanical gears and axles spinning in Shadow Demon¡¯s body.


    This severe damage caused the orderly gears to malfunction. They creaked as severalponents burst out of the hole.


    What a terrifying attack.


    Thispound strike had at least 5000 points of power!


    An attack of this intensity would be very likely to injure even a Fourth Grade dragon severely!


    If it weren¡¯t for Shadow Demon¡¯s exceptional physical and shadow resistance, it would not have survived. An ordinary Fourth Grade adept would have died on the spot.


    Even Greem felt cold sweat run down his face, despite only his consciousness being attached to Shadow Demon. He hastily ordered for Shadow Demon to retreat. Shadow Demon was very decisive in its escape. It hurled all the high-grade shadow magic it was capable of using at Circe in an instant before flickering away into the distance.


    The Fourth Grade shadow assassin and the lightless dagger might not be able to do anything to the Dark Witch leader, but they could still stall her for a few seconds.


    While Circe was busy defending herself, Shadow Demon flickered and escaped several kilometers away. It then fled towards the distance without turning back.

 Chapter 1186 - Clan’s Future Plans

    <h4>Chapter 1186 n¡¯s Future ns</h4>


    World of Adepts, Fire Throne.


    Inside the same hidden room.


    Greem let out a long sigh and slowly pulled his consciousness back from Seawoods.


    The battle in the distance had only just begun. It wasn¡¯t going to be easy for Shadow Demon to escape Circe¡¯s pursuit. Unfortunately, with his field of knowledge and experience, he would not be able to help in this battle between these two monarchs of the shadows.


    Thus, he decided just to stop thinking about it and hand over all decisions to Shadow Demon.


    Surely, with howrge Seawoods ne was, their battle would not conclude any time soon!


    After letting go of his concerns over Shadow Demon, Greem calmed down and started thinking about the future developments of the Crimson n. More worries began to appear in his heart.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine that with the major victory in Seawoods ne, the vampires would be weing a period of rapid advancement. The vampires would rapidly grow in powerpared to the other major factions of the Crimson n. They were very likely to outshine the other factions and be the heart of the Crimson n¡¯s power.


    That wasn¡¯t necessarily a bad thing, but it would undoubtedly cause the n to skew in a single direction.


    The only faction left that could keep the vampires in check would be Gazlowe¡¯s faction.


    Having established himself in space and being bolstered by the magical golem dragon, the Capital of Steel¡¯s influence had increased massively. They wereparable to the vampires. However, Gazlowe wasn¡¯t exactly the most loyal member of the n. It was fine to leave some important tasks to him, but Greem could not rely entirely on him.


    If it weren¡¯t for the emergency in space and the Crimson n finally having a chance at creating the Titan, Greem would never have handed the golem dragon over to Gazlowe, even if it meant the loss of the Capital of Steel.


    With the rise of these two factions, the goblins and the human adepts appeared inferior in power. Meanwhile, the veterans that had followed Greem in his conquest of other nes in the early days of the Crimson n had now fallen behind and reduced to second and third-rate members of the n.


    That was also something that Greem couldn¡¯t help but think about!


    As the leader of the Crimson n, Greem had to think about the future of the n.


    At this time, he was the only one, as the n leader, who had the qualifications and experience to suppress the two growing factions. He had to be the one to ensure that the resources of the n were still evenly distributed to the weaker factions as well.


    It was the only thing he could do.


    After all, the adepts had always worshipped the mighty.


    All resources and power would naturally gather in the hands of the powerful.


    The stronger the Vampires and the Capital of Steel were, the more the resources, materials, knowledge, and talent of the n would lean towards them. It was only the result of the process of ¡®elimination¡¯ within the n.


    The weak had no rights, authority, or status!


    As such, if Greem wanted the n to develop in a bnced fashion, he would have to promote capable individuals amongst the goblins and human adepts and sessfully introduce them into the n¡¯s core management.


    Greem had a few candidates in mind for such a n.


    Of the goblin faction, the ones that stood out were Snox, Locke, Drusi, and Gonga.


    Amongst them, Snox was the most veteran of them all. He had followed Greem since his early days and was also incredibly loyal.


    However, Snox¡¯s potential was average. Despite all the high-grade herbs and treasures he had consumed over the years, he had only barely pushed himself to advanced Second Grade. Without the intervention of an external force, he would not be able to advance to Third Grade within his lifetime.


    Magical Mechanic Locke, on the other hand, was a goblin of legends that had risen to power in recent years!


    With his extraordinary talents, he had already be an advanced Second Grade magical mechanic. Moreover, the Chip estimated that the limit of his potential was intermediate Third Grade. With some serious cultivation, Locke could very easily be a Third Grade adept.


    A Third Grade adept was not much to Greem as he was right now. He could kill them with a flick of his finger or a wave of his hand! However, Third Grade adepts were the core and backbone of any adept n!


    The ones who made up the main military force in adept wars were the powerful Third Grade adepts. Fourth Grade adepts, on the other hand, were nuclear powers. If they were drawn into a battle, it would often mean a struggle to the death. There would only be one n left standing after that war!


    As such, the addition of a Third Grade adept was a significant event for any adept n!


    As for the other two goblins? Brutalblood Army Commander Drusi La Salle and Dean of the Goblin Research Institute Gonga. Their talent was insignificant, in all honesty.


    Themander was only peak First Grade, even at the moment. Advancing to Second Grade seemed like such a colossal task for him.


    After all, the goblin machinist-sorcerers were no more than goblins with slight elementium talent and the ability to pilot magical machines. They had insufficient talent and could only win through numbers. It was a profession designed to be cannon fodder.


    Consequently, there were truly none amongst them that had a talent that could attract Greem¡¯s attention!


    Meanwhile, Magical Goblin Leader Gonga was a schr. He did not excel atbat or management; he was only advanced First Grade. Moreover, this seemed to be the limit of his potential.


    Thus, after much consideration and out of a desire for optimization, Greem decided to cultivate Snox and Locke.


    After deciding on the matters on the goblin faction, Greem started considering the human adepts instead.


    In all seriousness, the cultivation of native adepts in the Crimson n was both a sess and a failure.


    There were many excellent individuals among them, three of whom were core members of the n. These three people were Meryl, Gargamel, and Billis. However, of the three of them, only Billis was abat adept. The other two were more focused on managing the n¡¯s affairs.


    Apart from the three of them, most of the native human adepts of the Crimson n were still stuck at First Grade. Hardly any of them were Second Grade. Consequently, they barely had any voice in the ruling structure. They were always subordinates, never the leaders.


    However, in all honesty, these lowly human adepts of the n were supposed to be the mainstream.


    If the number of non-humans continued to increase in the Crimson n and the human adepts decreased in number, then the Crimson n would begin to be perceived as an outside force in the eyes of the other ns.


    That was not beneficial to the long-term development of the Crimson n!


    This problem might not have been all that obvious while Greem remained within the n. However, should Greem ever leave the n, its future would be very precarious.


    Other non-human organizations on the continent could serve as a study for this matter. All of these organizations were distrusted by the adept ns, whether it was the small kingdom of Storm Giants or the few vampire ns throughout the region.


    Their ns would always be repelled and driven away by the surrounding adept ns when they tried to expand their worldly territory. Even a single step forward was difficult for them.


    The Crimson n that Greem had established could soon face the same problem.


    The solution was naturally to increase the support and cultivation of native adepts within the n.


    Greem quickly selected a few decent candidates for this.


    Fire Dragon Adept Meryl, Bug Adept Billis, and Mystique Emelia.


    Meryl was his disciple and was absolutely loyal. Her potential had also increased tremendously after obtaining the fire dragon¡¯s bloodline. As long as the Crimson n tilted some resources obtained from Lance in her direction, there would be no problem cultivating Meryl into a Third Grade adept.


    Meanwhile, Mystique Emelia was the best candidate to rece Gargamel.


    Gargamel¡¯s talent was simply too terrible. Even after receiving favor from Greem, he was still limited to Second Grade, with no chance of ever reaching Third Grade.


    Inparison, his daughter Emelia had excellent potential. She was young, but she was already an advanced Second Grade adept of the nt attribute.


    As for the shadow of the spore princess that loomed over Emelia? After confirmation from Alice, Greem was certain that it would be no threat to the Crimson n. That was why Greem was more than willing to develop a genius like herself.


    Billis was a veteran of the n that Greem intentionally consideredst.


    He was too cruel and bloodthirsty. His actions were unusually evil, and he walked a bloodline path that was unbearably brutal and bloody.


    Even Greem was often worried that Billis would not be able to control the Queen Bug and be assimted into a non-human insect creature.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s worry and bottom line, the Queen Mother never dared to thoroughly devour Billis¡¯ soul, no matter how much of an advantage it held. It left Billis¡¯ human soul in a constant state of battle andpatibility with the Queen Mother.


    It was the fundamental reason for Billis¡¯ inability to advance!


    Thus, to help Billis advance, Greem would have to find a way to fully merge the souls of Billis and the Queen Mother. Moreover, the assimtion would have to be centered around Billis¡¯ soul, rather than allowing the Queen Mother to devour it.


    It was undoubtedlyplicated to achieve such a feat!


    Even though Billis had requested Greem¡¯s help in this matter many times in the past, Greem had set it aside due to the many things he was busy with. Now that he was injured and had to recuperate, he had more time and energy to deal with the n¡¯s affairs.


    Thus, all the things he had put aside had to be resolved now.


    His n had worked hard and freed him from the burden of dealing with the n¡¯s troubles. They had also gathered an incredible amount of wealth and resources for him.


    It was now time for Greem to pay the n back for their achievements!

 Chapter 1187 - Mary’s Pride

    <h4>Chapter 1187 Mary¡¯s Pride</h4>


    Shadow Demon returned to Fire Throne eleven days after separating from Greem.


    Even though it managed to return with the Orb of Shadows, it had received horrifying damage.


    It was fortunate that Greem had used plenty of memory alloy when he forged Shadow Demon¡¯s body. Shadow Demon was able to repair the damage to its body just by drawing upon the endless amount of shadow energy avable to it.


    Meanwhile, the vampires in Seawoods ne returned to the n headquarters six days after Shadow Demon.


    The entire Crimson n burst out inmotion the moment they returned!


    After all, many of them had returned after advancing to a higher grade.


    Mary had undoubtedly advanced to Fourth Grade, allowing the Crimson n to truly be a powerhouse in Zhentarim. If Alice was also counted as a member of the n, then the Crimson n already had the power required to dere themselves independent of the Zhentarim Association.


    News of this had yet to spread, but once it spread all over Zhentarim, a new series of political changes would most certainly happen!


    Of course, apart from Mary sessfully reaching Fourth Grade, two other blood elves had also advanced to Third Grade. They were Blood Elf Mage Isa and Blood Elf Shapeshifter Spa.


    Meanwhile, the other vampires also improved to varying degrees, though none of them managed to advance to Third Grade!


    As Seawoods ne was the personal property of the vampires, Mary was in charge of all the decisions. She enved the native trolls and put them to work, turning their former capital into a massive castle meant as an outpost for the vampires.


    A massive blood pool had also been created in the divine domain of the Feathered God.


    As long as the vampires worked hard, they could turn the castle into a holynd of vampires. The blood pool could also be the source of power for other high-grade vampires in the future.


    However, these were all future ns that had yet to be put in motion. Mary and her vampires would have to toil hard to make this visione true.


    The more immediate benefits were therge number of spoils that Mary had brought back with her. Some of these items were excellent resources that even Greem was impressed by.


    Mary left her subordinates alone immediately upon returning. She marched straight to Greem¡¯s Fire Throne.


    Mary arrived at aboratory. She grabbed Greem by the cor and pulled him before her eyes for a close inspection.


    ¡°Have you...gone out...on an excursion of any sort recently?¡±


    Greem frowned, somewhat confused by what was happening.


    ¡°What are you talking about? An excursion?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m asking you whether you went to Seawoods ne.¡± Mary red her incisors and threatened Greem ¡®viciously.¡¯


    ¡°Seawoods ne? Why would I go there?¡± Greem had a ¡®confused¡¯ look on his face. ¡°As you know, the injury to my soul hasn¡¯t healed yet. Why would I be running around now?¡±


    At such a close distance, Mary could sense that Greem was not lying in the slightest.


    His soul origin did indeed not match his identity as a Fourth Grade adept. It was too weak and tumultuous.


    Could that damned snake have suffered bacsh because too many of her followers died? There was no other reason why she would be within an inch of her death by the time they invaded her den.


    Such aplicated question was clearly not a thing that Mary should be thinking about. Little sparks had already appeared in her pretty crimson eyes after a while. It was apparent she was already at the limits of her wits.


    There was no need to think about things she couldn¡¯t understand. Only Mary could so easily brush over stuff like that.


    After giving up on thinking about the mystery, Mary quickly returned to her normal state.


    A smile so sweet it could drown you appeared on her face.


    ¡°You are Fourth Grade, and I am a Fourth Grade now as well. What do you think? Let¡¯s go outside and fight it out?¡±


    Obviously, Greem firmly rejected such a masochistic suggestion.


    A smile appeared on Mary¡¯s face.


    ¡°Alright, I won¡¯t tease you. Just stay here and heal up! From now on, you are my person. If anyone bullies you, just tell them my name, and I will deal with them for you.¡±


    Having said that, Mary lifted her slender neck and let out a bold, gleefulugh.


    All sorts of expressions that betrayed her joy of superiority over Greem shed over her face. Greem couldn¡¯t help but roll his eyes.


    ¡°Alright, alright, no more. These are the things I brought back for you this time.¡± Mary had teased Greem enough to let out all the repressed feelings of dissatisfaction she had felt over the past one hundred years. She waved her hand and summoned arge pile of items from her storage ring.


    ¡°Count them closely. I still have to pay a visit to my cute, gentle little sister, Alice!¡± It sounded like Mary was gritting her teeth when she said ¡®sister.¡¯


    It was hard to count an adept¡¯s age urately.


    It wasn¡¯t exactly clear who between Mary and Alice was older, and so it was hard to decide who was the elder sister. Consequently, in ordance with the habit of adepts to respect power, whoever between them was stronger was the elder sister. It didn¡¯t matter if you refused to acknowledge it. After all, whoever was stronger had the final say.


    Consequently, having been suppressed by Alice in grade for all these years, Mary had to make do with being the ¡®little sister¡¯ for a very long time. In all honesty, the nameless fire raging in the depths of her heart was hot enough to burn steel already.


    Now that both she and Alice were beginner Fourth Grade, they were finally on equal footing.


    However, since she was abat adept, she was slightly more important and significant that Alice, with herck ofbat abilities. It only seemed reasonable that she be the elder sister now!


    Mary finally had the chance to be the elder sister. She might just fall sick if she didn¡¯t take the opportunity to wave that around!


    After teasing Greem a bunch, Mary pecked him lightly on the lips and rushed away joyfully.


    Greem felt likeughing. He only shifted his eyes to the pile of spoils once Mary¡¯s aura had vanished from Fire Throne.


    The corpse of the Feathered God.


    Eleven divine crystals of the lightning attribute.


    A piece of origin substance that had yet to be corrupted by foreign energies.


    And that...egg.


    There weren¡¯t very many things here, but each of them made Greem¡¯s heart re up.


    In all honesty, almost eighty percent of the best stuff that Mary and her vampires had risked their lives to obtain was here.


    That meant that Mary had only extracted the blood of the Feathered God while leaving everything else with him.


    Did Mary not understand the value of these spoils?


    Disregarding everything else, that origin substance alone was incredibly rare. It had obviously been extracted from the nar origin of Seawoods by the Feathered God through some unknown means. The Feathered God had been using faith power as its container to prevent its contamination by foreign energies.


    A pure origin substance like this was far superior to the origin substance often found in the World of Adepts. Those origin substances were often contained with mono-elementium energy or no-attribute energies. After conversion, as much as 3000 siths could be extracted out of this piece of origin substance.


    Thest time, Greem had to risk his life in a bloody battle between peak Third Grade adepts for only 500 siths of origin substance!


    If Greem were fortunate enough to obtain two such pieces of origin substance, his path to Fifth Grade would be unobstructed. All that would be left were his daily meditations to increase his Spirit.


    The moment his Spirit reached the threshold, his advancement to Fifth Grade would happen without any difficulty.


    Sadly, there was only one piece of origin substance before him. He would have to find some way to obtain more in the next few hundred years.


    That was the only focus for most Fourth Grade adepts!


    After carefully putting away the origin substance, Greem started examining the other items as well.


    The corpse of the Feathered God.


    Most of her divine blood had already been extracted, causing the activity of her other remains to be incredibly lowered.


    However, the corpse was still very valuable!


    The Feathered God had once been a Fifth Grade native god, after all. Even though she had dropped to Fourth Grade due to giving birth, her body still possessed the traits of immortality. With proper treatment, this ¡®immortality¡¯ trait could be transferred.


    The so-called ¡®immortality¡¯ was a power that only belonged to high-grade creatures.


    High-Grade creatures referring to supernatural creatures beyond Fourth Grade.


    Beings with an immortal body would never die of natural causes. They would never die of old age and did not require sleep, air, or food. Even sealed in an environment with no magic, they could survive for eternity in their original state.


    Fourth Grade body-refining adepts trained and strengthened their bodies in all sorts of ways, precisely to turn their bodies into immortal bodies. The only ones that could achieve such a feat were body-refining adepts at peak Fourth Grade.


    As such, an immortal body was invaluable to an adept!


    If Greem weren¡¯t an elementium adept, an immortal body like this would be incredibly attractive to him. As for the changes to his appearance? Those things could slowly be adjusted with magic. In fact, remaining in a non-human form might be worthwhile just for the sake of immortality.


    In all seriousness, there weren¡¯t many individuals among high-grade adepts who could retain their human forms.


    Even though most Fourth Grade adepts typically looked like humans, they were terrifying beings when they revealed their true forms inbat.


    Take Greem, for example.


    His true form inbat was a massive, ten-meter-tall me giant.


    He could only fully utilize the golden mes in his Heart of Principles in this mode. It was only in this form that he could unleash the full might of a legendary fire adept!


    His usual human form could both be said to be a disguise or an energy-saving mode.


    The point being that no high-grade adept was a simple human at their core!

 Chapter 1188 - Treasure

    Chapter 1188 Treasure


    After putting away the origin substance and the Feathered God¡¯s corpse, Greem¡¯s gazended on the divine power crystals.


    Divine power crystals. They sounded like they were simr to magical crystals, a concentration of elementium, or a different form of energy!


    However, magical crystals were only concentrations of magic energy that could be found anywhere. Divine power crystals, on the other hand, were crystallized, concentrated divine power.


    Just as water had a liquid state and ice was its solid state, divine power crystals were the ¡®solid¡¯ state of incredibly concentrated faith power.


    Under natural circumstances, faith power would never concentrate and crystallize in this manner.


    Only gods who used their power to gather faith power could transform the state of divine energy into crystals.


    That meant every divine power crystal contained a trace of a god¡¯s power.


    These things were quite valuable to adepts!


    Greem was still unclear about how he could use these divine power crystals, so he simply put them away as well.


    Finally, the only thing left before him was the exaggeratedlyrge...egg.


    Greem had only just approached the egg and had yet to examine it with his Spirit when the egg trembled. A screeching mental message came from within the egg.


    Supposedly, when one wasmunicating mentally, it would be possible to understand them despitenguage or species barriers. However, this mental message could not express aplete consciousness at all. It could only convey emotions of anger and hatred.


    At the same time, a small bolt of lightning crashed down from above Greem¡¯s head.


    The lightning appeared golden in color. It wasn¡¯t very powerful, with only one to two hundred points of power.


    The lightning bolt did not injure Greem in the slightest, but it did cause his long hair to stand on ends. He also felt a slight tingling throughout his body.


    The power of thews.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be surprised.


    A little life that had yet to developplete consciousness had already mastered parts of the lightningws. It was obvious that the Feathered God had trulymitted a lot to cultivate this descendant of hers.


    If that was the case, then the divine power crystals and the origin substance were also probably prepared for this little guy.


    The descendant of a divine creature probably possessed divine traits from the moment of their birth!


    Even though the life in the egg was no more than a shapeless embryo at the moment, it already possessed terrifying mightparable to a First Grade adept. In fact, even a First Grade adept¡¯s Chain Lightning could not affect Greem in the slightest, while this little creature was able to paralyze him, if only for the briefest instance.


    What should he do with this egg?


    Hatch it?


    Greem rejected the idea the moment it appeared in his mind.


    The resources required to cultivate a divine creature was not something he could afford at the moment.


    Greem was not willing to use the divine power crystals and origin substance on this egg. Without the nourishment and care provided by the Feathered God, it would also be challenging to hatch the egg.


    Break the egg and devour its contents?


    In all honesty, this idea was deeply appealing to Greem.


    Ever since he changed his bloodline to that of a starbeast, Greem had desired the flesh of higher beings in the depths of his heart. Their flesh, souls, and everything else was nourishment for the starbeast bloodline.


    However, for the prey to be able to affect Greem¡¯s bloodline, that creature would have to be Fourth Grade, at least.


    The effects of magical creature meat below Fourth Grade was already minimal for Greem!


    The daily meals that he had could only satiate his appetite. The only food that could rapidly replenish his energy and stamina was a Fourth Grade magic energy meal.


    However, Fourth Grade magical beasts were extremely rare, even in the World of Adepts.


    Apart from adept ns with exceptional power and influence, who could afford to eat Fourth Grade magical beast meat on a regr basis!?


    Of course, there were still a few Fourth Grade dragons in Lance.


    However, all of those dragons were difficult opponents. Greem didn¡¯t have the confidence to beat them, even if he was at his peak. Not to mention, these dragons all had legions of subordinates. They were also exceptional fighters, making them far more difficult a preypared to solitary Fourth Grade magical beasts.


    At the thought of this, Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes.


    Perhaps it was time to spread the news throughout Zhentarim and start purchasing information on the location and abilities of Fourth Grade magical creatures in the ck Forest. He could then gather the n¡¯s forces and hunt them down. That would soon be a regr activity of his.


    As for devouring this egg? That would certainly bring about some benefits for Greem¡¯s bloodline.


    However, it still felt like a very inefficient and wasteful way of utilizing such a brilliant treasure!


    Perhaps there was a better, more efficient way of using the egg.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but give out an order, ¡°Chip, search for methods to use this egg.¡±


    [Beep. Mission epted. Searching database.]


    As expected, the information pulled up by the Chip covered all sorts of domains, including hatching, devouring, blood ritual, cultivation, and many more. The most cost-efficient of these solutions was to hatch the Feathered Serpent and to cultivate it into a fearsome divine creature.


    However, this process would take upwards of a thousand years. All sorts of rare resources would also have to be consumed during this process. In all honesty, Greem had absolutely no confidence he could wait around until the Feathered Serpent was grown.


    Another option was to conduct a blood ritual to turn the Feathered Serpent¡¯s bloodline into nourishment for Greem¡¯s body. ording to the Chip¡¯s estimate, if all went well, Greem would not only be able to heal the damage to his soul origin but also improve his Physique and bloodline potential by a significant margin.


    Thus, without any hesitation, Greem chose to conduct the blood ritual.


    As Greem made up his mind, the Chip immediately projected a list of items in his mind.


    These were the resources required for the ritual.


    Greem took out a nk scroll and ced it on his forehead. The list of items was perfectly copied over. He then sliced through the air with his finger, creating a small rift in space. He then put the scroll into the rift.


    While he was doing all this, Gargamel was hunched over a table in the Crimson Wing, busy writing away with his quill. Emelia and Eva were by his side, helping him deal with the multitude of n affairs.


    A sh of fire appeared above his head as a rift was torn in space. A scroll glowing with a red rune fell onto his desk.


    ¡°These are the items I require soon. Collect them as fast as possible and send them to Fire Throne. Report to me if any of them poses a difficulty.¡±


    Gargamel had just touched the rune on the scroll when Greem¡¯s intimidating voice boomed out in the room. He opened the scroll, and a series of words were projected into the air.


    ¡°A Fourth Grade soul altar.¡±


    ¡°30 grams of Serpentbane hops.¡±


    ¡°A set of high-grade soul-transfer equipment.¡±


    ¡°A soul-locking crystal.¡±


    ......


    ......


    Row upon row of resources was listed, almost all of them a rare, top-tier adept item.


    Even as experienced as he was, Gargamel had only heard of most of these items in name, without having ever seen them before. A frown appeared on his face when he saw the list. His face was full of frustration and hesitation.


    ¡°What¡¯s difficult about this?¡± Emelia still seemed as rxed as ever. ¡°The n leader knows the situation and wealth of our n. We can send over what we have first and try and borrow the others from other ns.¡±


    Gargamel finally rxed when he heard his daughter break down the task.


    ¡°Send a copy of this list to Meryl. We will try and put together what we have. Since the n leader has directly given out this order, he must be in a hurry. I will pay a visit to the Fourth Grade ns.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s no need, father. Don¡¯t be in a hurry to go.¡± Emelia¡¯s eyes rolled around. She couldn¡¯t help but chuckle. ¡°Lady Mary just advanced to Fourth Grade. Our n will most certainly be holding a banquet. Let news of this spread out first. Wait until the eve of the celebration before you make your visit. The rise of our Crimson n is obvious to anyone with two eyes. When that happens, you won¡¯t have to be worried about borrowing a few little resources, will you?¡±


    Gargamel gave it some thought and nodded, impressed by the suggestion.


    News of Mary¡¯s advancement quickly spread, and Zhentarim was shocked once again.


    This time, it wasn¡¯t just the small and intermediate adept ns that couldn¡¯t sit still any longer. Even the dozen Fourth Grade organizations were moved. The most excited among all of them had to be the vampire ns.


    It had been several thousand years since thest Fourth Grade vampire appeared in Zhentarim!


    As such, vampires ns of varying size and fame all over the continent couldn¡¯t suppress the call of their blood. They hurried to the Crimson n as fast as they could.


    In just one month, four vampire ns had already joined Mary¡¯s forces, increasing the number of Third Grade vampires in the Crimson n to as many as six!


    Of course, these vampire ns all had their own territories in Zhentarim prior to this. Thus, small outposts were established for the Crimson n all over Zhentarim, expanding their influence to as many as five regions.


    The vampires also rapidly grew to be the strongest faction in the Crimson n, with the most potential as well!


    An ordinary adept n was actually home to two Fourth Grade adepts now. Moreover, these two Fourth Grades had a very intimate rtionship as a couple.


    In all honesty, all the Fourth Grade organizations in Zhentarim felt the pressure on their shoulders when they heard this news.


    Anyone who wasn¡¯t a fool couldn¡¯t help but realize that change wasing to Zhentarim!

 Chapter 1189 - Am’s Feelings

    Chapter 1189 Am¡¯s Feelings


    Two Fourth Grades in one n.


    If Alice was considered part of the n, then it meant that the Crimson n was now simultaneously guarded by three Fourth Grades.


    This...this situation, the more you thought about it, the more you reflected on it, and the colder the chill you felt in your heart.


    For an ordinary adept, the more Fourth Grade adepts that appeared in Zhentarim, the better. This way, Zhentarim would have greater diplomatic weight among the other major organizations. Their status and authority in the World of Adepts would increase.


    However, for the veteran Fourth Grade adepts, three Fourth Grade adepts standing on the same side was an evident and fearsome threat!


    For a long time, the Zhentarim Association had been a loose coalition of adepts. They were mostly responsible for mediating the rtionships between the Fourth Grade organizations. The Zhentarim Association had alwayscked the necessary binding power over the Fourth Grade adepts to form a proper authority. The best the Association could do was restrain the Fourth Grade adepts and prevent them from falling into internal civil war and destructivepetition.


    The main reason for this situation was because the Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim were all independent. Even if some of the adepts had a closer rtionship, it was mostly at the level of an acquaintance. The closest they would get is an invitation to explore some ancient ruins.


    However, in a situation of actual crisis, these Fourth Grade adepts would still stick to their own. They would never risk their own lives for the sake of another!


    With the appearance of the two Fourth Grades in the Crimson n, with both of them beingbat adepts that excelled at fighting, a firm and powerful force hade into existence.


    How would this core of power expand?


    Would they unite the forces scattered across Zhentarim to form a significant group simr to the three major adepts organizations? Or would they let things lie as they were and develop at their own pace?


    That was the question burning on everyone¡¯s mind!


    Once, Chairman Freed of the Zhentarim Association had also held the ambition of uniting the forces of Zhentarim to form the fourth major organization of the continent. For this purpose, he went to great lengths to persuade Vice-Chairman Mirva of his cause. With the two of them as the core, they formed the organization now known as the Zhentarim Association.


    Apart from this, he also maintained good personal rtionships with the other adepts in the Association.


    Through his management of these interpersonal rtionships, he was able to remain the center of the Zhentarim Association¡¯s power after hundreds of years.


    However, a new center of power had now risen in Zhentarim.


    Would these two forces sh, or would they tolerate each other?


    Even Freed himself didn¡¯t know what would happen next, let alone the outsiders.


    However, these were still ultimately concerns behind the scenes.


    As an adept of the center of the continent, Mary¡¯s advancement to Fourth Grade was good news for Zhentarim, no matter how you looked at it. Without hesitation, Vice-Chairman Mirva hurried to the Crimson n and handed over an Elder¡¯s Ring of Authority to Mary.


    Now with two Fourth Grade adepts in the n, the Crimson n¡¯s reputation quickly spread across thend. They instantly became the most-talked-about adept n of the center.


    ............


    Zhentarim. Sarubo n outpost.


    Fiednan City.


    Am was dressed in a ck robe. He held a book titled ¡®The Book of Adepts¡¯ in his hand as he slowly walked down a dark corridor and headed towards the knowledge hall.


    There were as many as seven adepts stationed in this n outpost. They were usually busy with their own things. Even when it was their turn to give public lectures, they would do it as quickly as possible. They were rarely ever anywhere besides their rooms or theboratories.


    It was hard to run into a person while inside the adept¡¯s living area of the outpost.


    However, the moment you emerged from the adept¡¯s area, the ce would be significantly livelier.


    It was almost time for the public lecture. There were many apprentices amongst the crowd who were rushing towards the knowledge hall with books in hand. When they saw the standard ck adept¡¯s robe that Am was wearing, their expressions would freeze for a moment. They would then step aside and bow.


    Am couldn¡¯t care less if the apprentices were paying their due respects. He continued walking forward with a stern expression on his face.


    It was his turn to give a public lecture today. The n rewarded the public lectures that he held twice a month with a monthly payment of three hundred magical crystals. It was one of the few methods by which n adepts could obtain magical crystals from the n.


    Of course, if he were willing to be stationed at a n resource site, he would be paid much more than this. If he knew what he was doing, he might even be able to obtain some free adept resources on the job.


    For schr adepts like himself who didn¡¯t dare to venture into the ck Forest, this ie of resources and magical crystals was his the only thing pushing him forward.


    Unfortunately, for some reason, Am didn¡¯t dare to take a single step out of the n outpost.


    It caused him to have the lowest ie of resources and magical crystals among all the adepts of the same grade in the n!


    That wasn¡¯t the worst of it.


    What truly made him feel bad was those ¡®terrible¡¯ news that asionally arrived at the outpost.


    The Crimson n had conquered another territory.


    Someone from the Crimson n had advanced to be an adept.


    The Crimson n¡¯s territory had expanded.


    The Crimson n had defeated some other n.


    ......


    ......


    These pieces of news were like lingering nightmares for Am. The Crimson n was incredibly active. They were always doing something amazing and shocking every so often, constantly keeping them as the talk amongst the adepts.


    As a n adept that had betrayed the Crimson n for the Sarubo n, Am was naturally very sensitive to such news and information. He paid extra attention to it.


    Back when the Crimson n was under siege by multiple adept ns, hispanions had congratted him, praising him for his decisive choice to leave a sinking ship.


    However, when news of the Crimson n¡¯s victory returned, all of them fell silent.


    In particr, that fearsome Greem had overwhelmingly defeated Lady Sanazar in a duel. It was a tremendous mental blow for Sanazar, who had gone into hiding in her room ever since she returned from the duel


    Finally, when the Crimson n rose uncontested and became a Fourth Grade organization, an aura of defeat lingered around Am. Everyone around him criticized him for every action he made.


    Am had also secretly gathered information on the Crimson n in private.


    When he found out that the gentle and shy Meryl had be a fire dragon adept and advanced to peak Second Grade with a great chance of advancing to Third Grade, Am threw a tantrum. He smashed everything inside his room.


    Meryl...Meryl.


    That girl with freckles and who didn¡¯t even dare raise her voice around her friends had actually achieved so much. And him, the former apprentice of Greem, was no more than an intermediate First Grade adept.


    The difference in their power and their statuses. Both of these things stabbed at Am¡¯s heart, even though he had convinced himself that he no longer cared.


    Am had shouted and screamed, cried andughed more than once in his room.


    He knew very well that among the five pseudo-adepts that had followed Greem, he and Meryl were the only ones to advance into adepts. Meanwhile, between him and Meryl, he was the one who had fire affinity. He had been the one most likely to inherit Greem¡¯s teachings.


    At the very least, if he had followed Greem, he would now be of equal status to Meryl. He would be a powerful adept that most n leaders would have to greet respectfully!


    However, all of this had be no more than fantasy with that one wrong ¡®misstep.¡¯


    He was now the enemy of the Crimson n and a joke of the Sarubo n.


    It inflicted even more mental pressure and suffering on Am, who already wanted nothing more than to grow stronger.


    He had fantasized more than once. If...if he had not betrayed Greem, if he had not been tempted by Adept F¨¹gen to be a spy inside the Crimson n, then he would be enjoying glory and respect in the Crimson n. He would be enjoying the endless amount of resources and an uncountable mountain of magical crystals.


    Disregarding everything else, just his identity as a direct disciple of Greem would have allowed him to be part of the Crimson n¡¯s core members. He would have enjoyed status and authority far surpassing that of Meryl.


    Even as weak as she was, Meryl had managed to advance to peak Second Grade. With his superior talents, he might even have be Third Grade now, a powerhouse respected and by thousands of adepts.


    At the thought of all that glory, all that sess, Am felt his heart rage and wail in anger. Every midnight, he would stab his leg furiously with a needle, just to break free of all the disappointment and regret that he felt.


    However, he could not show any of this madness and weakness on the outside.


    He had his ownpetitors and enemies in the n. If he were to express his dissatisfaction with his current environment and the n, then who knew how the higher-ups would punish him.


    When he was dejected, he would take it all out on his female apprentices. In fact, to make sure that they didn¡¯t spread rumors about what he might have said in his sleep, he often used subtle means to ¡®deal¡¯ with them.


    Ever since then, the female apprentices of the n feared him like a monster. None of them dared approach him anymore!


    Another turn at the corner in front and he would be at the entrance to the knowledge hall. Am could hear some noise from the corridor.


    ¡°Big news...big news. Did you hear? Another Fourth Grade adept has appeared in the Crimson n.¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°How is that possible?¡±


    ¡°You think Fourth Grade adepts are blueberries? You think they just pop up whenever...tch!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s true. I heard this from the message ry tower of the n.¡±


    The male apprentice that everyone doubted appeared short and fat. His face was flushed red, trying to defend himself. He waved his hand as he shouted, angry that no one believed him.


    However, his shouting did not seem to convince hispanions. On the contrary, they stepped back with pale faces and lowered their heads, only ncing behind him out of the corner of their eyes.


    The fat apprentice turned around in surprise and saw the pale, sinister face of Adept Am.


    ¡°Speak. Who advanced to Fourth Grade?¡±


    Adept Am¡¯s voice was chilling and stern, like a cold breeze from an endless abyss. The apprentice couldn¡¯t help but shiver.


    ¡°It¡¯s...it¡¯s the vampire adept...Adept Mary.¡±


    The book that Am was holding tight in his hand fell onto the ground and ttered.

 Chapter 1190 - A Trade in the Darkness

    Chapter 1190 A Trade in the Darkness


    Neo Valley.


    The location of ck Mystery¨C the origin tower of the Dark Witches.


    A ck portal slowly lit up in an enormous magical hall on the eleventh floor.


    One dozen witches were waiting here before the portal, covered in ck robes and their faces obscured by the hoods. Their entire bodies radiated with a solemn, sinister aura. They were elite adepts of Shadow, the hidden task force of the Dark Witches. Even the weakest one among them was advanced Second Grade, while the average member was around intermediate Third Grade.


    A group of Dark Witches with such power was a fearsome and awe-inspiring group no matter which ne they were in. Moreover, they were even led by a Fourth Grade witch elder!


    Today, they had gathered here to execute a secret mission.


    When the spatial energy from the portal finally stabilized, the leader of the group nodded. The witches then silently walked into the portal and vanished in an instant.


    Soon, all sixteen Shadow elites had disappeared, leaving only Shadow Elder udina and Circe, who was shrouded in ck smoke.


    ¡°That ne has been engulfed by the Dark Canopy. They will not be able to predict your arrival. Make it fast. Retreat from the ne once you have retrieved the Orb of the Fire God. I will be waiting here at the Dark Portal for your return.¡± Circe¡¯s low voice rang out in the silent hall.


    Shadow Elder udina turned around and nced at Circe, before furiouslyining, ¡°To think you would use the elites of us Shadow to steal a treasure for that bastard. You¡¯ve really outdone yourself, Circe! If we suffer losses on this operation, prepare to exin yourself to Lady Malvina!¡±


    Circe¡¯s face was hidden in the shadows, hiding her expression. Only her odd voice could be heard.


    ¡°How I will exin the situation to Lady Malvina is my business. As long as I am the leader of the Dark Witches, you have to obey the n¡¯s decisions. What is it, udina? Do you wish to challenge me now?¡±


    udina snorted and dove into the portal without another word.


    When her immense and pure shadow energy pierced through the ne barrier of the alien world, the image of a strange world appeared on the other side of the portal.


    There were only boiling sand, shattered rocks, and a smoking volcano visible across the vast, lifeless, red earth. A massive, burning fireball hung in the air, continually searing the world with unbearable heat and light as if trying to set the world itself on fire.


    A short momentter, the shadow powers finally cloaked the Dark Portal once more as the image slowly faded.


    However, the temperature in the hall had increased by a dozen degrees.


    Once the hall returned to peace, and she was the only one left in the room, Circe let out a resentful sigh before turning to leave.


    ............


    A bloody battle was also raging in Faen ne, where the Pale Witches ruled.


    The elite Dark Witches that had traveled here as reinforcements had prated the central mountains of Garan Continent. They were furiously sieging the main temple of Meve, the Moonlight Goddess.


    Due to the existence of a massive canopy of darkness, elf temples all over Garan were cut off from their god. Many temple guards had also been drawn to the war in the southwest due to the Cmity of Witches.


    As such, the only ones in the main temple who could stop the Dark Witches were elven priestesses who held the favor of the goddess.


    Unfortunately, even though the priestesses were protected by powerful divine magic, their enemies were the Dark Witches, who excelled at stealth and assassination. The priestesses had no choice but to defend the main temple and endure the enemy¡¯s constant attacks.


    Even though news of an attack hade from multiple temples, the only one that had suffered a significant loss was the main temple of the Moonlight Goddess.


    The main temple had been attacked by multiple high-grade Dark Witches. Even the head priestess had died in battle. The Moonspring kept in the temple had also vanished, fallen into the hands of the witches.


    A short momentter, the darkness over the area dispersed.


    The elven gods were once again able to connect with their temples. It was then that they heard of this infuriating news of the witches¡¯ attack.


    For a moment, light glowed across every elven temple as divine energy filled the air.


    One after another, the gods cast down their clones and avatars. Under the lead of Saoirse, the Goddess of Elves, they charged down the central mountains and started hunting the fleeing witches.


    The gods¡¯ True Sight allowed them to see through everything. No creature of darkness could escape their pursuit. Thus, one ferocious battle after another broke out throughout Garan Continent.


    Unfortunately, the fleeing Dark Witches were very familiar with their operation. They also had aprehensive n of escape. They brazenly summoned legions of shadow creatures and had them assault all the cities and towns that were unprotected by divine powers.


    The witches scattered and went into hiding, silently sneaking towards their prepared evacuation points.


    Some of the Dark Witches were tracked by the gods and died in battle. However, even more of the Dark Witches sessfully escaped their pursuit and returned to the World of Adepts from their evacuation points.


    The Moonspring was also brought back to the World of Adepts!


    ............


    Half a monthter, Dark Witch Leader Circe finally met the legendary fire adept under thepany of Alice at the top of the Tower of Fate.


    Even though the two of them had battled against each other in the shadows several times, this was the first time they were meeting in person.


    Greem still appeared injured.


    Arge red robe was draped over his tall and muscr body. He looked as young and youthful as ever. However, anyone smart could tell that he was only putting up a front. His Spirit, the most essential trait for an elementium adept, was particrly weak.


    However, even the weakest of Fourth Grade adepts was a ferocious lion that should not be taken lightly.


    When Greem stepped into the hall and locked eyes with Circe, who had hidden her figure and face, he could clearly read the hatred and caution in her eyes.


    ¡°So d to meet you here, Miss Circe. We have finally met!¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh.


    Witch Circe¡¯s gaze lingered on Greem for a moment before shifting down towards his shadow. Two beams of ck light shone out from the ck mist that shrouded her face. Her gaze pierced through the boundary between the shadow and reality and saw the figure that she hated with all her passion.


    ¡°I have no intention of talking nonsense with you; let us finish our trade as we agreed!¡± Circe cut straight to the issue.


    Alice couldn¡¯t help but interrupt her then.


    ¡°ording to the prior agreement, the Dark Witches will be trading the Orb of the Fire God and the Moonspring for the Orb of Shadows. Since you are here, I am sure you have what is needed. Why don¡¯t you show us the goods first?¡±


    Circe¡¯s face twisted into an ugly expression underneath the mist when she heard Alice so casually bring up these two priceless treasures. They might not know how heavy a price the Dark Witches had paid for this, but as the leader of the Dark Witches, she knew perfectly well.


    It was such a heavy price that her heart would break at the very thought of it!


    The Orb of the Fire God was an artifact created by Sinai, the Fire God of the World of Gods. It was just as powerful as the Orb of Shadows. Trying to steal the Orb of the Fire God from his hands was a nearly impossible task.


    However, Alice had divined that the Orb would be handed over to one of his followers during a nar war. Thus, the Dark Witches took that opportunity andunched an ambush, badly wounding the follower and retrieving the Orb.


    Of course, the Dark Witches had paid a heavy price for this operation as well!


    Elder udina, who had led the operation, was heavily injured and required at least thirty years to get rid of the mes that ravaged her body. Shadow had also lost a Third Grade witch and three Second Grade witches. They had all been killed by the artifact; their souls did not even have the chance to escape. Naturally, this meant that they could not return to life.


    Meanwhile, the Moonspring was a divine item of the elves of Faen. It was located in Moonlight Goddess Meve¡¯s main temple. Trying to rob the Moonlight Goddess¡¯ temple had been unimaginably difficult.


    The Dark Witches had lost five Second Grade Dark Witches to obtain the Moonspring!


    That was why Circe¡¯s expression was so ugly when she heard Alice¡¯s question. She fell silent for a long moment before waving her hand and releasing two Fifth Grade items.


    The Orb of the Fire God was a sphere the size of a fist. It constantly burned with an inextinguishable golden me. The moment it was released from its container, it turned into a massive fireball and seemed to only grow by the minute.


    The temperature of the hall was also rising rapidly, as if this ce was going to turn into a molten world at any time.


    Greem shut his eyes and silently felt the fire elementium particles in the air. They were so dense they had nearly turned solid. Greem could feel his every cell scream out loud, expressing their desire to devour the Orb of the Fire God and turn it into part of his power.


    Mm, this was indeed a Fifth Grade artifact, and an offensive one at that. The value of such an item was far above the Orb of Shadows for Greem.


    After finishing his inspection, Greem looked at Alice. She nodded her head, and he knew that the Moonspring was the real thing. He opened his right palm, and a metal w emerged from his shadow, cing the Orb of Shadows in his hand.


    Circe¡¯s breath instantly became short and rapid!

 Chapter 1191 - Fair Trade

    Chapter 1191 Fair Trade


    Trading a Fifth Grade Orb of the Fire God and a Fourth Grade Moonspring for a Fifth Grade Orb of Shadows.


    No one would ever agree to such unfair terms.


    However, the significance of the Orb of Shadows to the Dark Witches was simply too great!


    As unwilling as they were, Circe had no choice but to agree to this unfair trade.


    After getting her hands on the Orb of Shadows, Circe shot a hateful nce at Greem and turned to leave. However, Greem extended his hand and stopped her.


    ¡°What do you want?¡± Circe was surprised and immediately prepared for battle.


    It was the first time a deep sense of danger had appeared in her heart since she arrived.


    This ce was Alice¡¯s Tower of Fate, not the ck Mystery of the Dark Witches.


    Alice, Greem, and Shadow Demon had a pretty good chance of taking her down if Alice had ill intentions. So even though she knew that Alice would never betray the Northern Witches, Circe still felt her heart tighten.


    ¡°Our transaction isn¡¯t over yet, Lady Circe. Why the rush?¡± Greem coughed lightly. His Spirit¡¯s weakness was still as evident as ever.


    ¡°Isn¡¯t the transactionplete? What else is there for us to trade?¡± Circe asked cautiously.


    ¡°So, you mean you don¡¯t want her?¡± Greem smiled slightly and drew a circle in the air. The red elementium gathered into a mirror, revealing a young, restrained witch.


    Judging from her appearance, her dress, and her emblem, she was a Third Grade Dark Witch.


    ¡°Karin,¡± Circe¡¯s expression lightened slightly. She feigned surprise and said, ¡°Lord Greem, why have you imprisoned one of our n¡¯s young witches. This...is hardly goodwill, is it?¡±


    Greem was well-prepared for Circe refusing to acknowledge her orders.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t run over to Dark Witch territory to catch her. I captured her in my adept tower. Do you really not know anything about what she was doing?¡±


    Seeing as Greem¡¯s tone wasn¡¯t severe, it seemed like there was room for negotiation. Circe hurriedly replied, ¡°She¡¯s a young witch from our n that we sent to Zhentarim to venture and train. She must have ignorantly and mistakenly entered your territory. How about this? Any losses that you have suffered, we Dark Witches will be willing topensate. That should be enough, is it not?¡±


    Greem had no intention of being cordial to these Dark Witches. He tossed a parchment at Circe that had a list of a dozen valuable high-grade resources. These were rare resources that were urgently needed for the blood ritual that the Crimson n could not put together within a short time.


    Circe wanted to reject the offer and keep Greem frustrated over having to find these resources. However, the value of a Third Grade Dark Witch to a n was indescribable. That was especially so in times like these, where the n had just suffered significant losses. Losing a Third Grade witch just for ¡®a few¡¯ resources undesirable. Even with her authority and influence, Circe would be reprimanded and questioned by the n for her decision.


    Circe lifted her head once more. Her eyes looked through the mist and stared at Greem. Finally, she spoke.


    ¡°Let go of Karin and allow her to return to her outpost in Zhentarim. I will send all the resources you require to your hands as soon as possible.¡±


    The leader of the Dark Witches had made a promise. Greem could still trust the word and honor of someone of her position.


    Without wasting any time on pleasantries, Greem waved with one hand, and several fire runes entered the mirror.


    Soon, Witch Karin was escorted out of Fire Cave by a squad of high-grade magical machines under the directions of the tower spirit. Karin took a long while to get up from the ground after her magical bindings were removed. She shot a resentful nce at this terrifying ce that had humiliated her before turning and vanishing into the shadows.


    Circe nodded silently and hurried away from the Tower of Fate.


    Once she had left, Greem looked at Alice and asked in a concerned tone.


    ¡°Can this Moonspring help you recover your life origin?¡±


    Alice was touched when she saw his worried expression. She chuckled, ¡°More than enough. Don¡¯t forget. I just advanced to Fourth Grade. My lifespan¡¯s already been extended tremendously. With the Moonspring to replenish the life origin I lost prior to this, I should have no problem regaining the lifespan of a Fourth Grade adept!¡±


    After getting an affirmative reply from Alice, Greem was finally relieved.


    After flirting with Greem slightly, Alice¡¯s gaze drifted towards the Orb of the Fire God and the Moonspring. She took a sudden step forward.


    As she stepped forward, theplex array carved onto the floor of the astrology hall slowly lit up, illuminating the room and making it appear as if they were in a tiny boat amidst the endless sea of stars.


    The light in the hall abruptly dimmed as powerful starlight energy burst forth from the bright stars in the night sky. The hall had be a mysterious and beautiful world of stars and light.


    Alice was somehow fully equipped now.


    She held the Staff of Divination in one hand and the Hourss of Time in the other. The Witch¡¯s Mask was on her face, and the Mercury essories were attached to her belt. Many pretty cards floated around her, the contents on their faces shifting and changing.


    Fate Witches gained unique and unusual abilities upon reaching Fourth Grade.


    Though they still weren¡¯t excellentbatants, they could be considered extremely powerful individuals in an auxiliary capacity!


    Alice transformed, her body rapidly growing in size. In just a few seconds, she had turned into a beautiful and mysterious goddess that stood several hundred meters tall.


    She focused her attention on the enchanting starlight and raised her Staff of Divination. She chanted profound words and pointed at the two artifacts in the room. Two gentle beams of light shone from the night sky, turning into intricate starlight chains and wrapping around the artifacts.


    Greem instantly felt the Orb of the Fire God and the Moonspring fade from his senses.


    At the same time, two furious mental fluxes abruptly burst forth from the depths of space.


    One was bold and furious, the other cool and indignant. Both were equally angry.


    Now that the artifacts had been sealed, the connections with their masters had been obscured.


    This way, both Fire God Sinai and Moonlight Goddess Meve had lost their connection with their divine tools.


    Even if they managed to get the help of the God of Divination, they would not be able to find the location of their artifact any longer!


    Alice motioned with her hand, and the Orb of the Fire God drifted in front of Greem.


    ¡°I have sealed the divine aura on the orb. It will prevent any troubleing from the Fire God. You will have to create a separate, isted space if you wish to examine it. Do not bring it outside of that space before you have gainedplete control of the orb. Otherwise, the Fire God will be able to sense its location and your soul aura! When that happens, the Crimson n will be in deep trouble.¡±


    Greem smiled bitterly.


    Was he not in enough trouble already?


    He already had the Libram of Wisdom in Fire Throne. That was also a spoil of war that could never see the light of day. Should the God of Wisdom ever sense Greem¡¯s soul aura through the Libram of Wisdom, he would track him down the moment he left the World of Adepts. He would teach Greem an unforgettable lesson.


    As they say, you can¡¯t break an already broken jar!


    Greem was already shouldering plenty of grudges on his back.


    Honestly, the hatred from a Fire God could hardly scare him. If worse came to worst, he would just stay inside the World of Adepts for a few hundred years. He didn¡¯t believe the gods would remain on the alert for a ¡®mere¡¯ artifact.


    Moreover, the ones that robbed the Fire God were the Dark Witches. If anything, they should be the first ones he found trouble with.


    With this in mind, Greem felt a lot more confident about possessing the Orb of the Fire God.


    Even though he wanted to stay and get intimate with Alice, the orb was very, very tempting. He couldn¡¯t wait until he had gainedplete ownership of it.


    The Orb of the Fire God was not like the Orb of Shadows.


    The attribute of the Orb of Shadows was ipatible with Greem. In fact, using the Orb of Shadows for an extended period would even contaminate Greem with shadow energy. It was not worth what it offered in exchange. Meanwhile, the Orb of the Fire God was a Fifth Grade fire artifact that perfectly matched Greem¡¯s needs.


    As long as he could wipe away the divine brand left by Fire God Sinai, Greem would obtain an origin artifact that genuinely belonged to him.


    Even a Fifth Grade adept would go mad with envy if they knew he possessed such a treasure!


    After all, Fifth Grade artifacts and equipment were so rare that not even Fifth Grade adepts would necessarily have one in their possession, let alone a Fifth Grade artifact that perfectly matched the adept¡¯s attribute. The value of such an item was immeasurable!


    After bidding Alice farewell, Greem excitedly returned to Fire Throne with the orb.


    The first thing he did upon returning was creating a unique, isted space inside the adept tower.


    With the endless supply of energy from the tower, Greem tore a spatial rift in the air. He then stabilized it and slowly expanded it until the space was a dimension about a hundred square meters in size.


    If needed, Greem could further expand this space. However, this would also take up more energy from the adept tower and was hardly worth it.


    Thus, Fire Throne was now an anchor for two independent dimensions. One was used to hold the Libram of Wisdom and the other to store the Orb of the Fire God. These two items were Greem¡¯s most treasured objects at the moment.


    After visiting the two dimensions and his ownboratories, Greem began working hard to convert the arcane knowledge he had obtained a while ago into practical spells to fill in the gaps in his magical arsenal.

 Chapter 1192 - Clash of Civilizations

    Chapter 1192 sh of Civilizations


    The miniaturization and simplification of the floating rings were the main directions of Greem¡¯s research at the moment.


    As this research touched upon the fundamental difference in arcane arts and adept magic, its progress was incredibly slow and difficult.


    In all seriousness, arcane arts and adept magic came from the same origin of magical pattern studies. They were supernatural powers born out of ancient spellcasters copying the natural patterns found on magical creatures.


    However, while the adepts preserved the chaos, bloodiness, and taboo of ancient magic in theirter developments, the arcanists produced a simplified, neutered version of the ancient magic.


    This version was indeed easier to learn and understand, making it practical for increasing the numbers of the arcanists. Unfortunately, the supernatural powers they simplified and neutered were the most profound ones that manifested when synchronized with the narws.


    Without these profound portions of ancient magic, the arcane arts had indeed be simpler to learn. Even apprentices with unsatisfactory talent could slowly advance by umting experience and technique. However, this also severed the origin connection between the arcane arts and the narws. That made it much more difficult for the arcanists to advance at the higher gradespared to adepts.


    Meanwhile, the adepts insisted on their ancient traditions. Their magic was bloody, cruel, and filled with chaotic and mysterious elements. The same rune and the spell could havepletely different effects when cast in the hands of various adepts.


    In addition to the grueling experience they went through, and the constant refinement of fighting techniques, the average adept¡¯s power was three to five times that of the average arcanist.


    Some had even simplified the difference: arcanists relied on knowledge and equipment while adepts relied on technique and abilities.


    Arcanists respected knowledge; adepts respected power!


    The fundamental difference between the two spellcaster systems also manifested in their equipment. While the arcanists¡¯ equipment was often intricate and very detailed, the adepts¡¯ equipment was simple but straightforward, even bloody at times.


    The principles behind the floating ring weren¡¯t all thatplicated. The knowledge required was also elementary. It was the creation of an anti-gravity barrier with a fixed direction and form through a forcefield of simple construction. It then allowed an object to hover under zero-gravity conditions.


    However, the energy used by the floating rings was arcane energy that had been refined and tamed multiple times. Such power was six to seven times tamerpared to the magical energy used by adepts. Arcane energy was easier to store,press, and modte. It could even be inserted directly into a spellcaster¡¯s body and was of minimal radiation risk to ordinary individuals.


    Given the difference between arcane energy and the adept¡¯s magic energy, Greem would have to find a way to adapt. If he didn¡¯t do so and used the adept¡¯s magic energy to supply power to the floating ring, it would easily cause fluctuations in the energy system. The floating ring would not be able to function effectively and stably. In fact, in the worst-case scenario, the energy system would even copse and cause a terrifying chain explosion.


    The arcane system and the adept system were two civilizations that had developed independently of each other. Even though it might seem like there were many simrities, there were, in truth, even more fundamental conflicts and unresolvable differences.


    Most adepts could only extract the useful parts of arcane knowledge they obtained and cast away all the conflicting elements.


    After all, trying to merge two utterly distinct spellcasting systems was a colossal task that not even several generations of adepts or geniuses could aplish easily.


    As such, the obtaining of arcane knowledge was meant as a means for adepts to expand their knowledge reserves. It was an instinct to search for simr civilizations that they could refer to in their own development of knowledge.


    Greem also faced simr problems when he tried to use the arcane knowledge he had recovered on runic studies, spells, and equipment carving.


    The adept¡¯s magic system contained around two to three hundred runes rted to fire. However, only seven of these runes were origin runes. The rest were only derivatives orbinations of the seven origin runes.


    After some research and experimentation, Greem also found the arcane runes in the arcane system that corresponded with these seven origin fire runes. Unfortunately, the runic arrays he carved with these arcane runes either had no effect or induced strange, inexplicable phenomenon.


    It made Greem¡¯s head hurt, but there was nothing he could do about it.


    The Chip might be powerful, but it couldn¡¯t do much when it came to the more advanced domain of profound studies. It could not guide Greem forward rapidly as it always had. After all, at this level andplexity, therge amount of data and experience umted by the Chip was of no use.


    Mystic and profound studies required constant experimentation and searching at every step along the way. Failure was only par for the course.


    That was because of the unpredictable nature of mystic studies!


    ording to the Chip¡¯s data¡¯s estimate, mystic studies originated from the delicate changes of forcefields caused by thebination of magical energy and material substances. The difference in materials, environment, and substance causedrge,plex, and numerous energy spaces created by the resonance between countless forcefields.


    Under such circumstances, a stable state was temporary, localized, and small in scale. Constant change and flux were what was generally referred to as mystic studies!


    The adept¡¯s magic itself was the pursuit of this unpredictability.


    They used minute, localized energy changes as a lever to move the powers of the narws, thus guiding thews in the direction they wanted. That was the true heart and core of adept magic!


    In this process, the only thing that adepts could control was the guidance process.


    They used chants, handsigns, spellcastingponents, and magical arrays toplete the task of guiding the energy. Yet, how did the energy resonance that came afterward seed at moving the narws? How did the movements of the narws then spread to the principles?


    Low-grade adepts knew nothing about this. Only high-grade adepts that had finallye into contact with the narws could continue researching this domain.


    Take fire magic, for example. The focus of Greem¡¯s research back in First Grade was how to gather more fire elementium particles and invoke more fire elementium resonance when forming his fireball. In other words, he was trying to figure out how he could increase the concentration of energy in his fireball, make its explosion radiusrger, and make the fireball itself more destructive.


    At Second Grade, Greem had researched the prative effects of fire energy and its conductivity.


    At Third Grade, Greem put his mind to the conversion and assimtion of fire energy with other magic energies.


    At its core, prior to Fourth Grade, Greem¡¯s research on fire magic had only revolved around its superficial physical traits. It had not actually involved the magic origin of fire energy.


    Now, upon advancing to Fourth Grade and mastering some of the lesser firews, Greem¡¯s research was finally moving towards the direction of magic origin. There were no pioneers in this domain nor any experience he could draw upon or patterns to follow. He had to figure out everything from scratch, alone.


    Every high-grade domain was a knowledgeable individual with plenty of information on their specific expertise. However, their research was closely rted to their own abilities. Should such research and knowledge be leaked, it would mean that everything about them would be made public.


    That would put them in grave danger!


    It was precisely out of such considerations that high-trade adepts always kept their research a secret. They would only teach or trade their knowledge in portions, never offering them up to the public as proper theories as arcanists would.


    Inparison, this situation was much better when it came to the three major adept organizations.


    Through the use of resources, materials, and magical crystals as rewards, the organizations could obtain some inferior research materials and information that were not as sensitive to an adept¡¯s privacy. This information could also be used as a reward, motivating low-grade adepts¨Cwho required the information but did not have the ability to embark on such research¨Cto join the organization.


    However, at Zhentarim, the adept organizations were too scattered and fractured. They existed in the form of multiple independent ns. Magic knowledge would only be traded within ns, causing the magic system of Zhentarim to be significantly inferior to the three major organizations.


    If Greem wanted to make progress on his high-grade magic research, he would have to work hard on his own while also finding help from the three major organizations.


    Greem¡¯s rtionship with the Northern Witches was tense. Trying to obtain high-grade knowledge from them was impractical. Meanwhile, the Adept¡¯s Association kept to themselves. Trying to purchase knowledge from them without a suitable medium to help him and without a suitable point of association was incredibly tricky.


    In the end, byparison, the Silver Union was his best choice!


    The Silver Union was indeed a massive adept¡¯s organization that most closely resembled amercial entity. As long as you had enough magical crystals, there were no spells or resources you couldn¡¯t buy.


    However, the high-grade knowledge useful to Fourth Grade adepts was too expensive. Even with Greem¡¯s wealth, he was troubled by the astronomical price.


    The reason Greem insisted on expanding to space was that he had his eye on its market. Tens of thousands of different nes, each with their own unique distribution of resources.


    Something scarce in the World of Adepts could be much moremon in another world!


    If Greem could navigate his way around the massive market of space thatbined tens of thousands of nes, he could make a profit by conducting internar trade and taking advantage of the price difference. The incredible profit that could be found in space was unimaginable for a small n stuck in a ne.


    Sending Gazlowe to establish an outpost near Exodar Camp was the Crimson n¡¯s first step towards this goal!

 Chapter 1193 - The Orb of the Fire God’s Secret

    <h4>Chapter 1193 The Orb of the Fire God¡¯s Secret</h4>


    Inside an isted dimension.


    It was a strange space, only one hundred square meters in area.


    There were no windows, walls, ceilings, floorboards, or even an entrance or an exit. The entire space was a sealed room surrounded by an unusual semi-translucent forcefield.


    You could knock on the forcefield if you stood at the edge of the space. It proved that the forcefields were material substances that indeed existed, rather than just an illusion. Strange, colorful lights could be seen outside the forcefields, making it hard to identify where this ce was exactly.


    There was no air, no earth, and no water in this space. Naturally, there could be no life either. However, this ce wasn¡¯t silent!


    Greem was greeted by a destructive torrent of fire when he entered the space through a teleportation array. The red mes washed over his body but could not injure him in the slightest. On the contrary, they turned into dense fire energy that was almost solid in texture and surged into his body.


    Greem could feel the concentrated fire aura within his body. He could also sense, more than anything else, themotion and desire of his Spirit. It had been left exhausted from the injury to his soul.


    Here, nourished by the plentiful and pure fire energy, it seemed as if even the wound to his soul was healing. He was reinvigorated and felt like he had before his injury¨C filled with power.


    The entire space was empty save for the Orb of the Fire God hovering in the air. It was slowly radiating waves of pure fire energy.


    If this was just pure fire energy, the Heart of Principles in Greem¡¯s body could also achieve a simr effect. In fact, the power given off by his Heart was easier to control. The fact that the mes from the Orb could nourish and strengthen Greem¡¯s soul and Spirit meant that it contained something extraordinary.


    Greem didn¡¯t approach the Orb of the Fire God in a rush. Instead, he observed it from a distance.


    The starseal that Alice applied was still active. No unusual energy fluctuation could be sensed within the Orb. The waves of fire energy radiating from it were simply due to the Orb of the Fire God being such a powerful vessel and source of energy.


    The fire energy was gathered from the surroundings and concentrated within the core of the Orb. Most of it was converted into an usual, higher energy and stored. The rest of it radiated outwards in the form of this fire energy that was gradually modifying the environment.


    If Greem didn¡¯t absorb the scattered fire energy in this isted dimension, the next time he came in, this ce would be a sea of fire energy. If the Orb of the Fire God was given enough time and space, it could even forge a ne of fire or a molten world out of thin air.


    Even this isted dimension had already been changed slightly by the Orb¡¯s presence.


    The edge of this space was filled with sparks of fire fluttering in the air like ribbons. Meanwhile, the mes were much more concentrated and furious in the area¡¯s center, where the Orb was. Red mes circled the Orb of the Fire God, pulsating and ebbing like waves.


    Closer to the Orb of the Fire God, the fire energy was so dense that it had turned into a liquid state within ten steps of the artifact. It shrouded the Orb in a massive ball of fire and hid it from sight. Even from a distance, Greem could hear the loud rumbling from within the liquid ball of fire.


    Greem stood at the edge of the dimension. Blue light flickered in his ck eyes as he instantly scanned every change in the energy of this room.


    The intensity of the emitted fire energy at the edge of the dimension was at 137 points, while the power at the center had reached 335 points. Meanwhile, the intensity within that massive fireball was as high as 628 points.


    If Greem were just a Third Grade adept, he would only be able to move around the edge and center of this dimension. If he got too close to the fireball, his life would be at risk.


    Fortunately, Greem had advanced to Fourth Grade. He also had the Chaos Physique. It allowed him to move freely in a space filled with such concentrated fire energy.


    Greem had intended to use the devices in hisboratory to decipher the secrets behind the Orb of the Fire God. However, the strange element in the fire energy extracted from the Orb would rapidly vanish upon leaving the radius of the Orb¡¯s radioactivity. The fire energy would turn into ordinary fire energy.


    That was more than enough evidence that the greatest secret of the Orby within itself.


    Greem casually walked through the mysterious sea formed of fire energy. Every movement of his Spirit would cause a tidal wave to wash across the sea of mes. His Spirit was continually guiding some sort of unusual power into his body. It made him feel warm as if he were soaked in a hot spring of just the right temperature in the middle of winter. It was sofortable he didn¡¯t feel like doing anything else.


    His body was very rxed, but his Spirit was only getting increasingly excited.


    Countless fire elementium particles that resonated with his Spirit were surging into his tattered mind, slowly but surely mending the damage there. During this process, Greem¡¯s soul origin was also being nourished and healed.


    Greem slowly walked up to the fireball and extended his right hand into the mes.


    He could feel the scorching heat the moment his arm entered the fireball. If he were any other adept, his arm would have been reduced to ashes in just a few seconds. All of the flesh would have burned away from the shocking heat of the fire.


    However, he was a Fourth Grade fire adept. Such horrifying heat was barely anything to him.


    A short momentter, the fireball trembled, and the energy dispersed. The Orb of the Fire God was taken out of the mes and revealed in its true form¨C a sphere the size of a fist.


    ¡°Come out and talk! I know you are in there,¡± Greem casually said, even though there was no one around him apart from the Orb of the Fire God.


    ......


    ¡°ying dead is not something that works with me.¡± Greem smiled scornfully as he said, ¡°You better not be a consciousness clone of Sinai, or I will have no choice but to wipe you away!¡±


    Upon hearing Greem¡¯s vicious threat and sensing the terrifying fire energy that radiated from him, the Orb of the Fire God that had beenying silently in his palm finally moved.


    mes erupted out of thin air.


    Golden fire appeared from the Orb and gathered together to form an unusual face.


    ¡°How did you sense my presence? Honestly, how? Even those two vicious women from before couldn¡¯t detect my presence. How did you do it?¡± The voice that came out of the face of fire was young and child-like. It sounded cute, so much so that it was even vaguely enchanting.


    ¡°Vicious woman? Ha! If Alice hears you describe her like that, you will regret it. As for detecting your presence? Hmph! Nothing difficult. I once met a ming Tiger with its own consciousness in the Fire ne. That is why I am familiar with the elementium life fluctuation radiating from you.¡±


    ¡°A ming Tiger with its own consciousness,¡± The face mumbled to itself, its tone filled with envy.


    ¡°Alright, since you are an artifact spirit with your own consciousness, you should understand what I am about to do to you, don¡¯t you?¡± Greem threatened coldly. ¡°So tell me, do you intend to open up your consciousness core to me, or do you want me to take the effort to wipe away your existence?¡±


    The smile on the face disappeared as the voice changed from that of a child to the low voice of a man.


    ¡°Wipe away my consciousness? Haha! Tiny adept, I am notughing at you, but you wouldn¡¯t be able to aplish such a thing even if you were a Great Adept! You are just a Fourth Grade adept, while I...am the spirit of Fifth Grade artifact. You can¡¯t do anything to me.¡±


    Greem chuckled and gripped with his right hand, cutting off all energy supply to the Orb of the Fire God. The face vanished without a trace, reduced to simple sparks.


    ¡°Chip, begin a deep scan. Send the results to me as soon as possible.¡±


    [Beep. Mission established. Beginning scan.]


    As the Chip¡¯s mechanical voice rang in his mind, two beams of blue light shone from Greem¡¯s eyes, continually changing spectrums and frequency as they scanned the Orb.


    The Orb¡¯s outeryer was a sort of strange crystal, cool to the touch, without a trace of warmth. However, when the scanning wavesnded on this crystal, most of the spectrums and frequencies were reflected, unable to prate it in the slightest.


    Even the energy spectrums that were fortunate enough to prate the crystalyer soon entered a space of fire of seemingly endless size. The flood of fire energy disrupted these scanning beams before they could go any further.


    Greem heard a slight popping sound and turned his head away. ck smoke was rising from his eyes.


    Greem closed his eyes. Two streams of blood trickled from his eyes and flowed down his cheek.


    Hmph! He had not been careful enough. The energy spectrum that had prated the Orb had been reflected and caused slight damage to his eyes.


    He could only close his eyes and release waves of holy light from Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring to heal his wounded eyeballs. The fire energy he wielded was indeed most powerful in offense, but it was inferior to pure, holy light when it came to its healing effects.


    After almost five seconds, the itch on his eyeballs finally faded. Greem opened his eyes, and they were back to normal again.


    As expected of a Fifth Grade artifact. Even without its owner¡¯s control and having most of its abilities sealed away, its instinctive ability for retaliation was still able to hurt Greem.


    Greem gritted his teeth and chuckled viinously. He gathered power in his eyes without any hesitation once again, and two blinding beams of blue light shone on the Orb once more.


    This damned thing! He was going to break it in today at all costs!

 Chapter 1194 - Portent of Danger

    <h4>Chapter 1194 Portent of Danger</h4>


    The Moonspring.


    A sacred item of the elves.


    It possessed mysterious powers that surpassed the Spring of Life, the Spring of Youth, and the Spring of Magic.


    Drinking from the Spring of Life could replenish lost life force without any side effects.


    Drinking from the Spring of Youth could give eternal youth, leaving a person¡¯s body at their peak and unaffected by the flow of time until their lifespan was over.


    Drinking from the Spring of Magic could help supernatural creatures recovered magic power at a faster rate. The process was gentle and came at no risk.


    Meanwhile, the Moonspringbined the traits of all these elven treasures. When basked in moonlight, the well could periodically produce a sort of wondrous springwater. When the Moonspring¡¯s water was drunk, it could prevent the loss of life force, the fading of youth, and the exhaustion of magic power.


    Even the seeds of the famous Moonwells of the elves had to be soaked in the Moonspring¡¯s water until they sprouted before they could be nted.


    If the Spring of Life was a treasure that could replenish life force for an individual only once in their life, then the Moonspring blessed by Moonlight Goddess Meve was a treasure capable of constantly restoring life force. A support item like this was the best artifact for professions that relied heavily on their life force.


    With the Moonspring, Alice no longer had to be as cautious as she had been in the past when conducting her divinations. She no longer had to fear the bacsh of Fate devouring what was left of her lifeforce.


    It was because of how significant and vital the Moonspring was to the Fate Witches that Alice held a massive ceremony the day after she obtained it. She led all of the Fate Witches in a fate prayer ritual in the astrology hall at the top of the Tower of Fate.


    The Moonspring looked like a clear pool of spring water.


    It was only two to three square meters in area, ced in an incredibly simple wooden basin.


    Every time moonlight shone down on the springwater through the ceiling, silver sparks of light would radiate from the liquid, filling the entire hall with the fresh smell of grass after rain.


    Alice had applied a Fate blessing on Greem when he entered Morrian ne, while she was only Third Grade. That had exhausted nearly eighty percent of her life force. If it weren¡¯t for the power of Fate she had managed to steal with the abduction of the heir of the Morrian ne, she would already be on her death bed by now.


    Even after advancing to Fourth Grade and extending her lifespan, the lost life force could not be replenished by her advancement. It undoubtedly affected how many years she had left to live after her advancement.


    Now, with the Moonspring, she could recover her life origin. After advancing to Fourth Grade, her lifespan was restored to the standard length that Fourth Grade adepts should have.


    This Fate prayer ritual was incredibly important to her. It was unbelievably crucial to her life!


    As the many Fate Witches and apprentices prayed zealously, a projection of the River of Fate slowly appeared in the hall. It emerged midair and seemed to lead towards the distant sky. It was bold and broad, magnificent and colossal. It felt as if one¡¯s soul was frozen in ce, and the very core of your being trembled when your Spirit came into contact with it.


    No one could see the source of this long river, and no one could see where it was headed. Anyone would be able to feel their insignificance in front of such a long river steeped in the vor of time and history like this.


    The Fate Witches here might have all witnessed the River of Fate multiple times throughout their lives. However, that oppressive aura that pressed against their faces still caused them to be enlightened to countless truths.


    The Fate apprentices were already in a dizzied, confused state when the projection of the River appeared. Their souls simply weren¡¯t resilient enough. Only the eyes of one girl among the apprentices glowed brightly, signifying her still calm and rational mind. She lifted her head and looked at the slowly roaring torrents of Fate before her. She couldn¡¯t resist reaching out to those strange ribbons of light.


    When her youthful fingers touched the ribbons of light formed by the projection of the River of Fate, her entire body trembled. The very origin of her life and soul trembled as if they were about to be washed down the River of Fate by its mighty power.


    Just then, a slender hand radiating starlightnded on her head, covering her entire person with starlight power.


    With the protection of the starlight power, the young apprentice¡¯s finger finally broke free of the River of Fate¡¯s flow. The two prettyyers of ribbons rubbed against each other but did not intertwine. It no longer felt as if she would be washed away and ground to dust by that merciless Fate power.


    ¡°Lucia, do not act brazenly simply because of Fate¡¯s favor to you.¡± Alice caressed her long hair and shook her head slowly. ¡°Fate is a high power! It is cold and merciless. If you want to swim freely in the River of Fate, you must first understand it,prehend it, and obey it. Fate is also the fairest power in the world. It will always allow you an equitable exchange. If you know everything about what you want, then what exactly do you intend to use to exchange Fate for it?¡±


    ¡°My life, my soul, my knowledge...I am willing to offer my everything for it!¡± Lucia lifted her head stubbornly, staring straight into Alice¡¯s pretty eyes as she insisted.


    ¡°Girl, everything you just mentioned is insignificant to Fate! If you want to trade with Fate, you will first have to make yourself possess value. So, since it is not yet time for you to make contact with Fate and trade with it, it¡¯s best to continue your studies first! When the time is right, you can stand where I stand, proudly and bravely negotiating and trading with Fate! ¡±


    ¡°Alice, can the power of Fate of the World of Adepts change the fate of the arcanists?¡±


    ¡°That is impossible! Morrian ne, where the Arcane Empire existed, is a primary ne, only one step away from equalling the World of Adepts. The power of Fate here is insufficient to change the fate of a ne of the same level.¡± Alice lowered her head and looked at the disappointed Lucia. She continued, ¡°But you don¡¯t have to be disappointed. Your existence is the continuation of the Arcane Empire. You carry with yourself a branch of the Morrian ne¡¯s Fate that has yet to fade. As long as you don¡¯t give up, the Arcane Empire will have a chance of rising again.¡±


    ¡°Then what does the power of Fate of the World of Adepts hope to gain from me?¡± An ordinary girl might have been moved to tears at this point, grateful for the chance she had been given. However, even though Lucia¡¯s soul was weak and powerless right now, the perpetual gleam of wisdom glowed in her heart.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know either!¡± Alice smiled and concealed nothing. ¡°Perhaps it is waiting for the remnants of the Arcane Empire to strengthen this branch flow of Fate before assimting it into a branch of the World of Adept¡¯s own Fate, turning the arcanist into a part of the World of Adept¡¯s power system.


    ¡°There are simply too many possibilities. Even I cannot give you a proper answer. In all honesty, every word you say and every decision you make now are all subtly affecting the direction in which this branch of Fate flows.


    ¡°Fate is whimsical and unpredictable! However, Fate is also a ¡®future¡¯ piled up by one ¡®present¡¯ after another ¡®present.¡¯ To some extent, it is possible to divine its flow and manipte it. As for how to do that? You will have to continue studying and practicing. Otherwise, you will remain as you are now, powerless as you watch the torrent of Fate.¡±


    Lucia opened her eyes wide and stared at the pretty, goddess-like Alice before her. After a long while, a bitter smile appeared on her face.


    ¡°Thank you, Alice. I can feel the sincerity from the depths of your soul. Thank you for not lying to me or coaxing me. However, I must remind you; there seems to be a cmity waiting for you today. You must be careful! ¡±


    Cmity?


    Alice¡¯s heart trembled. She conjured a magical mirror of water with a wave of her hand and looked at her appearance.


    The gentle aura that her beautiful face radiated was enough to brighten the mood of anyone who saw her. The hair tied up above her head was brilliantly shiny, adding a hint of matureness to her youthful beauty.


    Judging from her aura, her appearance, and her color, it did not seem as if any ill fate would befall her today!


    However, as a Witch of Fate, she could not ignore even the smallest of omens or portents. In particr, the Fate prayer ritual today was a crucial moment that concerned whether Alice could sessfully replenish her life origin. With a slight mistake, anything could happen. Losing a Fourth Grade treasure was the least of it. More importantly, her lifespan from now on could be affected as well.


    What could go wrong here? Was someone scheming against her?


    Alice closed her eyes and started to silently sense and work out the cause, process, and result of everything surrounding today¡¯s event. Strangely enough, the power of Fate sent no signals of warning to her. The result of her divination was also neutral. She could not find any problems.


    Believe in Lucia¡¯s feelings and give up on the ritual? Or continue the ritual?


    For a moment, Alice could not decide!


    ¡°Alice, it¡¯s time!¡± Little Fairy Helen beat her wings and flew out of the array. She circled Alice. ¡°If you don¡¯t hurry up, we will miss the best time to activate the starlight array. What are you waiting for?¡±


    Alice took a deep breath and grabbed Helen. She leaned in by her ear and whispered, ¡°I will go into the array aler. Stay outside. If...and I mean if...anything happens to me, look for Greem immediately. He might be the only one that can save me then!¡±


    Helen¡¯s eyes opened wide. She could not understand what she was hearing.


    However, as Alice¡¯s contracted spirit, she agreed to do as ordered.

 Chapter 1195 - Primal Water and the Spirit World

    <h4>Chapter 1195 Primal Water and the Spirit World</h4>


    Fire Throne.


    Greem, who was dealing with the Orb of the Fire God in the isted dimension, felt his heart twinge. He turned and left immediately.


    When he hurried to the teleportation room on the fifth level of the tower, a white light shed as spatial flux filled the room. A familiar, tiny silhouette slowly appeared.


    ¡°Helen, why is it you? Where¡¯s Alice?¡± A bad feeling appeared in Greem¡¯s heart when he saw Helen¡¯s face.


    ¡°Bad guy, go see Alice, quick. She...it doesn¡¯t seem like she¡¯s going tost much longer!¡± Helen hastily circled around Greem like an aggravated bee, grabbing his hair and yanking him towards the teleportation array.


    Greem¡¯s face turned pale. He dove into the teleportation array without any hesitation.


    A short momentter, Greem arrived at the astrology hall under Helen¡¯s lead.


    The radiant starlight power here had yet to fade entirely. Arge group of Fate Witches and apprentices was standing silently around the room, while Sofia and Snowlotus helped Alice slowly walk out of the array.


    Alice¡¯s face was deadly white. Even her pretty hair had turnedpletely white, and wrinkles could be seen at the corner of her eyes, her face, and on her hands. It had only been a few days, yet it seemed as if she had already reached the end of her lifespan. The lifeforce in her body was so weak it could barely be sensed.


    ¡°What happened? What...what happened to you?¡± Greem pulled Alice to his side and sternly asked the two witches that were helping her.


    Before Sofia and Snowlotus could exin, the dying Alice grabbed Greem¡¯s arm weakly and shook his arm as she said, ¡°No...not their fault. I was not careful...fell into Maysa¡¯s trap.¡±


    ¡°Maysa!¡± Greem¡¯s eyes opened wide when he heard that name. mes burst forth an inch from his red eyes.


    However, he quickly suppressed his anger and asked in a solemn tone, ¡°How did she do it?¡±


    Even though Alice had always been fighting against Great Witch Maysa, she was always protected by the World of Adepts¡¯ narws while she was here. Even as much as Maysa hated Alice, there was nothing she could do to her.


    Protected by the narws, further shielded from Fate by the Tower of Fate, and favored by the Fate powers themselves. From all aspects, Alice should never have fallen victim to Maysa¡¯s scheme.


    ¡°She did something to the Moonwell!¡± Alice leaned helplessly on Greem, so tired that she could barely open her eyes. ¡°Go...look for Emelia. It is a death trap. Only she......¡±


    At this point, Alice¡¯s body went limp as she fell unconscious.


    The Tower of Fate was sealed from the public once more.


    It was the only option that Sofia and Snowlotus could think of.


    The Tower of Fate was sealed from the public once more to cut off all news of Alice¡¯s ident from spreading.


    Fortunately, the Tower of Fate was located in the remote Dragonblight. Communications with the outside world were infrequent, to begin with. Shutting off the Tower from the rest of the world for a few months was no problem.


    However, people would start noticing after a while.


    After all, ever since Alice advanced to Fourth Grade, the Tower of Fate had be the center of attention of the witches. Being sealed off from the world for an extended period was likely to draw the attention of people with ill intentions.


    Alice had been poisoned with a sort of time poison.


    Her life origin was already verycking. The purpose of the Fate prayer ritual was to recover this missing portion of her lifeforce. However, an unusual time poison had actually been hidden in the Fourth Grade Moonspring, the most importantponent of the ritual. Consequently, the poison managed to reach Alice¡¯s life origin rapidly.


    This poison could rapidly devour life force and was exceedingly hard to remove.


    Thus, thest bit of Alice¡¯s lifeforce was being corroded, leaving her instantly at death¡¯s door!


    Life was like a candle; it would not stop burning the moment it was lit.


    The candle that represented Alice¡¯s life was already eighty percent shorter because of the Fate blessing she ced on Greem. Only a small segment of that candle was left. Alice had hoped to recover her lifeforce with her advance to Fourth Grade and the aid of the Moonspring. However, she had fallen victim to Great Witch Maysa¡¯s time poison.


    What remained of her candle was instantly shortened to a tiny film of wax. It had lost all the thickness that a candle of life should have. Naturally, this meant that the candle could no longer sustain the burning of the me of life.


    Fortunately, Alice had an omen that this would happen prior to the ritual. She protected herself with all of her equipment and managed to survive the first explosion of the time poison. However, even with the protection of the unique Fate Witch equipment, Alice still didn¡¯t have much time left.


    Emelia was soon summoned to the Tower of Fate. Here, she saw Alice, who had been sealed in a starlight array.


    While she was worried sick and unsure of what to do, Greem finally spoke up.


    ¡°Before being sealed, Alice said that you were the only one that could save her!¡±


    ¡°I,¡± Emelia was stunned. Surprise was written all over her pretty face. ¡°I don¡¯t even know what kind of poison this is. How am I supposed to save Lady Alice?¡±


    At this time, Lucia, who had been following behind Snowlotus, suddenly spoke up.


    ¡°Lady Emelia, Alice mentioned that only you could save her. She might not have necessarily meant that you would be able to cure her of the poison directly, but something else. For instance, you might have heard of this poison, or you might have seen something or someone that could save her, or perhaps you have some means of helping her regain lifeforce.¡±


    Emelia¡¯s expression shifted several times when she heard Lucia speak. In particr, when Lucia mentioned a method of regaining lifeforce, Emelia¡¯s expression changed most drastically. It looked like she was deep in thought about something.


    ¡°Did you think of something?¡± Greem didn¡¯t dare disrupt her thoughts. He waited until she waspletely calm before he asked impatiently.


    ¡°I can¡¯t do anything about the time poison that Lady Alice has been poisoned with. I have never even heard of such poison. However......¡±


    ¡°However, what?¡±


    ¡°However, I have heard rumors of the Moonspring.¡±


    ¡°Rumors? What kind of rumors?¡±


    Emelia¡¯s expression turned into one of pain for a moment. After struggling for a while, she finally turned towards Greem and spoke honestly, ¡°My lord, you already know of my true identity, don¡¯t you?¡±


    Greem paused for a brief moment.


    ¡°You mean the soul of the Spore Princess that has assimted with you?¡±


    Emelia smiled bitterly. She knew this little secret she had been keeping for a hundred years could not be concealed form this high-grade adept. The reason she hadn¡¯t been captured and used as an experimental subject was purely because of Gargamel and Eva¡¯s protection.


    ¡°Since you know that my soul has assimted the consciousness of a spore princess, you would know that the magical sporepeople are not native creatures of the World of Adepts. Theye from an ancient ne known as the Spirit World.¡±


    ¡°The Spirit World.¡± Greem was acquainted with this name because the Spirit World was just as described by Emelia. It was an extremely ancient and well-known ne.


    All sorts of unusual spirits of all shapes and forms existed in that ne!


    Spirits were unusual, immaterial consciousness bodies. They had no physical forms but possessed unimaginable and strange abilities. Many powerful spellcasters wouldmunicate with spirits from the Spirit World and form contracts with a suitable one.


    Afterpleting these magical contracts, spellcasters would be able to easily summon spirits from the Spirit World to their current position to aid them in some tasks.


    Manypanion creatures summoned by adepts were, in fact, these spirits merged with some native creatures. This way, the contracted spirit would have a material body and would be able to exist for an extended period in a material world.


    After going through all the information he had in his mind about the Spirit World, Greem still had not found a way to save Alice. He couldn¡¯t help but ask solemnly, ¡°What is there in the Spirit World?¡±


    ¡°It isn¡¯t a question of what there is in the Spirit World, but what there is with us magical sporepeople.¡± For some reason, when Emelia mentioned the magical sporepeople, her pretty face waspletely distorted. It was filled with hatred, anger, and vicious fury. She gritted her teeth as if her entire being was seething was hatred.


    ¡°Tell us, what do the magical sporepeople have? If your suggestion can truly save Alice, I will be willing to fulfill any request you have along the way!¡± As a high-grade adept, no mental flux from Emelia could escape his senses.


    Not to mention how obvious Emelia¡¯s emotions were.


    ¡°Primal Water!¡± Emelia exined firmly. ¡°The magical sporepeople have Primal Water in their hands!¡±


    Primal Water?


    Greem quickly searched the Chip¡¯s database but found nothing at all.


    This situation was very rare!


    Either the contents were too taboo and had been sealed away by high-grade adepts, or even the high-grade adepts had never heard of such a thing and had not recorded it.


    Greem nced at Sofia and Snowlotus. Both witches looked confused as well. Instead, it was the apprentice, Lucia, who seemed to be thinking about something.


    ¡°Exin a little!¡± Greem looked at Emelia and said.


    ¡°Primal Water is an unusual state of water elementium when gathered at the very birth of a ne. As the ne is born, the Primal Water continues to split, filling the ne with an endless supply of clean water.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s something as miraculous as that?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but exhale, impressed by the wonders of the multiverse. ¡°Then what are the specific uses of this Primal Water?¡±


    ¡°Purification!¡± Emelia replied. ¡°I don¡¯t know if it will be able to save Alice, but it will most certainly be able to purify the poison that has polluted the Moonspring. With the proper Moonspring back, we should have no problem with saving Alice.¡±


    Greem looked back at Sofia and Snowlotus.


    Both of them nodded.


    Obviously, they agreed with Emelia¡¯s opinion!

 Chapter 1196 - Travelling to the Spirit World

    <h4>Chapter 1196 Travelling to the Spirit World</h4>


    The Spirit World.


    The forest during the night was quiet.


    Tall, towering trees were everywhere.


    Beneath the trees were wild, verdant growths of bushes and vegetation, as well as massive, colorful mushrooms whose caps were the size of umbres.


    Thick vines wrapped around ancient trees like serpents,yer uponyer, extending all the way into the broad canopy above. Looking up from within the forest, the sky seemed to be filled with entangled green vines tied together in a three-dimensional array that connected every tree.


    It wasn¡¯t dark in the woods.


    Apart from the faint pirs of blue light that pierced through the canopy from the moon, the moss and mushrooms on the ground were also glowing with colorful light, illuminating the forest and turning it into a strange, unusual wondend.


    Here, three unusual visitors appeared in this remote corner of the world, shattering the peace and quiet.


    A spatial singrity slowly opened in the green clearing. Terrifying, dense red mist spilled forth from the singrity, instantly taking up all space within ten meters of it.


    The red mist shimmered, as though there was some strange beast within struggling and roaring ferociously.


    A short momentter, the red mist faded, revealing three unusual figures.


    The first was a woman.


    She appeared human from the waist up, with a butt, bosom, slender figure, and a pretty face. Yet strangely enough, everything from the legs down was very obviously not human. Countless soft vines extended from her waist, supporting her body as an octopus¡¯ tentacles would.


    However, even more shockingly, her skin appeared almost semi-translucent. You could see the green and viscous liquid that ran beneath it.


    As the party¡¯s guide, Emelia was the first member of the group to awake from the teleportation.


    She stretched her body and got used to the nar environment while she assessed their surroundings.


    The space inside the Spirit World was vast. After such a long time away from this ce, she couldn¡¯t be sure that the teleportation she had conducted wouldn¡¯t deviate from her ideal location.


    Most of the red mist had dispersed already. Still, some of it gathered together into a strange fire humanoid that was still struggling to adjust to the local conditions.


    ¡°My lord, this is the Spirit World! I can sense the unique nar aura here.¡± Emelia respectfully reported to the fire humanoid afterpleting her assessment.


    ¡°The narws here seem entirely different from a normal ne. They resemble thews of the elementium nes more. Also, what¡¯s with my body. Why is it in such a weird state?¡± Greem¡¯s voice rang from the me humanoid.


    It seemed he had not fully broken free from the nar teleportation sickness.


    ¡°My lord, the Spirit World is a strange world utterly different from any other ne. Non-native creatures will not be able toe here with their corporeal forms. Consequently, only your mental consciousness was teleported here. If you control your body using your past experience and habits, you will feel a little not used to it!¡±


    ¡°Mental consciousness?¡± Greem gasped. ¡°You mean my body is still in the Tower of Fate? That only my mental consciousness has traveled here with you?¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    ¡°Then what is this little guy?¡± Greem casually grabbed a green ball of light from beside him as he spoke.


    ¡°Master, it¡¯s me! It¡¯s Remi!¡± Remi¡¯s voice came from within the ball of light.


    ¡°Remi, how did you travel here with me?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not surprising, my lord. Lord Remi is your contracted spirit. Since you are bound by the soul, youing to the Spirit World would naturally drag Remi along with you. That is because your form in the Spirit World is the true form of your soul origin!¡±


    ¡°I see!¡±


    Greem continued to talk with Emelia while silently calling for the Chip in the depths of his mind.


    After a dozen seconds, the Chip¡¯s distorted voice appeared in his mind.


    [Bzzz. Detecting severe mental disruption...zzz...currently in a foreign ne with a different flow of time than the host body...bzzz...mentalmunication severely dyed.]


    ¡°Chip, can you still provide me with aid even though my body is not present with me?¡±


    [Bzz...trying to eliminatemunication dy. Estimated time until solution: 28 hours, 37 minutes, 21 seconds.]


    The Chip had been embedded in Greem¡¯s very DNA. His Spirit was able to function as the medium with his body providing the energy required for its functions.


    Now that Greem¡¯s mental consciousness and body were separated, only a part of the Chip had traveled with him. To maintain a connection with its main body in the Tower of Fate, the Chip would have to be affected by the different time flows of the two ne worlds.


    It was obvious that the Chip would not be able to provide further assistance in the next twenty-eight hours.


    Greem sighed. He knew he only had himself to rely upon now.


    He stood up slowly, repeatedly recalling his original appearance in his mind.


    Strangely enough, as he recalled his appearance, the crude humanoid form of fire started to twist and distort. The obscure face of the humanoid form started to sink and rise, forming into proper facial features.


    A short momentter, a bright sh of fire shone as the mes around Greem faded away, revealing his young, handsome face and tall, muscr body.


    He was a Fourth Grade adept, after all. In just a few seconds, he had managed to figure out some basic uses of energy-shaping. Even though he was only a shapeless ball of mental consciousness, he had managed to create a perfect, almost solid body for himself.


    A gentle breeze blew past, and Greem felt a slight chill.


    Dammit! He was too focused on shaping his body and forgot to create clothes for himself!


    Greem ignored the girl who had turned her face away and was blushing bright red. A thought flowed through his mind, a bit of his Spirit was exhausted, and a perfectly fitting adept¡¯s robe appeared out of thin air, covering his muscr body.


    Energy materialization was a small trick that posed no problem for a Fourth Grade adept like himself.


    After all, it was challenging for the Fourth Grade adepts to procure supplies in the ces they tended to go to. The conversion of energy into some simple living supplies was a handy thing to learn. However, enchanted items or magical equipment with their own magic systems could not be created through simple energy-shaping.


    Clothes alone were not enough.


    Greem waved with his left hand, and a fire coral staff of intricate design appeared in his hand. He lifted his right hand. White light glowed on his little finger as a delicate ring formed from coiled rose branches appeared.


    The Fire Coral Staff and Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring.


    As expected of Fourth Grade items, they could transmit part of their power through energy projection. That saved Greem from using his own Spirit to sustain their existence while also maintaining a certain degree of their actual strength.


    Meanwhile, the Fire Throne set wasposed of Second Grade equipment, and itsbined effect was no more than Third Grade. Consequently, the items could not conduct energy projection with their power. That meant they could not help Greem in the slightest while he was in the Spirit World.


    Of course, if Greem were willing to exhaust arge amount of Spirit to project and manifest their power, these low-grade items could appear as well. However, every second of their presence would be a drain on Greem¡¯s Spirit.


    It was now that Greem truly understood.


    Why did so many high-grade adepts refuse to equip low-grade magical equipment, even if it meant going without any gear on their person? The real reason was that low-grade equipment was not of any use in most situations. Rather than leave this low-grade equipment on, it was better to reduce their spiritual load and leave the energy to useful equipment.


    Greem possessed two pieces of Fourth Grade equipment despite only advancing less than a hundred years ago. Such a wealthy and fortunate individual was very rare amongst Fourth Grade adepts.


    That was why Emelia¡¯s gaze towards Greem was filled with unconceble envy and admiration.


    Of course, there was no way that Emelia could know that Greem had hidden away two Fifth Grade artifacts in his tower. Otherwise, she would surely curse the nar consciousness for its tant favoritism.


    ¡°Master, master, I want a body too!¡± Remi was only Third Grade, and he did not specialize in Spirit control. Thus, after a few failed attempts at forming a body, he could only call out to Greem for help.


    Greem casually started rubbing the green ball of light that was Remi¡¯s consciousness in his hands. A brief momentter, a life-like version of Peppa the pig appeared before everyone.


    ¡°Don¡¯t make me a pig!¡± Remi created a mirror and saw his appearance. He almost broke down when he saw it and started whining and pleading with all he had.


    Unfortunately, here in the Spirit World, he could not create a body for himself. After some ineffectual whining, he had no choice but to ept his new body.


    Even though Remi didn¡¯t like his new body, judging from the way that Emelia was continually eyeing him and the little stars in her eyes, Peppa the pig was a realdykiller!


    After some messing around, the three of them finally got used to the new nar environment. They could start exploring the Spirit World now. Meanwhile, their bodies in the Tower of Fate were protected by Shadow Demon. No harm shoulde to them.


    After packing everything up, Greem looked at Emelia.


    ¡°This was once your home. You should lead the way. So, which direction should we head in to go to the Spore Forest?¡±


    Emelia closed her eyes and sensed for a moment before pointing in a direction.


    ¡°There!¡±

 Chapter 1197 - Sage of the Spirit World

    <h4>Chapter 1197 Sage of the Spirit World</h4>


    The Spirit World might be an extremely strange world, but it was also home to many ordinary creatures with no supernatural powers.


    However, these ordinary creatures were not wholly ¡®ordinary.¡¯ After all, each one of them possessed intelligence.


    The three of them had only walked a small distance from the point they arrived when the bushes by the road rustled. A white rabbit with red eyes leaped out from within.


    This unusual little rabbit didn¡¯t seem to be afraid of the strangers either. It stood on its hind legs and put on a human-like smile as it greeted the three of them.


    ¡°Greetings, foreign visitors! Wee to the Spirit World.¡±


    The rabbit¡¯s ent was weird, and its tone was a little strange, but for some reason, Greem easily understood what it was saying.


    ¡°Greetings,¡± Greem was still dressed like an adept, with a staff in his hand. He looked the rabbit up and down and found no signs of elementium within its body.


    That was unimaginable!


    In most nar worlds, only high-grade creatures were capable of awakening intelligence andmunicating with humans. These creatures would have to be a minimum of Second Grade. After all, without the sustenance of magical energy, it was difficult to support the logical thought unique to intelligent life with a weak body and a weaker lifeforce.


    Low-grade creatures only had basic, instinctual intelligence. Only high-grade animals could awaken full intelligence and sentience!


    It wasmon knowledge in the nar worlds, but it clearly did not work the same way here in the Spirit World.


    The Spirit World before them seemed to have significantly weakened thews of other nar worlds while greatly strengthening and amplifying mental consciousnessws in a deviant fashion. Native creatures of the Spirit World could possess shockingly advanced intelligence despite having extremely low grades.


    At the very least, most rabbits in the World of Adepts only knew how to scurry around and munch on grass, instinctually avoiding the dangers of the natural world. None of them would be able to think like this little rabbit would, identifying dangers as they came while also being aware of the existence of nar worlds.


    While Greem was digesting this newfound knowledge of the world, Emelia proudly stood forward from behind him, speaking up loudly, ¡°What family are you from, little guy? And where are the adults?¡±


    The little rabbit stood up straight in surprise. Its small pink nose took a few quick sniffs of Emelia, and a forced smile appeared on its little rabbit mouth.


    ¡°You have that annoying sporepeople smell on you. It seems like you¡¯re another wanderer that drifted to a different world. A little self-introduction; I am Am of the Snowpear n, an abandoned Am.¡±


    ¡°Where are your parents?¡±


    ¡°Those two bastards left me behind and went on a vacation by the beach,¡± A dejected expression appeared on Am¡¯s face when he said that, as if he was about to cry.


    An image naturally appeared in Greem¡¯s mind: two elderly rabbits leaning on their walking sticks, wearing singlets and sunsses, and holding hands as they walked towards the setting sun.


    It was a ridiculous notion, but the moment the image appeared in his mind, Greem became firmly convinced of its existence, as if he had personally witnessed the scene.


    Hmm? The narws of the Spirit World were quite strange. Not only was there no suppression of thoughts and ideas, but they seemed to aid and propel them in the mind.


    ¡°Alright, alright. I have no time to chat with you. Hurry up and tell me where the Sage of the Spirit World is. We need to ask him for directions!¡± Emelia was half a nar creature, after all. As such, she still had painful memories of how talkative the creatures here were. She quickly interrupted Am¡¯s recollections and asked the crucial question.


    ¡°Very well, annoying spordy. Head west for three days from here, and you will be able to meet the Sage. Also, when you pass by Beta¡¯s house, remember to send my greetings to him.¡±


    The three of them bid farewell to Am and immediately headed into the distance in the direction he pointed.


    Greem unintentionally turned back and saw the little rabbit Am stand straight on his hind legs, waving farewell with a white handkerchief in his hands that he had produced out of somewhere.


    That image, that scenery. Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel likeughing!


    Greem¡¯s worldview greatly expanded as they traveled. He saw all sorts of unimaginable scenes along the way.


    A duck with a grocery store by the roadside, a cat that built a wooden house on a tree, monkeys ying hide-and-seek in a maze of sunflowers, and many more animals living simple lives like intelligent, sentient beings.


    Of course, the arrival of Greem and his party also caused the animals to be excited. They emerged from their homes and greeted them with their weird ents and tones.


    One time, while they were camping, a litter of kittens even ran into Greem¡¯s arms and started ying around. Strangely enough, Emelia and the equally cute Remi were not as close with these native creatures.


    At the sight of all this ridiculousness, even Greem became somewhat helpless, despite his usualposure.


    He looked at the little furry balls climbing all over himself and frowned as hemunicated mentally with Emelia.


    ¡°Are the natives here not afraid of strangers? Have they never heard how scary adepts are? Are they not scared we will eat them alive?¡± Greem frowned and peeled a curious kitten that was clinging to the edge of the cooking pot as he said this, pulling the creature away from the steaming stew.


    ¡°My lord, don¡¯t look down on the native creatures here. They all have extremely sensitive mental senses. If you have even the slightest hostility towards them in your heart, they will be able to sense it immediately!¡± Emelia squatted by the campfire, adding logs to the fire while stirring the stew in the pot.


    Steam rose as the stew in the pot bubbled, bringing some fresh mushrooms and pieces of meat to the surface of the liquid.


    The mushrooms had all been picked nearby, while the meat was brought from the World of Adepts.


    When they arrived, Emelia had warned Greem and Remi not to harm any talking animal or nt here in the Spirit World. Otherwise, they would not be able to obtain the help of any of the native creatures in their travels.


    Emelia was very serious when she said this!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but fall into thought when he heard Emelia¡¯s reply.


    When he once again lowered his head, he realized that the little kittens that had been ying in his arms had gathered together, looking at him with big, droopy eyes.


    The leader of the kittens stood out, shivering as he asked in his sweet voice, ¡°O¡¯ respected lord adept, are you...are you going to eat us alive?¡±


    Greem¡¯s expression changed.


    He had never expected that these kittens had managed to sense a portion of his thoughts, even though he had only justmunicated mentally with Emelia briefly and had notmitted to any of the ideas in his head.


    There were no signs of elementium on their persons, nor any indication of supernatural powers. Yet, they were able to detect the hidden hostility of a Fourth Grade adept. How could Greem not be impressed by this!?


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry about it. We adepts have no interest in small guys like you! If you were slightly fatter, with a bit more meat, I might consider eating you, ¡°Said Greem, putting on a mean face and threatening them.


    Strangely enough, regardless of how fierce he made himself look, the kittens were utterly fearless. Instead, they lunged into his arms and started tussling together once again.


    ¡°The creatures of the Spirit World love to get close to people with exceptional Spirit. Consequently, the Forest Sage that we are about to pay a visit to is one of the smartest and wisest people in thisnd. However, people like him mostly learned the trading ways of the spellcasters. They are very likely to ask for something in return.¡±


    ¡°A trade? What kind of trade? What do I need to prepare ahead of time?¡±


    ¡°Nothing much. Their requests are mostly for some special snacks. Only a few of them will raise some unusual requests. Just do what you can and take on whatever request you can grant. If we can¡¯t deal with the Sage here, we can look for Sages elsewhere to talk to!¡±


    Greem thought for a moment and asked, ¡°You mean, the Spirit World isn¡¯t divided by race or territory, but revolves around these sages?¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡± Emelia nodded and said, ¡°There is no so-called strong or weak in the Spirit World, only ordinary individuals and sages. These sages often have contracts with individuals from foreign nes. They are contracted spirits that have seen the outside world. Having gained knowledge of the greater universe, their wisdom is undoubtedly superior in the eyes of the average being.¡±


    Greem nodded silently. He had vaguely figured out the unique rules of the Spirit World now.


    As expected, three dayster, they met the ¡®Sage¡¯ in a grass hut in a clearing.


    It was a panther with pretty ck fur. Strangely enough, the panther had six ws, and there was an unusual hook at the end of its tail. However, the most surprising thing about the panther was the soul projection hovering on its head.


    The soul projection looked just like the panther itself, only a dozen times smaller.


    Most of the soul¡¯s immaterial body was peeking out of its head, while the lower half was embedded in the panther¡¯s head, connected with its soul origin.


    A contracted spirit...this was a Second Grade contracted creature!


    Greem could sense that this unusual panther had signed a soul contract with someone in a distant ne. Moreover, the contract¡¯s agent could freely summon this panther from the Spirit World to their own world through the contract¡¯s power.


    For some reason, Greem felt like his understanding of otherworldly summoning deepened when he saw this panther.

 Chapter 1198 - Marsh Wetlands

    <h4>Chapter 1198 Marsh Wends</h4>


    The Sage appeared very calm when he saw Greem.


    In the outside world, a Second Grade creature would surely shiver in fright when they saw a Fourth Grade adept. However, here in the Spirit World, the panther appeared utterly calm and even slightly rxed.


    ¡°Wee to the Spirit World, great spellcasters from the World of Adepts.¡± The Sage crouched within a hut justrge enough to fit himself. He looked calmly at Greem and his party, and not at all surprised because of their identity. ¡°I am Anthony. What can I help you with?¡±


    Emelia shot a nce at Greem before stepping forward and saying, ¡°Wise Sage, we intend to travel to the Spore Forest, and we were hoping you could point us in the right direction!¡±


    ¡°The Spore Forest?¡± A human expression appeared on Anthony¡¯s feline face. He lifted his snout and sniffed Emelia¡¯s body a few times. ¡°You are the Spore Princess that ran away to a different ne. It seems like you intend to start a ughter in the Spore Forest now that you are back in the Spirit World.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to ask about our intentions. We just wish toplete this transaction without any trouble!¡± Emelia¡¯s expression seemed a little dark now that her secret had been dug up of the ground.


    ¡°You guys didn¡¯te at the best time!¡± Anthony ignored Emelia¡¯s words and said, ¡°The Sporepeople have recently formed an alliance with the Fungi Giants and the Swamp Lords. They took over nearly eighty percent of the territory in the Marsh Wends, chasing out the lizard people, the bullfolk, and the hydralings. The two forces are still fighting there. You guys will probably get caught up in a war if you head there now.¡±


    ¡°We came here for war to begin with!¡± Emelia replied with resolution.


    ¡°I understand, I do,¡± Anthony couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh. ¡°Your uncle chased you away from the Sporepeople. Now that you have someone behind you, you have toe back for revenge! Very well; all that trouble between you and your uncle is no business of mine. ording to the Spirit World¡¯s rules, you just have to give me a hundred magical crystals, and I can point you in the right direction. If you can provide me with five hundred magical crystals, I can even draw upon some of my authority and transport you directly to the Marsh Wends.¡±


    Emelia smiled when she heard this. She immediately took out five hundred magical crystals and put them in a pile in front of Anthony.


    ¡°We choose the second option!¡±


    Greem had arrived here as a ball of mental consciousness. Naturally, he had none of his worldly belongings with him. Meanwhile, Emelia had managed toe here with her actual body due to the unique nature of her soul. As such, she did notck magical crystals.


    ¡°Very well!¡± Sage Anthony put away the five hundred magical crystals with a broad smile on his face. He then stood up and said in a low voice, ¡°Well then, the three of you stand over here! Adept, watch your contracted spirit carefully, please. Don¡¯t let him leave anything here in my ce!¡±


    Once Greem, Remi, and Emelia were gathered around him, Sage Anthony stood on his hind legs, lifted his head, and let out a long growl. A strange halo appeared beneath the party.


    The next second, the entire world spun wildly out of control.


    The three of them endured the dizziness and sense of distorted spacetime, only to realize that they were now on top of a tall hill.


    A strange marsh full of life¨Cthough not exactly rich with resourcesy before them.


    The tall hill that Greem and his party were standing on was at the edge of the marsh. An uneven sea of trees stretched behind them, with the hill marking the boundary between the marsh and the forest.


    This marsh was still preserved in its original state.


    The mist was thick and heavy.


    Thekes, rivers, and mires spread all over the marsh were plentiful water supplies, resulting in the area being constantly cloaked in dense mist.


    Strange, towering mushrooms the size of giant trees were everywhere to inside the marsh.


    They were all incredibly huge.


    The stalks of the mushrooms were so thick that it would take ten people to wrap their arms around it fully. The giant caps of the mushrooms were hidden in the mist that hung above thend.


    Many swamp creatures had also dug homes into the mushroom stalks and lived within.


    Small mushroom huts of all shapes and sizes also littered thend. Inbination with the unique environment of the Marsh Wends, it made for an unusual scene of nature.


    Greem looked at thend before him and nced at Emelia.


    ¡°We are here already, and the fighting is imminent. You can tell me about our main enemy on this trip now, can¡¯t you?¡±


    ¡°We are mainly here to obtain the Primal Water. ording to what I remember, this has always been in the hands of my Uncle Fahssn. Thus......¡±


    ¡°Thus, if we want to obtain the Primal Water, we will have to kill this Fahssn person!¡± Greem finished the sentence with a false smile on his face.


    ¡°My lord, I had no intention of using you. The fact is that we have to kill our Uncle Fahssn if we want to obtain the Primal Water. Moreover, if you deal with my uncle, I will willingly hand over a Ragveil Herb, Nature¡¯s Soul, and the method of taming the Fungi Giants!¡± Emelia gritted her teeth and offered all of her bargaining chips.


    She knew this n leader of hers very well after all their interactions over the years. Naturally, she knew what things would be able to move him.


    Ragveil was an incredibly rare herb even in the World of Adepts. It was the main ingredient for brewing the Fourth Grade potion Cloud of Deep Sleep, making it an incredibly valuable material.


    Meanwhile, Nature¡¯s Soul was an elementium soul formed in nature. It was a primary ingredient used to create high-grade magical equipment and a required material in the creation of an elementium avatar for elementium adepts.


    As for the Fungi Giants, Greem had only heard Emelia described them, without any experience of their true power. He was still hesitating about the conditions she offered.


    ¡°How powerful is this Fahssn?¡±


    ¡°He was only intermediate Third Grade when I left the Spore Forest. He should be at advanced Third Grade now!¡±


    Advanced Third Grade? An enemy like this was someone we should be wary of?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but look at Emelia in confusion.


    Emelia smiled bitterly and exined, ¡°My lord, you have to be careful. Us sporepeople aren¡¯t too powerful ourselves. However, when we run into a powerful enemy, we will choose to assimte with the Fungi Giants we have tamed. When that happened, our powersbined will allow us to advance by a major grade temporarily. If you don¡¯t want any trouble, you will have to kill them before they can merge.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t you have any good news for me?¡± Greem asked somewhat unamusedly.


    Emelia immediately rxed when she heard Greem tease him. She knew that the n leader must have epted her offer if he was speaking like that.


    ¡°Well...there is one major piece of good news! The creatures living in the Marsh Wends, be they carnivorous beasts, nts, or fungal creatures, are all of the nt-attribute. Their greatest fear is fire. That is why they chose such a wet ce filled withkes and rivers as their homes. With your might, you are practically unstoppable here in these marshes!¡±


    ¡°That does sound like good news! Alright, since the Marsh Wends used to be your home, why don¡¯t you tell me what we should do next?¡±


    ¡°We should go to the Cave of Shadows and look for Moat! He is a famous Sage in these marshes. We can only ughter without being rejected by the Spirit World if we obtain his support. Otherwise, killing any swamp creature will draw the hatred of all the natives. It will make our journey much more difficult then!¡±


    ¡°What Grade is this Moat person?¡±


    ¡°Fourth Grade!¡±


    Greem immediately drew in a breath of cold air.


    The Marsh Wends was only one of twelve regions in the Spirit World, yet the number of Fourth Grade creatures in this region alone approached a dozen. In pure numbers of powerhouses, the Spirit World was no weaker than the World of Adepts. They were a nar world with their own unique civilizations.


    Even as tough as he was, Greem didn¡¯t dare wreak havoc in the Marsh Wends. A small misstep, and he could be the enemy of every being here.


    After some discussion, the three of them put on some simple disguises.


    To avoid being recognized by the enemy and alerting them of her presence, Emelia threw on a thick ck cloak, put on the hood, and hid her aura with the Assassin¡¯s Ring. Greem remained dressed like an adept and ced Remi on his shoulder.


    The three of them stepped into the Marsh Wends, one after another.


    Upon stepping into the marshes, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed. The Marsh Wends was indeed the most beautiful and fantastical of all the marshes he had ever seen.


    The entire ce was filled with vastkes and interconnected rivers. The ground was covered in a thick moss and grassyer, upon which a shocking number of mushrooms and fungi grew. The air was filled with a unique, fragrant, and damp aura, along with plenty of spores.


    These spores were almost the size of a finger, each with their strange caps and tiny tail wings.


    They floated about in the air, glowing with a faint light, illuminating the Wends, and turning it into a dream-like paradise.


    For some reason, these tiny spores seemed to be afraid of Remi. They would drift away when they approached within ten meters of the adepts.


    As the party of three walked through the Wends, they could see massive fungus creatures everywhere, floral creatures that could walk upright like humans with their roots, and water elementium that wandered the rivers aimlessly.


    They might be intelligent, but it was obvious that their thoughts weren¡¯t tooplex, and they hardly schemed at all.


    Instincts drove every one of their actions. They ate when they were hungry, slept when they were tired, and drank when they were thirsty. Most of the time, they roamed thend freely, like patrols of this magnificentnd. They were free, unbound, and without purpose.


    Even when they ran into the adepts, they only looked at them curiously for a brief moment before leaving!

 Chapter 1199 - Sage of the Marshes

    <h4>Chapter 1199 Sage of the Marshes</h4>


    Nightfall.


    The Marsh Wends at night was a unique sight of its own.


    Emelia had started a fire on a clearing by ake, and she used a pot to cook a stew. She had picked some fresh mushrooms along the way, and the stew was smelling very nice.


    Remi had vanished somewhere when the sun went down.


    Greem wasn¡¯t worried about him at all.


    After all, he wasn¡¯t a Third Grade Spirit of Pestilence for nothing. If Remi were to go berserk, he alone would be enough to turn an entire area into and of death instantly.


    Meanwhile, Greem had arrived at the top of one of those colossal mushrooms when night fell. He sat at the edge of the mushroom cap and looked down at this uniquely different nar environment. His heart was filled with awe and respect for the wondrous work of nature.


    Dense and humid mist hung in the air of the marshes, causing the stars above to appear blurred and faint.


    Massive mushrooms of varying sizesy spread out within Greem¡¯s sight, looking like an unusual forest. Greem was impressed. While you were here, you would get the impression that it wasn¡¯t the mushrooms that wererge, but that you had shrunk in size.


    All of a sudden, it was as if humans had turned into ants. The wild mushrooms by the roadside that could be crushed with a press of a finger had now turned into giant trees, and your power was insignificant and tiny.


    The fluttering, glowing spores hovering in the air between the mushrooms were almost like fireflies.


    They were everywhere, all at once. They took root where theynded and grew into new mushrooms.


    Some of these mushrooms would be fortunate enough to grow to massive sizes, bing a member of this forest of mushrooms. Others would be eaten by the wandering Fungus Giants and swamp creatures the moment they sprouted.


    Apart from these glowing spores, there were also many giant sporebats flying around in the sky. They fed on the bright spores, circling the giant mushrooms and devouring these drifting lights.


    These sporebats resembled stingrays, beating their t wings as they glided in the air. They had a ck stinger at the tip of their tails, vaguely letting off a poisonous aura.


    Naturally, ordinary sporebats didn¡¯t dare find any trouble with Greem.


    However, there would always be some ignorant fool who came knocking on the door.


    While Greem was admiring the unique night scene from the top of this fifty-meter tall mushroom, a Third Grade sporebat found him and lunged at him.


    It was a sporebat with an unusual knack for fighting¨C abat spirit. Its wings were ck and covered with hard, brown bristles. Its kin also had decent magical resistance.


    However, its offensive options were more limited. It could only spit acid or strike with its poison stinger. Naturally, none of these attacks were any threat to Greem at all. If it wasn¡¯t to experience the might of a so-calledbat spirit, Greem could have ended this battle in mere seconds.


    Greem¡¯s fireballs evaporated the acid spit by the ckwing. Meanwhile, every time it tried to approach Greem, it would be forced away by his mes.


    After a few fruitless attempts, the angered ckwing finally used itsbat spirit powers.


    An unusual mental shockwave sted against Greem. It wasn¡¯t very powerful, but its strange paralyzing powers caused Greem to freeze on the spot.


    To think, the powers of a Third Grade creature could altogether bypass Greem¡¯s magical resistances and affect him directly! For a reasonably long duration as well! This unusual ability instantly drew Greem¡¯s attention!


    The ckwing took advantage of Greem¡¯s momentary paralysis to glide forward. The poison stinger on its tail immediately stabbed at his neck.


    However, that was the limit of its attack!


    The next second, a giant zing hand grabbed the ckwing by its tail, firmly anchoring it to the spot. The next second, the mes red and quickly spread all over the ckwing¡¯s body.


    The searing pain put the ckwing in tremendous agony. It struggled with all it had, but it could not break free of the zing hand¡¯s grasp.


    The Chip had finally recovered now. It was sending out several notifications in Greem¡¯s mind.


    [Spirit Paralysis. Unique species ability of elite Sporebats. Duringbat, the creature is able to shed scale powder to be silently inhaled by the opponent. When required, the scale powder can be activated with Spirit to paralyze the opponent¡¯s mind and render them defenseless.]


    ¡°So it wasn¡¯t a pure mental power, but a sort of techniquebining Spirit and an unusual substance.¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but start brooding in silence.


    He had slightly underestimated the opponent today.


    If he had treated the ckwing as a worthy opponent, he would have at least protected himself with a Ring of Fire, even if he did not simply just summon the Burning Domain. In that case, the ckwing¡¯s scale powder would have been burned to ashes the moment it approached him. It would never have been a threat.


    However, the fact that its scale powder could paralyze a Fourth Grade¡¯s mind for even a brief moment made it worth examining.


    Just as the thought of killing appeared in Greem¡¯s mind, an oddly elderly voice appeared in his mind as well.


    ¡°Visitor from afar, let this ignorant child go! I apologize sincerely to you in his name and the name of the Marsh Wends.¡±


    Greem turned around. A one-meter-tall creature was looking calmly at him not far in the distance.


    If it weren¡¯t for the pure nature¡¯s aura in his body, Greem would have thought of him as an ordinary swamp corruptor. Its one-meter stature was indeed too small. It was also covered in brown seaweed and pungent mud. Even its face was covered by the tangle of seaweeds, making it hard to see its actual appearance.


    However, its powerful spiritual pressure as a Fourth Grade creature could not be overlooked!


    ¡°You are...¡± A name shot through Greem¡¯s mind as he instantly extinguished the mes burning on the ckwing.


    However, after such a terrible burning, the ckwing was on itsst legs. It hung limply from Greem¡¯s hand by its tail.


    ¡°Greetings, guest from afar. I am Moat, the Sage of these marshes!¡±


    ¡°So you are Moat! Honestly, we were on the way to look for you!¡± Greem was somewhat shocked. He became warier of the uncanny omniscience of these Sages.


    ¡°Guest from afar, before we find a ce to talk, don¡¯t you think...you could save ckwing first?¡± Moat might look small in size, but there was no fear or humility in his voice. Instead, his voice was filled with amanding confidence.


    Greem raised his right hand and looked at the charred creature in his grasp. He chuckled slightly.


    ¡°I¡¯m only good at setting fires, not so much at saving people. If you, sir, have some way of healing him, I will be more than willing to witness your powers!¡±


    ¡°Very well, since you have no objections, just hand him over to me.¡± Moat¡¯s face was still hidden beneath the seaweeds, making it hard to see the changes to his expression.


    He was leaning on a ck staff that was slightly taller than himself. He tapped the staff against the ground, and a green beam of lightnded on the ckwing.


    The charred skin on its body crackled and fell off, revealing a newyer of skin beneath. Even though it was on death¡¯s door earlier, the ckwing instantly became lively once more. However, out of fear of Greem¡¯s might, it remained limp on the ground, not daring to move a single inch.


    Since a Fourth Grade Sage was asking for mercy for this creature, Greem had no choice but to relent.


    He snorted lightly and waved his right hand, cutting off the ckwing¡¯s poison stinger.


    The stinger fell onto the mushroom cap and bounced slightly. The ckwing trembled in pain, but it didn¡¯t dare to struggle too much.


    ¡°Go. Next time, use your eyes and don¡¯t make an enemy of someone stronger than you!¡± Greem cast the ckwing aside and kept the poison stinger for himself.


    There were some scales on the poison stinger as well. That was more than enough for him to examines the scale powder!


    The Third Grade ckwing instantly flew away without turning back once it was released. Its unreasonable, barbaric aura of ferocity was also gone.


    Moat did not object to any of this and watched on calmly.


    Greem smiled when he smelled the fragrant smell of stew from beneath the mushroom. He invited Moat graciously, ¡°Emelia¡¯s meat stew is done. Sir Moat, why don¡¯t you grace us with your presence and join us for dinner!¡±


    Moat smiled.


    ¡°I hope I won¡¯t be a bother!¡±


    Emelia wasn¡¯t at all surprised at the sudden appearance of Moat, the Sage of the Marshes. They hade into contact with a Sage of another region before this, after all. These Sages seemed to have an unusual way ofmunicating amongst themselves.


    Thus, Emelia had predicted that Moat would find them a day after they entered the Wend Marshes.


    She diligently helped the two Fourth Grades sit by the fire and filled arge bowl of stew for each of them. The three of them then feasted on it, along with a helping of bread and cheese.


    Greem nced at this Sage of the Marshes with his unusual appearance as they ate. Finally, he couldn¡¯t help but ask, ¡°Sir Moat, may I know what species you are exactly?¡±


    In all honesty, Greem had been trying to guess at Moat¡¯s species from the moment he saw him. Unfortunately, every one of his guesses didn¡¯t quite fit the mark.


    ¡°Hahaha. My species might be somewhat out of your expectations,¡± Moat chuckled and said, ¡°I am a Swamp Giant!¡±


    A Swamp Giant. A one-meter-tall Swamp Giant.


    Greem was utterly stunned in confusion when he heard Moat¡¯s reply.

 Chapter 1200 - The Blight

    <h4>Chapter 1200 The Blight</h4>


    Greem had seen plenty of Swamp Giants on the way here.


    They were humanoid creatures, wide and bulky, with massive bodies, thick legs, and tentacle-like arms. Their bodies were also covered in many strange, tumor-like growths.


    An adolescent Swamp Giant was an average of ten meters tall. Even juvenile Swamp Giants were at least three meters tall.


    Yet, Sage Moat was iming that he was a Swamp Giant. That...was slightly beyond Greem¡¯sprehension.


    It made Greem more certain that Sage Moat was certainly a deviant, even amongst the Swamp Giants.


    Only someone with exceptional talent could outshine the rest of the Swamp Giants and be the guide, observer, and Sage of the massive Marsh Wends.


    Greem fumbled for words for a few seconds before finally nodding, ¡°It seems you must be an exceptional person, even among the Swamp Giants. Otherwise, you couldn¡¯t have reached your current level.¡±


    Even though he was already a Fourth Grade that stood far above most nar creatures, Sage Moat still lived a simple and humble life. Greem could barely see any of the blinding energy radiance given off by high-grade equipment on his body.


    There were no energy signatures on the moss robe he was wearing, the staff he was holding, or any narw flux unique to high-grade items. These were obviously just mundane items. In all honesty, even an ordinary apprentice adept in the World of Adepts would not be so poor!


    However, Greem quickly understood the situation.


    After all, the creation of any high-grade item required a tremendous amount of alchemical knowledge as support, as well as many forging techniques and methods. This knowledge didn¡¯te just from the inspiration of one or two geniuses. It was an umtion of experience over generations.


    Meanwhile, the Spirit World had not constructed a centralized system of knowledge and legacy.


    Their Sages and powerhouses were scattered across the Spirit World like loose pearls,cking a single thread that could unite them into a unified force.


    If one were being nice, you could call this being free, and if you wanted to be honest, you would say that they were in a state of disunity!


    No wonder Moat lived such a simple, crude life even though he was a Fourth Grade.


    The two Fourth Grades sat by the campfire, enjoying the stew made out of fire dragon ribs. The rich energy aura in the stew stirred Moat¡¯s appetite as well. He devoured his portion in the blink of an eye.


    ¡°What meat is this? The fire aura in it is so dense,¡± Moat enjoyed his meal tremendously. When he let out a burp, a small burst of fire red from his mouth. ¡°It¡¯s good...so good! I haven¡¯t had ribs with so much kick in my life!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s Third Grade fire dragon meat,¡± Emelia giggled as she continued stirring the metal pot with adle. ¡°This is the fire dragon feast that only our n leader gets to enjoy. If it weren¡¯t for you today, our n leader wouldn¡¯t have been sharing it with us!¡±


    ¡°Fire dragon meat...and Third Grade!¡± Moat couldn¡¯t help but gasp in surprise.


    Dragons were terrifying creatures that reigned over the skies in the eyes of the Sages.


    Moat might be a Fourth Grade, but if he were to challenge a Fourth Grade dragon, he would have no chance of victory. Moat didn¡¯t even have absolute confidence in defeating a Third Grade dragon.


    The most important reason for that was the dragons¡¯ ability to fly, as well as their fearsome breath. Having Moat fight against the dragons when they could fly and he couldn¡¯t was a ridiculous proposition.


    He couldn¡¯t pursue them or hit them.


    Even Moat couldn¡¯t help but shiver at the thought of dragons.


    As it goes, when you eat someone¡¯s bread, you owe someone a favor!


    Moat hesitated for a brief moment. Finally, he took out some dried mushrooms tied in a string and tossed them into the pot.


    ¡°Since you were so generous as to treat me with fire dragon meat, I can¡¯t be holding back either. These are Giant Shiitake Mushrooms unique to the Marsh Wends. Their fragrance lingers for a long time and is the best condiment to any dish. Moreover, if you eat these mushrooms for a long time, it will improve your Physique as well!¡±


    ¡°Oh? It¡¯s beneficial to one¡¯s Physique?¡± Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but be moved when he heard this.


    Elementium adepts like himself, whose Physique had reached 32 points, were already a rarity. Trying to improve Physique further at this point was exceedingly difficult.


    Of course, if Greem used the body-refining adept¡¯s method of stimting the body, there would still be room for improvement. However, those methods often came at the cost of Spirit. Greem could not possibly resort to such measures!


    Thus, Greem couldn¡¯t help but pick up one of the cooked mushrooms and ce it into his mouth when he heard of their wondrous benefit.


    The mushroom was fragrant, and its texture was smooth.


    While Greem was tasting the mushroom, his Spirit was focused on the Chip¡¯s report.


    [Beep. Detecting strange, high-energy material. Edible. Said material¡¯s fragrance contains elements that are capable of asserting beneficial stimtion to cells. Estimates suggest that the host¡¯s Physique will improve slightly after consuming the material. Host will have to consume the material 100 times to improve Physique by 1 point. Resistance to improvement is estimated to be after 210 servings.]


    Greem instantly drew in a breath of cold air when he saw the Chip¡¯s analysis.


    Didn¡¯t this mean that his Physique could still improve by 2 points if he continued to consume these mushrooms?


    The fundamental benefit that 2 points of Physique could bring for a Fourth Grade fire adept like himself was far more than 5 or 6 points for a low-grade adept. If these 2 points of Physique could be provided to Fourth Grade body-refining adepts, it would only bring them more benefit.


    If the Crimson n got their hands on these mushrooms and sold them in the World of Adepts, it would surely drive the Fourth Grade adepts mad with desire.


    After all, at their level, there were simply far too few means by which to improve any of their attributes by 2 points without any drawbacks.


    Greem remained silent for a moment. He couldn¡¯t help but speak up, ¡°Sage Moat, will you be willing to trade the spores of these Giant Shiitake Mushrooms? If you are willing, I can trade some knowledge and materials with you.¡±


    ¡°These Giant Shiitake Mushrooms are a special mushroom that I managed to breed. If you want the mushrooms themselves, I¡¯m happy to give you a batch of them. But if you want the spores, then...¡±


    ¡°Then?¡±


    ¡°Then, you will have to help me with something!¡±


    Greem wasn¡¯t surprised at Sage Moat¡¯s suggestion. Instead, he looked calmly at him. ¡°What is it?¡±


    ¡°Several smallkes in the Marsh Wends have gone dry mysteriously without any reason over the past few years, reduced to dead, dry mud. Many Fungus Giants, Swamp Lords, and other creatures living in these ces have contracted a terrifying blight. Swamp creatures infected by this blight show obvious signs of decay on their bodies. They then go mad and start attacking everything around them.¡±


    Greem listened silently to Moat¡¯s exnation. His eyebrow was raised slightly, as if deep in thought.


    ¡°You mean...you want me to investigate the cause of this blight for you?¡±


    ¡°Yes. As long as you can find the source of the blight, I can give you the Giant Shiitake Mushroom spores as a reward. If you can eliminate the source of the blight, I have two more special mushrooms in my possession. One is beneficial to the Spirit, and the other benefits elementium affinity.¡±


    ¡°Hss...¡± Greem drew in a breath of cold air once more. When he looked at Moat again, it was as if he was looking at a walking treasury.


    Even a sunken ship had three pounds of nails in it!


    He honestly had never expected that this seemingly poor and broke Sage Moat could have treasures that would move even him.


    However, even the best treasures could not get in the way of his central purpose here!


    Greem fell silent for a moment before speaking, ¡°Sage Moat, in all honesty, we are here at the Marsh Wends for the Primal Water. Before we get our hands on the Primal Water, I don¡¯t wish to branch off into other affairs.¡±


    ¡°Primal Water?¡± Moat turned and looked at Emelia, before calmly saying, ¡°This little girl didn¡¯t provoke you intoing here, did she? There is indeed Primal Water here in the Marsh Wends. It is kept in the holynds of the magical sporepeople. If you want to obtain the Primal Water, you will unavoidably sh with them!¡±


    ¡°Yes. That is why I want to hear your opinion before I head to the Spore Forest!¡±


    Moat fell silent.


    After a long pause, he finally said: ¡°You must have heard the news of the Marsh Wends along the way. Over the past few years, there have been drastic changes happening here. The driving force behind the changes is the leader of the magical sporepeople, Fahssn, the lord of the Fungi Giants Kalvax, and several other independent Swamp Lords.


    ¡°So, I suggest you ept this request to investigate the blight! With the investigation as an excuse, you can brazenly enter most regions in the Marsh Wends without being stopped by the local creatures. If I am not wrong, this cmity that has befallen the Marsh Wends is very likely to have something to do with the actions of the magical sporepeople.¡±


    Greem¡¯s eyes gleamed when he heard Moat¡¯s words.


    ¡°You mean to say that if the blight does have something to do with the magical sporepeople, you will be willing to act as well?¡±


    ¡°Not just me,¡± Moat tapped his staff angrily. ¡°I have contacted Mortok, the King of the Hydras and Morses Lightwing, the Leader of the Sporebats. As long as you produce sufficient evidence, I will personally exile those bastards from the Marsh Wends!¡±


    It seemed like the cmity of the Marsh Wends had caused Moat to be uncharacteristically furious.

 Chapter 1201 - The Dead Mire

    <h4>Chapter 1201 The Dead Mire</h4>


    Spirit World, the Marsh Wends.


    Coilfang Cave.


    It was a vast body of water in the northwestern corner of the Wends.


    Some called it ake and others called it a sea. However, with his experience, Greem could see that this was an ind sea.


    Greem glided about forty meters in the sky, riding on arge sporebat. He flew along the river as they wound down thendscape, making his way into the region where the mist was thickest.


    ¡°This is the Niga Waterway. It is mainly merlocs and lobstroks that live here. They don¡¯t get along well and are almost always at war with each other.¡± Therge sporebat was an intelligent Second Grade creature. As such, he was far more respectful towards Greem than the other sporebats were.


    Greem looked around curiously when he heard the sporebat¡¯s exnations.


    A massive waterway, about a hundred meters wide, was flowing beneath him and between the forests of mushrooms.


    Several small streams split off from the waterway every few kilometers, forming small ponds and puddles here and there. The vige of the merlocs was built above a shallow pool. They were all simple wooden huts of crude, shoddy work.


    When the sporebat flew past the merlocs¡¯ vige, Greem could see their ugly, dark green figures chasing after each other as they garbled in their strangenguage.


    ¡°What sort of merlocs are they? Mirefins, or Inkspewers?¡± Blue light flickered in Greem¡¯s eyes as he quickly recorded the appearance of these merlocs. The Chip then startedparing them to the information in the database.


    The Chip¡¯s data revealed that there was a 67% chance they were Mirefins, 25% they were Inkspewers, and a 7% chance they were Tidecallers. The chance that they were any other type of merloc was lower than 1% and was not disyed.


    ¡°They are Mirefin merlocs!¡± The sporebat turned its head and replied as it weaved between several tall mushrooms, ¡°You adepts are truly knowledgeable and powerful individuals. To think you would even know of beings as weak as Mirefin merlocs.¡±


    Greem didn¡¯t mind the sporebat¡¯s reverence. He simply looked into the distance, observing the looming figures standing upon some small isles in the middle of the waterway.


    These creatures were like magnified lobsters. They walked upright like humans, walking around with the four limbs extending from their t abdomens and intimidating their enemies with their two strong ws.


    Compared to the merlocs, the lobstroks wererger, more muscr, and more ferocious. A thick shell protected their bodies, and ayer of moss grew on their shells. The crude spears and des of the merlocs could not break their shells and even simply slipped past the moss, making it very difficult for the merlocs to inflict any serious damage.


    It was no wonder the lobstroks had taken up the best hunting positions in the center of the waterway, while the merlocs had been chased away to a rtively remote corner.


    The food of the merlocs and lobstroks were the various fish that swam in the waterway.


    The merlocs were chasing after the sporebat, garbling as they hurled their javelins into the air, only for the projectiles to fall limply back to the ground, impaling several of their own kind instead.


    ¡°They seem to be hostile towards you?¡± Greem asked.


    ¡°My people will sometimese over and eat a few merlocs when they get bored with mushrooms. That¡¯s why we aren¡¯t on good terms with the merlocs!¡± The sporebat gave a simple exnation.


    He couldn¡¯t help but smile when he recalled the fresh taste of merloc flesh.


    ¡°Does the Sage not restrict such acts of ¡®killing¡¯?¡±


    ¡°Killing? No, no, no. This isn¡¯t killing; it¡¯s hunting. The merlocs are far too good at reproducing. Without someone to limit their poption, they would be able to stuff every inch of the Marsh Wends with their green forms. They have no restraint. Thus, we eat the merlocs, the merlocs eat the aquatic creatures, and the aquatic creatures eat the mud. These are the rights bestowed us by the narws. Even the revered Sages cannot take these rights away from us!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but nod when he heard the sporebat¡¯s reply.


    Many of the Second Grade creatures in the World of Adepts were still stuck in a primal, instinctual state of intelligence. Yet, an ordinary Second Grade sporebat of the Spirit World already had such a deep understanding of its world.


    It was not just intelligence. It was experience and knowledge only gained after living in the world.


    ¡°Sit tight, Lord Adept, we are about to pass through the Dead Mire right now. The creatures there haven¡¯t exactly been friendly recently,¡± As the sporebat warned loudly, it started to fly even faster, diving past several hills and arriving above a strangend.


    Greem, who had been sitting silently on the back of the sporebat, abruptly stood up. His sharp eyes looked at the earth before him in shock and surprise.


    This ce might have been a vast and beautifulke not too long ago.


    However, with the passage of time, the water here had flowed elsewhere due to some unknown reason. The ck and slimy bed of theke was exposed, and the ce turned into the terrifying and pungent Dead Mire.


    Due to the changes in the environment, the swamp creatures that had lost their homes went berserk. They started to fight for what puddles remained in the area. For the sake of thisst bit of water supply, all the swamp creatures descended into a frenzied battle.


    Even from afar, Greem could see countless pieces of shells and torn limbs on the ck mud. Anyone who could survive such a bloody and cruel battle had to be terrifying individuals. Most of them were Swamp Giants, Fungus Giants, and Hydras.


    However, even the victors of this war could not find enough water to nourish their bodies. They dragged their nearly withered bodies across the several kilometers of the Dead Mire, searching for what puddles remained.


    The Dead Mire. Truly a mire of death!


    ¡°Wait up here for me. I will go collect some samples!¡± Greem instructed the sporebat and leaped out of the sky.


    Forty meters was nothing to Greem. He did not even cast Feather Fall on himself; he simply crashed into the mud like a meteor.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    Mud sshed everywhere, and a wave of fire rolled outwards.


    The ming tongues evaporated the mud in the air before it couldnd.


    Greem squatted slightly and negated most of the impact from the fall.


    An ordinary person¡¯s organs would have been badly damaged even if they had not died from such a fall. Greem¡¯s thirty-two points of Physique did its work here. A potentially lethal force had only made his body stall slightly. It did not leave a single injury.


    He slowly stood up straight and walked out of the crater, now made of dry earth rather than mud.


    His arrival was loud and shocking. Naturally, it drew the attention of several shambling figures nearby.


    A withered Swamp Giant close to him immediately roared and charged when it saw Greem¡¯s zing body.


    To think a Second Grade Swamp Giant would dare to charge at a Fourth Grade adept. Judging by its suicidal actions, the blight had not only affected its body, but its mind as well.


    Greem snorted. He leaned against the staff in his left hand and extended his right palm at the enemy. A barrage of fireballs shot at it.


    Greem was only two meters tall, while the withered Swamp Giant stood at around seven meters tall. However, the Swamp Giant could not take a single step further before it was drowned by fire magic. It was slowly sted backward by the fireball, and its body started to turn dry and crumble.


    A Swamp Giant¡¯s towering body contained a tremendous and resilient life force. Even if one-third of their body had been removed, they could regenerate with the sheer amount of life force they possessed. It was this resilience that allowed the infected Swamp Giants to survive all these years of drought.


    However, it didn¡¯t matter how strong their life force was. The Swamp Giant was facing a terrifying fire adept. Nothing could save it now!


    With just five seconds and seven fireballs, Greem had sted the Swamp Giant to pieces, reducing its body into bloodstains on the ground.


    Sparks dissipated from the broken body of the Swamp Giant and slowly merged into the mist. Greem frowned and grabbed with his hand, picking out a cluster of faint ck smoke from the air.


    Greem¡¯s fire gathered into a fireball and sealed the ck smoke within.


    Some ck smoke in a hurry to escape crashed against the fire and was turned to dust in an instant. The rest of the smoke seemed to know the terror of the mes now. It didn¡¯t dare approach the fire and instead wandered aimlessly inside the fireball.


    Aren¡¯t the narws of the Spirit World a little too powerful? Even smoke has intelligence?


    Greem smiled coldly and gathered power in his eyes. Blue light flickered as he quickly identified the nature of the ck smoke.


    [Beep. Detecting fatal virus. Warning. Said virus has terrifying infectiousness and lethality. It can cause an infection of the third degree to host. suggesting host tactivate Ring of Fire and prevent all possibility of infection.]


    As expected.


    Greem had felt the sight of the smoke was familiar the moment he saw it.


    As expected, the Chip¡¯s scans confirmed his suspicions.


    The ¡®blight¡¯ was simply the infection of a strange virus.


    The means by which the virus spread and infected its victims resembled Remi¡¯s techniques.

 Chapter 1202 - Feed

    <strong>Chapter 1202 Feed</strong>


    Greem, Emelia, and Remi had been acting separately ever since they epted the mission from Sage Moat.


    Greem came here to investigate the blight, while Emelia snuck over to the Spore Forest. Meanwhile, Remi was wandering the Marsh Wends aimlessly.


    Before they split off, Greem had already warned Remi that he could not freely spread his gue virus as he did in other lesser nes. Otherwise, if they provoked the fury of those Fourth Grade Sages, even Greem couldn¡¯t guarantee his survival.


    After all, even Zhentarim of the World of Adepts had no more than thirteen Fourth Grade adepts. Yet the Marsh Wends, despite being a dozen times smaller than Zhentarim, contained eight Fourth Grades. When it came to individual territories, the Spirit World undoubtedly had more high-grade beings than the World of Adepts.


    If they were to act brazenly as they had in the past in this alien world, they would eventually be hunted by the natives. Out of consideration and convenience, Greem had agreed to the Sage¡¯s request to investigate the blight.


    However, it seemed like Moat¡¯s suspicions weren¡¯t without reason.


    This so-called blight wasn¡¯t a natural disease caused by a drought of water. It was a terrifying virus that had been cultivated through unique means.


    Greem tapped his staff without any hesitation when he identified the ck smoke. A ring of fire appeared around him, and he immediately summoned Remi from afar.


    ¡°Master, what do you want now?¡± Remi found himself in front of Greem and immediatelyined, ¡°I just found a somewhat interesting merloc and you...hmm, what is this?¡±


    Remi quickly smelled the virus trapped in the fireball. His beady green eyes quickly opened wide.


    ¡°It smells like modified viruses and spores...Master, it seems like there¡¯s someone skilled at manipting gue spores here as well. Where did you get this?¡±


    ¡°They were in the bodies of those infected by the blight. What do you think? Are you able to identify where they are from with your expertise?¡±


    ¡°Release them all! I can¡¯t get more information if I don¡¯t devour them.¡±


    Greem waved his hand, and the fireball dissipated.


    The ck smoke immediately attempted to escape but was devoured by Remi in a single breath.


    After inhaling all the ck smoke, Remi smacked his lips, and his eyes zed over. He muttered to himself as if daydreaming, ¡°Feed...infection...dispelling.¡±


    Several minutester, Remi shivered and woke up from his dazed state.


    ¡°I figured out how these creatures got infected! Follow me.¡±


    Remi brought Greem to a clearing in the center of the Dead Mire. There was a shallow puddle about a hundred square meters in size here. It was also the region where the swamp creatures were most concentrated.


    Arge pack of swamp creatures had gathered here. Some of them showed visible signs of the blight¡¯s decay on their limbs, and many flies hovered around them. Other animals actively avoided those infected by the disease, not daring to approach at all.


    ¡°Master, do you have any means of concealing us? We should be able to see something good soon!¡± A vicious smile appeared on Remi¡¯s pig face.


    Greem tapped his staff against the ground, and a ring of fire engulfed them.


    As the mes washed over them, their figures vanished without a trace.


    Remi looked around him and at his own body curiously through the mes. Everything in sight appeared scarlet as if his eyes had been covered in a red veil. Everything he saw was twisted and distorted.


    ¡°Is this one of the firews you have mastered? Truly wondrous.¡± Remi looked around enviously, even walking near a Fungal Giant and baring his teeth, only stopping when he confirmed that no one could see him.


    ¡°What are we waiting here for?¡± Greem asked.


    ¡°For a good show to begin!¡± Remi smiled wickedly. ¡°They intentionally neutered the virus¡¯ ability to transmit aerially. The virus can only be transmitted through direct contact. It seems like the culprit doesn¡¯t want the virus to spread without restraint.¡±


    ¡°And what about that?¡±


    ¡°Therefore, the best method for them to selectively infect the creatures in a specific region is by throwing out feed. This way, they can control the infected in a particr area without bing infected themselves!¡±


    ¡°When will the culprits arrive?¡±


    ¡°Soon. At the very least, I can sense that the virus in the infected creatures only appeared recently!¡±


    ¡°Very well, we will wait then!¡±


    ............


    Time spent waiting is often long, but very valuable as well.


    Remi went out to collect samples of the infected¡¯s waste, while Greem started to collect some native spores and mushrooms.


    He could sense that the unique environment of the Marsh Wends was rted to the strange mushrooms here. Meanwhile, some of these mushrooms¡¯ contents greatly interested Greem.


    While the two of them were busy working, an insignificant and sneaky figure slipped into the area.


    It was a male sporeperson about half a meter tall. He had sharp facial features, shifty-looking eyes, and looked as if he was about to do something bad. He had swollen bumps on his back as well.


    Supposedly, with how weak the sporepeople were, he would have been torn to pieces by the frenzied swamp creatures here before he could reach the center of the Dead Mire. Somehow, he had managed to slip all the way in without being attacked at all.


    The reason for it was simple. The sporeperson was emitting the blight¡¯s unique stench, causing all of the swamp creatures to keep as far away as possible. However, Greem¡¯s scans could not find any signs of decay that the blight inflicted on this sporeperson.


    After looking around and confirming that there were no abnormalities, the sporeperson carefully approached a shambling Fungal Giant and tossed a white mushroom the size of a fist at it.


    The white mushroom rolled along the ground and finally drew the attention of the Fungal Giant.


    Perhaps sensing the mushroom¡¯s fragrance, the Fungal Giant lunged forward madly, grabbed the white mushroom with its arms, and ate it.


    A short momentter, the Fungal Giant started to tremble and roar. Large parts of its once muscr body began to wither and dry rapidly. Flies flew out of its mouth and circled its body.


    Seeing as the Fungal Giant had fallen victim, the sporeperson immediately moved towards his second target.


    However, just as he took out a white mushroom and prepared to do the same again, a soft male voice from behind scared him.


    ¡°Who made you do this?¡±


    The sporeperson turned back abruptly and saw Greem appeared out of nowhere in the air.


    Greem was dressed like a human adept, but he did not radiate any of his fearsome magical aura. From the outside, he looked just like an ordinary human. However, the sporeperson was not an ignorant fool either. He was able to recognize that Greem was no average person.


    Moreover, what he was doing was an act of evil that should never see the day of light; he immediately turned and ran.


    However, with his power that was onlyparable to an advanced apprentice, there was no way he could escape the legendary fire adept. Even the very thought of it wasughable!


    Greem snapped his finger, and a ring of fire mysteriously appeared beneath the spore person. Shackles of mes as solid as actual steel extended from the mes and bound the sporeperson tightly.


    Greem stepped upon the soft mud and appeared beside the sporeperson. He waved his right hand, and a small golden me gathered on the tip of his index finger. The sporeperson was panicking, but the small me immediately drew his attention.


    When his eyes settled on the me, his mind and thoughts seemed to have slowed down in a mire. He could no longer effectively organize his thoughts or put together a response.


    He had been charmed...by a simple fire spell!


    ¡°Where are you from? Why did youe here to poison the swamp creatures? Where did you create these viruses?¡± Greem immediately began his interrogation without any hesitation.


    ¡°Podling Cave...Podling Cave...Podling Cave.¡±


    For some reason, it seemed like the sporeperson¡¯s mind no longer worked properly. He could not remember anything apart from the words ¡®Podling Cave.¡¯


    ¡°Sir Moat, what do you think we should do about this?¡± Greem could not get any other answer despite repeated attempts. He could only turn his head and ask the strange eyeball on his shoulder.


    Through this Eye of Nature, Moat had been able to witness the entire process from a hundred kilometers away.


    Sage Moat was not in a good mood. His voice, even through the Eye of Nature, carried a heavy killing intent.


    ¡°Podling Cave is the sacrednd of the magical sporepeople! Many terrifying traps and guards guard the cave. Even I can¡¯t freely extend my mental consciousness into it. Judging by the current situation, the viruses were created by the sporepeople in Podling Cave with the purpose of forcing the other species and creatures out of the Marsh Wends. Hmph! These bastards have crossed the line this time!¡±


    ¡°Then, you mean?¡± As someone uninvolved in the local affairs, Greem couldn¡¯t care less about the residents¡¯ lives. However, upon hearing that Podling Cave was the sacrednd of the sporepeople, he couldn¡¯t help but be excited.


    ¡°Have the sporebat bring this sporeperson and the virus carriers back. I will contact the hydra¡¯s king and the leader of the sporebats. We will discuss the matter of exiling the sporepeople. In the meantime, if you can produce more decisive evidence, I will not hesitate to use the Marsh Wends¡¯ entire force against the sporepeople. When that happens, we will be able to break into the sporepeople¡¯s sacrednd, and you will naturally get your Primal Water.


    ¡°Furthermore, we can consider your mission to find the mastermind behind the blight to bepleted! I will get the rewards to your hands as soon as possible.¡±

 Chapter 1203 - Civil War Erupts

    <h4>Chapter 1203 Civil War Erupts</h4>


    The Marsh Wends wasrge and had a diverse ecosystem.


    Moreover, the unique nar environment had given birth to all sorts of strange creatures and nts.


    However, in terms of numbers alone, there was no doubt that the strange spores gliding through the air were the most superior.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s scans and analysis results, gic sequences of the spores could be found in the bodies of almost all the creatures in the Marsh Wends. If one were honest, the Marsh Wends¡¯ ecosystem wasposed entirely of spores and animals that had assimted with the spores.


    The source of these spores was the mushroom forest that grew all over the Wends.


    The mushrooms grew and became home and food for all sorts of swamp creatures. Mature mushrooms would release countless spores, spreading their genes all over thend.


    The many different species of mushrooms, and the many spores with their different genes, parasitized and contaminated all the animals and nts of the Marsh Wends. It created all sorts of strange, unusual magical creatures and nts.


    It appeared to be an exceedingly slow and gradual process. However, with the appearance of the magical sporepeople, this process of assimtion seemed to have been elerated.


    The magical sporepeople were small and insignificant. Theycked muscr bodies, great strength, or mysterious powers. They used to be an inconspicuous lesser species of the Marsh Wends.


    At the same time, the magical sporepeople were also incredibly powerful. They cultivated a shocking quantity of parasitic spores and mixed them into the unique mushrooms of the Wends. Bit by bit, the spores began to contaminate powerful species surrounding them.


    In the three hundred years that the magical sporepeople had lived in the Marsh Wends, they had managed to corruptrge groups of Fungal Giants, multiple Swamp Lords, and even a powerful tribe of ogres.


    Tribes that had been contaminated by the spores of the magical sporepeople became servants, loyally protecting and guarding the sporepeople. Even if they knew something was wrong, the Marsh Wends¡¯ powerhouses had trouble making their way through thends of these subordinate species to attack the sporepeople themselves!


    The rtionships and connections involved in this were tooplicated. Even Greem only managed to straighten out all the politics after thinking about it for a while.


    Of course, it helped that Emelia was able to provide him with some insider information!


    After all, half of Emelia¡¯s soul memory came from the spore princess. Even though the princess was forced to abandon her hometown due to being defeated in a civil war, she still had many of the tribe¡¯s ssified secrets in her memories.


    In particr, information on the powerhouses of the sporepeople and a mapyout of the Podling Cave drew Greem¡¯s attention.


    The leader of the magical sporepeople that stood opposed to Emelia, her uncle Fahssn, was no more than an insignificant Third Grade. However, the Fungal Giant he could assimte with, Mragesh, was a genuine Fourth Grade monster. He would have to be regarded as a fearsome Fourth Grade opponent inbat.


    Apart from the Fungal Giant, Fahssn had also managed to draw a powerful Swamp Lord to his side, partly through persuasion and partly through coercion. This Swamp Lord was Krach.


    Krach was a fearsome Swamp Lord of advanced Fourth Grade. He possessed destructive power and an incredibly resilient life force.


    Apart from these two individuals, Fahssn could also mobilize the leader of the Ango¡¯rosh Ogres, Gorefist. He was also a scary fighter at Fourth Grade.


    The Marsh Wends had a total of eight Fourth Grade creatures, and three of them were subordinate to the magical sporepeople alone. The remaining five could still maintain a numerical advantage, but it was hard to unite their forces into a coherent opposition.


    Fortunately, with Sage Moat as the conduit, they barely managed to form a core for the Anti-Sporepeople Alliance. Meanwhile, due to his need for the Primal Water and Emelia¡¯s stance, Greem was naturally on the side of the Alliance.


    For the next few days, Greem ran all over the Wends visiting areas ravaged by the blight, catching one sporeperson after another as they went out to infect the swamp creatures. The mounting evidence was finally enough to enrage the leaders of the other tribes!


    On the seventeenth day after Greem and his party arrived in the Marsh Wends, a terrifying civil war in the swamps broke out!


    The once quiet and peaceful Marsh Wends had devolved into battlefields all over the ce. The roars and battle cries of countless swamp creatures of various races and shapes could be heard all over the dark Mushroom Forest, their forms shing inbat over and over.


    Greem traveled beneath a shady mushroom tree with Remi in tow. He passed by a small hill and ran into a group of swamp creatures that were tied up inbat.


    On one side were three colossal Swamp Giants of enormous size. Each of them was over seven meters tall. Their bodies were as intimidating as ck bears. In ce of ws, they had long, tentacle-like appendages. Their bodies¡¯ surface was also covered in green moss and lichen, with white bumps vaguely showing beneath.


    They were obviously on the side of the Anti-Sporepeople Alliance.


    On the other side were two dozen equally imposing and muscr Ango¡¯rosh ogres.


    The ogres were only three to four meters tall, barely reaching the waist of the Swamp Giants. However, they were great in numbers and very disciplined, not as dull and clumsy as ogres in other worlds tended to be.


    The ogres even appeared to have a bnced squadposition. There were seven or eight ogre warriors with shields in hand at the very front, enduring theshes and body blows of the three Swamp Giants. Meanwhile, a dozen ogre barbarians were beating away at the Giants with their stone hammers and clubs.


    Even further behind the lines stood two shaman ogres.


    They tossed balls of red mist at the ogre warriors, causing them to be even more ferocious inbat, while also hurling red fireballs at the Swamp Giant, causing parts of their bodies to dry and wither.


    A squad of two Second Grade and one First Grade Swamp Giants was forced back by a team of First Grade ogres. It looked as if they were about to be defeated.


    Greem tapped his staff and observed the battlefield from a distance away. Who knew what he was thinking. Meanwhile, Remi evaluated the battlefield with his beady, little pig eyes, as if he was nning something nasty.


    Seeing that an outsider had approached the battlefield, an ogre close to Greem let out a roar and charged at him with a hammer in hand.


    Hisrge body and heavy hammer caused the ground to tremble with every step he took. His rumbling footsteps almost sounded like the war drums of humans.


    Due to the advantage they had in this fight, the shamans were able to cast their gaze over as well. When they saw that theirpanions were charging a frail creature that was not even two meters tall, they couldn¡¯t help but start chuckling.


    They might not be stupid, but they were still quite far from true intellect. Knowledge required umtion, and intelligence was a product of legacy. Not every creature that had a brain could be called an intelligent being!


    The next second, the two ogre shamans couldn¡¯t help but let out an audible gasp.


    The insignificant and tiny creature in the distance had only raised his staff when five fireballs of shocking intensity shot forward. The ogre warrior that had been charging at Greem was blown away by a single fireball. His body was kept in the air by the chain of fireballs that followed after, utterly sting him into a mist of blood and flesh before he could evennd.


    Both sides of the conflict stopped fighting when they saw this. They turned and looked at the remaining half of the ogre¡¯s body.


    ¡°A Fourth Grade...he¡¯s¡ª¡± One of the shamans shouted out loud.


    Before he could even finish, the ¡®short¡¯ human vanished abruptly. He then realized, to his horror, that the human had appeared beside him.


    There was no time for chanting and casting. The shaman ogre might not be as muscr as the ogre warriors, but he was no weakling either. He raised the thick staff in his hand and smashed it at the enemy.


    Judging from the breaking wind sounds of his motion, this wooden staff would be enough to break the bones of any ordinary creature.


    Unfortunately, he was fighting against a fearsome fire adept!


    Greem didn¡¯t even need to cast a spell. He merely touched the shaman with his staff, and the fire energy in the ogre¡¯s body instantly ignited.


    The next second, the shaman¡¯s entire body was on fire. mes burst forth from his mouth, his nostrils, and his ears. They even surged forth from the pores of his skin, turning the ogre into a zing human torch in the blink of an eye.


    He howled in agony, but both of his eyes had already been scorched blind. He could only run around helplessly and aimlessly.


    When the fire energy in his body had been exhausted, and the mes were finally extinguished, the ogre¡¯s body was ck as charcoal. It copsed to the ground with a thud and moved no longer.


    He had been alive while the mes were burning, yet by the time the mes went out, he was already dead.


    The world was indeed so strange at times!


    The other shaman looked at Greem in horror. When he realized that the human¡¯s gaze had shifted to him, he immediately scurried away. However, before he could even take two steps, a beam of red light shot from Greem¡¯s eyes and swept past his legs.


    A deep scorch mark was burned into the ground where the red beam had passed. The ogre¡¯s legs had been severed from the knee, and his entire body crashed into the ground. He screamed in pain.


    Even the two shamans of advanced First Grade had been ughtered so easily. Naturally, the rest of the ogres did not dare approach the enemy.


    The screamed and scattered, fleeing in every direction.


    Greem took down another five of them with zing Fireballs, while the rest disappeared into the distant mist.

 Chapter 1204 - Starting a War

    <h4>Chapter 1204 Starting a War</h4>


    Greem might have aided the three Swamp Giants as an ally.


    However, when the Ango¡¯rosh ogres had been routed, the Swamp Giants did not behave in a friendly manner towards Greem. If Greem hadn¡¯t shown the Giants the strand of hair that Sage Moat had given him, they might have even have assaulted him.


    The stubbornness and inflexibility of the swamp creatures couldn¡¯t be more obvious!


    The leader of the three Swamp Giants approached Greem and sniffed the hair as hard as he could. He then spoke in his deep, low voice, ¡°This is the smell of the Swamp Sage. It seems like you are indeed our ally. Speak, runt. How do you intend to deal with these annoying ogres?¡±


    ¡°Attack...of course, I¡¯ll attack them!¡± Greem had a helpless smile on his face. ¡°The Ango¡¯rosh ogres are helping the sporepeople with their evil deeds. Naturally, we should teach them an unforgettable lesson. What could make them more angry and upset than raiding their home?¡±


    ¡°You want to invade Stonehammer Camp? There are over a thousand Ango¡¯rosh ogres there.¡± Surprise appeared on the Swamp Giant¡¯s mossy face, but he quickly became excited. ¡°I like you. The Swamp Sage might be smart, but he¡¯s way too hesitant. We should have put together our powers and chased away those evil-doing bastards of the Marsh Wends a long time ago! If you really intend to attack the ogres, then count me in. Swamp Giant Angor is willing to follow you!¡±


    ¡°Swamp Giant Korath is willing to follow you.¡±


    ¡°Swamp Giant Korath is willing to follow you.¡±


    Even Greem didn¡¯t expect that his seemingly thoughtless promation of war would resonate so profoundly with the Swamp Giants as to make them dere themselves allies.


    Now that the Swamp Giants had volunteered themselves, Greem epted their offers without any hesitation. He had nned to start a storm in the Marsh Wends, to begin with.


    Greem and Remi led the Swamp Giants in a different direction. They passed through several ponds and rivers and arrived at the so-called Stonehammer Camp. Swamp Giant Angor kept letting out deep, resonating growls throughout the journey.


    Swamp Giants continued to appear from deep within the Marsh Wends as they marched. By the time they arrived at Stonehammer Camp, a crowd of twelve Swamp Giants followed behind Greem.


    The strongest among these Swamp Giants was Third Grade Tarut, while the rest were young First and Second Grade giants.


    The squad stopped close to Stonehammer Camp and observed the camp from a distance.


    By human standard, this so-called Stonehammer Camp was hardly a proper camp.


    They did not even have crude wooden fences, let alone a proper wall around the grounds.


    There were only mushrooms in the Marsh Wends. It was too hard to find suitable lumber for the construction of a wall. Stonehammer Camp was only some high ground surrounded by several waterways and ponds.


    The ogres had marked the boundary of the camp with thick, five-meter tall stone pirs. There was a pir every dozen meters, with nothing in between them. It was an extremely crude arrangement.


    The ogres had already caught wind of the Swamp Giants¡¯ arrival. Arge horde of ogres stood on top of their hill, forming a thick wall of flesh and prepared to fend off the giants¡¯ invasion.


    In truth, the Ango¡¯rosh ogres had flown into a frenzy when they heard that the Swamp Giants were marching on Stonehammer Camp. With their numbers and power, they were more than prepared to charge out and face the giants on the open field. However, when the leaders of the ogres found out that there was a fearsome high-grade adept among the Swamp Giants, they used their authority to suppress the ogres¡¯motion. They then set the battlefield at the edge of the camp.


    However, Greem thought that the concerns and actions of the ogre leaders were utterly unnecessary.


    Such crude defenses were of practically no help in a battle. Rather than stay cooped up behind those pointless stone pirs, it would have been much better to go on the offensive. At the very least, that would have given them more room to move about and, therefore, more tactical options!


    There were quite a few Swamp Giants here, but Third Grade Tarut was the most respectful towards Greem. The rest of the Swamp Giants were only following Greem out of courtesy or simply because of the crowd.


    The reason was simple. Their understanding of power was just different!


    The Third Grade Swamp Giant had begun toe into contact with the higher powers. He had started to experience the terror of principle forces. That was why he could deduce the might of a Fourth Grade adept from a foreign ne just byparing Greem to what he knew.


    Meanwhile, ordinary giants still had yet to break free of their habits as lesser creatures. They still judged the might of a creature by their size and the development of their muscles.


    ¡°Lord Greem, how do you think we should wage this war? Our side seems to be far inferior in strength.¡± Tarut was obviously a Swamp Giant with excellent thinking and learning skills. He squatted down andmunicated with Greem with his loud, booming voice.


    Hispanions didn¡¯t seem to agree with his viewpoint and started moring. The First Grade giants, in particr, were loud.


    ¡°Fight, however you like. There¡¯s no need to be all that serious!¡± Having experienced a dozen bloody and cruel nar wars, such a small ¡®skirmish¡¯ was nothing in Greem¡¯s eyes. To be brutally honest, this was hardly a war. It was, at the very best, a scuffle between two viges. ¡°We are not alone. Once the fighting starts, Moat will certainly reinforce us!¡±


    ¡°But......¡± Tarut still appeared concerned.


    ¡°What is it? Are you afraid? If you Swamp Giants are so scared, you can stay behind. I can send my fire creatures to the frontline in your ce!¡± Greem coldly said.


    ¡°Afraid? Lord Greem, please retract your assessment of us. We Swamp Giants will never feel fear even in the face of death. Death for the Swamp Giants is returning to the embrace of Mother Swamp. Our souls are eternal.¡± Clearly provoked by Greem¡¯s words, Tarut beat his chest with his hand as if his honor had been slighted.


    ¡°Then take out the courage and might of the Swamp Giants and show me your power! Don¡¯t worry; I will send my army of fire creatures to aid you.¡± Greem was already dissatisfied with how Moat was dragging his feet.


    Alice was in urgent need of the Primal Water. He did not have too much time and effort to spend wasting away waiting.


    Compared to the slow,posed nning and strategies of Moat and the other leaders, Greem was far more aggressive in his approach. At any rate, the Marsh Wends was not his territory. Someone else would manage the carnage after all the destruction had been done. Greem had nothing holding him back and fully intended to escte the scale of war as quickly as possible.


    Greem looked across the battlefield. The bulky figures of the ogres were squashed together, making it hard for him to find the Fourth Grade ogre leader, Gorefist.


    As such, Greem gave up on searching for Gorefist and focused on the fighting at hand instead.


    He waved at Tarut and stepped onto the battlefield.


    With every step he took, his body rapidly grew in size.


    mes surged out of his ¡®skinny¡¯ body, causing his body to swell in size. By the time he arrived within a hundred meters of the Ango¡¯rosh ogres, he had transformed into a me giant shrouded in a raging fire.


    When his half-meter-thick feet stomped against the muddy ground, the shapeless forcefield of mes and the incredible heat he radiated spread out in every direction.


    The damp and wet ground instantly dried and hardened. The moss, lichen, and colorful mushrooms growing on thend withered and burned in an instant. Even the ponds and pools nearby started to bubble and let off steam as their muddy waters boil!


    Both parties involved in the conflict looked at this fearsome me giant that had appeared out of thin air in horror. They could sense the overwhelming and terrifying flux of fire that he was giving off. Everyone¡¯s hearts beat uncontrobly. For the first time, they witnessed the terror of a high-grade adept.


    ¡°Sickles of mes, contract manifested for the first time; megate!¡±


    A short chant reverberated across the battlefield as an unusual door made of fire appeared before the me giant. A connection arose between the me giant¡¯s staff and the megate. Overwhelming fire energy started to surge towards the door.


    The megate tore open space and summoned a massive army of fire creatures from the distant Fire Elementium ne.


    The megate opened, and countless fire creatures swarmed forward. Among them were low-grade creatures like fire spirits, mespirits, fire giants, me hounds, firebats, and intermediate-grade creatures such as the zefire mespirits, me giants, molten giants, and fire sprites.


    Of course, Greem also saw high-grade fire creatures within the army, such as me fiends, Fire Lords, and phoenixes.


    At the same time, a deep voice rang out in Greem¡¯s mind.


    ¡°The quality of your fire energy is very excellent. As an equal exchange, I can temporarily lend you my army of fire. Remember, I couldn¡¯t care less if all the First and Second Grade fire creatures were to die. However, for every Fire Lord that bes a casualty, you will have topensate me with a hundred units of fire energy. Do we have a deal?¡±


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled.


    He could sense that the individual that had established a connection with his mind was a Fifth Grade Fire Lord at the very least. In truth, at his level, he should be referred to as a Fire King.


    Since the Fire King was willing to offer goodwill towards him, Greem naturally had to ept the offer.


    Theymunicated briefly through the megate, exchanged their fire brands, then ceased theirmunications.


    While Greem had beenmunicating with the Fire King, the swarm of fire creatures had already engaged the Ango¡¯rosh ogres!

 Chapter 1205 - Gorefist

    <h4>Chapter 1205 Gorefist</h4>


    In truth, the environment of the Marsh Wends was not suited as a battlefield for fire creatures.


    However, with a master of fire like Greem around, no disadvantageous environment couldst for long.


    Seeing that the fighting had broken out, Greem raised both his arms and started casting. Hepleted a massive Meteor Shower in just six seconds. zing meteors engulfed in redva pierced through the dense mist, one after another, crashing from the skies with ck tails of smoke.


    They struck mostly near the ogres¡¯ formation, forcing the weaker ogres to lift their wooden shields to cover their heads. However, the quickly crashing meteors created craters in the ground. The violent fire shockwaves threw many of the ogres to their feet, and the sshing rain ofva sent them running around in agony.


    The entire frontline of ogres had instantly descended into a magma hell.


    The Ango¡¯rosh ogres had formidable Physique, terrifying Strength, and numbers in the thousands. It made them a particrly fearsome force. However, such an army was nothing in the eyes of a Fourth Grade fire adept.


    If it wasn¡¯t out of concern of the Fourth Grade ogre chieftain, Greem could have gone all out and exterminated them by himself.


    How fearsome was a legendary fire adept unleashing all his power?


    A Fourth Grade fire adept was an apocalyptic cmity on the battlefield. Every action, every fire spell, could inflict devastating damage to the enemy.


    With the fire creatures as fodder in the front and Greem wreaking death and destruction from behind, the twelve Swamp Giants only had to endure a negligible amount of pressure inbat. They mostly gathered around Greem, exterminating any ogre that slipped past the fire creatures or attempted to destroy the megate.


    The fire creatures were an unstoppable torrent by now, engaging the ogres in a vicious battle.


    The smaller fire creatures were nothing more than fodder. Their powers were already greatly affected by the damp environment. The moment they approached the ogres, they were crushed to sparks by the stone hammers and sticks.


    Though the sparks from their disintegrated bodies would burn the ogres, they were resilient enough to withstand such damage. Injuries like that only provoked the ogres and made them even more wild and reckless in battle, rather than hinder them.


    Only Second Grade fire creatures with bodies that were almost entirely solid and amazing powers could inflictsting, severe damage to the ogre warriors. Moreover, the beings summoned here weren¡¯t the fire creatures themselves, but a projection of their power.


    That only made them even more ferocious and fearless than usual.


    Once the me power in their projection had been exhausted, they would self-detonate without hesitation, inflicting the maximum amount of damage and causing as much chaos as possible.


    Consequently, deafening explosions were constantly ringing on the frontlines. Waves of fire would wash over the swamp, leaving behind charred skeletons and human torches.


    Horrible. The battle was unusually gruesome!


    However, this was the ogres¡¯ base, after all. The hundreds of meters of ponds and swamps at the front of the camp were the worst battleground for the fire creatures. Most of their energy was exhausted by the air¡¯s humidity, leaving them with only a small portion left that they could unleash on these wicked ogres.


    Meanwhile, Greem¡¯s fire spells were still the main threat to the ogres.


    Be it the Meteor Showers, the Doomsday Volcanos, or Molten World, each and every one of his spells had terrifying might and shocking radius. They were incredibly lethal to the ogres!


    Even as robust and resilient as they were, the Ango¡¯rosh ogres could only dejectedly ept the reality of their fragility in front of Greem.


    Gorefist, who had been hiding in the army, witnessed ogre after ogre copse in the mes, and familiar figure after familiar figures reduced to ashes in the fires. He let out a furious roar, but there was nothing he could do.


    With the horde of fire creatures standing in the front, and twelve Swamp Giants standing guard, very few ogres could even make it near the megate. The ogres had to endure wave upon wave of fire spells. Their cries of anguish before death were heartbreaking.


    ¡°Gorefist, that human adept is a reinforcement found by Moat. Apparently, he¡¯s a legendary Fourth Grade fire adept. Do not underestimate him. Buy as much time as possible. Krach and I will arrive shortly. We will work together and take him down when we arrive. He will be yours to do as you please!¡±


    ¡°Hurry up...move faster. That damned bastard is ughtering all my men. Every body falling in battle here is one of my people, yet you two are still watching from afar...no! I must stop him!¡±


    ¡°No...Gorefist, you must not step in battle! I believe that human adept is trying to lure you out and kill you in singlebat. You will die if you show yourself!¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t believe it! He¡¯s a Fourth Grade, but I am a Fourth Grade as well. There¡¯s nothing to fear. Come here as soon as possible! Perhaps by the time you arrive, I will have twisted off his head and feasted on his blood.¡±


    While Gorefist was shouting in his mind, Greem had summoned another gigantic meteor and sent it crashing down from the skies.


    The Meteor Showers from earlier had only summoned meteors about one meter in diameter. Still, they had devastated the ogres. This gigantic meteor was over twenty meters in diameter. When it cut across the sky towards the ground, it was almost as if it had seared a burning mark in the air.


    Even the space of the ne began trembling when the meteor passed by.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! If a meteor like thatnded in the ogres¡¯ ranks, the damage it could inflict was unimaginable.


    Gorefist could no longer hold back. He roared and pushed aside his men before charging into battle.


    The moment he stepped onto the battlefield, he let out a furious shout. He swung the stone hammer in his right hand over and over as if it was weightless before finally hurling it forward.


    It turned into a fireball and rapidly approached the even more massive, more terrifying fireball crashing down from above.


    A loud explosion rang out. The hammer shattered the meteor into several pieces and splintered it in every direction. Gorefist made a grabbing motion, and the falling stone hammer vanished instantly.


    It reappeared in Gorefist¡¯s right hand the next moment.


    Greem sensed an unexpected flux of the narws during this process.


    Hm? The narws that the ogre chieftain had mastered were truly unusual. To think he could resummon a weapon he had thrown into the distance!


    On closer thought, a narw power like this was practically useless for most adepts with their long-ranged spells. That said, it was a decent ability for melee professions with ack of reach.


    With this ability, even a creature as clumsy and unintelligent as an ogre could take on the role of heavy artillery!


    Gorefist stood in the center of the battlefield with a hammer in each hand. His beady green eyes stared viciously at Greem, hatred burning strongly within.


    Fire creatures foolish enough not to know better were crushed beneath Gorefist¡¯s foot when they got close. The entire battlefield shook as if an earthquake had happened.


    Powerful shockwaves spread through the ground to the surroundings. All fire creatures caught in this shockwave instantly turned to ashes, without even the chance to self-destruct.


    Forty-two points of Strength.


    In just half a second, the Chip had determined the ogre chieftain¡¯s Strength.


    It was important to note that Greem¡¯s base Strength at the moment was no more than 27 points. And this was only thanks to the constant supply of fire dragon meat and the use of a significant amount of resources. As expected of a Fourth Grade melee fighter, his base Strength was 15 points higher than Greem¡¯s.


    If Greem fought him in person, he would have to endure a tremendous amount of force with every parry or strike he attempted!


    Even so, Greem would not back off.


    After all, this was a rare chance to pick off a Fourth Grade native creature.


    If he missed this chance, he would have a much, much, much harder time killing even a single Fourth Grade of the Spirit World.


    Greem waved his hand, and the fire creatures on the battlefield split off to the sides. The twelve Swamp Giants also retreated close to the megate.


    Thus, the center of the battlefield was left to the two Fourth Grades!


    Gorefist, Ango¡¯rosh Ogre Chieftain.


    From a distance, he looked like a fat, overweight human.


    He was over seven meters tall¨C not exactly the tallest amongst the ogres, but certainly the bulkiest.


    He stood there like a mountain of flesh, b upon b of meat on his body. There were so manyyers that it almost looked like he was wearing armor of flesh. His stubby legs were half a meter in diameter, leaving craters in the ground with every step.


    Due to his excessive size, Gorefist only wore a hide around his waist, barely covering his more sensitive parts.


    He also wore a ne of skulls on his neck. He wore a sharp bone in his nose as a piercing. His eyes were wide as metal shields, and his big ears drooped all the way to his shoulders.


    The only weapons he had on his person were the two giant stone hammers.


    Greem could faintly sense some strange energy flux from the hammers. It seems like they were no ordinary items!

 Chapter 1206 - The Tragic Ogre Chieftain

    <h4>Chapter 1206 The Tragic Ogre Chieftain</h4>


    As the two Fourth Grades prepared for battle, the other participants inbat started to move away silently.


    It was simple. They were all scared of being caught by the shockwaves of the Fourth Grades¡¯ attacks!


    Once there were no other distractions within five hundred meters, Gorefist lifted his hammer, roared, and charged forward.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    The earth trembled, and the world shook.


    Fearsome shockwaves emanated from where he stepped, and a deep footprint remained in the ground where he trampled. All the puddles around the point of impact were blown into the air and split into tiny particles of water by the vibration of the strange shockwave.


    The chieftain of the Ango¡¯rosh ogres thundered towards Greem like a berserk bull.


    The me giant that Greem had transformed into was a dozen meters tall, while Gorefist was only seven meters tall.


    Even though Gorefist was smaller in size, he didn¡¯t seem intimidated at all, judging by how fearlessly and recklessly charged forward.


    Greem quickly cast his spells, and several me Vines began to creep towards the ogre. However, the me Vines were shredded to sparks by the force shockwaves in the air before they could wrap around the opponent¡¯s thick limbs.


    The wind howled as the hammer crashed forth, instantly smashing the fire projection that Greem had left in his original spot.


    Meanwhile, Greem¡¯s actual body appeared a hundred meters away. A chain of zing Fireballs cut across the sky andnded on Gorefist.


    Beng! Beng! Beng.!


    Consecutive explosions rang out, causing Gorefist to grunt over and over again.


    However, the winds howled once more as a warhammer burst forth from the mes, stirring a gale in the process. The hammer smashed viciously towards Greem.


    Greem did not dare hesitate in the slightest. He teleported a hundred meters away with Fire Teleportation and dodged the flying hammer.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The difference in Strength was too massive. Greem had absolutely no confidence in defending against the hammer with his magical defenses. With Gorefist¡¯s 42 points of Strength, Greem¡¯s body would turn into meat paste upon contact.


    Even if the hammer couldn¡¯t break Greem¡¯s magical shields, the shockwave from the impact would be more than he could bear.


    If Greem was further stunned by the impact of such a heavy weapon...


    That was the agony of elementium adepts when fighting against warrior professions. They could not allow the enemy to touch them in the slightest.


    Fortunately, as an elementium adept, Greem¡¯s mobility was far superior to Gorefist.


    As the two Fourth Grades continued to attack each other, the previously rowdy crowd of fighters became scurrying rats, covering their heads and fleeing away from the battlefield with all their might.


    The battlefield of Fourth Grades was exceedingly terrifying. There was no room for the weak.


    Greem regrly scattered to the winds, erupted into tiny sparks and drifted into the air, or appeared here and there around Gorefist using Fire Teleportation. He was changing positions every three to five seconds, simply to prevent getting hit by the enemy.


    Yet, regardless of how dangerous the situation became, Greem never strayed more than a hundred meters away from the ogre chieftain.


    He had no choice! It was what he needed to do.


    Area-of-effect spells might be unavoidable, but their magical power was too scattered. They could not inflict any significant damage to this enemy. Only concentrated single-target spells could prate the opponent¡¯s forcefield defenses and inflict sufficient damage.


    However, very few such spells could be cast instantly. Their trajectory was also too predictable.


    If they were a hundred meters apart, Gorefist would be able to read the trajectory of all the fire spells. He would then have plenty of time to think and react, be it to dodge or shatter the spell with a thrown hammer.


    However, Greem also suffered incredible pressure by skirting within a hundred meters of Gorefist. The ogre¡¯s terrifying Strength was overwhelming!


    Those howling hammers might not have hit Greem even once, but just the shockwaves in the air caused by their passage made his Inferno Shields shatter.


    The battle was like a bear trying to catch a cat. The bear seemed clumsy, but the fight could be decided in an instant if anything happened.


    Greem was utterly untouched since the start of the battle. Meanwhile, the ogre chieftain had been bombarded with fire spells and covered in burn wounds. Still, injuries like these were only light wounds for the tough-skinned ogre.


    Gorefist only had to protect his head and heart with his hammer. The enemy could freely attack the rest of his fleshy body. He persistently struck at the dodging Greem. Even though he missed every single time, his hammers still put incredible pressure on the adept.


    Gorefist stared with his strange, triangr, beady eyes through his hammers at Greem, with a shifty gleam that did not match his stature. He was intentionally putting on an act of clumsiness and ignorance. If the adept truly believed that this was all he had to offer, then the battle techniques he would unleash in the heat of battle would catch the enemy by surprise and teach them an unforgettable lesson!


    None among Fourth Grades, caster or warrior, was an idiot.


    If you ever believed your opponent to be a fool, you would not be far from a death trap!


    However, while Gorefist was hiding his real power, Greem was also holding back.


    Among the few firews he had mastered, he had made sure to conceal the two most important ones¨C Fire Pration and Invisible mes. He had only been using Increased Fire Effectiveness and Increased Spellcasting Range.


    While the ogre chieftain was scheming his demise, Greem was also plotting the ogre¡¯s death.


    Since the opponent was tantlyying down bait, he would happily devour it.


    Greem was also trying his best to inflict as many minor injuries as possible while the ogre held back. It was a free advantage offered by the opponent. It would not be so easy to freely bombard the enemy when he finally went all outter.


    Gorefist continued to endure the fire spells in agony while secretlypressing the space avable to Greem. His small, beady eyes continued to turn around their sockets as he tried his best to calcte his chances of sess with the ambush.


    Meanwhile, Greem was actively moving around with Fire Teleportation, using the Chip¡¯s scans to gather the opponent¡¯s information and data. Greem might not have Alice¡¯s exceptional sense for danger, but analyzing the enemy¡¯s movements and predicting the flow of the battle through dynamic analysis was the Chip¡¯s area of expertise.


    With the two Fourth Grades intentionally guiding the battle where they wanted it to go, the first fuse was quickly lit!


    Gorefist swung the hammer in a wide arc, forcing Greem to use Fire Teleportation once again. When Greem¡¯s body vanished in a pir of fire, Gorefist turned around to face his back. Both hammers flew forward and crashed towards an empty spot on the ground. He roared and strode forward, giving Greem a hug of death with his strong arms just as the adept appeared out of thin air.


    Wooosh!


    The fierce winds howled ferociously.


    Greem¡¯s path to the right and left had been thoroughly cut off by the hammers. He had also just finished his Fire Teleportation, and there was a three-second cooldown until the next time he could cast it.


    Gorefist thundered forward like a wayward train, catching this perfect moment and using his arms to further seal off any path of escape that Greem had.


    Gorefist¡¯s broad mouth opened as wide as it could go as he charged. He let out the loudest and most vicious roar he had made since the start of the battle. The shapeless soundwave burst forth from his mouth,pressing the air and causing it the visibly form into a wave that crashed against Greem¡¯s body.


    All the fire defenses around Greem popped and shattered. His mind was also dazed for a brief moment. It felt like his soul consciousness was numb and no longer responsive to his thoughts and intentions.


    Berserk Howl!


    It was a secretbat technique of Gorefist that allowed him to cripple the enemy¡¯s Spirit momentarily with a battlecry. The duration of its effect was determined by the resilience of the opponent¡¯s Spirit.


    Gorefist couldn¡¯t help but grin widely when he saw the me giant stripped of all his defenses and his body swaying about. There was only a mere distance of thirty meters between them now. Moreover, no one could stop him from reaching the me giant and crushing him into pieces.


    Before his smile could spread to the rest of his ugly, tattooed face, Gorefist¡¯s legs tripped on something. His chubby body lost bnce as he crashed to the ground head first, sliding towards Greem covered in mud and water.


    A small, but strangely hard, wall of fire about half a meter tall had appeared on the ground between him and the adept without his knowledge. Gorefist¡¯s substantial body crushed the second and third wall of fire after he was tripped by the first one. Hisrge head then smashed a fourth and a fifth wall.


    When he finally slid up to the me giant, Greem had broken free of his daze. After crashing into so many walls of fire with his head, Gorefist was stunned, despite his Physique.


    The next instant, a pir of golden mes engulfed the ogre chieftain¡¯s body, roasting him thoroughly, inside and out.


    The fearsome fire pration effect inflicted devastating damage to Gorefist.


    Gorefist, who had believed his flesh body to be more than enough to endure the mes, realized that the fire was inflicting terrifying damage to him. It was almost as if every strand of fire could ignore his forcefield and his body, directly burning his consciousness and soul origin.


    The ogre chieftain was instantly roasted, badly. He quickly got up on his feet and fled the golden mes, desperately patting away at his body at the still-burning mes.


    ¡°Hammer!¡± Gorefist shouted out loud, opening both palms wide to retrieve his hammers.


    However, despite holding the pose for five or six seconds, he still felt nothing in his hands.


    He lifted his hand and looked at the distance with wide-open eyes of shock. The me giant was stepping on one of the hammers, slowly putting it away into his storage equipment. The other hammer was also long gone.


    A cold breeze blew past, and Gorefist once again felt tremendous searing pain all over his body.


    Bastard.

 Chapter 1207 - Rauluns, The Diviner of the Water

    <h4><strong>Chapter 1207</strong> Rauluns, The Diviner of the Water</h4>


    Without his weapons, Gorefist¡¯sbat power was cut by over thirty percent.


    It didn¡¯t matter how fast he moved his thick, stubby legs; he would never catch up to Greem¡¯s phantasmal movements. Moreover, the fire spells, now affected by fire pration, provoked unbearable agony every time they hit him. The damage he was enduring was increasing exponentially.


    Gorefist was a warrior who excelled at meleebat after all. Without the means to close the distance with a spellcaster, he would be kited to death.


    If he still had his warhammers, Gorefist had an attack that could barely qualify as a mid-range threat. Without the warhammers, Gorefist only had a simple directional attack in his Berserk Howl!


    Trying to stun the opponent with Berserk Howl and taking him down in that short duration was an insult to their intelligence. The helpless Gorefist could only chase after the me giant like a foolish bear, all while enduring a ceaseless barrage of fire attacks.


    The oue of the battle had been decided!


    The only thing that kept the ogre chieftain from falling was the thought of his two allies who were hurrying over.


    Once Fahssn and Krach arrived, it would be a breeze to take down this human adept with thebined power of three Fourth Grades. At the very worst, they would be able to scare away the opponent and preserve the Ango¡¯rosh ogres¡¯ camp that hadsted for several thousands of years.


    This conviction kept Gorefist standing in the face of the ferocious fire spells, simply refusing to keel over.


    Compared to Gorefist, who was fighting very conservatively and trying his best to survive, Greem was also suffering.


    He was very cautious.


    On the one hand, he had to be very careful not to be caught in any of the ogre¡¯s traps. On the other hand, he had to control the power of his attacks and ensure they didn¡¯t exceed the ogre chieftain¡¯s tolerance threshold. He did not want the ogre to copse before his allies arrived.


    This battle had already been decided. However, the victory of a single battle, even if it meant the death of an enemy Fourth Grade, was of no help to Greem¡¯s real purpose on this trip.


    Greem¡¯s actions would only have meaning if they helped build on the foundation of achieving his ultimate goal!


    Gorefist was not allowed to copse.


    At least, not until he drew both his allies over!


    ............


    There was arge, clearke.


    The surface of the water was calm and smooth. It looked as beautiful and clear as a giant sapphire in the middle of the Marsh Wends¡¯ dark, damp environment.


    Sage Moat stood quietly on the shore, drawing a simple array on the ground with his staff. When everything waspleted, he stood at the center of the formation with his wooden staff, holding a wooden bowl half-full of water in his hands. He then started to chant an ancient and mysterious spell.


    His deep, low voice rang over the transparent surface of theke. Even though there was no wind, small ripples started to spread across the water. Seven minutes into his chanting, his tone began to turn higher, and the calm waters began to bubble like boiling water.


    Near the end of Moat¡¯s chanting, theke¡¯s surface started to bubble into a dense mist. The mist did not dissipate but instead gathered together to form a massive water humanoid standing a dozen meters tall.


    When Moat lethargically chanted thest syble of the spell, the wooden bowl shattered into pieces. The liquid inside the bowl entered the water-humanoid¡¯s body as the creature opened his eyes.


    The Diviner of the Water, Rauluns, Fourth Grade.


    The summoning ceremony took over fifteen minutes. It was only then that Rauluns regained the full extent of his consciousness.


    He lowered his head and looked at Moat, who was as tiny as a child. In his deep, maic, and ancient voice, Rauluns spoke.


    ¡°Moat, what is that you have awakened me from my slumber for this time? I can feel it. I have only slept for three hundred years this time. If you cannot provide me with a good reason, I will retrieve the Soul of Water I gave you and cut off the spiritual connection between us.¡±


    He assimted his body into a natural source of water and slowly increased his power through thousands of years of slumber. It was Rauluns¡¯ method of cultivation and growth. However, this method was very prone to disruption by external factors in a material ne.


    That was why Rauluns was in a bad mood, having been abruptly awakened from his sleep even though he and Moat were good friends of over a thousand years.


    ¡°Old friend, much has happened in the Marsh Wends while you were sleeping. Why don¡¯t you sense with your power now that you are awake? The Marsh Wends need you. We need you. You cannot keep sleeping!¡± Moat shook his head bitterly as if he had no other choice.


    ¡°The Marsh Wends.¡± Rauluns paused for a moment before closing his eyes and focusing on his senses, as Moat had suggested.


    As expected of a Fourth Grade Diviner of the Water. Any ce with a source of water could not escape his spiritual senses, even if it were thousands of kilometers away.


    He simply shut his eyes and sensed for a brief moment before opening them once more. His calm, gentle eyes were now filled with the red gleam of anger.


    ¡°Why...why is life in Marsh Wends withering away? Why is the water elementium of Marsh Wends crying in sorrow? What has happened in the Marsh Wends in the three hundred years I was asleep?¡±


    Moat lifted his head, and his eyes met Rauluns¡¯ own.


    Two spiritual threads, one green and one blue, connected. Rauluns immediately understood everything that had happened in the past few hundred years.


    ¡°The magical sporepeople...a blight...a human adept...war of the Wends,¡± Rauluns¡¯ gaze turned sharp and furious. ¡°It seems like the source of this cmity is the magical sporepeople. It¡¯s time to chase those people out of the Wends after this concludes. That said, what is with the human adept? Why do I sense an even more terrifying aura from him?¡±


    Moat¡¯s expression turned into an awkward one at the mention of the human adept.


    ¡°He...he¡¯s a fire adept!¡±


    Rauluns¡¯ calm attitude immediately changed.


    ¡°What? Moat, you¡¯re mad! How could you let a Fourth Grade fire adept run rampant in our Marsh Wends? He will inflict devastating damage to the environment. No! I must evict him immediately!¡±


    Water and fire were at odds.


    Even without meeting him, Rauluns already had a bad impression of the fire adept.


    Even if Greem was blessed by Alice, he would still not provide a good impression to Rauluns. In contrast, Greem and Moat were acquaintances and even friends at this point, thanks to the favors that he had been doing him.


    Otherwise, Moat would never have immediately mobilized the Fourth Grades on his side for reinforcement when he received Greem¡¯smunications.


    Of course, the main reason Greem was able to get Moat to bolster him was that his actions were in line with the Wend¡¯s welfare. With the same goal in mind, having an additional Fourth Grade like Greem to help them would increase their odds of exiling the sporepeople from the Marsh Wends!


    Unfortunately, Rauluns, who Moat had speciallye to awaken, clearly did not wish to get along with a fire adept. As the mediator, Moat couldn¡¯t help but feel a headache at the thought of his difficult situation!


    ¡°Old friend, please slow down! The human adept has onlye for the sporepeople¡¯s Primal Water. There is no conflict of interest. So......¡±


    ¡°Very well, seeing as he has not broken any of our rules since entering the Wends, I won¡¯t find trouble with him. Primal Water? The reason the losses to the Marsh Wends has been so heavy is very likely because the sporepeople have extracted all the water from the swamps and refined it into Primal Water. Hmph! The human adept must not be allowed to take the Primal Water with him. We will simply send him on his way with some other treasureter.¡±


    Moat did not express an opinion on the Diviner¡¯s suggestion. He simply sighed.


    Rauluns had note into contact with the fire adept. Naturally, he did not understand his true powers.


    If Rauluns truly wanted to send the human adept away in such a dismissive fashion, the Wends would likely face another cmity!


    Of course, with his understanding of hispanion, Moat knew that arguing with Rauluns at this juncture was of no help. He could only sigh and silently begin considering how he could change Rauluns¡¯ mind.


    ¡°Regardless, the fire adept is now fighting with Gorefist of the Ango¡¯rosh ogres. Out of consideration of our personal benefit and our rtionship to the adept, we should be helping him now. Old friend, we will have to rely on your Mist Teleportation this time!¡±


    ¡°No problem. I will have to lend him a hand on this one. Old friend, stand closer to me!¡±


    Moat walked across the surface of the water and stood next to the Diviner.


    ¡°Rx your Spirit, friend. We are teleporting now.¡±


    Rauluns shouted excitedly, and their figures dove beneath the water, vanishing without a trace.


    Mist gathered in a corner of theke fifty meters away, and two strange silhouettes appeared.


    ¡°This is the southwestern corner of Darkswamp Lake. Give me two minutes to prepare, and we can teleport again. I estimate that we should arrive near the ogres¡¯ camp after another eleven teleportations.¡±


    ¡°Thank you!¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to. It is all for the Marsh Wends!¡±


    A short momentter, water shimmered across the surface of teke as the two figures vanished once more.

 Chapter 1208 - Disagreement

    <h4>Chapter 1208 Disagreement</h4>


    Deep in the murky, dim Mushroom Forest.


    A tall mushroom covered the dark, heavy skies with its cap, causing the forest clearing to be even darker than it already was.


    Fluorescent mushrooms and moss spread all over the forest glowed with colorful lights. Combined with the glowing spores drifting through the air, the Mushroom Forest looked surreal and enchanting, as if it was a world taken from a children¡¯s story.


    Looking into afar from the dense Mushroom Forest, you could see a wide valley overgrown with spore-like nts. These nts had thick stems and massive fruits that were utterly disproportional to the rest of their size.


    As the fruits were toorge, each with a diameter of a meter, they bent at a steep angle. Several sporepople were working diligently in this field of spore nts, their one-meter-tall figures shuffling between them.


    Sometimes they dug at the dirt and picked up some weeds. Other times, they watered the nts with a green sap, carefully taking care of each nt as if they were their children.


    When a piece of fruit was ripe, it would burst apart, and thick, viscous juice would flow out. A strange baby would also flow out of the fruit along with the liquid. When that happened, the sporepeople in charge of the Sporeborn Woods would gather.


    They would carefully wrap the baby in cloth and send it back to the vige. As the period of ripening arrived, one magical sporebaby after another was born. The workers then became incredibly busy, with no time to rest at all.


    Several hulking Fungal Giants continuously patrolled the outskirts of Sporeborn Woods. The petite form of a sporeperson could be seen on the shoulder of every Fungal Giant. The limbs of the sporepeople sunk into the bodies of the Fungal Giants, as if they had assimted with the giant creatures.


    It was this unusual ability of the sporepeople that allowed them to carve out a territory of their own in the vicious environment of the Marsh Wends, despite their frail and weak bodies. They were also spreading spores to corrupt the entirend slowly.


    The sporepeople were not fully united as a people, either. They were generally divided into nobles and peasants.


    The so-called magical sporepeople, in fact, were referred to as the nobles. They often had all sorts of strange magical abilities and could allow corrupted swamp creatures to inherit these abilities of theirs. On the other hand, ordinary sporepeople had no such powers. They could only work in tiring and exhausting professions such as cultivators, gardeners, or scouts.


    Emelia waited impatiently in the Mushroom Forest until a shifty, skinny little figure appeared before her.


    ¡°Uncle Naru, what¡¯s the situation like in the sacrednd?¡± Emelia hastily asked when he saw the sporeperson appear.


    ¡°Fahssn has left. It seems like something has happened over at the ogre camp. He¡¯s rushed over there to help! Only Zio remains on guard in the sacrednd, but he¡¯s leading an army of Fungal Giants. It will be challenging to sneak our way in!¡± The sporeperson, known as Naru, was an elderly male. Judging from his appearance, he was already at the end of his lifespan. He was panting just from speaking a few sentences.


    ¡°And the secret passage? Does the secret passage my father secretly excavated still exist?¡±


    ¡°The secret passage is still there...but your escape through the passagest time drew the suspicion of Fahssn. He has been searching for the passage all this while. He even set up plenty of traps inside the sacrednd as a precaution against anyone sneaking in through the passage. Even I couldn¡¯t get any information on many of those traps.¡±


    ¡°Uncle Naru, thank you so much. You have always been the most loyal to our family. You were also the one who watched me grow up from when I was just a girl. If...if things go well this time,e with me and leave this ce!¡±


    ¡°Princess, have you already given up on the ancestral rule of the magical sporepeople?¡±


    Emelia let out a resentful sigh.


    ¡°Naru, you have never stepped out of these marshes. You have no idea how vast and wide the world truly is. I am an adept now. The World of Adepts is a civilization more glorious and advanced than the Spirit World. The so-called ¡®ancestral legacy¡¯ of us sporepeople that we have maintained for a few hundred years now looks like no more than a joke to me. If we leave this backward, isted world, we sporepeople will be able to develop better and quicker.


    ¡°Speaking of which, Uncle Naru, how did things go with the old nspeople I asked you to sway to our side?¡±


    ¡°Your highness, you have been gone far too long. Many of the old nspeople have already passed away. I didn¡¯t dare probe anyone out of caution. Thus, I only managed to bring seven people to our side; the seven most trustworthy people I could find!¡±


    Emelia¡¯s eyes lit up when she heard Naru¡¯s answer.


    ¡°That¡¯s enough, that¡¯s more than enough! We will go ording to the n. I will sneak into the sacrednd and retrieve the things that rightfully belonged to my father. You gather our people and prepare some seeds. Seeds of as many kinds as possible, bring them all with you. Remember, when you see the sacrednd burn, bring all the nspeople here. Then, I will bring you all to that new world.¡±


    Emelia quickly gave a few instructions and sent Naru away.


    She lifted her head and looked at the dim horizon. She checked the message she had received from the n leader before putting on her hood and silently sneaking towards the sacrednd of the sporepeople.


    The magical sporepeople¡¯s sacrednd was located inside a massive, winding cave.


    If one were to approach from the front, they would run into a garrison with every step and a patrol with every five. There were countless guards and troops along the way. Even Sage Moat, with all his mysterious powers, could not extend his senses and Spirit into this cave.


    Naturally, there was no way he could have known what the sporepeople were scheming!


    The person who built the sacrednd was not Fahssn, but Emelia¡¯s father in her past life, the leader of the magical sporepeople. It was only natural that Fahssn, who had usurped the throne, did not know that there was a secret passage leading to the outside world inside the closely guarded sacrednd.


    ............


    The fighting on the battlefield was still as intense as ever.


    After losing his warhammer, Gorefist was like a clumsy bear chasing the me giant to no avail. He was not able to close the distance in the slightest.


    Meanwhile, with a simple wave of his hand, Greem brought about devastating destruction to the ogre camp and Gorefist!


    Even though the ogres had the numerical and geographical advantage, Greem alone decimated the Ango¡¯rosh ogres.


    While Greem was ruling over the battlefield with an iron fist, the first wave of reinforcements arrived.


    It was none other than Sage Moat and Water Diviner Rauluns, who had made their way here as fast as possible through Mist Teleportation.


    Even though they brought no reinforcements with them, their identities as Fourth Grades alone were enough to tip the scales.


    Gorefist fell into despair and fled towards the camp, leaving Greem to harvest the life of his nspeople freely.


    Greem waved his hands, and the horde of fire creatures charged into the camp after the retreating ogres. For a moment, mes burned everywhere, and the cries and shouts of the ogres could be heard all over.


    Seeing that the ogres had lost all ability to retaliate, Rauluns slowly stepped onto the battlefield across from Greem.


    ¡°The Ango¡¯rosh ogres have lost the courage to resist. Outsiders, you may stop now!¡± Rauluns calmly said, seemingly without any discernible expression on his face made out of water elementium, ¡°We will take over the rest of the fighting. You must stop your ughter now!¡±


    Mm? The water elemental wasn¡¯t on our side?


    Greem was confused by the hostility expressed by the water elemental and couldn¡¯t help but look at Moat with a look of utter confusion.


    Moat smiled bitterly and took out a small silk pouch, which he threw at Greem.


    ¡°This is the reward for what you have done so far. As for the battle here, take a break! Our main goal today is Fahssn. It¡¯s best if we...make Gorefist submit rather than simply killing him!¡±


    ¡°Submit?¡± Greemughed coldly. ¡°We haven¡¯t even caught the ogre chieftain, and you are already thinking of making him submit? If we don¡¯t take this opportunity to destroy the ogres¡¯ camp, it will be toote to do so when their reinforcements arrive.¡±


    ¡°Human adept, know your ce,¡± For some reason, Water Diviner Rauluns had no goodwill towards Greem at all, ¡°How we deal with the ogre chieftain is an internal matter of the Marsh Wends. An outsider like yourself has no ce in telling us what to do!¡±


    The expression on Greem¡¯s zing face froze momentarily when he heard Rauluns¡¯ reply. He stared at the Water Diviner and finally nodded. ¡°Very well...very well indeed! Since this is the matter of your Marsh Wends, I should take a break.¡±


    Having said that, Greem waved his hand, and the staff flew into his hands from beside the megate.


    Without the fire power from the staff, the megate started to implode, finally dissipating into loose sparks. The fire creatures engaged inbat also began to disperse, quickly vanishing without a trace.


    All of a sudden, only the twelve Swamp Giants were left chasing after the retreating ogres. The battlefield suddenly appeared oddly lonely.


    Hmph!


    Rauluns couldn¡¯t be bothered by Greem¡¯s actions.


    He started chanting as he stood in a pond. Water humanoids began to rise from the water, instantly forming a massive army of water elementals.


    These water elementals were only First and Second Grade, but they came in shocking numbers.


    They quickly moved across the water¡¯s surface, rapidly recing the fire creatures on the battlefield and forming a numerical advantage over the ogres once more.

 Chapter 1209 - Water Elemental Army

    Chapter 1209 Water Elemental Army


    People who were used to being the most important person could behave like idiots sometimes, even if they were incredibly intelligent!


    Even though Greem was prepared to be used as bait for the sake of drawing out Fahssn, he was still pissed by Rauluns¡¯ ungrateful attitude.


    Greem had already experienced the stubbornness of elementium creatures.


    Thus, Greem stepped away when the Water Diviner started pointing fingers and looking for trouble. He decided to watch silently.


    However, even though this Water Diviner wasn¡¯t exactly the sharpest tool in the shed, he was indeed very powerful.


    Disregarding everything else, just this ability to summon elementals was enough to shock and surprise Greem. The number of water elementals was overwhelming.


    When Greem summoned fire creatures earlier, there had only been four or five hundred of them, at best. However, the megate¡¯s existence allowed for new fire creatures to stream forth from the Fire Elementium ne continuously. That was what made it seem like there was no end to them.


    However, this Water Diviner was truly very impressive. With just a wave of his hand, he directly summoned an entire horde of water elementals, numbering in the thousands. A water-elemental army like this, even if they consisted only of low-grade individuals, was still a considerable force. All each one had to do was fire a simple Water Arrow.


    Such power might not be anything in Greem¡¯s eyes.


    However, against those barbaric ogres without any long-ranged attacks, the water-elemental army was a terrifying opponent. There might be a few ogre shamans among the ogres who were capable of casting simple spells, but they were too few in number. They could only scurry around against the murderous and unstoppable water elementals, without even the opportunity to retaliate.


    Water arrows whooshed and cut across the air all over therge camp as Greem watched on from the side. What came after were the cries of agony and death throes of the Ango¡¯rosh ogres.


    The Ango¡¯rosh ogres were genuinely sturdy. They could even endure the attacks of seven or eight water elementals and charge up to them to smash them into puddles. Unfortunately, though they could withstand attacks from seven or eight water elementals at once, seventeen or eighteen water elementals were too much!


    The ogre warriors continued to roar in anger, raising their wooden shields and stone hammers to protect their vital points. They howled with all they had and charged at the water elementals.


    Pew! Pew! Pew! The water arrows crashed like violent raindrops, ringing out loud when they hit the ogres¡¯ shields and bodies. Some Slow and Mire spells were also mixed in with the barrage of Water Arrows, cast by the high-grade water elementals. The ogres hit by these spells roared in anger. Their eyes were bloodshot from how much they were exerting themselves, but their feet were still rooted to the spot as if they had been glued to the ground. They were as slow as turtles.


    The water elemental¡¯s strategy was just that simple¨C a barrage of Water Arrows and Slows. Yet, it was shockingly effective and powerful!


    Their offense did not appear as destructive or violent as the fire creatures¡¯ had, but the unfortunate Ango¡¯rosh ogres could only die filled with resentment under the ceaseless rain of water arrows. They were robbed of any ability to resist.


    Greem reverted from his me giant form and returned to his human form. He watched the water-elemental army fight on in silence.


    Even though he felt no goodwill towards the stern-faced Rauluns, the water-elemental army he had summoned was shockingly powerful. If his fire creature army fought against Rauluns¡¯ water elemental army, Rauluns would undoubtedly be the one to win.


    It wasn¡¯t that fire elementals were weaker than water elementals. Rather, it was because the fire creatures were only cannon fodder than Greem had temporarily summoned from another world. They were not his direct subordinates. Meanwhile, the water-elemental army was disciplined, and the few high-grades serving as theirmanding officers were quite intelligent.


    It was only natural that Greem would lose, pitting a loose force of fire creatures against a proper, disciplined army!


    However, if Greem could pull together an army of magical machines from the n, he hadplete confidence in crushing this water-elemental army.


    ¡°Battle requires calmness,posure, and intelligence. You pyromaniacs are always too impulsive, ill-suited as excellent generals,¡± Water Diviner Rauluns couldn¡¯t help but start speaking in an excited tone after seeing how well the situation was going for them. The sound of his voice made Greem frown in annoyance.


    ¡°Hmph! It doesn¡¯t matter how many low-grade creatures there are. They are still cannon fodder in the eyes of true powerhouses, crushed with the wave of a hand. The effort spent to train all these little guys would be better used to strengthen yourself! How much could these cannon fodder help when you run into an opponent of the same grade?¡± Greem already didn¡¯t like this water elemental diviner guy. He immediately rebuked Rauluns without holding anything back.


    The Water Diviner couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes when he heard Greem¡¯s reply.


    ¡°Do you mean to say that you are more powerful than me?¡±


    ¡°Not necessarily! Who can say for sure? We haven¡¯t fought yet.¡± Greem still appeared calm andposed.


    ¡°You......¡±


    Seeing as tempers were starting to re and tensions were rising, Sage Moat felt his head hurt. He immediately interrupted, ¡°Alright, alright. Let¡¯s not discuss this problem for the moment. Look, it seems like Gorefist has appeared again.¡±


    Indeed, Ogre Chieftain Gorefist had appeared once more in the center of the camp after hiding to treat his wounds. He took out a stone stick that he had found somewhere and started to swing it around. In the blink of an eye, he had exterminated a squadron of nearly a hundred water elementals.


    Even though the high-grade water elementals were furiously hurling Slows at Gorefist, the difference in their grades was too apparent. He managed to resist most of the spells. Even the asional spell that worked on him did not affect him for more than half a second.


    After some brief treatment, Gorefist had once again be full of energy. He shook his fat body and strode across the battlefield with thundering steps. The water-elemental army¡¯s pace was halted wherever he went, and whenever he swung his stick.


    The low-grade water elementals were crushed into drops of water by a fearsome shockwave when they approached Gorefist. The ogre chieftain couldn¡¯t care less about the hundreds of water arrows. One after another, he smashed the high-grade water elementals into beads of water.


    And this was after Greem had ¡®stolen¡¯ Gorefist¡¯s hammer. Otherwise, the losses to the water-elemental army would only increase even further.


    ¡°Gorefist is just a ferocious as ever!¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but p as he nced at Rauluns and said, ¡°What is it? The guy who¡¯s been talking big is just gonna sit by and watch his subordinates get ughtered by the enemy? Hehehe. Maybe if you summon a few more water-elemental armies, you might wear out the ogre chieftain!¡±


    Moat instantly knew things were about to go south when he heard Greem¡¯s cold words. However, it was already toote.


    Water Diviner Rauluns snorted furiously and shouted, ¡°Do not think only you pyromaniacs can rule over the battlefield. We water elementals have terrifying might that you cannot possibly imagine. Now, let me show you the power of us water elementals.¡±


    Having said that, Rauluns instantly turned into a wave and surged onto the battlefield.


    Waveform. It was the physical form that the Water Diviner took on when moving at fast speeds.


    His appearance directly drew the attention and wariness of Gorefist.


    Both of them were veteran powerhouses of the Marsh Wends. Naturally, they knew each other very well.


    Gorefist watched as the wave surged before him and reformed into a humanoid silhouette. He waved his stick as he shouted loudly, ¡°Rauluns, do you intend to exterminate everyst one of us Ango¡¯rosh ogres?¡±


    The wave had caught several ogres along the way.


    Now that he had returned to his humanoid form, Rauluns slowly dragged the half-dead ogres out of his body and threw them aside. He lowered his gaze and looked at the ogre chieftain, calmly speaking, ¡°Gorefist, pull out of the alliance with the sporepeople, cut all ties with them, and I can still allow you and your people to live in the Marsh Wends. Otherwise......¡±


    Rauluns waved his hand, and arge amount of mist rose from the ponds, rivers, and swamps nearby, forming into thousands of water arrows. These cold arrows gleamed as they refracted light from the dim sky. They slowly adjusted their direction and pointed straight at Gorefist, who was still standing with the stick in his hands.


    Gorefist¡¯s face turned dark.


    Rauluns¡¯ summoned water arrows were utterly iparable to the arrows used by the low-grade water elementals.


    Gorefist had been able to endure the hundreds of water arrows and go on a rampage earlier because of his fleshy body and fearsome elementium resistance. Those low-grade arrows couldn¡¯t even prate his skin before sttering into beads of water.


    He wouldn¡¯t be afraid of them, no matter how many of them there were!


    However, Rauluns¡¯ water arrows contained tremendous amounts of water elementium. Even Gorefist frowned when he sensed them. Being shot by a thousand of these water arrows...even the ogre chieftain couldn¡¯t help but betray fear at the thought of that.


    However, just as the ogre chieftain was put into a corner and hesitating over his choice, a low, booming voice rang out on the battlefield.


    ¡°Rauluns, it seems like your brain has turned into mush after such a long sleep. Help an outsider fight apanion from the Marsh Wends? This is what you do? This is the Water Diviner? Hmph.¡±


    As the voice rang out, the mist scattered as two equally towering figures stepped onto the battlefield.


    Fahssn and Krach. They were finally here!


    Greem¡¯s pupils shrank. He could finally rx.

 Chapter 1210 - A Secret Talk

    <h4>Chapter 1210 A Secret Talk</h4>


    Fahssn showed up to the battlefield on the shoulders of an exceptionally colossal Fungal Giant.


    It was a terrifying Fungal Giant who had reached beginner Fourth Grade.


    His entire body was covered in furry green fungi, and several squid-like tentacles split off from his two upper limbs. These appendages constantly squirmed and stretched, making for an unsettling sight. A half-meter tall sporeperson covered in strange tattoos stood quietly on the Fungal Giant¡¯s shoulder. His hands and legs had assimted with the Giant¡¯s body.


    From a distance, anyone would have treated this sporeperson as an essory on the Fourth Grade Fungal Giant¡¯s body. It was hard to imagine that such an insignificant and tiny person was controlling such a massive creature.


    Another equally massive giant stood at the Fungal Giant¡¯s side.


    This Giant¡¯s body was covered in green moss, parasitic seaweed, and many bulbs and sores. At a nce, the Swamp Giant didn¡¯t look too different from the other Swamp Giants that Greem had seen so far. However, upon sensing carefully, Greem could pick up on the violent and vicious aura of strength within the Swamp Giant¡¯s body.


    The few powerhouses of the Marsh Wends that stood before Greem were all glowing bright red underneath the Chip¡¯s scan. Greem could fall at any one of their hands if he were not careful.


    Even the ogre chieftain, who Greem had already defeated, had the ability and power to kill him if he had the opportunity.


    No one should ever let down their guard in front of a Fourth Grade opponent before they were truly and utterly defeated!


    Rauluns no longer held back when he saw that the enemy¡¯s reinforcements had arrived.


    Almost at the same instant that Fahssn and Krach appeared, thousands of water arrows howled and shot towards Gorefist.


    Gorefist panicked at the sight of this. The thick block of stone in his hands immediately started swinging around, knocking, crushing, and smashing most of the water arrows. However, the rain of water arrows still hit him all over his body, making him look like a boar with bristled fur. It was a terrible sight to behold.


    However, the Physique of a Fourth Grade ogre was formidable. Even after sustaining so many wounds, he was injured but not dead. In fact, these were only light injuries for him.


    Gorefist protected his vital points with his weapon and struggled out of the range of the arrows¡¯ attacks. He panted in exhaustion and finally stopped swinging the stone stick. He looked at his body covered in water arrows and let out a furious snort. Violent shockwaves rippled through his body as all the arrows disintegrated instantly, blown away along with drops of his violet blood.


    Gorefist endured the injuries with no more than a frown. All the muscles across his body tightened, and the hundreds of wounds were sealed simultaneously, preventing any further loss of his blood and stamina.


    Gorefist finally stabilized himself after doing all this. He strolled to hispanions¡¯ side and red angrily at his enemies.


    Water Diviner Rauluns wanted to continue pursuing the ogre chieftain, but Sage Moat called him back to his side. Both parties stepped forward and red at each other across a hundred-meter-wide pond.


    On one side, there was Swamp Sage Moat, Water Diviner Rauluns, and the legendary fire adept, Greem. On the other, you had the leader of the magical sporepeople, Fahssn, Swamp Lord Krach, and Ogre Chieftain Gorefist.


    To think that there were six Fourth Grades present upon such a small battlefield.


    If anyone were to witness this scene, news of it would certainly shock every native creature in the Marsh Wends.


    Sich an event had rarely ured in the tens of thousands of years of history of the Marsh Wends. In fact, it might be unprecedented.


    After all, the lifespans of the creatures in the Spirit World were a dozen times longer than the average animals of an ordinary ne. Consequently, the way they looked at problems and solutions was very different. Responses were often very slow. If Greem had not intervened in this matter, the conflict would have taken another one or two hundred years before it erupted.


    ¡°Lord Moat, this situation isn¡¯t quite right, is it? Three against three, with both sides having rtively equal power. It doesn¡¯t seem like we have the upper hand in a situation like this. You don¡¯t intend to use an outsider like me as the mainbatant, do you?¡± Greem endured the ogre chieftain¡¯s death stare without a word, all while casuallymunicating mentally with the Swamp Sage.


    The implication in his words was already obvious. He was only a passerby who happened to be walking by. He had only been involved because of Sage Moat¡¯s request. Now that he had alreadypleted that request, he had no more obligation in helping Moat fight his wars.


    Swamp Sage Moat continued staring across the river, his face stern and cold. Meanwhile, he was secretlymunicating with Greem.


    ¡°Sir Greem is a respected guest of ours from the World of Adepts. Of course, I would never treat you improperly! I have already given over all the good stuff I collected over the years as your reward earlier. What else are you looking to get from me?¡±


    ¡°Those were just a few mushroom seeds. I¡¯m sure it¡¯s not much to you, Sir Moat. Moreover, cultivating magical mushrooms like these are going to be reasonably troublesome as well. Who knows if I will seed in growing them once I¡¯ve brought them out of this ce. If the mushrooms can¡¯t grow outside of this ce, all the work I¡¯ve put in for you would have been for nothing!¡±


    ¡°Hehehe. Sir Greem, why is there any need to try and deceive you. You have the spore princess as your subordinate, after all. Surely you will bring some of her sporepeople with her when you go back? The sporepeople have always been the best at cultivating magical nts. They won¡¯t have any problem growing a few special mushrooms.¡±


    ¡°Haha, I¡¯d never truly considered that angle. However, now that you have reminded me, I will certainly give it some thought.¡±


    ¡°Also, Sir Greem, the Hydra King and Lightwing will arrive soon. Even though we will have a numerical advantage, it won¡¯t be an easy matter winning this battle.¡±


    ¡°And what about it? Do you want to hire me to help you?¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s no need for that! It is an internal conflict of our Marsh Wends, after all. If you are too deeply involved, it will probably make the others unhappy.¡±


    ¡°Then what would you have me do?¡±


    ¡°May I know what you, sir, are nning behind the scenes?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m just an outsider. What could I possibly be nning?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe. Sir Greem, we are both smart people. There¡¯s no need to hide anything from each other. Since you¡¯ve worked so hard to draw Fahssn out of his base, and the spore princess is missing right now, you aren¡¯t thinking of inciting a war and leave us trapped here in battle while you sneak into their sacrednd, are you?¡±


    The elderly were often the sharpest people. Everyone here was over a thousand years old and a ruler of the Marsh Wends for centuries. It was too much to expect Greem¡¯s actions to have evaded their eyes.


    Greem still had a smile on his face after Moat revealed his intentions, but the light in his eyes had turned dangerous.


    ¡°What is it? Do you intend to stop me now?¡±


    ¡°No, no, no, sir. I believe you misunderstand. It¡¯s not exactly polite that you¡¯ve arranged all this behind our backs, but you have not broken any agreements between us. As such, I am happy to see you seed. However...¡±


    ¡°However, what?¡±


    ¡°I hope you can do us a little favor when you execute your n?¡±


    ¡°What favor?¡±


    ¡°I hope you can help us draw Fahssn away from the battle temporarily when the fighting reaches a climax.¡±


    Greem finally understood something when he heard this. He whispered back, ¡°You want me to create trouble at the sporepeople¡¯s sacrednd and lure Fahssn back. That way, the enemy will be missing an important individual in the fight. The other two will no longer be threats to you!¡±


    ¡°Indeed, that is my intention!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head after he mulled over the idea for a moment. ¡°I don¡¯t like this suggestion. Fahssn is very obviously a difficult opponent. If I lure him back, it could cause disastrous consequences for my own n. I don¡¯t want to fight a Fourth Grade on his home territory.¡±


    ¡°Your actions will gain you the goodwill of all the leaders of the Marsh Wends.¡±


    ¡°Who knows if I wille to this ce for a second time. Your goodwill isn¡¯t exactly worth much!¡±


    ¡°The heart of a thousand-year treant.¡±


    ¡°Treants live for an average of four thousand years. A thousand-year treant heart is worth a Third Grade item at the very best.¡±


    ¡°And a Starfell gem.¡±


    Starfell gems weren¡¯t products from material nes. Instead, they came from deep between the boundless space.


    These gems naturally possessed unique powers that could not be found in material nes.


    However, the power of each starfell gem could only be confirmed after appraisal. Prior to the evaluation, their powers were unknown and mysterious!


    As such, starfell gems were often strange items of indeterminate grade in the World of Adepts¡¯ value system. If the appraised gem has sufficient power, it could be a true Fourth Grade item. However, if its attributes were weak and inconsequential, then it would only be a Third Grade item.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but hesitate.


    An item that could possibly be at Fourth Grade was enough value to move him.


    However, this mission concerned Alice¡¯s life. Greem might be moved, but his rational mind still made him shake his head.


    They had not been hiding their conversation from Rauluns.


    All of a sudden, he interrupted, ¡°I have a Watersoul Jade in my hands. It can provide its contractor with two full-power attacks. There should be no problem if we throw this Watersoul Jade into the deal, is there?¡±


    The Watersoul Jade. Two full-power attacks from Rauluns.


    It was important to know that Rauluns was an advanced Fourth Grade powerhouse. If Greem could summon a full-power attack from Rauluns, he could easily kill any opponent of beginner Fourth Grade if they were caught unaware!


    Having this Watersoul Jade on his person was like having two extra lives.


    Any intelligent person would not reject this deal.


    Greem agreed without any hesitation!

 Chapter 1211 - Directional Teleportation Array

    <h4>Chapter 1211 Directional Teleportation Array</h4>


    There was a dark, sinister, and narrow cave.


    As it was underground, the walls of the cave were covered in moss and lichen, glowing with a faint light in the darkness.


    At this very moment, a slender figure was clearing out an area in the center of the cave. She squatted down and silently started carving an unusual array into the cold, hard stone floor.


    It was a small directional teleportation array¨C thirty-three mysterious runes, two hundred and eighty-eight runic lines, and not a single mistake or deviation in every brush and stroke. Otherwise, it would not only fail to summon the n leader, but it would also cause a terrifying magical bacsh, thereby exposing the existence of this secret passage.


    Honestly, it was challenging toplete such aplex task without the Spirit of a high-grade adept.


    High-grade adepts pursued the improvement of their Spirit so aggressively because only exceptional Spirit could sustain calction and sensory abilitiesparable to a superputer. High-grade teleportation arrays wereposed of hundreds of runes woven in an intricate pattern. The lines that guided the flow of energy were as thin as silk and oveid at such incredible density they couldpare to the hair on a person¡¯s head.


    It was impossible to draw such an array without a mind that could run at superhuman speeds.


    That was only the high-grade arrays!


    Ultra-grade arrays¨Cthose of Fifth Grade and above¨Cwere even more astounding. Those arrays wereposed in three dimensions.


    One would have to memorize the exceptionallyplex runic patterns, the innumerable runes, and each individual node¡¯s coordinates. Without tremendous Spirit, you would probably need a brain asrge as a brain monster toplete such a colossal task.


    After half a day, Emelia finallypleted the directional teleportation array.


    She scanned the array a few more times with her Spirit. After confirming there were no mistakes or gaps in the array, Emelia took out a dozen high-grade magical crystals and carefully ced them in the array¡¯s energy nodes.


    Emelia checked the time and activated the array.


    Faint energy radiance seeped out from the energy nodes, flowing down the magical lines carved into the ground towards the rest of the array. All the magic nodes and runes along the way were illuminated by the magical lines, one by one.


    A nearly imperceptible magical fluctuation trembled through the cave, prating the stone walls, the rockyers, and slowly emanating into the distance.


    A short momentter, the array began to run with increasing intensity, as if it had obtained a response.


    The changes in the energy of the cave¡¯s surroundings could no longer be concealed when the array started functioning. Several strange roars and howls came from the distance, through the countlessyers of rock. The sound of crumbling caves and stone could be heard now.


    Layer afteryer of the rock walls shattered as the roars slowly approached.


    Emelia looked at the directional teleportation array that was now running at full capacity and gritted her teeth. She instantly armed herself to the teeth and charged into the darkness without turning back.


    An endless series of magical explosions could be heard ringing from the depths of the tunnel, mixed with the furious roars of Fungal Giants and strange, fleshy sounds.


    At this crucial moment of life and death, a humanoid figure standing two meters tall appeared at the center of the teleportation array. The air roared with the sound of surging magic energy. Sparks of fire elementium split out of the atmosphere and merged into the humanoid silhouette like moths to a me.


    With every bit of fire elementium that entered the silhouette, the profile became even firmer and stable.


    Gradually, the facial features of the humanoid form could now be discerned. It was finally showing signs of materialization!


    Seemingly dissatisfied by the rate at which the fire elementium was gathering, Greem¡¯s crisp voice rang out in the air.


    ¡°This is too slow! All of you, get over here!¡±


    Arge, overwhelming spiritual pressure appeared around the silhouette. The entire cave glowed red as countless fire elementium particles were forcibly pulled out of the air towards the humanoid figure.


    Greem¡¯s hand, legs, shoulders, back, chest, stomach, head, and organs began to grow, quickly forming into an entire person.


    A muffled explosion rang out.


    Greem stepped out of the teleportation array with the fire coral staff in hand. His tremendous Spirit spread outward, allowing him to see everything that was happening within ten kilometers instantly.


    He could clearly ¡®see¡¯ that he was currently inside the narrow passage of a giant undergroundbyrinth. Emelia had transformed into the Mystique about sixty meters in front of him, brandishing her countless appendages and fending off the attacks of several Fungal Giants.


    Emelia might be known as the Mystique, but in the end, she was only a nt attribute adept who excelled at odd, unexpected attacks. She was an excellent fighter among Second Grade adepts when it came to adaptability and the element of surprise.


    However, when it came to a frontal conflict, she was not the opponent of a few Fungal Giants.


    Moreover, there was even an advanced Third Grade among those Fungal Giants. If Gargamel had not invested everything in his daughter and equipped her with the best magical equipment he could find, she would certainly never havested until the moment Greem arrived.


    Emelia¡¯s slender, rope-like appendages swarmed at the Fungal Giant charging through the walls. However, all the vines were torn to pieces by the giant¡¯s muscr hands, and green sap spilled all over the ground.


    Four or five green lights lit up around Emelia¡¯s petite body.


    Emelia endured the intense pain, supported by the countless pieces of magical equipment, and let out a sharp scream. She summoned even more vine appendages tosh at the attacking Fungal Giant.


    Victory through numbers, conquest by swarm.


    Emelia was like a monster with infinite regeneration. A forest of vine limbs reached out from her body, sealing off the Fungal Giants¡¯ path of advance. Even if all her appendages were smashed to pieces and torn to shreds, Emelia refused to take even a single step back. She was defending this tunnel leading to the cave with her very life.


    Upon sensing the increasingly intense energy flux in the passage, the Fungal Giants started to attack even more ferociously. The Third Grade Giant in the lead let out a furious roar and charged into the storm of vines, rushing forward like a madman.


    Fighting a Third Grade enemy as a Second Grade was hopeless, even aided by an arsenal of magical equipment.


    The Third Grade Giant came closer and closer to Emelia. His violet and purple appendages were about to reach her very own body when a gentle, long-awaited voice rang in her mind.


    ¡°Good job. You can rest now. Leave the rest to me!¡±


    It was the n leader!


    Emelia¡¯s tense mind rxed upon hearing the voice. The hundreds and thousands of instances of pain being transmitted through her vine appendages almost instantly devoured her soul.


    She let out a scream and almost fainted on the spot.


    All of her vines fell limply to the ground when she lost her mental control.


    The Third Grade Fungal Giant, now freed from the vines¡¯ obstruction, roared and strode forward. A strong and powerful appendage howled through the air and crashed towards Emelia.


    ¡°You dare raise a hand in my presence?¡±


    A tall figure appeared in time and caught Emelia as she copsed to the ground. The staff he was holding in his other hand managed to stop the appendage dead in its tracks.


    The red staff held the violet appendage in ce as a sizzling sound came from the point of contact.


    Aaaaaah!


    The terrifying searing produced by the staff inflicted unspeakable agony on the Third Grade Fungal Giant. He stumbled back several steps before he managed to regain bnce. He then looked solemnly at his opponent. A clear, ck burn mark could be seen on his limp appendage.


    ¡°Fourth Grade. You¡¯re Fourth Grade!¡±


    The Third Grade Fungal Giant was not wholly ignorant, after all. He had managed to identify the power of his opponent based on the aura that Greem was radiating. Then, his gazended on Emelia, and an expression of shock and anger appeared on its ugly, green face.


    ¡°Emelia. You have the aura of Emelia¡¯s soul! You are the magical princess that ran away.¡±


    Greem ignored the Fungal Giant¡¯s surprise and brushed his hand over Emelia¡¯s forehead. A thread of Spirit seeped into Emelia¡¯s mind, and she instantly felt her pain reduced by half.


    ¡°What now? Should I kill this guy or let him live?¡± Greem asked casually.


    Judging from his tone, killing a ¡®mere¡¯ Third Grade seemed to be a simple matter!


    ¡°Uncle Ersund, do you still intend to follow Fahssn down this path of darkness and evil, or are you willing to rejoin my side? You will only have this one chance to decide.¡± Emelia lifted her pretty face and looked at the Third Grade Fungal Giant with sympathy.


    A vicious expression appeared on the Third Grade Fungal Giant¡¯s face. He once again brandished his appendages.


    ¡°No need for the facade, Emelia. When have we Fungal Giants ever been truly free? You should never havee back! Now Die!¡±


    The appendage swung downwards, causing even more violent winds than thest strike.


    ¡°Hmph! Fool.¡±


    Greem snorted. He didn¡¯t seem to do anything, yet a light red elementium barrier appeared from his body and engulfed all the Fungal Giants.


    Burning Domain.


    Elementium barriers like this might not be much against opponents of the same grade, but they were terrifying machines of ughter against arge group of low-grade enemies.


    The moment the Burning Domain took shape, mes ignited on the bodies of the Fungal Giants. Their entire persons burned violently.


    The Third Grade Fungal Giant was no exception!


    Its appendage was still traveling through the air when he was blown back by a ring of fire. He had just stabilized himself when the Burning Domain appeared. His entire body started burning.

 Chapter 1212 - Devastation

    <h4>Chapter 1212 Devastation</h4>


    mes of rage spread across the ground as a god of fire descended!


    Greem turned into a me giant, grabbed Emelia in his arms, and freely traveled through the caves. mes erupted, and fires spread where he appeared.


    It wasn¡¯t just the magical sporepeople who faced decimation. Even the Second and Third Grade Fungal Giants and swamp creatures could not survive more than ten seconds in the Burning Domain.


    A trail of burned, scorched, and twisted bodies were left behind as Greem traveled through the caves. Judging from how severely burnt they were, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the pain and despair they had experienced before their deaths.


    This ce was the sacrednd that the magical sporepeople had defended for several hundred years. Corrupted swamp creatures hid almost everywhere, along with terrifying and dangerous magical traps. However, all of these were insignificant in Greem¡¯s eyes.


    He continuously scanned his surroundings with the Chip as he advanced.


    Secret passages, hidden rooms, pitfalls, traps, ambushes; nothing¨Cabsolutely nothing¨Ccould escape Greem¡¯s eyes. His response to all this was straightforward and violent!


    Fireballs, fire arrows, and mes. Fire spells of every form fired from his hands.


    All scheming and strategy were pointless before such overwhelming power. mes were all that were needed!


    The thirty-meter-long winding stone road was covered in magical traps. The whole ce was glowing red in Greem¡¯s eyes. He couldn¡¯t ignore it even if he wanted to.


    A wave of fire surged forward, triggering all the magical traps and causing a deafening explosion of elementium. However, apart from riddling the tunnel with holes, the eruption of the traps had not been able to hurt Greem in the slightest.


    Greem advanced and arrived at a narrow passage only wide enough for a single Fungal Giant to walk through. Faint energy radiance could be seen on both sides of the tunnel.


    Greem focused power on his eyes and increased the Chip¡¯s prative vision. He instantly saw through the one-meter-thick stone wall and saw the countless red figures hiding behind the secret doors in them.


    Greem snorted coldly and tapped the staff in his left hand. The Burning Domain instantly extended into the stone walls. In just three to five seconds, the enemies hiding in wait started crying out in pain. The two hidden doors also glowed red from the heat of the Domain.


    ¡°Attack...attack...all of you, charge and attack!¡±


    There seemed to be a leader amongst the enemies. He shouted loudly and gave his orders.


    The doors on both sides opened up, and the badly burned forces prepared to charge out and attack Greem.


    Unfortunately, the death trap they had prepared for Greem had caught them instead.


    Due to the narrow passageway, the many enemies were stuck inside the passage, unable to establish their formations. Greem took this opportunity to seal off their paths with three Demonic Walls of Fire. He then casually summoned a Firestorm and hurled it where the life signatures were the densest.


    mes crackled as the wave of fire seared his enemies.


    The sizzling sound of burning never stopped, nor did the constant screams and cries for mercy.


    However, the more enemies that burned, the stranger things seemed to be. Not only was there ack of a burnt smell, but the air also seemed to be filled with the smell of grass and wood. Green sparks started to rise from the scorched bodies of the dead. One could feel their Spirit be invigorated when they came into contact with these green balls of light.


    nt elementium particles were truly the tamest magical particles in the world.


    Even a fire adept like Greem was invigorated and refreshed uponing into contact with such dense nt elementium. Emelia¡¯s bursting headache also became significantly reduced when she absorbed the elementium particles.


    The Demonic Walls of Fire sealing the exit paths, the Firestorm to exterminate the enemies, and a few more fireballs to open up a path forward.


    It was a violent and straightforward solution, but when supported by Greem¡¯s overwhelmingly powerful mes and incredible spiritual senses, there was no response to it. It was a situation of utter despair!


    Before the enemies could surround Greem, his fire spells had already descended on them.


    He didn¡¯t even need to apply the Fire Pration and Increased Fire Effectiveness effects to his mes. The base damage of these fire spells was already enough to sweep away all enemies in his path.


    In fact, when Greem traveled past some hidden passages or rooms, he hurled a fireball into the doors under Emelia¡¯s reminder, and all the enemies would be dead.


    Greem was like a naughty child running about looking for ant nests with a pot of boiling water in his hand. The ambushes of the enemy, their traps, their offensives¨C all of these were frail and pointless in his eyes.


    All he had to do was throw out his spells!


    ¡°n leader, this isn¡¯t exactly the n we discussed earlier, is it? Shouldn¡¯t we prioritize exterminating the forces at the center of the sacrednd and taking control of that area? If we take our time like this, Fahssn will teleport back once he hears of themotion.¡± Emelia was suffering from a headache, but she still quickly identified the problem.


    There was no real need to exterminate the forces and guards hiding all over the ce. The most important thing was prating the magical spore center and taking control of the most important Spore Source in the sacrednd. However, Greem was now ying around as if he had plenty of time. He did not seem to be in a hurry at all and was toying with the guards.


    This...confused Emelia!


    However, Greem had not established his reputation as the legendary fire adept for nothing. He would never make such an obvious mistake without a n. Emelia was only asking gently, without any hint of questioning in her tone.


    Greem smiled as a sly expression appeared on his fiery face.


    ¡°I¡¯m intentionally going slow.¡±


    ¡°Then, you...?¡±


    ¡°Indeed, I am waiting for Fahssn to return. Emelia, if we are fortunate enough, we might be able to avenge your losses as well!¡±


    Emelia took a deep breath, and an expression of disbelief appeared on her pretty face.


    She might have tried her hardest to lead Greem to the Marsh Wends and into the sacrednd, but she had never expected him to kill Fahssn. The reason was simple. She still retained enough respect for the Fourth Grades!


    It was hard to truly understand a Fourth Grade creature¡¯s power if you had not ventured to the outside world.


    It was only when you had lived in a higher ne like the World of Adepts that you could truly appreciate the terror and might of the Fourth Grades, of these powerful beings who were demi-gods in their own right!


    Take the current situation as an example. The sporepeople had been guarding the sacrednd for hundreds of years, turning it into an imprablend of death covered in traps. Yet, theck of a Fourth Grade meant that Greem¡¯s invasion was less of a battle and more of a ughter.


    The massive gulf in power between Third Grades and Fourth Grades was not something that could be made up for with numbers!


    Moreover, the one invading the sacrednd was none other than Greem, an adept powerful enough to be feared even amongst Fourth Grade. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine why the sacrednd was in such trouble.


    The fact that Greem was so confident when he would be facing a Fourth Grade meant that he certainly had ns in mind. Emelia knew this n leader well enough to know that he never exaggerated or made empty promises.


    Thus, the nervous Emelia remained silent and started wondering what secret ace her n leader could be hiding. As smart as she was, she quickly discovered certain things.


    The teleportation array from earlier had a tough timepleting its teleportation. With how powerful the n leader was, the teleportation should not have been so difficult, especially over a mere distance of five hundred kilometers.


    If the n leader had teleported over from the Ango¡¯rosh ogre camp, it would not have caused the array to overload in that manner. Judging from this, the n leader had very likely pulled an ally from the World of Adepts with him through the aid of the directional teleportation array.


    Had Lady Marye?


    Emelia couldn¡¯t help but stick her neck out and look at the cave¡¯s shadows, hoping to find signs of the Fourth Grade vampire.


    Greem had done an excellent job of keeping his powers secret. Emelia had no idea that Shadow Demon even existed. Naturally, she could not have known that an incredibly fearsome killer had hidden itself in Greem¡¯s shadow!


    ............


    The Spore Hall.


    This ce was the most crucial and vital location in Podling Cave.


    An exceptional tall podling stood at the center of this cave, taking up nearly half the space. Many sporepeople were gathered around the tree, seemingly working hard on something.


    This unusual podling wasn¡¯t rooted in the earth. Instead, they dug into arge pile of bones. Its stem was a dozen meters thick in diameter, and several dozen branches split off from its main body. The leaves at the edges of the branches appeared like strange mouths, with sharp teeth and viscous slime.


    The sporepeople were instructing swamp creatures whose minds they controlled and ordered them to crouch down in front of the tree.


    When this happened, the tree would extend its thick vines, wrapping up the swamp creatures and tossing them into the air. The mouth-like leaves would open up and tear wildly at the prey¡¯s flesh.


    After a feast, the dozens of terrifying mouths would burp and fall limply against the tree as they napped.


    However, a powerful enemy had broken into Podling Cave, and the podling was unsettled.

 Chapter 1213 - Clash of the Strong

    <h4>Chapter 1213 sh of the Strong</h4>


    Most swamp creatures had probably never expected that the true ruler of the sporepeople of Marsh Wends wasn¡¯t Fahssn, but this podling of unusual power.


    The sporepeople, at their core, were only servants split off from the podling for the sake of taking care of it.


    Upon sensing the potent threat approaching its home, the podling shook its green branches, and its dozens of green mouths snapped loudly. It was calling for its servants with its unique mental flux.


    As for the fact that those servants were currently trapped in a bitter battle far away from here? That was not within the podling¡¯s considerations!


    As the podling¡¯s odd, screeching cries rang out, a portal suddenly opened in the cave. Fahssn scrambled out of the opening in a hurry, enduring a barrage of attacks from the enemies as he retreated.


    Fahssn turned around and fired a green beam at the portal after he exited. He was trying his best to sustain the gate to allow his two allies to return as well.


    Unfortunately, Krach only managed to set a single foot through it before he was dragged back by a green tentacle that had appeared out of nowhere. The portal shimmered and disintegrated into countless sparks in front of Fahssn¡¯s pained gaze.


    ¡°O¡¯ great master, why have you summoned me back in such a hurry?¡± Since there was no turning back now, Fahssn stopped worrying about the two puppets that were lost among enemies. He knelt before the podling and asked.


    ¡°Enemy...invader. Exterminate invaders quickly!¡±


    Podlings were unusually frightening magical nts.


    Their mental activity wasn¡¯t as effective as a human¡¯s, but that didn¡¯t mean that they were unintelligent. On the contrary, this fearsome podling possessed incredible might and viciousness. It had reached advanced Fourth Grade.


    The advanced Fourth Grade podling and the beginner Fourth Grade Fahssn; it was the greatest force that the sporepeople could produce!


    Swamp Sage Moat knew certain details about this, but he had never revealed anything to Greem. Instead, he simply pushed Greem down along the river and made Greempliantly travel to the Podling Cave.


    Meanwhile, Emelia did not know much either. She had been the spore princess for a very brief duration. She had never been powerful enough to be favored by the podling, which resulted in her not knowing anything about its real power.


    Utterly oblivious to what awaited him, Greem charged into the Spore Hall with Emelia, Remi, and Shadow Demon in tow.


    ............


    The one-meter-thick hidden door quickly turned into magma beneath the zing fire. Greem strode into the Spore Hall with Emelia in his arms.


    Judging by the Chip¡¯s scans, this was the most crucial location of the sporepeople¡¯s sacrednd. Before he entered, Greem had wondered about what could have existed in this room. Mountains of resources, materials, treasures, and magical crystals?


    It was only when he finally set foot in here that he realized what awaited him. He was shocked and surprised by the fearsome magical nt before him.


    Emelia might not be able to appraise the grade and power of this nt, but Greem could. The Chip¡¯s robust scanning and analysis abilities meant that no high-gade creature could escape Greem¡¯s notice without tremendously powerful means of concealing their energy aura.


    Advanced Fourth Grade!


    Greem¡¯s face paled upon sensing the fearsome energy reaction of the podling. In the Chip¡¯s scans, it appeared as a blinding bright-red like that of a sun.


    When it picked up on a foreign presence, the podling¡¯s hundred-meter-tall body abruptly twisted and bent down. All the green mouths pointed straight at Greem. Fahssn stood at the feet of the podling, upon the head of a Fungal Giant. His limbs were merged with the Giant¡¯s head, controlling the colossal creature to advance towards Greem.


    There had to be a change in the ns. The enemy¡¯s power was far beyond his expectations.


    Greem casually opened a portal of fire in front of him and stuffed Emelia into the rift.


    There was no room for a lower-grade individual on a Fourth Grade battlefield.


    That was why Greem had put Emelia into a temporary dimension and left Remi outside the hall when the fighting started. He then cautiously evaluated the two enemies he was about to face.


    Terrifying...truly terrifying.


    Both enemies radiated green energy, indicating the fact that they used nt magic. Greem had the advantage here. After all, fire was the enemy of all nts: their bane and their doom!


    However, the intensity of their energy emission was so blinding that Greem couldn¡¯t help but be concerned.


    ¡°Damned intruder. I will devour you!¡± The podling, in particr, appeared to be very vicious and savage. It seemed to go berserk upon seeing the enemy.


    The podling¡¯s thick stem swept across, and threerge green mouths opened as wide as they could, snapping ferociously at Greem.


    [Evade...evade...evade...detecting imminent danger. Suggesting host take evasive measures immediately!] The Chip¡¯s warnings red in his mind, but the enemy¡¯s attack was too fast. There was no time to dodge now.


    Greem tapped his staff, and threeyers of Lava Shields appeared in the path of the podling¡¯s strike. Unfortunately, all the Lava Shields were smashed to pieces by the green vine, and three green mouths appeared next to Greem.


    In the blink of an eye, a dome-shaped fire forcefield appeared in front of Greem, preventing the three mouths from biting him.


    Dong!


    Greem was instantly blown away into the air like a top sent flying by a naughty child. He crashed into a wall and became embedded in the rock.


    The three mouths seemed to have been dazed for a moment before regaining their senses. The effects of an unusual power silently extinguished the magical mes that had spread to the podling¡¯s branch.


    Fahssn charged forward with the Fungal Giant with this opportunity, intent on beating Greem while he was down.


    What incredible power!


    Greem recovered after shaking his head a little. The Chip projected a fearsome number in his mind.


    Forty-six points of Strength.


    That was the Strength demonstrated by the podling in its first strike!


    Greem spat out a mouthful of blood. The bloodnded on the crushed rocks by his feet, and a purple fire started burning on the ground. He pulled himself out of the stone wall with considerable difficulty. His muscr chest had caved inwards, and cracks covered his zing body.


    Some of the cracks were sorge thatva was flowing out.


    The enemy was scary. Even with a nt¡¯s slender body, the podling had as much as 46 points of Strength. That was more than enough to crush Greem, with his mere 27 points.


    Greem had only been so severely injured earlier because he had been caught unaware, which allowed the enemy to shatter his defenses.


    Greem looked at Fahssn as the Giant charged at him. He waved his staff, and three torrents of fire sted forward, stopping the Fungal Giant from advancing any further. Meanwhile, white light appeared around Greem as he used the pure, holy light to heal himself.


    His caved chest started to swell up as his damaged body recovered with the surge of fire energy from the Heart of Principles.


    However, this healing only persisted for a while before Greem had no choice but to leap away with Fire Teleportation.


    His tall outline had just vanished when another thick branch from the podling smashed the ground where he had just been.


    Those thin, slender branches were actually as sturdy as rods forged of steel. A single strike from these iron whips was enough to pulverize the ground and shake the earth. Web-like cracks spread out from the point of impact.


    Greem had just appeared in another corner of the hall three hundred meters away when the podling immediately detected his presence. Its terrifying body that took up nearly half the space in the hall twisted slightly, and the branches whipped at the adept at howling speed.


    The green mouths on the ends of the branches alsoshed out viciously as the branches struck.


    Greem had a feeling that he would end up much worse off being bit by the branches than being struck by the branches.


    Dammit! Where did such a terrifying monster appear from?


    No! I must force out its true power, slowly, bit by bit.


    Greem grit his teeth and grunted, once again teleporting away.


    He had prepared to dodge this time. The moment his body rematerialized, he hurled a fearsome Scarlet Firestorm at the podling¡¯s stationary roots.


    The dozens of green mouths on the podling hissed simultaneously and spewed out green smoke to resist the mes. The green smoke shed with and neutralized the explosive tide of fire in midair.


    A Firestorm of eight hundred and ny points of power was neutralized, just like that!


    Greem frowned slightly.


    What tremendous poison.


    Such incredible Strength and such ferocious poison attacks. This enemy was not going to be an easy opponent!


    However, Greem was no ordinary fire adept either. The power he possessed was beyond the imagination of the average person.


    Greem teleported away once again, dodging thebined attacks of Fahssn and the podling. He nted his staff in the ground upon appearing, waving his hands around. In a single breath, he had summoned several fireballs and shot them at the podling¡¯s stem.


    The podling screeched and whipped the fireballs to shards with its branches.


    However, just as the podling twisted its body in a gloating fashion and prepared to lunge at Greem again, a terrifying tide of fire erupted on the pile of skeletons where its roots grew.

 Chapter 1214 - The Battle

    Chapter 1214 The Battle


    Where did this attacke from?


    For a moment, the podling was utterly confused by the Scarlet Firestorm.


    It had defended against all attacks from the fire adepts. So, where did this Firestorme from?


    The podling shook its body violently, spewing dense poison mist from its stem and screeching for its servants to attack the enemy. Meanwhile, most of its focus was spent on finding the concealed enemy.


    In the face of the horde of sporepeople, swamp creatures, and the Fourth Grade Fungal Giant controlled by Fahssn, Greem once again leaped away with Fire Teleportation.


    The moment he reappeared, Greem quickly cast his spells and directed a chain of fireballs at the podling.


    The podling waved its branches and vines, ferociouslyshing out at the fireballs. Just like thest times, even after it shattered all the fireballs, a terrifying fire spell abruptly erupted over its body and spread all over.


    The podling might not be as cunning as a human, but it wasn¡¯t stupid.


    Through just these two attacks, it had managed to determine that the enemy had some ability to turn his spells invisible. It was only when the spells detonated that the podling would know when it was hit.


    Concealing spells?


    The podling had never heard of such an ability, but it was undoubtedly a terrifying threat to itself!


    The podling could only do its best to chase Greem away before using poison mist to extinguish the fires again. In just this brief exchange, the podling¡¯s massive body was covered in even more ck marks.


    Glowing green sap seeped out of its damaged stem, filling the hall with a pungent smell.


    The pain from the burning had inflicted tremendous agony and suffering to the podling. Its slender vines and green mouths whipped around the hall, smashing at the ground and the walls over and over. Yet, that annoying and tiny rat simply drifted around the room with his Fire Teleportation, causing all of its attacks to miss.


    All of his servants, other than Fahssn, had already been reduced to ashes by the wild me shockwaves. None of them were of any help.


    The podling was indeed very powerful. However, its weaknesses were also undeniable!


    Immobile and vulnerable to fire.


    As a powerful advanced Fourth Grade magical being, the podling wasn¡¯t fearful of ordinary mes as other swamp creatures would be. Its green body that shimmered with a metallic gleam was as tough as refined steel. Yet, it couldn¡¯t defend itself at all against that fearsome golden fire.


    Magic Pration. The damned fire adept must have mastered aw rting to magic pration. Why else would mere mes be able to harm it?


    That was it! The fire adept must have also mastered aw to turn his fire spells invisible. That was what troubled the podling the most!


    Whenever the fire adept appeared, there would be a barrage of fireballs, along with one or two potent, invisible spells.


    It forced the podling to swing its entire body andsh with all its vines and branches whenever it saw Greem attack. It had to form a dense, imprable defensive line. If it were fortunate enough, its wildly whipping vines and branches would be able to trigger the invisible spell before itnded on its body. That would significantly reduce the amount of fire damage that its stem had to suffer.


    After several fruitless attempts lunging at Greem, Fahssn flew into a rage.


    He shouted in anger, and the Fungal Giant¡¯s feet suddenly rooted themselves into the stone floor. Its right tentacle then swelled in size and length, wildly extending and growing forward like monster vines.


    Greem couldn¡¯t dodge in time, and his leg became entangled.


    He lifted his staff, and a dozen fireballs kept the podling at bay. Meanwhile, he rapidly transformed into a me giant, his entire body engulfed in ayer of exploding golden mes.


    Fahssn¡¯s tentacle was now wrapped around a thick pir of fire that was a dozen meters tall.


    Even as his tentacle continued to crush Greem¡¯s legs, the mes were also inflicting damage to him.


    Some of the vines on the tentacle appendage had just started to wither and turn to ash when new vines grew out and wrapped around Greem¡¯s body once more. At the same time, the vines continuously tore and dug into Greem¡¯s body, seemingly searching for any gaps they could tunnel into.


    An overwhelming surge of golden fires rushed out of Greem¡¯s body. If it weren¡¯t for Fahssn¡¯s robust regeneration, his right arm would have already been reduced to ashes.


    While Greem wildly attacked Fahssn with fire spells, several green spots also started appearing on his body. They were the effect of the enemy¡¯s terrifying poison!


    As expected of Fourth Grade creatures. The poison it used was so potent it could even contaminate elementium fire. If Greem¡¯s current biological construction of elementium fire wasn¡¯tpletely distinct from that of a human¡¯s physiology, he might have already died of the poison!


    While the two powers continued to sh, the fire and poison devoured and neutralized each other on Greem and Fahssn¡¯s bodies. It was inflicting tremendous elementium damage.


    No Fourth Grade would have so easily employed a suicidal, self-damaging attack as this.


    However, as a servant of the podling, Fahssn had ced the safety of the podling over his own life!


    While Fahssn entangled Greem, the podling shook its body. Several branches intertwined to form a fearsome palm that crashed down from above. Fortunately, Greem sensed iting and barely dodged out of the way.


    In the end, Greem was left with nowhere to run. He had no choice but to detonate his body, leaving behind the parts that were entangled by Fahssn while he fled with the rest and rematerialized in the distance.


    Even though he had managed to escape Fahssn this way, Greem had also lost nearly 7% of his fire body.


    This 7% power would have been recovered in a few minutes with the Heart of Principles¡¯ aid under ordinary conditions. However, Greem was now engaged in an intense and dangerous battle. Where was he supposed to find the time to regain this 7% loss to his power?


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    The podling¡¯s giant palm crashed down. The parts of Greem¡¯s body that were left behind were crushed to a bloody paste along with Fahssn¡¯s right arm. The fearsome force shockwave rippled outwards as the 7% of Greem¡¯s power was extinguished in an instant.


    When Greem¡¯s subsequently rematerialized, it was evident that theyer of golden mes around him had thinned slightly.


    The podling was undoubtedly the happiest to have been able to achieve this oue with Fahssn¡¯s sacrifice.


    However, it had no idea that the moment Greem cut off his tail and escaped, the shadow he projected on the floor had also vanished without a trace. That shadow had silently merged into Fahssn¡¯s shadow.


    The three violent waves of power from Fahssn, the podling, and Greem reverberated and echoed in the hall, affecting Fahssn¡¯s spiritual senses. Otherwise, as a Fourth Grade, he would never have missed even the smallest of energy fluctuations within a hundred meters of himself.


    Moreover, Fahssn was only a Third Grade sporeperson who had taken control of a Fourth Grade Fungal Giant.


    This parasitic takeover had provided him with powerful regeneration and the unique powers of the Fungal Giant, but he still could notpare to an actual Fourth Grade.


    At the very least, Fahssn¡¯s Spirit was only at the level of a Third Grade!


    Having lost a portion of his power, Greem could not attack as recklessly as he had before.


    He started to move around, dodging the podling¡¯s myriad attacks while evading Fahssn¡¯s unusual entangling vines. Every time he appeared, he would only have a minimal amount of time tounch an offensive.


    The slightest hesitation or pause would cause him to be entangled by Fahssn and struck by the podling.


    Apart from physical attacks, the podling was also steadily spreading out parasitic spores that could not be seen with the naked eye. Unfortunately, such attacks could not escape the Chip¡¯s scans. A simple defensive fire spell kept all those spores at bay.


    All spores were afraid of fire. As long as they approached Greem, the spores were incinerated by an invisible barrier of fire. They could not even touch his sleeve.


    The attacks of these parasitic spores had failed¨Cwhen they had always worked before¨Cand the podling had no choice but to resort to clumsy physical attacks.


    The two forces continued to battle violently in the narrow space, not concerned with how their attacks would devastate their surroundings. This reckless fighting brought about unimaginable cmity to the sacrednd.


    The ground quaked and the rocks crumbled.


    The entire underground space was copsing violently. Giant boulders fell from above as tunnels and passages were buried under the stones. The sacrednd was gradually being reduced to ruins from the fighting, devouring thousands of sporepeople lives in the process.


    The three Fourth Grades continued battling in the Spore Hall, unconcerned with the changes outside. They were trying their best to inflict as much damage as they could on their enemy.


    Finally, being forced to avoid a falling boulder, Greem was once again restrained by Fahssn¡¯s wildly growing vine hands.


    Upon seeing such an excellent opportunity, the podling immediately waved its thick stem and smashed at Greem at howling speed, with no concern about identally injuring Fahssn.


    Greem suddenly lifted his head and smiled at the palm swinging at him.

 Chapter 1215 - Desperation Seeps In

    <h4>Chapter 1215 Desperation Seeps In</h4>


    A subtle energy flux appeared momentarily before vanishing!


    If they hadn¡¯t all been Fourth Grade powerhouses, the three fighters would have easily ignored this unusual energy flux amidst the chaos of the battle.


    This energy flux was subtle, yet sinister, and carried with it a terrifyingly overwhelming aura.


    What was truly horrifying wasn¡¯t this flux of energy, but its source!


    At the same instant that the shadow energy erupted, a tall, blurry figure emerged from Fahssn¡¯s shadow. The sharp, de-like ws in his hands stabbed in and out of the Fungal Giant¡¯s body.


    As the ws continued to sh, waves of fearsome shadow power erupted inside the Giant¡¯s body. These miniature energy explosions not only inflicted even more severe damage to the Giant¡¯s flesh but further corrupted most of his core organs with shadow energy.


    The shadowy figure circled Fahssn rapidly, his ws continuously weaving and stabbing. In just the blink of an eye, hundreds of wounds had appeared on the Fungal Giant¡¯s body. Shadow energy continued to explode in these wounds. Blood as ck as ink seeped out of the gashes, along with pieces of organs.


    Fahssn, who was using his entire body to restrict Greem, had now be the perfect target. He could not even retaliate.


    He roared furiously, his free arm extending into several separate appendages thatshed at the mysterious enemy. Unfortunately, his slow and clumsy movements could not catch up to the opponent¡¯s phantasmal form.


    The howling, whipping vinesnded on bare ground, pulverizing the stone ground and reducing it to dust.


    As Fahssn resisted, the ck figure quickly closed the distance, appearing behind Fahssn¡¯s actual body. The w pierced his brain with a simple stab, and a tremendous surge of shadow energy instantly shredded his mind and mental consciousness.


    The Third Grade sporeperson that was parasitizing the Fourth Grade Fungal Giant let out a tragic cry. His soul aura instantly vanished in front of everyone¡¯s eyes.


    Greem had sessfully assassinated Fahssn with the help of Shadow Demon by using himself as bait. However, at the same time, he¡¯d endured a terrifying strike from the podling.


    The Shield of Holy Light, created by Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, was smashed to sparks by the podling¡¯s ¡®palm¡¯ made out of countless entangling vines. The multiple Lava Shields and dozens of Inferno Shields he tried to create were also smashed to pieces by the podling before they could fully manifest.


    Even as strong as it was, the podling¡¯s strike was momentarily stalled after smashing through so manyyers of magical defenses. Greem took full advantage of this window of opportunity. He used the violent recoil from a st of fire to retreat out of the radius of impact.


    An earthshaking impact rang out!


    Greem¡¯s scrambling figure was blown forward by the vicious shockwave. He couldn¡¯t help but stumble away. The defenses he barely managed to conjure in time trembled as the loose rocks and stone from the impact shot at him. Blinding sparks and terrifying cracks could be seen on the fire shields around him.


    Three-meter-thick green vinesshed out of the smoke and dust. Greem could only teleport away without any hesitation, just dodging the ferocious attack in time.


    His figure reappeared in another ce. An odd snapping sound could immediately be heard as three mouths charged out of the smoke and snapped at him like a hydra.


    Greem lifted his hand, and a barrage of zing Fireballs flew at the enemy. The explosion managed to keep the three green mouths at bay. Before he could regain his bnce, he felt a vicious wind against his back. Another giant vine was whipping towards him.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! This podling¡¯s way too huge!


    When it went berserk, every single part of its body was a weapon.


    The entire room was full of dancing whips, each about two to three meters thick and covered in scary thorns that seemed to have a metallic sheen. Being hit by such a vine, even without considering the podling¡¯s own 46 points of Strength, was already a threat to Greem.


    Apart from the vines, the arm-like, agile branches and mouth-like leaves were all massive threats. The mouths could spew out a terrifying poison mist and constantly salivated.


    Their saliva sizzled when itnded on the ground. White smoke would rise, melting a small hole into the stone.


    Poison attacks, acid attacks, multi-attacks.


    This podling seemed to have gone mad. It used its slender, soft, and agile stem to its fullest potential, whipping about and unleashing a torrent of attacks at Greem.


    Greem was forced to teleport around the hall constantly. He could not stay in any spot for more than three seconds. Otherwise, terrifying roots would pierce out from beneath the ground, thick vines would crash down from above, and bone-chilling mouths would snap at him, forcefully crushing all his magical defenses to pieces.


    Greem had also tried to cover himself in his invisible mes and hide.


    Unfortunately, before he could even escape, he would be revealed by a breath of poison mist.


    These mes would collide and sh with the poison mist. The poison mist evaporated each time, but Greem¡¯s cloak of fire would also be contaminated green!


    However, while the podling was wildly trying to kill Greem, Shadow Demon once again appeared. He was standing right before the podling¡¯s stem, exposed above the pile of skeletons.


    Fire erupted as a blinding light shed in the hall.


    Shadow Demon appeared out of the shadows and quickly arrived atop the skeleton pile. The sharp de in his hand prated the podling¡¯s defensive forcefield and pierced into the seven-meter-thick stem.


    The stem ruptured, and green sap sttered everywhere. Terrifying acid coated Shadow Demon¡¯s entire body.


    Poison attacks were ineffective.


    And acid attacks had to burn through Shadow Demon¡¯s incredible resistance.


    With his resistance, the acid would have to continue burning for three hours before it could corrode his metal body. That was more than enough time for Shadow Demon to kill any enemy of his.


    The podling¡¯s reaction at having been attacked was unusually extreme.


    It twisted its body back, and eight green mouths lunged at Shadow Demon from every direction, their sharp teeth grinding as they snapped forward.


    Shadow Demon had no choice but to run after two rounds of attacks.


    He might be a magical machine with excellent physical defense and magic resistance, but even he might not be able to survive multiple attacks from the podling at close distance.


    When Shadow Demon retreated to the shadows, and the podling¡¯s attacks missed, a series of fireballsnded on the podling¡¯s body.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    A violent chain of explosions sted the podling¡¯s stem and ruptured it even further. Green sap sttered across the ground. The mes had even ignited one of the branches. The green mouth on the end of the branch struggled in agony and let out a scream resembling that of a baby¡¯s wail.


    However, no amount of screaming could save its life. The green mouth turned into a pile of ashes as it wailed.


    ¡°You damned bastards. I will kill you.¡±


    The podling was the one caught between two enemies now.


    Shadow Demon and Greem were both incredibly slippery and cunning.


    When the podling tried to chase after Greem, Shadow Demon would sneak close to its body and inflict devastating damage. When the podling attempted to chase after Shadow Demon, Greem would use his terrifying might to hurl an endless stream of violent spells.


    Attacks from two powerful Fourth Grades. Either one of them was enough to injure the podling badly.


    The podling¡¯s greatest weakness was the fact that it was rooted and unable to move freely. It could only tiresomely chase after the two enemies, without the freedom to choose its own battlefield.


    In the end, driven to a rage by the constant harassment of Greem and Shadow Demon, the podling finally went berserk.


    It twisted andshed out with its vines and branches, chasing off the two enemies that buzzed around him like annoying flies. It then pulled its roots out of the pile of skeletons with much difficulty, causing the entire hall to rumble and shake as it did so.


    Due to how much of a hurry it was in, the podling had no time to extract its roots slowly. It was basically cutting off and leaving behind the majority of its body in doing so. As the bones rolled off of the skeleton pile, the sound of snapping roots could be heard.


    Pungent, green sap flowed from the severed roots, staining the pile of skeletons a sickly green color. The bones that were covered in this sap started to soften and copse like a bad cake before turning into a puddle of disgusting green liquid.


    The moment the podling pulled out its roots, the skeleton pilepletely copsed, revealing the strange well hidden deep below. The water in the small well was extremely clear and gave off an unusual, overwhelming sense of unending lifeforce.


    The tens of thousands of the podling¡¯s roots had been wrapped around the well and further covered in the skeletons of thousands of swamp creatures. That was why the aura of the well had not leaked out and been detected by anyone.


    However, when the podling finally uprooted itself in a desperate attempt to attack the enemy, Greem finally discovered the existence of the well.


    Primal Water.


    So the Primal Water was there!


    ording to Emelia¡¯s information, there was certainly Primal Water in the Podling Cave. However, Greem had found no signs of the Primal Water in all his probing and fighting earlier.


    Just as he was suspicious of having been tricked or lied to, he discovered what he was searching for beneath the roots of the podling.


    It was now that he finally understood why this podling could grow to such a colossal size and possess such horrifying power. It had dug its roots into the well and used the Primal Water to grow and absorb the nutrients he needed to grow rapidly.

 Chapter 1216 - Victorious Return

    Chapter 1216 Victorious Return


    ¡°Halt!¡±


    Greem shouted sternly.


    ¡°Hand over the Primal Water, and I will leave immediately. This ce will still be your territory.¡±


    ¡°Dream on...intruder!¡± The podling hissed. ¡°I will tear you to pieces and water my endless well with your blood!¡±


    ¡°Then, we fight to the death!¡±


    Greem was enraged by the podling¡¯s stubbornness. He roared and transformed into a dozen-meter-tall me giant. His entire body became shrouded in a ze of golden fire, and two zing fireballs burned in his hands.


    The me giant might be inferior to the podling in size, but his terrifying and intimidating mes were undoubtedly the greater threat. In particr, when Greem let out a battlecry, fearsome torrents of fire that were several meters long burst forth from his eyes and mouth, making him appear like a god of fire descended upon the mortal world.


    Even as fierce and arrogant as the podling was, it could not help but be intimidated by this disy of power.


    Meanwhile, energy bubbled silently in the podling¡¯s shadow, and a ferocious aura erupted. Shadow Demon¡¯s strange silhouette slowly surfaced from the darkness as he stared coldly at the opponent with his red mechanical eyes.


    It was obvious that once the battle started, there would be no stopping until a victor was decided!


    The podling was nervous, having to face Greem and the phantom-like Shadow Demon at the same time. It had over seventy-percent confidence in handling these two enemies, but...that was only seventy percent, after all. There was still a thirty percent chance it would die to theirbined force.


    For a Fourth Grade being with a very long lifespan, a thirty percent chance of death was already uneptably high.


    ¡°I created this Primal Water by extracting over twenty percent of the water from the Marsh Wends. It is my guarantee for advancing to Fifth Grade. Don¡¯t even dream about taking any of it.¡± The podling shook its stem violently, all hundreds of meters of its length twisted about like a snake.


    Its tone was still cold and severe, but its attitude was softening.


    ¡°We won¡¯t take all of your Primal Water. All we want is one-third of it!¡± Greem raised the increasingly unstable zing Fireball in his hands and continued to put on the pressure. ¡°At any rate, if you remain turtled in this cave, those people of the Marsh Wends will have no means of exiling you. You will have plenty of time to collect the water source and lives of the Marsh Wends slowly. Certainly, that is a better option than a fight to the death here today!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Bastards, you have no idea how difficult it is to collect water here. I only managed to achieve what I have today after four hundred years, and you are demanding one-third of the fruits of my effort. Dream on...it will never happen!¡±


    ¡°And what about one-fourth, then? You don¡¯t really believe that the weight of two Fourth Grades is not equal to one-fourth of your Primal Water, do you?¡±


    ¡°No, too much! If I give you one-fourth, then I will have trouble increasing my power.¡±


    ¡°One-fifth, then, and no less! If you won¡¯t even agree to one-fifth, then we only have one choice.¡± Having said that, the zing Fireball in Greem¡¯s hands had turned from red to golden yellow. The violent fire energy contained within was horrifying.


    The podling did not reply. Instead, it used its sensitive spiritual senses to observe the expressions of its enemies.


    Unfortunately, one was a magical machine, and the other was a sly fire adept. One couldn¡¯t read the expression of a machine, and the other one was an absolute expert and negotiator. They were far better at diplomatic negotiations than an inexperienced ¡®rookie¡¯ like itself.


    Finally, threatened by the enemy¡¯s martial power, the three of them came to a reluctant agreement.


    Greem provided over a million magical crystals and arge number of resources unique to the World of Adepts in exchange for one-fifth of the Primal Water in the podling¡¯s possession. One-fifth of the Primal Water amounted to 750 grams, while only 500 grams were needed to save Alice.


    Thus, Greem could conduct some special research with the remainder!


    If Greem had a small material ne at hand, this 250 grams of Primal Water would be enough to instantly create several rivers stretching for hundreds of kilometers in that world.


    That was the true meaning and significance of having Primal Water!


    ............


    Outside the sacrednd of the sporepeople.


    The intense earthquake hadsted for over half a day.


    The mountains where the sacrednd was located had copsed amidst some deafening rumbling and in front of the eyes of everyone. The massive cloud of dust and smoke had utterly obscured the ruins.


    Eight short sporepeople stood on their toes somewhere in a forest close to the Sporeborn Woods, trying their best to see what was happening.


    Naturally, they had witnessed everything that had happened in the sacrednd.


    However, with how weak they were, there was no way they could involve themselves in the fighting!


    ¡°Uncle, did we make the right choice? The princess has...has changed, after all! ¡±


    ¡°Indeed, Uncle Naru. The princess is a human adept now. Will...will she still treat us as she did in the past?¡±


    The shortest and most elderly of the sporepeople stroked his shriveled beard and replied sorrowfully, ¡°This has always been the fate of us sporepeople. We are always bent to the will of the powerful! The sporepeople are most certainly going to undergo drastic changes after this battle. Our fates are not going to end well if we remain here.¡±


    ¡°What about the princess? Has she managed to establish herself in that other world? Can she protect us?¡± A slightly younger sporeperson couldn¡¯t help but mumble.


    However, before Naru could reply, a crisp male voice rang out behind them.


    ¡°If you can¡¯t believe Emelia¡¯s promise, then certainly you should at least be able to believe the words of a Fourth Grade adept!¡±


    The sporepeople¡¯s faces flushed white when they heard the unfamiliar voice. They turned back with beating hearts to see who was speaking.


    It was only then that they realized a human adept in red robes was standing behind them. Meanwhile, standing beside the human adept was the Spore Princess Emelia that they had been talking about.


    Of course, none of them paid attention to Remi.


    ¡°Princess, you managed to escape from the sacrednd. You didn¡¯t...didn¡¯t run into Fahssn in there, did you? Thank god you escaped quickly enough. Otherwise, you won¡¯t have been able to escape Fahssn¡¯s evil ws. Look! Fahssn went on a rage, and the mountains are already copsing.¡±


    Emelia unamusedly interrupted Naru when she heard him go on an incoherent rant.


    ¡°Naru, stop mumbling! Come here and greet Lord Greem! He is my n leader. He just came out of the sacrednd, and he has already killed Fahssn! Even the sacred mountains were destroyed by his hand.¡±


    The sporepeople couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air when they heard Emelia¡¯s words. When they looked at Greem once more, their eyes were filled with fear and admiration. In particr, when they saw the shriveled head hanging from Greem¡¯s waist, their expressions turned into one of horror and uncertainty.


    A head. The head of Fahssn, the leader of the magical sporepeople!


    Even though the head was shriveled, that unusual skin color and vicious eyebrows indeed belonged to the Fahssn that they were all familiar with.


    With this head as evidence of his deeds, the sporepeople no longer had any doubts. They copsed onto their knees and didn¡¯t even dare stare directly at Greem.


    ¡°Wait here with them until I return. Remi will protect you all!¡± Greem did not even cast a second nce at the sporepeople. Instead, he gave his instructions directly to Emelia.


    ¡°n leader, are we not leaving immediately? Where...do you intend to go?¡± Emelia asked in surprise.


    ¡°Settling some dues!¡± Greem gritted his teeth and said, ¡°There are some dues I need to collect from some people.¡±


    Having said that, he turned and left the Mushroom Forest.


    ............


    Two dayster.


    The World of Adepts, the Tower of Fate.


    White light shimmered around the teleportation array. The internar teleportation finallypleted after several minutes.


    When the white light faded, Greem, Emelia, Remi, and eight short figures appeared in the array.


    ¡°You¡¯re back. So, did you bring any Primal Water back with you?¡± Helen, who had been staying in front of the teleportation array all this while, quickly flew before Greem. She circled around him nervously as she asked. Her voice trembled.


    Greem did not say anything. He simply took out a t wooden jug and shook it. The jug sloshed with the sound of water.


    ¡°It¡¯s all good if you got it...all good.¡± Helen was almost breaking down into tears. ¡°Alice has almost exhausted her lifeforce. The time poison seems to be constantly elerating.¡±


    ¡°How do we use this thing?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    ¡°Leave it to us! We have already prepared the items required for the ceremony. We were only waiting for you to return with the Primal Water. Let¡¯s go; we will begin immediately.¡±


    A short momentter, bright light once again shone from the Tower of Fate after days of silence. This beam of white light pierced through the shroud above Dragonblight, making for a wondrous, brilliant sight.


    The profound and mysterious River of Fate appeared above the Tower of Fate as a projection. Countless stars fell from the river, crashing towards the Tower of Fate.


    The moment the stars crashed, a tall and pretty silhouette appeared and opened her arms, letting the stars freely enter her body.


    As the stars continued to fall, the form of the pretty witch started to be increasingly real.


    Finally, when the River of Fate faded away, the witch turned around. Her thousand-meter-tall body towered over thend, and her pretty, brilliant, star-like eyes glowed with blinding, shocking radiance.

 Chapter 1217 - Dark Undercurrents

    <h4>Chapter 1217 Dark Undercurrents</h4>


    Alice had returned to her usual state from before she was poisoned, and almost no one knew of what had happened to her.


    At the very least, there weren¡¯t very many people who knew about the whole affair apart from a few malicious enemies watching from the sidelines.


    After two weeks of being sealed off, the Tower of Fate once again opened to the public.


    No one knew when, but Legendary Fire Adept Greem, Bloody Queen Mary, and Fate Witch Leader Alice had formed a small social circle of their own. A three-person circle of frightening power.


    Fourth Grades. Three Fourth Grades.


    It was nothingpared to the three major adept organizations. However, for a rtively unknown adept n, it was shocking news.


    A discordant response emerged within Zhentarim when they heard the news of Mary¡¯s advancement. Adept ns of smaller sizes became unusually excited. They saw this as a sign of the growing power of the central adepts and an omen of the birth of a powerful adept.


    The appearance of such a powerful adept would be the core needed to unite the center of the continent, once and for all!


    However, in contrast to the excitement of these low-grade adepts was the reaction of the high-grade adepts.


    Zhentarim, which stood at the center of the continent, had always been a loose alliance of adept ns, with each managing and ruling over their own territories. With this system of governance, they had managed to fend off the infiltration of influence from the three major adept organizations and created a legacy of several thousands of years.


    Now, the Crimson n had abruptly appeared within the Zhentarim Association, a n with two Fourth Grades. Even more concerningly, these two Fourth Grades were a couple.


    That...was beyond what the Zhentarim Association could ept!


    It wasn¡¯t that the Zhentarim Association couldn¡¯t have a core of its own. Instead, it was that this crucial figure had best not appear while they were still alive.


    After all, such an individual¡¯s appearance would mean a tilting of resources, territory, and power.


    The politics of Zhentarim would most certainly be greatly shaken during this process.


    If these resources all gathered around that ¡®core,¡¯ then it was possible for a major organization simr to the three organizations to appear in Zhentarim.


    And that was something that none of the high-grade adepts were willing to witness!


    Firstly, the three current major organizations¨Cthe Silver Union, the Northern Witches, and the Adept¡¯s Association¨Cwould never allow such a thing to happen.


    It wasn¡¯t as if the three organizations did not have the power to take over Zhentarim. Instead, they were concerned about desperate retaliation from the local ns, which would weaken their organization in the process. If they broke their fangs devouring Zhentarim, they would expose their weakness to the other twopetitors.


    It was out of such concern that the three major organizations hade to an agreement in the shadows. None of them were allowed toy a finger on the center of the continent. Zhentarim would exist as a buffer zone for their organizations.


    However, even if they didn¡¯t invade Zhentarim, they would certainly not allow another powerful organization that could rival them to appear there. If a central figure that could unite Zhentarim appeared, it was almost certain that that individual would face persecution by the organizations, both in the shadows and in daylight!


    Secondly, it wasn¡¯t just the external organizations. Even the Zhentarim Association itself would not want to see a ¡®core¡¯ appear.


    Without a core, the Fourth Grade adepts would remain as kings and rulers of their ownnds. They would be unquestioned and could take all the resources in their territories for themselves. However, should a ¡®core¡¯ appear, the resources, territory, and authority they possessed would certainly be worn away.


    Rather than bing members of a sizeable adept organization and bing subject to a powerful adept, it was better to remain king of their own mountains. It held more freedom and was more liberating.


    As such, the Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim were probably the most opposed to the existence of a core individual!


    Furthermore, many Fourth Grade adepts dreamed of being this key figure of unification.


    As a veteran Fourth Grade, Chairman Freed had worked diligently for a thousand years to forge the current prosperity of the Zhentarim Association. Did he not want to turn the Zhentarim Association into a powerful force that could rival the three major organizations?


    Of course he did! However, it wasn¡¯t that he didn¡¯t want to do it. It was because it was a colossal task to aplish.


    There were a total of thirteen Fourth Grade adepts in the centralnds. All of them were veterans who had lived, trained, and survived for hundreds of years. Their powers might vary, but it was challenging for any of them topletely suppress another in battle.


    No two Fourth Grade adepts would be able to achieve a swift victory in the event of a battle. The most likely scenario was a draw, with both sides injured or even dead. It would cause two adept ns to fall into ruin!


    It was this bnce of power that kept the centralnds in a delicate state of peace.


    Freed had invested a great deal of effort in the creation of the Zhentarim Association. He had even managed to persuade Vice-Chairman Mirva to join his cause. However, in the end, Mirva was more of a friend than anything else.


    Should Freed ever attempt to start a war between the high-grades in an attempt to unite Zhentarim, it would be a wholly different matter. When that happened, whether Mirva would support him and howmitted this support would be were utterly unpredictable!


    Because of how sensitive an issue it was, and how much of a difficult feat it would be, Freed could only keep Zhentarim Association as an alliance on the surface. In the shadows, the various Fourth Grade adepts were still working on their own, with no intent of actual cooperation. It was impossible to achieve the streamlining and reassignment of high-grade resources and military power.


    However, Greem had appeared out of nowhere during such times. The unstoppable rise of the Crimson n had put this ancient, terrifying topic of unification in front of everyone¡¯s eyes once more.


    Whether Greem had the capability to be a unifying figure, and whether he had the ambition to do so were all questions that required answers!


    Thus, even as the Crimson n continued to prosper, schemes began to form in the shadows, schemes directed at Greem.


    ............


    The Central Lands, the Qatarselon Region.


    Bloodcastle.


    This ancient castle was deep in a rtively small mountain range. Only a winding forest path connected it to Maple Town, which stood outside the mountains.


    This town had a poption of a thousand, with reasonably decent facilities.


    The ruler of thisnd had been the Vik Family for a very long time, an ancient n of vampires.


    Bloodcastle was their home, and Maple Town was the farm where they bred their livestock. That said, to maintain their facade of ¡®ruling¡¯ and not scare away all the civilians with rumors of bloodsucking monsters, the Viks had always restrained themselves when it came to feeding!


    Unfortunately, the Vik Family had beenpletely defeated by an adept n.


    Not only did their blood master die by the enemy¡¯s hands, but even the foundations of the Vik Family itself had also been uprooted. All thend belonging to the Vik Family had also fallen in the hands of their enemies.


    The only ones which could have so quickly taken over the Viks¡¯ territory were naturally other vampire ns.


    Bloodcastle had changed hands a total of three times and finally ended in the hands of the Heinesen Vampires. However, with Mary¡¯s meteoric rise, all the other vampire ns only had two choices: migrating away from the centralnds or obediently bing Mary¡¯s subordinate.


    Bloodcastle, once the pride of the Viks, was handed over to Mary by the Heinesen n as an offering. It was now the most important outpost for the Crimson n vampires in the centralnds.


    The sinister Bloodcastle wasposed of five separate castles and fortresses. It functioned as both the living space of the vampires and as a military fortress. Four of the smaller fortresses that were spread around the main castle were not designed withfort in mind. They were meant for defense and warfare.


    These fortresses were very sturdy in construction. Even their entrances and windows were unusually narrow and small. Most passages only allowed a single, fully-armed guard to walk through. Meanwhile, the critical regions of defense were filled with secret passages, tunnels, and hidden openings to attack from.


    The outeryer of Bloodcastle had sacrificedfort and entertainment for incredible defensive capabilities. In all honesty, Bloodcastle only required two to three hundred elite warriors to stave off an invasion of a few thousand enemies.


    Meanwhile, the main castle, which was protected by the four fortresses, was an elegant, majestic construction.


    The ill habit of vampires pursuing perfection, elegance, and nobility couldn¡¯t be more evident than in the construction of this building. If this ce wasn¡¯t so far away from any other living humans, and if it weren¡¯t for its unusually sinister atmosphere, it would have been easy to mistake the ce for a castle meant for the exclusive entertainment of nobles and royalty.


    Many guests were now gathered in the main hall on the second floor of the castle.


    Naturally, the only ones that could be present here were vampires, all dressed in pretty, noble clothes.


    Most of the male vampires wore tuxedos, with neat red bow ties and fancy hats. They held walking sticks in their hands and had neat mustaches under their noses. On the other hand, female vampires wore pretty dresses, sunhats of various colors, and soft silk gloves on their hands. They also wore beautiful, delicate high-heeled shoes.


    Everyone was appropriately dressed, perfect examples of the elegance and refined arrogance of the human nobles.


    Unfortunately, these individuals were all insignificant small fry. The true masters who could decide the future of the vampires were gathered on the third floor in a secret room, furiously discussing a particr matter.


    ¡°With the might of us vampires, we are entirely capable of establishing a new adept n of our own. Lady Mary, what do you think? Should we not just leave the Crimson n and with Bloodcastle as our headquarters?¡±


    A Second Grade vampire was excitedly giving a speech. However, before he could finish, a sh of crimson cut through the room as his entire person exploded in a puddle of blood.

 Chapter 1218 - Mary’s Frustrations

    <h4>Chapter 1218 Mary¡¯s Frustrations</h4>


    The dead vampire came from the Rothers n.


    They were a vampire n that had only recently joined Mary.


    He might not have been the most powerful individual in the Rothers n, but as an advanced Second Grade, he was still a reasonably authoritative figure.


    Yet, Mary had killed such a vampire instantly without the chance to retaliate!


    All the vampires in the room turned pale when they smelled the thick scent of blood. The couldn¡¯t help but whimper in fright.


    ¡°Silence, all of you!¡± Mary sat upon a tall wooden chair. Her crimson eyes swept across all the vampires present here as she coldly said, ¡°From now on, anyone that dares mention secession from the Crimson n will be killed without mercy!¡±


    Having said that, Mary pointed at the puddle of blood, and everything started to move in reverse. The spots of blood spattered all over the room gathered together and reformed into the image of the Second Grade vampire.


    ¡°Rothers, he¡¯s your subordinate. Tell us how he should be punished!¡± Mary¡¯s gaze turned coldly towards a Third Grade vampire sitting to her left.


    ¡°Ever since we joined you, the Rothers n ceased to exist. Everything is to your will!¡± Rothers couldn¡¯t help but be shocked by Mary¡¯s terrifying blood magic, and hurriedly stood up to bow.


    In all honesty, it wasn¡¯t surprising that she had been able to kill the vampire so easily.


    What was surprising was her method of ¡®reviving¡¯ the vampire!


    Rumors that high-grade vampire lords could freely determine the lives and deaths of their subordinate vampires had always existed since ancient times. Rothers had believed these rumors to be baseless legends. Now, it seemed like high-grade vampire lords did indeed possess unique blood powers.


    Blood powers tailored explicitly for use on their subordinates!


    The terrified Rothers quickly expressed subservience, now even more respectful and fearful of Mary.


    ¡°As expected, you understand where you stand. Very well, seeing as this is his first offense, he is simply demoted from count to viscount. He will be allowed to redeem himself in the future.¡±


    Second Grade vampires held the noble title of count, simply by virtue of their power. Now that he had been demoted to viscount, it meant that he could only enjoy the authority and benefits of a First Grade vampire within the n. Moreover, the only vampires allowed in this room today were Second Grade counts. Having been demoted, the vampire could only dejectedly leave the meeting.


    A total of a single Fourth Grade, seven Third Grades, and twenty-two Second Grades were currently present in this small room.


    It was the result of the majority of vampire ns submitting themselves to Mary after her advancement to Fourth Grade. In truth, the Second Grade vampire had actually expressed the mindset of most high-grade vampires here. With such power gathered in this room, they had more than enough qualifications to establish a new n belonging solely to the vampires in Zhentarim!


    Unfortunately, as excited as they were by the idea, their Fourth Grade blood master, Mary, did not seem to be moved by the thought of absolute power at all. She immediately surprised this dissenting current with the most violent and cruel method imaginable.


    Considering Mary¡¯s romantic rtionship with Greem, most of the vampires were willing to ept this situation, as reluctant as they were. Given how intimate Mary was with the n leader, all the vampires in the Crimson n would most definitely reap the maximum benefit as long as she was around.


    In fact, some high-grade vampires that had just joined even fantasized that Lady Mary could demonstrate her tremendous powers and make the fire adept submit to her prowess. This way, the vampires would not have to secede, and they would even be the leaders of the massive Crimson n.


    While these neers were scheming in their minds, the veterans who had followed Mary for decades smiled bitterly. Outsiders might not know the details of Mary and Greem¡¯s rtionship, but they, the blood knights and blood elves, knew very well what the dynamic was.


    These outsiders were going down an entirely wrong path if they were attempting to sow discord between Lady Mary and Lord Greem.


    As Mary¡¯s followers, they knew very well that their master waspletely under the thumb of their n leader. Their rtionship was also not something that could be moved by resources or benefits.


    That was why Soros, Isa, and Spa, the three marquis vampires, couldn¡¯t help but shake their heads when they saw the outsiders¡¯ excitement. They pitied them for their foolish thoughts. Old Fox Vanlier, whom Mary had forcefully promoted to peak Second Grade with her powers, stroked his beard and sneered coldly.


    Everything that he possessed, all the authority he now held in his hands, and all the power within him had been bestowed upon him by Mary. As such, he was probably the most loyal subordinate among all the vampires.


    Mary¡¯s swift, decisive punishment of the vampire that stood out of line was Vanlier¡¯s idea as well.


    While Mary had been intimidating the vampires with her disy of power, she silentlymunicated with Vanlier.


    ¡°Master, the current situation we are facing is likely a plot hatched by those old fools.¡±


    ¡°Old fools? Do you mean the Fourth Grades of Zhentarim?¡±


    ¡°Indeed!¡±


    ¡°What have you picked up on?¡±


    ¡°These vampire ns had all been pushed around and oppressed by those Fourth Grade organizations before joining us, be it in the shadows or on the surface. In all seriousness, they only joined us because they had nowhere else to turn to!¡±


    ¡°Isn¡¯t this...good for us?¡± Mary was somewhat confused. ¡°Those old fools would do us a favor?¡±


    ¡°Perhaps they are doing us a favor, but it¡¯s truly a sinister scheme at heart.¡± Vanlier put on one of his sly smiles. ¡°They might not have expected your rtionship with the n leader to be as firm as it is. That is why they attempted to create discord between you and him by strengthening your forces. Think about it. Lord Greem is the n leader of the Crimson n, yet you lead the n¡¯s strongest branch. That would indirectly cause you and Lord Greem to doubt and suspect each other over your intentions. What the vampires here are thinking about are likely ways to sow more conflict between you and the n leader.¡±


    ¡°Bastards! I was wondering why these vampires were so willing to join me. So this is why! Hmph! Just wait and see what I¡¯ll do to them in the future.¡±


    ¡°Speaking of which, master, what was that technique you just used earlier? To think you could kill and revive a vampire with such ease. How did you do it?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! That is a blood power I obtained after advancing to Fourth Grade¨C Blood Symbiosis. With this ability, I will be able to store the soul of any vampire subordinate temporarily. With the use of a blood halo, I can reconstruct a body for them.¡±


    Vanlier¡¯s eyes glowed when he heard Mary¡¯s exnation. He couldn¡¯t help but be exceedingly excited.


    ¡°Master, if you are capable of such a feat, wouldn¡¯t you be able to wear down any enemy with an endless horde of vampires?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! It¡¯s not as simple as you think.¡± Mary coldly exined, ¡°Low-grade enemies might have a difficult time destroying a soul, but it is a small matter for those old Fourth Grade fools. If they destroyed your soul along with your body, I would not be able to revive you, even with all the blood power in the world.¡±


    Vanlier frowned and thought about it. He couldn¡¯t help but agree with that assessment.


    The powers of high-grade adepts were too strange and unusual. Trying to beat them through sheer numbers was too simplistic and crude of an idea. Regardless, Blood Symbiosis was still one of the most powerful of Mary¡¯s blood abilities.


    ¡°Master, if you don¡¯t want their scheme to continue, then why not find something for them to do?¡± The old fox smiled. ¡°The four vampire ns that joined us also contributed five small nes and one mid-sized ne. Why don¡¯t we pick a grinding stone from among these nes and use it to train our forces?¡±


    ¡°The mid-sized ne, then!¡± The pride of a high-grade adept appeared on Mary¡¯s pretty face. ¡°There¡¯s hardly anything in those small nes that can draw my interest now!¡±


    ¡°Very well, I will arrange it immediately!¡±


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    It had been two weeks since Greem returned from the Spirit World.


    He had been busy at work dealing with the spoils of war from his adventures all this while.


    The Primal Water, the Watersoul Jade, the Starfell Gem, the heart of a thousand-year old treant, the mutated mushrooms, the warhammers of the ogre chieftain, the Bleeding Spear, the corpse of the Feathered God, the divine power crystals, and the egg.


    With the exception of the treant¡¯s heart, which was a Third Grade item, all these things were incredibly rare and powerful, even among other Fourth Grade resources!


    Greem put a tremendous amount of thought into how he should deal with them.


    The first to be dealt with were naturally the mutated mushrooms.


    These had alle from Sage Moat. Consuming them over a long period of time could deliver an increase of 1 to 2 points of a specific stat, with insignificant side effects.


    If these mushrooms could be sessfully cultivated, they would immediately be strategic resources for the n.


    Though 1 to 2 points of improvement in a specific attribute might not be much for a low-grade adept, it was incredibly significant for high-grade adepts. So much so that you could call it revolutionary!


    After returning to the n, Greem immediately summoned Emelia and had her lead her sporepeople in an attempt to grow these mushrooms. For this purpose, the Crimson n had even found a swamp area in the Ailovis Region simr to the Marsh Wends and turned the ce into a restricted area. A few sporepeople were then selected to cultivate the spores.


    Given Emelia¡¯s performance in the Spirit World, Greem decided to reward her with the heart of the thousand-year treant.


    Emelia was a nt adept, and the heart was an excellent nt-attribute material. It was a very appropriate substance to carve a staff out of.


    With the aid of such excellent material, it was certain that Emelia¡¯s magical powers would improve tremendously!


    The second thing that Greem turned his attention to was the Starfell Gem.

 Chapter 1219 - Treasures

    <h4>Chapter 1219 Treasures</h4>


    Starfell gems across history had various properties with no pattern to them. Thus, the appraisal of a starfell gem was more often like an exciting gamble.


    ce your bets, big or small!


    No one knew what unique attributes an appraised starfell gem would have, and yet, these properties would undoubtedly affect the value of the gem tremendously.


    The starfell gem that Greem had obtained also had peculiar properties¨C it was known as the Cursesinging Crystal. The holder of the gem had a chance of triggering a Phantom Curse when attacking an enemy. This curse would attack indiscriminately and bypass magic resistance entirely.


    Another indiscriminate cursed item!


    If Greem equipped this gem known as the Cursesinging Crystal, he could trigger a curse when attacking an enemy. This curse would simultaneously and indiscriminately affect the holder of the gem and the individual being attacked.


    Just imagine, hit the enemy once, and both you and the enemy would be cursed; that incredibly weird scenario would surely make the battle even more strange and dangerous.


    That was why Greem was furious the moment he appraised the Cursesinging Crystal. He wanted to destroy it on the very spot. However, after a while, he thought otherwise.


    This strange crystal might not be a good fit for him, but it might be excellent high-grade equipment for another person. For instance...Mary!


    Mary had already advanced to Fourth Grade. The origin abilities of vampires made her naturally immune to most curse magic. If this Cursesinging Crystal were in Mary¡¯s hands, the Phantom Curse would only affect the enemy and not her.


    What other Fourth Grade items could be more valuable for her!?


    Moreover, the Chip detected that the chance of the crystal¡¯s curse triggering was around 8%. It was a little on the low side for Greem. However, for Mary and her incredible Agility and attack rate, an 8% trigger chance was already incredibly high.


    Thus, Greem could only regretfully order the Cursesinging Crystal sent to Mary instead of keeping it for himself.


    The Watersoul Jade. It was an incredible trump card that could save his life in moments of crisis. Naturally, Greem had to take excellent care of it.


    Meanwhile, the Primal Water¡¯s attributes were too mysterious. Even with the Chip¡¯s aid, the progress of Greem¡¯s research was exceptionally slow. He could only remain patient and work on it slowly.


    On the other hand, the strange warhammers he had taken from Gorefist were revealed to be Fourth Grade weapons of high power after the Chip¡¯s appraisal.


    Greem didn¡¯t know what material Gorefist had forged these warhammers out of, but they each weighed over 1,600 kilograms. Greem couldn¡¯t even swing them with his 28 points of Strength, let alone use them inbat.


    With this, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how shockingly strong and powerful Gorefist was!


    [Gorefist¡¯s Warhammers. Fourth Grade weapon.


    Use requirements: Strength 41 | Physique 38 |


    Offensive power: 760 ¨C 980 points.


    Abilities: Return, Berserk Strikes, Whirlwind.]


    One had to admit that these two warhammers that Gorefist hadmitted all his resources into creating did indeed possess decent power. Greem even saw traces of principles in the abilities possessed by the warhammers.


    However,pared to the high-grade equipment created in the World of Adepts, this pair of warhammers was still too crude and simple!


    In particr, that annoying requirement of 41 Strength kept most elementium adepts from using it. Only pure body-refining adepts and certain bloodline adepts could meet the base requirement of using these warhammers.


    After examining their attributes, Greem could only regretfully put them away as part of his collection. He would have to see if he had the opportunity to trade it away for other items in the future. Otherwise, equipment with such strict usage requirements will have to gather dust in his personal collection.


    [Bleeding Spear. Fourth Grade weapon.


    Use requirements: Troll Bloodline.


    Offensive power: 600 ¨C 780 points.


    Abilities: Energy Projection, Split Attack.


    [Energy Projection: Form a spear of light with the user¡¯s power and hurl it at the enemy. Projected spear will have 70% of the Bleeding Spear¡¯s power. Cooldown: 5 seconds.


    [Split Attack: Attacks from the Bleeding Spear will split off upon hitting its target, dealing diminishing damage to other nearby targets. Total targets of split attack: 3. Diminishing damage: 70%, 50%, 30%.]


    This Bleeding Spear was obtained from the small ne of Seawoods. It was a ritual item of the trolls and their national artifact. Unfortunately, it was a Third Grade voodoo doctor who had been wielding it. He had not even been able to use even one-tenth of the spear¡¯s real power.


    That was why Shadow Demon had so easily killed him and why the Bleeding Spear hade into Greem¡¯s possession.


    Unfortunately, the conditions of usage for the Fourth Grade Bleeding Spear were even stricter. Only individuals with a troll bloodline could use it. It was a waste of its two powerful offensive abilities since Greem could not use them at all.


    Of course, if Greem was willing to put it some effort and make a pair of gloves with the bloodline and skin of the trolls, there was a chance he could wield the Bleeding Spear. However, Greem was a legendary fire adept, after all. Waving a spear around like a warrior instead of his staff wasn¡¯t exactly the right priority!


    Thus, Greem could only shake his head, sigh, and put away the Bleeding Spear as another item in his ¡®collection.¡¯


    It was, in fact, amon situation for most adepts after otherworldly wars!


    Every ne had its own uniquews and strange races. The equipment and weapons raided from those worlds would have their own individual usage requirements. For a high-grade adept to fully unleash their potential and power, they would have to spend decades and hundreds of years exhausting massive amounts of resources to create custom-made magic equipment for themselves.


    Fourth Grade equipment that naturally suited an adept was incredibly rare and valuable.


    Take Greem, for example. Despite having gotten his hands on so many Fourth Grade items and weapons, there were very few among them that werepatible with his origin attribute. At this point, he only had the somewhat average Fire Coral Staff.


    Even Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring was barely utilized with Greem¡¯s power. He was not a holy knight, after all. He could not draw out the full potential of Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring.


    The only thing that could move him among his items was the Orb of the Fire God.


    It was the only artifact in all his items that possessed fire origins. It was perfectlypatible with his attribute. Sadly, the Orb of the Fire God had an owner. It would be a tough battle for Greem to wear away the divine brand that the Fire God had left within it!


    Apart from the Orb, the Libram of Wisdom was also an item to look forward to!


    As the God of Wisdom¡¯s artifact, it possessed the mysterious ability to enhance the host¡¯s Spirit, while providing an incredible amount of knowledge. All spellcasters, not just Greem, would covet such a treasure.


    If Greem could sessfully turn the Orb of the Fire God and the Libram of Wisdom to his own use, his power would skyrocket.


    The Chip had performed some basic calctions. With his power as a fire adept and the aid of the Orb and Libram, his fighting power could match that of a peak Fourth Grade adept.


    With such power, Greem would be a real powerhouse in the World of Adepts. No one could stop him, and no one could defeat him.


    There were undoubtedly other simr individuals in the three major adept organizations. However, those people were busy meditating in an attempt to advance, break out of the world, and be truly immortal. Very few individuals were like Greem, having free time to travel the world, stirring up trouble, and managing his own organization.


    If Greem were to possess such power, it would be a far easier matter to unite the forces of Zhentarim into a single organization. At the very least, no adept n or Fourth Grade adept would ever dare to disobey the will of a peak Fourth Grade on the surface.


    The divine crystals that Greem had obtained were also precious resources.


    Sadly, the Feathered God possessed lightning as its attribute. The divinews contained within the crystals were also of the lightning attribute. They were clearly ipatible with Greem.


    If Greem forcefully assimted these crystals, he could gain a basic grasp of the lightningws.


    However, he would greatly waste these divine crystals in the process, resulting in a considerable loss of the divinity within them. Furthermore, assimting the lightningws through such a method was more of a contamination to his firews.


    It was simply not worth it. It was a short-sighted idea that would yield no proper benefit in the long run!


    Since they couldn¡¯t be used on himself, he would have to trade it away.


    Inevitably, there were intermediate-grade lightning adepts who would fight with their lives over these divine crystals. After all, if a Fourth Grade lightning adept absorbed these divine crystals, he could only slightly improve his affinity with lightning while gaining ess to one or two unknown lightningws.


    However, in the hands of a Third Grade lightning adept, they would be able to ess the lightningws for the first time in their lives. That would increase their odds of advancing to Fourth Grade by twenty to thirty percent. With the aid of other materials, their chances of advancing would be a whopping sixty to seventy percent.


    Anyone wouldugh out loud at such incredible odds!


    Even as generous as he was, Greem wasn¡¯t willing to trade away such a rare adept resource. There were one or two famous Third Grade lightning adepts in the centralnds. If these crystals were to fall in their hands, then the Crimson n would be creatingpetitors for themselves!


    That was why most Fourth Grade organizations kept a tight hold on all strategic adept resources. They would rather the resources gather dust in their warehouses than for them to go onto the market. It was to avoid making more ¡®enemies¡¯ for themselves.


    He couldn¡¯t use them, and he couldn¡¯t release them on the market. Was he supposed to just let them sleep in the warehouse then?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but start thinking, trying to find a possible owner for these crystals within the n. The Chip shed images of the n members through Greem¡¯s mind. Finally, when a particr image appeared, Greem¡¯s eyes lit up. He had a vague idea of what he could do.

 Chapter 1220 - Dealing with Arms

    <h4>Chapter 1220 Dealing with Arms</h4>


    Thunder Dragon Arms.


    As a Third Grade thunder dragon that had joined Greem during the developmental years of the Crimson n, Arms was still considered a young, powerful, and wealthy dragon.


    However, ever since he allied with the humans, he waspletely shunned and rejected by Lance¡¯s dragons. He was no longer part of their social circle.


    Simrly, Arms did not fit in with the human adepts either.


    Thus, he became a lonely dragon, often staying alone in his massive territory with no direction in life.


    It was said that the ambitious Emerald Dragon Iritina had fought with him several times over this. A giant rift had appeared in their rtionship.


    If Greem could help Arms reach Fourth Grade, his presence would certainly further propel the Crimson n to greater heights. However, Arms stillcked in loyalty, especiallypared to Dragonborn Zacha.


    However, Zacha was only advanced Second Grade at the moment. He was still far weaker than Arms. The divine crystal would not have as much effect on him as it would on Arms. Moreover, one was a pureblood dragon, and the other was a dragonborn of mixed blood. The difference in theirbat prowess, even at the same grade, was tremendous.


    After some hesitation, Greem finally contacted that thunder dragon in the faraway world of Lance¨C Arms.


    The magical screen unfolded before his eyes as an unusual image appeared before him.


    On that screen was a tall mountain cave, as well as Thunder Dragon Arms.


    His scales were still as shiny as ever, his fangs and ws as sharp as before, and his streamlined body still just as majestic. However, he seemed to be in very low spirits. His entire body was syedzily over the rock floor. He didn¡¯t even seem to have the energy to lift his head to greet Greem.


    ¡°What¡¯s...happened to you?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but pause for a moment.


    ¡°Iritina is nning to leave me.¡± An expression of pain appeared on Arms¡¯ long dragon face. ¡°She thinks I¡¯m useless and resents that the other dragonsugh at me and that I can¡¯t build her a fancy home. She¡¯s nning to leave me for somewhere else!¡±


    Greem was speechless.


    He had never expected to see a dejected, whining, and crying dragon lounging in his home in his entire life. This being was supposed to be a dragon lord¨C an enviable and powerful creature, a majestic ruler in the eyes of the worldly mortals.


    Well, this wasn¡¯t so bad for him. The worse the situation Arms was in, the more leverage he would have over the dragon, and the easier the negotiations would be!


    Greem wasn¡¯t one for formalities.


    He pointed with his finger, and the focus of the magical screen switched to a pile of strange crystals behind him.


    Arms¡¯ eyes instantly opened wide when he saw this image. He immediately got up from the ground with all fours, lifted his nose, and tried his best to sniff through the screen.


    ¡°The smell ofws. I smell the smell of lightningws on them. Those...those are divine power crystals! You¨Cno, Sir¨Cwhere did you get them?¡± Arms was immediately reinvigorated. The light of hope shone from his big dragon eyes. He was very cautious when he spoke as if he wanted to curry favor with Greem and was careful not to say anything wrong.


    ¡°You don¡¯t need to know where they came from. I just want to know if these would help you?¡±


    ¡°Of course...of course they will...they definitely will.¡± Arms instantly started roaring out loud, ¡°With these divine crystals and the resources I have collected over these years, I should have no problem advancing to Fourth Grade within two hundred years!¡±


    Dragons truly had a long lifespan. An incredibly easy advancement like this would take them one to two hundred years? By the time Arms woke up from his slumber after his advancement to Fourth Grade, there would already be a whole new generation of First Grade adepts.


    ¡°A guaranteed advancement like this would take you two hundred years?¡± Greem was speechless. For the first time, he understood how difficult it was for dragon creatures to advance.


    The principles of the world were still fair!


    Dragons had powerful bodies, excellent magic resistance, incredible strength, devastating magic powers, and nearly uncontested melee prowess. Certainly, having gained so much, the dragons would have to lose out in certain aspects.


    It took an exceptionally long time for their powers to grow, and producing offsprings was aplicated affair as well.


    These two factors severely limited the number of dragons, preventing them from forming an endless horde and bing the destroyers of the universe!


    ¡°n leader, I signed a cooperation agreement with you. You can trust me fully! What do you think about...about these divine crystals? Don¡¯t you think...?¡±


    Greem was expressionless, and his tone was calm andposed. He said, ¡°We have indeed signed an agreement of cooperation. However, once you advance to Fourth Grade, your Spirit will certainly triumph mine. Do you think a contract like that could still bind you? Tell me, how am I supposed to trust you?¡±


    ¡°n leader, I am already a member of your n. Can you still not trust me? Moreover, no one in the n apart from me carries the lightning attribute and could possibly¡ª¡± Arms had not finished his sentence when he saw Greem use his mes to disy the image of a certain dragonborn.


    Arms closed his eyes immediately and struggled internally for a moment.


    ¡°My lord, Zacha is only Second Grade at the moment. Even with the aid of these divine crystals, it would be near impossible for him to cross two major grades and reach Fourth Grade! Moreover, apart from their melee prowess and insignificant elementium powers, dragonborn are inferior to us dragons in every aspect.¡±


    The image on the screen flickered once more, this time revealing the corpse of a massive divine creature. Arms looked at the body. Even dead, it still radiated a sacred aura of intimidation. His words came to a stop, and he was momentarily stunned.


    What had Greem been doing? How had he managed to get his hands on the corpse of a divine creature? Moreover, judging from the aura it was radiating, the creature had undoubtedly been a terrifying peak Fourth Grade existence in life!


    If Greem were willing to invest everything, then this corpse and the divine crystals would be able to forcefully pull Zacha to Fourth Grade, even as terrible as his potential was.


    He no longer had any room for negotiation now!


    An expression of pain and agony appeared on Arms¡¯ face.


    He had been working with Greem for so many years. Naturally, he knew what it was that Greem wanted. Still, to hand over his freedom and his life for ¡®mere¡¯ pieces of divine crystals. The...thought of this was still so painful!


    However, Arms knew that if he missed this opportunity, getting his hands on any divine crystals in the future would be impossible.


    If he led his dragons on a raid to another world, they would never be able to obtain divine crystals of such power. If he followed those Fourth Grade dragons on raids, then even if they managed to obtain such crystals, they would only belong to the Fourth Grade dragon lords.


    He would never be able to get close to these crystals.


    Divine crystals of such power and of the same origin attribute as himself were rare enough that they were things he could onlye across, never things he could seek. If he missed this opportunity, and he would regret it for eternity!


    After struggling for a brief moment, Arms finally lifted his head. His light-blue eyes stared straight at Greem as he spoke, ¡°Give me the corpse of the divine creature and the divine crystals, and I will sign a dragonsoul contract with you.¡±


    Ordinary dragon contracts were already incredibly binding for a dragon. A contract signed with their dragonsoul as the basis was even more terrifying. To sign a contract like this was to hand over their very life to another individual.


    A single thought would be all it took to kill them.


    It was unimaginable for a proud, pureblood dragon.


    Greem raised an eyebrow, but his expression was still as calm as ever. He replied coldly, ¡°I can only give you half of the corpse. I already have ns for the other half!¡±


    Arms already twisted face became even more ugly.


    ¡°Fine, I¡¯ll take half, but I want a real dragoncliff! ¡±


    ¡°That is no problem!¡±


    Arms let out a puff of ck smoke from his nostrils as he replied sternly, ¡°The very best!¡±


    ¡°That is no problem! I can order Gargamel to open the n treasury and help you build thergest, most majestic, and most brilliant dragoncliff in Lance. I promise you it will be the brightest star among the Fourth Grade dragons of Lance!¡±


    Arms finally felt better when he heard Greem¡¯s reassurance.


    With the divine crystals, his control of the lightningws would certainly improve significantly. With the corpse of the divine creature, his thunder-dragon bloodline would be further nourished. With that, it wasn¡¯t just a matter of advancing to Fourth Grade; he might even have a sliver of a chance of reaching Fifth Grade!


    A little thought was still hidden deep in Arms¡¯ heart.


    If...if he could reach Fifth Grade before Greem did, even a dragonsoul contract wouldn¡¯t be perfectly binding!


    ............


    Any other adept would have been much more reluctant to give away the corpse of a Fourth Grade divine creature like this.


    With some special methods, the immortal trait of the divine creature¡¯s corpse could be transnted into an adept¡¯s body. However, Greem walked the path of an elementium body. He did not have as strong a desire for an immortal body as a body-refining adept would have.


    As for the other half of the corpse that he had reserved? It wasn¡¯t meant for him, but a ¡®veteran¡¯ of the Crimson n that was worth investment.


    Perhaps, that person could bring him an unexpected surprise when they got stronger.


    After all, there weren¡¯t many things left in this world that was worthy of his reminiscing anymore!

 Chapter 1221 - Billis’ Springtime

    <h4>Chapter 1221 Billis¡¯ Springtime</h4>


    Billis¡¯ life was exceptionally dull.


    Ever since he decided to convert his body into an insectoid form, his thoughts, likes, dislikes, standards of beauty, and life had been upended.


    Wine, food, beauties, uncontested authority¨C none of these things attracted him any longer. The meaning of his life had been twisted and distorted beyond recognition by that ugly, evil Queen Bug. He had lost interest in everything else apart from high-energy meat.


    Billis¡¯ unique traits turned him into the most lonesome and conspicuous figure in the Crimson n.


    He conducted missions alone, ventured into the ck Forest alone, lived in a shelter alone. Even when he was within the n¡¯s towers, he kept to himself, never interacting with anyone else.


    Even so, the terrifying name of the Bug Adept Billis had still spread far and wide.


    His ugly, vicious insectoid body, his ferocious, cruel army of insects, and his phantasmal movements made outsiders more curious and fearful of him.


    As a veteran core adept of the Crimson n, Billis¡¯ fighting power was at the top among Second Grade adepts. He had even, at one point, been the core fighting force of the Crimson n when they went to war. However, with the gradual rise of the Crimson n, more and more high-grade adepts began to appear. The core of the n started to shift from Second Grade to Third Grade and was now showing signs of moving entirely to Fourth Grade.


    Under such conditions, Billis, who had practically exhausted all his innate potential, was slowly beginning to fall behind!


    First were the few vampires under Mary who reached Third Grade. Then Meryl, who once had practically no fighting power, had mysteriously advanced into a fire dragon adept.


    Beginner Second Grade...intermediate Second Grade...advanced Second Grade.


    Step by step, Billis had witnessed as Meryl rapidly grew in power. She was now at peak Second Grade and only one step away from Third Grade. Apart from her, there were also many weaklings in the n that Billis had once looked down upon who were now quickly gaining on him. It seemed like they would surpass him any day.


    Such incidents urred over and over. Naturally, it provoked Billis tremendously.


    For his own sake, and for that frustrated, restless insect heart of his, Billis had secretly visited Greem in hopes of finding an opportunity to advance through his master. Unfortunately, as a Fourth Grade adept, Greem had been too busy. He was so busy he had no time to think about the Second Grade bug adept who tirelessly waited for his attention.


    Billis had just returned from the ck Forest¡¯s depths and had further increased the scale of his insect army. At this point, Bug Adept Billis was an advanced Second Grade adept with a horrifying army of insects.


    He now had over two dozen intermediate Second Grade Voidreavers, over a hundred advanced First Grade magical mantises, and thousands of insects at hismand. If it wasn¡¯t for his ¡®weak¡¯ Spirit holding him back, Billis could extend hismand to a legion of insectsrger than a human kingdom.


    After returning to the n headquarters, Billis immediately went to his room.


    He had no apprentices or teaching assignments. Apart from his mission and room, Billis never went anywhere else or participated in anything else, let alone those crowded banquets.


    In all honesty, growing stronger and evolving were the only two things that held meaning in Billis¡¯ world!


    However, before he could return to his usual, dull silence, a glowing fire rune appeared before his eyes and hovered silently in the air.


    Billis¡¯ heart moved when he saw this strange fire rune that represented Greem. He might not know what Greem had in mind for him, but hope rose in his heart.


    After a brief moment of hesitation, he reached out with his strange insectoid arm and touched the burning rune.


    Even though the rune clearly burned with bright golden mes, Billis did not feel his hand sear when he touched it. The golden mes roared, and the rune quickly extended to his arm and spread all over his body.


    Billis was still confused when the golden mespletely engulfed him. Lights flickered before his eyes, and he could feel space tremble around him. When he once again regained consciousness, he realized that the golden mes had dissipated, and he was now in a wide hall.


    Greem stood there across the hall, staring unblinkingly at him with his ck eyes.


    This ce was Fire Throne!


    Billis immediately understood.


    The n leader had used some sort of mysterious spell at that moment and had instantly teleported him here from over five thousand kilometers away.


    Billis¡¯ unusual, insectoid eyes only nced at Greem before looking away.


    It had only been an instant, but Billis had felt his eyes hurt as if they had been burned by fire. Greem had not even been actively using his powers.


    Billis couldn¡¯t help but feel his heart go cold at this.


    Once, he had been one of Greem¡¯s most powerful ¡®assistants,¡¯ closely following at his side. Now, even staring directly at his brilliance inflicted bacsh on him.


    The difference in power between them couldn¡¯t help but make Billis dejected!


    ¡°Billis, do you know why I called you here today?¡± Greem¡¯s voice was clear and crisp. His words lingered in the hall as if resonating with the environment.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know! Please tell me, n leader.¡± Billis hurriedly bowed, fearful and respectful.


    ¡°Take a look at this first!¡± Greem tapped his staff, and a rift appeared in midair. Half of a powerful creature¡¯s corpse slowly flew out of the rift.


    Those light green scales, those white, holy wings, and that terrifying aura that remained even after death. Billis gulped with some difficulty. His sickly green eyes fixated upon this strange corpse as an irrepressible voice within him was shouting, roaring ¡®Devour it...devour it.¡¯


    It was the corpse of a high-grade magical creature. Even though the body had been split apart and only half remained, its overwhelming, domineering aura was still as strong as ever.


    Billis couldn¡¯t help but guess wildly in his heart when he saw this corpse. Was it Fourth Grade? Or Fifth Grade?


    A power that Billis could not fullyprehend, so tremendous and profound, remained in the corpse, intimidating all who dared to approach it. However, as overwhelming as this power was, a dead creature was a dead creature, after all. The lifeless inactivity of the body was in for all to see.


    ¡°My lord, this is...¡± Billis¡¯ heart beat wildly. He suppressed the restlessness in his heart and behaved even more subservient that before.


    ¡°This is a spoil of war the n brought back from the Seawoods ne. It is the only native god of Seawoods ne. It used to be Fifth Grade, but it fell to Fourth Grade due to specific reasons, which was why we were able to kill it!¡± Greem looked at the corpse calmly. ¡°I called you here to ask you a question. If...I let you devour this corpse, how far could you go?¡±


    Billis felt his entire mind go nk when he heard that, as if a bolt of lightning had sted him on a perfectly clear day. After several minutes, he gathered his thoughts and focused once more.


    ¡°My lord, since this divine creature once reached Fifth Grade, it must possess an immortal body. If I devour it, my potential will rise from peak Second Grade to Fourth Grade. When that happens, my chances of advancing to Third Grade will be 100%, and my chances of reaching Fourth Grade will also be as high as 60%.¡±


    Greem listened silently. The Chip¡¯s assessment agreed with Billis¡¯ evaluation.


    Billis¡¯ most significant problem currently didn¡¯t lie with himself. Ity with the Queen Bug that had assimted with him. The Queen Bug¡¯s limit was once intermediate Third Grade. However, the forceful reversal of its assimtion with Acteon had caused its potential to fall to peak Second Grade.


    With the corpse of this divine creature, it could raise its potential once again. That was well within the Chip¡¯s calctions.


    Greem had thought of asking the Death Witches to turn this corpse into an advanced Fourth Grade undead creature. However, the Chip had determined that an advanced Fourth Grade undead creature could not match the value of two future Fourth Grade subordinates!


    That was why Greem had opened the doors to his treasury and used these resources to create loyal, high-grade fighters for the n. Billis might be inferior to Arms when it came to individual fighting power. However, his unusual method of manipting swarms to devour his enemies often had unexpected effectiveness in certain situations.


    No other Fourth Grade adept would dare waste such resources on their subordinates before they could confirm their own advancement. Only Greem had such absolute confidence in himself that he dared to bestow his juniors with Fourth Grade resources, creating so many individuals with the potential of reaching Fourth Grade in the n.


    Even though it was a bit of a waste to hand over half of a divine creature¡¯s corpse to Billis, a mere advanced Second Grade adept, it wasn¡¯t a big deal. A small loss in benefits at the moment was more than worth it for the future of the Crimson n.


    Greem controlled Arms through the dragonsoul contract.


    Greem had to find a method of doing so for the bug adept as well. However, before he even came up with an idea, Billis had already hastily offered up a suggestion.


    Bloodsoulbined with a Primal Voodoo Curse.


    Methods of control that remained effective at higher grades all had to do with the soul.


    This suggestion of using Bloodsoul and Primal Voodoo Curse from Billis was abination of two spells that affected the soul directly. Judging from this, Billis didn¡¯t seem opposed to having another person control his soul.


    Greem had walked too easy a path. He had no idea of the despair and agony that Billis had felt for all these years, the pain of never being able to improve. Without Greem¡¯s help, Billis alone would never have found a way forward.


    That was because the resources and items that could solve his problems were not things he coulde into contact with at his level!


    Rather than stay trapped at his current level and die of old age as a Second Grade, it was better to present his value and be a loyal subordinate beneath a powerful adept like Greem. Handing over his soul and offering up his loyalty with both hands was the best way to gain Greem¡¯s trust!


    Thus, it wasn¡¯t a matter of Greem finding a way to control Billis; it was Billis trying his best to offer himself up to gain Greem¡¯s favor.


    In all honesty, a single word from Greem would have plenty of individuals willing to offer up their souls for the chance to advance to Fourth Grade. When that happened, Billis would no longer have such an easy opportunity to gain such valuable resources!

 Chapter 1222 - Greem’s Home Life

    Chapter 1222 Greem¡¯s Home Life


    After giving out most of the top-ss resources, Greem could finally let out a breath of relief.


    He intended to take this opportunity to slow down and umte power.


    The growth of the Crimson n required time, and so did his personal growth.


    Time was always on his side!


    Thus, Greem went into hiding in Fire Throne and vanished from the public eye once again. This period of seclusionsted for a long, eighty years.


    ............


    Fire Throne, fifth level.


    After several magical expansions, the inside of this small tower had changed drastically.


    As a base of development for the Crimson n, Fire Throne would still be too small of a space. It could no longer house the forces of the n, now growing daily. However, as a private, sealed space reserved for Greem¡¯s exclusive use, the tower¡¯s area was frightfullyrge.


    Apart from a dozen security and maintenance magical machines, Greem and Shadow Demon were the only ones who could ess the fifth level and its tens of thousands of square meters of space. Even Mary, who had extremely high ess levels, only came here to ¡®visit¡¯ every so often. She spent most of her time visiting on the fourth level, where Greem¡¯s room was.


    Meanwhile, Alice, who had simr levels of ess, hardly ever set foot in Fire Throne. She was always busy with the cultivation and development of the Fate Witches in her Tower of Fate. Even when Greem wanted to get intimate, he was the one who had to run over to the Tower of Fate to find her.


    The door to Greem¡¯s room burst open in the morning.


    Greem stretched his aching waist and rubbed his slightly trembling legs as he shambled past the steel doors, tired and yawning.


    The luxurious room behind him was aplete mess now.


    Thevish bedframe carved out of purpleheart timber was now a wreck. It hardly looked like a bed anymore. It was as if a terrifying typhoon had ravaged the room. Pieces of broken furniturey everywhere.


    Maryy amidst this wreckage, her naked body as white and smooth as ever. Even though she was asleep, her unimaginable curves, radiant cheeks, and glowing skin were still incredibly seductive.


    The ¡®fight¡¯st night had been a little too intense. Neither of them had managed to hold back their strength. It was a fairlymon thing. Their time together always ended up in a brutal ¡®battle.¡¯


    Their excess powers and energy would radiate into the surroundings while they tussled together. This ordinary furniture didn¡¯t stand a chance against the ¡®might¡¯ of two Fourth Grade adepts!


    Greem¡¯s base Physique had remained at 30 points ever since he advanced to Fourth Grade. Improving his Physique by even a single point was incredibly difficult. If it weren¡¯t for the mushrooms he had brought back from the Spirit World, his Physique would still be at 28 points!


    Meanwhile, Mary¡¯s Physique had been rapidly increasing ever since she advanced to Fourth Grade. Her Physique was now at 24 points.


    Those 24 points were a tremendous level of Physique. Only demon lords and legendary monsters spoken of by the mortals could have such incredible Physique.


    It was this rapid increase in their Physique that caused the two adepts¡¯ ¡®battle¡¯ to reach such intensity andst for so long.


    Finally, after seventeen hours and thirty-six minutes of bitter ¡®fighting¡¯ and ¡®meleebat,¡¯ Greem won by a slight margin with his superior Physique and techniques!


    However, by the time he walked out of the room, he was already stumbling and could barely straighten his back.


    Greem dragged his aching body across the corridor and arrived at a bright hall. Arge and long table had been ced at the center of the room above its shiny floor. All sorts of delicious delicacies and drinks had been ced here.


    A strange, stone chair had sat at the end of the table. Four pretty and slender women waited on him at each side of the table. These women had dark skin that glowed with a healthy radiance. Their slim waists and figures might make them seem weak, but their bodies contained explosive power in truth.


    The faint marks of magical brands could be seen through their loose, thin clothes.


    They were members of the diverse elf race. They belonged to a strange branch of the higher elves known as night elves.


    Greem¡¯s muscr body was only covered by a light robe. The end of the robe dragged along the ground as he walked barefoot across the hall with his long, crimson hair rolling down his shoulders. His entire being was the very incarnation of pride and arrogance.


    The night elves waiting on both sides of the table hurriedly pulled the heavy stone chair out when they saw Greem arrive. They helped him sit down and proceeded to carry the tes to him.


    The night elves who could serve Greem here were all at least of the Second Grade. On the outside, they all could have been reputed fighters of their own. Here, they could only y the role of a weak maid, serving their one and only master to the best of their abilities.


    Ever since they were sold to this tower, they had be eternal prisoners to this giant cell.


    The secrets of the tower, the personal habits of the adept, and the defensive mechanisms of the tower were ssified secrets that could never be leaked. As servants belonging to this tower, they would no longer be able to leave this ce until their deaths.


    Greem had purchased these servants because they were pretty, but also because he needed someone to take care of his daily life.


    As a high-grade adept, Greem spent most of his time in theboratories and on breaking in the artifacts sealed in the isted dimensions. He had no time to deal with the trivial matters of daily life, such as eating or showering.


    Naturally, these servants would help him with those things instead!


    Greem was a Fourth Grade adept, after all. His every movement and breath carried with them an indescribable power. Terrifying elementium radiation would be left behind where he walked.


    Ordinary human maids would have died a painful death from the overwhelming amount of elementium radiation if they stayed in such an environment for an extended period. Only servants like these, who had some degree of power, couldst longer.


    As such, the personal towers of most high-grade adepts would purchase or kidnap high-quality servants like these to serve them. Moreover, they were often treated as disposable.


    In contrast, Greem gave all of them Talismans of Fire Resistance. He also created a living environment for the servants on the second level that resembled their former homes.


    Such ¡®acts of kindness¡¯ were rare for high-grade adepts like himself!


    Greem sat upon the stone chair, quickly cutting up a fire dragon steak with his utensils before putting it in his mouth, chewing, and finally swallowing it.


    Even though the maids prepared many dishes for Greem of great variety, he still preferred such fire dragon steaks that were lightly vored and simply prepared. Dragon meat, dragon tendons, dragon bones, and dragon marrow were either incredibly tough or contained an unimaginable amount of fire elementium.


    Any other adept who attempted to eat fire dragon steak would find, to their agony, that the meat was so incredibly tough it could rival enchanted leather armor. They wouldn¡¯t be able to tear off even a strip of flesh, even if they ground their teeth to pieces.


    The dragon tendons in the meat were even more miserable. It was impossible to bite through the tendons if you did not have sufficient jaw strength.


    Meanwhile, the bones themselves could not be cracked or damaged without at least a Sharpening Spell of Second Grade and above.


    Only high-grade adepts like Greem, with sufficient Physique and Strength¨Calong with the aid of certain spells¨Ccould so easily tear and devour a dragon steak.


    As for the other dishes? They might be well-prepared and more delicious than fire dragon steak, but the energy contained within them wasparativelycking. After such a hard ¡®fight,¡¯ Greem would not be able to replenish his energy even if he ate a hundred kilograms of ordinary food.


    At his level, the primal digestive system of humans appeared inefficient and troublesome. Eating as humans did was vastly inferior and ineffectivepared to directly devouring energy crystals.


    However, maintaining the loose connection between humans and adepts, keeping the form of a human, and some of their customs was something that high-grade adepts should strive to do.


    While Greem dealt with the dragon steak with all his might and attention, a slender night elf with perfect etiquette reported the tower¡¯s resource situation.


    ¡°There are only five tons of fire dragon meat left. I have already informed Lord Gargamel to hunt another Third Grade fire dragon.


    ¡°There are only three sets of furniture left in the tower. I have been meaning to ask you if all the furniture in your room should be changed out for obsidian furniture. Otherwise, the turnover rate is a little too high.


    ¡°Lady Meryl has sent an abyssal subus over. She is only three hundred years old, a lifespan equivalent to a seven-year-old human girl. She¡¯s waiting on the lower levels at the moment. When will you be appraising her?¡±


    Greem¡¯s mouth was stuffed full of dragon meat. His jaw ached slightly from all the chewing. He was only listening somewhat to the maid¡¯s report.


    Finally, he swallowed the meat with some difficulty and washed it all down with the wine on the table. He then patted his chest and exhaled.


    ¡°A subus...I haven¡¯t seen these abyssal creatures since I was an apprentice. They are truly rare beauties. Where did Meryl manage to get her hands on one of them?¡±


    ¡°Lady Meryl mentioned that this subus came from the Capital of Steel in space. She has been asking to see you, my lord, and seems to have a certain purpose in mind!¡±


    Space...an abyssal subus...


    Greem paused for a moment. He couldn¡¯t help but frown and think.

 Chapter 1223 - Unexpected Visitor

    Chapter 1223 Unexpected Visitor


    The World of Abyss was also known as the home of the demons.


    It sheltered demons, as they represented its evil and twisted origin.


    Almost all Abyssal demons were formed by the corruption of an evil soul or will by the Abyss consciousness.


    Apart from the moremon demons, many other evil creatures also lived in the World of Abyss. They included demon-hunting spiders, bodaks, all sorts of undead, ghosts, corrupted mortals, and even more damnable existences.


    The only ones who could survive in the World of Abyss were powerful, evil madmen, with no exceptions!


    However, amidst all the ugly, evil, and chaotic demonic creatures, the subi were undoubtedly the most weed in other worlds.


    They had pretty looks, explosive figures, and an instinct carved into their very gics to obey the powerful. They would go to any lengths to seduce and please their masters. Consequently, many high-grade adepts would keep subi servants in their personal towers.


    However, even though subi might look pretty and seductive, they were still cruel, evil, and twisted at their very core. If they managed to get hold of your weakness, they would crush you beneath their feet without any hesitation the very next moment, even if they had just been subserviently obeying your orders earlier. They would let you know the full extent of the cruelty and evil that demons were capable of!


    That was why even Greem, as smart as he was, couldn¡¯t quite figure out the purpose of the subusing here to seek an audience with him.


    Greem met the subus in a hall on the second level.


    When the subus slowly walked into the room, Greem narrowed his eyes and assessed the demon.


    Her white skin was smooth as jade, and small purple spots could be faintly seen on her upper arm. Her red lips were like zing mes, and her glowing, red eyes made her look cute and petite. Her appearance could very easily draw out a sense of protectiveness from male creatures.


    Subi did not have a habit of wearing armor. Most of this subus¡¯ skin was exposed, with only a few key areas covered by a thinyer of dark scales. These scales were spread in a very ¡®artistic¡¯ fashion. They barely covered the tips of herrge breasts and her crotch.


    Rather than protection or modesty, these scales served more the purpose of seduction.


    Therge, crimson wings on her back, her agile tail, twisted horns, and hooved feet were all evidence of her identity as a subus. It only increased her attraction, making her feel like more of an exotic beauty to be treasured.


    Even in the face of an overwhelming Fourth Grade fire adept like Greem, this young subus showed no signs of fear. Rather, she continually unted her seductive figure and looks the moment she entered.


    ¡°Speak up then...which Abyssal Lord are you subordinate to? Why have youe here to seek an audience?¡± Greem narrowed his eyes, a dangerous light glowing deep within.


    His domineering spiritual-pressure filled the entire hall. The fire elementium in the room started to move with the slight change in his emotions. It was almost as if a storm of fire would begin at any moment.


    This entire tower was Greem¡¯s territory. Naturally, this hall itself was also filled with his dense fire aura.


    In a world of fire, Greem was the absolute tyrant and ruler!


    Any slight shift in Greem¡¯s emotions while he was in this domain of his would trigger tremors in the fire elementium, resulting in horrifying cmities.


    How could a mere advanced First Grade subus ever hope to resist the spiritual pressure of a Fourth Grade adept? Her face instantly went pale. She wrapped her arms around herself, her knees buckling, and began shivering uncontrobly on the ground.


    Even terrified by Greem¡¯s aura, her every movement was still as seductive as ever. Even her action of wrapping her arms around herself only further emphasized her trembling breasts, making her look even more vulnerable and weak.


    ¡°Hmph! Brat, your techniques won¡¯t work on me!¡± Greem sneered coldly and waved his hand. A massive hand of fire appeared above the subus, threatening to crush her at any moment. ¡°Spit out your purpose here now, or......¡±


    ¡°O¡¯ revered Lord Greem, I...I am a subordinate of Prince Gerobarrick. It...it was Lord Kzoyde that made mee to see you.¡± The subus was actually terrified now. She shouted out her answer as loudly as she could.


    Gerobarrick, Kzoyde.


    Greem waved away the hand of fire and started brooding in silence.


    Why did these two names sound familiar to him?


    Adepts had extraordinary Spirit, after all. Retentive memory and rapid calctions were child¡¯s y to them. Greem still had an impression of these two names, even though he had only heard them in passing a hundred years ago.


    However, before he even needed to recollect where he heard the names, the Chip had already searched his mind and found memories rted to these two names.


    Kzoyde was a ming Demon with a sizeable force behind him. Greem had met him in a market in the Fire Elementium ne. That Kzoyde had imed to be a subordinate of Prince Gerobarrick when he introduced himself.


    Memories shed past Greem¡¯s mind as he remembered everything.


    ¡°True, I do know of a ming Demon known as Kzoyde. What¡¯s the matter? Why did he send you here?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    ¡°Lord Kzoyde is overjoyed to hear that Lord Greem has advanced to Fourth Grade. As such, he sent me here, hoping to establish directmunications with you, my lord. Furthermore, he wishes to meet you in person as well,¡± The subus shivered as she spoke.


    ¡°Meet me...then have him speak with me personally!¡± Greem¡¯s gaze turned sharp as he pointed at the subus. The power hidden in her body was instantly forced to appear.


    A dark-red light appeared from her body, quickly turning into a tall Second Grade ming Demon. The demon¡¯s chest was covered in evil tattoos, two long horns grew from the top of his head, and a cape of me fluttered behind him.


    Judging from the energy aura that his entire person emitted, this was only an energy projection, rather than the person himself.


    It had been a long time since theyst met. This ming Demon had advanced from advanced to peak Second Grade. Given the intensity of the fire gathering in his body, he was probably going to turn into a Lord of Ashes soon.


    The subus grunted and fell unconscious the moment the ming demon appeared.


    ¡°Lord Greem, we meet again!¡± Kzoyde hastily bowed when he saw Greem. His tone carried with it a trace of exasperation.


    Two hundred long yearster, he had only taken a small step forward in his evolution as a demon. Yet, the fire adept in front of him had risen from Second Grade to Fourth Grade, an advancement of two major grades.


    The difference was massive.


    As someone who had met Greem both then and now, Kzoyde could feel the tremendous change in their rtive positions. The emotions and feelings invoked by this experience were not something that others could hope to understand!


    ¡°We don¡¯t know each other all that well, do we? Why have you gone to such lengths to climb out of the World of Abyss to find me? What is it that you wish to talk about?¡± Greem coldly said.


    ¡°Truly direct and straightforward, Lord Greem. I won¡¯t be holding anything back then. I am not actually the one who wanted to speak with you. It isn¡¯t the lord I serve either. Rather, it¡¯s someone powerful from another world. I am very sorry for this, but to prevent a leak of information, I cannot state the name of that person here. However, I have a message from him here for you. I hope you will ept it.¡±


    ¡°And the message?¡±


    Kzoyde smiled and exploded into sparks without a second word.


    Meanwhile, the unconscious subus suddenly shivered and woke up. She quickly got up from the ground.


    ¡°Mm? What happened to me? My...my head hurts!¡±


    A thought shot through Greem¡¯s mind. He couldn¡¯t help but smile gently and wave his hand at the girl.


    ¡°Come over here!¡±


    The subus shivered and hesitated on the spot. She didn¡¯t dare move forward.


    Greem had no time to waste on her. He motioned with his hand, and the subus flew towards him, restricted by an unknown power.


    Greem ced his hand on the subus¡¯ forehead, and thousands of strands of Spirit prated her head like serpents of fire. The next moment, the Chip¡¯s notification rang out in Greem¡¯s mind.


    [Beep. Detecting unknown data stream. No traps or harmful substances have been found upon examination.. Requesting instructions from host. Receive data?]


    ¡°Receive!¡±


    As Greem gave his order, a strange flow of data surged into his mind, quickly turning into a recording of a sequence of events.


    Greem watched and listened quietly. He quickly understood everything.


    A short momentter, when Greem finally let go, the subus¡¯ eyes went white as she copsed to the ground.


    What borate design.


    This subus was only a messenger.


    The information to be conveyed had been hidden deep in her mind, and she had no idea. Moreover, those images and recordings had vanished without a trace after Greem received them!


    The main reason why the sender of this message had gone to such lengths andplexities was that certain information could not be orally or textually conveyed. Should they be spoken or written, the individuals involved behind the scenes could pick up on the fact that they were being mentioned!


    Greem looked at the unconscious subus and considered for a brief moment. He then picked up a small golden bell beside him and shook it. A short momentter, the calm,posed leader of the maids walked out.


    ¡°Take her downstairs! Keep in her the tower. There¡¯s no need to restrict her movements, but she cannot be allowed to leave the tower ormunicate with the outside world.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    The maid did not know why she should be doing these things, but she knew well enough not to ask. She waved her hand and summoned two other night elves, who carried the subus away.


    Greem stood silently in ce for a moment before sighing and erupting into mes as he returned to his room.

 Chapter 1224 - Dealing with the Orb of the Fire God.

    Chapter 1224 Dealing with the Orb of the Fire God.


    Inside an isted dimension.


    As the mes in the corners of the space gathered together, Greem¡¯s muscr figure slowly materialized.


    However, the moment his soul aura appeared, a dense and massive fireball shot towards him and crashed into his body.


    This fireball was nearly five meters in diameter, filled with liquid fire energy so dense it had almost turned solid. The heat radiating from the edge of the fireball was already enough to destabilize the space. The milky-white barrier that marked the boundaries of this dimension creaked under the tremendous load of energy.


    Such a terrifying fireball obviously burned at an incredible heat. Just the surface of the fireball already reached thousands of degrees, while the core of the fireball had hit upwards of ten thousand degrees.


    A Third Grade adept wouldn¡¯t even need to be hit by the fireball to turn to ashes. They might roast to death just by standing too close.


    Greem showed no signs of panic when he saw such a horrifying fireball crash towards him. Instead, he simply smiled.


    ¡°Stop fooling around! Show me your true form!¡± Greem chuckled as he said. He then reached into the fireball with his hand and pulled out the silently burning orb within.


    As his palm trembled slightly, the fireball that had lost its core immediately erupted and dissipated into the sea of fire around him.


    The entire space instantly zed with fire.


    Greem did not seem to care. He stood amidst the mes quietly as he toyed with the orb in his hand.


    Eighty years. Eighty long years.


    Greem had been fighting with this Orb of the Fire God daily all these years.


    The brand of that powerful Fire God had fully assimted with the fire origin of the orb. Trying to erase itpletely was an impossible task. Greem¡¯s only solution was to seal the divine brand and cut off its control over the orb.


    Such a task was still a monumental one. However, Greem was backed by a Fourth Grade Fate Witch. Suppressed by Alice¡¯s Hourss of Time and Staff of Divination¨Ctwo powerful artifacts in their own right¨CGreem finally managed to project a fire clone into the orb and supnted the divine brand¡¯s position.


    The Orb¡¯s power weakened in doing so, and several of its abilities were also sealed away. However, it ultimately put the orb in Greem¡¯s control.


    It was only at this moment that Greem had truly gained control of the Orb of the Fire God!


    From now on, this orb truly belonged to him.


    Greem toyed with the orb, silently feeling the plentiful and overwhelming fire energy within. He could sense the presence of his soul aura in every strand and every spark of fire energy inside the orb. With a single thought from Greem, the fire energy within the orb would move ording to his will, freely forming whatever state he wished, as if it was his own limb.


    Greem gripped the Orb of the Fire God tightly as a light flickered in his eyes. The sea of fire inside the dimension gathered and dissipated under his will, sometimes forming into brilliant fireballs soaring across the air, asionally turning into bright red birds that danced in the sky, and sometimes transforming into a threatening beast.


    Greem controlled the mes and yed with them. His understanding of fire energy deepened as the mes continued to shift from form to form.


    Greem might have been able to control fire in the past and had even mastered four firews, but the marks of his maniption were still too obvious. Unlike now. The fire was him, and he was the fire. The two of them were closely connected and were showing signs ofplete assimtion.


    The Chip projected the most recent analysis of Greem¡¯s body in his mind.


    [Greem. Male. Fourth Grade Principle Adept (Fire Specialization).


    Chaos Physique (Excellent Magic Resistance). Starbeast Bloodline (13%). Heart of Principles (56% Mastery).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 31 | Agility 19 | Spirit 44.


    Bloodline Talent: Energy ckhole.


    Fire Laws: Increased Fire Range, Increased Fire Effectiveness, Fire Pration, Invisible mes, Critical Fires.]


    At Greem¡¯s level, even a slight increase in power required a colossal investment of resources and time.


    After eighty long years of daily meditations and training, Greem had only managed to increase his Spirit by 4 points. Part of this had even been thanks to the various strange mushrooms.


    The mutated mushrooms had now lost all effectiveness on Greem. He would have to find new high-grade resources again if he wanted to elerate his progress!


    The constant battling with the Orb of the Fire God and the Libram of Wisdom over the years had benefitted Greem greatly as well.


    His mastery over the Heart of Principles had increased from 48% to 56%. That gave him ess to one new firew: Critical Fires.


    Under the effects of thisw, Greem could freely enhance an offensive spell with twice the fire damage. The cost of this was double the exhaustion on his magic power.


    Greem¡¯s offensive power was already top of the line and exceedingly scary. With this ability to further enhance his attacks, Greem¡¯s spells were devastating.


    However, with Greem¡¯s 44 points of Spirit, the unrestrained use of this Critical Firew would rapidly exhaust his Spirit. Fortunately, the Orb of the Fire God could relieve the strain on his limited Spirit.


    [Item Name: Orb of the Fire God


    Item Categorization: Elementium Orb (Artifact)


    Item Attribute: Fire


    Item Grade: Fifth Grade


    Basic Attributes: +3 Spirit | +2 Physique


    Enhancements: 300% increase in power to passive and summoning fire-spells.


    Unique Item Effects: Fire Breathing, Fire Mending, zing Berserker, Fire Immunity (Intermediate)


    Item Abilities: Scorched Earth (Fifth Grade divine fire spell, sealed), Inferno Armor (1700 points of defensive power), Dimension of mes (Self-contained fire dimension, capable of containing up to three fire creatures)]


    As the Orb of the Fire God slowly fell under Greem¡¯s control, its attributes were gradually revealed.


    Compared to Fourth Grade magical equipment, the Fifth Grade Orb¡¯s power was obviously on another level.


    Disregarding everything else, just its unique effects alone made Greem overjoyed.


    While Greem remained within mes, he would gain the abilities of Fire Breathing (passively absorb surrounding fire energy to replenish exhausted energy), Fire Mending (absorb surrounding mes to heal wounds), zing Berserker (300% increase in movement speed while walking in fire), and intermediate Fire Immunity.


    All these effectsbined made Greem possess fire abilities as diverse as a Fire Lord!


    Moreover, the Orb had a self-contained fire dimension of its own that could store three fire creatures. Greem couldmit to cultivating three powerful fire creatures as his subordinates. He could keep them in his Orb and release them as a hidden ace at crucial moments in battle.


    The enhancement provided by the Orb of the Fire God was also impressive.


    It was 300%. Even though this enhancement was limited to passive and summoning spells, it was still a tremendous improvement to Greem¡¯sbat prowess. The most obvious change was to Greem¡¯s Burning Domain, which had been gradually getting less useful as his enemies increased in power. Burning Domain¡¯s strength had increased from 200 points to over 600, and even 700, points of power.


    Such power was more than enough to pose a threat to an ordinary Fourth Grade adept!


    Greem¡¯s favorite megate spell could also now summon a great deal more fire creatures. It was an increase from 500 to 1,500 fire creatures. In a certain sense, Greem was now even more terrifying than adepts that specialized at summoning.


    Unfortunately, the Fifth Grade divine spell contained within the Orb of the Fire God was now useless due to the divine brand being sealed away. It was basically a missed opportunity for Greem to gain ess to Fifth Grade fire spells before he reached that level. It was a huge shame!


    Once he was done appraising the Orb of the Fire God, Greem took out the Fire Coral Staff from his Elder¡¯s Ring.


    He gently ced the orb at the tip of the staff. The orb clicked as the fire crystal that had been fixed in ce by four coral tendrils fell off. Greem put the Orb of the Fire God in its ce, and the four coral tendrils converged once more, wrapping around the orb and fixing it in ce.


    Greem then lifted the fire crystal that fell off and put it away.


    In all honesty, this crystal was a potent item as well. Sadly, it was utterly inferior whenpared to the Fifth Grade Orb of the Fire God.


    After dealing with the Orb of the Fire God, Greem turned and left this isted dimension. Instead, he went to the dimension where he had ced the Libram of Wisdom.


    A small altar silently functioned here. The Libram of Wisdom was ced here, stacked with another unusual book. The energy projection of the two books was somewhat merged together.


    As the Orb of the Fire God waspatible with Greem¡¯s origin attribute, it had been possible to suppress the divine brand with the might of the Fate artifacts. However, the Libram of Wisdom was the primary artifact forged by the God of Wisdom for his personal use. There was almost no chance of suppressing the divine brand inside.


    Since there was no chance of erasing the divine brand, the only option was to simply destroy the Libram.


    Greem was decisive, as well. He immediately summoned Remi and returned him to his former state¨C his scroll form. However, Remi still kept his intelligence and consciousness.


    Through the power of the Bloody Altar and Greem¡¯s aid, the Scroll of Voodoo started to devour the Libram of Wisdom slowly.


    This process was exceedingly slow and difficult. A bacsh had almost urred several times.


    Fortunately, the Libram of Wisdom was only a ¡®dead¡¯ object. Without Hierro¡¯s control, it was quite hard for a Fifth Grade artifact to resist the corruption of the Bloody Altar with its instincts alone. Additionally, with Remi¡¯s intervention as an artifact spirit, it was a rtively smooth process of assimtion.


    Remi¡¯s weak soul projection appeared above the books when he sensed Greem¡¯s arrival.


    ¡°How is it? How deep is the assimtion now?¡± Greem asked.


    ¡°87%,¡± Remi replied lethargically. ¡°I need resources. I need energy...this is a really tough nut to crack. You are going to have to find something to replenish my power!¡±


    Was it 87%? That meant it would take a minimum of another twenty years for Remi to devour the Libram full.


    ¡°I understand. I will collect the resources you need as soon as possible and bring them to you. Just stay here and finish the task without any worries!¡±


    Greem examined the assimtion progress. After confirming that there were no problems, he finally left the isted dimension.

 Chapter 1225 - True Aristocrats

    Chapter 1225 True Aristocrats


    The Crimson n.


    A ring, reputed name.


    It had risen from nothing to an age of glory in the centralnds in a mere two hundred years.


    Two hundred years. That might be long enough for an ordinary human, but for high-grade adepts that stood at the very peak of the world, it was no more than a glimpse in time.


    Two hundred years might be enough for a First Grade adept to reach the end of their lifespan, and two hundred years might only allow a high-grade adept to improve slightly. But for the Crimson n, two hundred years was already enough for it to grow into maturity and achieve its current excellence.


    Due to the limitations set down by the Witch Council, Alice was never able to announce her rtionship with Greem publicly.


    Consequently, in the eyes of outsiders, the Crimson n only had two Fourth Grade adepts.


    However, this number was quickly overwritten as an even more terrifying Fourth Grade appeared within the Crimson n ranks. His rise to Fourth Grade had drawn increasing attention from the high-grade adepts and made them warier. Rumors and gossip rted to the Crimson n started to spread all over thend.


    Third Grade Thunder Dragon Arms had returned to the Crimson n in domineering fashion, appearing before the public as the third Fourth Grade powerhouse of the n!


    Three Fourth Grades gathered in a single n. Such a thing had never happened before in Zhentarim.


    The Crimson n was now an undisputed ultra-n, a glorious aristocrat family that reigned above all other ns in the centralnds.


    If the Fourth Grade adepts of Zhentarim had only been wondering if Greem had the ambition to unite Zhentarim, they were now certain.


    The only question was when he would set his ambition into motion!


    The Crimson n¡¯s meteoric rise also put the Zhentarim Association¡¯s leadership in an awkward position.


    The one dream they had harbored for centuries had not been able toe to fruition. Now, a Fourth Grade adept had appeared out of nowhere and taken up the position they had always yearned for, bing the center of attention and power of the entire Zhentarim area.


    They hated to see this, but there was nothing they could do!


    Apart from the three Fourth Grades of the Crimson n, Zhentarim had fourteen other Fourth Grade adepts. If they could unite their forces, they would most certainly be able to suppress Greem¡¯s growing influence and power.


    Unfortunately, everyone had desires of their own. They each had their own ns and schemes.


    Asking them to contribute their forces and obey the orders of the n in an organized assault on the Crimson n¡¯s influence was a good idea. Still, it was a fantasy that would nevere to materialize.


    This much was evident from Chairman Freed and Vice-Chairman Mirva¡¯s rtionship.


    The two of them had been partners for five hundred years now. They were extremely close, yet their n forces showed no signs of assimtion.


    The main reason for such a phenomenon was because no powerful adept had appeared in the centralnds in thousands of years. Without a strong central figure, the centralnds would always remain in a state of separation, never bound together in a single force.


    With this period of umtion and expansion, the Crimson n¡¯s foundations had grown ever firmer and more robust.


    Apart from their leaders, the Third Grade force that formed the backbone of their military had also taken shape. They were terrifying, both in quality and quantity.


    Third Grade:


    Vampire Faction: Blood Knight Soros (intermediate Third Grade), Blood Mage Isa (beginner Third Grade), Shapeshifter Spa (beginner Third Grade), Rothers (advanced Third Grade), Disais (intermediate Third Grade), Bechdel (intermediate Third Grade), Morses (intermediate Third Grade).


    Human Adepts: Fire Dragon Adept Meryl (beginner Third Grade), Bug Adept Billis (intermediate Third Grade), Mystique Emelia (beginner Third Grade), Dragon Devourer Oliven (intermediate Third Grade).


    Brain-Monster Faction: Brain-Monster Gazlowe (peak Third Grade), Split-Brain Mok (beginner Third Grade).


    Goblin FRaction: Goblin Magical-Mechanic Locke (beginner Third Grade), Goblin Sage Snox (beginner Third Grade).


    As for the Second Grades? They were only even more extensive in number!


    During this time, the Crimson n had also umted a sizeable reserve of Queyras alloy through their continuous trade with Molten Fire City. In doing so, the magic generator furnace was no longer a limiting factor for the magical machine army.


    There was a time when a hidden force working behind the shadows had contacted Molten Fire City, attempting to pressure its owner and force them to cut off trade with the Crimson n. Just as the lord of Molten Fire City was about to do so, Greem approached him and offered up the mushrooms from the Spirit World for trade.


    Such excellent resources that could benefit even high-grade adepts were simply too much of a temptation. Alfred, the Lord of Molten Fire City, caved-in to Greem once more.


    Three species of those mutated mushrooms were used to trade for Queyras alloy, and the cooperation between the two ns continued.


    News of the Crimson n having ess to otherworldly resources that could increase the attributes of high-grade adepts instantly caused amotion throughout Zhentarim when it was leaked from Molten Fire City.


    As reluctant as they were to continue increasing the Crimson n¡¯s power, the high-grade adepts of Zhentarim could not cut off their desire for more power. They couldn¡¯t help but send out representatives in hopes of purchasing these resources from the Crimson n.


    A resource that could increase the base attribute of a Fourth Grade adept was invaluable.


    That was why many Fourth Grade adepts whose progress of improvement had stalled entirely had no choice but to open up their treasuries and offer their riches to trade with the Crimson n.


    After many negotiations and arguments, the Crimson n managed to procure a hundred siths of high-quality origin substance, two spacestones, seventeen bloodline purification potions, and six high-grade bloodline reconstruction potions through the trade of their mushrooms.


    Items that could be traded amongst Fourth Grade adepts were often high-grade resources and materials. As for powerful magical equipment? They didn¡¯t even have enough for their own use, let alone to be traded away to other adepts.


    Greem was already plenty surprised that they were able to obtain a hundred siths of origin substance in this manner.


    Origin substance represented the future of Fourth Grade adepts. It was an absolutely necessary resource for advancement. To think that someone would be willing to exchange origin substance for these mutated mushrooms. That was basically trading away their future for an immediate increase in their power.


    Greem could not judge if such an action were the right one.


    After all, he had not experienced the tragedy of not having any progress in his power for hundreds of years. Naturally, he could not understand the agony and despair of these adepts. Not everyone would be able to reach the limit of Fourth Grade and use the origin substance to be revered Great Adepts before the end of their lives.


    In such a case, it was best to give up on a pointless struggle early on and live in the moment. That might not necessarily be the right way of living!


    ............


    After a hundred years, Greem had once again returned to the Fire Elementium ne.


    Unlike other foreign worlds, Greem felt no difort or nar suppression in the Fire Elementium ne. In fact, he felt rxed, more so than ever, from his very soul to his body.


    The mes that covered the Fire Elementium ne had gathered around Greem the moment he stepped out of the portal. They gathered around him, forming circle after circle of mes. Some pure fire spirits that had been born in this world emerged out of nowhere and started dancing around Greem as well.


    These fire spirits followed him wherever he went as if he had be the ruler of this world of fire. It was as if the world as a whole breathed and moved to his will.


    However, Greem knew very well that he was no more than a medium. What truly attracted the fire spirits was the Orb of the Fire God embedded in his staff.


    To avoid others detecting the orb¡¯s presence, Greem had forcefully cut off the orb¡¯s resonance with the Fire Elementium ne and chased away the fire spirits lingering at his side.


    Greem closed his eyes and silentlymunicated with the world. He soon obtained information on his location from the fire elementium.


    The Fire Elementium ne was toorge. Without specific nar coordinates to guide him, Greem would never be able to reach his desired location in his entire life.


    When Greem was still a Second Grade adept, walking around the Fire Elementium ne had been a dangerous endeavor. Danger lurked in every corner. However, now that he had be a Fourth Grade adept, everything here seemed so easy.


    Traveling through the Fire Elementium ne seemed less like an adventure and more of a leisurely stroll!


    Perhaps it was the pure fire energy in Greem¡¯s body, but most fire creatures here mistook him for a local. As such, most roaming fire creatures minded their own business when he walked by. They no longer lunged at him as if he was the enemy.


    Greem was still dressed like an adept.


    He wore a red adept¡¯s robe and further covered himself with a ck cloak. The hood was pulled over his face, and he had his staff in hand. He walked across the fiery continent like a traveler casually sightseeing.


    When he was in a rush, he would teleport six or seven times with Fire Teleportation, crossing hundreds of kilometers with every teleportation. When he had time on his hands, he would break into the homes of intelligent fire creatures and visit the more powerful individuals among them. When he was bored, he would stop at somend of fire and build a small magical hut for himself before taking a nice nap.


    One had to admit that the world consciousness of the Fire Elementium ne was truly different. It did not give one any sense of urgency, or continuously push you towards improvement as the World of Adept did. Instead, it only contained an indescribable sense of leisure andziness.


    In all honesty, the Elementium Lords, Kings, and Monarchs of the four Elementium nes were far toozy.


    With the power and size of the elementium nes, they could form a horrifying flood of elementium creatures with a little effort and conquer most known higher civilizations.


    Unfortunately, elementium creatures seemed to be uninterested in conquering and invading other worlds. They wasted the tremendous amount of power they had and simply roamed thend leisurely with no higher purpose in mind!

 Chapter 1226 - Path of Flames

    Chapter 1226 Path of mes


    Only those who had experienced the might of the Fire Elementium ne could truly understand it.


    The Fire Elementium ne was incredibly vast. It had nearly a dozen times thendmass of the World of Adepts and was still continually growing and expanding.


    In truth, the Fire Elementium ne wasn¡¯t as peaceful and calm as it seemed on the surface.


    It didn¡¯t invade lesser nes ceaselessly as the World of Adepts did. But over the eons since the birth of the Fire Elementium ne, it had also invaded several famous space civilizations in history. However, it was uncertain if these invasions were intentional.


    The stories were always different but simr. The flow of events in each particr incident bore shocking simrities.


    It always started with the rise of a dominating species that conquered one world after another. When the power of the civilization reached a certain level, they would cast their gaze towards the Fire Elementium ne, a world with an endless source of troops and fire energy.


    Their past victories and sess caused these powerful civilizations to lose their minds. They dreamed of conquering and enving the elementium nes to turn them into resource nes from which they could take whatever they wanted.


    These civilizations had all undoubtedly overestimated their own strength and underestimated the true might of the elementium nes!


    When they opened a direct portal from their homeworld to the elementium ne, it wasn¡¯t them who initiated the charge. Instead, it was an endless horde of elementium creatures that surged into their world,manded by the Elementium Lords, Elementium Kings, and Elementium Monarchs.


    Their dream of conquering the elementium worlds did note to fruition. On the contrary, their homeworld became ravaged by hundreds of billions of elementium creatures.


    The direct connection between the two worlds also caused a sh inws between the nes. It didn¡¯t matter how well developed these newly risen nes were. How could theirws possiblypare to the ancient elementium nes inplexity and power? Thus, the narws were assimted, and an endless amount of elementium flooded the new world, causing devastating changes to its environment.


    Gradually, the new world would be assimted by the elementium ne, guided by the assimtion of theirws.


    The new world would vanish, and the elementium ne would grow much stronger andrger.


    Countless powerful beings and species had dreamed of challenging and conquering the elementium nes throughout history. Without exception, all of them had turned into the foundation stones upon which the elementium nes now stood. It had alle about by the elementium nes¡¯ ¡®passive¡¯ expansion.


    Greem had indeed expanded his worldview just by traveling through the Fire Elementium ne. He had seen countless fire creatures and diverse species of semi-elementium creatures.


    These semi-elementium creatures were new species formed from the assimtion of defeated native creatures from other nes. Such beings were not recorded in the Adept¡¯s Handbook and, thus, possessed research value.


    Dustfire Valley, with its strange, unusual scenery. The surging, overwhelming waves of the Sea of Ashes. The Sacred Fire Altar upon which countless fire creatures prayed and worshipped. The volcano ranges covered in smog and ck clouds.


    The environment of the Fire Elementium ne was truly harsh and severe. Ordinary nar creatures had no hopes of surviving in such a ce. However, this did not mean that there were very few living creatures in the Fire Elementium ne. The number of living things in the Fire Elementium ne probably exceeded the number of living things in an ordinary material ne.


    After all, the beings who lived in materials nes, especially intelligent species, often had far lower reproduction speeds than elementium creatures.


    Greem had witnessed the birth of a fire creature several times during his journey. Fire elementium would abruptly gather at a single point, lights would sh, and an ordinary fire spirit would be born, just like that!


    Greem had tried to decipher and research the source of these fire creatures¡¯ birth, but the scorching world consciousness always hindered his progress. He had immense trouble peeking behind the curtains at the secrets of the elementium ne.


    He wasn¡¯t a native creature of the Fire Elementium ne, after all. His soul consciousness was constantly rejecting the Fire Elementium ne¡¯s mental contamination, keeping himself from bing impulsive and easily enraged as the natives of this ce were. Adept was a profession that required intelligence and wisdom. Greem could not let his mind and soul be so easily taken over by changes in his emotions.


    It was because of this unique trait of the adepts that Greem appeared to be so discordant with this world.


    Unless he opened up his mind and willingly epted the origin contamination of the world consciousness, he would remain an outsider in the Fire Elementium ne, never able to be a part of this world.


    However, now that he had the Orb of the Fire God, he had a stable and firm mental connection with that vague, yet surely existent, world consciousness. He could obtain a faint understanding of the mes on a daily basis through every object and every life he came across.


    It indirectly furthered Greem¡¯s mastery over the firews!


    The Fire Elementium ne was the origin world that all fire creatures and wielders of fire dreamed of, after all. They could only find what they truly sought here in the Fire Elementium ne.


    Greem leisurely walked across this zing continent. With every breath, he took in the pure ¡®air¡¯ of the Fire Elementium ne. This air might reduce an ordinary human¡¯s lungs and windpipes to ashes in an instant, but it felt warm andfortable to Greem.


    With every deep breath, it felt as if his chest had been revitalized, and even his steps felt lighter.


    There were no humans to deal with, no menial affairs to look at, no concerns of pursuing enemies, no need to worry about politics. It was just him, alone, walking freely upon thisnd, free to do whatever he liked. This feeling of freedom was something that no other world or environment could give him.


    Greem stopped at the edge of a cliff along Skycrack Valley. He then started preparing a sumptuous feast for himself.


    The sky was a constant crimson in the Fire Elementium ne. There was no night or day. As such, even Greem himself had no idea whether this was breakfast, lunch, or dinner.


    As a Fourth Grade fire adept, he could instantly elementiumize his entire body and his Spirit. It had reduced the biological requirements of his human body to a minimum. He could go for months without food without any threat to his life. Still, out of his human habits, Greem would eat once a week to satisfy his human cravings.


    Greem put up the pot, started the fire, and quickly brewed a mushroom stew for himself. He then tossed in a few pieces of fire dragon meat as well. This makeshift camp was soon filled with a delicious, delectable fragrance.


    Just as Greem filled a bowl with the stew and prepared to dig in, the fire mist around him suddenly parted. A strange, elderly fire spirit walked out of the fog.


    ¡°That smells good! It¡¯s rare for there to be a guest here at Skycrack Valley. Would you mind if this old one bothered you for a moment?¡± This unusual fire spirit was clearly different from the rest of its kind. Most fire spirits had very vague facial features that could hardly be distinguished. However, this fire spirit not only had obvious facial features but even behaved like a human noble.


    More concerningly, the fire aura he radiated was that of a Fourth Grade.


    ¡°I suppose it¡¯s fate that we met. You can sit down and have a meal with me if you don¡¯t mind.¡± Greem smiled and replied.


    ¡°That sounds good.¡± The fire spirit immediately smiled. ¡°In all honesty, when I heard one of the younglings say that an otherworld traveler was wandering around here, I was only nning to take a quick look. Who would¡¯ve thought you were such a good cook? Of course, I had to approach you for a meal!¡±


    The elderly fire spirit brazenly sat down by the fire after exining his motivations. He lifted his nose and sniffed. He couldn¡¯t help but praise. ¡°It smells so good! Only travelers like you could bring such unusual delicacies into our world.¡±


    The fire spirit did not hold back at all. He took the utensils that Greem passed to him and immediately started enjoying the stew as he talked with Greem.


    Fire dragon meat filled with the essence of fire, strange mushrooms that could change the gics of high-grade lifeforms, a stew containing forty-one different spices and ingredients. Such a delicious meal was exceptionally valuable, even in the World of Adepts. Every mouthful of stew would cost a fortune.


    Just this pot of stew alone would cost a rough estimate of over two hundred thousand magical crystal. That was enough to purchase a small adept tower.


    ¡°So good...simply brilliant. I have never had such a good stew in my entire life. The meat is fire dragon meat, probably Third Grade. Just as fresh and delicious as I expected it to be. But what¡¯s in this mushroom stew? I have never tasted such a thing before. Are they mushrooms you cultivated yourself?¡± The fire spirit was a knowledgeable individual, after all. He had managed to tell the ingredients of the stew just from the taste of it alone.


    ¡°These mushrooms are special strains I got from the Spirit World. They can increase the activeness of a high-grade creature¡¯s cells and Spirit.¡± Greem did not conceal anything and gave a simple exnation.


    ¡°No wonder I feel so good after eating this stew. It¡¯s like I just went for a dip in the Sea of Ashes. I suppose I really have to thank you for this grand feast!¡± The old fire spirit couldn¡¯t help but fall speechless for a brief moment. ¡°I can¡¯t just eat your food without giving back. Here...take a look at these. Take anything that might be of use to you.¡±


    Having said that, the fire spirit waved his hand, and a rift tore in space. He took out a few strange items and put them in front of Greem.


    There was a fire marrow stone that was the size of an ordinary rock, glowing with bright yellow mes.


    There was the egg of an underground fire dragon, the size of a human head and covered in unusual magical patterns.


    There were also strange crystals the size of a fist, flickering like fire in a solid-state.


    A Fireze queen ant...the core of a magma beast ...and fire cores.


    Greem evaluated the items with a smile on his face, something unusual glowing in his eyes.

 Chapter 1227 - The King’s Invitation

    Chapter 1227 The King¡¯s Invitation


    Molten Fire Crystal.


    Greem¡¯s eyes gleamed, surprised to find a Molten Fire Crystal in the pile of treasures.


    It was a rare Fourth Grade fire material.


    If Greem didn¡¯t have the Orb of the Fire God, his second-best choice for a magic amplifier to embed in the fire coral staff would be a Molten Fire Crystal. However, now that he had something better, Greem didn¡¯t need it as much.


    The old fire spirit saw Greem silently toying with the Molten Fire Crystal and couldn¡¯t help but speak up, ¡°You have a good eye, sir. I found this Molten Fire Crystal in the depths of the Sea of Ashes. It can amplify all fire damage by 12% and is capable of projecting a Molten Shield with 900 points of power on its own. It¡¯s a very powerful Fourth Grade fire material.¡±


    However, the next second, the fire spirit¡¯s introduction came to a halt as he watched Greem pull out his staff from his storage equipment. The entire staff was forged from a crimson fire coral. Four coral tendrils twisted together at the top of the staff, wrapped around a strange orb glowing with golden mes.


    The entire world seemed to tremble and shake when he took the staff out. The winds howled, and the clouds gathered.


    The fire clouds hanging low in the skies started to spin around with the staff at their very center. They formed a vortex that funneled down towards the staff as if trying to merge with the orb sitting on top of it.


    Even the old fire spirit couldn¡¯t help but turn solemn at the sight. He could feel the fire energy within his body bing rowdy and unruly as if it wanted to break out of his body and join that orb.


    A Fifth Grade artifact was a Fifth Grade artifact, after all. No matter how Greem tried to hide it, the orb¡¯s uniqueness and extraordinariness were still in to see!


    Greem tapped his staff, and an overwhelming wave of fire surged outwards, instantly dispelling the phenomenon gathering around him. The fire clouds rushing in the sky roared out furiously. The sound spread for hundreds of kilometers, causing thend itself to quake in fear.


    It wasn¡¯t until Greem put away the staff that the phenomenon gradually vanished. However, the terrifying roar from the world consciousness was still deeply branded in the old fire spirit¡¯s soul.


    He let out a long sigh.


    ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought you would have a treasure of such a level on your person. It seems like I¡¯ve only embarrassed myself today! I can¡¯t ept the hospitality of a revered guest for nothing, either. Let this Molten Fire Crystal be the payment for my dinner then! My name is Sion. I live in zefire, not far from here. If you are ever interested, feel free to head there and be my guest!¡±


    ¡°I will certainly visit if I have the chance to. I still have ces to go for the moment, so I won¡¯t be staying any longer!¡± Greem politely rejected the offer.


    Sion nodded without a word and put away all his treasures. He tossed the Molten Fire Crystal to Greem before turning and scattering into loose sparks.


    Greem gripped the Molten Fire Crystal in his hand and felt the pure, overwhelming fire energy within. He couldn¡¯t help but nod in approval. He might not need this anymore, but it would be good to use it as the core of a Fourth Grade golem.


    Greem already had the powerful Shadow Demon as his bodyguard. Most other magical golems were no longer powerful enough for his needs. However, throwing out a few more golems inbat to cast some Fourth Grade fire spells was still a good choice.


    The old fire spirit from earlier was a real veteran Fourth Grade fire creature, yet he had not sensed Shadow Demon at all, even though Shadow Demon had been hiding in Greem¡¯s shadow all along. That was the main reason why Greem dared to roam the Fire Elementium ne alone.


    If any fools dared to find trouble with him, Greem would undoubtedly make them regret their choice. The injury to his soul had healed, the Orb of the Fire God was now in his possession, and Shadow Demon constantly stalked in the darkness.


    It was because of the power he had umted that Greem wasn¡¯t afraid to show the orb to the fire spirit. If the fire spirit dared to attack him out of greed, Greem could take it as an opportunity to harvest a high-quality fire core!


    The Fire Elementium ne was a dozen timesrger than the World of Adepts. Naturally, it was also home to countless fire creatures. Higher creatures that were rarely seen in material nes roamed everywhere here.


    Aimless Second and Third Grade fire creatures just walking about without purpose were as numerous as the stars in the sky.


    If Greem wanted to start a hunt here, he would certainly make a killing in profits and return with his arms full of fire cores.


    Higher creatures like these would never be walking around alone in other nes. Individuals of such power were often leaders of their own organizations or forces. Trying to attack individuals like these would be provoking a ho¡¯s nest. Just the constant harassment would be displeasing enough to deal with.


    However, in the Fire Elementium ne, there were plenty of individuals who had Second or Third Grade power without the intelligence to match.


    Even the local intelligent races would not treat such primal beings as their own kind. They were only seen as walking fire materials and resources. When needed, one could gather their forces and hunt them down. When they were not required, they could be left to roam thends freely.


    Greem had no need for the materials that these Second and Third Grade fire creatures could offer, but his followers still had need of them. In particr, Third Grade fire-crystal cores were incredibly beneficial items for Meryl, with her fire dragon bloodline. Thus, Greem would asionally attack the Third Grade fire creatures he ran across and collect high-quality fire crystal cores.


    Upon arriving in the Fire Elementium ne, Greem had tried to contact his old friend¨C ming Tiger Cindral. However, judging from the faint response, Cindral was obviously too far away from him.


    Even with the Chip¡¯s aid, Greem only had a vague direction of where Cindral was and no chance of establishing directmunications. Greem gave up on the idea of visiting his old friend and focused on hurrying to where he wanted to go.


    ............


    The Sea of Ashes.


    One had to admit that the Sea of Ashes was a forbiddennd, even in the Fire Elementium ne where numerous powerful individuals roamed thends.


    Much like the vast seas that isted the continents of the materials nes, the Sea of Ashes was a barrier that kept each continent in the Fire Elementium ne separate. It made it difficult for the continents to interact with each other, thereby giving rise to various civilizations.


    The Sea of Ashes was alsoposed of fire, but its energy level was much higher than the average me. Ordinary fire creatures would have their fire cores melted if they stayed in the sea for too long, burning their consciousness away.


    Only high-grade fire creatures could protect themselves using the firews to prevent themselves from bing fuel for the Sea of Ashes. Most other fire creatures kept a safe and healthy distance away from it.


    In fact, many Fire Lords and Fire Kings would build their pces somece in the Sea of Ashes. It allowed them to be free from disturbances of the outside world, while also putting them closer to the Sea of Ashes.


    The Fire King that Greem wanted to visit was one such strange fellow.


    The constant Fire Teleportation and marching had made Greem tired, even with his Physique.


    Finally, three months after entering the Fire Elementium ne, Greem arrived at the edge of the Sea of Ashes, the entrance to Fire King Groms¡¯ pce.


    Just as Greem set foot on an unusual altar on the edge of the Sea of Ashes, five Guardians of me shrouded in green and white mes stepped out of the smoke and moved in his way.


    ¡°Stop there! Adept from another world, you have trespassed into Fire King Groms¡¯ territory. We will attack you if you do not step back! Please leave immediately.¡±


    These Guardians of me were only Third Grade, but they showed no fear in front of Greem¡¯s spiritual pressure. Instead, their threatening words made it seem like they were willing to fight at the drop of a hat.


    Just as the five Guardians surrounded Greem, space started to shimmer in several hidden locations nearby. mes zed as several armies of fire creatures appeared, projecting their chaotic and explosive aura towards this location.


    Greem would have certainly run away with a pale face if he were still Second or Third Grade. However, now that he had advanced to Fourth Grade, such an ¡®insignificant¡¯ situation could no longer intimidate him.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be so rash, little fellow! I came here on the invitation of your King. I believe it¡¯s best for you to contact your superiors before you decide whether to start a fight!¡±


    ¡°The King¡¯s invitation?¡± The Guardians looked at each other, unsure of what to do. However, one of the Guardians had an explosive temper. He shouted out loud, ¡°Inviting an adept? That¡¯s not possible. Our master hates humans with a passion. There is no way he invited a mere Fourth Grade like yourself. He must be lying! Let¡¯s work together and take him down!¡±


    Provoked by his words, the other Guardians became eager to fight as well.


    Greem¡¯s face darkened.


    Groms was a Fifth Grade Fire King at best. He might be one grade higher than Greem was, but they were not bound in any subordinate or superior rtionship. He had onlye by invitation because he was interested in his ¡®suggestion,¡¯ not because he was here to pay his respects.


    The behavior of the Guardians made Greem furious.


    With Shadow Demon and the Orb of the Fire God protecting him, Greem had absolute confidence in escaping from the Fire Elementium ne. As such, he could no longer suppress his fury. Fire surged through his heart as the Heart of Principles began to beat wildly.


    ¡°Stop!¡±


    Just then, a deep and low voice rang out from afar.


    The fires parted, and a colossal Molten Giant stepped out from the Sea of Ashes with earthshaking steps.


    ¡°So d to see you, Sir Greem. On behalf of the great King Roms, I wee you to our pce!¡±

 Chapter 1228 - The Law Fires

    <h4>Chapter 1228 The Law Fires</h4>


    The Guardian of mes bowed and paid respect when they saw who had arrived.


    ¡°I am Rhyolith, a lord serving under King Groms. I came here to wee you. Please follow me, sir!¡± The twelve-meter-tall Molten Giant said to Greem with a booming voice.


    He then turned and looked at the Guardian of mes that had challenged Greem earlier. He said in a stern voice, ¡°Derat, you were rude to the guest. As punishment, you will be doing ten years of hardbor in Shatterstone Abyss. You can only return once you have harvested a hundred high-grade pyre stones.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    The Guardian lowered his head dejectedly and bowed to the Molten Giant once more. He turned and left under the escort of a squad of Earthfire spiders.


    The rest of the Guardians were clearly intimidated now. They hurriedly stepped aside and opened up the path forward for Greem.


    The elementium creatures had never had the intricate customs of human society. The Molten Giant turned and walked into the Sea of Ashes after disciplining his subordinates. The sea of mes parted when he approached, revealing an unusual path paved with fire crystals.


    Greem followed after the Molten Giant in his human form and walked into the Sea of Ashes.


    It was a strange road that seemed to wind on endlessly in the Sea of Ashes.


    The mes in the sea parted silently before them and closed behind them once they had passed. It was almost as if the two of them were walking inside a transparent ss dome. It was calm and peaceful around them, while fires raged on furiously further away.


    The Molten Giant appeared to be an individual of few words. He focused on walking down the road and had seemingly no intention of talking or interacting with Greem.


    The Sea of Ashes was typically known as the Sea of Death to most fire elementium creatures; no lifeform should be able to live here. However, as Greem followed the Molten Giant down that long, winding path, he could sense something with the help of the Chip and the Orb of the Fire God. There were strands and traces of life in the distance.


    These fire creatures seemed to be extremely curious about Greem¡¯s arrival. They would dive into the mes and vanish for a moment before reappearing close to Greem and observing in silence. The Molten Giant obviously knew of their existence, but he did not bother to exin them to Greem.


    Thus, Greem could only wonder in his mind.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s scans, the average energy level in the Fire Elementium ne reached upwards of one to two hundred points. An outsider entering the Fire Elementium ne would have to endure two hundred points of fire damage constantly.


    Two hundred points of elementium damage was tremendous. Only Second Grade adepts could hope to survive under such pressure!


    The minimum requirement of exploring the Fire Elementium ne was Second Grade. Moreover, adepts of other attributes would not be able to replenish their powers by absorbing wandering elementium. Once their magical powers were exhausted by the harsh environment, they would have no choice but to leave.


    However, here in the Sea of Ashes, the energy level soared to over a thousand points of power. Without the firews¡¯ protection, even fire creatures could not survive here.


    The fact that the Molten Giant could move about the Sea of Ashes so freely meant that he had grasped some firews. If...if Greem could kill him and rob him of his fire core, he would have a very high chance of analyzing and obtaining his firews.


    This method of stealing others¡¯ firews was far quicker and more convenient than meditating diligently by yourself.


    Judging from his colossal size, giant fists, and surging fire energy, Greem would have no more than a 73% chance of winning against him in the Sea of Ashes, even if he were to go all out and summon Shadow Demon.


    Greem would even be injured in this process, while Shadow Demon would be severely damaged.


    If the Molten Giant was a little more fierce, he could even choose to detonate his core at the moment of his defeat. Greem would be left with nothing then. He would get absolutely nothing apart from a body full of injuries and some magma shards.


    Given his understanding of these fire creatures, it was almost guaranteed that they would self-destruct when they were defeated!


    It was because of how difficult it was to deal with these fire creatures and what little profit there was to be obtained from killing them that very few ns in the World of Adepts tried to expand into the Fire Elementium ne.


    The fire creatures here were too poor and too passionate. Conquering them would be worth nothing at all!


    The fifty-kilometer walk quickly came to an end as Greem was absorbed in his thoughts.


    When Fire King Groms¡¯ massive pce appeared in front of Greem, he couldn¡¯t help but be dazzled, despite howposed he usually was.


    A wooden pce with stone pirs. There were over a hundred stone pirs, each reaching high into the sky and thick enough that one required five men to fully wrap their arms around it. It was arge and majestic pce. The fact that such a considerable pce could be constructed in this terrifying, zingnd of ashes was itself a miracle.


    Just a rough estimate of thebor, cost, and investments that went into its construction left Greem speechless.


    As expected of a Fire King. Only a mighty individual like a Fire King could live in such a work of wonder.


    ............


    zing red. Terrifyingly hot. Even the air itself was burning. However, the burning of the mes was unusually peaceful, as if the fires were one with the space around them. It didn¡¯t matter how fierce the mes zed; they did not cause a single ripple in space.


    Greem stared straight at the zing humanoid the moment he stepped into the hall. His eyes were filled with shock and curiosity. He was no longer a rookie now. As a Fourth Grade fire adept, he could see all the various unusual aspects of this fire in front of him.


    This fire was derived from the narws. It was fundamentally different from the ordinary mes of the world. The power gathered in their core naturally carried a trace of sacred holiness!


    Greem might have grasped some of the firews, but he was only mixing in a trace of thews in his spells when he cast them. However, this me humanoid was incredibly pure and sublime. The mes that made up his body were formed entirely of the fire ofws. There was no chaos or impurities in those mes.


    All thew fires gathered together to form a small stream that circted throughout this individual¡¯s body. They were exceedingly tame and obedient. However, as someone who had personally handledw fires, Greem knew very well how vicious and savage they truly were.


    Even a single spark ofw fire exposed to the material world could start a terrible firestorm!


    Yet, this me giant was like an unmoving statue. He let thew fires flow freely and silently through his body, seemingly without any difort at all.


    Greem stood in silence and observed the me giant for a long time.


    Even though the giant did not speak or move, Greem had significantly benefitted from observing his form and the flow of power within him.


    At his level, there were no longer any precedents or preset paths upon which he could follow. The only thing Greem could do was construct a path and direction of development for himself, given his potential and abilities.


    Now, having witnessed the true form of a Fifth Grade Fire King, Greem finally had a reference to base his own improvement on. He now had the time and opportunity to correct his past mistakes.


    Thus, when he stepped into the hall and set eyes upon the giant, Greem abruptly froze. His entire person fell into a mysterious state of chaos, confusion, and yet enlightenment at the same time.


    The giant zing with golden fires opened his eyes. He nced at the dazed Greem as a trace of praise and pity appeared in his eyes.


    ¡°My king, what has happened to this person? Should I wake him up?¡± The Molten Giant Rhyolith, who appeared evenrger and more muscr than the Fire King, couldn¡¯t help but speak up.


    ¡°No need!¡± The me giant scolded unamusedly. ¡°You dumbasses. You¡¯ve followed me for so long, yet still, none of you have understood anything. Fools with only muscles and no brains. Do you think size alone decides the might of an individual? Don¡¯t forget; we are fire creatures. Only increased mastery over fire can improve the source of our power.¡±


    The Molten Giant waspletely confused by the scolding that hade out of nowhere. He scratched his head, and his voice boomed, ¡°My king, why did you get all angry all of a sudden? Haven¡¯t I already improved by a minor grade these three hundred years?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! You¡¯ve only gone from intermediate Fourth Grade to advanced Fourth Grade after three hundred years by my side, yet you have the face to be proud? Look at this human adept. He took a look at me and instantly went into a state of enlightenment. In my opinion, he will catch up with your grade in less than a dozen years! When that happens...¡±


    ¡°When that happens, I still won¡¯t be afraid of him!¡± Rhyolith proudly shouted. ¡°He¡¯s the size of a pea. Even if he were the same grade as me, I would only need a single punch to kill him!¡±


    The me giant¡¯s face turned dark as thew fires flowing through his body showed signs of going berserk.


    ¡°Idiot! Idiot...how many times have I told you that what decides our power isn¡¯t our size or our muscles. It¡¯s the level of our firews! What¡¯s the point of having such arge body if you aren¡¯t sustained by the firews?¡±


    The Molten Giant still wanted to argue, but he was interrupted by his king, who had discovered something strange.


    ¡°Hm? What is this? To think it can hide in the shadows...hehehe! Since you¡¯vee to my hall, you had better show yourself!¡±


    The giant opened his eyes wide and stared calmly at the fist-sized shadow directly beneath Greem. He turned his palm, and endless fire energy filled every inch of space in the hall.


    There was no room for a shadow to manifest where the fire energy burned!


    An unusual metal golem of fairlyrge size appeared suddenly in the middle of the hall.

 Chapter 1229 - The Fire King’s Mission

    Chapter 1229 The Fire King¡¯s Mission


    [Beep. Detecting temte of a Fifth Grade fire creature.


    [Grade stable, energy level stable, spiritual temte stable.


    [Conducting dataparison; correcting and optimizing the base model temte of host.


    [Beep. Dataparisonplete. Discovered 31 deviations, 17 incorrect categorizations, 164 inefficiencies, and 6 major data mistakes in host¡¯s temte.. Requesting instructions from host. Proceed with correction based on new model of Fifth Grade fire creature?]


    The moment Greem saw the me giant, the Chip had started drawing wildly upon Greem¡¯s Spirit as if it had just discovered a new continent. It was utilizing all that Spirit to drive its calctions. Even with Greem¡¯s Fourth Grade Spirit, it was hard to sustain the insane speed at which the Chip was functioning.


    It was like a ck hole had appeared in Greem¡¯s mind, wildly devouring all of his Spirit without mercy.


    Fortunately, his power was no longerparable to what it was in the past. He gritted his teeth and managed to endure the Chip¡¯s insane requirements, gradually stabilizing the Chip¡¯s calctions.


    [Temte of Fifth Grade creature has been constructed and optimized. Correction of host¡¯s own temte will be conducted in the future!] Greem finally managed to reign in the Chip¡¯s madness after a while. He regained control of his body.


    However, that one instant of calctions had drained him of nearly seventy percent of his Spirit. His mind was incredibly exhausted and fatigued at the moment.


    It was only when he finally managed to direct a portion of his Spirit outwards and came to his senses that he realized that something was wrong. Shadow Demon, who should have been in hiding and guarding over him, had been revealed. He was standing in front of him, desperately trying to break free of the me shackles wrapped around him.


    Seemingly sensing Greeming to his senses, the me giant sitting high atop his throne finally spoke up.


    ¡°You¡¯ve finally woken up. Little guy, you are quite interesting. If you had taken a little longer to wake up, I was prepared to capture this doll and dissect it!¡±


    His voice wasn¡¯t exactly loud, but it appeared tremendouslymanding and domineering in this hall of mes. Moreover, when his voice traveled through the room, it seemed able to trigger resonance with the fire elementium in the air, making his voice even more intimidating andmanding.


    Greem tried his best to ignore the splitting headache from exhausting his Spirit and calmed down. He then bowed and paid his respects to the unusual giant in front of him.


    ¡°I am honored for this audience with you, my lord, and honored to have received your guidance. I, Greem, express my heartfelt gratitude towards the great King Groms!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t be in a hurry to thank me, kid. There are some old debts to be settled between the two of us still!¡± The me giant let out a muffled grunt, his gaze at Greem hiding a hint of hostility.


    ¡°May I know what Your Majesty is referring to?¡±


    ¡°Two hundred years ago, you came to the Fire Elementium ne and killed one of my Fire Lords. How should we settle this blood debt?¡±


    Two hundred years ago...Fire Lord......


    Greem¡¯s mind spun rapidly, and he quickly managed to match the description to an event in his memory.


    ¡°I was foolish and ignorant as a young man. For besmirching your dignity, I sincerely plead for Your Majesty¡¯s forgiveness!¡± Greem hurriedly apologized, seemingly in utter sincerity.


    As a Fifth Grade Fire King, there was no way Groms would have gone to such lengths to summon him to the Fire Elementium ne just over the death of a mere Second Grade two hundred years ago. The reason Groms was doing this was clearly toy the groundwork for the conversation toe.


    Greem knew this very well and could only lower himself for the discussion to proceed.


    ¡°I have plenty of Second Grade Fire Lords under mymand; it isn¡¯t a big deal. Still, your act of killing my subordinate has made me theughing-stock of the other Fire Kings. I can¡¯t exactly look past that now, can I!¡± The me giant looked rxed on his throne, and it was hard to discern what expression he had on his face.


    ¡°Greem is willing to do his very best topensate for his past mistakes. If there is anything Your Majesty requires, Greem will dedicate his very being to itspletion!¡±


    A smile broke on the giant¡¯s face as if he was delighted by Greem¡¯s understanding.


    ¡°I am looking for something! I had nned to find it through Maysa, but that n has fallen through. Now, that thing I was looking for must have fallen in Maysa¡¯s hands. So, I need you to help me retrieve it!¡±


    Greem leaped up in surprise and said, ¡°Steal from Maysa? My lord, Maysa is a Seventh Grade Great Witch!¡±


    The me giant chuckled loudly, ¡°I¡¯m not that foolish as to have you go head-to-head with a Seventh Grade Great Witch. Maysa has been relying on her being sheltered by Fate to peek at the secrets of powerful beings all over the universe. She then uses these secrets to coerce people into serving her. Her actions are vile, disagreeable, and they have long since drawn the ire of many people.


    ¡°But don¡¯t worry, her actual person is hidden in a mysterious space known as the Domain of Fate. She hardly ever takes a single step out of there. The ones running around on the outside pulling strings for her are either her Fate clones or individuals that have been forced into her service. You won¡¯t run into her actual person on this mission!


    ¡°A while ago, she sent a Fate clone to meet me, hoping to borrow my power against you. And what she threatened me with was that thing I was looking for. That bitch knew very well that I was searching for that thing, and she sent someone to snatch it away ahead of time. That is why I don¡¯t n to help her this time and summoned you instead.¡±


    Greem took a deep breath and asked calmly, ¡°What do you want me to do?¡±


    ¡°ording to my most recent information, that item is now in the World of Adepts! That¡¯s a ce where even I can¡¯t easily go. That is why......¡±


    ¡°So, you want me to help you get that item back?¡±


    ¡°Indeed! If you can do this, then I will stand by your side for all of your fights with that bitch in the future! Hehehe. I, Groms, might not be the most powerful individual in the Fire Elementium ne, but Imand respect even amongst the seven Fire Kings. With my support, it will be entirely possible for you to be a Fire Lord in this world. I can carve a piece ofnd out for you, and you will be a Lord of the Fire Elementium ne. How about that! Very generous conditions, aren¡¯t they?¡±


    Greem frowned and thought for a moment before speaking up, ¡°Compared tond, I am more interested in firews. What I want to know is how you are able to purify and concentrate such a tremendous number ofw fires.¡±


    The air in the hall suddenly froze!


    Fire King Groms stared at Greem silently. After a long while, he finally smiled.


    ¡°Law fire? A good name for it. However, for fire elementium creatures like ourselves, fire is fire. There is no need to give it such a wordy name. Thew fire you speak of, we call it origin fire. If you want to know the secrets of origin fire, then earn it with that thing I want!¡±


    Groms was a Fire King, after all. With his power and identity, he could be a deity of fire if he were to descend on an ordinary nar world. Every word and action of his moved thews of the Fire Elementium ne and contained a binding power of their own.


    That was why Greem didn¡¯t hesitate to nod ande to an agreement with him.


    Finally, when Greem left, he couldn¡¯t help but turn and ask.


    ¡°Lord Groms, may I know what that item you seek is?¡±


    The me giant remained silent and threw a fire crystal at Greem instead. His voice boomed, ¡°Don¡¯t look at it here. Don¡¯t ask and don¡¯t talk about it. Go look for that new Fate Witch! She will give you the answers you need.¡±


    Greem nodded, bowed, and turned to leave.


    Shadow Demon followed silently behind him. It wasn¡¯t until they left the hall that he merged into Greem¡¯s shadow once more.


    ¡°Chip, what do you have?¡±


    [Beep. Fifth Grade fire creature temte 22%pleted. Understanding of firews increased to 71%. Mastered two new firews: Fire¡¯s Fragility and Fire¡¯s Resilience.


    [Fire¡¯s Fragility: Host can reduce a target¡¯s fire resistance beyond negative at the cost of nullifying all of the host¡¯s defenses.


    [Fire¡¯s Resilience: mes that affect the host¡¯s target will not extinguish on their own.]


    Two decent firews, Greem noted to himself as he hurried back to his tower.


    Two monthster, Greem finished his lengthy journey and returned to Fire Throne.


    ............


    The Tower of Fate.


    The enchanting and brilliant river of stars slowly faded away as Alice¡¯s slender figure appeared once again.


    ¡°How is it? Was the divination too much of a burden on you?¡± Greem stepped forward and put his hand on Alice¡¯s arms worriedly.


    Alice brushed her hair behind her ear and rolled her eyes. ¡°I¡¯m a Fourth Grade witch now. Why is it that your impression of me is someone fragile as ss?¡±


    ¡°True, true...men are all so fake! Even though he wants to ask whether the divination seeded, he¡¯s still trying to paint himself as a good man. Hmph,¡± Helen scolded as she circled the two of them and left behind a trail of magic dust.


    ¡°Where did she learn all this from? Why¡¯s she so mean with her words now?¡± Greem rolled her eyes and tried to grab the little fairy, but the tiny creature deftly weaved between his hands.


    ¡°Who else...other than that increasingly rebellious arcane apprentice. No, I can¡¯t call her an arcane apprentice anymore. She actually managed to advance without any guidance. She...is an arcanist now!¡±


    ¡°An arcane apprentice advanced in the World of Adepts?¡± Greem¡¯s face twitched. He couldn¡¯t believe his ears.


    It seemed like the World of Adepts had obtained the corresponding arcane knowledge system from the destruction of the Arcane Empire. At the very least, the fundamentals of the arcane system wereplete. That was why the world could now sustain the advancement of arcanists.


    A foreign arcane-apprentices like her was only the first one. From now on, as long as one¡¯s powers matched thews of advancement for an arcanist, there would be a second arcanist and a third.


    Soon, it was likely that a unique branch of adepts would appear in the World of Adepts!

 Chapter 1230 - Alice’s Analysis

    <h4>Chapter 1230 Alice¡¯s Analysis</h4>


    ¡°What Fire King Groms is looking for is a Lightfire stone.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s an exceedingly rare magical material, only born where light and fire energy is very dense and concentrated.¡±


    ¡°I believe that Groms is searching for the Lightfire stone to correct some of his firews. If he can convert some of his fire energy into light energy, his movement speed would undoubtedly increase tremendously.¡±


    ¡°A while ago, an adventuring party from the Adept¡¯s Association found an ancient ruin in another world. The Lightfire stone was one of their spoils. It is now in the hands of a Fourth Grade adept of the Adept¡¯s Association known as Olivia.¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown when he heard Alice¡¯s exnation. ¡°If Maysa wants to coerce Groms, why doesn¡¯t she keep the stone with her rather than let it end up elsewhere?¡±


    ¡°Because that¡¯s her modus operandi!¡± Alice smiled and said, ¡°She¡¯s a Seventh Grade Great Witch. She has woven and manipted the powers of Fate for tens of thousands of years. The web that she has woven around her must be incrediblyplex, so much so that it is hard for anyone to imagine.


    ¡°Everyone knows that Witches of Fate have nobat power! Then what is it that Maysa relies on to mobilize and manipte so many powerful individuals? The mysterious and wondrous Fate!


    ¡°She uses Fate to peek at powerful individuals. When she discovers what they badly need, she will do everything in her power to push Fate in the direction that would deny them what they want. In doing so, the individual would not be able to get it, and their only choice would be to turn to her and obey her instructions.


    ¡°It is through such a method that Maysa has woven a terrifyinglyrge web that engulfs individuals from all over the universe. Everyone is only a puppet, a node on this giant web of hers.


    ¡°I dare say that the reason the adventuring party was even able to discover the ancient ruins was definitely because of Maysa¡¯s intervention. Just by leaking some information, she would be able to keep the Lightfire stonepletely out of Groms¡¯ reach without lifting a finger.¡±


    ¡°World of Adepts, Adept¡¯s Association; Groms might be a Fifth Grade Fire King, but his name alone is not enough weight for that adept called Olivia. Even though Groms knows precisely where the Lightfire stone is, he has no option but to ask for Maysa¡¯s help.¡±


    ¡°This is soplicated!¡± Greem listened silently and sighed. ¡°Alice, you are not going to turn into a crazy Fate-peeking pervert like this in the future, will you?¡±


    ¡°What are you thinking about,¡± Alice sighed. ¡°If this behavior of hers worked, she would never have incited bacsh from the world consciousness of the World of Adepts. An individual who toys with Fate is destined to be despised by Fate!¡±


    ¡°So, you became her gravedigger and inherited the world consciousness¡¯ will to deal with her?¡±


    ¡°Not precisely dealing with her. The best I did was destroy her ns of manipting the river of Fate in the World of Adepts. I am protected by the world consciousness in the World of Adepts and shielded from her schemes. However, if I step out of the World of Adepts, things will be increasinglyplex and out of my control.¡±


    Greem shook his head and chuckled. ¡°This is probably the problem with all you Fate Witches. You are only willing to take action once you have perfectly grasped every single cause-and-effect of an event and controlled every possible variable. Meanwhile, an eighty percent odds of sess is already more than enough for me to take the risk!¡±


    Alice replied sternly, ¡°Greem, you must not think like that! The reason we only act when we have 100% certainty isn¡¯t out of a pursuit of perfection. It¡¯s because of the unpredictability of Fate. An event that has a 99% chance of sess for you, should it ever fall in the hands of a Fate Witch, could be made to fail with that mere 1% probability of failure.¡±


    ¡°For Fate Witches, there is no such as 99% and 1%. There is only 100% or nothing at all- there is no gray area!¡±


    ¡°That serious?¡± Greem was rendered speechless for a moment. ¡°I never felt that Maysa was that unstoppably powerful!¡±


    ¡°That is because we are protected by the river of Fate in the World of Adepts. She can¡¯t peek at any of our secrets. The things that she thinks she sees have all been distorted and obscured by the river of Fate. That is why she always had an incorrect judgment of your abilities and why, instead of eliminating you, she has mistakenly helped you grow in power.¡±


    ¡°And this time? How should we try and get that Lightfire stone?¡± Greem had just heard plenty of unimaginable things, but he still had an optimistic outlook.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know!¡± Alice turned her palms upwards.


    ¡°Don¡¯t know?¡± Greem¡¯s eyes opened wide. It was the first time he had heard these words from Alice¡¯s mouth. ¡°How could you not know?¡±


    ¡°There are too many suspicious things behind this. The entire thing is shrouded in dark clouds. There are many things where I can¡¯t even properly see the flow of Fate.


    ¡°Firstly, Maysa has dozens, if not hundreds, of other alternatives if she wanted to hide the Lightfire stone from Groms. Yet, she sent the stone to the World of Adepts and had it fall into the hands of the Adept¡¯s Association. I can smell conspiracy from this alone!¡±


    ¡°You mean to say that she has already predicted this situation and is trying to incite conflict between the Adept¡¯s Association and us?¡± Greem narrowed his eyes, his expression turning solemn.


    ¡°That is obvious! Because of the self-destruction incidentst time, the Adept¡¯s Association already has pre-existing tension with you. In addition, the rapid rise of the Crimson n is also drawing the attention of the three major organizations and making them wary. If you go try and negotiate for that Lightfire stone, the Adept¡¯s Association won¡¯t be nice to you at all.¡±


    ¡°Will they attack me with numbers?¡± Greem scratched his head and asked.


    ¡°Well, definitely not! The Adept¡¯s Association is one of the three major adept organizations, after all. tantly surrounding and killing a high-grade adept of another region is a significant taboo!¡±


    ¡°Then, what am I afraid of?¡± Greem smiled, his strong confidence beaming through his words. ¡°The best they can manage is a duel. As long as they aren¡¯t afraid of marring their own reputation, I won¡¯t mind epting their challenge.¡±


    Alice sighed and extended a hand to caress Greem¡¯s face as she said, ¡°Greem, Greem...what is it that has given you such confidence that even a colossal organization like the Adept¡¯s Association doesn¡¯t scare you?¡±


    Greem proudly said, ¡°My power, of course...and your support!¡±


    Alice sighed, ¡°It¡¯s best if it doesn¡¯te down to a war...warmongers die young. Make too many enemies, and it wille back to bite us one day.¡±


    ¡°I understand. Don¡¯t worry. I will properly manage the rtionship between the Crimson n and the Adept¡¯s Association!¡±


    Alice finally nodded after receiving Greem¡¯s assurance.


    ............


    Greem only stopped at Fire Throne for a few days after returning from the Northern Lands. He then boarded a floating ship headed for the east.


    Before he left, he sent all the Third Grade fire cores he got from the Fire Elementium ne to Meryl, giving her a pleasant surprise. To deal with any unexpected incidents along the way, Greem brought Billis, who had advanced to Third Grade.


    This way, he could leave most troubles along the way to Billis while he focused on researching the newly established temte of a Fifth Grade fire creature. In his spare time, he also modified the Fourth Grade Molten Fire Crystal into a Molten Fire Beast golem.


    The golem was far weaker than Shadow Demon, but it was still a Fourth Grade golem, after all. It was more than enough to deal with most situations.


    This ce was a floating ship belonging to the Adept¡¯s Association. As was standard regtion, it was manned by a Second Grade adept and five First Grade adepts. Paired with the runic arrays carved on the ship, they were more than well-equipped to deal with the magical creatures they would run into along their journey.


    The floating ship looked like a ck and brown sailing ship. It rose from the Minsel Skyport and steered towards the ck Forest, carried by an intense surge of wind elementium.


    Second Grade Adept Ralph, who was in charge of protecting this ship, patrolled the deck as was his habit. After discovering nothing out of the ordinary, he prepared to return to his room, satisfied.


    However, when he turned, his eyes unintentionally swept past two figures standing silently at the end of the deck. He couldn¡¯t help but stop in his tracks.


    The only ones who could travel between Zhentarim and Adept¡¯s Association territory were proper adepts or human nobles of incredibly high status. Neither of these individuals should have been able to avoid Ralph¡¯s spiritual senses.


    For some reason, when Ralph¡¯s gazended on those two hooded figures, he felt his skin jump. It was almost as if it weren¡¯t two adepts standing there, but two ferocious monsters that could devour every morsel of his being.


    Ralph remained dazed for a moment. His right hand immediately gripped the runic crystal that allowed him to control all the arrays on the ship. He silently pulled up the information stored within.


    With his Spirit as a Second Grade adept, he almost instantly managed to scour the list of passengers and found the information on these two guests.


    Green and Billy. Two ordinary, inconspicuous names.


    However, noted beneath those two names were two bright red words: Crimson n!


    The Crimson n? That n had been on the rise in Zhentarim recently. Why were they going to Association territory now?


    The fact that they could avoid his spiritual senses and the ship¡¯s scans meant that they were very likely high-grade adepts in disguise. But all the high-grade adepts of the Crimson n were well-known. They......


    Ralph pretended to survey the geography beneath the ship while secretly evaluating the two adepts.


    For some reason, the more twisted and unusual of those two figures was familiar to him.


    Suddenly, his eyebrow jumped. He knew who it was.


    Bug Adept Billis. To think, one of them was the most frightening Third Grade adept of the Crimson n.


    What was he going to the Adept¡¯s Association for?


    Ralph couldn¡¯t help but frown and start thinking to himself.

 Chapter 1231 - Future Path

    <h4>Chapter 1231 Future Path</h4>


    ¡°n leader, that adept seems to have recognized me. Do you think we should......?¡±


    Billis licked his lips as if he couldn¡¯t wait to dig into his food.


    ¡°Keep a close eye on him. Let him report to his superiors if that¡¯s all he¡¯s doing. If he tries anything else, I won¡¯t mind bathing this path with blood,¡± Greem looked at the scenery around him and said.


    ¡°Understood! Leave it to me.¡±


    Billis smiled viciously as his body, hidden beneath the ck cloak, started to squirm. A piece of his body, about the size of a little finger, fell to the ground and split into countless tiny beetles. These insects silently spread out all over the ship along the wooden nks.


    In less than fifteen minutes, the entire floating ship was under his surveince.


    In particr, a swarm of beetles was now hiding beneath the boot of Second Grade Association Adept Ralph. He was the focus of Billis¡¯ surveince, and he had absolutely no clue.


    Midnight. The floating ship glided above the clouds with the vast ck Forest below.


    A thin barrier of invisibility surrounded the ship and kept it concealed.


    With this barrier, most unintelligent magical creatures would not detect the ship¡¯s presence, keeping it safe from most threats. Meanwhile, any magical creature that could detect the ship¡¯s presence from its faint magical flux had already been beaten scared by the Adept¡¯s Association. Naturally, none of them dared to raid a transport ship belonging to the Association.


    For the sake of keeping the ship concealed, all adepts onboard were restricted from using magic during nighttime. Left without much else to do, they either lounged on the deck and admired the ck Forest in the night, or hid in their rooms to do some minor research or meditation.


    Ralph sat before a wooden table in his securely protected cabin,municating with someone from headquarters through a diamond-shaped crystal.


    ¡°...are you sure it¡¯s the legendary fire adept?¡± It was an elderly adept who spoke on the other end of the crystal. He was frowning as he listened to Ralph¡¯s description. Finally, he couldn¡¯t help but interrupt him.


    ¡°This...I can¡¯t be sure! But it¡¯s very likely.¡±


    ¡°Why do you think it could be him?¡±


    ¡°Because I¡¯m certain that one of the two robed figures is Bug Adept Billis. He could be considered a core member of the Crimson n in recent years. However, ording to my observations, the bug adept seems to treat the other individual with a lot of respect, as if that person was the one in the lead instead. That is why I deduced that he is probably Crimson n Leader Greem.¡±


    ¡°Mm. When you put it like that, indeed, the other person is most likely Greem. He¡¯s probably the only person in the Crimson n who could make Billis show such respect. When is this ship of yours going to reach its destination?¡±


    ¡°In thirty-seven days.¡±


    ¡°Very well. Continue your observations...actually, never mind. Don¡¯t do anything, and don¡¯t pay any extra attention to them. I will arrange for something else on my end. Be careful. Do not provoke them. There are no kind individuals among Fourth Grade adepts!¡±


    ¡°Yes, I understand.¡±


    Ralph had no idea that while he was secretlymunicating with headquarters in a heavily protected room, a dozen small ck dots were silently monitoring his every action.


    Inside a simple cabin on the second level of the ship.


    Billis sat on an empty wooden bed frame. His body squirmed, rising and falling beneath the cloak. It was a frightening sight.


    Meanwhile, hispound eyes flickered on his exposed insectoid head. As many as a hundred images could be seen shing in his eyes. Some were images of individuals moving about in their rooms, some were of people resting on the deck of the ship, and some were of adepts reading or meditating.


    It was important to note that most adepts had an almost paranoid concern for their personal safety. They would never go into deep meditation if they weren¡¯t in a ce where they were sure of their protection.


    Yet, the insects that Billis sent out could hide from the ship¡¯s detection arrays and the security arrays set down by these adepts themselves, watching their every action. Their lives were already in Billis¡¯ hands.


    With the options avable to him, Billis could quickly kill any single one of them. In fact, if he wanted to leave behind no clues, Billis could even wlessly set up their death as the result of an experiment ident.


    He held the lives of others in his hands. It was the feeling of absolute control and authority that Billis was most intoxicated with!


    However, as arrogant and unhinged as he was, there was still one ce on the ship he didn¡¯t dare approach.


    That was the room where the n leader, Greem, rested.


    Perhaps it was because the other adept¡¯s on the ship were too weak, but they could not feel the explosive energy radiating from Greem¡¯s body. In their eyes, Greem was only a slightly more lonely and quiet First Grade adept.


    In Billis¡¯ eyes, Greem was a moving volcano. And not just any volcano. He was an active volcano that had been suppressed for a thousand years and would let out an apocalyptic eruption at any time. The room he rested in was filled with terrifying fire energy that sent chills down Billis¡¯ spine.


    Every time he gavemands to his insects, Billis made sure to have them distance themselves from Greem¡¯s room. He was genuinely terrified that his insects would trigger that silent volcano if they got close.


    If this fearsome power were to erupt, all of the adepts on the ship would be instantly vaporized by fire along with the ship itself. Nothing would be left.


    Meanwhile, in Greem¡¯s room, the fire adept finally, slowly, opened his eyes.


    The fire coral staff in front of him was glowing bright red from the heat. It was so hot that the nearby space had been distorted, causing the room to appear strange and otherworldly.


    The Orb of the Fire God on top of the staff was connected with Greem¡¯s Heart of Principles through an immaterial chain of fire. Pure fire energy, as hot as boilingva, flowed through the chain. Every time it circted, the energy itself seemed to undergo a change.


    Its color turned from a reddish-white to golden yellow.


    This change in the me¡¯s color indicated the rise in its energy level.


    Ever since his meeting with the Fire King in the Sea of Ashes, Greem had an approximate idea of the direction in which high-grade energy proceeded. At the moment, Greem would have to deepen his understanding of the fire and increase his Spirit to improve his powers.


    Without sufficient Spirit, there was no way he could control the dangerous, berserk fire elementium at a minute level. Without sufficient Spirit, there was no way he couldpress and refine the wild fire elementium.


    When Greem was still in the lower Grades, he had thought of fire elementium as particles that could be freely manipted and controlled. However, as his understanding of fire deepened and his Spirit¡¯s sensitivity increased, he could feel the fire¡¯s personality.


    Indeed, fire had its own personality!


    Much like water elementium was gentle and tame, wind elementium was free and unbound, and earth elementium was slow and firm, the fire elementium that Greem wished to master was passionate and wild. If one went along with its elementium trait, everything would be exceedingly simple. However, go against its elementium quality, and you would find it difficult to control.


    Fire¡¯s power came from its explosiveness and its destructiveness.


    Naturally, such wild and berserk elementium could not be unleashed to its full potential in the hands of a calm and gentle spellcaster. Only adepts with explosive tempers and reckless behavior could fully maximize the might of fire magic.


    In contrast, Greem had been restraining his instincts in battles in the past. He relied far too much on the Chip¡¯s aid.


    It undoubtedly kept him safe, but it also became an obstruction in the assimtion of his mind and body with the fire elementium.


    In particr, now that he was at Fourth Grade, Greem could feel the rejection and unruliness of the fire elementium at every step along the way. His inability to tame fire elementium had slowed down his understanding of the mes.


    However, Greem did not regret anything even after realizing this!


    Only fire that bowed to his will was good fire. If he had to sacrifice a portion of his rationality to increase his affinity with fire, Greem would rather reject the fire.


    However, this didn¡¯t mean that Greem intended to give up on fire.


    If he could not open himself to the fire elementium or leave his safety in the hands of the frenzied and ferocious mes, he could only find a different path to increase his mes¡¯ energy levels.


    If his understanding of fire were not enough to continuepressing fire energy, he would have to find another recement. And Greem¡¯s choice was the Orb of the Fire God!


    Greem constructed an energy chain between his Heart of Principles and the Orb of the Fire God. He then transferred the fire energy he had gathered in his body into the orb and used its power topress and refine the mes. He moved thepressed fire energy back to his Heart and used the strange principle powers contained within the fire energy to strengthen his Heart of Principles.


    Given Greem¡¯s current Spirit and the capacity of his Heart of Principles, this process of modification was extremely slow and challenging.


    That was why Billis always sensed an overwhelming and surging fire energy in Greem¡¯s room. The intensity of the energy here had obviously exceeded Greem¡¯s current grade!


    However, this only made Billis even more shocked and surprised. The defeatist notion of submitting before Greem only grew in his heart.

 Chapter 1232 - Tor the Goblin

    <strong>Chapter 1232 Tor the Goblin</strong>


    One monthter.


    The floating ship slowly drove into arge skyport.


    Five other floating ships had arrived at Port Bansai at the same time, each from a different region.


    Once the shipnded smoothly on the grass, the adepts walked down the wooden nk and joined the rowdy stream of human traffic.


    Greem and Billis also walked down the floating ship, one after another. Before they had the time to survey the skyport, a little goblin with furry ears and hair all over his body appeared in front of them.


    ¡°Lord Billis, is that you? I saw you once from afar back at the n headquarters. You¡¯re just like back then...terrifyingly sinister. It is this humble one¡¯s honor to meet you here in Port Bansai...how long are you nning to stay here, my lord? Are you nning to go anywhere in particr?¡±


    The little goblin was both overjoyed and extremely talkative in front of Billis, just like a fan that had met his idol. He was speaking so fast and so passionately that the two adepts couldn¡¯t interrupt at all.


    Greem had indeed instructed Meryl to arrange the n member in charge of this region to receive them before he set off. However, he didn¡¯t expect that the n member stationed over at the Adept¡¯s Association would be a goblin.


    Moreover, it seems like he idolized Billis tremendously!


    Billis had always been a loner. He seldom interacted with the lower-level members of the n. As such, Billis was obviously somewhat flustered when faced with the passionate little goblin. The confusion and awkwardness then quickly turned into rage.


    He lifted his arm slightly, and a scythe-shaped insectoid arm d in a ck carapace rested on the goblin¡¯s neck. The goblin immediately fell silent.


    ¡°Shut up now! From now on, I ask a question, you answer with a single sentence. More than one unnecessary word and I will dig your brains out of your skull.¡±


    The sharp limb hovered around the goblin¡¯s head, and his body immediately froze up. He looked at Billis¡¯ ghostly green eyes with his own beady little puppy eyes.


    There were many smallerpound eyes around those two eyes of Billis, making for a frightening sight.


    ¡°What¡¯s your name? What¡¯s your job here?¡± Billis coldly asked.


    ¡°I am Tor, the person in charge of the Goblin Chamber of Commerce here.¡±


    ¡°And it was the n that notified you of our arrival and sent you here to receive us?¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡± The little goblin gulped.


    ¡°Who gave the direct order?¡± Billis¡¯ tone abruptly turned sharp.


    ¡°It was Great Sage Snox who gave me the direct order. As for who gave Sage Snox themand to do so, I do not know!¡±


    ¡°What is the order that you received, specifically?¡±


    ¡°Sage Snox said that you, Lord Billis, wasing here and we were to give you a proper reception. We do not know anything else apart from that.¡±


    ¡°Mm, good. Bring us back to the n¡¯s outpost here then! And remember, keep a low profile.¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    Though somewhat surprised by Billis¡¯ viciousness, Tor was still clearly a veteran at diplomacy and trained at his job. He quickly recovered from his fright and excitedly guided the two adepts to a strange goblin racecar.


    Indeed, even Greem did not expect to see a racecar here. It was a strange racecar¨Ca heavily modified version of a goblin transport¨Cand packed with goblin aesthetics.


    A red chassis, low against the ground and without a roof. Large, round metal wheels and a shiny crystal windshield. Most conspicuously of all, arge bunch of rockets soldered to the back of the car.


    Even though the car had not yet been started, its extravagant and unusual design already drew the gaze of many nearby adepts. However, when they sensed the dense aura of blood around Billis, they immediately looked away.


    It was a few kilometers from the skyport to the city. Most adepts had brought their own mounts or simply summoned creatures to ride over there.


    For a moment, the sky was filled with giant bats, two-headed hunting eagles, windslicers, wyverns, and many other flying beasts. Meanwhile,rge rhinoceros, Nightmares, and many other creatures were sprinting across thend. Greem even saw an adept riding on a ckskin boar. Quite the personality, he thought to himself!


    ¡°My lord,¡± Billis felt his head swell when he saw the goblin racecar. He was cursing the goblins in his mind. They didn¡¯t seem to know the meaning of ¡®keeping a low profile¡¯ at all.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go. There¡¯s no need to keep our identities a secret now that we have already arrived. Not to mention, they are already monitoring us. It¡¯s fine to be a little showy now!¡± Greem looked around him, and his gaze swept past a giant tower in the distance. He could sense the sinister gazes lingering on him.


    Greem smiled, and the three of them got into the red car.


    Tor put on his helmet, threw on his sses, and gleefully turned back to shout at Billis, who was cramped up in the small seats of the goblin car, ¡°Lord Billis, you are ready, aren¡¯t you? Then let¡¯s set off.¡±


    Tor stepped on the pedal without waiting for an answer. The massive rockets behind the car sted out long streams of mes, and the three of them shot forward from the propulsive force.


    Yup, they shot forward, like a bullet.


    The violent propulsive force of the rockets caused the racecar to tremble violently. The entire chassis vibrated, and the scenery around them started to blur. If Greem hadn¡¯t grabbed the steel sides of the car and dug his fingers deep into the metal, the sudden gust of wind would have been enough to blow him out of the vehicle.


    Even Billis had to extend both arms and stab them into the metal to secure himself in his seat. Even so, his hood had been blown aside by the winds and fluttered behind him, revealing his hideous insectoid body.


    Billis opened his mouth with the intent of hurling a few insults at the goblin, but a rush of wind immediately surged into his mouth. His stomach swelled slightly from the sudden intake of air, and his face turned red.


    However, Tor didn¡¯t seem to realize anything. He was stuck to his seat by two leather seatbelts and was still hollering as he kept his foot pressed on the pedal.


    The racecar left behind a thick trail of ck smoke as it dashed past the many adepts. The panicking adepts quickly threw up their defensive shields, barely saving them from being carbonized by the rocket mes.


    It wasn¡¯t until the goblin racecar had vanished from their sights that the adepts rushed out of the smoke, coughing and gasping as they did so. They then realized, to their fury, that their mounts were now coated in soot.


    ¡°Bastards.¡±


    ¡°Go and die.¡±


    All sorts of curses and insults filled the air, but they obviously couldn¡¯t reach the ears of the person responsible for all this.


    ............


    At the top of the giant monitoring tower.


    A few adepts looked at each other helplessly.


    ¡°What¡¯s the reaction with the Divination Wand?¡± The middle-aged adept in the lead asked coldly.


    ¡°Fourth Grade. He¡¯s definitely a Fourth Grade adept!¡± A young adept holding a withered wooden stick hurriedly replied.


    ¡°And the monitoring crystal?¡±


    ¡°Red...his energy reaction is a blinding red!¡± Another adept, this one with a strange magical mirror in his hands, bowed and answered.


    ¡°Then it¡¯s most likely the truth!¡± The adept in the lead sternly instructed, ¡°Inform Lord Haimos immediately. The legendary fire adept has indeed arrived. Have him prepare himself!¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    The adepts replied in unison and quickly went to work.


    ¡°That Greem is a famous person, even in the Central Lands. Who knows what he¡¯se to our territory for,¡± The leader muttered to himself.


    When they used the power of the monitoring tower to scan the mysterious adept secretly, he had realized what was happening. A scalding spiritual appendage had reached toward the tower, only slithering away after light contact with the defensive array.


    As the host of the tower, he had felt how terrifyingly powerful that scalding spiritual appendage had been!


    An adept who could merge some of his elementium traits into his spiritual will was incredibly powerful. Even in the Adept¡¯s Association, any adept capable of such a feat belonged to the Association¡¯s upper echelons.


    Now that such a formidable individual had entered Association territory, something was bound to happen, regardless of his intentions.


    ¡°Whatever! This is way beyond my league. I¡¯ll leave it to those people from headquarters to worry about it!¡± The adept in the lead sighed and turned to leave.


    ............


    The goblin racecar was still gliding rapidly five meters above the ground.


    As Tor continued to steer the car, the bodies of the passengers swayed from side to side, all while vibrating along with the car.


    Billis might be Third Grade, but he was clearly not used to flying at such extreme speeds.


    The intense tremors and the irregr vibrations were making his stomach churn.


    When Tor produced a perfect drift and swerved the car, turning it one hundred and seventy degrees, Billis could finally tolerate it no longer. He opened his insectoid mouth and vomited everything he had yet to digest.


    From a distance, one could see a light yellow mist spew out of the end of a red lightning bolt, slowlynding on the ground alongside the dust.


    Fifteen minutester, when the racecar came to a screeching stop in front of a towering metal castle, Billis rushed out of the car at lightning speed and started vomiting on the ground.


    From just a nce, Greem could see the remains of a few human bones amidst Billis¡¯ vomit.

 Chapter 1233 - The Adept of Torture

    <strong>Chapter 1233 The Adept of Torture</strong>


    Greem and Billis soon settled down in this castle of steel after their long journey.


    The steel castle was the Goblin Chamber of Commerce¡¯s outpost here.


    As befitted the goblin traders, the front of the castle was a row of shops, while the main body of the building served as a living area and warehouse.


    A squad of twenty magical machines managed the safety of the castle.


    Apart from these steel soldiers, five goblin machinist-sorcerers had also been stationed in the castle. These goblin machinist-sorcerers were the true guardians of the castle, responsible for the goblin leadership¡¯s safety in the outpost.


    The Goblin Chamber of Commerce had been working diligently over the past few decades and had finally managed to extend their influence into the Adept Association¡¯s territory. They had a total of eleven goblin shops of various sizes and this metal castle, which served as their headquarters; it was the fruit of the goblins¡¯ hard work.


    The Crimson n might be a household name in the Central Lands, but far away here in the east, the Goblin Chamber of Commerce could only expand and survive as best they could like any other tradingpany. Fortunately, they were backed by a fairly powerful n. The goblins themselves were passionate and experienced traders. At longst, the Chamber of Commerce was able to establish itself here and was slowly expanding.


    A while ago, Tor had even requested for one or more high-grade adepts to be assigned and stationed here.


    The World of Adepts was a world ruled by human adepts, after all. If the Chamber of Commerce consisted solely of goblins and were not backed by a single high-grade human adept, they would face all sorts of covert and overt discrimination in their transactions.


    The goblins had suffered greatly from such incidents over the years!


    That was why Tor was genuinely happy and excited to hear that the infamous Third Grade Bug Adept Billis of the n had arrived from n headquarters.


    It wasn¡¯t until they entered a secret room that Tor found out that the mysterious adept following Billis was the n leader himself. The sudden and tremendous amount of passion he disyed upon realizing this was too much to bear, even for Greem.


    After sending Tor away with some difficulty, Greem finally had time to look at the authority framework of the Adept¡¯s Association.


    The Adept¡¯s Association was one of the three major adept organizations of the World of Adepts. It controlled a vastnd to the east of the Continent of Adepts with a total area of over seven million square kilometers. They had three hundred and seventy million citizens, thirty thousand adepts, and over a thousand conquered lesser nes.


    The assessment of an adept organization¡¯s might came down to a few key indicators¨C wealth, power, resources, authority, and number of adepts!


    The Silver Union had always been famous for their overwhelming wealth amongst the three major adept organizations. They possessed incredible wealth and resources. The Adept¡¯s Association, on the other hand, was supported and recognized by the majority of adepts. They had thergest number of adepts and the mostplete system of adept development. They also had the most powerful adepts in the entire World of Adepts.


    Thus, when it came to overall power, the Adept¡¯s Association was undoubtedly first amongst the three adept organizations.


    Meanwhile, though the Northern Witches were weaker than the other two factions, they were remarkably united against outside forces, making them vicious enemies to those who would threaten them. If they kept to their own side of the continent in the Northern Lands, they were equals to the Adept¡¯s Association and the Silver Union.


    Greem came from Zhentarim. That ce was famous for being and of freedom and ack of central governance. The adept organizations there developed with the n as the core and the axle. The development and welfare of their n were paramount!


    Meanwhile, the Adept¡¯s Association was a ssic meritocratic, academic gathering. The influence of adept ns had been minimized. The true forces behind progress in the Association were powerful, individual adepts, not the ns that stood behind them.


    In the Central Lands, adepts were subordinate to their ns. Trying to grow stronger without the support of a n was nearly impossible. However, in the Adept¡¯s Association, the numerous adept ns had instead be attachments to individual prodigies. These ns could only grow stronger if the adept they invested in rose in position and authority within the Association.


    The status of adept and n waspletely reversed!


    Adepts who developed in Zhentarim were fated to be servants and stepping stones for their ns as long as they had not advanced to Fourth Grade, regardless of how powerful they were as individuals. They would have to endure hundreds of years of back-breakingbor. Such an atmosphere was naturally burdensome and kept many elite adepts without ns outside of the mainstream.


    The Adept¡¯s Association did not have such strict restrictions or bias. Their cultivation of adepts was based solely on individual talent and merit. It was a highlyplete and perfect system. Thus, the Association became the first choice for many grassroots adepts who had no background to speak of.


    However, Greem knew very well that what truly decided the status of an adept organization was the number of top-ss adepts!


    In this aspect, the Adept¡¯s Association was uncontested.


    ording to an iplete census, the Adept¡¯s Association had over forty Fourth Grade adepts. That was three times the number of Zhentarim. As for what other forces they had kept hidden away from the public eye? Those were ssified secrets of the Adept¡¯s Association that no one knew.


    Compared to the gargantuan Adept¡¯s Association, Zhentarim was like a tiny human standing beside a giant. If it weren¡¯t for the power struggle between the three major adept organizations that kept them individually in check, Zhentarim would have sumbed to an invasion.


    Naturally, Greem and the Crimson n he had founded had no means to be arrogant in front of the massive organization known as the Adept¡¯s Association. If it weren¡¯t for his absolute confidence in himself, Greem would never have dared toe into ¡®enemy¡¯ territory to search for a chance at ¡®cooperation¡¯!


    Olivia. The powerful adept who now possessed the Lightfire stone. Greem had already reviewed her information several times.


    Olivia. Fourth Grade. Elementium Adept.


    Gender: Female. Age: Unknown.


    Eldest daughter of the Armstrong family. Has a brother who is currently only First Grade.


    Exceptional adept talent since birth. Advanced to Fourth Grade in just three hundred years. Such terrifying advancement speed made her the fastest improving and most talented young adept of the Adept¡¯s Association in the past thousand years.


    ......


    The report was wordy and filled with information. However, there were only two words that described her powers: Gravity Control.


    It seemed like Adept Olivia¡¯s expertise was in the more niche field of gravity control.


    The maniption of gravity also belonged to elementium magic, though in a specialized branch of its own. It was categorized as a branch of the already rare maism magic. It required that adepts who learned this magic also possess the necessary elementium physique. That was why very few adepts studied this magic in the World of Adepts, and almost next to none had reached Fourth Grade.


    Olivia was probably the only adept in the entire World of Adepts who had reached Fourth Grade with gravity magic!


    Fourth Grade adepts were treasured in every organization. They were the most powerful fighting force of the world and propped up the individual organizations. Young adepts like Olivia, who had tremendous potential, were particrly favored by the Adept¡¯s Association. They were treated like pearls and enjoyed ess to all sorts of resources and knowledge.


    Olivia¡¯s performance in the past had been ster as well. She demonstrated shockingbat prowess and had personally led a dozen invasions against otherworld civilizations. She was not only a talented adept but also a powerful one with plenty ofbat experience.


    ......


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown after reading Olivia¡¯s report.


    Powerful. It would be difficult to make contact ande to friendly terms with such a powerful adept. Olivia probably wouldn¡¯t even bother to talk to Greem if he didn¡¯t have enough leverage on his side. If that were the case, obtaining the Lightfire stone from her would be even more difficult!


    Thus, less than half an hour after chasing Tor out of the room, Greem summoned him again.


    ¡°You have been stationed here in the east for seventeen years now. Have you heard of the Fourth Grade adept known as Olivia?¡±


    Tor¡¯s face turned into a frown when he heard Greem¡¯s question.


    ¡°The Adept of Torture¨C Olivia. There are probably very few people who have not heard of that name here in the east.¡±


    ¡°The Adept of Torture...that¡¯s an interesting title. Why has she been given this title? Is she powerful?¡±


    ¡°The reason she¡¯s known as the Adept of Torture is that all her victims have been crushed to meat paste by her terrifying magic. You can¡¯t even find a trace of a proper corpse. It¡¯s because of how extreme and cruel her magic is that most people are terrified of her,¡± Tor couldn¡¯t help but lift his head and nce at Greem when he said this. ¡°My lord, you are not thinking of finding trouble with this Adept of Torture, are you?¡±


    ¡°What nonsense are you thinking about,¡± Greem reprimanded unamusedly. ¡°This is Adept¡¯s Association territory. Do you think I can return to the Central Lands alive if I tried anything on Olivia?¡±


    ¡°As long as you understand!¡± Tor wiped the sweat away from his forehead.


    ¡°However, I might need to contact this Adept Olivia because of certain matters. Do you have any means of putting me in contact with her?¡±


    Tor shivered in fright when he heard Greem¡¯s words. He smiled and said, ¡°My lord, the Goblin Chamber of Commerce has only been established in the east for no more than seventy years. Our foundations are still weak. There¡¯s no way we could havee into contact with a Fourth Grade adept already.¡±


    ¡°Then tell me everything you know about this Adept Olivia.¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡± Tor gulped and started to slowly exin what he knew.


    The gist of it matched the information that Greem had. The only part that stood out about Tor¡¯s exnation was that Olivia was a decisive, determined, and vicious individual. She was exceptionally ferocious and merciless towards her enemies. However, she did care for one person¨C her brother, First Grade Adept Wills, who was born of the same mother.


    Olivia might have shocking potential as an adept, but her brother, on the other hand, had absolutely no talent. If Olivia had not invested a mountain of resources on him, he would not even have made it to First Grade.


    If Olivia had any weakness to speak of, it would have to be this brother of hers!


    Greem raised an eyebrow when he heard this. He started to have some thoughts on how to approach this problem.

 Chapter 1234

    A wide, bright, and magical hall.


    Countless runic crystals embedded one side of the hall. Every single crystal glowed with a faint light, each projecting a unique image of its own. All the pictures put together made for a strange wall of screens.


    There was an adept in every one of these images, though it seemed like they were in different locations, judging from their backgrounds. A small half of the images were still ck. They didn¡¯t seem to be connected.


    An elderly adept stood in the middle of the wall of crystal screens. He wore an old-fashioned wizard¡¯s hat, a pair of tortoise-shell sses, and white robes. His silver beard flowed all the way down to his chest. The adept tapped his staff against the ground and demanded loudly, ¡°Alright, you¡¯ve all been investigating for so long. You must have a conclusion by now, don¡¯t you? What exactly does the fire adept want from us ining here?¡±


    Most of the adepts behind the screens were still busy with their own business and were only diverting part of their attention to the conference.


    Several high-grade adepts in robes of various colors bowed to the white-robed adept. They then looked at each other before one of them finally spoke up.


    It was a strange adept wearing ck armor and a clown mask. Judging from his aura, he was Third Grade.


    ¡°Lord Domhnall, judging from the recon group and divination group¡¯s information, Greem hase to the east to look for someone!¡±


    ¡°Someone...who? Someone in the organization, or outside?¡±


    ¡°In...the organization!¡±


    ¡°Oh? Who is it?¡±


    Several adepts on the screens seemed to have had their interests piqued by the conversation between the Vice-Chairman and the adept in the clown mask. They started to turn their attention towards the discussion.


    ¡°Lady...Lady Olivia!¡± The adept in the mask couldn¡¯t help but lower his head when he said the name. Cold sweat seemed to seep out from beneath his mask.


    ¡°Olivia.¡±


    ¡°Hm? Since when was he acquainted with Olivia?¡±


    ¡°Indeed, Olivia. Have you ever been acquainted with that fire adept?¡±


    For a moment, voices filled the room as the adepts the person in question.


    In one of the images on the screen wall, a female adeptyzily on her bed. She had ck hair down to her shoulders, a golden headband, pretty looks, and a slender figure. Before this, she had only been paying some half-hearted attention to the conversation in the hall.


    However, when the masked adept said her name, she abruptly sat up, and her pretty, gentle face turned stern and solemn.


    ¡°Silence, all of you!¡± The young adept shut herpanions up with a single shout. She then turned her gaze towards the masked adept. Light glowed in her purple eyes, her entire person radiating the terrifying aura unique to Fourth Grade adepts. ¡°You said that the legendary fire adept is here to look for me?¡±


    The masked adept instantly broke out in cold sweats when the Adept of Torture stared at him. He put on a forced smile and said, ¡°Mydy, I did not say that. It is the unanimous results of the seven members of the divination group. There should not be an error..¡±


    ¡°Legendary fire adept...Greem...the Crimson n,¡± The young female adept raised an eyebrow and mumbled to herself repeatedly. She was searching her mind for memories rted to these keywords.


    Unfortunately, no matter how she stirred, everything came out nk.


    The only thing rted she could find in her memories was hearing of the legends and rumors of this fire adept.


    ¡°Olivia, do you...know this fire adept?¡± The elderly adept in white robes frowned and asked.


    ¡°I don¡¯t...we have never made contact before this!¡± The young adept replied firmly.


    ¡°Good!¡± Vice-Chairman Domhnall was obviously relieved. ¡°This Greem has been stirring up storms in the Central Lands over the past few decades. It¡¯s said that he has amassed a sizeable force and that the Crimson n has be the only ultra-n of Zhentarim. Many people are spreading rumors that he could be the core of the Central Lands. In all honesty, we are discussing within the Association about how to deal with this guy!¡±


    ¡°What do you think we should do then?¡±


    ¡°Since he¡¯se to the east, we should take this opportunity to contact him. It will be a good chance to observe his potential and power. If he is truly as powerful as the rumors say, then the Association will have to consider suppressing this Crimson n.¡±


    ¡°You can arrange the Association¡¯s response. I don¡¯t care. However, if this guy is here for me, I will meet him and see what he wants. If necessary, I can help you test the waters.¡± The young Olivia confidently and proudly remarked.


    ¡°That is good. Then I will arrange for a few people to assist you and help you out.¡±


    ¡°No need. Are you not confident in my abilities? It doesn¡¯t matter if he¡¯s a dragon or a slug. He will be no more than dirt before me!¡±


    Having said that, Olivia¡¯s screen faded into ck.


    The excited adepts immediately started talking amongst themselves once Olivia had disconnected. Obviously, they couldn¡¯t wait to see the explosive conflict that would break out in the near future.


    After all, of the four dozen Fourth Grade adepts of the Association, Olivia was most certainly among the top ten in power.


    She was facing off against a mere fire adept from a ruralnd. Naturally, no one looked favorably on that fire adept¡¯s odds!


    ............


    Olivia waved her hand and deactivated the magical crystal. She then leaned against her bed and fell into silent thought.


    It was a bedroom that had been decorated in an extravagant fashion. The furniture was excessively grand and ornate, the style of which resembled those of elite and wealthy nobles.


    Once the silencing barrier vanished, Olivia could hear the loud noise of the crowd and the instruments crashing into her room through the wooden door. She couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    Before she could do anything, the solid golden oak doors burst open from the outside. Three young men and women rushed into the room, chasing after one another.


    The young adept in the lead was handsome and muscr. The ornate ck robe he wore was tailored to fit, making him stand out even further.


    It was obvious from the appearance of the robe, its delicate magical seams, and the gemstones that lined its sleeves that this was not the standard robe handed out by the Adept¡¯s Association. Instead, it was expensive goods custom crafted for him. That alone revealed the adept¡¯s overwhelming wealth.


    Unfortunately, he did not seem to show any care for such a precious robe. The sleeves and cor of the robe were covered in wine and oil stains. The young male adept was also clearly beyond drunk. He held two pretty female adepts in his arms, one in each hand, flirting with them as he stumbled into the room.


    The three of them were no more than First Grade.


    The two young female adepts had beenughing joyously. However, when they saw Olivia and the cold expression hanging on her face, they shivered in fright and quickly stood straight. They bowed and remained silent, their faces full of fear.


    Meanwhile, even though the young male adept was only First Grade, he showed no fear or panic when he saw Olivia. He pushed aside his two femalepanions and ran towards the Fourth Grade Olivia, grabbing her sleeves and swaying it side to side.


    ¡°Sister...sister...so you¡¯ve been hiding here. I was wondering. Why didn¡¯t I see you in the hall at all?¡± The male adept was so drunk that he couldn¡¯t even stand up straight. He copsed into Olivia¡¯s arms as his drunken breath pressed against her face.


    ¡°You may leave now!¡± Olivia coldly said.


    The two First Grade female adepts quickly bowed before carefully walking out of the room, closing the wooden doors as they left.


    Olivia sighed. She lifted the male adept¡¯s head with both hands. Magic filled the air, and a faint mist of alcohol seeped out of his pores, gathering into a ball of liquid between her palms.


    The young male adept shivered when the alcohol was drained from his body; he instantly regained consciousness.


    ¡°Sister, it¡¯s you!¡± Young Wills couldn¡¯t help but sp his head. It was still aching from all the drinking earlier.


    ¡°Wills, you should know that losing our rationality because of drinking is a major taboo for us adepts!¡± Olivia¡¯s face seemed stern, but her actions spoke otherwise. She was massaging her brother¡¯s temples.


    ¡°Sister, don¡¯t tell me what to do!¡± Wills lifted his head and let out a pathetic chuckle, ¡°Hah! A useless piece of trash like me! What¡¯s the point of keeping my mind calm and rational? Is there even any space for improvement for me?¡±


    Olivia¡¯s hands froze, and a sorrowful expression appeared on her face.


    Her brother¡¯s talent for magic was terrible. He was practically an instor for magic. Even after consuming countless resources, Olivia had only managed to pull him up to intermediate First Grade.


    His development had reached its limits now. It didn¡¯t matter how many resources shemitted. It didn¡¯t help a single drop or let him improve in the slightest.


    ¡°Wills, don¡¯t abandon hope. Believe me. I will find something that can change your talent and allow you to continue living!¡± Olivia caressed his face while clearly stricken with pain.


    Wills let out another pained chuckle and shook his head, ¡°Sister, you¡¯ve said that thousands of times. You know my potential. There is no more room for improvement. None at all. I am three hundred and thirty-seven years old now. If it weren¡¯t for the life-extension ceremony you held for me several decades ago, I would already be a pile of bones. Now...after so many repeated enhancements, my soul has reached its limits. Even if you find better, more useful treasures to extend my life, my soul no longer has any capacity for growth.


    ¡°So, sister, don¡¯t make me meditate or research magic anymore; I was not born for this. Rather than that, why not let me use what¡¯s left of my time to enjoy myself thoroughly......¡±


    Having said that, Wills looked at Olivia¡¯s pale face and stumbled out of the room.


    Olivia closed her eyes in pain as Wills walked out.

 Chapter 1235 - The Adept’s Invitation

    Chapter 1235 The Adept¡¯s Invitation


    Greem temporarily settled in at the Goblin Chamber of Commerce.


    Through Tor¡¯s local connections, he started to track down the Adept of Torture covertly.


    The Crimson n¡¯s Goblin Chamber of Commerce was doing well in the Central Lands. But in Adept¡¯s Association territory, where powerful adepts roamed everywhere, they could only keep a low profile.


    Given Tor¡¯s experience, the best he could do was contact Second Grade adepts here. No Association adept more powerful than that would care for an outsider goblin with no substantial background.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for the Crimson n emblems that they wore, most of the goblins would face immense danger and discrimination while traveling around the World of Adepts.


    However, just as Greem was thinking hard about how to approach that terrifying Adept of Torture, a fancy invitation appeared before him.


    ¡°You must be Adept Greem.¡± A middle-aged adept in a white robe emzoned with two interlocking silver rings bowed to Greem.


    Judging from his aura, he was a Second Grade adept.


    ¡°You are?¡± Greem frowned slightly.


    ¡°My name is Leo. I am a subordinate of Lady Olivia. I havee with her orders to hand this invitation to you, sir!¡±


    ¡°Olivia?¡± Greem narrowed his eyes slightly and smiled as he said, ¡°It seems like your Adept¡¯s Association has been doing a good job when ites to reconnaissance. You even managed to figure out my purpose ining here. Tell me, what are you people nning?¡±


    ¡°Mydy wishes very much to meet a powerful outsider like yourself. That is why she will be hosting a weing banquet at Blueberry Vi. She hopes you would give her the honor of attending that banquet.¡±


    ¡°And the time?¡±


    ¡°Three days from now.¡±


    ¡°I understand. Go back and report to yourdy now then! Tell her I will arrive punctually.¡±


    Leo nodded, bowed at Greem once again, and turned to leave.


    Greem listened as his footsteps slowly turned softer in the distance. He then tapped the ornate invitation with its red paper and blue lettering. The elegant words instantly started twisting and distorting, finally projecting the face of a pretty adept.


    ¡°You must be Greem! I don¡¯t care what purpose you have in mind in visiting me, but we will have to arrange a meeting. Remember; three days from now. I will be waiting for you at Blueberry Vi in the Ais Mountains. Come if you dare!¡±


    A simple sentence, then the projection vanished. The energy aura dissipated without a trace, and all Greem was left with was an ordinary letter.


    ¡°Chip, how did it go? Did you manage to capture her soul aura?¡±


    [Beep. A forcefield protected that projection message. Collection of soul aura unsessful. However, a portion of her magical flux was observed and is currently being analyzed.


    [Beep. Analysisplete.


    [Target: Olivia


    Gender: Female


    Target Grade: Intermediate Fourth Grade


    Profession: Elementium Adept (Preliminary Mastery of Gravity Laws)


    Innate Abilities: Maic Pulse Physique


    Basic Attributes: Strength (Unknown) | Agility (Unknown) | Physique (Unknown) | Spirit 42


    [Magical Equipment: Unknown


    Combat Style: Unknown


    Offensive Abilities: Unknown]


    ......


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and sigh when he saw all the unknowns in the Chip¡¯s analysis.


    The Crimson n¡¯s rise to power was still far too recent. Their foundations were weak, and they had practically zero influence anywhere else apart from Zhentarim. It seemed like training a professional intelligence agency within the n for the purpose of obtaining information on the three major adept organizations would be a necessity.


    At the very least, if the Goblin Chamber of Commerce here had been paying some attention, they wouldn¡¯t be reduced to this situation where they had barely any information on Olivia.


    Right. It was time to diversify and differentiate the n¡¯s various factions based on separate missions and purposes!


    ............


    Three dayster.


    A strange wind dragon beat its green-white wings andnded in front of a beautiful vi at the foot of a colossal mountain range. A gale ravaged the grass as the dragon slowlynded in a clearing beside ake.


    Greem, dressed in a light robe, stepped off the dragon wing onto the ground. Billis, who was cloaked in ck, followed closely behind.


    A dozen hawk-like magical mounts already rested upon this clearing. When they sensed the unique intimidating aura of the dragons, they shivered in fright and cowered in a group.


    The few female apprentices that had been sent to receive the guest were also intimidated by the overwhelming aura of the Third Grade dragon. They couldn¡¯t help but back away, their faces pale and white.


    Greem turned around and waved his hand. The twenty-meter-long wind dragon instantly trembled. Its scales then quickly turned from solid to unusual wind elementium, which was then absorbed by a crystalline elementium core.


    The elementium crystal core flew into Greem¡¯s hand after taking in all the wind elementium. The light faded away, and it appeared just like a normal crystal.


    ¡°This must be one of the magical golem cores you make yourself, isn¡¯t it, sir? Truly fantastic and much more powerful than the average golem summoning core. I would certainly love to purchase some from you and look into their secrets!¡± A handsome young adept smiled as he walked towards Greem.


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, you are?¡± Greem looked at the male adept as the Chip quickly identified several details based on his aura.


    Third Grade. An unusual chill emanated from his soul. He should be an elementium adept of the ice attribute!


    A single grade of difference meant heaven and earth. It didn¡¯t matter how careful and how secretive you were. There was no way you could hide your secrets in front of a high-grade adept.


    ¡°I am Toyn, Lady Olivia¡¯s subordinate. I am here under her orders to greet you. Please follow me! Mydy has been waiting for your arrival for a while now.¡±


    Having said that, Adept Toyn bowed and led Greem and Billis towards the entrance of the vi.


    They could hear joyful music from the vi before they arrived, mixed with the giggles of women and the clinking of wine sses.


    The vi itself was a sea of joy and cheerfulness.


    An ornate fountain flowed at the center of a wide, open-air hall. Jets of water burst out from the bottom of the pool, creating little rainbows as the light shone upon them.


    Several small statues also stood to the side. These statues came to life¨Cseemingly coordinated with the music¨Cchasing each other around the fountain in rhythm. A pretty and seductive mermaid leaned against a rock at the center of that pool sang beautiful lyrics with her moving voice.


    Long tables had been ced by the pool, serving all sorts of delicacies and drinks.


    Adepts in formal dress and smiling nobles with wine sses in their hands gathered together to talk or surrounded the pool to enjoy the mermaid¡¯s performance. Some of them were even dancing and waltzing around the pool.


    At a single nce, Greem discovered that most of the guests were adepts. Even the people who were dressed as nobles radiated some degree of magic. Obviously, those people also had a talent for magic and had only stopped pursuing being an adept for specific reasons.


    Most of these people were also Second or Third Grade, exceptionally experienced, and clearly elites.


    Greem and Billis passed through a garden under Toyn¡¯s lead. They circled around the banquet and arrived at a somewhat quiet hall.


    Adept Olivia, wearing a dinner dress, was waiting there for them calmly.


    ¡°My lord, please go in.¡± Toyn smiled as he said, ¡°As for you, sir. You must be Adept Billis. Why don¡¯t we go to the hall at the front for the moment? There¡¯s a lot of people there who are looking forward to meeting you!¡±


    Billis did not respond to this invitation. It wasn¡¯t until Greem gave a subtle nod that he followed Adept Toyn to the hall at the front.


    For some reason, the environment here had be much more peaceful and quiet.


    Even though he could still hear the music from the hall, it sounded more distant and almost less real.


    This hall was a flower house, filled with all sorts of nts. There were ornamental green vines, berries, and Purplesun flowers. There were also more vicious, carnivorous nts like the human-faced flowers, smiling mushrooms, and Seastench grass. However, even the most terrifying of magical nts could only cower obediently before a Fourth Grade adept.


    Adept Olivia lifted her dress as she elegantly walked around with a watering can and watered the nts.


    The magical nts waved their thorned branches, shaking off the beads of water like yful dogs.


    Olivia was not wearing any shoes. She walked around the dirt with her white, smooth feet.


    Tempted by the rich scent of her flesh, some of the magical nts had lost all rationality. They extended their roots and branches silently towards her white, bare feet.


    These roots slithered like little serpents, arriving close to her feet under cover of the dirt.


    Finally, one of the nts could no longer suppress their desire. The rootsshed forward like a biting snake.


    Just a millimeter away from making contact with Olivia¡¯s feet, a shapeless, formless halo pressed down. The roots and their owner were squashed to dirt by that halo as if they had been crushed between two giant rocks. All of its leaves, branches, and roots had been ground into an unrecognizable green paste.


    A pungent stench filled the air. All the magical nts retracted their branches and curled up as if bitten by frost. They then started shivering like terrified children.

 Chapter 1236 - A Huge Disagreement

    Chapter 1236 A Huge Disagreement


    ¡°These mindless things. They never learn even after getting punished so many times.¡±


    Olivia put down her watering can lightly, patted the dirt from her hands, and smiled as she said, ¡°They will never know who the master here really is unless you give them a proper lesson! Don¡¯t you think so, Adept Greem?¡±


    Greem smiled when he heard this question and its double meaning.


    ¡°There are some things you will never know are possible unless you give them a try! If adepts had always been obedient, rule-following cronies, I¡¯m certain they would not have been able to venture into the realms beyond.¡±


    Olivia smiled again. ¡°It seems like Adept Greem is someone who enjoys an adventure!¡±


    ¡°Those who have everything naturally prefer order and stability, and those who have nothing prefer adventure and revolution!¡±


    ¡°So, you came here to our Adept¡¯s Association with a request in mind? May I know what it is that you want exactly?¡± Olivia was obviously a straightforward person. She couldn¡¯t help but go straight at the main issue after exchanging a few words.


    Greem fell silent for a moment before speaking again.


    ¡°The Lightfire stone. I heard you obtained a Lightfire stone in an otherworldly ruin. I am here for it!¡±


    Olivia was stunned for a brief moment, but she quickly recovered. Calmly, she said, ¡°The lightfire stone is indeed in my hands. That said, what is it that Sir Greem intends to trade for it? I believe you should know the value of this Lightfire stone!¡±


    Greem reached forward with his hand and waved. A magical mirror appeared in midair. A three-meter-long metal spear engraved with mysterious patterns appeared in the mirror.


    Olivia shot a nce at the mirror. She quickly identified the spear¡¯s energy level and primary attributes based on the elementium aura radiating from it.


    ¡°This spear might contain a trace of thew powers, but the person who forged it was terrible at his job. To think, this requires a specific bloodline to use it! It can be considered a Fourth Grade item, but it is certainly among the most inferior items you can find among Fourth Grade items. My Lightfire stone is a precious resource, even at Fourth Grade. It could almost be considered a Fifth Grade item.¡±


    Greem sighed and waved his hand. The item being projected in the mirror quickly changed.


    This time, it was a giant pair of metal hammers that appeared. They were also engraved with various runes, and a mysterious and profound aura of strength radiated from them.


    ¡°This one is slightly better than thest one, but it¡¯s still trash. The Strength requirements are ridiculously high. Anyone who could fulfill such requirements would never care for such inferiorw powers. Do you only have such garbage in your hands?¡±


    There wasn¡¯t much Greem could say in response to the scorn that Olivia openly showed him.


    The Adept¡¯s Association was one of thergest adept organizations in the World of Adepts, after all. Their alchemical knowledge and skill were far more advanced than most other ces. These spoils that he had obtained from an alien world were worth practically nothing to the talented gathering of the Adept¡¯s Association. He was only humiliating himself by disying these weapons. It wasn¡¯t quite Olivia¡¯s fault for her disdainful reaction.


    Greem sighed. He waved his hand again. The contents of the mirror change once more.


    Three unusual white mushrooms floated in the mirror now. However, the energy aura they gave off was so insignificant it almost went undetected.


    Olivia took a look at the white mushrooms and looked at Greem curiously, waiting for his exnation.


    The energy aura of the three mushrooms was too weak. They didn¡¯t seem to be any sort of powerful magical nt. Of course, as a Fourth Grade adept, there was no way Greem would produce any ordinary mushrooms to try to use as leverage. That was why Olivia figured that these mushrooms must have some unusual ability.


    ¡°These are mutated mushrooms I obtained from another world. It cannot help you in battle, but it can slowly improve your attributes.¡±


    ¡°Oh? How significant is the improvement? Is it effective on Fourth Grade adepts as well?¡±


    ¡°It is effective on Fourth Grade adepts, and the margin of improvement is between 1 to 2 points!¡±


    ¡°That much? Are there any side-effects to consuming them?¡±


    ¡°Judging from all evidence we have so far, there are no apparent side-effects.¡±


    ¡°...¡± Olivia suddenly fell silent. A light flickered in her eyes. It seemed like she was thinking about something, waiting for something.


    Far away in a distant tower, the group of high-grade adepts who just heard this conversation immediately flew into a frenzy.


    At the level of Fourth Grade, the improvement of one¡¯s attributes by even the slightest amount was always incredibly difficult. Now, Greem had produced a few inconspicuous mushrooms and was iming that they could improve their main attributes by 1 to 2 points with no drawbacks.


    That was unbelievable!


    No one would hate to have a better Physique and more powerful Spirit. In fact, most adepts present in this tower would be more than willing to take out their most precious treasures to trade for an improvement of 1 to 2 points in their main attribute.


    Of course, no one would ever offer something as invaluable as the origin substances, but everything else was up for negotiation.


    ¡°Olivia, trade the Lightfire stone for the mutated mushroom spores, as well as their cultivation method. The Association willpensate you for any losses incurred on your part!¡± Naturally, it was the elderly Vice-Chairman Domhnall who spoke up.


    ¡°Compensate me?¡± Olivia smiled coldly. ¡°Does the Association have another Lightfire stone in its treasuries? I have big ns for this Lightfire stone!¡±


    ¡°Olivia, stop messing around! This exchange is extremely beneficial for the Association. You are obligated to¡ª¡±


    Unfortunately, before the Vice-Chairman could finish, the projection from Olivia¡¯s side abruptly went ck. She had obviously cut off connection with the tower.


    ¡°Bastard!¡±


    ¡°Dammit!¡±


    ¡°Olivia is being a little too arrogant for her own good!¡±


    The high-grade adepts in the hall immediately startedining. Even Domhnall¡¯s face turned dark.


    ¡°Horner. Your tower is closest to the Ais Mountains. Go there immediately. We must not let Olivia fool around with this deal.¡±


    A bald man in one of the crystal screens smiled wickedly. ¡°I¡¯m not exactly the best man for the job, am I? Olivia has never been one to bend to rules. She only listens to the Chairman. Since the Chairman isn¡¯t around, I¡ª¡±


    ¡°This is an Association badge. Take it with you. If Olivia doesn¡¯t recognize the significance of this exchange and insists on doing things her way, I give you the authority to temporarily rescind her identity as an elder.¡± Vice-Chairman Domhnall waved his hand, and a mysterious badge passed through the mirror and appeared before the bald adept.


    The bald adept grabbed the badge and put it away before smiling. ¡°Understood, leave it to me!¡±


    Having said that, the image on his screen changed. He was now in the sky and flying quickly into the distance.


    Naturally, Greem had no idea about all thismotion urring behind the scenes.


    He was still hard at work negotiating with Olivia.


    ¡°These mushrooms are indeed wonderful, but they can¡¯tpare to the Lightfire stone. The Lightfire stone is far more powerful and has much more utility. If you have nothing better to offer me, then please leave now!¡±


    Greem narrowed his eyes. Blue light flickered deep in his eyes. He was silently assessing the truth of Olivia¡¯s words. Finally, he gritted his teeth, and the contents of the mirror changed again. This time, a mysterious egg was disyed.


    ¡°This is the egg of a divine creature from another world. It is still highly active. If you are willing to put in the effort to cultivate the creature, it has the potential to reach Fifth Grade.¡±


    Olivia¡¯s eyes finally opened wide when she saw the Feathered God¡¯s egg.


    Ordinary magical creatures and resources were useless when it came to saving her brother. Only Fifth Grade divine items like these could have a chance of doing so. If she could let her brother form a Lifebinding Contract with the divine creature in the egg, he would have a chance to transcend the limit of his lifespan as a First Grade adept.


    As such, Olivia immediately started casting spells to verify the attributes and effects of the egg. Greem did not stop her either and simply observed from the side.


    After a long while, Olivia finally stopped casting her spells.


    ¡°I want that egg, the spores of the mutated mushrooms, and the way to cultivate them. If you agree to these terms, I will hand over the Lightfire stone!¡±


    Greem smiled mockingly when he heard these terms.


    ¡°Lady Olivia, this might be your territory, but there¡¯s no need to be so aggressively exorbitant, is there? That is a Fifth Grade divine creature I have there.¡±


    ¡°It hasn¡¯t even hatched!¡±


    ¡°But you¡¯ve confirmed its lifeforce with your spells. The odds of sessfully hatching it are extremely high.¡±


    ¡°Hatching a divine egg and elerating its growth. You and I both know very well how many resources would have to be sunk into such an endeavor. If hatching a divine creature was so easy, do you think you would have been so willing to part with it, instead of keeping it for yourself?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Even so, Adept Olivia, there¡¯s no need to push such a hard deal. I imagine that those Fifth Grade Great Adepts would be more than happy to take a divine egg like this into their own hands. After all, it represents the addition of a Fifth Grade subordinate. I believe the conditions they can offer for such an egg can¡¯t be too shabby, can they?¡±


    ¡°They can certainly offer a lot. Unfortunately, they do not have Lightfire stones in their possession!¡±


    ¡°You...¡± Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel anger boil in him in the face of such an unreasonable adept.


    To think she was trying to trade for a Fifth Grade item with a mere Fourth Grade item! And the spores of the mutated mushrooms had to be thrown in as well?


    The anger showed on Greem¡¯s face. The fire elementium in the air started to be restless, and the temperature of the room rose exponentially.


    ¡°Adept Olivia, these are your final terms? If so, then I refuse!¡± Greem wanted the Lightfire stone badly, but he wasn¡¯t willing to pay such a heavy price for it.


    A light flickered in Olivia¡¯s eyes as well. She coldly said, ¡°Since there¡¯s such a great disparity between our ideal terms, and neither of us is willing to ept them, why don¡¯t we settle it with a bet?¡±


    A bet?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be puzzled at this suggestion.

 Chapter 1237 - Battlefield Above the Lake

    Chapter 1237 Battlefield Above the Lake


    There was argeke in front of Blueberry Vi.


    You could see the bright vi in the distance under the night sky and across theke¡¯s peaceful surface. Merry music could also be faintly heard.


    With his excellent vision, Greem could even see the small flying tform he hadnded on when he arrived.


    ¡°What did you bring me here for?¡± Greem looked around him and couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    ¡°This is only a temporary home of mine where I rest. I didn¡¯t install arge arena for any sort of training purposes, so we can¡¯t really go all out.¡± Olivia, who was still dressed in a dinner dress, lifted her hand casually and pointed at theke in front of them. ¡°Since that¡¯s the case, let¡¯s make thiske our battlefield!¡±


    Greem listened calmly.


    ¡°We will fight with the area above theke as the battlefield. Anyone forced out of the perimeter or thrown into the water will be considered the loser. Moreover, since the people in the vi are all my friends and family, I do not wish for any harm toe to them during our exchange. As such, whoever is unable to control their powers and prevent them from spreading out of theke will also be considered to have lost! How about that? Can you ept those terms?¡± Olivia stood proudly, the cold night winds making her long ck hair flutter in the wind. Her thin dress pressed against her body and further exposed her curves.


    ¡°And what happens after the victor is decided?¡± Greem did not show any expression, much less any concern or worry on his young and handsome face.


    ¡°If you win, you are free to put forth any terms. If you want the Lightfire stone, I will hand it over with both hands at no cost. However, if you lose, we will have to conduct the trade ording to my prior suggestion!¡± Olivia coldly replied.


    ¡°Reasonable terms. I ept!¡± Greem nodded in agreement without any hesitation.


    ¡°Let¡¯s enter then!¡± Olivia let out a soft battlecry and walked onto theke first.


    Indeed. Olivia ¡®walked¡¯ onto theke instead of flying into the area.


    As she let out her battlecry, two strange halos¨Cone ck and one white¨Csuddenly appeared around her. They started to vibrate as they moved up and down. The two halos looked like they were forged out of countless sparks from a distance. Spots of beautiful energy were cast down towards the ground as the halos collided with each other, making for a fantastical, surreal image.


    Empowered by the halos, Olivia¡¯s body seemed to have lost all weight. She stepped onto theke with her white feet and walked towards the center of theke, step by step.


    [Beep. Detecting two unusual maic fields of opposing maic poles. Energy level incredibly high Maic poles are in a state of dynamic change.]


    ¡°Dynamic change?¡± Greem frowned when he heard the Chip¡¯s notification. He couldn¡¯t help but frown and said, ¡°Is it possible to determine the base traits of the two maic poles?¡±


    [Beep. The ck halo¡¯s maic trait is attraction, while the white halo¡¯s trait is repulsion. A unique maic disturbance is created during the collision of these two powers. It is estimated that such a disruption can inflict vicious damage on biological lifeforms. Note: Said damage can ignore defense. Ordinary elementium defenses will not be able to protect against this maic disturbance.]


    ¡°Damn.¡± Greem felt his head hurt when he heard this. For the first time, he felt fear and respect towards this Adept of Torture.


    There were no easy opponents amongst the Fourth Grades, especially if they were someone with a long-established reputation. No wonder Olivia had so confidently challenged him to a duel!


    However, he had already given his word. Backing off before a battle was not Greem¡¯s way of doing things.


    Greem took out his fire coral staff and tapped it against the ground. mes shot out of the staff and gathered into two wings of fire on his back. These massive Wings of Fire beat slightly as Greem shot into the air like an arrow let loose from a bow.


    A fire trail zed behind him, continuing to burn in the air for a long time toe.


    Greem typically rode on his magical golems or used Fire Teleportation when he was traveling. He seldom used the Wings of Fire. There was only one reason for this. The Wings of Fire were too conspicuous and drew too much attention!


    The Wings of Fire, formed entirely out of static mes, continued to p on his back, allowing Greem to hover in the air and fly around at rapid speeds. However, these two wings were so bright they could be seen from dozens of kilometers away in the night.


    Moreover, the mes burned on for a long time wherever he flew past, leaving behind a clear trail for any pursuers. Escaping with the Wings of Fire was no more than a joke.


    Faced with the Adept of Torture¡¯s terrifying maic halos, Greem had no other option but to cast the Wings of Fire and enhance his mobility.


    The Wings of Fire immediately drew the people¡¯s attention at Blueberry Vi the moment they lit up in the air.


    A massive magical barrier appeared out of nowhere and engulfed the vi. Countless ck dots rose into the sky and observed from a distance. However, everyone was smart enough to know not to approach and disturb the two Fourth Grade adepts.


    ¡°Are you ready?¡± Olivia lifted her head and looked at Greem, who was flying above in the sky.


    ¡°Anytime now!¡±


    He had barely just finished when Olivia raised a hand at him and made a grabbing motion as she shouted, ¡°Come down here!¡±


    The white halo around her somehow vanished and mysteriously appeared above Greem. The next second, an incredibly powerful and terrifying gravity affected Greem¡¯s body, pushing him down from the air.


    Greem was horrified.


    Ayer of powerful fire energy constantly protected his entire body; any foreign power would have to prate this invisible forcefield of mes before they could hit him. Yet, now, a simple attack from the enemy was able to prate his forcefield and instantly affect him.


    His hair, skin, flesh, bones, and everything inside his body was being guided and dragged down towards the ground by an invisible force.


    If Greem¡¯s Physique were less than 20 points, that one attack would have been enough to injure his internal organs. If it weren¡¯t for the fire energy around him, the Wings of Fire would not have been able to endure this degree of gravity.


    Greem let out an enraged cry and beat his wings furiously. He then gathered five zing Fireballs and shot them at Olivia.


    The best defense was offense!


    The opponent¡¯s gravity control was too strange. He couldn¡¯t let her do as she liked.


    Olivia did not even raise an eyebrow at the sight of the five fireballs.


    She lifted her right hand and pointed at empty air. Two miniature white halos appeared in front of the fireballs.


    Drawn by the gravity, the first two fireballs instantly changed trajectory and crashed together. Their explosion further detonated the other three fireballs behind them.


    Five fireballs containing violent fire energy exploded, causing a massive eruption above theke. The terrifying me shockwaves instantly engulfed the thousand-meter-wide surface of theke.


    The water bubbled and boiled in an instant under the extreme heat.


    White smoke rose, and the entire battlefield was filled with mist. However, even the mist was vaporized by the shocking temperatures before they could spread out. The two Fourth Grade adepts were revealed once again.


    ¡°You think your measly fire powers canpare to my gravity control! Have a taste of my Quadra-Gravity Halo!¡± Olivia let out a battlecry, utterly unharmed by the previous explosion. The energy in her body surged as three more white halos appeared above the white halo on top of Greem. They merged and formed into a single halo.


    Greem¡¯s muscr body immediately started creaking, the sound of his bones trying their best to resist the pressure. Blood trickled down his orifices, indicating that he had been injured internally. Meanwhile, his body was pressed down from the sky and shot towards theke like a cannonball.


    Upon seeing the famous legendary adept known throughout Zhentarim about to be injured beneath her Gravity Halo, Olivia let out a wild, boisterousugh. Her hands continued to weave in front of her, tightening her control over the Gravity Halo and preventing her opponent from escaping.


    Dong! A muffled boom rang out.


    A massive ball of fire crashed into theke and sunk to the bottom.


    However, Olivia showed no signs of joy at the sight of this. Instead, the smile faded from her face as the ck and white halo around her shed. She reappeared a hundred meters away.


    A massive meteor crashed from the skies and smashed into the water immediately after she teleported.


    A massive pir of water sted into the air, rising a hundred meters high before scattering down as boiling beads of water. The terrifying shockwave lowered the surface of the water before producing massive waves that measured several meters tall to roar and surged towards the shore.


    Olivia drew a circle in front of her with her right hand. A strange halo instantly formed and split the iing waves in half. Not a single drop of vapor even touched Olivia.


    After dealing with the wave, Olivia stared through her halo at Greem, who had appeared in the sky once again. A hint of wariness finally appeared in her gaze.


    What she had just forced into the water earlier was only a humanoid ball of me, rather than Greem¡¯s actual body. Greem had somehow managed to hide somewhere else and had unleashed that terrifying Meteor Crash while she had let her guard down slightly.


    If it weren¡¯t for her plentiful experience that allowed her to dodge the moment she realized something was off, she would have been hit by that crashing meteor and blown into theke.


    What ability was that? To think he could allow a ball of fire to mimic his soul aura, while he hid himself for a sneak attack...dammit! This legendary fire adept did indeed had the power to support his reputation!


    Light flickered in Olivia¡¯s eyes. Her gaze couldn¡¯t help butnd on the staff that Greem held in his hands. For some reason, she kept having a feeling that that staff was projecting an unusual spiritual pressure on her, making her feel somewhat restrained.


    There was something odd about that staff.

 Chapter 1238 - Clash of Powerhouses

    Chapter 1238 sh of Powerhouses


    The previously merry and rowdy Blueberry Vi had fallenpletely silent.


    As the magical barrier rose around thepound, the human servants ran into the buildings to hide, panicking and pale. The adept guests at the banquet took to the skies and observed the giantke from within the barrier.


    Arge ball of fire hovered in midair above the water¡¯s surface, standing off against the ck and white halos.


    The two individuals moved quickly across the surface of theke, the fire and the halos colliding and shing.


    Every sh sent tremors through the air that shook the very space itself. At least half of the surface of theke was now burning with fire.


    However, even the most ferocious and violent of the mes could not suppress the ck and white halos¡¯ existence. The mes would disperse, and the fires extinguished where the two halos shone. It didn¡¯t matter what form the mes took. They were shredded to scattered sparks by the halos and fell down to theke below, making it seem as if the water itself was burning.


    As Olivia¡¯s friends, families, and subordinates, all the adepts present were familiar with that pair of ck and white halos. However, no one had seen that formless, shifting golden me.


    The few Third Grade adepts that hovered in the air couldn¡¯t help but cast their gaze at a strange adept hiding underneath a thick, ck cloak. They then looked towards the young handsome adept standing beside that person.


    Toyn. He was Olivia¡¯s most trusted subordinate among them all.


    Toyn could feel the burning gazes from hispanions. He couldn¡¯t help but bitterly smile as he said, ¡°I only know that Lady Olivia¡¯s guest tonight is that legendary fire adept, Greem, from the centralnds. As for why they are fighting now? I have absolutely no idea. Judging from how things are going, it¡¯s only a friendly duel rather than a deathmatch!¡±


    ¡°Greem? I seem to have heard of this name before. It seems like he¡¯s fairly well-known over in the Central Region!¡±


    ¡°Mm, I have heard of him as well. Hah! I even heard that this Adept Greem advanced to Fourth Grade in just two hundred years after he started learning magic. I can¡¯t believe those fools from the centralnds actually dared toe up with such aughable lie for the sake of making themselves look better!¡±


    ¡°Truly! Truly! Those weaklings from the centralnds! How could they possiblypare to Lady Olivia. Hmph!¡±


    Everyone present here was an elite adept of the Association. They had far too many means by which to investigate and obtain information from the other regions. Unfortunately, the ineffectual rulership of Zhentarim in the past had left too deep an impression on them. That is why they refused to believe these legends of Greem when they heard them.


    Billis lifted his head when he heard everyone¡¯s cold, mocking words. He gazed coldly at everyone present from under the shadow of his hood.


    There were seven Third Grade Association adepts.


    Judging from the nearly imperceptible energy aura leaking from their bodies, only one or two of them made him wary. The rest of them were easy prey. If there were no rules to the fight, Billis had confidence in devouring all of them in singlebat.


    That was why he felt a genuine hatred and disgust for the arrogance that they showed in their each and every action. If this weren¡¯t the enemy territory, he would want nothing more than to start a ughter and allow these arrogant Association adepts to witness the ferocity of Central adepts.


    The Association adepts did not seem to care about Billis¡¯ cold attitude. They continued to talk amongst themselves and mock all they wanted.


    Suddenly, a middle-aged adept reached out with his hand and cast a spell. ¡°Three thousand points...the intensity of their shockwaves has reached three thousand points of power!¡±


    ¡°What? That¡¯s impossible. If the shockwaves are at three thousand points, this ce would have been razed already.¡±


    ¡°Perhaps they are able to restrain their powers...can you guys see? The shockwaves of their attacks aren¡¯t even radiating out of theke.¡±


    The Third Grade adepts obviously couldn¡¯t believe that a Central adept could hold his own against their master. Each of them hastily cast their own spells to examine the energy levels in the distance.


    ¡°Three thousand one hundred and sixteen points of power at the edges of the shockwave.¡±


    ¡°Four thousand five hundred points at the core of the explosions.¡±


    ¡°I estimate the energy level at the moment of collision to be over five thousand seven hundred points.¡±


    The adepts couldn¡¯t help but break out in cold sweat as the numbers appeared before them. For the first time, they felt like this magical barrier around them was too thin and fragile.


    Even though it seemed like both individuals in the fight were restraining their power and preventing the shockwaves from emanating beyond theke, who knew what could happen? Who could maintain such precise control during such an intense and ferocious battle!


    If either of them got too excited and failed to rein in their powers, it would be no more than a wave of their hands to destroy Blueberry Vi.


    All the Third Grade adepts immediately started applying magical defenses to themselves without any hesitation.


    Even Adept Toyn, who was in charge of Blueberry Vi, slowly turned the snake-eye ring on his little finger. He quickly gave instructions to the Second Grade adepts watching from below them to evacuate everyone.


    Seeing how nervous the Third Grade adepts were, the other low-grade adepts immediately realized the danger of the situation. They retreated into the building and activated all the defensive arrays before finally being able to rx.


    ............


    The battle above theke was still as dangerous and vicious as ever.


    The two of them had gotten slightly too into the fight and were even starting to use some of their hidden aces.


    Greem turned into a shapeless cluster of mes, continually circling around Olivia and attacking her with searing fireballs and devastating pirs of fire. A thousand meters away, a powerful centaur formed of ck mist fought against Shadow Demon, who was flickering in and out of the shadows.


    Meanwhile, Olivia was now surrounded by multiple ck and white halos. They were of various sizes and thicknesses. Even their gravity effects switched and changed regrly in the blink of an eye.


    Under her fine, minute control, the gravity halos could attract or repel at a moment¡¯s thought. These traits could switch a dozen times in less than a second. Meanwhile, anything that got caught by her halos would be crushed, stretched, twisted, and deformed beyond recognition by the rapidly changing maic forces.


    Naturally, there was no way Greem¡¯s flesh body could have survived such devastating damage!


    After experiencing the terrifying effects of turbulent gravity, Greem turned himself into mes and protected himself with the golden mes from the Heart of Principles.


    As expected, once the firews protected him, Olivia¡¯s gravity halos could not affect him directly anymore.


    The battle between the two of them quickly turned into a sh ofws!


    Olivia¡¯s gravityws were clearly superior to Greem¡¯s firews. However, Greem had a far better mastery of his ownws.


    Increased Fire Range, Increased Fire Effectiveness, Fire Pration, Invisible mes, Critical Fires, Fire¡¯s Fragility, and Fire¡¯s Resilience; Greem repeatedly switched between the seven firews. Every one of his attacks tested Olivia with a neww to deal with.


    By the time Olivia started to get used to the frequency and effects of his different attacks, Greem began to use differentbinations of his firews, imbuing his spells with wondrous might and power.


    In all honesty, this was the first time in her life that Olivia felt genuine hatred and disgust for fire as an elementium!


    With Fire Pration, the elementium resistance that Olivia had always been so proud of was utterly useless. With Critical Fires, even the smallest spark of me could inflict devastating damage to her. She had to constantly monitor every change in elementium around her for Invisible mes. With Fire¡¯s Fragility, trading hits with Greem became no more than a joke. With Fire¡¯s Resilience, any fire that managed to catch onto her became unbelievably challenging to extinguish.


    After realizing the might of Greem¡¯s firews, Olivia finally put away the arrogance in her heart. She started to treat her opponent as an equal and quickly threw out her first hidden ace.


    A centaur spirit that existed as both immaterial and material!


    This Fourth Grade centaur spirit could freely shift between a material form and an ethereal form. It could dodge physical attacks from the enemy with its ethereal form before switching to its material form and stunning the enemy with a War Stomp. It could then expand on that opportunity and unleash a vicious flurry of attacks.


    If Greem had not been prepared, Olivia and her myriad of techniquesbined with the barbaric centaur spirit¨Cmight have been able to knock him out of the sky.


    Fortunately, just as Olivia had assistance, Greem also had an ally at hand!


    Shadow Demon flickered out of his shadow, instantly fending off the centaur spirit¡¯s attacks. The two summoned creatures thenmenced charging all over the battlefield, constantly flickering as they struggled to decide a victor.


    Seeing as his opponent had started using summoned creatures, Greem did not hesitate to do so as well. He tossed out a Fourth Grade golem core, instantly summoning a Fourth Grade Molten Giant standing at over thirteen meters tall.


    The Molten Giant might only be a beginner Fourth Grade, but when its towering form crashed into theke, it was still tall enough to attack Olivia with the upper half of its body. When thekewater shed with the Molten Giant¡¯s violent mes, the entireke started to bubble and boil.


    The many aquatic creatures that lived in theke now met with cmity. One by one, they were cooked alive. Their bodies floated to the surface and were reduced to cinders by Greem¡¯s terrifying Burning Domain.


    Olivia, who had been freely soaring across the air with her gravity halos, was wincing in pain from the endless barrage of fire spells. The gravity halos encircling her might be able to block all of the attacks, but the sparks from the shattered spells still caused her tremendous pain when they touched her.


    Enraged, Olivia extended both hands, and countless gravity halos surged forward. The immobile Molten Giant was instantly riddled with holes. Its Lava Shields and Inferno Shields couldn¡¯t have defended against those gravity halos.


    Where the halos traveled, fire elementium was shredded to sparks by the turbulent gravity, leaving massive holes in the Molten Giant¡¯s body.


    This beginner Fourth Grade Molten Giant crumbled after just five minutes in battle, proudly sacrificing itself in the line of battle!

 Chapter 1239 - Clash of Laws

    Chapter 1239 sh of Laws


    At Greem and Olivia¡¯s level, ordinary numbers could no longer describe the terror and might of their battle!


    Two Fourth Grade adepts could be at the same grade, but what truly set them apart was what narws they had mastered and the depth to which they had mastered them.


    The fact that Olivia could so proficiently manipte the gravity halos undoubtedly had much to do with her unique Physique. Meanwhile, even though the firews that Greem had mastered weren¡¯t as profound as Olivia¡¯s gravityws, his understanding, analysis, and application of thews were clearly superior.


    In all seriousness, thew powers that they had respectively mastered made them the cream of the crop among Fourth Grade adepts!


    Consequently, the battle between these two ¡®pseudo-Principle Adepts¡¯ created increasingly prominent shockwaves from conflictingws.


    The vast surface of theke had beenpletely upended by burning fires and strange gravity halos. The two powers could be seen shing and colliding at every corner of theke. Moreover, the tremors from their conflict were starting to overwrite thew attributes of this regional space.


    Every ball of fire and halo of light on this battlefield was incredibly dangerous and violent. There were many times when the disruption in thews started to cause strange changes to the elements. The fires no longer looked like fires, and the halos began to twist and distort.


    Even the two adepts themselves didn¡¯t dare touch these distorted phenomena that they had unleashed with their own hands!


    Olivia¡¯s gravity halos were constantly changing in their traits and characteristics. They would attract at times and repel at others. They were only two incredibly simple magical effects, yet through constant, rapidbinations, Olivia had managed to create intricate patterns of attack.


    Faced with Greem¡¯s long-ranged attacks, Olivia could simply divert the attacks away from her using a repulsion halo. She could even directly disrupt the internal spell models and cause them to disintegrate before they could reach their target. Olivia also took full advantage of her gravity halos¡¯ power when fending off Greem¡¯s melee attacks.


    Whenever Greem managed to find an opportunity to close the gap for a strike, she would use a repulsion halo to push him away. When she was ready to go on the offensive, she could use a halo of attraction to pull Greem towards herself.


    This means of manipting space on the battlefield through her gravity halos could make another enemy go insane!


    If her enemy hadn¡¯t been Greem, they might already be on the brink of defeat.


    However, Greem¡¯sbat techniques were not to be trifled with either.


    The manybinations of firews and the urate casting of his powerful spells made him a vicious cannon. Even though his opponent shredded or diverted most of his attacks, the shockwaves from their explosions still inflicted devastating damage to Olivia.


    Greem leaped away with Fire Teleportation and immediately took full advantage of that moment of opening to approach Olivia. Without any hesitation, he cast Dragon¡¯s Breath, and a cone-shaped st of fire surged towards the Adept of Torture.


    A fire spell that engulfed such arge area was not something that could be defended by one or two gravity halos.


    Olivia quickly wove signs with both her hands. One hand drew a white halo in the air thatunched herself flying backward, while the other created a ck and white halo that shot deep into the mes.


    The zing mes chased madly after Olivia¡¯s retreating figure. The tongues of fire at the very tip were almost able to lick at her dress. The extreme heat caused a few sparks of fire to ignite on Olivia¡¯s unprotected dress. She instantly let out a muffled grunt of pain.


    Meanwhile, the Gravity Cannon that Olivia had fired smashed through the mes like a heavy stone sinking in water and made direct contact with Greem¡¯s body. Greem did not manage to dodge in time. His entire life arm was crushed and shredded to sparks by the Gravity Cannon.


    Greem let out a grunt and stepped aside. Fire energy surged out from his severed arm and quickly reformed into a new one. However, the color of this new arm of fire was much brighter than the rest of his body. It was obviously slightly weaker as well.


    Greem had turned his body into one of mes at the very start of the battle.


    This way, any damage to his body could be rapidly recovered with fire energy.


    It was the main reason why elementium adepts always preferred to elementiumize their bodies inbat!


    A loud explosion rang out.


    Olivia charged out of the mes, wholly surrounded with ck and white gravity halos. A hole had been burned into her dress, revealing the equally scorched and ck skin beneath.


    ¡°Bastard! How dare you injure me,¡± Olivia let out a furious howl. ¡°You forced my hand!¡±


    The golden headband she wore glowed brightly and started to flow down like liquid. This liquid quickly turned into a set of purple armor. A mysterious, half-meter-long magic wand also abruptly appeared in her hands.


    Now fully equipped, Olivia¡¯s aura instantly soared and increased exponentially. A chain of gravity halos flew at Greem every time she pointed with her wand.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare hesitate at the sight of this. He pointed forward with his staff several times in a row.


    Chain Fireballs.


    Scarlet Firestorm.


    Holy Light¡¯s Retribution.


    A series of fire spells and equipment abilities were unleashed. The two opposing forces shed above theke, immediately causing a terrifying elementium storm to break out.


    Firews and gravityws were both essentialponents within the ne.


    As such, a sh of thesews caused the regional space¡¯s fundamentalws to be chaotic and dangerous.


    All sorts of strange colors emanated from the collision of power¡¯s epicenter.


    Even though they were the ones that had caused this disaster, both Greem and Olivia were genuinely terrified of these ribbons of light. They hastily moved away to avoid being caught by them.


    These fantastical ribbons of light were shards of power that had leaked out from the nar space upon the damage inflicted on the fundamentalws. As these ribbons of lights were mutated energy, neither Greem nor Olivia could recycle the power for their use anymore. Moreover, such mutated energy was basically poison and a pollutant to their increasingly pure systems of power.


    If they were affected by this mutated energy, the ensuing process of purification would cost them a tremendous amount of effort and resources. Even more terrifying was the fact that it would cost them precious time to grasp thews!


    The two of them had not been fighting so intensely at the start of the battle.


    The powers theymanded had only been restricted at the level of elementium, without much use of thews.


    However, when they started to get serious, they began to draw upon greater and greater powers.


    This esction continued until it was a raw sh of narws!


    In doing so, the sh ofw powers had inflicted irreparable damage to theke.


    Fantasticalw shards and distorted spatial rifts filled the entire space above and inside theke. It forced the twobatants to be even more cautious. They had to carefully avoid these drifting ¡®mines¡¯ as they continued to fight with all they had.


    It was then that the Chip¡¯s value in Greem¡¯s mind was truly put on disy.


    Greem could focus entirely on battle while leaving the Chip to predict the trajectory of the fight and sense the dynamic changes in battle.


    All the ¡®mines¡¯ and all traps were marked out in his vision with different colors by the Chip. The main targets of Olivia¡¯s attack and the radius of effect were also indicated.


    Greem only had to avoid the red dots and remain in the territories marked in green, and he would be able to neutralize eighty percent of Olivia¡¯s offense.


    Of course, the so-called ¡®safe zones¡¯ and ¡®danger zones¡¯ of the battlefield were also continually changing and always rtive, rather than absolute.


    Olivia was not a rookie inbat. She was a genuine powerhouse with the infamous title of the Adept of Torture!


    Her robust control over gravity allowed her to specify the changes in gravity in certain areas freely. There were no ¡®safe zones¡¯ where her power couldn¡¯t reach. As such, the ¡®safe zones¡¯ marked out by the Chip also contained quite terrifying storms of energy.


    However, they were only ¡®safe zones¡¯ in the sense that the damage sustained in these areas would not affect Greem¡¯s performance inbat!


    ¡°This is your power? Not bad, not bad indeed.¡± Olivia held up a massive gravity halo in front of her, shielding herself from Greem¡¯s storm of spells as she coldly said, ¡°However, if this is all you have, it¡¯s still far from enough to do anything about me.¡±


    Before she could finish her sentence, the fire spells that had arrived in front of her gravity halo abruptly exploded in unison.


    These fire spells had always been fired with Olivia as the target. Consequently, they were easily intercepted by her gravity halos and unable to unleash their full power. This time, Greem targeted all of his fire spells at her gravity halo. The storm of fire that erupted at its full strength instantly inflicted tremendous damage.


    Olivia¡¯s expression instantly changed. She hastily stepped back, but the exploding storm had immediately engulfed the entire area.


    The gravity halos might be powerful, but they weren¡¯t an air-tight defense!


    The powerful mes seeped in from the gaps between the gravity halos andshed wildly at Olivia. The purple leather armor she wore lit up with purple light and formed anotheryer of elementium armor.


    The elementium armor shed with the mes.


    Even though the mes were kept away from her body and failed to inflict any burns to Olivia, the collision of powers still caused her to be injured by the shockwaves.


    She was only an elementium adept, after all. Moreover, the Physique of female adepts was ordinarily weaker than male adepts.


    She started to cough up blood, even as she defended against the intruding mes.

 Chapter 1240 - Aftershocks of the Fight

    <strong>Chapter 1240 Aftershocks of the Fight</strong>


    The battle urring above theke of Blueberry Vi was being disyed onto the screen in thatrge hall of the Adept¡¯s Association.


    Countless Adept¡¯s Association members were watching the fight through their crystal screens.


    Olivia might not be the most powerful among the Association elders, but she did live up to her name. No one would dispute if she was listed as one of the ten strongest adepts of the Adept¡¯s Association. Yet, somehow, that legendary fire adept had managed to suppress Olivia in frontalbat and injure her to the point where she was coughing blood.


    Didn¡¯t this mean that he was superior to most Association elders when it came tobat prowess alone?


    Heavy breathing could be heard in the Association hall, and the atmosphere was heavy and repressed.


    ¡°Horner, intervene!¡± Vice-Chairman Domhnall¡¯s resentful voice rang out, ¡°We absolutely cannot sit by and watch an adept from the Centralnds beat down an Association adept. Stop their duel.¡±


    Horner, who had already arrived at the Ais Mountains a long time ago, immediately stepped forward. His iparably wild and domineering aura pressed towards the distant battlefield with the weight of a mountain. The two adepts engaged in battle reacted instantly.


    Another Fourth Grade adept had arrived?


    Greem had no intention of continuing his fight with Olivia while another Fourth Grade watched from the sidelines. He evaded a few attacks from Olivia with a several Fire Teleportations and flickered to the edge of theke. He even summoned Shadow Demon back to his side, despite the machine still being engaged in a furious fight against the centaur spirit.


    Meanwhile, Olivia was clearly too invested in the fight. The interruption of the fight by her ¡®ally¡¯ made her incredibly furious. She roared angrily at the bald adept approaching from the horizon.


    ¡°This is my fight...Horner, you won¡¯t get off easy! How dare you interrupt our fight.¡±


    Body-Refining Adept Horner let out a cold snort when he saw the berserk Adept of Torture covered in scorch marks.


    ¡°Olivia, this is the will of all the elders of the Association! What? Do you intend to oppose every one of us?¡±


    Olivia let out a furious shout, resembling that of an injured and desperate animal. A trace of a vicious and hateful expression appeared on her soot-covered face.


    ¡°This is my fight...I haven¡¯t lost, yet. I did not lose...what is wrong with you bastards? Why did you intervene in my fight? I still had the Scales of Gravity...I had the Attraction Array. I could have shredded that bastard into pieces. You...you people...stole my victory.¡±


    Olivia was furious, but there was no way this battle could continue.


    Even if she still had the means to fight, Horner¡¯s arrival had made Greem incredibly wary. Even if Olivia were to guarantee Greem¡¯s safety with her own life and reputation on the line, no one would ever continue fighting while another Fourth Grade adept watched intently.


    Thus, this ¡®stalemate¡¯ of a battle came to a hasty end.


    By the time the two fighters returned to shore, theke behind them was already marred beyond recognition. It was now and of death where no living being would dare to set foot. The once emerald-like, crystal clear surface of theke now burned with mes. Rifts in space also drifted everywhere.


    In fact, the boundaries between water and fire were no longer clear.


    Many of the mes were still burning on the water, seemingly as if the water itself was their fuel. Meanwhile, the strips of light bleeding out from the spatial rifts drifted in the night wind, waving like pretty silk ribbons.


    The battle between the two Fourth Grade adepts had severely affected the nar space near theke. Thews here had be twisted and changed.


    The aftershocks of their battle would affect this ce for many years toe. Theke itself and the surrounding areas would be affected by turbulent, shiftingws. This terrifying effect couldst for days and even months; no one knew when it would truly end. It all depended on the severity of the distortion of thews inflicted on this ce.


    It was said that true Principle Adepts that had passed the threshold of Fourth Grade could cause the narws to resonate with every single movement of their body. Even a simple flip of their palm couldpletely rewrite thews in a region.


    They could raise a volcano in the ocean¡¯s depths, built a castle in the sky thousands of kilometers in the air, and cultivated a garden of eternal spring in an icynd of death.


    The principles were their toys and their weapons!


    They could use their principle powers to change the narws in an area forever, influencing the ce for eons toe. Such horrifying might was naturally beyond what a Fourth Grade adept could ever hope to do!


    The fundamental reason that all nar worlds strived to expel individuals above Fourth Grade from themselves was that their existence severely affected the functioning of the narws. If these individuals were allowed to do as they liked within a ne, it was only a matter of time until the utter copse of the ne¡¯s system!


    However, certain powerful beings among the Fourth Grades, especially those who had a profound grasp of the narws, were also subject to such hostility and rejection from the world consciousness. This sense of rejection would reach its peak when they advanced to Fifth Grade. It would even be so strong that they would have no choice but to leave the world that so actively rejected them.


    Inparison, the Fourth Grade adepts who led good,fortable lives in the World of Adepts were often the less talented individuals who had no chance of advancing to Fifth Grade. A real powerhouse would feel the ¡®hostility¡¯ of the ne world towards them the moment they advanced to Fourth Grade.


    ............


    Even though there was no conclusion to the battle at theke, everyone could see how Olivia had been forced on her back foot.


    The Adept of Torture threw a tantrum and rampaged around the area for a while before furiously epting the oue.


    The three adepts returned to the Blueberry Vi and sat down in a hidden room.


    Even though Olivia¡¯s eyes were still filled with anger and denial when she nced at Greem, she behaved in a much calmer fashion.


    At the very least, she was no longer as arrogant and pushy as before. Instead, she treated Greem with a hint more respect, as if he was an equal!


    She was abat adept who had gotten to where she was through sheer power. She had always looked down upon those who summoned creatures to fight for them while they hid in the shadows. In contrast, a straightforward fighter with tremendous power like Greem was more to her taste.


    However, even though respect had been established through this fight, a grudge had also formed.


    For Olivia, the reputation she had lost in this fight was what she held most dear. She was so annoyed at the intervention because Horner had stopped her before she could use any of her killing moves.


    However, she had no idea that it was the same for Greem as well!


    The focusing crystal, the Orb of the Fire God, the Watersoul Jade...none of these items could easily be revealed in battle and were hidden aces that Greem had prepared for his deadliest of enemies.


    Naturally, he couldn¡¯t use any of these against an Adept of Torture who he could only injure but not kill. Suppressing the enemy in battle was the best result that Greem could hope for.


    After all, he was here at the Adept¡¯s Association to solve a problem, not to turn the problem into a dead knot!


    ¡°This is...¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask when the bald adept sat down.


    ¡°I am Horner, one of the elders of the Association!¡± Bald-headed Horner appeared gleeful, seemingly excited to have witnessed Olivia make a fool of herself.


    Meanwhile, the Adept of Torture sat on the side with an angry face. You could sense her fury when she red at the two male adepts.


    ¡°With regards to my transaction with Lady Olivia...¡± Greem was still concerned about this matter.


    ¡°The battle has not concluded. Naturally, we cannot proceed with this exchange.¡± Olivia¡¯s face was so dark you could probably squeeze ink from it. ¡°Unless you beat me, I will never hand over the Lightfire stone!¡±


    Greem¡¯s thick eyebrows stood up straight as his expression turned vicious.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be in a hurry...don¡¯t get agitated!¡± Horner quickly interrupted and tried to ease the tension. ¡°Lord Domhnall had already spoken before I came here. We wish to invite Lord Greem to the Association headquarters for a visit. There are many adepts there who can¡¯t wait to meet you. I believe you won¡¯t reject us, will you?¡±


    Even though Horner spoke humbly, the tone of certainty and insistence in his words made Greem frown.


    ¡°I certainly won¡¯t reject the invitation, since Lord Domhnall himself is the one that offered it. However, my main purpose here is to¡ª¡±


    ¡°Haha! Lord Greem. We have plenty of talented individuals in the Adept¡¯s Association, as well as a mountain of resources. Lightfire stones aren¡¯t exactly unique resources either. Are you worried that you will return empty-handed on this trip?¡± Horner enthusiastically persuaded.


    Since Horner was already offering to solve this problem of his, Greem had no reason to reject him any longer.


    Moreover, since he was already at the easternnds¨Cthe ce known as the ¡®Adept¡¯s Paradise¡¯¨CGreem would be happy to take a look around. Being able to tour the headquarters of the Adept¡¯s Association could help him better understand the true extent of influence of thisrgest organization in the world!


    Greem finally nodded in silence.


    ¡°I left my mount back at home due to the hurry I was in. You won¡¯t mind if I borrow your skyship for the trip to headquarters, will you?¡± Horner was speaking to Olivia this time.


    Olivia hesitated for a moment but finally nodded in approval.


    She drew a circle with her hands, creating a ball of blue light on her palm. She then whispered a few words into the ball before dispelling it.


    ¡°Go, the skyship is prepared. It can leave now!¡±


    A short momentter, a silver skyship took to the air from the Ais Mountains. It adjusted its direction slightly and quickly flew towards the southeast.


    What could be waiting for him there at the Adept¡¯s Association? Greem couldn¡¯t help but be somewhat nervous and excited!

 Chapter 1241 - The Tower of Observation

    Chapter 1241 The Tower of Observation


    Just like the other regions, the Adept¡¯s Association also had vastnds and territories.


    However, thesends were not as wealthy or popted as the Central Region.


    Flying high above and looking down, everything on the ground appeared small and fuzzy.


    There were still many primal forests within the Association¡¯s territory. Many wild animals lived there. It wasn¡¯t as scary as the ck Forest, but many unpredictable dangers still lurked within.


    At this height, the human settlements were the size of a fingernail, scattered haphazardly around several white towers. These towers were tall and slender. From a distance, they look like wooden sticks that had been stuck into the ground. They radiated with enchanting lights of various colors.


    While Greem stood at the edge of the ship and observed the earth beneath him, the body-refining adept known as Horner stepped up next to him.


    ¡°That¡¯s the North Reach. It¡¯s the coldest region in the Association territories,¡± Horner pointed at the north and described with a tone of awe.


    Greem looked to the north. He could very clearly see the forests turn darker as they stretched towards the north. He could also faintly see mountains and forest coated in white snow in the very distant north.


    ¡°To the east, 6,500 kilometers away, is the vicious ckreef Sea...and to the south, the infamous ck Forest,¡± Horner calmly said. ¡°Several tens of thousands of years ago, a dozen adepts came here from the Centralnds and founded the first human settlement. After all these years of hard work, effort, and fighting, we Association adepts have finally made thisnd our own. It is the cradle and paradise for all adepts. It is something that each and every one of us in the Adept¡¯s Association will always be proud of!¡±


    Naturally, Greem was well-versed in the history of the Adept Association¡¯s development.


    However, when he heard an Association adept repeat this same history with a tone of reverence, Greem could finally understand the difficulty of the Association¡¯s development and all it¡¯d had to do to reach its current form.


    ¡°Just take a look for yourself! Every single tower here belongs to the Adept¡¯s Association.¡± A woman¡¯s voice came from beside. Olivia walked out of the cabin and arrived next to the two of them. ¡°Here, ns are not allowed to build their own adept towers. All adept towers belong solely to the Association. Any adept n that vites this rule will be exiled from Association territory!¡±


    ¡°On this point alone, the Adept¡¯s Association ispletely different from your Zhentarim Association!¡±


    Greem smiled helplessly at Olivia¡¯s criticism.


    There were reasons behind every rule and means of survival.


    The Centralnds were the earliest human territory to be established in the World of Adepts.


    Thend there was rich, resources were plentiful, and the poption of humans was high. In addition to their vast territories, it allowed for the birth of many small, self-sustaining ns. Theck of powerful adepts further meant that even ordinary adept ns could fend off high-grade adepts through the use of adept towers. It made the unification of the Centralnds a monumentally difficult task!


    For the past tens of thousands of years, Zhentarim had remained a loose box of sand. No one had been able to unite the adept ns and form a concentrated force.


    Meanwhile, the three major adept organizations in the west, north, and east were all major organizations that were founded by Central adepts that had migrated to these regions. All of them had to go through tremendous difficulties to get where they were today.


    Due to the difficulty of the situation they began with, these individuals were unusually united. They had to rely on the strength of the whole to slowly obtainnd from the ck Forest¡¯s terrifying magical creatures.


    These difficult trials had tempered their will and power.


    Inbat power alone, the adepts from the three major organizations were far superior to the Central adepts. That was the main reason why the adepts of the Adept¡¯s Association had always looked down on the Central adepts!


    In the recent thousands of years, the territories of the three major organizations had expanded. However, the Centralnds alone remained unchanged, with no obvious expansion of any sort.


    That alone was proof that the lives of the Central adepts were far too peaceful, so much so that they hadpletely abandoned the idea of fighting for a better future.


    The territory in the Centralnds was too vast. As such, it had been divided into three dozen regions ofpletely different cultures and geography. The Adept¡¯s Association only had one-fifth of thend of the Centralnds, and they also split thesends into a dozen different territories. However, the actual authority over thesends was firmly held by the hands of the Association.


    Meanwhile, the means by which the Adept¡¯s Association exerted their authority was through the tall, intimidating adept towers!


    All the adept towers belonged to the Adept¡¯s Association. Any Association adept or apprentice that chose to roam thends could freely visit the towers and obtain their required supplies.


    It was because of such a generous atmosphere of learning and cultivation that the apprentices and adepts felt such belonging and trust in the Adept¡¯s Association.


    While they traveled this vastnd in pursuit of their studies, they represented the Adept¡¯s Association and the will of all these towers. At these times, the existence of the adept ns felt incredibly insignificant, so much so that they were moreparable to human nobles than the adepts.


    Thus, adepts of the east were Association adepts first, and members of their respective ns, second. Moreover, they only took pride in their status as members of the Adept¡¯s Association. Their n was no more than their background and where they were born.


    At this moment, Greem could only smile bitterly in the face of two proud Association adepts.


    After all, when it came to a sense of belonging and pride, Zhentarim would never be able topare to the Adept¡¯s Association!


    ............


    Seven dayster.


    After a long journey crossing tens of thousands of kilometers, the skyship finally arrived at the heart of Association territory¨Cthe Izar Province.


    The Izar Province was the headquarters of the Adept¡¯s Association. It was also thergest, richest region of the eleven provinces. The poption of humans here was incredibly dense, with many settlements bustling with life. They were not as cold or harsh as the other settlements at the borders of Associationnds.


    The first thing that could be seen when the skyship emerged from the forest were the numerous towers. The adept towers here stood in a circle, surrounding the main settlements of Izar and providing people with a sense of security.


    Meanwhile, at the center of the towns and settlements, a particrly sizeable adept tower pierced through the clouds, making everyone who witnessed it feel all the tinier.


    The heart of the Adept¡¯s Association, the Tower of Observation!


    Even if Greem had never been here personally, he had read descriptions and praises of this Tower of Observation in many books.


    It was a pce of magic that gathered the intelligence and techniques of all the adepts.


    It was a mysterious tower that carried the dreams and ideals of tens of thousands of adepts.


    It was the spine that propped up the very world of the adepts.


    The Tower of Observation did not appear at all inferior to the Silver Union¡¯s Castle in the Sky. Instead, it was constantly motivating and inspiring the countless numbers of Association adepts.


    Many adepts even spread the rumor that a mysterious door of light existed at the Tower of Observation¡¯s highest floor. Once Association adepts had made it past Fourth Grade, they would reluctantly step through that door and venture to the realms beyond to find newnds and new homes for themselves.


    Thus, that door of light was imbued with a veil of mystery and wonder by the many adepts.


    It was almost as if any adept that had the luck to walk through that door could sessfully advance past Fourth Grade and be one of the revered Great Adepts!


    Such rumors were, obviously, not to be believed. However, when Greem witnessed the tower for himself, his eyes were uncontrobly attracted to the top of the tower hidden above the clouds. He couldn¡¯t help but wonder what that door of light honestly looked like.


    Most flying ships could onlynd near the towers on the outside. None of them could enter the inner region. Only a few ships could make it past the perimeter of towers and fly straight for that magnificent tower at the center.


    In response to the confused look that Greem gave him, Horner smiled and exined, ¡°There are no-fly zones close to the headquarters. Ordinary flying ships and mounts are not allowed to fly here. However, Association elders are exempt. We can fly straight to the Tower of Observation, so there¡¯s no hassle of having to switch to a different transport.¡±


    Greem nodded in understanding when he heard this.


    The flying ship casually drifted across the sky, past vast stretches of farms, towns, and viges.


    Soon, the giant tower approached!


    The closer they were, the more Greem could feel the pressure and intimidation emanating from the tower.


    Finally, the ship slowlynded about fifteen kilometers away from the Tower of Observation.


    A short momentter, the adepts got onto ck carriages that drove them towards the tower¡¯s entrance.


    Billis rode on the same carriage as Greem.


    Billis appeared exceptionally excited and restless at being in a new ce.


    His body, curled up in his seat, was squirming without stop. He was almost like a child that had just found a new toy.


    Billis turned his head and looked at the faint red light all around them. He knew that Greem¡¯s barrier of firepletely protected them. Thus, he felt safe enough to ask, ¡°My Lord, who exactly won between you and that female adept?¡±


    ¡°No one won, and no one lost. Someone intervened before we could reach a conclusion!¡± Greem casually said.


    ¡°Still...you should have an estimate in your mind! Who would¡¯ve won?¡± Billis¡¯ admiration and respect for Greem had reached unprecedented heights ever since he advanced to Third Grade. That was why he seemed particrly adamant about learning whether Greem had won.


    ¡°Fifty-fifty!¡± On the other hand, Greem didn¡¯t seem to care. ¡°If it¡¯s a matter of winning or losing, it could swing either way. However, in a life and death situation, I would have better odds¨C about a seventy percent chance to win. However, she certainly still has some aces hidden up her sleeve. Even if I were to kill her, I would not be able to escape without severe injuries to myself.¡±


    Billis finally licked his lips in satisfaction after hearing Greem¡¯s evaluation.

 Chapter 1242 - The War Tower

    Chapter 1242 The War Tower


    When Greem and Billis got off the carriage, they were instantly stunned by the sight of the majestic tower before them.


    Bold, magnificent, mysterious, and profound.


    Countless words of praise rushed through their minds, surging through their bodies as a warm rush. They could feel their hearts cheer and their emotions soar.


    The Tower of Observation¡¯s walls glowed brightly under the warm sun. The tower¡¯s structure wasn¡¯t the traditional cylindrical shape, but aplex, multi-structure configuration consisting of many other, smaller ¡®towers¡¯ that split off from the main body.


    Manyrge runic stones covered in intricate magical lines floated high in the air, orbiting the tower along mysterious paths. The unique, green-golden material refracted the sunlight into gold, deep-blue, violet, red, and many other fantastical colors.


    Several rainbow bridges that looked almost solid connected the various sub-towers. A terrifying amount of energy surged within these rainbow ¡®bridges.¡¯


    The central tower connected with these smaller towers through countless air corridors and flying discs. Countless small balconies and gardens were also scattered across the Tower of Observation exterior, all of them covered by an invisible barrier.


    If one were to look from above, you could even see the adepts and apprentices strolling within the barriers.


    As the area surrounding the Tower of Observation was covered in an anti-flying barrier, and all unauthorized teleportation was restricted, you could only walk up the tower with your own two feet.


    However, as Fourth Grade adepts, they still enjoyed quite a lot of privileges and benefits.


    When Greem and the others arrived at the entrance to the tower, a twenty-meter-wide flying disc slowlynded in front of them.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go, Adept Greem. Since we¡¯re here, why not let me give you a tour of the Adept¡¯s Association!¡± Adept Horner was being very friendly.


    However, Olivia had clearly be impatient.


    ¡°Go on your own little tour! I will go look for a certain someone to settle some business.¡±


    Having said that, her body erupted into a cloud of ck mist.


    When the mist faded, Olivia was nowhere to be seen.


    ¡°Follow me!¡± Horner led the way and stepped onto the flying disc. Greem and Billis followed behind him.


    Horner didn¡¯t seem to make any gestures, but the flying disc already started moving up.


    Countless apprentices and adepts were walking busily along the vast za around the tower. Upon seeing the disc, they couldn¡¯t help but lift their heads and take a look. These people became smaller and smaller in Greem¡¯s vision until they were finally no more than little ck dots.


    It was impossible to see their faces and figures without casting Eagle Eye on himself!


    As the disc continued to gain altitude, everyone and everything on the ground grew smaller and smaller still. Meanwhile, the tower itself and everything on it appearedrger andrger.


    As the flying disc continued to rise, a massive runic stone drifted past them. Greem could sense a powerful, perfect, and utterly self-consistent energy cirction system within it.


    These runic stones were probably a part of the Tower of Observation¡¯s defenses.


    The purpose of their existence was to continuously monitor for unusual spatial fluctuations and energy reactions around the Tower. Upon detecting any abnormality, the runic stones would instantly transform into terrifying cannon tforms to exterminate any intruders before they could even approach.


    Greem might have collected some information on runic security stones, butpared to these true masterpieces, what he had researched were no more than trash!


    More importantly, these runic stones were not independent entities.


    Greem could sense arge, powerful, and mysterious soul controlling all of these. The runic stones were only some of the eyes and appendages avable to this entity.


    It was inevitable that the Tower of Observation had its own tower spirit¨C one that was extremely intelligent!


    The entire Adept¡¯s Association appeared calm and peaceful, like the perfect, ideal academy and paradise. However, Greem could see streams of energy cutting across the various areas with his unique Elementium Sight. He saw lines of interlocking energy strands, ovepping energy forcefields that concealed each others¡¯ existence.


    If the runic stones were the things on the surface, then these were what was hidden in the shadows.


    With these two systemsbined, one on the surface and one hidden from the public eye, the Tower of Observation¡¯s powerful and wless defensive system was formed!


    The flying disc passed through all these energy fields, continuously meshing with the defensive systems around it. Meanwhile, a strange energy flux radiated from Adept Horner. Through this flux, the flying disc was allowed to pass through the various forcefields and rise above the smaller sub-towers.


    The flying disc was still circling upwards.


    When they reached the edge of one of the sub-towers, Horner pointed at it and chuckled, ¡°This is the Breeding Tower. Any special beasts that the Association requires can be custom-ordered here and cultivated en masse. Most of the time, we need these beasts to exterminate the native armies of the nar worlds we invade.¡±


    This Breeding Tower was a dirt-yellow color and covered in a transparent elementium barrier. Greem could see the vast space inside the tower through the barrier.


    Supported by unusual spatial expansion magic, the inside of the tower was visibly muchrger than it appeared to be. Moreover, several smaller spaces had been carved out with static energy barriers, each of which contained all sorts of different magical beasts and creatures.


    Several tiny ck dots, the size of ants, moved around the space. These were the adepts in charge of monitoring and breeding the beasts.


    The flying disc quickly whisked past the Breeding Tower. Greem could only get a nce at the activities within and could not gauge the depth of the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s research in that field.


    ¡°Adept Horner, could I know what the procedure of events is for the Association when dealing with lesser nes?¡± A thought rose in Greem¡¯s mind, and he couldn¡¯t help but ask.


    ¡°What? Are you interested in this?¡± Hornerughed. ¡°Then let me take you to the War Tower for a tour!¡±


    Having said that, the flying disc turned and began to fly towards another sub-tower in the distance slowly.


    The War Tower was actually a ¡®miniature¡¯ tower split off as one of the Tower of Observation¡¯s bases.


    It wasn¡¯t exactly small, however. In fact, it would be considered a sizable adept tower if it were built in Zhentarim.


    The Tower of Observation had a total of seven hundred and seventy-seven levels.


    The base of the War Tower split off of the one hundred and thirty-sixth level of the Tower of Observation.


    Thus, when the flying disc slowlynded on one of the War Tower tforms, they were already thousands of meters above the ground. Clouds could be seen leisurely drifting by, making this ce seem as if it was heaven itself.


    The tform wasn¡¯trge; it was only about a hundred square meters in size. Four five-meter-tall metal golems stood there.


    When the flying dided on the tform, colorful light shone from one of the metal golems¡¯ head. The other golems stood forward, raising their heavy metal swords and going on alert.


    However, when the first golem¡¯s scans reached Horner and sensed the unusual energy flux, all security measures were dispelled.


    The metal golems returned to their ce and became unmoving statues.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go! I will show you around the insides of this ce!¡± Horner walked ahead of them and stepped onto the stone path that led into the tower.


    At a thousand meters in the air, it was an incredibly high altitude. Strong gales wailed all around them. Ordinary people would have been scared limp walking on this seemingly unsupported stone path that was only five meters wide.


    However, a high-grade adept like Greem could walk calmly and naturally on the path. In fact, he even had the mood to admire the scenery below while he walked.


    At the end of the path was a bright door of light that perfectly separated the inside of the tower from the outside.


    Passing through here obviously required extremely high clearance, but this could not stop Horner, who was an elder.


    The three adepts appeared in front of the door of light, and three holes that were approximately their size opened on the door. When they walked past, the door of light quickly shut again.


    The interior of the War Tower was a vast space in every dimension. Metal tforms hovered all over the tower, and a door of light opened onto every one of these tforms. Meanwhile, bright, glowing runes formed rows of numbers above each of the doors.


    ¡°...an intermediate rebellion has urred in ne JY0367. Reinforcement request has been received. Batserpent Squad, please prepare for battle. The next teleportation shall begin in 25 seconds.¡±


    Greem heard a crisp, female voice reverberating throughout the tower the moment he set foot into the room. A squad of eleven adepts appeared from somewhere and stood on one of the metal tforms.


    Arge mechanical arm lifted the metal tform through the tower, past countless portals and tforms, and finally stopped at a tformbeled JY0367.


    The adept squad, fully equipped, moved onto the metal tform. They stopped for a while before entering the portal in an orderly fashion, led by their leader.


    Apart from these sudden teleportations, there were countless mechanical arms in the War Tower that regrly lifted these metal tforms up and down. Adepts could always be seen on these tforms.


    When they reached the portal that they wanted to travel through, they would take out a golden bade and press it against the door of light. The door of light would then glow brightly. Once it had wholly stabilized, the adepts would make their way through and vanish.


    ¡°This is the War Tower of the Adept¡¯s Association. Every single portal corresponds to a lesser ne we have conquered. Any adept can freely travel to a lesser ne to explore and adventure once they put in an application with the Association. All their spoils will belong to themselves,¡± Horner proudly exined to Greem.


    Greem looked across and was mildly stunned.


    There were four or five hundred portals just within his vision.


    The size and ferocity of the Adept¡¯s Association potential for war were on full disy!

 Chapter 1243 - Intimidation

    <strong>Chapter 1243 Intimidation</strong>


    ¡°These must be the small and mid-sized nes that you have conquered. How does the Association deal with the more difficultrge nes?¡±


    After holding it in for a long time, Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask this question that he had been keeping in his mind the whole time.


    After all, there were too few top-ss resources that could be found in the small and mid-sized nes. They were more than enough for one or two adepts and perhaps even a small n, but small nes did not have enough resources to keep arge organization running.


    If someone were to tell Greem that a monstrosity like the Adept¡¯s Association was built on the foundation of raiding only small and mid-sized nes, he would never believe it, even with his life on the line.


    It didn¡¯t matter how many small or mid-sized nes you invaded. The best you could do was maintain a scarce living as a Fourth Grade adept. To be truly wealthy and allow an organization to continuously expand, invading civilizations that were close to or on par with the World of Adepts was the only option.


    Horner sinisterly smiled when he heard Greem¡¯s question. He fell silent for a moment, seeminglymunicating with someone far away.


    Finally, his eyesnded on Greem once more.


    ¡°You are fortunate! For some reason, the old guy looks upon you favorably. He¡¯s made an exception and allowed you to go on a tour of the higher levels of the War Tower. Come with me!¡±


    Horner had just finished speaking when the metal tform beneath them slowly rose to the higher levels, lifted by a giant mechanical arm.


    One after another, they passed by the metal tforms, and, one after another, the phantasmal portals were left behind. The metal tform continued to rise unflinchingly until a three-meter-thick st door stopped it.


    ¡°Rafatus, the old guy gave me clearance to bring him on a tour to the higher levels. Open up!¡± Horner shouted.


    ¡°Message connecting. Please wait momentarily,¡± A sweet, mechanical voice rang out in the air. It seemed like it was the tower spirit of the Tower of Observation that was speaking.


    A short momentter, the voice rang out again.


    ¡°Clearance confirmed. Wee, Adept Horner and Adept Greem! All other personnel, please remain behind.¡±


    The mechanical voice had just finished when a bright beam of light was cast on Billis. He vanished without a trace before he could even gasp.


    Greem lifted an eyebrow.


    ¡°Please do not be concerned. Your follower has been ced in a safe ce: Dimension DF7710. He is perfectly safe. I will release him when you leave the War Tower.¡±


    As the voice spoke, a magical mirror appeared. Inside the mirror was an image of Billis, who was imprisoned in an empty alternate dimension. Billis was clearly panicking. Countless ck insects shook off from under his cloak, searching for a rift or an exit in this endlessly white space.


    Greem waved his hand and created a fire rune in the air. He then whispered a few words. Billis suddenly froze in the image. He listened intently and finally gave up on his pointless resistance. He sat down and waiting silently for the end of his ¡®imprisonment.¡¯


    The magical mirror vanished.


    The thick st door suddenly split into countless crescent-shaped pieces and retracted into the tower walls, revealing the path upwards.


    The metal tform continued rising.


    This time, what appeared before Greem was no longer colorful, pretty portals, but dark doors of light that glowed a bleeding, crimson red.


    ¡°ne doors!¡± Greem took a deep breath and only exhaled after a long pause.


    The portals in the lower levels were all teleportation portals. However, these here were ne doors. The difference between the two of them was not just the name. It was a fundamental difference that concerned the very nature of their existence.


    Teleportation portals were an ¡®inexpensive¡¯ method of teleportation. It was the excavation of a ¡®crude¡¯ wormhole between two nes through the use of space magic. It allowed for the simple transportation of workforce and resources.


    However, this teleportation method was extremely crude, and adepts that went through this process would have to endure tremendous spatial pressure. It put additional risk and stress on the traveling adepts.


    Moreover, teleportation through the use of such portals was easily affected by space tides.


    If the adepts traveling through the portal were to run into a spacestorm, then what awaited them was a disaster. They would either be caught up in the spacestorm or teleport to some unknown ce.


    Both of these options were fairly lethal for intermediate and low-grade adepts!


    However, ne doors were different.


    ne doors were nar passages constructed between two nes using sophisticated space magic and techniques. The entire passage was protected by spatial arrays and was incredibly safe and stable.


    However, the construction of a ne door required a tremendous number of rare resources. Not every nar world was worth such an investment.


    Yet, there were as many as three dozen of these crimson portals on the higher levels of the War Tower.


    Each of them had their own heavy, crushing presence. You could sense the traces of otherworldly energy aura radiating from the doorframes, which were carved full of strange patterns.


    As Greem and Horner rose even higher up, Greem could see one of the crimson doors vibrate violently. It seemed like a war was going on. Five wide metal esctors reached out from the tower walls and extended towards that door. An endless stream of magical beasts and towering metal golems rushed into that portal without stop.


    ¡°That is a door to Darklight, a world with far too many strange creatures that simultaneously possess light and dark power. We have only managed to establish a forward base there so far, and the fighting is still very intense. Five elders have already hurried over there to stabilize the situation. Even so, we haven¡¯t been able to dissuade the native creatures from their crazed assaults on our base.¡±


    ¡°Darklight. How developed is the civilization over there?¡± Greem asked curiously/


    ¡°They are a civilization at the same level as our World of Adepts, only a few thousand years behind, perhaps. However, the power of the natives is too homogeneous. It¡¯s not that difficult to deal with them!¡±


    Greem observed the voodoo beasts and metal golems silently as they swarmed forward. He could make some basic estimations of the intensity of the fighting on the other side of that portal based on the rate at which these foot soldiers were being run down. If a world like this was ¡®not difficult to deal with,¡¯ what would a ¡®difficult world to conquer¡¯ be like?


    Greem wondered to himself, even as he felt sorrow at the tremendous disparity of power between Zhentarim and the Adept¡¯s Association.


    The Zhentarim Association, with what power they had, would probably have tomit all their might just on an invasion into a mid-sized ne! Meanwhile, not only was the Adept¡¯s Association able to invaderge nes on par with the World of Adepts, but could even casually categorize them based on the difficulty of conquering them.


    The vast difference in power revealed in this deted Greem¡¯s ambition. He had wanted to unify the Centralnds, but he couldn¡¯t help but be dejected by what he had seen.


    Moreover, since they were willing to show him the secrets of their War Tower, it meant even these secrets weren¡¯t their most important ones. There had to be something even deeper beyond these crimson portals.


    However, Greem knew the situation he was in.


    As an outsider, there was a limit to the courtesy that could be extended to him. If he pushed the letter, he would be forcing the Adept¡¯s Association to turn on him!


    Greem nodded satisfactorily and smiled at Adept Horner as he expressed his gratitude.


    ¡°Well, we¡¯ve toured the War Tower. How about it? Let¡¯s go to the Association¡¯s main hall for a spin! There are many elders over there who want to meet you!¡±


    Horner felt rxed when he saw Greem nod.


    The metal tform immediately returned along the same path it had arrived. It returned to the lower levels of the War Tower and retrieved the ¡®imprisoned¡¯ Billis before leaving the War Tower. The adepts then got onto a flying disc and flew towards the main body of the Tower of Observation.


    Fifteen minutester, in a hall on the three hundred and twenty-seventh level of the central tower, Greem finally met the dozen Association elders who had been waiting here.


    It was a simple magical hall. A dozen Fourth Grade adepts in robes and armor of various colors were gathered in the room, talking amongst themselves as they waited.


    When Greem and Horner stepped into the room, they immediately halted their conversation, and their eyes looked towards Greem.


    Greem immediately felt the tremendously heavy pressure pressing towards him.


    Everyone here was a Fourth Grade adept; there were no weaklings among them.


    They didn¡¯t even need to speak. Even a simple gaze of theirs could be empowered with Spirit and extended over Greem¡¯s body as an invisible force.


    They were using their Spirit appendages to subtly search for Greem¡¯s secrets even as they looked at him. Greem even smelled the revolting smell of divination magic on some of those gazes!


    Sixteen Fourth Grade adepts, sixteen pairs of eyes, sixteen sources of spiritual pressure.


    This sort of intimidation and probing would have made any other Fourth Grade adept turn pale.


    Greem resisted the impulse to take out the fire coral staff. He maintained the smile on his young, handsome face. Overwhelming fire energy surged out of his Heart of Principles, the power of the firews turning into runes that rushed towards his mind.


    A searing surge of mental consciousness rose from Greem and shed with the horrifying spiritual pressure of the many Association elders.


    Everyone let out a muffled grunt at the same time.


    The heavy pressure in the air vanished in an instant.


    Greem paused his steps for a brief moment and managed to neutralize the bacsh from the sh. He then smiled and greeted the elders of the Association.


    The Association elders immediately showed expressions of puzzlement. Half of the elders, who were only present here as clone projections, even flushed red in the faces. It seemed like that unusual, searing mental will had invaded their bodies.


    Fortunately, they were Fourth Grade adepts, after all. Even if they were only clone projections, they were able to suppress the ¡®insignificant¡¯ aftershocks of that sh in an instant.

 Chapter 1244 - The Words Behind Their Backs

    Chapter 1244 The Words Behind Their Backs


    ¡°Wee...wee.¡±


    An elderly adept with wrinkles on his face and a wisp of a beard on his chin walked forward. His eyes were slightly closed, and a strange light gleamed in them.


    ¡°I am Domhnall, and we wee you, Sir Greem!¡±


    The other adepts also nodded in this direction and acknowledged Greem¡¯s arrival.


    Meanwhile, Olivia didn¡¯t so much as move a muscle.


    Greem hurried forward, bowing to Adept Domhnall and paying respects as a junior. Greem wasn¡¯t being humble. Rather, it was because he knew very well about the background of this elderly adept that he showed his respect.


    Domhnall, Vice-Chairman of the Adept¡¯s Association, responsible for managing most of the Association¡¯s daily affairs. He had held this position for as long as 1,200 years, hardly making a single mistake along the way.


    Consequently, there were many rumors about him in public.


    The most convincing rumor was that Domhnall was the soul clone of a Great Adept of the Association. He had remained in the World of Adepts for the long-term development of the Adept¡¯s Association and was thus in charge of managing the Association¡¯s affairs.


    In doing so, most of the other Association adepts were liberated from menial duties and could focus all their time and energy on their personal improvement. More crucially, it allowed the Adept¡¯s Association to remain eternally within the grasp of a select group of individuals. It would never be the battlefield of individual, ambitious adepts vying for power.


    Domhnall appeared quite pleased by Greem¡¯s show of respect. He pulled Greem along with him as they walked around the hall, patiently introducing him to all the adepts present in the room.


    Geraldine, Fourth Grade elementium adept, male.


    This was a powerful adept whose body had been entirely converted into light elementium. His eyebrows, skin, flesh, and even his bones had turned transparent. You could see the organs in his body and the blood circting throughout perfectly. The light elementium surging within him was also apparent. You could see how the light elementium melded and meshed with the muscle tissue.


    He must have been after the enhancement tobat power by choosing such an unusual elementium form. However, there were both benefits and downsides to such a thorough elementiumization. Otherwise, Greem wouldn¡¯t be so insistent on keeping his human form.


    Ames, Fourth Grade bloodline adept, male.


    He was a strange individual with blue hair and blue eyes. A peculiar magical halo engulfed him. As he had utterly concealed the aura of his halo, Greem couldn¡¯t figure out its effect based on sight alone.


    However, the Chip estimated that the halo was a radiated forcefield formed as a result of his overpowering magical beast aura that could not be easily concealed.


    Neve, Fourth Grade bloodline adept, female.


    Neve was a strange adept with almost no hair at all. She was bald and had no eyebrows orshes to speak off. Her skin was smooth as jade, and a pair of green reptilian pupils rested in her sharp, narrow eyes. An intense and chilling aura would rise from her when her pupils shrank.


    She must have possessed some unusual serpentine bloodline. That much was evident from the sinister aura she radiated. However, there were as many as a thousand known serpentine bloodlines, with over a hundred of them having the potential to reach or exceed Fourth Grade. It would not be an easy task figuring out her actual bloodline.


    ......


    ......


    In addition to Horner and Greem, there were eighteen Fourth Grade adepts in this hall. It would be a shocking scene if it were set in the Centralnds.


    However, here, it appeared normal and casual!


    While Greem was silently recording and collecting basic information on all these Fourth Grade adepts, the Association elders were also trying to uncover Greem¡¯s information.


    With the aid of a mentalwork constructed by Tower Spirit Rafatus, the elders couldmunicate between themselves without drawing Greem¡¯s attention.


    ¡°Olivia, you just fought him. What was it like? How powerful is he?¡±


    ¡°Indeed, Olivia. You fought with that guy for such a long time. It must have been a stalemate, wasn¡¯t it?¡±


    Olivia¡¯s face darkened when herpanions teased her. She couldn¡¯t help but let out a furious roar.


    ¡°Schreiber, if your attacks are as sharp as your tongue, why don¡¯t you challenge him to a duel? He¡¯s a fire adept; you¡¯re a fire adept. Why don¡¯t you two see whose mes are stronger? Campbell, you bastard. Don¡¯t think that your magic will necessarily be able to beat me! Why don¡¯t you challenge that fire adept as well, if you¡¯re so confident!¡±


    Even more people entered the mental conversation when they saw Olivia lose her cool.


    ¡°I heard that this Greem fellow was only three hundred years old when he advanced to Fourth Grade. Is that true?¡± Finally, a sharp male voice asked.


    ¡°I know about this!¡± The bloodline adept known as Ames spoke up, ¡°I went to the Centralnds a while ago, and I took the opportunity to do some research on this Adept Greem. ording to the information avable to the public, the first time he became the center of public attention was when he advanced to First Grade. It has only been three hundred and eighty-seven years since then.¡±


    ¡°And his birthce? Does he have any rtives?¡± Some asked coldly.


    ¡°There¡¯s no longer anywhere we can look to in order to find this information! It¡¯s said that a little ident happened at the resource site of the n he belonged to when he advanced. All the apprentices and even the stationed adept died in that ident. Only him, a female adept, and a bug adept survived. Moreover, all of them advanced to be adepts.¡±


    ¡°Hah! ident. It was probably something to do with blood rituals!¡±


    ¡°We¡¯ve already contacted the Sarubo n with regards to this matter and tried our best to obtain what primary information we could. Indeed, Greem seemed to have been an apprentice epted from a nearby vige from the resource site. We couldn¡¯t find any more specific information beyond that. The stationed adept of the resource site tried to sacrifice his apprentices in a blood ritual to advance to Second Grade. Unfortunately, he failed, and his n benefitted three apprentices under him instead.¡±


    ¡°He failed? Not necessarily! In my opinion, it was this Greem who outwitted the adept!¡±


    ¡°Advanced to First Grade three hundred and eighty-seven years ago. Second Grade, three hundred and sixteen years ago. Third Grade, two hundred and thirty-two years ago. And finally, Fourth Grade ny-four years ago. If we were to calcte based on these milestones, he would have been exactly three hundred years old when he advanced to Fourth Grade.¡±


    The mentalwork suddenly fell utterly silent. The adepts couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    Even though the speed of advancement had absolutely nothing to do with thebat prowess of an individual, the fact that Greem could rise to prominence in the Centralnds indirectly demonstrated his overwhelming talent as an adept. Moreover, judging from his performance after advancing to Fourth Grade, this would not be his final destination. He was still improving and advancing at a respectable pace.


    Of course, this wasn¡¯t the first time they had met an individual with such unbelievable talent.


    Over a thousand years ago, one Adept Sarubo had rapidly risen in prominence in the Centralnds, in a fashion just as domineering and overwhelming. Unfortunately, even as talented as he was, he could not avoid the endless interventions and disruptions of the three major organizations from the shadows. In the end, even he could not unite Zhentarim and was forced to advance to Fifth Grade and leave the World of Adepts.


    Sarubo was now a Sixth Grade Great Adept, making a prosperous living for himself in the realms beyond. Sadly, the Sarubo n he left behind in the World of Adepts had fallen from their position of prominence after just three or four hundred years of prosperity.


    Of course, the main reason for this was because Great Adept Sarubo demanded far too many resources from the n, which affected the n¡¯s development. He had sessfully advanced from Fifth Grade to Sixth Grade, while the n he left behind had been drained of its nutrition, resulting in a gap in power between him and his followers.


    If he had taken less from his n and bestowed resources on his descendants in a reasonable manner, the Sarubo n would not be in the situation they were in. They would notck a Fourth Grade adept and be reduced to a mid-sized n that could easily be pushed around.


    ¡°Just three hundred years to advance to Fourth Grade, and another eighty years to stabilize his Spirit. Hisbat power has already reached the level of an advanced Fourth Grade. This Greem fellow is not to be underestimated!¡± It was k¡¯shir who spoke up this time. He was a powerful bloodline adept who was undeniably stronger than Olivia.


    ¡°Olivia, there¡¯s no need to be so upset! I know you have many techniques that you have yet to unleash, but this Greem fellow definitely has many more aces hidden up his sleeves than even you. In a deathmatch, you should be happy to have a forty percent chance of winning!¡±


    If Olivia, the Adept of Torture, was definitely one of the top ten Association elders, then k¡¯shir was certainly among the top five. An ultra-powerhouse.


    No one would doubt his words.


    Greem could suppress the Adept of Torture. A person like him was probably worthy of being known as an ultra-powerhouse.


    If a person like him was allowed to stir up a storm in the Centralnds...everyone¡¯s expressions turned solemn.


    ¡°Then how should we deal with this Greem. Should we try our best to pull him to our side, or should we suppress his rise?¡± Someone asked softly.


    If Greem were only an ordinary adept, they would not have needed to go to such lengths. However, if Greem were truly as powerful as an ultra-powerhouse, then the disunited Zhentarim would be the best ce for him.


    ¡°In the one thousand years I have managed the Adept¡¯s Association, I have seen countless geniuses. However, in the same thousand years, the three major adept organizations are still the three major adept organizations. A fourth force has yet to emerge. Why?¡± Vice-Chairman Domhnall couldn¡¯t help but chuckle when he saw everybody so concerned.


    ¡°Their foundations are too shallow! Trying to unite the entirety of the centralnds with only one Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouse? Come back and talk when you¡¯re an Eighth Grade adept, why don¡¯t you!¡±


    Having said that, Domhnall let out a long, arrogantugh.

 Chapter 1245 - Difficult Negotiations

    Chapter 1245 Difficult Negotiations


    In a special, secret room.


    Greem sat down calmly to begin the actual negotiations with Adept Domhnall.


    ¡°Sir Greem, did you reallye here to the east only for that Lightfire stone?¡± Domhnall was the host, after all. Naturally, he was the one to initiate the conversation.


    Even though Domhnall was the only person in the room, Greem could clearly sense over two dozen mysterious consciousnesses carried on Domhnall¡¯s person. Frankly speaking, apart from the elders who were upied with vital matters or stuck in other worlds, all the Fourth Grade adepts were observing this negotiation.


    ¡°I have truly learned of the Adept Association¡¯s might and prosperity sinceing here: the knowledge, the nar coordinates you possess, your otherworldly ves, and high-grade resources. These are all things I am interested in. However, before we discuss trade on those items, I want to seal the deal on the Lightfire stone.¡± Greem might be alone, but he was not relenting at all.


    ¡°The Association only has this one Lightfire stone in our possession at the moment. What price do you intend to pay to obtain it?¡±


    ¡°I recall that this Lightfire stone is in Olivia¡¯s hands. You¡ª¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry about this, Sir Greem. The Lightfire stone was given to Olivia as a mission reward to begin with. As long as you agree to our conditions, I have the means to make her hand it over!¡± Domhnall narrowed his eyes, his expression sly and cunning.


    Greem brooded in silence for a moment before speaking.


    ¡°As you should know, Lord Domhnall, I have in my possession some unusual mushrooms from another world. They can increase the base attributes of an adept by a certain degree, and they are effective even on Fourth Grade adepts. If you are willing to hand over the Lightfire stone, I can provide you with three people¡¯s portions of magical mushrooms!¡±


    ¡°Those mushrooms are only some resources used to increase base attributes. Your offer doesn¡¯t carry sufficient weight yet!¡± Adept Domhnall proudly retorted, ¡°We have many other simr adept resources in our possession after the tens of thousands of years of umtion since the establishment of our Adept¡¯s Association. Besides items that can improve attributes, we even have plenty of resources here that can improve an adept¡¯s talent and potential.¡±


    Greem frowned. He couldn¡¯t help but be slightly nervous.


    If it were anyone else, Greem would be confident that they were only bluffing to improve their position in the negotiation. However, faced with this old man who had lived for a thousand years, Greem genuinely believed that everything he said was the truth.


    With the size of the Adept¡¯s Association and the endless amount of time they had to stockpile resources, it only made sense that they had such deep pockets. However, these items were considered strategic resources. The three major adept organizations would never let them fall into the hands of theirpetitors easily unless they were already on the ropes.


    On the other hand, Greem and the Crimson n were still too poor. Otherwise, they would never trade away a resource as vital as the mushrooms.


    ¡°Then...what is that you want, Lord Domhnall?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    ¡°I want you!¡± Domhnall stroked his wispy beard as he casually said.


    ¡°Me?¡±


    ¡°Yes! As long as you are willing to join our Adept¡¯s Association, I can make the decision to give you this Lightfire stone as a weing gift!¡±


    Greem narrowed his eyes and smiled as he replied, ¡°My lord, you should know that I am currently an elder of the Zhentarim Association!¡±


    ¡°Elder of the Zhentarim Association,¡± Domhnall repeated after Greem,ughing madly as he did so. ¡°You can repeat that again! We will see if Freed is as insistent on you being an elder of the Zhentarim Association as you are!¡±


    Having said that, he let out another boisterousugh!


    A sh of anger flickered across Greem¡¯s face as Domhnallughed. However, his expression quickly turned into one of awkward frustration and, finally, dejection.


    Domhnall couldn¡¯t be med for mocking him. Greem¡¯s position in the Centralnds at the moment was quite awkward indeed. He had kept a low profile and hidden within Fire Throne for the past eighty years. One reason for that was to heal the injuries to his soul, but also, he was concerned about further provoking the adepts of the Centralnds.


    If it weren¡¯t for the alliance he had formed with the Fire King and the agreement for his method of purifying thew fires, Greem would never have emerged from hiding and appeared in public again.


    The only thing he was relying upon on this trip was the Orb of the Fire God, which he had now finally gained some measure of control over.


    It was thanks to this Fifth Grade origin magical equipment that Greem could suppress Olivia, much to her chagrin.


    ¡°Since both of us are willing to have an honest talk, there is no need for any more smoke and mirrors. Your position in the Centralnds at the moment is very awkward. There¡¯s really nowhere to go for you. If you truly intend to unite Zhentarim, we three major adept organizations won¡¯t be your first concern. Retaliation from within the Zhentarim Association will be very intense, indeed. Do you have the confidence to suppress the united retaliation of a dozen adepts?


    ¡°Even if you were to wait a few more years to further bolster the n¡¯s power, it simply won¡¯t work. Do you expect the three major adept organizations to watch silently when you finally possess the power to unite the Centralnds?¡±


    Greem fell into a speechless silence.


    ¡°I hear that you have four Fourth Grades in your n now. You, Mary, Alice, and a powerful thunder dragon from another world. Truly, a formidable force if given more time to mature and grow. However, that is still nothing before our Adept¡¯s Association.


    ¡°Rather than stifling your growth by remaining amongst those talentless adepts of the Centralnds, why don¡¯t youe to our Adept¡¯s Association? At least here, we have broader skies, free for you to grow and explore. Moreover, our Adept¡¯s Association has a far superior reserve of knowledge and resources than the other two major organizations. Practically day and nightpared to Zhentarim.


    ¡°If you want to continue advancing and rise to Fifth Grade,ing to our Adept¡¯s Association is the wisest decision!


    Vice-Chairman Domhnall¡¯sbat prowess was utterly unknown, but his persuasive ability was indeed impressive. Even as determined as Greem was, he felt his heart waver slightly when he heard Domhnall¡¯s words.


    Just then, the Chip¡¯s cold voice rang out in Greem¡¯s mind.


    [Detecting the presence of an unusual mental forcefield. Initial estimates suggest its effects to be mental contamination, resulting in the victim bing more receptive to suggestions. Reminding host to remain alert!]


    Shit! It was mental magic. No wonder his mind was wavering from a few words.


    Greem cursed furiously to himself, all while calling upon the firews to protect his mind.


    Nothing seemed to have changed in his appearance, apart from a strange fire rune suddenly lighting up deep in his ck eyes.


    Domhnall, who had been keeping a close eye on Greem, believed himself to have guided Greem¡¯s thoughts onto the right track. As he prepared to deal the final blow and seal the deal, the suddenly ignited fire rune abruptly burned a massive hole in his intricate web of Spirit.


    Domhnall was surprised and instantly lost all control over Greem¡¯s mind.


    ¡°Thank you for your concern, Lord Domhnall!¡± Greem¡¯s eyes burned passionately as he smiled coldly. ¡°My life is in the Centralnds is going quite well. In fact, I have no ns for migration to the east at the moment. So, I believe it¡¯s best we get back to discussing our terms!¡±


    Cough.


    Seeing as Greem had managed to free himself from the mental maniption, Domhnall could only let out a sigh and put on a smile once more.


    ¡°Since you have no intention ofing to our Adept¡¯s Association, we won¡¯t be pushing the issue either. If that¡¯s the case, we will have to settle this business the proper way! Ten million magical crystals, in addition to the spores of those magical mushrooms, and the cultivation method.¡±


    Olivia¡¯s voice shouted out in objection within the mentalwork the moment Domhnall gave the offer.


    ¡°Olivia, this deal concerns the benefit of all elders of the Association. We can¡¯t let you do whatever you want on this matter. In the end, isn¡¯t extending your brother¡¯s life what you want the most? Very well. We will send an invasion team to an elven kingdom immediately and take their Tree of Life off their hands. Your brother should have no problem living for another hundred years with a Tree of Life as a sacrifice. That¡¯s enough, isn¡¯t it?¡±


    The Tree of Life of an elven kingdom from a mid-sized ne was still not as valuable as the egg of a Fifth Grade divine creature. However, Olivia knew that this was the old man¡¯s final offer. She had no choice but to agree to these terms.


    Olivia gritted her teeth and replied sternly, ¡°I want to lead that invasion team personally. My brother doesn¡¯t have long left. We can¡¯t afford to proceed slowly with the invasion!¡±


    ¡°Very well!¡±


    A bloody war in another world had been decided in a matter of a few sentences, exchanged between two of the most powerful adepts in this world. All of it stemmed from no more than a desire to allow the rtive of a Fourth Grade adept to live a few years longer!


    Greem had no idea that this negotiation was happening behind the scenes. He frowned deeply, considering the terms that were being offered to him.


    Ten million magical crystals, and all the magical mushrooms.


    These two terms put together represented an unbearable burden to the Crimson n as it was! Greem had to consider all the consequences on the Crimson n¡¯s future development before he could decide.


    Finally, fifteen minutester, Greem took off an unusual ring from his ring finger on the right hand. He weighed it in his hand solemnly as he said, ¡°This is Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, a Fourth Grade treasure I found in a holy knight ne. It can convert one¡¯s powers into non-attribute holy light power. There shouldn¡¯t be any problem if I use this to discount some of the magical crystals, would there?¡±


    Having said that, Greem poured fire energy into the ring, creating a holy light shield and holy light arrow in front of him.


    All of a sudden, Domhnall raised an eyebrow. Adept Geraldine¡¯s excited yelp rang out in his mind.


    ¡°That ring is mine. Old man, help me get that ring!¡±


    Greem finally smiled when he saw the slight change in Domhnall¡¯s gaze.

 Chapter 1246 - Origin Blood

    Chapter 1246 Origin Blood


    At the level of Fourth Grades, it wasn¡¯t too difficult to obtain some high-grade equipment.


    One could simply go to an otherworldly battlefield, fight a few wars, and find some decent equipment. Meanwhile, even those who didn¡¯t like to go into battle could simply umte some wealth from the backlines and use those resources to forge decent magical equipment.


    However, this only referred to obtaining Fourth Grade equipment!


    Finding origin equipment that belonged only to yourself and waspletelypatible with your soul origin was no more than a dream.


    The equipment you obtained in battle was often ipatible, while the ones created through the umtion of resources were often mediocre. As such, the average Fourth Grade adept had very few pieces of equipment that genuinely suited them.


    Greem was a perfect example. He had obtained all sorts of Fourth Grade equipment since his advancement: the Bleeding Spear, the ogre¡¯s warhammers, Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring, Shadow¡¯s Breathing, the Ring of Shadows. However, the only one that matched his fire affinity was the fire-coral staff.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Orb of Shadowsing into his possession that he used to trade for the Orb of the Fire God, Greem¡¯sbat prowess would not have improved so rapidly. He would not have been able to stand toe-to-toe against a powerful individual like the Adept of Torture.


    That was why even Adept Geraldine couldn¡¯t help but be exceptionally excited when he saw a Fourth Grade ring that was perfectlypatible with his origin attribute. He couldn¡¯t wait to get his hands on it.


    The reason Greem was willing to offer Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring as part of the exchange was mainly that he could not use the ring to its full potential. It barely disyed the might of a Fourth Grade item in his hands. Most of the time, Greem forcibly drew on the ring¡¯s powers with his powerful Spirit.


    In his hands, such awkward equipment was an inefficient ring of healing at the very best. He might as well trade it away with this opportunity and make the best use of the ring.


    As for whether this would aid the enemy, it wasn¡¯t exactly a problem to be considered!


    The Adept¡¯s Association was still too far away from Zhentarim. For the foreseeable future, which was the next few hundred years, Greem¡¯s main rivals would be the stubborn, conservative Fourth Grade adepts of the Centralnds.


    Greem would not easily make enemies out of the three major adept organizations before he had confidence in surviving!


    Even if the Adept¡¯s Association was hostile towards him, they couldn¡¯tunch an actual invasion. As for the schemes and plots that they could throw his way? Greem couldn¡¯t care less about those.


    As long as the three major organizations did not dare to start an actual war, Greem had confidence in winning this race of time and power.


    Domhnall, who was sitting across from Greem, took Sodden¡¯s Holy Ring into his hands. He toyed with it a little and verified its attributes. His wrinkly old face rxed before breaking into a slight frown as he said, ¡°The base price of Fourth Grade items in the market right now is between two to three million magical crystals. This ring is rtively powerful, but its attributes are too niche. That might affect its base value if traded away. However, since you are willing to offer it up, I won¡¯t push the price too low; three million magical crystals, how about that?¡±


    Greem gave a thin smile, ¡°I remember there was one Adept Geraldine among the adepts you introduced to me earlier. I believe if I contacted him, he would be willing to offer a far higher price than what you¡¯re offering me!¡±


    Domhnall¡¯s expression didn¡¯t change. He appeared asposed as ever.


    ¡°You are right. The market for high-grade items is simply like this. What might be an invaluable treasure in the hands of one who needs it might just be another high-grade item in the hands of another. Since you¡¯ve mentioned him, I will contact Geraldine and see how high a price he is willing to pay!¡±


    A short momentter, a light shed in the room as a mysterious person of light appeared out of thin air.


    After elementiumizing his body, Geraldine had gained this strange ability to disassemble and reassemble his body freely. He could infiltrate any ce where there was light. Nothing could stop him from entering. His power was also endless wherever there was light.


    Such power wasparable to those incredibly pure elementium creatures!


    ¡°I want this ring. You can offer whatever price you like, Sir Greem. As long as it is something I can afford, I will not give a lower offer!¡± Geraldine was a straightforward man, and the ball was clearly in Greem¡¯s court now.


    Everyone here was a veteran Fourth Grade adept. If Greem were to ask for an exaggerated sum, he would only be mocked. That wouldn¡¯t be beneficial to the rest of the negotiations. However, giving too low a price was simply uneptable.


    Greem narrowed his eyes. He took a good look at this seemingly straightforward but incredibly cunning Adept Geraldine. After a long pause, he spoke up.


    ¡°Five million magical crystals...and a drop of...your blood!¡±


    Geraldine was a humanoid made out of light elementium. His entire body glowed with blinding brilliance. As such, it was impossible to discern his expression. However, judging from the flux of his light elementium, he had not been provoked by Greem¡¯s rude request.


    ¡°You intend to research light elementium?¡± A whileter, Geraldine finally said.


    ¡°Indeed! Amongst all the elementium particles, light elementium alone possesses excellent purifying traits and a unique method of teleportation. In speed alone, light elementium is undoubtedly one of the top three. As such, I wish to research your light elementium and improve the slow movement speed of my transformed giant body!¡± Greem smiled.


    Geraldine didn¡¯t really have an opinion on what Greem said.


    It might be the truth, or it might be a lie. He would have to discern it for himself.


    There were far too many curses that required the use of a person¡¯s blood and hair. Actively asking for someone¡¯s blood was a very offensive gesture indeed.


    However, given Greem¡¯s identity, casting a curse on an Association elder was no different than dering war on the Adept¡¯s Association. As such, whether Greem would do something so foolish was a matter that Geraldine had to judge for himself.


    Were there fools among Fourth Grade adepts? There might be quite a few madmen, but there were no fools at all!


    Would a Fourth Grade adept with arge n in the Centralnds take the risk of going to war with the Adept¡¯s Association, simply to curse him, Adept Geraldine, despite theck of any grudges or hostility between them?


    Seeing as Geraldine was still wary and cautious, Greem could only take a step back himself.


    ¡°Since Sir Geraldine clearly has his doubts, why don¡¯t I avoid taking the blood with me? All I need to do is sense the lightws here. That shouldn¡¯t be a problem, should it?¡±


    Geraldine was happy to hear this. He finally nodded and said, ¡°Very well!¡±


    His right finger sliced his chest, and a milky-white drop of blood hovered towards Greem.


    Perhaps feeling that this trade wasn¡¯t exactly fair for Greem, Geraldine decided topensate in his own way. What he offered up wasn¡¯t an ordinary drop of blood, but origin blood from deep within himself.


    Origin blood was incredibly crucial to a person. It was not something that should fall into the hands of another adept. However, since Greem had already promised not to take it away and only feel and experience itsws at close distance, there should be no problem.


    Moreover, Geraldine did not believe that anyone could decipher the lightws he had only mastered after several hundreds of years just by sensing with their Spirit.


    Greem looked at the origin blood floating in front of him. He did not use a container to store it. Instead, he drew a few lines in the air with his hand, merging several fire runes with the blood. He then slowly reached and felt for that unusual power within the blood.


    Blue light flickered dimly in the depths of his eyes. Lights of various spectrums were emitted to repeatedly scan and confirm the elementiumposition and energy structure within.


    [Beep. Detecting light elementium aggregate of abnormal concentration. Conducting in-depth scans.]


    A three-dimensional image of this drop of blood had been projected in Greem¡¯s mind. As data started to flow in, the picture became clearer and clearer. The projection was soon able to simte the energy flux and frequency from the blood with perfect uracy.


    [Beep. Acidity level of thepound confirmed.


    [Beep. Cell activity surveyed.


    [Beep. Composition of the acidity is 21.46% identical to human blood. No bacteria detected.


    [Beep. Light elementium has reced biological energy, highly assimted with cell structure. Conducting deconstruction of energy structure. Warning. Said deconstruction will cause irreversible disintegration of energy structure. Requesting instructions from host: would you like to proceed with the operation?¡±


    ¡°Pause it temporarily. Conduct the operation after finishing all other tests!¡±


    [Beep. Instruction sequence has been readjusted. Composition analysis resuming.


    As the Chip¡¯s notifications continued to ring out in his mind, Greem¡¯s tests on that drop of origin blood started to push towards the deeper structures.


    As Greem poured all his focus onto the drop of blood, Domhnall and Geraldine couldn¡¯t help but exchange a look. Their expressions turned solemn.


    Greem was analyzing the origin blood. However, at the same time, the Association adepts were also observing Greem.


    Unlike the average alchemist adept, Greem did not rely on any equipment or even divination wands to conduct his analysis. It was almost as if he really was using his eyes and fire spells to perform aplicated examination of the blood.


    Such a method of analysis was unprecedented!


    Could Greem¡¯s eyes possibly be more urate than a magnifying ss on an alchemy tform? Could Greem¡¯s spiritual senses go past the limits of what was possible and see the cells at their smallest level? Could he see the origin structure of the energy without the aid of a spectrum analyzer?


    There were too many impossibilities that made the two adepts start to be suspicious.


    It couldn¡¯t be possible that Greem was just putting on a show, could it? Could it be that he didn¡¯t actually see anything?


    It wasn¡¯t just them. Even the Association elders observing from the mentalwork were bing anxious.


    While the two of them were replying to the elders¡¯ barrage of responses in their minds, a beam of red light shone from Greem¡¯s eye and hit the rotating origin blood.


    The two energies of differing attributes shed, instantly triggering an intense reaction.


    The origin blood was isted. Naturally, there was no way it could resist this red beam. Its pure, stable energy structure instantly disintegrated, causing the blood to turn into sparks of white light that dissipated into the air.

 Chapter 1247 - Back and Forth

    <h4>Chapter 1247 Back and Forth</h4>


    It vanished.


    A drop of origin blood vanished just like that?


    It wasn¡¯t just Domhnall. Even Geraldine himself was stunned at the sight of this!


    They closed their eyes to sense their surroundings. The origin blood had indeed dissipated entirely. It had disintegrated thoroughly, not leaving behind even a trace of its aura.


    There were no concerns about the blood leaking out and being used for curses now!


    Did Greem make a mistake in his handling of the blood?


    Geraldine thought to himself. He had been wary of Greem, but now he couldn¡¯t help but feel sorry for him.


    Greem had given him a powerful Fourth Grade ring that was perfectlypatible with his attribute. Meanwhile, he had only given Greem a single drop of origin blood, which he wasn¡¯t even allowed to bring out of this room.


    Geraldine had believed these to be fair terms earlier, but upon reflection now, he thought them too harsh on Greem!


    Geraldine hesitated for a moment and finally said.


    ¡°Did you make a mistake earlier? Would you...do you want me to give you another drop of my origin blood?¡±


    Greem took a long and deep breath, trying to ease his pulsating headache. He smiled bitterly and replied, ¡°Trying to grasp aw of an entirely different attribute is nearly impossible! It¡¯s fine. It seems like this was no more than an ambitious dream, after all. Even if you were to give me more of your origin blood, it would be challenging for me to decipher anything out of it.¡±


    Domhnall chuckled and entered the conversation as he watched the frustrated expression on Greem¡¯s face.


    ¡°Mastering an additional attribute ofw powers is undoubtedly something to be celebrated, but there¡¯s a limit to everyone¡¯s abilities. Without the corresponding elementium talent, it will be near impossible to truly grasp the lightws, even if you were to devour Geraldine whole. Otherwise, the entire World of Adepts would have fallen into a chaotic frenzy of endless murder!¡±


    ¡°It was my fault for being impulsive!¡± Greem rubbed his head, a dejected expression on his face.


    In truth, he couldn¡¯t be happier.


    The projection of the blood in his mind was now as realistic as the actual thing. Its surface gleamed with a crystalline brilliance, its energy aura almost entirely identical to the disintegrated drop of blood.


    The Chip was also projecting a long series of data andplex structural breakdowns at the edges of this three-dimensional projection. However, what truly made Greem so happy wasn¡¯t the data or the perfect simtion, but the few words at the very end of the report.


    ¡°...replication is possible...¡±


    Replication is possible, replication is possible, replication is possible.


    Greem repeated this sentence over and over in his mind. He could feel his entire head ringing.


    To think, this drop of origin blood was replicable once the Chip hadpleted its analysis!


    What...exactly did that mean for him?


    In all honesty, even Greem didn¡¯t know himself.


    However, that didn¡¯t stop him from believing that he had hit the jackpot!


    If it was possible to replicate this drop of origin blood on a massive scale, what could he do with the umtion of all that replicated blood? What would be created? An elementiumized humanoid formed out of pure light? Or some sort of entirely new elementium lifeform? Could the origin blood of a Fourth Grade being like this be of use to Mary?


    For a moment, Greem couldn¡¯t help but dream about the possibilities so much that he indulged in the fantasies.


    ¡°Sir Greem...Sir Greem. We haven¡¯t finalized the trade from before?¡± Vice-Chairman Domhnall couldn¡¯t help but call out to Greem.


    Greem shook his head and drove away all those impractical thoughts. He then regathered his focus and faced this old fox seriously.


    The one thousand years that Domhnall had lived for had refined his mind to iparable sharpness and determination. As the soul clone of a Great Adept, his knowledge and experience were vastly superior to all the Association eldersbined.


    As they said, the longer you lived, the more cunning you were!


    It would be unusual if he weren¡¯t trying his best to weasel the best deal for himself in negotiations!


    Thus, Greem could only pull himself together and focused on negotiating with this manager of the Adept¡¯s Association.


    ¡°Lord Domhnall, there is no way I can hand over the spores and cultivation method for the magical mushrooms. These are top-ss resources I only managed to obtain after many deadly trials in another world. I am counting on using these mushrooms to gather some capital for the n! As such, there is no way I can hand over their method of cultivation. We only sell the final product, not the spores or the techniques behind their cultivation!¡±


    ¡°Sir Greem, there¡¯s no need to be so absolute, is there! Your mushrooms are quite wondrous indeed, but they are consumable Fourth Grade adept resources, in the end. Meanwhile, the Lightfire stone that you want is an excellent Fourth Grade item in terms of quality alone. In fact, it wouldn¡¯t be an exaggeration to call it a Fifth Grade item! ¡±


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter how much you praise the lightfire stone, my lord. The fact remains that it is a Fourth Grade item. Do you actually intend to price it as a Fifth Grade item? Lightfire stones might be rare, but they aren¡¯t precisely one-of-a-kind. If I was willing to spend a few decades roaming in the realms beyond, I¡¯m certain I will be able to find one.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m afraid you will be disappointed, Sir Greem! Dual-attribute treasures like the Lightfire stone are a rare resource even in the realms beyond. The asional one that appears often falls into the hands of a Great Adept in a matter of days. Trying topete against those Great Adepts as a Fourth Grade adept...hehehe. Don¡¯t you find that notion childish andughable?¡±


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter how much you work that tongue of yours, my lord. I will not hand over the spores or the method of cultivation. However, as long as you agree, I can provide a supply of these mushrooms to the Adept¡¯s Association at the highest priority. Three adept¡¯s portion per year, for a total of ten years. How about that?¡±


    ¡°When ites to resources like these, we much prefer to be able to produce it ourselves! The reason you are unwilling to hand over the spores and their method of cultivation is that you are worried we will establish a monopoly in the market. How about this? Once weplete the trade, I can assure you that the magical mushrooms will only circte within the Association. They will never be sold as products with forces outside the organization. How about it? You shouldn¡¯t have a reason to object to these terms now, do you?¡±


    Damn, you could do that?


    Greem was rendered speechless for a moment. He didn¡¯t know how to respond.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The first person to put their terms forward would always be on their backfoot!


    Since Domhnall was certain that he needed the Lightfire stone, he held the absolute initiative in these negotiations. There wasn¡¯t much Greem could do but passively parry with all he had!


    In all honesty, if Domhnall had stubbornly insisted on the harsher terms from before, Greem would have had no choice but to relent as well. Now that Domhnall was already making certainpromises, Greem knew well enough to meet him at the middle ground. He shook Domhnall¡¯s hand, and the deal was settled.


    After settling the deal, Domhnall reached back into empty air and made a grabbing motion. A strange stone burning with milky-white mes suddenly appeared and drifted towards Greem slowly.


    Greem lifted his head and looked at this tiny, fist-sized stone. Numerous emotions couldn¡¯t help but well up in his heart as he saw it.


    Once upon a time, when he saw that mountain of magical crystals in the Tower of Fate, Greem had been excited beyond words. He had wanted to lie on top of those magical crystals and not move a single inch for the rest of his life. Yet now, with just his two lips, he had given away a mountain of magical crystals, all for this one tiny stone.


    The changes that had happened between these two periods of this life were truly unimaginable! It was miraculous in its own way.


    The stone in front of him was not veryrge, but it was incredibly heavy. It was so much so that Greem could feel the strain on his Spirit when pulling it over.


    Since Domhnall had happily handed over the stone, it meant that he wasn¡¯t worried about Greem reneging on the deal.


    Backing out of a deal with the Adept¡¯s Association? A person who would dare to do that had probably not been born in the World of Adepts yet!


    Greem didn¡¯t reach out to grab the Lightfire stone. Instead, he raised his hand and let out the Bleeding Spear and the ogre warhammers.


    The two sets of heavy weapons ttered to the ground with arge thud, causing the floorboards to rumble loudly, despite being protected by magical arrays.


    ¡°Since I¡¯m already here, I don¡¯t intend to bring these two pieces of garbage back with me. Just offer me any price, my lord. I¡¯ll trade them for some magical crystals!¡±


    Domhnall still had as sharp an eye as ever before. He immediately figured out the attributes and weaknesses of the two weapons with a single nce. He smiled, ¡°The technique used in creating this spear is simply crude. Thew attribute it possesses is the only redeeming factor. As for those warhammers. Truly garbage, like you said. Apart from returning them into the forge-fires and extracting the rare metal in them, they aren¡¯t worth much else.¡±


    Having said that, Domhnall lifted his head and nced at Greem before saying, ¡°However, since it¡¯s you, I can make the decision to purchase them at the price of Fourth Grade items. One and a half million for these warhammers, and two million three hundred thousand for the spear. Thates to a total of three million eight hundred thousand magical crystals. How¡¯s that?¡±


    Greem was more than satisfied with this price. He quickly nodded in approval.


    Upon seeing Domhnall put away the two pieces of equipment, Greem carefully put away the Lightfire stone in his Elder¡¯s Ring as well.


    ¡°The ring you sold for five million magical crystals, and these two weapons for three million and eight hundred thousand. You just need to hand over one million and two hundred thousand magical crystals, as well as the spores and their method of cultivation, and our deal is settled!¡±


    ¡°Your Adept¡¯s Association must have contact people in the Centralnds as well. Have them go to the Crimson n headquarters in Ailovis. I will notify the n immediately and have them hand over these things. In the meantime, I¡¯m afraid I will be imposing on you!¡±


    Domhnall was quite satisfied with Greem¡¯s perfectly courteous and appropriate attitude.


    ¡°Since you are here as a guest of the Association, why don¡¯t you walk around the Tower of Observation for the next few days. Our libraries andboratories are the best in the entire World of Adepts. I¡¯m certain that you won¡¯t be disappointed with your trip!¡±


    ¡°Moreover, it seems like quite a few of the elders intend to exchange some thoughts with you in private. You are going to be quite busy in the next few days!¡±


    Greem could only nod in response to the old adept¡¯s vague words. He then got up and left the room.


    Once Greem left, the smile on Domhnall¡¯s face faded. He couldn¡¯t help but stroke his beard as he brooded in silence. A momentter, he suddenly said, ¡°Tell me, what do you feel about this Greem?¡±


    A low and hoarse voice rang out in the empty room.


    ¡°Mysterious, powerful, and shrouded with the unknown. He is protected by an unusual power. I cannot see his Fateline!¡±

 Chapter 1248 - Fate’s Servant

    <h4>Chapter 1248 Fate¡¯s Servant</h4>


    Inside a hidden room.


    A strange humanoid figure had suddenly swelled up from the empty ground.


    As the light yellow mist that obscured the figure scattered, a strange man who looked even older than Domhnall was revealed. The folds and wrinkles on his face were so heavy that it was almost impossible to discern his actual appearance.


    This elderly man was hunched over, leaning against a yellow staff taller than himself. His hair was a mess, and his eyes were a nk white with no pupils at all. He was even wearing a raggedy old robe that had clearly not been washed in years. The stains and dirt on the robe had already covered its original color, making it impossible to tell what material it was made of.


    At a single nce, this was a poor wandering adept who couldn¡¯t be in any worse of a financial situation. He was someone who could never be seen at a proper ce, let alone the Tower of Observation, a structure that represented the Adept Association¡¯s greatest achievement.


    Yet, somehow, this old man had not only appeared here, but even casually acknowledged Vice-Chairman Domhnall¡¯s greeting.


    ¡°Maztan, you are the most potent diviner of the entire Association. Can¡¯t even you see Greem¡¯s future clearly?¡±


    ¡°Domhnall, as I said earlier, someone has concealed this young man¡¯s Fate from view.¡±


    ¡°So, we won¡¯t be able to see anything at all?¡± Domhnall couldn¡¯t help but frown as he said, ¡°Maztan, the Association has treated your people very well over these years. The budget allocated to diviners is the highest of all the branches. We even gave you the top floor of the Tower of Observation. Do you really intend to dismiss me with just those results?¡±


    ¡°I can sense a powerful stream of Fate power rising in the north. She has been keeping a constant eye on this young fire adept as well. If we diviners were to intervene here, I¡¯m afraid...we could be starting an unseen Fate war!¡±


    ¡°War?¡± Domhnall cackled coldly. ¡°Since when have we adepts been afraid of war!? I¡¯ve paid you well all this while. Wasn¡¯t it all in hopes of you being of use in situations like this? What is it? Do you intend to refuse my orders?¡±


    ¡°Domhnall, we¡¯ve had an enjoyable cooperation over the past few hundred years. What is it with you today?¡± Maztan raised his head, his milky-white eyeballs staring straight at this old friend of his as he hissed, ¡°What is it about this young man that¡¯s made you so agitated?¡±


    ¡°Danger. I smell danger on him!¡± Domhnall frowned and brooded for a moment before saying, ¡°The problem is I still have not been able to find the source of this danger. That is why I wanted your help to search for the reason for my feeling!¡±


    ¡°I understand. Then I...will try my best! I¡¯ll return and borrow the tower¡¯s powers. Perhaps I can see more than what I was able to.¡±


    Having said that, Maztan tapped his staff as his entire person vanished as light yellow mist.


    Once Maztan¡¯s aura had vanished entirely, Domhnall couldn¡¯t help but mumble to himself, ¡°The Centralnds...the richest and most poptednd of the World of Adepts. If we of the Adept¡¯s Association can¡¯t get our hands on it, no one can. Hmph! Greem, you had best not have any thoughts of uniting the Centralnds. Otherwise......¡±


    ............


    The Tower of Observation.


    The seven hundred and seventy-seventh floor.


    Looking down from here, the soft clouds hovered inyers around the waist of the tower, making it impossible to see what was on the ground. You could only see the bright spots of the earth¡¯s colors through the gaps in the clouds every once in a while.


    Yellow smoke dissipated in arge magical hall. Maztan¡¯s hunched figure appeared.


    He walked towards the back of the hall with his staff the moment he appeared.


    The dull thuds of the staff tapping against the ground lingered in the room, echoing without stop.


    As the only Fourth Grade diviner in the entire Association, Maztan was revered and respected. Even though every Fourth Grade adept could have a floor of their own, Maztan was the only person who could have the top floor of the Tower of Observation to himself.


    That was both an honor and a burden of expectations!


    Whenever the Association arrived at a crossroads of their development, a chief diviner like himself would have to part the mist and be the shining light that guided the Association down the right path.


    However, only Maztan himself, who had studied Fate magic, understood what tremendous power was required to shift the course of a massive ship of the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s size and ensure there were only clear skies ahead.


    In the past one thousand years since Domhnall had been in charge, the Adept¡¯s Association had always seemingly been at peace and stable. In truth, the Adept¡¯s Association had already encountered countless terrifying cmities that were not known to the world. With the help of the chief diviner and the massive force of the Adept¡¯s Associaton, they had managed to pull themselves out of these whirlpools of death, time after time.


    It wasn¡¯t that easy to stay in this seat of the chief diviner!


    At the very least, to Maztan¡¯s knowledge, there had already been three chief diviners who had died to the bacsh of Fate prior to himself.


    The seat of chief diviner was not a fixed position.


    Whoever could be the only Fourth Grade diviner of the Association would be able to sit firmly upon this throne, giving orders and enjoying the most generous allocation of resources. However, these resources came at a cost. Most of the time, their lives!


    At any one time, there could only be a single Fourth Grade diviner within the Adept¡¯s Association. It was only once this diviner had died to a Fate bacsh that the Association would select the most powerful and excellent of the Third Grade diviners to cultivate and push towards Fourth Grade.


    Meanwhile, before this new chief diviner died, the other diviners were no more than reserves and insurance!


    That was why there were hardly any feelings of affection or fraternity between the diviners of the Association. Instead, it was a simple, viciouspetition. Those below wanted nothing more than to rise to the top. Meanwhile, those in positions of power spent their lives in fear, always afraid that they would one day be stepping stones for the Association to sacrifice and turn their Fates around.


    They might be able to change the Fates of tens of thousands of adepts, but the one thing they could not truly control was their own Fate.


    Looking from this perspective, Maztan was quite jealous of his colleague who worked in the north.


    Perhaps that was what a messenger of Fate should truly be like.


    He, on the other hand, was no more than a lowly servant cowering before Fate!


    Maztan was the only person on the seven hundred and seventy-seventh floor of the Tower of Observation. It was a rule he hadid down and his only pride.


    At the very least, no one was allowed to set foot in his territory before he died.


    As the chief diviner of the Association, Maztan naturally possessed extremely high clearance in the Tower of Observation. His authority over Tower Spirit Rafatus was second only to Domhnall.


    It allowed him to draw on the tower¡¯s energy reserves freely and reced the power of Fate that needed to be extended in his Fate rituals with as much magic energy as possible.


    The Tower of Observation...the Tower of Observation.


    The reason this tower was named such was because it was the tallest tower in the World of Adepts. When one stood at the top of this tower, they could see the unusual speck of blue at the edge of the horizon if they had good enough vision.


    That was the color of the Boundless Sea!


    Maztan passed through a lonely and empty corridor and arrived in front of a metal spiral staircase. He walked up, holding onto the rails as he did so. Finally, he arrived at the astrology tform.


    The tform was a very crude construction. It was a narrow space ced under the roof of the Tower.


    Above the tform was the tip of the Tower of Observation. A ten-meter metal spike stood there, terrifying magical energy radiating from it. The walls of the astrology tform were hollowed out. When the cold winds of the altitude soared past the metal wall¡¯s patterns, they would cause a phantom-like howl.


    A one-meter-tall stone pir stood at the center of the narrow space. An unusual crystal the size of a human head was embedded at the top.


    Clouds and mist filled the inside of this crystal, obscuring everything from sight.


    Maztan walked into this small room through the staircase.


    Upon setting foot here, he pulled his robe tighter around himself. Yet, there was no stopping the cold winds from seeping in from the corners of his clothes, robbing him of what little warmth he had.


    This ce was Fate¡¯s Shelter. All powers apart from Fate power were rejected from here.


    As such, Maztan could not cast any spells to protect or warm himself. Even his robe had to be made out of ordinary cloth with no magical effects to speak of.


    If it weren¡¯t for his Physique as a Fourth Grade adept, he might even have risked hypothermia just by staying here.


    Eleven points of Physique were undoubtedly incredibly low for a Fourth Grade adept. However, it was enough for Maztan.


    Due to their profession, diviners alwayscked in lifeforce. Even if they were to take perfect care of themselves and increase their Physique as much as possible, their lifeforce would be drained away with all the significant Fate rituals that they conducted.


    A price had to be paid to scry Fate!


    The diviners of the Adept¡¯s Association did not have such high affinity with Fate as the Fate Witches did. To scry Fate¡¯s direction required them to sacrifice their lives. The most considerable exhaustion was to their Physique!


    Once Maztan¡¯s Physique was wholly eroded, it would be the end of him.


    Before that, he still had eleven points of Physique. That was enough to do plenty of things.


    Maztan stumbled before the stone pir and ced his right hand over the crystal. He caressed it softly.


    A tremendous surge of energy flowed through the tower, lighting up all the runes and arrays on the walls. Even the stone pir started glowing, inch by inch.


    Finally, when the magic energy surged into the crystal, the tip of the Tower of Observation glowed with blinding radiance.


    The winds mysteriously halted!


    The mist and clouds inside the crystal slowly faded away, revealing a majestic and mysterious world within.

 Chapter 1249 - Peeping Creep

    <h4>Chapter 1249 Peeping Creep</h4>


    Maztan, who had been calm andposed just a second earlier, was now like an excited child that had just gotten a new toy. He leaned against the crystal ball and greedily observed its contents as he mumbled to himself.


    ¡°Mine......mine......all mine! This is my world......you will never keep any secrets in front of me......¡±


    ¡°What should I do first now? ¡±


    ¡°Right, it¡¯s been seven days since Ist saw Anna, my darling. I think I¡¯ll take a look at her first! ¡±


    As Maztan mumbled to himself, seemingly in an insane fit, the image in the crystal ball continued to shift. Soon, it turned into an image of a room shrouded by water vapors.


    A pretty woman with a bodacious figure was lying in an extremely luxurious bath. She was gently sshing the warm bath water on herself. Steam filled the air, making for a very enticing sight indeed.


    Several young maids were gently massaging her shoulders, while one of them was painting her nails and another was peeling grapes and feeding her......


    The entire bathing room was filled with pretty, exposed women.


    ¡°Hahaha......Anna, my darling, you finally can¡¯t help but take a shower after so long! My god, that figure, that skin, that waist......of all the Fourth Grade female adepts, you are the most feminine of them all......¡±


    Just as Maztan was peeping on that pretty female adept from the top of the Tower, Adept Anna, who was bathing in the pool, suddenly lifted her head. Her rxed smile turned into a vicious frown.


    She lifted her hand and tens of thousands of water arrows shot out of the pool, instantly shredding to pieces the magical eye that had appeared in the air.


    ¡°Goddammit Maztan! You bastard......peep on me one more time and I will dig your eyes out and use them to y ball! ¡±


    At the top of the Tower of Observation, the image in the crystal ball became distorted. A water arrow shot out form within, instantly soaking Maztan¡¯s clothes with water.


    Maztan was not only not frustrated at having been humiliated in this fashion, he even lifted his arm to sniff the fragrance of the water. An extremely twisted and perverted smile appeared on his face.


    ¡°Even the bathwater of a beauty smells so good......Anna, you will be mine eventually. I will dig out all of your secrets. Heheh! Next time, I will peep on you while you¡¯re in the toilet and make a recording of it for some ckmail material......kehkehkeh......¡±


    ¡°Speaking of which, if I¡¯m not wrong, it should be about time for that girl from the Silver Union to go to sleep. Just the right time to go take a look......¡±


    Having said that, Maztan smiled and lunged at the crystal ball again. He started to desperately rub the ball to try and find the special mark he had left in the River of Fate.


    The image in the crystal shifted continuously. At times it was a highly secure magical room and at others a giant swaying ship at sea......the targets of the scrying were adepts that were either meditating or copying scrolls in their private quarters......they were all different people in many different locations, but they all seemed very rxed. It was obvious that they had no idea that Maztan was peeping on them!


    Finally, guided by a beam of red light, the image in the crystal ball finally stopped at where Maztan wanted it to. It was a rather feminine room belonging to an adept. A pretty adept who could be called a beauty in every sense of the word was disrobing, seemingly preparing for bed.


    ¡°Helena, I¡¯ve peeped on so many female adepts, but when ites to the shape of their butts, you are still the prettiest of them all......¡±Maztan was practically leaning against the crystal ball at this point. His tongue was stretched out from his mouth, licking the image of that adept¡¯s butt without stop.


    ¡°Baby, you will be mine in the future! ¡±


    Perhaps Maztan¡¯s lustful intent was a little too strong, but the female adept in the crystal ball suddenly looked back and surveyed her room anxiously.


    Unfortunately, she was only Second Grade. There was no way she could quickly find the magical eye that Maztan had created through his special means as the Fourth Grade Adept Anna had been able to do.


    The young female adept hastily took out a talisman from her undergarments and whispered a strange name into the magical device. A short momentter, lights flickered in the room and an elderly female adept appeared out of thin air.


    ¡°Lady Beatrice, that feeling¡¯se again! I......I am so afraid! ¡±


    The young adept lunged towards the elderly adept the moment she appeared and hugged her arm.


    ¡°Hmph! It¡¯s that foul stench of Maztan again! Maztan, you are overstepping your boundaries. This is Silver Union territory. Peep on my disciple again and I will go to the Tower of Observation and expose your vile behavior for everyone to see. Now get out, you bastard......¡±


    As the elderly adept shouted out angrily, an invisible energy barrier enveloped the entire room, cutting off the divination crystal¡¯s remote observation.


    The straight line distance between the Tower of Observation and the Castle in the Sky of the Silver Union was around ten to fifteen thousand kilometers. Yet, Maztan was actually able to instantly projec this power across through the use of his divination crystal.


    This indirectly demonstrated the terror of a high-Grade diviner!


    For high-Grade diviners, every ce in the world was practically transparent to them, with the exception of a few ces protected by the powers of Fate.


    Even though they might not have the ability to kill someone remotely or cast a curse, their constant scrying and endless probing would be enough to dirve the more unstable adepts insane.


    In particr, young, pretty female adepts couldn¡¯t bear to be the victims of harassment. Just the thought of a perverted old adept constantly observing them eating, sleeping and showering from every angle was unbearable!


    Maztan felt no shame even after being interrupted by that Adept Beatrice. Instead, he started to viciously insult her instead: ¡°Beatrice, you hag. You¡¯re just jealous I¡¯m not peeping on you cause you¡¯re too ugly......Hmph! Next time, I will sneak in while you¡¯re enjoying yourself with one of your manservants. I¡¯ll make a recording and we will see if you still got the face to look me in the eye the next time......¡±


    Maztan continued cursing and shouting for a good while before remembering the main task on hand.


    ¡°Dammit! I can¡¯t fool around any more! I¡¯ve been exhausting quite a lot of the Tower¡¯s energy. If I can¡¯t produce any information of note, Domhnall will be on my ass......¡±Maztan couldn¡¯t help but shiver at the thought of Domhnall¡¯s means of discipline. He leapt onto the crystal ball and started to seriously search for the legendary fire adept.


    The fire adept was residing in the Tower of Observation. Even if he was protected byyers of magical arrays, he could not stop the sneaky infiltration of Maztan¡¯s mental appendages through the River of Fate.


    As Maztan continued to toy with the crystal ball, the image of room after room flickered past within. Finally, Maztan caught the fire adept¡¯s figure in a securely protected room.


    This was a magical room that had been decorated quite luxuriously. The young fire adept was sitting in front of a wooden table with a magical mirror hovering before him. It seemed like he wasmunicating with someone far away.


    ¡°Heheh, brat, caught you! Now let me see what you are doing. ¡±


    Maztan chuckled coldly. He rubbed the crystal ball with both hands and pushed the magical eye forward. He wanted to zoom in and see who Greem was talking to and what they were talking about.


    However, strangely enough, before the eye could approach him, the image in the crystal ball turned faint. Large spouts of red mist engulfed the image and concealed everything.


    Then, the divination crystal lost all contact with the magical eye!


    ¡°Bastard! What happened? Did the fire adept ce down some sort of defensive array? ¡°Maztan howled furiously: ¡°That¡¯s impossible, I¡¯ve imbued my magical eye with the power of Fate. It should be able to prate most known defensive arrays. That bastard......how exactly did he destroy my magical eye? ¡±


    ¡°No, this won¡¯t do! I must try again! ¡±


    Maztan had clearly never seen something so strange happen. He refused to give up and started rubbing the crystal once more. He created another magical eye and projected it into the fire adept¡¯s room through the River of Fate.


    The same image appeared. the fire adept was sitting in front of the table, whispering into the magical mirror. It seemed like he was ignorant to what had happened earlier.


    ¡°Hm? Seems like this wasn¡¯t the fire adept¡¯s doing. Did I mess up somewhere myself? ¡±


    Maztan curiously pushed the eye forward. However, just likest time, the image in the crystal ball started shaking violently before he could approach. Red mist rose and everything faded from sight/


    ¡°Dammit......bastard......goddamit......¡±


    This time, Maztan was certain that the scrying had not failed because of his own mistake. Rather......the legendary fire adept had destroyed his magical eye through some means.


    Dammit! What could it be?


    To think he would be able to destroy a magical eye protected by the powers of Fate. That fire adept had some truly bone-chilling abilities!


    Could it be some firew he had mastered? The red light that flickered right before the magical eye was destroyed. That seemed to be a unique trait of fire elementium......but how did he manage to destroy the magical eye without seemingly lifting a single finger?


    Since it¡¯s impossible to scry on the adept, might as well try scrying on the organization behind him!


    The Fate protection on him seems to be the work of that brat from the north. Right, why not take a look at what she¡¯s doing?


    Maztan had also heard of the beauty of the leader of the Fate Witches from the information that the Association had gathered.


    He always had extraordinary passion for scrying on pretty women. As such, he rubbed his hands excitedly and put the divination crystal to work again.

 Chapter 1250 - Monster of Fate

    Chapter 1250 Monster of Fate


    The divination crystal went ck for a moment before slowly lighting up again.


    The image inside the crystal was that of the deste Dragonblight. The crystal was looking down from high in the sky. This ce was shrouded in dark clouds, with wild grass growing everywhere and unusual magical beasts stalking within.


    At the edge of the image, a strange tower stood alone and lonesome in these ins, a silent testament to the countless years it had witnessed.


    It did not have any of the shy lights or radiance that other adept towers typically had. It also had none of the traffic or fancy architecture.


    Dragonblight was nothing more from heartbreaking loneliness and destion!


    ¡°Hehehehe. These Fate Witches lead a pretty tough life, don¡¯t they! Why don¡¯t I show them a good time then.¡± Maztan chuckled perversely and directed his magical eye towards the Tower of Fate.


    ¡°Spin, o¡¯ Wheel of Fate. Let me see what that Alice is doing.¡±


    A series of chants came from Maztan¡¯s mouth. He cut open his right index finger with his nails and drew a ¡®&¡¯ shaped symbol on the divination crystal. The blood was quickly absorbed, and the image in the crystal began to move. The mist started to clear, seemingly as if an image was about to be revealed.


    However, just as the vague image began to surface, the crystal suddenly glowed with blinding white light. Maztan¡¯s eyes even started to tear up from it. When he finally regained hisposure and wiped away his tears, the crystal was once again shrouded in the mists of Fate. He could no longer see anything.


    ¡°Bastard! Bastard...does that Alice always keep herself protected with the powers of Fate at every single moment? To think her defenses are so airtight. I couldn¡¯t see a thing,¡± Maztan cursed resentfully and even started sulking.


    However, he had plenty of means to scry on people. He wouldn¡¯t give up from a mere rejection like this.


    Alice might keep herself well-protected, but there was no way she could keep up such a tight defense for all the people around her, could she?


    Maztan quickly recovered and started drawing on the crystal with his blood again while fervently praying, ¡°O¡¯ Fate, please let me see the person who spends the most time with Alice!¡±


    Energy surged towards the top of the Tower of Observation. Overwhelming Fate power shrouded the astrology tform, shing and merging with the elementium energy nearby, causing a colorful ssh of colors to be seen high in the skies.


    The mist in the divination crystal faded as the Fate powers guided it forward. The image changed rapidly, finally settling on a young girl crouched at a wooden table, seriously studying divination.


    It was a young girl with blonde hair to her waist and pretty facial features. She had a wooden hammer in her hand and a tortoise¡¯s shell in the other. She was mumbling angrily to herself, all while knocking on the shell with the hammer every so often.


    ¡°How am I supposed to break it? A tortoise¡¯s shell is so tough, and all I get to use is a wooden hammer. Hmph! Why can¡¯t it be a golden hammer? Even a metal one¡¯s fine.¡±


    After hammering on the shell for a bit longer and realizing that it was all in vain, the girl tossed away the wooden hammer. She pushed away all the other random stuff on her table and took out a magical tome to start reading.


    ¡°...Fate is one of the most powerful principle powers in the world! Take hold of Fate, and you can take hold of the trajectory of your life, allowing yourself to transcend the River of Fate and live free above.¡± The young girl couldn¡¯t help but grumble again when she read this. ¡°Transcend Fate. What¡¯s the point of that? All we can do is look but not intervene. Any intervention means an immediate bacsh from Fate...hmph! What kinda future does a profession like this have?¡±


    Seemingly having ran out of patience to continue reading the experience and feelings of the adepts that came before her, the young girl pushed the book aside and started rolling all over the table instead.


    ¡°Fate power...Fate power...Alice is always saying that we can be favored by Fate as long as we follow its guidance. Yet...she still doesn¡¯t teach me any Fate magic even though I can already control Fate power. Hmph! So stingy!¡±


    Maztan couldn¡¯t help but be surprised when he saw this young girl who spoke so poorly of Fate¡¯s power.


    For some reason, Maztan seemed to be looking at an overwhelming torrent of Fate when he saw her. It was a power different from the World of Adept¡¯s Fate power, yet simr in indescribable ways. It was profound and mysterious, with no means of putting that feeling into words.


    A Child of Fate.


    There was no need for any more appraisals. The moment he saw her, Maztan was sure that she was the heir of a ne that appeared abruptly and vanished just as quickly a hundred years ago.


    It seemed like Alice had hidden her in the Tower of Fate to avoid disturbances from the outside world!


    Maztan had only heard of these mysterious individuals known as the children of Fate from his books. He knew nothing of their power and mystery.


    Thus, out of curiosity, Maztan drew on his Fate powers and pushed the magical eye towards the young girl.


    The girl, who was rolling about on the wooden table, suddenly stared at a particr spot in the air. Her pretty eyes glowed as she stared as if something interesting was about to happen there.


    Maztan¡¯s perverse gaze shed with the girl¡¯s stare through the divine crystal. The two of them observed each other and assessed each other, both seemingly somewhat curious about the other.


    Could this girl actually see the magical eye?


    Maztan moved the magical eye horizontally across the air slowly. The girl¡¯s head followed along, her eyes firmly locked onto the eye¡¯s position.


    Dammit! She could see it.


    ¡°Hey, old man, how do you make this strange eye thing appear? Can you teach me?¡±


    Having said that, the girl waved her hand, and the magical eye shook violently.


    The next moment, when the image in the crystal finally stabilized, what appeared in front of Maztan was arge face and a single, blinking eye.


    Maztan didn¡¯t know how, but this magical eye of his forged out of Fate power had fallen into the girl¡¯s hands. She was now putting in front of her eye and taking a curious look.


    ¡°Bastard, this is my magical eye!¡±


    Maztan was furious. However, regardless of how he tried to give orders to the divine crystal, he could not wrestle back control from the girl.


    It was almost as if, as if, as if...the Fate power was no longer in his control. As if the eye was now no more than a toy in the girl¡¯s hands!


    Maztan was instantly terrified.


    He had never been afraid of a battle of Fate! He had the means to protect himself from Fate retaliation as well!


    However, this kind of power and ability to take away someone else¡¯s Fate power and instantly turn it into their own...he had never heard of such a thing.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! Children of Fate were truly monsters!


    This young girl who had been no more than a pretty and cute thing in his eye was now a terrifying monster more vicious than even the creatures of the Abyssal World.


    Maztan instantly severed the connection between the divination crystal and the magical eye. The crystal¡¯s image faded to gray, and the crystal itself became filled with the mists of Fate once more.


    ¡°Hmph! That¡¯s not good. With the aid of that child of Fate, Alice will certainly be able to beat me when ites to Fate power. Mm, it seems like I had best not prod the witches in the north for a while now. I¡¯ll get Domhnall to deal with this first.¡±


    Maztan started to pace about the astrology tform in frustration. However, just as he gritted his teeth and tried his best to find a way to deal with that damned child of Fate, he suddenly froze in his tracks.


    He turned around slowly and lifted his head. His eyes stared unblinkingly at a specific spot in the air.


    There...a nexus of Fate power surged as a very familiar magical eye slowly formed. It blinked a few times and stared at him.


    ¡°Hey, old man, we meet again.¡±


    Five secondster, an incredibly tragic scream came from the astrology tform at the top of the Tower of Observation.


    ¡°No no no no no no no no no no no......¡±


    ............


    Tower of Observation, the two hundred and sixteenth floor.


    Inside a bright and spacious room.


    Greem was casually seated across from another adept, having a pleasant conversation.


    His visitor was Schreiber, a veteran fire adept that had advanced to Fourth Grade over three hundred years ago.


    His purpose here was simple and straightforward; he wanted to exchange thoughts and experiences on the firews with Greem. In the end, he wanted to have the two of them appraise each other¡¯s firews!


    Of course, thew powers mastered by high-grade elementium adepts were all ssified secrets and hidden aces reserved for the direst of situations. They should never be shown in their entirety to an outsider. However, if you met someone of the same attribute, exchanging some of the less sensitive information was a shortcut to your own improvement.


    Perhaps worried that Greem might hold back, Schreiber immediately materialized three fire runes after putting out his request. Each of these runes spun slowly, radiating traces ofw power as they did so.


    ¡°These are the three firews I have mastered: Increased Fire Range, Fire¡¯s Frenzy, and Fire¡¯s st!


    ¡°Increased Fire Range, as the name implies, increases the range of all offensive fire spells.


    ¡°Fire¡¯s Frenzy allows the caster to move rapidly while engulfed by fire.


    ¡°Fire¡¯s st provides all offensive fire spells with the repulsion effect of a Halo of Repulsion.¡±


    After giving a simple introduction of these three fire runes¡¯ powers, Schreiber smiled and looked to Greem.


    A sincere smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face as well.

 Chapter 1251 - Law Runes

    <h4>Chapter 1251 Law Runes</h4>


    He had only mastered three firews?


    The very idea of that wasughable.


    As a veteran adept that advanced over three hundred years ago, there was no way that Schreiber had only mastered threews. The ones he was showing now were only the less crucial ones he had selected!


    Greem smiled as he listened to Schreiber¡¯s exnation and assessed the three runes hovering in front of him. Naturally, without Schreiber¡¯s permission, he couldn¡¯t extend his Spirit into thew runes to investigate their structures. He could only faintly and vaguely make out theirw auras.


    Greem might have created fire runes countless times in the past, but those were low-grade runes: magical circuits constructed with a series of energy nodes to simte specific effects.


    However, ever since he reached the level of narws, Greem felt like he was starting to fall behind when it came to runecraft. The Chip had created every rune he now grasped through a long sequence of calctions. He didn¡¯t do anything apart from using the runes once they had been constructed.


    His power had always been built upon the Chip¡¯s robust calction and simtion abilities, as well as the multiple pieces of powerful magical equipment he had. His understanding of thew powers was still, in truth,cking.


    In all honesty, before Schreiber showed him thew runes, Greem had never realized that something as immaterial as the firews could be materialized in this fashion.


    This small move was like thunder on a sunny day. It showed Greem an utterly new path down the road ofw cultivation.


    Greem brooded in silence, quickly running through his seven firews to judge which was best for a trade.


    Increased Fire Range, Increased Fire Effectiveness, Fire Pration, Invisible mes, Critical Fires, Fire¡¯s Fragility, and Fire¡¯s Resilience.


    Schreiber already had Increased Fire Range. Naturally, thatw had to be excluded.


    Critical Fires and Invisible mes were incredibly significant to Greem¡¯s system ofbat. As such, he couldn¡¯t offer them up for trade either. The others weren¡¯t all that valuable and wouldn¡¯t affect Greem negatively even if the opponent got ahold of them.


    As such, Greem settled on three firews to be traded.


    Greem¡¯s right hand quickly moved through the air, the fire energy at the tip of his finger drawing a strange and unusualw rune. When thew rune finally took shape, a mysterious me ignited, and the rune burned silently in the air.


    These mes were no ordinary fire. They glowed with bright golden color and required no fuel at all. It burned silently and peacefully even though it was in a vacuum.


    The mes also radiated no heat or light.


    They looked like a pretty still image. It would have been impossible to pick up on their presence if you didn¡¯t see the mes with your own two eyes!


    These werew mes. Naturally, drawing uponw powers made them thousands of times more potent than ordinary fire. Fire magic constructed with such mes would have a shocking effect and force.


    In truth, Greem did not have any mental image of thesew runes in his mind when he started drawing. However, when he immersed his mind in the corresponding firew, a strange power began to move in his mind.


    What he drew was not aw rune, but his actual understanding of this one particrw. His dense mental consciousness moved and bent in midair ording to the fire energy, which caused him to unconsciously materialize the firews into this unusual rune form.


    When he put his arm down and turned to look at the threew runes he had drawn, an odd feeling rose in his heart. Those firews that were once vague and unfamiliar to him now appeared so crystal clear. They even started to turn intow runes in his mind and were slowly being branded onto the core of his consciousness.


    [Beep. Detecting abnormality in Host¡¯s mental consciousness.


    [Warning. Warning. Abnormality uring in the core of Host¡¯s consciousness. Said abnormality is incredibly beneficial to Host. Degree of improvement unclear. Requesting instructions from Host. Halt abnormality?]


    ¡°Don¡¯t stop it!¡±


    [Beep. Order received! Beginning dynamic observation.]


    Greem opened his eyes, only to see Schreiber¡¯s look of surprise and puzzlement.


    Upon seeing Greeme to consciousness, a strange smile appeared on his face, ¡°Sir Greem, could it be...that this was your first time forming aw rune?¡±


    By the end of his sentence, it seemed like Schreiber was holding back some disbelief in his tone!


    ¡°Well, yes. I¡¯ve always been too busy with other experiments in the past. I¡¯ve never tried to materialize my firews. It wasn¡¯t until I saw you do it today that I actually tried to materialize them!¡± Greem exined, somewhat awkwardly.


    However, the more he exined, the more interesting the expression on Schreiber¡¯s face. It was as if he was struggling between belief and disbelief.


    Liar, liar, liar. He has to be a liar!


    If this was his first time formingw runes, then what had he been using to control the firews in battle?


    Liar. This Greem fellow is just a big, fat liar. Not a single word of his can be trusted!


    Schreiber howled in his own mind.


    However, the unusual aura that rose from Greem when he formed thew runes was obviously an external manifestation of thew powers merging with his consciousness core.


    There was no way he could fake such a thing!


    What Schreiber had just seen led him to believe Greempletely, but Greem¡¯s exnation just went against everything that he knew. That was why Schreiber was all worked up. He stared straight into Greem¡¯s eyes, trying to discern from his face or movements any reason he would be lying about this.


    Unfortunately, all he could see was honesty!


    Goddamned honesty.


    Schreiber squeezed out a ghastly smile and forced himself to forget what he just saw. He then spoke with a hoarse voice, ¡°Sir Greem, why don¡¯t you introduce these three runes of yours!¡±


    Anyw runes belonging to an elementium adept was a vector that carried their consciousness and will. Otherwise, they would not be able tomand it with perfect uracy as they did. Without Greem¡¯s permission, Schreiber could not prate thew runes¡¯ aura to figure out their specific effects.


    ¡°These are the three firews I have mastered so far: Fire Pration, Fire¡¯s Fragility, and Fire¡¯s Resilience.


    ¡°Just as its name implies, Fire Pration allows me to prate the fire resistance of a target creature, causing them to be further damaged by my mes!¡±


    Greem called the Fire Pration rune to his fingertip as he exined, allowing it to spin in ce.


    Schreiber looked at the rune, calm andposed. It was obvious he was not moved by its effect. Instead, it was most likely that he had already mastered this firew himself, which was why he appeared so calm.


    Greem¡¯s wasn¡¯t frustrated. He waved his hand, and the Fire Pration rune returned to its original spot. Another rune then floated to his finger.


    ¡°With Fire¡¯s Fragility, I can reduce a target¡¯s fire resistance below zero at the cost of nullifying all of my defenses. In doing so, I can inflict greater fire damage than what is possible!¡±


    Schreiber narrowed his eyes when he heard this. It seemed like he was thinking about the applications of this firew inbat.


    In all honesty, nullifying your defenses wasn¡¯t the smartest thing to do inbat. However, when you needed to apply extreme pressure on the enemy at certain moments, this could be a very good way of doing so!


    Greem nced at Schreiber but did not pause. Instead, he started introducing thest rune.


    ¡°Fire¡¯s Resilience; the mes that I have ignited on my enemies will never extinguish on their own. If my enemies don¡¯t take the time to put out the fires on themselves while engaged inbat, they will have to constantly endure the mes¡¯ damage.¡±


    Schreiber¡¯s eyes finally glowed when he heard the effect of this firew.


    Even though Greem¡¯s exnation was vague, he still quickly figured out the viciousness of this firew. He was a veteran fire adept, after all.


    Ordinary elementium mes would often burn out by themselves in battle, even when lit upon the enemy, simply due to ack of constant energy supply. However, magical mes enhanced with this specialw would burn perpetually unless countered withw magic of a simr level.


    It was a very cost-effective and efficient way of slowing the opponent down, especially in a high-grade adept battle where every second mattered.


    A firew like this was a proper representation of what it meant to be a principle adept!


    Schreiber¡¯s breath couldn¡¯t help but be more rapid.


    Even though these were all firews, there were still differences in quality between them. Laws like Increased Fire Range, Increased Fire Effectiveness, Fire Pration, and Fire¡¯s Frenzy were of the lowest quality. Meanwhile, Fire¡¯s Fragility, Fire¡¯s st, and this Fire¡¯s Resilience were obviously of a higher level. Their power and effects were far superior.


    In all honesty, even though Schreiber already thought plenty of this legendary fire adept Greem, he never expected he would be able to produce such powerfulws so easily.


    Moreover, these were obviously not his real hidden aces!


    Schreiber couldn¡¯t help but be even more excited at the thought of those invisible fires and the unique double-damage effect that Greem had disyed in his fight against the Adept of Torture.


    Unfortunately, those two firews clearly formed the core of hisbat style. He would never trade them away!


    As such, Schreiber could only turn his attention back to Fire¡¯s Fragility and Fire¡¯s Resilience.

 Chapter 1252 - Combining Law Runes

    <h4>Chapter 1252 Combining Law Runes</h4>


    Half a dayter, the exchange was finallypleted.


    Schreiber traded his Fire¡¯s st for Greem¡¯s Fire¡¯s Resilience.


    Schreiber left excitedly after they exchangedw runes. It was obvious he was in a hurry to get back and master thew within the rune.


    However, a trade like this wasn¡¯t the end of the matter. There were a lot of things to be done after obtaining a neww rune.


    Even having obtained thew rune of Fire¡¯s Resilience, Schreiber would still have to decipher the correctw from within and convert it into part of his mes. The chances of seeding with all these were still rtively low.


    There were all sorts of firews in a nar world.


    Even the same firew would have different effectiveness when used by different adepts. Take Increased Fire Range, for example. It increased Greem¡¯s spell range by three to five kilometers, while Schreiber¡¯s spell range was increased by up to six kilometers.


    Most of the time, the power of thews directly corrted with the caster¡¯s affinity.


    The greater your affinity, the more powerful thew. The weaker your affinity, the weaker its effects. Meanwhile, the energy level of thews, as recorded in the books, was often the average or median value.


    If Schreiber had extremely high fire affinity, deciphering Fire¡¯s Resilience would be an endeavor that was very likely to seed. Conversely, if he failed to decipher the rune, all he would obtain would be some understanding of the firews!


    Both adepts knew about this going into the deal. As such, neither of them could be sure who woulde out on top with this exchange. However, with the Chip¡¯s aid, Greem¡¯s chances of failing to decipher the Fire¡¯s st rune was close to zero.


    After seeing Schreiber off, Greem activated all the arrays in the room and sealed himself inside.


    This ce was Adept¡¯s Association territory, after all. It wasn¡¯t the best ce to attend to some more sensitive and private matters. However, with Shadow Demon as his guard, his safety was basically assured.


    The first thing Greem did upon entering the room was to conduct aprehensive self-examination.


    Hey on his luxurious bed, his consciousness instantly sinking into the depths of his mind.


    Greem¡¯s affinity was fire elementium. As such, his mind took the form of a boundless sea of mes. The fires burned silently, the entire world a stretch of crimson red.


    A red crystal hovered above the mes at the center of this world. It remained unmoving regardless of how the mes beneath raged and burned. It simply stood there, silent and peaceful.


    However, when you approached the crystal, you could see turmoil within its structure through its countless smooth faces. It seemed as if a terrifying world of fire was contained within.


    At this moment, threew runes, still burning with golden mes, descended from the sky. They stopped near the red crystal and started to circle it wildly as if searching for their proper position.


    When Greem¡¯s mental consciousness descended on this strange world, the entire world began to bubble with liveliness.


    The consciousness core wasn¡¯t a physical ce that existed. Instead, it was a mental projection formed from the amalgamation of the soul, flesh, and consciousness of highly intelligent lifeforms. Its existence was incredibly significant for an intelligent being!


    If the most important thing for a body-refining adept was the assimtion of flesh with their mental consciousness, then the most important thing for an elementium adept was to assimte their soul with their mental consciousness.


    That was why body-refining adepts sought an immortal body, using all sorts of means to repeatedly refine their physical form, ultimately forging their very consciousness into their flesh. They were creating a unified self through a powerful and immortal body to reach a higher level of existence.


    Meanwhile, most elementium adepts couldn¡¯t care less about their physical bodies. They focused solely on strengthening their soul and mental consciousness to achieve an undying soul free from the physical body¡¯s limitations. However, the soul and mental consciousness were immaterial things, after all. They still required a medium or a container of sorts.


    The consciousness core projected with the mind of an elementium adept was this special container with which to hold one¡¯s soul and consciousness.


    Thus, even if their physical body were to bepletely destroyed, they could continue existing in a state of pure energy!


    In particr, after advancing into principle adepts, the projected consciousness core would no longer need to be the container of their soul and consciousness. Instead, it would be reced by the narws they had mastered.


    They divided their mental consciousness into countless consciousness fragments and embedded them into the nar world¡¯sw system. In doing so, their souls would be truly immortal as long as thew system still existed!


    Even if their enemies utterly destroyed the adept¡¯s body, and the adept¡¯s descendants were hunted down and killed, the adept would eventually regain consciousness as the consciousness fragments in the narws gathered together.


    Take Alice, for example. The First Witch of Fate had left the World of Adepts tens of thousands of years ago, yet her powers continued to influence the will of the World of Adepts.


    There was a thousand-year-period where her legacy had been severed. However, as long as thew system remained, the consciousness fragments that Maysa left within the system would spread throughout the world.


    Once these consciousness fragments gathered in sufficient quantity and conformed with specific narws, a new Battle of Fate would begin.


    Anyone who unintentionally assimted a consciousness fragment belonging to Maysa would be a host of her consciousness. They would gather together, guided by the mysterious power of Fate, where they would viciously devour each other. In the end, a new Maysa would be born!


    The moment this new Maysa was born, she would inherit all the Fate power that the Fate Witches had umted in their absence. Furthermore, once she advanced to Fifth Grade and stepped out into the World of Adepts, it would finally be time for the new and old Maysas to merge.


    Through such a process of umtion and assimtion, Maysa was able to continuously leech off of the World of Adept¡¯s Fate power, even after having left this world tens of thousands of years ago.


    Being parasitized by an insect that it had exiled from this nar world long ago...was obviously not something that the world consciousness could permit!


    Thus, after several cycles, it finally retaliated.


    It retaliated through Alice¡¯s hands, intending to cut Maysa out of this never-ending Battle of Fate, rearrange thews of Fate, and dispose of the illogical parts that threatened the World of Adepts.


    The world consciousness had no limbs to speak of. Naturally, it had no means ofpleting such a task on its own.


    That was why it chose to shelter Alice and Greem, who stood opposed to Maysa. It was relying on them to achieve this monumental task for itself!


    If Greem had only been somewhat aware of this, he now better understood this mission entrusted to him now that he had advanced to Fourth Grade. His connection to the world consciousness had be stronger as he advanced.


    As Greempletely immersed himself in his consciousness core, he could clearly sense the world consciousness¡¯ emotions. Its joy, anger, anxiety, and its expectations.


    The World of Adepts was toorge, after all. Its nar consciousness could not be as sensitive, sharp, or responsive as an ordinary lifeform. It was mostly like a giant infant, rying its emotions through instinct, incapable of expressing its thoughts coherently.


    However, in the subconscious of the World of Adepts, Greem was ssified as one of its own. It was incredibly obvious in the path of growth and development that Greem had experienced so far.


    When Greem¡¯s consciousness descended to the core, this projected space seemed to take on a life of its own. Waves of fireshed out from the sea of mes. The entire space zed furiously, preparing for the arrival of Greem¡¯s soul.


    Greem¡¯s consciousness body appeared above the crystal. He looked at this rowdy world of fire and started to materialize the rest of thew runes without any hesitation.


    Increased Fire Range, Increased Fire Effectiveness, Fire Pration, Invisible mes, Fire¡¯s st, Critical Fires, Fire¡¯s Fragility, and Fire¡¯s Resilience.


    Eight unusual runes that contained refined firews started to circle the red crystal incessantly, asionally shing with it and causing sparks to appear. Their movements caused the consciousness core to tremble slightly, resulting in the world of fire itself bing destabilized.


    If thew runes were allowed to collide with the consciousness core in this manner, the consciousness space would start to fall apart. Even as talented as he was, Greem would suffer from such an urrence.


    Naturally, he would not just stand by and watch this happen. He extended his mental appendage forward, attempting to guide thesew runes into the consciousness core.


    Unfortunately, it was incredibly difficult to have them quietly assimte with the consciousness core. It was almost as if there was powerful repulsion between each of these runes.


    ¡°Chip, what is happening? Why are they repelling each other so strongly? Aren¡¯t they firews that I materialized?¡± Greem could not understand what was happening.


    [Beep. Host has missed the best opportunity to assimte thew runes.]


    ¡°Best opportunity; when would that be?¡±


    [When you mastered your firstw rune. Other elementium adepts are unable to master multiplew runes in a short time. They are able to merge theirw runes with their consciousness in a timely manner every time they master a new one. Then, they condition their consciousness core to ept the next rune through a long period of adjustment, aided with potions.


    [The assimtion ofw runes is much easier and safer this way as well.


    [Host obtained arge amount ofw runes through calctions. By choosing to assimte eightw runes all at once, the difficulty is eight times that of the average adept.]


    Damn! Greem finally understood where he went wrong once he heard the Chip¡¯s exnation!

 Chapter 1253 - Future Direction

    <h4>Chapter 1253 Future Direction</h4>


    What people typically did in eight separate instances, Greem was trying to do all at once.


    No wonder the assimtion of thesew runes seemed so difficult!


    Greem sighed. He could only ce his hopes on the Chip.


    ¡°Chip, perform a search to see if there¡¯s any solution to the problem at hand. This opportunity for a soul migration is precious. I do not want to waste it because of a stupid mistake!¡±


    [Beep. The difficulty of assimtion stems from Host¡¯s soul. It is not at peak Fourth Grade level and is insufficiently powerful to bind eightw runes. There are two solutions. One: Abandon mostw runes and assimte only some of them.


    [Given the Host¡¯s current Spirit, the limit of assimtion is fourw runes.]


    Greem listened silently.


    He knew very well that he only had 44 points of Spirit at the moment. Every point increase in his Spirit after Fourth Grade would allow him to host anotherw rune. By the time he reached peak Fourth Grade and gathered tenw runes, he would have the opportunity to assimte all of them and forge his own firew.


    When that happened, Greem would sessfully advance to Fifth Grade!


    It also meant that thews that Greem would control at Fifth Grade would not be firews belonging to any particr ne. Rather, thosews would be principles belonging to him alone. It allowed Fifth Grade adepts to break free of the limits of material nes and unleash devastating power far beyond what a material ne could bear.


    ¡°Abandon some of thew runes? That isn¡¯t going to have an adverse effect on me, is it?¡± Greem asked cautiously.


    [Beep. Abandonedw runes will vanish, and the Host will forget them!


    [In addition, there is a limit to how many times the consciousness core can be modified. This limit strongly corrtes with the strength of the soul and the resilience of the mental consciousness. If these factors are below average, the number of times that the consciousness can endure modification will be reduced.]


    Greem was shocked. He couldn¡¯t help but ask, ¡°The tomes repeatedly mention a limit in development potential. Is that limit rted to the number of times that the consciousness core can be modified?¡±


    [Judging from the information currently held in the database, the Host¡¯s prediction has a 97.36% possibility of being correct! Adepts whose potential limits are judged to be intermediate Fourth Grade are very likely limited because their consciousness core can only ept five to six modifications. That is a far cry from the ten modifications required for advancement to Fifth Grade.]


    ¡°I understand! Now, I finally know what exactly the so-called limit of potential means!¡± Greem let out a sigh, ¡°An individual¡¯s attributes, the strength of their soul, and innate talent. These factors decide the strength of the consciousness core, which in turn limits how far they can go. It seems like the Fourth Grade adepts who had the consciousness to actively strengthen their body and soul were right to do so!¡±


    [Beep. Innate conditions are the main factor deciding the strength of the consciousness core. Optimization and adjustmentter in life can only improve talent slightly. It cannot reverse someone¡¯s fate at its core!]


    ¡°What about me, then? Chip, can you identify the limit of my potential?¡±


    [Beep. Due to the Chip¡¯s limits, scans can only estimate Host¡¯s limit as above Fifth Grade. More detailed analysis requires the Host to sustain calctions with more Spirit!]


    ¡°Speaking of which, you mentioned that there were two solutions to our current predicament. What¡¯s the second one?¡±


    [Beep. If Host is unwilling to give up on thew runes at hand, Host will require a powerful core to endure the bacsh of thew assimtion in Host¡¯s ce. The only item that meets this condition in the Host¡¯s possession is¡ª]


    ¡°The Orb of the Fire God!¡± Greem eximed.


    At the same time, he instantly understood the significance of the Chip¡¯s notification.


    It had simply been too soon since his advancement.


    Eighty years of umtion and adjustment was a very long time for an ordinary mortal, but it was still too short for a Fourth Grade adept whose lifespan couldst for a thousand years. Greem had made five to six hundred years of progress in just eighty years. At this point, his Spirit had instead be the limiting factor holding him back.


    This process was something he simply couldn¡¯t rush!


    Since his Spirit was insufficient to sustain the assimtion of eightw runes, then he would just use the Orb of the Fire God to rece him. A Fifth Grade Orb of the Fire God to rece an intermediate Fourth Grade fire adept. It was more than enough.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but hesitate with both options ced before him.


    The first was to assimte the runes with his own power, giving up on four of the runes in the process. The second was to rece himself with the Orb of the Fire God and assimte all eightw runes into the Orb.


    ¡°Chip, which option is best?¡±


    [Beep. Out of consideration of Host¡¯s future development, it is suggested that the first option be taken.]


    ¡°Give up four firews? As you said, if I give up on thosews, I will forget them forever! That¡¯s four firews! An ordinary adept would have a difficult time obtaining even a singlew, and you want me to give up four of them. Why should I?¡±


    [Judging from the data currently held, the precondition for advancing to Fifth Grade is possessing a sufficient number of narws, then melding them into a principle power held by the adept themselves. Consequently, the base firews that the Host chooses to assimte will decide the final power level of the principle fires after assimtion and advancement!¡±


    Greem drew in a breath of cold air and said, ¡°So, you mean to say that I can¡¯t just assimte any firew. I have to prepare for my future advancement and tailor myws, choosing only those that match my specifications?¡±


    [Yes! The uracy of this theory is as high as 86.93%. The principle fire that the Host will be able to materialize in the future directly corrtes to the firews that the Host chooses to assimte now. If the firews that are assimted are contradictory on a fundamental level, they will weaken the principle fire¡¯s power in the future!]


    After hearing the Chip¡¯s theories, Greem instantly understood why the three major adept organizations were always more powerful than independent adepts and organizations. The most fundamental reason was probably the difference in legacy and umtion.


    If a Fourth Grade adept like Greem had been born in the three major adept organizations, he would have obtained an investment of resources and proper guidance the moment he advanced. There would never be an incident caused by a simple matter like this, where Greem had obtained seven firews and yet had not even tried to assimte a singlew rune into his consciousness core!


    Such a thing could only happen in a chaotic ce like Zhentarim. The major ns had monopolized high-grade knowledge and casting techniques. Ordinary adepts had no one to guide them through their advancement. They were like blind men riding horses, purely surviving on luck.


    Even Greem had made such an expensive blunder due to theck of guidance and help!


    ¡°Chip, how should I choose between these eight firews? Is there no way toy out a systematic n for the future?¡±


    [Beep. Host has to make a choice now. Choose between the eightw runes, based on the Host¡¯s future path of development.]


    ¡°Be more specific!¡±


    [Fire is an exceedingly lively and violent elementium. It is one of the four basic elementium and has tremendous potential and power. However, there are different paths of development for fire as well. For instance: an explosive style centered around fire¡¯s explosive power, a destructive style focused on continuous fire damage, a gueri style taking advantage of the mobility of fire, or a control style making use of the special effects of fire elementium.


    [There are many possible paths to be taken. It is suggested that the Host choose a primary direction of advancement based on Host¡¯s preference and practical conditions. The development of other peripheral powers and skills can be dyed until after the advancement to Fifth Grade!]


    Greem nodded silently.


    Up until this point, he had been unsure of how he should approach his advancement to Fifth Grade. However, after hearing the Chip¡¯s analysis, Greem finally saw the future path clearly.


    He now possessed eight firews. Amongst them, Increased Fire Range, Increased Fire Effectiveness and Fire Pration were basic firews, suited for any system.


    Invisible mes and Fire¡¯s st were special effects that aided with controlling the enemy. Meanwhile, Fire¡¯s Fragility and Critical Fires were suited for the explosive style of inflicting massive damage in a single instance. Fire¡¯s Resilience was good for continuous offense.


    Judging by the firews that he currently possessed, Greem had a decent foundation to go for either a control style or an explosive style. What he chose was entirely up to his preference now!


    Control, or explosive power.


    Greem shut his eyes and thought silently.


    In truth, being able to have such frustrations was a privilege that only Greem could enjoy. Other Fourth Grade elementium adepts would be overjoyed to even be able to grasp a single elementiumw. Not many could be as picky as he was, nning for his future development past Fifth Grade.


    Other elementium adepts would take whatever they could get and assimte whateverw they managed to grasp. No one would look as far to the future as Greem. As for what they could obtain after advancing to Fifth Grade? That was all up to Fate.


    That was the main reason why the adepts tried their best to win the favor of the nar consciousness!


    If the nar consciousness liked you, you might get a decent principle ability. If the nar consciousness hated you, the principle ability you got would beplete garbage.


    As a member of a ne world, every individual would unavoidably be affected by the world consciousness to varying degrees!


    If Greem preferred to fight in person in his future battles, then the explosive style was the way to go. However, if he did not want to take such a risk, the control style was his best choice.


    He could just leave the offense to his fearless magical golems!


    At the thought of this, Greem made up his mind. He finally made his decision.

 Chapter 1254 - Soul Migration

    <h4>Chapter 1254 Soul Migration</h4>


    As Greem made his choice, fourw runes circling the red crystal fell apart without a single sound.


    Greem felt a stinging pain in his mind as the runes disintegrated. The firews corrting to these runes were wiped away by a mysterious force. Thews were wiped away thoroughly. All of the knowledge and experience that Greem had concerning thosews vanished as well.


    Increased Fire Effectiveness, Fire¡¯s Fragility, Critical Fires, Fire¡¯s Resilience; these firews that other fire adepts would die to get their hands on vanished, just like that.


    Not a single trace of them remained!


    Meanwhile, the four remainingw runes represented Increased Fire Range, Fire Pration, Invisible mes, and Fire¡¯s st. They continued to circle around the red crystal formed from his consciousness core. They continued to tremble and struggle, refusing to be bound and assimted in this fashion.


    However, at this moment, a blinding sun suddenly appeared in this zing world, slowly sinking from the crimson sky above.


    The Orb of the Fire God.


    No, more urately, the energy projection of the Orb of the Fire God!


    Controlled by Greem, the Orb had projected its powers into his soul consciousness and was slowly approaching the red crystal that represented the consciousness core.


    Thew runes refused to be bound. They were still struggling with all they had, making it difficult for Greem to merge them with his consciousness core. However, the power of the Orb of the Fire God waspletely under Greem¡¯s control. It joined with the red crystal without any hesitation.


    Aided by this incredibly powerful ally, the red crystal¡¯s control over the fourw runes increased tremendously. The fourw runes trembled slightly and let out a whimper, like that of a beaten dog. However, they could not change their fate of being slowly drawn towards the red crystal.


    Thew runes finally calmed down. They approached the red crystal obediently and branded themselves upon it.


    The assimtion of thew runes with the consciousness core was an extensive modification to the soul. The pain and agony of the process were iprehensible to someone who had not experienced it for themselves. Most adepts assimted thesew runes one by one, with at least a hundred years of adjustment between each attempt. Consequently, they would not have to suffer such a severe impact on their soul.


    However, Greem did not have three or four hundred years to deal with these runes slowly. That was why he summoned the orb¡¯s energy projection and used its powers to bind the fourw runes, forcing them to merge with his consciousness core obediently.


    The impact on the soul in the process of assimtion was also mostly shouldered by the orb¡¯s projection. Otherwise, there was no way Greem could have endured that kind of pain!


    The modification to his consciousness core represented an improvement to the strength of his soul.


    Even though Greem¡¯sbat prowess would suffer in the short term due to the loss of a few firews, this process would have tremendous benefits for his potential and his future path.


    Moreover, Greem was assisted by the Chip and the Orb of the Fire God. It was a hundred times easier for him to grasp newwspared to the average elementium adept.


    However, since he had decided on his future path, he could no longer recklessly develop any firew he chose to, as he had in the past!


    This process of assimtion took Greem twenty-seven days toplete.


    Even with his 34 points of Physique, Greem felt dizzy when he finally stepped out of his room. However, his soul¡¯s ascension after the assimtion of hisw runes made Greem¡¯s mind feel clearer and more powerful than ever before. That long-awaited sense of strength he could feel from the depths of his soul was intoxicating.


    His Spirit was still at 44 points, with no increase whatsoever. However, his soul¡¯s control over his body and his mental consciousness had improved by leaps and bounds.


    At this moment, it was almost as if Greem had the soul of a principle adept, stuffed in the body of an elementium adept. His body was still the same body, and his mind was still the same mind. However, his soul¡¯s control over fire and his understanding of fire¡¯s secrets had improved by a whole level.


    In truth, the strength of Greem¡¯s soul was still some distance away from that of a true Fifth Grade adept. However, it was still more powerful than the average Fourth Grade adept. These benefits were not obvious or visible, but they would significantly impact Greem¡¯s future development!


    After an entire month of remainingpletely motionless, without resting or eating anything, Greem¡¯s Spirit had undoubtedly weakened. However, his somewhat pale but handsome face had joy written all over it. A startling red brilliance glowed in the depths of his ck eyes.


    Several sparks outside the magical barrier caught his attention when he stepped out of the room.


    Magical messages!


    Greem hesitated for a moment before waving. A small opening appeared in the magical barrier, and these stray sparks of light immediately rushed towards him.


    Greem reached forward with his hand as the messagesnded on his palm, turning into immaterial consciousness streams that merged with his mind. An unfamiliar voice rang out in his mind.


    ¡°Adept Greem, I am interested in something in your possession. I am looking forward to meeting you in person.


    ¡°Adept Greem, I also have something in my possession that you might be interested in. Why don¡¯t we arrange a meeting?


    ¡°Adept Greem, I am Obi. I urgently hope to see you.


    ¡°What is the matter, Adept Greem? A meeting between us is certainly going to be beneficial for you. Please give me a reply as soon as possible.


    ¡°I¡¯m going mad already. How could you have gone into seclusion now? This is Obi. I am still waiting for news from you.


    ¡°It¡¯s been fifteen days. Why haven¡¯t youe out yet?


    ¡°Remember to contact me once you¡¯re out.


    ¡°......¡±


    All these messages were from an adept called Obi. Greem could see the change in their emotions from the messages: fromposure to concern, and, finally, to anxiety.


    It seemed like Greem¡¯s unexpected seclusion had almost driven a Fourth Grade adept insane!


    Obi?


    Greem frowned slightly. The Chip instantly projected the basic information on this Adept Obi into his mind.


    Adept¡¯s Association elder. Fourth Grade adept. Summoner.


    Even though the information avable was crude and simple, Greem could already guess at Obi¡¯s purpose in meeting him.


    The only item of all those he had revealed since he arrived at the Adept¡¯s Association that could have attracted this summoner was that......


    In all honesty, Greem wasn¡¯t too eager about a trade like this.


    After all, at his level, there were very few things that could attract his desire. Moreover, he already had the Orb of the Fire God and the Libram of Wisdom, which he had yet to devour fully. These two Fifth Grade items alone made him far more powerful than most Fourth Grade adepts.


    Greem would not be afraid even if he ran into a peak Fourth Grade powerhouse.


    Even here, at the heart of the Adept¡¯s Association, Greem was confident in being able to escape, as long as the Association wasn¡¯t ultimately openly hostile against him. He could escape alive as long as he wasn¡¯t swarmed by dozens of Fourth Grade adepts while suppressed by a top-ss adept tower.


    That was the real reason why Greem was so fearless ining here!


    Greem¡¯s wasn¡¯t exactly passionate about this request for a meeting.


    He lifted his arm and sniffed his slightly smelly robe. He turned and headed to the bathroom without any hesitation.


    Four hourster, the refreshed Greem opened his barrier, hungry and looking for food. He summoned the servants of the tower and had them deliver a sumptuous feast of magical meat.


    Fourth Grade adepts, in particr elementium adepts, had mostly aplished the elementiumization of their bodies to some extent. When necessary, they could simply devour magical crystals to maintain or replenish their energy reserves.


    Compared to magical crystals, there was simply too little energy contained in food.


    For a Fourth Grade adept to fill their terrifying energy reserves, they would have to eat several tons of food. Moreover, most foods contained only fragments of life energy. The energy required to convert the food into high-energy substances through the inefficient human digestive system was tremendous.


    Fourth Grade adepts could only recover their exhausted energy by consuming the flesh of high-energy magical creatures. It was also quite difficult and tiring to hunt such animals.


    However, as thergest adept organization of the World of Adepts, the Adept¡¯s Association had numerous resource nes. Since the ck Forest¡¯s magical creatures were too powerful and hard to capture, they simply moved to a lesser ne and bred weaker magical creatures as livestock.


    An entire ne dedicated to breeding these magical creatures allowed their numbers to increase exponentially.


    Obviously, there were adept parties responsible for harvesting these specially bred magical creatures. An entire system of gathering high-energy food was constructed in this manner.


    If Greem had not established an outpost in Lance and obtained a steady supply of dragon meat, he would not have been able to build such a sturdy Physique.


    However, just as Greem was digging into his feast, an uninvited guest showed up outside his door.


    ¡°Adept Greem, this is Obi. You should be able to see me now, right?¡±


    Greem hesitated for a moment when he sensed Obi¡¯s message. Finally, he opened the door of the room.


    This room belonged to the Tower of Observation. It was a property of the Adept¡¯s Association.


    However, as a guest of the Association, this room was regarded as Greem¡¯s personal territory as long as he stayed here. Even with the title of an Association elder, Obi could not enter by force.


    That was basic courtesy between adepts!


    The door opened suddenly, and a muscr man strode into the room. He saw Greem stuffing his face and froze momentarily. An expression of understanding then appeared on his face.


    ¡°Perfect timing. I was getting hungry as well! How about it, Sir Greem, could you treat me to a meal?¡± Obi was clearly a straightforward person. His loud voice rumbled throughout the entire hall.

 Chapter 1255 - Ancient God Ruins

    Chapter 1255 Ancient God Ruins


    A short momentter, another chair and set of cutlery were ced on the other end of the long table.


    Obi started to dig into the food as well.


    After nearly an hour of feasting, Greem finally managed to relieve that burning hunger in his stomach. The Heart of Principles beat violently, pumping pure fire energy to every inch of his body.


    Compared to before, the fire energy surging from the Heart of Principles was less dense. However, thew aura of the energy was thicker than ever. To some extent, it had reached the level of ¡®sacredness.¡¯


    Sacred meant something very different for adeptspared to what the word meant in the World of Gods!


    ¡®Sacred¡¯ wasn¡¯t a description of majesty or holiness. It was a description of purity and perfection!


    After removing the less relevant firews, Greem¡¯s mes had be purer and more refined. They started to resemble principle fires now.


    At this point, Greem walked down a path very simr to that of Fire King Groms.


    Adept Obi was a straightforward person. He ate heartily, while also ncing at Greem every so often.


    ¡°Adept Greem, have you...been practicing some sort of special magic? Why has your aura changed so drastically?¡± He couldn¡¯t help but ask after observing Greem for a while. ¡°If it wasn¡¯t for your soul flux, I wouldn¡¯t have been able to recognize you.¡±


    Greem smiled in response to Obi¡¯s direct line of questioning, ¡°Some problem came up with my soul, which was why I had to go into emergency seclusion. Now that I¡¯ve solved the issue with my soul, it¡¯s only natural that my aura has changed slightly!¡±


    ¡°A problem with your soul? You managed to keep Olivia on the defensive while there was a problem with your soul. Doesn¡¯t that mean you would easily defeat her if there were no problems? Hahaha. If Olivia heard of this, she would probably try and fight you all over again!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not exactly the case!¡± Greem said, ¡°I only dealt with a small problem in my soul. It doesn¡¯t affect my power inbat much at all. I wouldn¡¯t be able to get too much of an advantage even if I fought Olivia again.¡±


    Obi clearly didn¡¯t fully believe Greem¡¯s show of humility.


    He stared at Greem.


    After a long pause, he sighed.


    ¡°Who cares if you¡¯re telling the truth. It has nothing to do with me! Domhnall might care if you¡¯re weak or strong, Olivia might care, but I...Obi only cares about Obi. I couldn¡¯t be bothered with anything else!¡±


    Greem finally decided to ask a question when he heard Obi¡¯s exmation.


    ¡°Sir Obi, may I know why you were in such a hurry to visit me?¡±


    Obi¡¯s spirits seemed to have lifted when he heard Greem¡¯s question. Hisrge, round eyes stared straight at Greem as he rubbed his hands urgently, ¡°I heard from Obi that you have the egg of a Fifth Grade divine creature in your hands?¡±


    Greem nodded silently.


    ¡°Indeed, I do have such an egg!¡±


    ¡°Then,¡± Obi appeared even more anxious now, ¡°can I have a look?¡±


    Greem lifted his head and looked at Obi. He waved his hand and mes gathered to form a half-meter-tall mirror. The image in the mirror shifted continuously between multiple items until it finally settled on arge, white egg.


    Greem pushed, and the mirror drifted slowly over to Obi. The egg, which was hidden in a room far away in Fire Throne in the Centralnds, appeared so close through the mirror. Obi could even see the magical patterns on its shell and feel its aura.


    Upon seeing this wondrous item that he had been dreaming of, Obi cast away all his elegance and etiquette. He threw his cutlery to the ground and pulled the mirror before him. He then started casting spells to verify certain things.


    Unfortunately, the conditions of his examination were too crude. There weren¡¯t very many methods he could use for verification.


    Even so, after a simple confirmation of the egg¡¯s existence and its energy levels, a trace of wild joy appeared on Obi¡¯s gruff face.


    ¡°This is the egg of a bird of some sort...lightning attribute...lifeforce still fairly strong. The mother of this egg must have advanced to Fifth Grade over two hundred years ago. Congrattions, Adept Greem. You must have defeated this divine creature while it was in a weakened state, having to hatch this egg. Otherwise, it would not have been easy to get your hands on the egg of a Fifth Grade divine creature. Even the Adept¡¯s Association would have had trouble aplishing such a task!¡±


    As expected of a veteran Fourth Grade adept, Obi was able to deduce plenty of information through a limited number of clues. He was able to describe it with such detail that it was almost as if he had seen everything go down. Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed.


    In truth, Greem had been very fortunate when it came to this incident.


    Seawoods ne had been a lesser ne belonging to the Zhentarim Association. The Zhentarim Association¡¯s attempts to conquer the ne had been foiled several times, all by this divine creature. However, even they didn¡¯t expect that the Fifth Grade divine creature could have been so easily dealt with by Greem and Shadow Demon.


    The conclusion of that battle indeed filled Greem¡¯s coffers to the brim!


    ¡°Adept Greem, I want this egg!¡± Obi lowered his head and thought for a moment before finally speaking his mind.


    Greem did not give him a reply. Instead, he simply stared calmly at the adept.


    It was the egg of a Fifth Grade divine creature. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine its actual value.


    Even though the creature born from this egg wouldn¡¯t be Fifth Grade at birth, it possessed the possibility of advancing to Fifth Grade. Such an item wasparable to the Lightfire stone in value and quality alone.


    However, while the Lightfire stone could immediately be put to use, this egg required hatching and further investments. The amount of effort and resources needed to rear the creature to maturity would be astounding.


    However, this egg also represented the possibility of owning a powerful divine creature with the potential of reaching Fifth Grade. It would be an excellent choice for a pet or a magical guardian!


    Since Obi clearly understood the value of this egg, he certainly came prepared with an offering of sufficient value in exchange. Greem was just waiting for Obi to put out an offer that could move him. Otherwise, he would rather sacrifice the egg and nourish his starbeast bloodline, as he had initially nned.


    Compared to his elementium talents, Greem¡¯s bloodline power did not enhance his abilities sufficiently. The main reason for that was because Greem had only recently obtained his starbeast bloodline. He had not fully drawn out its bloodline powers.


    As such, finding special high-energy substances that could stimte his bloodline¡¯s growth was a decent option to increase hisbat power further!


    ¡°Adept Greem, I solemnly introduce to you...the undying wraith!¡±


    Obi let out a drawn-out cry as a spiritual being radiating an aura of death appeared out of thin air. This creature was a shifting cloud of white smoke. The face of a woman appeared faintly at the core of the smoke.


    An ethereal cry of sorrow echoed in the room when it appeared.


    Even as firm as Greem¡¯s mind was, he couldn¡¯t help but feel his consciousness swaying slightly when he heard it.


    ¡°This is an intermediate Fourth Grade undying wraith! It will fight obediently for you as long as you control its malice core. What about it, Adept Greem? Are you happy with an assistant like this?¡± Obi looked fervently towards Greem.


    Greem did not reply. He simply snapped his finger. A dark metal golem silently emerged from his shadow.


    Its gigantic and heavy body did not feel out of ce, even though it was standing in such a small shadow. Its sharp, gleaming metal ws were frightening to look at.


    It was obviously an unusual constructbining the unique characteristics of shadow creatures and mechanical golems!


    Obi looked at Shadow Demon, and his words came to a sudden stop. He then dejectedly put away his undying wraith.


    However, he immediately thought of the egg, and his spirits were reinvigorated. He took out his second treasure.


    ¡°This is the plume of a phoenix. As long as you are willing, I can be the intermediary and helpt you form a magical contract with a Fourth Grade phoenix. That way, you will gain a Fourth Grade flying magical beast!¡±


    Greem sighed when he heard Obi¡¯s words. He pressed his forehead with a finger, and a magical contract appeared.


    The contract was written with the ancient and mysteriousnguage of the dragons. The soul brands of Greem and Arms remained on this contract. Moreover, this was not the moremonly seenpanionship contract. It was a Contract of Forced Summoning, more widely known as a contract of servitude.


    Obi fell silent again.


    His face shifted between green and white as his eyes filled with disbelief.


    That was a contract of servitude! A Fourth Grade dragon was the subject of a contract of servitude!


    Obi felt like the whole world was spinning around him at the moment. It was almost as if a little ind in his heart was breaking apart.


    Bastard! What a bastard. This Greem fellow is such a bully!


    He had produced two incredible treasures, and both of them were shot down like nothing. Even Obi felt embarrassed for himself.


    ¡°The ruins of an ancient god. I have the coordinates to the grave of an ancient god in my possession...how about that? Are you interested?¡±


    Ancient god ruins.


    Greem mumbled to himself. The Chip quickly projected the rted information.


    Ancient god ruins were not products of the World of Adepts. They were something that came out of the World of Gods.


    Some gods that lost battles in the World of Gods would push their kingdoms away from the nar world to avoid their enemies. Their kingdoms would drift into the depths of space and wander around aimlessly.


    Due to theck of faith to sustain them, these ancient gods often had no choice but to enter an eternal slumber to survive.

 Chapter 1256 - The Death God Trap

    <h4>Chapter 1256 The Death God Trap</h4>


    Gods were a majestic, higher lifeform.


    Compared to mortals, gods had immortal bodies and undying souls. They were practically perfect beings that could exist in perpetuity.


    However, the gods¡¯ frustrations and agonies were also billions of times more than what mortals had to experience!


    Just as humans had allies and enemies, the mighty gods also had their own rivals and opponents. Naturally, the enemy of a god could only be another god!


    If a mortal was defeated in war, they might lose their home, their family, and die a tragic death. However, if a god was defeated in battle, they would suffer a far more horrendous fate!


    Any individual that could be a god would have an immortal body and an undying soul. They could be tortured and humiliated for billions of years if their enemies captured them.


    To avoid such a tragic ending, most gods would take the most drastic of actions when faced with inevitable defeat. They would destroy their own god kingdoms, disintegrate their bodies, and self-destruct their souls. The only goal was to prevent a single thing of theirs falling into the hands of their enemy.


    Meanwhile, those who refused to give up entirely would choose self-exile instead!


    Before the god was wholly defeated, they would push their god kingdom into the turbulent depths of space, preventing their enemies from giving chase. Meanwhile, they would have no choice but to abandon all their believers in their origin ne, leaving them to the mercy of the enemy faith.


    Without believers and faith, the defeated god would naturally lose the ability to sustain their massive god kingdom. When that happened, the god¡¯s only option was to keep the god kingdom running with the use of divine crystals they had put away prior to this.


    The god itself would choose to go into eternal sleep to reduce the divine power consumption of the god kingdom.


    Thus, a god kingdom that was once popted with countless believers and holy messengers became void of all life. A once-glorious god kingdom was reduced to a deste tomb.


    There were only two oues for gods that chose such a path of self-exile.


    It was possible that the remnants of their believers left in their origin ne would be able to rise from the ashes once again, gathering enough believers and faith to pull the wandering god kingdom back to their world.


    Or all the believers would be hunted down, and the source of faith would be severed entirely. If that happened, then the moment the god kingdom¡¯s reserve of divine crystals came to an end would be the moment the god kingdom fell apart. The god¡¯s body would then disintegrate, their soul scattered into oblivion!


    Certain once-powerful and worshipped gods might have a tremendous supply of divine crystals stored in their god kingdoms.


    It could take tens of thousands of years of aimless drifting before their god kingdom finally fell apart.


    However, even in exile, the gods and their kingdoms were not necessarily safe!


    A god kingdom wandering on its lonesome in the depths of space, through the endless spacestorms, was a feast for predators from other words. Of course, their god kingdoms could be dangerous death traps as well.


    If these hunters happened to approach at the right time when the exiled god¡¯s power was at their weakest, they would be able to obtain unimaginable riches and resources.


    Even a starved camel wasrger than a horse!


    As broken and poor as a god was, you would still be able to find several powerful artifacts if you scoured their entire god kingdom. Even a single artifact would be more than worth the investment for most hunters.


    Of course, if these hunters were unfortunate and approached the god kingdom while the exiled god still had some power to spare, it might be an entirely different story. There was also scum that set traps ahead of time and baited hunters into these traps with the god kingdom as bait.


    After all, it was already incredibly fortunate to be able to find a broken god kingdom wandering about in space. You couldn¡¯t possibly also hope for the god in that god kingdom to be on their dying breath, only waiting for someone to walk in and slit their throat. The possibility of an urrence like that was far, far too low!


    That was why the discovery of every ancient god ruin represented a tremendous risk.


    The ruins might have already been visited by countless hunters, leaving not a single thing behind. It was also possible that a mad god had intentionally spread false information with the intent of luring in the greedy to kill everyst one of them.


    That was why Greem remained expressionless when Obi mentioned the ruins of an ancient god, even though the offer indeed attracted him.


    His path to Fifth Grade couldn¡¯t be any clearer now. All he had to do was walk down this path. Crossing the limits of the ne and bing a Great Adept was only a matter of time. Going on an adventure into the ruins of some ancient god at this point was just finding trouble for himself.


    In all honesty, even if there were such ruins, Greem would rather explore it after he had advanced to Fifth Grade. At any rate, with how fast he was progressing, advancement to Fifth Grade would happen in the next three to four hundred years.


    That much time was basically nothing in rtion to an ancient god¡¯s ruins. There would be no problem dying such an exploration.


    Furthermore, Obi was an elder of the Adept¡¯s Association. There was no way he could have revealed information about these ruins without having first provided this information to the Association. That also meant that the Adept¡¯s Association must have organized an exploration party of their own to excavate the ruins.


    If he were to intervene in this matter as well, he would undoubtedly run into the Association¡¯s forces.


    When that happened, they would both be working towards their own ends, and conflict would be unavoidable.


    Perhaps he knew Greem¡¯s concerns, but Obi immediately said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, the Adept¡¯s Association will not be involved in any sort of excavation with regards to these ruins!¡±


    ¡°Why not?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t understand.


    ¡°Hahaha. Only adepts outside the Association like yourself would ask this question.¡± Obi replied proudly. ¡°Our Adept¡¯s Association has countless clues to many such ruins and mystic realms. There are only so many Fourth Grade adepts in the Association, on the other hand. To verify all these ims, investigate all these clues and search for all that treasure is a very exhausting task in itself.


    ¡°That is why the Association is focusing its forces on exploring the more easily excavated locations. As for ruins as mysterious and unknown as the one I mentioned, we don¡¯t quite have the manpower required for an exploratory trip at the moment. Otherwise, I would not have offered it as part of our exchange!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown. ¡°How can I trust that the information you provide me will be urate?¡±


    Obi put on a wide grin as he said, ¡°I heard you are on...good terms with that witch in the North. Can¡¯t she tell you if the clues I give you are real or fake? Moreover, do I look like the kind of guy that cheats other people with fake information?¡±


    Seeing that Greem was interested, Obi took out a worn-out magical ring and threw it at Greem. ¡°This is a ring I found in the realms beyond. Its seller mentioned that it came from an ancient ruin. You can verify that with that Witch of Fate ande back to me if you are interested in this deal. I will trade the clues to the ruins¡¯ location for your divine creature¡¯s egg. That shouldn¡¯t be a problem, eh?¡±


    Obi did not say anything more. He turned and left Greem¡¯s room.


    Greem rubbed this faded magical ring of strange design between his fingers as he watched the adept leave. His heart couldn¡¯t help but start beating faster.


    It would be a lie to say that the idea of these ruins did not move him!


    Any random ancient god was a terrifying existence of Fifth Grade or above. The fact that their god kingdoms could drift through those spacestorms untouched for so many eons was a testament to their power in life.


    Such gods could easily have been Sixth or Seventh Grade, and no one would disagree with such an assessment.


    If Greem could rob one god kingdom, he would no longer need to worry about resources and treasure for the next thousand years. He wouldn¡¯t be the only one to have his pockets filled to the brim. Even the Crimson n would benefit significantly from scouring such ruins.


    Greem¡¯s path forward might be clearer than ever, but he still needed to make considerations for Mary and Alice.


    Greem immediately contacted Alice, who was far away in the North.


    After exchanging a few words, Greem tore a rift in space and sent the magical ring to Alice¡¯s hands.


    A short momentter, Alice¡¯s figure appeared in a magical mirror.


    ¡°Do you want the good news or the bad news?¡±


    Greem already had an answer in mind when he heard Alice¡¯s question.


    ¡°The good news is that the ancient god ruin does exist, and the bad news is that this is a trapid down by our old friend Maysa, isn¡¯t it?¡± Greem sighed as he said.


    ¡°It seems like you¡¯ve figured it out!¡± Alice smiled sweetly as she replied, ¡°In all honesty, Maysa did a very clean job on this one. I can only confirm that this ring is rted to a god of death. I couldn¡¯t find any signs of interference from Maysa. However, the fact that this information just so happened to reach your ears, and all the coincidences that led up to this point, match Maysa¡¯s modus operandi.


    ¡°Since we already have some idea of what¡¯s happening...tell me, what¡¯s your n? Are you going to reject Obi¡¯s offer?¡±


    ¡°Reject the offer? Why would I?¡± Greem suddenly chuckled. ¡°If this is indeed a trapid out by Maysa, then it¡¯s very likely that the ruins are real and that there¡¯s an actual living god still inside those ruins. She wants to avoid drawing our suspicion, after all.¡±


    ¡°But this is obviously a trap she arranged. If we trace her path, we will inevitably fall into that trap!¡±


    ¡°What if we aren¡¯t the ones that go?¡±


    ¡°Er......¡±


    Greem smiled when he saw Alice with her jaw open, surprised at the proposition. ¡°I can rest easy now that I¡¯ve confirmed things with you. Just leave the rest to me. I will deal with this properly!¡±


    ¡°You...you really intend to trade with that Obi?¡±


    ¡°Haha! How could I not agree to such a meaningful exchange? Don¡¯t worry. I¡¯m not stupid enough to go stepping in that trap. I will take my time to pick a few appropriate substitutes to take the fall for us.¡±


    After cuttingmunications with Alice, Greem gave the matter some more thought. Finally, he contacted Obi shortly after he had just left.

 Chapter 1257 - The Tome of Corruption

    <h4>Chapter 1257 The Tome of Corruption</h4>


    Three monthster.


    In the same Sea of Ashes that stretched for thousands of kilometers, Greem once again met the powerful Fire King Groms.


    The entire fire hall almost burst into mes the moment he took out the Lightfire stone.


    Thew fires burning on Groms¡¯ body started zing furiously. Blue mes shot out of his eyes, like fireworks in celebration.


    ¡°Good...simply amazing. I knew you could be trusted...now hand it over to me!¡± Groms stood up and said in his loud, booming voice.


    Greem did not move even after the Fire King extended his fiery hand. He had an odd smile on his face.


    ¡°My lord, haven¡¯t you forgot a little something before I give you this Lightfire stone?¡±


    Groms couldn¡¯t help but shake his head. ¡°You human adepts are all like this. It never feels good to make a deal with you people. What is it? You think us fire creatures would lie and deceive as you adepts do?¡±


    Groms took out a fire crystal from his chest and tossed it towards Greem. He shouted, ¡°The method for extracting origin fire is recorded in there. You can hand over the Lightfire stone now!¡±


    Greem pressed the crystal against his forehead and performed a simple survey of its contents. He nodded in satisfaction. He then let go of his grip and let the Fire King pull the Lightfire stone to his side.


    ¡°Very well, the deal isplete. You may leave now!¡±


    Having both obtained what they wanted, Groms was obviously in a hurry to experience the Lightfire stone¡¯s effects. He impatiently ¡®chased¡¯ Greem out of the Sea of Ashes.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare stay in this foreign territory for too long. He immediately opened a portal to Fire Throne and vanished from the spot.


    That alone demonstrated the reason why so many high-grade adepts liked to build adept towers belonging to themselves. It didn¡¯t matter what foreign ne they were in. As long as long-distance internar teleportation wasn¡¯t restricted by some magical means, they could instantly cross incalcble distances and return home with the guidance of the tower¡¯s coordinates.


    Of course, such a technique had very strict preconditions and requirements.


    It was only possible with advanced magical knowledge and sufficient power. The ability to teleport great distances in a single moment was something that only adepts of Fourth Grade and beyond were capable of.


    The first thing Greem did upon returning was run to his isted dimension to retrieve the Libram of Wisdom, which had now been fully devoured.


    In all honesty, the Libram of Wisdom no longer existed, now that it had beenpletely devoured by the Scroll of Voodoo.


    In its ce was a unique magical tome¨C The Tome of Corruption.


    It was a terribly thick and weighty tome. Its cover was made of dragon leather, and the pages were bound together with adamantine hinges with sharp edges. The first thing that came into view upon turning its page was a sickly green doll stuck in the paper. This doll¡¯s body was covered in all sorts of unusual magical patterns.


    Remi, the Spirit of Pestilence!


    As the Scroll of Voodoo evolved into the Tome of Corruption, Remi became a summoned creature of the tome. Greem could still summon him at any time, just like before, and have him aid in battle.


    Moreover, with the increase in Greem¡¯s power and the evolution of the Tome of Corruption, Remi had unexpectedly advanced to Fourth Grade as well.


    He was Greem¡¯s Soul Equipment, after all. He was intimately tied to Greem¡¯s soul and could not exist independently in this world away from his master.


    Greem turned over to the second page and was surprised to find the old hag that Remi had turned into his contracted servant. That said, the old poison hag still remained at Third Grade. She had not advanced like Remi.


    Greem continued to turn the pages and realized that this Tome of Corruption might as well be called the Tome of gue. The entire volume was filled with the various gue creatures that Remi had collected and created.


    As Greem continued to flip the pages of the tome, the Chip¡¯s notification rang out in his mind.


    [The Tome of Corruption. Fifth Grade artifact. It contains a God of Wisdom¡¯s understanding and experience on the material nes, space, knowledge, and power. It also includes a vast system of gue creatures.


    [Estimates suggest that it can provide Host with +5 Spirit and increase the rate at which host processes and digests knowledge. It will also provide Host with additional knowledge and proficiencies. Host will be able to ovee the limitations of elementium specialization and gain ess to spells of other attributes that are two or more grades lower than Host¡¯s current grade.


    [This artifact also possesses a Halo of Poison. It will allow Host to automatically master all spells of the poison attribute.]


    Hssss!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air as he clutched this Tome of Corruption.


    Even with the Orb of the Fire God, Greem had only barely been able to control it. He had not managed to wipe out the God of Fire¡¯s brand hidden within. However, this Tome of Corruption was different. It was Greem¡¯s Soul Equipment. It belonged entirely to him, inside out.


    That was why the Fifth Grade Tome of Corruption was able to enhance Greem¡¯s powers and abilities to such a frightening extent.


    Disregarding everything else, the +5 bonus to his Spirit alone was shocking.


    It was important to note that the most powerful Fourth Grade magical equipment could only provide a maximum of three bonus points to any single attribute. Meanwhile, the Tome of Corruption provided five additional attribute points, all of them in Spirit, the most important attribute for elementium adepts.


    With the aid of the Tome of Corruption, Greem¡¯s Spirit instantly shot up to 49 points. That already made him equal to those peak Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouses!


    Of course, enhancements from items were not a representation of Greem¡¯s real power.


    He still had a long way to go to reach peak Fourth Grade. However, when he was engaged in battle, these five additional points of Spirit would push hisbat prowess to unimaginable heights!


    At the very least, should he ever face off against that Adept of Torture, he would be able to absolutely crush her with overwhelming power.


    Furthermore, the second most significant enhancement provided by the Tome of Corruption was oveing the limits of elementium specialization.


    Greem had elementium specialization in fire magic. It gave him destructive offensive power with fire spells, but it also made it very easy for his opponents to counter him. However, with the Tome of Corruption, Greem could cross the threshold of elementium specialization and use spells of other elementium. As long as those spells did not exceed Second Grade, he would no longer be limited by his fire specialization.


    The addition of the entire spectrum of elementium magic to his fire spells gave Greem ess to a variety of mixed elementium spells. Greem could now have many more possibilities with his attack patterns and techniques.


    Moreover, the Tome of Corruption also had a Halo of Poison on its own. It allowed Greem to use terrifying poison magic with no restrictions. Greem only had even more options to choose from in battle now!


    As Greem¡¯s Soul Equipment, the Tome of Corruption also contained the Fourth Grade Remi and his gue army. If all of them were released in battle, Greem could instantly raise an army of cannon fodder to serve him.


    All these benefits alone were enough to demonstrate how overwhelmingly superior a Fifth Grade artifact waspared to Fourth Grade magical equipment.


    Greem carefully took out a mithril chain and tied the Tome of Corruption to his waist.


    In addition to the Orb of the Fire God, Greem now had two Fifth Grade artifacts in his possession. At the very least, he could no longer be defeated by another Fourth Grade adept now.


    The suppression effect that Fifth Grade items possessed over Fourth Grade magic was not something to ignore either.


    When Greem fought with another Fourth Grade adept, the fire spells he cast with his Fourth Grade staff would mostly be neutralized by the opponent¡¯s forcefield and resistances. However, if he used the Fifth Grade Orb in the casting of his spell, the fire damage would be far greater than if he had used his staff alone.


    It was the guaranteed oue of having an artifact of superior Grade!


    After carefully putting away the Tome of Corruption, Greem could finally calm down and examine the fire crystal he got from Groms.


    [Beep. Detecting new data stream. Host can receive said data stream. Requesting instructions from Host. Receive data? ]


    ¡°Receive!¡±


    The next moment, a searing stream of consciousness surged into Greem¡¯s mind, quickly devoured and absorbed there.


    Groms had not lied. It was indeed a special technique used to extract origin fires, or the principles fires, as Greem called them.


    Moreover, after refining his consciousness core at the Adept¡¯s Association, Greem now had a better understanding and grasp of the principles fires. He could certainly bring them to fruition now.


    That was something that most other Fourth Grade adepts were still unable to do.


    ording to the typical flow of advancement for a fire adept, the adept would mostly be busy collecting origin substances to grasp firews and to assimte thosew runes with their consciousness core. The principle fire was something that they only formedter on. An adept would first have to gather a sufficient number of firews and increase their Spirit to the 49 point limit. Finally, the adept would conduct a special ceremony to merge all the firews together to form the principle fire.


    After advancing to Fifth Grade, fire adepts could then spread this spark of principle fire throughout their bodies, allowing them to get used to the fire gradually. Then, it would take another few hundred years of hard work to modify their bodies and refine the origin fire slowly.


    At this moment, Greem was essing techniques and secrets exclusive to Fifth Grade adepts as a Fourth Grade himself. Naturally, this brought about a tremendous benefit to himself.


    In all honesty, if Greem could forge his own principle fire prematurely, it would significantly empower him. In addition to his two Fifth Grade artifacts, he would be like a Fifth Grade Great Adept with a Fourth Grade¡¯s appearance.


    Such power would make him a wolf amongst sheep while he remained among the Fourth Grade adepts of the World of Adepts!


    However, to forge his principle fire with his current power was still too hasty. After all, his consciousness core had only just recently undergone change. It would not be able to endure much more pressure in the short term.


    As such, Greem once again went into seclusion in Fire Throne, silently waiting for his consciousness core to recover.


    This waitsted for five entire years.


    This day, a strange fingerbone in Greem¡¯s possession started ringing out.


    Greem took out the ringing bone, still radiating dense death energy, and frowned.


    This thing was themunication token the lich left with him.


    The fact that Kanganas was contacting him now...could it be? Was it time for that mission already?

 Chapter 1258 - Gathering Monsters

    <h4>Chapter 1258 Gathering Monsters</h4>


    This ce was an empty and deste area in the depths of space.


    The stars flickered in the distant darkness, each bright star representing a healthy and intact nar world. The tremendous distance made them look like tiny little spots of light in the endless night.


    For someone who had only just stepped out of their homeworld for the first time, these flickering stars might seem within their reach. It was almost as if all they had to do was reach forward, and the stars would be in their grasp. It was no more than an illusion.


    Even the closest star was hundreds of billions of kilometers away. If anyone attempted to approach these stars, charmed by their beauty, they would soon realize to their horror that they would never contact these stars, even if they were to fly for several decades without stopping.


    So close yet so far...the vastness and greatness of space were not easilyprehended!


    Space wasn¡¯t empty.


    While most of space appeared utterly devoid of anything, that couldn¡¯t be farther from the truth. Only people who had experienced space for themselves would understand why space wasn¡¯t ¡¯empty.¡¯ Space wasn¡¯t an empty void. Rather, all of that space was filled with rising and falling energy tides. These tides of energy gathered at times and scattered at others, forming a tumultuous and majestic sea of energy all over the universe.


    Ordinary ne creatures were not qualified to witness or appreciate the scenery of these energy tides!


    Ordinary substance unprotected by any form of energy would be disintegrated by the energy tides, as they continuously eroded and wore away at everything around them. All materials were ground into imperceptibly tiny elementium particles that were then scattered into space and assimted as part of the energy tides.


    At this moment, a massive rock about a hundred square meters in width was tumbling through space. The rock¡¯s surface shed with the ubiquitous energy tides, causing sparks to appear as it did so.


    The roaring energy tides were like ferocious beasts, constantly chipping away at the rock. asionally, ck dust would fall away from the rock and be cast away into the depths of space.


    Without incident, this fragment of a continent from a broken ne would bepletely devoured by the spacestorms in three to five years. Not a single piece of it would be left by then.


    However, it was a shelter for certain unusual beings at the moment.


    Shrouded in a faint veil of white death energy, Lich Kanganas stood silently on a more level spot on the rock. A small array flickered beneath his feet, about five square meters in size.


    The array was transmitting a subtle but unusual fluctuation into the distance.


    Kanganas had been waiting here for a year already. Judging from his behavior, he could continue waiting forever.


    Of course, he wasn¡¯t waiting in vain!


    Finally, as the energy tides trembled slightly, a small point of light approached from the endless darkness, slowly approaching thisnding spot in the depths of space.


    A short momentter, the sparks and fires caused by the rock¡¯s collision with the energy tides parted, and an unusuallyrge and powerful creature entered.


    It was an unusual creature resembling a scorpion. He was about five meters long, and the surface of his body was covered in a hard, golden shell.


    This scorpion-like being had three segments to his body.


    The middle portion was the longest, with four pairs of sharp limbs reaching out from the sides. The front segment was his head, short and agile, with two terrifying pairs of pincers reaching out from either side. Lastly, the back of its body was a fearsome stinger with clearly defined segments. Thest half-meter of the stinger was pitch-ck and gave off a pungent, bitter smell.


    An earth-yellow barrier engulfed him as he approached, protecting him from the constant erosion of the energy tides.


    This strange scorpion red at Kanganas with his greenpound eyes the moment he arrived. The lich didn¡¯t seem surprised by the scorpion¡¯s arrival. Instead, he started conversing in an indolent tone.


    ¡°Sand King, you are early! The rest of them haven¡¯t arrived yet. Why don¡¯t you take a breather!¡±


    ¡°Kanganas, I hope the guests you¡¯ve invited are capable people. Otherwise...it¡¯s not going to be easy to deal with that ice dragon!¡± ¡®Sand King¡¯ replied in kind with a mental message.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. Everyone invited this time is a powerful individual selected with much care and attention. There won¡¯t be any incidents.¡± Lich Kanganas¡¯ soulfire was incredibly concentrated. They appeared as two golden crosses projected from his two ruby eyes. His Spirit was shockingly powerful.


    That was only natural. As the one who initiated this mission, he had to possess sufficient authority and power to be able tomand his team members.


    The scorpion fell silent after hearing the lich¡¯s assurance. He walked to a corner of the rock, crouched on the hard ground, and closed his eyes to rest.


    Anyone who could make it through the vast distances of space through those ferocious spacestorms to arrive here was no weakling. Even this seemingly insignificant scorpion radiated powerful Fourth Grade energies. With how robust his body was and hard his shell was, he would not have expended much energy in getting here.


    However, there was simply nothing here, not even a temporary resting spot. There was really nothing he could do but close his eyes and rest as he waited!


    The scorpion¡¯s arrival seemed to herald the start of something. For the next six months, two more powerful individuals arrived in the same fashion. They also exchanged a few words with the lich before finding a spot to rest.


    At this point, the tiny rock of no more than a hundred square meters in surface area was carrying as many as four powerful individuals from different nes. They each took up a corner and waited in silence. asionally, they would talk with each other. No one seemed to mind the wait.


    Finally, after two more months and no more neers, Sand King couldn¡¯t help but speak up.


    ¡°Kanganas, is the person you called for stilling? If no one else ising, then we should start discussing our ns, should we not?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t be in a hurry. That fellow¡¯s definitelying! Moreover, his powers are very helpful for our operation this time. So......¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Big man, is he? To think he would let me wait for this long. I can¡¯t wait to see what important person ising to meet us!¡±


    ¡°Hehehe. Look, speak of the devil; he¡¯se!¡±


    As Kanganas¡¯ mental message echoed in this cramped space, a blinding sh of fire ignited in the distant space. Loud explosions could be heard as the mes flickered and approached rapidly.


    In the blink of an eye, a pir of fire erupted at the center of the rock. The silhouette of a two-meter-tall humanoid could be seen in the center of the eruption. A short momentter, the fires dissipated, and the four individuals could finally see the neer¡¯s appearance.


    It was a human!


    The neer wore an unusual set of ck dragon leather armor. A dark red cape was draped over his shoulders, the hood obscuring most of his face, only revealing a white chin and two crimson strands of hair.


    He was only two meters tall and neither too fat nor too skinny.


    His height would have made him a giant amidst humans, but here in this strange gathering of creatures, he was the smallest of them all.


    Even Lich Kanganas stood at three meters tall. The rest of the Fourth Grades were also hulking individuals with tremendous size.


    The human adept held a red staff in his hand, an ordinary magical jewel embedded at the top of the staff. A thick tome was bound to his waist with silver chains. Judging from its sharp mithril spine, it could easily double as a blunt weapon.


    The neer looked unusually young and handsome. However, everyone present here was a veteran that had lived for hundreds of years. No one would assume that this human was a rookie just because of his appearance.


    Lich Kanganas performed a quick sweep of the human adept with his crimson soulfire when he saw him arrive. When his ¡®gaze¡¯nded on the thick tome, his soulfire shrank abruptly as his Spirit trembled.


    Was that the Libram of Wisdom?


    But the aura didn¡¯t match! Could this fire adept have a second powerful magical tome equipment in his possession?


    The abilities and equipment of any individual were part of their power. They would not allow another individual to scry and peer into their secrets freely. That was why Kanganas did not make any further inquiries, as curious as he was. He simply walked forward to wee the adept, as if he couldn¡¯t be bothered by what he saw.


    ¡°You¡¯ve finally arrived!¡±


    Naturally, the young human adept was Greem, who had hurried here after receiving the message. Among all these powerhouses, he was only acquainted with Lich Kanganas. Thus, he smiled at the lich as he said, ¡°My ne is slightly further away from this ce. It took me some time to get here.¡±


    ¡°All that matters is that you¡¯re here. That¡¯s all that matters. Time? Hah! What does that count for in the eyes of individuals like ourselves?!¡±


    Kanganas secretly started to examine the energy aura that Greem radiated, even as he continued to make small talk.


    Unbelievable! It had barely been a hundred years, and this fire adept he had barely paid any attention to back then had advanced to intermediate Fourth Grade!


    Such a terrifying speed of improvement! Even Kanganas, with all his knowledge and experience, couldn¡¯t help but be shocked seeing this.


    Upon seeing the lich¡¯s passionate greeting, the other three individuals couldn¡¯t help but exchange looks. They then shifted their gaze onto the neer.


    ¡°Late guy, I am Sand King; what¡¯s your name?¡± Sand King, who had always been known for his fiery temper, couldn¡¯t help but be the first to speak up.


    Sand King was only his title. No one really knew or cared about the scorpion¡¯s actual name.


    After all, everyone was only here for a mission. They barely trusted each other. There was no way they would share secrets about themselves.

 Chapter 1259 - Admission Ceremony

    Chapter 1259 Admission Ceremony


    ¡°You can call me Fireman!¡± Greem nced at this unusual scorpion and said.


    Keeping a low profile in this group of strangers would keep him away from some unnecessary trouble, but it would also lower his value in the eyes of his panions.¡¯


    Should any one of them be determined to be a ¡®weakling,¡¯ then what awaited them would certainly be oppression and the erosion of their benefits.


    Anyone who could be a ¡®friend¡¯ of a lich was no good person. It was only natural that you would be bullied and oppressed if you were weaker than them. Such things happened anywhere you go!


    That was why Greem was keeping up a firm attitude even while he tried to stay out of the spotlight.


    ¡°Fireman? I¡¯ve never heard of this name. What about you two? Have you ever heard of this fellow?¡± Sand King¡¯s question was directed at the two giant individuals standing silently by the side.


    In all honesty, these two individuals terrified Greem quite a bit as well.


    The first one appeared to be a Medusa, judging from her appearance.


    Medusas were a species with only females and no males. As for how procreation worked for them? Greem had no idea.


    This was a pretty Medusa who was a perfectbination of strength and beauty.


    She stood tall, the upper half of her body with the slender curves of a human woman. Her naked body was covered in violet scales,yer uponyer.


    Her bosom was plentiful and majestic, almost like two ser balls had been ced on her chest. Moreover, her chest trembled slightly with her every movement, making for a very enticing sight.


    Six equally scaled arms each held several different weapons and equipment. The equipment glowed with magical power. It was obvious that each of them was a powerful piece of magical equipment.


    A slender, ten-meter long tail formed the lower half of her body, supporting her as she slithered over the uneven terrain.


    Meanwhile, her pointed cheeks perfectly matched the beauty standards of humans. She was incredibly pretty and seductive. However, her narrow, sharp eyes, purple lips, and slithering snake-hair were all indications of her terror and cruelty!


    Greem did have a Medusa as his subordinate.


    However, this was the first time he had met an intermediate Fourth Grade Medusa.


    A Medusa was a vicious fighter at both close and ranged distances. They also had powerful petrification powers and were unusually difficult opponents!


    Another unique individual stood not far away from her.


    In all seriousness, this fourth individual was simply arge, obscure ball of blue light.


    One could faintly see an unusual skeletal structure drawn out of sparks of white light in the midst of the blue light. It neither resembled the skeleton of a human nor a beast. It was a very strange sight to behold.


    Starspirit...a starspirit from the Spirit World!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but howl in his own mind.


    Goddammit! To think he would run into this unique creature in the boundless depths of space even though he didn¡¯t even meet one of them back in the Spirit World.


    Starspirits were unique lifeforms. They had no flesh or body. They were simply a mass of void energy. Starspirits could convert any form of magical energy into void energy and use it to unleash devastating void magic.


    As void energy was of apletely different energy system than most supernatural powers, ordinary creatures had almost no means of defending against void magic.


    ording to records of adepts who hade into contact with void energy, elementium spells were ineffective at defending against void magic. Rather, pure energy shields devoid of any elementium attributes were more effective.


    Some adepts had conducted analysis and believed that void energy was a unique energy formed through abination of mental energy with pure energy. The only way to kill a starspirit was to disperse the void energy shell around them and shatter the void energy core contained within.


    However, it was easier to say such things than to actually do it. A powerful starspirit was far harder to deal with than a spellcaster of the same grade in all aspects. Even Greem didn¡¯t want to make an enemy out of a starspirit unless it was absolutely necessary!


    ¡°Sand King, you don¡¯t have to keep running your mouth!¡± The pretty Medusa slithered over. ¡°Kanganas invited him. Do you not believe in Kanganas¡¯ eye?¡±


    Sand King waved both of his giant pincers and said in his booming voice, ¡°Kanganas just loves fighting with people. He only ever invites people who he can¡¯t defeat into the team. It seems like this Fireman fellow has some skills!¡±


    ¡°Alright, since everyone is here, why don¡¯t you exin the mission, Kanganas! If anyone wants out, then speak up. It¡¯s better if you quit now than stay on and drag everyone down,¡± The starspirit stepped forward, and the air trembled with his unusual mental message.


    Greem¡¯s eyes narrowed under the shadow of his hood. Blue light gleamed in the depths of his eyes.


    [Beep. Detecting unusual magical energy. Unable to include in any of the current magical systems. Request instructions from Host. What should this magical energy be named?]


    ¡°Void energy!¡±


    [Beep. New energy spectrum has been established, known as void energy. Said energy is abination of powerful mental energy and pure space energy. It possesses the powerful abilities Empower and Mind Infusion.]


    ¡°Empower...what kind of ability is this?¡±


    [Beep. Void energy is a special mental energy. It is a form of materialized and energized mental energy. There are four levels of void energy, each indicated by a different color: red, green, yellow, and blue. Red is the most powerful energy level, and blue is the weakest energy level. This also means that the change in color of the void energy would indicate a change in the energy¡¯s power level!


    [Meanwhile, Empower is a unique application of void energy! Starspirits can freely imbue void energy onto the surface of any substance. In doing so, unique magical effects can be imitated. For instance: explosion, disintegration, disruption, binding.]


    While Greem was silently observing the starspirit and secretly analyzing his unusual void energy powers, the starspirit seemed to have noticed something.


    Yellow light suddenly glowed from the depths of the blue ball of light, shooting towards Greem.


    The yellow light that represented the starspirit¡¯s power shed furiously with the red light that shot out of Greem¡¯s own eyes. A visible wave of energy rippled through space, causing both the starspirit and Greem to take a step back. Their expressions turned solemn and stern.


    The light blue energy outside the starspirit¡¯s body started to change colors. It slowly turned yellow.


    This also meant that the void energy level in the starspirit¡¯s body was rising, reaching the levels ofbat readiness!


    ¡°Alright, that should be enough!¡± At this point, Lich Kanganas could only step forward personally. ¡°What we need to deal with this time is an advanced Fourth Grade ice dragon. Both of you had best save some energy to use on that creature!¡±


    As his sinister voice rang out, one of a series of teeth hanging at Kanganas¡¯ waist suddenly exploded. A skeletal wall ten meters long, one meter thick, and two meters tall abruptly rose from the ground, separating Greem and the starspirit.


    The two of them had no intention of fighting anyway. They were only using this minor conflict to disy their power. The wave of energy that had erupted in midair wasn¡¯t powerful, but it was a demonstration of their power.


    Sand King and the Medusa looked at each other. They could feel an unnervingw aura in that wave of energy that had erupted.


    ¡°Alright, since everyone¡¯s here, let me make some introductions!¡±


    Kanganas hovered in the air, his crimson soulfire gazing coldly at everyone.


    ¡°Sand Kinges from an unusual ne known as Dune Castle. He is the ruler of that ne¨C a fairlyplete, self-contained small world. He specializes in sand elementium attacks and has decent stealth and offensive powers. Moreover, his defenses are probably the strongest of us all!¡±


    No one could dispute that im!


    Disregarding everything else, you could imagine how powerful Sand King¡¯s defenses were just by looking at his thick shell. Moreover, most insectoid beings had stubborn lifeforces. This was something that they held superior over most other races.


    ¡°Hehehe, skeleton boy, there¡¯s no need to praise me any further than that! For all the good words you are saying about me, aren¡¯t you just nning to make me your meat shield? Let¡¯sy down the rules first. If there is equipment suited for me in that dragon¡¯s den, no one is allowed to fight with me over it,¡± Sand King turned his ghostly green eyes and warned everyone else.


    ¡°No one will fight with you over equipment!¡± Kanganas jaw moved as he spoke, ¡°Medusa Sshina is an agile fighter, while I, Fireman, and Starspirit Ts are all spellcasters. If Gaia¡¯s Barrier is indeed in that dragon¡¯s possession, it will belong to you.¡±


    Sand King finally shut up after getting an assurance from the lich.


    ¡°Medusa Sshina, from Shadowsong ne. She is a ruler with decent authority over there, with over ten thousand Medusas under hermand. She excels in closebat and petrification attacks.¡±


    Sshina simply nodded proudly after listening to Kanganas¡¯ introduction, with no intention of adding any further information.


    ¡°Starspirit Ts, from the Spirit World. It¡¯s a powerful ne that can evenpare to the World of Adepts. He excels in using the mysterious void energy. As for his powers...,¡± Having said that, Kanganas paused. Clearly, he had no idea how to describe that unusual void energy.


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to go into any further details on Sir Ts¡¯ powers. I¡¯m sure everyone knows the power and mystery of a starspirit. There¡¯s no need to say anything more!¡± Greem smiled and said.


    He could tell that this wasn¡¯t the first time the rest of them had gathered together. They already had some semnce of synergy between them. Greem was probably the only new guy here.


    ¡°So, Sir Fireman, are you going to introduce yourself, or should I do that for you?¡± Kanganas said coldly.


    ¡°I¡¯ll do it myself!¡± Greem stepped forward. ¡°I am Greem. You can call me Fireman as well. I am from the World of Adepts. I have a small territory of my own in the Centralnds of the continent there. As for my proficiencies...naturally, it¡¯s fire magic! I believe this is the main reason why Lord Kanganas has invited me here!¡±


    After a simple introduction, Greem could instantly feel the other individuals lower their guard slightly around him.


    Obviously, they had approved of his power and were now treating him as one of theirpanions!

 Chapter 1260 - Opening Gambit

    <h4>Chapter 1260 Opening Gambit</h4>


    The Chillfrost World.


    This ce was an unusual world utterly different from any other ne.


    The narws here appeared to be severely distorted, turning this small ne into a harsh world covered eternally in ice and frost.


    The chilling winds howled, and des of snow and ice shed through the air.


    Looking from afar, the entire world appeared as varying shades of gray and white. Even the skies were covered by a thick and denseyer of dark clouds. No stars or moons could be seen from here.


    The ground was covered in sheets of ice dozens of meters thick. Mighty peaks of ice and snow towered above the earth.


    This ce was exceedingly cold and hostile to most creatures. However, at a single nce, you could still sense the presence of numerous lifeforms in the vast icy ins and the hazardous mountains and rivers.


    These creatures were unusual ice creatures, or simply ice elementals of different forms. Any creature that could exist and survive in such a harsh environment would need to have tremendous resistance to the cold!


    A skeletal portal radiating death appeared silently upon a vast snowy in. Five unusual figures of different shapes and sizes emerged from within.


    Greem could feel the ice energy pressing in from every direction the moment he stepped out of the portal.


    It was a nar world that was extremely hostile towards him.


    From the vague nar consciousness to the creatures that lived in this world, and even a single de of grass, single flower, or even the chilling winds blowing past him; every single thing in this world seeped with hatred towards him.


    When Greem set foot on the snowy ins, the snow and ice crunched beneath his feet. Countless silver chains glowing withw powers appeared out of thin air and bound him firmly.


    These silver chains reached into empty space on one end, while the other end was tied firmly around Greem. The powers of the narws furiously suppressed Greem¡¯s fire powers.


    Greem¡¯s energy aura dropped rapidly. In the blink of an eye, he went from intermediate Fourth Grade to beginner Second Grade. If it wasn¡¯t for the wildly pumping Heart of Principles sending surges of pure fire energy all over his body and resisting the suppression of thews, Greem might even have fallen below Second Grade.


    Without energy protection, the ice energy all around started to surge towards Greem.


    It almost seemed like it was intent on freezing him to death on the spot.


    The cloak that Greem wore instantly hardened. Ayer of blue frost started to creep up the fabric at a visible rate.


    Greem could only feel the sharp stinging chill of the wind. His entire body, flesh, and even bones were rapidly freezing and hardening in the cold. If it weren¡¯t for his exceptional Physique, he would have already sumbed to the cold and been turned into an ice statue!


    ¡°Hmph! What a vicious opening gambit!¡± Greem grunted and tapped his staff against the ground. A strange surge of warmth ran through his body, expelling all of the cold.


    As he waved his staff, the temperature within five meters of Greem started to rise rapidly. Soon, his surroundings were just as warm as he liked it.


    However, this ¡®insignificant¡¯ action of his clearly incited an even more ferocious retaliation from the narws. Even morew chains reached out from the air and reached towards Greem.


    They were so aggressive that it seemed like they almost wanted to exile Greem from the ne entirely!


    Greem¡¯spanions were not spared from this treatment. They were also suffering badly from the nar suppression.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. It was always the scenario facing anyone that invaded a foreign ne!


    If they were only a few small fries, they would not have enjoyed the privilege ofplete suppression from the narws. However, it was because all of them were so overwhelmingly powerful that they were suffering so. Their bodies and souls were all seeping withw powers from their own worlds.


    Law powers of two different sources could not co-exist.


    That was why they had triggered such vicious nar suppression when they entered the ne.


    However, even after their elementium powers had been suppressed, they still had powerful physiques and terrifying innate abilities. Thus, even bound byyers uponyers ofw chains, they could still move freely and with ease.


    Of the five people in the party, Greem was probably the one with the weakest physical body.


    That was why Kanganas, Sshina, Sand King, and Ts turned to look at Greem once they were done familiarizing themselves with the environment. They wanted to see how he would break free of this annoying suppression.


    Greem¡¯s performance surprised them immensely!


    Due to his ¡®reckless¡¯ use of hisw powers, the nar consciousness had unleashed severe bacsh onto him. However, Greem simply waved his staff, and a cloud of fire engulfed him. The terrifying bacsh then vanished without a trace.


    Almost...as if it had never existed to begin with!


    ¡°Let¡¯s go! This ce is over five hundred kilometers away from the ice dragon¡¯s den still. Let¡¯s hurry and move out!¡± Greem walked away casually as if nothing had just happened.


    The other four members of the party couldn¡¯t help but exchange looks.


    ¡°Bone, how did he managed to resist the nar bacsh?¡± It was Ts, the mysterious starspirit that posed the question.


    ¡°Indeed. His Physique is not as high as mine, and even I would have been injured from that earlier bacsh. How did he manage to dispel it?¡± A booming voice chimed in. It was Sand King.


    ¡°Don¡¯t ask too many questions. All of us have our secrets. If you don¡¯t want any trouble, I suggest you all shut your mouths!¡± Kanganas replied coldly.


    However, before they set off, he squeezed out a single sentence from between his teeth.


    ¡°Be careful. That guy has an ultra-grade item on him.¡±


    Having said that, the lich floated into the air by himself and flew after Greem before the rest of the party could ask more questions.


    An ultra-grade item.


    The three members of the party were shocked. When they looked at Greem again, their impression of him had changed entirely.


    There were no weaklings among those who could control an ultra-grade item!


    ............


    Traveling through a ne that was actively hostile against you was tough business.


    However, Greem was protected by the Orb of the Fire God. It wasn¡¯t that hard for him now that most of the nar bacsh had been neutralized.


    He continued forward with some difficulty. The Chip had projected a countdown to the corner of his eye. The number was ticking and changing constantly.


    [37 hours, 26 minutes, and 41 seconds until nar suppression is dispelled.]


    The Chip had been working at full power to decipher the narws here the moment they set foot in Chillfrost. As the analysis progressed, Greem¡¯s power slowly rose again.


    What stood before him was a vast, boundless in of snow and ice.


    There was only white wherever he looked. White ice pirs of strange shapes, piles of white snow, and white snowkes dancing in the air.


    Bone-chilling winds soared past him, but they were roasted warm by theyer of fire around Greem the moment they approached. When the wind reached Grem, it was merely a warm breeze, pleasant andforting.


    However, when the warm breeze passed by Greem and met with the crushing cold once more, the air crackled. The moisture in the air froze into snow powder and ice shards, and all of it fell to the ground.


    While Greem was walking forward, a small bump appeared on the snowy ground. The snow burst apart as a swarm of strange worms charged forward.


    These snow worms had a thickyer of fur, two legs, and long ears on their heads. They opened their vicious mouths, as wide as half their body, and lunged forward with bloodshot eyes.


    These snow worms chittered and rushed at Greem the moment they sensed his unusual aura.


    These worms weren¡¯t powerful at all. They were at the level of intermediate apprentices at the very best.


    However, their advantage came in their numbers and the chilling temperatures of this world. It allowed their attacks to pose a sliver of threat against Greem.


    Greem casually hurled two Explosive Fireballs forward, sting two craters in the snow and turning seven snow worms to ashes.


    As impressive as this result was, Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown. He once again felt his helplessness at fighting in a foreign ne.


    Back in the World of Adepts, those two Explosive Fireballs would have created a sea of fire over a hundred meters in radius, exterminating most of these little critters. But now...two Explosive Fireballs had only been able to make two five-meter-wide craters and kill only a tenth of the snow worms he had expected.


    Greem was slightly flustered at this!


    His powers were too badly suppressed here.


    While Greem was frowning, a crackling sound suddenly rang out in the empty snow ins. A dozen nearly translucent crystal monsters rushed at him, their bodies letting out a cracking sound with every step.


    These monsters appeared more powerful than the snow worms. Each of them seemed to be the equal of a First Grade adept. Moreover, their entire bodies wereposed of translucent crystal. It allowed them to blend in perfectly in this snowy world of ice. An ordinary person would have trouble seeing them.


    Guided and incited by the nar consciousness¡¯ hostility, these native creatures stormed forward recklessly with no regard for the power difference between them and the invader.


    A short momentter, a massive halo of fire shed across thend as all the snow within a thousand meters started to melt. Thend was charred ck. Countless snow creatures were burned to a crisp in the wave of fire, scattered to the wind as ck dust.

 Chapter 1261 - Ice Giant Descendant

    <h4>Chapter 1261 Ice Giant Descendant</h4>


    Ice creatures continued to swarm forward with no regard for their own lives.


    However, their courage and fearlessness were like pretty bubbles in the face of absolute power¨C crushed with a single touch.


    A new wave of native creatures charged forward and turned into dust.


    Another wave of native creatures rushed forward and was crushed to pieces.


    The one standing at the front of the five-person party was no longer Greem, but Sand King.


    Sand King wasn¡¯t quite unleashing any of his powers, either. He simply walked forward with his thundering steps, crushing all the monsters he came across like a heavy tank. Sand King might have seemed smaller than some of those magical creatures¨Csome of whom stood up to dozens of meters tall¨Cbut his terrifying control over sand constantly shrouded him in a sandstorm.


    Any creature that walked into the sandstorm was quickly shredded and torn into pieces. When Sand King walked by, all that would be left behind him were his strange footsteps andrge pools of blood.


    As for the ice breaths, ice spears, and snowballs that the native creatures fired at him while at death¡¯s door? They shattered into tiny pieces of ice against Sand King¡¯s imprable carapace. Their attacks could not leave anything on his giant body apart from a few spots of frost here and there.


    Initially, only apprentice-level creatures attacked the party. However, as the party continued to push forward and entered within fifty kilometers of the snowy ins, the number of native creatures attacking them had increased in power level.


    The apprentice-level snow worms, the beginner First Grade crystal monsters, the intermediate First Grade frost demons, the advanced First Grade snow apes, the beginner Second Grade ice abominations, and the advanced Second Grade frost wraiths.


    These ins, the cier ins, were clearly a fairly resource-rich area in Chillfrost. The attacks against the party had barely stopped since they started their journey. They were continually being attacked by packs of monsters or ambushed by individual predators.


    In all honesty, these native creatures were quite vicious and savage indeed!


    However, when their opponents were top-ss powerhouses from other nes, their ice powers and insignificant physical prowess appeared to beughable.


    It didn¡¯t matter what they tried. Hiding under a thick pile of snow, ambushing along the party¡¯s path, or even summoning a blizzard to conceal their presence; no amount of fancy technique would help if they did not have the corresponding power to deal with these enemies!


    They came...and they stayed forever.


    Reduced to ice shards and returned to the nar origin.


    Tens of thousands of ice creatures paid with their lives as the price, but they could not even leave a single scratch on the enemy party members.


    The difference in power was too vast. It was so huge that there was no way to make up for it with numbers or tactics!


    The party still continued forward at a leisurely pace.


    Of course, if it was necessary, the party could easily traverse the five hundred kilometer distance in the blink of an eye and arrive at the ice dragon¡¯sir.


    However, since they had only just arrived, they were still suffering from severe nar suppression.


    That was why the party intentionally dyed their progress, wiping out the local poption as they waited for the effects of the suppression to ease up.


    Spellcasters relied on their analysis of the local narws to reduce the suppression to themselves. Meanwhile, physical fighters like Sand King relied on the powerful adaptability of their bodies.


    Their ability to decipher the narws was mediocre, but their ability to adjust their bodies and adapt to a new nar environment was incredible.


    As such, the party members were not in a hurry. They continued on their steady pace, slowly approaching their target destination one step at a time.


    In truth, Kanganas and the others also hoped the ice dragon would sumb to the nar influence and charge out of itsir to challenge them.


    After all, that would take away some degree of the dragon¡¯s geographical advantage!


    The act of breaking into their of a thousand-year0old ice dragon was undoubtedly filled with tremendous risk. However, the chances of the dragon charging out of itsir were very, very minute. No ruler would ever emerge from their hiding spot and fight against multiple enemies of the same grade over some insignificant civilians.


    Three dayster.


    After crossing the cier ins and making it past the Deepfreeze Valley, the party finally arrived at their destination.


    All the mountainous, hazardous, and steep snow peaks could no longer be seen here. Everything within sight appeared to bepletely t. The ground was also covered in a thick sheet of ice, a dozen meters thick.


    Meanwhile, a chilly sea flowed slowly beneath the ice, asionally letting out chilling winds into the air. The depth of this sea was immeasurable. Despite their powerful Spirits, none of the party members were able to sense the bottom of the sea.


    There were no signs of life in this location. Even the cold wind seemed to betray a hint of destion and death as it blew past.


    However, a colossal block of ice stood at the center of this frozen sea. The ice peak reached beyond the dark clouds, making it difficult to see what was at the top.


    ¡°It knows we¡¯re here!¡± It was Kanganas who spoke. His crimson soulfire flickered in his skull, projecting a chilling aura far colder than even the cold winds of this foreign world. ¡°I can sense its power rising.¡±


    The rest of the party did not say anything. They were all using their own techniques to sense the presence of the terrifying creature on top of that snowy peak!


    Greem lifted his head. A red beam shot out of his zing eyes towards the peak. He could vaguely see something through those dense clouds.


    A majestic pce seemed to stand upon the peak and between the clouds.


    Just as Greem attempted to get a better look, the clouds were disturbed, and his vision was disrupted. Everything became shrouded in mystery once more.


    ¡°Chip, conduct a self-assessment. What is my condition right now?¡±


    [Beep. Self-assessmentplete.


    [Greem. Male. Fourth Grade Semi-Principle Adept (Fire Specialization).


    Chaos Physique (Excellent Magic Resistance). Starbeast Bloodline (15%).


    Heart of Principles (76% Mastery of Fire Laws).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 27 | Physique 31+2 | Agility 19 | Spirit 44+5.


    Bloodline Talent: Energy ckhole.


    Fire Laws: Increased Fire Range (Locked In), Fire Pration (Locked In), Invisible mes (Locked In), Fire¡¯s st (Locked In).


    [Host is currently experiencing nar suppression.


    [Chillfrost narw analysis progress: 100%. Host¡¯s power has been suppressed to beginner Fourth Grade. Host currently has 82% of full power. Elementium power is 76% as effective as usual. Effectiveness of firews is notpromised.]


    Greem read the data provided by the Chip and was speechless.


    Even with the help of the Chip and aplete analysis of the nar suppression, he had only managed to recover 82% of his usual power. Hispanions were most certainly more affected than he was. How well could they fight still?


    However, the degree to which everyone had recovered their powers was an incredibly private secret. If this information was leaked, it would be very easy for an opponent to deduce their Spirit¡¯s strength. Even though they were in a party, there was no way they could share such information.


    ¡°This is the entrance to the ice dragon¡¯sir,¡± Kanganas¡¯ Spirit was getting restless now that they were here. ¡°A little further, and we will be entering the settlement of the ice giants that the ice dragon has enved.¡±


    ¡°Ice giants?¡± Greem said in surprise. ¡°Didn¡¯t the ancient ice giants go extinct? How could there possibly be ice giants here?¡±


    ¡°Kehkehkehe...ancient ice giants are powerful existences of Sixth Grade and above. There¡¯s no way a mere Fourth Grade ice dragon could enve them!¡± Kanganasughed sinisterly and exined, ¡°The ¡®ice giants¡¯ here are only mutts that have inherited some degree of the ice giant¡¯s bloodline! Even so, there are quite a few individuals among them who have reached Third and Fourth Grade. They are not easy opponents at all!¡±


    ¡°Hehehe! Cannon fodder! If you think this is trouble, then I can deal with all of them alone. Of course, I will take most of their spoils for myself!¡± Sand King chuckled with his booming voice.


    ¡°Hmph! You wish!¡± Sshina flicked her slender tongue as she coldly said, ¡°We will strike together, and we must be clean. Don¡¯t let these giants disrupt our ns.¡±


    Everyone else nodded and said nothing else. Together, they stepped onto the sheet of ice above the frozen sea.


    They did not make it a hundred meters across the ice before they stopped and looked around them.


    Several giant pirs of ice had abruptly burst up around them. Several towering and ferocious giants walked out from within the ice. These giants had blue skin that almost seemed translucent. You could see their bones and blood, all of a slightly darker shade of blue.


    There were males and females amongst the giants, all of them covered in crude, simple garments made out of animal skin.


    The giants stood at an average of twelve meters tall.


    The male giants looked more muscr and were bald. Their eyes were so white it seemed like a terrifying snowstorm was brewing within. The female giants were more petite, and they had strange hair behind their heads that seemed to be woven out of icicles.


    Without exception, all of them had the infamous strength that all giants possessed. They also had shocking ice powers.


    Seventeen ancient ice giant descendants, the leader of whom had the powers of a beginner Fourth Grade. The rest of the giants were also at Third Grade. Even the two giants that looked like children had the power of an intermediate Second Grade.


    ¡°Stop there, outsiders!¡± The leader of the giant¡¯s had a loud voice. When he shouted, the sea beneath them seemed to roar alongside him. The ice around him also cracked and erupted. ¡°This is the territory of the great Ice Dragon Nax. You may not enter without permission!¡±


    Tch. What age is it? To think that there are still people that like to announce their names before they got to the fighting.


    Greem insulted the giants in his mind and hurled out the massive fire spell he had been preparing, without any mercy at all.


    Scarlet Firestorm.

 Chapter 1262 - Shadow Demon Appears

    Chapter 1262 Shadow Demon Appears


    The battle started abruptly and ended even faster.


    All the party members had experience dealing with powerful, brawny enemies with some degree of magical power and no high-grade magical equipment.


    Scarlet Firestorm.


    Ripple of Death.


    Petrification Beam.


    Earth Tremor.


    Void Overflow.


    The one dozen ice giants surrounding them were knocked t onto the ground instantly, their formation scattered and in ruins. The forcefields of the weaker giants shattered immediately. Their bodies were then swarmed with strange energy of various colors: red, white, and gray. They screamed in agony and copsed.


    Only the three strongest ice giants managed to endure the attacks. They roared as chilling winds engulfed them. They lifted a hand and began hurling massive ice spikes at Greem and the rest of the party.


    These ice spikes were an entire meter in diameter, each one of them containing freezing cold that could kill any creature in a single strike. Even the Fourth Grade invaders would have trouble dispelling the cold if caught in it, let alone an ordinary mortal.


    The reason the ancient ice giants were so powerful was because of their absolute control over the cold.


    The adepts called it principle powers, while the giants, who were the embodiment of the universe¡¯s will, called it Origin.


    It didn¡¯t matter what this power was called; anyone that could master a specific power to the extreme and control it with finesse would be a powerful opponent.


    However, the principle powers were the cause of both the rise and fall of the ancient ice giants!


    The ancient ice giants were born in ordance with the will of the universe. They were incredibly strong, and the ice powers they possessed was enough to wipe out anyone who made an enemy out of them. That was why they managed to make a name for themselves in ancient times, establishing themselves as figures of respect and fear for countless mortal worlds.


    However, as the will of the universe shifted, the Titans came into existence, and the various giant tribes gradually fell into decline.


    The moment the ice giants¡¯ forces started to weaken, they were attacked by countless rising tribes and species.


    Thus, the bloodline of the ancient ice giants came to an end. Only remnants of their bloodline remained in certain remote worlds. These ice giant descendants did not have the terrifying might of the ancient ice giants. They were either physically ipetent or possessed limited control over their ice powers.


    In conclusion, they might seem like Fourth Grade creatures, but their true powers were a far cry from their bloodline source!


    A single round of attacks had managed to knock out most of the ice giants. Sand King alone was enough to deal with the three remaining giants.


    Sand King possessed an unusual ability to travel through the ground.


    He vanished from the spot, digging into the ice, just in time to dodge the desperate retaliation of the ice giants.


    When he once again appeared, he was right beneath the three giants.


    The ground quaked, and the ice splintered as Sand King¡¯s giant body burst forth from below. The three ice giants were thrown into the air. As they panicked and scrambled to react, Sand King reached with his two pincers and cut the two advanced Third Grade ice giants in half with a single snap.


    He then smashed the Fourth Grade ice giant into the ground with his head. His stinger lunged forward and stabbed the giant in the chest, injecting fearsome venom into his body.


    The leader of the ice giants was truly a Fourth Grade creature. It did not die, even after being so severely injured. Instead, it let out a furious roar and grabbed Sand King¡¯s pincers with his arms. He then opened his mouth as wide as it could go, attempting to let out a breath of the strongest ice power he could muster.


    Frightening ice power gathered in the giant¡¯s throat. The color was faint, almost a translucent white, but the icews contained within the breath made everyone in the party frown.


    The bloodline of the ice giants might have been in decline, but this terrifying attack that drew upon all of the giant¡¯s blood essence was a massive threat to a Fourth Grade powerhouse!


    Sand King immediately started struggling with all he had.


    His pincers started to crush down on the ice giant¡¯s arms, causing the giant¡¯s bones to creak and splinter. The stinger in the giant¡¯s chest started to move around wildly, making a mess of his chest cavity.


    Unfortunately, it wasn¡¯t so easy to escape thest desperate attack of the ice giant. The ice giant leader had clearly made up his mind to fight to the very end. Even as injured as he was, he would rather die than stop his attack.


    An ordinary party would have attempted to save Sand King, if only to ensure he could continue fighting as their meat shield. However, this party wasposed entirely of wanderers and individuals of the evil alignment. No one would be willing to risk danger just to save a teammate.


    However, there were always exceptions!


    Just as the ice giant¡¯s ice power peaked, a dark, towering figure gleaming with a metallic sheen emerged from the giant¡¯s shadow. The sharp metal des in its hands stabbed the giant through its head. Shadow power surged forward, instantly crushing his brain and consciousness.


    The ice power finally went berserk at the peak of its might!


    The ice power should have been controlled by the ice giant. Instead of stingpletely towards Sand King, it erupted as a halo of ice in every direction.


    The world seemed to lose all its color where the ice power passed. Every substance lost its original color as it was sealed under a solidyer of ice.


    A short momentter, the ice exploded, causing everything frozen in the ice to shatter in tiny, white shards. No creature could possibly have survived such conditions.


    However, there were always exceptions!


    Two ferocious figures broke free of the ice, shrugging off pieces of ice as they charged out of the explosion.


    Sand King¡¯s once golden body was now covered in frost. He shook his body furiously as he ran away, casting down shards of ice to the ground.


    Once the frost was all gone, Sand King appeared untouched, as if he had not been injured at all.


    However, everyone in the party could clearly sense that Sand King¡¯s violent, earth-yellow origin powers were now stained with a white trace.


    He had been affected, after all!


    However, everyone¡¯s gaze lingered on Sand King for only a brief moment. Their attention then shifted to the metal golem.


    A Fourth Grade golem.


    Everyone¡¯s gaze turned cold.


    Greem chuckled and exined, ¡°I am a spellcaster. Meleebat is not my proficiency. It¡¯s very logical to bring a metal golem at my side!¡±


    Having said that, Greem epted a red crystal and a drop of blood that Shadow Demon passed to him. He weighed it in his hand and smiled as he said, ¡°Sand King, since I helped you out so much, you won¡¯t mind if I take some of the materials, do you?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t mind at all; in fact, I have to thank you for helping me there. Otherwise, I would have been badly injured!¡± Sand King shook his massive body and nced at Greem with his green eyes.


    The metal golem shook its body and cast off the thick shell of ice on its back. It then turned into shadow once again and slowly merged with Greem¡¯s shadow.


    Its assimtion with Greem¡¯s shadow had been wless, so much so that the other party members did not even detect its presence. However, that undispeble surge of ice power had stained Shadow Demon¡¯s shadow powers, making it possible to sense its existence now.


    The other party members put on a forced smile, but in truth, they were more cautious around Greem now.


    In particr, the other spellcasters were shocked. Even their movements became unnatural.


    What were spellcasters most afraid of? Of course, it was those stealthy assassins!


    It was only natural that they would put up their guards now that they knew Greem had brought with him such a stealthy and powerful golem.


    It was fortunate that Shadow Demon had been contaminated with a trace of ice powers, allowing them to track its movements. However, none of them would dare to let a Fourth Grade shadow golem move freely around them.


    After taking out all the ice giants, the party stopped to harvest their corpses for materials. High-grade bloodline materials like these were hard toe by. To let them slip by would be a disgrace to the name of the ancient ice giants.


    Everyone worked on harvesting the corpses.


    Soon, the ice giant corpses were all split up between the party.


    Giants might be powerful, intelligent beings in the eyes of mortals, but they were only moving materials and resources in the eyes of these evil beings.


    The party made it across the ice giants¡¯ territory, crossing several kilometers of ice, before arriving at that giant ice cliff that reached into the clouds.


    Everyone exchanged looks when they saw this sheer, icy cliff. They then took to the sky and slowly flew upwards against the wall of ice.


    The closer they got to the peak, the more they could sense the destion and chill surrounding that space. The group could not sense any signs of life here. The only thing they could feel was that subtle fear from the depths of their soul.


    The Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter; there was no doubt it was here!


    However, its aura had been concealed by a more powerful soul flux.


    Everyone cautiously passed through the cloudyer at the middle of the ice cliff. They then flew for another half an hour before reaching the peak.


    This ce was a broad tform, several square kilometers in size. A majestic pce of ice stood at the very center.


    The entire pce was not built with a single piece of wood, but crystalline blocks of ice. A hundred ice pirs filled with intricate carvings and mysterious patterns supported the pce.


    A strange dragon crouched on a tall tform at the back of the pce. When it sensed the arrival of unfamiliar auras, it lifted its headzily and evaluated its uninvited guests.


    Ice dragon.


    So this was the so-called ice dragon!

 Chapter 1263 - Skeletal Ice Dragon Nax

    Chapter 1263 Skeletal Ice Dragon Nax


    This dragon was unusual!


    Even though it had the body and appearance of a skeletal dragon, its insides were very different. The gaps between the bones, its chest cavity, and the tiny holes in its bare, leather wings were filled with blue, bone-chilling ice energy.


    Crystalline frost covered the surface of the bones. Strangely enough, it did not seem to affect the dragon, as if the ice did not exist at all.


    The ferocity of the dragon,bined with the unstoppable seeping force of ice, gave rise to this horrifying monstrosity!


    ¡°Why is it an undead dragon?¡± Greem frowned. ¡°I¡¯m certain ice dragons are also creatures of flesh and blood. Where is its flesh?¡±


    Greem might now have seen any Fourth Grade ice dragons back in Lance, but he had killed several First and Second Grade ice dragons. All of those ice dragons, without exception, were living creatures. None of them were undead!


    ¡°This is just evidence that the Ancient Reliquary is in its possession.¡± Kanganas¡¯ crimson soulfire cut through the distance andnded on the ice dragon crouching within the pce. He exined in a cold voice, ¡°It might have once been a dragon with blood and flesh, but after such a long time exposed to the Ancient Reliquary, its flesh must have been corroded away. Don¡¯t forget, the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter contains thews of death and ice.¡±


    Greem instantly understood the situation after hearing the lich¡¯s exnation.


    As expected, there were always two sides to a coin!


    This ice dragon coveted the icews in the Ancient Reliquary. However, if it absorbed the powers within the Reliquary, its flesh would unavoidably be destroyed by the deathws within. Those were high-grade deathws! The corroded tissue could not possibly regenerate through sheer physical powers.


    The powers of death had thoroughly modified this ice dragon. It was a skeletal ice dragon with thew powers of both ice and death.


    It was now an undead dragon from head to toe!


    ¡°Insignificant, greedy invaders. I smell the howls of resentful wraiths on you¨C souls of my subordinates, of the residents of my kingdom of ice. Your actions will be punished by Fate! I will seal you in ice and ce you in front of the pce entrance to warn all whoe after.¡±


    The skeletal ice dragon raised its upper body, and its blue leather wings red open. Strange runes glowing with bright light and a dense cloud of ice energy surrounded its body. From a distance, the dragon looked like an intricate sculpture of ice.


    ¡°Hmph! Big words for a mere dragon!¡± Kanganas couldn¡¯t help but mock the dragon, ¡°If I¡¯m not wrong, you must be trying to merge the Ancient Reliquary with your soul, aren¡¯t you?¡±


    ¡°You bastards! I knew it! You are here for the Reliquary,¡± The skeletal dragon roared as clouds of frost surged out of its mouth, causing the temperature in the pce to fall by a hundred degrees or so.


    ¡°The Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter contains deathws and icews. You are trying to assimte the Reliquary with your soul to advance to Fifth Grade. You underestimated its power and overestimated yourself. You were even willing to turn yourself into an undead just to make the assimtion seed. Kehkehkehe. Quite decisive, I see!¡± The lich coldly continued, ¡°Now that we¡¯re here, best recognize your situation. Hand it over! Or else...¡±


    Perhaps infuriated by the lich¡¯s words, the dragon roared and crouched down. It charged towards the party with thundering steps.


    ¡°Sand King, Medusa, stop it!¡± Kanganas¡¯ sharp voice rang out in the hall. Meanwhile, he took a few steps back and quickly started chanting the spell to open a rift to his undead dimension.


    ¡°Dammit! This beast is too big!¡± Sand King shouted furiously. ¡°I can only stop it for around twelve seconds. You guys had better pick up the ck after that!¡±


    Having said that, Sand King shook his body as he instantly extracted arge amount of sand and dirt from beneath the ice. The sand merged into his body. His insectoid body had only been five meters long, but it instantly started swelling. In the blink of an eye, he had turned into a scorpion about twelve meters long. Sand King immediately charged at the skeletal ice dragon.


    The dragon¡¯s tail alone was thirty-five meters long. It was several timesrger than Sand King.


    The collision of the two titans was like the crash of aet against a. A violent storm instantly appeared at the center of the pce. Several of the closest ice pirs were blown to ice shard fragments by the rippling shockwave and sted into the distance.


    Sshina, who was lighter in weight, was blown back by the winds. She had to curl her tail around a pir to stabilize herself.


    Meanwhile, Ts the Starspirit reacted unusually. Three strange shields glowing with a dark light appeared around him before he crouched against the ice. Several strange runes flew out of his body.


    These runes seemed to possess iprehensible and weird powers. They flew towards the sh of blue in the center of the storm.


    Greem was also casting his spells quickly. As his voice started to rise in pitch, a massive door forged entirely out of mes appeared and opened wide.


    The next moment, a tide of fire creatures rushed forward and charged towards the ice dragon at Greem¡¯smand.


    ¡°Alright...my turn!¡± At almost the same instant, Kanganas managed to open his undead dimension.


    A skeletal door appeared out of thin air. As it opened, an elite army of undead marched out from within in an orderly fashion.


    At the very front of the army was a horde of two hundred fearsome ghouls.


    These creatures had no skin¨C only slime above their exposed muscle fibers. They crouched over the ground like hounds, white bone spikes growing out of their spines.


    Their primary weapons were their sharp, wed limbs, as well as their vicious teeth and extendable tongues.


    A dozen lesser liches stood behind the ghouls, dressed in gray robes and holding bone staves in their hands. They were natural undead spellcasters, capable of casting most death magic and several fearsome soul curses.


    nking the formation of lesser liches was thirty undead knights.


    There were all sorts of undead knights amongst them, from the weakest skeletal knights (First Grade) to the most powerful Scourge Knights.


    However, even they weren¡¯t the most potent forces in Kanganas¡¯ undead army.


    As the elite undead continued to swarm forward, the sound of rattling bones could be heard. A gigantic bone dragon, measuring fifteen meters in length, appeared in the pce.


    ¡°Army of the dead, dispose of this fool for me!¡±


    Lich Kanganas waved his staff, and all the undead lifted their heads and let out a battlecry. They stormed towards the dragon from its nk.


    Fire creatures, undead creatures, void runes.


    The three spellcasters unleashed their powers, instantly summoning a terrifying army that charged towards the fight from every direction.


    Meanwhile, Sand King was beginning to falter!


    The gigantified body he created using his innate powers was not an actual physical body, after all. Sand King still had to endure the difference in Strength caused by the massive size difference with every sh against the skeletal ice dragon.


    The dragon¡¯s body had been forged harder than steel by the powers of ice. Apart from a few kes of frost and ice falling off its body during the fight, it did not seem to be injured. Meanwhile, Sand King was already covered in injuries. Cracks could be seen everywhere on his carapace, and his insectoid blood was frozen into ice before it could even hit the ground.


    Sshina moved around the battle with her agile body, asionally scaling the ice pirs and attacking the ice dragon with her vicious snake arrows.


    Sshina had six arms. Tow of them shed the ice crystals aimed at her to pieces, while another two pulled the bow and shot out strange snake arrows.


    These snake arrows came from her hair of snakes.


    Every time a snake arrows hit an enemy¨Cin addition to the impact of the arrow itself¨Cthe arrows would instantly turn into vicious poison snakes that coiled around the opponent.


    It was Sshina¡¯s most powerful long-range attack!


    However, her attacks were virtually ineffective against Skeletal Ice Dragon Nax. Those snake arrows couldn¡¯t even prate the thickyer of ice on Nax¡¯s bones. After turning into snakes, the arrows would freeze into little sculptures before they could do anything.


    The difference in their sizes also made Sshina fearful of approaching the dragon.


    If she were hit directly by the dragon¡¯s extreme ice powers, she would not be able toe out unscathed. She did not have Sand King¡¯s tough carapace or his ferocious Strength to break free of the ice.


    In all honesty, it was simply too difficult fighting against this skeletal ice dragon!


    Sand King¡¯s every movement was reduced to a crawl while he was within the radius of Nax¡¯s frost halo. His insectoid limbs would be frozen to the ground if he stopped for even the briefest of moments. He had to rely on his overwhelming Strength to crush the ice before he could move again.


    After holding on for thirteen painful seconds, Sand King had no choice but to retreat from the battlefield. The moment he stepped away, therge horde of fire creatures, undead, and void runes immediately surrounded the dragon.


    The skeletal ice dragon, Nax, roared in anger when it saw enemies swarming in from every direction. It opened its maw and let out a giant breath of frost.


    Every single creature in the charge, undead or fire creature, was instantly encased in a thickyer of translucent ice. As the frost dissipated, the ice crystals shattered, and every creature sealed within broke into pieces.

 Chapter 1264 - The Forest of Ice Clusters and the Mist of Ice

    <h4>Chapter 1264 The Forest of Ice Clusters and the Mist of Ice</h4>


    Frost Breath!


    Iparably pure and powerful.


    The breath attack contained no other elementium or physical effect apart from the extreme, bone-chilling cold!


    That was enough to deal with mortal enemies!


    A Frost Breath was no more than a single-attribute elementium attack, after all¨C Greem had seen plenty of simr attacks. It didn¡¯t matter if it was an all-out attack from a Second Grade ice dragon or a Fourth Grade ice giant¡¯s desperate retaliation. The effects of a breath attack might differ, but the attack¡¯s power would always remain within the limits of the narws.


    However, this Frost Breath...was clearly beyond the limits of Fourth Grade. It was approaching the power of the gods.


    Indeed, the power of the gods!


    Gods were higher beings with terrifying powers beyond what was possible for mortals. They were individuals that had transcended the limitations of the narws. Divine spells driven by divine power were naturally tens, even hundreds, of times more potent than ordinary magic!


    While Nax¡¯s Frost Breath didn¡¯t cover an exceptionally wide area, it was incredibly powerful. It contained traces of thews of ice that an ordinary person couldn¡¯t hope to survive.


    It didn¡¯t matter if you were a colossal giant, a lightning-fast assassin, or a spellcaster protected underyers of magical defenses. As long as some form ofw power did not protect you, you would not be able to resist the icews¡¯ corrosion and destruction.


    The low-grade fire creatures and ghouls were encased in ice before they could struggle in any manner. The ice then shattered, and the creatures along with it.


    The entire ground was littered with pale, frost-covered corpses. There were no bloodstains or cries of agony, only a lingering aura of cold.


    The more powerful undead knights and fire creatures were able to struggle for a while in the ice. However, they did not have the ability to resist the icews; they also splintered into tiny shards as the ice broke apart.


    The undead knights had not actually died, despite having splintered into countless pieces. They were still struggling and trying to break free of the frost to put their bodies back together. Meanwhile, as the fire creatures shattered, their zing bodies vanished, leaving only smoldering fire cores on the ground.


    These fire cores were still burning under the frost, trying to melt the ice with their mes¡¯ heat, such that the fire creatures could regenerate their bodies.


    A mighty armyprising two thousand fire creatures and elite undead crumbled under a single Frost Breath and vanished without a trace.


    At a single nce, there were less than ten creatures who were still alive and with intact bodies. It was an absolute massacre!


    However, Skeletal Ice Dragon Nax seemed to have been affected by the use of its breath. The frost that covered its skeletal body was slightly thinner now. It seemed like such arge-scale attack proved to be a tremendous burden on it as well.


    On the edge of the battlefield.


    Several explosions rang out.


    Ice erupted, and cold air seeped outward.


    Greem, Kanganas, and Ts broke free of their ice encasements and appeared in the pce once more. Sand King had already burrowed underground, avoiding the terrifying attack altogether. Meanwhile, Medusa Sshina had been frozen solid on an ice pir by the Frost Breath. She could not move a single inch and remained still, like a sculpture of ice.


    She did not have Sand King¡¯s overwhelming Strength that could allow her to break free of the ice with sheer physical force. However, a burst of light shed, and the frost on Sshina¡¯s body was cast off to the ground as gray dust.


    Sshina opened her mouth slightly and spat out blood after freeing herself. She nced furiously at the skeletal dragon through the mist of ice before flickering out of sight.


    Greem did not send Shadow Demon out to attack the ice dragon on such a chaotic battlefield. Instead, he kept Shadow Demon close by his side to protect him.


    Skeletal Ice Dragon Nax had clearly managed to assimte the Ancient Reliquary to some extent. The fearsome power he possessed was no longerparable to that of a Fourth Grade creature. Standing out too much while fighting an opponent as powerful as this would risk drawing attacks towards himself.


    That was something that Greem absolutely hoped to avoid!


    That said, it was a good idea to demonstrate some degree of effort and contribution to the party.


    Greem waved his staff, and a hundred fireballs formed in an instant. They howled and crashed towards the skeletal dragon within the mist.


    Themotion and ferocity of the attack were so great that everyone¡¯s attention uncontrobly turned towards it.


    The skeletal dragon, who had just unleashed its breath and was surveying the room for any surviving enemies, instantly saw the fireballs. Two bright, chilling beams shot out of the mist andnded on Greem.


    The next second, the mist burst apart.


    Nax charged forward with its mighty body, opened its maw, and snapped at Greem.


    One was a giant, thirty-meter-long, twelve-meter-tall, and fifty-ton skeletal ice dragon.


    The other was a mere human, two meters tall, and no more than a hundred kilograms in weight.


    If these two individuals collided, the only possible result was the human¡¯s absolute defeat, crushed into the ground and turned into paste!


    Greem wasn¡¯t so foolish as to sh with such a gigantic creature head-on. He leaped away with Fire Teleportation and appeared in a different corner of the pce, a thousand meters away.


    The moment he appeared, he waved his staff and summoned a massive Scarlet Firestorm at the dragon¡¯s location.


    The skeletal ice dragon was simply too huge. Naturally, its size made it less agile.


    It had just turned around and locked onto Greem¡¯s new position when the Firestorm erupted, with it at the very center.


    A thick pir of fire rose to the ceiling, its zing mes engulfing everything within three hundred meters. The extreme heat and mes ignited everything in their radius. Even the air and the ice crystals began burning.


    As a top-ss fire adept, Greem could freely imbue every single one of his fire spells with the corresponding firews. Of course, to injure a giant monster like Nax, Fire Pration was necessary for each and every attack!


    Without thews of fire, the most ferocious of mes could not injure Nax, even if they were to burn the dragon for several months.


    Only mes imbued withw power could prate the ice mist surrounding Nax and slowly inflict fire damage on its skeletal body.


    Of course, the damage being inflicted was minimal.


    However, Greem wasn¡¯t Nax¡¯s only enemy.


    While the skeletal ice dragon was furiously chasing after Greem, arge cloud of death energy and several unusual void runesnded on its body.


    Where the death energy spread, the ice crystals melted and the cold dissipated.


    The bones engulfed by the death energy instantly turned pale white. The dragon¡¯s bone spikes and ice forcefield started to sizzle and turn ck.


    The void runes were even more mysterious. Theypletely ignored the skeletal dragon¡¯s defenses and drifted into its bones, causing the ice energy in its body to turn vtile.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the terrifying ice forcefield in Nax¡¯s body, and his powerful Spirit that neutralized part of the void damage, Ts might have been able to scatter the ice energy in the dragon¡¯s body into terrifying chaos energy.


    Chaos energy was a vicious poison for any nar creature!


    The poison of energy!


    Nax reared its neck and let out a loud roar. A hint of pain could be heard in its cry.


    Four hundred years. It had been four hundred years since thest time it had felt pain.


    A group of bastards had broken into its ce, injured its noble body, and were plotting to steal its most precious treasure.


    Nax could no longer suppress its anger at the thought of that. It wanted to use its merciless dragon breath to turn its enemies into ice sculptures and personally crush them to pieces with its body.


    Nax roared furiously. Blue light gleamed in its eyes as powerful ice energy immediately filled the entire pce.


    Once as hard as steel and smooth as a mirror, the floor of the pce began to shake violently and undte as if a wave was passing through the ground.


    Ice spikes pierced out of the floor, instantly turning the hall into a sea of ice clusters.


    The towering clumps of ice took up most of the pce¡¯s space and obscured everyone¡¯s vision. The countless reflections from the ice surfaces disoriented the invaders, making it difficult for them to determine the skeletal dragon¡¯s genuine position.


    The mist of ice that filled the hall also had the effect of weakening and refracting Spiritual senses. It effectively suppressed the senses of the invaders.


    This ce was Nax¡¯s home field, after all.


    It couldn¡¯t be any more familiar with every inch of space in this pce. It knew every curve and every corner down to the veryst detail. When everyone¡¯s senses were obscured, the invaders would lose their numerical and strategic advantage as a team, while Nax would be able to hunt them down freely.


    Sshina, who was the weakest of them all, was instantly on edge. Her hissing snake-hair flicked their forked tongues, helping her watch over every possible direction from which the enemy could approach.


    She concealed her own aura and silently slithered across the ceiling.


    The forest of ice clusters beneath her was shrouded in mist. Tens of thousands of silhouettes moved between the ice crystals. It was impossible to tell which were real and which were only reflections, and even more impossible to tell where everyone¡¯s actual position was.


    Starspirit Ts¡¯ body transformed into a cloud glowing with an unusual, dark light. He slowly merged with the ice mist and vanished without a trace.


    Greemughed at the sight of this. Fire zed around him as he vanished from sight, protected by thew of Invisible mes.


    In the blink of an eye, Kanganas became the only person left in the room!

 Chapter 1265 - Encircled Dragon

    <h4>Chapter 1265 Encircled Dragon</h4>


    <i>God bloody dammit!</i>


    If it weren¡¯t for the thousands of years of destion and cold wearing away all of Kanganas¡¯ emotions and feelings, he would be furiously cursing at these teammates of his.


    Dammit! He was a caster!


    If everyone was hiding, was he supposed to be the one to face that unreasonable dragon!?


    Kanganas hadn¡¯t finished insulting his teammates in his mind when his soulfire trembled abruptly.


    <i>Dammit! That skeletal dragon¡¯s here.</i>


    His surroundings were still shrouded in mist and covered in ice crystals.


    Even as ¡®slender¡¯ as he was, Kanganas would have trouble traveling through all the ice clusters.


    The forest of ice clusters was still as silent as before. The mist drifted quietly. Kanganas could not sense any change around him.


    However, even though he could not see the skeletal dragon¡¯s body or hear its footsteps, he could feel the dragon¡¯s unusual aura of cold thicken. It was so cold that even his soulfire shrank and shivered.


    Kanganas raised the short white bone staff in his hand without any hesitation. A cloud of death energy engulfed everything within a hundred meters, causing all substances within the radius to sizzle loudly.


    In particr, the ice crystals started to rot and turn ck before crumbling into dust. Even the ice mist had lightened up, faintly revealing what was around him.


    A hulking creature glowing with blue light suddenly appeared from the mist, roaring and charging at Kanganas.


    Kanganas waved his staff over and over. Several massive figures appeared, standing in the way of the skeletal dragon¡¯s charge.


    The first was a beginner Fourth Grade bone dragon, apanied by two beginner Fourth Grade Scourge Knights and an intermediate Fourth Grade greater lich.


    They could all feel the skeletal dragon¡¯s overwhelming aura of might, along with its devastating ferocity. If Kanganas had not forcefullymanded the bone dragon to intercept the skeletal dragon, it would never have done such a foolish thing.


    Unfortunately, as the soul-bound servant of a lich, sacrificing its own body to defeat the enemy was the only option that the bone dragon had.


    A deafening sound rang out as the two skeletal dragons of imbnced sizes collided with each other.


    A force shockwave rippled outwards. All creatures significantly smaller than the dragons were uncontrobly lifted off their feet and blown away from the battlefield.


    The next second, shattered bits of dragon bone and dust-like shards of ice howled as they flew outwards. An odd crackling sound could be heard as the ice pirs nearby were hit and pierced by the shrapnel from the impact.


    Both Kanganas and his subordinate greater lich were also blown away. Only the bone dragon and the two Scourge Knights were able to remain on the battlefield.


    Massive shards of blue ice and ice dust settled to the ground and covered everyone beneath it.


    The violent force from the collision had shredded the surrounding space to pieces. Any Spirit that extended into the battlefield was torn apart, preventing anyone from seeing the sh¡¯s result.


    A bone dragon and two Scourge Knights against the skeletal ice dragon Nax. Even though both parties were Fourth Grade, the massive difference in power could not be made up for with mere numbers.


    A short momentter, the battlefield abruptly fell silent.


    A massive dragon skull was hurled out of the mist, sliding a hundred meters across the cracked ice floor beforeing to a pause. The eye sockets of the bone dragon were empty. Its soulfire had extinguished. It was thoroughly dead.


    Meanwhile, the two Scourge Knights were still lost in the mist of ice and had not appeared yet. Considering the gulf in power, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine their fates!


    Kanganas, who had drifted a thousand meters away, started shouting impatiently, ¡°Sand King, I know you¡¯ve recovered. Help me stop this creature immediately, at this very instant, or our deal is off.¡±


    It was only natural that Kanganas was so flustered. The Fourth Grade bone dragon might not be the strongest subordinate, but it was certainly one of his best and most elite servants.


    Now, it had sacrificed itself on the battlefield to absolutely no effect, along with two Scourge Knights. Even though he had lived for a thousand years, Kanganas felt the pain of this loss to his very core!


    These Fourth Grade undead servants were notmon creatures that could be summoned en masse from the Skeletal ne. In fact, many elite Fourth Grade servants were personally created by liches with their exceptional necromancy and alchemical abilities. This process often consumed extremely expensive materials and gems.


    Losing even a single one of these servants would make Kanganas upset for days. The fact that he had lost three of them at once felt like a dagger in his heart.


    However, no number of servants, no matter how expensive, couldpare to his own life!


    When it came to a moment of life and death, Kanganas would have no hesitation in abandoning them.


    Perhaps sensing the lich¡¯s ¡®fury,¡¯ Sand King emerged from the ground and once again stood in front of Kanganas.


    Kanganas was finally relieved now that apanion shielded him. Hended on the ground and started chanting rapidly with the aid of the Fourth Grade greater lich. They were preparing a powerful death spell.


    Energy rippled in the ice mist, and the roars of a dragon could be heard. It seemed like Nax was engaged in battle with the Medusa Sshina.


    It was a terrible and brutal fight!


    The next second, fire shed inside the mist. mes zed as Greem quickly teleported forward and threw a vicious Fire Core Explosion into Nax¡¯s chest cavity.


    A hell of ice and fire.


    Ice magic was a branch of water magic, to begin with. That branch of magic had always had an adversarial rtionship with fire magic. That was why even Nax could feel that soul-prating agony when the mes roasted its bones.


    Nax let out another cry that tore the clouds apart. The next second, clouds of blue mist chased after a humanoid me, carving out an empty path in the pce full of ice clusters.


    As the fires burned and the ice resisted, a massive void array appeared on the ground where the mist was the densest. Endless void energy gathered in the air, covering Nax¡¯s mighty body with ayer of light.


    The next second, the void energy erupted!


    A portion of the ice energy in Nax¡¯s body was disrupted and reduced to chaos energy, causing it to lose control over part of its body instantly.


    ¡°Bastards...you damned bastards......I will......¡± The skeletal ice dragon cried out furiously but was quickly interrupted by another series of violent attacks.


    The entire pce turned into a ughterhouse as attacks rained down on Nax. Large amounts of ice energy spilled out of Nax¡¯s body, contaminating the nearby space and causing it to be incredibly chaotic.


    While his teammates upied the skeletal dragon, Kanganas and his Fourth Grade lich subordinate managed to cast their spell. A Rain of Gloom began to fall from the sky onto the pce itself.


    The already downcast skies turned utterly dark.


    ck clouds rose from the ground and soon covered the entire sky.


    The light was so dim that it was almost impossible to discern anything. Pungent rainwater descended from the skies. The stench was nausea-inducing, but what was even more terrifying were the red sshes that appeared on the ground where the raindropsnded.


    It was not any ordinary rain. It was a rain of rotting blood.


    As the evil rain of blood continued to baptize the pce, the mist of ice was worn away, revealing the battlefield in its entirety. The ice clusters were also quickly melting in the rain, giving everyone more space to move and dodge.


    It had only been five minutes, but Sshina was already badly injured from the fighting. She had no choice but to grit her teeth and bow out of the battle.


    Her once pretty body was now covered in bruises as well as blue marks left behind by the invading ice energy. Much of her flesh had sumbed to the ice energy and had shattered to shards of ice, leaving wide gaps in her body.


    It was fortunate that this ce was as cold as it was. Most of Sshina¡¯s injuries were frozen, preventing a lethal loss of blood. Otherwise, given the number of holes that had appeared in her body, the loss of blood alone would have weakened Sshina tremendously.


    Her hair of snakes had mostly been frozen dead. The frozen snakes had shattered and turned into ice shards. Her long serpentine tail had also been severed in half. Even though what remained of her tail was d in scales, it had still been inflicted with all sorts of cuts and gashes by the des of ice and snow.


    Sshina slithered along the ground with her crippled tail. Every inch of movement made Sshina grit her teeth in pain.


    Meanwhile, Sand King, who was enduring all the pressure from Nax alone, was also in a terrible state.


    His thick carapace was cracked everywhere. Every time he shed with the skeletal dragon, ck insectoid blood spilled onto the ground through these cracks, staining the ice floor beneath them.


    One of Sand King¡¯s pincers had also been bitten off, while his proud stinger had been snapped in half; the broken part barely hung onto his body by some pieces of tissue and scale.


    In contrast, Greem and Ts, who were spellcasters, were in a much better situation.


    They were constantly moving around on the edge of the battlefield.


    When they found the opportunity, they would teleport forward and unleash a devastating round of attacks. When the dragon seemed to turn its attention towards them, they would run away without hesitation. As for the honor and dignity of a Fourth Grade powerhouse...that stuff was best left to the ¡®warriors¡¯!


    A Rain of Gloom from above, a rotting ground below, and several Fourth Grade attacks surrounding it. The battle might be in a violent stalemate, but the overall situation was obviously in the invaders¡¯ favor.


    Thebination of five powerful evil individuals. Even as mighty as Skeletal Ice Dragon Nax was, it was difficult to endure such terrible pressure from every side.


    The battle was slowly starting to tilt in the invader¡¯s favor!

 Chapter 1266 - To Each Their Own

    <h4>Chapter 1266 To Each Their Own</h4>


    Ice Dragon Nax was very mighty indeed.


    However, its power was still insufficient to deal with a party of five powerful Fourth Grades.


    The main reason the battle seemed so ¡®intense¡¯ was simply because the members of the party were all holding back. They were cautious around each other and could not cooperate to the fullest extent.


    In all honesty, in individual power alone, Kanganas, Ts, and Greem were just as powerful as the skeletal ice dragon.


    However, this was only a ¡®fun¡¯ little hunting game for them. It would be nice to return victorious and with loot in their possession, but they could simply escape and return another day if they lost. That was why they consciously avoided all the opportunities to inflict grievous injuries upon the dragon that required them to be injured in some capacity.


    It was a party of strangers put together on a whim, after all. They even had to endure suppression from the nar consciousness of the Chillfrost world as they fought. No one would be willing to risk their lives in this battle. That was why this fight had dragged out for so long.


    However, the party¡¯s members were still powerful, after all. It didn¡¯t matter how the dragon struggled or fought with its life on the line. It could not escape its fate of defeat!


    However, what made Greem the most curious was the fact that Nax showed no signs of leaving its pce, regardless of how intense the fighting had be or how injured it was. The dragon remained rooted in the pce as it fought against the members of the party.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be suspicious of its behavior.


    ¡°Sand King, you don¡¯t have to keep fighting the dragon anymore. Dig your way to the heart of this ce, and see if there¡¯s anything strange there.¡± Greem teleported around repeatedly, avoiding the dragon¡¯s tackle and tail strikes as he shouted, ¡°I suspect the Ancient Reliquary isn¡¯t with the dragon, but......¡±


    Greem wasn¡¯tmunicating with mental messages. He was shouting these words.


    Upon hearing this, the members of the party paused for an instant. Even the skeletal dragon was stunned. The soulfire burning in his eye sockets jumped slightly.


    So there was something wrong with it.


    The members of the party immediately understood the situation when they saw the dragon¡¯s reaction.


    No wonder the pce had such an unusually cold aura. This aura wasn¡¯t the dragon¡¯s aura, but the aura of the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter.


    The Ancient Reliquary might possess powerful icews, but it also contained dreadful deathws. In truth, the Reliquary was not a suitable origin artifact for Nax.


    However, for the sake of advancing to Fifth Grade, Nax had absorbed the icews in the Ancient Reliquary at the cost of its own body. That made its ice powers grow in power and devastation. However, the apanying deathws converted it into an undead dragon, hated and despised by all living creation.


    The intense modification to its soul had made it much more powerful, but it also bound the dragon to this location. Before Nax fullypleted its soul modification, it would not be able to take a single step away from the ice pce, much less fly freely in the skies like a proper dragon.


    As for why Nax didn¡¯t simply bring the Reliquary with it? The reason was simple!


    It couldn¡¯t endure the terrifying and powerful principle powers within the Reliquary at all.


    The evolution fromw to principle wasn¡¯t just a change of terms.


    Laws were fundamental rules that a rule abided and functioned by. They were typically a small branch of a greater principle power.


    Take the fire principles, for example. They were an exceedinglyrge andplete system of power. Meanwhile, the firews that Greem had grasped were only a small extension of this massive tree of principle powers.


    It wasn¡¯t until he gathered sufficientw powers that Greem could peer into the principles¡¯ secrets through hisw powers.


    As forpletely grasping a single principle power in its entirety...that was not something that a low-grade lifeform could possibly hope to aplish! Their bodies would not be able to endure the strain.


    Fourth Grad. These beings might be akin to ¡®gods¡¯ or ¡®demigods¡¯ in their own worlds. However, at their essence, they were no more than mortal beings. Their bodies and souls were allposed of material, nar substance.


    Since they had not broken free of the nar consciousness¡¯s limitations, they naturally could not ascend beyond the ne and execute the nar principles in ce of the nar consciousness.


    The nar consciousness controlled all the principle powers within a ne; they would never hand over their authority to an outsider. Even those who were powerful enough toe into contact with thew powers could easily invite bacsh from the nar consciousness if they crossed the line.


    As such, an ancient artifact containing two principle powers was of unimaginable significance to both Nax and Kanganas!


    That was why Nax became utterly horrified and furious when he realized that the enemy had be aware of the Reliquary¡¯s true location.


    There was no need for any sounding of horns. With a simple sentence, Greem had pushed the dragon into a corner! It had no choice but to fight to the death now.


    Kanganas also had to put in some effort now if he wanted the Reliquary. ying it safe was not an option. Should the skeletal ice dragon force hispanions back with desperate, reckless attacks, Kanganas would have trouble dealing with the dragon¡¯s ferocious attacks and frost breaths alone.


    Thus, the battle instantly began to reach a crescendo!


    The dragon no longer cared about the devastation of the Reliquary¡¯s power to himself. He started to draw recklessly from the principle powers within the Reliquary of Deep Winter. It converted that energy into an all-engulfing blizzard that devoured every inch of space in the pce.


    The battle had finally begun now!


    The party could no longer pool their powers in such a harsh environment. They could only fight on their own and await the moment when the Reliquary¡¯s bacsh struck the dragon.


    Either the dragon would cripple and kill them with this burst of power, or they survived until the dragon ran out of power and was consumed by the Reliquary¡¯s bacsh. It was a contest of their stamina and true power.


    No one could see or sense anything in the ice pce now!


    Everyone¡¯s spiritual senses had been suppressed to the limit by this chilling power. Even with their Spirits as Fourth Grades, their spiritual appendages could not extend beyond fifty meters away from them.


    Such narrow ¡®vision¡¯ pushed them to a precipice in this dangerous battle. A single mistake, and their bodies could be shredded to pieces and their souls torn to bits.


    However, even as dangerous as it was, no party member chose to flee from the pce. It was simple; they didn¡¯t want to lose their chance to obtain the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter!


    Even though the Ancient Reliquary might not bepatible with their soul origin, and even though they had already promised Kanganas that they would help him obtain the dual-attribute artifact, when the opportunity presented itself in front of them, everyone could have a chance to obtain the Reliquary in a chaotic skirmish.


    Truly, who would give up on an opportunity to obtain an artifact?


    At least Greem wasn¡¯t one who would give up on such an opportunity!


    At this point, it was everyone for themselves. No one could care less about the others.


    Greem held the Tome of Corruption in his left hand and the fire coral staff in his right. His entire body was shrouded in the crimson Burning Domain. Shadow Demon flickered in an out of sight beneath him, constantly on the watch for danger.


    Greem walked forward without any hesitation, his skin-tight leather armor making him appear taller than usual. He pursed his lips and looked around him with cold eyes. The skin on his smooth forehead split apart as a strange, diamond-shaped crystal appeared.


    Greem¡¯s Spirit became incredibly concentrated as it was fed through the focusing crystal. Tremendous fire energy surged out of the Orb of the Fire God and his Heart of Principles, gathering around him, zing and eager. The moment he sensed the enemy¡¯s aura, Greem would be able to unleash a devastating and unforgettable attack on them!


    As for injuring his party members...hehehe, at this point, there probably wasn¡¯t such a thing as a party member anymore!


    Anyone that dared to approach him was someone with bad intentions. Greem would not hesitate to strike.


    A violent shockwave rippled out from about three hundred and seventy-five meters to Greem¡¯s left. He could feel the energy aura of the dragon and Sand King through the shockwaves.


    Sand King¡¯s muffled grunt of pain could be heard through the mist and snow. Judging by the power erupting from the conflict, Sand King had been badly injured. He would probably be forced out of thispetition for the Reliquary.


    Just as expected, a sky rending roar could be heard, and Sand King¡¯s unique aura quickly fled from the ice pce.


    Sand King was out of the equation now!


    Greem searched the pce in the mist, wondering to himself who the dragon¡¯s next target would be.


    Sshina, Ts, or himself?


    Kanganas was a lich infamous throughout the universe. He would not have earned such infamy if this was the limit of his power. It was almost certain he had concealed his real power.


    Under such circumstances, if the dragon wanted a level ying field against Kanganas alone, getting rid of the other people was the best choice.


    If that were the case, then the dragon would either choose the weakest, Sshina, or......


    Before Greem could finish his thought, the mist parted as the badly injured dragon roared and charged towards him.


    A Frost Breath was the first thing to greet him. A bright blue cloud of energy surged towards Greem. The radius was sorge and the temperature so cold that it was beyond Greem¡¯s capabilities to detect the specific numbers.


    The Chip¡¯s rms started ring in Greem¡¯s mind!

 Chapter 1267 - A Flock of Freaks

    <h4>Chapter 1267 A Flock of Freaks</h4>


    [Beep. Warning. Warning. High-energy low-temperature particle stream surging towards Host. The estimated core impact area will contain energy over 7900 degrees in intensity. Impact radius is estimated to be 216 meters. Suggest that Host conduct evasive maneuver immediately.


    [Beep. Detecting unusual icews. The effects are unknown. Suggest that Host immediately avoid the area.


    [Chaos Physique effect activated. Absorbed and converted 783 points of low-temperature energy damage.


    [Innate bloodline ability Energy ckhole activated. Transferring and neutralizing 1695 points of low-temperature energy damage.


    [Firews activated, neutralizing 3742 points of low-temperature energy damage.


    [Defensive fire forcefield activated, negating 630 points of low-temperature energy damage.


    [Elementium resistance negating 561 points of low-temperature energy damage.


    [......


    [Host will sustain 489 points of low-temperature energy damage.]


    Arge cloud of ice energy surged forward and instantly engulfed Greem in blue mist as the Chip continued to beep.


    The frost rolled forward and shed violently with Greem¡¯s fire defenses and elementium forcefield. The zing magical shields were frozen into ice shards in an instant. Even the ice floor beneath Greem¡¯s feet couldn¡¯t endure the cold. Frost rapidly appeared over the floor as the ice itself shattered.


    Even Shadow Demon, who was hiding in the shadows, was affected by the icews. Ayer of ice crystals appeared on its metal body, and it almost seemed like it would be frozen dead on the spot.


    Greem¡¯s flowing sleeves immediately turned hard as steel. The frost started to spread from the corner of his sleeves, intent on turning him into an ice sculpture.


    The towering skeletal ice dragon roared and charged over.


    Should Greem be frozen in ice, he would probably be crushed to pieces by the dragon before he could break free.


    Compared to their Dragontongue magic, dragons preferred to end their battles in the most primal, violent way possible!


    ¡°Go, Shadow Demon!¡±


    They had only just met, yet the ferocious old dragon had almost forced Greem into a corner. Thus, Greem didn¡¯t dare drop his guard. He shouted an order to Shadow Demon, all while the Tome of Corruption¡¯s pages flipped rapidly in his hand. Ugly wights filled with horrible gues were summoned, one after another.


    These wights were mostly First Grade and werepletely useless on a Fourth Grade battlefield. The moment Greem summoned them, they were instantly frozen into sculptures by a passing cold wind.


    However, when the skeletal dragon thrashed past, these sculptures erupted, releasingrge clouds of yellow poison mist, eroding Nax¡¯s blue bones and causing ck spots to appear.


    ¡°gue poison...dammit! This is gue poison! You bastard! How dare you release gue poison in my chambers! I will kill you!¡± The infuriated dragon lunged forward, its blue jaws snapping at the quickly retreating Greem.


    At this point, Greem could no longer hide his powers.


    Emerald light shed from the Tome of Corruption as Greem was surrounded by a poison halo.


    The focusing crystal on his forehead glowed as bright as a star as his Spirit violently surged into his fire coral staff. The disguised Orb of the Fire God began to glow brilliantly, emitting the prismatic radiance unique to ultra-grade items.


    The next second, all light in the room dimmed. There was only the radiance from the increasingly bright orb. The Orb of the Fire God was like the bright moon in the sky. When it appeared, all other sources of light seemed to lose their color. It was the only thing in the room burning with all its ferocity. Its temperature and brightness rose without stopping; it was...a sun.


    Indeed, the Orb of the Fire God was like a miniature sun descending upon the ground. It let off horrifying heat and light as its power continued to rise.


    Shock and horror appeared in Nax¡¯s blue soulfire as it charged forward. It could sense that the terrifying sun zing in the young adept¡¯s hands was an ultra-grade artifact not inferior to the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter.


    What was scarier was the fact that the adept seemed to be able to control the devastating fire energy within that artifact freely!


    Nax could feel this miniature sun rise before it, all while it continued to approach like a moth to the me. Nax let out a terrified roar and extended both blue wings to their limits. The dragon beat its wings with all it had and barely managed to kill its momentum.


    Nax¡¯s ws sunk deep into the ice beneath its feet, ripping twenty deep ridges into the ground.


    However, just as its rush came to a screeching halt, Greem¡¯s charging attack had reached its peak as well. Greem waved both his hands together, and a tremendously violent stream of fire energy shot out of the Orb of the Fire God. The mes turned into a one-meter-thick pir of fire that struck the skeletal ice dragon¡¯s body.


    The instant the pir of fire struck, the dragon felt like it had been thrown into a terrifying, zing cauldron. Every part of its body started burning furiously, from inside to outside.


    What was even more horrifying was the fact that this pir of fire had also ignited the surging ice energy in its body. Even the ice energy was burning now.


    Nax reared its head and let out a roar of agony. It was no longer blue ice energy that surged out of its maw, nostrils, eye sockets, and ears now¨C it was red, zing mes.


    This single attack had injured Nax¡¯s very soul origin. The dragon retreated into the mist like a whimpering puppy.


    Kanganas was rapidly approaching the tall tform in the depths of the mist. All sorts of strange undead swarmed all around him.


    Because of these undead wandering everywhere, Kanganas managed to figure out the approximate location of the tform.


    However, while he gleefully snuck towards his destination, he abruptly stopped in his tracks and turned back to look into the mist.


    There, a thousand meters away, a terrifying energy aura was rising. It was so powerful that it had managed to suppress the ice energy that was everywhere in this pce. When he felt the traces of heat that pierced through the mist and the oddly searing consciousness attached to it, Kanganas couldn¡¯t help but be nervous, even asposed and cold as he usually was.


    Even though he was quite a distance away, and the chaotic ice energy was obscuring his senses, Kanganas still managed to identify the source of this energy aura in an instant.


    Greem...it was Greem, the human adept who called himself Fireman!


    Since when did he be so powerful?


    Thest time they had fought in Morrian ne, he had over a seventy percent chance to kill Greem. It was precisely because of this certainty that Kanganas had boldly invited Greem on this mission to y the dragon.


    However, judging by the energy aura he was radiating, Kanganas probably did not have any chance of winning. The appearance of such a powerful individual in the party made Kanganas nervous. He was no longer sure if his scheme would seed now.


    However, Kanganas had no idea that even as he was shocked by Greem¡¯s eruption of power, Ts had already snuck onto the tform and was searching desperately for the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter.


    The instant Greem¡¯s energy aura erupted in the distance, Ts lifted his head from the magical runes he was analyzing. He also looked towards the distant battlefield.


    ¡°This power,¡± Ts couldn¡¯t help but brood in silence, ¡°Even if they aren¡¯t a Fifth Grade, they aren¡¯t far away now! Did that human adept use some sort of explosive magical equipment, or was this his true power? Either way, we would have to be cautious around this fellow now!¡±


    Due to his unique energy system, Ts wasn¡¯t actually afraid of these same-grade opponents of his. However, out of respect for an ultra-grade powerhouse, he had no intention of finding trouble for himself.


    Ultra-Grade powerhouses. Those were terrifying individuals, even in the eyes of the starspirits!


    Never mind. Let them fight their own fights. He had best find a way to get the Ancient Reliquary in his hands first.


    Even Ts felt excited at the thought of soon possessing an ultra-grade item.


    While the two powerful spellcasters were scheming their own ns, Sshina was cursing furiously in a corner of the ice pce.


    ¡°Bastard! Bastard! Bastard! Kanganas, where did you find this absolute monster! I thought the ice dragon was a freak, but now, it seems like the real freak had been hiding by my side all along. Bastards! This battle is way beyond my level already! I can¡¯t stay here any longer, or I will turn into a stepping stone for those bastards.¡±


    Sshina cursed angrily as she lunged at the edge of the mist as quick as lightning.


    The battle had escted severely at this point. It was no longer a fight that small fry like herself could be involved in now. If she insisted on staying here despite the situation, she would be the variable that all thepetitors would focus on getting rid of first.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Only the most powerful individuals of the party had the right to obtain a powerful treasure. At the very best, the second and third most powerful could give it a try. However, the best a small fry like herself could get were some leftovers.


    However, the fact that the inconspicuous human adept was thergest raid boss hiding in the party was beyond her expectations. Sshina became nervous at the thought of all the cold words she had directed at the human along the way. She started to curse herself for herck of foresight.


    ¡°Bastards! Bastards! All bastards! They¡¯re all so powerful, and they just want to pretend like they are the rookies. Hmph! I curse you all! May none of you leave this pce of ice!¡±


    Sshina spat and slithered out of the ice pce in the blink of an eye.

 Chapter 1268 - Hell of Ice and Fire

    <h4>Chapter 1268 Hell of Ice and Fire</h4>


    The ice pce, on top of the mysterious tform.


    Starspirit Ts was still diligently analyzing the mysterious patterns carved onto the tform. However, he had no choice but to put this task on hold when he was halfway through.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The dragon had returned!


    The brutal battle between the fire adept and the dragon that Ts had been expecting did not happen. Or rather, it was over too quickly. As a result, Ts was now stuck on the tform as the dragon returned before he could find the entrance into the hidden passage.


    Even Ts felt his heart quiver with sympathy when he saw the skeletal ice dragon emerge from the mist.


    It was in such a terrible condition!


    Ever since it forcibly converted itself from an ice dragon into a skeletal dragon, all of Nax¡¯s scales and flesh had vanished. The dragon only had its steel-like skeletal frame and those horrifying massive bone spikes on its spine.


    What filled the space between its bones and its chest cavity was bright blue ice energy. The blue ice energypletely filled up the dragon¡¯s chest and skull, even causing strange, flickering ice runes to form on the bones¡¯ surfaces.


    Ayer of translucent ice crystals covered every inch of Nax¡¯s bones. To attack Nax¡¯s body itself, you would first have to prate its forcefield and shatter thatyer of frost.


    It was only possible to injure the skeletal dragon if you were able to break through these twoyers of primary defenses!


    However, while Nax remained within this frost-filled pce, it practically had a limitless pool of power to draw upon. It could freely use the devastating power of ice energy.


    This ce was itsir and its home!


    No Fourth Grade creature could possibly defeat Nax in this pce of ice while it possessed the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter.


    However, there were always exceptions!


    The only thing that could beat an ultra-grade artifact was another ultra-grade artifact!


    Nax, who didn¡¯t dare carry the Ancient Reliquary on its person and relied only on the ice energy within, naturally lost instantly against Greem, who had two ultra-grade artifacts on him.


    Terrifying golden mes burned furiously on the dragon¡¯s body. It didn¡¯t matter how it beat at the mes or gathered ice energy; it simply couldn¡¯t extinguish the fire. Golden fire and blue frost shed wildly over the dragon¡¯s body. They thrashed and rampaged wildly against each other, almost causing all the energy in the dragon¡¯s body to go into unrest.


    This once elegant, proud, holy, and magnificent Skeletal Ice Dragon Nax was now half-engulfed in mes and half-covered in ice. The two unusualw powers fought with Nax¡¯s body as the battlefield, its life and energy as the fuel viciouslyshing at the opponent.


    Meanwhile, with every sh, they exhausted more and more of Nax¡¯s already waning life force.


    Nax was practically blinded from all the smoke and fire. It stumbled its way back to the mysterious tform.


    What the dragon needed most at the moment was the aid of the reliquary.


    Only the pure and plentiful ice energy within the reliquary could put out the stubborn mes burning on its body. However, when it approached the tform, it instantly noticed that damned starspirit trying to decipher the magical protection array.


    Nax was on the verge of madness.


    Even though Nax had been badly injured by the firews, it still possessed its mighty Strength and iparable Dragontongue magic. It would never be afraid of a cowardly ¡®thief¡¯!


    Nax opened its maw, and a strange breath of ice and fire rolled towards the blue ball of light.


    Dammit! How did the dragon return so quickly?


    Ts cursed to himself as void energy flickered in his body. Several void energy shields appeared in front of him, blocking the breath of ice and fire.


    It wouldn¡¯t have been much if the breath wasposed only of fire and ice. These shields formed out of void energy could perfectly defend against elementium particles of any attribute. However, the twow powers attached to the dragon¡¯s breath were what was most scary about the attack.


    Thews wildly destabilized the void energy as they continued to tussle between themselves.


    The void energy shields shattered into stardust with a clear crack as the dragon¡¯s breath concluded.


    The next second, Nax opened its scorched maw wide and snapped at the starspirit¡¯s mysterious and beautiful body.


    Dammit! Law powers of two attributes, and two severely conflicting ones at that.


    Ts didn¡¯t even have time to curse. His silhouette flickered as he teleported a hundred meters away, dodging the maw of the dragon.


    The moment it appeared, the skeletal dragon¡¯s equally burned tailshed through the mist down from above.


    This ce was Nax¡¯s home field, after all. No trace of energy changes or disruptions could escape its notice. As Ts didn¡¯t want to stray too far from the tform, he was immediately struck by the dragon¡¯sbo attack after teleporting away.


    Even Ts could not react in time now.


    The slender, yet thick, dragon¡¯s tail crushed several newly formed shields and whipped Ts on its cloud-like body.


    There were no sounds of cracking bones or splitting flesh. This ball of blue light was scattered by the terrible force, along with all the starry nodes within.


    The blue ball vanished instantly.


    When it once again reappeared, it was in the mist five hundred meters away.


    The cluster of stars only managed to take shape after some difficult reforming and reassembling. However, the body of the starspirit had lost over half of its star nodes. The void energy that formed the shell of the body was also thirty percent gone.


    ¡°Dammit! Dammit! This is a terrible loss!¡± Ts propped himself up with much difficulty and said resentfully, ¡°My void circuits were scattered, and I¡¯ve even lost thirty percent of my void energy. I won¡¯t be able to recover such losses without a hundred years of rest! Damned dragon. I will make you pay for this.¡±


    Ts started to mobilize his void energy as he cursed quietly.


    Soon, countless strange lights shot in every direction, and the starspirit¡¯s shining body disappeared into the mist again.


    Nax hurried onto the tform while Ts was still routed. A strange array appeared when Nax¡¯s aura came into contact with the dense blocks of runes. This arraypletely engulfed the skeletal dragon.


    The dragon¡¯s soul auramunicated with the array of runes to conduct a series of verifications and confirmations. Finally, a pir of light shone from the center of the tform. A small opening appeared on the tform¡¯s smooth surface and dense ice energy¨Cso dense it had almost turned solid¨Csurged out.


    The liquid ice energy broke down into dense mist uponing into contact with the air outside. The fog spread outwards. Nax impatiently put his jaws at the opening, greedily absorbing this liquid ice energy.


    Strangely enough, the moment the ice energy entered its body, all of the golden mes were instantly extinguished. Blue ice energy was once again the dominant force in Nax¡¯s body. Even the dragon bones that had been exposed by the shattered frost were once again covered in an armor of ice.


    However, an unusually pale streak of death energy entered its body along with the ice energy.


    The addition of this death energy instantly caused the dragon¡¯s still powerful life aura to be weaker and duller. Its lovely bones started to turn ck, then yellow, as the aura of rot unique to undead creatures crept further around Nax¡¯s soul.


    As a once proud and majestic dragon, Nax hated undead creatures with a passion!


    However, for the sake of more power, Nax had no choice but to abandon its pride and glory as a dragon and embrace its identity as an undead. For Nax, who viewed its glory as its very life, this decision was a huge blow to its soul!


    However, at this moment of life and death, Nax no longer had the luxury to hesitate.


    Nax inhaled violently, letting the ferocious ice energy and sinister death energy baptize its soul and turn it into a suitable host for the Fifth Grade Reliquary.


    If no outsiders appeared, Nax could have dragged out this process over the course of a few hundred years. In doing so, the pain that its soul would have to endure could be spread out over the countless years.


    It no longer had time. It could only risk its own life to make immediate modifications to its body!


    The risk of a failure in modification had risen exponentially in doing so.


    Nax reared its head and let out a roar of agony. Its once bright blue body covered in frost was now rotting and falling apart at a visible pace. Ice energy and death energy were intertwined together as they sprinted throughout its body. It was almost as if the dragon had been infected by ink that was rapidly spreading all over, turning his bones brittle and ck.


    Such apound modification of both the soul and the body was a tremendous impact on the soul. An ordinary person would never be able to endure it.


    Even Nax, the skeletal dragon, could only howl desperately to express the indescribable agony it was suffering!


    The mist continued to ripple.


    Two figures slowly walked towards the tform, one from the right and one from the left.


    They looked at the roaring dragon on the tform, then at each other. Their eyes were filled with unconceble greed and caution of their rival.


    ¡°I never expected how much of your power you kept hidden,¡± Kanganas was the first to speak. ¡°It seems like you have managed to make the Libram of Wisdom submit. Otherwise, there is no way you¡¯d have such tremendous power!¡±


    His crimson soulfire swept across the tome-shaped equipment in Greem¡¯s hand, his gaze filled with regret.


    If he knew the Libram of Wisdom was so powerful, he would have obtained it at all costs, even if it meant injuring himself to defeat this fire adept.


    However, it was toote to say anything now.


    The fire adept had obviously managed to subdue the Libram of Wisdom fully and turn it into his magical equipment. Obsessing over matters of the past was simply unwise.

 Chapter 1269 - Persuading the Lich

    <h4>Chapter 1269 Persuading the Lich</h4>


    ¡°I let you have the Libram of Wisdomst time. You...won¡¯t be fighting with me over the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter again, will you?¡±


    Kanganas asked with an unmoving expression.


    However, his tone was somber, even carrying with it a trace of caution.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The terrifying attack that the fire adept had unleashed earlier was too shocking. Even a creature as powerful as Nax had turned and fled, running all the way back to the tform to heal his wounds. Kanganas himself wouldn¡¯t have fared much better than Nax.


    That was why Greem¡¯s attitude would be a decisive factor before Kanganas engaged the dragon in battle. He had no choice but to take that into consideration.


    ¡°That¡¯s an ultra-grade item, one with dual-attributes. Don¡¯t you think you shouldpensate me somehow if you¡¯re making me give up on such a treasure!?¡± Greem had pulled his hood behind his head now, revealing his young and handsome face.


    Golden mes burned within his eyes, a glowing crystal on his forehead, a heavy tome in his left hand, a strange staff in his right, and a fire forcefield all around him.


    Shadow Demon lurked beside him, phasing in and out of sight. Greem was not moving a muscle, but all of these factors gave him a ferocious and powerful aura that engulfed the entire room.


    Reality always had the final say!


    True power was the ultimate bargaining chip in a negotiation.


    ¡°I can provide you with a small resource ne in exchange. The profit made from that ne is fairly impressive. I can guarantee an annual profit of two million magical crystals at the very least!¡± Kanganas grit his teeth and put forth his offer.


    ¡°A small ne...two million crystals,¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but smile, ¡°If you think that sort of ie isparable to a dual-attribute principle artifact, then how about I give you a small ne and the Reliquary goes to me?¡±


    ¡°Then three more Fourth Grade undead servants along with the ne. I can transfer the authority over their souls to you. You will instantly gain three Fourth Grade subordinates for your use!¡± Kanganas¡¯ soulfire was trembling as he made this offer.


    Fourth Grade undead servants. Those were nomon cabbages. Even Kanganas couldn¡¯t produce Fourth Grade undead at will.


    Creating a Fourth Grade undead didn¡¯t just require various high-grade materials; they also neededplete, powerful souls. Once Kanganas had managed to obtain these materials, he would have a chance of creating a Fourth Grade undead through his exceptional necromancy skills.


    The undead created through necromancy and alchemy might not be as ferocious as wild undead, but they were more loyal and dependable. The cost of making such undead meant that even a lich of Kanganas¡¯ power, despite having control over an entire skeletal ne, did not have more than ten Fourth Grade undead.


    Giving away three of them was as painful for Kanganas as cutting off his own flesh. It was pain that reached all the way to the bone marrow.


    If he didn¡¯t absolutely want to obtain the Reliquary, he would never make such a sacrifice.


    As he appreciated the sorrowful ¡®expression¡¯ on the lich¡¯s white and smooth skull, Greem finally said, ¡°Since you are so reluctant to part with your resource ne and your subordinates, I won¡¯t take them from you after all.¡±


    Upon hearing this, Kanganas was shocked, and his aura started rising in response.


    ¡°Are......you going to go back on your word to help me? ¡±


    ¡°I can consider letting you have the artifact, but on the condition that......¡±


    ¡°That? ¡±


    ¡°You serve me for a hundred years!¡±


    The crimson soulfire in the lich¡¯s eye socket zed furiously when he heard this. Even the two rubies that were embedded in his eye sockets couldn¡¯t conceal the ring ze of his soulfire.


    ¡°You are humiliating me! Human adept, even we liches have dignity! Our soul is free. We will never be someone¡¯s servant. If you want to enve a lich, you are wee to try with all you have!¡±


    It was obvious that Kanganas was very sensitive and stubborn on this matter. He looked as if he would rather die than bend the knee, prepared to fight to his death if needed.


    ¡°The service I¡¯m speaking of isn¡¯t the envement of your soul. I am simply inviting you to be a guest elder at my n. I guarantee that I will not make you do anything in these hundred years that would put your life in danger. All you have to do is register with my Crimson n as an elder, open up an undead branch in the n academy and take in a few human apprentices.


    ¡°Of course, if any problems appear with the n, you should help to the best of your abilities. Not only will I not touch any of your possessions or assets within these one hundred years, but I will also provide you with the authority and resources that an elder is entitled to. How does that sound like to you? eptable?¡±


    Kanganas looked at Greem as he smoothly offered his conditions. The lich couldn¡¯t help but be suspicious. ¡°Greem, what exactly is it that you want? I don¡¯t believe you are so kind as to help me!¡±


    Greem seemed to be prepared for the lich¡¯s suspicion. He casually replied, ¡°Kanganas, even if you obtain the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter, will you be able topletely assimte it within a hundred years?¡±


    The lich had obviously considered this question before. Kanganas replied without hesitation, ¡°Impossible! It is a Fifth Grade dual-attribute principle artifact. Even with my power, aplete assimte would take upwards of two hundred years.¡±


    ¡°That settles it, doesn¡¯t it?¡± Greem chuckled as he said, ¡°You won¡¯t be roaming around for the next two hundred years once you get the reliquary anyway. Why note over to my n and be a guest elder for the duration?


    ¡°You have so many high-grade undead under yourmand. Just send some fellow to deal with the whole academy and administrative side of things. You can find a secluded ce and do your research in the meantime. Not to mention, the resources in our World of Adepts have to be much more plentiful than that Alliance of Liches you¡¯re in! You are free to collect any resources you require through the Crimson n¡¯s channels.


    ¡°This...is all the sincerity I can offer you already!¡±


    Having said that, the mes around Greem started to grow in size. His entire body instantly transformed into a dozen-meter-tall me giant. His booming voice was like rolling thunder, echoing in the ice pce for a long time.


    It seemed like Kanganas had sensed Greem¡¯s threat and felt his sincerity. His soulfire flickered, and, finally, he nodded silently.


    ¡°Good! If that¡¯s the case, then go! I will help you get the reliquary.¡±


    Greem raised his staff without any hesitation and struck first.


    His target was not the skeletal dragon crouching over the tform, absorbing the artifact¡¯s power, nor Kanganas, who waspletely on guard, but something in the distant mists.


    The mists were driftingzily there, and the ice floor was as smooth as a mirror. There were no signs of enemies anywhere.


    However, as a pir of fire erupted, several dozen void energy shields abruptly shattered, revealing the starspirit¡¯s cloud-like body.


    ¡°I will hold the starspirit back. You have thirty minutes to take out the dragon. If you haven¡¯t seeded after thirty minutes, we will swap opponents. How¡¯s that?¡± Greem said.


    Kanganas hissed in reply when he saw the starspirit appear, ¡°Deal!¡±


    The two of them spared no more words. Both of them drew upon all their power and attacked their enemies furiously.


    ¡°Bastard,¡± Starspirit Ts shouted angrily as he scrambled and dealt with Greem¡¯s violent attacks. ¡°Fireman, what did the lich promise you? Why do you help him so? Tell me his offer; I will double whatever offer he made. All I ask is for you to stop the lich. How about that?¡±


    Greem chuckled in his giant form, ¡°He¡¯s willing to serve me for a hundred years. Are you able to do that?¡±


    ¡°What? How is that possible?¡± Ts said in shock as he dodged the fire spells, ¡°He...he agreed to those conditions? Fi...fine! I can serve you for a hundred years...¡±


    ¡°Two hundred years!¡± Kanganas¡¯ furious cry rang out from a distance.


    Obviously, part of his Spirit observed this area, even while he attacked the skeletal ice dragon.


    Two hundred years...that was not a short time, even for a Fourth Grade powerhouse! Liches might not be truly immortal or eternal, but they could still live for a few thousand years.


    Two hundred years might not be much to them. They just had to bunker down and tolerate it, and it would be over soon. However, two hundred years was a long and arduous amount of time for most other creatures!


    While Ts stuttered and wondered what to do next, Greem hesitated no longer. He pointed his staff at the opponent, and a ghostly green halo rose from the Tome of Corruption, instantly engulfing the starspirit¡¯s body.


    It was a poison halo unleashed with the aid of the Fifth Grade Tome of Corruption. Even though it wasn¡¯t at the level of poisonws, it was already a sufficiently terrifying attack against the unprepared starspirit.


    Ts¡¯ cloud-like body instantly turned into a sickly green color as the gue poison ravaged through his body. Even though the strange void energy killed most of the gue virus, the short conflict that had broken out in Ts¡¯ body was painful and damaging.


    An even more terrifying attack came next. Greem bent down, opened his mouth, and let out a breath of golden mes containing powerful firews.


    Ts was in deep trouble now!


    For the first time, Greem had amplified this breath of fire with fourw effects with the aid of the Orb: Increased Fire Range, Fire Pration, Invisible mes, and Fire¡¯s st!


    Ordinary Fourth Grade adepts might have mastered several different elementiumws, but assimting thews into their elementium attacks was very taxing on their Spirit. A typical adept could usually only draw upon a singlew power at any one time. An adept who could use two to threews simultaneously was an elite without any doubt.


    Meanwhile, someone who could use four firews all at once like Greem would be a feared ruler of their own world!


    The multiple firewspounded together formed a powerful cluster ofws that instantly affected Starspirit Ts.

 Chapter 1270 - Tulas’ Feelings

    Chapter 1270 Ts¡¯ Feelings


    Elementium was not scary! What was scary were the principles!


    For high-grade creatures, their powerful elementium resistance provided them with basic elementium immunity. Ordinary fire, frost, and wind could no longer faze them. At the very best, these elements could only cause them a little trouble.


    The only things that high-grade creatures feared werews and principles¨C the deeper applications of power that reached towards the origin of all power.


    They could never avoid thews and principles, let alone reach the level of immunity!


    Thus, when two Fourth Grade powerhouses made up their minds to battle, the first things to sh were the elementiumws in their possession.


    Fire and void energy!


    Neither was superior or inferior. They were both a part of the massive system of power in the multiverse. When the two forces shed, the primary contest was between the casters¡¯ understanding and mastery of their respectivews, as well as their ability to move the principles using thews as a lever.


    Greem possessed an overwhelming advantage in these aspects!


    The void energy that Starspirit Ts possessed was undoubtedly an exceptionally powerful and unique form of power. It was mysterious and strange, its secrets mostly unknown to outsiders. Consequently, Ts¡¯ offensive power was slightly stronger than Greem¡¯s.


    However, in a contest of forces, power wasn¡¯t the only consideration. The auxiliary forces were also a deciding factor.


    Ts might have decent high-grade equipment on him, but that equipment still fell incredibly shortpared to Greem and his two artifacts. Of the two artifacts that Greem held, the Orb of the Fire God was used for offense and the Tome of Corruption for defense. The help that these two pieces of equipment provided him in a battle ofws was tremendous.


    The moment theirw powers shed, Ts¡¯ expression changed. An ominous feeling rose in his heart.


    Fire versus void energy!


    It was the violent fire energy that possessed the absolute advantage in the sh. The mes crushed the void energy runes that Ts had unleashed, and the firews instantly affected Ts¡¯ cloud body.


    The void energy shields shattered, and the void energy runes dissipated. Thew fires ignited Ts¡¯ body and instantly started burning. Ts¡¯ void energy was not only unable to protect his consciousness core, but was even forcibly used as fuel by the surging firews. The mes started to spread and became impossible to extinguish easily.


    Meanwhile, most of Ts¡¯ desperate retaliatory attacks were dispelled by thew fires. What remained of the damage that got through was also endured by the Orb of the Fire God. Greem was barely touched under thoseyers uponyers of defenses.


    The void energy runes that managed to reach Greem and enter his body were able to convert part of his fire energy into terrifying chaos energy. However, Greem had the starbeast bloodline and was able to absorb such chaos energy.


    As such, the starspirit¡¯s retaliation wasn¡¯t even able to inflict as much damage as Greem¡¯s body was capable of healing. Some of these wounds healed in an instant the moment they appeared. They did not affect Greem¡¯sbat prowess in the slightest.


    One was powerful, and the other was weak. Both of them had used their most potent attacks, but the impact was remarkably different.


    The figures of the zing humanoid and the blue mist slowly moved into the distance as they fought. The battlefield slowly moved towards the edge of the ice pce as the mists mored with loud explosions and tremors. Even though their figures were obscured now, it was easy to imagine their battle¡¯s intensity and ferocity through themotion rippling through the mist and the loud noises involved.


    Kanganas, who remained in the center of the pce, didn¡¯t dare ck off either.


    He could tell that Ts was not Greem¡¯s opponent at all. As such, he had to finish off this already grievously injured dragon before Greem returned.


    It was obviously a tremendous challenge for him!


    The skeletal dragon was still a powerful creature, after all. No one would be able to gain an edge over it quickly.


    Time was life itself!


    Kanganas started to fight with all he had for the sake of the Ancient Reliquary.


    As his deep, low voice chanted out the magical words, an undead dimension slowly opened once more. A new army of elite undead swarmed out from the portal and charged at Nax recklessly.


    An even more ferocious and savage battle broke out instantly.


    ............


    The rest of the party members had met up outside the towering and majestic pce.


    They each took up a space for themselves, far away from each other. They stared into the continually moving ice mists, the light in their eyes flickering. No one knew what they were thinking.


    The starspirit seemed to have lost all interest in what was happening in the pce. Stars glowed in his cloud-like body as he stared coldly at Greem.


    ¡°Fireman, that¡¯s a Fifth Grade dual-attribute artifact. Are you not interested in it in the slightest?¡± It was Sand King who spoke first.


    His body was still in poor condition, his carapace covered in cracks and blue frost. However, his Spirit was mostly in good condition, and he still had over sixty percent of hisbat strength left.


    ¡°So what if it¡¯s a Fifth Grade artifact? It isn¡¯tpatible with me. Even if I take it by force, I will end up in just as miserable a condition as the dragon. I will be turned into something that is neither human nor monster. I quite like my human body. I have no intention of turning into a monster with no physical senses!¡± Greem replied casually,pletely ignoring Ts¡¯ furious gaze.


    ¡°Of course, you don¡¯t care! You already have two Fifth Grade artifacts in your possession, both of which arepatible with your innate attributes. Hmph! If you¡¯re so powerful, why don¡¯t you stop using your artifacts and have a proper fight with me again!¡± Ts was still upset at the situation.


    After the battle earlier, he thoroughly and finally understood all the aces up this adept¡¯s sleeve.


    Sand King and Sshina opened their mouths wide when they heard Ts reveal Greem¡¯s secrets. They stared at this young adept in horror.


    They had already heard stories about the World of Adepts¡¯ powerful civilization, but they didn¡¯t expect that an adept from that world could be so unbelievably powerful. Compared to the skeletal dragon in the ice pce, this fire adept was probably the true monster here!


    Sshina, who was the weakest of them here, couldn¡¯t help but show a trace of worry on her face. Her tattered snake tail slithered slightly as she subtly put some distance between her and the fire adept.


    Even Sand King started turning his greenpound eyes as he silently assessed this inconspicuous human.


    As powerful creatures from other worlds, their assessment of a creature¡¯s power was mostly based on whether that being possessed a powerful body and soul. They didn¡¯t really care too much for magical equipment or weapons.


    After all, most of their own worlds did not have power systems asplete or powerful as the World of Adepts.


    They had only evolved into what they were after tens of thousands of bloody battles, emerging from amongst countless other creatures as the apex predators. They lived in odd, twisted but plentiful worlds, often possessing powerful talents in certain areas. However, the worlds they lived in often had very primal, backward civilizations, if they had any at all.


    In truth, this was the condition of most nar worlds!


    The powerful civilizations that currently existed in the universe had note into being naturally. They had all been elevated to their greatness with thousands of years of development.


    Countless adepts had stepped out of the World of Adepts, explored the boundless space, searched for rare treasures and resources, conquered innumerable nes, gathered all their essences, and brought them back to the World of Adepts.


    This selfish act of raiding that they constantlymitted empowered and strengthened the world consciousness of the World of Adepts. The inclusion of foreign resources and knowledge systems allowed the World of Adepts¡¯ nar consciousness to grow continually. In doing so, it gave back to the power system of the world.


    Of the major nar worlds, the worlds that had a healthy andprehensive cultivation system like the World of Adepts¨Calong with proper alchemy techniques and rich resources¨Cwere incredibly rare.


    Fourth Grade beings like Sand King and Sshina from alien worlds were very likely the most powerful beings in their worlds. However, in the World of Adepts, they were only at the level of elite Fourth Grade adepts.


    In fact, neither Sand King nor Sshina could be considered any of the best amongst the elite adepts. They only had exceptional talents in certain areas and aspects of fighting!


    That was why the two of them became cautious and fearful in front of this powerful fire adept from the World of Adepts. They were no longer as bold or arrogant as they had been when they first met him.


    Meanwhile, even though Ts believed himself to be just as powerful as Greem himself, he recognized and feared the two origin artifacts he possessed. In all honesty, it was because he didn¡¯t realize Greem¡¯s actual situation that he had suffered such a terrible loss in their exchange earlier.


    Greem nearlyughed out loud when he heard Ts¡¯ venting words. He couldn¡¯t help but reply, ¡°In the World of Adepts, equipment is part of an individual¡¯s power. In fact, it¡¯s a vitalponent of their power.


    ¡°We human adepts do not have the natural Physique of magical creatures or your different species¡¯ unique, innate abilities. What are we supposed to fight all of you with, if not with our equipment? You wouldn¡¯t ask the dragon to cut off its ws, its wings, and then pluck off its scales before you fight it, would you?¡±


    Ts fell silent.


    They had always been the strongest individuals in their homeworlds. Now that they had stepped out of their worlds and witnessed the might of individuals from other nes, it was only natural that they would lose their confidence and be desperate.


    ¡°I promised you quite a lot earlier. Why did you not help me, but the lich instead?¡± A short momentter, Ts finally asked the question that he wanted answered most.


    ¡°Because he possesses a force behind him, while you are only one individual!¡± Greem smiled. ¡°Putting aside the slight difference in yourbat prowess, the benefits I get from helping him is muchrger than what I would get from helping you.¡±


    Ts was once again silent!


    ¡°It seems like it¡¯s settled,¡± Sand King, who had been paying attention to the battle in the pce, suddenly cried out.


    Everybody lifted their heads and cast their gaze into the depth of the mists.

 Chapter 1271 - End of the Battle

    Chapter 1271 End of the Battle


    Kanganas had won!


    This much was evident from the skeletal dragon¡¯s cry of despair and tragedy before its death.


    After being surrounded and beaten down by the outsiders¡¯ entire party, it had been struck a mighty blow from Greem. Even though Nax was far more powerful than the average Fourth Grade¨Cso much so that it approached the realm of a Fifth Grade¨Cit was still not a match for Kanganas. That was especially the case when Kanganas went all out with no regard for the losses he incurred. The swarm of undead the lich unleashed had simply devoured the skeletal dragon.


    The liches were infamous monsters among all the monstrosities and terrors of the universe because of their shameless tactic of swarming enemies with their endless horde of undead. In addition, liches were naturally experts at toying with the soul. Death at their hands did not mean the end of suffering.


    Quite the opposite. Death at the hands of a lich marked the start of a painful and arduous afterlife!


    Liches would never waste the soul or body of their victims. They used every part of their victim to their full potential, turning them into one of their obedient undead servants. Such servants had no expiry date, nor freedom or dignity.


    Death at the hands of a lich was an eternal fall of the soul and body into darkness and depravity. The victims of a lich would suffer painfully in endless despair and agony, living an unlife where they were neither dead nor alive!


    A lich would never abandon a victim until they had squeezed everyst drop of value out of their being.


    Meanwhile, Nax, who had turned itself into an undead willingly, was practically a mountainous pile of treasure for a lich. Apart from providing Kanganas with the Fifth Grade Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter, Nax¡¯s body and soul were also some of the best materials for crafting high-grade undead.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine that a powerful skeletal ice dragon would soon appear within Kanganas¡¯ subordinate ranks. With such powerful aid, Kanganas would be able to rise to the levels of the strongest Fourth Grades instantly.


    Once he assimted the Ancient Reliquary, his path to Fifth Grade would be clear of all obstacles!


    ............


    As Kanganas¡¯ soul aura vanished, the ice pce started trembling violently.


    This majestic pce that had been supported by the power of the artifact couldn¡¯t help but start shaking now that it was gone. Large chunks of ice and frost were falling off of the tall ceiling and broad walls. The ice mist in the pce was also not bound by any power now. It slowly started to dissipate.


    Finally, after fifteen minutes, the mists parted.


    Kanganas walked out of the pce, dressed in rags and covered in wounds.


    Even though his body was tattered beyond recognition, and his Spirit was so weak that it was almost tempting to leap on him, Kanganas¡¯ jade-white skull appeared to have a joyous expression on it.


    He had undoubtedly obtained unimaginable benefits and profit within the pce. Just the artifact and the skeletal dragon alone were more than what he had expected to obtain on this trip.


    The joyful lich formed a stark contrast to the party members waiting outside. Sand King, Ts, and Sshina¡¯s faces were dark and brooding. It was obvious that they were upset that Greem had been able to suppress thempletely and kept them out of the final battle.


    They had gone to great lengths by venturing to this dangerous foreign ne and injuring that vicious skeletal dragon. If the party members had killed the dragon together, they would have been able to firmly request for a ¡®fair¡¯ share of the dragon¡¯s hoard.


    However, now...now that the lich had settled the final battle alone, their share of the profit would be greatly affected.


    Because of this, everyone¡¯s gaze towards Greem and Kanganas was resentful and filled with anger.


    Kanganas was a sharp and experienced diplomat. He could read everyone¡¯s expressions and immediately stood out to make a stand.


    ¡°I have opened the doors to Nax¡¯s treasury! Apart from the reliquary, I only took the portion I was entitled to. The rest of the treasure remains untouched. Go now, and you can split it evenly between yourselves. I suppose that¡¯s your share of the profits on this adventure!¡±


    Sand King and Sshina finally smiled when they heard this. They immediately charged into the crumbling temple as fast as they could. Ts hesitated for a brief moment, nced at Greem and Kanganas before hurrying into the pce without another word.


    Once everybody had left, Kanganas turned and looked at Greem.


    Greem was expressionless and seemed to have no intention of moving to take any of the treasure for himself.


    ¡°You are a very odd person!¡± Kanganas eximed. ¡°You are the most mysterious adept I have ever seen, whose thoughts I cannot get a grasp on. Sometimes, I have absolutely no idea what it is that you want.¡±


    Greem did not reply. He simply looked into the depths of the fading mists and frowned. ¡°Why did you trick them into the mists? Are you trying to exterminate them all in one fell swoop?¡±


    A smile appeared on Kanganas¡¯ jade-white, crystalline face void of any flesh or blood. His lower jaw moved slightly, ¡°In the past, I would certainly have killed these fools.¡±


    ¡°And now?¡± Greem smiled as well.


    ¡°It¡¯s very different now. I have obtained everything I wanted, and I now have the confidence to take the next step forward. Leave these fools alive, and I may have a chance to use them again in the future!¡± Having said that, Kanganas¡¯ soulfire swept over Greem¡¯s body. ¡°As for you, sir...the agreement between us still stands. For the next two hundred years from this moment onwards, I am willing to ally myself with you and be a member of your noble n.¡±


    Even though their words were notw, at their level, every oath they made possessed a strange power of its own that resonated with the narws.


    Even without any magical contract, the aura ofws filled the air when Kanganas solemnly made his promise. An ancient and profound thread of Fate bound him and Greem together.


    Neither of them rejected this thread of Fate. They let it simply enter their bodies and sink into their souls.


    Such an oath contract had no actionable uses of punishment. Rather, any bacsh was rted entirely to the difference between the two contractors¡¯ Spirit. If Kanganas¡¯ Spirit were utterly superior to Greem¡¯s, nothing would happen to him even if he were to go back on his word.


    However, if Greem¡¯s Spirit were far stronger than his, Kanganas would incur tremendous losses by breaking the oath.


    No high-grade creature would look lightly upon anything that involved their very soul origin!


    Greem and Kanganas were more trusting of each other now that the contract had been established.


    Although it wasn¡¯t at the level of unconditional trust, they, at least, no longer needed to be wary of a sudden ambush from each other as the other party members were.


    ¡°You¡¯ve helped me tremendously. Take this as apensation of sorts!¡± Kanganas lifted his hand and tossed a strange heart the size of a grindstone to Greem.


    The mists in the air instantly froze into ice when the heart appeared, ttering to the ground as tiny, little shards. A bone-chilling cold spread in the air, causing the blood of any creature in the vicinity to freeze and their bodies to lock up.


    ¡°Nax¡¯s heart!?¡± Greem gasped in surprise.


    The massive heart encased in ice was still beating slightly, containing powerful and plentiful life force. The life aura it radiated was the exact same as Skeletal Dragon Nax.


    ¡°Kehkehkehe. Even I didn¡¯t expect that dragon to have clung on to its living body so badly. To think it dug out its heart and sealed it in ice before it converted itself into an undead,¡± The lich¡¯s jaws ttered as he spoke. ¡°It seems like the dragon intended to find some way to restore its living body after its soul had been modified. But now...kehkehkehe, it belongs only to us!¡±


    Greem weighed the heart in his hands and scanned its life energy with the Chip. He nodded in satisfaction and put the heart away into his Elder¡¯s Ring.


    At their level, ordinary equipment was no longer helpful in any manner. Low-grade equipment would barely be able to amplify their powers.


    Moreover, powerfulw powers would fill their bodies when they engaged inbat. Low-grade equipment would not even be able to bear the intensity of the mes containingw powers, let alone be used to attack the enemy. Inferior equipment would be reduced to ashes the moment Greem used any power at all.


    As such, apart from high-grade equipment that matched their grade, using any other equipment would just be a waste.


    This ice dragon¡¯s heart was a decent Fourth Grade material no matter how you looked at it. It would certainly make for powerful equipment once it was processed, whether as proper magical equipment or a single-use tool.


    Naturally, Greem epted the lich¡¯s ¡®goodwill¡¯ without any hesitation!


    ¡°How should we deal with this ne?¡± Greem lifted his head and looked at Kanganas.


    ¡°The ecology and nar environment of this world has been severely distorted by the Ancient Reliquary. It is very difficult to restore it to its former state. You can keep it for yourself if you are interested. I believe those three fellows won¡¯t dare to fight you for it!¡± Kanganas gave his suggestion.


    Having said that, he opened a small interdimensional portal.


    Before he departed, he left onest message.


    ¡°I will keep my promise! I am returning to the Skeletal ne to put things in order. It will take me two or three years. Once everything is settled, I will personally pay a visit to you. I will see you then!¡±


    ¡°As will I!¡±


    White light shed once Kanganas entered the portal, and the rift in space started to mend.


    He was carrying such valuable treasure on him. It was only natural that he didn¡¯t dare take his time traveling as he had ining here. That was why he teleported back instantly, even at the cost of additional resources and energy. He did not want anything unexpected to happen on the journey back.


    That alone demonstrated the cautiousness and intelligence of the liches!

 Chapter 1272 - Horton Magic Academy

    <strong>Chapter 1272 Horton Magic Academy</strong>


    Greem returned just as he departed, his movements unknown to anyone else.


    In the minds of the Crimson adepts, the legendary Lord Greem had remained in seclusion within Fire Throne. He had never left at all.


    Only a few higher-ups within the Crimson n even knew of his departure and return.


    The first thing Greem did upon returning to Fire Throne was, naturally, hand over the coordinates of Chillfrost ne to Meryl.


    He had already buried a positioning runestone there. With the runestone and these coordinates, the n¡¯s search party would not need to go through the troublesome process of calcting and triangting Chillfrost¡¯s exact location.


    Chillfrost had an excessively in and monotonous nar environment, as well as distorted narws due to the influence of an artifact. However, it was still a decent small ne, after all. It was the perfect world to be settled by ice adepts.


    The Crimson n of the present was no longer the ragtag gathering of adepts it had been in the past. It was a mega-n that was rapidly growing and developing. The massive influx of foreign adepts imposed a significant strain on the n territory¡¯s hosting capacity. The tworgest regions of the n were already overpopted at the moment.


    Under such circumstances, Greem intended to further open up the limitations on foreign adepts and allow them to participate in certain administrative functions within the n.


    After proper consideration, Greem decided to open up Lance, as well as the n outpost in space, to the general public. It would further elerate the development and expansion of these strongholds.


    The Crimson n had not possessed the foundation tomit to such a decision in the past. Had they opened up any n locations to outsiders, it would have been effortless for their enemies to obtain essential and ssified information, allowing those enemies to conduct targeted destruction and harassment.


    However, Lance was now protected by the Fourth Grade Thunder Dragon Arms, while the outpost in space was defended by Third Grade Gazlowe and his Steel Capital. Anyone who tried to stir up trouble in these ces would have to consider whether they had the capability and qualification to start anything.


    Mary watched over the Crimson n¡¯s headquarters in the World of Adepts, while Alice covered their assets in the North. In addition to the legendary fire adept, Greem, who remained hidden behind the scenes, the Crimson n had an extremely firm foundation. They were not afraid of being challenged or contested by any worldly or adept forces.


    In fact, there were many times where Greem grumbled about his enemies being too tame and quiet. He was wondering if...he should send some people to tug on their whiskers and get them moving again.


    Life without enemies was truly an insufferable one!


    Having been to the Adept¡¯s Association and witnessed an adept organization of a different structure, Greem¡¯s worldview had significantly expanded. If Zhentarim was and of small and medium n-run enterprises, then the Adept¡¯s Association was a massive conglomerate of cooperations thatbined the force of a great many people to achieverge-scale industry and economy.


    It was obvious which organization was superior at a single nce.


    It was truly a miracle that Zhentarim had managed to survive for so long between the three major adept organizations!


    Greem could faintly sense traces of maniption behind this miracle.


    However, he didn¡¯t care too much about this maniption and did not look into it. He was solely focused on the Crimson n¡¯s development and future.


    If the Crimson n were to bare its fangs right now andunch an invasion against all the other ns, Greem might have a decent chance of achieving his ambition. The amount of power he had gathered in his hands was enough to unite the Central Lands.


    Even though the Central Lands would fall into a drawn-out war that wouldst for hundreds of years, it would be an opportunity to unite the scattered ns to form an organization simr to the three major adept organizations.


    However, that was only assuming that no external forces intervened in this conquest!


    Should any of the three major adept organizations intervene, it would not just be a matter of being thwarted in his conquest. It was possible that Greem¡¯s act of domination would shatter the silent agreement of the Central Lands as a neutral buffer between all the major organizations. Zhentarim would be the battlefield upon which the three major organizations would publicly wage war and expand their influence.


    When that happened, the Central Lands would be dragged into a mire of conflict. Any ambitions or dreams that Greem once possessed would be rendered into dust.


    From a certain perspective, the incredibly gentle and even friendly attitude that the Adept¡¯s Association held towards him was very suspicious. They were the strongest organization, after all, and perhaps the one that was most invested in the absence of a significant force in Zhentarim!


    Perhaps, they had long hoped for Zhentarim to fall into chaos, such that they could finally have a reason to reach in with their dirty ws! When that happened, they could use the protection of their own interests as an excuse to override the agreement between the three major organizations and send troops into the Central Lands.


    Considering the myriad of factors, starting chaos in the Central Lands and hoping to profit amidst all the confusion was an entirely imusible n.


    If military conquest was not feasible, then why not diplomacy?


    After giving the matter some thought, Greem raised the suggestion of establishing a public adept academy.


    There was an incredible number of adept academies throughout Zhentarim. A quick count would yield as many as three hundred. However, the basic model of education for these academies centered around contracts. Outsiders had to agree to a specific duration of contracted service when they joined the academy. That was the condition for obtaining the knowledge and resources belonging to the academy.


    Even adept academies that were known as public institutions functioned in the same fashion. The only difference was that these ¡®public academies¡¯ were not subordinate to any n, but the Zhentarim Association itself.


    Greem¡¯s academy would have to offer better and more favorable terms to obtain the favor of free and wandering adepts seeking a proper education.


    Greem intended to establish the academy based around a tuition system, rather than a contract system.


    The public adept academy, founded by the Crimson n, would not force any outsiders to sign servitude contracts. Instead, the school would offer knowledge and resources at a clearly demarcated price. That would weaken the unwillingness of free and wandering adepts to join the academy.


    Moreover, the Crimson n had numerous Fourth Grade adepts and individuals. These people¡¯s reputation could be used to attract students, especially if they asionally gave public lectures. Such lectures were unimaginable events for most low and intermediate-grade adepts.


    Mary could lecture on blood magic while the diviners would flock to listen to Alice. Gazlowe could teach about mental magic, Emelia was the best choice for the Dean of the School of nts, Remi for the School of Poison, Gonga for the School of Magic Energy, and Billis for the School of Evolution and Mutation.


    If Arms was made to teach in a Draconic School, and Kanganas established a School of Necromancy, while Greem himself taught the School of Fire......


    In all honesty, the appearance of so many high-grade lecturers in a single academy would cause a massivemotion in the World of Adepts. All the wandering adepts and free adepts would want nothing more than toe to such a holy ce of knowledge.


    There was the attraction of knowledge, resources, and powerful adepts. All of these adepts woulde to the Crimson n¡¯s academy of their own free will.


    Given such circumstances, no enemy of the Crimson n would be able to criticize them in any fashion, as upset or frustrated as they might be at such a situation. If they dared to stir trouble, the Crimson n would have the perfect excuse to take out their long-hidden butcher¡¯s knife.


    The three major organizations couldn¡¯t exactly strip the Crimson n of their right to self-defense, could they?


    However, for such an ideal to be materialized, it required several conditions to be fulfilled. Firstly, the name of the Crimson n had to hold sufficient power to draw the masses. Secondly, the n¡¯s reserves of knowledge and resources had to be plentiful. Thirdly, it required a core group of individuals that were both sufficiently powerful and obedient.


    In truth, the Crimson n had already fulfilled all of these conditions!


    For the sake of this ambition, Greem held many discussions with Mary and Alice, even having multiple secret meetings with the higher-ups of the n. They went through every single detail and structure in this public adept academy.


    Finally, after a year and a half of busy preparations, the Horton Magic Academy was officially founded in a ce known as Ironwood City.


    ............


    Ironwood City, Horton Magic Academy.


    Ever since the eye-catching adept tower was constructed, this ce had be a bustling hub of activity.


    As Ironwood City was a little too small in size, Horton Magic Academy was built in the vast area surrounding Horton Tower, right by the Roy Rivers. There were dense magical woods here, as well as swamps shrouded in mists and tombs constructed underground. There were even towns filled with magical-machinery, where the gears ground and the furnaces huffed without stop.


    Horton Magic Academy was approximately divided into a dozen schools of different attributes. The mysterious and legendary fire adept, Greem, was the Dean of the academy and the head of the School of Fire.


    The names listed alongside Greem¡¯s as the heads of the various Schools were equally as shocking. It made the hearts of every adept that came here to learn more about the academy beat uncontrobly.


    School of Blood:


    Head of Department: Mary (Fourth Grade)


    Assistant Heads of Department: Soros (Third Grade), Rothers (Third Grade)


    Department Instructors: Isa (Third Grade), Spa (Third Grade), Dolores (Third Grade), Severus (Third Grade), Vanlier (Third Grade).


    The entire department consisted of a total of thirty-three individuals, almost all of which were high-grade vampires above Second Grade.


    The School of Blood¡¯s activity was centered around Bloodcastle, Horton Tower, and Serpentfowl Cliff. The trial locations of inner members of the School included Seawoods ne and the ck Forest.


    School of Fire:


    Head of Department: Greem (Fourth Grade)


    Assistant Heads of Department: Cindral (Third Grade), Montague (Third Grade)


    Department Instructors: Bresse Sharpini (Second Grade), DeVon Purcell (Second Grade), Vincent Goyle (Second Grade).


    The entire School of Fire consisted of seventeen instructors and professors. Greem was the department head in name only. All the administrative work and lecturing had been left to ming Tiger Cindral and Minor Fire Lord Montague, who had been rmended into his service by Fire King Groms.


    The School of Fire¡¯s main area of activity was focused within Horton Tower, Fire Throne, and Lance, while theirnd of trial was the Fire Elementium ne.


    School of Necromancy:


    Head of Department: Kanganas (Fourth Grade)


    Assistant Heads of Department: Scourge Knight Shatterface (Fourth Grade), Higher Lich Vaulx (Fourth Grade)


    Department Instructors: Lich Gyers (Third Grade), Undying Banshee Ethelyn (Third Grade), Zombie Lord Kans (Second Grade)


    In truth, the entire School of Necromancy was supported solely by high-grade undead rmended by Kanganas. Apprentices and adepts that studied in this department would have the opportunity to travel to the Skeletal ne and find wild undead suitable to their needs and bind them to their service.

 Chapter 1273 - Am’s Death

    <strong>Chapter 1273 Am¡¯s Death</strong>


    Just as Greem expected, the appearance of Horton Magic Academy instantly caused a massivemotion in the Central Lands.


    There had never been a magic academy that could put together such arge department of high-grade adepts and powerful otherworldly creatures as their instructors. There had never been a magic academy have their lessons and trials spread over a dozen different lesser nes. There had never been a magic academy that had ever recruited students with such low barriers for entry.


    Consequently, when the list of Horton Magic Academy instructors was made public, the entirety of Zhentarim and the Central Lands bubbled with noise.


    eptance of students with no discrimination of race, sex, bloodline, or any other limitations. High-grade knowledge and resources with no binding contracts were required to be signed. Fair education with no discrimination, excellent magical facilities, and those eye-catching and powerful instructors.


    Horton Magic Academy had borrowed many aspects of its education system from the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s cultivation system. The ultimate goal of the academy was not the cultivation of n adepts for a n¡¯s personal use. The academy had opened up the excellent resources of the Crimson n to the general public. It was a magic academy that had been established solely for the benefit of the people.


    It allowed Horton Magic Academy to be a wild melting pot of free adepts that remained outside of the Crimson n¡¯s governing system, despite being established by the Crimson n.


    Horton Magic Academy cared not for a student¡¯s background. They would even ept students that already belonged to other ns. Moreover, they would provide such students with the same basic resources avable to everyone else.


    As long as you had the magical crystals to pay the tuition, as long as you were willing to remain in the academy, its doors would always be open to you.


    No contracts of servitude, nopulsory missions, no discrimination based on bloodline, no difference in nobility and peasantry. It was equality of opportunity and freedom.


    It was undoubtedly the most attractive aspect of the academy!


    It was important to know that most adept ns in the Central Lands were barely getting by.


    Apart from a few ns who could invade and raid foreign nes for incredible profits, most ns were lucky to have a single lesser ne, providing them with a stable ie stream.


    The rare resources in every n also had to be tilted towards exceptionally talented individuals. Ordinary adepts and apprentices were often in tough situations, economically speaking.


    These ordinary adepts and apprentices, who made up the majority of the adept poption, would have no choice but to negotiate with their ns for better resources. The terms of these negotiations were often contracts of servitude or recruitment onto nar battlefields.


    Either sell yourself, or sell your life.


    There were no other options for these people.


    After all, all the adept resources avable out there were monopolized by the various adept ns!


    However, Horton Magic Academy now offered them a different choice.


    Free and wandering adepts could choose to apply as instructors at the academy. They could earn a wage through means such as providing lectures, brewing potions, writing scrolls, and creating voodoo beasts or golems. They could then use their sry of magical crystals to purchase high-grade knowledge that the academy offered to the public.


    They were free adepts and could leave if and when they chose to. They were not bound or limited by any organization and, consequently, did not have to risk their lives in any manner. Moreover, if they became instructors at the academy, they could enjoy the privilege of using some of the magical facilities at no cost.


    It was tremendously good news for the free adepts who possessed plenty of materials, but noboratories in which they could process and use them!


    Moreover, the Crimson n was incredibly wealthy. The core tower of Horton Magic Academy was one of the best towers ever constructed. They had every facility imaginable within the building, all of the highest quality,parable to some of the Central Land¡¯s best towers.


    At the very least, the small magic academies that could be found throughout the Central Lands were utterly inferior to Horton Magic Academy in every respect, be it in terms of wealth, staff, or resources. That was why every free adept and apprentice in the Central Lands rushed toward Ironwood City when they heard of the academy¡¯s unbelievable standards.


    In just six months, Ironwood City had been forced to expand three times. Its poption had also swelled exponentially from six thousand to one hundred and twenty thousand.


    This nameless city that stood at the border of Ailovis had instantly be a massive adept city in the Central Lands, simply because it neighbored the Horton Magic Academy.


    ............


    Feidnan City, Sarubo n outpost.


    Am, dressed in a gray robe, walked through a dark and silent magical tunnel and passed a faintly glowing barrier. He arrived at the public corridor of the Conjuration Department.


    A broad stone corridor stood in front of him. Several apprentices were hurrying to the hall with books in their arms. It was three minutes until Adept Am¡¯s public lecture on conjuration. The students were rushing as fast as they could. They did not want to miss out on this free lecture that was avable once a week.


    As the adept responsible for this lecture, Am would obtain a certain number of magical crystals and points from the n aspensation to support his expensive experiment.


    However, when Am arrived at the entrance to the hall, he was surprised to find three apprentices standing at the door. They seemed to be waiting for his arrival.


    Am hesitated for a moment.


    These three apprentices were all disciples of his. They were all talented individuals, and all of them were at the advanced apprentice level.


    The three apprentices surrounded Am when they saw him arrive. They looked at each other, nervousness written all over their faces. They were obviously hesitating about speaking about something.


    ¡°What are you doing here? The lecture is about to start. I don¡¯t have time to deal with any of your problems. We can talk about it after the lecture is over!¡± Am frowned as he spoke.


    Natalie, the pretty, petite female apprentice with freckles on her face, finally found the courage to speak up.


    ¡°Teacher, the three of us are here to say our farewells!¡±


    ¡°Farewell? Are the three of you going on an expedition?¡± Am frowned even more. ¡°Your Spirits are barely at the advanced level. It will be a while until you reach the pseudo-adept level. There¡¯s no need to be in such a rush to go on an expedition.¡±


    ¡°We aren¡¯t going out on an expedition.¡±


    ¡°Not an expedition? Why are all three of you leaving together, then? Tell me, did something happen back with your families and ns?¡± Am asked solemnly.


    ¡°Nothing has happened to our families. We just...wish to leave and go to another ce to continue our education. That ce offers incredibly lenient conditions. Many of ourpanions from the tower have already left! We only wanted to bid you farewell before we departed.¡±


    Am fell silent.


    His face turned pale, making him appear even weaker and elderly than he was.


    His life in recent years had been tremendously depressing and upsetting.


    He was a traitor of the Crimson n, after all. Even though the Sarubo n treated him appropriately as one of their adepts, many people mocked him behind his back.


    Even those pesky, insignificant apprentices would hide a trace of sympathy and disdain behind their respectful gazes when they met him in the corridors.


    Am, one of the first five disciples of the legendary fire adept, Greem, and the only one among them to possess fire affinity. To think he had betrayed his own teacher out of ¡®loyalty¡¯ to the Sarubo n.


    If Greem had simply died, Am would have been praised as an individual with exceptional foresight. His status in the Sarubo n would have skyrocketed, and he might even have be an authority of great importance. However, no one could predict the future. The script of life would never go ording to the expectations of the weak!


    Greem had managed to rise like a zing star despite being repeatedly suppressed by the Sarubo n. In fact, he was so powerful that he had defeated the Third Grade Lady Sanazar, who currently ruled the Sarubo n.


    Lady Sanazar had been humiliated by Greem in a battle between the most powerful adepts of the Zhentarim Association. She had been forced to retreat to a lesser ne to recover and mend her wounds. At the moment, the individual managing the Sarubo n was none other than Lord Violeteye, who held the same reputation as Sanazar as a Third Grade of the n.


    However, just as the n had been preparing to exact revenge on Greem, terrifying news returned. Greem had advanced to Fourth Grade!


    When news of this arrived at the Sarubo n, the entire n fell silent.


    Fourth Grade...Fourth Grade...Fourth Grade.


    Fourth Grades were the most powerful entities in the World of Adepts!


    If Greem insisted on waging war on the Sarubo n, it would not have mattered that a Sixth Grade Great Adept stood behind them.


    After all, Great Adept Sarubo was far out in space. He might want to help with the n¡¯s affairs in the World of Adepts, but there was nothing that he could tangibly do.


    Fearful and afraid, Am had hidden in the Sarubo n¡¯s outpost, never daring to take a single step out of Feidnan City.


    Even though he chose to iste himself, news continued to stream in from the outside world.


    In the past one or two hundred years, the Crimson n and its legendary fire adept leader were the most popr topic in the Central Lands.


    An explosive piece of news would emerge every so often, causing amotion in the Sarubo n. However, what made Am the most regretful was news of Red Dragon Adept Meryl advancing to Third Grade.


    Am had smashed everything in his room andb when he heard of this news. He got himself blind drunk and screamed in agony amidst the mess for the entire night.


    He had always believed himself to no longer care about anything happening in the Crimson n. However, on that night, hepletely understood the truth. He still cared!


    However, time was the best cure. After a hundred years of silence and work, he calmed down and became the most diligent and hardworking First Grade adept of the Sarubo n.


    Indeed, two hundred years had passed, and Am was still no more than an ordinary advanced First Grade adept. Half of his life was over, and even his looks and body were starting to fade.


    Today, he was stopped in his tracks by three of his very own disciples and was told that they had to take their leave. For some reason, something in Am¡¯s heart was telling him that this had something to do with that devil of a bastard again.


    A vicious beast howled in Am¡¯s heart.


    He gritted his teeth, smiled, and asked.


    ¡°Tell me. What is this ce that has managed to attract you to pursue education there?¡±


    Natalie fell silent.


    It was another apprentice, Russel, who found the courage the speak up.


    ¡°Horton Magic Academy. It¡¯s...it¡¯s established...by the Crimson n!¡±


    Crimson...Crimson, just as he expected!


    This damned, curse of a name again. Had he been cursed by a demon? Why was it that he would hear this damned name wherever he went?


    Am felt his head ring. Thest trace of color faded from his face, and he felt a sweet taste in his mouth. His body trembled. He pressed his hand against the wall and slowly copsed limply to the ground as his apprentices cried out in surprise.


    Thest trace of life faded from his elderly shell of a body.

 Chapter 1274 - Frustrations

    <h4>Chapter 1274 Frustrations</h4>


    Kerslin Castle, headquarters of the Zhentarim Association.


    Inside a secure magical room.


    The two individuals who represented the Association¡¯s highest authority sat face-to-face, worry and concern wearing heavily upon their faces.


    After a long silence, Chairman Freed finally spoke.


    ¡°How is the situation within the Association, currently?¡±


    Vice-Chairman Mirva sat on the opposite couch with a dark expression on his face. His eyes glimmered. It was obvious that he was in a pretty bad mood as well.


    ¡°Things are generally stable at the moment!¡± Mirva replied in a coarse voice, ¡°Most Association adepts have signed contracts of servitude. They won¡¯t take any rash actions until their contracts have been fulfilled. On the other hand, it¡¯s...¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s what?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s the new apprentices that recently arrived this year that are the problem. Over half of them have yet to sign a contract with us. They seem to be watching from the sidelines, waiting until the Association offers better conditions.¡±


    ¡°These weak-willed bastards. Without the Association¡¯s recruitment, they would have rotted in their dull little viges as meager farmers and lowly adventurers. Investigate their families and backgrounds; start applying pressure on their families. Hmph! They can hesitate, but I don¡¯t believe even their families dare hesitate.¡±


    Mirva nodded silently, then rubbed the snake-eye ring on his right little finger. A new order was quickly given out.


    Having done that, Mirva let out said in an exasperated tone, ¡°It seems like Greem is intent on going against us. How should we deal with him?¡±


    The old and sly Freed couldn¡¯t help but sigh when he heard hispanion¡¯s question.


    ¡°Greem is young, but veryposed and experienced in his way of handling things! To avoid going against us directly, he chose not to expand his territory. Now, we can¡¯t even find an excuse to summon the Association elders and punish him in any manner.¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s still young. He¡¯s only three hundred years old at the moment. He has plenty of time to oust us. Judging from the Crimson n¡¯s current actions, he has no intention of starting an adept war or expanding his territories. He has his sights set on the next two or three generations.¡±


    ¡°Perhaps even the fourth or fifth.¡±


    ¡°Yea, he¡¯s very, very patient. He obviously wants to y the waiting game until we die of old age!¡±


    ¡°Its been a long time since a new Fourth Grade adept was born in the Central Lands. Greem has been the only one in the past two or three hundred years. It¡¯s been over eight hundred years since you and I advanced to Fourth Grade. We won¡¯t be able tost for more than two hundred years, no matter how many more treasures we find. The other Association elders are in the same predicament as us. Even Ker, the youngest of us, is already five hundred years old. Greem is avoiding direct conflict. He¡¯s targeting the new generations and waiting for us old people to die!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Once the older Fourth Grade adepts have died of old age, the new generation of Fourth Grade adepts will be living under that terrifying shadow of his. When that happens, no one in the Central Lands will dare to go against his will, even if he doesn¡¯t start a war!¡±


    The two leaders of the Zhentarim Associationined together, but they had no solution with which to deal with Greem.


    When it came to sheerbat prowess, the legendary fire adept was probably already the most powerful adept in the Central Lands.


    This fellow had even gone to the Adept¡¯s Association headquarters in the east recently and had friendly rtions with them. ording to the news that Freed recently obtained, the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s evaluation of Greem was very high. They even listed him as the fire adept closest in prowess to an ultra powerhouse.


    Ultra powerhouses. What were they? They were powerful individuals at peak Fourth Grade, with the greatest chance of advancing to Fifth Grade!


    How few years had it been since Greem advanced? To think he would already be evaluated so highly by the Adept¡¯s Association.


    Of course, Freed and the others would not doubt the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s judgment at all. They would only be fearful of Greem¡¯s rming rate of improvement.


    At the speed he was developing, the entirety of the Central Lands and the Zhentarim Association would eventually be his. Freed, who had conspired towards the same goal for so many years, was naturally upset about this. He was unwilling to see what he had devoted his entire life to be someone else¡¯s possession.


    However, a simple flip through the list of instructors at Horton Magic Academy and a long list of incredible names would blind you. Fourth Grade...Fourth Grade...Fourth Grade...so many Fourth Grades, from a dragon lord to a Fire Lord to a lich.


    In all honesty, Freed¡¯s heart trembled when he saw this list.


    He might have had a mean streak in the past that would have made him attempt to intimidate Greem with the hundreds of years of umtion behind the Zhentarim Association. However, upon seeing the number of powerful individuals that Greem had gathered, andparing that to the loose gathering of adepts he had around him, all will to fight seeped from his body like leaking gas.


    Out of nowhere, Freed felt incredibly sad and dejected. His tense spirits abruptly rxed as he sunk limply into his couch. A teardrop formed in the corner of his wrinkly eyes.


    ¡°We can¡¯t beat him anymore,¡± Mirva also let out a series of sighs. ¡°Once all of us old fools die, the Central Lands will fall into his hands. For the next one to two hundred years, I want to try our best to cultivate the few good seeds we have in the Association. See if we can continue our legacy. Perhaps they are our only hope now.¡±


    Freed remained silent. He did not reply.


    Almost every Fourth Grade adept had tens of thousands of descendants and n members, especially those belonging to ancient ns that hadsted for thousands of years. These Fourth Grade adepts were the very gods of these ns. As long as they remained, no one would dare dispute or encroach upon the rights of their descendants.


    However, once their lifespans came to an end and their souls dissipated, the fates of their once sheltered descendants would be like candles in the wind.


    Who didn¡¯t have an enemy or a rival? Once their protective umbre was gone, these former enemies that had been kept down and low for hundreds of years would lunge for the throat. The n would either fall into decline or be pulled up at the very roots, exterminated to thest member.


    These things were more thanmon in the World of Adepts!


    As such, most Fourth Grade adepts would find ways to protect their ns when they realized that Fifth Grade was an imusible dream. They would also try to cultivate a new powerhouse who could take on the n¡¯s legacy in their ce.


    However, while it was easy to say such things, actuallymitting them to action was difficult.


    First, these Fourth Grade adepts would never be willing to cultivate any adept that was not a direct descendant.


    Those who were outsiders would always remain outsiders!


    The Fourth Grade adepts would never be willing to train these adepts that joined halfway, no matter how talented they were. After all, it was almost inevitable that these individuals would split off and found their own ns once they reached Fourth Grade. They would never treat their mentor¡¯s n as their own family.


    Thus, the legacy of the n could only be passed on to a direct descendant.


    However, in doing so, the number of options avable would be incredibly limited.


    The number of individuals within the descendants of a Fourth Grade adept who had the potential to reach the same level were very, very few. To raise all of them to Fourth Grade sessfully would also consume an exorbitant amount of resources.


    While a Fourth Grade adept¡¯s future was still uncertain and not yet doomed, they would first guarantee resources for themselves before providing their descendants with whatever leftovers they had.


    This situation undoubtedly further reduced the possibility of magical geniuses appearing among their descendants!


    That was why there were very few examples of high-grade adepts emerging from within the same n and inheriting the n¡¯s legacy. Most adept ns faced uncertain futures. It was allughter and joy while they were on the rise, but those times wouldn¡¯tst forever. When the dark times came, they would live in poverty and struggle to survive.


    Many adept ns simply fell to ruin without a single surviving descendant.


    Take Chairman Freed, for example. The Sidmund n he belonged to had three thousand members. Four hundred of these members were direct descendants of his. Among them, only one hundred and twenty-seven had a talent for magic, while only two of them had managed to reach Third Grade.


    However, even these two individuals were not worth investing in or training. That was because they didn¡¯t have sufficient talent to begin with. They had only managed to reach their current heights thanks to the pile of resources avable to them.


    Of Freed¡¯s direct descendants, there was a reasonably talented granddaughter. She was only two hundred years old, but she was already advanced Second Grade. Still, helping her reach Fourth Grade within another one to two hundred years was a difficult task.


    That was why Freed felt his heart ache at the thought of his n declining after his death.


    He knew very clearly what would happen if he offended Greem too much now. Greem might not be able to do anything at the moment. However, once Freed had died of old age, Greem would certainly take bloody and terrifying vengeance on the nspeople and descendants he left behind.


    That was the cruel reality of the World of Adepts!


    Usually, everyone treated the Sidmund n as an ancient and noble n, out of consideration for him. However, once he was gone, his n would not be supported by a single Fourth Grade adept. They would be like fish on a cutting board then¨C no happy fate awaited them.


    Freed lifted his head and looked at Mirva, his gaze filled with pain and hesitation.


    He knew that Mirva¡¯s n was in the same situation as his. There were no capable individuals among his descendants who could support the n after his death. Mirva¡¯s grandson had done quite a good job recently and had a fairly talented child.


    However, that child was only intermediate First Grade at the moment. To help him reach Fourth Grade within two hundred years was a hundred times harder than doing so with his own granddaughter.


    They were both in the same boat and were facing the same difficulties.


    ¡°There¡¯s no way we can keep fighting with Greem. However, Ker and Alfred are still young. They still have three to four hundred years left to live. They aren¡¯t going to be willing to be suppressed by the Crimson n, are they? Perhaps we should win them to our side!¡± Mirva stroked his beard and said.


    ¡°Alfred. His Molten Fire City has allied with the Crimson n now. He¡¯s making a killing out of selling those rare ores mined from his city. There¡¯s no point in hoping that he¡¯ll be the one to stand forward and make trouble.¡± Freed got upset every time they mentioned that lord of the Molten Fire City.


    However, his thoughts quickly shifted to another person. ¡°Ker, on the other hand, is someone we can win to our side. Her n territory neighbors the Crimson n. She must be feeling even greater pressure than us. If some sort of conflict could ur between them, we might be able to suppress Greem¡¯s arrogant ambitions slightly.¡±


    Mirva¡¯s eyes gleamed as he chuckled coldly, ¡°Isn¡¯t that easy? I will go and arrange the matter immediately. I will make sure to have their two ns fight very soon! Hehehe, with Ker as the vanguard, we can get Matthew, Nics, and Gaia on our side as well. At the very least, we will be able to slow down the Crimson n¡¯s development and buy ourselves more time.¡±


    Having said that, Mirva promptly left the room in great spirits.

 Chapter 1275 - Fate Broadcasting

    Chapter 1275 Fate Broadcasting


    East of the continent. The Tower of Observation.


    The scrawny Maztan was lyingfortably in his extravagant bed on the highest floor, snoring.


    All sorts ofvish and expensive furniture could be seen all over his room. The walls were covered with pictures of curvaceous and beautiful women. A full set of gold cutlery sat on top of the dining table in the corner of the room. A bright, magical light kept the ce illuminated with fantastical lighting.


    If anyone were to break into this ce by ident, they would not have believed that this was the room of a Fourth Grade adept. That was because the entire room was filled with the boorish air of extravagance and debaucherymon to nobles. It was utterly unlike the mysterious and transcendent air of high-grade adepts.


    Moreover, not a single item rted to magic could be seen in the entire room. Instead, there were adult toys littered all over the ce, covered in expensive silk undergarments.


    While Maztan was sound asleep with a big pillow illustrated with a naked woman in his arms, a space in the room¡¯s corner started to ripple. An unusual magical eye appeared, blinking a few times as it began to examine the room curiously.


    The magical eye somehow appeared both real and illusory, but it did indeed exist here in this space.


    The eye was a blurry silhouette the size of a fist. It drifted around the room, seemingly curious about everything in here.


    Finally, its gazended on Maztan¡¯s loathsome and naked figure. The eye then started to approach the Fourth Grade adept, taking every inch of his body into full view.


    Maztan was truly one ugly creature!


    There was barely any flesh on his bony body. His loose muscles draped limply over his prominent bones. From a distance, he looked just like a still-breathing skeleton.


    His gray skin was covered in spots. Messy, thick, ck hair grew all over his chest, armpits, the soles of his feet, and many other ces where hair wasn¡¯t supposed to grow. Meanwhile, his head only had a few thin, yellow strands of hair.


    As a Fourth Grade diviner, Maztan obviously didn¡¯t care much for his personal hygiene. His ugly body was covered in filth, and the entire room was filled with a pungent odor.


    Maztan was deep in sleep, and the magical eye was very close to him now.


    Most other people might not be able to pick up on the profound flux of Fate radiating from the eye, but he couldn¡¯t be more familiar with it.


    Maztan angrily cursed as he stirred from his slumber. He opened his eyes; what met them were a pair of pretty, crystalline eyes. They were sorge and so crystal clear, and they took up most of his sight.


    Maztan had no choice but to take a few steps back before he could see the entirety of the magical eye hovering in front of him. The pair of pretty eyes silently stared at him through that magical eye.


    ¡°Bastard, it¡¯s you again, you little rat!¡± Maztan cursed viciously with his crooked mouth and waved his arms about furiously, trying to chase the magical eye away.


    Unfortunately, the magical eye only moved back half a meter before moving to where he couldn¡¯t reach and continuing its ¡®spying¡¯ mission.


    ¡°Uggo, is this your room? Just as I expected, it¡¯s smelly and ugly, just like you.¡± The magical eye caused the air to vibrate as a strange mental flux radiated outward. ¡°You always say you¡¯re a Fourth Grade adept, but why can¡¯t I find a single thing rted to magic or divination in your room? Can you take me on a tour of yourb? I am really interested in the experiments of Fourth Grade adepts.¡±


    The eye seemed to be intent on bothering Maztan. It circled around him, observing everything as the person behind the eye continued to talk. Anger and helplessness were written all over Maztan¡¯s ugly face now.


    ¡°Shut up!¡±


    Maztan shot out a beam of golden light from his palm, sting the magical eye into pieces.


    However, the moment the magical eye dissipated, ripples appeared in the nearby space again. A new magical eye appeared.


    ¡°Why did you destroy my Fate¡¯s Eye? Don¡¯t you know reforming it costs Fate power? You already destroyed seventy-three of my Fate¡¯s Eyes yesterday. I haven¡¯t even settled that score with you yet!¡±


    Maztan¡¯s actions did not seem to have any effect on the person behind the eyeball. It let out a bombardment of words the moment it appeared, leaving a true-blue Fourth Grade diviner so frustrated he couldn¡¯t even fall asleep again.


    Maztan reluctantly climbed off of his luxurious bed. He randomly grabbed a silk robe from the carpeted floor, draped it over himself, and stumbled towards the bathroom.


    ¡°Brat, stop following me. I¡¯m going to shower. You¡¯re wee toe in if you want to see what an old man looks like in the shower!¡± Maztan shouted angrily before he entered.


    The threat seemed to have a little bit of an effect. The eyeball hesitated for a moment and did not follow Maztan into the bathroom. Instead, it simply drifted around the bedroom.


    Obviously, the personal quarters of a Fourth Grade adept were not so simple. It might appear like thevish home of a useless noble, but defensive arrays were hidden all over the ce. Beneath the wooden floorboards, above the ceiling from which the chandelier hung¨C all of these ces were covered in magical arrays.


    Moreover, several subtle, hidden spots in the room also radiated faint elementium fluctuations. These were hidden drawers and secret rooms.


    These secret rooms were covered byyers uponyers of defensive arrays that prevented scrying through divination, as well as keeping most other supernatural powers from entering.


    Unfortunately, this magical eye wasn¡¯t sustained by ordinary, worldly magical power. It ignored all these magical defenses and freely roamed the rooms.


    Seven minutester, Maztan walked out of the hot shower refreshed, only to see the magical eye casually floating out of his secret magical room.


    That room was filled with all his most precious and treasured items!


    Maztan¡¯s face instantly became twisted and distorted.


    Ever since thest time, when he scryed on that Witch of Fate in the Northern Lands, he had been bothered by that Daughter of Fate apprenticed to the Witch of Fate. That girl seemed to be adored by the Fate powers. She possessed seemingly iprehensible means of manipting Fate.


    Ever since she unintentionally captured the Fate¡¯s Eye that Maztan invented, she had managed to learn how to do it herself without any guidance. From then on, she had be Maztan¡¯s nightmare that couldn¡¯t be dispelled!


    Seemingly curious over this strange old man that possessed tremendous power of Fate, the girl started to use Maztan¡¯s own Fate¡¯s Eye technique to observe him constantly and from every possible angle.


    When Maztan meditated, she would be there. When Maztan divined, she would be there. When Maztan dined, she would be there. When Maztan slept, she would be there. When Maztan hid in his room protected by Fate power, she would be there.


    Either way, even though Maztan¡¯s Fate power could perfectly shield him from the Witch of Fate¡¯s notice in the north, these defenses were utterly ineffective against this daughter of Fate.


    Maztan had tried countless means of protecting himself, but there was simply no way he could shield himself from this girl¡¯s constant scrying.


    For six months, this annoying eyeball floated around him every second of every day, monitoring his every action. He did not have any privacy left to himself.


    Moreover, he was the only one who could see this strange magical eye. The other adepts, even the Fourth Grade adepts of the Association, could not see this damned thing with their naked eyes.


    In all honesty, Maztan had always been doing such things to other people, peeping on others¡¯ private lives.


    However, he had never experienced such a situation himself. To be bothered for six whole months without pause! Moreover, the terrifying part was the fact that the girl seemed to be able to instantly summon a new Fate¡¯s Eye whenever he destroyed it.


    Perhaps, maybe, it was possible...that the Fate powers favored this girl so much that she felt no burden at all when drawing on Fate powers.


    That was what made Maztan truly despair!


    ¡°Girl, what exactly is it that you hope to get from me? Please, I beg you, let me go! If you keep bothering me like this, I will go mad.¡± Maztan instantly charged over and grabbed the magical eye. He pressed his face against it and shouted with all his might.


    ¡°I already said it, didn¡¯t I? Teach me all the Fate magic you know, and I will leave you alone. I have already asked Alice, but she won¡¯t teach me even a single Fate spell. She even said that I¡¯m the daughter of Fate and I can only get everything I want from Fate. Hmph! She¡¯s just being stingy. That¡¯s why she has all these excuses!¡±


    Upon hearing that her demand was his Fate magic, Maztan¡¯s expression instantly changed. He crushed the eyeball and turned to walk out of the room.


    A short momentter, a new eyeball appeared behind him as the girl¡¯s sweet voice rang out again.


    ¡°Old man, you destroyed another one of my Fate¡¯s Eyes. If you keep ying rough, I will disy your ugly body for everyone to see and let everyone witness your ugly side. Hurry up, teach me Fate magic, or I will start broadcasting the images I have.¡±


    Maztan was furious. He started to curse and insult this monstrous little girl with all the crude swear words he knew.


    The girl seemed to have been infuriated by this. A strange spiritual flux radiated from the eyeball and rippled outwards.


    The ripple silently spread throughout the Tower of Observation. The image of an ugly, naked man¡¯s body appeared in the minds of every being that the ripples touched, regardless of what they were doing at the moment.


    The tower instantly flew into an uproar!

 Chapter 1276 - The Diviners’ Tower

    <h4>Chapter 1276 The Diviners¡¯ Tower</h4>


    The Castle in the Sky, the Diviner¡¯s Tower.


    Even within the Silver Union, the Diviner¡¯s Tower was an exceptionally mysterious and ssified ce.


    Outsiders hardly knew of this ce, and the only ones that could enter the tower were unique individuals in silver robes, often seen holding thick tomes in their hands as they walked around. These adepts were individuals with the unique profession of Archivist.


    The Diviner¡¯s Tower was an important location from where the archivists could observe the world¡¯s movements and record its secrets.


    A strange old man dressed in white robes with a pair of tortoise-shell sses stood on a stone balcony extending out of the Diviner Tower¡¯s seventh floor. He was silently assessing the Castle in the Sky as the bright sun shone down upon it.


    After a long time, he finally retracted his gaze and turned back into the tower.


    This ce was a magical room filled with the aura of knowledge. There was barely any furniture around. Instead, there were only all sorts of books and tomes. All of the books were stacked atop each other, such that the massive piles reached the ceiling a dozen meters above the ground. The books were messily arranged. The only reason the pile had not simply copsed was the sheer weight and number of the books there.


    If one took a look around the room, the only thing they would see, apart from books, would only be more books. There was a small desk, about half a meter tall, at the center of the room. Many scrolls, tomes, notes, and booksy on the desk; some sprawled open, others remained shut, and some were crushed beneath the other documents.


    There were several stacks of books along the path where the old man walked towards the desk. Anyone who walked through here would have to be very careful not to cause all the books to copse instantly.


    Given the old man¡¯s frail Physique, he would not be able to survive such a disaster.


    Moreover, most of these tomes glowed with magical light and were protected by defensive arrays. If they all copsed onto the ground in a massive fall, triggering their magic, a cmity would erupt in this room.


    A young child with tender features sat at the desk, cross-legged. He had a strange quill in his hand, seemingly scribbling something on a scroll.


    The child lifted his head when the old man returned from his break. The light of curiosity gleamed in his shiny eyes.


    ¡°Teacher, did you see something again?¡±


    It was no wonder that the child would ask such a question.


    The old man¡¯s habit was to take a look at the Castle in the Sky¡¯s scenery from the balcony once every evening. Typically, this break wouldn¡¯t take more than half an hour and was his only leisure activity.


    Most of the time, the old man bunkered down in this sea of books, writing and scratching, continually recording the important events happening across the world.


    Indeed, this was the strange ability of archivists.


    Archivists were witnesses to history. They were the recorders of history. They could see all sorts of mysterious and unknown happenings urring all over the ne, no matter how far away. These events could be minor or major. Without exception, all of them would profoundly affect the future of the world.


    Archivists did not require powerful and mighty magic. The only thing they needed was a firm and devoted conviction towards Fate. If the World of Adepts was a world that belonged to the adepts, then the archivists were the spiritualists among the adepts. However, the archivists did not believe in or worship any god or higher being. Instead, they revered the River of Fate that ran behind the scenes, like an impossiblyplicated yet iparably urate machine that held the strings to everything.


    They were servants to the Fate powers and devoted believers of Fate.


    They never intervened in the flow of Fate. They simply watched with their eyes as lowly servants and recorded every event that would affect the future of the World of Adepts with their pens.


    When and where they appeared, it would often mean a critical event that would drastically affect the world¡¯s future was about to ur.


    They would use their pen and paper to record the birth of a genius adept, record their trajectory of growth, as well as their instant of glory. They archived these detailed records in a secret room within the Diviner¡¯s Tower.


    Even the senate heads of the Silver Union had no authority to read these scrolls and documents. The archivists were the only ones allowed to ess them.


    The Diviner¡¯s Tower was like a mysterious organization that remainedpletely isted from the outside world. They did not rely on anyone, and they did not harm anyone. They only observed in silence from a height that no ordinary adept could imagine, monitoring every crucial thing that happened within the ne.


    What gave the archivists such authority was the Omniscient Eye ced above the top of the tower.


    The Omniscient Eye amplified every archivist¡¯s powers while they were in the Diviners¡¯ Tower. Apart from a few areas within the World of Adepts that were affected by unusual powers, everything in the ne was like an open book to them. They could cast their gaze towards any location at any time.


    In the eyes of the archivists, there were no secrets in this world!


    However, at this moment, this inconspicuous old man who held the ultimate authority of the Diviner¡¯s Tower and the one hundred archivists within seemed exceptionally excited. He waved his arms around uncontrobly upon walking into the room.


    ¡°Fate is flowing. Fate is flowing...the River of Fate is warning me again. A revolution that will change the future of the World of Adepts forever is happening in the Central Lands right now. Hurry...hurry! Inform Indal immediately. I want all of his Eagles to move out now and record everything happening there.¡±


    It was the first time the young archivist had seen his teacher so excited, so much so that he seemed almost insane. The young child hastily brushed away the scroll he was writing on and took out a crystal from between the books. He ced the crystal on the desk, rubbed it slowly, and whispered into it.


    A short momentter, lights flickered in the room as the image of a middle-aged man with firm facial features appeared. The man wore an emblem with a scroll and quill on his robe. The strange tattoo of an eye was also drawn on his forehead.


    That was the symbol of the Omniscient Eye!


    ¡°Tower Master, what has happened? Why did you summon me in such a hurry?¡± The man bowed respectfully to the old man, somewhat confused.


    ¡°Indal, send out all members of your Eagle Squad and hurry to the Central Lands! There, in a ce known as Ironwood City, something important is currently happening. I ask that you observe from a close distance and urately record everything that happens there.¡±


    ¡°All members of Eagle?¡± The man lifted his head in surprise, but quickly nodded and said, ¡°Understood, my lord. I will give the order immediately! I will also be going there in person to oversee everything personally. I won¡¯t let you down.¡±


    ¡°As long as you understand! Remember, the main Fateline is always hidden and concealed under countless events and happenings. Your task is to peel away everything and find the true Fateline. Then, observe carefully and record how Fate affects the future through each individual involved and each event that urs. Most importantly, you must find out the individuals that are pushing the Fateline forward. They are the core of Fate that we must observe and understand!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    As Indal acknowledged his orders, his image slowly faded away.


    Five minutester, several strange individuals dressed in silver robes with scrolls and quills in hand walked out of their rooms all over the tower. They walked to their balconies and transformed into handsome and majestic eagles. They cried out loud and dashed into the air.


    Eleven massive eagles circled above the Diviner¡¯s Tower before turning under their captain¡¯s lead and flying towards the Central Lands.


    The young archivist apprentice crouching on the banister had no choice but to turn his envious gaze away and back to his teacher.


    ¡°Teacher, I¡ª¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t even think about it! You¡¯re still young. You have not experienced the real world and have no idea of the evil hearts of people. You will suffer greatly if you go on an expedition now.¡±


    ¡°It shouldn¡¯t be a problem if I go with Uncle Indal, will it?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! They have a mission on hand right now. They can¡¯t be distracted by taking care of you. Also, how many of the scrolls on the Central Lands have you read?¡±


    The apprentice felt his head swell when the old man mentioned those records.


    ¡°Teacher, there are over three hundred rooms full of records on the Central Lands¡¯ history alone. I...I¡¯m only on Year 31,428.¡±


    ¡°So you¡¯ve only understood the most recent 1,500 years of the Central Lands. That¡¯s 31,000 years more to go! I won¡¯t let you go out until you¡¯ve finished reading theplete history of the continent and be an actual archivist.¡±


    The young child¡¯s face twitched when he heard the old man¡¯s reply. He had been studying diligently without rest for two years, and he barely managed to grasp the changes and development of the Centra Lands in the past thousand years.


    If he had to master the history that reached over thirty thousand years ago, along with the development of the three major organizations, he would go insane just at the thought of all the reading he had to do.


    ¡°Sonke, these are the basics of an archivist. You won¡¯t be able to hold that quill firmly if you don¡¯t wear away the instinctual impatience and sloth of humans upon the vast sea of books. Every schr that walks out of the Diviner¡¯s Tower as a representative of the Omniscient Eye is a reliablepanion. You, on the other hand...have a long way to go!¡±


    ¡°Then...teacher, if an apprentice can¡¯t bear this boring and tedious lifestyle any longer and wants to give up halfway through, what would happen to them?¡± Sonke¡¯s eyes started gleaming.


    ¡°Haha! What kind of ce do you think the Diviner¡¯s Tower is? No one can take away any secrets of the world from here. If you can¡¯t be an archivist, then the moment you give up, everything youmitted to memory will vanish without a trace.¡±


    Having said that, the old man looked towards the distant horizon out of his window. ¡°No one can take away the secrets here! They belong only to this tower.¡±


    The young Sonke wiped away the cold sweat from his forehead andposed himself. He bowed to the old man and returned to the desk,mitting himself fully to his studying and recording again.


    A strange eyeball glowing with a golden sheen watched the distance tirelessly atop the tower.


    Where its gazended, the mists of Fate dissipated, and an image would appear, revealing the truths of the world.

 Chapter 1277 - Sun’s Water

    <h4>Chapter 1277 Sun¡¯s Water</h4>


    Silver Union, the Castle in the Sky.


    As the core location of the Castle in the Sky, every action from the Diviner¡¯s Tower would tug on the strings and minds of the Silver Union leaders.


    News of theplete mobilization of the archivists¡¯ Eagles reached the Union senate leader¡¯s desk in less than five minutes. His expression turned solemn.


    Union Senate Head Salvini had a humanoid form, but his skin gleamed with a light golden color resembling that of metal. His every action appeared somewhat stiff and slow, and a strange noise could be heard when the magical machinery within his body moved.


    As a Fourth Grade mechanical adept, Senate Head Salvini had mechanically modified his body to a shocking extent. At this point, it would be more urate to call him a new form of metallic lifeform than a mechanical adept.


    ¡°The Eagles. Complete mobilization.¡±


    Salvini pushed open the scroll with his stiff fingers and slowly read the report that appeared on the parchment.


    ¡°Those rigid bookworms of the Diviner¡¯s Tower. They always reject our applications to ess the information they have. They keep saying that Fate¡¯s secrets can¡¯t be revealed or that the information we are requesting is too sensitive. All of our attempts to obtain any information have failed. Hmph! The Union provides them with so many magical crystals every year, yet they refuse to contribute a single thing. How utterly ridiculous!¡± Vice-Senate Head Melone, who had also modified himself with all sorts of magical machinery,ined resentfully.


    Salvini shook his head and smiled bitterly. ¡°There¡¯s no point inining! The two of us are higher-ups of the Silver Union and rulers of the Castle in the Sky. We might seem to be on top of the world, but only the two of us know that all this is fake. At the very least, the three most important locations in the Castle in the Sky aren¡¯t even in our control: the Diviner¡¯s Tower, the Vortex Tower, and the Obelisk. If it weren¡¯t for the previous senate¡¯s insistent and reckless demands, we probably wouldn¡¯t even have ess to the Mystic Realm of Machines.¡±


    Melone was still furious. He gritted his teeth and said, ¡°Why don¡¯t we pause all magical crystal supply to the Diviner¡¯s Tower and force them into apromise?¡±


    Salvini shook his head even harder when he heard this horrible idea.


    ¡°The Diviner¡¯s Tower is a mysterious ce left behind by the older generations of the Silver Union; it¡¯spletely out of the Union Senate¡¯s jurisdiction. You should know that thest senate head repeatedly warned me not to cut off the supply of resources to those few locations when he handed over the position to me, no matter the conditions. We are also not to intervene or interfere in their affairs in any manner.¡±


    That was the first time Melone had heard of such a thing.


    He was stunned and stuttered as he said, ¡°Then what he means is¡ª¡±


    ¡°The previous senate head¡¯s meaning couldn¡¯t be more clearly expressed. What is essential in the Castle isn¡¯t us or all the things out there, but those few key locations. The reason the first Union Senate had expended such tremendous resources and human resources to construct the Castle in the Sky wasn¡¯t to boast of the Silver Union¡¯s power, but to protect these ces.¡±


    ¡°Thus, in all honesty, we are not the owners of this ce. We are little more than guardians!¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    A period of silence sank in.


    After a long while, Melone finally spoke again.


    ¡°Then what do you think of the incident this time?¡±


    ¡°Those archivists have always been this mysterious. They keep their mouths tightly shut. The only things that could interest them are the significant events that ur all over the ne, especially events that can affect the world¡¯s future development. So, the fact that they are mobilizing so many of their forces means something big is bound to happen soon. Speaking of which, have you figured out their destination yet?¡±


    ¡°Yes, as a matter of fact, I have. They seem to be headed to the Central Lands!¡±


    ¡°The Central Lands? What has happened there recently? Have Lodin immediately bring us all information on the Central Lands in recent years. We need to assess everything. Perhaps we can find a clue in there.¡±


    ¡°Understood, I will call for him now.¡±


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    Greem, who had never liked being involved in worldly affairs, hid in his tower after leaving all the academy administration to his subordinates. He started a new series of magical research.


    At his level, all research could not avoid the strange existences that were the principles. However, as a Fourth Grade adept, it was a little too early for him to research the principles themselves. He could only lower his standards and began an in-depth analysis of the various narws that made up the principles.


    Moreover, the research ofws could bring him an innumerable number of benefits.


    Disregarding the firews¡¯ unique effects could provide his spells with, the firews themselves were his stairway to Fifth Grade.


    Greem had been too unfamiliar with thew powers in the past. Naturally, this meant that he treasured every one of them and tried to grab hold of every firew he came across, refusing to give up even a single one. However, having experienced the formation of thew runes and having obtained the method of extracting principles fires from the Fire King, Greem finally had aprehensive understanding of thew powers.


    Not all firews suited him.


    If he wanted his future path to be smoother and his power to be greater, the only choice was to carefully select the appropriate firews!


    Being indiscriminate and pursuing sheer numbers in the number of narws possessed was probably amon mistake among all elementium adepts.


    After all, not everyone had such excellent talent that they could pick and choose what elementiumws they wanted. Even though the grasp of the elementiumws greatly corrted with the direction of an individual adept¡¯s research and understanding, there were still many uncontroble factors involved in the process.


    Consequently, most elementium adepts had incredible trouble improving their Spirit to 50 points and merging sufficient elementiumws to form their own unique principle power before their lifespan ended.


    Most Fourth Grade adepts were incapable of umting so much knowledge and could only rely on unique resources like origin substances to shorten the process of grasping thews. However, thew powers provided by the origin substances were often random and uncontroble.


    Elementium adepts that managed to reach Fifth Grade out of sheer luck and the umtion of origin substances would be the weakest of Fifth Grade Great Adepts.


    Most of the Seventh and Eighth Grade Great Adepts were actually ancient adepts. There were simply far too few new adepts that could reach that level in the past ten thousand years. The ultimate reason for that was the origin substances.


    Adepts sought to hasten their growth and take shortcuts. The consequence was a tremendous exhaustion of their innate talents and potential at the hands of origin substances.


    The duality of origin substances caused adept camps all over the realms beyond to put a strict restriction on the supply and flow of this resource. It was to prevent too many adepts in the World of Adepts from relying on origin substances to push them to Fifth Grade, simply because they couldn¡¯t bear the dull and monotonous process of grasping thews.


    In the eyes of the Great Adepts, the birth of a single Sixth Grade Great Adept was more significant than the appearance of ten Fifth Grade Great Adepts that barely achieved their advancement.


    Greem stood in front of an alchemy tform in a brightly litboratory. He was carefully mixing the alchemical liquid in front of him.


    Bluesteel, Illuminas, sparkling stones, sr flowers, Serpenthemp, Blood of the Old God¨C a dozen incredibly valuable magical materials were processed and then mixed into the liquid.


    ¡°Serpenthemp, crushed and squeezed for juice...filtered and purified thirteen times to be extracted into 50 grams of liquid. Await heating processing.


    ¡°Sparkling stones, crushed and sifted...grind into powder after removing all impurities. Mix with Serpenthemp liquid, add a small amount of energy modtion agent, and mix.


    ¡°Blood of the Old God......


    ¡°......¡±


    Alchemy in the World of Adepts was a series of unique chemical reactions of magic energy. Unlike chemistry on Earth, magical particles of all sorts were involved in every step and every reaction.


    Thebination of magic energy with chemistry is what formed the unique field of alchemy!


    Greem had gone to great lengths to mix this liquid. Every hundred grams of the fluid would sell for at least thirty thousand magical crystals. Its purpose was to imitate the drop of Geraldine¡¯s origin blood, the data of which Greem had stored in his mind.


    Geraldine, Fourth Grade elementium adept of the Adept¡¯s Association, light affinity.


    His origin blood had disintegrated into countless tiny data points and was stored in Greem¡¯s mind after it was analyzed. Right now, Greem was trying to rely on the Chip¡¯s powerful replication abilities to recreate that drop of origin blood through the use of magical materials.


    Even though he had the data and the Chip itself was sufficiently powerful, there were still tremendous difficulties replicating a drop of origin blood from a Fourth Grade elementium adept.


    The most challenging thing was the choice of blood!


    After half a year of repeated experiments and countless selections, Greem finally had a decent test result. When the milky-white liquid hovered in front of him, excitement flushed on Greem¡¯s face.


    ¡°Chip, analyze the final product!¡±


    [Beep. Comprehensive scan begun.


    [Liquid is an amalgamation of light elementium of high purity.


    [Cell activity of liquid meets expectations.


    [Energy traits meet expectations.


    [Energy density is slightly reduced at 3% below expectations.


    [Radiation slightly higher than expectations, but within eptable ranges.


    [Energyw aura is dense. Liquid is estimated to possess 76% of the power of the original model.]


    ¡°......¡±


    A series of data and information filled Greem¡¯s mind as the scan proceeded. However, he ignored everything and looked at the final conclusion.


    [Liquid possesses the might of light elementiumws. Able to achieve 76% power of the original sample. To achieve an independent andplete energy cirction system, an estimated 7200 grams has to be produced. Requesting instructions from Host: what should liquid be named?]


    ¡°Sun¡¯s Water!¡±


    [Beep. The new liquid, ¡®Sun¡¯s Water,¡¯ has been named. Mass production in progress. Estimated time untilpletion: 72 hours, 34 minutes, 58 seconds.]


    The first drop of Sun¡¯s Water was the hardest to create. However, once that was sessful, the rest of the manufacturing could be done by the tower spirit.


    Greem let out a long breath of air and turned his attention to other experiments.

 Chapter 1278 - A Battle Looms

    Chapter 1278 A Battle Looms


    Ice dragon heart, a Fourth Grade material.


    It was the heart of the skeletal ice dragon, Nax, which it had preserved before modifying its body and soul origin with the Ancient Reliquary.


    One could tell that Nax had put a lot of effort into preserving their vital organ. It was more than evident from the materials and techniques used to seal the heart in ice. They were all expensive, rare resources.


    The result of Nax¡¯s action was...that Greem obtained a very high-quality Fourth Grade magical material.


    That was all the heart could be now¨C a magical material!


    In the hands of a high-grade alchemist, an ice dragon¡¯s heart could be processed into a treasure like a Heart of Frost, which, when equipped, could provide its user with additional ice damage and freezing effect.


    Meanwhile, in the hands of a golem master, the heart could be turned into a high-gradeponent for a golem, or even as an auxiliary tool for the adept themselves. The heart would probably be modified into a source of power.


    Apart from these, the heart could also be grafted onto a voodoo beast or a mutated beast to create an exceedingly powerful magical servant.


    Meanwhile, Greem himself, after consulting the Chip¡¯s calctions, believed it was most optimal to simply sacrifice the dragon¡¯s heart as a Fourth Grade material to nourish his starbeast bloodline.


    At his current level, Greem had already maximized all aspects of hisbat prowess. Almost everything that could be improved upon had already been improved. From now on, the improvement of his powers had reached a teau.


    The only things that could still effectively improve his power were improvements to his Spirit, his soul origin, and his bloodline talent.


    Among these, Spirit could only be raised by constant daily meditations. The effects were minuscule, but at the very least, his Spirit was still improving, as slow as it might be. The deep meditations, which had been so effective in the past, only saw some trace results after one to two months of meditation.


    However, Greem could also read the Tome of Corruption as another means to improve his Spirit. In this regard, the rate at which his Spirit improved was ten times that of the ordinary Fourth Grade adept.


    The improvement of the soul origin was also something that could only be left to luck.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s estimates, Greem first had to collect a sufficient number of firews. Then, he had to refine those firews into his uniquew fire through the method provided by the Fire King. The moment hisw fire was ignited would be the moment he advanced to Fifth Grade. It would also be the instant his soul origin would ascend to another level.


    There was no other solution apart from this!


    Meanwhile, the only way to improve Greem¡¯s bloodline talent was to constantly devour the flesh of high-grade creatures, particrly those filled withw aura.


    Wild starbeasts spent their lives roaming the endless space, searching for the next nar world they could invade. Their only purpose in invading nar worlds was to devour flesh, steal souls, and extract the nar origin leaking out from the breaking ne.


    However, at their core, what the starbeasts devoured were actually shattered pieces of the narws.


    While ordinary creatures saw narw shards as a deadly poison, the shards ofw were the best delicacy the starbeasts could ever ask for. The starbeasts could not only eat thesews; they could also digest and absorb them, extracting the corresponding powers from thew shards and distorting them for their own use.


    The reason starbeasts were so powerful was that they werew creatures from the moment they turned into adolescents. The nature of the lifeform and the level of their souls were far superior to most nar creatures.


    That was why Greem had to find highly valuable and highly nutritious flesh to nourish his starbeast bloodline if he wished to improve the Chaos Physique.


    The ice dragon¡¯s heart undoubtedly matched this requirement!


    The blood ritual that he had prepared for the Feathered Serpent¡¯s egg hadn¡¯te to fruition. However, it was the perfect ritual to be used on this heart.


    While Greem was carefully preparing the special items required for the blood ritual, urgent news from the outside world forced him to put his work aside and emerge from hisb.


    The news came from Emelia.


    Gargamel and Emelia knew Greem well enough to know that he hated being disturbed while he was in seclusion. That was why Emelia¡¯s decision to send an urgent alert through special channels was evidence that something significant had urred. It was something that Greem had to deal with personally.


    Thus, Greem quickly took a look at the information sent to him. A stern expression shed across his calm andposed face.


    ¡°...conflict at the borders...conflict continues to escte. The Dener n has begun to mobilize their most of their forces. Border City Andman has fallen into enemy hands...Crimson Grand Duke Antoneil has been captured along with the city.¡±


    The Dener n.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but brood in silence.


    That was the powerful adept n that Fourth Grade Adept Ker belonged to.


    His rtionship with this Ker had been fairly amicable since his advancement to Fourth Grade. Even though they weren¡¯t intimate in any fashion, they still tolerated and respected each other¡¯s organization, out of respect for their status as Fourth Grade organizations.


    In the past hundred years, all of the Crimson n¡¯s expansions had intentionally avoided Dener territory. They did not even lift a single finger against their subordinate forces.


    To think, the Dener n had started trouble, even under such circumstances! Even though he had no evidence or information that informed him so, Greem could already smell the scent of a conspiracy in the shadows!


    It seemed like Horton Magic Academy¡¯s establishment had been a sharp stimnt to specific individuals, so much so that they couldn¡¯t help but reveal themselves from behind the curtains. It seemed to have given them the courage to tear aside their facade and fight with the Crimson n.


    Moreover, these people had even detained a Grand Duke. It was apparent that they were trying to provoke the fury of the Crimson n.


    Ever since the massive Crimson Kingdom was founded, there had already been three generations of kings. However, there had only been five officially titled Crimson Grand Dukes. These Grand Dukes represented the five subordinate forces branching out of the Crimson n.


    Even though these Crimson Grand Dukes were only ordinary human nobles that werepletely insignificant within the n, they represented the Crimson n¡¯s reputation and dignity to the public.


    Since the enemy had detained a Crimson Grand Duke, they were clearly trying to mar the reputation of the Crimson n.


    They were leaving no room for the Crimson n to remain uninvolved, yet still keeping enough room for negotiation and to prevent war. Otherwise, detaining a Second Grade adept would have been a much more effective military measure than capturing a Crimson Grand Duke.


    What was Ker nning, exactly? Was she willing to be used by the Association¡¯s old fools and be a sharp knife to be used against the Crimson n and him? Hehehe. Don¡¯t they think it¡¯s toote for them to act only now?


    Greem thought to himself as he strode into the teleportation room.


    Since these enemies did not intend to let him live in peace, then it was time for the Crimson n to retaliate with all its force. He would warn these ambitious conspirators that he, Greem, was not a force to be messed with, not by clowns like themselves. He would do so with fire and fury.


    ............


    Andman City. A small, insignificant city thaty on the southwest border of Ailovis.


    The fires burning all over the city had not beenpletely extinguished. ck clouds of smoke rolled above the sky, staining the horizon grey.


    The typically quiet city was dead silent now. All the doors and windows of the buildings within were shut tight. Confused and terrified gazes came from between the cracks in the windows as the citizens peeked at the strange army marching on the streets.


    It was an adept force belonging to the Dener n. Robust and muscr apprentice adepts rode on towering mounts, covered in thick, runed armor as they patrolled the streets.


    The apprentices would asionally charge into the houses, chasing their residents onto the streets and making them kneel along the road like ves. Anyone that dared resist them was executed on the spot.


    The corpses pinned to the walls and roofs were the fate of anyone that rebelled!


    The apprentices were hunting for the Crimson nobles and adepts that were hiding in the city. All suspects were sent to the jail and locked up.


    Several adepts riding on massive, two-headed eagles circled in the air, keeping a close eye on the city and making sure no one entered or exited.


    Arge group of Dener n adepts walked in and out of a fine vi a few hundred meters outside of the city. They were using this spot as their outpost.


    The vi itself was a three-story wooden building. At the moment, it was closely guarded by many voodoo beasts and guards.


    The second floor.


    In a very secure room.


    Antoneil closed the wooden window and turned his gaze away. He paced the room impatiently.


    Adept Sterling, who was quietly reading a book on a couch, couldn¡¯t help but chuckle when he saw this. ¡°Grand Duke, no need to be so frustrated! With how far things have gone, the affair is no longer within the control of people like you and me.¡±


    Antoneil suddenly stopped walking. He put his ear to the wall to hear for movement in the corridor beforeining to the adept, ¡°Aren¡¯t you a free-spirit? Well, I can¡¯t see things the same way you do! The two of us walked into a trap and fell into the hands of the Dener n. Who knows how the n will respond? If war breaks out......¡±


    The Crimson n and the Dener n were both famous Fourth Grade forces in the Central Lands. The Crimson n was even a one-of-a-kind ultra-n. If war were to break out under such circumstances, the consequences were unimaginable.


    Even a Crimson Grand Duke like himself could not bear the responsibility for such an event.


    As Antoneil¡¯s advisor, Sterling had a much broader worldview than his employer. He casually asked, ¡°What is it, my lord? Do you still think, at this point in time, that this conflict started because of some mistake on our part?¡±


    ¡°Is there any other reason than that?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe,¡± Sterling chuckled and said, ¡°You think too highly of you and me! Let me be honest with you. Even the two of us put together don¡¯t have the required weight to start a war like this. This is an adept war, not a worldly war for territory. The yers of this game aren¡¯t you and me, but......¡±


    Having said that, Sterling stopped speaking and turned to look towards the northeast, his gaze piercing through the walls and the vi.


    There. In that directiony the holynd of the Crimson n, home of the legendary n leader, Greem!

 Chapter 1279 - Manor and Valley

    <h4>Chapter 1279 Manor and Valley</h4>


    A ck carriage slowly drove into ck Rose Manor.


    The wooden wheels crushed the gray stones beneath it, letting out a soft crackling sound.


    The carriage passed down the hundred-meter long path, turned past a dried-up fountain, and slowly came to a stop at the manor¡¯s three-story building.


    A dozen individuals dressed in gray, white, or ck robes were already waiting by the stone steps. They bowed and paid their respects to the prettydy stepping out of the carriage.


    This person was a beautiful woman with striking looks and an impressive figure.


    Her light-golden hairplimented her skin, making it look as smooth and white as ivory. The light-purple lips beneath her shapely nose gleamed with an enchanting sheen. Her beautiful, jewel-like eyes reflected a lovely color under the light, yet also appeared to have a tremendous depth to them.


    Despite being a Third Grade psionic of the Dener n, she did not wear an adept¡¯s robe. Instead, she was wearing a ck dinner dress, like an ordinary nobledy. Her breasts were pressed firmly together by the dress, framed by a beautifully bejeweled corsage. A pair of white silk gloves were gripped in her slender fingers, each finger as smooth and pretty as jade.


    ¡°Wee, Lady Marilyn Mona!¡±


    ¡°Wee, wee.¡±


    The young and prettydy stood straight when she heard the words of greeting. Her gaze swept past the people around her andnded on the building.


    A massive web of invisible Spirit was released and withdrawn. In a single instant, everything happening in the building and the entirety of ck Rose Manor appeared in her mind.


    The woman couldn¡¯t help but frown slightly.


    However, this slight frown on her face only made her even more seductive than before. The dozen low-grade adepts present couldn¡¯t help but gulp, regardless if they were male or female. They once again felt that irresistible charm and lust that made their lips hot and their throats dry.


    A few of the First Grade adepts even had to force themselves to lower their heads and use magic to protect their minds, just to resist the terrifying impulse to kneel before Lady Mona and professing their undying loyalty.


    ¡°Why are the facilities here so crude? That Grand Duke fellow should have more ss than this, shouldn¡¯t he?¡± The lovelydy finally couldn¡¯t help butin after examining her surroundings, ¡°Couldn¡¯t you guys have found a better outpost? Do you really expect me to spend the night in such a run-down hut?¡±


    The Second Grade adept in charge of the group stepped forward when he heard the woman¡¯s questions. He lowered his hands and answered, ¡°Mydy, we didn¡¯t choose this location as our outpost. It was Lord Gallow¡¯s decision!¡±


    ¡°Gallow, Gallow...that bastard again. He can never let me rest,¡± Marilyn Monained angrily and walked into the building with light steps.


    The n adepts walked around her, like stars around a moon.


    Finally, after everyone sat down in the hall, Marilyn once again asked, ¡°Where¡¯s Gallow? Isn¡¯t he supposed to be here?¡±


    The same adept stood up to answer the question.


    ¡°Lord Gallow was supposed to be here. However, he received orders from n headquarters two days ago and left with the Bloody Spear Army.¡±


    ¡°Then what forces remain stationed here?¡±


    ¡°We have been constantly assaulted by the Crimson adepts ever since we entered the Ailovis Region. The Harps are fighting the Crimson n¡¯s magical machine army about fifty kilometers to the east. The Toyboxes are sieging the City of Loches in the southeast; the city is protected by a Crimson n adept tower. It will take some time for it to fall. The Stonedragons, on the other hand, have been sent to the north. It¡¯s said that Emelia of the Crimson n has arrived at Coldmountain City to reinforce the frontlines.¡±


    ¡°Obviously. I personally issued half of these arrangements. How would I not know of them? What I¡¯m asking is what forces remain stationed close to this damned manor?¡±


    ¡°Only the Second Voodoo Beast Army and us of the Seventh Adept Squad. The other forces are already engaged with the Crimson n¡¯s army!¡±


    ording to the military distribution of the Dener n, a voodoo beast army contained at least ten thousand voodoo beasts of various grades, while an adept squad consisted of fifteen First or Second Grade adepts.


    In all honesty, defending the lowly manor of a human noble with ten thousand voodoo beasts and fifteen adepts was absolute overkill and a waste of military power. However, considering that a Crimson Grand Duke was imprisoned here, this much security was necessary.


    No matter how glorious their title and position in the hierarchy were, a human noble was no more than a pathetic dog in the eyes of the adepts. In truth, the Dener n did not need to treat a noble with such seriousness.


    Dogs would always be dogs. They would never earn respect and treatment equal to an adept. However, when a dog¡¯s name started with the word ¡®Crimson,¡¯ even the arrogant Dener n had to treat them seriously.


    After all, there were only five dogs in the Crimson n that held the title of Crimson Grand Duke!


    Under such circumstances, a Crimson Grand Duke¡¯s status might be higher than an ordinary First Grade adept. They might be equal to even the Second Grade adepts.


    However, this referred only to their status and position. In truth, it was self-evident that the adepts were far more significant and essential individuals. The title of Crimson Grand Duke could be bestowed on anyone. The Dukes themselves were just ordinary people, after all. However, a Second Grade adept had actual power beyond what mortals were capable of.


    The fact that the Dener n now held a Crimson Grand Duke captive was a vicious insult to the Crimson n. The Crimson n would either have to save their Grand Duke or capture an individual of equal importance from the Dener n. Otherwise, they would lose face and reputation.


    However, this was precisely the most intolerable action that could be taken against the quickly rising Crimson n!


    ¡°Only a voodoo beast army and you people?¡± Marilyn Mona couldn¡¯t help but frown again.


    ¡°Mydy, there shouldn¡¯t be any problems, are there?¡± The Second Grade adept said in a surprised tone. ¡°We are just guarding a human noble and his First Grade adept and advisor. Is this force not sufficient for this task?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! What do you know? This Crimson Grand Duke might not be much in peaceful times, but in instances of escting conflict between ns such as now, he represents the Crimson n¡¯s face. They will be sending people to save him!¡±


    Marilyn was still upset. She continued angrily, ¡°The n¡¯s forces have been scattered all over to fight against the Crimson n¡¯s forces. Naturally, they can¡¯t send an army to attack this ce. That only leaves them with the option of sending elites. I was wondering when the bastards at headquarters were nice enough to let me sit behind the frontlines. Now I know why! This is the most dangerous ce. Hmph.¡±


    The fifteen Dener n adepts in the hall couldn¡¯t help but be nervous when they heard Marilyn¡¯s exnation. However, a few of the Second Grade adepts with the most potent auras licked their lips. They seemed to have gotten excited at the scent of blood.


    ¡°My lord, what do you think we should......¡± The Second Grade leader of the group asked in a soft voice.


    ¡°Ry my orders immediately. Have my Dream Garden forcee to me!¡±


    ¡°This...mydy, this order seems to contradict the assignments from headquarters. Should anything happen over at headquarters......¡±


    ¡°Hmph! My psionic powers are only at their most powerful when my Dream Garden is with me. Those bastards from headquarters know as much. Just ry my orders as is and have the Dream Garden force march here without stopping. If those bastards at headquarters stop me, then they can¡¯t me me if I walk away from all this!¡±


    ¡°Yes...understood. I will contact headquarters now!¡± The male adept nodded and agreed when he heard Marilyn¡¯s cold reply. Beads of sweat had formed on his forehead.


    ¡°Alright, all of you leave me and go make your arrangements or rest or whatever it is you do! Also, send the Grand Duke¡¯s advisor to my room. I want to see if he has any information of value in his mind.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ............


    A silent and deste valley.


    The forest trees were tall and old, their massive canopies covering vast swathes of the ground like giant umbres. Several hills stood around the area, along with gulches and ravines. The cries of birds and insects alike could be heard here and there.


    Buzz.


    Suddenly, an odd sound could be heard in the air.


    Three metal eyeballs the size of human heads flew through the air above the forest, leaving faint, fading trails of blue.


    One of the metal eyeballs perched high in the sky close to the valley, scanning everything within range. The other two dived into the forest and wove deftly between the branches and vines. Faint blue beams shot in every direction, checking for suspicious activity.


    The critters of the forest quickly hid in theirirs, and the forest instantly fell silent. All living beings stilled their breath, not daring to show themselves at all.


    The eyeball machines passed through and found nothing abnormal, so they returned to the sky. The three eyeball machines, in formation, flew towards the next patch of forest.


    When the eyeballs had disappeared from view, light shimmered beneath a tree. A group of adepts riding on magical mounts tore down the illusion barrier and revealed themselves.


    The leader was Third Grade Scarface Gallow, his face full of stitches and scars as if he had been torn apart.


    He rode on an exceedingly mighty horse. He turned and looked in the direction the machines had disappeared in as a solemn expression took over his face.


    This magical horse was particrly vicious. It was pitch ck and covered in dark violet scales. Its mouth was filled with de-like teeth and two long fangs.


    It was evident from a single nce that this was no magical creature born of nature. No, it was a magical beast that the adepts had specially bred and cultivated!

 Chapter 1280 - The Bug Adept Arrives

    <h4>Chapter 1280 The Bug Adept Arrives</h4>


    While Scarface Gallow stared in the direction the machines had vanished, a particrly muscr warrior in ck armor rode up beside him.


    The two ferocious magical horses showed no signs of intimacy next to each other. Instead, they growled and roared, trying to intimidate each other.


    After all, all magical horses were created through magical methods. The shadow of various magical creatures such as earthlions, shadow panthers, and unicorns could be seen in their bodies. It was because of theirplex genesis and chaotic gic sequence that there were only males among them. These creatures could not procreate naturally.


    Moreover, they only had a short lifespan of ten years. They were considered cheap voodoo beasts that could be manufactured en masse!


    However, cheap didn¡¯t mean weak.


    Because of how short their lives were, the adepts went all out in wringing out every bit ofbat potential they had within them. The beasts became even more ferocious and vicious than what was possible for creatures born in nature.


    Gallow¡¯s magical sword was tied to his back. He reached out arge palm and knocked the horse lightly on its head. ¡°Silence! If you alert the enemy¡¯s scouts, I will roast both of you for dinner.¡±


    His tone was light, but there was terrible intimidation behind it. The two magical horses immediately lowered their heads and became much less ferocious.


    ¡°Boss, do you think our ambush will seed?¡± The warrior in ck armor was a body-refining adept as well. His bulging muscles almost seemed like they would cause his armor to burst apart. He had a long scar across his face, which he had not bothered to do away with. The scar made him appear like a cruel and savage bandit.


    However, this intimidating man was as gentle as a rabbit in front of Scarface Gallow. In fact, he had a fawning smile on his face as he talked to Gallow.


    ¡°That is none of your concern!¡± Gallow rebuked coldly. However, he quickly instructed in a soft voice, ¡°The Swamp of Tragedies that we are invading this time is a restricted Crimson n area. It¡¯s said that this is where they grow their mushrooms.¡±


    The warrior¡¯s face lit up when he heard this. He licked his dry lips with his long, red tongue; excitement was written all over his face.


    The Crimson n¡¯s mushrooms. That was one of the best resources in the Central Lands that everyone had been seeking recently.


    It was said that these unique mushrooms from another world could effectively increase the Physique of an adept. High-grade adepts could improve their Physique by around 1 point, while intermediate adepts could improve it by an average of 2 points.


    As for low-grade adepts? Heh. At this point, there had not been a low-grade adept lucky enough to get their hands on such an excellent resource.


    The warrior, who was only beginner Third Grade himself, once believed that he would never set eyes upon such a valuable treasure. Who knew that the n¡¯s assault mission this time was to raid and destroy that restricted area of the Crimson n¨C the Swamp of Tragedies.


    With a little bit of luck, even he, the vicemander of the Bloody Spears, could get his hands on some decent loot.


    The warrior started licking his lips even more voraciously at the thought.


    ¡°Keep your guard up. Our operation might not go too well this time! If we run into the more infamous bastards of the Crimson n,¡± Even Gallow couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes at this point, ¡°Pray for yourself!¡±


    ¡°It will be fine. We have you, don¡¯t we, boss?¡± The warrior in ck armor didn¡¯t seem to worry. ¡°Boss, you are a peak Third Grade adept! The Crimson n might have quite a few Third Grades, but I have never heard of anyone whose might could rival yours!¡±


    Scarface Gallow shook his head dejectedly and said, ¡°Rumors are not to be trusted! If rumors were all true, then I would never have lost at the hands of Greem.¡±


    Gallow had to squeeze Greem¡¯s name out of his mouth when he said it. It had already been a hundred years, but the defeat still weighed on him.


    That might have been the one moment in his life where he had been closest to Fourth Grade!


    Without origin substances, he could only rely on his bloodline talent to slowly umte the energy required for his advancement. The difficulty and risk in this process was not something that others could ever understand.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, boss! There can¡¯t be more than a few legends like the legendary fire adept. Perhaps......¡±


    Amotion came from within the magical horses¡¯ ranks scattered throughout the forest as the warrior chattered on.


    Themotion gradually grew in scale, and it almost seemed like total chaos was about to break out.


    ¡°What¡¯s happening? You bastards, don¡¯t you know we are undertaking a covert mission? What¡¯s with all the noise?¡± The warrior in ck shouted in a restrained voice.


    ¡°Bugs...bugs......¡±


    ¡°Boss, there are bugs!¡±


    Scarface Gallow¡¯s heart sank when he heard the panicked cries of the knights.


    The Bloody Spears was an adept army that he had personally built up. Every member of the party was a First Grade adept at the very least. The knight leaders spread throughout the army were also required to have the might of an intermediate Second Grade.


    Meanwhile, as themander, he was peak Third Grade, while the vicemander was beginner Third Grade.


    Such a powerful army of magical knights would not panic, even if they were thrown into a horde of magical creatures. They would show no signs of fear or hesitation, no matter how perilous the path before them. They would pave a road of blood with their spears and swords, only stopping their endless ughter when the heads of all their enemies hung by their saddles.


    An army like this would be afraid of mere bugs? Either the person who made this im had gone mad, or...those were no ordinary bugs!


    Scarface Gallow was truly an elite adept that could serve as the leader of the Bloody Spears. The image of a terrifying adept instantly came to mind when he heard of the bugs.


    He could only hope that it wasn¡¯t that bastard.


    Gallow prayed to himself and patted his horse, diving straight towards the area where themotion was the greatest.


    The magical horse was not only able to bound rapidly across tnd. It could even scale steep cliffs and climb tall trees with its sharp, wed limbs.


    Gallow soon arrived at the location after a few quick leaps. The scene that came into sight made his and the vicemander¡¯s hearts to sink.


    Several half-meter-tall dirt mounds had risen from the ck ground near the roots of a tree. The dirt had broken apart, and countless terrifying ck beetles were swarming up from below.


    These ck beetles were all the size of mastiffs, their shells gleaming with a terrifying sheen under the forest¡¯s dim light. Apart from their tough shells, they also had four pairs of sharp limbs gleaming with a metallic shine and a giant pair of pincers in front of their mouths.


    These ck beetles might not look monstrous apart from their size, but they were incredibly challenging to deal with.


    Their shells were thick enough to resist ordinary magical weapons, while their limbs and pincers were sharp enough to slice through leather armor three fingers thick. Even the magical armor of the knights glowed when the beetles bit at them. Terrifying scratches and cuts were left on the metal surface.


    The appearance of the insect swarm had been too sudden. It had emerged directly beneath where the knights had been resting and instantly drowned three of the knights in a sea of ck.


    The other knights could no longer care for the gag order by then. Their runic spears pierced forth, each lunge apanied by a glowing explosion of magic.


    As members of the Bloody Spear, each and every one of them were qualified adepts. They were protected by magical armor, and the runic spears in their hands could unleash an elementium attack of their choosing, depending on the enemy¡¯s elementium attribute.


    Naturally, against the tide of insects, they chose fire attacks, which had thergest radius of attack and the most damage.


    Unfortunately, these ming spears that could quickly exterminate all life within a dozen meters barely worked on the insects. The ferocity of the mes and the sharp spears themselves could only kill the few beetles that were at the core of the explosion.


    The other ck beetles were only injured and recklessly attacked the three unfortunate knights caught in their midst.


    The three figures roared endlessly amidst the swarm, unleashing shocking elementium explosions. However, they couldn¡¯t break free of the encirclement of insects. The magical horses that had been caught in the tide were still valiantly resisting thanks to the scales on their bodies. An unbearable grinding, cracking sound of snapping teeth could be heard as they struggled.


    Sadly, there were too many insects attacking them. A little hill of insects had already gathered around them. The insects squirmed. Each wave of resistance from the knights would only cause ayer of ck beetles to fall off of the hill.


    However, it didn¡¯t matter how they fought with all their strength. The hill of insects was as thick and firm as ever, leaving them with no hope of escape. The beetles that continued to swarm approached the army of knights, seemingly intent on devouring everyst one of them.


    Bug Adept Billis...this was most certainly the work of Bug Adept Billis!


    The only one in the Crimson n who could cultivate such horrifying insects was the intermediate Third Grade bug adept, Billis.


    ¡°Rezai, go save the three of them!¡±


    Gallow drew the magical sword from his back, his cold, murky eyes scanning the battlefield for all movement.


    The warrior¡¯s name was Rezai.


    He acknowledged the order and pressed his thighs together, instructing his horse to charge towards the squirming pile of insects.


    Just as he was halfway across, Gallow roared, and his magical sword tremored. A shapeless, invisible thread of power sliced across the air, instantly beheading the two Voidreavers that had snuck to Rezai¡¯s side.


    The thread of force cut across the forest. Nothing could stand in its way.


    Trees and vines alike were severed at the waist.


    It passed through a seemingly empty clearing, and tragic insect cries could be heard immediately. Blood sttered as two heads went flying while their owner¡¯s insectoid bodies crashed out from the trees onto the grass.


    The death of the two Second Grade Voidreavers seemed to have signaled the start of an odd banquet of ughter. The cries of insects could be heard everywhere in the forest, loud and ring.


    Countless unusual insectoid silhouettes started to appear between the trees.

 Chapter 1281 - Pincer Attack

    <h4>Chapter 1281 Pincer Attack</h4>


    The swarm of insects descended.


    The forest had turned into a sea of bugs by the time the magical knights registered their presence.


    At a single nce, every inch of the forest floor was covered in the squirming figures of the ck insects. As more and more burrows started to appear, more and more terrifying insects emerged from below. The myriad of insects screeched and attacked the Bloody Spears madly.


    For a moment, the entirety of the forest ringed with deafening elementium explosions. The bright shes of fire, frost, and poison could be seen everywhere. Mixed in with the explosions were bone-chilling chattering noises, as well as the magical knights¡¯ battlecries.


    The only thing left apart from those sounds were the tragic death cries of unfortunate knights!


    The magical knights were not inexperienced or rookies in the least. All of them had endured the painful trials ofbat and faced death in person. However, when tens of thousands of fearless bugs swarmed toward you and drowned you beneath their creeping legs with sheer numbers, it was unimaginable despair that washed over you. The feeling of ten thousand bugs sinking their teeth into your body and slowly gnawing your flesh to bone was not something that any sane mortal could endure.


    It had only been fifteen minutes since the start of the battle, and already seven magical knights had been lost to the endless swarm of insects. They became struggling humanoid figures beneath the thousands of insects.


    The bug adept, Billis, didn¡¯t seem to have any intention of showing himself either. He remained in the shadows, continually sending insects to attack the knights. Meanwhile, the captains of the Bloody Spears were upied by several dozen unusual insects with various abilities.


    Among these insects were the magical mantises (First Grade) who were fast, stealthy, and possessed lethal scythe-like limbs. There were also the Voidreavers (Second Grade) who could travel freely through space and whose attacks could rend space itself. And then there were the yers (Third Grade), with razor-sharp limbs and incredibly hard carapaces.


    Several of these Third Grade yers were fighting Gallow and keeping him busy.


    These yers didn¡¯t appear too different from the ck beetles running rampant in the woods. However, they had sleeker bodies, tougher carapaces, and sharper limbs. What was even more terrifying was their extreme flying speeds with their four pairs of wings.


    Their sharp ws and lightning speed made their attacks extremely dangerous.


    Scarface Gallow might be able to execute the Voidreavers as if they were no more than chickens, but even he had to be careful against the yers. These insects could cleave a giant pir of metal in half with their limbs; they were not to be underestimated.


    After all, as many as five yers were currently fighting against him!


    An individual yer was only at beginner Third Grade. Supposedly, they shouldn¡¯t be able to threaten Gallow, who was already at peak Third Grade. Unfortunately, the way the insects fought was starkly distinct from the way adepts fought. It made them much more dangerous than an ordinary adept.


    At the very least, no adept would ever have the ridiculous idea in their minds to kill themselves just to inflict damage on an opponent. Neither would they ever trust theirpanionspletely.


    That resulted in Gallow being unable to kill even a single one of the Third Grade yers, despite being powerful enough to crush any of them in singlebat. Still, the main reason for him being reluctant to endure some damage to kill these insects...was because that damned bug adept was still hiding nearby. He was simply waiting for him to be injured!


    From the very start of the battle, Gallow could sense a spiritual flux around the insects. It was very subtle and faded in and out of reach. A closer examination would yield the conclusion that this spiritual flux was not aplete, independent spiritual consciousness, but an amalgamation of the countless tiny insect consciousness.


    It was precisely this unusual characteristic of the Spirit that made Gallow unable to pinpoint Billis¡¯ actual location. Put simply, Billis had very likely used a magical technique to scatter his consciousness across every single one of those insects.


    In doing so, there was no ¡®true body.¡¯ Anyone who wished to kill Billis would first have to exterminate all of his insects!


    The battle between the two forces started to escte in intensity and ferocity.


    Perhaps sensing that neither the Voidreavers nor yers could do anything to Gallow, Billis immediately changed his attack n.


    Hundreds of First Grade magical mantises gathered from all over the woods. They charged towards Gallow, high upon his horse. Meanwhile, the five yers and thirteen Voidreavers fled away from Gallow, turning their sights onto the Bloody Spear¡¯s ordinary members.


    The effect of this simple change in strategy was shocking!


    The offensive power of the five yers couldn¡¯t be more obvious against the ordinary magical knights. Their figures flickered like the wind where they passed by, leaving the knights with their armor shattered and knocked off their mounts.


    Without the mobility of their horses, the knights immediately became targets for the swarm. It didn¡¯t matter how they swung their swords or what spells they cast; they could not stop the advancing horde.


    In the blink of an eye, ck beetles were already crawling all over their body.


    From a distance, much of where the knights had been standing had already been swarmed by the insects. It was hard to see the knights themselves now.


    Crack, crack, crack!


    An unbearable gnawing sound continued to echo through the battlefield.


    The knight adepts that were caught by the insects had no chance of escaping. They could only struggle with all their strength and endure the waves of agony from all over their bodies. Their elementium shields were crushed to pieces, their ck armor torn apart, and countless smaller insects dug into their armor and their flesh, tearing their way between bone and flesh as they devoured all they could.


    The adepts could feel their flesh, bones, organs, and veins being chewed away amid the nightmarish gnawing sound around them. Not everyone could experience such despair.


    Most of the knight adepts that were caught by the insects would go mad from this sensation. They simply self-destructed when they realized they were doomed.


    When the battle reached its peak, explosions could be heard all over the forest, quickly followed by a rain of pungent insect pieces and blood. Of course, not a trace of the knight adepts¡¯ bodies could be found.


    Knight adepts were not truly official adepts, after all!


    From a certain perspective, they were only adept apprentices that had grasped a certain degree of elementium power. They were then able to unleash power equal to an actual adept with their magical armor, magic weapons, and special training.


    However, the consequence of such training was ack of depth in magical knowledgepared to proper adepts. That made themck flexibility and, thus, means of survival.


    An adept army like this was unstoppable when ughtering ordinary nar natives; it significantlypensated for the adepts¡¯cking numbers. In the face of terrifying enemies such as these, their chances of escaping alive were infinitely close to zero.


    Fortunately, as they were trained en masse, their deaths weren¡¯t too devastating a loss to endure!


    After all, there were too many weaklings in the World of Adepts who did not have sufficient talent to advance to be official adepts. If these pseudo-adepts were willing to walk down this path of modification and enhancement to be special adepts, they could, to some extent, enjoy simr treatment to their genuine adept counterparts.


    It was the fundamental reason why there could be so many adept armies!


    This ce was a remote forest only fifteen kilometers away from the Swamp of Tragedies. It was also the hiding spot that Gallow had chosen in preparation for the ambush ahead.


    Unfortunately, the Crimson n had somehow managed to discover their tracks, which led to their current predicament¨C encircled by Bug Adept Billis.


    Surrounding a powerful army of the Dener n with the might of one person alone.


    Only a few adepts could possibly achieve such a feat!


    After resisting for an entire hour and understanding that they could not win, Gallow finally gave the order to retreat. Only seventy of the once three-hundred-strong army of knight adepts managed to withdraw from the forest. Among them were Gallow and Rezai, themanders, as well as the one dozen Second Grade captains.


    Such grievous losses were worthy of being called a thorough defeat!


    However, now that the Crimson n was aware of their presence, they would not be able to leave so easily.


    They had barely stepped out of the forest when a dark shadow covered the skies above.


    The Mothership Versailles was already standing in their way.


    Dong. Dong. Dong.


    The ground rumbled as gigantic three-meter-tall magical machines crashed into the earth. They ignited their buffer rockets only ten meters away from the ground, causing them to deposit small craters into the ground when theynded. They emerged from the holes, their metal gears creaking and grinding, and their ck cannons pointed at these defeated rats.


    ¡°Put your hands on your head, knees on the ground. Surrendered enemies will be spared!¡±


    ¡°Put your hands on your head, knees on the ground. Surrendered enemies will be spared! Resist, and you will be terminated with extreme prejudice!¡±


    A mechanical voice red on the battlefield. The magic energy cannons on the magical machines started to charge up. Bright blue light gathered within the weapons, the roaring sound faintly resembling thunder and just as terrifying.


    A gigantic magic energy cannon also reached out from under the mothership, silently charging up as well. The giant cannon¡¯s energypressed into a massive ball of blue light, the intensity of which was absolutely horrifying.


    Naturally, this giant cannon¡¯s target was Scarface Gallow, who was still practically unharmed at this point!

 Chapter 1282 - Battle Against the Bug Adept

    <strong>Chapter 1282 Battle Against the Bug Adept</strong>


    Scarface Gallow¡¯s expression changed, and he prepared to turn around and return to the forest.


    Unfortunately, a ck tide of insects crashed down from behind him, instantly merging into the appearance of a strange adept standing at several dozen meters tall.


    Five yers, a dozen Voidreavers, and a hundred magical mantises merged with the gigantic figure, like birds returning to their nest.


    Bug Adept Billis.


    This man, who was feared throughout the Central Lands, had finally shown himself in front of Scarface Gallow with his swarm¡¯s power.


    Tens of thousands of beetles, scorpions, and other insects squeezed together, forming into Billis¡¯s ugly form. When his gigantic body strode forward, countless beetles were shaken off and dropped to the ground. However, these insects quickly caught up with the rest of the swarm and merged with Billis¡¯ body again.


    Billis was able topletely cut off Gallow¡¯s path of retreat with the sheer numbers of his swarm.


    Ambushed...and caught in a pincer attack!


    There was no need for any more discussion. Rezai, the vicemander, pointed with his sword and shouted, ¡°With me!¡±


    He led all the magical knights and charged towards the army of machines without hesitation.


    The countless stitches on Gallow¡¯s face began to twist and squirm like an ugly centipede.


    He could clearly see that a death trap had beenid ahead of them. Even if he was the one leading the charge against the enemy, they would not have emerged unscathed, let alone when it was Rezai who was leading the army.


    The only reason Rezai was doing so was to stall the magical machine army and give him an opportunity to slip away from the bug adept.


    After all, if they remained here, they would be caught in a pincer by the enemy. Moreover, it was apparent the army of magical machines and the mothership were the more significant threat.


    At this point, escape demanded sacrifice.


    Gallow whipped his horse as they charged at the vicious ¡®Bug Adept Billis.¡¯


    The next second, the blinding light of energy filled the battlefield.


    Countless energy beams and magic energy fireballs shot towards the charging knights like a merciless rain. The knights were not willing to back down either. They put up elementium defenses around themselves while taking out metal spears from their satchels on their saddles. They used magic to ignite the arrays on the spears and hurled them towards the machines.


    The attacks of both armies shot past each other. The next second, their attacks bloomed upon the battlefield.


    Terrifying and deafening explosions. Destructive elementium tides and blood and flesh sttered everywhere. The battlefield was instantly engulfed in a rain of blood!


    In truth, Gallow had already foreseen what would happen the moment he turned away from his army.


    That was why he did not turn back and look, regardless of how loud amotion was urring behind him. Instead, he focused entirely on that massive ¡®bug adept.¡¯


    His vicious magical sword ringed in his hands. His powerful aura solidified and pressed towards the opponent like an invisible wall.


    His overwhelming Strength spread into the surroundings through an invisible forcefield. His unbelievable force even overwrote the simpler narws within thirty meters.


    Rocks and dirt particles of various sizes started to float in the air as if gravity had disappeared. Gallow also started levitating as he moved towards the ¡®bug adept.¡¯


    The magical horse suffered the opposite fate. Its spine copsed, and its flesh sttered the ground as if a mountain had crushed it. The beast couldn¡¯t even let out a cry before it was crushed to paste by Gallow¡¯s simple step.


    Gallow¡¯s physical Strength had reached a limit. Even without the use of any magic, he was able to fly in the air. At this point, gravity was no longer an invisible and ethereal rule. Instead, it was a strange power in Gallow¡¯s hands that he could freely twist and morph to his will.


    The gravityws were no longer effective in the areas Gallow¡¯s force could reach. That was why this unusual phenomenon that disobeyed thews of gravity had urred!


    Scarface Gallow concentrated all his power into this sword. He then exhaled and shouted as a thick ck sword aura shot toward the towering man of insects.


    Rustle!


    A rain of insect corpses fell to the ground as a gaping hole appeared in the insect person¡¯s body. You could even see the vast forest behind him through that hole.


    The bug person looked down at this open chest and lifted his head to howl. No one could imagine that the insect person would be able to open his mouth so wide. A torrent of countless ck beetles flew out from within.


    Like a dark, ck tide, they swept forward and crashed against the forcefield around Gallow.


    The invisible yet material force of strength around Gallow was evenly distributed all over the defensive forcefield. All creatures that came into contact with the forcefield were instantly squashed to dirt by the overwhelming force. The tide continued to swarm and continued to die. However, even as they died, they imposed incredible pressure on Gallow.


    Gallow¡¯s levitating body had stopped moving forward.


    No matter how much force of strength he tried to muster, he could not take a single step forward.


    ¡°Bastard, you can¡¯t stop me!¡±


    Gallow howled and swung his magical sword. With every sh, arge and terrifying gash appeared on the insect person¡¯s body. In the blink of an eye, the bug person¡¯s body had shrunk by one-fourth.


    However, Billis was not a harmless little creature that would not retaliate!


    The giant insect body squirmed, trying its best to mend the ¡®wounds¡¯ on its body. Billis then waved his bloated right hand, and a long spear formed purely of beetles appeared out of his hand.


    Zip!


    The insect person assumed a throwing stance, and the spear of insects turned into a ck flicker, appearing instantly in front of Gallow.


    The spear was half a meter thick. Most of the beetles on the spear¡¯s surface had been killed by Gallow¡¯s terrifying force radiation. More and more insects peeled off as the spear pressed forward, quickly causing the spear to be thinner and thinner.


    By the time it reached Gallow, the spear was already the thickness of a mere stone, but the beetles that formed the rest of the spear radiated an overwhelming aura. It was obvious that these were no ordinary insects.


    The ugly stitch on Gallow¡¯s face twisted, and a silver star that had been embedded on his face abruptly flew out. The star crashed into the spear.


    The silver star was fairly small, but it contained incredible, raging force. The ck spear disintegrated instantly. However, just as Gallow rxed briefly, the spear¡¯s shards suddenly turned into two Third Grade yers that glided towards him from both sides.


    Their scythe-like limbs sliced across Gallow¡¯s towering body when they passed by, causing sparks to fly. Several deep marks appeared on Gallow¡¯s armor, revealing his tan, golden skin beneath.


    Gallow¡¯s zombified body made him impervious to poison and incredibly resistant to elementium magic. However, he still bled against the terrifying physical damage of the yers. A visible wound had appeared.


    This process of transformation between insects had been too unexpected, and Gallow had not able to execute these yers in his surprise. The insects beat their wings and fled with all they had the moment they managed to escape Gallow¡¯s radius of force radiation.


    ¡°How dare you.¡±


    Thoroughly enraged by the enemy¡¯s attack, Gallow roared and kicked his leg forward. An invisible ripple of force appeared in the air. With the aid of this bit of power, Gallow¡¯s body shot backward rapidly, allowing him to engulf the two insects within his range of attack once more.


    ck light flickered in the air as a force thread as thin as silk flew out and sliced past a yer. The next second, the force erupted as the beginner Third Grade yer exploded into a rain of blood.


    The other yer was able to instantly vanish and escape by beating its wings and flying at full speed.


    The insect person, who was striding forward, let out a hiss. It seemed like it had felt great pain when the Third Grade yer was killed. However, the insect person quickly recovered. Two bright lights lit up where his eyes were as he stared at Gallow and hissed, ¡°You dare destroy my Third Grade insect servant. Pay for that with your life!¡±


    The insect person wasted no more words. ck light shed in his hands, forming into multiple ck spears that he hurled unceasingly toward Gallow.


    The forcefield alone was no longer enough to stop these mighty spears. Gallow could only swing his magical sword and use his incredibly powerful force threads to cut up the spears before they hit him.


    The spears of insects were no longer much of a threat if they couldn¡¯t reach Gallow.


    It didn¡¯t matter how many insects there were if this situation continued. They would not be able to touch Gallow at all.


    After such a long time fighting against the bug adept, Gallow had finally figured out his method of offense. The bug adept did not excel at meleebat. He preferred tomand his insects and have them attack the enemy.


    Supposedly, Billis would be able to enhance his insects with poison, paralysis, curses, and other magical effects. Unfortunately, these methods that were effective against most living beings were useless against Gallow¡¯s undead body.


    When it came to pure power alone, the bug adept¡¯s variety of attacks and techniques were unimaginable and nearly impossible to defend against. This battle would already be over if he were fighting an ordinary Third Grade adept and not the peak Third Grade Gallow.


    However, the longer the fight, the more calm Gallow became.


    As long as he could calm down and fight a tight battle, Billis would be much less of a threat once he killed the Third Grade insects. When that happened, he could unleash a devastating strike that could exterminate most of the insects and cripple the bug adept.


    Unfortunately, this wasn¡¯t a fair duel, but a battlefield where life and death could be decided in an instant!


    The next second, Gallow paid the price for his hesitation and stalling.

 Chapter 1283 - Gallow Defeated

    <strong>Chapter 1283 Gallow Defeated</strong>


    As the battle on the ground slowly became a stalemate, the mothership hovering in the sky started to move.


    Goblin Adept Locke stood before the main control panel in the mothership, dressed in sharp military garb. He held his hand over a turquoise button, slowly moving the firing cross onto the muscr figure beneath.


    After all these years of training, he had finally be an advanced Second Grade magical mechanic. He¡¯d also had the fortune to be promoted to themander of the Versailles. Blood Elf Archer Sandor was also an intermediate Second Grade now and served as Commander Locke¡¯s personal assistant.


    The battle on the ground raged on. As the Versailles¡¯mander, Locke no longer needed to be personally involved in these ¡®lowly¡¯ ground battles.


    He only had to sitfortably in this neatmand center and give instructions to the hundreds of goblin mechanics across this metal beast.


    Once everything was prepared, Locke pressed themunication crystal in his right ear and shouted hastily, ¡°Calling for Sir Billis......calling for Sir Billis; this is Commander Locke of the Versailles. Please reply if you hear this, Sir Billis!¡±


    A short momentter, Billis¡¯ unique, deep hissing voice could be heard.


    ¡°What¡¯s happening? Can¡¯t you see I¡¯m busy? Whatever you have to say, spit it out.¡±


    ¡°Sir Billis, Versailles¡¯ giant magic energy cannon is done charging. We can fire at any time. The power of the shot is estimated at around 4200 points of power, with an estimated impact radius of 115 meters. Please distance yourself from the target, or you will be within impact radius!¡±


    ¡°Just fire at will! If I back off, do you think your clumsy cannon can hit a peak Third Grade bloodline adept? Just fire. I will leave behind some of my swarm to keep him still. Remember, make sure you hit him; this might be your only chance.¡±


    ¡°Understood! Attack will begin in ten seconds. Please prepare evasive maneuver, sir!¡±


    ¡°Ten...nine...eight...seven......¡±


    A loud countdown echoed in themand center.


    When the final ¡®one¡¯ rang out, Locke mmed his hand down against the button to fire without hesitation.


    Mothership Versailles trembled in the skies. A five-meter-thick ck beam shot straight towards the ground,pletely engulfing Scarface Gallow within its radius.


    Horrifyingly powerful magic energy was bound within that ck pir of light. The beam disintegrated all substances that it came into contact with as it shot downward.


    When the ck light reached him, the distorted forcefield around Gallow only held for half a second before shattering into pieces. The ck lightnded directly on his body. Smoldering ck smoke rose from his intricate magical armor, his tan skin, and his withered hair. His body itself started to disintegrate and fall apart.


    Moreover, when the ck light hit Gallow, it instantly killed the hundreds and thousands of ck beetles all around him. The ck light that shot past Gallow¡¯s body continued to drill into the ground, vaporizing the tons of dirt, rocks, and sediment, creating an endless abyss on the spot.


    What was this...this terrifying st magic energy!?


    Gallow turned around to look, an expression of twisted terror on his ugly face. He immediately took a step forward in an attempt to escape the ck beam.


    However, while he prepared to apply force and leap away, a shocking number of ck beetles braved the beam of energy and swarmed him, turning into ck chains wrapped around him and restraining his movements.


    ¡°Bastard...do you want to die already?¡± Gallow was furious. He swung his magical sword, instantly slicing the chains into carapace shards. From the corner of his eye, he could see Bug Adept Billis quickly fleeing, surrounded by a hundred of his high-grade insect servants.


    ¡°No......¡±


    Scarface Gallow instantly understood.


    That damned Bug Adept Billis had already made the decision to keep him restrained. He was even willing to cast aside all of his insect army to do so, only escaping with his high-grade servants.


    The insects hissed and swarmed towards Gallow, despite having been abandoned and used as sacrificial pawns. Even as the energy st vaporized tens of thousands of their kin, they continued forward with no fear or hesitation.


    Obviously, their actions had put Gallow in a terrible spot!


    All matter was quickly being disassembled and disintegrated under that ferocious beam of magic energy. Three secondster, a scorched figure, almost half-melted, struggled out of the ck beam. They stumbled and kneeled upon the ground.


    If it weren¡¯t for the strange magical sword that the scorched figure had gripped tightly in his hands, even Billis wouldn¡¯t have been able to recognize what this shapeless ¡®thing¡¯ was.


    The might of the mothership¡¯s main cannon was incredible. Even a Fourth Grade adept had to be careful around it. A Third Grade adept like Gallow? If not for him still being close to peak condition, it not for him having an undead body, and if not for him having tremendous magic resistance, Gallow would have been reduced to dust already.


    In all seriousness, what saved Gallow was none other than the three body parts that he had grafted from the corpse of the Fallen Emperor he found: the Spine of the Undead, the Withered Heart, and the Hand of Death.


    These three body parts from the Fallen Emperor had reached the standard of an immortal body. They were also the sources of power that pushed Gallow¡¯s Physique, Strength, and magic resistance to such heights. Most of Gallow¡¯s body parts had already been melted and destroyed in the face of such surging magic energy. Only these three body parts had kept Gallow alive, due to the unique Fourth Grade forcefield that rose around them.


    It was unfortunate that this patchwork ¡®immortal body¡¯ of Gallow¡¯s was notplete. Otherwise, he would not have been so grievously injured by that concentrated energy st. He would have been able to escape with a few minor wounds.


    Strike while the enemy was down!


    Upon seeing how ravaged and injured Gallow was, Bills immediately turned back. His entire body erupted into a swarm of ck insects, each buzzing loudly as they lunged back toward the battlefield.


    Magical mantises, Voidreavers, yers, and a dozen more types of insects charged forth, slipping into the shadows, disappearing into the wind, or simply leaping forward. They descended upon Gallow like a dark cloud.


    Gallow lifted his burned face. Only half of his head was left now. He held back the boiling embers of rage within him and pped his chest. Most of the flesh on his chest had been carbonized, revealing his steel-like ribs beneath.


    Through those scorched bones, one could see that gray heart lying silently within, cold and unmoving.


    It was the Withered Heart that Gallow had transnted into himself!


    It was a shame that the violent energy st had ultimately managed to prate the forcefields generated by the undead body parts. Not only had Gallow¡¯s flesh been burned away, but a small corner of the Withered Heart had also been scorched.


    Both the Withered Heart and the Spine of the Undead had received damage of varying degrees. Moreover, such damage was irreversible and irreparable.


    If Greem were here, he would be happy to realize that Gallow, who previously had 39 points of Strength, now only had 37 points remaining. His Physique had also slipped from 34 points to 32 points.


    It wasn¡¯t in reference to his energy reserves, which could fluctuate at any time. No, these were his actual base attributes!


    The points that he just lost could not be regained through food, rest, or nourishment. The loss in attributes represented the loss in origin power from the ¡®immortal body parts¡¯ that Gallow had transnted. It was a permanent loss of origin power.


    For Gallow, who wanted nothing more than to advance to Fourth Grade, this tragedy was an unbearable agony upon his heart!


    However, no matter how pained and furious he was, surviving was his utmost priority at the moment.


    Gallow shocked his Withered Heart and activated a Talisman of Escape he had hidden within. The next second, his body fell apart. The flesh and bones appeared to be released from the death energy that kept them together and scattered across the ground.


    Thirty secondster, all the flesh and bone melted down into puddles of ck liquid, which slowly seeped into the dirt and vanished without a trace.


    Gallow managed to escape in the end.


    ............


    The invasion of the Dener n had provoked the Crimson n into an all-out resistance.


    The border where the two Fourth Grade ns were connected had turned into a battlefield so chaotic and messy¨Cwhere advances were made and losses sustained at every hour¨Cthat no one could predict how the war would pan out.


    On the one hand, the Crimson n was quickly mobilizing its forces to defend important resource sites, mystic realms, and restricted areas. On the other hand, they were sending out numerous elite parties to ambush and hunt down the Dener n forces that had prated deep into Ailovis.


    Ambushes, traps, reinforcements, interception, counter-interception: all sorts of battle broke out along the vast tens of thousands of kilometers of Ailovisnd, centered around the Crimson n¡¯s strategic locations. Schemes, conspiracies, and ns unfolded one after another, turning this once peacefulnd into a bloody ughterhouse where adepts spilled their blood.


    First Grade adepts were no more than obedient soldiers and cannon fodder in a war of this scale. Only Second Grade adepts and above could be considered vital forces in this conflict. However, to truly dominate a region of the battlefield, a Third Grade adept was required.


    Given the typical flow of adept wars in the Central Lands, Third Grade adepts were considered ultimate weapons that could decide the conclusion of a war. Fourth Grade adepts, on the other hand, were nuclear weapons meant for a truly apocalyptic war.


    The moment Fourth Grade adepts appeared, there would no longer be any concept of victory or defeat. The only things left would be death and survival!


    When it came to overall power, the Crimson n¡¯s umtion was a littleckingpared to the Dener n due to their rtively recent rise. However, the quantity and quality of Third Grade adepts in the Crimson n was undoubtedly superior.


    That was why the Dener n was able to catch the Crimson n by surprise with a sudden war. Theyunched a full-scale invasion into Ailovis and managed to conquer nearly a thousand square kilometers ofnd with their better-trained foot soldiers.


    However, as the Crimson n managed to stabilize themselves and retaliate, the Dener n¡¯s advances were rapidly halted. The mes of war spread out over five thousand kilometers as hundreds of battles broke out simultaneously.


    For a moment, the west border of Ailovis had be a vicious battlefield where adepts from both ns waged conflicts of life and death!

 Chapter 1284 - Forceful Invasion

    <h4>Chapter 1284 Forceful Invasion</h4>


    ck Rose Manor.


    It was deep in the night now, but the manor was still brightly illuminated, and many silhouettes flickering here and there.


    However, the only people who could enter and exit from the manor were strange individuals dressed in robes or armor. Judging from the metal emblem they all wore on their chests, these people were official adepts of the Dener n.


    Numerous powerful magical beasts were also looming in wait around the manor, some more hidden than others. They formed a tight and imprable defensive that firmly protected the estate.


    At the moment, about one kilometer southwest of the manor, a strange bat clung upside down to a branch in the sparse woods. It quietly monitored the movements of the estate under cover of the leaves.


    p, p, p.


    The soft sound of beating wings came from the darkness as three furry bats with red eyes the size of a human headnded in a clearing in the woods.


    The bats then transformed into two men and one woman dressed like nobles.


    The bat that had been left here as a lookout hastily emerged from the canopy. Itnded on the ground and turned into a pretty, nobledy. She knelt before the three nobles and paid her respects.


    ¡°Viria¡¯s greetings to you, Lady Spa, Lord Kevin, and Lord Stevens!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s enough; you may rise! How long have you been posted here?¡± Blood Elf Shapeshifter Spa stepped forward and asked coldly.


    ¡°It¡¯s been five days! I was assigned here to watch ck Rose Manor ever since the Dener n¡¯s forces upied Andman. I have threepanions on this task with me. They are scattered in several other locations.¡± This nobledy had clearly only been turned into a vampire recently. It was only natural that she was so shaken and excited to see the Third Grade Spa suddenly.


    ¡°Since you¡¯ve been watching for so long, are you able to confirm the location of Grand Duke Antoneil?¡±


    ¡°The enemy forces have strict security around the manor; we couldn¡¯t find any chance to infiltrate. Thest time we saw the Grand Duke was three days ago. He was seen briefly at a certain window on the second floor. We have not seen him since!¡±


    ¡°Which is to say, we can say with certainty that he remains in this manor.¡± Spa took a few casual steps forward and looked at the bright manor through the sparse trees. A vicious expression appeared on her face.


    ¡°Yes, mydy,¡± First Grade Vampire Viria hastily lowered her head and replied nervously.


    ¡°And the manor¡¯s defenses? Who¡¯s in charge there?¡±


    ¡°ording to our investigations, a Third Grade psionic from the Dener n is stationed here. Moreover, a strange group of adepts took up residence in the manor two days ago. We still haven¡¯t managed to figure out where they came from and who they are.¡±


    ¡°A Third Grade...¡± Spa¡¯s face warped into a vicious expression when she heard this.


    Her blood master, Mary, had recently made a promise to all of them. She was prepared to choose the most elite individual from among the best-performing Third Grade vampires and forcefully promote them to Fourth Grade to bolster their forces.


    When news of this spread, the only seven vampires in the n became incredibly excited. They wanted nothing more than to pull their hearts out to show their loyalty to Mary.


    However, with the number ofpetitors, there had to be some sort of objective standard of assessment!


    This sudden adept war became the perfect trigger for the vampires. They recklessly threw themselves at the battlefield to prove themselves.


    To obtain greater contributions in the war, Spa the shapeshifter led several of her high-grade subordinates and a party of weaker vampires here. She was prepared to break in and rescue the Crimson Grand Duke.


    Time was wasting away!


    Should news of Antoneil¡¯s presence here reach the n headquarters, this ce would be swarming with the Crimson n¡¯s forces. She wouldn¡¯t have the chance to im all the contributions for her own.


    At the thought of this, Spa didn¡¯t dare dy any longer. She waved her hand, and her two advanced Second Grade subordinates bowed.


    ¡°Mydy, what are your instructions?¡±


    ¡°Kevin, Stevens, the two of you lead the forces and infiltrate the manor from the nks. If the enemies don¡¯t discover you, then slip into the building and search for Antoneil. If you are discovered, then immediately retreat while covering each other. Remember, retreat to the southeast.¡±


    ¡°Yes, sir!¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s set out now, then!¡±


    The two Second Grade vampires nodded to each other, then put their hands to their mouths as they let out a silent call in the direction they came from.


    A short momentter, the strange, soft sound of beating wings could be heard.


    The two vampires transformed into bats again in a poof of red smoke. They took to the air and joined the main force of vampires before flying towards ck Rose Manor under cover of night.


    In the blink of an eye, only Spa and Viria were left.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go. You will help me infiltrate from another direction,¡± Spa said coldly.


    The minor vampire, Viria, trembled and acknowledged her orders.


    She stood up and turned into a red-eyed bat, pping her wings and taking to the night sky.


    The two silhouettes¨Cone big and one small¨Ccircled around and quickly approached ck Rose Manor from another direction.


    High up in the night air, with the cold winds brushing against her face, Viria felt a bone-chilling cold, even with the fur on her body.


    A not-veryrge human manor was quickly approaching below them.


    It was an incredibly ordinary manor.


    The main building was a wooden, three-story structure. Several tiny wooden huts and warehouses were scattered behind the main building, with a small ntation on the side. In front of the building was a simple garden and za. The fountain at the center was already dried up, revealing the mud at the bottom.


    A simple road paved with pebbles stretched from the manor¡¯s entrance all the way to Andman City, not far off in the distance. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how the city¡¯s nobles and prominent individuals had ridden here on carriages for banquets when the city was still thriving.


    Small manors and mansions like these that were close to the city were the nobles¡¯ favorite ces to party!


    However, with the start of the adept war, this ce had changedpletely.


    Powerful auras could be sensed everywhere, in every key entrance and hidden passageway. Packs of voodoo beasts patrolled the manor¡¯s surroundings. Any creature not wearing an emblem of the Dener n was attacked on sight.


    A troop of elite adepts stood guard at the entrance, carefully and seriously examining every individual that entered and exited the manor.


    As for the three-story building? It was shrouded in a strange mist, fading in and out of view. It was hard to discern what was happening within.


    A protective array...the building had been obscured by a protective array.


    Viria beat her wings with all her strength and flew against the sharp winds. She spoke in a soft voice, like that of a mosquito, ¡°Mydy, that¡¯s the building. Thest ce the Grand Duke was seen was...¡±


    As the two of themmunicated, the quiet manor was suddenly shaken awake by an rm.


    The vampires that had secretly descended from the skies triggered had the security arrays scattered all over the manor the moment theynded.


    As the ring rms rang, the vampires gave up on sneaking around. They revealed themselves and charged toward the main building.


    ¡°Over here.¡±


    ¡°The enemy...they¡¯re in the skies.¡±


    Shouts could be heard all over as groups of adepts and voodoo beasts gathered from all over. They quickly surrounded the vampires.


    The two Second Grade vampires had no choice now but tond along with their remaining four dozen subordinates.


    They transformed into their human forms, and the battle started instantly!


    ¡°Careful, they are vampires! Watch out! Don¡¯t let them bite you.¡±


    There were several knowledgeable individuals in the enemy ranks. They were instantly able to identify the vampires based on their abilities and the way they dressed.


    Everyone knew that vampires were powerful assassins with ridiculous Agility. They were also extremely resilient and hard to kill. The only way to kill them was to attack their only vital point.


    ¡°Adepts who can fight at melee range, intercept them. Everyone else, use your spells. Remember, aim for their hearts! That¡¯s their true vital point!¡± The leader of the Dener forces shouted. He quickly made strategic arrangements while pulling out his staff and preparing a powerful spell.


    It was a hundred times easier to create a vampire than it was to raise a human adept. Yet, vampires were not the mainstream force of the World of Adepts. The main reason for that was because adepts had thoroughly researched the vampire¡¯s weaknesses and strengths. Thus, everyone had an idea of the techniques and means to deal with vampire adepts.


    ¡®Major Illumination!¡¯


    ¡®Modified Stinking Cloud (Garlic Stench)!¡¯


    ¡®Static Forcefield!¡¯


    Several simple, modified spells explicitly adapted for use against vampire adepts crashed towards the vampires. Even the melee adepts had swapped their weaponry for silver weapons. They enchanted those weapons with a strange magic that prevented the vampires from healing through consuming blood.


    Even an ordinary adept could inflict significant damage on a vampire with the aid of such equipment, let alone this army. The army wasposed of elite-force adepts from the Dener n.


    The enemy had badly beaten Spa¡¯s group of vampires in the blink of an eye. The vampires had suffered over a dozen casualties upon contact, while only three of the Dener adepts had stepped back from the battle due to injuries.


    The Dener n had also lost nearly a hundred voodoo beasts. However, as voodoo beasts were a disposable force, neither party counted them as actual casualties.


    The vampires that had broken-in were beginning to falter. They quickly started to attempt to escape the manor, even as they continued to fight.

 Chapter 1285 - The Life of a Grayskin Rat

    <h4>Chapter 1285 The Life of a Grayskin Rat</h4>


    ¡°Go back; you have no ce in this battle.¡±


    Spa hovered in the dark, lightless sky as she said this. Then she dove straight down towards the manor.


    The cool night wind rushed past her aerodynamic form, causing her soft fur to wave quickly. Spa vanished without a trace after a few quick turns in the air. She was nowhere in sight now.


    Viria felt a sudden chill rush over her body. She beat her wings and quickly flew away.


    The battle in the manor raged on.


    The invading vampires were clearly at a disadvantage. They slowly retreated even as they fought. Their forces had already scattered in the darkness of the night. They scampered all over the manor, spreading chaos throughout the building.


    Six adepts wearing Dener n emblems were herding a pack of voodoo beasts and chasing after a group of vampires. When they passed by a tall tree, a white and slender arm reached out from the darkness and grabbed thest adept in the group that had fallen behind, pulling him behind the tree.


    As the hand was swift, the other adepts, who werepletely focused on their task, did not at all realize that they had lost apanion.


    Back in the shadows, before the abducted adept even understood what happened, a slender figure pressed up against his body as two sharp fangs sank into his neck.


    A short momentter, Adept Ralph stopped trembling and stood up straight.


    ¡°Go to the main building and bring me to Antoneil!¡± Spa instructed before turning into a bat and slipping into his sleeves.


    ¡°Understood!¡± Ralph replied respectfully.


    When he emerged from the shadow of the tree, he lifted his head, and one could vaguely see his inhuman transformation under the dim light of the moon. His eyes had turned red, and his face was unusually pale.


    He tidied up his cor, hiding the small bite wound on his neck, then turned and walked towards the building without hesitation.


    Even amid the intense fighting, security around the building had not rxed at all.


    A group of strange adepts in standard white armor stood guard in front of the entrance. Among them were both males and females of various ages, but everyone had a strange emblem of a mountain on their right shoulder.


    It was a ck mountain shrouded in white mist...it was an unusual design. Even with all Spa¡¯s knowledge, she had never seen such an emblem.


    ¡°This is the emblem of Lady Marilyn Mona¡¯s Dream Garden troop. They are Lady Mona¡¯s direct subordinate force. I have no idea what unusual abilities they have,¡± Ralph continued tomunicate with Spa through a unique mental connection as he walked calmly towards the adepts.


    ¡°Who are you? Why are you here?¡± A male adept stood out and stopped Ralph in his tracks. His stern expression did not change at all, even in the face of an ¡®ally.¡¯


    ¡°I am Ralph of the Seventh Adept Squad. I have critical information to report to Lady Mona. Let me through!¡±


    ¡°At this time,¡± The male adept hesitated for a moment and said, ¡°Lady Mona is most likely still in deep meditation at the moment. She won¡¯t be willing to see anyone! Just pass on the information to us!¡±


    ¡°My captain was the one that sent me back. It is critical information. I have to hand it to Lady Mona personally!¡±


    Ralph¡¯s insistence seemed to push the male adept to apromise.


    He turned back and instructed, ¡°Yasna, bring him to wait in the living room on the first floor. Send news to thedy once she awakes!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡± A young girl in short brown hair and leather armor nodded in acknowledgment before leading Ralph into the building.


    The moment he entered, Ralph could clearly feel himself pass through a transparent barrier of light. The inside of the building had a very different air to it.


    An old but broad wooden set of stairs stood across from the entrance, leading straight to the second level. Meanwhile, to the left and the right were the dining hall and a small guest hall, respectively. There were also some tiny rooms in the corners meant for servants to rest in.


    Lady Mona had taken up residence in the entirety of the second and third levels. Thus, her subordinates had no choice but to live in the servant¡¯s rooms. However, no adept dared to make a singleint in the face of such ¡®unjust¡¯ treatment.


    ¡°Follow me! Don¡¯t walk around blindly, or you¡¯ll trigger all the magical trapsid down around here. Neither of us will be able to pay the price if we end up disturbing Lady Mona in her meditation.¡± The short-haired girl was fairly enthusiastic as she led Ralph into the guest room on the left.


    ¡°Keep this girl upied while I will go take a look on the second floor!¡± Spa gave Ralph a few simple instructions through their mental connection before silently crawling down from his robe. She then turned into a ck-haired rat and scurried up the stairs.


    Once a young and beautiful druid of the Faen ne, Spa was skilled at transforming into other animals. After being transformed into a blood elf and taken back to the World of Adepts, she slowly became the shapeshifter that she was now.


    She was the only individual among the converted druids who had not lost her ability to shapeshift, despite turning into a blood elf. However, as the druid¡¯s Wild Transformation ability was not verypatible with a blood elf¡¯s innate talents, it was tough for her to grow stronger.


    The rat that Spa had turned into climbed up the stairs, avoiding the areas radiating with magic. She managed to evade all the runes and arrived at the entrance to the second floor.


    Without any hesitation, Spa turned down the right corridor and ran across the wooden floorboards. Her fur started to change colors like a chameleon as she sprinted, camouging her as she progressed. In addition to her small size, it was nearly impossible for an enemy to spot her.


    A particrly massive Many-Eyed Beast crouched in front of one of the five rooms there, dutifully keeping guard.


    Many-Eyed Beasts were a type of voodoo beast that the adepts created with a beholder as a blueprint. These creatures had stout bodies, a dozen flesh tentacles reaching out from all over, and weird eyes at the tip of their tentacles.


    Like beholders, these monsters could fire magical beams and curses of various attributes through these eyestalks. Moreover, the eyestalks were covered in a thinyer of scales, making them agile and resilient. They could even be used as whips in meleebat.


    These voodoo beasts¡¯ only weakness had to be their slow movement speed. That was why most adepts used them as guard dogs more than anything else.


    At the moment, the Many-Eyed Beast was lying on the groundzily. Only three of its twelve eye stalks were raised high, surveying the corridor. The rest rested on the ground, seemingly bored.


    One could faintly sense two weak life forces behind the wooden door it guarded. One was an ordinary person, while the other radiated weak elementium power. It seemed like one of them was a First Grade adept.


    This ce wasn¡¯t an adept tower, and the wooden door was only a simple wooden door. It did not have the ability to obscure or block out the senses of the adepts. Otherwise, Spa would not have been able to sense who was in that room so easily.


    This must be where Antoniel was kept prisoner!


    Spa didn¡¯t dare approach the Many-Eyed Beast.


    She knew very well that these Many-Eyed Beasts often had the ability to see through invisibility and sense elementium on one of their eyes. It was fortunate that she was only using shapeshifting and camouge; these abilities did not generate much magical flux. Otherwise, she would have been discovered the moment she stepped into the corridor.


    Spa curled up in a dent along the wall, using the shadows to hide herself. She then carefully let out a strange aura.


    Call of the Wild!


    It was an ability to summon animals that was unique to druids.


    However, while most druids used it to summon animalpanions, Spa was probably the only one who used it to lure out critters.


    A short momentter, a chittering sound could be heard in another dark corner of the corridor.


    A small mouse with thin whiskers poked its snout out from the shadows and sniffed. Its appearance naturally attracted the attention of the Many-Eyed Beast.


    Spa could hide by shapeshifting and camouge, but this ordinary mouse had no such ability. No matter how stealthy it was, it was shining as bright as a sun in the night in front of the Second Grade Many-Eyed Beast.


    Its eyestalks slowly rose, and the ones that were already on guard turned around, staring at this little fellow hesitating between the shadows and the light.


    Even though this Grayskin rat was being bothered by a strange aura that was fervently calling it forward, it could also sense the terrifying aura of danger beyond the darkness.


    Ever since a strange group of humans took up residence in the building, all the Grayskin rats had frightfully hidden in their homes. They didn¡¯t daree out to scavenge or move about. This agonysted for seven days. Now, they were all starving badly, yet they still did not dare emerge from their nests.


    They could sense a fearsome aura of death outside. Their powerful instinct for danger prevented them from acting on impulse, allowing them to survive until now.


    However, when that strange calling power appeared, this particr rat could not hold back any longer. It slipped out of its nest and came here to this ce it was so familiar with. One more step forward, and it would leave the shadow¡¯s embrace and enter the light.


    Here, it hesitated; it doubted.


    One step forward was death, and one step backward was survival. However, its inferior intelligence prevented it from resolving theplicated feelings it was experiencing.


    Finally, the Grayskin rat was no longer able to suppress the impulse in its heart. It dashed headfirst out of the shadows!

 Chapter 1286 - Illusion

    Chapter 1286 Illusion


    The instant the Grayskin rat darted forward, the Many-Eyed beast leaped forward impulsively.


    Slow Ray!


    Beam of Decrepification!


    Aura of Weakening!


    Three gray beamsnded on the rat simultaneously, causing its tiny body to turn grayer than before. It wasn¡¯t until the rat was crouching on the ground and utterly immobile that the Many-Eyed Beast shifted its heavy body beside the rodent. One of its eye-stalks wrapped around the rat and put it into its giant maw.


    The gray rat was so tiny that it could barely even sate the appetite of the Many-Eyed Beast. However, the taste of blood was more than satisfying.


    The creature reached out with its red tongue and licked away thest bit of flesh and blood from between its teeth. It was then that the Many-Eyed return to its spot, nced around, and finally crouched down again.


    How could it possibly know that in the five seconds that it left its post, a tiny snake no more than a foot long, had slithered under the crack beneath the door?


    There were two men in the room. One was standing, and the other was lying down.


    The one lying on the bed was a middle-aged man in adept robes. His face was pale, and his lips were purple. His skinny chest heaved with strenuous effort, and his breathing wasbored. The other man appeared somewhat fat. Even though he was dressed in intricate nobles¡¯ clothes, he still seemed to be disheveled and worn-out due to theck of grooming.


    The adept lying on the bed had lost consciousness and was in aa. That seemed to be the reason the noble was pacing around the room anxiously. The man couldn¡¯t help but let out a sight whenever he saw hispanion¡¯s unconscious figure.


    Spa snuck into the room but did not reveal herself immediately. Instead, she moved into the shadows in a corner of the room and silently evaluated everything in the room.


    She was already a Third Grade vampire adept, not a rookie that just made her way out into the world.


    This man looked exactly the way Antoneil was described in the information she possessed. For some reason, though, Spa felt a genuine unease in her heart when sheid eyes on the man.


    It was almost as if someone somewhere was hinting at something to her.


    What was wrong, exactly?


    Was she too suspicious because her trip here had been too simple and easy?


    Or did she actually fail to catch something crucial?


    Spa immediately closed her eyes. She began to rey every detail and action taken by every person since she entered the building.


    With the Spirit of a Third Grade blood adept, Spa was able to perfectly reconstruct and review everything from every angle without any difficulty.


    Suddenly, Spa¡¯s body trembled. She seemed to have understood something.


    She emerged from her hiding spot without hesitation, transforming into her human form in a shroud of red mist. She ignored the terrified Crimson Grand Duke Antoneil and shouted to nowhere in particr, ¡°Marilyn Mona, this must be your mental illusion, right? I, Spa, am here already. Do you intend to continue deceiving me?¡±


    The trembling Antoneil suddenly let out a cry of surprise, ¡°You, you are Lady Spa. You are here to save me. Oh, take me away from this ce, please!¡±


    He cried as he stumbled towards Spa.


    A severe expression appeared on Spa¡¯s face. She lifted a hand, and a red beam shot straight through Antoneil¡¯s skull, creating a puncture hole from the front all the way to the back.


    Antoneil¡¯s body froze and copsed limply to the ground, terror syed over his face.


    Spa didn¡¯t seem to care at all that her rescue target had just died by her hand. Instead, she silently gathered her powers and waited for the psionic to arrive.


    Finally, a sweet female voice rang out in the room.


    ¡°I am truly curious, Miss Spa, about how you managed to see through this illusion. Could you sate my curiosity?¡±


    As the voice appeared, strange changes took over the room like a sinister wind.


    All color quickly faded away from the room.


    The faded walls and floorboards quickly started to peel and fall off, revealing the empty grayness beneath. All the furniture in the room, the adept on the bed, and the corpse on the ground faded in color, leaving only gray shapes behind.


    However, Antoneil¡¯s corpse wasn¡¯tpletely fake. As the colors and disguises wore away, its actual appearance came to light.


    A Venomfiend.


    It was a sort of unusual slime-like creature with pungent blisters all over its body.


    A sharp ck spike floated within its semi-translucent body. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what would have been awaiting Spa if she had let it approach. Poison spray and a poisoned stab.


    The scene in front of her flickered as everything vanished without a trace. Spa instantly returned to her original spot, at the entrance on the first floor.


    Ralph remained frozen on the spot, while Spa was still a bat climbing out of his robe.


    Spa shuddered. She finally understood that everything she just experienced earlier had only been an illusory dream. However, how could she be sure that what she saw now was reality?


    Spa didn¡¯t dare dy any longer. She flew up into the air and started to radiate violent blood energy, creating a domain of blood energy around her.


    As expected, where the blood domain spread, the ¡®real¡¯ hall started to quake. The wooden floorboards below her crumbled and fell into nothingness.


    To think there was only a void beneath the floor. Spa could see a sea of fire burning towards her from a distance. However, before the mes could reach Spa, this mysterious world was shattered by her violent blood energy.


    The world in front of Spa¡¯s eyes quickly flickered when the illusion was broken.


    This time, she appeared in an empty and mysterious hall. A young, pretty female adept slowly walked toward her, one step at a time. She was holding a ck wooden spike gleaming with a sickly green sheen in her hands.


    It looked exactly like the spike in the venomfiend¡¯s body.


    ¡°How many times do you intend to use the same trick?¡± Before Spa could shout out loud and shatter the illusion, her body trembled, and she roared instead, ¡°Bastard! You dare trick me?¡±


    Unfortunately, she understood the situation a little toote.


    The pretty adept in front of her was no illusion at all. In fact, even the poison spike was real. The enemy had waved her hand, and the spike had stabbed Spa in the waist as her blood energy dispersed.


    Strangely enough, despite being stabbed, Spa did not feel any pain at all.


    Spa was utterly shocked. She curled her fingers into ws and shed several dozen times, sending crimson trails cutting through the air at the enemy.


    Unfortunately, Marilyn Mona gave her no chance to attack. She had retreated the instant she managed to stab Spa, cing down several psionic barriers in front of her as she retreated.


    By the time Spa broke through the barriers, the scenery around her had changed.


    This time, Spa was in an incrediblyrge arena. A massive sea of countless terrifying voodoo beasts was pressing towards her from every direction.


    The voodoo beasts at the very front row growled and huffed, white misting out of their noses as they did so. The ground beneath them rumbled when they stepped forward. Their teeth were razor-sharp, and their eyes were bloodshot.


    Spa was slightly terrified. For the first time in this battle, she felt a genuine chill in her heart.


    She pulled out the ck spike from her waist. What started flowing out wasn¡¯t red blood, but white pus that smelled like bitter almonds. A strange, numb sensation began to spread from her waist to her spine, heart, brain, and limbs. Spa felt her eyes blur. She could no longer feel her waist now.


    ¡°This damned bastard! Just how many illusions did she make? Which ones are real? And which are fake?¡± Spa shouted internally.


    However, she had no time to verify reality or illusion. The terrifying horde was roaring and thundering toward here like a vicious torrent.


    A violent and bloody battle instantly broke out in the arena!


    As the battle in the illusion continued, Spa¡¯s actual body remained unmoving on the building¡¯s first floor.


    A dozen bubbles hovered in the air around her.


    She was inside one of those strange bubbles, caught in a nightmare with her eyes shut. Every time a bubble popped, a new one would float over and catch her within.


    A few strange wounds would then appear on Spa¡¯s body, causing blood to spill out. However, Spa did not seem to realize this. Her eyes remained shut, her eyelids shuddering violently. She could not escape the illusions.


    Of course, not all the illusions that Spa was experiencing were fake.


    Over thirty adepts in uniform sat cross-legged in the rooms surrounding the hall. They concentrated their Spirit, guiding Spa¡¯s mental consciousness and dragging her deeper into the illusions.


    asionally, Marilyn Mona¨Cwho was standing in a corner of the hall¨Cwould send a dozen voodoo beasts or some adepts to attack the shapeshifter in the dreams.


    It was the presence of these actual enemies that made the illusion so terrifying!


    If Spa could not differentiate between illusion and reality, then the illusory attacks would be able to leave actual wounds on her body. However, if she believed all attacks to be illusory, then the real attacks mixed between would inflict terrifying damage on her.


    Real and illusory, illusory and real.


    Sometimes, it could be very hard to tell the difference between reality and illusion.


    And on the strange battlefield of the mind, the inability to do so often meant death!

 Chapter 1287 - Boiling Fury

    <h4>Chapter 1287 Boiling Fury</h4>


    On the seventh day of the war between the Dener n and the Crimson n, the fervor finally peaked.


    Scarface Gallow of the Dener n, peak Third Grade adept, had been surrounded by the Crimson n outside the Swamp of Tragedies and escaped with grievous wounds. It was rumored that his injuries had affected his foundations as an adept. He would no longer have any hope of advancing to Fourth Grade in his life now!


    Shapeshifter Spa of the Crimson n, advanced Third Grade adept, had slipped into ck Rose Manor in an attempt to rescue Crimson Grand Duke Antoniel, only to be trapped in Marily Mona¡¯s Labyrinth of Illusions; she died in battle.


    The retirement of the two Third Grades from the conflict indicated that the war was slowly moving beyond everyone¡¯s control.


    The fires of hatred and grudges that had umted between the two rival ns could now only be extinguished by blood a hundredfold. The fires of war would not cease until then!


    The crippling of Gallow and Spa¡¯s death were like two massive bombs that instantly blew up the battlefield. It shattered all sense of silent, mutual agreement between the two ns to contain the conflict. The leaders¡¯ efforts to prevent the war from turning into an all-out ughter had gone to waste.


    The intensity and severity of the war instantly escted beyond the grasp of both ns. Neither side held back anymore; they couldn¡¯t hold back, even if they wanted to.


    The war went from skirmishes between low-grade adepts to intense fighting between high-grade adepts. Blood from both ns flowed like a river, and the mes of war burned without an end in sight. All sorts of taboo magic and devastating strategies that scarred thend started to appear on the battlefield.


    At this point, a simple surrender and concession of territory would not settle the matter!


    Coldmountain City.


    It was southwest of Ailovis and a necessary path for the Dener n to go through if they wanted to head into more prosperousnds.


    Here, the Crimson n¡¯s army stood off against the Dener n¡¯s army, fortified by Coldmountain Castle and a firm adept tower. Both parties had resentment and the firm responsibility to hold their ground carved into their bones. They had been stuck here in a stalemate for three days with no clear victory yet.


    The Crimson n dared not retreat and had nowhere else to fall back to!


    Behind Coldmountain City was the most prosperous stretch ofnd that the n possessed, which they had painstakingly managed for over two hundred years.


    Should this fortress fall, the Dener n would be able to freely ravage the Crimson n¡¯s core territories. Even if the Dener n were ultimately repelled, such a disaster would devastate the Crimson n¡¯s foundations and set them back.


    For the n and themselves, the Crimson n had no other option but to stand strong!


    The Dener n, on the other hand, also had a strong reason to break through at all costs.


    The heights that the war had escted to were now far beyond the original mastermind¡¯s estimations and ns. The resentment between the two ns was so deep that there was no hope of an ordinary mediation.


    Unless the Dener n could cripple the Crimson n in one swift blow, they would find themselves on a horrible backfoot in the negotiations that came after the war.


    From the start of the war, Adept Ker of the Dener n had never nned to devour or conquer the Crimson n. After all, the Crimson n had substantial foundations and a terrifying backbone of powerful individuals!


    The Dener n had only a single Fourth Grade adept, while the Crimson n had as many as four or five Fourth Grades showing on the table. That was why Ker¡¯s original intention was only to injure the Crimson n and intimidate them, ending the war before it escted to the Fourth Grades level.


    This way, with most of the Fourth Grade adepts standing on the sidelines, the Dener n could benefit significantly in the post-war negotiations.


    Moreover, many other adept ns¨Cespecially the Fourth Grade ns¨Chad sent out secret adept forces of their own to aid the Dener n. These adepts swapped their emblems for Dener emblems and fought in the name of the Dener n.


    Some of these ns provided military forces, while others provided resources. The Dener n was only a front. Should they lose the war, the other Fourth Grade ns would intervene and prevent the Crimson n from reaching into Dener territory. Should they win, then all the resources,nd, and poption they obtained would belong to the Dener n.


    Even Adept Ker would break outughing with joy with such conditions!


    However, when the battle started, the war¡¯s intensity and the Crimson n¡¯s resistance was beyond Ker¡¯s expectations.


    Scarface Gallow was a peak Third Grade adept and a famous powerhouse of the Dener n with the greatest hope of advancing to Fourth Grade. However, he had been surrounded by Crimson forces and badly injured in a risky maneuver by bug adept Billis, who had also been badly injured in the endeavor.


    Ker had personally examined Gallow¡¯s injury after he fled back to the Dener n. She concluded that his very origin had been damaged, and it was highly likely that he would never advance to Fourth Grade.


    It was a massive blow to the Dener n, so tremendous that no number of resources or territory could ever make up for it!


    However, news of Third Grade Blood-Elf Shapeshifter Spa¡¯s death at ck Rose Manor returned; that news did not make Ker feel any joy or pleasure at a wrong avenged. No, it made her feel a genuine chill from the depths of her heart.


    The war seemed to have spiraled out of her control!


    The retirement of the two Third Grades seemed to be the opening of Pandora¡¯s box. The war continued to escte to a scale beyond Adept Ker¡¯s control. Even if she were willing to stop the war now and offer a truce, the mes of war would continue burning towards Dener territory, fueled by unending hatred.


    That was what frustrated her the most and what she feared the most!


    It was why Ker felt a hint of regret for the first time when she heard of the death of the Third Grade Crimson adept.


    Perhap...she had made a mistake!


    News of Spa¡¯s death quickly reached the Crimson n, and it ignited the fuse of the leadership. In particr, the vampire faction was furious. Each and every vampire wanted nothing more than to charge onto the battlefield and ughter Marilyn Mona.


    Inside the city lord¡¯s manor of Coldmountain City.


    Mary sat on arge chair at the end of a hall, dressed in red armor. Her face was cold and stern, the very corners of her eyes dripping with murder.


    As the only blood master of the vampires, she was, without a doubt, their owner and ruler. Now, a direct subordinate of hers had died at the hands of the enemy. It was a grievous insult and humiliation towards the vampire faction and toward her, Mary.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for Greem¡¯s instructions that she, as a Fourth Grade adept of the n, not quickly set foot on the battlefield, Mary would have led all her vampires and razed ck Rose Manor to the ground.


    All of her efforts and sacrifice to reach Fourth Grade, yet it only put more constraints on her. It was incredibly torturous for Mary, who had always preferred striking before thinking things through.


    That was why Mary could no longer suppress her fury in front of her equally restless subordinates. She stood up and shouted.


    ¡°What are all of you hollering around here for? If you have the ability and power to do so, go and bring that whore back to me! Dead or alive, anyone who brings Marilyn Mona back to me will immediately be promoted to Fourth Grade.¡±


    In all honesty, despite themotion the vampires made, they had all been eagerly waiting for this promise from her mouth.


    The moment Mary gave her word, the entire mansion bustled withmotion.


    Beng. Beng. Beng!


    Red mist erupted all over the building as bats fluttered out into the night.


    All the vampires swarmed out of the hall, circling once over Coldmountain City before flying southwest in a massive crimson cloud.


    They summoned their forces and allies along the way, calling more intermediate and low-grade vampires to their cause, as well as gathering all their blood servants.


    The red cloud traveled quickly, swelling in size as it went. By the time it flew out of Coldmountain City, it had turned into a thunderous army of countless vampire bats. They flew into the distance without any hesitation.


    No one knew when it had happened, but the vampires in the Crimson n had grown in such great numbers that they were now a truly horrifying army!


    Twenty-five kilometers away from Coldmountain City was where the Dener n had set up camp.


    Several Third Grade Dener n adepts were gathered in the strategist¡¯s tent discussing their current situation. However, before they could conclude their discussion, a few n adepts burst into the tent with pale faces.


    ¡°My lords...my lords, trouble! Outside, out there...the enemy has arrived.¡±


    The Third Grade adepts froze upon hearing this and quickly emerged from the tent.


    As expected, after casting Eagle Eye and other sight-enhancement spells, they could see the furious crimson cloud charging out of Coldmountain City. Even the advanced Third Grade adept couldn¡¯t help but feel his head spin at the sight of that.


    Vampires...all vampires!


    Judging by the scale of that cloud, all of the Crimson n¡¯s vampires have mobilized! Still, the real question was: Was Fourth Grade Mary among their ranks?


    At the thought of possibly running into a Fourth Grade vampire adept, the Third Grade adepts of the Dener n couldn¡¯t help but gulp nervously. They could feel how dry their mouths were.


    ¡°Prepare for battle...prepare for battle,¡± The adept in the lead was a male adept in a dark green robe. He had tan skin, a sharp face, and a wolf-head helmet on his head. He was a muscr man as well, and upon seeing the vampires, he pulled out a shortsword from his belt and shouted, ¡°All adepts, immediately cease your resting. Come out and prepare for war! Everyone, return to your forces. We must stand firm against this wave of attack.


    ¡°If...and I¡¯m only saying if...Mary appears among the enemies, you are permitted to retreat ahead of time. Remember, if our forces are routed, the next gathering point is¡ª¡±


    Unfortunately, the vampire army had mobilized too quickly. They had far too little time to prepare.


    Just as the Third Grade adepts prepared to return to their own armies and await the battle, the cloud turned slightly, passing by their encampment and heading somewhere southwest.


    All the Dener adepts were already gripping their staffs and wands in hand, so tight they could almost crush the magic tools between their fingers. No one expected the vampire army only to be passing by.


    They watched dumbfoundedly as the vampire army cut through the sky and disappeared over the horizon. They had no idea how to respond.


    Should they pursue, wait, or disperse and go back to rest?


    The Dener n adepts had no idea what to do!

 Chapter 1288 - Desperate Fleeing

    <strong>Chapter 1288 Desperate Fleeing</strong>


    ¡°Where are they heading?¡± A Dener n adept asked in confusion. ¡°What¡¯s there southwest of here?¡±


    Everyone shook their heads.


    Only one adept suddenly piped up, ¡°Andman City. ck Rose Manor! They are heading for ck Rose Manor!¡±


    The expressions of all the adepts turned. They instantly understood.


    They¡¯d stabbed the ho¡¯s nest. Lady Marilyn Mona was in for a reckoning!


    The Third Grade adept in charge of the entire army took out amunication crystal and urgently contacted headquarters.


    Marilyn Mona received news of the vampire¡¯s movements about seven minutester.


    The moment themunication concluded, she quickly summoned all the stationed adepts of ck Rose Manor and sent them to the neighboring Andman City. She departed under the escort of the Dream Garden troops, quickly separating from the n¡¯s main forces as she fled towards Dener n territory.


    Coldmountain City was over five hundred kilometers away from Andman City. With the vampires¡¯ flight speed, they would need a minimum of four hours to arrive, even if they traveled with no regard for their stamina.


    Four hours wasn¡¯t particrly short, but it wasn¡¯t incredibly long, either. Marilyn Mona did not have the luxury of riding back to the n headquarters in a carriage. Moreover, with all themotion the vampires were making, it was evident that they held no regard for appearances now. Nothing was holding them back.


    Even if Mona managed to escape back to n territory, her survival still couldn¡¯t be assured until she was protected by absolute power. The threat of death continued to linger over her head!


    All the adepts were riding on massive goats as they leaped and bounded towards Dener territory like the wind. Of course, magical horses were slightly faster over short distances. However, when it came to stamina, the giant mountain goats were far superior.


    Moreover, these special mounts bred by the n could sprint for days on end on a single meal. They were superior creaturespared to ordinary mounts when it came to stamina, endurance, and docility.


    They would have to pass through Stoneshard Valley to return to n territory, the only path that connected Dener territory and Crimson territory.


    The two hundred kilometers of travel took them three hours to traverse.


    They received news that Andman City had been attacked by the vampires just as they arrived at Stoneshard Valley. They didn¡¯t even have time to rest.


    Simultaneously, the garrison at Stoneshard Valley also received reports that a terrifying army of adepts was marching in their direction.


    ¡°Those vampires have gone mad! Mad, I tell you!¡± Marilyn Mona, who had traveled here as fast as she could, was utterly shocked and furious. She might be a Third Grade adept, but even she couldn¡¯t help but be anxious when hearing of such a terrifying horde of enemies pursuing her so insistently.


    ¡°We are leaving now! Now! We can¡¯t stay here any longer. We must return to n headquarters now!¡±


    As she shouted her orders, the Dream Garden forces immediately ruffled their goats and passed through Stoneshard Valley. They sprinted towards the n hearnds upon a road of gray and white stones.


    They could see dark smoke rising from Stoneshard Valley in the distance only an hour after they departed.


    ¡°Dammit! Those vampires won¡¯t dare to venture into Dener territory, will they?¡± Mona consoled herself desperately, but she did not have much confidence left.


    ¡°The situation is dire. We cannot keep traveling leisurely like this! Ansok, Muto,¡± Mona named four or five of her subordinates and instructed sternly, ¡°Each of you lead a group of people in different directions. Rally back at n headquarters after you escape enemy pursuit. Talina, you continue down the main road with everyone else. Remember, run as fast as you can.¡±


    Talina was a young adept, but she was only a Second Grade. Her body trembled when she heard Mona¡¯s orders, but she dared not go against her superior. She gritted her teeth and nodded in acknowledgment.


    The hundred-man party of adepts quickly split up into five separate groups. The main group and its sixty adepts continued fleeing down the main road under Talina¡¯s lead. The other groups scattered into the forest and escaped in different directions.


    Meanwhile, Marilyn Mona slipped into the woods alone and fled northwest with all she had.


    Since she was trying to escape, she couldn¡¯t fly in the air.


    On the one hand, flying wasn¡¯t her expertise, and trying to outrun the vampires in the air was a foolish idea. On the other hand, flying in the sky would leave obvious tracks in the air, allowing the enemy to track her down easily.


    That was why Mona cast a series of spells on herself the moment she entered the woods, including Haste, Obscure Detection, and Stoneskin. She then ignored her subordinates and started running with all her strength.


    The forest¡¯s gray trees were tall and straight, most of them growing at a higher elevation. The spots of clearing that could be found in the woods mainly consisted of shrubbery and bushes, as well as thick roots that slithered everywhere like snakes.


    Night had fallen over the continent now.


    Traces of white vapor rose from the ground when night fell, covering the forest in ayer of mist. The mist made it difficult for an ordinary person to see ten steps beyond where they were standing.


    A slender figure charged out of these mists, running straight into a green bush. The petite figure did not seem to be injured at all. Instead, it was the bush that had been stomped beyond recognition with overwhelming force.


    Snap.


    Marilyn Mona stopped abruptly in her tracks. She lowered her head, only to realize that her beautiful dress had been torn to ribbons by the bramble. The dress barely clung to her body now. Light red marks could be seen on her white, exposed skin, but there were no signs of injury.


    Like the majority of elementium adepts, Mona focused most of her effort on improving her Spirit. She did not pay as much attention to raising her Physique. Even though she was Third Grade, her Physique was still a pathetic 11 points. It was barely enough for her to survive the nar radiation and suppression of foreign nes.


    Eleven points of Physique already made her as terrifying as a mammothpared to an ordinary human. However, it was hardly noteworthy among the adepts.


    With the Haste spell, Mona sprinted at superhuman speed. Her figure had turned into a blur, making it difficult to capture her silhouette. However, such horrifying speed also carried unexpected risks.


    Evenmon bramble and branches could inflict scratches; she had to put up elementium shields to avoid being hurt. However, with so many brambles and branches flying past her, she was lucky to have been able to keep the shield up for more than a few minutes.


    If she wasn¡¯t quick enough to swerve away from crashing into a tree, Mona¡¯s 11 points of Physique meant that she wouldn¡¯t be the unfortunate one. The tree would be the unfortunate one. However, too many collisions and scratches started to add up, making for an unpleasant feeling.


    Compared to her Physique, Mona¡¯s Strength and Agility were only worse!


    She only had 6 points of Strength and 7 points of Agility. They were neither enough for her to rampage through the forest nor enough to control her tremendous speed.


    After fleeing madly for fifty kilometers, Mona finally had to stop and breathe. She took this opportunity to examine her aching body and her shredded dress.


    She braced against a tree with her arm and panted for a while before regaining her breath. She then took out a magic crystal from her ring and took a look. She frowned.


    It had been one and a half hours since she separated from her subordinates. Four of the six red dots in the crystal ball had been extinguished. That meant that four of her subordinates had fallen victim to the vampires.


    Such speed and power. It also served to demonstrate the power and terror of the vampires on her tail!


    What was even more terrifying was the ferocity and resolution they disyed!


    It seemed like her decision to kill Spa had been a foolish one. Her actions had called down such disastrous cmity.


    However, regret was of no use at this point.


    Mona had already sent out a call for help to the headquarters before she departed. She believed that the n elders would not hang her out to dry, given her position and status. In fact, it was also possible that Lady Ker herself was making her way toward her.


    Mona¡¯s anxious, beating heart slowly calmed down at the thought of this.


    She looked back at the path she hade from and frowned even more.


    She¡¯d had no opportunity to cover her tracks when she fled in that frenzied manner. The ravaged shrubs, crushed grass, the fallen trees. There was even a tiny gap left in the mist that indicated the path she had taken.


    These tiny tracks were practically nothing to an ordinary person, but they were as clear as day for the adepts and their powerful Spirit.


    If those vampires were on her tail, she would not be able to shake them like this.


    She was a noble Third Grade psionic, yet she was being chased around in the woods by a bunch of vampires like she was nothing more than a lowly mutt. This humiliation burned furiously in Marilyn Mona¡¯s heart. She cursed, but there was nothing she could do.


    She gritted her teeth angrily and cast another Invisibility and Concealment spell on herself. It wasn¡¯t until she had turned wholly invisible and had wiped away all traces of her elementium aura that she carefully hovered over the ground and flew deeper into the woods.

 Chapter 1289 - Mary Intercepts

    <strong>Chapter 1289 Mary Intercepts</strong>


    A smallke deep in a forest.


    It was only two to three hundred square meters in surface area, but it was the favorite resting spot for the nearby forest creatures.


    Even the most savage and ferocious of predators became tame and gentle here. They came to theke quietly and left quietly after they had had their fill. Theke was crowded with all sorts of animals that hade here to have a drink.


    Night fell, and the curtain of darkness hung thick in the air.


    The calm surface of theke appeared even quieter as it reflected the beautiful moonlight.


    Two ck forms suddenlynded on top of a boulder sticking out of theke. Their arrival also caused the bright moon in the skies to be obscured by ayer of crimson mist.


    Puff! Puff!


    Two muffled puffs could be heard as the two silhouettes turned into humanoid forms.


    ¡°Soros, what¡¯s the situation on your side? Did you manage to find that fellow¡¯s tracks?¡± It was a gentle and elegant nobleman who asked the question, his carefully-groomed mustache gleaming in the moonlight. The clothes he wore were intricate and exquisite.


    He was Marquis Rothers, who had submitted to Mary with his entire n of vampires. In return, he had be an important subordinate that Mary frequently relied on.


    Rothers had brought nearly all of his subordinates on this hunt for the Third Grade psionic. It was obvious he had his eyes set on that promotion to Fourth Grade. Naturally, he was Soros¡¯ strongestpetitor, who held the highest reputation amongst the vampires apart from Mary herself.


    ¡°Hmph! Do you think I¡¯d be loitering around here if we found her already?¡± Soros grunted. ¡°These damned adepts. They aren¡¯t much good at fighting, but they are very good at hiding and concealing. We¡¯ve managed to hunt down most of the psionic¡¯s subordinates, but we haven¡¯t seen any sign of her yet. Hmph! A bastard that is willing to cast aside her subordinates to escape alone; she had best pray she doesn¡¯t run into me!¡±


    Rothers caressed his mustache with his fingers as he stared at the quiet forest around him. He said casually, ¡°Us vampires have alle out this time. We¡¯ve destroyed two enemy outposts. It is almost certain that their retaliation will arrive soon. We don¡¯t have much time left. Why don¡¯t we cooperate, Lord Soros!¡±


    ¡°Cooperate? How so?¡±


    ¡°If we thoroughly surround these woods and seal off all possible paths of escape, the only thing left would be a narrowing of the circle and the search of the remaining area. If we work individually, our will be full of gaps, leaving her with plenty of room to dance around and evade our searches. If we work together, with one person on the outside watching for any gaps in the encirclement, and the other dedicated to searching for the psionic, we will be much more efficient!¡± Rothers still had the same gentle smile on his face.


    Soros¡¯ gaze focused as he replied in a deep voice, ¡°And who would be in charge ofying down the encirclement, while the other searches?¡±


    In the end, this was the most crucial question for the both of them!


    Rothers fell silent for a moment before speaking up, ¡°Lord Soros, you are a talented individual. You have an excellent chance of advancing to Fourth Grade even if you don¡¯t rely on our blood master¡¯s ability to promote us through the Embrace. Since that is the case, why don¡¯t you leave this opportunity to me? Of course, I won¡¯t disappoint you. I can¡ª¡±


    At this point, Rothers¡¯ voice turned hushed as he silently sent a voice transmission to Soros instead.


    The promises Rothers¡¯ made moved Soros tremendously. However, even if Soros were confident in advancing by his own power, he wasn¡¯t willing to so easily give up on the path with a higher chance of sess.


    Moreover, if Rothers were to advance to Fourth Grade ahead of him, he would have to treat him as a superior for the foreseeable future. Soros felt incredibly upset at the thought of that awkward situation.


    Moreover, the vampires were very particr about seniority. If Rothers were to advance before him, Rothers would always remain his senior by a little bit, even if Soros were to advance to Fourth Grade after. Didn¡¯t that mean he would always be one step inferior to Rothers then?


    Rothers seemed to have perceived Soros wavering, but still hesitating. Thus, he spoke again, this time promising greater and even richer benefits to Soros for him to bow out of thispetition.


    His efforts were rewarded by Soros¡¯ silent nod.


    ¡°If that¡¯s settled, then let us start now! If things drag on for too long, I¡¯m worried that reinforcements from the Dener n will mess things up for us.¡± Rothers was overjoyed and impatiently suggested that they get to work.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. Only some intermediate or low-grade small fry can get here. As for their Fourth Grade adept? She had best stay obediently in her tower!¡± Soros chuckled coldly.


    He didn¡¯t exin anything, and Rothers knew better than to pursue the question.


    After all, he already understood something from what Soros said. Their blood master must have divulged something to these direct subordinate vampires of hers. Otherwise, Soros would not be so confident in their operation.


    In the end, their blood master still treated her people with more importance.


    Rothers reflected resentfully before turning into a bat and flying toward the edges of the forest.


    It was undoubtedly the most dangerous and helpless point in Marilyn Mona¡¯s life as an adept.


    She hid carefully within the hollow of a big tree, several dozen meters above the ground.


    The entrance to the hollow was only the size of a fist. This ce was once the home of some squirrels.


    However, that family of squirrels was now lying in the corner of the hollow, utterly unmoving. Strange runes spun deep in their eyes.


    Marilyn Mona, who once had a pretty and slender figure, had now shrunk to a squirrel¡¯s size. She was nervously hiding in the tree hollow as she awaited news from a distance.


    It was so quiet outside in the forest that she could even hear the squirrels¡¯ breathing and the beating of their hearts. Every so often, she could hear an odd sound of beating wings outside the tree.


    These vampires had arrived so quickly and in such haste that Mona had no opportunity to make more preparations.


    If she had not discovered this tree hollow unexpectedly and subdued the squirrels to serve as her cover, the enemy would have already found the faint magic aura of Shrinking Size.


    She did not kill the squirrels.


    That was because she still needed their weak life auras to conceal her own aura.


    However, at that moment, the snake-eye ring on her right little finger shed slightly.


    Mona quickly rubbed her ring, and an elderly female voice appeared in her mind.


    ¡°Mona, where are you now? Why have you not returned to the n?¡±


    It was the voice of Adept Ker.


    Mona almost started tearing up when she heard that familiar voice.


    ¡°Mydy, I have been surrounded by the enemy. I cannot escape anymore. The enemy is searching everywhere for me. I expect them to find me in a few more hours.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! You were too reckless. How could you have killed an enemy Third Grade adept just like that?!¡± Ker reprimanded solemnly.


    ¡°Mydy, it was my mistake. I will not repeat it again in the future!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! As long as you understand where you went wrong.¡± Ker remained silent for a moment before speaking again, ¡°You¡¯ve been following me for five hundred years. I won¡¯t abandon you. Stay where you are, and remain hidden. I will depart from my tower to rescue you. You must hang in there until I arrive!¡±


    ¡°I understand! I will hang in there!¡± Upon hearing that the n leader had not abandoned her, Mona was so happy she almost shouted out loud.


    The light from the snake-eye ring slowly faded. It was evident that Adept Ker had cut off theirmunications now.


    Mona hesitated for a moment. She couldn¡¯t help but write the runes for Visual Avoidance and Suggestion in her palm before sending them to surround the tree hollow.


    This way, even if any vampires discovered this tree hollow, they would subconsciously turn away under the Rune of Suggestion¡¯s effects. As long as it wasn¡¯t a Third Grade vampire that found the tree hollow, the vampires would not even realize what had happened to them.


    The City of Musta.


    Dener n Territory, Berkley Province.


    The tower at the center of the city glowed brightly, the entire structure engulfed in brilliant elementium light. It looked like blooming fireworks in the night, making for an impressive sight from a distance.


    A short momentter, the light faded away from the tower.


    The doors opened abruptly as a group of adepts flew out from within.


    They had just stepped out of the doors when a particrly old female adept instructed the rest of them, ¡°Hurry over as soon as possible. I will go ahead of you all!¡±


    Having said that, this terrifying adept who had no nose or ears and only several holes in their ce, immediately took to the air, flying rapidly towards the forest.


    Ker was a Fourth Grade bloodline adept and one of the more famous powerhouses of the Central Lands.


    At the moment, she had no choice but to emerge from n headquarters to save that subordinates of hers that had poked the ho¡¯s nest. She had teleported to the adept tower closest to Mona¡¯s location and was preparing to rescue here.


    However, before she had even flown a kilometer across thend, Ker stopped in her tracks and looked at the sky¡¯s big, bright moon.


    She didn¡¯t know when it had happened, but the silver moon had been stained with a trace of red.


    A thinyer of red mist obscured the moon¡¯s light, tinging the whole world scarlet as if it had been covered in blood.


    Ker smelled the familiar scent of blood. Her expression instantly turned into a ferocious scowl.


    ¡°Mary, to think it¡¯s you! Show yourself, since you¡¯re here already!¡±


    Giggles that sounded like silver bells could be heard. Mary descended from high above the sky with her crimson wings and crimson armor. The blood moon behind her hung high in the sky,pletely engulfing her profile in the night.

 Chapter 1290 - Enemies Everywhere

    Chapter 1290 Enemies Everywhere


    Envy and resentment flickered in Adept Ker¡¯s eyes when she saw Mary in the night sky, as bright and eye-catching as a blooming rose.


    She tapped her staff, and a strange, tiny monkey climbed out of her sleeve. The monkey sat on her shoulder and red at Mary with its red eyes. Ker¡¯s body began glowing as she applied a series of halos to herself.


    Bloody Mary was a terrifying killer known for her Agility. Even Ker had to be on her guard with so little distance between them.


    ¡°Mary, is your presence here meant to be a challenge to me?¡± Ker red at Mary furiously as she said.


    ¡°How, how could I dare to do so?¡± In her deathly sweet voice, Mary spoke, ¡°You¡¯re a real old veteran, even among the Fourth Grades! You will have to look for Greem if it¡¯s a fight you want. I could hardly be bothered by such crude matters.¡±


    ¡°Then why are you standing in my way?¡±


    ¡°One of my subordinates just died. Of course, I had to look to clear the ledger with you. I will be very upset if that Mona girl of yours doesn¡¯t die tonight!¡±


    ¡°Step aside...this is my territory. You have no right to stand in my way!¡±


    ¡°Hehehe, Lady Ker, you really intended to go save that Mona! Very well then, go ahead,¡± Having said that, Mary stepped aside, as if she wouldn¡¯t intervene if Ker were to just fly away.


    However, her aura was still firmly locked onto Adept Ker. She was not loosening up at all.


    ¡°You......¡± Ker was flustered. She hesitated for a moment, but she did not walk down the road past Mary in the end.


    They were both Fourth Grade adepts. Ker was a few hundred years older than Mary and far more experienced and sinister when it came to fighting. However, they were both of the same grade, and even Ker wasn¡¯t absolutely confident ining out ahead.


    Ker gritted her teeth and hesitated for a long while. Finally, she sighed and flew back to the tower in the distance.


    A short momentter, lights shed in the tower. Adept Ker had teleported elsewhere.


    ............


    Rhine City.


    Dener n Territory, Berkley Province.


    Compared to Musta, this city was a hundred kilometers away from where Marilyn Mona was trapped.


    It was the middle of the night, and bright light suddenly shed from the city center¡¯s tall tower. A violent energy tide shrouded the structure, creating a shy show of light.


    It was so bright that one could see the colorful lights from dozens of kilometers away.


    A short momentter, a ck silhouette flew out of the tower, heading somewhere into the distance.


    However, before Ker could even make it out of the city, a deafening dragon¡¯s roar could be heard from afar. A fearsome figure cloaked in lightning appeared before her.


    That aerodynamic form, blue body d in crackling lightning, those firm, gleaming scales, and those seemingly scrawny yet powerful ws.


    In all honesty, no one wouldn¡¯t be nervous when a terrifying dragon stood in front of them and stared at them with their amber eyes.


    ¡°Fourth Grade...Thunder Dragon...Arms,¡± Adept Ker spat out the name from between her teeth.


    Of course, she added a bunch of curses after that name in her mind.


    ¡°Human adept, this road is closed for the moment. I suggest you find another path!¡± This was the first time Arms had shown himself in the World of Adepts since his advancement to Fourth Grade. He appeared calm and collected in front of this Fourth Grade adept. His overwhelming aura of might weighed down upon the city, terrorizing its entire poption of humans.


    There were no questions or pointless banter from Ker. She immediately turned and left for the tower.


    A short momentter, lights flickered all over the tower. Ker had teleported away again.


    Her destination this time was a n tower on Kerry Ind.


    It was one of the Dener n¡¯s First ss resource sites. Due to the magical arrayid down around the ind, not many people knew of this ce.


    Of course, the reason Ker hadn¡¯t chosen to teleport here was that this ind was quite far from where Mona was. It was over two hundred kilometers away. However, it seemed like the Crimson n¡¯s Fourth Grades had intercepted all the towers close to Mona. Ker had no choice but to teleport here and fly the rest of the way.


    Fortunately, two hundred kilometers wasn¡¯t all that far for a Fourth Grade adept like herself.


    What she never expected was for a dense cloud of ck smoke to erupt right in front of her the moment she emerged from the barrier surrounding the ind.


    The edges of the ck smoke blocked Ker¡¯s Spirit. It was more than enough to alert Ker to the oddity and power of this smoke. If she had to fight in such an environment, her vision, sight, smell, and spiritual senses would all be suppressed to their lowest sensitivity.


    It was undoubtedly a terrible scenario for an adept!


    ¡°Shadow Demon......¡± Ker red at the ck smoke in front of her with endless hatred. She chose not to charge forward after a moment¡¯s hesitation.


    If this had been the past, she would have had no idea what she had run into. Now, with all the information provided to her, she finally had a better understanding of the Crimson n and that mysterious legendary fire adept.


    That...must be that personal bodyguard that the fire adept had made for himself¨C Shadow Demon!


    Shadow golems were strange creations thatbined the strengths of metal golems and shadow creatures. They might not have the most potent offense or defense, but they were uniquely difficult to deal with.


    Moreover, the fire adept was a very generous man. He had equipped this golem of his with multiple pieces of Fourth Grade shadow equipment. It was an unbelievable squandering of resources and a heartbreaking disy ofvish wealth!


    After all, most Fourth Grade adepts in the Central Lands didn¡¯t have more than a single piece of Fourth Grade equipment! Meanwhile, the fire adept was equipping his goddamned golem with Fourth Grade weapons.


    Just the thought of this filled Ker¡¯s heart with fury!


    Of course, Ker had confidence in defeating an unintelligent golem that was only capable of fixed offensive and defensive routines.


    However, she was in a hurry to save someone. To start fighting against a difficult opponent like this shadow golem here was not exactly the best idea!


    Ker didn¡¯t want to give up yet. She turned and headed towards the tower once again.


    However, just as she turned around, a crisp frog¡¯s croak could be heard from her waist.


    Ker paused for a moment. She took out a mysterious wooden badge from her belt. Magic surged into the belt as a tiny humanoid projection appeared above the badge. It resembled Psionic Marilyn Mona.


    Mona¡¯s projection had zed eyes with blood streaking down from the corners. The projection slowly turned into loose sparks of light beforepletely crumbling in front of Ker¡¯s eyes.


    Marilyn Mona was dead!


    As a core member of the Dener n, Ker naturally had Mona¡¯s soul brand in her possession. Now that even her soul brand had scattered, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what had happened to her!


    Scarface Gallow had lost all hope of advancement, while Marilyn Mona had died to the Crimson n¡¯s encirclement. Even if the Crimson n had also lost a Third Grade adept, this war was already a loss in Ker¡¯s mind.


    Moreover, as the war raged on, the Dener n would continue to bleed.


    It was unbearable torture for her, the leader of this n!


    The Dener n might be supported by several other Fourth Grade organizations in public and the shadows. However, what kind of support and aid couldpensate for the loss of two Third Grade elites?


    It was at this point that Ker truly regretted her actions.


    She should not have listened to the promises of those gutless fools. She should never have been the one to step forward, using the Dener n as the de.


    Ker, who was about to leave, instead turned around and shouted at the ck smoke, ¡°Greem, I know you can hear me. Three days from now! I will be waiting for you at Stoneshard Valley to resolve this conflict!¡±


    Having said that, she turned and returned to the resource site without looking back.


    A long whileter, a towering metal figure slowly appeared from the smoke. It stared in the direction Ker had vanished into and brooded for a moment. Finally, it shook its head silently and disappeared.


    At the same time, a Mothership was hovering somewhere a few thousand kilometers away.


    After giving Shadow Demon the order to retreat, Greem cut off his spiritual connection with the golem. He turned back and asked, ¡°What¡¯s the current situation of the war? What other organizations and ns have gotten involved? You all should have been able to investigate that much by now, am I right?¡±


    Gargamel, Meryl, Emelia, Snowlotus, Vanlier, and the other subordinates were sitting below him.


    They looked at each other. In the end, it was Meryl who stood up and replied, ¡°Teacher, we conducted our investigations. Although no official adepts from any other ns have appeared in the war so far, quite a few of their armies and forces have been seen.¡±


    ¡°Ah, what are there?¡±


    ¡°The White Spirits of the Entom n appeared during the Battle of Stoneshard, and the Swamp Flying Dragon Army of the Banda n was seen during the attack on Fallmountain City. Apart from these, we also saw the Cloud Giant force of the Gaia n, the Ghost Army of Annemdor Academy, and the Stonedragons of the Fabres n.¡±


    The person who stood behind the Entom n was naturally Elder Nics, Elder Matthew led the Banda n, and the Gaia n was founded by that man with the Gold Titan¡¯s bloodline. Meanwhile, Annemdor Academy was a private asset belonging to Vice-Chairman Mirva.


    Who would¡¯ve thought an ¡®ordinary¡¯ adept war would have involved so many Fourth Grades?


    Greem chuckled coldly, an expression of thought taking over his face.

 Chapter 1291 - Battle for the Central Lands

    Chapter 1291 Battle for the Central Lands


    There was an adept war between the Dener n and the Crimson n, yet the shadows of so many other ns lurked behind it. Naturally, only Greem could fully understand all the implications behind this.


    In the eyes of Gargamel, Meryl, and the others, it was only a natural expression of hostility that the incumbent forces of the Central Lands held toward newly rising ns. However, Greem could see that this trouble was initiated by the existing forces across the entirety of the World of Adepts.


    The things that you could see differed based on the height upon which you stood!


    The Central Lands had been quiet for far too long.


    They had such vastnds, plentiful resources, poption, andplete legacies of knowledge. Yet, they were still suppressed and reduced to a second-rate organization by the three major adept organizations. The importance of Zhentarim was utterly incongruous with the sheer scale and size of the Central Lands.


    There were external reasons for this¨Cthe three major organizations unwilling to see the rise of another rival¨Cand internal reasons: the incumbent forces of the Central Lands werergelyposed of independent ns who did not want to see a centralized force cutting into their benefits.


    Thisbination of external and internal factors was what gave rise to the strange existence that was Zhentarim!


    The appearance of Greem and his Crimson n had undoubtedly begun to shake the ruling foundations of the Zhentarim Association. The ns and their leaders were starting to be anxious. Of course, to say that the Crimson n had utterly shattered the framework of Zhentarim was a bit premature.


    However, the Crimson n¡¯s appearance did indeed mean that the first brick had been taken out of Zhentarim¡¯s foundations. As long as it continued down its current path, it would only be a matter of time until the Zhentarim Association copsed!


    Greem could see this clearly, and so could those old Fourth Grade fools!


    Greem had originally prepared himself mentally to wage war against all the ns of Zhentarim. Judging by the current situation, those old fogeys were still a little too conservative. They had only pushed out Ker for a spearhead.


    They remained behind the scenes, eager to get rid of the variable that was Greem while not wanting to have their ns bear any damage that coulde from war. It was hardly a surprise that the Central Lands had ended up in this state of disharmony for several thousand years now, considering the hesitation and indecisiveness of these ns.


    In fact, Greem had already prepared himself for the eventuality that the Crimson n would be demolished even before he established Horton Magic Academy. He was still young; he had the capital to afford defeat.


    Moreover, the most important thing to the Crimson n wasn¡¯t its worldly territory, resource sites, or even its hundreds of n adepts. It was their powerful high-grade adepts.


    Even if the enemypletely wiped out the Crimson n¡¯s current foundations, and even if none of the Crimson n¡¯s adepts or apprentices survived, all Greem had to do was hide in and defend Fire Throne. He could remain shut-in for a hundred years, and there would be nothing his enemies could do.


    Greem, Mary, Alice, Arms; these four Fourth Grades were the greatest assurance for the Crimson n¡¯s continued existence!


    As long as they were still around, no one could truly exterminate the Crimson n.


    Even if the n was defeated, all they had to do was wait for another hundred years. When those old fools had all passed away, who among their descendants and their sessors could stop the still youthful Greem?


    Greem had countless opportunities to try and fail. However, if the ns of Zhentarim chose to walk down the path of violent opposition, it would mean eternal doom for them. Given the resentment umted between them, their ns would not escape the terrible fate of extermination and a severed legacy.


    It was the most bloody and most cruel truth of adept wars!


    The Crimson n, which Gargamel, Meryl, Emelia, and the others saw as the bedrock they had to defend with their very lives, was no more than a simple bargaining chip in Greem¡¯s eyes, to be used against his many enemies.


    A few hundred years of trials, difficulties, and cmities befalling the n? Greem could tolerate all those things happening. As long as he could achieve his final goal, all the bumps he met along the way would be no more than the desperate struggles of his enemies.


    It was the different perspective that arose from standing at different heights and havingpletely different views on life!


    However, that was only assuming the worst-case scenario. Judging by the current situation, the old fools were still reluctant tomit to an all-out war against the Crimson n. Otherwise, should seven or eight of those Fourth Grade adepts unite their forces, Greem would be prepared to retreat to Fire Throne.


    However, those old men didn¡¯t dare!


    If the Crimson n fought with suicidal zeal, it could quickly exterminate or cripple three or four Fourth Grade ns in the process. If that was the case, who among this alliance of Fourth Grades would be willing to be sacrificial victims to the Crimson n? Who would be willing to fight on the very front lines?


    The sudden duel issued by Adept Ker wasn¡¯t precisely a desperate attempt to achieve something by defeating Greem. Instead, she could see everything with perfect rity now and was looking for the quickest way to stop the Dener n from bleeding any further.


    She was unwilling to remain as the spearhead against the Crimson n for the rest of the Zhentarim Association. She was using this method to force those ghosts to step out of the shadows.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how bloody and cruel the battle in three days¡¯ time, which would decide the Central Lands¡¯ fate, would be. Meanwhile, it was probably best for the Crimson n to find some more allies for itself in the meantime.


    ............


    Three dayster.


    Stoneshard Valley.


    Ever since they confirmed the final battle¡¯s date, the Dener forces that had reached deep into Ailovis had slowly retreated to Stoneshard Valley and the surroundingnds.


    They set up camp and strengthened resistance here, startingrge-scale construction and hurrying to ce down as many temporary magical defenses as they could.


    There were several round watchtowers, each three-stories high and nearly ten meters in diameter. Several sniping spots and observation slits in the towers could each have ten adepts stationed within.


    These impromptu war towers protected the adepts within with powerful magical arrays. Simultaneously, the adepts could use the offensive arrays within the buildings to amplify their attacks.


    These war towers were constructed in a hurry, and most of the magical facilities were single-use. However, the resources and materials consumed in their construction were no less than a proper adept tower. That was why ns that did not have so many resources could not afford to use these war towers in suchvish fashion.


    The cheapest adept tower would cost at least two hundred thousand magical crystals, while a single one of these impromptu war towers cost one hundred and fifty thousand magical crystals.


    For the sake of defending the dignity of the n in thisst battle, the Dener n had constructed as many as thirty of these towers in front of Stoneshard Valley.


    However, having war towers alone was not enough. These towers were meant for defense after all.


    The Dener n also ced numerous garrisons between these towers,posed of shocking numbers of forces. These adept forces consisted mostly of adept apprentices that could unleash power roughly equal to an adept with the aid of special equipment andbat techniques.


    Their existence made up for the insufficient number of official adepts and increased the flexibility of the n¡¯s strategies in war.


    The Dener n had also put together several tens of thousands of powerful voodoo beasts and ced them before the war towers. They were the cannon fodder for this fight.


    Adept Ker finally felt slightly relieved after making all these preparations. She sat calmly inside the fortress located in Stoneshard Valley, silently awaiting the Crimson n¡¯s arrival.


    Standing at her side were Zhentarim Association Chairman Freed, Vice-Chairman Mirva, Elder Nics, Elder Matthew, Elder Fabres, and Elder Mornashen Gaia, known as the leader of the Gaia n and as the most powerful adept of the Central Lands.


    One could frankly im that almost every Fourth Grade adept in the Central Lands with any kind of disagreement or grudge against the Crimson n was gathered here. The other Fourth Grades were either watching matters unfold from the sidelines or were genuinely not interested in the politics.


    Moreover, individuals were also sent out from the three major adept organizations to observe this war and evaluate the Central Lands¡¯ future trajectory.


    Of course, should things start to move in a direction ¡®detrimental¡¯ to them, it wasn¡¯t unlikely that these ¡®observers¡¯ would take action as well. There was no need for armies. All it would take was the appearance of one or two incredibly powerful Fourth Grades on the battlefield, and the war would go down whichever path they had chosen.


    If one were to be even more straightforward, they would point out¨Curately¨Cthat this war would never have reached such intensity if not for the major organizations¡¯ subtle influence in the shadows!


    Noon had just passed when a massive dust cloud rose on the horizon.


    A rumbling army of magical machines charged forward, heading towards Stoneshard Valley like a steel dragon.


    At the forefront of the army was a hundred goblin chariots, the Steel Pathfinders.


    The goblin chariots had now broken free of their former constraints of steam power. They were now powered by magic energy and, thus, no longer released their signature white smoke. A hundred goblin chariots thundered across thend, stopping two kilometers away from the enemy lines. They began to bunker down as the cannons on top of the chariots spun around. In the blink of an eye, a kilometer-long wall of steel had appeared.


    Behind the chariots was a massive army made up of magical machines.


    Ten Motherships hovered in the air.


    Each of these Motherships was asrge as a small city. The bottoms of the Motherships were covered in terrifying cannons, their silver hulls brightly reflecting the sun¡¯s light.


    An army of over ten thousand magical machines marched in perfect formation on the ground. Each of these machines was over three meters tall. Fearsome magic energy cannons and beam rifles were installed on their torsos, shoulders, and arms.


    With each coordinated step forward, it felt as if the earth itself quaked along with them.

 Chapter 1292 - 2 Fire and Undead

    Chapter 1292 Fire and Undead


    Everyone fell silent.


    Even though they all knew the Crimson n had been hiding a massive army of magical-machine constructs, the visual impact of seeing over ten thousand magical machines thunder onto the battlefield like a torrent of metal still shook them to their core.


    Dammit! Why were there so many of them?


    Did the Crimson n dig up everyst scrap of metal ore from their Goblin ne?


    It was important to note that in most material nes, it was only possible to obtain one ton of refined steel by refining and processing over a hundred tons of ordinary metal.


    Moreover, such exceptional steel could only be used for the armor of the magical machines. To obtain alloy with sufficient conductivity and hardness to craft weapons, one would have to resort to small-scale production in theirboratories.


    Due to all these limiting factors, creating metal golems on arge scale was very difficult. Not only did it require a tremendous amount of metal resources, but it also needed manpower in the form of alchemists. In the entirety of the World of Adepts, the Silver Union was the only organization able to entirely rece their armies of footsoldiers and cannon fodder with metal golems. Even the two other major organizations relied primarily on their adept forces and voodoo beasts as their military.


    The appearance of this massive magical machine army had up-ended everyone¡¯s expectations. They once again confirmed that the Crimson n most certainly possessed the means to create magical machines at a very low cost.


    The Crimson forces couldn¡¯t care less about what outsiders thought about their magical machine army. The rest of their military forces began to appear.


    These forces arrived by the Motherships.


    As the ten Motherships stopped above the Crimson n¡¯s military formation,rge groups of unique adept forces leaped off of the ships¡¯ decks, registering in and filling the spaces in between the magical machine armies.


    The most eye-catching of these groups was an army of over seven hundred goblin machinist-sorcerers.


    Goblin. It was a synonym of lowly crudeness in the eyes of most adepts. Goblins were creatures reared in adept towers for the sole purpose of being used as test subjects or as feed for their voodoo beasts.


    Yet now, these lowly creatures that weren¡¯t even fit to be ves were piloting ferocious magical machines and weaving through the battlefield with grace. Many of the adepts felt as if their worldviews were copsing and breaking down as they saw the goblins¡¯ fluid movements and eager battlecries.


    What had happened to this world? Why was it that even feed and test subjects had taken up arms?


    Soon, the adepts¡¯ eyes were drawn toward another strange army.


    As many as two thousand fire creatures had gathered together, causing the area they stood on to ignite and burn furiously, turning into a sea of mes. Even at a nce, the quality of the members in this fire creature army was horrifying.


    In the past, even with all his power, the strongest fire creature Greem could summon had only been Second Grade. However, in this fire army, even the weakest individual had the power of a beginner Second Grade, while the most powerful individual was a Fire Lord at intermediate Fourth Grade.


    This Fire Lord stood at the front of the army, golden mes burning silently all over his body. It was undeniable that he was an individual who had mastered specific basic firews.


    It was not a fire summoning. It was a real fire army- a whole army of fire creatures with ranks and officers and amander.


    While everyone was evaluating this army of fire creatures, the Fire Lord concluded its conversation with Greem.


    ¡°We are here to aid you in your war, as per the orders of the Fire King! Human adept, point out our enemies! Also, Lord Groms said that he is delighted with your gift. If you can find more Primal Water in the future, he will be willing to maintain this coborative rtionship.¡±


    The Fire Lord¡¯s voice boomed, but his tone was a straightforward one. He had none of the slick cunningmon to mercenary groups. It almost seemed like he was eager to figure out the enemy, finish the fight, and go home to sleep.


    ¡°No need to be in a rush, Sir Grisen. Your enemies are those special adept forces stationed around the war towers. However, before you charge into battle, I will need to have another friend of mine wipe out those annoying voodoo beasts in our way. Once the voodoo beasts are scattered, your forces can charge forth. When that happens, your troops will exterminate the adept forces, while my magical machine army will siege the war towers. That will make the battle a little easier.¡±


    ¡°Huh, you mean to say you invited more reinforcements aside from us? And they are...?¡± Fire Lord Grisen couldn¡¯t help but ask out of curiosity. He might seem like arge, stout, and dumbva giant, but there were no idiots among those who could reach Fourth Grade.


    In all seriousness, high-grade elementium creatures were just as intelligent as adepts of the same grade. The only thing theycked was wisdom and knowledge umted over countless decades and cunning that had been honed in deadly trials.


    ¡°You might have heard about how our academy managed to hire a very famous lich. I was able to make acquaintances with several other famous and powerful liches across the universe through him. And so, the other mercenary army with us today is......¡± Greem paused for a moment as a shocking scene unfolded on the nk of the Crimson n¡¯s magical machine army.


    Three strange figures wrapped in ck cloaks appeared there.


    They lifted their arms, and the cloth slid down to reveal their jade-white skeletal hands. The three figures hovered half a meter off the ground, loudly singing an incantation in unison.


    As their voices rose in pitch, a ck spot of light appeared in the center of the three of them, continuously growing in size. The earth around them started to rise as a shocking number of skeletons burst forth from underground. Soon, a ten-meter-tall and five-meter-wide skeletal door had been constructed around that ball of darkness.


    Dense death energy gathered around the skeletal door, creating a roiling gray cloud that rose into the sky and blotted out the sun.


    Once everything was ready, the skeletal door connected with an undead dimension and formed a stable portal.


    The next second, death energy emanated from the ck screen of light. A seven-meter-tall skeleton walked out from within, dragging a massive skeletal sword against the ground as it emerged.


    It was a Skeleton General at advanced Second Grade. Judging from its tough bone armor covered in bone spikes, and the zing green soulfire in its eye sockets, there was no doubt that its very presence on the battlefield would terrorize its enemies.


    The ck screen of light never rested after the moment the Skeleton General appeared.


    Death energy pulsated outward over and over, and the portal spat out another group of powerful and vicious undead with every beat.


    Undying wraiths, ck knights, skeletons, reapers, abominations, undead knights, lesser liches, undead mages, skeletal dragons. Apart from these elite high-grade undead, there was also an unending horde of skeletal warriors equipped with bone armor, bone shields, and bone swords, as well as ghouls that flooded the ins and hills.


    It was almost as if the portal connected to an infinite ne of the undead. These vile creatures continued to walk out of the portal without stop, starting to swarm towards the Dener n¡¯s formation under themand of the elite undead.


    High-grade liches and their undead armies.


    The Fourth Grade adepts in the fortress of Stoneshard Valley couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    All liches were Fourth Grade and above.


    That meant three Fourth Grade liches and a Fourth Grade Fire Lord had somehow appeared on the side of the Crimson n. What tremendous price had Greem paid to summon such powerful reinforcements?


    Of course, in the World of Adepts, the Fourth Grade adepts did not fear these liches in the slightest.


    Even Fourth Grade liches would have to endure terrifying nar suppression while they were here. What remained of their power was not enough to scare off the adepts.


    Still, they couldn¡¯t help but be impressed with the legendary fire adept¡¯s vast social circle.


    To make allies out of individuals like liches and Fire Lords¨C that required absolute power!


    Without the power to defend yourself and intimidate these beings, any sort of coboration you had with them would be no different than plotting with robbers. A tragic fate would be the only thing awaiting you.


    Yet, the fire adept had somehow managed to simultaneously make allies out of so many evil creatures and savage elementium beings. He was no ordinary person indeed!


    As everyone sighed exasperatedly, the battle finally broke out.


    The first ones to step onto the battlefield were, naturally, the wildly sprinting ghouls.


    These creatures were scrawny, but what muscle fibers could be seen on their bodies were as thick and tough as steel wires. The ghouls sprinted across the ground like hunting dogs at rapid speeds. They leaped over any obstructions, the sharp ws on their hands and feet providing them with the strength to easily do so.


    From a distance, the tens of thousands of ghouls were like a white tide that instantly devoured the empty space between the armies. They quickly arrived before the voodoo beasts.


    The thirty war towersmenced functioning at the same time. Overwhelming magic energy surged through each of the towers, lighting up their numerous arrays and runes.


    Layers of elementium defenses stacked upon each other, firmly protecting the tower below a series of barriers. Then, the offensive arrays lit up as devastating elementium magic was unleashed upon the ghouls, guided by the adepts in the towers.


    Violent lightning crashed down from above like an apocalyptic nightmare. Dozens of bolts of silver lightning, each over two-meters thick, cut through the ghouls and instantly turned them to ashes. Not a trace of their corpses could even be found.


    Ice magic quickly turned the frontlines into a world of frost. Countless des of snow and ice rained down from above, pinning the ghouls to the ground and slicing them to death.


    Elementium magic of various forms and effects ravaged the battlefield, instantly wiping out the first wave of ghouls charging at the forefront.

 Chapter 1293 - Clearing Out the Fodder

    <h4>Chapter 1293 Clearing Out the Fodder</h4>


    Thousands of ghouls were shredded to pieces in an instant. However, the adepts in charge were not excited in the slightest. Instead, they were furious.


    ¡°Send out the orders...now! Have those idiots stop firing. Ghouls are the most worthless fodder in the enemy¡¯s forces. Have the adepts conserve their magic energy and prepare to deal with the high-grade undead. Leave the ghouls to the voodoo beasts.¡±


    After the order was given, the thirty war towers immediately stopped attacking. They began gathering magic energy as they waited in silence.


    Without the war towers¡¯ interference, the swarm of ghouls and skeletons finally shed with the voodoo beasts.


    In the blink of an eye, a tide of blood rose from the frontlines. Mixed in that massive wave of blood were countless bone shards and dismembered limbs.


    Voodoo beasts were created with the sole purpose of being fodder in the first ce. The biological materials used in their construction were the wild beasts captured from ck Foret. The more powerful voodoo beasts were singled out and used as guardians for adept towers. The rest were only twisted monsters created with crude technique and stimted to only know battle and ughter.


    Voodoo beasts often had bizarre shapes and forms as well. It was easy to tell that they were a simple amalgamation of wild animals. However, without exception, all voodoo beasts had strong, muscr bodies, savage killing instincts, and a variety of means of attack.


    When it came to Physique alone, the voodoo beasts were head and shoulders above the ghouls and skeleton warriors. A single berserk voodoo beast standing three meters tall could brush aside a dozen slow skeletons with a single blow. However, the beasts did not have sufficient space on the battlefield. All the ghouls and skeletons and beasts were crowded together, fighting with their primal instincts.


    Under such circumstances, the voodoo beasts¡¯ superior strength was dampened, and the skeleton army was able to make full use of their overwhelming numbers.


    The two massive forces shed without end in view of everyone.


    It was almost as if all thebatants had been thrown into a blender. One side was being crushed into white bone dust, while the other was being shredded into meat paste.


    Both parties were still advancing, the frontlines slowly grinding away as they did so. The battlefield was soaked in blood, the earth covered in pieces of flesh and bone; it was all mixed up into an unholy mess.


    The voodoo beasts, ghouls, and skeletons continued to fight above the filth, die, and add even more fuel to this furnace of flesh and bone.


    Seeing as the undead army had fully engaged with the voodoo beasts, the hundred goblin chariots on the backline started to move forward slowly. Soon, the voodoo beasts were entirely within the range of their cannons.


    The magical machines and goblin machinist-sorcerers followed firmly behind, acting as this battle¡¯s heavy infantry. Meanwhile, the fire army remained unmoving, quietly waiting for the moment the undead scattered the voodoo beasts.


    The war towers finallymenced attacking once again.


    They did not use any offensive magic with wide area-of-effects. Instead, they started to snipe the high-grade undead marching within the undead army. After all, these undead were inflicting too much damage to the voodoo beast army with their unique abilities. They had to reduce the numbers of these powerful undead. Otherwise, the voodoo beasts would die too quickly!


    The goblin chariots began unleashing their might. Bright, blinding fireballs cut across the sky,nding in the midst of the voodoo beasts with their tails of ck smoke. They obliterated the more powerful abominations among them and sting their bodies into bits of blood and flesh.


    It would be impolite not to reciprocate, after all!


    Both sides were executing and killing the more essential individuals in this battle in a targeted, organized fashion. Once these powerful beings that served as the spine of the armies were gone, the armies themselves would be significantly weaker.


    asionally, a war tower and the goblin chariots would also exchange fire across the thousands of meters of distance. A few scant energy fireballs would explode against the tower barriers, unable to inflict any damage at all. The war tower¡¯s offensive spells were also shot into fireworks by energy beams from the ground, casting a pretty rain of light over the chariots.


    The goblin machinist-sorcerers raised their arms and cheered whenever they intercepted attacks from the war towers, filling the battlefield with their strange goblin dialects.


    ¡°This damned Greem! How dare he collude with foreign liches,¡± Adept Ker smacked her table angrily, fury written all over her face.


    She had visited many of her friends and was barely able to put together such a massive army. Who would¡¯ve thought that these voodoo beasts meant to exhaust the Crimson n¡¯s reserves of magical machines were instead tussling with a bunch of witless undead?


    Moreover, judging by the current situation, it was very likely that the undead army would end up being the victors in this battle.


    After all, there were three Fourth Grade liches behind the lines sustaining the Undead Skies spell. An unending army of undead was still swarming out of the skeletal nes, imposing tremendous pressure on the Dener n.


    For most species, losing several tens of thousands of their kind in battle would be enough to cripple them for eternity. However, for the undead, it would tarnish their name not to have at least hundreds of thousands of casualties in a war.


    When other species wanted subordinates, they would have to search for the right victims, capture them, and slowly tame them. Meanwhile, the liches simply invaded a small ne and used their unique magic to corrupt the nar origin.


    Once the nar origin went out of control, the entire world¡¯s environment would be converted into and of death that the liches required. After nting this seed, the liches only needed to return in a few hundred years, and they would find themselves with a ne full of undead creatures.


    While others had to train subordinates one at a time, the liches harvested subordinates ne by ne. The disparity in efficiency was more than a million times!


    That was why any lich that was known throughout the multiverse was most certainly a terrifying genocider. Each of them controlled multiple skeletal nes upon which no living things resided. All of these nes were once ordinary material nes full of life.


    Because of their incredible capital of soldiers, the liches werepletely unbothered by the loss of these low-grade undead. If necessary, they could even draw upon several skeletal nes at once and fill the entirety of Stoneshard Valley from the bottom to the top with undead skeletons.


    Lich Kanganas was silently conversing with Greem, even as they observed the rain of blood on the frontlines.


    ¡°I have helped you gather the people you need. I can deal with all of the enemy¡¯s fodder. However, we will not engage the enemy adepts directly. That will cause the Alliance of Liches tounch an inquiry.¡±


    ¡°I understand. We will finish the battle between the adepts personally. All you have to do, sir, is clear out the battlefield for us!¡± Greem¡¯s steady and calm voice replied. All three liches could hear him clearly.


    ¡°Then...it¡¯s about time you handed over the tomb of the death god you promised us! We only need the spatial coordinates for its location. You won¡¯t have to worry about verifying its existence. That is up to us!¡±


    ¡°We are already allies, Sir Kanganas. How could I ever deceive you? Here, these are the coordinates.¡± A series of coordinates with hundreds of digits was transmitted to the liches. The three of them engraved them firmly in the depths of their souls.


    The death god¡¯s tomb that they were referring to was, in fact, a god kingdom of a death god. The god had exiled its own kingdom after its defeat in a war. Without the sustenance of faith, this death god could only choose to go into eternal slumber to avoid exhausting what remained of their divine energy reserves.


    Such god kingdoms would drift on endlessly in space. To find them without spatial coordinates would be like searching for a specific grain of sand on a beach. It was impossible.


    That was why Kanganas had called for two of his lichpanions without hesitation when he heard the news of such a god kingdom from Greem. He was nning to work together with the liches to take the god kingdom for themselves.


    A death god. That meant the god still possessed a divine authority of death.


    These were precious things that were incredibly beneficial, even for the liches.


    If the liches were sick of this life devoid of feeling and flesh, they could choose to assimte the death god¡¯s divine authority. They would have a great chance of inheriting the death god¡¯s divinity and faith powers, obtaining a chance at ¡®rebirth.¡¯


    That was why robbing the tomb of a death god was certainly a profitable business for liches.


    As for whether this was fake news? Hehehe! There hadn¡¯t been a single person yet who dared to deceive a lich!


    Greem would provide the coordinates, and the liches would provide the fodder. They quickly came to an agreement, which exined the current situation.


    As the million-strong undead army continued to attack, the several tens of thousands of voodoo beasts belonging to the Dener n were wiped out without a trace. It was then that the three liches cut off the supply of energy to the skeletal door. The ck portal slowly disappeared.


    As for the hundreds of thousands of undead left on the battlefield? The liches couldn¡¯t be bothered to recall them. They ordered them to charge at the enemy before vanishing from the spot.


    The fodder had been dealt with. What was left was the bloody conflict between the elite forces.


    The fire creature army, which had been lying in wait for a long time, roared and charged forward from the nk of the magical machine army. Led by the Fire Lord, they started to attack the Dener n¡¯s formation viciously.


    The war towers, which had been conserving energy all this while, lit up one by one.


    Raging Lightning, ce Storm, Earth Spikes, Vicious Fireballs. It was almost as if a portal to the elementium worlds had been opened. Violent, explosive elementium spells of various attributes crashed down from the sky, instantly engulfing the entire battlefield in a tide of apocalyptic explosions.


    The somewhat stagnated rhythm of war once again came crashing back to a peak!

 Chapter 1294 - Scattered Flames

    <h4>Chapter 1294 Scattered mes</h4>


    It was an undeniable truth that the undead army¡¯s sacrifice had been worth everyst skeleton!


    Without the undead army devastating the voodoo beasts, the Crimson n¡¯s magical machines would not have been able to simply march in and siege the war towers.


    Had the voodoo beast army intercepted them, the machines would have been exposed to the endless bombardment of thirty war towers. It wouldn¡¯t matter that they were forged of steel and fire; the machines would never have been able to endure such fearsome firepower.


    After seven hours of grueling battle, the cannon fodder on both sides had been fully depleted. Now was the time for the real armies to step onto the battlefield.


    The Dener n remained on the defensive, while the Crimson n sent out the fire creature army and the magical machine army as their vanguard.


    The magical machine army pressed forward, step by step, in perfect unison. They concentrated their firepower and unleashed it upon the war towers and every moving thing nearby.


    As abat machine that had undergone countless modifications and improvement by the Crimson n, the PG-52 was undoubtedly the magnum opus of goblin engineering and magic-energy machinery studies.


    Even the ordinary PG-52 model had the power of an intermediate First Grade. Considering their imprable armor made entirely out of magical alloy, their excellent magic energy conduction system and their basebat power could rival that of a peak First Grade adept.


    Moreover, after several adjustments, the PG-52bat machines that used the newest memory alloys and Queyras alloy had reached the level of an intermediate Second Grade adept.


    The magic energy weapons they were outfitted with were also optimized forbat power.


    The Mark-II magic energy cannons equipped on their shoulders could unleash as much as 377 ampurs of power. Converted from the goblin ampur unit to the World of Adepts units, that was an energy intensity of 426 points. It was equal to the all-out attack of a Second Grade adept.


    Meanwhile, the rapid-fire guns attached to the torso of the PG-52 might only have 210 points of offensive power, but their firing rate was three times that of the Mark-II magic energy cannons.


    Apart from these, the PG-52¡¯s were also outfitted with a set of four magic energy beam guns on each arm. These weapons could freely switch between heat rays, frost rays, and energy beams.


    Out of concern of running into enemies with elementium or energy immunity, the PG-52 was also equipped with the more rudimentary goblin rifles. When magic energy weapons were ineffective against an enemy, they could switch out their ammo for metal bullets that had arcane and magic energy crystals mixed within.


    These bullets propelled by magic energy could unleash violent metal shrapnel all over the battlefield when the arcane crystals in the shells exploded. It would absolutely ughter any foe in their path. As it was a physical attack, even individuals with energy immunity would not be able to survive it.


    On the other hand, the PG-52 relied on a magic energy shield for its defense. The source of this shield was a device attached to its torso. These magic energy shields could only provide frontal defense but had up to 600 points of defensive power, significantly higher than what a dome-type barrier could provide.


    As long as the shields were not destroyed in a single attack, they could regenerate by consuming more magic energy. It was suited for offensive magical machines like the PG-52.


    When there were as many as tens of thousands of PG-52 machines marching together as an army towards the enemy formation, the hail of cannon fire and colorful energy beams was more than enough to flood the Dener n¡¯s formations and turn them into a sea of energy.


    The various adept forces hiding between the war towers engaged with the fire creature army under such harsh enemy fire.


    Spells flew across the battlefield as supernatural powers were unleashed here and there.


    No one knew if they would live to see the next second, so they were all giving their best and unleashing their most violent and destructive spells at the enemy.


    There were no weaklings among the fire creatures that hade to reinforce the Crimson n. Almost every single individual was intermediate First Grade and above. They charged courageously at every breathing, moving foe, casting their mes at their victims.


    When they were bombarded by enemy fire, and their bodies were scattered into sparks, they would self-destruct their fire cores and engulf everything within a dozen meters in a sea of mes.


    As more and more fire creatures fell dead upon the battlefield, it became more and more suitable for fire creatures to fight on. The surviving, high-grade fire creatures became even more challenging to deal with!


    The beginner Fourth Grade Fire Lord Grisen leading the army was a five-meter-tall Molten Giant. White-hot magical mes shrouded its body. It waved its ten-meter-long me whip in one hand and hurled magma fireballs continuously with the other.


    Wherever he passed, adept forces that were only at First Grade were sted into oblivion and burned to a crisp.


    In truth, fire creatures were, without a doubt, the most difficult opponents among all elementium creatures!


    Stay too far away from them, and they could shoot fireballs and me arrows of incredible power at you. Keep too close, and the mes around them would burn you to a crisp, with nothing you could do about it.


    Moreover, this molten giant did not have a weak body like other elementium spellcasters.


    With that five-meter-tall body of his, anyone that dared to approach and challenge it to meleebat would be meeting a giant fist or a ming whip. Either of those options would be enough to crush a mammoth to a pulp in a single strike.


    That was why Grisen attracted the wild bombardment of several war-towers the moment he strode into the Dener n¡¯s formation. However, he didn¡¯t seem to mind at all. An Inferno Shield, so dense it almost seemed solid, appeared in his hand; it protected him from most of the magical attacks as he brazenly ughtered the helpless Dener Forces.


    As a Fourth Grade going against First Grades, any living being that moved within a hundred meters of him would instantly be turned into ashes by his terrifying aura of mes. Most of the time, he didn¡¯t even need to fight. All he had to do was appear where the ants were most concentrated, and the enemies would flee at full speed, burned and seared all over.


    While the war towers were upied with the Fire Lord, the magical machines pressed forward as a storm of energy beams and bullets instantly crashed down upon the towers¡¯ barriers. Sparks flew everywhere.


    Dong. Dong. Dong!


    Ten goblin chariots converted into siege mode, and a series of deafening sts immediately prated the outermostyers of a war tower. The walls of the tower were engulfed in mes.


    These war towers had been constructed in a short time on the spot. The buildings¡¯ bodies weren¡¯t made of steelrock, obsidian, or any other magic resistant materials. Instead, they were just dirt that had been solidified with magic and further reinforced with runes.


    Naturally, such material could not possibly endure the test of an intense adept war!


    Once the forcefield was destroyed, the next round of attacks caused the war tower to crumble in front of everyone¡¯s eyes, reduced to dirt and sand. Only half of the adepts within managed to escape. Two of the survivors were fortunate enough to reach one of closer war towers, while fire creatures devoured the other three before they could escape.


    The adepts were gods of the battlefield when they hid within the war towers and controlled their myriad of magical arrays. That kind of power allowed them to grasp an enemy¡¯s life and death within their palms.


    However, once this shell of theirs had been peeled away, adepts were still far too frail for a real battlefield. At the very least, the adepts could notpare to most otherworldly creatures in terms of Physique or Strength.


    What truly made the adepts powerful were their minds, knowledge, and the wisdom and legacy that had been passed on for tens of thousands of years!


    However, the war towers were not so easily destroyed either.


    The magical machine army only had time to raze one war tower when Grisen the Fire Lord could finally hold on no longer against the war towers¡¯ bombardment.


    Fire creatures were not natives of the World of Adepts, after all. Moreover, the Grisen that had appeared here was only a projection of his power from the Fire Elementium ne. The destruction of this elementium shell was no more than the conclusion of his trip to the World of Adepts.


    Of course, at the moment he was destroyed by a war tower, Grisen chose to self-destruct as well. The might of a Fourth Grade Fire Lord projection¡¯s explosion was well beyond the imagination of most people.


    A halo of fire that stretched for an entire kilometer shed on the battlefield. Grisen¡¯s dissipating body turned into the most violent me imaginable as it spread out and devoured everything within the halo¡¯s radius that was not a fire creature.


    Even the five towers closest to the point of explosion melted like candles before the mes, let alone bodies of flesh and blood. Naturally, all the adepts in those towers were beyond dead.


    The self-destruction of a Fourth Grade Fire Lord¡¯s projection had vanquished nearly a thousand members of the adept forces along with five war towers, and had even left a vast sea of fire in the middle of the battlefield. Such terrifying power. All the adepts present couldn¡¯t help but shake their heads and sigh.


    The adepts who hid in their towers, believing themselves to be safe, couldn¡¯t help but be anxious now!


    These results also caused the Fourth Grade adepts in Stoneshard Valley¡¯s fortress to frown.


    The adept forces that had died in the explosion hade from many of the ns present here. Anyone would be upset to see hundreds of years of effort turned to ashes in a single instant in this fashion. They were only upset, but Adept Ker was practically bleeding tears now.


    The adept forces might be external reinforcements, but the adepts in those six war towers belonged to the Dener ns. Six war towers meant sixty official adepts.


    It didn¡¯t matter if the Dener n had strong foundations and legions of adepts. Even they couldn¡¯t bear such devastating losses!


    Moreover, this was only the prologue to the battle. The battle would only start once the magical machine army charged forward and engaged in a melee. When that happened, the Dener n¡¯s adept losses would be an unimaginable sum.


    Ker¡¯s face turned dark and green. She gripped the handles of her stone seat so tightly that dust started to fall off the stone.

 Chapter 1295 - The High-Grades

    <h4>Chapter 1295 The High-Grades</h4>


    The war raged on!


    The fodder were all but obliterated. What remained was a contest between the elites of both ns.


    The war towers and goblin chariots were sting at each other from a kilometer away. A shocking number ofbat machines stepped onto this explosive battlefield.


    To minimize the number of casualties, the magical machines stood in a loose-yet-orderly formation. They wildly unleashed their firepower at the war towers as they marched forward.


    Naturally, the war towers wouldn¡¯t just stand still and leave them be. Blinding bolts of lightning crashed down from above, destroying one machine after another.


    Meanwhile, the Dener n adept forces that had been hiding around the towers began to strike, knocking down all magical machines that entered their range with powerful elementiumbination attacks.


    Even though every individual member of these adept forces had the might of a First Grade, they were still vastly inferior to an actual adept. However, when they werebined and equipped with magical equipment and weapons, they could unleash stunning and devastating attacks.


    The Magical Archer Corps had three hundred members and was divided into six squads, each containing fifty members.


    These members of the Archer Corps were all advanced apprentices of astounding physical size and Strength. In addition to the runic longbows and enchanted explosive arrows they had equipped, each squad could instantly engulf an area of the battlefield in a sea of mes with a single volley.


    The might of an individual explosive arrow was mediocre, at a decent 140 points of power. That was approximately equal to an ordinary attack from a First Grade adept! However, when fifty explosive arrows exploded all at once, it could inflict damage of as much as 700 or 800 points of power.


    That was already at the level of a Third Grade adept!


    Even a peak Second Grade adept could be instantly killed if hit by such a violent attack, let alone opponents of First Grade and below.


    Adept forces could unleash power far beyond their actual grade when inrge groups, even on a dangerous battlefield like this one. Their existence was also a sort ofpensation for theck of high-grade adepts!


    However, even though these adept forces might have offensive power rivaling that of high-grade adepts, they did not have the corresponding defensive power or abilities. The members of these adepts forces were as frail as ss. They were not likely to survive the bloody baptism that was a genuine high-grade war.


    As they destroyed one magical machine after another with their destructive attacks, some enemy forces managed to slip past their attacks and reach them.


    Violent magic energy fireballs, torrents of energy beams, blooming shrapnel shing as bright as fireworks- the Magical Archer Corps¡¯ members¡¯ individual defenses were only at First Grade. These defenses were quickly worn out after a round of attacks from the enemy.


    Without shields and force fields, the human body was as fragile as ss on this cruel battlefield.


    One after another, members of the Magical Archer Corps began to copse, howling in agony as they did so.


    Once their numbers started dwindling, they would slowly be unable to wipe out the enemy from a distance until their doom finally arrived.


    Adept forces like the Magical Archer Corps that had long-ranged abilities were sustaining losses at an eptable rate. However, adept forces that were focused primarily on melee engagements were powerless before the horde of magical machines.


    The PG-52¡¯s were superior to them when it came to Strength, defense, and offensive power. Moreover, these were machines that did not fear death. None of the machines would stop firing because of their injuries. As long as their energy core continued to function, the sizzling sound of sting energy beams would continue to sound, even if only their torso remained.


    Magical machines shambling around with severed limbs or crawling around with their upper half could be seen everywhere on the battlefield, still firing their weapons with all their might.


    The members of the adept forces were humans, after all. They could not perform the same as machines!


    Apart from these adept apprentices who fought on the frontlines in organized armies, there were also foreign legions from other worlds. Frost giants, ice giants, giant earth elementals, beholders, two-headed rhinos, earth maulers, flying swamp dragons, otyughs...


    These monstrous beasts would have been a blight upon any ordinary human world they were cast into.


    Here, they were no more than cheap meat shields meant to dy the magical machine army¡¯s march by even a minute longer.


    The magical machine casualties were severe, but their results were more than evident!


    Where the magical machines marched, all the monsters and adept forces in the way were crushed to minced meat. All the magical traps were detonated. Meanwhile, the goblin chariots that pressed forward under cover of the goblin machinist-sorcerers were clearing out the war towers in an organized fashion.


    As the chariots bombarded the towers, the machinist-sorcerers would charge to the foot of a tower and hurl packets of explosives at its base. If they didn¡¯t have time to retreat, some of the more berserk machinist-sorcerers would charge straight into the tower and detonate the explosives in their arms.


    The war towers had been constructed in a very short time frame, after all. The material used to build their walls couldn¡¯t endure such brutal explosions. After the repeated, suicidal charges of the goblins, the war towers finally copsed, one by one.


    Of course, the adepts inside these towers had no hope of surviving the barrage of bullets that would greet them when they emerged from the rubble.


    Goblins. This inferior species that had once been the epitome of baseness had, for the first time, triggered anxiety and fear in the hearts of adepts.


    Were these goblins not afraid of death!?


    Unfortunately, the cruel reality of war left them no time to philosophize or think. Once the final war tower outside Stoneshard Valley had been razed, the battle escted.


    Now was the time for the core adepts of the ns to step onto the battlefield!


    The Dener n¡¯s Second and Third Grade adepts floated into the air above Stoneshard Valley. They were shrouded in magical protections of various colors and effects. Each of them appeared like a dazzling jewel from a distance, shining with colorful radiance.


    Meanwhile, seven powerful adepts stood in front of these Second and Third Grade adepts. None of the seven hadplicated magical shields or barriers around them. However, their powerfulw powers constantly distorted the narws around them.


    This effect caused their forms to appear blurry and distorted. Any low-grade adept that attempted to look upon them would feel their eyes sting.


    They were seven Fourth Grades...seven Fourth Grades.


    What a terrifying force- especially in the Central Lands, where all the ns were not united!


    There was no need for fighting at all. Most adept ns would probably be scared out of their wits when they saw those seven intimidating figures.


    Seven...those were seven Fourth Grade adepts! They were individuals that stood at the apex of this world!


    They might all be rulers of their ownnds in their own right in usual times. However, they had now gathered together for the same cause. And that which they opposed was......


    Inside a Mothership that hovered above the very center of the Crimson n¡¯s formation, Greem stood up with a smile on his face.


    ¡°Finally, it is our turn now! All members of the Crimson n,e with me and give them a show!¡±


    mes rose all around the room as Greem teleported himself and the hundred intermediate and high-grade n members.


    mes shed on the deck of the Mothership as numerous towering figures appeared.


    All the Second Grade n members remained on the deck, while the Third Grade members flew forth behind Greem and Mary. The Crimson n adepts stared down against the Dener n adepts from across the battlefield.


    Naturally, standing at the forefront was the infamous Legendary Fire Adept Greem. He raised his staff, and a deafening dragon¡¯s roar could be heard in the distance. A muscr dragon d in bright blue scales cut through the skies and appeared below Greem.


    Greem¡¯s toned body sank down,nding on the back of Fourth Grade Thunder Dragon Arms. There, he stood unmoving as a stone pir.


    Bloody Queen Mary followed behind Greem, dressed in red armor. Mary¡¯s crimson hair spread behind her shoulders, her scarlet eyes bright as rubies, her nose sharp and delicate, her lips red as fire, and her wings beating in the sky.


    One had to admit that Mary¡¯s beauty was iparable throughout the Central Lands. At the very least, her looks were uncontested among the Fourth Grade adepts.


    Unfortunately, Alice couldn¡¯t show herself in this battle due to her unique status.


    After all, her title as the leader of the Witches of Fate meant that she couldn¡¯t do as she liked. Should she appear on the battlefield, the enemies would be able to pull more foreign reinforcements to their side with the excuse that the Northern Witches wereunching an invasion.


    It was three against seven, yet the Crimson n showed no fear. Instead, their auras soared and even seemingly suppressed the enemies¡¯ auras.


    In particr, when Mary lifted her hand and released the golem dragon from its talisman, the entire battlefield fell silent.


    There was only the earthshaking thud of the golem dragon¡¯snding.


    Bastards! They did bring that war machine with them!


    Fabres of the seven Fourth Grade adepts couldn¡¯t help but wince at the sight of it. Resentment and hatred bubbled deep in his eyes.


    His reputation had been tarnished by his defeat at the hands of this monstrous war machine. That was why he could not suppress the fury in his heart when he saw this gigantic construct after a hundred years.


    Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! Those goddamned mercantile Silver Union adepts! To think they even sold such a high-grade golem talisman; were they taking their own rules for nothing?


    Almost all the high-grade adepts present started cursing in their own minds at the same time!

 Chapter 1296 - The Might of Fire

    Chapter 1296 The Might of Fire


    ¡°Chairman Freed, I didn¡¯t expect to see you here.¡±


    Greem stood forward and smiled gently at the opponent.


    ¡°Sir, what is your purpose here today? Is it to mediate? Or is it to help Adept Ker in this war against us?¡±


    A stern expression appeared on Freed¡¯s face when he heard Greem¡¯s mocking question.


    ¡°Greem, don¡¯t you forget. Your advancement to Fourth Grade was only possible due to the efforts of everyone present here. Since you¡¯ve asked, I will give you a proper answer. As long as you guarantee that the Crimson n will not take over any region apart from Ailovis and Arash from now, I will convince Adept Ker to pull out of your territory. The association will alsopensate for any losses the Crimson n has suffered thus far!¡±


    ¡°What about it? Those are very generous conditions! All you have to do is agree to these terms, and the war will end. Everything will go back to normal, and you will still rule over the two wealthiest pieces ofnd in the Central Lands. These are the best terms we can offer you!¡±


    Greem fell silent for a second when he heard Chairman Freed¡¯s conditions for a truce. He then burst out inughter.


    Freed¡¯s expression was first one of confusion when he heard Greemugh so brazenly. His face then turned dark as he shouted, ¡°Greem, I hope you don¡¯t walk down the wrong path! There are seven Fourth Grades here on our side. You only have three. Even if we count that metal golem, that¡¯s only four Fourth Grades. Are you that confident...that confident in obtaining the final victory?¡±


    Greem finally shed his smile and looked at Freed as he said calmly, ¡°Chairman Freed, if you were firmer in your attitude earlier and refused to offer anypromise to us, I might have retained a shred of respect for you. Things have already reached this stage, yet you are still dreaming of a peaceful reconciliation? No wonder the Zhentarim Association remains a hollow shell even after so many years of management. You...are not fit to lead the Central Lands!¡±


    ¡°You...¡± It was the first time in his life that Freed had been insulted and humiliated in this fashion to his face. His face turned the color of a pig¡¯s liver as veins appeared on his forehead. His expression twisted into a vicious snarl, ¡°Good, very impressive. Well then! Let me see just how capable you are today!¡±


    Freed was an old man who was well-versed in the ways of the world, after all. Even as furious and upset as he was, he resisted the impulse to storm forward and start the fight immediately. Instead, he returned and stood behind Adept Ker, seemingly subordinate to the Dener n in this war.


    ¡°If it¡¯s a war you want, then let there be war! Save the words and our time!¡± Mary could no longer suppress the boiling passion in her blood. She red her wings and turned into a crimson blur as she charged at the enemy.


    Of the seven Fourth Grades on the Dener side, only Fabres was a body-refining adept. However, Mornashen Gaia possessed a Gold Titan bloodline and had mighty prowess in meleebat as well.


    These two adepts looked at each other and stepped forward to intervene with Mary without any hesitation.


    ¡°Go, Arms. Let us work together to deal them a vicious blow!¡± Greem had never fought at full-strength since he obtained the two Fifth Grade artifacts.


    Today, his will to fight had been stimted by the enemy¡¯s overwhelming spiritual pressure. For the first time since he achieved such power, he went berserk without holding back.


    mes red as golden fires burst out of every pore on Greem¡¯s body. He instantly transformed into a five-meter-tall giant me humanoid shrouded inw fires.


    Meanwhile, Arms¡¯ body was asrge as a mountain. Thousands of chains of lightning crackled around him as he rushed at the Dener adepts with Greem on his back.


    With Arms as his ride, Greem did not need to dedicate any part of his mind to defense. Shadow Demon was prepared to strike as well, hidden in Greem¡¯s shadow. The Tome of Corruption at his waist flew into his hands automatically as the pages started flipping.


    Fourth Grade Spirit of Pestilence Remi cackled wildly as he appeared in the air. In the next instance, he wholly vanished out of sight.


    A Burning Domain engulfed the battlefield. Every substance and creature within the domain began to burn from the intense heat and mes.


    Greem tapped his staff, and four fire runes flew into Mary, Arms, Remi, and Shadow Demon¡¯s body. With this fire rune, they could move freely within the Burning Domain without being burned.


    Just as Greem finished hisbat preparations, four terrifying spells sted towards him.


    Skyripper Twister- it was Chairman Freed¡¯s Fourth Grade wind spell, which possessed the ability to both trap and attack the enemy!


    Seal of Darkness- a unique spell unleashed by Adept Ker. The moment the victim triggered the Seal of Darkness, a portion of their powers would vanish instantly.


    Streaming Waterfall. Elder Nics was a water adept. His attack was understandably the weakest of them all.


    Otherworld Summoning. Elder Matthew was a summoner and could call contracted creatures from other worlds to aid him in battle.


    Apart from the long-ranged spells, all the Fourth Grade adepts also had several pieces of magical equipment and scrolls. They began using these tools without holding back, and their numbers started to grow at an increasing rate. In the blink of an eye, their formation almost seemed crowded.


    Amongst them, Elder Matthew undoubtedly did the most summoning. As a summoner, he had conjured up three Fourth Grade creatures from alien worlds: a man-faced serpent, a beholder, and a devourer.


    The man-faced serpent was a strange monster over twenty-meters-long and with a human face on its serpentine head. It had a resilient life force and an agile body, as well as paralyzing attacks. No creature could escape unscathed if the man-faced serpent managed to wrap around them.


    The beholder was an unusual magical creature that typically lived underground. Its body was a massive eyeball, five meters in diameter with a total of seven agile eye-stalks growing out of it. At the end of each eye-stalk was a strange eyeball, each able to fire a magical beam of a different attribute.


    Meanwhile, the devourer was an exceedingly tricky creature to deal with. It did not have an actual body. Most of the time, its only tangible manifestation was a bloody maw with two wings on it. Any being the devourer bit could instantly die by having their soul crunched to pieces.


    Apart from these three Fourth Grade monsters, a red-eyed monkey also climbed out of Adept Ker¡¯s sleeve. This monkey quickly transformed into a Redeye Tyrant, a berserk ape with tremendous fighting power.


    As all this happened, Adept Mirva took out golem talismans and released two mithril statues.


    Compared to Greem and his forces, these veteran Fourth Grade adepts that had ruled over the Central Lands for the past few centuries all had powerful aces of their own. When all these aces were put together, they instantly formed a powerful squad formed solely of Fourth Grade creatures.


    However, before this squad could unleash any devastation, Arms arrived in front of them with Greem on his back.


    The next second, the entire battlefield was devoured by wild lightning.


    Countless writhing silver serpents of lightning weaved between these Fourth Grade creatures amidst the blinding lightning storm. Extreme currents surged violently through their bodies.


    In the blink of an eye, several of the summoned creatures were already howling in agony and attempting to flee out of the storm.


    Before they could make it too far away, Greem raised his staff, and a blinding halo of fire bloomed on the battlefield. Where the halo traveled, all adepts and foreign creatures were knocked off bnce and off their feet.


    This fire halo contained thew of Fire¡¯s st, which allowed it to prate the opponents¡¯ magical defenses and apply the effect of the Halo of Repulsion.


    While the enemy was still struggling within the mes and lightning, a roaring meteor crashed down upon the battlefield. An even more ferocious shockwave of fire engulfed the enemy along with thousands of meteorite shards, forcibly knocking them back.


    The Orb of the Fire God was truly a treasure perfectlypatible with Greem¡¯s soul origin. Greem would not have been able to cast two such powerful spells containing firews so quickly without its help.


    Moreover, the Orb was a Fifth Grade artifact. It possessed a natural grade suppression effect against Fourth Grades. Otherwise, an even more powerful fire spell would not have been able to achieve such a tremendous result.


    Only the man-faced serpent and the redeye tyrant survived this wave of attacks. The beholder and the devourer whimpered and dissipated into sparks before they could even demonstrate their abilities.


    Still, there were also individuals on the battlefield who were unaffected.


    The two eight-meter-tall mithril statues slowly pressed toward Greem and Arms with heavy steps. They were metal golems and were naturally unaffected by debuffs and charms.


    While Greem and Arms were unleashing attacks with all they had, the enemy¡¯s offensive spells were also inflicting damage upon them.


    However, as a Fourth Grade dragon, Arms was protected by his scales and possessed enormous resilience. He grunted in pain but stood his ground. Meanwhile,yers of firews surrounded Greem. Even though multiple spells struck him, he was entirely unharmed and untouched.


    It was a sort ofw defense that the Chip had carefully constructed in the most optimal structure andbination of the four firews.


    It was impossible to prate such aw defense with ordinary elementium magic!


    Onlyw powers could prate his defense of firews to wound him. And that...was the fundamental reason why high-grade adepts were able to crush adepts of lower grades so easily!

 Chapter 1297 - Clash of the Powerful

    <h4>Chapter 1297 sh of the Powerful</h4>


    If I havews and you don¡¯t, then I will forever remain undefeated!


    The enemy adepts might have also grasped certainw powers, but they were like babbling babies in their application ofw powerspared to Greem. It was almost hrious how clumsy and inflexible they were with theirw powers.


    They appeared stiff and forced even when attaching theirws to their spells, let alone delving into the more profound applications ofw powers.


    Greem might only have one thin defensiveyer ofw power, but the supernatural might that reigned supreme over all worldly powers forcefully neutralized each and every one of the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    On the other hand, Greem¡¯s fire spells unleashed with the Orb of the Fire God¡¯s help inflicted unspeakable pain on his opponents. It was so terrible that their faces turned pale when they saw the mes lunging at them.


    Like a ferocious tiger diving into a flock of sheep, thebination of Greem and Arms rampaged through the enemy ranks uncontested. It didn¡¯t matter which adept was their target; their only choice was to duck and flee with all they had.


    Seeing that they could not defend against Greem¡¯s attacks at all, Freed awkwardly dodged a bolt of fire hurled at him as he shouted at Mornashen Gaia, ¡°Hurry...transform now! Only your Gold Titan transformation can stop this guy.¡±


    The Gaia n leader, who was busy chasing after Mary with Body-Refining Adept Fabres, suddenly stopped. He turned and looked at the chaos of the main battlefield and snorted coldly, ¡°Useless fools!¡±


    Mornashen Gaia reared his head and howled. He lifted his hands as if in prayer as he shouted, ¡°In the name of Gaia, by my bloodline powers, with the ancient glory of the Gold Titans...¡±


    As this strange voice filled with unusual power reverberated throughout the world, Mornashen Gaia¡¯s alreadyrge muscr body began to swell even more. The form of a Titan, filled with beauty and an aura of holiness, appeared behind him.


    Greem¡¯s body trembled as Arms continued to pursue the enemy. He turned around and looked solemnly upon that mighty figure that was growing in size at this very moment.


    It was a powerful being of colossal size!


    He had a humanoid form, but his muscles were hard and firm. His skin was a bright golden shade and radiated the aura of strengthws. He was d in golden armor resembling that of ancient Roman warriors- a golden helmet on his head with golden bracelets on his hands and feet.


    Greem felt an unprecedentedly oppressive spiritual pressure push against his face when Gaia opened his eyes and stared coldly at him. The intangible spiritual pressure was so intense that it caused Greem¡¯s robes to flutter violently in the wind. If it weren¡¯t for thew powers protecting him, Greem might have been knocked away by the spiritual pressure alone.


    Mornashen Gaia now stood over fifty meters tall after his transformation into a Gold Titan. His entire body glowed with blinding light.


    Golden light burst from every inch of his muscr body. Everyone who looked at him had no choice but to narrow their eyes and protect them with magical power. Even so, they could only barely see his silhouette.


    The Gold Titan¡¯s bloodline power flowed in this body, so overwhelming that it struck fear into the hearts of all who witnessed him.


    The moment Mornashen Gaiapleted his transformation, even the always arrogant Mary could only resentfully back away to avoid that unbearable emission of power.


    The difference in the quality of their power was toorge. Greem had to endure tremendous spiritual pressure and suppression just by bathing in Gaia¡¯s radiance. Mary almost felt like she had descended into a foreign world.


    ¡°Greem, do you dare to duel me!?¡± The massive titan shouted out loud, seeing as he couldn¡¯t suppress Greem with his spiritual pressure.


    Even though he did not intentionally raise his voice, the mighty sonic waves still caused everyone present to frown. They could only put as much distance between them and this colossus.


    In all honesty, when the Gold Titan stood up straight and projected its spiritual pressure, Greem felt every nervous fiber in his body tremble. However, he kept the same rxed smile on his face.


    ¡°Haha, why wouldn¡¯t I!?¡± Greem shouted back in return.


    His zing five-meter body started to grow again. This time, it only stopped when he reached thirty meters in size. The Heart of Principles in his chest no longer held back either and started beating rapidly.


    The Heart of Principles working at full force allowed Greem¡¯s body to fill with pure fire energy even after growing to such a massive size, preventing him from just being a hollow body.


    Size was an unimportant factor toward victory in a battle between high-grade individuals.


    However, it was true that you would always stand to benefit somewhat with arger size!


    That was why the two strongest adepts of the Central Lands immediately turned into their mightiest forms the moment the duel began.


    Mornashen Gaia drew upon the titan bloodline coursing through his body. Titans were powerful giants, unique throughout the multiverse. They were born with overwhelming innate strength and could manipte magical energies as if they were part of their very own bodies.


    Thus, they became one of the more unusual species of the universe, born innately with tremendous power.


    Meanwhile, Greem relied on his two Fifth Grade artifacts.


    Without them serving as the source of his energy, he would have been a hollow shell if he blew his body up to such a massive size.


    Now, with the Heart of Principles continually putting out fire energy, the Tome of Corruption to guard his body, the Orb of the Fire God to unleash the might of the firews, and the focusing crystal¡¯s magnifying effect, Greem¡¯s basebat power could already rival ultra-powerhouses (peak Fourth Grade).


    Meanwhile, even though Mornashen Gaia could not yet be called an ultra-powerhouse, his transformed body still held astounding might that could not be underestimated.


    When the Gold Titan and the ming giant stared down at each other, the other adepts knew well enough to retract their Spirits and slowly retreat from the battlefield.


    It wasn¡¯t that they didn¡¯t want to be involved in this fight; there was simply no ce for them!


    Greem¡¯s Burning Domain and Mornashen Gaia¡¯s Domain of Strength were extremely overbearing powers that could not tolerate any others.


    Thew powers shed violently within these domains. Under such circumstances, anyone that remained on the battlefield would unavoidably draw the shingw powers toward themselves.


    However,w powers only distinguished between themselves and others. There were no such things as allies!


    Adept Ker slowly flew behind Freed and the others, her eyes staring unblinkingly at the two giants on the distant horizon. One glowed with golden radiance while the other zed with suffocating mes. Both were so eye-catching and breath-taking in their presence.


    ¡°This is the power of ultra-powerhouses?¡± Ker asked in her hoarse voice.


    No one replied. Only Freed nodded reluctantly and resentfully, his face twisted with hideous envy.


    Ker said nothing more. She took a few deep breaths, her eyes starting to well with tears.


    That was the legendary fire adept she had been bold enough to challenge just a few days ago?


    She looked upon that towering figure and felt the pressing heat against her face causing a stinging pain.


    Ker had honestly never expected that even she would have one day been foolish enough to issue a challenge to such a powerful adept. The gulf between their powers was even wider than the difference between the moon and a firefly.


    Apart from Ker, who was mired in her swamp of self-hatred, the other adepts also had dark expressions on their faces.


    All of them here had lived much longer than Greem and had experienced far more things. However, now it seemed like all they had gone through was no more than an illusory bubble. Pretty, but popped with a single touch.


    Perhaps...maybe...everything they had done in the past appeared like the acts of fools in the eyes of that legendary fire adept!


    He couldn¡¯t even be bothered to turn his eyes toward them. Instead, he had given them the loudest p across the cheek by merely demonstrating such raw, overwhelming power. It wasn¡¯t just Ker now. The other adepts could also feel that stinging blush of embarrassment on their cheeks.


    While these Fourth Grade adepts had the qualifications toment on this battle, those who were below Fourth Grade did not even meet the requirements to witness it.


    As these two overwhelming domains of power shed, it engulfed nearly all of the battlefield. The weaker adepts were forced to step away from the battlefield, as far as five kilometers away, only observing the battle from a distance.


    Given their abilities, they could not see anything from five kilometers away, especially with those violent domains in their way. They could only feel the severity of the fighting indirectly through the mild shockwaves that radiated from the battlefield.


    They might not know who was winning or losing, but they could still tell when one of the powers had the advantage and was suppressing the other.


    Ultra-powerhouses. This blinding title was still too far away for them, so much so that they almost believed they would never reach such heights. Today, they were fortunate enough to witness two powerful adepts who had the might of peak Fourth Grades, despite not having reached that level yet.


    More importantly, they both belonged to the Central Lands!


    The significance of ultra-powerhouses to the Central Lands was clear to every single adept. Yet, today, two such ultra-powerhouses had turned their swords against each other because of a ¡®minor¡¯ internal disagreement. This sh of ideals and cruel reality undoubtedly left every central adept disappointed.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Adepts only respected the powerful and worshipped might!


    The sudden appearance of an ultra-powerhouse would undoubtedly shatter the bnce of power and touch upon the benefits and welfare of many ns. Under such circumstances, it was impossible to remain seated on that ultimate throne without a rain of blood to coat the steps leading toward it.


    That was why this war became inevitable the moment the Crimson n rose to power and the legendary fire adept made his name!

 Chapter 1298 - The Power of Laws

    Chapter 1298 The Power of Laws


    Domains engulfed thend, and thews sent tremors through space.


    The two domain powers of entirely different natures shed, wrestled, and neutralized each other.


    Greem couldn¡¯t care less about these natural shifts in the domain powers. He was entirely focused on the opponent before him.


    The Gaia n...Titan bloodline. The strongest individual in the Central Lands.


    He had heard such information about the man in front of him countless times. He had even tried to obtain more detailed information. Unfortunately, there were very few members within the Gaia n. It was a tiny n.


    The main reason for this was the fundamental problem with all higher bloodlines!


    The more superior the bloodline, the more difficult it was to give birth to pure-blood n members. Moreover, the Gaia n were not actual descendants of Titans. They were only individuals who had inherited some of the Titan bloodline through unique methods.


    The Gaia n had over seven thousand members, but fewer than ten had awakened the Titan bloodline to be official members approved by the n. The rest of the n members were all ordinary individuals.


    Even today, the Gaia n remained one of the few ancient ns that continued to intermarry within the n, with minimal contact with the rest of the Central Lands. Due to these ancient and unyielding rules, they could barely preserve their Titan bloodline legacy and keep it from being stolen.


    It was also their self-istion that prevented new adept talent from joining. By refusing to share their Titan bloodline, the Gaia n remained unable to assemble a force capable of conquering the Central Lands, despite having the strongest individuals in there.


    However, just because the Gaia n had very few members did not mean that they were weak.


    Almost every person that awakened the Titan bloodline had the potential to be high-grade. It was the most enviable trait of the Gaia adepts!


    Their n leader, Mornashen Gaia, was nine hundred and thirty-seven years old now, and he was at a terrifying advanced Fourth Grade. Of course, due to his Titan bloodline, his actual power could rival that of a peak Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouse.


    Even someone as confident as Greem would have to be careful when fighting against an opponent like that.


    As Greem continued to stare off against the Gold Titan, the bright-blue light of the Chip could be seen glowing clearly in Greem¡¯s zing golden eyes. Basic information on his opponent started to drift down like drops of rain.


    [...Mornashen Gaia. Possesses Titan bloodline. Advanced Fourth Grade. Leader of the Gaia n, or what is known as the n of Gold.


    [...initial estimates suggest that Mornashen Gaia¡¯s Titan bloodline ability is ¡®Devour.¡¯ It allows him to suppress Titan bloodlines of other origins, devour them, and turn them into nourishment for his own bloodline origin.


    [...base attributes of Mornashen Gaia¡¯s Gold Titan transformation: Strength 49 | Physique 47 | Agility 13 | Spirit 49.


    Bloodline Talents: Devour. Combat Abilities: Unknown.]


    Hss......


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air when he saw the Chip¡¯s estimations of Mornashen Gaia¡¯s base attributes. For the first time, he truly felt how fragile and weak his body waspared to this mighty Gold Titan.


    Mornashen Gaia¡¯s Strength and Spirit were both at 49 points. If it weren¡¯t for his grade holding his power back, even ultra-powerhouses who had a single attribute at 50 points would not dare challenge him.


    While Greem was doing everything he could to discover the secrets of Mornashen¡¯s body, the Gold Titan could not bear the wait any longer.


    ¡°You¡¯ve had enough of a look, haven¡¯t you? If you¡¯ve had a good look, then it¡¯s my turn now.¡±


    Mornashen roared and started striding forward. With his massive legs, he appeared before Greem in just three steps. His giant palm glowed with golden light. It wrapped into a fist and crashed straight down onto Greem¡¯s head.


    A thundering noise sounded as he struck with his fist. A terrifying bolt of lightning as thick as a tornado descended from the skies, striking at Greem at the same time as the fist. Mornashen¡¯s horrifying 49 points of Strength caused a cone-shaped hurricane of wind pressure to appear in front of his fist as he punched.


    The wind arrived before the fist!


    The wind pressure¡¯s intensity was over 3,700 points, as indicated by the Chip in Greem¡¯s vision. That was almost equal to Greem¡¯s most powerful attack before he obtained the two Fifth Grade artifacts.


    Moreover, this was only the power of the wind pressure. The fist itself contained over 7,900 points of power. In addition to that devastating bolt of lightning, this one casual punch from the Gold Titan easily possessed over 10,000 points of power.


    An attack of such intensity was enough to kill any Fourth Grade instantly. It wouldn¡¯t matter if they were prepared; the result would be the same.


    Greem, who had turned into a zing giant, was only thirty meters tall. He was like a dwarf in front of the fifty-meter Gold Titan. That was why mes sted out of the front of Greem¡¯s body when the punch arrived. His body lunged backward from the force as he avoided that ferocious strike.


    Simultaneously, a radiant red cloud gathered above his head, intercepting the golden bolt of lightning. The Fourth Grade Lightningcall and the Fourth Grade me Barrier shed, with the lightning being devoured in the end. A small piece of the me Barrier remained.


    However, while Greem smoothly dodged the fist, the vicious wind pressure that apanied it was not as easily avoided.


    The wind cut across the air, slicing Greem once across his chest as he lunged back. The quad-coloredyer of firews around Greem stalled for a moment as the wind struck against it. A small dent appeared on the invisible defensiveyer.


    The muffled sound of cracking bones could be heard faintly in the air.


    Greem took a few stumbling steps backward. His entire body then vanished in a st of fire.


    The next second, Greem reappeared a thousand meters away. He stood up straight and stared at Mornashen with fury in his eyes.


    Greem waved his hand over his chest, and the dented defensive barrier ofws and the energy bones within his body were restored to their original state.


    Damn! That 49 points of Strength was truly overwhelming! He had almost been done-in by just a tiny graze.


    However, when Greem saw how clumsily Mornashen was when turning around to face him, a thought appeared in his mind. He struck without any hesitation.


    This time, Greem did not rely on the focusing crystal, nor did he draw upon the Tome of Corruption¡¯s poison power. He simply created a fireball with the help of the Orb of the Fire God and threw it at the enemy.


    3,500 points of power.


    Now, even a simple attack from Greem could rival an all-out attack from his past self.


    However,pared to Mornashen, his power was still ¡®meager¡¯!


    Mornashen, who had managed to turn around and was charging toward Greem, did not even avoid the fireball when he saw it. He punched straight through the molten rock andva, letting the rest of the mes wash over his body.


    Mornashen strode through the fire unharmed. He chuckled coldly, then pointed a single finger at Greem¡¯s location. In the sky, the dark clouds instantly turned into crackling lightning clouds, sending bolt after bolt of electricity down at Greem.


    Greem¡¯s me Barrier protected him and would not be defeated by these bolts of lightning for a while. However, with the lightning constantly disrupting him, he was having incredible trouble concentrating casting his spells.


    Greem teleported away without hesitation, trying to reposition himself again.


    The moment he stepped out of the mes, another blinding bolt of lightning sted down, causing him to stumble backward.


    Greem lifted his head in surprise. It was only then that he realized that the lightning cloud from earlier was still hovering above him, repeatedly assaulting him with lightning bolts.


    Dammit! A locked-on attack!


    The Tome of Corruption hanging at Greem¡¯s waist promptly appeared in his hands. The pages flipped rapidly of their own ord. When the tome stopped on a page carved with mysterious runes, a blob of green, slimy poison appeared above the runic array. The toxin then flew into the lightning cloud above.


    The lightning cloud, which had been crackling with silver serpents of electricity, turned a sickly green color that cast the rest of the world in the same pale-green shade.


    The poison power had disrupted the lightningws in the cloud. Naturally, the cloud had gone out of control and could no longer threaten Greem in the slightest.


    Greem took this opportunity to fire another two Magma Fireballs at Mornashen in the distance.


    Of course, both fireballs were struck by a thick chain of lightning in the air without exception.


    After a few attempts to close the distance, Mornashen realized that he would never catch up to Greem with his Fire Teleportation. Mornashen wasted no more effort and instead chose to gather electricity between his fingers and send it crackling continuously at the opponent.


    A ranged battle? Gold Titans had never been afraid of that.


    If elementium adepts could so easily kite Gold Titans, then Mornashen Gaia would not have earned his title as the strongest bloodline adept of the Central Lands!


    For the next few hours, the entire battlefield was engulfed in an apocalypse of zing fires and snapping electricity.


    The violent mes and the lightning both contained fearsomew powers. Where they struck, everything crumbled away. Even the ground became scorched with each attack. The sky itself was rent, leaving dark red marks in the air that would not fade with time.


    Wherever the mes and lightningnded, slight tremors and changes would ur to the narws there. Such attacks that delved deep in thews were the most frightening ones. The damage they inflicted was challenging to repair.


    Had thisnd been scorched by ordinary fire, grass and flowers would be able to grow again in less than a year. Where Greem¡¯sw fires burned, the scorchednd would remain barren for the next dozen years, void of all life and hope.


    The reason was simple. The narws there had been changed!


    Until the narws were restored, thisnd would never recover to its former glory.

 Chapter 1299 - Ghosts and Phantoms

    <h4>Chapter 1299 Ghosts and Phantoms</h4>


    An unnoticed corner of Stoneshard Valley in the east.


    Two adepts, a male and female, were hiding deep underground within the bulb of a magical flower. They were secretly observing the battlefield in the distance.


    The image of the two colossal giants tearing at each other¡¯s throat was being projected onto the inner walls of the flower bulb.


    The hearts of these two adepts trembled as they watched the devastating and apocalyptic might of the two powerful adepts. Even though they were hiding in apletely safe and hidden spot with no chance of being affected by the shockwaves, they still felt their mouths turn dry. An indescribable anxiousness and frustration throbbed in their chests.


    ¡°Ultra-powerhouses. Who would¡¯ve ever thought that a ce as run-down as the Central Lands would be hiding two ultra-powerhouses?¡± The female adept cursed angrily.


    ¡°They don¡¯t deserve to be called ultra-powerhouses yet!¡± The male adept remarked coldly, ¡°The two of them are only able of such power through external means. One relies on his overwhelming bloodline power, and the other relies on a high-grade artifact that ispatible with his soul origin. They, by themselves...have clearly not yet reached the standards of an ultra-powerhouse!¡±


    ¡°They are very close, even if they aren¡¯t there yet,¡± The female adept replied angrily. ¡°If this development is allowed to continue, the Central Lands might be able to break free of the Association¡¯s control and be a new force of their own. Don¡¯t forget why the Association sent us here. What they wanted was for us to buy over some of the loose forces of the Central Lands. If the two of us are the ones that let the Central Lands slip through the Association¡¯s fingers, that kind of burden to bear...¡±


    Having said that, the female adept couldn¡¯t help but shiver. It was obvious that she had thought of something nasty.


    The male adept had a dejected expression on his face as well.


    The situation before them had gone far beyond their control. It involved the future of the Central Lands, the fates of half the Fourth Grade adepts of the Centra Lands, and two adepts whose power seemed to rival those of ultra-powerhouses.


    What good could Third Grades like themselves do?


    In all honesty, they might be inspectors from the Adept¡¯s Association and well-received anywhere in the Central Lands they went. However, in the Fourth Grades¡¯ eyes, they were no more than the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s spies and plugs in the Centra Lands.


    Though the Fourth Grades wouldn¡¯t actively undermine them, it was unavoidable that they would work around and behind them in the shadows.


    Moreover, with their power as Third Grades, recklessly walking into that vicious battlefield could mean their immediate deaths. After all, both opponents were fighting all-out now.


    As such, they would rather observe everything from underground than take a single step toward that battle.


    ¡°What do we do?¡± Fear shed across the female adept¡¯s face at the thought of the punishment they would have to face after today.


    ¡°What can we do? Just report everything we saw here today as it happened and request for stronger adepts to take over and manage the situation. Otherwise,¡± The male adept replied decisively.


    Adepts stronger than them. Didn¡¯t that leave only the Association elders?


    Moreover, judging by the intensity of the fight, an ordinary Association elder might not be able to settle things, even if they were present!


    The female adept licked her dry lips and was just about to say something else when a sinister voice rang in the underground space.


    ¡°The two of you brats shut up. Keep your eyes on this fight and watch carefully! You don¡¯t see fights of this level in the World of Adepts very often.¡±


    The voice came from the ring of authority that the adepts wore. There weren¡¯t very many individuals in the Adept¡¯s Association who could override their jurisdiction and perform directmunication in this fashion.


    Moreover, this voice was so unique and memorable that the two adepts immediately thought of the same ultra-powerhouse¡¯s name. They looked at each other.


    Cerveris.


    ¡°My greetings, Lord Cerveris!¡± The two adepts said in unison, their faces flushing with excitement.


    Since headquarters had sent an ultra-powerhouse like Lord Cerveris, it meant that they were prepared for a big operation!


    ¡°Shush. Don¡¯t be so loud, you two!¡± The sinister voice continued to speak, ¡°You don¡¯t think only our Association sent people here, do you? Hmph! Idiots.¡±


    The faction that the female adept belonged to appeared to have some connections with Cerveris. She mustered her courage and asked, ¡°My lord, have the other organizations also sent forces here?¡±


    After a short moment of silence, the cold voice repliedzily, ¡°I haven¡¯t found who the Silver Union have sent here, but the Northern Witches will definitely be sending Khesuna here, that bitch. Hmph! If I have the opportunity, I won¡¯t shy away from a reunion with her.¡±


    Judging from Cerveris¡¯ resentful tone, their meeting wouldn¡¯t be quite a peaceful or friendly one!


    After another moment, the voice suddenly said, ¡°You two brats best leave now! Go back to the outpost in the Central Lands and await further news. While you¡¯re at it, make sure to pull back all forces you have waiting nearby. I can sense new auras approaching. If a fight starts, it will be toote for any of you to run.¡±


    The faces of the two adepts, who were intermediate and advanced Third Grade respectively, turned pale when they heard the warning.


    The male adept stomped his feet and pulled at the flower bud, causing it to shrink rapidly. When the space was so small that it barely amodated the two of them, he began to control the flower and dig away from the battlefield.


    Meanwhile, the female adept rubbed her ring of authority and sent out retreat instructions to all of her subordinates. The forces sent here were all elites that the two of them had spent hundreds of years training and cultivating. All of them were at least Second Grade. If any of them were to die here, they would be absolutely heartbroken.


    After the two Third Grade Adept¡¯s Association adepts had snuck away, a mysterious figure appeared near Stoneshard Valley.


    It was a strange crystal ship that resembled a stingray.


    It hovered high in the air, over two and a half kilometers northeast of Stoneshard Valley. It silently observed the two ¡®ultra-powerhouses¡¯ as they fought.


    The inside of the flying ship was muchrger than it appeared outside. A dozen individuals in the Silver Union¡¯s unique silver robes busily worked at their posts inside the broad centralmand.


    Ratpersons, treants, sethraks, dark elves, ck dwarves, gnomes...at a single nce, there were individuals of so many different species, it was almost as if you had walked into some sort of menagerie.


    ¡°Lord Tartas, the scouts have been sent out. We will have an image feed of the battle soon,¡± A silver-robed adept with a humanoid body but the head of a snake reported respectfully.


    Fourth Grade Golem Master Tartas sat on a small, elevated tform with his eyes closed. He opened them slowly when he heard this.


    Tartas was also not a human. He was a mixed-blood human with obvious gnome blood. He was only 1.3 meters tall, with undeveloped muscles and Spirit slightly lower than the average Fourth Grade adept.


    However, as a high-grade golem master of the Silver Union, most of his power, in fact, came from the golem that was assimted with his very own soul. That was why this person appeared to be somewhat weaker than the average adept.


    Tartas opened his eyes, and the first thing he saw was the image of the battle in the distance projected onto arge screen in front of him. Tartas¡¯ eyes instantly gleamed when he saw the two towering adepts tearing the world apart with their every movement.


    ¡°Titan bloodline. Truly one of the most powerful bloodline powers in the universe!¡± He stared as he praised, ¡°It¡¯s a shame that Titans are too strong. Otherwise, the Union could capture one or two of them, and we could make flesh golems out of them. They would certainly make much more powerful golems than those slow and clumsy metal cans. Such a shame...such a shame!¡±


    He continued to speak until no one knew exactly what shame he was referring to.


    However, his gaze was quickly drawn towards the me giant.


    ¡°An energy body...fire elementium modification...these elementium adepts only have these few tricks up their sleeves for enhancement of their powers! No creativity at all...hang on, isn¡¯t the offensive and defensive power of this fire adept a little off the charts? He¡¯s only intermediate Fourth Grade. How are his attacks reaching over 10,000 points? What...this...how is it possible?¡±


    Tartas was more surprised the longer he looked. He waved his hand and called the screen forward, then put on a multipurpose pair of goggles. He leaned onto the three-dimensional projection and started to analyze with all he had.


    ¡°Artifact...he¡¯s using an artifact! A Fifth Grade artifact...hang on, why are there two spots of high-energy reactions detected on him? Could he...could he have two Fifth Grade artifacts on him? Bastard...this lucky bastard.¡±


    The silver-robed adepts in the room shrugged when they saw their flight supervisorugh like a madman. They returned to their work like they hadn¡¯t seen anything weird.


    In all honesty, they were very busy!


    They had to collect and arrange all the data collected from this battle, predict the future of the Central Lands, and provide information upon which the Silver Union higher-ups could make their decisions. None of these tasks were easy. It was no wonder that their flight supervisor for this trip was one of the Union¡¯s more famous powerful individuals.


    While Fourth Grade Golem Master Tartas was breaking out in tears andughter, three witches stood in a barrier of invisibility, just ten meters away. All three witches had simr figures, appearances, and age. They were also observing the fight.


    Death Witch Leader Khesuna. In the Northern Lands, her name carried enough weight to shake the world where she traveled. It was often rumored that she was the most powerful of the Northern Witches.


    Apanying her were the two supervisors of the Witch Council stationed at the Central Lands. One was Second Grade, and the other was Third Grade, belonging to the Dark Witches and the Pale Witches, respectively.


    The two of them did not belong to the Death Witches, but they were still beholden to the Witch Council. As such, in the face of the sudden appearance of this witch leader, the two witches could only obey her every order fearfully.

 Chapter 1300 - Main Fateline

    Chapter 1300 Main Fateline


    ¡°Lady Khesuna, what do you think about what¡¯s happening?¡± Third Grade Pale Witch Julia asked in a soft voice.


    ¡°Tell your subordinates to behave themselves. There are too many people here today. Our people cannot show themselves easily, no matter what happens!¡± Khesuna looked around her, then looked to the skies. A stern expression came over her face.


    ¡°The other adept organizations also sent people here?¡± Julia gasped in surprise.


    ¡°Not just them,¡± Khesuna lifted her head, a sinister smile on her cold face. Her eyes were fixed firmly on a few dots circling above Stoneshard Valley. She spoke in a cold voice, ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought that even those greater-than-thou fellows woulde as well?¡±


    Julia looked into the distance following Khesuna¡¯s gaze. She could barely recognize those ck dots as several mighty and majestic eagles. That was the extent of what she could see.


    However, as a Third Grade witch, the breadth and depth of Julia¡¯s knowledge and experience were far beyond that of an ordinary person. Given Khesuna¡¯s tone and the few keywords she threw out, Julia could quickly figure out the background of those eagles.


    ¡°My...mydy. They are...they are......¡±


    ¡°As long as you know who they are. There¡¯s no need to speak their name! Otherwise, the threads of Fate will draw their attention toward us. These bastards that enjoy hiding behind Fate! Hmph! A bunch of peeping toms!¡±


    However, Khesuna¡¯s gaze quickly turned elsewhere, to another region. She could faintly sense an incredibly revulsive and annoying soul aura over there.


    Cerveris. Dammit! Those old fools of the Adept¡¯s Association let this butcher out? With him stirring the pot here today, no one will be able to leave uninvolved.


    Khesuna¡¯s gaze turned cold at the thought of this. A bone-chilling aura surged out of her white body beneath the brown leather armor, instantly turning the area around her into a zone of death.


    Several majestic eagles circled high in the skies above Stoneshard Valley, asionally letting out a few loud cries.


    The eagle that Indal had turned into soared in the skies. Looking down from above, the two and a half kilometer long Stoneshard Valley was no more than a short, gray line in the earth. Meanwhile, the two giants fighting with all they had in front of the valley were no more than two slightly more powerful ants.


    While he soared in the skies and felt the terrifying heat emanating from the ground, a human face made out of pure smoke appeared in front of him.


    ¡°Indal, what is the situation over there?¡±


    ¡°Tower master, it has been over two weeks since we arrived here. An adept war of the highest level just broke out here. As you can see now, two individuals with the might of ultra-powerhouses are fighting. What they are fighting for is control over the Central Lands for the next few hundred years.¡±


    ¡°Indal, how many times have I told you, do not be tricked by matters beyond the main Fateline. Your task is to find that individual blessed by Fate, then observe and record how the Fate powers push forth the ne¡¯s development! We should not involve ourselves in the schemes, plots, and conflicts of any adept or adept organization apart from this.¡±


    ¡°I understand, tower master. We have been working ording to your instructions. However...this is where the Fate powers led us to in the end. After we reached the Central Lands, I scattered the members of Eagle to track and investigate prominent organizations or individuals that could influence the events in this area. Today, all Eagle members have been guided here by the powers of Fate. My lord, this ce has be a gathering spot for the Fate powers. A historical event that will change the Fate of the Central Lands is about to pass!¡±


    ¡°What? The Fate powers are already gathering? No, I must project over the Omniscient Eye immediately. Have all your men keep their eyes and books open, ready to record everything without missing a single detail! We won¡¯t run into such a good chance more than a few times in our lives.¡±


    The old schr, who had always been the wisest and mostposed among them, was now the most excited of them all. He waved his arms over and over as he ranted about his excitement.


    A short momentter, a small, vertical slit opened between Indal¡¯s eagle eyes. It was a strange eye.


    ¡°Fate...Fate......I see Fate. To think this tinynd has gathered so many powerful individuals who bear so many Fatelines upon their backs. Dammit! Let me count: one, two, three...bastards! How are there so many of them!? There are actually seven children of Fate here.¡±


    ¡°Seven? That¡¯s not possible!¡± Indal listened closely to the mental fluxing from his third eye and couldn¡¯t help but exim in surprise, ¡°Tower master, isn¡¯t there only supposed to be one child of Fate?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! You ignorant dunce. Indal, it¡¯s been so many years since you entered the Diviner¡¯s Tower! You¡¯ve also recorded so many major events all over the ne! How could you ask such a stupid question?¡± The third eye rolled as it said, ¡°Do you think the Fate powers are like little teenage girls, always pouring their adoration onto the same person for eternity?¡±


    ¡°When you feel as if you can see the future unfolding before you, when you feel as if everything is going your way, that means that the Fate powers have taken a liking to you and have invested their hopes upon you. However, such hopes do note without a price! Anyone that obtains the favor of Fate is an agent selected by Fate. Their purpose of existence is to push forward the world¡¯s developments in a predetermined path and trajectory.


    ¡°However, do you think that Fate will continue to favor them, all the way to their deaths, even once they havepleted their mission in history? To be frank, any person who has been a renowned individual in the long history of the World of Adepts was once a champion of the Fate powers. They can all be perceived as children of Fate at their specific points in time. However, once they¡¯ve fulfilled their purpose, Fate will flow and look for their next agent that can push forward the world¡¯s developments.


    ¡°That is why we can call these individuals both children of Fate and bastards of Fate! Their value, their lives, all of it is in the hands of the great entity known as Fate! Meanwhile, we serve as eyes that roam beyond the river of Fate. That is our mission and our glory!¡±


    Indal listened closely to the Fate theory that the old tower master was describing. He couldn¡¯t help but ask, ¡°Then...who in this massive revolution is the current child of Fate?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t be misled by worldly power or influence. Close your eyes and quietly feel the flow of the Fate powers. Where the Fate powers gather will be where that person,¡± As the eye continued to espouse its theories, its mental flux suddenly fluctuated violently, ¡°Dammit! Dammit! Dammit...what¡¯s happening? Why are so many people shrouded by Fate mists here today?¡±


    The Omniscient Eye turned. When its gazended on a particr spot in Stoneshard Valley, an individual cloaked in ring red light came into view.


    This individual appeared to be covered in some sort of magical invisibility.


    They appeared to have sensed the gaze of the Omniscient Eye, for they lifted their head and red at the eagle. It was only when they sensed no danger or threat that they looked back at the battle in the distance.


    When this adept appeared in view of the Omniscient Eye, the strange eye embedded on the top of the Diviner¡¯s Tower hundreds of thousands of kilometers away in the Castle in the Sky glowed with blinding prismatic light.


    Unfortunately, before the tower master could clearly discern the main Fateline that the person carried, a dense mist swarmed from every direction, concealing thempletely.


    ¡°Hmph! It¡¯s Cerveris! He¡¯s the most vicious among the ultra-powerhouses of the Adept¡¯s Association. If the Adept¡¯s Association has let him out, their intention must be to stir up a storm in the Central Lands. He reeks of the smell of that peeping freak, Maztan! Maztan might not be much of a diviner, but he¡¯s still good enough to conceal an adept¡¯s main Fateline for a while. Never mind! We can go look for the next person.¡±


    The eagle circled in the skies and quickly searched the entire battlefield.


    ¡°Tartas of the Silver Union is here, and so is Khesuna of the Northern Witches. Eleven of the Central Lands¡¯ Fourth Grade adepts are here as well, with four more hidden all over the ce.


    ¡°Judging from the flow of the Fate powers, none of them are today¡¯s protagonist! It seems like the person we are searching for is one of the twobatants. Come, Indal, let us meet this child of Fate!¡±


    Having said that, the eagle hesitated no more. It beat its broad wings and flew straight towards the violent battlefield.


    At this point, that battlefield had turned into an apocalyptic wastnd!


    When two powerhouses that stood at the peak of this world struck with wanton recklessness, they inflicted too much damage upon the world they resided in.


    The space that stretched for over two hundred kilometers was now beyond recognition. From a distance, you could see rampaging magical elementium everywhere, as well as spatial turbulence caused by shingws and unusual phenomena caused by mutatedws.


    The once ck, rich earth was now scorched and dry. The dirt had turned into a strange substance somewhere between y and crystal. Hot air hissed from the cracks in the ground every so often as redva flowed below, causing manyva pools to appear when fireballs exploded and left craters in the ground.


    Even the ground was in such a terrible state. One could only imagine what had happened to the sky. The air was covered in dark red scars, terrifying spacestorms, and chaos energy leaking from these tears.


    Two towering giants, one golden and one zing with mes, fought with no regard for their lives within all this destruction and carnage.

 Chapter 1301 - Outside Intervention

    Chapter 1301 Outside Intervention


    Greem quickly weaved around the battlefield.


    Compared to his opponent, the Gold Titan, his advantage came from his devastating fire magic and superior mobility.


    In terms of long-range firepower alone, Greem had the upper hand. However, considering both factors of Physique and Strength, Mornashen was overwhelmingly superior to Greem.


    It was simple. Greem had 27 points of Strength while Mornashen had 49 points.


    In the face of such incredible Strength, Greem was as frail as a paper person!


    On the other hand, Greem had as much as 34 points of Physique. Such a high Physique already made him an oddity amongst most elementium adepts. However, whenpared to Mornashen¡¯s 47 points of Physique, he waspletely dwarfed.


    Strength decided their meleebat prowess. Whilebat technique and fighting experience did make a difference, it wouldn¡¯t matter at all before absolute, overwhelming Strength!


    Physique determined their physical resistance and regenerative powers. It was also the foundation of most body-refining and bloodline adepts. In this regard, most elementium adepts did not do enough. They hardly ever strengthened their Physique, believing that it would be sufficient as long as their bodies were strong enough for their minds.


    Spirit determined the potency and range of their spiritual senses while also making their minds work faster, their thoughts process quicker, and their memories expand. The level of their Spirit also directly affected the strength, range, duration, and prative power of their magic.


    Even though Mornashen had also reached the peak of 49 points in Spirit, it was obvious that he had not spent enough time researching and studying magic. It resulted in him only being able to cast a few lightning spells, apart from the special racial abilities of a Gold Titan.


    If one were to analyze everything seriously, it seemed like the only thing that Greem was genuinely superior to Mornashen in was Agility!


    He had 19 points of Agilitypared to Mornashen¡¯s 13 points.


    Mornashen¡¯s gigantic size was indeed several times that of Greem¡¯s zing body after transforming into the Gold Titan. Greem could only employ guerri tactics, moving quickly through the sea of fire with his perks as a fire adept. Like a hunting dog teasing a rampaging bull, he led Mornashen around the battlefield, all while keeping distance between them.


    It wasn¡¯t that Greem didn¡¯t want to leave Mornashen in the dust, but that it wasn¡¯t very effective to do so!


    If the distance between them were more than a thousand meters, it would be very easy for Mornashen to determine his fire spells¡¯ trajectory. Should Mornashen be able to intercept the fire spells before they hit him, his 47 points of Physique would allow him to go unharmed. The mes from the spells¡¯ explosions might still be incredibly powerful, but they were really no more than a warm breeze to the Gold Titan.


    The minor fire damage inflicted by such explosions couldn¡¯t evenpare to Mornashen¡¯s rapid regeneration powers.


    Of course, Greem¡¯s Invisible mesw had helped a lot at the start of the battle, allowing him to toy with Mornashen over and over. While the Gold Titan wildly chased after his target, there would always be a barrage of fire spells mysteriously exploding against his back.


    Even though Mornashen quickly healed these wounds by drawing upon his bloodline powers, getting injured too rapidly and too frequently would also strain him.


    Moreover, it was not like regeneration came at no cost!


    Regeneration required the constant exhaustion of his stamina and bloodline powers.


    Should the bloodline powers in his body be exhausted, he would no longer be able to maintain his Gold Titan transformation. Once he lost the Physique, Strength, and Spirit enhancement provided by the Gold Titan, he would have absolutely no chance of beating Greem with his two artifacts.


    Every adept present today could see that, let alone himself!


    To reduce the drain on his bloodline powers, Mornashen stopped healing the minor wounds that did not affect hisbat prowess. Instead, he focused more of his attention on the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    His 49 points of Strength made him an utterly unstoppable juggernaut. Even ordinary pieces of rock and dirt could instantly be lethal tools when driven by his barbaric strength. Every time he swung his giant fists, a massive tornado appeared.


    His punch would affect everything a kilometer in front of him.


    Moreover, every time he struck with a physical attack, a corresponding bolt of lightning would also st down from the skies. That constantly made the enemy endure twofold damage from the physical attack and the lightning strike. It was devastatingly powerful.


    That was why Mornashen would dig his feet into the ground and kick every time he attacked, flingingrge clouds of dirt and sand into the air. He would then simply punch and, thus, create a small sandstorm.


    While all the sand obscured the enemy¡¯s vision, and their defenses trembled from the rapidly flying pebbles, Mornashen¡¯s real punch and tornado would arrive.


    When faced with this tactic from Mornashen, Greem had no other option but to move out of the way.


    Even an ordinary stone became a small zing meteor with a smoking tail when flung with 49 points of violent Strength. Most stones were not hard enough and burned out halfway due to friction against the air.


    However, the surviving rocks caused Greem¡¯s Fourth Grade Inferno Shields to tremble. Some could even punch straight through. The pieces of rock that pierced through the shields were able to inflict decent physical damage to Greem¡¯s body.


    Unlike the elementium adepts who soughtw powers their whole lives, bloodline adepts did not ce so much emphasis onw powers. They pursued the purification of their bloodline in an attempt to revert to their ancestral origins. They hoped to reach the pinnacles of the ancient magical creatures through their research on bloodline magic.


    However, pure bloodlines also carried with them correspondingw powers of their own!


    After transforming into Gold Titans, the members of the Gaia n would naturally grasp thews of strength and thews of lightning. Moreover, they did not have to research or study thesew powers as the elementium adepts did.


    As long as their bloodline power reached the required level, their understanding and mastery over thews would naturally flow into their soul origin through their bloodline inheritance. It would almost be as if they had studied thosew powers themselves for countless years.


    That was why high-grade bloodline adepts usedw powers in a more instinctual fashion andcked the flexibility and transformations of the elementium adepts!


    Take Greem, for example. He had onlye into contact with thews some two hundred years ago, but his application and creativity with the use ofw powerspletely outshone Mornashen, who was a veteran adept who had advanced over nine hundred years ago.


    The Gold Titans¡¯ powerful strength and lightningws appeared to be distinct in Mornashen¡¯s hands, showing no signs of assimtion orbination. Although there were instances ofbined physical and magical damage during the battle, that was more a natural manifestation of the Gold Titans¡¯ natural prowess rather than Mornashen¡¯s own application.


    In contrast, Greem might only be a rookie that had only recently started studying thew powers, but he had already created many uses for thews, such as hisw fires andw shield. They gave him an advantage in the fight against Mornashen.


    At their levels, ordinary physical attacks and elementium damage could no longer leavesting damage on their bodies. Only attacks possessingw powers could prate their forcefields and bodies to inflictsting wounds.


    To some extent, Greem¡¯sw defenses and Mornashen¡¯s tough body already had the unusual effects of a body-refining adept¡¯s immortal body. The only difference was how they achieved such a defense!


    After over ten hours of fearsome fighting, both Greem and Mornashen had sustained terrible wounds. Their stamina and Spirit were starting to deteriorate, and they could no longer continue fighting at peak condition.


    Generally speaking, it seemed like Mornashen had suffered much more grievous wounds. Hisbat prowess had declined to a dangerous tipping point.


    If he crossed this threshold, then the bloodline powers in his veins would no longer be able to sustain his colossal size. Should he revert to his original form, this battle between ¡®ultra-powerhouses¡¯ would conclude with his defeat!


    Just as he was about to be defeated, an unexpected and sudden power broke into the battlefield and sped toward Greem.


    [Beep. Detecting the appearance of foreign curse energy. Able to threaten Host. Suggesting that Host conduct evasive maneuver immediately.]


    Greem erupted into mes the moment he received the Chip¡¯s warning, vanishing without a trace.


    The sudden st of fire pushed Mornashen backward, causing him to stumble for a hundred meters before he regained his bnce.


    A dozen clusters of golden mes escaped in different directions. In the end, all the mes slowly dissipated, with only the me in the northeast gradually growingrger until it turned into Greem¡¯s mighty body.


    Greem frowned when he reformed. He looked down at his right chest. A dark spot wriggled there, squirming and twisting. The strange, dark patterns were arranged in the form of a rune, and an even more mysterious energy aura was growing within those patterns.


    This is the power of a curse!?


    Why is it so strange and so difficult to deal with?


    Greem was able to avoid the curse attack in time earlier. However, he had been grazed by the aftershocks of the curse energy when he escaped, leaving this strange curse mark on his body.


    This curse mark contained a profound and unusual energy aura. Even when Greem burned it with all his firews, he could only keep the curse constrained to the size of a palm on his chest. He could not remove it entirely.


    Moreover, after absorbing some of the fire energy, the curse mark underwent a transformation and turned into a wormcurse.


    The ck wormcurse writhed as even more terrifying worms appeared, biting viciously at Greem¡¯s body.


    Greem¡¯s expression froze for a moment, and he frowned deeply!


    His gaze cut through the vast battlefield andnded on an enemy that had just revealed himself.


    So, it was him.

 Chapter 1302 - Internal and External Conflict

    <h4>Chapter 1302 Internal and External Conflict</h4>


    ¡°Cerveris...this is an internal conflict of our Zhentarim. What is it? Does your Adept¡¯s Association intend to intervene as well?¡±


    Greem instantly recognized his opponent and remarked coldly.


    He gathered a prismatic ball of me in his palm as he questioned the enemy, brushing it over the ck wormcurse on his chest. Where the fire burned, the ck spots faded away. The wormcurse let out a strange cry, almost like that of a living creature. It then turned into a puff of ck smoke and vanished without a trace.


    Upon seeing Greem dispelling his wormcurse with firews, Cerveris couldn¡¯t help but start cackling coldly.


    ¡°You can drop all the nonsense. Weren¡¯t you a real arrogant snob back at the Adept¡¯s Association? You even beat up that brat, Olivia. I represent only myself today¨C no rtion to the Adept¡¯s Association whatsoever. I simply don¡¯t like you and want to teach you a lesson. How about that?¡±


    Cerveris was a short male adept. His back was hunched over and curved like a bow. He had a hooked nose, ghostly green eyes, and when he smiled, you could see the ck and yellowed teeth in his mouth. He had gone almost entirely bald. There was only a sparse ring of sickly yellow hair around his scalp.


    He wore a pure ck robe on his person, adorned with all sorts of magical gemstones. With his every movement, the jewels would gleam and reflect blinding light, making it difficult to stare straight at him.


    Most elementium adepts became greatly affected by thew powers they continually studied and assimted at the Fourth Grade level. Their appearances, bodies, and even their manners would begin to change. Cerveris was known for his curse magic. As such, he also used special magical techniques to modify his body and turn its attribute into voodoo poison.


    In doing so, his Physique became morepatible with his innate magical talents!


    However, this also resulted in an undesired consequence. His voodoo poison body was corrupted by thews of darkness and became twisted beyond recognition. Moreover, this corruption urred at the level of thews. It was impossible to undo the corruption through ordinary means.


    That was why dark adepts that studied necromancy, curses, voodoo poison, or agony magic often had hideous appearances. They had all been affected by theirw powers!


    When Cerveris emerged like the gargoyle he was, the adepts of the Central Lands frowned. Hesitation appeared in their eyes.


    Even though Cerveris had made it very clear that his assault on Greem was a personal action, he was still the most notorious ultra-powerhouse of the Adept¡¯s Association. It wasn¡¯t easy to separate his personal activities from the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s stance.


    If the battle earlier had only been a civil war within Zhentarim, the appearance of Cerveris had changed the nature of this war!


    At this point, it wasn¡¯t just the adepts of the Central Lands that hesitated. Even Mornashen, who had just been engaged in violentbat, couldn¡¯t help but pause in doubt.


    He did not like Greem or the Crimson n¡¯s forceful rise to power. That was why he had decided to teach this young Fourth Grade adept a lesson when Chairman Freed extended him an invitation to do so. However, to work with an outsider against an adept of the Central Lands was out of the question. Mornashen frowned, anger and fury taking over his face.


    Greem looked around him, his eyes sweeping past the faces of the adepts present. He then said, ¡°Cerveris, even if you want to intervene in the affairs of the Central Lands, don¡¯t you think you should ask for the approval of some people here? Chairman Freed, what are your thoughts on this?¡±


    Greem casually kicked the ball over to Chairman Freed, who had a helpless look on his face.


    When he heard Greem call him out, the frown grew even wider. However, he had to take a stance at a moment like this.


    After a moment¡¯s hesitation, Freed stood forward and said resentfully, ¡°Greem, ever since you advanced to Fourth Grade, you have constantly disrupted the proper order of Zhentarim. It has drawn the ire of all of your equals in the Central Lands. Everyone has gathered here to crusade against your tyranny and recklessness. That is why...I believe that Cerveris is justified in joining this battle!¡±


    ¡°Seconded!¡± Vice-Chairman Mirva also stepped forth, ¡°This war was caused solely by your foolish actions. There is no division of Zhentarim and the outside world in this war. Greem, don¡¯t think you can escape judgment just by bringing up tensions between the different organizations!¡±


    ¡°Indeed!¡±


    ¡°If you are fearful, then admit your defeat now. As long as you lower your head, surrender, and sign a contract discontinuing your expansion, we will still allow you to remain in the Central Lands!¡± Nics and Matthew, who had always been more cowardly than the others, jumped out at the same time and fed the me.


    Surprisingly, it was Adept Ker¨Cwho had always been quick to act¨Cwho remained silent and speechless.


    Greem couldn¡¯t care less about these clowns.


    The only people here right now that were a threat to him were the so-called ¡®ultra-powerhouses¡¯!


    Greem¡¯s gaze fixated upon his opponent, Mornashen. He silently waited for him to take a stand.


    Mornashen had managed to heal all the wounds on his body with that short rest. His injured Titan body was now as unchanged as it had been before the fight.


    He looked around the battlefield and shook his colossal body. A blinding sh of golden light shone as he reverted to his original, three-meter size.


    ¡°Ptoo!¡± Mornashen spat, his spit flying through the air with the speed of a bullet and punching a deep hole into the ground. ¡°I¡¯m not as shameless as you people! Even if it¡¯s a war, it¡¯s a war between us Central Land adepts. What is the damned point if you call for foreign help? I am done with today¡¯s battle. You people are free to fight however you like. I am out!¡±


    Having said that, Mornashen ignored Freed and the other adepts¡¯ purple faces. He waved his sleeve at them and turned away, vanishing from the battlefield in a matter of a few jumps.


    ¡°Kehkehkehe! Who would¡¯ve thought that there were still a few fellows with some spine here in the Central Lands? He¡¯s free to leave. It¡¯s not going to make a difference. Come here,e here,e here. Your name is Greem, isn¡¯t it? Come! Let this great one trade a few blows with you. Let¡¯s see what you are really made of, eh? Instead of you relying on your two artifacts to brush those Central adepts aside,¡± Cerveris then turned around and said, ¡°You lot! I¡¯m helping you people to get rid of a big problem today, eh? You¡¯re not going to stand by and just watch, are you? Come,e. Everyone, strike together and take down this Greem fe!¡±


    Cerveris immediately extended a right hand as scrawny as a chicken¡¯s leg and drew three sickly green runes in the air.


    The runes glowed with a pale green light when they werepleted and vanished on the spot.


    A few hundred meters away, Greem felt a chill run through his body. Three unusual runes appeared directly on his zing body. If it weren¡¯t for the quad-coloredw defense around him, the three runes would have entered his body and reached straight for the core of his power.


    [Beep. Host has been attacked by curse runes. Initial estimates suggest the runes¡¯ effects to be: Decrepification, Blindness, and Confusion.


    [Rune attacks have been stopped byw defense. Effectiveness has been halved. Host will suffer from Decrepification (-5 Physique), Blindness (unable to see anything, range of spiritual senses halved), and Confusion (unable to visually lock on to enemy targets. Chance for a spiritual lock on to fail.).


    [Curse duration: 7 seconds.]


    Dammit! What terrifying curses!


    It was important to note that Greem¡¯s Fourth Grade magic resistance andw defense had already made him impervious to most curse magic. Even the asional curse that could affect him typically could notst for more than a third of a second. He had never experienced curses like those from Cerveris. Every one of them was so potent and persisted for so long.


    Seven seconds. And that was with thew defense mitigating half of its power! These curses were probably able topletely reduce an ordinary adept¡¯s Physique by half and then turn them into a blind madman.


    Cerveris snorted when he saw Greem¡¯s prismatic barrier neutralize half of the curse runes¡¯ power. He reached into the air and pulled out a ck wooden staff. His silhouette flickered, and he appeared right beside Greem. He lifted his hand, and a barrage of shadow arrows shot out.


    Greem sensed Cerveris approach, but with the curse ced on him, it was almost as if his eyes had been covered with a ck cloth. He could not see anything at all. His spiritual senses were also poorly oriented due to the Curse of Confusion. He could not determine whether the presence he had locked onto was the actual opponent.


    Greem had no choice. The mes around him surged as he leaped a thousand meters away with Fire Teleportation.


    At that moment, Freed and the other adepts hesitated for a moment. However, their faces twisted in hesitation as they made up their minds. They took out their magical equipment and prepared to attack Greem.


    However, Mary, Arms, Shadow Demon, Remi, and the magical golem dragon wouldn¡¯t just sit by and watch this happen. Their bodies shed with color as they charged forward.


    Adept Ker watched as everyone charged forward. She alone remained motionless, her brows fixed in a deep furrow. Freed couldn¡¯t help but speak sternly to her, ¡°Ker, your Dener n is already in so deep against the Crimson n. Do you think that this can end peacefully for you still? Let this chance slip by, and what will you use to stop Greem from making further advances? Don¡¯t forget, he is already an ultra-powerhouse. If we don¡¯t unite our forces, we can only be defeated by him one at a time.¡±


    Ker¡¯s face twitched a few times, and a vicious expression took over.


    ¡°Greem, if I help you now, would you say grudge between us is settled?¡± Adept Ker suddenly shouted, but the content of her words was so shocking that everyone couldn¡¯t help but be stunned from surprise.


    Damn, that was an option for her?


    ¡°It¡¯s a deal!¡± Greemughed loudly and said, ¡°In truth, I have always been quite impressed with you, Adept Ker. It is my honor to be able to fight by your side!¡±


    ¡°You had best keep your word! Hmph!¡±


    Ker¡¯s expression seemed to have lightened up slightly. She let out a battlecry, and the red-eyed monkey on her shoulder leaped forward in a somersault, instantly transforming into a terrifying, berserk ape. The ape howled loudly and lunged at Freed and the others.


    The battle instantly devolved into a chaotic mess!

 Chapter 1303 - Curse Adept

    Chapter 1303 Curse Adept


    Greem summoned Shadow Demon to his side the moment the chaotic fight began.


    The battle from earlier had been a ¡®fair¡¯ duel between two powerful adepts. It wasn¡¯t the most appropriate ce for a golem like Shadow Demon to appear. Mornashen would not acknowledge his defeat if Shadow Demon yed a part in it.


    Even if Greem had the power to unite the Central Lands in the future, Mornashen would undoubtedly y a critical role in the united Central Lands. In fact, anyone who wanted to unify the Central Lands would have to find some way to bind the Gaia n leader to their side.


    The reason for that was simple. Mornashen¡¯s power was the absolute guarantee for his status!


    That was why Greem could not do anything that would cause Mornashen to hold a grudge if wanted to cate Mornashen utilizing force.


    However, his opponent was now Cerveris of the Adept¡¯s Association. The fundamental nature of the fight had changed. The two of them were notpetitors, but enemies in the truest sense of the word.


    To hold back any further now would only make a mockery of himself in front of his opponent.


    That was why Greem instantly summoned Shadow Demon to him when he sensed the power of Cerveris¡¯ curses. Shadow Demon was utterly immune to curses, after all.


    Cerveris noticed Shadow Demon the moment his shadowy aura approached.


    He smiled with his mouthful of yellowed teeth andughed.


    ¡°A shadow golem? Kehkehe! Greem, don¡¯t think you are the only one with such things.¡±


    As Cerveris said that, ripples appeared in his shadow as Greem felt a familiar energy aura.


    Shadow Demon, who was hiding in Greem¡¯s shadows, opened its dark eyes wide. It carefully scanned the shadow of the curse adept. As expected, it could sense a familiar presence in the shadow space within.


    The enemy also had a shadow golem. Moreover, judging from its aura, it was a Fourth Grade shadow golem.


    A spark of light appeared in Shadow Demon¡¯s eyes. It sprang forward without hesitation, striking first at the enemy in the shadows.


    Two ck spots of fire lit up in Cerveris¡¯ shadow. A strange towering creature, also forged of Shadowsteel, opened its eyes. A cruel smile appeared on its face as it glided backward, avoiding Shadow Demon¡¯s attack.


    Spells flew across the vast battlefield. mes burned everywhere. As magic erupted all over the sky, all sorts of afterimages were left behind.


    The momentary shadows of these shes and afterimages, some asrge as wheels and others as small as the tip of a needle, became the battlefield where these two shadow golems pursued each other.


    They never appeared in front of the other adepts. Instead, they leaped rapidly from shadow space to shadow space. Even when they asionally traded blows, the exchangessted for no more than an instant; the strikes were so fast that it was impossible to capture with the naked eye.


    Like two immaterial phantoms engaged in a ghostly dance, the two shadow golems chased after one another. Small energy storms that erupted from the shadow spaces outlined the trail of their chase while also indirectly hinting at their fight¡¯s intensity and danger.


    The same advanced shadow techniques, the same imprable body of steel, the same fearless means of ughter. It was because the golems were so simr that their battle to death seemed so slow and difficult.


    From an overall standpoint, Shadow Demon still held the upper hand. The reason for that was the fact that it was equipped with two pieces of Fourth Grade magical equipment, while its opponent was no more than a well-crafted shadow golem!


    Greem could only sigh when he saw his Shadow Demon upied by the opponent¡¯s golem.


    After all, he had already revealed Shadow Demon back at the Adept¡¯s Association. He would have to look down on the Association if they did note up with preventative measures against Shadow Demon after that.


    The adepts had all picked their opponents and were fighting with all they had. In particr, Arms was surrounded by all sorts of summoned creatures and voodoo beasts.


    They might not be as powerful as the thunder dragon, but they were still able to hold him back when attacking in swarms.


    Meanwhile, Mary, Remi, and the clumsy golem dragon had to face five Fourth Grade adepts all at once. It was truly a dangerous and precarious predicament.


    Freed, Mirva, Nics, Matthew, and Fabres.


    Any one of the five would have been a fearsome opponent. Theymanded their summoned beasts and voodoo beasts to upy the most powerful Fourth Grade dragon while concentrating their forces on Mary and Remi. That put the two of them in a perilous situation.


    However, Adept Ker had just turned coats and became Greem¡¯s ally. She and her Redeye Tyrant joined the fray and held back Freed and the other Central adepts. It indirectly reduced the pressure on Mary and the other Crimson n adepts.


    Even though Remi and the golem dragon were both technically at Fourth Grade, they were clearly no match for true Fourth Grade adepts.


    Mary and Ker, the two Fourth Grades, as well as Remi and the golem, the two pseudo-Fourth Grades, were supposed to fight against five adepts. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how daunting of a task that was.


    Regardless of how furious their fight turned out to be, they were only the side characters, after all. The only ones who could genuinely decide the victor of today¡¯s battle were still the two ultra-powerhouses.


    Ordinary adepts were not qualified to involve themselves in that battle!


    Greem was not currently in good condition.


    Cerveris¡¯ curse magic possessed unusual pration power. Greem was susceptible to its effects, even when protected by his barrier of four firews.


    The Curse of Decrepification could reduce his Physique.


    The Curse of Debilitation could reduce his Strength.


    The Curse of Blindness could weaken his senses.


    The Curse of Deceleration could reduce his Agility.


    The Curse of Confusion could disrupt his mental consciousness.


    The Curse of Pox would cause blisters to appear all over his body.


    The Wormcurse could absorb a portion of his magic energy and convert it into strange worms that ate away at his flesh.


    The Bigtongue Curse could cause his tongue to swell and make him lose his ability to cast spells.


    Visions of Madness could cause illusions to appear and drive him into a manic state.


    ......


    ......


    As an ultra-powerhouse, Cerveris was most proficient at reducing his opponents to a shambling mess with a series of curses before finishing them off with powerful magic wands or even his staff.


    The reason Cerveris was so terrifying was simply because of a piece of powerful magical equipment that waspletelypatible with his soul origin¨C the Book of Curses.


    It was also Fifth Grade Soul Equipment!


    Cerveris held in the book in one hand while making gestures with the other. Every time a curse rune was formed, it would vanish instantly and appear on Greem¡¯s ming body.


    Greem was already thoroughly annoyed by these unstoppable curses. He roared and created boiling Magma Fireballs in his palms, which he viciously shot at the enemy.


    Every time that happened, Cerveris would turn into a cloud of ck smoke, scattering and reforming elsewhere. Like most elementium adepts who had elementiumized their body, Cerveris had no vital spots. Naturally, he was not afraid of the fireballs¡¯ explosions.


    However, even though he was not afraid of fire, it didn¡¯t mean he wasn¡¯t fearful of the firews!


    The most significant characteristic of thew powers was that they could not tolerate otherw powers.


    Shouldw powers in a certain region gain the upper hand, they would naturally start to contaminate the surrounding narws in an attempt to assimte them. It was a characteristic of thews and also an instinct of theirs. There was no stopping such a phenomenon from happening!


    That was why even Cerveris¡¯ cursews had to back away when the firews zed across the sky. He had to gather even more intense powers to retaliate against the firews.


    However, the cursews were innately sinister and excelled at contamination. They were not as ferocious or explosive as the firews, especially in a direct sh.


    Even though the battle was fairly even, with the cursews pushing back and forth, Greem appeared to have the absolute advantage. He was forcing Cerveris to scramble around constantly with his violent and vicious fire spells.


    The molten giant that Greem had turned into was like a deity of fire. Blinding golden mes shrouded his entire body, and the air itself was filled with bone-melting heat. Whenever he lifted an arm to hurl out a barrage of Magma Fireballs, an entire region of the battlefield would be devoured in waves of fire and devastating shockwaves.


    Every time Cerveris approached him, Greem would swat at him with his gigantic palms. Magical mes washed over the world in waves, and the ck smoke that Cerveris had turned into scattered into pieces.


    By the time he reformed with much difficulty within the fire, his ck robes hung in tatters over his bony body.


    ¡°Hack! Hack! Hack!...dammit.¡± Cerveris coughed violently, expelling the shocking heat and annoying mes frum his lungs. Only then did he feel a little better.


    He hadn¡¯t thought that Greem had grasped the very rarew of Invisible mes that allowed him to conceal his fire spells.


    It was because of this strangew that Cerveris experienced so much trouble in this battle.


    If foreign firews managed to infiltrate his body, even Cerveris would have to exert himself to expel them. The fire damage that he would have to endure in the meantime was so severe that even a Fourth Grade curse adept as powerful as himself couldn¡¯t help but turn pale.


    ¡°Dammit! Didn¡¯t this Greem only advance two hundred years ago? How is he so proficient with the application ofw powers? Bastard! Bastards! I¡¯ve been tricked by those old foxes at headquarters again.¡±


    Cerveris cursed angrily as he turned into smoke and reformed again, avoiding a series of spells that had been flung his way. Meanwhile, in the gaps between Greem¡¯s attacks, he cast as many vicious curses at the fire adept as possible.


    The two adepts continued to battle against each other, rapidly draining their opponent¡¯s stamina and Spirit.


    The battle was as intense and dangerous as when it first started.

 Chapter 1304 - Conflict Between Regions

    Chapter 1304 Conflict Between Regions


    ¡°Brat, to think you¡¯re still full of energy after a fight with a Gold Titan...quite the body you have, innit?¡± Cerveris continued to verbally assault Greem even as he wove between the mes.


    In all honesty, he was impressed by this legendary fire adept from the Central Lands at this point.


    He had personally witnessed the might of the Gold Titan earlier.


    If Mornashen Gaia were willing to join the Adept¡¯s Association, his fighting power would undoubtedly rank within the Association¡¯s top five. Meanwhile, even Cerveris couldn¡¯t get a good grasp of Greem¡¯s true limits; he could not estimate Greem¡¯s real power.


    However, Cerveris was almost sure that Greem¡¯s individual fighting power was no weaker than those three ridiculously powerful bastards ranked as the top of the Adept¡¯s Association. Even Cerveris himself was only ranked fourth!


    That meant Greem¡¯s actualbat prowess was superior to his.


    If it weren¡¯t out of consideration for the fact that Greem had been fighting with Mornashen for so long, Cerveris would not have jumped out and taken on the role of the firestarter.


    Contrary to expectations, this legendary fire adept was just as ferocious as before, even after so many hours of fighting. Cerveris couldn¡¯t help but stare at Greem, continually scanning and observing those two sun-like radiances within his body.


    To think an elementium adept from Zhentarim with no background and no support could possess two ultra-grade artifacts, one of which was a piece of origin magical equipment and the other Soul Equipment. This fire adept was so unbelievably wealthy that even a prodigy of the Adept¡¯s Association like Cerveris couldn¡¯tpare to him.


    Cerveris howled with all he had in his mind at the mere thought of this.


    Dammit! How is this bastard so incredibly lucky! Isn¡¯t the nar consciousness of the World of Adepts ying favorites a little too much?


    However, the moment this thought appeared in his mind, Cerveris knew he had messed up.


    This wasn¡¯t space, where the nar consciousness had no reach or influence. It was the World of Adepts, the world where the adepts¡¯ will ruled over all else. To curse the nar consciousness in this world, even in one¡¯s mind.


    Cerveris, who was elementiumizing his body to avoid a fireball from Greem, felt a stinging pain from within. His body, which had turned semi-immaterial, instantly reverted to normal.


    A few strands ofw aura that had contaminated his body earlier had unexpectedly merged together, giving them enough strength to break free of the suppression of his curses and start a riot in his body. That was what caused his immaterialization to fail!


    ¡°nar consciousness, you dam...¡± Cerveris¡¯ face flushed white. He didn¡¯t even have time to escape through other means when he was hit right in the face by a Magma Fireball.


    The violent and ferocious magical mes scattered everywhere, licking Cerveris all over his scrawny frame. The boilingva within the fireball also engulfed his entire person.


    Cerveris howled in agony and rampaged through the sea of fire randomly, like a ck ape that had been burned to a crisp on the outside. The pieces of cloth that peeled off his body sizzled wherever theynded, melting everything around them and reducing all substances into pungent, stinging slime.


    It hurts...it hurts so incredibly...so incredibly much!


    Cerveris howled over and over until, finally, he was able to neutralize the firews in his body with a monumental amount of curse power. However, just as he managed to resolve the trouble within him, he felt the mes around him flicker and stall for an instant.


    Cerveris turned around in horror. The only thing in view was a massive magma palm.


    Boom!


    An earthshaking thud could be heard as the giant magma palm crashed down from above, mming Cerveris straight into the ground.


    The magma palm zed with raging fires and bubbled with scaldingva. All the earth around the point of impact was quickly scorched ck. Even the air itself crackled and became distorted from the heat.


    Szzzzz!


    A strange sound could be heard as ck smoke dissipated from the cracks between the giant¡¯s fingers. The smoke quickly escaped in all directions, as if it had a mind of their own.


    A short momentter, the smoke gathered a thousand meters away, reforming into Cerveris¡¯ badly tattered body.


    ¡°Bastard...bastard. You dare wreck my body? I will curse you.¡±


    Cerveris cursed Greem angrily as he reached into the air with his hand.


    He pulled out the Book of Curses.


    However, the moment the heavy book fell into his hands, he stopped cursing and hurling insults. He became utterly silent.


    The red-trimmed ck book in his hands, with a series of mysterious runes carved onto the cover, had been damaged. Perhaps Greem¡¯s attack had been too violent, and the overwhelming firews of the Orb of the Fire God had seeped into the Book of Curses with its endless fire energy.


    The left corner of the Book of Curses was visibly sizzled. Smoke was even rising from some of the individual pages as if they were about to ignite at any moment.


    Aaaaah! My Book of Curses...I will curse all of you for ten thousand years!¡±


    The Book of Curses was Cerveris¡¯ Soul Equipment. Any damage sustained by the book was damage inflicted on his soul. Any damage to the soul was not to be overlooked!


    Cerveris no longer continued his reckless fighting. He roared loudly and shouted thest of his curses before turning into ck smoke and cutting across the sky, fleeing rapidly from the battlefield.


    Cerveris had fled!


    At this instant, countless people cursed Cerveris silently in their minds.


    Fourth Grade Golem Master Tartas, who was hidden in his crystal skyship above Stoneshard Valley, swore angrily.


    ¡°Damn all your ancestors, Cerveris. You freaking bastard that can only talk shit. You can¡¯t even beat a Central adept on thest legs of his strength. I...I...damn all the women in your family.¡±


    Themander of the skyship, whose face was now full of Tartas¡¯ spittle, carefully bowed and asked, ¡°My lord, should we still proceed with our operation now?¡±


    ¡°Proceed? Operation my ass! You pea-brained bastard! Can¡¯t you tell the situation¡¯s gone entirely out of control.? If Cerveris won, we might have been able to recruit an ultra-powerhouse for free and take Greem back with us to the Union. Now what? Cerveris has fled! What can we still do by hanging out here? Prepare to pack up and go back, people!¡± Tartas was even more furious now.


    Even though the Silver Union had sent him here to observe the future trajectory of the Central Lands, they had also authorized him to intervene at a crucial moment as an inspector from the Silver Union. However, Tartas was only a Fourth Grade golem master, after all. He was still a fair distance away from bing an ultra-powerhouse.


    If he were to really start a fight now out of impulse......


    Tartas looked at that colossal me giant on the horizon and gulped. He felt his breathing run short.


    Tartas wasn¡¯t the only one resenting the situation at this moment. Even Death Witch Leader Khesuna couldn¡¯t help but sigh in the shadows.


    ¡°Mydy, that Greem fellow seems to be almost done in. What do you think we should do now?¡± The Third Grade witch looked into the distance, excitement and eagerness written all over her face.


    Ultra-powerhouses. Gold Titan. Ultra-Grade artifacts. The power ofws.


    One rarely encountered battles of such a level. At the very least, she had never heard of such a battle in the hundreds of years since she¡¯d been born. Others might not be able to witness such an event, but she had been present at such a close distance. The glory and excitement of all this made her almost eager to want to participate personally.


    She might not have the power to join a fight of such a level, but the Lady Khesuna beside her did.


    Charge forward, defeat these male adepts, and crush all of these losers beneath her feet.


    She fantasized and felt her whole body turn hot with passion.


    The next second, her excitement was extinguished by a single chilling nce from Khesuna.


    ¡°Fool!¡± Khesuna said coldly, ¡°I go and defeat Greem. What then?¡±


    ¡°Then...¡± The Third Grade witch paused.


    Wasn¡¯t the glory of defeating an ultra-powerhouse enough? That was an ultra-powerhouse!


    ¡°Have you considered the consequences of defeating Greem? What stands in front of us is not a conflict between ns. It is a conflict between regions for control over the Central Lands! If I defeat Greem, it would mean that both the incumbent forces of Zhentarim and Greem¡¯s rising n will have been defeated in this war.


    ¡°Greem will be forced back to the Crimson n, pull back his forces, and go on the defensive. But what about Freed and the others? What will they choose? They are no longer enough to stand up against Greem. This much is obvious after today¡¯s battle. What will they do? Either flee from the Central Lands, or draw in an external organization to serve as a counterbnce to the threat of Greem.¡±


    ¡°Tell me which among the three major organizations will they choose?¡±


    The Third Grade witch finally came to her senses after hearing Khesuna¡¯s cold line of questioning. She lowered her head, thought for a moment, and replied, ¡°It will not be our Northern Witches. We Northern Witches have never had good rtions with the people of Zhentarim. They would never ask for our help even in times of crisis!


    ¡°It¡¯s not likely that they will go to the Adept¡¯s Association either! After all, the Adept¡¯s Association is too powerful. It¡¯s easy to invite someone into your home, but to ask them to leave after that is much more difficult. Should the Adept¡¯s Association be allowed to reach into Zhentarim, victory or defeat will no longer matter. Zhentarim will no longer belong to the Zhentarim Association!


    ¡°Therefore, in my opinion, it is most likely that they ask for help from the Silver Union! The members of the Silver Union are very mercantile people. It isn¡¯tpletely impossible to get the Silver Union to support them with an ultra-powerhouse if they offer enough resources as payment.¡±


    The Third Grade witch turned pale afterpleting a simple analysis of the situation. She immediately realized how reckless she had been.


    It was not a simple battle between individuals. It was a conflict for power, for authority over a significant region of the continent. Moreover, this war could even affect the bnce of power between the three major organizations. Of course, everyone had to weigh their options before theymitted them to action!


    Her suggestion for Khesuna to join the fray of battle was a terrible, terrible idea for the Northern Witches¡¯ benefit.


    The Third Grade witch lowered her head, not a hint of color in her face.

 Chapter 1305 - The Battle Concludes

    <strong>Chapter 1305 The Battle Concludes</strong>


    While the observers hesitated and chose their actions, the result of the battle grew clearer and clearer by the minute.


    Greem, who had already dueled Mornashen and Cerveris in session, might still be powerful, but he was already at his limits.


    However, with the aid of the two Fifth Grade artifacts, his power was still at the level of an ultra-powerhouse, even at his weakest. That was why it was absolute domination when he was free to intervene in the battle between the Crimson n and the invading Central adepts.


    No one could defend against his explosive fireballs brimming with dense firews. No one could neutralize the terrifying and ferocious corrosion of thews.


    The first to flee was Matthew.


    He had been engaged with Remi the Spirit of Pestilence and had been unable to disengage when Greem hit him with an Explosive Fireball.


    The mes were easy to shield himself against, but thews were not!


    Matthew might have studied thews for several hundreds of years, but he was as proficient with the application ofw powers as a baby was with words. He had no idea how to draw upon thews to form a defense for himself.


    As such, when faced with the surging magical fires and the prating firews, the elementium defenses around Matthew shattered like an eggshell. mes engulfed his entire body before he could even cry out in surprise.


    Aaaaaah!


    Matthew screamed in agony and broke free of the sea of mes with all his power, fleeing toward the distant horizon.


    Most people of sufficient power could see his body scorched and burning as he ran, a few clusters of fire still clinging onto his skin, refusing to be extinguished.


    It was obvious that the firews had seeped into his body. Even if he fled back to his n, it would take several years of rest and conditioning to remove the firews¡¯ contamination.


    With Matthew serving as a precedent, the other adepts on the battlefield began to consider their own safety and benefit.


    The second victim Greem set his eyes on was Elder Nics, who had always been hostile toward the Crimson n. The shadow of Elder Nics could faintly be seen behind several of the conflicts involving the Crimson n in the past.


    Nics also appeared to be very cautious and guarded against Greem. The moment he saw Greem look over with his zing eyes, Nics crushed a piece of magical shell-like equipment in his hand without any hesitation. Mists surged around him as he vanished without a trace.


    He had truly fled, as even his soul aura was gone entirely from the battlefield.


    It seemed to open a valve of sorts as the few remaining adepts started to panic.


    They all began to escape and flee the battlefield through their own means before Greem could turn on them. In the end, the only person left was Body-Refining Adept Fabres, whose face had now turned dark green and whose eyes filled with dread.


    Fabres was a ssic body-refining adept. He did not have the variety of magic that elementium adepts possessed, nor did he have the same kind of mobility. He had tried fleeing the battlefield, but Fourth Grade Thunder Dragon Arms always stopped him.


    The anxiety and dread he felt wholly distracted him from the fight against the dragon.


    On the one hand, he had to be wary of Greem striking him with invisible spells, while on the other, he had to find an opportunity to escape the battlefield. However, before that opportunity could arrive, Mary and Ker surrounded him.


    Fourth Grade Thunder Dragon Arms, Bloody Queen Mary, and Adept Ker. With these three Fourth Grades beating down on him, Fabres was predictably defeated quickly, despite his tough body.


    He was very fortunate not to have be a sacrifice to Greem¡¯s firews. At the same time, he was also very unfortunate, as he became a test subject for Arms¡¯ lightningws, Mary¡¯s bloodws, and Ker¡¯s darknessws.


    Fabres howled in pain as he crashed down from the skies, smashing a deep crater into the ground. His body crackled with shes of electricity, crimson energy bubbling from his wounds. A dark ck rune flickered on his forehead, causing his consciousness to sink in and out of darkness.


    Body-refining adepts that focused on Strength were still too immobile, after all. They did not have the speed that an agile adept like Mary would possess.


    Thus, Fabres became the only high-grade captive in this historic battle.


    Once the battle¡¯s result was clear, Adept Ker slowly flew away from Mary and stared at Greem.


    She could sense that Greem was incredibly injured and spiritually exhausted. However, no one could see through Greem¡¯sw defenses under all those mes, and no one knew how grievously wounded he actually was.


    Were they ordinary injuries? Or were they deep wounds that hurt his actual body? Or perhaps it was grievous damage that had shaken the very foundations of his power. Greem¡¯s actual conditions here could affect the attitude of the major forces toward the Crimson n henceforth.


    In the past, Ker would certainly have lunged forward with all she had and fought endlessly until the legendary fire adept had been defeated. However, now that the two of them were grasshoppers tied on the same rope, Ker couldn¡¯t help but be concerned about Greem¡¯s injuries.


    Of course, more so than her concern, Ker was also keeping her guard up around the fire adept.


    There had been too many conflicts and disagreements between them before their truce. Even though they had agreed to settle their differences earlier, it was entirely possible for Greem to dismiss his promises. That was why Ker could only stand aside and await Greem¡¯s response.


    Greem might be burnt out, but he still pulled himself together and dealt with the battle¡¯s conclusions.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. It had been was a battle of high-grade adepts. If he, the n leader, did not take a stance, then there was no one else who could represent the will of the Crimson n.


    ¡°Adept Ker, our agreement still stands. My Crimson n will form an alliance with your n, effective immediately!¡±


    Upon hearing Greem¡¯s words, Ker could finally rx.


    Those Fourth Grade adepts might look like mighty, higher beings that would stand eternally. However, if they chose the wrong side in a conflict, even an ancient n with thousands of years of legacy and an incredible foundation could be reduced to dust in a matter of moments.


    The conflicts between high-grade adepts were just as dangerous and vicious as the scheming and plotting between apprentices.


    A conflict between adept apprentices ended with very low stakes. The worst thing that could happen was the death of the individual. However, should a high-grade adept lose a war, it could easily mean the disintegration of an entire n of thousands of individuals. Moreover, any individual that was even remotely rted to the defeated Fourth Grade would most certainly face the scythe of death.


    As for the associated worldly kingdoms, their monarchs, and all their nobility? You could only imagine how many people would be involved in the ensuing purge!


    The cause of this event might have been the conflict between the Crimson n and the Dener n, but by the end of it all, the conflict had evolved into a war between the incumbent forces represented by Freed¡¯s Zhentarim Association and the newly rising influence of the Crimson n.


    Meanwhile, Adept Ker¡¯s choice to change sides had proved to be the correct one. With that one decision, she had undoubtedly preserved the Dener n¡¯s right to continue existing. As for Freed, Fabres, and the others? Their ns now faced an unprecedented crisis.


    Survival or death? All of that was now up to no more than a single thought in Greem¡¯s mind!


    ¡°Mary, you stay here and deal with the cleanup. You should consult with Adept Ker, especially with regard to future ns regarding the Central Lands. I won¡¯t be sticking around,¡± Greem gave a few simple instructions. He then looked around the battlefield and, after confirming that he had settled everything, erupted in a massive cluster of mes.


    By the time the fires dissipated, Greem was nowhere to be seen.


    Inside Fire Throne.


    Greem had reverted into his human form. He stumbled straight into Alice¡¯s arms when he appeared,rge spouts of ck blood spewing forth from the myriad wounds on his body,pletely staining Alice in ck.


    He had fallen unconscious the instant he teleported back.


    ¡°Helen, quick! Come and help!¡± Alice endured her difort with the pungent blood and shouted urgently.


    ¡°I¡¯ming, I¡¯ming. How¡¯d he end up in such a terrible condition!? He...thew powers in his body are so chaotic,¡± Helen beat her wings as she pointed her wand at Greem and cast Levitate.


    Unfortunately, the magical light was shattered into pieces by the chaoticw powers in Greem¡¯s body the moment it entered. Greem, who had just begun to levitate, sunk straight into Alice¡¯s arms again, almost throwing her to the ground.


    ¡°Helen, are you trying to help, or are you just making more trouble for me!?¡± Tears were already welling up in Alice¡¯s eyes at the sight of her bloodied lover. She had none of her usualposure or patience.


    ¡°I...he...thew powers in his body have gone out of control. I...my magic won¡¯t work on him anymore!¡± Little Helen, who had always been a carefree spirit, almost started crying when her partner started shouting at her so sternly.


    At this time, it was Lucia, who had been watching on quietly from the sidelines, that decided she could not watch on any longer.


    Arcane Enhancement.


    An instant-cast Second Grade arcane spell enhanced Alice¡¯s Physique and Strength by 5 points. This Arcane Enhancement allowed Alice to barely prop up Greem and bring him to a room with a bed.


    She put him down carefully and took off his robes. Atst, the tears she had been holding back streaked down her cheek.


    Greem had a muscr body that wasparable to a Second Grade body-refining adept. At this moment, that body was covered in wounds, much of the flesh appearing as bloody pulp. It was almost as if he had been thrown into a barrel of knives and rolled around. You could see bone here and there, as well as long gashes measuring several fingers wide.


    Blood continued to pour out of his body.


    The blood still appeared ck despite how much he had been bleeding. Moreover, it carried a nauseating stench. It was obvious that there was some form of poison in his body.


    More terrifying was the fact that ck smoke rose from the wounds on his body. Most of his flesh had turned ck and was giving off the smell of rot.


    Greem¡¯s wounds were unprecedentedly severe!

 Chapter 1306 - Healing? Butchering?

    Chapter 1306 Healing? Butchering?


    If the injuries that Greem had sustained were onlymon elementium wounds, then regardless of how severe they were, a single Enhanced Potion of Life would have restored him to full condition on the second day.


    Unfortunately, what had ravaged Greem¡¯s body wasn¡¯t elementium damage, but all those twisted and distorted foreignws.


    Their presence caused Greem¡¯s wounds to be so severe and difficult to deal with that Alice had no idea where to start.


    Most of the foreignws had already been shattered into countless tinyw shards. They lingered in Greem¡¯s bones, veins, organs, blood, and flesh like bloodsucking leeches. They had assimted with Greem¡¯s body and energy, continually causing the mutation of hisws.


    Their presence was what prevented Greem¡¯s wounds from mending. Even his bodily functions were thoroughly disrupted, resulting in his current condition.


    No magic or potion would be effective against these wounds. Greem¡¯s biological system could only function properly once these foreignws and energies were slowly worn away. Only then could he start healing again.


    .........


    Greem was ced limply upon a rough stone tform.


    He was utterly unconscious now andy there naked, oblivious to what was happening to him.


    Alice had changed into a dark robe, cing a rattling tray of metal equipment onto the edge of the stone tform. The smart and active Helen waved her wands as a dozen bright arrays wereid down around the stone tform, clearly illuminating Greem¡¯s naked body without blinding Alice.


    Lucia, who was Alice¡¯s disciple, wandered around listlessly in the room as well. It was the room of a high-grade adept, after all. Anything ced in this room would be a rare resource that tens of thousands of people would die to get their hands on.


    Though Lucia had no use for most of these things, she was more than satisfied to take a look at them andy her hands on them.


    However, even though she tried her best to walk around calmly, her gaze always drifted uncontrobly to that naked body on the stone tform.


    It was the muscr body of a man, filled with life!


    The muscles exposed beneath the light were clearly-defined and firm. Their outlines were smooth and spoke clearly of the tremendous strength contained within. His face wasn¡¯t precisely breathtakingly beautiful, but its features were certainly handsome and gave off the unique charm of masculinity.


    Greem¡¯s once healthy and strong body was now covered in all sorts of wounds, strands of ck and gray smoke rising from each of those injuries. Whenever tendrils of flesh reached out from the injuries in an attempt to mend the muscles, the smoke would swarm forward and erupt in a series of explosions.


    Thus, the wounds remained open and ck blood continued to stream like a river down his body.


    He was one of the people responsible for the fall of the Arcane Empire!?


    Lucia thought to herself silently.


    After studying all those magical tomes under Alice¡¯s tutge, Alice had gained a different understanding and perspective on everything that had happened in the Arcane Empire. She had only been one of many ignorant arcane apprentices. She had no proper or objective understanding of theplexities or vastness of the universe.


    However, now that she¡¯d had the opportunity to stand upon the shoulders of the highly-developed adept civilization, Lucia finally understood the significance of civilization and how difficult it was for one to exist.


    Not everyrva would sessfully grow to be a butterfly. In fact, many fell prey to the ws of ferocious predators soon after they were born and before they could achieve metamorphosis.


    The man whoy on this tform in a deplorable condition was the terrifying me giant in her memory. The colossal giant that had stood dozens of meters tall. The giant that wiped out the arcane academy, that burned her most respected teacher, Sir Brown, and that personally ended her life.


    The silhouette of this man slowly ovepped with the fire giant in Lucia¡¯s mind. She was at a loss all of a sudden.


    He...he...to think, he was Teacher Alice¡¯s lover!


    It was he who brought her soul back to the World of Adepts.


    That was what gave her the opportunity at a second life in this alien world.


    The fall of her homeworld...the personal grudge of her teacher¡¯s death...even her own death had been at the hands of this man.


    For a moment, Lucia herself wasn¡¯t sure what attitude and feelings she should hold toward this man.


    While Lucia was frustrated, confused, and unsure of what she should do, what she wanted to do, and what she could do, Alice called for her with a frown on her face.


    ¡°Lucia, stop standing around doing nothing. Come here and help me.¡±


    Er......help?


    Lucia seemed to have lost her usual free-spiritedness. She walked over to the stone tform stiffly, almost like a puppet on strings. Her gaze wandered around the room. She was unsure of where she should look.


    Mary appeared almost like a bloody butcher now. She hacked away at the body of the man on the tform.


    Greem had 34 points of Physique. That made his body as tough as a magical alloy.


    Finally, Lucia overcame her shyness as a girl and her odd sense of hatred for the man. She regained the curiosity that a Second Grade arcanist like herself should possess. Indeed, Lucia¡¯s arcane abilities had improved rapidly during her tutge under Alice. She was improving at an unbelievable rate.


    She was now a Second Grade arcanist and a First Grade adept!


    It was a bizarre case of multi-ssing and, in fact, the only example of multi-ssing in the World of Adepts.


    More urately, it was an unprecedented event, but there could certainly be more such individuals in the future.


    Lucia¡¯s existence had opened up a new system of power in the World of Adepts. A new power system would soon appear among the original sses in the World of Adepts¨C the arcane adept!


    And Lucia was the pioneer of this new ss of spellcaster.


    Of course, this was not a glory that Lucia had been dreaming about or seeking.


    Lucia shook her head and cast aside all the unnecessary emotions in her mind. She regained the curious and exploratory mindset of an arcanist and began to turn her attention to this perfect male body before her.


    It was truly perfect. In all honesty, even if Lucia were to imagine and draw an ideal body by herself, she would not have been able to create such a wless form.


    Lucia gently touched the man¡¯s arm. The muscles were firm but had an sticity to them. The skin was smooth and even seemed to gleam with a crystalline energy radiance.


    On careful inspection, this man¡¯s body might even be more perfect than most women that could be called beauties.


    However, the soft sensation of his skin was only an illusion!


    Even when Lucia applied more strength, the muscles would not sink any further aside from the slight dip she had initially made with her finger.


    Lucia¡¯s expression changed as she started to apply more force.


    Unfortunately, the muscles remained unmoving, as if they couldn¡¯t sense the change in Lucia¡¯s strength at all.


    Lucia¡¯s expression changed again. She took a very sharp silver scalpel from the operating table and gently pressed the de against the man¡¯s arm. Simrly, the skin dipped slightly, and then the muscles moved no further.


    Lucia decided to slice at the man¡¯s arm with all she had. The sharp de shed with the soft skin, and a muffled grinding sound¨Clike that of aged leather being cut¨Ccould be heard. Sparks even flew here and there.


    Even though Lucia had used all her strength, she still could not cut through the man¡¯s skin. In fact, it was the silver scalpel that seemed to have dulled due to her excessive force.


    Was the Physique of high-grade adepts so terrifying?


    A look of horror finally appeared on Lucia¡¯s face!


    High-grade adepts were truly monsters.


    ¡°Stop ying around over there. Come here and give me a hand,¡± Alice, who had been busy with work at the front of the tform, called out.


    Lucia muttered an acknowledgment and walked over.


    Greem¡¯s 34 points of Physique had made every inch of his skull and every piece of his flesh incredibly tough. Ordinary weapons could never hurt him now.


    Only special scalpels that had been enchanted with a Spell of Sharpening and a Spell of Armor Piercing could slice his skin to reveal the bright red tissues beneath that brimmed with fire energy.


    What Alice was doing now was opening up each and every one of Greem¡¯s injuries to find thew shards hiding within. She then neutralized thew shards through a unique method.


    Of course, this was an excessively bloody and savage process. An ordinary person couldn¡¯t even sit through the entire operation. Moreover, due to Greem¡¯s incredibly resilient body, the process of fixing him up looked less like an operation and more like the butchering of a beast.


    It wasn¡¯t just scalpels and tweezers that were being used. Alice even used axes and saws on the operation, tools that ordinary people used to fell trees.


    The sound of a hacking axe could be heard over and over in therge room, along with the chilling sound of a grinding saw. It would make anyone close their ears in horror.


    Due to the repeated battles that Greem had engaged in, most of his injuries reached deep into his wounds and bones. As such, the treatment wasplicated.


    For instance, Alice even had to cut open Greem¡¯s chest and hack away all the ribs in the way with an axe to reveal his beating heart.


    What a strange human heart this was!


    Underneath Greem¡¯s ribs was a mass of dark red tissue. Inside the chest cavity, a strange heart the size of a human head beat, connected to the surrounding organs with countless blood vessels.


    The surface of the heart was covered in numerous strange magical patterns. These patterns were twisted, shattered, and even squirmed, making for a truly unusual sight.


    This thing was no longer an ordinary heart. No, this was a magical heart. In fact, it was a Heart of Principles that brimmed withw power!


    The reason Greem had such overwhelming fire power apart from the two Fifth Grade artifacts was due to the iparable strength of this Heart of Principles.

 Chapter 1307 - Troublesome Laws

    <h4>Chapter 1307 Troublesome Laws</h4>


    At this moment, the Heart of Principles had been contaminated by foreignw energies!


    The dark-red beating heart seemed to have been visibly stained a dark gray color.


    That was Cerveris¡¯ curse energy!


    Until this energy was removed, the contaminated Heart of Principles would not be helpful to Greem.


    ¡°Lucia, do you see the gray parts? Hurry and cut them out! Be careful not to let the gray parts touch your skin. Otherwise, with your Physique, there is no way you can survive the curse power.¡±


    Lucia¡¯s hands trembled slightly.


    How many times in the dead of the night had she woken up screaming, haunted by the memory of that colossal, terrifying me giant at the moment right before her death?


    Now, that giant was lying in front of her, and she had an enchanted scalpel with which to slice his heart. If her hand were to slip and stab the heart slightly, could he still live?


    For some reason, this thought took up the entirety of Lucia¡¯s mind the moment it appeared. Her whole mind was filled with this ridiculous idea and insuppressible impulse. On the other hand, the Fate powers that she had been studying for all these years were subtly warning her not to do so!


    In the past, the emotional Lucia would have given in to her feelings and did what she wanted to do. However, after being surrounded by the Fate powers for so long, even she had unknowingly gained the habit of following the will of Fate and having it decide everything for her.


    If Fate was giving out warnings to her, it must have foreseen something bad for her. What could that be?


    Lucia wondered silently, her hand showing no signs of hesitation at all. Like the most precise machine, she urately and correctly incised and removed pieces of gray flesh from the heart before disposing of them.


    Incisions of this kind undoubtedly inflicted tremendous damage to the Heart of Principles, but that was still better than leaving it in a situation of turbulentws for an extended period.


    Greem might be unconscious, but his 34 points of Physique still gave him tremendous regenerative powers. The hole where the flesh had been cut out healed at a visible rate. Countless flesh tendrils reached out from the muscle fibers around the wound and meshed together.


    It was almost as if every strand of tissue and every bone in Greem¡¯s body had a mind of its own. Truly, every high-grade adept was a monster in every sense of the word!


    They were monsters, both in biology and in mentality!


    Lucia was working her hardest to help Alice with the operation. When she finally straightened her back and wiped the cold sweat off her head, she came to a sudden understanding.


    The destruction of the Arcane Empire was not the doing of any one individual or entity. It was a certainty in the development of civilization!


    For a civilization or empire to ascend to greater heights while it was not yet ready would only attract countless predators¡¯ attention and malice. These invasions were not decisions made by one or two individual predators, but the natural result of countless civilizationsing into conflict and devouring each other.


    The me giant had been iparably powerful in her eyes, a mighty, omnipotent existence that could destroy the world with a single wave of its hands. However, in other predators¡¯ eyes, he was probably no more than one of the weaker ¡®scavengers¡¯!


    That was why it was only a cowardly act for her to have directed all her resentment for the Arcane Empire¡¯s death onto him alone. That was because she didn¡¯t dare to challenge the many powerful existences that were actually responsible for the invasion. She didn¡¯t dare make enemies out of entire worlds. She hadpressed all her hatred and agony and projected them onto the one concrete enemy before her.


    The more she understood the reality of the situation, the greater Lucia¡¯s suffering became!


    The kind of courage required to dere war against entire worlds and nes and against the powerful beings that had invaded the Arcane Empire was not something that a mere Second Grade arcanist and First Grade adept that had found herself in a foreign world could ever muster.


    However, even though she might not have the power required to exact her vengeance, she could still scream as loud as she could in her heart. If she didn¡¯t even have the courage to shout out in anger at her enemies, then what exactly was the point of her existence, of hermitments!?


    Greem gradually woke up from hisa as the foreignw energies were slowly removed from his body.


    When he opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was quite an unbelievable sight: a young and pretty girl whose eyes were burning with the fires of vengeance shouted at him, ¡°Once I¡¯m powerful, I will challenge and defeat all of you!¡± Having said that, she turned and ran out of the room.


    Greem¡¯s mind was powerful enough to process all the information in front of him.


    He could very clearly see that the girl¡¯s clothes, hands, and even face were covered in blood from the operation on him. Her young and pretty face was also somewhat familiar to him.


    Greem was barely able to lift his head amidst all the confusion. He ignored his open chest cavity, ignored the numerous gouges in his body, and looked towards the bloody and exhausted Alice.


    ¡°Don¡¯t look at me. Even I can¡¯t tell that girl what to do.¡± Even as worn out as she was, the sweetest smile still appeared on Alice¡¯s face when she looked upon Greem.


    ¡°It¡¯s been hard for you! Go, take a rest. Leave the rest to me,¡± Greem looked at Alice, sorry for what she had gone through, and consoled her.


    Indeed, high-grade adepts like him had plenty of means by which to regenerate, as long as the enemy had not destroyed their soul. However, given his current grade and the severity of his injuries, this recovery process could take upwards of decades or centuries.


    It was simple- high-grade adepts had basically developed their physical potential to its limits. The healing potions that could have healed any wounds in the past were barely effective on them now. Ordinary injuries could scarcely leave a trace on their bodies. However, anysting damage would often bew injuries that could not be fully cured.


    Now that Greem was conscious again, he could take over his own treatment. It would undoubtedly be an extremely long and expensive process!


    ¡°Chip, perform a full-body scan immediately andy out the corresponding treatment and recovery n.¡±


    [Beep. Order received. Full-body scan in process.]


    Soon, a three-dimensional projection appeared in Greem¡¯s mind. The Chip indicated all the severely injured parts of Greem¡¯s body in dark and light red¨Cand there were a lot of them¨Cwhile a series of treatments and recovery ns were listed to the side.


    Greem looked at the numerous red spots on the projection as well as the long list of resources required for his treatment. He sighed. He had no choice but to revise the n¡¯s development n and leave a hundred-year period for him to recover.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The injuries Greem had sustained were too serious!


    It was fortunate that he had won this war. Otherwise, it might have taken him a long three hundred years to recover fully.


    ............


    Graybear Hill, the Giant¡¯s Castle.


    As a worldly territory that had been in the Gaia n¡¯s possession for several thousands of years, the Giant¡¯s Castle was a famous ce in the Central Lands and, perhaps, even the World of Adepts.


    Ever since the ancestor of the Gaia n unexpectedly discovered the well-preserved corpse of a Titan in an abandoned ruin out in space and sessfully extracted its bloodline, the Gaia n had undergone a meteoric rise. They became the most powerful bloodline n of the Central Lands, known throughout the World of Adepts.


    Unlike elementium adepts, bloodline adepts and particrly bloodline ns were reliant on their bloodline¡¯s purity and growth potential. However, these two factors were the most problematic factors to control.


    The greater the potential of the bloodline, the more difficult it was to produce offspring. That was the central dilemma that troubled all bloodline ns, preventing them from developing any further. They might all possess iparable individualbat prowess, but they were repeatedly unable to grow into significant organizations due to the limited numbers of their members.


    Mornashen Gaia might be the most powerful individual in the Central Lands, but there were no more than seven other bloodline adepts in the Gaia n who could be considered powerful aside from him. It was practically a single line of session. Even the slightest unexpected incident could cut the legacy of this bloodline n short.


    That was why Mornashen Gaia represented absolute authority in his n, as well as the unrelenting barrier that stood between the n and their enemies.


    Today, the Giant¡¯s Castle was shrouded in a fog of worry.


    That was because Mornashen Gaia had been injured!


    The n leader could be injured! If anyone had ever made such a joke in front of the Gaia n members, they would haveughed and punched them in the face. However, this joke had be a bloody reality today, and the members of the Gaia n couldn¡¯t help but be anxious.


    In a hidden room inside the Giant¡¯s Castle.


    Two middle-aged adepts, one male and one female, stood in the middle of the room with concerned expressions. Mornashen Gaiay on the bed, propped up on his back against the back of the bed.


    ¡°Alright, alright, it¡¯s just a few small wounds. Look at your faces,¡± Mornashen might have returned injured, but he appeared asposed as ever. It was as if he wasn¡¯t bothered in the slightest. ¡°Right, speaking of which, what was the conclusion of the battle after I left?¡±


    ¡°My lord, the conclusion waspletely unexpected!¡± The middle-aged male adept had a solemn expression on his face still. He strode forward and reported, ¡°The legendary fire adept managed to defeat Cerveris after you left and forced him to flee the battle.¡±


    ¡°Oh?¡± Mornashen¡¯s expression changed. He slowly straightened his body. ¡°So, you mean, the Crimson n has won!¡±


    ¡°Yes, my lord! ording to the observers we left behind, Adept Ker switched sides at thest moment and helped the Crimson n against Freed and the others. It was aplete victory for the Crimson n. All the Fourth Grade adepts fled back to their homes, and most of the forces they left behind have be captives of the Crimson n.¡±


    Mornashen couldn¡¯t care less about the details. He had fallen into deep thought. The two core members of the Gaia n could only silently bow and exit the room when they noticed this.


    ¡°The world¡¯s about to change.¡±


    After a long while, Mornashen sighed to himself.


    There was no one else here now, so there was no need for him to put on an appearance anymore.


    Without his bloodline power actively suppressing his injuries, three clusters of golden mes appeared on Mornashen¡¯s resilient body, crackling as they burned.


    Damned Greem! How were his firews so troublesome to deal with?


    The powerful n leader of the Gaia n cursed in his heart. An expression of pain and regret appeared on his face!

 Chapter 1308 - A Storm Stirs

    <h4>Chapter 1308 A Storm Stirs</h4>


    Zhentarim, inside a hidden burrow.


    It was a well-concealed location deep underground and one of a dozen secret shelters that the Adept¡¯s Association had established in the Central Lands.


    The entirety of the burrows was abyrinth with winding corridors connected to five of these secret shelters. All sorts of precious resources and materials were stored in these shelters.


    At this moment, the burrows were filled with howling cries of agony!


    Cerveris tossed and turned in his smoke form inside thergest and most luxurious rooms in these burrows. asionally, his twisted and ugly face formed in the ck smoke and let out a ghastly cry. The face would then be sted into scattered smoke by a sudden eruption of golden mes.


    Several Third Grade adepts from the Adept¡¯s Association were gathered in a corner of the room, quietly discussing a method of treatment for this ultra-powerhouse. However, before they coulde to a conclusion, their ears were filled with a sharp and stern howl.


    ¡°Bastards, you are all bastards. The Association cultivated all of you at significant cost, yet none of you can get rid of these firews. Tell me, what¡¯s the point of keeping you fools around?¡± Cerveris reverted to his human form, pantingboriously on the ground. His entire body was covered in scorch marks, making for a pitiful sight indeed.


    However, Cerveris immediately started begging instead, ¡°Hurry up...have you all still note to a conclusion? Hurry...all of you, hurry up...that bastard¡¯s firews are about to act up again.¡±


    Before he could finish speaking, another sh of fire appeared from within Cerveris¡¯ scrawny frame, erupting in a warm and fiery st. His body was instantly sted into tiny pieces before regathering into a single cloud of smoke.


    ¡°Four firews. At least four firews are all entangled together in him,¡± The Third Grade elementium adepts had helpless looks on their faces. They could not do anything about this problematic situation before them.


    Law powers could not be removed employing ordinary herbs or potions. It required the use of equivalent high-grade powers. There might be potion masters, enchanters, alchemists, and summoners here, but none of them could do anything about thew powers, which only Fourth Grade adepts had mastered and could control.


    Eventually, Cerveris managed to endure this new round of eruptions from the firews. He reformed and screamed out wildly, ¡°I am leaving for the Adept¡¯s Association. Hurry up and open a portal for me. I want to leave now.¡±


    The Association adepts looked at each other. They had no choice but to work together and open up a portal to the east of the continent. Cerveris hurried through the doorway, practically scrambling and crawling as he did so.


    Once the portal had shut, one of the moreposed middle-aged adepts frowned and said, ¡°Now that Lord Cerveris has left, what should we do about the Central Lands? We have basically dered open hostilities against the Crimson n. If¡ª¡±


    ¡°So what if it¡¯s open hostilities? What is he going to do? Bring people and knock down our doors?¡± Another male adept spoke up resentfully.


    ¡°That just might be a possibility. If they doe knocking down our doors, we can¡¯t allow all the forces that the Association has left here in the Central Lands get caught in one fell swoop. I suggest...that we all go into hiding separately. The entire Central Lands branch is to go incognito!¡±


    ¡°Seconded!¡±


    ¡°Agreed!¡±


    ¡°Very well, that is what we will do then. Everyone split up and prepare!¡±


    The Association adepts immediately erupted into mists of various colors and vanished from the room once their discussion had concluded.


    ............


    The Battle of Stoneshard Valley sent tremors throughout the Central Lands, not unlike an apocalyptic earthquake.


    The rise of an ultra-powerhouse had also thoroughly ignited the pride and passion of the Central adepts.


    Countless adepts moved around, looking to obtain more information on the historic battle that hade to pass. Numerous versions of the events of Stoneshard Valley were born as gossip and rumors spread around. However, every single version shared a simr trait¨C they had the same protagonist. That protagonist was none other the greatest adept that had recentlye to power in the Central Lands¨C Greem.


    Greem might be a Fourth Grade fire adept, but he still required a long time to train and improve before he could be a peak Fourth Grade adept.


    However, that did not stop everyone else from passionately pushing him onto the throne of the strongest adept in the Central Lands.


    Ultra-powerhouse. The Central Lands.


    For the first time in history, these two words were closely connected.


    The significance of this was only genuinely felt by the Central adepts, who had endured discrimination and condescension from adepts of the othernds.


    From now on, the Central Lands were no longer a desert of talent. It was no longer a helpless collection of loose sand. It had be the fourth organization that couldpare to the three major organizations.


    Almost every single Central adept apart from those of therge ns were excited about this change!


    It was the hope and blessing of these adepts that caused the Crimson n¡¯s prestige and influence to swell like a rising tide. In the blink of an eye, the Crimson n had suppressed all voices of objection and be the uncontested mega-n of the Central Lands.


    The circumstances in the Central Lands became increasingly transparent after the conclusion of the battle.


    There were many, many free adepts cheering for the Crimson n. The cries for unification were deafening throughout the Central Lands. However, the only ones who could decide the future fate of Zhentarim were still the dozen Fourth Grade organizations.


    In the past, a single Fourth Grade adept was already an immovable force in the Central Lands!


    No matter how severe the conflicts in the Central Lands, the dozen Fourth Grade organizations could remain unfazed, keeping absolute order and control of theirnds with an iron fist. No one with ambitions of something greater would ever offend these Fourth Grade organizations, in the hopes of avoiding retaliation.


    However, the Crimson n¡¯s prestige was at an all-time high. Cries of unification could be heard throughout thend. Meanwhile, the Greem upon whom everyone ced their hopes had also amassed sufficient power to shatter the current state of Zhentarim.


    Under such circumstances, even those Fourth Grade organizations that had weathered countless storms were growing anxious!


    The skies of Zhentarim were about to turn.


    Gaia n Leader Mornashen Gaia had retreated back to the Gaia n headquarters after the battle of Stoneshard Valley; he had yet to emerge. It was said that he was recuperating from his wounds.


    The Dener n, which had been the greatest opponent of the Crimson n in this war, had suddenly be one of the reasons for their total victory. As such, the Crimson n and the Dener n¡¯s leaders watched over Stoneshard Valley together as the battlefield was cleaned up.


    Freed and the other Fourth Grade adepts who had been badly defeated in the war fled back to their n territories. They began to recruit forces and form alliances in preparation for what was toe. The four of them put out a unified deration. They would never approve of the Crimson n¡¯s tyrannical rule and swore to oppose the Crimson n until their deaths.


    Even though they had made their derations, no military movements could be observed yet. Instead, they all secretly contacted the Fourth Grade adepts who had not participated in the earlier war in an attempt to draw more people to their side.


    Freed and the others might have been the losers in the Stoneshard Valley battle, but Legendary Fire Adept Greem was also severely injured after fighting Mornashen and Cerveris consecutively. Freed and his allies spread a rumor behind the scenes that Greem¡¯s power had fallen below Fourth Grade due to his excessive injuries and that he would not be able to engage inbat for another few hundred years.


    Freed and his allies imed that as long as all Fourth Grade adepts in the Central Lands united, they could easily exile Greem from Zhentarim. When that happened, the Central Lands would return to peace and the ns would be able to maintain their former influence and authority.


    These ims were undoubtedly very effective at moving those Fourth Grade adepts!


    After all, being able to reign over a n, over and of their own, was always superior to being subordinate to a more powerful individual. The only thing that everyone was wary about was Greem. They were anxious about the degree of his injuries.


    If Greem¡¯s injuries were not as severe as Freed and his allies imed, jumping out in opposition at this moment would ce their n and all its assets under the de of an ultra-powerhouse. It was this concern that made everyone pause and hesitate.


    At the moment, another crucial piece of news arrived. Finally, no one was able to keep up their formerly calmposure.


    The legendary fire adept, Greem, had shown himself once again!


    ............


    The sun of September was bright and gentle.


    Everyone could feel the gentle warmth when the sun cast light down upon them.


    Mothership Versailles cruised slowly through the skies.


    Greem stood at the bow of the ship, a thick red cloak draped around his shoulders. He stood silently in the face of the chilling winds.


    The crude means of treatment had devastated his body, causing his Physique to fall from 34 points to 18 points. However, his Spirit had somehow benefitted from the ordeal and rose by 2 points to a total of 46 points.


    From an overall perspective, Greem¡¯sbat prowess had been severely affected. It would be a while until he recovered his peak form from earlier.


    However, it was only natural that the outside world had no idea of his real condition.


    His action of showing himself before the world again had struck fear into the minds of everyone conspiring against him.


    An injured ultra-powerhouse was still an ultra-powerhouse!


    Until they figured out his actual condition, no Fourth Grade adept would dare try and pull the tiger¡¯s whiskers.


    ¡°It has been so long since an ultra-powerhouse appeared in the Central Lands!¡± Adept Ker stood by Greem¡¯s side and let out a sigh, ¡°I remember eight hundred years ago, Adept Sarubo rose out of nowhere and enjoyed an era of glory and power. Unfortunately, out of fear of the three major organizations, he never dared to change the state of Zhentarim. Thus, he could only remain a temporary observer, quickly leaving for the realms beyond after advancing to Fifth Grade.¡±


    Greem tightened his robe around him and smiled when he heard Ker¡¯s seemingly allusive words, ¡°I am not in a hurry! There¡¯s at least four to five hundred years of slow grinding improvement until my advancement to Fifth Grade. There¡¯s enough time in between for me to do plenty of things!¡±


    Standing on the other side of Greem was the captive Fourth Grade body-refining adept, Fabres. It didn¡¯t seem like there were any shackles on him, but judging by his dejected expression, he had already lost all confidence and ability to continue defying the Crimson n.


    ¡°When are you releasing me?¡± Fabres asked dejectedly, ¡°After all that has happened, my n must be in chaos right now. If I still do not return, I cannot guarantee that my n members won¡¯tmit to certain extreme ns of action!¡±


    Greem chuckled when he heard Fabres¡¯ tepid threat.


    ¡°You are free to leave at any time you like, sir. On this, I can guarantee you: you are always free!¡±


    Fabres hesitated for a moment before turning and walking toward the bow of the ship.


    At the edge of the bow, he stopped. He did not turn back, but he spoke in a disheartened voice, ¡°Don¡¯t worry. I, Fabres, will no longer be your enemy! From now on, the Fabres n will obey the every whim and will of the Crimson n. I only hope that you will allow me to preserve the legacy of my n.¡±


    Greem¡¯s voice came from the distance.


    ¡°You have a deal!¡±


    Fabres nodded silently and leaped off of the Mothership.

 Chapter 1309 - Plans for the Central Lands

    Chapter 1309 ns for the Central Lands


    Ker slowly looked away once Fabres¡¯ silhouette had vanished over the distant horizon.


    After a moment¡¯s hesitation, she finally asked in a soft voice, ¡°Lord Greem, since you now possess the power and reputation to unify Zhentarim, could I ask what you have in mind for the structuring of the organization in the future?¡±


    It was only natural that she asked such a question!


    In all honesty, countless people in the Central Lands wanted to know the answer to this question.


    The Crimson n was rising, and Greem was ascending toward his throne. How did the legendary fire adept n to unify Zhentarim? How would hemand and reorganize the scattered forces and ns of adepts?


    That was the burning question in the mind of every Central adept.


    If Greem solely wanted to benefit the Crimson n and propel it to greatness, he could rule over the entirety of Zhentarim as a mega-n. It would allow the Crimson n to grow rapidly in a short time.


    However, this was notpatible with the hopes of therge number of weaker adepts that popted the Central Lands.


    In the past thousands of years, the Central Lands had been ruled by scattered and disunited adept ns. All sorts of alliances and rivalries connected the assorted ns. Together, they held over ny percent of the Central Lands¡¯ resources in their hands. Free and wandering adepts who did not have the support of a n would find it difficult to survive.


    Meanwhile, most ns were biased toward their own bloodline descendants, so much so that these ns¡¯ core authority was often made up entirely of bloodline descendants. No matter how talented they were or how much potential they held, foreign adepts would always be inferior to the core adepts of the n.


    That was why free, grassroots adepts in the Central Lands often had to work far harder to make a living for themselves than if they joined the Adept¡¯s Association. Meanwhile, down over in the Northern Lands, the witches reigned supreme and were extremely xenophobic people. The Silver Union was the world of the esoteric adepts. Adepts of other sses and branches were suppressed there as well.


    From an overall perspective, the best ce for any adept to develop was none other than the Adept¡¯s Association!


    The Northern Witches ruled through the Witch Council. The Northern Lands were divided into thirteen territories, each governed and managed by a witch branch. Only public affairs were put to a discussion and decided by the Witch Council,posed of the various witch branches¡¯ leaders.


    Other adept organizations could not possibly model their own ruling governments after the Northern Witches.


    That was because the Northern Witches were naturally united together by a single individual¨C Witch Queen Salem.


    As one of the only three Ninth Grade adepts from the World of Adepts, she was a powerful adept who held various titles, including Witch Queen, Monarch of the Witches, and the Ancient Witch!


    The ruling structure of the Silver Union was also a legitive assembly, that of a senate.


    However, esoteric adepts were incredibly influential in the Silver Union. Adepts of other sses were greatly suppressed and prevented from holding any office with real authority.


    If Greem did not intend to employ the governing model of a mega-n, his only option was to go for a governing structure resembling that of the Adept¡¯s Association!


    Upon hearing Adept Ker¡¯s questions, it wasn¡¯t just Mary, but Meryl, Emelia, and the other Crimson leaders who became interested. They all wanted to hear the thoughts and decisions of their n leader.


    It was a decision that would determine their benefits, after all. It was only natural that they would be concerned.


    Greem stood at the bow of the ship, looking at the shifting clouds in the distance as a rxed expression appeared on his face. He said calmly, ¡°I do not intend to use the governing structure of the Adept¡¯s Association!¡±


    Ker¡¯s face turned dark. It was obvious that she was somewhat discouraged at hearing this answer.


    Meanwhile, Meryl, Emelia, and the others seemed to be delighted to hear this.


    Only Mary¡¯s expression did not change. Her eyes were still fixed on Greem, filled with unconceble concern and anxiety for him.


    Greem sighed and said, ¡°Of course, I have no intention to return to the old and beaten path of a single adept n.¡±


    Meryl and Emelia were stunned for a moment.


    An expression of thought appeared on Ker¡¯s face as the light of hope secretly lit up in her eyes.


    ¡°In truth, the best method for uniting the hearts and minds of the people of the Central Lands has already appeared, though it is only a tiny sprout at this stage,¡± Greem continued.


    ¡°Do you...do you mean...Horton Magic Academy?¡± The light in Ker¡¯s eyes suddenly lit up.


    ¡°Indeed!¡± Greem nodded and said, ¡°Adept ns are often too focused on their own bloodline descendants, making it difficult for them to ept and assimte excellent and talented new blood. As such, we should weaken the ruling power of ns and turn toward magic academies, whose mission is to spread knowledge to all. That is the best solution I cane up with!¡±


    ¡°This might draw the ire of all high-grade adepts!¡± Adept Ker sighed, ¡°After all, the system of adept ns led by high-grade adepts has kept too many people far toofortable for far too long. The magic academy will probably face united opposition from all major ns if it attempts to grow evenrger in scale!¡±


    ¡°But this will be incredibly beneficial to the Central Lands, won¡¯t it? Otherwise, there would not be so many free adepts cheering for the rise of the Crimson n.¡±


    ¡°But the ones who can truly decide the future of the Central Lands aren¡¯t those powerless free adepts, but high-grade adepts with actual fighting power.¡±


    ¡°That is why we must be the pioneers and march on forward. Moreover, the enemies aren¡¯t fully united under a single banner. There are plenty of methods we can employ to sow division amongst them. At the very least, I trust that your Dener n will stand by our side?¡± Greem asked, half in jest.


    The expression on Ker¡¯s face flickered several times. Finally, she nodded with some difficulty and said, ¡°Of course. From the moment our two ns reached an agreement, the Dener n had only one path avable to us. I can stand out and express my support for Horton Magic Academy, as well as transfer most of the n¡¯s assets to the academy!¡±


    Greem nodded happily when he heard this.


    ¡°That is enough! With the addition of Fabres¡¯ forces, we are not alone on this side. Moreover, we can also try to win more forces to our side, particrly Molten Fire City, Silentridge, or any other neutral parties. Whates next is no longer a battle of powers, but a battle of diplomacy! Let¡¯s see which of us can draw more allies and more support to our cause!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Those defeated hounds. They have no right to stand against us. As long as you are here as the Central Lands¡¯ uncontested ultra-powerhouse, I believe the fence-sitters will know how to choose. That being said,¡± A sh of worry appeared on Ker¡¯s face, ¡°The Adept¡¯s Association has chosen to intervene directly this time. It is obvious they don¡¯t intend to allow the Central Lands to unify. Will they send out more adepts after this to intervene in the affairs of the Central Lands?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! If the Adept¡¯s Association has decided to be enemies with the Central Lands, then we can also draw in allies for ourselves from the other regions. There is no way the Silver Union and the Northern Witches will sit by and watch the Adept¡¯s Associationunch an invasion into the Central Lands! They might be happy to see the Central Lands and the Adept¡¯s Association tear each other down to pieces. However, if I were to die in battle, then the Central Lands would be the Adept¡¯s Association territory. How could they possibly allow such a thing?¡±


    ¡°So, what is our next step?¡±


    ¡°Intimidate some of them, win over some of them, and knock the rest down a peg,¡± Greem spoke decisively, ¡°As for Freed and Mirva? Just dere war on them now! The more ferocious of a beating we can give them, the more we can intimidate Nics and Matthew. If they try anything funny again, there will no longer be room for them here in the Central Lands. As for Alfred...I will personally go and talk to him!¡±


    The members of the Crimson n were excited to hear this and stood up straight.


    ¡°Ry my orders. Gather the Crimson forces and prepare to assault Kerslin Castle!¡±


    ¡°Yes, my lord!¡±


    ¡°Yes, my lord!¡±


    ............


    Kerslin Castle.


    Headquarters of Zhentarim Association.


    It was also the territory of the Jorma n, which Freed belonged to.


    It had been a little over a month since the battle at Stoneshard Valley, and rumors regarding the Central Lands were only growing and growing. It was bing harder and harder to tell which were truths and which were only rumors.


    However, the tension lingering around Kerslin Castle was, without a doubt, enormous.


    One after another, adept forces were recalled from lesser nes back to headquarters and stationed at the several fortresses around Kerslin Castle. Messengers scurried here and there, continually rying all sorts of information.


    The most attention-catching of which was most certainly information on the Crimson n¡¯s movements!


    When they heard that the participants of the battle at Stoneshard Valley were grievously injured and had retreated to their own ns to nurse their wounds, Kerslin Castle had celebrated joyously. However, when news of Greem¡¯s reappearance in public reached them, the castle became deadly silent once more.


    In particr, when they heard that the Crimson n was rallying their forces and preparing for a march on Kerslin Castle, the entire Jorma n was stunned!


    What further frightened them to their core was the rumor that the legendary fire adept, Greem, was marching along with the Crimson n¡¯s army.


    When the news broke out, nearly half of the Jorma n¡¯s subordinate forces scattered. The rest who remained were also in a state of constant fear and anxiety.


    To intimidate these fence-sitters, Freed had no choice but to personally order the recall of all adept forces stationed in lesser nes and the reinforcement of the headquarter¡¯s defenses.


    As for whether such an order would allow for revolts in the lesser nes and destabilize the Jorma n¡¯s rule? That was beyond their consideration now.


    ording to recon forces sent out by the Jorma n, the Crimson n had sent as many as seven Motherships for their assault on Kerslin Castle. All of the Crimson forces were hiding in the Motherships, so it was difficult to gauge the invading force¡¯s exact numbers.


    Unlike other adept ns, the Crimson n had arge army of magical machines and numerous other war machines. It was more than well-known by now.


    In particr, the most infamous magic energy war machines were the powerful magic golem dragon and the Motherships.


    Now that the Crimson n had sent out seven of their ten Motherships, it was more than enough to indicate the severity and significance they assigned to this invasion.


    For a while, Kerslin Castle was filled with a tense and murderous atmosphere!

 Chapter 1310 - Intimidated and Terrified

    <h4>Chapter 1310 Intimidated and Terrified</h4>


    To march from Ailovis¨Cwhere the Crimson n was located¨Cto Kerslin Castle required traveling through four different regions.


    It was a journey that spanned six thousand and five hundred kilometers.


    If one were to travel in a straight line without resting in-between, it would still take them over a month to reach Kerslin Castle. That didn¡¯t take into consideration the various battles or ambushes that the army might encounter along the way. Otherwise, it would take even longer.


    There were one big, seven intermediate, and twenty-three small adept ns across these four regions.


    Among them, the singlerge n was the Entom n of Fourth Grade Adept Nics. Naturally, due to Nics¡¯ stance, the Entom n was also in a state of hostility with the Crimson n.


    When the Crimson n¡¯s Motherships slowly appeared on the distant horizon, all the adept ns along the way bunkered down and shut their doors. They did not dare cause any trouble and bring disaster upon themselves.


    In particr, the Entom n was incredibly nervous.


    All core members of the n had returned to Oakwood City and had shut themselves in the n tower. When the Motherships passed by Oakwood City a hundred kilometers away, the Entom n didn¡¯t even risk sending out a sortie to assault them. They were terrified of the prospect of the Crimson n army changing their targets in a fury and unleashing their wrath upon Oakwood City.


    The Crimson n¡¯s air force did not just consist of seven Motherships. There was also a massive sky tform constructed upon the Motherships.


    Of course, the air force¡¯s scouts were the cheap-yet-efficient eyeball machines.


    They wandered several kilometers ahead of the main army in the thousands, searching for any creature or trap that could threaten the fleet. A volley of heat rays would exterminate any individual that approached the fleet without warning.


    Meanwhile, closer to the Motherships were the unique goblin airnes, piloted by goblin pilots. These airnes were approximately the size of a carriage and, therefore, the power of the magic energy weapons they carried was also much greater.


    The Wild Charlie-II rapid-fire cannon.


    The Model-773 enhanced magic-energy beam gun.


    The Jubling-3 magic-energy torpedoes.


    The ultra-modified magic-energy dome barrier.


    Lotte¡¯s multipurpose goggles.


    Magic-energybustion modules.


    Triggered arcane-magic defensive shields.


    ......


    One had to admit that after hundreds of years and dozens of generations of studious research and experimentation by the goblin engineers, the magic-energy weapons of the Crimson n¡¯s goblins were much more advanced than before.


    In particr, the offensive power of magic-energy weapons and the goblin mechanics¡¯ security had peaked.


    With the constant supply of Queyras alloy from Molten Fire City, they had managed to create many magic generator furnaces. That resolved the energy shortage problem that had always held the magical machines back. The magical machine army of today was utterly iparable to the past. Theirbat prowess has risen by several levels, turning them from a cannon fodder army to an elite army within the Crimson n.


    However, the past few centuries of unrestrained excavation had also caused the Goblin ne¡¯s metal reserves to fall to a dangerously low level. The Crimson n had to search all over for simr resources nes to obtain more and better magical alloys to ensure the continuation of the magical machines¡¯ development.


    Nics stood on the highest balcony of the Oakwood City¡¯s adept tower, a staff in his hand. He silently looked at the fleet as it flew across the sky.


    Even though that person was not in view, he could still sense the overwhelming aura pressing against his face due to his Spirit as a Fourth Grade adept. In particr, Nics could sense that familiar and terrifying magical aura on thergest Mothership of the fleet.


    Greem. Greem was actually in the fleet!


    Nics gripped his staff tightly, so much so that the veins were showing on his scrawny left hand. His face was incredibly dark.


    The people surrounding him were the Third Grade adepts of the Entom n.


    They watched Nics with stern looks on their faces, fearful that their n leader might do something terrible in his anger.


    One person in the crowd¨Ca muscr man in golden armor and a giant axe slung across his back¨Cstrode forward and spoke in a loud voice, ¡°n leader, let me charge at them with the White Ghosts! At the very least, we can stop those mouthy fools from mocking the Entom n for ourck of courage!¡±


    ¡°Tiger, you can¡¯t drag the whole n into this affair just because of your own desires.¡± A middle-aged man with a wise but stern expression stepped forward and scolded him, ¡°The opponents¡¯ forces are overwhelming. If we are tounch an assault on them, we might draw their full wrath upon Oakwood City. If they give up on Kerslin Castle and chose first to attack Oakwood, we......¡±


    The middle-aged adept left the sentence hanging.


    However, everyone knew what he meant.


    There was no way that Oakwood City would survive the rampage of the magical machine army. That was especially the case given the numerous powerful individuals in the enemy ranks: adepts like Bug Adept Billis, Red Dragon Adept Meryl, Mystique Emelia, and Blood Knight Soros. The odds of the Entom n¡¯s victory were incredibly slim.


    Meanwhile, it was evident that the enemy had no intention of attacking the Entom n right beside them. Instead, they marched on to assault Kerslin Castle. On the one hand, it was because Freed was the leader of the opposition forces. On the other, it was also because they did not take the Entom n¡¯s power the least bit seriously.


    Only three Motherships and a new magic golem dragon had been left in Ailovis. Yet, even these bare defenses were enough to discourage all the ambitious and malicious enemies out there.


    The muscr man known as Tiger looked at the hesitating middle-aged adept and spoke in a cold voice, ¡°Is the Crimson n not going to send forces after us if we keep ourselves shut in here and act like good, little boys? You bunch of cowards. If we are to fight with them, then we must not cling to any hope of luck. We should take advantage of their long march and of the fact that their army cannot remain stationary for too long. We shouldunch a quick sortie and retreat to our tower. What are they going to do, actually stay here and siege us?¡±


    Another adept, this one looking much more elderly, couldn¡¯t help but retort resentfully, ¡°We are all cowards, and you alone are a hero, is it? If you¡¯re so capable, why don¡¯t you lead your forces and assault the Crimson headquarters? Let¡¯s see the difference in our powers, shall we? The might our n has umted over hundreds of years against their overwhelming military force!¡±


    In the blink of an eye, a few more adepts had joined the argument. They made a totalmotion on the balcony.


    His subordinates¡¯ arguments made Nics¡¯ face turn even darker.


    He tapped his staff firmly against the ground. A wave of energy rippled away, causing all the adepts to stumble backward.


    ¡°Silence, all of you!¡±


    Nics looked around him at all the adepts; his face dripped with frost and frustration as he shouted, ¡°The enemies haven¡¯t arrived at our gates yet, and here you all are, fighting amongst yourselves! Hmph!¡±


    ¡°n leader...¡± The muscr man stepped forward as if he was about to say something more.


    However, his words were interrupted by Nics.


    ¡°Alright, save it forter! We are not the enemy¡¯s targets. There¡¯s no need to put ourselves before their de.¡± Nics¡¯ expression was dark as he said, ¡°We will observe how their fight with Freed proceeds before we decide on our future actions. Until then, all of you stay here in the tower quietly. Do not start any trouble that you cannot resolve yourself. Am I understood?¡±


    ¡°Yes, my lord!¡± The other adepts bowed in unison, relief on their faces.


    The muscr adept let out a reluctant grunt, but he could only bow and acknowledge his orders.


    After suppressing the n¡¯s disagreement, Nics turned and looked at the Crimson fleet in the distance. He couldn¡¯t help but mutter to himself, ¡°The world is about to change. The skies of Zhentarim are about to change!¡±


    ............


    Kerslin Castle.


    Inside a magical room.


    The magical mirror flickered several times before finally revealing the distant image.


    Freed looked solemnly at the silhouette of the adept in the mirror as he bowed, ¡°Lord Ulnak, you must help me this time!¡±


    A short momentter, the blurry outline finally stabilized to reveal a young, handsome man with a cold expression on his face.


    He yawned and shot a quick nce at Freed before coldly speaking, ¡°You know my time is precious¨C do not waste it. Hurry up and say what you have to say!¡±


    ¡°My lord, my...my n has made a troublesome enemy. If you do not offer us help now, we might not be able to meet again,¡± Freed might look like a wise and gentlemanly old man on most asions, but he was like an obedient little apprentice before this person.


    ¡°Oh? I thought you were doing quite well for yourself in the Central Lands! How did things end up this way?¡± The young man paused for a moment, ¡°Has the Adept¡¯s Associationunched a full-scale invasion?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not the Adept¡¯s Association, but...but¡ª¡±


    ¡°I am eager to return to that experiment of mine. If you do not wish to speak, then there¡¯s no need to do so!¡± The young man¡¯s said with a severe tone.


    ¡°My lord, I¡¯ll speak, I¡¯ll speak. It¡¯s not the Adept¡¯s Association. It¡¯s a newly risen n of the Central Lands that has invaded my n. Their n leader is a fire adept. He has not yet reached peak Fourth Grade, but he already has the might of an ultra-powerhouse,¡± Freed hastily exined the situation.


    ¡°Central Lands...fire adept...¡± The young man caressed his chin as he thought to himself. These few words, put together, gave him a puzzling sense of familiarity.


    Suddenly, he lifted his head and asked: ¡°The fire adept you speak of isn¡¯t called Greem, is he?¡±


    It was Freed who was surprised now.


    He had truly never expected that even Sixth Grade Great Adept Ulnak, who resided in the realms beyond, would know of Greem¡¯s name.


    For some reason, an ominous feeling rose in Freed¡¯s heart!

 Chapter 1311 - Murder By Dream

    Chapter 1311 Murder By Dream


    The Versailles.


    Inside a luxurious room on the second level inside the hull.


    Greem sat in the corner of the room at the desk, silently reading the Tome of Corruption by an illumination crystal¡¯s light.


    As expected of Soul Equipment, the Tome of Corruption had obtained unusual intelligence after devouring the Libram of Wisdom. Greem would flip through the Tome of Corruption daily, reading and memorizing its contents.


    Every time he read the Tome of Corruption, the contents recorded on its pages would differ.


    Most of the time, they would only be a few nonsensical sentences. asionally, there were strange runes and unusual chants. ording to the Chip¡¯s analysis, these were all fragments of specific high-grade knowledge.


    These knowledge fragments were shattered, in chaotic sequences, and often contained numerous mistakes or knowledge that only held true on specific nes. For an ordinary adept to decipher anything of use through these fragments was akin to searching for a needle in the sea. It was understandably impossible.


    However, Greem had the Chip¡¯s aid. He didn¡¯t need to decipher and analyze these chaotic pieces of knowledge slowly. All he had to was forcefully memorize them and store them in the Chip¡¯s database. The actual organization and deciphering of the data would be left to the Chip.


    As such, after a long period of consistently reading the nonsense recorded in the Tome of Corruption, Greem was able to reap certain benefits as well.


    Moreover, the very attempt to read such cryptic content was also a form of training for his Spirit.


    Ever since he obtained the Tome of Corruption, Greem¡¯s daily habit consisted of three things: meditation, reading, and experimentation.


    Most of the time, eating, sleeping, and entertainment were necessary activities for ordinary humans. However, these things were inconsequential to high-grade adepts. They could go for several months without eating, drinking, or sleeping, especially when they were busy working on their mysterious experiments.


    They would only take a quick rest to recover from the exhaustion of their Spirit running out.


    Many high-grade adepts evenpletely changed their body¡¯s energy cirction system, recing the primitive practice of eating and digesting with the direct absorption of pure energy crystals.


    For these adepts, worldly enjoyment and happiness were insignificant and pointless.


    The authority wielded by an emperor, with which a single word would let a thousand heads roll; the unforgettable wines, the seductivedies, the cute and innocent girls, the treasures collected from all over the world, and the sycophantic ttering of the court nobles in thevish and wasteful banquets.


    All of that could not provide a single iota more joy to an adeptpared to making a minor improvement in their experiment.


    The trajectory of the lives of adepts had already deviated from the understanding of worldly mortals, ascending to unimaginable heights. They saw the world for what it truly was, and they had be ascetics that sought only knowledge and truth.


    If adepts of low and intermediate grade were still rodents struggling within the nar worlds, then high-grade adepts were ascended beings who had witnessed the wonders of other nar worlds. They had seen the beauty of the realms beyond and experienced the baptism of the spacestorms. The way they looked at the world, life, and power had broken free of a nar world¡¯s constraints. They could be considered entirely different lifeforms from lower-grade adept.


    Ants might be overjoyed at the discovery of a single drop of honey. Meanwhile, a lion would have scaled the cliff and let out a prideful roar at the world and all the thousands of weaker beings that resided within.


    The difference in life, power, and vantage point had forgedpletely different existences!


    Even if an ant were ced in the lion¡¯s position, could it possibly see the sprinting pack of gazelles in the distance with its weak eyes? Could it remain unmoved by the strong, violent winds of mountains with its weak strength? Would it be terrified at everything it was seeing, or would it feel pride and joy?


    The answer to all this was all unknown, but at the same time, established knowledge!


    It was true that the Chip¡¯s aid and Greem¡¯s memories of his past life had helped Greem achieve his current aplishments. However, at its core, most of Greem¡¯s achievements had to be attributed to his strict self-discipline and tremendous sense of danger.


    Anyone else might have sumbed to the desires in their hearts, lost in their enjoyment of the rush of authority, or the various beauties that could be found all over the world.


    Fourth Grade adepts were already the most powerful individuals in a nar world!


    When were you supposed to enjoy yourself, if not now?


    Moreover, with the blinding title of Fourth Grade adept, ultra-powerhouse, and legendary fire adept, no woman or even female adept would ever reject his advances. Truly, who could possibly resist such temptations without a powerful mind and even more powerful will?


    Greem had aplished it.


    There was a small window on one side of the room, right above the desk.


    It was deep in the night now, and the moon hanging in the sky glowed with silver light that pierced through the window and cast upon Greem.


    For some reason, the moon tonight was somewhat hazy and had an odd, enchanting quality to it.


    Greem looked up at the moon. He could faintly sense the fluctuations ofw aura.


    Before he could respond, the colors and sights in front of his eyes suddenly turned dim. Lights flickered in the cabin as a colorful mist rose. Two seductive women with exceptional appearances and figures, dressed in flimsy clothes, appeared out of thin air and started dancing along with music, which had also begun ying mysteriously.


    Then, a beautiful and mysterious woman stepped out of the mists, slowly appearing before Greem.


    She wore a thin veil over her face, which covered her unnaturally beautiful looks. Only her memorable, deep-blue eyes could be seen. A translucent crystal was embedded in her forehead, flickering with a dark, deep radiance.


    Her entire person radiated with thatw flux that Greem had sensed earlier.


    She was an adept. A Fourth Grade adept that had mastered powerfulws!


    How did she manage to sneak onto the Versailles?


    Confusion rose in Greem¡¯s mind, and he couldn¡¯t help but look around him.


    As expected, the only thing remaining in view were the three mysterious female adepts and himself. Everything else was quickly fading away and vanishing.


    The floorboards, the wooden desk, the walls, bed, the two potted nts at a corner of the room; everything was slowly turning transparent before scattering into mists, causing the entire space to appear even more fantastical.


    Greem tried calling out to the Chip, but he got no response.


    He immediately realized that this was no longer in the original material world. Instead, his mental consciousness had been dragged into a special illusory realm by some means.


    The most suspicious observation that lent credibility to this idea was the constantly radiatingw flux from the opponent!


    ¡°You must be Greem! Truly a brave man. You are already so severely injured, yet you still dare to venture out here,¡± The beautiful female adept bit her cherry lips lightly. She looked as gentle and harmless as a rabbit, but her words would send chills down the spine of any man, ¡°Are you not afraid you will die on this trip?¡±


    Greem continued looking at his surroundings. He tried drawing on his power several times, but he could not even produce a single spark of fire. It was almost as if the enemy had absolute control over this space, such that there wasn¡¯t even a trace of fire energy here.


    However, the firews themselves were not affected by spacetime or the illusory realm. They appeared around Greem, turning into a quad-colored magical defense.


    The beautiful adept chuckled when she saw thew fires suddenly appear around Greem, ¡°I was wondering why you were so unfazed. So you were counting on yourw powers!¡±


    Her pretty eyes then wandered along Greem¡¯s body. She couldn¡¯t help but praise, ¡°To think a young adept that advanced only two hundred years ago could have pushed hisw powers to such heights. Truly impressive. However, if this is the extent of your power, then I¡¯m afraid you won¡¯t be walking out of this dream alive today.¡±


    ¡°Dream?¡± Greem was stunned for a moment.


    He had believed the opponent to have dragged his mental consciousness into some sort of illusion, in all honesty. However, judging from the opponent¡¯s meaning, this wasn¡¯t an illusion, but a dream.


    Didn¡¯t that mean the him in reality was dreaming?


    Greem smiled and stepped forward. Both of his arms reached forward as he summoned his equipment.


    The next second, a light shed as the Tome of Corruption appeared in his left hand, radiating waves of dark light from its pages. Meanwhile, his right hand was empty as before. The fire coral staff had not appeared.


    It seemed like the dream had cut off all of his connections with the outside world. He could not contact all of his equipment and weapons and, therefore, could not materialize them in this dream. The sole exception was the Tome of Corruption, as it was his Soul Equipment.


    ¡°Soul Equipment?¡± The adept was shocked once more. ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought that you would possess such high-grade Soul Equipment as well, apart from your firews? Very well then, let us fight our heart¡¯s content in this dream!¡±


    The beautiful adept stepped back. Colorful mists surged around her,pletely concealing her figure. At the same time, the two dancing women giggled and slowly approached Greem.


    For some reason, a murderous aura that pierced straight through Greem¡¯s soul filled the air.


    Back in reality, Greem was still seated at the wooden desk, his arms held empty where the Tome of Corruption should have been, his gaze loose and unfocused. You could even hear light snoring from him.


    The moon in the sky was still as bright and pretty as before.


    However, the empty cabin was filled with a chilling, murderous aura.

 Chapter 1312 - The Last Witch of Despair

    <h4>Chapter 1312 The Last Witch of Despair</h4>


    Northern Lands, the Tower of Fate.


    Today was the day the Fate Witches gathered for their routine astrology ceremony.


    From afternoon tote in the night, the highest floor of the tower glowed bright like amp, illuminating the entirety of Dragonblight. Meanwhile, projections and lights flickered in the astrology hall. It was a sea of light.


    Lucia squatted on the astrology tform, listlessly popping the bubble-like illusions that drifted past her with her finger. The strange silent image of a particr location of the nar world shed in each of these bubbles.


    Naturally, anyone whose actions could be captured and projected by the Tower of Fate was no nameless individual. Almost every one of these bubbles showed an image of a powerful individual in the World of Adepts with enough influence to cause ripples throughout the world with a single action.


    Obviously, it included the legendary fire adept Greem among them; Greem, whose name could be heard everywhere in the Central Lands, and who reigned supreme over all other adepts there!


    ¡°Hm? What¡¯s happened to him? To think he could fall asleep when he¡¯s reading.¡±


    Lucia casually grabbed the bubble projection and slowly angled and moved it around. She peeked at the ¡®napping¡¯ man within.


    ¡°Something¡¯s...not right. This doesn¡¯t look like he¡¯s sleeping, but...¡±


    Lucia mumbled to herself when, suddenly, she heard a low but elegant voice beside her ear.


    ¡°Dream Assassination...this is Dream Assassination! It seems like Ivana couldn¡¯t hold back any longer.¡±


    Lucia turned to look at the woman who stood beside her dressed in an intricate, starry robe. Alice¡¯s face and skin glowed with a crystalline radiance. Lucia couldn¡¯t help but speak out in surprise, ¡°Teacher, your lover has been caught in a Dream Assassination. Are you...not concerned?¡±


    A sweet smile appeared on Alice¡¯s beaming face as she said, ¡°If Greem was so easily killed, he wouldn¡¯t have lived to this day. Ivana has always been very patient and would never have struck if she wasn¡¯t confident of her victory, but this time, she¡¯s in for a rude surprise!¡±


    ¡°Why...why do you have such confidence in Greem?¡± Lucia asked out of surprise.


    ¡°You¡¯ve grasped many applications of the Fate powers now. Can you not see the trend of Greem¡¯s Fate? Do you think that it looks like he is about to die today?¡± Alice smiled and responded with a question.


    ¡°Er,¡± Lucia was speechless.


    She still regarded herself as an arcanist, after all. Even though she now possessed the power of a First Grade Fate Witch due to the favor of Fate, she was still used to observing and analyzing everything with the attention and knowledge of an arcanist most of the time.


    That was why she was having a hard time bing used to the way in which Alice easily trusted and believed entirely in Fate.


    Perhaps this was why Alice was Fate¡¯smp holder and could only toy around with a few simple Fate spells!


    ............


    Silver Union, the Castle in the Sky.


    An ugly witch with a hunched back and messy hair stood before a mushroom cottage inside a small swamp. She silently looked up at the starry night sky above.


    Faint yellow candlelight shone out of the cottage behind her, painting the side of her body with a softyer of gold.


    Twelve main stars traveled through the dark sky, illuminating different regions of the sky as they progressed down their paths. Thousands of stars filled each part of the sky. Sometimes they were bright, and sometimes they were dim, giving a sense of constant change and transformation.


    The night sky tonight was especially strange, as the stars were shifting and changing more frequently and intensely than unusual.


    Some stars would suddenly be unnaturally bright, so much so that they even threatened to outshine the twelve main stars. Others would bepletely lightless and vanish from view. If it weren¡¯t for the faint light they still gave off, one might have assumed the star to have fallen.


    Witch Liana was staring at a certain region of the sky in the southeast.


    As she watched, one of the region¡¯s minor stars began to glow excessively, almost illuminating half of the night sky. At the same time as it began shining brightly, it also seemed to have ignited. A dark red rim of light encircled the star, making it seem as if it had caught on fire.


    Liana couldn¡¯t help but bare her yellowed teeth in a broad smile and chuckle coldly when she saw this.


    ¡°Ivana, oh, Ivana. I have waited five hundred years for you. I never expected you to walk out of the Misty Lands! I might not have been able to do anything while you were hiding in the Misty Lands! However, now that you¡¯ve walked out of your own ord and even started a fight against someone of the same grade...kehkehkehe! Do you think that I have forgotten what happened five hundred years ago? The shame and anger you bestowed on me? I will return all of it today.¡±


    Liana hurried back into her mushroom cottage. ttering could be heard as she rifled through her shelves until, at longst, she dug out a wooden carving from a dusty old box.


    The carving was only the size of her palm. The wood looked old and yellowed, with several cracks running all over it.


    The carving was in the likeness of a pretty and slender woman, with delicate, gentle eyebrows. In fact, it looked somewhat simr to the woman that had appeared in Greem¡¯s dream.


    Liana tossed the carving into arge, ugly pot in a corner of the cottage without hesitation. The carvingnded in the sickly green stew with a plop and quickly sank to the bottom.


    The moment the carving fell into the poison stew, which had been brewing for over a hundred years by now, a furious and pained cry could be heard from the distance.


    ¡°What a moving and pretty scream...what a nostalgic voice. Ivana, the hatred you have inflicted on him, I will return ten-fold, a hundred fold...kehkehkeh.¡±


    Liana continued to chuckle sinisterly, her voice almost like that of a hooting owl as she continued to form more and more sickly green runes between her hands, which she swiftly put into the pot.


    The mes under the pot burned even more furiously and started to be stained with a trace of ghastly green when they licked the pot.


    The screaming in the air seemed to grow louder and higher in pitch!


    ¡°Despair! Scream! Suffer! Ivana, this is your retribution.¡±


    It seemed like the despair magic alone was insufficient, for Liana moved a stool over and picked out thergest jar hanging from her ceiling. She then opened the jar and poured out its filthy contents into the pot, along with the giant eyeball swimming within, of course.


    The moment the eyeball touched the stew, it transformed into a massive eyeball-like monster, which wrapped itself firmly around the carving.


    The carving seemed to havee to life. She screamed out hideously and began sinking to the bottom of the pot with the eyeball monster.


    The pot immediately started shaking violently. The sickly green soup inside bubbled and roiled as if two monstrous beings were fighting within.


    ¡°How is it, Ivana? This Banquet of Despair that I¡¯ve spent a few hundred years preparing just for you and the Eye of Despair. You must be enjoying yourself! Why not something with a little more kick, then?¡±


    Witch Liana didn¡¯t hold back. She started grabbing jars and bottles with both her hands, tossing the Eyes of Despair she had specially prepared for this asion into the pot, one after another.


    These Eyes of Despair had no special effects other than being one of the most terrifying corruptors known to exist. They could inject a spiritual essence known as ¡®despair¡¯ into their victims through physical attacks.


    Moreover, such attacks could not be neutralized by magic resistance!


    While Liana gleefully danced around the pot, a sharp, furious, and terrifying female voice rang out in the cottage.


    ¡°Liana, you are digging your own grave!¡±


    The next moment, the sharp voice turned into a shrill scream, causing a terrifying sonic wave to ripple through the room.


    Aaaaaah!


    The sonic wave was incredibly destructive and instantly tore apart every substance unprotected by magic.


    The mushroom cottage disintegrated before the fearsome sonic wave.


    Everything from the fungus, the wooden pirs, the metal hooks, the books, jars, to all the mysterious, tiny little trinkets, shattered in the sonic wave before being minced into miniscule particles and blown into the distance.


    Even the seemingly mad Liana appeared to have been struck violently by the scream. Streaks of purple blood started to flow out of all her orifices. Her skin began to crumble, inch by inch, revealing the dry and shriveled flesh beneath.


    Liana might have been an incredibly powerful Witch of Despair five hundred years ago. However, due to her severe injuries, her power had regressed to that of an advanced Second Grade. She was far from her prime.


    She was cursing a Fourth Grade False Witch as a Second Grade. Moreover, that was no ordinary Fourth Grade, but the very leader of the False Witches. To survive a retaliation like this without instantly dying was already fortunate.


    If Ivana wasn¡¯t caught up in her Dream Assassination, this reprisal would have been enough to kill Liana!


    A short momentter, Liana struggled and got up from the ground.


    The cottage she had been living in for three hundred years had vanished without a trace. Nothing existed in this swamp apart from that giant pot and herself.


    Liana showed no signs of regret or agony, despite her grievous wounds. Instead, an even more hideous and wretched expression took over her face.


    ¡°I can¡¯t live for much longer anyway. Today is the perfect day to drag you down to hell with me. Ivana, I¡¯ll be waiting for you down there!¡±


    Liana leaped straight into the pot. Her entire body rapidly melted, like she was made out of ink, quickly turning the green stew ck.


    A massive and terrifying essence of despair surged around the wooden carving. The essence then started to contaminate the spiritual node in the distance through the spiritual channel.


    In a northwestern corner of the sky where the skies were bright with stars, a dim star abruptly lit up with radiance before turning into aet and falling out of the sky.

 Chapter 1313 - True Despair

    <h4>Chapter 1313 True Despair</h4>


    In all honesty, Greem had never experienced such a dangerous battle in his life!


    He had never been on such a backfoot, even back when he fought the two ultra-powerhouses one after the other.


    Today he finally experienced frustration and the meaning of home-field advantage at the hands of this terrifying and mysterious adept.


    In truth, it had been hundreds of years since Greemst had a dream, starting from when he advanced to an adept.


    Given an adept¡¯s careful and stern nature, they would never do such a thing as let their Spirit roam, which would then result in a dream. If an adept really did have a dream, they would never see it as a natural biological process of his mind. They would treat it as feedback from the world consciousness.


    The world consciousness would be trying to warn them of something through a dream.


    The higher the grade of the adept, the more confident they were of this fact!


    The dream that Greem was experiencing today was clearly not a reflection of his spiritual consciousness. There would at least be a hint of familiarity to the scenery in the dream around him. However, the more nd the dream world was, the more Greem¡¯s powers were restricted.


    Firstly, this dream world was incrediblycking in fire elementium!


    The mysterious adept that had drawn Grem into this dream hadpletely sealed away all fire elementium from this dream world.


    Putting a fire adept into a world without fire elementium was essentially disarming him from the start of the fight!


    Secondly, all material elementium that formed the real world was also missing from this dream world. Instead, the world was unimaginably rich with the more immaterial spiritual essences.


    It was practically the best arena for adepts that specialized at mental maniption and suggestion!


    If it weren¡¯t for the multiple firews that Greem had mastered, he would bepletely unarmed. He wouldn¡¯t even have the ability to defend himself.


    Fortunately, Greem was no ordinary adept, and this dream world was still a world in some sense. It could cut out fire elementium, but it could not strip Greem of his mastery over his firews.


    In this dream world that only existed in the spiritual space, firews were no longer immaterial, intangible objects. Instead, they had be powerful weapons that could manifest at any time.


    This world was filled with spiritual essences. That made it rtively easier for thew powers that typically functioned behind the scenes of the material world to manifest and appear.


    As such, Greem could only abandon his usualbat style and begin using thew weapons in a very clumsy and untrained fashion.


    Greem was truly clumsy with thews.


    In the past, Greem had almost relied entirely on the Orb of the Fire God¡¯s enormous power to control the fire elementium around him. Once the fire elementium had gathered together to form powerful fire spells, they were then enhanced even further by the firews.


    Now, without the aid of the Orb of the Fire God or the Chip¡¯sbat assistance, Greem could only rely on the Tome of Corruption and his own potent firews.


    Increased Fire Range, Fire Pration, Invisible mes, and Fire¡¯s st.


    These four firews materialized as four lights of different colors. They circled Greem and served as a recement for the missing fire elementium.


    Greem molded thews using his powerful Spirit, turning them into massive shields or firing them at the enemy as arrows.


    It was Greem¡¯s first time using thews independently from fire elementium; that was why he appeared so clumsy. Fortunately, he was protected by the Tome of Corruption. The Fifth Grade artifact¡¯sw powers protected his consciousness very well, preventing him from scrambling in the face of the enemy¡¯s ferocious attacks.


    The dream world¡¯s limitations on Greem were undoubtedly incredible!


    However, pressured by the enemy¡¯s unrelenting attacks, Greem¡¯s mind operated at rapid speed. He soon figured out an alternative means of using thews.


    This ce was the dream world. Greem couldn¡¯t summon the Orb of the Fire God, nor Shadow Demon.


    However, with the Tome of Corruption in hand, Greem could still summon the Spirit of Pestilence, Remi.


    Unlike the outside world, all lifeforms in the dream world manifested in their souls¡¯ origin state. Thus, a one-meter wide green ball of light suddenly appeared at Greem¡¯s side when he summoned Remi.


    ¡°Where is this? What a strange world!¡± The green ball of light looked around curiously the moment it appeared. It appeared to be exceptionally excited and happy.


    It was a strange world shrouded in colorful mists.


    The edges of the world seemed to stretch on into the distance without end.


    There was only a void all around them, apart from the hundred square meters of wooden nks they stood on.


    Greem was fighting a strange battle against the three female adepts on this tiny battlefield.


    Four light barriers of different colors surrounded Greem, while an even thicker wall emanated from the Tome of Corruption, enveloping all the other barriers.


    His opponents were three exceptionally strange witches.


    Witch Ivana mostly hid in the mists, rarely emerging to attack. Meanwhile, the other two Fourth Grade witches she controlled were radiating a strange mental flux as they circled Greem¡¯s barrier, striking at him over and over.


    Their every movement and action seemed to be able to draw upon the spiritual essences of this dream world.


    Every time their attacksnded on thew barriers, the firews would shake violently. Simultaneously, traces of spiritual essences would flow into Greem¡¯s consciousness, causing him to suffer from frustrations and distractions.


    Greem had tried to retaliate against these two witches with all his strength. He had even managed to pin and kill one of them with his powerfulw arrows.


    Unfortunately, they didn¡¯t seem to be actual consciousness bodies, but some sort of creationposed of illusions and mental magic. Just a few seconds after Greem slew one of the witches, another witch reformed from the mists and rejoined the battle.


    Greem could not persist forever under their continuous attacks, nor could he identify Witch Ivana¡¯s actual location. asionally, several powerful spiritual spells sted out of the mists, always causing the Tome of Corruption¡¯s barrier to tremble as if it would break the very next moment.


    It was only natural that Greem¡¯sw powers were being rapidly exhausted under such conditions!


    That was why Greem hastily gave Remibat orders the moment he summoned him.


    ¡°Stop messing around, Remi. Help me stall the enemy. I want to look into a way of shattering this dream world!¡± Greem quickly gave out an order.


    ¡°Leave it to me!¡± Remi acknowledged it and instantly let out a massive poison halo that enveloped the entire battlefield.


    The two illusory witches at Greem¡¯s side were instantly contaminated and turned a sickly green color. Their bodies melted into disgusting pools of green liquid. However, the swords they threw out before their ¡®deaths¡¯ managed to stab the green ball of light.


    The overwhelming spiritual essences that erupted the very next second caused Remi to howl out in pain!


    Given hisw powers¡¯ usual might, Remi¡¯s poison would have left the ground contaminated for months toe. Here in this unusual world, the poison power that Remi had unleashed at significant cost was channeled away in a matter of seconds by a strange power.


    This world rejected all magic elementium apart from spiritual essences. Naturally, this included poison!


    He had only managed to maintain the poison halo for three seconds despite the power he expended, but he had exterminated two of the enemies.


    Remi was still rejoicing in his victory when two silhouettes flickered in the mists. The two witches charged out once more, swords in hand. In fact, they looked identical to the previous two witches in appearance.


    Remi drew in a breath of cold air. He finally understood why Greem had summoned him.


    There was no replenishingw power in this unusual world, and attacks expended far more energy with far fewer returns. Even an ultra-powerhouse would be wrung dry if such a battle dragged on!


    That was why Greem was in such a hurry to escape from this dream world.


    He had noticed that this mysterious witch was far from reaching the level of an ultra-powerhouse. The reason fighting her had been so difficult was that the dream world gave her far too much of an advantage.


    However, while Greem was thinking painfully for a method to escape the dream world, screams of pain could be heard from the depths of the mist. A giant eyeball monster fell from the mists above.


    The next second, the mists trembled asw power reverberated throughout the realm. The witch was somehow fighting against a giant eyeball monster.


    The creature was massive, but it was only a beginner Third Grade. If it weren¡¯t for the tremendous amounts of ¡®despair¡¯ essence that it carried, it wouldn¡¯t be enough to dirty the witch¡¯s shoe.


    The witch disposed of the eyeball monster in a matter of seconds. However, the mists nearby had been contaminated by the spiritual essence of ¡®despair.¡¯ Every mental consciousness in this dream world had consequently been contaminated to varying degrees.


    Greem quickly supplied the Tome of Corruption with more Spirit, protecting both him and Remi with hisw barrier.


    The fearsome despair essence was like ink, rapidly staining the mists with a pitch-ck color.


    At this point, it was almost as if a rain of ink had fallen from the sky. More and more despair essence surged into the dream world, wildly contaminating and devouring everything.


    All sorts of strange, ck creatures were now crawling all over the Tome of Corruption¡¯s barrier. They had twisted, distorted bodies and terrifyingly sharp teeth with which they gnawed upon it.


    Meanwhile, the screams of the mysterious witch in the mists became higher in pitch and filled with even more despair!


    What was happening? Where did this strange surge of ¡®despair¡¯ essencee from?


    Greem was stillpletely confused when the unusual dream world crumbled rapidly around him.

 Chapter 1314 - Clearing Out the Outskirts

    Chapter 1314 Clearing Out the Outskirts


    In all honesty, Greem had never experienced such a strange battle!


    The mysterious enemy had been defeated before Greem could think of a solution to beat them. The reason for the enemy¡¯s defeat had actually been the intervention of a third party.


    The utterly confused Greem blinked. All of a sudden, his mental consciousness returned to his body in his room.


    Greem¡¯s lightless eyes suddenly lit up, and his snoring ceased. He stood up abruptly and reached out with both his hands. The fire coral staff and the Tome of Corruption appeared in each hand.


    With the tremendous enhancement from the Orb of the Fire God, Greem immediately picked up on a quickly fading trace ofw power.


    It was obvious that the mysterious witch was hastily retreating, having realized that her n had failed.


    Greemughed grimly and focused his Spirit. He gathered a massive amount ofw power and sent it in pursuit of the fading trace, even cutting across space to do so.


    Like a statue of mud cast into the sea, the giant ball ofw power vanished without a trace. It had disappeared along with the trace of the enemy¡¯sw. Even Greem had no idea if he had managed to inflict any damage to the enemy.


    Greem focused and examined his surroundings. After confirming the mysterious enemy had left for good, Greem finally rxed. He couldn¡¯t help but cough up blood.


    Perhaps sensing the tremors in Greem¡¯s Spirit, a red silhouette flickered as Mary appeared in the room through teleportation.


    ¡°What¡¯s the matter? Why did you concentrate so much power all of a sudden? Is it an enemy?¡± Mary asked several questions in a row. Her eyes noticed the traces of blood by Greem¡¯s lip, and she raised an eyebrow, ¡°Where is the enemy?¡±


    Greem shook his head and bitterly smiled as he said, ¡°They already left!¡±


    ¡°Which faction did they belong to?¡±


    ¡°They were probably from the Northern Witches. However, I can¡¯t be sure if it was her personal action or the Northern Witches¡¯ decision as a whole.¡±


    ¡°The Northern Witches? Do you know who she was?¡± Mary had a vicious expression on her face, as if she wanted to eat someone alive.


    ¡°It was a Fourth Grade witch that specialized in illusions and dream magic. It shouldn¡¯t be hard to find out!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! These Northern Witches have been getting increasingly bold! They even dare to assassinate you publicly now. It¡¯s about time we teach them a lesson,¡± Mary said furiously, ¡°The Northern Lands have a few outposts here in the Central Lands as well. I will send my forces to wipe them out now!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t be rash!¡± Greem reached out and Mary by her hand, shaking his head as he exined, ¡°Now is the time the final victor of the Central Lands will be decided. We cannot allow anything unexpected to happen now. We will remember this and settle everything once we have unified the Central Lands; moreover, I gave her a nasty blow at the end there. I believe even someone as powerful as her won¡¯t have a good time after that.¡±


    Greem revealed his confidence in his newfound powers between his words!


    ¡°Then let me move into your room! At least I can stop any more of those bastards trying to pick a fight while you¡¯re injured,¡± Mary replied furiously.


    ¡°I couldn¡¯t suggest anything better!¡± An expression of pure glee instantly appeared on Greem¡¯s face when he heard this.


    Mary saw the expression on his face and blushed. All the anger on her face turned into shyness, and she shot a mean re at Greem.


    The murderous aura in the room vanished instantly, reced by the flirtatious tension between the couple!


    ............


    ¡°Bastard...bastard...bastard......¡±


    Far up north, even north of the Northern Lands, in the Chillwind Kingdom.


    A series of curses could be heard from a tower looming over the center of the Howling ins.


    ¡°Liana, you bastard! Who would¡¯ve thought you were still alive after all these years? Dammit! You ruined all my ns!¡±


    A mysterious witch covered entirely in ck silk clothes was cursing furiously. Lost Paradise, the Fourth Grade illusion crystal she had been using for six hundred long years, fell onto the icy floor and shattered into tiny shards with a loud crack.


    Waves of terrifying, ink-like substance radiated from within the shattered crystal. That was the despair essence that Witch Liana had unleashed at the cost of burning her very soul and all of her blood essence.


    An ordinary person would have been overwhelmed by despair with a single drop and transformed into a murderous killer with a twisted soul. Even a First Grade adept would be corrupted into a monster that knew naught but ughter and self-harm should theye into contact with such concentrated despair.


    Even a Fourth Grade witch like Ivana was not willing to tussle with such intense negative emotion. After all, clearing out such intense feelings of hatred and despair would require her to expend extraordinary effort.


    While she was cursing Liana, Ivana abruptly raised her head and looked at the hall¡¯s ceiling in disbelief. A wormhole, one meter in diameter, had appeared there out of nowhere, and terrifying torrents of mes were surging out from within.


    Moreover, these were no ordinary mes, but...but pure, concentratedw fires formed out of the firews. That was what Ivana was most terrified of!


    ¡°Basta......¡±


    Ivana¡¯s face turned white. She only had time to crush the beast fang hanging from her neck before thew fires devoured her.


    The next second, the tall tower trembled violently, and red tongues of fire slithered out from all the windows and cracks in the structure. An intense burning odor instantly filled the building.


    Dark, ck clouds of smoke rolled out of the tower, visible even from dozens of kilometers away.


    A short momentter, a sky rending scream could be heard throughout the ins.


    ¡°Greem, this is not finished!¡±


    ............


    Half a monthter.


    The massive sky fleet passed through one region after another, flying past mountain after mountain.


    Finally, the path ahead of them appeared clear of obstructions.


    They had left the towering mountains behind, and the vast stretches of the forest began to fade into tiny clumps of trees. What appeared before them were vast green fields and multiple human settlements.


    There were viges, cities, farms, and manors here and there. Of course, there were also castles and mansions of interesting design.


    As thergest structures in the World of Adepts, adept towers were the focus of attention wherever they were. They were like watchtowers that had been plunged into the earth using their powerful magic to spread an adept¡¯s will to every corner of the world.


    This ce was already the territory of the Entom n!


    The Crimson Fleet was not in a hurry to advance to Kerslin Castle now that they were here. Instead, they split into three forces¨Cled by Greem, Mary, and Arms, respectively¨Candmenced uprooting all the adept towers of the Entom n in the outskirts.


    Anything that was an asset of the Entom n in name, be it manor, castle, or city, was graced by the presence of the Crimson Fleets. They hunted down, captured, or killed core members of the Entom n in this process.


    Anyone that resisted was turned to dust by a Mothership¡¯s giant magic energy cannons, regardless of whether it was a castle or a manor they were hiding in. Not even their souls remained.


    Ordinary structures like these could not endure the giant magic energy cannons¡¯ bombardment, even if magical arrays protected them. If a single shot didn¡¯t do the job, then two or three shots would suffice. This ce wasn¡¯t their territory anyway. Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to negotiate a surrender or to send out forces to conquer these locations. Anyone that didn¡¯t immediately surrender met with a giant magic energy cannon shot.


    The giant magic energy cannons posed a minor threat to Fourth Grade adepts, but a lethal one to Third Grade adepts.


    The Entom n could not survive the magic energy cannons¡¯ bombardment, even if they charged out in a desperate attempt at retaliation. Even if they managed to get up close, a single barrage from the magical machines would be enough to shred them to pieces.


    Meanwhile, the adept towers located in strategic locations became the primary targets of the Crimson Fleet.


    The City of Lakarr.


    It was a massive city that stood between Imn Hill and the Ksali River. It was also thergest and most prosperous city of the Entom n in the Iranac region.


    Of course, arge adept tower had been constructed here!


    Greem and the three Motherships stopped about one and a half kilometers away from the city. As Greem silently looked down at this human city that looked the size of a chessboard from this height, he could see the humans frantically running around the city with his powerful magical vision.


    The giant adept tower was like an unmoving pir of stone that stood in the city center. Layers uponyers of forcefields and barriers covered it; the tower walls flowed with shockingly immense amounts of magical energy.


    Not a single adept could be seen within the city. All the Entom n adepts had hidden in the tower, erecting all sorts of magical defenses as they observed the Crimson Fleet¡¯s actions.


    In all honesty, they believed the Crimson Fleet was only here as a show of might. They never believed that the opponent would have the ability or determination to conquer this tower.


    ¡°Tell them! As long as they are all willing toe out and surrender, they can preserve all the civilians andnd here. Otherwise, we will invade by force!¡± Greem looked down calmly and gave his orders to Adept Locke, the fleetmander.


    Locke acknowledged the orders and immediately announced their intentions to the city of Lakarr with a massive loudspeaker. His voice spread out to every corner of the city and sowed fear in the hearts of every civilian.


    There was no way the adepts would surrender!


    The Third Grade adept stationed in this tower immediately rejected Locke¡¯s suggestion and replied viciously, ¡°Come attack us if you dare! We will exterminate you in front of the tower.¡±


    Naturally, Greem was happy to see such hardheads.


    Under his orders, the gship Versailles and the other two Motherships slowly moved forward, gradually bring the adept tower within range of their giant magic energy cannons.


    The next second, the Versailles trembled as a blinding beam of red light cut across the sky and sted the tower.

 Chapter 1315 - The Crimson Motherships

    Chapter 1315 The Crimson Motherships


    The tower trembled, and energy scattered in every direction.


    The pir of energy sted against the forcefield; the tower turned red from the heat in an instant.


    Two terrifying surges of power shed in midair, neutralizing each other and causing horrifying crackling sounds.


    The entire adept tower erupted into mes like a giant torch. The walls of the building glowed with a blinding red shine. There wasplete chaos inside the tower. All the Entom n adepts connected their Spirits with the tower spirit; the spiritual channel was bustling with voices.


    ¡°...abandon energy cirction to Arrays One through Nine. Transfer all energy to tower defenses. Hurry, we must act swiftly.¡±


    ¡°No, we can¡¯t do that! Energy supply to Arrays Seven through Nine must not be cut off. Otherwise, we will lose all ability to retaliate.¡±


    ¡°Wake up! The defensive arrays are already breaking down. What is the point of your offensive arrays now? Listen to me and prioritize energy supply to the defensive forcefield.¡±


    ¡°I object.¡±


    The Crimson n¡¯s army was pressing into Entom n territory, but the Entom n did not dare face them in frontalbat. They could only pull back all their main forces and core adepts of the n back to Kerslin Castle. Consequently, the most powerful adept in the Lakarr adept tower was only Second Grade. It was obviously incongruous with the tower¡¯s grade itself. Naturally, there was no way they could unleash the true power of the tower.


    The tower was having an exceptionally difficult time surviving this first violent attack from the Crimson Fleet gship.


    After a dozen seconds, the energy pir started to weaken. The first shot from the giant magic energy cannon had not managed to crack the tower¡¯s firm shell.


    However, before the Entom n adepts could exhale in relief, their hearts were strung up again. That was because the Versailles had slowly back away, and an equally massive Mothership drifted into its position. Its cannon was already charged, and the terrifying roaring of the cannon was horrifying.


    ¡°Hurry, hurry...replenish the energy and restore the outermost defenses as quickly as possible,¡± The shouts of many adepts could be heard ringing from the tower. However, the next moment, their voices were drowned out by a terrible st of energy.


    Yet another pir of energy cut across the one and half kilometers of empty space, preciselynding on the same location as thest cannon shot.


    The forcefield that had just faded away revealed itself once again, blocking the energy pir with itsyers of force walls. The force walls could not endure the terrifying power of the cannon shot and shattered one after another.


    However, an endless supply of energy surged from within the tower as new force walls reced the damaged ones. Through this means of constantly replenishing exhausted energy, the tower was once again barely able to survive the enemy¡¯s attack.


    Twelve secondster, the energy pir dissipated, and the second attack ended.


    The Motherships hovering high in the sky switched positions once again. A third Mothership drifted forward before the horrified gazes of the Entom adepts.


    ¡°Dammit! Open fire...return fire. We must retaliate! Otherwise, we will be sitting ducks. Once the tower is broken, none of us will survive.¡±


    As the adept¡¯s leader shouted out hismands, the tower trembled as severalyers of magical light appeared around its structure. Countless runic circuits filled with magic energy lit up sequentially and activated the numerous offensive arraysid down throughout the tower.


    The next second, magical lightning bolts as thick as silver serpentsshed forward, along with a hail of frost weapons, giant globs of poison, and a barrage of shadow arrows. The attacks sted against the sky fleet in a torrent.


    The Mothership that was preparing to fire showed no signs of retreat or defense. It was the two other Motherships behind it that erected a strange defensive barrier that engulfed the third one as well.


    It was a sort of special defensive barrier thatbined energy shields and anti-magic barriers. It was incredibly effective at neutralizing elementium spells.


    The defensive barrier shed with the rain of spells. It was as if fireworks had lit up over the city. However, before the shockwaves from the explosions faded away, a pure white beam of energy shot out from the cannon, sting against the tower¡¯s shields once more.


    This time, due to the diversion of energy to its offensive arrays, the tower¡¯s defensive forcefield was no longer able to endure such a ferocious attack. The forcefield started to shatter and break down,yer byyer. Soon, arge hole ten-meters in diameter had burned through the forcefield. The energy pirnded unimpeded on the structure of the tower itself.


    The defensive arrays on the tower¡¯s walls lit up one by one, the magical runes glowing with blinding light. The dust and dirt on the walls of the tower were instantly blown away by an unseen force. The part of the structure hit by the energy pir began to glow bright red as if it was moltenva.


    After fifteen long seconds, the energy pir finally extinguished, leaving a giant, three-meter-wide scar on the tall tower. From a distance, it was almost as if a giant had left a burn scar on the tower with an equally gigantic cigar.


    Fortunately, the tower had been built out of obsidian, an excellent material. It possessed exceptional magic resistance and decent physical resistance. The tower was barely able to survive the cannon¡¯s shot by the skin of its teeth.


    However, even though the section of the wall sted by the energy pir had cooled and returned to its original color, it was still damaged. It had now be a weak point of the tower.


    While the cannons cooled down, the tower drew wildly from the magic power in the energy pool at the building¡¯s bottom. It injected the tower walls with power. The tower¡¯s robust array system allowed the shattered forcefield to be restored, once again sheltering the tower.


    As for the damage to the tower? That would have to be patched up after the battle.


    At the very least, no Entom adept would dare brave enemy fire to repair the tower. That wasn¡¯t courage, but idiocy!


    ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought that the Crimson n would possess such a terrifying magical weapon!?¡± The few Second Grade adepts that the Entom n had left in the tower all carried terrified expressions on their faces. They shouted out loud, ¡°Where do they get all this magical power from? Could it be...could they have hidden an entire adept tower in those ships?¡±


    It was no surprise that the Entom adepts were so shocked. To their understanding, the most powerful things in the world were none other than war towers. War towers had aplete energy pool and energy cirction system, along with plenty of defensive and offensive arrays. Towers could store magic energy when not required, and draw upon the energy pool to supply the tower during times of war.


    These perfect magical facilities provided the adepts with a perfectly safe environment to freely unleash their destructive power. Naturally, war towers became a synonym for ultimate power in the hearts of all adepts!


    Today, the Crimson n had dared to face off against arge adept tower with only three metal ships in the sky. That was far beyond the understanding of the Entom adepts, and it filled them all with awe and shock.


    They had always believed that the Crimson n had been fueling these gigantic monstrosities with their tremendous wealth- that they were powering these flying death machines through a humongous supply of magical crystals.


    They now recognized their mistake.


    It was obvious that these metal ships held a power source in no way inferior to the energy pools of the adept towers. Otherwise, an energy st of such intensity could not havested for so incredibly long!


    The miniaturization and mobilization of energy pools and elementium pools had always been key research subjects for most major adept ns. However, they never expected such technology to appear within the Crimson n.


    Judging from the ease with which the ships maneuvered around, as well as theplete defensive and offensive system, the Crimson n were already well-versed enough with this technology to implement it efficiently in war.


    The power that the Crimson n had been hiding was overwhelming!


    ¡°Mobilize...go...tell the Swamp Flying Dragon force to strike now! We can¡¯t let the enemy continue to attack our tower brazenly like this. We must counterattack,¡± Some of the more vicious and bloodthirsty adepts started shouting.


    As they gave their orders, several doors opened at the waist of the tower. Approximately a hundred strange dragons appeared.


    Adept apprentices dressed in robes of various colors rode on the backs of these dragons.


    They held high-grade magic wands and scrolls in their hands. Where they appeared, they shredded the enemy to pieces with a rain of instant-cast spells.


    If the enemy attempted to engage in a melee, then the dragons would leave them a terrifying memory to keep for what remained of their lives: sharp, scythe-like ws and fangs, powerful limbs, acid breath, and those ear-rending howls.


    Swamp flying dragons had inherited some dragon bloodline, after all. They might notpare to even the weakest of the pureblood dragons, but in a pack, they were still a terrifying force to be reckoned with.


    Pseudo-dragon mounts and apprentices with the ability to unleash powerful spellsbined both physical and magical attacks. You could almost call it perfect.


    Unfortunately, such an army was little more than dead meat in front of the Crimson Fleet.


    The Motherships retracted the giant cannons and revealed hundreds of smaller magic energy cannons in their ce. The ck cannon barrels adjusted their angles ording to the enemy¡¯s position as they approached. Once the dragons were within firing range...Boom! Boom! Boom! Hundreds and hundreds of energy fireballs shot towards the dragons, like meteors falling from the sky.


    One or two fireballs were not enough to kill these dragons, given their resilience and magic resistance.


    However, with this carpet of fireballs raining from above, even pureblood dragons would be doomed, let alone these mutts.

 Chapter 1316 - Putting Down Dragons

    <h4>Chapter 1316 Putting Down Dragons</h4>


    ¡°Dodge...dodge, all of you, high-speed maneuvers, immediately!¡±


    The leader of the Swamp Flying Dragon army was an actual First Grade adept. However, even he felt his scalp go numb and his heart throb at the sight of those countless fireballs and their ck tails of smoke.


    The dragon he was riding reared its head as he shouted his orders. It folded its wings and wove and dove in between the fireballs like an unstoppable arrow, slowly but surely making its way towards the giant ship.


    Itspanions were also dodging and weaving about wildly behind.


    Unfortunately, there were simply too many energy fireballs packed together. They might be able to dodge one or two of them, but they couldn¡¯t avoid all of them. There were even a few dragons that crashed together in their panic.


    For a moment, the sound of exploding fireballs, the agonized screams of the dragons, and the shouts of the apprentices mixed into a chaotic mess.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    The series of fireball explosions generated a fearsome shockwave, which made the battlefield even more dangerous and unpredictable. Several of the swamp dragons crashed into the fireballs and started to swerve unpredictably, crashing into and detonating even more energy fireballs.


    Pretty fireworks erupted in the air.


    In the blink of an eye, over twenty swamp dragons and their adept apprentice riders had been blown to bits. Pieces of dragon organs, flesh, and purple blood scattered down to the ground in a wet and warm rain, making for a rather magnificent, if morbid, sight.


    Even more swamp dragons managed to charge past the clouds due to their magical shields and began to approach the Motherships.


    At this point, squads of magical machines were already standing in wait near the Motherships¡¯ edge. They erected their energy barriers and activated their magic energy cannons, silently waiting for the enemy¡¯s arrival.


    The magic energy cannons had a firing range of seven hundred meters, far beyond the scope of the dragons¡¯ acid breath. Consequently, the magical machines were the first to fire in the engagement.


    The three Motherships were arranged in a triangle formation, with the Versailles slightly behind the other two.


    While the swamp dragons desperately pped their wings to reach within attacking distance with the apprentices on their back, a storm of small energy fireballs shot out from both sides of the three Motherships.


    The adept who had just flown above the clouds felt a chill spread through his heart. He watched with eyes wide open as the hail of fireballs crashed down from above.


    The ships had only fired three hundred magic-energy fireballs earlier. It might have looked like plenty, but there was still plenty of space between each shot in which to weave and dodge. However, the machines¡¯ bombardment was a true rain of fire this time, in every sense of the word. There was no possibility of avoiding the fireballs by means of movement or positioning.


    The adept activated the Barrier Gem that he gripped tightly in his hand without hesitation.


    A magical barrier appeared,pletely enveloping him and his dragon. The fireballs immediately erupted into a sea of fire, just barely after the barrier appeared.


    Over a dozen dragons screeched and fell from the skies.


    ¡°Disengage from the enemy¡¯s firing range...disengage from the enemy¡¯s firing range. Launch a dive assault once we reach higher altitudes!¡±


    The king of the swamp dragons beat its wings at their leader¡¯s orders and flew even higher. Finally, they were past the Motherships, circling above all the Crimson ships. The magic energy cannons of the Motherships could no longer attack them at this angle. Only the squads of magical machines arranged on the wide decks could continue firing.


    The leader of the Swamp Flying Dragons continued to circle in the air, dodging one fireball after another.


    Meanwhile, he hastily produced several seeds from his pouch and threw them down at the deck. These seeds were only the size of fists and were so light they seemed almost weightless.


    They drifted down slowly. Uponnding on the deck, young green sprouts started to grow from these seeds. The sprouts might look thin and weak, but they had as much prative power as high-grade enchanted weapons.


    These sprouts quickly pierced through the half-meter thick metal deck and began to dig and grow under the deck. The ability to devour everything- that was the unique power of these magical nts.


    By devouring the ship¡¯s metal, the magical nts started growing at extraordinary speed, soon transforming into gigantic lifeforms that resembled metal squids.


    They waved their dozen-meter-long vines about, rampaging across the deck, knocking down the machines or picking them up and hurling them at other machines as projectiles.


    The machines quickly mobilized, surrounding the metal squids and suppressing them with relentless firepower. Unfortunately, these magical nts had exceptional resilience and remained lively even after being riddled with holes. Until the magical consciousness in their mind was wiped away, they would not die.


    For a moment, the decks of the Motherships had been thrown into disorder!


    Ci!


    The sound of a sharp arrow piercing through the air.


    A magical arrow of an exotic design cut across the chaotic battlefield, bypassing the dozens of metal tentacles and embedding itself in the head of one of those squids.


    The arrow quickly exploded, and magical mes surged out of every crack in the squid¡¯s head. This mighty, uncontested magical nt instantly fell limp as the metal it had assimted shattered into loose debris. Its metallic-organic body turned into green slime that sizzled as it eroded what remained of the deck below.


    The intermediate Second Grade magical archer, Sandor, had appeared on the deck. She held a metal longbow of strange design in her hands, carved with all sorts of unusual magical runes. She turned back and shouted out orders to her subordinates.


    ¡°Stay on the deck and take care of these squids. Hmph! I will go dy the ones responsible for this!¡±


    These individuals with magical longbows slung across their backs and shortswords at their waists were blood elves with the magical archer ss.


    Having said that, Sandor leaped several times and arrived at the edge of the ship¡¯s deck. She kicked against the ground with her slender legs, and her body flew across the air like an eagle. The adept riding on the swamp dragon king happened to be circling overhead at that moment. He waved his magic wand without hesitation upon seeing Sandor fly toward him.


    A terrifying cloud of ck smoke immediately wrapped around her.


    Sandor let out a grunt as her blood aura erupted, sting away the smoke. She raised her longbow, and an explosive arrow instantly shot toward the adept.


    As an intermediate Second Grade fighting against an advanced First Grade adept, there was no questioning this sh¡¯s victor!


    The explosive arrow sunk into the adept¡¯s head, and his head exploded into tiny pieces like a watermelon.


    The swamp dragon king let out a sorrowful roar, but before it could dive down, it felt a weight on its back. Sandor hadnded on the dragon.


    She had switched the longbow to her left hand while her right hand pulled a dagger out of its sheath. With one light motion, she severed the massive dragon head and sent it tumbling down toward the earth. Sandor stepped on the dragon¡¯s falling corpse as she scanned the skies. Once she located her next target, she kicked off and charged forward.


    Her body was still in the air, but her bowstring was already trembling. Yet another explosive arrow buried itself into the spine of a swamp dragon like a bolt of lightning. In the next second, the arrow exploded, and the apprentice on the dragon¡¯s back howled as he fell from the sky.


    His body passed by Sandor midair. There was a cold gleam of light as another human head soared through the air. Sandor stepped upon their corpses and leaped into the air again.


    Sandor¡¯s movements were the perfect expression of a blood-elf magical archer¡¯s agility and magical attacks. She ughtered the dragons as if she were putting down stray dogs, knocking one apprentice after another out of the skies, beheading them before she moved on to the next one.


    It was a ughter. It was a simple, bloody ughter!


    One hundred swamp dragons with their fully-equipped adept apprentice riders would have had no problem conquering a human kingdom. Here on this battlefield of adepts, they had been disposed of before they could even cause a ssh.


    Lakarr¡¯s adept tower was ultimately no more than a regional city. It was already impressive for them to have an army at the scale of the Swamp Flying Dragons.


    Once the Swamp Flying Dragons had been dealt with, the adept tower lost all means of retaliating against the Crimson Fleet. They could only defend themselves stubbornly with endless forcefields, no longer daring to send out any sorties.


    Thus, the Crimson Fleet released an army of three hundred magical machines to work with the fleet in clearing out the rest of the City of Lakarr.


    The mortal armies of the human kingdom truly had absolutely no chance in front of an adept army.


    The three hundred magical machines marched forward in formation and razed Lakarr¡¯s city walls with a single bombardment. The soldiers of Lakarr scattered fearfully before they even fought these hundreds of gigantic metal monsters.


    That was a good thing!


    If they insisted on attacking the magical machines, the Crimson Fleet might not y so gentle anymore. The three Motherships would be able to raze half of the city¡¯s buildings in just two to three attacks. When that happened, the civilians of Lakarr would die along with the Entom n.


    After routing the Lakarr guards, the magical machines split up into squads and marched on the tower along the streets. The three Motherships hovered in the air above, serving as cover for the machines.


    The Motherships slowly approached, continually trading attacks with the adept tower as they did so.


    With the magic generator furnaces, each Mothership was as powerful as an adept tower. With three of them against the enemy¡¯s one tower, it was only natural that the opposition had no choice but to remain on the defensive.


    The reason the Crimson Fleet had sent out ground forces was simply to wear down the tower¡¯s energy reserves quicker. It couldn¡¯t be helped. Until the tower¡¯s energy was exhausted, the Crimson Fleet would not be able to assault and enter an adept tower with aplete offensive and defensive system, regardless of their numbers.


    Thus, a difficult siege began!

 Chapter 1317 - The Chessboard of Fate

    <h4>Chapter 1317 The Chessboard of Fate</h4>


    Three dayster.


    The smoke had yet to stop rising from the City of Lakarr.


    Debris and rubble filled the city, the streets lined with the smoldering skeletons of what used to be buildings. There was smoke everywhere, filling the air with a pungent odor.


    The adept tower located at the center of the city had lost its former magnificence and grandeur. It stood there like a half-burned match, telling of unbearable tragedy and sorrow.


    The adept tower had been conquered.


    The sixteen Entom adepts within had all, without question, be captives of the Crimson Fleet. Among them were thirteen First Grade adepts and three Second Grade adepts.


    The reason they had not fled through the teleportation array in the tower wasn¡¯t that they were brave soldiers who would fight to the very end. Instead, it was because the Crimson n had disrupted all teleportation with a special magical array the moment they arrived at Lakarr.


    The Entom adepts left in Lakarr¨Cwho had nowhere to run¨Chad be stranded pawns. They had no choice but to raise their hands in surrender after the tower¡¯s defenses were broken.


    ording to the World of Adepts¡¯ws, no party was allowed to kill adept captives that had surrendered during times of war. Otherwise, they would face judgment from all other adepts in the world!


    There was no adept who didn¡¯t treasure their own life.


    These adepts might have signed contracts of servitude with the Entom n and had promised decades of service and loyalty in exchange for resources and authority. However, this did not mean that they were required to give their lives for the Entom n.


    That was why their contracts of servitude were consideredpleted the moment the tower was conquered. What was left was to obediently surrender and find some means of bartering for their freedom, either by offering resources in return or something else.


    In the end, if they had been actual core members of the Entom n, they would never have been abandoned and put before the Crimson n¡¯s butcher knife during such precarious times.


    The Crimson Fleet remained stationed in the city for two days as they waited for the other two fleets to rejoin them.


    Mary and Arms had each led a fleet to clear out the two neighboring territories of the Entom n. Judging from their excitement, it was rather evident that their trip had been quite bountiful.


    War was truly the fastest way to gain wealth!


    Even though the Entom n had pulled most of their resources back to Kerslin Castle, what little was left behind was more than enough to fill the pockets of Greem and his forces.


    The three fleets rejoined as one and dallied no longer. They turned and headed straight for Kerslin Castle.


    Only the Crimson n could be so bold and brash in their military movements, all thanks to their numerous Motherships. An ordinary adept n would typically consist of hordes of voodoo beasts,rge subordinate armies, and servants used for menialbor. They would never have been capable of such flexible military maneuvers.


    Those armies were not only unable to fly, but were also extremely slow at marching. They also relied heavily on logistics and supplies.


    If these forces were brought along in a war, the army would have to fight their way through one pass after another slowly. Otherwise, if the supply chain was intercepted, the subordinate army and menial servants would fall apart rapidly.


    However, these problems did not exist for the Crimson Fleet.


    All their armies, forces, supplies, and resources were carried within the Motherships. However, these things would only be revealed when they engaged the enemy in battle. Most of the time, the armies werepletely concealed in the ships.


    Without ground forces burdening the army¡¯s advance, they didn¡¯t have to fight every enemy outpost and fortress along the way.


    After a quick trial of their military power in razing three territories of the Entom n and receiving a particr piece of news that he had been waiting on for a while, Greem immediately gave the order for the Crimson Fleet to advance upon Kerslin Castle.


    The battle at Stoneshard Valley had torn away thest curtain of the Central Lands and revealed the internal conflicts of Zhentarim for all to see.


    Greem¡¯s new force had gathered sufficient power to overturn the incumbent forces of the Central Lands. The battle of Stoneshard Valley had only been the opening act to what was toe!


    However, that battle had been disrupted by far too many external factors, causing the Crimson n¡¯s victory to appear muddy, unclear, and undecided. Thus, the incumbent forces had not been sufficiently impressed to bow down before the Crimson n immediately. That left Zhentarim, and even the entirety of the Central Lands, on the precipice of danger. It was the danger ofplete separation and civil war.


    Should Freed and the others find the opportunity and time to do so, they would certainly bring foreign forces into the conflict at the cost of selling out the Central Lands. When that happened, Zhentarim would not be able to avoid the fate of constant war and fighting!


    If Greem didn¡¯t want the foundations of what would be his empire torn to shreds in a never-ending war, the siege on Kerslin Castle was unavoidable. Moreover, it was a battle he had to win!


    The reason Greem had the army advance so slowly and even stop midway to clear out three of the Entom n¡¯s territory wasn¡¯t that he wasn¡¯t in a hurry. It wasn¡¯t because there was ack of urgency, either. It was because...the perfect time had yet to arrive!


    Greem was waiting.


    He was waiting for news from Alice, for news of the best time to attack!


    Life was like chess, and Fate was the chessboard!


    He was approaching slowly, forcing the enemy to make irrational decisions for the sake of self-preservation.


    Should theymit to these irrational decisions, Greem¡¯s invasion would no longer be the actions of a bully against a victim. He would no longer be a tyrant stirring trouble in the Central Lands in a y for more territory.


    Instead, it would take on a different meaning, that of restoring things to order. Greem would bring about a new order to the Central Lands!


    He wasn¡¯t just doing this for the sake of public opinion. He was doing it as a message to Fate itself.


    At his level, aided with the leader of the Fate Witches, Fate was no longer a mysterious and profound concept far out of his reach. Instead, it was a monumental power that he could grasp and borrow from!


    Ever since he advanced to Fourth Grade, everything Greem had been doing, every n he had put to paper, was out of consideration of the benefits to all adepts in the world. There were many times where he made himself y the character of a patient man who was concerned for the overall state of affairs of the World of Adepts, even at the cost of the Crimson n itself.


    Even though he had the strength of an ultra-powerhouse, he acted as if he was no more than an inconsequential individual in the Central Lands. He established the Horton Magic Academy, sacrificing the Crimson n¡¯s short-term benefits to push for the dismantling of ns. Even the sh between Fourth Grade organizations that broke out after had been a war started on the enemy¡¯s part. The Crimson n had been the defender.


    All of these actions, all of this behavior might make Greem seem passive and perhaps even cowardly. However, they also allowed him to avoid bacsh from the nar consciousness. They established him as the side with justice.


    It was an incredibly important distinction to establish!


    Many powerful and talented adepts in the past had been rejected by the World of Adepts simply because they did not know when to rein in their greed and ambition.


    The reason so many high-grade adepts had been born in the World of Adepts wasn¡¯t for them to stir trouble in their own world fighting amongst themselves. Instead, the World of Adepts regarded these powerful individuals as its servants and defenders. If an alien civilization attempted an invasion, the World of Adepts would be able to put together a force powerful enough to expel the enemy.


    The rtionship between the World of Adepts and the adepts themselves was like that of a beehive and the bees. Only when the bees had grown stronger could they continue to rob more resources and poptions from other worlds to further strengthen the beehive.


    The beehive¡¯s improvement would also benefit the bees greatly, allowing them to fly faster and fight harder.


    The two were in a mutually beneficial rtionship!


    However, ultra-grade powerhouses were still too much of a burden on the world due to the corrosion of theirws. Thus, the World of Adepts had no option but to exile adepts who had advanced beyond the ne¡¯s grade threshold. Otherwise, if these individuals were allowed to wreak havoc within the ne, they would eventually be tumors in the development of the World of Adepts.


    Individuals like these would eventually suffer a bacsh from the Fate powers!


    That was why Greem had to y it carefully, hiding his real ambitions in all sorts of ways.


    Even though any adept could easily see his real ambitions, the fact was that his performance worked well on the nar consciousness. That was because the nar consciousness was a pure utilitarian entity that only cared about the results and not the means by which they were aplished.


    More urately, the nar consciousness had yet to evolve the nuanced, minute emotions of humans. It could only evaluate the value of your existence through the influence of your every action. This trait of the nar consciousness allowed Greem to borrow power from Fate.


    The nar consciousness always regarded itself as a fair and just entity!


    All adepts born in the World of Adepts were its children and its resources. Whether it was Freed and those who represented the incumbent forces, or Greem, who represented the rising force, they were all members of Zhentarim and all a part of itsplicated consciousness.


    If conflict broke out between these two groups, then whosever existence was more beneficial to the World of Adepts would be the one favored by the nar consciousness. Meanwhile, the nar consciousness could move events by manipting the Fate powers.


    By observing and sensing the flow of Fate powers in the Central Lands, Alice could predict the intentions of the nar consciousness.


    When the Crimson Fleet had been slowly sieging Lakarr and left the Crimson n¡¯s headquarters exposed, the intimidated Freed and his allies finally came to a decision. However, even though they believed their decision was unknown to the rest of the world, they could not hide from the omnipresent nar consciousness.


    The once fair and just scales of Fate began to tilt!


    Upon receiving Alice¡¯s notice, Greem hesitated no longer. He immediatelymanded his fleet to attack Kerslin Castle. They advanced at such speed that all his enemies were struck with disbelief.


    Seven days after entering Entom territory, the Crimson Fleet finally arrived at Kerslin Castle!


    ............


    It was a war fortress at high alert.


    All the adept forces that had been pulled back here had been stationed around Kerslin Castle, their backs against numerous war towers and defensive arrays as if they were preparing for a bloody battle to the very end.


    The surroundings of Kerslin Castle had been forged into an imprable fort of steel. Not even a fly could enter or exit freely from here.

 Chapter 1318 - Freed’s Hidden Ace

    Chapter 1318 Freed¡¯s Hidden Ace


    The Crimson Fleet was slowly approaching Kerslin Castle.


    The seven Motherships were of a gigantic, intimidating scale and had slender, aerodynamic designs. Everyone who witnessed them emerge from beyond the horizon couldn¡¯t help but feel a freezing chill rise in their hearts.


    Meanwhile, a flood of steel rumbled across the earth: an army of goblin chariots, eyeball machines, magical machines, and that humongous magical golem dragon. A dust storm was left in their trail.


    It was a terrifying army of over ten thousand magical machines!


    The small castles and fortresses that the Entom n had built along their path were like dirt walls in front of a tractor. They were destroyed by a ferocious torrent of cannon fire and energy beams, unable to stop the approaching army for even a brief instant.


    This ce was already within the core territory of the Entom n.


    They had ruled thisnd for hundreds of years. Naturally, they had also established a robust andprehensive defense system, supported by numerous powerful adept forces.


    Unfortunately, these soldiers were still mortal, after all!


    No matter how powerful these adept forces were, their defensive fortifications would be reduced to ruins by a barrage of cannon fire. Even when theyunched a suicidal charge at the enemy with what courage they had left, their only fate was being riddled with holes by the rain of energy beams.


    The difference in power was simply too vast!


    So vast, in fact, that there was no way topensate for that difference with technique or experience.


    It didn¡¯t matter if the armies hid underground, in the forest, or even if they were invisible. None of them could hide from the Motherships¡¯ scanners, which epassed over thirty spectrums. Nor could they hide from the eyeball machine scouts that scoured every inch ofnd like a swarm of locusts.


    Those who hid underground would be crushed to paste by a simple gravity barrier, joined as one with the dirt and pebbles under the earth. Those hiding in the forest would be greeted by a rain of cannon fire and were sted to bits along with the ancient trees.


    Those who dared to approach the Motherships while invisible were riddled with holes by a storm of energy beams before being trampled into the earth by the magical machine army that marched behind.


    This murderous army of magical machines obediently and efficiently obeyed every order issued from the Motherships and kept all enemies from reaching within a thousand meters. That was because a thousand meters was the ideal firing range for the magic energy cannons!


    As the lead Fourth Grade force of Zhentarim, the Entom n naturally had much more power than this hidden away.


    The moment the magical machine army set foot into core Entom territory, all sorts of traps, ambushes, and special forces repeatedly harassed and attacked the Crimson Fleet.


    The magical machine army was responsible for wiping out all ground forces, while the goblin machinist-sorcerers were responsible for protecting the Crimson Fleet.


    The machinist-sorcerers formed small, mobile patrols and ceaselessly marched on the decks of the Motherships. Should any powerful adept or creature step aboard, the machinist-sorcerers would engage them along with the magical machines on board, keeping the enemy from breaching the hull.


    Crimson adepts of various grades were also on board the ships, forming a vitalponent of the ships¡¯ defense. They were scattered across the many entrances, firmly guarding these doors that led into the ship.


    Their united defense allowed the Crimson Fleet to repeatedly repel the enemy even as they marched deeper and deeper into Entom territory. Again and again, they had thwarted the enemy¡¯s attempts to capture the Motherships.


    Finally, after two days of tiresome traveling, the Crimson Fleet crossed thest fifty kilometers ofnd and arrived at the looming Kerslin Castle.


    The Crimson Fleet quickly stopped and hovered above the clouds, hiding behind the clouds and revealing only a small half of their silver hulls.


    The magical machine army arrived soon as well. They slowly assembled in formation and stood off against the forces of the Entom n. The magical golem dragon stood behind the army, its hundred-meter tall figure standing out as clear as day and its appearance as vicious as any other dragon.


    Just gazing upon its massive and heavy body inflicted equally heavy despair upon the hearts of the enemy forces.


    Perhaps sensing this intimidating aura from the enemy, the earth trembled as the gigantic Kerslin Castle started to animate and transform before the eyes of the Crimson adepts.


    Kerslin Castle.


    The current Kerslin Castle was no longer the previously peaceful and quiet five-story castle. It had be a monster.


    A true monster!


    Kerslin Castle trembled and shook.


    Some of thest sturdy pieces of rock and statues began to peel away from its walls and fell to the ground during the shaking. The main body of Kerslin Castle was struggling and squirming like a humongous monster trying its best to free itself from the earth.


    As its movements were so frantic and violent, the entire earth itself trembled and quaked. From a distance, Kerslin Castle looked like a terrifying monstrosity crawling up from underground. Waterfalls of sand and stone ran down its sides as it rose.


    Several hundred years of silence and inactivity had allowed far too much dust to gather on its body. Now, all of this dust and sand and stone were being brushed off to the ground like a giant stream, slowly revealing the green-gray stone foundations below.


    These stone foundations looked rough and uneven at ces. However, a tremendous surge of energy flowed within them, simr to that of a human¡¯s life energy.


    It was this stream of energy that came to therge pieces of rocks attached to Kerslin Castle¡¯s gigantic body. It was this stream of energy that allowed it to struggle and rise, breaking free of the earth like an actual living being to stand up before everyone¡¯s eyes.


    In just a few moments, Kerslin Castle hade to life, turning into a vicious monster with a body of steel and stone. The castle itself had be its head. An incredibly powerful forceful also appeared around its massive body.


    ¡°Greem, do you think you are the only one with hidden aces up your sleeves?¡± The giant beast stood straight as Freed¡¯s elderly voice came ringing from within Kerslin Castle, ¡°Kehkehkeh! Since you are already here, why not have a taste of the power of an animated war fortress?!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s just an animated war fortress!¡± Greem¡¯s crisp andposed voice also rang out in the air, ¡°Is that all, Freed? Is this the final trump card you have prepared to deal with me? If that is the case, then I will be severely disappointed!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Don¡¯t you underestimate Kerslin. Today, I will stop you dead in your tracks! The Central Lands belong to us, to all adept ns. A person like you should never have been born here in the Central Lands. So, as the Chairman of the Zhentarim Association, I order you...


    ¡°To get out of Zhentarim and leave the Central Lands!¡±


    As Freed shouted with all he had, the animated Kerslin Castle also reared its head and roared like a vicious beast. The two gigantic stone pirs that served as its legs stomped two deep craters into the ground.


    The next second, it roared and picked up two gigantic clumps of dirt from the ground. A sh of yellow light shone over the dirt clumps as they became as hard as stone.


    Phew! Phew!


    The winds howled fiercely.


    Two massive boulders cut across the five-kilometer distance and flew towards Versailles, the Crimson Fleet gship.


    The animated Kerslin Castle was over a thousand meters in height. The boulders it had created were also several dozen meters in diameter. The boulders rubbed against the air as they flew across the sky, and the rocks soon ignited. They rushed up into the sky like two meteors.


    The Motherships were veryrge ships, but they were only two hundred meters long measured from tail to tip. If such massive boulders hit them, they would certainly snap and crash to the ground.


    ¡°Counterattack...counterattack.¡±


    ¡°Activate the defensive barriers.¡±


    ¡°All cannons fire!¡±


    The seven Motherships frantically conducted evasive maneuvers in mid-air, themand halls loud with orders and instructions.


    Multiple defensive barriers appeared, melding together and further enhancing the strength of the shields on each ship.


    The numerous cannons on the front of the ships lit up immediately, letting out a rain of energy fireballs. The fireballs shed with the boulders in mid-air, erupting into fireworks and causing a sea of mes to appear.


    The boulders had shattered into several smaller rocks after the explosion and scattered in every direction.


    Now reduced in size, these smaller rocks crashed on the defensive barrier harmlessly, only causing a few ripples in the shield.


    However, the rain of debris that came after inflicted moderate damage on the Entom n¡¯s fortifications and the magical machine army.


    Greem resided within the Versailles, silently looking at the ferocious monster in the distance. The Chip¡¯s projection of the creature was slowly spinning within his vision.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s analysis, this animated castle now had the terrifying might of an advanced Fourth Grade. In that regard, it was far more potent than the beginner Fourth Grade magical golem dragon.


    More importantly, it wasrger and stronger, as well. If the magical golem dragon shed with the castle, it would probably be ripped apart in less than five minutes and reduced to lifeless metal.


    However, ording to the Chip¡¯s estimations, this wasn¡¯t the limit of the creature yet. If...if Freed was vicious enough to be willing to merge with the animated Kerslin Castle, then that monstrosity could even unleash the might of a peak Fourth Grade.


    Which was to say that Freed could also temporarily possess the power of an ultra-powerhouse!


    An ultra-powerhouse?


    It seemed like ultra-powerhouses were worth less and less these days. There appeared to be someone popping up every other day with the power to rival an ultra-powerhouse.


    Greem grumbled in his mind.


    In all honesty, it would be more than enough for him to be the only pseudo-ultra-powerhouse in the Central Lands. The existence of Mornashen Gaia alone was already a tremendous annoyance. Now, even Freed could transform into an ultra-powerhouse.

 Chapter 1319 - Freed’s Decision

    <h4>Chapter 1319 Freed¡¯s Decision</h4>


    Greem became angrier the more he thought about Freed with the power of an ultra-powerhouse.


    However, he did not reflect on the fact that it was his actions that had pushed Freed to this extreme. If it weren¡¯t for him, Freed would never have shown his ultimate trump card.


    Freed was only intermediate Fourth Grade, after all. Moreover, as his lifespan slowly approached its end, his powers had been degrading, and he was showing signs of regressing in strength. Forcefully assimting Kerslin Castle was not without its cost. In fact, its bacsh was so severe that even Freed would have to think carefully before doing it.


    Despite being an animated fortress, Kerslin Castle¡¯s energy supply came from a magic wellspring underground. It could not venture more than two and a half kilometers away from this leyline node. Moreover, forcefully assimting Kerslin Castle would cost Freed a hundred years of his lifespan.


    In all honesty, Freed truly couldn¡¯t afford to pay such a hefty price!


    He was already eight hundred years old. He had less than two hundred years of life left. If he were to exhaust a hundred years of his lifespan, he would soon face his grave.


    All these considerations had prevented Freed from attempting this assimtion, despite having developed it as a means to push his might to peak Fourth Grade.


    Even after the Crimson Fleet had already advanced into the very hearnd of the Entom n, Freed had still hoped to beat back the enemy with the animated fortress alone. He did not want to assimte with Kerslin Castle forcefully. Until it was absolutely necessary, he desperately did not want to take this extreme course of action.


    Greem seemed to have seen through Freed¡¯s awkward position. Crimson light glowed in his hands, and his lips started moving subtly. He was silently sending a message somewhere.


    Soon, the ferocious magical golem dragon looming beneath the Crimson Fleet charged forward with rumbling steps. It rushed past the magical machines and hurled itself at the gigantic Kerslin Castle like a living meteor.


    It wasn¡¯t the only Fourth Grade creature to step into battle, either.


    A deafening dragon¡¯s roar could be heard in the skies.


    The slender and elegant body of Fourth Grade Thunder Dragon Arms appeared on the edge of one of the Motherships. He roared, letting his overwhelming aura of might fill thend. He beat his wings and dove down from the Mothership at incredible speeds.


    A Fourth Grade golem dragon and a Fourth Grade thunder dragon lord.


    High inside Kerslin Castle, Freed stood upon a throne carved of stone, his face filled with wrinkles and his back hunched over. He caressed two strange crystals embedded in the armrests of the throne, using those as a conduit to control this gigantic monstrosity.


    Upon seeing the two enemies approach, one rumbling across the earth and one diving from the altitudes, the color faded from Freed¡¯s face. He looked down at the runic crystal hanging from his chest and gritted his teeth. He hesitated for a long while, but still, he could not make the decision.


    Finally, he gave up on the impulse to assimte and instead grabbed the two control crystals firmly andmenced his retaliation.


    Kerslin Castle was like a giant, rampaging beast. It roared as its four stone pir legs stomped against the ground, causing a row of earth spikes to appear in the path of the golem dragon, temporarily halting its charge.


    Kerslin Castle then turned around and focused entirely on defending against the diving Fourth Grade dragon.


    The animated Kerslin Castle was over a thousand meters in height, while Fourth Grade Thunder Dragon Lord Arms was no more than thirty-five meters in length from crown to tail. However, Freed was utterly focused, as if a formidable foe had descended.


    The reason for that was simple¨C Arms was indeed a powerful opponent!


    The animated Kerslin Castle was unbelievably humongous and possessed incredible strength. Such a horror was basically a god descended to earth against beings of lower grades. It was invulnerable and omnipotent. However, against an opponent of the same grade, Kerslin Castle was vulnerable due to itsck of agility.


    Kerslin Castle was indeed mighty, but it was pointless if it could notnd a hit on the enemy!


    Under Freed¡¯s control, the monstrous Kerslin Castle stood on its hind legs and swept violently with its front limbs, like two mountains swinging through the air. Its movements were slow, but its massive size and overwhelming Strength allowed it to create violent turbulences in the air.


    An ordinary magical creature would probably have been crushed to a pulp by these violent disruptions, let alone if the legs themselves hit them.


    At this moment, the terrifying power of apex predators like the Fourth Grade dragons was put on disy!


    Arms was like a bolt of blue lightning as he dashed between the two massive legs. Violent electricity crackled around him,shing out and jumping between the two mountainous limbs like silver serpents.


    Every st of electricity caused literal tons of sand and rock to fall off the legs.


    An unending rain of debris continued to fall off the vicious monster¡¯s body.


    A thousand-meter-tall beast and a thirty-five-meter-long blue dragon. They were so different in size that it looked like a mastiff chasing and biting at a dragonfly from a distance. Even though it was clearly Kerslin Castle that had the advantage in size, it was the only one sustaining damage in this battle.


    Arms appeared to be concentrating his attacks on the head of the monstrous beast, which was the body of Kerslin Castle itself. Unfortunately, the gigantic creature was defending itself thoroughly and kept swinging at Arms with its thick front limbs. Most of the time, the beast would rather use its limbs to block Arms¡¯ attack than let a bolt of lightning crash onto Kerslin Castle.


    The battle between the two Fourth Grade continued in this intense and violent fashion.


    The dragon¡¯s breaths were ferocious and concentrated, so powerful that they probably outshone the attacks of most Fourth Grade magical creatures.


    After being circled by the Fourth Grade thunder dragon and showered in that devastating lightning breath, the steelrock that formed most of Kerslin Castle¡¯s body had turned red. Some of it had even softened into molten rock, flowing and sliding off of its body.


    A single, viciously drawn-out dragon breath had cause Kerslin Castle to slim down. Even though the amount of material lost was hardly perceptiblepared to its massive body, the loss was still incredibly painful to Freed, who was controlling Kerslin Castle from within.


    The vicious monstrosity started to lunge and bite with even more ferocity!


    At this point, the magical golem dragon had managed to knock aside the dozen earth spikes that had kept it restrained. It rushed onto the battlefield. The two terrifying magic energy cannons on its back repeatedly fired, sending red fireballs crashing against the body of the stone monstrosity.


    Tons of shattered rock crumbled and fell like andslide. It was a terrifying and shocking sight to behold.


    In the face of the pincer attack, the stone creature turned and abandoned the thunder dragon in favor of the golem dragon. The magical golem dragon that had been hurrying forward without hesitation appeared utterly shocked. It started to retreat without a moment¡¯s dy, fleeing rapidly even as it bombarded the enemy with cannon fire.


    The gigantic beast stopped after pursuing some distance. It then turned back, seemingly as if it couldn¡¯t go too far away from the pit it had crawled out of.


    Upon seeing this, the Crimson n¡¯s adepts were all able to figure out that some sort of tremendous secret was hidden in thatrge pit. The numerous Motherships slowly moved forward, using their giant magic energy cannons to join in the assault on Kerslin Castle.


    One powerful energy beam after another, one magic energy missile soaring through the sky after another, one violent magic spell after another. In the blink of an eye, the monster had been drowned in a hail of magical attacks.


    The Entom adepts who were hiding within Kerslin Castle, in the head of the monstrous beast, gritted their teeth and retaliated with their own magical attacks.


    Bright and violent magic shed in the air, both sides trading attacks with all they had.


    Low-grade adept forces could not even interfere in such a terrifying battle. They could only engage the magical machine army in a corner of the battlefield several kilometers away. Only individuals with exceptional power or strong defenses had the qualifications to step on this battlefield and join in the offense against the hulking monstrosity.


    For a moment, the battlefield red with light and fire. Battlecries could be heard everywhere, and shockwaves from erupting spells filled the air.


    After half an hour of arduous fighting, Kerslin Castle remained like a dog on a leash, unable to reap a single reward for all the fighting it had done. Fury surged through Freed¡¯s body. He looked at the ferocious enemies all around him and finally bit the bullet.


    He plunged his left hand into his chest and ripped a gash in his own body. Strangely enough, no blood flowed from the wound.


    Freed gritted his teeth, grabbed the runic crystal, and stabbed it into his heart.


    ¡°Forbidden Spell, Union of Life.¡±


    Freed shouted the spell¡¯s words, and the magical patterns on the crystal lit up in order, outlining an exceedinglyplex and mysterious array.


    Freed shuddered when the array finally lit up in its entirety. His appearance seemed to age at a visible rate. His skin was instantly covered in more wrinkles and, now, even dark spots like the bark of trees when winter came.


    However, with the runic crystal as a perfect conduit between him and the massive Kerslin Castle, there was no longer any buffer between them. Their consciousness and aura merged together, and the two entities were now one.


    Kerslin Castle suddenly froze.


    The vicious beast protected Kerslin Castle beneath its arms, silently enduring the dragon breath, the giant magic energy cannon shots, and the barrage of spells.


    Tons and tons of boulders fell off, slowly growing into a hill at the feet of the creature.


    However, Kerslin Castle seemed to have animated once more and slowly sunk into the body of the gigantic hulk. It vanished without a trace.


    The next second, the vicious beast came to life again!


    It stood on its hind legs and converted entirely to a humanoid form.


    The rocks attached to its body moved and rearranged into the shape of a human¡¯s head, body, and limbs. Moreover, these rocks appeared to take on life as they moved, gradually growing more active and rapid as they slid across the monster¡¯s body.


    The monster¡¯s aura was growing even more violent, oppressive, and heavy. Everyone who set eyes upon it felt like they were losing their will to battle.


    Peak Fourth Grade!


    At this moment, the animated Kerslin Castle had gained the overwhelming power of a peak Fourth Grade!

 Chapter 1320 - Luring The Tiger From Its Den

    Chapter 1320 Luring The Tiger From Its Den


    Kerslin Castle had truly be a Fourth Grade entity now!


    That gigantic, four-hundred-meter-tall stone body covered in dark red lines, those limbs so thick they resembled entire mountains...even though it had shrunk a little in size, the control it had over its body waspletely different now.


    Arms had an incredibly sharpbat intuition and sense of danger. He was the first to notice the difference in Kerslin Castle. He rapidly beat his bright blue wings, circling the stone giant as he subtly increased the distance between them.


    The clumsy golem dragon did not have the same sense of danger. It continued to charge forward recklessly, firing massive energy fireballs endlessly from the two magic energy cannons on its back.


    The energy fireballs no longer caused rocks and boulders to fall off of the stone giant¡¯s body. Dark-red magical lines appeared all over the giant¡¯s body, absorbing most of the energy fireballs¡¯ damage.


    The remainder of the energy from the eruptions only sted off a few pebbles and barely damaged the giant.


    The stone giant remained unmoving and then abruptly pointed its palm at the golem dragon.


    A sandstorm engulfed the golem dragon.


    Before the golem dragon could escape, a forest of earth spikes stabbed up from underground, snapping loudly against its metal body. In just a single move, numerous dents had appeared on the golem dragon¡¯s body.


    ¡°Die!¡±


    Freed¡¯s low voice bellowed from within the stone giant.


    The stone giant then opened its palm and swung it towards the golem dragon.


    There were at least one and a half kilometers between them.


    The earth trembled as a shocking amount of concentrated earth elementium surged out of the ground, forming into a hundred-meter-wide palm that crashed down upon the golem dragon.


    The golem dragon had been knocked around by the dust storm and earth spikes earlier and wasn¡¯t standing firmly on its feet. However, it showed no fear in the face of the enemy¡¯s vicious attack.


    The golem dragon reared its metal head and let out a formless sonic wave from its maw. The magic energy cannons on its back started firing at maximum frequency. There were so many fireballs they practically formed a line of me that sted against the giant hand crushing down from above.


    Dong!


    The sonic wave and the magic energy cannonsbined finally shattered the earth hand.


    The elementium hand of earth elementium copsed, and the resulting wave of dirt pushed the golem dragon thirty meters away. In the end, the golem dragon had to nt its metal limbs deep into the earth, gouging deep ditches into the ground until it came to a stop.


    The golem dragon shook its body and cast off the dirt. It looked at the suddenly more powerful enemy in the distance, and its own energy aura began to rise.


    The magical golem dragon had not been damaged much in the exchange earlier. However, in the eyes of observers, the stone giant had easily knocked the golem dragon away with a single strike.


    It was an incredible humiliation for the magical goblins piloting the golem dragon!


    The golem dragon opened its maw and let out a loud roar that reverberated through the air. It then shook its tail and lunged at the enemy.


    Arms also folded his wings and dove downwards, forcing the stone giant to go on the defensive with a ferocious assault.


    A metal dragon, a stone giant, and a pureblood dragon. These three entities of entirely different natures of existence shed together once again in this manner.


    Freed, who had thoroughly assimted with Kerslin Castle, could now freely control this hulking creature. It stood upon the earth, continually epting the leyline energy being siphoned from underground to maintain such a massive body¡¯s energy requirements.


    Every single action taken by Kerslin Castle moved the earth elementium, turning it into giant boulders that flew at the enemy, transforming it into stone spears with incredible piercing power, or casting a rain of rocks over an entire region.


    With Kerslin Castle¡¯s ability to magnify elementium power, Freed¡¯s control over earth elementium grew stronger and stronger!


    Moreover, due to the tough stone body of Kerslin Castle, neither the thunder dragon¡¯s breath, the golem dragon¡¯s wild thrashing, or the Motherships¡¯ bombardment could truly damage it. None of their attacks could prate the hundred-meter-thick body and hurt its soul origin.


    Meanwhile, Freed stood firmly at the edge of the pit, alternating freely between ranged attacks and melee strikes. Either way, with every move, he sent ripples throughout the ranks of the Crimson n.


    The golem dragon was forged entirely out of metal. It was able to endure Freed¡¯s earth elementium attacks. However, Arms and the Motherships appeared too frail in front of these violent attacks. If any of the stone giant¡¯s attacks were tond, they would cause unimaginable devastation.


    Two of the Motherships had already been hit by Freed¡¯s spears and were forced to retreat from battle. If it weren¡¯t for the stone giant not venturing too far away from the pit, the Crimson Fleet would already have suffered numerous casualties!


    The reason the battle appeared so one-sided had to do with the Crimson n¡¯s advantageous position.


    The Crimson n held the absolute upper hand in this war. They had rampaged their way through Entom n territory without so much as a single effective opposition.


    Seen from above, vast swathes ofnd around Kerslin Castle had already been conquered by the magical machine armies. The Entom n¡¯s adept forces were either conquered or routed. Their figures could be seen running from the Crimson n¡¯s pursuit, both in the air and on the ground around the main battlefield.


    There was no possibility that Arms would ever fight in a desperate and suicidal fashion against the opponent, given such circumstances.


    However, when he started pulling his punches, the beginner Fourth Grade golem dragon would have to face the full wrath of therger, more powerful Kerslin Castle alone. Naturally, it felt like it was being countered in every aspect and was having a very awkward time in this fight.


    Greem simply chuckled at the sight of this from within the Versailles. He suddenly stood up from his chair and appeared at the front of the deck in a sh of fire.


    He did not transform into a me giant, nor did he cast any fire spells. He simply stood there, and Freed¡¯s heart trembled. The stone giant¡¯s attacks became less bold and unrestrainedpared to before.


    Even Freed felt powerless at the continuous appearance of new high-grade opponents.


    He had to keep forty percent of his attention on the legendary fire adept, thirty percent on the sly Fourth Grade thunder dragon, twenty percent on the stubborn golem dragon, and thest ten percent on the movements of the Motherships in the sky.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. These entities were all capable of inflicting damage to him. Of course, the attacks from the other insignificant ¡®ants¡¯ couldn¡¯t even tickle him, let alone leave any sort of damage.


    However, no matter how careful Freed was, Legendary Fire Adept Greem seemed to be toying with him. Greem simply stood on the deck and stared with a smile on his face, as if he had no intention of joining the fight at all.


    Could it be?


    Could Greem¡¯s injuries remain, and he was only putting on appearances?


    The moment the idea was born, it wrapped itself around Freed¡¯s mind like a sinister serpent. Even as he continued to attack and defend, he found himself repeatedly wondering about the answer to this question.


    Was it a trap, or was it an opportunity?


    Freed did not know, and there was no way he could.


    The loss of a hundred years of his life span had caused his hatred for Greem to reach a peak. If there were even the slightest of chance he could bring death to this man, he would never give up on it. In fact, he would be more than willing to pay the price for it!


    There wasn¡¯t much else that Freed had left to lose now!


    Upon making up his mind, Freed started to move in the direction of the Versailles subtly.


    Once he had reached within distance to strike, Freed left behind the thunder dragon and golem dragon without hesitation. The massive body of the stone giant instantly crossed a kilometer of distance. Upon seeing the Versailles within striking distance, Freed roared loudly.


    ¡°Die, Greem!¡±


    Freed gathered a tremendous amount of earth elementium and turned it into elementium boulders, which he shot at Greem.


    In the blink of an eye, the massive Mothership had been surrounded by a shocking number of boulders and rocks. Moreover, as Freed continued to manipte them, they pressed down on the Mothership¡¯s shields further, as if intent on crushing the entire ship t.


    The unique power of earth elementium to slow things down instantly wrapped around Greem.


    If Greem were caught unaware and did not have time to unleash the power of an ultra-powerhouse, it was very likely he would be injured by this attack.


    However, Greem showed no signs of fear in the face of this terrifying assault. Instead, he had a nasty smile on his face, like his evil n had just seeded.


    With the Chip¡¯s aid, the stone giant¡¯s subtle movements towards the Mothership had not escaped his eyes.


    However, for the sake of ending this battle faster, Greem decided to put on a show for the enemy!


    Upon seeing the terrifying mountain crashing down upon him and sensing the overwhelming earth elementium, Greem took out a strange object in the shape of a water drop and waved it.


    The next second, a looming water elemental appeared out of thin air.


    The light green water elemental was over a hundred meters tall. It wore several strange metal bands of intricate design on its wrists, ankles, waist, and neck.


    The water elemental roared and summoned a fearsome torrent of water.


    An endless stream of elementium water surged out of thin air, forming a ferocious tide that crashed against the mountain.


    Water and earth shed on the battlefield.


    A terrifying shockwave rushed through thend. Every substance caught in the shockwave was crushed to pieces and blown away.


    Numerous sandstorms and water vorticesshed at each other like two venomous vipers, cleansing the entirend thoroughly.


    The five Motherships activated their barriers but were still blown away like tiny ships in a storm. The violent sh of powers had inflicted severe damage, even to the Motherships.


    The Watersoul Jade!


    It was the Fourth Grade item that Greem had obtained from the Spirit World; it possessed the might of an all-out attack from Water Diviner Rauluns. Even though Rauluns was not at peak Fourth Grade, he was still a powerful individual of advanced Fourth Grade.


    Thus, Greem was sessfully able to survive Freed¡¯s attack with the power of the Watersoul Jade.


    Upon seeing the stone giant intent on continuing its attack, Greem couldn¡¯t help but smile bitterly and point behind Freed.


    Freed turned back in horror, only to see Mary¡¯s petite body disappear into the pit like an arrow. Moreover, at the instant she dove into the pit, Mary even had the time to turn around and wave at Freed.


    Freed, who was now assimted with the stone giant, instantly turned pale in the face!

 Chapter 1321 - Unexpected Backlash

    Chapter 1321 Unexpected Bacsh


    ¡°No............¡±


    Freed¡¯s heartrending scream lingered in the air, but there was nothing he could do to stop this terrifying nightmare of his turning into reality.


    Freed had be truly powerful after assimting with Kerslin Castle. In fact, to some extent, the animated fortress¡¯ power was far superior to the Gold Titan.


    If Kerslin Castle did not have the weakness of being unable to leave its leyline node, it would probably be the nightmare of all ultra-grade powerhouses!


    Even when fighting two-against-one with the golem dragon and the thunder dragon, Freed had not suffered any damage. To some extent, he was even suppressing the golem dragon.


    However, a pseudo-ultra-grade powerhouse forcibly created through forbidden means was ultimately not the real thing. If anyone were to target the ws in itsbat system, its weaknesses would bepletely exposed, and everything would copse.


    That was the situation with Freed and Kerslin Castle.


    There were two irreparable and innate weaknesses to Kerslin Castle. The first was its inability to leave its leyline node, and the second was its massive drain on its host¡¯s life energy due to its enormous size.


    If the enemy caught either of these weaknesses, it would be the end of Kerslin Castle, let alone the fact that both of them had been exposed!


    Not long after Mary entered the pit, the entire ground started to quake violently.


    The towering stone giant that seemed almost like an ancient giante to life copsed in a series of violent quakes. The massive amount of steelrock, no longer bound with earth elementium, crashed onto the ground. Giant, hundred-meter-tall mushroom dust clouds rose into the air.


    Even as the dust rose into the air, everyone could still hear Freed¡¯s tragic and sorrowful howl.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Having assimted with Kerslin Castle, the body of the stone giant had be Freed¡¯s own body. Now that the stone giant¡¯s body was falling apart due to the loss of its energy supply, Freed was practically experiencing torture. It was like he was being skinned and cut apart alive.


    Without the incredible spiritual resilience of a Fourth Grade adept, the agony of this process would have broken Freed¡¯s mind and reduced him to an idiot!


    Even so, the waves of pain were still unbearable for Freed. The entire battlefield reverberated with his horrible, terrifying screams.


    The scarier part was the fact that the alchemical lifeform that was Kerslin was actually attempting to take control of Freed¡¯s consciousness in his moment of weakness. Kerslin had developed an independent consciousness and intelligence, after all.


    Freed¡¯s Spirit, his consciousness, magical knowledge, emotions, and memory. Everything¨Cabsolutely everything¨Cin Freed¡¯s mind had be a battlefield between these two entities. Every fragment of memory, every strand of emotion, every trace of understanding; all these things that had once belonged exclusively to Freed had be shared property of the two of them.


    For the first time since his assimtion, Freed felt genuine fear.


    He realized that damned Kerslin wasn¡¯t just robbing him of his memories and emotions. It was even attempting to wipe out his very existence. If Kerslin took away all he owned, then everything that was signified by the name of Freed would no longer exist. A new lifeform known as Kerslin would appear in the world with all his memories, feelings, and knowledge.


    ¡°No...you bastard! These are all mine!¡±


    A new battle erupted amidst the giant, crumbling mountain. The animated Kerslin Castle squirmed and struggled. All the doors and windows leading to the outside world had shut tight. The stone walls and corridors were now covered in a soft, fleshy membrane. These membrane walls were coated in a slimy alchemical solution, making the castle itself seem like the intestines of a living being.


    The Entom n adepts who had been stationed in various rooms and outposts across Kerslin Castle were horrified to find that this membrane was enveloping them. If their body came into contact with the membrane, they would be stuck, and their flesh would slowly melt away.


    With every adept that was dissolved, Kerslin would be able to obtain everything they owned. Their tremendous Spirit, knowledge fragments, feelings, and their understanding of magic!


    However, the powerful Entom adepts would not just stand by and watch this happen either. They took out their magic staffs, wands, scrolls, and treasures and began to attack Kerslin Castle with all they had.


    For a moment, the sound and light of magical explosions could be seen everywhere in the already tattered Kerslin Castle.


    Unfortunately, Kerslin, who had already nned to devour all of them a long time ago, would not let them escape its body. Specially trained voodoo beasts swarmed out of secret passages in the castle, attacking the adepts while they were glued to the membrane.


    The battle instantly reached its most intense state!


    The Entom n adepts had been fighting furiously to repel the Crimson n invaders just moments earlier. They were now fighting even more fervently, but their opponent was once an ally of theirs.


    No. More urately, while they had been fighting earlier, they were now struggling for their very lives!


    To preserve their lives, to protect their memories and emotions, to retain their very existence, all of them struggled with all their might!


    There were many adepts who chose to self-destruct when death was inevitable.


    They would rather blow themselves to bits and wipe themselves out of existence than fall into the hands of the enemy and be toyed around with!


    Unfortunately, their sacrifice was destined to be in vain.


    The moment their defeat was certain, Kerslin had sealed the entirety of Kerslin Castle.


    From then on, the castle had turned into a sealed dimension. Every soul or consciousness that died here would not be able to escape. They could only hide and scurry, waiting until the moment they were devoured and digested.


    Meanwhile, the desperate struggle for dominance between Freed and Kerslin continued in the core chamber of Kerslin Castle.


    Even though Freed had barely any of his lifespan left, he was unwilling to just let go of thesest fifty years of his life. Nor was he willing to just let everything he had worked for over the past millennium fall into the hands of someone else.


    Two mental consciousnesses of entirely different natures tussled furiously in this room, fighting for control over the consciousness of this powerful alchemical lifeform created through assimtion.


    One would emerge as the victor, and the other would forever be damned.


    There was no room for peace or co-existence. There was only victory and defeat, life and death!


    ............


    The sound of rumbling. Falling rocks could be heard.


    Several boulders piled at the top of the mountain of debris were blown away, revealing the nearly squashed Kerslin Castle.


    Strangely enough, all of Kerslin Castle¡¯s windows and doors had vanished. The five-story tower stood there upon the pile of boulders, with not a single entrance or exit.


    Dong. Dong. Dong.


    Countless light-blue traction beams shot toward the mountain, causing tens of thousands of rocks and boulders to levitate into the air.


    All the shattered steelrock was cast away. Finally, Kerslin Castle was also levitated into the sky, exposed to the many curious eyes below.


    ¡°Master, what is with this castle? Do you need me to crush it for you?¡± Fourth Grade Thunder Dragon Lord Arms couldn¡¯t help but open his big dragon eyes wide. He looked at this strange alchemical castle curiously, confused about what he was seeing.


    Could Freed have been dumb enough to think that sealing the castle off would be enough to protect him?


    He¡¯s a Fourth Grade adept! He¡¯s not that dumb, is he?


    Arms mumbled to himself in his mind and reached out with a sharp w to poke the castle. The magical aura radiating from the tower unsettled him. It was as if something extremely terrifying was happening inside!


    ¡°He¡¯s right, Greem; what happened to Freed? Why is his soul aura getting weaker and weaker?¡± It was Bloody Queen Mary who spoke this time, having emerged from the pit.


    She waspletely covered in dust and dirt. Even her hair seemed caked in mud. However, she appeared exceptionally excited and chirpy, tossing around a transparent stone in her right hand.


    Every time the stone trembled, you could feel an extremely pure surge of magical energy radiate into the air. You could feel your magic energy replenish rapidly just by being in its vicinity.


    ¡°A Gem of Power? ! And a Gem of Power that has almost turned into a World Stone!¡± Arms had always loved wondrous treasures and artifacts. His eyes immediately turned into gleaming gems as he leaned forward with his nose to take a big sniff.


    The next moment, Arms stood on his hind legs and shouted out loud< ¡°Master, I want this stone.¡±


    Greem, who was slowly drifting down from the Versailles, let out an unamused grunt.


    ¡°That¡¯s Mary¡¯s loot! You can talk to her if you want it. Don¡¯t bother me while I¡¯m appraising this castle!¡±


    Arms¡¯ gaze turned toward Mary, and the pretty womanid out her conditions in the sweetest, most innocent of voices.


    ¡°Two thousand five hundred kilograms of dragon blood.¡±


    Arms¡¯ face turned dark, and he replied with a middle finger!


    Greem ignored Arms and Mary¡¯s banter and focused power to his eyes. Intense blue light shone out of his eyes, slowly scanning the interior of Kerslin Castle.


    He was initially shocked but quickly shook his head and sighed. A cold and sarcastic smile appeared on his face.


    ¡°Teacher, is Freed inside? What do you think? Should we break in forcibly?¡± Meryl beat her red wings, slowly approaching in her half-dragon form as she asked in a soft voice.


    Everything that had happened on the Fourth Grade battlefield was simply beyond her imagination!


    She had no clue what was happening, how the fight started, how it had gone, and how it ended. All she knew was that the greatest enemy of their excursion this time might be hiding in this strange castle.


    The problem was that her teacher¡¯s expressions were too unusual and cryptic!


    Had they won yet? Was the battle over already?


    Greem shook his head again and sighed.


    ¡°That foolish Freed. He let this alchemical lifeform learn of too much knowledge that it should not have learned, and allowed it to obtain too much power that it should not have had. Hmph! It serves him right to suffer from this bacsh!


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to worry about Freed any longer. We should be preparing a coffin for him! Er...if there¡¯s still a corpse left by the end of this, that is.¡±

 Chapter 1322 - Commotion in the Central Lands

    <h4>Chapter 1322 Commotion in the Central Lands</h4>


    When news of the Entom n¡¯s decimation got out, the entirety of Zhentarim was shocked!


    The organizations that had allied with Freed to suppress the Crimson n now lived in perpetual fear. They were terrified of the day they would wake up to find the Crimson Fleet appearing before them.


    Then, something happened that struck even more despair into their hearts. On the second day after the Entom n¡¯s destruction, the Fabres n announced their eptance of the Crimson n as a sovereign force. They willingly submitted as a subordinate organization and sent out many of their n adepts to join the Horton Magic Academy.


    These adepts undid their servitude contracts with the Fabres n and joined Horton Magic Academy as free adepts. These actions thoroughly exined the thoughts of Fourth Grade Body-Refining Adept Fabres.


    Following the Fabres n¡¯s announcement, Adept Ker of the Dener n also made a simr announcement and sent Dener n adepts to join Horton Magic Academy as free adepts.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it either!


    Soon, a third force surfaced and dered their stance.


    This third organization was the well-known Molten Fire City.


    Over the years, Molten Fire City had maintained good rtions with the Crimson n. The trade agreement between the two organizations had benefited both parties greatly. The Crimson n obtained the irreceable Queyras alloy, while Molten Fire City gained a steady supply of dragon materials.


    Both parties needed each other and formed a strong rtionship. Even when Freed promised all sorts of benefits to Alfred, Lord of Molten Fire City, he was still unable to sway him to his side.


    Now that the Crimson n¡¯s unification of the Central Lands seemed like an inevitability, Lord Alfred knew what choice he had to make. He had been observing from the sidelines for a long time, after all.


    While many ns were still hesitating, Molten Fire City became the third auxiliary organization to submit to the Crimson n.


    A revolution wasing!


    In the past, only the smarter and sharper high-grade adepts could vaguely sense this powerful, rising force that threatened to change the Central Lands. Now, almost any adept that wasn¡¯t an idiot could feel the ferocious storm brewing on the horizon.


    Threerge adept ns had submitted to the Crimson n in session. It was the clearest sign of all that pointed to the future of the Central Lands.


    The Crimson n. Horton Magic Academy.


    These two names became the most hotly discussed topics among adepts of the Central Lands!


    As long as it was a ce where adepts gathered, you would find them talking long and hard about these two entities. They represented mystery and power, as well as the future of the Central Lands.


    However, in the thirty-three regions of the Central Lands, there were over a dozen Fourth Grade organizations and more than a thousand organizations and ns of smaller scales. To unify such a chaotd and establish a singr, gigantic, and effective organization was no easy task.


    Setting aside everything, even the numerous intermediate and small adept ns were often backed by tremendously powerful individuals. It was very easy to make enemies out of ancient adepts that had lived for several thousands of years and who now resided beyond the realms.


    The Sarubo n was one such example.


    The Sarubo n¡¯s headquarters was located in Feidnan City. They possessed no more than one to two hundred square kilometers of worldly territory and less than a hundred n adepts. There were many such intermediate ns all over the Central Lands, with seemingly nothing special about them.


    However, if the Crimson n were to wipe out the Sarubo n, they would inevitably make an enemy out of the Sixth Grade Great Adept Sarubo, who remained alive in space.


    Sarubo might be beyond the realms and unable to return to the World of Adepts.


    However, should he fly into a rage, he could easily cause trouble for Greem by ravaging all of the Crimson n¡¯s assets in space. Even if Greem could reign supreme in the Central Lands, he would bear the risk of losing everything he owned in space.


    Moreover, given the rate at which Greem was improving, it was only a matter of time until he advanced past Fourth Grade and stepped beyond the realms. If Greem were to wipe out all of these ns indiscriminately, the moment he passed into space, he would be swarmed by countless Great Adepts looking to settle their grudges!


    Even Greem felt his heart beat nervously at the thought of being surrounded by an army of Great Adepts in space.


    This forceful invasion method was untenable, so Greem had no choice but to pursue a roundabout alternative. He was using Horton Magic Academy as a gentle means of obtaining control and authority over the Central Lands.


    He wouldn¡¯t devour the ns employing force. No. Everyone wouldpete fairly, and he would draw away all the talent of the Central Lands with a superior learning environment, more bountiful adept resources, and excellent mentors.


    Horton Magic Academy would grow stronger and more influential through this fashion.


    Meanwhile, the other ns would fall into stagnation due to theck of fresh blood and the inability to grow or develop. In doing so, the Great Adepts could not assign any me to Greem.


    In summary, the Great Adepts¡¯ bloodline descendants could be wiped out, but it would not be at the hands of the Crimson n.


    It was out of such consideration that Greem gave up on the development of the Crimson n and instead focused on promoting Horton Magic Academy!


    Greem had no other option. He didn¡¯t want to be a scurrying rat forced to flee everywhere from vengeful Great Adepts.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t out of fear of the Sixth Grade Great Adept Sarubo, Greem would have already ripped up the Sarubo n by its roots. There was plenty of bad blood between them.


    Everything was rted!


    These ns backed by Great Adepts might look like roadblocks in the Crimson n¡¯s path to unification. They were like nasty hedgehogs that Greem would rather not touch. However, conversely, they were also a sort ofwork resource for Greem.


    If the Great Adepts in space were willing to make an ally out of Greem, Greem didn¡¯t mind helping their bloodline descendants. However, if they were unreasonable, Greem could simply wipe out their bloodline and cut off theirst connection with the World of Adepts.


    As for why the bloodline descendants of Great Adepts would often go into decline? That was one of the unsolved mysteries of the World of Adepts since time immemorial!


    For one, giving birth was extremely difficult.


    Those who could rise beyond Fourth Grade and be a Great Adept could no longer be called humans. They might retain humanoid forms, but you would find no gic sequences or even organs that bore any resemnce to humans if one were to dissect them.


    Ultra-Grade adepts had already walked too far down the path of modification and transformation; the very life essence of these individuals had changed. What human female could possibly give birth to a true human child with these Great Adepts?


    Ordinary women and low-grade adepts would not be able to endure a Great Adept¡¯s overwhelming life essence. If such life essence was imnted in their bodies, they would die not muchter.


    Meanwhile, if a Great Adept couple was to procreate, the odds of giving birth to an ordinary human baby were incredibly slim!


    That was why the descendants of Great Adepts in the World of Adepts were mostly descendants that had been left behind while they were still weak. After several thousand years and numerous generations, the bloodline simrity between the Great Adepts and their descendants was practically gone.


    Moreover, the more powerful an individual was, the weaker their children would be if born as ordinary humans!


    That was why even those descendants that bore the name of Great Adeptswere, in fact, frequently in decline over generations. It was even possible that the Great Adept that left behind this bloodline would refuse to acknowledge these people as their descendants.


    Secondly, it was incredibly difficult to pass down bloodline legacies.


    Anyone that could be a Great Adept was once a proud prodigy. The path they took to sess was often unique and irreplicable.


    It was the main reason why the appearance of a Great Adept did not necessarily mean a continuous stream of sessors that would rise after them!


    It wasn¡¯t that these Great Adepts didn¡¯t want such a thing to happen. They were unable to realize such ambitions.


    The Great Adepts often used incredibly rare resources and unique treasures to cross the threshold that they had. Where were their descendants supposed to find these same resources to walk down the same path?


    The appearance of every Great Adept gave a sample and reference for their descendants to study. However, they could only serve as references, after all. They were very few sessors who had managed to be Great Adepts by following precisely the same path as their ancestors had taken.


    The main reason behind this was that all Great Adepts kept their abilities and means of advancement a secret. They would never let the world know of such secrets.


    Their enemies would be able to counter their abilities with such information. That was why all Great Adepts went to great lengths to hide the secrets in their development path. Without these details, the information that Great Adepts provided to the outside world was often iplete and misleading.


    Anyone that tried to advance to Fifth Grade through the methods they revealed was destined to suffer, fail, and even die.


    Take Greem, for instance. If he did indeed manage to advance to Fifth Grade in the future, the Orb of the Fire God would almost certainly y a central role. However, where would he go to find a second Orb of the Fire God for his disciple or sessor to use?!


    Thus, upon reaching Fourth Grade, there would only be a vague direction left for you. There would no longer be a fixed path that you could always count on as a reference!


    With the fall of the Entom n, the Central Lands seemed to have been enveloped in mist and clouds. A storm was brewing.


    It was now time for everyone to choose sides!


    Either join the resistance and unite to push back against the Crimson n, or lower your heads and acknowledge the Crimson n¡¯s rule over Zhentarim. To the many ns of the Central Lands, neither of these options was desirable.


    Thus, even while the Crimson Fleet was still hovering above the ruins of the Entom n, messengers from various Zhentarim ns had already hurried over. They couldn¡¯t wait to discuss the matter of cooperation with the ruler of the Crimson n.


    Naturally, all of them got to witness the devastation inflicted on the Entom n in person.

 Chapter 1323 - Forbidden Life

    <strong>Chapter 1323 Forbidden Life</strong>


    The mes burning on the ground had yet to extinguish.


    Plumes of ck smoke lingered above the battlefield.


    There were no remnants of human architecture within fifty kilometers of Kerslin Castle. Even the once green fields had been reduced to scorched earth. Patches of ck marks designated what was once thend of the Entom n.


    However, Kerslin Castle remained standing upon this lifeless in. In fact, this castle didn¡¯t seem to show any sign of damage at all.


    An old castle could remain in the center of such a ravaged and devastated battlefield? Moreover, everyone knew that his Kerslin Castle had animated into a raging stone giant and fought a ferocious war against the Crimson n.


    Even though it was obvious that Kerslin Castle had its secrets, what happened next was truly mysterious. After the battle concluded, not a single core adept of the Entom n managed to escape from the castle. They had vanished without a trace. It utterly confused and terrified all the observers. They could feel a genuine chill in their hearts.


    Had the Crimson n reached such heights of power that they could wipe out everyst member of the Entom n without leaving a single survivor? These conjectures struck even more fear into the hearts of Mirva and the others. Consequently, the voices calling for resistance against the Crimson n grew softer still.


    At this point, even the few organizations that had been firm in their hostile stance against the Crimson n had fallen silent. It seemed like they wanted to stay low for the moment and avoid being made the second example by the Crimson n!


    The reason they had opposed the Crimson n was to avoid losing the authority and power they possessed. However, if the result of a violent opposition was death and extermination, it was apletely different story. With their thousands of years of lifespan, it was too high of a price for a Fourth Grade adept to pay.


    Freedom was indeed important, but if the price were their own life, then no Fourth Grade adept would ever agree to such an exchange!


    Compared to losing their lives, submitting to Greem and bing subordinates of the Crimson n no longer seemed as uneptable.


    They had been far too used to being the sovereigns of the Central Lands, which resulted in a bias of their understanding of the world. They had never witnessed the terror of an ultra-grade powerhouse and believed that they could force Greem to submit just by uniting their forces.


    The battle at Stoneshard Valley and the battle at Kerslin Castle hadpletely shattered their false pride and peace. It also allowed them to truly understand the might of an ultra-grade powerhouse. Ultra-grade powerhouses were no longer the same species as Fourth Grade adepts. They existed on two ends of the food chain. One was a predator, and the other was no more than pathetic prey.


    This understanding upended the worldview they had formed over the past few centuries. It also allowed them to recognize their folly and childishness. The reason Zhentarim had managed to exist for tens of thousands of years wasn¡¯t because they¨Cthe Fourth Grade adepts¨Chad intimidated the three major organizations. No, it was because the three major powers maintained a fine and delicate bnce between themselves.


    Now that the bnce had been broken, the future path of Zhentarim had be an important question in the minds of all Central adepts!


    Would they choose Greem, or would they choose one of the three major organizations? Or perhaps they would remain as fence-sitters, letting the Central Lands be a bloody battlefield where all three major powers fought for control?


    All the Fourth Grade adepts that had appeared in the past had instinctually rejected the very idea of unifying the Central Lands. They had always preferred the calm and tranquility of the status quo. Now, even they had no option but to consider this question seriously.


    If they weren¡¯t willing to make a decision, someone woulde along to make it for them. When that happened, those adepts wouldn¡¯t have many options left.


    Just like that, the question of whether the Central Lands would be unified had be an artifact of the past. Now, people were discussing how unification would happen!


    Whether Greem would be a tyrant, whether the Crimson n would assimte every single n, or what kind of position would adept ns have in the Central Lands in the future. These questions burned furiously in the back of the minds of the leaders of the many ns. They wanted the answers to them desperately.


    Of course, the only one who had the answers was the Crimson n!


    On the eleventh day since the Entom n¡¯s extermination, and the second day since Molten Fire City announced its subordination to the Crimson n, countless anonymous messengers swarmed to Kerslin Castle. They all wanted to meet the victorious Greem and obtain practical promises from him.


    The moment the messengers arrived at where the Crimson Fleet was stationed, the first thing they saw was the perfectly untouched Kerslin Castle.


    Many of the messengers who often visited Kerslin Castle back in the day couldn¡¯t help but be curious. The castle before them looked exactly the same as it always had in the past. It had not changed at all. However, when their gaze lingered on the castle, they couldn¡¯t help but feel an odd sense of strangeness.


    It was almost as if this was the first time they wereying eyes on Kerslin Castle!


    The messengers of the various ns stepped into Kerslin Castle with this strange feeling weighing on them.


    The feeling grew even more intense once they entered the castle.


    The same castle gates, the same za, the same light-golden stone corridors, the same spiritual suppression, and even the same magical aura flowed through the walls. Yet, what filled the messengers¡¯ noses was a thick scent of blood. What lingered near their ears were the screams and cries of undead wraiths, and what always remained within the corner of their eyes were seemingly crying spirits.


    All of this was evidence that a horrifying blood ritual had taken ce here. Moreover, the victims of this ritual had likely been those missing Entom adepts.


    Two hundred adepts, seven of which had been Third Grade. An entire army of adepts had just been sacrificed through this blood ritual.


    The messengers couldn¡¯t help but feel a deep chill in their hearts at the very thought of this. Even their steps seemed stiffer.


    Naturally, Greem couldn¡¯t meet each and every messenger of the numerous ns personally. Only messengers of the major ns could have a personal audience with him. The smaller ns and organizations could only visit Meryl and ry their secret terms and agreements to her.


    As a great battle had just concluded here, there were only ruins all around them. These messengers had nowhere to stay but Kerslin Castle. However, after just a single night, all the adepts moved out of Kerslin Castle.


    They would rather spend a night in the wild under a mud house eating rations than take another step into Kerslin Castle. That one night of endless nightmares had almost driven them insane.


    A certain adept was spreading a rumor of what he had experienced. On the night he was in the castle, he had woken up in the middle of the night. He was horrified to find that he was no longer lying in hisrge,fortable bed; he was bathing in a pool of blood.


    There were caved-in heads, severed limbs, tattered intestines, and all sorts of white and red substance floating in the pool, along with countless souls of the dead. These souls were trying to climb out of the pool, their pale faces distorted from extreme agony. They reached out with their broken arms and howled at him in despair.


    Moreover, the room¡¯s walls, floor, and ceiling had all been covered in ayer of gray substance. The gray substance squirmed and swelled, thick vessels bulging on the surface. The fleshy material was a sickly translucent pink, and it rumbled continuously. Some sort of purple liquid seemed to be flowing within. asionally, he even saw specks of undigested flesh and meat.


    Living inside the castle felt like he was living in the stomach of a strange lifeform. It was this feeling that made him move out in a hurry and no longer dare to remain inside Kerslin Castle.


    The current Kerslin Castle was no longer the Kerslin Castle of the past!


    It had undergone some kind of change, bing...bing some inexplicable existence that was simultaneously an alchemical lifeform and a biological being of flesh and blood.


    That was why the adepts with sharper senses instinctually chose to distance themselves from the castle!


    It wasn¡¯t just the messengers. Even the higher-ups of the Crimson n were staying in the Motherships rather than Kerslin Castle.


    There were only two guests at Kerslin Castle currently¨C Greem and Mary.


    Of course, Shadow Demon always followed at Greem¡¯s side, constantly protecting him.


    As for why Greem chose to stay in Kerslin Castle? It wasn¡¯t because he enjoyed the scary atmosphere. He was trying to further convince this strange lifeform, which had broken the limits of magic, to join his side.


    Indeed, Kerslin Castle now possessed all the characteristics of an intelligent lifeform. If it weren¡¯t for itsck of a permanent energy supply, even Greem would have trouble controlling this forbidden lifeform that had devoured the entirety of the Entom n.


    Compared to an ordinary lifeform, forbidden lifeforms grew stronger by employing taboo and forbidden magic. They needed blood rituals, sacrifices, murder, or destruction to fuel their growth. Adepts might look like individuals with no care for the taboo, but they had to abide by the basic principles of being an adept. They could not merely victimize weaker individuals of the World of Adepts.


    These were basic ts of being an adept that had been established for the sake of the adept civilization¡¯s continued growth!


    You could choose to break these rules, but if knowledge of your actions got out, you would be cklisted by every single adept organization. No one would trade resources or expertise with you again.


    Some of the more self-righteous adepts would even actively hunt you down; the Adept¡¯s Code of Conduct would not forbid their actions.


    Considering the severe consequences, no adept had ever dared to conduct ughter or blood rituals publicly. Of course, as long as you did it in the shadows and destroyed all evidence, there would be no problem.


    There would always be numerous adept apprentices that died silently in private adept towers every year. These apprentices were often sacrifices for dangerous magic or experiments. Most adept organizations turned a blind eye to these instances and would notunch detailed investigations.


    After all, the improvement of their adepts meant the growth of the n¡¯s strength. They couldn¡¯t be happier to see their adepts grow more powerful!

 Chapter 1324 - Nightmare Castle

    <strong>Chapter 1324 Nightmare Castle</strong>


    Greem slowly woke up from his bloody nightmare.


    Even though he wasn¡¯t screaming out of fright, his face had turned pale.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. No one would be in a good mood if they were always dreaming about bathing in blood with the screams of begrudged souls all around them.


    Mary sat silently beside him. She took out a handkerchief and wiped away the sweat from his forehead.


    ¡°How did it go? Did you manage to find its soul core?¡±


    Greem smiled bitterly and shook his head.


    Kerslin had sacrificed every single lifeform in the castle through a blood ritual and had then fallen into a deep sleep. If Greem wanted to gainplete control over Kerslin, his only choice was to dive into its nightmarendscape and search for the soul core that Kerslin had hidden away.


    Should Greem be able to find it and gain control of it, he would have a new subordinate under him¨C Nightmare Castle Kerslin.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s estimations, Kerslin had possessed the power of a beginner Fourth Grade prior to its blood ritual. After the ritual, Kerslin had managed to reach advanced Fourth Grade. If Greem were willing to provide Kerslin with a mega magic generator furnace, Kerslin would be able to rival ultra-powerhouses in some respects.


    Of course, most of Kerslin¡¯s power came from its two abilities, Halo of Nightmare and Nightmare Transformation; it was still some distance away from being a true ultra-powerhouse. However, should any ultra-powerhouse carelessly fall into Kerslin¡¯s Nightmare Domain, they would face an unending nightmare!


    After devouring so many adepts, including the advanced Fourth Grade Freed and seven Third Grade adepts, Kerslin had reached the level of a forbidden lifeform.


    The potential of forbidden lifeforms was unpredictable!


    The Chip estimated that the fully grown Kerslin could have the potential to reach Sixth Grade. That was already a terrifying potential for most nar creatures.


    That was why Greem had to find its soul core before it fully digested the power from the blood ritual. Otherwise, he would forever lose the opportunity to control this monster. If Greem forcefully enved this forbidden lifeform, what awaited him would most certainly be betrayal in the future.


    If Greem was always more powerful than Kerslin, then it might remain an obedient ve. However, the moment Greem weakened, Kerslin would undoubtedly betray him and assault him with all its ferocity.


    That wasn¡¯t conjecture- it was a certainty!


    Thus, Greem¡¯s current options were limited. He either had to find the soul core and truly control Kerslin or destroy it before it matured. He had no other choices.


    ¡°Why don¡¯t you...let me try!¡± Mary gritted her teeth and volunteered.


    One would have to actively delve into the Nightmare Domain if they wanted to search for Kerslin¡¯s soul core. Even though Kerslin had fallen into a deep slumber and was unable to actively operate the Nightmare Domain, the Nightmare Domain¡¯s existence alone was a massive risk to Fourth Grade adepts.


    Even Greem had to be extremely cautious every time he ventured into the Nightmare Domain. He was terrified of waking up Kerslin¡¯s budding consciousness. Trying to find the soul core of unknown color, shape, or size under such conditions was nearly impossible.


    However, considering this venture¡¯s reward was possibly a Sixth Grade forbidden lifeform in the future, Greem was more than willing to take such a risk!


    That was why Greem hesitated for a moment when Mary volunteered. He then smiled and took her hand gently as he said, ¡°How could I let such a beautifuldy venture alone!? I¡¯ll go with you.¡±


    Mary smiled and put her slender, white hand in Greem¡¯s broad palm.


    The next second, their mental consciousness melded together and seemed toe into contact with something unusual. Their vision blurred as they appeared in apletely different scene.


    Night had fallen.


    These were the gates to a towering castle. They were in the za in front of the castle, and a stream of carriages wasing in and out of the castle. Elegant men and women in fancy clothes were walking out of those carriages.


    The men were gentlemanly and noble, the women attractive and elegant.


    They held hands and walked into the castle as pairs,ughing as they did so. Manservants in tuxedos with silver trays in hand waited at the gates with maids in white outfits and rabbit ears on their heads. They bowed and made way for the guests to enter.


    What appeared before Greem and Mary was a luxurious banquet rife with an atmosphere of debauchery and enjoyment. The guests conversed gleefully in groups of two or three, dancing along to the elegant tune, or hiding under dim curtains and gossiping amongst themselves.


    Such banquets were an unavoidable part of a noble¡¯s life!


    Mary stepped out of the carriage with Greem¡¯s help. She looked around her and calmly stated, ¡°This is the za in front of Kerslin Castle! It seems Kerslin¡¯s imagination is a bitcking. It can only project scenes from reality into its dreams.¡±


    Greem smiled and wrapped his hand around Mary¡¯s waist. The two of them walked toward the banquet hall along with the crowd.


    ¡°This is just the Halo of Nightmare that Kerslin is radiating unknowingly in his slumber. It is not the actual Nightmare Domain yet. That is why things seem so peaceful.¡± Greem had entered Kerslin¡¯s dreams countless times. Naturally, he was familiar with many things here.


    Mary was dressed in a bright-red silk dress. Her smooth corbones, shoulders, neck, and arms were all exposed. The skirt didn¡¯t reach further than her knees and revealed her voluptuous thighs and slender legs.


    She had a pair of translucent crystal shoes on her feet.


    Meanwhile, Greem wore a sharp suit. His muscr body made the shirt a tight fit, and his excellent figure was clear for all to see.


    His dark red hair was scattered behind his shoulders. Paired with his ck eyebrows, ck eyes, straight nose, and firm lips, he radiated an aura of youth.


    The two of them walked to the doors hand in hand and looked at the lively hall.


    Mary¡¯s hand had found its way around Greem¡¯s waist some time earlier. She looked at Greem with a smile and said, ¡°This is the nightmare you have been talking about? If nightmares all look like this, then I would certainly prefer to have nightmares over dreams every night. Hmph!¡±


    Greem shook his head andughed. He then said in a soft voice, ¡°Do you think that a nightmare world created by a forbidden lifeform would be so simple? Do you think it would terrorize you in such a straightforward fashion, like an illusion? Kerslin has its strategy. It shows you all the nice things first, and then shatters everything abruptly. You had best not throw up when the weird things start happening!¡±


    Mary smiled coldly, ¡°I am the infamous Bloody Queen, after all. What kind of horror do you think could possibly scare me? Speaking of which, it¡¯s been so many times since you¡¯vee here. Have you got any clues yet?¡±


    As they talked, the two of them walked toward another hall down the corridor instead of entering the main hall. It was quiet underneath the pergs with the green vines hanging down from above, making for a romantic atmosphere.


    At this moment, two young, cute girls rushed past them. The bolder one of the two even gave Greem a flying kiss before running away, giggling.


    ¡°Soul forms!¡± Mary frowned and couldn¡¯t help but mutter.


    Greem nodded.


    ¡°Everyone at this banquet is in their soul form, including ourselves. Kerslin¡¯s soul core is hidden here, waiting for a banquet of ughter to begin.¡±


    ¡°There are two phases to this banquet. The first phase is the peaceful phase, which is where we¡¯re at. We can move freely now. The second phase is the ughter phase. When that happens, everyone at the banquet will fall into a frenzy and start ughtering everyone in sight. Kerslin will then use the power emanated from their deaths to transform into a nightmare monstrosity. Quite the difficult creature to deal with.¡±


    Mary¡¯s heart trembled when he heard Greem¡¯s evaluation of Kerslin.


    Greem was a legendary fire adept with the power of an ultra-powerhouse. If even he felt like the opponent was a difficult enemy, then it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how powerful the opponent truly was.


    Fortunately, this was only the nightmare space radiating from Kerslin¡¯s consciousness rather than the actual Nightmare Domain. Therefore, the Kerslin that appeared here was no more than a nightmare projection of its massive spiritual consciousness.


    Even if they ran into danger, they would be safe as long as they escaped the projected castle in a timely fashion.


    While Greem was exining the results of his investigations to Mary, a crimson light shed in the main hall. The gentle music suddenly changed and turned sinister and terrifying.


    The howls of a terrifying monster could be heard in the hall, mixed with the terrified screams of thousands of people.


    ¡°The ughter phase has begun! We shouldn¡¯t dally any longer. Where are you nning to search?¡± The smile faded from Greem¡¯s face as he asked solemnly.


    Mary looked around and said coldly, ¡°I¡¯ll be on the third floor!¡±


    Greem wasted no words as he replied, ¡°The ughter phase will onlyst for fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutester, Kerslin¡¯s nightmare consciousness will be projected. You must retreat to the doors of the castle by then. Otherwise...its nightmare consciousness will have the power of a peak Fourth Grade in here!¡±


    Mary did not hesitate. Crimson light flickered, turning into two wings that lifted her body towards the tower¡¯s third floor.


    Meanwhile, Greem turned and walked toward the main hall filled with screams.


    His clothes transformed as he walked, and the fire coral staff and Tome of Corruption appeared in his hands.


    By the time he arrived at the hall, it had turned into a ughterhouse filled with scenes and images that would send chills down the spines of the most hardened veterans!

 Chapter 1325 - Nightmare Domain

    Chapter 1325 Nightmare Domain


    The hall had now turned into a purgatory of flesh and blood!


    The once elegant guests had torn off their masks and were madly chasing and killing each other.


    They had no weapons at all.


    No, they were simply using the most primal weapons avable to the human body¨C their teeth and limbs.


    They wrapped around each other, biting and tearing, using everything they had to attack whoever was around them.


    They had lost all reason and manners as humans. They simply lunged and tore at each other like a pack of wild beasts. Their faces were twisted in ugly expressions, and their mouths opened so wide that the sides were starting to split.


    They would lunge at the closest target, open their mouths wide, and bite the victim on the neck or body. They would not loosen their bite the moment their teeth sunk into flesh. They howled like animals, all while shaking their heads and tearing off arge chunk of meat from their victim.


    Every time a victim copsed to the ground, seven or eight people with bloody mouths and bloodshot eyes would jump forward and tear the unfortunate person to pieces.


    There were no longer any living humans in the hall. There were only beasts!


    These creatures had no allies orpanions. Every living creature was an enemy to them.


    The young men and women who had been dancing with each other on the dance floor were now crouching over the ground, roaring and attacking each other like animals.


    Greem had just approached the doors to the hall when two manservants dressed in nice suits lifted their heads abruptly.


    Their mouths were covered in blood, and so were their hands.


    A pretty nobledy dressed in an elegant gowny beneath them. Half of her neck was gone, and her chewed esophagus was exposed for all to see. Her chest was bloody, with chunks of meat already missing from her body.


    What was more shocking was the fact that the nobledy didn¡¯t seem to be dead, despite her severe wounds. She turned her head around neurotically and snapped with her mouth viciously as if she was also trying to bite at something.


    [Beep. Host is continuously being affected by the Halo of Nightmare. Host has entered the surface level of the Nightmare Domain; the Banquet of ughter has begun. Suggesting that Host finds Kerslin¡¯s soul core as soon as possible. Otherwise, Kerslin will continue growing stronger as it absorbs the power from the blood ritual.


    [The Banquet of ughter is the first phase. Kerslin¡¯s base power is estimated to be at intermediate Fourth Grade. The nightmare will enter the second phase in 7 minutes, 13 seconds. Kerslin¡¯s power is estimated to reach advanced Fourth Grade. The nightmare will enter the third phase in 16 minutes, 28 seconds. Kerslin¡¯s power is estimated to reach peak Fourth Grade. The nightmare will enter the fourth phase in 28 minutes, 46 seconds. Kerslin will transform into a forbidden lifeform.


    [The odds of victory against Kerslin in the fourth phase within the Nightmare Domain infinitely approaches zero.]


    A series of notifications rang out in Greem¡¯s mind. Meanwhile, the two monstrous manservants leaped from the ground and lunged at him.


    The Chip quickly scanned the creatures, and their data appeared in Greem¡¯s mind.


    [Nightmare Ghouls. Spirit creatures. Intermediate First Grade. Created from the living beings killed by the Nightmare Castle. Soul cores of said creatures are formed of resentment and are hostile toward all living creatures. Invulnerable to physical damage, but vulnerable to elementium damage.]


    Vulnerable to elementium damage?


    A cold smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face. He flicked his fingers, and two purple fireballs the size of eggs flew at the ghouls.


    The fireballs were tiny, but they were incredibly powerful!


    Boom! Boom!


    The purple fireballs erupted into a cloud of surging purple fire the moment they touched the ghouls, engulfing them in mes.


    They were no more than First Grade spirits. They were reduced to ashes by Greem¡¯s powerful magic before they could resist.


    Without the two ghouls pressing her against the ground, the half-devoured nobledy managed to flip herself over. She crawled across the floor with her chewed-up limbs, growling as she moved toward Greem. Her mouth snapped uncontrobly as if she couldn¡¯t wait to bite someone.


    A halo of fire erupted from Greem before the nobledy could reach him, turning her into dust.


    The moment the mes appeared, all the ghouls scrambling in the hall paused abruptly. They stopped their movements and turned to look at Greem, standing tall at the doors to the hall. A crimson fire glowed in the depths of their eyes.


    Aooooo!


    All the ghouls howled and screamed before crouching down against the ground and sprinting toward Greem.


    Greem gripped the fire coral staff in his hand and tapped it gently against the ground. An evenrger halo of fire sted outward. Every single ghoul that touched the halo was reduced to ashes before they could even yelp.


    However, to Greem¡¯s surprise, no matter how powerful his fire magic, he only seemed to be able to exterminate the ghouls. His attacks did not seem to have any effect on the castle itself.


    The clean, smooth floor was still as smooth and bright as before. Despite all the violent mes that had burned in the room, no marks had been left on the floor at all. Meanwhile, the ghouls that he had been able to wipe out with ease were still swarming from various corners of the castle. They forcefully kept Greem in the room, unable to proceed any further.


    ¡°Chip, are these spirits undying?¡± After vanquishing thousands of ghouls in a matter of a few spells, Greem finally noticed something was wrong. The number of ghouls did not reduce at all.


    [Beep. These spirit creatures are all souls that are bound to the Nightmare Castle. Their resentment cores remain in Kerslin¡¯s possession. Thus, as long as Kerslin¡¯s soul exists, these spirit creatures can be projected infinitely.]


    So these aren¡¯t the actual bodies of the spirits, but only a projection of their resentment!


    Greem grunted and snapped his fingers.


    A crimson barrier emerged from his body, forming a dome ten-meters in radius, keeping all the enemies at bay. The ghouls would be turned to ashes by the mes in the barrier the moment they entered. Greem didn¡¯t even have to lift a single finger.


    Burning Domain. It was Greem¡¯s Burning Domain!


    If this were the outside world, Greem¡¯s Burning Domain would be a massive barrier that could engulf an entire kilometer. However, here in Kerslin¡¯s Nightmare Domain, the Burning Domain was suppressed and only had a radius of ten meters. That undoubtedly made it significantly weaker.


    However, that was more than enough to cremate these First Grade ghouls!


    Greem looked around at everything in the hall, even as he continued to exterminate these damned ghouls with his Burning Domain. This ce wasn¡¯t the real world, after all. It was only a projection of Kerslin¡¯s Nightmare Domain.


    Consequently, Kerslin¡¯s soul core could exist in any form here. The only way to find it was to actively force it toe out of hiding.


    Boom! An explosion rang out close to Greem.


    One of Greem¡¯s Inferno Shields had been crushed to pieces by a twisting silhouette. After being hit by another fireball, the assant struggled for several seconds in the Burning Domain before burning to ashes.


    Hm? Did the ghouls¡¯ grades just go up?


    Greem paused for a moment and instantly regarded the notifications in his mind.


    [Now entering the intermediateyer of the Nightmare Domain. Nightmare creatures grade increased.


    [Ghosts of Despair. Second Grade. Amalgamations of a shocking number of resentful wraiths.


    [Abominable Hounds. Spirit Creatures. Second Grade. Skilled at biting and lunging.]


    It was then that Greem realized the monster he had just disposed of was an abominable hound. The beast did not have a single hair on its body. Instead, its naked body was covered inrge patches of rot and blisters. It also had two vicious and ugly heads.


    It was said that the three-headed Cerberus of the Abyssal ne was the final form of these abominable hounds.


    Moreover, these hounds all possessed an unusual ability¨C sh!


    This thought had just appeared in Greem¡¯s mind when seven vicious forms abruptly appeared all around him. These hounds opened their maws wide and bit at him the moment they appeared around his Inferno Shields.


    The mes of the Burning Domain burned on their bodies, causing them to howl in agony, but it was unable to reduce their ferocity in the slightest. These creatures did not seem to fear death at all. They desperately attacked Greem¡¯s Inferno Shields even as their bodies crumbled to ashes behind them.


    Three of Greem¡¯s Inferno Shields had been torn apart when all seven of the hounds were reduced to dust.


    The moment the abominable hounds died, a bone-chilling scream could be heard outside the Burning Domain. Several spectral faces surged out of the body of a ghostly woman. These faces charged into the Burning Domain and surrounded Greem.


    Even though the mes of the Burning Domain burned most of the faces out of existence, some of the spectral faces managed to prate through Greem¡¯s defenses and appeared before him.


    The Tome of Corruption in Greem¡¯s hands let out waves of sickly green light. An intangible force web was cast, dragging all of the spectral faces into a vortex that had appeared on the book¡¯s cover.


    The ghostly woman seemed to realize the situation and lifted her head to scream.


    Simr screams rang out all over the castle immediately. More and more ghostly women cloaked in light gowns emerged from the walls, floor, and ceiling.


    In the blink of an eye, they had all surrounded Greem!


    Ghosts of Despair. These were terrifying monsters formed out of multiple spirits. They contained unending emotions of despair within their bodies. Any adepts that could not endure the dreadful weight of their sorrow would oftenmit suicide.


    It was almost seven minutes now. The second phase of the Nightmare Domain would soon begin.


    Greem also noticed that the more he ughtered, the more terrifying the Nightmare Castle¡¯s energy aura grew!


    The endless horde of nightmare creatures was also rapidly evolving and growing stronger after absorbing this energy. It had only been five minutes, yet Second Grade nightmare creatures had already appeared. What kind of monsters would appear once the nightmare went into the second phase?


    Greem wondered to himself when the Chip¡¯s notification appeared again.


    [Time is up! Second phase of the Nightmare Domain beginning now.]

 Chapter 1326 - Going All-Out

    <strong>Chapter 1326 Going All-Out</strong>


    The entirety of Nightmare Castle started trembling lightly.


    It was as if a terrifying monster had woken from its ten-thousand-year slumber. The entire castle was filled with a bloody, cruel, and vicious aura.


    The nightmare creatures that had been swarming from every corner of the castle stopped assaulting Greem. Instead, they gathered in the corner of the hall and merged to form an amorphous gray monstrosity. As more and more nightmare creatures merged with it, the monstrosity continued to grow in size. It slowly filled up every inch of space in the hall as its bulky body began to swell toward Greem.


    [Beep. Detecting Fourth Grade energy aura. Initial estimates suggest this creature to be a beginner Fourth Grade!]


    The Chip¡¯s notification caused Greem¡¯s heart to tremble slightly. It was only the start of the second phase, yet a Fourth Grade nightmare creature had already appeared. How much more powerful would the nightmare creatures be in the phases toe?!


    Greem didn¡¯t dare let this monster continue growing freely. He tapped his staff against the ground, and a surge of golden fire wrapped toward the amorphous being with blistering heat.


    The golden mes crashed against the gray monster.


    The sound of sizzling flesh instantly rang out in the hall, and a pungent odor filled the room.


    Eeeeeeeek!


    The gray monster seemed to have a sense of pain. It started twisting and struggling violently.


    As its body was sorge that it filled up the entirety of the hall, its movements immediately caused the castle itself to quake.


    The monster shook its body wildly, flinging out balls of slime-like substance. These balls of liquid quickly swelled upon hitting the ground, turning into poison slimes.


    These slimes dragged their slimy bodies across the floor, spitting out gray mucus at Greem as they approached.


    Fortunately, Greem was protected by the Burning Domain and his Inferno Shields. He didn¡¯t have to bother with these numerous weaker beings. However, their presence was definitely a hindrance in Greem¡¯s fight against the gray monster.


    The Tome of Corruption in Greem¡¯s hand started flipping ording to his will. With every turn of the page, an ugly and vicious gue creature leaped out from the Tome. These fearless wights rushed at the slimes the moment they appeared.


    Once they reached within a certain distance, the wights¡¯ swollen abdomens would erupt. A terrifying wave of poison would st out in every direction, apanied by bone shrapnel from the wights¡¯ own bodies.


    The gray slimes instantly turned dark purple, and their movements became unusually slow.


    In truth, the terrifying part about nightmare creatures were the emotions of despair that their attacks contained. These emotions would often evoke severely negative reactions from their victims. Unfortunately, gue creatures were not living beings and, naturally, had no such negative emotions to draw up.


    However, the enemies that the gue creatures were facing also relied primarily on poison and virus. Consequently, their attacks were very ineffective against these nightmare creatures.


    Since their respective abilities were useless against each other, the only option left was a bloody melee!


    The wights lunged forward ferociously. They were either riddled with holes by the acid spray, devoured by the slimes and digested into ck liquid in their bodies, or self-destructed to cover the enemies in ayer of green gue spores.


    The gue creatures and the nightmare creatures were caught in a difficult fight in the center of the hall. Their battle indirectly hindered Greem¡¯s movements.


    Compared to all the action and chaos on Greem¡¯s side, Mary was having a much more peaceful time.


    Perhaps it was due to Mary¡¯s unique identity as a vampire, but the Nightmare Castle showed no signs of hostility toward her. In fact, it even showed hints of a soul resonance with her.


    Mary had ryed a message back to Greem, exining that she had found clues to Kerslin¡¯s soul core and that she was going deeper into the Nightmare Domain to explore.


    Since that was the case, Greem gave up on his n to regroup with her. Instead, he started to focus entirely on his fight against the nightmare creatures here. As for Kerslin? It was obvious that it was still in deep slumber to digest the tremendous power it had obtained from the blood ritual.


    The only thing Greem could do in his current position was to draw all the enemy¡¯s attention toward himself and give Mary a chance to sneak into the deeper levels of the Nightmare Domain.


    At the thought of this, Greem transformed without any hesitation.


    Furious, violent mes burst out of every pore in his body, turning his surroundings into a zing sea of fire. His body was surrounded by scalding mes and started to rapidly grow in size.


    A molten giant.


    Ever since he advanced to Fourth Grade, the molten giant form was the only form that could host the entirety of the overwhelming fire energy and mysterious firews within him!


    His human form was enough for most ordinary asions. However, if Greem wanted to fight at full-strength, his flesh body would not be able to endure the might of the firews. The firews would probably have melted Greem¡¯s own body down before he could even injure the enemy.


    Of course, this also had to do with the fact that Greem had not gainedplete control over his firews. If he had managed to turn the firews into a part of him, such an incident would never ur. After all, how could fire possibly ever hurt fire itself!?


    The molten giant that Greem transformed into was twelve meters tall, farrger than the size of this tiny hall.


    By the time his transformation wasplete, his head had bumped against the ceiling. The terrifying mes that raged around him licked furiously at the ceiling and the floor, crackling loudly as they burned. However, the stone did not melt intova as it typically did.


    After transforming into a molten giant, Greem no longer needed chants for most of his fire spells. Instead, he could easily cast them with a wave of his hand as if they were his innate abilities.


    Greem strode forward, and the mes around him spread outward. The entire hall was instantly engulfed within the Burning Domain. At the same time, a mysterious and heavy pressure pushed in from all around. It shed with Greem¡¯s mental consciousness and attempted to force Greem¡¯s power back into his body.


    ¡°Hmph.¡±


    Greem grunted. He protected his body and mind with the Tome of Corruption before injecting most of his Spirit into the Orb of the Fire God. Wave upon wave of violent and ferocious magical mes began tosh at every corner of the hall like a living tornado.


    The gray monster across from Greem suddenly had to endure the devastation of the mes!


    So what if it was a Fourth Grade nightmare creature!?


    Battered by two artifacts, the gray monster¡¯s body was soon scorched ck. It even started to shrink in size. No matter how many nightmare creatures swarmed and assimted with it, its body continued to shrink and wither rapidly.


    Just as Greem was about to exterminate the monstrosity, a new notification from the Chip rang in his mind.


    [Time is up! Third phase of the Nightmare Domain beginning now.]


    The notification had just ended when the scene before Greem¡¯s eyes started to shift strangely.


    The beginner Fourth Grade monstrosity erupted suddenly!


    Its massive body blew up into tiny blobs of liquid spread across every corner of the hall. The castle itself absorbed the liquid.


    The next second, the Nightmare Castle came alive.


    Gray, fleshy substance started to seep out of the floor, the walls, and the ceiling, quickly merging together. The entire hall, apart from where Greem¡¯s Burning Domain stood, soon became covered in this strange flesh-like substance.


    The flesh bulged and throbbed, its surface covered in slimy liquid and many, many wrinkles. Looking from a distance, it was almost as if you were in the stomach of a living creature.


    Naturally, that would make Greem food in the intestinal tract!


    In corners and secret rooms all over the castle where Greem¡¯s gaze could not reach, fleshy cocoons were throbbing at a uniform rate. The embryos of some strange creatures were in these cocoons, bobbing up and down in a sickly green liquid.


    However, when Greem¡¯s violent mes ravaged the castle, the creatures in these cocoons became restless.


    Those who had matured or were nearing maturity tore open their cocoons impatiently. They emerged from the vile liquid, shaking their ugly bodies as they reared their heads and smelled the air. They screeched and ran to where they had smelled fire.


    Greem, who was standing in the hall and clearing out the disgusting fleshy substance, felt something. He could sense the aura of the room grow even more disturbing.


    It wasn¡¯t just a violent and cruel aura now. No, a sort of strange emotion that made his mind falter was rising in his heart. Just as firews could burn without the need for fuel, this strange emotion was able to prate the hearts of humans and nt the seeds of despair right within.


    The nutrients that allowed these seeds to grow were all the various negative emotions that one carried within!


    As long as you still possessed emotions, the Nightmare Domain would be able to provoke your negative emotions using the power ofws, causing your mind and heart to move toward darkness slowly.


    The only thing that could counter aw was anotherw!


    The light ofw power glowed from the Tome of Corruption, and the Nightmare Domain¡¯s negative emotions were kept at bay. However, Greem¡¯s dark eyes had somehow zed over with ayer of crimson. The gleam of Spirit within him had weakened as well.


    Greem was no longer fighting against an ordinary nightmare creature at this point. No, he was fighting against this slowly awakening Nightmare Castle. The nightmare creatures that continued to attack him through the flesh walls had also risen to the level of intermediate Third Grade.


    That was already a daunting challenge from Greem, who had yet to recover from his severe wounds from thest battle!

 Chapter 1327 - Clash of Souls

    Chapter 1327 sh of Souls


    The Nightmare Castle might have awakened, but it was without limbs or ws. It could only leave the extermination of its enemies to its subordinate nightmare creatures.


    Fundamentally, nightmare creatures were only spirits who manifested in the Nightmare Domain as projections of their souls.


    However, since devouring all the Entom adepts, Kerslin had evolved from a pure alchemical lifeform into a monster with biological traits.


    Kerslin now possessed life and soul¨C everything that an intelligent lifeform should have!


    The only problem now was that Kerslin¡¯s evolution had urred by means of a blood ritual; its soul origin was consequently polluted by a murderous and savage aura. The moment it awoke from its slumber, it was likely to transform into a fearsome forbidden lifeform.


    Should a horror like Kerslin go out of control and rampage through Zhentarim, it would be a cmity for the Central Lands. However, if Kerslin could be controlled, it would be an excellent servant for any adept organization.


    After all, a magical servant with the potential to reach Sixth Grade was rarely seen, let alone one that would serve an adept!


    Disregarding everything else, if Mary could sessfully gain control of Kerslin¡¯s soul core, thebination of Mary and Kerslin would make them powerful enough to rival Lich Kanganas. Of course, this referred to the lich before he obtained the Ancient Reliquary, not the incredibly powerful frost lich he had now be.


    Lich Kanganas had been hiding in his skeletal ne ever since he obtained the Ancient Reliquary of Deep Winter. He had not shown himself at all. Even when Greem invited him to major events, he would only send Fourth Grade subordinates as his representatives.


    If Greem had not managed to draw him out with the coordinates of the death god¡¯s tomb, he would probably not have appeared for another few hundred years.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s observations, Kanganas¡¯ assimtion of the Ancient Reliquary was going exceptionally well. Kanganas had reached peak Fourth Grade and was now an ultra-powerhouse. Moreover, the ice powers it had absorbed had blended perfectly with his original death powers, forming a unique chill of death.


    During a battle, Kanganas could apply this chill of death on his servants, allowing their physical attacks to possess the magical effect of freezing their enemies¡¯ souls.


    One could just imagine the sight of an entire ne of skeletons, with each of them having the ability to freeze the soul. Every time they struck their enemies, their foes¡¯ minds would freeze and be unable to react or retaliate in the slightest.


    Even such a powerful and terrifying ability was only a preliminary manifestation of the assimtion. If Kanganas had another few hundred years, he couldpletely assimte the Ancient Reliquary with his soul origin. He would then immediately rise to Fifth Grade and be the first lich in the multiverse with the chill of death.


    Everyone was silently improving and growing stronger. Naturally, Greem did not dare to slow down with his own progress. Even though he possessed a firm position of advantage in the Central Lands, he could not give up on any opportunity or challenge by which he could improve himself.


    Compared to Greem¡¯s smooth sailing path, Mary¡¯s future was shrouded in more uncertainties and troubles.


    Vampire adepts like herself were powerful because of their bloodlines. However, their bloodlines also restrained them.


    Everything they possessed came from their bloodline, allowing them to advance at unbelievable rates at lower grades. However, the instant they lost their bloodline or reached their bloodline limit would be the moment they hit a dead end. They would have a hard time improving even slightly for the rest of their lives.


    Most bloodline adepts would never be able to shatter their bloodline limits and advance into higher lifeforms without massive opportunity or numerous blood trials.


    Mary did have decent talent and potential, but that was it!


    Compared to the true prodigies out there, Mary¡¯s talent as a vampire was horrendous. If it weren¡¯t for the nourishment from the tremendous amount of dragon blood sourced from Lance, Mary would probably have taken an additional seven to eight hundred years to reach her current level.


    She would have had to race against her own lifespan with all her effort!


    One had to admit that Mary¡¯s acquaintance with Greem was the greatest fortune in her life. She was able to trust in Greempletely. It made her an utter oddball in the World of Adepts, where trickery, lies, and pragmatism reigned supreme.


    It was this sort of trust and emotion that liberated both Greem and Mary. Despite theirck of blood rtions, contracts, or pragmatic dealings, the two of them were still able to believe in each other from the bottom of their hearts.


    Such a connection was no longer something that could be described with ordinary emotions!


    It was Greem¡¯s trust in Mary that allowed him to focus all his efforts solely on dealing with the Nightmare Castle in front of him.


    Through his Elementium Sight and spiritual senses, Greem could see all sorts of strange, distorted fluctuations in the forcefields within Nightmare Castle. These fluctuations ovepped and entangled with each other, ultimately causing the nature of the forcefields to change.


    It was these excessivelyplex transformations that made it impossible for any outside force to travel far.


    It was the main reason Greem¡¯s Burning Domain and spiritual senses had been forciblypressed when he first entered the castle.


    Now, after analysis and calctions from the Chip, Greem had obtained a preliminary understanding of the forcefield fluctuations and transformations in the Nightmare Castle. It allowed him to extend the Burning Domain further, carbonizing all the enemies that swarmed toward him and constantly stopping them before they could step within ten feet of him.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Ever since the Nightmare Domain moved into its second phase, Greem had been facing nothing but Second and Third Grade nightmare creatures. They might not be Greem¡¯s opponents, but they were still able to keep Greem trapped in the hall through their sheer fearlessness and numbers.


    Meanwhile, even as it used the nightmare creatures to buy time, the Nightmare Castle was quickly transforming. The flesh-like substance soon covered every inch of the castle. Greem could hear a low, drum-like beating while inside the hall.


    A heartbeat...that was the sound of the Nightmare Castle¡¯s heartbeat!


    [Time is up! Third phase of the Nightmare Domain beginning now.]


    The Chip¡¯s notification had just vanished when the sound of the throbbing heart disappeared.


    The entire Nightmare Castle turned oddly quiet.


    An unprecedentedly ferocious power surged from the top of the castle. It pressed down toward Greem along with the numerous forcefields in the castle.


    If this had been before the battle of Stoneshard Valley, Greem might have been able to endure this shockwave with his 26 points of Physique. This time, Greem¡¯s face flushed white. He could only gather a tremendous amount of fire energy and focus it in front of him as a shield against the approaching st.


    Boom!


    There was a loud explosion. The twelve-meter-tall molten giant flew out of the Nightmare Castle like a baseball batted away into the distance. His body only stopped after crashing into the gates of the castle.


    Peak Fourth Grade.


    In the third phase, the castle already had the power of a peak Fourth Grade. It had even managed to blow him out of the castle.


    This is not a good start!


    Greem thought to himself as he picked himself out of the debris. zing mes roasted the rocks around him, turning intova that flowed to the ground.


    The Nightmare Castle slowly began moving in front of his eyes like an ancient beast. A tremendously powerful soul fluctuation rose from the depths of the castle and crashed toward Greem like a hill.


    A sharp light gleamed in Greem¡¯s eyes. He stood tall with his gigantic body and faced the attack with a mixture of all four firews.


    Dong!


    A muffled thud from the explosion could be heard.


    Intangible spiritual energy shed in midair, causing visible ripples to spread out. The air above the Nightmare Domain was wrinkled like a piece of parchment, and the horrifying sound of tearing space could be heard.


    There were no tricks involved in a spiritual sh like this. Both entities had given up on all their spellcasting techniques andbat skills to sh with their very souls. It was a contest of Spirit, the soul, and the resilience of the mind.


    Greem had the Tome of Corruption to protect his mind and the Orb of the Fire God to supply him with energy. In that regard, he was undoubtedly superior to Kerslin. Kerslin might be half an alchemical lifeform and possess superior physical and mental fortitudepared to a human adept, but it was no match for Greem, who had two artifacts in his possession.


    Greem stumbled back repeatedly after the sh.


    With every step he took with his zing legs, he left deep,va-filled craters in the ground. The earth sizzled loudly as theva burned.


    Of course, the Nightmare Castle¨Cwhich was a hundred times bigger than Greem¨Cwas having a hard time as well.


    The blinding light of zing mes could be seen bursting out all over the castle. The thick smell of smoke rose from within the castle into the sky.


    The Nightmare Castle itself trembled violently, the delicate sculptures on the outer walls shaking and falling off in the process. Deep cracks appeared in the castle¡¯s foundations, stretching all the way up to the fourth floor.


    The intricate wall of forcefields that surrounded the castle also snapped and popped unceasingly.


    This sh had been a sessful demonstration of the two fighters¡¯ power.


    Kerslin was overwhelmingly Greem¡¯s superior in Strength and Physique, while Greem was the stronger one in Spirit.


    Perhaps the most obvious weakness of Kerslin was itsck of mobility.


    It was a lifeform created from an alchemical castle, after all; it had basically zero mobility. If it weren¡¯t for the unique Nightmare Domain, it would be entirely countered by a powerful adept like Greem.


    After an unsessful attack, the Nightmare Castle started trembling again. It was preparing another attack, and Greem had nowhere to run. He could only shake his molten fire body and face the attack head-on.


    Even as he continued to battle with Kerslin, Greem secretly sent a message to Mary.


    ¡°Three minutes and eleven seconds...you only have three minutes and eleven seconds left! Retreat immediately once that time is up. I won¡¯t be able to stop this fellow for any longer than that!¡±

 Chapter 1328 - Forced Embrace

    Chapter 1328 Forced Embrace


    The walls shook violently.


    Hordes of nightmare creatures swarmed through the dim and dark corridors, sprinting toward the battlefield.


    Meanwhile, an inconspicuous silhouette the size of a palm slowly but firmly crawled forward on the ceiling where their gazes were not directed.


    The surface of this shadowy figure was covered in hair. It grabbed onto the cracks between the rocks with its sharp ws and silently moved forward against the shadow of the ceiling.


    The battle outside the castle was still as intense as before. That much was obvious from the constant quaking of the castle and the rate at which the nightmare creatures respawned.


    It was already the fourth phase of the Nightmare Castle. Every single nightmare creature that emerged from the dark corridors and rooms were Third Grade at the very lowest. These monsters were terrifying creatures that could wreak havoc on the outside world. However, here in this castle, they were no more than fodder in the battle against two high-grade individuals.


    Mary was not as powerful as Greem and did not possess the ability to face Kerslin head-on. Should she be exposed, what awaited her would be a never-ending encirclement of Third Grade nightmare creatures.


    What surprised Mary was how smooth her operation had gone since sneaking into the castle¡¯s third level. The castle was still filled with shocking numbers of nightmare creatures and traps. However, it was almost as if there was an unseen deity sitting in her mind and giving her instructions.


    What paths to take, where the traps were located, when she should wait in silence, and when it was fine to proceed. Guided by that tiny voice, Mary was able to make it past one trap after another, sneaking by one scout after another. Just like that, she had managed to reach the fourth level of the castle.


    If her sense were not mistaken, the consciousness core that was engaging Greem in a vicious battle of the soul outside emanated from this location.


    However, Mary didn¡¯t dare unleash any of her Spirit, let alone scan everything around her with her spiritual senses. Thus, she took full advantage of her bat transformation to hide and proceed carefully. Finally, after crawling through a long corridor, Marry arrived at a wide and spacious magical hall.


    This hall had most likely once been the core hall of Kerslin Castle. Numerous crystals surrounded the central tform. A ck ball of light measuring ten meters in diameter hovered above the crystals, connecting itself to various regions of the castle through ck ribbons of light.


    Hundreds of strange images flickered on the ck ball. These were live images being transmitted back from various locations in the Nightmare Castle. Most of these images were of the battle that was currently happening in front of the castle.


    At this moment, a hazy and translucent figure of light stood before the central tform.


    He lifted his head and examined the continually shifting images, his hands flickering about as if they were in a dance. Under this mysterious individual¡¯s control, the offense, defense, and flow of life energy throughout the castle were perfectly organized.


    The figure of light was translucent, and an exceptionally bright ball of light flickered at the location of his heart, vaguely radiating a soul fluctuation unique to living beings.


    Kerslin¡¯s soul core.


    Mary felt a fire ignite in her heart and prepared to climb over across the ceiling.


    However, just as she was about to move, the strange voice in her head appeared again.


    ¡°Be careful; that figure of light is a fake. This ce is full of magical traps. Do not take a single step forward!¡±


    Mary¡¯s body trembled as she instantly stopped in her tracks.


    There was too much distance between her and the mysterious figure. Moreover, she couldn¡¯t actively use her spiritual senses to examine his soul aura. As such, it was quite difficult for her to determine if the figure was the real thing.


    The voice in her head had helped her a lot on her journey through the castle. Mary chose to believe in the voice without any hesitation.


    ¡°Then what should I do? There¡¯s not much time left,¡± Mary posed the question in her mind, ¡°Alice, if you know what to do, just tell me. There¡¯s no need to put on all this show and performance!¡±


    The voice in her mind paused for a moment. Finally, its deep, neutral voice turned into Alice¡¯s sweet voice.


    ¡°Hehe, I was worried you would hesitate if you knew it was me!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! I still don¡¯t know if you will lead me to my death. However, all I need to know is that you will never hurt Greem. That is why...I believe you!¡± Mary spoke without any hesitation in her voice.


    Alice paused for a moment and finally let out a sigh, ¡°Who knows who¡¯s the luckier one between you and Greem to have met each other! Well, speaking of which, what you should do next is......¡±


    Mary couldn¡¯t be bothered to think about Alice¡¯splex emotions. Instead, she shut her eyes and listened to Alice¡¯s strategy. No one could hide their secrets before a powerful Fate Witch.


    Not even the newly born Kerslin!


    There were no secrets that Alice couldn¡¯t uncover as long as she wanted to. The only question was whether she would be willing to pay the expensive price for those secrets.


    With Alice¡¯s utterly unfair magic, Mary was able to weave between the countless traps and energy threads as if an omniscient god aided her. Her target was no longer the humanoid form in the center of the hall, but a small, secret room hidden in a tall pir behind the hall.


    This small room was only a dozen square meters wide, and it had barely any furniture in it. There were only a chair and a table.


    Adept Freed, who had been missing all these days, sat quietly on that wooden chair. He had a ck dagger stuck on the top of his head. His eyes were white, his body trembled, and he let out meaningless moans from his mouth.


    Clearly, Kerslin was still in the process of the intense soul assimtion with Freed. If Kerslin hadn¡¯t wanted to inherit the knowledge and memories in Freed¡¯s soul perfectly, this battle of the souls would have concluded a long time ago.


    Mary climbed to the door of the secret room carefully, but was stopped by a thin barrier of energy. The barrier might look thin, but it possessed incredible energy intensity. An assassin proficient in Agility like Mary would have a difficult time shattering the barrier in a single strike.


    With the barrier at the entrance, Mary would not have any chance of sneaking in unnoticed.


    Just as Mary started to wonder what to do, Alice¡¯s voice rang out once again.


    ¡°Prepare yourself! I just contacted Greem. He willunch his most ferocious assault seven seconds from now. His attack will trigger Nightmare Castle into entering an energy overload. This barrier will vanish for half a second, so you must grasp this opportunity. The moment you enter the room, you must control him with your soul brand.¡±


    ¡°I understand!¡±


    Mentalmunication was the fastest means of conveying information. Even the mostplicated of thoughts could be conveyed in the blink of an eye.


    The instant the attack that shook the castle arrived, Mary transformed into her human form and lunged into the room while the barrier was down.


    Her movements were quick, but this was Kerslin¡¯s Nightmare Domain, after all. Kerslin had the home-field advantage. The moment the blood energy fluctuated, Kerslin was able to pick up on it.


    Energy immediately erupted in the magical hall outside, and a ferocious spiritual pressure pressed toward Mary like a hill, threatening to crush everything into pieces.


    Meanwhile, ¡®Freed¡¯s¡¯ body trembled violently in the room. The battle of souls had been put aside for a moment. He lifted his head, two blinding lights glowing from his yellowed eyes.


    There wasn¡¯t much time left for Mary!


    For powerful individuals like themselves, a thought took no more than an instant. Naturally, when facing an enemy, their reactions would be their first line of defense. There was no need to think or hesitate- the moment Mary¡¯s aura was exposed, Kerslin and the Nightmare Castle¡¯s retaliation was already ready.


    The energy barrier that had disappeared for an instant due to the energy overload appeared once again. It extended from the walls and quickly surged toward the center. It would take no more than half an instant for them to seal the entrance once more.


    When that happened, the invaders would first have to break this barrier if they wanted to reach Kerslin.


    Unfortunately, even half an instant was time.


    For Mary, who had exceptional Agility, Kerslin¡¯s rapid responses were no more than hrious movements in slow-motion.


    Crimson energy erupted at the door¡¯s entrance the previous moment as Mary transformed into her human state. The next instant, Mary¡¯s crimson figure had made it through the room and had arrived next to ¡®Freed.¡¯


    A miniature tornado instantly appeared between the two of them, forming a vicious vortex that tore at Mary¡¯s body. These des of wind, each as thin as a scale, ravaged Mary¡¯s body. Even with her blood energy shielding her, countless fine cuts still appeared all over. It was almost as if she had been thrown into a shredder.


    The vortex of wind continued to grow in size, attempting to shut off all of Mary¡¯s paths of attack.


    ¡®Freed¡¯s¡¯ line of thought was straightforward. He would force Mary back with this fearsome instant-cast spell and buy some time for himself. All he needed was one second-no, half a second-and he could redirect the powerful energies of the castle¡¯s core to protect this body. It would allow ¡®his¡¯ consciousness core to escape back to the central crystal.


    Of course, this meant that it would have to abandon the soul of this advanced Fourth Grade adept, as well as the opportunity to reach for the next grade for the time being.


    It was a shame, but it did not hesitate at all.


    That was because the pain of having another subjugate one¡¯s soul was not an experience it was willing to relive!


    Sadly, the opponent that it faced today wasn¡¯t just the legendary fire adept stirring up a storm out there. There was also this Fourth Grade blood adept. However, what truly decided Kerlin¡¯s fate was the mastermind behind the scenes- Alice, the Witches of Fate¡¯s leader!


    Mary did not intend to retreat or step away. She endured the terrifying spell, bursting through the vortex to grab hold of ¡®Freed¡¯s¡¯ body. She then sank her fangs into his neck.


    At the same time, a strange beam of prismatic light surged into ¡®Freed¡¯s¡¯ body, forcibly detaining Kerslin within.


    Noooooooooo!


    ¡®Freed¡¯ let out a scream of horror, two distinct voicesing out of his throat.


    However, no matter how they struggled and howled, the powerful instinct of a vampire soon overwhelmed their true consciousness.

 Chapter 1329 - Nightmares

    <strong>Chapter 1329 Nightmares</strong>


    Everything urring in the Nightmare Domain was no more than a battle of wills.


    No matter how ferocious and intense the battle was, the outside world remained utterly unaffected.


    When Mary forcefully Embraced Nightmare Castle Kerslin and gained control of it, Greem¡¯s mental consciousness was instantly rejected by the Nightmare Domain by a powerful force.


    It was the same room in the actual Nightmare Castle. Greem opened his eyes, and Mary followed soon after.


    Greem frowned, but Mary had a big smile on her face.


    ¡°Did it work?¡± The question had just left Greem¡¯s mouth, and he immediately knew it had been an unnecessary one.


    In fact, Greem didn¡¯t even have to see that gleeful expression on Mary¡¯s face. He immediately knew what had happened when he sensed the strange resonance between Mary¡¯s soul and the Nightmare Castle.


    The moment she emerged from the Nightmare Domain, Mary¡¯s soul had been bound with this Nightmare Castle. Strands of crimson energy flowed between them, and this monstrosity of alchemy and flesh whimpered before Mary¡¯s authority, as gentle as a puppy.


    The forcefield pressure that had been weighing on Mary and Greem all this while also vanished instantly.


    Powerful crimson energy reced the castle¡¯s life force, bing the Nightmare Castle¡¯s source of energy to maintain its functions.


    ¡°We should return the Gem of Power to Kerslin, shouldn¡¯t we? Otherwise, its home-field advantage will be limited to within the castle. With the Gem of Power, it can extend its Nightmare Domain over a thousand meters away. When that happens, everything within one and a half kilometers of the Nightmare Castle will be Kerslin¡¯s home field!¡± Mary asked impatiently.


    Even though she had the Gem of Power with her, she still had to respect Greem¡¯s opinion on how she should use it.


    ¡°It¡¯s your pet. You decide!¡± Greem smiled, but his tone clearly approved of Mary¡¯s idea.


    Mary dly took out the Gem of Power. Surges of crimson energy appeared around her, turning into a red pir with an indentation upon it. Mary put the Gem onto the pir, and it retracted into the ground.


    A short momentter, the Nightmare Castle glowed brightly with crimson light. Layers of forcefields expanded from the heart of the castle, expelling all elementium energy that did not belong to it. In the blink of an eye, countless energy forcefieldyers once again engulfed the Nightmare Castle, turning the whole area into Kerslin¡¯s home-field once more.


    Greem estimated that Kerslin had reached an advanced Fourth Grade level after falling under Mary¡¯s control. It had yet to reach the level of a forbidden lifeform. Meanwhile, Freed had been sacrificed in the blood ritual and became a Fourth Grade spirit bound to the Nightmare Castle. However, his powers had degraded to that of a beginner Fourth Grade.


    ¡°How is it? Do you feel any improvements to your power after gaining control of Kerslin?¡± Due to the existence of the energy forcefields, even Greem could not obtain detailed information on Kerslin. He could only ask Mary.


    ¡°Not really. It¡¯s just the addition of an advanced Fourth Grade subordinate!¡± Mary smiled brightly and seemingly bragged in a cheerful tone. ¡°However, if the battlefield is within Kerslin¡¯s radius of effect, I would have the confidence to fight you ultra-powerhouses!¡±


    That meant that thebined power of Mary and Kerslin could reach peak Fourth Grade!


    Unfortunately, the mobility of the Nightmare Castle was terrible. Mary could only fill-in for the role of a defense ultra-powerhouse. It wasn¡¯t the perfect conclusion, but Greem still nodded in satisfaction.


    With this, the foundations of the Crimson n were truly secure!


    Zhentarim had been thoroughly shaken by Greem¡¯s appearance as a pseudo-ultra-powerhouse. The ripples spreading across thend had not ceased, even now. Schemes and plots from the regions around Zhentarim also started to press forward.


    This time, the Crimson n would have to push forward regardless of what happened.


    If they could not survive this ordeal, then the only future they would face was extermination. Greem might be able to escape unscathed due to his status as a Fourth Grade adept, but the other members of the Crimson n would have a hard time ever living in the Central Lands again.


    Now that Mary had gained control of Kerslin, her prowess had improved tremendously. She could even rival ultra-powerhouses in some respect.


    That was undoubtedly a firm anchor for the Crimson n, that now found itself on the edge of a ferocious storm!


    There was no need to fight any battles or to put on an intimidating front. All they had to do was release a little news about Mary¡¯s improvement, and they would be able to scare off many of those malicious enemies stalking in the shadows. It would save the Crimson n a lot of trouble.


    It was precisely because Greem had considered this question thoroughly that he suddenly smiled.


    ¡°Then, as a celebration for obtaining the Nightmare Castle, let us host a banquet here! There have been a lot of n representatives visiting recently anyway. We might as well have an audience with them with the banquet.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! I know the banquet¡¯s just an excuse. You just want to frighten those messengers, don¡¯t you? Alright, we will make it tomorrow night. I will give you a huge surprise then!¡± Mary grunted, clearly having seen through Greem¡¯s ns.


    The two of them smiled at each other, a light of anticipation in their eyes.


    ............


    The second day.


    Nightfall.


    All the n messengers who had been waiting in the vicinity had received notifications from the Crimson n. They slowly began to return to Kerslin Castle.


    The past few days they had spent in Kerslin Castle hadpletely changed their understanding of the castle.


    It was obvious that a blood ritual had just taken ce in the castle not long ago. As the numbers and prowess of the adepts involved in the ritual were horrifying, the entire castle had been shrouded in permanent resentment and the scent of blood.


    However, this time, as they arrived at the castle on their mounts, they immediately noticed the atmosphere had changed.


    The resentment lingering in the air was gone. The smell of blood had thinned, turned into a light mist that resembled blood energy.


    Meanwhile, the people who greeted them at the castle¡¯s doors were none other than the vampires subordinate to the Bloody Queen. The men conducted themselves eloquently, and the women were incredibly pretty. All of them were dressed in fancy dress clothes and behaved in an elegant fashion, managing the banquet in an orderly manner.


    Apart from the high-grade vampires, many of the higher-ups of the Crimson n were also here.


    Just the ones that could be seen at the banquet included Fire Dragon Adept Meryl, Mystique Emelia, Emerald Dragon Iritina, Bug Adept Billis, Goblin Sage Snox, Split-Brain Sock, Goblin Adept Locke, and Magical Goblin Leader Gonga.


    After so many years of trials and tribtions, these veterans of the Crimson n who had followed Greem for hundreds of years had mostly reached Third Grade as well. As for those who couldn¡¯t keep up? They had either been eliminated from the core group or had simply died of old age. Either way, those people would not be able to appear at such an event!


    However, that wasn¡¯t the truly shocking part of the banquet. What stunned the guests more were the servants weaving their way between the crowd.


    Every messenger who could attend the Crimson n¡¯s banquet was someone of importance, a Second Grade adept at the very least.


    The major ns might only send a single adept as a messenger, but that person would be no lower than Third Grade. Meanwhile, the smaller ns often only had one or two Second Grade adepts across the entire n. As such, the n leader themself would have to be the messenger.


    As high-grade adepts, all of them had attended countless adept banquets. However, none of them had high-grade spirits as servants like the Crimson n did now.


    The servants holding silver tters as they weaved between the crowd were not humans or vampires at all. Instead, they were pretty female spirits with seductive figures¨C dream enchantresses.


    Dream enchantresses, also known as night enchantresses, were strange creatures of unusual seductiveness. They had wings and a tail. Their greatest ability was the ability to drain the life essence of intelligent creatures through dreams.


    That was why they were often noted as exceptions from ordinary monsters and spirits in many books. However, no matter how you categorized them, it was obvious that they were not ordinary intelligent lifeforms but terrifying and dangerous creatures of an unusual sort.


    The fact that the Crimson n could tame dream enchantresses and use them to serve adepts was more than a sufficient demonstration of their power.


    These dream enchantresses were all fearsome Second Grade spirits. Left in a small adept n, they could easily wipe out every single living being. Here, they were no more than humble servants working their best to fulfill the needs of the adepts.


    The only problem was that when the dream enchantresses walked past the guests, the weaker Second Grade adepts would show signs of being charmed. They could only subtly add a fewyers of magical protection to themselves and put some distance between them and those monsters.


    The Second Grade adepts were impressed by these insignificant matters, while the Third Grade adepts noticed far more shocking details!


    The more powerful of the Third Grade adepts had already started delving into research in thews. They might not be able toe into contact with thews or attempt to grasp them, but they could still imitate thews¡¯ effects through their magic.


    That was why the Third Grade adepts were fixated on Kerslin Castle while the Second Grade adepts were distracted by the dream enchantresses.


    How strange, how unusual, how odd.


    For some reason, Kerslin Castle feltpletely different from a few days ago. The aura it radiated was utterly unfamiliar, such that they were confused.


    Did they sense wrongly, or had something strange really happened to Kerslin Castle?


    While everyone was confused, the hostess of the banquet arrived. Bloody Queen Mary stepped down the stairs in her clicking heels, wearing a scarlet dress.


    The confusion on everyone¡¯s faces turned into utter and inconceble shock when she appeared.


    This...how could this be possible?

 Chapter 1330 - A Hall Full of Guests

    <h4>Chapter 1330 A Hall Full of Guests</h4>


    Mary didn¡¯t appear alone!


    As the n leader of the Crimson n, Greem wore an intricate ck robe when he appeared with Mary hand-in-hand.


    Despite his fame as the legendary fire adept and his striking physique, Greem could not steal the attention from Mary, whose aura was bright and burned as if it was on fire.


    At the moment, the soul aura radiating from Mary was resonating with the Nightmare Castle. Their powers were intertwined and, even now, were growing stronger and brighter, like a rising crescendo. The very sight of her thoroughly stunned all the adepts present.


    It was precisely because Mary¡¯s radiance was too blinding that Greem had been unintentionally overlooked. The prideful, beautiful woman lifting the hem of her skirt with one hand was the only thing that remained in the guests¡¯ eyes.


    Mary.


    Bloody Queen Mary.


    Since when had she also be so powerful!?


    Mary was the second-inmand of the Crimson n and a powerful Fourth Grade adept in her own right. However, her radiance had been outshone by Greem¡¯s blinding brilliance all this while. The fact that female adepts in the Central Lands were generally weaker than male adepts also further caused people to underestimate Mary¡¯s status and position.


    The moment Mary appeared in the hall, her overwhelming aura, crushing Spiritual pressure, and forcefield resonance that seemed to control the heartbeats and minds of every adept in the room here left an indelible mark in their hearts!


    ¡°Wee...wee, my guests!¡±


    Mary¡¯s smile was even brighter now, but it was obvious that her greeting wasn¡¯t directed at the guests already present in the hall.


    Just as everyone was confused about who her words were directed at, a light shed in the shadows. An individual with a powerful aura appeared in the hall, his deep voice booming as he spoke.


    ¡°Congrattions, Adept Mary! And congrattions to you as well, Lord Greem!¡±


    It was a stout and muscr middle-aged man who walked out of the shadows. He had a face full of beard, and his head was bald on the top with three ck and white braids running down the back. He wasn¡¯t wearing robes, but a seemingly ancient leather armor. There were no signs of any other magical equipment on his person.


    Gasps rang out in the hall when the man appeared.


    ¡°Lord Den.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s Den Fabres.¡±


    Everyone¡¯s expressions tightened as they hastily looked down and bowed.


    It was their instinctual respect and fear of Fourth Grade adepts. Intermediate adepts like themselves had trouble even breathing within the presence of a Fourth Grade adept.


    ¡°I heard you defeated Freed, so I took a special trip here to take a look,¡± Den lifted his head and carefully examined the forcefields around him, as well as Mary herself. There was a hint of surprise on his face as he let out a soft sigh and said, ¡°It seems like you have indeed gained a lot in this battle. Congrattions, Lady Mary!¡±


    The World of Adepts had always been a world where power decided status. Now that Mary was enhanced by the entire castle¡¯s power, she was heads and shoulders above Den. He was an easygoing person and immediately shifted attitudes, even changing the way he referred to Mary.


    Mary immediately smiled and waved her hand. A ck-and-red rug appeared abruptly, extending all the way from Den¡¯s feet to the doors of the hall.


    This ability to instantly materialize energy into solid objects caused the other adepts to gasp in awe.


    Den sighed silently and stepped onto the soft rug, slowly walking toward the two hosts.


    Even though they were ¡®allies¡¯ now, Den still didn¡¯t want to step within ten meters of Greem and Mary. In fact, for Fourth Grade adepts like themselves, ten meters was already far too close. Most people would be anxious to be within such distances.


    For some reason, the closer he got to Mary, the more severely Den¡¯s spiritual senses were suppressed. Once he was within ten meters of Greem and Mary, Den refused to take a single step forward.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Den had a feeling that an unpredictable and terrifying retaliation would ur if he took even one more step.


    While the three of them were ¡®intimately¡¯ exchanging greetings, Mary turned her head and cast her gaze into the darkness beyond the doors of the hall.


    ¡°We have another guest!¡±


    Greem and Den couldn¡¯t help but smile bitterly.


    After all, as long as they were within range of the Nightmare Castle, their spiritual senses would be severely affected and disrupted by the powerful forcefields. They did not have as much of a sensory range as Mary while in this castle.


    ¡°Hehehe, I¡¯m notte this time, am I? Who would¡¯ve thought you would appear before me, Den?¡± A hoarse female voice rang out as Adept Ker slowly stepped out of the shadows and approached them.


    ¡°You are truly beautiful!¡± Ker examined Mary carefully, her face full of envy and reminiscence as she eximed, ¡°How I miss the days after I had just advanced to Fourth Grade. That was probably the most memorable and beloved period of my entire life!¡±


    Mary was clearly an amiable and sociable person as well. Seeing as Ker was humbling herself and speaking kindly of her, Mary had no reason to put on and an arrogant and hostile front.


    The forcefield fluctuations that were suppressing Den and Ker lightened by half.


    Mary even took Ker by her arm and started chatting happily with her at her side.


    It was undoubtedly a show of attitude from Mary as well!


    It was an evident demonstration that Ker was far more important to her than Den.


    This move undoubtedly caused Ker to be relieved as well, having been anxious at how their past hostilities should be resolved.


    ¡°How could I miss out on all this if all of you are here!¡±


    A red light flickered in the darkness, and a towering figure appeared before the crowd.


    ¡°Casten Alfred! Wee, wee,¡± Greem¡¯s expression rxed, and a gentle smile spread over his face.


    Due to practical needs and requirements, Molten Fire City and the Crimson n had formed a very intimate rtionship over the past two hundred years. The personal friendship between Alfred and Greem had also improved with each passing day.


    Of course, in the face of tremendous benefit, that kind of personal friendship was no more than a performance both of them were taking part in!


    Even so, Greem still weed Alfred very warmly. After all, his appearance meant that another heavy weight had been ced onto the scales on the Crimson n¡¯s side.


    Five Fourth Grade adepts were a fearsome group, no matter where they were situated. In particr, in the disjointed Central Lands, this alliance already had more than sufficient influence to quash any voice of opposition.


    If those who opposed them had the courage to retaliate, then Freed wouldn¡¯t have been the only person standing within Kerslin Castle when the Crimson Fleet arrived.


    Spineless scheming, endless calctions, inaction, hesitation, fear.


    Zhentarim was just as the three major organizations expected it to be, a bowl of loose sand. Even when Greem had pushed them to the wall, they remained watching from the fence, wondering and thinking about their best move. Consequently, they watched as the Crimson n forcibly conquered Kerslin Castle.


    In truth, Greem had already prepared himself for the eventuality of an invasion of Ailovis and for the headquarters to be under siege the moment the Crimson Fleet set off. He had only brought seven of the Motherships with him, leaving behind three of them to defend the headquarters against any enemy offensives.


    Freed had to be dealt with regardless of the cost. He was the leader of the voices of opposition, after all. Greem was willing to let Ailovis burn if it meant that Freed was defeated.


    As long as the Crimson n could defend the n¡¯s few key locations, it would be fine if they lost all of their other territories. The moment the Crimson Fleet returned, victorious, all the territory that their enemies had stolen would have to be returned with interest.


    The Crimson n would finally settle the debt between them when that happened!


    To Greem¡¯s utter surprise, Mirva, who had been intentionally left behind in the Crimson Fleet¡¯s path, did not make any movements at all. He did not take the opportunity to attack the Crimson n¡¯s headquarters, nor did he attempt to reinforce Freed. It was almost as if the entire battle had nothing to do with him at all.


    That was what surprised Greem the most!


    However, upon reviewing the information on this former vice-chairman of the Zhentarim Association, Greem had a vague understanding about the motivations behind his actions.


    Mirva did not have long to live!


    If Freed had two hundred more years of lifespan left, then Mirva only had a hundred years left.


    A hundred years. That might sound like a long time, but it was nothing to high-grade adepts. They couldn¡¯t conduct more than one or two significant experiments in that amount of time. Once Mirva had passed away, the Annemdor Academy that he managed would be the target of all his rivals and enemies.


    At the very least, Greem had never heard of any particrly exceptional sessors in Annemdor Academy. Medium Adept Dante also seemed to have suffered tremendous injuries in the battle between the four Third Grade adepts back then. Ever since then, no news of him had appeared again. Who knew if Mirva would be able to help him reach Fourth Grade before Mirva died himself.


    If Dante could not advance to Fourth Grade, then Annmedor Academy would likely be demoted to a Third Grade organization soon.


    It was amon state of affairs in Zhentarim!


    The Central Lands might be rich in resources, poption, andnd, but it was ultimately a hierarchy dictated by ns and bloodlines. Too many resources had been provided to the main family adepts who had insufficient talent.


    Meanwhile, even adepts who were known as prodigies from a young age had tremendous difficulty collecting knowledge and gathering resources if they did not have a formidable background or n to rely on.


    These prodigies could only survive between the cracks of the various ns, toiling hard day after day to obtain resources and knowledge. They even had to face oppression and exploitation from the adept ns regrly.

 Chapter 1331 - Secret Gathering

    <strong>Chapter 1331 Secret Gathering</strong>


    The people here today could all be considered allies of the Crimson n.


    The arrival of Den, Ker, and Alfred undoubtedly boosted the Crimson n¡¯s reputation tremendously. Greem and Mary gave them a warm wee, and the five of them prepared to walk into the hall and begin the festivities.


    However, before they started moving, all five of them paused and turned to look into the distance.


    Who would¡¯ve thought that there would still be guests arriving at this time?


    A crystal flying ship resembling a stingray flew out of the darkness and came to a hovering stop at the za in front of the Nightmare Castle. Two strange silhouettes of the same height appeared before everyone, slowly drifting to the ground.


    ¡°Tartas and Monari. They are members of the Silver Union¡¯s senate. Tartas, in particr, has quite the authority. He might look like a simple half-blood gnome, but his uncle is one of the few ultra-powerhouses of the Union,¡± Ker was clearly acquainted with the neers and quickly introduced Greem and Mary with a voice transmission.


    Two Fourth Grades.


    Greem¡¯s heart couldn¡¯t help but skip a beat.


    Even if the Silver Union viewed the Central Lands¡¯ matters with great significance, sending a single Fourth Grade would have been enough to express their attitude. However, two Fourth Grades had appeared together today. Greem was confident that the Silver Union wanted to make moves on Zhentarim for themselves.


    Moreover, Alice had informed him that Freed had contacted one of the three major organizations before the war. Even though she had been vague, it was most likely that Freed had chosen to talk with the Silver Union, given an analysis of the situation.


    Two Fourth Grades of the Silver Union had appeared soon after the Crimson n defeated the Entom n. Even a fool would not believe it if you told them that there were no schemes behind this.


    Greem thought to himself. As the leader of the Crimson n, hosting his guests was part of his responsibility.


    Greem smiled gently and walked forward with both hands spread out.


    ¡°Wee! Wee! Everyone who makes it to Nightmare Castle tonight will be the friends of our Crimson n. Why don¡¯t the two of youe in with us and have a talk since you are already here!¡±


    Tartas was a half-blood gnome, no more than 1.3 meters in height. He was so short that his robe dragged on the ground, making him look like a sly and wretched man. Meanwhile, Monari was also not a human. He had the body of a human male but possessed an eagle¡¯s head.


    Tartas was a golem master, while Monari was a puppet master.


    Golem masters often possessed an incredibly powerful magical armor that they could equip to dobat with their enemies. Meanwhile, puppet masters excelled at manipting puppets. They often carried a ridiculous number ofbat puppets with them.


    These two professions were also the most popr professions within the Silver Union!


    Tartas red with his beady green eyes and spoke in response to Greem¡¯s warm invitation.


    ¡°Our original intent ining here was to meet Freed. Who would¡¯ve expected you to move so fast and deal with him already? So, we have no choice but toe to see you instead.¡±


    The other adept, Monari, was visibly moreposed and used to dealing with such social situations. He spoke casually in a thick foreign ent, ¡°We have also heard much about your feats in recent times, Sir Greem. In all honesty, I admire you quite a lot, Sir Greem. However, since you have defeated Freed, we will need you to give us some exnation on certain matters.¡±


    As expected of senate members from the Silver Union, the arrogance and pride in their tones were unconceble, despite them being in the Central Lands.


    ¡°You¡¯ve made a long journey here, and I insist that you must be treated as guests. There¡¯s no reason we should talk out here in the cold! Why don¡¯t we sit down and have a good discussion on these matters inside...please!¡± Cold light gleamed in Greem¡¯s eyes, but he warmly led all his guests into the Nightmare Castle.


    The moment they stepped into the castle, everyone¡¯s expressions changed.


    The reason for it was simple. The castle possessed shockingly powerful forcefield defenses.


    The moment they stepped in here, the adepts all felt their spiritual senses forced back into their bodies. All extended Spirits were severed here, and all means of magical probing restricted. They had been reduced to ordinary humans who could only feel with their physical senses.


    Theck of spiritual senses meant that they could no longer sense everything within their range. Without their spiritual senses, they would lose the advantage if something unexpected happened.


    This terrifying state of blindness made everyone nervous.


    After all, as Fourth Grade adepts, they had never put their lives in the hands of strangers!


    Tartas and Monari exchanged looks, a hint of understanding in their eyes.


    This ce seemed to be Bloody Queen Mary¡¯s home field.


    If they were to fight here, their spiritual senses would be suppressed immensely, while Mary¡¯s abilities would be enhanced. The advantage brought about by this was horrifying.


    Before they came here, the only one they had honestly perceived to be a threat was Legendary Fire Adept Greem. The rest of the Fourth Grade adepts were no more than mediocre fools!


    However, upon stepping into Mary¡¯s home field, the two Union senate members¡¯ faces turned dark. For the first time, they felt worried about their mission.


    After the Fourth Grade adepts walked into the third floor of the Nightmare Castle together, the other adepts finally let out a breath of relief. They started to gather together and talk again.


    The gathering of seven Fourth Grade adepts was undoubtedly a rare asion in the Central Lands!


    The fact that they had gathered indicated that a significant event would soon ur in the Central Lands.


    What would it be?


    The appearance of a fourth major organization...or something else?


    Wasn¡¯t that the reason that all these messengers from various ns had gathered here? It was to obtain an advantageous position in this revolution of the Central Lands! Now that all the key actors had gathered together, what would they talk about? Would the talks go well?


    All of these questions lingered in the hearts of the adepts.


    Unfortunately, even though they were many and often came fromrge ns, the adepts could only wait patiently. They had to wait until the key actors hade to a conclusion and for them to announce it.


    ............


    The meeting in the Nightmare Castle had already begun.


    When the seven adepts took their seats on the third level, an unusually majestic and gigantic eagle circled in the night sky above the castle.


    The eagle was massive, about six to seven times the size of an ordinary eagle.


    Their feathers were tough yet firm and glowed with a metallic gleam. Their crimson eyes scanned the ground and betrayed the light of intelligence.


    Seeing as the people it was tracking had already gone into the castle and that there was no way of peeking inside due to the strong disruptions from the forcefields, the eagle let out a cry. It then beat its wings and flew southwest.


    While it was beating its wings, one of its feathers fell off and drifted leisurely across the sky, riding on the cold winter winds.


    The feather was only an ordinary object with no magic in it, after all. As such, it did not draw the attention of the many adepts below.


    Finally, it drifted to the ground,nding on a small hill about two kilometers west of the castle.


    The moment the feathernded, a strange figure dressed in a robe appeared out of nowhere and pinched the feather between his fingers.


    It was a middle-aged man with stern features. He wore an emblem with a scroll and a quill on his robe. A strange tattoo of an eye was drawn on his forehead.


    He stroked the feather, put it before his nose, and sniffed. An unusual stream of information that only an Archivist could decode flowed into his mind.


    Gathering at the Central Lands...forbidden lifeform...enter the castle to investigate.


    It was an investigation mission personally passed down by the tower master. He was to immediately sneak into the castle and figure out the secret agreement being brokered between the adepts. In the meantime, he was also to learn more about the forbidden lifeform.


    Archivists always adhered to the fundamental principle of never getting involved, never intervening, and never exining anything of what they knew. They were only servants of Fate. They were like an eye that existed beyond humankind, solely responsible for observing and recording all major events happening in the World of Adepts while staying uninvolved.


    It was because of their principles that the other adept organizations never suppressed Archivists.


    However, this didn¡¯t mean that high-grade adepts would like their presence!


    No one liked a person standing in the shadows recording everything they were doing with their quill. Even if these people were harmless, it was still very annoying!


    This infiltration mission was also an extreme course of action.


    The confidential agreement and the forbidden lifeform were both ssified secrets of the Crimson n. They would never easily reveal them. However, the tower master wanted him to sneak in there and figure it all out.


    Even though he knew this mission was incredibly difficult, the Archivist showed no signs of fear on his face. After reading all the information on the feather, he waved his hand as it quickly burned away.


    Once the feather had turned entirely to ash, the Archivist shook his robe and seemingly vanished into thin air as he turned invisible.


    There were no magical fluctuations or life signs detected. This invisible man quickly sprinted toward the tower like a ghost.


    Two and a half kilometers...two kilometers...one and a half kilometers......

 Chapter 1332 - Mary’s Prowess

    <strong>Chapter 1332 Mary¡¯s Prowess</strong>


    Mary frowned abruptly in the meeting room.


    ¡°What is it?¡± Greem asked softly. He had been mentally connected with Mary and could sense her displeasure.


    ¡°A little bug seems to have broken into the castle. It seems he¡¯s quite hard to deal with.¡±


    ¡°Be careful! Just kill him if he¡¯s a spy from another adept organization. If it¡¯s one of those Archivists, then just expel them from the castle.¡±


    Mysterious strangers had been trying to sneak into the castle these past few days. Mary was extremely annoyed at this point.


    One had to admit that the Archivists were a harmless group of individuals. They were a neutral organization that remained uninvolved in all adept affairs, after all. However, just because a gnat was harmless didn¡¯t mean that it was fine to let them buzz around. That was why Greem suggested that Mary expel the Archivist from the tower.


    After all, killing an Archivist was likely to anger the Diviners¡¯ Tower.


    No adept or organization could survive if they made an enemy out of this mysterious organization that possessed all the World of Adepts¡¯ secrets in the past tens of thousands of years.


    That was why high-grade adepts didn¡¯t dare kill these Archivists without proper reason, as much as they hated their privacy-breaching actions.


    After all, what stood behind them was the Omnisicent Eye, which represented the ability to witness everything in the World of Adepts!


    ording to certain adepts that knew more about the Diviners¡¯ Tower, the Omniscient Eye was likely a projected manifestation of the Fate powers of the World of Adepts. One could understand and uncover all the secrets flowing in the World of Adepts¡¯ shadows with the Omniscient Eye.


    The adepts were a veryrge group of individuals. Naturally, there would always be some of them who did not like the fighting nor the scramble for power. Rather, they preferred to conduct research and seek the truth of the world in silence.


    These people gathered around the Omniscient Eye with the motto of never being involved, never intervening, and never exining. They worked constantly, relying on the Omniscient Eye to peer into the World of Adepts¡¯ higher principle powers.


    Due to their prolonged contact with the Omniscient Eye, they had unknowingly conducted an exchange of power with the Fate powers. The Omniscient Eye allowed them to approach it and track the flow of the Fate powers. However, they were also forbidden from revealing their research and knowledge. All of that information could only be stored within the looming Diviner¡¯s Tower.


    That was why, in all honesty, the Archivists were no more than servants bound to the Omniscient Eye¡¯s side. However, they firmly believed that they were the ones who had grasped the Fate powers!


    Though all other adepts perceived the Archivists as madmen, their prolonged contact with the Fatews had given them powerful and unusual magical abilities.


    The means by which they hid themselves were utterly different from adepts of conventional elementium attributes. The power they possessed could even be considered an independent branch of power that existed entirely outside the traditional adept¡¯s system!


    The negotiations in the room continued.


    Apart from Mary, who appeared somewhat distracted, the other adepts were very focused. They were treating the matter with solemn seriousness.


    The group was clearly split into two factions: Zhentarim and the Silver Union.


    The Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands might seem like a pack of unorganized wolves. However, the moment any of the three major organizations revealed their ambitions to conquer Zhentarim, they instantly turned their spears outwards and formed a united line.


    The conflict within Zhentarim was a civil war at best. In the end, no matter how savage the fighting, the meat would remain in their pot instead of ending up in the jaw of an outsider. If the three major organizations were allowed to extend their dirty hands into Zhentarim, it would be much more difficult to drive them out!


    That was why the atmosphere in the room suddenly turned heated the moment everyone sat down.


    As expected, Tartas and Monari came here with a secret agreement signed by Freed. The agreement consented to the Silver Union establishing an outpost in his personal territory and founding a major public city here.


    Naturally, this public city would have to be open to all organizations and ns.


    Everyone knew very well that the Silver Union would most likely be the ones directing what happened within this public city.


    That would have been crossing the line!


    Zhentarim might have allowed Silver Union members to conductmercial activity here in the past, including the establishment of minor outposts and small amounts ofnd. However, the construction of an actual adept tower was strictly forbidden!


    As long as the Silver Union had no adept tower within Zhentarim, they would never be able to truly nt roots in the Central Lands, nor have any hopes of growing their influence.


    While many cities in the Central Lands would sometimes hire Silver Union members as management, the authority over the adept towers always remained firmly grasped in the hands of Central adepts.


    The mostmon examples of this situation were the flying ships that traveled all across the Central Lands. Those ships were all managed by the Silver Union. However, the Silver Union ships only had the right to transport goods and personnel. They did not possess even a single base of operations where the ships were allowed to remain for extended periods.


    It was the ironw of Zhentarim and its final bottom line!


    However, this secret agreement signed by Freed had clearly broken this rule. Not only had he allowed the Silver Union to construct a so-called ¡®public city¡¯ in his territory, but he had also handed over the most crucialponent to the Silver Union¨C control over the adept tower of the city.


    It was no wonder that Ker, Alfred, and Den¡¯s faces all turned purple after reading the terms of the agreement. They had already cursed Freed ten times over in their hearts, hurling every insult they knew of at him and every member in his family tree.


    Only Greem remained unfazed after reading the agreement. Instead, a cheeky smile appeared on his face.


    ¡°If Freed was the one that signed this agreement with you, you should be looking for Freed to honor what he has agreed to. Why have youe to me instead?¡±


    The agreement was undoubtedly not theplete picture.


    The actual contents of the agreement between Freed and the Silver Union most likely included a deal for the Silver Union to send forces to help him resist the invasion of the Crimson n. Meanwhile, he would betray Zhentarim¡¯s benefit and transfer part of the authority over his territory to the Silver Union.


    Such terms clearly could not be written in paper, which was why it took the form of a cooperative city development n instead. Moreover, judging by the terms of the agreement, Freed had even sold Kerslin Castle over to the Silver Union.


    It seemed like these two guests hade here today with the intent of taking over Kerslin Castle with that ¡®agreement¡¯ of theirs!


    Taking over Kerslin Castle.


    Mary¡¯s attention was immediately drawn back when she heard these sensitive terms. She started ring at the two Silver Union members much more fiercely.


    The forcefield fluctuations in the air began to concentrate upon sensing Mary¡¯s emotions. Crimson energy twisted together, forming tiny and imperceptible energy nodes.


    Powerful and fearsome pressure was then applied to these two Silver Union members, with the energy nodes as the center of force. Tartas and Monari felt a chill run through their bodies as their Spirits tremble. They could sense the very hostility of their environment toward them.


    Their expressions changed, and they silently started to prepare for the eventuality of battle!


    Tartas kept up the smile on his face, but a faint silver radiance was glowing on his skin beneath his robes, varying in brightness along with his breathing. Meanwhile, the eyes of a tall and majestic metal golem in the crystal ship one and a half kilometers away glowed red, theplicated runes all over its body slowly lighting up.


    The castle¡¯s forcefields could not wholly sever the mental connection between Tartas and his magical golem. When necessary, Tartas could teleport the magical golem armor to his side with just three seconds to confirm the spatial coordinates.


    Meanwhile, the eagle-headed Monari also had a few intricate silver statues in his palm. If it came down to a fight, he would only need to throw out these miniature puppets, and they would instantly transform into ferociousbat puppets.


    That was why the two Silver Union members remained calm and confident even though they were still within Mary¡¯s home field.


    However, this confidence vanished like mist the moment Mary¡¯s crimson eyes glowed!


    Mary smiled sinisterly. When red mist started rising around her, the forcefields of Nightmare Castle resonated with her magical aura and merged as one. The entire space was suddenly separated from the World of Adepts, cutting off all magical connections outside the castle.


    The magical golem armor on the crystal ship dimmed, having lost the guidance of the soul aura. Tartas¡¯ expression shifted tremendously. His eyes were filled with unconceble horror when he looked at Mary.


    He was a golem master. His attributes were mediocre, and over eighty percent of his power rested within that magical golem armor that he had spent countless treasures and rare materials forging. If his soul connection with the magical golem armor were severed, he would be effectively crippled, making him about as strong as a beginner Fourth Grade adept.


    Moreover, he would be a beginner Fourth Grade adept that had barely any elementium spells in his arsenal nor a resilient Physique, overwhelming Strength, or incredible speed.


    In contrast, Puppet Master Monari was barely affected by the change in his environment. Still, fighting against a greatly enhanced melee adept with extraordinary Agility, spatial sense, andbat technique in such a closed environment was not an intelligent move!


    Seeing as everyone was on edge as if they were about to break out into a fight at any moment, Greem simply smiled. He reached out with his hand and patted Mary¡¯s right hand a few times as he gently said, ¡°I¡¯m sure our two guests won¡¯t be unreasonable! Why not sit down and hear what they have to say first?¡±


    Bloody Queen Mary was usually never someone who could be talked down with words. However, Greem had her wrapped around his finger. She red at the two Silver Union adepts angrily and spat, ¡°There is no more Kerslin Castle now. There is only my Nightmare Castle! Anyone who has their eyes set on it is an enemy of mine. Hmph! Don¡¯t regret it if I pick a fight with you!¡±


    Having said that, Mary¡¯s imposing aura slowly subsided, and the forcefield fluctuations weighing on everyone¡¯s shoulders gradually faded away.

 Chapter 1333 - Absolute Power

    <strong>Chapter 1333 Absolute Power</strong>


    Negotiations were always long and challenging.


    Moreover, the result of negotiations would always end up equal to the difference in power between the two negotiating parties.


    One had to admit that Mary¡¯s shocking disy of power had indeed given the Crimson n greater leverage in this mediation. Even those who believed they had figured out the true depth of the Crimson n¡¯s power were now confused and in despair.


    Who would¡¯ve thought? Who would¡¯ve expected!?


    Not only did the Crimson n have their n leader, the legendary fire adept in possession of two artifacts and with power rivaling an ultra-powerhouse now. Bloody Queen Mary had now demonstrated that she held equally fearsome strength.


    Thebination of Mary and the Nightmare Castle might not be equal to a true ultra-powerhouse, but as long as they remained where they had their home-field advantage, they could unleash power equivalent to an ultra-powerhouse.


    Thisbination could be considered an ultra-powerhouse that could only be used on the defense!


    It also meant that a mere adept n in the Central Lands possessed two pseudo-ultra-powerhouses. Such absolute power was not just enough to crush the Central Lands¡¯ ns, but also sufficient to make the three major organizations treat them seriously. They would have to truly ponder if they should improve their rtionship with the Crimson n.


    A change in quality could ur when there was sufficient quantity!


    When Greem was the only pseudo-ultra-powerhouse of the Crimson n, he still did not possess enough influence. The three major organizations had plenty of means to keep him in check using their vast reserves of power and resources.


    However, when the Crimson n gained another pseudo-ultra-powerhouse, the three major organizations¡¯ numerical advantage became far less obvious. It was no longer practical for them to hope to intimidate the entirety of the Central Lands by sending over an ultra-powerhouse, as they had done in the past.


    Curse Adept Cerveris¡¯ defeatst time could be interpreted as an outlier. However, with Mary¡¯s rise to power, those who once looked down upon the Central Lands would have to properly reconsider the consequences of recklessly throwing their weight around now.


    Cerveris had not shown himself once since he returned to the Adept¡¯s Association and hid in his room. It was said that the injuries he sustained were severe. There was no way he could remove the foreignws that had seeped into his body without several years of treatment.


    In contrast, Greem had recovered enough toe out of hiding after just a month.


    In this regard alone, Greem was superior to Cerveris. He was a genuine powerhouse that no one could underestimate.


    There were no more than ten ultra-powerhouses throughout the entirety of the World of Adepts. All of them were split between the three major organizations. In the past, Gaia n Leader Mornashen Gaia was the only one who had been able to reach this level in the Central Lands.


    Greem and Mary¡¯s sudden appearance would now undoubtedly affect the bnce of power in the World of Adepts significantly!


    To put it frankly, even if Greem and Mary were utterly penniless now, their status and power as pseudo-ultra-powerhouses would allow them to do almost anything they wanted. The three major organizations could not stop them if they wanted to nt their roots in the Central Lands¡¯ power vacuum and develop.


    In the World of Adepts, power was authority, and absolute power was absolute authority!


    Even a gigantic organization like the Adept¡¯s Association would not be able to suppress two united ultra-powerhouses.


    That was why Tartas and Monari were not the only subdued ones when Mary disyed her ¡®true power.¡¯ Ker, Alfred, and Den had also been impressed.


    Ultra-powerhouses were ultra-powerhouses. Even a pseudo-ultra-powerhouse had the overwhelming power to crush a Fourth Grade adept inbat!


    Tartas and Monari, who hade here in ¡®sincerity,¡¯ immediately got up and bid farewell to their hosts.


    Their outdated information had not only made their trippletely pointless but had also given them quite a scare. They obtained none of the things promised to them in their agreement with Freed. The only thing they could do was bring back terrible news to the senate heads and senate members; it was awful news that no one would like to hear.


    As for whether they would be allies or enemies with the Crimson n in the future? That was not a matter that could be decided by two ¡®humble¡¯ senate members like themselves.


    After sending off the two Silver Union senate members, it was once again a closed-door meeting between the allied forces of the Crimson n. The three Fourth Grade adepts were now much more humble and gentle in their attitude toward Mary and Greem.


    In the past, Mornashen Gaia¡¯s presence meant that Greem would have always been kept in check, no matter how powerful he was. He would require the aid of these three guests of his if he wanted to unify the Central Lands.


    That was why Ker, Alfred, and Den had yet to put down their pride as Fourth Grade adepts. They always carried themselves and referred to themselves as ¡®allies¡¯ of the Crimson n.


    However, with Mary¡¯s sudden growth in power now, a single Mornashen Gaia could no longer keep them both in check. The bnce of power in the Central Lands was leaning far too heavily in their favor. The rise of the Crimson n was now unstoppable!


    Under such circumstances, the three Fourth Grade adepts were no longer as important as they previously believed themselves to be. If they did not lower themselves slightly, there might no longer be a ce for them in the Central Lands of the future.


    They might feel hints of sorrow and despair in their hearts, resentful that they had been born in the same era as this prodigious couple. However, more than anything, they were probably rejoicing that they had not made enemies out of the Crimson n for their own reasons.


    Compared to them, Mirva, Nics, Matthew, and the others were probably wallowing in regret now! They could only imagine the despair they would feel when news of Mary¡¯s strength reached their ears.


    The three Fourth Grade adepts could easily imagine their reactions without seeing it for themselves.


    The ns that the opposing adepts belonged to were also ancient ns that had existed in the Central Lands for thousands of years. They all had various connections and rtionships formed over these years, whether on the surface or in the shadows. However, these adepts and their ns might soon be exiled from Zhentarim because of their incorrect judgment. They would be forced to fight for scraps in foreign territories.


    Just the thought of this cold reality sent chills down the spine of Ker and the other two. They were all spooked at the very possibility that they might have been the one to suffer that fate.


    Freed had been dealt with, and the Entom n exterminated. It was more than enough for an opening move. Once the rebels heard the news of what had happened here, there was no way they would gather together for ast stand.


    At their level, everyone viewed their lives as the most important thing above all else, even above their ns.


    To ask these Fourth Grade adepts to sacrifice themselves for their n was an impossible task!


    Ker was almost entirely sure the rebels would panic and fall into helpless despair the moment they heard the Crimson n had two ultra-powerhouses.


    Either flee or surrender.


    There would not be a third option for them!


    Gather together to form a resistance?


    The fate of the Entom n was the bloodiest reality to answer those hopes of theirs.


    They might wish to protect the former glory and freedom of their n. However, if the pursuit of these things meant putting their lives in danger, they would rather suppress their desires and move on.


    That...was the true nature of the spineless Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands!


    ............


    The so-called secret meeting was more urately a show of Mary¡¯s powers.


    Once everyone had personally experienced the terrifying power of Mary and the Nightmare Castle, there was no longer any doubt as to the final victor of the struggle for power in the Central Lands.


    After a brief discussion of the terms of surrender, Ker, Alfred, and Den left on their own, each of them hurrying to the various other Fourth Grade ns.


    There was no need for verbal intimidation or threats. All that was needed was a presentation of the bloody reality, and they would naturally what best to choose.


    Every one of them was a Central adept. Most of them were acquaintances of hundreds of years and had all sorts of rtionships between them. Ker, Alfred, and Den would be far more effective as messengers than having the Crimson Fleet pay a visit to the ns one by one.


    There were hundreds and thousands of adept ns, with as many as a dozen Fourth Grade ns. If a war were to break out, it would take at least a dozen years to wipe out all the opposition. To unify the Central Lands into a single organization would take decades of work.


    That was why Greem leaned toward a peaceful unification, even though he was confident in crushing these stubborn rebels. It was the only way to best preserve the elites and essence of the Central Lands, instead of letting them go to waste in a civil war.


    The actual situation was just as Adept Ker predicted. When the Fourth Grade ns they visited heard that Bloody Queen Mary also possessed the might of a pseudo-ultra-powerhouse, they finally bowed their heads and entered agreements with the Crimson n. They would all invest their n¡¯s resources into the newly founded Horton Magic Academy.


    Horton Magic Academy quickly grew in scale, bing thergest and most famous public academy in the Central Lands.


    A powerful faculty, an endless stream of adept resources, a specialized department system, and the backing of ultra-powerhouses- these were all reasons for its sess!


    Moreover, Greem¡¯s focus was on the promotion of the Horton Magic Academy instead of turning the Crimson n into the only mega-n in the Central Lands. In that regard, his terms were very fair towards the various ns.


    After all, the doors to Horton Magic Academy were always open to all adepts and apprentices. The talents that came out of the academy were also not required to join the Crimson n.


    These terms and conditions were fairly beneficial to the smaller ns whose growth had been restricted in the past due to theirck of resources!


    Thus, the sense of resistance that the incumbent forces held toward the Crimson n slowly faded over time.

 Chapter 1334 - The Alliance of the Defeated

    Chapter 1334 The Alliance of the Defeated


    Annemdor Academy.


    Inside a dark, dim room.


    Mirva, who had not shown himself in days, wasmunicating with someone in a soft voice through a magical mirror.


    The mirror was the only source of light in the room and glowed with a sickly green light. Not only did the light not illuminate the space, it even filled the entire room with a sinister aura.


    The magical mirror was split into several different screens, with an individual appearing on each of those screens. If one were to zoom in to one of those screens, they would be surprised to find that all these people were Fourth Grade adepts famous throughout Zhentairm.


    All of these individuals had enjoyed fame and glory in the past. Each and every one of them was an important character that could send tremors throughout the Central Lands with a single stomp of their foot. At this moment, they appeared as nervous and anxious as rats in a sewer.


    Adept Matthew, with his sparse hair and swollen eyes in a corner of the mirror, asked in an anxious and soft voice, ¡°Has this news been verified? It had best not be false news released from Greem in an attempt to sow disorder amongst us.¡±


    In another corner of the mirror, Nics spoke solemnly with a grim expression, ¡°I just sent off Den. He came here to persuade me to surrender!¡±


    The other adepts in the mirror couldn¡¯t help but start cursing when they heard that name.


    ¡°Den is a spineless bastard.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! He must have said that because Greem controls him.¡±


    ¡°We can¡¯t trust his words!¡±


    ......


    Mirva said bitterly from his room, ¡°It was Alfred who came to see me!¡±


    The adepts in the mirror fell silent and cast their gaze toward Mirva.


    ¡°What did Alfred say?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve always been on good personal terms with Alfred. Could it be...did he say the same thing?¡±


    The expression on Mirva¡¯s face grew even more bitter when he heard everyone¡¯s questions.


    ¡°This is no longer just a rumor, but the truth! Apparently, those who experienced Mary¡¯s Nightmare Domain on that night weren¡¯t just Ker, Den, and Alfred. There were also two Silver Union senate members present.¡±


    ¡°How powerful was she?¡±


    Mirva inhaled deeply and said, ¡°Enough to rival an ultra-powerhouse. Naturally, she would have no trouble with ordinary Fourth Grades like ourselves!¡±


    The room fell silent.


    Everybody lost interest in speaking any further, and the atmosphere turned dreary and heavy.


    After a long pause, Adept Nics finally spoke again. He posed a question to Mirva, ¡°Mirva, what do you think we should do next? Freed...is gone. We...we......¡±


    Everybody in the mirror looked at Nics with looks of sympathy.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Of all the Fourth Grade ns apart from Ker¡¯s Dener n, Nics¡¯ n territory was the closest to the Crimson n¡¯s Ailovis region. If Greem refused to stop here, his next target would either be Vice-Chairman Mirva for his position in the Zhentarim Association or Nics for his proximity.


    That was why the threat of doom was far more imminent for the two of thempared to everyone else!


    Nics¡¯ question was very vague, but everyone understood what he meant.


    In fact, everyone also wanted to know Mirva¡¯s choice. He was the only one who could lead them now that Chairman Freed was dead. Should they fight, or should they surrender?


    If everyone stubbornly insisted on resisting the Crimson n to the very end, then Greem would still have a tremendously difficult time unifying the Central Lands. Don¡¯t forget, the other name for the Central Lands was Zhentarim!


    Zhentarim. The name itself held a meaning- it referred to the unique and scattered distribution of ns in the Central Lands.


    Divided regions, and forests of adept towers.


    There were many adept ns in the Central Lands. The rise and fall of ns were amon urrence.


    Every time an adept war broke out, no one cared about the change in borders of worldly territories. Adepts were only interested in control over the adept towers.


    A small adept n might be weak, but all they had to do in the face of an invasion from a superior force was to retreat into their tower. With the aid of their adept tower, they could repel a siege from enemies many times their number.


    Moreover, if the invading force was unable to conquer the tower, then all the worldly territory they had seized would be in vain.


    After all, they couldn¡¯t possibly siege the opponent¡¯s tower indefinitely. Once their armies retreated, the n would be able to project their influence and forces across their territory once again. All thend and poption that had been seized would return under their control, with only the loss of some resources!


    That was why trying topletely pull an adept n up by its roots and exterminate them was an arduous task in the Central Lands. There was no way you could possibly chew down an adept tower without the courage and determination to break most of your teeth.


    Greem¡¯s Crimson Fleet might have demonstrated power enough to conquer an adept tower, but their ws were also revealed.


    Multiple high-grade adepts were required to be present during the siege, and powerful war machines like the Motherships or the golem dragon were needed. Even with all these conditions, the casualties suffered by the invading side were still terrifying!


    That was why the Fourth Grade adepts here would still be an incredible nuisance for Greem if they insisted on opposing the Crimson n to the very end.


    Greem¡¯s Crimson Fleet might be fearsome, but there were only three Fourth Grademanders who could truly hold the line in a conflict: Greem, Mary, and Arms.


    They couldn¡¯t possibly always be on the frontline, personally leading fleets to conquer one tower after another, could they? Without them to protect the Crimson Fleets, a single Fourth Grade adept would be enough to devastate the army.


    When that happened, the Crimson n¡¯s unification would be dyed indefinitely.


    That would give everyone the confidence to wait for a change in tides!


    They firmly believed that the three major organizations wouldn¡¯t sit by and watch Greem devour all the sheep in the Central Lands and take the fattest piece of meat for himself.


    The reason everything seemed so calm at the moment was because the Crimson n had erupted with unexpected fury and ferocity. The three major organizations had been entirely unable to react.


    Wars urred far too frequently in the Central Lands in the past. However, those wars were often long, drawn-out, and boring. Cutting across vastnds to attack the enemy¡¯s base and ending a war with an arrow straight through the heart, though......


    In all honesty, such an adept war had never urred in the history of the Central Lands!


    Consequently, the three major organizations had been unable to predict how quickly events would unfold after the internal conflict of Zhentarim finally broke. Everything soon spiraled out of their control.


    What determined the victor in an adept war wasn¡¯t the number of low and intermediate-grade adepts, but the rare few high-grade adepts!


    At the start of the war, the three major organizations had sent out ultra-powerhouses to witness the battle, with ns to turn the tides if required. They had believed those ns and preparations to be sufficient.


    After all, thest time Greem appeared at the Adept¡¯s Association, his power was only on par with the Adept of Torture. He was certainly powerful, but he still had some way to go until he could reach the ultra-powerhouses.


    What they had never expected was for the legendary fire adept to improve so tremendously in just a matter of years. Not only was Greem able to forcefully wear out the Gold Titan Mornashen, but he was even able to severely injure Curse Adept Cerveris in a ¡®fair¡¯ duel.


    That...was all clearly beyond the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s expectations!


    If even Cerveris had been defeated by Legendary Fire Adept Greem, then they could only send more powerful ultra-powerhouses after him now. However, these individuals were either exploring the depths of endless space or shut up in istion conducting their own important experiments.


    The Adept¡¯s Association might want to summon them, but even if these people with their unique personalities were willing to give up on whatever important tasks they had on hand, the time and cost required for them to return from space were tremendous!


    If these powerful individuals could not be mobilized, then all that was left were their armies.


    However, the vast and dangerous ck Forest itself was a natural barrier that prevented such maneuvers. The Adept¡¯s Association might not have much trouble teleporting a few powerful individuals using teleportation arrays, but attempting to teleport entire armies was no more than fool¡¯s talk.


    Mobilization through aircraft?


    Even if they could gather all the flying ships required for the task and properly organize the logistics, it would take them over two months to aplish such a job! Given the speed at which the Crimson n had managed to take down the Entom n, two months would be more than enough for them to eliminate the most stubborn opposition and stabilize the situation in the Central Lands.


    When that happened, what were the Association armies that had traveled all this way supposed to do?


    Moreover, how would the Northern Witches and the Silver Union react once they had mobilized several Association armies? The intertwined politics of the three major forces meant that even more time had to be wasted on exining the purpose of their mobilization.


    By the time the three major forces came to a conclusion, the Central Lands would probably already belong to the Crimson n!


    The point was that the Crimson n¡¯s hidden power was so immense that even the three major organizations could not react in time when it was finally revealed.


    However, while the three major organizations¡¯ main concern was what benefit they could gain from the chaos in Zhentarim, what was presented to the Fourth Grade adepts of Central Lands was a life-and-death choice!


    Their eyes flickered, and their expressions were stern yet filled with sorrow and tragedy.


    Once upon a time, they had been feared gods of the Central Lands, who could shake the world with a single move. However, ever since they ran into this demon god that was even more unreasonable than them, they had no means of venting their frustrations apart from grumbling to themselves.


    Frustrated. Indeed, they were all incredibly frustrated!


    In all honesty, the reason Greem was able to be Fourth Grade so quickly was due to the aid of everyone present here. Yet, they had now been cornered by this much younger adept. In fact, they might even have to bend the knee to him in the future.


    Nics, Matthew, and the other Fourth Grade adepts all felt so upset at the very thought that their heads just might blow up any next moment!

 Chapter 1335 - A Tavern in Space

    Chapter 1335 A Tavern in Space


    Vast rivers of stars shot by, forming pretty ribbons of light in the background.


    From a distance, the entire universe appeared filled with color.


    The shining stars seemed within grasp as if all one needed to do was reach forward to touch them.


    However, this was only an illusion.


    Even the closest star was billions of kilometers away. Without the ability to cut through space, you could spend hundreds of years flying and never get close to them.


    Space was infinitely vast and filled with many, many things!


    The vastness and majesty of space weren¡¯t within the realm of imagination for ordinary nar creatures. Moreover, the depths of space were filled with fluctuating energy tides and spacestorms.


    It was impossible to survive in such a harsh and horrifying environment without a robust Physique and extraordinary magic resistance.


    At this moment, a humanoid figure radiating purple light emerged from the depths of space, rushing forward through a spacestorm with the might of countless Second Grade spells.


    The ce that the figure was heading toward was what appeared to be arge mountain range drifting in the endless space.


    The entire mountain range stretched for five hundred kilometers, a collection of pitch-ck rocks covered in plenty of glittering metal particles. The presence of its amazing metal content allowed these mountains to survive the destruction of the spacestorms and remain in space.


    It was apparent that this mountain range had drifted into space after the destruction of a continent in a broken world. Due to its mostly metallicposition, it had managed to exist until now. However, as the spacestorm continued to erode the mountains, the edges were starting to fall apart.


    The boulders and steelrock that peeled off of the mountains would instantly be tossed far away into the depths of space by sparks of energy.


    The mountain range was crumbling and shrinking at a visible rate.


    In perhaps another hundred years, this five-hundred-kilometer-long mountain range might vanish without a trace, devouredpletely by space.


    As long as you were diligent enough, you could find all sorts of strange items that drifted from the nar worlds. Moreover, anything that could remain intact despite the energy tides would certainly carry a value of its own!


    There would always be intelligent people who knew best how to take full advantage of the remaining utility in such space ¡®trash.¡¯


    Since the mountain range had another hundred years to go until its disintegration, a small tavern had popped up in a small, t ridge in the middle of the mountain range.


    It was obvious that this mysterious figure in purple light was heading for that tavern.


    The purple figure dodged some spatial turbulence slicing towards them, avoided a few boulders peeled off the mountains, endured the cold, howling winds, andnded on the ridge.


    In front of the figure was some strange architecture dug into the belly of a mountain. The doors were exceptionallyrge, so much so that they could allow a whale to enter. The doors of the building appeared to be made out of wood. You could still see the delicate, intricate patterns of wood on it.


    However, a strange magical rune had been carved on the surface of the doors.


    The magical rune glowed and dimmed, uniformly radiating energy and propping up a thin barrier of energy. This incredibly thin and intricate energyyer kept the endless spacestorms at bay, allowing the two wooden doors to remain untouched.


    The image of a beer mug with foam at the top was carved into the sign above the doors.


    The purple figurended in front of the tavern, passed through the barrier, and pushed apart the doors to enter.


    The world inside the doors was utterly different from the world outside!


    It was a harsh, cruel, and deste world outside, while this interior room was filled with boisterous chatter and lively talk.


    Those two seemingly simple doors had an incredible magical power that separated space and cut off energy auras.


    Inside the tavern was a round space, with a few massive stone pirs that ran all the way to the ceiling. Several humans stood behind a wooden counter. Judging by their appearance and uniform, they were the bartenders and servers of this tavern.


    A dozen stone tables had been ced all over the tavern, each with several patrons gathered around it, talking as they ate and drank.


    There weren¡¯t many humans among these patrons. They all had strange skin colors, features, clothes, and spoke unknownnguages. There were even a few otherworldly patrons of prodigious size in the corner of the hall.


    The tavern doors had been built sorge as to amodate patrons like them.


    Moreover, the food ced on the stone tables were all very different as well. There were raw meat, green vegetables, and many other wholly mysterious and unusual dishes.


    These patrons mighte from different nes, belong to different races, and look entirely different. However, without exception, all of them radiated fearsome and overwhelming power.


    Anyone who could cross the vast stretches of space to arrive here would have to be a Fourth Grade at the very least. In fact, it wasn¡¯t rare to see Fifth or Sixth Grade individuals here.


    Everyone was wee here as long as they were willing to abide by the tavern¡¯s rules.


    The reason why so many otherworldly powerhouses were willing to obediently abide by the rules of human adepts in this tavern was that the owner behind this tavern was a Great Adept of Seventh Grade.


    That was more than enough reason for the patrons to behave!


    The purple figure dispelled the energy defenses around them upon entering the tavern, revealing the outline of a young female adept.


    She was bald and without eyebrows. She had purple eyes and purple leather armor. She was quite pretty as well, though her expression appeared a little too cold.


    She walked to the bar upon entering and tossed two star diamonds onto the counter as she grunted, ¡°One fiendfish, and get me a room.¡±


    The bartender behind the counter was as round he was big. The manner in which he moved and spoke befitted his role as a bartender. He waved his big, fleshy hand over the counter, and the two star diamonds vanished without a trace.


    ¡°One fiendfish for Lady Gloria and prepare our best guest room. Annie, go and clean the room yourself. Best not bother Lady Gloria with any things left behind by thest guest,¡± Bartender Tom¡¯s loud and gruff voice rang out in the tavern.


    The subus, Annie, who worked as a tavern girl here, quickly made her way into a tunnel behind the tavern.


    Traveling through space was no easy matter!


    The constant energy tides and spacestorm wore away at a travelers¡¯ stamina and spirit. There were very few species that could recover their strength and energy while enduring the storms. That was why this tavern was less of a ce of entertainment and leisure, and more of a resting stop for people to rx and recover.


    Soon, arge te of fiendfish was served.


    Compared to food from the nar worlds, this serving of fiendfish was clearly far toorge.


    The fiendfish alone was alreadyrger than Adept Gloria. Moreover, the fiendfish appeared extremely ugly and vicious. Its body was covered with bone spikes and even a gray carapace. Sparks flew when you tapped the fish with silverware.


    That was more than enough evidence of the fiendfish¡¯s toughness!


    Moreover, the fiendfish was still alive when it was ced on the stone table. It wriggled its body and shot sharp water arrows at all living things around it.


    The water arrows howled as they cut through the air with the might of Second Grade spells.


    Lady Gloria lifted a finger and flicked it. A purple bolt shot through the fiendfish¡¯s head, and dark-green brain sap started to leak out. She immediately bent over and started sucking the brain sap loudly.


    Fiendfish were unusual hybrids of starbeasts and nar creatures. Their brain sap and flesh contained overwhelming magic energy and were excellent food for recovering lost stamina.


    It did not look aesthetic for a dish, and its flesh was far too stringy and pungent. However, in the depths of space where resources were hard toe by, there weren¡¯t many high-energy foods like this that were not only cheap but cost-effective.


    Fourth Grade Gloria might be a powerful individual in the World of Adepts, but here in the chaotic wilnds of space, a Fourth Grade could only barely survive between the cracks.


    As such, there was nothing she couldin about!


    Bartender Tom watched as Lady Gloria devoured the fiendfish and walked up to her side. He spoke in a low, mysterious voice, ¡°Lady Gloria, there¡¯s news from headquarters.¡±


    Lady Gloria didn¡¯t care about her image; she was still wolfing down everything on her te. As she continued to eat, she nced at the fat man beside her and frowned, ¡°Do they not know I¡¯m tracking down that Spiritsprite? I spent seventeen years and just managed to find its tracks. What do they want me for right now?¡±


    Tom chuckled and said, ¡°I heard the idiots at headquarters suffered a significant loss. Even Cerveris has been severely injured and is hiding out in his room. That is why Domnhall has been hastily calling for you to return!¡±


    ¡°Cerveris has been injured? Who? Who is it? Are there still people in the World of Adepts that dare publicly oppose the Association?¡±


    ¡°The news we got was very vague. Apparently, an elementium adept has appeared in the Central Lands. Supposedly, he¡¯s quite a powerful one. He even went to Association headquarters and defeated Olivia. He¡¯s been preparing to unify the Central Lands recently and has fought quite a few battles there!¡±


    ¡°Hmph! Someone powerful could actually emerge from those spineless fools in the Central Lands?¡± Gloria scoffed, ¡°Let them keep fighting. My mission over here should be almostpleted by the time they beat each other¡¯s brains out. It¡¯s not toote for me to return then.¡±


    Tom smiled bitterly as he said, ¡°But those aren¡¯t the orders from headquarters. Domnhall has been really pressing down on us. He wants you to return to headquarters as soon as you received this news. ording to him, the situation over at the Central Lands will have settled if you return toote.¡±


    Gloria¡¯s face instantly soured upon hearing the order. She had gone through so much trouble, and her mission was finally looking up.


    ¡°Why didn¡¯t he go look for Ainley, but me?¡±


    ¡°Sir Ainley just entered an ancient ruin. He¡¯s unlikely toe out for another ten to twenty years, so......¡±


    Gloria¡¯s expression turned even darker.


    ¡°Hmph! The losses over this Spiritsprite will be on Domnhall¡¯s tab. Just wait and see what I will do to those idiots who can¡¯t even keep watch over their home base once I¡¯m back.¡±


    Having said that, Gloria got up and angrily marched toward the teleportation array at the back of the tavern.

 Chapter 1336 - The Butterfly Effect

    <h4>Chapter 1336 The Butterfly Effect</h4>


    The World of Adepts was an extraordinary and mystical ce.


    With the adepts¡¯ expansion, their civilization had spread to thousands of foreign nes along with the Great Adepts, growing and developing in thosends.


    Due to the limits of the World of Adepts, all adepts above Fourth Grade were forced out of the world. They had no choice but to make a living among the stars in space, continually training themselves. Compared to the numerous Great Adepts out there, the Fourth Grades of the World of Adepts were truly nothing.


    However, one had to consider the fact that all three Ninth Grade Great Adepts originated from the World of Adepts. That alone made the World of Adepts a unique world, despite the fact that it could only tolerate the existence of individuals Fourth Grade and below. The World of Adepts wasn¡¯t just the homeworld of the adepts- the very civilization of the adepts was rooted here.


    It created a very unusual phenomenon. Everything that happened in the World of Adepts drew the attention of many other people. News from the World of Adepts would continue to spread, thereby creating an unusual ripple across the universe.


    Only three major organizations had existed in the World of Adepts over the past tens of thousands of years. All of them were seemingly backed behind the scenes by one of the three Ninth Grade Great Adepts who could determine the direction of the adept civilization¡¯s development.


    The Central Lands might be the region with the mostnd, the richest resources, and the densest poption. But for the longest time, it had existed only as a buffer zone between the three major organizations, enduring endless suppression and bullying.


    However, the unique nature of Zhentarim was what established its position. The three major organizations kept each other in check, and no single party was allowed to take over this rich region ofnd.


    Thus, an unusual bnce of power consisting of multiple parties was formed!


    However, there was nothing permanent in the world, and nothing that could not be changed.


    Zhentarim, which had always been known for its weak adepts, was suddenly undergoing shocking changes because of one powerful adept appearance. The rate and ferocity of the change were beyond everyone¡¯s imagination!


    An ¡®ordinary¡¯ adept war between the Dener n and the Crimson n had quickly spread across Zhentarim in less than a month, its fires raging all over thend. There was probably no one who had predicted this development. Nor could anyone have possibly foreseen this event.


    During the battle of Stoneshard Valley, Legendary Fire Adept Greem demonstrated overwhelming might, defeating two ultra-powerhouses one after the other. This terrifying aplishment thoroughly extinguished the confidence of the incumbent forces.


    For a moment, the Central Lands were stunned in awe as all the adept ns began to take measures to preserve themselves!


    Just as everyone believed that Greem had been severely injured and forced behind the scenes for the moment, the Crimson Fleet took the initiative and went on the offensive. They struck straight for the headquarters of Fourth Grade Adept Freed, the heart and leader of the opposing forces.


    Assisted by powerful war machines, the Crimson n defeated Freed, despite his assimtion with Kerslin Castle. Moreover, in the final moments of the battle, Freed suffered a frightening bacsh from the alchemical lifeform, Kerslin.


    The ultimate result was not just Freed¡¯s sacrifice, but a blood ritual conducted at the cost of every Jorma n adept hiding in Kerslin Castle. It gave rise to the new forbidden lifeform, Kerslin.


    While Kerslin was in deep slumber to digest the power it had obtained from the blood ritual, Greem and Mary broke into the Nightmare Domain and gained control of its soul core. Bloody Queen Mary, who had always possessed not-quite-enough power, improved tremendously. She now owned a castle from which she could unleash devastating strength.


    The appearance of a second pseudo-ultra-powerhouse instantly became the final straw that broke the delicate bnce of power in Zhentarim!


    At this point, there was no longer an equivalent force in Zhentarim that could stand up to and rival the two ultra-powerhouses of the Crimson n. The Fourth Grade ns that had been nning to stall for hope finally despaired. One by one, they lowered their heads to the legendary fire adept of the Central Lands.


    On the fifth day after Mary took over Kerslin Castle and renamed it Nightmare Castle, Fourth Grade Adept M announced that the Kunis n would be joining Horton Magic Academy.


    On the seventh day, Fourth Grade Adept Roderick of the Hill n announced that they were willing to ept the Crimson n¡¯s leadership and sent many of their adepts to join Horton Magic Academy.


    On the thirteenth day, a bombshell dropped on Zhentarim. Gaia n Leader Mornashen had paid a secret visit to Nightmare Castle to meet Legendary Fire Adept Greem. Mornashen announced an alliance between their ns to push for the joint prosperity of all adepts in the Central Lands.


    This news was a gigantic bomb that instantly made all Central adepts understand where they were headed. The fractured Zhentarim was now in the past. A new and powerful adept organization was finally sprouting and growing on thisnd.


    As thest and most crucial tile fell, the entirety of the Central Lands capitted like dominos.


    Andrew of the Ahlden Caln, Ashton of the Smalley n, Ariza of the Mansour n, Adrea of the ire n. For a moment, numerous Fourth Grade organizations expressed their willingness to join the Crimson Alliance, epting Legendary Fire Adept Greem¡¯s leadership and contributing part of their n¡¯s resources to Horton Magic Academy, the future of the Central Lands.


    In doing so, only three people remained hesitant in the Central Lands. Mirva, Nics, and Matthew.


    However, they did not have much time left to think!


    Twenty-seven days after the extermination of the Jorma n, the Crimson Fleet once again set off, heading for the territories of these three adepts. In the face of imminent doom, Matthew was the first to cave-in. He announced his surrender while the Crimson Fleet was halfway there. Nics followed soon after.


    As for ¡®Vice-Chairman¡¯ Mirva? He also actively surrendered the moment the Crimson Fleet arrived at Annemdor Academy.


    ............


    Annemdor Academy.


    Located in the southwest corner of the Asia region, Annemdor Academy bordered Griffin Cliff, the Medusa Swamps, and the Horned Wolf Wilderness. The academy also controlled a tunnel that led to the Underground World.


    One could honestly im that this region was one of the best locations for trials in the Central Lands. Annemdor Academy was also known as one of the most famous magic academies in the Central Lands due to their expertise in enchanting magical items.


    However, all of this glory became a thing of the past the moment the Crimson Fleet arrived in the skies above the academy. A new chapter had begun.


    Mirva led all the academy adepts and apprentices to wee the fleet on the Golden za in front of the academy. He watched with aplex expression on his face as the Mothershipsnded.


    These giant flying ships that were five hundred meters long and one hundred meters wide were stunning machines, no matter how you looked at them. There were the smooth, silver hulls of the ships, those aerodynamic yet gigantic curves, and the cannons that lined both sides of the ships.


    When such a monstrosity of steelnded from above, the shadow cast was enough to cover half of the za. The pressure it gave off, as well as the unique air of blood and steel, made every adept watching feel like they were suffocating.


    However, this steel monstrosity was no ordinary machine!


    Violent magic energy coursed through the ship, distorting the space around it and forming a forcefield. Anyone that wanted to attack the ship would first have to figure out how to prate this fearsome magic energy forcefield.


    Mirva might have lost all confidence in victory, but he still had sharp insights.


    Given the degree of distortion around the ship, he could estimate that the magic energy forcefield had an intensity of approximately 2000 points; only Fourth Grade adepts could break through these defenses. No number of Third Grade adepts would be able to crack this forcefield without tremendous effort.


    Fortunately, the forcefield was only effective against long-ranged spells but could not stop solid objects from passing through. Boarding the ship was undoubtedly the best option to destroy these Motherships.


    However, considering the hordes of magical machines and Crimson adepts on board, this was obviously not the best way to take down a Mothership either.


    Mirva¡¯s thoughts wandered everywhere. He lifted his head and silently watched the familiar figures drifting to the ground.


    Greem, Ker, Alfred, Den, Mornashen, Andrew, Roderick. And all the way in the back, Mirva could also see Matthew and Nics¡¯ silhouettes.


    They looked away the moment their eyes met.


    For some reason, even the everposed Nics felt a trace of awkwardness. He felt the heat of a blush on his old, wrinkled face.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. At their age, they were no longer just one or two brave pioneers marching alone. Behind them stood a massive n of thousands of individuals. Most n members had no talent as an adept. They could only rely on the n¡¯s grace and the provision of the worldly territories to lead extravagant and debaucherous lives.


    Meanwhile, n members with adept talent would enjoy unimaginable benefits, allowing them to uncover their abilities and potentials to their fullest.


    It was because their ns were so massive that they could be Fourth Grade organizations that ruled over an entire region, allowing their bloodlines to continue spreading like the countless leaves of a tree.


    However, while they may have seeded because of their n structure, the same n had be their point of weakness!


    While Mirva was still wondering about his final decision, his wailing, crying bloodline descendants affected his choice.


    He could put up a resistance to the very end, but the entire n would burn with him!


    He could choose a different master. All three major organizations would be more than willing to ept a Fourth Grade adept like himself. However, his n was simply toorge. There was no way he could bring them with him. Moreover, after thousands of years of governing thend, the n was intimately connected with it. How could they just sever these connections without a second thought?


    Because of all this, Mirva, Nics, and Matthew did not dare to fight and could not flee. They were trapped in an awkward position with their hands tied.


    Mirva finally lowered his head to the gently smiling Greem. He put on a forced smile and said.


    ¡°Wee! Wee to our humble academy, Lord Greem.¡±

 Chapter 1337 - Women and Descendants

    <h4>Chapter 1337 Women and Descendants</h4>


    That night, Greem and hispatriots stayed at Annemdor Academy.


    It waste in the night, and Greem was seated at a wooden table alone, frowning as he assessed this parchment before him.


    Greem and Mary of the Crimson n


    Ker of the Dener n


    Alfred of the Molten Fire City


    Den of the Fabres n


    Nics of the Entom n


    Matthew of the Bane n


    Mirva of the Annemdor Academy


    Mornashen of the Gaia n


    Andrew of the Ahlden n


    Ashton of the Smalley n


    Ariza of the Mansour n


    Adrea of the ire n


    M of the Kunis n


    Roderick of the Hill n


    It was a small parchment, but it detailed all the Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands, as well as the situation with their ns. The names of Freed and his Jorma n had already been scratched off with a thick red line at the end of the list.


    This single cross wasn¡¯t just writing off two names, but the lives of tens of thousands of other people.


    With the death of Freed, the extermination of the remnant Jorma forces was well underway. All Jorma n members had already been gathered together for public execution. Adepts that possessed the Jorma bloodline were also being systematically ¡®dealt with.¡¯


    Of course, it was fine if ordinary members of the Jorma n somehow managed to slip away. The Crimson n did not have the time or energy to chase them all over the world. However, direct bloodline descendants of Freed and those with adept talent that had somehow avoided the disaster of Kerslin Castle had to die!


    The Crimson n had already sent outrge packs of vampires to hunt down these stragglers. They would be hunted to the very ends of the world and silenced.


    That was perhaps the cruelest and most savage side to the adept wars!


    Greem had always understood the value of life, but he did not want to leave behind any potential troubles for the massive cause he was working toward.


    The Jorma n was easy to deal with. Without Freed, they were sheep to the ughter without a chance to retaliate. The only things that troubled Greem at present were the ¡®allies¡¯ on this list.


    He read the list from top to bottom and from the bottom to the top again. The only person that Greem could trust among all these names was Mary. Greem couldn¡¯t even put too much trust in Adept Ker, who had been most enthusiastic and helpful in the past few days.


    Of this list, Mary was firmly on his side, while Ker, Den, and Alfred could be considered true allies. As for the rest? They had either sumbed to the Crimson n¡¯s influence or were merely fearful of death. Either way, none of them could be trusted at all.


    Should the Crimson n show signs of weakness, or any unexpected incidents ur in the Central Lands, these adepts would be the first to turn on him. As long as Greem remained powerful, they could only hide their ambition and malice in their hearts.


    Furthermore, of these other adepts, Mirva, Nics, and Matthew were the renegade factors. They surrendered after everyone else had, and they also had quite the grudge with Greem. These two things alone ensured that they would not just settle in silence.


    However, the Central Lands desperately needed stability to prevent those wolves of the other regions from encroaching. That was why even Greem could only ept the surrender of the three adepts, despite his own desires.


    If necessary, Greem would even console them to avoid a war.


    Mirva, Nics, and Matthew had only chosen to surrender at the veryst moment. It was apparent that they were still hung up on the conflict. If Greem didn¡¯t punish them at all, he would not be able to intimidate the fence-sitters and keep them in line. However, if the punishment was too harsh, it might stir a sense of sympathy and resentment in the hearts of the adepts. It would make it much more challenging tomence with the assimtion that was toe after.


    The Chip might be assisting Greem, but he was still not very good at dealing with suchplicated scenarios. He had spent most of his life in meditation orboratories. Politics was not something he was particrly acquainted with.


    Fortunately, the World of Adepts was a world where power reigned supreme. As long as he held the greatest military power, his opponents would not dare to take any actions that crossed the line.


    Moreover, time would always be on his side!


    While Greem silently thought about how to deal with Mirva and his two friends, he could hear gruff voices and shuffling steps outside the door to his room.


    ¡°What¡¯s the matter, Billis?¡± Greem asked impatiently.


    The door opened, and Billis bowed as he replied with his strange insectoid hiss, ¡°n leader, it was Adept Mirva. He was worried youcked servants to wait on you and sent a few maids over.¡±


    Maids?


    Greem¡¯s gaze reached past Billis and saw the few slender figures standing behind him.


    ¡°Let them in!¡± Greem replied.


    ¡°Yes, my lord!¡± Billis then turned around. His ssy greenpound eyes swept past the young women as he hissed, ¡°You may go in now!¡±


    Greem had also made preparations of his own for this stay in Annemdor Academy.


    Fourth Grade Thunder Dragon Arms remained in the Crimson Fleet, with Meryl serving as themander. Meanwhile, intermediate Third Grade Bug Adept Billis apanied him into the academy.


    With a Third Grade bug adept guarding the entrance, and the Fourth Grade Shadow Demon by his side, Greem was more than a match for any ordinary Fourth Grade adept even though he was still injured. It was because of his confidence that Greem agreed to the offer to stay in the academy.


    Five women in total entered the room. They were all exceptionally beautiful. Two of them even gave off traces of magic.


    Greem lifted his head, and his eyes swept over their bodies. A subtle smile appeared on his face.


    Maids? Judging by their dress and etiquette, Greem could tell that these were not true maids. They were nobledies used to a luxurious life. As for the two women with magic fluctuations? They were Second Grade female adepts.


    Mirva had sent them here.


    The two women that radiated magic stepped forward at the same time and bowed.


    ¡°Lord Greem, please hold no suspicions against our n leader. He means no ill will.¡±


    ¡°Oh?¡±


    ¡°The n leader was worried that my lordcked servants, which was why he sent us here.¡± The woman pulled the sleeve on her shoulder down, revealing a rune resembling a brand. She said softly, ¡°To avoid any doubts or misunderstandings, the two of us have had all our magical power sealed away. If my lord does not trust us, my lord is free to examine the seal.¡±


    The other adept also pulled off her shirt, revealing the brand on her shoulders and snow-white bosom. She kneeled and said,, ¡°Don¡¯t worry, my lord. We are female adepts trained meticulously by the n. We have been trained in that aspect and will be able to satisfy you!¡±


    The two female adepts were very straightforward, but the three normal girls were already blushing bright red, their heads practically disappearing into their chests.


    They had been sneaking nces at this terrifying adept of legends ever since they entered the room.


    However, they never expected the legendary fire adept that was famous throughout Zhentarim would be such a young and handsome man.


    As it was close to bedtime, Greem was not wearing his usual robe. Instead, he only had a thin spidersilk night robe around himself.


    Greem was not even four hundred years old at this point. He was still well within the youth of his long lifespan. Even though his Physique had gone down due to the severe injuries he received recently, his body was still as muscr and attractive as before, with perfectly proportioned limbs.


    More crucially, due to his body being constantly soaked in magic energy, every inch of his skin and flesh contained explosive fire energy. The fire energy blended with his life force, forming an incredibly masculine and wicked aura!


    In addition, the influence of the firews had also made every one of Greem¡¯s movements radiate an aura of unquestionable authority.


    Greemy casually on his wooden chair, his long, dark red hair scattered behind his back. Much of his chest could be seen where the robe ran down his body. You could even see a faintyer of dark red energies surging beneath Greem¡¯s perfectly smooth skin from a distance.


    Even without his renown as a legendary fire adept or an ultra-powerhouse, this body alone would allow Greem to attract all the women he wanted.


    At the very least, these three carefully selected women and two adepts were all flustered and breathing heavily.


    Suddenly, that feeling of humiliation at having been forced to be a cheap woman used to serve another man had vanished without a trace. They licked their lips lightly. They suddenly felt like it wasn¡¯t all that difficult of a task to sacrifice their bodies for the n.


    ¡°Leave me! Billis, find a room for them,¡± Greem could sense every change in their psychology with the Chip¡¯s aid. He chuckled coldly and sent them away.


    Of course, Greem wasn¡¯t some abstinent monk. He didn¡¯t want to ruin the golden opportunity he had created due to simple lust.


    Once the five women had left dejectedly with Billis, Greem put away the parchment and started to consider a new question that had just appeared in his mind.


    He did not seem to have a single descendant even now. That...might be a significant problem in the near future!


    It was important to note that the core of any adept n was its bloodline.


    The Crimson n he had established had developed into a titan, but what exactly was the n¡¯s core bloodline? Of course, that would be his direct descendants!


    That way, the Crimson n would naturally gather around his direct descendants, even if Greem would have to one day leave for space due to advancement to Fifth Grade.


    However, he did not seem to have any descendants at all, nor was it likely he would have a descendant any time soon. It seemed like this problem was another issue that would have to be dealt with promptly!

 Chapter 1338 - Greem’s Wicked Thoughts

    <h4>Chapter 1338 Greem¡¯s Wicked Thoughts</h4>


    Lineage. It was the most important issue in the World of Adepts!


    Bloodline would determine your starting point and future potential, while lineage would decide whether certain groups of individuals would ept you.


    The reason adept ns had appeared was because of the formation of isted groups around certain core bloodlines.


    Take Greem, for example. He was already a Fourth Grade legendary fire adept. If he could leave behind a bloodline, those among his direct descendants who could awaken that bloodline would possess fire affinity and weakw powers far surpassing that of their peers.


    Greem¡¯s bloodline descendants would have superior magical talent and attributes from the moment they were born!


    Moreover, their odds of advancing into high-grade adepts were also much higher.


    These were advantages that ordinary adepts had no ess to!


    However, bloodlines were much like streams and rivers. They gradually be muddied and polluted with the flow of time and the assimtion of different lineages. After a few generations, the essence andw aura in Greem¡¯s core bloodline would vanish without a trace, reduced to an ordinary bloodline.


    For the sake of preserving the purity and concentration of the core bloodline, many adept ns had stringent rules regarding coption. n members were only allowed to partner with each other, thereby preventing the introduction of a foreign bloodline.


    Therger and more powerful the adept n, the moremon incestual rtionships were. The most direct consequence of this was the appearance of more and more deformed descendants. Geniuses were often born alongside idiots.


    Many high-grade adepts would try endlessly throughout their long lifetime to mate with numerous partners, hoping to give birth to a descendant with their origin bloodline. However, as their power continued to increase, and the magic continued to influence their biology, this chance would be smaller and smaller.


    In the end, the terrifying energy radiation of high-grade adepts would be beyond the tolerance of ordinary women. The woman would probably die in the adept¡¯s arm before they could even finish.


    High-grade adepts could only set their sights on intermediate-grade adepts or female creatures of foreign nes if they wanted to create offspring.


    Some more extreme adepts had even started considering the possibility of ¡®creating¡¯ offspring through the alchemicalbination of bloodlines to avoid the whole unlikely reproduction process.


    Greem had experienced an unstoppable rise to power in the past, leaving him constantly busy and with a never-ending list of enemies to deal with. He¡¯d never had the time to think about descendants or offspring.


    Now, with the increasingly clear situation of the Central Lands and the seemingly unstoppable rise of the Crimson n, the more profound problems hiding between the wreaths of glory and victory started to surface.


    It was time he had a child!


    For some reason, when this thought appeared in his head, it started to upy his entire mind like weeds growing in the wild. He began to be a little restless.


    In his current state, the odds of giving birth to a child with an ordinary woman were close to nil.


    No ordinary beauty would reject Greem¡¯s grace.


    However, his gene factors were far too potent for mortal women. The fearsome fire radiation alone would kill most life that existed in the universe, let alone the eggs of those frail, helpless women.


    At this point, Greem had rtionships with two high-grade female adepts, Mary and Alice.


    Mary¡¯s bloodline powers were far too powerful. Any child born with her would only be a vampire with no chances of inheriting the other person¡¯s bloodline. If Greem wanted to have a child, Alice would be the only option left to him.


    However, Alice was always hidden in her Tower of Fate, making even meeting her aplicated affair. Moreover, nobody knew whether her identity as the Witch of Fate would cause unknown effects on her child.


    Greem propped his head with his hand while setting down a new mission for the Chip.


    ¡°Chip, begin new research question on how I should create a bloodline descendant.¡±


    [Beep. Research topic constructed. Required information has been extracted. These are the initial summaries:


    [Filtering from database. Target: all acquainted female organisms.


    [All female organisms of Second Grade and below have been excluded, as they will not be able to survive host¡¯s energy radiation.


    [With a Second Grade female organism as the body of conception, the odds of offspring survival is 3.6%, while the odds of host mother survival is 21%. With a Second Grade female organism as the body of conception, the odds of offspring survival is 8.1%, while the odds of host mother survival is 52%.


    [Target candidates include Meryl and Emelia.


    [Meryl¡¯s red dragon bloodline is the mostpatible with Host. The base odds of offspring survival will increase by 32%. Odds of inheriting the red dragon bloodline will be 34%.


    [Emelia possesses nt attribute, which conflicts with Host¡¯s origin bloodline. Offspring¡¯s regenerative factor will be significantly boosted. Odds of inheriting nt attribute will be 11%.


    [Now filtering through Fourth Grade candidates. Strongly advise against Mary as the host mother. Odds of offspring inheriting vampire bloodline is at 100%. Said odds cannot be controlled by any means.


    [Candidate: Alice. Fourth Grade. Human female. Candidate is the best one for Host within the database. Candidate¡¯s Fate talent can perfectly merge with any attribute or bloodline


    Note 1: Fate talent will positively affect offspring, though effects remain unknown.


    Note 2: Candidate¡¯s Physique should be improved slightly before conception.


    [Potential methods for improving Physique is listed below.]


    ......


    ............


    Northern Lands, the Tower of Fate.


    Lucia and a few other witches were gathered around a wooden table, listening carefully to Alice¡¯s lecture in a bright hall.


    Alice stood in the center of a hall, dressed in a soft silk robe that entuated her curves. She had a jade-white belt around her waist, while her silky silver hair was scattered down her back. She had a tranquil and peaceful face, her sharp, blue eyes like deep oceans that gave her a sense charm of mystery.


    While Alice was softly exining the means of manipting Fate magic to her students, a sudden chill rushed up her heart.


    There was no need for divination crystals or her Staff of Divination. Alice simply frowned, and she understood the cause and root of this chill.


    ¡°Greem, you bastard,¡± The gentle Alice immediately turned into a spooked Persian cat. She raised a hand, created a ball of purple light, and hurled it into empty space.


    The air was torn apart as the purple light slipped into the void, vanishing without a trace.


    However, before the torn space could mend together once more, the other witches heard a pained cry from the other side.


    It was a familiar voice. It seemed to be that legendary fire adept Greem, who was raising a riot in the Central Lands!


    The witches were surprised and started making looks at each other.


    Herpanions made a few subtle signs at her, and Lucia silently reached her hand under the table, taking out a divination crystal from her sleeve.


    She rubbed the crystal, and the mists of Fate in it started to dissipate. Just as a strange image was about to appear, Alice¡¯s grating shout rang by Lucia¡¯s ear.


    ¡°If any of you dare to use divination magic for no good reason, I will make you witch trainees again for three years!¡±


    Lucia¡¯s heart leaped, and the magic power was dispelled. The divination that was about to form also vanished without a trace. The crystal was once again shrouded in mist.


    After ¡®fiercely¡¯ intimidating her disciples, Alice waved her hand, and the Staff of Divination appeared without a sound.


    Alice grabbed the staff and quickly cast a series of Fate sealing spells. After thoroughly mixing up the cause-and-effect behind that scene earlier, Alice let out a breath of relief.


    With the Fate sealing spells she had cast with the Staff of Divination, no diviners would be able to look into what had just urred as long as their power was insufficient to break Alice¡¯s seal.


    The disciples, Lucia included amongst them, appeared discouraged at the sight of that.


    Their teacher was well-acquainted with Greem. Almost every single Fate Witch had heard of this rumor!


    However, how well-acquainted they were and how intimate they were in private were all matters of gossip and curiosity for them.


    Unfortunately, their teacher was undoubtedly the leader of the Witches of Fate. She was far more trained and precise with her control of Fate powers, never leaving behind any points of weakness they could take advantage of. It also caused the fire of gossip in the hearts of the Fate Witches to burn ever more furiously, though they never found a chance to satisfy their curiosity.


    Their teacher¡¯s moment of ¡¯embarrassed fury¡¯ definitely had something to do with the legendary fire adept...who knew what that guy had done to stir their teacher like that?


    The witches raised their heads in confusion and looked at their teacher blushing as red as an apple. Their curiosity only grew stronger.


    What exactly had that fire adept done?


    ............


    Alice¡¯s casual little attack had been nothing to her, but it almost caused a tragedy on the other side!


    The purple bolt cut across tens of thousands of kilometers, ignoring theyers of magical defenses around Annemdor Academy and exploding in Greem¡¯s room.


    The ferocious currents of electricity immediately left Greem fumbling all over.


    This sudden ¡®assault¡¯ against him also caused an instantaneous and violent chain reaction.


    Bug Adept Billis, who had been keeping watch outside, immediately sensed something wrong. He quickly issued a signal indicating an attack to the Crimson Fleet outside while copsing into ck beetles and crawling into the room.


    Everything happening in Greem¡¯s room undoubtedly tugged at the hearts of every Fourth Grade adept.


    The moment they sensed shockwaves radiating from Greem¡¯s room, every Fourth Grade adept couldn¡¯t help but look toward where Adept Mirva was.


    The Crimson Fleet instantly activated their energy shields, and the giant magic energy cannons were slowly extended and pointed at the academy.


    The roaring sound of charging energy filled the sky!


    Fourth Grade Thunder Dragon Arms cursed as he soared down from a Mothership and unleashed his dragon¡¯s aura of might.


    The entire academy was filled with tension!

 Chapter 1339 - Trouble Returns

    Chapter 1339 Trouble Returns


    Greem coughed as he emerged from the thick, ck smoke.


    The surging tide of insects pulsed around him, the silhouettes of high-grade insect generals fading in and out of view.


    ¡°It¡¯s a misunderstanding, just a misunderstanding,¡± Greem hastily exined, ¡°A little ident happened during my experiment. There haven¡¯t been any enemies. It¡¯s all alright. You can all leave now!¡±


    The Crimson adepts naturally had a hard time believing Greem¡¯s exnation.


    However, if their n leader had already given them the order, their only option was to obey.


    The energy charging within the giant magic energy cannons aboard the Mothership dissipated, and the Crimson adepts riding on flying magical beasts returned to their camps in an orderly fashion.


    Arms, still crackling with glowing lightning,nded beside Greem, his entire body asrge as a hill. Aftermunicating with Greem briefly and confirming that there were no problems, he finally scattered the electricity and dispelled his aura of might. He then walked over to the Golden za and went back to sleep.


    The tide of ck insects around Greem also gathered together, reforming into Billis, dressed tightly in his ck robes.


    It was then that Ker and the Fourth Grade adepts finally flew up to Greem. They had arrived earlier than anyone else, but as they were not actual members of the Crimson n, they could only watch from the sidelines for the moment.


    ¡°Lord Greem, there¡¯s nothing you need us to do, is there?¡± Ker stepped forward and examined Greem curiously.


    Everyone here was one of the most powerful adepts in this world. Some of them might be stronger than the others, but they all had an incredible breadth of knowledge and experience.


    They could tell that Greem had been electrocuted and shocked by lightning judging from the burn marks on his body. However, given the severity of the injuries, the electrocution had been little more than a prank. That was because an attack like this could only make a mess out of Greem¡¯s appearance, instead of being able to inflict any sort of injury on him.


    If someone truly intended to assassinate Greem, they would never use such a pointlessly weak attack.


    Even so, the color had faded entirely from Mirva¡¯s face. His hands, hidden under his robes, were even trembling.


    It was no wonder that he was so terrified. In that moment, should a conflict have broken out, Annemdor Academy would have been reduced to an artifact of history in a matter of seconds. The offensive power demonstrated by the Crimson Fleet made even a Fourth Grade adept like Mirva frightened to the very core of his being.


    ¡°Lord Greem,¡± Mirva stumbled forward.


    There were many Fourth Grade adepts here, but no one would look down on Mirva for the moment of ¡®weakness¡¯ he was showing here. It was simple. This ce was where all of Mirva¡¯s trusted subordinates and family lived. If a battle did indeed break out, his n would disappear in the blink of an eye.


    It wasn¡¯t just Mirva. None of the other Fourth Grade adepts here could bear the heavy loss of an entire n¡¯s extermination. Most of them had no hopes of advancing any further. Their n and family were everything.


    Fire zed around Greem, and arge red robe was instantly draped over his body. He looked at the frightened Mirva apologetically and looked around at the other adepts as he said, ¡°It¡¯s no big deal...it was just a little bacsh from my experiment. It hasn¡¯t injured me at all. It¡¯s quitete now. I think we should all return to our rooms and rest! We can talk tomorrow if there are any matters you wish to address.¡±


    Since Greem had already said that, everyone else could only leave and return to their rooms.


    That said, most of them probably wouldn¡¯t be able to get a good, peaceful rest after what had just happened.


    In truth, Annemdor Academy was a microcosm of what was happening across Zhentarim.


    The entirety of Zhentarim had, in fact, been intimidated by Greem¡¯s power as a pseudo-ultra-powerhouse. They might be reluctant to bend the knee, but they did not want to throw their lives away in a battle against Greem either.


    Thus, Zhentarim and all its ns and adept towers had swallowed their disapproval and submitted to Greem¡¯s power!


    Due to theck of time to improve their rtionship, this new alliance of ns was hardly united. Most of the alliance members were also very hesitant and would not truly obey Greem with all they had.


    Under such circumstances, it was crucial that Greem remained as powerful as he was!


    As long as he remained the most powerful individual in the Central Lands, he could intimidate the opportunists and push them in the direction that the Crimson n¡¯s revolution was working toward.


    That was why Greem could not copse nor fail at any time!


    The moment he revealed weakness, this pack of wolves would turn on him.


    Fortunately, Greem¡¯s power was currently far beyond those of the Central adepts. The only opponents that could truly threaten him now did not exist within the Central Lands, but .yond......


    Greem returned to his room, escorted by Billis.


    Greem stood straight before he left and stared into the far eastern horizon.


    There, a purple star close to the horizon glowed brightly, catching his attention.


    Greem took a deep breath and suppressed the frustration that had risen in his heart.


    Just a moment earlier, a mysterious chill had appeared out of nowhere and surged through his body. He could sense that this was a warning from the nar consciousness, conveyed through the firews he had mastered.


    Danger from the east!


    That was where the Adept¡¯s Association was!


    Could they still be unwilling to admit defeat even after Cerveris¡¯ loss? Were they nning to send out someone new to find trouble with him?


    Greem was no diviner, after all. He might have had some sense of danger before it arrived, but he could not extract more detailed information through the formlessw powers. He would typically contact Alice during these asions and obtain her genuine opinion.


    However, he had also just recently ¡®angered¡¯ her. It would be best not to count on any advice from her for the time being.


    Greem shook his head. He could only do his best to defend against any ambushes that would being his way.


    ............


    The instant Greem had felt that sense of danger was the instant Adept Gloria returned to the Adept¡¯s Association through a portal.


    The Tower of Observation, the seven hundred and twenty-first floor.


    A light blue portal shimmered in a stone room, pretty ribbons of light drifting from within. The ribbons of light wandered through the room. Every time they came into contact with the stone wall, a spacetime barrier would glow around it.


    The ribbons of light would retract and continue drifting listlessly around the room.


    The Fourth Grade adepts waiting outside the room nced at the light ribbons with fear and wariness in their eyes.


    That was because these ribbons of light were the rumored time fluctuations. They often existed in the boundaries between two nar worlds of different attributes.


    These light ribbons might look pretty, but they were horribly dangerous things.


    Time fluctuations flickered in and out of existence as tens of thousands of years passed in a single second for them. The flow of time in these fluctuations was different from the rest of the universe.


    Living beings dragged into these time fluctuation would be affected by the different flow of time. They might be frozen in time, trapped forever in that instant of time fluctuation. They could be swept into a backflowing current and revert to their selves at a certain point in their pasts, or experience ten thousand years in a single second, their short lifespans drainedpletely and being reduced to bones.


    It was precisely because of the chaos and unpredictability of time fluctuations that nar creatures avoided them at all costs.


    Even Fourth Grade adepts were likely to die if they wandered into a time fluctuation without preparation.


    That was why these higher-ups of the Adept¡¯s Association were so on edge at the sight of these drifting time fluctuations around the portal. They were fearful that something wrong might ur with the spacetime barrier on the walls.


    An energy storm suddenly stirred in the teleportation room. The cerulean long-distance portal started to shake violently. Waves of spacestorms blew into the room through the blue portal. If it weren¡¯t for the arrays in the room, the teleportation room and Tower of Observation itself would be ravaged by these spacestorms.


    When the trembling of the portal finally reached a peak, purple light shed all over the room. A humanoid figure passed through the gate and appeared in the room.


    The purple light appeared to be the manifestation of some sort of unusualw. It not only kept the energy tides at bay, but was even able to protect its owner from the time fluctuations.


    A short momentter, the humanoid figure managed to find their footing. They stepped out of the teleportation room and appeared in front of the other Fourth Grade adepts.


    ¡°Gloria, you¡¯ve finally returned!¡± The one standing at the forefront of the group to greet the new arrival was naturally Domnhall, who was in charge of all the Association¡¯s matters.


    ¡°Wee back, big sis!¡± A petite girl threw herself into the arms of the glowing humanoid. Her tone was light, and it was obvious that they were intimately acquainted.


    The other three Fourth Grade adepts nodded as well.


    ¡°Wee back, Lady Gloria!¡±


    ¡°Wee.¡±


    While everyone was exchanging greetings, Maztan¡¯s hoarse voice rang out from the tunnel in the distance.


    ¡°Gloria¡¯s back, Gloria¡¯s back...my darling,e here and let me have a look. Let me see if your skin has turned rough from all the spacestorms out there.¡±


    Everyone¡¯s faces turned dark upon hearing Maztan¡¯s rude words.


    Gloria had just dispelled all the spacetime turbulences lingering around her, as well as the protective purple light. Her face turned absolutely vicious and ugly.


    The next second, she cast aside the sister in her arms and punched Maztan right in his big ugly face, blowing him into the stone wall. She then stomped on him viciously.


    Dong!


    The entire Tower of Observation trembled at the impact.


    Everyone¡¯s eyelids couldn¡¯t help but jump slightly.


    As usual, Maztan was utterly fearless and reckless, while Gloria was just as violent as always.


    With this violent woman¡¯s return, the Association would probably be quite ¡®lively¡¯ for the foreseeable future!

 Chapter 1340 - The Lady Arrives

    <strong>Chapter 1340 The Lady Arrives</strong>


    The three major organizations kept each other in check. A sudden shift in power on any one side would instantly trigger a chain reaction with the other two.


    As the second mightiest ultra-powerhouse of the Adept¡¯s Association, Gloria¡¯s return meant that the Association¡¯sbat strength had increased considerably, making up for the difference caused by Cerveris¡¯ injury.


    Consequently, the Silver Union and the Northern Witches became slightly nervous.


    It was said that the Speaker of the Silver Union personally approved recalling one of their only two ultra-powerhouses from the Vortex Tower¨C Mechanical Adept Stephen.


    Meanwhile, the Northern Witches summoned the Witch Council. They unanimously agreed to send a witch of an ultra-powerhouse level to the Central Lands to ensure that the Northern Witches¡¯ benefits were not infringed upon.


    Naturally, this task fell on the shoulders of Death Witch Leader Khesuna!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. There were only two ultra-powerhouses throughout the Northern Lands. One of them was Death Witch Leader Khesuna, while the other was Pale Witch Leader Silvia. Furthermore, of the two of them, Khesuna was undoubtedly stronger at offense and direct conflicts. She was the most suitable candidate for this errand.


    Everyone could clearly tell that the once weak Zhentarim now faced a massive structural revolution. If this development were allowed to continue as is, it was likely that a new major organization would appear in the World of Adepts.


    The appearance of such an organization clearly did not benefit any of the three existing major organizations!


    However, if they were to intervene carelessly, the other two major organizations might be able to rob them of the most significant slice of the pie, thereby affecting the future development of their own organization. All three organizations took the same line of action despite not having discussed anything between themselves. They waited patiently to see what happened next, all while sending ultra-powerhouses in preparation for intervention.


    The Silver Union and Northern Witches were even making contact behind the scenes, looking for a way to suppress the Adept¡¯s Association and the Central Lands simultaneously.


    Their ideal scenario was undoubtedly for the Adept¡¯s Association to sh directly with the Crimson n, leaving them both battered and bruised. They could then rush into the Central Lands and sweep the battlefield.


    However, when they heard that Gloria of the Adept¡¯s Association had returned, they couldn¡¯t help but be concerned for the Crimson n. If Gloria were able to defeat the Crimson n and wipe out the Central Lands alone, this well-cooked pot of rice would go straight into the maw of the Adept¡¯s Association.


    Due to this concern, the two major organizations had hastily sent out individuals with equalbat prowess in hopes of intimidating Gloria and keeping her from acting rashly. However, given Gloria¡¯s typically brash and unreasonable personality, it was unknown how well this intimidation could work!


    The three major organizations were practically intervening directly now, leaving the situation in the Central Lands even more unpredictable and shrouded in mists.


    If it was impossible to predict, then there was no point mulling over it!


    Greem, who had conquered all the Fourth Grade forces of the Central Lands, returned to Nightmare Castle without any hesitation and joined Mary once again.


    Hiding back at one¡¯sir was probably the right decision in the face of impending danger!


    However, Fire Throne was only a small adept tower, after all. Neither its offensive nor defensive power could match Greem¡¯s current ability and status. Moreover, Fire Throne was truly not an intimidating structure given the power of his opponents.


    That was why Greem instinctually chose to flee to Mary¡¯s Nightmare Castle the instant he sensed danger approaching.


    Greem¡¯s injuries were still severe, and Mary had only just recently gained control of the Nightmare Castle.


    Both of them might have power rivaling that of ultra-powerhouses, but they knew that they were still slightlycking whenpared.


    However, their forcesbined should be enough to ward off any malicious forces!


    On the third day after Greem returned to Nightmare Castle, the enemy he had been awaiting finally arrived.


    ............


    Another dark, lightless night.


    The moon in the sky was nowhere to be seen, leaving only patches of stars glowing in the night.


    Even these stars were soon obscured by thick, ck clouds.


    The entire world was pitch ck.


    Nightmare Castle stood lonesome upon the in.


    There did not seem to be a single source of light within the castle, nor any signs of life.


    Both the Crimson Fleet and the magical machine army had retreated to Ailovis. The only thing left upon these scarrednds was the Nightmare Castle.


    The castle appeared like a ferocious monster waiting with bated breath and an open jaw for its prey¡¯s arrival.


    Thick mist shrouded the castle, making it appear even more dangerous and evil than it already seemed!


    Skrra! The sound of space being torn apart.


    A small portal appeared two and a half kilometers away from the castle. A petite figure d in purple light stepped out of it.


    Gloria did not go into hiding. Nor did she immediately start her offense. Instead, she teleported once more near the Nightmare Castle and examined this silent castle with a wry smile.


    ¡°Hmm? What a strange power,¡± Gloria had heard of the strangeness of this castle, but no amount of detailed information couldpare to the sensation of experiencing it for herself.


    A very unusual lifeform. It had both the unique magical aura of alchemical lifeforms and the soul fluctuations of intelligent, biological life.


    From a certain angle, this dead silent castle could be seen as an intelligent lifeform, albeit with a unique form of existence. However, through the castle¡¯s soul core, the only thing that Gloria could sense was the insuppressible aura of bloodshed and murder.


    This thing was a forbidden lifeform created utilizing a blood ritual!


    Gloria quickly managed to put an uratebel on the castle.


    She had traveled far and long in space. She had witnessed and heard of countless unusual lifeforms, even one or two forbidden lifeforms simr to this castle. Most of these forbidden lifeforms did not have good endings!


    It was simple. They often couldn¡¯t suppress the murderous instinct that came from the core of their being, causing the lifeforms to make enemies that were far too powerful for them. Such forbidden lifeforms would eventually meet their match, no matter how powerful they became.


    However, that was in space, an environment that was actively hostile against all living beings. This was the first time that Gloria had ever seen a forbidden lifeform that had yet to mature and reach the peak of its power.


    Gloria lifted her head and sniffed a few times. She was finally certain that the prey she was hunting was hiding inside this castle. That said, the scent was obscured by a unique and powerful blood aura, leaving her unable to obtain more specific information on her target.


    It was a special tracking method that Gloria had figured out on her own!


    Creatures that could survive in space were all formidable and fearsome opponents. They either had bodies or scales as tough as magical alloy, absolute power enough to crush everything in their way, or horrifying, inhuman agility.


    If theycked suchbat powers, then they would have to rely on exceptional stealth or incredible spiritual senses.


    Without these abilities, one would be nothing more than prey in space. You would not qualify to be a terrifying predator!


    The means by which Gloria tracked her enemies wasn¡¯t through smell, tracks, or other physical marks. Instead, she followed the energy aura of the opponent. It was possible to hide and obscure tracks, but it was impossible to change one¡¯s unique energy aura.


    Moreover, the more powerful an individual, the more likely they were to absorb wandering magic energy from their environment unconsciously.


    For instance, a typical fire adept would often leave behind a clear trail of fire where they traveled due to the radiation of their life force. The fire elementium where they had passed by would not only be more concentrated, but more energized as well.


    This phenomenon could persist for months.


    A legendary Fourth Grade fire adept could even permanently change the distribution andws of fire elementium in a region.


    That was why Gloria was always able to track down her opponents. Even if the adept were to conceal their aurapletely, there would still be tracks left behind due to their unconscious elementium interaction with their environment.


    Greem. Fourth Grade fire adept. Raised in the Sarubo n of the Central Lands before leaving and establishing the Crimson n. Possesses exceptional talent and is well-versed in golem creation and fire magic. Fire specialization.


    Addendum: Possesses two artifacts. The first is a Fifth Grade fire-attribute principle aggregate that is entirelypatible with his soul origin. The second is tome-shaped magical equipment suspected to be Soul Equipment. Fifth Grade, unknown origins.


    Addendum: Constantly escorted by a powerful Fourth Grade shadow golem. Said golem possesses multiple Fourth Grade shadow magical equipment. Known abilities are as follows......


    Mary. Fourth Grade vampire adept. Also raised in the Sarubo n. Has an intimate rtionship with Greem. Both of them advanced to adept at the same time and left the Sarubo n at the same time. Publicly acknowledged lover of Greem.


    Addendum: Possess the following magical equipment¨C Stinger, Cursesinging Crystal, Boots of Dodging, Ghosthaunt que......


    Addendum: She appears to have ventured into Kerslin Castle and gained control over the half-evolved alchemical lifeform. An energy forcefield that can suppress Fourth Grade adepts exists within the castle. Initial estimates suggest that Mary and the Nightmare Castle¡¯sbination has power somewhere between advanced Fourth Grade and peak Fourth Grade, making them a formidable threat to ultra-powerhouses.


    Gloria had been away from the World of Adepts for far too long. She was not quite acquainted with all the strange changes that had happened to the Central Lands.


    However, being backed by the powerful Adept¡¯s Association, all data on the enemy had been readily provided for her. That was why Gloria only had to recall the information in her mind as she stood outside the castle.


    Two pseudo-ultra-powerhouses...weaklings that had never ventured through space nor experienced the bloody conflicts of foreign worlds. How could these people ever be considered rivals to actual ultra-powerhouses?


    Gloria smirked and strode toward the sinister castle looming in the darkness!

 Chapter 1341 - The Might of One Punch

    Chapter 1341 The Might of One Punch


    ¡°She has arrived!¡±


    Mary sensed Gloria¡¯s presence through the Nightmare Domain the moment she teleported over.


    The luminance of Gloria¡¯s energy in Mary¡¯s spiritual senses was so blinding that it felt like a sun rising over the horizon. She couldn¡¯t ignore it even if she wanted to.


    Mary was no longer that ignorant adept of the past. She had met all sorts of Fourth Grade adepts and had even experienced the power of ultra-powerhouses. However, she had never seen an individual as powerful as the adept that had appeared in front of her now.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Nightmare Castle¡¯s enhancement of Mary¡¯s power, staring straight at the intruder¡¯s energy emission would have been enough to injure her.


    This pressure and this power were unprecedented among all the enemies that Mary had faced in the past!


    Greem took a deep breath and smiled bitterly, ¡°That¡¯s Gloria, ranked second of the ultra-powerhouses in the Adept¡¯s Association!¡± With the Chip¡¯s aid, he was able to identify the intruder even before Mary managed to.


    ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter who she is! Anyone that dares to walk into my castle will be taken down!¡± Mary said with a vicious expression, the nails of her slender fingers growing wildly and turning into sharp ws. They glowed with a crimson light and possessed three magical effects: Rend, Corrode, and Bleed.


    ¡°Don¡¯t show yourself yet!¡± Greem shook his head and stopped her, ¡°Whether we will be able to defeat our enemy weighs entirely on the home field power of the Nightmare Castle. I will go and face her first. You remain in the castle and suppress her as much as possible with the castle¡¯s forcefields.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m better than you at fighting,¡± Mary¡¯s red eyes seemed to flicker with fire as she shouted.


    ¡°But we need the home field advantage!¡± Greem remained calm, ¡°If you were to face her first and wound up badly injured, the home field advantage of Nightmare Castle will be neutralized. Our odds of winning will be even lower then!¡±


    Mary gritted her teeth and asked resentfully, ¡°Why is it that I always have to stay behind in a fight? I don¡¯t need your concern. I want to fight as well.¡±


    ¡°Your turn wille! Let me wear her down. The final decisive battle will be left to you!¡± After so many years of being together, Greem obviously knew how to console this violent girl who was so close to going berserk.


    ¡°Hmph!¡± Mary finally stopped raisingints.


    Just as Greem turned and prepared to step out, she suddenly pulled at his sleeves.


    ¡°If¨Cand I mean if¨Cthere is actual danger, we can give up!¡± Mary looked straight into Greem¡¯s eyes and said in a serious tone, ¡°Nothing else matters! The Central Lands, the n, the resources- we can give up all of it! As long as we are still alive, we can start from zero again, no matter where we are.¡±


    Greem smiled gently and patted Mary¡¯s hand. He then turned and walked out of the Nightmare Castle.


    In front of the dark shadow of the castle, Greem stood upon the scarred and scorched in. He held the Tome of Corruption in his left hand and the fire coral staff in his right. He held his breath and waited silently for his opponent to arrive.


    Soon, the mists parted, and a slender female silhouette shrouded in purple light emerged.


    The purple glow was so bright that even Greem could not see the opponent¡¯s real appearance through the radiance. However, the Chip was able to arrange a simple reconstruction of her appearance through infra-red sight, elementium tracking, energy spectrum detection, and several other methods of detection.


    Though she wasn¡¯t exactly a beauty, she was still quite pretty.


    At the very least, Greem did not see any signs of magical modification to her appearance!


    ¡°You are Greem?¡± The purple figure stopped walking and couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh, ¡°I thought you were going to keep hiding in your rat¡¯s hole until I dragged you out by your tail!¡±


    Having said that, she brazenly let her gaze sweep up and down Greem¡¯s body beforementing, ¡°Not bad! Not bad at all! At the very least, you are the most excellent of all the male adepts I¡¯ve ever seen!¡±


    The words werepliments, but the arrogant and scornful tone in her voice was exceptionally annoying.


    Greem chuckled coldly and sent a message to Mary in her mind.


    ¡°Start the suppression!¡±


    The next second, the chuckling purple figure froze in ce. Gloria¡¯s burning gaze cast toward the dark castle sitting a few hundred meters behind Greem.


    She could clearly sense a terrifying domain power radiating from the castle. That domain had engulfed all the surrounding space, locking it down before applying a powerful forcefield fluctuation on her.


    The energy fluctuation she emitted was instantly weakened by over thirty percent.


    Domain radius: 1.5 kilometers.


    Energy level: Fourth Grade.


    Domain effect: Power suppression.


    Source of domain: Nightmare Castle.


    Rage burned in Gloria¡¯s heart. Power surged through her body. She wanted to break into the castle and drag out the little rat that was hiding within first.


    However, Greem struck before she could put her n into action.


    Greem¡¯s body expanded rapidly, transforming into a towering molten giant in less than a second. A light of four different colors glowed in the molten giant¡¯s core, representing the four firews that Greem had mastered. The Tome of Corruption also projected a prismatic light that lingered around the molten giant, forming the firstyer of defense.


    The fire coral staff in Greem¡¯s right hand was also projected in arger, energy form. It turned into a fire staff a dozen meters long and unleashed a three-meter-thick torrent of mes that sliced toward the opponent.


    ¡°Hmph! You think this is enough to beat me?¡±


    Gloria unleashed an invisible forcefield and instantly kept the surging mes at bay. The scattered sparks caused waves of fire to rise wherever theynded.


    Where the fires burned, all life was extinguished and all substance reduced to ash!


    However, thisnd had just experienced a cmity. All substance and life that could be burned had already been burnt during thest great battle. When these mes surged past, they no longer reproduced the same scene of carnage as they had in the past. The ground turned even more scorched, and the air grew warmer, but that was it.


    Boom!


    The mes erupted.


    Gloria faced the blistering heat of the mes and charged up against them toward the molten giant. Her tiny right hand was balled in a fist, which she swung toward the giant.


    Weng!


    A strange muffled sound could be heard, like that of a jet dashing close to the ground. Her small fist punched through the mes and crashed against the molten giant¡¯sw defenses, apanied by fearsome wind pressure.


    [Warning! Warning! Offensive power of enemy attack exceeds current defenses. Complete defense is impossible. Suggesting that Host take evasive maneuvers immediately.] The Chip¡¯s rms red in Greem¡¯s mind.


    Unfortunately, the time between the Chip¡¯s warnings and Gloria¡¯s attacksnding was utterly insufficient for Greem to use Fire Teleportation.


    Despite Greem¡¯s all-out magical defenses, Gloria¡¯s attack managed to forcefully prate, shattering all the Lava Shields in-between beforending on thestyer of his barriers.


    Another loud explosion.


    Greem had been punched in front of his stomach, but it was the back that erupted from the impact.


    A massive gaping wound appeared on the molten giant¡¯s broad back. Tons of moltenva and fire energies were sted away in a cone, causing a rain ofva to descend upon the earth.


    A single strike from Gloria had prated Greem¡¯s molten fire body!


    The molten giant teetered forward as his giant feet scraped against the ground. He slid backward for a few hundred meters beforeing to a halt.


    The massive wound on his back had badly injured Greem. If it weren¡¯t for the elementiumized body having no so-called vital spots, this one punch would have been enough to cripple Greem.


    The molten giant slowly stood up, having lost most of the ¡®flesh¡¯ on its back. The exposed Heart of Principles was beating wildly. It pumped out a tremendous amount of surging fire energy with every beat.


    Fire energy flowed through his body, despite the loss of most of his organs. Some of the energy was wasted, while the rest turned into fire elementium and began to mend his damaged body and organs.


    The outline of the organs and blood vessels started to stretch out throughout Greem¡¯s body at a visible speed. Pure fire energy filled the void opened in his body, temporarily sealing the wound on his back.


    Just seven secondster, the molten giant was able to stand up once again, albeit wavering in the process.


    Gloria had not gone entirely unharmed from that assault earlier either!


    The Tome of Corruption¡¯sw retaliation and the bacsh from the molten giant¡¯s mes were enough to blow away the energy forcefield around Gloria¡¯s right fist. The surface of her exposed fist had carbonized in an instant. Even the flesh inside was steaming from the heat, and her finger bones were scorched ck.


    Gloria grunted and drew on her power. Purple mes flowed along her arm and enveloped her fist. After cutting out the firews, the fires burning on her fist were instantly extinguished. Her damaged flesh and tendons were rapidly healing through the powerful energy surges.


    In just seven seconds, Gloria had managed to heal the damage to her right fist. She once again charged toward Greem.


    Greem could only halt his own recovery and let out a series of explosive fireballs to slow the enemy¡¯s movements. He then teleported away the moment he unleashed his attack.


    Greem appeared a thousand meters away in another region.


    Just as he found his footing, a five-meterrge ball of dirt came crashing through the air. The sound it made as it cut through the air caused even Greem¡¯s heart to tremble.

 Chapter 1342 - Undying Flames

    <strong>Chapter 1342 Undying mes</strong>


    The terror of high-grade body-refining adepts was something Greem had only understood through books.


    None of the body-refining adepts he had met so far had made him so fearful and concerned.


    It didn¡¯t mean that body refining adepts were inferior to elementium adepts.


    Compared to elementium adepts, body-refining adepts spent most of their resources and time on the refinement and training of their physical bodies. The variety of spells they had mastered wasparatively few.


    Even the few spells that body-refining adepts mastered were practical spells to break free of restrictions or close the distance.


    The weapon of a body-refining adept was often their very own body. asionally, one of these adepts would also use offensive magical equipment that allowed them to unleash their specialties. Their physical Strength was shocking, and their Physique had been refined to a level where they could endure high-grade spells.


    Most body-refining adepts were also experts in closebat and possessed fearsomebat techniques to defeat their enemies faster and more devastatingly. Their favoritebat style was to brave the opponent¡¯s attacks, close the gap, and take out the opponent in a single strike.


    The reason elementium adepts were powerful was because of their numerous spells of tremendous power and incredible flexibility. However, when it came to instantaneous explosive power and lethality, body-refining adepts were head and shoulders above the elementium adepts.


    The might of elementium adepts were more easily demonstrated on the battlefield, earning them titles as ss cannons, exterminators, and destroyers. However, body-refining adepts were ssical duelists. They held the advantage in narrow spaces and rapid engagements against opponents of the same grade.


    Elementium adepts would have a tough time defeating body-refining adepts of the same grade if they could not create some distance or restrict their opponent¡¯s movements!


    Today, Greem experienced this principle for himself.


    Gloria was a body-refining adept, one who had reached the ultra-powerhouse level!


    Her every movement, even the wind pressure unleashed by her bare fists, could inflict devastating physical damage on Greem. Of course, this was partly due to the fact that Greem¡¯s Physique had decreased tremendously due to his injuries during thest battle.


    More importantly, the Chip¡¯s data allowed Greem toe to a horrifying conclusion.


    Adept Gloria likely had a piece of ultra-grade magical equipment in her possession! Moreover, it was Strength-type equipment!


    This much was obvious from that savage strike earlier.


    It was important to note that the main reason for Greem¡¯s dominance over the Central Lands and most Fourth Grade adepts were his two artifacts¨C the Orb of the Fire God for offense and the Tome of Corruption for defense. Together, theirw powers were enough to crush any opponent of the same grade.


    If Gloria had not relied on the might of her artifact to shatter the Tome of Corruption¡¯s defense, Greem would not have suffered such terrible damage.


    Greem had just escaped Gloria¡¯s range of attack and was instantly surprised by the giant ball of dirt hurtling toward him.


    If anyone else had thrown this ball of dirt, Greem could calmly st it to pieces with fireballs and then deal with the person behind it. When the attack came from Gloria, Greem had no choice but to cautiously dodge aside before flickering away with Fire Teleportation once more.


    After three failed attempts to close the distance, Gloria was furious. She turned around, ignoring the sly fire adept as she sprinted toward the Nightmare Castle just a few hundred meters away.


    As long as the Nightmare Castle remained, that annoying forcefield suppression would persist.


    Even as powerful as Gloria was, she could not possibly catch that slimy fire adept while thirty percent of her power was sealed. Thus, Gloria changed targets, preparing to tear down the castle first.


    Given her barbaric, overwhelming Strength, tearing down an immobile castle wouldn¡¯t take much time at all!


    Perhaps sensing the tremendous hostility emanating from Gloria, Kerslin instantly went berserk. Fearsome nightmare power tore at the mind of the adept, attempting to drag her into the Nightmare Domain.


    Unfortunately, protected by the strange purple light, Gloria¡¯s soul remained as firm as a bastion and unrelenting as a boulder in a river. In fact, Gloria was able to lock onto Kerslin due to its mental attack. She broke free of Greem¡¯s stalling tactics and ran toward the Nightmare Castle.


    Gloria stopped abruptly after just a hundred meters and looked down.


    ck light glowed from her shadow as a five-meter-tall golem slowly emerged. Two metal ws shrouded in ck mists were attacking her glowing purple defenses.


    The purple light was shockingly effective when used to defend against energy attacks. However, it was somewhat mediocre against physical attacks. That said, as a body-refining adept, Gloria held no fear of a mere shadow golem.


    She let out a battlecry and swung her right fist down upon the ck body of the golem.


    ng! A terrifying metallic ring could be heard.


    The five-ton heavy, Fourth Grade Shadow Demon forged entirely of shadowsteel was blown away like a bowling ball. Its massive body scraped against the ground at high speed with a grinding metallic noise.


    A terrifying hundred-meter-long ditch had been raked across the earth, a small hill of dirt forming at the end of it. Shadow Demon¡¯s metal body was distorted beyond recognition when it climbed up from the ditch, trembling.


    ¡°Avoid her. Do not fight her head-on. Use gueri tactics and focus on harassment!¡± Greem gave an order, and Shadow Demon levitated into the air before disappearing with a puff of ck smoke.


    Dong! Dong!


    Twopletely transparent sts shot through the smoke,nding on a hill a thousand meters away and razing it from existence.


    Overwhelming physical prowess. Even without magic, the wind pressure formed by her punches alone could have such a devastating impact! Gloria¡¯s power could not be more obvious.


    ¡°Leaving already? Our fight¡¯s not settled yet!¡± Greem¡¯s injuries had mostly recovered in those few seconds. He roared in his booming voice as two golden fireballs formed instantly in his palms. He threw them at Gloria.


    Gloria had been relying on her barrier of purple light since the start of the battle, neglecting to avoid any of the attacks directed at her.


    If the enemy dared attack her, she would simply endure the attack and counter!


    Gloria had never gotten the short end of the stick in an exchange of blows.


    However, when she turned around and saw the two golden fireballs, her expression finally changed.


    What tremendousw power!


    What finally moved Gloria wasn¡¯t the size of the fireballs or the fire energy contained within. It was the trace of the fearsome principle power they possessed.


    It was evidence that the legendary fire adept had not only gained full mastery of multiple firews, but that he had even purified and refined thesews, allowing him ess to a sliver of the principle fire powers.


    The change fromw to principle was not just a change in name. It was a genuine change in the very nature of its power!


    One could only continue advancing to the principle level and beyond after fully digesting thew powers that one possessed and assimting them with one¡¯s soul. It was an evolution of an adept¡¯s soul and the only path of advancing into a principle adept!


    Regardless of the core principles the fire adept had mastered, Gloria had no interest in experiencing them for herself.


    For the first time in battle, Gloria kicked with her legs. Her body shot a hundred meters back like a lightning bolt, allowing her to dodge the two unusual fireballs.


    Boom! Boom!


    Two loud explosions rang out. Waves of fire quickly devoured everything nearby.


    Compared to the attacks from before, the fireballs¡¯ explosion was weaker and caused far smaller shockwaves. However, everything burned wherever the golden mes passed.


    Dirt, sand, fossils, shards of metal, ores, and minerals¨C everything, including the air itself, had been ignited.


    This fire didn¡¯t seem to require any fuel. Golden mes appeared abruptly wherever the trace of the fire principle swept past, burning quietly and gently.


    Gloria could sense a trace of ¡®eternity¡¯ in these golden mes!


    Undying mes!


    Gloria took two steps backward, silently evaluating the golden fires burning in front of her eyes. She was utterly shocked into silence.


    She had truly underestimated this Legendary Fire Adept Greem.


    It was true that he was only an intermediate Fourth Grade and was still a distance away from advanced Fourth Grade. That was why Gloria had treated him as a luck brat that had only managed to obtain his current aplishments due to his two artifacts.


    Now, it seemed like the mastery of hisws was no weaker than any other ultra-powerhouse. Undying mes, Undying mes...though the trace of principle power he had managed to consolidate was still very weak, it was still a trace of principle power.


    There was no defense against powers of the principle level as a Fourth Grade adept!


    Even as prideful as she was, Gloria had no confidence in enduring the golden mes with her purple light. The scary thing about this golden fire wasn¡¯t the fire itself, but the principle contained within the me.


    Should the principles invade her body, and should sheck a power of equal magnitude to neutralize it, it would be a very tragic ending for her. Gloria shivered at the very thought of it.


    Cerveris couldn¡¯t have been injured by these mes, could he? If that were the case, then thew fires in his body would never be extinguished without power of equivalent magnitude to expel it. Even an ultra-powerhouse would have their origin damaged if thesew fires were allowed to burn on for an extended period of time.


    Gloria¡¯s face couldn¡¯t help but turn pale at the thought of this. She took a few steps backward and put some distance between herself and the golden mes.


    ¡°Gloria, this is the Central Lands. It is not the ce for Association adepts like you to throw your weight around. If it¡¯s a fight you want, then very well- I will be your opponent!¡±


    A deafening roar filled the night sky. The mes around Greem zed even higher. He raised both hands, and a rain of meteors crashed down from the sky with tails of ck smoke, instantly engulfing the battlefield in a violent inferno.

 Chapter 1343 - The Power of Principles

    <h4>Chapter 1343 The Power of Principles</h4>


    Wuuuuuuu!


    The whole sky was filled with zing meteors hurtling toward the ground.


    This attack was even more ferocious and violent than the previous one.


    Yet, for some reason, Gloria couldn¡¯t help but let out a breath of relief. Her wildly beating heart slowly calmed down.


    Fortunately...fortunately, it seemed like that tiny trace of fire principle was all the fire adept could muster. If Greem could imbue a fire spell with such radius and power with a trace of that Undying principle, then Gloria would turn and flee without a second thought.


    She did not want to embarrass herself by getting singed and burned all over.


    She might be incredibly prideful, but she wasn¡¯t so arrogant as to dare to fight against principle powers!


    As the meteors rained down, Gloria weaved about rapidly, punching with her fists over and over to shatter the meteors with equally violent force.


    As for the stter ofva and fire? All of it was kept at bay by the purple light around her. It could not touch her at all.


    Compared to Mary¡¯s extraordinary Agility, Gloria had obviously raised her Physique and Strength to the limits. Every one of her actions contained devastating power.


    If Greem had Undying as the core of his fire principles, then the core of Gloria¡¯s strength was Unstoppable! Moreover, she had imbued this will of hers into every one of her techniques. Every punch and kick contained the same barbaric will to crush every defense and decimate every object.


    Though she was indeed powerful, she had yet to reach the level where her willpower and technique were one and the same. She was only borrowing slightly from the realm of willpower to empower her skills further.


    However, this imbuing of her will had allowed her to surpass Cerveris and be the second-ranked ultra-powerhouse in the Adept¡¯s Association.


    Meanwhile, even though Greem¡¯s understanding and mastery over the principle powers were slightly superior to Gloria, he had far less umted experiencepared to her.


    Gloria was able to take full advantage of this fact. She quickly unleashed her assault, weaving through Greem¡¯s ferocious fire spells. She would then close in on the molten giant and let loose a barrage of punches the moment the opportunity presented itself.


    Whenever that happened, Greem had no choice but to scramble and flee in a hurry!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Greem might have be more powerful after transforming into a molten giant, but his defenses were insufficient against this opponent.


    Who would¡¯ve thought that those seemingly tiny fists could possess such fearsome power?


    If it weren¡¯t for Greem¡¯s elementiumized body being able to scatter into energy and avoid most of those punches, then even a steel giant would have been turned into scrap.


    Comparatively, Greem was exceptionally courageous even in the face of this incredibly mighty ultra-powerhouse. Fireball after fireball, cloud after cloud of mes, wave after wave of fire. It was almost as if the apocalypse had descended upon them. Greem was turning the whole battlefield into a world of fire andva.


    Greem also asionally drew on that fearsome principle fire, mixing it in between the rain of fire spells he was unleashing at the enemy. If Gloria were as ignorant as the average Fourth Grade adept and was struck by these ¡®Undying mes,¡¯ she would end up scorched inside and out.


    Every once in a while, Greem¡¯s Undying mes would sh with Gloria¡¯s Unstoppable strikes. When these two ultimate powers of different attributes shed on the principle level, it would cause the narws themselves to tremble and ripple.


    Thesew shockwavesw would travel in every direction through the World of Adept¡¯s principle system, almost instantly spreading to every corner of the world.


    Every de of grass and every lifeform in the World of Adepts could faintly feel the world¡¯s unrest. However, they were limited by their level of consciousness and intelligence. They panicked and cowered in fear, but none of them had any idea where this feeling came from.


    Only strong individuals who hade into contact with thews and principles could clearly feel every fold and ripple being transmitted through the world¡¯s principle system. No matter where they were or what they were doing, they cast aside their work and turned around, gazing into the distance where the principle shockwaves emanated from. They silently awaited the conclusion to this conflict between some of the most powerful individuals in this world!


    ............


    Adept¡¯s Association, the Tower of Observation.


    Domhnall held his staff in his hand as he hurried to the highest floor of the tower. He was furiously venting his anger at Maztan.


    ¡°This is the power of principles! The power of principles! You fool...I had you monitor Greem. What exactly have you been doing? Why...why does he have mastery over principle powers all of a sudden? Why did you not figure out such important information?¡±


    Domhnall lifted Maztan, who was wrapped under multiple nkets on his couch like a riceball, and shook him around angrily. Domhnall¡¯s crooked nose practically prodded Maztan in his face, and his spit had covered Maztan all over.


    While Domhnall was fuming, Maztan was confused and shocked. He immediately shouted back in a voice just as loud.


    ¡°How can you me me for this? It¡¯s not like you don¡¯t know who¡¯s standing behind that fire adept- the Witches of Fate. He has a whole n of Fate Witches behind him, along with Fate¡¯s daughter herself. Do you know how hard my work has been dealing with those witches every day? I lost another thirty years of my life. Thirty years...thirty whole years! Can you make up for my losses?¡±


    Domhnall finally regained a trace of his rationality after hearing Maztan shout. He let go of his cor. There was still anger on his face, but his tone was much gentler.


    ¡°Even so, failing to uncover the fact that the fire adept has mastered the principle powers is still your responsibility! There¡¯s no need to exin yourself. The Association will help you recover the lifespan you lost through a magic ceremony as soon as possible. However......¡±


    Having said that, Domhnall paused for a moment and took out a dry cloth to wipe his sses. The dark circles around his eyes were incredibly obvious. ¡°I want you to keep a constant eye on Greem from now on. I want you to figure out everything he¡¯s doing on a daily basis, with no exceptions. The Association will provide you with any resources and materials you require. However, if you dare say it¡¯s an impossible task again......¡±


    Domhnall didn¡¯t finish his threat, but his sinister gaze and cold expression said everything.


    Maztan shivered in fright. Finally, he lost all courage to argue and simply acknowledged the orders, ¡°Very well! I need spacestones, Queen Lazear¡¯s Cube, demonic dragon blood, and thirty girls between ages five and seven.¡±


    Upon seeing Domhnall¡¯s gaze still fixed firmly on him, Maztan exined with a hoarse voice, ¡°I¡¯m not trying to do anything debaucherous with the girls. It¡¯s simply the minimum requirement for a blood ritual. It¡¯s impossible to break through Alice¡¯s Fate restrictions without the power of blood rituals.¡±


    Domhnall tilted his head and thought for a moment. He then nodded. However, before he left, he warned once again, ¡°Maztan, restrain yourself a little! I know you have given up a lot doing divinations for the Association. However, understand where you stand. Given your innate potential, you would have been nothing without the Association¡¯s sponsorship. You would be dirt, incapable of climbing to the heights where you now stand.


    ¡°Since you¡¯ve enjoyed the offerings of the Association, you must make necessary sacrifices at key moments. Otherwise, this position of the top diviner of the Association will have to change hands. Don¡¯t forget; I have plenty of other diviners under me who have their sights set on your current position.


    ¡°They are all hoping to contribute their powers and lives to the Association!¡±


    After leaving behind these words, Domhnall turned and left the stunned and pale Maztan behind in the room.


    ............


    Silver Union, the Silver Hall.


    Senate Head Salvinin abruptly stopped working on the documents at hand. He raised his head and sensed the ripples and shockwaves from the principles.


    As he frowned, a knocking came from the doors as Vice-Senate Head Melone came busting into the room.


    ¡°Sir Senate Head, you¡¯ve sensed it as well, haven¡¯t you? Principle power...that is principle power!¡± Melone was clearly restless. He paced around furiously and waved his arms incessantly.


    ¡°Alright, shush! I know already,¡± Salvini then lowered his head and continued working on the documents.


    ¡°Oh, sir, that¡¯s principle power! The conflict in the Central Lands has already reached the level of principles! What should we do? We need a n.¡±


    ¡°A n? A n for what purpose?¡±


    ¡°Express our stance, of course! Since the legendary fire adept Greem hase into contact with the principle powers, it means that his path to Fifth Grade is now without obstruction. Given his youth and ability, advancing to Fifth Grade will be no problem at all. We of the Silver Union have to think of something in dealing with a future Great Adept like him! If we have no concrete n, we have to at least show our attitude. To fight or to negotiate- how should we deal with him in the future?¡±


    ¡°You are thinking too much! He¡¯s no more than a Central adept that happened toe into contact with the principle powers through unknown means. There¡¯s no need to make such a fuss. In my opinion, there¡¯s no need to actively build a rtionship with him. He wille to us!¡±


    Melone¡¯s eyes gleamed when he heard this. He agreed readily, ¡°Indeed, indeed...the Association is at odds with him. They are sure to be enemies from now on. If that¡¯s the case, the fire adept will naturally have to make allies out of us if he wants to establish himself in the Central Lands. But what if he chooses to side with the Northern Lands?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! I see your brain¡¯s all burnt out from all the engine oil fumes you¡¯ve been breathing in. The Northern Lands...you think the Northern Lands have the courage and tolerance to ept a powerful adept that has touched the fire principles as an intermediate Fourth Grade? A male adept?¡±


    Even the Senate Head couldn¡¯t help but start chuckling coldly at the thought of that.


    The Vice-Senate Head clearly understood immediately as well, as he started smiling.


    Principle power. Who would¡¯ve thought that another person had managed to master the principle powers! Cough!

 Chapter 1344 - Battle of Principles

    <strong>Chapter 1344 Battle of Principles</strong>


    Should a high-grade battle escte to the level of principles, the effect it would have on the world was terrifying.


    If a ne was an old building, then the principles were the unseen foundations hidden below it. Thews derived from the principles were then the glue that held the wooden nks together.


    What formed the building¡¯s actual body were the millions upon millions of life and substance within the ne. Every de of grass, every tree, flower, and stone. From the intelligent races that ruled thend to a pebble deep in the forest, all were part of what made up a perfect nar world.


    When a battle was restricted to the level of elementium, there was practically no threat to the building. At worst, the building¡¯s decorations and furnishing could be ruined, but the building itself would be untouched.


    However, the moment a battle escted to the level of thews, it could permanently affect parts of the building¡¯s frame and structure. In that regard, such conflicts could indeed leavesting damage to the building.


    As for a battle of principles? That was no longer just a threat to a single room, but the very foundations of the building.


    The principles of the world cycled in a perfectly self-sustaining fashion. They were like individual, yet perfectlypatible, gears keeping the nar world running with theirbined powers.


    Now, imagine that a tiny rock was introduced to this assembly of gears. It might be small, but it would significantly disrupt the functioning of the world¡¯s system. Moreover, if further magnified, its effect on the very foundations of the world would be destructive!


    It was the fundamental reason why principle adepts were exiled from the nar world!


    Meanwhile, this particr conflict was between Greem and Gloria. One was an elementium adept who had juste into contact with the fire principles and was able to draw on a trace of the Undying principles. The other was also no more than a body-refining adept who was able to imbue her body and techniques with a hint of the conviction of being Unstoppable.


    To say that their actions could shake the foundations of the world was exaggerating. However, as two of the most powerful individuals in the World of Adepts, it was undeniable that their every action was leavingsting marks on the world.


    The sh between Greem¡¯s principle and Gloria¡¯s conviction had created terrifying ripples that spread to the principles¡¯ level. The battle¡¯s shockwaves were being continually magnified by the principles and spread to the foundations of the world.


    Soon, even the nar consciousness itself had cast its gaze over, watching over this high-grade battle urring in the Central Lands!


    From now on, both Greem and Gloria would be marked by the nar consciousness as dangerous elements within the ne. Should they do anything capable of threatening the ne¡¯s stability, the nar consciousness would inflict bacsh without any hesitation and exile them beyond the ne.


    Even if Greem were still an intermediate Fourth Grade yet to reach the upper limit of Fourth Grade, that would be the case. The nar consciousness had already ssified him as the same kind of individual as the other ultra-powerhouses; he was tagged for an eventual exile.


    Greem had stepped upon an irreversible path to the realms beyond!


    He would be continuously suppressed by the nar consciousness as long as he remained in the World of Adepts. If he attempted to remain here against the will of the world, the entire world would be at odds with him. He might not be the public enemy of every living being, but his luck in the World of Adepts would plunge drastically.


    Fortunately, Greem was still an intermediate Fourth Grade. There was a bit of a buffer, and the nar consciousness was willing to dy his sentence. As for whether this dyed sentence woulde in a few decades or a few hundred years? That would depend on whether Greem would abuse this trace of principle power he had grasped.


    Gloria, on the other hand, would have to endure far harsher bacsh.


    She was the one who had initiated this battle. She was also already a peak Fourth Grade. She would probably be forced to roam the realms beyond for a while after the end of this battle. The entire World of Adepts would no longer wee her until the nar consciousness¡¯ fury had subsided!


    There were ways to reduce the hostility of the nar consciousness. That was to raid and conquer more lesser-nes of great power. When and if you were able to return as a conqueror with the resources, poption, and knowledge of a foreign ne, the nar consciousness would provide you with generous, positive feedback.


    It was the simplest way to win the favor of the nar consciousness!


    The battle raged on.


    However, Greem was already starting to feel exhausted.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. This was the first time Greem had participated in an all-out battle with principle powers, and he had yet to recover from his wounds. Gradually, Greem started to be unable to fend off the opponent¡¯s attacks.


    Both of them were some of the most powerful people of the World of Adepts. The ferocity and danger of the fighting were only escting exponentially.


    The blows they were exchanging were obvious, and they were switching between offense and defense so quickly that it was hard to catch their every action. However, the battle urring on the spiritual level hidden from in sight was equally dangerous and fascinating!


    From the very start of the battle, their Spirits had been wrapped tightly together.


    Locking-on to the opponent, breaking free of the lock.


    Spiritual stwaves, counter-stwaves.


    Direct attacks, defense against those attacks.


    Feints and counter-feints.


    As an elementium adept, Greem¡¯s control and application of his Spirit were far superior to Gloria. Consequently, Gloria was on the defensive and relied purely on her resilient Spirit to neutralize Greem¡¯s waves of ferocious spiritual attacks.


    However, on the actual battlefield, Gloria was overwhelming Greem with her tremendous physical Strength. She chased him all over the in, forcing him to avoid staying in one spot for more than three seconds.


    The sh of their powers had brought about an unprecedented cmity to thisnd!


    Naturally, there were no ordinary lifeforms left alive by now. Even the Fourth Grade Shadow Demon that Greem had painstakingly crafted after his advancement was moving around very cautiously.


    After hiding in the shade for a moment and absorbing enough shadow power to patch its injuries, Shadow Demon had found an opportunity to cut back into the battlefield and ambush Gloria.


    Five secondster, a tattered and almost ruined Shadow Demon scrambled away from the fight.


    It went back into hiding and mended some of the damage, waiting to recover further before joining the fight again.


    Despite its sturdy body of shadowsteel, Shadow Demon had tragically fallen into a terrifying cycle of getting torn apart, getting fixed up, and getting torn apart again.


    It wasn¡¯t that Shadow Demon wasn¡¯t trying its hardest, nor that its techniques were crude, and absolutely not that it was frail as ss.


    Instead, it was simply because the battlefield it was situated in was far too terrifying!


    The slender and petite female adept of no more than one hundred and seventy centimeters in height was a demon amongst demons. Gloria wasn¡¯t very big, but her body weighed a shocking three tons. Moreover, her seemingly tiny and weak fists were nightmares for Shadow Demon.


    Have you ever seen a five-meter-tall, five-ton-heavy metal golem simply get swatted aside by a tiny girl? Have you ever seen a shadow golem who boasted an indestructible body get punctured by a fist?


    If you had seen this scene for yourself, you would truly understand the meaning of ¡®strength!¡¯


    If Shadow Demon didn¡¯t have the Shadow¡¯s Breathing ability to mend itself with shadow power, and if its body had not been forged of abination of shadowsteel and memory alloy that allowed for easy repairs, then it would have already been out ofmission by now.


    Meanwhile, the only effect that Greem and Shadow Demon¡¯s bloody struggle had was only a mild weakening of the purple light around Gloria. After an entire day and night of fighting, Gloria¡¯s punches were still as ferocious as when they started. Her movements showed no signs


    of slowing either.


    Exhausting her stamina? A battle of endurance had never been a weakness for body-refining adepts and their immortal bodies!


    In contrast, Greem was starting to falter after all this time fighting.


    His injuries had reduced his Physique, rendering him a ss cannon. After an entire day of fighting, his stamina was no longer able to keep up with the battle¡¯s pace.


    After having thew defenses of his Tome of Corruption shattered several times in a row, Greem had finally exhausted all his strength. He hastily teleported back to Nightmare Castle and hid.


    Without Greem as the mainbatant, Shadow Demon no longer dared to show itself. It hid in the shadows, prepared to strike once more to stall the enemy for two or three seconds.


    That was the best it could do now! A few more seconds and it would have hopes of escaping alive!


    The battle had finally reached an intermission.


    The purple light had been weakened by half. Only a thinyer shrouded Gloria as she slowly walked toward Nightmare Castle. At this point, you could finally see Gloria¡¯s appearance through the purple light, albeit faintly.


    A bald head, no eyebrows, purple eyes, and that eye-catching purple leather armor.


    One had to admit that the ferocious Gloria was a unique individual, even when it came to her appearance. She would stand out wherever she went.


    ¡°Good...very good,¡± Despite having fought for so long, there hardly seemed to be a trace of fatigue on Gloria. She stared at the looming castle and said coldly, ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought I would run into such a formidable man in the World of Adepts. Greem, join our Adept¡¯s Association! With how powerful you are, you won¡¯t have a future in thisnd of weaklings.


    ¡°Those weaklings with no future don¡¯t even dare venture into space, let alone establish an empire of their own in foreign worlds! Mingling with them will do nothing but drag yourself down to their level.


    ¡°I heard you intend to unify the Central Lands? Those weaklings of the Central Lands are fence-sitters. They can never be truly united, nor will they ever obey you sincerely. How are you supposed to venture into the battlefields of foreign nes with these two-faced vipers with you?¡±


    Gloria¡¯s words were harsh and cold, but her evaluation of the Central adepts was spot-on.


    Greem remained silent for a moment within the darkness. Finally, he spoke up.


    ¡°Everybody would prefer to walk the path they have chosen for themselves! I intend to walk down mine, regardless of how difficult it might be. You can refuse to be my ally, but I do not wish for us to be enemies! Leave. If you leave now, I can pretend as if nothing has happened today. However, if you insist on forcing my hand, do not fault me for making enemies of your Adept¡¯s Association.¡±


    Gloriaughed coldly.


    ¡°Make enemies of us Adept¡¯s Association? Haha! Well, let me see if you have the capability to do so! I¡¯ming in now, Greem. Hide yourself well.¡±


    Having said that, Gloria strode past the castle gates.

 Chapter 1345 - Bloody Battle at the Castle

    Chapter 1345 Bloody Battle at the Castle


    The hall on the first floor was pitch ck.


    Even though there was no light source, it did not prevent Gloria from seeing and sensing as usual.


    Layer uponyer, the countless forcefield fluctuations enveloped the entirety of the castle, dividing its space into tens of thousands of tiny regions.


    Each region containedpletely different environmental traits, causing the spiritual senses that Gloria extended outward to return shattered and disjointed. The world appeared as a strange collection of nonsensical images that could not be stitched together.


    Gloria¡¯s senses were suppressed in a tiny, twenty-meter diameter. Everything beyond that range was a blur. Even if her senses could provide some form of feedback, she could not be sure any of it was reliable.


    The castle was dead silent, and a light, bloodlike mist hung in the air. The mist¡¯s origin and destination were utterly unknown. It simply drifted about the castle¡¯s dark, winding corridors with seemingly no purpose.


    Wherever the mist drifted, the mossy walls, floor, and ceiling would turn damp. If you had run your hand across the wall, you would find blood trickling down your fingers.


    Perhaps knowing that ordinary voodoo beasts would not be able to inflict any damage to Gloria, Kerslin put away those lowly means of attack. It was greeting the Nightmare Castle¡¯s first guest with all of its sincerity.


    Gloria roamed the ghostly hall. The wooden stairs leading to the second floor of the castle were no more than thirty meters away, yet despite walking for five minutes, it remained in the distance as if she could never reach it.


    The sound of several small flying creatures batting their wings could be heard in the darkness just beyond, but their actual forms couldn¡¯t be seen.


    The castle was like a haunted house, void of any other human being.


    ¡°Cheap tricks!¡± Gloria chuckled coldly.


    She had established her reputation a long time ago. She had participated in far too many battles and witnessed far too many scenes of carnage. No matter how terrifying and fearsome a situation she was ced in, it appeared no more than a childish game to her.


    ¡°If you all insist on hiding, then I will go in and drag you out!¡±


    Gloria stomped hard with her right foot, and the thick stone tiles beneath her were pulverized. A ten-meter wide crater appeared.


    Gloria let out a battlecry and plunged both her hands into the ground. When she stood up again, she was holding a five-meterrge piece of the floor.


    Ferocious winds howled.


    She threw the stone forward like a cannonball. It sted through the mist and vanished into the darkness.


    Several muffled thuds could be heard in a row. The entire Nightmare Castle trembled violently.


    The piece of rock had smashed through several walls. Just as it was about to destroy the fourth wall, a looming dark figure appeared out of nowhere. Sharp metallic nging rang out in the darkness. There were shes of a de, and the rock was diced into countless tiny pieces.


    Shadow Demon stared at Gloria through the three broken walls. It rubbed its metal ws together, causing sparks to appear. After patting off the dust from its hands, Shadow Demon returned to the shadows without a sound.


    Meanwhile, Gloria¡¯s purple eyes gleamed. She kicked lightly with her right leg, and pieces of rocks were tossed into the air. When they reached her chest, she swung her fist and sent them shooting forward.


    Wuuuuuuu!


    These pieces of rock were like cannonballs, howling as they flew in every direction.


    Gloria was unable to determine her orientation or position in the castle effectively, but she did not need to do so either. Given her violent power, every piece of rock she sent flying would inflict severe damage to the castle.


    She didn¡¯t believe that those bastards in hiding would be able to sit still if she tore her way through the building!


    As expected, just as she continued to tear apart the castle gleefully, a mist of blood started to spread behind her. Mary had transformed into a crimson bat and silently glided behind her.


    Gloria sensed Mary¡¯s presence the moment she rushed within twenty meters of her.


    Gloria turned around abruptly and punched with her fists. A thick pir of air, nearly as solid as rock, sted forward.


    The bat beat its wings, weaving through the air and avoiding the wind pressure st by barely an inch. Mary transformed back into her human form upon arriving before Gloria. She gripped Stinger between her hands and began the dance of death with her fearsome opponent.


    The Nightmare Castle had nearpletely suppressed Gloria. Her spiritual senses, Physique, Strength, reaction speed, and attack speed had all been weakened. However, the purple light around her seemed to be the principle power of some ultra-grade equipment. It helped her neutralize a portion of the castle¡¯s suppression.


    Their battle was incredibly dangerous for Mary, who was no more than an intermediate Fourth Grade! Mary was dancing on the line between life and death.


    Gloria, who was a peak Fourth Grade in possession of a mysterious ultra-grade artifact, was like an incarnation of the very concept of Strength. Her not-very-muscr body contained overwhelming power. Every single movement unleashed chilling force on her surroundings.


    Her every punch and kick did not even need to make contact with the opponent. Just the horrible wind pressure caused by her strikes would inflict unimaginable damage on them.


    With a single punch, a fearsome st of wind would sweep the enemy away, even if they were still dozens of meters away. The burst ofpressed air caused by her punch was like a deadly cannon shot. Her attack might still be on the way, but the wind would already spread out and create a massive cyclone.


    That was terrifying for Mary, who only had 21 points of Physique and 17 points of Strength. Her bones would be shattered and her flesh ttened to paste if she was even grazed by those bolts ofpressed air, let alone the actual punch itself.


    Mary¡¯s Agility was raised from 44 points to 47 points while she remained in her domain of the Nightmare Castle. It made Gloria¡¯s every action appear so slow in Mary¡¯s eyes. If it wasn¡¯t out of concern of retaliation from the purple light, Mary could casually walk through and frolic around in her storm of punches and wind pressure.


    Stinger, the Third Grade dagger, was honestly not much of a threat to Gloria. Mary had gotten close enough to strike several times, but the only thing she had managed to achieve was causing ripples to appear on the purple light.


    However, the wild assault of her blood energy was causing Gloria¡¯s purple light to dim. It no longer felt as firm and imprable as before.


    Perhaps sensing how formidable of an opponent Mary was, Gloria stopped abruptly. Iparably violent power surged through her body as the purple light started to gather in her palm, forming a blinding ball of light.


    ¡°Mary, back,¡± Greem, who had been watching everything unfold from within the castle, immediately sent out a warning through their mental connection.


    Mary always listened to everything Greem said. She did not linger for even an additional second. She unfolded her wings and flickered out like a specter. Just as her silhouette vanished from the spot, a blinding sun rose from Gloria¡¯s hand.


    It was a purple sun!


    Where the rays of the purple sun reached, the crimson mist dissipated. This unbelievable radiance illuminated the entire castle.


    ¡°Aaaaaaaaahhh!¡±


    Mary screeched. Her skin that had been exposed to the purple light started to rot and melt rapidly.


    That strange power was still seeping into her body, its corrosive power a bone-chilling sight to behold.


    Mary¡¯s outline flickered once again as she rushed into a neighboring room just in time to avoid the rest of the purple light rays.


    Mary¡¯s heart was still beating violently even after escaping the enemy¡¯s range of attack. She took out a vial of dragon blood and drank everything. Her injured body started to heal, and she was finally relieved. She couldn¡¯t help but reflect on how close of an escape that had been.


    It was fortunate that she had fled the moment that Greem told her to. Otherwise, she would not have been able to escape so easily.


    What power did that purple light have exactly? Why was it so powerful? Mary was a powerful Fourth Grade adept already, yet even she could not defend herself against the purple light at all.


    Could it be...that was a sort of principle power as well!?


    Mary moved through the castle quickly, all while drawing on her authority and issuing several orders to Kerslin.


    A crimson tide surged out from the depths of the castle, roaring through the stone corridors and cascading down from the top-most level toward the petite figure on the first floor.


    The Boundless Blood Sea!


    It was a terrifying ultimate ability that Mary had created bybining her powers with the Nightmare Castle¡¯s. Of course, if it weren¡¯t for the Gem of Power, creating a sea of blood of such scale would have required the sacrifice of countless lives.


    Mary controlled the sea of blood and sent it rushing toward Gloria like a ferocious torrent.


    The purple light around Gloria grew even weaker!


    The one day and night of fighting with Greem had exhausted much of the purple light. She was also in the opponent¡¯s domain now and the forcefield suppression was constantly draining her power.


    Gloria had no option but to use her indiscriminate area-of-effect attack to catch that slippery little rat. Only an indiscriminate attack like that could capture that little bat, forcing her to engage in a direct sh of energy reserves.


    Unfortunately, her act of charging up had been too obvious, and the damned bat had managed to escape.


    Just as Gloria recovered from the violent release of power and prepared to pursue the bat, a loud roaring could be heard. A torrent of blood rushed toward her from the stairs that led upward.


    Gloria¡¯s face instantly flushed white!


    ¡°Basta¡ª¡±


    The sea of bloodpletely devoured her petite figure before she could finish her curse.

 Chapter 1346 - Mary’s Ferocity

    <h4>Chapter 1346 Mary¡¯s Ferocity</h4>


    The most significant characteristic of blood energy was its tremendous corrosive power.


    Blood energy could corrode almost all magic energy within the known elementium spectrum. Only a few powers, such as space energy, time energy, and curse energy, were immune to its corrosion.


    Gloria¡¯s protective purple light was not immune to the blood energy¡¯s corrosion either. The frail barrier finally cracked when the blood sea washed over her.


    ¡°Aaahhhh!¡±


    Gloria¡¯s sky rending scream came from within the blood sea.


    An iparably violent force instantly sted away all blood within thirty meters of her, sending crashing waves into the walls of the castle. Gloria gripped her hands tightly together within the space she had created with her sonic wave.


    Noticeable red spots had appeared on her left arm, her right leg, and her waist. These spots were a symptom of blood energy gathering within her body that she had not been able to dispel in a timely fashion.


    The soundwave continued to rock forth, neutralizing and shredding all blood that entered its radius. Ripples had even appeared in the space around Gloria. It was obvious that her soundwave attack was powerful enough to tear space apart.


    Even though Gloria¡¯s soundwave attack was fearsome, Greem couldn¡¯t help but rejoice from the shadows at the sight of this. That was because...the protective purple light around Gloria had vanished!


    Greem was already utterly exhausted at this point. A good portion of the Nightmare Castle had also been reduced to ruins. Yet, Gloria remained unharmed.


    Greem¡¯s mes and Mary¡¯s blood sea had managed to inflict some degree of damage to her. However, that level of damage was not beyond the endurance limit of a top-ss body-refining adept.


    With enough time, and with the opportunity to draw on her power, such flesh wounds would heal in an instant!


    Unfortunately, you could never count on your enemy¡¯s mistakes orpassion in a battle of high-grades.


    While Gloria was drawing on her origin power to force back the corrosive blood sea and escape, she lifted her head and watched with horror as a crimson figure descended from above in a suicidal plunge.


    ¡°You¡¯re looking to die!¡±


    ¡°Get back down there!¡±


    Two Fourth Grade female adepts with different voices, yet the same fiery temper, shed above the sea of blood.


    If this were t ground, Mary would not have been able to move Gloria a single inch, even with all her power. After all, Gloria had an unreasonable Physique and violent Strength. Unfortunately, they were fighting in the air.


    Gloria threw out a punch. Mary did not even attempt to dodge. She simply took the strike with her body. When Gloria¡¯s fistnded on Mary¡¯s shoulder, the air itself resounded with the horrible sound of shattering bones and sshing blood.


    Mary had been punched on her right shoulder, but a long bloody tear ripped through from her shoulder to her waist. Shattered pieces of bone, shredded remains of her organs, and flesh that had been ground to paste blew out behind her body along with a fountain of purple blood.


    Mary became even more savage after receiving these grievous injuries. She ignored the wounds and forcefully knocked Gloria back into the blood sea.


    Dong! Dong!


    There were two muffled thuds as Gloria and Mary shed once again, tearing at each other as they sunk to the depths of the sea. You could not see their figures beneath the turbulent blood sea, but you could tell the intensity and danger of their battle through the massive waves rippling outward.


    Several secret rooms in the castle opened as a few specially treated voodoo beasts rushed out. They roared and dived into the sea of blood, ignoring the corrosion of their own bodies as they charged toward Gloria.


    Dong!


    Yet another devastating st. A strike of unrivaled force burst out, knocking much of the blood ten meters into the air, as well as everything that had been swimming in it. Gloria howled and attempted to charge out of the blood. Her body was now covered in all sorts of unusual wounds.


    Unfortunately, Mary¡¯s slender figured lunged forward once more. Powerful blood energy guided the blood toward Gloria, forming into two crimson shackles that wrapped around her legs.


    ¡°We¡¯re not done yet. Don¡¯t even try to run.¡±


    Mary¡¯s once pretty face was now covered in gashes of various sizes. Moreover, many of these gashes curled outward, like the smiles of babies. A lot of the flesh on her body had been ground to paste. You could see her white bones beneath.


    Her chest hadpletely copsed as well, with several terrifying gouges on her back. Even her skeleton¡¯s frame was no longerplete. As for her organs and her veins? Most of them had been pulverized by Gloria¡¯s violent Strength, turned into an unrecognizable mess of red and purple.


    The potency of a vampire¡¯s lifeforce allowed Mary to survive despite these lethal injuries. If anything, she became even more ferocious and courageous as she dragged Gloria back to the depths of the blood sea.


    The blood sea was Mary¡¯s domain!


    She possessed limitless regenerative power while she was in here.


    Every time her body¡¯s flesh and bones were crushed to dust, the endless energy within the sea would surge into her body, rapidly repairing all damage to her.


    As long as the blood sea remained, and as long as Gloria was unable to destroy every single cell in her body instantly, Mary would be able to regenerate with the tremendous amount of blood energy at her disposal. However, the pain she had to endure through this process was unavoidable!


    Mary¡¯s body was destroyed over and over again in her battle against Gloria and regenerated over and over again. Just her organs alone had to be regrown several dozen times by now. Meanwhile, her arms that functioned as her main weapons in this conflict had regenerated over a hundred times.


    The pain and agony that she had to endure in this cycle of destruction and regeneration were not discounted in the slightest! Her body¡¯s intense pain was a vicious stimulus to Mary¡¯s mind, causing her to be even more violent and reckless in her attacks. She was practically trying to kill herself as she fought against Gloria.


    Naturally, her efforts reaped the rewards she deserved. It was the scrappiest and most terrible battle that Gloria had ever had to fight in her life.


    In the end, even Gloria couldn¡¯t help but be impressed and even somewhat fearful of Mary.


    The soft feared the tough, the tough feared the vicious, while the vicious feared the reckless!


    Even Gloria didn¡¯t know what to do against a reckless and undying enemy like this.


    Again and again, she tried to break free of the blood sea. And every time, she was stopped by Mary in the most violent way possible. It had only been fifteen minutes since the battle started, but the danger, ferocity, and carnage of it all had far surpassed the fight from yesterday.


    Now that she had exhausted her purple light, Gloria could only project her Strength and force the corrosive blood away from her. It was at this moment that Mary¡¯s Third Grade Stinger was able to show its might.


    It was no more than a piece of Third Grade magic equipment, barely able to break through Gloria¡¯s skin. There was no chance it could ever inflict any injury to Gloria¡¯s flesh and bones. However, all Mary needed was to break her skin.


    As long as Stinger could break Gloria¡¯s skin, the Rend and Bleed effects of blood energy would be more than enough for her to deal with. Moreover, once Stinger tore Gloria¡¯s skin, the colossal amount of blood energy around her would have an entry point into her body. The blood energy would tunnel into her body, causing more and more crimson patches to appear.


    In just fifteen minutes, Gloria had been dragged from her ce above the clouds to the muddy swamp she was in. Her entire body was covered in crimson spots and patches.


    The blood energy had seeped into her body and was actively working to destroy her bones and organs. Should the blood energy manage to seep into her energy cirction system, Gloria would sustain even more terrifying damage.


    However, while Mary was throwing herself at Gloria again, Greem suddenly gave her a warning from the shadows.


    ¡°Back!¡±


    Mary fled without any hesitation upon hearing Greem¡¯s warning, despite finally having gained an advantage over her opponent.


    As expected, after backing off a hundred meters away, a purple, mist-like energy began to spread throughout the blood sea. The crimson liquid began to turn purple. Several beams of light shot out from the depths of the blood sea. These beams of light cut through everything in their way, piercing through the castle walls and shot into the sky, illuminating the whole world.


    Half of the structures around the Nightmare Castle copsed from the repeated violent attacks. Even the main castle itself was riddled with holes by now. Several towers had snapped in half and crumbled to the ground, sending massive dust pirs into the air, visible from more than ten kilometers away.


    Gloria was enraged. She was like a goddess of war imprisoned in a purple gem as she rose into the air shrouded by the mist. The turbulent blood sea beneath her was still raging on, asionally sending tall pirs of blood in the air.


    The blood sea seemed to want to keep Gloria here, but every pir of blood that reached toward the purple mist turned purple and shattered into red dust as if all the moisture had been extracted from it.


    What power was this?


    Greem finally revealed himself from his hiding spot, glowing with the faint crimson radiance of his firews. He rose into the air, facing off against Gloria. Meanwhile, the badly injured Mary also beat her wings and stared wickedly at her opponent, as if willing to throw her life on the line at a moment¡¯s notice.


    ¡°Good...very good,¡± Gloria might have been in a much better state than Greem and Mary, but her Strength had greatly weakened ever since she unleashed this purple mist. However, Gloria didn¡¯t seem to care. She looked at her two opponents viciously as she said, ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought two such nasty adepts could appear in the Central Lands? Well, let us fight with all we have!¡±

 Chapter 1347 - Khesuna Visits

    Chapter 1347 Khesuna Visits


    Greem¡¯s expression didn¡¯t change when he heard Gloria¡¯s battlecry, but his heart slowly sank.


    He was already at his limits at this point of the battle. Mary wasn¡¯t doing much better, either.


    More importantly, the shockwaves from their battle had caused much of Nightmare Castle to copse. Their home field advantage was slowly slipping away.


    Meanwhile, Gloria¡¯s injuries......


    Despite all the tricks and techniques at his disposal, Greem was unable to find out Gloria¡¯s condition through the purple mist. However, judging from the information provided by the Chip, Gloria wasn¡¯t entirely unscathed, despite how much she was trying to appear to be.


    Her current forcefulness might only be a front meant to force Greem and Mary topromise!


    However, even that was only conjecture.


    If his conjecture were wrong, then the consequence that came after would be so terrifying that Greem refused to even think about it.


    As the three of them prepared for another round of fighting, two fearsome auras arose simultaneously from the southwest and the north. These auras were gradually moving toward the battlefield.


    A third party.


    The three of them were both surprised and couldn¡¯t help but look toward the distance.


    With the aid of the Chip, Greem was able to record the soul fluctuation and energy aura of any individual he had met before. There was no way of eluding his detection.


    Greem narrowed his eyes and sensed the spiritual pressure pressing in from a distance. Soon, he figured out the identity of the neers.


    The aura from the southwest was unfamiliar to him, while the aura from the north clearly belonged to Death Witch Leader Khesuna. If that was the case, then the individual approaching from the southwest should belong to the Silver Union.


    If they were appearing at the same time, they must have been watching the battle all this while and finally coome to a conclusion before showing themselves.


    What exactly was it that they wanted?


    The same question arose in Gloria¡¯s mind, as well.


    As members of the three major organizations, it wasmon for them to get in each other¡¯s way and break out into fights. However, the fact that these neers dared to intervene in a battle between ultra-powerhouses meant that they were not ordinary people either.


    Gloria was much more familiar and acquainted with the powerhouses of the other organizations. She identified the neers the moment their auras appeared.


    It was Mechanical Adept Stephen that hade from the Silver Union, while the Northern Witches had sent Death Witch Leader Khesuna. W. Without a doubt, the two of them were among the most powerful ultra-powerhouses of their organizations.


    If a fight were to break out at this moment, Gloria had confidence in defeating Mechanical Adept Stephen; she was much less confident with Khesuna.


    Khesuna was an ultra-powerhouse who had made a name for herself hundreds of years earlier than her, after all. She possessed a fearsome army of undead at hermand. Even someone as powerful as Gloria had to think carefully before engaging an opponent like that. It would be incredibly frustrating and upsetting to be defeated at the hands of Khesuna¡¯s undead army.


    With the intervention of these two people, there was no way the battle today could proceed!


    Gloria grunted and slowly flew away from the Nightmare Castle, cutting across the sky toward the eastern horizon. She didn¡¯t even nce at Greem or Mary when she left. The two of them did not stop Gloria from leaving, either.


    The reason for it was simple. Gloria¡¯s power made them incredibly wary!


    Given where the fight had been heading, Gloria seemed to retain power enough to defeat Greem and Mary forcefully. She was only retreating because of the intervention of the two neers.


    This understanding was a massive blow to Greem¡¯s confidence. He finally gained a better glimpse into the depths of the might of the three major organizations. It was not something that he alone could hope to rival.


    All the sessful battles in the past few months weren¡¯t so much him seeding in intimidating the major organizations. Rather, it was the major organizations keeping each other in check that had provided him with the opportunity and time to deal with the Central Lands.


    He was indeed quite powerful, but that was only rtive to the Central Lands!


    If any of the three major organizations were to march into the Central Lands freely, Greem would have no option but to flee the Central Lands or hide back in his n.


    ¡°Why don¡¯t you show yourselves and let us have a talk now that you are here, my esteemed guests!¡± Scarlet light flickered from Greem¡¯s body as he transmitted a mental message into the distance.


    ¡°Hmph! I have no interest in souring the mood where that madwoman is. If you are interested,e seek me at Paradise House!¡± Having said that, the aura from the southwest was retracted and vanished into the distance.


    Khesuna was much more straightforward and showed herself without any hesitation.


    The terrifying figure of a gargantuan creature appeared on the top of a hill on the distant horizon. It beat its massive wings and arrived above the Nightmare Castle like a raging storm.


    The winds had arrived before they had!


    Death Witch Khesuna stood upon a mighty ice dragon. The dragon¡¯s scales were dull and lightless, its body covered in sharp bone spikes and icicles. There wasn¡¯t much flesh left on the dragon¡¯s body. Its scales clung to its bony frame, and gray mist lingered on its long head.


    Two terrifying soulfires burned silently in its empty sockets. They gave no feeling of warmth; they caused a terrifying chill to rise in the hearts of anyone that stared into the dragon¡¯s eyes.


    It was an undead dragon that possessed the ice and death attributes!


    If Lich Kanganas hadid eyes upon this undead dragon, he would undoubtedly leap up in excitement. That was because this undead dragon was perfectlypatible with his soul origin. If he could have the dragon as his subordinate, the Reliquary would help it grow into an even more powerful and terrifying undead dragon.


    The undead dragon was over forty meters in length andrger than Arms. Judging from the fearsome frost and death aura it radiated, it was far more powerful than Greem.


    At this moment, Khesuna was standing on the head of this powerful undead dragon, silently sizing up Greem and the beaten-up Mary.


    Khesuna was a powerful Death Witch of the ultra-powerhouse level who had made her name a long time ago.


    She was not ugly. Quite the contrary, there was an indescribable beauty to her. She had white and smooth skin, a delicate but cold face, silver hair tied behind her head, and intricate leather armor on her body.


    It was hard to tell she was an old witch nearly a thousand years old just from her appearance, let alone believe that she was the leader of therge branch of Death Witches.


    However, when she stood proudly atop the Fourth Grade ice dragon and red at everything with her cold and merciless gaze, everyone could feel her terrifying might as an ultra-powerhouse. Her piercing spiritual pressure,bined with the ice dragon¡¯s chilling aura of might, made for a frightening experience.


    Greem and Mary¡¯s hearts trembled. They got closer to each other andbined their powers, barely able to endure the spiritual pressure weighing on them.


    ¡°Greem...who would¡¯ve thought we would meet again!¡± Khesuna said calmly. Her tone was cold, but there seemed to be some sort of emotion behind it.


    It was no wonder that even Khesuna couldn¡¯t help feel something at their reunion. Greem had only been a puny Second Grade who could barely stand in her presence thest time they had met. Yet now, he had grown and matured, bing an ultra-powerhouse who could talk to her as ¡®equals.¡¯


    It was no wonder that Khesuna felt like this!


    Two hundred years. What could be done in the span of just two hundred years? Increase one¡¯s Spirit by another 1 or 2 points? Improve by one minor grade? Anyone who could aplish such feats could already be considered prodigies amongst the Fourth Grades.


    Yet, this man before her had gone from Second Grade to Fourth Grade in two hundred years. Now, he led the Central Lands as an ultra-powerhouse with mighty fire powers. This transformation was shocking, even for someone with Khesuna¡¯s power and status.


    Moreover, this male adept had evene into contact with the principle powers. That...that was progress that even Khesuna envied tremendously!


    Greem didn¡¯t dare show any pride or rudeness before this infamous Death Witch. He hastily nodded and acknowledged, ¡°I have only aplished what I now have due to Lady Khesuna¡¯s care in the past. I, Greem, thank Lady Khesuna sincerely!¡±


    There was no need to respond to a smile with a p.


    Since Greem had already lowered himself so humbly, Khesuna couldn¡¯t quite put forth forceful and unreasonable behavior.


    She silently retracted her spiritual pressure and said softly to Greem, ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought...truly, who would have...? I had already overestimated your powers as much as I could before I came here, but I never expected you would have managed to force Gloria into a corner like this. Not bad! It was quite enjoyable to watch!¡±


    Greem could only smile bitterly in response to Khesuna¡¯s praise.


    He was alreadypletely exhausted, and Mary was badly injured. The Nightmare Castle had also been torn to pieces. In all honesty, even if this battle could be considered a victory, it was a brutal victory!


    The Crimson n had almost exhausted all its resources in this one battle alone!


    Khesuna couldn¡¯t help but chuckle coldly when she saw Greem¡¯s expression.


    ¡°If you aren¡¯t satisfied with yourself having brought the battle to such a standstill, I can only say you don¡¯t know Gloria well enough. It¡¯s about time you properly investigate Gloria.¡±


    Greem nodded at Khesuna¡¯s advice.


    As a newly risen force, they were far inferior to the major organizations when it came to information.


    For an infamous ultra-powerhouse of the Adept¡¯s Association like Gloria, the Crimson n should already have started collecting information. With this experience behind them, Greem was sure to develop targeted means of dealing with her the next time they met.


    ¡°Since Lady Khesuna is already here, we can¡¯t exactly leave her hanging out here in the wind!¡± Mary, who had been healing her wounds, finally spoke up. ¡°The Nightmare Castle is a little tattered, but it should still have no problem hosting a guest. Please, Lady Khesuna, let us talk in the castle!¡±


    Having said that, Mary was the first to fly into the Nightmare Castle.

 Chapter 1348 - Shockwaves of the Battle

    Chapter 1348 Shockwaves of the Battle


    Half an hourter, Khesuna flew out of Nightmare Castle and headed toward the North.


    Greem¡¯s expression was solemn as he watched the witch disappear into the distance. He was utterly silent.


    ¡°What is it? Are her terms unreasonable?¡± Due to her severe wounds, Mary had not participated in the ¡®negotiations¡¯ earlier.


    After a quick round of treatment and some feasting on blood, all the wounds on Mary¡¯s body had vanished. She had restored her former beauty and charm.


    It was the most fearsome and annoying trait of vampires!


    However, the side-effects left behind from the battle had yet to fade. Traces of purple mist still lingered around Mary¡¯s bones and flesh. Mary¡¯s regeneration waspletely useless where the purple haze lingered.


    A light tearing sound could be heard from her newly healed body. That was the sound of her flesh being torn apart once again by Gloria¡¯s power.


    Her body was instinctually patching up the injuries, but the wounds tore apart every time they were healed. The agony that Mary experienced in this unending process was something only she could understand.


    Even so, Mary smiled brightly. It was impossible to tell that her internal organs had been shredded to pieces just from her face!


    Greem eyes shifted away from the horizon andnded on Mary. A trace of pain shed in his eyes as he said, ¡°We¡¯ve survived the most dangerous wave of all. Don¡¯t worry about any of the things thate after. Just focus on healing your injuries! I have already extracted a bit of the purple energy. I will help you get rid of it once I manage to figure something out. Go and sleep in your blood coffin in the meantime. It should help lessen the pain you are suffering.¡±


    ¡°The situation has yet to stabilize. Those bastards around us are still watching eagerly. I can endure this for a little longer,¡± Mary was unusually calm today. It was only further evidence of the dire straits they were in.


    It wasn¡¯t until after Gloria demonstrated power enough to crush the two of them that Khesuna and Stephen chose to show themselves and force her away. The result of the battle was a stalemate. Greem and Mary might be badly injured, but Gloria wasn¡¯t doing much better either. Otherwise, she would not have retreated so willingly.


    Greem and Mary might have suffered grievous wounds, but they had to put on appearances and pretend to be much less wounded than they were. Who knew if those adepts from the Central Lands they had managed to suppress would try something again if news of their injuries spread?


    Greem had already made up his mind. If those Central adepts refused to stay down at this time, he would uproot their ns in the most violent and brutal fashion possible and make an example out of them- after he had recovered, of course.


    Until then, he would have to keep a low profile. Until Mary¡¯s injuries had healed, and his Physique and Spirit had recovered. When that happened, their powersbined would be enough to truly make the Central Lands his possession. There would no longer be any enemy who dared to challenge them like today.


    After hastily returning to his room to treat his wounds, Greem used his authority as the Crimson n leader to send a list of resources to Meryl and Emilia.


    Nightmare Castle had been badly damaged in this battle. Most of the buildings around it had copsed entirely, and numerousrge holes had appeared in the main castle itself. All of its secrets were now exposed to the world.


    When Freed forged this castle in the past, his main consideration had been the toughness and magic resistance of its walls. That was why the castle was mainly made out of steelrock and obsidian. Now that the castle had be Mary¡¯sir, toughness was no longer as crucial. Instead, the critical trait was itspatibility with blood energy.


    That was why Bloodmarrow Stone stood at the top of Greem¡¯s long list of demands. Bloodmarrow stone was a special material that was exceptionallypatible with blood energy. A downright horrifying number was written after the material- 27 tons.


    It was the lowest amount required after the Chip¡¯s calction. Any fewer bloodmarrow stones, and the restored Nightmare Castle would not have the desired effect.


    Bloodmarrow stone might not be as rare as spacestones or breeding flowers, but twenty-seven tons of it was expensive enough to ruin most Fourth Grade adepts.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Crimson n¡¯s rising status in the Central Lands and their authority that was now just short of utter dominance, it would have been impossible to amass such a shocking amount of the material, even if they sold every asset of theirs.


    If they didn¡¯t have enough bloodmarrow stone in stock, they could simply search in the stores of other ns. If they still didn¡¯t have enough after scouring all the Central Lands¡¯ major ns, they could purchase from the major organizations. Naturally, he left the details to his subordinates. Greem only needed to make the request.


    The Crimson n had not ced any unreasonable requests on the various ns since defeating them. If things continued as it always had been, then what would have been the purpose of the Central Lands¡¯ unification? This matter of collecting bloodmarrow stone was an excellent opportunity to figure out the ns¡¯ attitudes toward the Crimson n.


    The Fourth Grade organizations were some of the most influential ns in the Central Lands. They were used to their freedom and had never epted control and domination from another n. Anger, argument, and negotiation were unavoidable. The more important thing was to see how high a price they were willing to pay to maintain the current facade of peace.


    That was what Greem most wanted to uncover and understand!


    Greem left all the messy details to the Crimson n and retreated to his room without hesitation. He then began a serious and detailed examination of the purple energy.


    This ce was the only magical room that remained intact after the battle.


    There were several functioning arrays spread across the center of the room. All of them were specially modified and enhanced containment arrays.


    Meanwhile, bits of purple light drifted in the center of each of these arrays.


    These sparks of purple light appeared to have an intelligence of their own. They could continuously draw on the magic energy in the air to strengthen themselves and possessed the basic instinct to attack and defend, much like a primal beast.


    That was why Greem had modified these containment arrays topletely iste all energy flow with the outside world. It cut off all opportunity for the purple light to strengthen and enhance itself.


    The arrays also cut off the purple light¡¯s soul connection with its source. That made the purple sparks behave in an extremely confused manner. They thrashed about within the arrays, struggling to find a way to escape.


    ¡°Chip, have you managed to identify the attribute of this energy? What exactly is it?¡± Greem asked softly.


    [Beep. Examinationplete.


    [This energy is the result of abination of life energy and willpower. Its fundamental manifestation is that of incredible Strength.]


    ¡°Incredible Strength?¡± Greem brooded for a moment, ¡°That fits the Strength attribute that Gloria demonstrated in battle! Continue.¡±


    [Due to thebination of willpower during its formation, this energy remains within the control of its owner despite being separated.]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air, ¡°Doesn¡¯t this mean Gloria can continue directing the energy to attack after sending it into the bodies of her enemies?¡±


    [Affirmative! This foreign energy remains under the owner¡¯splete control as long as it is within a thousand meters. There is no dy between the owner¡¯s will and the energy¡¯s actions due to its instantaneous connection to the mind. However, such willpower can be weakened and isted by magic energies. The specific effect will depend on the difference in power and grade between the user of the energy and the opponent.]


    Greem¡¯s eyes gleamed after hearing the Chip¡¯s analysis.


    This kind of ability tobine life energy and spiritual willpower into a new source of power was the unique privilege of melee adepts. A pseudo-principle adept like himself would not be able to use it.


    However, if he could decipher this technique and refine it, it could be very suitable for Mary!


    Mary already possessed the ability to manipte blood. If she obtained the ability to use this strange power, herbat ability would increase drastically.


    Now that he knew that the purple light was abination of life energy and willpower, Greem would be able to find a way to separate them. The pure life energy left behind after extracting the willpower also possessed tremendous research value to Greem.


    He had never been able to figure out what the ultra-grade weapon in Gloria¡¯s possession was. He might be able to figure something out by researching Gloria¡¯s life energy. At the very least, he would be able to uncover the attribute and characteristics of her artifact.


    It might be very little information, but bit by bit, he would be able to discover Gloria¡¯s weakness.


    In all honesty, it was the first time in Greem¡¯s life he had been beaten in such overwhelming fashion!


    If he could survive these difficult times, and if he could figure out the enemy¡¯s weakness, Greem didn¡¯t mind retaliating with all his power.


    Gloria, in particr. It was high time she felt the might of Central adepts!


    There weren¡¯t very many people in the Central Lands who knew of the ultra-powerhouse battle at Nightmare Castle. Those who knew chose to remain silent and assess the effect of this incident.


    Firstly, it would affect morale!


    Secondly, this attempt by the Adept¡¯s Association to suppress the Crimson n had not achieved its desired effect.


    The ultra-powerhouse had arrived and was forced to leave, while Greem remained in his Nightmare Castle, still lively enough to send messengers to the various ns to demand resources.


    It severely disappointed the fence-sitters waiting for some sort of change to ur. They wanted to reject the Crimson n¡¯s unreasonable demands, but without a leader to guide their resistance, no individual Fourth Grade n or adept dared to disobey the legendary fire adept.


    He was a powerful adept that even an ultra-powerhouse could not do anything about, after all!

 Chapter 1349 - The Gem of Strength

    Chapter 1349 The Gem of Strength


    Greem sat silently inside the magical room.


    The intricate leather coat he wore perfectly outlined his muscr figure. The fire dragon hide that had undergone numerous treatment processes no longer had the shy, fiery effects it used to have. The power it possessed was much more contained and subtle now.


    It was hard to sense the presence of any fire energy from this leather coat from a simple nce. Even Greem¡¯s typically overwhelming fire aura was restrained, making him seem like an ordinary man.


    The Tome of Corruption ced before Greem flipped of its own ord, the thick and heavy pages rustling as they moved. Every time Greem thought of a certain spell or array in his mind, the Tome of Corruption flipped to that page and waited for him to read its contents.


    The Libram of Wisdom, the former incarnation of the Tome of Corruption, was truly the bestpanion for a spellcaster!


    It contained knowledge on all sorts of things, covering power systems from adept magic, demonic magic, divine magic, arcane magic, and many other systems. You could find almost any knowledge you sought in its pages.


    It was the most powerful aspect of the Tome of Corruption.


    Its fundamental purpose wasn¡¯t as a weapon inbat but as a treasure trove of knowledge!


    However, what frustrated Greem was the fact that he wasn¡¯t the original owner of the Libram of Wisdom. He had only forcibly devoured the Libram using his Soul Equipment. Even now, Greem did not possess the right to read the Tome of Corruption¡¯s contents freely.


    Every time he opened the Tome of Corruption, the content and knowledge he could ess werepletely random and different. They were like tiny, jumbled shards. Every time he flipped the pages, Greem could only see a small piece of the puzzle of specific high-grade knowledge. Greem would have to continuously offer up his Spirit in order to obtain more and more fragments of knowledge in hopes of getting theplete picture.


    Some knowledge fragments were incredibly valuable, while others were utter nonsense. If Greem wanted to obtain valuable knowledge, he could only continuously offer up his Spirit, testing his luck over and over, umting and piecing the knowledge together, bit by bit.


    At some point, when he obtained all the knowledge fragments, he would be able to restore the full picture of high-grade knowledge!


    That was why Greem¡¯s favorite activity to do in his free time was to take out the Tome of Corruption and try his hand.


    His luck was quite good today!


    The Tome of Corruption sat in front of him, a spark of purple light suspended above its pages in a bubble. As Greem offered up a point of Spirit, the Tome of Corruption rustled and flipped rapidly, finally stopping on a page.


    It was a new method of utilizing the Tome of Corruption that Greem had just discovered.


    By offering up his Spirit with a specific object as the target, the Tome of Corruption would automatically appraise and disy the information it had on the item. The amount of Spirit offered up in this process determined the detail in the information that Greem would get.


    With his 44 points of Spirit, 1 point was practically nothing. He could recover that amount with just half an hour of meditation.


    With the investment of one point of Spirit, Greem felt a slight sting in his mind. The Tome of Corruption had extracted some of his Spirit.


    A short line of words appeared on the page.


    ¡°......the power of conviction......¡±


    Four words. He had sacrificed a point of Spirit for a four-word response from the Tome of Corruption?


    Greem could barely believe his eyes.


    A single point of Spirit might not sound like a lot, but that was one point of Spirit from an intermediate Fourth Grade legendary fire adept. Converted into fire spells, that would be eight ordinary fireballs, four Magma Fireballs, two Vicious Fireballs, and half a zing Fireball.


    If this point of Spirit were used on the battlefield, it would be enough to wipe out a mortal army of two to three hundred elite soldiers fully equipped with magic-resistant armor.


    However, such powerful Spirit, when used to identify the purple light, had only obtained a four-word response. Greem couldn¡¯t help but be terrified.


    The only exnation for this situation was that the purple light¡¯s origin was not simple at all. It very likely involved the ultra-grade artifact in Gloria¡¯s possession. That was why the tome would have ssified information on the purple light so highly, so much so that even Greem was shocked.


    However, the more ¡®expensive¡¯ the information, the more valuable it would be for Greem!


    After a slight pause, Greem sacrificed another 8 points of his Spirit.


    These 8 points of Spirit were one-fifth of Greem¡¯s total Spirit. To have so much Spirit extracted from him all at once felt like arge hole had been cut open in his mind, his brains left to pour out from within.


    A short momentter, the pages flipped and slowly stopped on a nk page. Several short lines of words started to appear.


    ¡°This substance is a mutation of the power of conviction,posed of refined magic energy and powerful spiritual will. Its manifested attribute is neutral energy that can be regarded as ¡®physical¡¯ damage.¡±


    Greem scratched his head when he was done reading.


    He had paid such a heavy price, sacrificing eight points of Spirit, and all he obtained was information he already knew. That...had been a rather pointless exchange, hadn¡¯t it!?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but grit his teeth at this thought. His Spirit connected with the Tome of Corruption once more. This time, he offered up twenty points of Spirit altogether.


    Twenty points; that was practically half of Greem¡¯s total Spirit.


    The moment Greem gave the instruction to sacrifice his Spirit, he let out a terrible yelp. He clutched his head and remained tensed up in pain for a long while.


    He was a human, after all. He was not a machine, much less a cake that one could freely cut up as one liked. A human had blood and flesh. The Spirit, in particr, was a rather fragile construct.


    In a battlefield, an adept would usually output Spirit at a stable rate, drawing in the wandering magic energy to construct powerful spells. It was a gradual process, and the bacsh inflicted on the spellcaster was much more tolerable.


    Greem was having half of his total Spirit extracted all at once. He would probably have been stunned or even rendered unconscious if not for his extremely resilient mind.


    After half a day, Greem finally recovered from his groggy state. He was able to focus and read the knowledge fragment being projected by the Tome of Corruption.


    Object Name: Seed of Conviction


    Item ssification: Mutated Conviction Power


    Item Attribute: Neutral


    Item Origin: Combination of refined magic energy and powerful Spiritual will


    ¡°Analysis Results: This power originates from a peak Fourth Grade lifeform, currently estimated to be a member of the World of Adepts. By continually refining and concentrating their life energy, the user can turn life energy into their own magic power. Then, by guiding that power through some unknown force, the user was able tobine it with their own conviction power, creating the potent Seed of Conviction.


    ¡°The Seed of Conviction contains tremendous physical power and the host¡¯s conviction of being ¡®Unstoppable.¡¯ When activated, the Seed can manifest in the form of Strength, absorbing wandering magic energy or host¡¯s life energy to strengthen itself.


    ¡°Note: As the Seed of Conviction contains the spiritual will of its host, it can be manipted by the host while within a certain range. Manifested characteristics of the Seed of Conviction include: directional energy eruption, dyed activation, energy resonance, and many more.


    ¡°The attribute of the Seed of Conviction is neutral, manifested as ¡®physical¡¯ damage. The Seed of Conviction manifests with a purple-ck hue and contains the power of Fifth Grade energy equipment. Initial estimates suggest this artifact is...the Gem of Strength!¡±


    A bunch of information flooded into Greem¡¯s mind as a stream of data. It was then organized by the Chip to be stored for future research.


    The source of the purple light¡¯s power was Gloria¡¯s life energy. She hadbined that life energy with magic energy to further enhance its power, before adding in her own spiritual will. Thus, a unique Seed of Conviction was created, a unique manifestation of power!


    What grabbed Greem¡¯s attention the most was undoubtedly the Fifth Grade artifact that made all this possible.


    The Gem of Strength. What was that thing? He had never heard of such an item. Could it be an artifact or treasure from another world?


    Even though the Tome of Corruption did not provide specific information on the Gem of Strength, Greem would have a much easier time uncovering information with this name in mind.


    However, it was clearly impossible to obtain any more knowledge for today!


    He had sacrificed a total of 29 points of Spirit already. It was a tremendous burden, even for Greem. He might havepleted the elementiumization of his body and Spirit, but the preservation of his flesh body had left him with the various ws of a human.


    He could avoid physical damage inbat through his body¡¯s energy transformations and the projection of his power. However, he still had to endure the various inconveniences of a human body in daily life.


    The human body was simply far too frailpared to other magical creatures!


    It had aplicated intestinal system, an outdated digestive system, a fragile respiratory system, frail bones, and insufficiently protected organs. Any two of these things already made it impossible to sustain arge body, not to mention the fact that humanscked an effective energy storage organ.


    Truly, there were only ws and imperfections in the human body.


    An ordinary human could only be a nar creature. They could not venture outside of the ne, as they were incredibly dependent on having a stable and gentle environment.


    Adepts were able to venture into the multiverse despite their origins as humans because of their legacy of knowledge and the supernatural power they had discovered.


    If adepts were unable to draw power from their environment and had to rely on their own bodies¡¯ pitiful energy reserves, they would be tens, if not hundreds, of times weaker!


    A clever mind and an unbroken legacy of knowledge were perhaps the foundations for the adept civilization¡¯s continued growth and strength.

 Chapter 1350 - The Sudden Magic Surge

    Chapter 1350 The Sudden Magic Surge


    The Central Lands. An outpost of the Adept¡¯s Association.


    Gloria¡¯s furious shouting echoed throughout the underground castle, reverberating within the dark tunnels and causing dust to fall from the ceiling.


    ¡°Domhnall is a bastard...Maztan is an even bigger bastard. The whole Association is filled with bastards. To think they couldn¡¯t even manage simple information-gathering. Tell Domhnall to summon Reese back from space...if that¡¯s impossible, then Thor is fine as well.¡±


    The overseer of this outpost, who was no more than intermediate Third Grade, stood around awkwardly. He stuttered in front of the raging Gloria, unable to find words to exin himself. His two assistants listened to Gloria¡¯s rant carefully as if they were ready to spring to action immediately.


    The other Association adepts in the outpost knew well enough to hide in their rooms. No one dared to show themselves at this moment and expose themselves to Adept Gloria¡¯s fury. Even the voodoo beasts patrolling the outpost shuddered and returned to theirirs in fright.


    For a moment, this Association outpost hidden under the Anris Mountains fell utterly silent. Only Gloria¡¯s furious shouting could be heard.


    After a long while, Gloria¡¯s anger finally subsided, slightly. Overseer Cassidy Peyton finally spoke up gingerly, ¡°Mydy, it¡¯s not as if the Association has been remaining idle. I heard...I heard......¡±


    ¡°Spit it out if you have something to say. Don¡¯t stutter in front of me.¡±


    ¡°I heard that Lord Maztan was gravely injured over this affair. His life is hanging in the bnce!¡±


    ¡°Oh?¡± Even Gloria was stunned for a moment when she heard this.


    Maztan might be a perverted bastard, but his mastery of divination was unrivaled. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t have been able to monopolize the top floor of the Tower of Observation for as long as three hundred years.


    These diviners had always been precious babies of the Association. The Association would never let any harme to them. That was why the only injury that Maztan could possibly suffer as the chief diviner was from Fate bacsh.


    The fact that the highly protected Chief Diviner Maztan could be struck by Fate bacsh was more than enough proof that Legendary Fire Adept Greem was protected by tremendous Fate powers. The Association¡¯s report seemed to have mentioned that the individual behind this Fate power was the Witch of Fate Alice, who had only appeared two hundred years ago.


    These people who grasped the powers of Fate might be far weaker than an ultra-powerhouse like Gloria, but even Gloria would not want to make an enemy out of them.


    The reason was simple. Gloria just didn¡¯t want to make trouble for herself!


    These unusual spellcasters who bowed before Fate might not be very powerful, but they had extraordinarily unique and fearsome abilities. As long as they were willing to pay the price, there was nothing that they could not find out within the nar world.


    Given the current circumstances, it was obvious that that bastard Maztan was not a match for that little witch in the north!


    ¡°Hmph! To think he can¡¯t even beat a little witch that¡¯s young enough to be his great-granddaughter. It¡¯s better if he died. He¡¯s not the only diviner in the Association. We might even get a better chief diviner if he dies,¡± Gloria was still cursing relentlessly.


    Maztan had intruded on her privacy several times before. If it were not for the fact that they were both Association adepts, Gloria would have killed him a hundred times over. Even just running into Maztan disgusted her greatly. Maztan would have had no concept of restraint if she didn¡¯t beat it into him.


    That was why Gloria would always fracture every single bone in Maztan¡¯s body when they met. As long as she didn¡¯t damage his brain, the Association could heal up any of his injuries, regardless of how bad they were.


    Injuries inflicted by Fate bacsh were the one things that the Association couldn¡¯t help with!


    Cassidy Peyton pretended not to have heard Gloria¡¯s curses. He didn¡¯t dare respond either.


    ¡°You; contact headquarters immediately and have Domhnall send over Olivia, Neve, and Horner. As long as they help me keep Khesuna in check, I can capture Greem myself!¡± Gloria seemed to be very upset over her failure a few days ago. She was still shouting.


    ¡°Doesn¡¯t that mean we are dering war with the Northern Witches?¡± Cassidy Peyton instantly started sweating, his face turning pale.


    The Northern Witches were had indeed run into a problem of withering talent over the past thousand years. Several famous witch branches had fallen into ruin. However, a starving camel was stillrger than a horse. The Northern Witches were still one of the three major organizations, after all. There were two or three witches at ultra-powerhouse level remaining in the Northern Lands.


    This amount of power might not be enough for them to make advances onto another organization¡¯s territory, but it was more than enough for them to defend their own!


    That was why Central Lands Overseer Peyton could only gulp nervously when he heard Gloria¡¯s words.


    Ultra-powerhouses. The Adept¡¯s Association had no more than five of them. That was equal to the total number of ultra-powerhouses between the Silver Union and the Northern Witches. Gloria was ranked second among these five ultra-powerhouses. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine the sheer power and influence she possessed.


    However, the hierarchical structure of the Adept¡¯s Association was slightly different from a conventional adept organization. Even an ultra-powerhouse like Gloria often had to obey orders from Domhnall, who was just an intermediate Fourth Grade.


    Though ultra-powerhouses like Gloria were highly revered and treated well within the Association, they did not have as much influence in matters that decided the future of the Association as Domhnall did.


    They were essentially executioners. No matter how good the benefits or how high their positions, they would always have to listen to Vice-Chairman Domhnall¡¯s instructions.


    The reason for that was simple. The Association was an association for all adepts, not an association for a few powerful individual adepts!


    That was why Gloria could only throw her words around when it came to a matter like dering war with the Northern Witches. It wasn¡¯t her ce to make such an important decision.


    ¡°I will ry your request to the Association as best as I can. However,¡± Cassidy paused and said in a soft voice, ¡°The Association is unlikely to take any big actions in the short term. You might not know this, but while you were fighting with Greem, important news came from headquarters. A magic surge ising soon!¡±


    ¡°A magic surge?¡± Gloria paused for a moment and said, ¡°Shouldn¡¯t there be another five hundred years until the next magic surge? What is the hurry?¡±


    Cassidy Peyton smiled bitterly.


    ¡°ording to the diviners¡¯st divination, there was supposed to be five hundred years until the next surge. However, there¡¯s been an unforeseen variable. Apparently, remnants of the Arcane Empire intentionally detonated a Mythar in the Abyssal World and caused a premature magic surge to avoid pursuit. That is why a magic surge is expected soon, at a maximum of ten years!¡±


    ¡°What is the origin of the magic surge?¡±


    ¡°Inkdeep Valley!¡±


    Even Gloria couldn¡¯t help but put on a severe expression at the mention of a magic surge.


    ............


    ¡°A magic surge?¡±


    Greem frowned inside Nightmare Castle. He repeated this word to himself.


    ¡°Yes, two days ago, the Tower of Fate observed an unusual shift in the magic tides. ording to my divination, a tremendous magic surge that will affect the entire universe will soon erupt. It will happen within the next ten years. That is why you must be prepared,¡± Alice warned with a solemn expression from the magic mirror.


    It had been over a month since Alicestmunicated with Greem because of that little incident between them. She had suddenly contacted Greem now, but she brought only bad news.


    If Greem were just an ordinary adept, he might not even have heard of the term ¡®magic surge.¡¯ However, with his gradual rise to be one of the most powerful individuals of the World of Adepts, many secrets that were once hidden from him were slowly being revealed.


    Magic surges, or more specifically, magic-energy surges, were terrifying phenomena that no nar world was willing to face!


    When a magic surge urred, the already vast and fluctuating sea of magic energy in space would grow even more ferocious and intense. The intensity of the magic energy could rise by a hundred times.


    This increase in intensity naturally affected the nar worlds greatly!


    The nar worlds were like tiny little buildings, the entrance of which was a small wooden door and some windows. As long as these entrances were guarded, most foreign intruders could be kept out.


    However, when a magic surge urred, the shift in energy levels would force open the weak spots of the nar worlds¡¯ barrier.


    When that happened, there would be far more passages into a nar world. Any foreign creature could pass through the ne¡¯s barrier and enter the World of Adepts through these unknown wormholes and spatial rifts.


    The arrival of these guests would be a cmity for the ordinary creatures of the World of Adepts.


    With the exception of the few space travelers and unfortunate fools who wandered into the World of Adepts, most individuals who could break into a nar world with their own power was no pushover. Their purpose was either to reap souls, raid, or simply enjoy a banquet of ughter.


    The adepts could protect themselves with their adept towers, surviving attacks from otherworldly magical creatures. However, ordinary mortals with no supernatural power had no means of surviving.


    Moreover, during a magic surge, the native magical creatures of the World of Adepts would also be unusually violent and bloodthirsty. They would form horrifying stampedes and rush out of the ck Forest to invade human territory.


    That was why every adept organization would carefully protect their borders during these times, monitoring every spatial weakness in their territory. They would have to guard against stampedes from the ck Forest, as well as invasions from starbeasts, trying their best to mitigate damage to their civilian poption.


    The functioning of the World of Adepts still relied heavily on the countless mortals, after all!

 Chapter 1351 - Gathering at the Central Lands

    Chapter 1351 Gathering at the Central Lands


    The magic surge didn¡¯t just affect any single ne, but every one of the nar worlds.


    The spatial barriers that could protect a nar world in the past would be riddled with holes. Any simple rift could allow a terrifying otherworldly creature to slip in.


    There was no truly-safe spot across the universe!


    Such magic surges weren¡¯t exactly disasters for high-grade adepts. After all, it was an opportunity to obtain rare and valuable resources. However, for the numerous mortals and low-grade adepts, there would no longer be any guarantee of their safety. Many of them would die because of a single magical creature¡¯s rampage.


    Moreover, the primary world wouldn¡¯t be the only world under siege. Even the subordinate lesser nes of the World of Adepts would be assaulted.


    Ordinary adept ns would have to send patrols to each of these worlds, continually monitoring the weak spots in space while also maintaining order in the lesser ne. Most adept ns would find themselves at a loss at this point. They did not have sufficient adepts to oversee everything.


    Consequently, most lesser nes controlled by adept ns would face problems following a magic surge. A n¡¯s ie would be significantly affected.


    That was about all that Greem knew about the magic surges. However, after a long talk with Alice, Greem finally recognized their horror.


    If Greem were only the n leader of a small n, his only worry would be casualties within the n and among the popce of his territory.


    However, he was not just the Crimson n¡¯s leader now. He was also the most powerful Fourth Grade adept of the Central Lands. The very safety of the entire of the Central Lands fell upon his shoulders.


    It was a responsibility as well as a burden!


    Ten years was not long, but it wasn¡¯t a short time, either. Should the magic surge ur and spatial rifts start appearing, any adept n that failed to make preparations would be staring down the barrel of invasions from magical creatures and monstrous starbeasts. This event would undoubtedly be a major trail for the Crimson n, who had just established itself.


    If the Central Lands suffered excessive casualties in this magic surge, Greem and the Crimson n would likely lose their best opportunity to unify the Central Lands!


    At this point, even Greem wasn¡¯t sure if he was the unfortunate one to have run into a magic surge at this crucial moment or if the very rise of the Crimson n was encouraged by the nar consciousness for this event.


    After some serious thought, thetter scenario was the more likely of the two.


    After all, the Crimson n had only been a regional adept n in the past. Their military might had exploded exponentially, and they had ravaged the Central Lands without contest. Their rise to power had been the result of a series of coincidences and fortunate events. Step by step, they had made their way here.


    Before he heard the news of the magic surge, Greem had believed the current situation to be the fruit of his patience in hiding the n¡¯s power. When Alice told him about the magic surge, there was a shift of reference in his mind.


    Perhaps all of this had been the nar consciousness¡¯s intent. It pushed Greem onto the throne of the ¡®hero¡¯ of the Central Lands, making him unify the Central Lands¡¯ forces to ovee the looming cmity.


    If he performed well, the nar consciousness would probably generously ¡®reward¡¯ him with the Crimson n¡¯s rule for the next thousand years toe. If he performed poorly, perhaps a new ¡®savior¡¯ would emerge and rescue the Central Lands.


    It was precisely because Greem was growing increasingly powerful that he could slowly begin toe into contact with the workings of the world behind the scenes. He began to have a strange feeling. It was a sense that the heavens and earth themselves were no more than a chessboard and the individuals living within them, no more than pieces!


    However, he was no longer an insignificant pawn as he had been in the past. No, he was a rook who could charge forth and stir the chaos. Even if the nar consciousness wanted to achieve some purpose, it would have to do so through Greem¡¯s hand.


    This process was an excellent opportunity for Greem to peek into the principles that governed this world!


    Naturally, now that he knew this, Greem would not sit by and let the opportunity slip past him. After a quick moment of thought, Greem quickly gave out a series of orders.


    Surely the Adept¡¯s Association, Silver Union, and the Northern Witches had received simr news by now. No one would be interested in starting a war during such times. Their focus would be on defending themselves.


    Thus, the pressing cmity that the Crimson n had been facing was dissolved by an even greater cmity on the horizon!


    ............


    Ailovis, the Crimson Wing.


    This ce was the Crimson n¡¯s territory and likely the future heart of the Central Lands.


    After two hundred years of diligent management, this rich and bountifulnd had be popted and wealthy.


    Viges, towns, and cities rose from the ground, dotting the green and yellow in alongside the patches of green growth and forests. It was a microcosm of the unique liveliness and prosperity of the Central Lands.


    Ever since the Crimson Wing was chosen as the headquarters of the Crimson n, three tall adept towers had been erected in a triangr formation. They were the most remarkablendmarks in thisnd.


    There were about a hundred kilometers of distance between each other. The triangle that they protected was the most prosperous and popted territory of the Crimson n.


    It was early in the morning.


    A silver-white flying ship wove through several white clouds that were drifting leisurely in the light blue sky. The ship was headed toward the Crimson Wing.


    A muscr man with a stern and determined face stood at the bow of the ship. He wore a golden robe and was calmly observing the beautiful scenery shing by on the ground.


    Suddenly, footsteps rang out behind him.


    A handsome young man in golden armor stepped forward and said, ¡°n Leader, we are approaching Crimson Wing!¡±


    ¡°Mm!¡± The middle-aged man said in a deep voice, ¡°Have we establishedmunications? What was the Crimson n¡¯s purpose in summoning all of us here?¡±


    ¡°We have inquired. Molten Fire City and the Dener n have already arrived. As many as seven Fourth Grade adepts are already at Crimson Wing. However...¡±


    ¡°However, what?¡±


    ¡°They are keeping a tight lip. We weren¡¯t able to find out anything. Only Molten Fire City replied. They only gave us two words¨C ¡®magic surge.¡¯ We don¡¯t know anything else.¡±


    ¡°Magic surge!?¡±


    Leader of the n of Gold, Mornashen Gaia, couldn¡¯t help but tremble at the mention of that taboo term. His face turned dark.


    ¡°Are you sure that was what Molten Fire City said? Magic surge?¡±


    ¡°Yes, we are absolutely sure!¡±


    Mornashen¡¯s expression turned solemn. He waved his n member away and brooded in silence.


    The flying ship cut through the air quickly, passing by a forest that stretched for fifty kilometers and crossing a river before finally arriving at its destination, Crimson Wing.


    Three adept towers stood silently on the horizon, their structure piercing the clouds.


    There wererge areas of farms around the towers, along with numerous cities. You could see a stream of carriages proceeding along the grid-like roads as if they were ants marching in a chain.


    Perhaps they had seen the ship in the sky, but some of the tiny humans below waved their hands and hats at the ship.


    A massive human city slowly came within sight in the center of the three towers. It became clearer and clearer as the ship got closer.


    There were more flying objects in the sky now!


    Eyeballbat machines the size of human heads roared as they buzzed through the sky. They scanned the aura of the flying ship and did not intercept it. Instead, they escorted the ship, cutting an elegant arc in the sky as they moved toward anding strip on the edge of the city.


    As expected of Crimson Wing. There were two Motherships merely hovering above the city. They hovered at the edges of the city, serving as giant aerial tforms.


    You could make out the countless ck dots and flying objects that took off andnded on these Motherships from a distance.


    The flying ship stopped at Landing Bay 3.


    Mornashen had just led his five n members down the steps of the ship when Molten Fire City Lord Alfred¡¯s tall and skinny figure appeared.


    Two Fourth Grade adepts whose names sent tremors throughout the Central Lands smiled as they greeted each other.


    ¡°You arrived earlier than me! How is it? Did you manage to find out anything?¡± Mornashen Gaia asked impatiently upon their meeting.


    ¡°Come into the city with me. We will have a talk once we find a ce and settle down!¡± Molten Fire City Lord Alfred waved his hand, and a ck carriage lying in wait drove up to their side.


    The two Fourth Grade adepts got onto the same carriage while their followers hopped onto the other carriages.


    Soon, the wheels creaked as the carriages drove out of thending bay toward the city of Crimson Wing in the distance.


    Molten Fire City Lord Alfred waved his hand, and ayer of green magical particles engulfed the carriage. The two of them then started whispering to each other.


    ¡°What¡¯s with the whole thing about a magic surge? Why were we summoned for a gathering? Could it be...an actual magic surge ising?¡± Gaia asked hastily.


    As Fourth Grade adepts, they both understood much of the true nature of the world¡¯s secrets. They were not unfamiliar with the term ¡®magic surge.¡¯


    ¡°Given the information I currently have, I am certain that a magic surge is on the verge of urring! Greem has summoned all of us to discuss how the Central Lands will respond to the magic surge.¡±


    ¡°How else can we respond? Obviously, we will all be guarding our own territories......could it be? He does not intend for the various ns to transfermand of their forces to him, does he?¡± Mornashen¡¯s face turned dark at the mention of this, ¡°We can¡¯t mobilize any more forces from our n. If that is what he intends to do, I will never agree, even if it means I will have to fight him again!¡±


    Alfred finally couldn¡¯t help but shake his head andugh.

 Chapter 1352 - A New City

    Chapter 1352 A New City


    Despite being a somewhat newly established city, Crimson Wing had a shocking poption of two million.


    It was a tremendous number in a world of magic where transport and resources were not that plentiful.


    In the World of Adepts, cities with a poption of ten to twenty thousand were considered small cities. Those with twenty thousand to fifty thousand were mid-sized cities, cities with fifty to ny thousand poption wererge cities, while those with more than ny thousand were massive cities.


    This standard was established for a reason. It was the limitation of transport, food, and water!


    In a higher ne like the World of Adepts, things were still incredibly limited. Even though the adepts could travel through space, upend mountains, and empty oceans with a single wave of their hands, the mortals still lived a primitive lifestyle that relied on farming, fishing, and hunting.


    The lives of adepts and the lives of ordinary people were as different as heaven and earth. It was impossible to visualize the gap between them. Adepts would rather waste enormous amounts of resources to cultivate some incredibly delicious fruits than direct even a single thought toward the improvement of a mortal¡¯s crop yield.


    Crops grown on therge amount ofnd that the ordinary humans lived on was not enough to sustain too many people. The hard work of the average farmer was barely enough to fill the bellies of his own family. If a family wanted to eat meat and enjoy better meals, they would have to take the risk and hunt in the woods.


    That was why it was impossible for there to be arge poption in any given ce. Theck of food alone was enough of a problem for a governor.


    If local food production was insufficient, then why didn¡¯t they import from othernds?


    Here, the issue of transportation in magical worlds had to be discussed.


    The roads in the World of Adepts were mostly crude and simple dirt roads. At their very core, they were roads that had only appeared due to the incredible number of travelers and merchants that traversed the same paths. Such roads would often be impassable when it rained. Even when the weather was good, there were too many potholes and rocks along the road to make for a smooth journey.


    Most of the transportation of goods in the World of Adepts relied on carts- specifically, wooden carts drawn by a special breed of wildebeest. The unique features of these wooden carts were their limited load, fragility, and slow speed.


    With such roads and means of transportations, the transporting of goods over short distances was still possible. However, it was no more than a delusion if one hoped to continuously ferry essential resources such as food, drinking water, and firewood for hundreds of kilometers daily.


    It was this series of primitive and outdated technologies that the people still relied on that limited the appearance of massive cities!


    Even within the capital cities of the few famous Fourth Grade organizations of the Central Lands, the poption rarely exceeded a hundred thousand. It wasn¡¯t that these organizations did not want to attract more residents to their cities. Rather, they could not shoulder the resource shortage that would ur with the increase in poption.


    Consequently, the fact that Crimson Wing could provide for two million people hinted at something deeper. Many of the Fourth Grade adepts arriving from afar started to wonder.


    Could it be that the Crimson n had such plentiful resources that they could even extend them toward their ordinary civilians? Still, wasn¡¯t wasting these resources on these lowly mortals an incredibly wasteful act on its own?


    It was important to note that these mortals had absolutely no magical talent. Their only value was in working thend and, more crucially, to reproduce. They were to use their great numbers to give birth to a certain ratio of apprentice adepts.


    These apprentices were the only ones that had value and were worth investments from the ns. Mortals without magical talent were little more than livestock in the eyes of many adepts. They were only tools necessary for the continuation of the species!


    As such, they could never be bothered to expend their precious time and energy on these useless creatures, let alone help them improve their lives.


    However, this massive city of Crimson Wing was very different from any other city!


    It was a strange city that hadbined magic with everyday society and daily life.


    The neatly arranged streets, the clean and smooth stone roads, the organized shops and stalls, the residential areas,mercial districts, and entertainment districts with their meshing architectural styles. You could even see numerous magical machines and metal carriages running through the streets by the crowd of pedestrians.


    Crimson Wing had already abandoned inefficient and slow horse-powered carriages. The magical machines powered with magic energy batteries were their primary form of transporting goods. You no longer had slow, clunky wooden carts rumbling down the streets; you had precise magical machines forged entirely out of metal.


    Small shops relied on magical machines to transport goods, while the major merchants used special goblin flying ships.


    Powered by magic energy, these flying ships no longer gave off steam wherever they went, nor did they make tremendous noise due to their propellers. They glided silently through the sky, buzzing here and there ording to fixed flying routes. The whole city gave off a sense of a burgeoning magic-mechanical civilization!


    Ever since the Crimson n had obtained a steady supply of Queyras alloy from Molten Fire City, the forging of the magic generator furnaces had never stopped. Magic energy was no longer a problem that bothered the Crimson n.


    There were many goblin shops opened in Crimson Wing. They sold nonbat magical machines to everyone and even provided free magic energy charging services. These shops undoubtedly made it very convenient for the promotion of magical devices throughout the city.


    A magical machine that could traverse hundreds of kilometers of distance without any rest was far more cost-effective than having to keep an entire caravan group around. Consequently, you could no longer see those outdated caravan merchants anywhere in Crimson Wing.


    They had been reced by magical machines that could travel as fast as the wind.


    However, for the sake of pedestrian safety, all magical machines that entered Crimson Wing could only run at their lowest speed. Moreover, they had to travel on the stone roads.


    The poprization and application of the magical machines and the bloom of a magical civilization allowed for many unusual upations to appear in Crimson Wing. Magical=machine mechanics, magical-machine technicians, pilots, researchers, janitors,w enforcement forces, etc.


    One had to admit that Crimson Wing was a new worldpletely different from any other city in the World of Adepts! Even a top-ss adept like Mornashen could not understand norprehend the energy and liveliness of this city.


    ¡°Does Greem have nothing better to do? Why has he made all these toys?¡± Mornashen put the curtains of the carriage down, his face struck with disbelief. ¡°What is the point of treating these humans so well? They will bepletely useless when an enemyes. Even an apprentice adept would be more useful. At least they can throw a few fireballs!¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to care about what he thinks,¡± Molten Fire City Lord Alfred stroked his little mustache as he asked softly, ¡°Just tell me, do you think the citizens of this city are happy? Do you think they are content?¡±


    ¡°What in the zes is the point in keeping them happy and content? What can you get in return by wasting resources and energy on them? Can they help us conquer a lesser ne?¡± Mornashen was clearly a firm advocate for the ssical stance of bloodline superiority and adept superiority. He couldn¡¯t be less interested in these pointless affairs. ¡°With their frail bodies, probably half of them would die the moment they were teleported to a foreign ne.¡±


    The Lord of the Molten Fire City shook his head but did not argue. Instead, there was a change in the topic of conversation.


    ¡°You have seen the Crimson Wing for yourself. Have you not sensed how it is different from other adept cities?¡±


    ¡°Are you talking about the magic energy?¡±


    ¡°Indeed! You should have sensed it for yourself. This city is filled with magic energy. It is a prosperous city sustained entirely by magic energy. Aren¡¯t you curious where their magic energyes from? Don¡¯t tell me ites from those three adept towers. They can¡¯t sustain such incredible demand.¡±


    ¡°You mean...the Crimson n has obtained a source of infinite energy? What is it? Some sort of treasure or a magical array? Or perhaps a unique technique from a foreign world?¡±


    ¡°I have done my investigations. It is a sort of unique device known as a magic generator furnace. They can endlessly extract chaotic magic energy from space and tame it for use.¡±


    ¡°Isn¡¯t that the same as elementium altars?¡±


    ¡°Not at all. Elementium altars can only be constructed on fixed spots along leyline nodes. Moreover, they cost a shocking amount to build. However, this magic generator furnace they have invented is a mobile energy source that can be fitted on any magical machine.¡± Alfred narrowed his eyes and exined in awe.


    ¡°No wonder the Crimson n can employ magical machines on such a tremendous scale. So they were relying on an endless source of magic energy! The crucial requirements for any civilization or organization that wishes to grow and expand are energy and resources. They no longerck energy now. As long as they continue to expand outward and obtain the required resources from foreign worlds, it will be no problem for them to establish themselves as a massive organization,¡± Mornashen Gaia couldn¡¯t help but exim in awe as well. ¡°No wonder Greem could incite conflicts everywhere and still grow stronger with each passing year. So this is the true reason for their power!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t overthink. The reason Greem summoned us here must be to discuss how we should deal with theing magic tide. Mine and Ker¡¯s attitudes are very clear. We will be deferring to him in all matters. As long as his demands do not cross the line, we will stuff ourints and obey. That said, if he pushes too far, I am hoping you will argue logically and point out his mistakes, brother. We can¡¯t let him do whatever he wants.¡±


    A half-grin appeared on Mornashen¡¯s face when he heard this, ¡°This is your¡¯s and Ker¡¯s stance?¡±


    ¡°And Ariza¡¯s and Roderick¡¯s. You are the only one left amongst the Central adepts who can wrestle with Greem now. So......¡±


    ¡°So you wish to push me forth and roast me upon the spit?¡± Mornashen shed a sarcastic smile.


    ¡°We don¡¯t want you to oppose Greem. We just want you to ¡®argue logically¡¯ with him!¡± Alfred couldn¡¯t help butugh awkwardly.


    Power was status.


    Without the power to back it up, even Fourth Grade adepts like himself had no spine to their words.

 Chapter 1353 - Plots and Schemes

    Chapter 1353 Plots and Schemes


    ¡°A magic surge ising!¡±


    Greem announced it casually. Everyone present fell silent.


    Anyone who had a seat here in this wide hall was no ordinary adept. Fifteen Fourth Grade adepts sat at a long obsidian table, representing almost every single major organization of the Central Lands.


    Two or three of their descendants or most trusted subordinates stood behind them.


    Greem of the Crimson n.


    Mary of the Crimson n.


    Mornashen of the Gaia n.


    Ker of the Dener n.


    Alfred of the Molten Fire City.


    Den of the Fabres n.


    Mirva of the Annemdor Academy.


    Nics of the Entom n.


    Matthew of the Bane n.


    Andrew of the Ahlden n.


    Ashton of the Smalley n.


    Ariza of the Mansour n.


    Adrea of the ire n.


    M of the Kunis n.


    Roderick of the Hill n.


    Fourth Grade Thunder Lord Arms crouchedzily on therge za in front of the hall, his bright blue scales reflecting the warm sunlight.


    With him guarding the ce, no outsider could hope to break in and uncover the secrets being discussed amongst these adepts.


    Two silver Motherships hovered silently in the skies above, apanied by countless ck dots. Even further on the horizon, three looming adept towers stood strong, shimmering with blinding radiance.


    As the first crucial meeting of the Central Lands, Crimson Wing was now under incredibly high security. However, considering the fact that every single Fourth Grade adept of the Central Lands was gathered here, there was probably no one who would dare find trouble here!


    Only Fourth Grade adepts had the right to sit in this hall; their subordinates could only stand behind them and listen in silence. Without the Fourth Grade adepts¡¯ permission, these subordinates had no right to speak, let alone make any decisions.


    Adepts had never cared for theplicated rules and etiquette of human nobles. That was why Greem cut straight to the topic at hand the moment the meeting started.


    The many apanying Third Grade adepts might not understand what the term ¡®magic surge¡¯ meant, but the Fourth Grade adepts knew well enough.


    ording to historical records, a magic surge would ur in the multiverse every ten thousand years. Incredibly powerful magic energy tides would surge forth from the depths of space, ravaging all material nes and elementium worlds.


    The appearance of the magic surges posed both a benefit and a threat to the countless nar civilizations.


    With the surging of the magic energy tides, all power systems that relied on magical energies as their foundation would be stronger. Simultaneously, the magic energy tides would wash against the material nes and weaken their nar barriers.


    Consequently, when a magic surge urred, the starbeasts that typically roamed the depths of space would emerge from theirirs and rush to the material nes in hopes of a feast.


    Moreover, the magic surge would affect a nar world¡¯s magical creatures, causing them to be exceedingly active. In the World of Adepts, these magical creatures would often be unable to suppress their murderous instincts and would charge out of the ck Forest to assault human cities and settlements.


    With threats both from within and outside the world, every individual who ruled any amount ofnd across the universe had to prepare cautiously for the impending danger!


    The numerous Fourth Grade adepts exchanged looks, some of themmunicating privately with their minds.


    Finally, Bloodline Adept Andrew, wearing white leather armor, couldn¡¯t help but speak up.


    ¡°Has the news been confirmed?¡±


    Judging from his expression, he had absolutely no prior knowledge of this magic surge.


    Everyone here might be a Fourth Grade adept, but the difference in their abilities and talents meant that their fields of specialization differed as well. Consequently, due to theck of a powerful diviner in his n, Andrew had yet to obtain any information on the iing magic surge.


    ¡°It has been confirmed beyond the shadow of a doubt!¡± Greem said solemnly.


    Andrew couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air.


    Ten thousand years was simply far too much time. It was long enough to make most nar creatures forget the horror of magic surges. Even Fourth Grade adepts only had a base lifespan of approximately a thousand years. Most of the time¨Cand with a little luck¨Cthe average Fourth Grade adept would never run into one of these legendary magic surges throughout their entire lives.


    Unfortunately for the adepts seated here today, their luck didn¡¯t seem too strong!


    ¡°How much time do we have left?¡± It was Den who asked this time.


    ¡°About ten years!¡± Greem sighed and said, ¡°The first wave of the magic surge will affect the World of Adepts ten years from now. When that happens......¡±


    Greem did not finish his sentence, but everyone knew well enough what he meant.


    These Fourth Grade adepts stood at the peak of this world. Even the most powerful magic energy tides could not threaten their lives. However, just because they did not fear the iing threat did not mean it was the same for their subordinates. Even if their subordinates were strong enough to survive this cmity, their territories and lesser nes would still be vulnerable.


    When the magic energy tides washed across the world, the nar barrier would be riddled with holes. All sorts of starbeasts and monstrosities could slip into the nar worlds and stuff themselves. Until they were expelled from a world, the worldly territories would remain in constant unrest. Individual lesser nes might even fall out of their control amidst the chaos.


    That was why the adept ns¡¯ main priority, apart from safeguarding their territories in the World of Adepts, was stabilizing their rule over the lesser nes. However, almost every one of the ns present herecked the necessary military force to defend every one of their lesser nes. It was an awkward situation.


    ¡°Ten years.¡±


    ¡°Indeed, why is it so soon? Why do we only have ten years to prepare for this?¡±


    Anxiety and frustration appeared on the faces of most of the adepts.


    It was probably inevitable that their treasuries would shrink after this magic surge!


    Of course, not all adepts were so anxious and nervous. For instance, Molten Fire City Lord Alfred appeared calm andposed.


    Molten Fire City was located in the very center of the Central Lands. None of its territories bordered the ck Forest, and there were norge spatial rifts nearby. That was why he appeared so rxed, enough to be concerned about other matters.


    ¡°Lord Greem, since you have summoned us here, could it be that you already have arrangements in mind?¡±


    Greem replied calmly, ¡°The Central Lands has been a tray of loose sand in the past. We have never been able to truly unite into a singr force, regardless of the threat. That is why I believe there is a need tobine everyone¡¯s idle military forces and conduct a joint defense. What does everyone think?¡±


    Greem appeared to be asking for the others¡¯ opinion, but he and Mary each took up one end of the table. As he spoke, profound and violent power gathered around them, causing every Fourth Grade adept present to feel mountainous pressure weighing upon them.


    The adepts looked at each other until, finally, their gaze unanimouslynded on Mornashen Gaia, n Leader of the n of Gold, sitting at the first seat to the left of the long table.


    Even Greem and Mary shifted their gazes to Mornashen, guided by everyone else¡¯s line of sight.


    Even as powerful as he was, Mornashen Gaia couldn¡¯t help but be somewhat nervous with so many powerful individuals staring at him.


    It was the first time Greem was holding a meeting between all the forces of the Central Lands. If he pushed too hard, he would undoubtedly be courting disaster for the Gaia n. However, as the only Fourth Grade adept left in the Central Lands who could still keep Greem somewhat in check, he had to take a stance.


    That was why Mornashen Gaia frowned before saying solemnly, ¡°I don¡¯t find this to be a good solution! We of the n of Gold already have a waning bloodline. Very few of our n members have awakened their bloodline powers. If you were to conscript a few of them, we wouldn¡¯t have enough military strength to defend the n¡¯snd, let alone our lesser nes!¡±


    Mary frowned at the appearance of this opposition. The smile faded from her face. She might not have dared to make an enemy out of this fearsome Gold Titan in the past, but with the power of Nightmare Castle now by her side, she felt no fear.


    She might be injured, with Nightmare Castle in shambles, but Mornashen Gaia was not at his peak either. It was still a toss-up as to who would win in an actual fight!


    Fortunately, even though Mary was furious, she knew that today¡¯s matter was of great importance. She could not wreck it over one of her tantrums. She stifled her anger and red at everyone with her crimson eyes. The Fourth Grade adepts who met her gaze couldn¡¯t help but feel their hearts tremble and quickly looked away.


    It was said that Lady Mary had been badly injured in the battle that had urred not long ago. However, judging from the aura she was radiating, her power wasn¡¯t too much affected. That caused the few scheming rats among them to frown. They had to reconsider their ns again.


    ¡°You are all overthinking this matter!¡± Greem had predicted this response. He smiled again as he exined, ¡°The joint defense I am speaking of is not the conscription of military forces from your n to strengthen the Crimson n¡¯s forces. Rather, ns with power to spare will be mobilizing their forces to aid other ns facing trouble, depending on the geography and severity of the cmity.¡±


    Greem lifted his hand. Magic energy surged through the hall as a three-dimensional map of the Central Lands was projected onto the table.


    ¡°Please look, everyone. There are a total of thirty-one regions in the Central Lands, seven of which lie on the borders and neighbor the ck Forest. Naturally, the Ailovis region will be defended by the Crimson n. We will not require any reinforcements.¡±


    ¡°As for the other ns, you have M¡¯s Kunis n, Ariza¡¯s Mansour n, Roderick¡¯s Hill n, as well as three other regions that are jointly managed by several mid-sized ns.


    ¡°I believe that these three ns will have ack of military forces, given that they will have to worry about internar invasion as well as stampedes from the ck Forest. As such, we of the Crimson n are willing to provide an army of two thousand magical machines to aid in their joint defense against the magic surge.


    ¡°It is not too much to ask those of you who do not face the threat of the ck Forest to contribute some amount of your power, isn¡¯t it? I can guarantee that the forces mobilized from your n will not be fielded on the battlefields the Crimson n is involved in. They will only be fighting where they are needed.¡±


    The hall instantly fell silent upon these words.


    The expressions of the Fourth Grade adepts flickered and changed as they brooded in silence!

 Chapter 1354 - Meeting of the Higher-Ups

    Chapter 1354 Meeting of the Higher-Ups


    ¡°......¡±


    ¡°Major ns neighboring the ck Forest are to send out forces and adepts to exterminate magical creatures within your corresponding areas of jurisdiction. No species of magical creature can be allowed to have more than a poption of a hundred within five hundred kilometers of the ck Forest¡¯s border. Wild magical creatures of Second Grade and above are to be terminated with extreme prejudice.


    ¡°Post mobile scouts in the key areas to keep a constant eye on changes in the ck Forest.


    ¡°The Bracada and Dagon regions are situated in the south. They are unprotected by any Fourth Grade forces, and the local mid and small ns jointly manage the area. Given their individual powers, they won¡¯t be capable of much more than defense. Notify them to immediately organize a coalition army to exterminate the magical creatures in the ck Forest.


    ¡°As for theirck of high-grade adepts. Adept Matthew, your Bane n is the closest to Bracada. You will work with their coalition army and set up camp in the ck Forest there. The Bane n does not need to participate in the extermination, but your people will be responsible for hunting down the more powerful high-grade magical creatures. That is fine with you, yes?¡±


    The silent Matthew thought for a moment after hearing Greem¡¯s question. Once he was sure that this assignment wouldn¡¯t affect him or his n adversely in any fashion, he nodded and assented.


    ¡°Understood, everything will be done as instructed by Lord Greem!¡±


    ¡°Mm!¡± Greem was calm andposed. He continued delegating the duties, ¡°The situation in the Dagon region is a little moreplicated. It has to contend with both the ck Forest and the Underground World. Adept Mirva, your Annemdor Academy isn¡¯t all that far from Dagon. Why don¡¯t you be responsible for the defense of Dagon?¡±


    At this point, all of Mirva¡¯s edge had been worn away by the repeated incidents in recent days. He actually appeared like the elderly man he was. Just judging from his outward appearance, he had already entered the twilight phase of his life. Both his physical body and Spirit were showing signs of decay.


    ¡°Understood. I will contact the ns at Dagon immediately once I return!¡±


    ¡°Mm!¡± Having dealt with the south, Greem turned his sights to the ns in the north, ¡°Adept M, Adept Ariza, Adept Roderick. The territory of your three ns neighbors the ck Forest. You should have no problem dealing with this magic surge on your own, am I right?¡±


    The three adepts looked at each other. Finally, it was Ariza, who was dressed like a barbarian, who spoke up first.


    ¡°Our Mansour n might run into some problems.¡±


    ¡°Ooh? Please, borate.¡±


    Ariza, who had an ancient war-ape bloodline, hesitated for a moment.


    He looked around the room before finally gritting his teeth and revealing the true state of his n¡¯s affairs.


    ¡°The Mansour n holds possession of three lesser nes. The two small lesser nes have been fully developed. Security should not be a problem. However, the intermediate ne is my concern. We have only barely managed to establish a foothold there, let alone begin any sort of development. Once this magic surge erupts, most internar teleportation will be affected. I am worried that our only forward post there will be removed by the enemy while we are unable to send reinforcements. However, if we of the Mansour n were to station too many adepts there to stabilize the situation, we probably won¡¯t have enough forces to deal with the ck Forest.¡±


    The resources and lesser nes controlled by each n were ssified secrets. They would never reveal them of their own ord if they were not staring down the barrel of such a cmity.


    It had been seven hundred years since Ariza advanced to Fourth Grade. It was entirely ordinary for him to have the coordinates of three lesser nes in his possession. After all, even as ruthless as the Crimson n was, they still controlled no more than four lesser nes.


    However, of these four lesser nes, the Goblin ne and Seawoods ne were already very developed. Only Lance was still being slowly colonized. Meanwhile, all sorts of rare mineral deposits had already been discovered in the Mountain ne. Unfortunately, due to its harsh environment, the development wasn¡¯t progressing too quickly.


    They had also exterminated Freed¡¯s Jorma n recently and taken their five lesser nes¡¯ coordinates into their own hands. However, due to the change in regime, the established order in these lesser nes had returned to chaos. Reestablishing governance and building up a supply chain of resources again would take at least a few decades.


    Since Ariza had taken the lead, Adept M, dressed in a red noblewomen¡¯s dress, also decided to speak up.


    ¡°I will also have problems on my side! I have four lesser nes in my hand, two of which are still unstable. We won¡¯t have any trouble with the routine extermination in the ck Forest still, but we won¡¯t be able to have the forces needed to execute any high-grade magical creatures that appear.¡±


    Greem nodded. His eyes thennded on thest adept who had yet to say anything, Adept Roderick.


    He was a pretty man dressed like a noble. His face had a very feminine beauty to it. In addition to the eyeliner he had applied to himself, he was a rather androgynous individual.


    ¡°I won¡¯t have any problems. My n can manage both the lesser nes and the ck Forest. There won¡¯t be any trouble!¡±


    Greem nodded in satisfaction. He then said, ¡°Since Adept Ariza and Adept M have a slightck in military power, our Crimson n will reinforce you with an adequate number of magical machines. The mobile, two thousand-strong magical machine army will be sent to Ariza¡¯s n to exterminate the magical creatures! On the other side, our Crimson n will send out two Third Grades to help Adept M. We shouldn¡¯t have any trouble this way!¡±


    Ariza and M both ced a hand on their chests and expressed their gratitude upon hearing this.


    ¡°Now that the matter of the ck Forest is settled, we should talk about the spatial rifts,¡± Greem looked around at everybody and said solemnly,¡± The moment the first magic-surge wave hits, all the spatial rifts and voids will open naturally. The nar barrier will no longer be able to stop the spacestorm or otherworldly creatures from entering. As such, every n must perform aprehensive and detailed investigation of weak spatial points in their territories. We must then try and reinforce these locations.


    ¡°As for known mega-rifts that form naturally......¡±


    Upon saying this, every adept, Greem included, couldn¡¯t help but look at Andrew sympathetically. The most famous mega-rift in the Central Lands was located in Ahlden n territory.


    That mega-rift was a massive tear measuring a full kilometer in length. Should it open, the Ahlden n would be in hot water!


    The mega-rift had not been a source of disaster for the Ahlden n in the past couple of thousand years. On the contrary, it was their most significant source of wealth.


    As one of the few spatial weak points in the World of Adepts, crossing through the nar barrier at these mega-rifts cost one-tenth of the energy required in other locations. The Ahlden n constructed numerous portals to other well-known worlds at the edge of this mega-rift. They profited greatly from their internar trade.


    To be absolutely honest, one out of every two otherworldly ves in the Central Lands had entered the World of Adepts through this mega-rift.


    However, with the iing magic surge, this giant treasure box had suddenly turned into a noose around the Ahlden n¡¯s neck. Given the fragility of space there, extremely powerful starbeasts could force their way in, let alone smaller magical creatures.


    Starbeasts. They were the natural enemies of all nar creatures!


    They spent their lives in the depths of space, continually enduring the corrosion of the magic tides, to the extent that they were already immune to ordinary elementium spells. Elementium adepts had no hopes of even injuring them if they did not draw upon the power ofws.


    Moreover, the power system of the starbeasts was entirely different from nar creatures. Consequently, the magic resistance that some adepts were so proud of was utterly useless in negating their attacks.


    The consequence of these two factors was that a single Fourth Grade starbeast could easily defeat four to five human adepts of the same grade. Should a swarm of starbeasts emerge from the mega-rift during the magic surge, the Ahlden n would most certainly face destruction!


    ¡°Don¡¯t look at me! If the magic surgees, my Ahlden n is definitely incapable of defending the mega-rift alone! When that happens, the starbeasts won¡¯t just be ravaging my territory, mind you. The entire Central Lands will be affected,¡± Andrew warned viciously.


    ¡°Hmph! Your Ahlden n didn¡¯t think about us when you were making a killing with the mega-rift. Now you want to drag us down when danger¡¯s heading your way?¡± Adept Den couldn¡¯t help but grunt unpleasantly.


    ¡°He¡¯s right. Your Ahlden n has made so much profit from the mega-rift over the years. It¡¯s about time you take a little of your treasuries to strengthen the seal there,¡± It was Ashton of the Smalley n who spoke up now. His territory was only separated from the Ahlden n by one region. They would be affected as well if the starbeasts invaded.


    It was no wonder he was so upset!


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. We of the Ahlden n won¡¯t be shrinking back. I will arrange for the sealing of the mega-rift once I return from this meeting. I will do my best and construct more war towers within this ten-year buffer period. We will surround the mega-riftpletely,¡± Andrew gritted his teeth and made a promise. The topic then turned to a different one. ¡°However, our n will still becking in military power then. I¡¯m afraid I will need your help to fill the war towers constructed then!¡±


    Everyone¡¯s expression turned at the mention of this.


    It was obvious that Andrew wanted their adepts to risk their lives for the Ahlden n¡¯s sake!


    The atmosphere of the room froze and turned cold.


    There were too many regions and ns in the Central Lands. Each n had its own needs and welfare to take care of. Unifying them in essence and not just name alone was a monumental task!


    If Greem didn¡¯t step forth at this moment, today¡¯s meeting would end on an unpleasant note. Everybody would go back to dealing with things their own way, just like they always had in the past.


    Greem coughed and attracted everyone¡¯s attention. He then started speaking.


    ¡°Andrew, that is your n¡¯s territory. You must take on most of the responsibility!¡±


    Andrew¡¯s face turned dark, but he knew that there was no refuting this point. He could only nod and acknowledge the fact.


    ¡°However, we won¡¯t just sit by and watch either. Do what you can with the resources you have. The rest of us will pitch in where you arecking.


    ¡°When the magic surge arrives, I will have Mary move Nightmare Castle over to help you guard the mega-rift. Furthermore,¡± Greem turned and looked at Mornashen Gaia, ¡°One of us two must be guarding the mega-rift at all times! What do you think?¡±


    Mornashen Gaia, leader of the Gaia n, hesitated for a moment. He nodded reluctantly!

 Chapter 1355 - Trouble in the Central Lands

    Chapter 1355 Trouble in the Central Lands


    A magic surge wasing!


    What was a magic surge?


    Just half a day after the conclusion of the Crimson Conference, this bewitching term started to spread to every corner of the Central Lands like a gue.


    However, the news did not spread uncontrobly outward. It was contained amongst the adepts.


    The ordinary civilians and haughty nobles werepletely ignorant. They lived their busy lives as always, hunting, trading, and farming; they were oblivious to the terrifying cmity that would befall this world.


    The adepts had locked down all information, preventing any cause of panic among the mortals.


    However, when the news spread amongst the adepts, many of them were just as confused.


    What was a magic surge? Where did ite from? What threat did this pose to them? Why did the legendary fire adept who had unified the Central Lands in name summoned everyone to Crimson Wing just to convey this news? Was a magic surge such a terrifying event?


    Endless questions and doubts flooded the minds of most adepts. They could only dive into books and papers, hoping to find information on magic surges in the vast sea of knowledge.


    Once every ten thousand years...an eruption of magic energy...the appearance of spatial rifts...magical creature intrusions...starbeast invasions.


    Numerous shocking words jumped off the pages at the adepts, each one chilling and terrifying to behold. Ten thousand years was simply far too long for them, long enough for history to turn into legend and truth into myth.


    Now, when the world showed them the true face of history once again, every single adept was stunned. Once again, they felt their insignificance against the vastness of the universe.


    Adepts were some of the most elite individuals in this world, enjoying a debaucherous life of luxury and authority. However, they were hardly a ssh in the overwhelming river of the multiverse¡¯s history. At the very best, they were only a tiny drop of water that flowed along the river, living their small, perfect little lives.


    They were much like summer insects who could never speak of ice, believing themselves to have understood the world fully after flying to so many gardens and visiting so many patches of grass. They lived carefree lives, enjoying themselves to the fullest and burning up the rest of their lives in a mere summer.


    How could they possibly know whaty beyond the warmth and heat of summer days?


    How could they know that after the chilly autumn winds woulde the white-d world of winter and then spring, where all things came to life?


    Those who could be adepts had a much longer lifespan than mortals. In their eyes, mortals were these summer insects, ignorant to the world¡¯s truth and cruelty.


    Adepts understood the nar worlds and had their sights set on the realms beyond. They had witnessed a greater,rger, and more majestic world beyond the one they resided in. However, just when these adepts had believed themselves to have grasped the world¡¯s pulse, this one unfamiliar term dragged them into apletely foreign domain.


    The adepts might be beings as powerful as gods themselves in the eyes of mortals. However, in the eyes of truly powerful existences, these adepts were as frail as ants. They were so insignificant it wasn¡¯t even worth mentioning them.


    They should not have run into such a universal cmity given their short lifespans thatsted only a few hundred years. For better or worse, they were fortunate enough to personally experience this overwhelming and mysterious magic surge in ten years.


    Yellowed and tattered tomes were dug out of libraries, and pieces of ssified secrets from ancient books were uncovered. All the information put together, pieced together, made for a bloody picture!


    Magic surges were horrifying things. The horror of a magic surge was beyond their imagination!


    ording to iplete records that the adepts managed to uncover, thest time the World of Adepts experienced a magic surge was 8,500 years ago. Thising magic surge was about 1,500 years early.


    Thest time the magic tides in space turned turbulent, itsted for a hundred years, causing a dozen waves of magic surges. The damage inflicted on the World of Adepts during that period was unimaginable. The poption of the Central Lands was reduced by more than half, and as many as thirty percent of the adepts died in the line of battle.


    Of course, that wasn¡¯t the worst of it!


    ording to the ancient records, the Adept¡¯s Association was the one who suffered the most severe casualties.


    A massive spatial rift had appeared there, and a shocking number of starbeasts had swarmed in. They had ravaged thend, causing the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s poption to shrink by two-thirds and over fifty percent of its adepts to die.


    One had to admit that the magic surge thatsted for a hundred years had profoundly changed the World of Adepts.


    Inkdeep Valley, located in Adept¡¯s Association territory, was said to be the terrifying remnant of a bloody battle between an ultra-powerhouse adept and an intruding starbeast. It had been several thousand years now, and the marks left upon the world had yet to fade.


    That alone was a testament to the ferocity and terror of that fight!


    The mega-rift left in the Ahlden n¡¯s territory was also a remnant from thest magic surge. It was a rift that the World of Adepts could not patch up, even now.


    Along with the news of the iing magic surge came the Crimson Conference¡¯s firm and indisputable instructions.


    Clear out the ck Forest, search for spatial weak points, migrate core poption to more stable regions, andincrease construction of war towers.


    It was a preparation guide from the Crimson n, and it would serve as the defense strategy for the entire Central Lands in the next ten years!


    When the Central adepts finally digested this news of a magic surge, the region was soon filled withints andmentations.


    It was important to note that every Fourth Grade adept, upon advancement, would dere the most bountiful region avable as their n headquarters. Naturally, such a ce would be a safe ce, far from the ck Forest and surrounded by other areas.


    Bit by bit, the numerous small and mid-sized ns were forced to the edge of the Central Lands. Without any exception, all of them would face the danger of a stampede from the ck Forest.


    These smaller ns all had numerous hunting parties, trained to delve into the ck Forest to hunt for valuable magical creatures and resources. In peaceful times, the ck Forest was not only not a threat to these ns, but also a tremendous trove of treasure and resources.


    Should the magic surge arrive, this situation would turn entirely on its head.


    The hunters would be the hunted as the scattered magical creatures gathered together and unleashed a stampede upon the human ns.


    It was unknown if these smaller ns could defend against these stampedes without the same wealth and power as the major ns!


    The fall of an adept tower did not just signify the loss of the lives of a dozen adepts and a hundred apprentices. The human cities and settlements protected by those towers would burn and be reduced to food for the tens of thousands of wild beasts.


    Given the intelligence of adepts, they were able to quicklye to a conclusion about what would happen based on interference and deduction.


    If the magic surge were as terrifying as imed in the ancient records, then the adept ns of the Central Lands would face an unprecedented reshuffling of power. Most ns and organizations without the power to defend themselves would disappear beneath the hooves of the stampede.


    The surviving adept ns then only had to survive the magic surge¡¯s first few waves, protecting their territories and adept towers. What awaited them would be a tremendous increase in influence and power.


    There were two sides to everything in the world!


    Magic surges were terrifying affairs and apocalyptic cmities. On the other hand, they also brought along incredible benefits.


    Naturally, the first was the increase in magical creature resources.


    Ferocious magical creatures not seen in a hundred years and fearsome starbeasts rarely spotted in a thousand years would all appear, hoping to feast on the flesh and souls of humans. Defeat them, and the surviving adepts would obtain a once-unimaginable amount of resources.


    With the sustenance of these resources and the trials of fighting, most adepts¡¯ chances to advance to a higher grade were amplified tremendously. From a certain point of view, you could see it as intentional guidance and feedback from the nar consciousness!


    Aid the World of Adepts in eliminating the enemy and the intruders, and the nar consciousness would reward you indirectly, allowing your soul to rise in power rapidly.


    By helping the World of Adepts, you would be helping yourself!


    The second benefit would be the change in the environment. The increase in magical particles would stimte the birth of more, stronger, and more excellent descendants.


    In the Words of Adepts, the number of human babies with magic talent born during the magic surge would increase ten-fold, a hundred-fold. If all these children were cultivated properly, the adepts would enjoy an exponential increase in number.


    As for the other benefits? Those were benefits that only high-grade adepts could enjoy.


    After all, chaos in the nar worlds was also the best time for them to venture into the muddy waters!


    The World of Gods was usually well-defended, with barely any chances of infiltration or invasion. Now, with theing of the magic surge, their nar barrier would be full of holes. It was the best time for those with grudges to repay them, and for those with none to obtain resources.


    At the very least, Greem intended to go for a stroll in Faen ne!


    After all, Alice had begged for Greem to destroy Faen ne following the death of Endor. Greem could not possibly aplish such a feat given his current powers. However, he should have no trouble going over to Faen for a stroll and have a conversation with a few old friends.


    In particr, the Elven Sword Saint Agassi had forced Greem to flee all over Faen. He was also the one who had personally killed Endor. He kept all these grudges fresh in his mind!


    Of course, if he had the time, he could also go for a round of harvesting in the Holy Knight ne. It had been more than two hundred years now. Surely, a new batch of holy knights must have emerged.


    Though Greem no longer needed the means of improving Spirit by devouring souls¨Cwith all its defects and problems¨Che could still use it to cultivate the next generation of adepts in the n.

 Chapter 1356 - The Stoney Wilderness

    Chapter 1356 The Stoney Wilderness


    Ailovis, the Stoney Wilderness.


    Located between River Venlo and the Cedrac Mountains was an empty wilderness that measured approximately twenty square kilometers in area.


    For some reason, no trees, vegetation, or grass could be seen here. Instead, there were only boulders and rocks of various shapes and sizes.


    These green, gray, and hard rocks filled the wilderness. There were no signs of any life or nts besides these rocks.


    It was slightly past noon when a small caravan of wagons slowly made their way down the narrow path that had been made through the wilderness. The caravan wasn¡¯trge. There were only three wagons, three of which were carrying food and other goods, and a carriage that belonged to Adept Ragu.


    The caravan turned onto an even smaller road halfway through the wilderness. The road was somewhat bumpy, and the wagons¡¯ wheels were asionally damaged by rocks hidden in the earth. Fortunately, the mercenaries protecting the caravan were experts at surviving in the wild. Repairing and recing a broken wheel was well within their expertise.


    Finally, the caravan stopped near a pile of rocks.


    Jack, the captain of the mercenaries, cautiously approached the ck carriage at the center of the caravan. He knocked on the carriage lightly as he said, ¡°Lord Ragu, we have arrived at the Stoney Wilderness!¡±


    A deep and hoarse man¡¯s voice came from within the carriage.


    ¡°I understand. Wait for me out there.¡±


    Jack respectfully stepped away and waited in silence.


    Seven minutes passed before Adept Ragu finally emerged from the carriage, havingpleted his routine meditation. He stood on the steps as he looked around at this unusual ce around him.


    He sensed the environment¡¯s magic intensity quietly before waving a single hand and drawing a rune in the air. The rune was then allowed to dissipate and vanish slowly.


    All of a sudden, Ragu¡¯s vision was filled with prismatic lights. Several balls of magic light bobbed in the air, each of a different color, ranging from yellow, green, golden, and many others.


    Even without Elementium Sight, it was obvious that yellow was the most dominant color among the lights. The other balls of light had been forced to the edge of the region.


    ¡°As we expected, there is an imbnce of elementium. To think it could let the earth elementium suppress the other elementium to such an extent. The n¡¯s assumptions were correct.


    ¡°It seems like there are indeed some minor spatial rifts here. The earth elementium is unnaturally active. Could it be that the rift here is connected to the Earth Elementium ne?¡± Adept Ragu mumbled to himself as he examined the test results of his spell.


    He was the only person in the caravan that was an adept. The rest of them were all mortals, specially hired to take care of his lifestyle.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Ragu had gotten used to a luxurious lifestyle in an adept tower. The difficulties of traveling around outside presented too many diforts for him. In the past, when Adept Ragu did go out on errands, he would always be apanied by two or three apprentices who could serve and attend him.


    However, the n was facing a shortage of manpower. All adepts and apprentices had been assigned many tasks and were busy traveling all over the Central Lands. Thus, he could only hire mortals and mercenaries to serve him instead.


    The mortals and mercenaries kept a healthy distance away from Ragu. They watched as the tall and scrawny adept dressed in an intricate robe cast his spells, envy and respect in their eyes.


    Adepts were the true rulers of this world that they lived in. Ordinary people like themselves were little more than sniveling bugs before the adepts.


    It was because they understood their position and status perfectly that these human mercenaries behaved so respectfully in front of Adept Ragu. They didn¡¯t even dare to breathe too heavily before him, fearing that their crass and crude behaviors would disturb the adept¡¯s spellcasting.


    After confirming his purpose here, Adept Ragu turned to Jack and said, ¡°Set up camp here! We might need to remain here for two more days.¡± Having said that, Ragu lifted his head and looked at the sky. He then continued, ¡°It¡¯s still early. Have the rest of the people work on the camp. You bring along a few people and follow me to investigate this ce.¡±


    Having said that, he ignored the mercenary captain and activated the ¡®Fly¡¯ spell contained in his belt. He slowly took to the air and flew into the distance.


    ¡°Hurry, hurry, hurry...all youzy bums. Did you not hear Lord Adept¡¯s orders? Hurry up and get off of the wagon and clean up the area. If the camp isn¡¯t done by the time I return, then you can forget about dinner tonight,¡± The muscr captain, with his face full of scars, shouted out before singling out a few individuals, ¡°Tol, Ironhead, One-Eye; the three of you, follow me. Don¡¯t forget your tools! Let¡¯s go.¡±


    The four mercenaries hastily collected their equipment before leaping onto their horses and chasing after the ck dot on the horizon.


    Adept Ragu hovered ten meters above the ground, holding a semi-translucent ck crystal in his hand. He would cast a spell and verify the energy intensity of the wandering elementium particles in the environment after flying out some distance. He was attempting to confirm the exact location of the spatial weakpoint through this information.


    After changing directions four or five times, Adept Ragu finallynded beside a rough pile of rocks. When he pointed the ck crystal ball at the rocks, a strange yellow light appeared in the center of the crystal.


    ¡°It should be here!¡±


    Adept Ragu circled around the rocks one time and confirmed that there was no mistake. A short momentter, Jack and his three mercenaries arrived on horseback, their saddles filled with all sorts of digging tools.


    ¡°Dig...dig through this pile of rocks for me!¡±


    The mercenaries immediately went to work without another word.


    In just fifteen minutes, they had dug a hole into this approximately thirty-meter-wide pile of rocks. A strange ball of light the size of a bean could be seen inside.


    This ball of light wandered slowly in the crevices, asionally letting out strands of yellow mist. These mists were quickly absorbed by the rocks. The rocks close to the light visibly became more crystalline, as if they had been charged with energy.


    ¡°So it was indeed a miniature spatial singrity,¡± Adept Ragu chased the mercenaries away when he saw this. He moved closer and examined the ball of light. He then took out a parchment and started recording something.


    However, while he was busy at work, the pile of rocks suddenly started shaking violently. Even the ground itself seemed to be quaking.


    ¡°Hm? Why is there an earth elementium creature here?¡± Adept Ragu took a few steps backward and looked at the mid-sized earth elemental that had emerged from the ground.


    It was a three-meter-tall humanoid earth elemental. Its body was formed of shattered rocks and pebbles of various shapes and sizes. Find sand flowed slowly between the stones.


    ¡°Who disturbed my slumber? I smell the smell of adepts. Human adept, why have you broke into the home of Barat?¡± The tall earth elemental¡¯s head was formed of a single rock with a chipped edge. The two dim spots of yellow light were its eyes. It had no mouth, but it could converse with Ragu telepathically.


    The sudden appearance of the elemental undoubtedly terrified the four human mercenaries. They cast aside their tools and pulled out their weapons, protecting Adept Ragu.


    ¡°Barat? Your name is Barat? Hehehe, who would¡¯ve thought a sentient earth elemental could have appeared in such a remote ce. It seems like this ce does have some research value, after all!¡± Compared to the anxious mercenaries, Adept Ragu appeared much moreposed.


    After all, this earth elemental was no more than a beginner First Grade when ssified ording to its energy level. It was far from a substantial threat to him!


    ¡°Barat, I hereby dere to you that thend you reside upon belongs to the Crimson n. As a Crimson adept, I possess the authority to banish you back to your elementium world. Speak, would you prefer to kill yourself or hand over your life brand and submit as my servant?¡±


    ¡°No...we earth elementals are always free. I refuse to be bound! We shall fight! Barat will crush you to death.¡±


    Adept Ragu¡¯s deration had clearly infuriated the earth elemental. It roared and rushed toward the mercenaries, raising a wave of earth as it did so.


    Jack and the mercenaries could only meet the elemental inbat, as reluctant as they were.


    The mercenaries were out of their league. The earth elemental had no weaknesses and was iparably strong. In just a single blow, the wooden shields of the mercenaries had been shattered to pieces. The mercenaries could only dodge the rocks hurled toward them while circling around the elemental. However, none of them dared to get too close.


    Aware that these mercenaries were no match for the earth elemental, Adept Ragu took out a silver insignia. He waved it, and a three-meter-tall magical machine appeared.


    The machine whirred as it raised its arms and unleashed a volley of energy fireballs from its cannons.


    Rocks scattered everywhere, and dust rose into the air.


    The magical machine instantly ground the earth elemental that had been wreaking havoc earlier into dust. The elemental turned into an ordinary pile of rocks and scattered to the ground.


    The seemingly scrawny Adept Ragu made his way across the rocks, digging through them until he found a fist-sized stone within. The stone glowed with an earth-yellow light. He sealed the stone with some simple spells and put it away.


    It seemed like the spatial singrity here had existed for quite a while, such that a First Grade earth elemental had actually been born. With this earth elementium core in his possession, he could refine it slightly and turn it into a Rock Mark. It was a fine idea to summon an earth elemental as a servant every so often.


    It was important to note that a First Grade Rock Mark like this could easily sell for eighty magical crystals. It wasn¡¯t a lot, but it was still money!


    Adept Ragu never expected to make an unexpected catch like this while out on a n mission. A satisfied smile appeared on his face.

 Chapter 1357 - Clan Assignment

    Chapter 1357 n Assignment


    Night quickly fell.


    The campfire had been lit in the middle of that temporary camp. The thick smell of stew lingered in the air of the Stoney Wilderness.


    Because of the earth elementium core from that afternoon, Adept Ragu was in an exceptional mood. He had a rare smile on his thin and yellow face.


    The rugged-looking Jack put on as big of a smile when he passed the stew and a soft loaf of bread to Adept Rage, as he asked a question.


    ¡°...my lord, my little kid Tom has always been a smart kid. He¡¯s always been able to pick up anything he¡¯s taught. Unfortunately, he¡¯s never been able to meet a teacher willing to teach him. That is why...I was hoping......¡±


    ¡°Every child under ten will have their talents examined by someone from the ns. Does your child not have a talent for magic?¡±


    ¡°No...of course he does. But...ording to the adept that tested his talent, our little Tom has recessive talent. He needs to activate his talent before he reaches ten, or that talent will be lost forever.¡±


    ¡°Recessive talent,¡± Adept Rage couldn¡¯t help but shake his head.


    Every ten years, adepts would travel all over to search for children with magic talent. They would then be gathered together and sent to adept towers for further training. However, the situation in Zhentarim was a bit different. Every n had its own territory and civilians. Typically, you wouldn¡¯t be allowed to recruit apprentices from ns other than your own.


    That was why adept ns and organizations without their own private territory would lose the chance to gain fresh blood. If such a situation was allowed to persist, it was only natural if their legacy was cut short!


    While these messengers were traveling all over searching for apprentices with magical talent, they would unavoidablye across individuals with recessive talent. These individuals¡¯ magical talent was sealed away the moment they were born. If this recessive talent wasn¡¯t activated through special means before they were ten years old, then their talent would assimte with their bloodline and be forever inessible.


    Adept ns without sufficient power and resources would often give up on these individuals with recessive talent. They refused to invest any resources in them. The reason was simple. The Awakening Potion required to activate such recessive talents was worth a hundred and twenty magical crystals, while an apprentice with awakened talent was not any stronger than an ordinary apprentice.


    If the awakened apprentice could not advance to be an adept, then the n would take a loss.


    Not many adepts were willing to spend a hundred and twenty magical crystals to bet on an apprentice with unknown talents. That was the fundamental reason they were cast aside!


    Without the investment of a n, an ordinary family had no means of paying the massive price of one hundred and twenty magical crystals.


    It was important to note that magical crystals were the hard currency of the World of Adepts. The adepts entirely monopolized them. Without an adept connection, an ordinary family could not purchase any magical crystals regardless of how much gold they had.


    After all, all adepts traded in magical crystals and never epted gold coins.


    ¡°Have you managed to umte enough magical crystals for an Awakening Potion? If you have enough, I can help you purchase a vial!¡±


    ¡°I should have enough by next year. I heard they are recruiting adventurers to go exploring in the ck Forest over at Dagon. They will be paying ten magical crystals for each mission. I want to try my luck there.¡±


    A mysterious and faint smile appeared on Adept Ragu¡¯s face when he heard what Jack had said.


    ¡°On ount of how well you have served me these past few days, a word of warning. Do not go to Dagon, no matter what. Do not leave Ailovis regardless of how generous the remuneration promised. Perhaps one day in the future, you will find that the only safe ce in the world is Ailovis.¡±


    Adept Ragu stopped speaking entirely after that.


    The matter of the magic surge was limited to the adepts only, after all. All adepts had signed non-disclosure agreements with their ns and would never reveal the truth to the mortals. That was why this simple warning was the best Ragu could do for the mercenary captain.


    If Jack insisted on leaving Ailovis for Dagon, he and his family just might be caught in the danger when the magic surge erupted.


    Meanwhile, Ailovis was the headquarters of the Crimson n and home to Horton Magic Academy. The n¡¯s tremendous power would keep this ce safe. Regardless of how ferocious the magic surge would be, Ailovis would remain the safest and most peaceful ce in the Central Lands.


    Without any doubt.


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    Greem sat calmly on his red throne, listening to Meryl and Emelia¡¯s report through the magical mirror.


    ¡°...with all these years of hard work, one hundred and fifty square kilometers of living space have been opened up in the ck Forest of White Tower. Doverand City also stands in front of the ck Forest. The magical creatures will not be able to make it past.


    ¡°Doverand City currently has a poption of twenty thousand, with over a hundred active mercenary groups. A twelve-man adept party is also stationed there. I n to construct another medium tower in Doverand City soon to ensure that our efforts in the past two hundred years won¡¯t be washed away by the magic surge.


    ¡°I have enough workforce here to deal with any contingencies, but I stillck one high-grade adept...especially since the adept tower that will be built at Doverand City will have to be manned by a high-grade adept. I can only count on Teacher for this.¡±


    Greem appeared calm andposed after hearing Meryl¡¯s report. He tapped the ceramic cup in his hand, watching as ripples spread across the surface of the liquid. The fragrant steam of the tea rose into the air.


    ¡°I know you want me to send Billis over. However, the situation in the Central Lands does not allow for that. He has to remain here,¡± Greem lifted a hand to stop Meryl from saying anything more. ¡°You do still need help, so I will be sending Iritina and her green dragon flight over. You shouldn¡¯t need to worry about manpower on your side now!¡±


    ¡°Yes, my lord!¡± Meryl¡¯s face blossomed into a smile when she heard that it was Emerald Dragon Iritina and her green dragons that wereing. All these years of acquaintance had made her and Iritina rather close friends.


    Moreover, the bloodline of dragons flowed through their veins. That sense of intimacy that came from the depths of their souls was irreceable by any bonds!


    Now that Meryl had finished, it was Emelia¡¯s turn to speak on the matters of Ailovis and Crimson Wing.


    ¡°Lord n leader, with all these years of expansion, the ck Forest to the east of Fire Throne has fallen under the n¡¯s control. Medusa Dana has gathered a rtively strong army on her side, helping the n maintain order and authority over the surroundingnds.


    ¡°However, we stillck a firm foothold there. Currently, our scouts have reported three locations appropriate for an outpost¨C Eaglehead Mountain, Splinter Valley, and Spider Forest. I intend to construct a small city at Splinter Valley to serve as a forward outpost. When the magic surge erupts, we can send two Motherships and Golem Dragon One over as guards. They will not have much trouble dealing with the stampede there.


    ¡°With regards to the matter of potential spatial rifts within our territory, I have mobilized all Crimson adepts and apprentices to scour Ailovis, marking out and sealing every spatial singrity and rift theye across.


    ¡°We are sealing the spatial weaknesses that are less of a threat. As for those that run the risk of turning into spatial rifts, we will construct war towers in ordance with their danger levels. With these policies in ce, I believe that the threat of the magic surge to Crimson territories will be at its minimum.¡±


    Greem listened quietly. After confirming that there were no ws in the arrangement, he turned and looked at Snox, who was standing in a screen in a corner.


    Snox immediately jumped up in excitement and started speaking when he saw it was his turn.


    ¡°My lord, the new Golem Dragon Two will be avable forbat very soon. What do you think......¡±


    Greem finally smiled when he heard this news.


    ¡°And the Motherships? The n only has ten Motherships at the moment. It¡¯s not quite sufficient for our purposes any longer. I hope to have twenty Motherships before the magic surge. That should be no problem, am I right?¡±


    ¡°Twenty Motherships?¡± The gleeful Snox immediately mped up. He gulped as he said, ¡°My lord, you should know that the ore reserves of the Goblin ne are running dry after all these years of excavation. Even if I mobilized all the goblin engineers and worked without stop, we can¡¯t do it without enough magical alloys!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t you worry about the magical alloys,¡± Greem immediately replied, ¡°I found a whole mountain of metals in space. All you have to do is send goblin engineers over to build a smelting factory and refine all the ores you mine there.¡±


    ¡°In space,¡± Snox felt his legs twitch at the mere mention of that terrifying ce. Space was and of death. Even a Second Grade could not survive easily in space, let alone goblin engineers, with theirck of power and means to protect themselves.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. I have got everything arranged over there. Gazlowe will be responsible for the safety of the goblins sent there. They just have to focus on their work!¡± Having said that, Greem turned to a different topic, ¡°Moreover, I don¡¯t intend to mobilize all ten of the newly constructed Motherships. Leave half of them in the Goblin ne to protect your world.¡±


    ¡°The Goblin ne was a low-magic ne, to begin with. Even if you had portals leading directly to the Goblin ne, there wouldn¡¯t be too many opponents willing to go there. Five Motherships and three thousand of the newest models of magical machines, as well as Golem Dragon Two. That should be enough military force to protect the entire Goblin ne!¡±


    ¡°Yessir, understood, very well. I thank my lord¡¯s care and generosity in the ce of all goblins!¡± Snox and the other goblin leaders standing behind him in the magical mirror smiled in relief.


    ¡°However, I will need the goblin machinist-sorcerers waiting in Ailovis as a mobile force. The Central Lands are far too big, after all. Any gap in our security could result in a disaster. That is why I need a sufficiently powerful and mobile response squad!¡± Greem gave out new instructions after handing out the carrot.


    Snox and the other goblin leaders acknowledged his orders and gave no objections.


    The magic surge was right at hand. If the Goblin ne tried anything funny during this time, the Crimson n would be in a difficult position. That was why Greem had to take measures to keep the goblins in check, even if he really trusted Snox and Gonga.


    This three-thousand strong army of goblin machinist-sorcerers was the essence of the Goblin ne, umted over the years. It contained almost all the goblins who had any talent forbat.


    If anyone among the goblin leaders wanted to break free of the Crimson n¡¯s rule, they would have to consider the three thousand goblins held ¡®hostage¡¯ in Greem¡¯s hands.


    The Goblin ne could not bear to shoulder such losses!

 Chapter 1358 - The Magic Surge Begins

    <h4>Chapter 1358 The Magic Surge Begins</h4>


    The day the magic surge erupted was like a button being pressed. The giant machine filled with rusted parts that was the Central Lands started to creak and run.


    One had to admit that the Central Lands were indeed the most popted and wealthiest region ofnd in the World of Adepts.


    The Central Lands had remained divided and fragmented for tens of thousands of years. Despite its history, the Central Lands¡¯ natural geographical boons allowed it to shine with brimming energy and life when it finally gained a heart upon which their powers could be concentrated. The vigor demonstrated by the Central Lands in these past few years had shocked everyone familiar with them.


    The Association adepts that had been stirring trouble in the Central Lands hastily retreated back east. A long and challenging process of fortifying Inkdeep Valley began.


    If the mega-rift in the Central Lands was a prettydy, then the rift sealed in the depths of Inkdeep Valley was a mammoth.


    The size of the two rifts was not even on the same scale. The rift in Inkdeep Valley was a tremendous pain for the Association adepts.


    The Association adepts responsible for constructing towers in Inkdeep Valley were extremely close to just killing themselves!


    Their task was to stuff more than five high-grade adept towers in that narrownd measuring no more than fifty square kilometers while ensuring that the buildings would not interfere with each others¡¯ elementium altars. This unreasonable request was practically an insoluble problem. The Association adept in charge of the fortification had almost gone mad over the whole affair.


    It was important to note that the most crucialponent of any adept tower was the elementium altar hidden deep within. Due to an elementium altar continually drawing magical energy from the Elementium nes and space, adept towers could receive an endless supply of elementium.


    Common sense in the construction of adept towers dictated that two different elementium altars had to be at least fifty kilometers apart. Otherwise, the elementium interference from their activity would cause unpredictable energy resonance and affect the stability of the space around them.


    If that happened when the five towers in Inkdeep Valley were operating simultaneously, the spatial turbulence created would be enough to wipe them out before the enemy arrived.


    If they didn¡¯t construct multiple adept towers, they would have to rely on a single tower supporting all the adepts when the magic surge descended on them. Support from a single adept tower was far from sufficient when the adepts would face fearsome starbeasts- tough, resilient, and possessing tremendous offense and magic resistance.


    The Adept Association had no other choice but to seek a different path to achieve their desired results. They built an energy-conversion pool somewhere underground, outside of Inkdeep Valley. It was foreign technology from the Arcane Empire, and they were using it to supply the towers on the frontlines with power.


    It indeed allowed more towers to be constructed and operated without interfering with each other.


    However, in doing so, they had also created a critical weakness in their defense.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what would happen when the magic surge finally cracked the spatial rift wide open. When hordes of starbeasts and otherworldly monsters swarmed through the opening, it would be a true trial of the adepts¡¯ courage!


    If anything were to happen to the energy-conversion pool during the invasion......


    In all honesty, the Association higher-ups didn¡¯t even dare imagine the scene of that happening.


    Even the dominant Adept¡¯s Association had to deal with the magic surge cautiously and fearfully. It was only natural that the other two major organizations were equally on edge.


    Unexpectedly, the entire World of Adepts entered a period of unprecedented peace and quiet.


    Every adept organization was trying their best to build up their defenses and strengthen their forces, like ants trying to put their nest together before the storm arrived. The adepts kept their lips tight, but their cautious behavior and constant construction of adept towers still caught the attention of mortals and caused quite amotion.


    Time flew by quickly.


    Eight years were gone in the blink of an eye. Just as the adepts¡¯ preparation work wasing to an end, news of theing magic surge started to spread throughout the mortal world.


    The individuals who had spread the news out to themon people were a group of madmen.


    Indeed, just as the magic surge was about to arrive, a group of insane individuals appeared all over the world, in various major towns and cities. Some of them called themselves prophets, others imed to have seen dreams of warning from the Great Consciousness, but all of them ran about dering the end of times.


    Initially, the rulers and nobles of human kingdoms regarded these madmen with scorn and disdain, simply throwing them into prisons and ignoring their words. Strangely enough, the more of these madmen they executed or imprisoned, the more madmen would appear the next day.


    Soon, even these rulers of human kingdoms couldn¡¯t help but be doubtful and anxious.


    Given their political expertise and abilities, they quickly sensed that something was wrong. After all, when they secretly asked their adept acquaintances about these incidents, the answers they got back were vague and uncertain.


    Compared to the adepts, the mortals had absolutely no written memory of the magic surge after all these years. Any legend or information about a magic surge had been wiped out from humanmunities by the adepts. Consequently, the mortals had no idea how to respond to the impending cmity.


    There were no fools amongst those who ruled over entire kingdoms, even if they were not adepts themselves. The moment they smelled danger, they began a different sort of ¡®escape¡¯ for themselves.


    No one knew where would be safe and which ces could turn into a horrifying battlefield the next second. However, you could never go wrong with counting on the powerful. As such, the nobles started to send their most excellent or direct descendants to towers guarded by adepts.


    In their hearts, adept towers represented absolute power. They were the final fortresses that would never fall!


    The n could be snubbed, theirnd could be lost, but as long as the towers remained standing, hope would remain.


    Thest two years passed by in a sh.


    ..................


    Northern Lands, the Tower of Fate.


    Two witches sat silently in the center of the astrology hall. Their heads lifted as they examined the dark night sky above them.


    There, in the depths of space, waves of energy rippled throughout the universe, washing across the stars. The stars were blinking, zing with all they had, radiating light thousands of times their usual brightness. The entire night sky was illuminated.


    The light from these stars tussled with each other as if a never-before-seen war was unfolding in space.


    Bit by bit, these stars exhausted their starlight and finally turned dim once again. Some of the stars even wobbled and crashed, cutting across the night sky and vanishing into the darkness.


    For a moment, the beautiful and unchanging sky full of stars seemed to be filled with a dramatic and tragic brilliance!


    ¡°The magic surge has begun!¡±


    Alice looked up at the night sky, her ivory-smooth skin appearing even more charming under the illumination of the starlight. Her starry blue eyes reflected the stars as they moved across the sky.


    Even though she had already expected this scene, Alice still couldn¡¯t help but sigh as she saw the darkest shadow in the sky grow and slowly devour the rest of the night sky.


    ¡°Teacher,¡± The beautiful Lucia, who appeared only sixteen or seventeen, betrayed an expression of confusion and doubt as she stood silently behind Alice. After a moment of hesitation, she finally asked, ¡°Does the eruption of this magic surge have anything to do with the Arcane Empire?¡±


    Having studied under Alice¡¯s tutge for so long, Lucia had be a Second Grade astrologist and a First Grade arcanist. Naturally, she was able to pick up on something through the violent changes of starlight in the sky.


    ¡°If you have already sensed something, then you should not ask me. You should seek all the answers you want by yourself! Remember, as an astrologist that has offered your life to Fate, Fate will always be with you. All you have to do is open up your heart and truly embrace it!¡±


    Having said that, Alice turned around and looked quietly at Lucia. She then sighed with a loving expression on her face, ¡°Are you still unwilling to offer yourself to Fate?¡±


    ¡°My life and soul belong to the arcane arts! I will never offer myself to anything other than the arcane,¡± Lucia was still as insistent as ever.


    Alice sighed and said, ¡°If you ept Fate, then Fate will be your weapon, your life, your everything! But if you reject Fate, it will be your greatest burden! Think carefully before you make your decision.¡±


    Lucia smiled brightly as she replied, ¡°I already decided, from the moment I was brought back to life. My everything belongs to the arcane arts. They cannot be offered to anything else!¡±


    Alice sighed again. She no longer fussed over the issue, but instead turned to gaze into the night again. Right now, countless other powerful individuals in countless other worlds were staring into the same sky.


    Perhaps they were all feeling the same emotions that she was!


    ............


    The Silver Union.


    A crisp and drawn-out bell ringing could be heard echoing over the Castle in the Sky.


    Countless Union adepts in silver robes rushed out of their homes and theirbs, taking up the balconies as they gazed at the zing night sky. They all chanted those two fearsome words in their minds silently.


    Magic surge.


    After ten years of preparation and waiting, the magic surge they had been expecting had finally urred!


    The looming Obelisk, whose base was buried in therge za and whose tip disappeared into a mysterious spatial vortex, suddenly glowed brightly.


    Row upon row of profound and mysterious runes carved on the Obelisk lit up sequentially, turning into pretty ribbons of light that hovered above the za.


    This ce was a restricted area in the Silver Union. Even the Fourth Grade senate members were not allowed to set foot here without permission.


    However, just as the magic surge erupted and the Obelisk glowed in response, two portals appeared in the za. Two elderly adepts wearing wizard hats and tattered robes appeared, leaning on their magical staffs as they walked out.


    They saw each other when they stepped through their portals.


    The elderly adept on the left was the first to hold his hand over his chest and speak, ¡°Wee back...Lord Dous!¡±


    The adept being greeted took a look at his acquaintance¡¯s white hair and old-fashioned sses. He couldn¡¯t help but shake his head, ¡°I knew you would be here. You, who rules over the Diviners¡¯ Tower, would most certainly appear given the scale of what is to happen. Tell me, why have you stopped me here?¡±

 Chapter 1359 - The First Wave

    <h4>Chapter 1359 The First Wave</h4>


    The master of the Diviners¡¯ Tower lifted his head calmly and said, ¡°I humbly request that my lord turn back and refrain from interfering with the affairs in the World of Adepts this time.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re chasing me away just as soon as I returned to the World of Adepts?¡± Dous opened his eyes wide in fury.


    ¡°Not chasing you away, but requesting you leave! As old friends, I do not wish to see you embroiled in the vortex of Fate once again. So, please, give up. Go back to space and let them settle the matter of the Central Lands on their own.¡±


    ¡°You...did you see something?¡± Dous asked solemnly.


    The elderly tower master shook his head silently but said nothing. He then turned and walked back into the portal he hade from.


    Dous could see, very clearly, several deep wrinkles crawl across his old friend¡¯s forehead with what few words he had just said. Even his back seemed more hunched over when he turned around.


    Fate bacsh.


    His old friend had suffered such severe Fate bacsh with just those few words. The implication behind this caused even Dous, the clone of a Sixth Grade adept, to tremble in fear.


    Perhaps he truly shouldn¡¯t have returned this time!


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    Like all adepts, Greem was standing silently in the hall, sensing the tremors in space with the tower¡¯s aid.


    The magical tides had just erupted, and the waves had yet to reach the World of Adepts. Consequently, nothing unusual had urred yet. However, this peace will notst too long. The instant the tide washed over the World of Adepts, everything would change.


    The world would eliminate those who could not adjust to the changes!


    There were undoubtedly countless adepts like himself at this moment, observing every change in the depths of space as they waited silently for the expected cmity to arrive.


    Greem was almost overwhelmed with emotion at what was toe. His body trembled slightly, and he almost fell.


    Greem lifted his head and looked around him.


    The tower wasn¡¯t shaking, nor was the ground.


    What had trembled earlier wasn¡¯t the outside world, but his mind.


    When his spiritual consciousness melded with the formless fire principles that existed everywhere in the world around him, the tremors and ripplesing from the World of Adepts¡¯ power system became even more apparent.


    The first wave of the magical tides had swept over the World of Adepts.


    An overwhelming torrent of magical energy was surging out of the depths of empty space, roaring as it charged forward and knocked the material nes around as they hovered within their nar barriers.


    Due to the protection of the nar barriers, the magic tides could not seep into the nar worlds. However, as each wave of violent energy washed against the barriers and eroded them, cracks started to appear.


    If a nar barrier was the size of a watermelon, then these cracks were as fine as a hair. They didn¡¯t look significant at all, but strands of space energy could seep into the nar world through these cracks, creating horrifying energy storms within.


    The skies of the World of Adepts abruptly turned crimson.


    It was almost as if a red-hot poker had been stabbed through the sky, poking a massive hole in the world and causing seas of fire and wild energy storms to appear on the horizon.


    A strange cracking sound could be heard throughout the world. The clouds were stained red and rumbled restlessly, as if they were boiling in a cauldron.


    Countless forest beasts and critters emerged from theirirs, disturbed and nervous. They looked at the zing horizon and the slowly expanding shadow in the sky in silence.


    Finally, a spot in the sky caved to the pressure of the tides. There was a loud tearing sound as a spatial rift measuring several dozens of meters were torn open. Just like that, spacestorms from the realms beyond rushed into the World of Adepts.


    The formless spacestorms blew across thend and over several towering mountains. Like a rotting cake, the green quickly faded from these mountains before the rocks themselves were gradually worn down. The soft dirt and everything above it was shredded to unrecognizable pieces, blown away into the distance.


    The greenery of the earth vanished quickly.


    nts, trees, bushes, moss, grass, and the tens of thousands of beasts, birds, and insects that lived on thisnd disappeared instantly without a trace.


    It was almost as if somebody was running an invisible razor over the earth, again and again.


    The animals and nts disappeared, the dirt disappeared, the sand and pebbles disappeared. Soon, the mountain¡¯s very base was exposed and giving off sparks before the devastation of the spacestorm.


    The World of Adepts was one of thergest nar worlds in the universe. The strength of its nar barrier was naturally far superior to the average ne. Thus, most of these spatial rifts were closed in just a few seconds, preventing further corrosion from the magical tides.


    However, just these few seconds of corrosion had brought about a terrifying cmity to the world¡¯s interior.


    The nar barrier stood firm, resisting the erosion of the magical tides. The first half of the tide washed over soon. The rest of the wave continued to surge forward endlessly, but it could not inflict any further damage to the nar barrier.


    However, all the past weaknesses and spatial rifts in the nar barrier were now open due to the magical tide¡¯s surging.


    ............


    The Central Lands, the Ahlden mega-rift.


    The dark shadow in the sky continued to twist and struggle, now measuring an entire kilometer in length.


    Three adept towers were spread across thend, massive pirs of light glowing from their tops, forcibly containing the spread of the dark shadow.


    Numerous war towers around the adept towers glowed with magical light. Together, they erected a massive barrier that protected the entire ce.


    The light pirs of the adept towers were battling against the dark shadow.


    Finally, as the magical tides washed over and over, the dark shadow tore wide open, transforming into a crimson rift. A spacestorm of horrifying intensity blew into the World of Adepts.


    The spacestorm instantly surrounded the Ahlden n¡¯s fortified stronghold. Fortunately, the area protected by the barrier held firm and remained undamaged, but the ground past the barrier¡¯s reach was shaved away at a visible pace.


    Sparks flew off of the energy barrier, and mes burned everywhere.


    Ahlden n adepts were running around and shouting inside the towers. They shut off one auxiliary defensive array after another, redirecting all the magic energy to the barrier.


    With the three adept towers clinging on with all their might, the Ahlden n¡¯s fortified stronghold was able to survive the first wave of the magical tides!


    When the barrier finally stabilized under the intensity of the spacestorms, the adepts exhaled in relief. Passionate cheering rang out all over the towers.


    Andrew, whose hands were gripped tight in anxiety, let out a long breath of relief.


    He calmed himself down and rubbed the snake-eye ring on his right little finger. He then spoke in a solemn voice, ¡°We have survived the first wave of the magical tides. All n members are to remain at their stations until further notice. Furthermore, I¡ª¡±


    Andrew had not managed to finish his sentence. He stopped abruptly.


    His eyes opened wide as he stared at the screen of light in front of him. A strange creature resembling a swordfish had appeared on the screen, having entered the World of Adepts alongside the spacestorm.


    The spacestorm that could shred and tear most substances to pieces was utterly harmless to the creature. It shook its ck, shiny body and quickly weaved through the sky, propelled by the spacestorms.


    Given its fearsome speed, most spells wouldn¡¯t even be able to catch up to it!


    ¡°Starbeast...it¡¯s a starbeast! Prepare to attack immediately!¡±


    Andrew immediately shouted out loud.


    As he shouted furiously, the three adept towers simultaneously glowed brilliantly. Bolts of magical lightning cut across the sky and sted the fish-shaped starbeast.


    However, what happened next stunned them to their very core.


    The countless bolts of lightning that appeared as if they could tear the world asunder were wholly absorbed by the starbeast, then concentrated into a single golden lightning bolt which it fired at the barrier.


    It was fighting alone against three powerful adept towers, yet the lightning bolt was able to cause the barrier to shudder. If it weren¡¯t for the three towers all sharing some of the damage between them, the barrier would have been pierced with a single strike, creating a passage for the starbeast to enter.


    Andrew could not help but frown deeply.


    He could clearly sense that this was no more than a beginner Fourth Grade starbeast.


    However, the starbeast was actually able to square off against three adept towers through its powerful racial ability. That...was clearly beyond the limits of Andrew¡¯s imagination!


    ¡°Use elementium magic of another attribute!¡± Andrew immediately gave a new order.


    Since lightning magic had not been able to harm it in the slightest, perhaps something else would. He didn¡¯t believe that this beginner Fourth Grade starbeast could be utterly immune to all elementium attributes.


    The next second, a crimson torrent of mes engulfed the starbeast.


    However, just likest time, the starbeast stood still and absorbed all the mes before opening its maw and firing a golden fireball.


    ¡°Next one!¡±


    ¡°Keep switching the attacks.¡±


    ¡°Continue.¡±


    Andrew felt his head buzz. This starbeast that had broken into the World of Adepts by ident was actually immune to all elementium magic. Not only was it immune, but it was fully capable of absorbing the elementium and retaliating with the elementium energy.


    Long-ranged spells were clearly not the best way to fight against a starbeast like this!


    While Andrew hesitated on what to do next, a seductive voice rang in his mind. ¡°Have the towers stop for the moment! This starbeast is quite interesting. I will go and y with it.¡±.

 Chapter 1360 - Fighting Fish

    <h4>Chapter 1360 - Fighting Fish</h4>


    Mary attracted the starbeast¡¯s attention the moment she appeared.


    As Fourth Grade creatures, both had an extraordinary sense for the aura of threat radiating from each other. However, starbeasts were predators that roamed the depths of space; nar creatures were no more than prey in their eyes.


    The only question was how powerful the prey was and how difficult the hunt would be!


    That was why the starbeastunched a ferocious attack at Mary the moment it sensed her presence.


    The starbeast was ten-meters long, its body long and narrow. It had sharp fins near its mouth, along its back, and on both sides of its body; it resembled a deep-sea ribbonfish. However, it was far more vicious, ferocious, and ugly in appearance.


    The most powerful trait of this starbeast was its ability to devour magic.


    Its seemingly ordinary and smooth ck body possessed an unusual energy forcefield. The forcefield could disrupt any spell structure, reverting it into chaotic, unsequenced magic energy. It could then devour this magical energy and convert it into its own power to attack the enemy.


    Just this one ability alone made it a natural predator of all elementium adepts!


    However, it was a mistake to believe it was weak at meleebat simply because of its ability to devour magic. Its long and pointed snout, as well as its smooth and sharp fins, were lethal, anti-magic weapons when propelled by its tremendous speed. This starbeast was far more powerful than an ordinary nar creature, even in meleebat.


    This fish-like starbeast had excellent speed and anti-magic capabilities. Meanwhile, Mary was known for her Agility. When these two opponents that both relied heavily on their speed shed, it made for a fight that you could not see.


    In every sense of the phrase, it was literally a fight you could not see!


    The fish and the adept were like two flickering phantoms chasing each other through the sky, only leaving faint afterimages behind them. The two of them chased andshed at each other, using everything within their means to tear a piece of flesh off of each other. The ferocity of the battle could match any war you had ever witnessed.


    Human adepts primarily relied on magical weapons, tools, scrolls, potions, and wands in battle. Even though the adepts could cast powerful elementium spells with their power, opponents of the same grade would typically give them no time to chant and cast their spells.


    That was why Mary abandoned all means of attack that required casting. She only used simple and fast physical attacks. Her magical abilities manifested Stinger¡¯s three enchanted effects¨C Rend, Bleed, and Sharpness.


    As expected of a blood adept, Mary built all her offensive strategies around inflicting wounds to the enemy. As long as the enemy was wounded and bleeding, she would be able to be stronger and stronger through battle.


    In the end, her opponent would realize, to their horror, that they were basically fighting against their own blood. No matter how they attacked and injured Mary, they would only be exhausting their life force.


    It was the might of the adepts and what made them such formidable opponents!


    The starbeast also only realized this fact after a while.


    Its primary ability was the ability to devour magic, after all. Its exceptional speed was only rtive to other creatures. Against an assassin blood adept like Mary whose trade was Agility, its speed was utterly unimpressive.


    It was only slightly inferior in speed, but that made all the difference!


    The starbeast was already insanely fast, but it was still just a little bit slower than Mary. This tiny difference in speed was enough for Mary to run circles around the starbeast, toying with it as if it was no more than a ything in her palm.


    After five minutes of fighting, Mary remained untouched, while three deep gashes had appeared on the starbeast¡¯s body; the injuries were deep enough to see its bones. The starbeast¡¯s unusual skin might have the ability to deconstruct spells and devour magic, but itcked in physical defense.


    The starbeast flew into a rage, seeing as it could not catch up to Mary and had been injured. It could clearly sense traces of blood energy dissipating from its wounds as its life force slowly drained away.


    Meanwhile, blood energy was surging around its opponent. It seemed like she was slowly leeching away at its life force through its wounds.


    The starbeast wasn¡¯t a fool. It instantly changed tactics upon realizing the situation.


    With a flick of its long tail, it distanced itself from Mary¡¯s crimson form. Once it was a sufficient distance away, it opened its mouth, and a pungent ck arrow of poison shot toward Mary.


    If I can¡¯t beat you in closebat, then I won¡¯t!


    The starbeast seemed to be able to function as half a caster after distancing itself from Mary.


    At the very least, its poison arrows possessed many magical attributes, including corrosion and lethal toxicity. Ordinary nar creatures would easily sumb to these attacks.


    ¡°Hmph! If you¡¯re ying for real, then I suppose it¡¯s only fair I show you my true power!¡± Mary chuckled and turned into a bolt of red lightning, dodging the poison arrow and lunging at the starbeast.


    The starbeast did not attempt to flee or dodge at the sight of this. It simply coiled around itself, protecting its body with its fins and tail as it fired another poison arrow at Mary.


    ¡°Kerslin, suppress its Spirit for me!¡±


    ¡°Yes, mydy!¡±


    Mary and Kerslin maintained the most intimate of mental connections through a hidden frequency. The instant the starbeast decided to go on the defensive and attempt a counter-attack, Mary gave her first order to Kerslin.


    The next second, a sinister spiritual fluctuation surrounded the starbeast. Two tremendously powerful spiritual consciousness tugged at each other. Kerslin was trying to drag the starbeast¡¯s consciousness into his Nightmare Domain. Naturally, the starbeast struggled with all it had, attempting to break free of the spiritual suppression.


    A victor was instantly decided. Kerslin was defeated, and the starbeast had won. However, the starbeast¡¯s Spirit still stalled for a moment, causing a slight dy in its movements.


    This tiny dy was more than enough time for Mary!


    The blood energy in her body was raised to its limits. Her body, which had still been visible as multiple afterimages, turned into a single crimson thread that shot straight through the starbeast¡¯s body.


    Its defense was unsessful!


    A strange cry resembling that of a cow echoed throughout the battlefield. A massive hole abruptly appeared in the starbeast¡¯s body as its blood sttered outward like a fountain.


    A massive, gaping hole had been carved in the center of its ten-meter-long body. ck blood rained down on the ground along with bits of flesh here and there.


    Despite having sustained such terrible injuries, the Fourth Grade starbeast wasn¡¯t dead yet. It endured the pain and fled into the distance.


    Judging by how fast it was flying through the air, its speed had hardly been affected by its wound.


    Thunderous cheers erupted from the adept towers below.


    ¡°Escape? You wish,¡± This was the first time Mary was fighting in the magic surge. She could not ept it if she did not return with spoils in hand. She unfurled her wings and prepared to give pursuit.


    However, the next moment, Adept Andrew appeared in front of her silently, standing in her way.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be in such a hurry, Lady Mary!¡±


    ¡°Move, or I will look for you when the prey has escaped!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Lady Mary. I have already mobilized the Winged Dragon Force,¡± Andrew smiled, but his eyes betrayed fear and respect. ¡°The starbeast has been heavily injured. The Winged Dragon will suffice in finishing it. The defense of the mega-rift is critical and rests upon you. Leave it to us to hunt down the prey! Don¡¯t worry. I assure you that the head of the prey will be presented to you before the end of the day.¡±


    As if on cue, a dozen ck dots rose from a tower in the distance. They roared as they chased in the direction of the starbeast.


    These were mixed-blood Third Grade winged dragons with Third Grade adepts as their riders. They were quite a formidable force.


    ¡°Hmph! Remember to send the prey to my castle when you¡¯ve caught it. Its ability to devour magic is quite unusual. I will have to do some proper research on it!¡± After reasserting her dominance, Mary put away her wings and dashed out of the sky in a crimson sh, disappearing into a strange tower protected by the numerous war towers.


    Andrew stood silently in the sky after watching Mary leave.


    The mega-rift above him was still swirling restlessly, unleashing waves of spacestorms every so often. An ordinary person would have been reduced to dust in less than three seconds here.


    Even an adept would have to erect multiple elementium shields around themselves if they wanted to move freely across a battlefield like this.


    Only high-grade adepts like Mary or himself could keep the spacestorm at bay through their life forcefields and have unimpeded movement.


    Meanwhile, starbeasts were like fish in water in this harsh environment that most would consider and of death. Not only did they feel no pressure from the spacestorms, but they could also draw on the ebb and flow of the tide and use them as weapons.


    High-grade adepts only tolerated the environment, while starbeasts thrived in it.


    This slight distinction magnified the difference in power between the adepts and the starbeasts!


    Andrew was a bloodline adept. He could transform into a giant lizard with tremendous defensive ability, a strong jaw, and a fearsome petrification ability.


    While he would have an easy time repelling the starbeast, it was nearly impossible for him to stop it from escaping. If the starbeast were slightly craftier and had fought a gueri battle against Andrew, he would have been forced to leave the radius of the tower¡¯s support. His chances of victory would have plummeted even further.


    A starbeast like that, capable of rivaling his own power, had been severely injured at Mary¡¯s hands. Moreover, it seemed like Mary had not been fighting with all her strength. It made him even warier.


    Andrew knew that many factors, including innate talent and magical equipment, could create a gap in power between adepts of the same grade. Still, to watch an extremely young adept grow to a level where even he could only look up to¡­¡­


    It made Andrew incredibly dejected and emotional as an adept that had lived for seven hundred long years.

 Chapter 1361 - The Fire Crows and the Ironstone Wilderness

    <h4>Chapter 1361 The Fire Crows and the Ironstone Wilderness</h4>


    The arrival of the magic surge was a difficult trial for all nar worlds!


    Given the scale of the World of Adepts and the power of its inhabitants, no intruder or monster could shake this colossal civilization.


    However, just because the safety of the adept civilization was guaranteed didn¡¯t mean that every single n and organization that made up this civilization would go unharmed. Quite the contrary- in this time of turbulence and chaos, any organization could easily face devastating losses if they made even a small mistake. Their advantage and position that they had built up over the years would be lost to the wind in the blink of an eye.


    This fact...was the fundamental reason all adepts were so cautious and wary of the magic surge.


    Even a world as powerful as the World of Adepts had to be cautious when dealing with the magic surge, let alone smaller nar worlds that were inferior to the World of Adepts.


    When the magic surge arrived, and the nar barriers could no longer protect the worlds within, the natives would have to face the onught of spacestorms and vicious monsters. They had no other way out but to throw their lives into the grinder in hopes of reaching that minuscule chance of survival.


    Weakness was the original sin in the universe!


    ............


    The Goblin ne, Ironstone Wilderness.


    It was a deste and quietnd of red earth.


    The earth here was too acidic, contained too many minerals, metals, and far too little organic material. Consequently, no nt life could grow here. Thend that stretched for nearly fifty meters was barren. Apart from individual hills and stone pirs riddled with holes from the acid rain, there did not seem to be anything else.


    Due to the acidity of the earth, the ground appeared dark red. Under the sun, it almost seemed as if the earth was soaked with blood. Thus, this ce was also known as the Devil¡¯s Land.


    Due to the inability to grow any nts here, it was only natural that there were no settlements. There were no goblin cities or viges anywhere in sight, let alone any goblin activity.


    However, a loud rumble suddenly red out in this destend.


    A fully-equippedpany of goblin chariots appeared within view. The heavy goblin chariots had tracks of steel that crushed the red earth beneath them. Meanwhile, magic energy cannons rotated on top of the vehicle, pointing here and there at the shadows beneath the rocks.


    A goblin wearing an aviator¡¯s helmet and goggles peeked out of the top of the first chariot in thepany.


    He was holding binocrs up to his eyes and looking at all the hills and stone pirs around him.


    The geography here was unusually dangerous, and the environment was incredibly harsh; it was clearly not a ce suited for life to thrive. With the magic surge looming just over the horizon, thepany did not dare to let down their guard for any reason at all. They surveyed this region of spatial weakness meticulously.


    Indeed, the reason Ironstone Wilderness was so deste was that it was a region of spatial weakness. The chaotic magic energy seeping in from another world had changed the environment here, causing an elementium imbnce that resulted in the red earth.


    The goblinpany wasposed of eleven goblin chariots, each outfitted with magic energy cannons, rockets, and magical machines. Their mission was to patrol this Ironstone Wilderness regrly, ensuring that no otherworldly creatures could sneak into the Goblin ne during the magic surge.


    To better help them with their task, the higher-ups had assigned a goblin helicopter to eachpany.


    As the goblinpany rumbled across the red earth, a helicopter codenamed Flying Fish flew past them at an extremely low-altitude. It then curved in an elegant line and flew to a red hill in the distance.


    Goblin Commander Pike¡¯s green hair rustled about violently under his leather hat in the wind. He bent over slightly and shouted, his hand pressing themunication crystal in his ear.


    ¡°Morris, you bastard. Don¡¯t fly so close to the chariots. Dammit! My eardrums nearly burst from that terrible noise of yours. Remember, fly higher and check out Zone 27. The device indicates that the sealing array there has been triggered. Some nasty things might have slipped in. Be careful.¡±


    ¡°Flying Fish received, Pilot Morris reporting in. Heading to Zone 27 now.¡±


    Commander Pike smacked the chariot loudly and pointed in the direction the helicopter was headed. He raised his binocrs again and continued tracking the aircraft.


    The chariotpany took a sharp turn and headed toward a forest of stone pirs.


    Before the chariots reached within one and a half kilometers of the stone forest, a flock of birds assaulted the helicopter. Fortunately, Morris was quite a skillful pilot. He was able to conductplicated evasive maneuvers with the helicopter, escaping the birds¡¯ encirclement and turning straight back toward the chariots.


    Pike, who had been watching on anxiously, was overjoyed to see this. He immediately ordered thepany to establish a defensive formation. The magic energy cannons creaked and quickly adjusted their angles. The metal mps used to support the chariots on both sides embedded themselves into the ground. A light blue barrier then engulfed the entirepany.


    The helicopter flew straight at thepany. Just as it was about to pass within the chariots¡¯ radius of fire, it barrel-rolled to the side, curving away and revealing the unusual birds squawking behind.


    It was a strange flock of birds that the goblins had never seen before!


    They resembled giant ducks, but they had no hair on their long necks. They had a strange red sac on both sides of their heads. These birds weren¡¯t exactly massive, had red feathers, and flew at a mediocre speed.


    If it weren¡¯t for the fact that the helicopter was trying to lure them into firing range, it would have been able to leave them in the dust a long time ago.


    The Goblin ne of the present was no longer the Goblin ne of the past!


    Having experienced the depths of the adept civilization, the goblins had gained a tremendous wealth of knowledge and experience; Commander Pike was able to identify these ¡®monsters¡¯ in just two seconds.


    Fire Crows!


    Birds with the ability to spit fire!


    The two sacs near their mouths were where they stored their saliva. Their saliva wouldbust when it came into contact with air, allowing them to shoot out fireballs just by spitting. The ferocity of these fireballs was about half that of an average one from a human adept. However, the mes themselves had an odd adhesiveness, allowing them to continue burning on the enemy for a long time.


    It was the most troublesome aspect of fire crows!


    It was not very difficult to deal with an individual fire crow. The problem was that fire crows were flock animals. They lived in flocks, the smallest of which consisted of two to three hundred fire crows, while thergest could go up to tens of thousands of crows. The size of the flock depended on whether there was sufficient food where they lived.


    ording to Pike¡¯s knowledge, there were no fire crows in the Ironstone Wilderness and not very many across the Goblin ne, either. That was why he was certain that this flock of a thousand fire crows must be intruders that had snuck in through a spatial rift.


    They were sure to migrate to a ce with more ¡®food¡¯ once they adapted to the environment and geography here. Goblins were most certainly on their list of prey.


    To ensure the safety of the Goblin ne, these fire crows could not be allowed to roam freely.


    Consequently, the moment the fire crows flew into their firing range, the magic energy cannons of the chariots immediately fired.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    A series of energy fireballs flew into the sky, crashing into the fire crows and causing seas of fire to erupt everywhere.


    The fire crows might be able to breathe fire, but that was due to their special saliva; they weren¡¯t actually fire creatures themselves. The cannon fire of the goblin chariots instantly inflicted devastating damage to the flock.


    The battlefield was filled with the pained and furious cries of the fire crows, along with the sound of exploding fireballs. Numerous fire crows were sted into bits, while others were burned ck and crashed to the ground as scorched corpses.


    The few crows that survived the gauntlet quacked and dove downward, sting the light blue energy barrier with their fireballs.


    Unfortunately, as their individual might was too insignificant, they were incapable of shaking this barrier sustained by all eleven goblin chariots.


    The air around the barrier moved around turbulently as the fireballs exploded. However, the mes did not simply dissipate, but turned into a red liquid that slowly dripped down the barrier. This red liquid would instantly ignite the moment it was exposed to air again, rapidly corroding the energy barrier.


    There were still far too few goblin chariots here. Their first wave of attack had halved the number of fire crows, but their attacks after were far more ineffective against the now scattered and disorganized fire crows. It was like trying to hit mosquitos with a cannon.


    After a dozen volleys, they had only managed to shoot down a few more fire crows.


    That was far too fewpared to the five hundred fire crows still left in the air.


    The crows flew up and down, trying their best to spit fireballs at the energy barrier.


    Judging from their actions, they intended to burn through the barrier and rush in to fight the goblin chariots.


    Since the magic energy cannons were ineffective, Pike gave an order, and the magical machines hanging from the back of the chariots prompt;y leaped off. They formed a row and started to shoot at the fire crows with energy beams.


    With their near-instantaneous projectile speed, the energy beams were far more effective than fireballs in this scenario. They were a little weaker, but given the countless guns on each magical machine¡¯s body, they more than made up the difference.


    Bzt! Bzt! Bzt!

 Chapter 1362 - Danger Lurks

    <strong>Chapter 1362 Danger</strong> Lurks


    Caw! Caw! Caw!


    The scattered fire crows croaked loudly and suddenly dispersed. They chose to distance themselves from the goblin chariots and started circling beyond their range of fire.


    They no longer charged in a single flock as they had before. Instead, the fire crows formed assault groups of two to three, constantly diving toward the chariots from every direction and corroding the energy barrier with their sticky fire. They would retreat from the cannon¡¯s range of fire the moment theypleted their attack, continuing to circle outside while they awaited their chance.


    Only a few magical machines apanied the chariotpany. As such, the magical machines could not cover all the air around them. If they scattered their gunfire, they would not be able to inflict as much damage on the fire crows as before.


    ¡°Mm?¡± Upon seeing this, Commander Pike paused for a moment. He then mumbled to himself, ¡°Could there be a leader amongst these fire crows?¡±


    As First Grade magical creatures, fire crows might be powerful, but their intelligence was notparable to humans. Only when an advanced First Grade or Second Grade Fire Crow King was born would the entire flock appear much more intelligent.


    Only a high-grade fire crow king like that could have the intelligence to notice the goblin chariots¡¯ immobility.


    Pike immediately picked up his binocrs and tried his best to search for that fire crow king in the flock. Just as he expected, Pike followed the cries of the birds and found an exceptionally majestic andrge fire crow.


    The fire crow had a circle of golden feathers on its head. It looked like a crown from a distance.


    It seemed like this fire crow was not only their leader, but even had the potential to advance to a fire crow emperor!


    ¡°Man¨¦, pay attention to the fire crow king on coordinates 230,783. I want you to shoot it down with the magical machines. The chariots will provide you with cover,¡± Pike immediately gave out orders upon discovering their target.


    Man¨¦, the captain of the magical machine squad, promptly turned his machine around when he heard this. He quickly locked onto the unusual fire crow with his tactical disy.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go! We are going to shoot down that ugly bird!¡±


    Heughed arrogantly as all eleven of the magical machines rushed out of the energy barrier. They fired all their weapons, all while they approached the target.


    After hundreds of years of advancement in technology, the present magical machines had cast the goblin¡¯s outdated steam-machines far behind them.


    The standard PG-52bat magical machine was outfitted with two Mark-II magic energy cannons on their shoulders, two magic energy rapid-fire guns on their chests, four magic energy ray guns on their arms, and sets of sixteen-round rockets on their back.


    Such tremendous firepower allowed every PG-52 magical machine to rival a Second Grade adept in offensive might. At the very least, a squad of magical machines arranged in tight formation in battle would most certainly be a vicious meat grinder.


    Rockets flew into the air wherever the machines went, whistling as they dove into the midst of the fire crows. The rockets were filled with plenty of shrapnel and arcane crystal fragments. When they erupted in mid-air, they were capable of wreaking destruction over arge area.


    Fire crows were magical creatures with excellent magic resistance. Otherwise, they would not have been able to cross a spatial rift so easily. However, their bodiescked the protection of hard scales or hide, making them far more vulnerable to physical attacks.


    That was why the sudden explosion of shrapnel hit numerous fire crows. Dark blood sttered everywhere as the birds howled and crashed to the ground.


    However, even more of the fire crows rallied in their fury, lunging at the exposed magical machines from every direction. Their napalm projectiles were fired before they even arrived!


    A series of fireballs shot toward the magical machines.


    ¡°Activate your shields! Shields, everyone...remember to put up your shields!¡± Man¨¦¡¯s cries rang out in themunication crystals.


    Several pieces on the magical machines¡¯ bodies started flipping over, revealing rhomboid crystals that quickly projected energy shields around them. These shields were not very powerful individually. But when stacked atop each other in this fashion, they were far more resilient and provided a wider range of protection than just a simple magic energy shield.


    While the energy shields protected them from the fireballs flying in from every direction, the magical machine squad retaliated with all they had. The magic energy cannons and rapid-fire guns unleashed energy fireballs of varying sizes, sting the fire crows lunging at them into pieces. The ray guns on their arms repeatedly zapped, shooting down the fire crows with heat rays and frost rays.


    The battlecries of the goblin mechanics filled the entiremunication channel.


    There was no need to think aboutplicated tactical maneuvers at this point. Unleashing all their firepower on their opponent was the only thing they could do!


    Meanwhile, the chariots behind them had also turned their cannons around and were clearing the way for them with their own volley of attacks.


    It was a bloody road paved with the blood and corpses of the fire crows!


    The fire crows encirclement wasn¡¯t without its results either. After all, the magical machines¡¯ shields couldn¡¯t provideplete cover after they left the energy barrier. Under the fire crows¡¯ wild bombardment, a few of the magical machines had their shields eroded or destroyed. They could only continue forward while enduring the mes with the sheer sturdiness of the machines.


    At this point, the magical machine had managed to make seven hundred meters of progress. They were deep in the midst of the fire crows and had shot down over three hundred of the creatures. However, they had suffered two casualties themselves.


    Both of the machines were destroyed due to mes burning through and causing a massive explosion. Naturally, there was no hope for the goblin mechanics piloting them.


    At this point, fewer than two hundred fire crows remained of the massive flock.


    The fire crow king was visibly enraged. It led its personal guard and attacked the magical machines.


    The mes it spewed were far more powerful and corrosive than the average fire crow. mes burned through the hulls of two more magical machines before the pilots were sniped to death by a fire arrow from the fire crow king.


    However, the fire crow king could not find too many opportunities to go on the offense with the goblin chariots and magical machines working in coordination. After all, a fire crow¡¯s attacks only had a range of a hundred meters, while the magical machines could cover up to seven hundred meters of distance.


    In fact, the goblin rocket¡¯s maximum effective distance was 1,500 meters!


    This tremendous difference in range meant that the fire crows had no option but to endure enemy fire to go on the offense. In the end, it was only natural that the fire crows were defeated!


    The fire crow king eventually epted their defeat and fled with thest thirty surviving fire crows, squawking as they did so.


    The goblin chariots immediately gave pursuit to prevent these fire crows from causing trouble in the goblin cities. The battle continued even as they went on the pursuit.


    The same scenario was happening all over the Goblin ne.


    Fortunately, the Goblin ne was a ssic low-magic ne. Even with the magic surge¡¯s arrival, the nar environment was still very hostile toward magic energy; overly powerful magical creatures and monsters could not be bothered toe here. They had their sights set on the higher nes.


    Moreover, there were far too few native magical creatures in the Goblin ne to ever form a threat to thepletely mechanized goblins.


    Thus, when the magic surged erupted,rge-scale massacres were all but avoided. Only individual towns and viges reported heavy casualties asionally!


    However, not all nar worlds were as fortunate as the Goblin ne.


    Almost every material ne faced threats on two fronts due to the magic surge.


    There was the threat of intruding starbeasts, disaster creatures, and monsters from the outside, while magical creature stampedes threatened to break out from within. For a while, every single ruler across the universe waspletely busy and upied.


    It didn¡¯t matter how well they had set up their defenses. They could not stop otherworldly beings from invading or the magical creatures from storming out of their forests. The more ipetent rulers could only choose to abandon part of their citizens andnd, concentrating what power they had on protecting their own assets.


    The abandoned civilians could only pray!


    After all, these civilians had no supernatural powers. Even a single First or Second Grade magical creature would be enough to cause an unimaginable cmity.


    Moreover, in many of the smaller nes, the enved poption would obtain opportunities to rise and rebel against their rulers due to the chaos sown by the magic surge. Internal revolutions broke out in numerous nes, causing a change in the ruling ss.


    However, no matter how hard anyone tried, the chaos and turbulence that engulfed every nar world broke out in full force!


    Many schrs and sages across the countless nar worlds would all coincidentally refer to these chaotic times as the Dark Ages. Moreover, what truly brought them despair was the knowledge based on past experience that this Dark Age wouldst for a hundred years.


    A hundred years. That would be an entire life for most nar creatures!


    ............


    With the descent of darkness, some suffered. Yet, some continued to live blissful lives!


    At this moment, the civilians living in Ailovis felt even more grateful and blissful that they lived here.


    When the magic surge erupted, there was news of intruding monsters from all over the Central Lands. There were even incidents where entire towns were devoured without a single trace.


    All this news stood in stark contrast to the peace of Ailovis.


    It was the Crimson n¡¯s territory after all, and the soon-to-be hearnd of the Central Lands. Consequently, there were far more top-grade adepts gathered here than elsewhere.


    These powerful adepts kept a low profile. However, when danger truly arrived, their fighting force would be incredibly valuable.

 Chapter 1363 - Trouble in the Central Lands

    <strong>Chapter 1363 Trouble in the Central Lands</strong>


    The eruption of the magic surge was like Pandora¡¯s box had been opened. It unleashed tremendous disasters upon all the material nes.


    Greem had no idea what arrangements the three major organizations had made in preparation for this event.


    All he knew was that the Central Lands was truly in trouble now!


    Ever since the first wave of the magic surge reached the World of Adepts, there had been over a hundred cases of otherworldly intrusion reported in the Central Lands every day. There were probably more that had slipped into the ne through more inconspicuous means and had yet to be detected.


    The arrival of these intruders brought unimaginable turbulence to the Central Lands.


    Most of these intruders had been randomly teleported to the World of Adepts after wandering into a spacetime vortex. Some malicious intruders had traveled the infinite vastness of space to take advantage of the weakness in the World of Adept¡¯s nar barrier to raid and ughter to their heart¡¯s desire.


    The unintentional intruders were many in number, but they varied in power. Most of them simply went into hiding in the World of Adepts, prepared to flee to another ne at any moment. Most of these unintentional intruders were not very powerful. They were also disorganized and without support- it was easy dealing with them. Almost every one of these unintentional intruders that had been discovered had been hunted down.


    However, intentional intruders were much harder to deal with!


    After all, they came prepared. These intruders were more familiar with the environment of the World of Adepts and were sometimes backed by even more powerful individuals. This particr kind of intruder was bad news for the adepts who ruled this ne.


    Reports on seven cases of mass deaths spread across six regionsy upon Greem¡¯s desk. Each file represented the fall and extermination of a human settlement.


    ¡°The Mysterious Deaths of Molten Fire City.


    ¡°A mass death event urred today in the Skettis region. The location is to the east of the region, only a hundred and fifty kilometers away from Molten Fire City. All 416 mortals living in a town known as Maz died abruptly over a single night.


    ¡°Initial investigations reveal that the corpses of the victims remain untouched. None of their possessions have been touched either. The victims were spread all over the town. It seemed as if all of them had died at the same instant due to an unknown reason.


    ¡°All victims were smiling in their deaths. Their muscles were stiff, and initial dissections found signs of supernatural power on the corpses.


    ¡°Time of death is three days after the eruption of the magic surge.


    ¡°The case is currently being investigated and managed by Molten Fire City Second Grade Adept Freina.¡±


    ......


    ......


    ¡°The Mysterious Disappearance of the rke¡¯s Treasure Well.


    ¡°rke Alchemy Academy, located in the Ank region, experienced an anomaly. The Treasure Well, one of the academy¡¯s primary trial locations, was shrouded by a mysterious white mist.


    ¡°At present, the academy has lost contact with the eleven alchemist apprentice undertaking their trials in the Treasure Well. An official adept of the academy has also gone missing after venturing into the well to investigate.


    ¡°This incident happened on the third day of the magic surge eruption. Second Grade Adept Woodwhisker of the Entom n has gone to investigate.


    ......


    ......


    ¡°The gue of Entones City.


    ¡°On the seventh day of the magic surge, a mysterious gue broke out in Entones City of the Asia region. The gue infected over one-third of the city¡¯s poption upon breakout. The estimated number of infected then was approximately twenty-one thousand.


    ¡°The gue has been spreading rapidly toward the surrounding territories. At present, the three neighboring towns have been afflicted, and the scale of the gue continues to grow.


    ¡°This area is under the joint management of the local organizations Quirin Cottage, Mourning Bell Academy, and Morrin¡¯s Stone Tower. They have sent out adepts to form an investigative team aiming to investigate and control the gue.


    ¡°Signs of taboo magic have been found in the gue viruses. The investigative team is currently pursuing the offending adept. Currently, there are no signs of otherworldly involvement.¡±


    ......


    ......


    Greem read the case briefs on his desk one by one, the frown on his forehead scrunching even further with each page.


    In the past, all he had to do was manage the affairs of the Crimson n.


    The dedicated Meryl and Emelia had also aided him. As such, he had never felt n affairs to be a burden of a task.


    As the Central Lands slowly fell into his control, there were 31 regions spanning 3,751 square kilometers containing 1,000 adept ns. All of them had be ces and locations he had to understand and manage. A tidal wave of reports requiring his administrative and executive decisions flooded his office.


    It was important to note that Meryl and Emelia had already helped him filter out most of the less urgent matters. The only reports that reached his desk either involved Fourth Grade adepts, Fourth Grade organizations, or were moreplex than they appeared. Either way, they all required him to make a decision as the leader of the Crimson n.


    Any one of these reports was enough to give him a headache for several days toe!


    These days, all ordinary affairs had already been kept off his desk. Yet, these seven cases had still found their way into his hands. It was more than enough evidence that all of these cases were somehow rted to the magic surge¡¯s eruption.


    These were many insignificant events. However, they were very likely hinting at the arrival of a powerful and cunning otherworldly creature in the Central Lands. These events were likely their doing and were, perhaps, themencement of some ritual. Maybe they were just to satisfy their bloodlust.


    Greem wasn¡¯t too worried about the intruders that started a massacre the moment they entered the ne.


    Intruders like that wanted nothing more than a feast. They would leave as soon as they filled their bellies. Greem¡¯s attitude toward such intruders was to simply banish them.


    After all, there were far too many otherworldly monsters these days. It was impossible to kill them all.


    Banishing them from the ne after discovering them and sealing the rift they came in through was the best result with minimal effort that Greem could think of!


    What really made Greem¡¯s head hurt were the sly predators.


    They would not start a massacre at a whim, as that would draw the adepts¡¯ intervention. Instead, they behaved like chameleons, sneaking into the World of Adepts silently and hiding all traces of their existence. They would even disguise themselves and blend in among the local nobles.


    They could go into hiding for decades for their secret ns, slowly corrupting the human settlements near them through their unique methods.


    By the time they were exposed, they could cause casualties numbering in the hundreds of thousands!


    The Adepts¡¯ Handbook recorded the invasion of the sporepeople, the snakeskins, and the undead. There were signs of the intervention of a greater force in space behind each of these terrible historical events.


    The World of Adepts was a famous nar world, after all. The quality of the human souls here was vastly superior to the smaller nes. Many otherworldly monsters worked in the profession of peddling the souls of creatures from the major nes.


    By bringing souls from another major world back to their homeworld, they would be able to strengthen their homeworld and obtain feedback from the nar consciousness. It was one of the means by which the nar worlds strengthened themselves!


    If the Central Lands had not effectively belonged to Greem now, he wouldn¡¯t have bothered to worry over all these incidents.

 Chapter 1364 - Greem’s Growth

    <h4>Chapter 1364 Greem¡¯s Growth</h4>


    While everyone was worrying about the otherworldly intrusions, an even more concerning matter urred.


    Information returned from various watchpoints revealing that the magical creatures residing in the depths of the ck Forest were rapidly gathering. It seemed like they were preparing for a stampede that was about to happen soon.


    Moreover, these weren¡¯t the actions of individual magical creature lords; it was a seemingly conscious act of mobilizing across the entire ck Forest. The magical energy entering the nar world during the magic surge contained traces of chaos and savagery. They had stimted the magical creatures, turning them much more ferocious and vicious than usual.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what would happen soon. Such terrifying magical creatures had all gathered together and would be herding an even more massive number of ordinary beasts forward. Their impact on human society once they charged out of the ck Forest would be immense!


    If the adepts¡¯ response was inadequate, it could shake the very foundations of the adept civilization.


    Moreover, the unrest among the beasts and magical creatures was not an independent, localized incident. Rather, every creature across the ck Forest of the World of Adepts was stirring.


    The adepts had suppressed and ughtered the magical creatures lords with far too much impunity in the past tens of thousands of years. With the aid of the magic surge, the magical creature lords finally believed it was time to wrestle back control from the adepts!


    One had to admit that the adepts had been far too lenient in recent years. It had been a long time since they had exterminated high-grade magical creatures in the depths of ck Forest. Consequently, a new generation of magical creatures lords had grown and matured without their knowledge. These magical creatures were eager to advance and be rulers of the ck Forest.


    Launching an assault against the adepts was the simplest and easiest way for these magical creature lords to establish themselves and be magical creature rulers!


    Of course, they were careful about their choice of targets as well. The Adept¡¯s Association was far too powerful to even think of touching.


    The golem armies of the Silver Union were unbreakable, making them an unviable target.


    The Northern Witches were slightly weaker, but they were incredibly unified when fighting against amon enemy. It was best not to attack them either.


    Thus, the disunited Central Lands became the only target of the magical creature lords seeking to sharpen their fangs!


    Even though stampedes also urred with the three major organizations, their scale paled inparison to those that would appear in the Central Lands.


    Information ryed back from scouts who had risked their lives revealed that the scale of the stampede this time would be far greater than ever before. The number of magical creature lords that hade together was shocking. Once their numbers were sufficient, they would charge out of the ck Forest and inflict a devastating blow upon human society in the Central Lands!


    This revtion instantly drew the attention of all the adept ns, making them even more fearful than before.


    Stopping a stampede wasn¡¯t as easy as sealing off intruders from space.


    There were only so many rifts in the nar barrier. All they had to do was guard the rifts and kill every intruder that passed through them. It was difficult work, but it had been very effective so far. On the other hand, the ck Forest surrounded the Central Lands. It was nearly impossible to determine where the stampedes woulde from.


    Of course, the adepts could also rely on astrologists and diviners to foresee the magical creatures¡¯ movements. However, after so many years of conflict with the adepts, the magical creatures had developed their own systems of stealth and counter-divination.


    It was said that the magical creature lords of the ck Forest had specially raised a Crow Emperor with divination abilities to counter the divination of the adepts.


    Since the adepts had failed to realize the magical creature lords¡¯ movements ahead of time, ns to assassinate the ringleaders were now incredibly unlikely, given that the magical creatures had all gathered together.


    If dispersing the stampede was impossible, then the only option was to wait until the charge rushed out of the ck Forest. Every region of the Central Lands, especially those bordering the ck Forest, was soon filled with anxiety, dread, and fear.


    Regions guarded by Fourth Grade organizations were holding up better. Everyone felt safer being protected by at least one Fourth Grade powerhouse. The regions without Fourth Grade ns and jointly managed by an alliance of smaller ns could only shrink their defensive line. Their only hope was to defend the core territories of their n.


    In doing so, waves of refugees broke out in the human kingdoms they had abandoned.


    No one was willing to sit and wait for their eventual deaths at the jaws of beasts. The civilians hastily packed all they had and fled their homes, streaming toward the rtively safer center regions of the Central Lands.


    For a moment, the entirety of the Central Lands was filled with fear and panic!


    ............


    Fire Throne.


    Greem was naked, soaking in a giant wooden barrel bigger than himself. The barrel was filled with a sort of pungent blue liquid.


    There was no need for a fire to heat the water. Greem himself was a furnace.


    His body appeared dark red and luminescent. You could faintly see the slow-moving blood under his semi-translucent skin. It was blood, but in truth, it was not much different from boilingva.


    The blue liquid in the wooden barrel started to boil as the temperature rose within his Burning Domain. The viscous blue liquid roared and bubbled like a raging monster, bubbles appearing and popping over and over.


    Greem¡¯s entire body was soaking in the liquid. The pores of his skin were open as they absorbed the unusual medicine simmering in the liquid. Simultaneously, the energy poison and impurities that had umted in his body were also being expelled.


    He remained in the bath for five hours. Greem eventually climbed out when the blue liquid had turnedpletely ck.


    Shockingly enough, despite emerging from such a sticky and filthy liquid, Greem¡¯s body did not pick up even a drop of the filth. It remained immacte and spotless.


    He stood silently in his room, his wickedly charming and powerful masculine figure on full disy!


    ¡°Chip, self-examination!¡±


    [Beep. Mission epted. Self-examination began.]


    A series of mechanical whirring sounds could be heard as a flood of information appeared within Greem¡¯s view, forming into a three-dimensional humanoid model.


    Greem¡¯s attributes flickered and appeared beside the model.


    [Greem. Male. Fourth Grade Semi-Principle Adept (Fire Specialization). Starbeast Bloodline (97%). Chaos Physique (Excellent Magic Resistance). Heart of Principles (Fire Principles 89%plete).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 21 | Physique 15 (+2) | Agility 16 | Spirit 46 (+5). Bloodline Talent: Energy ckhole, Fire Principle (Undying mes).]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shake his head and sigh after seeing his attributes.


    His Strength had dropped by 6 pointspared to before, his Physique by 16 points, and his Agility by 3 points.


    He might have won at Stoneshard Valley, first defeating Mornashen Gaia, then Adept¡¯s Association ultra-powerhouse Cerveris, but it was a tragic victory.


    The severe injuries he had suffered had lowered his Physique significantly. Even his Strength and Agility had been affected by this decrease in his Physique.


    However, there were always two sides to a coin. The constant fighting had helped Greem¡¯s Spirit increase by 2 points, from 44 to 46 points. Even though it was only 2 points, he could feel the effect of the improvement clearly. His mind was clearer than ever before.


    He was now officially advanced Fourth Grade. Having risen by a minor grade, he was only one step away from peak Fourth Grade!


    The enhancements provided by the Orb of the Fire God and the Tome of Corruption magnified even one point of increase in his Spirit by a dozen times. Moreover, with the experience from these past few battles, Greem was slowly starting to discern his future path of development.


    The deciphering of the starbeast bloodline had reached 97%. Just a little more, and Greem would possess a bloodline transformation ability of his own. The Chaos Physique was only a passive racial trait of the starbeast bloodline. It could not truly be considered one of his powers.


    The reason the starbeast bloodline had been deciphered to this extent was that Mary had sent over a fish-shaped starbeast awhile ago.


    Greem soaked daily in a medicinal blend made with the starbeast¡¯s blood and several unique herbs. It was the body-refining adept means of strengthening the body. As expected, his Physique had recovered by 1 point. However, the bath¡¯s greatest effect was the improved assimtion of his body with its starbeast bloodline.


    Greem had relied entirely on his fire magic in battle all this while. He had barely ever shown the power that his starbeast bloodline should possess. The fundamental reason for this was because he had not found the correct path to allow his bloodline to grow and thrive.


    He was only a fumbling rookie that had barely started on the path of bloodline magic!


    He might have a starbeast bloodline, but he did not even manifest the most basic of bloodline traits apart from Chaos Physique and Energy ckhole, two of the more insignificant abilities of the starbeasts.


    That did not match his status as an advanced Fourth Grade adept!


    However, the corpse of the starbeast that Mary sent over had allowed Greem to find a means to improve his bloodline.


    Devour, devour, devour.


    The ssic characteristic of the starbeasts was their constant path of devouring. They devoured everything, from high-grade creatures, intelligent lifeforms, souls, and even nar origins.


    These things were all fuel for the growth and evolution of the starbeasts and the source of their strength.


    Since Greem had chosen a starbeast bloodline for himself, he would have to strengthen his bloodline in the ancient and ssical way that all starbeasts did.


    However, as a principled and intelligent individual, devouring other intelligent species would undoubtedly leave a horrid taste in Greem¡¯s mouth. That was why he decided without any hesitation to consume other starbeasts.


    Starbeasts all grew in weird shapes and sizes. They were monsters amongst monsters. Greem felt no psychological burden devouring any of them.


    Of course, Greem wouldn¡¯t actually be devouring the flesh of the starbeasts. Rather, he would be consuming the unique gic sequence within their bodies. Greem could use the Chip¡¯s powerfulputation powers to strip beneficial gene fragments from starbeast corpses and assimte them with his own body.


    However, given his bloodline¡¯s current state, only starbeasts of Fourth Grade and above could help further his growth. That said, there were no weaklings among such starbeasts. Each and every one of them was a ferocious predator capable of ughtering an entire ne.


    That was why Greem would have to work hard if he wanted to feast upon their flesh!

 Chapter 1365 - The Man of Light and the Stoneheart Egg

    <h4>Chapter 1365 The Man of Light and the Stoneheart Egg</h4>


    Through his self-examination, Greem discovered that his greatest improvement was in his fire magic.


    With the Heart of Principles¡¯ continued analysis, Greem had finally started tobine the multiple firews to form a principle fire of his own¨C the Undying me.


    The Undying me would strike fear into the hearts of even ultra-powerhouses!


    What Greem needed to do now was to slowly refine all the fire energy in his body into principle fire ording to the method provided by the Fire King. He would then use the principle fires to slowly modify his own body.


    Once his body had be perfectlypatible with the Undying me, Greem would havepleted the legendary principle-body modification. He could then start preparations for advancement to Fifth Grade. Until then, he would remain a semi-principle adept!


    The Chip estimated that the principle body modification would take two hundred and eighteen years. That was assuming that all other factors besides the umtion of principle fire and Spirit had been ounted for. The moment these two things reached peak Fourth Grade would be the moment Greem would sessfully advance to Fifth Grade.


    Greem put the soft leather armor made out of fire dragon hide back on his body afterpleting his bath for the day. Even though he could create all sorts of simple clothes by manipting elementium as a Fourth Grade adept, this manifested energy clothing would not possess the strange characteristics that magical items did.


    The internal construction and runic systems of enchanted magical items were tooplex for Greem to manifest with his current knowledge and ability.


    That was why this fire dragon leather armor with its tremendous defensive power was still precious equipment for him!


    Greem put all his clothes back on and took a single step forward. His entire person vanished in a pir of mes.


    mes flickered in the corner of another magical room. Greem stepped out from the fire.


    Strange, dazzling light radiated from a small pool in the room. The pool, of a standard seven meters length, five meters width, and three meters depth, was filled with a strange liquid brimming with light elementium aura. Moreover, the liquid itself gave off a peculiar, indescribable aura of life.


    No one would be able to connect this glowing pool of liquid with human blood.


    However, the liquid was indeed blood!


    Even Greem had not expected that the blood he had managed to clone at a significant cost by deciphering Light Adept Geraldine¡¯s origin blood would look like this.


    One could feel how pure and clean the glowing liquid in the pool was just by standing beside it.


    As waves rippled throughout the liquid, all sorts of fantastical lights and colors would appear before you, reaching deep into your heart. Even Greem felt his mind tremble and his Spirit flutter for a moment.


    As if it sensed Greem¡¯s gaze, the liquid began to rise, turning into a humanoid form in the center of the pool. Light flickered as a translucent humanoid that looked just like Greem stood in front of him.


    ¡°Hey, original, what exactly do you n to do with me? You can¡¯t imprison me like this forever, can you? Life is free! You might have been the one to bless me with life, but I still desire freedom!¡± The translucent humanoid spoke, his voice identical to Greem¡¯s own.


    Greem frowned slightly.


    He still couldn¡¯t quitee to terms with what had happened. Geraldine¡¯s blood, which he had replicated at great cost, actually maintained a rather unusual mental connection with Geraldine.


    Even though the adept tower¡¯s istion meant that Geraldine could not sense his clone while he was far away in the east, this translucent humanoid did possess a portion of the Messenger of Light¡¯s might.


    The humanoid possessed blood filled with dense light elementium and light principles simr to Geraldine¡¯s own. The only difference between them was that Geraldine had hundreds of years of memories and emotions, while the man of light only had a pure soul that Greem had created with a portion of his Spirit at the core.


    Apart from this, the two were practically identical.


    Moreover, if the man of light was released from the tower, Geraldine would instantly be able to detect its abnormal existence through the light principles.


    When that happened, Geraldine would track the man of light to this ce, and Greem would have to exin the whole situation to him!


    That was why Greem had no intention of releasing this man of light and creating trouble for himself until he figured out what to do with him.


    ¡°What will you do if I let you go?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask curiously.


    ¡°I will find that Geraldine fellow and fight him. If he wins, he will assimte me. If I win, I will assimte him. At any rate, there can only be one Messenger of Light in this world. It is either him or me!¡± The man of light only possessed rudimentary intelligence. He had yet to pick up the sly and cunning of humans, nor their ability to lie. His power was only beginner Fourth Grade, an entire minor grade lower than Geraldine.


    ¡°You have no hope of beating him!¡± Greem shook his head and said, ¡°He has an actual body. He will be able to produce light energy endlessly as long as he lives. The same can¡¯t be said for you. Once you leave this pool of light liquid, you will lose the ability to generate light energy. Your energy reserve will only deplete over time until it ispletely exhausted.¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh again when he said this, ¡°You can never defeat him! After all, you are not a real lifeform.¡±


    ¡°Then how can I be a real lifeform?¡± The man of light asked curiously.


    ¡°Firstly, you must have a core that hosts your Spirit consciousness and your soul origin. Secondly, you will have to construct a body for yourself that is perfectlypatible with your light origin,¡± Greem did not hide anything from this man of light. He was genuinely trying to help with all his effort.


    After all, this man of light was an intelligence formed with his Spirit at the core. He could make the man of light¡¯s consciousness dissipate and its soul vanish with a single thought. That was why he was not worried that the man of light would turn on him.


    If Greem could help the man of light with its trouble, he would instantly gain a trusted Fourth Grade subordinate!


    ¡°Don¡¯t be in a hurry. I will try my best to gather adept materialspatible with light elementium and forge a real body for you. You will be able to move freely then! Perhaps you might even be able to find a chance to steal Geraldine¡¯s power for yourself,¡± Greem consoled.


    ¡°I understand! I¡¯ll leave it to you, original! Remember to wake me up if you make any progress,¡± The man of light nodded before his body copsed into liquid and fell into the pool again.


    Greem left the pool behind and walked toward an alchemy workshop in another corner of the secret room.


    Shadow Demon¡¯s four-meter-tall, pitch-ck bodyy on a strange tform here. Countless alchemical beams were carvingplicated and intricate patterns and runes on its shadowsteel body.


    During the battle at Nightmare Castle, Shadow Demon had suffered much at the hands of Gloria. Its body had been destroyed and torn apart countless times.


    Even though Shadow Demon possessed the ability to heal itself while remaining in shadowspace, the severe damage it had sustained had caused its power to decrease considerably. Thus, Greem decided to add anotheryer of modifications to it, enhancing its stealth and ambush abilities.


    After the modification, Shadow Demon would finally be able to pose some degree of threat and pressure ultra-powerhouses, unlike before!


    ording to the Chip¡¯s calctions, the modified Shadow Demon¡¯s grade would leap from intermediate Fourth Grade to advanced Fourth Grade. Its offensive power against elementium adepts would improve by leaps and bounds. With such power, Shadow Demon would have no problem overpowering a beginner Fourth Grade adept.


    Greem silently waited until the magical runes on Shadow Demon had beenpleted. The golem sat up from the tform. He waved his hand, and the golem vanished into his shadow like a phantom.


    After putting Shadow Demon away, Greem turned and teleported out of the room. Just then, a magical message rang out in his mind.


    ¡°Starspirit Ts? Why is he looking for me?¡±


    Greem returned to his room with that question in his head. He took out a blue crystal the size of a nail from a hiddenpartment in the wall and ced it on his desk¡¯smunication crystal.


    As traces of an unusual energy aura radiated from the blue crystal, themunication crystal lit up, and the image within began to grow clearer.


    Soon, the image stabilized as Ts¡¯ strange mist-like body and constetion of nodes that formed his skeleton appeared.


    ¡°It¡¯s been a while, Greem!¡±


    ¡°It has been a while, indeed! Why have you suddenly contacted me?¡± There was no hint of friendliness or joy in Greem¡¯s voice at having met an old acquaintance.


    They had only been temporary allies once before, for the sake of their individual benefit; there was no trust or rtionship between them. Greem had to reflect on each word that Ts spoke and mull over them cautiously, in fear that he might be led into a trap or conspiracy.


    However, as a Fourth Grade adept, it was always better to have numerous connections than wander the worldpletely alone. That was why Greem had contacted the starspirit over matters of internar trade after the Reliquary mission. The two of them had had some dealings in the past.


    However, Ts had suddenly contacted him today after a hundred years. It did not seem like his purpose was an exchange of resources either. Greem decided to get straight to the point.


    ¡°Old friend, the magic surge has begun. How is the situation on your end?¡± Starspirit Ts gazed at Greem with the two bright white lights that were his eyes. It was obvious that the answer mattered very much to him.


    ¡°I am managing. The situation might be quite terrible, but it has yet to reach the worst-case scenario!¡± Greem minced his words and kept it vague. Obviously, he would not tell Ts the actual state of affairs in the World of Adepts.


    ¡°That is only natural. Your World of Adepts is one of the rare higher civilizations in the universe, backed by Ninth Grade Great Adepts. An unexpected magic surge could hardly shake your foundations,¡± Starspirit Ts sighed and continued, ¡°Meanwhile, things are very different in my Spirit World. Everyone is disorganized and scattered. We are all individually powerful, but we are unable to unite and fend off the intruders.¡±


    ¡°Oh? There are already intruders breaking in on your side?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but be curious.


    ¡°It¡¯s the Starbeast Hessmoto! That bastard broke into our Spirit World and forcefullyid a Stoneheart Egg here. We are still searching for that embryo everywhere now!¡± Having said that, even as typically calm andposed as he was, Ts couldn¡¯t help but start cursing.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but shiver when he heard the words ¡®Stoneheart Egg.¡¯


    God, how unfortunate for the Spirit World!

 Chapter 1366 - Bounty of the Gods

    <h4>Chapter 1366 Bounty of the Gods</h4>


    Starbeast Hessmoto and its stoneheart eggs had a notorious reputation!


    Hessmoto was infamous throughout the universe. It was a terrifying Sixth Grade starbeast. However, unlike other starbeasts, Hessmoto rarely broke into a nar world to forcefully steal nar origin.


    Instead, it relied on a far more infuriating and repulsive means to do so. Put in more abstract terms, the starbeast would rape the nar consciousness and give birth to a stoneheart egg that leeched the nar origin. In doing so, the stoneheart egg would be able to slowly grow by feeding on the power of the nar origin.


    The stoneheart egg might be an egg, but it was a challenging entity to deal with. It possessed control over the earthws and could freely move and travel underground, avoiding the pursuit and tracking of the nar natives.


    By the time a starbeast hatched from the stoneheart egg, it would already be a fearsome Fourth Grade monster.


    It was through this method that Hessmoto was able to create numerous descendants. Meanwhile, any material nes it targeted would lose a lot of their nar origin, and the nar consciousness would be damaged. In severe cases, the ne might even drop in level!


    Fortunately, the incubation of the stoneheart egg took time as well. It would take ten years for a stoneheart egg to hatch from the moment it wasid. If the nar natives could find this freely traveling stoneheart egg underground within ten years and kill it, the lost nar origin could be recovered.


    Of course, if Greem could run over to the Spirit World, steal the stoneheart egg for himself, and bring it back to the World of Adept for a blood sacrifice, he would most certainly obtain the highest degree of feedback from the World of Adepts.


    Unfortunately, while that seemed like a good idea, it was apletely impractical one!


    That was because Ts would never invite him to hunt down the stoneheart egg. Instead, he was tiring to use his connection with Greem to contact Alice.


    If it hadn¡¯t been necessary, the natives of the Spirit World would never ask for outside help in the hunt for the stoneheart egg. After all, they were also worried that the stoneheart egg might be taken away by individuals from other worlds, resulting in a loss to the nar origin anyway.


    However, the stoneheart egg was simply too cunning. It moved about underground frequently, never giving the natives a chance to catch it. The only solution that Ts could think of was to ask for help from a Fate Witch like Alice. He wanted to borrow her power to locate the stoneheart egg.


    The source of power for diviners and prophets of the Spirit World was the nar consciousness itself. Now that even the Spirit World¡¯s nar consciousness was itself a victim of Hessmoto, they had no means of tracking the egg through divination!


    Greem introduced Ts to Alice and stopped thinking about the whole affair.


    It was the magic surge. Every ne was in absolute chaos and turbulence. Most powerhouses would choose to return to their homeworlds and guarantee the ne¡¯s safety before they would go out exploring again.


    That was why the constant nar invasions of the past had paused for a moment in the ten years leading up to the magic surge. Everyone was in a hurry to reinforce their worlds. During this time, most higher civilizations would stop going to war and, with the exception of disaster creatures and starbeasts.


    For a while, there had been a rare period of peace across the major nes!


    However, given Greem¡¯s current status and authority, he did not have much time to lie around idly.


    Soon, a ssified report was ced on his desk.


    Greem was in big trouble!


    There were no walls in the world that could keep out the windpletely.


    Greem hadid a plot down for the son of the God of Wisdom Hierro and had stolen the famous Libram of Wisdom for himself. He had kept this incident under wraps for a long time until bringing the Libram out with him once he had converted it into the Tome of Corruption.


    Even so, the God of Wisdom Hierro had ultimately managed to uncover Greem as the perpetrator through some unknown means.


    ording to information obtained through discreet channels, Hierro now saw Greem as his greatest enemy.


    He had already put out a pricey bounty in the World of Gods. Anyone that brought Greem¡¯s head to him would obtain a piece of Fourth Grade divine equipment personally forged and customized by Hierro. They would also be allowed entry to the Hall of Wisdom to read its books for up to three years. Of course, the friendship of all of Hierro¡¯s believers would also be extended to them.


    In all honesty, even Greem himself felt the impulse to chop his own head off when he heard of the incredible bounty!


    Fortunately, the God of Wisdom Hierro was only a Sixth Grade God, and a God of Wisdom that was not particrly versed in the ways of fighting. While Hierro himself did not dare to step out of his god kingdom, his limited amount of authority and number of believers were not too much of a threat to Greem.


    As for whether he dared to send out a Fifth Grade clone of himself? That wasn¡¯t even a consideration.


    There were too many apex predators and domineering individuals in the universe. If the Fifth Grade clone of a god ever dared show themselves, they would be hunted down by nearly everyone who had to power to do so. When that happened, Hierro¡¯s clone might not even be able to protect itself, let alone hunt down Greem.


    There were many artifacts and divine equipment in the World of Adepts. Most of these were not created by the adepts themselves, but obtained through raiding the World of Gods.


    The main reason for this was that the adepts and gods were very simr in racialposition. Humans were the foundation of their worlds. Consequently, they were simr in knowledge, techniques, and power systems.


    The adepts only needed to modify the divine equipment they had stolen slightly to be able to use it for themselves. Naturally, they were inclined to steal divine equipment from the gods.


    Of course, the more important reason was that the gods of the World of Gods tended to bestow divine equipment on their subordinates and believers as a status symbol. These subordinates and believers were naturally far weaker than the gods and much easier prey.


    These two reasonsbined resulted in high-grade adepts preferring to steal divine equipment from the hands of high-grade believers of the World of Gods. They could rapidly improve their fighting strength in doing so.


    The ultimate consequence of such actions was the division of the World of Gods and the adept civilization into two irreconcble, opposing factions!


    Believers of the World of Gods and adepts would always break out into a fight whenever they met in space.


    However, hose whose names could be found on the World of Gds bounty list were often Great Adepts and beyond. Fourth Grade adepts like Greem were a rare sight.


    Rather than creating trouble for Greem, this bounty issued on his head served to spread his name out in space before he ventured out there. It was very likely that Greem¡¯s name had now spread across countless ces in space!


    However, while this news hardly fazed Greem, the arrival of another report caused his scalp to buzz.


    A second god had issued a bounty on Greem. Moreover, this god was a Seventh Grade major god.


    The God of Fire Sinai!


    The Orb of the Fire God in Greem¡¯s possession was an artifact created by Sinai.


    This veteran god of the World of Gods had managed to discover through some means the perpetrators who had broken into his lesser ne, killed his loyal followers, and stolen the Orb of the Fire God. They were the Dark Witches of the World of Adepts.


    In his fury, he put out a bounty on both the Dark Witches and Greem.


    The bounty was incredibly enticing, but Greem was no longer in the mood to make fun of it.


    He could ignore the threat of the God of Wisdom. As long as he did not leave the World of Adepts and break into Hierro¡¯s territory, the God of Wisdom was barely a threat to him. However, this Seventh Grade God of Fire was a different matter entirely.


    Seventh Grade. A god like that was a big deal, even in the World of Gods!


    If Sinai were set on killing Greem, then Greem would have to be extremely cautious whenever he went to space henceforth. Should the Fire God catch wind of his location, all he had to do was send out a high-grade clone; the odds of Greem sessfully escaping back to the World of Adepts was no more than thirty percent.


    Moreover, God of Fire Sinai was a fighting god. Even if he only sent out an insignificant Fourth Grade fire clone, it would be able to pose a serious threat to Greem¡¯s life. It would break into a nar world to do so.


    Greem felt his head buzz at the very thought of this. His hair stood on end, and for the first time, he felt a genuine chill in the depths of his heart.


    However, he regretted nothing!


    After all, without the aid of these two artifacts, he would be no more than an intermediate Fourth Grade now. He would have had to endure the oppression of the veteran adepts silently while he slowly refined his power.


    Yet now, even Mornashen Gaia had to bow before him. The Central Lands had fallen into hisp, if only in name at the moment. How had this miraclee about? Through the aid of the two pieces of powerful Fifth Grade divine equipment, of course.


    Greem had managed to exceed his grade¡¯s limitations with these two divine artifacts and suppressed many powerful individuals that would otherwise have defeated him. Without their aid, Greem would never have had such an advantage in his battles against his peers.


    That was why Greem would never give up on these two treasures that meant so much to him, regardless of the difficulties he would have to face!


    However, he would have to watch out for his safety now.


    The pressure of being targeted by two otherworldly gods at the same time was something that most others would not have the privilege to experience.


    He was undoubtedly safe while he remained in the World of Adepts and their associated camps in space.


    The two gods were not foolish enough to rush into these ces to hunt him down, regardless of how unreasonable and barbaric they might be.


    Still, Greem would have to take care to obscure his tracks if he wanted to move around in foreign nes from now on. The consequences of being spotted by the gods and hunted all across the universe were unimaginable.


    Greem would have to stay low for the moment and minimize the enemy¡¯s chances to assassinate him. Moreover, if he could further improve his power, he would have a greater chance of dealing with any enemies that came his way.


    Greem would not have dared to make such bold ims in the past.


    Every step forward since reaching Fourth Grade had been difficult, and every point increase in his attributes had been so demanding and expensive.


    However, Greem was unlike your average adept. He had an opportunity to improve significantly in the short term. That opportunity was the uplifting of his starbeast bloodline!


    His analysis of the starbeast bloodline had reached 97%. He was only one step away frompletion. Once the analysis seeded, he would instantly possess his own bloodline transformation.


    When that happened, not only would hisbat prowess improve drastically, even his fighting style would change tremendously!

 Chapter 1367 - Inkdeep Valley

    Chapter 1367 Inkdeep Valley


    Inkdeep Valley.


    As the most frightening point of spatial weakness in the east of the continent, this ce was a naturalnd of death.


    Looking from high above in the air, Inkdeep Valley looked like a massive gash left upon the ck earth. It was slightly wider in the center and tapered off at the ends, stretching for nearly fifty kilometers. There were no signs of any greenery within several kilometers.


    Wisps of ck mist emanated from the depths of the valley, even in broad daylight, obscuring what was happening down there.


    ording to the historical records kept by the Adept¡¯s Association, Inkdeep Valley was not a natural valley. It was one that had been created by a single sword sh. It was a scar left behind from the battles of the Great Adepts of ancient times.


    As this sh¡¯s might had been too powerful, the principle powers contained within it hadsted up to the present. Despite the World of Adept¡¯s self-regenerative abilities, the damaged narws here had yet to be entirely restored after all these years.


    Thus, Inkdeep Valley became a ce of extremely chaotic narws.


    At this moment, numerous war towers stood along both sides of the massive rift that was Inkdeep Valley. The adept towers¡¯ light could be seen everywhere, piercing through the mists and illuminating the scenery below.


    Large groups of magical eyes patrolled above the valley, continually monitoring for changes below.


    The so-called Inkdep Valley didn¡¯t exist here on the surface, but ten thousand meters down in the valley¡¯s depths.


    That was where the narw chains had been severed, causing space itself to be thrown into turbulence and the flow of time to fluctuate wildly.


    The fifty-meter-long spacetime rift still constantly fluctuated, even today. Thousands of tiny spatial tremors would ur in the nearby space, creating a myriad of illusory effects and spacetime vortices.


    Countless adepts hade here to study the changes in spacetime over the past tens of thousands of years, but none of them had returned with anything to show for their efforts. The few individuals that got too close to the spacetime rift had been dragged into it and vanished entirely, never to be seen again.


    Some had tried to pass straight through Inkdeep Valley. Half the time, they found themselves outside the World of Adepts¡¯ nar barrier after passing through the rift. Of course, the other half had likely been teleported to a random corner of the universe. Moreover, the location of the teleportation through the spacetime rift was different every time. There were no patterns to speak of.


    It seemed like this spacetime rift was exactly what it was imed to be¨C a rift created by the destruction of mighty principle powers from an adept of ancient times. There was nothing particrly unusual about it beyond that.


    Most of the time, the Adept¡¯s Association kept the spacetime rift beneath Inkdeep Valley sealed. However, this didn¡¯t stop unusual things from emerging every so often.


    With the magic surge¡¯s arrival, the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s seals had been broken, and the rift was active once again.


    A series of strange and powerful monsters and magical creatures emerged from the spacetime rift with every wave of the magic surge. These monsters would roam the bottom of the valley and fight each other. asionally, some of the more powerful creatures would charge out of the valley and attempt to break into Association territory.


    When that happened, the war towers above the valley would fire with all their might!


    It hadn¡¯t even been a month since the eruption of the magic surge, but the pile of magical creature corpses at the bottom of the valley was already a dozen meters thick. Corpses also littered the exit to the valley, the ground scarred by terrifying marks left behind by elementium bombardment.


    The patrol in the sky used to be formed by squads of Association adepts. However, ever since a squad of adepts had been lured into the valley by the gaze of a particrly powerful magical creature to be fodder, the patrolling was left entirely to the magical eyes.


    Association adepts released magical eyes from the safety of the war towers, covering the entire valley and monitoring every single change in the spacetime rift.


    asionally, high-grade Association adepts would lead elite parties into the valley to exterminate the magical creatures piling up in there. They wanted to prevent them from establishing any kind of order and organization that would make them even more challenging to deal with.


    Every time this happened, Inkdeep Valley turned into a battleground filled with blood and ughter!


    Inkdeep. A demon¡¯s abyss soaked with blood as dark as ink.


    ............


    Dense mist roamed before the eyes.


    An acrid and pungent odor lingered in the polluted air.


    The odor was so strong and overpowering that an ordinary person would suffocate to death in moments.


    The ck earth beneath their feet was obscured by the innumerable corpses below them. The Association party was literally stepping over corpses as they advanced.


    This party only had seventeen members, but three were Fourth Grade, and the rest were Third Grade. It was an unbelievably powerful squad of adepts.


    Even the weakest member of the party was an intermediate Third Grade. Such power alone would have qualified that adept as a n leader of a mid-sized n in the Central Lands. Here, he was no more than a porter meant to collect magical resources.


    It was Fourth Grade Body-Refining Adept Horner who walked at the forefront, followed swiftly by Fourth Grade Elementium Adept Schreiber. The third Fourth Grade adept was Neve. She was thest person in the formation, in charge of covering the rear.


    The rest of the party members were all Third Grade, without even a single Second Grade to drag them down. These Third Grades covered almost every single profession found in the adept power system, from array masters to sealing masters to psionics and enchanters. They were a versatile and well-rounded team.


    The three Fourth Grades in charge ofbat were also a well-bnced team. Body-Refining Adept Horner was the tank, Fire Adept Schreiber was the offense, and they had the more versatile Bloodline Adept Neve. Even abat squad like this was very well-rounded, capable of dealing with any situation that came up while also retaining the necessarybat force.


    The incredible might of the Adept¡¯s Association could not be more evident than here!


    The party had been proceeding toward the bottom of the valley along a steep slope ever since they entered the valley. Greenish-brown steelrock was in the valley¡¯s walls around them as they walked, carved with numerous defensive arrays.


    These arrays were to prevent some of the more unusual magical creatures from tunneling into the earth and escaping Inkdeep Valley that way.


    As they walked, it became obvious that many magical creatures had emerged from the rift over the past few weeks. Several deep w marks and signs of damage could be seen in the sturdy stone walls around them.


    The adept with the lowest grade in the party was a female adept. She wore skintight white leather armor and had her hair in a ponytail. She held a half-meter-long wand with a tip that constantly glowed with lights of different colors.


    All of a sudden, she pointed her crystal wand at a pile of corpses beside her, and the tip of the wand glowed deep purple.


    ¡°My lord, there¡¯s the corpse of a me smence over there!¡± The adept hurriedly cried out.


    ¡°A me smence,¡± Schreiber, who was walking second in the formation, couldn¡¯t help but stop and give out orders, ¡°I want its hearts. You can collect what other parts you find useful! Riven, Garr, the two of you protect her!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    Two adepts bowed at the same time and escorted the female adept toward the pile of corpses. Meanwhile, the other members of the party spread around, resting silently as they waited for the organ harvesting to bepleted.


    While Inkdeep Valley caused enormous trouble for the Adept¡¯s Association, it also brought them incredible benefits. That benefit was the wealth of magical creature resources from all over the universe.


    Many of these magical creatures were monsters not found in the World of Adepts. Their magical organs and bodyponents had incredible research value for high-grade adepts. It was only natural for them to harvest some resources every time they took a trip like this.


    While they were waiting silently in ce, Body-Refining Adept Horner frowned. He flickered and appeared in the center of the valley¡¯s narrow path, gazing straight into the turbulent mists below.


    The other members of the party were veterans as well. Through their own means, they had all picked up on the abnormality below. They took up positions and prepared for a battle.


    Schreiber stood firmly at the center of the formation, palms facing upward as fire gathered above them. Two zing fires could also be seen more clearly in his eyes.


    The trembling of the earth was bing more prominent.


    Suddenly, the mist parted as a gigantic creature ten meters in height lunged out from within. It tackled Horner with agile movements.


    ¡°Careful...its a corpse hound!¡± Schreiber was instantly able to identify their attacker with his knowledge.


    Corpse hounds were undead creatures created by fanatical necromancers or death gods. They were dogs whose bodies, upon closer inspection, would be revealed to be sewn out of countless rotting human corpses.


    The process of creating a corpse hound was incredibly cruel and horrifying. These human corpses might be long dead, but they would still let out haunting cries and death throes every so often, making every witness to their screams quake in fear.


    The corpse hound that the adept party had run into was a powerful Fourth Grade undead. Moreover, it was one with its own aura of fear.


    The corpse hound charged at Horner without any hesitation when it emerged from the mists.


    Horner¡¯s gaze turned sharp. He took a big breath, and his right arm swelled several times in size, bing asrge as a giant¡¯s arm.


    He let out a roaring bellow.


    Horner stomped forward with his feet and extended his right arm, meeting the Fourth Grade corpse hound¡¯s tackle head-on.


    Just as Horner¡¯s overwhelming strength blew back the corpse hound, Schreiber waved both his hands. A series of fireballs exploded on the monstrosity¡¯s body.


    The other members of the party also took out wands and scrolls, drowning the corpse hound¡¯s position in a barrage of spells.

 Chapter 1368 - Abyssal Demons

    <strong>Chapter 1368 Abyssal Demons</strong>


    A beginner Fourth Grade corpse hound was a terrifying monstrosity capable of causing mass murder in any nar world. Their undead body and aura of fear made them a fearsome enemy.


    However, this corpse hound had been pulverized and reduced to a puddle of blood in less than three seconds after running into this elite party of adepts from the Association. What remained of the rotting corpse was rapidly dissolving into a pungent ck puddle that slowly seeped into the dark earth.


    In the end, the only thing left behind was a withered heart and a grudge crystal.


    Both of these were valuable Fourth Grade materials.


    However, Horner¡¯s bearded face showed no signs of joy as he watched his subordinates carefully put away the spoils of the battle.


    He stared solemnly into the mists below, his expression cold and severe.


    ¡°Seems like a big guy has appeared down there. Otherwise, a vicious predator like the corpse hound wouldn¡¯t have charged out so carelessly.¡±


    Schreiber, who stood beside him, dispelled his fire shields with a wave. He sensed the valley¡¯s aura with a frown, treating the situation with equal seriousness.


    ¡°It¡¯s the smell of sulfur and fire. I¡¯m afraid some demon from the Abyssal World has arrived! Who cares? We only have to wipe it out when we run into it. I just happen tock some demon¡¯s blood for an experiment!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not a big deal if it¡¯s just one or two demons, but if there are too many of them......¡± Even the usually impulsive and reckless Horner couldn¡¯t help but hesitate. ¡°These fiends have tough hides. It¡¯s always a pain to cut through them.¡±


    ¡°We will retreat if there are too many of them. Let them bash their heads bloody against the war towers before wee out and slice off their heads. It¡¯s not like you intend to die in this awful valley, yes?¡± Schreiber replied unamusedly.


    Horner let out a brazenugh and continued walking into the mist ahead of everyone else.


    ............


    The Central Lands, the Ahlden mega-rift.


    Compared to Inkdeep Valley, the mega-rift here was a dozen times smaller. Consequently, the number and power of otherworldly monsters emerging from this rift were also iparable.


    Andrew¡¯s Ahlden n was also iparable to the colossus that was the Adept¡¯s Association. It had hardly been a month, but the pressure he¡¯d had to endure was already wearing on him.


    Still, he could not abandon his identity as the leader of the Ahlden n. This ce was his n¡¯s territory, after all; right behind him stood his trusted subordinates and n members who had followed him for hundreds of years. Moreover, thisnd was still home to the Ahlden n¡¯s six million civilians and their countless vis, castles, and viges.


    Should even one magical creature slip past his garrison here, all the nearby towns and their residents would face an apocalypse.


    Before the magic surge, he had evacuated most of the civilians in his territory to areas protected by adept towers. However, the chaos caused by such mass migration was causing him a headache.


    The magic surge would not just end in a matter of days. ording to past experience, it would take a hundred years from the magic surge¡¯s eruption to the mid-phase stabilization to its final dissipation.


    A hundred years. It might be a small slice in the life of high-grade adepts, but it was an entire generation for the frail and fragile mortals.


    The n might be able to concentrate the civilians and shelter them for a time given their resource reserves. However, if the situation dragged on, even the Ahlden n would not be able to support so many mouths without any ie.


    That was why Andrew¡¯s current n was only to survive the most ferocious, initial ten years of the magic surge. Once the situation had stabilized slightly, he would try his best to restore his territories to their original states and return the civilians to where they hade from.


    The mega-rift remained thergest variable in this n of his!


    Should there be a day where an overwhelmingly powerful starbeast broke through their line of defenses, the n will not have anything else to stop them. Even someone with half a brain could imagine what would happen next.


    In all honesty, the main reason the Ahlden n had managed to firmly defend the mega-rift was due to the five-hundred-strong magical machine army from the Crimson n, as well as Mary and Mornashen Gaia who had been stationed here.


    For an ordinary adept n, its strength came from the n adepts it had cultivated. These adepts might be few in number, but they were crucial to a n and formed the very foundation of a n¡¯s prosperity.


    Most adept ns would also raise armies of magical creatures or adept forces to make up for insufficiencies in their military power. Adept forces were fundamentally adept apprentices that possessedbat prowess equal to adepts. It was a way of putting to use apprentices who had no hopes of advancing.


    However, the impact of the magic surge had forced most of these armies to return to the lesser nes and maintain their ruling order in those worlds. The only things that Andrew had left to defend the mega-rift were a few voodoo beast squadrons and a handful of adept forces.


    A force like this might be enough to deal with an ordinary adept war, but they were ipetent when it came to apprehending starbeasts and magical creatures that could cross through space and arrive here in the World of Adepts.


    So far, only two starbeasts had managed to break-in through the mega-rift.


    The Fourth Grade starbeast was injured by Mary and then hunted down by the Ahlden n¡¯s winged dragon force. Andrew had personally killed the other Third Grade starbeast near the towers.


    Apart from these starbeasts, over a hundred other magical creatures and monsters had also swarmed into the nar world. The weakest of them had been an advanced Second Grade creature. A monster like that would have easily massacred an entire kingdom of mortals.


    Here on this battlefield, it was no more than the most insignificant cannon fodder.


    However, starting from the thirty-seventh day of the magic surge, the mega-rift¡¯s tremors had intensified. The otherworldly creatures emerging from the rift began to trend more and more toward abyssal demons.


    There were the weak demons, the Second Grade redme demons, the longhorn demons, hellhounds, quasits, vrocks, and the subi. Then there were the stronger demons reaching up to Fourth Grade: the demon-hunting spiders, the hezrous, the brezu, the mariliths, and the balors.


    Andrew suspected very strongly that a Great Abyssal Lord wanted to invade the World of Adepts and had opened a nar portal connecting the Abyssal World with the mega-rift. That was why so many hideous and annoying abyssal demons had appeared in his territory.


    It wasmon knowledge that abyssal demons were twisted beings that were easy to anger. They were filled with malice and were violent, tyrannical, unpredictable, and had no sense of morality.


    They often invaded other nar worlds, bringing destruction and fear with them.


    They worked their hardest to destroy and take apart everything. They reveled in the process.


    They opposed order, so much so that even Abyssal Lords could not make them obey their everymand.


    Unless they were controlled by way of magic, there was no way they would unite. Nor was it possible for them to execute an operation in an organized manner. Any ns they might have had one moment could be shoved aside the next. They could hardly care about thepletion of ns and the realization of goals.


    All they cared about was whether their streak for violence, cruelty, blood, murder, and chaos could be fulfilled. They didn¡¯t care about anything else beyond that.


    In the end, abyssal demons were no more than evil spirits or evil, hideous creatures created by the corruption of the Abyssal Will. They possessed no rationality.


    Other magical creatures might consider their odds of survival when breaking into a nar world for a feast. Abyssal demons couldn¡¯t care less. They would storm forth like overeager hounds, even if they knew it was a bloody battlefield where they had no chances of survival.


    Battle, fighting, and killing until they crashed into a puddle of their own blood.


    Even a Fourth Grade adept like Andrew hated to deal with such bloodthirsty monsters!


    No number of abyssal demons could threaten his life. However, they were a considerable threat to the war towers of the Ahlden n.


    After all, all abyssal demons were powerful beings versed in magic as well as physicalbat!


    They possessed dark, magic-resistant skin covered in magical patterns and tremendous strength. Almost all of them could endure the bombardment of the war towers and charge forward.


    Meanwhile, even casual demonic spells they hurled at the tower could leave behind visible marks.


    More concerningly, most high-grade demons possessed Pinpoint Teleportation, allowing them to teleport to any location on the battlefield within their vision. This racial ability rendered the adepts¡¯ strategy of using voodoo beasts to stall the enemy while the towers unleashed fire moot.


    Any Ahlden n adept that dared leave their tower would instantly be swarmed by a horde of demons and torn apart. It didn¡¯t matter how strong you were or how excellent your magic was; you would die on the spot against the ruthless horde of demons.


    That was why, after losing two Third Grade adepts, not a single Ahlden n adept dared to take another step from the tower.


    In doing so, the task of preventing the demons from fleeing fell squarely on the shoulders of the voodoo beasts. However, next to the massive and fearsome abyssal demons, they were like hounds before lions. There was nothing they could do but howl and whimper in despair.


    As some of the abyssal demons fled the battlefield and broke into the backlines, the fires of war started to spread.


    In just a few days, the smoke of war was rising all over Ahlden territory. The cries of humans could be heard everywhere as the demonic creatures went on a rampage. The previously peaceful human society had be a sacrifice to this magic surge.


    Andrew stood in a dark and sinister room. He solemnly tapped the magical crystal in front of him and sent out a request for help.

 Chapter 1369 - Abyssal Invasion

    Chapter 1369 Abyssal Invasion


    ¡°...you must understand where I stand. My White Ghosts are already stationed in the ne of Randen. In fact, they are engaged in conflict with the intruders there as we speak. What about the Stonedragons? That¡¯s impossible. They have to guard our n headquarters. If they leave, the headquarters will bepletely vulnerable.¡±


    ¡°I am very sorry, Andrew. I really want to help you, but things are just as tight on my end. Therefore......¡±


    The anger burning in Andrew¡¯s heart was close to erupting as he watched Nics with his expression of pity in the magical crystals. However, the only thing he could do was cut off themunication and make that ugly old face vanished from his view.


    The only light source in the room dimmed, and the room turned dark again, much like how he currently felt.


    There were different social circles amongst the Fourth Grade adepts. Andrew had contacted three of his panions¡¯ that he was on the best terms with, but all of them had rejected his call for help.


    Andrew knew that those three would never easily hand over their forces, even if they had any idle troops lying around. The magic surge wouldst for a hundred years. Every n would have to dedicate all their resources just to survive. There was no way that anyone would be willing to help another n.


    Even if they had the military force to spare, they would be more inclined to hold it in their grasp as a mobile unit in response to any unexpected changes. That was why his act of calling for aid was utterly in vain. He had put his face out there so the others could trample on it.


    A small magical rune still hovered in the dimmunication crystal. It was the magical brand with which to contact the Crimson n. He could contact the legendary fire adept, Greem, whose name had spread across the Central Lands with just a single tap.


    For some reason, his outstretched right hand hesitated for a moment. It hovered in the air, refusing to press the crystal.


    Andrew knew full well what would happen once he pressed this button. It was very likely that the Ahlden n would lose all its independence henceforth. If he were to survive this cmity by borrowing the power of the Crimson n, how was he supposed to return a favor this huge?


    However, everything happening in his territory left him no room to decide otherwise. If he were to bring back all adept forces stationed across the lesser nes to reinforce the n, he might have a chance of repelling the enemies and allowing the n to survive this first wave of the magic surge.


    That said, it would plunge the three lesser nes into chaos. It was possible that the three nes would forever fall out of the Ahlden n¡¯s control.


    Moreover, there would still be a second wave, a third, and a fourth. Even if the Ahlden n survived the hundred years of the magic surge, they would be badly bruised, and their foundations would be shaken.


    That was why Andrew only hesitated for a moment. In the end, he reached out and tapped the rune.


    The negotiations with Greem were straightforward and easy. So much so that Andrew couldn¡¯t help but doubt his ears.


    The first batch of magical machines would arrive at the mega-rift in seven hours. Versailles, the Crimson Fleet gship that carried the magical machines, would be responsible for wiping out the demons that had broken into Ahlden territory.


    As for the price? If the corpse of a Third Grade starbeast could be considered a price, then Greem was honestly not asking for much. It stunned Andrew, who had, in truth, prepared to hand over authority to half his n¡¯s territory.


    After ending themunications, Andrew personally summoned his most trusted Third Grade adept, Hahn. He had him bring the corpse of the Third Grade starbeast to Fire Throne.


    Five hours after the messenger set off, a silver ship that covered half the sky slowly drifted into Ahlden territory. It did not change course to pursue the demons scattered all across thend. Instead, it headed straight for the mega-rift.


    ............


    Dark red plumes of smoke were spreading near the mega-rift.


    The earth rotted and the rocks crumbled wherever the power of corruption reached.


    The chaotic and disordered Abyssalws shed with the World of Adepts¡¯ narws, devouring and neutralizing each other, leaving countless pieces ofw fragments in space.


    At this moment, the mega-rift was like a portal that led straight to the Abyssal World. Every so often, the mega-rift shimmered and trembled before spitting out a hundred magical creatures of various grades.


    Most of these were low-grade demonic creatures, with a few resilient longhorn demons or vrock scouts mixed among them every so often.


    Unfortunately, the numerous spatial faults and spacetime fragments near the mega-rift shredded most of these demons to pieces before they could even see where they were.


    However, their relentless efforts were not in vain.


    As more and more demon blood scattered across thend, the earth around the mega-rift began to degrade quicker and quicker. Now, even the wind itself carried a hint of the Abyssal World¡¯s unique heat and madness.


    There were also monsters from other worlds teleported over through the mega-rift alongside the abyssal demons. However, they were clearly enemies with each other as well. The first thing they did upon arriving was to fight each other.


    Initially, everyone fought their own battles. As more and more monsters appeared, two distinct factions began to form¨C the abyssal demons and all the other monsters.


    The abyssal demons gathered together andunched a vicious attack against the non-demonic monsters. Figures could be seen all over the edge of the mega-rift engaged in a gruesome battle. Tattered corpses and colossal silhouettes were everywhere.


    Of course, many individual creatures couldn¡¯t be bothered with this ¡®civil war¡¯ between the demons and the monsters. They broke free of the conflict and strode toward the forest of war towers in the distance.


    After a month of constant fighting and destruction, several gaps had appeared in the formerly tight array of adept towers and war towers. Over a hundred of the twenty-meter-tall war towers had been destroyed. A mountain of monster corpses piled around each of their smoldering remains.


    It was evident that the abyssal demons had also paid a tremendous price for breaking the Ahlden¡¯s defensive line. However, such losses were minimalpared to the entirety of the Abyssal World, which was hundreds, if not a thousand, timesrger than the World of Adepts in size.


    The Abyssal World had regrlyunched foreign incursions on other worlds. All the wealth, resources, and souls they obtained were converted into part of the Abyssal World, perpetually strengthening that corrupted, evil, and twisted world consciousness.


    Any single Great Abyssal Lord of the Abyssal World possessed sprawling territories and armiesparable to the World of Adepts. Their armies stretched across mountains and ins, and they fed upon the flesh of otherworldly creatures. That was why the only thing that Andrew faced was endless warfare and destruction.


    The rate at which demons emerged from the mega-rift hastened even further, as if they had sensed the impending arrival of war.


    Finally, as ripples spread across space, a Fourth Grade minor demon lord broke free of the spatial restraints and arrived in the World of Adepts.


    The demon lord had just emerged from the spatial rift when his massive and vicious body was bound to the spot byw chains reaching out of thin air. The nar suppression instantly weakened his overwhelming aura.


    Fernus roared furiously, his four short and thick hooves stomping against the ck earth. His massive body, asrge as a dragon, struggled violently with all his might. The countless spikes on his body were snapped and crushed by the chains, inflicting unprecedented damage to Fernus¡¯ body.


    However, as he continued to rampage and struggle, he started to gain more ease of movement.


    When that fearsome executor¡¯s de with its jagged edge and zing abyssal mes appeared in Fernus¡¯ hand, the World of Adepts¡¯ suppression was reduced to its lowest degree!


    Fernus lifted the executor¡¯s de above his head and let out a beast-like howl at the nar consciousness that managed this world. Its vicious and ugly appearance, the massive sword burning with purple mes, and that mouth full of sharp teeth. This creature was a perfect personification of the unique cruelty and violence of the abyssal demons. A murderous Demon¡¯s Aura instantly appeared around him.


    Was it already taunting the nar consciousness of the World of Adepts upon appearing?


    It was the first time Commander Locke had seen such an arrogant, unreasonable, and foolish individual. He moved the monitoring crystal and observed the powerful abyssal lord from every angle. Locke clicked his tongue in awe, all while giving outbat orders to his many subordinates in themand center.


    Just a monster from another world. Why are you so arrogant?


    The next moment, a dark red light shed where Versailles was. A three-meter-thick beam of light cut across the battlefield and sted against the body of the abyssal lord.


    Abyssal Lord Fernus turned his wrist and ced the giant de in front of him in response to this sudden attack. The Light of Annihtion fired by the giant magic energy cannon shed with the abyssal mes zing on the sword, giving off a blinding light.


    When the light finally disappeared with the Light of Annihtion¡¯s dissipation, the proud figure of Abyssal Lord Fernus appeared before the mega-rift once again.


    A visible, one-meter hole had appeared on Fernus¡¯ body and sword. You could see the scorched earth behind Fernus through this hole, along with his purple blood and the nearly-burned organs in his body.


    It was obvious that the abyssal lord had not managed to block the full might of the giant cannon. In the end, the Light of Annihtion had been able to injure its mighty body.


    However, while such injuries might have been enough to kill any living being ten times over, it was no more than a severe wound to Fernus!


    Fernus roared furiously with his hideous face, letting out a deafening cry at the Mothership in the air. As he shouted, several unusual and powerful figures emerged from the mega-rift. They beat their ck and red wings as they charged at the Mothership.

 Chapter 1370 - Bloody Battlefield

    Chapter 1370 Bloody Battlefield


    The first wave of enemies to emerge from the mega-rift was a pack of thirty vrocks.


    These were a kind of unusual demons that resembledrge bats. They had scrawny bodies but exceptionallyrge leather wings. They circled the skies like vultures waiting for prey. Their attacks were fast and vicious, primarily relying on their sharp ws.


    Most abyssal demons might have a pair of leather wings on their backs, but they were often too bulky and heavy to actually fly. The pair of wings they possessed were more decorative than functional.


    For instance, the quasits that looked like skinned toads and the longhorn demons infamous for their barbaric rushes were all unable to fly. Regardless of how hard they pped their wings, they could only make themselves hover about half a meter above the ground.


    A flying altitude like that was virtually the same as not being able to fly.


    The most capable flyers among the abyssal demons were probably these vrocks.


    They had scrawny, light bodies that allowed them to sprawl their wings and soar in the skies. By relying on berserking spells and their sharp ws, they were threats that could not be underestimated.


    While vrocks had mediocre meleebat abilities, their exceptional flying skills allowed them to be intermediate-grade demons. They often took up the role of scouts and lookouts under the rule of demon lords.


    Upon seeing their master Demon Lord Fernus injured by that strange ship in the sky, all the vrocks let out a peculiar cry resembling that of an ape. They beat their wings and rushed into the air.


    They circled in the sky, avoiding the giant cannon at the silver ship¡¯s front as they dashed toward the expansive deck.


    Before they could get close, rows of magical machines stepped onto the deck of the Versailles. The next second, a blinding sh of light lit up the sky as a barrage of energy fireballs crashed into the ranks of the vrocks.


    These vrocks were mostly Second Grade creatures. Only a few individuals that led the pack had reached Third Grade. They screeched in the face of the storm of fireballs, but they did not have time to turn away before the mes engulfed them.


    Large squads of magical machines always apanied the Crimson Fleet. Almost everyone in the World of Adepts knew this. Unfortunately, these vrocks did not!


    The abyssal demons might have potent fire resistance due to their physiques, but they were not actually immune to fire. The overwhelming fireballs still inflicted severe magical damage to the vrocks.


    Seven of the thirty Second Grade vrocks were scorched ck in the first wave of fireballs. They crashed down from the skies and left a trail of ck smoke behind them. However, judging by the way they struggled as they fell, only two of them were actually dead. The other five were only severely injured.


    ¡°Dammit! These demons have ridiculous fire resistance. We can¡¯t take them down like this! All units, attention! Switch to frost rays!¡± The magical mechanic in charge ofmanding the magical machines shouted out loud. Mechanical whirring could be heard as they switched their equipment. The next wave of attacks was no longer energy fireballs but a rain of frost rays.


    Apart from the frost rays, powerful explosive goblin rockets also whistled and took to the air. Each of these rockets was as thick as a man¡¯s arm and one-meter long. They contained plenty of arcane crystal fragments and metal bullets inside them.


    Every time a goblin rocket howled and surged into the midst of the demons, the impact would cause the arcane crystal fragments to explode outward violently. The shockwaves, along with the shocking amount of shrapnel, would erupt where the demons were densely packed. That scene of carnage was an extremely cathartic sight for everyone who could witness it.


    The savage force of explosion made the metal bullets exceptionally lethal!


    Pupupu!


    A series of puncturing sounds could be heard. The vrocks that had been engulfed in the explosion were blown away, their bodies trembling unstoppably as the shrapnel cut through them. Holes the size of a finger appeared all over their bodies, and purple blood sttered everywhere.


    The thirty-strong squad of vrocks had suffered tremendous casualties after just three rounds of attacks from the machines. Only the two Third Grade elite vrocks managed to escape the enemy¡¯s range of attack, themselves wounded and badly injured. The rest of the vrocks had died in the barrage.


    The two elite vrocks screeched as they circled in the air, but they did not dare cross the enemy¡¯s line of fire again!


    Demon Lord Fernus had been standing silently on the spot, absorbing the abyssal aura radiating from the mega-rift to mend his wounds. He lifted his head with his bloodshot eyes opened wide. He couldn¡¯t believe what he had just seen.


    That was a squad of intermediate-grade vrocks! They were an excellent aerial assault squad, even in the Abyssal World. To think...to think they had been exterminated before they could even reach the enemy.


    Fernus drew in a breath of cold air. For the first time, he felt regret for his recklessness!


    However, abyssal demons were truly violent creatures whose minds were filled with only murder.


    Fernus only maintained his rationality for three seconds before the thick scent of blood devoured it on the battlefield. He let out another furious roar and ordered every demon to charge at the enemy in the distance.


    A bloody battlefield, a ground stained with blood, broken corpses, and the provoking battlecry of a demon lord. The hordes of abyssal demons that had just teleported over howled and rushed into battle before their bodies had even adapted to the new nar environment.


    The numerous war towers unleashed their might. The tower walls glowed with prismatic light, shooting out bolts of lightning, des of ice, and raising spears of earth from the ground. All of these attacks inflicted devastating damage to the crowded army of abyssal demons.


    This ce was a battlefield. It didn¡¯t matter how strong an individual abyssal demon was or how excellent their magic resistance. None of them could survive the endless barrage of a dozen war towers. Their towering bodies were shredded to pieces, those pieces then ground to paste and mixed with the ck earth until they were indistinguishable.


    However, even amidst the storm of spells,rge groups of high-grade demons were using Pinpoint Teleportation to arrive beside the war towers instantly.


    When that happened, it was the voodoo beasts¡¯ duty to charge forward and stall the demons!


    A simple war tower measured twenty to thirty meters in height. There were no living facilities orboratories in them. They only had basic offensive and defensive arrays, as well as a small energy pool.


    War towers had no elementium altars of their own. Thus, they could not absorb ambient magical energy from space. Their functions relied primarily on their small energy pool, which was connected to an actual adept tower¡¯s energy room. Thus, a war tower could only be considered an extension of an adept tower.


    Because of their simplification, it was impractical to use the same materials in their construction as used in adept towers. These war towers were quite vulnerable to an abyssal demon¡¯s reckless attacks, each of whom was easily eight meters tall and several tons heavy.


    The voodoo beasts standing around the war towers were the only thing that could stop the abyssal demons!


    However, while both the demons and voodoo beasts were meant to be cannon fodder, the demons were far better at their job.


    The abyssal demons were all big and strong. Their bodies were even covered with tough scales and corrupted armor. Moreover, they were capable of unleashing instant-cast spells. The voodoo beasts were like hunting hounds facing down ferocious lions. It didn¡¯t matter how much they struggled or how fearless they were. They were cut down by the score in front of the demons.


    Redme demons were a sort of low-grade demon, moremonly known as fire demons. They were the primary forms of intermediate-grade Ash Lords. If Ash Lords could evolve one step further, they would be the legendary me Fiends, capable of incinerating everything in their way.


    First Grade redme demons were considered a special branch of the abyssal demons that were the best at long-ranged attacks.


    Upon seeing the longhorn demons, the quasits, and the hezrous ughtering the voodoo beasts and assaulting the war tower, the redme demons got to work as well. They gathered in groups with their skinny bodies zing with purple abyssal mes. They shouted as they hurled globs of abyssal fire at the war towers.


    The war towers had been constructed out of magic-resistant stone and reinforced with defensive arrays, all while protected by an energy barrier. However, no number of defensive measures could stand up to the endless onught of war.


    As the abyssal demons marched forth and unleashed their attacks, the war towers on the outside started to fall, one by one. Legions of voodoo beasts were ughtered and cut down. The battlefield ran red with blood. You could see corpses lying everywhere.


    Every time a war tower copsed, the Ahlden n adepts within had to scramble away to safety.


    They had to escape from a tower¡¯s ruins to the closest war tower, or even the adept tower behind the lines. These distances of no more than a hundred meters were often the difference between life and death!


    The abyssal demons that had been ravaged by the war towers would instantly teleport the moment they caught sight of the adepts.


    Dong, dong, dong!


    The sound of their teleportation filled the air, and the escaping adepts would instantly find themselves engulfed in the shadows of multiple looming creatures. The demons swung their sharp ws and weapons, and these First and Second Grade human adepts would die on the spot.


    The corpses they left behind were instantly split between all the abyssal demons!

 Chapter 1371 - Clash of Iron and Blood

    <h4>Chapter 1371 sh of Iron and Blood</h4>


    As pure abyssal creatures, demons were almost always rejected by material nes.


    The powers of evil, chaos, and corruption they represented were no different from a lethal poison for most nar creatures. In fact, their powers could directly corrupt the souls of nar creatures.


    Souls killed and devoured by demons, even those belonging to believers of the gods, would not be able to remain in the higher nes. Those souls would fall to the Abyssal World, along with all the other tainted souls, to suffer all sorts of torture from the harsh environment there.


    The reason the demons swarmed into the World of Adepts fearlessly was to obtain a chance to reap the souls of nar creatures. The more they killed, the more souls they corrupted, the more potent the feedback they would receive from the Abyssal consciousness after returning.


    It was incredibly difficult to advance in grade in most worlds. It required constant training and the umtion of energy. Meanwhile, the advancement of abyssal demons was fast and straightforward. All they had to do was kill without stop and steal souls without pause, and they would be able to grow stronger and stronger without limit.


    Consequently, if they were fortunate enough, mere abyssalrvae could evolve into a Fourth Grade higher demon in just two or three years.


    Such rapid evolution and a simple path of advancement spared the abyssal demons from thinking too much. There was no need for thought or research. All they had to do was focus on killing and devouring.


    One had to admit that abyssal demons were terrifying murdererspared to most other nar creatures!


    As legion upon legion of demons died on the frontline, their corpses and flesh turned into puddles of ck liquid that continued to corrupt thend. The initial demonification of the area around the mega-rift had beenpleted.


    The abyssal aura seeping from the mega-rift was able to repel the World of Adepts¡¯ narws even further, converting part of the battlefield into a ce like the Abyssal World, harsh and barren.


    The human adepts weakened when fighting on suchnd. Meanwhile, the nar suppression that the invading demons experienced rapidly lessened.


    This weakening of the adepts and strengthening of demons widened the gap in their power even further!


    After a long recharge time, the giant magic energy cannon on the Versailles was finally ready. A thick beam of red light cut across the sky and sted toward the demon lord once again.


    Unfortunately, Fernus easily teleported and dodged this powerful attack.


    The energy beam grazed past his shoulder, burning a bottomless hole into the ck earth.


    Meanwhile, Demon Lord Fernus had managed to patch up the massive hole in his chest with his potent regenerative power. His injuries had gone from ¡®severe¡¯ to ¡®light.¡¯


    If he had a little more time, he might even be able to wipe away all signs of that wound. When that happened, Fernus would have entirely recovered to a fearsome demon of frightening power.


    The overwhelming regenerative power of demonic creatures was iparable!


    The mega-rift was still spitting out all sorts of demons endlessly. There were chittering imps, horned demons, and firelobbers, as well as more powerful demons like vrocks, hezrous, subi, and redme demons.


    These demons¡ªwhich would usually fight and kill each other¡ªhad be allies on the battlefield under themand of Demon Lord Fernus. They might not see eye-to-eye, butrge scale conflict within their ranks had not broken out.


    They gathered with their own race of demons, and the legion of demons began to growrger andrger.


    Most of the abyssal demons rushed at the war towers in the distance without hesitation, provoked by Fernus¡¯shes and cries. The rest of the demons were unable to suppress their raging excitement. They had smelled the unique scent of nar creatures and had slipped away to where the feast was waiting.


    They couldn¡¯t wait to explore this beautiful world filled with the fragrance of good!


    If these abyssal demons were allowed to run rampant in human society, even a single First or Second Grade demon would be enough to cause a massacre.


    After all, ordinary humans were far too weakpared to these abyssal demons.


    Moreover, the demons were vicious creatures that had emerged alive from endless battles, while the humans were mere farmers equipped with only their tools. It didn¡¯t matter if there were a thousand farmers for every demon; there was no changing a human¡¯s tragic fate of being hunted down and devoured.


    Even a fully equipped army of rabbits stood no chance against a lion!


    Upon seeing the situation reversed, Commander Locke of the Versailles waved his hand. A seven hundred strong army of magical machines descended to the ground on steel wires. They marched toward the battlefield in tight formation.


    Of the seven hundred troops in the magical machine army, five hundred were PG-52bat magical machines, while the other two hundred were goblin machinist-sorcerers.


    Unlike the voodoo beasts, they didn¡¯t have to engage the abyssal demons at melee distance; they all possessed long-range fire. The moment they stepped onto the battlefield, their Mark-II magic energy cannons, rapid-fire guns, ray guns, and goblin rocketsmenced firing.


    That ferocious and overwhelming firepower riddled every abyssal demon in range with holes and shredded them into pieces. For a moment, the entire battlefield echoed with the sound of roaring cannons and a rain of energy beams. The demons were beaten back right after they had started gaining the upper hand.


    Upon seeing this, a four-meter-tall Third Grade hezrou rushed at the magical machine army with bloodshot eyes. It raised its arm and pointed at the skies above the magical machines as it charged.


    The next second, ck and red clouds appeared as meteors crashed from the skies.


    Meteor Shower!


    A simple Third Grade fire spell.


    Though the might of the spell was inferior to that cast by a Third Grade fire adept, it was enough to disrupt the enemy formation and stall their advance. Against enemies with weaker magic resistance, this Third Grade spell alone would be enough to wipe out half of their numbers.


    The magical machine army disyed incredible discipline in the face of the demon¡¯s retaliation.


    The magical machines at the front of the formation put away their guns and cannons. They took out metal axes and longswords from their backs and rushed at the hezrou. Meanwhile, the magical machines behind them lifted their cannons and shot down the meteors with a barrage of attacks.


    Even the cloud of fire in the sky was torn apart by goblin rockets, preventing any more meteors from forming.


    The vast majority of the magical machines remaining were hardly fazed. They ignored the drizzle of mes drifting down from above and continued marching forward as they rained fire on the demons.


    The Third Grade hezrou was injured all over before it could even reach the machines. Blood covered its entire body. The moment it came into contact with the machines, it smashed a magical machine to pieces with its overwhelming strength. However, it was then pushed to the ground by the rest of the magical machines and beheaded, all its limbs chopped off swiftly at the same time.


    The Ahlden n adepts were stunned when they saw this. They couldn¡¯t help but start wondering about the true might of the machines.


    It was important to note that a Third Grade hezrou was a powerful creature that excelled physically and magically. It possessed tremendous physical strength and the ability to instant-cast numerous spells. A creature like that could even survive several rounds in a battle against a Fourth Grade adept.


    Supposedly, a powerful demon like that was not something that lesser creatures should be able to overwhelm with sheer numbers. However, this Third Grade hezrou had been forcefully taken apart by a group of magical machines of an average of intermediate Second Grade right before their eyes.


    These magical machines relied on their ferocious firepower!


    What if their opponent was not a demon but a Third Grade adept instead? How long would this Third Grade adept be able tost? And how many machines would they be able to take out before they died?


    The Ahlden n adepts couldn¡¯t help but sweat at the mere conjecture and estimation. Their hearts beat wildly.


    None!


    If both sides refused to back down and continued fighting to their deaths, then the Third Grade adept¡¯s magical shields would be shattered and riddled with holes before they could even eliminate a single magical machine.


    Of course, if they were a little more cunning, the Third Grade adept could retreat as they fought. They could flee after casting a single high-grade spell and returnter to ambush again.


    Through such a strategy, a Third Grade adept could slowly wear down this magical machine army due to theirck of a high-grade adept¡¯s escort.


    However, that was built on the assumption that the adept would be able to recover magic power rapidly, while the enemy had no means of reinforcing the magical machines. If the Mothership in the sky were to join the battle, such gueri tactics would be no more than a joke.


    Everyone had already witnessed the power of the giant magic energy cannon!


    Just because a demon lord had managed to easily dodge its attack didn¡¯t mean that human adepts would be able to do the same.


    If the Crimson n were to wage war with the Ahlden n, the Crimson n wouldn¡¯t even need to dispatch a single high-grade adept. Thebination of the fleet and the magical machines alone would be enough to wipe out the Ahlden n.


    Victory would most certainly belong to the Crimson n. The only question would be how many magical machines they would lose!


    The death of the hezrou seemed to be the prelude of something. In the next fifteen seconds, another four Third Grade demons died under the magical machines¡¯ barrage.


    It wasn¡¯t just the human adepts who had their attention drawn over now. Even Demon Lord Fernus couldn¡¯t help but look over.


    Fernus had raided over a dozen nes with his subordinates. Yet, even he couldn¡¯t help but be surprised. It was the demon lord¡¯s first time seeing a world use magical machines as the main force on a battlefield.


    Did he mess up and enter the wrong ne? Was this...not the World of Adepts?


    Fernus shook his spiky demon head and mumbled deeply in the demon¡¯s tongue. Soon, another powerful army of demons traveled through the mega-rift and descended upon the World of Adepts, revealing their vicious and ugly forms in front of everyone on the battlefield.

 Chapter 1372 - Mariliths

    Chapter 1372 Mariliths


    A group of high-grade mariliths emerged from the mega-rift.


    These demons had long, thick serpentine tails for a lower half, with four muscr arms- two extending from each side of their upper body. They were covered in fine, dark green scales, flickering their crimson tongues from between their mouths full of fangs. Their red eyes glowed with a sinister light as they assessed their surroundings.


    These high-grade mariliths intimidated all the demons around them the moment they appeared. The weaker, lower-grade demons moved aside, clearing out the battlefield¡¯s ttest and widest area for them.


    However, it wasn¡¯t over yet.


    As the mariliths parted, an exceptionally enchanting six-armed marilith appeared before everyone.


    It was a female Fourth Grade marilith!


    Her upper half alone was over four meters tall, making her a gigantic beauty.


    Her perfectly shaped face, that smooth white skin, those moving almond eyes, and that strange braid of brown hair that moved about despite theck of wind. Unfortunately, her naked upper half was covered in ayer of violent scales, preventing anyone from witnessing the tremendous beauty thaty beneath.


    Whenever this female marilith slithered forward with her dozen-meter-long tail, her breasts shook along with her movements, drawing everyone¡¯s gazing toward her chest. The numerous intricate metal bracelets she wore on her arm ttered as she moved, making a crisp ringing sound.


    Inexperienced apprentice adepts would often have trouble differentiating mariliths from medusas. That was only natural. After all, medusas had an inseparable bloodline tie to the mariliths.


    Mariliths would invade and raid material nes every chance they had. Consequently, they left behind many descendants with the bloodline of demons. For instance, there was the Demonspawn, a demon-human descendant.


    These demonspawn looked like humans, though they were often incredibly tough and strong upon reaching adolescence. Moreover, individuals with a concentrated bloodline would often manifest magical patterns on their bodies and could even draw upon the racial traits of their parents.


    There was a subset of these demonspawn whose fathers were high-grade adepts. The mothers were lowly subi or some other female demons.


    Most of these mixed-blood descendants did not have very good fates.


    The limit of a demonspawn that manifested magical patterns as a child was Third Grade. In the World of Adepts¡¯ history, there had never been a demonspawn adept that had managed to advance to Fourth Grade.


    The reason for it was simple. The nar consciousness was hostile toward these demonspawn and actively suppressed them!


    This group of high-grade mariliths surrounded the Fourth Grade six-armed marilith as they marched onto the battlefield.


    It was important to note that mariliths often took up the role of strategic nning among the abyssal demons. They were among the rare few demon species capable of rational thought and nning.


    Of course, due to abyssal demons¡¯ chaotic nature, there wasn¡¯t much point in handing out excellent strategies for them to execute. Any subtle schemes would eventually end up in a chaotic brawl.


    Of course, the demons were experts when it came down to an all-out fight!


    Most of the time, Fourth Grade six-armed mariliths had no choice but to step on the battlefield themselves to ensure their ns were carried out sessfully. They would dice their enemies with their numerous sharp swords.


    Moreover, this Fourth Grade marilith was clearly of equal standing with Demon Lord Fernus. She was able to pick up on the decisive factor influencing the trend of the battle the moment she set foot on the battlefield.


    She led her two dozen marilith subordinates, herding the hordes of low-grade demons toward the magical machine army. Once the magical machines and war towers¡¯ fire was drawn toward them, the mariliths instantly activated destorm and Pinpoint Teleportation to arrive right in the middle of the magical machines. A storm of carnage was instantly unleashed.


    destorm was the terrifying ultimate skill of mariliths.


    They could use magic energy to form multiple magical weapons around them and make them spin wildly. Every time a marilith activated destorm, it meant that they were ready to charge into enemy ranks.


    The long and thin des they held with their slender-yet-strong arms, and the storm of weapons spiraling around them turned every one of them into walking incarnations of destruction.


    Even if the enemy had surrounded them, the mariliths would be able to gracefully and elegantly walk through them as if taking a stroll through a garden. Where their des were pointed, they were uncontested. The only things they left behind were the shredded remains of their opponents.


    If a marilith were to rush into a horde of voodoo beasts with destorm activated, it would make for an impressive sight!


    des flying everywhere, blood sttering across the air, limbs falling here and there as beast after beast was beheaded and diced into a thousand tiny pieces. To step onto a battlefield where a marilith was present was the same as stepping into a ughterhouse. Torn pieces of flesh and bone would be everywhere around you.


    However, when these mariliths rushed into the ranks of the magical machine, they became stuck like a dull knife in a log. They were not unstoppable as they should be.


    Neither their destorms nor their swords worked. They only created sparks of fire when they shed the machines, leaving behind deep cuts but inflicting no further damage.


    The tremendous shock of the blows also caused the mariliths¡¯ wrists to hurt. The swords in their grip rang loudly as they struck metal.


    They couldn¡¯t...couldn¡¯t sh through!


    While the mariliths were momentarily surprised, the magical machines¡¯ retaliation gave them a good taste of pain.


    There was no fear of friendly fire at all. The rain of energy beams and goblin rockets instantly enveloped the mariliths. The horrifying elementium might of the energy beams and the endless barrage of metal bullets riddled them with holes.


    Mariliths might be high-grade demons with exceptionalbat technique and offensive power. However, their slender bodies meant that they were best suited as agile warriors. Even the scales on their bodies were mostly light and thin.


    These scales were effective defenses against light shing weapons like swords and daggers. In addition to their agile figures, they could avoid and neutralize most melee attacks. Their only weakness was ack of defensive power!


    Ack of defensive power!


    If their enemies were weaklings like the voodoo beasts, rushing in with destorm was the best course of action. However, the moment their offense stalled, then their act of charging the enemy would be nothing short of suicidal.


    After the first wave of bullets, seven of the Second Grade mariliths shrieked and copsed to the ground, dead and riddled with holes.


    However, the five Third Grade mariliths and the Fourth Grade marilith were still as vicious as before. As high-grade demons, their offensive attacks were beyond the limits of what the magical machines could survive.


    Six miniature storms of des raged on among the magical machines. Where the mariliths passed, the PG-52 magical machines were disassembled, cast in every direction as fragments of metal and pieces of gear.


    You could still see sparks of electricity crackling between the broken pieces as they went flying.


    High-grade demons were truly high-grade. If they were to go all-out, they could easily slice up these machines made out of magical alloy ten times tougher than steel.


    After just a single encounter, seven mariliths had died, while the magical machines had suffered over thirty casualties.


    Perhaps sensing the threat of these mariliths, the war towers turned around and started sted bolts of lightning down at the demons. The mariliths twisted and vanished from the spot under themand of the Fourth Grade marilith, dodging the numerous magical attacks.


    The Fourth Grade six-armed marilith herself ignored the bolts of lightning. She erected an elementium barrier to protect herself and continued to hunt down the magical machines, which were now spreading out.


    Where her six strange des reached, the machines were sliced apart like butter. She continued forward without stopping, no machine able to stop her from advancing.


    The machines around her continued to attack, but their beams and bullets were all stopped by the barrier and her scales. Even the asional attack that prated could only inflict a light wound on her body.


    Fourth Grade demons were truly horrifying!


    ¡°Hmph! A little too arrogant, aren¡¯t we! Prepare the giant cannon. It¡¯s time we show her something colorful,¡± Commander Locke of the Versailles was furious. He gave out orders loudly.


    Soon the giant magic energy cannon had recharged, and everyone could hear the terrifying roaring sound of gathering energy.


    The marilith could sense the source of emergency ahead of time with her exceptional sense of danger. When the barrel of the cannon lit up and a ck beam of light shot toward her, the marilith pointed forward with her six swords. Her slender body cut a snow-white line across the battlefield as she abruptly appeared a hundred meters away.


    This hundred-meter dash allowed her to dodge the energy beam sessfully. At the same time, she had sliced up the eleven magical machines in her way.


    The entire battlefield fell dead silent for an instant.


    Even Mary, who was sitting in Nightmare Castle and resting, couldn¡¯t help but open her eyes. Her gazended far away on the unstoppable six-armed Fourth Grade marilith.

 Chapter 1373 - The Devouring Fish

    Chapter 1373 The Devouring Fish


    Fire Throne


    Greem carefully processed the corpse of a starbeast in a brightly illuminated magical room.


    Greem asionally cut off a piece of the starbeast¡¯s body under the Chip¡¯s instructions. He then put it in his mouth, chewed, and swallowed. These pieces of flesh still flowing with purple blood were incredibly pungent and foul-smelling. The texture of the meat was also tough and leathery. It was hard for Greem to slice the flesh, even with an enchanted scalpel.


    An ordinary person would not have been able to digest such a piece of starbeast flesh, with all its intense elementium poison. It was likely that a mortal would be instantly corrupted into a monster the moment they swallowed the meat.


    However, Greem¡¯s stomach waspletely different from a mortal¡¯s. The walls of his stomach were tough and resilient. A golden fire, thousands of degrees hot, also burned within him. The starbeast flesh was engulfed by the golden fire almost immediately, vaporized and disassembled into magical particles of varying elementium traits.


    However, his stomach absorbed the unique gene factors found in the flesh and transferred them to a specific region in the body through specially constructed channels.


    There, the starbeast bloodline gic sequence that Greem was attempting to construct spun slowly. The gene factors that he had just absorbed were added to this gic sequence,plimenting the damaged and missing portions.


    Of course, most of the starbeast gene factors he absorbed ovepped with the gic sequence already present. Most of the gene factors were only strengthening what was present rather than patching in the missing portions. The progress bar of the gic sequence inched forward, bit by bit.


    98.8965%.


    Greem was only able to detect the minute changes past the fourth decimal point due to the Chip¡¯s detailed senses. It was almost as if he was trying to piece together a puzzle, except the puzzle was a gic sequence consisting of millions of tiny gic sequences.


    At this moment, Greem had managed to piece together over 98% of the starbeast bloodline. The remaining 2% might not seem significant, but it was no easy matter toplete it.


    Other adepts did not have the aid of such a handy Chip. Most of the time, they could only experiment and test through instinct while relying on luck. If they got it right, they would make progress. If they got it wrong, all the progress they had achieved up until then would be in vain; they would have to start all over again.


    Though there were many powerful individuals amongst the adepts, their research on bloodlines remained in a rather primitive state. Moreover, most high-grade adepts conducted their own research. They would never share their results with other people.


    It resulted in a magical system surrounding bloodline research that was fragmented and barred behind numerous barriers. It was impossible to sustain a bloodline n with a stable legacy.


    Most bloodline ns that appeared in the World of Adepts were transient. They fell from greatness after their powerhouses left the World of Adepts or died. The bloodline would weaken over generations until it finally died out.


    Of course, there might have been some degree of intentionality from the Great Adepts in creating this scenario. By preventing consistent bloodline research, they could stop any single bloodline n from growing too powerful and dominating the World of Adepts for extended periods of time.


    That, in turn, gave elementium adepts and adepts of other disciplines the chance to shine!


    Of course, this was only Greem¡¯s conjecture. There was no firm evidence that supported this theory.


    Greem could hardly care about the intentions of the Great Adepts. All he wanted to do was make up for the insufficiencies in his starbeast bloodline and allow this bloodline power he had been cultivating to show its true might.


    99.1365%.


    As Greem scarfed down the meat in big gulps, the progress bar on the starbeast bloodline¡¯spletion rose steadily.


    A Third Grade starbeast might not be enough to sustain the construction of an entire starbeast bloodline, but it would be more than enough to fill in the 3% he was missing!


    Finally, with a crisp notification ring from the Chip, the light blue progress bar in Greem¡¯s mind reached 100%.


    The next second, Greem let out an abrupt sneeze. His entire body shivered violently.


    It was almost as if a singrity had opened in the depths of his mind. His mental consciousness had merged with some vague principles of an unknown world for a brief moment. Then, a mountain of experience, inherited knowledge, and unusual understandings flooded his consciousness like a tidal wave.


    [Beep. Detecting foreign data stream. Initial estimates suggest this is a world legacy from the starbeasts. Requesting instructions from Host. Receive data?]


    ¡°Receive...now...immediately!¡±


    Greem was practically howling at the Chip when he gave his order.


    It was important to note that most starbeasts epted this instillment of knowledge from birth. There was a gradual process to it. Naturally, they could easily endure all of it. Moreover, most starbeasts were terrifying creatures of untold resilience. Their spiritual resilience was also probably a hundred times stronger than a human consciousness like Greem¡¯s.


    That was why they suffered no pain when epting such a legacy of knowledge!


    However, Greemcked the buffer that they had from First to Third Grade. He was epting the legacy modifications and inheritance of a Fourth Grade starbeast as a human, all at once. In all honesty, if the Chip had not endured part of the legacy¡¯s impact for him, Greem would probably have been the first idiot in the World of Adept¡¯s recorded history to have his mental consciousness sundered by the legacy of his bloodline.


    Even so, just enduring the shockwaves of the bloodline legacy was enough to cause Greem to yelp in pain. Blood flowed out of every orifice and even his pores.


    The blood came out thick and without stop. One couldn¡¯t help but wonder how Greem had managed to contain such ridiculous amounts of blood in his two-meter-tall human body.


    It wasn¡¯t just blood. Large spouts of pure fire energy sted out of Greem¡¯s body along with the ck blood.


    The red mes surged out of Greem¡¯s body and vaporized everything around him. Even the obsidian floor beneath him was scorched red, despite being protected by magical arrays.


    The light robe that Greem wore instantly turned into ashes when the mes erupted.


    Greem moaned loudly, enduring the pain that came from the gic level of his body as he silently waited for the Chip¡¯s analysis.


    There was far too much information from the starbeast¡¯s legacy. Even a real starbeast would require a tremendous amount of time and energy to digest all that knowledge.


    However, Greem did not have a dozen years to waste away, absorbing this information and legacy. Thus, he had to rely on the Chip¡¯s powerful data storage and organization ability. The Chip would chart the tremendous sea of knowledge and plot out the most straightforward and efficient route of bloodline inheritance.


    The Devouring Fish!


    One had to admit that the starbeast bloodline that Greem had chosen for himself was quite the rare creature. It was called the Devouring Fish and possessed a stomach that could devour all lifeforms and energy.


    Anything it devoured could only quietly be turned into chaos energy and be part of the fish.


    The reason Greem had taken on the legacy of a Devouring Fish was directly rted to the fish-shaped starbeast that Mary had sent to him. After all, the main reason why Greem¡¯s starbeast bloodline had managedpletion so quickly was solely due to the ice dragon heart and the fish-shaped starbeast.


    These two things had stimted Greem¡¯s bloodline power to grow so rapidly!


    Greemy down in a pool of boiling redva. Tremendous changes were happening both inside and outside his body due to the modifications from his inherited legacy. It was impossible to see what was happening in his body, but the surface of his crimson skin began to grow translucent, crystal-like scales.


    These scales covered almost every inch of Greem¡¯s body, with the exception of his eyes, nose, ears, and mouth. As Greem breathed heavily, streams of invisible fire spouted from his nose before gathering together to form sparks of golden principles mes.


    It was obvious that even the starbeast bloodline modification that was affecting his entire body had not managed to suppress Greem¡¯s original talent for fire. On the contrary- with the bloodline power suppressing and expelling the fire energy in Greem¡¯s body, most of the impure origin mes had been scattered. What remained of the purest fire energy gathered around the fire principles and concentrated into the Undying mes that Greem had been pining for.


    From now on, the Undying mes were both a magical ability at Greem¡¯s disposal, as well as a fire principle that he had assimted with the depths of his soul!


    From now on, the Undying mes were a part of him. No one could separate them from his soul.


    While Greem¡¯s mind was starting to blur from the fatigue, a notification from the Chip rang out.


    [Beep. First starbeast bloodline patchpleted.


    [Host has obtained first starbeast bloodline legacy. Listed below are the abilities obtained.


    [Devouring Fish Transformation: Host can transform into a Devouring Fish, gaining ess to all itsbat prowess and bloodline abilities.


    [Berserk Devouring: Devour a creature that is no more than twice the size of the Host, converting said creature into chaos energy for the Host¡¯s use. This special ability can only be used once a day. (Note: Enemies more than two timesrger than the Host cannot be devoured!)


    [Devour Magic: Bloodline ability. Able to devour a spell no more than 6,000 points in intensity and convert it into chaos energy for retaliation. Said ability can only be used three times a day.


    [Host¡¯s Strength and Physique will be improved after transforming into the Devouring Fish. Every 10 points of Spirit will sustain an additional 2 minutes of bloodline transformation. Host will revert from transformation when Host has less than 10 points of Spirit remaining.]


    [......]


    [......]


    Greem was both surprised and overjoyed to read the countless rows of numbers and statistics.


    Finally, this bloodline modification that he had been undergoing for the past two hundred years had concluded. It could finally be of use on a battlefield. The unusual powers of the starbeast bloodline truly surprised him!


    Perhaps, this was the real reason why the starbeasts were able to roam the gxy uncontested and instilled fear upon all nes!

 Chapter 1374 - Scattering the Stampede

    Chapter 1374 Scattering the Stampede


    The fire and smoke of war had not faded since the arrival of the magic surge.


    News of otherworldly intruders and stampedes from the ck Forest could be heard everywhere across the Continent of Adepts. Either of these incidents would bring about terrifying cmity and iparable disaster upon the mortals.


    asionally, you could hear news of unknown beasts breaking into certain regions, causing significant casualties. Sometimes, it would be the downfall of an entire human kingdom due to the spread of an unknown gue or the invasion of an otherworldly monster. The more they heard such news, the more the civilians began to panic.


    They brought their entire families with them and herded what livestock they had as they made for the depths of the mountains or followed the stream of humans toward the few safe regions left in thend. The Ailovis Region and the Hayworth Region under Crimson n rule were undoubtedly the only safe inds left.


    Civilians that lived in these two regions had every reason to rejoice for their fortune.


    Every time they saw the shocking number of Motherships hovering in the sky, every time they saw the rows upon rows of tall and mighty magical machines, a heartfelt sense of safety arose.


    Due to the immense amount of preparation work that the Crimson n had done ahead of time, all safety risks within the two regions were monitored and controlled. When the first wave of the magic surge had arrived, all the otherworldly intruders were wiped out by the n¡¯s military forces before they could attempt anything.


    The direct result of this was that the invasions urring in the other thirty-one regions of the Central Lands were exacerbated to varying degrees. Meanwhile, the two regions governed by the Crimson n were void of even a magical creature¡¯s shadow.


    It wasn¡¯t just the otherworldly creatures that had been kept away. Even the beasts, low-grade magical creatures, and magical creature lords in the ck Forest neighboring Ailovis were surrounded by Motherships before they could rush out of the forest.


    The Crimson Fleet unleashed Golem Dragon One from their Motherships without a second thought. Golem Dragon One was apanied by an army of two thousand magical machines.


    They were no longer the old, clumsy steam machines of the past. Instead, they were the PG-52bat machines that had been strengthened and improved over dozens of generations of goblins.


    When it came to overall capabilities, a PG-52bat magical machine¡¯s fighting power could rival that of a Second Grade adept. The fact that the magical machines were fearless andpletely obedient made them far more cost-efficient than Second Grade adepts.


    However, the might of magical machines could not scale infinitely.


    In truth, the PG-52 was already the very peak of magical machines!


    Second Grade was the limit of assembly-line magical machines.


    More expensive magical alloy and metal resources were required to improve the magical machine¡¯s strength further. The limits of these resources and materials meant that the magical machines could not be improved infinitely.


    However, the creation of the golem dragons stood as a testament to the potential of magical machines. Golem Dragon One¡¯s exceptional performance allowed the goblins to have representation among the high-grade military forces of the Crimson n.


    When Golem Dragon One¡¯s hundred-meter-long metal body appeared in the ck Forest and razed a wide path through the forest, the beasts instantly scattered.


    Golem Dragon One was an amazing magical machine that could face off against a Fourth Grade adept. Though it had multiple weaknesses, including its numerous blind spots on its belly and itsck of agility, the two thousand magical machines covered for these ws.


    The wild magical creatures and beasts that had just gathered scattered chaotically throughout the forest like frightened sheep. The magical machine army following the golem dragon hunted them down and killed them without discrimination.


    The magical creatures had their most savage side brought out by the magic surge. They formed packs and turned around to charge at the magical machines. Unfortunately, their bravery and savagery shattered underneath the imprable iron bodies of the magical machines.


    Individual courage and bravery counted for nothing in front of the unstoppable tide of metal. The few magical creature lords among them might be able to make waves against the magical machines. However, as waves eventually shattered against the rocks, so did the magical creature lords quickly ground down to bits.


    Poisondusk lizardpeople, mindshredders, gnolls, splinterfiends, ckscale lizardpeople, gustwind birds, spider-apes, forest trolls, wood woads, dirt wendigos, armored bears, skullcrusher ogres, gulgars, hundred eyes, winged serpentdrakes......


    The ck Forest of the World of Adepts was a treasure trove of magical creatures. There were creatures of every shape, size, and form in horrifying numbers.


    Any individual magical creature lord among them were fearsome monsters. However, in the face of the magical machine army, they were reduced to small-fry that could hardly change anything.


    Against Golem Dragon One that could uproot an entire fortress with ease, the magical machine army and their endless barrage of cannon fire, and the Motherships that dominated the skies. The magical creature lords were executed summarily by the giant magic energy cannons. The rest of the magical creatures fled after that, disappearing into the depths of the forest without ever looking back.


    For a moment, no magical creature tracks could be found within 1,500 kilometers of the ck Forest northeast of Ailovis.


    After chasing the magical creatures to distantnds, the magical machines stopped pursuing and instead returned to the n. However, the Crimson Fleet had left behind a few well-hidden monitoring magical-arrays within the 1,500-kilometer area.


    In doing so, the Crimson n would be notified of any future actions taken by the magical creatures.


    The 1,500-kilometer buffer zone was more than enough for the Crimson n to survive this magic surge safely.


    It wasn¡¯t easy for the magical creature lords to organize a stampede either. After all, they had no concept of logistics, supply lines, or organization.


    With their natural aura of intimidation as magical creature lords, they could suppress the beasts for two to three days. In that time, they would gather the animals and herd them toward the human settlements.


    It was possible to take suchplex maneuvers every so often. However, when the target of their attack was thousands of kilometers away, it was impossible to suppress the restlessness of the beasts and make them show up sessfully.


    After all, no high-grade magical creatures were willing to endure three to five days of hunger just to travel a thousand kilometers on a suicidal assault against a human city. It was particrly so when there was prey all around them to devour. If the high-grade magical creatures started preying on the weaker beasts, then the beasts would sumb to their natural instincts and flee immediately.


    To some extent, a 1,500-kilometer buffer zone was already an impassable zone for a stampede!


    Of course, this violent means of exiling the beasts was not a method avable to any adept n. They had to find the beasts¡¯ gathering spot in the hazardousnds of the ck Forest and send a group of elites to hunt them down and exile them.


    Aplishing such a feat required a mobile group of elites that could fight regardless of the environment and geography.


    Only a few adept forces amongst the Fourth Grade ns could barely meet this standard. The other adept forces were either not strong enough orcked the flying mounts required to travel through the ck Forest quickly.


    If they could not scatter the beasts with overwhelming speed and force, then a genuinely bloody war would break out in the dim and dark environment of the ck Forest. That was not good news for adept forces so deep in enemy territory.


    Major ns had plenty of wealth and resources. They could maintain the upkeep of several adept forces at the same time. However, most of the smaller ns only had a single adept force that they had dedicated everything to.


    If such an adept force was lost in the ck Forest, the n would not be able to recover from the loss. They would forever be reduced to a third-rate organization.


    Consequently, no adept n would ever dare mobilize their most precious military force to assault the magical creatures without an absolute guarantee of victory. They preferred to wait silently in their adept towers, resisting the invasion of the stampede with war towers and voodoo beasts.


    The magical creature lordscked the power to destroy a proper adept tower.


    As such, the safety of the adepts was guaranteed, and there was no risk of the adept forces being wiped out.


    However, the swarming stampede could still devastate the n¡¯s territories. That was unavoidable!


    In the eyes of the adepts, there was an evaluation that urred. The official adepts and adept forces were precious assets that could not suffer losses. Meanwhile, the mortals in n territories were little more than numbers on paper to the adepts.


    Even though massive casualties were an incredibly annoying affair, there was no way the adepts would put their very lives on the line to protect these inconsequential ¡®assets.¡¯


    ¡®Assets¡¯ could always be recovered over time, but the loss of adepts from the n was unbearable!


    It was the adepts¡¯ conservative and short-term perspective that made the stampedes so dangerous and lethal. They brought about tremendous danger and death to the Continent of Adepts.


    Compared to the selfish governance of the Central Lands, the three major organizations disyed exceptional discipline.


    The Silver Union was incredibly wealthy. In response to the magic surge, they had retracted the poption in their territories, relocating all mortals to their innernds, where it was safe from the spatial rifts and the ck Forest. Meanwhile, they filled the border towns and cities withrge armies of metal constructs and golems.


    These countless golems and constructs had helped the Silver Union fight off several stampedes from the ck Forest. Though they were suffering terrible financial losses, the safety of the civilians and their territories had been protected.

 Chapter 1375 - Battle in the Northern Lands

    <h4>Chapter 1375 Battle in the Northern Lands</h4>


    Compared to the Silver Union¡¯s wealth, the Northern Witches relied on individual courage to resist the magic surge.


    Who would¡¯ve thought that the ones who fought most ferociously, most simply, and most savagely throughout the World of Adepts, would be the witches? In the face of this catastrophic disaster, the Northern Witches demonstrated courage and bravery far beyond those of the male adepts.


    They did not remain guarded within their n territories. Instead, they walked out of their adept towers, rallied mortal armies from theirnds, and marched into the few fortresses neighboring the ck Forest.


    Mobilized by the Witch Council, many witch tribes that were not threatened by the stampede also sent outrge numbers of witches and voodoo beasts to reinforce the border regions. They worked together, united, establishing a firm andyered web of defense on the edges of the ck Forest.


    In this battle between humans and beasts, the various witch branches put aside their past rivalries and unleashed their own unique styles ofbat upon the magical creatures.


    Naturally, the ones that served as fodder for the battle were the undead armies summoned by the Death Witches.


    These undead armies might not be as numerous as the undead armies of a lich, nor asplicated, but they wereprised of formidable elites. In particr, the undead pythons, dust sprites, bonews, and wandering spirits that made up the main force were all exceptional at melee fighting.


    In addition, they all possessed the unique undead aura of rot, making them even more effective opponents against the living beasts and magical creatures in the forest. With these undead to sacrifice themselves in battle, the impact of the stampede wasrgely mitigated.


    Thus, even mortal armies and voodoo beasts were able to hold the line against the charging creatures.


    The Coldwinter Witches created massive blizzards on the battlefield. Though they did not kill many of the beasts, they inflicted untold agony and trouble.


    Meanwhile, the Dark Witches had brought their shadow army with them.


    These forces might not be all that obvious during the daytime. When night fell, the entire battlefield became the world of the shadow armies. These hordes of shadow creatures were active in every inch of shadow on the battlefield, ughtering legions of beasts and monsters with their strange and sinister abilities.


    The Agony Witches put up curse altars and cursed the magical creature lords over and over until their knees turned weak. Whenever this happened, the Pale Witches would send out their apanying spirits to aid the Dark Witches in their assault of the magical creature lords.


    The Deceit and False Witches were in charge of misdirecting and enchanting the stampede, causing them to scatter and fall apart amidst the myriad of illusions.


    There was no need for the Fate Witches to step onto the battlefield in this war against the ck Forest stampedes. Their most significant value was in divining and predicting the next location in which the next wave of stampedes would appear, as well as the magical creatures¡¯ target and scale of the attack.


    The border of the Northern Witches that ran along the ck Forest was extremely long and winding. Without the Fate Witches¡¯ guidance, the Northern Witches would not be able to perfectly defend their borders, even if they were to mobilize every single witch.


    If the border were breached in any one spot, then what awaited the Northern Lands¡¯ civilians would be a bloody and cruel massacre!


    Ordinary civilians had no means of defending themselves against the magical beasts. Should the stampede reach a human settlement, the consequences would be horrifying, enough to make anyone break into a cold sweat at the mere thought of it.


    The Crimson n had a piece ofnd in the Northern Lands. Though thend technically belonged to the Fate Witches, the actual authority over the territory resided in Meryl¡¯s hand.


    The Crimson n had assigned two Motherships, seven hundred magical machines, and Iritina¡¯s green dragons to protect thisnd.


    In all seriousness, it would be ridiculous if such a powerful and elite force was unable to defend the three-thousand-square-kilometer-widend.


    The moment the beasts in the ck Forest east of White Tower showed signs of gathering, the Crimson Fleet instantly routed them and sent them fleeing.


    Ever since then, Meryl had been systematically andprehensively eliminating the high-grade magical creature lords in the surrounding ck Forest. Without these magical creature lords serving as leaders, the beasts could not gather and form a stampede again.


    As for the smattering of beasts and magical creatures that charged out of the ck Forest every so often? They were turned into a sort of trial for the low-grade adepts and apprentices.


    Compared to the stern and murderous tension of the Northern Lands, White Tower was an unexpected paradise!


    Perhaps sensing the Mothership¡¯s significance inrge-scale warfare, the witch higher-ups led by Death Witch Leader Khesuna and Dark Witch Leader Circe contacted Meryl in White Tower.


    After a series of negotiations, the Crimson n sent out the two Motherships and four hundred magical machines in the name of ¡®foreign requisition.¡¯ They were mainly in charge of transporting the voodoo beasts of the Northern Witches, as well as the much-needed logistics. They weren¡¯t actually taking part in the fighting in the Northern Lands.


    Even so, the addition of the two uncontested tyrants of the sky allowed the tides of battle in the Northern Lands to change instantly. They went from stubborn defense to active offense.


    One gathering of beasts after another was devastated by the Northern Witches in an overwhelming fashion. One magical creature lord after another was assassinated in theirir, and one region after another returned to peace and quiet with the descent of the Motherships.


    One had to admit that the Motherships that the Crimson n had invented were like massive and mobile war fortresses. Except for their defenses being somewhatckingpared to actual adept towers, Motherships were already infinitely close to perfect.


    After working with the Motherships inbat several times, all the Northern Witches became incredibly interested in these silver fortresses that could fly through the skies.


    The Northern Witches were not just a bunch of savages. Their grasp of high-grade magic, knowledge, and technology was extremely advanced as well. Naturally, they were extremely curious about the magic energy system of these flying ships.


    The Northern Witches would have absolutely no trouble forging such metal ships given their knowledge, ability, and resources. However, the difficult part was the energy supply required to power such a massive construct. The amount of magic energy needed to keep it running would be extremely shocking.


    If the Motherships had no external energy source and were powered entirely through magical crystals, they would burn through an entire mountain of magical crystals in just one month.


    That was why the more knowledgeable Northern Witches paid close attention to the cores of the Motherships.


    Finally, through their own unique magical means, they managed to discover the magic generator furnace¡¯s existence!


    These strange furnaces could pierce through the nar barrier and absorb wild, untamed chaos energy directly from space. They were then able to tame and convert the chaos energy into magic energy through their unique means.


    Such technology and knowledge were clearly more advanced and profound than the elementium altars of adept towers.


    The ability and means to create these magic generator furnaces were worth much more than these Motherships!


    At this point, those who had looked down upon the rumored legendary fire adept finally corrected their attitude. They recognized that Greem was indeed a terrifying and talented prodigy of an adept.


    Disregarding everything else, the ability to create these furnaces alone made him the most valuable and impressive prodigy in the World of Adepts!


    Unfortunately, these magic generator furnaces were undoubtedly one of the most ssified secrets of the Crimson n. The Northern Witches could do nothing but stare longingly at the Motherships and drool.


    Khesuna had thought about negotiating with Greem through Alice in an attempt to obtain the magic generator furnace through a trade of resources. However, Greem¡¯s response immediately cut off all such possibilities.


    The conditions Greem offered were straightforward. The Crimson n would sell a batch of magic generator furnaces to the Northern Witches on the condition that the Witch Council permitted Alice to be married to him.


    Upon hearing this condition, Khesuna decided to give up almost instantly!


    The Northern Witches were an istionist, localized adept organization, after all. They had always carefully maintained the matriarchy in their ranks, conservatively protecting their witch traditions throughout the ages.


    To have Alice, the leader of the Witches of Fate, be married to Greem instead of the other way around was a challenge to the authority of the Northern Witches themselves.


    It was impossible for them to ever agree to such a condition!


    However, if it was the other way round, and the legendary fire adept married into the Tower of Fate as a subordinate of the Fate Witches, they would be more than wee.


    Unfortunately, given Greem¡¯s current status and position, such a scenario was impossible.


    The Northern Witches were ruled by witches, while the Central Lands were ruled by the powerful.


    Should an ultra-powerhouse like Greem lower himself and be a subordinate of the Nothern Lands, then the tremendous organization he was putting together in the Central Lands would copse overnight. The respect that Greem had worked so hard tomand would vanish without a trace, and the Crimson n would be suspected and rejected by all Central adepts.


    The world was simply so ridiculous at times!


    Some things that sounded simple and hrious became incredibly vital and crucial when it concerned specific individuals and characters.


    Even the slightest imperfections could not be tolerated!


    The Northern Witches weren¡¯t the only ones opposed to Greem and Alice¡¯s marriage. There were voices of opposition in the Central Lands and even within the Crimson n.


    This romance that concerned two powerful organizations in two different regions could affect the bnce of power in the World of Adepts. Such an important matter was no longer just a personal affair, but something that concerned the organizations they represented!


    The Northern Lands was an organization built around the Witch Queen and the witches. Anyone who tried to challenge the witches¡¯ position of authority would be met by the disapproval of all witches.


    No one cared about how intimate Greem and Alice were in private. However, if they attempted to go public with their rtionship, the ripples and aftershocks would be beyond their control.

 Chapter 1376 - Colossal Berserk Ape

    <strong>Chapter 1376</strong><strong>Colossal Berserk Ape</strong>


    Inkdeep Valley.


    Themotion in the valley was still ongoing.


    After many rounds of extermination, the intruders residing in the depths of Inkdeep Valley¡¯s abyss had been mostly wiped out. However, the resulting narw turbulence had turned the ce into and of death.


    Ordinary creatures could no longer survive at the bottom of Inkdeep Valley for a single second. The environment and narws there were so harsh that they could no longer sustain the presence of organic lifeforms.


    The consequence of this was the gradual degradation of the World of Adept¡¯s narws within Inkdeep Valley as control was slowly handed over to the chaosws. Chaos was the axis here now, and disorder the orthodox. Everything that the adepts were familiar with was now warped and distorted.


    The adepts no longer had the advantage in such an environment. In fact, they even had to actively resist the suppression of the chaosws. It was difficult for them to take a single step here. Danger lurked in every shadow.


    In contrast, the otherworldly monsters who were already versed in the chaosws were like fish in the water. They became even more ferocious and brazen in their actions.


    Ever since the chaosws imed dominion over Inkdeep Valley, the Adept¡¯s Association stopped sending sorties of adepts down there. Instead, they guarded the adept towers that firmly stood at the entrances to the valley, preventing any powerful otherworldly monsters from breaking into Association territory.


    Every day, dozens¨Ceven hundreds¨Cof magical creatures crawled out of the valley, attempting to break into the World of Adepts and feast upon its inhabitants. Battles broke out constantly at every single entrance.


    A barrage of magical attacks easily dealt with the more reckless creatures that only knew how to charge forward. The only concern was the enemies with unusual magical abilities.


    They had speed as fast as the wind, capable of breaking through the adept¡¯s defense line of voodoo beast before anyone could respond. Or they had strange stealth abilities that allowed them to brazenly walk past the adepts unnoticed. Some even had the ability of flight and easily bypassed the adept towers.


    Any of these possibilities presented problems for the Adept¡¯s Association. They could only do their best to intercept and hunt down these anomalies to reduce the pressure on the defensive line.


    Of course, no defense line could be absolutely imprable!


    That was why the Adept¡¯s Association principle was to prioritize therger threats. The Third and Fourth Grade monsters were not allowed to leave Inkdeep Valley. As for the innumerable, smaller enemies? They could only turn a blind eye and let them go if they didn¡¯t have the manpower to deal with them.


    The Adept¡¯s Association had aprehensive and tight regional defense system in every one of their territories anyway. If these invaders showed themselves, the regional adept forces would deal with them.


    The coteral losses and casualties inflicted before these creatures were apprehended were the unavoidable costs of dealing with the magic surge.


    It was a once-in-ten-thousand-year cmity, after all!


    ............


    The forty-eighth day of the magic surge.


    It was an ordinary day, with everything going as usual!


    Saguri sat inside the main control array of War Tower 107, just like any other day, using the numerous arrays around him to monitor all movements from the nearby entrance to Inkdeep Valley.


    Array of Life Detection, Array of Elementium Detection, Array of Heat Detection, Array of Warning, Array of Motion Detection. With over a dozen arrays, the wondrous arrangement continually scanned for motion at the entrance through their own means.


    Suddenly, one of the dozens of arrays flickered with a bright red light.


    ¡°Mm? That¡¯s the Earth Amplitude Detection Array. It should have the longest range of detection,¡± Saguri looked over and couldn¡¯t help but mumble to himself, ¡°Could something have happened at the bottom of the valley?¡±


    He pondered the matter to himself as he pressed the third crystal button to his left.


    ¡°Mast, there¡¯s movement at the bottom of the valley. Go check it out with your magical eye!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    The instruction was quickly ryed to a magical room on the third floor of the war tower.


    First Grade Adept Mast hastily got up from his crude bed and stood inside aplicated array drawn on the floor.


    He started chanting, and a magical eye the size of a human head appeared close to War Tower 107. Under his conscious control, the eye slowly cut through the dense mist and flew toward the bottom of the valley.


    The mist parted to either side within view of the magical mirror as the magical eye arrived, revealing the terrifying scenes below.


    The ground was littered with the corpses and remains of all sorts of vicious creatures, forming a bloody carpet that led to the depths of the valley.


    The air was thick with the scent of blood, and the howls of resentful spirits never stopped.


    The magical eye cut through the mist and followed the bloody path downward, silently moving toward the bottom of the valley.


    Initially, the eye¡¯s image was extremely clear, and the eye could detect movements up to a hundred meters around it.


    However, as it moved deeper into the valley, the narw aura began to thin and be distorted. The magical mirror images grew increasingly unclear, and the eye¡¯s sensing radius was suppressed to within a dozen meters.


    Meanwhile, the corpses they saw belonged to increasingly monstrous beings. That much was evident from the size and appearance of the bodies.


    While the magical eye was heading toward the bottom of the valley, the walls on both sides began to tremble rhythmically.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    It was almost as if a vicious and violent beast was slowly climbing upward, and the entire valley was trembling due to its actions.


    It wasn¡¯t just the ground itself. Even the mist and the air appeared to tremble with the quakes. The image transmitted from the magical eye grew blurry and out of focus.


    All of a sudden, the mist parted as an exceptionally gigantic monster entered within view. The magical eye exploded and shattered to pieces.


    First Grade Adept Mast, who had been controlling the magical eye far away in War Tower 107, shivered in fright. He hastily contacted his superior, the Second Grade Adept Saguri.


    ¡°Prepare...prepare the defensive barriers immediately. A war beast...it is a war beast that¡¯sing for us!¡±


    ring rms rang out throughout the war towers almost instantly.


    The war towersmenced powering up, countlessplicated runic arrays lighting up in order from the tower¡¯s base to the top. Dome-shaped energy barriers appeared one after another, engulfing the war towers and isting them from the outside world.


    A ferocious tide of energy then started to gather within the towers, lingering around them and preparing to turn into violent offensive spells that sted at their enemies.


    However, just as they finished their preparations, an earthshaking cry could be heard from the valley.


    A fifty-meter-tall colossal berserk ape with thick ck hair sprinted out of the mist.


    It was enormous, with four powerful limbs. Its body was covered in ck hair. The creature looked around it with a pair of crimson eyes on its ferocious face.


    A thunderous growl came from its mouth, and hot, steaming air shot out of its nostrils as it breathed.


    Fourth Grade. That was a Fourth Grade colossal berserk ape.


    The instant the enemy¡¯s identity was clear, bolts of ferocious lightning cut across the sky toward it.


    A fierce light glinted in the ape¡¯s eyes. It covered its head with its hands and crouched while dirt-yellow smoke gathered around it and concealed it.


    The next second, the battlefield was filled with the blinding light of lightning!


    Lightning rumbled, and electricity crackled across the ground.


    The battlefield¡¯s center was engulfed by a white storm of electricity. Countless sma balls extended from the center of the explosion and sizzling the ground where theynded.


    The entire ce was filled with the scorched smell of electrified flesh!


    The raging storm of lightningsted for a dozen seconds before dissipating. When the blinding white light faded away, the humongous mountain of scorched flesh was revealed.


    Finally, it moved.


    Large pieces of burnt flesh sloughed off, and a ck rain descended upon the ground.


    All of a sudden, a pair of red eyes opened on the ck mountain of flesh. The creature red at the closest War Tower 107 with burning eyes.


    ¡°Insufficient offensive power,¡± Adept Saguri, who was hosting War Tower 107, felt his heart beat uncontrobly. He screamed wildly into themunication crystal, ¡°Continue to attack...continue to attack!¡±


    The twelve war towers within range immediately started to gather energy, albeit with much difficulty. Bolts of electricity began to crackle throughout their walls. In just a few more seconds, the next wave of lightning attacks would descend and drown this fearsome enemy in electricity once more.


    Unfortunately, the colossal berserk ape would not give them this opportunity again!


    It let out a loud cry and shook its body, casting off the burnt and dead flesh. It ignored its terrible injuries and lunged wildly at War Tower 107.


    When the colossal berserk ape stood straight, the twenty-seven-meter-tall war towers only reached its belly. With this fierce rampage, its giant fists screeched through the air, crushing the war tower¡¯s energy barrier in a single blow andnding on the tower itself.


    Crack! A horrible sound could be heard.


    The fist snapped War Tower 107 right in half.


    The upper half was blown a few hundred meters away, rolling across the ground until it disappeared from view. The remaining half of the tower was in shambles. The magical arrays inside exploded, one after another. With a sharp eye, you could see the few human adepts scrambling about in the ruins of the tower.


    They lifted their heads and looked at this ferocious monster with horror on their faces. They took out scrolls and attempted to flee to the other war towers. The blinding light of teleportation shed all over the war tower.


    However, there were always a few slow individuals. By the time they realized something was wrong and attempted to flee, their entire world turned ck.


    The terrifying iron fist of the colossal ape crashed down again.


    Dong!


    The rest of the war tower was crushed into dust along with its base!


    The battlefield fell utterly silent!

 Chapter 1377 - The Might of a Fourth Grade Adept

    Chapter 1377 The Might of a Fourth Grade Adept


    The might of Fourth Grade creatures was truly something that could not be dealt with by ordinary means.


    The bloodline of a giant berserk ape might not be all that impressive, but it had advanced to Fourth Grade. The colossal ape was able to unleash horrifying devastation to all enemies that dared stand in its path.


    Such a powerful creature would be able to endure even a vicious attack from an actual adept tower, let alone these simplified war towers. When the colossal berserk ape revealed its real power, one of the tiny war towers instantly became its sacrifice.


    That wasn¡¯t the end of it. The murderous ape, with its scorched ck hair, picked up a five-meterrge piece of rubble and hurled it at the closest war tower. It then instinctively beat its chest several times before turning and lunging at the third war tower.


    ¡°Attack...attack...use your most powerful spells!¡±


    ¡°Let out the voodoo beasts...have the voodoo beasts stall it!¡±


    The colossal berserk ape¡¯s burst of power caused the faces of all the overseeing adepts in the war towers to turn pale. They shouted out orders hastily, all while secretly reaching for the escape scrolls in their pouches.


    The teleportation coordinates were already set. They would be able to instantly escape to the adept towers in the backlines at the key moment just by activating the scrolls.


    This was the only reason they dared to remain stationed in the war towers!


    Bolts of lightning crashed down from the skies once more, forcing the ape to stumble forward as its hair stood on end. Large scorch marks appeared all over its back and shoulders.


    However, even such ferocious magic could not kill it. In fact, the lightning bolts were barely even impeding its movements.


    The colossal giant ape dug its fingers into the ground and picked up a giant piece of earth. It raised it above its head, blocking the bolts of fierce lightning as it sprinted toward the closest war towers.


    It kicked, punched, tackled, and even headbutted.


    What war tower could possibly endure such devastation from a fifty-meter-tall colossal ape?


    One by one, the war towers were knocked down like stalks of sugar cane. The Association adepts inside the towers either fled sessfully or died. The casualties were tremendous.


    The attack of the war towers had inflicted damage on the ape as well. Unfortunately, the extent of the injuries was not enough to stop its movements. On the contrary, the pain and wounds had made the ape even more savage. Every one of its actions was more wild and vicious than before.


    The Association adepts were incredibly furious and frustrated at the sight of a Fourth Grade monstrosity ravaging their war towers.


    They gave out orders frantically. Waves of violent spells bombarded the colossal berserk ape from every direction, causing it to howl in pain and grow even more fierce.


    In less than ten minutes, eight war towers had copsed at the hands of the colossal berserk ape. The adept casualties inflicted over the course of this made the host of Adept Tower Three, Fourth Grade Bloodline Adept Neve, unbearably furious.


    Of course, as a human adept, rushing out to fight a literally berserk creature wasn¡¯t befitting of the calm and rational image of the adepts.


    Light flickered above Adept Tower Three as a sea of magic energy began to gather. With her own bloodline power as the trigger, a fearsome thirty-meter-long serpent with jade-green scales appeared.


    It was a bloodline projection Neve had created through the powers of the tower. It was, in fact, twice as powerful as she was.


    The instant the giant serpent appeared, the rampaging berserk ape stopped its movements. It turned around and red at this projection.


    The two gigantic monsters stared at each other, a thousand meters and a dozen war towers between them.


    The bloodline serpent projected by Neve opened its eye slowly. Several strange spots of green light could be seen around its unusual purple eyes. The serpent flicked its long, forked tongue as the whole battlefield was engulfed in a cold and sinister aura.


    The serpent clearly had terrifying venom. Once bitten, the poisonws it possessed would render all antidotes ineffective. The only thing that could resist the poison¡¯s power would be the individual¡¯s poison resistance and life force.


    Upon sensing the might of its opponent, even the berserk ape became cautious. It was fearful that it might be killed because of a single moment¡¯s carelessness.


    The colossal berserk ape might not be very intelligent, but it still knew where the true dangery. It might seem like it was only barely equal with the war towers, having sustained so much damage. However, its wounds were only surface wounds. Its life origin had hardly been touched.


    Which was to say that no matter the number of war towers, the colossal berserk ape would have been able to destroy them all given sufficient time.


    The war tower had no hopes of endangering its life!


    However, this terrifying serpent that had materialized out of thin air was a different matter entirely.


    In all honesty, this mysterious serpent was the only thing on the battlefield that could threaten the ape¡¯s life.


    Hssss!


    With the adept tower behind her, Neve had no fear of this ignorant berserk ape.


    The serpent hovering in the air above Adept Tower Three opened its maw, and a ball of glowing green poison shot toward the enemy like an arrow.


    The berserk ape frowned and extended both arms forward. Large clouds of yellow smoke surged and concentrated into a massive boulder in front of it.


    Pu!


    A dull impact could be heard as the poison hit the boulder.


    The battlefield instantly rang out with the sound of sizzling poison. Dense white smoke rose from the boulder.


    The white smoke did not dissipate. Instead, it mysteriously wrapped around the boulder and found its way into the colossal ape¡¯s giant nostrils.


    Aooooo!


    The colossal berserk ape instantly flew into a rage when the poison smoke entered its body.


    It shook its body twice and felt a terrifying, stinging pain inside.


    It lifted its head and roared, its blood boiling in response to its emotions. The boiling blood allowed it to suppress those traces of poison instantly.


    Phew! Phew!


    The wind howled as yellow light shed in the ape¡¯s hands. With every sh, a five-meter-long boulder would form and shoot toward the mysterious serpent in session.


    The serpent was much smaller than the ape was. It was obvious that it did not excel at strength.


    That was why the berserk ape was attempting to force the serpent forward into a melee.


    Why didn¡¯t the colossal berserk ape charge at it?


    Berserk apes preferred to settle everything with violence. That did not mean that they wereplete idiots. The serpent was coiled right above an adept tower. If the berserk ape got too close and became entangled by the powers of the adept tower, it would easily betray a lethal weakness to the serpent.


    Thus, the ape dodged the poison spit attacks with agile movements, all while retaliating with massive boulders hurled at the adept tower.


    The two massive creatures attacked each other just like that, with the adept tower at the center of their battle. In the blink of an eye, the entire battlefield had turned into a mess.


    The war towers caught between the two Fourth Grade powerhouses were undoubtedly the most unfortunate. They would be razed to the ground by attacks from any side. If the serpent¡¯s poison spit hit a war tower, its barriers and walls would be corroded in a matter of seconds, its walls crumbling as if they had been made of sand.


    If they were hit by a boulder from the ape, the entire structure would copse. The adepts inside would die instantly if they didn¡¯t escape in time!


    Truly, when gods fought, it was the mortals who suffered!


    In less than an hour, this ape had removed the one dozen war towers that the Adept¡¯s Association had nted close to this entrance.


    If it weren¡¯t for the terrifying shockwaves from the ape and serpent¡¯s battle, the magical creatures hiding at the bottom of Inkdeep Valley would have swarmed out and scattered in every direction.


    The serpent that Neve had projected might have shocking offensive power, but it still had limitations against this overwhelmingly resilient and strong ape.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the cover of the adept tower, the serpent would have been torn to pieces by the ape in a matter of minutes.


    Of course, if Neve were willing to put her own life on the line, she was very likely to kill the ape at the cost of heavy injuries to herself.


    However, losses incurred were on the part of the Association, while her life belonged to herself!


    Neve still knew well enough which was more important.


    After the battle had gone on for a while, Neve grew frustrated. She silently sent a message to Adept Tower Two in the distance.


    ¡°Help me a little, Olivia!¡±


    A short momentter, a familiar mental flux rang out in her mind.


    ¡°I thought you wouldn¡¯t need me...I will help you control it. Just attack with all you have!¡±


    The next second, a powerful and unusual magical power descended from the sky and crashed down upon the colossal berserk ape.


    The berserk ape¡¯s movements suddenly became extremely slow, as if it had just fallen into a swamp. It lifted its right arm in an attempt to throw a boulder at the serpent, but it was almost as if its entire body was wrapped in chains. Every single movement was incredibly heavy and difficult.


    Halo of Gravity!


    Moreover, a hundred-fold Halo of Gravity!


    The serpent took this opportunity to lunge forward, instantly coiling its body around the ape. It lifted its serpent head and bit the ape on its neck.


    Aooooo!


    The colossal berserk ape let out a pained cry, beating its chest and tearing at the slippery body of the serpent. Dirt-yellow smoke surged from its body, furiously seeping into the snake.


    The serpent might only be Neve¡¯s bloodline projection, but it also contained much of her mental consciousness. The damage sustained by the serpent also fed back to her in the tower.


    Neve squirmed in agony but grit her teeth and endured it. She used all her powers to inject her poisonws into the ape¡¯s body.


    A ck shade visibly began to take over the ape¡¯s body and face. The fearsome poison powers instantly suppressed the raging earth powers until the ape started to go limp.

 Chapter 1378 - Demons Invade

    Chapter 1378 Demons Invade


    The appearance of the Fourth Grade colossal berserk ape was like a prelude to something more.


    Ever since then, the intrusion of otherworldly creatures toward the World of Adepts escted, gradually sliding toward aplete loss of control.


    Given the might of the adept civilization, scattered intruders like these were still no problem. If they were only trying to sneak into the World of Adepts to steal some rare resources not found elsewhere, they were still likely to seed.


    After all, the World of Adepts was far toorge. Topletely defend such vast territories without fail was impossible.


    The native adepts were more than willing to turn a blind eye when the intruder was powerful and possessed strange abilities, as long as they kept a low profile. They had no reason to put their lives on the line to hunt down such intruders.


    Most of the time, they were willing to just let them by!


    However, while a few individual ¡®smugglers¡¯ could be ignored, the organized intruders who were attempting to colonize the World of Adepts were intolerable by any adept organization.


    Since the magic surge erupted, all these powerful organizations of the World of Adepts had experiencedrge-scale invasions of otherworldly creatures. They were fighting everywhere without pause, buried knee-deep in monster corpses.


    Among the major organizations, the most unfortunate one had to be the Adept¡¯s Association.


    Their spatial rift was thergest, allowing the strongest otherworldly forces to enter. Consequently, they drew the attention of the troublesome disaster creatures!


    It was said that three infamous Disaster Lords had simultaneously set their sights on their spatial rift. They had specially constructed a nar gate and were herding high-grade enved creatures to assault the Association towers.


    Meanwhile, the more powerful disaster creatures lurked at the bottom of the valley. It appeared they were amassing in number, waiting for the moment to blow past the defensive line in one fell swoop and rush into the World of Adept¡¯s fertilends.


    All sorts of signs indicated that the Adept¡¯s Association was in a bad spot!


    If even the most powerful organization in the World of Adepts was in such a situation, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how the other organizations were faring.


    Putting aside everything else, the Central Lands alone were in enormous trouble!


    If the Adept¡¯s Association faced invasion by the disaster creatures, then the Central Lands were almost as unfortunate in dealing with a severe demonic invasion.


    The Abyssal World was undoubtedly a civilizationrger and more terrifying than the World of Adepts.


    That was a boundless and suffocatingnd of terror.


    The environment there was harsh- harsh enough that no life could hope to survive.


    There was no sense of morals there. It was a kingdom of endless ughter.


    There were no such concepts as friendship, family, or love. It was a ce of evil with only betrayal, murder, and destruction.


    The Abyssal World was also known as the Bowels of the Universe or the Lower ne. It was the ce where the junk and garbage of the multiverse settled and sedimented in.


    If one were to think of the universe as a gigantic lifeform, its tremendous age would have caused an unimaginable amount of toxins to umte and gather within the body. All this poison had gathered together and settled down, forming what was now known as the Abyssal ne.


    It could be said that everything negative, evil, chaotic, and corrupt was gathered in the Abyssal ne. Though the ce was barren and unpopted, over time, exceptionally unusual magical creatures were born there.


    Those were the abyssal demons!


    The Abyssal ne might be vast in territory, but it was inferior in resources.


    The demons born there engaged in constant fighting and murder over what few resources they were. They sustained themselves on flesh by killing their brethren and strengthened themselves through the energy they had managed to rip from their victim¡¯s corpses.


    They grew through murder and improved through ughter, slowly walking down the path of nar incursions.


    Once an abyssal demon had developed fully, the Abyssal ne¡¯s limited resources were no longer enough to sustain their evolution. For their sake and that of the Abyssal ne, they roamed the universe, searching everywhere for weak worlds they could invade and raid.


    They recklessly charged into any material ne, all for a bite of warm flesh and a sip of delicious soul. They harvested and took away everything that could be taken with their might and fearlessness.


    They did not fear death!


    Even if they died in another world, they could revive in the Abyssal ne through their demon brands. Moreover, the more they killed and the more souls they stole, the greater the feedback from the abyssal consciousness of the Abyssal ne.


    To be absolutely honest, a low-grade demon relied entirely on murder and nar feedback to evolve into a high-grade demon.


    It could be said that there was no nar consciousness as wild, chaotic, and evil as the abyssal consciousness. Not only did the abyssal consciousness not forbid internal disputes and murder, it actually enjoyed these pointless conflicts.


    The abyssal consciousness was not just savage and chaotic itself. It had imnted this worldview deep inside the demonic creatures of the Abyssal ne.


    There were no such things as loyalty or faith within the Abyssal ne. On the contrary- chaos, evil, and destruction became the main themes of the ne to be upheld.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how terrifying the individuals that emerged from such wanton destruction, murder, and violence would be!


    There were instances of major nar worlds espousing order and justice who had invaded the Abyssal ne in the name of purifying evil throughout history. They were overconfident and intent on turning and of evil into paradise.


    Unfortunately, before they could even conquer one ten-thousandth of the Abyssal ne, their homeworlds were conquered by the abyssal demons.


    Their nes were destroyed, and all lives were reaped.


    Their homeworld was then dragged back to the Abyssal ne by the demons and assimted by the Abyssal World.


    In all seriousness, the Abyssal World was the scavenger of the universe.


    The material nes that had been defeated in internar conflict had their nar origins dissipate, their principles shattered, and their lives cast to the wind. The remnants of a ne would drift across the gxy until it merged with the Abyssal World and became part of the Bowels of the Universe.


    The existence of the Abyssal World was only a natural course of the multiverse!


    However, should the Abyssal World grow too powerful, it would be able to corrode the universe and adversely affect its development.


    Many theories, including radical ideas from ancient adepts, posited that the magic surges were the universe¡¯s attempts to ¡®self-purify!¡¯


    When too many toxins and poisons had umted in its body, it was time for a magic surge. It provoked cancerous civilizations such as the Abyssal World and the World of Disasters to sh with the major nes, relying on the might of the major civilizations to limit the growth of these tumors.


    These theories werergely supported and acknowledged by most adepts!


    At the very least, this had been the course of the universe¡¯s development in the understanding of the World of Adepts. However, everything they knew about the past was obtained from books. The cmity they were facing now was something they had to endure with their own lives on the line.


    That was because......


    The demons had trulye!


    ............


    The Ahlden Mega-Rift.


    This ce that had brought the Ahlden n endless wealth and glory had now be their persistent nightmare!


    Much like the disaster lords, several demon lords from the Abyssal World had concurrently set their sights on the rich resources and bountiful poption of the World of Adepts. They couldn¡¯t wait to intrude and reap the souls of its inhabitants.


    No matter how powerful the civilization, they were still several levels inferior to the Abyssal World.


    Fortunately, the disaster creatures, who were far more powerful, had their sights set on Inkdeep Valley as their point of entrance. The inferior demons didn¡¯t darepete with the disaster creatures. Their only option was the smaller mega-rift in the Central Lands.


    They opened a nar gate in the Abyssal World and connected it with this mega-rift. They then herded endless legions of low-grade demons into the World of Adepts, using their flesh and bodies to corrupt the nar space here. In doing so, they created a Chaos Domain around the mega-rift.


    With the Chaos Domain, the abyssal demons no longer had to endure nar suppression from the World of Adepts. If the native adepts of the World of Adepts dared show themselves outside their towers, they would face an army of demons at their full force.


    Several Fourth Grade adepts were staring at a magical mirror in front of them in a tall tower just three kilometers away from the mega-rift. They felt their hearts tremble at everything they were witnessing.


    What was shown in the magical mirror was an image of the surroundings of the mega-rift.


    Everything they were familiar with there had vanished.


    The sky was ck and red.


    Waves of heat surged through the air, hot enough to turn a person dizzy and unconscious.


    Thend was scorched, and the bedrock was exposed. There were no longer any signs of dirt or nts. There were countless cracks in the ground, red-hotva spewing forth from below and running across the ground like serpents of fire.


    Abyssal demons of all shapes and sizes had gathered beneath these crimson skies. They chattered, argued, and pushed each other around. If it weren¡¯t for the few demon lords standing at the mega-rift intimidating them with their auras, the demons would have ughtered each other before the adepts even attacked.


    From a distance, you could see the ck and red figures of the demons everywhere across the earth.


    Most of them were a sort of tiny demon only a hundred and twenty centimeters tall, but muscr and sporting crimson scales. They had sharp horns on their heads, fangs, a pair of pping wings, and a long bony tail. They also held little silver forks in their hands.


    These were the weakest cannon fodder in the army of the abyssal demons¨C the imps.


    When needed, they would be the cannon fodder charging at the very front. When not required forbat, imps were food reserves that the higher-grade demons had prepared for themselves.

 Chapter 1379 - Two Armies Stand-off

    Chapter 1379 Two Armies Stand-off


    Imps might not look like much, but they were quite powerful!


    If you really wanted to make aparison, the Abyssal ne¡¯s imps were equal in status to the peasants of the World of Adepts.


    Given the adepts¡¯ knowledge, they knew more than well enough that a single imp could easily ughter a dozen peasants. They were powerful enough to rival intermediate apprentice-adepts.


    While there were many apprentice adepts in the World of Adepts, they were still not as numerous as the imps in the Abyssal ne.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to see how superior the Abyssal World was to the World of Adepts when it came to fighting prowess alone!


    The superiority didn¡¯t just reflect itself on individual fighting power, but across every aspect of their civilizations.


    In the face of an overwhelming invasion from several Fifth and Sixth Grade great demon lords, Andrew of the Ahlden n had no choice but to send out a call for help. He attempted to rally all the Central adepts to help him defend against the demon invasion.


    Apart from the few Fourth Grades of the Crimson n, most of the thirteen Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands had already arrived. They were situated in the headquarters of the Ahlden n, a massive adept tower, as they silently observed what was happening over at the mega-rift. They feltplicated emotions over the whole affair, including relief and joy.


    It was fortunate that the mega-rift was located in Ahlden n territory. If the rift had been within their own regions, they would probably be in the same situation as Andrew- tearing their hair out in frustration.


    Fight back?


    In all honesty, all the Fourth Grade adepts gathered here might have had such thoughts prior toing here. They had nned to gather the Central Lands¡¯ forces and send this horde of foolish abyssal demons packing. However, upon seeing the actual state of affairs here, they had no choice but to stuff their expectations. They could only hope to keep the demons limited to the vicinity of the mega-rift and out of the surrounding areas.


    What had changed their n was none other than the rming numbers and actual power of these abyssal demons!


    At this moment, as many as five Fourth Grade demons stood near the mega-rift.


    One was a short, stout Quasit with rough skin, like that of a skinned toad.


    One was a seductive Subi with an explosive figure.


    One was a slender me Fiend who was constantly surrounded by leaping fireballs.


    One was an exceptionally tall and muscr Hezrou shrouded by a pungent cloud of rot.


    One was a tall, six-armed female Marilith.


    They were all surrounded by numerous Second and Third Grade demons. Judging from their ferocious auras and vicious appearances, they were all elite demons skilled atbat.


    The trouble with fighting demons was simple. As long as they were Second Grade and above, they were all proficient in using Pinpoint Teleportation. Consequently, there were no such things as frontline and backline when fighting against these demons. The moment a battle broke out, these demons would be able to teleport everywhere and wreak havoc with their exceptional skill at both close and long-range. A slight misstep, and you would be defeated.


    That was why the Fourth Grade adepts were so hesitant to fight even though they far outnumbered the abyssal demons. Once they left the shelter of the adept towers, life and death could be decided in a matter of seconds.


    ¡°When will Lord Greem be arriving?¡± Den asked solemnly.


    All the Fourth Grade adepts couldn¡¯t help but perk up their ears and turn to look at Andrew when they heard the question.


    Even though everyone hade here by invitation, it didn¡¯t mean that everyone present was necessarily willing to fight for the Ahlden n¡¯s sake. After all, there was a real risk of death in battling abyssal demons.


    Everyone would feel much safer and secure if there were one or two ultra-powerhouses here.


    Everyone was a panion¡¯ of the Central Lands, after all. If Andrew was defeated here, the Central Lands would likely be baptized in the mes of the abyssal demons¡¯ wrath. With this understanding in mind, everyone didn¡¯t mind contributing their strength as long as the risk was contained within an eptable range.


    Naturally, the precondition to helping out in a fight was that someone was standing in front of them!


    Everyone might have been resentful of Greem bing the most powerful adept of the Central Lands before this. However, upon seeing the trials and tribtions the Central Lands were facing, they couldn¡¯t help but feel relief.


    Thank god they weren¡¯t the ones in his position!


    They would probably have no solution to this terrible situation, much like all their otherpatriots.


    Andrew¡¯s calm and cool gaze swept past everyone¡¯s faces as he said, ¡°I have ryed the situation here to him. I have yet to obtain a reply. However,¡± After a moment¡¯s pause, he continued, ¡°Lady Mary has been here for over a month and has severely injured two of the demon lords in session. Otherwise, the demons would not have remained so quiet!¡±


    ¡°And Lord Mornashen Gaia? He should be showing himself during such times, shouldn¡¯t he?¡± It was Matthew who asked this time.


    It was obvious that no one felt entirely calm without at least a single ultra-powerhouse present here.


    Before Andrew could reply, a loud and deep voice rang out from beyond the hall.


    ¡°No need to be concerned about me. I am already here!¡±


    As his voice boomed, Mornashen Gaia strode into the hall and appeared before the adepts with two of his nsmen in tow.


    The few adepts who were on good terms with him nodded and greeted him. Mornashen looked around him and nodded slightly. He then walked up to therge magical mirror.


    One could clearly see what was happening at the mega-rift through the mirror. The rift was continually spitting out abyssal demons. Every time space trembled, it meant that the forces of the abyssal demons had strengthened a little more.


    Even though therge majority of these reinforcing demons were only First and Second Grade, they would eventually be trouble if their numbers were allowed to grow perpetually in this fashion.


    ¡°What are you all waiting for? Hurry up and route the demon lords, then find a way to seal the mega-rift. This way, it will make it much more difficult for any worthless trash to break into our world...huh?¡± Mornashen Gaia still had his fiery temper. He almost flew into a rage upon seeing the situation.


    ¡°Lord Greem has yet to arrive. Why don¡¯t we wait?¡± Nics asked carefully, clearly reluctant to take up arms so quickly.


    ¡°Hmph! No wonder the three major organizations have always looked down on us. What is it? Do you guys forget how to fight when Greem isn¡¯t around?¡±


    The adepts looked at each other awkwardly and started to hesitate.


    Even though they knew Mornashen Gaia spoke the truth, they still had troubleing together when the matter concerned their lives and safety.


    After all, the territory belonged to someone else, while their lives were their own!


    ¡°Hmph! Bunch of cowards,¡± Mornashen Gaia snorted angrily and disdainfully as he shouted, ¡°Leave the hezrou and the quasit to me. Split the rest of them amongst yourselves!¡±


    The bloodline of the Gold Titans was truly ferocious. Mornashen had offered to take on the two most powerful demon lords instantly. The adepts had nothing to say with that.


    Joy shed over Andrew¡¯s face as he excitedly replied, ¡°I¡¯ll take the me fiend!¡±


    A single Fourth Grade me fiend might be a fearsome challenge for Andrew, but this disaster was happening on hisnd. If he didn¡¯t put his own life on the line, these slippery allies of his were even less likely to try.


    He had no room to wriggle around, even though the situation would be perilous for him!


    ¡°Leave the marilith to me! Hmph! If she weren¡¯t so lucky, I would have taken her out thest time,¡± Mary¡¯s seductive voice abruptly rang out in the hall. Judging from her tone, she was quite dissatisfied with the results of herst battle.


    This way, only the subus, the weakest of the five Fourth Grade demon lords, was left.


    Nics and Matthew looked at each other and stepped forward.


    ¡°The two of us will deal with the subus! I have some magical equipment that defends against spiritual charm on hand. It¡¯s the most appropriate for dealing with her.¡±


    Now that they had divided the demon lords amongst themselves, the remaining Fourth Grade adepts could deal with the high-grade demon subordinates.


    Their task might be somewhat simpler, but considering the sheer number of high-grade demons, it wasn¡¯t going to be a walk in the park either.


    The adepts had none of the pointless andplicated etiquettes of human nobles.


    After agreeing on a strategy, everyone exchanged looks and left the magical hall.


    The next second, the silhouettes of the human adepts appeared in the sky above the Ahlden adept tower.


    There was no need for greetings or battlecries. The five towering demons standing in front of the mega-rift looked over and stared at the adepts.


    A series of demonic screeching could be heard as the abyssal demons that filled the space started howling and shouting. They spoke in the demon¡¯snguage, their voices hoarse and hard on the ears. It was like countless frogs croaking in unison.


    One had to admit that the demons were terrifying, evil, and corrupt creatures!


    When tens of thousands of them gathered together, their murky abyssal aura was thick enough to suffocate a mortal. The Abyssal consciousness seeping out of the mega-rift also shed with the consciousness of the World of Adepts.


    It was evident that the consciousness of the World of Adepts was no match for the Abyssal consciousness. It was continually being pushed back.


    The World of Adepts¡¯ consciousness had already been expelled from the few kilometers of space around the mega-rift. Even the principles andws that constructed the area around there had been shattered and torn asunder.


    When the numerous adepts stood forward against the abyssal demons, a radiant white light suddenly glowed around them. With this white light, the massive and evil Abyssal consciousness would not be able to corrupt them with its chaos and disorder.


    This way, they wouldn¡¯t have to be concerned about the influence of the abyssal aura!


    It was obviously a reward from the World of Adepts¡¯ consciousness for their act of ¡®justice.¡¯


    If they could execute a fair number of these abyssal demons, they would obtain bountiful feedback from the nar consciousness.


    Traces of dark-red light also glowed from the demons opposing them on the other side.


    That...was obviously a form of enhancement that the Abyssal consciousness was providing them as well!

 Chapter 1380 - Battle Against the Demons

    Chapter 1380 Battle Against the Demons


    A nar invasion was, in fact, a conflict between two consciousnesses.


    The Abyssal consciousness was undoubtedly the more ancient and massive of the two.


    That was why the protective light from the World of Adept¡¯s consciousness had no other effect aside from protecting the Fourth Grade adepts from the Abyssal will¡¯s corrosion.


    Meanwhile, the abyssal demons enjoyed practical enhancements from the Abyssal consciousness. Apart from their Strength, Agility, Physique, and Spirit all being improved slightly, their violent and savage bloodthirst was greatly amplified.


    A dark red light glowed from every demon. It was almost as if they had been strengthened with Bloodthirst. Theirbat prowess had been magnified almost two times.


    It increased the destructive power of the demons even further!


    ¡°Let¡¯s fight!¡± Mornashen Gaia let out a quiet sigh. His body started glowing from the center as if a golden sun had been stuffed into his body.


    As the golden light illuminated the battlefield, Mornashen¡¯s body began to swell and grow in size. Ancient golden armor appeared on his body, covering most of it save for his left shoulder and arm.


    Golden armor, a golden skirt of leather, golden boots, and a golden helmet.


    Mornarshen Gaia glowed brightly and grew a hundred meters tall when he transformed into the Gold Titan. He instantly became the most conspicuous individual on the battlefield.


    ¡°Demons, get out of the World of Adepts! Otherwise......¡± Mornashen lifted both hands as he spat out a prophecy of doom in his booming voice. Thousands of blinding lightning bolts crashed down from the skies above and gathered within his palm.


    ¡°Die!¡±


    Mornashen pushed both hands forward as he shouted. The bright torrent of lightning surged forward like a tree of silver, devouring the demons¡¯ location like a roaring tide.


    Ka!


    An earthshaking boom could be heard as the blinding white light finally faded away, revealing the ravaged battlefield.


    Terrible! Truly terrible! Unbelievably terrible!


    The violent electricity had run through one demon after another. Even with their overwhelming magic resistance and lifeforce, they could not survive such ferocious lightning. The earth and every demon engulfed by that thousand-meter-wide lightning storm was scorched to ashes.


    Only individual Third Grade demons were barely able to survive. Most of their bodies were in tatters. Even their exposed flesh and organs were scorched and withered. They struggled as they crawled out of the unrecognizable piles of ashes that were once their bodies.


    With this single strike alone, Mornashen Gaia had killed over ten thousand demons. That was over one-fourth of the total demons killed in this invasion.


    The entire battlefield fell deadly silent for a moment.


    Then the eyes remaining demons turned bloodshot. They howled as they charged at the towering gold giant, hurling all sorts of powerful spells toward Mornashen as well.


    Havoc Hammer!


    Words of sphemy!


    Meteor Shower!


    Flesh Separation!


    Greater Power Word: Death!


    Soul Annihtion!


    ......


    ......


    The instant-cast spells of these Second and Third Grade demons were both powerful and inconspicuous. It was impossible for an ordinary creature to dodge them all.


    Mornashen Gaia, who had just charged up and unleashed a powerful attack, raised both arms over his face. Golden light rose all around him, and he endured this insane wave of spells.


    Even though he was immune to most of the First and Second Grade spells, it wasn¡¯t that easy to endure the high-grade demons¡¯ attacks.


    The giant stumbled backward, the golden light around his body flickering. Mornashen¡¯s breath turned ragged; it was obvious he was being injured. However, he managed to endure all the spells with the tremendous power of his Titan bloodline in the end.


    Only Mornashen Gaia could have achieved such a feat with his Gold Titan transformation. Any other Fourth Grade adept present would have died or at least suffered grievous injuries in that violent bombardment of spells.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go, as well. We can¡¯t let Mornashen Gaia face the enemy alone!¡± Body-Refining Adept Den roared. His entire body howled across the air and sted into the horde of demons like a human cannon.


    The next second, his power erupted.


    A force shockwave swept across the battlefield, instantly knocking all demons caught in its radius into the air. Their bodies twisted all over as they flew away, as if an invisible hand had just toyed with them like dolls.


    Den had killed a hundred First, Second, and Third Grade abyssal demons in the blink of an eye. They were reduced to broken rag dolls.


    The other Fourth Grade adepts looked at each other and stopped hesitating. They took out their true power and unleashed devastating magic upon the demon army.


    For a moment, they were unstoppable gods of war, razing their way through the battlefield and raising hell wherever they went!


    Fourth Grade adepts were Fourth Grade adepts, after all. When they unleashed their power without hesitation, that destructive might and unstoppable momentum were enough to strike fear into the hearts of any enemy and quench any will of opposition.


    Naturally, the five demon lords could not simply watch as the human adepts ughtered their subordinates.


    They howled, screeched, bellowed, or roared as they transformed into theirbat forms. They lunged at the eight Fourth Grade adepts, those who represented the peak of human might.


    The one charging at the forefront was naturally the hezrou, who went berserk at the very sight of fighting.


    Hezrou. Fourth Grade demon, chaotic evil. It was incrediblyrge, standing nearly three meters tall and weighing over three hundred and fifty kilograms.


    The hezrou was exceptionally huge.


    Its massive size gave it incredible Strength as well, allowing it to swing a gigantic bronze battleaxe easily.


    The hezrou¡¯s appearance was also quite unusual. It looked like a skinned ape tossed intova until its flesh was half-cooked. However, its bulging muscles and vines were more than enough evidence of its real power.


    Apart from being absolutely hideous, the hezrou¡¯s most distinctive feature was the incredibly pungent liquid that its skin would secrete during battle. This stench was far beyond the limits of tolerance for most ordinary creatures. It was enough to smother most enemies as they fought the hezrou.


    Thus, seeing a rampaging hezrou lunge at you was akin to seeing a pile of the most disgusting shit imaginable crashing toward you.


    No one was ever in a good mood fighting against a hezrou!


    Just as this Fourth Grade hezrou demon lord was lunging toward Den, a spear of lightning buried itself in the ground before it. The electricity erupted, and the wild chains of lightning forcefully pushed the hezrou backward.


    ¡°Your enemy is me!¡± Mornashen Gaia let out a deafening battlecry and intercepted the hezrou. At the same time, the lightning spear in his other hand flew forward and cracked at the quasit demon lord.


    The hezrou let out a strange, ape-like cry in response to Mornashen¡¯s taunt. It waved its bronze axe and charged at the Gold Titan.


    The might of a Fourth Grade demon was iparably violent.


    Every demon that stood in the path of its charge was instantly blown away. The ground itself was crushed to dust beneath its powerful strides. Finally, the hezrou leaped into the air with its savage strength and swung the battleaxe at the Gold Titan¡¯s calf.


    Er...it couldn¡¯t be helped. The difference in their sizes was toorge. Even with the approach run, the hezrou was barely able to reach the Gold Titan¡¯s calf.


    However, on a Fourth Grade battlefield, a giant body did not necessarily represent absolute power!


    Even though the Gold Titan was over twenty timesrger in size, he was the one at a disadvantage due to itsck of agility.


    The Gold Titan lifted his right leg and met the hezrou¡¯s axe.


    A loud ng could be heard as an invisible force shockwave rippled outward, blowing all demons in the vicinity away and making them spit blood.


    The two fighters stumbled backward, spots of blood sshing over their bodies.


    The hezrou was suffering the downsides of being smaller in size. Its Strength might not be much weaker than Mornashen¡¯s, but Mornashen¡¯s giant size and Titan bloodline were magnifying the difference. The hezrou had been blown into the midst of the demon army and had crushed seven low-grade demons on impact.


    Gold Titan Mornashen Gaia also stumbled a few steps backward. A gash the size of a washbasin had appeared on his right feet. A fountain of golden blood was spewing forth.


    Mornashen¡¯s exceptional Physique allowed him to recover first. He stood up straight and raised his hands. Violent lightning power gathered between his palms, concentrating into two unstable, crackling lightning spears.


    ¡°Die, demon!¡±


    The next second, Mornashen Gaia bellowed and swung both arms. The two lightning spears turned into a white blur and sted at the scrambling hezrou.


    A vicious look flickered in the demon lord¡¯s eyes. It casually picked up two demons around it and hurled them toward the lightning spears. Right before the erupting lightning bolts could reach him, the hezrou¡¯s body flickered and vanished from the spot.


    Great Teleportation!


    It was a spell that almost all high-grade demons were proficient in. It was an incredibly useful ability for avoiding lethal attacks from an enemy.


    The lightning spears shot through the bodies of the low-grade demons and buried themselves in the ground before exploding into a flurry of serpent-like chains.


    As the lightning crackled, a dozen demons in the vicinity of the explosion were scorched alive before crumpling lifeless to the ground.


    It was obvious that the attack had not managed to hurt the hezrou at all.


    While the Gold Titan was chasing after the hezrou, the quasit also charged forward with a vicious smile.


    The next second, a Chaos Hammer formed of evil runes and abyssal aura crashed on the Gold Titan¡¯s body as a ck bolt, causing the giant to pause for a moment.


    In that one moment of staggering, the two demon lords simultaneously teleported to the Gold Titan¡¯s side and shed at his body with an axe and a jagged de.

 Chapter 1381 - A Sudden Twist

    Chapter 1381 A Sudden Twist


    Roar!


    A howl of agony could be heard throughout the battlefield. The Gold Titan lifted his head and roared furiously, his entire body glowing with blinding lightning.


    A lightning storm engulfed the two demon lords attacking him before they could flee.


    By the time they stumbled out of the lightning storm, their bodies had been scorched. From a distance, they looked like ghosts scurrying out of a coal mine. Even their demon wings had been reduced to tatters. They were in a truly terrible state.


    Thanks to their resilient lifeforce as high-grade demons, the demon lords were barely able to avoid the Gold Titan¡¯s stomp of death and scrambled out of his range of attack.


    However, Titans had always been known to be experts at every range!


    Before the demons could escape far, a crackling lightning-spear was hurled in their direction, instantly catching them in a massive web of electricity.


    The battlefield was filled with the pained and agonized cries of the two demon lords.


    Mornashen Gaia was truly the most powerful bloodline adept of the Central Lands. His Gold Titan bloodline was without equal. That was why even the fearless and reckless demon lords were starting to buckle in the face of Mornashen¡¯s all-out attack.


    Human adepts were intelligent beings that preferred to strike after thinking!


    Mornashen Gaia held the absolute initiative even when fighting against two demon lords. He was dominating the battlefield with his overwhelming might. Demons who couldn¡¯t flee fast enough from his gigantic figure were either destroyed in a fearsome storm of lightning or crushed underfoot.


    Meanwhile, on the other side of the battlefield, Mary had managed to torture the six-armed marilith to the brink of death. If she hadn¡¯t wanted to capture this demon with the Nightmare Castle¡¯s power, Mary would have skinned, butchered, and drained her dry.


    Apart from the two of them, Den¡¯s battle with the me fiend was also exceptionally intense. Fortunately, Den wasn¡¯t fighting alone. Molten-Fire City Lord Alfred rushed forward and used his unusual soundwave magic to help him establish an advantage.


    me fiends were unusual demons that relied heavily on their elementium powers. Their Physique and Strength were vastly inferiorpared to the hezrous. However, they possessed a tremendous innate talent for fire spells.


    Manipting fire was as easy for them as breathing was for humans!


    As befitting their identity as demons, they also had decent physical prowess. In addition to their Burning Domain and Infernal Halo, there weren¡¯t many enemies that could close in on them for a melee.


    Human adepts couldn¡¯tpare to these natural magical creatures when it came to both bodily attributes and elementium talent. However, an adept¡¯s incredible intelligence allowed them to maximize the utility of magical equipment and optimize their fighting prowess.


    A me fiend¡¯s fire magic was shocking. However, Den was able to gain temporary fire immunity with a Fourth Grade Talisman of Fire Resistance and a Firebath Potion.


    Through hisplicatedbat techniques as a body-refining adept, Den was able to stay close to the me fiend, beating the demon down and forcing it to run away constantly. The demon had absolutely no time or space to unleash its terrifying and fiery might.


    Meanwhile, Nics and Matthew¡¯s battle against the Fourth Grade subus was even more decided.


    Subi were not known for their fighting prowess among the abyssal demons. On the contrary, they often obtained higher positions by seducing and relying on other powerful demons.


    Their primary weapons were the whip wrapped around their waist, their dagger-sharp ws, and their Charming Kiss ability.


    They were constantly unting their bodies and seducing the enemy, even in the middle of an intense battle. They would wink and send flying kisses at their enemy while they fought. In fact, when they flicked their whips, the cracks would be apanied by enchanting moans.


    Young adepts with weak wills would probably be charmed by the winks and the kisses before the battle even started.


    In truth, subi preferred group battles!


    Most of the time, through conscious seduction and charm, they could turn one of the opponents against their own teammates.


    Unfortunately, the subus¡¯ opponent today were two old, sly, and sinister Fourth Grade adepts.


    Nics and Matthew.


    At their old age, they no longer preferred fighting directly with their enemies. That, however, didn¡¯t mean that they were weak or mediocre.


    Both Nics and Matthew were veteran adepts that had advanced to Fourth Grade seven or eight hundred years ago. They might not be very powerful Fourth Grades, but they had a speechless array of sinister abilities to defeat their enemies.


    Rotworm: An unusual insect that could cause the victim¡¯s flesh and blood to rot rapidly once it entered the victim¡¯s body.


    Dagger of Separation: A gold dagger with unusual powers. Any limbs severed or wounds opened by this dagger could not be healed by means of magic or regeneration.


    Heartbreak Bell: A tiny metal bell that could cause any who heard its ring to die of a broken heart.


    The Staff of Curses: Once the staff was dipped in even one drop of the enemy¡¯s blood, it would be able to apply a random curse on the enemy every five seconds.


    Shadownail: Puncturing the victim¡¯s shadow with this nail would cause them to lose the ability to move for a brief moment.


    ......


    While none of this myriad of magical equipment could inflict a lethal wound to the subus, they all possessed incredibly annoying and infuriating abilities.


    After being attacked by both of these elderly and sinister adepts, the subus demon lord was already covered in wounds and thoroughly enraged.


    However, no matter how furious she was or how hard she tried to attack the adepts with suicidal moves, they simply relocated and patiently wore her down.


    As for her charming abilities? Even if she threw out her hip unting her body, the two adepts would remainpletely unmoved as if they were scarecrows. Her seduction had absolutely no effect.


    No, it did have an effect. There was a glint of greed flickering in the two cunning adepts¡¯ eyes, a light that struck fear into the heart of the subus demon lord. She began to retreat backward as they fought. She no longer dared to fight these two adepts with all her strength.


    The one-sided nature of the battle pushed the subus demon lord over an edge. Finally, she could no longer tolerate it. She let out a shrill cry.


    ¡°Meillerie, you bastard! If you don¡¯te out now, I will die here today!¡±


    Meillerie......who¡¯s Meillerie?


    Nics and Matthew were a little curious, but they didn¡¯t give much heed to what the subus was saying. It was important to note that subi were creatures that excelled at charming; every single movement of their bodies and every word they uttered was imbued with magical charm.


    That was why the two adepts had applied Frigid Heart on themselves before the battle, rendering them immune to all charming effects. However, their souls were still lustful, which was why their eyes betrayed their desires, even as they remained seemingly unmoved.


    ¡°Hmph! You useless whore! Can¡¯t even charm two elderly human adepts. Watch me!¡± A booming roar rang out as fire shed on the battlefield. A five-meter-tall demon appeared behind Nics and Matthew.


    A massive executor¡¯s de zing with abyssal fire shed horizontally, instantly slicing Matthew¡¯s defenses in half, along with Matthew himself. Matthew cried out in pain. His entire body was cut in half, and he exploded into a cloud of ck smoke, which promptly vanished from the spot.


    Meanwhile, Nics was extremely sly. While Matthew¡¯s body stalled the enemy¡¯s de for a brief moment, his own body suddenly froze on the spot.


    The massive executor¡¯s dended on Nics¡¯ body after slicing through Matthew.


    Nics¡¯ living body suddenly turned into a paper person, which was instantly ignited by the abyssal mes and reduced to ashes.


    A thousand meters away, at the edge of the adept¡¯s tower, the space warped and trembled.


    Nics and Matthew appeared simultaneously, coughing up blood as they stumbled onto the ground.


    Matthew, in particr, was in a terrible state. His body had been cut in half. Both piecesy strewn on the ground, but he had not died yet.


    ¡°Come back!¡± Matthew propped up his upper body strenuously and pointed a finger at the bloody lower half. The lower half of his body stood up on its own and walked over to his side.


    Matthew pressed both hands against the ground and tried to piece the two halves of his body together once more. However, the moment they were pieced together, purple mes shed from his wound and blew them apart.


    ¡°Dammit! Abyssal fire!¡±


    Matthew pounded the ground with his fist angrily, but there was nothing he could do.


    The mes of that powerful demon had attached themselves to the surface of the cut. It would be impossible to rejoin his body until the abyssal mes were purified.


    Matthew could only pick up the Dagger of Separation and swiftly cut off the parts of his body that the purple mes had attached themselves to. He could finally use his strange magic to piece his body together once again.


    When he finally stood up, he was half a head shorter than he was before.


    Once he was done treating his wounds, he finally had a chance to take a proper look at the demon that had injured him.


    It was a perfect and exemry specimen of the abyssal demons!


    Its muscr and powerful body was over four meters tall, and it weighed a shocking two tons.


    Its crimson skin was covered in fine, gray scales, while a pair of gleaming wings red behind its back and a long scaly tail extended from its spine. There were four pairs of thick twisted horns on its head, making it appear even more vicious than it already was.

 Chapter 1382 - Fourth Grade Battlefield

    Chapter 1382 Fourth Grade Battlefield


    There were simply too many types of demons.


    In the World of Adepts alone, they had several hundred tomes and books dedicated to the recording and illustration of the various abyssal demons. Even so, the adepts still had a hard time differentiating the demons at times.


    However, this new demon was clearly no small fry. He was a fearsome higher demon- an abyssal pit fiend.


    That meant his original form was that of a Fifth Grade demon, though the World of Adepts currently suppressed him; he was only capable of unleashing the power of peak Fourth Grade. Even so, his terror and strength were enough to shock everyone.


    It was said that pit fiends were terrifying monsters that had climbed out of the depths of the abyss. Their bodies zed perpetually with eternal abyssal fire. Where they went, all life withered and died. They were the incarnation of the death and destruction brought down by the Abyssal consciousness.


    When this powerful demon appeared, he did not need to lift a single finger to intimidate every human adept present. His vicious appearance and dominating aura alone were enough to achieve that.


    All the human adepts began to move toward the adept tower and gathered together. They looked upon this strong and vicious pit fiend cautiously.


    In particr, the executor¡¯s de that he held in his hand drew everyone¡¯s attention.


    It was written in the books that the weapons of the pit fiend was known as Butcher Knives. They were forged with an unusually robust abyssal metal. They were demonic weapons with numerous fearsome abilities, including destroying the soul or stopping regeneration.


    Everyone couldn¡¯t help but look at Matthew at the thought of this.


    Could this abyssal pit fiend have yet to forge his own personal weapon? How else was Matthew still alive?


    Matthew was ghastly pale right now. He trembled as he took out a wooden doll the size of his palm. It was intricately carved with all sorts ofplicated runes and lines. The wooden doll looked quite simr to Matthew himself when it came to appearance and dress. It even had eyes and eyebrows drawn on.


    However, a deep crack ran throughout the wooden doll¡¯s body, almost threatening to split it in half. The voodoo doll was obviously useless now!


    Everyone finally realized what had happened.


    Matthew had, in fact, ¡®died¡¯ once to the demon already. However, his voodoo doll had died in his ce.


    Upon this revtion, everyone looked toward the massive executor¡¯s de in the pit fiend¡¯s hands, their eyes betraying a trace of fear and cowardice. Even though everyone had their own secret means of saving their lives, no one could bear to be cut by the pit fiend¡¯s Butcher Knife.


    Even Mornashen Gaia, the hundred-meter-tall Gold Titan, was intimidated by the de. His pupils shrank abruptly when he saw it.


    He could hear the resentful howls of spirits emanating from the de. He could feel the fearsome threat that the weapon posed to his soul.


    He couldn¡¯t help but feel his heart tremble slightly. He stood silently in front of the adept tower, scanning the battlefield over and over.


    However, he quickly let out a coldugh.


    ¡°What are you all scared of? This is our territory! If he dares step close to the adept tower, it¡¯ll be the perfect chance to skin him, tear out his tendons and, slice him apart. If he doesn¡¯t daree closer, then we will just deal with them with our long-range spells.¡±


    Having said that, Mornashen Gaia raised both hands into the sky, calling bolts of violent lightning the size of pirs from above. They crashed down onto the battlefield in the distance as a waterfall of lightning.


    The other adepts followed his example, leaning against the adept tower as they conjured powerful and violent spells down on the battlefield.


    One had to admit that the might of Fourth Grade adepts was extraordinary.


    When the Fourth Grade adepts unleashed their power in this fashion, it instantly pushed the demon army swarming ahead of them to the brink of extermination. However, with so many dead demons, their corrupt blood and evil souls were able to further corrupt the surrounding nar space.


    The demonification of the area around the mega-rift progressed even further!


    The more dead demons there were, the more power the Fifth Grade pit fiend could unleash within this world. Overall, the situation was certainly not in the adepts¡¯ favor!


    If it were only ordinary demons that died, the demon lords couldn¡¯t have cared less. Instead, they would be d to see it happen. However, many of the demons on the battlefield were their elite subordinates or trusted tribesmen.


    They couldn¡¯t just let these demons die!


    The demon lords followed behind the pit fiend and strode toward the human adepts.


    The abyssal pit fiend was unusuallyrge and heavy. Every step he took with his hooves left a half-meter-deep crater in the ground. Cracks ran across the earth from them.


    Moreover, wherever he stepped, the earth would crack and burn. Even the rocks and pebbles were corrupted by the abyssal aura and seemed as if they had turned more depraved and evil.


    ¡°We can¡¯t let this demon keep growing stronger on ournd!¡± Mornashen Gaia¡¯s expression turned solemn as he shouted, ¡°If we let his power break the limit of Fourth Grade, no one here will be able to be his opponent. We need to banish him from this world before he adapts to the environment.¡±


    ¡°Mornashen, if you are nning to strike, count me in!¡± A crimson figure appeared in the air and said, ¡°I¡¯ve been wanting to taste the blood of a higher demon for a while now.¡±


    ¡°Count me in as well!¡± It was Andrew who spoke up this time.


    This ce was Ahlden n territory. If everyone decided to flee out of cowardice, the Ahlden n had the most to lose. Out of both reason and emotion, he had no choice but to grit his teeth and step forward.


    Two ultra-powerhouses and an intermediate Fourth Grade adept, against a powerful Fifth Grade pit fiend versed in both the magical and martial arts. Even though he only had the power of a peak Fourth Grade, it was still a perilous battle for the adepts.


    However, since the three adepts had agreed to deal with the strongest demon, the others had no excuses.


    The adepts and the demons let out their own battlecries and charged toward each other.


    ............


    High up in the sky, three kilometers away from the battlefield, the silver Mothership Versailles sailed in the air, blocking the demons¡¯ path to the rest of the Central Lands.


    This way, even if the Ahlden n was defeated, the demons would first have to get past the Mothership to enter the inner territories.


    A few of the Crimson n¡¯s higher-ups were silently observing this battle on the bow of the deck.


    ¡°Teacher, are you not going?¡±


    Meryl¡¯s red dragon bloodline had been stimted by the sight of the bloody and terrifying battlefield. Her blood boiled, and her red wings had appeared.


    Her body was now covered in fine crimson scales, and her usually seductive eyes now had a ring, scorching quality to them. Four horns, two small and tworge, quickly grew on her forehead, making her appear like the red dragon adept she was.


    Meryl was having trouble suppressing her restless red dragon bloodline after sensing the air of savagery and bloodthirst pressing in from the distant battlefield.


    Behind her, the beautiful Emilia, dressed in a soft green robe, also had a tense andbat-ready look on her face.


    Commander Locke, who stood even further behind them, was also on edge. His green goblin face had turned scarlet, and specks of red light had appeared on the edges of his beady green eyes.


    Bug Adept Billis stood at the end of the group. His hood hung low, and his ck robe obscured his figure and his face. However, you could sense his restlessness just from the asional lumps that rushed across the surface of his robe.


    Greem was wearing in, crimson leather armor. He turned back and looked at the eager Meryl and nced at Emilia, whose face was flushed red with excitement. Her hands were balled into fists as she suppressed the urge to fight. Greem shook his head and chuckled, ¡°Of course I¡¯m going. Otherwise, the mega-rift will be breached today!¡±


    ¡°Then...then we will...go as well...to help you!¡± It was a short sentence, but Meryl hesitated as her voice fluctuated.


    ¡°This is a Fourth Grade battlefield. Third Grades like yourself could die at any moment!¡±


    ¡°I...we......aren¡¯t scared!¡±


    ¡°Cough!¡± Greem shook his head again and waved his hand. A radiant red barrier engulfed everyone.


    Strangely enough, the moment the barrier enveloped them, the Crimson higher-ups instantly snapped back to their senses. They broke out in a cold sweat at the thought of what just happened.


    ¡°Awake now?¡± Greem smiled faintly.


    The few of them that represented the Third Grade core members of the Crimson n lowered their heads, wiped away their sweat, and bowed. ¡°Thank you for your help, n leader!¡±


    ¡°No need to feel guilty over that. This is a battlefield of two nar civilizations, after all! Only Fourth Grade adepts can sense thews¡¯ presence and resist the Abyssal will¡¯s temptation and corruption. All of you will have to keep growing before you can participate in a battle of this level!¡± Greem stood their leisurely, calmly observing the battlefield in the distance as if victory and defeat in this battle did not matter to him.


    ¡°That demon is too strong. I am only concerned...that Lady Mary will be injured at his hands!¡± Of all the adepts present here, only Meryl dared to speak to Greem in this fashion as his disciple. The rest of them could only wait silently and listen.


    The demon in the distance might seem ferocious, but everyone felt calm when they saw howposed their n leader was.


    They had been corrupted by the aura of savagery from the Abyssal will and became incredibly bloodthirsty.


    However, after being sheltered by the n leader¡¯s firews, all thoughts of ugher and murder in their hearts had been suppressed.


    Intelligence andposure, the traits expected of the adepts, returned to them once again!

 Chapter 1383 - Crimson Ambition

    Chapter 1383 Crimson Ambition


    ¡°I¡¯ll move when it¡¯s time to!¡±


    Greem was calm andposed as he looked at the battlefield in the distance.


    ¡°These Central adepts think too highly of themselves and are too used to having no restrictions. Making them obey me is no easy task. Naturally, I have my way of suppressing them while I¡¯m around. But what do you all intend to do to maintain the authority of the Crimson n once I¡¯m gone?¡±


    Everyone couldn¡¯t help but freeze up when they heard Greem¡¯s words.


    ¡°Teacher, you...you are still so young. Why would you say something like that?¡± Concern shed on Meryl¡¯s face as her cheeks flushed red.


    ¡°Meryl, don¡¯t fret. My lord doesn¡¯t mean it that way.¡± Emelia was incredibly smart and sharp. She pondered for a moment and asked, ¡°n leader, could it be...that you¡¯re almost about to take that next step?¡±


    The next step.


    This shocking sentence shook everyone to their core. They opened their eyes wide and stared at this towering figure before them.


    Everyone had felt something out of the usual from their n leader this time.


    The overwhelming fire energy their n leader used to radiate had vanished without a trace. If it weren¡¯t for his familiar voice, silhouette, aura, and scent, everyone here would have treated Greem like an ordinary human as he stood in front of them.


    Indeed, the n leader¡¯s energy aura waspletely concealed, reced with a genuine warmth and an unquestionable aura of dignity.


    His smile was like spring, able to infect the heart through some unseen, extraordinary means; it made one feel warmth throughout their bodies. His anger was like infernal fire, able to ignite the souls of anyone in the most violent and barbaric fashion.


    They only had some vague idea of their n leader¡¯s might, but they did not know what made him so powerful. Now, having heard Emelia¡¯s question, they understood what was being implied. Everyone held their breath and waited silently for the n leader¡¯s reply.


    The smile on Greem¡¯s face grew even wider.


    Everyone here was a trusted member of the Crimson n. Naturally, there was no need to conceal anything.


    Greem stared at the distant battlefield as he said in a soft voice, ¡°That next step isn¡¯t such an easy one to take. I have only found my direction. Actually taking that next step will require at least a hundred years or more.¡±


    Even though Greem replied very leisurely, the Crimson n members were instantly able to pick up on the implications behind what he said.


    If time was the only factor left, didn¡¯t that mean that the n leader was already prepared in terms of resources, knowledge, and all the other factors? A smooth path forward. The n leader¡¯s approach to Fifth Grade Great Adept was but a smooth way going forward!


    Overwhelming joy and excitement shed over the faces of the Crimson higher-ups. However, the status they held within the Crimson n now forced them to digest this information calmly.


    Everyone fell silent for a moment and started to fantasize about the future.


    The n leader¡¯s meaning was obvious now. He would probably devote all his time and effort in the next hundred years to the umtion and training for taking the next step. Given that to be the case, the Central Lands would be left in their hands to maintain and expand.


    Everyone present here was someone that the n leader could trust and rely on. They would all likely have to take on tremendous responsibilities in the future. Authority and status were good things to have, but it was no different from sitting on top of a volcano without the corresponding power to back it up.


    When all that backed up force came erupting in a single st......


    Fortunately, the Crimson n didn¡¯t just have a single Fourth Grade at the moment. Apart from Greem, there was also Mary and Arms. Arms was a pureblood dragon, after all. He was a decent fighting force as an honorary elder of the n. However, Fourth Grade Bloody Queen Mary was the only person who could sustain the Crimson n and keep the tens of thousands of Central adepts under her control!


    Of course, if anyone present here could show more outstanding results, they would also have the chance to rise and be the leader of the Central Lands.


    That position, status, and the authority of it- merely thinking of it all had everyone¡¯s hearts beating faster. They could barely contain their excitement.


    Rising to Fifth Grade, forging a legend, bing an entity akin to a god for the World of Adepts. They had had such daydreams in their lives countless times. However, they knew their limits. Such fantasies would only remain daydreams. They seemed to be within reach, but they were incredibly far away. These dreams were not for them. Not with their current power and potential.


    That was why Fourth Grade was regarded with such glory and reverence within the World of Adepts. After all, Fourth Grade was the absolute apex of power and achievement for most people.


    It might just be a fantasy for other adepts. However, for these core adepts of the Crimson n, sess was right before them. All they had to do was to put in that ¡®tiny bit¡¯ of effort!


    Everyone¡¯s breathing turned hot and heavy.


    Greem did not turn to look.


    He knew that these trusted subordinates of his needed some time to digest such a bombshell of news.


    Mary was his most intimate partner. Naturally, he hoped that she would continue walking down the path of an adept instead of falling into the pointless politics and power games in the Central Lands.


    Finding and raising a Fourth Grade sessor within the Crimson n was the ideal course of action. This new Fourth Grade candidate had to be chosen from among these few individuals. That was why Greem revealed his personal ns ahead of time to provoke their ambition and will to strive.


    Ambition wasn¡¯t such a bad thing!


    As long as you had the power to match your ambition, it would be a source of strength that continued to push you forward. However, if you didn¡¯t have sufficient power, then ambition would be a seed of disaster. It would drive a person insane and push them toward their death.


    However, the Crimson n would be protected by Greem and Mary for the next few hundred years. This next generation of the n had plenty of time to grow and strengthen themselves.


    If one of them could sessfully advance to Fourth Grade, the Crimson n¡¯s fame and the legendary fire adept would instantly propel them into a position of power and authority in the Central Lands. It was an incredible temptation to the Third Grade Crimson adepts, causing them to be somewhat restless.


    While their minds were thoroughly distracted, blood and flesh had covered the entire battlefield.


    After a bloody battle, the adepts had severely injured three of the six demons. They were the quasit, the me fiend, and the marilith.


    However, this battle still ended in the adepts¡¯ defeat!


    The reason for their defeat was because no one could stop the pit fiend¡¯s reckless rampage.


    Even with Mornashen, Mary, and Andrew¡¯sbined power, they were not a match for the pit fiend. The pit fiend relied on his teleportation abilities to travel all over the battlefield, sending the adepts scurrying in every direction.


    The terrifyingbination of his teleportation and his fearsome Butcher Knife......


    Every time the pit fiend struck, it was a trial of life and death for a Fourth Grade adept.


    The Fourth Grade adepts had to simultaneously deal with their own opponents while being wary of sneak attacks from the pit fiend. In all honesty, fighting a battle like this was an excruciating task!


    Mary was perhaps the only one among them who could catch up with the pit fiend, on ount of her exceptional Agility. However, she couldn¡¯t support the entire battle on her shoulders alone. When she was unable to lure an enemy into the Nightmare Castle, she was no more than an intermediate Fourth Grade.


    That much power was insufficient to stop the pit fiend¡¯s rampage.


    The only one with the might to match the pit fiend was Mornashen Gaia. However, his hundred-meter height made his every action slow. It was nearly impossible to catch up with the pit fiend.


    If he focused too much on the pursuit, the pit fiend could suddenly turn around and strike him. When that happened, even Mornashen couldn¡¯t guarantee he woulde out unscathed against that strange Butcher Knife.


    Thus, a somewhatedic game of cat and mouse began on the battlefield!


    Mary flickered around the pit fiend like a dragonfly but was simply unable to pierce his defenses. Meanwhile, the tall and ferocious Gold Titan chased right behind, hurling bolts of lightning at the pit fiend.


    The pit fiend simply ignored the lightning bolts. It rampaged across the battlefield with itsrge and heavy body, recklessly chasing after the human adepts. asionally, it would activate Pinpoint Teleportation and appear beside a Fourth Grade adept, smiling as he swung his de.


    The massive executor¡¯s de burning with abyssal fire would always achieve something when swung!


    Individually powerful human adepts might be able to endure the power of the de with their resilient soul. The weaker ones could only avoid the fate of a shattered soul by using means like voodoo dolls and recement puppets.


    In all honesty, the pit fiend alone was enough to send the adepts packing.


    Every time he disappeared from view, the adepts would be fearful for their own lives!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The pit fiend¡¯s attacks were too fearsome. Death was the only result if they couldn¡¯t stop the de. It was no wonder everyone was worried and scared.


    No casualties had urred yet amongst the Fourth Grade adepts at this point in the battle. However, at the rate things were going, it was only a matter of time until one or two Fourth Grades died!


    The disadvantage of the human adepts was bing increasingly obvious, and their defeat increasingly certain.


    It was because they knew this that the morale of the adepts was only slipping further and further.

 Chapter 1384 - Greem Appears

    Chapter 1384 Greem Appears


    Greem, who was hiding in the shadows, knew that it was his time to move!


    Otherwise, if any of those cowards turned and ran, it would be a very messy situation to clean up.


    With that in mind, Greem moved without hesitation.


    There were no fancy lights or massivemotion. Greem simply strolled toward the battlefield, walking in the air.


    As his feet left the ship, his body began to grow in size. His body became slightlyrger with every step. The battlefield was three kilometers away, yet he arrived at the edge of the battle in just ten steps. At the same time, his body grew to unbelievable proportions.


    A thousand-meter-tall body.


    Greem did not transform into a molten giant this time. Instead, he retained his actual appearance. However, having grown a thousand meters, his every action appeared slow and stiff.


    ¡°Demons, leave our world, or you will die here today!¡± Greem¡¯s lips moved only slightly, but his voice rumbled across the sky like rolling thunder.


    Where it reached, the earth quaked and the adept towers trembled. Even the Crimson adepts, who had remained behind on the Mothership, were forced to sp their ears as they were knocked around by the sound wave.


    Greem¡¯s sudden appearance cloaked all thebatants in a mysterious fear.


    All the adepts and demons stopped in their tracks and turned to look at this fearsome giant in horror.


    His crimson leather armor glowed with magical power, and an intricate ck cloak wrapped around his body. He had a handsome and heroic figure, along with those ck eyes that contained untold intelligence.


    Every feature of his was elegant, fitting, and aesthetic. However, when they appeared on a thousand-meter giant body, they seemed so strange and intimidating.


    Every adept and demon gulped at the same time. They felt as if even breathing was difficult.


    ¡°Greem. This...this is Greem?¡± All the adepts were stunned silent. They could hardly believe their eyes.


    Meanwhile, the demons started roaring, insulting this frightening intruder with coarse insults in their abyssal tongue.


    ¡°Foolish human adept. You don¡¯t think that bing bigger makes you stronger, do you? True power requires¡ª¡± The eight-meter-tall figure of the abyssal demon was like an ant before Greem. He cackled coldly and walked toward the giant. However, his words stopped short in his mouth as he suddenly turned anxious. ¡°Dammit! Principle fires?¡±


    Greem slowlynded beside the Ahlden n¡¯s origin tower. The tremors from hisnding caused the tower to tremble slightly.


    ¡°Andrew, you don¡¯t mind if I borrow some of the energy from your tower, do you?¡± Greem was sorge that even the looming adept tower was like a toy beside him. The tip of the tower could barely reach his waist.


    Having said that, Greem bent over and grabbed the top of the tower with one hand. Violent, surging magic energy flowed into his body through the tower¡¯s walls.


    A strand of golden fire slowly appeared in his other hand, glowing brighter and brighter. Finally, the fire became brighter than the sun. It was as if a scorching sun had appeared in Greem¡¯s palm.


    The appearance of this fire caused the surrounding narws to be restless. The adepts and demons on the battlefield could all sense the unprecedented activity of the fire elementium around them. The fire elementium swarmed toward the fire like birds returning to their nests.


    Allws rted to fire within the surrounding space were distorted. All spells and magic that required fire elementium became chaotic and disorderly. The chances of a failed spell-casting increased exponentially.


    The pit fiend felt this more so than the others.


    It could sense the terrifying and mysterious changes befalling to thews of this region behind the scenes!


    His savage eyes remained fixed upon that ball of golden fire. His face was filled with shock, horror, and disbelief.


    Principle fire. How could it be a principle fire? Was this not the World of Adepts? Could the narws here have mutated? Had the upper limit of power been increased to Fifth Grade?


    The pit fiend sensed his surroundings silently. Thews had not changed. The greatest amount of power he could draw upon was peak Fourth Grade. What had happened to the nar consciousness of the World of Adepts, then? Why had it allowed a creature within this ne toe into contact with a principle power of this level?


    No matter how great his disbelief, it was a matter of fact that such a thing was unfolding before his very eyes. The thousand-meter-tall giant pressed his mouth to the golden fire after absorbing magic energy from the adept tower. He puffed his lips and blew lightly.


    The next second, an indescribably violent stream of fire came surging from the golden mes and rushed at the pit fiend as a furious tide.


    ¡°You piece-of-shit world consciousness! You bloody bastard actually allowed for cheating! The upper limit of power is supposed to be peak Fourth Grade! Why is this asshole able to unleash Fifth Grade principle fire?¡± The pit fiend was beyond furious. He cursed the nar consciousness of the World of Adepts over and over in his mind.


    However, he did not dare take the golden mes lightly as he had with all his opponents before this. He hastily cast Pinpoint Teleportation and leaped out of the range of the mes.


    He had no choice but to evade the mes. The demon lords behind him were no idiots. They quickly erupted into mes and teleported away.


    Unfortunately, while they could dodge the mes, the numerous low-grade demons behind them couldn¡¯t.


    The mes rolled across thend.


    Every creature on the earth and above it stopped in their tracks as their bodies zed and turned ck. A light breeze blew over them, and they all crumbled into ck dust.


    The Third Grade demons had resilient life forces and were able tost slightly longer in the principle fire. However, they had been burned to a crisp. mes came out of their eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. They stumbled all over the battlefield like blind men. It was obvious they had lost all their external senses.


    Soon, even thisst bit of their life force was burned away by the principle fire. They copsed to the ground as their bodies disintegrated into countless specks of ash.


    This torrent of me did not seem veryrge, but it was extraordinarily ferocious and terrifying. It engulfed every inch of space around the mega-rift in a few seconds.


    Over half of the fifty thousand abyssal demons that had teleported here over the past month had died in the battles before this. Now, what remained of them had been turned to ashes by the principle fire.


    The demon lords stared at the scene of this happening with eyes wide open. They gritted their teeth, wanting nothing more than to rush forward and crush their enemy. However, the mes were beneath them. They had to beat their wings and remain hovering a hundred meters above the ground; none of them dared touch the mes.


    They might be Fourth Grade adepts, but they would sustain grievous injuries if the mes caught up with them. It would be a terrible time.


    Fortunately, they were high-grade demons and sufficiently powerful. All of them could use abyssal fire with some degree of proficiency. There was a trace of the Abyssal consciousness¡¯ aura contained within the abyssal fires that cloaked them. It helped shield them from the principle fire.


    It was this discovery that made them feel a little safer!


    Otherwise, without a means to counter the principle fire, they would have had to flee back to the Abyssal World with their tails between their legs.


    Demons were violent creatures who could only think of murder and ughter. However, fleeing in the face of an overwhelmingly powerful enemy was not an embarrassing option for them either.


    After all, given their might as Fourth Grades, reviving from the Abyssal Brazier with their demonic brands would take at least ten years. If possible, they would prefer to return with their spoils rather than die and be kicked back into the Abyssal World by the enemy.


    The pit fiend howled angrily. His body exploded into purple mes, leaving a slowly expanding ring of fire in the air.


    His body vanished without a trace!


    ¡°Seems like you don¡¯t intend to leave,¡± Greem¡¯s deep voice echoed throughout the space. He lifted a hand as radiant light emanated his body, enveloping every inch of space within a hundred meters of himself.


    The pit fiend appeared at the edge of the light.


    It was obvious that he had intended to teleport to Greem¡¯s side and attack but had been stopped by this strange light.


    Principle power. Only principle powers could stop the teleportation of a Fifth Grade demon!


    The pit fiend swung his Butcher Knife, cutting open the light. He then dove into the light and shed at Greem¡¯s body.


    Beingrger was disadvantageous in a battle between high-grades!


    Without proper defenses, therger you were, the more opportunities for the enemy to attack. Without sufficient power, increasing your body¡¯s size only weakened the strength of the individual parts of your body.


    As a veteran Fifth Grade demon, Meillerie knew all these things well!


    Greem did not panic even though the enemy was now next to him. Golden mes burned in his palm, and he swung his hand downward.


    Two powerful forces shed together in an instant.


    The next second, the earth was torn asunder, the sky split apart, and the nar world trembled. It was almost as if a typhoon had just ravaged the battlefield. Everyone in the vicinity was blown away.

 Chapter 1385 - The Pit Fiend Flees

    Chapter 1385 The Pit Fiend Flees


    Fortunately, the damned cannon fodder had all died in mes.


    Otherwise, this sh of the powerful would have wiped out everyone else and turned that battlefield into a death zone.


    The Fourth Grade adepts and Fourth Grade demons scurried away amidst the ferocious shockwaves. They each used their own means to flee the battlefield as quickly as they could.


    The most unfortunate individual on the battlefield had to be the Fourth Grade hezrou.


    It had never excelled at speed to begin with, and it had even been badly injured in the fighting earlier. Consequently, it was much slower at fleeingpared to everyone else. Before it could escape the range of the fight, the force shockwaves and golden mes caught up with it.


    When the force shockwave came crushing toward it, the Fourth Grade hezrou was ttened as if an invisible hand had wrapped around it and was gripping as tightly as possible. The hezrou¡¯s body was twisted beyond recognition, and fountains of purple blood came spilling from its body.


    Despite the terrifying injuries inflicted to it, the hezrou managed to survive with its resilient Physique and stubborn life force. However, just as it reached out to the me fiend¨Cits closest ally¨Cto call for help, a golden ripple washed across its body.


    mes burst forth from its heart as the golden ripple ignited the hezrou¡¯s magical energy. A fearsome Undying me burned from within its organs, causing it to howl and yelp in agony.


    ¡°Izal, save me!


    ¡°Tyria, give me a hand, and from now on, I......¡±


    Regardless of how the hezrou screamed and pled, its demonpanions simply fled even faster.


    Finally, the Undying me prated the hezrou¡¯s organs, dissipating from its orifices and the pores of its skin, transforming the hezrou into a zing torch. It stumbled around the battlefield howling in pain.


    A short momentter, its life force was exhausted, and it crumpled to the ground like a piece of rotten wood. It never got up again.


    The adepts and demon lords all felt a chill in their hearts.


    That...had not been an ordinary abyssal demon! It was a Fourth Grade demon lord, a god-like deity that was capable of world destruction in any other world.


    Here on a battlefield of the World of Adepts, it had died like a dog.


    The psychological gap was enough to make everyone who witnessed its death feel sorrow, even if it had been their enemy! After all, that demon could easily have been themselves.


    In all honesty, the hezrou might have been stronger than most of them. Yet now, it had be a sacrifice to the shockwaves of a battle between two truly powerful individuals.


    How powerful were the two individuals currently locked inbat, exactly?


    After fleeing all the way back to the Ahlden n¡¯s adept tower, the Fourth Grade adepts finally had a reprieve to observe the battle in the distance.


    The earth shook, and the tower trembled.


    The entire battlefield was covered in force shockwaves and golden me ripples. The adepts¡¯ Spirits couldn¡¯t even infiltrate the battlefield to observe what was happening.


    Matthew was old and elderly. He had even been wounded badly by the Butcher Knife earlier. Though the voodoo doll had saved his life, the impact from the sh had severely damaged his Spirit.


    As he fled into the tower panting, he turned back and took onest nce at the thousand-meter-tall figure of Greem. An unspeakable fear crept into his heart, and he was momentarily lost in thought.


    After all the events that had happened in the Central Lands, his rtionship with Legendary Fire Adept Greem was still very tense. He had hoped to form a small group with Mirva and Nics that would have secretly gone against Greem and his decrees.


    However, upon seeing Greem¡¯s might and witnessing his own pathetic disy earlier, Matthew felt his ambitions crumble and die. The reluctance and resentment that had always burned at the bottom of his heart dissipated silently.


    He did not want to die.


    He still had many n members that required his protection and thousands of descendants that needed him alive.


    If he died, these n members and rtives of his would face terrible persecution and revenge. He could imagine that oue even if he was thinking with his toe.


    He did not want to fight any longer.


    He had resisted for so long, yet Greem was only improving. Now, Greem had reached a level where they could only look up in awe. Meanwhile, they were as pathetic as dogs roaming the streets.


    Let him be if he wanted to unify the Central Lands!


    At any rate, with his remaining fame as a Fourth Grade, his n could still enjoy another two or three hundred years of respect and glory. For Matthew, whose path forward hade to an end, this was enough.


    Matthew stared at the battlefield in the distance, the thoughts in his mind flickering like a candle in the wind.


    While he was lost in thought, an earth-rending boom rang out in the distance. An even more violent and ferocious storm erupted in the center of the battlefield, with sparks of golden mes blowing in the wind. It swept across the horizon, destroying everything in its path.


    The remains of the two dozen war towers that had been razed in the past month of fighting had remained on the battlefield. Though the war had left its mark on the base of the towers, they had remained there, covered in rubble and dust.


    At this moment, even those tower bases had met their end!


    When the vicious storm rushed across the horizon, everyst piece of evidence of their existence was wiped away.


    The violent force shockwave destroyed the adept towers¡¯ forcefields in the distance, while the golden mes caused magic energy turbulence wherever theynded. Seas of golden fire erupted here and there.


    Two fearsome powers dominated the entire battlefield. They tore andshed at each other, asionally erupting into violent energy storms when both powers shed with each other.


    Though it was impossible to sense the exact energy level of the storms through the adept tower defenses, the adepts had a good estimate just by how much the tower was quaking.


    This was no longer a battle at the level of peak Fourth Grade!


    Could it be? Had Greem advanced to Fifth Grade? Every adept wondered to themselves, but they quickly dismissed the idea.


    The World of Adepts was a very strict major nar world. Peak Fourth Grade was the limit of power here; no power beyond peak Fourth Grade was allowed to exist. That would trigger severe reactions from the nar consciousness, even to the extent of bacsh.


    As for Fifth Grade creatures? They weren¡¯t even allowed to exist inside the ne. They would endure endless nar suppression, causing them unbearable agony at every moment.


    Yet, the scene unfolding before their eyes was beyond theirprehension!


    Were they simply outdated in their understanding? Or was the world too wild for theirprehension?


    For a moment, many of the adepts became dispirited and lost in their thoughts.


    More than their own musings, they were more concerned with the oue of this battle.


    And an oue arrived soon.


    Battles between high-grade creatures always concluded quickly.


    The reason fights between low-grade adeptssted so long was that their offensive and defensive powers were all within a limit.


    Even when there was a difference in their powers, it wasn¡¯t easy to build up an absolute advantage quickly. They could only slowly wear down their opponent¡¯s strength and find an opportunity to deliver a lethal strike.


    Such problems did not exist between high-grade creatures!


    At their level, they had already improved their powers to a horrifying extent. The dispute between them was an all-epassing conflict that involved their bodies, Spirits, souls, and principles.


    Consequently, it was more dangerous and more terrifying.


    Unexpectedly, it was the Fifth Grade pit fiend Meillerie who was defeated after several shes.


    d in abyssal fire, it howled and fled from the zing golden giant. It dove into the mega-rift and vanished without a trace.


    When the pit fiend fled, everyone could clearly see a trace of gold mixed in with the purple abyssal fire around him. It was obvious that Greem¡¯s principle fire had managed to reach him.


    However, despite defeating the pit fiend, Greem didn¡¯t seem to be doing too well either.


    His thousand-meter-tall body glowed with lights of two different colors. They flowed slowly across his skin.


    Oneyer was the light from the Tome of Corruption¡¯s enhancement, while the other was the fire energy provided by the Orb of the Fire God. In addition to Greem¡¯s own Undying mes, these two powers gave him threeyers of protection on the principle level.


    Due to these protections, Greem was able to endure the pit fiend¡¯s ferocious melee attacks and heavily wound Meillerie with his principle fire.


    The fact that he had managed to defeat a Fifth Grade while being a Fourth Grade was due to many factors!


    The first was the restrictions from the narws.


    This ce was the World of Adepts, Greem¡¯s origin ne.


    Naturally, he was blessed by the nar consciousness while he was here. The pit fiend, on the other hand, had to endure tremendous suppression.


    This difference in treatment from thar ne consciousness kept Meillerie¡¯s power limited to peak Fourth Grade.


    The second factor was Greem¡¯s superior equipment.


    Pit Fiend Meillerie had no other high-grade equipment other than his Butcher Knife.


    One could im without mistake that every individual that emerged from the abyss was broken beyondpare. Their powers were built entirely upon their Physique and theirbat abilities. The only equipment demons possessed were those they robbed from others!


    In striking contrast, the Fourth Grade Greem was equipped with two Fifth Grade divine artifacts. In particr, the Orb of the Fire God was origin equipment that was perfectlypatible with his soul origin and adept talent.


    It provided him with terrifying benefits inbat!


    Apart from these, Greem had also unexpectedly formed his principle fire¨C the Undying me. It became the key to deciding this battle.


    At the very least, it gave Greem a powerful means that could threaten the Fifth Grade pit fiend.

 Chapter 1386 - Bending the Knee

    Chapter 1386 Bending the Knee


    The battle had concluded, but the shockwaves created in the process had yet to cease.


    Greem maintained his thousand-meter form, the marks of the battle rapidly fading from sight. The Orb of the Fire God residing in his pounding heart regrly supplied him with fire energy, as if it had opened a portal to the Fire Elementium ne itself.


    The Heart of Principles pumped with all its power, furiouslypressing and refining all that fire energy.


    When it turned into golden mes and surged out of the Heart of Principles, a powerful and majestic aura ofws spread outward.


    As the golden mes surged throughout Greem¡¯s body and gathered into a roaring torrent of fire, ancient principle power rose and filled every inch of his body. The principle power even reached into his soul and conducted a thorough modification.


    ording to the World of Gods, Fourth Grade was the highest that mortal creatures could ever achieve. Another step further, and they would unavoidablye into contact with the boundary that separated gods and men. One more step and they would be gods. They would be true immortals. However, any who could not cross that boundary would remain mortal. Their souls would eventually fall apart, and their bodies would rot, returning to the cycle of the ne.


    To clearly denote the boundary between god and man, the gods characterized peak Fourth Grades as demigods. These were individuals who had one foot within the realm of the immortals. You could only ascend to be a true god after advancing to Fifth Grade!


    ording to the World of Adepts¡¯ principles, only those who had advanced to Fourth Grade could repeatedly refine their bodies and souls toplete the principle modifications required for their Fifth Grade advancement.


    The fundamental requirements for advancing to Fifth Grade andpleting the principle modifications to the soul were 50 points of Spirit and thorough control over aplete principle!


    Greem¡¯s current situation was very unusual, indeed.


    Firstly, his Spirit was no more than 47 points at the moment, having had a single point increase in the battle earlier. He had not even reached the prerequisite for advancing to Fifth Grade.


    However, the enhancements from the two pieces of Fifth Grade divine equipment as well as his extraordinary experiences had allowed him to refine the Undying mes prematurely. It was a bonafide principle fire!


    All these factors umted, along with the nar consciousness¡¯ reward for his victory over the abyssal demons, allowed a principle modification of his soul to ur.


    To put it in more understandable terms, other peak Fourth Grade elementium adepts tidied up their rooms before carefully inviting their guests inside. In Greem¡¯s case, he had brought the guest into his room before it was even done being furnished.


    Principle fires were one of the superior powers of the nar worlds, after all. They could not even be touched by one with a mortal body!


    That was why Greem didn¡¯t dare revert to his human form even after the battle had ended. He retained his thousand-meter giant form.


    If he forcefully reverted to his original form, he would explode almost immediately. The reason for that was simple. His human form was incapable of containing the powerful and overwhelming principle power he now possessed!


    He could only maintain his current form, trying his best to use the principle fire to modify his soul and original body until they could amodate the principle powers.


    Of course, this was secret, personal information that only Greem himself knew. The other adepts had no means of finding out.


    When they saw Greem easily maintain his thousand-meter-tall body and send the Fifth Grade abyssal pit fiend fleeing in an overwhelming fashion, all the adepts felt was fear and respect. That depressing thought of never being able to defeat Greem also surged through their minds.


    That was particrly the case for Mornashen Gaia!


    The many Fourth Grade adepts cautiously flew out of the adept tower and slowly approached Greem. Greem was sorge that they didn¡¯t quite know how to interact with him for a moment.


    If they stood on the ground, there would be a thousand-meter giant and adepts that looked like ants to him. Was Greem supposed to bend all the way over to talk to them?


    Fly in front of his face? Would that...be perceived as an affront to him and anger him?


    The Fourth Grade adepts knew they were not as powerful as Greem, but they had always mentally regarded him as a peer of theirs. Even though Greem was improving far faster than them and was slightly more powerful, they were all still Fourth Grade adepts; there wasn¡¯t a fundamental difference in their positions.


    At this moment, when they saw his towering figure and felt his overwhelmingly superior aura, they felt a genuine sense of defeat in their hearts for the first time.


    When they looked upon Greem, they were reminded of the times they were apprentices- reminded of the nervousness, fear, and awe they had felt when they saw adepts for the first time. It was a trembling that emanated from the depths of their souls. It was an instinctual desire to tter when a lesser creature met a higher one.


    No one would be foolish enough to walk to their own death, knowing that they were no match.


    Thus, ttery and obedience became the only method of self-preservation for many low-grade adepts.


    Now, these veteran Fourth Grade adepts who had reigned over the Central Lands for hundreds of years felt this feeling they had not experienced for a long, long time.


    Greem smiled when he saw the Fourth Grade adepts drift hesitantly in front of him. He waved his hand and created a hundred-meter-wide fire cloud in front of him. He then said in his deep voice, ¡°Why don¡¯t you stand on here!¡±


    The fire cloud was just barely at Greem¡¯s chest. This way, he didn¡¯t need to lower his head, and they didn¡¯t need to shout. It was a bit more convenient.


    The Fourth Grade adepts looked at each other. Finally, they hesitantly stepped on the cloud.


    The cloud of fire that Greem had created was formed out of static mes. Stepping on top of it was like stepping on top of soft cotton. However, the might of Greem¡¯s principle fire that he had just demonstrated earlier left a searing impression. Everyone that set foot on the cloud did so gingerly. They were fearful of those horrifying Undying mes.


    Perhaps Mary was the only one among them who did not behave so cautiously in front of Greem.


    She pped her wings andnded on Greem¡¯s shoulder. She walked around curiously there, asionally pulling at Greem¡¯s giant earlobe and caressing his crimson skin at times. She was like an overly curious child.


    With Mary breaking the ice, everyone managed to get over that trace of unfamiliarity and fear they held toward Greem. They gathered around and bowed.


    ¡°Lord Greem, could it be? Have youe into contact with the principle threshold and taken the next step?¡± Mornashen Gaia stepped forward and asked urgently.


    He was the one who was most concerned about the answer to this question amongst the adepts.


    Greem chuckled when he heard Mornashen¡¯s questions, ¡°You are only half-right!¡±


    Everyone nodded inprehension.


    The fact that Greem could manipte such powerful principle fire meant that he had definitely mastered his fire principles. However, he still seemed to becking something before he could take that next step.


    However, none of the adepts really cared about that.


    Tossing aside their pride and acknowledging Greem¡¯s position in the Central Lands would be incredibly beneficial for their current situation.


    Just take the mega-rift, for example.


    If otherworldly invaders heard that there was a powerful adept in the Central Lands capable of defeating a Fifth Grade demon, would they still dare to enter through the rift recklessly? What about the magical creature lords of the ck Forest? Would they still dare to run rampant across the Central Lands?


    Greem¡¯s presence alone would be enough to keep many enemies at bay, discouraging them from setting their sights on the Central Lands.


    At this moment, the Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands finally, truly understood the blessings of having a dominant adept standing behind them all!


    ¡°Lord Greem, what do you need us to do henceforth?¡± The first to stand out and express his stance was unexpectedly the shrewd Matthew. He smiled fawningly, presenting himself as humbly as possible.


    What pride and ambition he held had been worn away by that terrifying encounter with the demon. He no longer desired for anything more. That much was evident from how eager he was to express his stance.


    Other Fourth Grade adepts might be willing to bend the knee, but they couldn¡¯t quite give up on their dignity so quickly.


    Greem¡¯s smile didn¡¯t change, but the light gleaming in hisrge ck eyes seemed to soften slightly.


    ¡°The Fifth Grade demon might have fled, but three of the Fourth Grade demon lords have escaped into the Central Lands. Split them amongst yourselves and decide who¡¯s more suited for a hunting mission.¡±


    Everyone had seen what urred earlier.


    When the Fifth Grade demon was defeated, it had fled to the Abyssal World with the Fourth Grade subus in tow. The other demon lords had been forced back from the mega-rift by the shockwaves. They had no choice but to flee into the distance.


    If these three Fourth Grade demons were allowed to roam the Central Lands, they would bring cmity to every n they came across. Thus, hunting them down was a necessity!


    Moreover, while no one might have been willing to take on these Fourth Grade demons during the battle, things were different now. With the wind of victory behind them, these Fourth Grade demons were little more than top-grade resources and materials in their eyes.


    The many Fourth Grade adepts present couldn¡¯t help but lick their lips when they heard Greem said this. They couldn¡¯t wait to hunt down these demons.


    Den and Alfred looked at each other. Just as they were preparing to volunteer for the task, Matthew smiled again and spoke up.


    ¡°My lord, you are the most powerful adept of the Central Lands. Naturally, we should defer to you in all matters! I, Matthew, will be the first to support your orders, no matter what they might be.¡±


    Den and Alfred could only stop themselves halfway and curse in their own minds, ¡°Asskisser!¡±


    ¡°Very well!¡± Greem nodded and said, ¡°It¡¯s just a few demon lords; I won¡¯t be fighting over such morsels. I will stay here and seal the mega-rift. Mary will lead a team to hunt the three demon lords. Matthew, Ker, Den, Alfred, and Mornashen- I am sorry to have to ask you to apany me here on this task!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡± The adepts who were named instantly smiled.


    Evidently, they knew that following Mary in hunting the Fourth Grade demon was a plump assignment.

 Chapter 1387 - Plane Announcement

    Chapter 1387 ne Announcement


    There were a total of fifteen Fourth Grade adepts in the Central Lands. However, only ten of them were present here.


    That meant five of the Fourth Grade adepts had note here to join the battle.


    Greem looked at everyone present and asked solemnly, ¡°Mirva, M, Ariza, Roderick, and Ashton. Why aren¡¯t they here?¡±


    His tone was light, but it was clear there was a hint of me behind his words.


    Alfred stepped forward and exined in a soft voice, ¡°I contacted Mirva about the situation before I came here. However, it seems like something¡¯s cropped up over at Annemdor Academy. They are currently engaged in battle with the Underground World. That is why he couldn¡¯te in person!¡±


    ¡°The Underground World......¡± Greem fell silent for a moment.


    The Underground World referred to the creatures of darkness that resided in the endless caverns that existed beneath the Continent of Adepts. Though their resources, supplies, and poption were extremely limited, they maintained aplete ecology that wasn¡¯t affected by the outside world.


    For the humans and adepts that lived on the surface, these creatures that lived underground were little, small monsters. There was no reasoning with them. Every so often, when the Underground World had umted sufficient power, they would impatiently rush out of the darkness to raid the surface world.


    It seemed like the magic surge had provoked these underground creatures. They must have believed that the surface adepts were too upied with the magic surge to deal with them and had emerged to cause trouble.


    Annemdor Academy had often been involved with the Underground World in the past. It wasn¡¯t surprising that they would be engulfed in the underground riot this time.


    Greem nodded and said, ¡°And the others?¡±


    It was Molten Fire City Lord Alfred who replied. He shook his head dejectedly and said, ¡°A while ago, arge swarm of magical creatures started gathering in the ck Forest near Ariza¡¯s Mansour n. It¡¯s said that there are as many as ten million magical creatures, including several Fourth Grade magical creature rulers. M and Roderick have hurried over to help!¡±


    Ten million magical creatures; that was at the level of a major stampede!


    It was no wonder the leaders of those ns would be so busy as to be unable to deal with the issue at the mega-rift.


    ¡°And Ashton?¡±


    ¡°I might know a bit about this!¡± Ker stepped forward with a bitter smile. ¡°A lesser ne under Ashton¡¯s control seems to have been invaded by an otherworldly species. They are currently fighting for dominion over there.¡±


    Truly, the interpersonal rtionships of the Fourth Grade adepts in the Central Lands were incrediblyplicated. They were all allied and hostile against each other inplex ways. If Greem did not have the power to keep them in line, mediating the various conflicts between them alone would have troubled him greatly.


    The World of Adepts was scarred by war at the moment. Plumes of smoke could be seen everywhere. There wasn¡¯t a single piece of sacrednd to be found across the continent.


    Greem¡¯s sharp eyebrows rose, and his ck eyes filled with a crimson light.


    Finally, he lifted his head and let out a furious shout, ¡°I, Greem, solemnly swear to y any who dare to invade the Central Lands again during this magic surge!¡±


    ¡°Leave!!!!!¡±


    This final word was almost as thunder cracking throughout the heavens. The word ¡®leave¡¯ rumbled across the clear skies, causing the clouds to shake and roll away.


    The overwhelming power contained within his words rippled outward, shredding all clouds in sight. The sky suddenly turned unnaturally clear, revealing the deep blue sky above.


    Greem had eximed his statement with all the power and fury he could muster.


    In particr, thatst word had borrowed the might of the fire principles. By way of weak yet distinct vibrations throughout the world principles, that one word had spread across every corner of the Central Lands.


    It was Greem¡¯s first ne announcement and his first furious shout toward the world. Of course, this message could only be received by powerful individuals who had managed toe into contact with the narws.


    The ordinary mortals of the World of Adepts did not even have the qualifications to hear Greem¡¯s battlecry!


    ............


    The skies of the World of Adepts rumbled over and over.


    However, even if you shut your eyes and listened intently, you couldn¡¯t hear anything at all.


    Inkdeep Valley.


    An unprecedented battle was raging at the entrance of the valley.


    Hordes of magical creatures herded by the disaster creatures charged out of the mists, fearlessly assaulting the Association adepts stationed there.


    The sky was purple and ck.


    The ground was pock-marked and covered in the corpses of magical creatures.


    There were no weaklings among those who could break into the World of Adepts. The intruders were either giant creatures with tough skin and tremendous strength or agile individuals with unique racial abilities. These intruders were all extremely dangerous for the Association adepts.


    At this point, the Adept¡¯s Association had already lost over twenty mid and high-grade adepts, as well as over a hundred low-grade adepts to keep the magical creatures behind Inkdeep Valley.


    Even so, they were still unable to repel the invasion of the Scourge Lords.


    As the battle¡¯s scale escted, the number of magical creatures and disaster creatures swarming out of Inkdeep Valley increased exponentially. Fearsome Third and Fourth Grade creatures charged forward and destroyed the war towers daily before rushing at the adept towers behind them.


    The war towers that sat at the edge of the valley had been razed and rebuilt, rebuilt and razed, over a dozen times.


    If it weren¡¯t for the incredible might and wealth of the Adept¡¯s Association, they would already have gone mad from the constant losses incurred!


    To prevent the Scourge Lords from destroying the adept towers, the Adept¡¯s Association had summoned three of their five ultra-powerhouses back to the World of Adepts. They took turns watching over the frontlines to prevent the defensive line from copsing.


    It was Gloria¡¯s turn to guard Inkdeep Valley today!


    ck smoke shrouded the chaotic battlefield. Shouts could be heard everywhere. Gloria had just crushed the skull of an armored tyrant bear and was standing over its copsed corpse. All of a sudden, she lifted her head and stared at the dim skies in shock.


    Thunder rumbled there as an intimidating roar filled the skies.


    Every magical creature, disaster creature, and high-grade adept on the battlefield stopped what they were doing and turned to look toward the southwest.


    Most of the magical creatures and low-grade adepts were confused. They could sense that something unusual had happened in that direction, but they werepletely clueless about the nature of that change. Only high-grade disaster creatures and adepts could delve into the narws and decipher the message contained within.


    Leave!


    A simple word, but it contained a wild, searing willpower.


    Gloria examined the announcement carefully and found it vaguely familiar.


    It was him...the male adept in the Central Lands!


    He...he can move the world principles now!?


    That damned bastard! Thest time they had fought, he had only been able to reach the level of the narws. How long had it been since theyst saw each other? To think he could already embed his will into the principles and used their powers as his microphone.


    That...was simply unbelievable!


    Gloria thought to herself.


    At that moment, a berserk dragon beast, clearlycking a sense of danger, stormed over with thundering steps.


    Gloria¡¯s thoughts were interrupted, and she flew into a rage. Anger flickered over her face, though it was hidden behind the purple light. Her silhouette shed and circled the dragon beast as a purple light.


    The next second, the Third Grade dragon beast keeled over in a fountain of blood. All three of its dragon heads had been snapped off. They howled as its body copsed limply to the ground.


    Soon, a smallke of blood had pooled beneath its body. Its life force was cast to the wind.


    A five-meter-tall giant with numerous arms stood on another corner of the battlefield. He turned around and received the mysterious message from the distance.


    The instruction to ¡®leave¡¯ was an affront to him, but the giant¡¯s face couldn¡¯t help but turn grim when it sensed the means by which the message had been ryed.


    The aura of principles. How could it be the principles? Could there still be individuals beyond Fourth Grade that remained within the World of Adepts? If this conjecture were to be trusted, then the n for the Scourge Lords to invade the World of Adepts would be a very risky one.


    They all had the might of Fifth or Sixth Grade, but all of them had been suppressed to peak Fourth Grade after entering the World of Adepts. They might have an advantage inbat prowess against the local ultra-powerhouses due to their resilient bodies and advancedbat techniques. However, they would be in mortal danger if they were to run into a creature with Fifth Grade powers.


    Fortunately, it seemed like that individual resided in the Central Lands. That was a long way from the eastern side of the continent they were invading. The odds of running into this individual was much smaller this way.


    Still, it seemed like there was a need to gather ¡®them¡¯ for a discussion. If an ultra-grade individual protected the Central Lands, it would be best not to try anything funny there.


    Havinge to this conclusion, the many-armed giant waved his hand, ordering the disaster creatures around him to continue their assault. He turned and went back into the depths of the valley.


    The bloody battle raged on across the battlefield!


    ............


    Silver Union, Diviner¡¯s Tower.


    The tower master, dressed in cloth robes, stood upon a narrow and dangerous balcony.


    He opened his arms wide in silence as he listened to the voice resonating throughout the principles. He mumbled in a seemingly dream-like state.


    ¡°A principle user...to think another principle user has appeared in the World of Adepts! Judging from his current powers, he will be a new Great Adept in another hundred years. Great Adept. A Great Adept! A powerful individual who has broken free of the limits of the ne! One who can travel fearlessly throughout the multiverse!¡±


    ¡°Listen, everyone! Listen! This is the first cry let out by this principle user toward the world. How elegant! How absolutely entrancing. This is the limit of what nar creatures can achieve.¡±


    Archivists all over the Diviner¡¯s Tower put down their quills and raised their tired faces toward the horizon, listening quietly to this voice rumbling from a distance.


    Another truly powerful individual had been born in the World of Adepts!

 Chapter 1388 - The Rulers of the Western Region

    Chapter 1388 The Rulers of the Western Region


    The Silent Forest.


    This ce was a vast stretch of forest located deep in the ck Forest.


    Beneath the Silent Forest¡¯s two-kilometer-wide canopy, the ce was filled with powerful magical creatures that usually reigned over their own territories. Meanwhile, ordinary beasts, whose numbers were a hundred times that of magical creatures, had gathered as well. There were innumerable critters and insects as well.


    They were of every species possible- so many that it was beyond the realm of imagination.


    From the wind condors, razorwind hawks, chimeras, and wyverns flying in the sky, to the razortusk boars, iron rhinos, berserk apes, and earth maulers on the ground. There were even the strange purplecrawlers, bloodsucking spiders, formian ants, as well as the mostly extinct owlbears, bulettes, and gryphons.


    In all seriousness, you could probably find every magical creature described in the Monster¡¯s Encyclopedia here. There were even many species and animals yet to be recorded.


    Even if an adept schr that specialized in zoology were present, they would have trouble identifying each and every creature here.


    These magical creatures typically hid in theirirs deep in the ck Forest. They had their own living areas and hunting areas. They rarely traveled and wandered into other creatures¡¯ territories. Today, bound by a mysterious force, they had suppressed their instinct and desire to hunt. They gathered silently in this forest, awaiting instructions from the rulers of the forest.


    While the numerous magical creatures gathered in the forest center, three rulers of different species with equally savage auras had gathered to discuss the uing invasion.


    Arge group of harpy witches had grouped up in the southeast corner of this small camp.


    The harpy witches had a sizeable magical creature kingdom in the ck Forest. Members of their realm had gray feathers and were exceedingly ugly. They looked more like birds than humans. Only individuals who had significantly evolved would shed their feathers. They would only retain blue feathers on their joints, pits, and the tips of their limbs.


    The harpy witches gathered here today were clearly elites, even within their kingdom. Their exposed skin was white and smooth. Their figures were slim and curvy, with exceptionally delicate and perfect facial features. The only remnants of their racial origins were their crimson eyes, their sharp, curved ws, and the blue wings extending out of their backs.


    As spellcasters who had awakened to elementium powers, most harpy witches were d in obvious wind and lightning elementium. When such arge group of spellcasters gathered together, the tide of magic aura they created was enough to trigger resonance with their surrounding¡¯s wandering magic energy.


    A pretty woman draped in a red feather cloak stood at their center, elegant and noble.


    She was exceedingly tall, slender, and beautiful. She would cause amotion in the mortal worlds with her appearance. However, the unique savagery of the magical creatures could be seen in her purple eyes, marked with dark eye-shadow.


    More importantly, this beautiful woman whobined the gentle beauty of human women and the savagery of magical creatures within herself was actually wearing an intricate crystal crown.


    She was an intermediate Fourth Grade harpy queen!


    Supposedly, Harpy Queen Filoxi¡¯s power as an intermediate Fourth Grade should not have qualified her as a ruler of the ck Forest. However, considering the shocking number of spellcasters in the harpy witch kingdom and their surprising number of strong fighters, she was granted a seat amongst the three forest rulers.


    Meanwhile, a jellyfish-like creature hovered alone in the eastern corner of the encampment. It looked to be about the size of a rhinoceros. It floated ten meters above the ground with thousands of strange strands dragging beneath its body.


    This jellyfish-like creature was semi-translucent, and its body was filled with a light blue liquid. It let out dizzying waves of light in the dim and dark environment of the forest.


    This magical creature faced off alone against the other two rulers but was not at a disadvantage. Even the harpy queen, Filoxi, would betray caution and vignce when her eyesnded on its strange body.


    The third forest ruler was a giant bear with white hair all over its body.


    It was five meters tall, and it sat upon a log, much as a human would. Its legs were crossed, and it had a giant pipe in its mouth, smiling as it blew out smoke.


    Crude and simple metal armor hung over its body, covering its chest, back, and ribs; the rest of its body was still exposed. A metal helmet sat tilted on its head. Judging by how firm and thick it looked, the helmet had been forged with the unique starfell metal found deep in the ck Forest.


    The three of them could be said to be powerful, uncontested ruler-ss magical creatures in the ck Forest¡¯s western regions. They were tyrants that no one dared oppose within the territories they respectively governed.


    Now, encouraged by the magic surge, they had gathered together to discuss an official assault against the human settlements.


    The Silent Forest was already on the edge of the western regions of the ck Forest. Another fifty kilometers east of here, they would enter the human territories of the Central Lands. It was said that the human adepts had constructed a dozen war towers and an entire adept tower at the edge of the forest in preparation for their attack.


    The three rulers showed no signs of fear despite this knowledge. Instead, they were discussing the division of spoils after destroying the adepts¡¯ defensive line.


    ¡°Adepts...we only want adepts!¡± Harpy Queen Filoxi tapped the crystal staff in her hand heavily as she red with her purple eyes. ¡°Hold back a little when you are fighting. Don¡¯t kill all the human adepts. What we want are live adepts. The more powerful, the better. If you catch any adepts alive, we are willing to trade for them with dark crystals and Garo fruits!¡±


    ¡°Garo fruits are a delicacy. I still can¡¯t forget that sweet taste in my mouth.¡± The white bear betrayed a humanoid look of gluttony. It blew out a thick cloud of smoke and chuckled, ¡°Don¡¯t worry! I will try and hold back when I run into those human adepts. However, I want all their magical crystals. If anyone were to try and fight them for me...hehehe! Don¡¯t me me if my fists don¡¯t recognize you as an ally any longer.¡±


    ¡°That is fine! Filoxi wants the human adepts, you want the magical crystals, and I want the human souls, kehkehkeh! There¡¯s no need for any conflict now. It¡¯s a perfect result for everyone!¡± The jellyfish did not have a mouth. Itmunicated entirely with mental messages.


    ¡°Since it¡¯s decided, let us begin our attack as soon as possible!¡± The white bear put away its pipe and stood on two legs as it roared. ¡°Let the little ones sit here for too long, and they might get antsy and restless. The stampede formation might get disrupted.¡±


    ¡°Very well. Then......¡± The jellyfish did not finish speaking. All of a sudden, it froze, and its body turned slightly. Its thousands of fleshy strands also reached up and pointed toward the northeast.


    Mysterious rumbling and thundering wereing from that direction.


    These were unusual fluctuationsing from the level of the world principles. Ordinary creatures could not even detect these fluctuations. Only powerful individuals like themselves, who had reached the level ofws and principles, were qualified to embed their Spirit within the principles and decipher the message within.


    The moment the three of them extended their Spirits into the principles, a violent, searing will rushed into their minds. It was a single word¨C ¡®Leave.¡¯


    Harpy Queen Filoxi was caught unaware. She cried out in pain and spat out blood. Small mes appeared on her red feather robe and threatened to ze up into a massive sea of fire.


    The harpy witches gathered around her also yelped. Some of them jumped forward to protect their queen, while others flew into the air to look for the unseen attacker. The rest gathered their wind powers and attempted to help Filoxi suppress the mes.


    ¡°Do not touch those fires...get away from me!¡± Her subordinates didn¡¯t know better, but Filoxi could instinctually sense the terror behind those golden mes.


    She cast aside that treasured robe and instantly fled a hundred meters away. When her subordinates¡¯ wind elementium shed with the burning robe, a massive ball of mes erupted.


    The mes caught three harpy witches that did not manage to evade in time. Their bodies and hair instantly ignited. No matter how they beat the mes or sted them with magical power, it didn¡¯t help. The magical power they concentrated at the fire only turned into fuel, causing the mes to turn even more ferocious.


    The golden fire consumed three Second-Grade harpy witches in just a dozen seconds, reducing them to piles of ck ashes.


    The other harpy witches finally realized the terror of this golden fire. They no longer dared to add more fuel to the mes and hastily fled further away.


    Filoxi had been injured, and the white bear wasn¡¯t doing too well either.


    It was tough, resilient, and managed to easily endure the searing will that had invaded its body through the principles. It stood on two legs and patted its chest heavily. A red stream of fire shot out of its nostrils, reducing the grass before it to ash.


    However, the Undying mes were not so easily expelled!


    The white bear lifted its muscr right arm and looked confusedly at the mes burning on its palms. It tried multiple times, through several means, but it simply could not extinguish this seemingly weak fire.


    He couldn¡¯t use magical energy!


    If he used magical energy, it would add fuel to the fire. It would only make it grow stronger. But if he couldn¡¯t use magical energy, what was he supposed to do? Quench it with his hand?


    The white bear extended two ws from its left hand and precisely pinched the me between them. A short momentter, he let go. The fire was still burning quietly there.


    It was almost as if the fire had nted roots in the bear¡¯s soul. As long as the fire in its soul wasn¡¯t extinguished, this small me would never go out!

 Chapter 1389 - Present from the Plane

    <h4>Chapter 1389 Present from the ne</h4>


    ¡°Bastard! What happened?¡±


    Even the white bear could no longer stay calm. He roared furiously, ¡°How did the principle powers attack us?¡±


    The jellyfish was the only one who had escaped unscathed, having erected a translucent barrier just in time to prevent the searing will from reaching it.


    Without the searing will to guide it, the Undying mes regressed into ordinary magical mes. They were extinguished with a few simple frost rays.


    The jellyfish ignored its two flusteredpanions. Instead, it stared into the distance, silently sensing the mild but unmistakable fluctuations in the principles.


    After a long pause, it let out a dejected sigh, ¡°I¡¯m pulling out from the invasion n this time.¡±


    ¡°What did you say, you old monster?¡±


    ¡°Are you serious? You were the one that initiated this operation. The two of us came here at your invitation.¡±


    The other two rulers immediately started making a fuss. The attack earlier had frightened them, but giving up on a potentially highly profitable operation because of that one incident was being far too cautious.


    The jellyfish was clearly the oldest magical creature in the ck Forest¡¯s western regions, and the most ancient. It turned around abruptly and warned the two young rulers solemnly.


    ¡°Never forget, the two of you, this world remains that of the adepts! We can ambush and assault the human settlements during the magic surge when the adepts are upied with other more urgent matters; we can obtain what necessary resources we need. As long as we don¡¯t go overboard, the high-grade adepts will have no choice but to turn a blind eye to our actions.


    ¡°However, should a ruler emerge amongst them, that ruler will be incredibly aggressive and radical to maintain their dignity and glory. To provoke such a ruler at this time will spell disaster for our western region.¡±


    The two newly risen rulers of the western region couldn¡¯t help but frown and hesitate when they heard the jellyfish¡¯s advice.


    It was such a rare opportunity!


    Due to the ck Forest¡¯s expanse and the separation caused by the few major human settlements, the ck Forest could roughly be divided into four regions: the north, south, east, and west.


    Each region contained its own powerful magical creatures. These powerful creatures would often be the rulers of their respective regions, reigning over hundreds of thousands of kilometers ofnd.


    The western region of the ck Forest was caught between the Central Lands and the Silver Union. They had had to face repeated exterminations from the adepts because of this. Consequently, there were very few Fourth Grade magical creatures, and even fewer capable of bing rulers.


    Under such circumstances, raiding adept territory for resources was the perfect chance for the magical creatures to grow stronger secretly.


    If they gave up on this opportunity, an explosive development would remain no more than a fantasy among the magical creatures.


    After all, magical creaturescked the adepts¡¯ organized power system, alchemy system, and legacy system. Every single resource they required for evolution in their lives had to be slowly discovered somewhere in the ck Forest. That was far too difficult for the inhabitants of the ck Forest, who had neither an industrial normerce system.


    ¡°How powerful is this adept powerhouse that appeared out of nowhere?¡± Harpy Queen Filoxi asked solemnly.


    It was a very crucial question!


    If the opponent was just a peak Fourth Grade powerhouse, they still had a chance of fighting back with their powersbined. If they could lure the adept to the few death zones that could be found in the ck Forest, it might even be possible to kill the adept.


    The jellyfish replied coldly, ¡°Judging from the principle aura I could sense, that fellow¡¯s probably even more powerful than an ultra-powerhouse. In a certain sense, we should treat him as a Fifth Grade adept!¡±


    ¡°How is that possible? Isn¡¯t the upper limit of power in this world peak Fourth Grade? Why is there an exception like this?¡± Filoxi couldn¡¯t help but let out a piercing cry.


    Horror and frustration appeared on the white bear¡¯s face.


    ¡°This is bad. Bad...without those magical crystals, only a few of those cubs back at home will be able to grow up properly.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! That adept has already announced the Central Lands as his property. Feel free to provoke an ultra-grade adept if that¡¯s what you want. At any rate, I won¡¯t be joining you,¡± The jellyfish snorted. ¡°The reason I have managed to live so long is that I¡¯ve always been able to tolerate when it was necessary. You guys are thinking of fighting an ultra-grade adept in their own world. Hmph! Sick of living?¡±


    Having said that, the jellyfish turned and drifted into the depths of the forest.


    Its semi-translucent body glowed with a strange blue light as it started flickering through the trees, rapidly vanishing into the darkness.


    The white bear watched in dumbfounded silence, then burst out in a series of curses. However, in the end, he did not give the order for the stampede to advance.


    Just as the white bear was about to leave in frustration, Harpy Queen Filoxi beat the blue wings on her back and flew over.


    ¡°Bernie, you aren¡¯t thinking of giving up as well, are you?¡±


    ¡°What is it? Do you still intend to attack?¡± Bernie the white bear rebutted angrily.


    ¡°The Central Lands are a definite no, but we might have chances in the other regions, no?¡± Flioxi flexed her sharp tongue as she said, ¡°Don¡¯t forget. The western regions border the Silver Union as well. While those over at the southern regions are attacking the Silver Union, we can hurry over with only our most elite subordinates. Maybe, just maybe, we might be able to get our share of the spoils.¡±


    Bernie couldn¡¯t help but hesitate after hearing Filoxi¡¯s suggestion.


    ¡°Those bastards from the southern regions have dibs over that area. Will they try and get revenge on us if we run over and join them?¡±


    ¡°Hmph! You want the spoils from war, yet you are fearful of everything. How can you hope to strengthen your family like this?¡± Filoxi clicked her tongue and mocked. ¡°If you miss this magic surge, you won¡¯t have enough magical crystals to hasten your tribe¡¯s growth. How long will it take for them to mature and grow powerful with just time alone to help? It¡¯s all up to you if you want to take a risk.¡±


    White Bear Bernie was a brave but straightforward bear. It instantly made up its mind.


    ¡°Alright, count me in. I need to go back and make some simple arrangements in the west. I will regroup with youter. As for the little fellows we¡¯ve gathered here? Just let them move freely! As long as we don¡¯t show ourselves, the adepts have no reason toe find trouble with us.¡±


    After a simple discussion, the two rulers left the camp in their own way.


    Before they left, they gave the order for the massive stampede that had gathered from the surrounding thousands of kilometers to charge out of the forest, rushing toward the closest human settlement.


    However, the figures of the intermediate and high-grade magical creatures had vanished from the rumbling stampede. That undoubtedly made the stampede much more chaotic and disorderly.


    Correspondingly, they became far less of a threat!


    ............


    The Ahlden Mega-Rift.


    Greem finally managed to let out all the anger and resentment seething in his heart through this ne announcement.


    He stood silently at the edge of the mega-rift. He used his Burning Domain to wash away the abyssal aura that lingered on the earth.


    It was a principle power from anotherrger nar world. Every trace of the abyssal aura contained the savage, violent, chaotic, evil will, and power of the Abyssal World.


    What he needed to do now was to neutralize the abyssal aura with his fire energy. He could then wait silently for the World of Adepts¡¯ narws to regain control over thend.


    Even if he didn¡¯t do so, the World of Adepts¡¯ world consciousness would eventually regain control over thend in the absence of the demons. However, with his aid in defeating the demons and banishing the Abyssal will, the world consciousness had a much easier job regaining control over thend.


    Consequently, with every inch ofnd that the World of Adepts regained, Greem could feel pure life energy surging into his soul.


    It was clearly the nar consciousness rewarding him for righting all wrongs!


    This reward might be minuscule, but as he continued to purify thend, the stream of life energy slowly gathered in his soul, improving his Spirit slightly.


    More importantly, it purified Greem¡¯s soul, making him feel a warmth, as if he was within his mother¡¯s womb. It was incredibly rxing andfortable.


    The Chip¡¯s notification continued going off in his mind.


    [Detecting assimtion of high-purity life essence. Estimated to improve host¡¯s Spirit slightly.


    [Detecting assimtion of high-purity life essence. Estimated to improve host¡¯s Spirit slightly.


    [......]


    Due to the constant notifications, Greem ignored them and treated them like background music. He focused all his attention on the three-dimensional human model projected in his mind.


    As the nar feedback continued to surge into his body, all his bodily attributes improved slightly. Even the red bar that represented his fire affinity and talent was experiencing an unusual change. The sliver of gold at the top of the bar was slowly extending downward, as if mixing in with the rest of the bar.


    Greem had forcefully converted his bloodline, changing from an elementium adept¡¯s development path to a dual path of elementium and bloodline. This shift in his development had left some subtle wounds in his soul.


    Now, nurtured by the purest life energy, these wounds hidden in his soul were slowly mending. The devouring-fish bloodline he had just assimted was also growing quickly and merrily.


    It was now that Greem thoroughly understood why so many adepts were willing to ¡®exact justice¡¯ in the name of the nar consciousness, even at the cost of damaging their own n¡¯s might.


    To think that the nar consciousness¡¯ feedback could deliver such tremendous benefits to an individual!

 Chapter 1390 - The Death God’s Trap

    <strong>Chapter 1390 The Death God¡¯s Trap</strong>


    While you were weak, you would probably constantly dream of growing stronger.


    When Greem finally attained power, he realized that the powerful had their own problems to deal with.


    At this moment, he did not dare make any rash actions!


    The modification of his principle body had only just begun; it was far fromplete. However, he had lost the ability to do whatever he desired from now on.


    The closer he was tied to the principles, the more clearly he could sense the nar principle system¡¯s existence and the nar consciousness¡¯s attention on him. At present, it was almost as if Greem had been ced in a room full of delicate ceramic and ssware. Even the slightestmotion could result in devastating destruction.


    After all, his battle against the abyssal demon had been in the name of repelling a foreign invasion. Even if incredible damage had been inflicted on the nar space around the mega-rift, all the me had been assigned to the pit fiend. Thus, all he had to do was enjoy the nar feedback.


    Now that there were no enemies, his every action drew immense attention from the nar consciousness.


    The nar worlds weren¡¯t as fragile as people thought they were. However, Greem was an individual who had grasped a world principle and who could project his consciousness onto the principle level to affect the entire world on a grander scale. The nar consciousness was keeping him on a tight leash, monitoring him as if he were a criminal.


    Greem was still in his honeymoon phase with the nar consciousness. He had just repelled the abyssal invasion, and the nar consciousness did not hesitate with its generosity. It provided Greem with tremendous nar feedback.


    This feedback could be seen as both a reward to him as well as an expression of the nar consciousness¡¯s affection. While he still had some of the feedback left over, he would be favored by the nar consciousness.


    If he were to take any actions that harmed the World of Adepts, this affection would be the first thing to be consumed. The nar consciousness would tolerate his existence and his behavior so long as the affection was not exhausted. However, the moment the appreciation was exhausted, the nar consciousness was likely to turn against him, taking every means possible to banish him from the World of Adepts.


    The functioning of a nar world required the support of the principle system. A giant rat who could interfere with the principle powers like Greem was an eyesore. Naturally, they would incite the displeasure of the nar consciousness.


    If this giant rat had some self-awareness and knew how to hold back, the nar consciousness might be able to tolerate its existence. However, should the giant rat recklessly start interfering with the ne¡¯s functions, then the nar consciousness would be determined to banish the rat at any cost.


    It was as simple as that!


    The numerous ultra-grade adepts since ancient times had all been banished to the realms beyond for this reason. They were forced to find new ces to call home beyond the World of Adepts.


    Now that Greem had truly grasped control over the Undying mes fire principle, he was facing the same trouble.


    His existence was too powerful for this world now!


    ¡°It seems like I must learn to hold back with all of my actions from now on,¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh. He then went back to work to seal off the mega-rift.


    As he chanted loudly, giant fire runes appeared out of thin air and merged with the mega-rift. Provoked and constrained by the fire runes, the rift grew smaller and smaller until it was no more than a radiant portal a hundred meters in diameter.


    Greem wasn¡¯t an expert sealing master, after all. The fact that he could constrain a massive mega-rift to a hundred meters length was already outstanding. A portal this small could hardly allow any higher magical creatures of Fourth Grade and above to pass through.


    If the only ones that entered the World of Adepts through the rift were rats below Fourth Grade, a few Third Grade adepts and the adept tower would be enough to deal with them.


    With a mighty individual like Greem here, the adepts of the Ahlden n felt much safer. They became more active.


    They rode flying beasts and circled around the rift, measuring all sorts of things. Meanwhile, more adepts gathered under the portal to construct war towers and other amenities.


    They couldn¡¯t help but stare up at this mighty, thousand-meter-tall adept as they worked. Such power was probably at the limit of what the ne could contain!


    Second and Third Grade intermediate adepts like them were as frail as ants before such a powerful adept. They wouldn¡¯t even survive a single p. Moreover, the closer they came to Greem, the more they could sense the massive gulf in their power.


    There wouldn¡¯t even be a battle. Greem only had to unleash his restraints over the fire energy in his body, and everything within a kilometer would turn to ashes. First and Second Grade adepts would instantly die under such horrifyingly hot mes. Third Grade adepts would struggle for a little longer, but they would not escape from the radiation¡¯s radius alive.


    Moreover, Greem¡¯s Burning Domain also contained fearsome fire principles. Even if the adepts had magical techniques that allowed them to be reborn elsewhere or transfer their souls away, they could not escape the burning of the fire principles.


    The only way to survive was to change the fluctuations of their very souls or to flee to another world and use the world barriers to cut off the pursuit of Greem¡¯s fire principles. Otherwise, no techniqueswould be effective against the principle powers. They were fated to death.


    The only thing that could deal with a principle power was another principle power!


    Greem left the rest of the work to the ant-like adepts after finishing his seal on the mega-rift. He stood silently on the spot, modifying his body with the fire principles in his Heart of Principles.


    The days passed by quickly.


    Soon, the war towers were erected once more, and what remained of the mega-rift was once again underprehensive surveince. However, the principle modification to Greem¡¯s body was only 26%pleted!


    Today, just as hepleted his daily meditation and wondered what to do next, a strange mental flux came within range of his senses.


    [Beep. Receiving long-rangedmunication request from Lich Kanganas. Requesting instructions from Host. Authorize request?]


    Kanganas?


    Greem frowned and authorized the request.


    The next moment, a chilling mental consciousness connected with his own.


    ¡°Sir Greem, that was a vicious trap you led us into!¡±


    Kanganas startedining furiously the moment the connection went through.


    ¡°Despite the fair terms of the trade, you concealed the truth of the Death God¡¯s tomb, causing our side to incur severe losses. In the name of the Alliance of Liches, I give you the most severe warning and remonstrance. You...hm? Why is your mental state so strange?¡±


    ¡°Hold up,¡± Greem interrupted Lich Kanganas unamusedly and said coldly, ¡°Kanganas; when we went forward with the trade, I was very clear about what I was giving to you. Those were just a set of spatial coordinates belonging to a Death God¡¯s tomb. Even I didn¡¯t know much about the actual situation there. Now, let me ask you- did you manage to find your destination ording to the coordinates I gave you?¡±


    ¡°We did, but¡ª¡±


    ¡°Was the destination a Death God¡¯s tomb?¡± Greem interrupted him again.


    ¡°It was, but¡ª¡± Kanganas had clearly run into some terrible trouble. He was full of resentment and wanted to let it out somehow.


    ¡°There is no ¡®but¡¯ in this situation. The terms of our agreement were that you would fight for me once, and I would give you the coordinates to a Death God¡¯s tomb. That was all! As for whether you would find anything there, or whether there would be traps, was not within the terms of our trade. It¡¯s a bit unreasonable for you toe and question me over this, isn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°Er......¡±


    Kanganas immediately fell silent.


    As a proper lich, he yearned for a Death God¡¯s tomb with all his being.


    If he could sessfully excavate a Death God¡¯s tomb, just the corpse of the Death God and its divinity brand alone would be enough to make him incredibly wealthy. Not to mention all the divine power crystals to be found.


    In fact, the liches could even take control of the Death God¡¯s corpse through particr abilities and take over their remaining followers and faith power.


    However, exploring a Death God¡¯s tomb was undoubtedly a hazardous job!


    The more vicious Death Gods would even make a fake tomb and ce their clone in it to bait tomb raiders to their deaths. Sometimes, a Death God might not have exhausted their faith power and died. They might only be in a deep slumber.


    If that were the case, the Death God¡¯s tomb would be a Death God¡¯s trap. Anyone who walked in would be in for trouble. Not only would they fail to raid the tomb for treasures, but they would also die in there.


    That was why Kanganas knew he alone would not have the ability to take down an entire Death God¡¯s tomb. After obtaining the coordinates from Greem, he had gathered a few volunteers from the Alliance of Liches for an exploration mission.


    These five Fourth-Grade liches and the endless undead army theymanded were an overwhelming force in any nar world.


    Unfortunately, such a powerful force had fallen apart at the Death God¡¯s tomb!


    Kanganas was tight-lipped about the specifics of what happened. He refused to divulge anything. However, anyone could deduce the terror of their ordeals just based on the oue.


    Of the five Fourth Grade liches that entered the Death God¡¯s tomb, only three escaped alive.


    The other two¡¯s bodies had been destroyed. One was fortunate enough to flee with their soul and returned to their phctery to be reborn. The most unfortunate one had their soul harvested by the Death God, used as nutrition to replenish the Death God¡¯s divine power.


    Such a terrifying event naturally sent a wave ofmotion throughout the Alliance of Liches.


    The most ancient and powerful liches appeared and swore to hunt down this despicable Death God. Naturally, the liches also criticized the young adept who provided Kanganas with the ¡®incorrect¡¯ information.


    After the dust had settled, Kanganas had hurried over impatiently to find trouble with Greem!

 Chapter 1391 - The Demi-god Lich

    <h4>Chapter 1391 The Demi-god Lich</h4>


    ¡°You...what¡¯s your situation right now?¡±


    Kanganas had been busy trying to use Greem earlier. However, his sharp senses as a high-grade lich allowed him to detect the unusual nature of Greem¡¯s soul fluctuation instantly.


    ¡°Why do I smell principle powers on you? Could you have managed to push your firews to the level of the principles?¡±


    Kanganas¡¯ mental fluctuation seemed high-pitched and excited, unlike its usual cold and sinister tones. Obviously, he was shocked by his finding.


    It had only been a little while since hest saw Greem; it had been no more than a year. It was barely enough time for a nap or a stroll for individuals at their level. How could he have undergone such a tremendous change in such little time!?


    Greem¡¯s horrifying advancement speed hadpletely upended Kanganas¡¯ understanding of everyday reality!


    He could actually smell a thick scent of principles on Greem. Kanganas knew full well what that meant for a Fourth Grade adept.


    That was why he asked his question so impatiently. He wanted to hear that terrifying ¡®answer¡¯ as soon as possible!


    ¡°How should I put it? My current situation is veryplicated!¡± Greem said calmly, ¡°More urately, I should be considered half-advanced!¡±


    ¡°Half-advanced?¡± The Fourth Grade lich was confused by what Greem had just said. He could hardly understand what ¡®half-advanced¡¯ was. Advancement was advancement. What was ¡®half-advanced¡¯?


    ¡°The meaning is simple. I have already mastered one fire principle. However, my Spirit hasn¡¯t reached the required threshold yet, so my path to advancement is stuck.¡±


    ¡°Mastered a fire principle...Spirit below the threshold,¡± Lich Kanganas couldn¡¯t help but mumble to himself.


    He repeated these words to himself over and over. The more he thought about it, the more surprised he was.


    How did such a strange thing happen?


    His Spirit didn¡¯t reach the threshold, which meant it had not reached the 50 point threshold yet. By what means had Greempressed andbined the fire principles? How had he refined them and raised them to the level of the fire principles?


    Could that be the credit of the Orb of the Fire God? Could owning high-grade divine equipment that was perfectlypatible with your soul origin actually allow you to refine thew powers and rise to the level of the principles?


    At the thought of that, Kanganas¡¯ heart that had been cold and silent for several thousand years wanted to start beating again. He also had high-grade divine equipmentpatible with his soul origin.


    The Ancient Reliquary of Winter possessed the principle powers of both death and cold. If he couldpletely merge the reliquary with his soul, then it would definitely be able to unleash more power than the fire adept¡¯s Orb of the Fire God.


    It was important to note that Kanganas had also be an ultra-powerhouse after obtaining the reliquary. If he could obtain the means to refine and uplift thew powers from Greem, he might be able to advance into a Fifth Grade Great Lich instantly.


    When that happened, he would be one of the most powerful individuals in the Alliance of Liches with the reliquary. He couldmand many other liches.


    The titles for liches at the various grades differed from adepts.


    Third and Fourth Grade liches were known as Liches. Meanwhile, peak Fourth Grade liches were known as Demigod Liches, Fifth Grade liches were known as Great Liches or God Liches, Sixth Grade liches as Lich Elders, and liches above Seventh Grade were known as Lich Kings.


    The most powerful lich in the multiverse right now was a Seventh Grade lich king. Liches of higher grades had not appeared yet!


    ¡°Where are you right now? I¡¯lle over and meet you now,¡± At the thought of all this, Demigod Lich Kanganas couldn¡¯t help but turn restless. As for their earlier disagreements because of the Death God¡¯s tomb? That was all water under the bridge when it came to a matter as important as advancement.


    ¡°Coordinates 09123,18237,¡± Greem casually sent over the coordinates of the mega-rift.


    A short momentter, the portal that had beenpressed to only a hundred meters in width rippled. A crystalline skeleton dressed in intricate magical robes emerged and arrived in the World of Adepts.


    ¡°Enemy attack!¡±


    ¡°Prepare to attack!¡±


    ¡°Be careful, it seems to be a lich.¡±


    The Ahlden n adepts circling the portal on flying beasts put up elementium barriers and took out their wands. They were prepared for a fight.


    ¡°You can stand down. He¡¯s my guest!¡± Greem¡¯s gentle but booming voice rang out in the skies above.


    Upon hearing this, all the adepts hastily dispelled their spells. They stopped their chants and left the vicinity.


    Meanwhile, Kanganas, who had hurried over in a hurry, lifted his head and looked at the thousand-meter-tall Greem.


    He opened his mouth wide, and the short staff in his hand almost fell out of his grasp.


    He looked Greem over and over. Finally, he carefully flew up before Greem. He eximed in surprise, ¡°No wonder you said your situation isplicated...this is surprising!¡±


    ¡°Apologies for making you see me in such an awkward state!¡± Greem chuckled, ¡°I ran into some trouble earlier and can only remain in this gigantified state. Fortunately, there¡¯s no loss to mybat power!¡±


    ¡°Can you let me see what fire principles you have mastered?¡± Kanganas rubbed his palms impatiently.


    He was a demigod lich; There was no reason for him to thirst after Greem¡¯s fire principles. As such, Greem did not intend to hide anything. He lifted his giant right hand and extended his index finger.


    A small golden me appeared above it.


    The unique magic and abilities of high-grade adepts were always their secret weapons. They would never show them to others so easily. Only ¡®friends¡¯ like themselves, who had no direct conflict of interest, would be so generous as to show each other their abilities.


    Demigod Lich Kanganas didn¡¯t try extending his Spirit into the fire to explore its secrets. He only silently sensed for the principle characteristics of the fire.


    It was a small me. It might look insignificant, but as it burned on Greem¡¯s fingertip, it caused all the surroundingws to tremble and quake. All principles powers other than thews of fire were subtly pushed away on the principle level.


    When Greem used his fire principles at full force, the principle powers of the local territory would be temporarily rewritten. Apart from fire, Greem¡¯s opponents would not be able to replenish elementium orws of any other attribute.


    That was the main reason why principle adepts were so superiorpared to elementium adepts!


    They had the ability to cut off their opponents¡¯ connection with thew system at its source. Without a connection to thews, it was impossible to fight against a principle adept and their endless magic energy with just individual power alone.


    Apart from the might of principles, the fire adept¡¯s fire also possessed a terrifying characteristic of being able to lock on to lifeforms. Should Greem¡¯s fire principles manage to infiltrate his opponent¡¯s body, the principle powers would seep into their soulspace and continue burning forever with their life energy as fuel.


    Such a vicious fire principle would never rest until its victim was dead. Without the ability to draw on other principles to neutralize the fire principle, no one would be able to avoid the fate of eventual death.


    Kanganas might be a demigod lich now, and he might have the Ancient Reliquary of Deepwinter with him, but he felt a genuine, instinctual fear from his soul when he watched the silently burning me in Greem¡¯s palm.


    It was devastation from the principles, devastation of power, and a devastation of might!


    Once upon a time, Kanganas had be proud and arrogant upon obtaining the reliquary.


    In his eyes, there were very few opponents of the same grade who were his equals. Even the so-called ultra-powerhouses were split into different ranks. Garbage like Cerveris would not be Kanganas¡¯ match, even if there were a dozen of them. Only an ultra-powerhouse like Gloria, who had experience in space, possessed the qualifications to fight against him.


    However, in the face of this human adept he once thought insignificant, Kanganas felt a genuine sense of loss.


    This was principle power! Real, bonafide principle power!


    Ever since he advanced from an ordinary lich to a demigod lich, he had believed himself to be exceptionally talented. He became exceedingly arrogant. However, who would¡¯ve thought that this would happen? This seemingly irrelevant Greem had managed to find the path to Fifth Grade faster than him. He had be a powerful principle adept.


    For some reason, Kanganas felt a flood of emotions at the thought of this.


    However, as a sly and cunning lich, there was no way that Kanganas would ever betray these feelings. Moreover, he was only a crystalline skeleton now. Who could possibly read his emotions from that smooth skull of his!?


    ¡°Let us work together!¡± Kanganas suddenly blurted out.


    Since Greem was so shockingly powerful, it was only natural to pull him over to his side.


    ¡°We were allies, to begin with!¡± Greem smiled and said. ¡°What is it? Does our promise from before no longer count?¡±


    It was then that Kanganas remembered that he had agreed to serve Greem for two hundred years.


    Kanganas had been focused on assimting the reliquary for the past dozen years. He had left the matter of Horton Magic Academy to his subordinates entirely. Now that he thought about it, he was technically Greem¡¯s ¡®subordinate¡¯ in name!


    In the past, Kanganas might have scoffed at the suggestion and even forced Greem to change the terms of the agreement. However, now that Greem had be a powerhouse who was superior to him in power and grade, Kanganas was now the inferior.


    If that were the case, then he would probably actually be his ¡®subordinate¡¯!


    Kanganas instantly became nervous at the thought of this.

 Chapter 1392 - Future Allies

    <strong>Chapter 1392 Future Allies</strong>


    ¡°We are friends, aren¡¯t we?¡± Greem said with a sincere tone.


    ¡°Friends......¡± Kanganas was speechless.


    In all honesty, no one in their right mind would dare be friends with a demigod lich. After all, the terror of liches and their heartlessness was known throughout the multiverse.


    That was why Kanganas was unsettled by Greem¡¯s show of goodwill.


    ¡°You saw my current condition as well; I¡¯m halfway there. I might not be rejected by the World of Adepts yet, but I don¡¯t have much time left inside this ne,¡± Greem smiled as he exined, ¡°Leaving the World of Adepts for the realms beyond will leave me all alone again. I¡¯m afraid I will have to ask for your help on many matters then, my ¡®friend¡¯!¡±


    Greem might not have revealed all his ns, but it was evident that he ced quite a bit of importance on Kanganas.


    Kanganas was already a demigod lich. With the power of the reliquary, he should have no problem advancing into a Great Lich. Though Greem might be venturing into that realm ahead of him, Kanganas wasn¡¯t too far behind in terms of individual fighting power.


    nning ahead and establishing good rtions with the lich would keep Greem from walking into spacepletely blind. He would at least have apanion.


    Power, influence, connections, resources- these were all things necessary for the growth of a powerful Great Adept. They were all required!


    The moment the topic of discussion shifted back to benefits and merits, Kanganas¡¯ doubts dispelled instantly. He even started rejoicing.


    Greem needed a powerfulpanion to aid him, and so did Kanganas. Once he advanced to Fifth Grade and became a Great Lich, he would have the qualifications to raise his own banner within the Alliance of Liches. He could gather the weaker and more unfortunate liches around him to create his own force.


    It was important to note that, as creatures that had gone against the natural cycle of life and shattered the boundaries of life and death, liches werergely discriminated against and rejected by most spellcaster organizations. In fact, many orthodox spellcasters hated liches with a passion. They would hunt down liches upon discovering them.


    That resulted in many low-grade members of the Alliance of Liches leading miserable lives, hiding like sewer rats wherever they went. They could not present themselves as the noble spellcasters they were and had tremendous trouble obtaining the resources and knowledge they required.


    Kanganas had finally managed to achieve something. With all the power he now possessed, he had survived those difficult days. Even so, he still had trouble finding suitable people to trade high-grade knowledge and rare resources with.


    After all, the lich¡¯s sinister image was an impression that was hard to dispel; very few spellcaster organizations were willing to deal with them.


    If Kanganas had a powerful legendary fire adept as hispanion, he just might be able to open up connections with the adepts. That would make it far easier to umte both resources and knowledge.


    It was only with resources that he would be able to gain more power. Raising his banner and forging his own force within the Alliance of Liches would no longer be a dream.


    As for the matter of the Death God¡¯s tomb? Hmph! Making an ally out of a powerful adept for the Alliance of Liches was worth far more than the death of an insignificant lich!


    At the thought of this, Kanganas¡¯ attitude changedpletely. He became much more friendly and intimate with Greem.


    Both sides were willing to engage in this fellowship!


    They were both loners amongst their own people and had very few allies. Now that they hade to amon ground, they instantly agreed on an alliance and became panions¡¯ that would guarantee a stable exchange of benefits.


    With their firmly-established alliance, they became much more honest with each other.


    Kanganas made up his mind to establish aboratory near the mega-rift to make it more convenient to research Greem¡¯s current advancement situation. Correspondingly, he would hand over all the secrets of space that he had collected to Greem and allow him to get familiar with the realms beyond rapidly.


    Everybody got what they wanted. It was a fair and just trade!


    After dealing with Demigod Lich Kanganas, Greem finally looked around him.


    He had an odd sensation that he was being monitored by someone these days.


    Despite all the methods he employed, Greem could not locate that mysterious individual who spied on him from the shadows.


    It wasn¡¯t the archivists of the Diviners¡¯ Tower. Those people would turn into eagles or clouds and blend into the background. It was a stealthy means of hiding themselves, but Greem could still catch them with his spiritual senses.


    It couldn¡¯t be a powerhouse sent by the Adept¡¯s Association either. ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, the Association was currently in much greater trouble than the Central Lands. It was the vicious Scourge Lords that were emerging from Inkdeep Valley. They were far more powerful than the abyssal demons in every aspect.


    If the Association actually had the means to stir trouble in the Central Lands during such times, Greem wouldn¡¯t mind reciprocating their ¡®goodwill¡¯ by paying a visit to Inkdeep Valley.


    Greem might not have been able to confirm the existence of this mysterious individual, but he could sense the warnings that the nar consciousness was rying to him through the principles.


    He had just repelled the abyssal invasion; his rtionship with the nar consciousness couldn¡¯t be better. It was only natural that he obtained a little favor in this fashion. Unfortunately, Greem was unlearned in the art of divination. Consequently, he could not obtain more detailed information from the nar consciousness.


    As for Alice? She had been invited to the Spirit World by Starspirit Ts a while ago and had yet to return. Thus, Greem could only observe in silence and try to locate the observer with the Chip¡¯s help.


    Sadly, the opponent appeared to be someone powerful with their own unique abilities. Even with all his power, Greem could deduce the existence of such a foe butcked the means to verify it.


    The ominous feeling in Greem¡¯s heart grew even more prominent!


    ............


    Greem stood silently on the spot.


    His only job for the past few days had been remaining here silently, letting the mes surging out of the Heart of Principles slowly radiate through his body and modify it.


    He only had three pieces of magical equipment on his person right now.


    The Orb of the Fire God was ced in his Heart of Principles, where it turned into a zing fireball. A constant stream of pure fire energy poured out from there. The power contained dense fire principles and scalded the Heart of Principles like boilingva.


    However, due to Greem¡¯s potent life force, new flesh was continually growing in his Heart of Principles to rece the damaged tissue. However, the newly grown flesh could not bear the principle fire either and withered once more.


    Scorched, regrown, scorched, and regrown...the cycle continued until strange golden particles appeared. These flesh particles were no different from ordinary flesh, but they possessed principle powers whollypatible with the Undying me.


    Not only would these golden flesh particles not be scorched by the principle fires, but they would be stronger and more active when bathed in principle fire.


    Greem¡¯s heart was now the size of a house. However, enduring one hour of constant agony from the pain of his heart being scorched only yielded a piece of golden flesh the size of a bean. Topletely rece the Heart of Principles with golden flesh would take fifteen years of hard work.


    Modifying the Heart of Principles was essentially an attempt to create a magical heart for the Orb of the Fire God that could contain the principle powers of a Fifth Grade fire. This process was long and arduous. Plenty of rare and valuable adept resources were also required to hasten its progress.


    The Orb of the Fire God was the source of Greem¡¯s power now. It could no longer be reced by anything else. In all seriousness, Greem¡¯s power system after advancing to Fifth Grade would revolve entirely around the Orb of the Fire God.


    Even the Fifth Grade Tome of Corruption had to take a backseat. It could notpete with the Orb of the Fire God.


    Apart from these two Fifth Grade artifacts, the only thing that could keep up with Greem¡¯s improvement was the focusing crystal. The other magical equipment was of inferior grade, and Greem could hardly get any use of it in battle now.


    He could still use the Fourth Grade equipment, but each use would significantly reduce their durability. As for equipment below Fourth Grade? It could not even bear the power that Greem was now capable of unleashing.


    The moment Greem¡¯s fire energy surged into them, they would explode into pieces. If the magical equipment itself was destroyed, then all the effects that they could provide would naturally be moot.


    After all, the materials and means through which they were forged did not allow them to bear the might of principle powers!


    From now on, like all the other Great Adepts, Greem would be on a difficult journey, searching for resources to craft a piece of customized high-grade equipment for himself.


    While Greem was silent in thought, an elderly adept dressed in a wizard¡¯s hat and gray robe observed him without a sound, far away at the edge of the mega-rift¡¯s territory.


    The elderly adept¡¯s back was hunched over. He couldn¡¯t be more than 1.7 meters tall. Compared to Greem¡¯s gigantic body, he was like an ant at the foot of a rhinoceros.


    However, his presence transcended everyone¡¯s sight and senses.


    He might be standing in a rather remote location, but a few adepts still passed by here asionally. Whenever their spiritual senses or sight swept past the old adept, all they saw was a bunch of broken rocks. There was nothing unusual about the spot.


    Thus, even though batches of adepts passed by the elderly adept on patrol, not one of them picked up on his presence.


    The elderly adept remained there for a dozen days.


    He had appeared there almost the instant Greem repelled the abyssal pit fiend. He stood there quietly, watching over Greem¡¯s every action and monitoring his soul aura.


    The more he looked, the more interested he became. He developed an intense curiosity about Greem!

 Chapter 1393 - The Mysterious Adept

    <strong>Chapter 1393 The Mysterious Adept</strong>


    ¡°Chip, have you not found that bastard yet?¡±


    [Beep. Panoramic scan and topographyparison activated. No abnormalities discovered. Suggest that Host unleash me Lightwaves with the fire principles at the core to conduct a scan on the principle level.]


    ¡°me Lightwaves? That is an application of the fire principles you were able toe up with?¡±


    [Affirmative! After crossing the Fourth Grade threshold and reaching Fifth Grade, adepts undergo a fundamental evolution. The methods and techniques of battle they always used in the past are no longer effective against enemies of Fifth Grade and beyond. Uncovering and finding advanced applications of the principle powers is of utmost urgency. Otherwise, Host wouldck the means to deal with enemies of Great Adept level and beyond!]


    Greem nodded silently.


    This mysterious enemy was hiding very well and was enough of a threat for the nar consciousness to warn him of their existence. All of these signs pointed toward the fact that the enemy was incredibly powerful. They were likely a Fifth Grade opponent.


    But who were they associated with?


    Maysa? The Adept¡¯s Association? Or the Silver Union?


    If it was the Adept¡¯s Association, shouldn¡¯t they prioritize the reinforcement of Inkdeep Valley, provided that they had such a powerful ally on their side? Why would they ever send such a person to the Central Lands?


    Meanwhile, he had established an agreement with the Silver Union before all this. They should have no reason to send such a terrifying individual as this opponent when he had not done anything to infringe on their benefits.


    Therefore, it seemed most likely that this was an assassin sent by Great Witch Maysa!


    Greem cursed in his mind at the thought of this.


    His road to his current position had been an incredibly difficult and thorny one. It was almost entirely owing to Maysa¡¯s schemes and plots. If he had the ability and opportunity in the future, he wanted nothing more than to drag that witch down from her lofty heights and throw her into the mud.


    That would be the only way to vent all the boiling resentment he had been holding in him!


    ¡°Send the magical model of me Lightwaves to me!¡± Greem ordered in a soft voice.


    The next second, an unusually massive stream of data surged through his mind, quickly forming into aplicated, three-dimensional mental model.


    It had 1,027 magical circuits, 368 energy nodes, 13,119 runic lines, and 689 runes. It included the varying magical systems of arcane magic, adept magic, and magic energy.


    Thisplicated array was only a simple detection spell. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine howplicated other Fifth Grade spells were!


    More importantly, the driving force behind a Fifth Grade spell like this was no longer magical elementium, but principle power. A Fourth Grade adept would not be able to unleash this spell, even if they got their hands on the magical model.


    Greem might have refined and created his principle fire, but his Spirit still had not reached the required threshold for Fifth Grade. He might be able to use Fifth Grade spells with the aid of the Orb of the Fire God, but he would have to wait until he advanced to truly bring out the might of Fifth Grade spells.


    Since the Chip had already managed to calcte and create the me Lightwaves spell, Greem was able to obtain all the information on the spell the moment his mind received it.


    That meant Greem was incredibly familiar with me Lightwaves, even though this was his first time casting it. There was no hesitation or dy when he cast the spell; it was as if he had done so a thousand times before.


    Greem shut his eyes and thought silently for a moment. All of a sudden, he opened his eyes and gave out an order with his fearsome spiritual senses.


    ¡°All adepts present return to the adept tower immediately!¡±


    There was no exnation nor any preparation at all. Greem¡¯s orders were transmitted into the minds of every human adept working near the mega-rift.


    The adepts were confused, but no one dared question the orders of an ultra-powerhouse!


    In just five minutes, the mega-rift that had been buzzing with activity fell utterly silent. Not a single person could be seen around except for Greem¡¯s gigantic silhouette.


    ¡°Kanganas, are you gonna go hide, or are you stay and watch? I have an uninvited guest around here, and I intend to make them show themselves!¡± Greem¡¯s Spirit was able to connect with Demigod Lich Kanganas rapidly.


    The lich was currently standing on a hill. He had taken out an intricate alchemical creation, which he tossed onto the ground. The box rapidly expanded into a hundred-meter-wideboratory.


    Upon hearing Greem¡¯s questions, his body tensed up in surprise. The soulfire hiding behind the rubies of his empty eye sockets scanned the surrounding area repeatedly. However, he did not find anything out of the usual.


    That couldn¡¯t be. Greem was not only superior in firepower to him but also had superior means of detection?


    Kanganas grumbled internally as he cackled, ¡°Do what you wish! I won¡¯t involve myself.¡±


    In all honesty, he also wanted to see how Greem would force out an enemy that even he couldn¡¯t detect. If he could learn some applications of higher powers through watching this process, it would be worth taking on some risk.


    Greem no longer held back after obtaining Kanganas¡¯ reply.


    He bent over with his giant body, staring at the empty battlefield with zing eyes as he said, ¡°Esteemed guest, do you intend to show yourself? Or would you prefer I beat you into existence? Hm?¡±


    The ground remained deste and empty. Only the scorched, exposed bedrock revealed the horrors of the battle not long ago.


    ¡°Hmph! Very well, then. Show yourself!¡±


    Greem shouted and raised both his arms. A vast magical array appeared around him. An unbelievable amount of mes surged from his palms, turning into strange waves that resembled pulses of light or fire. These waves then extended in every direction at rapid speed.


    The mes did not have the horrifying aura of the Undying mes, but they carried a strange principle fluctuation with them. Nothing changed when the waves rippled past. The sky remained the sky, and the earth remained as the earth. It was almost as if these waves of principles had no offensive power at all.


    Strangely enough, when the waves reached the mysterious elderly adept, the fire principles contained within them shed with his magical defenses. A strange principle reaction urred.


    Almost as if a Potion of Revtion had been used, the elderly adept appeared within Greem and Kanganas¡¯ spiritual senses out of thin air.


    So somebody was here; that was Kanganas¡¯ first reaction!


    What strange mes! To think they were able to replicate the characteristics of light! Could Greem have mastered the use of his fire principle already? That was Kanganas¡¯ genuine reaction!


    The elderly adept was just as surprised as Kanganas.


    His mouth was agape, and his eyes were round with shock. He almost looked like he had just seen a ghost when he saw Greem raise his arms as the magical array appeared around him.


    In truth, even ghosts would be terrified of this elderly adept instead of the other way around. A specter would have to be at least Fourth Grade or above to make this elderly adept pay any attention to them at all.


    Greem once again felt the pain of being such a colossal size.


    Having a thousand-meter-tall body might look overbearing as if he could simply pluck a cloud from the skies just by raising his hand. However, it made it incredibly troublesome to bend over and talk with this elderly adept.


    Still, he bent over and stared at this mysterious adept with cold and stern eyes.


    When those lightwaves came into contact with this adept, they were repelled by another principle power. This meant this inconspicuous adept was a bonafide principle adept.


    He seemed to be Greem¡¯s superior in both age and prowess as well!


    It made Greem be exceptionally cautious.


    He quickly scanned the adept¡¯s appearance andpared it to all the known adepts in the Chip¡¯s database, but he found no match.


    Greem stared at the opponent for a while. Finally, he put on a warm smile.


    ¡°And who might you be, sir? Why are you keeping an eye on me?¡±


    Greem might have suppressed his voice, but his massive size still caused his words to boom like thunder.


    As his voice rolled across the earth, the rocks around the elderly adept shook.


    ¡°It seems like he was right, after all. I should not havee back!¡± The elderly adept shook his head and sighed, not actually answering the question.


    He then lifted his head and stared at Greem. He asked with an odd expression, ¡°Kid, how exactly did you master that spell? If my estimations are not wrong, it has barely been thirty days since you obtained the fire principles. Thirty days should not be enough for you to master a Fifth Grade spell, should it?¡±


    Others might not know the difficulty behind such a feat. But as a Great Adept who had lived for thousands of years, the elderly adept knew it better than anyone else.


    It would have taken a dozen years for anyone to get used to the sudden qualitative change that urred to their soul origin, let alone being able to cast aside the low-level means of energy application they had been using for hundreds of years. They would have to recreate a whole new system of magic revolving around the principle powers.


    Even the elderly adept had used a hundred years of hard work to finally discover his first Fifth Grade spell. The difficulty involved in the process was something only he could understand.


    It was no wonder he was looking at Greem like a monster! Greem had just cast a Fifth Grade spell with such ease and grace!


    Could there be such a prodigy in this world?


    However, even a prodigy wouldn¡¯t be capable of such a ridiculous disy, would they?


    This..pletely upended the elderly adept¡¯s understanding of the world.


    Curiosity got the better of him. The elderly adept put on a passionate¡¯ smile and said in a gentle voice, ¡°Kid. If you tell me honestly how you learned this Fifth Grade spell, I promise not to make trouble with you today. How about that?¡±


    So he was here to make trouble.


    Greem sighed. His expression turned solemn as he said, ¡°And if I refuse?¡±


    ¡°Hehe! Then you will regret your choice.¡± The adept chuckled coldly.


    For some reason, it seemed as if the entire world was rising and falling with the changes in his expression.


    Principle power......fearsome principle power!

 Chapter 1394 - Clash of Principles

    <strong>Chapter 1394 sh of Principles</strong>


    What exactly were principles?


    This question had run throughout the adept civilization for perpetuity!


    The earlier adepts had a simple analysis and exnation for it. However, such information had always been considered high-grade knowledge of the adept civilization. Their weaker, low-grade members had no ess to it.


    The ancient adepts believed that the principles were a basic framework and means of operation manifested by a nar world. Every nar world formed with a sea of magic as its foundation, the core principles as its framework, the lesser principles forming its internal veins, and the derivativews as flesh and blood.


    ording to this idea, the more principles a nar world could carry, therger it would be and the more advanced the ne.


    The World of Adepts was one such higher ne; it was close to perfection, with aprehensive principle system. The World of Adepts was highly regarded in the multiverse and was one of the few major nes among the countless worlds.


    The more powerful the World of Adepts, the easier it would be for the lifeforms born in its world to surpass the nar world¡¯s limits to be truly powerful individuals.


    However, despite the principles being what made the World of Adepts so powerful, they were also the same things that shackled its growth!


    As vast as the World of Adepts was, the principle power it contained was also limited.


    There was a limit to the number of ultra-grade adepts it could tolerate. It could not grow and expand without end.


    An ancient adept once conducted an experiment and investigation thatsted several tens of thousands of years. They discovered that the World of Adepts contained an approximate total of 2,000-2,300 principles.


    A pothole for every carrot!


    Which was to say that the World of Adepts could only handle two thousand or so individuals of Fifth Grade and beyond!


    The highest floor of the adept civilization was upied by these two thousand or so ultra-grade adepts.


    Once all the principle powers were taken up, the adepts that came after would have no principles to take on and, thus, no means to advance and grow stronger. For these adepts that came after to advance to Fifth Grade, they would have to wrestle with their predecessors for control of the principle powers. Alternatively, they could find ways to increase the number of principles avable in the World of Adepts to obtain a chance at advancement.


    Of course, if an adept were fortunate enough, the Great Adept taking up their desired principle would die in the depths of space. If that happened, the Great Adept¡¯s origin principle would no longer be upied, and a new Fifth Grade adept could be born!


    There were so many Fourth Grade adepts in the World of Adepts, yet only a few of them could advance to Fifth Grade. Why was that the case? The main reason for it was because their path to advancement was upied by someone else. That Great Adept had thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of years more experience with their desired principle. To steal control from a Great Adept was nearly impossible.


    Thus, foreign incursions and invasions were the only way for the World of Adepts to develop and grow stronger.


    Raiding resources, poption, souls, and knowledge from other worlds.


    Once enough had been stolen from other nar worlds, the World of Adepts¡¯ nar origin would be nourished and grow stronger. The stronger the nar origin, the more world principles that could be born, providing more paths for the younger generations to advance.


    As such, principles were one with a nar world!


    The stronger the ne, the more principles would be born, and the more individuals that could grow stronger through these principles there would be. That would allow for the nar natives to be more capable of conquering foreign worlds.


    The more foreign invasions conducted, the stronger the nar world and the more principles there would be avable.


    It was a virtuous cycle that allowed for a nar world¡¯s strength to snowball and grow infinitely!


    Greem had been able to receive the favor of the consciousness of the World of Adepts, distinguishing himself from the numerous Fourth Grade adepts and obtaining a path to advancement. That certainly had to do with the fact that he had been passionately engaging in internar warfare in the past few centuries.


    The essence of the Goblin ne and Lance brought back to the World of Adepts, the knowledge obtained from the Arcane Empire, the mushrooms introduced from the Spirit World, the active unification of the Central Lands, and repelling the abyssal invasion.


    All of these events had culminated together, perceived by the nar consciousness as contributions to the World of Adepts. Individually, each of these wars might not have been all that significant. Together, they were enough for Greem to receive the nar consciousness¡¯s favor. It made it easier for him to grasp the principles.


    That was why Greem¡¯s current achievement was both incidental and yet also an inevitability!


    That said, even among the thousands of principles, there were main principles and branch principles as well.


    The Undying me that Greem currently grasped was only a lesser principle under the fire principles¡¯ greater branch. If he wanted to grow even stronger from now on, he would have to raid other worlds¡¯ fire principles and nurture the branch principle he currently possessed.


    Of course, it would be wonderful if he gained the opportunity to grasp the main fire principle.


    However, the World of Adepts had existed for millions of years. The central fire principle was almost certainly in the hands of some Great Adept. Greem¡¯s attempt to peer into the fire principles would certainly provoke hostility and retaliation.


    That was why certain enemies had appeared in Greem¡¯s path the moment he chose to be a fire adept. He had been too weak in the past and not powerful enough to draw the ire of his enemies.


    The moment he stepped out of the World of Adepts and became a Fifth Grade fire principle adept, he would have to be careful of attacks from the shadows!


    ............


    It had not been long since Greem mastered his fire principle, but that did not mean he was ignorant of the source of the principle powers and his current situation.


    Due to the Chip¡¯s robust database and calcting abilities, Greem¡¯s understanding of the principle powers was superior to some Fifth Grade adepts.


    Greem was able to obtain plenty of useful information the instant the elderly adept drew upon his principle powers.


    At the very least, he was able to figure out the attribute of his opponent¡¯s principle powers.


    It was water!


    The elderly adept excelled at a kind of water principle that neutralized enemy attacks with a gentle power.


    Water to quench the fire!


    Hehehe; it seemed like the mastermind behind the scenes had thought of everything.


    All of these clues pointed Greem subtly toward the Great Witch Maysa.


    What was toe would always arrive.


    Moreover, having the battlefield be within the World of Adepts was always better than having it in space.


    After confirming his enemy¡¯s attributes, Greem stopped trying to negotiate. His gigantic body zed with fire as he abruptly mmed his burning hand toward the ground.


    The winds howled.


    Even before the palmnded, the rocks around the elderly adept caved downward in the shape of a palm. The imprint was three meters deep. From a distance, you could even see Greem¡¯s fingerprints on the scorched rock


    The adept stood silently on the spot, a powerful and mysterious force protecting all space within two meters of him. The bedrock he stood on did not copse like the surrounding rock. Instead, it remained standing resiliently like a nail.


    The old adept tapped his staff, and a flood of cerulean water essence surged out around him as if a portal to the depths of the sea had been open.


    The water essence rushed around the adept, forming into a massive water giant. The water giant raised both arms and blocked the palm.


    Greem¡¯s zing palm shed with the water giant¡¯s arms.


    A deafening explosion could be heard as a fearsome shockwave rippled outward. Where the shockwave reached, everything was reduced to dust!


    Even the exposed bedrock that had survived Greem¡¯s battle with the pit fiend was not spared.


    The energy shockwave traveled for several kilometers and caused mountains to copse, their rocks reduced to dust.


    The me giant and water giant in the center of the battlefield did not budge at all. The zing palm and the liquid arms stuck together as the two differing principle powers washed over, shed with, and neutralized each other. The rest of the elementium explosion that could not be neutralized was released into the surroundings as energy shockwaves.


    The war towers, which had only recently been repaired, glowed as the elementium barriers appeared and shattered after only several seconds. Then the energy shockwaves whipped against the towers viciously.


    Just ten secondster, the war towers crumbled and copsed into a bunch of ruins. As for the Ahlden n adepts inside the buildings? They were probably dead if they hadn¡¯t escaped in time.


    Meanwhile, the adept tower in the distance stood like a weary traveler in front of the shockwaves. It erected numerous barriers and defenses against the destructive shockwaves and barely protected itself.


    Meanwhile, pale-white and light-blue principle power appeared around Demigod Lich Kanganas, turning into an imprable barrier that stopped the radiating shockwave and principle powers.


    He was in a dangerous ce, but his eyes glowed with the light of excitement and curiosity. He stared unblinkingly at the battlefield in the distance, using all his spiritual senses to witness the two powerhouses¡¯ energy fluctuations.


    Kanganas looked so excited and tense that it was almost as if he was the one in the fight!


    With the water giant protecting the adept, Greem could not hurt his opponent no matter how he tried.


    The elderly adept lifted his head and smiled coldly. ¡°Kid, don¡¯t you have any respect for the elderly? To think you would strike with such a heavy blow on your first move...hehehe! Let me show you the true power of the principles!¡±

 Chapter 1395 - Principle Battle

    <strong>Chapter 1395 Principle Battle</strong>


    Greem had fantasized about what a principle battle would look like countless times before this.


    Due to theck of information, he¡¯d never had reliable resources with which to conduct research on this topic.


    Today, this elderly adept was giving him a serious lesson on how to conduct a principle battle, just as a proper mentor would.


    Still, the price Greem was paying for it was simply too high!


    Mixing principle power into elementium spells would undoubtedly increase their lethality and pration power. That was how Greem had always utilized his principle powers. However, this was the first time he was engaged in a battle purely on the principles¡¯ level.


    A strange principle power that was gentle as water and unusually resilient extended from the elderly adept. The energy reached into the principles of the World of Adepts and leveraged them. The elderly adept guided the principle power toward Greem¡¯s soul through the fire powers that he emitted.


    This action caused Greem to immediately break out in cold sweat!


    Even as prideful and powerful as he was, there was no way he would ever fight back against the entire principle system of the World of Adepts with his power alone!


    If he did not have a method to deal with this attack from his opponent, the leveraged principles would wash over his mental consciousness and soul origin like a devastating flood. When that happened, the self-consciousness that was Legendary Fire Adept Greem would cease to exist.


    Fighting a principle powerhouse was truly a terrifying experience. Through his familiarity with the principles and the means by which to fight with them, the elderly adept was overwhelmingly crushing Greem.


    In a fraction of a second, Greemmunicated rapidly with the Chip in his mind while all this happened.


    ¡°Principle Crushing: An effective means for veteran principle adepts to deal with rookies by taking advantage of their more refined technique and experience. The specific method is as follows: Using rapid principle-skipping and willpower-infiltration, the opponent guides their principle attack into the nar system. The resulting bacsh from the principles is used as a means of attacking the opponent.] The Chip silently recorded how the elderly adept manipted the principles. It then used all the data and its rapid calctions abilities to deduce the expected oues.


    ¡°How can I deal with this principle-crushing?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered with the details at the moment. All he wanted was a solution.


    [There are seven potential solutions.


    [One: Cut out part of Host¡¯s Spirit in the form of a me clone and severe Host¡¯s mental connection to it. That will turn the me clone into a decoy and draw away the principle bacsh.


    Note: This solution only has a 63% probability of sess.


    [Two: React with the same principle-skipping and willpower-infiltration to guide the opponent¡¯s attack toward the world system. In doing so, we can borrow the world system¡¯s power to resist the principles controlled by the opponent.


    Note: This solution only has a 45% probability of sess.


    [Three: Use the powers of the Tome of Corruption and the Orb of the Fire God to forcefully take the principle bacsh.


    Estimated probability of sess: 79%. Host¡¯s soul will have to endure impact from the principles.


    Probability of minor injury: 21%.


    Probability of major injury: 77%.


    Probability of death: 2%.


    [Four......]


    The Chip listed seven solutions, but most of them involved dodging or enduring the attack in some manner. Given theck of information on principle battles, the Chip could only make deductions based on the avable information. It could not make urate predictions that allowed for domination of the fight as it always had.


    After a brief instant of weighing each option¡¯s pros and cons, Greem made his decision.


    ¡°We will go with the second option and sh with him directly. Furthermore, make preparations for using the first and third options. Should the attempt at retaliation turn sour, immediately put the backup options to work!¡±


    Greem had already gained some understanding of the world principle system¡¯s structure after all these years. He knew that everything in the world was derived and manifested by principles andws of varying levels.


    What formed the world itself were the principles, butws were what manifested in a form that mortals could ess.


    This nar world structure meant that an individual¡¯s mental consciousness would have to endure constant disruption by the variousws while traveling through the principles. It created an innumerable number of variables.


    Principle-skipping, put in moreprehensive words, referred to the act of skipping from oneyer of principle to another while two principle adepts shed with their mental consciousnesses.


    The medium in which the conflict urred changed and shifted rapidly at every moment. The means of triggering the various principles was also very varied.


    With their respective principle powers as the medium and their mental consciousness as a guide, the two opposing adepts shed within the world¡¯s principle system like two surfers. Should either of them trigger a bacsh from the principle system due to a mistake, this conflict of principle and mind would instantly put them on the backfoot.


    If Greem didn¡¯t want to engage the elderly adept in this little dance within the principles, then this battle would be very one-sided. The elderly adept was backed by the horrifying monstrosity that was the World of Adept¡¯s principle system. Any principle attacks he directed at the adept could be directed into the principle system.


    In doing so, the elderly adept could freely attack Greem by leveraging the principle system, while Greem could hardly retaliate.


    Through this method, the elderly adept would be able to crush and defeat Greem with minimal energy exhaustion. It was a fearsome strategy!


    However, the elderly adept never expected Greem to leap into the principle system after him without a moment¡¯s hesitation.


    A rookie adept who had not evenpleted his Fifth Grade advancement wanted to engage him in a principle battle?


    The elderly adeptughed out loud and controlled his water principle tounch a vicious attack at Greem.


    The fire giant that Greem had turned into refused to back down against the elderly adept¡¯s water giant. They furiously beat andshed at each other. Horrifying mes that seemed as if they could burn down the whole world shed against blue waves that filled the skies. The energy explosions resulting from the conflict sent shockwaves all over, threatening to rip even empty space into pieces.


    Meanwhile, within the intangible and imperceptible principleyers, the two adepts¡¯ mental consciousnesses were locked onto each other. They controlled the principle powers and wildly skipped from principle to principle.


    As they caused chaos and havoc, ripples spread throughout the principle systems. The functioning of the principles, which was as strict and perfect as tens of thousands of interlocking gears, gradually became disrupted.


    There was no doubt that Greem would have to endure more of the principle bacsh in this battle of principles. However, to the elderly adept¡¯s surprise, Greem was able to put up a fight, despite being a rookie.


    Greem wasn¡¯t as familiar with the operations of the principles and their minute variations, but he was able to do a proper job and prevent the elderly adept from finding a lethal weak spot. The two of them continued to battle in the principleyer, slowly causing a massive disturbance within the principle system.


    At this point, both of them were starting to regret their actions!


    The nar consciousness might have shown Greem tremendous favor, but it came at a cost. As one of the two individuals responsible for the disturbance, Greem could feel the ne¡¯s feedback seeping away as he fought.


    Indeed, as punishment for his disruption of the nar principles, he was losing a portion of his feedback from repelling the abyssal invasion every second he remained within the principle system. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine what would happen if he didn¡¯t stop by the time all the nar feedback was exhausted. His life force would be next on the chopping block!


    That said, the nar consciousness was a fair and just entity!


    Even while it punished Greem, it did not spare the elderly adept either.


    Greem could easily imagine what the elderly adept was feeling when he saw his face slowly turn green and purple with frustration. What he didn¡¯t know was what price the elderly adept had paid to deal with this bacsh from the nar consciousness.


    Greem was genuinely very curious about this!


    This fearsome principle battle ended up as a battle of attrition, with both sides suffering heavily. It was undoubtedly beyond both their expectations, though Demigod Lich Kanganas was having a st watching them fight.


    In all honesty, this battle between principle adepts was so terrifying that allnd within ten kilometers had turned into a death zone. However, the phenomenon was clearly not a threat to Kanganas, who was protected by his reliquary.


    He erected a blue and white barrier that blocked all attacks from the elementium,w, and principle levels. It allowed the lich to witness this intense and mighty principle battle at close distance!


    He was also at a critical moment of advancing from peak Fourth Grade to Fifth grade. Understanding and grasping the operations of the principle level would certainly be beneficial to his future development.


    No matter how intense the fight got, no matter how much their surroundings were destroyed and the world quaked, Kanganas continued watching with excitement. He wanted nothing more than for the battle to grow even more intense.


    ¡°I¡¯m done...done, I say,¡± Finally, the elderly adept caved before Greem¡¯s feedback had been exhausted.


    He was the clone of a Sixth Grade adept, after all. Sneaking back into the World of Adepts had only been possible at great cost. For him to maintain this level of power within the World of Adepts required him to pay a tremendous price, far greater than what Greem had imagined.


    The limit of everyone¡¯s power had been constrained to peak Fourth Grade. However, the elderly Adept Dous had originally believed himself capable of crushing Greem through his advantage in the principleyers.


    Unfortunately, even though Greem was technically a rookie, his technique was unbelievably refined. To think, he was able to grasp the methods of a principle battle without guidance and force the fight into a war of attrition!


    That pushed Dous into a corner!


    He was only a peak Fourth Grade clone. How many resources and energy reserves could he possibly bring with him? A war of attrition was just too costly.


    It didn¡¯t matter how strong he was; he was far away in the realms beyond and only able to transmit a limited amount of energy into the World of Adepts. If this battle continued, the principle system might devour his clone. That would be a loss far too severe to bear.


    He had no choice but to call a stop to this principle battle!

 Chapter 1396 - Forced into Retreat

    <strong>Chapter 1396 Forced into Retreat</strong>


    This principle battle had benefitted Greem greatly.


    Even though he had lost a tremendous amount of nar feedback due to the battle, it was all worth it.


    At the very least, Greem now understood exactly what principle battles were.


    Throughout the annals of the adepts¡¯ millions of years of history, nearly ten thousand Great Adepts had been born in the World of Adepts. Nearly two thousand of these Great Adepts walked the path of principle adepts.


    The number of principle adepts would soon approach its limit. Other adepts that came after them would only have more difficulty advancing into principle adepts. It would be no easy task.


    Bloodline adepts prioritized their bloodlines heavily. They sought to purify their bloodline powers and restore them to their most primal, undiluted forms. They tried to recover the glorious and ancient powers of their source bloodline. Back when the universe had just been created, the principles were undefined, and all sorts of creatures were born. There were innumerable beings who could have destroyed worlds with a wave of their hands in those times. Each of them was incredibly powerful.


    The ultimate pursuit of bloodline adepts was the restoration of this ancient glory!


    Body-refining adepts were known for their durable bodies; they were a ssic example of brawns over brains. Their pursuit was the refinement of their bodies through any means possible- to turn their flesh and blood into an immortal body capable of enduring any assault.


    They might call themselves adepts, but what they did made them not much different than martial artists. Their so-called magic was little more than a tool to aid them in battle!


    Esoteric adepts, on the other hand, pursued the pinnacle of alchemical creations. They did not think much of their own bodies, nor did they give too much weight to nurturing and strengthening their soul origin. Instead, they focused all their efforts on the creation and enhancement of alchemical products and magical golems.


    They often used these esoteric golems as their bodies while hiding their true selves in a subordinate lesser dimension.


    It was said that the founder of the Silver Union, the Creator and almighty Ninth Grade Esoteric Adept, Patrick, possessed an esoteric golem body that was as powerful as the primeval monstrosities. The golems he created all possessed horrifying might and were so intricate that it was impossible to differentiate the golems from actual living creatures.


    The main reason the Silver Union had survived throughout the tens of thousands of years was primarily due to him!


    Meanwhile, principle adepts were an extreme amongst the spellcasters that were the adepts.


    Magical elementium was only the very tip of the energy system. Its power was vastly inferior to its source- the principle powers.


    That was why any individual that studied and manipted elementium would eventually walk down the path of principles!


    However, there were only so many foundational principles and derived lesser principles in a perfect nar world.


    The narws were an even more inferior existence. They were a sort of supplementary force derived from the lesser principles.


    Foundational principles, lesser principles, andws. These things were interwoven together in their own unique fashion, giving rise to the countless beautiful and varied nar worlds.


    Thus, principle adepts were the most powerful existences that the World of Adepts could give rise to!


    The source of every principle adept¡¯s power was their origin ne. While much of their growthter relied on raiding other nar worlds, the very source and core of their power were rooted within their homeworld.


    That was precisely why the numerous principle adepts that had stepped out of the World of Adepts to explore space would often be the first ones to return to defend the World of Adepts. They weren¡¯t too passionate about the World of Adepts¡¯ internal affairs, but they would not hesitate to return when it was in danger.


    After all, if the World of Adepts was destroyed, their roots would be severed. It was undoubtedly a terrifying notion for those Great Adepts who had already attained great power.


    That was also why the Adept¡¯s Association was the strongest of the three major adept organizations!


    Why specifically?


    Because the Adept¡¯s Association was home to the most significant number of principle adepts, and these people were the ones who cared most for the World of Adepts¡¯ welfare.


    Principle battles were a new form ofbat derived by the principle adepts. Using their principles as a medium and their mental consciousness as guides, they took full advantage of the intimate connection between the various principles, roaming the principle system like expert surfers.


    The power of an individual was negligible, after all!


    However, if one were able to borrow a world system¡¯s power, they could magnify their individual power by hundreds of times. That kind of power was not something that a mortal being could hope to survive.


    Everyone¡¯s mind was different, and so were the principles they had grasped. When coasting and weaving between the different levels of principles andws, the principle adepts would often run into principles they were more acquainted with and those they were less proficient with. A battle of principles did not just rely on brute force. In fact, it required more technique and demanded that the adept be able to track and suppress their opponent using the principleyers that were beneficial to them.


    That leveled the ying field for principle adepts to some extent, allowing even weaker principle adepts to win over stronger ones!


    However, this was only the case due to the upper limit of power within the World of Adepts.


    If Greem had been banished from the World of Adepts, the elderly adept would not have had to resort to such aplicated and exhausting means of battle. Who cared about the strength of principles? Who cared about the techniques of utilizing the principles? All he had to do was crush Greem¡¯s body and disintegrate his soul with overwhelming power. When that happened, no number of fancy techniques would be worth anything.


    How were the principles supposed to manifest if their host no longer existed!?


    Consequently, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be impressed by the wonders of the world. Without the blessing of the World of Adepts, he would not have been able to fend off this fearsome enemy, no matter how talented he was.


    Of course, that was also because he didn¡¯t want to expose his devouring-fish bloodline prematurely.


    He was already the center of attention. Who knew what other enemies were lurking in the shadows looking to strike at him? Greem could only feel confident in reigning over the Central Lands if he kept a hidden ace up his sleeve.


    The elderly adept clearly had the initiative in this principle battle. He was able to pull his Spirit out of the conflict uponmand, instantly breaking free of his tussle with Greem.


    Greem frowned and shouted out, ¡°You get to decide when we stop? Why don¡¯t you stay now that you¡¯re already here!?¡±


    Greem gave no chance for the elderly adept to reply. He opened his mouth, and a torrent of golden mes pressed down against the elderly adept.


    The adept was furious. He wanted nothing more than to instantly summon his true self from space and destroy this annoying brat with a single p. However, he knew his limits. Great Adepts like himself had to practically smuggle themselves into the World of Adepts every time they returned. The amount of power they could bring back with them each time was minimal.


    Since there was no way of quickly defeating and killing this legendary fire adept, he should flee now.


    Should he continue fighting, something might happen to this clone of his; his reputation in space would be smeared.


    A Sixth Grade Great Adept had sent out his clone, only for it to be killed by a brat that had not even advanced to Fifth Grade? If news of this got out, it would be a permanent blemish to his reputation.


    Dous shivered at this thought. The water giant roared and turned into a raging stream, sting Greem¡¯s curtain of fire apart and carrying Dous away into the distant horizon.


    Greem did not attempt to chase after the adept. Instead, he stood silently on the spot as if thinking about something.


    The Chip was silentlymunicating with him in his mind.


    ¡°Have you managed to find out anything about that old man?¡±


    [All known information on Great Adepts has been investigated. No corresponding file discovered.]


    Greem brooded in silence. He wasn¡¯t surprised.


    At the level of Fifth Grades, adepts would have lifespanssting for thousands of years. The more stubborn individuals could even live up to ten thousand years if they resorted to extreme measures. Thus, obtaining a census of all surviving adepts that had stepped out of the World of Adepts in the past tens of thousands of years was a nearly impossible task.


    Even as a Fourth Grade adept and the de facto ruler of the Central Lands, Greem only had information on twenty or thirty Great Adepts in the Chip¡¯s database. Moreover, most of this information was iplete.


    The Great Adepts that he had on record also had not contacted the World of Adepts in hundreds of years. No one knew where they were or if they were even alive. If these Great Adepts had died quietly in some ancient ruins or somewhere deep in space, there was no way the World of Adepts would find out about their deaths.


    The Great Adepts who were verified and in close contact with the Central Lands numbered fewer than five. That included Sixth Grade Great Adept Sarubo, who had stepped out of the World of Adepts only eight hundred years ago!


    The amount of information that Greem had avable was minusculepared to the ten thousand Great Adepts out there. It was only natural that he could not find the results he wanted.


    ¡°Then what are the characteristics of the principle he has grasped?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    After that long battle with a sh of their principles, it was only natural that they had gained an understanding of each others¡¯ powers. Analyzing the characteristics of the opponent¡¯s principle was only a reasonable conclusion.


    [A lesser branch of the water principle. Manifested characteristic is the Pressure of Water. It is able to transfer weight using the unique attribute of water elementium, causing tremendous pressure on localized regions.


    [Moreover, the water giant created by the opponent was notposed of ordinary water elementium; it was highly extracted and refined water essence. Said substance possesses a tremendous magnification effect on water principles.]


    Water essence?


    Greem contemted for a moment.


    That could be considered a high-grade material in theboratories of most adepts!


    Judging from how casually he had just summoned that hundred-meter-tall water giant, water essence was hardly valuable to him. A hundred-meter-tall water giant would have to weigh forty tons at the very least. If it was made entirely out of water essence, it would be ten times heavier.


    No wonder the water giant was able to sh with his gigantic body despite being ten times smaller!


    While Greem was deep in thought, Fourth Grade Adept Andrew flew out of his tower and cautiously approached him.


    The devastating principle battle from earlier had clearly terrified Andrew.


    Andrew didn¡¯t know when it started, but he could no longer see this legendary fire adept as merely an equal. Even a Fourth Grade like himself trembled before Greem.


    ¡°Mm? What¡¯s the matter?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    Andrew nodded hastily and waved the parchment in his hand as he said, ¡°Big trouble over at the Adept¡¯s Association!¡±

 Chapter 1397 - The Association Calls For Help

    <strong>Chapter 1397 The Association Calls For Help</strong>


    The Adept¡¯s Association was really in trouble now!


    The parchment was a request for aid, and the person who had issued it was Vice-Chairman Domhnall of the Adept¡¯s Association.


    The other two major organizations had probably received a letter just like this one as well.


    Greem stared at the parchment, and it flew out of Andrew¡¯s hands toward him. As the scroll unfurled, the magical recording within started to y, showing Greem the terrifying carnage unfolding at Inkdeep Valley.


    A thousand-meter-long reptile with numerous heads and dark green scales climbed out of the depths of the valley.


    It released a ring screech when it appeared, and its body glowed with a jade-green light. The radiance covered an area of a hundred meters. Every voodoo beast and monster within the green light rotted rapidly and turned into puddles of purple liquid.


    Meanwhile, three Fourth Grade adepts in Association robes stood around the monster, two men and one woman.


    The female adept was Gloria, who had fought Greem once before!


    Greem also recognized one of the two male adepts. It was Adept Cerveris. The other was an unfamiliar face.


    Three adepts, three ultra-powerhouses!


    These three ultra-powerhouses from the Adept¡¯s Adept¡¯s Association surrounded the fearsome creature and fought against it.


    Meanwhile,rge hordes of magical creatures charged out of the mists of the valley behind the monstrosity. These creatures had the wings of an eagle, the head of a serpent, and the body of a lion. Every one of them carried a revolting aura of corruption!


    Mutated beasts. They were mutated beasts that had been affected by the Scourge Lord¡¯s Scourge Aura. They weren¡¯t of a very high grade individually. At best, they were First or Second Grade. However, there were so many that it was nearly impossible to kill them all.


    Judging by the number and strength of the mutated beasts swarming out of Inkdeep Valley, the Scourge Lords must have connected the spatial rift at the bottom of the valley to a ne that had been corrupted by the aura of disaster. All the mutated beasts of that nar world were now being herded into the World of Adepts.


    It was a typical move from the Scourge Lords!


    They first opened a spatial rift, then herded an endless stampede of disaster creatures into the world they were invading. Regardless of whether these disaster creatures lived or died, their existence would corrupt and destroy the narws around the spatial rift.


    Once the narws had been damaged to a certain degree, the Scourge Lords would then send their high-grade subordinates!


    The many-headed reptile, for instance, was barely a minor Scourge Lord. It was either the clone of a true Scourge Lord, or one of their high-grade subordinates. Regardless of which it was, its appearance was a cmity for the World of Adepts!


    Apart from the reptile, a many-armed giant and a colossal bone-fiend could be seen in the image projected by the parchment. These individuals demonstrated power at peak Fourth Grade, but their true forms were probably fearsome Fifth Grade creatures.


    The Adept¡¯s Association was pulling all out the stops to deal with these minor Scourge Lords.


    Greem could see as many as eighteen Fourth Grade adepts just from the projection. In addition to the adepts stationed in the towers behind and supporting from the backlines, the Adept¡¯s Association had at least invested two-thirds of their high-grade forces in this battle.


    Even so, the situation did not look good for them!


    The endless swarm of mutated beasts continued to emerge from Inkdeep Valley, storming and assaulting the adept towers and forces like a dark, moving cloud.


    The vicious battle extended from the skies to the ground and even all the way underground.


    It could be said that every piece ofnd within fifteen kilometers of Inkdeep Valley had been fully upied by the ck and red forms of the mutated beasts. The adept forces could only retreat to the side of the war towers, their backs against the elementium barriers as they fought against the endless army of mutated beasts.


    Lightning crackled around the war towers as bolt after bolt of thunder crashed down from the skies, turning the beasts into ashes and dust.


    It was still not enough to stop the tide of monsters.


    These mutated beasts could fly and even burrow underground. Ugly and vicious carapace or scales covered their bodies. Ordinary elementium spells below Second Grade could not kill them quickly. Only powerful spells of Second Grade and above could slightly stall their mad advance.


    The Adept Association¡¯s reserve of cannon fodder was quite plentiful indeed.


    Voodoo beast armies of strange shapes and sizes marched out of the towers- a rather brazen disy of the adepts¡¯ experimentations. They brandished their ws and rushed fearlessly at the mutated beasts.


    You could see voodoo beasts and mutated beasts tearing into each other everywhere on the battlefield!


    Due to the shocking numbers of mutated beasts and the three powerful minor Scourge Lords, the Adept¡¯s Association was unable to push the enemy back into Inkdeep Valley, even with all their might. Naturally, there was no way they could purify the aura of corruption either.


    The parchment projectionsted only five minutes, but the information revealed was enough to frighten anyone.


    Greem didn¡¯t know what the others thought about the situation. However, he knew that if the disaster creatures had chosen to invade the mega-rift instead, then the Central Lands would probably be swarmed with mutated beasts by now.


    Of course, entering through the mega-rift was a far more difficult task than doing so through Inkdeep Valley. To sustain the twisted and distorted forms of the Scourge Lords here would require at least several months of corruption.


    That was the main reason why the disaster creatures had chosen to invade Inkdeep Valley rather than the mega-rift of Ahlden!


    Once the projection ended, it quickly rolled itself back into a scroll with a thwack and returned to Andrew¡¯s hands.


    Greem frowned and said coldly, ¡°What¡¯s the Adept Association¡¯s intention in sending this to us? Do they want reinforcements? Hmph! Have they forgotten what they did in the Central Lands?¡±


    Andrew¡¯s face was pale, and he appeared distracted. It was obvious he was still bothered by the images they had just witnessed. Upon hearing Greem¡¯s question, he bowed and answered, ¡°The Association didn¡¯t just send this parchment. They also sent a Third Grade messenger. Should we grant him an audience, sir?¡±


    Andrew had witnessed two fights of rming proportion and power. Even with his Spirit as a Fourth Grade adept, it was all a little hard to digest.


    ¡°Call him over! I would love to hear what terms the Association can offer us,¡± It was no wonder Greem was so resentful. If not for the Adept Association¡¯s intervention, his unification of the Central Lands would not have been as risky or difficult.


    If he had not held the initiative every step of the way and grew faster than the enemy¡¯s expectations, all his hard work over the past hundred years would have been in vain.


    White light shed in the adept tower in the distance. A young male adept with a handsome face and an air of elegance flew toward Greem, d in white light.


    Even though he had already seen Greem¡¯s magnificent figure in the distance, he still felt a genuine sense of fear and awe when he approached Greem¡¯s gigantic face.


    Third Grade...his power of Third Grade, which he had always been so proud of, was nothing before this towering legendary fire adept.


    He had a feeling that all this man needed to do was move his finger, and he would be crushed to death as easily as an ant.


    This Third Grade young male adept hastily put his hand over his chest and bowed. He then said in a loud voice, ¡°Association Special Messenger Germaine pays his regards to the great Lord Greem!¡±


    The terms ¡®great¡¯ and ¡®respected¡¯ were not words that were easily used amongst adepts. ¡®Respected¡¯ was a term usually used for high-grade adepts, while ¡®great,¡¯ naturally, was only used for Great Adepts.


    It was an unspoken convention. No high-grade adept would break this convention to enjoy the reverence of a Great Adept as a Fourth Grade.


    ¡°Great?¡± Greem chided coldly, ¡°You are stirring up trouble for me!¡±


    The young male adept hurriedly exined, ¡°Lord Greem, please do not misunderstand! I have no means of putting you in a difficult position. I am only acting in ordance with the direct orders of Lord Domhnall. He said I was to treat you with the respect orded to a Great Adept when I met you.¡±


    ¡°Domhnall,¡± Greem smiled. ¡°What did he send you here to say?¡±


    ¡°Lord Domhnall said that all the unpleasantries of the past were simply a result of our misunderstandings. The Adept¡¯s Association will fully reimburse the losses incurred by Lord Greem.¡± This young Third Grade adept was an eloquent individual. He was able to adjust his attitude appropriately and put himself in a very humble position.


    ¡°Compensation...is not needed!¡± Greem said coldly. ¡°All I want is the Adept¡¯s Association to stop meddling with Central Land affairs. If you are here to apologize on behalf of the Association, you may leave now! You...are not qualified to give such an apology!¡±


    The expression on the adept¡¯s face froze, but he quickly put on a smile again.


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to make me leave so early, my lord. I still have some information here from Lord Domhnall to ry to you!¡±


    ¡°Speak!¡±


    ¡°That...I,¡± The young Adept Germaine looked around at Andrew and the demigod lich standing not far away. Finally, he gritted his teeth and said, ¡°Lord Domhnall said that he hopes that Lord Greem will be willing to help the Association through these difficult times, on ount of your past friendship......¡±


    ¡°Past friendship...haha! Lord Domhnall is quite the jester!¡± Greem almost couldn¡¯t help but startughing out loud.


    ¡°Lord Domhnall knows that he has wronged you in the past. As such, he instructed me to bring this to you,¡± Adept Germaine felt his heart pounding when he heard Greem¡¯s mockingughter. He took out a rectangr wooden box and respectfully presented it to Greem, sweating as he did so.


    First Cerveris and then Gloria. Greem had not forgotten these two gifts from the Association. The fact that they dared ask him for help after all that undoubtedly confused him.


    He was incredibly curious about what treasure Domhnall had produced to convince him to help them.

 Chapter 1398 - Strange Negotiations

    <strong>Chapter 1398 Strange Negotiations</strong>


    Greem waved the wooden box over toward him. He opened a corner of it and nced at its contents expressionlessly before putting the lid back on.


    Due to his forcefield, no one else could see the box¡¯s contents through the distorted space around him.


    Greem did not return the box to the young adept. Instead, he casually waved his hand and opened a spatial rift. He then put the box into a small fire dimension he had created. At Greem¡¯s level, ordinary storage equipment could no longer be used.


    Storage belts and rings were utterly unable to bear his fire principle powers. As such, he had to excavate small fire dimensions to store his more valuable possessions.


    As long as he wasn¡¯t in some unusual environment where space was distorted, these small dimensions marked with his brand could be opened and closed at any time. They were more convenient than ordinary storage equipment.


    ¡°This much will make me forget your transgressions in the past, at the very best. It isn¡¯t enough to talk about reinforcements. You stay here for the moment,¡± Greem thought for a moment and said solemnly, ¡°I still have some trivial matters to finish up here. Wait until the Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands have gathered together. I will discuss the matter of reinforcing the Association with them.¡±


    ¡°Lord Greem, forgive my impudence...but the Association cannot afford to wait any longer!¡± Adept Germaine pled anxiously, ¡°Even before I left the Adept¡¯s Association, Inkdeep Valley...was already on the verge of being overrun.¡±


    ¡°That can¡¯t be!¡± Andrew, who had been standing to the side, couldn¡¯t help but counter. ¡°The disaster creatures might be ferocious, but the Association has always been powerful. They should have no problem fending off the invasion for at least a few more months.¡±


    Adept Germaine put on a bitter smile when he heard this. He then said, ¡°That is supposed to be the case, but...but......¡±


    ¡°Is there something you are not supposed to say? I should tell you that these are the Central Lands, not the subordinate territory of your Association. We have no duty or obligation to help you defend against an otherworldly invasion. So, it¡¯s best if you tell us everything you haven¡¯t told us yet,¡± Andrew had an ugly expression on his face. His n was currently the one facing the most trouble in the Central Lands.


    If Greem were to actually redirect forces to the Association¡¯s aid, who was supposed to defend this mega-rift?


    If it had been a few days ago, he would have had the confidence to push back the invaders using the n¡¯s umtion of resources and power over the past few centuries. However, judging from the current situation, the invaders were all fearsome forces from ces like the Abyssal World and the World of Disasters. A mere Fourth Grade adept like himself could not repel such terrifying enemies in such numbers.


    That was why he would be the first to reject a proposition to reinforce the Association!


    Adept Germaine hesitated when he heard Andrew¡¯s question. In the end, he gritted his teeth and exined, ¡°I¡¯m not trying to hide anything...it¡¯s just that the situation there is not looking good.


    ¡°Our Association wouldn¡¯t be in such bad straits if there were only those three minor Scourge Lords. The problem is the appearance of a strange creature in the depths of Inkdeep Valley. It¡¯s not very powerful, but it has an unusually fearsome corruption ability. Up to this point, a third of the voodoo beasts we sent to the battlefield has been corrupted into mutated beasts by that creature.¡±


    ¡°Directly corrupting your voodoo beasts on the battlefield and turning them into mutated beasts?¡± Greem suddenly interrupted to ask.


    ¡°Yes, my lord! It is because of that monster causing trouble that the situation has turned so terrible. If...if we cannot exterminate this monster within ten days, the Association will probably have to abandon Inkdeep Valley and retreat to headquarters to defend our core territories,¡± Adept Germaine¡¯s fear was written all over his face. It was obvious that the monster had left a horrifying impression on him.


    ¡°The only ones that could possibly do such a thing are principle creatures,¡± Greem nodded and said, ¡°Without simr principle powers to push back against it, ordinary creatures will be corrupted incredibly easily. Now I know why Domhnall sent you for me. He must be intending to borrow my principle powers!¡±


    ¡°Well said, my lord. That is indeed the case!¡± Adept Germaine no longer concealed the truth now that Greem had managed to figure it out anyway. He nodded and acknowledged Greem¡¯s conjecture, ¡°Lord Domhnall also said that if you, my lord, were willing to help personally, the Association would¡ª¡±


    Adept Germaine¡¯s voice suddenly vanished at this point as he switched to magical voice transmission. It appeared as if he was promising some generous terms to Greem.


    A short momentter, Adept Germaine returned alone to the Ahlden n¡¯s adept tower, leaving Greem, Kanganas, and Andrew beside the mega-rift.


    Kanganas might not be a native of the World of Adepts, but after some studying, he had gained a basic understanding of the Continent of Adepts.


    Upon seeing the Association adept leave, he was the first to ask in a shady voice, ¡°From what I know, your rtionship in the Adept¡¯s Association is not very good. I wonder; what exactly did they give you to change your mind? You could keep defending the Central Lands and watch havoc break out in their territories. Wouldn¡¯t that be a better idea?¡±


    ¡°Origin substance......two-thousand siths of origin substance!¡± Greem replied calmly.


    ¡°Two-thousand siths of origin substance...hm, quite the generous gift indeed! That said,¡± A trace of disbelief appeared on Kanganas¡¯ smooth crystalline skull, ¡°If you are iming that you agreed to help them over some origin substance, then I will be the first to doubt that! They are your enemies. If they were to be severely weakened during this invasion, I am sure that would be morepatible with the Central Lands¡¯ interests!¡±


    Andrew did not say anything, but judging from his expression, he agreed with the demigod lich¡¯s view.


    The Adept¡¯s Association was simply too powerful- so powerful that they could fight against the rest of the organizations of the Continent of Adepts alone.


    If it were possible to make them suffer losses due to the disaster creature invasion, then the Silver Union, Northern Witches, and the Central Lands would all be happy to see it happen.


    Greem chuckled and said, ¡°If this wasn¡¯t a magic surge, but just an ordinary invasion, I would be happy to watch from the sidelines. However, given that the magic surge is ongoing, it will be challenging to banish the Scourge Lords once they¡¯ve established a foothold in the World of Adepts. As a member of our world, I must naturally obey the call of our nar consciousness and repel the invaders!¡±


    Greem suddenly changed the tune of the discussion to one of obligation. There was nothing Kanganas or Andrew could say to that. However, judging by how the lich was sneering, he didn¡¯t believe a single word of what Greem had just said!


    Greem wasn¡¯t bothered. He secretly whispered a few words to the lich with magic.


    ¡°Now, that¡¯s right! That¡¯s appropriate for people of our stature. I knew you were nning something behind the scenes...kehkehkeh! Now I can rest easy.¡± The crimson soulfire in Kanganas¡¯ eye sockets pulsed as he said excitedly, ¡°Leave the task of rying the information to me. I will make sure to get this news to that ¡®esteemed person¡¯ as quickly as possible. Kehkehkeh......¡±


    Andrew was drawing a nk. He had no idea what the two of them were talking about. However, he was sure that any individual being plotted against by a principle adept and a demigod lich was an unfortunate individual. No, an extremely...horribly...terribly unfortunate individual!


    ¡°Andrew, don¡¯t just stand around. Go tell all the Fourth Grades of the Central Lands toe here for a meeting. Two days is the limit. Anyone who doesn¡¯t arrive in two days will have to bear the consequences!¡± Greem said nothing more after giving his orders. He shut his eyes and silently started recovering the strength he had lost in the battle earlier.


    At his current level, he would be able to recover by exhausting energy, no matter what damage he sustained. If there were wounds on his body that could not be healed, it would mean that he was nearing his limits.


    The mysterious enemy from earlier had clearly been a powerful principle adept. Compared to him, Greem¡¯s application of the principle powers was akin to that of a toddler. They were not even remotely on the same level.


    If it weren¡¯t for the Chip¡¯s extraordinary calction abilities, Greem would not have qualified to drag the battle into one of attrition. After the mysterious fight, most of the nar feedback Greem had obtained by repelling the Abyssal invasion had been consumed by nar bacsh.


    That said, even though his losses were great, Greem didn¡¯te out of the battle empty-handed.


    At the very least, he now understood the basic concept of principle battles.


    He still would not be able to defeat the principle adept¡¯s clone if they met again. However, if hebined with his starbeast bloodline, there was the slightest possibility Greem would be able to kill the clone.


    Now, it was just a question of whether that adept would be foolish enough to try the same thing again!


    ............


    The Ahlden n tower.


    Adept Germaine was maintainingmunication with headquarters through a magical mirror in a room.


    Domhnall¡¯s elderly face appeared in the crystal.


    ¡°How did it go? Did Greem agree to act?¡±


    ¡°My lord, he has yet to promise anything other than gathering the Fourth Grades of the Central Lands for a discussion,¡± Adept Germaine looked dejected.


    ¡°Hmph! What¡¯s there to be disappointed about? The fact that he would even react so favorably is already beyond our expectations. Isn¡¯t he gathering the Fourth Grade adepts? You must make contact with all the Fourth Grade adepts before the meeting. Make any promises you must. Do it well, Germaine. I have already authorized the use of all our hidden resource sites for you. Do not hesitate to offer any resources or materials to the Fourth Grade adepts if it means being able to convince any of them.


    ¡°Remember; at any cost, by any means necessary!¡±

 Chapter 1399 - Secret Discussions

    <strong>Chapter 1399 Secret Discussions</strong>


    Greem was now the ruler of the Central Lands in name and in truth.


    Every Fourth Grade adept of the Central Lands had gathered at the Ahlden n¡¯s adept tower awaiting his audience, just a single day after his order.


    Even Ashton, who had been engaged in a bloody battle on a lesser ne, had hurried over. He had teleported twice through the arrays before arriving at the mega-rift. Thus, it wasn¡¯t hard to see that Greem¡¯s terrifying might had left an indelible impression on the Central Lands¡¯ adepts.


    Everyone had been busy with defending their territories and lesser nes after the magic surge erupted; they hardly had time to have a gathering like this one. Thus, everyone took the opportunity as best they could. The first few adepts who arrived had a small meeting of their own and exchanged what information they had.


    Truly, it was nice being able to enjoy the shade of a big tree!


    The appearance of a powerhouse like Greem in the Central Lands had, to some extent, started to change themonce and stubborn perception of Central adepts as weaklings. Greem¡¯s shout toward the world had directly affected the Central Lands¡¯ current political and military situation.


    Greem had managed to beat back the abyssal invasion alone and had sealed the mega-rift once again. He then intimidated the magical creature rulers of ck Forest, causing the more powerful magical creatures to avoid thest few stampedes.


    Even though the stampedes still caused terrible disasters and chaos in the various territories, the situation was much more contained. Without the powerful magical creatures to strengthen their ranks, the stampedes remained as disasters and did not escte to a cmity level!


    The three regions to the south and the five to the north had all endured stampedes of varying severity. Overall, everything remained within a manageable range.


    This situation was already far better than everyone¡¯s expectations!


    Gradually, the adepts became less opposed to Greem¡¯s dominant position.


    The World of Adepts was a spellcaster civilization that respected power and worshipped those who wielded it. The many Central adepts were too used to being kings of their own hills in the past. They had forgotten the heart that pulsed at the center of the adept civilization.


    In the face of such a dominant and powerful fire adept, they could only adapt and obey. They did not have the power to rebel at all. That much was obvious enough to the adepts after all the blood that Greem had shed.


    The Central Lands had remained the same way for far too long. The political situation was outdated, inflexible, and utterly ipatible with the needs of the current times. This magic surge was both a test for the adepts as well as an excellent opportunity to shuffle the deck.


    The adept ns that could not adapt would slowly decline, while new ns would gain new life from these declining ns¡¯ remains. Meanwhile, the n that would oversee this change of power would undoubtedly be the most powerful Crimson n.


    As Greem forged one miracle after another, won glory after glory, the adepts finally became able to affirm his rule. Naturally, that also meant epting the dominant status of the Crimson n.


    Consequently, with a single order from Greem, they all hurried here without hesitation, despite all the difficulties and conflict that their ns were still engaged in.


    The other ns were doing quite well. Only the two lesser nes under Ashton had run into trouble. The first ne was experiencing rebellion from the local natives, while otherworldly creatures had invaded the second. The two problems gave him a headache, and he had no choice but to hurry over to those nes personally.


    Having received a notification for the meeting while in one of the lesser nes, Ashton could only reluctantly hand overmand to his aide, as unwilling as he was. He then returned to the n with an internar teleportation array before using the public teleportationwork to reach the Ahlden n¡¯s adept tower.


    The bitter battle in the lesser nes, along with the turbulence of long-distance teleportation, gave Ashton a headache when he arrived.


    Fortunately, his formidable Spirit as a Fourth Grade adept allowed him to recover quickly and solemnly march out of the array.


    Adepts of the Ahlden n were already waiting here. They bowed and paid their respects to him.


    ¡°Have they all arrived? Ker as well?¡± Ashton asked once he had emerged from the teleportation array.


    He was well-acquainted with Ker. Naturally, she was the first person he wanted to see to ask about this gathering¡¯s purpose.


    ¡°All the Fourth Grade adepts have arrived, my lord. You are thest one!¡± A middle-aged adept with a sickly yellow face walked over and exined the situation in a soft voice.


    Those bastards...always loved to oppose this and that, yet now they are so quick to scurry over when a meeting is called. Hmph!


    Ashton cursed in his mind and prepared to go look for Adept Ker.


    Before he could leave the teleportation hall, a handsome young male adept wearing the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s emblem stopped him in his path.


    ¡°Please wait a moment, Lord Ashton!¡±


    A Third Grade adept of the Association? Why is such a fellow in Andrew¡¯s tower?


    Ashton stopped in his tracks, several questions in his mind as he coldly evaluated the adept.


    The Adept¡¯s Association had behaved far too oppressively and unreasonably all this while. Their rtionship with the Central adepts wasn¡¯t exactly genial.


    ¡°My lord, please give us a moment to talk,¡± The young adept guided Ashton out of the teleportation hall and down two corridors. They stopped in a quiet corner as the adept finally introduced himself, ¡°My name is Germaine, from the Adept¡¯s Association. Lord Domhnall¡¯s sends his greetings to you!¡±


    ¡°Domhnall,¡± Ashton brooded in silence before saying, ¡°What did he send you here for?¡±


    He knew that Domhnall was one of the most influential decision-makers of the Adept¡¯s Association. His identity was rather unique. In fact, he was quite likely to be the clone of a Great Adept. Ashton naturally knew bits and pieces of this secret.


    ¡°Since my lord has only just arrived, you might not know this. The reason Lord Greem has summoned you all for a meeting is to send reinforcements to the Adept¡¯s Association,¡± Germaine smiled as he exined.


    ¡°Reinforce the Association? Are you pulling my leg?¡± Ashton¡¯s eyes opened wide. ¡°The Association is so powerful. What could they possibly need the help of the Central Lands for?¡±


    Adept Germaine sighed in his mind. He could only softly exin what had happened in Inkdeep Valley, again. In all honesty, he had repeated the same words over a dozen times in just this one day alone.


    Inkdeep Valley...invasion of the disaster creatures...mutated beasts stampede...the copse of the defensive line......


    A schadenfreude smile appeared on Ashton¡¯s face as he listened to the adept¡¯s exnation. The wars in the two lesser nes had run him ragged for the past few months so much that he had no time to deal with any matters beyond the n.


    Now, it seemed like the Adept¡¯s Association was having its fair share of trouble.


    For some reason, all the Central adepts had the same smirk on their faces when they heard news of the Adept¡¯s Association predicament. Adept Germaine was already used to it by now!


    ¡°Lord Ashton, the Association badly requires the aid of the Central Lands at this moment. If you could push for reinforcements during the meeting, then the Association will be willing......¡± At this point, Adept Germaine¡¯s voice turned quiet as he switched to using magical messages tomunicate.


    The two of them then started some intense negotiations in seclusion.


    After fifteen minutes, they had yet toe to an agreement. Germaine appeared to be hesitating as if he couldn¡¯t decide on something.


    Ashton¡¯s expression suddenly changed. He seemed to be listening to something. Then, he chuckled and asked, ¡°Have you not decided yet? Ker has informed me that the meeting is about to begin. Miss this opportunity, and I won¡¯t agree to any of your terms again.¡±


    ¡°Very well, then it is as you desire!¡± Adept Germaine gritted his teeth and said, ¡°I will order that thing you want and have it sent to your n. We will be relying on my lord in the meetingter then!¡±


    Ashton nodded in satisfaction.


    Ever since the magic surge erupted, this negotiation was the only thing that made him feel any joy or happiness. Though the situation in the lesser nes had yet to be resolved, being able to get his hands on such an item was enough rpense to brighten his mood.


    ............


    The Central adepts met at the mega-rift.


    Greem had created a cloud of fire and kept it hovering in front of his chest, saving everyone the trouble of shouting back and forth.


    Mary and the others had also been summoned back from their demon-hunting mission.


    In just half a month, Mary had captured the marilith and imprisoned it in the Versailles. The high-grade me fiend was killed by adepts and disassembled into a bunch of materials.


    The surviving quasit managed to flee into the ck Forest. Hunting it was a far more troublesome task now.


    That said, the Central Lands had finally managed to obtain some semnce of peace.


    Once they had secured this mega-rift, the magic surge¡¯s first wave would be over for the Central Lands.


    Though the other Fourth Grade adept ns were still a mess, there were no terrible situations where kingdoms or territories were overrun.


    That was already incredibly fortunate!


    Naturally, at the center of all this and responsible for such an achievement was the legendary fire adept.


    Greem called everyone toe closer. He then looked around and said calmly, ¡°The reason for today¡¯s meeting is to decide on a rather important matter. Andrew, call Germaine over and have him exin the situation again!¡±


    Soon, Germaine hurried over and described the purpose of his visit in detail, as if he had never discussed the issue with the many adepts.


    Finally, Andrew took out the parchment and reyed the projection within.


    Everyone was horrified!


    Honestly, having secret discussions and agreeing to terms in the safety of a room was one matter, while witnessing the carnage on the battlefield was a whole different matter. All the adepts couldn¡¯t help but start wavering in their decision.


    The battle there seemed to have exceeded the realm of an ordinary nar invasion!

 Chapter 1400 - An Unexpected Decision

    Chapter 1400 An Unexpected Decision


    The Central adepts weren¡¯t fools.


    They could see that the battle at Inkdeep Valley had transcended the scope of an ordinary nar invasion. It was slowly sliding in scale toward a principle war.


    The biggest difference between a principle war and a nar war was that a principle war was more direct and devastating.


    An internar war might concern incredible benefits, resources, poption, and knowledge, but a principle war was a pure battle between factions.


    The adept civilization was seen as one of the sources of evil in the multiverse along with the disaster creatures, abyssal creatures, underground creatures, and undead creatures. However, at their core, the adepts and the disaster creatures were two fundamentally distinct factions.


    The adepts and the undead were representations ofwful evil. They did not have reservations in what they did in pursuit of their ultimate goals. However, they obeyed strict ssifications and hierarchy amongst themselves. When there wasn¡¯t a conflict of interest, the more powerful would have an obligation to shelter and protect the weaker adepts, while inferior adepts were required to obey the will of superior adepts.


    The disaster creatures and the abyssal creatures, on the other hand, were ssic examples of chaotic evil. Superiors held absolute authority over those weaker than them, and the weak had no individual rights to speak off. It was a simple, bare rtionship of a tyrant and their subjects.


    Moreover, chaotic evil beings did not behave in any predictable fashion. Sometimes, even they did not know what their next action would be.


    At the very least, the adepts upheld basic principles such as ¡®fair trade¡¯ and ¡®equivalent exchange.¡¯ Abyssal demons and Scourge Lords believed only in the barbaricw of power. Whoever was strongest could take everything with them. They refused to engage in any negotiations or agreements.


    ughter and raiding were the only things on their minds!


    There was no hope of any negotiation or mutual agreement when the Abyssal World invaded nar worlds. They didn¡¯t care about how much territory they had conquered, nor what plentiful resources they could excavate from thend they had taken. Their only purpose in risking their lives to invade other worlds was to kill and pige.


    They would kill everything that could die and take everything that could be taken with them!


    Everything from lives to souls- they would take it all.


    They would take and take until thend had been reduced to a wondend of death where even the nar origin was gone. Eventually, the broken ne would be dragged back to the Abyssal World and converted into part of its vast territories.


    The Scourge Lords were not too different from the abyssal demons.


    They liked invading one nar world after the other, using their powerful and evil willpower to corrupt the nar origin and create a newnd belonging to them. Corrupted nar origins would lose all control over their nar world. The world would start corrupting all living beings within it into horrifying mutated beasts.


    Through this method, the Scourge Lords would create new sources of military power!


    They would herd these newly gained subordinates to evenrger nar worlds, endlessly expanding their reign of chaos like a growing snowball.


    Thus, the Scourge Lords¡¯ invasion of the World of Adepts was ultimately a conflict between the principles of chaos and order!


    Individually-powerful adepts might choose to collude with certain Scourge Lords in hopes of obtaining bountiful benefits. However, in the face of this sh of alignments, neither side could or would back down. The only thing left was to muscle through and see who was superior in strength.


    Even though the Central adepts weren¡¯t passionate about helping the Adept¡¯s Association, they could not resist the World of Adept¡¯s consciousness¡¯ intense hatred and anger toward the disaster creatures.


    Influenced by the nar consciousness, every single adept held endless hatred toward disaster creatures. In addition to the promise of rewards by the Association, eight of the thirteen Fourth Grade Central adepts supported reinforcements.


    Andrew, Mirva, M, Ashton, and Roderick were the ones who strongly opposed the idea.


    At a single nce, everyone who objected was facing trouble within their own ns.


    Andrew had a giant spatial rift in his territory. He would remain anxious for the remainder of the magic surge, never daring to let down his guard.


    Mirva wasn¡¯t in a much better position either. His Annemdor Academy was currently engaged with the Underground World. The evil creatures that hid in the darkness underground had been affected by the magic surge and were trying to get to the surface to raid for resources.


    Annemdor Academy, which sealed off their path to the surface world, became their primary target of attack.


    It was said that the two parties had already fought two or three times, with losses on both sides. However, Annemdor Academy had ultimately managed to keep the underground creatures contained with the magical facilities and endless traps they hadid down in the past couple hundred years.


    However, no one knew how much longer Annemdor Academy would be able to hold back the entirety of the Underground World with their power.


    Meanwhile, M, Ashton, and Roderick were all unfortunate individuals facing severe stampedes and otherworldly invasion in their territories. Until they had extinguished the fires burning in their own backyards, they were unwilling to invest forces in Inkdeep Valley.


    Invasion of disaster creatures? Let them in?


    At any rate, the Adept¡¯s Association was holding them back. As scary as the Scourge Lords were, they could not possibly cross tens of thousands of kilometers to arrive at the Central Lands to create chaos.


    It was due to such sinister thinking that they all made the choice that best benefitted them.


    Eight of the thirteen Fourth Grade adepts had chosen to join the fray, while five objected. The decision now rested in Greem and Mary¡¯s hands.


    As the leaders of the Central adepts and the most powerful individuals here, their decisions were the only ones that could represent the Central Lands.


    Greem¡¯s eyes swept past the adepts one by one. A mysterious smile appeared on his face. He knew that almost half of the eight adepts that supported reinforcing the Adept¡¯s Association didn¡¯t believe in that course of action.


    They did not actually want to help the Adept¡¯s Association. Instead, they believed themselves to know Greem well enough that they were sure he would never agree to the Association¡¯s terms. That was why they had so boldly supported the proposition, as they wouldn¡¯t actually have to engage in battle if Greem simply rejected the idea.


    By doing so, they could earn favor from the Adept¡¯s Association while keeping themselves removed from the situation!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a chuckle. His expression then turned solemn as he said, ¡°With consideration to the development of the World of Adepts, letting the disaster creatures invade freely is clearly going against the benefit of the adept civilization. Thus, I¡¯ve decided...to reinforce the Adept¡¯s Association!¡±


    It was almost as if a giant bomb had been thrown down a chilling abyss. The expressions of all the adepts changed almost instantly.


    ¡°Since the majority of people here are in support of this motion, I will now assign your missions.


    ¡°The mega-rift must be defended. While I lead a sortie to the Association, Mary and Andrew will stay behind and be responsible for the rift¡¯s stability.


    ¡°Mirva, I don¡¯t care what you do, but do not allow any underground creatures to the surface while we are out at the Association.¡±


    ¡°Understood! I will defend the entrance with all I have!¡± Mirva hastily wiped off the sweat on his forehead. He was d he didn¡¯t choose to support the proposition just because of the benefits offered by the Association.


    Annemdor Academy¡¯s situation in recent times was not looking good. The underground creatures were assaulting the entrance as if they had all gone mad. If he, the leader, were to be assigned to the east, the academy would probably no longer be able to suppress those creatures of the darkness.


    ¡°M, Ashton, and Roderick; remain in your n territories and fend off the stampedes. Do not allow them to break through the defensive lines and ravage the Central Lands, no matter what.¡±


    ¡°Understood! Understood! Understood!¡± The three of them nodded, sweating just as profusely as Mirva.


    ¡°Mornashen Gaia, you might have chosen to join the battle, but the Central Landsck a powerhouse to defend them. You will be responsible for the security of the Central Lands while I¡¯m gone. I will have Meryl and Emelia work with you!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡± The leader of the Gaia n stepped forward and nodded in acknowledgment.


    ¡°As for the rest of you,¡± Greem looked at all the adepts once again and said, ¡°Since you¡¯re all so passionate, you will be going to war with me!¡±


    The adepts looked at each other and could only nod and acknowledge the orders.


    The weaker ones, including Matthew and Nics, had bitter expressions on their faces as if they had just swallowed something nasty. The resentment and anger in them boiled so hard it felt like it was searing their souls.


    If they¡¯d had another chance, they would never throw themselves into this terrifying sh of factions just for some ¡®insignificant benefits¡¯ promised to them.


    Goddamn...that Germaine bastard! He put them in such a terrible position!


    Wait, didn¡¯t Greem have a grudge with the Adept¡¯s Association? Why would he agree to a request for aid? Could there be something they didn¡¯t know?


    ¡°Everyone prepare. We will set out tomorrow! You may all leave now.¡±


    The Central adepts bowed and returned to their towers upon hearing this. Judging from the bitter looks of resentment on their faces, it was obvious that all of them couldn¡¯t wait to show that damned Adept Germaine some hearty ¡®hospitality.¡¯


    As for the few other adepts who were sharper than their peers? They couldn¡¯t help but be curious about Greem¡¯s decision. They gathered together once the meeting was over and repeatedly discussed the meaning behind Greem¡¯s actions.


    Was Greem an idiot?


    If Greem were an idiot, then that would make them-the Central adepts he defeated-absolute donkey brains worse than an idiot.


    Did the Adept¡¯s Association promise incredible rpense?


    If Greem had not gone mad, then he wouldn¡¯t have given up on this opportunity to weaken the Adept¡¯s Association just for some insignificant material benefits.


    What did wealth count for in the face of greater influence? Even if the Adept¡¯s Association offered mountains of magical crystals, treasures, and resources, it could notpare to the benefit of watching it lose its military power! After all, that would be a historic chance for the other major organizations to fill the power vacuum!


    No matter how they analyzed the situation, they could not find a reason that would be enough to move Greem to help the Adept¡¯s Association!


    What were his motivations? The Central adepts could not help but agonize over the issue.

 Chapter 1401 - Forceful Teleportation

    Chapter 1401 Forceful Teleportation


    Sending ordinary adepts would not be helpful at all when it came to reinforcing the Adept¡¯s Association!


    Given the Adept Association¡¯s might, there was no way itcked in low-level military power. The only thing they could possiblyck were top-levelbat forces.


    That was why the Central adepts chose to mobilize only seven Fourth Grade adepts this time, led by Greem. Both Mornashen Gaia and Mary stayed behind in the Central Lands.


    The Central Lands were hundreds of thousands of kilometers away from the eastern end of the continent. It would take the adepts more than a month to arrive if they traveled by flying ships. However, if a few high-grade adepts were the only ones traveling, then long-ranged teleportation arrays were their best option.


    However, the only problem was Greem currently being stuck in his thousand-meter form. Teleporting him over to the Adept¡¯s Association posed a tremendous challenge for the Association¡¯s array masters.


    Numerous array masters worked hard for over a dozen hours beneath the mega-rift. Finally, they were able to put together a massive teleportation array spanning nearly a hundred meters in diameter.


    After repeatedly checking the teleportation array and confirming there were no errors, the array masters finally started drawing energy from the adept tower¡¯s energy room to power the array. As the intensity of the light continued to increase, the entire area was filled with blinding white light, making it hard to see anything at all.


    !


    The sound of space being torn apart could be heard as the newly-sealed entrance of the mega-rift started to twist and distort. It then gradually grew in size.


    After some tinkering by the array masters, the mega-rift was no longer connected to the Abyssal World, but to the teleportation arrays on the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s side.


    The Third Grade array master in charge of assembling the teleportation array was sweating all over from his workload. However, no matter how much the array masters overloaded the array, they could not make the spatial rift grow anyrger than this.


    At this point, the mega-rift was only three hundred meters tall and five meters wide. It was impossible to fit Greem¡¯s gigantic body through such a tiny opening.


    Greem was getting a little impatient after waiting around a while.


    ¡°Back down, you all. Leave the rest of the work to me!¡±


    Greem walked up to the mega-rift with heavy steps. He then let out a furious cry and gathered fire principle power upon his palms. When both his palms were coated in ayer of golden light, he thrust them into the mega-rift and grabbed the spatial distortion at its edges. He then pulled it apart with all his strength.


    !


    Yet another loud ripping sound could be heard as Greem widened the mega-rift from three hundred meters to five hundred meters tall. It was now eight meters wide as well.


    Violent spacestorms blew out of the mega-rift, sting against Greem¡¯s mighty body and causing sparks to fly everywhere.


    However, this wasn¡¯t enough yet.


    The Heart of Principles in Greem¡¯s body, now 4% modified, throbbed violently. An incredibly pure surge of fire principle power rushed throughout his body and activated every single bit of fire energy within him.


    Aaaaaah!


    Greem let out a prolonged cry, his muscles bulging as he increased his strength and tore at the rift even more ferociously than before. He couldn¡¯t care less that his palms were being cut open by the mega-rift.


    ¡°Retreat! Retreat! Retreat!¡±


    Greem¡¯s actions terrified the low-grade adepts around him. In their understanding, it was impossible to touch a spatial rift with a body of flesh and blood. The horrifying sharpness of spatial energy was not something that nar creatures could hope to resist.


    Yet, this legendary fire adept was actually forcing the mega-rift apart simply because he was getting impatient. They were scared out of their minds to witness what was happening.


    Greem was protected by his fire principle as well as his two divine artifacts; he wasn¡¯t afraid of the spatial rift. However, the low-grade adepts didn¡¯t even dare think about touching these spatial fragments.


    When Greem forced open the mega-rift with raw strength, spatial fragments were sent scattering in every direction. Spacestorms also managed to slip in through the opening. All the low-grade adepts hastily escaped back to the adept tower.


    Meanwhile, Ker, Den, and the other adepts put up elementium barriers and shielded themselves from the spatial fragments. Seeing Greem rip open the mega-rift with his giant size was like watching two colossal beasts battling against each other.


    Their eyebrows jumped over and over, the muscles in their faces as taut as drawn wires as they muttered to themselves in their minds, ¡°Monsters...monsters......there are only monsters around these days!¡±


    After two bouts, Greem was finally able to tear the rift open enough for him to barely pass through. Greem didn¡¯t dare waste any more time. He shouted, ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡± He then immediately dove headfirst into the spacestorms.


    ¡°Let us go as well!¡± Ker and the others looked at each other, bitter smiles all over their faces.


    After what Greem had just done, the teleportation this time was doomed to be much more turbulent than what they were used to. All the Central adepts heading for war could only cast extrayers of defenses and shields before reluctantly diving in after Greem.


    ............


    The east of the continent, sixty-five kilometers north of Inkddep Valley.


    Ka, ka, ka!


    The teleportation array that had been constructed on this empty area started to glow with a bright white light. Dark spatial distortions started to appear and extend outward.


    ¡°It¡¯s starting up...it¡¯s starting. Someone¡¯s trying toe over from the other side! Watch out for the stability of the array! Sim, increase the intensity of the defensive arrays!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    A series of orders were quickly given out. The many Association adepts in charge of maintaining this teleportation array got to work, helping toplete the teleportation as best as they could.


    What they had never expected was a giant teleporting over from the other side. The spatial rift they had opened wasn¡¯t even enough for the other party to travel through. An earthshaking ripping sound could be heard as the spatial rift was forcefully torn apart. A thousand-meter-tall giant glowing with golden light emerged with difficulty.


    ¡°How is he so big?¡± The Association adept in charge of this teleportation array stared on with a cked jaw. He then abruptly let out a scream, ¡°Hurry! Everybody return to the war tower...the array is about to blow!¡±


    The next second, the dozen Association adepts scurried into the war tower in the distance like injured rabbits. Just as an elementium barrier was erected around the war tower, the teleportation array that had been pushed to its limits exploded.


    ¡°Gah...Light of Principle!¡± Greem let out a deafening cry as a radiant red light appeared around him, pushing back against the cutting spatial fragments. He then slowly walked out of the shattered space, one step at a time.


    The seven Fourth Grade adepts that had traveled with Greem emerged from the cloud of dust,pletely worn out and exhausted. You could even see fine cuts from spatial fragments on some of their bodies.


    However, they were Fourth Grade adepts, after all. A little spatial turbulence wasn¡¯t enough to kill them!


    All themotion naturally attracted the attention of some high-grade Association adepts.


    One of Greem¡¯s acquaintances arrived from the direction of the battlefield, flocked by several subordinates. He stopped in the air above the ravaged teleportation array.


    ¡°How...how did you get so big!?¡± The acquaintance was dressed in a white robe, his entire body glowing with a gentle, milky-white light. It was the light elementium user, Geraldine.


    Greem slowly moved his limbs and inspected his body. After confirming that there were no injuries, he was finally able to rx. He stood up straight, his body almost disappearing into the clouds. Even where Geraldine was hovering in the air only reached his calf.


    ¡°Oh, it¡¯s Geraldine! I¡¯m here to reinforce the Adept¡¯s Association. What is it? Am I not wee?¡± Greem bent down and said, his rolling thunder of a voice almost causing Geraldine to go deaf.


    ¡°Of course, I know you are here to help. But...but why did you turn yourself so big that even our teleportation array was blown apart?¡± Geraldine had a look of disbelief on his face.


    He had met Greem before this. Naturally, he knew how powerful he had been. It had barely been a dozen years since then, and yet, Greem¡¯s power had improved exponentially. It was so much so that even he had to look up at Greem now.


    The tremendous difference was hard to get used to!


    ¡°No need to ask so many questions. Best tell me about the situation over at Inkdeep Valley instead! Also, has the Silver Union and the Northern Lands sent anyone? You couldn¡¯t have managed to swindle only the Central Lands, could you?¡±


    ¡°How could you call this a swindle?¡± Geraldine let out a forced chuckle. ¡°We are all part of the adept civilization. It¡¯s only natural that we should all shoulder an equal share of the burden.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! If it wasn¡¯t for the nar feedback, do you think I would be here? Tell me, who have they sent?¡±


    Geraldine¡¯s expression froze, then turned into a bitter smile, ¡°The Silver Union sent quite a few people, but there are only three Fourth Grade adepts, led by Vice-Senate Head Melone! The Northern Lands sent five witches, including the ultra-powerhouse Khesuna, who I believe you are familiar with. Look, speak of the devil- they¡¯re here!¡±


    Greem was incrediblyrge. Naturally, he could see further and clearer than everyone else.


    Perhaps sensing his presence, a dark shadow flew over from a distance, quickly approaching him.


    At the front of the group was a vicious and fearsome corpse dragon. Five witches stood upon its broad back. Naturally, at the front was Death Witch Leader Khesuna.


    ¡°Greem, I didn¡¯t expect you to be here! Could it be...have you already advanced?¡± The other adepts did not have as sharp senses, but Khesuna was quite sensitive to principle powers as an ultra-powerhouse.


    That was why she could sense the overwhelming fire principle power in Greem¡¯s body when she approached, causing her to be quite befuddled.


    ¡°Advance? Still too early for that, I¡¯d say!¡± Greem chuckled and said, ¡°Lady Khesuna, I didn¡¯t think you guys would arrive faster than us. So, what¡¯s the situation over at Inkdeep Valley like?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s good that you haven¡¯t advanced,¡± Khesuna felt a mysterious sense of relief when she heard this. However, she quickly realized the inappropriateness of what she had just said. Sheughed forcefully to cover for it. ¡°I was simply worried that you would have loose foundations, having only been at Fourth Grade for such a short time. It¡¯s best to spend some time to properly digest and let it all sink in!¡±


    Greem smiled but said nothing more.

 Chapter 1402 - First Foray into Battle

    <h4>Chapter 1402 First Foray into Battle</h4>


    The Northern Lands only sent five witches.


    In addition to Death Witch Leader Khesuna, the rest were also familiar faces.


    Felmyst, Fourth Grade death witch, an undead summoner.


    Angelina, Fourth Grade Deceit Witch leader, unknown specialization.


    Tysha, Fourth Grade Pale Witch, unknown specialization.


    Greem also saw Dark Witch Leader Circe at the tail of the group. She had cloaked herself in a thin veil of darkness, but given the current difference in their power, Greem was utterly able to see her face through the shadows.


    Sensing that the veil had lost its purpose, Circe simply waved her hand and dispelled the darkness, revealing her appearance to everyone else.


    She was a slender and beautiful woman. Theck of exposure to sunlight, however, made her skin pale and unhealthy. All sorts of strange, curling ck patterns covered her skin. These patterns asionally gave off traces of dark energy.


    She wore neat, skintight leather armor. Two curved daggers were sheathed at her waist, their des so dark and unreflective that it was impossible to tell what kind of metal they were made of.


    Greem took another look. With the prative power of the principles, he was able to pick up on the more unusual traits of Circe¡¯s body. Even a Fourth Grade Dark Witch was practically exposed before his eyes.


    Apart from a few key organs that were still shrouded in deep darkness, Greem could see the rest of her body. The pration of principle powers was not something that could be stopped by enchanted equipment, energy defenses, or simple clothes.


    Only magic-energy that contained the principles of darkness could hope to stop Greem¡¯s principle infiltration!


    However, it was apparent that the advanced Fourth Grade Dark Witch leader did not possess such advanced applications of thews and principles; she could hold no secrets in front of Greem.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s target of focus, Khesuna stomped her feet. A pale mist of death spread outward, cutting off his gaze.


    ¡°The things of the past are in the past. Given your current power, I believe there¡¯s no need for you to bully those weaker than you, is there? Not to mention, you would not have achieved your current power without the Orb of the Fire God. To some extent, you should, in fact, be thanking a ¡®certain someone¡¯!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but break outughing at Khesuna¡¯s reasoning.


    ¡°Bullying those weaker than me? She¡¯s older than me, isn¡¯t she? My senior, if you will. Hardly bullying. If it weren¡¯t out of respect for you, I wouldn¡¯t let this slide so easily. However, since you¡¯ve spoken, I will......¡±


    Having said that, Greem let out a grunt. mes erupted on Circe¡¯s right arm and zed furiously.


    Circe cried out in surprise and started waving her arms. Large surges of shadow energy surged into the mes, but they could not extinguish the fire. On the contrary, they made the fire burn even stronger, as if she had poured fuel onto the mes.


    The crackling sound of the fire was apanied by the smell of burnt flesh!


    Circe was quite the vicious woman indeed. After a few failed attempts to put out the fire, she immediately pulled out her dagger and cut off the burning flesh. Arge chunk of meat flew off, along with the mes burning on them, exposing a bloody wound and a tiny bit of white bone.


    Horrifyingly, a soft red glow gathered around her injury, and a new fire ignited.


    This time, the mes burned her bone directly!


    The other witches around her started casting spells or using wands. All sorts of colorful magded on the mes.


    Suppressed by the witches, the principle fire finally started growing smaller.


    However, when it became the size of a candle me, it did not budge any further. Regardless of how the witches attacked the fire withw powers, engulfed it with ice magic, or even resorted to unusual sealing spells, they could not put out the goldenf me.


    Khesuna let out a grunt when she saw the witches helpless before the me. She pursed her lips together and blew. A nearly translucent breath of frost and death washed over the golden me, instantly freezing it into a tiny crystal of ice.


    Khesuna grabbed the crystal between her fingers and put it in front of her eyes to inspect the fire frozen within, so lifelike it almost seemed like it was still burning. Khesuna couldn¡¯t help but speak in an upset tone, ¡°This is you trying to take me down a notch? Not bad, are you? Your temper¡¯s growing along with your strength, eh?¡±


    Greem smiled. He didn¡¯t respond too much to Khesuna¡¯s act of helping. Instead, he chuckled. ¡°It¡¯s only a small punishment. I have no intention of making it difficult for her. Since she¡¯s been punished, let us forget everything of the past!¡±


    Khesuna¡¯s expression was cold. She lifted her head and stared straight at Greem¡¯s face. After a long pause, she sighed and said, ¡°I suppose this is what she deserved! Alright, now that we have gotten over this, we should start talking business. Why...did you choose to reinforce the Adept¡¯s Association? I thought you hated their guts!?¡±


    ¡°Naturally, I still hold a grudge. That said, the disaster invasion is a matter that involves the entirety of the World of Adepts. I can¡¯t just watch by, can I? Moreover, they promised so muchpensation. There¡¯s also nar feedback to be obtained. Why wouldn¡¯t I contribute?¡±


    ¡°I hope you are speaking the truth,¡± Khesuna had a face on that said she didn¡¯t believe a single word of what Greem was saying. She sighed and said, ¡°You have just arrived and don¡¯t know what the situation is. Just follow me to the frontlines, and you will learn how terrible it¡¯s gotten. Hmph! The Adept¡¯s Association is in big trouble this time!¡±


    Khesuna swept a nce at theCentral adepts¡¯ Fourth Grades, who were standing obediently by the side. A weird look appeared in her eyes.


    ¡°Quite willing, aren¡¯t you? To think you would bring half of the Central Lands¡¯ Fourth Grades with you, despite how dangerous this ce is. Be careful. Don¡¯t lose all your forces just because of a moment¡¯s carelessness. If that happens, you won¡¯t be able to rule over the Central Lands anymore, as powerful as you may be!¡±


    Greemughed heartily. ¡°You people always looked down on the Central Lands in the past. Why was that? Simply because they were overly cautious individuals that always hid behind the lines and put safety first. How many of those Fourth Grades could have properly experienced the bloodshed of a nar battlefield? This is a rare opportunity to train the troops. They were all very eager as well and actively asked to join the fight. How could I discourage them? Heheh, one bird with stones!¡±


    Khesuna knew that Greem wasn¡¯t speaking the truth when she saw the bitter smiles on the faces of the Fourth Grade Central adepts. However, she wasn¡¯t nice enough to worry about the Central Lands. Seeing as Greem was a prodigy, a quick reminder was all that was needed.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go take a look at the battlefield! Some of you might start having regrets once we arrive.¡±


    Having said that, Khesuna stomped her feet. The gigantic corpse dragon reared its neck and let out a cry. It then turned around with some difficulty and flew off toward the distance where the sounds of war could be heard.


    Indeed, even while they were talking, you could hear deafening screams and battlecries from the distant horizon. The light of violent spells filled the skies, and fearsome energy shockwaves made the earth itself tremble.


    They might be over fifty kilometers away, but the shockwaves from the battlefield could still reach them. That meant the Adept¡¯s Association was no longer able to contain the battle within Inkdeep Valley.


    Adept Geraldine, who had arrived to wee Greem and his party, listened silently to their exchange. It was then that he cordially led them all toward the battlefield.


    The vast territories along the way were all upied by Adept¡¯s Association forces.


    War towers had been set up along key geographical points and essential roads, all of which were filled with long lines of wagons moving resources toward Inkdeep Valley. Meanwhile, there were plenty of adepts circling the skies on giant owls and two-headed eagles, busy at work.


    Greem¡¯s arrival instantly caused chaos.


    After all, not everyone had the luck to witness a thousand-meter-tall giant!


    Upon seeing this gigantic figure slowly walk over with heavy steps and pass by above their heads, all the ordinary guards, workers, apprentices, and even some of the low-grade Association adepts couldn¡¯t help but feel their hearts throb wildly.


    The voodoo beasts in charge of pulling the carts were so terrified that their knees buckled, and they couldn¡¯t get up. The Association adepts flying in the sky hastily scattered. They didn¡¯t dare get in the way of the giant.


    In fact, a squad of wyverns even rose from a camp nearby, helping Greem chase away the people in his path before he arrived.


    After passing through a grassy in, crossing a hundred-meter-wide river, and a not-very-tall mountain, Greem and his party arrived at Inkdeep Valley.


    Due to his size, Greem was able to see the entirety of the battlefield in an instant. Even asposed as he was, he couldn¡¯t help but frown. For the first time, he learned of the terror and horror of two major nes shing.


    It was a massive battlefield that stretched for thirty-five kilometers!


    War towers were set up like a forest all across the battlefield from where the mountain was. A single, looming adept tower stood silently at the center of the battlefield, like a lone moon amidst a sea of stars.


    Just fifteen kilometers in front of the adept tower, dark mists spread everywhere and pressed against the ground. Winding rifts in the ground could be vaguely seen under the fog.


    At the moment, hordes of mutated beasts were swarming out of the rifts to attack the war towers near them. Each war tower was like a nexus of battle of its own. Shocking numbers of voodoo beasts emerged to match the mutated beasts.


    The voodoo and mutated beasts were like floods of two different colors, red and ck. They pressed against each other, shed, and ground away at their enemies. Every moment, thousands of lives were lost on the battlefield and crushed to paste beneath the countless heavy feet until a swamp of blood formed.

 Chapter 1403 - Terrifying Battlefield

    <strong>Chapter 1403 Terrifying Battlefield</strong>


    The skies were a dark crimson.


    The earth was filled with muddy streams of ck and red, the air filled with the screams and howls of voodoo beasts and mutated beasts alike.


    The numerous war towers activated forcefields and magical barriers, glowing brightly with the light of magic. It was almost as if the entirend was a forest of Christmas trees. The forcefields were to stop the mutated beasts from approaching, while the magical barriers defended against long-range spell attacks.


    Every time the mutated beast horde approached, an opening at the bottom of the war towers opened so an rming number of voodoo beasts could swarm out.


    The mutated beasts were terrifying creatures whose bodies and minds had been wholly corrupted and twisted by the disaster aura. They had wings like eagles, heads like serpents, and bodies as tough as lions. Their limbs were powerful, and their ws were curved and sharp enough to tear apart a thick sheet of steel.


    Ordinary human warriors could not be their opponents!


    Meanwhile, the voodoo beasts were vicious creatures created from the experiments of adepts involving bloodline mixture. They all stood over five meters tall, their bodies possessing the traits of many different types of beasts.


    The voodoo beasts were superior to the mutated beasts in both size and strength. They also possessed scales that protected them from enemy blows. Consequently, the battle was incredibly fierce. A single voodoo beast would rampage through the tide of mutated beasts, charging forward fearlessly like a giant tank.


    Meanwhile, the mutated beasts had the obvious numerical advantage!


    Due to their ability to both fly and sprint on the ground, they were all over the battlefield. Every time a voodoo beast appeared, it would instantly be surrounded and summarily torn apart by dozens or even hundreds of mutated beasts. Some of the more fearless mutated beasts would even cling onto the voodoo beasts, holding on by their fangs and ws as they tried to tear into the voodoo beasts¡¯ flesh.


    The ferocious and vicious voodoo beasts were often covered in several mutated beasts after just wading a hundred meters through the horde of enemies. They fought back with all their might but would copse due to their injuries after killing approximately a dozen mutated beasts. The mutated beasts would then devour the corpses.


    Some of the mutated beasts even started howling and wing at each other as they fought over the flesh of the voodoo beasts.


    Whenever that happened, the closest war tower would gather tremendous magical energy into a fearsome spell and hurl it where the mutated beasts were most concentrated.


    Wild Lightning! Meteor Shower! Earthspears! Corrosive Swamp! Blizzard! ......


    All sorts of elementium spells of various shapes and colors swept across the battlefield. Wherever the light of elementium was seen, sted flesh and limbs were all over the ground. No mutated beast was able to endure a magical attack from the war towers.


    The Association adepts hid within the war tower, relying on its solid defenses and the numerous voodoo beasts to protect them. It was only then that they could calmly attack every mutated beast that entered their range of attack.


    However, even ants could bring an elephant down with sufficient numbers!


    If the mutated beasts became too numerous, even the war towers could not remain absolutely secure. That was especially the case with the disaster creatures that remained in hiding amongst the mutated beasts.


    From a distance, Greem could see the remnants and ruins of several war towers close to the entrance of Inkdeep Valley. Only the base of the towers remained. These ruinsy in destion, like burned-out candles. There were countless holes on the walls, and the insides of the towers were a mess. Greem could even faintly make out the bloodstains and skeletons left sprawled on the ground.


    He could estimate the Adept Association¡¯s approximate losses just from the number of war towers that had been razed.


    Either way, it was a horrible, uneptable, and massive number!


    Given their power, the Adept¡¯s Association would never have been forced into such a corner if their only enemies were the mutated beasts.


    A thousand powerful creatures upied the center of the battlefield, their bodies shrouded by a strange light. These creatures asionally formed squads to assault the already sieged war towers.


    Most of these creatures were Third and Fourth Grade disaster creatures. Though they did not have the fearsome Scourge Aura of the Scourge Lords, they could still draw on the disaster powers to enhance their offensive and defensive might.


    Consequently, any war tower they set their sights on would often be a sacrifice of the battle. It didn¡¯t matter that the forcefields were incredibly sturdy, their magical attacks devastatingly powerful, or that they were protected by legions of voodoo beasts. There was no stopping the assault of the disaster creatures.


    Sickly-green corrosive poison sttered the forcefields of the war towers. In less than thirty seconds, the forcefields would turn as thin as a sheet of paper. The packs of disaster creatures would then close in on the towers and tackle the walls with their bodies. They would use their sharp ws to dig out an entrance into the building.


    Once a hole appeared, the disaster creatures would make their way in.


    A short momentter, the war tower would be filled with the agonized cries of the adepts before their deaths. A series of magical explosions would often be heard as well.


    However, against the resilient and magic-resistant enemies with fearsome disaster abilities, the frail human adepts were no match.


    War tower after war tower was taken down. The adepts within that did not escape were all killed. The losses incurred were so tremendous it was hard to keep count!


    The enemy¡¯s shocking numbers made every Central adept who witnessed it turn dizzy. Their faces were pale.


    Individuals at Greem¡¯s level hardly concerned themselves with low-grade magical creatures, mutated beasts, and disaster creatures anymore. Instead, Greem simply narrowed his eyes and assessed the few particrly strong and eye-catching minor Scourge Lords.


    Fundamentally, they did not yet deserve the title of Scourge Lord. These individuals were only subordinates or assistants of actual Scourge Lords.


    There were no fixed physical characteristics to their bodies. The only thing that separated them from ordinary nar creatures was their undeniable chaos aura.


    This aura was so ipatible with the narws that every disaster creature was shrouded in a dense purple-ck mist. This mist wasn¡¯t actually mist, but rather distortions caused by the sh of two conflicting principle auras.


    The closer it was to Inkdeep Valley, the more obvious the disaster aura and the more damaged the World of Adepts¡¯ narws. As the World of Adepts¡¯ws continued to be pushed back, the nar suppression applied to these disaster creatures gradually weakened.


    The magic surge wouldst for a hundred years.


    If these disaster creatures were allowed to adapt to the narws here, they could charge out of Inkdeep Valley. When that happened, untold ughter and cmity would befall the natives of the World of Adepts!


    Given this, it was only a matter of time until the other major organizations reinforced the Adept¡¯s Association.


    After all, everyone was still on the same side. If the disaster creatures were allowed to nt their roots here, it would spell tremendous trouble for everyone.


    Fortunately, the only ones that had set their sights on the World of Adepts this time were a bunch of inferior Scourge Lords rather than the World of Disasters¡¯ overlords. Otherwise, the Adept¡¯s Association would already be calling for help from space, begging the Great Adepts to send clones or subordinates to help defend.


    The mastermind behind this attack was a Sixth Grade Scourge Lord known as Dilmas. Dilmas was a hundred-meter-tall three-headed hound. Each of his heads could control a unique elementium attribute, making him a truly fearsome opponent.


    The Minor Scourge Lord Illhoof that Greem ran into in the Arcane Empire was, in fact, a Fourth Grade mutated clone of Dilmas.


    This time, Dilmas was actually trying to profit from the fact that the World of Adepts was beset by a magic surge. Naturally, such an action deserved vicious retaliation.


    At the very least, the disaster creatures could not be allowed to corrode and modify Inkdeep Valley, such that they would turn it into a beachhead for invasion by the World of Disasters. Should an actual Scourge Lord break into the World of Adepts, banishing them would require a price far, far heavier than what was needed to drive out this invasion.


    It was important to note that the fall of most nar worlds wasn¡¯t caused by natural cmities. It was caused by the invasion of evil civilizations like the disaster creatures or the Abyss. The adepts typically invaded only in hopes of stealing resources and poption. They rarely inflicted catastrophic damage upon the victim neworld.


    Only an evil species like the disaster creatures, the abyssal creatures, or the starbeasts would destroy a nar world¡¯s origin and foundations for no good reason. Alternatively, they would corrupt the world¡¯s nar origin and turn all its natives into obedient ves.


    That was why the appearance of disaster creatures or starbeasts in a nar world often spelled doom for that world!


    However, it was exceedingly difficult for a Sixth Grade creature like Dilmas to break into the World of Adepts. The tremendous chaos energy and aura in his body would trigger the most severe bacsh possible from the World of Adepts¡¯ws.


    Until he actually invaded, he would send his numerous subordinates and endless mutated beasts to slowly corrupt and distort the narws near the spatial rift. It was the mostmonly used tactic of the Scourge Lords!


    If an invaded world did not have sufficient power to repel the mutated beasts¡¯ invasion and their subordinates, they would be doomed. Once a hole of sufficient size eroded into the ne¡¯s barrier, the Scourge Lord themselves would descend.


    To fight against a Sixth Grade as a Fourth Grade was impossible, even with the advantage of being on one¡¯s homeworld. They would crumble beneath that kind of overwhelming power and bembs to the ughter.


    If that did happen, even an ultra-powerhouse like Khesuna would no longer be safe. Meanwhile, powerful adepts like Greem, who had grasped principle powers but had yet to advance to Fifth Grade, were delicacies in Dilmas¡¯ eyes.


    Thus, helping the Adept¡¯s Association was helping themselves.


    In these times, the calm, rational minds of the adepts would allow them to make the wisest decision!

 Chapter 1404 - Assignments of Battle

    <h4>Chapter 1404 Assignments of Battle</h4>


    ¡°What¡¯s the extent down there inside Inkdeep Valley?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    His question was vague, but all the adepts present clearly understood what he meant.


    Adept Geraldine, who had led him here, replied solemnly, ¡°Advanced Fourth Grade.¡±


    The numerous Fourth Grade Central adepts around him couldn¡¯t help but break out into a mor upon hearing this.


    The upper limit of power that the invading disasters could unleash near Inkdeep Valley was advanced Fourth Grade. Even though that was still a minor grade away from the actual upper limit of power in the World of Adepts, the powerful Physique of the disaster creatures and their horrifyingbat style already made them a match for peak Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouses.


    Indeed, the suicidal attacks of the mutated beasts over the past few months had managed to weaken the strength of the nar barrier around Inkdeep Valley. Once the narws were no longer able to suppress the disaster creatures, the adepts would lose all of their home field advantages in the war.


    That was an exceedingly horrifying thought!


    ¡°How much time do we have left?¡± Khesuna, who stood high on the corpse dragon¡¯s back, asked coldly.


    ¡°Forty days at best. When that happens, the nar consciousness¡¯s suppression of the disaster creatures will all but vanish. When that happens......¡± Geraldine did not finish his sentence, but all the adepts present were veterans of nar invasions. They could naturally imagine the horrible consequences.


    ¡°Where¡¯s Domhnall? He summoned us here. Shouldn¡¯t he at least show his face?¡± A group of Silver Union adepts in silver robes flew over from a distance and asked Geraldine in a stern tone.


    Before Geraldine could reply, the space around him started to wrinkle and distort like paper. It trembled slightly, as the ripples slowly turned into a wave when Domhnall appeared out of thin air with his staff in his hand.


    ¡°Wee, esteemed Lady Khesuna, Vice-Senate Head Melone...Lord Greem...we wee your arrival!¡± Domhnall apologized to everyone upon appearing. His gazended on Greem¡¯s giant body, and he was fazed for a second, causing him to pause in the middle of his greeting.


    Meanwhile, the way he referred to the leaders of the three forces with equal respect betrayed the fact that something was wrong. The Vice-Senate Head of the Silver Union couldn¡¯t help but start looking Greem up and down.


    Honestly, Greem¡¯s current condition was beyond unusual. His energy aura was profound andplicated, such that even Melone couldn¡¯t determine his specific grade level.


    However, everyone had gathered here for the disaster creatures, not for some amicable teatime.


    Melone was the first to bring the issue back to attention. He asked in a stern voice, ¡°Domhnall, what¡¯s the matter with your Adept¡¯s Association? You have so much power. How did you let the disaster creatures establish a foothold in Inkdeep Valley and let things cascade to where it¡¯s at?¡±


    An awkward expression appeared on Domhnall¡¯s elderly face. He let out a sigh, ¡°That is because none of us expected Dilmas was in such a hurry to enter the World of Adepts. He brought forth his actual person and currently resides in the spatial rift at the very bottom of the valley.¡±


    ¡°What? Are you sure it¡¯s Dilmas¡¯ real body?¡± It was the first time everyone had heard of this. They couldn¡¯t help but be surprised.


    Dilmas was a Sixth Grade monstrosity, a fearsome Scourge Lord infamous throughout the multiverse. If he were personally residing in the spatial rift, he would be able to inflict devastating damage to all the adepts who tried to seal or purify the disaster aura near the valley, even if his actual body couldn¡¯t pass through.


    ¡°It¡¯s been confirmed!¡± Domhnall¡¯s smile was unusually bitter.


    Everyone could see that the Adept¡¯s Association must have paid a heavy price to verify this information.


    ¡°Then the Association¡¯s intentions are...?¡± Melone continued to ask.


    ¡°As everyone can see, there are over a thousand high-grade disaster creatures gathered around the entrance to Inkdeep Valley. They range from Second Grade to Fourth Grade. However, what is giving us the most trouble are the twenty-one Fourth Grade creatures.


    ¡°If all we hope to do is defend the towers, the Association has more than enough power to spare. We can definitely keep the disaster creatures contained within Inkdeep Valley. However, driving them out and purifying the disaster aura in Inkdeep Valley is no longer possible with the Association¡¯s power alone.


    ¡°However, if we don¡¯t find a way to banish these disaster creatures and thoroughly purify Inkdeep Valley, the narws will not be able to regain control. Once the narw chains arepletely severed, Sixth Grade Dilmas will be able to enter.¡±


    Having said that, Domhnall lifted his head and looked at everyone. He then sighed, ¡°All the major organizations must be incredibly busy as well during this magic-surge period. If it weren¡¯t for ourck of options, I would never have been able to lower myself to ask you all for help. You all know the full extent of the situation now. You are free to decide if you are willing to help us!¡±


    Everyone¡¯s face was dark and brooding.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. They might all be Fourth Grade adepts, but the number of Fourth Grade enemies on the other side of the battlefield was not inferior to them. There was no guarantee of safety in battle. A slight misstep, and they would permanently and truly be dead.


    That was why even Fourth Grade adepts like themselves were nervous and anxious about stepping onto a nar battlefield like this one.


    ¡°We have no problems on our side!¡± The first to express their position was actually Khesuna. As one of the only two ultra-powerhouses in the Northern Witches, she naturally possessed great sway among the witches.


    After Khesuna had expressed her stance, the other Fourth Grade witches behind her simply stood in silence. It was obvious that they would abide by her decision.


    ¡°We of the Silver Union have no problems with the situation either! Since we¡¯re here, naturally, we are prepared to fight against these disaster creatures,¡± Vice-Senate Head Melone of the Silver Union also spoke up. The seven Silver Union adepts behind him of various heights and races also looked calm andposed. It seemed like they couldn¡¯t care less about their deaths.


    In contrast, the Central adepts that Greem led were somewhat reluctant.


    ¡°Dilmas must not be allowed to enter the World of Adepts!¡± While the Central adepts frowned and hesitated, Greem¡¯s deep and crisp voice rang in everyone¡¯s ears.


    ¡°For the sake of this, we of the Central Lands are willing to fight as well! However,¡± Greem leaned forward slightly with his gigantic body and stared at Domhnall, ¡°As we have never truly worked together before, and because ourbat styles are different, we of the Central Lands will only fight with our own. We refuse any attempts to break up our ranks and reassign teams!¡±


    Upon hearing this, the seven Central adepts finally looked slightly more relieved.


    After all, Greem was now more powerful than even ultra-powerhouses. Having someone as strong as him by their side was always better than being enrolled into the Association¡¯s forces and being used as cannon fodder.


    ¡°Agreed! We of the Northern Witches also request to be treated as a singr unit.¡±


    ¡°Us as well. We will not ept orders to the individuals from the Association!¡±


    It was not the perfect scenario he had envisioned, but the three major organizations¡¯ requests were well within the scope of reason.


    Thus, Domhnall readily agreed after a quick moment of thought.


    Led by Domhnall and Geraldine, the adepts continued to travel forward and soon came near the adept tower. The other adepts followed Domhnall into the building to rest, while Greem could only remain outside due to his gigantic size. He stood silently and adjusted his condition.


    The Adept¡¯s Association might have recalled all their Fourth Grade adepts and ultra-powerhouses in the battle up till now. However, the shocking number of disaster creatures kept them from gaining an advantage.


    For the past month, the Association could only remain on the defensive, relying on the war towers and adept towers to exhaust the enemy¡¯s forces.


    This defensive strategy might have worked against any other enemy. However, it was hardly effective against the disaster creatures, who easily corrupted entire nar worlds to fill their ranks. They were backed by several nes¡¯ worth of military force. Such a battle of attrition hardly concerned them.


    In fact, many famous major nes in the multiverse had been forcefully destroyed and torn apart by the disaster creatures through this insoluble swarming strategy.


    To break this deadlock, the Adept¡¯s Association had no choice but to take on a more aggressive and active strategy!


    It required the Adept¡¯s Association to leave the protection of the adept towers to fight and kill the disaster creatures.


    After all, the mutated beasts might be innumerable, but the high-grade disaster creatures were certainly limited. Once their numbers had been shaved down, the Adept¡¯s Association would be able to organize a hit squad to seal off the spatial rift at the bottom of Inkdeep Valley.


    Though the battle up until now had not gone well, it was the only strategy that the Adept¡¯s Association coulde up with!


    The reinforcements from the three major organizations undoubtedly attracted the attention of the disaster creatures as well.


    In particr, Greem¡¯s thousand-meter-tall body was an incredibly conspicuous sight.


    There were no weaklings amongst those who could increase their size to a thousand meters!


    Though ordinary people could also growrger through various means, doing so would only be courting death when fighting against an opponent of the same level.


    Without sufficient power to protect the body, without adequate energy to sustain the functions of the body...it would only work if you were just trying to intimidate the opponent. But stepping onto the battlefield with such a body? That was unimaginable!


    In all honesty, Greem¡¯s appearance truly horrified the disaster creatures.


    The Fourth Grade monstrosities gathered together and silently discussed their n against the human adepts.

 Chapter 1405 - Association Battle Squad

    <strong>Chapter 1405 Association Battle Squad</strong>


    The intensity of the war intensified with the arrival of the reinforcements.


    Large hordes of mutated beasts emerged from the rifts along the ground, driven by the Fourth Grade disaster creatures. They screeched and took to the skies.


    Fortunately, their wings weren¡¯t enough to sustain flight above a hundred meters. They could only circle in the air like a murder of terrifying crows and attempt to break out of this bloodynd encircled by the war towers.


    The war towers glowed with blinding magical light as they sted the mutated beasts down from the sky with vicious spell after vicious spell. Meanwhile,rge packs of voodoo beasts patrolled around the war towers, fending off wave after wave of mutated beasts.


    Voodoo beasts and mutated beasts. They were both killing machines specially bred for war and murder. They were fearless, bloodthirsty, and savage. It was only natural that a bloody ughter would break out when they shed with each other.


    They were all wild beasts with no rationality to speak of, the lust for murder in their soul origins amplified through corrupted and twisted means. Consequently, they were exhausting their very lives in the suicidal and savage attacks theyunched at their enemies.


    As the war went on, the endless army of mutated beasts gradually gained the numerical advantage and started to push the voodoo beasts back. The disaster creatures took advantage of the battlefield gaps created in this manner and quickly began to hunt down the more isted war towers.


    If even a single crack opened in a war tower, the terrifying disaster creatures would endure the dense barrage of spells and tear it even wider. Once the break had turned into the hole, it would be the end of the war tower.


    The disaster creatures that swarmed in would rampage throughout the war tower, dragging out every human adept in hiding and eating them alive. The cruel ughter would onlye to a stop once the adepts in the adept tower had remotely detonated the war tower.


    Layer byyer, the war towers were destroyed in session. The position of the Adept¡¯s Association suddenly looked terrible.


    Every time this happened, it was the cue for high-grade adepts to leave the adept tower and clear out the battlefield.


    Numerous ck spots flew out of the looming tower and slowly approached the frontlines. Once they were close enough, all the adepts would stop moving.


    The elementium adepts would spread out and start silently chanting the long,plicated incantations of high-grade spells. The body-refining adepts and bloodline adepts would spread out in the meantime, making their own preparations for battle.


    Forty of fifty secondster, shockingly powerful high-grade spells covering a tremendous surface area would explode among the mutated beasts like fireworks. Hundreds and thousands of mutated beasts would explode like tin cans with every spell unleashed.


    A dozen massive clearings instantly appeared on a battlefield swarming with mutated beasts. These clearings were filled with blood and severed limbs. The entire ground was stained with ck corpses and red blood, rendered into a horrifying swamp.


    Aooooo!


    An ear-piercing scream rang out.


    Large packs of mutated beasts took to the skies. They beat their twisted wings with all they had and lunged at the human adepts in the sky. The disaster creatures also became mysteriously excited. They blended in with the crowd of mutated beasts, using them for cover as they snuck toward the battlefield.


    This time, the adepts were all from the Adept¡¯s Association.


    There were a total of forty-three adepts, consisting of one ultra-powerhouse, three Fourth Grade adepts, seventeen Third Grade adepts, and twenty-two Second Grade adepts; there were no First Grade adepts in their ranks.


    Ordinary First Grade adepts were of no use in a nar war of this level. They would probably be killed en masse by the battle¡¯s shockwaves alone. Even the Second Grade adepts in the group had to be powerful peak Second Grade individuals who could hold their own in battle.


    Otherwise, they would be little more than paper soldiers on the battlefield!


    ¡°The enemy ising. Everyone stay on your toes!¡±


    ¡°Pay attention! All body-refining adepts, step forth. Prepare to follow my lead and meet the enemy.¡±


    Fourth Grade Body-Refining Adept Horner shouted loudly at the very front of the formation, giving out orders to the other adepts.


    A dozen adepts standing behind him and to the nk of the formation stood out. They were fully equipped with leather armor, te armor, or robes. Even their weapons varied. However, the one simrity between all of them was a thin barrier of light around their bodies that made it seem as if their bodies themselves had been forged into powerful magical equipment.


    Bloodline Adept Neve also let out a shout of her own behind the body-refining adepts.


    ¡°All bloodline adepts prepare to transform. Guard the elementium adepts around you carefully.¡±


    Having said that, Neve¡¯s white robes were split apart by her swelling body. Neve was only 1.7 meters tall, but her body quickly grew in size as ayer of jade green scales appeared on her skin.


    Her head also started to transform and distort. Her mouth protruded forward and turned into the head of a serpent. A crimson forked tongue flicked from her mouth as she hissed.


    Neve hadpleted her transformation into a thirty-meter-long magical serpent in just three seconds. She quickly coiled up and raised her head, waiting for the battle to break out.


    The other bloodline adepts alsopleted their bloodline transformations. They turned into blood apes, giant wind elementals, twin-headed eagles, or even evil giants. Through their powerful bloodline transformation abilities, the frail human adepts instantly became fearsome monstrosities that even disaster creatures and abyssal demons would not fancy as opponents.


    Meanwhile, the elementium adepts standing in the rank furthest back put up magical barriers and elementium defenses of various colors. They used powerful area-of-effect spells to exterminate the endlessly charging mutated beasts.


    Light Elementium User Geraldine stood in the center of the elementium adepts. He had transformed into a blinding giant of light, glowing with intense light in the sky. Two beams of white light shot from his eyes and pierced the battlefield, where they wreaked destruction.


    Where the beams of light reached, the bodies of the mutated beasts quickly turned white, as if they were being assimted and devoured by the light. Their bodies rapidly disintegrated into countless tiny light particles.


    For a moment, purple blood and bodies rained down from the skies. The momentum of the mutated beast army stalled for a brief moment.


    The ultra-powerhouse, Cerveris, stood still at the back of the formation. His attention wasn¡¯t on the battlefield- it was on Greem and his thousand-meter-tall body.


    His gaze also drew Greem¡¯s attention. Greem opened his giant eyes wide and swept a nce at Cerveris before closing them nonchntly and going back to rest. This act of scorn undoubtedly caused the anger in Cerveris¡¯ heart to re.


    However, for some reason, his throat felt dry. He didn¡¯t dare utter even a single insult at Greem. He could only turn around and let his feelings fester within.


    While he was distracted, the mutated beasts had already begun shing with the body-refining adepts. A wave of blood sttered across the sky as limbs and flesh flew everywhere. The entire frontlines were filled with violent force shockwaves.


    Whether swinging their weapons or their bare fists, body-refining adepts were all bodybuilding fanatics with imprable bodies and incredible strength.


    Their every motion and movement could create violent vorticesparable to Second Grade spells. Every one of their punches would create invisible eddies due to the wind pressure, and every one of their kicks was a savage scythe.


    Those mutated beasts, who were mere First or Second Grades, were like fish in the face of a vicious current. They could not do anything but ept their fate as they were crushed by thousands of air currents from every direction and blown away.


    The mutated beasts were ground to blood and paste the moment they came close to the body-refining adepts; it was as if they had been chopped to pieces by countless invisible des. The wave of blood that formed from their ughter sshed against the adepts¡¯ bodies.


    The savage waves of blood never stopped. They quickly devoured the mutated beasts behind the frontlines like a twisted tsunami.


    Such terrifying power and savagery. The mutated beasts would have been terrified if they had any inkling of intelligence. However, the mutated beasts¡¯ fearless and savage nature drove them into the blood waves without any hesitation.


    Gaha!


    They growled as they rushed forward, ignoring the horrible wounds appearing on their bodies as they lunged at the closest enemy they could find.


    High-grade body-refining adepts were practically walls of steel. However, unleashing force shockwaves outwardly in this fashion took quite a toll on them as well. Even as they wove a of destruction, there were still plenty of mutated beasts that managed to break through and reach them.


    Horner stood at the forefront of the adepts. He looked calmly at these mutated beasts with their bloodshot eyes, sharp fangs, and ck jaws. It didn¡¯t seem like he was applying any strength at all as he punched over and over in quick session.


    The pressurepressed in front of his fists turned into invisible bullets that shot straight forward. They instantly carved a hole through a dozen mutated beasts. The force shockwaves around his fists were consciously controlled into a forward-facing vortex, unfurling outward as it traveled.


    All the mutated beasts dragged into the vortex were sliced up into thin pieces, as if they were thrown into a blender.


    Horner did not cast any elementium spells. He simply let forth these simple, uniform punches as the space in front of him turned into a zone of death.


    Anyone who entered that zone would die. He was unstoppable!


    For a while, Horner was able to suppress the mutated beast horde with his power alone.

 Chapter 1406 - The Weakling Squad

    Chapter 1406 The Weakling Squad


    Horner¡¯s savagery incited the anger of the disaster creatures.


    Soon several Fourth Grade disaster creatures made their way to the frontlines under cover of the mutated beasts.


    Boom!


    A strange spider-ape hybrid broke through the wave of blood, roaring as it appeared in front of Horner.


    This creature was a strange being born of a berserk ape and underground spike-spider¡¯s mixed bloodlines. Its upper half was that of a ck ape, with thick, ck hair and bulging muscles. Meanwhile, its bottom half was that of an eight-legged spider, the hairy limbs gleaming with a strange gray light.


    Much like the other disaster creatures, this spider-ape wasn¡¯t carrying any proper weapons or equipment. It only had a sharpened ck spear in its right hand.


    The material appeared to be some sort of wood.


    However, the fact that it could be chosen as a weapon for a Fourth Grade and could endure the speeds at which it was being swung around indicated that this wooden spear was not as ordinary as it looked.


    Once it had charged through the wave of blood, the spider-ape rumbled through the air with its eight hairy limbs, lunging at Horner viciously.


    ¡°Foolish idiot. Die!¡± Horner shouted out loud and punched forward multiple times with both fists. Countless force shockwaves sted at the enemy like cannonballs.


    The spider-ape did not dodge. It simple covered its face and chest with its arms as it continued forward.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Several of the attacksnded on the spider-ape¡¯s shoulder, waist, and arm, causing its muscles to twitch and tremble. However, it did not seem to have been injured at all.


    The spider-ape quickly closed in. It raised its right arm, and the ck spear stabbed toward Horner¡¯s chest like a bolt of ck lightning.


    As a body-refining adept, his specialty was crushing strength with strength!


    Horner gripped his right fist tightly. Light-purple light gathered on his fist as he punched at the spear tip without any hesitation.


    The spear and fist crashed together. The violent force they carried rushed at each other, instantly turning into fearsome force waves that rippled outwards.


    The body-refining adepts closest to the battle were blown away. Strangely enough, the two individuals at the center did not budge a single inch. The fist was pressed against the tip of the spear, all the muscles of the arm trembling and undting. It appeared they were locked in a contest of Strength.


    When it came to pure physical Strength, the two of them were equally matched. The spider-ape also had a slight advantage in Physique and endurance.


    However, apart from base Physique and Strength, there were also other factors important in a battle. For instance- equipment!


    While the two of them were locked in a stalemate, runes began to glow on Horner¡¯s bracers, ne, and belt. They turned into magic energy that surged into his body.


    The next second, Horner¡¯s Strength increased by nearly fifty percent, allowing him to drown the enemy in a crushing tide of force.


    The spider-ape was fighting back with all its might when it felt an unstoppable force rush toward it. Before it could step out of Horner¡¯s reach, the adept¡¯s fist blew away the spear and punched him in the stomach.


    Boom!


    A gaping hole appeared in the spider-ape¡¯s back as Horner¡¯s fist pierced through it.


    Aaaaaah!


    The spider-ape screamed in agony, its eight limbs frantically moving backward as it pulled its body away from Horner¡¯s fist. It waved its spear even more frantically, the dark light of the weapon leavingsting ck trails in the air.


    Horner had intended to chase down the spider-ape and crush its skull, but these ck trails stopped him in his tracks and prevented him from going any further. His right middle finger that had made direct contact with the tip of the spear was injured. A small ck hole could be seen in it.


    ck blood dripped from the wound, and the poison within was forced out by Horner¡¯s violent strength, dissipating into wisps of ck smoke.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Another three Fourth Grade disaster creatures of equally strange appearances broke through the wave of blood and appeared near Horner. The spider-ape howled in pain. A gaping hole might have been opened in its body, but it still gritted its teeth and charged forward.


    Horner couldn¡¯t help but frown.


    Such horrible injuries would have been enough to kill any ordinary creature. Yet, that spider-ape was still able to fight with such ferocity.


    The toughness and savagery of the disaster creatures couldn¡¯t be more obvious!


    In a duel, Horner was confident he could kill any disaster creature of the same grade by using his advantage in equipment and technique. Fighting one against four¨Cor three and a half, in this case¨Cwas quite impossible. It would be challenging even if he were a minor grade stronger than he currently was.


    At this critical juncture, a poison bomb that engulfed an area of ten meters exploded amid the three disaster creatures. Bloodline Adept Neve quickly slithered over, standing in the way of the four disaster creatures alongside Horner.


    The two parties went back and forth, shing with each other at the frontlines with their myriad abilities.


    Light-Elementium User Geraldine had transformed into a fearsome light giant in the center of the battlefield. Two beams of milky-white light shot out of his eyes. Where the light beams went, the entire battlefield was sliced up and thrown into chaos.


    The light would even hit Fourth Grade creatures that were engaged in battle if they weren¡¯t paying attention. They would scream in pain and dodge aside.


    Fourth Grade adepts indeed had an awe-inspiring ability to dominate the battlefield if theyshed out with all their might!


    The other adepts that hade as reinforcements flew out of the adept tower once the Association¡¯s battle squad had engaged the disaster creatures. From both nks, they started to exterminate the mutated beasts and disaster creatures that had gathered around the valley.


    As discussed earlier, the Association¡¯s squad would take center stage, the Northern Witches and Central adepts would take the left nk, and the Silver Union would take the right. They would encircle the enemies.


    This assignment was given out of consideration of the difference in power between the major adept organizations.


    The Central Lands had Greem. Overall, however, the Central adept squad was the weakest among all the organizations. The reason for it was simple. They had never engaged in any team battles nor been a part of anyrge-scale nar wars. That had always been the weakness of the Central Lands!


    An individual¡¯s power was never enough on such a cruel and bloody battlefield. Only a team that could trust each other could cover each other¡¯s weaknesses and enhance their strengths.


    In this regard, the Central adepts undoubtedlycked a sense of cooperation, long-term thinking, trust, and war magic.


    At this moment, to their detriment, the more cowardly ones among them were still wondering if this was Greem¡¯s plot to get rid of them!


    It was impossible to unite and organize these disjointed adepts without harsh, authoritarian means.


    Ker. Intermediate Fourth Grade, Sealing Master. Specialized in shadow sealing techniques.


    Den. Beginner Fourth Grade, Body-Refining Adept. Specialized in closebat.


    Alfred. Intermediate Fourth Grade, Elementium Adept. Specialized in sound magic.


    Matthew. Beginner Fourth Grade, Summoner. Specialized in summoning powerful otherworldly creatures.


    Nics. Beginner Fourth Grade, Elementium Adept. Specialized in water magic.


    Ariza. Beginner Fourth Grade, Bloodline Adept. Able to transform into a lion-headed human.


    Roderick, Beginner Fourth Grade, Elementium Adept. Specialized in nt magic.


    It seemed like there were all sorts of adepts spanning all manner of specialization. However, trying to put them together into a squad capable of fighting against Fourth Grade disaster creatures was back-breaking work.


    There might be many of them in the party, but the only one who could serve as a tank was Body-Refining Adept Den. Ariza might be a bloodline adept capable of transforming into a lion-headed human, but that particr ancient beast didn¡¯t excel at meleebat. They preferred to charm and trick an enemy with illusions and sensory-disabling abilities.


    That was why Den was the only person who could stand at the front. Matthew could also summon some tough otherworldly creatures to help, but that was it.


    It would be okay if they were just a little weak on defense, but the squad was incredibly weak, even on offense!


    There might be many elementium adepts among them, but they all excelled at single-target, instant-cast spells. Theyced in the kind of potent area-of-effect spells that required long cast times and someone to cover for them as they cast.


    It would have been fine if they onlycked war magic. After all, wouldn¡¯t it be okay if they had excellent equipment and were able to match the disaster creatures in a duel? However, many of the Central adepts couldn¡¯t even do this much!


    They indeed had numerous pieces of magical equipment on their persons. However, most of them were used for self-preservation, escape, or defense. While it wasn¡¯t like they had no offensive equipment, they certainly didn¡¯t have much.


    In all honesty, Greem felt a chilling breeze run over his heart when he got his hands on the Fourth Grade Central adepts¡¯ basic information. At the same time, he fully understood why the three major organizations despised and looked down on the Central Lands so.


    Upon seeing the other organizations get into formation and rush into battle, Greem could only sigh and give out his own orders.


    ¡°Den, you¡¯re in charge of defense.


    ¡°Matthew, summon some powerful magical creatures to help Den.


    ¡°Ariza, you are in charge of the second defensive line.


    ¡°The rest of you stay by my side and exterminate the mutated beasts with long-ranged spells.


    ¡°Alright, let¡¯s go!¡±


    Having said that, mes surged around Greem. His body was instantly d in red-white mes. He marched forward, scattering out numerous fire runes as he did so.


    The fire runes dove into the bodies of every single Central adept. The next moment, their bodies glowed with red light as they were engulfed by light.


    ¡°This is my Light of Principle! You won¡¯t have to worry about the chaos principles on the battlefield with this! Since we are all here already, let the other major organizations see if we Central adepts are truly a bunch of useless fools!¡±


    Greem roared as he lunged into the battlefield headfirst.

 Chapter 1407 - The Might of the Powerful

    Chapter 1407 The Might of the Powerful


    The more dangerous the battlefield, the more the powerful could unleash their full strength!


    A giant, zing, humanoid-like Greem stepped onto the frontline; the entire battlefield was intimidated by his overbearing pressure. Like a giant rock thrown into a boiling pot of oil, the whole battlefield erupted.


    The Burning Domain that Greem had not used in a long time sted outward. Everything within its thousand-meter-diameter started burning.


    The low-grade adepts of the Association hid inside the war tower. They did not have to endure being burned by these terrifying mes. Meanwhile, the voodoo beasts and mutated beasts exposed outside suffered a disastrous fate. They were like ants being pressed onto magma. After just a few seconds of struggling, they erupted into mes and were quickly reduced to ashes.


    There was no difference between First and Second Grade creatures in Greem¡¯s eyes. Any living being that stepped into his Burning Domain and came into contact with the aura of fire was doomed to death. They did not even have the time to struggle in pain.


    Even the Third and Fourth Grade human adepts would have had to endure being burned by the mes if it weren¡¯t for the fire runes attached to them.


    The thousand-meter-giant that was Greem walked forward without hesitation. The mutated beasts exploded into ashes. Wherever his Burning Domain reached, the popping sound of fires igniting could be heard. The muddy ck and red currents that painted the battlefield instantly turnedpletely red.


    After burning all the enemies closest to him to death, Greem continued walking forward slowly. The typically fearless mutated beasts were scared out of their wits by this overwhelming disy of power. They hastily fled from the domain.


    A hrious scene yed out on the battlefield.


    A thousand-meter-giant slowly walked across thend while all the mutated beasts in his path fled in every direction. In fact, for the sake of opening a route of escape, the more powerful mutated beasts shed their ws and cut down the panions¡¯ standing in their way.


    Those who couldn¡¯t flee in time were caught by the ring of fire and exploded in just three seconds. The tattered corpses, blood, and shattered bones were all reduced to ck, withered ashes by a hot breeze before they could hit the ground.


    Several Central adepts flew in front of Greem, pressing forward along with him. They watched the hellscape in front of them, shocked and fearful.


    The majesty of a god, the might of a destroyer of worlds, the creatures trembling in fear like ants, and the total control over life and death.


    Perhaps, maybe, just maybe...that was the limit of an adept¡¯s power inside a nar world!


    Even the Fourth Grade adepts found themselves intimidated and frightened by the sheer power they were witnessing, let alone those lower lifeforms on the battleground below. For a moment, the battlefield fell utterly silent. The only sounds remaining were the horrified screams of the mutated beasts and the fearsome sounds of erupting fires.


    Death Witch Khesuna remained at the Burning Domain¡¯s edge, standing tall upon her giant Fourth Grade corpse dragon. She nced at Greem¡¯s gigantic zing body from a distance. Her cold, beautiful face betrayed no joy, sorrow, surprise, or anger; her body merely radiated a hostile and freezing chill.


    The other Fourth Grade adepts behind her all had expressions of shock on their faces. It was the first time they had witnessed the terrifying might of a true adept powerhouse. In particr, Dark Witch Leader Circe and Deceit Witch Leader Angelina, both of whom had grudges with Greem, were unnerved. They were trying to stay calm, but the flickering light in their eyes betrayed their real emotions.


    The first time they had heard of Greem¡¯s name, he had been no more than an insignificant ant whose constant presence annoyed them. But now...? There had been aplete reversal in their positions. What did they count forpared to this proud man who stood at the peak of the ne with his power?


    Equally as shocked as the Northern Witches were the Silver Union adepts.


    As the Silver Union only had one ultra-powerhouse, that individual had to remain in the Castle in the Sky to defend it from unexpected attacks. Thus, there were no ultra-powerhouses among their ranks for this excursion.


    When theyid eyes upon the mighty figure of the legendary fire adept, they were only left with shock, awe, and envy.


    The Fourth Grade golem masters looked at each other and let out a sigh of helplessness. They summoned their magical armor golems and equipped them before roaring and rushing onto the battlefield.


    Meanwhile, Cerveris turned and stared firmly at Greem, who now resembled a god of fire descended to end the world. His entire body trembled intensely. He wasn¡¯t afraid. Instead, he was filled with emotions of hatred and helplessness.


    Greem had be so powerful. When could Cerveris wash away the humiliation he had received then?


    Inside the looming Association tower, Gloria lunged at the giant mirror of light before her. She stared at her former opponent with the same kind of resentment. Her shoulders trembled as purple light shimmered across her body. It was obvious she was furious.


    ¡°This is the legendary fire adept who fought with you for over a hundred moves?¡± A youthful-looking adept in a sickly green robe chuckled and teased, ¡°I don¡¯t find that very likely! How could you possibly have fought such a terrifying fellow with that insignificant power of yours? Don¡¯t tell me he only recently obtained that kind of power. There hasn¡¯t been a single individual among all the ultra-powerhouses I¡¯ve seen that has been able to lock onto a principle power as a Fourth Grade.¡±


    ¡°Shut up, Ainley! If you¡¯re not looking for a fight right this moment, then you had best shut that bloody mouth of yours,¡± Gloria suddenly turned around, her temper ring. Her furious eyes made it seem like she wanted nothing more than to tear her colleague into pieces.


    The young Adept Ainley simply smiled in the face of an ultra-powerhouse¡¯s threat. After all, he was the first-ranked ultra-powerhouse in the Adept¡¯s Association. Gloria wouldn¡¯t dare attack him, even in her tantrum.


    However, while it might seem like he wasn¡¯t bothered by anything, a hint of caution and wariness flickered in the depths of his eyes whenever his gazended on the mighty figure in the mirror.


    Dammit! Since when did such a terrifying rookie appear in the World of Adepts!? With that kind of power, fighting him would be......


    Adept Ainley didn¡¯t dare finish his thought. He was afraid that he would lose the confidence and courage to challenge that individual if he followed that thought to its logical conclusion.


    Vice-Chairman Domhnall stood silently in the central control hall on the seventeenth floor of the tower. He was also watching the fearsome fire giant from his own screen. He couldn¡¯t help but let out a sigh.


    It was impossible to suppress that man any longer. From now on, even he had to start considering amicable rtions with the legendary fire adept of the Central Lands!


    While this fire adept remained, all of the Association¡¯s ambitions for the Central Lands would be in vain. Given the long lifespan of ultra-powerhouses, Greem would easily turn the Central Lands into a massive adept organization just as powerful as the Adept¡¯s Association in just a thousand years.


    Even asposed as he was, Domhnall couldn¡¯t help but find himself waver at the thought of the Adept¡¯s Association regressing into a second-rate organization and suppressed by a formerly third-rate organization at his hands. Moreover, that suppression couldst for a thousand years.


    A thousand years...a thousand years! That was far too long, even for a Fourth Grade adept like himself!


    Greem, rampaging on the battlefield, had no time to bother with these sinister gazes from all over. He focused on his task of roasting mutated beasts.


    Every mutated beast that entered the Burning Domain and became set on fire would exhaust a bit of Greem¡¯s fire energy. Individually, this amount of fire energy was utterly insignificant. While walking across the battlefield and incinerating hundreds of enemies at a time, however, the umted consumption was still a burden on him.


    If Greem had to maintain such a massive zing body and such a fearsome Burning Domina on his own, he would have exhausted much of his power just on the cannon fodder. With the Orb of the Fire God continuously supplying him with fire energy, he wouldn¡¯t be tired even if he kept this up for three days and two nights. Nor would his power be exhausted.


    He was the star of the battlefield now. He had drawn the attention of everyone. Hostile or friendly, surprised or hateful- no adept or disaster creature could ignore his existence. The only thing they could see was his fearsome figure burning down the whole world with a wave of his hands.


    Ker and the seven Central adepts had stepped on the battlefield anxiously, believing a deathmatch wasing. Who knew that just following Greem would make things so easy? All the enemies turned to ashes before they could even approach.


    Such overwhelming might, such power that his enemies seemed little more than ants!


    However, just because the ants couldn¡¯t approach didn¡¯t mean the same for the disaster creatures. The experienced veteran adepts hastily reminded Greem, ¡°Be careful! The disaster creatures are almost upon us!¡±


    Before they could finish speaking, a group of terrifying disaster creatures appeared at the edge of the Burning Domain. They howled and charged into the domain, ignoring the golden mes that had ignited all over their bodies. They stepped across empty air and lunged at the adepts.


    ¡°Prepare for battle...prepare for battle!¡± Adept Ker screamed as she waved her wand. Several ck circles flew at the enemies.


    Blind...Slow...Weaken...Decrepify...Madness...Drain Will.


    A series of curses and mysterious sealing spells entered the bodies of the disaster creatures. At the same time, several voodoo golems the size of Ker¡¯s palm appeared out of her sleeve and started circling around her.


    They giggled over and over as if they were living creatures.


    Just as the ck-light entered the body of one of the disaster creatures, Ker pointed at one of the dolls and shouted, ¡°Hamstring!¡±


    The next second, the disaster creatures¡¯ speed slowed to a crawl as if they couldn¡¯t run anymore.


    Through her strange shadow sealing spells, Ker instantly threw the formation of the disaster creatures into chaos!

 Chapter 1408 - Pulling the Team Together

    <h4>Chapter 1408 Pulling the Team Together</h4>


    Matthew quickly started summoning otherworldly creatures as if he had gone mad.


    Soon, several tough-looking creatures appeared: a man-faced serpent, a beholder, and a devourer.


    Den, the only body-refining adept in the party, stood forward without any hesitation. He let out a battlecry and grew from his two-meter size to a muscr four-meter hulk. He rushed to the very front of the formation, radiating intimidation as he did so.


    Bloodline Adept Ariza¡¯s body also distorted and transformed into a strange lion-headed human.


    It was a strange creature that stood three meters tall, with a human¡¯s body and the head of a lion. The humanoid body¡¯s skin was yellow and had no hair on it. Its muscles were developed and symmetrical. Meanwhile, the lion-head above its neck had a mouth full of sharp teeth, wide eyes, and arge nose. It was a majestic and fearsome creature.


    This lion-headed human was more muscr than a regr human, but it looked like a gentle kittenpared to the disaster creatures. It was obvious that it didn¡¯t specialize in Strength and Physique.


    Afterpleting his transformation, Ariza instantly rushed behind Den and started casting a series of bloodline magics.


    Charm Monster, Greater Illusion, Mirror Image, Suggestion, Wisdom Drain.


    Despite Ariza¡¯s might as a Fourth Grade adept, half of his bloodline magic was utterly ineffective against the disaster creatures. Only Greater Illusion and Wisdom Drain managed to affect them.


    Two of the disaster creatures were distracted in this fashion.


    One lunged forward and started fighting against a non-existent illusion, while the other suddenly started turning in circles as if it had lost its direction.


    If Ariza was the only one fighting against these disaster creatures, then these charms and illusions clearly couldn¡¯t help him win. However, today, he was backed by a group of Fourth Grade elementium adepts, all of whom walked quite unusual paths.


    While the two disaster creatures were confused, three incredibly powerful Fourth Grade spellsnded on their bodies.


    Soundwave Dimensional Array; it was Molten Fire City Lord Alfred¡¯s attack!


    Water Dragon¡¯s Rage. That was Nics¡¯ spell!


    Nature¡¯s Wrath...was Roderick¡¯s magic!


    Unfortunately, even their three Fourth Grade spellsbined could notpare to the meteor crashing down from the sky.


    A red meteor, five meters in diameter, quickly plummeted from the skies andnded in the middle of these disaster creatures. The red meteor exploded instantly. It turned into thousands of molten rocks that sted in every direction, zing with golden mes. The explosion engulfed a diameter of a few hundred meters.


    The violent force shockwave was able to stun even these ferocious disaster creatures. The rain ofva and magma that came after was even more lethal.


    The three Fourth Grade creatures in the center of the explosion were instantly riddled with holes. The violent mes rapidly devoured their location. Meanwhile, the disaster creatures that managed to dodge in time were still affected. They scampered out of the attack¡¯s range, covered in injuries.


    Despite the devastating blow to their ranks, three disaster creatures still managed to charge through the numerous spells to reach Den. They immediately started fighting with him. The other disaster creatures quickly gathered again and prepared to hunt down these ignorant human adepts.


    Unfortunately, they were promptly greeted by Greem¡¯s vicious fire magic!


    Fire magic had always been known as the ruler of the battlefield. There was a reason for that. Moreover, Greem¡¯s principle power made the fire spells even more ferocious than ever.


    In the battle, every disaster creature had to endure the constant burning of the Undying mes, bearing the agony as they fought with the human adepts. It indirectly increased their burden, infuriating them to the brink of absolute madness.


    In all honesty, the Central Lands might have mobilized far more Fourth Grade adepts than the other three major organizations, but their battle results were mediocre. Their battle against the disaster creatures consisted mostly of stalling and dying, with none of them being able to deliver a lethal strike.


    After all, disaster creatures were savage and cruel beings. If they were truly forced into a corner, their final retaliation would put them in mortal danger!


    It was precisely theirck of resolution and courage that bogged the battle down. The disaster creatures they were fighting were injured all over but could still rampage throughout the battlefield without restraint.


    In contrast, the Central adepts appeared to be gradually suppressed. It almost seemed like the tables would turn on them.


    If one were to be brutally honest, the entire battlefield was being held together by Greem¡¯s power alone. If Greem had given up on the situation, the Central adepts would have long since fallen apart!


    Greem stood at the very back of the formation, reinforcing the fighters with fire magic as he sighed to himself.


    The Central Lands were truly weak!


    Still, no matter how upset he was, Greem couldn¡¯t simply let the disaster creatures defeat the adepts. After all, his reputation was on the line as well!


    ¡°Chip, dynamic battlefield analysis, please! I want to look for an opening on the battlefield.¡±


    [Beep. Dynamic scan activated. A total of eleven Fourth Grade disaster creatures and twenty-four Third Grade disaster creatures detected. Detailed information is currently being processed.


    [Beep. Adept Ariza will be in a precarious situation imminently. Coordinates: 225,087. Two Fourth Grade enemies are pincering him. Please reinforce immediately.]


    Greem waved his hand and threw a magma fireball at a specific location on the battlefield. The vicious and violent shockwaves instantly blew away the disaster creatures attempting to pincer Ariza, temporarily alleviating the situation for him.


    [Beep. Den is now being attacked by three disaster creatures. The enemy might break through at any moment.]


    Without another word, Greem raised both his hands. A Fire Pir erupted a hundred meters in front of Den. The mes licked at all the enemies around it.


    The three Fourth Grade disaster creatures hastily fled, and the offensive against Den was dyed for a moment.


    [Adept Ker is standing too far out. A disaster creature is currently nning a stealth attack on her.]


    Greem¡¯s eyes gleamed as two thick golden beams swept across the horizon. They arrived close to Ker; a strange tiger with wings on its back and horns on its head tumbled out of the sky, just barely avoiding Greem¡¯s attack.


    Ker screamed when she saw this. Her hands moved quickly and several gray and ck halos wrapped around the tiger.


    The beast hurriedly escaped from her range with a few leaps. The ambush ended without a result.


    With the Chip¡¯s absolute surveince and Greem¡¯s uncontested principle fires, the Fourth Grade Central adepts finally managed to survive the most challenging phase of all and get over their awkward movements.


    They realized that they had no risk of danger when such a powerful ultra-powerhouse backed them. Naturally, they could forget about their worries. They could begin thinking about cooperation and the best way to inflict the most damage to their opponents.


    The cooperation and teamwork finally allowed each individual to disy the full extent of their power!


    Driven by Greem¡¯s actions, the selfish Fourth Grades of the Central Lands finally abandoned their narrow thinking and started to devote their all to the team.


    They were Fourth Grades, after all. Even though it was just a slight change to theirbat style and thinking, it reflected greatly on their battles. It was almost as if they had been reborn.


    Alfred specialized in soundwave magic. He was far more capable than his peers when it came to detecting and locating hidden enemies. He actively volunteered himself to deal with the stealthed enemies. He used berserk music notes to disrupt the enemy, providing the more vulnerable adepts like Ker and Matthew with an additionalyer of protection.


    Nics specialized in water magic and could create mirror images and teleport his allies. When he contributed his power to the team, all members of the party were instantly reinforced with effects such as Mirror Clone and Water Reflection. Several intricate and well-hidden Wells of Teleportation were also ced amongst the group.


    If any of the group members sensed danger, they could flee to another ce using these Wells of Teleportation. In doing so, they had an extra means to escape the enemy¡¯s pursuit.


    Meanwhile, Adept Roderick¡¯s nt magic was incredibly well-rounded, with the capacity for offense, defense, and healing.


    An extensive Nature¡¯s Barrier enveloped the team, allowing all members¡¯ bodies and Spirit to recover while they were within it.


    He also caused giant vines to grow everywhere, dying and slowing down the disaster creatures.


    The Central adepts had always been too selfish in the past. They rarely thought about their panions¡¯ in team battles, let alone using their own powers to protect them.


    When they finally tried it for the first time, they instantly gained positive feedback.


    The entire group became orderly in their approach against the disaster creatures. With Greem covering for them with ferocious fire magic, the battlefield would not fall apart again.


    The Central adepts¡¯ battle got even easier as they gained confidence and the will to battle!


    Using the disaster creatures to train his forces.


    There was always a group of people keeping their eyes on the Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands all over the battlefield. This unbelievable scene rendered them speechless. They couldn¡¯t help but shake their heads and sigh.


    Man...using such fearsome disaster creatures to make the team mesh together. That was...a little too daring, wasn¡¯t it!?

 Chapter 1409 - Battle of the Stars

    <h4>Chapter 1409 Battle of the Stars</h4>


    Suppress the entire battle with one¡¯s power alone, and it would be a miracle. If you failed to do so, tragedy would strike!


    Even though both sides could see the intention behind Greem¡¯s attacks, it wasn¡¯t possible to mimic him. After all, they didn¡¯t have his level of power.


    Greem was able to keep all the mutated beasts away with his Burning Domain. That cut off any chance of the mutated beasts reinforcing the disaster creatures. If the disaster creatures wanted to attack the Central adepts, they would have to grit their teeth and enter Greem¡¯s Burning Domain.


    Though the Fourth Grade disaster creatures¡¯ magic resistance meant they wouldn¡¯t be burned to ashes by the mes Greem radiated, the constant burning of the Undying mes was still a burden on them.


    At the very least, they would have to dedicate thirty to forty percent of their power to resist the effects of the Burning Domain. Naturally, this left them incapable of attacking the adepts with all their might.


    What really infuriated the disaster creatures was the thousand-meter-tall me giant standing far in the backline¨C Greem.


    Whenever the disaster creatures organized a vicious offense, Greem would hurl numerous shockingly powerful fire spells at them. The disaster creatures often had to throw their own formations into chaos just to avoid the mes.


    The disaster creatures were unable to organize themselves, while the Fourth Grade Central adepts were gradually bing more used to fighting alongside each other; they were finally starting to resemble a team. Under the effects of all these factors, the Fourth Grades of the Central Lands were already able to execute two Fourth Grade disaster creatures and six Third Grades.


    This ¡®tremendous¡¯ sess undoubtedly boosted their confidence and fighting spirit. Despite the grudges that some of them held against each other, they were all beginning to work together and cooperate.


    That put even more immense pressure on the disaster creatures!


    The battle raged on the battlefield while the minor Scourge Lords hiding in the valley¡¯s mists were engaged in a massive disagreement.


    They weren¡¯t blind nor deaf. In fact, just the familiar aura of that thousand-meter-tall giant allowed them to make the connection to the burning will that had spread through the principles some days ago.


    It was clearly a Fourth Grade adept that had obtained preliminary control over Fifth Grade powers!


    Just digesting this information had expended all of the minor Scourge Lords¡¯ energy, let alone engaging in a discussion on how to deal with the enemy.


    Their real forms in space might be incredibly powerful, but their powers would be limited to peak Fourth Grade the moment they entered the World of Adepts. If they were to go up against an adept with Fifth Grade powers under such circumstances, every minor Scourge Lord here would run the risk of death.


    The low-grade mutated beasts might not have intelligence, but higher beings like themselves had fearsome intelligence that matched their might. None of them were willing to bear such a terrible risk for the benefit of the whole.


    Thus, the question of how to deal with the fire adept quickly became the core of their heated discussion.


    Some were skeptical and believed that the fire adept was putting up a front. They wanted the minor Scourge Lords to attack him in unison and kill him immediately. Meanwhile, another minor Scourge Lord suggested that theirpanions dy the fire adept while they attempted to find a breakthrough on other fronts.


    If that was the case, a new question cropped up. Who was supposed to stall the fire adept!?


    After pushing the task back and forth between themselves, the monumental and challenging task fell unexpectedly on the strongest individual among them¨C Fiveface.


    Fiveface was a terrifying many-headed serpent with peak Fourth Grade powers.


    He was the one who had fought against all three of the ultra-powerhouses of the Adept¡¯s Association alone and forced them to retreat.


    Naturally, it became a consensus that he should be the one to fight against the fire adept!


    There were five minor Scourge Lords here, all with peak Fourth Grade powers and control over mighty principle powers.


    It was only natural that the vicious and savage minor Scourge Lords were eager tounch a counterattack upon seeing the human adeptsunch such a grand assault on them.


    After concluding their discussion, the minor Scourge Lords immediately recalled their subordinates from the battlefield. They charged out of the valley mists with heavy steps.


    Themotion on the battlefield instantly drew the attention of all the adepts. The ones who were rtively far out on the battlefield quickly retreated and rallied. The seven Fourth Grades of the Central Lands also retreated upon seeing this. They circled Greem¡¯s giant body and awaited his instructions.


    After the battle here today, all of them finally understood something. Without Greem supporting them all, the Central adepts were nothing on a nar battlefield. They had to rely on Greem if they hoped to live.


    That was because only Greem had the power to save them from the ws of the disaster creatures at those crucial moments. As for thepanions at their sides? It would be a blessing if they could fend for themselves!


    No one else really cared about the internal workings of the Central adepts. The instant the minor Scourge Lords showed themselves, the Adept¡¯s Association also started moving out.


    Over a hundred humanoid adepts flew into the sky from the adept tower behind the frontlines. Standing at the center of them all were the Association Fourth Grades led by none other than Domhnall himself.


    ¡°It seems like they are eager for a final showdown!¡± Greem stepped forward and silently sent voice transmissions to the Central adepts, ¡°Stay back when the fight beginster. Don¡¯t even think about leaving the radius of my mes. y safe!¡±


    All the Central adepts instantly gained a direction when they heard the message. They gathered around Greem like loyal guards.


    Only the more experienced amongst them, like Ker and Alfred, frowned deeply. They seemed hesitant to get too close to Greem. They knew that once the battle began, Greem was most certainly going to be the star of the human adepts.


    When that happened, the battlefield that Greem was involved in would be the most dangerous location of all!


    The decision to stay closer or further away from Greem was the best test of the adepts¡¯ experience and understanding of the battlefield dynamics.


    Everyone held their breath and remained silent as they sized up these fearsome creatures climbing out of the valley depths. The more they looked, the deeper they frowned. In the end, all the adepts¡¯ brows were tied up in knots. Their hearts pounded uncontrobly.


    One...two...three...four...five.


    Dammit! There were five peak Fourth Grade disaster creatures in total!


    It was not going to be an easy battle.


    The most significant difference between ordinary disaster creatures and minor Scourge Lords was the existence of a Scourge Aura. The so-called Scourge Aura actually referred to the domain of light formed by a Scourge Lord¡¯s principle powers.


    The moment an enemy stepped into the domain, they would be assaulted by the fearsome principle powers. Only Fourth Grade adepts, who had masteredws, could have a chance at resisting the principle powers.


    Adepts below Fourth Grade were little more than defenseless rabbits in front of principle powers. The only difference between them and ordinary humans was the fact that they would die slower and suffer more pain in the process.


    Apart from that, they were no different from mortals before the Scourge Aura!


    A lizard with five heads stood at the forefront. Jade-green scales covered its body, and its four thick limbs supported its gigantic body. The five heads all looked forward, though facing different directions.


    ¡°Lord Greem, it seems like we will have to work together for this one! Do you see the many-headed reptile? It¡¯s called Fiveface. Each of the five serpent heads has scales of a different color, each having a distinct elementium attribute. Red is fire, white is wind, blue is frost, brown is earth, and the central head is green for poison,¡± Domhnall was clearly trying to get back on Greem¡¯s good side. He pointed at the reptile as he solemnly exined its powers to Greem.


    Greem stood tall at the center of the battlefield, silently appraising his opponent.


    Though Domhnall¡¯s exnation was helpful, it wasn¡¯t asprehensive as experiencing it for himself.


    The reptile was most likely a Fifth Grade creature as well, only that its power had been suppressed to peak Fourth Grade due to being in the World of Adepts.


    A creature like this would have attributes and a grasp over the principle powers superior to Fourth Grade adepts. It was definitely more powerful than even ultra-powerhouses.


    In particr, Greem could sense the presence of a strange principle power on its hundred-meter-long body.


    ¡°Chip, are you able to analyze the attributes of the opponent¡¯s principle power?¡±


    [Beep. Information gatheringplete.


    [Target Creature: Five Face.


    Target Grade: Fifth Grade (Limited to peak Fourth Grade within this ne).


    Target Species: Mutated Smander.


    Target Attributes: Strength 45 | Agility 18 | Physique 52 | Spirit 48.


    Scourge Aura (Principle Power): Poison + Disaster Power.


    [Poison is the target creature¡¯s actual attribute, while the disaster power is a shared attribute between all disaster creatures.


    [Host will have to be cautious of the two principle powers when inbat. In particr, disaster power can corrupt Host¡¯s Spirit and cause Host to gradually lost control over the fire principles.


    [Rmended method of defense: The Tome of Corruption.


    [Host must constantly be enveloped in the Tome of Corruption¡¯s principle light. Should the principle light be shattered, the fire principles will be able to shield Host¡¯s Spirit for eleven seconds. Any longer than that, and the Host¡¯s Spirit will be at risk of being corrupted.]


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown when he heard the analysis. He bemoaned to himself, ¡°Dual attributes? The poison alone is difficult enough to deal with. Why do I have to deal with disaster power as well!? They get blessings from the disaster power. What about me? Is the nar consciousness not going to help while I¡¯m fighting on our home ground!?¡±


    [Beep. Vague higher consciousness contacted. Detecting high energy flow into the body. Requesting instructions from Host. Allow connection?]


    ¡°Dammit, of course...that¡¯s a free blessing from the ne! ept the connection.¡±


    The next second, Greem felt as if his mental consciousness had been soaked in warm water. Strange energy flowed from space and merged with his fire principles, turning into a peculiar principle power of its own.


    ¡°Hahaha...with the aid of the World of Adepts, I¡¯m no longer afraid of that snake¡¯s disaster power!¡± Greem finally smiled.

 Chapter 1410 - World Power

    <h4>Chapter 1410 World Power</h4>


    Disaster power wasn¡¯t the same thing as disaster aura.


    Any powerful creature that emerged from the World of Disasters was steeped in an undispeble disaster aura from flesh to fur. It went right down to their very bones. Wherever they went, the disaster aura they radiated corrupted all substance and Spirit, degrading the environment until it resembled that of the World of Disasters.


    This disaster aura was also the unique mark of the World of Disasters!


    Meanwhile, disaster power was a world power. It was an origin brand left on the souls of nar creatures that the World of Disasters favored. This power wasn¡¯t an innate trait of disaster creatures. Rather, it was a manifestation of the World of Disaster¡¯s power brought forth by the use of their chaos principles.


    Only a few of the most powerful creatures in the World of Disasters could use disaster power. The intensity of their disaster power revealed the degree to which the World of Disasters favored them.


    Correspondingly, while the minor Scourge Lords could draw on disaster power to strengthen themselves, Greem would be able to enjoy the blessings of the World of Adepts, especially while he was fighting on his home ground.


    With the Chip as the bridge ofmunication, Greem was able to reach into the principle level with his mental consciousness. He came into contact with the massive-yet-disorderly consciousness of the World of Adepts. The next second, an unfamiliar surge of energy flowed into Greem¡¯s mind, making him feel a cozy, maternal warmth.


    This flow of energy gave Greem a deep understanding of the principles while also instilling him with a deep hatred toward these invaders.


    Now, he had no choice but to fight, even if he changed his mind!


    Greem stepped forward, the foot of his thousand-meter-tall body booming against the ground. He bent over and let out an earthshaking roar at the disaster creatures in the distance.


    ¡°Get out of this world!!!¡±


    It wasn¡¯t what Greem himself wanted to say; it was an involuntary battlecry sparked by the absorption of the World of Adept¡¯s power.


    This roar represented the world consciousness¡¯ deep hatred and fury for these invaders, as well as the world power¡¯s rejection and loathing for the disaster power!


    After letting out that roar, a blinding golden light suddenly shone from within Greem¡¯s thousand-meter-tall body of mes. The golden light illuminated the entire battlefield. A golden aura appeared around every adept as they bathed in the golden light.


    With the protection of this golden aura, the adepts no longer had to worry about being corrupted by disaster power!


    While the adepts were uncertainly examining the attributes of this golden aura, Greem had already leaped into action. Golden fireballs the size of mountains gathered in his hands and sailed toward the enemy formations, howling as they cut through the air.


    ¡°Bastard...that is world power,¡± Gloria said through her grit teeth.


    Domhnall couldn¡¯t help but let out another regretful sigh, ¡°He¡¯s already able to draw on world power. That means that he has obtained the acknowledgment of the world consciousness...cough.¡°


    Domhnall had not finished his sentence, but everyone could sense the weight and emotion behind his words. They were supposed to be the mainbatants here today, but an outsider had taken all the glory and the spotlight. Meanwhile, the Association adepts had been reduced to a bunch of small fry and spectators.


    The Association adepts felt distraught at the thought of this. Many among them even startedmenting that the World of Adepts¡¯ world consciousness was so partial!


    No matter how upset they were, it didn¡¯t change things. As the World of Adepts¡¯ tremendous world power projected into their souls, they felt a genuine hatred and disgust for the disaster creatures, much like Greem.


    The ordinary Fourth Grade adepts also started howling and charging forward as if they had just locked eyes with their nemesis. Only peak Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouses were able to protect themselves with principle powers. They did not lose all rationality from the world power¡¯s influence.


    However, judging from their increasingly red eyes, it was obvious that even they could not resist that influence for much longer!


    ¡°It seems like the world consciousness has sensed the threat of the disaster creatures. It¡¯s urging us to drive out the enemy!¡± Domhnall let out another sigh. ¡°The world consciousness is quite the pragmatist. It saw that Greem was more powerful than us and immediately shifted all its blessings to him.¡±


    The young Adept Ainley, who had just returned from space not long ago, couldn¡¯t help butugh out loud, ¡°Domhnall, it¡¯s not the first day you¡¯ve dealt with the world consciousness. It has always been like that. The only difference is that you always thought of yourself as the center of the world when its blessings were on you. That is why you feel the difference all the more now. Haha! Once you get to the depths of space and visit a few more nar consciousnesses, you will realize that they are all too pragmatic and practicalpared to humans! Alright, I won¡¯t waste my time here talking with you all. I want to get my hands dirty and earn a little nar feedback as well. That stuff is the best resource you can find anywhere.¡±


    A sharp and vicious aura, no weaker than Greem¡¯s own, arose from Adept Ainley. There was a sonic boom as he dashed to the frontlines.


    ¡°I¡¯m going too...you watch out for yourself!¡± Gloria shot another mean nce at the towering giant in the distance as she spoke to Domhnall. The mysterious purple light then shrouded her body like armor as she charged into battle.


    Domhnall might be known as a Fourth Grade, but he was not proficient in battle at all. Thus, he could only suppress the urge to do battle and observe the fighting in silence.


    There were five peak Fourth Grade minor Scourge Lords on the enemy¡¯s side. Meanwhile, the adepts had as many as seven ultra-powerhouses. The situation was about even. However, Legendary Fire Adept Greem was in a special state of being right now. The nar consciousness also blessed him. Crushing an ordinary minor Scourge Lord shouldn¡¯t be a problem for him.


    In that case, they had quite the advantage on their side!


    While Domhnall silently assessed their odds under the adept tower, the Northern Witches also moved into action.


    ¡°Lady Khesuna; the Association and the Central Lands have already gone in. Do you think we should...?¡± Deceit Witch leader Angelina couldn¡¯t help but step forward on the corpse dragon¡¯s back and ask.


    Her body trembled as she said this. Her eyes were red. Obviously, she was using her powerful mental consciousness to resist the uncontroble urge for battle within her soul.


    The other three Fourth Grade witches were in simr conditions. They were all barely suppressing the boiling impulse to fight.


    Khesuna, who stood proudly upon the head of the dragon, remained silent for a moment. Finally, she spoke up.


    ¡°The nar consciousness has been enraged, but we cannot lose our rationality simply because of that. Doing battle is a given, but you all must remember to keep a tight grip over your true selves while you fight. Let us go. We shall also have a battle with these damned disaster creatures to our hearts¡¯ delight.¡±


    Upon hearing her promation of war, the eyes of the Northern Witches instantly turned red and violent. Unrestrained fighting spirit burst forth from within them. The corpse dragon stretched its wings out and dove at the frontlines with a loud roar.


    Meanwhile, the Silver Union didn¡¯t have a single ultra-powerhouse backing them.


    Even an adept as powerful as Vice-Senate Head Melone couldn¡¯t resist the influence of the nar consciousness. He had already rushed ahead eagerly with the Union adepts the moment Greemunched his assault.


    The entire battlefield instantly reached a climax!


    Greem was the one who started the fighting, but he was simply too big. Even with him striding forward and throwing fireballs as he did so, the Association adepts were able to overtake him.


    It was a high-grade battle. There was absolutely no room for low-grade creatures to intervene!


    Disregarding Greem¡¯s destructive Burning Domain, the shockwaves from the battle of any two high-grade creature alone were enough to crush any weaker beings into pieces.


    The entire battlefield was filled only with Fourth Grades and no one else!


    The many-headed reptile, the many-armed giant, the winged serpentdrake, the dust elemental, and the ten-headed ghoul.


    The five minor Scourge Lords each took up a spot, leading their Fourth Grade subordinates on their own charge against the human adepts.


    Meanwhile, Greem¡¯s giant golden eyes instantly locked onto the strongest individual on the opponent¡¯s side¨C the many-headed reptile, Fiveface. Fiveface¡¯s five serpent heads also turned around and red at Greem. A twisted and evil re flickered in all ten of his different-colored eyes.


    ¡°Die, ugly!¡±


    Greem gathered two fireballs and pumped as much energy into them as he possibly could.


    In Greem¡¯s current state, his body surged with endless amounts of fire principle power and unique world power. The twobined to form an unusually strong power that even the Chip could not yet analyze.


    The fireballs¡¯ energy levels continued to rise under the observation of the Chip. It repeatedly broke several thresholds that even Greem didn¡¯t expect.


    It hit 8,000 points...9,000...10,000.


    When the energy level of the fireball reached 10,000 points, the red glow of the mes abruptly faded and turned into a nearly translucent milky-white.


    Upon seeing this, even the disaster creature Fiveface appeared concerned.


    It was important to note that the energy limit that an ordinary Fourth Grade adept could achieve was 2,000-3,000. Even an ultra-powerhouse as powerful as Gloria could only achieve 7,000 points of power in a single attack.


    But now, a simple fireball that Greem was focusing on had managed to reach 10,000 points of power. That was already going beyond the limit of power that should be possible in the World of Adepts.


    If it weren¡¯t for the world power allowing him to do so, Greem would never have achieved such a feat in a thousand years!


    Greem could sense the terrible power contained within the fireballs in his hands. He let out a shout and threw it without hesitation.


    Its target? The many-headed Fiveface!

 Chapter 1411 - Battle of the Ultra-Grades

    Chapter 1411 Battle of the Ultra-Grades


    Fiveface¡¯s five faces almost turned white from horror when he sensed the terrifying energy intensity contained in the two fireballs.


    He raised his five reptilian heads and opened his maws, spitting out as many energy balls of his five elementium as possible. In the end, he was able to detonate the two fireballs before they reached him.


    The Vicious Fireballs copsed inwards when they detonated. All of their power erupted simultaneously, creating a massive mushroom cloud of mes at the frontlines.


    The terrifying energy radiation and shockwave ravaged the surroundings, vaporizing everything within range of the mes and leaving a deep crater in the ground measuring over five hundred meters in diameter.


    The adepts and the other disaster creatures fighting in the center of the battlefield fled in every direction, panicked and terrified. None of them dared be involved in the battle between those two ultra-grade powerhouses.


    ¡°Ferenen Cambatu...Mother of mes!¡± Greem chanted quickly and summoned a massive cloud of fire. It rapidly enveloped the opponent¡¯s location like a red puff of cotton candy.


    The next second, a sickly green poison halo pierced through the fire cloud.


    The poison and fire powersshed at and neutralized each other, corroding the nar space. Puddles of poison fell everywhere upon the ground.


    Fiveface emerged from the mes with earth-shaking steps.


    A few patches of its scales were visibly burned, with golden mes still smoldering on them. The main head of Fiveface stared firmly at Greem, while the others turned around and used their various breath attacks to put out the remaining Undying mes.


    However, even after extinguishing the mes, the injured parts remained withered and ck. It was obvious that they had been affected by the principle powers.


    The Undying mes were very effective against enemies that had not mastered principle powers. However, it was rtively easy for Fiveface to put them out as long as he was willing to pay the price.


    On one side, you had a thousand-meter-tall me giant. On the other, there was a massive reptile measuring a hundred meters in size. They were both gigantic individuals. When they crashed together, the mountains literally trembled, and the ground was upended. Both of them were protected by principle powers as their poison halo and fire halo shed. The resulting principle shockwaves became even more devastating and lethal than the original attacks were.


    The Fourth Grade adepts and disaster creatures who had just fled a kilometer away turned back to look for an instant. They were scared out of their wits and immediately turned to run. The ultra-powerhouses and minor Scourge Lords were able to endure the shockwaves, but their own powers were affected.


    Even they had no choice but to frown and move away from the nucleus of the battle.


    The ten thousand-meter-wide space at the center of the valley was left as an exclusive battlefield for Greem and Fiveface.


    For the sake of being able to match Greem, Fiveface began devouring spatial energy by the mouthful, his body swelling up to several times his original size. Eventually, he was able to reach Greem¡¯s waist.


    His five serpentine heads then summoned magic energy and created numerous elementium shields over his body. Rock Armor, Frost Shields, Whirlwind Shields, and Wave Shields.


    Once he had applied defenses from all the elementium powers he was capable of using, Fiveface lunged at the me giant with its sharp ws overgrown body.


    The two gigantic monstrosities shed together. Poison, fire, frost, rock, wind, and water- magic energy of various attributes sted against each other and reduced the other to oblivion, leaving the earth and skies a mess.


    With their powerful Spirits, they were even able to tear apart space itself, causing violent storms to appear!


    The many-headed reptile was truly a powerful creature with tremendous Strength and Physique. His five heads ignored the zing fires and wrapped themselves around Greem¡¯s body, using their sharp fangs to bite at the mes.


    Meanwhile, Greem seemed to have gone berserk. The mes shooting out of his zing body reached unbelievable temperatures. They caused Fiveface¡¯s body to blister all over, filling the air with the noxious stink of burned flesh.


    The principle light radiating from the Tome of Corruption formed a thin barrier around Greem¡¯s body. This barrier was as thin as an insect¡¯s wing, but it managed to endure Fiveface¡¯s ruthless tearing and tackling.


    However, no number of principle defenses could stop the violent attacks of a raging beast. Fiveface¡¯s sharp fangs were able to bite through the barrier and inject surges of elementium energy into Greem¡¯s body.


    This elementium energy contained his soul aura and was no different than the most vicious poison in the world to Greem, whose body was currentlyposed purely of fire.


    Greem endured the twisting agony from his body. His massive hands balled into fists and smashed against Fiveface¡¯s heads with resounding thuds. Golden mes gathered in his eyes and shot out as golden beams, leaving crisscrossing burn wounds on the enemy¡¯s back, so deep you could even see bone.


    The violent fire energy gathered by the Orb sted out of his hands, turning into golden waves of me that engulfed Fiveface.


    The many-headed lizard squirmed in agony, but he stubbornly refused to let go of his bite. He used all of his strength to tear out pieces of me from Greem¡¯s body and cast them far away from the battle.


    Greem was fire, and the fire was Greem!


    He might be a thousand metersrge, but fighting against a reptile with five heads like this one was still quite the disadvantage. His Physique was also at a low point and far from his peak. Consequently, he was not a match in a contest of sheer strength.


    If he couldn¡¯t pry the enemy away from him, then it was simply a matter of who was more vicious!


    Greem tolerated the pain and drew upon as much power as he could from the Orb of the Fire God and the Tome of Corruption. He used the mes to brutally burn the enemy¡¯s body.


    The two of them rolled around the battlefield and fought in that savage fashion, neither side gaining ground!


    Though neither could defeat the other, they both suffered severe losses.


    Greem¡¯s body of fire did not have sufficient defense. It had been torn out in chunks by Fiveface, making for a horrendous sight. Meanwhile, Fiveface was suffering the most painful, most agonizing ordeal he had ever faced in the past few thousand years.


    His body, heads, legs...almost every piece of his body had almost been thoroughly cooked by Greem!


    Even during the most intense moments of the fight, Fiveface could smell the scent of burned fleshing from his body. The skin and flesh under the surface of his body had almost all been burned to charcoal. They came off inrge pieces at the slightest touch.


    Even the organs inside him were half-cooked. The organs hurt as if there were tens of thousands of needles stabbing them at all times. It was unbearable pain.


    Fiveface really doubted whether he would find a single piece of untouched flesh across his body once this fight was over.


    ¡°Bloody hell! Why is there an ultra-grade adept in the World of Adepts? Shouldn¡¯t they all have been banished to space? Nair! Ramzai! Many-Arms...you bastards! Come and help me, quick! I¡¯m almost burnt to a crisp here!¡± Fiveface raised one of his head and let out a shrill cry as he continued to fight.


    He was using the nativenguage of the World of Disasters, anguage that only noble higher creatures like themselves had the right to use. Unfortunately, his tragic cries for help could not move the steel hearts of hispanions.


    They continued to fight with the Fourth Grade human adepts as if they had not heard him. Clearly, none of them were willing to be involved in the vicious battle between the two ultra-grade beings!


    They prided themselves on their power. But while they remained in the World of Adepts, and while thend had yet to be corrupted by the disaster powers, the limit of their might was peak Fourth Grade.


    To fight against an ultra-grade adept whose power had clearly exceeded the limits of the nar world with only the might of a peak Fourth Grade. In all honesty, only an idiot like Fiveface who had been blinded by his own power would do it.


    Even the most powerful among them was suffering terribly against that fire adept. They would only fare worse.


    Invading the World of Adepts might be crucial, but it wasn¡¯t important enough for them to give their lives in the process!


    Intentionally or otherwise, the four minor Scourge Lords and the human adepts they were fighting against strayed further and further from the central battlefield. They were already approaching the border of Inkdeep Valley, leaving more than enough space for the two mainbatants.


    Greem was stillmunicating rapidly with the Chip, even as he fought.


    [Beep. 26% of Body of mes missing. Approaching severe damage...17% of fire energy lost. Attack intensity is weakening. Estimated to fall below 10,000 points in 23 seconds.


    [Target creature is estimated to still retain 67% of itsbat ability. Target creature remains a threat to Host. Rmend Host use Devouring Fish Transformation and devour the enemy with the starbeast bloodline. Estimated sess rate of devouring: 37%.


    [Furthermore, for every 1% reduction in target creature¡¯sbat ability, the chance of sess will increase by 2%.]


    ¡°I can¡¯t use the transformation. That¡¯s a killer ace I¡¯m saving for certain enemies. I can¡¯t waste it on fodder like this one. Just tell me- if we continue to grind this out, who will be the first to copse?¡± Greem calmly rejected the Chip¡¯s suggestion.


    [Beep. Given the current development, target creature is estimated tost for another 127 seconds, while Host will onlyst for another 89 seconds. Host¡¯s body will be the first to copse and bepletely invaded by the poison power.] The Chip¡¯s response was calm and cruel.


    Greem¡¯s fire principles might be far stronger than the enemy, but he was utterly outmatched in terms of Physique. That allowed the opponent tost longer than him despite enduring more grievous wounds.


    ¡°Then there¡¯s no more need to hesitate. Activate Scorched Earth!¡±


    [Beep. Order received. Scorched Earth activating.]


    A tremendous change immediately took over the battlefield!

 Chapter 1412 - Fiveface’s Despair

    Chapter 1412 Fiveface¡¯s Despair


    This ce was a strange and mysterious world!


    The skies were a dark red.


    The ground was filled with terrifying volcanoes of various heights.


    These volcanoes were exceedingly active and violent. Thick, ck plumes of smoke billowed from their craters. As the ck smoke continued to rise, even the crimson skies became obscured by rolling ck clouds.


    Redva flowed all over the exposed magma, formingrge and small pools all over the earth. Groups of fire creatures yed and frolicked in every one of theva pools.


    An exceptionally majestic volcano stood tall at the center of this world. Its tip couldn¡¯t be seen, hidden behind the ck clouds in the sky. Only half of its ck and red body could be seen.


    This gigantic volcano was still active. The thunderous rumbling inside the volcano was like the eternal background music of this world. Tens of thousands of powerful fire creatures gathered around the volcano. Each of them was over Fourth Grade in might, with many being powerful Fifth Grade existences.


    Without exception, they were all gathered around small fire altars at the foot of the volcano. Without fail, they meditated and prayed here every day, even forming patrols to prevent any non-fire creatures from approaching their holy mountain.


    However, as they conducted their daily prayers today, a deafening roar suddenly erupted from the majestic holy mountain.


    ¡°The Orb of the Fire God! I sense the aura of the Orb...who is it? Who is it that dared to steal my treasure?¡±


    The violent voice washed across the world, instantly dispelling all the ck clouds within five thousand kilometers. The mighty body of the giant volcano appeared before the countless believers for the first time.


    Wherever the fearsome voice passed by, the ground cracked and the volcanoes erupted. The world itself trembled before it. However, the fire creatures living in this kingdom did not appear fearful at all. Instead, they prostrated themselves on the ground, praising the great Fire God Sinai as they did so.


    A five-meter-tall fire giant kneeled piously in front of thergest fire altar. He asked with his booming voice, ¡°My master, what is it that has incurred your wrath so? Your most loyal servant Arihi awaits your instructions!¡±


    This fire giant was a terrifying Fifth Grade powerhouse!


    Fire God Sinai vented his anger after rising from his slumber. He then slowly retracted his overbearing divine power. Only then did the thousands of volcanoes across the Kingdom of Fire¡¯s vast territories cease erupting and return to peace and quiet.


    ¡°I remember now. My Orb was stolen by a bunch of despicable adepts. Arihi, I just sensed the presence of the Orb. The Fifth Grade divine spell Scorched Earth that I sealed within has been activated. Send someone to investigate immediately. Send back the nar coordinates if you find the culprit¡¯s location or the Orb of the Fire God...hmph! These reckless fools. I will cast down a clone and raze their world to ashes!¡±


    ¡°Yes, my master! It will be as you wish!¡±


    Fifth Grade Fire Giant Arihi turned and left the god kingdom upon receiving his orders. He teleported to another nar world that belonged to Fire God Sinai.


    He took his ce in the Great Temple there and sent out the Fire God¡¯s decrees to the dozens of subordinate lesser nes. These major nar forces that served the Fire God Temple immediately went into action searching for information on Greem and the Orb of the Fire God.


    To their surprise, their aimless search actually ended up tremendously sessful. An anonymous, unaffiliated lich provided an incredibly valuable tip to the Fire God Temple.


    The forces of the Fire God immediately switched the focus of their investigation; they set their sights on a nar war urring in the World of Adepts.


    It seemed like...the aura of the Orb of the Fire God was leaking from there!


    ............


    Scorched Earth was a Fifth Grade divine spell.


    It was a powerful spell sealed within the Orb of the Fire God.


    It was said that this was also the first Fifth Grade divine spell that Fire God Sinai created after his ascension!


    As for its power?


    One could judge that much just by looking at Fiveface!


    Fiveface was truly miserable this time.


    He might be Fifth Grade, but his power had been limited to peak Fourth Grade level while within the World of Adepts. That gave the human adepts he typically looked down on the opportunity to injure him.


    Of course, his Strength might be limited, but his tough Fifth Grade Physique remained. He still had no problem crushing a peak Fourth Grade human adept.


    Sadly, he was truly, incredibly unfortunate!


    Firstly, his opponent Greem was also an unusual individual.


    Even though Greem did not even have the Spirit of a peak Fourth Grade, he had somehow mysteriously masted a powerful principle fire. It was an unimaginable phenomenon in most nar worlds.


    Secondly, Greem had equipped two pieces of Fifth Grade divine equipment.


    Due to the might of the Orb of the Fire God and the Tome of Corruption, Greem could endure the violent attacks of a Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lords. He was even fighting him to a standstill.


    Most importantly, Greem was actually able to draw upon the Fifth Grade divine fire-spell Scorched Earth that was sealed within the Orb. That was the real reason that Fiveface was suffering such a tragedy!


    He had been hit directly by a Fifth Grade divine fire spell after being grievously injured in his savage tussle with Greem. Even as powerful as he was, Fiveface copsed instantly.


    The ferocious divine spell surged into Fiveface¡¯s body, charging and rampaging recklessly through his insides. Fiveface¡¯s four-hundred-meter-tall body turned scarlet in a single instant.


    It was almost as if a volcano had been stuffed into his body; endless mes andva were waiting to burst forth. The scales on his body red as red mes came bursting out of the gaps between them.


    Through his skin, so swollen it had almost turned transparent, you could see that it was no longer blood that flowed in his body. It was viscous, boiling-hotva.


    The terrifying power of the fire had nowhere to go. It could only rampage in Fiveface¡¯s body, instantly causing four of the five heads to explode into pieces. The only remaining head also lost one of its eyeballs. A giant, bloody hole remained where the eye once was.


    ¡°Save me!!! Nair...Many-Arms...save me!! I...I¡¯m going to die!!!¡±


    Fiveface had been tortured to the brink of death by the Fifth Grade divine fire spell. He no longer cared about Greem. Instead, he instantly turned and fled towards Inkdeep Valley. Bloody holes erupted all over his body as he ran away. It wasn¡¯t blood or organs that came spilling out from within, but clusters of fire and thickva.


    If things continued at this rate, he would probably be consumed by the mes before he could flee the World of Adepts, even with his massive body.


    The other minor Scourge Lords were absolutely shocked. They had known that the legendary fire adept was a troublesome opponent, but they never expected that a Fourth Grade human adept would defeat a Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lord. Moreover, it seemed like such an overwhelming defeat.


    It was important to note that Fiveface was already the most powerful amongst them. If he couldn¡¯t deal with the legendary fire adept, then even they were in danger.


    They were rats in the same hole.


    For the first time, the minor Scourge Lords felt a genuine chill from the bottom of their hearts. Could it be...could it be that this invasion of the World of Adepts would be a trip to their graves?


    Without any hesitation, the minor Scourge Lords turned and ran, racing toward the bottom of the valley alongside Fiveface.


    A chase began!


    ¡°Now you think of fleeing? Toote!¡± Greem roared from the center of the battlefield. He had paid a heavy price. If the enemy were allowed to escape now, it would be a massive loss for him.


    Greem strode forward and grabbed the air with one hand. Large balls of fire energy gathered in midair and turned into a one-meter thick-chain under his expert fire maniption skills. The chain rattled as it cut across the sky and wrapped around Fiveface¡¯s body.


    ng! A muffled boom rang out.


    The fire chain instantly pulled taut as Greem¡¯s gigantic body skid forward, dragged along by the furiously fleeing reptile. No matter how much he leaned back and pulled with his arms, he could not stop his body from slowly sliding toward the valley.


    ¡°Den...Ker..e help me, quick!¡± Greem pulled with all his might as he shouted.


    ¡°Coming! Coming...I¡¯ming!¡± Den and the several Central adepts hurried over hastily from the horizon. They quickly helped Greem pull onto the creaking fire chain.


    With the help of a Fourth Grade body-refining adept, Fiveface¡¯s momentum finally came to a halt. The valley was just a hundred meters in front of him, but Fiveface¡¯s giant body was being pulled back by the human adepts. He could not even take a single step forward.


    Moreover, as more and more adepts joined the effort, Fiveface was dragged further and further away from Inkdeep Valley. He left deep gouges in the ground as he clung on for dear life.


    Fiveface finally let out an ear-piercing scream of fear and despair.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Dust rose into the air and the earth quaked.


    Three equally gigantic and ferocious figuresnded on the edge of Inkdeep Valley. They were Fiveface¡¯spanions.


    Fiveface screeched with the only head he had left, as if he had just set eyes on his saviors.


    ¡°Save me!!! Many-Arms...save me, and I will give you all my subordinate nes.¡±


    Fiveface was calling for help from the many-armed giant. The giant¡¯s body was also covered in wounds. He had barely managed to get here after escaping the Association adepts¡¯ pursuit.


    The many-armed giant hesitated for a moment when he heard Fiveface.


    While he was wondering if he should save his ally, Greem had already let go of the fire chain and was sprinting toward the valley.


    Many-Arms¡¯ expression changed. He nced at Greem¡¯s giant body fearfully. Finally, he dove headfirst into the valley and vanished without a trace.


    ¡°Basta......¡±


    Fiveface instantly despaired when he saw this.


    Before he could let out a final cry of anger, a heavy fist zing with golden mes smashed Fireface¡¯sst head into pulp.

 Chapter 1413 - Post-Battle Spirits

    Chapter 1413 Post-Battle Spirits


    Fiveface was dead!


    There was no greater shock on the battlefield than the death of a Fifth Grade creature.


    In the World of Gods, a Fifth Grade being would be a transcendent god.


    Killing a Fifth Grade was akin to ying a god!


    Even if you were to look at things that way, Fiveface was no more than a demon. However, no matter what you thought and what you called him, Fiveface was still a bonafide Fifth Grade existence. He was equal in power to the weakest gods.


    He was an existence that had transcended the limits of nar worlds and broken free of the limitations of narws. If nothing unfortunate happened to them, Fifth Grade beings would live for at least ten thousand years.


    Their bodies were immortal, and their souls were iparably powerful. Under ordinary circumstances, nar creatures would be injured just from looking at a Fifth-Grade. It was unthinkable for them to be wounded, much less killed.


    However, such an existence had died in the World of Adepts, at the hands of a Fourth Grade adept. That...the shock of it was enough to stun the adepts speechless.


    Unknowingly, a hint of awe, fear, respect, and envy appeared in the eyes of the adepts as they looked upon Greem¡¯s giant body. They weren¡¯t aware of these emotions that hade over them. It was probably the limit of power that a Fourth Grade adept could ever hope to achieve!


    Far away under the Association¡¯s adept tower, Domhnall let out another resentful sigh.


    For some reason, he¡¯d been sighing a lot more in the past year than in the past five hundred yearsbined.


    ¡°Fiveface is dead! Ry news of this to Lord Ulnak at Camp Exodar and Lord Riva of the Endless Gardens. I¡¯m sure they will be interested in this news!¡± Domhnall adjusted his feelings and immediately made contact with someone in the tower through discreet means.


    This message soon found its way to the Tower of Observation. It was then quickly ryed to the few Great Adepts who maintained close contact with the Adept¡¯s Association via the teleportation arrays.


    The youthful-looking Adept Ainley gently drifted down beside Gloria, whose face was pale as a sheet. He said in a solemn voice, ¡°I don¡¯t intend to provoke a fellow like that! The deal we agreed on earlier is moot. You...don¡¯t have any opinions on that, do you?¡±


    Gloria¡¯s body trembled when she heard this, but she did not open her mouth to retort.


    Adept Ainley nced at her in pity before putting on a smile and flying over toward the legendary fire adept standing proudly in the distance.


    It was about time to introduce himself and make some connections!


    An overwhelming victory. This battle was absolutely an unprecedented and overwhelming victory in the World of Adepts¡¯ history!


    To think that a Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lord had been in inside a nar world. That, too, was a significant and unprecedented event in the history of the universe.


    The many participants of the war-particrly the seven Fourth Grades of the Central Lands-were all overjoyed and excited. They gathered around the corpse of the many-headed reptile and went to work.


    This Fifth Grade monster had just recently been killed. Both its body and soul were in fresh, peak condition. Under Greem¡¯s instructions and with his approval, the numerous Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands became the most expert of butchers. They happilymenced dismembering and preserving what remained of the creature¡¯s magical organs.


    Fiveface had suffered a painful death. The Fifth-Grade divine spell had incinerated most of his body, and the parts that remained were badly damaged by fire energy. However, he was still a Fifth Grade creature. Even a scale from his body, a piece of meat, or a tendon would be an invaluable high-grade resource for the adepts here.


    Meat. Fresh meat cut off from the body of a Fifth Grade monstrosity...and they were the ones who performed the butchering.


    There was no doubt that this glory would make them proud even when they remembered this moment a hundred years in the future!


    Scaling, skinning, carving the meat, cleaning the bones, pulling out the tendons, gathering the blood, collecting the marrow, and preserving the brain.


    It was a series of bloody and filthy tasks, but the Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands refused to hand the job over to anyone else. They gathered around the corpse and happily went to work. The adepts of the other organizations could only watch jealously from afar. None of them approached the scene of butchering.


    Den, the only Fourth Grade body-refining adept in the Central Lands, rolled up his sleeves as he started butchering. Den looked just like a butcher as he carved up the spoils with a giant Fourth Grade knife he had found somewhere, wiping the sweat away from his red face as he did so.


    He wasn¡¯t sweating because of thebor, but because of his sheer excitement!


    He was holding the scales of a Fifth Grade creature in his hands as he stepped upon the flesh of a Fifth Grade creature and swung his knife to sever the tendons of a Fifth Grade creature, sshing the blood of a Fifth Grade creature all over his face. The work was tough and dirty, but Den couldn¡¯t be more excited. He was so eager he looked as if he would be fine doing all the work alone.


    Ker, Alfred, Matthew, and Nics gathered around, taking special sealing boxes out of their storage rings. They carefully dug out the magical organs from the gory mess, cast the proper preservation spells, and put them away.


    Meanwhile, Greem, the man who made it all happen, stood silently close to Inkdeep Valley. He slowly retracted all the fire energy he was emitting and restored his human form.


    It was a terrible sight. Greem¡¯s body was covered in wounds.


    There were injuries and missing flesh all over. In particr, the wounds Fiveface had gone berserk on were missing so much meat it was an absolutely ghastly sight to behold.


    Even the rtively unharmed portions of his body were covered in green and purple spots. These spots were created by elementium poison that Fiveface had left in Greem¡¯s body after biting him. Until Greem dealt with the poison, he would not be able to heal these wounds through his regenerative power.


    It had been a victory, but it came at a cost!


    Greem was not a body-refining adept that specialized in meleebat, after all. He had undoubtedly been at a disadvantage when fighting against Fiveface up close. That caused him to suffer severe physical injuries bordering on what you would call ¡®grievous.¡¯


    Fortunately, he won in the end.


    It gave him more than enough time to treat his wounds slowly!


    After leaving the matter of harvesting the corpse¡¯s resources to his subordinates, Greem shut his eyes and began the self-healing process. He intentionally left the harvesting job to the Fourth Grades of the Central Lands to make them feel involved and improve their sense of belonging.


    Judging from everyone¡¯s positive and eager attitude, they were far more epting of Greem¡¯s rule now than before. The feeling of pride for the Central Lands had taken root in their hearts and was slowly growing.


    Just as Greem closed his eyes to deal with his wounds, he sensed something. He opened his eyes and stared calmly at the unfamiliar figure approaching.


    This person was not even two meters tall, smaller than even Greem¡¯s finger. However, the tremendous power contained within him was enough to make Greem wary, even if he were in his peak condition.


    It was a reasonably good-looking young man. However, his hooked nose, thin lips, and dark eyebags ruined his impression, making him look like an overindulgent youth.


    Greem no longer judged people by their appearances but by the shine of the energy within them.


    Ordinary adepts could not prevent Greem from seeing everything about their existence through the principle level, even if defensive forcefields constantly shrouded them. However, this young adept was simply a ck hole to his senses. Greem could not even discover the elementium attribute of his energy.


    It wasn¡¯t the first time Greem had run into such a situation!


    Gloria had also been able to do such a thing by relying on her Fifth Grade equipment¡¯s protection.


    The unknown man stopped five hundred meters away from Greem and did not try walking any closer.


    They might both be human adepts, but there was no trust or friendship between them. If the adept continued forward, he would break Greem¡¯s ¡®safety distance¡¯ and provoke an instinctual reaction from Greem.


    Five hundred meters...that was the perfect distance. Even if one of them showed hostility, the other one would have ample time to react. That was why no powerful adept would ever allow another powerful individual to get too close.


    If an idiot were to be foolish enough to infringe on this safety distance......


    A fight would be inevitable!


    Of course, Ainley and Gloria were a different case. They might not get along with each other, but they were both from the Adept¡¯s Association and had at least enough trust to stay within a reasonable distance of each other.


    ¡°You are Ainley? I have heard of you,¡± Greem assessed the man and said, ¡°I believe you are the first-ranked ultra-powerhouse of the Adept¡¯s Association!¡±


    ¡°I am the first-ranked ultra-powerhouse!¡± Adept Ainley said proudly, but then switched to a cheeky smile. ¡°That said, us ultra-powerhouses can¡¯t really be proud of ourselves in front of you. A Fifth Grade creature...who would¡¯ve expected that even a Fifth Grade creature would die in your hands. That¡¯s unbearably terrifying!¡±


    ¡°You came here to say this?¡± Greem had an odd smile on his face.


    ¡°Of course not. I¡¯m here to discuss certain matters with you, sir. I see you are quite badly injured too. Why not let our Association¡¯s healers help you? This should help you recover yourbat power quicker as well,¡± Ainley said seriously when the topic of conversation veered back to proper matters.


    ¡°Also, these are your spoils. Keep them well!¡±


    Having said that, Ainley lifted his hand and threw out four strange crystals of various colors. They drifted slowly toward Greem.


    Greem looked at the crystals as the Chip¡¯s notification rang out.


    [Detecting four high energy elementium crystals. Peak Fourth Grade. Attributes: Wind, Frost, Earth, and Fire. ording to the scans, these should be the power crystals found from the destroyed heads of the many-headed reptile, Fiveface.]


    Who would¡¯ve thought that Ainley was generous enough to give up these peak Fourth Grade power crystals instead of putting them away for himself?


    The cold indifference on Greem¡¯s face thawed slightly.


    Just as he was prepared to talk with this socially-aware Adept Ainley, the Central Lands adepts below broke out into rowdy cries.


    Den¡¯s bloody figure emerged from the corpse of Fiveface. He lifted up a jade-green crystal in his hands.


    ¡°Fifth Grade...Fifth Grade.¡±


    Den was so excited his voice had turned sharp and high-pitched. However, everyone could only think about what he had just said.

 Chapter 1414 - Principle Crystal

    <h4>Chapter 1414 Principle Crystal</h4>


    Everyone¡¯s gaze was drawn firmly to the dark green crystal held in Den¡¯s hands.


    Most of them were hundreds of meters away, but the profound principle flux emanating from the crystal left a deep impression on them. Even Adept Ainley, who had not been moved at the sight of the four elementium crystals, was affected when he sensed the principle fluctuations.


    He abruptly turned his head, searing greed gleaming in his eyes as he stared at the crystal.


    A principle crystal!


    That had to be a principle crystal!


    A terrifying beast howled in Ainley¡¯s heart. He wanted nothing more at the moment than to reach out and cradle the crystal in his arms, to truly appreciate the taste of the principles within. Even though poison was wholly ipatible with his origin attribute, it was still a principle crystal! No one would ever not want it.


    Just as he was about to lose control over his emotions, Greem waved his hand, and a cluster of golden mes wrapped around the crystal. The dark green crystal flew into his hands.


    At the same time, a figure of the same dark green color emerged from his body. He danced on Greem¡¯s shoulder like a lively child dying to get his treat.


    ¡°Gimme, master...I want that thing. I want it, I want it.¡±


    It was Remi, the Spirit of Pestilence, who had been out of the picture for a while now.


    Ever since the Scroll of Voodoo devoured the Libram of Wisdom, it had advanced from Fourth Grade Soul Equipment to Fifth Grade. However, Remi¡¯s soul was too weak and incapable of controlling such a powerful body. Consequently, he had no choice but to fall into a deep slumber.


    Now, upon sensing a poison elementium crystal with a perfectlypatible origin attribute, Remi was naturally thrilled. He couldn¡¯t wait to devour the crystal to strengthen his soul and poison principles.


    Naturally, Greem would not reject his request. Remi was the artifact spirit of his Soul Equipment. Should Remi be stronger, it would be easier for him to use the Tome of Corruption. He would no longer be in the same awkward position as he currently was, where every use of the Tome of Corruption would exhaust Remi¡¯s umted soul power.


    That was why Greem gave the poison principle crystal to Remi without hesitation after obtaining it.


    The one-meter-tall Remi suddenly opened his mouth unnaturally wide and devoured the crystal in a single gulp. He rubbed his bulging stomach in satisfaction and dove back into Greem¡¯s body.


    Adept Ainley, who had been measuring his words and preparing to negotiate with Greem, was stunned in disbelief at the sight. After a momentary pause, the shock on his face faded into disappointment. He even lost all will to make small talk.


    Greem might not know how hard it was to obtain a principle crystal, but Ainley, who had spent years roaming the realms beyond, knew very well.


    Let us begin with the ssification of an adept¡¯s power. The traditional adept system divided adepts into nine grades, from First to Ninth. Each grade had its own corresponding standard of power.


    Apart from this, the source of power was also another category by which to divide adepts.


    Adepts of First to Third Grade relied primarily on elementium power. Be it for the sake of strengthening their bodies or unleashing devastation, the source of their magic was always elementium particles.


    These adepts were known as elementium adepts!


    Upon reaching Fourth Grade, adepts would be the most powerful beings in a nar world. They would finally qualify toe into contact with the narws. At this stage, the adepts would have to work hard to convert their elementium power into the correspondingw powers. In doing so, they would elevate their power¡¯s origin.


    Their grasp and mastery of the narws would then be the standard by which their power was judged.


    Adepts like that could typically be calledw adepts!


    Meanwhile, the magical powers of Fifth and Sixth Grade adepts werergely driven by principles. They had to concentrate thew powers to form their own unique principle power. It was only when one had mastered a particr principle power that they could rise from Fourth Grade, ascend beyond the limits of the nar world, and be a Great Adept that had transcended death and mortality.


    Thus, Fifth and Sixth Grade Great Adepts were also known as principle adepts!


    As for the powers of those beyond Sixth Grade? Ainley had only heard vague descriptions from others about how the Seventh and Eighth Grade Great Adepts no longer wielded principle powers. They used world powers of an even higher ss. What the traits of this power were and where it came from were all questions that Ainley had no answer for.


    The Ninth Grade Great Adepts who stood at the peak of adepts apparently possessed a strange power known as Origin. Of course, Ainley knew even less about Origin and what it was.


    If he weren¡¯t a core member of the Adept¡¯s Association, he probably wouldn¡¯t even have ess to the information he already possessed!


    After all, this knowledge was of the most ssified information even in the Adept¡¯s Association.


    Ainley had already been stuck at peak Fourth Grade for over three hundred years. Even now, he was still unable to elevate hisw powers into principle power. It was the only reason he had resolutely left the World of Adepts to go exploring in the realms beyond.


    It was the same for Gloria and the other Association ultra-powerhouses. They all faced the difficult problem of convertingws into principles.


    That was why Ainley had experienced such tremendous shock from watching a principle crystal disappear before his eyes. The tumultuous rise and fall of his emotions were so intense that his heart almost gave out.


    Principles...principles. Why were they so hard to grasp?


    The main reason for that was because principle powers were utterly intangible. They were mysterious and tremendous forces generated when a nar world moved ording to its systems. It was only possible to slowly sense and understand the higher principles by leveraging thews you had already mastered.


    It was like having a doctor who had never seen the anatomy of a person¡¯s body attempt to deduce the shape of your heart and how it functioned just by feeling his own pulse. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how difficult it was!


    That was why every adept who had made it past the threshold to be Fifth Grade were incredibly lucky. They were brilliant prodigies with exceptional knowledge of magic.


    It would have been impossible for them to achieve such unbelievable feats if that wasn¡¯t the case.


    Ainley almost felt his heart break when he saw Greem feed such a valuable principle crystal to a ¡®pet.¡¯


    He exchanged a few more meaningless words with Greem before hastily leaving.


    ............


    While the victorious Fourth Grades adepts joyously harvested their spoils and enjoyed themselves,rge groups of Association adepts and adept forces swarmed out of the tower and began to clean up the battlefield.


    Greem stood silently at the edge of Inkdeep Valley. With him here, the disaster creatures and mutated beasts were all forced to remain at the bottom of the valley, not daring to show themselves.


    It gave the Adept¡¯s Association a rare opportunity to wrestle back control over the battlefield!


    All surviving mutated beasts were executed, one after another, before being butchered and reduced to magical materials. With such high-quality materials, the Association adepts would be able to create more powerful voodoo beasts.


    The war towers that had been destroyed were cleared out. New war towers were quickly raised on top of their ruins.


    Large groups of Association adepts even flew above the valley onrge owls and two-headed eagles to cast down strange green nts.


    These green nts grew at a visible rate uponnding. Like enchanted daggers, their roots and vines dug into the hard stone cliff. Their leaves swayed about in the wind merrily as they devoured the evil and corrupting disaster aura.


    With their help, the mists of the valley slowly thinned.


    Apart from the depths of the valley, which remained shrouded in mists, the area outside the valley was alreadypletely clear and restored to its former appearance.


    As they continued to purify the disaster aura, the World of Adepts¡¯w chains quickly grew and extended back over thisnd. Thew aura grew stronger and stronger. The nar consciousness conveyed feelings of joy and happiness to every living creature toiling in Inkdeep Valley through the principle level.


    Of course, the low-grade adepts only felt more and more motivated as they worked. They couldn¡¯t understand the existence or source of this mysterious power.


    Meanwhile, the Fourth Grade adepts shut their eyes and focused as the traces of nar feedback entered their bodies.


    It was a rare chance toe into contact with the nar consciousness.


    Nourished by the nar feedback, the adepts were able to gain sudden insights into the narws that had eluded them in the past. The principle powers that they could never reach were revealed to them faintly, like no more than a mirage.


    Why was it that high-grade adepts were always eager to participate in repelling nar invasions? That was because the nar feedback and blessings from the nar consciousness after the victory was always a rare opportunity to study the principles.


    If there weren¡¯t arge-scale nar war capable of triggering the nar consciousness¡¯s sense of danger, they wouldn¡¯t be able to obtain a blessing of this level!


    From this perspective, the seven Central adepts who followed Greem here to Inkdeep Valley also obtained their just rewards. They put in the effort, risking their lives to fight with disaster creatures. It was only right that they received such a prize.


    Meanwhile, the Fourth Grades that remained in the Central Lands might have been safe, but they missed out on this opportunity.


    That was why it was always said that danger existed side by side with opportunity!


    The Adept¡¯s Association were not shy to help Greem, the most significant contributor to their victory.


    A dozen Second and Third Grade healers hovered around Greem, using their abilities to help him remove the elementium poison in his body.


    Meanwhile, in the face of therge chunks of missing flesh, the healers shot out green beams and applied healing potions that could stimte regeneration. They tried their best to patch up all the damage.


    With Greem¡¯s gigantic body and terrifying elementium resistance, any injury would require kilograms of higher healing potions to have even the slightest of effects.


    The fact that the Adept¡¯s Association were so willing to help Greem despite the costs demonstrated their sincerity in wanting to develop a friendly rtionship with him!


    With regards to this, Greem simply smiled and epted their goodwill.

 Chapter 1415 - The Association’s Open Conspiracy

    Chapter 1415 The Association¡¯s Open Conspiracy


    The Northern Witches and Silver Union each took up a spot at the edge of the battlefield as they recovered in silence.


    After hastily absorbing the nar feedback and catching the fleeting glimpses of the principles they were shown, the Northern Witches gathered around Death Witch Leader Khesuna and started whispering.


    ¡°What is the Adept¡¯s Association nning? One moment, they¡¯re bullying Greem. The next, they are trying to get on his good side. Do they actually intend to get on friendly terms with him?¡± It was Circe who said this.


    Due to their prior disagreements, Circe had always harbored a deep-seated hatred for the legendary fire adept. No matter what she tried to do to set Greem back, he still managed to rise without stopping.


    Even she, the Dark Witches leader, had to be extremely cautious in front of him out of fear that he would find some excuse to punish her. Circe couldn¡¯t help but feel her fury re at the thought of the humiliation she had just recently suffered at his hands.


    The moment Circe said those words, Khesuna¡¯s cold and icy rended on her.


    ¡°Circe, I don¡¯t care what disagreements and conflicts you had with Greem before this. From now on, that is all in the past. You must maintain your basic respect and etiquette toward him at all times. Otherwise, if he were to take issue with your behavior, even I wouldn¡¯t be able to save you. Understood?¡±


    ¡°I understand!¡± Circe immediately obeyed.


    The two of them were both witch leaders of equal status, but Khesuna had established her reputation far earlier than Circe. Moreover, Khesuna was also an ultra-powerhouse. Among the witch leaders, Khesuna and Pale Witch Leader Silvia were the group¡¯s respected big sisters. They were respected and feared by all the witches.


    Khesuna let out a quiet sigh.


    She could tell that Circe had not let go of her grudge.


    These high-grade witches had taken on tremendous authority and influence since advancing to Fourth Grade. They ledfortable lives where their every whim and will were obeyed. They had never truly experienced the dark struggles and cruel conflicts that urred among adepts behind the scenes.


    They were too young and prideful. They did not know the severity of offending a powerful adept who was still rapidly growing in power!


    The Adept¡¯s Association was powerful, wealthy, and influential. Yet, even they chose to take a soft stance with Greem instead of establishing hostile rtions with a future Great Adept. Meanwhile, Circe had rashly intervened in the conflict between the Fate Witches over some personal interests; she was only bing more and more involved.


    Circe might not have sensed the arrival of danger, but Khesuna had a feeling that all the Dark Witches would be in trouble due to her recklessness and impulsiveness.


    The Northern Witches had gone from their original thirteen branches to the current eight. They were far weaker than they once were. Among these branches, the Coldwinter Witches and Fate Witches were newly resuscitated branches that had only rediscovered their legacies recently after thousands of years of extinction.


    If something were to happen to the Dark Witches, the Northern Lands¡¯ situation would be even more unstable!


    Even though Circe¡¯s words were reckless, they clearly resonated with the Northern Witches.


    Deceit Witch Leader Angelina couldn¡¯t help but step forward and ask, ¡°Sister Khesuna, do you not find the behavior of the Adept¡¯s Association strange? They were atplete odds with Greem before this, and now they are being as nice as family. What exactly are they doing?¡±


    Khesuna looked at the witches around her and only saw confusion on the faces of her sisters. She could only shake her head and sigh, ¡°This is an open conspiracy of the Adept¡¯s Association!¡±


    ¡°Open conspiracy?¡± The witches did not understand.


    ¡°At this point, anyone can see that Legendary Fire Adept Greem can no longer be kept down. As long as he exists, the Central Lands will belong to him. None of our three major organizations will be able to take over.¡±


    ¡°Doesn¡¯t that mean that all three organizations should work together even more so to suppress Greem? What does any of this have to do with getting on his good side?¡±


    ¡°You all still look down underestimate what it means to be a high-grade adept. You have no idea how terrifying an out-of-control powerhouse can be,¡± Khesuna looked around and said coldly, ¡°Let¡¯s put it this way! Given Greem¡¯s current power, he would be able to exterminate any one of the major organizations if he was willing to drag his reputation through the mud and resort to gueri warfare.¡±


    ¡°Hsss,¡± The witches drew in a breath of cold air.


    They had witnessed the might of the legendary fire adept in the battle earlier, but they never expected Khesuna to rate him so highly.


    Didn¡¯t that mean Greem had absolutely no equal match within the World of Adepts?


    ¡°Of the three major organizations, the Silver Union has the Castle in the Sky, and the Adept¡¯s Association has the Tower of Observation. With those two fortresses, they would be able to retreat into safety and defend most of their assets if they were to run into an insoluble problem. However, our Northern Lands have no such top-ss facility. If our rtionship with Greem falls out, the entire group that is the Northern Witches will face an existential threat.¡±


    Khesuna paused for a moment here and looked at Circe coldly. ¡°I know you Dark Witches have made a lot of progress in excavating the Shadow World and that you have raised arge shadow army. However, think about what will happen if you continue provoking Greem. What can you do if he decides to crush your ck Mystery? Are you going to chase him around the world with your shadow armies?


    ¡°It¡¯s not like you haven¡¯t seen the might of a powerhouse! Greem alone ughter hundreds of thousands of mutated beasts and disaster creatures and kept them blockaded in Inkdeep Valley. If he activates his Burning Domain, Circe, do you think your shadow army will be able to survive?¡±


    Circe finally lowered her face. Her body, hidden in the ck mists, couldn¡¯t help but tremble.


    Khesuna didn¡¯t want to demoralize Circe too badly. She quickly exined the Adept Association¡¯s behavior.


    ¡°It¡¯s a good thing that the Adept¡¯s Association is trying their best to get on Greem¡¯s good side now. It means that they understand that directly suppressing him will no longer be effective. Such actions will only make an enemy out of him. So, they are using an open conspiracy. They n to send Greem out of the World of Adepts as soon as possible.


    ¡°If this process isn¡¯t elerated, Greem could easily ruler over the Central Lands for at least a thousand years, given how young and powerful he is. A thousand years is too long for our three major organizations. That is why the Association will definitely try to fulfill all of Greem¡¯s needs so that he can advance to Fifth Grade swiftly and get banished from the World of Adepts.


    ¡°A Central Lands without Greem...cannot be supported on the shoulders of the vampire Mary alone!¡±


    It was then that the witches finally understood. They couldn¡¯t help but nod in unison.


    Indeed, given that they couldn¡¯t suppress Greem anymore, shortening his time in the Central Lands was undoubtedly the best idea. Even if Greem realized their ns, he probably wouldn¡¯t be able to suppress his desire and impulse to advance to Great Adept earlier if possible.


    However, the fact that the three famous major organizations had been relegated to such a means of dealing with an adept from the Central Lands was quite tragic!


    ............


    The battle had not actually ended.


    The disaster creatures might have been herded back into Inkdeep Valley, but they still resided down there, guarding the giant spatial rift.


    If things dragged on, they could erode the foundation of the ne; the Sixth Grade Scourge Lord on the other end would be able to enter the World of Adepts. All of their efforts up until now would have been in vain.


    It was only inside the ne and with the aid of the nar suppression that the Fourth Grade adepts had a chance to kill those Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lords. Should their home field advantage be lost, everyone herebined would not survive a single p from a Sixth Grade Scourge Lord.


    As such, the nar barrier could not be lost, no matter the sacrifices!


    After a quick sweep of the battlefield and after purifying the disaster aura near the valley,rge packs of voodoo beasts were herded into the valley.


    The voodoo beasts and mutated beasts switched positions now. The voodoo beasts were the ones on offense, while the mutated beasts attempted to repel them. The valley itself had be a bloody battlefield.


    To prevent the voodoo beasts from being corrupted and turning on the adepts, this attack¡¯s main force was actually an army of animated constructsposed of iron golems and magical armors.


    Charging at the forefront were the animated armors.


    They stood over three-meters tall in the form of human warriors, despite having a hollow body. They were sustained purely by magical power. They held a shield in one hand and a sword in the other as they marched forth with heavy steps and perfect formation, five in a row.


    The mutated beasts howled and rushed forward the moment they entered the mists. The mutated beastsposed of flesh and blood immediately shed with these warriors of steel and iron.


    These animated armors had been adjusted by the Adept¡¯s Association and were much less stiff and clumsypared to an average steel statue. Their movements were agile, urate, and they were fearless.


    In the face of the mutated beasts, these animated armors stormed ahead and bashed with the shields in their left hands. Once the enemies were stunned, they raised their swords to slice.


    The animated-armor warriors had no life to speak off. Naturally, they had no fear of death either.


    They were simply a bunch of heavy-armor and swords animated through magical power. There was no other way to deal with them but to knock their shields and swords away and cave in their armor until they were incapable of fighting any longer.


    Their magical nature determined theirbat style!


    It was a savage style of charging and fighting without pause.


    The magical armors raised their swords and shields, cutting their way into the valley, step by step.


    Meanwhile, the mutated beasts took full advantage of their agile figures. They approached from every direction: the front, the nks, from the walls, or even from the skies.


    The entire Inkdeep Valley was swarming with their squirming ck and red figures. They instantly surrounded the invading magical-armor warriors!

 Chapter 1416 - Battle for the Slope

    Chapter 1416 Battle for the Slope


    There had never been such a thing aspassion or tolerance in a nar war!


    On one side, you had unforgivable invaders. On the other, you had the defenders of their home. There was no possibility of reconciliation between these two parties.


    Either the invaders would defeat the natives and be the world¡¯s new rulers, or the native defenders would exterminate everyst invader and defend their sovereignty. There were no other possibilities apart from these two!


    That was why the Adept¡¯s Association was forced to use its hidden aces in the face of these ferocious disaster creatures. It mobilizedrge armies of magical constructs and metal golems.


    Of course, the Adept¡¯s Association was notparable to the Silver Union in this particr aspect.


    The main reason why the Silver Union chose to nt its roots in the continent¡¯s eastern area was that most of the Continent of Adepts¡¯ rare ores could be found there. It was able to excavate the ores, refine them, and forge them onsite, giving rise to an awe-inspiring empire of golems.


    In the face of the magic surge, all the major organizations were being extremely cautious. A single misstep on their part would cause hordes of magical creatures to swarm the human kingdoms under their management, thereby weakening the foundation and future of the organization.


    Only the Silver Union was an exception. Its military forces were overwhelmingly powerful. It mobilized armies of golems to fight directly against the ck Forest rulers and kept the unending stampedes blockaded at the edges of the ck Forest.


    If it weren¡¯t for the fact that the golem armies could not fight away from the energy pools, the Silver Union would have stormed the ck Forest with their golems and exterminated every single one of those magical creature rulers.


    The invasions in Silver Union territory were also quickly and effectively suppressed by the mighty golem armies. Only a few small waves had rippled throughout theirnds. With the golem armies keeping guard, the otherworldy invaders could not gain any ground against the tide of animated constructs.


    The might of the Silver Union couldn¡¯t be more obvious!


    However, while the magical golems made them powerful, the golems also held them back!


    The golem armies were truly unstoppable and dominating. However, they were too big, too heavy, and too slow. As a defensive force, the golem armies were supported by an endless energy supply and proper transport lines. Thus, they were able to unleash devasting destruction on their enemies.


    However, upon leaving Silver Union territory, they would lose the numerous skyships that transported them and the countless energy pools scattered across thend. They would be much, much weaker!


    The Adept¡¯s Association was thergest adept organization in the World of Adepts. In overall power, it was superior to the other two major organizationsbined. However, their magical construct technology was inferiorpared to the Silver Union.


    They did not have the Silver Union¡¯s outstanding magical-statue forging technology, nor the same abundance of ores. The Adept¡¯s Association could not create their own army of magical statues. They could only use the more simple animated-armor warriors.


    These constructs were called ¡®warriors,¡¯ but they werepletely hollow inside. They were only metal armors that had undergone magical treatment and been animated. They could wagebat based on the will of the adepts.


    These magical-armor warriors were loyal, fearless, and easy to use.


    They had only one terrible weakness¨C insufficient defense!


    The magical statues created by the Silver Union were all solid metal golems of exceptional weight. These statues had arms that were a full meter thick. Even without weapons, the fists of these statues were as destructive as siege hammers.


    On the other hand, the animated armors were hollow. It saved on a lot of material costs, but it also made them exponentially weaker in defense.


    Under ordinary circumstances, the Adept¡¯s Association preferred to mobilize armies of voodoo beasts during nar wars. The animated armors served a better role as defenders of their adept towers.


    However, voodoo beasts were extremely susceptible to the corruption of powerful Scourge Lords. The Association had no choice but to relegate the voodoo beasts to the sidelines and use these animated-armor warriors as their vanguard.


    After the adepts¡¯ devastating assault, the mutated beasts that appeared from the other side of the spatial rift stopped swarming out of the valley. The disaster creatures restrained them and kept waiting in the depths of the mist. They silently anticipated the moment the principle chains around the spatial rift broke.


    The World of Adepts was arge world, after all. It contained a shocking number of powerful adepts. When all these adepts gathered together, the disaster creatures that had ravaged so many nar worlds were no match.


    After all, they were the invaders here. The narws continually suppressed them, stopping them from utilizing their full power. Otherwise, a ridiculous incident like a Fourth Grade adept ying a Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lord would never have happened.


    The low-grade disaster creatures might not fear death, but the high-grade ones were just as smart and self-aware as any other intelligent race. They highly-valued their lives. They were eager toe when there were benefits to be gained. On the flip side of that coin, they became fearful the moment they discovered the presence of a powerful individual capable of killing them.


    These minor Scourge Lords, who were all Fifth Grade creatures in actuality, were like gluttonous bears that lusted after the honey in the hive on a tree. If there were only bees up there, they would dive right in for a feast, even if it meant getting stung a little bit.


    If there was a poisonous and potentially lethal snake lying in wait inside the hive, then it wasn¡¯t quite worth it to lose their lives over a few handfuls of honey.


    The four minor Scourge Lords who had returned to the bottom of the valley were now in an awkward position.


    Continuing their invasion wasn¡¯t a good choice. There were so many powerful adepts gathered up there. Even minor Scourge Lords like themselves couldn¡¯t deal with the constant pressure of so many mighty individuals. Retreating wasn¡¯t an option either. Their leader, the Sixth Grade Scourge Lord Dilmas, was waiting out there.


    If they returned without results, Dilmas would almost certainly devour one of them alive to punish them for their cowardice and failure!


    In a position like this one, the four minor Scourge Lords could only summonrge numbers of mutated beasts from their own worlds. They hoped to defend the valley in this manner and wait until the principle chains around space finally loosened.


    As for rushing into a fight with the adepts? As long as the legendary fire adept remained at the valley entrance, doing so would be no different than suicide.


    That said, the fire adept was too massive. There was no chance of him squeezing his way into the valley. Without his overwhelming support, any of the other ultra-powerhouses that entered the valley would face the unified attacks of four minor Scourge Lords.


    If the stalemate continued like this, they would continue to corrupt the spatial chains here and might be able to buy time until the spatial rift could tolerate the power of Fifth Grades.


    When that moment arrived, the four minor Scourge Lords would be able to unleash all their power; they would certainly be able to ravage the World of Adepts uncontested. Those so-called adept powerhouses could only hide in their adept towers and tremble in fear.


    When that happened, the major adept organizations could achieve little more than self-preservation. All their territories and resource sites would be lost to the disaster creatures.


    If such a scenario urred, the various major organizations would pull their final trumps cards and beg all the Great Adepts to return from the depths of space to aid them, no matter the cost.


    It was an unknown if the Great Adepts who had left the World of Adepts and cut most connections would be willing to return and help, risking their lives in the process.


    Even if the Great Adepts were willing to help, their powers would be limited to the same level as the Scourge Lords while they were inside the World of Adepts. It was another uncertainty if they would be able to repel the Scourge Lords¡¯ invasion.


    It was precisely because both sides had reasons that prevented them from stepping back that an unusually bloody battle broke out.


    ............


    The first army of a thousand animated armors was exterminated in just half a day after being sent into Inkdeep Valley.


    Tens of thousands of mutated beasts swarmed the valley, all squeezed next to each other. It almost seemed like the valley had turned into a sea of monsters.


    The animated-armor warriors were only able to advance five hundred meters before they were sealed above the slope by the mutated beasts. The two forces fought a violent battle there. In the end, the mutated beasts wiped out the armors after losing fifty thousand of their number.


    However, just as the first magical armor unit was wiped out, the second magical armor unit stepped across the bloody and muddy ground. They rushed onto the slope of death, sweeping aside the tattered corpses of mutated beasts and fragments of armor in the way.


    This time, they a squad of a hundred adepts followed them. All of them were elementium adepts.


    When the second unit of a thousand animated-armors shed with the mutated beasts, an intense and terrifying elementium fluctuation arose from behind. A storm of elementium magic then devastated the frontlines of the battle.


    Lightning storms that seemed as if they would split the world apart, sharp earth spears that stabbed up from below, vortices with des of wind, swords of snow and ice that descended from the skies, clouds of poison that filled the air.


    The adepts did not avoid the animated armors with their attacks, but they did throw them where the mutated beasts were most concentrated.


    Where the violent spells erupted, even the animated armors and their magically reinforced bodies of steels were torn apart, let alone the mutated beasts and their bodies of flesh and blood.


    Hordes of mutated beasts fell on the frontlines. The violent magic ripped the corpses to shreds until they were reduced to unrecognizable bs of meat and puddles of blood. The valley slope, having gorged on the blood and flesh of countless monsters, was then ttened by iron feet. It quickly became exceptionally slick and slippery.


    However, none of this stopped the two different worlds¡¯ cannon fodder from running fearlessly to their deaths!


    The next wave of mutated beasts surged forward, trampling on countless corpses to tackle the animated armors. Waves of violent magic rained from the skies and turned the battlefield into a cruel ughterhouse.


    The adepts pushed down the slope with their magic, bit by bit, supported by the ever sturdy and reliable animated-armor warriors.

 Chapter 1417 - InChapter By Inch

    Chapter 1417 Inch By Inch


    Naturally, the disaster creatures wouldn¡¯t let the adepts push into the bottom of the valley so easily.


    If that happened, the mutated beasts would no longer be able to cover for them; they would have no choice but to engage the adepts in battle.


    The mutated beasts swarmed out of the valley¡¯s various spots in an even more insane fashion, surging toward the adept forces like a tide.


    Hordes of mutated beasts were stopping the advance of the animated armors on the ground using their bodies of flesh and blood. Meanwhile, numerous mutated beasts were scaling both cliffs before lunging at the adepts on the backlines from every direction.


    The adepts standing in the front waved their hands immediately. A screen of light was cast into the air as several gigantic animated constructs and golems were summoned.


    Compared to the animated armors, these war golems were made out of solid steel and stood over a dozen meters tall. They took on humanoid forms, or those of various animals and magical creatures, each of them possessing fearsome techniques for ughter and murder.


    They were like walls of steel, keeping out the mutated beasts that flooded in from every direction. They waved their swords and shed their way into the mess of limbs and bodies.


    Mutated beasts leaped from the cliffs and snapped their jaws onto the war golems¡¯ giant bodies. Their fangs and sharp ws scratched against the golems¡¯ metal bodies, creating a jarring, squeaking sound. However, they could only leave behind thin, shallow white marks.


    These war golems were outfitted with half-meter-long sharp razors all over their bodies. They didn¡¯t even need to engage the beasts. All they had to do was walk past the mutated beasts to be leaving behind a trail of chopped-up bodies.


    Bodies made of flesh and blood were no match for steel, after all!


    Still, even ants would be able to bite an elephant to death in sufficient numbers. As the mutated beasts continued to lunge forth without hesitation, war golems¡¯ razors continued to slice up beast after beast, tearing through their bones and tendons. The des gradually started to grow blunt.


    Finally, these razor des began to bend and snap. Some of the edges even got stuck on the rigid bones and skulls of the mutated beasts.


    The war golems that lost their weapons were soon put down by the mutated beasts. The monsters quickly gathered into a swelling mass of bodies. The pile of flesh was the result of hundreds upon thousands of mutated beasts stacked upon each other. At the very bottom of the pile were the war golems slowly being torn apart.


    A short momentter, when the mutated beasts scattered and rushed at their next target, the badly mutted remains of the war golems were finally revealed.


    The death of every war golem was apanied by the deaths of thousands of mutated beasts. The smell of blood and death filled the entire battlefield. Moreover, the stench grew thicker until it was so dense that it would suffocate an ordinary man.


    Inkdeep Valley was not just a bloody battlefield between adepts and disaster creatures. It was also a battlefield for the two differentws of two nar worlds.


    The World of Adepts could notpare to the World of Disasters in size or grade. However, as this was the World of Adepts, thews here possessed a sizeable advantage.


    The forces of order and chaos shed and tore at each other in the intangible space between worlds. Like two gargantuan squids, the first to sh before their bodies were the numerous tentacles around them.


    The two worlds fought with their principles as the main body and the narws as their appendages, wildly tearing and devouring each other. They tried to extend their principle chains further into their opponent¡¯s space.


    nar space was their battlefield, the principle chains were their weapons, and thews were their des. These conflicts and battles urred over every inch of air and internar space across Inkdeep Valley.


    Overall, the World of Adepts was slowly pushing back. Its narws had started to regain control over the space surrounding Inkdeep Valley, gradually pushing the disaster power back to the bottom of the valley.


    Once they were there, the disaster power became exceptionally tough and resilient. Supported by the souls of the minor Scourge Lords, the disaster power was able to defend its spot firmly. It left no vulnerabilities for the World of Adepts¡¯ consciousness to seep through.


    As long as that consciousness was unable to gain control over the area, that ce would remain as a scar on the World of Adept¡¯s nar barrier. As long as Sixth Grade Scourge Lord Dilmas continuously sent disaster power into the rift, a massive hole would one day open up, allowing an individual as powerful as him to project his power into the world.


    When that happened, no force in the entire World of Adepts would be able to stop a Sixth Grade creature from going on a rampage!


    Greem stood silently at the valley entrance, quietly sensing the turns and fluctuations of the narws.


    These things were usually hidden behind the scenes, away from his meddlesome eyes and senses. However, it was a crucial moment of conflict between the two world powers. Greem was blessed by the nar consciousness for being one of its mainbatants in this war. There was no retaliation to his soul consciousness for the act of peeking at the functions of thews.


    It gave Greem a rare opportunity to witness the world powers at work!


    World power was something that waspletely beyond Greem¡¯sprehension and understanding at the moment. He could probably only begin to research it once he had advanced to Sixth Grade.


    However, world powers were still a form of power even greater and more majestic than the principle powers. Greem obtained tremendous inspiration just by witnessing the world powers sh. At the very least, byparing the principle power he currently possessed and with the world powers before him, Greem was vaguely able to see the correct path of development moving forward.


    The world powers were like lighthouses that had been erected infinitely beyond the horizon. Greem might not have the strength and ability to grasp this power yet, but it had revealed to him the most primal and raw state of the universe.


    This tiny bit of revtion would allow Greem to make fewer mistakes on his path down the development of principles. That was what Greem valued the most!


    Principle powers were powerful forces generated when a nar world moved ording to certain fixed and uniform systems. World power was a sort of primordial energy gathered through the countless lifeforms and substances within a ne.


    An adept that had obtained control ofw powers was like a tumor growing on the principle system. They could gain power by drawing on thews and could even leverage them to attack their enemies.


    Fourth Grade adepts were like macrophage cells in the body of the World of Adepts. They were typically cared for by the nar consciousness and grew stronger by absorbingw powers. Should a nar invasion ur, they would be the main forces used by the World of Adepts to repel the invaders. They were the first line of defense.


    An individual like Greem had transcended the limits ofws andpleted the evolution to principles at the level of his soul, yet he remained at Fourth Grade. He was aplete oddity in the World of Adepts.


    That was why he was able to gain more inspiration and experience by watching the battle between these two world powers than any other adept.


    As the ace of the World of Adepts, Greem was also continually influenced by the nar consciousness on the principle level. For some reason, a genuine hatred and disgust for the disaster creatures would rise in the depths of Greem¡¯s consciousness. It was almost as if there was some unresolvable grudge between them.


    Fortunately, after all these years of contact with the world consciousness, Greem had gained a better understanding of its abilities and means.


    Greem consciously filtered out these consciousness fragments being stuffed into his mind. They were slowly submerged to the depths of his consciousness and could no longer affect his real senses and feelings.


    However, thanks to these means of influencing the consciousness, Greem was able to uncover more applications of the principle powers.


    If he could use his fire principle in as subtle a fashion as the nar consciousness influenced individuals, his fire¡¯s power would certainly increase even further. It would be incredibly dangerous and terrifying then.


    Greem left all the fighting to the Adept¡¯s Association after pushing the disaster creatures back into Inkdeep Valley. Top-ss adepts like Greem only needed to stay on the backlines, resting as they waited for the final decisive battle.


    Meanwhile, the other Fourth Grade adepts took turns to go into battle. They regrly assaulted the valley and wore down the forces of the disaster creatures.


    Unfortunately, the four minor Scourge Lords seemed to have vanished entirely. They hid at the bottom of the valley and refused to show themselves. It increasingly frustrated the Association, but there was nothing they could do but pile on the offense against the disaster creatures.


    On the slope, the battle raged on. Tons of blood and corpses soaked and filled every inch of ground and square of earth. Inkdeep Valley was a living hell at this point. There were so many bodies that you could not find stable footing nor see straight without obstruction.


    The victoryst time had clearly encouraged the Fourth Grade adepts. They were no longer as fearful as before. Now they fought with high spirits on the frontlines every day, hunting down one powerful disaster creature after another.


    The Central adepts were also encouraged by their sess and couldn¡¯t help but join in on more and more battles to obtain more and more results. They saw this as a result of their sudden spout of courage and their own independent decision-making for the benefit of the World of Adepts.


    However, as a third party, Greem could clearly see that their souls had all been influenced by the world consciousness to varying degrees.


    Their actions were only beneficial to Greem¡¯s ns, so he did not intervene at all. He only protected the Central adepts slightly with his powers when they became too rash in their attacks.


    At the very least, the minor Scourge Lords hiding at the bottom of the valley didn¡¯t dare emerge to ambush the Central adepts while Greem was carefully observing the battles. As for the adepts from the other organizations? Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered about them.


    He wasn¡¯t nice enough to help clean up the other organizations¡¯ mess!

 Chapter 1418 - The Elderly Adept’s Suggestion

    Chapter 1418 The Elderly Adept¡¯s Suggestion


    Suddenly, Greem understood why the Great Adepts were so out of tune with the nar consciousness.


    At the Great Adept level, the former mystery and majesty of the nar worlds vanished without a trace. Even something as massive as the nar consciousness was no more than a subject of a Great Adept¡¯s curiosity and research.


    The Great Adepts had their own self-consciousness. Naturally, they refused to be influenced and controlled by a nar consciousness like puppets on a string. Their powerful and resilient Spirits had been developed to the limits of a world, allowing them to resist the influence of the nar consciousness.


    More importantly, the power they had gathered within them had grown toorge. The principle powers they wielded were also enough to affect the world deeply. When such powerful existences remained in a ne, it was not a blessing for that nar world. In fact, on most asions, these individuals became the most significant burden on a ne world.


    Consequently, Great Adepts and the world consciousness of the World of Adepts were like a quarreling couple. The Great Adepts were incredibly powerful but were limited by the principles of the ne; they did not dare exert too much force in their actions. Meanwhile, the world consciousness was like a nagging wife, always hovering at their ears and telling them what they couldn¡¯t and shouldn¡¯t do. Over time, it was only natural that neither could stand the presence of the other.


    The Great Adepts were forced to leave for the realms beyond and cut off most of the connection with their homeworld. A nar consciousness could only continue sustaining the principle system¡¯s various functions across a giant nar world after these problematic elements had been weeded out.


    Following this line of thought, Greem figured that the nar consciousness¡¯ blessing over him would notst for long.


    The World of Adepts currently faced the threat of the magic surge. It desperately needed a powerful aide that could help it repel the invasion of these foreign civilizations. That was why its rtionship with Greem was in the honeymoon phase- so intimate that others were jealous to see it.


    However, once the foreign threat had been resolved, overly powerful individuals like Greem would be a thorn in the nar consciousness¡¯ side. It would most certainly employ every means possible to force him out of the ne. If Greem held back and kept a low profile, this banishment process would be long and gentle.


    If Greem didn¡¯t show restraint and did as he liked by leveraging the favor of the nar consciousness, then this banishment process would be violent and intense. It might even affect and involve the people that Greem trusted and cared for.


    Such a process would happen in the World of Adepts once every few hundred years.


    Thest time it happened, Great Adept Sarubo of the Central Lands had been banished. He had also been the first Great Adept that Greem hade into contact with.


    Greem had been somewhat surprised and curious as to the Sarubo n¡¯s situation. After all, an incredible prodigy such as Sarubo was the one who founded the n. The n should be incredibly influential and powerful! However, his experiences over the years had taught him that the Sarubo n¡¯s position in the Central Lands was very shaky. They only barely lived up to their name as a mid-sized n.


    Greem did not know much about the past situation and could not really understand why this was the case.


    He finally figured it out now. The reason for the Sarubo n¡¯s situation was probably because of fierce suppression by the nar consciousness.


    Moreover, Greem¡¯s appearance as a foreign soul that had traveled through the universe tond in the Sarubo n wasn¡¯t exactly a coincidence either! It was another means the world consciousness used to further divide and weaken the Sarubo n¡¯s forces!


    Given that to be the case, Greem¡¯s subtle rise to power and ultimate division with the Sarubo n might have been influenced and aided by the nar consciousness behind the scenes.


    However, Greem was now growing at a pace so fast that it unnerved the nar consciousness. Perhaps it would begin dividing and suppressing Greem¡¯s forces soon.


    It was precisely due to the heights at which he was standing that Greem could see further than any ordinary adept could dream of. In doing so, the nar consciousness lost its mystery in his eyes. Instead, it had be a potential hostile in the future.


    That was why Greem appeared so ipatible with the zealous atmosphere around him. While the other adepts were excitedly repelling the disaster creatures¡¯ invasion, Greem was cautiously calcting all the potential risks and gains of his situation.


    The disaster aura was slowly being pushed back.


    It coiled around the bottom of the valley, gathering in greater strength and struggling with all its might to break through the World of Adepts consciousness¡¯ suppression. Even the four minor Scourge Lords were starting to get restless. They slowly moved toward the frontlines.


    A decisive final battle was on the horizon!


    At this very moment, Greem frowned. He faintly sensed a hint of danger.


    Right as he patted his chest and prepared to transform into a me giant, a familiar and elderly figure suddenly appeared above the valley.


    ¡°No need to be concerned, kid. I¡¯m not here to pick a fight with you this time!¡±


    A familiar elderly face, familiar robes, familiar wizard¡¯s hat, and that familiar principle aura- it was that mysterious adept that had picked a fight with Greem once before!


    He was still wearing the same outfit, except his aura did not appear to be as stable as before. From this alone, Greem was sure that this elderly adept was no more than the projected clone of a Great Adept.


    The Great Adept hovered in the air and reached his head over to look down the valley. When he sensed the dense disaster aura on the four minor Scourge Lords, a cold and cruel smile couldn¡¯t help but spread over his face.


    ¡°Hey, kid, why don¡¯t we do business. If I help you deal with these monsters, could you give me the heart of that many-armed giant?¡±


    ¡°The heart of the many-armed giant?¡± Greem repeated the question curiously.


    The elderly adept was as tiny to him as a bug. It almost seemed like Greem could crush him with just a swat of his palm. However, Greem could sense overwhelming magic energy in that man¡¯s body of an intensity he had never seen before.


    The principle battle fromst time seemed to have exhausted too much of his Spirit. Consequently,manding this ridiculous amount of magic energy was like dragging an overloaded cart with a pony. The magic energy had be incredibly vtile and active.


    ¡°Indeed! There are four monsters down there. The many-armed giant and the ten-headed ghoul are Fifth Grades in actuality, while the winged serpent drake and the dust elemental are only Fourth Grade. It would be difficult to hunt down even one of them in space, even with thebined force of all the adepts in this world, let alone exterminate all of them,¡± The elderly adept chuckled coldly. ¡°Since they¡¯ve done us the favor ofing into the World of Adepts now, I say we take this opportunity of their weakness to keep them here forever.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s two Fifth Grades and two Fourth Grades!¡± Greem was a little speechless. ¡°They might be significantly weakened, but it¡¯s impossible to kill everyst one of them. My offensive power might be enough, but my defense is incrediblycking. If I rush down there and they pile on me, I will probably be dismembered in just two rounds of attacks!¡±


    The elderly adept continued chuckling.


    ¡°No shit. I¡¯m only willing to work with you on ount of that powerful Fifth Grade divine fire spell of yours. As I¡¯m sure you¡¯ve figured out by now, this is only an elementium clone I have projected into the World of Adepts. It can onlyst in this world for another six months if it doesn¡¯t die here today. So, while this perfect opportunity is in front of us, I¡¯ll rush in and blow myself up in the middle of all of them. Given that Ipletely sucked out all the magic energy from three adept towers earlier, it will be a pleasant surprise for them.


    ¡°When that happens, the minor Scourge Lords will be heavily crippled, if not just dead. Given your powers, you should have no problem hunting down one or two of them. I don¡¯t want much else but the heart of that many-armed giant. The rest of the spoils can belong to you. How about that? These conditions are appealing enough, aren¡¯t they?¡±


    ¡°Hss!¡±


    Greem drew in a breath of cold air. He couldn¡¯t help but take two steps back with his giant body. He looked at the elderly adept like he was looking at a monster. The muscles of his face twitched unstoppably.


    No wonder his energy aura seemed so unstable. A mere peak Fourth Grade elementium clone had gone ahead and absorbed all the magic energy from three adept towers and was barely constraining them within his tiny body.


    This old adept was probably more of a monster than those minor Scourge Lords down there in the valley!


    Moreover, the reason for him having turned himself into such a horrifying elementium bomb was definitely not as simple as he imed. If he hadn¡¯t chanced on a prey he wanted, if he hadn¡¯t wanted to get his hands on the heart of the many-armed giant, then his n had probably been to blow himself up along with Greem.


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but break out in cold sweat at this thought. Once again, he had experienced the Great Adepts¡¯ creative and unrestrained ways of doing things.


    ¡°Yes or no. Just give me an answer! This body of mine can¡¯t hold on for much longer,¡± The elderly adept said impatiently. ¡°Heheh, I¡¯m sure you know the consequences of rejecting me!¡±


    Greem could only negotiate helplessly, ¡°Give me one more day. I need to prepare a few things! We will strike one day from now!¡±


    ¡°Very well, one day it shall be! As we agreed, once I blow up, you will keep the heart of the many-armed giant. I wille find you and retrieve it after this is all settled.¡±


    The space around the adept warped strangely. He vanished without a trace.


    The entire conversation was clean and concise, and the adept¡¯s invisibility power was oddly powerful. It resembled a spell and an innate ability at the same time, yet it did not radiate even a hint of elementium. If it weren¡¯t for the senses between the principle powers, even Greem would have trouble detecting his presence.


    Since they were going to strike at the disaster creatures, Greem really did have to make a few preparations. Moreover, it was best to pull back the Fourth Grades of the Central Lands before they struck, to prevent any coteral damage.


    These individuals were all the Central Lands had. After everything they had been through, they were finally starting to acknowledge Greem as their leader. If possible, it was best not to use them as cannon fodder!


    Greem thought to himself.

 Chapter 1419 - A Terrifying Explosion

    Chapter 1419 A Terrifying Explosion


    The battle at the bottom of Inkdeep Valley raged on.


    The elderly adept made it sound like he wouldn¡¯t care about any coteral damage inflicted in the process. But when he faded away, he seemed to have notified the Silver Union of his ns somehow. Vice-Chairman Melone of the Silver Union thought about the strategy for a long time. In the end, he decided to ry the information to the Adept¡¯s Association and the Northern Witches.


    All four major organizations active on the battlefield obtained the same information. They began to subtly bait the disaster creatures out from the bottom of the valley.


    The Central adepts felt lucky when they learned of the ns.


    It was fortunate that a legendary fire adept had appeared in the Central Lands, thereby earning them the other organizations¡¯ respect. Otherwise, if they had been kept in the dark about this destructive n, it was very likely the other three organizations would have tricked them onto the frontlines and sacrificed them along with those minor Scourge Lords.


    At this moment, they could truly feel how great it was to be backed by a powerful adept!


    After the past few days of working together, their disapproval of Greem had been reced by a different kind of fear and respect. Greem¡¯s status in their minds was rising with each passing day.


    If it weren¡¯t for that, they would have already panicked upon learning the final battle was about to ur. How could they have fought and retreated in such a calm manner while slowly baiting all the enemies at the bottom of the valley to the entrance?


    A single day passed in the blink of an eye. Scorched Earth, the Fifth Grade divine fire spell sealed within the Orb of the Fire God, was finally recharged!


    ............


    Due to theck of further reinforcements, the Adept¡¯s Association finally began to falter at the frontlines.


    After the mutated beasts destroyed the sixth unit of animated armors, the Adept¡¯s Association had no choice but to send in the voodoo beasts again.


    That gave the disaster creatures a chance to make aeback.


    The ten-headed ghoul was the most challenging creature to deal with of the four minor Scourge Lords.


    The principle power he possessed was the repulsive Mind gue. It could transmit disaster power to every creature¡¯s mind through the principle level whilepletely ignoring magic resistance.


    If his power had not been suppressed, he could even directly corrupt a beginner Third Grade adept. Of course, the low-grade adepts and voodoo beasts were even more vulnerable to him.


    Upon seeing therge armies of voodoo beasts swarm forward, Ten-Headed Ghoul Mugus showed no fear. Instead, he excitedly rushed ahead. Arge horde of the voodoo beasts was instantly engulfed by the terrifying principle aura and copsed to the ground as a painful and evil transformation began.


    In just thirty seconds, these voodoo beasts whose minds had been gued by the disaster aura quickly turned into mutated beasts. The object of their loyalty also switched from the human adepts to the high-grade disaster creatures.


    The Adept¡¯s Association had thrown over a hundred thousand voodoo beasts into the fray this time, and nearly thirty thousand of them had been corrupted by Mugus in a single move. In doing so, the battle at the bottom of Inkdeep Valley turned around immediately.


    They had sacrificed so much to gain one and a half kilometers of ground. They were only a mere step away from the bottom of the valley now. Yet now, the disaster creatures chose to retaliate with their full might.


    The mutated beasts and the newly turned voodoo beasts erupted like a ck and red flood under the orders of the Scourge Lords. They surged out of the valley quickly andshed out at the war towers that had just been reconstructed.


    Meanwhile, the voodoo beast army that had just rushed into the valley was instantly surrounded and besieged by enemies numerous times their number. They were trapped and barely hanging on amidst the countless numbers of mutated beasts. Meanwhile, the human adepts following behind the voodoo beasts were sly as foxes. They had turned to run the moment something seemed off. Almost all of them managed to take shelter in the closest war towers.


    The war returned to its original state. Therge hordes of mutated beasts crashed against the human adepts¡¯ formations like a rolling tide, causing a greatmotion in the area surrounding the valley.


    The four minor Scourge Lords also disappeared into the hordes of mutated beasts as they silently snuck their way toward Greem.


    Right now, the individual they feared the most among the adepts was this legendary fire adept. That was why, before the decisive battle broke out, their foremost priority was getting rid of this fire adept.


    Unexpectedly, the gigantic fire adept did not put up his Burning Domain. Instead, he slowly retreated backward. Even when he finally detected the minor Scourge Lords, he simply got on one knee and raised both his arms, putting up two principle barriers that barely obscured his figure.


    One barrier was put up by the Tome of Corruption, while the Orb of the Fire God erected the other.


    The power of the two artifacts added together increased Greem¡¯s defensive power in that one direction by a hundredfold!


    What was the legendary fire adept doing? He seemed to be...shielding himself from something? Could it be...?


    The four minor Scourge Lords abruptly realized something was wrong.


    They turned around and were horrified to see an elderly adept hovering above the valley entrance, smiling and waving at them. The adept was dressed in a simple robe, tightened at the waist by a hemp rope. He had a wizard¡¯s hat on his head, a staff in his hand, and looked just like a schr.


    The next second, violent magic energy of extreme intensity erupted from the elderly adept¡¯s body. It blew apart the adept¡¯s body like a raging sun, rising into the sky with endless heat and light.


    It was almost as if a dozen bombs had exploded around him, or if a miniature sun had just popped up from the horizon. The temperature surrounding Inkdeep Valley instantly increased by a million degrees. Moreover, as the magic energy continued to ravage the environment, the temperature continued to rise rapidly.


    Everything not protected by magic within one and a half kilometers of the adept¡¯s explosion disintegrated the moment the energy shockwaves touched them. They were shredded into tiny particles and dust invisible to the naked eye.


    The earth closest to the epicenter rapidly withered and cracked. The dirt and sand vaporized and vanished without a trace. The exposed bedrock also started to melt like snow under a ring sun, until over a dozen meters of the bedrock had disappeared.


    The red and ck torrents of mutated beasts that had filled the valley turned to ashes from the insane heat. Energy shockwaves blew the ashes away and scattered them across dozens of kilometers.


    Greem crawled into a ball and expanded his principle barriers as much as possible, just barely protecting himself from the shockwaves by doing so. Loud crackling and popping came from his shields, as frequent as raindrops in a storm. Numerous holes had appeared on his principle barriers, even as sturdy and robust as they were. The light of principles flickered unsteadily.


    Greem was already using all his power to resist the might of the elderly adept¡¯s explosion. He had only barely survived the shockwaves due to the aid of his two Fifth Grade divine items.


    Meanwhile, the four minor Scourge Lords who stuck between Greem and the explosion suffered tragedy!


    Of the two Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lords, the many-armed giant was of a rtively small size and had excellent resilience and magic resistance. Upon seeing things turn sour, he had turned over and crawled into a ball, shielding his head with his hands and using his back to endure the st.


    Though he suffered terrible injuries all the same, he managed to survive the explosion with no risk of death.


    After the first round of energy shockwaves, a thickyer of the skin on his back was very obviously shaved off. His tall and majestic body was now skinned and bloody. You could even faintly see the scorched internal organs in his body through the burnt flesh.


    The other Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lord¨Cthe ten-headed ghoul¨Cwas powerful because of his corrupting abilities. His defensive powers were naturally far weaker than the many-armed giant, who was a physical fighter. The damage that the energy shockwaves inflicted on him was exceedingly horrible.


    The intense temperatures, the terrifying energy shockwaves, and the fearsome radiation- any of these would be enough to leave him gasping for air, let alone all of thembined.


    If the Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lords were suffering so, then it was only natural that the peak Fourth Grade minor Scourge Lords were doing even worse!


    If it weren¡¯t for their outstanding Physique, the explosion of the elderly adept alone would have been enough to kill them.


    The fearsome heat burned their bodies bright-red, the terrible shockwaves peeled the scales and hair off their bodies, and the horrifying radiation caused their skin to rot and fall apart. Blisters and dark spots appeared all over their bodies.


    Their eyeballs had swelled and exploded due to the heat. Their bodies had been skinned, revealing their blistering skin for all to see. The two of them rolled on the ground in agony, their exposed flesh sizzling when they came into contact with the equally red-hot ground.


    Even the seven war towers closest to the explosion had melted like candles under the energy tide, let alone these exposed disaster creatures.


    Naturally, the adepts inside had not survived!


    After enduring that energy st¡¯s most ferocious wave, Greem put away his damaged principle barriers, exposing his injured body. As he stood up, the seven Central adepts hiding behind him were revealed.


    Ker, Alfred, Den, Matthew, Nics, Ariza, Roderick- elementium barriers of various colors surrounded them. They lifted their heads and surveyed the devastated battlefield. Their eyes instantlynded on the four terribly injured minor Scourge Lords.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The explosion had cleansed the entire battlefield; no other living creature remained. Not a single thing was within sight, apart from the four minor Scourge Lords.


    Usually, the Central adepts would flee upon seeing such powerful minor Scourge Lords. At this moment, their gaze was only filled with endless greed and unconceble excitement.


    Strike while they were down!


    Fight!


    Several battlecries containing tremendous bloodlines rang out at the same time. Ker and the others took to the air without hesitation and charged forward with unstoppable momentum.

 Chapter 1420 - Chaotic Melee

    Chapter 1420 Chaotic Melee


    Courage and guts. Who would¡¯ve thought these things would appear in the Central adepts?


    Such a suggestion would have been a hrious joke in the past. However, this ¡®joke¡¯ hade true on this bloody and cruel nar battlefield.


    Ker and the other Central adepts who had achieved this ¡®miracle¡¯ were oblivious to what they had just done. All they could think about at the moment was how to ravage this prey before them with their most violent and savage spells.


    Indeed, these terrifying monsters that once resided in their nightmares had now be their prey. All they had to do was tear off a piece of flesh from the bloody bodies of those disaster creatures, and their great and mighty feats would be recorded in the historical records of the World of Adepts.


    It was a sort of glory, a form of belief, that provided the Central adepts with endless courage and motivation as they lunged at the grievously injured minor Scourge Lords.


    ¡°Bastards...you ants...how dare you harm my body. I will make you pay the price,¡± The ten-headed ghoul Mugus let out a berserk roar. Thick ck smoke scattered from his slime-like body, countless ghosts howling and shrieking as they thrashed within the smoke.


    These terrifying ghosts screeched and broke free of the smoke, swarming at the adepts under his instructions.


    ¡°Mother of light, haven of fire!¡± Greem boomed in a loud voice like an ancient fire-giant. He swung his hand and cast out a wave of light. It turned into dark red halos around the human adepts, perfectly enveloping their bodies.


    The ghosts running at the Central adepts turned into balls of me the moment they touched the halos. They screeched and howled horrifically, swerving left and right through the air. They clearly couldn¡¯t break free of the mes.


    Soon, the mes burned out their malice cores, and the ghosts vanished without a trace.


    These ghosts wereposed of Mugus¡¯ principle power. They could ignore all defense, corrupt any living creature, and even devour the flesh of his enemies. These ghosts were incredibly powerful and lethal weapons, even in space and the realms beyond.


    In the face of Greem¡¯s principle fire, even a Fifth Grade being like Mugus would have great difficulty forcibly corrupting these Fourth Grade adepts.


    As Mugus howled in anger, Ker and the others were already bombarding him with spells.


    Seal of Darkness!


    Infrasound Rupture!


    Water Dragon Rush!


    Nature¡¯s Wrath!


    Den¡¯s body glowed as hispanions provided cover fire. He rushed forward and started fighting this berserk ghoul to the death. Behind him, Ariza had transformed into a lion-headed human. He roared and followed after Den.


    Matthew, the weakest among them, summoned three Fourth Grade magical creatures and sent them forth to stall the other minor Scourge Lords.


    At the same time,rge groups of adepts from the Silver Union, the Northern Witches, and the Adept¡¯s Association poured out of the tower in the distance. They were rushing over as fast as they could.


    The minor Scourge Lords were severely wounded, but they weren¡¯t wholly incapacitated. Upon seeing the severity of the situation, they turned and hurried toward the valley. They couldn¡¯t be bothered to deal with the human adepts.


    They would only have the time and room to heal their injured bodies once they fled there and summoned more subordinates to cover for them. These injuries might look serious, but they were little more than flesh wounds. With enough time and sufficient energy, it wasn¡¯t too hard to recover.


    ¡°Focus your power on the serpentdrake. Ignore the ten-headed ghoul,¡± Greem quickly instructed his allies with a voice transmission. He himself strode over and stood in front of the many-armed giant that had been trying to sneak away.


    Ker and the others only realized the ten-headed ghoul¡¯s true terror once they started fighting it. They might be protected by Greem¡¯s principle fire and the nar consciousness¡¯s blessing, but the endless horde of ghosts were unstoppable. They were already starting to bite and tear at the Central adepts¡¯ bodies and injuring them.


    A Fifth Grade creature was Fifth Grade, after all!


    Greem could fight them to a standstill. Ordinary Fourth Grade adepts like them were not a match, even when they possessed superior numbers and the enemy was already injured.


    The difference in power couldn¡¯t be more obvious!


    The seven Central adepts had no choice but to give up on what seemed like the most delicious prey. They turned their focus onto the equally wounded winged serpentdrake.


    The serpentdrake was only a peak Fourth Grade minor Scourge Lord. It was powerful, but the best it could do was defend itself against a whole bunch of Central adepts. It had no room to run.


    ¡°Mugus, help me! I will give you half my wealth once we escape,¡± the serpentdrake endured the barrage of fearsome spells with its tattered body as it shrieked to itspanion for help.


    However, its heart soon plunged into the icy depths. Ten-Headed Ghoul Mugus sprinted toward the entrance of the valley without turning back.


    Three human adepts hadnded at the entrance. It was evident that they intended to cut off the minor Scourge Lords¡¯ escape route.


    There had never been any trust or friendship between the disaster creatures; they were only subordinates of the Sixth Grade Scourge Lord Dilmas. There was plenty of rivalry andpetition amongst them, and these were times of crisis. Naturally, it was every disaster creature for themselves. No one would ever put their lives on the line for another.


    The four minor Scourge Lords were instantly split up and intercepted by the major adept organizations.


    Greem took on the many-armed giant, Ker and the seven Central adepts stopped the serpentdrake, and the three ultra-powerhouses of the Association intercepted the ten-headed ghoul at the entrance of the valley. The Northern Witches managed to reach the only remaining dust elemental first and quickly surrounded it.


    Inparison, the Silver Union forces that consisted only of golem masters and puppet masterscked mobility. They were so slow that they didn¡¯t manage to corner even a single minor Scourge Lord for themselves.


    Silver Union Vice-Senate Head Melone was so furious seeing the other organizations steal all the prey that he almost couldn¡¯t resist taking the serpentdrake from the Central adepts.


    However, upon seeing Greem¡¯s gigantic, mighty body¨Cand recalling that terrifying Fifth Grade divine fire spell¨CMelone¡¯s anger quickly subsided. He was left with nothing but sighs.


    At this point, he could only hope that the Central adepts would be incapable of taking down the peak Fourth Grade serpentdrake. That way, the Silver Union would have a chance of taking over. After watching from the sidelines for a while, Melone could only shake his head in disappointment. He turned and flew toward the bottom of the valley with the Silver Union adepts in tow. He was hoping to find some spoils of value there.


    The battle was still as intense and savage as ever!


    The human adepts might have the absolute advantage, but it was still challenging taking down these powerful minor Scourge Lords. Of course, if the human adepts had fought as fearlessly as warriors and epted a little sacrifice, the fighting would probably already be over.


    It was precisely because no one wanted to die and no one wanted to pay the price for hunting this prey that the battle ended up as a war of attrition.


    The battles against the peak Fourth Grade serpentdrake and the dust elemental went without a hitch. Everything was within the control of the adepts. Meanwhile, on the other two battlefields, the battle against the Fifth Grade many-armed giant and the ten-headed ghoul appeared to be incredibly risky.


    Fifth Grades were Fifth Grades, after all!


    Even after being blown halfway to their graves by the elderly adept, the two monsters¡¯ remaining power was still superior to the Fourth Grade adepts.


    The many-headed giant was five meters tall and glowed with a radiant, earth-yellow light. While his feet were connected with the ground, he could endlessly absorb earth elementium and form thick stone armor around his body.


    Meanwhile, countless muscr arms grew on both sides of his body, all of them creating stone spears and boulders to hurl at Greem.


    The many-armed giant¡¯s Strength was surprising. Even though Greem was several hundred timesrger than the giant, he was still weaker in Strength. The zing hand that Greem swung at the many-armed giant had been destroyed by the giant several times through sheer force. As such, the battle inevitably ended up at a certain range.


    Greem tossed a series of fire spells containing the Undying mes at the giant. If any of them were to hit the giant, they would burn until he died. The many-armed giant retaliated with giant boulders the size of hills. These boulders would explode into countless fragments when they hit Greem¡¯s body.


    This method of fighting inflicted serious damage to both parties.


    However, while the many-armed giant relied on his stone armor and imprable skin to defend against the mes, Greem defended with the principle barrier put up by the Tome of Corruption.


    After enduring severe damage, the many-armed giant¡¯s power was basically equal to Greem. Under such circumstances, the two pieces of Fifth Grade divine equipment in Greem¡¯s possession became the final straw that allowed him to crush his opponent.


    The many-armed giant that relied primarily on his own body was no match for the legendary fire adept wielding two divine items!


    More and more clusters of golden mes started to burn on the many-armed giant¡¯s wide-body, quickly spreading into an inferno. The psychological pressure of these gradually spreading fires caused the enemy to lose the courage and faith needed to continue the fight.


    Many-Armed Giant Zagu was observing his environment as he traded blows with Greem. He was searching for the perfect opportunity to slip away. Finally, while Greem was dealing with a barrage of fifteen boulders, Zagu raised all his arms and swung them down at the same time.


    Smashed by overwhelming strength, the earth cracked apart, and a giant pir of dust rose into the air. The many-armed giant¡¯s body quickly faded away into the dust.

 Chapter 1421 - Zagu Falls

    Chapter 1421 Zagu Falls


    ¡°Running?¡±


    Greem chuckled coldly.


    He lifted his thick right foot and stomped it fiercely into the ground. The earth itself trembled violently. Fine cracks spread outward from the point of impact for over a hundred meters.


    A series of cracking sounds could be heard as the web-like fractures radiated rapidly in every direction. Soon, they had extended for several kilometers.


    The ground undted as if made of water rather than earth. Several terrifying, bottomless gulfs appeared here and there. Meanwhile, loud rumbling could be heard underground, as if there was a massive dragon struggling and roaring down there. The earth swelled here and there and erupted.


    Greem¡¯s use of the fire principles drew violent and savageva out from underground. Theva quickly filled the fractures in the earth, its terrible heat and mes quickly turning the battlefield into a zing hell of magma.


    ¡°Show yourself!¡±


    Greem shouted as his fire principle power surged wildly into the ground and detonated theva. A piece ofnd measuring over a hundred meters wide erupted. Tens of thousands of tons of shattered bedrock and boilingva were sent sting into the air like a giant pir of fire.


    Zagu the Many-Armed Giant had just dived underground. He had yet to escape when he was sted into the air by a thick pir ofva.


    ¡°You forced my hand.¡±


    Zagu was exceptionally furious. His many arms waved and swung, creating numerous force shockwaves that surged toward Greem like a tide.


    His heavy body sank downward, crashing against theva and mes as he plummeted toward the ground. A three-meter-thick stone pir rose from the ground under the effect of Zagu¡¯s earth principle. It rumbled and reached toward Zagu¡¯s feet.


    Once his feet made contact with the stone pir, he would be able to continuously draw earth elementium from the earth to maintain hisbat needs.


    Greem had already seen through Zagu¡¯s intentions with the aid of the Chip. He let out a battlecry and made a grabbing motion with his giant hands. Large spouts ofva gathered together, turning into an even bigger hand that swept across the horizon.


    Just a little bit more, and Zagu¡¯s feet would touch the pir- but that would not happen.


    The stone pir crumbled as Zagu was sent hurling into the air like a tiny bird.


    ¡°Bastard! You¡¯re looking to die.¡±


    Many-Armed Giant Zagu was already missing a good half of his body due to the explosion from earlier. Now that Greem¡¯s mes had forcibly sent Zagu flying away and cut him off from the earth, he became even more furious and berserk.


    In truth, the so-called many-armed giant was a variant of the legendary abomination, Hecatoncheires. They possessed the same kind of overwhelming Strength and terrifying earth principles as the Hecatoncheires.


    The most fundamental of the Hecatoncheires¡¯ powers was petrification!


    However, there were no signs of a third eye on this many-armed giant¡¯s forehead. It was hard to tell if it also possessed petrification principles.


    That was the only reason why Greem didn¡¯t dare engage the giant in a proper melee!


    However, the things you were most worried about were often the things that invariably happened.


    Many-Armed Giant Zagu went berserk. The numerous muscr arms on his body suddenly exploded, leaving behind only five pairs of arms. The most muscr of the right arms put two fingers together and cut across Zagu¡¯s forehead.


    The skin was cut apart and the blood vessels ruptured, leaving a bloody gash there. A strange,rge eye with a slit pupil appeared.


    The surface of the eye was smooth and crystalline, almost like a round piece of jade. As the eye blinked, a strange power of paralysis projected forward. It was of such intensity that it was horrifying.


    ¡°You are the one that forced me to use my petrification power! Die!¡±


    It seemed like using this ability was detrimental to Zagu in some fashion. However, Zagu had no choice but to use his most powerful ability to break free of the fire adept¡¯s control in this battle.


    Even though he was no longer supported by the earth principles, Zagu was able to activate the Eye of Petrification by relying on his tremendous energy reserves and the sea of earth energy gathered by the explosion of his arms.


    The violent earth elementium surged into his only eye, turning into a pale-yellow beam that shot across the battlefield toward Greem, who had raised his right arm as cover.


    The potent petrification principle power spread out rapidly. Even the principle fires in Greem¡¯s right arm couldn¡¯t keep out the invasion of such ferocious principle power. It was almost as if his right arm had been frozen. The flesh, vessels, tendons, bones, and muscles inside it lost their color at a visible rate. They turned gray and hard.


    In the blink of an eye, Greem¡¯s right arm had turned into gray stone. Moreover, the overwhelming petrification principle powers were swiftly flowing up Greem¡¯s shoulder, spreading toward the rest of Greem¡¯s body.


    If Greem had not protected himself with the principle powers, the petrification principle would probably have turned him entirely to stone at the moment of contact. It was precisely because of the overwhelming principle fire within his body that Greem was able to buy some time as the two powers shed.


    A true warrior would sever his arm when bit by a venomous snake!


    Principle powers were very resilient forces that were hard to get rid of once they attached to your body.


    That was why Greem did not even hesitate. He plunged his left hand into his right shoulder and ignited his fire powers. The entire right arm, along with half of his shoulder, was blown away.


    Even though all of his gigantic body was no more than a projection of magic energy, every trace of energy and every piece of simted flesh were still tightly connected with Greem¡¯s mental consciousness.


    It was the only way he could precisely control such a gigantic form.


    Naturally, it was unavoidable that the sudden loss of an arm inflicted terrible damage to Greem.


    He had no time to cry at this crucial moment. Any slight slip in focus on such a terrifying battlefield could mean death.


    Greem endured the horrendous pain and forced most of the fire principle power in his body to his eyes. The next second, two incredibly pure golden beams shot out of his eyes, cutting across the sky to slice Zagu¡¯s body.


    Fire powers possessed tremendous prative ability, and these golden beams converted from fire principles were even more terrifying.


    The remaining arms of the many-armed giant were cut off where the golden beams passed. They sted against Zagu¡¯s body and sizzled. They pierced straight to his lungs, causing unbelievable agony and making the giant howl over and over in pain.


    Zagu turned his gaze around, and the earth-yellow petrification beam shed with Greem¡¯s golden beams. The petrification power and the fire power wildly devoured and neutralized each other. Shockwaves from the principle powers rippled outward in circles.


    Every substance and lifeform caught in the waves were either instantly turned into statues or abruptly ignited into mes. In either case, the victims were finished. They had no hope of surviving that.


    The effects of Greem and Zagu¡¯s battle were widespread. Even the other adepts who were engaged with the minor Scourge Lords hastily fled further away. They had no chance of surviving with their abilities if these principle powers caught them.


    The aftershocks and stray bullets from the battles of higher creatures were often incredibly deadly!


    Moreover, the principle powersmanded by higher lifeforms were formless and intangible. They could not be detected with the naked eye and there was no dodging them. The radius of higher lifeform attacks was also vast. Most of the time, the radius exceeded the limits of the physical senses of ordinary lifeforms.


    That was why ordinary creatures could not even hope to join a high-grade battle. In fact, simply watching from the sidelines put their lives at significant risk.


    Perhaps, this was the massive gulf that divided man from god!


    ording to the World of Gods¡¯ ssification, Fifth Grades had achieved the standard to be known as gods. Peak Fourth Grades might have transcended the world, but they were still very much human.


    The main reason that Zagu hadn¡¯t dared engage Greem in a melee since the start of the battle was out of fear of Greem¡¯s terrifying Fifth Grade divine fire spell, Scorched Earth. After all, Greem had used that divine spell to kill a minor Scourge Lord more powerful than himself.


    That was why Zagu had made up his mind not to go within three hundred meters of Greem while it was uncertain whether he was capable of unleashing another Scorched Earth.


    That was the shortest distance at which he was confident in dodging the attack!


    Yet now, even without using his Fifth Grade divine spell, Greem had pushed him into a corner with just his fire principles. The golden beams and petrification beam shed in midair. Zagu, who was suspended in the air and unable to replenish his earth elementium, was undoubtedly the one at a disadvantage.


    Thus, the equilibrium between the two beams rapidly began moving toward Zagu. It instantly caused Zagu to break out in cold sweat.


    At this point, over a dozen golden mes were already burning silently on his body. He had been engaged in battle and had not had the time nor energy to extinguish them with his earth principles.


    If Greem¡¯s golden beams were to reach him, he would probably no longer be able to suppress the Undying mes. He would turn into a giant torch and die.


    Zagu only had three of his once numerous arms left. Two on the left and one on the right. He beat his chest violently with his arm, drawing on thest bit of petrification power within his control to force the golden beam away. He then sank down once more, hoping to dive underground.


    Greem, who was also left with only one arm, made a vicious y. The Orb of the Fire God in his body was driven to its limits as Greem opened his mouth. Apletely invisible me surged out of his mouth and hit Zagu straight in the head.


    A loud explosion could be heard as Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lord Zagu¡¯s skull exploded. His giant body crashed onto the ground like a mountain, leaving a fearsome crater in the earth.


    Greem was relieved.


    This was the second Fifth Grade creature that had died at his hands since he mastered his fire principle. What incredible glory and intimidating feats for a Fourth Grade adept who had yet to fully ascend to the next grade!

 Chapter 1422 - Division of Spoils

    Chapter 1422 Division of Spoils


    idents always urred on a nar battlefield!


    Just as they had desired, the adepts had managed to hunt down all four of the minor Scourge Lords. However, the adepts also paid a heavy price for this. The Central Lands and the Association each lost a Fourth Grade adept.


    Ariza was the one who died on the side of the Central Lands. He was killed by the final retaliation of the serpentdrake before its death. Meanwhile, it was Schreiber, the somewhat famous Fourth Grade fire adept, who had died on the Association¡¯s side.


    It was unexpected that Fourth Grade adepts had died in battle, but all things considered, it wasn¡¯t all that surprising. After all, Scourge Lords were powerful creatures who could travel throughout the universe uncontested. In many aspects, theirbat power was enough to crush human adepts of the same grade.


    Moreover, three of the five minor Scourge Lords that invaded Inkdeep Valley were Fifth Grade creatures. The fact that the adepts managed to catch all of them for the low price of two lives was already unimaginable.


    It was important to know that individuals like Fiveface, Mugus, and Zagu were truly apocalyptic creatures. If they broke into any other ordinary nar world, the natives would not have been able to kill them even if they mustered all their forces.


    The moremon urrences were how these ultra-grade starbeasts and Scourge Lords broke into nar worlds and turned them upside down. The majority of resources and lifeforms inside were devoured before they were driven back by native powerhouses at a high cost.


    Banishing such tremendously horrifying creatures often cost at least the lives of half the native powerhouses. That was a terrible, terrible cost.


    Moreover, these were only the cases where banishment was actually sessful. Those who could not expel these creatures would see their world torn apart and countless lives lost to the void of space. The tattered remains of giant continents could asionally be seen in space. It was the ultimate fate of these defeated nar worlds.


    This universe was one of great conflict and strife!


    The weak nar worlds that had yet to fully develop had to hide from the eyes of powerful predators such as the World of Disasters and the Abyssal World. Alternatively, they had to strengthen themselves urgently and keep these greedy predators at bay with overwhelming force.


    Of course, the only way to allow a ne to develop further and quicker was raiding other nar worlds to steal their resources, poption, knowledge, and souls. Only through such a method could they exponentially grow past their weak phase and earn a ce for themselves among the numerous powerful factions of the universe.


    In truth, there were only a few factions that truly reigned supreme in the multiverse.


    The World of Disasters, the Abyssal World, and the Titans.


    These three factions were the strongest in every regard. Their forces were also spread all over the universe; none dared to provoke them.


    Meanwhile, the adept civilization could only be considered second-tier. Moreover, they were slightly below average among the second tier civilizations. In this tier, you could find the World of Gods, the Elementium nes, the Dragon Kingdom, the Elven Empire, the Spirit World, and the Shadow World.


    Among them, the Elementium nes were an exception. In sheer power alone, they were worthy of being considered a first-tier civilization, along with the World of Disasters and the Titans. However, the elementium kings and monarchs were too free-spirited. They had no ambition or desire for outward conquest and expansion.


    Consequently, many nar worlds considered elementium creatures to be harmless beings. As long as you didn¡¯t provoke them, they were utterly unwilling to step out of their Elementium ne to find trouble.


    The Arcane Empire originally had the qualifications to reside within the second tier. Unfortunately, they failed to fend off the invasion of the numerous enemy factions. Their nar world fell into enemy hands, and the survivors scattered across space.


    After the second tier was the so-called third tier. There were countless numbers of these factions in the universe. Even the Alliance of Liches that Greem had associated with were a third-tier faction.


    They might have a few tremendously powerful lich kings within their ranks, but there were just far too few liches. It was the fundamental reason they could not grow to the same size and influence as other major factions.


    Simrly, there were the starbeasts.


    There were billions upon billions of different types of starbeasts. They made for a shocking poption, though they were scattered all over the boundless gxy. Moreover, the starbeasts even fought amongst themselves frequently. They were a type of powerful creatures that moved and acted ording to their instincts. They might be shockingly powerful, but they did not have the higher intelligence to match their might.


    They were like the ever-present vultures of the universe, continually roaming space and feeding on nar creatures. There were many of them, but they could not be organized and bound together into a singr, powerful faction.


    That was why the starbeasts were never considered an intelligent species, even though they were incredibly powerful!


    Only when you understood the might of the disaster creatures could you understand how amazing a victory this was for the adepts. Of course, this also had to do with the fact that the magic surge had only just begun. The true monsters of the World of Disasters¨Cthe Dominions¨Chad yet to awake from their long slumber.


    Once the Dominions of Seventh Grade and above awakened, none of this conquest would be the business of the Fifth and Sixth Grade Scourge Lords anymore. When that happened, the Great Adepts in space would also start interfering.


    In all seriousness, the battle of Inkdeep Valley could not be considered an official fight between the adept civilization and the World of Disasters. It was merely the whim of an individual Sixth Grade Scourge Lord to invade the World of Adepts.


    These skirmishes were inconsequential. Naturally, the Great Adepts had no interest in being involved. At any rate, a Sixth Grade Scourge Lord would not be able to devour the entirety of the World of Adepts. It was the perfect opportunity to throw the young adepts into the wringer and give them a chance to prove themselves.


    They didn¡¯t care if numerous Fourth Grade adepts died in the process, anyway. Their only concern was whether any Fourth Grade adept would be able to seize this opportunity and rise to Fifth Grade. Only such an individual would deserve some of their attention.


    After all, the adepts had their own factions and organizations in space as well. Attracting fresh blood to their organization wasn¡¯t a bad idea!


    A powerful adept like Greem, who was already halfway into Fifth Grade, would soon find himself being recruited by several adept organizations in space.


    ............


    The process of harvesting spoils after a battle was always exciting.


    The Central adepts gathered together and held a simple mourning ceremony for Ariza. They then put away his body and the things he had left behind.


    These things would be returned untouched to Ariza¡¯s n members once they had returned to the Central Lands. As for how Ariza¡¯s properties and assets would be divided within his n? That was up to the Mansour n to decide for themselves.


    As the ruler of the Central Lands, Greem had to make a gesture of sorts, seeing as Ariza had died for the Central Lands. Thus, he promised the Mansour n a protection period of a hundred years.


    The Mansour n would still enjoy the privileges of a Fourth Grade organization within these hundred years. They would be protected by the Crimson n and would not be attacked by any adept ns.


    If the Mansour n was fortunate enough to give rise to a Fourth Grade within these hundred years, they could continue ruling over their vast territories. If no Fourth Grade adept appeared, then they would be demoted to an ordinary Third Grade organization.


    When that happened, their former territories would be delicious food in the surrounding ns¡¯ eyes, and war would soon break out.


    This survival of the fittest was appropriate for the Central Lands¡¯ development. That was why Greem would not intervene in it.


    After dealing with Ariza¡¯s affairs, the only thing left was the division of the spoils.


    Through this battle, Greem and the Central Lands had obtained the corpse of a Fifth Grade many-armed giant and a peak Fourth Grade serpentdrake. Greem had taken down the many-armed giant all by himself. Naturally, he got to keep all of the spoils for himself. Meanwhile, the serpentdrake would be split up between the other six adepts.


    As the most powerful individual of the Central Lands, Greem had the right to pick an item of his choice before splitting the spoils. It was a form of offering and a show of loyalty from Ker and the others!


    After taking the corpses of two Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lords for himself, Greem couldn¡¯t be happier; he didn¡¯t make things any harder for Ker and the others.


    He simply took most of the serpentdrake¡¯s blood in a symbolic gesture and left the rest to the Central adepts.


    Greem had taken the blood for Mary¡¯s sake.


    The other six Fourth Grades of the Central Lands excitedly stepped aside and began arguing. After ten hours, they finally decided on a proper means of division.


    Den, who had put in the most effort, naturally obtained thergest share. He got most of the serpentdrake¡¯s skeleton and a few hundred kilograms of its meat. Meanwhile, Ker and Alfredbined got the wings and some of the meat. How they would divide the share between them was their own matter.


    Matthew got the damaged soul of the serpentdrake. With this as an offering, he should have no trouble signing a contract with another Fourth Grade creature from another world.


    Nics got the dragon crystal. Judging from the broad smile on his face, it seemed like he had great ns for the crystal.


    Roderick got the scales and front ws. These were excellent materials to forge powerful magical equipment that were hard to find anywhere else.


    If Ker and the others were thoroughly satisfied, then Greem¡¯s purse was basically bursting at the seams.


    The Fifth Grade Reptile Fiveface had provided him with four top-ss elementium crystals and a Fifth Grade poison principal crystal. Remi had already devoured the principal crystal. One could expect Remi to be an ultra-grade artifact spirit once he had fully digested this treasure.


    When that happened, Remi would possess the power needed to truly unleash the might of the Fifth Grade Tome of Corruption.


    When Greem killed Fiveface, he had borrowed the might of the Fifth Grade divine fire spell, Scorched Earth. The overwhelming power of the spell had damaged the reptile¡¯s corpse. Meanwhile, Many-Armed Giant Zagu had been killed quickly with a single decisive strike. That was why Greem was able to harvest even more treasures and materials from his rtively untouched body.


    While Ker and the others were excitedly dividing the spoils, Greem also used the Chip¡¯s scanning abilities to quickly obtain a list of all the materials and spoils he had obtained!

 Chapter 1423 - Sinai’s Clone

    Chapter 1423 Sinai¡¯s Clone


    Heart of the Many-Armed Giant, top Fifth Grade material. Contains a powerful life force and earth principle power. Could be used for life-extension ceremonies or to create a Fifth Grade earth-attribute magical item.


    Eye of the Many-Armed Giant, top Fifth Grade material. Crystallization of an earth principle. Able to convert magic energy into petrification power. Contains Fifth Grade earth principle.


    Headless Corpse of the Many-Armed Giant. Contains concentrated bloodline power and earth elementium. Can extract and refine blood into advanced bloodline synthesis potions. Can be modified into a high-grade undead. Can be crafted into a high-grade corpse golem. Can be used as a top-ss sacrifice material.


    Killing a Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lord was enough to instantly turn any Fourth Grade adept into a tycoon drowning in their wealth. It was a genuine Fifth Grade creature! Even just a bit of its blood or piece of flesh would be the most excellent Fifth Grade material.


    Fifth Grade materials were incredibly rare in the World of Adepts. There was an overwhelming demand for them and practically no supply. Even when the asional Fifth Grade material appeared on the market, it easily sold for upwards of ten thousand magical crystals per gram of material. Zagu¡¯s body was five meters tall and seven tons heavy. It was an incredibly high-grade material that was more valuable than a literal mountain of magical crystals.


    If Greem were willing to sell the corpse, he would be able to purchase two or three entire regions in the Central Lands. After all, all these materials were likely enough to push a Fourth Grade adept onto the throne of Fifth Grade.


    The regions in the Central Lands might be wealthy and contain plenty of resources, but they could not help a high-grade adept too much.


    If Greem dared offer to sell, all three major organizations were likely to break out into a heated bid for the materials!


    Things like resources, territory, and poption could be umted and gathered over time. However, an opportunity to be a Fifth Grade Great Adept was hard toe by. Anyone with half a brain could see which was more valuable.


    The Adept¡¯s Association had also managed to hunt down the Fifth Grade ten-headed ghoul. However, the quality of the materials was clearly inferior to the ones found on the many-armed giant. Even so, the materials were probably still enough for the Adept¡¯s Association to give rise to a Fifth Grade Great Adept.


    The only question was who the Adept¡¯s Association would choose, Ainley or Gloria. The two of them were both ultra-grade powerhouses with decentbat strength. With the aid of Fifth Grade materials, neither of them would have a problem advancing to Fifth Grade.


    Apart from this, the Northern Witches also managed to defeat the peak Fourth Grade dust elemental. With the spoils they obtained from the dust elemental, it was likely they would be able to cultivate another peak Fourth Grade witch.


    It was great news for the Northern Lands, who only had two ultra-powerhouses at the moment!


    As for the serpentdrake the Central adepts had taken out together? If it hadn¡¯t been divided between all of them, the resources would have been likely enough to allow one of them to rise to advanced or peak Fourth Grade. Given how they split it up between them, it could only allow each of them to improve slightly. It did not have the ridiculous effect of pushing someone to greater heights.


    Everyone had made profits of their own, which diluted the ¡®tragedy¡¯ of having lost two of their Fourth Gradepanions. The Silver Union was the only one who had nothing to show for their efforts. Vice Senate-Head Melone¡¯s face was as dark as the night sky now.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. After all, the Silver Union¡¯sbat style relied too heavily on magical statues and golem constructs. They preferred defending and counter-attacking, using their statues and golems to exhaust their enemy. It caused them to be incredibly ufortable with such high-paced battles and ultimately lost them their best opportunity to obtain spoils.


    The Adept¡¯s Association had also lost more than five hundred adepts of various grades in that battle earlier, apart from Fourth Grade Fire Adept Schreiber. On such a nar battlefield, Fourth Grade adepts were the only ones that the various organizations cared about.


    They might be frustrated and upset if they lost too many Third Grade adepts, but those losses would not weigh as heavily as the death of a single Fourth Grade. As for adepts below Third Grade? As long as they had not beenpletely wiped out, the high-grade adepts could easily see past them.


    Every major organization knew how it was.


    The worth of a single Fifth Grade Great Adept was far above that of ten Fourth Grade adepts, while one Fourth Grade adept was worth over ten Third Grade adepts, and so on. High-grade adepts were always fewer in number. They resided at the top of the adept civilization¡¯s pyramid.


    Of course, Fifth Grade Great Adepts had barely made their way to the middle reaches of the adept civilization. They were still a long, long way from the top. Still, for the low-grade adepts struggling with all their might inside the ne, Fifth Grades were already ¡®deities¡¯ far beyond their reach!


    ............


    World of Adepts, outside the nar barrier.


    This world was a perfect world,rge and full of color.


    The intense energy tides washed against the World of Adepts¡¯ nar barrier, sshing bright sparks across space. The World of Adepts remained unmoved in the wave of energy, like a giant ship at sea. The nar barrier refused to budge no matter how viciously the spacestorms blew.


    It seemed as if the nar world wasn¡¯t moving. However, if you were to zoom out and look at it from far out in space, you would notice that the World of Adepts was traveling and drifting through the storm ording to some profound principle at a speed of dozens of kilometers per second.


    Through the semi-translucent nar barrier of the World of Adepts, you could faintly see the gigantic Continent of Adepts within, along with its numerous mountains.


    At this moment, a three-headed hound of unusual appearance squatted near the nar barrier. The beast was over a hundred meters tall and had a body full of shiny ck hair. Three heads reached out from his neck.


    The left head was as pure as ice, the right as zing as an inferno, and the middle as dark as ink. Three principle auras¨Cred, white, and ck¨Cshrouded the hound, making him seem all the more majestic and ferocious.


    Three-Headed Hound Dilmas was of an evil faction, but his power was concentrated and refined to the level of a Sixth Grade. Evil as he was, there was a hint of majesty and holiness in that evil!


    Dilmas might be incredibly powerful, but his hundred-meter-tall figure was as tiny as a flea on an elephantpared to the giant nar barrier of the World of Adepts. The two of them were on entirely different scales. Naturally, it was hard topare them.


    At this moment, Dilmas was leaning against a small crack in the nar barrier, his three heads taking turns to blow pure disaster aura into the break.


    After the month-long effort of corroding this crack, it had grown visibly in size. However, it was still far fromrge enough to allow his tremendous power to enter. At best, Dilmas could project one-fifth of his power.


    Given Dilmas¡¯ might, even just one-fifth of his power would be an advanced Fifth Grade creature, strong enough to wipe out the Continent of Adepts alone.


    He might have just done so if this had been a few days earlier.


    However, the consecutive deaths of his several high-grade subordinates made him hesitate.


    Dilmas had a strong suspicion that some damned Great Adept had returned to the World of Adepts and was waiting there to shiv him in the back. Otherwise, how else could he exin the deaths of his subordinates at the hands of a bunch of ant-like human adepts!?


    In particr, the shocking explosion earlier had the unique scent of the elementium clone of a Great Adept.


    It made Dilmas even more certain of his conjecture.


    He sat by the rift on the nar barrier, breathing disaster aura down on it to corrode the narws. He then scratched and tore wildly in an attempt to widen the rift, all while sending attacks through the rift at any adept that darede close.


    It was his persistence and madness that kept the human adepts from sealing the spatial rift no matter how they tried.


    While Dilmas was in the midst of panicking and hesitating about his next move, he suddenly stopped. Apart from one head, which continued to stare at the rift, the other two heads turned around and stared coldly at an approaching figure.


    The stranger walked out of the spacestorms as if the raging energy tides did not even exist. They approached the three-headed hound with steady steps.


    Dilmas felt his heart tighten when he saw the stranger¡¯s ten-meter-tall silhouette of fire. He could see how the mes shrouded the figure tamely and sense the overwhelming fire power in his body. He squeezed out a name from between his teeth coldly.


    ¡°Fire God Sinai, what are you doing here?¡±


    It wasn¡¯t Fire God Sinai himself who came. It was merely a Sixth Grade fire clone of his. If it had been Seventh Grade Fire God Sinai himself, Dilmas would have fled the instant he noticed his presence.


    The towering me humanoid came within ten thousand meters of Dilmas. He stopped and stared, the golden mes in his eyes a striking sight.


    ¡°Leave, Dilmas! Leave now, and I can pretend I didn¡¯t see you. Otherwise......¡±


    Sinai spat out a threat the moment he spoke. Obviously, this made Dilmas incredibly annoyed.


    ¡°Sinai, this is the World of Adepts, not a subject world of yours. Since when did you get to issue orders around here? What is it? A Seventh Grade Fire God like yourself has sold out to the adepts?¡± A vicious expression shed over Dilmas¡¯ main head, the ck one. He then crouched over, and a threatening growl began to rumble in his throat.


    ¡°I am here to retrieve what is mine!¡± Sinai¡¯s clone replied sternly. ¡°Some damned adept stole my treasure. Today, I must punish them. You, leave! I need this rift!¡±


    Dilmas was fazed for a second when he heard this. He then nodded in silence as he said, ¡°No wonder I smelled the aura of your divine fire spell inside the world. So your divine artifact was stolen by the adepts...hehehe. Sinai, since we are both here to find trouble with the adepts, why don¡¯t¡ª¡±


    Before Dilmas could finish his sentence, Sinai¡¯s clone stomped his feet, and a zing sea of fire spread out around him. He shouted furiously, ¡°Silence! Gods like ourselves will never collude with disaster creatures like you. Leave, or there will be a fight between us!¡±


    ¡°Leave......¡±

 Chapter 1424 - The Powerful Clone of Sinai

    Chapter 1424 The Powerful Clone of Sinai


    Dilmas fled dejectedly, without any disagreement!


    If his enemy were only this Sixth Grade clone of Sinai, Dilmas would strike without any hesitation. It would be a victory, even if all he could do was tear off a piece of meat from the clone.


    However, he didn¡¯t dare.


    His senses were very sharp.


    He could sense that Seventh Grade Fire God Sinai¡¯s attention was fixed upon this clone. If he was foolish enough to try and fight, Sinai could probably descend here instantly through his clone.


    Dilmas was only Sixth Grade. If he were to run into the Seventh Grade Fire God, he would almost certainly die here!


    That was why Dilmas had no choice but to swallow his dissatisfaction and walk away.


    After chasing Dilmas away, the clone of Sinai slowly approached the spatial rift on the nar barrier. He let out a furious cry and stabbed both his hands into the opening before pulling it apart with all his strength.


    His vicious, divine fire-power shed with the plentiful regenerative power of the nar world. It created numerous spatial turbulences on the smooth barrier. Fierce magic energy tides arrived from a distance, furiously surging into the widening rift, causing a terrible energy storm to brew within Inkdeep Valley.


    As the God of Fire, Sinai was a powerful god whose temper was just as violent and fiery as his domain. There was no room for negotiations with the enemy in his eye. A fight was inevitable if there was a conflict between him and an opponent.


    As a Fire God with the power of a Seventh Grade, he indeed possessed the might required to behave in such a callous fashion.


    At the very least, Sinai had fought his way to his current position in such barbaric fashion over the past tens of thousands of years since his ascension to godhood. He might still be quite far away from bing a major god (Ninth Grade), but his fiery temper had solidified as a trait of his divine power.


    That was why Sinai could not suppress his rage when he sensed the familiar fluctuations of fire from the other end of the rift. He started to pull and tear at the gap without restraint, attempting to use all his power to squeeze his way into the nar world.


    The entirety of Inkdeep Valley was instantly thrown into chaos by his rough and reckless actions.


    ............


    Inkdeep Valley had turned into an apocalyptic wastnd.


    Crimson clouds of fire rolled in the skies, obscuring the bright sun and covering the entire world in a dark red nket of light.


    An energy tide rushed out of Inkdeep Valley, slowly circling its surroundings as it gathered into a tremendous storm.


    The ground split apart, revealing the giant rift at the very bottom- a scar upon the nar barrier. At this moment, a massive me humanoid was exerting all his power to climb out of the rift.


    The being was not toorge, but the power he contained had clearly exceeded the World of Adepts¡¯ limits. The powerful regenerative power of the ne surged in from every direction, squeezing the rift in an attempt to seal it once again.


    The me humanoid, who was stuck in the rift, let out a furious roar at the skies. He continued to tear away at the edge of the rift with all his strength while wriggling his way into the World of Adepts.


    His zing hand of fire shed with the jagged edges of the spatial rift. Countless space fragments crumbled from the rift as the two forces shed. Meanwhile, the two zing hands appeared to be immune to the incredibly sharp space fragments. They glowed with crystalline divine power as they protected against all external damage.


    !


    Another loud ripping sound.


    The spatial rift had been torn even wider. The me humanoid was finally able to thrust his head into the world. He took a deep breath and let out a breath of invisible mes.


    Voom!


    The me humanoid had only let out a single exhale, yet a terrible stream of fire spread across the nar world, stretching over fifty kilometers.


    Everything burned everywhere the invisible fire traveled.


    The nts, animals, trees, rivers, dirt, rocks, and even the air itself began to burn. The whole world was instantly cast into a sea of mes.


    Every single low-grade adept, voodoo beast, and golem construct were pulled back into the adept towers amid these fearsome fires. None of them dared take another step out of the elementium barrier. Those who fled a little toote instantly ignited and burned to cinders with their own screams and howls.


    It was the same for the voodoo beasts, as well as the golem constructs made entirely of magical alloy.


    Dark spots were left on the scorched earth where the fire burned, leaving behind only puddles of distorted metal where the golems had been.


    Domhnall, Ainley, Gloria, Cerveris, and Khesuna stood in a row in the sky above Inkdeep Valley. They stared at the me humanoid struggling to enter the World of Adepts from high above. Crimson light glowed around Greem¡¯s thousand-meter-tall body, absorbing all the strange fire into his own body.


    ¡°This doesn¡¯t seem to be Dilmas, does it?¡± Cerveris looked at the enemy in utter horror and said in an off-pitch voice.


    ¡°Dilmas is a three-headed hound, while this is the fire clone of a god. Obviously, they can¡¯t be the same person,¡± Domhnall turned and nced at Greem, who was as tall as a god himself. He remarked coldly, ¡°Lord Greem, don¡¯t you have anything to say as to why Dilmas turned into Sinai¡¯s fire clone?¡±


    Khesuna¡¯s expression didn¡¯t change, but there was a hint of mocking joy in her eyes.


    The youthful Ainley¡¯s gaze was drifting between Greem and Sinai¡¯s clone as if he was hesitating about something. Meanwhile, Gloria had a solemn expression. There was unmistakable anger in her eyes when she looked at Greem.


    ¡°There¡¯s nothing to say...anyone who tries to break into the World of Adepts is our enemy! Do we need to differentiate one of us from the other?¡± Greem said in a booming voice, as if this was the way things should be.


    Domhnall almost choked in anger at the response.


    The giant me humanoid lifted his head and shouted, as if he had sensed the aura of the Orb of Fire God in Greem¡¯s body.


    ¡°Adept, hand over the Orb of the Fire God, or I will turn yournds into cinders!¡±


    The voice rang like thunder, echoing throughout the skies.


    Greem chuckled coldly and said, ¡°I think you had best make your way in here before you think of taking back the Orb!¡±


    Greem created a me javelin in his hands and hurled it at the enemy without any hesitation.


    The weapon glowed with a crystalline shine. The tremendous might of the mes had caused them to concentrate into a sort of solid fire crystal, imbuing the javelin both physical and fire damage. However, before it could approach the me humanoid, it was shredded into scattered fire energy by several red threads that emerged from the opponent¡¯s body.


    Fire energy that Greem no longer controlled would never be able to harm the fire clone. In fact, it would only replenish the clone¡¯s energy supply.


    The fire principles under the control of Sinai¡¯s clone would only be superior to Greem¡¯s own. How could he possibly be harmed by fire!?


    Upon seeing the attack rendered ineffective, Greem opened his palm, and the Tome of Corruption appeared above his hand in the form of an energy projection. The pages of the book rustled as they flipped. Several dark green blobs of poison cut across the skies and shot toward Sinai¡¯s clone.


    Sinai¡¯s clone was stuck in the rift and could not dodge. Thus, even as he struggled, he lifted his head. Two beams of golden light shot out of his eyes.


    The poison was rapidly evaporated by the mes the moment they came into contact. Naturally, they lost all threat against Sinai¡¯s clone.


    Without the enhancement of poison principles, ordinary poison spells would not even be able to get close to Sinai¡¯s clone, let alone inflict any damage to him.


    Upon seeing his enemy¡¯s might, Greem had no choice but to take out the small and intricate Watersoul Jade. The power within it activated, and a hundred-meter-tall water giant appeared on the battlefield. It roared and surged toward Sinai¡¯s clone as a jade-green wave.


    Sinai¡¯s clone opened his mouth in the face of this overwhelming tide and gulped all the water down his stomach.


    Buuuurp!


    Sinai¡¯s clone let out a loud burp. A hint of green shed over his red face as steam shot out of his nose and mouth. The all-out attack of an intermediate Fourth Grade water giant was absorbed, just like that.


    The Watersoul Jade that had been resting in Greem¡¯s giant palm broke into several pieces with a loud crack. It then vanished into thin air as water elementium.


    The Watersoul Jade that could only be activated three times had finally been consumed!


    Greem frowned upon seeing Sinai¡¯s clone remain entirely unharmed. It couldn¡¯t be helped; Sinai was a master of fire as well. His mastery and application of fire and its principles were vastly superior to his.


    Most of Greem¡¯s abilities were utterly useless against Sinai¡¯s clone. He was immune to most of these fire attacks.


    It was probably the most troublesome issue with trying to fight a bigger fire with a smaller fire!


    Fire creatures in the Fire Elementium ne often didn¡¯t fight with fire spells. Instead, they engaged in close-range fights. The main reason for this was that everyone had too much fire resistance. Punching your enemies was far more effective than casting fire spells.


    Greem was now facing the same trouble!


    Greem chuckled coldly, ¡°What is it? Do you all intend to just watch? Don¡¯t forget, once he manages to make his way inside, there will be no happy ending for any of us. Push me into a corner, and I will leave immediately. In the end, you people will still be the ones that have to clean up the mess.¡±


    The faces of the ultra-powerhouses of the Association turned dark when they heard Greem¡¯s threat. It was almost as if they were ready to fight Greem right now.


    Only Domhnall was able to hold hisposure. He sighed resentfully and said, ¡°It is as Lord Greem says. This is indeed the situation we face! We shouldn¡¯t just watch on from the sidelines any longer. Let¡¯s go! Either way, we must not let this clone of Sinai enter!¡±


    Having said that, Domhnall turned and flew toward the adept tower!


    Ainley, Gloria, and Cerveris looked at each other. They had no choice but to swallow their anger and start concentrating powerful spells to shoot at Sinai¡¯s clone.


    A high-grade battle filled with unwilling participants broke out just like that!

 Chapter 1425 - Might of the Fire God

    Chapter 1425 Might of the Fire God


    ¡°You ants.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t even dream of resisting the might of a god...scram!¡±


    Fire God Sinai¡¯s clone tore the rift apart with much difficulty and tried to wiggle his way in. He had to resist the terrifying power of repulsion from the World of Adepts while also defending against the wild bombardment of the numerous ultra-powerhouses.


    The colossal me humanoid lifted his head, revealing an expression of wild fury and anger as he roared as loud as he could. Unfortunately, his body was still stuck in the nar barrier¡¯s rift. He could only draw upon a limited amount of his actual power.


    Against the increasingly ferocious attacksing from inside the nar world, there was nothing he could do but endure. Every time the rain of spellsnded on the thinyer of red light around his body, the barrier trembled and quaked. Sinai¡¯s clone couldn¡¯t help but be even more enraged.


    ¡°Get away from me.¡±


    The series of attacks incredibly frustrated Sinai¡¯s clone. He lifted the right arm that he had just barely managed to wriggle into this world and instantly created a roaring sea of fire that engulfed all the ultra-powerhouses.


    The offensive might of a Sixth Grade Fire God¡¯s clone was exceedingly terrifying!


    The sea of fire was over ten thousand meters wide. Moreover, the energy intensity of the mes was a uniform ten thousand points across the entire area.


    This one attack alone would have been enough to exterminate most nar creatures.


    The appearance of the sea of fire instantly put the ultra-powerhouses at risk of defeat.


    Greem had already elementiumized his body; fire could no longer hurt him. That was why he was the only one who was able to stand quietly within the mes without a scratch on him.


    Upon seeing his panions¡¯ struggle in the fire, Greem lifted his hand and cast out several fire halos at them.


    It was the fire immunity provided by these halos, as well as the resistances of the ultra-powerhouses themselves, that allowed them to barely survive the threat of death.


    Ainley let out a battlecry and turned into a cloud of white smoke. He dashed through the mes and quickly escaped. By the time he reformed his body at the edge of the sea of mes, there were scorch marks all over his intricate robe. It was quite a disturbing sight to behold.


    However, he had managed toe out of it unscathed!


    The purple light around Gloria glowed brighter than ever before, making it seem like she had been encased in a purple gemstone. She fled the fire while under its protection as fast as she could. The purple light had significantly dimmed by the time she escaped. Moreover, small clusters of fire the size of a fingernail pulsed inside the purple light. It seemed as if the fire principle power had managed to seep into her equipment¡¯s principle core.


    Gloria¡¯s face turned dark as ink when she saw this. She almost couldn¡¯t stop herself from cursing out loud.


    Of the three Association adepts, Curse Adept Cerveris was undoubtedly the worst off.


    He did not have powerful equipment to protect himself as the others did. How was he supposed to defend himself against a powerful Fire God¡¯s clone who was two entire grades above him with his curse principles alone?


    He howled in agony all the way out of the sea of fire. By the time he was out, his body was already ck as coal. Numerous parts of his body had been burned into ck sludge that continued dripping as he fled.


    The mighty fire principles rampaged within his body, and all he could do was muster his curse principles in an attempt to fight back. The result of such resistance was his body slowly melting down, bit by bit.


    ¡°Someone, help me! Gloria, save me, quick...I won¡¯tst much longer!¡± Cerveris hovered in the air after escaping the mes. He looked around with his scorched head, trying to look for hispanions. His face was ck and burnt, every inch of his skin cracking to reveal the roasted flesh beneath.


    Steam rose from every crack and hole of his body. Cerveris¡¯ eyes had already exploded. The ck blood had dried up into a gray, glue-like substance before it managed to run down his cheek.


    He turned his bloody and empty eye sockets around. He sensed Gloria¡¯s aura and immediately reached out with his burnt, cracked right hand. He had only just reached out with his hand when his nails were sted away. Pieces of his flesh peeled off like leaves in the wind, scattered as ash to the sky.


    In the blink of an eye, all the flesh had peeled off of Cerveris¡¯ right hand, leaving behind only the scorched bones.


    Gloria might be filled with disdain for the sinister and underhanded Cerveris, but she could not just sit by and watch as he burned to death. She let out a battlecry and split off part of her purple light to engulf the burned-up curse adept.


    The moment the purple light appeared, it cut off the connection between Sinai¡¯s clone and the fire principles in Cerveris¡¯ body. The power of the mes was instantly reduced dramatically.


    However, it wasn¡¯t so easy to dispel Sixth Grade fire power!


    Having escaped the jaws of death, Cerveris hastily expressed his gratitude and vanished from the battlefield.


    From the looks of it, he had returned directly to his adept tower using some secret spell. He then hid within an alternate dimension and used the spatial power to iste himself further from the fire principles¡¯ damage. Given his injuries, he probably wouldn¡¯te out of that alternate dimension for another ten years!


    The only one among the ultra-powerhouses who responded in aposed manner was Death Witch Leader Khesuna.


    The moment the mes appeared, Artest, the Fourth Grade corpse dragon she was riding, let out a breath of dense, white death-energy with all its power. The death energy protected it and Khesuna as they rushed out of the mes.


    Khesuna was perfectly unharmed when she emerged from the fire. Artest, who had kept them both safe, was severely injured by the ordeal. Small fires had ignited all over its ck body. No amount of death energy managed to put them out.


    Sinai¡¯s clone was truly Sixth Grade. With just a single move, he had managed to push the ultra-powerhouses to the edge of death and forced them to flee.


    However, this attack obviously also caused Sinai¡¯s clone to suffer even greater repulsion from the World of Adepts. The right arm he had managed to wiggle through was forced back out by the power of the ne. Only half his head was left stuck in the rift now.


    It also caused all his efforts up till now to be in vain!


    However, after the terrible shock from earlier, the ultra-powerhouses were now incredibly wary of Sinai¡¯s clone. They no longer dared to approach him.


    Just as Sinai¡¯s clone roared furiously and began to tear at the rift once again, the war towers in the distance finally unleashed the lightning st that they had been mustering in unison. Numerous lightning bolts, each three meters thick, descended from the skies. They struck at Sinai¡¯s undefended clone like an apocalyptic smite from the god of lightning himself.


    With every bolt of lightning, mes sted away from the head of Sinai¡¯s clone. He was incredibly furious, but there was nothing he could do.


    After all, more than half of his body was stuck in the rift. Sinai¡¯s clone could only draw upon a limited amount of power. Naturally, there was no way he could conjure an effective retaliation against the adepts.


    His eyes zed with fire as two golden beams containing mighty fire principles swept across the horizon likesers. Where the beams crossed, the sky was rent apart, and the ground split. The earth, dirt, nts, and the insects...everything was vaporized and made to disappear without a trace.


    Even the ultra-powerhouses hiding in the distance couldn¡¯t help but retreat even further away in horror. They did not dare take even a single step closer to the battlefield.


    Fortunately, Sinai¡¯s clone was mostly pushed out of the world by the ne¡¯s power at this point. Even his head was almost entirely out now. This caused his attacks to have barely any uracy; they were only an act of venting his anger.


    Moreover, the use of his divine-fire power only caused the World of Adept to reject him even more!


    A short momentter, thest bit of his head was pushed out. Only the dark distorted rift remained at the bottom of the valley.


    At this point, the so-called Inkdeep Valley had been marred beyond recognition!


    The numerous battles, along with the rampant destruction of Sinai¡¯s clone, had left no piece of greenery or life within fifty kilometers of Inkdeep Valley. The earth was ck and scorched, steam and smoke asionally rising from underground.


    The further in you walked through the scorched earth, the more devastated the environment.


    The air was no longer breathable, while hot air and poison that could melt bones drifted everywhere. You couldn¡¯t even find dirt on the ground, let alone nts. The only thing within sight was the ck bedrock.


    The ground was uneven and filled with ditches, and the ditches themselves were filled withva.


    Within fifteen kilometers of Inkdeep Valley, you wouldn¡¯t even be able to find the tough bedrock any longer. The only thing that remained was an area filled with chaotic ribbons of light.


    These light ribbons were not ordinary magical light. They were narws that had been forced to manifest after all the material substance had been melted away. Each light ribbon represented aw chain. They seemed to be chaotic and unsequenced, but they wove together in ordance with some profound and mysterious principle, forming a strange yet incredibly majestic sight.


    The countlessw chains twisted together in aplicated fashion, making it impossible to see where they came from and where they were headed. It was almost as if they were branches of the world that simply reached out from empty air.


    They might only represent the very tip of the world¡¯s principle system, but the strange and beautiful sight they presented was truly enchanting. Moreover, the more sensitive individuals were even able to sense the functioning of the world through thesew chains.


    What was the truth of the world?


    This! This was the truth of the ne world!


    nar creatures were only distracted and tricked by the material substance. They could not see past the illusory material to the true face of the world- the essence of the world. Now, with all the substance around the spatial rift thoroughly destroyed, the principles shaken, and thews thrown into chaos, the true face of the world was finally presented to everyone¡¯s eyes.


    However, the price that everyone paid to witness this scene might have been a little too much!

 Chapter 1426 - Fragments of Divine Authority

    Chapter 1426 Fragments of Divine Authority


    Upon seeing Sinai¡¯s clone vanish from the rift, Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a breath of relief.


    Even though Greem had orchestrated Sinai¡¯s arrival, the might of the clone had still exceeded his expectations. Greem¡¯s mind was still stuck at the level of nar creatures. Naturally, there was no way he could have predicted the true power of higher lifeforms.


    After that short contact with Sinai¡¯s clone, Greem had attained a certain understanding.


    Compared to adepts, gods possessed a deeper understanding and control of the principles that pointed toward the essence of all power. Unlike adepts, the gods divided principles into different domains, which were then organized into divinities.


    Divinities were to gods what the principles were to the adepts!


    The gods ced all their power into their divinities and used them to create their divine authority. This divine authority was then used to convert the faith power of their believers into divine power. Their divine power contained the might of their divine authorities, which also represented their homeworld¡¯s will.


    In that regard, the principle adept path was somewhat simr to a god¡¯s path of ascension. However, a god¡¯s powers were always borrowed rather than gathered by their own means. Consequently, when they left their god kingdoms and homeworlds, their true power would be significantly weakened.


    No wonder the numerous Great Adepts looked down upon the gods. They even called them parasites that fed off the principle systems of their origin ne. All of their power and might was tied to their origin ne. Should something happen to it, they would not be able to survive.


    It was the fundamental reason why the World of Gods always obstructed any foreign powers from entering their origin ne!


    On the other hand, what the adepts were doing was more of an imitation of a nar world¡¯s principle powers. They observed, researched, and experienced the systems by which the principles functioned. They then foundw powers that were mostpatible with their soul origin.


    By tracing the origins, they slowly moved from thew chains to the principles powers that resided at the ne¡¯s core. It allowed the power they controlled to approach the essence of the nar world slowly.


    If the nar world was a giant tree, then the adepts only had control over one or two leaves at the very tip of the branches. With the leaves in hand, you could follow the veins to find the twigs. You could then follow the twigs to the branches, and branches to the trunk.


    In the end, the source of all principle adepts¡¯ power would point toward the massive roots hidden deep under the ground.


    This system of roots was so massive that a singr adept would only be able to gain control of a small portion of it even if they dedicated their entire lives to it. Meanwhile, by relying on this essence that they had mastered, principle adepts would be able to siphon an endless source of power and allow themselves to grow stronger slowly.


    It was perhaps a path of power that the principle adepts had chosen for themselves!


    In just a single instant, Greem had managed to understand and calcte his future path through the principle aura around him, as well as the Chip¡¯s analysis of the Sinai clone¡¯s power. He also gained an approximate understanding of the source and overall structure of the principle powers.


    At his level, resources and knowledge were only the bare minimum. What truly decided his future potential was the height and depths of his rational thought process.


    Idealism, the idea that reality was fundamentally inseparable from human perception and understanding.


    It might only be a lofty philosophical idea back on Earth, but here in a foreign world filled with magic energy, the power of the mind reigned supreme over the material. The mind was the true force that possessed the ability to change and shape reality.


    ......


    Just as Greem was about to continue down this path of thought, the rift floating amidst the ribbons of light suddenly cracked out loud. Something was happening again.


    Oh? Sinai¡¯s clone had just been exiled from the World of Adepts, hadn¡¯t he? What¡¯s happening? Was he trying to enter again?


    Greem stared intently and started gathering up power within him.


    Just as expected, the rift tore open again. Sinai¡¯s ugly and hideous head of fire appeared, again.


    However, he wasn¡¯t foolish enough to enter himself this time. Instead, he opened his mouth and let out a zing hot breath of me.


    The mes surged into the nar world. Unlike before, it did not spread out and exterminate all substance around it. Instead, it circled around the rift and gathered into a concentrated sea of fire. Once the fire energy had reached a certain concentration, Sinai¡¯s clone spat out a golden crystal the size of a nail.


    The mes scattered around the rift immediately gathered around the golden crystal once it entered the world of Adepts, as if they had found a core to rally around.


    In the blink of an eye, a ten-meter-tall fire giant that very much resembled Sinai¡¯s clone got up from the ground. He began to examine this foreign world around him.


    Judging from its power levels and form, this new fire giant was a peak Fourth Grade fire creature. However, the fire energy contained within his body was more intense than even Fifth Grade fire creatures.


    A fragment of the divine authority of fire.


    That golden crystal was a fragment of divine authority!


    Only a divine authority fragment could serve as a host for the Sinai clone¡¯s consciousness and allow him to maintain control over the fire principles.


    Upon seeing this, Ainley, Gloria, and Khesuna¡¯s gaze instantly turned ring cold. Their hearts couldn¡¯t help but start beating wildly.


    The so-called divine authority was the foundation of a god¡¯s power. Only when the divine authority they were crystallizing became sufficiently powerful could they be gods of a higher grade.


    If the principle crystals that Greem had obtained earlier were only fragments of a certain principle power, then divine authorities were the essence of principles that formed aplete and functioning power system.


    It had been split off into a fragment the size of a nail, but as long as it remained a divine authority, the power it contained would be a perfect, refined system. Should a fragment of divine authority fall into the hands of an adept, it would be no less mystical than the philosopher¡¯s stone itself.


    This tiny divine authority fragment alone might not be enough to turn an ordinary human into a god, but there would be no problem using it to push a peak Fourth Grade adept to the Fifth Grade. However, considering the origin attribute of the fire divine authority, Greem was probably the only one who could make use of it.


    Upon seeing the divine authority fragment appear, a thought appeared in the minds of all the ultra-powerhouses present at the same time. They had a vague feeling that this was Greem¡¯s ultimate goal behind all his actions so far.


    Did he want to steal the Fire God Sinai¡¯s divine authority? Did he have the power needed to fight against such a terrifying clone of a Fire God? He didn¡¯t intend to borrow our power again, did he?


    While everyone¡¯s thoughts were turning in their minds, Greem¡¯s thousand-meter-tall body finally moved.


    Wild chuckling could be heard as Greem¡¯s gigantic body abruptly copsed. His body reverted into a torrent of pure fire energy that rushed toward the newly formed fire giant in the distance.


    The fire giant that was still bound by the countlessw chains had nowhere to run. He could only open his mouth wide and devour all the mes rushing toward him.


    Much like how Sinai¡¯s mes had not been able to harm Greem himself, Greem¡¯s fires could not harm this fire clone either. With enough time, he would be able to devour ten Greems put together.


    After all, what resided within the fire clone was a fire divine authority fragment that could refine and convert any fire energy absorbed!


    However, the fire energy that contained Greem¡¯s mental consciousness was not so easy to devour without a trace. It was important to note that the level of Greem¡¯s power was not inferior to this particr clone of Sinai. The only difference was the amount of reserve energy and their skill at manipting their power.


    Even the fire clone couldn¡¯t help but be confused by Greem¡¯s ¡®suicidal¡¯ action. However, It was free energy sent right to his mouth. The clone instinctually opened up and devoured that tremendous and overwhelming fire energy that belonged to Greem.


    Suddenly, the fire energy within his body that contained Greem¡¯s mental consciousness started to go berserk. The fire clone chuckled coldly and began to draw on his power to suppress that restless surge of energy.


    He had over a dozen times more power than Greem, to begin with; he wasn¡¯t worried at all about Greem causing any trouble inside his stomach. However, themotion in his body undoubtedly dispersed his power, causing him to lose control over his body of fire temporarily.


    As he was giddily attacking Greem¡¯s mental consciousness, the fire clone seemed to have sensed something. He turned back with all the power he could muster.


    A pair of massive, jade-green eyes were staring straight at him.


    Upon seeing the fire clone turn back, a hint of mockery appeared in those jade eyes. The creature opened its massive mawrger than even Sinai¡¯s clone¨Cand devoured the clone in a single bite.


    The Devouring Fish!


    The starbeast transformation ability that Greem had only recently mastered.


    After transforming into the Devouring Fish, Greem was able to devour an individual whose power did not exceed twice his own.


    However, it was obvious that the fire clone that Greem had devoured today was over a dozen times more powerful than himself. After a series of gagging motions, Greem opened his mouth and spat out a giant body made of mes. He then tore apart space and vanished without a trace.


    The remainder of the body of fire instantly scattered into a sea of fire, no longer controlled by the divine authority fragment and Sinai¡¯s soul.


    Inkdeep Valley, which had only started to return to peace and quiet, was ravaged by fire energy once again!


    Sinai¡¯s clone, who had been standing quietly outside the spatial rift and controlling the fire clone, let out a furious cry of anger.


    Just now...just earlier...that damned human adept had transformed into a starbeast and devoured his fire clone. More infuriatingly, his divine authority fragment had been taken away.


    Having lost his origin connection with the divine authority fragment, the Sixth Grade Sinai clone¡¯s aura immediately fell. His power was reduced by several minor grades.


    Just as Sinai¡¯s clone was about to fly into a rage and rush into the World of Adepts once again, his body froze. He turned around slowly.


    Three-Headed Hound Dilmas slowly walked back from the depths of space. An evil re of greed could be seen on all six of his eyes.


    They were both Sixth Grade. Sinai¡¯s clone might possess more energy in his body, but as a Scourge Lord, Dilmas excelled at meleebat.


    Now, victory and defeat was a toss-up between them!


    Sinai¡¯s clone could no longer suppress the anger bubbling within him. He raised a mighty sky of fire and struck at the Scourge Lord.

 Chapter 1427 - Conclusion of the Great Battle

    Chapter 1427 Conclusion of the Great Battle


    Fire Throne.


    Inside the most secure magical room of the adept tower.


    Space tore apart as a gigantic fish-shaped starbeast emerged from the rift. The creature copsed and rolled over on the cold and hard floor.


    It was a starbeast of a bizarre appearance.


    From its head to its tail, from top to bottom, this creature resembled a bighead carp. It was ten meters long and five meters tall, but it seemed like it wasposed entirely of a head and a tail. There was barely any portion that could be called a ¡®body.¡¯


    At the moment, the strange fish seemed to have devoured an entire sun. Endless ht and heat radiated from the fish¡¯s gigantic maw, turning the room into a massive oven.


    The fish was struggling wildly, its organs on the brink of being cooked by the ¡®sun¡¯ it had swallowed.


    Even so, the magical fish gritted its teeth, refusing to let the rampaging sun rush out of its stomach. At the same time, the fish quickly drew on the tower¡¯s power and summoned incredibly pure elementium water from the Water Elementium ne to fill the entire room.


    The fish then started devouring the elementium water wildly in an attempt to extinguish the struggling ¡®sun.¡¯ Water and fire shed within its stomach. The elementium explosions from the conflict of the two elements caused the fish to writhe in agony.


    No matter how painful or arduous it was, Greem refused to open his mouth and spit out the divine authority fragment that contained Sinai¡¯s will. Meanwhile, the unique Physique and innate ability of the devouring fish was working at full power to wear away at the crystal¡¯s wild and unruly will.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Several dull thuds echoed throughout this empty adept tower. The tower itself trembled and quaked from the impact.


    The conflict between Greem and the remnants of Sinai¡¯s will caused Fire Throne¡¯s surroundings to deteriorate rapidly. Fire Cave started to quake and copse as surges ofva sted out from underground, shooting over a hundred meters into the air before raining back onto the ground.


    The magical creatures and beasts that had been living peacefully around Fire Cave fled theirirs in a frenzy as if they sensed the arrival of doomsday.


    Soon, the magma swelling out of the cracks in the ground had engulfed all thend within five kilometers of Fire Cave. The magma quickly started fires, which then spread even further into the distance. The forest beasts that did not manage to flee in time were instantly devoured by the rain of magma and fire from above.


    Finally, an earthshaking explosion could be heard as all the ground around Fire Cave sunk a dozen meters downward, forming a giant basin in the area. The red magma and viscousva rushed up from below, quickly filling the basin and turning it into a deadlyvake that no creature could hope to approach.


    Fire Throne was history!


    ............


    Greem had chosen to flee immediately after devouring Sinai¡¯s fire clone, leaving behind a total mess for the Adept¡¯s Association to deal with.


    Inkdeep Valley had been thoroughly destroyed!


    Moreover, the damage was irreparable.


    After all, the one that had been fighting earlier was a fire clone that the powerful Fire God Sinai had split off and stuffed into the World of Adepts. The upper limit of its power might be peak Fourth Grade, but the tremendous quantity of energy reserves within it was superior to the average Fifth Grade!


    Such a powerful being would not be at a disadvantage even if it had to fight against a dozen ultra-powerhouses at the same time. In fact, it would be able to dominate the battle through its mastery of the fire principles and understanding of the higher powers.


    It was the fundamental reason why Sinai dared to charge recklessly into the World of Adepts, even though he knew numerous formidable opponents were waiting inside like ravenous wolves!


    If the adepts were wolves, then Sinai was a tiger. Even if a tiger was kept in a cage and sapped of most of its strength, its savage instincts and past hunting experience still made it superior to a pack of wolves, both in mentality and aura.


    However, what Sinai never expected was for the legendary fire adept to be such an unusual individual.


    ording to the grade ssification system of the adepts, Greem was still only an advanced Fourth Grade adept. Under thebined effects of his principle power and bloodline power, he had managed to gain mastery over the Undying mes principle ahead of time.


    This lethal ace up his sleeve made him a Fourth Grade adept unlike an ordinary Fourth Grade adept. While other adepts were still using elementium, energy,ws, and other low-level powers, he was already sting away with the bazooka equivalent that was the principles.


    These two individuals with powers that exceeded the ne¡¯s limits might have only shed for a brief instant, but their conflict had still inflicted devastating damage to the surroundings. More frightening was the damage extending deep into the principle level, scarring thews and principles and throwing them into terrible chaos.


    Inkdeep Valley no longer existed. All that remained was a spatial void. Any material substance that found its way here would be ground to unrecognizable dust by the turbulent energy storms. Even thew chains were torn apart here. They could not aplish their effect of stabilizing the nar space.


    The spatial rift that hovered amid the energy storms and chaotic principles stood in the middle of the void. Energy spacestorms asionally entered through the rift, making the area more chaotic and dangerous than before.


    Pieces of the continent were still peeling away and disintegrating from the magic energy at the storm¡¯s edge. All substances dragged into the storm instantly disintegrated into the most primitive particles and vanished without a trace.


    With a breach like this, the World of Adepts was probably losing several tons of substance per day!


    Naturally, the nar consciousness was furious upon discovering a ¡®bleeding¡¯ wound like this. It repeatedly called on thew chains to extend toward the energy storms, repairing the narws and restoring the turbulent principle powers bit by bit.


    However, even as powerful as the nar consciousness was, it would take hundreds of years to fully heal from this scar.


    Moreover, the presence of such a ce within the Adept Association¡¯s territory was undoubtedly an unstable factor.


    The repeated destruction and damage inflicted on this area had caused the nar barrier to be unprecedentedly vulnerable. The spatial rift was alsorge enough that otherworldly creatures of peak Fourth Grade could freely enter now.


    Without the nar consciousness¡¯ blessing, fighting here would be a massive risk, even for the most powerful of the Fourth Grade adepts. After all, without nar suppression or blessings, human adepts were still far too fragilepared to starbeasts, disaster creatures, and the abyssal demons!


    As dangerous as it was, the Adept¡¯s Association had no choice but to ept their tragic fate and plug the hole. After all, the rift was in their territory. If some formidable enemy emerged from it, they would be the first one to fall victim to it.


    Fortunately, upon sending the ultra-powerhouses to investigate, they discovered that the enemies that had been waiting outside the rift were gone. It provided the Adept¡¯s Association with a rtively ¡®safe¡¯ environment in which to patch the hole from the rift.


    Large groups of Association adepts put up barriers, enduring the destruction of the energy storms as they toiled around the spatial rift like hardworking ants.


    Setting down sealing arrays to prevent more spacestorms from entering, then purifying the environment inside the ne world. Calming and taming the turbulent elementium energy.


    There was all sorts of work to be done, all of it equally necessary and crucial. It was the only way to provide the nar consciousness with the best conditions to mend the damage to this world. Otherwise, thew chains would be torn apart by the energy storms from space right after they started to recover.


    If that were the case, then this scar upon thend would not heal, even after a thousand years!


    With this incident, it was obvious why the nar consciousness was so eager to banish all ultra-grade creatures from its world. The reason was simple. The damage that every one of their actions inflicted on the world was too horrifying.


    If they were allowed to use their powers as they wished, the entire nar world could be disintegrated and broken down into the most fundamental particles and energy. When that happened, the World of Adepts would lose its most fundamental function of nursing life and carrying on the legacy of the adept civilization.


    It was precisely because the Great Adepts understood this that they willingly left the World of Adepts to search the gxy for a ce to host their power.


    The disaster creatures had been beaten back, Greem had killed Sinai¡¯s fire projection, and Sinai¡¯s clone had gone missing.


    It was only now that the battle finally came to a conclusion of sorts.


    The Silver Union and the Northern Witches bade a simple farewell and hastily returned to their territories. Meanwhile, the six Fourth Grade adepts of the Central Lands, having lost their leader, scurried away under the cold and usatory gazes of the Association adepts.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Everyone clearly saw the great battle today with their own two eyes.


    Greem had yed the Adept¡¯s Association for a fool and used it like a tool. He had borrowed the Association¡¯s power to sink his fangs into the fire projection that Sinai cast into the World of Adepts.


    The reason Inkdeep Valley had been reduced to such shambles was intrinsically tied to the legendary fire adept.


    The Adept¡¯s Association would probably have to continually pour resources and manpower into the restoration of this ce if they didn¡¯t want the void to expand any further. Moreover, to prevent any new enemies from entering through the rift, at least one peak Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouse would have to be stationed here all year round.


    With all this effort required, the Adept¡¯s Association had been put in a terrible position!


    Given Domhnall, Ainley, and Gloria¡¯s viciousness in the past, they would haveshed at the six Fourth Grades of the Central Lands as retaliation, giving them eternal sleep in this brokennd and wounding the Central Lands badly.


    However, if the Adept¡¯s Association really did so, they would be tearing up all facade of niceties with Greem.


    If such a powerful adept were to make a fuss, even the nar consciousness would be frustrated, let alone the more ¡®insignificant¡¯ existence that was the Adept¡¯s Association.


    Having stolen the divine authority fragment inside the fire projection, no one could predict how fast the legendary fire adept would grow henceforth. For the sake of their futures and safety, the Adept¡¯s Association had no choice but to swallow their resentments and watch as Ker and the others left.


    Once news of this spread throughout the continent, it caused tremendousmotion across the World of Adepts!

 Chapter 1428 - The Fourth Major Adept Organization

    Chapter 1428 The Fourth Major Adept Organization


    The first wave of the magic surge finally ended.


    When Ker and the others returned to the Central Lands via the teleportation arrays, they immediately caused amotion throughout the region.


    Greem might have had the title of the legendary fire adept in the past, but he had never actually engaged the major organizations in a direct conflict. Thus, no one had a clear idea of whether he lived up to his reputation.


    After this trip to the Adept¡¯s Association, he had made his appearance alongside the other major organizations. The presence of Greem in the Central Lands allowed the region to beparable to the three major organizations in every aspect.


    This reality was not only an incredible surge of morale for all Central adepts but also allowed the Fourth Grade adepts to enjoy glory and reverence for the first time in their lives.


    They had returned as six after leaving as eight, with Ariza dying in the battle and Greem having gone missing. Still, the Central Lands¡¯ reputation had been elevated significantly, and there was an air of optimistic expectation for the future everywhere.


    Upon hearing that Greem had fought a fire projection of Fire God Sinai and gone missing, Mary immediately abandoned her post beside the Ahlden spatial rift and hurried to Fire Throne.


    When she and her party arrived there, they found Fire Throne razed by a mysterious force. Even Fire Cave had copsed, reduced to avake that was several kilometers in radius.


    It wasn¡¯t just Fire Cave that had fallen victim to theva. The surrounding ck Forest, once home to countless lives, had turned to scorched earth. The only things in sight were rolling steam and thick ck pirs of smoke everywhere.


    Mary stood at the bow of the Versailles as she examined everything within sight.


    Her brows furrowed as her face flushed white. She was clearly taken aback by the unusual scenery she was witnessing.


    A dozen Crimson adepts were beholding the same scene behind her. They were all silent and obviously concerned.


    ¡°You are sure that Greem returned here?¡± Mary suddenly asked in a cold voice.


    Emelia took a step forward and offered her calm analysis, ¡°ording to what Lady Ker and the other Fourth Grades said, the n leader left the battlefield alone three days ago. Meanwhile, the abnormality here also urred three days ago. I asked the adepts stationed at Pinecone City regarding this matter. They had also sent people to investigate underground when all this happened with Fire Throne, but they were forced out by the fires here. It seems like......¡±


    ¡°Seems like what?¡±


    ¡°Seems like the intensity of the fire underground has exceeded a thousand points. Even Third Grade adepts will not be able to travel into thevake to investigate the situation.¡±


    Everyone couldn¡¯t help but be horrified when they heard that.


    The intensity of the mes on the periphery already exceeded a thousand points. How fearsome were the fires inside Fire Throne? The n leader¡¯s adept tower didn¡¯t get devoured by theva, did it?


    Fire Throne was the n leader¡¯s personal tower. Usually, Mary was the only one among the Crimson adepts who could enter and exit freely. However, with all this happening to Fire Throne, the teleportation array inside the tower no longer seemed to function as well.


    The members of the Crimson n had actually lost all means of directmunication with Greem!


    ¡°No, I must find out what Greem¡¯s current situation is. All of you stay here. I will go down there and investigate personally.¡± Having said that, Mary red her wings and prepared to dive down.


    Just then, a sweet female voice rang out from behind her.


    ¡°Wait, Mary, my little sister!¡±


    Mary¡¯s body trembled and froze in the air. She slowly turned around.


    Three witches walked out of the cabin of the Versailles.


    Upon seeing the young and pretty witch in the lead, the Crimson adepts hastily bowed and paid their respects.


    ¡°My greetings, Lady Alice!¡±


    It was the leader of the Fate Witches, Alice, who had left the World of Adepts on an excursion awhile ago. Icdy Snowlotus and Berserk Witch Sofia apanied her.


    ¡°I remember we agreedst time that whoever¡¯s stronger gets to be the big sister. What is it? You think you can beat me for certain now?¡± For some reason, Mary could never calm down when she saw Alice. She slowly flew back onto the deck, staring at the witch with scowling eyes.


    ¡°Greem is still missing. Do you intend to challenge me at this time?¡± Alice smiled sweetly, her face rxed andposed.


    However, Snowlotus and Sofia were ring at Mary in a much more hostile manner from behind.


    Mary rolled her eyes and started chuckling as well.


    The more ill-tempered Berserk Witch Sofia spat out coldly, ¡°What are youughing at? Your man¡¯s almost dead, and you can stillugh?¡±


    Mary startedughing even harder, so much so that she had to catch her breath. ¡°Well said! Don¡¯t you forget, my man is also your leader¡¯s man...watch it! If you happen to push Greem into his grave with your curses, Alice might just be lunging at your throat!¡±


    Alice blushed upon hearing this, and she shot an unamused re at Sofia. She then rposed herself and said solemnly, ¡°Mary, you can¡¯t go down there. None of us here can go down there.¡±


    ¡°What is it? Is Greem really down there?¡± Mary flew up to Alice and finally started asking sternly.


    ¡°Mm, he is indeed down there,¡± Alice nodded and said, ¡°I performed a divination for him before I came here. He¡¯s safe, with no risk to his life. There is a little danger, but things will turn for the better!¡±


    ¡°Then why won¡¯t hee out here and see us?¡± Mary asked.


    ¡°You have an approximate idea of his situation. He¡¯s already halfway to Fifth Grade, only held back by the fact that he doesn¡¯t have enough Spirit. He seemed to have benefitted from this trip to the Association and has been forced into a deep slumber. This slumber will probablyst for a very long time. He will probably be a Fifth Grade adept when he emerges once again,¡± For some reason, there was no trace of joy or happiness on Alice¡¯s face when she talked about Greem¡¯s advancement.


    Mary felt a conflicted mix of joy and sorrow upon hearing this. She seemed to have been reminded of some difficult decision.


    The other higher-ups of the Crimson n had no such concerns. They all seemed to be filled with envy and admiration for this news.


    The n leader¡¯s pace was getting faster and faster, so fast that they could no longer keep up with him!


    At the thought of this, everyone¡¯s happy expressions turned moreplicated. They sighed in resignation in their hearts but sincerely rejoiced for their n leader at the same time.


    A Great Adept was finally about to be born in the Crimson n!


    Greem¡¯s advancement to Fifth Grade was a tremendous glory for the Crimson n and the Crimson adepts. However, for Alice and Mary, it would mean a temporary parting from Greem.


    They had spent most of the past hundreds of years on their own projects and business, only sometimes meeting up when they were free. However, they had all still been inside the same world. They could have met each other whenever they wanted. Naturally, they did not feel the same kind of concern and pining for their lover as if Greem had gone to the realms beyond.


    Once Greem advanced to Fifth Grade, it would be time for him to leave!


    When that happened, it would no longer be so easy to see him.


    If the two girls couldn¡¯t keep up with Greem, they would only be left further and further behind. When that happened, they would only be able to admire his radiance from the shadows, unable to approach him in the slightest.


    The hostility between the two girls vanished without a trace at this thought.


    Having obtained Alice¡¯s word on the situation, Mary no longer insisted on going down for an investigation.


    The two girls gathered and had a simple discussion. They then gave out a series of instructions.


    With thisvake at the center, a restricted zone twenty-five kilometers in radius was drawn out. No adepts outside of the Crimson n were allowed to enter this area. To ensure that Greem wasn¡¯t disturbed by any external interference, a Mothership was kept stationed above thevake all year long, manned by high-grade adepts from the n.


    Meanwhile, Alice and Mary went to various ces and began organizing the adepts of the Central Lands.


    To their surprise, even though Greem remained absent, the Fourth Grades of the Central Lands did not show any hostility or resistance toward their instructions. In particr, the six veterans that had followed Greem to war genuinely revered the legendary fire adept.


    Even Matthew and Nics, who had grudges with the Crimson n in the past, had changed their attitudes. They were eager and passionate about the unification and reorganization of the Central Lands.


    All the Fourth Grades of the Central Lands agreed unanimously to reorganize the forces of the major ns around Horton Magic Academy to create the fourth major adept organization of the World of Adepts. Moreover, Horton Magic Academy would be a public adept organization with no restrictions on the nationality or species of the members who wished to join.


    In doing so, many apprentices and adepts in the three major organizations¡¯ territories would probably be eager to join.


    However, it wasn¡¯t so easy to aplish such a colossal feat either!


    There was the organization of the departments within Horton Magic Academy, the ssification of subjects, staff hiring, workforce assignment, construction of resource sites, furnishing ofboratories, and internal allocation of resources. There were far too many tiny tasks that fell squarely on the shoulders of Mary, Alice, and the Crimson adepts.


    The Central Lands had been known as Zhentarim in the past, a name that also represented the region¡¯s loose organization where each prominent n managed their own benefits and profits.


    Now, they would all have to give up some of their territories, adept towers, and resources while also making sure the welfare of their n members was still taken care of. Negotiations over these matters would not conclude so quickly.


    The higher-ups of the Crimson n constantly traveled between the Fourth Grade organizations. Discussing, negotiating,promising, trading- everyone was busy at work, giving their all for the establishment of the fourth major organization.


    Finally, after five years of preparation and hard work, all of the negotiations came to an end. The Crimson n began to announce to the other three adept organizations that the Horton Magic Academy of the Central Lands was now officially the fourth major adept organization of the World of Adepts.


    Its date of establishment? The fifth day of the eleventh month of the year 33,072.

 Chapter 1429 - Academy Celebrations

    Chapter 1429 Academy Celebrations


    Year 33,072 of the Era of Adepts; The fifth day of the eleventh month of the year.


    Today was a great day destined to go down in the annals of history.


    On this day, the fourth major adept organization of the World of Adepts was sessfully established in the Central Lands. Its name? Horton Magic Academy.


    Horton Magic Academy had been located near Ironwood City of Ailovis since its establishment. The territory that belonged to the academy was about one-fifth of Ailovis. It was a public academy open to everyone.


    With the coboration and merger of the numerous Fourth Grade organizations of the Central Lands, Horton Magic Academy had be an institution of immense size. The total amount of area it governed was over 70% of the total area of the Central Lands¡¯ thirty-one regions.


    The introduction of arge number of intermediate and low-grade adepts instantly provided Horton Magic Academy with a massive faculty. It was enough to make them exceed the Northern Lands and Silver Union to be the second most powerful adept organization in the World of Adepts.


    Of course, every famous adept organization had to have a powerful adept that served as their soul and heart, a figure that the high-grade adepts could rally around. It was only when the higher-ups had been twisted together into a single united knot that the organization could be a singr entity that threatened all potential enemies.


    The heart of Horton Magic Academy was undoubtedly the legendary fire adept, Greem!


    Frankly speaking, it was all due to the overwhelming might of the legendary fire adept that the status quo in Central Lands had been shattered, the borders torn apart, and all the Fourth Grades brought under him.


    Such a tremendous feat was unprecedented. You could not find another individual of such aplishment, even if you rummaged through all the World of Adepts¡¯ historical records. If you were to keep searching, the only individuals you would find that wereparable were probably the three powerful Great Adepts who had established the three major organizations in ancient times.


    Moreover, those three powerful adepts had all be mighty Ninth Grade existences. They were leaders and pioneers respected by the entire adept civilization.


    Many adepts talked in private to each other about whether this Legendary Fire Adept Greem would one day also be such a powerful and great adept!


    These rumors only increased when people used their channels to find out the reason for Greem¡¯s absence from the expansion and reorganization of Horton Magic Academy. It was because he had found the path toward Fifth Grade!


    Perhaps the next time the legendary fire adept showed himself would be when he became a Great Adept!


    That meant the newly established Horton Magic Academy was fully backed by a future Great Adept.


    A Fifth Grade Great Adept that could still remain in the World of Adepts for the moment.


    In all honesty, there was no greater backing than this!


    It was probably the key reason why the three major adept organizations had not attempted to stop Horton Magic Academy¡¯s establishment.


    They even sent representatives to participate in the founding ceremony!


    ............


    Ironwood City.


    Headquarters of Horton Magic Academy.


    Ever since the eleventh month started, Ironwood City had been a sea of cheer and joy.


    Horton Magic Academy had expanded, and Ironwood City had be a holy city for adepts, famous across the continent. Voodoo beasts sprinted across the road alongside goblin vehicles while ferocious birds soared in the skies, all of them carrying adepts on their backs.


    Even the pedestrians who filled the streets to the brim, pacing here and there, were all adepts.


    This ce had be a world of adepts. Every corner, every inch of space, was filled with the silhouettes of the adepts. Meanwhile, those who served as waiters and attendants here were adept apprentices from all over the world who hade here to pursue magical studies.


    The size of Horton Magic Academy had also exceeded the usual size for an ordinary adept organization. It took up every inch of space within fifty kilometers of Ironwood City. Magical halls, libraries, alchemybs, magical machine factories, and magic training facilities had been built all over thend, scattered around Ironwood City.


    An apprentice that came to Horton Magic Academy would take months just to familiarize themselves with all the magical facilities avable inside the academy. They would have to find themselves hawkstriders or goblin cars to travel freely from one building to another.


    Otherwise, they would spend most of their day simply running between libraries andbs!


    After the remodeling of Horton Magic Academy, Ironwood City had be a city of magical machines. Magic energy pools could be seen all over the ce, along with magical-machine rental centers and magical-machine factories. The convenience and wonder of magical machines had been turned into part of everyday life.


    However, due to the excessive number of adepts present in the city, the magic-energy radiation had reached an unhealthy level. Though most of the radiation was filtered by purification arrays, there was still enough of it to injure an ordinary person badly. As such, the only ones who could step within fifty kilometers of Ironwood City were adept apprentices or adepts.


    Of course, as Horton Magic Academy¡¯s name spread far and wide, the academy started to select the more excellent and intelligent individuals that could be found amongst the one hundred and twenty-seven lesser nes that were part of the academy assets. These individuals were allowed to enter the academy and study as students.


    In doing so, arge group of unusual foreign students of various species and appearances suddenly appeared in Ironwood City.


    To ensure that the number of foreign students wasn¡¯t too excessive, Horton Magic Academy gave out a quota of fifteen students to every lesser ne under their rule. Moreover, these students had to be under the age of thirty, with special exceptions for certain races.


    Any human in the World of Adepts, as long as they had elementium talent and the potential to be apprentice adepts, were allowed to join the academy. Of course, the natives of the lesser nes did not enjoy such welfare.


    Almost every single foreign student selected from the natives were prodigies of their generation.


    Moreover, to obtain one of the few spots to go to the World of Adepts to study, these students were almost always subjected to bloody and cruel bouts of elimination with otherpetitors.


    There were prodigies to be found almost every year, but there were only so many quotas provided.


    The lesser nes often had their own sses of nobles and peasants. Naturally, the more important nobles were always eager to send their children and rtives into the esteemed World of Adepts to obtain the most excellent magic education.


    After all, even if the students failed to be adepts, thework and social rtionships they established during their study would easily allow them to be part of the ruling ss after they returned.


    This method of ¡®gilding¡¯ the students with acim was undoubtedly the easiest way for the foreign nobles to be more acquainted with adepts and the adept ss!


    Consequently, every foreign student that could survive thepetition and distinguish themselves was an individual of excellent skill and potential. They had onlycked the opportunity to prove themselves.


    Now, Horton Magic Academy gave them this opportunity they so badly needed!


    The higher-ups of the academy did not discriminate among the students of the academy; everyone was treated fairly and equally. As long as they took enough credits andpleted the academy missions assigned to them, the academy was sure to provide them with the resources they needed to develop themselves further.


    Whether they could seed and be adepts depended on their luck and their ability!


    Due to this impartial method of doing things and the tremendous amount of resources at their disposal, Horton Magic Academy was able to quickly cultivate their first batch of adepts within these five years of its reorganization.


    Some of these adepts were even foreign students who had now sessfully integrated themselves into the adepts.


    Today, the fifth day of the eleventh month, was the moment Horton Magic Academy was officially dered as established. It was also a great day for all the adepts and apprentices who had been living in Ironwood City for the past five years to rejoice and celebrate!


    ............


    Ironwood City.


    Inside the academy¡¯s adept tower that loomed at the very center of the city.


    Mary wore an intricate and beautiful adept¡¯s robe as she stood silently on the highest floor. She looked calmly through the window down at the city, neat as a chessboard, and the crowd that crawled through its tidy streets like tiny ants.


    Four beautiful elven maids were carefully helping her put on the unusuallyplicated essories behind her.


    Each magical essory glowed with a faint magical light. When they were all equipped, the essories resonated with the runic array on Mary¡¯s robe, creating a beautiful, radiant effect.


    Mary¡¯s power had been improving rapidly ever since she assimted the Nightmare Castle.


    These elven maids could sense magic radiation prickling their skin just by standing beside her. More terrifying, the bloodws and Nightmare Halo that Mary possessed were all very invasive.


    You would start bleeding out and fall into nightmares just by staying around her for more than fifteen minutes.


    Thus, the only ones who served Mary at her side were elves of Second Grade and above.


    While Mary was observing Ironwood City, seemingly in thought, Emelia stood by the side. She was already intermediate Third Grade now. She held arge pile of documents in her hand and was softly reading out reports on the founding ceremony¡¯s arrangements.


    ¡°......¡±


    ¡°The Silver Union¡¯s representative is Vice-Senate Head Melone. He is apanied by......the gifts they presented include......currently, they have been arranged to stay at Embassy Seven and are being received by Lord Alfred and Isa!


    ¡°The Northern Lands¡¯ representative is Deceit Witch Leader Angeline, who is apanied by......the gifts presented include......currently, they are arranged to stay at Embassy Nine and are being received by Lord Ker and Lilia!¡±


    Mary listened silently. She then asked without turning her head.


    ¡°And the Adept¡¯s Association?¡±


    ¡°No news as of yet.¡±


    It was less than an hour until the start of the ceremony, and there was still no news from the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s side. Their attitude couldn¡¯t be clearer!


    Mary snorted coldly and said nothing else.


    Emelia lifted her head and took a subtle nce before continuing her report.


    ¡°The Seafolk, the Underground World, and the Storm Kingdom have also sent their own representatives. I have instructed people to receive them.


    ¡°The preparations for the celebrations are allplete. We will require Lady Mary to be there personally to host the ceremonies.


    ¡°The approximate flow of events is as such......¡±


    ¡°......¡±

 Chapter 1430 - Old and New Crimson

    Chapter 1430 Old and New Crimson


    ¡°Mydy, all the representatives are present and awaiting your arrival!¡±


    The door at the end of the hall opened. Meryl, the other figure of authority in the Crimson n, walked in wearing a perfectly tailored adept¡¯s robe made of an incredibly soft material. She bowed and paid her respects to Mary.


    The two of them had been the closest of sisters in the past. However, as Mary grew stronger and stronger, the massive gulf in power between the two of them had cemented their positions as superior and subordinate.


    Given the Crimson n¡¯s wealth now, they would have no problem pushing both Meryl and Emelia to Fourth Grade. However, that was the limit of the n¡¯s power. Every step above Fourth Grade was aplicated and drawn-out process that couldn¡¯t be aplished with a simple umtion of resources.


    The two prideful women were also incredibly confident in themselves. Consequently, even as they were swamped with the numerous n affairs, they still found time to improve and train themselves further.


    Meryl was only advanced Third Grade at the moment, while Emelia was only intermediate Third Grade. Their grades were not very impressive, but their future potential was quite considerable.


    At the very least, both of them had confidence that they would be able to advance to Fourth Grade with their own power!


    It was an attitude and belief they had taken on for the sake of achieving greater heights in the future.


    ording to all the past data that adepts had collected, those who had been able to advance to Fourth Grade under their own power were the only ones who had a chance of advancing even further. Those who pushed into Fourth Grade with the umtion of resources should count themselves fortunate if they could rise to intermediate Fourth Grade.


    ¡°The time is upon us. Let us leave!¡± Mary turned around, looking at the two women awaiting her. She nodded and walked out of the hall.


    Everyone waiting outside the hall was a higher-up of the Crimson n.


    Standing at the very front of the procession measuring only a single meter tall was Goblin Sage Snox, dressed in a luxurious formal suit. As the most veteran of the goblins who followed Greem, he was almost three hundred years old. It wasparable to a human being eight hundred years old. It was also a record for the oldest goblin in history.


    Though Snox was supported by a tremendous quantity of excellent resources, he was still stuck at advanced Second Grade and unable to improve any further. As a result, he was slowly approaching the limit of his lifespan and quickly growing decrepit.


    Even so, on this most important day, he put on an intricate suit that represented the highest glory and bowed before Mary ahead of anyone else.


    ¡°Congrattions, mistress. The greatest congrattions...Snox pays his respects!¡±


    If it weren¡¯t for two young goblin maids holding him up, Snox would have copsed to the ground when he bent over ny degrees with that bow of his.


    Mary took a quick nce at his body and sighed as she nodded. She waved her hand, and a surge of blood energy entered Snox¡¯s body.


    Snox¡¯s spirit seemed to improve visibly.


    ¡°Do what you can! And take care of yourself,¡± Mary stopped to give a few words of advice. Her gaze then turned to the goblin standing behind Snox. ¡°Locke. You are responsible for Snox today. Make sure he doesn¡¯t get too excited!¡±


    Mary finally started walking away again after saying that.


    Locke the goblin was now an intermediate Third Grade Crimson adept. His status in the Crimson n was higher than even Snox and the other goblin nobles.


    Upon hearing Lady Mary¡¯s instructions, he waved away the goblin maids and personally supported Snox by the arm as he followed after this toughdy of theirs. Of course, they walked after Meryl and Emelia.


    The Crimson higher-ups who had been scattered in the various corners talking amongst themselves began to gather around. They bowed, paid their respects to Mary, and joined the procession.


    Blood Knight Soros, Split-Brain Sock, Bug Adept Billis, Blood Knight Windsor, Blood Mage Isa, Blood Elf Magic-Archer L, Icdy Snowlotus, Berserk Witch Sofia, Forest Spirit Eva, Vanlier the Old Fox, Commander Drusi La Salle of the Brutalblood Army, Dragonborn Zacha......


    After all these years of development and growth, the number of Second and Third Grade adepts in the Crimson n had increased to as many as three hundred individuals. A new batch of recruits and fresh blood had taken over key positions within the Crimson n. However, these veterans still held a certain status within Mary¡¯s eyes.


    With the passage of time, some of the veterans had already passed away. Missing among the veterans were Magical Goblin Leader Gonga, Tigule the Goblin, Medusa Dana, Charon the Manticore Leader, and Wind Adept Deserra.


    In the past few hundred years, they had either died of old age or unnatural causes during their expeditions or experiments. They were forever gone to the wind.


    The banquet hall was located on the seventh floor of the adept tower.


    When Mary stepped into the hall alongside the Crimson higher-ups, the entire area instantly broke out into thunderous apuse.


    The numerous Crimson adepts stood on both sides of the red carpet, pping vigorously and cheering with all their might. When Mary walked past them, they held their hands over their chest and bowed down as much as possible, their faces brimming with prideful smiles. They were overjoyed to be allowed to bask in this glory.


    Mary nodded at both sides as she passed through the crowd.


    Those who could enter the celebration¡¯s main venue were all veterans who had joined the Crimson n a long time ago or promising recruits who had recently risen to prominence in the academy. Even though most of them had not seen the legendary Bloody-Queen Lord Mary in person, this did not stop them from cheering for the n¡¯s bright future, the academy, and themselves.


    Mixed in the crowd were several unusual faces from lesser nes. These included giants, drow, beastmen, trolls, Redstone dwarves, goblins, gnomes, lightborne, flower sprites, stonewalkers, and half-dragons.


    The lightborne were a strange species whose entire body was formed of light elementium and who fed on light. They were natural spellcasters of the light elementium and could freely cast all the power associated with that elementium.


    Their light powers made them quite powerful at illusions and healing.


    Flower sprites were not flower fairies. They might seem simr, but they were two very different creatures at their core. Flower sprites had green bodies with two pairs of thin wings on their backs. They might be less than half a meter tall, but they were exceptionally savage. Their ws and teeth contained terrible venom, and they flew at incredible speeds.


    Flower sprites were fearsome magical creatures when used as scouts or assassins!


    Stonewalkers, on the other hand, were a sort of strange lifeform somewhere between an actual organic being and an earth elemental. The ne they lived in consisted of ranges of mountains and hills. You could scarcely find any water, fire, or even nts.


    Stonewalkers were born with the ability to traverse underground, unobstructed by earth or dirt. They also possessed numerous earth powers, making them exceptional miners and ambush forces!


    Half-dragons, on the other hand, were bloodline descendants of dragons and humans. The descendants that had inherited the bloodline of dragons would often awaken rted bloodline powers.


    Half-dragons like these might have trouble reaching the higher grades, but they were often powerful magical warriors, versed in both martial and magical arts. ced in an army, half-dragons were a formidable force that could both defend and assault.


    The more distinguished among the half-dragons were also the best assistant or bodyguard candidates for the high-grade adepts.


    After all, the loyalty of half-dragons was well-known!


    Of course, apart from these people, Mary also spotted some more unusual and indescribable individuals in the crowd. For instance, adepts that looked like slime, centaur adepts, and even one adept that looked like a walking sunflower.


    Ever since they started recruiting foreign students from the lesser nes, Horton Magic Academy¡¯s diversity had truly expanded.


    After walking through the crowd, Mary and her procession moved up arge tform with ten giant steps. Representatives from all over the world were already waiting there.


    Mary looked over and instantly noticed Fourth Grade Thunder Lord Arms, who was now in his human form. He was apanied by Emerald Dragon Iritina, who had also turned into a beautiful young girl.


    Ten muscr men with bald heads and green skin stood behind them. They were pointing at the various magical decorations hanging from the banquet hall¡¯s walls and ceiling, drooling as they did so.


    Mary did not even have to get close. Just from the aura they radiated, she could tell that these were First and Second Grade green dragons that had polymorphed.


    Arms¡¯ thunderous voice immediately rang out when he saw Mary.


    ¡°Mary, you are finally here! I¡¯ve been waiting here all day with my subordinates.¡±


    Mary frowned slightly. An invible and mighty aura instantly permeated the ce.


    Arms¡¯ expression froze, and Iritina immediately stepped forward, holding his arm and pulling him down into a bow.


    The ten human-shaped green dragons behind them also hastily paid their respects.


    ¡°Arms, I am so happy to see you here. Walk with me!¡± Mary faintly smiled as she walked past the thunder dragon.


    Arms scratched his head in frustration before asking Iritina in a soft voice, ¡°Did I say something wrong again?¡±


    Unamused, Iritina rolled her eyes and said in an annoyed voice, ¡°Human adepts love face. You must express proper respect to Lady Mary!¡±


    ¡°Respect,¡± Arms¡¯ face instantly turned dark as he said in an upset tone, ¡°She might not necessarily be able to beat me. Why should I respect her? Hmph! If it wasn¡¯t on ount of Lord Greem, I¡ª¡±


    ¡°Just shut up already. You don¡¯t get to say a single word more today!¡± Iritina might only be Third Grade, but she was very intelligent. She knew the adept¡¯s customs better than Arms, and this was the only way to get Arms to make fewer mistakes for the day.


    Mary walked straight to a corner of the tform after walking past Arms.


    Arge group of undead spellcasters in ck robes were gathered there around the infamous Lich Kanganas.


    As a powerful lich who could be of equal standing with Greem, Kanganas¡¯ appearance at Horton Magic Academy¡¯s celebrations undoubtedly demonstrated the powerfulwork and allies they possessed.

 Chapter 1431 - The Ceremony

    Chapter 1431 The Ceremony


    ¡°Wee, Sir Kanganas!¡±


    Mary expressed the appropriate respect toward this mighty lich.


    Apart from the fact that Kanganas was the department head of Horton Magic Academy¡¯s School of Necromancy, he was also a powerful spellcaster whose potential Greem had mentioned before. Either one of these factors would have been enough for Mary to offer her respect.


    ¡°This is only what I should do!¡±


    As a powerful lich, Kanganas had long since abandoned his rotting carcass. His skeleton had then been turned into a sort of strange substance simr to crystal. This substance possessed exceptional magic and physical resistance, making him immune to attacks from even small magical weapons.


    Moreover, with the increasing assimtion between Kanganas and the Reliquary, twoyers of principle aura now engulfed his skeleton.


    Ordinary Fourth Grade adepts would have to endure death energy and ice energy just by being too close to him, let alone attempting to fight him. They would probably be severely weakened before they could strike.


    The main reason Kanganas was willing to take some time out of his schedule to attend the celebrations was naturally on ount of Greem. He lifted his crystalline skull, two rubies embedded in his empty eye sockets. His concentrated soulfire burned furiously behind those rubies.


    ¡°I didn¡¯te alone this time. I brought a few friends along with me,¡± Kanganas turned around and started introducing them to Mary. ¡°This is Medusa Sshina...this is Sand King...both of them are old acquaintances with Greem. Meanwhile, this over here is Lich Resas.¡±


    Kanganas abruptly switched to mentalmunication at this point and started talking privately with Mary.


    ¡°Resas is here as a representative of the Alliance of Liches. He is hoping for an audience with Sir Greem. I was wondering if Miss Mary would be willing to arrange for that?¡±


    Mary¡¯s expression changed slightly. Her gaze swept across these few visitors.


    As expected, the only ones who could associate with Kanganas would have to be Fourth Grade at the very least.


    A powerful Fourth Grade Medusa, a mighty Fourth Grade insectfolk ruler, a mysterious Fourth Grade lich messenger- none of them were easy opponents to deal with. Who knew when Greem had made acquaintances out of them?


    ¡°Why don¡¯t you stay here for a few days, Sir Kanganas. I will try my best to contact Greem. If possible, I am sure he would meet all of you!¡± Mary consoled gently.


    Mary knew that she would never have been able to invite such otherworldly individuals here as guests with her limitedwork and experience. The reason they had all traveled billions of kilometers to arrive here at the World of Adepts for the establishment ceremony of a new organization was solely because of Greem.


    From a certain standpoint, it seemed like Greem did have some degree of standing in the realms beyond.


    After obtaining the hostess¡¯s word, Kanganas did not bother her any longer.


    Mary invited them, and they followed her as she walked up the tform.


    The giant tform in the middle of the banquet was a massive square about ten thousand square meters. Three thrones sat upon the tform, arranged in a triangr formation- onerge and two small.


    The throne at the very center was thergest and was a dark crimson color. Meanwhile, the two smaller thrones were arranged to the left and right, slightly behind the first throne. On the left, the throne was pitch-ck and speckled with tiny silver spots of light that represented stars. The throne on the right was a bright crimson, a color as sharp as flowing blood.


    Mary walked up to the thrones in her formal garb and sat down on the crimson throne to the right.


    The various guests and messengers also entered the venue, taking up their seats under the academy adepts¡¯ guidance. Soon, the venue was filled.


    At this point, numerous beautiful elven girls walked into the hall, serving drinks and food to the adepts and otherworldly powerhouses that hade from all over the world. The different species among the guests had varied preferences and tastes. As such, the tter ced before them differed in content.


    During this time, Mary looked around from her throne, identifying the various esteemed guests in attendance.


    Thunder Lord Arms, his lover, and his subordinates.


    Medusa Sshina and four of her tribespeople.


    The strange Sand King hade alone.


    Lich Kanganas and Resas, the messenger of the Alliance of Liches, as well as many subordinates.


    The many, many Fourth Grade adepts, subordinates, and trusted individuals of the Central Lands.


    At the front of the people seated to the right, Mary saw a group of individuals who looked very different from humans.


    The sea nagas. These were unusual creatures that lived deep in the sea.


    They had violet skin fully covered in fine scales, a long tail resembling a serpent, and a naked upper body like that of human women. They were all exceedingly pretty, with sharp faces, wavy green hair, and purple lips. They wore all sorts of essories on their neck, wrists, and ears, including shells, coral, and glowing pearls.


    In truth, most sea creatures were of extremely unusual appearance, often going against human standards of beauty. However, the nagas were an exception. They had humanoid appearances, decent intelligence, and were able to raise numerous witches due to their tremendous poption.


    Indeed, there was a rigorous assignment of sses based on gender amongst the nagas. Male nagas mostly advanced into melee warriors, while female nagas became spellcasters along the lines of witches and shamans.


    Though the other seafolk were also quite powerful, the only ones who were willing to maintain a close connection with the adepts on the surface world were the nagas.


    It seemed like the nagas hade here to participate in Horton Magic Academy¡¯s founding ceremony. In truth, they were really here to make acquaintances with the human adepts that hade here from all over the continent. They were hoping to be able to trade for adept resources that they badly needed.


    The forging techniques of the seafolk were incredibly crude. They desired the adepts¡¯ magical items, equipment, and essories very badly. In exchange, they were able to offer rare sea fish, coral, ores, and other magical materials.


    These trades would benefit both parties, which was why the nagas were so passionate about attending major events on the continent!


    After nodding at Fourth Grade Witch Saih, the naga leader, Mary turned her gaze to the underminers sitting beside the nagas.


    Like other nar worlds, the World of Adepts also had an underground world wholly isted from the surface world. Though the Underground World was incrediblycking in resources, food, and poption, it still gave rise to several unusual lifeforms.


    However, it was difficult for any true spellcasters to be born in such a dark environment. Consequently, most of the underground creatures who hade to pay respects were lizard assassins, wormspirits, and other unusual beings.


    The reason they hade to attend the ceremony was simr to the nagas. They were hoping to use it as an opportunity to conduct trades and exchange for resources.


    If they ever hoped to be included in the economy of the Central Lands, they would have to negotiate with Horton Magic Academy, thergest adept organization of the Central Lands. As a show of their sincerity, both the nagas and the underminers had brought the best resources they could offer as gifts.


    Mary simply had to smile and ept these gifts. Emelia and Meryl would manage the actual negotiations.


    After dealing with the two foreign tribes in an appropriate fashion, Mary turned her gaze to the other two major adept organizations who hade here to offer their congrattions¨C the Silver Union and the Northern Witches.


    The Silver Union¡¯s representative was still Vice-Senate Head Melone. He was followed by a few senate members in silver robes.


    The Silver Union was an adept organization that disregarded background and race, prioritizing personal knowledge and aplishment above all else. Consequently, theposition of the senate members was very diverse. There were humans, elves, gnomes, and even rat people.


    Moreover, all the Silver Union senate members here were golem masters. You could see the intricate magical armor constructs attached all over their bodies. These magical armor constructs were stuck to their bodies like anotheryer of skin. They were carved with many tiny,plicated runes that asionally released bright shes of elementium light.


    This magical armor construct technology was a unique ability of the esoteric adepts of Silver Union.


    When they needed to go intobat, these magical armor constructs that resembled essories would allow the golem masters to equip themselves rapidly. The runic arrays carved onto the pieces would provide them with unusual magical abilities.


    Golem masters with magical armor constructs practically wore a set of magic armor at all times. Moreover, it was a set of armor that imbued them with powerful abilities in battle.


    That was why golem masters could unleash tremendous power once they equipped their magical armor construct, even if they themselves were rtively weakerpared to the average adept.


    It was a path that the esoteric adepts founded to strengthen themselves!


    Upon seeing Mary look over, Melone stood forward and said loudly, ¡°I am here to offer blessings to Horton Magic Academy on orders of Senate Head Salvini. This is a gift prepared by the Silver Union. I hope you find it sufficient, Lady Mary.¡±


    Having said that, Melone shot a nce, and a rat person senate member stood forward. He took out a square silver chessboard and threw it into the center of the hall.


    It instantly grew in size until it was a massive chessboard about a hundred meters wide and long. Thirty-two metal chess pieces of various colors and shapes stood on either side of the board.


    These metal pieces were either armored warriors withrge shields and swords, imperial adepts holding staffs, gnomes pushing giant magical cannons, or beast tamersmanding ferocious creatures.


    Judging from the shape and design, this was a chess game popr among the Continent of Adepts¡¯ human nobles.


    After the chessboard expanded to itsrgest size, the pieces on both sides started moving as if they possessed life. They roared and shouted, even nging their armor and weapons, issuing a challenge to the pieces on the other side in all sorts of ways.

 Chapter 1432 - The Association’s Gift

    Chapter 1432 The Association¡¯s Gift


    ¡°A very intricate design!¡± Mary couldn¡¯t help but praise in awe.


    Everyone watched as the chess pieces on the board moved forward or backward under the Silver Union adepts¡¯ control. A terrible battle broke out whenever two pieces shed.


    Each chess golem had been programmed with different techniques andbat styles. Victory hinged not only on a piece¡¯s abilities but also the finesse with which the adept controlled it with their Spirit.


    If an adept had sufficiently powerful Spirit, they could cut their way through all the enemy pieces and execute the king with even the weakest pawn.


    It was obviously an adept¡¯s chess game meant for the training of Spirit. The chess pieces had been animated by the esoteric adepts and possessedbat power. That was the only difference.


    Crucially, the esoteric adepts had mixed in a sort of metal known as Mandas Alloy when they created these chess golems; it was a famous memory alloy. Even if the chess pieces were damaged, they would slowly be restored to their original form as long as sufficient magic energy was infused into the chessboard.


    Mary smiled. She expressed her gratitude toward Melone and ordered people to take the gift away.


    The gift might be intricate, but it did not have much practical use for Horton Magic Academy. Perhaps that was the Silver Union¡¯s intentions all along!


    After all, the two organizations were still engaged in apetitive rtionship. There was no way they would give away strategic resources as a gift to their rival.


    After the Silver Union came the Northern Witches.


    The representative they had sent this time was Deceit Witch Leader Angelina, and her gift was two small resource nes. It wasn¡¯t much, but it was still a far more practical gift than the Silver Union¡¯s chessboard.


    Mary expressed her thanks once more and gave orders for the crystal containing the ne coordinates to be put away. She then raised her goblet and offered a toast to all her guests.


    However, just as everyone was rejoicing and basking in the cheer, amotion could be heard from outside the tower.


    Mary frowned slightly and turned to look at Emelia, who was sitting to the tform¡¯s left. A green ball of light shimmered between her hands. It seemed like she wasmunicating with someone in the distance.


    Just a short momentter, Emelia¡¯s expression changed. She lifted her head and looked at Mary as she said softly, ¡°It¡¯s someone from the Adept¡¯s Association! They are heading here!¡±


    Emelia might have appearedposed when she said this, but Mary could easily tell that there was more to the situation.


    If the Association¡¯s representatives had arrived in proper manner and etiquette, they would have been properly received by the academy¡¯s adepts. There was no way amotion would ur. Thus, it was very likely that these bastards had muscled their way in.


    ¡°Meryl, go and greet them!¡± Mary chuckled coldly. ¡°Spare them from being able to say that we don¡¯t know our manners.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    Meryl acknowledged the order and stood up, a pair of wide red wings ring behind her back. A powerful gust of wind blew throughout the banquet hall as she flew away.


    After all these years of nourishment from the red dragon bloodline, Meryl¡¯s power had improved drastically. She was showing signs of tackling Fourth Grade within a hundred years. As she grew stronger, so did her faction and her subordinates.


    Everyone set aside their goblets and talked amongst themselves as they awaited the Adept¡¯s Association messenger.


    This was no benevolent guest!


    It was a celebration in name indeed, but there was stillpetition and conflict between the various major organizations. While the Adept¡¯s Association hade here to celebrate the event, they still insisted on doing things in such a fashion as to knock Horton Magic Academy down a peg.


    That was only natural!


    Soon, the messenger from the Association flew into the venue, apanied by Meryl.


    There were seven representatives in total, led by two adepts. One of these adepts was a strange female adept d in purple armor, with no hair and purple eyes. The other was a short male adept with a hooked nose, green eyes, dirty yellow teeth, and sparse, messy hair. He wore a ck robe on his person, adorned with all sorts of jewels.


    All the guests present in the hall shuddered upon seeing the Association¡¯s messengers. They could feel the oppressive aura radiating from the two of them.


    Ultra-powerhouses. Both of the adepts leading the party were peak Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouses!


    Meanwhile, the five adepts behind them, three male and two female, were all Third Grade. Though they were only Third Grade, their aura was incredibly ferocious. They seemed to be individuals who had climbed out of a pit of death, having endured countless battles and trials.


    Even the weakest one among them was advanced Third Grade.


    Mary was surprised, but she did not show it on her face. Instead, she put on a cold, insincere smile and said, ¡°I was wondering who it was. So it was Lady Gloria and Lord Cerveris! I express my wee to both of you esteemed guests in Greem¡¯s ce. Please......¡±


    However, the two Association ultra-powerhouses didn¡¯t seem to care much for Mary¡¯s niceties. They simply hovered in the air and looked around at everyone in the hall.


    The faces of the guests turned under the terrible pressure they were exerting. Their expressions were starting to turn forced and unnatural.


    Ultra-powerhouses would always be the most powerful force in a nar world!


    Perhaps it was this sudden surge in the appearance of ¡®pseudo-ultra-powerhouses¡¯ that made actual ultra-powerhouses seem less valuable. Today, upon experiencing the frightening spiritual pressure of actual ultra-powerhouses, every guest present at the event felt genuine fear from the bottom of their hearts.


    The Fourth Grade adepts were still doing ok. They remainedposed in front of such terrible pressure. However, adepts of Third Grade and below started to shift around in their seats, terror slowly creeping over their faces.


    If the Association adepts were allowed to continue terrifying the guests in this fashion, and if one of the adepts or otherworldly guests were to break down and start wailing, it would be a horrible affront to the Central adepts.


    Such a thing could not be allowed to happen!


    Mary¡¯s body trembled. She suppressed her raging fury as a crimson wave rippled within her eyes. Her own pressure rushed forth and resisted against that of the Association adepts¡¯. Unfortunately, she was not actually at peak Fourth Grade yet, while the Nightmare Castle was still thousands of kilometers away.


    Thus, it was only a given that she could not push back against the malicious spiritual pressure of two ultra-powerhouses.


    Upon seeing the unsavory situation, Mornashen Gaia also stood up and let out a stern cry, ¡°Lady Mary has invited you all to take your seats. I would suggest you all take your seats!¡±


    As he gestured and spoke his piece, Gaia¡¯s sturdy Spirit cut into this invisible battle.


    The Gold Titan was powerful, but his strengthy in his Physique and his lightning powers. He was inferior to these two ultra-powerhouses in Spirit.


    Gaia let out a muffled grunt as golden light shimmered across his body.


    Curse Adept Cerveris smiled superficially and let out a cold grunt. ¡°The two of us are here to offer our blessings in the name of the entire Adept¡¯s Association. What is it? Greem thinks he¡¯s too important for even an audience?¡±


    Adept Gloria remained silent all this while. It was obvious she was letting Cerveris say whatever he wanted to.


    The numerous Central adepts present stood up. They were infuriated by the unreasonable and brusque behavior of the Adept¡¯s Association. However, the Association adepts had not actually done anything. They were only ¡®unintentionally¡¯ causing everyone to feel difort due to their spiritual pressure.


    If the Central adepts were to strike out here, they would be the ones to break the peace and start a war!


    It was the real reason why Mary and Gaia couldn¡¯t transform nor properly deal with their opponents!


    The Adept¡¯s Association had simply sent two ultra-powerhouses and were already able to force the Central adepts to transform in response, without lifting even a single finger. If such a rumor were to get out, the Central Lands would forever be humiliated. Horton Magic Academy would also be looked down upon by everyone across the continent.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. After all, Mary and Gaia were only pseudo-ultra-powerhouses. Without transforming, they couldn¡¯t even reach the level of a pseudo-ultra-powerhouse.


    The guests from all over the world clearly had no intention of getting involved. They simply watched from the fence. Medusa Sshina and Sand King were surprised to see all this unfold. They nced toward Lich Kanganas, only to see him sit by idly.


    The two of them exchanged looks. They did not understand Kanganas¡¯ behavior, but they acted in line with him and watched from the sidelines.


    Fourth Grade Thunder Lord Arms also remained seated firmly, as if nothing was wrong at all. No matter how Iritina pinched him, he simply ignored it. It seemed like he was waiting to watch Mary make a fool of herself.


    Just as the atmosphere in the hall turned oddly quiet and Mary and Gaia were about to lose their cool, an exceptionally crisp voice rang out in the hall.


    ¡°Hm? Quite a lot of guests today! Mary, why are you having the guests stand out here instead of offering them a seat?¡±


    The voice wasn¡¯t very loud, but it sent tremors throughout everyone¡¯s hearts.


    Everyone¡¯s face changed when they heard this voice. Fear gripped their hearts.


    That was because they did not hear this voice with their ears. Instead, the voice had been imprinted directly in their brains by some mysterious power.


    That was what shocked them the most!


    If the owner of this voice hadn¡¯t imprinted a voice in their minds, but a spell...everyone couldn¡¯t help but start sweating cold perspiration at the mere thought of this.


    They opened their eyes wide and looked around the hall, hoping to find the owner of this voice. Sadly, given their power, they could not even figure out what ability the mysterious individual had used to speak to them, let alone being able to actually find him!


    However, there weren¡¯t only rookies in the room. Every powerhouse that had masteredw power and started to get involved in the domain of principles turned around and looked at the tall tform.


    Lights flickered there as Greem silently appeared before his throne. He slowly sat down.


    His entire body, inside to out, top to bottom, radiated a gentle and pure aura of light.


    Mm? Light?


    Since when did Greem switch to light elementium?

 Chapter 1433 - Overwhelming Power

    Chapter 1433 Overwhelming Power


    ¡°Gree...Greem? No, you¡¯re not him...you¡¯re...his clone.¡±


    Cerveris opened his eyes wide as he stared at the Greem sitting high on the throne. He was so shocked he even started stuttering.


    Greem¡¯s current state was bizarre. He was glowing translucently, his entire body formed of pure, gentle light elementium. Numerous mysterious patterns of searing white light also flowed across his body.


    His aura was profound and mysterious, making it difficult to tell the extent of his true power!


    Greem lifted his head and smiled at Cerveris, who was embarrassing himself like a fool. He then chuckled and said, ¡°It¡¯s only been five years, and here you are jumping about so spiritedly. It seems like you didn¡¯t get burned enough thest time!¡±


    Upon hearing Greem say the word ¡®burned,¡¯ the typically entric and neurotic Cerveris instantly lost his cool and slippery demeanor, revealing the other side of his personality.


    The fire at Inkdeep Valley had almost melted his very soul and his entire person. If the Association had not used a top-ss treasure to help him remove the fire principles, he would probably still be struggling bitterly in a pocket dimension in his tower.


    Cerveris opened his eyes wide; his expression was twisted and ugly. He pointed a trembling finger at Greem as he croaked in his hoarse voice, ¡°You¡ª¡±


    ¡°¡®You,¡¯ what? You were defeated by my hands, yet you still dare throw your weight around at my ce. What gave you the courage? Could it be...did Domhnall send you here to dere war against our Central Lands?¡± Greem¡¯s voice instantly turned cold and stern.


    Cerveris¡¯ chapped, dry lips fluttered like a butterfly in the cold winter winds. His finger continued to tremble. After a long pause, he finally put the hand down helplessly.


    Dering war on behalf of the Adept¡¯s Association? He didn¡¯t dare do that. Rush forward and challenge Greem to a battle? He didn¡¯t dare do that either.


    For a moment, this adept who stood at the top of the pyramid of adepts wasn¡¯t sure how he should respond to this fire adept. It seemed like...it was almost as if...as if he had never ended up well every time he ran into Greem!


    Seeing as Cerveris¡¯ ¡®mad-dog¡¯ persona had fallen apart and things were turning against them, Gloria narrowed her eyes and stood forward. She said in a cold voice, ¡°Greem, we are here to offer congrattions as representatives of the Association. Is this how you treat your guests?¡±


    Greemughed upon hearing that. ¡°Congrattions? My, I thought you were here to find trouble!¡± His gaze swept across the Association adepts. He couldn¡¯t help but let out a strange chuckle. ¡°I thought it would be Ainley who would being here. I didn¡¯t think it would be you...what is it? Did the old fellows of the Association decide to set you aside and sponsor Ainley instead? Those Fifth Grade resources couldn¡¯t have all fallen into Ainley¡¯s hands, could they?¡±


    Gloria¡¯s expression turned exceptionally ugly upon hearing this.


    She really wanted to rebuke Greem...but that tiny thorn in her heart was aching badly from his provocation. It was so bad that she couldn¡¯t even find the proper words to retaliate with!


    Greem was far too clever and mischievous. The words he had said were only meant partially in jest, but they had hurt Gloria deeply. Indeed, after thest battle, the Association had managed to harvest a batch of rare Fifth Grade resources, though they had also suffered significant losses in the process.


    If used properly, the resources would be enough to push an ultra-powerhouse on the threshold of Fifth Grade¨C like Ainley or Gloria¨Cpast that threshold. They could be Great Adepts. Given the number of resources, however, the Association could only guarantee the sessful advancement of one Great Adept.


    If Gloria had been this fortunate person, the Association should be taking steps to protect her and keep her safe so that she could focus solely on tackling the advancement. A ¡®menial¡¯ task likeing to the Central Lands to intimidate an opponent would never fall on a prized ¡®seed¡¯ and future Great Adept.


    Thus, even with no reports to support his im, Greem was able to guess the matter of fact with ease. He instantly managed to pour a cold bucket of water on Gloria before she could muster her words.


    Fifth Grade resources...Ainley.


    These secrets quickly incited a smallmotion inside the banquet hall.


    The adepts or organizations that did not know theplete picture began whispering amongst themselves, secretly trying to learn more. Meanwhile, major organizations like the Silver Union and the Northern Witches already knew the basic workings of what was happening. They did not express the same shock or surprise.


    ¡°Adept Ainley has gone into seclusion! Perhaps, the next time we meet him, he will already be a high and mighty Fifth Grade Great Adept!¡± Vice-Senate Head of the Silver Union raised his winess and said in a loud voice. ¡°Come, let us raise our sses and toast to Adept Ainley¡¯s advancement. Let us hope he will be the next Great Adept of our World of Adepts to step out into the realms beyond! Cheers!¡±


    Having said that, Melone finished the contents of his ss in a single gulp.


    The next moment, the guests also raised their sses and cheered, offering their praises and blessings.


    However, no one knew what they were truly thinking in their heads!


    With this series of events, the oppressive and arrogant aura that the Adept¡¯s Association¡¯s representatives brought with them copsed in an instant. Even Gloria appeared subdued. She could only resentfully lead the Association adepts to their seats.


    As for the gift that Gloria brought? It was a batch of thirty thousand ves from other worlds, with species such as minotaurs, ursas, trolls, and kobolds. They were a decent workforce to be used in mines or sent in as cannon fodder.


    Greem dly epted the gift.


    It was rare to see Greem since he had gone into seclusion. Vice-Senate Head Melone instantly capitalized on the opportunity. He narrowed his eyes and chuckled as he said, ¡°Lord Greem, I havee with a question for you on orders of a certain old man. Does your word still hold true?¡±


    He was being quite vague, but Greem instantly understood what he meant.


    Greem, the light-person, abruptly thrust his right hand into his chest. When he took his hand out of his chest, there was a ring of Antediluvian design in his palm. The next second, the ring floated over to Melone, carried by an invisible force.


    Melone picked up the ring and examined its contents with his Spirit. A quick momentter, he smiled and carefully put it away.


    ¡°Lord Greem, this is an important matter, so I shall not be staying any longer. They are still waiting for me to get back over there! Point being, our Silver Union won¡¯t be interfering in the affairs of the Central Lands moving forward.¡±


    After hastily leaving behind these words, Vice-Senate Head Melone left the venue with his subordinates. He immediately returned to Union territory through the teleportation arrays.


    Several guests who had been waiting for Greem promptly sentmunications to him upon seeing him appear. For a moment, a dozen differentmunication requests appeared in Greem¡¯s mind all at once.


    Mary could only sigh when she saw how busy Greem was.


    She knew that this was an insane world that greatly valued individual power!


    She might have the power of a pseudo-ultra-powerhouse, but she was still too green and inexperiencedpared to these truly powerful individuals from all over the world. If it weren¡¯t for Greem, powerful individuals like the lich, the Medusa, and the insectfolk leader would never appear here.


    Mary might have made a name for herself inside the World of Adepts over the past. Compared to Greem, her worldview was still too constrained.


    Even though she quite disliked thebel of ¡®housekeeper¡¯ that had been put on her, Mary had no choice but to ept the circumstances as they were. She started to help Greemwork with these influential individuals from all over.


    The founding ceremony had officially begun!


    As the tower shimmered with prismatic light, Ironwood City became engulfed in a sea of joy.


    Colorful elementium spells flew into the skies and erupted into beautiful fireworks everywhere within fifty kilometers of the city. Packs of flying horses, chimeras, firebirds, and other flying magical creatures soared in the air, casting down pretty petals as they flew.


    Squads of strange magical machines appeared on the streets, dancing to the music and making all sorts of weird poses to the jolly tune, making the adepts and apprentices break out inughter.


    The Darkmoon Faire,posed of numerous strange creatures from other worlds, also started performing on the streets, using their wondrous racial abilities to put on all sorts of strange performances, making many adepts stop and watch.


    Arge table was ced at every street corner, piled full of unusual food from alien worlds. There were so many different kinds of food with various appearances, making it hard for one to decide what they should pick.


    These were the ces where the low-grade adepts and apprentices celebrated. Meanwhile, the truly important individuals and high-grade adepts gathered in the banquet hall, clustered in groups of two or three as they talked passionately amongst themselves.


    Every member of the Crimson n was present, ensuring these foreign guests felt wee. Greem wasn¡¯t without his own affairs either. He dealt with one group of individuals after another, all of them ¡®allies¡¯ and panions¡¯ with their own little schemes in mind.


    The first person he granted an audience to was naturally Lich Kanganas, as well as Resas, the messenger from the Alliance of Liches. The messenger¡¯s purpose ining surprised Greem. He was being invited to excavate the Death God¡¯s tomb.


    However, given his current situation¡¯s unique circumstances, Greem could only politely reject the offer after some thought.


    He knew his own affairs better than anyone else. It was quite inadvisable for him to go exploring at this juncture.


    He had turned into the Devouring Fish and bit off the head of Sinai¡¯s fire projection, which contained a fragment of his divine authority of fire within.


    Such a powerful item, supported by a small sliver of Sinai¡¯s soul, had been at odds with Greem for several years now. That was why Greem¡¯s actual body remained hidden under the copsed Fire Throne to this day, battling fervently against the sliver of Sinai¡¯s soul.


    That was why Greem would never step out of his hiding spot until he made the divine authority fragment submitpletely!

 Chapter 1434 - A Temporary Farewell

    <h4>Chapter 1434 A Temporary Farewell</h4>


    In all honesty, Greem really didn¡¯t dare to venture out again!


    He was undoubtedly the wealthiest he had ever been in his life, but he was as weak and vulnerable as a sheep in terms ofbat prowess.


    These weren¡¯t words of humility, but genuine and sincere opinions of his own ability.


    A principle crystal, the corpse of a Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lord, a fragment of divine authority- any one of these would be enough to move Fifth Grade powerhouses to action, let alone the more desperate and greedy Fourth Grade predators.


    Greem was nearly invincible within the World of Adepts due to the blessing of the nar consciousness. No one could stand up to him in his current state of half-advancement, as no one could endure his unbelievably powerful Undying mes.


    The moment he stepped out of the World of Adepts, he would be little more than a Fourth Grade adept who had yet to advance to Fifth Gradepletely. He was probably the ideal prey for the numerous predators out there with all the treasures he was carrying on his person.


    His enemies would no longer be high-grade adepts fighting for power and authority- they would be sinister hunters that lurked in the darkness. That was why Greem did not intend to take a single step out of the ne until he had actually advanced to Fifth Grade.


    Death God¡¯s Tomb? Heh. Greem¡¯s current assets were probably worth half of the entirety of the Death God¡¯s Tomb!


    Those liches had invited him to excavate the Death God¡¯s Tomb, but who knew if their real target was actually him?


    Greem politely declined the invitation with some excuse and proceeded to decline the invitations by Sshina and Sand King as well. He then sent them away.


    Once Greem had dealt with all the guests, Mary finally walked in, having been made to wait all this while. She grabbed him by the cor and asked sternly in a quiet voice, ¡°You...what¡¯s your condition now?¡±


    In truth, Greem was a humanoid formed purely of light at the moment. He didn¡¯t really have a cor for Mary to grab! However, for the sake of cating Mary, he had no choice but to materialize a cor for her to hold.


    Greem could only shrug in the face of Mary¡¯s interrogation. He sighed and said, ¡°As you can see, this is my current condition. My body¡¯s trapped under Fire Throne. It probably can¡¯te out for a while still. Therefore, this body of light is the only means by which I can walk around outside!¡±


    Mary lifted her nose and sniffed. She frowned. ¡°Why is there the smell of different blood on this body. Like blood that doesn¡¯t belong to you?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s because the origin blood used to create this body was taken from Geraldine of the Adept¡¯s Association. I¡¯ve tried my best to mix its contents, but the body still maintains a subtle spiritual connection with the light elementium adept,¡± Greem said with a bitter smile on his face.


    ¡°You mean to say...he can sense your mind and the fluctuations of your emotions.¡±


    ¡°Well, not that bad. However, if we get too close, we can sense each other¡¯s location and approximate mental state.¡±


    ¡°How close is too close?¡±


    ¡°About five thousand kilometers! That said, he is weaker than me, so he might only be able to sense my presence within fifty kilometers.¡±


    ¡°Isn¡¯t that a serious side-effect? If the Association tries to capitalize on this and do something, you might run into trouble at some crucial moment!¡±


    ¡°Haha, don¡¯t worry about that! I¡¯m willing to bet that Geraldine must be suspicious right now, but he won¡¯t be able to figure out what exactly happened. If he darese to the Central Lands, I don¡¯t mind devouring him whole. In doing so, I can further improve the power of this light clone of mine.¡± Having said that, Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a self-assuredugh. His right hand also slid toward Mary¡¯s waist silently.


    Unfortunately, Mary scratched his hand before he could reach all the way. Five terrible wounds that reached into the bones could be seen. This body of light had no blood to speak of, only endless light elementium.


    After the skin was sliced open, there was no flesh to be seen within either, only semi-translucent bones and transparent, glowing muscles. Light elementium was best used for illusions and purification. As such, the wound instantly vanished in a sh of white light.


    Mary shed her fangs and threatened, ¡°Don¡¯t even think about touching me while you have someone else¡¯s smell on you. Don¡¯t try and trick me with your clone in bed. Hmph!¡±


    ¡°Ah,¡± Greem yelped in shock. ¡°Then...then you might have to wait a hundred years!¡±


    ¡°So be it! I can wait a hundred years! The point being, if you dare touch me with a clone before your actual bodyes out from under Fire Throne, I will tear you apart. If you can¡¯t stand it any longer, you can try and go looking for Alice. See if she will let you enter her sheets with a clone,¡± Mary warned sternly.


    If even Mary couldn¡¯t ept this clone, then it was even more unlikely for the always shy and embarrassed Alice!


    Greem felt as if he had just been struck by lightning. Despair swept over his mind.


    However, he quickly adjusted his emotions and called after Mary before she left.


    He took out a storage ring from his body and put it in his palm as he said, ¡°This body of mine still needs to protect my actual body. I can¡¯t stray too far from Fire Throne. I will have to leave the affairs of the Central Lands to you for the next hundred years. These are some things I got from the Associationst time. They should be quite useful for you. Here!¡±


    ¡°Take Shadow Demon back with you then! It¡¯s more important to keep your actual body safe.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s no need. No one will dare go close to my actual body. Anyone who dares to do so is likely not an opponent that Shadow Demon can fend off. Rather, it would seem like you need more powerful individuals on your side to hold the whole situation together. Keep Shadow Demon with you!¡±


    Having said that, Greem went utterly silent. Mary turned back, only to find that he had already left, leaving behind a small and intricate ring where he had been.


    Mary picked up the ring and sensed the jars of Fifth Grade blood stored within. A hint of sorrow shed over her face.


    Once upon a time, they had both been apprentices, struggling together in adversity, became adepts together, and rose to prominence step by step, together. Now, he was walking faster and faster into the distance. Could she...still catch up to him?


    The ever-prideful Bloody Queen Mary couldn¡¯t help but feel a sudden loss of confidence!


    As a special blood adept, her advancement was limited by the potential of her bloodline. ording to the adepts¡¯ records, a vampire of Fifth Grade had yet to appear anywhere in the multiverse.


    There had never been a vampire god, nor had there been a Fifth Grade vampire adept from any of the nar worlds. It seemed almost as if vampires were destined to be nar creatures, incapable of surviving beyond a nar world.


    That would mean Mary¡¯s path forward as a blood adept would havee to an end. There were no bloodline legacies for her to turn to. If she wanted to improve any further, she would have to rely on her current power to find apletely new path forward.


    After all these years of exploration, she realized that there was only one path that could allow her to continue growing in power¨C the blood principles!


    Vampire adepts were individuals that constructed their power system around the blood principles to begin with. The only problem was that their bloodline talent was so overwhelmingly powerful that the nar consciousness rarely blessed them. There were very few vampires who could extend their powers from the bloodws to the principles.


    After all, sustaining the rise of a peak Fourth Grade vampire would probably require millions of other lifeforms in the nar world to have their bloodlines corrupted. The amount of blood essence that a vampire would have to absorb to advance to Fifth Grade was so tremendous that it was impossible to imagine.


    Anyone with half a brain could understand why a nar consciousness would not want to favor a tumor like that.


    If Mary had not listened to Greem¡¯s advice and limited her conversion to beings from other nar worlds, the nar consciousness might already have begun rejecting her.


    Now, with the Fifth Grade blood that Greem provided her, Mary no longer needed to collect blood essence from within the ne bit by bit.


    In doing so, she could alleviate the nar consciousness¡¯s hostility toward her and have more time to experience the blood principles.


    The reason she was doing all this so seriously was simply to catch up with that gradually distancing figure!


    ............


    The only advantage in having a body of light was a faster flying speed and stronger illusions.


    With a sh of light, Greem left the tower. He hovered above Ironwood City for a moment before flying toward Fire Throne as a beam of light.


    Given his current Fourth Grade powers and the unusual traits of his soul and body, no one could see him as he cut through the air.


    Greem proceeded forward inplete silence, flying past one region after the next. He watched as the dirt-yellow ground beneath him slowly turned ck as more and more trees came into view.


    Finally, after flying for five thousand kilometers, not a single person could be seen on the ground. Instead, there were all sorts of beasts, fowl, fish, and insects.


    After flying another fifty kilometers through the ck Forest, the green vanished and what appeared was a vast and scorchednd.


    This scorchednd was about fifty kilometers in radius. The outside of thend was ck earth, withered and burnt. The closer you got to the center, the more cracks you could see in the ground. Once you reached within twenty-five kilometers of the center, you started to see spots ofva pools and tiny volcanoes here and there.


    You could even see numerous fire creatures here. These fire creatures lived like wild beasts without worry. They yed, lived, and wandered thisnd filled with fire and the smell of sulfur, all while rejecting the presence of any non-fire creatures.


    Because of this, Greem did not choose to exterminate them. Instead, he left them here to wander and serve as the eyes and scouts of Fire Throne.


    Greem finally stopped when he reached the giant, two and a half kilometer widevake.


    A Mothership with the Crimson n¡¯s giant emblem on it hovered in the clouds above theke. Greem could faintly sense the presence of hundreds of adepts and apprentices there.


    It was the garrison that the Crimson n posted above thevake. A Third Grade adept was constantly on standby here. However, given their power, there was no way they could sense Greem¡¯s presence!


    Greem shook his head and sighed. He then dove down out of the sky and into thevake.

 Chapter 1435 - Advancing to Fifth Grade

    Chapter 1435 Advancing to Fifth Grade


    Time flies.


    Eighty years flew by in the blink of an eye.


    Eighty years. It wasn¡¯t a particrly long nor short period. It could be a person¡¯s entire life or less than a nap in the eyes of a dragon.


    For a certain fellow buried under avake, it was only enough time for him to take a tiny step forward and advance from Fourth Grade to Fifth Grade.


    Fifth Grade was a dividing line!


    Those below Fifth Grade were still immature chicks in the eyes of the Great Adept, even if they were uncontested rulers within their own worlds capable of moving mountains and shifting rivers.


    Those above Fifth Grade were known as gods in the World of Gods. It was a demonstration of their ascension from mortality and an escape from the cycle of life and death to be a nearly immortal being. Meanwhile, in the adept faction, only adepts above Fifth Grade could be known as Great Adepts.


    Great Adepts were wholly different from your ordinary adept!


    This difference manifested in every aspect, from their body to their Spirit, to their very soul origin. Fifth Grade principle adepts had fully adapted to their principle powers. Affected by them, every part of the adept¡¯s body within and without had adapted and bepatible with the principle powers they possessed.


    Take Greem, for example. When he was Fourth Grade, his human body was still his true form, while the body of mes was his elementium form. That situation was now inverted. His me state was his actual body, while his human body was more of a projection to some extent.


    If it weren¡¯t to maintain thisst trace of a connection to his human origin, Greem would never leave behind such a fragile and dangerous weakness in his origin power.


    It was, in fact, the major problem that all human Great Adepts faced!


    Their human bodies were too frail. The limit of power that such bodies could contain was also far too low. If the Great Adepts insisted on keeping their human bodies, the most direct consequence was having to suffer terrible energy reserves and poor defenses.


    At the very least, the Great Adepts that stubbornly insisted on keeping their human origins were the weakest of Fifth Grade beings!


    Thevake started to turn restless in the afternoon.


    The mild quakes loosened the piles of boulders nearby, causing pebbles to fall off and even avnches in other ces.


    It seemed as if thevake was leaking.


    The viscousva started to flow away, and theke¡¯s water level quickly went down, revealing a scarlet bed of magma at the very bottom.


    Large spouts of steam rose from the ground, sting fine stones into the air as they did so. The internal temperature of these steam pirs was over five thousand degrees. Any human that got hit by these pirs would be vaporized without a trace.


    The earth was undting unevenly, with certain parts of the ground rising while others sank; wrinkles appeared all over thend. It was almost as if there was an earth dragon tunneling underground. Dirt flew everywhere around thevake as steam burst out from beneath.


    From a distance, it seemed as if the ground itself was boiling like water!


    The adepts on the Mothership noticed the abnormality on the ground a long time ago. Third Grade Blood Knight Windsor soon descended with a few other Crimson adepts to search for the source of thismotion.


    Windsor wore intricate knight¡¯s armor carved full of fine andplicated magical patterns. His crimson cape fluttered in the wind, making him seem all the more intimidating.


    Windsor and the adepts hovered in the air above thevake as they silently observed the changes below. From a distance, they could not spot any invaders or suspicious creatures.


    All theva had drained away from theke, and theke¡¯s scarlet bed could be seen. Scalding waves of heat rose from the bottom of theke, the air itself heavy with the smell of sulfur and fire.


    ¡°Lord Windsor, it doesn¡¯t seem like this was the doing of a person. Rather, something¡¯s happening underground!¡± One of the Crimson adepts couldn¡¯t help but frown as he said.


    ¡°Underground,¡± Windsor brooded in silence.


    As a member of the Crimson, he naturally knew what was hidden beneath thevake. Now that something was happening underground...could it be?


    While he was deep in thought, another Crimson adept let out a surprised cry.


    ¡°Look...what¡¯s that?¡±


    Windsor looked down and focused his gaze. He indeed managed to notice some new abnormalities.


    Several dark red ribbons of light seeped out from beneath the dried bed of theke. They were like prismatic tentacles of some giant squid, extending in every direction and toward the sky.


    For some reason, Windsor¡¯s heart trembled when he saw these ribbons of light. There was an impulse from the depths of his heart to simply turn and run.


    The Second Grade adepts might not be able to sense anything unusual about these light ribbons, but as a Third Grade blood knight, Windsor had already started to gain a vague understanding of the higher powers. His sharp senses insistently warned him not to approach those ribbons of light.


    Windsor hesitated for a moment before reaching into his storage pouch and pulling out a metal ore with a blue gleam the size of his fist. He rxed his grip on it and let it fall to the ground.


    The metal ore spun as it fell, the magical powers contained within leaving a blue trail in the air as it did so.


    Diablue Ore. It was a magical ore that contained water elementium powers. The Diablue metal extracted from it was an excellent material for forging a water staff.


    This Diablue ore might not look veryrge, but it was undoubtedly a mid-grade magical material. A piece of ore the size of a fist could easily fetch a market price of four hundred magical crystals.


    The Crimson adepts did not understand Windsor¡¯s actions, but they still focused and watched.


    The Diablue ore fell toward the ground and happened to collide with one of the wandering ribbons of light. The moment it came into contact with the ribbon, green smoke appeared as the ore instantly turned red-hot. The terrifying heat vaporized the ore instantly, leaving only scattered kes of metal drifting to the ground.


    ¡°Hss!¡±


    The Crimson adepts immediately drew in a breath of cold air. When they looked at the light ribbons again, a hint of fear had taken over their eyes.


    Diablue ore was not known for its defensive power, but it was still much harder than regr metal. In addition to its unique magical attributes, the ore would have no problem surviving an ordinary elementium attack.


    The fact that these seemingly harmless and weightless light ribbons could possess such terrifying power was unthinkable. If the adepts became caught in the ribbons, there wouldn¡¯t even be a body left to bury.


    ¡°You all return immediately and inform headquarters of the situation here. I will go down myself to have a better look,¡± As the one who shouldered the responsibility of overseeing thisnd, Windsor had an obligation to figure out the source of the disturbance.


    It was very dangerous down there, and he had no choice but to grit his teeth and go down to explore.


    Just as he was about to move, a familiar female voice rang by his ear.


    ¡°Come up! There¡¯s no need to go down there anymore.¡±


    It was Lady Mary!


    Windsor lifted his head in surprise, only to find two beautiful and perfect women hovering silently in the air as they watched the ground.


    And Lady Alice.


    Windsor waved his hand, and the other Crimson adepts quickly flew upward in a hurry. They bowed and paid their respects to Mary and Alice before returning to the Mothership.


    ¡°Inform themander to take the ship and await us fifty kilometers away from here. No one is to step within thevake area without permission! Go!¡± Mary quickly issued her orders.


    Over the past eighty years, Mary had ruled the Crimson n while also serving in the capacity of Associate Dean of Horton Magic Academy. Her reputation in the Central Lands couldn¡¯t be any greater, and she possessed tremendous influence and power within the Crimson n as well.


    With just a single order, the giant Mothership had vanished over the horizon.


    Only two prettydies were left above thevake.


    Mary beat her wings, causing her to bob up and down slightly in the air.


    After all these years, Mary¡¯s beauty was still as it was in the past.


    A beautiful face, crimson eyes, juicy red lips, fiery red hair that reached her shoulders, a slender waist, and long, white legs. She also wore enchanted dragon-leather armor that perfectly fit her form, making her appear all the more enchanting.


    Meanwhile, Alice standing beside her appeared to have be even more gentle and noble.


    She wore a purple starry robe on her person that outlined her slender figure. Her silk-like silver hair ran down her back, making her appear unusually gentle and tranquil. The light of intelligence gleamed in her long, narrow eyes, giving off a mysterious impression to all who saw her.


    The two women stood shoulder to shoulder as they watched the undting earth. Their eyes were filled with an unconceble concern and sorrow.


    ¡°Alice, say...is he going toe out today?¡± Mary asked softly. There wasn¡¯t any joy of reunion in her tone.


    ¡°Mm!¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s...already...Fifth Grade?¡±


    ¡°Mm!¡±


    ¡°Then is he leaving the World of Adepts immediately?¡±


    ¡°...not that soon, but he doesn¡¯t have much time left!¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    The two girls both fell silent.


    As they watched, thevake that had started to cool down began to tremble and quake violently once again.


    Fines cracks appeared all over the earth like broken porcin as blinding red beams of light shone from below. It was almost as if a burning sun was slowly rising from the ground.


    Everything on the surface began to melt and soften. Even the air itself had reached ridiculous temperatures.


    A giant hand broke apart the earth and reached upward amidst all the fire andva. The fire hand bent and gripped the ground as a gigantic and fearsome me humanoid emerged from below to stand proudly upon the earth.

 Chapter 1436 - Planar Suppression

    Chapter 1436 nar Suppression


    It was a me giant zing with golden fire, standing at ten meters tall!


    Even though ten meters was far shorterpared to when he was a thousand meters tall, the strange fires that shrouded the giant constantly radiated tiny golden ripples.


    These golden ripples were not visible to N ordinary mortal. They were almost intangible. Much like how magical auras could affect the environment, the narws changed wherever the golden ripples spread.


    The one controlling this space was no longer the almighty nar consciousness, but a different, searing consciousness. It was the soul consciousness of the golden me giant that ruled supreme here.


    Looking from a certain perspective, the golden me giant had be a source of principle power. The principle power flowing through his body was constantly interacting andmunicating with the World of Adepts¡¯ principle system, resulting in a trembling and rippling across the principle system.


    However, the nar consciousness would not just happily relinquish control over its space.


    Severalw chains suddenly reached out of the space around the me giant. They wrapped toward it like the tentacles of a ravenous octopus.


    The golden me giant clearly did not wish to be bound by thew chains. He roared and waved his hands as golden fire instantly engulfed arge stretch of space. Thew chains within that sea of fire shattered. Even space itself started to distort and break down as the mes burned.


    However, the nar consciousness was not so easily dissuaded.


    The next moment, space tore apart, and even morew chains rattled as they rushed toward the golden giant. Where thew chains passed, the mes started by the giant were gradually suppressed.


    The golden me giant howled in agony and attempted to draw on even more of his power to resist the chains. At that moment, a golden halo of Fatended on the giant¡¯s body, temporarily halting his resistance against the nar consciousness.


    ¡°Greem, don¡¯t confront the nar consciousness! You must endure its suppression if you want to extend your stay within the ne. Trust me, it will be okay!¡± Alice¡¯s sweet and gentle voice rang out in the giant¡¯s mind at the appropriate time. The giant finally stopped his futile resistance and gritted his teeth to endure thew chains¡¯ painful restraint.


    Once the giant had given up on resistance, the berserkw chains immediately wrapped all over his body and started to tighten. The golden me giant moaned in pain as thew chains contracted. His body began to shrink, and the fires on his body began to extinguish.


    Fifteen minutester, the me giant disappeared without a trace as a naked, muscr man standing two meters tall appeared on the spot.


    Greem shook his head and winced before finally trying to get up from the ground.


    His muscr body was covered in all sorts of mysterious and profound golden patterns. These patterns were then further covered and entangled with anotheryer of dark green skins, causing most of his power to be ced under an odd seal.


    Of course, thisyer of seals could not wholly suppress all his powers.


    As long as he wanted to, he could draw enough power from within him to break the seal and allow the principle power of the golden ripples to rule over the space around him once more. In doing so, however, the conflict between him and the nar consciousness would never be resolved.


    The nar consciousness would not rest until he was forced out of the nar world!


    After all, letting a powerful principle adept like Greem roam the nar world freely was a bad idea. He would rewrite the narws wherever he went.


    It was something that the nar consciousness could not allow to happen!


    Greem had reverted from his body of fire to his current human body; most of his power had been sealed away. The upper limit of power he could unleash now was peak Fourth Grade, only a fraction of his true might.


    It was such an unbearable experience. No wonder the Great Adepts could not tolerate it either.


    Greem had personally killed two Fifth Grade creatures in the battles before this. It caused his ego to swell. He hade to believe himself to be sufficiently powerful.


    However, upon advancing into a Fifth Grade Great Adept, he could finally experience for himself how ¡®savage¡¯ the suppression of the narws was upon ultra-grade beings!


    It was aplete suppression from every aspect. From the body to Spirit to the soul itself- it was aplete suppression of the individual!


    No wonder those Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lords became so ¡®frail¡¯ after entering the World of Adepts. Greem wasn¡¯t the impressive one. Rather, it was the nar consciousness that existed everywhere that was impressive. It was the principle power that he had managed to grasp that was impressive.


    Thebination of thetter two was what actually caused an upset in his battle against the Fifth Grade minor Scourge Lords and what forged Greem¡¯s moment of glory.


    ¡°Hm, what are you trying to do exactly? Showing up all naked after so long,¡± Mary couldn¡¯t help but tease as she beat her wings and flew down from above.


    Meanwhile, Alice blushed with a smile on her face.


    Greem chuckled awkwardly and waved his hand, creating a red robe over his body.


    However, where the golden mes reverberated, the space rippled turbulently. It took a long time for them to settle down once more.


    ¡°We are inside the ne right now. You...if it¡¯s not necessary, you should restrain from using your principle power. Otherwise, the nar bacsh will be a horrible experience for you!¡± Alice strolled to Greem¡¯s side before standing on her toes and gently brushing his hair past his shoulders.


    ¡°Uugggghhh...it¡¯s such a terrible feeling! I feel like my nose is clogged, my eyes are blindfolded, and there are fifty kilograms of chains wrapped around me. Even breathing is incredibly difficult!¡± Greemined angrily as if he would rather die now.


    His Physique was notparable to the minor Scourge Lords, after all. The minor Scourge Lords were able to unleash devastating power within the ne even as they endured tremendous suppression. Meanwhile, Greem was currently having trouble even maintaining his powers at a Fourth Grade level.


    ¡°That¡¯s because you¡¯ve just advanced and haven¡¯t gotten used to the nar suppression. Once you¡¯ve been here long enough and adapted to it, you will be able to unleash more and more power,¡± Alice exined simply to him.


    Greem already knew all this, but the experience was simply too unbearable. He wanted nothing more than to free himself of this torture and suffering as quickly as possible. It was only natural that he couldn¡¯t help butin.


    ¡°Have you advanced? Is that...golden me giant your true form?¡± Mary asked curiously. She had already circled Greem thrice now. She even put her face near Greem¡¯s and gently sniffed that sweet, enticing smell of blood pumping through his body, ¡°Smells good! So good that I want to have a tiny, little bite.¡±


    An amused expression appeared on Greem¡¯s handsome face. He reached his finger out and flicked Mary lightly on her forehead. Greem then wrapped his arm around her waist before turning to ask Alice, ¡°How much longer can I remain in the ne?¡±


    Alice smiled and said, ¡°Depends on how much of the ne¡¯s blessing you still have! If you don¡¯t leave the World of Adepts before the ne¡¯s blessing is exhausted, the nar consciousness will find you and banish you!¡±


    Greem focused his mind and immediatelymunicated with the Chip.


    The next second, a gigantic countdown appeared in his mind.


    [123 hours, 43 minutes, 57 seconds.]


    Time was slowly ticking away.


    This was thest remaining time he could remain within the World of Adepts. Moreover, if he drew upon power that exceeded the limit of this ne, that time would shorten dramatically.


    He really didn¡¯t have much time left to leave behind his st will¡¯!


    ¡°Chip, what¡¯s the result of the self-assessment?¡±


    [Beep. Beginning first self-assessment since grade advancement.]


    Soon, a torrent of numbers flooded Greem¡¯s vision.


    [Greem. Male. Fifth Grade Principle Adept (Fire Specialization).


    Starbeast Bloodline One: (Devouring Fish).


    Starbeast Bloodline Two: (4%).


    Chaos Physique (Excellent Magic Resistance).


    Heart of Principles (Fire Principles 217%plete).


    Bodily Attributes: Strength 26 | Physique 35 | Agility 18 | Spirit 51+5.


    Bloodline Talent: Energy ckhole, Fire Principles (Undying mes, Fire¡¯s Image)......]


    After a hundred years of umtion, in addition to the mes that Greem had devoured from Sinai, Greem had managed to increase the analysis of his fire principles to 217%. He had then sessfully unlocked his second fire principle ability: Fire¡¯s Image.


    Greem could summon three mirror-images of fire from the mes he unleashed inbat. These images could replicate most of his abilities andmanded potent fire maniption powers.


    More importantly, Greem¡¯s own self could switch freely between these three mirror-images, even under the effects of spatial interference or lockdowns.


    Greem¡¯s enemies would have to simultaneously endure the merciless bombardment of four powerful fire principle adepts. Moreover, if someone wanted to attack Greem himself, they would first have to eliminate all three mirror-images first.


    Just the thought of what would happen made Greem uncontrobly excited!


    Apart from the changes in his fire principles, Greem had also activated the analysis of a second starbeast bloodline in addition to the Devouring Fish. Once the analysis of that bloodline wasplete, Greem would gain a second bloodline transformation ability.


    When that happened, he could freely switch between his bloodline transformations as the situation demanded, making hisbat tactics far more varied and dangerous!


    Of course, the effect of having multiple bloodline transformation abilities on his development as an adept was something that needed to be observed over a longer period of time. He didn¡¯t need to worry about that issue for the moment.


    ¡°I still have some time. So, what do you think we should do next?¡± Greem grabbed Alice by the waist and whispered into her ears.


    Alice¡¯s face instantly turned bright red and Mary, who had been eavesdropping, instantly got excited.


    ¡°Couldn¡¯t have said it better myself! I¡¯ve been holding it in for a hundred years now! You¡¯re not getting away this time.¡±


    Greemughed out loud when he heard this. With a girl in each hand, he teleported and disappeared back underground.


    A short momentter, the ground started quaking once again.

 Chapter 1437 - Eye for an Eye

    Chapter 1437 Eye for an Eye


    Silver Union, the Diviner¡¯s Tower.


    Ever since the magic surge erupted, the elderly tower master had locked himself on the top floor of the tower, restlessly reading all the secret archives stored in there for the past tens of thousands of years.


    As he flipped through the scrolls, he continually muttered a series of mysterious words, things like ¡®the Three Rulers,¡¯ ¡®revival,¡¯ and many other words.


    On this day, the young archivist apprentice Sonke walked into the room carefully with a wooden tray carrying a few simple dishes. He said softly, ¡°Teacher, it¡¯s about time you eat!¡±


    ¡°No, no, I¡¯m not eating...take it away. Don¡¯t disrupt my train of thought,¡± The tower master was utterly unlike his usual wise andposed self. He appeared easily angered and temperamental as he waved his hand to chase Sonke away. ¡°Dammit...I keep feeling like I¡¯ve missed something. Why is it that I¡¯m starting to understand the things happening there less and less!? Alice...Alice must have done something. These damned Fate Witches, why do they always like to stir up Fate and turn it into a damned mess?¡±


    As he smacked the tower furiously, the Omniscient Eye above them suddenly let out a blinding sh of golden light. It rumbled as it turned, casting the golden beam at a certain ce to the northwest.


    ¡°The wheel of Fate is turning. Another Great Adept has appeared in the World of Adepts...hurry, Sonke! Help me up there. Who¡¯s the lucky fellow? Let¡¯s see. Is it the one from the Adept¡¯s Association or the one from the Central Lands?¡± Urged by the old tower master¡¯s ramblings, Sonke hastily put down the food tray and helped his teacher up the narrow spiral staircase leading to the Omniscient Eye.


    Upon arriving here, the old tower master seemed to gain a burst of strength. He pushed Sonke away and lunged onto the altar, projecting all his Spirit into the Omniscient Eye that was rapidly working away like a precise machine.


    The Omniscient Eye looked like a giant, hollow metal ball. It was two meters in diameter and floated above the altar, and a strange eye sat in the center of the metal ball. It had a white sclera, a pupil, and streaks of red nerves that ran throughout the eyeball itself. It darted around as it looked, appearing exceedingly intelligent.


    It wasn¡¯t a magical eye. Rather, it was the eyeball of an actual ultra-grade being.


    It was with the aid of this eyeball that the Diviner¡¯s Tower could observe anything they wanted, regardless of distance or magical obstruction. However, even the most powerful of eyes could not see through the mists gathered by the powers of Fate.


    The people that diviners hated the most were none other than other diviners!


    ¡°The mists of Fate...annoying! As expected, there¡¯s Alice aura on them. Still, judging from the environment, this should be the Central Lands. That means the one who advanced must be that legendary fire adept. Hahaha...even Dous couldn¡¯t do anything about this fire adept. Could he possibly replicate the legend of the Three Ancient Rulers?¡±


    One had to admit that anyone who had anything to do with Fate and divination was more than a little entric. This elderly tower master who had lived for nearly a thousand years was so off his rocker that his ramblings hardly made sense. As he continued to peek into the distance with the aid of the Omniscient Eye, he continued to babble along, spouting words and names that no one could understand.


    The Three Ancient Rulers.


    Sonke didn¡¯t quite understand what his teacher was saying, but this ancient name drew his attention. This particr name had appeared the most frequently in the records of the ancient times when he was browsing the archives.


    The Three Ancient Rulers referred to the three powerful individuals who had established the three major organizations of the World of Adepts in ancient times.


    First, you had the founder of the Northern Witches. She was the one known as the Witch Queen, Monarch of the Witches, and the Ancient Witch¨C Salem. Then you had Ignaz, he who had mastered the earth principles and was first Chairman of the Adept¡¯s Association. Lastly, Saint Patrick, the esoteric adept known as the Creator and founder of the Silver Union.


    They were the only three Ninth Grade Great Adepts of the adept faction at the moment. As such, they were also respectfully referred to as the Three Ancient Rulers!


    The fact that his teacher had justpared a Fifth Grade ¡®rookie¡¯ to the Three Ancient Rulers waspletely beyond Sonke¡¯sprehension.


    After all, Ninth Grade represented the very pinnacle of power in the multiverse. These people reigned far above the principles of the universe. They were almighty beings that ordinary adepts could never hope to reach.


    As such, his teacher¡¯s very act ofparing the Three Ancient Rulers to this man was already sacrilege. If news of this was heard by the three major organizations, trouble was certain to arise.


    However, this was the Diviner¡¯s Tower- the domain of the old tower master. No one dared challenge his authority under the gaze of the Omniscient Eye.


    After all, being able to live as long as he had was a symbol of power as well!


    ............


    Adept¡¯s Association, the Tower of Observation.


    The seven hundred and seventy-seventh floor.


    The typically quiet top floor of the tower was now crowded with people. Fourth Grade adepts who were typically absent and busy with their work were now all gathered around the new Chief Diviner Nostran, impatiently awaiting news.


    Seven hours ago, a surge in principle fluctuation from the depths of the nar system had rmed everyone. They were not aware of the disturbance¡¯s source, but they could faintly sense that a groundbreaking event was about to happen in the World of Adepts.


    Adepts below Fourth Grade were not too tightly connected with the nar system. Even if some of them also felt something unsettling, they couldn¡¯t verify it in any way. However, these Fourth Grade adepts were all able to pick up on something through thew powers they had grasped.


    For the sake of rifying their doubts, all of them had put aside their work and gathered on the top floor of the Tower of Observation, seeking counsel with this newly assigned Chief Diviner Nostran.


    Maztan, his predecessor, had used up thest of his life force on a divination seventy-eight years ago and died on the astrology tform. Meanwhile, Nostran was an elite who had been selected by Domhnall from the diviners in reserve and promoted to his current position.


    The brilliant light on the astrology tform persisted for two hours before Diviner Nostran finally stepped down, supported by a few female apprentices.


    ¡°How was it? Did you manage to confirm it?¡± As the leader of the Association, Domhnall was the first to step forward and ask solemnly.


    Nostran didn¡¯t dare offend this elderly adept who held absolute authority and control over him. He shook aside the female apprentices and stepped before Domhnall. He bowed and said, ¡°I¡¯ve confirmed it. It¡¯s him!¡±


    Domhnall took in a deep breath of air.


    The crowd behind him fell utterly silent.


    A Fifth Grade Great Adept couldn¡¯t quite threaten the Adept¡¯s Association, which had a firm foundation. However, a Great Adept remained in the World of Adepts was very scary indeed.


    If Greem took the risk of enduring nar bacsh in order to wreak destruction in the east, the entirety of the Adept¡¯s Association would probably quake beneath his boots.


    Cerveris¡¯ expression was particrly ugly among the crowd of Fourth Grade adepts.


    Gloria appeared much moreposed than him, but the quickly flickering light in her purple eyes betrayed her real emotions.


    She and Cerveris were probably Greem¡¯s most hated people within the Association. Even though they belonged to their own factions and served their own ends, the hostility had escted to the level of a personal grudge after two fights.


    Now that Greem had be a Great Adept, he would most definitely be banished from the nar world eventually. However, what little time he had left would be more than enough to do whatever he wanted.


    If......


    While everyone was talking amongst themselves and trying to digest this information, the Tower of Observation trembled as rms started ring.


    ¡°Warning...warning. Enemy assault: target creature has been locked on!¡± Tower Spirit Rafatus¡¯ sharp voice echoed in the hall.


    ¡°Who? Who is it? I need an image of what¡¯s happening outside,¡± Domhnall roared and tapped his staff heavily.


    The wall of the hall suddenly turned into a mirror and revealed what was happening out there.


    The Tower of Observation was now fully armed for battle.


    Layers of forcefields and barriers covered every entrance, window, and balcony. An evenrger dome-shaped barrier protected all the magical facilities surrounding the tower.


    The attack from outside had also triggered the Tower of Observation¡¯s defense mechanism.


    The runic stones that continually circled the tower had been activated. The defensive and offensive arrays carved on them lit up and started to move toward the enemy along certain profound orbits.


    A hidden door somewhere in the tower opened, and a hundred apprentice adepts took to the skies on high-grade voodoo beasts. They were all wearing specially crafted runic armor and held runic crossbows in their hands. The magical glow of their equipment was bright enough to see in daylight.


    Meanwhile, something was happening on the ground as well. Bunkers hidden all around the tower opened up, and thousands of armored rhinos charged out, runic riders riding upon their backs equipped with special javelins.


    Meanwhile, the other Association adepts also hurried to the closest magical facility after hearing the rms.


    In the blink of an eye, the area around the Tower of Observation had be empty.


    All the Association adepts who had gone into hidingmenced looking around the skies, hoping to see who it was that dared to knock on the doors of the holynd of all adepts.


    To their surprise, it wasn¡¯t a raging army nor a giant beast. There was only a single young male adept in a red robe hovering in the air.


    No other enemies could be seen apart from him!


    While the numerous low-grade Association adepts felt relief, the Fourth Grade adepts crowded on the top floor couldn¡¯t help but feel their hearts tighten at the sight.


    This was bad...it was actually him!

 Chapter 1438 - Intimidating the Association

    Chapter 1438 Intimidating the Association


    Two and a half kilometers away from the Tower of Observation, Greem stood proudly in the sky, assessing the tower in front of him with a cold gaze.


    The tower¡¯s defense mechanism had left an indelible impression upon him thest time he visited. At this moment, having advanced to Fifth Grade and on the verge of leaving the World of Adepts, Greem no longer had any reservations. All he wanted to do was vent the frustration that had been building in his mind over the past hundreds of years.


    Domhnall remained frozen on the spot. His lips trembled, but he did not give any orders.


    Even though they had not received any orders from their superiors, the adept forces that had flown into the sky began taking actions ording to their training and the tower¡¯s defense policies. They immediately charged at the unusual enemy.


    Two and a half kilometers...two kilometers...one and a half kilometers......


    After another hundred meters, the enemy would be within the optimal shooting distance of their Godying crossbows. The members of the Godyer force held their breaths and raised their crossbows, quickly estimating the remaining distance as they did so.


    However, their consciousness¡¯s abruptly terminated at this moment.


    Greem let out a muffled grunt. He didn¡¯t wave his hand or utter a single word. There wasn¡¯t even the customary sh of light indicative of all elementium magic. All the members of the Godyer force burst into mes, along with the flying beasts they were riding.


    Unstoppable golden mes surged out from their souls and rushed out of their bodies. They were like candles that had been thrown into a furnace. They melted into unrecognizable puddles in an instant before being vaporized and wiped from existence.


    This powerful force consisted of seventy-eight apprentice adepts, which had undergone special training to wield the Godying crossbows proficiently, could easily hunt down unprepared Third Grade adepts. Even a Fourth Grade adept would risk dying if these Godying crossbows surrounded them.


    Unfortunately, such a powerful adept force had been tragically exterminated by the enemy without even knowing how their foe had done so!


    The adept forces charging forward on the ground abruptly halted their mounts and stared at the lonely figure in the sky with fearful eyes. The horde of flying beasts sprinting around them continued to rush into the air like a tide, forming several giant arrows as they lunged at the enemy.


    Meanwhile, the closest runic stone levitating in the air had moved into its position.


    Theplicated patterns on the runic stone lit up in sequence. Iparably violent magic energy surged into the stone, converted into five-meter-thick lightning bolts that sted at the enemy from above.


    Greem didn¡¯t even lift his head. A piece of tome-shaped divine equipment appeared above him, forming a barrier that protected him.


    The violent lightning shed with the tome in mid-air, emitting a blinding sh and a shower of sma. The fierce and quick lightning bolt managed to cause a few ripples to appear on the barrier, but the sma that resulted didn¡¯t even manage to faze it.


    The tome quickly reverted to its normal form after the lightning bolt. Not a single sign of damage could be seen on it.


    The adepts in the tower all drew in a breath of cold air in unison.


    That violent attack from earlier was about 9,000 points of power. That was practically equal to the attack of a peak Fourth Grade adept. It didn¡¯t even graze the enemy.


    The defensive power of the opponent¡¯s magical equipment couldn¡¯t be more obvious!


    Controlling Fifth Grade divine equipment while Greem was still a Fourth Grade had been like having a scrawny bull pull an oversized cart. It was difficult to bring out the full power of the divine equipment. However, with the increase of Greem¡¯s power, this Fifth Grade divine equipment¡¯s true might was finally unveiled.


    Since Greem was here to vent, naturally, he wouldn¡¯t sit around after just being attacked.


    Upon seeing several ten-meter-tall and five-meter-thick runic stones float over and establish blinding energy chains with the tower as if preparing for a barrage, Greem simply chuckled. His lips parted slightly as he released a breath of invisible mes at the few closest runic stones.


    The breath of fire only appeared to be a weak breath of air initially. By the time it reached a few dozen meters away and had absorbed the wandering fire elementium around it, the breath turned into a roaring red flood of mes measuring over a hundred meters in length.


    The fire washed against the runic stone. The energy barriers that popped up in response exploded after only half a second.


    As everyone watched on, this runic stone that had the defensive power of a small adept tower was roasted bright red in a matter of seconds. The roasted stone rapidly melted and fell from the sky as a shower of boilingva.


    With the first stone, there was quickly a second and a third.


    These high-grade runic stones that contained numerous offensive and defensive arrays were made out of incredibly tough and magic-resistant materials. Each of them was worth over a million magical crystals. However, they were now melting like candles before the adepts¡¯ eyes.


    Domhnall felt like his heart was bleeding when he saw this.


    He quickly took out a messaging wand and gave the order to stop all engagements.


    The voodoo beasts that were nearing within a thousand meters of Greem hastily stopped and returned to the surface ording to the instructions from the adepts.


    The next second, Domhnall¡¯s old and decrepit form appeared outside the tower, standing off against Greem with a one-meter-thick elementium barrier between them.


    ¡°Greem...Lord Greem, I didn¡¯t think you would advance to Fifth Grade so quickly. May I know for what purpose you have paid us this honorable visit?¡± Domhnall asked, even though he knew clearly why Greem had done so.


    As for the destroyed runic stones and the exterminated Godyer force? He didn¡¯t even attempt to mention them.


    ¡°Hehehe. I advanced to Fifth Grade, so I thought ofing here for a stroll before I go and pay a visit to a few of my old friends while I¡¯m at it. I wonder if Sir Domhnall could do me a favor and bring them a message?¡± There was no need for Greem to put on any facade at this point. He was very clearly here to settle some grudges.


    The muscles on Domhnall¡¯s face twitched. He asked with a forced smile, ¡°Ah, I see. May I know who Lord Greem intends to visit?¡±


    ¡°Gloria and Cerveris!¡± Greem chuckled coldly. ¡°The two of them were always finding trouble with me back in those years. Now that I finally have the opportunity, I wish to repay them for their hospitality!¡±


    ¡°Haha, what an unfortunate coincidence then!¡± Domhnall also let out a cold chuckle as he said, ¡°Both of them have gone exploring in the depths of space. They are not currently in the Association. If you wish to look for them, why don¡¯t you go and take a venture in the realms beyond, Lord Greem?¡±


    Greem stared at Domhnall, who stared back with a defiant look. A cold gleam shed in his eyes. Greem slowly flew toward the elementium barrier and reached out with his right index finger. Scarlet light gathered at his fingertip as he traced a circle on the barrier. He then tapped the circle with the back of his finger.


    Boom!


    The elementium barrier within the circle exploded into kes of light, allowing him to stare directly at Domhnall.


    What exceptional elementium maniption technique!


    To think he could shatter only a portion of the elementium barrier without even damaging the rest of it! It demonstrated Great Adept Greem¡¯s advanced elementium-maniption abilities!


    Domhnall was mildly terrified, but he continued to stare at Greem coldly and calmly.


    He knew that Greem didn¡¯t dare kill him.


    After all, he still had so many subordinates and beloved individuals in the Central Lands. Should he actually wage war against the Adept¡¯s Association, the Association might go all-out in an attempt to exterminate the Crimson n after he left.


    That was why he was certain Greem didn¡¯t dare to kill him.


    Still, this experience of being humiliated was unbearable!


    Greem stared at him coldly for a moment before breaking into a smile.


    ¡°Well, if you say they aren¡¯t there, I¡¯m sure they aren¡¯t! I can believe you. At any rate, I have quite a few enemies. I will just go elsewhere for a stroll. Remember...to give my greetings to the two of them and tell them to be careful the next time they go out.¡±


    Having said that, Greem¡¯s body turned into a beam of red light and instantly traveled several kilometers away. Another violent st of fire erupted as he instantly teleported a few more kilometers into the distance.


    Through these continuous Fire Teleportation, Greem headed north with unstoppable momentum, heading straight for the Northern Witches¡¯nd.


    The scattered mes from his explosions instantly turned all the ground within a kilometer into scorched earth. Arge mark would be left on the earth by the time they were extinguished.


    Domhnall¡¯s face turned green, then white, upon seeing this. He let out a long sigh before turning and returning to the tower.


    Greem had clearlye here to show off his power while also issuing a stern warning to the Adept¡¯s Association!


    Upon seeing the elderly Domhnall walk into the hall, the many Fourth Grade adepts of the Association gathered around to console the old man.


    Cerveris seemed to know that the danger was over and began to shout and mor once again.


    ¡°Domhnall, we can¡¯t just tolerate this humiliation! Don¡¯t you worry, I will go over to the Central Lands and make amotion next time. I won¡¯t return until I¡¯ve taught the Fourth Grades of the Central Lands a lesson¡ª¡±


    ¡°Silence!¡±


    ¡°Shut up.¡±


    For some reason, both Domhnall and Gloria shouted angrily at him.


    Cerveris was taken aback by the reprimand from the two of them. He couldn¡¯t help but ask anxiously, ¡°What is with you two? Aren¡¯t I just sticking up for the Association? Why are you getting angry at me?¡±


    Domhnall ignored him and turned to look at Nostran. He asked in a solemn voice, ¡°How is it? How much longer do you think he can stay inside the ne?¡±


    Nostran sweated profusely as he performed his calctions. He then replied carefully, ¡°It should be no more than three days.¡±


    Domhnall narrowed his eyes and said resentfully, ¡°Three days...that¡¯s more than enough time for him to head to the Northern Lands for a trip.¡±


    ¡°Why don¡¯t,¡± Gloria frowned, ¡°we notify the Northern Lands and tell them to be prepared?¡±


    ¡°Why should we tell them of what¡¯sing?¡± Domhnall said coldly. ¡°The Association has been humiliated greatly. I won¡¯t be able to sleep well if nothing happens to the other two organizations. Rather, I¡¯m quite curious what kind of havoc Greem will raise in the Northern Lands.¡±


    He gave his instructions to the adepts, ¡°From now on, you all are to avoid conflicts with the Central Lands as much as possible. I have a feeling that Greem left something behind there. If anyone were to run into his sword and make big trouble, the Association wouldn¡¯t clean up your mess.¡±


    Domhnall stared coldly at Cerveris. It seemed like these words were meant for him.


    Cerveris sulked, not taking the words to heart at all.

 Chapter 1439 - Punishing the Witches

    Chapter 1439 Punishing the Witches


    Northern Lands, the Howling ins.


    Chillwind Kingdom was the most ancient territory belonging to the False Witches and the location of their origin tower.


    The False Witches were undoubtedly the most solitary and asocial group within the Northernnds in the past thousands of years. They rarely associated with the outside world. Even their trials and legacy were shrouded in mystery.


    As such, the Howling ins was also the most deste and unpoptednd in all the witches¡¯ territory!


    Today, the tower standing in the center of the Howling ins appeared to be awash withmotion. It seemed to be unusually alive with activity.


    That was because an enemy had arrived!


    An enemy that darede knocking on the Northern Witches¡¯ door to find trouble. In all honesty, such an incident had never urred in the past thousands of years. That was why many of the Northern Witches were utterly confused when they received the False Witches¡¯ call for help.


    Many Fourth Grade witches emerged from theirboratories or lesser nes and hurried toward the Howling ins in groups. However, before they could approach the battlefield, they could already feel the pressing heat against their faces.


    A battlefield. The Howling ins had turned into a battlefield!


    It was currently the dead of night.


    Yet, the skies above the Howling ins were burning. Giant clouds of fire filled the horizon, casting half the world in a dark red shade.


    The rolling clouds of fire seemed to be hiding some sort of terrifying creature within them, roaring as it thrashed. Gigantic meteors rained down from the skies against the lonely adept tower in the middle of the in.


    The tower trembled violently.


    Layer uponyer of elementium barriers were stacked around the tower, protecting it from one fireball after the next. However, the fireballs¡¯ violent force barraged the tower without end, causing it to tremble.


    The tower wasn¡¯t just defending.


    Horrifying, surging energy charged through the tower. Once the energy reached a certain level, it would be guided by the offensive arrays and turn into fearsome spells that sted at the enemy.


    Strangely enough, no matter how the tower attacked, the spells would vanish without a sound once they entered the red clouds. It was almost as if there was some terrible creature hiding within, capable of devouring any attacks hurled toward it.


    The witches maintaining the tower had no choice but to dispel their offensive spell. They switched to dispelling magic in an attempt to break through the cloud of fire and look upon the true face of their enemy.


    Unfortunately, the dispelling magic that they repeatedly cast toward the sky had no effect.


    The red clouds continued to burn there, rumbling loudly as fireballs and meteors rained down upon the tower and thend around it.


    If this had been the past, the high-grade witches stationed in the origin tower would have charged out with their subordinates to hunt down their enemy. For some reason, the False Witches were unusually tolerant today. They refused to show themselves even though the origin tower was already quaking under the enemy¡¯s attacks.


    As the origin tower of the False Witches, the tower actually possessed the ability to turn the entirety of the Howling ins into a realm of illusions. However, strangely enough, the False Witches had yet to try to drag their enemy into the illusory realm. It was almost as if they had forgotten about this ability of theirs.


    It wasn¡¯t that they didn¡¯t want to. Rather, it was because they didn¡¯t dare to!


    The witch leader hiding inside the tower already knew who the enemy in the clouds was. She did not want to embarrass herself in front of an actual Fifth Grade adept. The only thing she could do now was endure and wait bitterly until this legendary fire adept was exiled from the World of Adepts.


    The sound of wind and thunder rang out from afar.


    Dark clouds crowded in the sky and approached the Howling ins menacingly.


    When the dark clouds had gathered as high as a mountain, a piercing dragon¡¯s cry could be heard. The dark clouds parted as Corpse Dragon Artest¡¯s vicious and threatening figure appeared within sight.


    Naturally, riding upon the back of the corpse dragon was Death Witch Leader Khesuna!


    A stern cry rolled across the skies before she arrived.


    ¡°Greem, what exactly are you nning? This is the Northern Lands! It¡¯s not a ce you can do as you wish!¡±


    Meanwhile, ghostly howls and screams could be heard in another direction. A powerful witch with two silhouettes, one ck and one white, flew over and stopped at the edge of the red clouds.


    It was the other ultra-powerhouse of the Northern Lands, Pale Witch Leader Silvia.


    There were a total of two ultra-powerhouses among the Northern Witches. Both of them were here now. Moreover, one could sense a sea of other brilliant soul responses outside the battlefield.


    Every single high-grade witch of any repute in the Northern Lands had arrived. They had only yet to show themselves due to Khesuna¡¯s instructions.


    The red clouds parted slightly, revealing a youthful and handsome male adept. This man was over two meters tall, with a firm and muscr body. He wore a dark red robe that appearedpletely in and ordinary, as if it really was just a non-magical piece of clothing.


    The Northern Witches couldn¡¯t be more familiar with this silhouette and this face. It was the legendary fire adept, Greem, who had turned the World of Adepts upside down in the past hundreds of years.


    Greem revealed himself and looked coldly at Khesuna. He then chuckled and said, ¡°Khesuna, this is how you carry yourself when seeing an adept of superior grade?¡±


    Khesuna¡¯s figure froze as an awkward expression shed across her cold and pretty face. Finally, she lowered her head, put her hand over her chest, and bowed. ¡°My greetings, Great Adept Greem!¡±


    Silvia, who had been watching from the edge of the battlefield, also felt the awkwardness of the situation. She had no choice but to bow along with her apanying spirit, paying respects to Greem.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The adepts had always emphasized etiquette between superiors and inferiors. You were an inferior if you were of a lower grade. If you did not uphold the proper etiquette toward a superior adept, they could use it as an excuse to punish you, and there was nothing that anyone could do to help.


    ¡°Since you know your ce, you may step back now! I have some old grudges I have to settle against the False Witches!¡± Greem said sternly.


    Khesuna stood up straight and said in a sinister voice, ¡°Gre...Lord Greem, you might be a Fifth Grade Great Adept now, but don¡¯t you forget, we Northern Witches are supported by certain individuals as well!¡±


    ¡°Hoh, are you threatening me now?¡±


    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t dare. I am simply reminding my lord that you will have to venture to the realms beyond eventually. If things turn out too ugly here, you might not be able to exin yourself to the individuals affiliated with us in space.¡±


    ¡°Exin? What do I need to exin myself for? This bitch ambushed me. If it wasn¡¯t because of luck that allowed me to escape her Dream Assassination, do you think I would still be able to stand here?¡± Greem chuckled coldly. ¡°Do those people you speak of have the right to stop me now that I am here for revenge?¡±


    Khesuna abruptly fell silent.


    This world had always revolved around the powerful. Only those of higher grades had authority.


    Now that Greem had be a Fifth Grade Great Adept, he had be one of the rare few rulers of the adept faction. Just as he said, even the Great Witches could not simply ignore a Great Adept¡¯s right to exact vengeance.


    ¡°Perhaps this is only a misunderstanding!¡± Khesuna breathed and said in a soft voice, ¡°Perhaps there has been some understanding between the two of you. My lord, if you are willing to let Ivana go, us Northern Witches will be willing to¡ª¡±


    ¡°I do notck resources. All I wish to do is meet the bastard that dared ambush me. What is it? Do you not dare to even show yourself?¡± Thest sentence had been directed at the adept tower. The sound waves from his voice shredded several of the barriers around the False Witches¡¯ origin tower, sending sparks into the air.


    More terrifyingly, the very narws of the region distorted and trembled where Greem¡¯s will extended. As long as he wished to, he would even be able to cut off the mental connection between all the Fourth Grade elementium adepts and the world around them.


    Of course, doing so would undoubtedly cause him to endure terrible nar bacsh. Still, where his will could reach, the narws could be manipted and rewritten. Any adept with a grade lower than himself would not be able to connect to their narws to strengthen their elementium powers as in the past.


    Greem had performed a simple assessment. Within his principle domain, all elementium adepts would be weakened by half. Bloodline adepts would be weakened by 20% to 30%, while body-refining adepts were the least affected at 10%.


    One could honestly im that the dominance of principle adepts over elementium adepts was absolute and irresistible!


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s insistence, a skinny and decrepit figure appeared on a small tform high in the tower.


    What an ugly and old witch this was!


    She resembled a skinned toad, with most of her skin rotting away, covered with blisters of every size and shrouded in a sickly green cloud of poison. Her former beauty had vanished without a trace, leaving only an ugly face that looked as if it had been sshed with acid.


    Er......?


    Even Greem was surprised.


    If it wasn¡¯t for her soul aura, Greem might have taken her to be an impostor.


    ¡°Ivana, what...what¡¯s happened to you?¡± It was obvious that Khesuna had not seen her in a long time as well. She was stunned and shocked to see her appearance.


    Everyone here was a high-grade adept. Naturally, they could see that these wounds were not external, but the result of actual Spirit poison. Moreover, judging from her appearance, this Spirit poison had troubled her for a very long time. It had even seeped into her soul origin, causing her to radiate an aura of ¡®despair¡¯ from her soul and body.


    ¡°This was the result of that battlest time,¡± Ivana¡¯s body trembled as she screamed. ¡°Is the suffering that I have had to endure in the past hundred years not enough topensate for my past mistake?¡±


    ¡°It should be about enough with this.¡±


    Greem scoffed, and a beam of red light shot through the numerous barriers tond on Ivana¡¯s body. The light entered her flesh with a sh.


    Ivana instantly let out a howl of agony.


    A searing will.


    Without the aid of a Great Adept to dispel this searing will, it would trigger once every ten hours, only stopping once Ivana¡¯s blood had been brought to a boiling point.


    It was a fiery torture that would haunt her for the rest of her life!

 Chapter 1440 - City in Space

    Chapter 1440 City in Space


    Greem finally felt more at ease after punishing Ivana.


    ¡°Chip, how long more do I have left?¡±


    [Beep. Countdown to banishment: 11 minutes, 28 seconds]


    Hss! Only eleven minutes left now?!


    Greem was surprised, and an unspeakable emotion arose in him.


    He finally had to leave this familiar world for good. He couldn¡¯t help but feel a sense of reluctance and a hint of hesitation.


    He turned around to look at the Northern Witches, who were scattered all over and ring at him with hostile eyes. He made a pulling motion in front of him and tore open a small spatial rift, which he promptly entered.


    When Greem appeared once again, he had returned to the looming adept tower of Crimson Wing.


    The hall was filled with Crimson adepts that had arrived from all over. They looked at Greem silently when he suddenly appeared. The adepts bowed in unison, bidding theirst farewell to this legendary n leader of theirs.


    Greem hovered in the air as his gaze swept past the subordinates in front of him. He couldn¡¯t quite bear to leave this all behind.


    There were so many Crimson adepts, but he could only recognize a tenth of them. Many familiar figures had vanished from among the old faces, and a lot more new faces had appeared.


    This departure from the World of Adepts would be forever!


    Perhaps the next time he was fortunate enough to cast his soul projection back here, there would be even fewer familiar faces. That was the life of a Great Adept.


    Even Meryl, the disciple he had personally trained, would only have another seven hundred years to live if she didn¡¯t advance to Fourth Grade. Yet, such a ¡®short¡¯ lifespan was only a very tiny portion of Greem¡¯s own.


    Perhaps she would already be gone by the time Greem managed to establish himself in space and had the time toe back for a look.


    It was precisely because they wanted to avoid these repeated feelings of attachment and loss that most Great Adepts chose to control their emotions with indifferent rationality. They chose to put aside things like love, friendship, and familial ties. These things were too much of a luxury.


    It wasn¡¯t that the adepts were cold and heartless. Rather, they had ascended to such higher dimensions that it was impossible to maintain rtionships in the same fashion as a mortal!


    Greem finished looking at the hall around him and shifted his gaze to the horizon, his vision piercing through the walls of the tower. The numerous Fourth Grades of the Central Lands hovered in the air there, staring at that searing will withplicated looks in their eyes.


    Greem might be leaving, but the rise of Horton Magic Academy was unstoppable. The Crimson n only had to embed themselves within the academy. Given what remained of Greem¡¯s reputation, they would be guaranteed prosperous growth and development for the next few hundred years.


    Moreover, Mary and Alice remained here. There wouldn¡¯t be too many problems as long as they were there to watch over the Crimson n and Horton Magic Academy.


    After nodding at everyone present, Greem¡¯s gazended on Mary one final time. He then turned and dove into that ultra-long-range portal that was connected directly to space.


    ¡°Wait for me there for a few hundred years. I wille looking for you!¡±


    Mary¡¯s voice, somewhat hoarse from holding back tears, rang in Greem¡¯s ears before he vanished entirely.


    Greem smiled. He felt a lot more rxed now.


    ............


    Lights flickered as space trembled.


    After a momentary daze, Greem found himself inside a teleportation array.


    It was a teleportation room forged entirely out of magical steel. The room was huge, with the array only taking up a small area of the room.


    Split-Brain Sock stood outside the teleportation array, waiting with a fawning smile.


    ¡°Wee, master!¡±


    Greem ignored him and instead chose to expand his mental consciousness.


    It felt like he had been bound and gagged the whole time he had been in the World of Adepts. It was a horrible feeling. He had to try his best to hold back his power with every action he took, just to avoid the suppression of the nar consciousness.


    Now that he was finally in space, his body and soul were no longer restrained. He could finally stretch out and rx as he wished. That feeling of freedom and casualness was so enchanting that he almost forgot what he was doing.


    After his Fifth Grade Spirit and principle power hadbined, they formed a unique ¡®will¡¯! His every thought, word, and action seemed to have taken on rules of their own. They could turn into principle will wherever his consciousness could reach, recing the narws everywhere.


    His thoughts werews, and his will was the principle of the world.


    Everything within the space that his principles controlled had to obey his will!


    This feeling of absolute control, like that of a god governing over their world, kept Greem mesmerized for half an hour. It was only then that Greem slowly retracted his Spirit.


    Just now, Greem¡¯s consciousness had turned into a giant web that extended in every direction. It had reached out of the teleportation room and spread to every corner of this city of steel through its corridors and pipes.


    Naturally, during this process, Greem¡¯s mental consciousness had shed with Gazlowe¡¯s own.


    Gazlowe had shied away the moment he identified Greem¡¯s mental consciousness. In doing so, he had basically handed over control of the Capital of Steel.


    Greem merely stood in the teleportation room, unmoving. In a single instant, he had made out the workings of this gigantic city spanning dozens of kilometers, including its one hundred and three surface levels and seventy underground levels.


    In fact, many of the hidden passages and rooms were projected in Greem¡¯s mind as a three-dimensional map when he scanned them.


    Gazlowe, who had been banished to the ¡®wilnds,¡¯ had truly been developing quite well while Greem¡¯s focus was within the World of Adepts.


    Greem had noticed that thousands of alien creatures and gxy wanderers had taken up residence in the underground levels when he scanned the city with his Spirit. Greem even found all sorts of strange facilities in the city, such as auction houses, amusement parks, casinos, inns, taverns, smithies, enchantment factories, alchemybs, magical-machine recycling workshops, and many others.


    It seemed like the Capital of Steel had be a legitimate city in space in the past two hundred years that Greemhe had ignored it. It had be a massive base of operations for space travelers to rest, resupply, and exchange information.


    The reason Gazlowe had been able to keep a massive city like this running wasn¡¯t by his power alone. Instead, it was due to the six thousand magical machines that patrolled the city and the thirteen thousand more that were kept in reserve.


    It was highly likely that controlling these six thousand magical machines was already Gazlowe¡¯s limit. Otherwise, he wouldn¡¯t let so many magical machines remain dormant underground.


    The teleportation room was the fifth basement level, while Gazlowe¡¯s own resting spot was fifty levels underground. The trip from here to there was filled with traps and defenses. High-Grade magical machines guarded every critical entry. It was definitely a well-defended stronghold.


    Greem slowly retracted his Spirit after grasping the entire situation. He returned control over the Capital of Steel to Gazlowe.


    ¡°Bring me to see Gazlowe!¡± Greem casually said.


    Given the strength of his and Gazlowe¡¯s Spirits, they could easilymunicate without obstruction while in this Capital of Steel. However, remotemunication was still different from face-to-face interaction.


    That was why Greem chose to meet Gazlowe without any hesitation!


    Split-Brain Sock didn¡¯t seem surprised by Greem¡¯s request at all. He did not hesitate as he bowed and said, ¡°Please follow me, master!¡±


    The ten high-grade magical machine warriors in front of them started walking as Sock led Greem down the numerous corridors. They passed by one entry after another, walked past one heavy metal door after the other, each guarded by squads of powerful magical machines. Finally, they reached the fiftieth level and met Gazlowe.


    Compared to thest time they met, Gazlowe¡¯s brain had doubled in size. He looked like a mountain of flesh as he floated in the green liquid. It was hard to imagine that monstrous ball of flesh as a giant brain.


    Greem finally smiled when he saw Gazlowe.


    Since Gazlowe was willing to admit him here, it meant that Gazlowe had not changed his mind or position. He was still willing to obey Greem as his leader.


    That was especially important!


    Even though Greem could still sense the fire-brand he had left inside Gazlowe, he knew the truth. The brand could not keep Gazlowe entirely in line.


    As long as Gazlowe was willing to abandon a part of his brain, it wasn¡¯t impossible to remove the soul brand Greem had left behind. Now that Gazlowe was willing to expose himself at his most vulnerable and revere him as his lord, it was a sufficient show of his sincerity.


    Naturally, Greem dly epted all this.


    ¡°Master, I didn¡¯t think you would be so fast. To think you are already Fifth Grade!¡± Gazlowe¡¯s loud voice rang in Greem¡¯s mind, his voice filled with emotion.


    The first time they met, Gazlowe had only just advanced into a Third Grade brain monster with his sacrificial ceremony. Back then, Greem had only been an insignificant Second Grade adept.


    However, while Gazlowe was now much more powerful than before, he was still stuck at peak Third Grade. He had not even managed to advance to Fourth Grade. Meanwhile, his Second Grade master had overtaken him and risen to be a noble Fifth Grade Great Adept.


    This tremendous change was almost uneptable for a monster like Gazlowe. He couldn¡¯t help but start doubting his own intelligence and ability.


    Moreover, Gazlowe could sense two immensely powerful auras on this ¡®young¡¯ master of his. That meant he was carrying at least two Fifth Grade items with him!


    You might be able to stumble into power, but you couldn¡¯t just stumble into Fifth Grade items!


    It was more than enough evidence that this youthful master possessed truly horrifying power beneath his seemingly harmless appearance!

 Chapter 1441 - A New Body

    Chapter 1441 A New Body


    Greem had a nice sleep in the Capital of Steel.


    In all honesty, given the Physique and Spirit of a Fifth Grade Great Adept, Greem wouldn¡¯t have felt any fatigue at all even if he didn¡¯t sleep for a few dozen years. This time, he definitely needed to lie down and rest.


    The reason was simple.


    His suddenly unfurled Spirit needed to adapt to his current body. It would undoubtedly take some time.


    In Greem¡¯s mind, the Chip projected that the time required for this adaptation would be: 11 years, 3 months, 8 days. It was the shortest time possible obtained with the Chip¡¯s optimization.


    From a certain perspective, Greem could now bepared to those dragons who enjoyed eating and sleeping. A small nap, and he could sleep right past the lives of the more short-lived species!


    Greem fell into a deep sleep in a secret room sixty floors underneath the Capital of Steel. Only the Chip was left to defend him loyally.


    This one sleepsted for eleven years.


    Ding!


    As the Chip¡¯s rm rang out, Greem¡¯s mental consciousness trembled. He slowly came to.


    Disregarding the bonuses from his pieces of two divine equipment, Greem now had fifty points of Spirit. Greem only has one extra point of Spiritpared to those peak Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouses with forty-nine points.


    However, this one-point difference was the crucial turning point!


    At the higher grades, almost every point increase in Spirit would amplify one¡¯sbat power exponentially. This one point of Spirit was equal to the total sum of the forty-nine points that came before it.


    That meant from now on, even a slight increase in any one of Greem¡¯s main attributes would enhance hisbat power greatly. However, this also indirectly signified the difficulty of improving one¡¯s attributes.


    Magical equipment and essories collected during Fourth Grade could rarely continue being used once an adept had reached Fifth Grade. Take the two pieces of Fifth Grade divine equipment that Greem currently possessed, for instance. They had provided Greem with an additional 5 points of main attributes when he was Fourth Grade.


    Now that he had advanced to Fifth Grade, their bonus to Spirit had been reduced to two points.


    Still, those two points were of unusually great benefit to Greem!


    In fact, it was enough to allow a rookie like him to surpass ¡®veterans¡¯ that had advanced a thousand years earlier than him.


    Of course,pared to his fifty-two points of Spirit, Greem¡¯s other attributes were all horriblycking. Only his Physique exceeded 30 points. Moreover, this was only the result of Greem having obtained a bonus to his Physique through his starbeast bloodline.


    Otherwise, most newly advanced Fifth Grade principle adepts had Strength, Physique, and Agility below 20 points.


    Greem was a principle adept. He mostly fought at long range, bombarding his enemies with fire spells and rarely engaging up close. Considering that most of his enemies henceforth were likely to possess excellent magic resistance, a focus and specialization in a single elementium was very likely to put him in some awkward positions.


    He would have to try his best to increase all his attributes and reduce his weaknesses. At the same time, he had to study the high-grade applications of fire principles and make his offensive power even more vicious and unstoppable.


    That was what he should be doing in his first hundred years in space!


    As for exploration, searching for resources, and collecting knowledge? That would have to be put aside until he assembled his arsenal and put together his tools forbat.


    ording to the information Greem possessed, the Exodar Camp in which he and the Capital of Steel currently resided contained a dozen other Fifth Grade Great Adepts. Some of them did not excel at fighting. As such, they seldom stepped out of the camp to explore space.


    The resources and knowledge they required could only be collected through the crude market of the camp. It undoubtedly dyed their research progress, but it kept them safer than those adepts who spent all their lives in the gxy.


    Whichever one was a better option depended on the person!


    That was why Greem could actually exceed the Fifth Grade ¡®veterans¡¯ of the camp, despite being a rookie. The bonuses of his divine equipment enhanced him.


    Greem closed his eyes to sense the overwhelming fire energy within him. He could tell that every strand of fire was now coated in ayer of gold. Even though they had not reached the level of principle fire, they now also possessed a part of the principle fire¡¯s powers.


    More importantly, the essential organs inside Greem¡¯s body were now very different than before. His flesh had turned darker and stronger. The tendons and blood vessels were thicker and tougher. Every time the tide of fire energy pulsed in his body, his flesh was refined even further, making it seem tight and heavy.


    Many of his bones were showing signs of crystallization. Specks of tiny red crystals reced his skeletal grain and became the mainponent of Greem¡¯s skeleton.


    These crystals resonated with the fire energy in his body, demonstrating tremendous fire resistance and fire activeness. The greater the strength of the fire energy, the more active these crystals would be, and the higher Greem¡¯s physical and elementium resistance would rise.


    However, with the special mutation of his body, Greem now weighed over a ton. The density and strength of his flesh had reached a shocking level!


    Greem stretched his body and limbsfortably, letting his whole body snap and crack. A tremendous surge of strength rushed through his body, giving him the illusion that he could forcefully tear a mountain apart with his bare hands.


    Greem lifted his right hand and waved it in front of him as he admired it.


    A torrent of data and numbers filled his mind.


    This feeling of strength wasn¡¯t an illusion! It was the truth.


    As the Chip continued to scan and analyze, Greem¡¯s flesh gradually turned translucent before his eyes. The flesh, tendons, vessels, blood, and the fire energy inside him could all be seen.


    Golden bones, golden blood, golden fire energy.


    As Greem¡¯s mind willed it, arge wave of fire energy surged into his right hand. A mysterious transformation took it over.


    The powerful fire energy shed and resonated with his hand¡¯s golden bones and blood, generating waves of invisible golden ripples. These golden ripples were of such high frequency that they prated his flesh and created a forcefield around his right hand.


    Greem reached out with his index finger and casually ran it across the air. A dark rift instantly tore in the supposedly resilient space. The fine spatial shards cut across Greem¡¯s right hand like des, but they could not hurt his skin in the slightest. They were all repelled harmlessly by the forcefield.


    Spatial fragments. Those things were one of the sharpest objects in a nar world, capable of cutting almost everything!


    Now, even they couldn¡¯t harm Greem¡¯s body. It was obvious that this fire forcefield was far more potent than the limit of a nar world¡¯s power.


    Greem took out another dagger. It was forged with ckforged metal, coated with mithril, and enchanted with numerous effects.


    He sliced the dagger across his right hand lightly, but it did not cut his flesh at all. It only left behind several dark red marks. It seemed like this forcefield could even stop physical attacks.


    Greem increased his strength and pressed the de of the dagger further into his skin. Still, he could not cut it. At this point, Greem¡¯s skin was already tougher than dragon leather. Even a +3 enchanted weapon would not be able to cut him.


    Greem hesitated for a moment and dispelled the fire energy in his right hand. Thus, theyer of forcefield defense also vanished.


    This time, Greem applied pressure; the +2 dagger finally cut through his skin, leaving a thirty centimeters long wound on the back of his hand. The dark red muscles and tissue beneath could be seen.


    Golden blood dripped from his wound and stained the ground. A sizzling sound of corrosion could immediately be heard.


    Greem lifted the dagger, surprised to find that the de was now covered in marks and uneven. The de itself was bright red, on the verge of melting like a candle.


    Just the instinctual retaliation of Greem¡¯s flesh had nearly rendered this +2 enchanted dagger useless.


    In the blink of an eye, the gash on Greem¡¯s hand had healed. Fifteen secondster, only a dark red scar could be seen. The wound was gone.


    Twenty-seven secondster, even the scar itself had vanished.


    His entire right hand appeared smooth as marble, as if it had never been hurt at all.


    Greem nodded in satisfaction. He then took out all sorts of corrosive liquid and started to test the strength of his body.


    Finally, the Chip obtained a moreprehensive report on his body.


    Due to theck of unique refinement methods and Greem¡¯s own ordinary Physique, he had only attained 35 points of Physique after all the resources he had consumed, as well as his starbeast bloodline.


    This Physique wasparable to Third Grade dragons already.


    In space, this much Physique was still below averagepared to the numerous Fifth Grade adepts out there. It might be stronger than the principle adepts, but it was undoubtedly weaker than body-refining adepts, bloodline adepts, and Fifth Grade magical creatures.


    The Chip estimated that Greem¡¯s body could only endure magical weapons of Second Grade and below without the enhancement of his fire energy. With the enhancement of fire energy, his body could defend against magical weapons of Third Grade and below.


    With the principle protection from the two pieces of divine equipment, magical weapons of Fourth Grade could no longer affect him. Only ultra-grade weapons of Fifth Grade and above could inflictsting damage on him.


    As for his regenerative power? Greem was about average.


    If the enemy¡¯s attack contained no other magical effects or characteristics, Greem would be able to fully recover within half a day, even from a severed limb. However, the prerequisite to this was having a sufficient reserve of energy.


    That said, with the Orb of the Fire God inside him, Greem would never run out of fire energy. Even if he was sealed in an alternate dimension with no energy whatsoever, Greem could fight at high intensity with this body of his, sustained only by the fire energy provided by the Orb of the Fire God.

 Chapter 1442 - A Strange Invitation

    Chapter 1442 A Strange Invitation


    Gazlowe noticed Greem¡¯s mental activity the moment he woke up. After all, Gazlowe controlled the entirety of the Capital of Steel.


    ¡°Master, you are finally awake. I have received eleven invitations while you were asleep. Please examine them.¡±


    Gazlowe¡¯s mental fluctuation instantly trembled throughout the hall.


    Invitations?


    Greem¡¯s Spirit quickly connected with Gazlowe. Arge amount of rted data flooded his consciousness like a torrent.


    If this had been in the past, Greem would never have dared to connect directly with Gazlowe in this manner. After all, the human mind could notpare to a brain monster like Gazlowe. Without powerful calction abilities, the flood of data alone would be enough to inflict incalcble damage upon his mental consciousness.


    Suna of the Burning Ring.


    Eyre of the Wings of Darkness.


    Goleman of the Magic Research Federation.


    Freyde of the Blood Origin Society.


    Ebert of the Light of Magic.


    ......


    ......


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be stunned at the long list of adept organizations and unfamiliar names.


    Given his position in the past, he rarely had the opportunity toe into contact with Great Adepts.


    He was unlikely to have attracted their attention, even if he had gone knocking on their doors with valuable gifts as offerings. Now that he had be a Fifth Grade Great Adept, invitations fluttered down upon him like snowkes, even as he remained in his home.


    The only problem was that Greem was utterly unfamiliar with all this data. As such, he had absolutely no idea how to deal with it.


    Given that he had Gazlowe right beside him¨Csomeone who waspletely familiar with space¨CGreem knew what he had to do. Greem quickly obtained the data he wanted from Gazlowe through the mental connection.


    One had to admit that this camp in space was truly a chaotic ce!


    The Great Adepts who remained stationed in this camp were the ¡®schrs¡¯ who preferred not to fight. They buried themselves in theirbs, where they conducted their experiments and research. Their power might be superior to adepts of Fourth Grade and below, but they were weaklings amongst Fifth Grades.


    Who knew how much of their power they could unleash when they left their adept towers and the camp!?


    Because these Great Adepts all had tremendously long lifespans, they formed alliances across the dozen adept camps based on the content of their research.


    These adept organizations typically only consisted of three to five people, the members of whom were all Great Adepts. asionally, they also invited exceptionally talented Fourth Grade adepts to join their ranks. However, these organizations were all built around a topic that the members shared amon interest in. There wasn¡¯t much benefit or influence tied to the organizations themselves.


    That was the case for organizations like the Magic Research Federation and the Light of Magic.


    Apart from these, certain special adept organizations prioritized having the same ideal when recruiting. These were secret groups that were closer, more tight-knit, and more binding.


    These organizations included the Burning Ring, the Wings of Darkness, and the Blood Origin Society.


    The information collected by Gazlowe in the past few hundred years revealed that the Burning Ring was a small organization that mainly recruited fire spellcasters, based around Exodar and a few nearby camps.


    Meanwhile, the Wings of Darkness was a mysterious organization put together by a group of darkness adepts. Their members were unknown, their research topic was unknown, and even their organization¡¯s location was unknown.


    On the other hand, the Blood Origin Society¡¯s base was located within Exodar. They were a secret organization focused on researching bloodlines. The reason they had sent an invitation to Greem was likely rted to the starbeast bloodline he possessed.


    After reading through the material provided by Gazlowe, Greem finally started to read through the contents of these invitations.


    It was important to note that fewer and fewer Fifth Grade Great Adepts had emerged from the World of Adepts in recent years as the principles were slowly taken up.


    Fresh blood was rare. It was only natural that most adept organizations at Exodar Camp extended their hand in hopes of meeting with him.


    After reading through the eleven invitations, Greem discovered two familiar names amongst them.


    Great Adept Sarubo.


    Great Adept Ulnak.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown when he read these names. He fell into a long period of thought.


    They were both Sixth Grade Great Adepts! Moreover...Greem had made acquaintances out of both of them.


    Ulnak was the current manager of Exodar Camp. He had the Seventh Grade Great Adept Erlenwald as his superior, but Erlenwald often secluded himself for hundreds of years at a time. Consequently, Sixth Grade Great Adept Ulnak managed the affairs of Exodar Camp most of the time.


    His invitation to Greem for a visit was perfectly reasonable and natural.


    However, the invitation from Sixth Grade Great Adept Sarubo was somewhat unusual.


    In all seriousness, Greem had a conflict of interest with Sarubo.


    Greem had started on his journey of magic in the Sarubo n to begin with. His path from apprentice adept to Second Grade adept was all undertaken within the Sarubo n. During this journey, he had been fortunate enough to have a brief encounter with this Great Adept Sarubo.


    Though the person he met was only a clone projection of Great Adept Sarubo, the clone still contained a significant portion of his actual mental consciousness.


    In the end, Greem broke up with the higher-ups of the n on bad terms. He stormed out of the Sarubo n and founded his own Crimson n. While mostly skirmishes, the Crimson n¡¯s conflicts with the Sarubo n hadsted for almost four hundred years at this point.


    The most severe conflict between the two of them had been during the Third Grade selection contest held in Zhentarim. Greem had knocked the Third Grade Sanazar unconscious and caused her to lose her best opportunity to be Fourth Grade.


    Ever since then, Sanazar had not shown herself again. It seemed like she had been assigned to another nar world, with headquarters being taken over by a purple-eyed adept.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to see from all this that the conflict between Greem and the Sarubo n had reached monumental levels. If that was the case, why did Great Adept Sarubo want to meet Greem!?


    It couldn¡¯t possibly be to teach him a lesson, could it?


    Greem questioned his own conscience. If he were the kind of person who held grudges, he would have exterminated the Sarubo n while he reigned supreme over the Central Lands. The main reason he had not lifted a single finger against the Sarubo n was out of respect for this Sixth Grade Great Adept.


    That was why it was unlikely that Sarubo intended to worsen their rtionship. On the contrary, it seemed as if Sarubo wanted to improve their rtionship. After all, Great Adept Sarubo had long since left the World of Adepts. His n¡¯s might was gradually fading, while Greem¡¯s Crimson n was as bright as a sun in the morning afternoon.


    Greem closed his eyes and fell into thought. He gradually managed to process what needed to be done next.


    Finally, Greem opened his eyes and contacted Gazlowe. ¡°Help me contact Lord Ulnak! Just tell him that Greem will be paying him a personal visit.¡±


    ............


    Space, Exodar Camp.


    The tower at the center of the ¡®city.¡¯


    When Greem walked into the hall of a building in a simple red robe, the adepts around him hastily took two steps backward and bowed to show their respect.


    There were no weaklings among those who could live in space.


    Even the weakest of them had been advanced Second Grade. They all wore earth-yellow badges that represented Exodar Camp. It meant that they were a part of the Exodar Camp management and possessed certain authorities.


    They might not have seen Greem prior to this, but that didn¡¯t stop them from recognizing his identity.


    Greem was the first Fifth Grade Great Adept to have emerged from the World of Adepts in the past five hundred years!


    By the second day after Greem arrived at Exodar Camp, news of his exploits, as well as his image, were already circting the camp. Of course, the camp¡¯s adepts were not just looking for this information to sate their curiosity. They also wanted to get to know this legendary fire adept and preventmitting any unintentional offense toward him.


    It was a verymon sight in the camps in space.


    The more foolish ones were often tricked into causing trouble for the Great Adepts, thereby inviting their fury and destruction. After these things happened several times, the adepts of the camps learned better.


    Every time they reached a new camp in space, their first job was to obtain information on the camp¡¯s important individuals. It was the best way to avoid causing trouble.


    In the eleven years that Greem had been sleeping, everything known about him had spread throughout the camp.


    The adept who was fastest to advance...exceptional fighting prowess, unified the Central Lands. Executed numerous minor Scourge Lords...instantly defeated the projection of the Fire God.


    Any one of these achievements would have been great news, worthy of lengthy discussion and thought. However, all of these achievements were gathered upon the shoulders of a single, newly advanced Fifth Grade Great Adept.


    During this time, Greem¡¯s name was spoken of endlessly in Exodar Camp. He was like a blinding, rising sun. His reputation had even superseded those of the more veteran Fifth Grade Great Adepts.


    The direct consequence was Greem being recognized by an adept the moment he stepped out of the Capital of Steel and came to the giant door of the central za¡¯s tower.


    Greem had stepped into apletely foreign world and was being bowed at by every stranger he ran into. This strange experience caused Greem¡¯s expression to be awkward. He wasn¡¯t sure how to react.


    Fortunately, he was a Great Adept, which meant that no one here dared to tug at his hair.


    The first to wee Greem was a familiar face. Caelf, Head of Inspections, peak Fourth Grade.


    After inquiring about Greem¡¯s purpose ining here, Caelf enthusiastically contacted Tower Spirit Cammpus for him.


    Greem was led by a Fourth Grade golem-construct into the tower. They arrived on the twenty-third floor, where Greem personally knocked on the door of Lord Ulnak.

 Chapter 1443 - Camp Obligations

    Chapter 1443 Camp Obligations


    Unexpectedly, the door only opened three dayster!


    Three dayster.


    The tightly-shut door swung open. Great Adept Ulnak¡¯s face was dark as he walked out of the room in ck robes. He lifted his head and saw Greem standing respectfully at the door.


    ¡°Who are you? Why are you here? Cammpus, you¡¯ve been getting worse about security!¡± Ulnak grumbled in annoyance as if he had forgotten Greem¡¯s presence.


    ¡°Esteemed Lord Ulnak, please watch your words! I already ryed news of Adept Greem¡¯s visit three days ago. You were the one who chose to ignore the message due to your obsession with Experiment Nine,¡± Tower Spirit Cammpus¡¯ sharp rebuttal rang out in the air.


    Ulnak scratched his head when he heard Cammpus¡¯s ¡®exnation¡¯ and mumbled something under his breath.


    ¡°You are...Greem?¡± Ulnak raised his head as if trying to recall something. ¡°Right, you¡¯re the Fifth Grade that just recently advanced from the homeworld. Mmm, I remember now.¡±


    Greem stood there silently and respectfully, trying his best to contain his Spirit.


    The person who stood in front of him didn¡¯t appear as a lifeform in his sharp senses. Instead, the adept appeared like a cluster ofws, wrapped together in aplicated yet organized fashion. Hundreds ofw chains wrapped around his principle core and extended in every direction like the appendages of a squid.


    Some of thew chains disappeared into empty space. It seemed like they maintained tight connections with certain nar worlds.


    Of course, the thickestw chain was connected to the tower itself. As long as Great Adept Ulnak required it, he could connect with the tower spirit at any time and gain aplete understanding of everything within the tower.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s ¡®gaze,¡¯ Great Adept Ulnak shed with light. An invisible principle fluctuation cut off all of Greem¡¯s spiritual appendages and obscured him in blinding light.


    Greem stumbled backward and couldn¡¯t help but rub his eyes.


    He didn¡¯t know what Ulnak had done, but his eyes stung terribly and he couldn¡¯t see for a while!


    ¡°Kid, that¡¯s a little lesson for you. Don¡¯t be reaching everywhere with your Spirit when you¡¯re out there. If you run into the more impatient fellows, they would punish you just for that alone!¡± Great Adept Ulnak chuckled and said, ¡°Seeing as you are a rookie that just came from the homeworld, I won¡¯t be holding it against you!¡±


    ¡°Thank you for the lesson!¡± Greem slowly released fire elementium to mend the damage to his eyes as he bowed and expressed his thanks.


    In all honesty, most ordinary people would have trouble getting used to the tremendous change in status, going from the most important person in a nar world to an ¡®insignificant¡¯ rookie in space.


    Ulnak smiled. It seemed like he was incredibly satisfied with Greem¡¯s attitude. He then said, ¡°Follow me!¡±


    A two-meter-tall portal abruptly appeared in front of Ulnak. He entered without any hesitation.


    Greem swiftly followed after him.


    The destination of the portal was a wide and luxurious meeting hall.


    The room was filled with soft but bright lights that clearly illuminated everything in the room. There was arge wooden table in the center of the hall, covered in all sorts of books, tomes, scrolls, and writing utensils.


    Ulnak sat behind the wooden table upon arriving. He rummaged through the scattered items and finally took out an old scroll from the bottom of a wobbling pile of books. He tossed it to Greem.


    ¡°Look at it yourself! As a rookie, these are the rules you have the obey while you remain in Camp Exodar. Furthermore, if you wish to construct an adept tower in the camp, you will first have to report the location and the scale of the construction.¡±


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled when the scroll fell into his hands, and he could feel the unusual toughness and smoothness of the material.


    The Chip instantly identified the material in his mind.


    Dragon Leather!


    Greem was certain this was a scroll made out of dragon leather because he could feel a faint wave of dragon¡¯s aura on it. Only someone like him, who owned a small dragon ne and constantly came into contact with dragon materials, could have been sensitive enough to notice this.


    Greem rolled out the scroll and immediately saw row upon row of magical words inscribed upon it.


    Kemedian.


    It was probably the most widely used magical script andnguage among the adepts!


    The contents of the scroll were exceedingly simple as well. It introduced the scale andws of Exodar Camp, rules that outsiders had to abide by, and some special things to be taken note of.


    In general, most camps would wee Great Adepts!


    After all, the more Great Adepts there were, the more powerful the camp would appear to be and the more influence they would possess. Moreover, no Great Adept wandered the universe alone. All of them had only been able to reach the heights that they had because an organization of some sort supported them.


    The introduction of a new Great Adept to the camp was equivalent to joining forces with an organization of decent influence!


    As for the size of that organization? That would depend on the management skills and talent of the Great Adept themselves.


    That said, most adepts did not like to concern themselves with these trivial matters. There were very few organizations that could actually grow to a significant size.


    The true owner of Exodar Camp was Seventh Grade Great Adept Erlenwald. However, the one currently managing it was his disciple, the Sixth Grade Great Adept Ulnak.


    If Greem wanted to take up residence at Exodar, he would have to construct an adept tower of his own and fall in line with the camp¡¯s management.


    Of course, Greem had already established a foothold in Camp Exodar. That was the Capital of Steel that was located outside of the camp. However, the Capital of Steel was located outside of camp and wasn¡¯t under its direct protection.


    Most of the time, the Capital of Steel had to endure attacks by gxy wanderers and starbeasts, all by themselves!


    Should Greem choose to join Camp Exodar, he would also have to take on certain obligations, even as he enjoyed the protection of a Seventh Grade Great Adept. That obligation was to enroll himself as part of the camp enforcers and be one of its managers.


    Of course, as a Great Adept, he wouldn¡¯t need to do all that dirty work personally. There were effective and structured forces that already worked at the camp. These forces were the worker ants that kept it running.


    As authority figures, the Great Adepts only had to inspect their work once in a while and reward or punish ordingly. The Great Adepts only needed to show themselves when the scope of the problem was beyond what their subordinates could manage.


    These significant incidents seldom happened once in a decade.


    As such, most Great Adepts didn¡¯t object to being bound by these obligations!


    Moreover, being in control of the enforcers meant being able to slot in trusted subordinates into the force. This way, the Great Adepts would be able to intervene in the camp¡¯s resource and material market to obtain rare resources that could only be found in space.


    This beneficial agreement was undoubtedly generous for rookies that had just taken their first step out of a nar world!


    Unfortunately, Greem had already nned out his future. He could not walk along the same path that ¡®ordinary¡¯ people did.


    ¡°Have you made your decision? Which division of the camp do you intend to join?¡± Ulnak yawned as he asked impatiently.


    Greem carefully returned the scroll and said, ¡°My lord, I do not intend to join the camp!¡±


    The air in the room seemed to freeze for a moment.


    Ulnak lifted his head abruptly and took a serious look at Greem for the first time.


    ¡°You said...you don¡¯t intend to join the camp? Could it be that you have rtions with another camp? Is it the Endless Gardens? Are they trying to get you to join them?¡±


    For some reason, when the Endless Gardens was mentioned, Ulnak¡¯szy gaze turned cold and stern, as if harboring the mes of anger.


    ¡°The Endless Gardens?¡± Greem shook his head slightly. ¡°I have never even heard of them.¡±


    ¡°Well, if you¡¯re not nning on staying in the camp to find out more about space while collecting resources, what are you preparing to do? The situation in space is extremelyplicated. Don¡¯t think you can mess around just because you are Fifth Grade. I know of a dozen Great Adepts who have died in space over the past few thousand years alone. Don¡¯t act rashly!¡±


    ¡°I intend to go develop in the Fire Elementium ne. That ce is more suited to my soul origin. It should be better than a camp in space!¡±


    ¡°The Fire Elementium ne,¡± Ulnak brooded silently and couldn¡¯t help but nod in agreement with Greem¡¯s idea.


    As a pure fire adept, Greem would not be too badly rejected by the native fire elementals of the Fire Elementium ne. If he were willing to work hard and put in the effort, he would have no problem bing a free fire lord there in a few hundred years.


    As for bing a Fire King...that would probably require the blessing of the Fire Elementium ne.


    As an outsider that slipped into the ne, it wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how difficult it would be to obtain that blessing.


    ¡°If you don¡¯t intend to be a member of the camp, then you can¡¯t stay here for too long. Moreover, that small trading point you¡¯ve established outside of camp will no longer be protected by us! Have you thought your way through these consequences?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve made up my mind!¡±


    ¡°Very well. You may leave now then! Remember, you cannot stay in the camp for more than a year. You must leave Camp Exodar within the year!¡±


    Greem bowed and acknowledged the instructions. He then prepared to leave.


    Just as he was about to teleport away, Ulnak¡¯s voice rang out in his mind.


    ¡°You just arrived, so there will be a lot of organizations trying to get you to join them. Stay sharp and pick carefully. Don¡¯t get involved in the conflict and disagreements of the higher adepts.¡±


    Crimson light shed, and Greem¡¯s form vanished.

 Chapter 1444 - King’s Advice

    Chapter 1444 King¡¯s Advice


    The Fire Elementium ne.


    Edge of the Sea of Ashes.


    This ce was a world of fire,pletely different from the usual material ne. No magical particle of an elementium other than fire could be found.


    Even the mountains, rivers, earth, and skies wereposed of fire elementium in various states. Even the slightest handful of dirt here contained a shocking amount of pure fire elementium.


    Most of the fire elementium creatures here were unintelligent, non-sentient beings. They were born in the fire and wandered the ne aimlessly in a daze until their consciousness dissipated.


    Only fire elementals that identally merged with fires from another world and grew stronger could gain true intelligence. Consequently, the number of fire elementium creatures in the Fire Elementium ne that actually had intelligence were few and far betweenpared to the total poption.


    Unlike most material worlds, the elementium worlds werepletely open to outsiders.


    The four elementium worlds were like public elementium domains. Spellcasters from any material world could obtain feedback from the elementium worlds by means of sacrifice, resonance, or exchange.


    For instance, when Greem cast megate. He sacrificed a portion of his Spirit and fire energy to open a portal to the Fire Elementium ne and recruited elementium warriors to fight for him.


    It was, in fact, the core of most fire summoning spells!


    Today was yet another ordinary and peaceful day in the Fire Elementium ne.


    A radiant portal abruptly opened at the edge of the Sea of Ashes. Greem walked out of the doorway.


    It was apletely different experience than being in space. Greem felt his mood perk up just by stepping in here.


    The dense and active fire elementium in the air surged into his body like a tide, causing his humanoid form to erupt into a zing torch with a loud bang.


    Greem¡¯s body started to swell within the mes, only stopping once he had reached a hundred meters in size.


    Apart from the changes to his body, the dense concentration of fire elementium triggered the fire principles in Greem¡¯s body into manifesting. Two fire halos of different colors reverberated around Greem, shrouding his figure and causing sparks to drift away every time they shed.


    The fire principles also triggered the principle system hiding behind the Fire Elementium ne. Certain mysterious things were sent into Greem¡¯s body through thew chains. Simultaneously, the unique contents of his own principles were feeding back to the principle system.


    The two melded together and conducted a kind of exchange, causing a change to take over the fire principles!


    These fluctuations at the principle level were not something that ordinary creatures would pick up on. However, they could not slip past Fire King Groms.


    An overbearing consciousness of fire traversed across space and shed with Greem¡¯s mental consciousness.


    Greem let out a grunt as the mes around him dimmed for a moment. They then glowed brilliantly, provoked by the attack, and Greem was able to endure the ¡®barbaric tackle¡¯ out of nowhere.


    ¡°Ah, it¡¯s you! I was wondering where some mysterious soul had popped up from...hm? You¡¯re Fifth Grade already!¡± It was Fire King Groms¡¯ mental consciousness that had arrived. His actions had been rough and clumsy, but it wasn¡¯t out of any malice or hostility against Greem; it was simply the nature of fire creatures.


    Simply put, fire creatures had absolutely no idea what the word ¡®gentle¡¯ meant!


    Given the strength with which Groms¡¯ will descended earlier, Greem¡¯s body and Spirit would have been torn asunder if he had not advanced to Fifth Grade.


    ¡°Greetings, Lord Groms!¡± Greem might be of the same grade as Groms now, but Groms had advanced several thousands of years ahead of him. He still had to respect this seniority.


    ¡°You human adepts might be short-lived, but your passion for improving and rising to higher grades always impresses me. Still, human, now that you have advanced to Fifth Grade, you will have to obey the rules of the Fire Elementium ne while you¡¯re here!¡± Groms¡¯ booming voice echoed in Greem¡¯s mind.


    ¡°I was nning to ask you in the first ce, my lord. What is it that I need to take note of while I¡¯m here?¡± Greem humbled himself and asked in a modest tone.


    ¡°There¡¯s really not much you need to be careful about. After all, you are a powerhouse that has ascended beyond the mortals. You can do whatever you like as long as you don¡¯t invade the territories of the other Fire Kings!¡± Groms warned. ¡°However, remember, never walk within fifty kilometers of where the other Fire Kings reside. Otherwise, that will be akin to dering a war between kings!¡±


    Greem drew in a breath of cold air. He finally realized why Groms¡¯ will had rushed over the moment his Spirit fluctuations had spread out.


    ¡°Seeing as you¡¯re an old acquaintance and you¡¯re new to this, I won¡¯t be pursuing your offense this time!¡± Groms then sent over arge map that outlined the territories of various forces. He chuckled as he said, ¡°This is theyout of the Fire King forces within a five hundred thousand kilometer radius of the Sea of Ashes. Feel free to find a ce not governed by a Fire King to settle down.


    ¡°Whatever territory you manage to conquer in that area can all be your territory. However, do not ughter the intelligent fire natives without good reason. Should the nar consciousness consider you an unwee guest, you will not be able to find any more friends in the Fire Elementium ne!¡±


    Greem nodded silently.


    He knew that this was Groms repaying him for the lightfire stone fromst time.


    It had been a fair deal, with Groms getting the lightfire stone and Greem obtaining knowledge on how to create his principle fire. However, Fire King Groms definitely came out of the whole deal a little bit better.


    If Greem were still that insignificant human adept from before, Fire King Groms wouldn¡¯t be bothered by this. Now that Greem had be a Fifth Grade equal to himself, he had to behave more fairly and try his best to befriend a powerful adept with plenty of potential.


    ¡°Thank you, Lord Groms. I will contact you as soon as I settle down!¡± Having obtained what he sought, Greem hastily bid farewell to his friend.


    ¡°Very well. Good luck! I hope to still be able to sense your existence the next time I wake up,¡± Groms boomed once again, and his gigantic will of fire instantly dissipated as it returned to the depths of the Sea of Ashes.


    Elementium creatures were all incrediblyzy individuals.


    It was due to the fact that they lived radically different livespared to nar creatures. Even the most ordinary fire elemental could easily live for eight hundred years. Meanwhile, a Fire King like Groms could live for a hundred thousand years or more.


    As such, their concept of time was extremely loose and long!


    The way they liked to make friends was to observe and test an individual¡¯s character and personality over the course of thousands of years. In all seriousness, ordinary nar creatures did not have the qualifications to be their friends.


    That was because a valiant life was no more than an ¡®instant¡¯ in the eyes of elementium creatures, hardly enough for a nap or a stroll. You might already have turned old and died in what was the blink of an eye for them. How would it be possible for someone to ever befriend an elementium creature that way?


    Greem might have be a Fifth Grade now, but his lifespan was still only a tenth that of Groms. That was why Greem was already overjoyed that Groms was being this ¡®friendly¡¯ with him.


    Greem left the Sea of Ashes with consecutive Fire Teleportations. He found a rtively quiet spot and startedmunicating with the Chip.


    He had thought he would have to pay visits to a few Fire Lords to obtain information on the distribution andyout of the forces of the Fire Elementium ne, but somehow he had managed to get his hands on it really easily. What came next was naturallying up with an effective n of action.


    ¡°Chip, pull out that map we got earlier.¡±


    A massive map model was instantly projected in Greem¡¯s mind.


    The entire map was drawn with the Sea of Ashes at the center.


    The Sea of Ashes spread for approximately sixty thousand kilometers and took up the center of the map. It was marked in red, with a crown that represented Groms hovering above it. Meanwhile, the area within a hundred thousand kilometer radius around it was marked yellow. That was the territory governed by Groms¡¯ direct subordinates.


    Groms¡¯ whole territory spanned nearly five hundred thousand kilometers. The total area was almost equal to one-third of the Central Lands.


    It didn¡¯t sound veryrge, but it was important to note that there were many, many Fire Kings like Groms himself in the Fire Elementium ne. They numbered in the hundreds. It was also the most direct reflection of the Fire Elementium ne.


    Two of the four corners of the map were marked a deep red. They were the territories of Fire Kings Thanos and Zetas, respectively.


    One of them was Fifth Grade, while the other was Sixth Grade. Both of them were powerful Fire Kings that you would not want to provoke.


    Given that case, only the regions to the southwest and northeast were still marked green. These were areas governed by scattered groups of lower-grade Fire Lords. If Greem wanted to settle down quickly, he would have to set his eyes on the Fourth Grade Fire Lords.


    Southwest and northeast.


    Greem¡¯s eyes wandered across these two directions, and severalpletely unfamiliar names entered his eyes.


    Firebird Peak¨C Lord Zamok (Fourth Grade).


    Burning Bay¨C mespirit (Third Grade).


    Bigstone Mountain¨C Molten Giant (Third Grade).


    Land of Light¨C Phoenix (Third Grade).


    ......


    ......


    One had to admit that the Fire Elementium ne¡¯s sheer size gave birth to numerous tribes of fire creatures.


    All sorts of fire creatures, tribes, and species took up variousnds where they lived and grew over generations.


    The forces that could be marked out on the map were all significant forces of Third or Fourth Grade. The weaker forces werepletely ignored.


    Even if Greem were absolutely desperate, he would never set his eyes on the smaller forces.


    After all, the Fire Elementium ne was a world where power reigned supreme. You could only obtain a better location for your people if you had the strength to back it up. Only certain unique sites in the Fire Elementium ne¨Cthose hailed as death zones and forbiddennds¨Cwere suited to be a ce of residence for ultra-grade beings like Greem!

 Chapter 1445 - Broodmother Lasbes

    Chapter 1445 Broodmother Lasbes


    Half a monthter.


    The Burning Cave.


    Greem¡¯s majestic, hundred-meter-tall body stood at the peak of a small volcano as he silently surveyed this ck and red world of smoke and fire.


    The former ruler of thisnd, Broodmother Lasbes, had reigned over the Burning Cave for over two thousand years. She now cowered beneath Greem¡¯s feet, burnt and scorched, her bulging stomach flickering with golden runes left behind by the Undying mes.


    Lasbes¡¯ current condition was exceedingly terrible!


    Three days ago, a mysterious me giant had appeared in her territory, requesting that she submit and offer up her loyalty.


    Fire creatures were savage and cruel beings. There was no way they would simply give up their freedom without a fight!


    Thus, a terrible fight broke out.


    What Lasbes never expected was for this me giant to be a fearsome Fifth Grade powerhouse. In a violent fashion, he destroyed the Burning Cave that Lasbes had painstakingly managed for several thousand years, putting the torch to the countless traps and Emberweb spider descendants in the cave.


    The battle between the two of them went all the way from the Burning Cave to Singga Volcano, a distance of over a hundred kilometers. Finally, the match ended with Broodmother Lasbes¡¯ defeat.


    Lasbes was a five-meter-tall Emberweb spider with six sharp limbs and a pair of giant pincers. As the broodmother of the Emberweb spiders, Lasbes was most proficient atying down fire web traps and spawningrge numbers of fire spiders.


    She had set down a lot of spider traps near herir to catch wandering fire creatures. She lived by sucking out theva and fire from their corpses. In doing so, she could slowly get stronger.


    Her actualbat power might not be very impressive, but she had her incredibly troublesome webs and a frightening number of descendants. These two factors allowed her to rise up from within the numerous fire creatures, bing the only Fourth Grade fire lord within a radius of five hundred kilometers.


    However, she was primarily a fire lord in name only. Apart from the descendants she had spawned, she had no other subordinates from other species or tribes. It wasn¡¯t hard to figure out the reason why. You just had to look at her round stomach that didn¡¯t seem to have a bottom.


    Naturally, Greem had plenty of means to deal with a sly, sinister predator like an Emberweb spider that preferred to strike from the dark.


    The main reason Lasbes was so difficult to deal with was that she had constructed herir underground. The tunnels and passages down there were narrow and winding. In the face of fire creatures that were more than her match, she would simply hide underground and refuse to emerge. Against weaker opponents, she would mobilize all her forces and used self-detonating spiders, Ember spiderlings, and weaver spiders to lure them into the webs.


    However, Greem was even more sinister than she was!


    The first thing Greem did upon arriving was to blockade the entrance of Lasbes¡¯ir. He then raised a hell of fire and blew his Undying mes across every corner of the cave.


    Smothered spiders!


    Emberweb spiders were fire creatures that could even survive inva of several thousand degrees. However, their fire resistance meant nothing against a principle fire like the Undying mes. They could only screech in the golden sea of fire as they slowly burned to death.


    Even Fourth Grade Broodmother Lasbes had been forced out of herir to fight against Greem with a body smoldering with golden fire, let alone her spiderlings.


    Awkwardly enough, despite being a Fifth Grade, Greem¡¯s Strength, Physique, and Agility were all far inferior to this Fourth Grade broodmother. However, his powerful Fire Teleportation allowed him to dodge Lasbes¡¯ Vicious Lunge, Boiling Stter, and Smoldering Devastation.


    [Vicious Lunge: Lasbes¡¯ movement speed is increased by 300% while within her web. Her attacks possess a chance to paralyze the enemy upon contact.


    [Boiling Stter: Spits out a twenty-meter-long, sixty-degree-wide cone of boiling poison liquid. Enemies hit by the poison will receive 3,000 points of fire damage and 2,000 points of poison damage.


    [Smoldering Devastation: Spits a 5 meter by 5 meter fire web coated in poison at the enemy. Enemies caught in the web will be immobilized and will have to endure tremendous damage from the poison. Said poison will ignite the fire energy within the target¡¯s body.]


    One had to admit that Lasbes had truly deserved her title as a fire lord. Those who could rise up from the masses and distinguish themselves all possessed powerful abilities and techniques!


    Even though Greem was of a superior grade, protected by two divine artifacts, and wielded two fire principles, he still had to be careful against the broodmother¡¯s unusual Smoldering Devastation.


    It was impossible for Lasbes to defeat him, but if he were caught in the web and ended up being bitten a few times, it would be quite embarrassing!


    Thus, Lasbes had been able to force Greem to step back over and over again by spitting fire webs.


    It wasn¡¯t until they reached this volcano that she ran out of poison and webbing, upon which she was sted by a fireball and marked with a fire brand.


    ¡°Submit or die?¡± Greem shouted in his booming voice.


    ¡°I would rather die than surrender,¡± Lasbes let out a screech. The rune on her stomach abruptly turned into golden fire and instantly spread all over her body.


    This golden fire was the manifested Undying mes. It possessed the principle trait of being able to ignore magic resistance and burn the soul directly. Even with her fire resistance as a Fourth Grade fire lord, Lasbes writhed in pain. Her entire body was scorched and charred ck.


    Fortunately for her, Greem did not intend to kill her. The Undying mes only burned for five seconds before reverting into a rune. Greem then took out a healing potion and poured it on Lasbes¡¯ ckened body.


    Given the potent regenerative powers of Fourth Grade creatures and the aid of the healing potion, Lasbes recovered in just a few minutes.


    A muffled boom.


    Greem stomped on the Emberweb broodmother again after she attempted to burrow into the ground and escape. His voice boomed once more, ¡°Submit or die?¡±


    ¡°You dare?¡± Lasbes didn¡¯t even get to finish this time before she was once again engulfed by golden fire.


    The sizzling sound of burning flesh could be heard, and a pungent smell filled the air.


    A short momentter, the mes faded away, and Lasbes was healed by Greem again.


    ¡°Hehehehe. Little spider, keep it up. I have plenty of healing potions anyway. I should have no problem torturing you for another hundred years, at least. So tell me, what¡¯s your choice this time?¡± Greem chuckled coldly, the calmness of his words sending chills straight through the broodmother¡¯s body.


    ¡°I......¡±


    Lasbes had only said a single word when the golden mes engulfed her. Her pained screeches and howls rang out above the volcano again.


    A short momentter, the mes dissipated.


    Greem frowned and scratched his head as he said with an ¡®apologetic¡¯ expression, ¡°Sorry, that was a little early. What did you say just now?¡±


    Lasbesy breathless on the hard stone. She waved her limbs and pincers about furiously. She sliced the volcanic rock beneath her, leaving deep marks in the ground and sending pebbles flying everywhere.


    ¡°Why? Why did youe to find me? There are plenty of fire lords out there. Why did you single me out?¡± The broodmother was clearly very resentful about this issue.


    ¡°Because you¡¯re the smartest of them all!¡± Greem smiled as heplimented her.


    He did mean it.


    Those hulking big guys out there might be pretty powerful and of a high grade, but they all had explosive tempers and no idea how to adapt. They were stubborn oxen that would run all the way down the same path. Threatening them with death would be useless.


    In contrast, only individuals like Lasbes who had bloodlines from another world and sufficiently smart brains would know fear, as well as the value of life.


    Smart people were always afraid of death!


    It was an ironw concluded by the adepts, and Greem knew it well enough himself!


    ¡°And if I don¡¯t submit?¡± Despite his severe injuries, Lasbes only needed to rest for a brief moment. Her body was continually healing, and her voice had regained strength.


    ¡°Then I will keep ying with you for a little longer until my patience runs dry,¡± Greem gave an honest exnation. ¡°Then, I will twist off your head as a trophy, pull apart your limbs to make daggers, tear off your pincers for scissors, and make your spinneret and poison nd into magical equipment.


    ¡°Hmm, let me think, is there anything else of value in you...right, I can extract your soul as well. Hey, tell me, little spider, is there a spider crystal in you? I heard that¡¯s a really valuable thing too.¡±


    Emberweb Broodmother Lasbes couldn¡¯t help but tremble as she listened to Greem list off her body parts like pieces of treasure. As a high-grade intelligent lifeform, she was different than those stupid, foolish, and short-fused fire giants.


    She knew very well that death was not her ultimate fate when a high-grade elementium being like herself fell into the hands of a human adept. No, it was the start of endless torture!


    At the thought of being enved for the next thousands of years, Lasbes couldn¡¯t help but feel sorrow overwhelm her. She crouched on the ground and started crying out loud.


    Still, as an oddly-shaped arachnid fire creature, her crying just looked terribly ugly in the eyes of a human.


    ¡°Hi, little spider, have you made up your mind? If you still don¡¯t submit, I will take your legs to start!¡± Greem ground his foot into the spider impatiently, instantly making the broodmother howl in pain.


    ¡°I submit...I submit!¡± Bad people were usually only afraid of worse people. Emberweb Broodmother Lasbes finally lowered her prideful head and submitted to Greem after two thousand years of running rampant in this region.


    What came next was much more straightforward.


    Lasbes opened up her soul consciousness, and Greem nted his soul brand in there.


    In doing so, Fourth Grade Fire Lord Emberweb Broodmother Lasbes became the first native creature that Greem managed to subdue since entering the Fire Elementium ne.

 Chapter 1446 - Ancient Secrets

    Chapter 1446 Ancient Secrets


    With the aid of a local, Greem¡¯s conquest became a lot easier.


    For the fire creatures that had lived here for millions of years, the Fifth Grade Greem was no different than a god of fire. No matter how they struggled or resisted, there was no way they could change the inevitable result.


    Greem¡¯s overwhelming power was the key that guaranteed the sessful execution of his will!


    Taking down Lasbes was like pushing down the first domino tile. He was able to snowball and conquer a sizeable territory within the region. However, the fire creatures did not have much ambition, much less the dreams to conquer the entirety of the Fire Elementium ne.


    A Fifth Grade Fire King like Groms, for instance, conquered a good territory and enved some of the nearby fire creatures to serve as ves. That was enough. There was no need to spend too much time making all the fire lords submit to him.


    The Fire Elementium ne was a ssic ultra-sized nar world. It was a dozen times the size of arge nar world like the World of Adepts.


    The upper limit of power between the two worlds was also very far apart.


    The World of Adepts could only contain individuals of Fourth Grade and below, while the limit of power in the Fire Elementium ne was Seventh Grade. That meant one was very likely to run into fearsome Seventh Grade fire creatures within the Fire Elementium ne.


    Greem was little more than an ant before such powerful beings!


    Still, as a Fifth Grade fire adept, Greem would not hold back when it came to himself. He picked carefully and chose a special ce for his residence. It was a ce called the Molten Altar.


    It was said that the Molten Altar was once the passageway to the kingdom of a certain powerful Fire Hierarch. However, something happened that resulted in the death of this Fire Hierarch. The holy fire burning on the Molten Altar was extinguished along with him.


    Even so, the holy power that lingered around the Molten Altar had yet to fully dissipate after millions of years. Everyone who worshipped mes did not dare to approach the Molten Altar.


    As an outsider, Greem did not have the same fear and respect that was engraved in the soul consciousness of the fire creatures. After much pondering, it seemed like the Molten Altar was the only ce on Groms¡¯ map that matched Greem¡¯s identity as a Fifth Grade.


    Greem brought the Emberweb broodmother along with him. On the sixty-eighth day since his arrival, they reached the Molten Altar.


    It was a silent and destend.


    Even with Greem¡¯s tremendous and pervasive Spirit, he could not sense any souls or life in this area.


    It was almost as if the ce had been cursed. Even the scorched and withered earth and the hot winds blowing dust into the air seemed to carry a mysterious weight.


    The winds howled, the fires rumbled, and the ground itself seemed to be crying..


    Emberwb Broodmother Lasbes immediately stopped walking upon arriving here. An expression of fear and respect appeared on her ugly face.


    ¡°Master, better not choose this ce! I...I can smell the smell of grudge and death here. Even high-grade creatures like ourselves will be inflicted with something bad if we stay here too long,¡± Lasbes advised hesitantly.


    Greem did not reply. He simply stood on the spot and assessed thisnd silently.


    He could see stretches of mountains rising and falling in every direction from where he was. ck smoke rolled above the towering volcanoes, and the scarlet sh of theva illuminated the skies, causing it to appear dark-red and ck.


    There was a rtively t in amid all the volcanoes. At the center of the in was a crescent-shapedvake about ten kilometers long. The Molten Altar was located within the crook of the curvedke.


    The altar was unusuallyrge and majestic, surrounded by giant hundred-meter-tall stone pirs. At the center of the structure was a four-tiered stone altar. A strange stone tform sat at the very top.


    Due to its age, the altar was exceedingly old and was falling apart.


    The stone carvings and decorations on the altar were crumbling. Even most of the stone pirs had copsed entirely, leaving behind only foundations measuring two to three meters in height.


    For some reason, strange images shed through Greem¡¯s mind when he saw the ancient ruins before him.


    The entire sky and earth were crimson. A thousand-meter-tall portal of light stood at the center of the in. The Molten Altar burned with a ssy, purple fire in front of that portal.


    Fire creatures from all over crowded the in. They were of different species and grades, but they had the same fervor on their faces. They prayed zealously near the purple fire on the altar, guided by numerous fire priests.


    Every so often, a strong light would erupt from the purple fire, casting a purple glow on one of the believers.


    Whenever the purple glow appeared, the crowd would erupt into thunderous cheering. The prayers of the believers would grow louder and louder. Everyone watched enviously as the believer d in purple light slowly walked up the altar and vanished through the portal.


    Every time this happened, the atmosphere would rise even further and closer to the point of total ignition.


    All the believers became even more zealous and fervent, hoping that they would be the next one to be chosen.


    Passing through the portal...entering the kingdom of the god...mergingpletely with the origin fire.


    For some reason, this mysteriously intense wish infected Greem¡¯s mental consciousness as well. Even he wanted to kneel down and pray before the Molten Altar.


    [Beep. Detecting the intrusion of a mysterious foreign will. Please stay alert.


    [Beep. Detecting that Host has been enchanted. Principle defenses are activating now.]


    The next second, the two principle lights shrouding Greem¡¯s body shed and sent sparks into the air. A golden barrier instantly engulfed his hundred-meter-tall body.


    With the golden barrier protecting him, the unknown emotion that had reached across time was abruptly dispelled.


    Greem shivered. When he came to his senses, the vision before him had faded. Thend returned to its former deste appearance.


    ¡°Chip, what¡¯s going on? What happened to me just now?¡± Greem asked solemnly.


    [Beep. Detecting an unusual Spirit fluctuation forcefield in the region. Initial estimates suggest this is some sort of spacetime rewind to the ancient times. Suggesting that Host increase mental defenses!]


    Spirit fluctuation forcefield?


    Spacetime rewind?


    Greem thought to himself. He couldn¡¯t help but be more curious about the Molten Altar standing at the edge of his sight.


    Judging from his vision earlier, a powerful fire creature resembling a god had appeared in the Fire Elementium ne millions of years ago. He had forged a powerful god kingdom of fire and left the Molten Altar here as a passageway to the kingdom for selected believers.


    A god of the Fire Elementium ne.


    If such an individual did exist, they would be thousands of times stronger than the World of Gods¡¯ fire gods. The reason for it was simple. The number of believers and zealots was not even on the same level.


    Most gods from the World of Gods were reliant on a single material ne. However, no matter the number of intelligent creatures there, it could not possiblypare to an elementium ne. Moreover, elementium creatures were beings with simplistic thoughts and few demands. They were not like intelligent lifeforms of other worlds, withplex thoughts and unending greed.


    If a fire god did appear in the Fire Elementium ne, he could have as many zealots as he desired. That was a far better scenario than fighting for believers in the various material worlds.


    However, ording to Greem¡¯s understanding, the most powerful individuals in the Fire Elementium ne were no more than Eighth Grade Fire Hierarchs. He had never heard of a fire god from this world whose powery in faith.


    It seemed like it was impossible for a true Elementium Ruler to be born among the elementium creatures!


    It was said that this too had something to do with the Titans.


    Greem hade across conjectures by other adepts when reading ancient records found in Zhentarim. These conjectures proposed that the four elementium nes were where the fundamental particles of the multiverse were most plentiful, as well as the source of all supernatural powers in the material worlds.


    To avoid an excessively powerful individual rising from within the four major elementium nes and cutting off elementium supply to the material worlds, the Titans would patrol the elementium worlds every so often. They would exterminate any powerful individual who had a chance of bing an Elementium Ruler.


    Despite the countless elementium beings and vastnds of the four major elementium worlds, the most powerful individuals were only Eighth Grade Elementium Hierarchs. Ninth Grade Elementium Rulers had never been born.


    This was the fundamental reason behind the shadows!


    That meant the fallen Fire Hierarch here must have been a peak Eighth Grade existence. He must have been too powerful and was attacked by the Titans. His god kingdom then fell apart, and his altar was destroyed.


    Even after millions of years, this Molten Altar retained a portion of its strange powers from ancient times. It could drag people into a sort of spiritual illusion that provided glimpses into ancient secrets.


    Greem had managed to break free of the illusion earlier. What would have happened if he didn¡¯t manage to do so?


    Greem hesitated for a moment and asked gravely, ¡°Lasbes, what have you heard of this Molten Altar? Are there any taboos here?¡±


    Emberweb Broodmother Lasbes crouched behind Greem. She looked at the altar in the distance fearfully as she said in a trembling voice, ¡°No native creature of the Fire Elementium ne would ever approach the Molten Altar of their own ord. Rather, it¡¯s the outsiders that always seem to be attracted by the altar. They are always drawn in somehow.¡±


    ¡°Do outsiders often go missing here?¡±


    ¡°Yes! Many outsiders disappear after they get close to the altar. No one knows where they go. However, the more reliable sources say,¡± At this, Lasbes couldn¡¯t help but lower her voice, ¡°Their souls were taken away by the dead Fire Hierarch to be used as energy for a revival. As for the truth of these rumors, I have no idea!¡±


    A Fire Hierarch plotting a revival...that was shockingly major news!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes.

 Chapter 1447 - Enemy Tracks

    Chapter 1447 Enemy Tracks


    Anyone else might have gone looking for a different ce to stay once they heard of the mystery of Molten Altar.


    However, Greem¡¯s thought process was clearly different from an ordinary man¡¯s.


    He almost-instantly decided to make his home here to research this strange and dangerous Molten Altar.


    However, even after the idea took root, actualizing it seemed to be very difficult.


    The Fire Elementium ne nevercked manpower. There were plenty of strong fire creatures standing over a dozen meters tall with the ability to move objects weighing several tons. However, there was a distinctck of an architect with the proper aesthetic and ability to design.


    Compared to the myriad of sses found in the material nes, the Fire Elementium ne was much more rudimentary. Naturally, that meant they did not have any technicians.


    There only seemed to be a single ss in the Fire Elementium ne, and that was the ¡®wanderer!¡¯


    From the moment fire elementals were born of mes, they continually wandered and roamed the world. They would stay at a ce for eternity once they found a home that suited them. If they couldn¡¯t find it, they would wander for eternity until the consciousness in their core dissipated and reduced them to unsequenced fire energy again.


    That was why the Fire Elementium ne was said to remain in a chaotic, primitive state of society. There was no greater orrger concept of a kingdom, nor even the idea to form groups or alliances. At the very best, fire creatures of the same species would live together, creating a loose regional n.


    Meanwhile, the more powerful fire creatures would gather a bunch of subordinates around themselves to use as servants. The more capable ones would be Fire Lords. Above them were the Fire Kings, and at the very top of the pyramid were the Fire Hierarchs.


    Still, all of them shared the same system of governance¨C that of a master and servants. The Fire Kings and Fire Hierarchs owned morend and therefore controlled more servants.


    Fundamentally, their system of governance was the exact same as the Fire Lords!


    There was no concept of country or region. Moreover, elementium creatures did not even have tobor to fulfill their daily needs. All they had to do to survive was absorb some fire elementium as they wandered around. Naturally, this meant that there was no point in developing specializations or sses.


    The consequence of this was that Greem would have to hire architects from elsewhere and bring in materials if he wanted to build an adept tower here; the local fire elementium creatures could only serve asborers. Moreover, they would be the lowest of allborers, capable of little more than simple work that demanded brute force!


    Having made up his mind, Greem hastily sent Lasbes out to exterminate the surrounding Fire Lords.


    Given the Emberweb broodmother¡¯s ability, a group of Third Grade fire lords was absolutely no match. There should be no surprises there. As for the more powerful Fourth Grade Fire Lords? They could be left alone for the moment until Greem had the time to deal with them.


    After dealing with all that, Greem left a fire mark by thevake. He then casually tore space apart and returned to Camp Exodar.


    Greem¡¯s destination upon arrival was still the same ultra-long-range teleportation array hidden within the Capital of Steel.


    When Greem walked out of the teleportation room, Sock was already waiting respectfully for him.


    ¡°What is it? Is there a matter?¡± Greem¡¯s Spirit was incredibly sensitive. He instantly picked up on Sock¡¯s unusual behavior.


    ¡°Indeed, master!¡± Split-Brain Sock might be arrogant and prideful with a personality just as bad as his predecessor, but he dared not show any signs of disrespect to this increasingly powerful legendary fire adept. ¡°Recently, quite a few people have been asking about your whereabouts in the camp!¡±


    ¡°Oh, and who are these people?¡± Greem suddenly stopped walking and asked solemnly.


    ¡°Not veterans in the camp. Most of them are powerhouses from all over the gxy. They aren¡¯t very powerful. There are Third, Second, and even First Grades amongst them. However, they go around asking for your information upon arrival, with special concern to your location.¡±


    ¡°Were you able to find out their identities?¡± Greem smiled coldly. He already had an idea of who they were.


    ¡°Theye from all over the gxy and from various nes. However, they all share one characteristic.¡±


    ¡°They are believers of the Fire God?¡± Greem chuckled as he interrupted with a question of his own.


    ¡°Almost all of them. Even the asional non-believer is a gxy mercenary of some sort.¡±


    Greem thought for a moment before suddenly asking, ¡°What is the rtionship between the adept faction and the World of Gods out here in the realms beyond?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s very messy! Just as you understand, the adept faction has never been a single united front. The strategy taken toward the other forces is always affected and influenced by the more powerful adepts. Some adepts prefer to have the World of Gods as their target and often raid the gods¡¯ nar worlds. Meanwhile, other adepts have secret agreements with the World of Gods and work together on conquests against the elves, the gazers, or the dragons. In fact, some would even work together with the gods to deal with another adept!¡±


    Sock exined the situation in space to Greem as they walked.


    The Capital of Steel had be a private trading spot of sorts in its two hundred years of establishment near Camp Exodar. They had managed to procure their own sources of information. This stream of trivial, uncertain news¨Cmixed with rumors¨Cwasbined with the information that Greem had procured through more public means, allowing him to outline an approximate direction in which the adept faction was developing toward.


    From an overall perspective, the adept faction were not builders. They were destroyers!


    The adept faction was almost simultaneously at war with the Gazing Empire, the Dragons, the Elven Empire, the World of Gods, the Elementium nes, the Abyssal World, and the Shadow World. Of course, these wars weren¡¯t all dered in the name of the entire adept faction. Most of them were personal wars waged by small adept organizations or powerful individual adepts.


    Much like an octopus reaching out in every direction with its tentacles, the most powerful adepts of the adept faction were picking their enemies based on their personal liking.


    For instance, if an adeptcked dragon resources, he would encourage and guide the weaker adepts to attack the dragon¡¯s territory. The lower-grade adepts would then invade the dragon nes, hunt down low and intermediate-grade dragons, and take whatever resource they wanted with them.


    Through this process, the superior adept would be able to obtain the resources and materials they desired. The subordinate adepts would receive their protection, as well as some other benefits. Both parties got what they wanted, making for a win-win scenario.


    However, the fury of the dragons incited during this process would be taken on by the entirety of the adept faction!


    Superior adepts who wanted to conduct research on a demon¡¯s bloodline would rally adepts and break into the Abyssal World, waging numerous wars against the Abyssal Lords there. Whether the mighty forces of the Abyssal World were something that the adept faction could weather was not something they cared about.


    Indeed, one had to admit that Split-Brain Sock¡¯s evaluation was quite urate.


    The adept faction¡¯s policy toward the other forces resembled a hydra. The countless heads would snap their jaws and bite at any piece of meat that came close to them, whilecking any sense of a clear and defined overall strategy!


    In all honesty, if their enemies weren¡¯t in the same chaotic state, the adept faction would have been in deep, deep trouble.


    Believers of the Fire God.


    Hehehe, it seemed like Fire God Sinai had his eyes on him again!


    Greem could only shake his head and smile bitterly.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The Orb of the Fire God was an invaluable treasure that he would never part with. There was no resolving the conflict between him and Fire God Sinai.


    As a Seventh Grade god, Sinai was somewhat well-known even in the World of Gods. He possessed numerous subordinate gods below him. Greem felt his scalp buzz when he was the target of such an individual. He could feel his heart beat wildly.


    He had been hiding in the World of Adepts before this. Sinai could not have done anything to him, no matter how powerful he was. Now that Greem had stepped out of the nar world into space, Sinai held plenty of options to deal with him.


    Directly attacking Camp Exodar was little more than a joke, of course.


    Camp Exodar was protected by a Seventh Grade Great Adept; the camp itself had a decent military force. If Sinai had truly gone mad enough toe all the way here seeking vengeance, Greem would probably break out smiling in his sleep.


    If attacking Exodar directly wouldn¡¯t work, then the most effective means was to track down Greem and set up an ambush.


    Greem would have to be extremely cautious when venturing out. He would have to avoid giving his enemies a chance to catch him alone. Otherwise, any simple Sixth Grade vassal god or clone would be able to kill him!


    It was out of these concerns that Greem gave up on Camp Exodar and chose to set down a residence in the Fire Elementium ne.


    The reason for that was simple. Camp Exodar was a ce with too many shadows where his enemies could hide. It was hard to defend against an arrow fired from behind. Meanwhile, the Fire Elementium ne was a decent ce to stay, given that Greem could choose to leave the ce at any time.


    He would be overthinking the issue if he believed that Sinai woulde to the Fire Elementium ne to find trouble with him.


    After all, a fire god was basically an elixir of immortality for all high-grade fire creatures. If Sinai darede anywhere close to this lion¡¯s den or just sent just vassal gods or clones, the Fire Lords would definitely go berserk.


    What made fire gods a target for the Fire Lords was the divine authority within their bodies. That was the highest ss of fire-energy converter that could be used on any fire creature.


    A perfect fire god divine authority could raise any Fourth Grade fire creature directly to Fifth Grade. Even a divine authority fragment could improve a fire creature¡¯s power to a great extent.


    For instance, the fire god divine authority fragment that Greem obtained would have been enough to push a fire creature of beginner-apprentice level directly to peak Fourth Grade. The terrifying ability of divine authority couldn¡¯t be more obvious.


    Because of the power and rarity of the divine authority fragment, Greem couldn¡¯t bear to use it just to improve his powers. Instead, he left it in the light clone and hid it in the World of Adepts.


    He wasn¡¯t stupid enough to bring the divine authority fragment with him, much less into the Fire Elementium ne. If he actually did that, Fire King Groms would probably strike at him the instant he sensed the aura of the divine authority fragment.


    Friendship...camaraderie.


    These hollow words were worth nothing before the promise of tremendous benefit!


    Greem had not possessed the qualification to study an object like a divine authority fragment before reaching Fifth Grade. Now that he had be a Fifth Grade Great Adept, he needed to find a safe and secluded hiding spot for himself. He could then finally begin the research topics that he had put aside all this while.

 Chapter 1448 - Martin’s Sigh

    Chapter 1448 Martin¡¯s Sigh


    Naturally, Greem couldn¡¯t leave the matter of constructing a personal adept tower to some outsider!


    Should the tower¡¯s location be leaked, Greem¡¯s almighty enemies would be able to locate him at any time. As such, he could only leave this task to Sock. The split-brain was responsible for organizing all matters rted to the tower¡¯s construction.


    However, the environment in the Fire Elementium ne was too poor. Ordinary creatures couldn¡¯t survive there at all. Most of the construction work could only be left to the construction magical-machines. These construction machines would have to undergo special modifications to increase their fire resistance in order to adapt to the harsh environment of the Fire Elementium ne.


    Moreover, given Greem¡¯s current identity as a Fifth Grade Great Adept, an ordinary small or mid-sized tower would not allow him to unleash his full power. It was a given that this would have to be arge adept tower.


    After handing over the coordinates to Sock, Greem hesitated for a moment but finally decided to pay a visit to Great Adept Sarubo.


    It was time to settle his ties and grudges with the Sarubo n!


    ............


    Fifteen minutester, Greem appeared in front of a tall adept tower in Camp Exodar.


    All sorts of people were entering and exiting from the entryway on the first floor. These were all adepts, wearing robes and armor of various designs. They might be of different grades and sses, but they all wore a strange metal emblem on their chest.


    Whenever they passed through the defensive barrier, a sh of blue light would shine on the emblem. It seemed to be some sort of identification system.


    Meanwhile, two seven-meter-tall mithril statues stood silently on both sides of the door. A series of magical gemstones were embedded in the center of their humanoid heads. These gemstones continually scanned the adepts that passed through the entrance.


    With their indestructible bodies and violent metal fists, one could imagine how these two Fourth Grade mithril statues would give an invader an unforgettable memory should anyone try to enter without an emblem.


    Mithril statues wererge metal magical statues made mostly out of powerful magical alloy and coated with ayer of mithril. They could endure any elementium magic below Fourth Grade and only took half damage from Fourth Grade magical attacks.


    Such powerful metal golems were practically invincible against adepts below Fourth Grade. Even Fourth Grade adepts would have a hard time against these constructs.


    These two mithril golems might only appear to be beginner Fourth Grade, but they were far superior to Shadow Demon when it came to charging on the frontlines and taking enemy attacks.


    If one were to be brutally honest, even two intermediate Fourth Grade Shadow Demons put together would not be a match for a single one of these mithril statues. The reason for it was simple. They were designed for different purposes.


    These tough-skinned giant magical statues with potent magic immunity were the natural enemies of spellcasters. Therefore, an assassin-type magical-machine like Shadow Demon was even less of a match for them.


    However, Shadow Demon was superior to these mithril statues when it came to stealth and assassination.


    At the very least, spellcasters like Greem were always more fearful of golems like Shadow Demon and less concerned about mithril statues. The fundamental reason for this was that the mithril statues were toorge and clumsy. They were often unable to be used to their full effectiveness in many situations.


    As such, giant golems like the mithril statues could only be used as guards for critical magical facilities. It wasn¡¯t easy to bring them along for expeditions.


    The numerous magical gemstone eyes of the two mithril golems locked on to Greem when he approached the entrance. They creaked and started moving.


    ¡°Halt! Report your identity,¡± The mithril statue on the left moved into Greem¡¯s path. A booming mechanical voice came from within it.


    The movements of the mithril statues immediately drew the attention of the adepts. Their bodies trembled when their gaze fell upon Greem. Shock and surprise shed over their faces.


    ¡°It¡¯s the legendary fire adept!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s him...it¡¯s him.¡±


    At that moment, a mental fluctuation rippled over the mithril statues, and a low and hoarse voice spoke up.


    ¡°Just as I expected, it¡¯s you, Greem. Very well, you cane in now. I will be waiting for you in Hall Nine!¡±


    Judging from the voice, it was Fifth Grade Adept Sainz, whom Greem had met once before.


    As an adept, they could remember anything they had set eyes upon and recall anything they had heard. If it was needed, some adepts could even etch certain especially important scenes deep in their consciousness so that they could repeatedly recall them for appreciation and examination.


    It was one of the many benefits of adepts having powerful Spirits!


    The mithril statue stepped aside, and the barrier in front of the tower opened.


    Greem looked at the crowd around him and walked in calmly.


    A group of adepts hastily ran over the moment he entered the tower.


    The leader of the group was a familiar acquaintance of Greem¡¯s as well. It was Fourth Grade Adept Martin.


    A group of high-grade adepts wearing executor robes followed behind him.


    ¡°Greem...Lord Greem, very d to see you. I¡¯m here to show you the way on orders of Lord Sainz!¡± Two hundred years had passed, but Martin was still as tall and handsome as ever. However, Martin appeared a little awkward and at a loss, having so abruptly run into an ¡®old friend¡¯ who he now had to refer to as ¡®Lord.¡¯


    ¡°I appreciate Sainz¡¯s consideration!¡± Greem smiled and said. ¡°Since that¡¯s the case, let us talk while we walk!¡±


    ¡°Yes!¡±


    Greem ignored the Second and Third Grade executors of the tower and walked into the building under Martin¡¯s lead.


    ¡°Have you been staying in the tower all these years? Why not go back to the Central Lands for a look?¡± Greem asked curiously.


    ¡°I can¡¯t go back, nor would I want to!¡± Martin sighed. ¡°People like me are not good at managing affairs and can¡¯t be bothered to deal with those Zhentarim bastards. So, I might as well hide in this camp in space where no one can tell me what to do. It¡¯s a pretty unrestrained life I have here.¡±


    ¡°Then your family and friends...?¡±


    ¡°I might look young, but I am already over seven hundred years old. The only direct descendants I left behind in Zhentarim died out three hundred years ago. The other branch descendants use my name as a banner, but if you were to really go into it, they aren¡¯t all that rted to me anymore.¡± Having said that, Martin couldn¡¯t help but let out a resentful sigh. ¡°I can¡¯t be bothered to deal with them either. Just let them be!¡±


    ¡°And the others in this tower?¡±


    ¡°Their situations are simr to mine. Some have lost their bloodline, others have conflicts with those in Zhentarim, and some others prefer the quiet here. The situations differ slightly, but after all this time out here, no one exactly has a mind to return to that small and narrow world.¡±


    Greem nodded when he heard this. He could somewhat understand their plight.


    ¡°However, we know perfectly well of your exploits in Zhentarim, my lord. We are genuinely in awe that you were able to shatter the istionist shackles of Zhentarim in just a hundred years and pull the region back on the proper path!¡± Martin couldn¡¯t help but talk on for a few more sentences. ¡°You are truly the great bringer of change that the Central Lands has been waiting for! The Central Lands will rise in power as well from now on!¡±


    Greem responded to the praise with a few neutralments and continued speaking normally to Martin.


    After passing through countless corridors and passages and riding on several floating discs, they finally arrived at Hall Nine.


    Sainz was already waiting here.


    The same dirty robe, the same scruffy short hair, and the same scrawny figure with a red nose. Sainz stood silently there, evaluating Greem with calm eyes.


    As a Great Adept, he had thousands of ways and means by which to make himself look more handsome and young. However, these methods would hardly deceive an adept of the same power. Moreover, as a Great Adept, their value had never been dependent on their appearance.


    That was why many Great Adepts didn¡¯t care much for their appearances and looked very entric indeed.


    Today, upon setting eyes on Greem, Sainz felt envy and jealousy for the first time.


    It was good to be young!


    Compared to how old Sainz looked, Greem was indeed enviably young.


    At first nce, Greem was simply a good-looking young man, with eyes that glowed like stars and shapely facial features. He wasn¡¯t exactly outstandingly handsome. However, his figure was unexpectedly muscr with well-defined lines of the perfect ratio.


    When he simply stood there, he gave off the impression of being an ordinary person. He did not have the same suffocating presence of other adept powerhouses.


    However, horror and shock shed across Sainz¡¯s eyes when he looked upon Greem.


    As a Fourth Grade adept, Martin might not be able to sense the principle aura that Greem radiated. However, a veteran Great Adept like Sainz had advanced 1,900 years ago and could see it very clearly. Four principle auras. This newly advanced Greem was shrouded in four principle auras.


    Two of the red fire halos had a mystical principle resonance with Greem¡¯s soul. These were probably the fire principle powers he had mastered. Meanwhile, the other two¨Cone dark red and the other bright yellow¨Cappeared to be provided by some powerful treasures.


    The four unique principle auras mingled together and protected Greem firmly. The asional principle fluctuation that rippled out made Sainz¡¯s expression change.


    Being able to grasp two principle powers just shortly after advancement was enough to demonstrate Greem¡¯s unbelievable talent with fire. Moreover, apart from his outstanding ability, this young Great Adept also possessed valuable artifacts. That was what Sainz couldn¡¯t understand at all.


    Where did he find so many Fifth Grade artifacts?


    Was he the bastard child of some high-ranking individual within the adept faction?


    For a moment, even Sainz was renderedpletely speechless!

 Chapter 1449 - Recruitment Orders

    <h4>Chapter 1449 Recruitment Orders</h4>


    Sainz couldn¡¯t help but ask when they were both seated properly in the hall.


    ¡°Tell me, why have youe looking for me?¡±


    ¡°I wish to request an audience with Great Adept Sarubo!¡± Since Sainz already asked, Greem naturally went with the most direct answer.


    The scrawny little old man couldn¡¯t help but startughing sinisterly, as if he already foresaw the answer.


    ¡°Lord Sarubo is not like us. He has long since left the camp and established a mystic realm of his own. Contacting him is not going to be that easy!¡±


    ¡°But you definitely have a way to contact him, don¡¯t you? ¡°Greem chuckled.


    Sainz took a good look at Greem, sizing him up and down. Finally, he couldn¡¯t help but sigh once more as he said, ¡°Who would¡¯ve known that even Lord Sarubo would have made a misjudgment. Otherwise, he never would have let an individual as excellent as you slip through his fingers!¡±


    ¡°He didn¡¯t exactly misjudge me. I just want to take this opportunity to resolve certain misunderstandings and conflicts we had in my earlier years.¡±


    ¡°Kehkehkehe...those trivial affairs that happened within the nar world are somehow still worth your effort. You have only just advanced to Great Adept. You don¡¯t understand how the major yers like us think. For people like us, power is a power that you can truly control. As for the World of Adepts? Heh, given the damned rejection of the nar consciousness, there¡¯s not much we can intervene in.¡±


    ¡°But the World of Adepts is still our homeworld, isn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°True, true, true. What you say is very true indeed! However, you aren¡¯t innocent enough to believe that the entire Adept Faction is sustaining their losses in the nar wars with the Great Adepts that rise from the World of Adepts, are you? Once every few hundred years?¡±


    ¡°You should know that our adept faction is constantly at war with the gods, dragons, demons, and the gazers. There is no way we would have been able to sustain our efforts by relying on new blood from the homeworld alone.


    ¡°The higher-grade adepts possess major neworlds in their hands,parable to the World of Adepts. The production of fighting force from these major neworlds ensures the adept faction retains the tremendous power required to intimidate all our enemies.¡±


    Greem listened silently.


    Since advancing past Fourth Grade, the difference in the dimension of his existence had qualified him to learn of the true secrets of the universe. Greem could sense the curtain obscuring the true face of the world slowly pull open before his eyes as he listened to Sainz speak.


    A new world,pletely different from his previous understanding, was starting toe into view.


    ¡°Why is it that every Fifth Grade Great Adept that steps out of the homeworld will stop at a camp in space for a long time? On the one hand, it¡¯s because they have nowhere to go, while they themselvesck the ability to establish a mystic realm of their own. On the other hand, it¡¯s to adapt. To adapt to their new bodies, their new soul, and to all this new knowledge.


    ¡°I know that for a person as young as you to advance to Fifth Grade, you must have experienced terrible bloodshed and cruel conquests. Upon turning into a Great Adept, the way you see the universe, the neworlds, and resources will have to be different from before.


    ¡°The nes you have visited and conquered in the past were mostly small and medium-sized nes. The native creatures there are either foolish and slow or possess power yetck the ability to properly wield it.


    ¡°Fighting against such enemies was no different than wrestling with sheep, even if they had hundreds or thousands of times your number. With enough time and space, you could easily drag them to their death, even when faced with absolute danger and disadvantage.


    ¡°Why? Tell me, what is it that gave you such power and confidence?¡±


    Greem listened to Sainz¡¯s question and pondered. ¡°nar advantage...grade advantage...knowledge advantage......¡±


    ¡°Indeed. These were the things that gave you confidence. Thus, the enemies are no more than sheep in your eyes. They might grow horns, even ws and fangs, but it will never change their essence as sheep. And we...we are wolves! They are prey, and we are predators. It isn¡¯t our decision, but something that was decided by the difference in our neworlds.


    ¡°You can imagine the converse. If their worlds were stronger than ours, they would never let go of this opportunity to raid resources and the poption. The World of Adepts is only arge neworld. The resources it needs to grow and be a mega-sized neworld like the Abyssal World and the World of Disasters is simply far, far too much.


    ¡°Throughout this process of gathering the required resources, the enemies we will be facing will no longer be those lesser nes weaker than ourselves. The enemies that Great Adepts face are oftenrge neworlds,parable to the World of Adepts. And the wars betweenrge neworlds are beyond what you have experienced in those tiny worlds.


    ¡°That is why these camps in the realms beyond are like rookie camps for newly advanced Fifth Grade to gather resources and familiarize themselves with the conditions of war. Hehehe. People like us are little more than rookies who have yet to sharpen our fangs in the eyes of the adepts of higher-grades.¡±


    Greem¡¯s body trembled as aplex expression shed across his face.


    Meanwhile, Adept Sainz continued cackling oddly as he further revealed more harsh truths of the world to Greem.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be discouraged. Almost every newly advanced Fifth Grade adept will have to experience this adaptation of the mind and body. You were once an uncontested, omnipotent individual within a neworld. Here, you are little more than a rookie who possesses some power.


    ¡°Still, don¡¯t get dejected. At the very least,pared to those low-grade adepts, we make up the backbone of the adept faction. The higher-ups won¡¯t just let us die so easily!¡±


    Upon hearing all these shocking truths, Greem took a deep breath of air. He couldn¡¯t help but ask out of curiosity, ¡°Sir Sainz, why is it that you revealed so much valuable information to me?¡±


    ¡°Kehkehkehe, I just want to tell you that all those conflicts in the World of Adepts that you care so much about hardly matter in the eyes of a Sixth Grade Great Adept. He is constantly busy waging war against those major neworlds. Where would he have the time or effort to care about all those messy affairs in the World of Adepts?¡±


    Greem thought for a moment and asked, ¡°If nar conquests are so dangerous, are there Great Adepts that dislike them and choose not to participate?¡±


    ¡°Kehkehkehe, of course there are! Do you not see the one dozen Fifth Grades lingering inside the camp? They shut themselves in their rooms, never emerging and only collecting resources for their research and experiments.¡±


    ¡°Then...do the superior adepts not forcefully make them participate in nar wars?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe, no, that doesn¡¯t happen! After all, the direction and preferences of every adept differs. There¡¯s no way to bind someone and force them to do anything. However, for adepts who excel at killing and fighting, actively participating in the nar wars organized by superior adepts is perhaps the quickest way to strengthen oneself.


    ¡°Take our Camp Exodar, for example! The true owner of the camp is Seventh Grade Great Adept Lord Erlendwald. He chose to join Lady Barbara¡¯s forces and they are currently waging war against the Beast God. I heard it¡¯s quite an intense battle indeed.¡±


    ¡°You mean...only Eighth Grade Great Adepts have the right to dere war against a major neworld. They will then gather some Great Adepts to strengthen their forces and serve as the main army,¡± Greem asked.


    ¡°Indeed!¡± Sainz nodded and said, ¡°The so-called wars between major neworlds are not limited to just one or two neworlds. These are often horrifying wars that span dozens if not hundreds of neworlds. For the sake of hurting the enemy to the best of their abilities, these wars always begin on the peripheral neworlds. The invader will crush their enemy¡¯s resource worlds, fortress worlds, and faith worlds in an overwhelming blitz.


    ¡°In those cases, the weaklings out there are the cannon fodder of this war, while we are the backbone of the fighting. We are either deployed to take down stubborn fortresses or to deal with opponents of the same grade as us.


    ¡°I¡¯m sure you can imagine how crowded it is in those worlds, with millions upon millions of ants fighting in them. Meanwhile, outside the neworlds, dozens of Fifth Grade Great Adepts, vassal gods, and clones wage battle. I¡¯m sure you will never be able to forget such an experience once you¡¯ve experienced it for yourself!¡±


    Greem fell silent for a moment. Finally, he shook his head and smiled bitterly, ¡°It seems like you have a purpose in mind, with all that you¡¯ve told me today.¡±


    ¡°Kehkehkehe, as long as you understand!¡± Sainz broke into a sinister smile. ¡°The situation over on Lady Barbara¡¯s side is apparently quite tense; they stillck manpower. As such, recruitment orders have been sent to all the camps. You can choose to join, or not to. You enjoy absolute freedom.


    ¡°However, before you reject the offer, I hope you will take a look at the terms of recruitment first.¡±


    Having said that, Sainz took out amunication crystal and tossed it at Greem.


    Greem caught it and slowly extended his Spirit into the crystal.


    The next second, he extracted a tremendous amount of data with the help of the Chip.


    [The Beast War: Adept Recruitment Order


    [Individuals Recruited: Fifth, Sixth Grade Great Adepts


    [Mission Content: Ensure the sessful advance along the West Line!


    [Mission Sponsor: Great Adept Erlenwald


    [Mission Rewards: Two small neworlds, 1,000 siths of origin substance, a Fifth Grade material of your choosing, and 30,000 otherworldly ves. All spoils obtained during the war belong to the individual.]


    Apart from the simple terms described in the crystal, the rest of the information contained descriptions of the Beast War¡¯s current state. The recruitment this time waspletely voluntary. The recruited Great Adepts were to follow Great Adept Erlenwald and wage war along the West Line, destroying all neworlds that worshipped the Beast God along the way.


    Of course, these invasions¡¯ main forces were the Third and Fourth Grades, along with endless hordes of adept forces and voodoo beasts. The purpose of the Great Adepts¡¯ presence was to protect the invading forces from being assaulted by ultra-grade opponents.

 Chapter 1450 - Responding to the Summons

    <h4>Chapter 1450 Responding to the Summons</h4>


    A strange expression appeared on Greem¡¯s face when he read the strangely familiar contents of this recruitment order.


    After a long pause, he looked at Sainz with a false smile and said, ¡°I believe you were the one who issued thepulsory conscription orderst time as well. I still remember that mission clearly, even now! And now you¡¯re rmending simr missions to me again? Seems like we really do have an affinity for each other.¡±


    Sainz alsoughed and said, ¡°That does seem to be the case. However, Freed was the one I handed the mission tost time. Who would¡¯ve known he would push you forward to fill the ranks. Without the ¡®opportunity¡¯ from that time, you probably wouldn¡¯t have be a Great Adept so easily. If you think about it like that, it really is quite a coincidence.¡±


    ¡°So you and Freed...?¡±


    ¡°Aren¡¯t rted in any fashion. He had been providing me with offerings regrly because he hoped to obtain a share of the camp market! That is all.¡±


    ¡°Haven¡¯t I gotten in your way then?¡±


    ¡°It was just some low-grade resources anyway! Do you think those people that hide inside the neworld, fearful ofrge-scale ne wars, would have anything good to offer?¡± Sainz smiled as he exined. ¡°He did indeed ask me for help, but I rejected him!¡±


    ¡°Why?¡±


    ¡°Because Great Adepts that have left the World of Adepts almost never want to intervene in battles inside the nar world. We will trigger a bacsh from the nar consciousness if we get involved. If things turn sour with the nar consciousness, it could lower mypatibility with my principles. That would be a terrible loss for me! In particr, no one would ever dare touch someone who¡¯s blessed by the nar consciousness, like you.¡±


    ¡°Not necessarily, is it?¡± Greem seemed to remember something. He chuckled and said, ¡°I was attacked by the clone of a Great Adept in the World of Adepts. I believe he was called...Dous!¡±


    ¡°Dous!¡± Sainz appeared surprised. He followed up with a question. ¡°Dous of the Silver Union?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know what faction he¡¯s aligned with, but the signs do point toward him being close with the Silver Union,¡± Greem hesitated for a moment.


    ¡°Then it must be him!¡± Sainz sighed and said, ¡°Dous is a Great Adept that advanced 1,200 years ago. He¡¯s Sixth Grade now and has long since left Camp Exodar. It¡¯s said......¡±


    At this, Sainz lifted his head and stole a nce at Greem before he continued in a soft voice, ¡°It¡¯s said he¡¯s now in leagues with a certain witch and has been showing hints of leaving the Silver Union. That was why he had no choice but to leave the camp to avoid trouble. Of course, these are all just rumors!¡±


    Witch...avoiding trouble......


    Greem frowned slightly. He had a vague feeling that these two things were all somehow rted to him. However, he had never researched divination. He couldn¡¯t figure out the secrets lying behind all of this with only these tiny clues.


    Sainz did not urge Greem further when he saw him brood in silence. Instead, he simply picked up a book and started reading.


    After a long pause, Greem finally lifted his head and asked, ¡°If I said I was interested in this mission, who should I contact?¡±


    ¡°Kehkehkehe. Just give me the word, and I will help you contact who you need to.¡±


    ¡°And with Lord Sarubo...?¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to worry about that. I can promise you that Lord Sarubo won¡¯t hold anything against you over something as trivial as that. Moreover, if you do participate in that mission, you just might run into Lord Sarubo over there!¡±


    Having obtained the information he wanted, Greem didn¡¯t dally any longer. He bid farewell to Sainz and immediately returned to the Capital of Steel.


    Of course, Greem couldn¡¯t take everything that Sainz said at face value. That was why he assigned Gazlowe to inquire about and obtain more information on this recruitment order.


    Gazlowe had been stationed at Camp Exodar for over two hundred years now. He had his own means of gathering information. He didn¡¯t return with news on just one recruitment order, but five of them.


    The entire adept faction was currently waging war with five separate forces. Moreover, they had all scattered recruitment orders to the camps. Any adept interested in these missions or wanting to train their will in trials of life and death could voluntarily sign up for these missions.


    The rewards for these missions were bountiful as well!


    At the very least, they were much more bountiful than staying in camp without doing anything.


    In that regard, Sainz hadn¡¯t been nning anything malicious when rmending the mission to Greem.


    The descriptions of all the missions were simr. Some of them were about attacking the Gazing Empire, some about a war against the Abyssal World, and some were about invading the draconic nes. The point being that manpower was needed everywhere. Everybody was preparing for war. It was entirely different from the casual andid back adept lifestyle that Greem had expected.


    After a long pause, Greem couldn¡¯t suppress his curiosity about therge-scale nar wars in the end. He contacted Sainz.


    Sainz was overjoyed to hear an affirmative response from Greem. It made Greem suspicious that Sainz would be able to obtain some benefits as an intermediary.


    However, Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered with these insignificant details. Instead, he put all his attention into arranging matters within the camp.


    Greem left the issue of constructing an adept tower in the Fire Elementium ne to Split-Brain Sock. Greem had left nar coordinates there. With the aid of Fourth Grade Emberweb Spider Lasbes, the construction of the tower should be safe from disruption by other fire creatures.


    The only difficulty now was building construction machines that could endure the harsh environment of the Fire Elementium ne and purchasing materials in bulk.


    There was no hurrying these affairs. One had to take their time with it.


    ording to the Chip¡¯s calctions, the tower would not bepleted for another five or six years.


    Greem had nothing to do in the camp during this time anyway. He might as well take a look at therge-scale nar wars that Sainz had spoken of. That might be a good thing after all.


    At any rate, these recruitment orders weren¡¯tpulsory. Greem could cast his duty aside and walk away if he wasn¡¯t doing well. He didn¡¯t need to worry about being assigned to the most dangerous areas of fighting likest time.


    It was the fundamental reason why Greem had been willing to ept the mission!


    Of course, the tremendous mission rewards were a factor as well, albeit a secondary factor.


    Resource nes, origin substances, ves- these things were valuable, but you would always be able to find them if you were willing to collect them patiently. However, Fifth Grade materials were very hard to find in these camps.


    Greem had been incredibly fortunate to have obtained Fifth Grade materials in the war before this. He had not found them all that valuable, but upon taking a look at the market of Camp Exodar, he was surprised to find that there was an absoluteck of Fifth Grade materials. No one was willing to put them up for sale.


    Even when Fifth Grade materials were traded, it was in the form of private transactions.


    The Fifth Grade materials that Greem had obtained prior to this involved the body of a many-headed lizard and the corpse and soul of the many-armed giant. That said, the principle crystals were the only things from the bodies that he could really use. The rest of the stuff was valuable, but he could only leave them sealed in an alternate dimension for the moment.


    Of course, if Greem were a master-ss golem master, he might be able to turn that tattered body of the many-armed giant into a Fifth Grade voodoo beast.


    In doing so, Greem would obtain a Fifth Grade helper!


    Unfortunately, the most powerful golem master of Camp Exodar was only Fourth Grade. Someone like that didn¡¯t have the ability to process such valuable Fifth Grade materials.


    Greem would rather wait than let these materials go to waste. He had no choice but to let them gather dust in a warehouse!


    The principle crystal of the many-armed giant was of the earth elementium. It wasn¡¯t suited for Greem and couldn¡¯t be absorbed. He could only try to exchange it for a fire principle crystal.


    As for the soul and magical core that he had extracted from the giant? That could be used to create a Fifth Grade magical golem. Sessfully forging such a golem would require some fairly valuable Fifth Grade materials. Yet, these things were exactly the ones that were hardest to find on the market.


    Greem could only put his hopes in the mission¡¯s Fifth Grade material reward!


    One had to admit that adepts were very efficient when they mobilized.


    Sainz informed Greem that he would need to depart on the sixth day after agreeing to take on the mission.


    ............


    This ce was a giant stone fortress drifting in the depths of space.


    Its size wasparable to the main continents of many small nar worlds. The only ones that could set foot in this fortress were powerful adepts and elite adept armies from the various camps.


    Right now, the light of teleportation was fading away from a balcony on the seventy-third floor of the stone castle. A tall and muscr young was revealed.


    ¡°You must be Great Adept Greem of Camp Exodar! Please report to Lord Erlenwald in War Room 7,¡± It was a strange adept with a bird¡¯s head who was stationed outside the array. He was only Third Grade, but the energy in his body was unlike any other adept that Greem had ever seen before.


    Greem stood silently for a moment. After enduring the mild difort of the ultra-long-range teleportation, he finally had a chance to take a good look at his surroundings.


    Above him was a dark curtain speckled with stars. A giant energy barrier enveloped the stone fortress, protecting it from the magic tides outside and making the environment within much more tolerable.


    Though the magic winds that blew within the barrier were not as savage as those outside, their energy radiation was still beyond what ordinary creatures could hope to survive. The Chip estimated that any being that wished to move freely in this environment would have to be advanced Second Grade at least.


    While Greem looked around, a white light shed across several balconies nearby. Loud rumblings sounds could be heard as numerous adept powerhouses appeared in this stone fortress that represented one of the nexuses of the adept wars.

 Chapter 1451 - An Old Acquaintance

    <h4>Chapter 1451 An Old Acquaintance</h4>


    Greem left the tform and passed through a stone corridor suspended in midair. He arrived at a wooden door that led into the stone fortress.


    Two magical statues equipped with a sword and shield stood shoulder to shoulder in front of the wooden door.


    Upon sensing Greem¡¯s approach, a thin red beam shot out from a ck hole in the center of the statues¡¯ heads toward his body.


    [Beep. Detecting appraisal-magic fluctuation. Are countermeasures required?]


    ¡°No need!¡±


    Greem stood there silently and let the red beams sweep across him.


    The magical statues then stepped aside to the left and right. A magical voice rang out from within them.


    ¡°Scanplete. Please enter!¡±


    Behind the door was a long stone corridor, three meters wide and five meters high. It extended to the left and right with many wooden doors along the way.


    Greem had just stepped through the wooden doorway when a young female adept who had been waiting here hastily bowed. She said in her sweet voice, ¡°Wee, Lord Greem!¡±


    Greem nced at the adept with his dark red eyes and instantly saw through all her statistics.


    Third Grade, elementium adept, wind affinity.


    Even though the female adept looked like a human female, her internal construction was starkly different from an ordinary human. Her appearance also showed heavy signs of magical modification and reconstruction.


    A humanoid creature. Lesser ne...a foreign adept.


    A series of words shed across Greem¡¯s mind. He seemed to have understood where the female adept came from.


    The young female adept trembled beneath Greem¡¯s cold gaze. She could sense that, in one instant, all of her secrets had been exposed to this mysterious Fifth Grade Great Adept.


    The tremendous difference in their grades made her shiver like a rabbit in front of a tiger. She had no choice but to resist the instinctual fear in her soul with her resilient Spirit.


    Fortunately, Greem ended his scan with the Chip almost immediately. Otherwise, the sheer spiritual pressure and energy radiation he gave off would be enough to hurt her mentally.


    ¡°Over here, my lord! You just arrived here, so you will need to meet Adept Gerritsen first. He¡¯s in charge of recruitment matters.¡± The young adept had clearly received training. The smile on her face was just as sweet as ever, even as her body trembled in fear.


    ¡°Gerritsen?¡± Greem hesitated for a moment.


    ¡°He¡¯s a Sixth Grade Great Adept in charge of receiving adepts like you who have answered the recruitment orders. Moreover, he is also responsible for the assignment of missionster,¡± The female adept emphasized thest sentence as she spoke, as if hinting something to Greem.


    Greem nodded and said nothing more.


    The two of them quickly walked down the winding stone corridor of the fortress. They passed by numerous security points guarded by elite adepts. All these elite adepts looked toward Greem with respect and envy when they saw the young adept escorting him.


    They passed through all the corridors on the outeryer and stepped into another stone corridor suspended in midair. It was an entire kilometer long. This stone passage was the only corridor connecting the outeryer of the fortress to the inner region. As such, the amount of security and detection runes attached to it was shocking.


    Greem slowly walked down the stone corridor. He had the leisure to appreciate the magnificent sights below and around him.


    This ce was a passage suspended in midair.


    Several stone tforms hovered in the dark and boundless space around it. Each tform was several kilometers wide, packed to the brim with powerful, ferocious voodoo beasts and mighty war statues.


    These soldiers stood silently in the darkness. Even the most vicious of voodoo beasts remained absolutely silent. Only their eyes were open, glowing with a savage, bloodthirsty light.


    Looking across this vast space filled with stone tforms, it was almost as if there were only seas of red all around you.


    There were no weaklings among those present here either!


    The Chip was able to estimate the base power of the voodoo beasts and magical statues just from the energy reaction they emitted. Most of them were First or Second Grade magical creatures. Meanwhile, Third Grades made up about ten percent of their ranks.


    This number didn¡¯t sound significant. But considering the hundreds of thousands of creatures gathered there, just ten percent was already a shocking number.


    ¡°These are cannon fodder prepared for the war?¡± Greem asked curiously.


    ¡°No, this is a private army directly subordinate to Lord Erlenwald. The actual cannon fodder are stationed in other fortresses. Most of them are foreign armies and subordinate forces conscripted from the lesser nes. Their numbers are a hundred times this army¡¯s!¡± The young female adept replied.


    She didn¡¯t go into detail, but what information she revealed was already enough to shake Greem to his core.


    In Greem¡¯s previous experiences, the so-called nar invasions of the past had always started with the infiltration of an elite vanguard. A small forward base would then be constructed for the sake of pulling in more reinforcements. This strategy focused primarily on cooperation and infiltration. The priority was gaining control over the original rulers of the ne. The adepts could then take on the existing ruling structures to gain control over the whole nar world.


    Provided the adepts had sufficient forces to burn, they couldunch arge-scale invasion and wage war against the natives. If they won, they would obtain the resources and poption of an entire world. If they lost, they would have to return home and lick their wounds as they prepared for the next invasion.


    However, all of Greem¡¯s past experiences were in regards to lesser nes weaker than the World of Adepts. If the opponent was a nar world equal in might to the World of Adepts, it was apletely different matter. Even Greem had no idea how a war would be waged in these circumstances.


    However, this tiny corner that he just saw was enough to give Greem a vague impression. The true scale, depth, and intensity of arge-scale nar war were far beyond his expectations.


    He couldn¡¯t help but be a little anxious at what was toe!


    In a small or medium-scale nar war, a Fifth Grade existence like himself would already be a terrifying deciding force. In arge-scale nar war, a Fifth Grade Great Adept like himself was no more than a tinyponent in a greater machine.


    It seemed like their status was noble, but they didn¡¯t actually have that much of an impact. At the very least, their aplishments were hardly decisive!


    Greem and the young adept passed through the corridor and made it past several tightly-guarded points before arriving in the inner region.


    The traffic here was clearly much heavier than the outeryer.


    The bright, broad halls were filled with people walking in every direction. Some of them were elementium spellcasters dressed in robes and holding staves. Others were body-refining adepts wearing armor with swords sheathed at their waists. There were also summoners with contracted creatures curled-up on their shoulders. Of course, there were the bloodline adepts as well, their bodies radiating the thick scent of bloodline power.


    Human heads bobbed and shoulders rubbed against each other in this giant hall packed to the brim. It was oddly lively and filled with activity. However, Greem took a look and noticed that not even half of the adepts here were humans. The majority of them were foreign adepts of other species with strange appearances or marked differences in physiology.


    Some even obscured their bodies and made it difficult to identify their gender or species.


    Even the weakest individual here was a Third Grade adept. Moreover, the percentage of Fourth Grade adepts was quite high indeed.


    As Greem appeared, the crowd bustling in the hall suddenly went quiet. Everyone who saw the young female adept and Greem couldn¡¯t help but betray an expression of shock. They hastily stepped aside and created a path for the two of them.


    ¡°It¡¯s a Great Adept.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s a Great Adept. Be careful not to bump into his lordship.¡±


    People started whispering and muttering between themselves.


    ¡°This way, my lord!¡± The female adept serving as Greem¡¯s guide lifted her head proudly and led Greem through the crowd and out of the hall. They turned and walked up a spiral stone staircase.


    It wasn¡¯t until Greem had vanished from view that the hall resumed its activities, as if someone had pushed a y button. However, all the Third and Fourth Grades that had witnessed Greem personally couldn¡¯t help but gather together and chatter.


    ¡°Is it a new Fifth Grade adept? I¡¯ve never seen him before. He¡¯s quite an unfamiliar sight.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯ve never seen him in the Crystal Hall. He must have arrived today!¡±


    ¡°Judging from his appearance, he came from the homeworld.¡±


    ¡°Right, Sanazar! Aren¡¯t you from the homeworld as well? Have...have you ever seen his lordship?¡±


    The adept that the question was directed at was a tall woman shrouded in purple mist. The purple mist was thin- it was enough to obscure her aura but not enough to hide her figure fully.


    Judging from her appearance, her silhouette, and her aura, it was the Third Grade bloodline adept Sanazar who had vanished from Zhentarim a long time ago.


    Upon hearing herpanions¡¯ questions, Sanazar¡¯s almost-Fourth Grade aura became unstable. There was awkwardness and struggle written all over her face. Sanazar gritted her teeth in the face of these questions and replied angrily, ¡°I don¡¯t know him! There are so many old Fourth Grade monsters on the continent. How many could I possibly know? Don¡¯t ask me again.¡±


    Having said that, Sanazar turned and hurried toward her room,pletely ignoring the stunned faces of herpanions.


    Her heart wavered as she ran. She seemed to be at a loss.


    At that moment, Greem¡¯s tremendous Spirit had enveloped the entire room. She might have been hiding behind herpanions, but she had no confidence that she had been able to evade his spiritual senses.


    He has already advanced to Great Adept.


    He has already advanced to Great Adept.


    He has already advanced to Great Adept.


    This explosive news echoed in her mind, making her feel anxious and entirely at a loss.


    She had believed that the reckless, fearless way she had struggled between the line of life and death, the desperate way she had been training herself, would be worth it in the end. She would be equal with him once she advanced to Fourth Grade. Who would¡¯ve thought he would take that even more important step forward ahead of her, casting her even further behind?


    Sanazar felt genuine despair at the thought of this. She let out an unending howl in the depths of her mind.

 Chapter 1452 - Terrifying Numbers

    <h4>Chapter 1452 Terrifying Numbers</h4>


    To think he would meet such ¡®acquaintances¡¯ here. Greem couldn¡¯t help but marvel at the wonders of Fate.


    However, Greem was moved by the sight in front of him before he could finish marveling.


    What appeared in front of Greem was a vast crystal hall. Arge group of high-grade adepts had gathered within. When Greem stepped into the hall, everyone¡¯s gaze was drawn toward him. An overwhelming tide of spiritual pressure pressed toward him, causing the expression of his youngpanion to change.


    Greem raised an eyebrow and stepped forward in front of the young female adept. He faced the tide of spiritual pressure with absoluteposure.


    Without any hesitation, the Spirit that Greem radiated gathered into a silver shield in front of him. The four principle auras within him also manifested, turning into four strange, glowing runes as they attached themselves to the shield of light.


    Boom!


    There were no loud explosions or piercing ringing. The tremendous sh had all happened on the intangible spiritual level.


    Greem¡¯s expression turned dark, and his body trembled as his feet were driven into the crystalline floor.


    The over three dozen Great Adepts gathered within the hall broke out into broad smiles and started chuckling. The more impatient ones even started chanting out loud.


    ¡°Fall...fall...fall......¡±


    Greem felt as if he had been sted by lightning. His entire body trembled lightly, and his consciousness was a blur. He barely knew where he was. However, as the four-colored principle runes on his silver shield glowed, the waves of spiritual pressure pressing toward him were devoured, one after another. It was only due to this that Greem¡¯s spiritual defenses had not been overwhelmed.


    If Greem were only just a newly advanced Fifth Grade Great Adept, he probably would have already fallen unconscious. However, his robust principle defenses, in addition to his sturdy spiritual shield, allowed him to have as much defense on the spiritual level as veteran Great Adepts that had been active for a thousand years.


    Greem only wavered slightly and endured the spiritual attack. He remained rooted to the spot. However, the violent spiritual power with nowhere to go had been guided into the ground,pletely pulverizing the crystal floor within a dozen meters of where he stood.


    His feet were also stuck beneath the floor.


    ¡°Why didn¡¯t he fall?¡±


    ¡°Isn¡¯t he a rookie?¡±


    ¡°Zamur, your information ain¡¯t reliable.¡±


    A storm of spiritual messages erupted in the hall as everyone began talking amongst themselves. Beams of mental consciousness shot to and fro as the Great Adepts expressed their shock and pity. A tremendous disturbance could be observed in the air due to the sheer amount of power behind these individual Spirits.


    ¡°Alright, silence, all of you!¡±


    All of a sudden, a mighty mental consciousness sted into the air, instantly suppressing the mess of spiritual fluctuations in the room.


    The expressions of all the Great Adepts changed. They had no choice but to retract their Spirits dejectedly.


    ¡°Remember, from now on- no one is to y that boring game again! Hmph!¡±


    The hall instantly fell silent.


    Greem did not know what the Great Adepts were talking about between themselves. However, he was able to capture the source of that overwhelming spiritual fluctuation through his sharp senses.


    This ce was an oval-shaped hall, its structure somewhat resembling that of an opera house. The hall was high on the left and low on the right. There were over a thousand seats arranged along cascading steps that ran down the hall. However, there were only thirty-six adepts scattered here and there. All of them were Fifth Grade.


    On the rightmost end of the hall, where the heart of the area was, five crystal thrones were arranged in a row. An old man with a white beard was seated on the second throne from the left. Judging from how old he looked, no one would be surprised if he literally fell dead the very next second.


    When Greem looked at this elderly man, his eyes were filled with deep fear and respect.


    That was because of how he appeared in his sight. Everyone in the hall appeared light-red in Greem¡¯s senses, with a few specific individuals glowing a dark, nearly-ck red. However, this old man with the beard was a piercing dark purple in his eyes.


    Light-red represented a threat, deep-red represented a medium threat, while dark-red represented a tremendous threat. As for deep purple? That signaled extreme danger!


    The unseen battle between the Great Adepts earlier had clearly terrified the young female adept. She hastily bowed and paid respects to the white-bearded old man before fleeing from the hall without turning back.


    The old man was also evaluating Greem with curious eyes.


    He picked up a scroll on the table in front of him with his nails as he read softly, ¡°Greem, newly advanced adept. Born in Zhentarim of the World of Adepts, principle adept, fire specialization......¡±


    As the old man read off the document, a mysterious look appeared in the gazes directed at Greem. Some of the more dangerous individuals that the Chip had specially marked were looking him up and down, a hint of hostility gleaming from behind their eyes.


    ¡°Alright, since everyone¡¯s made it, we can do a simple assignment of the missions now!¡± The old man pped his hands as an invible aura of authority spread outward. ¡°Adept Greem, find a spot to sit in as well!¡±


    Greem acknowledged his words. He looked around him and sat down in an emptier spot in the hall.


    There were only thirty or forty people in this space meant to fit a thousand. It was only natural that the hall appeared empty and unpopted. However, everyone present was a Great Adept. Everyone had their own privacy zone that they would never let another stranger breach.


    That was why, as everyone released their Spirits and barriers, the hall didn¡¯t appear empty at all. On the contrary, they were a little tight on space.


    ¡°Some among you might already know me, but some of you don¡¯t. So, let me introduce myself,¡± The white-bearded old man chuckled and said, ¡°I am Gerritsen, the person-in-charge of this recruitment mission and your handler for these missions. So, if you¡¯re hoping to survive this war without a scratch on you and return home with loot aplenty, you all had best behave.¡±


    A nearly solid and cold gleam of light burst forth from the old man¡¯s eyes, almost hidden behind his sagging eyelids. He red coldly at all the adepts present. Every Fifth Grade adept who met his gaze felt a chill in their hearts and quickly looked away.


    ¡°This might be the first time some of you are participating in arge-scale nar war. Therefore, I will provide you with a simple exnation of the rules of war.


    ¡°Firstly, the main target of our war this time is the Eighth Grade main god Arugel of the beastmen pantheon. This fellow is also known as the One-Eyed Tyrant. He¡¯s a powerful god known for his savagery and bloodthirst. The tribes and believers he rules over are also terrifying, barbaric, and warmongering warriors.


    ¡°There are approximately twenty vassal gods of various gods that are subordinate to him. Each of them is a capable, powerful, and proficient warrior god. In addition, there are the clones of those main gods and vassal gods, as well as their consciousness projections and messengers. Our enemy is a formidable one.


    ¡°However, you don¡¯t have to be fearful either. Arugel and his vassal gods have always only thrown tantrums in their god kingdoms. They have never dared to take a single step out of their god kingdoms. As such, the only ones appearing on the battlefield will be their clones or mental projections.


    ¡°The bigwigs will be dealt with by more powerful adepts. As for you guys? You will have to work hard and ensure that our subordinate armies will be able to do what they need to do. The tough menial work of invading the nes with brute force will be left to those below us. Our job is to act as their shield and ensure ultra-grade individuals from the beastmen don¡¯t attack our forces.


    ¡°Usually, there¡¯s no need for everyone here to go to the frontlines at all. All you have to do is wait here. We will teleport you to wherever your power is needed when it is needed. If you are up for a fight, feel free to fight with the clones of those beastmen gods. If you aren¡¯t, all you have to do is intimidate the enemy and keep them at bay with a show of your force. All you need to do is make sure that the enemy can¡¯t disrupt our attacking forces.


    ¡°How is it? Does everyone understand the nature of your missions?¡±


    Greem nodded silently. As expected, the reality of the situation was simr to what he had learned through the information he had collected.


    In that case,ing out here for some contributions and reaping some mission rewards was quite an easy task. Moreover, there was one thing that Gerritsen hadn¡¯t mentioned. That was the fact that divine authority fragments could be found in the bodies of every god clone.


    Anyone who dared to take the risk and kill the clone of a beastmen god would reap tremendous rewards. Just the divine authority fragment alone would be worth more than whatever mission rewards were promised.


    However, the beastmen gods were extremely proficient at fighting. Trying to defeat and kill them was impossible for an ordinary Great Adept.


    ¡°After everything I¡¯ve said, I¡¯m sure you are very curious how the missions are usually assigned! Very well, I will show you right now!¡± The white-bearded Gerritsen chuckled coldly as he snapped his finger. The crystal wall behind him suddenly turned transparent, revealing what was behind it.


    There was another circr space behind the crystal wall. Arge cluster of crystals stood at the center of that space, so tall that it almost prated through the stone fortress.


    Groups of white-robed adepts were gathered around the crystal cluster. Most of their bodies appeared to be embedded within the crystals. Only a small part of their faces¨Calong with their mouths, noses, and ears¨Cwere exposed.


    Around this circr space were eleven other rooms simr to the crystal hall Greem was in. The crystal halls all had the sameyout. They were like petals that surrounded this giant round space.


    Greem could see through the now-transparent walls at the numerous powerful adepts meditating silently in the various crystal halls.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be shocked at this sight.


    There were twelve crystal halls in total. If the number in every hall was equal, that meant that over five hundred Great Adepts had been gathered in this stone fortress.


    That did not even include Great Adepts above Fifth Grade.


    What a terrifyingly powerful force!

 Chapter 1453 - War Potential

    Chapter 1453 War Potential


    Three monthster.


    Greem meditated silently inside a well-protected magical room.


    At his level, ordinary meditation techniques were already only a little better than nothing when it came to improving his Spirit. However, it was a habit that had been developed over the past hundreds of years. Greem was still more used to meditating over sleeping. He would only lie down and fall asleep when he was overly exhausted.


    However, he rarely ever got that exhausted, even once in a hundred years.


    Just as his soul drifted and his consciousness began melding with the principles, a sweet female voice rang out in the room.


    ¡°Lord Greem, it is your shift now!¡±


    It was a message from the spirit of the fortress.


    Greem frowned slightly and slowly opened his eyes.


    Hm? Is it time?


    Greem didn¡¯t dare dy. He stood up and opened a portal. The next second, he appeared at the entrance to Hall Cloud.


    As the centralmand center of the entire war, there were twelve crystal halls in Boulder Fortress where Great Adepts could rest while they awaited battle. The hall that Greem came to was codenamed Cloud, which was why some people also called it Hall Cloud.


    Five other adepts appeared at the same time Greem did.


    After all this time of getting to know each other, everyone had gained a certain understanding of theirpanions. They greeted each other and stepped into Hall Cloud at the same time.


    The adepts who had been on shift nodded when they saw their recements arrive. They vanished from the spot with explosions of different colors.


    The six adepts who had just arrived, including Greem, bowed and paid respects to the person seated at the front of the hall- Adept Gerritsen. They then found seats of their own and sat down. The six of them were the only ones in this crystal hall that wasrge enough to fit a thousand people. Every one of them sat far away from each other, silently doing whatever interested them.


    Some of them took out thick tomes and started reading. Others closed their eyes and began light meditation. Some others gathered mist around them and started tinkering with who-knows-what away from everyone¡¯s eyes.


    Only Greem remained seated in his crystal chair, observing the circr hall beyond the wall with great interest.


    This ce was undoubtedly the heart of the battle against the beastmen gods. The thousands of subordinate armies out there were working with elite adept forces tounch an unending assault against the beastmen worlds.


    The adepts embedded in that crystal cluster maintained close contact with the adept forces trillions of kilometers away through some peculiar method, rapidly rying information on the battles and skirmishes.


    Bloody and intense battles raged simultaneously across a dozen nar worlds.


    However, these wars were all trillions of kilometers away. The high-grade adepts present could only describe the savagery and intensity of these distant battles with crude numbers.


    ¡°Assault on ne Nike on Cloudclear Front has been obstructed. Losses of Two-Headed Dragon Army at 41%. High-grade reinforcements urgently required.¡±


    ¡°ne Behta of Skyriver Front has managed to corner the native army in their kingdom. It is said that they are currently praying for the vassal Beast God Urkan to descend. Request that headquarters send an appropriate force in response.¡±


    ¡°The situation on ne Moguta of the Bluesea Front is dire. Clone of vassal god, Eudara, has appeared on the battlefield. Target is Sixth Grade and has currently inflicted severe losses to ally forces. Ghostspirit Army has been exterminated. Commander Neemo has died in the line of duty. Wooddrake Army has suffered a 71% loss. Commander Wall is badly injured and has been sted into a nearby gxy. Reinforcements should keep an eye out and search for him.¡±


    The adepts wouldn¡¯t sit idly by now that the enemy had deployed a Sixth Grade clone onto the battlefield. The interception mission was quickly sent over to Hall Flower.


    A short momentter, the light of teleportation shed from Hall Flower as the Sixth Grade Great Adept in charge of that hall vanished to the battlefield along with two Fifth Grade adepts. At the same time, several adepts hurried to Hall Flower under instructions from the fortress spirit, recing the empty spots theirpanions had left behind.


    War was being waged in a dozen nes at once. Some armies were stuck outside the nar barrier, still working hard on breaking through. Others had already managed to infiltrate and were currently engaged in a bloody battle against the local natives around the portals and spatial rifts. There were also those that had finished their conquest and were currently cleaning up the remnant Beast God forces.


    There were wars on a dozen fronts at once. The numerous trivial and menial tasks that had to be aplished were uncountable. Every ne had to be dealt with differently. Adept forces of different levels and specialties had to be deployed based on the strength and abilities of the natives. It involved aplex chain of logistics, provisioning, transferring, recuperation, shift-changing, and rotation.


    They had to consider the dynamic changes to the battlefield and the follow-up response required whenever the situation changed. There were also unexpected factors of note. All these things added together into a steep and terrible cliff of statistics for anymand center to deal with.


    However, after tens of thousands of years of trials and tribtions, the adepts had developed their own uniquemand and order system. Every adept¨Clow, intermediate, or high-grade, adept or Great Adept¨Cwas assigned to their appropriate stations by thismand system.


    Through the constant deployment of their subordinate and vassal forces, the adepts were able to preserve their most elite individuals. These elites could then be mobilized at the most appropriate time in the most suitable location, allowing them to obtain the greatest results on the battlefield with the least effort.


    However, such wars could not persist for very long. After all, once the subordinate armies had been exhausted, suchrge-scale invasions would require the adepts to send in their own preciousbat forces.


    That was why the major civilizations participating in arge-scale nar war would have to take some time off to rest after the conclusion of each engagement. They had to wait for their subordinate forces to recover somewhat. Once a major civilization managed to refill its ranks, it would be time for the civilization to greedily search the universe for more prey.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be inspired and feel countless emotions at the sight of all this.


    That was because he remembered following the Northern Witches in an assault against a ne belonging to the Beast God once before. It was something that had happened almost three hundred years ago. Given the passage of time, that must have been the precursor to this massive invasion against the Beast God worlds.


    The Greem of that time had not understood the significance behind his actions at all. He had simply followed the Northern Witches blindly, hoping to obtain some resources in the nar war. Now he was seated in themand center of the adept faction, silently watching all this unfold from the perspective of a neutral observer.


    At this moment, there might be countless young adepts holding the same thoughts he had, bathing in blood on the frontlines of the nar war. They might be sessful and return home withrge numbers of resources, or they might fail and return to the dust in a cold, unfamiliar earth far from home.


    Whether they seeded or failed, their participation pushed the adepts¡¯ war machine forward, crushing the bodies of countless beastmen under its tracks as the adept faction slowly but surely climbed its way to the peak of the universe.


    The war against the beastmen had been raging on for over seventy years now. It had happened almost at the same time as the eruption of the magic tides.


    It was obvious that Witch Barbara, who had organized this attack, was also trying to take advantage of the magic tides to tear off a fatter, juicer piece of flesh from the beastmen pantheon. By exterminating the believers, she could weaken the strength of Beast God Arugel.


    As for when these two true bosses would sh and how they would sh? That was not information that someone of Greem¡¯s level would evere into contact with.


    Perhaps, at this moment, the true masterminds of this war were watching and assessing the actions of Greem and all their other pawns through an even loftier and higher lens!


    Greem felt an indescribable and unusual feeling in his heart at the thought of this.


    At this moment, however, the shout of an adept could be heard from the circr hall.


    ¡°An ultra-grade force has erupted in the beastmen capital of ne Behta of Skyriver Front. They summoned the clone of Kanbr through a blood sacrifice. Estimates suggest the clone to be Fifth Grade. Requesting reinforcements from headquarters!¡±


    The fortress spirit¡¯s voice rang out in Hall Cloud almost instantly.


    ¡°Adept Gerritsen of Hall Cloud, please assign reinforcements to ne Behta immediately.¡±


    The Fifth Grade clone of Vassal God Kanbr obviously didn¡¯t require Sixth Grade Gerritsen to mobilize. Thus, Gerritsen opened his eyes and nced at his six subordinates in the hall. His gaze quicklynded on a male adept known as Piotr.


    ¡°Piotr, you go! If possible, try not to fight. You just need to intimidate the enemy and make sure they don¡¯t ughter our forces,¡± Gerritsen calmly gave the order, and the Fifth Grade order stood up and bowed.


    The next second, an array lit up in a corner of Hall Cloud. Significant spatial fluctuations radiated from the array.


    It was important to note that themand center was trillions of kilometers away from the nearest battlefield. Landing there through a personal portal was impossible. Only these incredibly stable ultra-long-range portals could allow for traveling such incredible distances.


    Great Adept Piotr hastily stepped into the array. A few secondster, white-light shed as he vanished without a trace.


    A short momentter, another adept that belonged to Hall Cloud hurried over and found a seat to sit down in, recing Adept Piotr¡¯s position.


    The machine of war would not stop once it was started. It would onlye to a pause once one side had beenpletely defeated.


    For the next month of Greem¡¯s shift, numerous battles broke out on the frontlines, and more and more Great Adepts were sent out by the day. As many as four missions hadnded in Hall Cloud during this shift so far. The other Great Adepts had all been sent out, leaving only Greem and another Great Adept idle.


    Was this special care being extended toward him?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be curious, but he didn¡¯t ask.


    The one-month period quickly came to an end, and the next six people were called in. Greem and the others who had been holding the shift were then allowed to rest.


    Every shift change meant that they had five to six months of rest.


    They were allowed to move freely during three of these free months.


    They could choose to rest in Boulder Fortress during this time, or they could teleport to a warring ne on their own dime to collect the local resources and knowledge.


    However, they would have to rest and wait in Boulder Fortress for the next two months. If the fighting got too intense, they would have to rece the Great Adepts in their shift at Hall Cloud.


    The point being that Hall Cloud must always have six Fifth Grade Great Adepts at the ready at all times.


    If this was the same across all twelve crystal halls, that meant Boulder Fortress possessed the tremendous ability to deploy seventy-two Great Adepts all at once.


    Of course, if they were to disregard the consequences, they even had the potential to deploy a hundred and twenty Great Adepts simultaneously!

 Chapter 1454 - Try Not to Compare

    <h4>Chapter 1454 Try Not to Compare</h4>


    Boulder Fortress. Great Adept living area.


    This ce was an independent living areapletely separate from the other regions of the fortress. The only ones that could enter this ce were the Great Adepts.


    Greem traveled through the wide and brightly lit stone corridors alone. He took a few turns and finally arrived before a wooden door.


    Deng! Deng! Deng!


    A long time after Greem knocked on the door, a middle-aged adept opened the door. The adept¡¯s face was dark, and a mean-looking green lizardy on his shoulder.


    He red at Greem with a hostile look before coldly saying, ¡°What is it?¡±


    ¡°You are Adept Karon from Mountainshade ne, aren¡¯t you?¡±


    ¡°Indeed, that is me! You are...?¡±


    ¡°I am Greem from the World of Adepts. I came here today because I have a favor to ask of you,¡± Greem¡¯s face was full of smiles.


    ¡°Greem...World of Adepts......never heard of you,¡± Karon mumbled to himself. It was obvious he didn¡¯t like being disturbed during his leisure time. However, seeing as Greem was an adept from the homeworld, he suppressed his anger and let him in.


    As the adept faction¡¯s top-ss fighting force, a Great Adept¡¯s rooms were naturally quite well-furnished.


    With spatial expansion magic, the rooms that were only one or two hundred square feet in size were easily expanded to over ten thousand square feet. The interiors were then arranged into different areas and furnished ording to the preferences of the Great Adepts.


    Apart from therge living room, study room, bedroom, and bathroom, there was also the meditation room, sealing room, elementium altar, alchemyb, and other magical facilities.


    The Great Adepts could basicallyplete any experiments they wanted here in their room without setting foot outside.


    This Adept Karon was an earth-principle adept with a natural affinity for earth elementium. That was why stepping into his room was like instantly showing up in the depths of a dry and harsh desert. Drifting sand particles filled the entire room except for a folding chair and a parasol ced underneath a palm tree in the middle of the desert.


    Apart from these, not a single thing could be seen in the entire desert.


    Adept Karon led Greem along, and the two of them instantly came to the palm tree after two or three steps.


    ¡°Since you¡¯re already here, why don¡¯t we sit down and talk!¡±


    Karon leisurelyy on his chair and waved his hand. The sand under Greem¡¯s feet quickly formed into the shape of another folding chair. The next second, the yellow sand peeled off as a soft, brand-new rattan folding chair appeared.


    Elementium simtion was possible even for Fourth Grade adepts.


    However, Fourth Grade adepts could only simte the most basic of substances. They couldn¡¯t simte materials with moreplicated structures. A simted rattan chair was clearly moreplex than a wooden chair.


    Greem smiled and sat down.


    As Greem sat, a surge of fire burst forth from deep underground, instantly reforging the rattan chair into a ck-and-red magma chair.


    ¡°I feel morefortable sitting in this chair,¡± Greem smiled as he said.


    ¡°Feel free to sit on whatever you like, as long as you¡¯refortable,¡± Adept Karon replied with a smile, as if indifferent to Greem¡¯s actions. However, the yellow storm spinning deep in his eyes was not as calm as before.


    This was his room. The arrays, runes, energy, and wandering elementium in this room were all under the direct control of his mental consciousness. Greem was actually able to use his own elementium principles to forcibly change the room¡¯s environment and ¡®steal¡¯ a bit of elementium control from out of Karon¡¯s hands.


    That...already indirectly demonstrated Greem¡¯s masterful principle-maniption ability and power!


    Adept Karon was somewhat upset still, but he treated Greem more seriously upon seeing that.


    ¡°What is it that made youe find me, Sir Greem? Something special?¡±


    ¡°Not really. I only heard that Adept Karon was exceptionally skilled at the modification of living creatures, which was why I paid you a visit.¡±


    ¡°You want me to create a voodoo beast for you?¡± Adept Karon appeared to be extremely proud of his craft. His face was filled with pride when he heard Greem¡¯s request. ¡°I¡¯m afraid that¡¯s not possible. I¡¯ve been working on the creation of a peak Fourth Grade voodoo beast, so I¡¯m afraid¡ª¡±


    Adept Karon suddenly fell silent before he could finish. He looked at the seven-meter-tall corpse that had appeared before his eyes with horror and shock.


    ¡°...a many-armed giant, and a Fifth Grade one and that. The body is so well-preserved too......¡±


    Adept Karon leaped up from his chair and lunged at the corpse of the giant. He ignored the grime and burn marks on the body and softly caressed the thick hairs of the giant as he carefully examined it.


    ¡°Fifth Grade...it¡¯s actually a Fifth Grade. If I¡¯m not wrong, this many-armed giant used to be advanced Fifth Grade in life, with an earth affinity. What a shame...you didn¡¯t know how to preserve the body in battle properly. Over 35% of its body is damaged...fortunately, the magical organs in its body are still there.


    ¡°Wait, where is its heart? That¡¯s the most important organ in its body! Wait, and its head? If it¡¯s advanced Fifth Grade, it must have managed to crystallize a Crystal of Petrification. Where is it? The Crystal of Petrification? You didn¡¯t lose it, did you?¡±


    The Crystal of Petrification?


    Greem frowned as he casually took out the many-armed giant¡¯s eye from an alternate dimension. He tossed it in his hand as he asked, ¡°You talking about this?¡±


    Adept Karon turned his head and looked at the yellow crystal. He immediately ran over, grabbing it with his hands as he looked it over and over. It seemed like he didn¡¯t trust his eyes, so he grabbed the Crystal of Petrification with both hands and activated a trace of the petrification powers within.


    A thread-like beam shot onto the hand rest of the rattan chair. The next second, unusual petrification power spread within the folding chair, even transmitting to the sand beneath it. The chair, tree, parasol, and all the sand within a dozen meters turned into gray rock.


    ¡°What pure petrification power! Adept Karon couldn¡¯t help but admire. It was apparent that he loved this Crystal of Petrification immensely. If Greem weren¡¯t of the same grade as him, Adept Karon would probably rob him already.


    ¡°Adept Karon, you haven¡¯t given me a reply! Can you help me turn this into a Fifth Grade voodoo beast with these materials?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but speak up and interrupt Karon¡¯s frenzy.


    ¡°Difficult...very difficult...almost impossible,¡± Karon couldn¡¯t help but mumble.


    ¡°You can¡¯t do it?¡± Greem¡¯s face turned dark. It was somewhat beyond his expectations.


    ¡°Not that I can¡¯t do it. Rather, the damage to the body is quite severe, so the body¡¯s power will regress to some extent after it has been turned into a voodoo beast. Without the Crystal of Petrification, I¡¯m only confident in turning it into a beginner Fifth Grade. With the crystal, the odds of making it intermediate Fifth Grade are quite high!¡± Karon was still mumbling. His eyes were filled with deep pity.


    He might be a Fifth Grade Great Adept now with excellent biological modification abilities, but he was having a hard time finding Fifth Grade living materials. As such, he could only piece together Fourth Grade parts for his projects.


    The fact that he could still create peak Fourth Grade voodoo beasts despite being limited by his materials was already a testament to his exceptional ability!


    ¡°Intermediate Fifth Grade,¡± Greem brooded in silence.


    He had just advanced to beginner Fifth Grade. Being able to obtain an intermediate Fifth Grade voodoo beast was excellent. Moreover, it would be an earth voodoo beast that excelled at defense.


    However, Greem wasn¡¯t satisfied yet. He thought for a moment and took out a soul crystal from an alternate dimension, then asked, ¡°What if you had the soul of the many-armed giant as well?¡±


    ¡°The soul? You have the soul of the many-armed giant?¡± Karon was surprised. He then realized something. ¡°The body, the Crystal of Petrification, and the soul are all in your hands. Could it be that you killed this many-armed giant alone?¡±


    It was no wonder Karon asked.


    For Fifth Grade Great Adepts like themselves, it was impossible to kill an advanced Fifth Grade magical creature solo. It typically required the work of an entire team and, even then, it would be a trial of life and death.


    If they were fortunate enough to seed, the spoils still had to be shared between the entire party. Under such circumstances, being able to obtain one-fifth or even one-sixth of the spoils was already impressive.


    Yet now, Greem had obtained almost all the spoils for himself!


    That seemed like it was only possible if he killed the many-armed giant through his power alone.


    Greem only gave a few nondescript exnations in response to Karon¡¯s question.


    ¡°It isn¡¯t all that surprising. There was a surge in the magic tide a while ago, wasn¡¯t there? This many-armed giant was a minor Scourge Lord who was dumb enough toe into the World of Adepts to make trouble. Hehehe, taking advantage of the fact that he was greatly weakened within the nar world, I went to great lengths to finally kill it!¡±


    ¡°Hss,¡± Karon couldn¡¯t help but inhale as if he had an aching tooth.


    This Adept Greem was a little too lucky! To think he was able to run into such a fortunate asion.


    Karon¡¯s face filled with envy.


    However, he had no idea that Greem had only been peak Fourth Grade when he killed this many-armed giant. If he knew that, he would probably be ten times as shocked!


    ¡°Alright, Adept Karon, you still haven¡¯t told me. Can you create an advanced Fifth Grade voodoo beast with the many-armed giant¡¯s soul?¡± Finally, Greem couldn¡¯t help but ask this question he was most concerned about.


    ¡°It is very likely!¡± Karon lowered his head and thought for a moment before saying, ¡°With the Crystal of Petrification, and a few more resources, the damaged portions of the giant¡¯s body can be regenerated. However, you must be prepared. Without the most important head and heart, the product¡¯s final quality will be inferior to the original thing.


    ¡°Moreover, with the soul of the giant, the voodoo beast will be able to gain some unusual abilities. It might even have a chance of bing your contracted soul partner.¡±


    ¡°I already have a soul partner!¡±


    ¡°Give it up! You must know that this could be an advanced Fifth Grade soul partner. It has got to be¡ª¡± Before Karon could finish speaking, Greem released the Fifth Grade Spirit of Pestilence from a tome-shaped divine artifact. The Great Adept¡¯s face twisted up.


    ¡°Goddamn! Bloody hell! what in the...you...you aren¡¯t the bastard of some super high-grade Great Adept, are you!?¡±

 Chapter 1455 - Strange Seed

    <h4>Chapter 1455 Strange Seed</h4>


    An advanced Fifth Grade soul partner, or a piece of beginner Fifth Grade Soul Equipment with the potential for evolution? Even Karon knew which was more important between the two.


    Karon felt his heart bleed profusely when he saw Greem sh so many high-grade materials and equipment.


    Were Fifth Grade resources so easily obtained?


    Even a Fifth Grade adept would have to risk their lives to obtain such excellent resources. Otherwise, all they could get their hands on would be irrelevant leftover pieces from the dead bodies of Fifth Grade creatures. If you had to piece all your materials together in such a fashion, how were you ever supposed to create something of genuine quality?


    ¡°Alright, alright! With this soul crystal that belongs to the body itself, the chances of creating an advanced Fifth Grade voodoo beast will increase significantly. After I create the voodoo beast, I estimate that it will have a sixty percent chance of being intermediate Fifth Grade, and a forty percent chance of bing an advanced Fifth Grade. That is, of course, if I can sessfully provoke the disaster power within the soul crystal to turn into a disaster aura,¡± Karon analyzed from his professional angle.


    Greem nodded in satisfaction. The Chip¡¯s conclusion after its analysis was very simr to Karon¡¯s own. At Fifth Grade, the difficulty of creating high-grade items was no longer just a matter ofpatibility of elements. It was also about the manifestation of the principle powers contained within the magical materials.


    The higher the grade of the material being processed, the harder it would be. The adepts had even established a field known as material studies for this purpose. The purpose of material studies was to examine how to preserve and stimte biological activity in their materials to unleash the principle powers within them to their greatest extent.


    If such a high-quality many-armed giant corpse was given to Lich Kanganas, it could turn into a Fifth Grade undead. However, the earth principle powers and disaster power contained within the material were notpatible with death power. There would be a significant loss inbat strength.


    The Chip estimated that it would be lucky if the many-armed giant retained beginner Fifth Grade power after being turned into an undead!


    Meanwhile, the fact that Karon dared to promise so much clearly meant that he was very confident in his biological modtion and modification skills.


    ¡°Since Master Karon is so confident, may I inquire what price I need to pay for your services?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but take on a serious tone.


    The difficulty of crafting was incredibly high; an ordinary Fourth Grade adept would have no chance of seeding. Meanwhile, hiring a Fifth Grade Great Adept would undoubtedlye at a significant cost.


    Even Karon couldn¡¯t help but fall into thought at the question.


    After a long pause, he finally said, ¡°Thirty million magical crystals and 1,500 siths of origin substances. That¡¯s my final price. It can¡¯t go any lower! Of course, if you are willing to offer a set of intermediate Fifth Grade materials as payment, I can craft the voodoo beast for free. However, if the material is beginner Fifth Grade, I will have to ask for two sets.¡±


    ¡°The magical crystals and origin substance then! I can still afford that much.¡±


    Thirty million magical crystals were equivalent to the Crimson n¡¯s total profits over the past ten years. Meanwhile, 1,500 siths of origin substance could only be obtained if you swept the entirety of the Central Lands.


    Neither of these was a problem for Greem.


    After all, he had lived in the Central Lands for a long time. He had at least that much origin substance in reserve!


    Since they hade to an agreement, Karon immediately drew up a magical contract in the air with his finger before cing his soul brand onto it. Greem examined the contract. After ensuring that there was no problem, he also put his soul brand on it.


    Given the extent of their powers, even a contract with a nar consciousness as the guarantor would not be able to bind them fully. As such, their contracts were signed with their origin principles as the guarantor. Should one of them vite the terms of the agreement, they would suffer a terrible bacsh from their own origin principle.


    It meant Karon would no longer be able to harness earth principles, and Greem would no longer be able to harness fire principles. It sounded simple, but such an agreement was tightly-binding for Great Adepts, who relied entirely on principles.


    No one would ever joke around with their origin principles, not even as a passing remark!


    With the agreement in hand, Greem could rest assured as he handed the body of the giant, its Crystal of Petrification, and its soul crystal to Great Adept Karon. In order for these top-ss materials to unleash their full power, just the stimtion of the materials alone would take extraordinary effort and time.


    That was why Greem would probably have to wait a few years until he obtained his voodoo beast.


    Greem hesitated for a moment when he emerged from Karon¡¯s room. He then confidently walked to the loweryers of the Boulder Fortress. That was where the Third and Fourth Grade adepts were most active and where the fortress market was busiest.


    Boulder Fortress. The trading area on the fifth level.


    It had been over seventy years since the start of the Beastmen Wars. During this time, the adepts had managed to invade as many as a hundred and thirty-four beastmen nes. Many of the rare resources that were lost from these broken nes fell into the hands of high-grade adepts who participated in the nar wars.


    Thus, while many of the adepts were only Third or Fourth Grade, some of them might have managed to obtain some unbelievable treasures, artifacts, and materials by sheer coincidence.


    That was why the lofty Great Adepts would often disguise themselves and go to these lower-grade markets in hopes of picking out some cheap-yet-valuable resources.


    Greem disguised himself with his fire principles, turning into a muscr bearded man. He then mixed into the crowd and started wandering around the market.


    In all seriousness, the higher grade the material, the more primitive it often looked.


    Basic materials and resources were all recorded within the information tower of the fortress. Therefore, the more mysterious and unrecognizable items could only be sold in individual stalls.


    Many adepts put up stalls in the market, cing a few unusual objects there as they waited for buyers to appear. Finding a true ¡®treasure¡¯ amidst all the garbage was a real test of the buyer¡¯s eye.


    Greem smiled as he walked down the street as if indifferent to the merchandise around him. However, blue light flickered in his dark-red eyes, continually scanning the items in the stalls.


    Energy radiation intensity, elementium remnant, surface patterns and marks, analysis of fundamental substance makeup, forcefield fluctuation frequency- with all these detection methods, the Chip would be able to pick up on any unusual traits that these items might possess.


    After walking for a short while, Greem finally came to a stall by the roadside.


    The owner of the stall was a Third Grade elementium adept. He was holding a book in his hands and flipping through it listlessly. Three very unusual objects had been ced on the ck cloth of the stall. It was hard to tell their purpose from their appearance.


    One was a piece of metal that seemed to have fallen off some armor. There were blurry magical patterns and faint elementium fluctuations remaining on it. ording to the Chip¡¯s analysis, this was an armor fragment. However, it wasn¡¯t a core piece of the armor and was, therefore, not very valuable.


    Apart from the metal itself having some research value, it wasn¡¯t particrly useful.


    The second item was a darksteel longsword. The body of the sword was long, and there was no edge to it at all. No magical patterns had been engraved onto the item, nor any gemstones embedded. It looked ordinary and mundane, as if it was just in iron.


    For some reason, it gave off an incredibly sharp sensation when Greemid eyes on the sword. It was as if the edge was pointed right at Greem¡¯s brow.


    The third item was a pitch-ck stone the size of an egg. It was smooth as a rock. Simrly, no elementium aura could be sensed from it.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s gaze wandering between the three items, the stall owner quickly put away his book and greeted his customer with a smile.


    There were no idiots among the adepts here. Greem might have changed his appearance and retracted his principle aura, but the adept that owned the stall could not sense his grade level at all.


    That was enough for him to make certain assumptions!


    The only people here who could put on airs were either Fourth Grades or the asional Great Adept. That was why the stall owner quicklyposed himself and started introducing his merchandise enthusiastically.


    ¡°My lord, these things are all from the beastmen nes. Which one might you be interested in?¡±


    Greem picked up the longsword first. He brought it close to himself for better examination. He really couldn¡¯t sense any elementium aura from it. However, that pressing and chilling aura unnerved him. There were no bloodstains on the sword, but it radiated an overwhelming aura of bloodthirst and murder.


    ¡°What is this sword? It doesn¡¯t seem to be a magical weapon.¡±


    The adept smiled as he exined, ¡°It¡¯s not a magical weapon at all. It¡¯s a vicious sword that possesses ¡®bloodthirst.¡¯ Its owner was once a peak Fourth Grade Sword Saint who had managed to infuse most of his consciousness into the longsword. That is why it seems so extraordinary.¡±


    Sword Saint?


    Greem frowned slightly.


    That was amonbat profession in the beastmen nes. Only elites among the beastmen warriors could advance into Sword Saints. Their weapons were usually single-handed swords with no elementium power. They were known for their tremendous explosive power that made the barriers of spellcasters as fragile as eggshells before them.


    ¡°And this ck stone?¡± Greem put the longsword down and cast his eyes toward the ck stone.


    The Chip had actually managed to detect traces of principle aura on this stone. Anything that possessed principle aura of its own was an excellent object.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know either,¡± The stall owner scratched his head and replied in a somewhat dejected tone. ¡°I got all this from the body of a Sword Saint. My party went to great lengths to kill him, and these three things were all I got. As for what this ck stone is, precisely? I wanted to appraise it, but the information tower¡¯s appraisal fee was three hundred thousand magical crystals...so, I had no choice but to give up!¡±


    Greem listened closely as he flipped the ck stone over and over in his hand.


    In the end, he was certain that this was a seed!


    The problem now was whether the principle aura on the seed was because it had been in a certain location or if it was something inherent to the seed itself. If it was thetter, then this seed could also be categorized as a Fifth Grade material.


    ¡°Tell me, how much do you intend to sell this thing for?¡± Since Greem had his suspicions, he acted without any hesitation.


    ¡°Since the appraisal fee of this object alone is 300,000 magical crystals, I believe that its actual value should be...no less than 1,200,000!¡± Upon seeing a whale of a consumer arrive, the stall owner quickly dered a bold price. It was so bold of a price that even he couldn¡¯t help but blush a little when he said it.


    One million two hundred thousand magical crystals? That didn¡¯t seem too expensive at all!

 Chapter 1456 - A Crude Boor

    <h4>Chapter 1456 A Crude Boor</h4>


    ¡°Alright, a million and two hundred thousand magical crystals it is!¡±


    At Greem¡¯s level, anything that could be purchased with magical crystals was no trouble at all.


    Upon hearing how easily Greem agreed to the offer, the store owner¡¯s expression frozepletely. There was no joy on his face at all; there was only regret.


    At this point, he was certain that the ck stone must be some item of incredible value. He should not havee here to the market in hopes of getting lucky just to save that three hundred thousand appraisal fee.


    ¡°My...my lord, you...you might have heard wrong. I...I said three million magical crystals!¡± The adept couldn¡¯t help but stutter as he went back on his word.


    ¡°What did you say?¡± Greem¡¯s face turned dark, and he couldn¡¯t help but narrow his eyes.


    A harsh and chilling aura instantly filled the air.


    Three million magical crystals were nothing to Greem. If the stall owner had offered three million as the initial price, Greem would have agreed without even frowning.


    However, the fact that this adept shamelessly went back on his word after they hade to an agreement was a p in his face as a Great Adept.


    ¡°I...I said three...three million magical crystals. You heard wrong earlier!¡± At this point, the adept had no choice but to stubbornly insist on his lie. At the same time as he said this, he was screaming the same words over and over in his mind- ¡®Please don¡¯t be a Great Adept. Please don¡¯t be a Great Adept.¡¯


    He couldn¡¯t sense Greem¡¯s actual grade and, so, treated him as a Fourth Grade who had hidden his identity. Fourth Grades were still trouble, but given the person that stood behind him, he could still bury all this trouble under the ground.


    ¡°I will give you one more chance to reconsider what you said. If you insist on going against what we agreed upon, then you should be prepared for the consequences!¡± Greem chuckled coldly.


    The ¡®argument¡¯ between the two wasn¡¯t a bigmotion, but it still drew the attention of several adepts wandering in the market. A few of the stall owners nearby also folded their arms and watched as the drama unfolded.


    This ce was arge market. Naturally, there would be enforcer adepts around.


    Soon, a group of Fourth Grade adepts in golden robes with golden emblems pinned to their chests appeared amongst the crowd.


    ¡°What¡¯s happening? Why are you all gathered here? If you want to buy something, hurry up and do it. If you aren¡¯t buying, then pick it up and leave,¡± The enforcer adepts pushed apart the crowd and arrived before the stall.


    The adept that owned the stall seemed to be a slippery one too. He hastily moved forward and pulled the leader of the enforcers toward him as he mentally messaged something to him.


    ¡°Lord Kay?¡± The leader of the enforcers paused for a moment. He couldn¡¯t help but reply with a question, ¡°How is it that I never heard that Lord Kay had a brother like you?¡±


    ¡°A low profile...a low profile. I¡¯ve always preferred to keep a low profile, which is why I never walked about waving Lord Kay¡¯s name around,¡± The owner of the stall had an ingratiating expression on his face as he continued to speak with the enforcer mentally.


    The enforcer listened with a tilted head as his gaze swept toward Greem.


    When the enforcer¡¯s gaze fell on Greem, he paused for a moment. He then rubbed his eyes and took a better look, but he couldn¡¯t help but be suspicious.


    He was only intermediate Fourth Grade and couldn¡¯t tell what grade¡¯s Greem was exactly.


    ¡°Sir, how may I refer to you?¡±


    ¡°Greem!¡±


    ¡°Why don¡¯t I act as a mediator, and we just let this thing be.¡±


    ¡°Let it be? How so?¡± Greem chuckled coldly as he said. ¡°I had my eyes set on something and we agreed on a price, which he promptly backtracked on. How should we let this thing be?¡±


    ¡°Sir, you should consider this carefully. Lord Kay stands behind him...that¡¯s a peak Fourth Grade. He once killed two beastmen shamans and a Sword Saint on a nar battlefield a while ago. All three of those enemies had been peak Fourth Grade opponents!¡±


    Killing three opponents of the same grade as a Fourth Grade truly demonstrated tremendousbat prowess. However, trying to scare away a Fifth Grade Great Adept with that much was ridiculous!


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to continue wasting his words. He picked up the ck seed and threw a storage ring to the stall owner.


    ¡°A million and two hundred thousand magical crystals. No more, no less. This is settled!¡±


    The stall owner seemed to feel more empowered now that he had somebody to have his back. He reached and grabbed at Greem¡¯s sleeve and immediately started shouting, ¡°There¡¯s a thief here! A thief!¡±


    A cold light gleamed in Greem¡¯s eyes as the invisible me barrier that was always around his body manifested abruptly. The right hand of the adept erupted into golden mes upon touching his sleeve.


    Aaaaaah!


    The stall owner screamed in pain, but he couldn¡¯t extinguish the golden mes on his right hand, no matter what he did. On the contrary, the mes slowly crept up his arm, threatening to ignite the rest of his body.


    ¡°My friend, I¡¯d suggest you put that thing down first! I have already notified Lord Kay. If there is any conflict, why don¡¯t you leave it until he¡¯s arrived and the two of you can settle it between yourselves? Is that okay?¡± The leader of the enforcers was a sharp man.


    The more he looked at Greem, the more unusual he seemed. The guard didn¡¯t want to be involved in this messy affair at all. However, Lord Kay was one of the most powerful individuals among the Fourth Grade adepts.


    If he just let this fellow burn Lord Kay¡¯s blood-rted brother to death, then he won¡¯t be able to exin things to Lord Kay.


    While everyone was trying to figure things out, a mean and sinister voice rang out from behind the crowd.


    ¡°Who is it? Who dares harm my brother! You don¡¯t value your life, do you?¡±


    The crowd parted upon hearing this voice. A ferocious and muscr bald man with twoicallyrge knives on his back came forth. He wore ck leather pants with a dragon-leather armor set that ran across his chest. A violet magical pattern had been drawn on his body.


    His every action radiated a tremendously savage and vicious aura!


    ¡°It¡¯s Lord Kay!¡±


    ¡°Lord Kay¡¯s arrived. This new adept is in trouble.¡±


    Whispers rang out from the surrounding crowd, their voices filled with fear and wariness toward this ultra-powerhouse.


    Greem¡¯s face gradually turned even darker.


    The bystanders thought he was afraid. However, only Greem himself knew his feelings. It was more like the feeling of disgust at having stepped in dog shit in new shoes. He was a revered Great Adept, yet he had to deal with these crude boors. What a humiliation to his status!


    Perhaps he should never have concealed his identity.


    The adept that owned the stall must have eaten the gall of a bear. To think he had the guts to y such dirty tricks on a Great Adept!


    Out of his extreme anger, Greem startedughing instead. He turned around and looked coldly at this ¡®Lord Kay¡¯ to assess him.


    One had to admit that this Lord Kay looked quite impressive.


    Moreover, as a body-refining adept, he had managed to forge his will into his body and into the two magical knives on his back. It made him a top-ss elite even among the peak Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouses.


    This Lord Kay saw the golden mes climbing up his brother¡¯s shoulder the moment he arrived. His fierce brows furrowed as he extended the palms of his two hands wide open. There was a sh of jade-green light as the two magical knives appeared in his hands.


    The next second, cold light gleamed. The stall owner¡¯s right arm becamepletely cut off at the shoulder. The adept himself screamed in agony and was blown away.


    The severed right arm fell onto the ground. The mes instantly erupted, reducing the arm to ashes in mere moments.


    The crowd gasped, seemingly confused as to why Lord Kay would strike at his own brother the moment he arrived. Only a few people managed to guess that there was something wrong with the mes, which was why he had cut the arm off and prevented it from spreading.


    A looked of surprise shed across Greem¡¯s eyes.


    This ¡®Kay¡¯ fellow was quite impressive indeed. He was able to sense the golden fire¡¯s hidden characteristics and attempted to sever the Undying mes¡¯ connection with the soul of the adept with his own ferocious will.


    Unfortunately, he wasn¡¯t quite there yet.


    He had obviously not realized that the golden fire wasn¡¯t powered byw power, but principle power.


    It was a single word¡¯s difference, but it made for a ridiculous distinction.


    That was the distinction between man and god!


    ¡°Kid, don¡¯t get too cocky! If I wanted him dead, you wouldn¡¯t be able to save him,¡± Greem scoffed and snapped his finger. The adept who had been knocked into a wall and was now struggling to get up was struck again. Crimson light glowed from his wound as the golden mes appeared out of thin air and started burning again.


    Greem wasn¡¯t exaggerating.


    Given his current powers, killing a Third Grade adept was as easy as squashing an ant. That said, he was currently on a battlefield in space. He didn¡¯t want to be too cruel, which was why he only exacted a minor punishment with his Undying mes.


    Unfortunately, this Kay, who had spent most of his time in the midst of battle, had clearly been driven mad by his rising fighting will. He shouted out loud, ¡°You dare!¡± while swinging his twin knives and rushing at Greem.


    As he charged forward, the jade green knives flickered, and Kay vanished without a trace.


    To think, he still dared to strike at Greem still.


    At this point, Greem could no longer tolerate it all. His overwhelming, searing will erupted outward, instantly engulfing every inch of space within a dozen meters of him.


    Kay had just teleported five meters behind Greem when he was pushed out of the interspatialyers by an irresistible force.


    He waved his two knives filled with savage and violent aura and roared as if he would cleave Greem¡¯s defenses in two the very next moment.


    Unfortunately, that was the end of his attack!


    Several mysterious fire chains reached out of empty space, quickly wrapping around him until he was thoroughly bound and immobile. The terrifying searing will was then transmitted to his body via the principles, causing his soaring fighting will to be fuel and ignite into mes.


    ¡°Ah!¡± It was at this moment that Kay realized that he was in serious trouble. His fierce eyes opened wide as he shouted, ¡°You...you¡¯re Fifth Grade!¡±


    Fifth Grade...Great Adept.


    It was at this point that the crowd finally realized something was wrong. They hastily stepped back and walked away.


    Meanwhile, the owner of the stall had turned pale-white as he kneeled on the ground. A good half of his body was already burning up.

 Chapter 1457 - Old Man José

    Chapter 1457 Old Man Jos¨¦


    Fifth Grade.


    It was a lofty and unattainable height for most adepts.


    Anyone who could advance to Great Adept was undeniably a frightening existence, more fearsome than a cmity!


    The crowd started to panic.


    All the adepts hastily stepped away, even the enforcers.


    Only the unfortunate adept who was burning was left behind, along with Greem and Kay.


    Greem slowly turned back and looked coldly upon Kay, who was still desperately struggling against the fire chains. He chuckled, ¡°Kid, next time, open your eyes and look before you attack your opponent. You don¡¯t want to offend someone you can¡¯t afford to. Hmph!¡±


    Kay might have been entirely bound by chains, but he continued to swing his knives around, casting sparks off the chains. The pair of magical des seemed to have reached the limit ofw weapons. They carried a trace of principle power within them.


    Obviously, this Adept Kay was very talented indeed and was well-acquainted with the path of murder and bloodshed.


    This pair of twin knives was infused with his savage and cruel will, possessing the fearsome magical power of being able to shake an enemy¡¯s willpower.


    If the opponent were only an ordinary Fourth Grade, even the slightest negligence in their mental defenses during the heat of battle would render them vulnerable to that influence. The result would be the death of their body and the extermination of their soul. The knives would absorb all of the blood within their body, and they would be cast to the wind.


    Though a body-refining adept, Kay did not focus his efforts on the cultivation of his body. Instead, he invested most of his resources and diligence into the sacrificial improvement of his weapons. It was a rare case, but it was an alternative form of body refinement.


    Body-refining adepts who trained in this fashion would be slightly weaker themselves but would possess powerful weapons that exceeded their grade level. Other body-refining adepts trained their bodies to be as hard as magical weapons, while those like Kay improved their weapons through sacrifice as if it was another body of theirs. These weapons were tremendously powerful, sharp, and unstoppable.


    These body-refining adepts were exceedingly scary. They pursued extreme lethality and often had horrifying instantaneous bursts of power.


    Unfortunately, while he might be uncontested within his grade, his power appearedicalpared to a Fifth Grade Great Adept.


    Kay couldn¡¯t flee, even if he wanted to-w chains had tightly locked down the space around him. He couldn¡¯t even teleport.


    He couldn¡¯t attack or move forward either. Greem was only five meters away from him, but that distance was like the deepest of chasms. No matter what violent attack he unleashed, he could not move forward by even a single inch.


    He was like a fly that had fallen into a spiderweb. He struggled with all his strength, trying to break free of the constraints all around him. Unfortunately, there were so many fire chains wrapped around him that he could only feel despair. No many how many he sliced apart, the only result was that more chains¨Cthicker chains¨Cwould extend toward him and lock down everyst inch of movement he was allowed.


    Moreover, the golden mes attached to thew chains constantly licked at his body. The bone-burning agony that reached all the way to his soul made him even more insane and reckless in his actions.


    No matter how he tried, the difference in grade and power between the two of them was simply too massive. It was so big that it couldn¡¯t bepensated for withbat techniques and a raging will!


    Greem was like a huntsmen spider crouched in the center of his web, looking down upon the fly that had fallen into his trap and waiting silently until it had exhausted all its strength.


    The pervasive Undying mes corroded Kay¡¯s body through the principle level, slowly eating away at his flesh and life in an invisible dimension. Kay struggled with all his strength, preventing the fire principles from reaching his soul origin.


    Should the fire principles manage to reach his soul origin, Kay wouldn¡¯t just be losing his body and flesh. His soul would lose the future potential to reach Fifth Grade.


    No matter how much it hurt, no matter how difficult it was, he did not dare let up his resistance by even a single bit!


    The crowd hastily backed away.


    No one dared to walk up and provoke a Great Adept in the middle of his fury.


    Several adepts took out theirmunication tools and began contacting their backers, rying this information as quickly as possible. Even the leader of the enforcer adepts had no choice but tomunicate with the fortress spirit.


    The next second, a tremendous mental consciousness descended upon the area. It was almost as if a pair of eyes had been cast on Greem¡¯s body, looking straight into his soul.


    ¡°Great Adept Greem, please watch what you are doing. ording to Section 3 of Term 187 of the Boulder Fortress Adept Code, you cannot kill adepts of the same faction within the fortress without proper reason! Otherwise, you will be subject topulsory missions and heavy fines.¡±


    ¡°I have not killed him. I am only punishing someone who has offended me. What is it? Does Boulder Fortress allow a lower grade adept to actively strike at a superior?¡± Greem continued to roast the adept as he casually conversed with the fortress spirit.


    ¡°Of course not! Boulder Fortress will not allow any inferior to offend a revered guest of the fortress. However, Lord Kay is one of the top Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouses of Boulder Fortress. If possible, it would be best for him not to be sacrificed internally!¡±


    Naturally, the fortress spirit knew well enough which was more important between a peak Fourth Grade ultra-powerhouse and a Fifth Grade Great Adept.


    ¡°I understand. I won¡¯t harm his soul origin. I will only roast him a little and dry him out.¡±


    ¡°Thank you for your understanding and cooperation. Have a good day! Furthermore, I would like to inform you that a Great Adept closely associated with Kay is hurrying over. To avoid a conflict between Great Adepts, I suggest you pay attention to the extent of your punishment.¡±


    Another Great Adept.


    Greem frowned slightly. He couldn¡¯t help but sigh. Even this seemingly transcendent group of adepts were wrapped together in suchplicated webs of social rtionships.


    Beat up the small guy, and a big guy shows up. Beat up the big guy, and an old guy shows up.


    This principle held true no matter where he went!


    Just as Greem thought so to himself, a deep, elderly voice suddenly rang out.


    ¡°Friend, that should be enough now! Could you do me a favor and let him go?¡±


    Greem tilted his head and instantly saw an elderly adept fly over.


    This man wore a ck robe. His hair was a silvery-white, and his eyes were different colors¨C one red and one ck. Fine wrinkles covered his face.


    He seemed to be approaching while filled with anger; he radiated a turbulent and savage aura. He smiled as he greeted Greem. However, there was no genuine friendliness behind those smiling eyes¨C only a thick, murderous aura.


    ¡°Who might you be, sir?¡± Greem casually replied with a question.


    ¡°Jos¨¦ Mudi, of the cklight ne. I am currently stationed in Hall Thunder.¡±


    ¡°Greem, of the World of Adepts, Hall Flower.¡±


    A sinister smile shed across Great Adept Jos¨¦¡¯s face when he heard Greem¡¯s introduction. He chuckled and said, ¡°Ah, a revered adept from the homeworld. I was wondering why you were so confident!¡±


    As everyone knew, the adept faction had conquered a few dozen nes to serve as the cradle for the next generation of adepts. Among all these nar worlds, the World of Adepts was undoubtedly the most important, most notable, and most prestigious ne.


    While many of the other nes could be considered powerful enough to be homeworlds for other species, there was only one homeworld for the adepts¨C the World of Adepts!


    That was the origin of the adept faction and the homeworld of the three currently known Ninth Grade Great Adepts. That was why the World of Adepts was crowned with a superior status in the hearts of all adepts.


    The prestige of the World of Adepts was so incredible that all adepts originating from the homeworld were also regarded with the same prestige. This was an unspoken agreement within the adept faction.


    Most of the time, adepts from the World of Adepts were considered orthodox and mainstream, while adepts from the other nar worlds were only secondary in importance. Perhaps it was due to this discrimination that adepts of the other nar worlds were often filled with hostility and dissatisfaction toward adepts from the homeworld.


    These tiny details were incredibly evident in the social going-ons between the adepts!


    Not a single good word out of his mouth. Greem¡¯s already-burning fire red even further.


    Ever since he chose the path of fire affinity, Greem¡¯s temper had been wilder and more incendiary than before. His mind might be rational and clear, but he was getting into more and more situations where he fought first before talking.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The modifications to Greem¡¯s soul did indeed change part of his innate personality traits. It was perhaps a minor w that Greem had to ept as a fire adept!


    Greem grunted coldly and waved his hand. Kay, who had beenpletely scorched on the outside and well-cooked on the inside, was thrown in front of the elderly adept, wrapped in chains.


    Kay was a hard-boiled man too. He did not let out even a single yelp after such devastation. Moreover, even as badly injured as he was, and even though his twin knives were bright-red with heat, he held onto them tightly, refusing to let go.


    ¡°Teach...er......,¡± Kay cried out with great difficulty when he saw the old man. A thin wisp of invisible fire rose from his cracked lips as he said the word.


    It was obvious that he had beenpletely cooked by the strange fire, inside and out!


    The elderly adept bent over to examine Kay¡¯s soul origin. He finally let out a sigh of relief when he confirmed that nothing had happened to it. It caused his cold re at Greem to rx ever so slightly.


    ¡°Adept Greem, how did my disciple offend you. I hope you can enlighten me!¡±


    ¡°He didn¡¯t offend me. The guy who offended me is him,¡± Greem nced at the stall owner, who was barely breathing at this point, and said, ¡°Your disciple insisted on standing up for him and tried to attack me. Naturally, I had to punish them!¡±


    The elderly adept¡¯s gazended on the stall owner, and a sinister expression shed across his face. It was an expression that said, ¡®I knew it was you.¡¯


    He gritted his teeth for a moment. In the end, he turned toward Greem again.


    ¡°Everyone is here for the mission. Would you do me a favor and let the two of them go? I will be willing to take on any of the losses incurred on your part, sir!¡±


    ¡°There weren¡¯t any losses to speak of. I have already punished them, so I will simply leave them to you, sir. You can take them back with you any time you want...I won¡¯t be staying any longer. Farewell!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to deal with the elderly adept. He left behind a simple sentence and turned to leave.


    Adept Jos¨¦ stared at Greem¡¯s back with a dark face and aplicated expression. It was as if he was incredibly frustrated, but there was nothing he could do.

 Chapter 1458 - Plane Gere

    <h4>Chapter 1458 ne Gere</h4>


    [Editor¡¯s Note: We are changing our trantion of ¡®beastmen¡¯ when referring to their nar worlds or basic race. It will now be ¡®Orcs,¡¯ based on what we believe to be the most faithful trantion of the author¡¯s words. However, the Beastmen Gods are not confirmed to be just Orcs. Some may be other races under the catch-all term of ¡®beastmen.¡¯ Simr to World of Warcraft¡¯s Horde faction, where you have orcs mixed with other non-human races.]


    Four monthster.


    Greem¡¯s first mission arrived abruptly during his shift in Hall Flower.


    ¡°Cloudclear Front has been attacked. Numerous clones of the vassal beast-gods have descended on ne Gere. The offensive force has suffered heavy losses. We request immediate reinforcement from headquarters!¡±


    An adept suddenly shouted out loud in the boisterous circr hall. His voice instantly caught the attention of all adepts on shift. On theplicated map of stars disyed above the circr hall, one of the stars glowed with a blinding scarlet light and began flickering.


    The various Great Adepts stationed in the halls opened their eyes simultaneously. They started to process the reports provided by the fortress spirit as they silently awaited further orders.


    Just as expected,bat instructions were ryed to the corresponding halls five secondster.


    This time, three halls were chosen. The total number of forces deployed would be a Sixth Grade adept and four Fifth Grade adepts.


    Greem¡¯s Hall Flower was required to deploy a Fifth Grade Great Adept.


    Adept Gerritsen¡¯s gaze swept over andnded on Greem.


    ¡°Greem, I¡¯ll leave this mission to you!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    It had only been half a year since he¡¯d been stationed here, and his first mission was already the most dangerous¨C abat mission. Greem couldn¡¯t help butin in his mind. However, he maintained his calmposure and walked toward a portal that had shown up in the corner of the hall.


    The portal flickered, and the vision in front of Greem¡¯s eyes shed. In the blink of an eye, he had arrived in a broader and even busier hall.


    Guided by a golem, he soon rallied with the other Great Adepts he was being deployed with.


    The Sixth Grade Great Adept was a male adept known as Windstern. The adept¡¯s entire body was formed of twisted shrouds of ck smoke. It was impossible to see his real form at all. The other three Great Adepts wereposed of one female adept and two male adepts. They all looked very different from each other, and their principle auras were all thick enough to be on the brim of manifestation.


    The fortress spirit responsible for deployment immediately startedmunicating with the adepts once the five-person party had gathered.


    ¡°The ne Gere that you all are heading to this time is a mid-sized ne. The dominant force in that world is the Orc Empire, which has thergest poption and most resources of all that world¡¯s creatures. Our vanguard has already established a foothold there and taken over ten thousand square kilometers of the Orc Empire¡¯s territory.


    ¡°Now, the enemy has suddenly cast down arge group of beast god clones. It is obvious that they intend to exterminate our vanguard and kick us out of ne Gere. That is why your mission is to protect the vanguard force and force the beast god clones to retreat or simply exterminate them.


    ¡°The minimum requirements of the mission are as follows: One. Protect the orc city of Dun Modr, which we have just recently integrated into our defenses. Two. Protect the adept tower currently being constructed there. Three. Protect the Fourth Grade Adept Kurt, who is the core of the vanguard force. His soul contains the nar coordinates and information required for follow-up nar teleportations and reinforcements.


    ¡°The mission willst three months. Once the adept tower ispleted and the internar portal opened in three months, your mission will be aplished!


    ¡°Alright, I have finished my exnation of the mission. I will now teleport you to the frontlines. Please make your preparations!¡±


    The Great Adepts finally gained a preliminary understanding of the situation after hearing the fortress spirit¡¯s exnation. They looked at each other and suppressed their principle auras before moving closer together.


    A short momentter, an unusuallyrge magical array appeared around them as the entire space filled with terrifying spatial fluctuations. This internar teleportation was not only of incredible distance. It was also subject to disruption from the nar barrier. Consequently, the risk during teleportation was immense.


    However, this risk was no threat to these Great Adepts who had transcended the realm of mortals.


    After some momentary dizziness, the Great Adepts opened their eyes and saw that they had appeared in a foreign kingdom of unusual aesthetic.


    Countlessw chains whipped toward them out of empty air the moment they stepped out of the teleportation array. These chains ignored their elementium defenses and reached straight to their souls. If it weren¡¯t for the principle light stopping these chains, they probably wouldn¡¯t have been able to make contact with their soul origins.


    The Great Adepts all frowned. The overwhelming, berserk energy aura within their bodies was instantly suppressed. Low-grade adepts would probably have been so badly suppressed by the hostile world consciousness that they would not have been able to stand.


    Everyone here was a Great Adept. Through their principle lights, they could easily keep thew chains of the world consciousness at bay. This significantly reduced the suppression and side-effects that they had to endure.


    However, in this world filled with hostility, attempting to replenish their energy from the environment would be exceedingly tricky. It was like being dropped in the middle of a desert. The adepts had no means of replenishing their power from their surroundings and could only rely on their own energy reserves.


    Fighting against enemies of the same grade under such circumstances would undoubtedly magnify the risk and danger by several factors!


    ¡°Wee! Wee! We are overjoyed to see you all! You have just arrived here, so why don¡¯t you take a momentary rest in the camp,¡± Just as the Great Adepts were silently adjusting to their current conditions, a few Fourth Grade adepts who were in charge of this forward base gathered around them. They bowed in unison.


    ¡°I am Melora, themander in charge of this attack on ne Gere.¡±


    ¡°I am Dutar, in charge of the voodoo beast armies.¡±


    ¡°I am Kurt, in charge of the construction of the adept tower and the teleportation arrays.¡±


    ¡°......¡±


    The Fourth Grade adepts stepped forward one by one and introduced themselves. However, the Great Adepts were hardly concerned with who they were. It wasn¡¯t until they heard Kurt¡¯s name that the Great Adepts immediately turned over and looked at him. They made sure to carve the name of this person mentioned in their mission deep in their minds.


    Kurt was an inconspicuous-looking middle-aged adept. He had long brown hair, a rather skinny figure, and his body radiated a dense aura of wind elementium. He was only a beginner Fourth Grade and clearly had a substandard Physique. The adepts couldn¡¯t sense any signs of powerful magical equipment around him, either.


    An individual like this could step on such an important battlefield, but he was clearly not here in abat-adept capacity. Rather, he had probably been sent here due to his unique profession of array master.


    In a single instant, the Great Adepts had managed to uncover everyst detail about Kurt. Kurt felt immense pressure from being stared at by several Great Adepts at once. Beads of sweat dripped from his forehead.


    ¡°Go ahead and do whatever it is that you usually do; no need to always stay around us. Melora and Kurt stay behind. The rest of you may leave now!¡± The Sixth Grade Great Adept Windstern was a straightforward person. He quickly waved the irrelevant individuals away and kept the only two critical figures behind.


    The party of Great Adepts walked toward the city hall of this massive orc city, led by this Commander Melora. Greem took this opportunity to properly assess this firm stronghold filled with the orcs¡¯ aesthetics.


    Large, tall, crude, and barbaric.


    These were the words that naturally appeared in Greem¡¯s mind after scanning this orc city of Dun Modr with his Spirit.


    The entire city was built out of giant rocks, each one as tall as a whole human. There was no need to carve any reinforcing runes on these rocks, as the material itself was of shocking hardness.


    Crude towering city walls, watchtowers, and battlements built upon those walls, thick wooden stakes nted along the walls and the streets, tattered beastmen gs fluttering in the wind¨C it was obvious that this orc city had only recently fallen into the hands of the adepts. Many of the orc decorations and banners had not even been taken down.


    At this moment, the entire city appeared to be a giant work site. Work crews were taking apart buildings everywhere, along with adepts instructing golems and voodoo beasts cleaning up debris and corpses.


    Apart from buildings of stone and rock, the orcs also had many leather tents and wood architecture constructed here and there. However, it was hard to tell their original purposes before the war, given their crude appearances.


    The terrifying fires of war had burned through this city. Every corner of it had been a battlefield upon which thebatants spilled blood. Not many buildings had survived the carnage. The city hall was likely the exception among exceptions.


    Along the way, Greem could see that every single building was covered in the scorch marks of fire and deep gouges left behind by weapons. Orc corpses that had not been dealt with simplyy in the roads and alleyways, their bodies covered in bite marks from voodoo beasts that had gnawed upon their flesh.


    Strangely enough, while dominant intelligent species like the humans, orcs, elves, and dwarves differed in traits from ne to ne, it was still possible to immediately distinguish one from the other based on the obvious aesthetics of their culture.


    A wooden cage filled with captured orc warriors could be seen around a street corner that the Great Adepts passed by. These orcs were all muscr hulks standing over two meters tall.


    Specifically, they were orcs with tough bodies and light-green skin. Their bodies were covered in explosive muscles and rough skin. Their pores wererge, and their veins bulged and ran all over like tiny serpents.


    Even more terrifying were their ugly and vicious faces. They hadrge mouths filled with protruding teeth set right below their equally gigantic eyes. Their appearances made it hard to think of them as intelligent life. Most people would only regard them as magically-modified magical creatures.


    Perhaps only the Beast God Arugel could ept such ugly and horrible creations as his followers!


    Just as Greem and the others were about to arrive at the city hall, a fearsome and powerful principle fluctuation rippled from the distant horizon. The snake-eye ring on Commander Melora¡¯s finger glowed with a blinding green light.


    Melora rubbed his snake-eye ring andmunicated with someone in the distance for a moment. He finally couldn¡¯t help but sigh.


    ¡°My lords, the beast god clones seem to know of your arrival; they have hastened their extermination of our forces. Just earlier, another one of our armies was wiped out.¡±


    ¡°What are the losses?¡± Windstern asked.


    ¡°Three thousand men. It was an adept force that possessed First, Second, and Third Grade forces. Completely exterminated!¡±

 Chapter 1459 - The Impulsive Orcs

    Chapter 1459 The Impulsive Orcs


    ne Gere. The Valley of Flowers.


    The mes of war had yet to be extinguished. The entire battlefieldy in ruins and devastation.


    The once beautiful scenery of the Valley of Flowers, filled with blooming flowers and fluttering butterflies, had now been reduced to a horrible scene of scorched and ravaged earth. Countless tattered corpses could still be seen on the green ins.


    These corpses were all dressed in magical robes of various designs. The essories on their bodies still glowed with magical light.


    Apart from the dead adepts, the bodies of countless vicious and fearsome voodoo beasts could also be seen on the battlefield. The number of these voodoo beasts was dozens of times greater than the dead adepts.


    Squads of orc warriors walked through the battlefield, searching for survivors as they cut off the ears of their dead enemies. The pouches on their waists were already bulging from all the trophies they had collected.


    Apart from these orc warriors, there was also a group of scrawnier shaman apprentices walking around. They were dressed in leather robes, and their faces were covered in violet paint. They were not at all interested in trophies such as the ears of their enemies. Instead, they were carefully searching for those glowing magical essories and equipment.


    As elementium spellcasters themselves, the orc shamans could also use magical equipment. As such, the price of magical essories had always been extremely high within the Orc Empire. They were considered rare and valuable treasures in great demand.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The orcs were an intelligent species with violence and barbarism flowing through their blood. Their societies had always revolved around personal courage and might. Orc empires almost always consisted of arge majority of warriors. Only a few shamans and voodoo doctors possessed some extent of spellcasting ability.


    While most orcs did not possess elementium powers, they were believers of the orc gods. Through their system of faith, the orcs had constructed a powerful and alternative system of beast souls.


    Powerful individuals within the orc empire, when assisted by shamans, could obtain the blessings of the orc gods through sacrificial rituals. This blessing came in the form of sealing the souls of powerful magical creatures within their bodies.


    During battle, they could summon the beast soul from within them, allowing them to possess incredible Physique and powerful techniquesparable to magical beasts.


    That was why the strongest individuals in ne Gere were beastsoul warriors!


    The simplistic power system in ne Gere generated numerous warriors, but also ack of a crucial alchemy system. That was why even the most powerful beastsoul warrior in this world only used primitive weapons forged in the simplest, crudest fashion.


    At the moment, five tall and muscr figures stood shoulder to shoulder on a hill beside the Valley of Flowers.


    They all had green skin and wore dark-green leather pants. Their exposed upper bodies bulged with muscles, causing them to give off a cruel and savage aura. Lifelike drawings of ferocious beasts were etched onto their chests and backs. These drawings looked so real it almost seemed like they coulde alive and leap into existence.


    ¡°The adepts¡¯ reinforcements have arrived,¡± The orc that stood at the center of the group and had the most ferocious aura opened hisrge and fierce eyes abruptly. He pointed in the direction of Dun Modr and said angrily, ¡°Just earlier, I sensed the appearance of fivepletely different energy auras from there. It seems like the enemy¡¯s Great Adepts have entered this world!¡±


    ¡°Oh?¡± Another orc who had a tiger tattooed onto his chest sneered. ¡°If my lord¡¯s senses are correct, why don¡¯t we ambush them at their base? Those Great Adepts have only just arrived. They must not have adapted to the environment here yet. It¡¯s the perfect time.¡±


    At this, he couldn¡¯t help but extend his long red tongue and lick his lips.


    ¡°I disagree!¡± Another orc stepped forward. ¡°That ce has been turned into a base for the invading adepts. A lot of annoying arrays and traps must have beenid down. Rushing over without an understanding of what lies in wait is too rash. If we fall into an ambush, the tides might turn against us once again.


    ¡°Moreover, the few of us have yet to fully assimte with the beastsoul seeds bestowed upon us by the gods. The amount of time that we can maintain the orc gods¡¯ projection is limited. Why don¡¯t we wait for a little while until we can fully unleash the power of the gods¡¯ projection?¡±


    ¡°Wait, wait, wait...you people only know how to wait. By the time you¡¯re ready, the human adepts will be fully ready as well. How much better will the circumstances bepared to now? You cowards. I wonder if you are still fit to be called beastsoul warriors.¡±


    ¡°Shut up, ckbar! I¡¯ll challenge you to a duel if you continue being so unreasonable!¡±


    ¡°Feel free to do so! Let¡¯s see who¡¯s the fool.¡±


    An orc that was obviously of a higher grade than the rest let out a shout upon hearing hispanions¡¯ tempers re.


    ¡°Silence, all of you! Whether we should fight or whether we want to fight¨C we will be able to decide after a quick look. Come, let us take a walk to Dun Modr now. If the enemy is unprepared, we will charge over immediately. If the enemy came prepared, then we will retreat to ckwater City on my orders. We will gather all the beastsoul warriors of the ne and prepare for a final battle.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    This orc was clearly very well-respected amongst the others. None of the other orcs fought among themselves after he spoke. Instead, theymenced inspecting their weapons and equipment, making preparations for the battle that might break outter.


    ¡°Go!¡±


    The five orcs immediately started sprinting toward Dun Modr at this battlecry.


    Meanwhile, the orcs who were cleaning up the battlefield could only stare dumbfoundedly as those silhouettes instantly vanished over the horizon, leaving behind a massive trail of dust. It was only then that the five orcs¡¯ guards and servants realized what had happened. They let out their own battlecries and chased after their masters.


    ............


    ¡°Everyone prepare. The orc warriors should be upon us soon!¡±


    Sixth Grade Great Adept Windsterm stood above the tallest building in Dun Modr. He silently contacted Greem and the others with mental messages.


    ¡°So soon?¡± An adept with a mouse¡¯s head and a golden band upon that head let out a shrill cry of surprise. ¡°They aren¡¯t charging directly at us because they sensed our auras, are they?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe, Adept Poya, it¡¯s not like you don¡¯t know that those orcs have no brains to speak of. The higher their grade, the dumber they are. There¡¯s no point in ying tricks or plotting against them. They can only charge forward and fight like those Abyssal demons,¡± The only female adept of the party chuckled and said, ¡°I reckon they will charge straight at us without any bodyguards to cover or protect them.¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown. ¡°The beastsoul warriors of this ne are already quite powerful individually. In addition to the blessings from the beast gods, they will be quite troublesome to deal with. We haven¡¯t evenpleted the analysis of the narws here. Ourbat power is greatly suppressed. Fighting them now will be¡ª¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to worry about that!¡± Adept Windsterm chuckled. ¡°I brought a share of Taintroot Water with me this time. If those orcs push us into a corner, we will strike them with a vicious retaliation and teach them a lesson.¡±


    ¡°Taintroot Water? That¡¯s amazing,¡± The other Great Adepts broke out into smiles when they heard that name.


    Greem was perhaps the only one among them who had never heard of that name.


    However, he had heard of a name simr to that one in the past. He had heard of the Root of Corruption!


    When he had followed the Northern Witches during their invasion of one of the Beast God¡¯s nes, they had sacrificed hundreds of thousands of orcs to the Root of Corruption and turned it into a strange, wicked, and powerful tree. That wicked tree possessed the fearsome might of being able to corrupt and destroy the world consciousness.


    It had resulted in the descent of Seventh Grade Vassal God Garon of the Orc Pantheon in person!


    If that Seventh Grade vassal god hadn¡¯t been drawn away by an equally powerful witch, not one person in the party would have survived the onught of Garon, the God of ughter.


    The Taintroot Water that Windstern mentioned made Greem think of the Root of Corruption. Maybe there was some sort of connection between the two of them.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s indifference to the mention of Taintroot Water, the female adept known as Catherine couldn¡¯t help but send him a mental message. ¡°Taintroot Water is an incredibly powerful and valuable magical item. By sacrificing even a single drop of it, you can cause allw chains within ten kilometers to crumble and fall apart.¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air when he heard this. He eximed in shock, ¡°Doesn¡¯t that mean that every drop allows us to instantly rob ten kilometers of nar authority from the nar consciousness?¡±


    ¡°That is indeed the case!¡± Adept Catherineughed. ¡°If it weren¡¯t for the Taintroot Water, Boulder Fortress would never have so easily deployed us into the enemy nar world. It¡¯s fine if the orcs don¡¯te, but if they are foolish enough toe at us, it¡¯s the perfect opportunity for us to teach them a terrible lesson. Don¡¯t forget to take good care of me when that happens, ay, handsome boy.¡±


    Having said that, she giggled and winked at Greem!


    Adept Catherine¡¯s voice was sweet and beautiful. It sounded seductive if you shut your eyes and heard only her voice. However, she had an incredibly heavyset figure,parable to a boar that was a few hundred kilograms in weight. The rolls of fat on her face and body folded upon each other,yer uponyer. They even glistened with a greasy sheen. A single nce sent goosebump across Greem¡¯s entire body.


    Her incredibly seductive voice and revolting figure were such an extreme contrast that anyone who set eyes on her would probably be driven insane, torn between believing their eyes or their ears!


    Greem did not judge by appearance, but even he could not bear dealing with such an exceptional and exotic ¡®beauty.¡¯ For some reason, Greem felt his forehead and back be covered in a cold sweat. A terrible feeling washed over his entire being.

 Chapter 1460 - Secrets of the Gods

    Chapter 1460 Secrets of the Gods


    Just as Greem was about to fly off in a tantrum, a loud rumbling in the distance defused the awkward situation.


    The orcs had arrived!


    The Great Adepts looked at each other and stepped out of the city hall in unison, slowly flowing toward the city¡¯s northern wall.


    The orc powerhouses that had arrived from afar met with the Great Adepts one and a half kilometers outside of Dun Modr.


    The trail of dust finally came to a rest.


    As the dust slowly settled to the ground, five orcs of various appearances and professions were revealed.


    Two beastsoul warriors, one shaman, one sword saint, and a beast tamer.


    The distribution of professions was quite logical, though there were still a few too many fighters and too-few elementium attackers. However, that wasn¡¯t a problem for this party of orcs. Instead, it was simply a natural characteristic of orcs tock the ability to wield elementium powers.


    Within ne Gere, the upper limit of power for both orcs and adepts was peak Fourth Grade. However, the orcs could call on the blessings of the gods to obtain tremendous divine power, while the adepts had their own unique means to break the ne¡¯s upper limit of power.


    In an actual fight, there was hardly any advantage for either side. Victory or defeat rested solely upon the individual might of thebatants!


    Greem hovered in the air, resisting the narws with his principle powers as he silently evaluated the five orcs across from them.


    These orcs were truly mortals, with mortal bodies that had yet to transcend.


    However, a blinding golden light hid deep within their souls. Nearly imperceptible consciousness fluctuations radiated from these golden lights.


    God Summoning...consciousness projection.


    These two familiar words instantly shed across Greem¡¯s mind.


    The five orcs in front of them were no longer fully ¡®themselves!¡¯


    Having undergone a special God Summoning ceremony, the orc gods in their distant god kingdoms had projected a trace of their consciousness into the souls of these orcs. The gods could now see, hear, and feel everything that the orcs felt.


    These five orc powerhouses wouldn¡¯t be the only ones fighting the adepts in a while. They were backed by five eager consciousness projections hidden in their souls.


    In all honesty, the Great Adepts¡¯ desire to fight plummeted the moment they realized that only consciousness projections were hidden within the orcs, rather than orc god clones that would be their opponents.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Fighting against these consciousness projections wasn¡¯t exactly worth it. Even if they were fortunate enough to win, the adepts wouldn¡¯t be able to obtain those invaluable divine authority fragments. Upon realizing that the opponent¡¯s reinforcements came in the form of God Summoning, none of the Great Adepts could find the motivation in themselves to fight anymore.


    Most gods hid their true bodies within their god kingdoms to prevent being surrounded and attacked by their enemies. They had numerous means to project or extend their powers from their god kingdoms. The mostmon way to project their power into a nar world was through God Summoning or clones.


    Both of these were means of projecting consciousness, but the foundation of the medium waspletely different!


    God Summoning was projecting the power of the soul with the actual bodies of believers as a medium. The god could then control the believer¡¯s body by means of assimtion or possession. In doing so, the gods would gain a host for their consciousness to traverse the nar world freely.


    Apart from this option, the gods could also cast down their consciousness without relying on a believer¡¯s body. However, a descent in this fashion required a divine authority fragment to serve as the host of their power. That was why this method was also known as a god clone.


    Both of these options had their pros and cons, which was why there was no saying which was superior!


    God Summoning might allow the gods to cast down their strength at little risk, but the power they could unleash would be greatly limited by the possessed individual¡¯s attributes and might. If the possessed individual did not hold sufficient power, they wouldn¡¯t be able to unleash the full might of a god¡¯s consciousness projection.


    God clones did not have such problems, but they provided enemies with the opportunity to steal a divine authority fragment from the gods!


    The World of Gods and the adept faction had been at war for a very, very long time. Both parties knew each other¡¯s abilities intimately at this point, and they both had plenty of means by which to weaken their enemies.


    Divine authority fragments were a crystallization and manifestation of pure principle power. They were an irresistible temptation to both adepts and gods.


    Even the smallest divine authority fragment could save an adept a thousand years of studying the principles. That made divine authority fragments no less than tiny miracles for adepts, who had always revered power above all else.


    For the gods, a single divine authority fragment could elevate even the most humble of mortals to the level of a demigod; or in other words, peak Fourth Grade. Ten divine authority fragments merged together could then give rise to a true divine authority. That divine authority could allow an individual to ascend and be a genuinely immortal god.


    A god¡¯s grade was determined in such fashion.


    Those with only oneplete divine authority were low-ranked gods (Fifth Grade). Those with twoplete divine authorities were mid-ranked gods (Sixth Grade). Those with fourplete divine authorities were high-ranked gods (Seventh Grade). Those with eightplete divine authorities were powerful True Gods (Eighth Grade), while those with sixteenplete divine authorities were Major Gods (Ninth Grade).


    It was a fundamental index by which the gods were divided.


    However, the gods were often narcissistic as well!


    Those who had established a massive pantheon and possessed arge following of vassal gods would sometimes title themselves Major Gods, despite not having reached Ninth Grade. These things were not all that umon within the World of Gods.


    There were even gods who monopolized all the faith power of a singlerge nar world withoutmunication with the outside world. They dared to dere themselves Major Gods despite only being Sixth Grade. The Faen ne that Greem had once visited was one such case.


    It was fine if they were tiny pantheons in remote regions. However, should they open up their worlds and join the World of Gods, their arrogant, overstepping actions would immediately invite punishment and invasion from the other powerful pantheons.


    That was the reason why Faen ne¡¯s elven pantheon did not request aid from the outside world despite the prolonged invasion of the Pale Witches.


    Theseplex intricacies and knowledge of the god pantheons quickly shed through Greem¡¯s mind. It made him lose any faith in obtaining divine authority fragments during theing battle. At the same time, he couldn¡¯t help but feel fortunate that he had so easily obtained a divine authority fragment back in the World of Adepts.


    However, none of the orcs could understand the feelings of the Great Adepts.


    They were already beyond excited the moment they saw the Great Adepts.


    They could clearly see that countless narw chains still weighed down the Great Adepts and their souls. The energy level within the adepts¡¯ bodies had also been suppressed to an extremely low level.


    Strike while they were down!


    The five orcs roared and immediately lunged forward.


    These foolish idiots.


    Greem and the other Great Adepts couldn¡¯t help but curse in their minds. They did not want to fight with these ¡®broke¡¯ and ¡®poor¡¯ losers. However, the enemy was already rushing at them. They had to fight even if they didn¡¯t want to.


    The Great Adepts had no choice but to strike in response, their bellies filled with resentment.


    The enemy that Greem had chosen for himself was the beast tamer.


    Compared to the unstoppable edge of the sword saints, the wild barbarism of the beastsoul warriors, and theyered spellcasting abilities of the shamans, the beast tamers were probably the most average profession of them all!


    However, while Greem¡¯s belief was idealistic, the development of reality often deviated from one¡¯s imagination and expectations.


    This two-meter-tall orc, who wasn¡¯t even all that muscr, took out the dark green vine whip at his waist the moment he saw Greem.


    Crack! Crack! Crack!


    As heshed out with his long vine whip, space itself cracked. At the same time, the beast tamer chanted something in a deep and profoundnguage that Greem could not understand.


    The next second, a series of spatial ripples appeared in the air. Silver light shed as a dozen-meter-tall behemoth appeared.


    These were powerful war behemoths that the Orc Empire had specially reared and trained.


    When the one-meter-long soles of its feetnded on the ground, the earth itself quaked violently. Every part of its body was incredibly thick and muscr, and it had a bloodthirsty gleam to its red eyes.


    It had five-meter-wide shoulders with deltoid muscules that rose like tiny hills. The muscles hidden under all that hair could only be described with the word ¡®horrifying.¡¯ At the ends of its thick arms were hundred-inch long ws, each oneparable tonces used by the dragon knights of human kingdoms.


    The true terror of behemothsy in their ferocity and fearlessness!


    Behemoths were known as creatures without equal on thend. When fully grown, they could even hunt dragons of the same grade.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but feel a little dizzy.


    He had never expected that the first thing this inconspicuous beast tamer would do was summon such a ferocious and barbaric behemoth. Moreover, judging by the silver light glimmering around the behemoth, it was a deviant even amongst behemoths. It certainly possessed unusual and unknown powers.


    The behemoth stood on its hind legs the moment it was summoned and let out an intimidating battlecry. It crouched over and tackled Greem like a moving mountain.


    Before the behemoth even got close, its rumbling steps caused quakes to ripple across the earth. Dun Modr trembled from its movements.


    Greem charged into the air without any hesitation, flying a hundred meters into the air.


    Just as Greem believed himself to be safe, the dozen-meter-tall behemoth leaped and shed at Greem with its hundred-inch ws.


    Damn! How could such a heavy-looking beast jump so high!


    Greem appeared another hundred meters higher in the air with Fire Teleportation and barely dodged the behemoth¡¯s sharp ws.


    Szzzz!


    The air cracked and ruptured as space itself quivered.


    Ten shes lingered in the air at Greem¡¯s previous position, refusing to dissipate even after a long while.


    Dong!


    A tremendous impact sound could be heard.


    The behemothnded on the ground, smashing a hundred-meter-wide and ten-meter-deep crater into the earth. It only shook its head lightly before getting up from the hole as if entirely unharmed. It raised its front legs and roared at Greem, as if annoyed and trying to provoke its opponent into a fight.

 Chapter 1461 - Divine Beast Tamer

    <strong>Chapter 1461 Divine Beast Tamer</strong>


    Greem hovered high in the air.


    Since the battle had already started, he had no further intention of hiding his powers.


    However, he had only been in ne Gere for half an hour; the Chip¡¯s analysis of the narws was only at 0.13%. The amount of power that Greem was capable of unleashing within the nar world was only beginner Fourth Grade.


    Greem chuckled coldly in the face of the enemy¡¯s provocation.


    Behemoth? Uncontested ruler of thend? An idiot like you that can¡¯t even fly dares to challenge a Great Adept?


    Greem tried to draw on more of his power, but the nar suppression weighing on his body was too immense. The overwhelming magical fires had barely emerged from his body before they were shoved back in by the nar powers. He couldn¡¯t transform into his me giant form at all.


    He could only fight with this enemy before him using his weakest human form!


    Greem circled in the air continuously, dodging one giant boulder after the other. Meanwhile, the series of fireballs he cast were all swatted apart by the behemoth. None of them could reach the beast tamer at all.


    However, what made Greem somewhat worried was the fact that the beast tamer wasn¡¯t remaining idle. Instead, he waved his vine whip and started chanting again.


    He was still summoning.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be surprised and curious.


    Greem flew further up into the air until he was five hundred meters above the ground. He stood still, raised his arms, and started summoning a massive Meteor Shower.


    The behemoth might be able to shield the beast tamer from the single-target fireballs, but how was he supposed to stop this rain of meteors?


    Just as the Meteor Shower was about to rain down, the beast tamer flicked his whip. A crisp crack could be heard as space began trembling again.


    The next second, howling winds screeched above Greem¡¯s head. A golden w d in blinding lightning instantly appeared.


    Greem let out a battlecry as golden light rushed out from within him. It turned into a barrier that extended a meter away from his body.


    The golden w stabbed the barrier and caused it to creak loudly. The barrier dented inward and almost touched Greem¡¯s forehead. The lightning crackling around the w erupted into a storm of lightning that engulfed Greem¡¯s form.


    Having used the Tome of Corruption¡¯s principle defenses to defend against this unexpected enemy attack, Greem quickly suppressed the wild beating of his heart and gathered his fire principles in his eyes. They turned into two golden beams that sliced toward the w.


    In the next second came a haunting avian cry. The golden w was immediately retracted, dodging the beams before they could hit it. The owner of the w beat its wings and flew a hundred meters away, where it started to circle.


    It was only then, once the lightning faded away, that Greem could finally see the true face of his enemy.


    A thunder roc...it was a golden thunder roc!


    Thunder rocs were exceptionally fearsome magical beasts that naturally possessed powerful lightning abilities. They were only five meters tall when they stood straight, but their bodies were covered in golden feathers, and their wingspan was over seven meters wide.


    The primary means of attack for thunder rocs were their ws and long, curved beak, all as sharp as magical daggers. Lightning would streak across the surface of their feathers and crash toward the enemy in violent bolts as they attacked.


    Thunder rocs weren¡¯t the most powerful of Fourth Grade magical beasts, but with their incredible speed, fierce attacks, and apanying lightning damage, they were quite troublesome opponents indeed.


    ¡°Dammit!¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but curse now.


    The opponent had summoned two Fourth Grade magical beasts all at once. Moreover, both of these creatures were quite formidable fighters. Even Greem would be having difficulty dealing with them now.


    Ga!


    The thunder roc seemed to realize that Greem was no ordinary opponent. It pped its wings as it circled, keeping a sharp eye on the adept as it sent bolts of lightning shooting toward him.


    ¡°You think you are the only one who knows how to summon?¡± Greem¡¯s gaze turned murderous. He let out a shout, and the Tome of Corruption immediately started flipping, finally stopping on a specific page.


    A glowing green light rose from the Tome of Corruption. Arms and legs reached out from the ball of light and turned into the shape of a boy.


    ¡°Help me keep that thunder roc at bay!¡± Greem instructed Remi, and the Spirit of Pestilence simply giggled before erupting into smoke. When he appeared again, he was right next to the thunder roc.


    Remi inhaled and beat his chest. A breath of sickly green poison blew toward the thunder roc, prating the lightning barrier without resistance. The thunder roc refused to back down. It beat its wings wildly, and a torrent of electricity engulfed Remi instantly.


    Both sides had been injured in a single move!


    Ga!


    A piercing cry could be heard as the thunder roc quickly fled from the gue clouds. It had only been a moment, butrge tufts of feathers on the right side of its body had been worn away by the terrifying poison. It caused the roc¡¯s once majestic and beautiful right wing to turn bald, naked, and exposed.


    More concerningly, dark green spots now covered its right wing. It was obvious that the poison powers had seeped into its body.


    Having devoured the poison principle crystal, Spirit of Pestilence Remi had be a bonafide Fifth Grade artifact spirit. Hisbat power and poison lethality had increased by several times. Dealing with an intermediate Fourth Grade thunder roc was no problem at all.


    Even though the nar powers suppressed Remi¡¯s abilities, his basic attributes as a Fifth Grade were still far higher than a Fourth Grade thunder roc. It was an absolute dominance of power.


    The lightning attack that Remi had received in return only caused his green body to turn slightly dimmer. This much damage was almost instantly healed with a sh of light from the Tome of Corruption.


    The beast tamer clearly didn¡¯t expect Greem to have such a fearsome poison spirit at hismand. He was infuriated when he saw his beloved thunder roc injured so terribly. He quicklymanded the behemoth to leap into the air and attack Greem.


    Greem flickered through the air, dodging the behemoth¡¯s long w attacks while retaliating with violent fire spells of his own.


    Explosive Fireball, Meteor Shower, Doomsday Volcano, Scarlet Firestorm, Molten World, Fire Core Explosion, Ragnarok.


    One had to admit that fire magic was truly the strongest weapon on the battlefield!


    Fire¡¯s ability to spread and grow, in addition to the unique characteristics of the Undying mes, put every one of Greem¡¯s opponents in a worse position the longer they fought against him.


    Greem slowly set down his traps of fire around the beast tamer in no hurry at all.


    At this point, he had only shown the power of his Undying mes. He was still keeping Fire¡¯s Image a secret.


    He was waiting for a chance. A chance to deal a lethal strike!


    Should the beast tamer reveal any weakness, Greem would summon his three fire clones within the sea of fire below. They would use their most violent and savage attacks to kill the tamer on the spot.


    The battle raged on.


    The beast tamer was gradually starting to falter.


    The thunder roc he had summoned was not a match for Spirit of Pestilence Remi. And while the behemoth was fearless and seemingly invincible, it had no means of flying and, thus, could not attack the flying fire adept.


    As the battle dragged on, the beast tamer finally flew into a rage.


    No one knew what he did, but divine light burst forth from within him. He flicked his vine whip in one hand while gripping a curved dagger in the other. He charged straight into the air and prepared to engage Greem in a melee.


    Er...that was a good idea, but isn¡¯t that a little impulsive?


    It fully demonstrated that the beast tamer had lost his rationality after his extended and ineffectual offense. To think, he actually dreamed of relying on his superior orc Physique to overpower Greem.


    Greem was overjoyed. He prepared to activate Fire¡¯s Image and deal a devastating blow to the beast tamer. However, an unexpected discovery from the Chip¡¯s scan immediately caused him to go on alert.


    There was something wrong with that golden light!


    The beast tamer¡¯s body was d in a shroud of divine golden light. It seemed to be some sort of divine blessing.


    Upon detailed scanning and analysis by the Chip, Greem was horrified to find that the beast tamer¡¯s grade was silently and subtly increasing as he moved forward.


    Fifth Grade.


    The beast tamer had somehow risen to the level of Fifth Grade. Moreover, his power was rapidly increasing as his grade rose.


    Crack! Crack! Crack!


    The whip cracked several times in a row.


    The whip, made out of an unknown material, glowed with golden light. The cracking sound it made in the air was absolutely horrifying. Space itself shattered wherever the whip flicked. It left spatial cracks in the air, like ck spiderwebs reaching in every direction.


    The curved dagger the tamer held in his left hand radiated a frightening amount of divine power as well. Sharpening, Armor-Piercing, Rend, and other god-tier enchantments had turned an ordinary Fourth Grade dagger into a peak Fourth Grade artifact.


    The divine fluctuations it radiated suggested power enough to destroy the soul of a Great Adept. It caused Greem to feel nervous even from a distance.


    Goddammit! This beast tamer has called for his body to be possessed!


    Greem¡¯s immense archive of knowledge allowed him to understand what was happening instantly. He turned and fled without any hesitation.


    The projection of a Fifth Grade orc god, along with the foundations of a peak Fourth Grade beast tamer, was a formidable opponent. Greem might have been interested in a fight if he was at his peak. However, the analysis was notpleted yet, and he could only wield a fraction of his power at the moment. Going head-to-head against such a powerful enemy at this moment was deeply irresponsible to his own life.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Greem cast Fire Teleportation several times in session and escaped the pursuit of the beast tamer.


    His chain of Explosive Fireballs caused the golden light around the orc to tremble. While they couldn¡¯t break that divine shield, they effectively hindered the tamer¡¯s movement.


    The beast tamer was bing increasingly enraged.


    The whip in his handshed out faster and faster. It struck against the bodies of the silver behemoth and the thunder roc.


    An unsettling and tremendous change started to visibly ovee the Fourth Grade beasts!

 Chapter 1462 - Ultra-Grade Battle

    Chapter 1462 Ultra-Grade Battle


    Roar!


    The earth quaked and the rivers rumbled.


    The hair of the silver behemoth turned golden as it grew evenrger than before.


    The body of an elephant, the head of a lion, golden hair, and sharp ws. The golden beast¡¯s legs were four meters thick after the transformation. Its entire body radiated divine radiance. It was now able to step on empty air and charged toward Greem like a living mountain.


    Meanwhile, on the other side, electricity red around the thunder roc. The crackling currents flowed along its body as smaller sparks of fire and electricity flew in every direction. Bolts of golden lightning crashed down within a thousand meters of the thunder roc, electrocuting and scorching everything within sight.


    The sight of the lightning storm was so terrifying and intimidating that it almost seemed like the god of thunder had arrived.


    Meanwhile, a hint of a transcendent, noble power rippled within the body of the beast tamer. It was almost as if a god had descended onto his body and was coldly examining everything around him.


    Fifth Grade.


    He had somehow advanced to Fifth Grade and was now a beast tamer with the power of a god!


    Dammit! God Summoning.


    Greem gave up all thoughts of killing his opponent. Instead, he pivoted his strategy toward kiting, revolving around Fire Teleportation. He flew at high speeds while teleporting, hurling a storm of fire spells at the enemy between each teleportation.


    Unfortunately, the divine shield that emerged from the beast tamer¡¯s body blocked all of these attacks. There was nothing Greem could do about this either.


    Divine Shield and Divine Shockwave were the mostmon divine abilities that the gods possessed.


    It was a shield formed from divine power, which possessed the powerful ability to defend against all known forms of damage. It rendered a god immune to mental influence, poison, hypnosis, paralysis, concussion, and disease. It could also allow a god to be unaffected by any elementium magic.


    From the outside, the divine shield looked like a translucent eggshell.


    However, it was this thin barrier that blocked all of Greem¡¯s attacks. Even the Undying mes¡¯ principle effects could not seep through the shield, let alone the impact of ordinary fire.


    However, even with that imprable eggshell, the beast tamer still couldn¡¯t catch up with Greem¡¯s dancing silhouette. The profession of beast tamer primarily revolved around summoning beasts to do battle, after all. They had very few offensive or immobilizing divine magics while alsocking the necessary mobility.


    Being unable to approach Greem, all of the tamer¡¯s berserk power and unstoppable physical prowess was in vain. He couldn¡¯t harm Greem in the slightest.


    In his fury, the beast tamer could only crack his whip over and over,manding the golden behemoth and the thunder roc tounch a vicious attack against Greem.


    ............


    Greem¡¯s battle wasn¡¯t the only one raging around Dun Modr.


    Five orc powerhouses against five Great Adepts.


    Both sides had picked their opponents and were fighting in pairs. They were absolutely ravaging the surroundings of the city and turning everything upside down.


    Near the end, both parties fought with all they had; they could no longer care about the damage they were inflicting to the environment.


    The first ones to be unable to bear the harsh nar environment were the two Sixth Grade powerhouses.


    Great Adept Windstern casually tore apart the nar space and dove headfirst into space. The Sixth Grade orc powerhouse quickly followed with a scowl on his face.


    The two of them were no longer restrained in their powers once they were outside the ne¡¯s barrier. They both started fighting with the full might of their Sixth Grade powers. No one knew how the fight between them was going, but they could sense the apocalyptic destruction they were wreaking through the massive rift remaining in the sky.


    The waves of aftershocks from their battle blew out from the rift along with numerous spacestorms. Even the Fifth Grades engaged inbat had no choice but to flee from this disaster. Otherwise, if they were caught in one of those storms or aftershocks, their opponents might be able to grasp that opportunity to inflict a grievous wound.


    If we were to talk about the most ferocious individual in battle, it would have to be the Fifth Grade sword saint.


    After unleashing God Summoning, his power had risen exponentially from peak Fourth Grade to Fifth Grade. His unusually vicious and fearsome sword aura became several times more powerful. His attack range also increased to a shocking extent.


    With every slice of his sword, a concentrated pitch-ck sword aura that was as sharp as a spatial fragment cleaved through the horizon.


    Where the pitch-ck sword aura cut across, all substance instantly split into two!


    Even the disciplined and immortal forms of the body-refining adepts could not endure such fearsome sword aura, let alone an ordinary elementium shield. The one fighting against the sword saint was Catherine, the only female adept in the group and the only body-refining adept.


    Her plump figure bounced around as she flew through the air like a graceful pig. Herrge and heavy fists rushed forward in a barrage, the winds generated from her punches rippling through the air and dicing anything caught up in it to pieces.


    Every time the sword aura struck, Catherine would raise her head and let out a haunting moan of agony. When the sword aura that could slice everythingnded on Catherine, it only let out a dull thud, like metal against leather. Her unique Physique then absorbed the damage.


    Meanwhile, the sword saint was drifting between the storm of fists like a leaf, weaving back and forth while stepping from side to side. It was hard to capture his chaotic steps and phantom-like silhouette.


    The sword saint¡¯s sword aura and Catherine¡¯s fist winds.


    The two of them traded blows in this fashion, creating a tremendous uproar in the air.


    At a nce, their attacks didn¡¯t seem all that amazing. It looked just like two children toying around. There was no visible damage to eitherbatant at all. However, when a streak of wind or a piece of sword aura escaped from their duel, it instantly sted a hundred-meter-wide crater into the ground or left a thin, thousand-meter-long abyss in the earth.


    The two continued moving away as they fought in the air, slowly moving toward the horizon as they devastated everything around them.


    On another battlefield, the mouse-headed Adept Poya was also demonstrating his fearsome powers as a Great Adept.


    He was like an agile mole that could freely travel through the ground. By relying on the geography, he was able to avoid the beastsoul warrior¡¯s attack. He would then emerge abruptly from the ground and assail his opponent with an endless barrage of stone spears.


    The beastsoul warrior had nearly gone berserk from being toyed with. The form of a hundred-meter-tall magical beast appeared behind him. With the enhancement provided by this powerful beast soul, the orc warrior¡¯s every movement gained a hundred times the might of his own power.


    The color of the sky itself changed with every punch. The earth was torn apart with every stomp!


    However, crushing the surrounding mountains with his strength and ravaging the earth beyond recognition was insufficient to flush out Adept Poya. Instead, the warrior was still being struck by simple stone spears every so often, causing his divine shield to shake and tremble.


    In contrast, Bloodline Adept Tuncay appeared to be exceedingly courageous. He had transformed into a giant squid monster and was fighting with the orc shaman.


    Orc shamans could be ssified as elementium spellcasters. However, given the orc style ofbat, they often charged to the frontlines and engaged in meleebat anyway. The totems that the shaman casually cast all around glowed with lights of various colors. Whenever the squid monstrosity identally entered the light¡¯s radius, it would be instantly affected by all sorts of binding effects.


    Perhaps quicksand traps, or maybe bramblethorn ambushes. Sometimes rumbling ground or anti-gravity fields......every totem seemed to have its own unique and distinct powers that would catch an opponent off-guard.


    Apart from these binding and immobilizing effects, there were also many strange elementium effects. Even though the offensive power of these magical attacks was inferiorpared to the principle adepts, the hint of divine power contained within them was enough to break through principle defenses and inflict damage to a Great Adept.


    The battle between the orcs and the Great Adepts shook the world itself and instilled fear into the hearts of anyone witnessing it.


    The adepts invading ne Gere quickly hid inside Dun Modr and activated arge magical array. They relied on theirbined power to endure the aftershocks of the battle.


    Some of the lower-grade adepts witnessing an ultra-grade battle for the first time went ck-jawed in awe. It was like watching an unimaginable fantasy. They shivered in fright as they hid within the barrier.


    It was the first time they had experienced the horror of ultra-grade creatures!


    ............


    Greem was secretly scanning the entire battlefield as he fought the beast tamer.


    The Chip was collecting the data of every orc fighter and Great Adept!


    Judging by the current situation alone, the orcs were holding the absolute initiative. They were practically ruling the entire battlefield. Meanwhile, all the Great Adepts they were fighting were barely breaking even. They were only surviving by avoiding direct exchanges.


    The reason for this situation was due to the fact that the orcs were natives.


    The peak Fourth Grade orcs werepatible with ne Gere and could unleash a hundred percent of their power. In addition to the nar consciousness¡¯ blessing and the enhancement from the God Summoning, theirbat power after rising to Fifth Grade had increased exponentially.


    Inparison, the Great Adepts were in dire straits!


    They had just descended on this world and could not break free of the nar suppression on their bodies and souls. Every single one of the Great Adepts was basically fighting against an opponent of the same grade at their prime, while having an arm and a leg tied up. It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how dangerous and terrifying the situation was for them.


    If it weren¡¯t for the fact that all the Great Adepts present today were individuals with tremendous fighting power, casualties would already have urred!


    Naturally, Greem wouldn¡¯t show all his cards under such circumstances.


    Due to the nar suppression, he could not transform into his me giant form. Greem could only continue fighting with the enemy in his weakest human form.


    Furthermore, he still had two aces up his sleeves: Fire¡¯s Image and the Devouring Fish transformation. He did not want to reveal any of these aces unless it was absolutely unavoidable.

 Chapter 1463 - The First Battle Concludes

    Chapter 1463 The First Battle Concludes


    Since Great Adept Windstern had no intention of using the Taintroot Water, the battle today was not fated to be in the Great Adepts¡¯ favor.


    After a long time in battle, Tuncay¨Cthe adept who had transformed into a squid monstrosity¨Ccould no longer bear the ne¡¯s suppression. Both he and his opponent dove beyond the nar barrier. The other two pairs ofbatants quickly followed suit and shifted the battle to space.


    Greem hesitated for a moment but did not flee from the nar world like the rest of them.


    First, while the beast tamer was difficult to deal with, he wasn¡¯t so challenging that he had no choice but to transform. Second, the adept they were supposed to protect on this mission was still in the camp behind them. If everyone left and another orc powerhouse arrived, this mission would be finished.


    That was why Greem didn¡¯t stray too far. Greem led the beast tamer and his two Fifth Grade beasts along as he circled around Dun Modr. It seemed like their battle was tearing the skies and earth apart, but there was no real danger in truth. No significant damage had been inflicted on either party.


    Greem was secretly scanning for the opponent¡¯s true power while they fought. Judging by the information obtained by the Chip, the beast tamer¡¯s power was undergoing a slow regression.


    After all, the beast tamer was not the same as Greem.


    Greem was a bonafide Fifth Grade Great Adept, only forced into such dire straits by the nar suppression. Meanwhile, the beast tamer was fundamentally a peak Fourth Grade orc powerhouse. He had only managed to temporarily advance to Fifth Grade with the power projected through the God Summoning.


    Wielding Fifth Grade power with a Fourth Grade body exerted terrible exhaustion upon an individual, even with the protection of divine power. After an entire day and night of fighting, the beast tamer was starting to falter.


    Of course, it wasn¡¯t ack ofbat power on the part of the beast god who had possessed him. Rather, it was that the body of the host¨Cthe beast tamer himself¨Cthat was starting to copse.


    Just then, ripples appeared on the nar barrier as several spatial rifts tore open. The orcs and adepts who had fled to space for a battle had returned. However,pared to before, they were in far worse condition. Blood and injuries covered their entire bodies.


    They couldn¡¯t heal these wounds with their power. That was enough evidence to suggest that their injuries were grievous or that a foreign energy lingered on their wounds. These were the only conditions by which such obvious wounds could be left on their bodies.


    Both sides had clearly reached their limits. The energy reserves within their bodies had fallen to a hazardous level. However, neither side intended to sacrifice themselves to take down their enemy. As such, they could only call a truce and wait for a better opportunity to fight in the future.


    The five orcs had arrived in high spirits, but they had nothing to show for it after all that fighting; they could only walk away resentfully. The Great Adepts exchanged looks but said nothing. They chose to return to Dun Modr to rest and recuperate.


    Sixth Grade Great Adept Windstern seemed to have fought a pretty vicious fight. Over one-third of his body of smoke was missing. However, the orc powerhouse he had been fighting didn¡¯t go untouched either. ck smoke lingered around the countless wounds on his body. The orc couldn¡¯t heal the wounds through his power at all.


    Of the Fifth Grade adepts, the most badly injured appeared to be Bloodline Adept Tuncay. The majority of his tentacles appeared to have been severed by the enemy. Thick ck mist spewed forth from the stumps, making his form a sorry sight.


    Upon seeing the Great Adepts return ¡®victorious,¡¯ the adepts of Dun Modr rushed out hastily to wee them. They arranged clean rooms in which the Great Adepts could rest.


    To help mend the Great Adepts¡¯ wounds,rge groups of healing adepts gathered together to use every means possible to expel the foreign energy lingering in their injuries. The orcs¡¯ attacks contained terrifying beast god divine-power. Dispelling this divine power was an exceedingly difficult task, and the Great Adepts suffered greatly through this process.


    Fortunately, the orcs weren¡¯t in much better condition.


    After this battle, the adepts would not have to worry about ultra-gradebatants appearing on the enemy¡¯s side for a few weeks at the minimum!


    Perhaps because of this guarantee on the part of Great Adept Windstern, Dun Modr instantly bustled with life again.


    Large groups of adept forces teleported over from the various lesser nes. They rushed out of Dun Modr and started assaulting orc cities all across ne Gere under Commander Melora¡¯smand.


    For a moment, the smoke and fires of war rose over ne Gere once more as every region fell into deep, bloody battle once again!


    Greem and the other Great Adepts couldn¡¯t be concerned about the adepts¡¯ strategy for conquering ne Gere.


    These things were all nned and put into action by Melora and the other leaders of the army. The Great Adepts were only responsible for holding the backline and ensuring that the orcs¡¯ ultra-grade forces didn¡¯t attack the invading force.


    While hispanions were recovering in the city, Greem leisurely ran around exploring the more famous ¡®ancient ruins¡¯ and ¡®forbiddennds¡¯ of ne Gere.


    Of course, for a Fifth Grade Great Adept like Greem, it was nearly impossible to find anything within a nar world that could actually threaten him with death. The more dangerous the ce was rumored to be, the more excited and curious Greem became.


    ............


    ne Gere, the Sacred Dragon Valley.


    It was a pleasant afternoon, where the warm sun shone high above.


    The usually peaceful and quiet Sacred Dragon Valley was suddenly bustling withmotion.


    Arge group of wyverns arrived from the east, cutting across five thousand kilometers of distance and the Bismarck Mountains before descending at the valley entrance.


    The group wasposed of a hundred wyverns, with two adepts riding on each wyvern¡¯s back. At a rough count, there were over two hundred adepts in this army alone. They could be considered a formidable military force.


    The leader of the army reined in the wyvern king he rode upon. He was holding a crude map drawn on parchment in front of him. He quicklypared the geography and markings on the map to the scenery in front of him; a smile shed across his face.


    He turned around hastily and said, ¡°My lord, we¡¯ve arrived. This is the legendary Sacred Dragon Valley!¡±


    The leader was a Fourth Grade body-refining adept who wore adept robes but carried a pair of strange copper hammers on his back. The many years of body refinement made his body carry an oppressive aura of bloodthirst naturally. However, no matter how murderous his aura was, he had to be very careful near this fearsome individual before him. He didn¡¯t even dare to breathe too loud.


    After all, he had personally witnessed the terrifying prowess of this man!


    ¡°Oh? We¡¯re here already?¡± Greem, who had been meditating with his eyes shut all this while, opened them and looked down. When he saw the low valley hidden within the woods, his expression loosened as well. ¡°Since we¡¯re here, let¡¯s go down and make camp for a bit! We will enter the valley soon.¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    The leader acknowledged the order before turning around and shouting, ¡°Descend and prepare to make camp!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    Affirmations rang out all around him.


    The wyverns reared their necks and roared before beating their wings, pushing apart the canopy of the ancient forest and finding a clearing in the woods tond.


    Wild wyverns were First Grade magical beasts when fully grown. Its individual offensive power wascking, but its strong jaw, terrible venom,mendable mobility, and tendency to live in flocks made them one of the most challenging creatures to deal with.


    Meanwhile, these wyverns had all undergone bloodline modtion by high-grade adepts. Their basicbat power had been increased from First Grade to Second Grade. Meanwhile, the wyvern king had a skeletal crown growing on top of its skull. It was intermediate Third Grade.


    That much power was enough to make it a regional ruler in most forests!


    In this army, it was only an enved mount of the adepts. Its status was not much higher than those unintelligent voodoo beasts.


    In particr, it was currently carrying an absolutely horrifying Great Adept on its back. It was incredibly fearful of even thinking any rebellious thoughts.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    As the wyvernsnded one by one, the dead leaves and branches on the ground blew into the air by the wyverns¡¯ wings. The entire forest appeared to be crowded as these creaturesnded.


    Elite adepts leaped off of the wyverns and formed scouting parties to investigate their surroundings. The adepts remaining in the clearing summoned voodoo beasts and golems to level the ground and fell the surrounding trees. They were going to make preparations for a few days of camping here.


    By the time the leadernded in the clearing with his wyvern king, the ce was already starting to look like a camp.


    Those who were leveling the ground were leveling the ground, those setting up camps were setting up camps, those finding water sources were searching with all they had, and those preparing food were bent over their pots and pans; everything was so orderly and perfectly organized.


    There wasn¡¯t even a need for orders from the leader. The elite adepts were already searching toward the depths of Sacred Dragon Valley in preparation for their uing expedition.


    The wyvern king crouched gently and created a small stair with its wings and head, allowing Greem to walk to the ground easily.


    ¡°My lord, rest here in the camp for a moment and have some food. I¡¯m sure the scouting party will return with useful information very soon,¡± The leader apanied Greem attentively and cautiously gave a suggestion.


    It might be the Great Adept¡¯s private expedition, but I could surely obtain decent rewards if I can establish good rtions with him.


    The leader almost couldn¡¯t help but break out into a smile at the thought of this!

 Chapter 1464 - Tomb of the Dragons

    Chapter 1464 Tomb of the Dragons


    A silent valley in the middle of a vast mountain range.


    The trees in the forest wererge and ancient, their broad canopies easily measuring several hundred square meters wide. Tall mountains and vast forests were everywhere. Ravines were strewn about the valley. The songs of birds and the calls of insects never stopped.


    In all honesty, if this were the first time setting eyes upon this scenery, you would have a hard time believing that this was the most infamous forbiddennd of death in ne Gere.


    Sacred Dragon Valley. The forbiddennd that was rumored to be the tomb of dragons¨C the Sacred Dragon Valley!


    A party of five adepts was making its way through the dense forest with much difficulty.


    The individual in charge of leading the way was a Second Grade body-refining adept known as Ernst. He held two long, sharp magical knives in his hands. With every swing of these knives, the brush and the bloodsucking vines creeping across the ground were sliced into pieces. mes extended from the des and burned everything down until a path appeared.


    The magical nts hidden among the bushes were revealed once the fire had done its job. These nts hastily uprooted themselves and attempted to shuffle away. Unfortunately, their movements were too slow. Ernst¡¯s terrifying feet, heavier than a boulder and tougher than stone, crashed down upon them before they could even leave the ashes behind.


    Squeeee!


    The death throes of magical nts echoed throughout the forest. These screams that urred on the mental level spread far and wide and were quickly greeted with a response from nearby nts.


    Perhaps sensing how formidable these invaders were, the man-eating flowers, bloodsucking vines, and soulcatching herbs hidden within the bushes and brambles started to flee as quickly as they could, avoiding the path of the adepts entirely.


    The party¡¯s Third Grade leader betrayed an expression of disgust when he heard the rustling sound of uprooted earth and fleeing nts all around him.


    ¡°As expected of a forbiddennd. To think there were so many magical lifeforms hiding here! Hmph! Ernst, no need to hold back against these magical bastards,¡± Having said that, the leader of the adepts turned around and asked in a soft voice, ¡°Sina, did you discover anything?¡±


    Sina was the only female adept in the party. She was also the only psionic.


    She wore a tight moon-white robe. A wide belt fastened the robe to her body, making her waist appear slim and emphasizing her curves. Compared to the other adepts, Sina¡¯s skin was smooth and white. Silver hair cascaded down her shoulders, and a crystal was embedded in her forehead.


    ¡°The east...walked toward the cliff there. I can sense it. The aura of death there is much stronger than everywhere else!¡±


    Psionics specialized in mental magic. Naturally, their Spirit also tended to be the most powerful and sensitive. They could often discover abnormalities in ces where others would gloss over.


    Given theck of a diviner in the party, psionics could function as human radars using their powerful Spirit.


    ¡°You all heard that! Toward the cliff.¡±


    With that order from the party leader, the adepts continued forward and slowly approached the thousand-meter-tall cliff hidden in the depths of the forest.


    The geography here was very unusual indeed. First, you had nearly fifty kilometers of nothing but londs. Then, you woulde across a gentle slope. Finally, at the very end of the forest, you would find a thousand-meter cliff. The surface of the cliff was incredibly t as if a knife had cut it. All sorts of green vines and unusual flowers grew across the rocky surface. Meanwhile, there was a snowy peak at the very top of it.


    It was a beautiful and charming sight. The ancient trees all around were green and full of life. It was difficult to associate such beauty with the terrifying Sacred Dragon Valley.


    However, behind all this beauty, Sina could sense a persistent and sinister aura lingering around the party.


    ¡°Hmph! Parlor tricks...show yourself!¡±


    As the party approached the cliff, there was a cold gleam in Sina¡¯s eyes. The crystal on her forehead suddenly glowed with blinding light. It shot a beam of light toward a towering tree beside the party.


    Aaaaaah!


    A scream that urred solely on the mental level echoed in everyone¡¯s mind.


    The next second, the earth rumbled and dirt fell apart as the gigantic tree uprooted itself. Numerous thick rootsshed out from underground and started moving.


    The bark that had been hit by the white light started to peel off in chunks, revealing an absolutely horrifying side.


    If you peeled off the bark of an ordinary tree, you would only find wood and fiber beneath. When the bark of this withered tree broke apart, it was ck, rotten blood that came pouring forth. If you were to look into the tree through the opening, you would see a horde of squirming corpses.


    To think that the interior of this massive tree, measuring dozens of meters in height, was filled with corpses soaked in blood!


    Perhaps sensing that it had been exposed, the treemenced moving its body, creaking as its countless branches and vines wrapped together into a massive hand. The hand crashed down toward Ernst.


    At the same time, countless other ancient trees began trembling and moving in the surrounding woods. It was a terrible sight, watching as numerous looming figures uprooted themselves all over the forest.


    ¡°We¡¯ve fallen into the enemy¡¯s ambush! Assume defensive formation immediately!¡± The party leader shouted out loud immediately. Intense elementium light shone around him as he said, ¡°Sina, report our position to the camp and request reinforcements. Everyone else, prepare for battle!¡±


    The next second, the sound of elementium explosions rang out throughout the forest!


    ............


    The camp in the clearing, just a few kilometers away.


    Fourth Grade Adept Callum, who led this entire expedition, twisted the snake-eye ring on his little finger and concludedmunications with someone in the distance.


    He quickly called for ten elite adepts to reinforce the ambushed unit before turning to the resting Greem and speaking in a soft voice, ¡°My lord, the forward unit hase across the enemy¡¯s guards. We should be able to find the dragon tombs soon.¡±


    ¡°Mm, very well!¡± Greem nodded imperceptibly, but continued to rest with his eyes closed.


    With the Chip¡¯s iparable calction abilities, Greem had managed to analyze the narws here to a great extent. From now on, he would no longer be affected by the nar suppression.


    Though he would still be affected when he drew upon power above peak Fourth Grade, it was still much better than before.


    At the very least, Greem now possessed the ability to defend himself while within ne Gere.


    Even if multiple enemies attacked him and victory was impossible, he would have no problem escaping unscathed.


    It was because of this additionalyer of protection he had obtained that Greem had thought of going on this expedition in the lull between the fighting. He intended to plunder as much as he could inside ne Gere.


    Given his current status and identity, he could no longer explore alone like he always had in the past. Melora, the Commander-in-Charge of Dun Modr, assigned an elite adept force to Greem without hesitation. He was free to use this army as he wished.


    And thus, he had the current situation: Greem sitting silently in the camp awaiting news while numerous underlings ventured forth and searched for the Sacred Dragon Valley.


    The information that Greem had obtained indicated that Sacred Dragon Valley was little more than an ancient dragon¡¯s tomb!


    It seemed like some ancient dragons used to live in ne Gere a long time ago. However, as the orcs slowly gained total dominance over the ne, the dragons could no longer bear their constant harassment; they were forced to migrate from ne Gere.


    However, there was no way they could take the dragons¡¯ tomb¨Cwith the remains of generations of dragons buried underground¨Cwith them. They had no choice but to simply seal the tomb within Sacred Dragon Valley. As thousands of years passed by, a fearsome dracolich somehow emerged from Sacred Dragon Valley. That dracolich rapidly became one of the most infamous powerhouses of ne Gere.


    There might only be this one peak Fourth Grade dracolich in the tomb of the dragons, but it alone had managed to repel the orcs numerous times by relying on the tomb¡¯s traps and guards.


    If there were still living dragons in Sacred Dragon Valley, the orcs would never let this tomb filled with treasures slip by. However, if it was only a bunch of undead dragons, the orc barely had any interest.


    ne Gere did not have the exceptional alchemy techniques of the World of Adepts. They could not craft dragon bones and dragon crystals into powerful equipment. There were only warriors in the empire with brawns for brains. How were there supposed to process all that bone with their limited ability?


    Because of this, the dragon¡¯s tomb, located in a rural and remote region, had survived.


    This ce that the orcs were not interested in was no less than a treasure trove for an adept like Greem. That was why Greem had hurried here the moment he heard of this ce.


    ¡°Squad Five has made contact with the guards outside the tomb.¡±


    ¡°Squad One and Squad Four have arrived on location and are helping.¡±


    ¡°The elite squad has also arrived at the battlefield and are now sweeping up the defenders.¡±


    ¡°Squad Two has made it past the defensive line and has discovered the underground entrance into the dragon¡¯s tomb.¡±


    ¡°Adept Derrick has led three of his subordinates into the passageway. They are now clearing out the traps inside.¡±


    ¡°A Third Grade dragonwraith has appeared in the passage. The battle at the frontlines is exceedingly intense.¡±


    ¡°Urgent message! Urgent message! Arge group of high-grade tomb guardians has appeared on the frontlines. Request reinforcements of elite adepts.¡±


    Tomb guardians?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but open his eyes when he heard this. Joy shed across his face.


    If even tomb guardians had appeared, that meant the dragon¡¯s tomb that the adepts had discovered was the real thing!


    ¡°Let¡¯s go! Bring everyone. We will crush this dragon¡¯s tomb in one fell swoop and leave as quickly as possible. Better to leave than stay until the orcs catch wind of this!¡± Light shed in Greem¡¯s hand as the Tome of Corruption silently appeared.


    ¡°Remi, to the frontlines!¡±


    ¡°Understood!¡±


    Remi, the Spirit of Pestilence, flickered and silently headed toward the frontlines of the fighting.

 Chapter 1465 - Devastation

    Chapter 1465 Devastation


    By the time Greem arrived at the battlefield, the fighting was already over.


    Rotten trees and a dozen times the number of voodoo beast corpsesy strewn across the vast forest. Most of the bodies had been shredded to pieces or smashed into indistinguishable messes of flesh and blood.


    The battlefield had been roughed up. You could see odd-shaped corpses and signs of elementium devastation everywhere.


    Greem wore a skin-tight leather suit. An intricate cloak decorated with purple and ck patterns wrapped around him. Two strands of his dark red hair fluttered outside his hood, making him appear all the more handsome and dashing.


    Greem stepped upon the scorched and smoldering earth as he walked across the battlefield.


    He walked for another few kilometers and finally saw arge cave under the cliff, hidden under dense foliage and vines.


    It was a dark and lightless cave.


    The passage into the tomb extended downward at a slope. At a single nce, it was impossible to see where it ended.


    The adepts walking at the very front had already put up illumination stones on both walls of the passage. The soft white light dispelled the darkness and illuminated every inch of ground at their feet.


    Along the way, you could see terrifying remnants left behind by detonated magical traps. The adepts¡¯ steps rustled as they walked. The ground was covered not only in dust and sand, but also plenty of white bone dust.


    Soon, Greem arrived at a small cave.


    This room was somewhatrger than the passage before. As such, a lot of other things could also be seen. There were iplete pieces of dragon skeletons, as well as evenrger pieces.


    Everywhere, remnants of a bitter battle could be observed on the ground and walls. Several Third Grade bone dragons had already been torn into pieces by the vanguard force and scattered all over.


    Greem even saw apletely dissolved skeleton in a corner of the room. The skeleton was soaking in a puddle of viscous and pungent green liquid, slowly being corroded and eaten away.


    Judging by the skeleton¡¯s appearance and how the bone dragon had been disposed of, this was the work of Remi!


    Greem casually picked up a thick, one-meter-long bone. Blue light from the Chip shed in his eyes, and he was able to obtain the bone dragon¡¯s attributes.


    [Beep. Third right-rib of a low-grade bone dragon.


    Hardness: Second Grade.


    Flexibility: First Grade.


    Magic Resistance: Second Grade.


    Elementium Density: First Grade.


    Initial estimates suggest that the bone dragon was a Second Grade White Dragon in life. The dragon likely had low intelligence, and its breath was likely a frost breath.


    [Furthermore, the technique used in crafting the bone dragon is extremely simple and crude. The craftsmanship is at the level of an apprentice. Due to imperfections in the craftsmanship, the bone dragon lost all of its magical abilities from life. Over 40% of its formerbat power was also lost.]


    Er, it seemed like the Chip¡¯s appraisal of the dracolich¡¯s craftsmanship was pretty poor!


    It made sense too.


    An isted dracolich without a source of new knowledge would have to start from scratch. It would have to investigate, experiment, and attempt everything by itself with no external aid. It was only understandable given the circumstances.


    Greem casually tossed aside the bone and led his elite subordinates to the end of the cave. Three identical passages were arranged in a row here, and three strange runes were written with bones on top of the passages.


    A young adept was stationed in front of the entrances. He hastily came over and paid his respects when he saw Greem arrive.


    ¡°Have they gone in already? How¡¯s the exploration going?¡± Greem asked casually.


    ¡°My lord, Lord Remi took the middle path, while Adept Garr took the left path. Adept Tasir took the right path. We have not received a report from any of them yet!¡± The young adept replied respectfully. The adept¡¯s face had flushed red at being able to talk with an ultra-grade Great Adept in person. It was apparent he was incredibly excited.


    Greem nced at the passages. A powerful spiritual fluctuation rippled outward and instantly filled all three of the passages. It was searing hot, restless, faintly berserk, and seeped with a distant hint of pride and nobility. That was how his Spirit felt!


    His Spirit ignored the walls and the presence of any defensive forcefields. It transmitted throughout the passages like an overwhelming flood and directly passed by the other adept parties, who were making slow progress forward.


    The massive magical restrictions there were triggered, and a cold, deste spiritual flux erupted, forcefully stopping Greem¡¯s Spirit in its tracks.


    ¡°I don¡¯t care where you are from, guest from another world. Please, leave! This is the tomb of dragons, where the ancient dragons rest. None other than dragons are allowed to visit...whatever your intentions, please turn back!¡±


    Two powerful and massive spiritual consciousnesses shed within the tomb. The conflict¡¯s tremendous force had nowhere to go and spread out through the walls, causing the entire ce to tremble and dust to fall from above.


    ¡°Leave? Heh, I will naturally leave once I¡¯ve stripped this ce empty. However, when I leave, I do hope you, sir, will be willing to follow me. I am quitecking in capable subordinates at the moment, and you seem suited to serve me,¡± Greemughed as he strode into the winding corridors.


    Seemingly provoked by Greem¡¯s arrogance, the deste Spirit consciousness let out a roar. It had gathered all of its Spirit power and lunged at Greem.


    ¡°Hmph! You dare!¡± Greem grunted furiously as his searing will erupted without restraint, crashing right into the approaching consciousness.


    Dong!


    An intangible shockwave rippled out on the spiritual level, enveloping every adept and living being within the tomb. No matter where they were, no matter what their grades was, their bodies trembled and their Spirits shook when the spiritual ripple reached them. Blood streaked down from their eyes, noses, and ears.


    Some of the adepts below Second Grade even fell unconscious on the spot!


    Even the Fourth Grade adept following behind Greem had to grit his teeth to endure that unbearable spiritual shockwave.


    ¡°Fifth...Fifth Grade. You¡¯re...Fifth Grade?¡± Naturally, with this kind of unrestrained spiritual sh, it was always the weaker one that suffered. Greem¡¯s Spirit was already so strong and concentrated that it could manifest in actuality. How could a peak Fourth Grade dracolich hiding in a remote corner of the world possiblypare to such power?


    It was at this moment that the dracolich finally felt Greem¡¯s true power in its entirety.


    Fifth Grade...to think the invader was a Fifth Grade Great Adept!


    No matter how much the dracolich regretted its actions right now, Greem simply continued walking toward the depths of the tomb.


    The dracolich¡¯s hoarse voice did not die down. A short momentter, its voice could be heard again. ¡°Who are you, bastard? Get out of the dragon¡¯s tomb.¡±


    A few loud disruptions could be heard in the mental message, and the dracolich¡¯s spiritual fluctuation suddenly weakened. It then screamed, ¡°Impossible! How is even your contracted servant a Fifth Grade...I¡¯ll kill you!¡±


    The spiritual flux ended abruptly here, reced with Remi¡¯s sinister mental message.


    ¡°Master, I¡¯ve beaten down the dracolich. You had better hurry over to take a look!¡±


    Oh? If this dracolich could pique Remi¡¯s curiosity, it was certainly no ordinary creature. Greem hastily rushed over to the depths of the tomb out of curiosity.


    Greem passed through a strange gray barrier and arrived within an alternate dimension independent from ne Gere.


    This ce was the true dragon¡¯s tomb!


    The sky was gray within this massive space and filled with the cold and sinister aura of death. The ground was ck and the earth saturated with death energy, turning the whole world into a ce of death.


    If you took the earth here and spread it in any other grave, the corpses there would slowly transform into high-grade undead.


    Hundreds of dragon skeletons were scattered all over the ce.


    The size of these skeletons varied. Some were only a dozen meters long, while others were as massive as mountains, stretching far into the distance and out of sight. They might be of different tribes, but their corpses and souls had been buried here in death.


    That was why the death energy here was so wild and intense that it rendered even Greem speechless!


    Perhaps sensing the appearance of a living being, the death energy within the tomb began to grow restless. Clouds of gray mist asionally transformed into the appearance of a raging dragon, which would release chilling dragon roars.


    The entire tomb seemed to have turned alive with Greem¡¯s appearance!


    A dracolich crouched in the center of the tomb atop a square bone altar, seemingly bent over in pain. Its tattered and rotten bones had cracked, and several joints were covered in a slimy green liquid, causing it to be unable to move at all.


    The dracolich was still struggling within the green mist. However, it could not escape the strange creature sitting on top of it¨C Remi, the Spirit of Pestilence.


    Was this the dracolich that had shed directly with his Spirit earlier?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but take a few more interested nces at the dracolich.


    It was a pureblood dracolich!


    From its appearance alone, the dracolich looked like a giant lizard standing upright. Its curved spine made it only two meters tall in height, and it had a dark bone tail dragging along the ground. Its skull was hidden in the mist, making it difficult to see its true face.


    Dracoliches were powerful spellcasters whose physical ability had regressed in exchange for amplified Spirit.


    Unlike ordinary liches, dracoliches were mostly made of dragon bones. Consequently, they retained much of the dragon magic that they possessed in life. Even though their undead body could not actually wield Dragontongue magic, it still allowed the dracolich to master most dark magic through its own power.


    Curse magic, death magic, shadow magic- as long as it was a type of magic powered by negative energy, the dracolich could easily wield or master it!


    Unfortunately, this unusually powerful high-grade undead dragon had now be Greem¡¯s prisoner. It no longer had hopes of escaping.

 Chapter 1466 - Mysterious Light Array

    <h4>Chapter 1466 Mysterious Light Array</h4>


    The massive dragon¡¯s tomb had now beenpletely taken up by the adepts who had crowded in.


    A few skirmishes were still urring on the outside.


    These tomb guardians and dragonwraiths that had just awakened might be lofty, invincible existences to an ordinary graverobber, but they were little more than undead hindrances for the well-prepared elite adepts.


    Soulcatcher, Bind Spirit, Anti-Undead Barrier, Anti-Magic Forcefield, Protection From Evil- as elites, these adepts had plenty of methods with which to deal with these unintelligent antiques that had been sleeping for the past thousands of years.


    If all these special measures were ineffective, they could simply top it up with their ordinary spells and finish the job. However, for the sake of maximizing their profits, none of the adepts would ever obliterate these guardians or turn them into tiny pieces. After all, their valuable body parts were equivalent to mountains of magical crystals.


    Greem was savoring the main course, and these adepts that had followed him here naturally got to enjoy whatever he left behind for them.


    The scale of this dragon¡¯s tomb was quite impressive.


    This space had a radius of around a dozen kilometers, and several hundred dragon skeletons had been buried here.


    Some of the skeletons were only half-buried, their bones showing signs of corrosion from the passage of time. Other skeletons had merged entirely with the rocks and boulders, turning a white-gray color. However, without exception, their skeletons all radiated incredibly dense death energy within this mysterious space.


    The tomb guardians formed from their bones, and the dragonwraiths formed from their souls became the main obstacle to the adepts¡¯ looting.


    The adepts took out Soulcatching Wands and Spiritbinding Scrolls in a practiced fashion and quickly bound all the dragonwraiths in elementium chains. They then carefully ced these dragonwraiths into soul crystals or soul jars.


    Meanwhile, the rampaging tomb guardians could only be knocked apart by the body-refining adepts or rendered inactive by the numerousyers of Anti-Undead Barriers and Anti-Magic Fields. Every time a tomb guardian fell apart, the adepts would break out in loud cheering. They would quickly pick up and put away the high-grade dragon bones left behind.


    Greem left the adepts to collect their spoils while he and Remi circled the small, ten-meter wide dragonbone altar and evaluated it.


    For some reason, Greem had a strange, restless feeling in his heart. It was almost as if he had forgotten something important.


    As a Great Adept, there was almost no chance his senses were off. If he was feeling or sensing something, it meant that something harmful and inauspicious was almost definitely brewing right beyond his immediate knowledge. However, Greem had not practiced divination and could not ascertain the source of this unknown danger.


    Whatever this impending cmity was, it was definitely triggered by the exploration of the dragon tomb. The dracolich was undoubtedly responsible to some extent!


    Greem picked up the dracolich, whose limbs had almost fallen off from Remi¡¯s poison. He stared right into the dracolich¡¯s ghostly green eyes and warned sternly, ¡°Brat, don¡¯t try anything funny, or I¡¯ll¡ª¡±


    Greem¡¯s voice came to an abrupt halt before he could finish. A warning from the Chip rang out in his mind.


    [Beep. Detecting faith beacon deep within the target creature¡¯s soul.]


    A faith beacon?


    Greem¡¯s thoughts moved, and information regarding the subject quickly flooded his mind.


    Faith beacons were a unique means of spatial coordination. It was also a mark by which a god traced their devout followers. Through a faith beacon, a god would be able to sense the condition of their believer across trillions of kilometers.


    If the believer were to die unexpectedly, the faith beacon would automatically turn into a faith channel and transport the believer¡¯s soul to the god kingdom.


    It was an automated process that could not be interfered with!


    If anyone attempted to withhold the believer¡¯s soul, they would quickly draw that god¡¯s attention.


    Under ordinary circumstances, no one would offend those powerful gods just for the soul of a measly believer. However, there were many times where killing an individual and extinguishing their soul was a necessity, out of consideration of concealing certain secrets.


    Even though Greem had no intention of killing this dracolich to seal its mouth, he was still surprised by the fact that it had a faith beacon within its soul. It was almost unimaginable.


    After all, dracoliches were existences that were firmly beyond the realm of the living; they were bonafide undead beings. Such taboos were strictly forbidden, even amongst the dragons.


    Under ordinary circumstances,rge dragon tombs were managed and protected by specially appointed dragons. There would also be corresponding dragon magic set up within the graves to prevent the appearance of undead dragons. Undead dragons like dracoliches and tomb guardians would only ever appear in neglected and abandoned dragon tombs.


    If a dracolich had risen from this dragon tomb, then the ce had definitely been abandoned by the dragons. However, if that was the case, how was the faith beacon inside the soul of this dracolich to be exined?


    Would the dragons ever be willing to ept the faith power of an undead dragon?


    Peculiar, wicked, and absolutely inexplicable.


    ¡°Evil adept, prepare to suffer the rage of the dragons! Cinquera will never forgive you,¡± The dracolich might have lost all ability to resist, but it continued to stare with its ghostly green eyes as it cursed. The name that it brought up caused Greem to pause for an instant.


    Cinquera...what a familiar name! Right, that was the name of the female dragon who was a loyal follower of Night Dragon Faluzure. She was an infamous evil dragon throughout the multiverse.


    If she were the dragon backing this dracolich, then it would exin everything!


    While Greem was engrossed in thought, an emergency warning came from the Chip.


    [Beep. Detecting abnormal location signal...Signal source: the dragonbone altar!]


    What?


    Greem¡¯s heart tightened when he heard this. He raised his right hand, instantly gathering tremendous fire energy and smashing it down upon the small altar.


    A crunch could be heard as the dragonbone altar copsed entirely.


    The shattered bones scattered across the ground, revealing a small but intricate array within. The mysterious array flickered with white light. It was transmitting an unknown signal to space ording to some profound frequency.


    Greem¡¯s gaze turned sharp, and he let out a furious grunt.


    ¡°Quite bold, aren¡¯t you! To think, you dare to try such tricks before my eyes. Hmph!¡±


    Having said that, Greem extended his hand. Bright-red mes ignited along his hand and grabbed at the mysterious array. However, to his surprise, the zing hand did note into contact with anything at all. It was almost as if the magical array was only an illusion with no actual physical existence. The burning hand moved through the array several times but could not damage it in the slightest.


    Was this array really just an illusion?


    Greem himself was the first to dispel that thought from his mind as the signal that the Chip sensed did indeed exist.


    That meant the array possessed an unusual spatial characteristic. It looked as if it existed within this dragon¡¯s tomb, but it, in fact, existed in apletely different alternate dimension.


    As for how this array had projected into this space, Greem had absolutely no idea.


    ¡°Chip, are you able to discover the array¡¯s true location?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but give an order to the Chip.


    [Beep. It is a unique application of interspatialyers. The array does not exist within a single dimension. It instead exists in theyer between two neighboring dimensions. It is impossible to discover where the array is located without a concrete means of establishing a neighboring connection.]


    A connection.


    Greem turned back and looked at the still-cursing dracolich. He knew that the dracolich definitely had the connection method that he desired in its mind. However, the situation was rather urgent. The odds of obtaining the memory fragment he wanted by using soul-searching magic were no more than twenty percent.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but frown. He then said coldly, ¡°Is there no other way to make contact with this array?¡±


    [Yes, there is: principle powers. Since the light array has been projected into this neworld, it maintains certain special connections with some of the principle powers here. It is impossible to make contact with the array through ordinary means, but it would be possible with principle powers!]


    ¡°Principle powers? Tell me that earlier!¡±


    Greem was overjoyed to hear this. The burning hand that he had extended toward the array suddenly glowed with blinding light. The crimson mes were soon reced by golden, translucent fire. The Undying mes burned all over Greem¡¯s palm as the invisible strands of power started to silently affect the surrounding space.


    As expected, the fire principles trembled, and the mysterious array rippled along with it.


    [Currently deciphering the frequency of the enemy¡¯s principles. Estimated time untilpletion: 7 minutes, 25 seconds.


    [Beep. Warning. Warning. Detecting signs of a mysterious will descending. Estimated time until arrival: 5 minutes, 36 seconds.]


    Two messages rang out in Greem¡¯s mind at the same time. The former was good news, while thetter shocked him.


    Descending.


    Bastard! No wonder the dracolich was so stubborn. He was functioning as a spatial coordinate and guiding that mysterious will to descend here!


    Greem made up his mind. Even more power surged in the right hand he had thrust into the array. The violent and ferocious fire principle powers wildly rushed toward the unusual spatial node within the light array in an attempt to extinguish it instantly.


    Without this spatial node, the opponent would lose their ability to lock-on to this coordinate. Trying to extend your will across boundless space and trillions of kilometers? Try it again when you¡¯ve be the Lord of Spacetime!


    However, the mysterious will on the other end of the array seemed to have detected Greem¡¯s actions. An overwhelming dragon¡¯s aura of might projected into his mental consciousness from afar.


    ¡°Stop it, you arrogant fool! You will not be able to destroy the spatial coordinate that I have set down. I will give you a few minutes head start. Once I arrive, you will witness my might!¡± Such an overwhelming dragon¡¯s aura of might! Greem was certain that the individual on the other side was the Cinquera that the dracolich had spoken of.


    It was said that this evil female dragon was a terrifying Sixth Grade existence.


    If...just maybe, if this dragon were able to descend on ne Gere through this spatial coordinate, all the adepts here would not end up with a happy ending. Even a Great Adept like Greem would not escape unscathed.


    The reason for that was simple. Evil dragons boasted some of the most powerful individual fighting strength in the multiverse.

 Chapter 1467 - Gere Orcs

    Chapter 1467 Gere Orcs


    ¡°Seren, retreat to Dun Modr with your subordinates immediately. Do not turn back no matter what happens on my side. Remember, request for reinforcements from Lord Windstern the moment you get back. Ask him to reinforce me if necessary.¡±


    Greem¡¯s tremendous Spirit surged into the runic array. He was solemnly imprinting this conversation in the Fourth Grade leader¡¯s mind as he continued to resist the power of the mysterious entity.


    ¡°Go! I can only buy you six minutes at the most...and make sure to hurry!¡±


    As Grem shouted, the adepts that had been scattered throughout the dragon¡¯s tomb, digging for bones, started to gather together anxiously. They quickly rushed out of the dragon¡¯s tomb under Seren¡¯s lead and summoned the wyverns that had been resting in the clearing. They then took into the air and quickly flew in the direction they hade from.


    They did not understand what was happening, but it was a given to always obey a Great Adept¡¯s orders. Without hesitation, all the wyverns fled into the distance with all their strength.


    They had only made it fifteen kilometers away when a sky rending explosion abruptly rang out from behind them.


    The towering cliff looming in the depths of the forest suddenly copsed. The vast stretch of green trees started rumbling violently, as if a giant earth dragon had awakened. Massive pirs of dust rose into the air as the earth devoured the forest.


    It was like a scene from the apocalypse!


    But it wasn¡¯t over yet.


    The violent force shockwave pushed the dirt, dust, and wooden splinters outward in every direction. The massive wave of debris instantly caught up with the adepts like a tsunami and devoured them without a trace.


    All the adepts activated defensive forcefields and shielded themselves and their wyverns. The snapping and thudding of impacting objects could be heard as they tumbled forward,pletely disoriented.


    The shockwave only slowly dissipated after fifty kilometers. It was then that the adepts and their wyverns emerged from the dust cloud in an awkward scramble.


    ¡°What exactly could be so terrifying? Sir, what do you think we should do now?¡± The deputy of the squad slowly approached Captain Seren on his wyvern and asked doubtfully.


    They hade out here on this adventure with Great Adept Greem. If something were to happen to the Great Adept, they would be severely punished if they retreated back to camp. That was why he had no choice but to be concerned.


    ¡°No need to say anything more. We will hurry back to Dun Modr immediately! That was an order from Lord Greem himself. Moreover, given the might of that shockwave, the opponent he is fighting must be an ultra-grade entity as well. Whether we stick around will be of no consequence. We cannot help Lord Greem in the slightest. Cough.¡±


    As an elite Fourth Grade adept, Seren was an important individual of great repute, authority, and power within his own nar world. However, any random enemy that appeared on the unpredictable nar battlefield could possess overwhelming power and render himpletely insignificant.


    Honestly, it was an incredibly unpleasant feeling!


    No matter how upset he felt, saving his own life was the foremost priority. He could onlyplete the task Lord Greem entrusted to him if he was still alive.


    Seren shouted out his instructions as the wyverns started dashing toward Dun Modr without even a second¡¯s rest.


    While they were desperately flying away, Greem was also fleeing with all his might.


    ............


    The forest beneath his feet quickly faded away.


    However, the fearsome silhouette behind him was still pursuing stubbornly.


    Greem was already fleeing with all his abilities, but he still couldn¡¯t shake the annoying evil dragon.


    He was flying through the air as a formless cluster of fire, leaving behind a long trail of mes as he cut across the sky. Every time the evil dragon was about to catch up, Greem immediately activated Fire Teleportation and pulled ahead by an entire kilometer. He would then instantly dive into a fire portal he had just summoned.


    Even as powerful as Greem was, these fire portals could only allow him to escape a hundred or so kilometers away. Unfortunately, the evil dragon Cinquera that was determined to kill him could catch up on these hundred kilometers in less than ten minutes.


    Greem had no choice but to exert himself to his limits and use Fire Teleportation, Fire Portal, and Fire Flight to their fullest potential to escape the evil dragon¡¯s pursuit.


    One had to admit that the thought process of evil dragons was truly different from ordinary creatures!


    You could even say that the thought process of all evil creatures was starkly different whenpared to ordinary beings.


    As a Sixth Grade evil dragon, Cinquera would have to endure horrifying nar suppression and bacsh from recklessly rushing into the nar world. If this were an ambush or trap that an enemy had set down for her, she would already be grievously injured, if not dead.


    Yet, Cinquera didn¡¯t seem to be concerned about this at all. She had traveled through countless nar worlds and traversed trillions of kilometers through the magical array¡¯s guidance and arrived immediately within the dragon¡¯s tomb of ne Gere.


    Such recklessness and foolhardiness had caught Greem by surprise.


    He had thought that the evil dragon would have chosen to scout out the situation with a projection of some sort. He never expected that what woulde out of the array would be the fearsome and powerful dragon herself.


    The Sixth Grade evil dragon instantly blew the magical array part when she squeezed into this ne. In doing so, the dragon¡¯s tomb had been shattered into countless spatial fragments and sent flying across thend.


    The overwhelming dragon¡¯s power shed with the ne¡¯s power. The result was the terrifying shockwave that Seren and the others had witnessed.


    Even as powerful as Cinquera was, she could not unleash the full extent of her Sixth Grade power upon first arriving here. However, she was still able to crush Greem and Remi¡¯s resistance with her overwhelming might.


    Under Greem¡¯s instruction, Remi had rushed forward in an attempt at a cheap shot on the enemy while the ne¡¯s power still bound her. However, he had been turned into a pancake by a single p from the dragon.


    If Remi weren¡¯t a Fifth Grade artifact spirit of the Tome of Corruption, he would already be dead now!


    Greem had turned and fled from Sacred Dragon Valley without a second word upon realizing the dire situation he was in. He started to flee toward the distance with all he had.


    Fleeing back to Dun Modr was absolutely out of the question.


    Given how ferocious this evil dragon was, she definitely would not hesitate to chase him into Dun Modr and reduce the city into ruins. The city was defended by Sixth Grade Windstern and a few other Fifth Grade Great Adepts. But even with all their powersbined, they were unlikely to be able to match this evil dragon.


    If Dun Modr was destroyed, their mission would fail!


    In that one instant, Greem immediately decided on the direction he would flee.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    A series of loud explosions could be heard as a zing trail of fire cut across the skies of ne Gere toward the biggest city of the orc empire¨C Wintercastle.


    Wintercastle was not only thergest orc city of the orc empire, but also the location of Arugel¡¯s main temple!


    It was the capital of all orcs and the holy city in the hearts of all believers of the Beast God!


    Any orc in ne Gere that desired to advance to a higher grade had to first ept a mission from the Beast God in the main temple. They would have to win the blessing of Arugel through their bravery and zealousness, therebypleting their advancement by bathing in the god¡¯s divine radiance.


    To some extent, Arugel had reced the nar consciousness and be the only option for ne Gere¡¯s orcs to grow stronger. It resulted in the orcs gaining dominance over ne Gere. No other intelligent species could fight for control against them.


    Wintercastle was located in the heart of the vast Chillwind ins. It was also the heart of ne Gere itself. As such, this vast yet coldnd was home to far too many orc tribes than it was capable of providing for.


    The Chillwind ins were over five thousand kilometers wide. Almost every inch ofnd here was tundra. The temperature here was almost always forty degrees below zero. The cold winds never stopped, and there was no way to farm or rear livestock on thisnd.


    However, it was the harsh natural environment here that gave birth to the infamously ferocious orcs of ne Gere.


    They fought with the environment here, fought with the mighty magical beasts here. They had survived through the generations only with the Beast God¡¯s blessing until they had be the most powerful species in the nar world.


    There were also many ws in a system based around faith. The most significant problem was the fact that the entire society revolved around the powerful and glorified those with superior physical strength. It also indirectly sealed off all other paths of gaining power.


    There were very few elementium spellcasters throughout ne Gere, as the Beast God¡¯s power was notpatible with elementium powers. Individual elites might rise to be orc shamans, but they would not be able to develop independent elementium spellcasting systems outside of the Beast God¡¯s divine power.


    There were no schrs, sages, diviners, or other intelligence-based professions within the orc society.


    Even if there were individuals suited for such professions, they would often fall and be the dregs of society as their physical strength wasparativelycking. How were they supposed to embark on research in profound and esoteric knowledge when they couldn¡¯t even fill their bellies?!


    As such, it was the presence of faith toward the Beast God that severely limited the development of civilization and intelligence. That might strengthen the purity of the Beast God¡¯s faith, but it would bind the orcs of ne Gere firmly to the Beast God himself.


    Of course, this was only the opinion of the outsider adepts. The orcs of ne Gere themselves took pride in their crude, primitive-but-stubborn faith.


    Perhaps this was the result of a sh between two different civilizations!

 Chapter 1468 - The Worth of an Ant

    Chapter 1468 The Worth of an Ant


    Chillwind ins.


    Even as the mes of war raged on in other regions, this ce remained shrouded in bone-chilling cold.


    Numerous carts were lined up on the t and firm road that led toward Wintercastle, resulting in terribly congested traffic.


    These carts were filled with food and strong liquor.


    The creatures driving the carts weren¡¯t ordinary bulls either, but Splithoof bulls native to the Chillwind ins. These bulls were incredibly strong and possessed plenty of fat that allowed them to endure the cold temperatures. Consequently, they had be the main draft animals used around here.


    A small cart lumbered down the crowded road, crushing the hard ice that had formed over the frozen soil as it slowly moved toward the towering form of Windcastle in the distance.


    A corner of the thick wolf pelt thrown over the cargo lifted up silently. The face of a young orc peeked out from under the fur, tiny icicles hanging from his red nose.


    He looked at everything around him curiously. In particr, he was envious of the orc warriors who only had a light robe draped around their shoulders despite the chilling winds.


    His dream was to be a true orc warrior and be the pride and honor of his entire tribe. When that happened, even Dania would have to see him in a new light!


    Just as the young orc bit his finger lightly while enthralled with his fantasies, the elderly orc driving the cart turned around and patted his head. ¡°Put your head back in there, will you? It¡¯s cold out here. Be careful of catching a¡ª¡±


    All of a sudden, the elderly orc¡¯s voice caught in his throat. A look of absolute horror appeared on his green, wrinkled face. His dull eyes were staring straight past the young orc toward the horizon.


    The young orc turned around abruptly; the only thing he saw was a terrible fire that had spread all across the horizon.


    The sky...the sky itself was burning!


    The skies of Chillwind ins were burning.


    A straight, clear trail of fire was slowly extending and burning across the horizon. Wherever the trail of fire passed, a rain of golden fire descended from above and ignited everything below.


    Every cluster of golden fire was as blinding and beautiful as a meteor. However, when it crashed down from above in perfect arcs, it brought about an unprecedented disaster to thisnd ruled by frost.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Every wisp of golden fire thatnded on the ground would erupt and unleash a fearsome wave of fire. These waves looked thin, but they were hot enough to turn metal into liquid. Even boulders as tough as steel and coated in ayer of ice could not endure the might of these golden mes, let alone a body of flesh and blood.


    The ground was scorched ck wherever the mes traveled.


    Whether it was the ground¨Cwhich was hard as steel¨Cor the numerous towering statues of the Beast God, everything melted into flowing, semi-liquidva. The entirety of Chillwind ins had been turned into a sea of mes.


    The young orc and the elderly orc stared in dumbfounded silence. They watched as the trail of fire burned above their heads and watched as tiny sparks of fire drifted down and erupted, devouring everything around them in a zing flood of mes.


    Initially, you could still hear the horrified screams of the orcs. As the rain of fire continued, things slowly turned silent.


    Orcs would instantly erupt into mes where the me waves passed. Even the carts filled with cargo burned up like torches. The terrified Splithoof bulls broke free of their harnesses and fled in every direction. Before they could get too far away, a ke of fire wouldnd on them, the mes would spread, and the burning bulls would struggle forward for a few more steps until they copsed once and for all.


    The young orc watched as even those mighty orc warriors fell victim to this seemingly apocalyptic golden fire. One by one, the orcs around him turned to ashes, and the carts around him were torched into charcoal. He was horrified, but there was nowhere to run. He could only huddle together with the elderly orc and pray for the blessing of the Beast God.


    Perhaps the Beast God had indeed bestowed his favor upon them. Despite the rain of fire and the sea of mes that had now engulfed the Chillwind ins, this lone cart had survived the destruction.


    While the two orcs were shivering in the sea of mes, a loud and resonant dragon¡¯s roar rang out in the distant horizon.


    Numerous clouds that had been ignited by the mes surged along the trail of fire, pushed by a powerful, mysterious force. When the clouds approached the two orcs, they split apart to reveal the giant, vicious figure of a dragon.


    This hundred-meter-long dragon let out a resounding roar and beat its wings as it chased the path of fire. When its overwhelming aura of might scattered down toward the surroundings, the fragile lives of the elderly orc and the young orc were instantly extinguished. All that remained were two stiff bodies embracing each other upon the lonely ins.


    They had been literally scared to death by Cinquera¡¯s terrifying aura of might!


    ............


    Greem did not notice anything that had happened below him.


    At this point, he had no interest in ughtering these orc civilians that were no different than ants to him. All his attention was focused on how to lose the terrible cmity chasing after him.


    As for the cmity that his mes had brought to the orcs as he fled? That wasn¡¯t a problem that Greem needed to think about at this moment. He hadn¡¯t spread destruction intentionally; as an ultra-grade fire adept, every single one of his actions would unavoidably affect his surroundings.


    Along the way, Greem had tried to use fire clones several times to distract the evil dragon. He would abruptly explode as five identical zing humanoids would split away from him.


    Initially, the evil dragon had been excited enough to unleash her breath attack to wipe out all these clones. However, as Greem continued to escape, Cinquera started to grow impatient and furious. She focused solely on catching Greem himself and ignored the distracting clones entirely.


    She could clearly sense that the faith power in the air was growing denser and more potent as they continued forward; there was a temple to a powerful god not far ahead.


    As a Sixth Grade evil dragon, Cinquera¡¯s intelligence was not inferior to any of her opponents of the same grade. It was only her violent and cruel emotions that would often disrupt her logical rationality and push her towardmitting horrifying, unimaginable acts of terror at times.


    Cinquera had basically figured out the intentions behind that little worm¡¯s actions that she was chasing. That damned bastard! He was trying to cover his escape with the help of the temple.


    Hmph! It¡¯s just the temple of a Beast God. It¡¯s not like it¡¯s his actual god kingdom. Does that annoying worm really think that this much power would be enough to scare me away?


    Endless hatred and fury filled Cinquera¡¯s heart as she beat her colorful wings and continued soaring toward that small zing humanoid in the distance.


    ¡°I will tear you into a thousand pieces even if I have to chase you to this world¡¯s edge today...that¡¯s the only way I will be able to vent my anger for the loss of my spatial coordinate. Stay, worm!¡±


    Having said that, Cinquera opened her maw. A strange breath attack, shrouded in ck smoke, cut across a thousand meters and appeared directly behind Greem.


    Greem could sense that fearsome dragon breath behind him, so terrifyingly powerful that even his soul quivered in fright. He detonated his body without any hesitation, splitting into four mes of differing shapes and sizes. Each of the mes escaped in a different direction.


    The dragon breath seemed to possess an intelligence of its own. It was able to curve in midair and chase after the biggest ball of fire. Greem had no choice but to explode once again, sending a few balls of fire right into the breath and detonating its power prematurely.


    Boom! A loud explosion could be heard.


    A ck halo rippled out through the air. Where the halo passed, all the mes were extinguished, all elementium substance rendered inert, and all mental consciousness attached to them was obliterated.


    Greem reformed into a humanoid shape after fleeing a thousand meters. He turned around and took a look behind him. He couldn¡¯t hide the shock and horror he was feeling.


    Even the mental consciousness attached to the elementium particles was obliterated.


    The strange characteristic of that dragon breath alone was enough to kill a principle adept like himself!


    Wintercastle was right before his eyes now, and he could see therge temple in the city center. Greem did not dare hesitate. He quickly dashed toward his target the moment he reformed.


    Whether he would be able to escape the pursuit of this monstrosity of death would depend entirely on this attempt!


    The trail of fire that Greem had left behind did not affect Cinquera at all. She beat her colorful wings as she burst through the mes, a Sixth Grade living cmity tightly pursuing Greem.


    Perhaps sensing two powerful individuals approaching, several violent auras burst forth from the temple. Four strange silhouettes of varying heights appeared in front of the temple.


    ¡°Halt!¡±


    One of the four individuals was an elderly man who looked so old he almost certainly had one foot in the grave.


    He was wrapped in a colorful ritual robe, and patterns had been drawn all over his body with mud. He wore a strange feather on his head and held a long staff carved out of Pan¨¹ wood.


    Three somewhat familiar orcs stood in a row behind him.


    They were three of the orcs who had fought the Great Adepts at Dun Modr.


    The elderly orc tapped his staff, and a golden halo spread outward. He then shouted in a deep andmanding voice, ¡°This is the main temple of the great Beast God Arugel. You¡ª¡±


    Greem and Cinquera were going too fast, so fast that they had arrived at the main temple before the orcs had received any warning.


    The head priest had no choice but to step forward with his subordinates to stop the intruders.


    Before he could finish speaking, the elderly orc felt Cinquera¡¯s wild, barbaric aura. His expression turned ugly all of a sudden.


    Sixth Grade...this dragon was Sixth Grade!

 Chapter 1469 - The Calamity of Wintercastle

    Chapter 1469 The Cmity of Wintercastle


    Greem struck without hesitation when he saw the orcs standing in his way!


    He did not hold back. In fact, he couldn¡¯t have held back.


    Every single orc in front of him was one of the most powerful individuals among the orcs of ne Gere. Whaty beneath him was also the main temple of the Beast God Arugel; Greem had no doubts that they would be able to call down tremendous divine power from the distant god kingdom if they had a few seconds to prepare. They would once again turn into mighty avatars of the gods.


    Throwing the whole mess on them while they were still disoriented was the only appropriate action for a proper and intelligent adept.


    For the first time, Greem revealed his most ferocious and vicious side without holding back at all!


    It was almost as if a portal connected directly to the depths of the Fire Elementium neepth had torn open in the Orb of the Fire God residing in his heart. Violent fire energy surged throughout his limbs as his heart pumped forcefully.


    The intensity of the fire energy inside him instantaneously rose by two to three levels. The mes turned from red to deep-red, from deep-red to dark-red, and, finally, invisible.


    Greem did not cast any spells. He simply let loose this surge of mes at the orcs. The scorching mes immediately turned the area within a thousand meters into a furnace. Every substance and lifeform exposed to the fire burned down to the most fundamental particles of the universe.


    Every single life the mes engulfed was quickly being extinguished.


    The orc powerhouses¡¯ expression changed as they hastily drew on power from within to protect themselves.


    At least two of the five orcs had the power to defeat Greem as he was currently. However, under such unexpected circumstances, even they had to scramble just to remain unharmed.


    Greem¡¯s attack might be vicious and powerful, but it was only troublesome to deal with for these orcs that stood at the summit of this nar world. It wasn¡¯t a lethal strike. However, this attack spelled doom for all the ordinary orcs near the temple.


    Where the vicious mes spread, the orc believers that could not flee in time were immediately turned to ashes. Even the few individuals powerful enough to escape from the immediate radiuspletely ignited after running another thousand meters away.


    For a moment, the casualties were countless around the main temple. Numerous buildings were melting and softening under the fires and began to twist and copse.


    ¡°How dare you!¡±


    ¡°Death upon the enemy!¡±


    Greem could hear all sorts of curses and insults. The five orc powerhouses, including the main temple¡¯s head priest, let loose their strongest powers at this damned enemy.


    Simultaneously, the Sixth Grade evil dragon Cinquera had closed-in within a thousand meters of Greem. She opened her maw and unleashed another destructive dragon breath at this infuriating bastard.


    Two clusters of incredibly powerful attacks shot toward Greem from two different directions, cornering him and leaving him no room to dodge or escape. However, despite having run into a dead-end, Greem showed no fear. Instead, a sly and cunning smile crept up his face. He waved his hand calmly at his enemies as his entire person erupted and went up in mes.


    Fire¡¯s Image!


    ............


    One and a half kilometers away from Wintercastle.


    Greem and Cinquera had passed through here; the mes and aura of might had killed every single orc along the way.


    A strange mental flux rippled out in the middle of the still-raging sea of mes. The mes shrunk and condensed before forming into a two-meter-tall humanoid form.


    The mes on the figure¡¯s surface quickly solidified, transforming into a tall man wearing a leather suit with a purple-and-ck robe draped over his shoulders.


    As this man stood up and lifted his head slightly to look toward Wintercastle, an earthshaking explosion erupted in the distance!


    Two violent attacks whose power was far beyond the limits of this ne shed, instantly sundering the nar barrier and engulfing the main temple of the Beast God Arugel in an uncontrolled energy vortex.


    As the powers erupted, Greem could hear the furious roars and shouts of the orcs from afar.


    A visible force shockwave rushed out from within the city, instantly vaporizing every single orc along the way. This orc fortress that was had always been known for its sturdiness was devastated beyond recognition with barely any resistance.


    Greem had no idea what exactly was happening all the way over there. All he knew was that the wall he had been facing was pulverized by that shockwave like cheese and was being blown away as scrap.


    A concentrated and mighty consciousness suddenly shifted and locked onto Greem¡¯s position from the center of that explosion.


    Cinquera again!


    Greem had managed to transfer his actual body from the battlefield using Fire¡¯s Image, leaving behind only a clone there. However, he clearly had not managed to put enough distance between him and the evil dragon, as he was still within the range of her spiritual senses.


    Thus, after a single attack, the dragon was able to instantly pick up on the abnormality and once again found Greem¡¯s location.


    Greem knew his location was exposed now; he didn¡¯t dare overstay his wee. He turned and immediately started retreating from Wintercastle.


    The main temple of Arugel had already been blown to pieces. He didn¡¯t know what the actual damage was, but even the loss of a single brick would be an absolute humiliation for that lofty major god of the beast god pantheon.


    If he could endure such humiliation, he wouldn¡¯t deserve to call himself the major god of his pantheon!


    As expected, the moment the force shockwave hit the main temple, a blinding golden radiance rose from the hundred-meter-tall beast god statue within the main temple.


    As the light flowed across the statue, its appearance slowly underwent dramatic changes.


    He had a gruff face,rge mouth, and sharp fangs. He was d in crude, ugly ck armor, with a broad double-axe on his back. To think, it was the God of ughter of the beast god pantheon, Garon Arcadas.


    This God of ughter could sense the screams of agony from the believers the moment he descended, even before he had gotten used to this somewhat fragile body.


    The only ones that could set foot within Wintercastle and constantly pray near the main temple were the most devout of the orc pantheon. Now, tens of thousands of these believers had fallen victim to the enemy and died. Their emotions of despair and resentment flooded the Seventh Grade God of ughter, who couldn¡¯t help but feel a little ovee.


    A vicious expression appeared on his ugly face. He took out the massive double-axe from his back and walked out of the temple with rumbling steps.


    ¡°Cinquera, I see you are looking to die...to think you daree stir trouble in the temple of Lord Arugel himself. Why don¡¯t you stay here, huh? Forever!¡±


    Garon¡¯s fierce re locked onto the giant dragon flying out of the city the moment he stepped out of the temple. He shouted angrily as he raised his axe and leaned slightly back before hurling it with all his strength.


    The massive double-axe cut across the sky as a golden bolt and crashed toward Cinquera.


    At this point, Cinquera finally realized she had fallen into the scheme of that cunning adept.


    She might be rash, but she wasn¡¯t foolish!


    Garon was able to appear within the ne despite being a Seventh Grade god because he was being sustained by the tremendous amount of faith power concentrated in the main temple. That was how he had managed to protect himself from the nar suppression. Garon would not be able to move or strike freely like this once he was further from the main temple.


    Cinquera knew these weaknesses and strengths of the gods very well. The instant she sensed Garon¡¯s violent aura appear, she turned and fled from the main temple without hesitation.


    However, the might and ability of a Seventh Grade god was beyond the imagination of a Sixth Grade evil dragon. Before Cinquera could fly far, the golden bolt caught up to her and struck her on right wing.


    Roar!


    Cinquera released an earthshaking dragon¡¯s cry as her wing was pulverized and blown into a rain of blood. She did not even dare to turn back for a look. She continued to struggle and fly into the distance.


    Garon opened his palm and grabbed the double-axe that had spun its way back to him. He then instantly traversed a distance of six kilometers with his heavy steps and chased after the ragged figure limping away with a single wing.


    As these dominating individuals left one by one, the ravaged city of Wintercastle finally became quiet once more. However, between Greem¡¯s mes, that violent sh of power from earlier, and two consecutive bursts of ultra-grade powers, Wintercastle had been reduced to the brink of annihtion.


    A crumbling sound could be heard as some debris was shoved aside. The orc sword saint brushed off the dust on his body and climbed out of a crater with some difficulty. At the same time, the other orc powerhouses who had been blown away by the shockwave slowly returned, one by one.


    The five orcs had all been afflicted by Cinquera¡¯s strange ck smoke to varying extents. Dispelling this strange principle power would take quite some time and effort, given their power.


    Ultimately, this entire sequence of events had been a tremendous loss for them!


    But what truly infuriated them were the countless dead orcs in Wintercastle.


    The might of the invaders earlier was simply too terrifying. Anyone caught up in that power would die. Consequently, over thirty thousand of the orcs in the city had died. That was half the poption of Wintercastle.


    The number of orc elites lost today was enough to bring tears to the eyes of these orc powerhouses.


    ¡°Go! Find out who the adept that lured the evil dragon Cinquera to Wintercastle was! Immediately! We will tear that bastard into pieces in the next fight.¡±


    The head priest¡¯s roar instantly filled the skies of Wintercastle!

 Chapter 1470 - The Interrogation Room

    <h4>Chapter 1470 The Interrogation Room</h4>


    The God of ughter stopped chasing after fifty kilometers.


    He could only curse furiously at Cinquera¡¯s form as she slowly vanished in the distance, but there was nothing he could do.


    Cinquera, who had managed to escape by the skin of her teeth, chased Greem for another five thousand kilometers. That was when she finally stopped at the peak of a mountain, roared furiously, and turned back to the dragon¡¯s tomb.


    Greem, looking rather ragged and worn-out, had just reformed his body on top of a mountain when Great Adept Windstern¡¯s strange figure appeared before him. Following behind him were Poya, Catherine, and Tuncay.


    They had obviously just arrived as well. Their cold res shot past Greem andnded on the evil dragon Cinquera the moment they appeared.


    If Cinquera were in her prime, she would have turned back and lunged at the enemy, even if the nar suppression was limiting her power and her opponents were a Sixth Grade and four Fifth Grades.


    It wouldn¡¯t matter if she won. What was important was to fight first!


    All these so-called human adepts were just weaklings in Cinquera¡¯s eyes. She didn¡¯t regard any of them as an equal, even if they were the same grade.


    Unfortunately, she had been badly injured at the hands of the Seventh Grade God of ughter, Garon. She needed to treat her wounds as soon as possible. If she were to fight these human adepts now, the results would be unpredictable.


    That was why Cinquera could only give up in the face of these infuriated human adepts and turn to leave the battlefield. A rare urrence indeed.


    Great Adept Windstern secretly let out a breath of relief as he watched the evil dragon fly away. He then shifted his gaze to Greem, who still looked quite roughed up. He had nothing to say even after a long stare.


    Attacking the capital of the orcs alone...even Sixth Grade Great Adept Windstern didn¡¯t dare have such thoughts, yet Greem had actually done it.


    Truly, the newborn calf did not fear the tiger!


    If the orc capital was so easily dealt with, Great Adept Windstern wouldn¡¯t have waited all this while.


    Numerous orc powerhouses defended the capital. Moreover, this was only the most fundamental of defenses. The most frightening fact was the presence of the beast gods¡¯ main temple. The orc gods could descend from their god kingdoms at any time.


    Adepts like themselves had pretty good odds if they were only dealing with one or two god clones. However, to fight the gods themselves at their temple was a suicide mission.


    That was why the adepts¡¯ basic strategy when invading faith worlds had always been the same: wipe out the peripheral believers, reducing their numbers usingrge-scale means such as gues and curses. Once the power of faith no longer sustained the temples, the adepts wouldunch a final attack and wipe out the enemy.


    After all, most of the gods that faith worlds believed in were not native gods. To cast down their power across a gxy¡¯s tremendous distance required the support and guidance of faith from that nar world.


    If most of the believers were already dead and the foundations of faith were destroyed, the gods would only exhaust their god kingdom¡¯s power by descending. No god would ever do such a thing.


    Meanwhile, here in ne Gere, the adept faction had only taken their first step toward their ultimate goal. They were still at the stage where they built forward bases and establishing themselves on enemy ground. To attack the enemy¡¯s capital and main temple while the foundations of faith had not yet been shaken was no different than rushing toward death!


    That was why Great Adept Windstern couldn¡¯t help but marvel at Greem¡¯s tremendous luck as he watched the young adept bounce about spiritedly.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go back! No need to stir any more trouble in this world...we are here toplete our missions. There¡¯s no need to try too hard and put our lives on the line. You had best settle down for the rest of our mission!¡± Windstern sighed again as he said this before returning to Dun Modr.


    The other Great Adepts also shot a few strange nces at Greem before turning and leaving.


    Greem chuckled awkwardly and could only follow the rest back to the camp in his disheveled state.


    ............


    Greem was temporarily grounded after returning to Dun Modr.


    In truth, even without Great Adept Windstern¡¯s orders, Greem didn¡¯t intend to step out of Dun Modr for the time being anyway.


    Who knew whether that Sixth Grade dragon had actually left ne Gere?


    If that vengeful bastard were still lying in wait outside the camp, Greem would be throwing himself into her jaws just by running around!


    Moreover, it wasn¡¯t like Greem hadn¡¯t obtained the spoils he had been looking for on this adventure.


    When Greem ordered the adepts to retreat from the dragon¡¯s tomb, he had also instructed them to bring the dracolich with them. In truth, Greem had given out that order with the slight intention of drawing the enemy away. He would have been able to escape easily if Cinquera had pursued the wyverns instead.


    To his surprise, the evil dragon had locked onto him and chased him endlessly, forcing him to take the risk to lure her over to the orcs.


    Still, the results were satisfying. At the very least, Greem had obtained a peak Fourth Grade dracolich. The spoils were more than worth the risk.


    Greem started dealing with the dracolich after he returned to Dun Modr.


    This ce was a magical room deep underground.


    The room was dark, humid, cold, and sinister.


    Sickly green runes and magical lines ran all over the stone walls, ceiling, and floor. Rumbling magical energy flowed through these circuits, forming apletely sealed and isted magic prison.


    The dracolich, which looked like a giant, bipedal lizard, had all its limbs restrained by golden fire chains and was suspended in midair.


    The golden fire chains were of an incredible temperature and crackled loudly as they licked at the dracolich¡¯s dark bones. Moreover, the Undying mes had seeped into its soul and was inflicting unbearable agony to it.


    As an undead dragon, the dracolich should have no physical senses, much less a sense of pain.


    Unfortunately for him, the Undying mes had the principle characteristic of reaching the soul itself. This pain wasn¡¯t one that spread from the outside in, burning through the physical body to the soul. Instead, it was a pain directly etched deep into the soul through the principle power.


    That was why such torture on the principle level was horrifying for the dracolich, even with its undead body and magic resistance!


    ¡°Who would¡¯ve thought...who would¡¯ve thought...that you were a fervent believer of that Cinquera!¡± Greem strode slowly inside the room, ignoring the strained and twisted figure of the dracolich. ¡°Tell me, how did youe to know her? I don¡¯t believe that the dragons would so easily let Cinquera sully the dignity of the dragons!¡±


    Greem¡¯s word hadn¡¯te out of nowhere.


    The dragons had always viewed oaths and dignity with the greatest esteem. They firmly loathed the reversal of the naturalws and the creation of undead creatures with the corpses of their kin. Be it out of consideration of the general good or their own private intentions, the dragons would never let an evil dragon freely control a dragon¡¯s tomb.


    Either this dragon¡¯s tomb had been abandoned by the dragons, or an important dragon had intentionally covered up this incident. With his sharp senses as an adept, Greem could smell a scheme and conspiracy behind all this!


    ¡°Human adept, you had best let me go now. Otherwise, once Lady Cinquera finds this ce, she will devour you in a single snap!¡± The dracolich was quite stubborn indeed. Even after enduring all that torture from the Undying mes, it refused to reveal a single thing.


    ¡°You¡¯re still waiting for Cinquera to save you? Heheh,¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but startughing coldly, ¡°If only you knew what dire straits Cinquera was in right now. If only you knew that she lost one of her wings, you wouldn¡¯t be so stubborn!¡±


    ¡°Bullshit! That¡¯s impossible...there couldn¡¯t possibly be any person in this ne that could threaten the great Lady Cinquera. You¡¯re lying!¡± A glint of scorn appeared in the dracolich¡¯s ghostly green eyes. It was obvious it didn¡¯t believe Greem¡¯s words.


    Greem didn¡¯t waste words with it either. He lifted his hand and summoned a magic mirror. Lights flickered across the mirror as what had happened at Wintercastle was shown once again.


    The dracolich¡¯s face turned pale when it saw that barbaric and fearsome orc god shatter Cinquera¡¯s wing with a single violent strike.


    It wanted to rebuke the truth and im that this was a fabricated vision. However, Sixth Grade Cinquera¡¯s furious and anguished mental fluctuations emanating through the magic mirror were so, so real. It made the dracolich unable to say a single word of rebuttal as a believer of the evil dragon.


    ¡°Heheh, you are right. There¡¯s no one in this ne that could threaten Cinquera. However, don¡¯t you forget- there are still gods! I only pulled a small trick, yet I could lure her to the orc capital and force her into a fight with an orc god. Heh, now that Cinquera is grievously wounded, do you think she still has the ability to save you?¡± Greem struck at the dracolich¡¯s psychological bottom line without holding back.


    This unique magical room could iste the faith coordinate in its soul. However, Greem would have no chance of enving this dracolich if he didn¡¯t make it break down first.


    Of course, it would have been an entirely different matter if Lich Kanganas was here.


    The liches were the true masters of toying with the soul!


    The dracolich lowered its head and said no more. Its soul was incredibly resilient, and it had obviously not been affected by Greem¡¯s words.


    Greem wasn¡¯t bothered by this at all.


    As a Great Adept, he had plenty of time to y with his toys. He wasn¡¯t in a hurry.


    Greem grunted and said coldly, ¡°If that is the case, then rot here for a few more years! We can have a proper talk whenever you think things through.¡±


    Having said that, Greem turned and left the room.


    Golden mes red around the chains that bound the dracolich, and screams of agony rang out from the room.


    Greem turned and walked into the room beside the interrogation room.


    The strange ck stone he had obtained from the Boulder Fortress market was hovering above an array on an alchemy tform. The outermost stone shell had peeled off, revealing its true appearance underneath.

 Chapter 1471 - Road to Improvement

    Chapter 1471 Road to Improvement


    The Oddscale Fruit.


    A sort of earth-elementium fruit.


    It could absorb the earth-elementium power around it to provide the energy required for its growth. Ripe Oddscale Fruits had the effect of improving one¡¯s base Physique, given consistent consumption. However, it also had the tremendous side-effect of causing scales to grow on one¡¯s body and hindering intelligence growth.


    This Oddscale fruit was clearly a high-quality material that had been obtained by an adept after defeating an orc powerhouse. The fact that the Oddscale fruit possessed such magical characteristics meant that it contained traces of principle power.


    At this point, the adepts had invaded over a hundred orc worlds and had discovered all sorts of simr fruits in them. However, this was the first fruit that could rise to the level of principles.


    The seed of such rare fruit would be ssified as a high-grade strategic resource, even in the World of Adepts. The fact that this was Greem¡¯s first time seeing this fruit, despite being a Great Adept, was already evidence of its rarity and value.


    An orc powerhouse might have discovered it on ident, who then proceeded to hide it and use it to improve his Physique. However, Fate was often unpredictable. The orc who found the fruit did not even manage to save his own life in battle. In the end, the fruitnded in the hands of that Third Grade adept and, ultimately, in Greem¡¯s hands.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but marvel at the wonders of Fate when thinking about this!


    Even though the effects of the Oddscale fruit were excellent, its side-effect was also terrifying.


    Firstly, the growth of the fruit demanded dense earth elementium.


    If Greem were to rely solely on the earth elementium in nature, its growth would probably take an exceedingly long time. The orcs had no means of solving this problem. They could only try their best and nt the fruit in the most fertile soil they could find.


    Greem¡¯s first thought was to nt the seed on an earth-elementium altar.


    A standard, small-scale earth-elementium altar only cost around a hundred and fifty thousand magical crystals. It could constantly draw pure earth elementium from the Earth Elementium ne to provide for the Oddscale Fruit¡¯s growth.


    In doing so, an Oddscale Tree would grow rapidly, and the number of fruits produced would also increase correspondingly.


    The second problem was the umtion of earth-elementium residue upon consumption of the Oddscale fruit, which would lead to the growth of strange scales.


    That wasn¡¯t much of a problem for Greem. He had plenty of means to modte his body and deal with the residue after the fact.


    What really troubled him was the horrible side-effect of hindering intelligence growth.


    No wonder there were so few elementium spellcasters in the orc worlds. Their intelligence was probably dropping at a crazy rate after eating such fruits. In fact, it would be a surprise if they were capable of magic given such terrible side-effects!


    Greem would have to find some way of altering the gic sequence of the Oddscale Fruit and remove the harmful substances. It was a process that demanded immense time and energy.


    Obviously, this was not something that could be aplished on the battlefield!


    Greem had the Chip construct a long-term case file on this research and temporarily put the matter of the Oddscale Fruit behind him. He then started thinking about his path of improvement moving forward.


    At Fifth Grade, the means for a principle adept to progress manifested in improving their control over the principel powers. A principle adept had to further calcte and extend the principle powers they possessed, thereby gaining mastery over more powerful and profound principles. They could then merge all those principles to create their own unique principle power.


    Thest step was especially important!


    Principle suppression was a crucial factor in battles between principle adepts.


    Whoever had the stronger principle power of a higher dimension would be able to create a powerful, regional effect simr to nar suppression.


    The adepts also called this ability Domain!


    A Great Adept could create an environment suited to their powers within the Domain they created with their principle powers while also suppressing the opponent¡¯s principle abilities. It was simr to the Burning Domain that Greem had so painstakingly conceived.


    However, while the Burning Domain was a massive space of fire created by an area-of-effect fire spell, it had not yet reached the level of a principle Domain. Opponents of the same grade could easily dispel it.


    Consequently, Greem almost never used the Burning Domain in his battles against opponents of the same grade. He only used it as a means of extermination when dealing with numerous low-grade enemies.


    At this point, Greem had only mastered two low-level fire principles¨C Undying mes and Fire¡¯s Image. To forge these two into a new principel power and derive a principle Domain that suited his fighting style was undoubtedly an arduous task that would take a long time!


    Greem¡¯s lifespan was now over ten thousand years; he didn¡¯t have to hurry things at all. He only needed to umte experience and knowledge bit by bit. One day, he would eventually be able to create a unique fire principle of his own.


    Gathering resources, collecting knowledge,pleting the necessary experiments and magical research...these things would be the main tune of his long life toe, a perpetual constant that would always remain there!


    If he couldn¡¯t rush the fire principles, then the only immediate thing he could rely on to improve hisbat strength would be spells or magical golems.


    Ever since he reached Fifth Grade, the Chip¡¯s abilities had evolved dramatically along with Greem¡¯s own powers. Data calction, storage, and analysis abilities had all been elevated tremendously. The Chip could help Greem continue growing stronger from many aspects with its support.


    At this moment, there were four Fifth Grade fire spells simultaneously being analyzed and constructed within Greem¡¯s mind. Once this task waspleted, Greem would no longer have to fight as he currently did by using the most primitive fire energy to attack his enemies.


    That wasn¡¯t to say fire energy in its primitive state was weak. Rather, the form of attack was too monotonous and did not possess the variety of effects that spells often did. Consequently, an enemy could effortlessly deal with such attacks.


    Moreover, primitive fire energy required Greem¡¯s constant spiritual guidance to hit the enemy. During this period, his defenses would be weakened considerably, and he could easily be hit by bacsh if he was interrupted.


    These were the ws of directly-manipted magic energy. The only proper way to avoid such problems was to structure the primitive fire energy into more powerful and more flexible fire spells!


    Principle powers were the source of a principle adept¡¯s power, while spells that werepatible with that power were weapons that could unleash the true might of an adept.


    Both factors were crucial!


    The technique of deriving higher-ss magic by modifying low-grade spells was outdated. After the leap from elementium to principles, the very nature of magic had changed entirely. Greem had no choice but to explore and discover from scratch once again.


    Fiery Ignition: Fifth Grade guided fire spell. Greem could inject fire power into the enemy¡¯s body by means of sight. He could then ignite the magical energy within the enemy¡¯s body (Every point of magic energy would inflict 5 points of fire damage).


    Fiery Imminence: Fifth Grade fire summoning spell. Allows the summoning of a powerful fire army from another ne. The effect is ten times that of the lower-grade megate.


    Fiery Refraction: Fifth Grade offensive fire spell. Summons a fireball that refracts energy between multiple enemies. The fire damage increases by 1,000 points with every refraction, with a maximum of ten refractions (Initial damage is 6,000 points).


    Fiery Barrier: Fifth Grade defensive fire spell. Constructs a barrier using fire principles which defends against all passive and active magical attacks (Base defensive power of 20,000 points).


    Once these four principle spells werepleted, they would be added to Greem¡¯s arsenal. Along with the Fifth Grade divine spell, Scorched Earth sealed within the Orb of the Fire God, as well as the Fifth Grade poison spell, Halo of Rot formed within the Tome of Corruption, Greem would possess six spells that covered a variety of purposes, including summoning, offense, and defense.


    It would give him a sizeable edge in battles against opponents of the same grade!


    ording to the Chip¡¯s calctions, the four spells still needed two to three years before they could bepleted. During this time, Greem would have no choice but to hang in there with Fourth Grade spells that had principle power mixed in them.


    Meanwhile, the Fifth Grade voodoo beast that Adept Karon of Mountainshade ne was working on would probably need a few years toplete as well.


    As for creating a Fifth Grade magical golem himself? That would only be possible if he possessed arge number of Fifth Grade magical materials. Given the rarity and price of Fifth Grade materials, Greem would not be able to obtain them in bulk. If it weren¡¯t for that very fortunate incident in the war back in the World of Adepts, he would not even be able to get his hands on Fifth Grade scrap material.


    There was no hope of making a magical golem himself for the moment, and his principle spells still needed time to be finished.


    As such, Greem had no choice but to keep a ¡®low profile¡¯ for the moment and avoid being caught by his enemies in this period of his power vacuum.


    ............


    The mission¡¯s three-month period quickly concluded.


    Apart from the battle that erupted when they arrived, the rest of the mission¡¯s duration was almost suspiciously peaceful.


    Greem only knew after the fact that his actions at Wintercastle had really screwed over the orc powerhouses.


    An attack from Sixth Grade Evil Dragon Cinquera was not so easily endured.


    Two of the four orcs present had been inflicted with the strange principle power contained within the ck smoke of her breath. They only managed to dispel it after going through great lengths. While they had seeded in the end, they were also significantly weakened in the process.


    Due to this, the orcs were much weaker and did not dare to cause trouble at Dun Modr again. It allowed Greem and the others to sit out thest three months of their mission calmly.


    Dun Modr¡¯s first adept tower was established, and the city became the first impregnable fortress for the adept invasion into ne Gere. Even without Great Adepts to defend the city, the native orcs would never be able to banish the adepts from their world.


    Moreover, with this adept tower, the adepts¡¯ reinforcements could freely teleport into ne Gere and slowly conquer thends and pige its resources.


    The war that came afterward was intense and wouldst for a very long time. It could be several years, or even a dozen years, with constant shifts in the tide of war. However, none of this had anything to do with Greem anymore. After all, he was just here toplete a mission.


    Once the appointed time was up, Greem and the other five Great Adepts sessfully returned to Boulder Fortress through the adept tower¡¯s teleportation array.

 Chapter 1472 - Foundations

    Chapter 1472 Foundations


    Fire Elementium ne, the Molten Altar.


    Arge portal shimmering with dark-red light suddenly opened in midair.


    It was obvious that this portal wasn¡¯t all that stable. The spatial fluctuations from the fire-elementium door were incredibly conspicuous; the spatial tremors could be sensed from fifty kilometers away.


    The portal finally stabilized after a long while. Greem then traveled through the portal and returned to Molten Altar, dragging his dracolich prisoner with him as he strode through.


    ¡°Wee back, master!¡± Emberweb Broodmother Lasbes and Split-Brain Sock hastily hurried to the portal to greet Greem upon sensing the spatial fluctuations. They were the ones responsible for the affairs here.


    ¡°Throw this fellow in a cell. Make sure he doesn¡¯t get away,¡± Greem tossed the dracolich to the broodmother and took a good look at the Molten Altar before him.


    At this point, Molten Altar had be a massive construction site.


    Thousands of construction machines were busy working near thevake, moving blocks of stone, magical materials, magical alloys, and other necessary resources. Even more native creatures of the Fire Elementium ne were working as hardbor, ttening the ground and using volcanic rock to build a temporary path leading into the heart of theke.


    A giant metal furnace had been set up to the side of thevake. The exhaust pipes towering into the air spat out thick ck smoke that almost engulfed the entirety of Molten Altar¡¯s surrounding area.


    Magical ores that had been obtained from the camp in space were thrown into the furnace. There was a loud rumbling as they were crushed, filtered, refined, extracted, and finally turned into useable magical alloys.


    Metal columns measuring three-meters-wide and twenty-meters-long had already been forged. They were stacked on thekeside and would be moved into theke as foundations for the adept tower once they had been reinforced with magical runes and arrays.


    As this adept tower¡¯s location couldn¡¯t be revealed, the more technical work could only bepleted by more intelligent, high-grade magical golems. That was why the construction progress was rtively slow.


    Given the current rate of progress, the adept tower would take over twenty years toplete. That made them seem as slow as a tortoisepared to the Silver Union. However, Greem had no choice due to security concerns.


    After all, the Silver Union had numerous esoteric adepts. All the bricks, materials, and runic arrays they used in construction were semi-finished products that had been prepared ahead of time. During construction, all they had to do was put these pieces together and assemble them into aplete tower.


    If Greem wanted to build a tower all by himself to maintain secrecy, he would have to carve runes and arrays on every brick and door himself. Given the scale of the tower he envisioned, the amount of work involved would drive anyone insane.


    In all honesty, if it weren¡¯t for Split-Brain Sock having the ability to multitask and control a dozen magical golems to perform the carving of arrays simultaneously, the time needed for the construction would be even longer.


    Greem took a slow sweeping nce at the construction site and immediately got a perfect grasp of the progress. He nodded in satisfaction when he saw that everything was proceeding as nned.


    ¡°How has it been? Has the construction been going smoothly? Tell me now if there are any troubles. I can deal with all of them while I¡¯m here!¡±


    Split=Brain Sock couldn¡¯t help but put on a bitter smile in response to the questions. ¡°Master, the temperature of theva here is too high. Ordinary construction machines melt the moment they enter it. Even specially modified heat-resistant magical machines can¡¯t hold out for too long down there. Therefore, what we urgentlyck and need right now is muscle that can move freely in thevake.¡±


    ¡°Oh?¡± Greem thought for a moment. Molten giants appeared to be the only creatures in the Fire Elementium ne that fit Sock¡¯s requirements. The other beings were either too powerful to be forced intobor or too few in number. Greem quickly turned toward Emberweb Broodmother Lasbes and asked sternly, ¡°Are there any molten giant tribes nearby? It¡¯s best if the tribe has around two to five hundred members. As for their strength...Second Grade should be good enough!¡±


    Lasbes thought for a moment and said softly, ¡°I remember there was a molten giant tribe seven days southeast of here. They have around four hundred members, and the leader is Third Grade.¡±


    ¡°Mm! It will be them then! Find someone to lead the way for me. I¡¯ll be back very soon.¡±


    There was no hesitation at all. Ten minutester, Greem set off with a Second Grade elite ember spider at his side.


    Fifteen dayster, Greem returned with a tribe of four hundred tall molten giants. It was obvious that these molten giants were diverse; there were adolescents as well as youngsters. It was a reasonablyplete tribe.


    Unfortunately, the eleven-meter-tall figure of the Third Grade molten giant appeared somewhat tilted. There were obvious signs of external force applied to his body, as if he had been torn apart and put together again. Even his energy aura had almost fallen to the level of a Second Grade.


    ¡°Sock, these are the helpers I got for you. His name is Nasta. From now on, leave all the construction work in thevake to them! Make sure to keep them on a schedule and a tight leash. Try and finish the construction as soon as possible!¡± Greem handed the molten giants over to Sock upon returning.


    Sock immediately smiled when he saw the hulking figures lined up behind Greem.


    The stone blocks used for the construction of this tower were all easily three to five meters wide and several tons in weight. Ordinary fire creatures and construction machines could hardly lift them up, let alone do piling and reinforcement work sixty meters underva.


    Given the difficulty of the task and the environment, it was hard to make any progress without some proper helpers.


    Now that he had molten giants to do the work for him, everything could go ording to n.


    Of course, while Greem wasn¡¯t paying attention, Sock secretly dragged the Third Grade molten giant leader Nasta aside. He curiously asked how he had been ¡®recruited.¡¯


    Nasta was practically crying when he exined how that powerful master of theirs had turned into a hundred-meter-tall giant and given every molten-giant warrior a fat beating.


    In particr, Nasta¨Cas the leader of the tribe¨Chad stubbornly resisted and caused the master to turn furious. He was then promptly torn into countless pieces. If it weren¡¯t for Nasta having half a brain and submitting quickly after that, the master would probably have exterminated the entire molten giant tribe.


    It was the boon of working with fire creatures.


    They had fiery tempers, but once you made them submit, they were the most loyal followers that would never think of betrayal. If they grew sick of your rule, they would challenge you directly and decide their fate in battle. They would never try any schemes or plots, nor would they lie and try backstabbing or anything of the sort.


    Greem¡¯s actions of violently forcing the molten giants into submission andpleteck of offering any incentive might seem silly. However, the truth was that the molten giants had be Greem¡¯s most loyal followers the moment they lowered their heads.


    In the Fire Elementium ne, whoever had the hardest fist was the leader.


    That was the creed etched into the soul of every fire elementium creature!


    It was simple, brusque, and just that tiny, little bit adorable.


    The arrival of the molten giants caused a few hundred hulking figures to appear on the construction site.


    The bodies of the molten giants were not the same as other fire creatures that were formed entirely out of mes. Their bodies were pieced together from severalrge chunks of magma. What flowed within and between the magma was redva a thousand degrees in temperature.


    Their unique construction gave them formidable Physique and violent Strength that other low-grade fire creatures did not possess. They were incredibly suited to hardbor!


    The molten giants picked up the thick metal columns and slowly waded into thevake. The viscous, dark redva soon engulfed their bodies.


    Other magical creatures, even construction machines made entirely out of heat-resistance alloy, could not work properly in such a harsh environment. Molten giants could move about freely in theva. Not only did they take no damage, but they also became more energized.


    The molten giants stepped on something soft¨C molten rock at the bottom of theke, where theva was nearly two thousand degrees. They hammered the metal columns glowing with magical runes and arrays deep into the rock at specific positions.


    Strangely enough, the magical circuits on these inconspicuous metal columns immediately lit up when they came into contact with the boilingva. An invisible forcefield emanated from them and pushed the surroundingva aside.


    When all one hundred and twenty-eight metal columns were secured in ce, the forcefield they each emanated joined together in arger formation, opening up a half-kilometer-wide vacuum in the center of thevake.


    The moment the vacuum appeared, the army of construction machines that had been waiting outside swarmed forward and started working busily like ants.


    Given Greem¡¯s current status as a Great Adept, he would no longer be using cheap volcanic rock when building his personal tower. The stones amassed around theke like tiny hills were not ordinary rocks. They were all Firecrystal rocks that were considered valuable, even in the Fire Elementium ne.


    Firecrystal rocks in the Fire Elementium ne were like magical crystals in the World of Adepts. They were valuable, high-ss objects.


    Yet these rocks were now being used as the material for Greem¡¯s adept tower foundations!


    As the blocks of Firecrystal rock were tossed into theke¡¯s vacuum, the construction machines began to pile them up ording to the blueprints. As they built the foundations, they carvedplex and profound magical patterns and runes into the structure.


    Reinforcement runes, defensive runes, energy nodes, energy conductors, control arrays, magical circuits¨C every Firecrystal rock was a small magical circuit and energy node of its own. Once they were all connected, they formed arger runic array that only grewrger andrger as more building blocks wereid down.


    Etching runic lines, filling the grooves with the most conductive mithril, embedding magical gemstones with different functions at powers at key nodes- these numerous andplicated tasks could only be undertaken by the indefatigable magical machines and fire creatures.


    An ordinary person would have turned into ashes before they could even approach thevake!

 Chapter 1473 - A Mysterious Visitor

    Chapter 1473 A Mysterious Visitor


    The Fire Elementium ne, somewhere close to Molten Altar.


    There was a dark red cloud floating high above in the sky.


    A strange old man was stood quietly inside the cloud. He wore a ck tuxedo, sleek, straight pants, and a spotless pair of boots. The white hair on his head that betrayed his age wasbed finely and neatly.


    He wasn¡¯t using any flying device, nor were there any apparent traces of magic around him. He simply stood there in the cloud, bending over only slightly as he silently evaluated everything happening below at Molten Altar.


    From the outside, he looked just like an ordinary old man. It was impossible to find anything unusual about him.


    However, given the incredibly harsh environment of the Fire Elementium ne, he would never be able to survive if he was just an ordinary person, not to mention the fact that he was able to peek on Molten Altar while evading Greem¡¯s spiritual senses at such a close distance!


    The old man seemed to have been hiding in the cloud of fire for a long time now. He had basically looked over every unusual detail and aspect of the construction site. In particr, he seemed very interested by Split-Brain Sock and that small teleportation array connected with the Capital of Steel in space.


    Of course, the instant Greem appeared, the old man stopped staring and instead began only observing with his passive spiritual senses.


    After confirming Greem¡¯s actual grade numerous times, the old man took out an old-fashioned, ticking pocket watch from his breast pocket. He rubbed the metal lightly a few times before carefully putting it back into his pocket.


    The stopwatch wasn¡¯t veryrge. It was golden, and it appeared to be made out of brass. However, when the old man¡¯s finger ran over the watch¡¯s metal surface, an unusually powerful and mysteriousw fluctuation slowly spread outward.


    It was understandable that Greem had not been able to detect this old man, owing to his exceptional stealth abilities. Now that such obviousw fluctuations were spreading outward like a ripple everywhere within a thousand meters, Greem would be disgracing his title as a Great Adept if he still remained ignorant.


    Greem was discussing the matter of capturing more ves to form an army capable of defending the territory with Lasbes. All of a sudden, he lifted his head. There was an unconceble shock in his eyes.


    [Beep. Detecting signs of timew fluctuations. Currently tracing the origin.]


    Timew...Greem was surprised. Timews were perhaps the most sought-afterw power within the nar worlds. Along with the spacews, they were considered the most powerful of the narws.


    However, both temporal and spatial abilities were incredibly difficult to acquire through training. They demanded tremendous innate talent to learn. That was why Greem had never met any adept apart from Alice who possessed such powers, despite the countless adepts he had met in his life.


    It was only natural that Greem would be taken aback when sensing this unusualw fluctuation in the Fire Elementium ne now. His eyes quickly swept his surroundings to search for the origin of that fluctuation.


    Greem stood solemnly as blue light gleamed in his eyes, scanning the skies for any presence. Golden ripples spread outward and silently contacted the intangible narws hidden behind the scenes.


    There were traces¨Cslight, yet present¨Cwhere thews shed.


    Greem¡¯s gaze quickly followed the trace to a thick red cloud hovering in the sky above the valley. He then increased the frequency of the beams shooting from his eyes. His vision pierced through the red cloud and allowed him to see that old man standing in the cloud clearly.


    A human?


    No...and also not possible!


    A different adept might not have been able to see through to the old man¡¯s true form. But as a Great Adept assisted with his Chip, Greem was able to pierce through the appearances andy eyes on the opponent¡¯s power origin.


    The old man looked like a humanoid amalgamationposed of principle power. The insides of his body consisted of dense, tightly-meshed threads of power. His clothes, flesh, bones, skin, and even the beating heart inside his body were all made from countlessyers of threads of power tightly woven together.


    Upon energy spectrum analysis, these threads of power were revealed to be of the same origin as Greem¡¯s powers; it was fire elementium. That meant this entity was also a native creature of the Fire Elementium ne.


    Apart from his power origin, Greem also spotted three or four unique luminescences around him. These were clearly powerful magical items. In particr, the energy radiance shining from the old man¡¯s right chest was beyond anything Greem had ever seen. Moreover, it was the source of thew fluctuation from before.


    So thew fluctuation wasn¡¯t his own power, but the power of mighty magical equipment!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a small breath of relief upon knowing that.


    ¡°Sir, why don¡¯t youe down and have a seat now that you¡¯re already here!¡± Greem said softly.


    The old man didn¡¯t bother with courtesy. He chuckled, took a single step, and instantly appeared in front of Greem.


    Greem¡¯s expression hardly changed, but he was, in truth, terribly shocked. Even his pounding Heart of Principles couldn¡¯t help but pause for a beat.


    That had been 2,139 meters.


    There were 2,139 meters between where the old man had been and where he had now appeared. Greem had not sensed any trace of magic, supernatural power, or mystic abilities. Yet the old man had managed to traverse that distance in a single instant all the same.


    If it wasn¡¯t for the Chip¡¯s senses indicating that the old man was indeed present, Greem might have suspected that he was just a realistic illusion.


    Greem didn¡¯t know him, but Emberweb Broodmother Lasbes clearly knew the old man.


    This Fourth Grade fire lord that had feared no creature until Greem came along immediately crouched upon seeing the old man. She then eximed respectfully, ¡°Lord Hegel!¡±


    The old man patted his impable dress suit and turned to look at Lasbes as he said, ¡°Congrattions, Lasbes. It¡¯s only been a short while since we met. To think you¡¯ve already found a master.¡±


    Lasbes¡¯ mouthpart ttered slightly on her ugly face, but she could only sigh and lower her head.


    Meanwhile, Greem was already secretlymunicating with Lasbes.


    ¡°Who is he?¡±


    ¡°Hegel...Fifth Grade......a subordinate of Sixth Grade Fire King Zetas. Lord Zetas has not stepped out of his chambers in nearly ten thousand years. This Lord Hegel usually manages the affairs of his territory.¡±


    Subordinate? A subordinate, my ass...this was the freaking principle clone of a Fire King!


    Greem screamed in his mind, but he did not reproach Lasbes.


    After all, the broodmother did not possess such a sharp scanning ability as Greem did that allowed him to see through this Hegel fellow¡¯s true nature. That was why it was understandable that she hade to regard Hegel as a human subordinate of that Fire King.


    A human? Why did the Fire King create a principle clone with a humanoid form? Could that Zetas fellow have some unknown connections with humans?


    Greem wondered to himself as he greeted Hegel warmly.


    He could distinctly sense that Hegel was more powerful than him, even though he was no more than a Fifth Grade clone. If a fight were to actually break out here in the Fire Elementium ne, Greem would not have the slightest advantage.


    ¡°I see, it¡¯s Sir Hegel. I wonder which fair wind it is that has brought you here? Wee! I have not tidied up at all, and the ce is a little crude. So sorry that you have to see this!¡± Since there was no chance of winning, he might as well go for the soft diplomacy route. Greem was perfectly flexible and willing to adapt to the situation.


    ¡°Haha! Here in the Fire Elementium ne, there¡¯s no need for all that boorish courtesy. All the flowery stuff isn¡¯t exactly a custom here either. Best to just tell each other what we have to say!¡± Hegel calmly replied.


    ¡°Indeed! If that is the case, then I will speak frankly. May I know what business has brought you, Sir Hegel, to Molten Altar?¡±


    ¡°Nothing in particr. I had simply heard the news from my subordinates that an unfamiliar, otherworldly individual had appeared around here and is currently ¡®recruiting¡¯ all over the ce, which is why I came here personally to scope things out.¡±


    ¡°And...what have you found?¡±


    ¡°Hehehe, judging from what I¡¯ve seen, you must be from the adept civilization, right?¡±


    ¡°Indeed!¡±


    ¡°May I know what neworld you¡¯re from?¡±


    ¡°The World of Adepts!¡± Greem hesitated for a moment but gave the true answer in the end.


    At their current level, there were many things you couldn¡¯t simply lie about or say without thinking. What you said could often cause unknown effects in your future.


    ¡°The World of Adepts? Homeworld of the adept civilization...and you look so young. You must be an exceptionally gifted individual amongst the adepts!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t quite figure out what the old man was going for, so he could only reply with a few courteous words of humility.


    ¡°You are trying to be one of the Fire Kings, am I right?¡± Hegel suddenly asked.


    Greem¡¯s breath halted as his mental consciousness instantly boiled to a peak. He narrowed his eyes, and the fire energy within him started toe alive. The principle protection of the Tome of Corruption glowed beneath his skin.


    If necessary, Greem could instantly cover himself in multipleyers of magical defenses with all sorts of functions and purposes. The Scorched Earth divine spell inside the Orb of the Fire God, along with the Halo of Rot from the Tome of Corruption could both provide the enemy with a nasty surprise.


    Two Fifth Grade attacksunched from the will of his mind; even this unusual old man could not endure such a ferocious assault.


    Greem finally put on a ¡®gentle¡¯ smile after he had made all his preparations.


    ¡°So what if I am? And what if I¡¯m not?¡±


    The atmosphere suddenly turned cold and stern!


    ¡°If you do not intend to be a Fire King, then we can simply ignore what I just said. However, if you do have such intentions, I feel like it is necessary for us to have a dialogue,¡± Hegel¡¯s expression remained unchanged as if he wasn¡¯t bothered by Greem¡¯s wariness.


    ¡°A dialogue? About what?¡±


    ¡°About the path to bing a Fire King!¡± A smile filled with ¡®sincerity¡¯ appeared on Hegel¡¯s face.

 Chapter 1474 - Principle Infiltration

    Chapter 1474 Principle Infiltration


    A long time after Hegel left, Greem was still standing in the same spot, engrossed in thought.


    Emberweb Broodmother Lasbes gave out instructions, and all the fire creatures at work made sure to walk around to avoid Greem¡¯s position. None of them dared disturb him in the slightest.


    After a brief moment, Greem broke free from his silent brooding and returned to normal.


    Hegel¡¯s visit had been expected.


    Still, it was unexpected how soon the visit had been!


    The method to bing a Fire King? It was actually quite simple¨C drag arge nar world into the Fire Elementium ne and allow it to assimte the ne. That was all that was required!


    However, Greem himself knew the true value of arge nar world.


    The World of Adepts was arge nar world as well. It was far more ancient and vastly more powerful, but it was still very much ssified as arge nar world.


    The Arcane Empire, whose ruination Greem had personally witnessed with his own eyes, had also been arge nar world. That had been the Arcane Empire, a civilization so mighty they almost rose to the heights of the Adept civilization!


    Even throughout the boundless multiverse,rge nar worlds were few and far between. Each and every one of them was deeply coveted by the powerful factions of space and often were what the wars revolved around.


    Invading a small nar world with Greem¡¯s current power was no big problem. However, invading a mid-sized ne would be exceedingly difficult. Most of the time, the invasion was likely to end in a loss.


    For instance, the ne of Lance, which had long since fallen into the hands of the Crimson n, still did not truly belong to them. The adepts still had immense trouble excavating and developing the ne. Should they ever provoke those Fourth Grade dragon lords, even the steel fortress and its fearsome defenses would be ravaged by the dragons.


    Even such a mid-sized world that was still barely developed had already brought tremendous wealth and prosperity to the Crimson n. Could you imagine the profits to be obtained by conquering arge nar world? Just the thought of it would make your heart pound in excitement!


    The simplest, most direct way to gain acknowledgement from the Fire Elementium ne¡¯s nar consciousness and be a Fire King was to drag arge nar world to it and allow it to be assimted by the Fire Elementium ne.


    The simplicity and barbarity of the method left Greem speechless!


    If he was capable enough to conquer arge world, why wouldn¡¯t he just rule over that world? Why would he go to the trouble of trading it for a Fire King¡¯s status in the Fire Elementium ne?


    Upon further consideration, the authority and might of arge world¡¯s ruler might actually be inferior to that of a Fire King. That much was decided by the grade level and power of the different nes.


    The four major elementium nes¨Cearth, fire, water, and wind¨Cput together was a colossal nar world. That was two whole levels aboverge nar worlds. Even the Fire Elementium ne alone was considered a massive nar world, one grade above therge nar worlds.


    That was why it was understandable that the status of Fire King was considered more valuable!


    However, trading arge nar world under his rule for the status of Fire King was still not worth it in Greem¡¯s books, no matter how noble the status was. That said, if therge nar world in question didn¡¯t actually belong to him, then it was worth the consideration of sacrificing it to the Fire Elementium ne.


    Of course, Hegel had not traveled all this way to the Molten Altar just to tell Greem the means to bing a Fire King. Rather, he had been here to mark out the borders between their territories.


    King Zetas¡¯ territory was 3,500 kilometers northeast of Molten Altar.


    ording to the agreement between him and Hegel, Greem¡¯s sovereign territory could not exceed five hundred kilometers around Molten Altar. He was also not to have more than three Fourth Grade subordinates. If he were to break the terms of this agreement, the Fire Kings around him would have the right to banish him from the Fire Elementium ne at any moment.


    The reason for these terms was likely out of the intention to protect the native creatures of the Fire Elementium ne. It was the only way to prevent otherworldly visitors from hunting and raiding the wild fire lords to their heart¡¯s delight.


    These same terms also shattered Greem¡¯s grand ambitions in the Fire Elementium ne. Now, he had to think and n carefully the distribution of these three Fourth Grade subordinate quotas that he held.


    After some thought, Greem cast aside his thoughts on these frustrating matters and started to focus his attention on a different issue. He began to research Hegel¡¯s strange, phantom-like movement.


    He had a feeling that Hegel¡¯s strange movements weren¡¯t magic or power borrowed from some tool. It was likely an application of pure principle power. It was the future direction of Greem¡¯s development that he had never found the correct entry point for.


    Greem stood silently and reyed the image of Hegel moving that the Chip had captured, over and over in his mind. The rey speed was slowed down to an extreme, and almost every small movement of his body was further divided into countless keyframes that were then analyzed one by one.


    Apart from this, the Chip had also recorded the tiny changes in energy within Hegel¡¯s body.


    With all this databined, Greem was finally able to discover something out of the ordinary.


    Principle.


    As a principle adept, the source of power was always the principles!


    When the Chip slowed Hegel¡¯s actions down to an extreme, Greem could finally see how it worked. The principle power within his body merged with the narws, his entire body assimted into the principle system, and then he rematerialized at a specific position.


    Using the nar principle system as a bridge to aplish short-ranged teleportation.


    Such a means of teleportation could ignore all magical shields and barriers. It could also bypass walls, terrain, trees, and other obstacles. One could travel wherever they liked as long as the narws extended to that location.


    The only thing that could stop such teleportation was likely onlyw barriers or principle defenses!


    However, how many people within a material ne possessed defenses of such a high-grade level?


    Moreover, an adept tower would have to activate all its defenses and cut off all connection from the outside world to prevent any permeation of principles. However, such a state of istion demanded tremendous amounts of energy from the adept tower. It was no problem for the tower to maintain such a state for a few weeks, but the energy pool would eventually be exhausted.


    What was the tower supposed to do to stop this kind of principle infiltration then?


    The more he analyzed the topic, and the more he thought about it, the more powerful this application of the principles appeared to Greem. If it could be applied in actualbat, then his opponents would be in big trouble!


    ¡°Chip, immediately build a new research topic. Focus all efforts on calcting high-grade applications of fire principles, as well as the coupling of fire principles with narws.¡±


    [Beep. Mission constructed...calction mission model requires the collection of more relevant principle information. Mission details have been refined. The next step in the research topic requires Host toplete the relevant principle experiments.]


    Shua. Shua. Shua.


    The screen of light that the Chip projected in Greem¡¯s mind instantly filled with a sea of data. All sorts of forms and data flooded the screen like an avnche, piling higher and higher until the screen was almostpletely covered.


    ¡°Chip, you don¡¯t have to show me the intermediary processes. Just give me the final results!¡±


    [Beep. Instructions received.]


    The next second, the screen of light was cleared away, leaving behind only three prerequisites, written in glowing green text.


    [One: the conversion of the body into principle power (Current Progress: 78%).


    [Two: the creation of a fire consciousness (Current Progress: 0%).


    [Three: thepletion of relevant principlew coupling experiments (To be started).]


    Greem¡¯s gaze swept across the three conditions as he thought in silence.


    The conversion of the body into principle power. That was what Greem had been doing all this while since he became a Fifth Grade adept. Up to this point, he had only been using the principle energy of the Orb of the Fire God to irradiate his body and allow it to get used to the power of the fire principles.


    Now, what was demanded was for his body to be converted entirely into principle power, such that he could merge and assimte with the principles of a nar world itself.


    In truth, Greem would possess the foundation needed to merge with the principle system once hepleted this first step. However, the second requirement of creating a fire consciousness was also necessary. After all, without a fire consciousness to control his body, it would be challenging to separate from the principle system after being assimted.


    Greem was only trying to make use of the principle system, not give away his power. Without self-consciousness, the assimtion into the principle systems was more akin to allowing the principles to devour oneself.


    Creating a fire consciousness that transcended the principles was very, very important!


    The question of how to form this consciousness was one to which Greem had no answer, nor any clue how to begin doing so. If Greem wanted to research this topic, he would have to pay some visits to veteran powerhouses or the more experienced adepts in headquarters.


    These things couldn¡¯t be rushed. Greem could only take it one step at a time as he explored the issue.


    At any rate, with the ten-thousand-year lifespan of a Fifth Grade Great Adept, Greem had plenty of time to waste.


    The third requirement was conducting experiments in preparation for the final result.


    Performing these experiments without his body having been fully converted to principle power was far too risky. Thus, it seemed like he would have to hasten the conversion of his body.


    Just as Greem was about to return to Boulder Fortress after settling certain affairs in the Fire Elementium ne, Sock received an interesting piece of information.


    The information had been sent over from the World of Adepts, and the content was straightforward. It was a single line.


    ¡°Demi-God Lich Kanganas has returned to his skeletal ne. It is said that he is currently attempting to reach Fifth Grade.¡±


    Greem wasn¡¯t surprised to hear this at all.


    When it came to talent and ability, Kanganas was not inferior to him in any aspect. In particr, after obtaining the Reliquary, his powers had improved rapidly and almost exponentially.


    The reason he had only begun to prepare for advancement after so long wasn¡¯t due to ack of ability, but because of the unique characteristic of liches!


    Liches were undead. They were one of the ssic entities among undead creatures, in fact.


    They had no flesh on their bodies nor tendons or muscles. Necessarily, this meant that they did not possess lifeforce with which to nourish their soul. Under such circumstances, their advancement could only be fulfilled solely through the transcendence of the soul.


    The transcendence of the soul wasn¡¯t the most difficult part. Rather, the reconstruction of the phctery to allow for the transcended soul¡¯s containment was the most challenging stage in a lich¡¯s advancement.


    If they failed to advance and endangered their phctery in the process, they might turn to dust the very next moment. Their soul would be extinguished, even if they had just been a proud and mighty demi-god lich a moment ago.


    That was why the advancement of liches was far moreplex and troublesome than that of human adepts.


    They would never attempt advancement unless they were absolutely certain of their sess!

 Chapter 1475 - Urgent Reports

    Chapter 1475 Urgent Reports


    When he returned to Boulder Fortress, Greem could clearly sense that the battle¡¯s pace had hastenedpared to before.


    The atmosphere in the circr hall was unusually tense.


    The frequency at which Great Adepts were deployed increased more and more.


    White lights shed every so often from the various halls, the spatial fluctuations in the air never ceasing for even a moment. Casualties also started to appear among the Great Adepts who were deployed. Even within Greem¡¯s Hall Cloud, two familiar faces had vanished entirely.


    Over a hundred faith worlds had been conquered or destroyed. Even a major pantheon like the Orc Pantheon would fly into a rage at such an affront. They hadunched all sorts of retaliation against the adepts.


    The Orc Pantheon had as many as eighteen official gods that were known to the rest of the world alone. Over half of these gods possessed powerful divinities like ughter, War, Conquest, Power, and Destruction. Meanwhile, the other half had unusual and unique divinities such as Hunt, Chaos, and Tracking.


    It indirectly demonstrated that the Orc Pantheon was a formidable force. It was very difficult to defeat them.


    They were rash, impulsive, and would often fall into chaos and disorder due to their faction¡¯s nature. However, their tremendous individual prowess allowed them to pull the situation together, constantly putting the human adepts in grave danger while fighting against the orcs.


    The orc gods were powerful and dangerous but poor at strategic nning and tactical maneuvers. They often rushed forward boldly into battle in a valiant show of their strength. The frustrating thing was that these orc gods were utterly fearless. They frequently chose to rush into conflict using their true selves in a moment¡¯s rage.


    That was something that rarely urred in the adept faction¡¯s battles against the other pantheons of the World of Gods!


    The Orc Pantheon did not show weakness in the face of the adepts¡¯ unyielding offense. They sent out countless orc armies into the adepts¡¯ lesser nes and ughtered every living being in those worlds.


    They also used their faith worlds as strongholds and beat back the adepts¡¯ invasion over and over.


    For a while, the mes of war raged across a hundred nar worlds.


    Both sides made advances and suffered defeats in a constant back and forth, with the nar worlds as their battlefields and the universe as their stage. Entire systems of gxies were thrust into chaos and restlessness as the mes of war spread everywhere.


    Greem sat in Hall Cloud, quietly reading the Tome of Corruption in his hand. Even though the odds of the Tome of Corruption providing him with high-grade knowledge were very low, his extended reading and analysis efforts had allowed him to umte quite a lot of mystic knowledge.


    Meanwhile, reports of the situation on the frontlines were getting increasingly bloody and urgent.


    ¡°Urgent report! Orcs have appeared at Millefleur Front. They have invaded ne Utha and are currently ughtering the natives to hold a blood ritual. It appears they are summoning starbeasts.¡±


    ne Utha was a mid-sized nar world of the adept faction. If the orcs seeded in their blood ritual, the entire nar world would be devastated and ravaged by the time they managed to kill the starbeast.


    ¡°Enemy reported on Cloudclear Front. One orc-god clone has been spotted. Grade unknown.¡±


    ¡°Urgent report from Cloudclear Front. Seventh Grade God of ughter Garon has suddenly appeared in his true form. The frontlines have copsed. The specific number of losses is yet to be known.¡±


    ¡°Urgent report from Earthwind Front. Horr, Sixth Grade God of the Hunt of the Orc Pantheon, has been spotted. Sixth Grade Great Adept Housseau has requested reinforcements from headquarters.¡±


    ¡°Urgent report from System Eleven. Fifth Grade God of Tyranny Haistoc and God of Hatred Enus have joined the battle in space. The frontline is in danger.¡±


    For some reason, the orc gods were attacking everywhere as if they had gone insane. They immediately pounced onto a new target after they were done with a previous one and gave the adepts no chance toy traps or to surround them.


    Most of the time, they fought alone with their true forms, but their ferociousbat style and tremendous power allowed them to smash through one adept army after the next. Moreover, there seemed to be no pattern to where they chose to appear. It all seemed like they were just doing whatever they pleased.


    You could risk running into one of these rogue orc gods even if you were just stationed in a small, remote nar world. If that were the case, then even the Great Adepts were reasonably likely to die on their missions.


    For a moment, the adept faction was thrown into a panic. It seemed like the enemy was everywhere and would appear around every corner. All the Great Adepts began to feel nervous and anxious when they heard they had been assigned a mission, even if it was just a simple, low-risk task.


    Boulder Fortress correspondingly increased the frequency of Sixth and even Seventh Grade adept deployment in response to this situation. They finally managed to hold off the Orc Pantheon¡¯s retaliation through their plentiful number of Great Adepts.


    Meanwhile, as one of the many ¡®fodder¡¯ among the Great Adepts, Greem also saw more and morebat!


    Thebat light of Hall Cloud suddenly lit up.


    Adept Gerritsen, who was seated at the very front, tilted his head slightly as he listened to the report. His expression suddenly turned ugly.


    ¡°Greem, Antuso, Bibi. Go to System Eleven and provide reinforcement...now!¡±


    Greem¡¯s heart pounded when he heard his name called out.


    System Eleven was not a good ce. This was a hazardous mission!


    Greem was thinking a lot in his mind, but he showed nothing on his face. Instead, he simply stood up alongside his two Fifth Gradepanions and walked to the teleportation corner in the corner of the hall.


    White light shed. Greem and the others appeared inside the exceedingly busymand hall. They were quickly led by magical golems to a teleportation array engulfed in silver light.


    There were hundreds of these teleportation arrays, each one leading to a different system or nar world!


    A Fifth Grade adept who was responsible for coordinating things was already waiting in front of the array. Upon seeing Greem and the two adepts, he hastily reminded them in a hushed voice, ¡°Be careful when you get there. They are already fighting there, and it is all quite chaotic. Your mission is to stabilize the situation and make sure the adept army isn¡¯t routed. Of course, you must not let System Eleven fall into the hands of the orcs!¡±


    ¡°We can¡¯t guarantee that, can we? After all, the orcs are going off the rails,¡± Great Adept Antuso grumbled in dissatisfaction. He was obviously very unhappy at being deployed to such a dangerous ce.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry! The superiors will reward you properly. The reward for this mission will be double the usual!¡± The Fifth Grade adept smiled and consoled them.


    Greem and the other adepts finally felt a hint of joy.


    They knew there was no way they could disobey the orders anyway. Since they had to do this dangerous mission either way, being able to obtain double the reward waspensation enough to dispel most of their resentment.


    After they stepped into the teleportation array, the Fifth Grade adept waved a silver token in his hand. White, pulsating light flickered from beneath them and quickly engulfed the entire space.


    A short momentter, a blinding white light shed as the space around the array trembled violently. However, everything was contained within the silver barrier.


    By the time that space returned to normal, the array was already empty!


    ............


    The system they were traveling to this time was even further away than ne Gere.


    Even as resilient as Greem¡¯s Spirit was, he felt waves of nausea and discement. After enduring the spatial distortion with his tough Physique, all the pressure was suddenly relieved as he appeared at their destination.


    Greem had not even opened his eyes before the sounds of loud elementium explosions and bestial roars filled his ears.


    Greem calmed himself and opened his eyes, only to realize he was standing inside arge cave.


    The teleportation array was beneath their feet. Greem¡¯s twopanions were still swaying lightly, the bright glow of magic shining around them. Soon, they also recovered from their long-range teleportation and regained full control of their faculties. They opened their eyes and vigntly evaluated their surroundings.


    The individuals waiting outside the array were only a group of Second Grade adepts. Joy couldn¡¯t help but spread over their faces when they saw the three Great Adepts appear. They quickly stepped forward and paid their respects.


    Meanwhile, the waves of explosions and rumbling that could be heard and felt from outside showed how intense the fighting really was. The three Great Adepts frowned.


    Ultra-long-range teleportation arrays were some of the most valuable mobility tools of the adept faction. Under most circumstances, the adepts would only set up these arrays in the backlines or somewhere highly secure. It should not have been so crude and rough.


    The fact that they could hear the sounds of fighting while they were inside the teleportation array could only mean that the orcs had broken through the adepts¡¯ defensive line. The fires of war had extended into this ¡®safe zone!¡¯


    This was not good!


    The three of them exchanged looks and stepped out of the cave in unison.


    They had not appeared inside a nar world this time. Instead, they were in a fortress drifting through space.


    This fortress wasn¡¯t small. It was a thousand meters tall and at least one and a half kilometers wide.


    A stone fortress stood at the top, while a three-hundred-meter-thick rock foundationy at the bottom. Every inch of space inside the fortress glowed with a strange magical light. A giant barrier protected it.


    At this moment, the barrier was no longer intact. A hundred-meter-wide hole had been sted into the top of the barrier. Hordes of orc warriors were rushing and charging at the fortress defenses on ugly, vicious wyverns.


    Meanwhile, two ten-meter-tall orc gods with bulging muscles and pointed fangs stood behind the orc army.


    God of Tyranny Haistoc and God of Hatred Enus!


    Judging from their appearance, both gods had descended with their true forms; they could unleash a hundred percent of their violently berserk physical power.


    The arrival of Greem and hispanions undoubtedly attracted the attention of the two orc gods as well.


    Their savage gazes cut across the six kilometers of distance andnded on the three Great Adepts.


    Since their reinforcements had arrived, the two Great Adepts who had been holed up in the fortress also showed themselves.


    Five against two...the scales of victory appeared to be tilting toward the adepts!

 Chapter 1476 - The God of Tyranny

    Chapter 1476 The God of Tyranny


    ¡°Careful. Both of them are here in their true forms. This isn¡¯t the same as fighting their clones...be careful!¡± Perhaps concerned that the neers would invite defeat by underestimating their opponents, the two Great Adepts stationed here immediately sent them a mental message.


    It was the first time that Greem and his twopanions had set foot on such arge-scale battlefield in space; it was unavoidable that they were somewhat inexperienced. They pulled themselves together when they heard the Great Adepts¡¯ voices. They then quickly began applying casting defenses to themselves and their allies.


    Dong, dong, dong!


    Multiple blinding magical lights filled half the horizon. In the blink of an eye, Greem and his twopanions were shrouded in light. The numerousyers of magical defenses engulfed them firmly like colorful shells and kept them protected.


    As a principle adept, the most potent artillery on the battlefield, Greem naturally did not need to rush forward and engage the orc gods in a melee. After hastily activating all his magical defenses, he started chanting and preparing arge-scale fire spell.


    Antuso and Bibi were a bloodline adept and a body-refining adept, respectively. They weren¡¯t going to fall behind either. They slowly approached the battlefield as they made their ownbat preparations.


    Antuso let out a wild roar. Ghostly green light shone from his eyes as his entire body suddenly swelled and grewrger. His nose and chin started extending forward as four pairs of sharp fang grew out of his mouth, along with ws on his hands and feet.


    Smooth, shiny ck hair also rapidly grew all over his body. A spiral horn appeared on his forehead. As dark light glowed from the horn, the giant wolf that Antuso had transformed into slowly turned translucent until hepletely faded from sight.


    A Spiritwolf!


    To think, Antuso possessed the mysterious spiritwolf bloodline.


    Meanwhile, Body-Refining Adept Bibi uttered several battlecries. His body grew from two meters to three meters tall. The muscles all over his body bulged, and he pulled out a double-bit axe from behind his back. He then smiled wickedly as he stepped onto the battlefield as a monstrous hulk.


    The orc warriors who were swarming into the barrier leaped off the backs of their wyverns andnded on the fortress wall. Their steps crushed the stone blocks underfoot as they rushed at the Great Adepts.


    ¡°Fools!¡±


    Antuso¡¯s voice cackled coldly and scornfully from nowhere.


    All of a sudden, a translucent wolf-like figure appeared amid the orcs. Countless shes could be heard as the ws swiped across the air. Every orc within a hundred meters was instantly diced into countless pieces of meat as if they had run through a blender.


    The spiritwolf chuckled. His silhouette flickered, and he appeared in the middle of another group of orcs. sh! sh! sh! With another flurry of ws, those orcs were finished in an instant as well.


    There was even a Third Grade orc in this group.


    Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do before the absolute power difference. Much like the low-grade orcs, he was reduced to chunks of meat in less than a second without the ability to defend himself.


    ¡°Little ones, spread out! Let me see if these two fellows are really as good as they think themselves to be!¡± Haistoc was the first to be unable to hold back when he saw his subordinates ughtered.


    Haistoc, the God of Tyranny, looked like an unusually tall and muscr orc. He was over ten meters tall, and his limbs were extraordinarily thick. The size of his muscles was also incredible, enough to send shivers down one¡¯s back. He had a simple leather jerkin draped over his body, leaving his right shoulder exposed. He held a spiked mace in his left hand and a il in his right, giving him a violent impression from the outset.


    Due to his unique divinity that was suited for war, Haistoc was an incredibly qualifiedmander in battle. The moment he gave out his order, the orcs that had been driven mad with rage quickly stepped aside, giving enough space to the gods and the Great Adepts to fight.


    Greem and the Great Adepts watched in disbelief as Haistoc shook his giant body and voluntarily rushed at Body-Refining Adept Bibi,pletely ignoring his numerical disadvantage.


    On one side, you had a ten-meter-tall giant orc. On the other, you had a three-meter-tall body-refining adept. Bothbatants pursued a path of absolute violence, and their Strength was roughly equal. However, the tremendous difference inbat power was revealed the moment they shed.


    Haistoc¡¯s mace and il mmed against Bibi¡¯s double-bit axe when he rushed forward.


    Both of them bowed their knees and bent over slightly. Their muscles flexed as both parties¡¯ berserk might shed through the weapons in their hands. Bibi¡¯s expression instantly turned ugly. He was blown away by the overwhelming force after just three seconds.


    His body left afterimages in the air as he was sted like a bowling ball into an attached building of the fortress.


    Arge boom could be heard as a giant hole was knocked into the magically-enhanced wall. Everyone¡¯s eyelids jumped.


    Tssss!


    Greem, who was still in the midst of his rapid casting, couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air. For the first time, he had experienced the true terror of a god in its true form!


    Greem had nevere into contact with a god¡¯s true form, but he had shed with the clones of the gods before. He believed that given their ssification as the same Fifth Grade, the difference in power should not be all that great. Therefore, he had thought there was nothing to fear about the gods.


    Today, he personally witnessed the tremendous difference between a god¡¯s clone and a god¡¯s true form.


    They weren¡¯t on the same level at all!


    A god in its true form would wield the divine equipment mostpatible with their fighting style, while most god clones fought barehanded. A god in its true form would have its powerful divine authority to sustain them and could draw upon divine power from its god kingdom. In contrast, god clones usually only had fragments of divine authority. The level of their power was usually only a fraction of the god itself.


    Factor in their divinity and divine power, and the difference in power only grew exponentially!


    Even if they were both Fifth Grade, God of Tyranny Haistoc had still managed to blow Bibi out of the battlefield with a single strike.


    Fortunately, Bibi was a powerful Fifth Grade himself. Although he had lost to Haistoc in a sh of Strength, he had not actually received any significant damage himself.


    Aooooo!


    A furious roar rang out. Bibi turned into a human cannon and bolted from the debris toward Haistoc once more.


    Meanwhile, Spiritwolf Antuso appeared silently behind Haistoc. The ws of his two front paws sliced through the air and reached for the god¡¯s back.


    A pincer attack!


    The two adepts had never worked together before and didn¡¯t have perfect chemistry, but a simple maneuver like this was more than manageable for Fifth Grade adepts like themselves.


    Greem had also finished his casting at this point. He held thepleted spell above his hand and watched the battle with narrowed eyes. He was waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike.


    Haistoc showed no signs of fear or panic in the face of the pincer attack. Instead, heughed coldly. His body shook; all of a sudden, he had six arms on his torso.


    Each of the six arms held an unusual weapon of its own. There was a greatsword, a scimitar, an axe, a il, a spiked mace, and a pickaxe. Judging from the strange glow they possessed, it was evident that these were six pieces of low-grade divine equipment, each with a unique ability.


    Even though the six divine items weren¡¯t of very high grade, they were still divine equipment. They possessed the powerful principle characteristic of dispelling all elementium barriers and breaking through all physical defenses.


    The transformed Haistoc started to spin rapidly. The six arms wielding the six divine weapons rain down upon the body-refining adept and the spiritwolf.


    The two Great Adepts who were nning on pinning their opponent never expected this turn of events. They were caught off guard. They desperately attacked the enemy¡¯s towering figure, all while dodging the hail of divine weapons.


    However, the six pieces of divine equipment swung down upon them like a stampede. Dodge one, and you would get hit by another. Dodge that other one, and you would be hit by the next one. The two adepts held on for seven seconds before they were hit over and over by the divine weapons and blown away from sight.


    Of course, God of Tyranny Haistoc also paid the price for fighting two adepts of the same grade with such ferocity!


    As he blew the two adepts back, countless w marks and two deep gashes could be seen on his divine figure. However, these were only light wounds to his divine body. A sh of golden light rolled over the injuries, and they vanished without a trace. Even the two gashes left by Bibi¡¯s axe were quickly closing up.


    Haistocughed viciously and brandished his weapons. He had his eyes set on the weaker spiritwolf, and he wouldn¡¯t stop until the wolf was dead. However, before he could move, a violent fireball instantly engulfed his body.


    Greem didn¡¯t intend to hold back now that he hadmenced attacking.


    He grew to his full ten-meter size. Golden mes rose around him. He stood on the spot and waved his hand. Several golden fireballs containing the Undying mes hurtled toward the God of Tyranny in a barrage.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    The attacks didn¡¯t seem like they would end!


    Greem had practically turned into a one-man ballista. Bolt after bolt of fireballs cut across the sky with their long golden tails and bombarded the area where the god stood.


    The ce turned into a sea of fire in the blink of an eye.


    A furious cry could be heard. Haistoc waved his divine equipment and charged out of the mes. There were scorch marks all over his body. However, the golden mes that came after were kept three meters away from his body by ayer of radiant divine-energy. They could no longer touch him.


    Divine Shield!


    Greem spat out from between his clenched teeth.

 Chapter 1477 - Clash of the Powerful

    Chapter 1477 sh of the Powerful


    It was no wonder Greem was so furious. After all, Divine Shields were simply too ridiculous.


    They might only consist of a single, thinyer, but they possessed fearsome divine characteristics!


    First and most frustratingly, Divine Shields could block any known magical effect and damage.


    All abnormal effects such as charm, poison, hypnosis, paralysis, stun, disease, as well as elementium effects such as corrosion, frost, lightning, fire, or even sonic waves were ineffective against a god while the Divine Shield was still active.


    Second, while the Divine Shield was still active, the god was also immune to physical effects such as staggering, intimidation, and knockback.


    That was why, in Greem¡¯s opinion, the Divine Shield was basically like a watered-down invulnerability spell!


    The god could rampage about the battlefield without fear while their Divine Shield was up. They didn¡¯t have to be afraid of being surrounded by the enemy, nor did they have to be concerned about various annoying physical and magical effects.


    Even a Great Adept of the same grade would have to avoid a god that could freely move and strike as they wanted to!


    Haistoc rushed toward Greem like a storm the moment he activated his Divine Shield. The torrent of glowing divine equipment crashing down from above caused Greem¡¯s usuallyposed face to twitch ufortably.


    Shit.


    Greem fled without any hesitation.


    He teleported a thousand meters away with Fire Teleportation, then turned back and let loose with another barrage of mes. The enemy roared and chased after him again. Greem could only flee once more, switching to an even further location before he resumed his bombardment.


    Greem had engaged opponents in melees in the past, using the mes around him to sear the enemy¡¯s flesh. However, Greem did not dare let this God of Tyrannyy a single finger on his body.


    Judging from the force shockwaves earlier, Greem was certain that the base Strength of this God of Tyranny was at least above 50 points. Meanwhile, Greem¡¯s Physique wasn¡¯t even at 40 points. He would almost definitely be smashed to bits if he took even a single hit.


    That was why Greem focused only on running. He dared not directly sh with the orc god.


    However, just fleeing was pointless. If Greem didn¡¯t go on the offense and exhaust the power of the Divine Shield, then this battle would forever remain one-sided. Only after he shattered the Divine Shield would Greem¡¯s violent fire magic be able to put the orc god on the back foot.


    While the two were engaged in a chase, a violent shockwave rippled through the air. Body-Refining Adept Bibi roared and returned after having been knocked away.


    ¡°Bastard, you are the one that forced my hand.¡±


    Bibi was furious after having been blown away like that twice in a row. Blood surged through his body, and he grew evenrger in size. He waved his battleaxe asyer uponyer of glowing magical light shone around him. He roared and charged at the God of Tyranny.


    At this point, he was already five meters tall. He might only be half the opponent¡¯s height, but the overwhelming Strength he now possessed was equal to the god. It was obvious that he had activated some special magical effect.


    ng! ng! ng!


    The multiple pieces of divine equipment crashed down on the double-bit axe like hammers swung onto an anvil. Wave after wave of force shockwaves rippled outward, damaging the entire battlefield. Any living entity or substance that came into contact with these shockwaves was instantly shredded into tiny pieces, disintegrated, and blown away.


    The force shockwaves swept up the orcs and wyverns that were too close to the battlefield before they could escape. They immediately exploded into a mess of flesh and blood. Rocks began to fall off of the imprable stone fortress as the shockwaves washed against it. The outer walls started to cave in and peel off, one by one.


    No one knew what Bibi had enhanced himself with, but he was actually able to match the God of Tyranny¡¯s overwhelming Strength and wasn¡¯t blown away this time. However, as he was inferior in Agility and attack speed, while also having fewer arms and weapons, he was still undoubtedly at a disadvantage.


    Still, with thebined force of his and Greem¡¯s attack, they finally shattered the Divine Shield!


    The instant the shield broke, the spiritwolf reappeared above the God of Tyranny. He opened his wide maw and snapped at his head.


    Haistoc showed no fear even while being attacked by three enemies from every side.


    He lifted his feet and stomped the air as if it was the ground itself.


    The earth quaked!


    The Strength that Haistoc had unleashed at this moment was definitely above 55 points.


    His fearsome Strength shook the empty space and created an unusual quaking effect around him, resembling that of an actual earthquake. All elementium, energy, and particles within a thousand meters were sted outward by sheer force, creating an explosive shockwave.


    However, the shockwave didn¡¯t blow away the two Great Adepts around him as the previous ones had. Instead, the adepts were stunned on the spot.


    When one¡¯s Strength reached 40 points, they would possess the horrifying might to pulverize a mountain. At 50 points, they could shatter space itself, let alone a body of flesh and blood.


    As for 55 points? At Fifth Grade, it was a height that only pure-Strength adepts could hope to attain!


    This God of Tyranny was clearly only able to reach such terrifying heights due to the innate Strength of the orcs, the enhancement of his divine power, power aura, and many other abilities.


    Haistoc waved his six divine weapons. He prepared to crush the skulls of the two adepts while they were stunned. Just then, one of Greem¡¯s fireballsnded on the God of Tyranny¡¯s body. The Fifth Grade Scorched Earth spell embedded within was also unleashed without hesitation.


    One had to admit that only a concentrated high-grade spell like this could threaten a Fifth Grade god in his true form.


    Even as powerful as Haistoc was, he could not possibly endure aplete Fifth Grade Scorched Earth divine spell unharmed!


    Aooooo!


    Haistoc raised his head and let out a pained howl. Hundred-meter-long streams of fire shot out of his eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and even the pores of his skin. The violent and vicious mes even blew Antuso and Bibi away. Only the God of Tyranny stood there as a human torch. His entire divine body had been scorched ck by the fire.


    The golden orc god had instantly been turned into a roasted chicken.


    Enus, the God of Hatred, had been watching calmly from afar. His expression changed instantly. He let out a battlecry, intent on aiding hisrade. However, the two Great Adepts stationed at the fortress looked at each other and intercepted him in unison.


    ¡°Bastard! You injured my divine body! You will pay for this transgression with your life.¡±


    This Fifth Grade divine spell that had once killed a minor Scourge Lord was still quite insufficient for killing an actual god. The God of Tyranny had indeed been wounded in a moment¡¯s carelessness, leaving him in this terrible state. However, this was still within the realm of a minor injury; he wasn¡¯t critically injured yet.


    Haistoc was beyond furious after being hit by this unexpected Fifth Grade spell. He gave up on pursuing the two melee adepts and instead charged straight at Greem.


    Greem¡¯s body erupted into mes the moment he saw this. He fled toward the distance as a ball of fire.


    However, the God of Tyranny arrived before he couldplete his Fire Teleportation. He let out a furious cry. The berserk soundwave rumbled through space, instantly disrupting all the elementium within a hundred meters.


    Greem¡¯s Fire Teleportation was interrupted, and his body reformed again.


    ¡°Die, bastard!¡±


    The God of Tyranny took full advantage of the situation. He swung his arms. The greatsword with the Severing trait and the pickaxe with the Soulstake trait crashed toward Greem.


    Greem drew in a breath of cold air. The Tome of Corruption in his hand instantly erected a principle barrier in front of him. Violent fire energy poured out of the Orb of the Fire God and created countlessyers of fire shields beneath the principle barrier.


    These defenses temporarily stopped the attacks while Greem exploded. He split into four zing humanoid figures, onerge and three small. Each one fled in a different direction.


    There was a loud crackling sound as the God of Tyranny smashed through all the defenses and arrived at Greem¡¯s original position. He looked around him, and a cruel smile appeared on his face.


    ¡°Die!¡±


    He cried out loud. Haistoc waved his arms wildly, and four pieces of divine equipment of different designs instantly caught up to the four figures like shooting stars. All of them exploded with a loud bang.


    Greem stumbled out of the small humanoid figure that had fled southwest. The flesh on his back where the axe had hit him tore open, and a fountain of blood poured forth.


    Dammit! This axe possessed the divine trait of Execution!


    If Greem¡¯s life force had been less than half his total when he had been hit, he would likely have been killed on the spot. Fortunately, Greem was a long-range fighter. He had not been touched by the enemy even a single time up to now. Thus, his life force had been at its peak.


    If that hadn¡¯t been the case......


    Even though the Execution effect didn¡¯t ur, the Fifth Grade divine equipment¡¯s violent strike still inflicted untold damage to Greem.


    He screamed in agony as he fled further away.


    As he escaped, Greem resentfully hurled thest Fifth Grade spell he had at the enemy. The Halo of Rot.


    ¡°Brat! Now you know my power! Now, die!¡± Haistoc was finally able to vent his anger after beating up Greem so severely. He recalled the four divine weapons to his side and prepared to hunt down his opponent.


    However, the purple and ck halo had already appeared in front of him.


    ¡°Haha! Brat, don¡¯t struggle anymore. Just watch me,¡± Haistoc waved his divine weapon and destroyed the Halo of Rot. However, the color of his face turned instantly. ¡°You bastard! This is Fifth Grade¡ª¡±


    The Fifth Grade acid that had erupted instantly engulfed the god¡¯s divine form!

 Chapter 1478 - Visiting Sarubo

    Chapter 1478 Visiting Sarubo


    Haistoc¡¯s outdated knowledge had ultimately been his downfall!


    There were plenty of Great Adepts who could cast Fifth Grade spells among those he had met in the past. It wasn¡¯t unusual at all. However, very few of them could instant-cast a Fifth Grade spell.


    The only ones who could aplish such a feat were powerful individuals among the Fifth Grades. The young fire adept before him did not look like such an individual.


    Of course, it was possible that these Fifth Grade spells weren¡¯t cast personally but activated through some powerful magical equipment. Still, for a rookie that had just advanced to Fifth Grade to possess two high-grade items capable of unleashing Fifth Grade spells was unimaginable!


    It was due to this understanding and hisck of sensitivity for elementium or principles that Haistoc suffered such a terrible blow. If he had managed to sense that the blob of poison was actually a Fifth Grade spell, he would never have been dumb enough to detonate it himself.


    Now, he was in a dire situation!


    The explosion of acid instantly engulfed the entire area. The pungent and viscous liquid rapidly sizzled when itnded on Haistoc¡¯s divine body. Horrifying smoke started to rise, leaving behind small holes all over his divine form.


    A god¡¯s body might be immune to all worldly poison, but it wasn¡¯t immune to those containing poison principles.


    Haistoc roared. He channeled a vast surge of divine power from his god kingdom. It rinsed his ravaged body and purified the cruel principle that was eroding his form.


    Antuso and Bibi took this opportunity to rush forward and surround the smoking God of Tyranny.


    Greem slipped away into the distance during the chaos. He took severalrge gulps of lifestock solution and high-grade healing potions. It was only then that his body had enough regenerative power to mend the massive gash on his back slowly.


    Lifestock solution was an essence extracted from the elvish Tree of Life. It was considered a miraculous panacea on that ne, capable of even saving a person on the brink of death. Unfortunately for someone like Greem, the effects of the lifestock solution were much more limited. His body had already been refined to its limit, and almost all of his physical potential had been excavated.


    All the lifestock solution could do was stimte his body and allow his regeneration to elerate slightly!


    It was the same for the high-grade healing potions. Greem had to drink several tons worth of potions to get the slightest effect out of them. Otherwise, the body of principles formed after his advancement would be able to block the impact of these outside substances.


    The battle between Fifth Grades was so horrifying that everybatant below Fifth Grade could only stay as far away as possible. They didn¡¯t dare approach the battlefield in the slightest.


    Even the Fourth Grade orcs were not qualified to participate in this fight.


    Inside a nar world, Fourth Grades might be able to match Fifth Grades to some extent due to nar suppression weakening Fifth Grades. Outside of a nar world, Fifth Grade entities could unleash their might to the greatest extent in this boundless gxy.


    Everything below Fifth Grade was mortal. Only after advancing to Fifth Grade could one be a transcendent existence that could freely traverse the multiverse!


    All thebatants here were undoubtedly such transcendent beings.


    The moment they shed, their battlefield engulfed a massive area of over fifty kilometers.


    A single sh teleport would be a kilometer of distance. A proper teleport would cross several kilometers. A single punch or kick would send shockwaves throughout the area, enough to pulverize anything within range. If this were within a nar world, the fight of these seven transcendent beings would be enough to destroy a small world.


    Even a mid-sized nar world would be utterly ravaged after the havoc they had unleashed!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The power they possessed and the might contained within them was already far beyond the limits of nar creatures. They were at the level where they could split a mountain with a punch and create an abyss with a stomp. A single spell would wipe out everything within a hundred kilometers.


    Moreover, the destruction they wreaked while they fought was not limited to actual material substances. Even the intangible narws were caught up in the destruction as well.


    Even the narws had to make way for them.


    Where their powers spread, the narws were rewritten, overwritten, and modified. The principle systems of a nar world would be stirred into absolute chaos. It didn¡¯t matter how powerful the nar consciousness was. It would not be able to extinguish these foreignws and principles that contained such powerful individuality and willpower. The nar consciousness would have topromise and step back, thereby losing the only leverage it had over these individuals.


    Fortunately, this was space. Apart from the undting, ferocious magical tides, there was no nar consciousness in their way. The Fifth Grades were allowed to unleash the full extent of their might, fighting with all their might in the depths of space.


    The orc warriors caught up in this battle were shredded into paste before they could utter a cry for help. It was the adepts who managed to avoid the shockwaves by hiding inside the stone fortress.


    However, most of the fortress¡¯s outermost buildings had also been destroyed, resulting in numerous casualties of low-grade adepts and voodoo beasts.


    This battlested three days and nights. It wasn¡¯t until both sides were at their limits that the two orc gods finally retreated reluctantly.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Both parties were almost equally strong. Either of them would have to pay a colossal price to kill their opponents. It was obvious that neither party was willing to make this sacrifice. As such, they could only ept this inevitable conclusion!


    The two Great Adepts stationed here had wanted to keep Greem and his twopanions in the fortress for a little longer to recover. However, they rejected the offer. Instead, they dragged their broken bodies into the fortress¡¯s teleportation array and immediately returned to headquarters.


    They might not have obtained great results in this battle, but they still seeded in repelling the two orc gods¡¯ attack. Consequently, they were able to receive the doubled mission rewards they were promised. The three of them also received the privilege of being able to rest for half a year. It was then that they nodded at each other and returned to their rooms.


    After this shared experience of fighting together, Greem, Antuso, and Bibi instantly went from strangers to acquaintances. They exchanged contact information and became actual panions!¡¯


    After Greem became a Fifth Grade Great Adept, he could no longer lead the same life as he had before, as an ind of an individual. Being acquainted with more Great Adepts and establishing a vastwork of contacts was also a means of quickly improving his status and influence.


    After all, Greem had many enemies out there as well.


    The Great Witch Maysa was an important Seventh Grade individual. She almost certainly had considerable influence within the Adept Faction. If Greem remained without allies as he currently was, he would be vulnerable to being isted and pushed around by the enemy.


    That was why Greem had so passionately participated in the excursions of the adept civilization. He was protecting himself against any possible schemes by making himself part of a bigger group. Moreover, he constantly observed and evaluated the division of factions within the adept civilization to decide whose sides would stand in the future.


    He wasn¡¯t cursing or speaking ill of the adept civilization. This division within the adepts was a veritable fact he had seen and heard with his own eyes and ears. The adept civilization had never been a single unified force from the very beginning. They were divided into numerous factions with different values and directions.


    For instance, the faction he currently belonged to was led by Eighth Grade Adept Barbara. They were a group that focused on invasions against the orcs. The entire battle had begun due to Witch Barbara¡¯s decision alone; she was the mastermind of all this conflict. Greem was, at best, only amander who had only recently shaken off his status as a mere pawn!


    Greem had conducted investigations on this issue. Adept Barbara had no connections to the Northern Witches at all. Otherwise, he would never havee here even if he was threatened with death itself.


    Through his investigations, Greem knew it appeared as if the Northern Witches had formed their own faction and kept to themselves. They didn¡¯t like associating with adepts of other factions. It also caused other factions to significantly exclude the Northern Witches as well. They didn¡¯t have the most amicable rtions.


    Right now, Greem was only hoping that Witch Barbara was powerful and stern enough to keep Maysa¡¯s influence at bay. It was the only way he could continue growing stronger and stronger without the risk of dying.


    ............


    Greem unexpectedly ran into an old acquaintance just as he stepped out of the hall.


    Sanazar!


    She seemed to have been waiting here for a long time. She stopped Greem upon seeing him appear, a somewhat awkward expression on her face.


    ¡°Lord Sarubo wishes to see you!¡±


    Sarubo.


    Greem brooded in silence. He didn¡¯t think there was much of a problem with that, so he readily agreed.


    He followed after Sanazar¨Cshrouded in purple mist as usual¨Cas they wove through the winding corridors of the fortress. They stopped before the door of a room on the higher levels.


    Sanazar bowed and stepped aside when they reached this ce. She didn¡¯t say anything else either. It seemed like she did not intend to go in along with Greem.


    Greem turned around and looked at her briefly as he walked past her. He could see that Sanazar¡¯s heart was pounding wildly. Humiliation and anger were written all over her face, though she tried her best not to say anything.


    ¡°If you have nothing else to do tomorrow, pay me a visit in my room. I willpensate you appropriately,¡± Greem left behind these words and ignored Sanazar¡¯s surprised expression. He pushed open the door and walked in.


    A somewhat familiar middle-aged adept was sitting silently in the room, waiting for him. Upon hearing Greem arrive, the man¡¯s gaze immediately fell upon him.


    [Beep. Detecting unusual principle fluctuations. Analysis suggests that target creature is an amalgamation of high-grade principles. Target will possess absolute suppression power within a hundred meters of himself. Please remain alert.]


    Greem smiled bitterly in his mind, but his expression remained unchanged. He bowed deeply and respectfully to the middle-aged adept.


    ¡°I am overjoyed to be able to see you once again, esteemed Great Adept Sarubo!¡±

 Chapter 1479 - Business and Conversation

    Chapter 1479 Business and Conversation


    ¡°I know you.¡±


    The impression that Great Adept Sarubo gave Greem was still as mysterious and profound as before.


    In all seriousness, this was an individual that was worthy of Greem¡¯s admiration. If you were to look back at Sarubo¡¯s history, you would find that his exploits, as well as the speed of his advancement, were not inferior to Greem¡¯s history. In fact, he was even Greem¡¯s superior in certain aspects.


    Naturally, Greem felt genuine and sincere respect for this senior of his who had also risen to prominence from the Central Lands.


    In the end, the slight conflict between Greem and the Sarubo n was a result ofmonly seen tactics of suppression and influence amongst the various ns. The only difference was that Greem¡¯s path to prominence differed far too much from an ordinary adept¡¯s. It caused the Sarubo n¡¯s leadership to repeatedly choose the wrong option, leading to the current irreconcble rift between them.


    That said, while such disagreements were major affairs within the World of Adepts, they seemed much like childish fights now that they were far away from the homeworld and sitting across each other as Fifth Grade and Sixth Grade. They looked at each other and couldn¡¯t help but smile. It all seemed so funny and insignificant.


    ¡°I already promised to grant Sanazar an audience before I came in here,¡± Greem took the initiative to express his stance.


    ¡°Sanazar¡¯s always been that way. Her temper¡¯s too foul, and she won¡¯t let a single transgression slip by her. If she knew how to make the slightest ofpromises, she would never have ended up in such a bad rtionship with you!¡± Sarubo couldn¡¯t help but exim. ¡°Well, it¡¯s not all her fault either. After all, even I didn¡¯t see you for who you were going to be. Who would¡¯ve thought you would have grown so quickly! You almost seem like a chosen one!¡±


    ¡°A chosen one? That¡¯s a scary title to drop on me!¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but gasp, as if he didn¡¯t dare be described in such a fashion.


    ¡°Don¡¯t ascribe too much importance on a title like that. There could be more chosen ones out there in the multiverse. The world consciousnesses wouldn¡¯t just ce their bets on a single person!¡± Sarubo chuckled and said.


    ¡°Well, if you put it that way, my lord, then you could be called a chosen one yourself.¡±


    ¡°Haha! You can think of it that way if you wish. After all, who among us who has managed to be a Great Adept isn¡¯t blessed by luck and coincidence? We always start off thinking we are chess pieces that have liberated ourselves from the game. It isn¡¯t until we¡¯ve grown stronger and be able to see further that we realize we are still stuck on a chessboard. The only difference is that the chessboard isrger now!¡± For some reason, Great Adept Sarubo seemed particrly sentimental today. He seemed to be hinting at something with everything he said.


    ¡°My lord,¡± It was Greem who was confused now.


    ¡°It¡¯s nothing. It¡¯s just that I¡¯m reminded of myself when I just left the World of Adepts when I see you,¡± Sarubo sighed.


    ¡°My lord, I only just left the World of Adepts as well and don¡¯t know much about the adept faction¡¯s situation. Could you enlighten me?¡±


    ¡°The adept faction? What do you want to know? Before that, let¡¯s be clear. As is the custom among us adepts, I can¡¯t just hand over something of value to you at no cost. There has to be a fair exchange!¡±


    ¡°I justpleted a few missions, and I have plenty of magical crystals to spare.¡±


    ¡°Heh, kid, don¡¯t try and muddle by with magical crystals. How could I possibly trade information of this level for magical crystals?¡± Sarubo had an amused expression on his face.


    Greem let out an awkwardugh and said, ¡°Well, I did get my hands on some origin substance as well.¡±


    ¡°Origin substance it is then!¡± Sarubo pped and said, ¡°Seeing as you¡¯ve just left the homeworld, I assume you probably don¡¯t have anything of value that I would be interested in. Origin substance will do fine as payment! The price for an answer to one question is two hundred siths of origin substance. How about that? Is that eptable?¡±


    Two hundred Siths for a single question......


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air. However, he thought about it slightly and found it a reasonable offer.


    Any answers he would get from Sixth Grade Great Adept Sarubo would be pretty in-depth secrets of the adept civilization. This knowledge was what he most urgently needed at the moment. Obtaining the answers in exchange for some origin substance didn¡¯t seem all that bad at all!


    ¡°Very well, I ept your offer!¡±


    ¡°You can ask your questions now! Remember, think well before you ask.¡±


    Greem hesitated for a moment and finally asked his first question.


    ¡°How is the adept faction currently divided?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re so sure that the adept civilization is already divided into groups? Pretty tricky questions, eh, kid?¡± Sarubo chuckled, but his eyes were filled with approval for Greem.


    ¡°This question has bothered me for a long time. Supposedly¨Cgiven that the adept civilization is led by the Three Ancient Rulers¨Cwe should currently be in the middle of a flourishing and prosperous development. However, everything I¡¯ve observed so far points toward the adept civilization being loosely organized and divided internally. Moreover, there are undeniable signs of internal conflicts. It is quite an unthinkable situation!¡± Greem didn¡¯t hold back either and immediately exined his thoughts.


    Sarubo shook his head and sighed. ¡°The reason for it is very simple. It¡¯s been ten thousand years since the Three Ancient Rulers werest seen!¡±


    Greem¡¯s heart stopped for a beat when he heard this, but he said nothing and listened carefully for the answer.


    ¡°As you¡¯ve said, the adept civilization is currently divided and has no leader. It has split into numerous different factions. The direction of their development differs from each other, but a well-known Eighth Grade Great Adept is always at the heart of these factions.


    ¡°In the end, the only ones who managed to take that step and reach the final level were the Three Ancient Rulers. Meanwhile, there are approximately dozens of Eighth Grade adepts right behind them. Most of these Eighth Grade adepts have chosen to go into hermitage or istion in their mystic realms. They seldom show themselves in public.


    ¡°There are currently four known Eighth Grade adepts. One of them is Adept Barbara, who is presently leading the war against the orc pantheon. And she...was born in Zhentarim as well! Another piece of information on the house for you. This Adept Barbara also doesn¡¯t have too friendly a rtion with the Northern Witches.


    ¡°So, I must say, you were quite smart to have chosen her faction to join.


    ¡°Alright, this is as much as I can say for this first question of yours. Ask your second question!¡±


    Greem gritted his teeth. ¡°I wish to know about the basic situation regarding the other three factions!¡±


    ¡°Three factions, three questions.¡±


    ¡°Very well!¡±


    ¡°Then I will exin to you in detail.


    ¡°The Eighth Grade adepts that lie at the heart of the three factions are Great Adept Velibe, Great Adept Fantini, and Great Adept Curtis. They are from the Silver Union, the Northern Witches, and the Adept¡¯s Assocation, respectively.


    ¡°You seem to have grasped the situation...indeed, the four factions currently directing the adept civilizations¡¯ incursion against the foreign worlds correspond to the organizations that exist within the World of Adepts. No more, no less¨C exactly four.


    ¡°At the moment, Great Adept Velibe¡¯s main target is the Gazing Empire. The region where they are fighting is mostly contained within the territories of the Gazing Empire. The adepts are on the offensive, and the gazers are the ones defending.


    ¡°Great Adept Fantini¡¯s main conquest target is the Elven Empire. Both parties have been engaged in warfare across numerous neworlds for hundreds of years. For the moment, the adepts are still the ones on the offense.


    ¡°The only exception is Great Adept Curtis. The target of his incursion is Eighth Grade Abyssal Demon Lord Brusta. It¡¯s said that Great Adept Curtis has managed to take over arge number of nes in the Abyssal World¨Cequal to a major neworld¨Cand is currently repelling the hordes of abyssal demons invading Brusta¡¯snds. The demons are attacking, and the adepts are defending.¡±


    Greem listened carefully and etched these unfamiliar names in his mind.


    He was aplete rookie in this world. Everything he knew about the adept civilization hade from books. All the knowledge he possessed was antique and outdated. That was why he badly needed the supplementation of a reliable source.


    ¡°I also wish to know more about Maysa.¡±


    ¡°Silence!¡± Sarubo shouted and interrupted Greem¡¯s question.


    He then drew runes in the air, which flew and disappeared into the floorboards as a sh of blue light. In the blink of an eye, a unique runic array had sealed off the room entirely.


    It was only then that Sarubo turned toward Greem again and said sternly, ¡°Remember, kid, next time- don¡¯t mention the name of superior adepts without the proper preparations. In particr, someone who excels at divination, like Great Witch Maysa. Every time you mention her name with malice in your heart, she will be able to sense it, even if she is trillions of kilometers away. If you are someone she is paying special attention to, then she might even be able to overhear everything that you say.¡±


    Greem was shocked and terrified.


    He had never heard of such a thing.


    If everything that Great Adept Sarubo said was true, then Great Witch Maysa¡¯s Fate sensing abilities were too terrifying.


    ¡°Can I say that name now then?¡± Greem asked carefully.


    ¡°There¡¯s ayer of magic around us now, but that is still not enough guarantee. Next time you mention her, it¡¯s best to use ¡®that woman¡¯ or other words to rece her name. Basically, don¡¯t say her name again!¡±


    ¡°I understand!¡± Greem asked in a hushed voice, ¡°My lord, I wish to know more regarding that woman.¡±


    ¡°The Northern Witches have always been exclusive, mysterious, and unpredictable in their ways. That woman you¡¯re speaking of, even more so. I don¡¯t have too much specific information on her. All I know is that she lives in a ce called Fate¡¯s Domain and neveres out of there. Many adepts visit her for her help.


    ¡°However, the price of asking her for a divination is not cheap. Every individual that visits her will either owe her a favor or will have to pay an expensive fee. That is why her reputation has always been more infamous rather than famous!¡±


    ¡°And where is Fate¡¯s Domain?¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but grit his teeth and ask.


    Great Adept Sarubo looked at him weirdly before chuckling and saying, ¡°This should be another question, but seeing as you¡¯ve neverid a single finger on my n, I will throw this in as part of the fifth question!


    ¡°Fate¡¯s Domain is a mystic realm. It has no specific nar coordinates. You will need her invitation to enter the mystic realm. And the means of obtaining an invitation is to visit the witch clones scattered across the various camps in space.¡±


    ¡°Is there one in Exodar Camp as well?¡±


    ¡°No, not in Exodar Camp! I¡¯ve already said this. Many ces in space dislike and reject someone sinister like her who loves digging around for secrets. Go to the Endless Gardens if you wish to find her clone!¡±

 Chapter 1480 - Horr’s Clone

    Chapter 1480 Horr¡¯s Clone


    By the time Greem walked out of Great Adept Sarubo¡¯s room, he was 2,700 siths of origin substance lighter than before.


    It was important to know that even though Greem led a prominent and rising organization in the World of Adepts and had gone on dangerous missions numerous times during this war, he only had 4,600 siths of origin substance in his possession.


    He couldn¡¯t help but feel a little sad at having to part with over half of that sum.


    However,pared to the information he had obtained and what he could deduce between the lines, Greem felt it was all worth it.


    Greem returned to his room and, just as promised, Sanazar arrived for an audience in the night.


    They talked in secrecy inside the room for a moment before Sanazar quickly left.


    Another three hundred siths of origin substance were gone from Greem¡¯s purse.


    Greem wasn¡¯t in a hurry to return to the Fire Elementium ne after sending Sanazar away. Instead, he remained in Boulder Fortress to treat his wounds.


    The injuries that the God of Tyranny had left him were quite serious.


    Even though he had not died after being hit with a weapon imbued with the ¡®Execution¡¯ trait, his soul had still endured a terrible divine blow. He was truly injured all over, from his physical form to his soul. Everything hurt, and everything was damaged.


    His body¡¯s injuries were easy enough to fix, but mending the wounds to his soul was far more difficult!


    For the next six months, Greem practically spent every waking moment bathing in all sorts of healing waters, slowly recovering from thest battle¡¯s injuries.


    His injuries had just healed when yet another wave of fighting once again greeted him.


    ............


    Cloudsea Front. Outside the nar barrier of Altbright ne.


    A blinding light shed in the depths of space. Greem and five other adepts appeared within a teleportation array.


    Greem quickly dispelled the difort brought about by the teleportation. He opened his eyes and took a good look at this vast and majestic battlefield before him.


    The battlefield this time wasn¡¯t inside a nar world but outside the ne¡¯s barrier.


    The teleportation array beneath Greem¡¯s feet was etched upon arge green tile measuring a hundred meters wide and long. Four copper statues of dark dragons loomed on each corner of the array, erecting a semi-translucent barrier that kept the sea of corpses at bay.


    Meanwhile, a couple of hundred-meter-tall giants were fighting valiantly at the center of the battlefield, just fifty kilometers away. One was a blue giant, and the other was an orc god. Bothbatants pursued each other around the battlefield at unimaginable speeds. With every sh of strength, an avnche of magic would rush outward around them.


    The energy tides that they could unleash with every wave of their hand and every flick of their fingers were horrifying. When Greem looked upon them, the only feedback from the Chip was a blinding red light.


    Seventh Grade! The two giants engaging inbat were Seventh Grade!


    He could not see a single ally within fifteen kilometers of those two Seventh Grades.


    Meanwhile, fifteen kilometers away from them, four Sixth Grades were fighting with each other in pairs. Two adepts, two gods. Judging from the situation, the orc gods were the ones who were winning.


    Zooming even further out to twenty kilometers from the main battlefield, one could see the much more popted Fifth Grade battlefield. Great Adepts and orc gods¨Cboth in true forms and as their clones¨Cfought with all their might. Their battle cries and shouts could be heard all the way over here. The space around them was torn into chaos, sending chaotic energy rippling in every direction.


    Disregarding everything else, the background radiation alone that the Chip¡¯s scans observed was enough to make Greem¡¯s heart tremble with fear.


    Even the Fifth Grade battlefield¡¯s energy radiation reached an excess of three to four thousand points of power. An ordinary Fourth Grade adept would have trouble surviving in those conditions, let alone doing battle.


    Even Greem, who possessed the Chaos Physique, would have difficulty moving around in such a harsh environment; he would have to be very cautious. Should he slip up and end up being the target of the enemy¡¯s focused fire, his odds of escaping alive from a battlefield like this were very slim.


    Zoom! Zoom!


    While Greem was assessing the battlefield, three more Great Adepts appeared on another teleportation tile not far away from them. They were Fifth Grades as well.


    It seemed like Great Adepts of other regions were gathering here as well. A small war was about to break out!


    ¡°Let¡¯s go! Watch your positionster. Don¡¯t be all the way in front,¡± One of the Great Adepts in the group smiled viciously and rushed forward.


    The only acquaintance in Greem¡¯s party this time was Antuso.


    The two of them looked at each other and flew out of the teleportation tile without another word. They quickly approached the Fifth Grade battlefield.


    ¡°Let¡¯s cooperate a little in the battleter, see if we can get our hands on some spoils!¡± Antuso had transformed into his spiritwolf form and vanished from sight. His voice rang beside Greem¡¯s ear as a secret transmission.


    Greem understood what Antuso was referring to. He also transformed without hesitation into a dozen-meter-tall me giant.


    ¡°Nagus...Hemtam. Heaven¡¯s Fire!¡±


    Greempleted a short incantation and pointed at the god clone closest to himself. Crimson light gathered above the enemy¡¯s head as clouds of fire began to rumble, instantly turning the skies into a hundred-meter sea of fire.


    There was a loud crack when the sea of fire reached a climax. A fireball containing wild fire-energy crashed down from within. That was only the start. More and more fireballs crashed down from the skies toward the orc god¡¯s body.


    Even the slightest touch would cause the fireballs to detonate into a giant cluster of mes. The wildfire that spread outward burned everything violently.


    The opponent that Greem had chosen for himself was obviously just a god clone.


    It was a Fifth Grade clone of the Sixth Grade God of the Hunt, Horr.


    This clone was a lithe orc with a red face and violet skin. He held a strange spear in his hands while three Fifth Grade divine animalpanions crouched around him. One was a fierce mastiff lying at his feet, one was a purple hunting falcon perched on his shoulder, and thest was a fearsome snake coiled around his body.


    However, clones were ultimately just clones and not the real thing.


    The spear in Horr¡¯s hands and the animalpanions around him were all just projections of divine power and not the real things. Otherwise, Greem would never be interested in being involved with a ho¡¯s nest like this!


    The numerous explosive fireballs forced Horr¡¯s clone to dodge constantly, but a part of his body still ended up igniting.


    He dispelled the fire principle power in the Undying mes using his divine power, extinguishing the mes. Horr¡¯s clone was infuriated by this attack. He cast aside his original opponent and leaped straight at Greem.


    The spear was the first to arrive!


    Several spear images cut across the air and shot toward Greem. The Chip could sense that each one of these attacks¡¯ energy intensity was as high as 7,000 points of power. That intensity did not reach the Fifth Grade standard of 10,000 points, but the attack was fast and continuous.


    Trying to damage Greem¡¯s body with these spear images was not likely to seed. However, they could still shatter the magical defenses around him. As such, Horr¡¯s clone constantly threw out these spear images to force Greem to reposition himself, even as he rapidly approached.


    [Beep. The enemy has locked on to Host. Initial estimates suggest the method of locking-on is the opponent¡¯s Tracking divinity. From now on, all attacks fired by the target creature will automatically lock onto Host¡¯s position.]


    Greem lifted his head and looked, only to realize that the image of a golden arrow had appeared on his head and was pointing straight at him. No matter how he dodged, no matter where he teleported, this golden arrow remained pointed steadily toward him as if locked in ce above his head.


    It was probably the unique effect of that Tracking divinity!


    How bloody annoying!


    Fleeing was pointless now that he was being tracked in this fashion.


    Horr¡¯s clone didn¡¯t even have to aim. Even a random attack cast without looking wouldnd unerringly on Greem¡¯s body. The only thing that Greem could do was intercept the enemy¡¯s attacks. Otherwise, he would have to endure the attacks with his own body.


    Deng, deng, deng!


    He teleported three times and still did not manage to cast aside the tracking arrow. Instead, half of the fire shields around him had been broken. Greem also flew into a rage now. He no longer wasted efforts on dodging. Instead, he summoned fierce fires and traded blows with the clone.


    Horr¡¯s clone was very sly. He used his rapid movements to dodge most of Greem¡¯s spell attacks while continuing his assault of spear attacks. At the same time, Horr pursed his lips and whistled. As his whistle rang out, the mastiff and falcon lunged toward Greem from above and below, one ck silhouette and one purple.


    Meanwhile, the strange snake coiled around Horr¡¯s clone flicked its tongue. It looked at its surroundings with its ghostly green eyes.


    It was obvious that though they had not discovered Antuso¡¯s presence, the snake had felt an approaching danger through its bestial instincts.


    The mastiff had sharp ws with a terrifying Rend effect. If its attacksnded on an enemy, they would also apply a whole host of other effects, such as Eviscerate and Bleed.


    The falcon was like a bolt of purple lightning. It weaved quickly and turned sharply in the air, its movements so smooth and natural that it was hard to catch its actual position. Moreover, it asionally let out a piercing cry when it attacked. The scream had the unusual effect of confusing and disrupting the enemy.


    Even as capable as he was, Greem started to fumble when he had to deal with two such annoying enemies.


    If he wanted to get things done, it was inevitable that he would have to pay the price for it!


    Greem let out a shout and summoned the Tome of Corruption from within him. He let loose Spirit of Pestilence Remi and had him help fend off the enemy¡¯s attacks. He then finally focused and gathered his principle fire to make a barbecue out of the dog and bird.


    Large stretches of golden fire started to spread in every direction, turning an area within a thousand meters into a living hell. Greem stood in the center of the mes, enduring the numerous enemies¡¯ wild attacks as he chased down the damned hound with invisible mes.


    Four or five horrible gashes had already appeared on Greem¡¯s body, all thanks to this agile mastiff. In his rage, Greem focused his fire to exterminate this shiny ck dog first!

 Chapter 1481 - Killing A Clone

    <h4>Chapter 1481 Killing A Clone</h4>


    Any creature that could reach Fifth Grade, even if they had just been an ordinary dog before, would be a monster as terrifying as a demon!


    Moreover, the animalpanions that Horr the God of the Hunt had chosen for himself were all fearsome magical beasts with outstanding abilities to begin with. When they were raised to the level of a god, theirbat strength was enough to make a powerful fire adept like Greem struggle against them.


    With Remi¡¯s aid, Greem managed to withstand the God of the Hunt¡¯s assault. Moreover, to exterminate that damned hound, Greem had no choice but to use up one of his aces¨C The Fifth Grade Halo of Rot.


    A soft tearing noise could be heard as a rift tore open in space ten meters behind Greem. The ursed mastiff silently leaped out from within. With two swipes of its ws, it shredded the Inferno Shields around Greem. It ignored the me bacsh from the shields and pounced onto Greem¡¯s calf, biting viciously into the magma.


    mes scattered across the air, andva spilled forth.


    The mastiff howled in agony as it was showered in the red-hotva. It didn¡¯t have time to treat the wounds on its body and the blisters on its face as Greem¡¯s fiery hand came grasping from above. The hound stepped in empty air and dodged the attack. Most of its ck fur had been melted by the scorchingva, revealing the horrifying mess of blistered and burned skin beneath.


    However, damage of this extent was still tolerable for the mastiff. It stepped on the empty air and dodged left and right, nning to put more distance between it and the raging Fifth Grade adept.


    The purple falcon in the distance let out a screech when it saw this. It tucked its wings and lunged at Greem¡¯s face as a bolt of purple lightning. It reached out with its piercing talons in preparation to leave behind an unforgettable mark on the enemy as it grazed past.


    Horr¡¯s clone took this opportunity to approach. His meter-long spear unleashed a flurry of golden thrusts, bombarding Greem¡¯s defenses from afar.


    The three of them were oldpanions. Theirbination of ambush, pincer attack, and reinforcement was wless.


    However, Greem had already made up his mind to exterminate one of them at the cost of being injured. No degree of perfection in their teamwork could ount for that.


    ¡°Remi, intercept that falcon!¡±


    Greem¡¯s mental fluctuation rose and sent a message to Remi. He then ignored the attacks from Horr¡¯s clone and the falcon to focus all his power onto that damned dog.


    Greem abruptly stomped his feet, and a hundred red pirs of me instantly rose all around him. These fire pirs¡¯ positions were random and chaotic, scattered across a radius of a hundred meters and making them very unpredictable.


    The mastiff weaved left and right in the air as if it could sense where the mes were going to erupt. It was always able to dodge the fire pirs with inches to spare.


    Seeing as the opponent was about to escape the hundred-meter radius, Greem shouted out loud, ¡°Fire Prison!¡±


    The next second, the fire elementium in the air gathered around the hound like blocks of wood. It turned into a cage of fire and locked the creature within.


    The mastiff did not panic in the face of this obstacle. It reached out with its ws and quickly tore the cage to shreds. However, this momentary pause gave Greem another opportunity to cast a spell.


    ¡°Gamelio-Kannes...Land of Fireserpents! ¡°


    As Greem finished his incantation, the air beneath the mastiff suddenly turned scarlet. Countless terrifying fire serpents appeared out of thin air. There were an rming number of these serpents, and they instantly wrapped themselves around the mastiff,pletely immobilizing the beast.


    The mastiff let out a furious bark. It began to tear and bite with all its strength. Land of Fireserpents might be a peak Fourth Grade spell, but judging from the strength the mastiff possessed, it would not keep it trapped for more than five seconds.


    Unfortunately, five seconds were more than enough for a legendary fire adept!


    Greem tossed out the Fifth Grade Halo of Rot onto the mastiff without any hesitation.


    The mastiff¡¯s entire body turned ck the moment the Halo of Rot entered its body. The fur on its skin, the skin itself, and all its flesh and bones started to shrivel and wither at a visible pace.


    Horr¡¯s divine power, which used to permeate its body, was also corrupted and began to rot along with the dog¡¯s body.


    A divine mastiff with the fearsomebat prowess of a beginner Fifth Grade had fallen at Greem¡¯s hand in less than twenty seconds, just like that.


    Upon seeing his old friend¨Cwho had apanied him for countless years¨Ccrumble into dust from the Halo of Rot, Horr¡¯s clone let out a furious roar. He strode straight toward Greem.


    In truth, the mastiff that Greem killed was only its soul projection. The divine mastiff itself still loyally sat at the side of the true Horr!


    However, Horr¡¯s clone could not bear to see hispanion killed in such a cruel fashion, even if he knew it was only a soul projection that he could endlessly replicate.


    Horr¡¯s clone roared and charged at Greem. Meanwhile, Remi kept the purple falcon upied slightly away from the battlefield. They went back and forth, and it did not seem that their battle would conclude for a while.


    The snake coiled around Horr¡¯s clone also slithered down under his instructions and slowly wound its way behind Greem¡¯s back.


    Greem¡¯s eye lit up in the face of this ferocious attack. He actively rushed toward his enemy.


    Spiritwolf Antuso, who had been lying in wait for a long time by the sidelines, secretly snuck his way behind Horr¡¯s clone. His aura had risen to its peak, and he could unleash a devastating attack at any time.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    Three golden spears were thrown in Greem¡¯s direction. It would be too difficult for Greem to dodge with his Agility and size. He let the spear images pierce through his right shoulder, lower abdomen, and left leg. His body trembled slightly as three giant holes the size of washbasins appeared.


    Red fire, as thick as blood, started to flow from the wounds. Greem couldn¡¯t help but let out a grunt of pain.


    ¡°Scarlet Refinement, me st!¡±


    Greem withstood the pain and shouted. A ming stream of pure principle fire shot forth and crashed against the Divine Shield that had appeared around Horr¡¯s clone.


    Hmph! Finally forced your Divine Shield.


    Greem mumbled to himself in his mind.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. Every god and their clone possessed Divine Shield, which was the natural counter to adepts. The shield protected them from all magical effects as well as magical and physical damage while it was active.


    If the Divine Shield weren¡¯t dealt with first, then the opponent would always have an ace in the hole they could use to save themselves at a crucial moment. Trying to kill a god while they still had their Divine Shield was a foolish thought.


    For the sake of baiting out the Divine Shield, Greem had no choice but to use himself as bait. He had rushed at the enemy with all the fervor and ferocity he could muster. However, for the next dozen seconds after the Divine Shield was activated, it was Greem¡¯s turn to be beaten up.


    Greem activated the Tome of Corruption¡¯s principle defense without the moment he saw the Divine Shield. He unleashed the Burning Domain and started to burn the Divine Shield, hoping to exhaust its divine power as quickly as possible.


    Horr¡¯s clone stabbed Greem¡¯s principle defenses repeatedly. Every thrust caused the barrier to cave in severely and spread ripples across it.


    The dozen-meter-long snake also coiled around Greem¡¯s barrier. It ignored how its body sizzled against the fire and quickly tightened its grip, causing the barrier to creak and groan.


    Meanwhile, the snake opened its maw wide and waited patiently. It would strike and bite down the moment the barrier broke.


    ¡°Help me break the shield!¡±


    Greem sent a magical transmission to Antuso as he continued to attack violently.


    Even though this wasn¡¯t the perfect opportunity yet, Antuso listened and revealed himself behind the god clone. The ferocious attack he had been preparingnded right upon the Divine Shield.


    The clone¡¯s expression changed slightly upon sensing the Fifth Grade enemy that had suddenly appeared behind him. He couldn¡¯t be bothered to attack Greem anymore. Instead, he prepared to leave.


    A loud crack could be heard in his Divine Shield just then. Everyone¡¯s expression turned.


    One side was shocked, and the other was overjoyed.


    It made for a stark contrast!


    Crack! Crack! Fine cracks began to spread all along the Divine Shield. In the blink of an eye, there were fissures all over it.


    The next second, the Divine Shield crumbled without a sound into tiny pieces of divine radiance, which were quickly washed away by the magical tide around them.


    The divine body of Horr¡¯s clone was finally exposed to the two Fifth Grade Great Adepts.


    Kill!


    There was no need for any rallying cries or shouts for morale. The very thought of the perfect divine authority fragment in the clone¡¯s body was enough to drive Greem and Antuso insane. They rushed forward recklessly as if they had just drunk a magical stimnt.


    As a God of the Hunt, Horr¡¯s clone also had exceptional meleebat skills. He wasn¡¯t at a disadvantage even when he fought two against one. But for some reason, when he saw the two gleaming eyes of the adepts and felt their gazes full of greed and thirst, Horr¡¯s clone couldn¡¯t help but shiver.


    Dammit! I can¡¯t get tangled up with these two bastards! I¡¯ll escape first and think about my retaliationter.


    Horr¡¯s clone thought rapidly to himself while parrying Antuso¡¯s rapid attacks with his spear. He then started to move away from the battlefield slowly.


    At this point, he no longer cared about his animalpanions.


    Horr¡¯s clone ordered the snake to hold back Greem with all its power. Meanwhile, the clone withstood Antuso¡¯s attacks while attempting to move away and escape this awkward position of being pincered by two enemies.


    However, he had just moved a few meters away when he felt a foul wind behind him.


    Horr¡¯s clone turned around, only to see a giant maw, followed byplete darkness.

 Chapter 1482 - Divine Authority and Divine Virtue

    Chapter 1482 Divine Authority and Divine Virtue


    The one who devoured Horr¡¯s clone with a single bite was naturally Greem, who had transformed into the Devouring Fish.


    The mastiff, the snake, and Horr¡¯s clone had all died by Greem¡¯s hand. The surviving falcon knew well enough to take to the skies and flee toward its allies.


    ¡°Cover me...we will split the loot once we are safe!¡±


    Greem sent out a transmission to Antuso before escaping back toward the adepts¡¯ side with his bulging fish body. His swollen stomach seemed to be growing and constantly rumbling as if there was some monster rampaging inside.


    Several majestic god clones in the distance had sensed Horr¡¯s divine authority suddenly vanish. They cursed loudly as they hurried in this direction as quickly as they could.


    It was fine if Horr¡¯s clone was destroyed. That wasn¡¯t a particrly concerning issue.


    However, the divine authority fragment contained inside the clone had to be retrieved. Otherwise, Horr, the God of the Hunt, would forever lose that portion of his power.


    If Horr lost too many divine authority fragments such that he was unable to assemble a whole divine authority, he would drop down by a grade, turning from a Sixth Grade god to a low-ranked god. If the loss of his divine authority was severe, he might even fall back to the level of a demi-god and lose his status as a true god.


    The clone was disposable, but the divine authority fragment had to be recovered!


    The few gods who were more intimate with the the God of the Hunt immediatelymanded their clones to lunge at Greem, who had just devoured Horr¡¯s clone.


    There even seemed to be a Sixth Grade among the many clones rushing toward him. Greem didn¡¯t dare stay a single second longer on the battlefield upon seeing this. He scrambled his way back to the adept side as quickly as he could. The god clones wanted to keep up the pursuit, but adepts from the other side promptly intercepted them.


    Several violent fights instantly broke out on the battlefield again!


    If this were in the past, it would not have been so easy for Greem to devour and digest an opponent of the same grade. Now that he had the Tome of Corruption and the Orb of the Fire God to protect his body, he could keep the enemy from escaping. He guided the Undying mes to his stomach and forcibly melted down the divine body of Horr¡¯s clone with the two artifacts¡¯ aid.


    After fleeing back to the adept¡¯s side, Greem¡¯s giant and swollen fish body remained hovering in the air. He finally crushed the wisp of soul consciousness attached to Horr¡¯s clone to dust after much difficulty. The clone¡¯s divine body then reverted to divine power. Naturally, the divine authority fragments within were now in Greem¡¯s possession.


    Upon sensing the clone¡¯s soul consciousness vanish, Antuso asked eagerly, ¡°Did you manage to kill him? How many divine authority fragments are there? Spit it out and let me see.¡±


    Greem opened his tightly shut mouth, and a mysterious, blinding crystal floated out of his maw.


    ¡°Divine authority fragment...it really is a divine authority fragment!¡± Antuso put his face up against the crystal and examined it. He had an excited expression. ¡°From what I can see, this divine authority fragment can be split into three pieces. How should we divide this between the two of us?¡±


    ¡°Of course, I get two of the pieces, and you get one...I suffered some pretty big losses in that battle earlier. I am entitled to the lion¡¯s share!¡± Greem rolled his eyes, and the ugly face of the Devouring Fish made a very human expression.


    ¡°No, no...that¡¯s a divine authority fragment! We can¡¯t split it that way. We must each get half. I canpensate for your efforts and losses with other resources!¡± Antuso refused topromise at this point, even if they were fairly close acquaintances.


    After all, this business concerned a divine authority fragment!


    The very reason the adepts were constantly waging war against the World of Gods was because of the divine authority, divine virtue, and divine power found within a god¡¯s body. The gods¡¯ power system might seem distinct from the adepts, but these three resources could all be used by the adepts as well.


    Simply put, divine power was the power source, divine virtue was the manifestation of divine power, and divine authority was the foundation of divine power. Divinity referred to the domain of divine power which the god possessed!


    Divine authorities were the true heart of a god¡¯s powers. Most of the true gods¡¯ power came from their divine authorities. There were even legends of mortals who instantly ascended into gods when they stumbled onto a divine authority.


    Divine authority was also a necessary tool by which the gods could absorb and utilize faith power from their believers. It could also receive the prayers and requests from believers and process that vast amount of information. The gods could then weave a faithwork to receive all the faith power dedicated to them. Divine authority was the very terminal and heart of this system.


    The number of divine authorities represented the grade level of a god!


    Horr, the God of the Hunt, was at least a Fifth Grade low-ranked god. He almost certainly had at least oneplete divine authority and some more divine authority fragments in his possession. He would split out some of his divine authority fragments to serve as hosts for his clone. These clones would then battle in his stead.


    The fact that Horr¡¯s clone could summon three Fifth Grade animalpanions to do battle clearly had a direct corrtion to these three divine authority fragments in his body.


    If divine authorities were the heart of a god¡¯s power, then they were considered a pure energy converter to adepts. If the gods wanted to turn their magical equipment into divine equipment, the necessary materials would be divine authorities and divine virtues.


    Divine authorities imbued the divine artifacts with their superior grade and offensive power, while divine virtues provided the relics with unique divine traits.


    Due to the difference in their power systems, the adepts could not assimte divine authorities directly. However, they could use them to forge high-grade magical equipment that was perfectlypatible with their powers!


    A divine authority fragment, paired with the appropriate amount of divine virtue, could be used to create Fifth Grade magical equipment. The more divine authority fragments and divine virtues used in the process, the more terrifying and powerful the equipment.


    Naturally, given such temptations, every god appeared to be little more than a humanoid treasure trove in the eyes of the adepts. If an adept could skin a god, rip out their tendons, and stew their bones into oil, the stuff they could get out of it would be enough to make them wealthy and satisfied.


    For Greem and Antuso¨Cboth beginner Fifth Grade¨Ca single divine authority fragment meant another piece of Fifth Grade magical equipment. It was no wonder that they were so insistent on getting their share of the spoils and were having an argument about it.


    ¡°No way! My body¡¯s been torn to tatters by the opponent. I put in the most work, and I deserve to get the bigger share! Two for me and one for you. I...I will give you more divine virtue in exchange!¡± Naturally, Greem would never spit out food that¡¯s already in his mouth, especially when it was such a scrumptious and sulent piece of meat. He opened his mouth and spat out a ball of golden light.


    Prismatic lines could vaguely be seen shimmering and swimming within the ball of light. They moved around almost like sentient serpents.


    Antuso hesitated for a moment.


    He really wanted to win more loot for himself, but what he had just witnessed on the battlefield was enough to make him wary. Greem might only be a rookie, but he did have the power to back up his ims.


    Falling out with him over a ¡®mere¡¯ fragment of divine authority wasn¡¯t the most rational decision. Better to grant him this favor and further improve their rtionship.


    With this thought, Antuso could only nod and agree to thepromise.


    Greem spat, and the blinding crystal split into three smaller pieces of divine authority fragments. It was the smallest unit of divine authority possible. One of the fragments, along with that ball of divine virtue, drifted to Antuso. He put them all away with a broad smile on his face.


    Greem put away the two divine authority fragments and reverted to his human form.


    ¡°I intend to take another walk around the battlefield and see what more I can find. What about you?¡± Antuso couldn¡¯t help but ask passionately.


    ¡°I won¡¯t be going!¡± Greem sighed and pointed at his body. There were gaping wounds all over,yered with horrible gashes, all of which fumed with strands of ck smoke. It was obvious that they had been afflicted with foreign energy. ¡°These injuries alone will probably keep me in bed for a long time toe.¡±


    ¡°Go back ahead of me then! I will go out for a look-see again,¡± Antuso had not been injured too much in the previous fight. He was also greedy for more loot. His figure flickered. He vanished without a trace as he rushed toward the battlefield.


    Greem put Remi back into the Tome of Corruption before flying toward the teleportation tile at the backlines.


    Naturally, a Sixth Grade Great Adept was holding the line here. He had also witnessed Greem¡¯s fight against Horr¡¯s clone.


    Even though the battle had yet to end, he wouldn¡¯t stop Greem. After all, Greem had just significantly contributed to the fight and badly needed to return and rest.


    ¡°Lucky kid. You got yourself a divine authority fragment right as you got here. I am Adept Brien, in charge of the battlefield in this star region. Leave your contact method behind! We might be able to exchange some of our spoils when this is over,¡± The Sixth Grade Great Adept in charge of protecting the backlines nodded at Greem approvingly and offered his magical brand to Greem.


    Greem respectfully sent over his own magical brand before stepping onto the teleportation array and disappearing in a sh of light.


    The moment he returned to Boulder Fortress, Greem retreated to his room with the excuse that he needed to rest and recover.


    Once he was in his room and had activated all the magical defenses, he started to carefully count all his loot from this battle.


    Two fragments of divine authority.


    Thirty-eight units of divine virtue.


    Two thousand one hundred seventy-four pieces of divine power crystal.


    The reason there were so many divine power crystals was that Greem had devoured Horr¡¯s clone before he had the chance to use his power. As such, Greem had obtained plenty of divine power crystals and divine virtue after melting down Horr¡¯s body.


    A portion of the divine virtue also came from the two divine beasts that Greem had killed.


    There were no divine authority fragments inside them, but they gave Greem quite a lot of divine virtue and divine power crystals.


    Divine virtue was an excellent resource too!


    All you had to do was mix in a little divine virtue when forging something, and that object would possess strange effects akin to principle powers. This divine virtue hade from the God of the Hunt. Naturally, they would have some rtion to his divinity and his soul.


    What exactly were the characteristics of these divine virtues?


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but give out an order. ¡°Chip, analyze these divine virtues.¡±


    [Beep. Instructions received...analysis in progress.]

 Chapter 1483 - Examining the Loot

    Chapter 1483 Examining the Loot


    Divine virtue was excellent stuff as well!


    To some extent, you could say divine virtue was the unique trait possessed by true gods.


    For the gods, divine virtue was rted to a god¡¯s personality, beliefs, principles, alignment, and many other mysterious factors. Mortals could obtain supernatural powers by absorbing divine virtue, including increased lifespan and boosted resistances. Moreover, equipment enhanced with divine virtue would also gain corresponding characteristics.


    The point being that both divine virtue and divine authority were top-ss resources that every adept lusted after.


    [Beep. Divine virtue analysis has beenpleted!


    [Divine virtue belongs to Horr, Sixth Grade God of the Hunt, mid-ranked god of the Orc Pantheon. Estimated number of divine authority fragments is twenty-four. Domains within his divinity include: Hunt, ughter, Sacrifice, Marksman, Beast, Tracking, Trap-making, Detection.


    [Characteristics of target divine virtue are: Bleed, Trueshot, Tracking Mark, Focused Strike, Execute.


    [Host can absorb the divine virtue and use it to increase the body¡¯s base attributes or enhance certain traits. However, said divine virtue leans more toward the domains of ughter and Tracking and can only be used to enhance Agility and spiritual senses. The thirty-eight points of divine virtue are estimated to be able to provide the Host with a six-point increase in Agility and a thirty percent increase in spiritual detection radius.


    [If the divine virtue is used to nourish the starbeast bloodline, it is estimated to increase progress on the bloodline¡¯s analysis by twenty-six percent.


    [If the divine virtue is used to nourish Host¡¯s life force, it is estimated to increase lifespan by 380 years.


    [If the divine virtue is used on a mortal creature, one point of divine virtue will provide them with a random divine trait within the corresponding domain. If more than five points of divine virtue are used on a single creature, said creature would ascend into a holy beast.


    [......


    [......]


    Greem looked at the list of options that the Chip provided. He could feel his heart pound. Divine virtue was truly excellent material. It could bring about tremendous improvement to his powers.


    However, Greem couldn¡¯t help but get slightly upset at the thought that all this divine virtue could only be used to improve his Agility. Of the four main attributes of Strength, Physique, Agility, and Spirit, Agility was the most useless to him.


    He was a damned ss-cannon backline mage. He was a one-man artillery that didn¡¯t need phantasmic movements or ridiculous speed. All he needed was explosions, explosions, and even more explosions.


    That was why Greem¡¯s Agility was still at 18 points, even now. Even if he pushed that attribute to twenty-four points with the divine virtue, it seemed like perhaps, probably...it was most likely not going to have any practical benefit to him inbat as he was right now.


    Of course, while Agility wasn¡¯t important to Greem, it was exceedingly crucial for Mary. Of course, Mary had now reached peak Fourth Grade. She was standing at the threshold of transcendence, and her Agility had already reached the 49-point limit. It couldn¡¯t be raised further even if she wanted to.


    That was why this stuff was still useless for Mary at the moment.


    As for using divine virtue to improve his lifespan? There couldn¡¯t be a more wasteful thought!


    Greem¡¯s lifespan now numbered 12,000 years. He had barely spent one-twentieth of his life at the moment. Extending it for another 300 years under such circumstances was pointless.


    Use the divine virtue to create a holy beast?


    If Greem was a powerful god with plenty of divine virtue to spare, creating one or two divine pets to apany him might be a decent idea. However, Greem was an adept, and the only chance he had to obtain divine virtue was on the battlefield.


    As such, he did not have the qualification nor the power to be so wasteful and extravagant!


    By process of elimination, the best way to use the divine virtue was to nourish his starbeast bloodline or to forge powerful magical equipment. At the moment, the only two powerful artifacts in Greem¡¯s hands had been stolen from other people. He did not have an actual relic of his own.


    That was somewhat uneptable for a proud adept like himself.


    However, Greem didn¡¯t specialize in creating magical equipment. He would have to take his time to explore the idea if he wanted to create a tailored high-grade artifact for himself.


    Now that he had made up his mind, Greem hesitated no longer. He reached his hand into the ball of divine virtue and silently absorbed it.


    Absorbing divine virtue wasn¡¯t such a simple matter. First, you had to exterminate the soul consciousness that the god had left within it. Otherwise, recklessly absorbing a god¡¯s divine virtue would only turn you into a host for the soul consciousness.


    If the god were to activate their powers, Greem would be their soul puppet.


    Of course, Greem would never make such a mistake!


    He used his principle fire to exterminate all traces of Horr¡¯s soul consciousness.


    The level of principle fire was equal to things like divine power and the soul of a god. As such, using his principle fire was enough to wipe out any undesired elements from the divine virtue.


    ¡°Damned adept! I havemitted your soul aura to memory now...you will be my prey one day! I¡ª¡±


    As the Undying mes burned, wisps of ck smoke rose from the divine virtue and formed into Horr¡¯s ugly face.


    He roared, he shouted, and he cursed, but there was no stopping Greem from steadily exterminating this wisp of Horr¡¯s soul consciousness.


    Hehehe! A Sixth Grade mid-ranked god with a twenty-four-point divine authority level. He had lost three divine authority fragments with the loss of this clone. His divine authority level had fallen to twenty-one points.


    Twenty-one points wasn¡¯t exactly a lot, but it wasn¡¯t a little either. It allowed him to remain as a mid-ranked god. However, if anything more were to happen and he lost one or two more fragments of divine authority, then his grade would be at risk.


    Should his total divine authority level fall below twenty points, he would no longer be able to remain as a mid-ranked god. Even his god kingdom would suffer as a result and shrink by half. Even if he could retrieve the lost divine authority fragments after the fact and be a Sixth Grade once again, the copsed half of his god kingdom would require arge amount of divine power to recover.


    Such a thing would be an absolute disaster for any god!


    Whether he should send down another clone became a new question for Horr, the God of the Hunt.


    It was one of the difficulties faced by the gods that was not as often spoken about.


    Summoning a clone would allow them to create a recement that could travel anywhere; it was incredibly convenient. However, if something were to happen to the clone and the divine authority fragments could not escape back to them, they would lose actual power.


    The power of the gods rested in the amount of divine authority they controlled.


    ording to the World of Gods¡¯ principles, the amount of time, effort, and diligence required to forge divine authority fragments through the faith power of their believers was horrifying.


    Under ordinary circumstances, a god with a hundred thousand followers would require a thousand years to have a chance of extracting a single divine authority fragment from within the faith system. Moreover, this was the best possible scenario when there weren¡¯t other gods fighting for the same divinity.


    Should there be other gods involved in their divinity domains, then the conversion rate of divine authority fragments would be decided by the amount of control they had over specific divinity domains. The more gods involved in thispetitive process, the slower the rate at which divine power could be converted into divine authority.


    That was why the World of Gods was no utopia of peace, even when the adepts weren¡¯t invading!


    Almost every pantheon and god would have some degree of ovep in their divinity domains. As long as it didn¡¯t involve their main divinities, there would be room forpromise. Should there be a conflict in two gods¡¯ main divinities, then there would be no mercy to be spoken of.


    Whoever had the harder fist would live and go on to inherit everything that once belonged to the defeated!


    The other god would be exterminated and have their soul destroyed. Their god kingdom would fall into ruin, and their surviving believers would either be taken in by the other god or die along with their old god.


    For instance, there couldn¡¯t be two gods of death in the same nar world. Should two gods possess the identical divinity of death, then they would fight to the bitter end, even without encouragement from the nar consciousness.


    Due to the gods¡¯ constant infighting, the adept faction could slip in between the cracks and find an opportunity to profit from the gods.


    Divine authority and divine virtue. These were the most valuable treasures that the adepts could get their hands on!


    Divine virtue could improve their powers or be used to create high-grade equipment inbination with divine authority. Meanwhile, divine authority was a faith principle converter. They could convert the faith power of believers into pure divine power.


    However, Greem was an adept, not a god; he could not make direct use of this power. Still, this didn¡¯t mean that Greem couldn¡¯t use the divine authority fragments to improve his own might.


    After all, he did have a treasure in his possession that could make use of divine authority fragments.


    The Orb of the Fire God!


    The Orb of the Fire God was a piece of Fifth Grade divine equipment forged with fire divine authority by a Fire God in the first ce. Using the divine authority fragment obtained from the Fire God¡¯s clone to improve the quality of the orb was not a bad idea.


    Should the power of the Orb of the Fire God improve, so would Greem¡¯s own powers. He would be able to draw on even more fire energy.


    As for these two fragments obtained from the God of the Hunt? They were probably best used as sacrifices.


    If they were sacrificed to the Fire Elementium ne, it would increase the level of Greem¡¯s currently mastered fire principles. That was obviously more direct and essential than the improvement of equipment.


    Of course, sacrificing the fragments to the World of Adepts¡¯ nar consciousness was a decent idea too. Unfortunately, the World of Adepts couldn¡¯t provide him with the fire principles he needed; the Fire Elementium ne was a better choice.


    The more he thought about it, the more impatient Greem became.


    He couldn¡¯t be bothered with recovering in his room anymore. He hastily rushed to Boulder Fortress¡¯ teleportation array and returned to the Fire Elementium ne. This time, he even used the origin connection between souls to give an order to the light clone he had left in the World of Adepts.

 Chapter 1484 - Change in Mentality

    Chapter 1484 Change in Mentality


    Fire Elementium ne, the Molten Altar.


    A radiant portal slowly opened in the center of the valley. Greem returned to this ce once more.


    Compared to before, the shore of thevake was much more lively than before.


    Apart from molten giants, emberweb spiders, and magical machines, there were also many more fire creatures of various forms. There were low-grade fire elementals, fire spirits, mespirits, mid-grade and high-grade fire giants,va giants, magma hounds, and magma beasts.


    The entire area around Molten Altar almost seemed to have be a museum of fire creatures. You could practically see half of all native beings that could be found in the Fire Elementium ne here.


    Greem slightly frowned as he looked at Lasbes, who was hurrying over toward him. He said in a solemn voice, ¡°What¡¯s the issue here? Why are there so many lower lifeforms?¡±


    Lasbes hastily crouched when she heard Greem¡¯s question. She replied with her strange, hoarse mental voice, ¡°My lord, this is all hardbor that I¡¯ve enved from the surroundingnds to hasten the progress.¡± Having said that, she lowered her volume intentionally and said in a trembling voice, ¡°My lord, as you know, there is something evil about this Molten Altar. Low-grade creatures will mysteriously disappear after remaining here for too long. So, if we don¡¯t capture more people, we won¡¯t have enough to keep going.¡±


    ¡°Disappear?¡± Greem paused for a moment, but he instantly remembered what he saw the first time he came into contact with the Molten Altar. He readily believed what Lasbes said.


    ¡°Immediately send for people to build an altar for me. I want to sacrifice something!¡±


    ¡°An altar? Please enlighten me, my lord. What order and scale of a fire altar do you require?¡±


    ¡°The highest order...who I need tomunicate with this time is the nar consciousness of the Fire Elementium ne itself!¡±


    Tssss!


    Lasbes drew in a breath of cold air.


    It was important to note that for Fire Lords like herself, the individuals to whom they directed sacrifices were often the Fire Kings nearby. Without a sacrifice of sufficient magnitude, the nar consciousness would never reply to your request.


    Even this veteran Fire King couldn¡¯t help but get excited at having epted such an important mission.


    ¡°Contacting the nar consciousness...a fire altar of that scale and order can¡¯t beid out that easily. Perhaps only the Fire Kings would have world altars of such high grade,¡± An awkward expression appeared on Lasbes¡¯ furry spider face.


    ¡°You mean to say that we can¡¯t build an altar like that ourselves?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not that we can¡¯t, but that it will take a long time. We will also have to go everywhere to search for the required resources. I estimate that it will take us at least ten years, minimum, to construct the altar.¡±


    It was Greem¡¯s turn to be surprised now.


    Only now, he truly understood thepletely different perception of time and value in two different worlds.


    The most powerful Fire Lords in the Fire Elementium ne never knew the value of stockpiling resources ahead of time. They sat in their homes and slowly improved their powers. Consequently, their desire for outsider resources was much tamer.


    They did not have much of a desire for resources, materials, or territory. The point being that they would rather not move if they could. Instead, they could simply spend their days in theirir, slowly umting power with the passage of time.


    That was how most fire creatures lived their lives, a way of life etched into their very souls.


    Without any pressure for survival, there was no impulse or desire for evolution.


    Trying their best to scour for resources and knowledge while stockpiling all magical materials that could be needed in the future was the way of life and habit of all adepts in the World of Adepts.


    There would never be an awkward situation like this, where a Fourth Grade adept was unable to build a world altar.


    Ten years...dammit! Ten years was too long. Who knew if these divine authority fragments would end up bing a problem if they remained in his hands? It was best to convert them into actual power as soon as possible.


    Should he go over to Groms¡¯ and borrow his world altar?


    Still, bringing such a valuable sacrifice to the private territory of a Fire King...Greem didn¡¯t believe that Groms would turn on him over such meager pickings, but it would still be risky.


    Lasbes couldn¡¯t help but point at the distantvake with one of her legs when she saw the frustration on Greem¡¯s face. She had an odd expression on her face. ¡°My lord, isn¡¯t that over there a world altar? Why do we have to build one ourselves?¡±


    Greem was stunned for an instant. He turned around and looked dumbfoundedly at the old and ruined altar standing in front of theke.


    For some reason, when his gazended upon the altar, it was almost as if a string in his heart had been plucked. He felt tremors throughout his body, and an overwhelming emotion seemed to ovee him.


    ¡°Lasbes, contact Sock and tell him to have all fire creatures and magical machines evacuate from the Molten Altar...now!¡±


    Lasbes bowed upon hearing Greem¡¯s invible tone. She then said, ¡°Understood. I will do so immediately!¡±


    This ce was the private territory under Greem¡¯s rule, after all. There would be no disapproval or voices of doubt with a single order from him. In less than ten minutes, the bustling worksite had bepletely silent. There was not a single moving figure around Molten Altar.


    Greem¡¯s tremendous Spirit slowly roamed around Molten Altar, slowly but firmly sweeping every inch ofnd and space in the area. He scanned the skies and then the ground and even the bottom of thevake.


    It wasn¡¯t until he had confirmed that there were no abnormalities that he opened a megate in the air. A short momentter, Greem¡¯s light clone he¡¯d left in the World of Adepts walked out from within.


    ¡°Have you thought about how you¡¯re going to deal with this divine authority fragment?¡± The light clone asked curiously.


    ¡°I¡¯ve decided!¡± Greem and the clone only looked at each other to synchronize their minds. Greem instantly grasped everything that the clone had experienced in the past few decades.


    Horton Magic Academy had grown evenrger than before.


    Adept Ainley of the Adept¡¯s Association had sessfully advanced to Fifth Grade and had gone into space.


    Adept Nics of the Central Lands had gone missing in action during battles against the Underground World. His fate remained unknown.


    Bug Adept Billis had advanced to Fourth Grade and became a core fighting force of the Crimson n.


    Many individuals within the n had also advanced to Third Grade; the middle management was growing steadily in size.


    Thetest life-extension ceremony held by n veteran Snox had failed. He was on the brink of death now.


    The Goblin ne had submitted a proposal for the creation of the Magic-Energy Titan and was currently requesting resources from the n.


    Meanwhile, in the Northern Lands, Icdy, Berserk Witch, and Lucia¨Call three of Alice¡¯s aides¨Chad advanced to Third Grade.


    ......


    ......


    Greem took the fire divine authority fragment that the light clone handed to him and passed the clone a few divine virtue strands. Greem then instructed, ¡°Give these to Mary! With this divine virtue, she will benefit greatly from either improving her Agility or strengthening the powers of her vampire bloodline. Also, tell her that she can meet with me once the adept tower here isplete!¡±


    The light clone chuckled and put the divine virtue into his body. He then turned and returned to the World of Adepts through the megate.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but sigh once the light clone left.


    It had only been a few decades since he left the World of Adepts, but it felt like an entire century to him. Even if they rted to his own disciples and the people he cared about, all the changes happening there sounded like stories about strangers. There was an indescribable feeling of alienation and distance.


    His pursuit of power had caused him to make a great leap forwards. Unknowingly, he had started to cast hispanions behind. His past memories remained. Everything that had happened could be conjured up in his mind as fresh as when they had just happened. However, the emotions and humanity attached to these memories were slowly being washed away as he evolved and changed.


    His excessively rational and practical mind had not only wiped out all self-deception and delusion. It also caused him to no longer require illusory and transient love and rtionships to numb himself!


    Traveling throughout the world, exploring the infinite universe, and uncovering the secrets behind this world. This simple and true idea slowly rose to the top of his heart and became the ideal with which he was most obsessed.


    The pressure of survival had been what pushed Greem forward before he advanced to Fifth Grade. Every effort he had put into improving himself had been for the sake of survival, for the sake of himself, and for the sake of his n. For the sake of all these things, he had been sprinting forward with all his strength.


    Upon advancing to Fifth Grade, his lifespan had been extended to over ten thousand years, putting him in another dimension of existence entirely. His body and soul¡¯s principle conversion had also caused subtle but fundamental changes to his thoughts and mentality.


    The pressure of survival was no longer so immense. Even with Great Witch Maysa lurking within the adept faction and the God of Wisdom, God of Fire, and now the God of the Hunt threatening from outside, Greem still lived his life without worries and in a fulfilling fashion.


    If he was pushed into a corner, he would even give up the Capital of Steel in Camp Exodar. He would retreat to the Fire Elementium ne. This ce would never allow foreign beings to invade en masse. Greem¡¯s enemies would have to enter individually if they wanted to search for him. However, it would be like finding a needle in a haystack given the Fire Elementium ne¡¯s size.


    If even this ce was not safe, Greem didn¡¯t mind abandoning everything and wandering space.


    At any rate, given his ability, he could travel anywhere he wanted. He couldn¡¯t be pushed into a corner so easily!


    Moreover, he was all alone. There were no concerns he would leave behind. He wouldn¡¯t stay and fight to the bitter end over the meager territory he had here. It was precisely this unburdened mentality of his that gave rise to this feeling of freedom in Greem.


    As he was right now, Greem was filled with curiosity toward the universe. He even had an impulse to travel everywhere, slowly experiencing the wonders and mysteries of the world!

 Chapter 1485 - World Altar

    <h4>Chapter 1485 World Altar</h4>


    The Molten Altar.


    Greem stood silently before it.


    He had a feeling that if he used this world altar to perform a high-grade sacrifice, something unexpected would happen. However, he also had a feeling that this unexpected incident wouldn¡¯t be something bad for him.


    Since it wasn¡¯t something detrimental, then that meant it was something good!


    With a strange desire to just give it a try, Greem decided to perform his sacrifice here.


    Sacrifices were actually very simple things!


    Prepare a magical altar and allow the individual to contact an exceptionally powerful higher entity through the sacrifice. Prepare the appropriate sacrifice, and the whole process was ready.


    Whether those higher entities would have the free time to respond to the requests of some ¡®ants¡¯ would depend on their mood and the quality of the sacrifice. As long as the sacrifice¡¯s quality was sufficient, the higher entity wouldn¡¯t care if the individual performing the sacrifice wasn¡¯t too respectful.


    When worldly mortals performed a sacrifice, they always made it a grand affair. They would choose young and pretty girls to serve as priestesses and cullrge amounts of livestock for the express purpose of entertaining the higher entity.


    However, sacrifices with a higher entity were little more than ¡®fair¡¯ trade for Greem. There was no religious or mysterious ir to it at all. Both sides took what they needed and walked away satisfied; there was no need for all the decorum.


    After evacuating everyone unrted from the Molten Altar, Greem slowly walked up to this ancient altar that had been abandoned for over ten thousand years.


    Greem stepped on the severely degraded wooden steps lightly and started to walk up, admiring the ancient ruins as he did so. Five minutester, he stood in front of the strange stone tform of the altar.


    He didn¡¯t know what material the stone tform was made of, but it was a gray-white color and looked ancient. Carved into it were all sorts of unusual patterns and strange runes of unknown purpose. Even as knowledgeable as Greem was and as intelligent as the Chip was, they couldn¡¯t make heads nor tails out of these ancient patterns whose legacy had clearly died out long ago.


    Strangely enough, when Greem¡¯s eyes swept across the stone tform, the sounds of the runes naturally appeared in his mind, even without anyone to teach him.


    Still, he had no idea of what the incantation meant or what the purpose of the runes was.


    Interesting...Greem couldn¡¯t help but marvel.


    ¡°Oh omnipresent Will of Fire, Greem presents his request to you. Please ept the intricate gift I have prepared for you,¡± Greem shut his eyes and chanted the incantation out loud, silently attempting tomunicate in his mind with the world¡¯s consciousness.


    Unfortunately, no matter how he tried, no matter how sincere he was, there was no motion from the altar. There wasn¡¯t even a single trace of movement from the fire elementium.


    What is it? Not gonna show itself unless there¡¯s food on the table?


    Greem sighed and took out a divine authority fragment. He ced it gently on the stone tform.


    The effect was immediate. The moment the divine authority fragment touched the still-warm tform, a golden beam of light shone out from within the altar. It turned into a giant pir of light that pierced the skies.


    The tip of the pir of light exploded into a beautiful rain of golden light when it touched the sky. The sparks slowly drifted down from above, enveloping the entirety of Molten Altar and isting it from the rest of the world.


    An indescribably massive consciousness descended from the skies and locked onto Greem¡¯s Spirit.


    All of Greem¡¯s spiritual senses, as well as the Chip¡¯s detection abilities, were forced back into his body. Only his sight, hearing, and physical senses remained unaffected. It almost seemed like all of his supernatural powers had been sealed and could not be used.


    Greem had practically be an ordinary mortal next to the iparably powerful consciousness. He no longer had any of the things that he usually prided himself upon!


    ¡°Human, are you the one that wishes to sacrifice this divine authority fragment?¡±


    It was a tremendous, majestic, and mysterious voice. It had none of the emotions of a living being. It only possessed an ancient aura that suggested at its incredible age, as well as amanding air of authority.


    ¡°Great Will of Fire, it is indeed I who is sacrificing to you...please, ept my sacrifice!¡± As a Fifth Grade Great Adept, Greem knew full well the flow and process of a sacrifice.


    No amount of deceit or deception was necessary whenmunicating with such a higher existence. Their mental consciousnesses were both linked, and none of Greem¡¯s thoughts or desires could escape notice.


    ¡°I can ept the sacrifice. Tell me your request!¡±


    ¡°I wish to elevate the level of the fires that I possess. I am not satisfied with their might.¡±


    ¡°I can sense two entirely different fire origins on you. Which one do you wish to elevate?¡±


    ¡°May I know their effects after elevation before I make my decision?¡± Greem tried tomunicate with the great consciousness.


    ¡°Human, you have a fire origin that has a trace of the smell of Undying. I can elevate it to Soulburn. From then on, your fire will possess the ability to burn the soul directly. The other fire has the smell of Mirror Image. I can elevate it to Clone. From then on, your illusory images will possess around 30% of your offensive power,¡± It might have been a boon provided with the first sacrifice, but the Will of Fire of the Fire Elementium ne was being unusually gentle and friendly.


    Elevating the Undying mes to Soulburn definitely seemed to be an improvement in the level of the fire principle. It would make Greem¡¯s attack even more terrifying than before!


    Meanwhile, elevating Fire¡¯s Image to Clone would improve Greem¡¯s control over the battlefield, as well as his ability to preserve his life. With three fire clones at his disposal, Greem would be able to unleash even more devastatingbinations in battle.


    Greem bit his lip lightly. He couldn¡¯t help but hesitate for a moment.


    ¡°Human, I can sense the aura of more divine authority fragments on you. Why don¡¯t you sacrifice all of them? Then you won¡¯t have to worry about the choice!¡± The Will of Fire hinted in a considerate manner.


    Damn! This Will of Fire even had a dog¡¯s snout for a nose. To think it could even smell something like that!


    As expected, the older you were, the more cunning you became. Any intelligent entity would be sly once it had lived long enough. To think it even understood the principle of hunger marketing.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but mentally grunt about the Will of Fire¡¯s ¡®cunning¡¯ as he took out another divine authority fragment and ced it on the tform. He then chuckled. ¡°I choose to elevate Image to Clone! As for the extra fragment here, may I ask a favor of you?¡±


    ¡°What is it?¡± The Will of Fire seemed to be in a good mood to see two divine authority fragments.


    ¡°Help me merge these two things together!¡± Having said that, Greem carefully ced the fire divine authority fragment onto the tform alongside the Orb of the Fire God.


    ¡°Your request does not exceed the value of the sacrifice. It is epted...the sacrifice shall begin now!¡±


    The Will of Fire¡¯s loud and majestic voice boomed, and golden mes ignited upon the tform. The two fragments that Greem had ced on it instantly melted in the mes before disintegrating into countless sparks that dissipated into the air.


    The Will of Fire had taken away its sacrifice!


    The next second, two beams of golden light descended from the skies. One beam engulfed Greem while the other engulfed the divine authority fragment and orb on the tform.


    Countless mysterious and profound fire runes formed in midair before rushing into Greem¡¯s body like swallows to their nests. Greem instantly felt a mysterious force modifying the Fire¡¯s Image in his soul consciousness. Much of the fire origin knowledge that he couldn¡¯t figure out in the past suddenly appeared and became part of his mental consciousness.


    Meanwhile, the golden pir engulfing the fire divine-authority fragment had melted it down, reducing the fragment to a strange sort of liquid. The liquid was then merged with the Orb of the Fire God.


    The orb glowed brightly as strands of golden me and blinding runes wove together and modified its internal structure. The Fire God¡¯s furious and savage shout seemed to ring out in the air faintly as bright yellow mes burst forth from the orb, resisting the modification brought by the runes.


    If Greem were the one performing the modification, he would not have been able to stop the uproar brought about by the Fire God¡¯s wrath. However, not even the Seventh Grade Fire God Sinai could stop the Will of Fire within the Fire Elementium ne.


    As the infuriated roars and cries slowly faded away, the Orb of the Fire God glowed like a miniature sun. It was undergoing an unprecedented change. The one guiding this process was the Will of Fire, which had received Greem¡¯s sacrifice.


    As they say, you get what you pay for!


    With the Will of Fire performing the modifications, Greem no longer had to worry about the orb¡¯s original owner. That was because all marks and soul fragments Sinai left in the Orb of the Fire God had been wiped away by the Will of Fire. The only thing left to Greem was a new artifact waiting to ept a new owner.


    The grade of this divine equipment was advanced Fifth Grade, one minor grade higher than before its modification!


    However, what made Greem most excited was that the Fifth Grade divine spell Scorched Earth stored within the Orb had now be Critical Wildfire.


    It was a genuine Fifth Grade fire spell that possessed aplete spell model and activation incantation. As long as Greem was willing to study it carefully, he would actually be able to grasp this violent, offensive fire spell.


    These benefits were only a portion brought about by the change to the Orb of the Fire God.


    Once the orb epted its new owner, it would be Greem¡¯s exclusive origin equipment. It would no longer have anything to do with Sinai. To be able to truly obtain high-grade magical equipmentpatible with one¡¯s soul origin¨C what could make an adept happier than this!?

 Chapter 1486 - Mysterious Entity

    Chapter 1486 Mysterious Entity


    The sacrifice ritual hade to an end, and the Will of Fire was slowly dissipating.


    Greem seemed to remember something all of a sudden. He asked in a loud voice, ¡°Great Will of Fire, what would I need to sacrifice to you if I wish to be a Fire King?¡±


    ¡°A Fire King? To obtain my approval and be one of the rulers of this world, you must at least sacrifice twenty fragments of divine authority. Of course, if you have more of those that are fire divine authority, fifteen fragments will be enough!¡±


    Twenty fragments of divine authority...wouldn¡¯t that be all the power of a Sixth Grade god?


    To have a mere beginner Fifth Grade fire adept like himself take apart a Sixth Grade god and preserve all their power at the same time. Greem could never imagine himself doing something so ridiculous, even if he had ten times the arrogance and confidence!


    Greem put away the Orb of the Fire God when he sensed the will had vanished. However, he did not leave. He stood there and waited silently.


    The sacrifice ritual had gone too smoothly and too ordinarily. It seemed to be at odds with the strange feeling and premonition Greem had earlier. Were his senses off, or did he miss something during that whole process earlier?


    Greem thought in silence as he continued to scan the area.


    While Greem was filled with doubt, a mysterious mental message rang out in his mind.


    ¡°Hey, kid, you got any more treasures of that level in your hands? If you do, sacrifice them to me. The stuff I can offer you will definitely be way better than what the Will of Fire can!¡±


    Greem¡¯s expression changed drastically when he heard this voice. Shock and surprise appeared on Greem¡¯s face, and a hint of something that suggested he expected this to happen.


    Greem closed his eyes and scanned his surroundings even more meticulously. However, he still couldn¡¯t find the source of the mental message. He only knew that the voice had just abruptly appeared in his mind.


    ¡°Kid, there¡¯s no need to keep looking for me. My actual body is long since gone. Only a fragment of my soul remains roaming thisnd. If I were to be more direct, I would say that you¡¯re stepping on my body, kid!¡± This mysterious spiritual fluctuation that had appeared out of nowhere was incredibly weak. Given the aura that it was giving off, the entity didn¡¯t even have a First Grade¡¯s power.


    ¡°You must be that powerful Eighth Grade Fire Hierarch of the history, aren¡¯t you? The one that died. Did you find a way toe back to life?¡± Greem never dared to underestimate those high-grade existences.


    Each one of those old monsters possessed mysterious abilities and taboo techniques.


    Greem wouldn¡¯t be surprised if you told him that even an old monster that died tens of thousands of years ago coulde back to life. On the contrary, he would treat that as a matter of course.


    ¡°You...you know me?¡± The spiritual fluctuation turned a little more intense.


    ¡°I don¡¯t know much! That said, given that I had the guts to choose this ce as my territory, I¡¯ve definitely done the prerequisite investigations. Isn¡¯t that right, Lord Gomanreas?¡± Greem said, half in jest.


    All of a sudden, the mental voice vanished entirely. It was like someone holding their breath. The spiritual fluctuation was gone.


    Greem wasn¡¯t surprised at all. Instead, he waited silently.


    Time slipped by. Perhaps it was a minute, or fifteen, or even an entire day and night. Greem waited patiently and quietly. Finally, the mental voice abruptly rang out in his mind again.


    ¡°You¡¯re still here...why, kid?¡±


    A victorious smile appeared on Greem¡¯s face when he heard the voice in his head again. He chuckled and said, ¡°Because I¡¯ve been waiting for you toe to a decision!¡±


    ¡°A decision? A decision on what?¡±


    ¡°On whether you will choose to go down this path of revival that has no return!¡±


    ¡°Kid, you don¡¯t have much in the way of power, but you¡¯re quite bold, aren¡¯t you? To think, a mere Fifth Grade fellow like you dare intervene in a conflict between Eighth Grade entities! Huh! I wonder if I should call you ignorantly courageous, or unbelievably brave?¡±


    ¡°Thetter, of course!¡± Greem smiled. ¡°I know very well the consequences that might arise from working with you. However, if I remain your only point of contact, then we won¡¯t alert those former enemies of yours, will we?¡±


    ¡°Enemies? My enemies aren¡¯t in this ne. Moreover, I¡¯ve been dead for ten thousand years. It¡¯s a question of whether they even remember my existence at this point!¡±


    ¡°Good, very good. Now, the biggest problem that stands between our cooperation is what exactly your rtionship with the Will of Fire is? Can it...tolerate your revival?¡±


    The mysterious fluctuation suddenly went silent. It then started to undte once more after a long pause.


    ¡°Kid, my enemy isn¡¯t the Will of Fire, but those Titans. Those damned bastards tore me to shreds and cast my soul to the winds under the banner of sweeping away the toxic elements of the various neworlds. They forced me to slumber for so many years.¡±


    ¡°Revered Lord Gomanreas, your enemies are too powerful. I am only a mere Fifth Grade adept. Under ordinary circumstances, I would never be willing to get involved in all your grudges and ties. That is why I need a clear answer right now...what is the rtionship between you and the Will of Fire?¡±


    ¡°What could it be? Of course, we are not involved with each other at all!¡± The mysterious entity suddenly paused for a moment before saying, ¡°I used to be one of the Fire Kings. At my highest point, I attained the level of Fire Hierarch and was only one step away from bing the Ruler of Fire. Unfortunately, it was then that the damned Titans came knocking.


    ¡°They would never allow a true Ruler to be born in the Elementium nes. That was why they killed me and destroyed all traces of my existence. Still, I was once the most powerful entity in this world, after all. My soul aura permeated even the principles of this world; that is how I¡¯ve finally managed to reform my consciousness from the principles powers after ten thousand years. However, recovering my power will require an exceedingly long time.


    ¡°The Will of Fire won¡¯t intervene in my freedom, but it will no longer help me either. It allows my consciousness to remain cooped up around the Molten Altar and does nothing about it. If I have the opportunity to revive and be a true Ruler of Fire, it will have the chance to overwhelm the other three Elementium nes and be the strongest of them all. That is why it will be happy to see me rise to power once more!¡±


    Dammit! Ruler of Fire, Elementium Rulers...what was all this stuff?


    He was just a mere Fifth Grade adept. When did he get mixed up in all this nonsense?


    Greemined in his mind while severing his connection with the mysterious entity. He turned and walked down the altar.


    He had no interest in participating in the grudges of these cosmic figures. As a Fifth Grade adept, Greem couldn¡¯t even be considered a pawn in the scheme of things. If he were actually foolish enough to get involved with this former Fire Hierarch, he would probably find himself dead without even knowing how.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be in a hurry to reject me, kid. We can talk,¡± This mental voice was peculiar. Greem had obviously cut off his connection with it, but it could still appear in his mind.


    Greem promptly cut off the connection again.


    ¡°I can provide you with benefits.¡±


    Disconnect.


    ¡°I can give you better stuff than the Will of Fire.¡±


    Disconnect.


    ¡°I still have remains from the treasury of my god kingdom,¡± The mental voice seemed to have been driven to the brink of insanity by Greem. It finally shouted those words out loud in his mind.


    Strangely enough, this time, Greem didn¡¯t cut off the connection.


    ¡°Remains from the treasury of a god kingdom,¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but mumble.


    This being was a former Eighth Grade Fire Hierarch. His god kingdom had been destroyed and his body disintegrated, leaving behind only a fragment of his soul. However, if even a tiny bit remained of this god kingdom¡¯s treasury, then even the most meager of scraps would be enough to show up in Greem¡¯s fantasies.


    Greem knew that epting an offer like this was risky enough to put him in mortal danger. However, the greed and desire from the very core of his soul caused him to stop in his tracks. He lowered his head and started to weigh his options.


    ¡°Work with me, kid; I promise you won¡¯t lose out. The Will of Fire only gave you that tiny bit of stuff after you sacrificed two fragments of divine authority. If it were me, I would have given you much more than that!¡± The mental voice immediately started working its tongue and tempting Greem upon seeing a chance.


    Greem lifted his head abruptly and betrayed a disdainful smile. He then ignored everything that Gomanreas had to say as he walked toward the teleportation array in the distance.


    ¡°Hey,e back...kid, get your ass back here!¡±


    The voice seemed to be furious. Tall waves rippled out within thevake.


    Unfortunately, no matter how it raged, Greem simply walked away and left without a care.


    Finally, as the bright light of teleportation shone, the Molten Altar returned to its former peace and quiet!


    ............


    The World of Adepts, the Crimson Wing.


    It was the twelfth year since Greem¡¯s departure.


    Zhentarim, which had undergone numerous changes in its ruling structure, had finally settled down. It was gradually starting to rise to prominence in the Central Lands under the Horton Magic Academy structure, which was itself led by the Crimson n.


    New and more ambitious Crimson adepts began to climb thedder of hierarchy. The ¡®old ones¡¯ who couldn¡¯t keep up with the n¡¯s pace were reced and became stepping stones for the n¡¯s continued development.


    Great Goblin Sage Snoxy on a soft bed in a luxurious and extravagant room on one of the n tower¡¯s top floors. His entire body almost seemed like it was being devoured by the soft silk sheets.


    An entire roomful of goblins was gathered around him.


    Some were goblin adepts holding staffs, while others were magical mechanics with tiny golems squatting on their shoulders. There were even machinist sorcerers radiating stern and bloodthirsty auras. However, the majority of them were association chairmen and presidents dressed like merchants.


    An elven priest with long ears stood up and concluded the examination of Snox¡¯s body. The elf looked around the room at the goblin factions¡¯ various leaders and shook her head bitterly.

 Chapter 1487 - Snorlax’s Death

    Chapter 1487 Snox¡¯s Death


    ¡°Since Lord Snox is at his limits, we should have him hand over his authority as the leader of the General Chamber of Commerce.¡±


    Several of the goblin leaders motioned with their eyes as a goblin with only his left ear stood forward. He was dressed in the sharp uniform of the Chamber. He waved his hand and started making amotion.


    ¡°Left-Ear, what are you trying to do, exactly?¡± An old goblin wearing the Goblin Salvation Society robes stood up and stared angrily at this goblin.


    The other believers who had always seen the Great Sage as the savior of the goblins also gathered around him and started arguing with Left-Ear.


    Locke, who was now a Third Grade adept, sat casually and calmly in a corner of the room. He caressed a short staff embedded with all sorts of colorful, magical gemstones in his hand as he watched this dogfight unfold!


    A Third Grade adept andmander of the Crimson n gship Versailles¨C either one of these two positions would be enough to make him superior over all these goblins. He would be the key individual to win over, regardless of which goblin faction came into prominence. None of them would ever dare to erode the benefits that belonged to him and his people.


    That was why Locke could watch this fight in such a calm and aloof fashion. He didn¡¯t need to concern himself with the political scheming and ns behind it all!


    Simrly, the leader of the machinist sorcerers, ckwing, also remained detached from these affairs.


    As the leader of one of the few armed forces amongst the goblins that possessed elementium powers, ckwing was an important individual. He might only be at an insignificant level of Second Grade, but he led the Brutalblood Army that consisted of over thirteen thousand goblins.


    Moreover, ten percent of the machinist sorcerers were Second Grade.


    If you were to count it in that fashion, the machinist sorcerers were the most powerful force among the goblins, even if they weren¡¯t too powerful individually. Consequently, the status of their leader ckwing was also significantly elevated. He was an individual that everyone wanted on their side.


    Apart from the adepts and machinist sorcerers, the goblins¡¯ most formidable faction was the Goblin Research Institute, whose members were primarily magical goblins. They controlled two Fourth Grade golem dragons, as well as part of the Crimson Fleet.


    The engineers, mechanics, and technicians of the Goblin Research Institute became representatives of the goblins. They had quite a lot of sway within the Crimson n.


    Usually, these few factions minded their own business and worked in their own domains, seldoming together for any sort of discussion. Their rtionship was only barely at the level of having tea together every so often.


    Should something involve the benefit of their faction, they would certainly be at odds.


    They wouldn¡¯t go as far as assassinations and evil schemes, but swinging their fists around and beating each other ck and blue was amon urrence!


    In the past, the divided goblins were pulled together by the intermediary that was the Great Sage, and peace was kept between the various factions. As the Great Goblin Sage neared the end of his life, the entire goblin race faced a reorganization in power and authority.


    That was why they had all gathered here. The goblins all had their eyes set upon the Chairman position of the Goblin General Chamber of Commerce!


    Snox, lying in the luxurious bed, looked so old that it was unbearable to even look at him. The numerous life extension ceremonies had allowed him to surpass the limitations of a goblin¡¯s lifespan again and again. He had be the first goblin to live to six hundred years old.


    However, death had finally caught up to him after all these years. It caused his entire body, and even his soul itself, to radiate a cold and rotting aura, a herald of his death toe.


    ¡°Get...out. All...of...them, get...out......¡±


    Snox shouted with his feeble and trembling voice. The elven priest in charge of taking care of him stood up and demanded that the goblins leave.


    ¡°Let us leave. Lord Snox needs the quiet!¡±


    ¡°We can¡¯t leave. We still have to hear who Lord Snox intends to inherit the position of Chairman.¡±


    ¡°Indeed! The General Chamber of Commerce is a massive organization. It can¡¯t be without a leader. We must choose a new Chairman.¡±


    ¡°I choose Boss ckwing. He¡¯s the only one who has the power to remain seated in that position.¡±


    ¡°Nonsense! ckwing is already the leader of the machinist sorcerers. He can¡¯t take on two positions at once; it will cause a power imbnce. I nominate Vice-Chairman Bausch.¡±


    ¡°Bausch is too old. He won¡¯t live for too much longer, either. We ought to choose someone young.¡±


    ¡°And who would that be...you?¡±


    ......


    With the loss of Snox, the key figure who could unite the goblins, the various factions had truly fallen into a disagreement. None of them were willing to bow to another.


    If words couldn¡¯t settle their disputes, then only fists could do it!


    No one knew who was the first to take off the boot on their shoe and throw it, but the next second, an amusing fight broke out in the room.


    ¡°Lord Snox...Lord Snox...this isn¡¯t good. Stop it, all of you! Lord Snox has died!¡± The priest that had been taking care of Snox bent over, only to discover to her surprise that the first goblin of the Crimson n had taken hisst breath.


    ¡°Alright! Enough! You ugly fools...leave Lord Snox with thest shred of his dignity! If you want to argue and fight, feel free to do so in the hall outside! Now, get out! All of you!¡± Locke, who had been watching the whole mess coldly from the sidelines, finally stood up and shouted in anger. He tapped his staff, and a blinding elementium glow engulfed his entire person. The goblins, who were tangled together in a mess while biting each others¡¯ arms and pulling at each others¡¯ noses, finally stopped.


    ¡°Let us all leave!¡± ckwing also stood up. ¡°Let¡¯s first talk about what we should do for Lord Snox¡¯s final rites. The rest can wait untilter.¡±


    Having said that, he walked out of the room ahead of everyone else.


    The other goblins looked at each other. They had no choice but to put down their fists, tidy up their clothes, and walk out of the room one by one.


    Soon, only the priest and Adept Locke remained in the room, along with the dead Sage Snox.


    ¡°My lord, are you not leaving?¡± The elven priest looked at Locke curiously.


    Locke shook his head but did not give her a reply. Instead, he bowed respectfully at a corner of the room and said, ¡°Lady Mary, I have driven them out of the room, as per your instructions!¡±


    Lady Mary? The Lady Mary? The Bloody Queen who was the ruler of the massive Crimson n and the de facto leader of the Central Lands?


    The First Grade elven priest couldn¡¯t help but stare with wide-open eyes as a pretty and slender figure appeared out of thin air.


    There was probably no one who could have guessed Mary¡¯s horrifying identity just from her appearance, let alone figure out the fact that she was an ultra-powerhouse whose very name invoked fear.


    It was a young woman with slender limbs and iparable beauty!


    Her skin was wlessly smooth and white, and her face was so perfect that you could lose yourself gazing at it. Her small, red lips were pursed together, and there seemed to be a faint yet charming smile that always hung on the corners of her mouth. Her youthful and explosive figure would catch anyone¡¯s eyes. The body under that dragon leather armor was curvaceous, and much of her white skin could be seen.


    A pair of equally pretty ck wings beat behind her back, further amplifying the wild beauty and seductiveness of the woman.


    Mary¡¯s gazended on the old and rotten body of Snox the moment she appeared.


    She hovered silently above Snox and simply gazed at him like that. It was impossible to tell what she was thinking.


    It seems like Lady Mary hade here to say her farewells to Snox.


    Locke couldn¡¯t help but surmise. He made a look with his eyes and indicated for the priest to leave with him, such that Lady Mary could be alone.


    However, the female priest clearly couldn¡¯t endure the faint blood aura around Mary. Her entire body went limp. Even lifting a single finger was impossibly difficult for the priest now, let alone walking away!


    First Grade and peak Fourth Grade. The difference between the two was simply toorge!


    It was so immense that the priest felt genuine fear and horror in her soul, even when Mary restrained her energy aura as best she could. The priest¡¯s soul had gone numb, as if she had just seen the world¡¯s most terrifying predator. Her muscles were frozen, and she could not move in the slightest.


    If she remained by Mary¡¯s side for too long, she might just die of fright!


    ¡°There¡¯s no need to leave. You can stay!¡±


    Mary¡¯s seductive voice rang out in the room. She reached out with her hand, and a faint soul floated out of Snox¡¯s body.


    Typically, a soul would dissipate very rapidly after death.


    However, Snox had attained advanced Second Grade prior to his death. As such, his soul was much clearer and more resilient than an ordinary being¡¯s.


    Snox¡¯s soul stood confused in the air when he was pulled out of his body. He remained stunned for a moment before he recognized Mary.


    ¡°Lady Mary, I can¡¯t go on any longer. I will have to leave you now. Snox bids you farewell here!¡± Snox¡¯s soul kneeled in midair and kowtowed at Mary. He cried, ¡°Lady Mary, being able to meet you and Lord Greem in this life was the greatest honor of Snox...please, bid farewell to Lord Greem for me when you see him next time!¡±


    Mary couldn¡¯t help but sigh when she heard this.


    ¡°You little fellow. It seems like you are fated to a whole life of fortune! I finally understand now why that bastard suddenly gave me something as valuable as that. Hmph! This is wasted on you.¡±


    Having said that, Mary reached out with her hand and took out something, which she tossed toward Snox¡¯s soul.


    It was a suffocatingly beautiful ball of golden light. A winding golden thread swam within the ball.


    For some reason, when Adept Locke¡¯s eyes fell upon this golden thread, his breath stopped for a moment. His entire body stiffened, and his very soul trembled in excitement.


    Take it...take it...take it.


    Locke¡¯s entire being burst with desire for that golden thread. It was fortunate that he still retained his rationality, but it took him all his power to keep himself from doing something impulsive.


    What was that thing? Why did it tempt him so?


    Locke couldn¡¯t help but marvel!

 Chapter 1488 - Holy Snorlax

    Chapter 1488 Holy Snox


    Mary couldn¡¯t help but sigh as she watched the divine virtue swim around within the golden light.


    ¡°You lucked out, brat! Nowe back to life!¡±


    Mary pointed with her slender finger, and the divine virtue instantly entered Snox¡¯s soul.


    It was almost as if a sun had suddenly been stuffed into his soul. The soul on the brink of death, fragile enough that a breeze probably would have caused it to fade away, suddenly burst out with blinding light.


    The tattered soul had been reforged with the divine virtue as its foundation.


    Some fragments of the soul that had already scattered even appeared out of thin air, guided by a mysterious force. They merged back with Snox¡¯s soul, which now radiated a mysterious aura.


    The soul slowly returned to the body¡¯s dead shell, drawn by the attraction between soul and form. Where the golden light shone, the withered body started to fill up and be reinvigorated.


    Powerful and intense life force surged through Snox¡¯s scrawny and wilted body. His soul radiated a sacred and holy light, purifying his degraded physical form.


    The once wrinkled skin turned smooth again and the dark splots vanished, reced with a healthy glow filled with life and strength. His skin, flesh, tendons, and even blood became almost translucent and let out waves of holy light that inspired worship.


    ¡°A holy spirit!¡± The elven priest, who had been watching with wide open eyes, couldn¡¯t help but gasp.


    In the elven tomes she had read in the past, the elven gods would asionally provide divine blessings to their most devoted followers, turning them into beings with holy power. These individuals that possessed some of a god¡¯s power were called holy spirits!


    It was said that only the most devoted of believers, having undergone numerous trials and tribtions, would have the honor of being uplifted into holy spirits. Holy spirits could also represent a god and walk amongst mortals as their avatars. They would spread the teachings of the religion and strengthen the militia of believers.


    That was why this scene that the priest was witnessing was no different to her than a god creating a holy spirit.


    However, instead of a god, you had the fearsome Bloody Queen. Instead of a hero, you had a measly goblin. This unthinkable scene unfolding before her was turning everything she knew on its head.


    The priest quickly shut her eyes. She could hear a loud sound in her mind. It was the sound of her crumbling ideals!


    Locke was a knowledgeable and intelligent Third Grade adept.


    Even though he did not recognize the golden thread to be divine virtue, he still managed to surmise its true nature from everything that was happening, including the priest¡¯s reaction.


    Divine virtue...to think it was divine virtue!


    These things did not exist in the World of Adepts. They could only be obtained in the World of Gods.


    He had read about divine virtue in books as well. He knew that it could extend lifespans, improve Physique, and strengthen the soul. However, he also knew that the most significant benefit brought about by divine virtue was...deification!


    It was said that five points of divine virtue were enough to turn a mortal into a divine being.


    The fortunate individual would then possess an undying body and an immortal soul!


    They would possess a body as pure and holy as the gods and would no longer be affected by cold, heat, poison, curses, and old age. Moreover, their soul would be resilient enough to endure even Third Grade death magic.


    All these benefits, all that power, were brought about by divine virtue.


    Locke screamed madly and wildly in his heart at the thought of the mere Second Grade Snox being able to enjoy the gift of divine virtue. He put his hand over his heart and kneeled on one knee. It took all he had to stop his body from trembling.


    If...if that divine virtue had been bestowed on him instead, how much more powerful he could have be!


    Locke kept his head tucked and lowered toward the ground.


    In the brief moment where all these thoughts shed through the minds of Locke and the elf, Snox had already begun moving his body and getting up from the luxurious bed.


    He looked as if he had returned to his youth. Both his body and his appearance had reverted to the moment in his life where he was the strongest and most handsome; they would remain that way forever.


    Snox moved his tiny limbs around and felt the explosive power and endless energy within him. He finally raised his head curiously and asked, ¡°Mistress Mary, what is this that you have bestowed on me!? It¡¯s really effective. I...I¡¯ve actually been revived.¡±


    ¡°Hmph!¡± Mary snorted and said, ¡°If you¡¯re back to life, then get to work on reining those goblins in and make them obedient. Remember, this one point of divine virtue will only allow you to live for a hundred years more at best. Work well for me. If you perform good enough, I will continue to give you more divine virtue.¡±


    ¡°I understand! Snox is off to teach those rowdy bastards a lesson,¡± Snox leaped around in excitement. When he raised his head again, Mary had already vanished without a trace.


    Upon sensing Mary¡¯s departure, Adept Locke finally stood up. He smiled as he congratted Snox, ¡°Congrattions, Lord Snox! To think, you¡¯ve been bestowed with divine virtue. You are destined for greatness now.¡±


    In the past, Locke had always been arrogant and prideful around Snox, given his status as a Third Grade adept. However, he was being incredibly humble, so much so that he actively lowered himself.


    Snox appeared momentarily stunned. He then ran over and grabbed Locke¡¯s hand as he asked in an excited voice, ¡°Lord Locke, you are the most knowledgeable person I know. You must know what divine virtue is. Why don¡¯t...you tell me a little bit. What is divine virtue?¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s talk while we walk! It¡¯s best for you to show your face quicker. Otherwise, who knows what other kinds of a mess those fools will get up to?¡± Locke could sense the sacred power radiating from Snox¡¯s body even better now that they were close. He felt a strange feeling of suppression around Snox, despite being an entire grade higher than him.


    Locke couldn¡¯t help but sigh to himself in his mind.


    What a waste! How good it would have been if the divine virtue had been given to him instead.


    However, this one incident alone allowed Locke to understand the weight with which the two rulers of the Crimson n regarded Snox in their hearts. It seemed like he would have to get friendly with Snox from now on.


    ............


    Inside an arcane hall.


    A lively argument was going on.


    Spit and boots flew all over the ce, just as words and fists were also exchanged. Every goblin greeted their political rival with their utmost passion and pulled votes for their favored candidates with all they had.


    While everyone was arguing loudly and trading blows, an extravagant golden boot adorned with all sorts of jewels flew through the air and smacked the goblin who was sitting in the Chairman¡¯s seat on the forehead.


    A loud yelp could be heard as the goblin rolled onto the floor.


    He quickly got back on his feet. He picked up the golden boot and shouted, ¡°Who is it? Which bastard was the one that threw this boot!¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s me!¡± A vaguely familiar voice rang out from the hall.


    The goblins who had been tussling together in a brawl stopped their fighting and turned their heads toward the entrance. Two goblins walked through the doors, shoulder to shoulder, clearly intimate acquaintances.


    Huh, it was Lord Locke...and...who was the other goblin?


    The same question arose in the minds of all the goblins.


    The young goblins might never have seen Snox in his youth, but there were some old goblins here as well. They let out a gasp in unison and pointed trembling fingers at the ¡®handsome¡¯ goblin youth as if they had just seen a ghost. Their mouths were wide agape, but only broken gasps escaped their lips.


    ¡°Snox...it¡¯s Lord Snox!¡±


    Finally, one of the old goblins shouted out loud.


    It was almost as if a chilling breeze blew across the hall. All the goblins froze on the spot.


    Snox led Locke through the crowd by the arm as he walked toward the Chairman¡¯s seat with a cold smile on his face. All the goblins in his way felt a sinister and threatening aura pressing toward them. They found themselves involuntarily making way for him.


    Snox kicked aside the merchant leader stunned in front of his seat and sat down. He looked toward the shocked goblins and exined coldly, ¡°By virtue of Lady Mary, I have been revived! From now on, this seat is still mine, and my word is still the final word. Anyone who has an opinion can step forward now.¡±


    Third Grade Adept Locke stood by the seat. He tapped his staff against the ground, and an invisible shockwave washed across the goblins. It was then that the goblins finally managed to digest this unbelievable news. They hastily returned to their own seats, as obedient and honest as students that had just been disciplined.


    The merchant leader that got kicked aside crawled before Snox like a maggot. He lifted the golden boot above his head respectfully, trembling as he did so.


    The Goblin Salvation Society believers hurriedly rushed forward and crouched before Snox, shouting slogans such as ¡®Miracle!¡¯ and ¡®All hail Snox!¡¯


    The atmosphere in the room turned around instantly!


    ............


    No one really quite cared about the wholemotion among the goblins.


    However, news of the divine virtue spread like a gue.


    In just an hour, the entirety of the Crimson n¡¯s higher-ups had heard of this ¡®hrious¡¯ incident. Within the day, almost every Fourth Grade adept in the Central Lands had also received word of this shocking news.


    The capricious vampire adept, Bloody Queen Lord Mary, had been extravagant enough to use divine virtue to save a Second Grade goblin.


    In all honesty, the first word that every Fourth Grade adept uttered when they heard this was ¡®damn,¡¯ and their first reaction was to assume she had gone insane!


    However, even more adepts were more curious about how much divine virtue Lady Mary had in her possession.


    Perhaps...it was possible, just maybe...that they could also trade for it!


    With this idea in mind, numerous messengers from the various ns gathered in Crimson Wing once more.

 Chapter 1489 - Adjustment of Power

    Chapter 1489 Adjustment of Power


    Greem was no longer the same nameless pawn when he returned to Boulder Fortress again!


    It seemed like news of hisst battle had reached the fortress and had somehow spread among the people. It was said that he and Antuso had managed to kill the clone of a mid-ranked god.


    For a while, plenty of Great Adepts came to visit him and be acquaintances. In the end, Greem had no choice but to use the treatment of his wounds as an excuse to go into seclusion. It was the only way to stop the tide of ¡®passion¡¯ greeting him.


    Initially, Greem had been somewhat confused about it. It wasn¡¯t until he asked around a littleter that he understood why people were so excited around him!


    The adepts and the orc gods had been fighting for a long time. You could say they knew each other very well at this point.


    You attack my resource nes, and I will send someone to defend. I send someone to attack your faith worlds, and you defend.


    The two forces went back and forth in this fashion, locked inplicated battles throughout the gxies.


    Under ordinary circumstances, the amount of military power that both forces deployed into any particr region was approximately the same. Most of the time, individual ability and cooperation among thebatants decided victory and defeat.


    Generally, the adepts were more agile and flexible, with a myriad of strange spells and unexpected abilities. More crucially, the adepts always fought in person, allowing them to utilize the power of their equipment and spells to their fullest.


    Even though it was likely for gods to join the fray in their true forms as well, they often had no choice but to deploy god clones due to theirck of numbers.


    While these were only god clones, they were still quite powerful!


    Apart from the divinity domains they controlled, each god clone could also use themon spells avable to all divine beings, including Divine Shield, Divine Shockwave, and Energy st.


    The adepts also knew Divine Shield as ¡®mini-invulnerability.¡¯ All magic and physical attacks were useless against the gods themselves while it was activated. It was only by wearing out the Divine Shield through constant attacks that it was possible to harm the gods themselves.


    Because of this powerful defensive ability, the god clones always had the upper hand in their fights against the Great Adepts.


    If things turned south, they would activate their Divine Shield and flee. The adepts would be like dogs trying to bite down on a tortoise; they wouldn¡¯t know where to start. If the god clones had the advantage in battle, they could rely on the Divine Shield to endure a wave of attacks and convert that advantage into victory.


    It was precisely because of the gods¡¯ overwhelming advantage that the war dragged on for so long. These powerhouses of Fifth Grade and above were reduced deterrents. The true pivots of the war shifted to the various battles and conflicts within the neworlds.


    The adepts would be weaker if their resources nes continued to be destroyed. On the other hand, if the orc gods¡¯ faith worlds were ravaged and their believers massacred in great numbers, then they would be weakened.


    The orc pantheon could hold back a hundred Great Adepts with only twenty gods, precisely because of their tremendous individual power and clones.


    Due to this, the adepts could only use their numerical superiority to level out the orc gods¡¯ strength advantage. Under such circumstances, it was almost impossible to trap and kill a god clone in battle.


    If Greem did not have the unusual ability provided by the Devouring Fish, he probably would have had a tough time capturing Horr¡¯s clone, even if he could defeat him.


    The adepts and the orc pantheon had been at war for a long time, but fewer than ten god clones had been killed. Even in the worst situation, the doomed clone would choose to detonate their divine body and cover the escape of their divine authority fragments. They would never allow an enemy the opportunity to take the fragments with them.


    Greem¡¯s victory could be attributed to none other than that terrifying stomach of his!


    Many Great Adepts who had arrived to visit him upon hearing news of his achievement clearly had their eyes set upon Greem¡¯s Devouring Fish ability as well. They were prepared to work with him and hunt down isted god clones on the battlefield.


    However, Greem knew that such unexpected ambushes were only effective the first time. Once the orcs were prepared, it would be challenging to achieve something like that again.


    Either way, Greem¡¯s fame was spreading. He was one of the more well-known Fifth Grade Great Adepts of Boulder Fortress now.


    ............


    Half a yearter.


    A ten-meter tall me giant sat quietly on the floor inside a magical room.


    A strange orb burning with golden mes hovered before him. Thin strands of red fire shot from the orb into his head.


    Two entirely different powers were flowing parallel to each other along that chain of fire.


    An incredibly gentle golden power was surging out of the Orb of the Fire God. It contained an infernal heat that threatened to burn the world to ashes, yet also a holiness that seemed as if it would purify everything. If you looked at its form and appearance, it looked simr to fire divine-power.


    Meanwhile, what surged out of Greem¡¯s body were violent and invisible mes. These mes were fierce and furious, filled with an aura of destruction. These were the two fire principles that he now possessed.


    The two powers merged and melded along the fire chain, often shing and neutralizing each other due to their different natures. Fine cracks appeared and disappeared around the chain of fire. The energy shockwaves created by this conflict in powers were absorbed into outer space, preventing anysting damage to the surrounding area.


    However, as the conflicts and neutralization persisted, traces of mutated fire energy began to be left behind. This fire energy possessed the characteristics of both the fire principles and the fire divine-power. It appeared unusual.


    Greem continued chanting, guiding the mutated fire into his right eye. He then sessfully cast a spell and sealed the mutated fire in there.


    Greem¡¯s right eye grew brighter and more blinding as more and more mutated fire gathered within. From a distance, it looked almost as if a miniature sun had been stuffed into his eye. The golden light seared the eyes of anyone who looked upon it, and the heat was oppressive.


    Five thousand points...ten thousand points...twenty thousand points...thirty thousand points.


    When the energy level reached thirty-two thousand points in intensity, Greem finally received a notification from the Chip. He stopped his incantations and cut off the absorption of the mutated fire.


    [Beep. The Berserk Eye has been created. Energy intensity: 32,000 points. Capable of inflicting severe damage to beginner Fifth Grades and moderate damage to intermediate Fifth Grades if unleashed all at once. Can pose a minor threat to advanced Fifth Grades.


    [Unleashing the mutated fire stored within the Berserk Eye at a rapid rate will inflict damage on the medium. Fifteen days of recovery will be required with every use.


    [The Berserk Eye will remain sealed under most circumstances, preventing the use of normal sight.]


    Greem finally rxed after receiving the Chip¡¯s notification.


    As hepleted the final seal, the abnormality in Greem¡¯s right eye gradually faded away. Only a small fire rune, almost imperceptible to the naked eye, spun slowly in his ck pupil.


    He had sacrificed his right eye and obtained a powerful fire attack that could be unleashed at any time in battle. That was worth it, no matter how Greem looked at it. After all, those orc god clones all possessed shockingbat prowess in battle.


    Without a hidden ace, fighting against them was no less than torture!


    Greem¡¯s fire magic was powerful, but hecked trustedpanions on the battlefield. If a battle ended up being difficult, Greem was often the first target of a god¡¯s pursuit.


    To put it nicely, Greem would have no choice but to teleport around and kite them. To put it bluntly, Greem was the one being chased around like a homeless dog.


    Even though he had Fifth Grade Remi to aid him in battle, Remi¡¯s attribute was poison; being a tank didn¡¯t suit him. That was why Greem would have to find some way to deal with this weakness of his, at least until the intermediate Fifth Grade voodoo beast waspleted.


    Continuing his research on teleportation via assimtion with the principles was one option. Another option was to simply prepare more aces forbat use.


    After the past six months of preparation and putting aside research on all other fire spells, the Chip had managed to focus its calction abilities andplete Fiery Refraction.


    Apart from Critical Wildfire and Halo of Rot, Greem now also possessed a Fifth Grade fire spell that actually belonged to him. The spell was also an offensive one.


    In addition to the Berserk Eye, Greem now had four hidden aces that could decide a battle!


    Moreover, the improved Orb of the Fire God was not just mighty support equipment. It also had the unusual function of being able to collect faith power.


    Ordinarily, collecting faith power was a mysterious ability exclusive to the gods. Having assimted a fire divine authority fragment, the Orb of the Fire God also possessed a simr ability. However, the faith power it collected had toe from intelligent beings that devotedly worshipped Greem.


    It was through the Orb of the Fire God that Greem discovered, to his surprise, that he had a few devoted believers in several nes, along with several thousand loose believers.


    These people might not worship Greem religiously as an idol. Rather, they admired and respected him as a sort of standard in life. It was a different mentality from religious worship, but the faith power they gathered was not much different.


    Moreover, Greem shockingly discovered that he had a true believer that worshipped him faithfully in the World of Adepts.


    That was what was most unimaginable to him!

 Chapter 1490 - Plane Mutas

    <h4>Chapter 1490 ne Mutas</h4>


    When Grem once again returned to the station halls, everybody¡¯s attitudes toward him had changed slightly.


    Even Sixth Grade Adept Gerritsen looked at Greem with a hint of approval and praise in his eyes. Greem was part of his hall, after all. He got to bask in the glory of Greem¡¯s achievement as well!


    The magic surge was about toe to an end.


    Once the magic surge receded, the nar rifts that had opened because of the phenomenon would slowly close. When that happened, attacking any particr ne would require much more effort in tearing through the nar barrier.


    Perhaps it was because of this that the conflict between the adepts and the orc pantheon grew even more intense.


    Both parties were invading and defending across countless neworlds. The battles breaking out only grew more and more frequent. Consequently, the chances of Great Adepts being mobilized had been increased significantly. The number of deaths on both sides also rose exponentially.


    In such a chaotic mire of endless battles and skirmishes, the more powerful you were, the more spoils you could obtain.


    The adepts were frantically grabbing every divine weapon, divine authority, divine virtue, and divine power crystal that they could get their hands on. Some of the more powerful adepts were even able to strip the divinity of dead gods to create special magical equipment with unusual domain abilities.


    Meanwhile, the gods were also hunting as many adepts as they could.


    It didn¡¯t matter if it was the principle power of principle adepts, the immortal bodies of body-refining adepts, or the bloodline power of bloodline adepts. All of them were excellent, top-ss resources that could be used as materials for higher-grade divine equipment by the hands of the gods.


    In particr, the Great Adepts¡¯ immortal souls were a necessary material in creating high-grade petitioners!


    The battle between the adepts and the orc pantheon was more like a hunt between two high-grade species. The only ones dying were the cannon fodder and the low-grade subordinates, while the ones who benefitted from everything were the higher-grades that controlled the entire war¡¯s development.


    As an independent pawn within the adept faction with no backers, Greem needed to have more aces up his sleeve if he wished to survive in this colossal conflict between two titanic forces.


    Fortunately, even if he was only a pawn, he was a very useful and superior pawn. Given that case, he didn¡¯t need to worry about being mercilessly thrown out as a sacrifice!


    ............


    As the magic surge approached its conclusion, the chances of a climactic battle between the adepts and the orc pantheon only grew exponentially.


    The battlefields within all the small and mid-sized nes had been strategically retracted. All of the surviving forces then poured into the three major neworlds. It seemed like these three worlds were poised to be the final battlefield, where the ultimate victors would be decided.


    Countless encounters, ambushes, sieges, and raids broke out during this process. Both parties¡¯ high-grade forces were deployed frequently, and the chances and intensity of their battles rose steadily.


    Greem was informed of another deployment on the fifth day he returned to the station hall.


    The mission this time was even more straightforward and violent.


    They were to ambush an orc temple located in ne Mutas. A Sixth Grade Great Adept would lead the party.


    It was the usual gathering of adepts and the usual internar teleportation. However, when Greem and the others arrived in ne Mutas, what awaited them was a group of exhausted adepts covered all over in dust and dirt.


    This ce was a small hill hidden in a vast stretch of mountains.


    It was nighttime at the moment, peaceful as the stars in the skies were bright.


    The group of adepts had lit a bonfire and gathered around the intricate teleportation array. They bowed and weed the arrival of the Great Adepts.


    Dong, dong, dong!


    Several loud noises could be heard as the light of teleportation shed within the array.


    Several unusual silhouettes slowly appeared in the blinding white light, gradually forming into physical forms.


    Perhaps sensing the appearance of something that shouldn¡¯t be here, the nar consciousness began to gather power. The dark clouds in the skies were blown away by violent winds. The bright and immacte moonlight pierced through the mountain peaks and the branches of the trees, shining down on each of the Great Adepts.


    For a moment, the moonlight turned blood-red, and the whole world seemed to be filled with bloodthirst!


    Greem felt an overwhelming hostility from the world the moment hepleted his teleportation and walked out of the array.


    Countless rifts opened in the space around him, and a shocking number ofw chains reached out toward his body.


    Greem grunted. A radiant crimson light shrouded his body, which turned into a slithering thread of principle power. This principle thread shredded everyw chain that came close to him, preventing any of them from prating his body.


    Much like Greem, the other five Great Adepts¨Cincluding the Sixth Grade¨Chad conjured their own powers to resist the narws.


    The more they resisted, the more power the nar consciousness gathered around them!


    The other principle adepts, just like Greem, did not have the best Physique. Strenuous expressions appeared on their faces.


    ¡°We were fortunate to have aplished our mission! Our greetings, my lords.¡±


    Almost every adept in this party were Fourth Grades. The only Third Grade in the party had been the array master who had constructed this teleportation array. The leader of the party hastily walked forward and bowed upon seeing the Great Adepts arrive sessfully.


    The Sixth Grade Great Adept quicklyposed himself. He looked at his surroundings, unleashing his tremendous Spirit as he did so. In the blink of an eye, he had gotten a grasp of everything within a few dozen kilometers.


    ¡°Well done! Headquarters will reward you all greatly once you return.¡±


    It was no wonder the Sixth Grade Great Adept praised them so. What they had aplished was an achievement. They had broken into a mid-sized faith world and found a leyline to establish a teleportation array, all while fighting the numerous enemies pursuing them. All that with a party of only ten people!


    Such a tremendous achievement was deserving of all the praise the Great Adept gave them!


    ¡°My lord, this is a map of this world and the distribution of factions throughout it. We have marked out the location of the God of ughter¡¯s main temple, as per headquarters¡¯ request. Furthermore, numerous native orc forces have been pursuing us. The closest two are already within fifty kilometers,¡± The party leader was clearly a capable individual. This mission had beenpleted almost to perfection.


    ¡°Very good!¡± The Sixth Grade Great Adept was overjoyed to hear this. He nodded and said, ¡°There¡¯s no need to risk your lives after this. Stay here and defend the teleportation array. You are free to move as you wish after seven days! We will make sure to wipe out all targets nearby that pose a threat before we leave.¡±


    Having said that, the Sixth Grade Great Adept took out a few purple vials and tossed them to Greem and the others. ¡°Drink it! With this, you won¡¯t have to endure the pain of nar suppression as long as you don¡¯t use too much of your power.¡±


    Greem caught the vial and popped open the cork with his thumb. He could smell the potion inside almost immediately. The vial contained a strange liquid that immediately activated upon exposure to the air.


    [Beep. Initial scansplete. Target object is a Fifth Grade potion containing the aura of a ne origin. Upon consumption, Host¡¯s identity as an outsider will be masked by a unique nar aura, thereby allowing Host to avoid suppression from the nar consciousness.] The Chip quickly projected the results of its analysis in his mind.


    Mm? To think, headquarters was even able toe up with a potion like this.


    Greem thought to himself as he lifted his head and drank the potion.


    The unique, barbaric aura of the orc nes radiated from his body when he swallowed the potion. The narws lurking around Greem instantly shrunk back. Even the annoying hostility of the nar consciousness slowly dissipated.


    ¡°This is the world map. Take a good look and remember it! S, Colin, you two follow me. We will be attacking the orc temple. Greem, Rick, you two wipe out the ants around the array and rendezvous with us at the main temple...let¡¯s go!¡± Sixth Grade Great Adept Briel lifted his hand and summoned a beginner Sixth Grade storm giant. It picked him and the other two Great Adepts up, slowly rising into the sky and hurrying southwest.


    The sudden arrival of the Great Adepts had definitely alerted the orcs. However, the fact that the adepts had so decisively sent out this powerful force to assault the main temple of this world would be beyond their expectations.


    As long as Greem and the others were quick enough and inflicted sufficient damage, the orcs¡¯ foundation would probably be broken before the gods could descend. Once they destroyed the main temple, the orc gods would not be able to travel all that distance to retaliate against them, no matter how upset they were.


    Headquarters had already conducted their investigation before this mission.


    The main god worshipped by ne Mutas was Garon Arcadas, the God of ughter. ne Mutas was, in fact, one of Garon¡¯s seven most crucial mid-sized faith worlds. Should this world be destroyed, Garon Arcadas¡¯ might would undoubtedly be significantly affected for a short time.


    If that happened, the Seventh Grade Great Adepts would have more room and better odds in their battles against the Seventh Grade God of ughter.


    Upon seeing Sixth Grade Great Adept Briel leave with two of theirpanions, Greem couldn¡¯t help but look at the Fourth Grade adepts¡¯ leader.


    ¡°There are two enemy forces that are closer on our tail. The first is the orc squad from Pyrbante, led by an advanced Fourth Grade berserker...they are in that direction!¡± The leader exined while turning around to point, ¡°The other force is a powerful squad sent out from Galecliff. They are led by an advanced Fourth Grade tracker. Their position should be around here!¡±


    Two squads of orcs. There were almost certainly going to be quite a lot of Fourth Grades among them. However, they were still nothing but ants before Great Adepts Greem and Rick!


    ¡°Which one do you want?¡± Greem smiled coldly and indifferently.


    ¡°The berserker, I guess! Hopefully, he can let me have a bit of fun,¡± Great Adept Rick also smiled the same cold smile. His entire body turned into ck smoke and disappeared into the ground.


    Greem said nothing else. His body erupted into mes.


    There was a loud explosion as he appeared on the horizon.


    By the time the adepts looked toward his new position, another ring of fire had erupted, and Greem was far away in the distance.

 Chapter 1491 - A Slaughter

    Chapter 1491 A ughter


    A lively and bustling orc camp.


    Even though the curtain of night had fallen upon them, the camp showed no signs of quiet or sleep.


    The boisterous orc warriors gathered around a campfire, drinking strong spirits as they beat their chests and tapped their weapons, singing to the heavy tune of some old song. Theyughed loudly, and there hardly seemed to be any of the urgency and suspense that came with war.


    A dozen orc powerhouses with savage auras were gathered in the camp center¡¯srgest tent, loudly discussing a matter.


    Meanwhile, a particrly muscr werewolf sat at the very end of the tent. Two ancient-looking knives were sheathed behind his back, and he wore leather armor engraved with strange runes. He wore a bone ne made out of bone fragments and fangs on his neck. His joints were all covered with tough leather adorned with vicious spikes.


    A shaman sat by his side with feathers attached all over him. Several pieces of bone had been stuck through his nose and lips. His exposed body was covered in colorful ceremonial mud.


    The only ones that were allowed in the tent were orcs of at least Third Grade and above. They were all incredibly strong, muscr, and even their weathered armor couldn¡¯t contain their savage aura.


    As they loudly argued about how to exterminate the evil adepts hiding deep in the mountains, the orc shaman who had been sitting silently to the side suddenly lifted his head. His face was filled with shock and horror as he looked toward the mountains.


    There were few orc shamans, but all of them enjoyed reverence and respect within the orc tribes. They couldmunicate with the orc gods through special ceremonies. Thus, they became the most authoritative individuals when it came to decisions within the tribe apart from the n leaders.


    ¡°High Priest Sanger, did you discover something?¡± The strongest werewolf that sat at the head of the table reached out with his hand and stopped his subordinates¡¯ bickering. He frowned and asked.


    Even though he could not sense the specifics of what was happening, the chilling waves he felt from the bottom of his heart rmed him.


    He did not have any divination abilities, so it was only natural that he couldn¡¯t see the movements of the evil adepts fifty kilometers away. However, as an advanced Fourth Grade, he already possessed the qualification toe into contact with the intangible nar consciousness.


    It was almost as if...the Earth Mother was warning him through his sixth sense.


    An unknown danger was approaching this squad!


    ¡°It¡¯s the invaders,¡± The ugly face of High Priest Sanger twisted. He coughed violently as an unconceble look of fear and horror reflected in his pure white eyes. ¡°I don¡¯t know what they did, but they¡¯ve infuriated the Earth Mother greatly! The Earth Mother just gave me a warning. We must escape immediately! Now, hurry...we won¡¯t be able to make it if we dawdle any longer!¡±


    ¡°Are those invading adepts here to attack us?¡± The werewolf leader said in shock. ¡°Given their strength, that shouldn¡¯t be possible, should it?¡±


    ¡°Yes, let theme! Us orcs have never been afraid of them.¡±


    ¡°I will go wake up those brats now. It¡¯s just in time to give those adepts a nasty blow.¡±


    A few of the orcs that were clearly more brawns than brains began shouting loudly as if they could cut down any enemy that came their way.


    The entire tent started to bustle with noise again.


    ¡°Silence! Shut up, all of you shut up! Listen...what¡¯s that noise outside?¡± The werewolf leader abruptly perked his ears and seemed to be listening closely to something.


    The orcs fell silent and listened closely.


    As expected, they could faintly hear a series of strange explosions from the distance. Moreover, the explosions were getting closer and closer, louder and louder.


    Out of nowhere, the orc shaman started coughing up blood from hearing the sounds. His voice trembled.


    ¡°Enemy attack!¡±


    Dong, dong, dong!


    The orc powerhouses broke through the leather tents and took to the skies.


    They might not know Fly or have divine spells to support them, but their savage, violent Strength allowed them to ovee gravity and temporarily hover in the air.


    Even more orc warriors emerged from the patched tents, shouting as they looked at the sky and pointed with their weapons.


    Bright, beautiful fire halos erupted on the distant horizon like festival fireworks.


    Judging by the sequence and direction of the explosions, something was heading toward their camp.


    Greem arrived with the night winds and managed to find the orcs without much effort.


    Compared to the other adepts, Greem¡¯s means of stepping onto a battlefield was too shy and cool. With the long trail of fire he left behind in the air, people could see himing from fifty kilometers away.


    However, given his identity as a Fifth Grade legendary adept, there was no need to be too careful in a mid-sized world like ne Mutas.


    Greem appeared above the orc camp with Fire Teleportation and reformed his body. He looked down upon the dozen muscr orc powerhouses and the many orc warriors scurrying behind them.


    ¡°Ants.¡±


    Greem betrayed the unique ferocity and heartlessness of the adepts on his face. He raised his hand as a Meteor Shower wide enough to engulf the orc camp appeared.


    Even though his power was limited to a Fourth Grade level, his superior knowledge, technique, and aura allowed him to face off the dozen orc powerhouses with no fear on his face.


    He summoned the peak Fourth Grade Meteor Shower with a wave of his hand and instantly engulfed everyone in his sight.


    Meteors filled with fire energy and carrying a hint of the Undying mes¡¯ aura crashed down from above like raindrops. Dozen-meter-tall pirs rose into the air wherever theynded, turning into red waves of fire that enveloped the orc warriors.


    Whether it was the shockwave of the impact itself or the beautiful halo of fire that spread out after, the attack was lethal against these ordinary orcs.


    The rugged leather armor and hard shields that the orcs prided themselves on were as thin as paper before the golden mes.


    Their robust bodies couldn¡¯t endure the heat of the fire either. They screamed in agony as they scampered about the field of mes. It wasn¡¯t until the same mes burst forth from their orifices that they copsed to the ground like burnt charcoal, quickly crumbling to ashes.


    The tents ignited. The carriages and the carts ignited. The sky and the earth ignited. And, of course, every single orc between the sky and the earth ignited as well.


    This army of three thousand orcs¨Cwho were at an average of advanced First Grade¨Cwas a tremendously powerful force in ne Mutas. Even tossed into arge neworld, they would be able to wreak endless chaos and destruction.


    They were as ants before a legendary fire adept like Greem. They couldn¡¯t even look at him without burning their eyes, let alone mount any kind of effective retaliation.


    The ordinary orcs couldn¡¯t retaliate, but that didn¡¯t mean the dozen orc powerhouses couldn¡¯t do so either.


    Roar!


    Aooooo!


    Battlecries could be heard as the dozen orc powerhouses took out their weapons and charged at Greem from every direction.


    However, Greem¡¯s gaze cut across the orcs andnded on therge tent.


    The smell of divine spells...there was an orc shaman here?


    Greem chanted his spell without any hesitation. One and a half secondster, a Fire Core Explosion detonated within the camp, sending a mushroom cloud into the air. The life aura of High Priest Sanger, who had been secretly attempting tomunicate with headquarters, weakened instantly.


    A single spell wasn¡¯t enough...then one more!


    Greem was about to continue casting when the dozen orcs arrived next to him, led by the werewolf.


    ¡°Fools!¡± Greem grunted, and his Burning Domain that had not appeared in a while instantly engulfed everything within a thousand meters.


    The orcs that had just leaped into the air felt mes burn all around them. Every metal object they had on their person instantly turned as hot as fire. It was almost as if they had been tossed into a furnace. Even breathing was painful and arduous, let alone fighting.


    The Fourth Grade orcs could still gather some of their might and were barely able to keep the terrifying mes at bay. However, nearly half of the Third Grade orcs weren¡¯t able to stop the fire. They were turned into living torches, howling as they fell from the skies.


    ¡°Cut him!¡±


    ¡°Hurry up and kill him!¡±


    The Fourth Grade orcs roared and charged forward, mustering their Strength and striking at Greem¡¯s body with their variety of weapons from several different angles.


    The werewolf leader even shed through Greem¡¯s body in a bolt of silver lightning and appeared in the skies behind.


    Seven or eight gray cuts instantly appeared on Greem, and his body started to fall apart.


    ¡°Yea! You¡¯re the best, Hava!¡±


    ¡°Amazing!¡±


    The orc powerhouses immediately started cheering upon seeing this.


    Only the werewolf who had ¡®executed¡¯ the evil fire adept showed no joy. He turned back abruptly and shouted, ¡°Spread out now! That¡¯s not his real body!¡±


    The reminder came toote.


    The next second, Greem¡¯s fire clone exploded, and an evenrger wave of fire devoured all the nearby orcs.


    Greem¡¯s actual body slowly appeared from the sea of fire below. He held the charred body of the orc shaman in his hand.


    The werewolf leader howled and charged down from the skies once more when he saw this.

 Chapter 1492 - Orc Main Temple

    Chapter 1492 Orc Main Temple


    Cleaning up the orc camp only took Greem fifteen minutes.


    Apart from the werewolf leader and three Fourth Grade orcs who managed to escape with grievous injuries, all the other orc warriors had died on the spot without exception.


    Moreover, it was only because Greem wasn¡¯t feeling all that murderous and couldn¡¯t be bothered to chase after the escaped orcs.


    Otherwise, given the orcs¡¯ hriously terrible mobility, they would never have been able to escape the pursuit of a legendary fire adept. Though a few of the orcs had escaped, their bodies had been afflicted with the Undying mes during the brief fight.


    Given the might of the Undying mes, those orcs would face unending torture and agony even if they survived.


    The thought of having to lead such a pain-filled existence would be enough to strike fear into anyone!


    Greem unleashed his powerful Spirit and retracted it almost at the same instant, quickly scanning the entire battlefield. After confirming that there were no worthy opponents of note, he turned and rushed into the sky, moving into the distance as quickly as possible.


    A vast in measuring hundreds of kilometers wide was no more than a matter of seven teleportations for Greem. The soaring mountains and roaring rivers were also little more than dirt lumps and gutters that he could cross with a single stride.


    Greem turned into a humanoid me, exploding and constantly reforming in the sky. As he continued to erupt and reform, he crossed several thousand kilometers of distance, leaving behind a trail of scattering mes in his path.


    Greem¡¯s brazen behavior naturally drew the attention of orcs who were passing by. Ordinary orcs could not detect his presence. By the time they hurried out of their homes after hearing the explosions, all they could see in the sky were blooming fire flowers in the air. Greem was already hundreds of kilometers away.


    There were always arrogant and prideful orc powerhouses in these orc tribes. They charged into the air, intent on stopping this mysterious enemy. However, they were all sted out of the sky by fireballs before they could even see Greem¡¯s appearance.


    Even a Fourth Grade orc would not be able to defend themselves against Greem¡¯s Undying mes without preparation. If they were unfortunate enough for the Undying mes to reach their soul origin, they might even burn to death.


    Greem couldn¡¯t be bothered to talk with these orc powerhouses, nor was there anything valuable to be obtained from them. Thus, in this fashion, he rampaged his way through the most popted regions of the orc tribes and headed toward the main temple located in the central mountains.


    ............


    The mountain peaks that could be seen after entering the central mountains were all tall enough to pierce the clouds. It was an unusually dangerous ce.


    Orc tribes littered the rising and falling geography of the ce. Greem¡¯s quick scan from the sky of the number and intensity of lifeforms revealed as many as three hundred thousand orcs living in the region.


    Three hundred thousand...was a shocking number!


    It was important to note that the orc tribes were not particrly productive. Almost every member of a tribe was a warrior, and all the daily necessities that they depended upon were obtained by enving other species. The orc tribes mostly consisted of orcs but also took in powerful minotaurs, werewolves, birdpeople, and werebears.


    In general, the orcs were a savage and stupid race. They were humanoid beasts that would never holdpassion or sympathy for other species. They had short tempers and were incredibly cruel. They preferred action to thought and going into battle than engage in a debate.


    They were ssic meatheads, the kind with only brawn for brains!


    Perhaps it was because of their pure, violent strength that Beast God Arugel chose them. They were blessed with divine power and became a barbaric yet overwhelming force that conquerednd afternd, defiling elegant civilization after elegant civilization.


    Due to the severe conflict in their aesthetic sense, the orc pantheon and elven pantheon had tense rtions; they were almost at the level of bitter enemies. The orc pantheon¡¯s rtionships with other species such as humans, seafolk, dwarves, and underground creatures were also strenuous.


    They were simply too bloodthirsty, causing them to have no allies or friends to speak of in the World of Gods. At this point, they only had enemies or enemies-to-be.


    Even the most beautiful civilizations would wilt wherever the orcs imposed their regime. All that would be left would be ves forced into harsh oppression and envement. Society would also regress into little more than primal tribes.


    Furthermore, the orcs were too fertile. If their numbers weren¡¯t worn down through war, no material world would be able to endure the burden of having to sustain this terrible species that could eat and breed like locusts!


    Given the normal flow of a nar war, the adepts¡¯ first step to invading ne Mutas should have been sneaking individuals in to establish a firm forward base. They would then slowly expand the base¡¯s scale, constructing adept towers and internar portals to amodate stronger and more numerous adept forces.


    Wiping out the orc tribes around them, slowly eroding the orcs¡¯ foundation of faith, attacking the orc kingdom, and finally destroying the main temple. The process couldst for hundreds of years!


    Of course, the more resources and military forces they invested in the effort, the faster everything would proceed.


    Correspondingly, adept losses would increase, and more time would be required to amass such a force as well!


    That was why the adept headquarters would often try these strategic blitzkrieg moves.


    As long as they could destroy the main temple before the gods could cast down their clones, the nar war toe would be no more than a one-sided ughter. Without the orc gods to aid them, how were the orc powerhouses of this world alone supposed to stop the vicious and savage advance of the adepts?


    Greem¡¯s party did not waste any time in the other regions. They went straight for their target almost immediately upon arrival,unching their quickest and most direct attack at the orc temple.


    The orc temple was located atop an incredibly tall mountain. There were four tforms on the mountain face, connected with a set of stairsposed of over ten thousand steps that allowed the orcs to travel up and down. An orc camp of a thousand warriors was stationed on each one of these tforms. Every orc that could be selected for a station were strong individuals from all over the ne.


    Meanwhile, the orc temple stood several dozen meters high at the very peak. It was a majestic sight. It looked as if it was carved out of the mountain itself and remained part of it, stern as the region¡¯s mountains.


    At the moment, leaders of the numerous orc tribes were all gathered in a hall within the main temple. They stared at a few orc shamans dancing around a brazier with solemn expressions.


    What burned within the brazier was not charcoal but what seemed to be a collection of skulls. There were human skulls, elf skulls, dwarf skulls, dragon skulls, and many others.


    The mes rising from the brazier weren¡¯t an ordinary red color either, but a sinister green.


    The skulls chattered as the sickly mes burned, releasing chilling howls and screams. Souls asionally flew out of the mes, rushing toward one of the nearest orc shamans and carrying with them the most toxic of curses.


    Unfortunately, these souls clearly couldn¡¯t leave the green light enveloping the brazier. They were dragged back into the mes by a mysterious force before they could travel half a foot away.


    These were the skulls of the orcs¡¯ enemies when they united ne Mutas. Using the Brazier of Curses to sear their souls and make them suffer in agony for an eternity before the orc gods were the most horrifying way for the orcs to punish their enemies!


    Today, an even more terrifying enemy had appeared in ne Mutas, forcing the great God of ughter Garon Arcadas to give out a divine decree. All orcs of Mutas had been given a warning of the highest order.


    The Chief Priest of the orcs, Reverend Ormes, kneeled reverently in front of the thirty-meter-tall statue of Garon. He prayed silently. Meanwhile, his subordinates danced around the brazier and cast the skulls of their enemies into the mes.


    Compared to the orc warriors, Ormes did not appear tall or muscr. On the contrary, he seemed almost scrawny and weak. However, he wore a thorned headpiece upon his head. The spikes attached along the inside of the headpiece stabbed into his skull.


    Strangely enough, there was no blood.


    You could faintly see light wounds on his ugly and wrinkled face. Sickly green mes burned within the depths of his eyes, causing everyone who stared into his eyes to feel a strange dizziness as if their soul was leaving their body.


    ¡°The enemy ising. Have all the orcs prepare for battle!¡±


    ¡°Enemies? Chief Priest, haven¡¯t the adepts that invaded our world been forced to Mount Hagmu? Could they have slipped out of the encirclement?¡±


    ¡°Fool! It¡¯s not them! They were only here to steal the ne¡¯s coordinates. Lord Garon has given us a divine decree. A terrifying group of Great Adepts has broken into ne Mutas. Their goal is very likely to attack the main temple of Lord Garon. That is why we must immediately awaken the Earth Prophet and release the dark dragon. We will fight the enemy to the end until Lord Garon descends! Only then will we be safe!¡±


    ¡°Go...hurry!¡±


    Chief Priest Ormes shouted with all he had, and the orc leaders hastily ran out of the hall and headed to various locations on the mountain.


    Just then, a blinding golden light shone from the idol of Garon, illuminating the entire horizon. A strange cracking sound could be heard as the idol came to life and started moving.


    ¡°Descent...Lord Garon has descended upon us ahead of time!¡±


    The Chief Priest felt his heart squeeze. He kneeled before the statue and asked loudly, ¡°O¡¯ Great Garon, why...why have you descended early?¡±


    The giant statue slowly came to life, cloaked in the golden light. Its body, armor, appearance, and weapons all started to take on the form of the God of ughter as described in the legends.


    He ignored Ormes¡¯ question and instead lifted his head to look at the distant skies.


    ¡°Prepare for battle! The enemy has arrived. I will help you hold back the most powerful of them. Protect the temple. Do not let them defile or destroy this sacred ce.¡±


    Having said that, the giant statue took out the huge double axe from behind his back and rushed out of the temple with thunderous steps.


    Just then, the figures of the Great Adepts appeared on the horizon!

 Chapter 1493 - The Earth Prophet and the Dark Dragon

    Chapter 1493 The Earth Prophet and the Dark Dragon


    The battle had already broken out by the time Greem showed up at the central mountains.


    The thirty-meter-tall metal statue had be Host to God of ughter Garon¡¯s divine soul. His vicious and savage attacks sent the Great Adepts, led by Briel, flying in every direction.


    Several familiar figures danced and swerved around the temple as blinding bolts of light, but none of them could get any closer to the main temple.


    Greem¡¯s arrival drew everyone¡¯s attention.


    He had just stopped to survey the battlefield when Great Adept Briel¡¯s mental transmission rang out in his mind.


    ¡°We will hold back Garon¡¯s projection. You go and destroy the main temple!¡±


    Greem nced at that statue of Garon. The power level indicated by the Chip was actually at Sixth Grade. The color faded from Greem¡¯s face. He didn¡¯t dare set foot anywhere near that battlefield charged with terrifying energy.


    Well, if he didn¡¯t want to go anywhere close to the Sixth Grade projection of Garon, he should try his luck with the main temple!


    Greem consoled himself and erupted into mes. The next second, he appeared above the main temple.


    Perhaps this mission would be easier.


    Before Greem could finish his thought, a strange sense of falling overtook him. He crashed from the skies like an out-of-control meteor,nding heavily in the za in front of the main temple.


    It was fortunate that he was currently in his fire form, without a human¡¯s fatal weaknesses. When he climbed out of the smoldering crater as a dozen-meter-tall me giant, the damage to his body wasn¡¯t too severe.


    However, Greem frowned upon standing up.


    He saw a dirt-yellow magical halo around him. The principle aura radiating from it was familiar and detested.


    ¡°Halo of Gravity! Dammit! So it was this kind of power.¡±


    Greem¡¯s expression suddenly turned dark as he investigated the reason for his body crashing to the ground. His body exploded into mes, just barely avoiding a giant stone hand reaching out from the earth.


    Dong!


    The giant hand mmed into the stone za, instantly shattering the tiles and leaving a two-meter deep handprint in the earth.


    The next second, Greem reappeared three hundred meters away. He looked back, only to see a stone giant slowly climb out of the ground.


    Arge stone giant or a Rock Devastator? Perhaps an Earth Prophet?


    Greem¡¯s mind spun rapidly as the Chip shot out bluesers to collect information on the opponent.


    It was a giant stone creature measuring thirty meters in height. It had a humanoid form, but wasposed of heavy steelrock, not flesh. Its legs were thick enough to require several people to wrap their arms around a leg to encircle it. The steelrock that formed its body was bound together with numerous dirt-yellow halos.


    Apart from its terrifying weight and Strength, this stone creature also radiated fearsome earth elementium power.


    Dammit! This stone creature also possessed spellcasting ability. It was an Earth Prophet!


    Greem¡¯s face darkened in an instant.


    Of all the earth elementium creatures, these Earth Prophets were undoubtedly the most troublesome to deal with.


    Other earth elementium creatures might be just asrge and resilient, but they only had a select few innate earth powers. None of them actually possessed elementium spellcasting ability. Against big fellows like that, Greem could tear the lot of them apart just by kiting.


    That strategy was useless against the Earth Prophet!


    Earth Prophets possessed fearsome earth origin power, also known to the adepts as earth principle power. They could keep their enemies bound to the ground using Halos of Gravity, thereby saving them the embarrassment of having to chase after a flying enemy.


    Meanwhile, the innate Mire, Earthquake, and Split Earth abilities they possessed were devastating to most creatures. If an opponent was caught and trapped by the earth principle powers, the Earth Prophet could simply finish the job with a savage strike of its giant stone palm.


    Greem was unfortunate. He had been afflicted with the Halo of Gravity without being aware of it.


    The Earth Prophet was a Fifth Grade elementium creature itself. Its Halo of Gravity was more than enough to keep Greem suppressed near the earth. He would no longer be able to return to the sky now.


    ¡°Die, evil adept!¡±


    The Earth Prophet let out a booming shout from within its firm stone body. He strode to Greem¡¯s side and lifted his right foot before stomping furiously downward.


    Ugh!


    A vicious gale pressed against Greem¡¯s face.


    An Earthquake ability of Second Grade apanied the Earth Prophet¡¯s every action. Ordinary creatures would not be able to stand up around the being, let alone do battle against it.


    Boom!


    Greem¡¯s body scattered into mes and escaped in different directions.


    Unfortunately, no matter how he split up his body, the damned Halo of Gravity continued to enshroud him. He was unable to move more than three meters from the ground.


    There was another loud thud as the earth cracked once more; yet another gouge appeared on the za.


    Greem didn¡¯t dare drag the battle out against such a powerful opponent. The scattered mes reformed into four identical fire giants.


    All four of the fire giants started chanting their incantations at the same time. A short momentter, four massive fireballs the size of boulders crashed against the Earth Prophet¡¯s body from four different directions.


    Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!


    There was a series of explosions, and searing mes engulfed half of the stone giant¡¯s body.


    Even the steelrock of the Earth Prophet¡¯s body began to turn red and soften beneath the horrifying heat. It flowed toward the ground as half-molten magma. However, given the Earth Prophet¡¯s thick body, these mes wouldn¡¯t be able to burn through its four-meter-thick body even with fifteen minutes to do so.


    That was why the Earth Prophet simply endured the mes and turned around. It strode toward the closest fire giant and swung its fist. A rain of rubble and a wave of earth spears struck the fire giant.


    Greem frowned, and his expression turned solemn.


    That fire clone had actually been exterminated before it could escape!


    That might only have been a fire clone, but it possessed 30% of Greem¡¯s fire damage, as well as all of his spells. It should not have been so easily destroyed under ordinary circumstances, given its ability to use Fire Teleportation.


    Greem¡¯s expression was dark. He asked in a solemn voice, ¡°What¡¯s the problem, Chip?¡±


    [Beep. Halo of Slowing detected on Fire Clone 1 before it was attacked.]


    ¡°How am I unaffected, then?¡±


    [Beep. Host is protected by the principle barrier of the Tome of Corruption from the affliction of earth principle power. The fire clones are only a projection of a portion of Host¡¯s power. Deployment of fire principle power is required to resist the Halo of Slowing.]


    ¡°Dammit! This Earth Prophet is really difficult to deal with.¡±


    Greem grumbled to himself, but he had no choice but to extend his fire principle power to the other two fire clones, shielding them from head to toe.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    The mountain itself seemed to rumble as the Earth Prophet charged at another fire clone. It summoned a hail of earth spears and engulfed the fire clone in a cloud of dust.


    It was a slow, heavy stone giant against a group of agile fire giants. A battle broke out just like that upon the broad stone za.


    Simultaneously, Adept Rick¨Cwho had been off conducting a special mission just like Greem¨Carrivedte to the battlefield.


    Adept Rick chuckled coldly when he saw the Sixth Grade battle in the distance and Greem locked inbat on the za. He turned into ck smoke and lunged straight for the orc¡¯s main temple.


    He could sense that only a group of Fourth Grades remained in the temple. Dealing with them was obviously much simpler than dealing with a Sixth Grade god projection or a Fifth Grade elementium creature.


    Rickunched his attack against the main temple without hesitation.


    Just as he reached the main temple, a horrifying and chilling dragon¡¯s aura of might radiated out of thin air.


    An exceptionally terrifying dragon¡¯s head appeared. It opened its dark maw and let loose a two-meter-thick breath of ck mes.


    ¡°A dark dragon.¡±


    Rick instantly identified the enemy. He was absolutely horrified. His body erupted into ck smoke, just barely escaping the dragon¡¯s breath.


    The ck smoke that remained within range of the breath did notst a single second before it vanished entirely, leaving behind the screeching of a soul fragment.


    Great Adept Rick reformed a thousand meters away and spat out ck blood. His gaze at the dark dragon was filled with intense hatred and fear.


    Dark dragons were unusually powerful evil dragons!


    They were born with dark dragonfire, a me that possessed the twin principle effects of corrosion and burning.


    They were magical dragons and possessed shocking magic resistance. In addition to the dragons¡¯ unique aura of might and their own darkness Physique, the dark dragons were infamous even among evil dragons.


    The reason Rick was so fearful of the dark dragon was that he possessed a darkness Physique. Given their origin power simrity, the damage he could inflict on the dark dragon was far less than what the other attributes could do.


    To be honest, even three Ricks put together wouldn¡¯t be enough to beat this Fifth Grade dark dragon!


    When he saw the dark dragon go invisible once more and rush toward him, Great Adept Rick had no choice but to flee in a shy disy of his powers.

 Chapter 1494 - A Brutal Battle

    Chapter 1494 A Brutal Battle


    The battle proceeded brutally!


    The individuals involved in the fight all possessed enough destructive power to reshape they of thend. Their every action unleashed energy of incredible intensity.


    The energy shockwaves radiating from the battlefield instantly caused a devastating disaster to the surrounding regions. Even so, the might of the enemy did not discourage the ferocious orc warriors.


    Muscr orc warriors from all over the central mountains rushed wildly toward the main temple. They tried their best to approach the battlefield and attack these foreign adepts with their crude metal axes and bone spears.


    The weapons they threw were often shredded to pieces by a shockwave st before they could get close to the adepts. Naturally, their bodies were also shredded and disintegrated by these shockwaves.


    However, even such a tragic fate could not dissuade the ferocious orcs. Even more powerful orc warriors rushed over from a distance and threw themselves into the ranks of those attacking the adepts.


    In response to this, the adepts had no choice but to send out a single Great Adept to deal with these fearless ¡®ants!¡¯


    Greem had been locked down by the Earth Prophet on the za, while Rick was being chased mercilessly through the sky by the dark dragon. The only ones who could mobilize any more power were the ones fighting on the main battlefield.


    Sixth Grade Great Adept Briel summoned a Sixth Grade storm giant and a Sixth Grade Death Gale in his fury. The two were sent to stall Garon¡¯s projection, leaving Fifth Grade Great Adept S free to leave and attack the orc temple.


    Loud prayers could be heard within the temple. The unique crimson rays of a blood ritual shone from the building. It was obvious that these orcs were hosting a god-summoning ritual to bring down an even more powerful clone or projection of Garon Arcadas.


    This ce was the orcs¡¯ main temple, after all. With sufficient time, it wouldn¡¯t be surprising at all for them to summon an entire squad of orc petitioners. Speed was the essence of it all!


    Great Adept S had just reached the main temple when a dozen orc powerhouses glowing with a fierce red light appeared before him. Regardless of their actual power, all of them had now been pushed to peak Fourth Grade¨Cthe power limit of this ne¨Cby the possession of the petitioners.


    The orc powerhouses who were Fourth Grade to begin with might be able to endure the terrifying increase in their powers, but the bodies of the orcs that were only Third Grade were already starting to fall apart.


    The overwhelming strength caused their skin and muscles to tear. Blood ran down their bodies, staining their eyes, skin, teeth, and arms a bloody red color. Their muscles swelled, and foot-long steam rushed out of their noses as they exhaled. They shouted and intercepted Great Adept S with their weapons in hand.


    Judging from their circumstances, they were likely to die within the day to the overwhelming power they had just obtained, even without interference from Great Adept S. However, for the rest of the day, their power had increased exponentially, turning them into fearless peak Fourth Grade orcs.


    In just grade level alone, Adept S possessed an overwhelming advantage against these peak Fourth Grade orc petitioners. However, S would have to pay a steep price to exterminate all of them!


    After all, these were no longer the original orcs, but orc petitioners!


    Petitioners were unusual lifeforms.


    Devoted believers in life would find their souls brought to a god kingdom and given a second, eternal life. With an energy body bestowed upon them by the gods, they no longer possessed any emotion such as joy, anger, or even sorrow. They became ¡®pure¡¯ lifeforms that only knew how to ceaselessly pray to their god, offering up their worship and dedication.


    As petitioners, they were not typically allowed to leave the god kingdoms. However, they would sometimes join the fray to defend the gods they worshipped.


    Due to a petitioner¡¯s energy body and unwavering faith, they could leave the god kingdom via certain ceremonies where they would possess followers¡¯ bodies in the worldly kingdoms. However, due to their excessive soul energy, most worldly mortals would blow up due to the overwhelming power.


    Unless it were essential, no one would ever be willing to exhaust the foundation of faith.


    With the great invasion of the evil adepts, the orcs had no choice but to hold a summoning ceremony. They forcefully called down a dozen orc petitioners and managed to add yet another formidable squad to the temple¡¯s defenses.


    At this point, both sides had already unleashed all they had, attacking the opponent with their full force.


    The main battlefield was the conflict between a Sixth Grade Great Adept, aided by the storm giant and the Death Gale, and the Sixth Grade projection of Garon. The skies cracked and the mountains split as they fought. Entire rivers and mountains shattered into dust. The terrifying scene of the battle sent shivers down even the Great Adepts¡¯ spines, let alone ordinary people.


    Fortunately, as the two Sixth Grades continued fighting, they crushed every valley and mountain along the way, quickly arriving at the other side of the central mountains.


    Meanwhile, the battle had split into four tiny battlefields on the orc temple¡¯s side.


    Greem was stuck on the thousand-meter-wide stone za by the Earth Prophet¡¯s earth principles. The two of them were also engaged in a vicious melee that seemed incredibly dangerous for either side. The difference between life and death seemed to hang on a thread for them both.


    The Earth Prophet was tough and resilient. Apart from its two-meter-thick skin, it was also d in three-meter-thick steelrock armor.


    Greem had tried every trick in the book.


    Area-of-effect fire spells against the stone giant were like setting fire to a mountain. The mes seemed to burn wildly and cause everything in its path to wither, but in truth, they hardly damaged the mountain itself in the slightest.


    Only single-target fire spells could concentrate enough power on a single point to prate the horrifyingyers of defense to inflict damage on the opponent.


    However, these single-target fire spells were all-powerful spells that required at least seven to eight seconds of incantation. Meanwhile, the Earth Prophet¡¯s every wave of a hand invoked a massive earth attack that engulfed an area of two to three hundred meters. Given the Halo of Gravity that he had been afflicted with, Greem could never find enough time or opportunity to unleash his spells.


    It was at this moment that the benefit of having spells sealed within his magical equipment showed itself! With this magical equipment, Greem finally had a tiny chance of inflicting lethal damage on the stone giant.


    The Halo of Rot...wouldn¡¯t work!


    While the steelrock armor was still active, the Halo of Rot would not be able to prate the Earth Prophet¡¯s actual body to inflict sufficient damage.


    The Berserk Eye...wasn¡¯t worth the effort!


    Preparing the Berserk Eye required three entire days, and recovering from its use would require another fifteen days. Greem wasn¡¯t willing to use such a potent ace against this enemy when there wasn¡¯t much loot to be gained.


    There was only the Critical Wildfire of the Orb of the Fire God left!


    Greem made up his mind and started to be more patient and meticulous in his fighting.


    Even the slightest oversight against an enemy of the same grade could bring about disastrous results.


    The heavy stone fists and feet of the Earth Prophet were enough to badly injured Greem with just a graze. If the Earth Prophet got the chance to strike true, Greem might die on the spot.


    Earthquake, Mire, Quicksand Trap, Rce Forest, Rocky Howl, Split Earth, Summon Earthhounds, Boulder Smash. The Earth Prophet possessed a multitude of means to attack. Even with the degree of control that Greem possessed with the Chip in his mind, he had to move around cautiously, always careful not to make an unsalvageable mistake.


    Given Greem¡¯s slight frame, he would really fall apart from a single punch or kick from the Earth Prophet!


    If Greem¡¯s situation could be described as ¡®difficult,¡¯ then Rick¡¯s situation was almost certainly ¡®hazardous.¡¯


    Great Adept Rick had nowhere to run against the dark dragon that was equally as sly as he was and possessed the same kind of power. He had no choice but to resort to gueri warfare within the mountains.


    The two of them weaved and teleported throughout the skies, sometimes appearing in the east, asionally peeking out in the west, suddenly flickering to the south, and then all of a sudden, they were north again. The two individuals skilled in darkness magic tussled against each other in this fashion, with the sky as their stage and the mountains as the backdrop.


    The dark dragon might possess the absolute initiative, but it could not turn that advantage into a winning edge and deal a lethal blow to the adept. Meanwhile, Great Adept Rick was like a dancer spinning on a knife¡¯s edge. He was having a horrible time, but he did not dare to flee into the distance and leave the dark dragon free to do whatever it pleased.


    Otherwise, whichever battlefield the dark dragon chose to join would instantly cause a copse in the bnce of power.


    When that happened, the mission would failpletely, and he would face severe punishment from headquarters upon return!


    In contrast, S and Colin were in a much better position.


    S was fighting against seventeen peak Fourth Grade orc petitioners. Each one of these fighters was fearless and wielded not only thebat techniques of the orcs they had possessed, but powerful innate abilities of their own as well.


    There were bonuses like +3 Strength, +10 Defense, +4 Resilience, +3 Reflect, +3 Physique, etc.


    Moreover, these stat boosts were only a minor dealpared to the Bloodlust ability that they possessed!


    All their stat bonuses would be temporarily doubled when Bloodlust was activated. Moreover, they would lose all sense of pain and be immune to instant-death effects. Their attacks would be enhanced with all sorts of terrifying effects such as Rend, Blow, Cripple, and Interrupt.


    The seventeen peak Fourth Grade orcs were still no match for one Fifth Grade Great Adept. However, whenever they got into a dangerous position, one of the orc petitioners would activate Bloodlust and beat back S¡¯s offense with a mindless and savage assault of their own.


    An orc powerhouse was likely dead or grievously injured after Bloodlust ended. Still, while a peak Fourth Grade orc petitioner was fighting at full strength with Bloodlust activated, even S would have no choice but to fight defensively and hasten their deaths with his attacks.


    Through the orc petitioners¡¯ consecutive sacrifices, they were able to stall Great Adept S, who was only growing ever more anxious and impatient!

 Chapter 1495 - Death Tides

    <h4>Chapter 1495 Death Tides</h4>


    Compared to Greem, Rick, and S, Great Adept Colin was probably the one having the easiest fight of them all!


    The only ones he had to deal with were the hordes of low and intermediate-grade orc warriors swarming at him.


    There might be many of them, but not one could pose a lethal threat to Colin.


    However, his situation wasn¡¯t exactly optimistic either.


    The main reason for that case was that the orcs fought desperately!


    For some reason, all the orc warriors near the temple had all started gathering here. They did not employ any strategy, nor did they attack in sequence. Instead, all of them lunged recklessly at Great Adept Colin the moment they appeared.


    Colin was a Fifth Grade body-refining adept. All his flesh and bones had already been trained and refined harder than adamantium. His physical and magic resistance were equal to a pureblood dragon of the same grade. He had even used various terrifying magics to modify every part of his body into magical organs. He was more fearsome than a tireless ughter machine when setting foot on a battlefield.


    Ayer of fine scales appeared on his body. These scales were tough yet flexible. No axes, nor des or needles could prate them. His hands had also transformed into a pair of powerful ws. All sorts of unusual magical light shimmered upon them.


    It didn¡¯t matter how ferocious the orc warriors that rushed toward him were or how well-trained their techniques; they were little more than fragile sheep before Great Adept Colin. He disposed of an orc with every w, his ck ws piercing their chests, grabbing their hearts out from within, and crushing them.


    The orc warriors couldn¡¯t possibly survive such a terrifying attack, even with their stubborn life force.


    A horde of orc warriors would charge forward and perish in less than five minutes. Another group would rush forward before being decimated once more. It was like a resilient rock standing by the shore. No matter how ferocious the waves were, they could only shatter into tiny droplets, leave behind bubbles, and retreat helplessly.


    Those who could remain anywhere near the main temple were all orc elites. However, elite orcs were no different than ordinary orcs in front of Great Adept Colin. The corpses of one orc after another littered those ten thousand stone steps, their viscous purple blood gathering into a tiny stream that flowed down the stairway.


    While Colin was having the time of his life ughtering these pigs, he heard Sixth Grade Great Adept Briel¡¯s furious roar ring out in his mind.


    ¡°What are you still wasting time there for? Destroy the orc temple! Who knows what those orcs will summon with a little more time...go!¡±


    Briel¡¯s tone sounded incredibly furious. It was obvious that his battle against Garon¡¯s projection wasn¡¯t going well.


    Great Adept Colin¡¯s body trembled. He knew he had messed up.


    He pped his hands together, sending out an invisible force shockwave. The few dozen orcs that had gathered in front of him were instantly blown away. He took this opportunity to turn around and promptly charged toward the mountain peak like a bolt of purple lightning.


    He stopped himself in front of the stone za, looked around, and saw Greem fighting to the death against the gigantic Earth Prophet. The dense, powerful halo radiating from the Earth Prophet kept Greem bound firmly to its side.


    Moreover, this giant b of stone was incredibly tough and resilient. Even Colin wasn¡¯t sure how he would break the enemy down with his offensive power.


    Colin didn¡¯t choose to help Greem. Instead, he took a small detour, circling around the Earth Prophet¡¯s Halo of Gravity and heading straight for the temple¡¯s main doors.


    The orc petitioners gathered around Great Adept S instantly tried to split up their forces to intercept Colin when they saw this. However, they were stopped by S, who smiled wickedly and immediately unleashed even more power.


    Colin¡¯s body quickly disappeared into the hall, a series of afterimages left behind his silhouette.


    ¡°Hahahaha,¡± Great Adept S, who was beyond frustrated with these orc petitioners, couldn¡¯t help but let out a long, brazenugh. ¡°Just watch as your faith crumbl¡ª¡±


    Before he could finish his words, a dull thud came from within the temple. Great Adept Colin flew out of the building faster than when he had entered.


    Judging from his posture and horrified expression, he had not flown out of his own ord. He had been sent flying by something.


    What was happening? Could there be more opponents left in the temple!?


    Just as the Great Adepts¡¯ expressions turned into shock, an ugly double axe flew out of the hall, catching up to Colin with a howling sound and cleaving him across the chair.


    Boom! A muffled boom rang out.


    Great Adept Colin¡¯s body abruptly exploded. His body had actually been destroyed by the berserk divine power contained within the axe. Moreover, the wild divine power had even exterminated his soul at the same time his body exploded.


    Great Adept Colin had been murdered without even being able to utter a single cry!


    Wha...what?


    How could that be possible?


    A Fifth Grade body-refining adept had been sliced to death with a single sh. That...was simply unbelievable!


    Could it be...could it...?


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled. This was not good. He immediately prepared to flee.


    Therge, vicious axe inscribed with ancient runes flew backward. It was guided by a mysterious force andnded right in the hands of a tall orc stepping out of the temple.


    The orc was tall and muscr. He wore a full set of crude, ck armor. What muscles were exposed outside of the armor bulged violently, the skin covered in all sorts of scars. He had a savage, brutal face and a bone helmet on his head. He was alsopletely shaved, save for a small braid at the back of his head.


    It was this orc, who was no more than five meters tall and who radiated barely any power, that had killed Colin with a single strike.


    Greem¡¯s heart pounded wildly the moment heid eyes on him.


    This...this guy looked exactly the same as Garon Arcadas, the orc pantheon¡¯s God of ughter.


    Greem instantly struck at the Earth Prophet beside him without any hesitation. He couldn¡¯t even be bothered to check the true power of the new enemy.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. The Earth Prophet¡¯s Halo of Gravity firmly locked Greem¡¯s body down to the stone za. He couldn¡¯t escape if he didn¡¯t deal with this enemy first.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    All three fire giants rapidly encircled the Earth Prophet, baiting the stone giant into swinging its palm and pulverizing the tiles at its feet. In the short instance the Earth Prophet bent down in his swing, Greem¡¯s actual body had snuck behind it.


    A violent breath of mes blew out of Greem¡¯s mouth against the steelrock at the Earth Prophet¡¯s waist. A hole was instantly corroded in the stone armor that could endure Fourth Grade spells. Dirt-yellow light shone from under the armor. That was the actual body of the Earth Prophet¨C a yellow,va-like substance.


    Greem did not hesitate at all. He immediately unleashed the Critical Wildfire, stored within the Orb of the Fire God, into the Earth Prophet¡¯s body.


    The next second, the glowing yellow body of the Earth Prophet became searingly hot as if it had just swallowed a miniature sun. The mes instantly exploded.


    Boom! Boom! Boom! Severalrge explosions could be heard all over the Earth Prophet¡¯s stone body. Chunks of steelrock were sent flying everywhere, andva began to spill onto the ground.


    The Earth Prophet could not endure such a devastating attack. It reared its head and let out a pained howl as mes engulfed its body.


    However, even such ferocious Fifth Grade fire magic could only severely injure it. The thing was still alive.


    The Earth Prophet roared and turned around, nning to use its violent Strength to instantly kill the adept on its back with a single strike.


    If this had been in the past, Greem would have teleported away and dodged this violent retaliation from his enemy. However, Greem now had his own reasons not to back down with how desperate the situation was.


    He traded a punch for a spell!


    The fire clone that Greem had left on the spot was smashed to sparks by the Earth Prophet¡¯s fists. Meanwhile, he sent Fiery Reflection into the stone giant¡¯s body before swapping positions.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    A cluster of fire glowing with golden light bounced and reflected over and over inside the Earth Prophet¡¯s already tattered body. With every reflection, the ball of fire absorbed a portion of magic energy from its surroundings to enhance its impact. After just a few ricochets, the intensity of the berserk fire had reached 13,000 degrees.


    If the Earth Prophet had been unharmed, he might have been able to suppress such a violent fire spell with the protection of its steelrock armor and the aid of the Halo of Gravity.


    However, its body was broken and crippled. Even the earth¡¯s origin within him was rapidly leaking away.


    The Earth Prophet could no longer stand the abuse under such conditions. The life force quickly faded from its giant body.


    Aaaaaaaaah!


    The Earth Prophet let out a booming howl before its body crumbled to pieces.


    The Halo of Gravity it had emitted also vanished!


    After destroying the Earth Prophet with two Fifth Grade fire spells in session, Greem instantly grabbed the watermelon-sized earth principle crystal from within the rubble. He turned and fled without hesitation, disappearing from the za with a single teleportation spell.


    While Greem was eliminating the Earth Prophet, the tall orc that had strode out from the temple looked around with his savage eyes. A violent and brutal aura instantly locked onto Greem, S, and Rick.


    The savage aura within him erupted even more fiercely upon witnessing the scene of the orcs being ughtered.


    A ferocious glint in his eyes shone as he instantly decided on his next target.


    S!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped! After all, there was a whole group of dead and injured orc petitionersying around S.


    Even the god couldn¡¯t help bing furious at the sight of someone ughtering orcs in front of his temple.


    He lifted his right arm, swung the axe, and threw it forward in a single motion.


    And so, Great Adept S greeted his doom in his own desperate attempt to escape!

 Chapter 1496 - Desperation

    Chapter 1496 Desperation


    Supposedly, it shouldn¡¯t have been so easy for Great Adepts to die.


    After all, adepts had way too many mysterious spells and magic with which to transfer damage or create substitutes. Even in the face of absolute death, they had various abilities to snatch survival from the jaws of death.


    However, none of these were helpful in front of a God of ughter.


    The ferocious double axe radiating a destructive aura of ughter seemed to possess the unusual effect of being able to destroy the soul. Every adept the axe struck had their souls extinguished at the same time their bodies blew apart. They could only turn into a bloody sacrifice, screaming and howling in agony as they were wiped out from existence.


    Surestrike, Shatter, Soulquell.


    Greem could tell that the axe possessed these three principle characteristics just by seeing what happened to hispanion. Of course, there were probably a whole series of other principle attributes that he wasn¡¯t privy to as well.


    Great Adept Colin had been a body-refining adept with an indestructible body. Yet, even he had been cleaved apart and torn to pieces by a single axe without the ability to resist.


    The second unfortunate sacrifice to the God of ughter¡¯s wrath was Great Adept S.


    Great Adept S had begun fleeing into the distance the moment he saw what happened to Colin.


    Unfortunately, he obviously hadn¡¯t run fast enough for far enough!


    The axe cut across the horizon, rending space itself apart as it traveled several kilometers and nted itself in S¡¯s back. The magical shields, elementium barrier, special defenses, and even principle protections that S had activated around him all popped like bubbles beneath the ancient axe.


    Great Adept S¡¯s body exploded into pieces the moment the axe hit him. Meanwhile, it devoured his soul before he could even let loose a scream.


    Pieces of shredded flesh and torn robes fluttered down from the sky along with fragments of magical equipment and two or three items that still glowed with intense magical light.


    Great Adept S had died!


    The towering orc summoned the axe back to his side and looked around him, instantly locking onto the only two Great Adepts remaining.


    Greem and Rick.


    As for Sixth Grade Great Adept Briel? He had already escaped into the distance without hesitation the moment the orc appeared.


    Meanwhile, Greem and Rick had both been dyed by their opponents; they had yet to make it fifty kilometers away. However, they had both separated and gone in different directions and were quite far away from the main temple at this point.


    Once they made it fifty kilometers away from the main temple, they would be out of its radius. Garon Arcadas, who had appeared in his true form, would no longer be able to maintain his power as a true Seventh Grade god by then. He would also have to endure the tremendous suppression of the ne¡¯s principle system.


    That was why both Greem and Rick were flying with all they had, desperately trying to make their way past that crucial distance!


    Garon, the God of ughter, frowned.


    Forty-three kilometers and forty-seven kilometers.


    The two remaining Great Adepts were already reaching the limit of his range. Judging by their speed, he could only hunt down one of them.


    Garon¡¯s gaze swept around and locked onto Greem.


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. After all, Greem had suddenly powered up and unleashed a devastating series of attacks before he left. He had actually managed to kill an Earth Prophet in a matter of seconds. An intelligent Fifth Grade Earth Prophet wasn¡¯t much, but the swiftness with which Greem had dispatched the creature had still exposed his overwhelming potential for battle.


    Meanwhile, Great Adept Rick had barely inflicted any damage to the dark dragon.


    Uponparison, Seventh Grade God of ughter Garon turned his third and final attack upon Greem.


    He breathed in and raised his wrist firmly, posturing himself to throw his axe. The double axe instantly cut across space and caught up behind Greem.


    Greem felt his blood chill as he sped through the skies of the mountains. The Chip in his mind instantly red out screeching rms.


    [Warning! Warning! Detecting unusual divine will locking onto Host. Attack will arrive in 1.27 seconds!]


    ¡°Can we defend?¡± Greem quickly conversed with the Chip in his mind.


    [It is impossible to defend against the primary divine weapon of a god of this level with the magical defenses and principle powers Host currently possesses. Should the divine weapon make contact with Host, the chances of survival are 0%.]


    ¡°Can we escape with the fire clones?¡±


    [Negative!]


    ¡°Fire Teleportation?¡±


    [Negative!]


    ¡°Can we defend with both the Tome of Corruption and the Orb of the Fire God?¡±


    [Negative!]


    ¡°Don¡¯t just tell me what won¡¯t work! Tell me something that can help me survive!¡±


    [Assimting with the principles!]


    ¡°Assimting with the principles? Have youpletely analyzed and deciphered the knowledge required to move through the principles?¡±


    [Principle assimtion and movement 31% deciphered. The amount of knowledge currently possessed is insufficient to supportplete principle teleportation. However, it is barely enough to allow Host toplete limited principle assimtion once. However, forced principle assimtion will inflict Host with severe side effects. Please be cautious!]


    ¡°Cautious, my ass. I¡¯m staring death in the face right now. Screw the side effects...now...right bloody now! Do it! Assimte with the principles!¡± Greem practically shouted out hisst order.


    Even though he did not hear anything around him or feel an object approaching, Greem¡¯s soul seemed to have gone berserk. He could faintly sense the arrival of death and even smell the aura of ughter and savagery on the axe¡¯s de.


    The Tome of Corruption and the Orb of the Fire God within Greem¡¯s body let loose a surge of principle power beyond what he could endure. The energy quickly filled his entire body.


    Greem¡¯s form paused for a brief instant and then continued flying into the distance at extraordinary speed the next second.


    Garon stood quietly in front of the orc main temple. He paused for a moment and lifted his head. His cruel eyes cut across space and gazed upon a certain ce in the distance.


    Just there, an insignificant little adept had used some unusual means to escape his divine will. He had vanished for an imperceptible instant.


    ¡°Merging yourself with the principles of the ne system to escape my divine will?¡± A vicious smile appeared on Garon¡¯s ugly face. ¡°You dare try something like before me? Die!¡±


    Forty-seven kilometers away, the double axe that had passed straight through Greem¡¯s image had clearly missed its mark.


    Garon let out a grunt as the axe unleashed an overwhelming divine power shockwave. Every principle within several dozen kilometers was torn to pieces.


    Meanwhile, Greem, who had forcibly merged with the principles, slowly appeared, bathed in blood. Being forced out of the principle system by the turbulent principle powers had made him endure indescribable damage.


    His body looked unharmed, but everything inside was inplete disorder. All his flesh, bones, tendons, and organs were no longer in their original positions. Instead, they had reformed in random ces inside his body.


    That wasn¡¯t the most horrifying part. More concerningly, every piece of his flesh and skin had been polluted with twisted and mutated principle power. If it weren¡¯t for the Tome of Corruption and the Orb of the Fire God protecting his soul from the chaos, Greem would have already transformed into a mutated monster devoid of all reason and rationality.


    Fifty kilometers away, Seventh Grade God of ughter Garon extended his hand and grabbed the axe returning to him. He could sense the life aura that had reappeared fifty kilometers away. His brows furrowed, and an expression of shock shed on his face.


    ¡°Not dead? How could it be? A mere Fifth Grade adept managed to escape my principle attack? Impossible!¡± Garon was bbergasted.


    Given his prowess as a Seventh Grade true god, killing a few low-grade adepts couldn¡¯t be any easier. No idents should have urred. That was why he hadn¡¯t been paying too much attention when he threw the axe out earlier.


    He hadn¡¯t even been concerned when the adept merged with the principles.


    That was why Garon couldn¡¯t help but be surprised when the adept¡¯s soul aura reappeared. By the time Garon tried to lock onto the adept¡¯s aura again, the little bug had already escaped his range.


    Garon couldn¡¯t help but be frustrated at this unexpected turn of events.


    Dammit! These insects from the adept civilization are sly indeed. To think they could escape with their lives.


    Garon¡¯s expression became dark.


    Just then, the incredibly weakened chief priest of the orcs walked out from the temple behind him, barely supporting himself with a wooden staff. He got onto his knees fearfully.


    ¡°O¡¯ Great Garon, it is I who was incapable, who could not stop the adepts¡¯ attack, that forced you to descend in your true form. This is my fault. Please, cast your divine judgment down upon me!¡±


    Garon did not turn around. Instead, he surveyed the ravagedndscape of the central mountains. The assault by the Great Adepts had brought about unimaginable cmity to this holynd of the orcs.


    With his overwhelming divine will, Garon could only sense the withering life auras all around the orc temple. It would be fortunate if half of the three hundred thousand orc elites of this mountain survived this incident.


    The orc elites living here were all his loyal believers!


    As one of Garon¡¯s only seven faith worlds, such a loss was monumental. It would almost certainly affect his provision of divine power.


    If these were ordinary times, he could easily make up for this loss. However, they were currently at a crucial point of conflict against the adepts. A weakening of his divine power was not a good omen!


    Garon¡¯s expression didn¡¯t change as he said sternly, ¡°This isn¡¯t your fault. It¡¯s a scheme of the adepts. They are currently sieging ne Pandar. I only hurried here while we had some time to rest. I need to return promptly now. Hurry up and put together forces to expel the remaining adepts. Remember, you must defend the temple. I will leave my projection here for the moment.¡±


    The orc chief-priest hastily got onto the ground and acknowledged the orders.


    ne Pandar. That seemed to be the origin world of Enus, the God of Hatred!


    If anything were to happen there, it wouldn¡¯t just be a matter of losing one or two clones for Enus. It would be a significant incident. Enus himself might die, and his god kingdom might fall.


    In that case, the Great Adepts¡¯ assault of ne Mutas seemed more like a diversion now!

 Chapter 1497 - An Unbearable Sight

    Chapter 1497 An Unbearable Sight


    Greem¡¯s current condition wasn¡¯t very good!


    In truth, his current condition couldn¡¯t even be described with simple words like ¡®good¡¯ and ¡®bad.¡¯


    At this point, not only had his body, flesh, and bones been mutated, but even his fire principles had turned into an absolute mess. He was an unbearable sight to behold.


    He stumbled his way back toward the camp, all sorts of strange mutated flesh continually peeling off from his body and crashing toward the ground. When the mutated fleshnded, it transformed into principle mutants of various shapes and forms, regardless of what substance it assimted with.


    The mutants¡¯ appearances, existence, and forms were utterly different from nar creatures. They looked like ugly monsters whose gic sequence and bloodline had been mixed and synthesized randomly. However, they all possessed unusual and extraordinary principle abilities.


    Greem continued to stumble forward in the air, all the turbulent and chaotic principle power within him being suppressed by the Tome of Corruption. Moreover, he had to rely on the Orb of the Fire God to protect his soul and prevent the chaos of the principles from spreading there.


    It made his behavior increasingly uncontroble!


    Compared to his initial arrogance upon arriving on this ne, Greem looked terrible now.


    It seemed like his horrible condition had attracted the orc powerhouses as well.


    Halfway through his journey, Greem was stopped by an orc berserker radiating a vicious and savage aura.


    It was a warrior who stood three meters tall. His body was unusually muscr, his head bald, and his neck so thick and short it practically disappeared into his shoulders. He wore rhino hide armor on his body and swung a giant mace.


    The orc started roaring loudly while standing in Greem¡¯s way.


    ¡°Evil adept, weren¡¯t you all arrogant when you arrived? How did you end up like this? Haha! Now let I, Daguru¡ª¡±


    Greem didn¡¯t know what else he wanted to say after that.


    Toozy to talk to a musclehead like this one and concerned he would be surrounded if he stayed for too long, Greem unleashed the Halo of Rot without hesitation.


    A dark green halo wrapped around the berserker. His skin and hair began to melt like heated wax. Jade-green clouds of poison smoke started to leak out of his body rapidly as he crashed from the skies.


    The orcs were still toocking in the protection of powerful equipment. It didn¡¯t matter what kind of damage hit them; they had no choice but to endure it with their tough bodies and stubborn wills. However, there was no way the orc could have withstood a Fifth Grade principle poison spell.


    The orc berserker was knocked out of the sky before it could make a move and was instantly sent to death¡¯s bed.


    That had been an advanced Fourth Grade orc powerhouse!


    The orcs were abative species that would never retreat unless fear was beaten into them.


    Not long after Greem had exterminated an orc berserker, another orc intercepted his path.


    It was an orc sword-saint this time¡ª a peak Fourth Grade individual.


    An orc like that would be a famous individual in ne Mutas!


    Even this orc did not fare better at Greem¡¯s hands. A single Berserk Eye sted forward, killing the peak Fourth Grade sword saint.


    It was important to note that the average intensity of an attack from a beginner Fifth Grade Great Adept was 15,000 points. Meanwhile, the Berserk Eye that Greem had gone to great lengths to prepare could achieve a horrifying 32,000 points of power.


    An attack of this level would be enough to kill an unprepared beginner Fifth Grade Great Adept, let alone this mere peak Fourth Grade orc!


    The cost that Greem paid was the loss of his right eye. It exploded into chunks of flesh, leaving behind a bloody ck hole where it had once been.


    At this point, the orc powerhouses of ne Mutas finally understood the untraversable gulf of power between them and their enemy. Even if the opponent was no more than a significantly weakened Fifth Grade Great Adept, killing him still wasn¡¯t an easy matter.


    At the very least, a peak Fourth Grade sword saint had been worth no more than a right eye!


    The other orc powerhouses immediately ceased their restlessness after the sword saint had been instantaneously murdered. None of them dared lift a finger anymore.


    Thus, Greem was able to stumble his way back to the adept camp.


    The atmosphere inside the camp was extraordinarily tense now.


    A few members of the adept party nervously tested and prepared the long-range internar teleportation array. Meanwhile, Sixth Grade Great Adept Briel and Fifth Grade Rick stood in the middle of the camp, constantly surveying their surroundings for any changes.


    All of a sudden, Briel¡¯s expression turned into one of shock. He turned to look toward the distance.


    Soon, Rick sensed something as well. An expression of shock and disbelief shed across his face.


    ¡°Didn¡¯t you say that Garon himself locked onto Greem? Then...how do you exin this?¡± Briel asked sternly.


    ¡°He...I...this,¡± Rick was also confused. He couldn¡¯t help but stammer, ¡°My lord...I...I really did see Garon lock onto him. As for how he managed to survive that, I have no idea!¡±


    While the two of them quickly and subtly conversed with each other, a ck speck appeared on the distant horizon. It flew chaotically in the air, rising and falling, swaying until it was above the camp. It then simply crashed to the ground.


    ¡°Lord Greem seems to be very heavily injured,¡± A Fourth Grade female adept screamed and immediately extended a hand to catch Greem.


    A muffled boom.


    The impact from the fall caused another piece of flesh, the size of a thumb, to fly off of Greem¡¯s face. The fleshnded in the still-burning bonfire.


    The mutated principles shimmered as the flesh instantly merged with the mes. The next second, a strange monster that looked like a fire pudding had been created.


    It was a ball of liquid fire, enveloped by a translucent membrane. The mes inside it roared and tackled about violently, asionally surging out and unleashing terrifying mes of intense heat.


    ¡°Fire slimes? No...fire slimes are utterly insignificant monsters. There¡¯s no way there could be one at Third Grade. What exactly is this creature?¡± Rick couldn¡¯t help but mumble to himself.


    This little thing could be considered a Third Grade creature just from the mes it spat out. However, none of the spiritual flux unique to intelligent creatures could be sensed in its intense fire principle aura.


    A non-sentient principle mutant?


    Perhaps incapable of sensing the tremendous difference in power, or possiblycking a sense for danger, the newly created monster immediately attacked every adept around it.


    Moreover, its attacks contained a minute hint of fire principle power.


    It was faint, but it was undoubtedly, and without mistake, the real thing!


    Briel grunted and shredded the fire pudding into sparks with a twist of his Spirit. He then lifted his hand, drew arge rune in the air, and shot it into Greem¡¯s body.


    Strangely enough, the moment the rune entered Greem¡¯s body, all the berserk principle power inside him came to a halt. It had been suppressed like a lizard sealed in amber.


    Now Greem could finally open his eyes somewhat. He looked at the Sixth Grade Great Adept and said in a soft voice, ¡°My gratitude, my lord!¡±


    Even though he was incredibly curious how Greem had managed to escape the orc temple, Briel couldn¡¯t really ask any more questions after seeing Greem¡¯s condition. He waved his hand. ¡°The failure of the mission wasn¡¯t because of us. It was because of the opponent¡¯s power exceeding the limit of what we could possibly have dealt with. It¡¯s good that you were able to escape alive. Whatever else we have to say, we can save it until we return to headquarters.


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry. The mission only failed because a Seventh Grade god appeared in his true form. Headquarters cannot pin the me on us. Just focus on recovering once you get back!¡±


    Greem nodded weakly and shut his eyes. He then began to deal with the turbulent principle power in his body slowly.


    Mission failure, with a casualty count of two Great Adepts.


    Such a terrible defeat and loss were a tremendous responsibility, even for a Sixth Grade Great Adept.


    Briel and Rick were forced to attend a mission review with the higher-ups of the headquarters upon returning to Boulder Fortress. Meanwhile, Greem was given special treatment by virtue of his injuries. He was spared from any further ¡®torture¡¯ and returned directly to his room to rest.


    The mission this time had screwed Greem terribly!


    Not only did he not obtain any rewards for his mission, but his body had also been devastated to a horrible extent. He was indeed only that one step away from death.


    Moreover, foreign principle contamination of this sort was aplex problem, even for principle adepts. There was no other way to treat this problem than to extract the foreign principles one by one and rece them with fire principles.


    Detonating this body and reforming a new one was apletely ridiculous notion.


    All the foreign and mutated principles were rooted within his adept origin and starbeast bloodline. To give up on the foreign principles was to give up on everything he currently possessed. Greem had no choice but to work slowly and carefully, recovering bit by bit.


    Of course, Greem was also incredibly upset and obsessive over the reason for their failure in ne Mutas. He didn¡¯t know what mistake it was they hadmitted that had ultimately led to the Seventh Grade God of ughter appearing in person.


    However, after a secret visit to Great Adept Sarubo, he vaguely obtained an answer to his question.


    At the same time that Greem and the others failed their mission in ne Mutas, a violent raid unleashed in another neworld had been a smashing sess. God of Hatred Enus¡¯ origin ne had been destroyed!


    The God of Hatred had managed to escape the jaws of death and had fled into the god kingdom of another orc god. However, his grade had fallen from Fifth Grade to Fourth Grade, turning him into a mere demi-god.


    There was far too much information contained within this news. Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but zone out for a moment when he heard it.


    Of course, he could also taste the hidden implications and unspoken politics contained behind it all!

 Chapter 1498 - The Final Banquet

    Chapter 1498 The Final Banquet


    The deaths of two Great Adepts to dethrone a Fifth Grade god.


    It was quite an unimaginable thing to think of, but it was also the bloody reality.


    There were no rookies among those who could advance to Fifth Grade and step beyond the nar barriers. These Great Adepts were adept elites who had emerged from bloodypetition above the corpses of millions. Unfortunately, even they were still pawns that could be tossed aside for the schemes and plots of their superiors.


    It was just a matter of whether they were worth the sacrifice!


    God of Hatred Enus might have been fortunate enough to escape as a demi-god and avoid death along with his god kingdom. But after falling to the level of demi-god, he lost most of his divine power as well as his ability to create clones and projections.


    He would have to show up in his Fourth Grade true form if he wanted to join the battle. Of course, his chances of dying if he appeared on the battlefield were almost a hundred percent.


    If he chose to hide, Enus might be able to raise himself to his former glory with what followers remained in his faith worlds and with several hundred years. However, to maintain the divine power requirements of his followers across several worlds as a demi-god was unfeasible. He would have to borrow power from the other orc gods, turning him into a ck hole of divine power.


    That was why in the battles toe, Enus would not only be of no aid to the orc pantheon but would even severely weaken them.


    That was because he was too weak now!


    He retained part of his divine authority, divine virtue, and divinity as a demi-god. Consequently, he was little more than an unprotected cake in the eyes of both the adepts and the other gods.


    If they weren¡¯t in the same pantheon as him, the other orc gods would probably have torn him apart and devoured him alive!


    Meanwhile, after the severe injuries Greem sustained, he had no choice but to keep a low profile and hide in his room. He began the painful and challenging journey of recovery. It was fortunate that he had protected his soul with the Orb of the Fire God when he was contaminated by the shattered principles, preventing them from reaching his soul.


    Otherwise, his journey as the legendary fire adept would havee to an end. He would lose all hope of any further advancement!


    Even so, Greem¡¯s injuries were still unusually grievous.


    He spent three entire years recovering in the Boulder Fortress before recovering to his strength before the battle.


    This period of recovery also caused him to exhaust all of the divine virtue he had obtained earlier.


    He used most of the divine virtue to repair his body, damaged by the mutated principles. A small amount of it went to nourishing the starbeast bloodline. Greem also realized that the battles of ultra-grade adepts were no longer the same as those of low-grade adepts. Gone were the endless stalemates and days of going back and forth.


    The battles of ultra-grade adepts were more frightening and intense. Victory and defeat were often decided in one or two moments.


    Great Adepts would have to possess sufficient hidden aces and abilities. These were the only things that could grant them even the slightest initiative in the cruel and savage battles they had to face. If they were constantly suppressed by their opponent, turning the tides would be near impossible.


    When Greem once again came to the station hall, he immediately drew the attention and wee of the Great Adepts. Even Great Adept Gerritsen, who had always been rtively cold toward him, pulled him to his side and started talking passionately with Greem.


    ¡°Your wounds have recovered, yes?¡± Gerritsen asked warmly.


    ¡°Thank you for your consideration, my lord. I am almostpletely recovered now,¡± Greem replied politely.


    ¡°Good, good,¡± Gerritsen shed a smile. ¡°You should know that in the time you were recovering, quite a few people asked me about you!¡±


    Greem¡¯s heart moved when he heard Gerritsen¡¯s implicative words.


    Quite a few people...could anyone that a Sixth Grade Great Adept would take note of be Fifth Grade or lower?


    What is it that had caused even Sixth Grade Great Adepts to take notice of him?


    Greem wondered to himself as he intentionally asked curiously, ¡°Could I know who it is that has been concerned about me? I must pay them a visit and offer my gratitude, granted the opportunity!¡±


    ¡°Well, you don¡¯t have to worry about that. All you need to know is that people care,¡± Gerritsen had a mysterious look on his face. ¡°Speaking of which, there couldn¡¯t be a better time for you to have recovered. We are going tounch our primary offense against the orcs soon. Grab the opportunity and grab as much loot as you can for yourself!¡±


    ¡°The primary offense?¡± Greem said in surprise. ¡°To my knowledge, our progress in the past three years hasn¡¯t been all that sessful, has it? Of the seventeen gods of the orc pantheon, only Fifth Grade God of Hatred Enus has been demoted to a Fourth Grade demi-god, while Sixth Grade God of the Hunt Horr has been downgraded to a Fifth Grade low-ranked god. Trying to wipe out the orcs after such limited results doesn¡¯t seem wise!¡±


    Gerritsen suddenly let out augh. ¡°It seems like you still haven¡¯t gotten used to the pace of life as a Great Adept. With our lifespans thatst for upward of ten thousand years, do you think it would be worth it for us to fight the orcs to death over lesser nes? The main reason why Lady Barbara started this war wasn¡¯t fornd or resources. It was for the divine origin within the orc gods!¡±


    Divine origin was a loose term that referred to divine authorities, divine virtues, and divinities!


    ¡°What does that have to do with a battle against the orcs?¡± Greem was still confused.


    ¡°Without a war, how are we supposed to get divine origin? Without divine origin, what are we supposed to use to craft high-grade magical equipment? Lady Barbara has no grudge against the orc gods. She chose the orc pantheon as her opponent purely because the orc gods are infamous, even within the World of Gods. There¡¯s no concern that gods of other pantheons would aid them while we fight!¡±


    It was Greem¡¯s turn to be speechless now.


    Even though he had already vaguely guessed this to be the reason, to have a Sixth Grade Great Adept tell him all this in person was still unexpected.


    It wasn¡¯t about values, justice, glory, or being right.


    The adepts had mobilized the force of hundreds of neworlds and a hundred Great Adepts to wage endless war in the hundred neworlds of the orc pantheon for nothing other than the divine origin contained within those gods.


    Countless worlds were destroyed in this process, and the number of nar creatures ughtered in the process was in the trillions. How could those poor bastards ever understand? All the life of a small neworld could notpare to the value of three to five divine authority fragments.


    How could those individuals fighting on the bloody frontlines understand? That their lives were so cheap and worthless that they were bargained with by their superiors that controlled everything behind the scenes?


    Gerritsen couldn¡¯t help but let out a cold chuckle when he saw Greem¡¯s face turn pale.


    ¡°Given how powerful the orc pantheon is, we will likely trigger a violent retaliation if we push them into too much of a corner. The price we would have to pay for that would be immense. That is why we ought to stop while we¡¯re ahead. It¡¯s fine to give them a break now that we have torn a few pieces of flesh from their bodies and filled our stomachs for the moment. If you still want to obtain any more spoils, the uing final battle will be yourst chance. Miss this battle, and you won¡¯t be able to find another opportunity to harvest divine origin!¡±


    ¡°Unless, of course, you challenge a god alone! Hahahaha!¡±


    Gerritsen seemed to think his joke was funny and startedughing out loud.


    With how frank Gerritsen had been, Greem naturally understood what was being said.


    In all honesty, what Gerritsen said probably resonated with the thoughts of most adepts.


    It was not as if there weren¡¯t treasures more valuable and better than divine origin across the universe. However, the cost of obtaining those treasures was often far greater than simply waging war with the orc pantheon!


    The Great Adepts could gather together andy siege to a mediocre pantheon, scrambling to scrape together some divine origin from the gods. Such a convenient and inexpensive affair suited the benefits of all adepts. Otherwise, this war wouldn¡¯t have been able to attract so many Great Adepts to join its cause.


    Greem was only feeling somewhat shocked and stunned, having abruptly been exposed to the truth and immersed in this reality!


    He had personally witnessed the deaths of two Great Adepts.


    Those had been Fifth Grade Great Adepts!


    In a neworld, that would make them akin to gods!


    Greem would feel better if they died for some ideal or greater belief. However, to know that the only significance to their deaths had been to obtain some ¡®meager¡¯ material benefit made Greem feel hollow inside. There was a deep sense of emptiness and pointlessness to it all.


    As a Great Adept, he would have to ept the cruel reality of the world.


    Moreover, divine origin was not a ¡®meager¡¯ benefit. It was a top-ss resource that all Great Adepts pined after. If Greem possessed endless divine origin at the moment, he would be able to forge a dozen pieces of origin equipment and nourish his bloodline to its limit. How difficult would advancement be after that?


    That was why, as shaken as he was, Greem would never give up this opportunity to obtain more divine origin!


    ¡°My lord, where will the final battle you mentioned ur?¡±


    ¡°ne Saka!¡±


    ¡°ne Saka? That...that¡¯s the origin ne of the Beast God Arugel!¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but gasp.


    Most gods regarded the world in which they first ascended to be a god as their origin ne. All the nes they conquered after that were referred to as faith worlds. The status of these two kinds of worlds was utterly different.


    A god would be fine if they lost a faith world. It just meant a reduction in followers and a loss in faith power. However, if their origin ne was destroyed, their god kingdom would also be destroyed. Their grades would lower¨C if they were lucky. If not, they would die. It was no wonder that all origin nes were a cause of concern for the gods!


    The adepts had chosen ne Saka as their main battlefield. It seemed like the adepts did this to force the orc pantheon into battle.


    However, the plots and schemes were none of Greem¡¯s troubles. All Greem needed to worry about was whether he was prepared for this battle to get a share of the spoils for himself.

 Chapter 1499 - The Orc Pantheon

    Chapter 1499 The Orc Pantheon


    Three years of seclusion provided Greem with not just recovery but also many subtle improvements to his power.


    His lost right eye had recovered and been reforged into the Berserk Eye.


    The voodoo beast that he left with Adept Karon to craft had been finished.


    The four Fifth Grade fire spells the Chip had been constructing were allpleted.


    More importantly, after usingrge amounts of divine virtue to repair his body and nourish his bloodline, the Chip had finally managed to decipher and analyze the prerequisites for principle assimtion. Apart from his short and long-distance Fire Teleportation, Greem would also possess a more subtle and rapid means of mobility from now on¨C movement through the principles.


    If Greem faced an opponent of a higher grade than him, recklessly choosing to move through the principles in this fashion would expose him to risk. Against opponents of the same grade as those not acquainted with principle techniques, the ability to hide and move through the principle system was absolutely horrifying.


    Principles were formless, intangible concepts. Worldly weapons and ordinary elementium attacks could not even interact with the principle level. It would be impossible to harm Greem in his principle form without the use of principle weapons or high-grade principle techniques.


    The only problem was that Greem had only fully mastered two fire principles at the moment: Undying mes and the upgraded Fire¡¯s Clone. In particr, Undying mes was still a rtively low-level principle. It was lethal and effective against enemies below Fifth Grade, but it was somewhat useless against enemies of Fifth Grade and above.


    After elevating Fire¡¯s Image to Fire¡¯s Clone, Greem gained three fire clones that could freely form and scatter. Each possessed thirty percent of his offensive power. If they merged together, they would be a powerful fire creature with ny percent of Greem¡¯s power.


    Thus, Greem came up with a pretty ingeniousbat strategy.


    He would hide in the principles and wipe out all traces of his existence while having the fire clone remain outside, posing as him. Due to the soul connection between Greem and his clones, he didn¡¯t need to worry about enemies seeing through his ruse.


    If the opponent attacked with the fire clone as their target, then Greem would ambush them from the principles while they were wide open. It would most definitely catch them by surprise.


    It was because of these new, powerful aces that Greem gained more confidence than before. He walked out of his room and stepped upon the nar battlefields once more.


    ............


    ne Saka.


    The Beast God¡¯s kingdom.


    A vast, endless stretch of grassy ins extended beyond the horizon. The inside of the god kingdom was just exactly to Beast God Arugel¡¯s liking. The orc tribes were scattered all over the ins. A small idol of Beast God Arugel could be found in the center of each and every tribe.


    Here in this mysterious, vast, and plentiful god kingdom, the people had never wanted for food.


    The various tribes¡¯ daily mission was to send out hunting parties to battle with the ferocious beasts and creatures that were left to graze on the ins. Upon victory, they would drag their heavy hunting spoils back to camp, start a bonfire, and begin roasting their dinner as they cheered and danced around the statue of Arugel.


    Hunting, prayer, and living. These orc petitioners that had been liberated from aging and death lived fulfilling lives that would make all orc believers envious of them. Meanwhile, their constant daily sacrifices and prayers gave rise to pure, firm faith power. This faith power was gathered through the idols and channeled toward the Beast God temple that stood at the peak of a mountain at the center of the god kingdom.


    The great Major God of the orc pantheon, Eighth Grade Arugel himself, resided upon a towering throne in the center of the temple there, silently surveying his divine kingdom.


    The only one that could freely extend his will and power within this vastnd was him, Beast God Arugel!


    Not even the nar consciousness could extend a hint of its power here.


    He was the king here! He was the god! He was the absolute sovereign!


    Where the will of the Beast God reached, the mountains and valleys would reshape and reform to his heart¡¯s desire. Sometimes crumbling to pieces, sometimes turning t as earth, and sometimes undting like an earthquake. Everything within his god kingdom was like sticine to him. He could freely shape and form anything he wished here.


    If he wanted mountains, towering peaks would rise from the ground. If he desired rivers, surging torrents would burst forth and run across thend. If he wished for winter, chilling streams and freezing blizzards would fill the skies.


    What sustained all these miracles was the endless, surging divine power within the god kingdom!


    The petitioners living within the god kingdom, the mortal followers in the material worlds¨C all their faith power gathered within the god kingdom and was converted by Arugel¡¯s divine authority into the purest of divine power.


    Arugel, who possessed all this divine power, was the absolute master of this space.


    It was he who had personally created this god kingdom upon which the orc petitioners lived. That was how he had slowly increased his divine power and his grade!


    Gods were immortal!


    As long as his divine body wasn¡¯t destroyed by an enemy, his divine authority taken, and his consciousness wiped from it, Beast God Arugel would continue to exist until the end of the universe.


    Consequently, the way in which gods thought was fundamentally different from mortals!


    At the moment, a dozen strange figures of varying heights and types stood in Arugel¡¯s temple. Most of them glowed with golden divine radiance. It was apparent at a nce that they were clones of certain gods.


    Only one who was seated in a corner did not radiate the unique divine radiance of true gods. Instead, he looked like an ordinary, dejected orc.


    At the moment, a somewhat scrawny orc god whose eyes glowed with unnatural intelligence was talking his head off, exining to his peers the strategy to deal with the adepts¡¯ invasion.


    Unfortunately, the numerous orc gods present were all emitting a savage, impatient aura. They did not have the patience to execute suchplex strategic maneuvers.


    ¡°Do we have to make this soplicated? Those human adepts are all soft eggs. Can they even defend against us if we gather our forces and charge at them?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s true! All this shuffling around and tricks and schemes hasn¡¯t managed to weaken the enemy in the slightest; already, our power¡¯s been scattered all over the ce.¡±


    ¡°Right! Right! If I had a say, we should all follow after the boss. Just go all out and wipe out the adepts¡¯ir. We¡¯ll see what they have to be arrogant about after that!¡±


    These musclebrains were all muscr and powerful individuals. They had never been fearful of anything in all these years, even when they had to fight with numerical disadvantages. They were rough individuals that would swing their axes at the drop of a hat.


    This personality of theirs had only been amplified by their divine virtue after bing gods.


    Rough, callous, cruel, savage, impulsive, temperamental.


    These negative words seemed to follow them forever, bing abel for the entirety of the orc pantheon.


    Perhaps influenced by the restlessness of his vassal gods, even Arugel, the Major God of the orcs, couldn¡¯t help but be agitated.


    ¡°Those human adepts have be increasingly arrogant!¡± Arugel¡¯s true form was that of a one-eyed orc wearing a crude ck suit of armor. The giant eye embedded on his forehead blinked when he spoke of the enemy. A deep-seated hatred was revealed in it. ¡°They¡¯ve destroyed Enus¡¯ origin ne and ravaged many of our faith worlds. We must repay this grudge in blood!¡±


    Upon hearing this, Demi-God Enus stood up furiously and waved his arms. ¡°Boss, tell us how we¡¯re fighting this! I, Enus, will follow after you, even if I were to actually die.¡±


    ¡°Yes! I want revenge as well!¡± Horr, the God of the Hunt, who had demoted a grade due to the adepts, also stood up abruptly. His eyes were filled with burning hatred as well. ¡°We can send out an army of petitioners and wipe out the adept forces!¡±


    ¡°Very well! That is what we shall do!¡±


    ¡°Agreed!¡±


    Only Seventh grade God of War Kodyr, who was the only one with the war domain included in his divinity, stood up and opposed. ¡°My lord, we cannot do this! Don¡¯t forget, the elf and human gods are still waiting for us to show weakness! If we were to go on the offense so recklessly, our backlines¡ª¡±


    ¡°Shut up, you scrawny monkey! Do you think those fragile elves and unremarkable humans dare find trouble with us? Hmph! If they do daree, I will challenge them to a divine battle. We¡¯ll see whose axes are sharper,¡± God of ughter Garon, who was Seventh Grade himself, spat. He had a cruel and savage smile on his face, as if he would fight any challenger to the death.


    ¡°Yes! Divine battle! I think we could kill them just by scaring them to death!¡± A few of the Fifth and Sixth Grade vassal gods waved their fists and mored.


    ¡°Cough.¡± Seventh Grade God of War Kodyr couldn¡¯t help but sigh to himself. He once again felt sad over his identity.


    The orcs needed no strategy or tactics. All they did was gather their forces, shout their battlecries, and charge at the enemy. It put him, the God of War who was nning to develop the War domain as his primary divinity, in an awkward position. It made him seem out of ce with all these orc gods.


    On the one hand, he had to resist the influence of the chaotic and disorderly divine virtue deep within him. On the other, he had to try his best to suppress these restless and rowdy peers of his. Kodyr felt distraught over this most of the time!


    However, Beast God Arugel was an Eighth Grade Major God of a pantheon, after all. He could still barely suppress the wild tendencies and impulses within him. He shouted sternly at Kodyr, ¡°Speak, Kodyr. Where are the human adepts nning to attack next?¡±


    Kodyr¡¯s face turned pale. However, the Major God of their pantheon was asking. He couldn¡¯t lie. As such, he could only reply truthfully, ¡°Judging from how they are mobilizing and judging from the trend of their invasions......¡±


    ¡°Where?¡±


    ¡°Your ne Saka!¡±


    The temple fell silent.


    An earth rending howl could be heard throughout the skies.


    ¡°sphemy!¡±


    ¡°How dare they!¡±


    ¡°I see these adepts are sick of living!¡±


    The orc god clones were beyond themselves with fury. The restless waves of divine power radiating from them almost blew the ceiling of the temple apart.


    ¡°This is war!¡±


    ¡°Gather the petitioner army. I will tten the homes of the human adepts beneath my feet.¡±

 Chapter 1500 - Battlefield Harvest

    Chapter 1500 Battlefield Harvest


    The Beast God¡¯s rage erupted and quickly swept over hundreds of other neworlds. The war between the hundreds of ultra-grade adepts and the orc gods rapidly approached a climax.


    Ever since the human adepts showed signs of invading ne Saka, the orc pantheon¡¯s retaliation had be increasingly violent and intense.


    Moreover, the orc gods showed up to battle in their true forms with increasing frequency, often appearing in groups of three or four. Correspondingly, the Great Adepts of Boulder Fortress were being deployed more often.


    The battle between the adepts and orcs raged on without end in the numerous gxies and different neworlds. It seemed almost as if the fires of war would spread indefinitely.


    Naturally, the Sixth and Seventh Grade Great Adepts dealt with the true forms of the gods. Fifth Grade Great Adepts like Greem could only deal with clones or projections. Of course, asionally, they would also cross swords with some of the powerful orc petitioners.


    In these frequent battles, Greem¡¯s recent improvements in his power allowed him to obtain plenty of spoils. No one knew when it started, but soon the name of the Great Crimson Adept spread throughout Boulder Fortress.


    At the very least, the name of the Crimson was well-known among the Fifth Grade Great Adepts.


    Many Great Adepts were willing to work with him during missions, as coborating with him often meant obtaining unexpected benefits.


    After all, all of the Great Crimson Adept¡¯s abilities were rted to battle and ughter. Each of them was incredibly powerful. Furthermore, he possessed the ability to transform into a magical fish that could devour a defeated god clone alive.


    This ability guaranteed their ability to maximize their profits!


    In just a single year, Greem had been deployed five times, during which he devoured two god clones and a projection, yielding himself three divine authority fragments in total.


    Such achievements were incredibly eye-catching, even in Boulder Fortress, where there were upwards of a hundred Great Adepts.


    However, his achievements in battle undoubtedly also put him on the orc pantheon¡¯s hit list.


    Greem faced more and more danger when stepping onto a battlefield!


    ............


    ¡°Greem,e! I¡¯ve got a got mission here!¡±


    Greem was resting in his room when he received a magical transmission. The sender was Bloodline Adept Antuso, who he had worked with several times now.


    ¡°Oh, what kind of mission is it?¡±


    ¡°The orcs have sent out three gods, seven clones, and a dozen Fifth Grade petitioners; they are currently holding a siege of ckmountain ne. The defenders have already requested reinforcements from headquarters, but they are still somewhatcking in power. A second wave of reinforcements has been requested...just in time for us to go there for a hunt!¡±


    ¡°Who are the three orc gods?¡± Ever since he was targeted by God of ughter Garonst time, Greem had be increasingly sensitive to this issue.


    ¡°The Sixth Grade is the One-Eyed God Arges, and the two Fifth Grades are familiar faces: God of Tyranny Haistoc and God of the Hunt Horr,¡± Antuso appeared to be quite eager on the other end of the line.


    After all, the first divine authority fragment he had obtained came from Horr¡¯s clone. It was only natural that he wanted to tear off an even bigger piece of meat from the god now that he heard Horr was on the move.


    The One-Eyed God Arges. Greem thought for a moment and was finally convinced.


    As long as it wasn¡¯t someone terrifying like the God of ughter, Greem was confident he could deal with any of the other gods.


    Arges was not an orc, but a cyclops that worshipped Arugel. Due to his tremendous power and surprisingbat ability, Arugel promoted him to a vassal god, making Arges the infamous Sixth Grade One-Eyed God.


    Arges¡¯ most powerful ability was his long-range earth divine power bombardment. He was one of the few long-range fighters within the orc pantheon. However, due to his tall size and bulky build, his movements were slow and clumsy.


    Obviously, Greem wasn¡¯t afraid of an enemy like that!


    After receiving the transmission, Greem left the room and headed straight to the station hall, where he grouped up with Antuso and the newly recruited Great Adept Rossellini.


    Rossellini was a golem master. He had assimted a mysterious space substance with his will, thereby granting him the unusual talent to manipte astral constructs. Much like Greem¡¯s starbeast bloodline, space was his most powerful domain.


    He could unleash two hundred percent of his power in space!


    Greem, Antuso, and Rossellini had worked together numerous times now. They worked well together, and their abilities wereplementary. It allowed them to hunt down their enemies several times sessfully.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go. The reinforcement has been approved. We are setting off now!¡± Antuso was not the strongest Great Adept, but he had an extraordinarywork across Boulder Fortress. Communications with the superiors were all left to him.


    Greem greeted Rossellini, a scrawny man with strange purple skin, and the three of them instantly traveled to ckmountain ne through the teleportation array.


    They could feel the overwhelming energy radiation press against their faces the moment they stepped out of the array.


    The three of them stood in space, outside the nar barrier, defending against the magical tide around them as they gazed at the terrible battlefield below.


    Several dozen muscr orcs were rampaging throughout the battlefield like wild boars, d in divine power. Meanwhile, the human adepts gathered in groups, dodging attacks while assaulting the enemy¡¯s divine power defenses with their colorful spells.


    Meanwhile, a hundred-meter-tallbatant stood at the very heart of the battlefield, like a pir propping up the sky itself. He was tall and muscr, his body consisting of muscles as hard as stone. He had three fingers on each hand and a lone, fearsome eye on his head.


    A cyclops that had be a Sixth Grade mid-ranked god!


    His method of attack was straightforward as well. He would create several boulders asrge as entire mountains between his palms and hurl them at the enemy. The moment the bouldersnded, they would explode into countless tiny rock shards, enveloping everything within a thousand meters into its attack radius.


    Greem could scan everything clearly with the Chip in his mind. The intensity of this attack reached upward of 40,000 at the center and a speechless 13,000 in the periphery.


    As expected of a veteran Sixth Grade god. Even a casual area-of-effect attack was 8,000 points of power stronger than Greem¡¯s Berserk Eye, which was a product of heavy umtion andpression.


    The difference in their power couldn¡¯t be more obvious!


    The individual fighting against One-Eyed God Arges on the adepts¡¯ side was a bloodline adept. He transformed into a gigantic abyssal demon lord and circled the cyclops god with his ten-meter-tall body.


    Every time the cyclops threw a boulder, the abyssal demon lord would step across the air without hesitation and charge in for a bout of melee. Once the cyclops began creating another boulder, he would slip away again in a constant cycle of harassment.


    Both of them were shockingly powerful, but judging from the situation, the One-Eyed God was still the stronger of the two. He often used his exploding boulders to knock the demon lord around.


    As Sixth Grades, their every action would result in devastating aftershocks and impacts on their surroundings.


    The One-Eyed God would suddenly switch targets every so often as well, hurling boulders at the groups of adepts close to the battlefield. The Sixth Grade adept that had transformed into an abyssal demon lord would also asionally use Demon Teleportation to assault the Fifth Grade orc gods nearby.


    Every time that happened, it would be a test of abatant¡¯s luck and ability!


    It didn¡¯t matter if it was the orcs or the adepts. If either of them were unable to dodge the attacks of the Sixth Grade, they could easily find themselves in a precarious position on the brink of death. If one were to get injured during such an intense battle, it would be exceedingly difficult to escape whole.


    There were many times that the death of a Great Adept or a god clone became unavoidable!


    For the sake of self-preservation, the Fifth Gradebatants would inadvertently choose to distance themselves from the Sixth Grade battle. It might make them safer, but if they ended up at a disadvantage in a fight, it would also be more difficult for them to receive reinforcements from their superiors.


    The adepts¡¯ Spirit and the gods¡¯ divine will wove together on the massive battlefield, shing and battling. Their attention spanned every inch of space in this area.


    Naturally, the arrival of Greem and his twopanions drew the attention and rm of both parties!


    Horr, the God of the Hunt, was fighting in his true form. A deep-seated hatred could be seen in his savage eyes when he saw Greem. He let out a roar, casting aside the enemy before him to charge at the three neers.


    He might have been demoted from Sixth Grade to Fifth Grade, but his overwhelming divine power was still far beyond that of an ordinary Fifth Grade. With his exceptional technique and a better understanding of high-grade divine power, he had nothing to fear when fighting against numerous enemies.


    Moreover, this was his true form.


    The weapons he carried were all genuine divine items and not just projections of the artifacts. Furthermore, the numerous divine creatures hemanded were also fighting in their true forms. They weren¡¯t just projections of divine power anymore.


    It was out of this confidence that Horr was so relentless and ferocious in the face of three adepts of the same grade.


    Still, for the sake of safety, another Fifth Grade clone of a god and two Fifth Grade petitioners split off from the distant battlefield and hurried over. In doing so, the pressure on the adepts over there greatly diminished.

 Chapter 1501 - Battle of the Gods

    Chapter 1501 Battle of the Gods


    There were no idiots among those who could set foot upon this battlefield of gods and adepts!


    Any person who wasn¡¯t an idiot would turn and flee at the sight of an enemy stronger than them.


    That was why the idea of having high-grade adepts run around to quickly ughter low-grade god clones would remain no more than that.


    Upon setting foot on the battlefield, the only thing you could do was pick an ¡®appropriate¡¯ opponent for yourself, rather than dreaming of rampaging through a bunch of weaker enemies. The arrival of Greem and his twopanions might have increased the adepts¡¯ strength, but the power bnce was not so out of the gods¡¯ favor that they would flee.


    The peak Fifth Grade God of the Hunt Horr, a clone of Ogre God Mairo, and two orc petitioners roared and shed with the Greem¡¯s group.


    The two orc petitioners were undoubtedly the enemy¡¯s weakestbatants, but they were also the most annoying and hated enemies for the adepts.


    The reason for it was simple!


    Killing them was not easy, but there were no benefits to be reaped by killing them.


    Petitioners were divine beings formed bybining the souls of dead believers with divine power. There were no divine authority fragments or virtue within them. Even the armor and weapons they wielded were all projections of divine power.


    If you weren¡¯t quick enough to extinguish their souls after killing them, the souls would escape back to the god kingdom. There it would only take a tiny bit of divine power for them toe back to life.


    These petitioners were undoubtedly the kind of opponent that adepts were least willing to face!


    Due to this nature of theirs, the two petitioners fought fiercely and recklessly. They did not hold back in battle out of concern for their own lives at all. In fact, there were many times where they tried to be as much of a disruption as possible to force the adepts into having no choice but to pick them off first.


    The clone of Ogre God Mairo looked like an ugly, stupid, and greedy ogre. He had a half-meter-long horn on his head and swung a mace in his hands that could double as a magical staff.


    The ogre was mostly naked, with only a piece of hide wrapped around his waist. His skin was red and tough.


    Mairo¡¯s clone was almost like abination of a warrior and an adept.


    His primarybat role was that of a warrior, to rule over the battlefield with his powerful body and overwhelming Strength. Meanwhile, as a secondary ss, he also possessed the ability to cast spells rapidly.


    Even after ascending to be a god, Mairo wasn¡¯t exactly the sharpest tool in the shed.


    His spellcasting ability primarily concentrated on enhancement and support spells such as Bloodthirst, Berserk, and Haste. He could also throw out one or two fireballs asionally. In truth, as long as he wasn¡¯t raining down a hail of strikes nearby, he wasn¡¯t much of a threat for adepts.


    However, both Mairo¡¯s clones and the orc petitioners were only supporting in this battle. The true powerhouse of this group was still the peak Fifth Grade God of the Hunt in his true form.


    Horr, the God of the Hunt, possessed three divine weapons.


    Among these three weapons, the most famous was the Sixth Grade Rhok¡¯dr, Longbow of the Ancient Keepers. It was a terrifying divine bow possessing the three principle characteristics of Critical Strike, Trueshot, and Execute.


    In particr, the Execute characteristic would instantly kill any enemy if it activated. It possessed the ability to directly exterminate the soul!


    Apart from this, Horr also had the Fifth Grade Cor of the Deceiver and the Fifth Grade Boots of Avoidance.


    The former could refract Horr¡¯s actual location, making it difficult for an enemy to figure out his position. It also prevented all locking-on with Spirit or divine will. Being unable to lock onto Horr meant that all guided or single-target attacks were ineffective against him.


    Meanwhile, the Boots of Avoidance could improve Horr¡¯s ability to dodge attacks.


    The increase wasn¡¯t tremendous. It was a mere sixty percent.


    At least six out of ten attacks were not likely to make contact with Horr.


    Apart from his three pieces of divine equipment, Horr also possessed the Call of the Wild ability as the God of the Hunt. He could simultaneouslymand three divine creatures that were only two minor grades weaker than himself.


    The ones he chose were the beginner Fifth Grade Windrend Hawk, Berserk Giant Ape, and Tunnelling Sandworm!


    It was obvious that his hatred for Greem and Antuso was extreme. He had chosen to field only offensive divine beasts.


    It initially appeared only to be Horr, Mairo¡¯s clone, and the two orc petitioners rushing at them. However, their numbers suddenly doubled halfway through.


    It wasn¡¯t just Antuso who was terrified now. Even the mildly infamous Great Crimson Adept Greem¡¯s eyebrow was twitching wildly.


    Goddamn! This formation is a little too terrifying, isn¡¯t it!?


    ¡°What about it? Do you think we can take it?¡± Antuso was screaming in their mental channel.


    ¡°We can give it a try. It¡¯s going be a stretch, though,¡± Even Greem wasn¡¯t confident about this.


    ¡°Treasure where there¡¯s danger! I¡¯ll deal with Mairo¡¯s clone. Greem can stop Horr. Antuso...move fast ande help me once you¡¯ve dispatched the petitioners,¡± Rossellini quickly divided the tasks between them.


    ¡°And...what about those mongrels?¡± Antuso was still screaming furiously in their minds.


    ¡°Everyone take out what you¡¯ve been saving for the asion and keep those beasts upied. Don¡¯t let them get in the way of our business today!¡± Rossellini was quite the vicious and determined man.


    As the person who proposed the idea in the first ce, he had to take the initiative. He was the first to throw out a sandboard, from which a giant, beginner Fifth Grade sand serpent emerged. It shook its giant body, flickered its red tongue, and red at the sandworm digging through the ground.


    At the same time, Rossellini raised both hands and quickly chanted a strange, mysterious incantation. As a tremendous amount of blue starlight surged into his body, he was soon covered inyers of astral substance summoned from alternate dimensions.


    Meanwhile, a ball of blue light glowed beside him, forming into a powerful and unusual astral construct.


    This process sounded very slow, but it was, in fact, so fast that it was hard to tell what had exactly happened. In just a single instant, Rossellini had covered himself in a thick astral battlesuit. Meanwhile, a five-meter-tall astral construct stood up by his side.


    Cloaked in that blinding starlight, Rossellini looked like a mech from some other world. The suit glimmered beautifully as Rossellini raised an arm and shot a Starlight st at Mairo¡¯s clone.


    Meanwhile, at hismand, the astral construct at his side swung its chainsaw and drill as it lunged at the Giant Berserk Ape.


    Rossellini was incredibly decisive. He had taken on three enemies all by himself!


    Upon seeing this, Antuso knew that he could no longer hold back. If he didn¡¯t contribute, he wouldn¡¯t be able to get his share of the spoils once this was all over.


    He let out a roar and turned into a spiritwolf. He raised his head and let out a long howl.


    As he continued to howl, a five-meter-long, two-meter-wide rift appeared in the air. A shocking number of Armor-Eaters emerged.


    The armor-eaters were no more than a swarm of Second Grade magical insects, but they possessed a powerful magical characteristic.


    That was Armor Piercing!


    They could threaten beings and creatures far superior to them in grade level.


    Afterpleting his summon, the spiritwolf rushed at the two orc petitioners with this swarm of insects.


    Given his terrifying formation, Antuso would finish his opponent in a matter of minutes.


    The only opponents left for Greem were Horr himself and the Windrend hawk!


    It was only then that Greem let out a breath of relief. He raised his hand and summoned Remi and the ten-armed giant.


    The ten-armed giant was the intermediate Fifth Grade voodoo beast that Greem had asked Adept Karon to construct. Its bloodline origin was rted to that of the legendary Hecatoncheires.


    The moment the giant appeared, its ten arms made a slight grabbing motion and created three-meter-long spears out of thin air. It began to hurl these javelins repeatedly at Horr.


    A dark purple halo appeared under its feet. This evil halo could afflict all enemies within a thousand meters with a fearsome Curse of Misfortune.


    Remi was left to deal with the Windrend hawk, while the ten-armed giant would support Greem against Horr. Greem still had a beginner Fifth Grade Earth Shatterer in his possession. It was the magical golem he had created with the principle crystal of the Earth Prophet.


    It was wise to keep at least one card hidden up your sleeve on a battlefield like this.


    Seeing as the battlefield was basically filled, Greem kept the Earth Shatterer behind and focused on dealing with Horr himself.


    There were no idiots among those who could make it to Sixth Grade.


    Horr had fallen to Fifth Grade due to ack of divine authority fragments, but his exceptional divine power application and techniques still left Greem with an unforgettable impression!


    The ten-arm giantunched the first wave of attacks by Greem and the adepts.


    Horr threw out a single ball of divine power that detonated the hail of stone spears. The chaotic earth elementium and divine power shed, causing a magic storm to appear in the center of the battlefield. Consequently, everyone¡¯s spiritual senses were impeded as well.


    A fierce and towering figure leaped out of the center of the storm and shot three consecutive arrows at Greem.


    Due to their Trueshot characteristic, it would be impossible to dodge these arrows.


    Greem shouted out loud, ¡°Cover me!¡±


    He ignored the arrows and focused on gathering his mes.


    The ten-armed giant strode forward and continued its bombardment of stone spears. The three arrows were sessfully struck down!


    Simultaneously, threepletely identical clones appeared behind Greem, covering his actual body in a triangle formation. They uttered a furious cry in unison as numerous waves of fire surged toward Horr¡¯s divine body from every angle.


    A battle of the gods had begun!

 Chapter 1502 - Hunting Mark and Tracking Arrow

    Chapter 1502 Hunting Mark and Tracking Arrow


    Battles at the level of gods were always horrifying!


    A new battlefield had started outside the nar barrier of ckmountain ne.


    The only ones who were qualified to join this battle were individuals of Fifth Grade and above. Otherwise, just the shockwaves radiating from the center of the battlefield would be enough to kill you.


    Greem and his three fire clones transformed into dozen-meter-tall me giants, repeatedly attacking Horr with waves of fire and powerful spells.


    However, God of the Hunt Horr was truly a veteran god. Divine light glowed from his body as it flickered through space. He left a series of afterimages and illusions behind, making it impossible to determine his actual position.


    Due to the Cor of the Deceiver, Greem¡¯s Spirit couldn¡¯t lock onto his opponent at all. Greem could only use area-of-effect fire spells to wear away at the divine power around the opponent slowly. Even when an asional spell managed to find its mark, it often aplished nothing due to Horr¡¯s exceptional dodge rate.


    In contrast, it was Greem¡¯s me barrier that cracked from Horr¡¯s bow and arrows, crumbling into a shower of sparks.


    Greem was infuriated. He let out a furious cry, ¡°You aren¡¯t the only one with divine equipment!¡±


    The next moment, the Tome of Corruption appeared in his right hand, rustling loudly as its pages flipped.


    When the flipping pages finally came to a stop, a spell model formed out ofplicated runes projected into the air. The model quickly lit up, turning into a savage fire spell that flew straight at Horr.


    On the other side, the three fire clones had sneakily merged into one. Two beams of fire abruptly shot out of their eyes and swept across the sky. Even with Horr¡¯s high Agility and dodge rate, it was tough to dodge these beams, which sliced across an immense distance.


    Szzzzzz!


    The beams of fire swept across space. Horr weaved between the mes with his singr Agility, doing his best to avoid the attack of the fire clones.


    ¡°Chip, can you track Horr¡¯s actual body? If it¡¯s impossible to lock on to him, we won¡¯t be able to unleash our most powerful spells,¡± Greem quickly gave out his orders.


    [Beep. Full-spectrum elementium scan has begun. Effects of a unique divine principle detected. Unable to lock onto the target.


    [Switching to principle scans.


    [Beep. Tracking unique divine principle trail. Currently constructing dynamic tracking system.]


    After a series of notifications from the Chip, strange changes began to ur to Greem¡¯s vision. Large patches of elementium and principle traces were presented within his sight in the form of different colors.


    Trails remained every ce Horr had been!


    It was especially the case in the vast space of the gxy. It wasn¡¯t just empty nothingness in the background of space; the whole universe was filled with undting magical tides.


    When so many transcendent beings fought and moved in this area, their every action split apart the magical tides, causing ripples to roll out in every direction. And when they unleashed their power, waves of magic would rise.


    It didn¡¯t matter how well they concealed themselves or how well they deceived the enemy¡¯s senses. The background of magic exposed their location.


    For the first time, Greem was able to lock on to Horr¡¯s approximate position as the god continued to weave and dodge the stone spears and Ray of Ignition.


    It was only an approximate lock-on rather than aplete one because Horr¡¯s body itself was cloaked in blinding divine light. It was impossible to look at his form directly. All that one could make out was a blurry, radiant figure.


    That...was the unusual divine characteristic of the Cor of the Deceiver!


    Greem took full advantage of his allies¡¯ attacks forcing Horr to scramble and struck without any hesitation. Greem threw the recentlypleted Fiery Refraction forward as a ball of golden light.


    It was a fire spell that possessed the ability to track its opponent.


    The ball of golden fire chased after Horr¡¯s flickering body, leaving behind an eye-catching trail of fire in space. The Ray of Ignition from the fire clone also swept over and cut off the god¡¯s path of escape.


    Horr finally had nowhere to run.


    Horr let out a grunt in the face of this overwhelming tide of attacks. He finally unleashed his Divine Shield.


    Boom! Boom! Boom!


    Pupupu!


    The rain of attacks, along with the mysterious Ray of Ignition, shed against the Divine Shield. However, they only caused a shower of sparks without harming Horr in the slightest.


    Horr also unleashed a ferocious wave of retaliation while the Divine Shield protected him.


    Divine Shockwave!


    Energy st!


    Two incredibly savage divine spells instantly engulfed the ten-armed giant and the fire clone, drowning them in ferocious divine power.


    Even with the ten-armed giant¡¯s defense, it had no choice but to turtle up and erect an earth elementium wall around itself. The fire clone quickly fled from the battlefield, leaping a thousand meters away with Fire Teleportation.


    Horr clearly had no interest in these two lesser opponents. After forcing them away with his attack, he charged before Greem with a few nimble leaps.


    He raised his ancient Sixth Grade longbow above his head and smashed it down toward Greem¡¯s head like a melee weapon. Meanwhile, his right hand swept past his waist, and a half-meter long dagger stabbed toward Greem¡¯s chest at an incredibly tricky angle.


    Horr was the famous God of the Hunt. Apart from his urate marksmanship, his meleebat skills were also at the level of the gods.


    Greem was a ssic spellcaster. Even though his Physique and Strength were quite impressive for his ss, he couldn¡¯tpare to these ¡®standard¡¯ warrior sses. The moment Horr closed in on him, he merged with the space around him without hesitation. He fled away rapidly through the loose principle system of space.


    ¡°Hmph! You dare use such a crude principle technique,¡± A cruel and vicious smile appeared on Horr¡¯s ugly face. He shouted out loud, ¡°In my name, manifest principle!¡±


    As he shouted, the formless principle power suddenly appeared in space. A strange ball of light attached to the principle system and moving through it was also exposed.


    Greem had already suffered once to an opponent in a simr fashion; he was on high alert. The moment he realized something was wrong, he instantly detached himself from the principle system. He just barely managed to avoid getting caught in the principle shockwave that followed.


    This short exchange allowed Greem to flee no more than a hundred meters.


    ¡°Bastard! All these high-grade enemies seem to be very proficient with principle techniques. Is this ability that I only managed to decipher after so much effort going to bepletely useless?¡± Greemined as he reformed his body. He opened his mouth and let out a breath of invisible mes at Horr.


    The invisible mes burned the Divine Shield, rapidly exhausting its divine power. In just three seconds, he had managed to thin out the Divine Shield, causing it to be increasingly fragile.


    However, those three seconds were already enough for Horr to unleash a barrage of over a dozen attacks at him.


    Greem¡¯s body of mes was shredded into pieces and exploded into sparks.


    ¡°No. This isn¡¯t the adept¡¯s actual body!¡± With his powerful divine will, Horr was soon able to realize something was wrong. He turned around to see Greem standing a thousand meters away, where the fire clone had been.


    Swapped!


    Horr couldn¡¯t help but start cursing.


    One had to admit that adepts of Fifth Grade and above were no easy opponents at all. Every adept had an expertise in which they excelled. They possessed unimaginable techniques and abilities within that domain.


    Even as powerful as Horr was, it wasn¡¯t so simple to deal with a Fifth Grade Great Adept in a duel!


    However, as the God of the Hunt, this couldn¡¯t possibly be the limit of Horr¡¯s powers.


    He let out another shout. He pulled the divine longbow in his hands into a full moon. A glowing golden arrow instantly appeared out of thin air and fitted itself onto the bowstring.


    At the same time, a strange divine rune appeared silently on Greem¡¯s head and stayed there.


    ¡°Dammit! Hunting Mark!¡± Greem had already suffered from this ability thest time he fought Horr¡¯s clone.


    Once the Hunting Mark had locked on, all of Horr¡¯s arrows would contain the ability to track his target. It didn¡¯t matter where Greem fled. He would never be able to escape the arrows.


    The only means of defending himself was to st away the arrows themselves!


    However, with the speed of the arrows and the time it took to cast his spells, aplishing this was no easy feat.


    There was still that ten-armed giant here.


    Greem gave the order in his mind, and the ten-armed giant slowly stepped across space and approached Horr. As the giant marched forward, it unleashed a rain of stone spears to limit the potential paths of attack for the arrow.


    A blinding golden spot of light flickered through space, seemingly trying to find a weakness in the ten-armed giant¡¯s defense. The hail of stone spears erupted, but not a single piece of shrapnel could hit the spot of light. It seemed to swim about freely like a fish in water.


    Given Horr¡¯s ability, this tracking arrow wasn¡¯t so easily neutralized!


    Horr stood straight on the spot, the longbow in his hand trembling without stopping. He finally paused after he fired eighteen tracking arrows.


    Eighteen howling spots of light instantly appeared in space. They swarmed toward Greem¡¯s body like a strange nest of hos.


    Tssss!


    Even Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air at the sight of such a ferocious attack.


    These were all tracking arrows! Even if he were to teleport away, they would chase after him forever!


    It was only then that Greem felt a tinge of regret. He should have deciphered and analyzed a powerful area-of-effect spell. It would have saved him from this horrible situation.


    It seemed like he had to use that!


    Greem had nowhere to run. He could only curl up, grit his teeth, and endure this wave of attacks.


    The eighteen tracking arrows howled, weaving their way past the ten-armed giant¡¯s storm of stone spears and striking at Greem¡¯s body.


    The next second, the spot where Greem had been standing was devoured by a storm of exploding divine power.

 Chapter 1503 - A Savage Fight

    Chapter 1503 A Savage Fight


    Shockwaves of divine power and savage magic power washed over every substance within the area.


    By the time the destructive tide of divine power subsided, a shocking scene was left in the center of the battlefield.


    Greem had dispelled his fire body and curled into a ball. A dozen-meter-tall stone giant crouched over him, covering him with its own body and arms. The divine power had left terrifying marks on the stone giant¡¯s sturdy body, but the attacks had not prated its defense at all.


    Greem waspletely unharmed under its protection.


    Greem finally stood up once the turbulence of divine power ended.


    Pieces of rocks and stone crumbled off of his stone guardian as it stood up. It looked absolutely devastated.


    The beginner Fifth Grade Earth Shatterer had almost been forced out ofbat mere seconds after its appearance. There couldn¡¯t be better evidence of Horr¡¯s offensive power.


    If Greem hadn¡¯t held this ace hidden up his sleeves, he would have ended up in a tragic state indeed!


    Greem was also frustrated after being forced on the defense in that fashion. He silently tossed out the Halo of Rot.


    It was an area-of-effect poison spell. The God of the Hunt couldn¡¯t dodge this.


    Horr was instantly coated in ayer of green. Even the divine radiance he emitted began to dim. The divine body of a god was immune to ordinary poison. The Halo of Rot couldn¡¯t have inflicted even the slightest poison damage on a god if it hadn¡¯t possessed poison principles.


    Now, without his Divine Shield, Horr had no choice but to endure poison principles of this level.


    After casting a Greater Restoration on himself, Horr was able to wash off most of the poison afflicting his body with divine power. It allowed his body to regain its former radiance. Only splotches of dark green remained on his body.


    It was obvious that Horr hadn¡¯tpletely dealt with the poison principles!


    At their level, ordinary low-grade spells could no longer threaten an opponent. The only way to genuinely hurt each other was to find ways to unleash their ultra-grade spells.


    However, it wasn¡¯t so easy to unleash ultra-grade spells. The spells often had strict and harsh casting requirements.


    That was why the offensive abilities attached to high-grade divine and magical equipment were so valuable. Gods and adepts were willing to invest such a tremendous number of resources into the creation of this equipment because of that value.


    After all, being able to unleash one more ultra-grade spell than your opponent in a battle like this would put you closer to victory. Lacking the means to neutralize or attack an enemy often meant the difference between life and death for a Great Adept.


    Greem was only a beginner Fifth Grade Great Adept, and yet he possessed multiple ultra-grade offensive options. It was the most fundamental reason he could retain his title as the Crimson Great Adept!


    The battle continued to rage on.


    At this point, neither side could easily give up on the battle anymore.


    Horr¡¯s Divine Shield had been broken, and most of hismon divine spells such as Divine Shockwave, Energy st, and Greater Restoration had been used up. Currently, he was relying entirely on his base attributes and terrifying hunting technique that he already attained before he ascended to godhood. Even so, Horr was applying heavy pressure on Greem. Greem felt like he was constantly on the brink of death.


    As a God of the Hunt, harvesting one or two souls was no problem at all, even without any death domain divinities. That was why adepts killed by gods in person hardly ever had the chance to revive or reincarnate through magical means.


    It was the main reason why Great Adepts were passionate about hunting down god clones and avoidant when it came to the gods themselves!


    If it weren¡¯t for Greem having such confidence, he would never have provoked a god in their true form.


    With both sides having the determination to fight to the death, the battle became increasingly vicious and savage. The intensity of the fight rose exponentially.


    Horr might have fallen to Fifth Grade, but the fact that he was fighting in his true form meant that he at least had ten points of divine authority in him. It might even be at a shocking neen points.


    It would be worth it if Greem could get his hands on those divine authority fragments, even if he had to abandon everything else!


    As for the finale of a battle that woulde after this? Greem would be no more than cannon fodder at his current level. It was better to fight on the peripheral battlefields like this to obtain as much loot as he could.


    After all, there would be very few chances to obtain a god¡¯s divine origin once this war was over.


    Perhaps they were thinking the same thing as Greem, for the other two Great Adepts¨CAntuso and Rossellini¨Calso started to fight desperately.


    The first to break through was naturally Antuso, whose opponents were rtively weaker!


    While the swarm of armor-eaters distracted the petitioners, Antuso flickered in and out of view as the spiritwolf andunched a rapid assault.


    In just fifteen minutes, he had sessfully disposed of one of the orc petitioners. He then snatched away the petitioner¡¯s soul, and whatever divine power crystal remained, and put it in his pouch. The remaining petitioner tried his best to flee when he saw the tide turn, but he quickly fell to the jaws of the armor-eaters.


    These armor-eaters were of a low grade, but Antuso had specially modified them. They possessed unusual magic resistance and horrifying defense-piercing powers for their grade. Even Fifth Grade orc petitioners would fall before an entire swarm of them.


    Their deaths provided Antuso with a Fifth Grade soul and a small number of divine power crystals.


    After wiping out the petitioners, Antuso turned his focus around and lunged straight at the fearsome clone of Ogre God Mairo.


    In all honesty, enemies like Mairo¡¯s clone were the kind that all Great adepts tried their best to avoid!


    Overwhelming physical prowess, incredible Physique, shocking Strength, ridiculous defense; if it weren¡¯t for Mairo¡¯s low Agility and clumsy movements, no adept would dare go near a god clone like them.


    Mairo¡¯s clone used a means of attack that was extremely simple and monotonous, but they were overwhelmingly powerful!


    Mairo continuously buffed himself with Bloodthirst and Berserk, causing his pudgy body to grow even further in size. Blinding crimson light shone from his entire body as he chased after Rossellini with a giant wooden staff.


    Dong! Dong! Dong!


    His body was as massive as a mountain made of flesh. His stubby legs caused spatial ripples to spread across space as he charged forth. The wooden staff he raised above his head howled with wild, unfettered force, sending Rossellini packing like a frightened rat.


    Rossellini might look safe and secure while enveloped in that firm astral armor of his. However, even he could only flee in the face of the Mairo cone¡¯s fearsome staff.


    If that staff hit him, his astral armor could probably withstand the impact. However, he would definitely be crushed to mush inside the armor.


    After all, the Physique of Fifth Grade Great Adepts wasn¡¯t the highest!


    In a face-to-face conflict like this, the human adepts were always overwhelmed by the gods with their powerful bodies.


    Rossellini left behind a brilliant blue trail of starlight as his three-meter-tall body flew gracefully through space. He concentrated starlight and sted it at the pursuing ogre as he fled.


    The blue starlight shed with the blood aura around Ogre God Mairo, exploding into countless beautiful sparks.


    Meanwhile, the sprinting Mairo asionally threw out one or two giant fireballs, knocking Rossellini here and there. A thickyer of the astral substance around him burned away every time that happened.


    Rossellini would replenish his armor¡¯s astral substance with starlight, while the berserk ogre would reapply Bloodthirst on himself, and his simmering blood aura would erupt once more.


    The adepts fought against the gods, while the beasts fought against each other!


    The summoned creatures were fighting each other in pairs further away from the battlefield.


    In all seriousness, they were no longerplete entities. Instead, they were high-grade puppets subject to the every whim and will of their masters!


    The Windrend hawk, tunneling sandworm, and berserk giant ape were all divine creatures. Their flesh bodies had obtained a trace of divine virtue and had gained certain characteristics of immortality. They might not be the strongest, but the divine virtue within them gave them impressive, transcendental power.


    They were unopposable divine beasts against creatures of lower grades. However, against the specially crafted ultra-grade voodoo beasts of the Great Adepts, they were little more than wild beasts with a hint of divine virtue in them!


    The first to die on the battlefield was the berserk ape, whose opponent was Rossellini¡¯s astral construct.


    The astral construct could regenerate infinitely while bathing in starlight. As long as the ape¡¯s Strength did not exceed the limit of the construct¡¯s defense, then the astral construct was indestructible.


    The berserk giant ape and the construct shed and wrestled like two wild beasts.


    Roars and shockwaves filled the air. Flesh, hair, fur, and bits of broken bone drifted off into the distance along with light-blue metallic debris. However, before they could even flee from the battlefield, an evenrger and more ferocious shockwave caught up to them and shredded them into unrecognizable particles.


    Soon after the two orc petitioners died, the beginner Fifth Grade ape bit the dust. It was the first divine creature to die on the battlefield.


    Rossellini¡¯s astral construct had suffered greatly to finish off the berserk ape. Its body was tattered and torn. A few gaping gashes had been wed across its chest, revealing the wildly spinning starlight arrays within.


    Moreover, none of its limbs wereplete. Horrifying bite and w marks could be seen everywhere.


    However, all this damage gleamed with starlight.


    The astral construct just needed time to repair itself!

 Chapter 1504 - To the Death

    Chapter 1504 To the Death


    When Antuso and the astral construct were finally free to clean up the battlefield, the power bnce waspletely shattered!


    The advantage snowballed rapidly. Horr¡¯s side grew increasingly weaker, and the adepts¡¯ odds of victory steadily increased.


    In the end, it was Greem, Antuso, Rossellini and the armor-eaters, the astral construct, the ten-armed giant, Remi, and the Earth Shatterer surrounding Horr and Mairo¡¯s clone.


    The god and the god clone seemed to have realized the encroaching danger. They gave up on the unrealistic desire for victory and began to try and disengage.


    It was then that Greem and the other two adepts had a severe disagreement in their choice of target.


    Antuso and Rossellini insisted on attacking Mairo¡¯s clone. It was just a clone of Ogre God Mairo, after all. It had limited power, and the three of thembined could easily subdue him.


    If they were lucky enough, all three of them might get a divine authority fragment for themselves!


    However, Greem was entirely dedicated to the idea of hunting down Horr himself.


    Of course, as a Fifth Grade God of the Hunt that was only recently demoted from Sixth Grade, Horr would have far more divine authority fragments in his body than Mairo¡¯s clone. Even a conservative estimate would put his divine authority points at over 15.


    If they could hunt down the God of the Hunt, the three of them would die smiling.


    However, the difficulty in doing so was immense, and the odds of failure were over seventy percent!


    Moreover, that was only because Greem possessed the Devouring Fish bloodline. Otherwise, they wouldn¡¯t even have a ten percent chance of doing so.


    It had been hundreds of years since the adepts dered war against the orc pantheon. Even now, there had yet to be an incident where a god had fallen. Despite having his god kingdom destroyed, even the most unfortunate God of Hatred Enus had sessfully escaped with most of his divine authority and divine virtue. He had retreated and settled down as a demi-god.


    It could be seen how much survivability a true god had on the battlefield!


    Consequently, recklessly choosing Horr as their main target was likely to cause the three adepts to return with nothing to show for it.


    The arguments and disagreements between the three adepts reverberated violently inside their minds.


    Even though mentalmunication was almost instantaneous with hardly any time dy, it wouldn¡¯t take much time for the two gods to escape either. There was practically no time for them to argue or convince each other.


    The three-man party split up!


    Antuso and Rossellini chose Mairo¡¯s clone.


    They were confident in defeating Mairo¡¯s clone without Greem¡¯s help. However, it was uncertain how many divine authority fragments or how much divine virtue they would be able to obtain from a mere clone.


    Meanwhile, Greem gritted his teeth and chose Horr¡¯s true form in the end.


    Greem had already exhausted Horr¡¯s Divine Shield, as well as all his other divine spells. He had also survived three attacks from Horr¡¯s divine weapon. Meanwhile, he still had the orb¡¯s Critical Wildfire and the Berserk Eye in reserve.


    In addition to the Devouring Fish Transformation, he still had a fair chance at capturing Horr¡¯s true form. However, the price that Greem would need to pay for such a feat was so immense that even could hardly imagine it.


    Still, Greem was someone who dared to risk. Since there was a chance to win it all, he would not give up on it so easily. After all, there were at least a dozen divine authority fragments, arge amount of divine virtue, and three pieces of divine equipment to be gained.


    This risk was more than worth it!


    Greem no longer hesitated after making up his mind. He instantly unleashed his full force.


    He shed in bloodybat with Horr out there in space.


    Surrounding them was the ten-armed giant, Remi, and the Earth Shatterer.


    The ten-armed giant abandoned all defense. All ten of its arms swung rapidly without stop, tossing gray stone spears toward Horr. Its attacks were no longer aiming to injure Horr itself. Instead, they were just meant to seal off any paths of escape and dodging, providing Greem with more chances at a critical strike in battle.


    The Earth Shatterer had already sustained incredible damage. Typically, Greem would have already put it away to prevent it from sustaining any irrecoverable injury. But right now, Greem wanted nothing more than for Horr to attack the Earth Shatterer a few more times.


    It would give Greem a few more opportunities to inflict devastating damage on Horr!


    Moreover, the Hysteresis Halo that the Earth Shatterer carried would slow down Horr¡¯s movement speed. Even though the effect wasn¡¯t entirely noticeable, any minor increase or decrease to abatant¡¯s power at this critical juncture would be crucial.


    Spirit of Pestilence Remi gave up on attacking. Instead, he unceasingly spat out gues and poison to corrode Horr¡¯s body. If one instance of poison were insufficient, then perhaps two or three would do; the point was, all the gue and poison stacked together had turned Horr into an utterly green hulk.


    Even though the damage that the poison inflicted was minimal, it still effectively broke down the defensive power of Horr¡¯s body.


    With the aid of his three subordinates, Greem was able to strike back against Horr¡¯s arrows with his mes. However, there were many times where he had to use his fire clones to take on some damage.


    Otherwise, if Greem¡¯s own life force were too low, it would be too easy for the Execute effect on Horr¡¯s divine bow to activate!


    In doing so, his three fire clones were the ones that suffered. They screamed and died horribly, one after another. The reason for their deaths was all the same; the Execute effect of the arrows had been triggered.


    The arrows striking them might inflict tremendous damage, but they weren¡¯t supposed to be lethal. However, when the Execute effect of the arrows triggered, a strange golden de would mysteriously appear above their heads. It would strike down silently.


    Execute. When the target creature¡¯s life force was below one-fifth of their maximum, their soul would instantly be extinguished.


    It was an incredibly unreasonable and barbaric divine principle. When it activated, there was no means of defending yourself other than relying on your own soul¡¯s inherent resilience and resistance.


    There was only a trace of Greem¡¯s soul consciousness in each of the three fire clones. Naturally, those fragments of his soul could not possibly endure the Execute effect. That was why the fire clones had erupted into scattered sparks the moment they were struck.


    The three fire clones dying meant that they had managed to block three lethal attacks for Greem. He took this opportunity to inflict unimaginable fire damage to Horr with his iparably violent fire spells.


    The life force of both parties rapidly decreased.


    However, Horr possessed Greater Restoration. He impatiently cast it on himself again once it was off cooldown. Supported by his tremendous divine power, all the damage to his body was rapidly recovering.


    If it weren¡¯t for Greem¡¯s outstanding damage, Horr would probably be all healed up and restored to full.


    That was, in fact, the most troublesome aspect of fighting a god in its true form!


    Through their god kingdom and uncountable believers, they had an inexhaustible amount of divine power that they could expend. They could cast the incredibly costly Greater Restoration, at best, only once a day for an ordinary Fifth Grade god. Meanwhile, Horr could cast it as many as three times.


    Any of Horr¡¯s enemies would have to go through the trouble of wearing down his life force three times if they wanted to kill him.


    Greem wasmunicating with the Chip even as he fought against the god.


    ¡°Chip, when exactly can I transform into the Devouring Fish and swallow him?¡±


    [Beep. The God of the Hunt¡¯s true form, in this weakened state, possesses 15 points of divine authority. Under such conditions, recklessly transforming into a Devouring Fish and devouring the target will only yield a 6% chance of killing the opponent.


    [Meanwhile, the odds of Host being killed in the process are as high as 88%.]


    ¡°Then, what should I do?¡±


    [Reduce the target creature¡¯s life force as much as possible.


    [When the target¡¯s life force has fallen below 80%, the odds of devouring will reach 13%.


    [When the target¡¯s life force has fallen below 60%, the odds of devouring will reach 17%.


    [When the target¡¯s life force has fallen below 40%, the odds of devouring will reach 25%.


    [When the target¡¯s life force has fallen below 20%, the odds of devouring will reach 34%.


    [When the target¡¯s life force has fallen below 10%, the odds of devouring will reach 53%.]


    Tssss!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air.


    Even in the best-case scenario where he reduced Horr¡¯s life force below 10%, Greem would only have a 53% chance of sessfully devouring him.


    Barely more than half.


    It was practically asking him to wager his life!


    Horr was a god that had been demoted from Sixth Grade, after all. He couldn¡¯t be regarded in the same way as an ordinary Fifth Grade god. A result like this was expected.


    However, that couldn¡¯t satisfy Greem.


    He let out a furious roar.


    ¡°And if I lower his life force to 1%?¡±


    [Odds of sess will reach 83%.]


    ¡°Screw it! I¡¯ll go in on these odds!¡±


    At that moment, some gods on the main battlefield seemed to have received Horr¡¯s call for help.


    Two Fifth Grade god clones and five orc petitioners rushed out of the battlefield and charged toward this battlefield.


    ¡°Ten-armed giant, Remi, stop them! Leave Horr to me!¡±


    Greem shouted, and his two subordinates left the battlefield to engage the enemy in the distance. Only Greem, Horr, and the Earth Shatterer were left here.


    The other summoned creatures had all died!


    ¡°Fight!¡±


    ¡°Die!¡±


    Horr seemed to have realized the approaching threat. He and Greem both let out a battlecry and unleashed their most vicious attacks on their opponent.


    Just as Horr¡¯s attention shifted to Greem, the overlooked Earth Shatterer self-detonated without any hesitation.


    Indeed, it blew itself up!


    A beginner Fifth Grade Earth Shatterer that had been fielded in battle for the first time hastily ended its own life.


    Its self-detonation unleashed a vicious st at the God of the Hunt.


    Greem struck instantaneously while the god scrambled to defend himself.


    Critical Wildfire!


    Berserk Eye!


    Fiery Refraction!


    Three Fifth Grade fire spells and the self-detonation of a Fifth Grade magical golem. Such devastating power was impossible to endure, even for the God of the Hunt.


    The Chip monitored Horr¡¯s condition as his life force dropped rapidly from 67% to 11%.


    Eleven percent...the odds of devouring now was only slightly more than 50%.


    Greem had already unleashed all his hidden aces, but the damage he inflicted was evidently still insufficient!


    Greem let out another shout. mes surged across his body as he lunged forward.


    Trading the opponent¡¯s life with his own.


    Horr struggled desperately. His life force continued to drop as heshed out at Greem.


    [9%...7%...4%...2%...1%...]


    Greem had never felt time pass by so slowly and painfully. He abandoned all defenses, focusing entirely on using his own life to wear away at Horr¡¯s life force.


    When the Chip indicated Horr¡¯s life force was at 1%, Greem finally let out a howl. He transformed into the Devouring Fish and swallowed the god in a single gulp.

 Chapter 1505 - Greem’s Harvest

    Chapter 1505 Greem¡¯s Harvest


    ne Saka. God Kingdom of the Beast God.


    A tragic howl suddenly rang out inside the giant orc temple.


    ¡°My true form...my actual self...who killed my true form?¡±


    Horr¡¯s clone, who had been meditating silently in the temple, suddenly stood up and let out a furious and mourning howl. His radiant body began to peel apart,yer byyer. Divine power started to disperse from his body, and even his soul showed signs of disintegration.


    Every god clone left in the temple couldn¡¯t help but open their eyes and watch in horror.


    Horr¡¯s true form had been killed?


    It was somewhat unimaginable, but it was the only exnation for what was currently happening.


    Supposedly, even if a god¡¯s true form was killed, the clone left behind could still survive, providing them with a sliver of hope for revival. However, the copse of a god kingdom and the breaking of divinity triggered by the death of a god¡¯s true body would result in a vicious bacsh that no clone could ever endure.


    Horr had taken most of his divine authority fragments with him when he went into battle. Only one divine authority fragment remained in the clone left in Arugel¡¯s temple. Obviously, this divine authority fragment wasn¡¯t enough to support the overwhelming divinity that had shifted over after the true form¡¯s death.


    That was why Horr¡¯s clone was showing signs of falling apart!


    To think, Horr had actually been killed on the battlefield by a Fifth Grade adept much weaker than himself. It was clearly a difficult truth for the gods to ept. They couldn¡¯t help but look down on Horr with disdain for that.


    Given the savagery and cruelty of the orc pantheon, useless fools like Horr were better off dead. The divinity he left behind could then be split between everyone else.


    However, letting one of his vassal gods die on the battlefield in this fashion would undoubtedly impact Arugel¡¯s authority tremendously.


    Arugel suddenly stood up from his throne. His giant, fierce eyes red with the mes of hatred. He waved his hand. Four perfect crystalline glowing orbs flew out of his body and into the trembling body of Horr¡¯s clone.


    The threat of Horr¡¯s clone disintegrating was finally put at ease!


    However, Horr had once been a Sixth Grade true god. It was impossible for him to sustain such a tremendous divinity domain with only five divine authority fragments.


    Arugel looked around the room with his fierce eyes and demanded coldly, ¡°Anyone else who has divine authority fragments to spare, hand them over to Horr. Put together ten fragments for him and let him stabilize at the level of a low-ranked god!¡±


    The numerous orc gods in the hall looked at each other and smiled bitterly.


    Divine authority fragments. Those were the lifeblood of every god!


    It was incredibly difficult to obtain them in the first ce. After the numerous battles, they had all experienced losses to varying degrees. Who among them had more fragments to spare?


    However, the Major God had spoken. As reluctant as they were, the other gods had no choice but to do as they were told.


    Soon, another five divine authority fragments flew toward Horr¡¯s clone.


    A total of ten divine authority fragments quickly merged inside the body of Horr¡¯s clone to form aplete divine authority. Sustained by such power, the threat of death finally faded from Horr¡¯s clone.


    From now on, God of the Hunt Horr would be demoted to the level of a low-ranked god. He would be no different than those new gods that had only recently ascended. The only difference would be that he had a more powerful divinity and greater wealth reserves than them.


    However, these things were only reminders of former glory for a once-Sixth Grade god. It was nothing to be happy about.


    ¡°Horr, what happened? Which Great Adept was it that killed you? Tell me their name. I will avenge you!¡± As the Major God of the orc pantheon, Arugel was beyond furious at having one of his subordinates suffer such a defeat.


    ¡°It¡¯s...it¡¯s......¡± Even though it hadn¡¯t been long since the death of his true form, the instinctual connection between souls meant that Horr¡¯s clone knew about everything that had transpired trillions of kilometers away. However, the fact that his powerful self had been devoured by a mere beginner Fifth Grade weakling. He really couldn¡¯t bring himself to say it.


    ¡°What is it? Do you doubt my power?¡± The hesitation of his subordinate infuriated Arugel even further. He shouted out loud, ¡°Tell me his name! It doesn¡¯t matter if it¡¯s a Seventh Grade Great Adept or the Eighth Grade Barbara herself. I will get revenge for you!¡±


    ¡°It was...a human adept called Greem!¡±


    ¡°Greem?¡± Arugel repeated this unfamiliar name. For a moment, he couldn¡¯t think of any amongst the high-grade Great Adepts who had this name. Arugel looked at the other gods. ¡°Any of you know this person?¡±


    They all shook their heads.


    Only God of Tyranny Haistoc¡¯s clone¡¯s expression changed. He seemed to recall something uncertainly.


    ¡°He...he¡¯s a beginner Fifth Grade adept!¡± Horr¡¯s clone¨Cno, what was now Horr himself¨Cfinally managed to finish his sentence.


    Buzz!


    The next moment, an overwhelming and violent consciousness caused the entire temple to shake.


    ¡°Beginner Fifth Grade?¡± Beast God Arugel¡¯s roar filled the skies, ¡°Horr, why don¡¯t you go ahead and die!¡±


    ............


    Greem was fleeing.


    Ever since he devoured Horr, he had be the public enemy of every orc god on the battlefield.


    Even the Sixth Grade One-Eyed God had cast his gaze toward him and was moving over with his lumbering form, let alone the Fifth Grade clones and orc petitioners.


    Greem turned and fled without hesitation.


    The god in his stomach had yet to fully die. He needed to find a safe ce to digest him entirely.


    Covered by the ten-armed giant and Remi, he fled straight to Boulder Fortress. He shut himself in his room and didn¡¯t show himself again.


    [Beep. Obtained one divine authority fragment.


    [Beep. Obtained one divine authority fragment.


    [Beep. Obtained one divine authority fragment.


    [......]


    [......]


    It was a simple notification sound, but Greem¡¯s blood boiled every time he heard it ring out!


    He no longer had the mind to keep track of the constant notifications. His entire being was reveling in overwhelming joy.


    There was no sound more beautiful than this!


    He would simply be willing to bask in this happiness forever and ever!


    It took one entire year for Greem to thoroughly digest Horr¡¯s true form. What he obtained was enough to make anyone¡¯s mouth run dry and their eyes turn red.


    He gained 17 fragments of divine authority.


    He gained 463 units of divine virtue.


    Over 117,000 divine power crystals.


    Sixth Grade Divine Weapon: Longbow of the Ancient Keepers, Rhok¡¯dr.


    Fifth Grade divine equipment (headpiece): Cor of the Deceiver.


    Fifth Grade divine equipment (boots): Boots of Avoidance.


    Sixth Grade equipment (dagger): Devil¡¯s Strike.


    Fifth Grade equipment (bracer): Deathblow Bracers.


    Fifth Grade equipment (belt): Ogre¡¯s Belt.


    Fifth Grade equipment (essory): Great Restoration.


    ......


    ......


    One had to admit that Horr¡¯s equipment matched his status as a former Sixth Grade mid-ranked god. Three pieces of divine equipment and a series of only Fifth and Sixth Grade equipment. It was blinding.


    This equipment was Fifth and Sixth Grade but not ssified as divine equipment because divine authority fragments had not been used as their main material when they were forged. Instead, the material had been reced with other rare resources. Consequently, the equipment could not form a soul resonance with the god and would be considerably less powerful.


    However, how bad could equipment used by a Sixth Grade god be?


    Obtaining this equipment instantly filled Greem¡¯s arsenal up!


    Once Greem digested everything, he opened the restrictions and protections around his room. A flood of magical messages rushed into his mind and caught him by surprise.


    All of them were requests for transmissions, with most of them being from Fifth Grade Great Adepts. There were also a dozen Sixth Grade Great Adepts trying to reach him. And even Seventh Grade Body-Refining Adept Erlenwald.


    ¡°See me immediately aftering out of seclusion!¡±


    Great Adept Erlenwald¡¯s message was simple, but it contained tremendous magical power behind it. Greem looked the message over and thought for a bit.


    A ¡®mere¡¯ dozen divine authority fragments shouldn¡¯t be enough to drive a Seventh Grade Great Adept to do something horrible to him. Still, you never knew. Who knew why Erlenwald was in such a hurry to talk to him?


    No matter how he thought about it, the only things Greem had that could draw his attention were the divine authority fragments.


    Greem hesitated for a few days, but he finally contacted Great Adept Erlenwald.


    Just as their consciousnesses connected, Greem felt the world around him spin and space itself distort. When his consciousness snapped back to sharpness, he found himself located in arge and majestic hall.


    The hall was empty save for a throne ced on a tall tform. An adept whose image was somewhat blurry sat silently there.


    ¡°You are Greem?¡± The tall adept did not move, but an overwhelming mental consciousness pressed down upon Greem.


    Greem¡¯s face changed. For the first time, he felt the terror of a Seventh Grade Great Adept!


    Everyone said that Fifth and Sixth Grade adepts manipted principle power, while Seventh and Eighth Grade adepts manipted world power. Greem hadn¡¯t understood this saying before. But now, upon experiencing the spiritual pressure of a Greater Adept, he finally understood.


    World power...this was world power!


    At this point, the mental consciousness of the Great Adept was no weaker than the nar consciousness of the World of Adepts.


    The two might be different in terms of total power, but they were undoubtedly of the same nature.


    Equally superior! Equally majestic! Equally eternal!

 Chapter 1506 - The Primordial Kindling

    Chapter 1506 The Primordial Kindling


    Looking at Erlenwald was like looking upon a perfect world!


    This strange sensation was not something that one could understand unless you experienced it for yourself.


    The mental consciousness of the Great Adept was as noble and vast as a nar consciousness itself. It gave rise to a strange sense of majesty, vastness, and awe that one would feel when facing the boundless sea. It was almost as if what Greem currently faced was not a person or a singr individual, but a perfect new worldplete with a self-contained system.


    Greem lowered his head.


    It wasn¡¯t out of force from Erlenwald¡¯s spiritual pressure, nor was Greem forcing himself to express respect. It was simply because of the genuine respect and admiration he was feeling.


    It was just like when he had firste into contact with the origin consciousness of the World of Adepts!


    That feeling of belonging and warmth that reminded him of the womb was something he could still remember clearly even now.


    The adept before him radiated a powerful life aura. It wasn¡¯t as vast or deep as a real neworld, but the sense of nobility and majesty was the same.


    Self-contained principles, aplete world, a cycle of life, endless and eternal.


    Greem bowed his head down seriously and sincerely.


    ¡°Kid, we meet again!¡± The adept didn¡¯t open his mouth to speak, but hismanding voice echoed in Greem¡¯s mind.


    It was indeed not the first time the two of them had met.


    Thest time they had met would be back when Greem was executing his mission in the Arcane Empire. Someone from among the adepts had unexpectedly sabotaged them on their way back; they almost died during the teleportation. If it hadn¡¯t been for Great Adept Erlenwald¡¯s aid then, Greem would probably not be here now.


    That was why Greem hastily replied in a respectful fashion, ¡°Greem expresses his regret for not having thanked my lord for his helpst time.¡±


    ¡°Hmph! There¡¯s nothing to thank me for. I just don¡¯t like it when certain people¡¯s arms get too long and reach into my territory!¡± The Great Adept grunted and said, ¡°Who would¡¯ve expected you to be so incredibly lucky. To think you would have been able to survive despite that bitch Maysa¡¯s grudge against you? And you were even able to stumble into such fortune.¡±


    Greem didn¡¯t know what to say in reply. He could only bow and listen respectfully to what the adept had to say.


    ¡°Alright, there¡¯s no need for any riddles. You should know why I called you over, right?¡±


    ¡°For those divine authority fragments?¡± Greem asked probingly.


    ¡°Hmph! As long as you know!¡± Erlenwled chuckled and said. ¡°We¡¯ve fought those orc brats for so long, and I still don¡¯t have enough fragments to make Seventh Grade magical equipment. That¡¯s a horrible feeling, I¡¯m telling you.¡±


    Since he was already being so direct, Greem didn¡¯t have much room to wiggle around. He could only smile and ask, ¡°May I know how many divine authority fragments my lord requires?¡±


    ¡°Ten fragments!¡±


    Ten fragments were equivalent to an entire divine authority.


    If a treasure like this were given to the stupidest and most useless individual in the world, they would still be able to ascend and be a true god. The significance was so immense that Greem, despite his intelligence and decisiveness, couldn¡¯t help but hesitate.


    ¡°Hmph! Kid, do you think that I, as a Seventh Grade Great Adept, would just take your treasures for nothing?¡± Erlenwald seemed to have seen through Greem¡¯s hesitation. Heughed coldly and said, ¡°Us adepts have always paraded the principle of equivalent exchange. Naturally, I won¡¯t break custom either. Take a look.¡±


    He waved his hand, and three one-meter-wide bubbles suddenly appeared in front of Greem. Each of them carried a prismatic treasure as they hovered in the air.


    ¡°This is some of my collection; they should fit your needs. Simply pick one for our exchange!¡±


    Greem¡¯s heart trembled when he heard Erlenwald¡¯s words.


    The collection of a Seventh Grade Great Adept. Any of these things would be invaluable treasures!


    He rubbed his eyes andmenced scanning each and every one of them.


    What floated inside the first bubble was a strange metal the size of a fist. It glowed a ghostly-purple shade, and the aura it gave off was very mysterious.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s line of sight, Erlenwald spoke up.


    ¡°This is a piece of Starfallen Godmetal! Its name might sound vulgar, but it is quite powerful indeed. It is a material that can only be obtained after extracting and refining an entire continent. If used to refine the flesh, it can improve a body-refining adept¡¯s immortal body by two entire levels immediately. As for a...principle adept like you, regardless of how terrible our Physique is, it will instantly be increased to 50 points!¡±


    Fifty points of Physique...wouldn¡¯t that make him reach the level of a Fifth Grade body-refining adept?


    Compared to his current 35 points, it was a ridiculous improvement!


    However, Erlenwald wasn¡¯t finished yet.


    ¡°Moreover, afterpleting the refinement of your Physique with this godmetal, you will be immune to all negative effects. All debuffing curse or magic will be ineffective against you!¡±


    Tssss!


    Greem drew in a breath of cold air. His eyes betrayed an unconceble desire when he looked at the metal again.


    He was a principle adept, and Spirit was the most important attribute for him. However, he did have the starbeast bloodline. If he could boost his Physique tremendously, the Devouring Fish Transformation could be used as an everyday means ofbat in the future!


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but fantasize about the possibilities, but making a hasty decision was unwise. With great determination, he turned his head to the second bubble.


    A ck liquid floated within it. It looked like a strange liquid monster struggling and twisting.


    Greem couldn¡¯t obtain any discernable or useful information no matter how the Chip scanned or analyzed. It was evidence that this was a high-grade resource that Fifth Grade Great Adepts should not have been able toe into contact with.


    ¡°This is the Essence of Destruction. I extracted it from the true form of an orc god. It contains arge amount of divine virtue of Destruction and a portion of the divinity of Destruction. If you are lucky enough, you might be able to obtain unique powers rted to Destruction after using it to refine your Spirit.¡±


    Destruction.


    Greem lowered his head and thought for a moment.


    Given the fundamental principles of the World of Gods, the fire principles were indeed under the domain of Destruction. They were a branch of Destruction. If the Chip could thoroughly analyze the Essence of Destruction, it would significantly improve his mes¡¯ might.


    Out of curiosity, Greem forced himself to look at the third bubble.


    A strange fire the size of a finger floated within it. Moreover, the fire¡¯s color and the attribute it radiated shifted and morphed as it flickered.


    ¡°This is the Primordial Kindling, an unusual principle fire. It contains all the fundamental fire principles required to forge a world of fire. It is an absolutely necessary item for a principle fire adept to continue advancing upward!¡± Erlenwald said calmly.


    ¡°I want it!¡± Greem made his decision without hesitation.


    As a fire adept and a principle adept, a top-ss resource that could directly impact his future growth was imperative.


    As for the other two items? Greem had no choice but to forcibly forget about them.


    The universe was a vast ce, and there were all sorts of rare treasures out there. As long as Greem could grow sufficiently, he would be able to travel anywhere he liked and find any treasure he desired.


    Greed was not advisable!


    It was best to put in more effort and investment into his talent for fire, as that would directly impact his future.


    Erlenwald didn¡¯t seem surprised by Greem¡¯s choice at all. He waved his hand and put away the other two bubbles while the Primordial Kindling slowly drifted to Greem.


    It remained wrapped in the bubble.


    Greem understood Erlenwald¡¯s meaning. He gritted his teeth and took out a piece of crystalline divine authority which he pushed toward the Seventh Grade adept.


    Erlenwald waved his hand, and the divine authority flew into his palm.


    Great Adept Erlenwald toyed with the divine authority for a while and examined its attributes. After confirming its authenticity, he pointed with his finger, and the bubble in front of Greem popped.


    The Primordial Kindling immediately erupted when it came into contact with the outside world. The fire energy it absorbed stacked around ityer byyer like armor, making it appear as if it would spread all over in a matter of seconds.


    Greem knew that high-grade principle fires like these had a trace of intelligence and their own will. They would slip away from your fingers if they find the chance.


    Greem opened his hand and snatched the Primordial Kindling from the raging mes before swallowing it in a single gulp. He couldn¡¯t be bothered by the effects of the strange fire.


    He couldn¡¯t feel safe having such a tremendous treasure anywhere else than in his Heart of Principles, guarded by the Orb of the Fire God!


    ¡°Alright, kid. Now that our trade is over, I¡¯ll send you on your way! As a reward for your tactfulness, here¡¯s my magical emblem. Keep it well. I can cover for you, whether it is in Boulder Fortress or at Camp Exodar. No one will dare bully or threaten you then!¡±


    Greem grabbed onto the metal te that Erlenwald had tossed at him. He couldn¡¯t help but break into a smile when he sensed the special magic aura on it.


    ¡°My gratitude, my lord!¡±


    ¡°This is nothing. It¡¯s only the reward you deserve!¡±


    Having said that, Erlenwald waved his hand, and Greem felt the same spatial disorientation as before. When he snapped back to his senses, he realized he was back in his room.


    ¡°Chip, scan the Primordial Kindling.¡±


    [Beep. Comprehensive scans have begun. Please wait!]


    After a long and arduous wait, the Chip¡¯s results were finally projected after three days.


    [Beep. Detected strange principle kindling.


    [53 basic fire principles detected within.


    [37 of said principles are known, while 16 are yet unknown.


    [Currently extracting samples of unknown fire principles.]


    So many of them.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but lick his lips in anticipation upon hearing the Chip¡¯s report!

 Chapter 1507 - Mini Fire World

    Chapter 1507 Mini Fire World


    [Beep. Analyzed one basic fire principle. Effect: Scorch.


    [Beep. Analyzed one basic fire principle. Effect: Burn.


    [Beep. Analyzed one basic fire principle. Effect: High-Heat.


    [Beep. Analyzed one basic fire principle. Effect: Extension.


    [......]


    [......]


    A wonderful series of notifications rang out. Greem couldn¡¯t be happier.


    As a fire adept, the more basic fire principles he possessed, the higher the odds ofbining them into high-grade principles.


    For instance, the Undying principle that Greem possessed was made bybining the five basic principles of Burn, Extension, Energy Combination, Ignite, and more. Fire¡¯s Imagebined seven basic principles, and the improved Fire¡¯s Clone contained eleven principles.


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how much broader Greem¡¯s path within the domain of fire would expand once he analyzed all these basic fire principles. As for which principles suited him best? He had far more choices than before.


    Moreover, the Primordial Kindling contained many previously unknown fire principles. It was an incredibly rare thing!


    Without something as convenient as that, Greem would have had to travel to countless worlds and undergo dangerous explorations to collect so many basic fire principles slowly.


    The danger behind that was easily imaginable!


    Moreover, to Greem¡¯s understanding, the path forward for principle adepts was to absorb more fire principles of a broader range and forge them all into aplete system resembling that of a neworld.


    It would be as if there was a microscopic world contained within the adept¡¯s body itself when that happened. The adept would no longer be affected by external principles or magic energy.


    After advancing to Seventh Grade, a principle adept would possess an independent, self-sustaining mini-world system. They would no longer seek external power. Individuals at that level could only be sealed. It would be very difficult to thoroughly kill them then.


    At the very least, they would be eternally undying as long as their mini-world remained intact!


    That was why Fifth Grade was only theoretically immortal. They were immune to ordinary sickness, aging, and death, but they would still inevitably fall and die after receiving an overwhelming attack. It was only at Seventh Grade that external attacks would have incredible difficulty wiping out one¡¯s soul brand.


    Against such an opponent, only entities of a higher grade that could peel their soul brand out of the world origin and extinguish it had a chance of wiping them out.


    Otherwise, even if their body and soul were both destroyed, they would still find means to be reborn through a long period of umtion and reformation.


    That was what truly made high-grade adepts terrifying!


    True immortality...was manifested in them!


    However, it was because high-grade Great Adepts were so terrifying that there were so few of them as well. Compared to therge number of Fifth and Sixth Grade Great Adepts, there were not many Great Adepts of Seventh Grade and above.


    Fifty-three basic fire principles wasn¡¯t a lot, but it wasn¡¯t minor either. They were enough for Greem to forge them into a miniature version of a mini fire-world. However, Greem was only a Fifth Grade at the moment. His Spirit was clearly insufficient to sustain the formation of a miniature fire-world.


    The first step was to do whatever he could to use this newly-gained power to enhance his Burning Domain.


    After all, the Burning Domain could be seen as the prototype of a miniature fire world!


    Greem would merge a basic fire principle into his Burning Domain once he analyzed it. What served as the stimnt for this process was arge amount of fire energy and the divine virtue he had just obtained.


    One had to admit that divine virtue was one of the most cost-efficient resources out there.


    After wiping out the divine consciousness within, divine virtue would be an incredibly active energy essence. Because of how pure an energy source it was, divine virtue could be used to increase lifespan, imbue equipment with divine characteristics, and mitigate conflicts between opposing types of energy.


    The deeper his research into divine virtue became, the more Greem desired this incredible resource.


    Now he truly understood why those Great Adepts hungered so much for divine origin that they fearlessly cast themselves onto the nar battlefields!


    After advancing to Fifth Grade, most adepts would have exhausted everyst ounce of potential from their body and Spirit. At this stage, even the tiniest of improvement¨Ceven increasing a base attribute by 1 point¨Crequired thousands of years of effort.


    The only things that could elerate this process were high-grade resources.


    In all honesty, most resources that could be found within material nes were utterly ineffective for Great Adepts. Only the best and rarest of resources could have the slightest of effects.


    However, these resources were often stockpiled in the hands of powerful races or individuals that ruled over entire worlds.


    War was inevitable to obtain them.


    That was why the process of collecting resources was long and painful, often apanied by endless ughter and bloody wars!


    It was a troublesome and annoying process, but these internar wars were actually very safe for the Great Adepts.


    Onlyrge-scale nar wars like the Beast Wars could allow the Great Adepts to grow rapidly and exponentially in a short amount of time.


    For instance, by risking it all and devouring Horr¡¯s true form, Greem had established a rock-solid foundation for his future development. At the very least, every roadblock standing in his way from Fifth Grade to Sixth Grade had been knocked down.


    With the Primordial Kindling, therge amount of divine virtue he had obtained, and the seven divine authority fragments still in his possession, Greem only needed to find a ce and seclude himself. After two to three thousand years, he would ascend to Sixth Grade.


    It was the very definition of how taking a momentary risk would yield untold rewards!


    That said, only the person himself could understand how dangerous and terrifying a situation he had put himself in to aplish this feat.


    With so many resources now in his possession, further participation in the Beast Wars would only spell doom for himself.


    Greem dared to say that he was on the Orc Pantheon¡¯s absolute-kill list now. If he dared set foot on the battlefield, those high-grade gods would definitely hunt him down, regardless of the fact that they were of a superior grade to him.


    Moreover, his enemies might not be limited to just the gods.


    He was a walking treasure chest right now. There were probably quite a few people among the adepts who had their eyes on him. If they got the opportunity, the identity of being an ally wouldn¡¯t be able to save him.


    That was why after finishing his exchange with Great Adept Erlenwald, Greem only rested for a little longer. He then rejected allbat assignments, imed his mission reward, and left.


    ............


    Fire Elementium ne. The Molten Altar.


    Greem was attracted by this majestic adept tower in front of him the moment he stepped out of the teleportation array.


    In thevake boiling with rumblingva, a three-hundred-meter-tall adept tower that took up all space within five hundred meters stood silently. The tower base disappeared beneath the dark red magma, and the structure itself was enveloped inyers of dark-red light.


    A gap opened on the tower¡¯s forcefield upon sensing Greem¡¯s soul aura. Greem appeared inside a magical hall of the building with Fire Teleportation.


    ¡°Wee back, master!¡±


    Emberweb Broodmother Lasbes and Split-Brain Sock bowed and greeted Greem with a troop of magical machines behind them. Many other fire creatures of various forms stood behind them, including the Third Grade leader of the molten giants.


    ¡°Well done! You all will be rewarded based on your contributions in a bit!¡± Greem stood upon the stone tform of the hall and looked down at these two subjects of his silently. ¡°Has the enlightenment ritual been prepared?¡±


    ¡°The preparations have beenpleted. We were only awaiting your return!¡± Sock put on a fawning smile.


    ¡°Let us begin then!¡± Greem gave an order, and everyone immediately split up and went to work.


    The enlightenment ritual was the most important ritual for an adept tower once its construction wasplete.


    The adept had to split off part of their soul into a soul shard and ce it within the main control crystal. It would be the primary consciousness of the tower spirit. It was a crucial step that could not be left to the hands of another individual.


    An adept tower was only consideredplete once it had undergone the enlightenment ritual!


    As Greem¡¯s personal dwelling the next few thousand years, this tower was known as Fire Throne in memory of his oldir in the Central Lands that had been destroyed.


    As the Crimson n¡¯s leader, Greem still had absolute authority over all n affairs, even leaving the World of Adepts. Under his instructions, two mega magic generator furnaces had been installed in the energy room in the first basement level, apart from the most basic elementium altars and elementium pool.


    They would be the power source for the entire tower.


    Potent, surging space energy was taken in by the mega generator furnaces, which was then stored in the energy pool. The purification arrays carved onto the four walls of the energy pool would tame the violent chaos energy into wieldable magic energy. The energy would then be transported to every corner of the tower through magical channels and circuits.


    The various elementium energies extracted by the elementium altars would be stored in various elementium pools to support the daily consumption of the adept tower. Meanwhile, the magic energy of the generator furnaces was the core power that would be used to sustain the tower¡¯s massive magical array system.


    The two different energy systemsplemented each other, creating a perfect and self-sustaining adept tower!


    Activating the energy room.


    The enlightenment ritual.


    Separating an alternate dimension to create a personal storage space.


    All these trivial matters took Greem three days and nights of work to finallyplete. During this process, a subtle and well-hidden spiritual flux observed his every action.


    However, the moment the tower spirit was born, the defensive system of the adept tower activated. That reluctant spiritual flux was then kept at bay, unable to peer into the tower any longer.


    Perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s refusal to engage with it, the spiritual flux lightly touched the tower¡¯s defenses and sent Greem a request formunication.

 Chapter 1508 - Sunfire Cape and the Ancient Red Dragon

    Chapter 1508 Sunfire Cape and the Ancient Red Dragon


    It seemed like the soul fragment of the Eighth Grade Fire Hierarch was refusing to give up!


    Greem hesitated for a moment but ultimately opened a gap in the forcefields to let the spiritual flux in.


    ¡°Kid, you¡¯re real mean, aren¡¯t you? To think, you would be gone for so long once you left!¡± The spiritual flux impatiently started griping upon entering.


    ¡°O¡¯ Great Lord Gomanreas, if you have nothing else to say, please forgive me for not dealing with you! I am a very busy man,¡± Greem put on an icy front.


    ¡°Kid, I smell the scent of divine authority fragments on you again...how strange. Your power isn¡¯t all that impressive, so how is it that you can always obtain such unexpectedly high-grade resources? Tsk, tsk, tsk.¡±


    ¡°I got my hands on these by throwing myself onto the battlefield! Alright, if you have nothing more to say, I will need to go rest now!¡±


    ¡°Hold on,¡± Gomanreas couldn¡¯t help but speak up. ¡°Kid, think about it a little more. As long as you are willing to sacrifice divine authority fragments to me, I can provide you with unimaginable benefits.¡±


    ¡°Do you have a habit of making empty promises, my lord? ¡°Greem smiled coldly and took out a divine authority fragment and tossed it lightly in his palm. The shining crystal reflected an enchanting prismatic light. ¡°If you want to trade, why don¡¯t you list what you have to offer. I will trade with you if it¡¯s satisfactory. There¡¯s no need for all this beating around the bush!¡±


    Gomanreas¡¯ soul abruptly paused for a moment. The spiritual flux lingered on the divine authority fragment for a while before recovering to normal.


    ¡°My true form is no longer present, my soul has been scattered throughout the Fire Elementium ne, and my god kingdom ispletely gone. However, as a former Fire Hierarch, I do indeed still have some things left in my possession. Those things...can¡¯t just be exchanged for that one measly divine authority fragment in your possession.¡±


    Having said that, Gomanreas was immediately stunned again as he watched Greem produce a second fragment out of nowhere. His spiritual flux started to waver.


    ¡°Those still aren¡¯t enough...¡±


    Then, there were three divine authority fragments in Greem¡¯s hand.


    A hint of impatience also appeared on Greem¡¯s face.


    Gomanreas knew that if he didn¡¯t show anything that could interest Greem soon, he would probably be chased out of here.


    ¡°These still aren¡¯t enough! However, I can show you what I have first.¡±


    An unusual mental flux rippled, and a slowly rotating image of an object appeared in the air.


    There was an intricate cape woven out of the red feathers. Pure magical fire flowed along the fabric, making it outstandingly beautiful.


    ¡°Sunfire Cape, a Sixth Grade magical item, woven entirely out of the tail feathers of high-grade phoenixes. It contains the Firefeather and Fire Halo ability. It has a base defensive power of 50,000 points and can reflect 20% of all damage. Moreover, the mythical phoenix¡¯s magical characteristic will allow the item¡¯s owner to enjoy the privilege of rebirth once a day!¡± Gomanreas exined in a soft voice.


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but draw in a breath of cold air.


    What a powerful artifact of fire!


    Not only did it have very high base defense, but it could even reflect a portion of the enemy¡¯s attacks. More importantly, having this item meant having one chance of being revived every day. It was quite an amazing item when all these factors were taken into consideration!


    Still, Greem was somewhat dissatisfied that Gomanreas could only produce a single Sixth Grade item despite once being an Eighth Grade Fire Hierarch.


    ¡°O¡¯ Great Lord Gomanreas, could it be that...you have nothing of Seventh or Eighth Grade to show?¡± Greem grumbled.


    ¡°Seventh or Eighth Grade?¡± Gomanreas was surprised. ¡°Kid, you don¡¯t think Seventh and Eighth Grade items can be found anywhere, do you? Even back then, I only possessed one Eighth Grade artifact and three Seventh Grade artifacts.¡±


    ¡°Well, show them to me!¡± Greem said impatiently.


    In all honesty, Greem had never even seen what items above Sixth Grade looked like!


    ¡°But most of those things were destroyed in the final battle. Even what remained was split up between the Fire Kings. How could there be anything still remaining?¡±


    ¡°So even this Sunfire Cape is just for show?¡±


    ¡°Well, not the cape. That¡¯s what¡¯s left of my god kingdom. A small chunk of it remained and turned into a miniature ne, which allowed some things to be preserved. That¡¯s why I still have some items left!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s good. Well, how do you intend to trade? I sacrifice three divine authority fragments to you, and you give me the Sunfire Cape?¡±


    ¡°This...we might need to negotiate a little more!¡± Gomanreas suddenly paused as if there was something he was hesitant to say.


    ¡°What do you mean?¡±


    ¡°An ancient red dragon survived the fall of my god kingdom; it currently resides in that miniature ne and treats it as itsir. So, if you do want that cape, you might...just maybe...perhaps...have to make it past the ancient red dragon first!¡±


    ¡°Ancient red dragon? What grade is it?¡± Greem was shocked to hear this.


    ¡°Seventh Grade!¡±


    ¡°Farewell!¡± Greem expelled Gomanreas¡¯ spiritual flux without any hesitation and closed the defenses of the tower once more.


    A Seventh Grade ancient red dragon. Goddamn! Wouldn¡¯t he be marching to his death if he were to actually go!?


    As for why there was a Seventh Grade ancient red dragon in Gomanreas¡¯ god kingdom? Nothing was surprising about that. As an Eighth Grade Fire Hierarch, it was unavoidable that he would have a bunch of high-grade subordinates under him.


    The ancient red dragon had likely once been his pet!


    That was only because Gomanreas was Eighth Grade and the ancient red dragon was Seventh Grade. Their positions were incredibly different, which was why the dragon was so obedient to him. However, their roles werepletely reversed now. Gomanreas only had a fragment of his soul left. What was he supposed to use tomand a Seventh Grade ancient red dragon?


    It wasn¡¯t hard to imagine how the dragon went rogue.


    Gomanreas¡¯ soul was still persistently trying to contact Greem, but Greem simply ignored him.


    This soul definitely had a bunch of good stuff in his position. He wouldn¡¯t easily give them up until he was desperate. Greem made sure to really take his time and keep Gomanreas hanging.


    He had plenty of time anyway. He didn¡¯t mind spending hundreds of years ying with him!


    After kicking Gomanreas aside, Greem headed straight for the magical prison inside the tower. A prisoner he was greatly interested in was still imprisoned here!


    Dracolich Truman was tied to a red metal pir inside a dim and dark dungeon. A chain forged of adamantium passed through his corbone, shoulder bones, ribs, and limbs. This chain burned with golden mes.


    The Undying me constantly seared his soul and body, leaving the dracolich on the brink of death. The fire would then stop and allow the undead to recover some magic energy. The powerful regenerative abilities of the dracolich allowed him to recover quickly.


    Then another round of torture would begin!


    It was a repetitive and terrifying process that was ongoing.


    It had been a dozen years since Greem brought Dracolich Truman here from ne Gere. Greem had never interrogated or talked to him once during this time. He had simply left him here alone to suffer.


    When Greem once again stood in front of the dracolich, the creature was on the verge of breaking down. He had almost gone insane!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. No sentient creature could endure such seemingly endless torture.


    Dracolich Truman had believed himself to be important in the past and was prepared tost until the end for his faith. Who would¡¯ve thought the adept would just cast him aside and say nothing for a dozen years, only leaving Truman to suffer!


    This kind of neglect was what terrified Truman the most!


    ¡°Have you made up your mind? Hand over your phctery, and I¡¯ll let you go. You will also have some degree of freedom to speak of. If you have the guts to refuse me, the next time I¡¯ll see you will be in a hundred years,¡± Greem said nonchntly, as if he would turn and leave at a single word of refusal.


    Truman truly couldn¡¯t stand it any longer!


    He was an undead creature; living for up to ten thousand years was no trouble at all. If he was really going to be tortured for so long, what was the point of having been revived as a dracolich in the first ce!?


    Dracolich Truman lowered his head in pain.


    Greem watched closely as the dracolich dejectedly cast a spell and opened a portal to an alternate dimension where he took out his phctery.


    It was a purple box embedded with all sorts of magical gemstones. Strange and profound magical circuits were drawn all over it. You could sense the slightly fluctuating soul aura even through theyers of magical forcefields and barriers.


    Truman knelt on the ground and offered up his phctery with both hands.


    Greem took the phctery with his hands and scanned it with the Chip to confirm its authenticity. He then carefully put it away. As a beam of scarlet light shone on his fingertip, he drew a fire rune on Truman¡¯s forehead. He finally nodded in satisfaction as he saw the rune slowly etch into the undead¡¯s skull.


    With the phctery as a hostage and this fire brand, Greem could finally trust the dracolich to some extent.


    ¡°This adept tower is located in the Fire Elementium ne. Since it¡¯s not a suitable ce for you to live in, I will arrange a different ce for you. I will send you to the World of Adepts shortly. You will help Mary managed the Crimson n and Horton Magic Academy! Furthermore, here are a few more things. Deliver them to Mary and tell them they are gifts from me!¡± Having said that, Greem waved his hand, and a bunch of things drifted before Dracolich Truman.


    A divine authority fragment, ten points of divine virtue, a thousand divine power crystals, the Sixth Grade Rhok¡¯dr, Longbow of the Ancient Keepers, the Fifth Grade Boots of Avoidance, and the Fifth Grade Deathblow Bracers.


    Dracolich Truman licked his lips greedily when he saw the series of top-ss treasures and resources before him. For the first time, he understood the wealth of this new master of his.


    Damn! Were these things that a Fifth Grade human adept should own? If you were willing to give me any one of those things, I would have surrendered a long time ago.


    Dracolich Truman thought so with endless resentment!

 Chapter 1509 - Mary’s Future

    Chapter 1509 Mary¡¯s Future


    The World of Adepts, Central Lands.


    The Crimson Wing.


    The sixty-third floor of the Crimson n¡¯s origin tower. Mary, Meryl, and several other higher-ups of the n hade to meet with a messenger from space.


    A rarely seen dracolich!


    Moreover, it was at peak Fourth Grade. That made him a powerful force even within the World of Adepts.


    Any other Fourth Grade powerhouse would not be all that scary if they were alone. However, the presence of a Fourth Grade lich meant the possibility of a powerful and savage undead army. A single lich alone couldmand such an overwhelming force.


    A lich alone was an army!


    Moreover, this was no ordinary lich, but a noble even amongst liches¨C a dracolich. Even if it weren¡¯t here with the banner of the n leader, its identity alone would warrant the Crimson n¡¯s attention.


    This mysterious dracolich hastily walked forward and bowed when he saw Mary.


    ¡°My greetings, mistress!¡±


    Mistress?


    The higher-ups looked at each other and quickly understood what was happening.


    It seemed like this was another subordinate that Lord Greem had managed to recruit in space.


    ¡°You,¡± Mary paused and said, ¡°You¡¯re Greem¡¯s subordinate?¡±


    ¡°Yes, mistress!¡± Dracolich Truman smiled fawningly. ¡°My name is Truman, and I only recently joined my master¡¯s side. I am here at your disposal, in ordance with my master¡¯s orders!¡±


    ¡°Ah. So, where is Greem right now? It¡¯s been a very long time since hest contacted us,¡± Mary had still been asking nervously in the previous question, but the next sentence was filled with resentment.


    Dracolich Truman looked at Meryl, Emelia, and Billis. He started to hesitate.


    ¡°Feel free to speak! They are all trusted individuals!¡± Mary eximed decisively.


    ¡°Very well...my master currently resides in the Fire Elementium ne. He is currently in a seclusion of sorts!¡±


    ¡°Mm? It hasn¡¯t been long since he left the World of Adepts. It should be a time for exploration and adventures. Why is he in seclusion in the Fire Elementium ne?¡±


    ¡°My lord has just recently participated in an orc war organized by an Eighth Grade adept and has only now retreated from the battlefield. The tremendous number of spoils he was able to obtain is more than enough for him to reach Sixth Grade. That is why he has chosen to go into seclusion and slowly increase his power.¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s growing really fast! Could it be...that he¡¯s already preparing for Sixth Grade?¡±


    ¡°Indeed. My lord personally said that there were no longer any obstacles on his path to Sixth Grade. The only things he stillcks are the increase of his Spirit and the umtion of resources. There are no shortcuts for either of those. He will have to grind it out!¡±


    Hss! That fellow is improving faster and faster! Could it be that even I can no longer catch up to him?


    Mary thought silently to herself, her expression betraying her frustration and struggle.


    The other three higher-ups who were listening by the side couldn¡¯t help but be shocked. Their eyes opened wide as they stared at each other. They honestly had no idea what expression or reaction they should have right now.


    Their n leader was improving a little too quickly, wasn¡¯t he? It was so rapid that it almost extinguished all thoughts of catching up to him! Moreover, what would be the limit of his growth? He wouldn¡¯t just keep sprinting down this path at the same rate and be one of those higher existences, would he?


    Even though the three of them were definitely biased toward their n leader, the truth was that they had long since been impressed with the idea that their n leader would eventually be one of the most powerful entities out there.


    However, given their potential and ability, they could only apany him for a short period of a few hundred years. By the time their n leader became famous throughout the universe, they would probably be rotting in their graves.


    If they didn¡¯t work hard and keep improving, they wouldn¡¯t even be able to cheer for him from afar, let alone apany him!


    The dracolich had no idea how a few simple words from him had raised a tumultuous wave of emotions in the minds of the adepts.


    For a moment, everyone was stunned!


    ¡°My lord sent me here with a few things for you as well. Hopefully, they can help you make it past the threshold of Fifth Grade as soon as possible,¡± The dracolich couldn¡¯t understand theplex emotions everyone was feeling. He simply continued speaking.


    ¡°Oh, what is there? Show me!¡± Mary wasn¡¯t all too bothered by this revtion.


    After all, the divine virtue and divine power crystals fromst time already caused a pretty bigmotion in the Central Lands. At this point, she was still quite frustrated that she had to constantly send away those bastards that tried toe and trade for divine virtue.


    Dracolich Truman sighed and raised his hand to release a bunch of treasures from his storage ring. The entire magical hall was instantly illuminated with blinding light.


    A mysterious, prismatic crystal hovered in the air, slowly spinning.


    For some reason, Meryl and the others couldn¡¯t turn their gaze away from it.


    Their throats trembled. Their eyes were filled with infatuation. They couldn¡¯t help but reach out. They wanted nothing more than to take this crystal for themselves. Unfortunately, their hands were all repelled by an invisible force.


    A cold and sinister spiritual flux rippled out and caused them toe to their senses.


    Mary was sitting high up on her throne. She looked upon this crystal excitedly, but her expression wasplicated and changed every so often.


    Finally, she reached out with one hand and waved. The divine authority fragment slowly flew toward her palm and spun there.


    ¡°Divine...authority...fragment!¡± Bug Adept Billis¡¯ hood raised slightly as two glows shone crimson from under the shadow. He named the crystal dramatically with his hoarse voice.


    It was no wonder that Meryl, Emelia, and Billis were so impulsive. The temptation of the divine authority fragment was too immense for them.


    When it came to sheer talent and potential, Emelia was the best among them. However, even her future odds of sessfully advancing to Fifth Grade was no more than 2 percent.


    Under such circumstances, a top-ss resource like a divine authority fragment would undoubtedly be incredibly helpful!


    Being able to advance to Fifth Grade meant ten thousand years of lifespan and a lofty, transcendent status. Either one of these was an incredibly tempting thing for an adept struggling at the gates of Fifth Grade.


    Mary closed her right hand gently, grabbing the fragment in her palm. She could distinctly sense the pure principles turning within the divine authority fragment. It was a strange feeling, like constantly merging and synchronizing with the ne system itself.


    Mary felt like she could sense every pulse of the world as she held the fragment. She could even faintly make out the massive and mysterious will that permeated this world.


    Traces of principle power connected this fragment with the rest of the world. It allowed Mary to sense the presence of the principle system for the first time.


    Mary held the divine authority fragment tightly as her emotions fluctuated.


    Other people might not know Greem¡¯s intentions in sending this divine authority fragment to her, but Mary knew it clearly.


    Greem was giving Mary a new choice!


    Mary was a bloodline adept, and while vampires improved rapidly, they started to stall out upon reaching Fourth Grade. There weren¡¯t very many vampires across the universe that had managed to make it past Fifth Grade to Mary¡¯s understanding. There were only some rumors of bloodsucking creatures beyond Fifth Grade in the Abyssal World.


    If this was true, it meant that the bloodline limit of the vampire adepts was Fourth Grade. The bloodline limit would stand in the way of making any further progress!


    In consideration of the future, Greem had sent over this divine authority fragment.


    If the path of a bloodline adept was truly sealed off, then Mary still had one new path to choose from¨C to ascend into godhood.


    In truth, many high-grade adepts who had lost all future prospects sought to ascend into godhood if they refused to simply die off. They would find a small lesser ne and spread their faith there, spending hundreds of years to raise faithful believers. They would then gather all the faith power of the ne and ascend to be a voodoo god.


    However, adepts like these were considered ¡®alternative.¡¯ They were no longer epted by the mainstream and often kept to themselves. They hardly ever maintained contact with their former adeptpanions.


    As the bloodline source of most vampire adepts in the World of Adepts currently, Mary naturally received their worship and admiration. The process of bing a god would undoubtedly be much easier for her if that were what she desired.


    After thinking for a long time, Mary finally put the divine authority fragment away and turned to look at the other things.


    Ten balls of light glowing with divine radiance.


    Divine virtue! Divine virtue!


    Moreover, ten of them all at once.


    The one thousand divine power crystals seemed less impressive before them.


    Just as Mary believed there to be nothing else that could shock her like the divine authority fragment had, her eyes fell upon the prismatic glowing bow.


    She didn¡¯t know the bow¡¯s name, nor its grade level, but her eyes couldn¡¯t move away from it once it hadnded there.


    A Sixth Grade divine bow, Fifth Grade divine boots, and Fifth Grade bracers.


    Every one of these things was so valuable and tempting that Mary couldn¡¯t help but toy with them for a while before she put them away.


    Meryl and the two others could finally let out their breaths once the prismatic light was all gone.


    What was it with their master? How did he suddenly have so many top-ss treasures rted to the gods? Could he...could he have robbed a true god?


    The few of them probably would never have guessed that their master was far more insane than they took him for. He hadn¡¯t robbed a true god¨C he had devoured one!


    Mary naturally knew the value of these treasures could no longer be appraised with this neworld¡¯s value system. Thus, she reminded Meryl and the others that information on these treasures could not be leaked. Otherwise, untold dangers would be brought upon the n.


    Meanwhile, Dracolich Truman officially joined the Crimson n, bing the third powerhouse of the n after Mary and Alice!


    A peak Fourth Grade dracolich was a terrifyingly powerful existence in any neworld. Thus, the strength of the Crimson n was amplified by a dozen times once again!

 Chapter 1510 - Alice’s Pain

    Chapter 1510 Alice¡¯s Pain


    World of Adepts. The territory of the Northern Witches.


    The Tower of Fate.


    A routine, daily Fate prayer ceremony had just concluded. Several dozen Fate Witches were filing out of the astrology hall in an orderly fashion. Alice, the host of the ceremony, stood silently in the center of the starlight array, feeling the Fate power as it merged with her body like tiny raindrops.


    ¡°Teacher, there seems to be something on your mind today,¡± The sweet voice of a girl came from behind. It was Lucia.


    It had been many years now. This daughter of Fate had turned from a child to a beautiful young woman. A round face, a high nose, thin lips, eyes as bright as ck grapes, and her youthful and explosive figure all revealed her incredible beauty.


    Strangely enough, she didn¡¯t wear the traditional starlight robe of the Fate Witches. Instead, she had on an incredibly simple arcane robe. However, to indicate her status as an astrologist, magical patterns representing the sun, moon, and stars were woven into the robe¡¯s edges.


    Alice sighed as she turned around. She looked Lucia up and down and said, ¡°What is it? Do you still intend to walk the path of an arcanist?¡±


    ¡°Yup! ¡°Lucia replied softly, but the determination between her brows couldn¡¯t be more obvious. ¡°I firmly believe that the only truth of this world is tough, relentless research of the arcane arts! After all, the Fate power that we obtain by praying day and night is ultimately a power bestowed upon us.¡±


    ¡°Power is power. Is there a difference?¡± Alice¡¯s eyes were filled with unconceble appreciation and doting love for the girl.


    ¡°Yes! If Fate can give us power, then Fate can also take it away. Once Fate no longer favors us, we will no longer possess anything. We will bepletely useless. However, the arcane arts are different. No one can take away the arcane knowledge we¡¯ve obtained through our own research. No one at all!¡±


    Alice sighed and reached out to caress Lucia¡¯s silky smooth hair. ¡°Kid, you should know that if you insist on this line of thought, your level in astrology will never reach Fourth Grade! What Fate requires is utter devotion, not half-hearted efforts!¡±


    ¡°I know, but I would rather believe in a power that I truly own!¡± Lucia might be young, but she already held the dual status of both a Third Grade arcanist and a Third Grade astrologist.


    The arcanist profession required one¡¯s eyes to be open and to embrace the truth of the world. They rejected all that was illogical and all that was not knowledge. Meanwhile, astrologists required one to shut their eyes and zealously cast themselves into the embrace of Fate, listening to its guidance wherever it called them.


    Fundamentally, these two professions were utterly opposed, so much so that there was no room for tolerance!


    Strangely enough, both these professions merged perfectly in Lucia!


    ¡°What ns do you have for your future?¡± Alice asked curiously.


    ¡°I intend to continue improving myself, then go to the Abyssal World,¡± Lucia grit her teeth and said.


    ¡°Why would you want to go to the Abyssal World! That ce is filled with ugly and evil demonic creatures. It¡¯s hardly a ce for a prettydy like yourself!¡±


    ¡°I must go there!¡± Lucia said solemnly, ¡°Because I heard that many of the surviving arcanists have fled into the Abyssal World and are barely making it by. I...I wish to fight alongside them!¡±


    Alice sighed once again and said softly, ¡°The demons of the Abyssal World will not care for your ideals or beliefs. They will only tear apart your flesh and devour your soul. Thosepanions of yours have been living in the Abyssal World for over two hundred years by now. Are you sure they are still the same people as they once were?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know! Perhaps most of them have already been corrupted by the Abyssal consciousness! Even so, I wish to see for myself...even if only one person remains, I want to drag him out of that hell myself!¡± For some reason, when Lucia said that, her soft face suddenly glowed with an incredibly pure and holy light.


    ¡°Then work hard! The identity of a Third Grade arcanist won¡¯t be enough. You will need to at least have the strength of a Fifth Grade to go exploring in the Abyssal World.¡±


    ¡°I understand, which is why I will work harder from now on!¡±


    ¡°Now, I finally understand what your faith is! It¡¯s not that you are faithless; that which you worship resides not in the material, but inside yourself. That is perhaps the greatest difference between you and me!¡±


    ¡°Teacher Alice, you...you¡¯ve been spouting a lot of wisdom today. Could you be missing that Greem fellow again?¡± Lucia finally asked out of curiosity.


    The wholepassionate-elder image that Alice had earlier immediately crumbled at the question.


    She rolled her eyes at Lucia unamusedly and said, ¡°Since you don¡¯t intend to be a Fate Witch, don¡¯t call me teacher anymore. Just call me by my name!¡±


    ¡°Then...Alice, were you thinking about Lord Greem earlier?¡± Lucia clearly did not intend to let Alice shake off the question. She giggled and pursued.


    ¡°Cough!¡±Alice sighed and pulled Lucia into her arms as she said, ¡°Not so much thinking about him as...worrying about him!¡±


    ¡°Aren¡¯t those two things the same?¡± Lucia peeked her head out from under Alice¡¯s chest and asked. ¡°Moreover, I heard Greem¡¯s been doing quite well for himself! He even sent back a bunch of good stuff to Mary a while ago. Man, those things, even I can¡¯t help but drool at the thought of them! Alice, you aren¡¯t angry that he didn¡¯t bring you presents as well, are you?¡±


    Alice didn¡¯t know how to respond to the teasing and stuffed the girl¡¯s little head back into her chest.


    ¡°Aaah...Alice, do you intend to suffocate me? You...you seem to have gotten a little bigger there again!¡±


    ¡°You naughty kid! You¡¯ve be just like him now!¡± Alice¡¯s face turned bright red, but it was quickly reced by a wave of sadness.


    ¡°Sis, what¡¯s troubling you?¡±


    ¡°This is the tragedy of us Fate Witches!¡± For some reason, Alice had been sighing more and more frequently now. ¡°Even though we see Fate and know everything that will happen to our lover, we cannot say a single word about it.¡±


    Lucia was stunned.


    This time, she knew well enough not to ask. Instead, she simply listened quietly.


    She was a Third Grade astrologist herself. Naturally, she knew of the taboos for Fate Witches. Many things couldn¡¯t be revealed. Should those things be revealed, it would cause disruptions to the known Fate. When that happened, even more unpredictable and uncontroble splits and branches would ur to Fate.


    That was why Alice would say anything herself if it was something she could and was willing to speak about. Meanwhile, the things that she couldn¡¯t talk about would only end up harming everyone if Lucia asked about them.


    ¡°Lucia, perhaps your choice is the correct one! The longer you walk on the path of Fate, the lonelier it gets. We can¡¯t say or do anything even if we see the horrible future that our lover is about to face.


    ¡°If I don¡¯t say or do anything, he might still have the slimmest of chances to survive. But if I were to speak up or put anything to action, he might just lose thisst thread of hope.


    ¡°It¡¯s... excruciating. I feel so powerless. Sometimes, I really hate this ability of mine. Perhaps, beingpletely ignorant of Fate¡¯s arrangements and being able to live every day happily would be true bliss!¡±


    Alice finished what she had to say. She hugged Lucia tightly as her tears finally rolled down her cheeks and soaked the girl¡¯s hair.


    Lucia could only sigh helplessly and return the hug.


    ............


    Fire Elementium ne, Fire Throne.


    When a beautiful and blinding light shone from the adept tower, everything within six kilometers of Molten Altar became Greem¡¯s territory.


    Supposedly, taking possession ofnd in the Fire Elementium ne as a human adept should have triggered the rage of the Fire Elementium ne. High-grade fire creatures would have appeared to intervene.


    However, Greem had long since established good rtions with the nearby Fire Kings and dealt with any individuals that might pose a problem.


    When he finally showed his banner and outlined his territory, not only were there no riots from the locals, there were even messengers from the Fire Kings.


    Fire King Zetas and Thanos naturally wouldn¡¯te in person. They couldn¡¯t be bothered with an outsider like Greem. However, out of respect for Fire King Groms, they sent their own messengers, and friendly rtions of a sort were established.


    After all, Greem was able to make air in the Fire Elementium ne due to Groms¡¯ help. Naturally, Greem was considered part of Groms¡¯ faction.


    Greem neither acknowledged or denied this association. He simply glossed over it!


    It couldn¡¯t be helped. After all, Greem was still an outsider to the Fire Elementium ne. Though he had managed to get acquainted with the nar consciousness through a world sacrifice, he wasn¡¯t a local creature.


    It was only natural that he had to ride on the coattails of someone else¡¯s reputation to establish himself!


    Fortunately, Greem¡¯s identity as a fire adept waspatible with this world, which was why the locals didn¡¯t severely reject him.


    Once Fire Throne began functioning, Greem ended his days of wandering. He finally had a home of his own.


    After dealing with all the matters of the World of Adepts and Camp Exodar, he went into seclusion in Fire Throne and began the next step toward improving his might.


    The results of the orc war had left him filled and bloated.


    The divine authority fragments would be sealed off temporarily until he could find a way to maximize their value. Meanwhile, he directly absorbed therge amount of divine virtue. Greem used some of it to increase his base attributes, while the rest was used to nourish his increasingly powerful starbeast bloodline.


    Greem¡¯s base power changed tremendously as the days slowly passed!

 Chapter 1511 - The Fruit of Bliss

    Chapter 1511 The Fruit of Bliss


    Fire Elementium ne, Fire Throne.


    Greem sat silently in a room reading the Tome of Corruption. Iplete words and damaged spell models asionally flickered across the intricate and beautiful pages.


    Every time this happened, a blue light would flicker in Greem¡¯s eyes as the Chip forcibly recorded the data and stored it in its database.


    After all these years of umtion and stockpiling, the number of resources stored in his mind was incredible. If it weren¡¯t for the Chip silently organizing and categorizing everything behind the scenes, it would have been difficult for Greem alone to have sifted out the valuable high-grade knowledge within that uncountable amount of fragmented data.


    While he was happily sacrificing his Spirit to obtain the knowledge fragments within the Tome of Corruption, a familiar spiritual flux came into contact with the tower¡¯s defense.


    Stubborn yet firm, filled with an unyielding sense of determination!


    Greem sighed and finally opened up a gap in the defenses.


    Gomanreas¡¯ soul aura reached inside once more.


    ¡°Hi, kid! I thought of another good thing again!¡±


    ¡°Thought of, think of, thought of...Lord Gomanreas, you¡¯ve thought of five or six ¡®good things¡¯ by this point. All of them are either in some dangerous world or in some half-broken ne, either guarded by red dragons or abominations. Every one of them is something I can ¡®easily get my hands on!¡¯¡± Greem couldn¡¯t help but grunt coldly when he said this. ¡°Tell me, why should I continue trusting you?¡±


    ¡°Kid, you got to feel for an old man like me, yea? Even my soul has shattered into fragments. I¡¯m weaker than a cockroach at this point. I can hardly do anything. Even searching through my past memories is incredibly difficult,¡± Gomanreas started grumbling when Greem brought the topic up.


    ¡°Hold up, hold up,¡± Greem quickly interrupted him, afraid that Gomanreas would go on and on like he always did. ¡°Say what you have to say. If you have nothing to say, then I¡¯ll have to go deal with my own business!¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t walk away, kid. This time, I really thought of something good, and you can use it at your current grade.¡±


    ¡°Any red dragons involved?¡±


    ¡°No! I guarantee.¡±


    ¡°Is it in some dangerous environment?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not! You think too much. There aren¡¯t that many death zones in the Fire Elementium ne.¡±


    ¡°Then tell me about it.¡±


    ¡°Have you ever heard of the Fruit of Bliss?¡±


    ¡°The Fruit of Bliss?¡± Greem hesitated for a moment as the Chip in his mind quickly searched through its database. He did manage to find something. ¡°Are you talking about those Fruits of Bliss that can stimte the Spirit tremendously and cause one to momentarily experience illusions?¡±


    ¡°As long as you know about it. At least I don¡¯t have to talk about it now. I¡¯ll tell you, ordinary Fruits of Bliss do indeed have terrible side-effects, but the stuff I¡¯m telling you about is an excellent product that¡¯s been modified. It possesses a powerful effect of improving Spirit!¡±


    ¡°How effective is it?¡± Greem was immediately interested.


    At this point, hecked neither resources, treasures, materials, or knowledge. The only thing he needed was time. He needed a long period of time to meditate and improve his Spirit slowly. Once his Spirit reached the required standard, advancing to Sixth Grade would be a matter of course!


    Upon hearing that Gomanreas had a method to rapidly increase his Spirit, Greem couldn¡¯t help but be hooked.


    ¡°I was already Eighth Grade when I obtained these Fruits of Bliss. They werepletely ineffective for improving my Spirit, so I kept them around as a curiosity. As for you, I estimate that around a hundred of these will be enough to push you to Sixth Grade!¡±


    ¡°Really!¡± Surprise appeared in Greem¡¯s eyes, and he couldn¡¯t help but ask impatiently, ¡°Where are these Fruits of Bliss you¡¯re talking about? How many are there? How can I get my hands on them?¡±


    ¡°The conditions for the growth of the Fruits of Bliss are extremely harsh. Naturally, they aren¡¯t located in the Fire Elementium ne. They can be found in a resource mystic realm that another powerhouse gifted me during my peak as a Fire Hierarch. The number of resources there is tremendous. It¡¯s been many years since; there¡¯s sure to be an incredible stockpile of items in there!¡± However, Gomanreas¡¯ soul suddenly paused and said, ¡°Kid, only if you sacrifice one divine authority fragment to me will I have the energy to open up the mystic realm and take out the Fruits of Bliss for you. This way, everybody wins.¡±


    ¡°You mean I must first sacrifice a divine authority fragment, and it¡¯s uncertain if you will be able to give me what I want?¡± Greem hesitated. A dangerous light gleamed in his eyes.


    ¡°Kid, there¡¯s always give to every take! You want your Fruits of Bliss? Then you have to take on a certain degree of risk. Moreover, I¡¯m just a soul. The amount of energy required for me to fully recover is beyond your imagination. A single divine authority fragment is far from sufficient. Do you think that I would waste so much effort just to trick a single divine authority fragment from you? Hehehe, if it wasn¡¯t because I wanted to be on friendly terms with you, you think you could have gotten the Sixth Grade Fruits of Bliss with a measly divine authority fragment? Hmph!¡±


    Greem couldn¡¯t help but be moved by Gomanreas¡¯ words.


    Any other adept who only had one or two divine authority fragments in their hands would never dare try something like that. They would definitely insist on handing over the payment and the goods at the same time.


    However, Greem currently had six divine authority fragments on hand.


    This wealth gave him the confidence to gamble!


    After some hesitation, Greem finally sacrificed a divine authority fragment through the altar in the tower. Last time, Greem had directed his world sacrifice at the world consciousness of the Fire Elementium ne. This time, he chose Gomanreas¡¯ soul as the target.


    As the world altar devoured the fragment, the soul that was hiding somewhere out there let out a suggestive moan.


    ¡°Stop the moaning and howling. Hurry up and hand over the stuff!¡± Greem urged impatiently.


    ¡°What are you so impatient for? I¡¯m on it!¡±


    A strange flickering of light urred above the altar as a rift opened up in space. A miniature mystic realm could be seen projected there. The realm was separated by a thin, illusory curtain of light, making it hard to see through it.


    However, while Greem was surprised and stunned in ce, a small rift opened in the curtain. A bunch of white lights swarmed out from within andnded on the altar, stacking up into a tiny hill.


    As the curtain shut and space itself closed up, the mystic realm vanished without a trace!


    For the first time, Greem truly experienced the wonder of mystic realms as he watched. After a long while, he lowered his head to look at the goods he had traded for.


    It was a strange, semi-translucent white fruit. Every one of the fruits was the size of a fist. The skin was thin, and there was no seed to be seen. Milky-white flesh flowed within them.


    The whole ce was filled with a tempting fragrance the moment they appeared.


    Just a single sniff seemed to refresh one¡¯s Spirit!


    ¡°Kid, these are the Fruits of Bliss you deserve! We¡¯re even now,¡± Gomanreas¡¯ soul exined before leaving immediately.


    Greem took a nce, and the Chip immediately obtained an urate count of the fruits.


    Twenty of them!


    Gomanreas said that eating a hundred of them would push him to Sixth Grade. There were only twenty fruits before him right now. It was obvious that Gomanreas had him figured out and was prepared to use these Fruits of Bliss to get his hands on as many of his divine authority fragments as possible.


    His little scheme was obvious, but Greem couldn¡¯t care.


    In all honesty, if it were possible to allow him to quickly advance to Sixth Grade with these five fragments, the trade would be more than worth it!


    Still, Gomanreas was insistent on the divine authority fragments. Could they possibly be incredibly beneficial for the soul?


    Greem wondered to himself as he put away the fruits and returned to his room.


    Greem impatiently cut open a Fruit of Bliss inside his room. He then extracted the milky-white, liquid flesh from within.


    Obviously, Greem wouldn¡¯t trust that shady soulpletely. He would have to test the fruit¡¯s effects for himself. At any rate, with the Chip around, he would definitely be able to detect the effects of the fruit.


    With the aid of the alchemyb and detection arrays, Greem quickly obtained an ting answer.


    Effective...it was actually effective!


    Gomanreas hadn¡¯t been lying. The Fruit of Bliss did indeed possess the ability to stimte the Spirit and cause it to improve greatly. However, the hallucinatory effect was quite serious as well.


    Even with Greem¡¯s spiritual resilience, he would require a whole month to dispel the hallucinatory effectspletely. Judging by this, Gomanreas had probably been using these Fruits of Bliss as leisure hallucinogens.


    Given the tremendous Spirit of high-grade creatures and their control over it, they hardly ever had dreams!


    The only way to lose oneself was to rely on ¡®poisonous fruits¡¯ with violent hallucinogenic effects!


    Upon discovering that there was indeed no problem with the Fruit of Bliss and that everything was as Gomanreas had described, Greem hesitated no longer. He immediately devoured one of the fruits.


    One had to admit that the power of a Sixth Grade hallucinogen was truly powerful. Greem was instantly dragged into an illusory dream upon consuming one.


    This terrifying effectsted for two days before Greem managed to break free of the illusion with the stimtion and guidance of the Chip. However, once the second wave of the fruit¡¯s effects hit, Greem would probably be trapped in a hallucination for even longer.


    To resist the effect, Greem swallowed several potions that improved his Spirit resilience. He then slowly started expelling the negativeponents of the Fruit of Bliss.


    It took Greem nearly half a month to remove all of the hallucinogens from ingesting the first Fruit of Bliss. Meanwhile, Greem¡¯s Spirit had indeed significantly improved as he fought against the hallucinations.


    Fifty-three points!


    Greem¡¯s Spirit had actually increased to 53 points after tasting his first Fruit of Bliss!

 Chapter 1512 (END) - Fate’s Final Chapter

    Chapter 1512 Fate¡¯s Final Chapter


    Greem became obsessed with the Fruits of Bliss after getting his first taste!


    Every time he dispelled the fruit of Bliss¡¯ side-effects, Greem would impatiently swallow a second one. He would then rely on the Chip and his own Spirits¡¯ resilience to resist the hallucinatory effects.


    Moreover, his Spirit was constantly growing stronger through this process of resisting. It had grown exponentially more powerful than before!


    One fruit after another, one hallucination after another, one detoxification after another, one tumultuous battle in his mind after another.


    One had to admit that Greem possessed extraordinary resilience and determination that other adepts simply didn¡¯t. Through his own power, Greem was able to endure those unbearable hallucinations and obtain a rapid boost to his Spirit.


    Rising to 51...52......


    Greem was beyond ecstatic when he felt the tremendous and powerful Spirit within him.


    Several years passed in the blink of an eye. Only three Fruits of Bliss now remained of the original twenty. ording to the Chip¡¯s calctions, Greem¡¯s Spirit would increase to 53 points after consuming another Fruit of Bliss.


    It...was ridiculous speed for a Great Adept who had only advanced to Fifth Grade a hundred years ago!


    Dreaming of his future sess, Greem quickly swallowed the Fruit of Bliss.


    He instantly noticed something was wrong after eating the fruit.


    There was something unusual with this fruit!


    Yes, there was something hidden inside the flesh of the fruit that wasn¡¯t supposed to be there!


    The instant Greem realized something was wrong, a proud, arrogant, and familiar spiritual flux radiated from within his body.


    ¡°Hi, kid, we meet again!¡±


    Gomanreas¡¯ soul!


    He...he had actually hidden himself inside the flesh of the Fruit of Bliss, thus avoiding the scans of both the Chip and the magical arrays of the tower. He was now invading Greem¡¯s body.


    ¡°Hehehe, ignorant brat! You knew that I was in a hurry toe back to life and you dared put yourself at my mercy. Hah! I would shame my own name if I didn¡¯t eat you up!¡±


    ¡°Impressive, very impressive...you¡¯re really sly, Gomanreas! To think, you knew how to misdirect me and use the divine authority fragments to distract me. So your actual target was the Fruits of Bliss all along!¡± Greem screamed with all he had.


    The Chip¡¯s notifications were ring in his mind now. The warnings were all a dripping crimson red.


    [Warning! Warning! Currently losing control over Host body. A terrifyign soul power is invading Host. Host¡¯s mental defenses aren¡¯t able to resist an invasion of this level.


    [Beep! Host has lost 6% of control.


    ¡°Chip, think of something. How can we drive out the enemy?¡±


    [Beep. Expulsion impossible...difference in power too immense. Host¡¯s Spirits insufficient for the expulsion of foreign element. Effective resistance will vanish in 31 seconds.]


    ¡°And my Tome of Corruption? The Orb of the Fire God? Call them out and use the artifacts to hold him back!¡±


    [Beep. Both artifacts are bound to Host¡¯s soul. The enemy is invading Host¡¯s soul as well. Initial estimates suggest that the enemy is attempting to devour and take over Host¡¯s soul to gain full control of the body.]


    ¡°Then use the artifacts to deal with him!¡±


    [The two artifacts are included in the control that Host has lost. The enemy will obtain an equal proportion of control over Host for every bit of spiritual space it has managed to take over.]


    ¡°If the artifacts can¡¯t be controlled, then have them self-destruct! I would rather my body be destroyed thannd in the hands of that bastard!¡±


    [Beep. Host¡¯s control has fallen to 72%. Host no longer possesses the authority tomand the detonation of the artifacts.]


    ¡°No more hesitation then. Activate the Shattersoul Project immediately!¡±


    Gomanreas¡¯ spiritual flux abruptly appeared again, perhaps sensing Greem¡¯s panic and helplessness.


    ¡°Kid, who would¡¯ve thought you would have refined this body to such a decent extent! Hehehe, once I¡¯ve devoured you, I will help you improve it even further and make it more perfect. Kid, yourprehension of fire is still too pathetic. You¡¯ve wasted so many resources and powers in vain. Don¡¯t you worry. Once your soul ispletely in my hands, I will correct all these mistakes one by one.


    ¡°Self-destruct? Heh! As long as I¡¯m around, there¡¯s nothing you can do. Just watch slowly as you lose everything you own!¡±


    Greem wasn¡¯t foolish either. Naturally, he knew that this was a psychological tactic of sorts. If he were to lose his will to fight back due to fear or dejection, the opponent would only be able to take over his spiritual space even faster.


    But, so what if he knew all this!?


    He was facing the fragmented soul of an Eighth Grade Fire Hierarch after all. Even if it was only just a fragment of their soul, a mere Fifth Grade adept like Greem was no match for it now that it had infiltrated his body.


    As time slowly passed by, Greem¡¯s resistance gradually grew weaker.


    Finally, thirty-one seconds after Gomanreas¡¯ soul managed to infiltrate Greem¡¯s body, Greem¡¯s head tilted as he lost all consciousness!


    Several minutester, ¡®Greem¡¯ trembled. His neck snapped, and he opened his eyes.


    ¡°Ah...what kind of body is this? Why¡¯s there such a weak human body still left behind? What was that kid thinking about? How could a human bodypare to a perfect body of mes! Hmph! Modifying this body will take me quite a lot of time.¡±


    Greem stood up and stretched his limbs before trying to draw on all the powers he currently possessed.


    As his Spiritmanded, a tome-shaped item appeared in his left hand, and a searing hot orb flew out of his chest.


    ¡°Two pieces of Fifth Grade divine equipment. Mmm, this fire-gathering orb ispatible with my fire origin. It¡¯s a little weak, but investing in it will be worth it. Dammit! What is with this garbage book? Why¡¯s there only smelly poison principle power stored in it? Bastard! Did that idiot not know how severe the consequences of having impure powers are?¡±


    Seemingly dissatisfied with the origin attribute of the Tome of Corruption, ¡®Greem¡¯ shouted and easily dragged the Fifth Grade Spirit of Pestilence out of the Tome. Remi seemed to have lost all ability to resist as well. He was turned into ashes by a wave of golden fire, as if Remi was just a fragile wooden puppet.


    The Tome of Corruption immediately glowed with blinding green light when its artifact spirit was destroyed. It shook violently, and screams resembling those of dying souls could be heard.


    ¡°Hmph! Change your element for me!¡±


    ¡®Greem¡¯ grunted, and a surge of golden fire reached into the Tome of Corruption through his left hand. Violent and vicious origin fire seared the Tome of Corruption and changed its origin attribute.


    Such abilities and techniques were not something that a mere ¡®Fifth Grade adept¡¯ should have mastered. However, this unbelievable and ridiculous scene happened anyway. Moreover, it was developing in an even more terrifying and horrifying direction!


    In just fifteen minutes, the Tome of Corruption that possessed the principle attributes of knowledge and poison had been converted into a Book of mes capable of serving as a medium for any fire knowledge!


    The ability to forcibly convert the origin attribute of a Fifth Grade divine item was something that even those powerful gods were incapable of. Seventh Grade Fire God Sinai might have been able to do it if he were here in person, but he could not have aplished it with such ease.


    Through this, one could truly understand what horrifying and overwhelming ability and knowledge in fire the current ¡®Greem¡¯ possessed!


    Having finished modifying the Orb of the Fire God and the Book of mes, ¡®Greem¡¯ cast his gaze onto the storage spaces he carried. His Spirit peeked in, and he couldn¡¯t help but break out into wildughter.


    Look at these!


    Five divine authority fragments, a whole host of divine virtue, and divine power crystals. There were all sorts of rare resources and high-grade items.


    He might not have bothered to even nce at these things back when he was an Eighth Grade Fire Hierarch. Now that he had juste back to life, he had no choice but to inherit the equipment and body of this little fire adept.


    And for a Fifth Grade, a collection like this was beyond luxurious!


    ¡®Greem¡¯ was once again incredibly satisfied with his discerning eye for prey.


    The soul of the little guy had yet to extinguish. He had used some strange, unknown means to shatter his soul into countless tiny fragments, which were hidden all over his body now.


    What made him even more curious was the fact that this body seemed to have a rtively independent and mechanical soul that was silently covering for those soul fragments.


    However, this method could only buy time. Once Gomanreas¡¯ soul fragment had gainedplete control over this body, he would start summoning and collecting the rest of his soul fragments from all over the Fire Elementium ne. No impurities could survive within the soulfire of an Eighth Grade Fire Hierarch.


    It was precisely due to such confidence that Gomanreas temporarily let them go and instead turned toward the modification and improvement of this new body of his.


    With the world altar outside the adept tower, Gomanreas once again opened the resource mystic realm and retrieved the high-grade resources that had been stored in there for tens of thousands of years. He then casually pulled open another portal and took out more valuable things.


    Dragon envement contracts.


    Keys to god kingdom treasuries.


    Eighth Grade Firestone.


    ......


    ......


    These were all the treasures and resources he had stored in the past. They had been abandoned in these alternate dimensions due to his death.


    Now that he was back, he would naturally have to retrieve them all!


    While ¡®Greem¡¯ silently went about this long-due business of his, the tower suddenly trembled. It snapped in half with a loud crack.


    Gomanreas lifted his head in horror, only then realizing that a massive hole had been poked in the nar barrier of the Fire Elementium ne. A ten-thousand-meter-tall Titan had broken the tower and was staring at him with a pair of gigantic eyes that seemed to be filled with a crackling storm.


    ¡°Gomanreas! So you¡¯ve indeede back to life! I had thought the information false when I first received it. Who would¡¯ve thought it would be real? Hmph! I was able to destroy you 13,000 years ago, and I will be able to do so once again now! Die, you evil me that has manifested consciousness!¡±


    The next second, the Thunder God Titan waved his arm as an iparably violent will of lightning crashed down.


    Such terrifying power would be enough topletely st this area of the Fire Elementium ne into oblivion, let alone just this one Fifth Grade fire adept alone.


    ¡°Bastard! Which bastard sold me out? Maysa! Is it you? You gave me a host a body, and now you sell me to the Titans! I curse you!¡±


    Naturally, Gomanreas¡¯ soul was only Fifth Grade at the moment and had no means to deal with the destructive blow of a Titan.


    However, he was a decisive individual. He instantly detonated the Eighth Grade Firestone he had just obtained. While the explosion kept the Titan¡¯s hand at bay, ¡®Greem¡¯ used all his power to tear open a portal and escape through it.


    However, the Titan¡¯s devastating blownded the instant he escaped. Fearsome electric shockwaves wrapped all over ¡®Greem¡¯s body. The body was blown into countless fragments before it vanished behind the portal.


    ¡°The Abyssal World...dammit! I smell the unique stink of the Abyssal World. Gomanreas, do you think you can escape me by fleeing to the Abyssal World!? Hmph! Just you wait!¡±


    The Titan waved his hand and wiped out everything around Molten Altar before slowly exiting the nar barrier of the Fire Elementium ne.


    The power he had drawn upon in this incident had far exceeded the upper limit of what the Fire Elementium ne could tolerate. The powers of fire and lightning repeatedly shed in this space, causing such tremendous shockwaves that everything within five hundred kilometers reverted to its primordial state of chaotic elements.


    Thevake, Fire Throne, Molten Altar, thend around it, all the fire creatures that lived upon it¨C everything had vanished without a trace. Everything had turned into a chaos storm that devoured everything else.


    When it all finally settled down, a Fate eye appeared in the air.


    It looked at this area, sensing the traces of destruction left behind by the chaos storm and in the fragmented principle system of the neworld.


    Finally, its gazended on where the portal had been opened.


    ¡°Greem, I¡¯ve sacrificed my title as the daughter of Fate. This is all I can do to help you. Whether you can survive this trial ande out alive from the Abyssal World will be up to you,¡± Lucia¡¯s heavy sigh could be heard from within the eyeball.


    The eyeball then shattered as the Fate power became part of the chaos.


    The world was silent once more!


    ************************************************************


    The End


    The Novel will be updated first on this website. Come back and


    continue reading tomorrow, everyone!